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My High Fantasy Month 2014 wrap up

Posted in books with tags books, High Fantasy Month, pop culture, reviews on July 3, 2014 by Paxton

If you’ve been listening to my Nerd-to-Dos on Nerd Lunch the last month or so then you know I’ve been in the middle of what I was calling High Fantasy Month.

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The idea for this is that for an entire month I would read a bunch of “sword and sorcery” books. High fantasy is not really a genre I read. I’m not sure why, but I just don’t. So there’s several popular and famous series I’ve never tackled like The Wheel of Time, The Sword of Shannara and the Sword of Truth. I’ve read a few, most notably Tolkien’s The Hobbit, Hero and the Crown by Robin McKinley and The Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King, but as a whole, I just don’t really dip into the kings and knights sagas very often.

Well, I happened upon a pretty cheap copy of Sword of Shannara at a library sale so I thought, why don’t I make a fantasy reading marathon out of this? So I gathered a few other fantasy books I had lying around my TBR pile and made a reading schedule and started reading the first book on May 19. As of this week, I think I’m ending the first iteration of High Fantasy Month. I’ll do it again, but I want to move on to another genre. I don’t normally stick with one genre like this for so many books and I think I’m getting genre weary. I’m ready to read an action or sci-fi book now.

Here are some quick reviews of the high fantasy books I read this time out.

The First Book of Swords (1983) – Fred Saberhagen – I actually have all three of the original books in one giant omnibus edition. But I only read the first book. It’s good. Saberhagen is a really good genre writer and he’s created a fascinating world with this series. I’d definitely continue the story about 12 swords created by the god Vulcan and passed out to mortals. Each sword has a different, terrific power. The swords become lost for years but are eventually discovered and some unsavory characters do everything they can to get their hands on all 12 swords. I’ve reviewed two of Saberhagen’s other books before, one was a sequel to Bram Stoker’s Dracula and one was a sequel to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

Born to Exile (1977) – Phyllis Eisenstein – Book 1 in the Tales of Alaric the minstrel. I discovered this book while reading about inspirations for Steven Gould’s Jumper books (click the link and check out the See Also section on Wikipedia). The book is about a traveling minstrel who discovers he has the ability to teleport. It’s an interesting book in that Alaric is really the only consistent thread throughout the story which features essentially Alaric in a series of vignettes where he tries to not use his power, winds up using it, and then gets banned (or exiled) for using it. It’s a fun light read that I really enjoyed.

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Bionic Review: Six Million Dollar Man Season 1 – Part 2

Posted in pop culture, Six Million Dollar Man, TV shows with tags Bionic Man, Bionic Review, pop culture, reviews, Six Million Dollar Man, SMDM Season 1, TV shows on May 2, 2014 by Paxton

Sorry for the delay, but here are the second batch of Season 1 episode reviews for The Six Million Dollar Man. I’ll be grouping episodes in batches of four or so. Sort of similar to how they’d be done on the DVDs, but season 1 is a little different because the three pilot movies were in there as well mucking up my numbered groupings. There are only five episodes left in this season, so, after this I think I’ll just finish out the season in Part III and do five episodes instead of four.

Regardless, here are the next four episodes of Season 1 from The Six Million Dollar Man.

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Episode 5 – Little Orphan Airplane

Special guests: Scoey Mitchell (Barefoot in the Park), Marge Redmond (The Flying Nun), Lincoln Kilpatrick (Soylent Green), Dale Robertson (Tales of Wells Fargo)

Synopsis: A spy plane crashes in Africa with secret microfilm on board. Steve is sent to retrieve the film and save the pilot.

Bionics: Steve uses his bionic night vision and it is presented in the way it would be done for the rest of the series with the electronic beeping and square overlay. We also get the missile sounds when Steve throws stuff. This would be used throughout the series.

Notes: The accents for the African soldiers are literally all over the place. Some are unidentifiable, some are thick. Major Chooka has an AMERICAN accent. Plus he dresses like James Brown with a decorative cane and jacket draped over his shoulders. The accents will be an ongoing thing throughout the series run. See next episode. When Steve is airlifted into Africa he lands with no gear, just his bionics and khaki pantsuit. Again, Steve reveals his supposed “top secret” bionics to the spy plane pilot making Steve the least “top secret” project ever. This episode is the first time that Steve Austin has not killed or caused someone to be killed.

Review: This isn’t a bad episode. The pilot played by Scoey Mitchell is entertaining. He actually asks Steve if his bionics come in black. That’s funny. I like that they used an African war lord as the villain, but they made him a little ridiculous. This is a fun and entertaining episode that I enjoyed.

Toy Alert: In one scene Steve lifts an engine block with his bionic arm. Presumably this is why one version of the Kenner action figure was packaged with an engine block accessory (see above).

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Episode 6 – Doomsday and Counting

Special guests: Gary Collins (Miss America Pageant, Iron Horse, Wackiest Ship in the Army), Jane Merrow (Lion in Winter)

Synopsis: Colonel Zhukov (Collins) visits America to request a partnership in a space program with his Soviet Union. An earthquake at a secret Russian spacecraft installation initiates a self destruct sequence that threatens to destroy the entire island including Zhukov’s fiance. Steve travels to the island with Zhukov to save Zhukov’s fiance and the other trapped scientists.

Bionics: Steve blocks a falling steel girder with his bionic arm to save he and Zhukov. Steve uses a Geiger counter built into his arm to detect the trigger device for a nuclear bomb. Steve rips the electrical wires from the self destruct bomb and absorbs all the electrical current into his system to shut down the computer.

Notes: Again, accents are non-existent. Russian characters speak perfect non-accented English amongst themselves. There is A LOT of running through corridors in this episode. A LOT. Russian bases are 90% hallways, apparently. Oscar, for some reason, shows up on the island just as it’s about to explode in a pimping hat and awesome fur collar jacket. Zhukov surprisingly dies amidst a cacophony of terrible red laser effects. Looked more like the climax of a Journey concert. Steve continues to sodomize the phrase “top secret” by telling Zhukov about his bionics. Still no classic bionic sound.

Review: Not a bad episode to watch. Entertaining, despite all the running through hallways. Collins was enjoyable as the obviously not Russian Russian.

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Bionic Review: Dynamite Comic’s The Bionic Man vs The Bionic Woman (2013)

Posted in comic books, Six Million Dollar Man, TV shows with tags Bionic Man, Bionic Review, Bionic Woman, BW Comic, comic books, pop culture, reviews, SMDM Comic on March 24, 2014 by Paxton

In my reviews for Dynamite Comics’ The Bionic Man and The Bionic Woman titles, I mentioned that they are separate timelines. The Bionic Woman happens years after the end of The Bionic Man title. The point of today’s comic is supposedly to bridge the gap between the two titles and see why Jaime Sommers has “gone rogue” from OSI. Today I’m reviewing Dynamite’s The Bionic Man vs The Bionic Woman mini-series.

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This 5 issue mini is written by Keith Champagne and drawn by Jose Luis. At first glance the art is fairly strong so let’s see how the story holds up. Since this is a short mini, this review is going to be a little shorter.

Essential Plot: A giant bionic guy is killing people and stealing their hearts. Jaime and Steve have to stop him.

Characters: The story, of course, focuses on Steve and Jaime, and they are portrayed roughly the same as they are in their own titles. We also get a cameo from Oscar. And another “new” bionic menace is introduced. Again.

Story: I guess I liked the story, with the bionic serial killer, but honestly, it’s a little tired. Another bionic menace that only Steve and Jaime can handle. The first story arc in The Bionic Man involves a prototype bionic man wrecking havoc and the second story arc involves bionic Bigfoot creatures. The Bionic Woman comic involved an organization stealing bionic parts that eventually get used to create a bionic bad guy. This story device has become a little old. Part of the problem I think is that Jaime and Steve are a little too powerful at this point. It’s like having every Superman story feature an evil Superman. Let’s think of something else.

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Differences from the TV show: Steve Austin has only one bionic arm in this comic (see below) as opposed to the two he started with in his own comic. Otherwise, the differences that I mentioned in the previous comic reviews still stand.

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Art: The art is actually pretty good. Jose Luis brings some good action art and the characters are drawn faithfully. I even like the design of the evil bionic serial killer. Lots of pretty art to look at in this comic, even if the story is constantly trying to put you to sleep.

Overall: Overall, I was disappointed. While the art is great, the promise of this timeline and title bridging story was completely wasted.

Movie Board: The Worst Movies I Saw in 2013

Posted in movies, pop culture with tags Movie Board, movies, pop culture, reviews on January 15, 2014 by Paxton

I gave you the best movies I saw in 2013, now it’s time for the worst movies.

Battleship (2012) – I thought this movie was going to be awesome. And some of the alien tech is pretty awesome. But Taylor Kitsch can’t carry a movie. Plus his character in this is terrible. How did a f**k up go from being almost arrested for breaking and entering to being forced into joining the Navy instead of going to jail (what? they do that?) to becoming a COMMANDING OFFICER on a nuclear battleship only 2 years later? Does the career path of the Navy work that way? Retarded. This movie is BAD. And not in a good way. Liam Neeson is WASTED and Brooklyn Decker is HOT. This movie would have been so much better if they had let Kitch’s character’s brother be the lead. Well, it would have been slightly better.

Rock of Ages (2012) – On paper, this movie was tailor-made for me. A movie based on a hit Broadway show? Check, I’m in. An awesome soundtrack with 80s era rock and metal? Touche. Tom Cruise? Alec Baldwin? Julianne Hough? Paul Giamatti? Malin Ackerman? BRYAN CRANSTON?! Well played, Rock of Ages. Well played. You’ve pretty much hit most of my buttons. Too bad you squandered all that good will with a terrible goddam movie. And I LIKE musicals. Performances were bad on both sides (acting/singing). Story was dumb and weird. I really had a tough time making it through this movie. Check out the horribly awkward Alec Baldwin/Russell Brand number that completely redefines REO Speedwagon’s “Can’t Fight This Feeling”. I really wanted to like this. I thought I was going to LOVE it. I was wrong. Sooooooo wrong.

Alex Cross (2012) – I’m not what one would call “a fan” of Mr Perry. However, the idea of Matthew Fox as the bad guy is excellent and I thought the trailer looked REALLY good. Again, I was wrong (becoming a pattern). Holy sh*t this movie is a f**king mess. First of all, Perry doesn’t convincingly play “tough” or “bad ass”, which he needs to do by the end of the movie. Matthew Fox’s villain is shown in the movie to be this bad ass, ruthless MMA fighter. He enjoys inflicting pain and he seems to be very good at it. I’m supposed to believe that puffy Tyler Perry is going to go toe-to-toe with Matthew Fox in a fistfight…AND WIN?! No, no I don’t think so. And F**K YOU movie for thinking that is a even remotely plausible.

Escape Plan (2013) – I went back and forth with this one. Honestly, this is a bad movie. The dialogue is terrible and the acting is as well. Curtis Jackson (50 Cent) is embarrassingly bad in his 2 or 3 scenes. However, this movie, for me, is in the “so bad it’s good” category for 1 reason; Arnie and Sly. The fact these two guys are in it, together, make it worth the price of admission. Even though the movie is garbage. Just watch the scene where Sly and Arnie’s characters first meet in the prison. The dialogue is incomprehensible. It’s like they just started filming and told them to “say stuff”. This movie would be great to get all your buddies together with some pizza, beer and cocktails and just do nothing but make fun of the action onscreen. It’s terrible, yes, but fun. Something I can’t say about the other three movies on this list.

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Movie Board: Favorite Movies I Watched in 2013

Posted in movies with tags Movie Board, movies, reviews on January 13, 2014 by Paxton

Here are my favorite movies I watched in 2013. There are a few older movies in here, but everything in this list I watched for the first time in 2013.

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012) – Yes, the first one, which I didn’t see until January 2013. Just to set the stage, I didn’t just love the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I enjoyed it, but didn’t LOVE it. But the same can be said for me about the books. The Hobbit, on the other hand, I first read in high school and I LOVED it and have been drooling to see Jackson put the kind of love and detail he did for the Rings movies into this prequel. And judging from the first movie, he’s done it. I loved everything about this movie. The story, the sets, the music, the characters. LOVED it. And, as of writing this article, I also watched the second movie, The Desolation of Smaug. But since it was January, I couldn’t include it here. But, I LOVE this first movie and that’s why it’s on the list.

Fast & Furious 6 (2013) – I am in love with this series of movies. Especially everything since Part 4. As a matter of fact, I think I’ve seen every one of these movies in the theater EXCEPT Fast 5. Huh. Anyway, this particular entry has become my favorite of the whole franchise. Great cast, fun story, awesome action. Excellent teaser scene at the end for Part 7. Paul Walker’s death was tragic, yes, and it makes me curious how they are going to work around that.

Thor: The Dark World (2013) – The first Thor movie really surprised me in how much I liked it. So I was ready and waiting for this to not live up to it. But it did. I think I may have liked it even more than the first one. Loki and Thor are great. I like the return of Kat Dennings and Rene Russo as Frigga gets a chance to shine as well. This is just a fun movie. Are there a few problems? Yes, but it’s fun enough that they didn’t bother me.

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues (2013) – I love this movie. Was it as good as the first one? No, not really, but there is SO MUCH funny stuff in this sequel. The 70s setting, James Marsden as Jack Lime, Ron going blind, Doby the shark and the insane newsperson battle at the end. This was as good a sequel as you could get from Anchorman. Hopefully Dumb and Dumber To will be as good as this.