A Random Pain That I’m Used To
Heath Ledger is the Joker? (link)
Snakes On A Train (video)
merry go owned (video)
American's too fat for x-rays (link)
the fruit guys - blue (video)
the nickel trick (video)
10 types of men to avoid (link)
the invisible board (video)
where the hell is matt? (video)
10 types of women to avoid (link)
freestyle 10 speed (video)
aquaman TV show pilot (video)
I don't know why, but lately I've had a taste to watch Horror movies. Not scary movies mind you, but horror movies, as there is a distinctive difference. Scary movies usually involve lots of "jump at ya" scenes and are suppose to creep you out; usually involving ghosts. Horror movies on the other hand have more emphasis on disturbing you on a subject matter, that usually involves gore and extreme violence. The fact that I've grown to like watching horror movies is a surprise to me actually, since I've never really been fascinated with the ultra-gore-violent films before. I think part of it is the curiosity as to how far film makers can go to shock you. Either that, or I'm just getting more demented.
The San Diego Comic-Con has passed just this past week, and it's presence is still around. I've heard people from co-workers, TV specials, as well as news reports still talking about the event. There is one thing that I've always been fascinated with, and it's in how some people perceive the Comic-Con from an outside perspective.
The general perception is that it's simply (very simply) a Comic book convention, filled with 80% guys and nerds all over the place. Over a decade ago, I would pretty much agree with that, but within the past ten years the world of pop culture has invaded the event in full force, and it's brought in more "regular people" as opposed to just geeks.
On the flip side, I also have heard complaints from some who doesn't like the fact that Movies, TV, Video Games, Anime, etc... has proliferated at Comic-Con. They feel that Comic-Con "sold out," and lost part of it's charm as a large yet exclusive convention for the special interest groups. Me personally, I DO like the fact that pop culture has gotten so popular at the event, because besides the fact that it now has brought a balanced respectable number of men and women attending, we've got celebrities and the mass media recognizing how there are a lot of special things that the Comic-Con offers to just about anybody.
A lot of people from celebrities to the attendees themselves are seeing the Comic-Con as the best convention they've ever been to. I'll give you three examples.
1) Film maker Kevin Smith, recognizes how big an event Comic-Con is. He has mentioned this in public appearances (live or TV) throughout the year whenever it's brought up.
2) I met a female cosplayer who attended Comic-Con for the first time. She told me that she's been to other conventions (like AnimExpo) and immediately recognized how cool Comic-Con is because "there's so much more things to see and do."
3) G4 TV's host Olivia Munn of "Attack of the Show," attended both the Electronic Entertainment Expo and Comic-Con for the very first time this year. She was asked which one she perferred between the two, and guess which one she chose. That's right, Comic-Con! It must have been a great shock to the gamers out there who worship E3.
Slowly but surely, the idea that the Comic-Con just equates to nerds, will eventually fade away.
Random Octavarium
the scariest road in bolivia (pics)
chimp plays ms.pac man (video)
choke slam (video)
velcro at 94x (pic)
Super Throatio Brothers Theme Song (video)
young zebra vs lion (video)
Chinese space ship (pic)
Albi the racist dragon (video)
notice your nuts (video)
professional rock stacking (link)
Beatboxing Dog! (video)
Zelda mobile (link)
This is directed to guys....
Do you know how you or somebody you know, MAY buy (or download) an album by a female singer like... Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Hilary Duff, the Pussy Cat Dolls, etc...? Ofcourse as a guy, it isn't necessarily something to be proud of right? In guy terms, "it's very gay." I recently heard a very valid rebuttal to defend very hetero guys buying those kinds of albums....
"A guy would buy a female pop idol's album because he secretly wants to have sex with her. It's just a bonus if the music is actually good."
Yeah, I think that sounds about right. 
| You Are 92% Open Minded |
 Well, not really. But you may be confused on where you stand. You don't have a judgemental bone in your body, and you're very accepting. You enjoy the best of every life philosophy, even if you sometimes contradict yourself. |
Movies I've seen recently...
Clerks II (2006) B-
This is the sequel to the movie "Clerks" that is a cult classic about life in your 20's, at a time when you are still trying to find what you want in your life. Now "Clerks II" is about life in your 30's, wondering why you still haven't found what you want in your life. As this is a Kevin Smith film, this is primarily a talking head piece, where the conversations are usually off the wall, references pop culture, and nothing is taboo on many occasions (not for kiddies). On that level, he delivers as usual. Being that this is the sequel to Clerks, the movie starts off seemingly going nowhere in terms of plot, but by the end of the film you would have followed the natural progression of the story. There were some scenes that I thought did not work that well in the movie, primarily the John Hughes inspired musical montages, and the go-kart scene, and there were also some improbable things that happened as well. Some of the humor also felt purely tongue in cheek funny, but there were several that was downright hilarious and very memorable. The one thing that surprised me the most is the amount of "heart" the movie has on the plot, and you really feel for the situation of the main characters.
The Hills Have Eyes (2006) C+
We've been getting lots of pure horror movies lately, and "The Hills Have Eyes" is another one to add to the list. This is actually a remake from the original by Wes Craven, but he himself is helping Alexandre Aja make this. Shocking and disturbing is what can be said about this movie. While there's sorta a reasoning to the terrible things that happens here, most of it is just a means to show some gore and violence. If you are looking for some gore and violence, you've got it. Ofcourse it has to be said that a horror movie doesn't need to have a strong oscar calibur plot, but there are some unreasonable things that happen which takes away from the suspension of disbelief. This is a movie that should convince the audience to stay away from uncharted territories in the dessert. Take the plane instead.
American Pie Presents : Band Camp (2005) C+
Since this is a direct to video movie, it's not too surprising that most everything about the movie are purely average. The characters and the story progression are all cliche driven, by the numbers, with only a few little surprises. As an American Pie movie though, I enjoyed it for what it is, a movie about goof offs, hot girls, hijinks, underachievers, sex, alcohol, and hot girls, all in a High School life setting. Tad Hilgenbrink does his best imitation of Seann William Scott's Steve Stiffler, playing his younger brother who talks, curses, and gets into the same kinds of trouble. Eugene Levy even reprises his role as the very understanding adult figure trying to guide a teen through very embarassing subject matters. "Band Camp" delivers on it's admitedly simple concept, and I definitely enjoyed it.
- San Diego Comic-Con 2006 Sunday re-cap -
Compared to the past three days, the shuttle bus ride to the convention center was simply peaceful and nice. It's just the sign that Sunday should be a nice relaxing day.
The first thing I did was go to the Trailer park panel where they showed some of the trailers released at the comic-con, as well as some new ones. The only one that really stood out to me was the trailer for "Ghost Rider;" which I wasn't able to see on Saturday. Unfortunately, they did not show the new Spider-Man 3 footage shown the past day.
I went back into the exhibit hall and realized that I don't really have much to do anymore. I did end up buying two more things, one was planned, and the other was a little more spontaneous. The amount of people was probably comparable to how it was on Thursday, so it's at least not as crowded as Saturday was. What surprised me the most was that there were hardly any cosplayers on the floor, besides the professional models. I'm guessing the cosplayers were scared off by the increase amount of people that showed up the past Friday - Saturday, which probably made it hard for them to walk around, or even allow photo ops.
By Sunday, my body was really feeling the exhaustion from only getting 4 hours each day, for the past five days. If I closed my eyes, I would probably just fall asleep right there and then, despite the noise all around me.
To keep me awake, I decided to go play some of the video games on the floor. I opted for Capcom Classic Collections 2; featuring Super Street Fighter II Turbo, for the PlayStation2. When it was my turn to challenge the current winner, the guy who lost told me that the directional pad wasn't working properly, which prevents proper control of the special moves. Knowing that, I decided to use Blanka and with only the default attack moves at my disposal. Playing against a ton of Ryu / Ken players with the fireballs and shoryuken uppercuts, I figured I wasn't going to do too well. I won 10 matches straight! Not only that, I completely smoked some players and even got perfects several times (these were even people who knew how to play). I was quite happy with myself, because I haven't played a Street Fighter game against a stranger for probably almost two years now. It was a thrill for me, and I ended up spontaneously buying a limited edition Street Fighter graphic novel Series 1 collection as a result, and even got it signed by the creators from UDON.
I went to the Masquerade show video playback room, but they seemed to have misplaced the DVD of it. I decided I wasn't going to wait for them to come back with the real deal, but before I left, I overheard a conversation about how long the contract for comic-con is with San Diego. Apparently, the contract ends in 2009, and it was revealed that other cities are anxious to swoop in and take comic-con for themselves (with Los Angeles mentioned as one really interested). The staff said that there's a much better chance that comic-con will remain in San Diego.
I went back down to the exhibit hall, met up with my friend and his family. We had a diversion to see some Medieval sword fighting demonstration outside the mezzanine section, but for the rest of the day, we just walked around the dealer's room again. We noticed that there are booths offering additional discounts and offers because it is the last day. Unfortunately, we already bought most of what we really needed by that point. At about a half hour before Comic-Con 2006 ends, we left the convention center after getting some Starbucks Coffee (seems they have a slightly different Frappuccino menu there), and went our separate ways. I went home 110 miles north, they have plans to go to Sea World the next day.
- San Diego Comic-Con 2006 Saturday re-cap -
The shuttle was extremely running behind schedule, and it's probably because of traffic. They had two of those bicycle taxis outside, but they were asking for $15. Which is odd because according to the chat I had with "Cammy" on friday, they only charged her $5. Well, she was wearing a skin tight outfit..... So instead of waiting for the shuttle some more, I went ahead and walked. Despite what I said before, it only took 20 minutes.
I was able to get in the Lost panel, which i've been skipping every year. They had Damon Lindelof, Daniel Dae Kim, and Jorge Garcia there for the panel. They showed us a clip from the "Lost diaries" and stuff from the upcoming Season 2 DVD. There was even a surprising questioner drilling them about the cast's involvement with the Hanso foundation. Staged? It was all and all a really good panel, and despite the fact that I've been skipping it every year so far, it looks like this will be a permanent thing for me to attend now.
Afterwards I immediately went to the Grind House panel. Since it's been running for 15 minutes already, I wasn't sure how much I missed. Luckily right when I got in, Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez were just about to show the exclusive comic-con trailer, which actually was mostly for Robert Rodriguez's "Planet Terror." It looked like a pure exploitation movie, and it was absolutely excellent. It had old stock film footage style, over the top violence with lots of blood/gore, a woman with a machinegun for a leg, zombies, guns on the handles of a motorcycle, and trenchcoats with tons of machettes. For the panel RR/QT also brought with them five of the actresses in Grindhouse. The big announcement there was that Kurt Russell will play the villain in Tarantino's "Deathproof."
Kevin Smith was suppose to go up next, but he was unfortunately stuck in traffic, 30 miles away from the convention center. Grindhouse got an extra 30 mins because of that, and Smith's panel will be delayed until 6:30PM. Bummer.
I simply went to the exhibit hall again, and WOW i've never seen a Saturday THAT full. It was super super super packed, that we were like sardines in cans. The majority of people were spending their time at the south part of the exhibit hall. Actually, the north part wasn't as bad, but it's still quite busy.
I decided to go in Room20 at about 2:30, awaiting the 4:30 panel for Veronica Mars. I was obviously quite early, but I wanted to make sure I'm able to get in. It was a panel for the Stargate TV series which I do not really watch. I think the only person there that I knew was Robert Picardo. Either than that I was more or less uninterested.
The TV guide panel was up next, and while it had awesome panelists that included Jennifer Love Hewitt, Jorge Garcia, Frank Spotnitz, Brannon Braga, etc... It was kinda boring in that they were just having a discussion about the state of sci-fi shows. They only did a short Q&A, which was a little too late to pick things up at that point.
Veronica Mars panel was next and they had creator Rob Thomas there, along with Kristen Bell and other significant stars of the show. It was primarily a Q&A session, so it was entertaining and spontaneous. Somebody from the audience apparently lives in a former apartment of Kristen, and gave her a huge box that was still addressed to her. Somebody even asked her if she can sing a song from Reefer Madness. It was really cute seeing her stress out from not being able to remember the lyrics. At one point, Ryan Hansen even did a dance impression of Michael Jackson. It was all good fun. Damn I love the show.
*edit*
- video from Veronica Mars panel
- audio from Veronica Mars panel
The Veronica Mars panel actually overlaps with the Ghost Rider / Spider-Man 3 panels, so i wasn't sure if i'll be able to get in that. Going that direction, somebody suddently asked me for directions to the WB booth in the exhibit hall, for the Veronica Mars authograph sessuon. I gave her the directions but she did not understand what i was saying because she's never been to comic-con before. She felt guilty when she realized that I wasn't exactly going there, but I sure as hell wasn't going to leave her hangin. I led her to where she needed to go, then I went on my way to Hall H. We talked a bit on the way too, and she way even a Pinay; name of "Joy."
By the time I got to Hall H, the place was completely full and there was a long line outside already for Kevin Smith's delayed panel after Ghost Rider / Spider-Man 3. Since I completely missed that panel, I asked somebody and found out that they debuted what Venom looks like, and showed more footage of the movie. Sweet.
- just click here for the Spider-Man 3 stuff -
Well Kevin Smith showed up with Jason Mewes showing up a few minutes later, and they wasted no time jumping straight to his famous Q&A sessions. As usual, anything goes with Kevin Smith panels, and there usually aren't much boundaries at how far they go. There was a memorable humorous conversation that Kevin had with a deaf guy and his interpreter. There was much heckling from the crowd at some guy; who apparently is a big nerd who got kicked out from the message board involving dropping the "c-bomb" that he himself isn't willing to say. For whatever reason, there was also a trend for people to request Smith / Mewes for a hand shake. Lots of dialogue was said, but it was only a 45 minutes panel; as opposed to the original 1hr30mins, because of the whole late thing. Either way, we Kevin Smith fans were ecstatic.
I went upstairs to ballroom 20 for the Masquerade show. Since I was able to get an access pass to the photo area, I didn't really have to worry about standing in line early to attend the event. Admitedly, being at the backstage, I don't really get to see much of the skits (but that's where the video on Sunday comes in). Upon arrival there, who do I see? "Comic-con Lisa" herself! She was dressed as "Juclesia" who is apparently from the Magna Carta video game. She's the cosplayer that I always end up doing an "action shot" every year at the comic-con. In fact, even before I could really say anything much, she recognized me and asked if I want to go ahead and do one this year as it is "tradition" now. If my face was blushing at that time, I dunno, but the feeling going through my head right then was "wow, SHE remembers me." We weren't sure what we wanted to do this year, so we opted for the tried and true "punch in the face." What was wierd about doing that at the time, was that since this was a photo area we were in, it wasn't just my camera taking that "action shot." It'll be funny to think that picture will spread out to other websites besides my own. Well, "until next year."
As for the masquerade photo session. There were some memorable cosplayers that were pretty darn cool, like the littlest Davy Jones from Pirates Of The Carribean, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Kang, Spongebob, etc... I enjoyed taking photos of the cosplayers, but there were two things that bugged me. First was the "director" telling the cosplayer how to pose. Ofcourse something like that is to be expected, but they start asking for unusual poses that I even think probably baffles the cosplayers (this is even more evident when it comes to the females). Then you got the photographers with the stupid comments, making fun of some cosplayers, or making sexual jokes in regards to the female ones. They are talking amongst themselves, but they don't make any attempts at whispering. Yeah, those two things left a little bit of a bad taste in my month, and made things just a little less fun.
and then ofcourse you have the hot dancing cosplayer....
By the time the whole Masquerade event was over, it was already nearing 12AM. When I got on my shuttle, one of the cosplayers actually seats next to me. It's "Storm." I strike up a conversation about cosplaying, about how it's a totally different atmosphere at the AnimExpo compared to the Comic-Con, and she also told me some interesting things that I never thought about. She told me that cosplayers would rather NOT take a picture with you, and prefers that you just take the picture of them. While I myself am guilty of such a thing, I'd like to think that there are exceptions. But at the same time, I understand why some cosplayers wouldn't want to do that.
Anyways, back at my hotel. Just one more day of Comic-Con, Sunday.
- San Diego Comic-Con 2006 Friday re-cap -
First thing I did at the Comic-Con was to go to "Hall H," which is the largest room it has that seats 6500 people. I was by myself at that time, so I was able to get good seats near the front.
The first panel was for Warner Bros Studio. They showed the trailer for "The Reaping" which looks rather interesting in a religious way (kinda like "the Seventh Sign"). Hilary Swank and Anna Sophia Robb were there to promote the film. Next up was a clip of "The Wickerman" remake, that director Neil LaBute was there to present it. Afterwards, they showed a recorded greeting from Daniel Radcliffe and director David Yates, where they gave us hints of what's to come in "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix." No other things were shown for that though.
Surprisingly enough, the biggest thrill for the WB panel is for something that's already been shown in theaters; Bryan Singer talking about "Superman Returns." They showed blooper reels, which were all just hilarious that I would think that they should have just gone the comedy routine for the movie. The bloopers went as far as Richard White asking Lois Lane about the different sexual positions she used with Superman. Then Richard Donner himself showed up to talk about the release of "Superman II : the Richard Donner cut." They showed us a clip that was cut from the original theatrical Superman II release, involving Lois Lane figuring out Superman's secret identity. It was pretty darn cool. One other thing, the audience was then asked whether they wanted them to bring back General Zod, and the answer was a big YES. So we'll see what happens there.
After that panel was over, I went to the pilot screening of the new NBC show : Heroes. It turned out to be the 72 minutes version that WON'T be shown on TV, with only the possibility of it appearing in the eventual DVD release. So this was a very exclusive screening. The pilot itself felt a little slow and consisted of alot of introduction sequences of the many characters in the ensemble cast. I can already see the slow pace being fixed for the shorter TV version. The show did not feel like a Super hero movie, but more about the characters trying to figure out the connections and wierd things involving them, not unlike the other show "Lost." There were some pretty cool characters (like the definite fan favorite "Hiro"), some cool plot twists were revealed, and the serialized nature of the whole story interests me. The majority of the stars and the main creator were there to present the film, and while they don't have a definite ending to the series in mind yet, they hope that it will last a long while. Oh, they were giving out a free comic book on the show, but apparently the two buttons I received from their booth on the exhibit hall that I happen to leave at the hotel, are the things I needed to get a free copy of the comic book. ah well.
Heading back to Hall H for another panel, I had to wade through a HUGE crowd of people trying to enter Room 20 for the Battlestar Galactica panel. Wow, were there a lot of fans there for it.
The next panel is the Paramount Studio presentation. "Stardust" is the first movie on that panel, which they showed several clips, and director Matthew Vaughn and original novelist for the story; Neil Gaiman, talked about the movie. It felt like one of those fantasy films from the 1980's, epic and magical. It should be good. Afterwards is suppose to be on the live-action Transformers movie. To my disappointment though, they did NOT show any visuals from the movie because "nothing was ready to be seen yet." All they ended up doing was show a video recording of director Michael Bay introducing us to a "special addition" to the movie. It turned out to be Peter Cullen, who will reprise his role as the original voice actor for Optimus Prime! They even had him on the cellphone, pressed up against the mic, where (using his Optimus Prime voice) tells us to join the fight at 07/04/07.
Once again I had to leave the room to go to the "DOA : Dead or Alive" movie panel, which is featuring special appearances by Jaime Pressly, Holly Valance, Sarah Carter, and Natassia Malthe. Nope sorry, the panel was cancelled. As the guy at the door told me "DOA is in fact Dead On Arrival."
From that cancelled panel, it gave me an opportunity to visit down at the exhibit hall again, where it was even more crowded than the previous day. There were more cosplayers though, so that was good. I even got the photo of Zatana that I missed the previous day. I even walked by "The Reaping" actress Anna Sophia Robb, who because she is still rather young blended right in with everybody else. I probably would have been the first person to ask for a photo op, but I decided not to bother her. I did get a chance to swing by past a camera crew again (Electric Playground I think), so maybe I'll be on TV for another brief moment. Speaking of TV, I ran into "Attack of the Show's" hostess Olivia Munn, who I took two pictures with, and I even got her to sign an authograph on my Comic-Con name badge. Me very happy boy.
Off to the Star Wars spec-ta-cu-lar panel! They talked about several projects and events involving Star Wars, BUT they unfortunately did not show footage from the two tv shows in production ("not ready yet"). They did talk about how the Comic-Con was the very first public audience to hear about Star Wars, exactly 30 years ago. In fact, it was via a panel not unlike the ones I go to now. The difference was that they only had roughly 100 people in the audience for Star Wars. Imagine that. They also talked about the original theatrical release cut coming out on DVD, and then went to demonstrate the upcoming next-gen games. First, they talked about Lego Star Wars : The original trilogy. Cute, will buy. Then they showed us a live demonstration of their "euphoria" engine, where they tormented a game character of Indiana Jones involving him falling off a bridge or getting pumelled by large rocks. It was hella funny. Then they showed us footage for an untitled next-gen Star Wars game based between episode 3 & 4. The graphics were really nice looking, and the damage and violence they caused by using Force powers were simply incredible. Definitely looks like a must buy. One thing that I want to mention though, is that Lucas Ltd is not supporting HD-DVD or BluRay for the time being.
Then came the big panel for the day, the NewLine Cinema panel. One thing different about this panel is that they had actor Kenan Thompson moderate it. It felt a little too scripted because of that, but the few flavors he did (that involves cursing at times) were entertaining too. They first featured the DVD release of "Final Destination 3" and they even had a couple of the actors (Ryan Merriman and Mary Elizabeth Winstead) plus writer/director James Wong talk about how you can alter the scenes in it. They then were going to show us footage for the "Texas Chainsaw Massacre : The Beginning," but it was supposedly "too violent" to show. Then they showed us what appears to be the first several minutes of "Tenacious D : in the pick of Destiny;" which absolutely rock our socks off. It had a young actor do a pretty good Jack Black impression, Meat Loaf as the dad, and Dio as the metal poster that shows him his destiny. It was definitely a rock opera as it was all singing so far, but it was great and funny at the same time.
Afterwards, was "Snakes On A Plane!" Let me tell you first that the crowd that showed up for this was HUGE, it was freakin incredible how it completely filled up the 6500+ people capacity. They showed a montage clip of the Snakes On A Plane mania that included the official song, parodies like "Lions On A Bus" or "Goats On A Boat," and several spoof posters. They then brought out real live snakes from small tiny ones to freakin HUGE ones. Wow, my jaws were dropped most of the time. Then they showed us 10 whole minutes of the movie, which according to them didn't even have any of the best scenes. It wasn't bad, Snakes were killing people, everybody was in peril, and Samuel L. Jackson was a badass in killing some of them snakes. Speaking of which, the Baadasss MotherF***er himself showed up to roaring applause and a standing ovation. He was well loved by the people, and it showed big time. In the Q&A, he had some awesome wity answers, remarks, and comebacks. One guy asked them "how" the snakes got on the plane, and Samuel L. Jackson was practically going to bitch slap him saying how he's going to need to spend some money or get the bootleg to find out! "...but thank you for asking." What I thought was funny was how I told my friend that I should go up there and ask him "what is it like to be such a Baadasss MotherF***er?" Sure enough, somebody else asked him that, to the audience's delight. **** that could have been ****ing me, GodDamn MotherF***ers! Which brings me to a funny thing I noticed, at that time, whatever it was in the air, everybody and their mother were cussing left and right. I guess the atmosphere was just right for it, despite the fact that there ARE still kids in attendance.
It was a little past 7PM already and I decided to try my luck with one more panel to attend. The SNL: Saturday TV Funhouse presentation, that might bring the *possible* appearance of Triumph the Insult Comic Dog. Unfortunately, the room was completely full and there was no way I was getting in. I proceeded to eat a pretzel, took more photos from cosplayers, and went back to the hotel. When I arrived at the lobby, I came across a rather cute cosplayer dressed as Cammy. We chatted for a bit, and I *was* going to take her photo, but we are out of Comic-con grounds so I opted not to (I did not want to make her feel like she was still working). Anyways, back in the hotel room, and will get ready for Saturday.
Friday had it's disappointments, like the no-shows, or the lack of shows, but it was all in all still a good time. I also really realized how professional the comic-con staff are this year, more so than previous years. Kudos for them. I also noticed that the flash of my camera which I kinda broke the automatic function of (I always had to manual open it), is actually working again! Speaking of which, I've chosen the wrong people to use my camera today (for example). Also, hey, theres another girl dressed as Princess Leia in the Gold bikini (I still like the other one though)! Not only that, but the couple of Snakes On A Plane panel videos I took, are the very first uploads I put into my youtube account, so that's a celebration right there. Also also also, I think the room across from me hired a stripper.
Recent Comments