Shmee.Me

March 10, 2014March 10, 2014

Don’t Bother To See Now You See Me!

Now You See Me was a surprise hit for Summit Entertainment in 2013, but I think people got too caught up in the cool premise and excellent cast to care that movie itself was lacking in substance. Though it could be that due to its success I went in with high expectations, while other people were just happy it was watchable.

It is about four talented street magicians, J. Daniel Atlas (Jesse Eisenberg), Merritt McKinney (Woody Harrelson), Henley Reeves (Isla Fisher), and Jack Wilder (Dave Franco), that are brought together by a mysterious man to complete a series of increasingly difficult heists. The FBI lead by Agent Dylan Rhodes (Mark Ruffalo) is powerless to stop them.

With this setup it seems like it should be a magical Ocean’s 11, but it is never as clever as any of the Oceans’ movies. Instead of filling you with awe and wonder, they flash a bunch of pretty stuff in front of you and then end up with a ton of cash, and instead of letting you try and figure out how they did it, they have Morgan Freeman’s character tell you like two minutes later. They clearly think you are too dumb to understand what is going on without them holding your hand.

Since Freeman is always giving away how the magic is done it never feels like the magicians are doing any magic. It just makes them all seem like hustlers trying to pull a very large fast one on everybody. It is hard to root for a bunch of smarmy jerks, but that is kind of what they are asking you to do.

They do have a great cast in this film, but they all play their standard characters. Jesse Eisenberg is smart but neurotic, Harrelson is odd, Fisher is sassy and self confident, and Franco is a cool hustler. All these actors can do more then play their usual type, but the writers were too lazy for that. Well maybe not Franco, but if he keeps playing in movies like this we will never know. It is such as shame.

I wanted to like this movie, but I just couldn’t. It is pretty and has a fun cast, but it feels like they had a cool idea but didn’t think the audience was smart enough for it, so they dumbed it way down. It might have been a good movie at some point, but it is not worth watching in its current state.

March 7, 2014March 7, 2014

Who Should Play The Justice League Dark?

Guillermo Del Toro has been in talks with DC/Warner Brothers to do a Justice League Dark (The Justice League that deals with what goes bump in the night) movie, and if anyone is going to take Vertigo’s characters and make movie out of them it would be him. I, being the ever helpful person that I am, thought I would cast the big five for him.

John Constantine

John is probably the most recognizable JLD character, since his book has been running for what seems like forever, and he is the center of the JLD. I am going to pick Aaron Echkart.

He has got the look, and we saw in the Dark Knight he has no problem bringing comic book characters to life. I think he will also do a good job of mixing the serious with the humor that Constantine needs. Since they are going another way with Batman now, he should be free.

Madame Xanadu

The mystic of the JLD is a good opportunity to work in some young blood. My professional selection is Kerry Washington.

She is such a good actor, so it is time to get her away from Scandal and on to bigger things. I think she would have a lot of fun with this role.

Deadman

Deadman is an interesting one since he would have to be computer animated the whole time, and if you are going to do computer animation there is only one actor you need to call: Andy Serkis.

Andy is a the best at bringing life to CG characters, and he could let his creativity run wild with the poor undead Deadman.

Shade, the Changing Man

Shade would be a good time to use an unknown actor, since he can look like just about anyone, and the public would have no pre-conceived ideas on how he should look, but my job is to cast him, so I went with Cillian Murphy.

I probably should have shied away from another Dark Knight actor, but he is so good at being moody that I couldn’t help myself. He has proven in all his work that he would do a good job, and it would let him be the hero for once.

Zatanna

AKA The other JLD character people might know (but still probably not). Since she is the one that will probably save the day in this flick, I went with someone with a lot of acting experience, and I think she looks a lot like Zatanna as well. Jennifer Connelly.

My friends will probably just think I am picking her because of my long standing crush on her, but no, I think she has what it takes to play the master magician, and would provide a good anchor for this group.

This is my cast for the JLD. I would love to hear your take on the JLD, or even what other characters you would throw in and who you would like to play them. Like who would be Swamp Thing, or Frankenstein’s monster? Leave a comment if you have an idea! Shmee out.

March 6, 2014

Shmee Reads Gilded!

Gilded, the new book by Christina Farley, very much fits the standard YA mold. A young girl becoming a young woman finds out that she is special, and it is up to her to save her family, but despite its standard genre trappings this is a very enjoyable book.

Like I said before: Gilded follows sixteen year old Jae Hwa Lee as she is trying to fit in to her new life in Seoul South Korea. Her dad has moved her there after the death of her mother, so she can meet and be closer to her family. Soon however she is having weird visions and visited by traditional Korean spirits, and her Grandfather thinks the family is cursed. Can she navigate all this craziness, and maybe get a boyfriend out of the deal? Read the story to find out.

Even though the plot is well trod, the change in setting makes all the difference. The Korean folklore and tradition gives this book a good hook, and then Christina’s great writing style kept me reading. I am really impressed that this is Farley’s first novel because she has a real knack for it. I also like that this book, even though it starts a series, is a complete story. So many first books are just intros to the larger story, so it is nice that his book didn’t leave me hanging.

Jae is a fun character. Trying to balance real life and death issues, while also trying to have a social life as well. I like that she is not just mopey like so many other YA heroines. She is very easy to root for.

As you can tell, I think this is a great book, and one you would enjoy reading. As with most of the books I read, you can get this one free on the Kindle Lending Library, but even if you have to pay for it, it is worth it. I look forward to reading more of Jae Hwa Lee’s adventures.

March 5, 2014

Strider Is Back And In HD!

Strider, the game from the now Amazon owned Double Helix and published by Capcom, was not really on my radar, but when I heard that it was a Metroid clone in the vein of Shadow Complex, I was very interested. Plus I had several Microsoft Bing Points gift cards to use, so I went for it.

The story is really simple. You are Strider Hiryu a future ninja assassin tasked with killing The Master. First you will have to battle your way through a fictional Eastern European city gaining new powers, and slaying tons of bad guys and bosses. The more bosses you kill, the more powers you get, so can advance further on your quest.

I guess there is more to the story than that, but it kept popping up in the bottom of my screen while I was killing hundreds of robots, so I didn’t really keep track. But it has that awesome 80’s-90’s nonsensical feel to it, and as a child of the 80’s I can tell you that Soviet bad guys are right up there with Nazis in my book. They are just so easy to hate.

What I love about this game is how fast it is. You can attack as fast as you can press the “X” button. The other attacks may be a little slower, but I never felt like I was failing because of the response time. By the middle part of the game you get so many powers you really feel like an awesome ninja. It is great.

I never really paid much attention to Strider when I was younger, but I do remember Ninja Gaiden and Shinobi, and Strider feels like their brother, so it kicks the nostalgia in to overdrive making the game just that much more fun.

By default since this is a Metroid-like game, there is a lot of back tracking once you get a new skill that opens up new doors and looking around for random power ups, so that can get tedious at times. Some of the bosses can get a little cheap until you find their pattern, but those are just minor annoyances.

I have had a lot of fun with this game, and it is more than worth the $15. It is out on just about every major platform, so if you are interested there should be nothing stopping you from playing it, and I recommend it whole heartedly. Especially if you fondly remember your side scrolling adventure game days.

March 4, 2014March 4, 2014

Is This The End Of Almost Human?!

Last night was the season finale of Almost Human, and it sounds like it is also probably the series finale, so Fox has ended yet another Sci-Fi show I like after only one season. I should be mad at Fox, but at least Fox is trying, and if they ever got people to watch these shows when they were on that air, you know that they would still be on TV.

This episode showed a lot promise for the future, since we learn that John Kennex’s dad was a cop, and that he was probably killed for not being crooked. The idea of Kennex and Dorian rooting out the evil inside the police department sounded fun, but at least this episode felt complete, so that we were not left waiting for another season that would never happen to finish off the story line.

I think people either wanted this show to be Judge Dredd without the mask, or really push the Sci-Fi boundaries with its plots, but it ended up being more of a buddy cop police procedural set in the future. I would have liked both of those concepts too, but I still liked the show thanks to chemistry of the two leads.

Karl Urban and Michael Ealy play of each other so well, it was just fun to watch them. Even if the episode was lacking in thrills Urban and Ealy’s banter always made me smile. I would have liked to see how these two’s relationship expanded over more time, but I guess at least I got to see it for a little while.

As Fox pulls the plug on yet another good show, I am hopeful that they at least keep trying. Even one season of a good Sci-Fi show is better than no Sci-Fi shows at all, and they may still find that new ratings winner yet. I also think it is time for geeks to start watching good shows when they are on the air instead of waiting for them to hit Netflix or DVD, so we can support the people willing to take a risk on something different.