In Memoriam: Dennis Hopper, 1936-2010

Wha'chu talkin' 'bout, Grim Reaper?!

A moment of silence please for the legendary actor Gary Coleman.

Coleman may not have had the happiest life or the most enduring career, but he did star on Diff'rent Strokes, the first couple seasons of which, at least, are as funny and likable as anything that has ever been on TV. His was a flame that burned too bright and went out far too quickly.

Somewhere in Heaven, I hope he's having a reunion with Dana Plato, Martha Raye, and his goldfish Abraham.

He was 42.

The End of Lost

The ending of Lost has come and gone. I've had about three days and two viewings to think things over and let the series finale settle and sink in to both my brain and my heart. It wasn't the ending I was expecting and it wasn't the ending I wanted, but it was an ending. I'll give them that much. As for whether or not it it was a great send-off to a great show is anybody's guess. What it was was a really good episode of a really brilliant show that had a few fundamental problems that left me feeling a little cold, confused, and upset. In other words, it was Lost.

But while so many episodes of Lost are vexing and confusing and maddening (not to mention brilliant and thoughtful and exhilarating), there was always the promise of more to come, and that all of the answers would finally come at some point. Well, now that we had a definite, absolute ending, that familiar confusion turned into an angry realization that we were now on our own. After my first viewing, I was kind of pissed, not to mention confused about that last scene. But the more I thought about it, talked it over with friends, and rewatched it, I came to understand it more and enjoyed it a lot. But I still thought it was a big let down, if only because the "moral" of the story and the spirituality espoused right at the end was something I simply didn't buy into. But, you know, I liked it.

Oh, and if you haven't seen the last episode yet, don't read this, because I'm going to spoil the shit out of it.

So in order to talk about my fundamental problems with this finale, I have to share my brief interpretation of what the heck it was actually trying to tell us. Everything that took place on the island this season (not to mention everything that took place everywhere every other season) was "real" and took place on, well, Earth. Everything in the "parallel" world was some sort of afterlife where all of the characters went whenever they finally died. It was a sort of limbo that takes place outside of time as we know it, so Boone is there even though he died in season 1 (I think), Jack is there even though he just died, and Sawyer, Kate, et all are there even though they have yet to die at all. And then, at the end, after they all find one another and "wake up" and accept that they are ready to let go of life and move on, they journey together to... the next plain of existence, whatever or wherever that may be. Even the writers of Lost aren't going to attempt to tackle that one.

This little twist and ultimate resolution didn't work for me at all.

First of all, I was kind of annoyed that, after having invested an entire season in this parallel world, it ultimately had no real point other than as misdirection for the audience. I spent so much time trying to figure out how it would all tie in (the bomb, the alternate island on the bottom of the ocean, Desmond's visions, etc) and culminate in the island Losties taking down the smoke monster once and for all, but it just didn't. It was just a trick, which bugged me. But I can't criticize the writers too much for this one, since it was supposed to be a trick. But still, it was annoying to nothing we saw really mattered in that alternate reality until the very last scene in the church.

And then we have the entire cosmology of the show's vision of the afterlife to deal with. Now, I'm not a spiritual man, and I certainly don't believe in any kind of afterlife, but I'm willing to accept different theories and ideas about it in works of fiction. But boy was this one of the dumbest, most depressing visions of any afterlife I've ever heard of. So when we die, we just go to a limbo world for a brief time that is exactly like our old lives, but just with tiny differences here and there? So instead of going to Starbucks every morning to get your coffee, you might actually go to Caribou Coffee over there. And instead of driving a Prius, now you actually drive a Kia. And instead of being an accountant, now you're an actuary. And instead of people watching SNL, they actually watch Mad TV. I could go on and on with this one.

It's for reasons like this that attempts to manifest the metaphysical as physical so often fail in movies and on TV. The idea of the afterlife as a limbo where the world is just a little different and we can't move on until we find all of our old friends makes no sense to me. Jack really couldn't move on to Heaven until he was reunited with people like Boone and Libby? That just didn't strike me on any kind of spiritual or emotional level. It was just too corny, too trite, and too illogical.

And then we have the almost offensive appearance of Christian Shepard as some kind of spiritual adviser (the Virgil to Jack's Dante if you will), who comes in, dumps a bunch of expository dialogue, and then opens a door to some bright light. I'm sorry, writers of Lost, but that function should've been played by Desmond, not Christian. I understand what they were going for -- that it was a call back to season 1 and that Jack was finally reconnecting with his estranged father and blah blah blah -- but it was just stupid and almost offensive because, as characters go, Christian Shepard was a huge piece of shit. He was a bad father, a lousy drunk, and a negligent surgeon who killed at least one patient through his negligence. This guy has no right at all being in any kind of heaven with these character, let alone as some kind of St Peter, acting as God's representative. Sorry, Lost, but you got that one dead wrong.

I suppose it works if you look at the parallel world as just Jack's own limbo after he dies, but that doesn't make sense when you think about how Desmond envisioned it as well. Also, if it was just Jack, why would we have all those other scenes where, you know, Jack wasn't around? No, it was just dumb.

And, finally, forgetting about how their interpretation of the afterlife made no sense for me, why are we even seeing the afterlife at all? That's really how you're going to end your show? With all of the main characters reuniting after they die? They couldn't answer why Walt could kill those birds, how Ben got cancer, what happened to the atomic bomb, and so many other questions, but they did want to settle the whole "what happens after Sawyer dies" question? When people tune in to Two and a Half Men, they aren't thinking about where Charlie and Alan's souls will finally go after they die. And nobody cares about where the Losties' souls are going to go. Get back to the Island already.

But whatever. I began my criticism of the show's view on spirituality by telling you all I'm not the least bit spiritual. So, I guess, what really matters is whether this episode's finale was consistent and true to the show's own internal consistency. Well... sure, but maybe only because she show doesn't really have any internal consistency. This is Lost we're talking about here remember. But, sure, it was trite and overly sentimental and it made little sense to me, but it was well done and executed as well as they probably intended. It was nice to see Boone and Jack hug, even though it was more because the audience was excited to see Ian Summerhalder again and not because Jack ever really gave a shit about Boone.

And that's why the episode worked, because it was a gift to the viewers, and it was really about us moving on and not actually the characters.

Oh, and it was also about the Losties taking down the Smoke Monster! Even forgetting everything that took place in the parallel world (and I intend to), all of the stuff on the Island was awesome. The fight between Jack and Locke was epic. And the actual last scene where Jack dies and closes his eye for the last time was brilliant.

So, looking back, it was a strange episode of a strange series. But it was also brilliant in its own way, even if I had some fundamental problems with their intentions and execution. But it didn't ruin the series for me (which is what I feared after Battlestar's terrible finale totally ruined that entire series for me). After Star Trek, it's still my favorite show of all time. Even if I don't really know where Mother came from, what the Smoke monster is, who the others were, etc. And, of course, they never answered the final question that all Lost fans need answered: What the hell am I going to do on Tuesday nights?

And even this has gone on way too long already, here are a few random observations and nitpicks:




So if Sunn is pregnant with a healthy baby, does that mean when their daughter eventually died, she had to spend eternity in the afterlife as a fetus? Because that's just weird.


And who the hell is Jack's kid then? Is that a real person's soul in the afterlife, or just some kind of afterlife extra being used just to make the people who matter have a better time up there? Same goes for the janitors, cab drivers, and baggage handlers. I'd be pissed if I was forced to spend the afterlife cleaning up Hurley's bathroom.


When Miles is on the phone with Sawyer, he tells him he's at "my dad's museum/concert/benefit thing." Even the writers of this show had no idea what that party was supposed to be. Oh, and how bad of a cop is Miles anyway? An escaped murderer drives by in a bright yellow hummer and he doesn't even think to take down the license plate?


When Claire went into labor, why didn't that guy she told actually, you know, do anything about it? That seemed like a pretty ritzy party with lots of well to do people. Nobody thought to ask if there was a doctor in the house?


Boone is a total dick. Always has been, always will be. If somebody asked me if I wanted to stage a fight so my sister will get slapped by some guy in an alley on the off chance that Sayid will jump in and save her, I'd say... no. I'd tell Desmond to come up with a better way to "awaken" Sayid that doesn't involve me and my sister getting our asses kicked.


After Desmond removes the cork from the light, white smoke comes out of the hole. Is that the good version of the smoke monster?


I like the eyeliner all of the guys in Drive Shaft wore. A good idea for a punk bad would be "The Richard Alperts" who all wear really thick eyeliner, dye their hair black, and leave one single gray hair.


That concert where Daniel played piano accompaniment with Drive Shaft totally sucked. And not just because bass player left after one song to chase after some pregnant chick, but because it was just bad. And why did Daniel want to play with those guys anyway? It'd be like if my parents were rich and I told them I desperately wanted to have a concert where I played along with Dexys Midnight Runners.


I laughed a little bit when Locke said that Desmond is going to help him do the "one thing I can't do on my own," which is destroy the island. Oh, and he also can't leave the island on his own. Or kill Jacob. Or kill any of the candidates. Or Dogen. Or enter that temple. Or pass through those sonar barriers. Or, you know, anything at all really.


If Jacob's job is to protect the light, why does he live way the hell away under that statue? Why not build a house a little closer?


Why is Sayid's soul mate Shannon? Wasn't she just an island booty call because he thought he'd never see Nadia again? If I go to heaven, I want to spend it with the actual love of my life, not some chick I boned just because she happened to be deserted on the same island with me.


Same goes for Claire and Charlie. Sure, he loved her, but did she ever really love him? I always took her affection for him to be more like that toward an annoying and kind of creepy platonic friend who didn't really understand boundaries.


If Lapidus, Miles, and Alpert can get that busted ass plane flight-worthy in under an hour, during a massive storm, with only a blowtorch, a few boars of wood, and some duct tape, why do my planes always sit on the tarmac for hours just for "de-icing"?


When Jack sees his father in the church, why doesn't he freak out and yell, "the Smoke Monster is back!!!!!" and then try to kill him? He was "awakened" by that point, so he must've remembered how Smokie told him that he had really been the father he saw back on the island. Considered how every reanimated dead person he'd seen by that point was actually the smoke monster, why didn't he assume this was too? Or is that just wishful thinking on my part because it would've been a better ending had that actually really been the smoke monster?


Why does Jack have scars from the wounds he sustained on the island? Why doesn't Shannon also have a bullet hole in her belly? I'm not sure what was the point of that, other than that it was "kind of neat."


And as much as I like Hurley as a character... come on. He's going to protect the island? Jacob and the Man in Black spending 2,000 years in a struggle between good and evil is epic and totally bad ass. Hurley and Ben protecting the island sounds like a bad sitcom.


But, you know, I'd watch that sitcom.


Not that it matters, because I'm fairly certain Jack isn't dead. He gave Hurley a bottle of water, sure, but he didn't do the Latin chant. Jack still had the power all along. The "death" we saw was just his final transformation from human into the next Island protector. How that ties into the parallel world... I dunno yet. But I'll figure that out later.

Smoke Monster Reality

I'm busy working on my review/thoughts/manifesto on the Lost series finale. But until then, enjoy this clip from the 1987 film The Stepfather and get a glimpse of what it would've been like had the Smoke Monster escaped from the Island and became a real estate agent.

Xbox Live

A few days ago I bought a wireless adapter for my 360 and signed up for Xbox Live. Long story short, I don't know how I ever lived without this. I'm about ready to quit my job, dump my girlfriend, and withdraw completely from all society in the "real world" and just exist online, playing games, watching movies, and... well, that's about it, but that's enough.

I'm just going to break down my initial impressions, opinions, and experiences so far.

Set-up and Payment:
Out of the box, you get nothing but an ethernet cable and port on the back of the console. Wi-Fi requires purchase of a $100 adapter, and that's in addition to Xbox Live Gold membership that costs $50 bucks a year. So you are already looking at an initial investment of $50 bucks just to get online and play some games, which isn't very expensive all things considered, but it is kind of lame in comparison to the PS3's completely free online model. I understand why Microsoft charges to get online, but it still seems silly to pay a fee for the opportunity to buy things through the X-Box Live Marketplace.

As my buddy Justin mentioned in one of the comments on an earlier post, you also have the option of getting online by jacking your 360 into a laptop that has wi-fi, but for a couple of unimportant technical reasons that didn't give me satisfactory results.  But you can read all about that here if you are interested.

I sold a bunch of old games I never play anymore to Gamestop and made enough in store credit to pick up the wi-fi adapter for next to nothing. All you do is pop in the driver CD, restart your 360, and plug in the adapter. I was literally online about five minutes after getting home from the store. It's fairly idiot proof. I do wish the cable from the adapter was a bit longer and also that it plugged into the ethernet port on the back instead of taking up one of the USB ports on the front, but these are minor complaints. Oh, and I also wish it had been, I dunno, $50 cheaper. And that's a major complaint.

Once you get online and create an account, you set up an avatar. This was pretty fun since I like that sort of thing (you can see mine up on right there), but they are a bit too cutesy for an adult game console. They look only slightly more articulated than Wii avatars. There are a lot of options to customize his or her features and play dress up, with even more options available to buy online at prices that are, frankly, way too high.

Oh, and my name is "Fuwalda." Look me up if you're so inclined. My avatar is lonely.

Music Marketplace:
I haven't spent much time here, but I guess it's where you can buy music and videos. So far, all of the videos I've previewed are in standard definition and look fairly crummy, and I can't imagine why anybody would buy music straight to their 360. But if that's what you want to do, here's where you go to do it.

Video Marketplace:
Here is where you can buy or rent movies in SD and HD. I haven't done this, but they seem to be reasonably priced and the selections for new releases seem decent. Much better is the Netflix tab that allows you to stream movies as long as you already have a Netflix account. It gives you access to your queue and even lets you browse for movies in different categories. A search feature would've been nice as well, but I'm sure that will come with some new update. As long as your connection is good, SD movies look great and HD movies look fantastic. When I'm not playing games, this is where I spend a lot of my time. The HD movies look so good, I'll often watch just a few minutes of each just to see how good each film looks. I've become such a video snob over the years, I'll actually watch Bio-Dome in HD instead of, say, Ghandi in SD.

Games Marketplace:
And this is why you get a 360 in the first place, right? And the games marketplace doesn't disappoint. Here you can download demos or HD videotrailers for almost every game on the market. You can even buy a select number of full games, but I haven't done that yet. I think I'd rather just own the actual game all things considered, but sometime when I'm bored or drunk in my apartment I'm sure I'll end up buying Dead or Alive Extreme 2 or something equally stupid. Downloading is simple and fast, with the ability to line up downloads in a row. You can even play some games while you're also downloading, but some games suspend downloading in the background. I'm not sure why some games do this, but it must have something to do with online content. And when your downloads are down, a small, unobtrusive little box appears letting you know.

Honestly, just being able to download game demos straight to your console is a game-changer that makes this generation of game consoles the best ever, in my opinion. I never have to leave my apartment again.

Facebook:
Facebook is available on the 360, but the format is so odd and unintuitive that it is basically worthless. I never use it, and neither will you.

Web Browser:
Why is there no web browser? It seems like that would be a no-brainer. Nobody in their right mind would want to surf the web on their 360, but it would've been a nice option all the same. It's not something you'll miss, but it is a curious omission.

Bottom Line:
Xbox Live is a bit expensive to get set up right away, but it more than pays for itself with the embarrassment of riches it has to offer. If you have a 360 and aren't online, you're missing everything the console has to offer.

Gears of War

I beat Gears of War last night. On the easiest difficulty, of course, but it was still pretty tough there toward the end, but never so difficult I thought about giving up. That's how games should be: challenging but never so frustrating or cheap that you want to throw the controller out the window. Anyway, I beat Gears of War and thought it was the bomb.

Gameplay wise, Gears of War is the kind of game that ruins you for other games because it feels so right. Begin able to quickly duck behind cover and pop out to time your shots brings a level of tactical strategy to the shooter genre that it's hard to go back to a game like Halo where all you need to do is strafe around while shooting. That isn't to besmirch shooters like Halo, which I love, but that the pop and shoot style of cover found in this game is more my style. This is a thinking man's action game, requiring thought and strategy for every encounter or you're not going to make it very far. I died a lot, but after almost every death I was able to look at what happened and understand why I got killed. It was usually because I got sloppy and the enemy outsmarted me. Sun Tzu would've enjoyed this game.

Of course, there were also a few cheap deaths here and there, because the controls are so deep and each button has multiple uses depending upon the situation or location. The duck and roll button is the same as the one used for ducking behind cover, for example, so there were a few times when I'd try to jump out of the way only to find my character planting himself up against the wall in front of enemy fire. It's hard to explain, but if you've played the game, I'm sure it's happened to you. Also, the character is pretty slow, which is a design choice that works 99% of the time, but a quick turn feature would've been great. So there were a few times when I felt like I was fighting the controls a bit, but never so often that it made me mad.

Storywise, this game kind of sucks. It hints at a really deep, sci-fi storyline, but the writing is just bad. I enjoyed the dialogue between the characters and appreciated how the story started in media res with the war already underway, but nothing every really made sense. Mission objectives were never really set up or explained, and the chapters never really transitioned well enough together. All of a sudden you're on a train and have to drop some bomb that is never explained. And why were the locusts coincidentally hiding out in the main character's childhood home? It was just a bad story that was poorly told.

But who cares? The action was fierce, the controls were tight, and the graphics are outstanding. There are also a bunch of multiplayer options. You can either play through the entire game with a friend, or fight online against other people. Of course, this game is a few years old, so at this point I can last about 3 seconds online before getting killed. But it's still a fun 3 seconds. I give this game two thumbs way up. I enjoyed every minuted of it and will definitely play through again on the harder difficulty levels, or die trying anyway.

In Memoriam: Frank Frazetta (1928-2010)

Xbox 360

Well, I finally broke down and bought a next generation system. At least, I think the 360 is still a next generation system. The Xbox 900 isn't out already, right? Anyway, as a long-time hardcore gamer, I spent the past decade or so surprisingly content to keep gaming on my Xbox, PS2, and Gamecube consoles. Heck, I even have a Dreamcast and an N64 that I break out from time to time when the mood hits. Granted, for most of those years I had a pretty good PC that I also gamed on, but it always stung me in the back of my mind that there were all these other great games out there that I wasn't playing. And, frankly, until recently I was just too poor to invest in any of Next Gen system. Well... and I guess it also took me this long to finally realize that I wanted to get back into playing on a system that isn't ten or 12 years or, or older.

After some serious personal reflection and debate between the PS3 and the 360, I finally decided on the 360 for a couple important reasons: namely, price and the list of exclusive games. The 360 is just cheaper, comes bundled with 2(!!) games and has a list of exclusive games that just interest me more. I still play my PS2 and consider it one of the best systems of all time, but I'm too big a Halo fan to pass on the option to play the latest games in the series. Even Final Fantasy has become multi-platform, so the 360 won me over. Yes, the PS3 has a Blu Ray player that I covet greatly, but I'm still uncertain that Blu Rays will catch on and dominate the market the way DVD and VHS did. Downloadable content is catching on just as quickly as Blu Ray, so the format remains in doubt. And if Blu Ray does take over, players are going to be plentiful and come down in price far cheaper than the $300 or so asking price for the PS3.

Anyway, having played the heck out of my 360 for the past couple of days, here are my thoughts:

Out of the Box:
I bought the Xbox 360 Elite Spring 2010 Bundle from Amazon.com. The console came with one wireless controller, a 120 GB hard drive, a headset that I will never use, and the following games: Forza 3 and Halo 3: ODST. Not a bad bundle all things considered, though it strikes me as odd that it came with a composite A/V cable to connect to the TV. In case you don't know what that is, that's the exact same type of cable you used to hook your TV up to your Super Nintendo. I didn't expect Microsoft (or Sony) to include an HDMI cable or anything, but at the very least the industry standard should now be component or even S-Video. Composite? Pffft. If you have a next generation system that touts its ability to display games in full HD, you should include a cable that is capable of carrying an HD signal. End of rant.

Controller:
The 360 controller is nice. It feels comfortable and all of the buttons are well placed. I hold all controllers up to the Super Nintendo standard, since that console had the best controller in the history of videogames. It doesn't quite equal the sublime, perfect layout of the SNES controller, but I can't really complain about it. It's basically a modified version of the controller S for the original Xbox, but with analog sticks that just feel... better.

But the best thing about this controller is that it's wireless, which matters a lot more than I would've thought. Until playing the 360, I never really realized how annoying cords were, and not having one dragging over my coffee table and across my floor changes everything. I can now play from any seat in the house, even if I can't see the TV! And being able to actually turn the console on from the controller is amazing. That's one less trip I have to make from my couch.

Graphics:
I'll probably talk more about this when I discuss the games I've played, but the 360 graphics are incredible.  And remember, I've been playing games for the past few years on my PS2. So far, every game I've played (and I'm guessing all) have native resolutions of 720p or 1080i. I've played with both settings, and they look identical to my eyes and on my TV, but both look amazing. The leap to true HD graphics is the biggest leap in gaming since the release of the CD-based Playstation after years of cartridge-based systems.

DVD Player:
If this is your only DVD player, you could do worse than this for your DVDs. There is some argument on the internet as to whether or not it upconverts movies to 720p or 1080i, but to my eye it does not, even though the picture is incredibly clear and crisp. It fails for me a bit in the colors, however, as the looked a little dull and muted in my opinion. Also, the player is incredibly loud, though it's actually quieter playing movies than it is playing games. It's not a bad DVD player, but it's nowhere near as good as my stand alone DVD player, so I've actually been going through the hassle of switching my HDMI cable between the two for when I want to watch a movie and when I want to watch a game. My TV only has one HDMI port.

Xbox Live:
I dunno yet, since I haven't gotten it online yet. Not being wi-fi ready right out of the box is a huge mark against the machine in my opinion, considering how this is the year 2010 and even my ipod has built-in wi-fi at this point. This wouldn't be such a huge deal if the wireless adapter wasn't 100 bucks! That's a heck of a lot of money to ask for a little dongle that only gets one piece of equipment online.

Games:

Forza 3:
This game was one of two that came bundled with the console. It's a really great racing game. Not a whole lot more to say than that. If you want a great racing game -- and every gamer should own at least one -- this is probably as good as you'll find for the 360. But having played through Gran Turismo 1-4 over the years, I've kind of been played out on racing games, which used to be my favorite genre. This game is more fun and more accessible than Gran Turismo, with a lot of assists and features for newbies (like a rewind feature, which is amazing), but it's still just a racing game, albeit a next generation one.

More cars and photorealistic graphics distinguish this from most other games, but it's still just a car going fast around a track. I'm glad they included it for free, since I probably wouldn't have bought it on its own. But it's fun and worth playing when you, um, feel the need for speed.

Halo 3: ODST:
The other game included in the bundle, ODST is another game that benefits from having been included for free.  Don't get me wrong... I'm a Halo fan and this is a great game that does the series justice, but all things considered it's little more than an expansion pack for Halo 3. It's a prequel that takes place as a side story between parts two and three, doesn't feature the Master Chief as the main protagonist, and has one main city as its primary location. So while the mechanics are all there, the action is fast and furious, and it is fun to play, it comes across feeling a little like Halo light.

But what's there is awesome, and serves as a great introduction to the world of Halo on the 360. But I'd rather have Halo 3, but Microsoft knows that so why give me something for free if I'm already obviously going to pay for it? Graphically, it's a lot cleaner and more impressive looking than Halo 2 on the original Xbox, but the graphics are so dark (because the game takes place at night) it doesn't really do much to show off the next gen graphics. As a multiplayer game, I'm sure it's fantastic since it includes all of the modes and maps from Halo 3, but since I don't have Xbox Live yet, I'll have to wait and see. Good free game, but I'd rather have something a little more substantive.

Assassin's Creed:
Now this is a next generation game.  Assassin's Creed is an open-world, third person game that pits you as an assassin fighting against the Knights Templar set against the backdrop of the Holy Land during the Third Crusade. That's quite the summary, but it really has to be played to be understood. Or maybe it has to be experienced.

This game is without a doubt the best looking game I've ever played, and considering that it came out 3 years ago, I can't wait to see what the sequel looks like. The open-world of the cities your character explores are gorgeous, huge, and ridiculously detailed. Just climbing the buildings and jumping from rooftop to rooftop is good fun. Some wacky controls and repetitive missions keep this from being the true masterpiece it set out to be, but I'll get into that in a more in depth review once I play through it a bit more. But my first impressions are that it's an astoundingly beautiful technical achievement that is incredibly fun to play. Thumbs up.

Gears of War:
It took me a little while to warm up to this game, since it wasn't exactly what I was expecting. If you go into this game thinking you can play it like, say, Halo, you're going to die. It's an action-heavy shooter, but one that's kind of slow paced, placing an importance on finding cover and planning your tactics very carefully. Once I started to understand that design choice, I got into it and enjoyed it a lot more. But I still died. A lot. This is a hard game, but very satisfying. Every small encounter feels like a real battle, and each enemy you take down feels like an accomplishment.

Graphically, it's a technical achievement with big characters, expansive environments, and detailed textures. But everything does look very gray. That was an artistic choice I know, meant to give things a rundown, industrial look, but it does look very bland in places, even though the technical merits are outstanding. There is also a sequel out, but I picked this one up for ten bucks. I give it two way up.

Mass Effect
This is the one game I haven't really played yet, because it seems the most complicate, the most epic, and the one that actually requires you read the manual before playing. It's seems to be a really cool, really epic sci-fi/RPG with third person battle, leveling up, and space exploration. The graphics are amazing and the whole thing feels really cool, but I bought too many games too quickly and this game lost out because it's the least immediately accessible. But I bet it will be the most fun, so I'm also kind of saving it until I have a lot more time to invest in it with out distractions.

Also, it's a bit too similar in style to Halo and Gears of War, what with it being another sci-fi action game, so I tend to cycle through Assassin's Creed and Forza to break up the monotony of shooting through hords of aliens. Though Mass Effect is much deeper than either Gears or Halo.

Conclusion: 
The Xbox 360 is awesome. This is a great gaming system with amazing power and a phenomenal library of games. I still wish I had built-in wi-fi and a Blu Ray player, but I'm still happen I choose the 360 because the available library of games just interested me more. All I can really say about the console is that I started writing this review about a week ago, and it took me this long to finish it because I couldn't put my controller down. I suppose I should call my girlfriend one of these days and make sure she's still in town.

Clash of the Titans

The original Clash of the Titans is one of my all time favorite movies ever made of all time ever ever ever. It's just... fun, has lots of monsters, great characters, amazing special effects, and oodles of charm. It's probably in my top twenty favorite films or so, and is the kind of film I can rewatch anytime, anywhere, over and over again.

So this remake had some pretty big shoes to fill. And, no, it didn't entirely live up to the original, but it was a pretty good attempt all things considered. I liked it and thought that had it not been a remake -- or, at least, if I wasn't such a huge fan of the original -- it probably would've worked great when taken on its own, completely in a vacuum. But it was a remake, and therefore comparisons are going to be made.

Just to see how well (or poorly) it compares, I'm going to break things down into the most memorable (to me) story components that define a Clash of the Titans film:

Our Heroes:
To be honest, both films have duds for leading men. Sam Worthington has been in every movie I've seen lately, just like back in 2002-2003 when Colin Farrell was in every movie that came out and nobody really understood why. Seven or Eight years from now, we'll probably look back on this whole Sam Worthington business with the same confusion as we now look back on Colin Farrell. What's the last movie that guy did anyway? And Harry Hamlin is Harry Hamlin. He was a soap opera caliber actor who somehow lucked his way into a starring role, albeit in a silly action movie about Greek mythology.

I'm guessing both actors got the roles because they look good in togas. But Hamlin looks a little better in togas, and even though he's no better an actor than Worthington, at least he has charm and charisma in spades.
Winner: Classic

The Supporting Cast:
Both films make up for the poor casting of the hero by having awesome supporting actors in various roles, both big and small. The original film spent all over their budget on the incredible pantheon of Gods: Laurence Olivier as Zeus, Claire Bloom as Hera, and Maggie Smith as Thetis, and Ursula Andress as Aphrodite. But best of all was Burgess Meredith as Ammon, giving a stellar, almost Shakespearean performance in a film about stop motion monsters.

The remake has Liam Neeson as Zeus, who I suppose is as good a replacement for Laurence Olivier than anybody else working today. Ralph Fiennes is fun to watch as Hades. And... that's it for the Gods. There were some other gods walking around -- I even saw Dr. Bashir at one point dressed as... somebody! -- but nobody else had anything to do. Missed opportunities there. No Angelina Jolie as Aphrodite? No Kevin Costner as Poseidon? At the very least they should've had a cameo by Maggie Smith, who is still a great actress. Maybe she was too busy making the next Harry Potter movie.

The remake fared better in the casting of the soldiers I guess, with an awesome performance by Mads Mikkelsen as maybe the best bad ass Greek solider in the history of toga movies. He was awesome. And we also saw Pete Postlethwaite for about five seconds, which wasn't nearly long enough. When I saw him make an entrance, I thought for sure he was going to play the Burgess Meredith role, which would've been awesome. But, alas, he didn't, nor did anybody else for that matter, which is a shame because he added a depth and sense of humanity to the storty that kept it grounded in some kind of realism.
Winner: Classic

The Story:
For the most part, both have similar stories: Perseus has to kill Medusa to stop the Kraken from killing Andromeda and destroying all of Argos. The original kept things pretty simple as a hero's quest to fulfill his destiny and stop the big monster. The remake added a lot of subtext, additional characterization for the heroes and gods, and layered the conflicts so you were never quite sure who was right, who was wrong, and what was going on. And none of that really worked in my opinion.

To begin with, Perseus is a demigod in both films, having Zeus for his father and a human for his mother. The original film deals with this as the myths do: Like this is a perfectly normal thing that happens, albeit making Perseus special and blessed by the gods and humans alike. In the remake, they approached it with a 21st century mindset that he should be conflicted about which side to choose, wanting to prove himself as a human wile denying his godhood, etc. This is a very clever and brilliant addition to the story that works perfectly on paper but is completely pointless. I don't want to watch a guy struggle with his emotions, I want to watch him slice and dice gorgons. And the whole plot about the god letting Hades torture humans to rally them to pry for help made little sense too, especially since it made both Zeus and Hades the villains, even though only Hades was actually the villain because Zeus was secretly helping Perseus along... or something. I don't know. It made no sense.
Winner: Classic

The Babes:
The original film has Ursula Andress as Aphrodite, which is perfect casting. Have the most beautiful woman on the planet play the most beautiful of the goddesses. And even more radiant was Judi Bowker as Andromeda. I fell in love with her as a kid and I'm still in love with her today.

The remake has Alexa Davalos as Andromeda, who serves no function in the story and isn't even the love interest of Perseus. So when the chain her up to be sacrificed to the Kraken, we have no real reason to care. How did they mess that up so bad? She was very pretty, but she was no Judi Bowker, and she looked a lot hotter in that Chronicles of Riddick movie. Much better, and more lovely, was Gemma Arterton as Io. I never really understood her character, but at least she was given a lot to do and even got to kick some ass.

Oh, and Attia from that HBO show Rome was in it. For about five seconds. She got real old and kind of chubby. Sorry.
Winner: Classic

The Monsters:
And here's what we all really care about, right? Which film has the best monsters. What wins, the CG or the stop motion effects by Ray Harryhausen? Let's look at each set piece in more detail:

The Scorpions:
Giant scorpions are disgusting and horrifying, but I have to give the nod to the remake, since this was definitely the best sequence in the movie. The CG was perfect and the entire scene was exciting and action-packed. Also, the scorpions were absolutely terrifying and gross. They looked real.
Winner: Remake

Cerberus:
Cerberus wasn't in the remake, so the classic wins by default.
Winner Classic:

Medusa:
This one is tricky, since the Medusa in both films looked awesome and terrifying. The CG version in the remake definitely looked more "real," and the decision to make her face still look beautiful was interesting and quite effective. The Medusa in the original was just a grotesque monster. The CG version actually had a bit more life and personality. However... the classic scene was better because the setting was better, the sequence was better directed, and the suspense was killer.
Winner: Draw

The Kraken:
The Kraken in the finale of the original Clash of the titans wasn't Ray Harryhausen's best work. It was well done and had his signature look and charm, but the design just looked like a reptilian King Kong. It's an awesome scene, but it just wasn't up there with the best work of his career. But the Kraken in the remake was off the hook. Now that was a monster! Also, the sequence was just a bit more exciting, with an areal battle between Perseus and some harpies flying in and around the Kraken's writhing tentacles. It was cool. The only problem was how the director kept the camera in so close we never really got a good establishing shot showing the Kraken's true size. He should've pulled back just a bit.
Winner: Remake

Overall Winner: Classic

The remake had amazing special effects, great, creative design work, and a fun cast, but the story was too muddled and the suspense just wasn't there for the most part. They overthought things and tried to be serious when they should've been more fun. But it as still a cool movie that was exciting and cool. But it just didn't have the heart of the original.

Video Clip: Arnold's Best Lines

This is awesome:

Titans edit.

I edited my Arnold vs. Sly post to add a category based on total box office totals. It is interesting reading, but it didn't change the end result. Stallone is still the best.

Clash of the Titans: Arnold Vs. Sly

This is probably the most important blog post anybody has ever written.

And, no, I'm not talking about that new movie (or even that old movie). I'm talking about the clash of the real titans: Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone, arguably the two greatest action stars of all time. Both have made their mark on film history and popular culture, but whose legacy reigns supreme? Who is the greatest action star of all time? Who is the coolest actor ever?

Let's find out by taking a close look at each actor in a few different categories, awarding points based on each round. Even I don't know who's going to win this one. Let's get right to it:

Acting Talent:
Let's just get this one out of the way. This is either the most important talent for an action star or the most irrelevant. I'm not sure which. Both of these two are underrated actors in my opinion. That isn't to say they are both master class thespians, but they both have a lot of talent that make them more than the mindless, musclebound dolts many people would lead you to believe they are.

Stallone has been nominated for a Best Actor Academy Award for crying out loud, in 1977 alongside William Holden and Robert De Niro, all of whom lost out to Peter Finch for Network. He was also nominated for the Golden Globe that same year, and a slew of other awards. Since Rocky, his nominations have been few and far between, but it's still better than Arnold, who ain't won shit except an MTV movie award for T2 and a Kid's Choice Award for Kindergarten Cop.

On the other hand, Sly has "won" more Razzies than Arnold (8 to Arnold's 1), including the distinction of winning their "Worst Actor of the Century" award. Ouch.

Winner: Stallone. Nobody can match Arnold's effortless charm, but when it comes to the actual craft of acting, creating characters, and giving nuanced performances, Stallone wins hands down, even if only for his amazing performance in Rocky.



Physique:
Both men are huge, incredible athletes, but only one was Mr. Olympia... seven times in a row. Arnold Schwarzenegger was arguably the greatest bodybuilder of all time, but it's no question he was the most famous. Also, Arnold is 6'2" while Sly is 5'9". You could argue that makes Sly more lithe and agile, but that would just be silly. At the end of the day, Stallone makes a very convincing boxer or green beret, but Schwarzenegger looks like he could catch a missile in his teeth.

And while neither actor can really be considered classically handsome, Schwarzenegger's Austrian features are simply more imposing and regal. He looks like a cyborg or a Cimmerian Warrior. Sly just looks like a broken down boxer from South Philly.



Winner: Arnold.

Signature Roles:
Both men have two major characters/series to their credit: Sly has Rocky and Rambo while Arnold has Conan and the Terminator. Sly's character's are arguably more iconic and better known. Rocky and Rambo are household terms. As is the Terminator to a certain extent, but as much for the skeletal robots as for the Arnold character. And while Schwarzenegger was perfectly cast as Conan the Barbarian, the character was already world famous from the Robert E. Howard stories and the Marvel comics. One might even argue that the depictions of the character in the drawings of John Buscema or the paintings by Frank Frazetta are as indelible in the public memory of the character as Arnold's depiction.

But at the end of the day, Stallone is Rocky and, to a lesser extent, Rambo. Nobody ever made any sequels or remakes to Rocky and Rambo without Stallone. The very idea of such a thing is ridiculous. But Conan was a character before Arnold and he is still character long after he stopped playing him. And they keep cranking out Terminator movies, TV shows, and comics, a lot of which are vastly superior than Part 3.

Winner: Stallone. You could make the argument that the Terminator is the best movie villain of all time, but Rocky is arguably the best hero. And the hero always wins.

Filmmaking: This is a tricky category, and it basically only exists because Stallone has written and directed so many of his own films. Schwarzenegger has never written anything so far as I know, and has only directed one episode of Tales From the Crypt and a made for TV movie that was terrible. So maybe he has no real interest in filmmaking beyond simply acting, and that's fine. But I would be remiss if I didn't give props to Sly for being... well... a perfectly adequate director of top notch action films. His is a style that is best suited to movies like Rocky 4, where the characters have already been firmly established by better directors in previous films and where the plots move forward only through musical montages. Had he directed Schindler's List, there would've been a lot more musical montages of Liam Neeson working out in his factory while steam and smoke billowed in the background. Also, Hitler would've been played by Mr. T.

And he is also a wonderful writer, believe it or not. He even received his second Academy Award nomination for Rocky. He was actually only the third filmmaker to receive nominations for acting and writing in the same year, after Orson Welles and Charlie Chaplin. Arnold has certainly never done anything over the entire course of his career that could garner him any kind of comparison to either of those two legends.

Winner: Stallone.

Body Count: 
I'm not going to count how many people have died in all of their films, but that's only because I don't have to. Stallone made the Rambo movies. In the fourth film alone he probably killed off more people that the Terminator did over the course of three movies. Just watch this scene:




Winner: Stallone. Stallone has killed about a billion people in his films. Still... he's never killed a Predator, but then again, he's never been given the chance. I think Rambo could take a Predator. And why has nobody made that movie? Stop cranking out those terrible Alien Vs Predator movies and start making Rambo Vs Predator already.

Overall Film Oeuvre:
Now, here is where things are going to get somewhat tricky and subjective. I'm going to rank each actor's films into two categories: Those I consider to be good to great, and those I consider to be absolute pieces of garbage, and then weigh the two to see who comes out on top. It's hardly scientific, but it's not as though this is my PhD thesis or anything.

Arnold's Good to Great films are:

Conan the Barbarian
The Terminator
Commando
Predator
The Running Man
Total Recall
Kindergarten Cop (yeah, that's right.)
T2
True Lies
Eraser
The Sixth Day (Why not? It was pretty good, even if it was the worst on this list.

Total Count: 11. Amazing list of films all things considered. T2 in particular is the best action/science fiction film ever made.

Stallone's Good to Great films are:

Rocky
Rocky II

Nighthawks
Victory
Rocky III
First Blood
Rambo: First Blood Part 2
Rocky IV
Lock Up
Cliffhanger
Rambo 3
Demolition Man
Cop Land
Rocky Balboa
Rambo

Total Count: 15. Sly's total count was higher, but the level of quality of Arnold's films may be just a little higher. I was being fairly generous with a few of Stallone's films (like Lock Up and Rambo 3) because they are ridiculously entertaining and awesome, even if they aren't all that well made. But, again, Rocky is one of the greatest films ever made, and First Blood is one of the most perfect action films.


Arnold's Garbage:

Hercules in New York
Red Sonja
Raw Deal
Red Heat
Twins
Last Action Hero
Junior
Jingle All the Way
Batman and Robin

Total Count: 9. Sure, these are all terrible, unwatchable movies, but 9 is a respectable number of mistakes, considering his imdb filmography lists 41 acting credits.

Stallone's Garbage: (and I'm skipping over everything he did before Rocky, since he was young and broke and desperate. Arnold was never any of those things.)

Rhinestone
Cobra
Over the Top
Oscar
Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot
The Specialist
Judge Dredd
Assassins
Get Carter
Driven
D-Tox
Shade
Spy Kids 3-D

Total Count: 13. These are some terrible films. Still, at least he never made a movie with Sinbad.

Winner: Draw. They both have made a bunch of great films and a bunch of shit. At the end of the day, if Rocky and T2 were the only two films I was allowed to watch for the rest of my life, I'd be ok with that.

Overall Box Office Totals:
By no means should money equal success or any kind of mark of quality, but it does go toward showing a person's success both as a box office draw and as a popular figure in film history. Needless to say, but men have achieved incredible success and made a lot of people a lot of money. But here are the breakdowns according to Box Office Mojo:

(And just remember that none of these totals are adjusted for inflation, so this is hardly scientific.)

Stallone:

Overall film grosses: $1,639,909,420
Average film gross: $49,694,225
Total number of films over 100 million: 5
Highest grossing film: Rambo: First Blood Part II: $150,415,432 (US only.)

Schwarzenegger:

Overall film grosses: $1,621,940,362
Average film gross: $70,519,146
Total number of films over 100 million:  7
Highest grossing film: Terminator 2: $204,843,345

Winner: Schwarzenegger. While Stallone's films have made $17 million more than Schwarzenegger's, that's really not very impressive considering the totals are based on 33 of Stallone's films opposed to 23 of Schwarzenegger's. Adjusted for inflation and considering rentals, things might be different, but I bet Arnold would still come out on top. It's close, but Arnold has always been the bigger box office draw for a longer period of time.

Where Are they Now:
Well, Schwarzenegger is Governor of California... which is cool for him, but lame for us. I have no idea if he's a good Governor nor do I care. I just want to see him cranking out movies. Still, had he stayed in Hollywood, maybe he would've done a bunch of shit like D-Tox and Spy Kids 3-D too.

As for Stallone, he's still making awesome, kick ass action movies! Stallone got a lot of attention for coming back to the Terminator franchise a few years ago, but Stallone said "fuck it" and made another Rocky and another Rambo. And then this year we've got the Expendables, which is going to be the best movie ever made. And according to the imbd, he's making another Rambo movie! What's next? A sequel to Over the Top? I'd watch it.

Winner: Stallone. While Arnold went legit, Stallone stayed the course and kept kicking ass.

Overall Winner: Sylvester Stallone.

All things considered, Schwarzenegger might have a more "respectable" resume, with some of the all time best action films and a few pretty good family films, but Stallone just kicks too much ass. He's a better actor, he's a great writer and director, and even though he stumbled a few times over the course of his career (ok... a lot of times), he never lost site of what the fans want: Rocky and Rambo kicking ass and taking names. That's why he's the greatest action star of all time.