Ohhh yeah! The new Ghostbusters trailer has landed, and it looks fantastic! These ladies are ready to take the fight to the ghosts. The trailer seems to give a little too much away, but it is still fun to watch.
Shmee Needs Help Finding Dory!
It has been a while since I have phoned it in and just posted a trailer, so I am going to fix that today with a movie about fish! Finding Dory to be specific. It looks pretty good. Not mind blowing, but pretty good. I guess we will find out if it can live up to the original in a few short months, and maybe its sugary sweetness will take your mind off of the terrible presidential election.
San Andreas Will Have You Shaking For All The Wrong Reasons!
I can see the appeal of a movie like San Andreas. It has a likable lead and you are guaranteed a lot of action, I mean that is why I saw it, but you should stay far away from this flick. Well, unless you are having a bad movie night, then it might be the right choice. Its script is so bad it must have been written during the writer’s strike and they just forgot to update it.
If you came for Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson flying around in his helicopter while things fall apart, you will be happy for about half of this movie. Watching LA and San Francisco get demolished is kind of cool looking. So there is some enjoyment to be had as he flies all over California saving his family, but those moments are quickly squashed every time someone opens their mouth.
I mean the dialog in this movie is SyFy Original bad. Except for the fact with movies like Sharknado at least the writers are in on the joke. I am not sure what happened with San Andreas script. I looked up the guy who wrote the screenplay on Wikipedia and I was shocked to see how much good stuff he has done. Maybe he wrote an outline and Village Roadshow Pictures was like, “Great we film tomorrow”!
Usually I have something to say about the acting, but there is no point. This script just leaves actors to fend for themselves, so while I could be hard on them for being wooden or stilted, I am just going to give them all a pass. Especially Paul Giamatti whos job it is to hang around Caltech and say sciencey things. It is a shame they couldn’t get Ben Affleck to come rework the dialog in his Batsuit.
All that being the case, the special effects are pretty cool, and for some reason it is always fun to LA and San Francisco tumble. It is a shame people had to keep talking and that this movie was almost two hours long. It would have been great as a forty-five minute Discovery Channel ‘what if’.
If you are in the mood to laugh-off Johnson, Giamatti and co saying stupid stuff while the world falls apart, San Andreas might be what you are looking for, but I don’t think the producers envisioned the audience shaking with laughter when they made this movie. So if you aren’t in a so-bad-it’s-good sort of mood, watch something else.
Shmee Watched The Skies And Survived Neptune’s Fury!
Team Japan filed their immigration paperwork and became Team UK for Bellingham MegaGame’s second Watch the Skies event. This time subtitled: Neptune’s Fury. You can see how British I am now since I am smoking a pip and holding a blue teacup! I was curious how much would change between the two games, and I am happy to report quite a lot!
The basic gameplay mechanics didn’t change that much, so I am not going to go back over them (my link to my first game is here and The Paladin’s is here), but the teams playing sure did. This time people went in to the game with their eyes wide open. Everyone had agendas and schemes they wanted to accomplish. This made the game much more fun since we were constantly trying to figure out what was going on. So much so that the Aliens were secondary for much of the game. Another big change was that we all shuffled our roles, so this time I was no longer in charge of Science, but I had instead been promoted to Prime Minister! Well until Brazil assassinated me for selling them bogus tech, and then my second in command took over the country and I became a totally different person who was appointed Deputy Prime Minister.
The Prime Minster is an odd role. Because while you are in charge of everything, you also know the least. The other countries’ leaders are all lying to you, and your own teammates can only relay a bit of what they are gathering in their specific areas, but they don’t have enough time to do it thoroughly. It is like being the center of a giant game of telephone while throwing money at people. Being the Deputy Prime Minister on the other hand is crazy because you can go anywhere and do anything. Your legs ache from all the running around, but at least you can find out what is happening for yourself. Like that all the Scientists are creating their own country.
With so many teams having so many things going on it is still hard to explain all that happened, but I am happy to report that the UK, despite being attacked by a giant monster, London getting nuked by the US via France, and of course myself getting assassinated, end up pretty dang good: The people were mostly happy; We launched an aircraft carrier in to space Battleship Yamato style; We kicked those American jerks out of the UN, and then our Chief Scientist started his own country only to leave them to return to Britain and declare himself the King since we all decided to go to space and take the Queen with us. Enjoy your nuked castle!!!! We have all of Space! Long Live The Space Queen!
I guess what I am saying is, if there is a MegaGame going on near you, you should attend. If you have already played the game you should still go because not only will the controllers change up the story, but a different role not to mention different players totally change the game. It is a ton of fun. If you don’t believe me you can read The Paladin’s experience here. Oh and here is me being the best Prime Minister ever, you are welcome:
Who Can Catch James Bond?!
Something very interesting is happening to James Bond, and it is not who will play the character next, but who will get to distribute the next set of films. Sony distributed the last four films which have all raked in over $500 Million a piece with the last two each taking in well over $800 Million, so lets just say every major studio wants a crack at the franchise. I don’t think there has been an opportunity for a studio bidding war for distribution rights as big as this one in the history of film.
Disney has been smart snapping up all the low hanging franchise fruit, but this time I don’t think the other studios will stand by and let them have 007 as well. Universal has been on a tare recently with three films crossing the $1 Billion worldwide mark last year so they will have some extra cash to throw at lucrative franchises. Meanwhile Sony doesn’t have a lot going for it right now in the way of mega-IP, so I am not sure they can afford to loose James. Lionsgate and Legendary both recently received major Chinese financial backing, and Bond does very well in Asian markets, so they both could make a play. Not to mention I am sure Warner Brothers will put in some kind of offer, even if just to make the other studios write bigger checks.
I can’t wait to hear how this turns out, and how many Millions ($$$) it took to get the famous spy back on screen. My guess is that Sony bends over backwards to keep the British double-agent in their corner, but that Universal, Lionsgate, and Legendary really make them pay for it. Disney and Warner have a lot going on right now, so I am not sure they could guarantee the commitment to the franchise that MGM no doubt wants. Whatever happens 007 will have plenty of gadget and tuxedo money.