- Movies

Friday videos and links...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Sat, 01 Jun 2013 03:28:42 +0000

Today's video and music theme is Texas Rangers walk-up songs:

1st up, Lance Berkman uses "God's Gonna Cut You Down" by Johnny Cash.

A thing that won't trigger nostalgia: Blockbuster Video.

Top 25 Epoch-Making Anime

The Lord of the Rings Family Tree project. Ambitious, and still not the easiest thing to follow.

7 Pictures of Tom Cruise being tall.

Brad Johnson: The Price of an NFL career.

The much-hated A.J. Pierzynski uses "Bullets" by Creed, "Set It Off" by Audioslave, and included below because it's the most interesting, "AJ Scratch" by Kurtis Blow:

MLB's State-of-the-art Replay System

The Giant Rubber Duck in Hong Kong; coming soon to a major city near you.

Political: The Brickmuppet sums up all of the scandals of the current governmental administration that started breaking the past few weeks.

Political/Cultural: The Part of the World That Shoots Back

And finally (for now) Adrian Beltre's song is "Pa Que Retozen" by Tego Calderon:

A video I really wanted to find, or a recording even, is George Chandler's cover of Del Shannon's "Runaway". Chandler performed the cover for an episode of The Benny Hill Show, and apparently never recorded the song otherwise. Which is a shame, because it was probably the best version of the song ever performed. I have video from the show, but I am somewhat reticent to upload, as Benny Hill related videos seem to be taken down regularly.

My current video game project, since hitting the level cap in Scarlet Blade (it's been upped since, and a new area added) is to use the free trial of World of Warcraft to level every class with every race to level 20, and to make judgements thereon. So far I've leveled a Warrior for Human, Dwarf, Gnome and Night Elf, and I'm working on Draenei. I won't do Pandas until the end. One thing I can tell you is that the Draenei starting area hasn't been optimized for the free trial. At least one quest chain requires access to mail, which is blocked in the demo. The four original races have all been streamlined to make the level experience to 20 quick and rewarding. In fact, it's probably a little "too" quick, and it's clear (especially in areas that I had previously visited with older characters) that a lot of quests had been cut, even though their resources where sometimes still in the game. This is an improvement in some cases; e.g. a hunting quest chain in Loch Modan has been cut in half at least. Originally you had to "kill 8 xxxxxx's" for four different low-level animals, then four different medium level animals, then four different high-level animals, then a boss animal for each. Each group was located in a different area; the entire quest chain could have you running over the entire area (pre-mount if you're doing it at the appropriate level) and can take hours and hours of work (days for a casual player). However, in some cases Blizzard cut off a quest chain half-way through, leaving a story half-finished, or cut out a quest chain that uses unique resources. A good example is in the human starting area, which cut out the quest chain involving one of the kobold-infested mines, even though the kobolds and mine are still there. Most of the quest chain involving the human bandits is gone, leaving this group of bandits that everyone talks about, but that you never really do anything about. But more about all of this later.

Links and Links...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 01:22:37 +0000

Yu Darvish strikes out Albert Pujols five times. (Sort of)...

Incidentally, the guy who created this has (allegedly) been given a contract with Fangraphs.

The fundamental problem with Tinkerbell

The Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon: Either you first heard of this recently, or you will hear about it again soon. No joke.

Pictures of abandoned power stations @ i09

Helicopter drone video of Niagara Falls

Top 25 anime character designers

Otaku musician busted for Junior-High sex (and for not looking anything like his artists' renderings)

Christianity in anime. I think there's an aweful lot that can be written about Puella Magi Madoka Magica. But I want to watch the series again with my wife first.

Share and enjoy: Sad Josh Hamilton

Last night the home plate umpire at the Angels/Rangers game took a foul-tip in the worst possible place, which brought up mentions of The Nutty Buddy.

Sunday links and stuff...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 01:07:00 +0000

NSFW:

Sarah Hoyt: Digging Under/Building Under

Viking "Sunstone" found in shipwreck.

Pocket Princesses

"Hair Archaeologist" discovers how to recreate (realistically) the fabulous 'dos of antiquity.

Hat-tip to Anthony Cagle's Archaeoblog for some of the links.

I went and dug up some more AMVs after WonderDuck did an AMV post. First up, WonderDuck's own "Angel" based on Kanon.

Here's one I found. This video is short, but is waaaaay better than I expected it to be. Very tight editing with good timing. Surprisingly effective use of Nichijou.

Alamo links:

The Alamo siege chronology.

The Mission San Antonio de Valero

Alamo images

The Last Days of Davy Crockett

Michael Lind's The Death of Davy Crockett

Tour of The Alamo. Doesn't work very well, but has some interesting information.

A video shared by WonderDuck, "Gratuitous Violets" featuring Revy from Black Lagoon and Motoko Kusanagi from Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex:

Shinji's a bitch. (It's an old conversation, but this is the first time I've seen it in comic form.)

The third ClimateGate document dump has occurred. I bet you heard all about it on the news this week, didn't you?

In the spring, a young man's fancy turns to thoughts of love. To wit:

Readers of El Goonish Shive have been speculating for a long time that Elliot's relationship with Sarah was doomed, and it seems Dan Shive finally started the final ball rolling when Elliot was thrown into long-term proximity with Susan. Of course, Elliot didn't have a clue, until...

Jeph Jacques has stated that he doesn't plan Questionable Content in advance; he just rolls with what feels right. He seems to be rolling into finally having Marten enter another relationship. Specifically... This could be interesting. Claire is high-strung and craves affection for who she is, and just doesn't click with people. Whereas Marten is basically a wimpy, less-glib version of Matt LeBlanc. Jacques has made it clear that Claire has a crush on Marten, but Marten's feelings are more circumspect (he wants to love and please the entire world, of course.)

In Girl Genius, Princess Zeetha has her hat set on Mr. Higgs...

But on the other hand, Order of the Stick just had one of the saddest moments ever. However; well done Mr. Burlew. Excellent writing.

Speaking of excellent writing. Macross Frontier debuted five years ago. I haven't watched it. I'm scared. Other than Super Dimension Fortress Macross and Robotech I have seen Macross Plus and some of Macross 7. Plus was OK, but I didn't really like 7. However, in a fit of extreme nostalgia that occurred while I was sick earlier this week, I decided it was finally time to watch Frontier. So far, I've watched the three versions of the first episode, plus the second and third. I have some concerns, but some high hopes as well. Frontier is very much an homage to the original, but they've certainly messed with the characters a bit. I like the male lead, Alto; but I'm not too thrilled with the two female leads, which are, at this point, Lynn Minmei split into two characters. Older Minmei is "The Fairy of The Galaxy" Sheryl Nome, and Younger Minmei is high-school student and wanna-be singer Ranka Lee. There isn't enough separation. The other big problem is that they really have to rush the story (it's only 25 episodes). I will be talking more about Frontier, I'm sure. Oh, love the art. Love it.

Speaking of not-so-excellent writing, I'm trying out the new free-to-play MMO by Aeria Games, Scarlet Blade. This is the western regions release of Queen's Blade Online. If you're familiar with Queen's Blade, you know what that means.

Here's a short video with very little content. I'm still learning to play.

Music and links...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Sun, 03 Mar 2013 15:04:54 +0000

Remember Michelle Jenneke, the Australian track star who won fame for bouncing up and down and shaking her butt before an Olympic race on international TV? It got her a gig with Sports Illustrated.

James Lileks: Everything you know about the 1920s is wrong.

Visual timeline of the One Ring.

Vernon responds: Letter to "The Breakfast Club" explaining why they failed their detention assignment. And have to come back next week.

Hat-tip to Kaedrin for the previous two links.

Sarah Hoyt tackles group identity, why racial and other divisions in America are a "first world problem", and how people self-seperate and seek support in truly difficult circumstances. When The Chips Are Down.

Imperial Incompetence: The Battle of Hoth

U.S. Judge overturns lower court's decision: Sea Shepherd are indeed "pirates".

Watt's Up With That looks at Global Cooling media of the 1970s. It looks...familiar.

The Soviet Union got the cream of the intelligentsia, Vietnam got the hottest actors and politicians...North Korea gets Dennis Rodman.

Rachel Maddow busted for Twitter spam trend manipulation. No comment from Twitter, but they have suspended all of the accounts.

The Sequestration in one chart. It's in the upper-right-hand-corner. Highlighted in RED and CIRCLED. And you still might not notice it.

"Yume no Naka e" from Kare Kano. Original music done right.

Same song by ZONE:

Rockin' Sunday Links...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Sun, 17 Feb 2013 15:54:24 +0000

100-year-old photos found in 112-year-old camera.

Turning Vincent Van Gogh's self-portrait into a photograph.

Japan's second-oldest man found to be a mummified corpse; family was still cashing the pension checks.

Stealing magic tricks, the honor system, and Teller.

Working with Lindsay Lohan is similar to working with a lit stick of dynamite. Nothing we didn't already know, but this article makes you laugh and shake your head in wonder.

Hat-tip to Mark at Kaedrin for the previous two links.

The video isn't so great IMO, but I love the song. The artist is Aya Hirano, who spent about five years as the top voice talent in Japan and one of the best voice actors evar. Now people just make fun of her for being a nut.

Dragon Season breaks down the Guild Wars 2 personal story from the general to the specific for every possible choice in the game. It's a little less impressive when you look at it that way.

Russian family cut off from all contact for 40 years. Apparently an old story, as the family was discovered in 1978.

WARNING: Political Links below:

Reagan through liberal eyes; re: the upcoming Reagan biopic.

Drinking Their Own Ink by Sarah Hoyt. Confirmation bias on the Left. Spawned a later post, because in the comments NPR was included as an example of the mainstream liberal media, to which an NPR listener took exception. After refusing to engage with facts, he apparently left a $1 tip and a snarky rant for Sarah, which was returned and prompted another post.

Chief Greek statistician threatened with jail for revealing true size and scope of Greece's financial problems.

The following video is NSFW (language) but if you don't mind that, you have to watch it. Not just listen to it, watch it.

I mentioned on Twitter that I stopped my World of Warcraft subscription. There are so many free-to-play and buy-once MMORPGs now that I felt foolish still giving money to Blizzard while trying out all of the other games. And that's without the penchant to suddenly load up GTA: Vice City. I've gone through the prologue in TERA with the controller; I think I'll try it again with the keyboard. Opinion seems mixed as to whether the controller is adequate. I have The Secret World loaded, but haven't tried it yet. I played through the prologue of Rusty Hearts months ago but haven't returned. And of course, I've still got Guild Wars, Guild Wars 2 and Age of Conan loaded as well.

I meant to do this on Sunday links...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 02:21:25 +0000

Music for the week...yes and no...

This guy (the guy who makes these videos) has apparently been around a while...in fact when I showed some of these to my wife, she explained to me that she had seen most of them a long time ago. So shoot me. It helps if you're familiar with World of Warcraft; there is a lot of material that references the game as much as the contents of the songs.

An essay on John Kennedy and the Cold War. There isn't much in there new if you study history beyond your high school or college textbooks, but if you don't...

Is green energy a fad that has run it's course? (In the long run, no...but the artificial stimulation of the green energy market may be in trouble.)

Sarah Hoyt on "Ungovernable" Americans.

The book of moe dictators.

Animated gif of the refit of the Enterprise from the TV series version to the movie version. The article the gif is taken from, about whether the Enterprise was updated, or was in fact an entirely new starship.

Everything you ever wanted to know about the Kennedy Assassination. (Cynics view, although plenty of time is given to discussing conspiracy.)

Are you worried about all of the horrible things that can happen if you take a cruise? If you aren't, you will be.

I had mentioned when I built my current computer that the namesake, Saya, was from Blood: The Last Vampire. Although, technically, it was the version of Saya from Blood +. Because it's a dual-processor system, you see. In Blood +, Saya is a twin of Diva. Clever? Maybe not. I'm now working on the next computer, which will be named Sena. Because I'm using a 90-degree-rotated case, everything's up top. And while it won't be dual-processor, I will be Crossfiring two Radeon 6870's, so the computer will still have two big ones.

Ok, I'm done being childish. The character is cute, I like the color scheme, and while the...attributes...stack (snerk) up nicely, how can you resist this smile?

Sunday links, now with more Star Trek...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Sun, 02 Dec 2012 15:59:35 +0000

But not to start with.

Some links to do with the song and artist:

The artist of this rendition is The Southern Sons Quartet, the song is Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition.

Did you know China is building a Stargate? If it was Japan or South Korea, I would be worried. Don't they know what could come through that thing? But it's China, so I'm kinda assuming it will just fall down.

The two big (inherent) problems with Star Wars video games are 1) Everyone is a Jedi 2) Like in other video games with "moral" sides, there is no consequence for being evil. Oh, excuse me, DARK. They aren't evil, just different. They choose the path less traveled. They eat jawas, but it's ok.

The Namib Beetle, which previously inspired the creation of Moisture Vaporators (that's mentioned in the article as well) has now inspired the Stillsuit. What's a Stillsuit?

Also on Wired.com, this short article about the U.S.S. Enterprise, the Big E, the CVN-65, the FIRST CVN, has been decommissioned. This is a very sad thing, although the third ship of the Ford-class supercarrier, the CVN-80 will be the next Enterprise. On the other hand, the Enterprise CVN-80 won't enter service until 2027. Odds that we ever see it in the water? I give it 65 against, 35 for.

Final voting trends from the 2012 election. I.E., which states voted more Republican than 2008, and which voted more Democrat than 2012. The numbers say this past Presidential election will be one for the history books. In essence, it is truly amazing that Barack Obama won re-election. How Obama managed to hang on, and/or how Romney managed to blow this chance will make for a ton of scholorship.

Back to Star Trek; how NASA could build a warp drive. Of course, that title is a bit misleading. NASA couldn't and wouldn't. But maybe it COULD be done, in general.

Things you thought you knew about Star Trek that aren't actually true.

Restoration of the original Enterprise prop by the National Air and Space Museum.

How 'bout some Sunday linking?

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Sun, 11 Nov 2012 15:52:21 +0000

Klaus Nomi for the win. All of them. Klaus Nomi pwns every musical argument.

The next two paragraphs are political.

Well, the argument over immigration reform started up right away. Unfortunately, it's already gone balls-up. Moderate and liberal GOP'ers are calling for passing an "amnesty" bill, -any- "amnesty" bill, just to get it off the table. A side argument is "whatever we support, it has to give immediate citizenship for every illegal immigrant currently in the U.S., and we -must- market it as an amnesty to non-whites, whether it is or not." I'm not opposed to the immediate citizenship, but without a legalization process and fixes to the immigration process itself, nothing would actually be repaired or improved. As for making sure non-white immigrants of any legal status are told this is an amnesty program; I think that's incredibly cynical, as well as misunderstanding what illegal and legal immigrants want, much less non-white populations in the U.S. in general. Unfortunately, the voices on the right, GOP-affiliated or not, are getting caught up in arguing against this bullshit rather than advocating for actual immigration reform and border security. Meanwhile, the only response from the Democrats is that immigration, is indeed, an issue.

Meanwhile, those that jumped up and started talking about Obama's -overwhelming- win...yeah, not so much. While it does look like Obama definitely won the electoral college, Romney may actually win the popular vote. Did you wonder why the news stopped talking about the numbers almost immediately? (Well, except to keep saying it was -huge- for Obama.) Obama lost 8-9 million votes from 2008. Romney received about 1.5 million less than John McCain, and those numbers are still changing. Obama lost votes from every demographic except under-30s. That makes me feel better. On top of all that, the vote fraud investigations are starting up. I love how the Democrats and media maintain a narrative that the Republican Party instigates massive programs of voter intimidation and vote fraud in every election, when every investigation that ever results in convictions is of Democrats. St. Lucie County is currently reporting 247,000 votes cast in a district of 175,000 registered voters. This is in a district heavily targeted by Democrats in order to oust incumbent Representative Allen West. The Democrats, who have spent the last twenty years insisting that every vote must be counted, re-counted, and when possible, changed to match a guessed-at intent in order to accurately express the will of the voters and DAMN the rules, are arguing that the deadline for recounts is past. How people keep voting Democrat on grounds of honesty and integrity is beyond me.

OK, politics is over.

Is "Gangnam Style" the joke that changed music forever?

H.M.S. Bounty replica sinks off of North Carolina coast.

Grand Theft Auto 5 scheduled for next spring. The series will return to Southern California and feature a larger world than, allegedly, San Andreas and GTA 4 combined. You will also be able to pick one of three protagonists, although none are female (which is upsetting a few people). There will also -not- be a PC version at launch (which has upset a few more people).

The Franz Ferdinand "death" car. Yeah, -that- Franz Ferdinand.

Evelyn McHale - The Most Beautiful Suicide. Immortalized by Andy Warhol, the original amateur photo is amazing.

How much would it cost to build the Death Star? (Original Death Star, and assuming it's made of steel.) Hat-tip to Hellinahandbasket.net.

I completely forgot to link Mark's Six Weeks of Halloween at Kaedrin this year. However, he found some good links this week, which I'll share below. And go back and read his Six Weeks of Halloween posts; they're always worth it!

Michael Myers tweeted his adventures on Halloween night.

Who would win a mass knife-fight among all 44 Presidents? I mostly agree with the conclusions, although I really have to call them on Lincoln. There is a huge Lincoln fad at the moment which seems to be boosting him to some kind of superhero status, which is probably to blame. And pairing him with Andrew Jackson would be a mistake; Lincoln would probably be the first President Jackson cut. Teddy Roosevelt would be much more likely to team up with Lincoln than his distant cousin, IMO.

So let's do a Sunday post instead...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Sun, 28 Oct 2012 16:23:03 +0000

Did I do this one already? I can't remember.

Results of billion-dollar treasure hunt in Hindu temple to be revealed.

WWII photos superimposed onto current photos

Correlating knowledge with political identity; Pew Research ongoing poll.

Eugene de Salignac: If you're around my age, you are probably familiar with his photography; his photographs of New York architecture in the first half of the twentieth century were rediscovered in the 1980's. As a result of the wide exposure de Salignac received then, his work became the classic baseline, or at least introduction, for photography buffs my age.

Researcher Michael Mann, who was primarily responsible for the "hockey stick graph" that purported to show temperature rise correlating with industrialization and predicted extreme increases in temperature from 2000 to 2004 (which didn't happen), is suing National Review Online for libel. The alleged libel has to do with the data Mann used to create the graph, which was included in a 2001 U.N. report that won a Nobel Prize for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Those doing the libeling have achieved their goal, which is to bring the data behind the graph before the public eye where the data and the methods used to analyse it can be judged. In effect, NRO is forcing Mann to "put up or shut up".

What really happens when your pet's food disappears quickly. (Comic)

Is Moneyball Dead? (funny)

Movies. I have watched a lot of horror movies the past couple of weeks, and I don't think I have a single film to recommend beyond what I already have.

Carved: The Slit-Mouthed Woman. Japanese. The slowest-moving, non-scary slasher movie I've ever watched.

The Dark Side of the Moon. Low-budget Alien. I had high hopes for this movie at first, but gave up about sixty minutes in.

Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl. Japanese. Heh. Forgot about this one. Like The Machine Girl, which I mentioned a couple of years ago, except this movie is explicitly a comedy. VGvFG is done very much in the Troma style, although it has a higher budget, a better story, better acting, better fx...better almost everything than most Troma films, actually. If you like that sort of thing, Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl may be one of the best movies you'll ever see. I also recommend the English dub, which adds it's own layer of humor that works for english-speaking audiences where the Japanese doesn't.

The Shock Labyrinth. Japanese. I forgot about this one, as well. Not overly frightening, but a decent creep factor and the story is way out there. A group of twenty-something Japanese revisit the scene (unwittingly, of course) of a fatal amusement park accident that claimed one of the group of friends when they were very young. The past, present and future intertwine to carry out an act of vengeance. Good story, good acting. The complex timeline mostly works, which is an accomplishment.

The Shrine. A good idea ruined by poor execution. The main characters are stupid and unrelatable, which makes the "you've got it backward" story uninteresting. Once you figure out what's going on, you don't care about the rest of the movie.

: The Legend of a Portrait. Korean. This one was actually pretty tense, if predictable. Worth watching even after you figure out where everything is going.

Parasitic. Wow, this was bad. I only watched half of it. Bad acting, bad plot. The editing and directing are either terrible or just nonexistent. There are, however, hot chicks and nudity. So it has that going for it.

Exorcismus. U.K. Man, I wanted to like this movie. And it wasn't too bad, except for the priest, until the final thirty minutes. But, like I said, the characterization of the priest was terrible. As for the rest of the movie, the setup was good but the payoff was bad. It's a shame.

Fragile. I'm turning out to be a liar. Here's another recommended movie. Children with chronic and fatal diseases are being moved from their old hospital to a new one. Unfortunately, bizarre accidents start happening, like bones breaking while you watch. The culprit is one of the best and most original movie monsters I've seen in a long time. Stars Callista Flockhart, but don't let that stop you.

I'll probably try to watch a few more, but as usual now that I've said it, I probably won't.

Lousy weekend links...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Mon, 22 Oct 2012 22:25:10 +0000

I missed doing a Halloween movie lead-up to the holiday last year, and finally got a start on watching some horror movies this year before getting side-tracked. However, I'll have a few reviews below. I also went back to do some more anime introductions, but noticed I was jumping from the "C"s to the "M"s; so I'm going through the Right Stuf catalogue to see what I'm forgetting.

Maine State Senate candidate comes under fire for playing World of Warcraft. Well, sort of. This story was all over Twitter and Facebook a couple of weeks ago. The narrative applied to the story was that stupid Maine Republicans were claiming the Democrat candidate was less-qualified because she played World of Warcraft (which in-and-of-itself is a bit stupid). However, subsequent updates to the story have illustrated that by her own admission, the candidate has devoted an extensive amount of time to the game in addition to describing herself as "lazy". She also praised the MMORPG for allowing her to "kill stuff without going to jail", the kind of sentiment that video game defenders are constantly defending and explaining. Of course, Republicans are routinely attacked for similar statements related to target shooting or hunting, so it's somewhat hypocritical to try to defend her with the "it's just a game!" explanation. Anyway, as a long-time computer gamer, my knee-jerk reaction was to defend the WoW player against, stupid anti-technology politicians; but after looking into the story I think the Maine GOP actually makes good point: In terms of work ethic and public relations, the Democrat candidate may not be a good choice for the job.

Also, two bad judicial decisions affecting technology. The first decision recognizes that the North Carolina state government has the invested power to force bloggers to edit content which falls under the purvue of licensed professions. In this particular case, the state government is requiring a blogger to edit content regarding a diet he claims he used to help his diabetes. The government says they don't approve of the diet and the blogger therefore can't blog about it. However, the lawsuits will continue, as the blogger's current suit was denied on grounds of standing. The blogger has not yet been harmed by North Carolina's requirement and therefore can't sue (yet). The second decision is bit more concerning at the moment, as the Americans With Disabilities act has been construed by a judge to apply the Netflix's movie database. Therefore, Netflix has agreed via settlement to provide Closed Captioning on all streaming movies by 2014. Netflix, a private company that provides a paid service, was determined by the judge in the class action lawsuit to be a "public service", by some contrivance enabling him to reach one arm far up his own a**. Troubling.

P. J. O'Rourke: Atlas Shrugged, and So Did I

Homemade BIG Head Halloween masks (look at this; I mean it).

Ghost Hunt. A thirteen-episode anime series based on some light novels. I was hoping this would make an interesting horror series, but Ghost Hunt ended up being much lighter than I expected but entertaining nonetheless. There are a few creepy moments and the animation quality is so-so. The series one big bonus is that the thirteen episodes actually comprise only a handful of stories that run seamlessly from episode to episode. So you're actually getting several movie-length stories instead of a tv series, which lends at least a couple of the storylines some additional weight.

Grave Encounters: A surprisingly effective and entertaining reality-tv-based horror movie. An obvious ripoff, Grave Encounters actually maintained a good pace, had good acting and sfx, and made the most of a highly-derivative setup. Recommended.

The Human Centipede 2: No link. While the original managed (at least according to some people, including myself) a certain level of tension, a small amount of horror, and an impressive performance by Dieter Laser, the sequel has nothing. Laurence R. Harvey does his damnedest, to no avail. Peeking into the nature of his villain, Martin, seems to be the one recommendable aspect of the sequel; but this course is abandoned half-way though the story. The viewer is left in the final half hour with a goofy, grotesque comedy of incompetence that manages to completely fail. At everything.

White: Another Korean girl-haunting movie. Very effective and entertaining, but a little light on the horror elements compared to other films of this meta-genre. However, the story is complex and enjoyable, even if it doesn't actually make sense in the end.

Ju-on 2: Sequel to the original Ju-on (obviously). Starts slow, but will have your skin crawling by the end. Tells five or so (can't remember) interconnected stories that don't seem to actually connect at first. However, even by the end of the movie I can't figure out the beginning. It's possible it doesn't actually signify. Hmm.

Apartment 143: A ripoff of Paranormal Activity, crossed with The Exorcist and any paranormal investigator movie. Nothing outstanding, but better than you would think. Not a waste of time.

YellowBrickRoad: Still not sure what this movie was *about*. Really good setup, but predictable and, seemingly, pointless.

I watched a few other movies, but I'm not interested in commenting on or recommending any of them. I may save them up for another "What I'm NOT watching" post.

Hopefully, I'll be back later.

Better late than never...or maybe not links...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Sun, 14 Oct 2012 15:29:21 +0000

Well, I think that's enough mourning.

Hat tip Hellinahandbasket.net.

Climate attribution (linking weather to climate-based causes) research a "non-starter" to some, and at least at such a basic level as to be ineffectual.

Speaking of which, Al Gore is doing another media event similar to last years fake-out, and this time he's going to prove climate change causes bad weather.

The Easter Island heads have bodies? No, I didn't know that, or forgot about it if I heard it.

The Ig-Nobel Prize: Rewarding the stupid and pointless in scientific research.

Place your bets: 30 Hornets vs. 30,000 Bees.

The Endgame review: First detailed history of the Iraq War from George W. Bush to Barack Obama. Just reading the review was interesting, as the authors apparently document policies that were reported as failures but were in fact great successes, and actions taken that failed miserably while being reported as successes. Not necessarily along political lines, either. So much for embedded journalists.

The Vert-A-Pac car carrier: A rail car invented to carry the Chevy Vega (the 70's economy car) economically enough to keep the profit margin tight.

So, is Yu Darvish the ace the Rangers need? Yu Darvish complete strikeout montage.

Movie Poster Cliches

Pat Caddell, pollster for Presidents Carter and Clinton says media has become an enemy to the American people:

And finally, more Julie Brown:

Those semi-reliable Friday links...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Sat, 22 Sep 2012 01:35:04 +0000

Yeah, not what I usually post for music. But, I've mentioned being a fan of "Nashville Sound/Countrypolitan" pop/country, so...

Demotic, the "common" Egyptian language, translated. This is pretty cool. Considering the mess Ancient Egyptian history is in, having access to the "common man's" writing may help straighten some things up.

The Great New England Vampire Panic. Not fiction. Hat-tip to Anthony Cagle's Archaeoblog for the last two links.

Are you a fan of Puella Magi Madoka Magica? Then check out this upcoming figure inspired by Akemi Homura:

11 Stars Who Bared All (and epically failed).

Right after I mentioned it, MLB.com wrote an article about the AL West.

I'm stopping here for now, but may do another post this weekend.

Doin' Some More of those Friday Links...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Sat, 15 Sep 2012 01:51:13 +0000

I mentioned this on Twitter earlier today. The American League West, long considered a "weak" division in baseball, this year has all four teams in playoff contention. Technically, the Mariners are closer to "not eliminated...yet" than actually competing for a wild card slot. However, by winning percentage the West is the most competitive division in baseball this year. Of course, if you add the Houston Astros in, as they will be next year, then the A.L. East is better, again. In that light, I am firmly rooting for the Houston Astros to be a winning team next year. Also, I want to point out that, regarding the second-place Oakland A's...I called it.

Naturally occurring bacteria eats large portion of Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

Political, but funny as hell: At the DNC convention, you probably heard there was a bit of a kerfuffle regarding the removal of the word "God" from a statement that was originally about "God-given rights", and the removal of a statement concerning the recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. After the media stink occurred, the man in charge of the platform committee was recognized in order to propose amendments to reverse the removals. Unfortunately, the convention representatives didn't cooperate, leaving Chairman Antonio Villaraigosa, the mayor of Los Angeles, at a loss.

Stanley Kubrick's One Point Perspective.

Yay! 40 More of the worst Liefeld drawings!

Japan: A Nation of Bullies. Apparently.

Roman Polanski's Rape that wasn't a rape.

Confessions of a Disney Employee Part 2:

Apocalypse Not: Why You Shouldn't Worry About End Times. Hat tip to The Unwanted Blog.

Tomb of China's First Emperor Still Sealed; Waiting for better Science.

Friday Links, right on time...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 06:18:29 +0000

Thanks to Brickmuppet's latest trip to Japan, I learned about Viking Style (what the Japanese call buffets, apparently). Don't do a Google Search for Viking Style. It refers to other things as well.

From Anthony Luke Photography, photos of models used for classic pin-ups.

Linked from the same site, the New York City Municipal Archives has a ton of old photos of New York.

When Carbonite dropped Limbaugh: CEO talks about "hole in our revenue" to analyst.

Great Wall of China collapses. No, not the old part. A section repaired by the Chinese Government.

July 2012 hottest July on record...but only if you use the old, compromised monitoring stations instead of the new, verified stations.

Federal Reserve Study on the "Bush Recession": Not Bush or the banks' fault, turns out the Fed zigged when it should have zagged.

Ten Fantasy Sagas wronger than Twilight. I"m marginally familiar with Dragonquest and Hamilton's works, but have not heard of any of the others.

Lord of the Rings parodies. Some are pretty good. I recently read The Wobbit by Paul Erickson, which turned out to be one of the more clever direct parodies I've read.

Friday Links, a day early...

nospam@example.com (Ben) — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 23:52:48 +0000

Amtrak losing money on food services; $9.50 burger costs taxpayers over $16.00. How does that even happen? At least, without someone saying "this might not be a good deal..."

History and ecology of the Charr from the Guild Wars games. If you haven't seen it. If you don't play Guild Wars, it's still interesting world building.

The Cinema Snob reviews the 1979 movie Goldengirl, a James Coburn/Susan Anton movie about a genetically-engineered track and field athlete being groomed for the 1980 Olympics. One of those movies that's so bad in all the right ways that it ends up being awesome.

Shamus Young discusses Spec Ops: The Line. This recent shooter from Take2 Interactive not only has a decent story, but directly addresses how awful the stories in these military shooters usually are.

In the continuing saga of Japanese school bullying, school administrators recently sought to expel a victim because the 20 cigarette burn scars on his arm was disturbing the other students.

And finally, Wowcrendor plays Itzazoo, a childrens' game that features compelling gameplay, a fantastic physics engine, and the ability to enable either awesomeness or coolness in the options: