This Looks Promising...

Top Five Friday: HULK SMASH!

Man, what the fuck is with me?

It seems like lately if I don't immediately review a book/movie/album/concert, I totally forget about it and never remember to do it. It's been a couple of weeks now since I saw The Incredible Hulk and said I'd review it in a few days. Did it happen? Fuck no.

So, with that in mind... here's the next best thing...

The Top Five Reasons You Should Go See The Incredible Hulk!

NOTE: Please be aware this will contain mild to moderate spoilers so click away if you want to "go in fresh."

5. NO HULKDOGS
This really could fit under a wider umbrella of "It's better than the first one" but that just seems really vague. Considering there's only two things I remember about the first one, I thought I should pick one. The first thing I remember about it was "I didn't really like it." Not much to go with there, huh? The other thing? Fucking Hulkdogs. Well, not literally fucking Hulkdogs although that might have been an interesting subplot. But I'm talking about the gamma ray affected poodles that were angry - and man, you wouldn't like them when they're angry. Suffice to say, there was nothing in The Incredible Hulk that made me cringe and be incredibly pissed that it was in the movie. That's a plus!

4. CGI Hulk
So... I thought it looked better. I mean, it's the Hulk, right? The Hulk's not real. It's not based on anything real. It's going to be incredibly difficult for something that's not based on reality to ACTUALLY LOOK REAL! I was so blown away by people bitching about the movie [either of them] with a "The Hulk looks fake." THE HULK _IS_ FAKE! Geez. These are the same people who make shit like The Pacifier or Air Bud successful, I swear.

3. The Score
It's odd actually because for the most part, I've considered the score of most of the Marvel flicks to be a big weakness. A serious lack of anthemic themes for the major characters sucks. For someone who loves a large part of movie scores, the lack of a major identifiable theme is a serious drawback. And while I don't know if the Hulk had a "Hulk Theme" that blew me off my seat, I really thought the overall score was impressive. The homages to the old TV theme really seemed to add something to it as well as it was something that people could identify with. I look forward to the soundtrack actually being released on iTunes so I can see if I like it as much as I think I did.

2. TONY STARK ALERT!
This one I really don't want to spoil but suffice to say... the path to the Avengers is getting clearer and I'm getting the happy pants just thinking about it.

And the #1 reason to go see The Incredible Hulk...

1. Ed Norton
Easy pick, right? Who wasn't enthused at the announcement that Ed Norton was going to play Bruce Banner? He really knocked it out of the park. A lot of hullabaloo [good word choice!] was made about him not being happy with the finished product. The current rumor is that there's about 40 minutes of footage that was shot that is mostly Banner character development that is sitting on the cutting room floor. Thank god for the invention of the Director's Cut. I'm of the opinion that adding 40 minutes of Norton written character development to the movie could make the race for best comic book movie of the summer a hell of a lot closer.

So, was it better than Iron Man? No.

Will it be better than The Dark Knight? The Magic 8-Ball says "Signs Point To No"

But was it a shitload better than the old Hulk movie and a very worthy member of the Marvel feature film family? Absolutely.

The Palladium Reborn

Followers of the Los Angeles music scene may be aware that the historic Hollywood Palladium was bought last year by Live Nation who immediately shut it down for renovations. I haven't been to the Palladium in years but as a youth, I was always struck by how nice of a venue it was on the inside - the outside was another story altogether.

But apparently Live Nation has sunk millions into a top-to-bottom renovation that includes everything from the stage, to back-of-house, to the restrooms, etc. I'd like to see the outside get a little sprucing up personally as the Palladium always looked like a shithole from the outside but really blew your mind once you got in.

From the very elaborate staircases going up to the second level to the wood [or woodlike?] floors to the chandeliers, the Palladium was probably the nicest venue I can remember from my early concert days.

I still remember how tight security was at that place with a far-too-friendly search and guards screaming at people for trying to take gum into the building. But I've got a lot of fond memories of shows at that particular venue. It'll be nice to see it up and running at full strength again.

The Palladium is currently scheduled to host The Kooks in October for their re-opening party so that should be a fun night for LA music fans.

Ya Frakkin' Frakhole

After finishing Season 2/2.5 of Battlestar Galactica tonight, I have to admit, I'm quite surprised by the direction the show went and frankly, the show in general.

In all honesty, I just wanted to watch it because it's a sci-fi show and I'm a quasi-sci-fi junkie. Spaceships? Cool. Killer aliens? Awesome. Hottie killer aliens? Mega-awesome.

But man oh man, did it turn out to be so much more. The show is amazingly well-written and drifts far and beyond your usual sci-fi faire.

Let's see... just some of the topics they've covered in the first two seasons in one way or another...

Abortion.

Political corruption.

Racism.

Religion.

Religious zealotry.

Hate crimes.

Loyalty.

Rape.

Survivalism.

Theocracy.

Justifiable homicide.

Vigilantism.

Military Dictatorship.

Theocracy vs Military Dictatorship.

And there's a ton more that are just escaping my brain at the moment.

Most sci-fi is very clearly written in black and white. The heroes are very obvious - the villains even more so. And BSG tends to follow the same course - but every once in a while they toss in a curveball to make the good guys just not so good and the bad guys maybe not so bad.

Much credit goes out to the writing team for BSG for having the courage and the talent to stray away from the fallbacks of sci-fi and delving a little beyond the surface to create a series that has been absolutely gripping for the first two seasons.

Season Three arrived today from Blockbuster Online [I think] so I'll keep you informed if it rocks my frakkin' ass as much as the first two did.

Ugh

Perhaps the ugliest expensive car I've ever seen
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WHITE WARRIOR!

Random Randomness

Considering I work late tonight, I thought I should probably give you more of a post today than the Carlin thing. So, some random thoughts on some random news over the past few days.

NEWS: G.I. Joe Movie Gets A Subtitle
REACTION: Well, there's two good things about this. To me, a subtitle means it's a high probability that the studio is thinking "franchise" - and I'm hopeful that means they really like the footage they're seeing and think it's going to be a success. The other good thing? The subtitle is "Rise Of Cobra" - which is exactly the kind of thing I want to hear, baby! This is the first piece of news we've had on this movie in a long while [although I expect that to change next month at Comic-Con] and I think it's good news.

NEWS: UFC Fight Night Was Saturday Night
Yeah, it was. But other than the TUF Finale being another surprising win for Amir, nothing on the show really did much for me. Everything just seemed kinda... there. But I did come away from the show with two pieces of insight - 1] Joe Rogan is a loose cannon out there. Knowing how similar Dana is to Vince McMahon, I gotta think Dana's sitting in the back ready to spit nails when he hears Rogan mention Tito Ortiz and Kimbo Slice on his TV show. He used to do the same thing with Pride. It really is fascinating that Dana lets him get away with it.

Oh, the second thing?

Evan Tanner's beard needs its own reality show as it has reached ungodly levels of awesomeness.

NEWS: It's Been One Year Since The Chris Benoit Situation Went Down
REACTION: It's hard to believe it's been a year already. I still can remember exactly how I found out and how absolutely stunned I was. It started with "Chris Benoit is dead" to "His whole family is dead too" and then developed into what we know now. I often joke about people who claim George Lucas "raped their childhood" but if anything, if anyone has ever come close to doing that to me - it's Chris Benoit. He has completely changed the way that a lot of people look at the business that they loved - hell, he's even caused some people to stop watching all together. But of course, that's not even close to the worst part of the whole situation. There's a special place in hell reserved for Chris Benoit.

NEWS: Dodgers Considering Trading Billingsley And Kemp For Sabathia
REACTION: God help me. Here we go again. After I spent all winter paranoid that Coletti was going to do some huge ill-advised desperation move, he managed to play it safe and stay the course for the most part. Now? The rumors are starting again and this time, I'm even more concerned because many believe Coletti's job may be on the line if he can't salvage this season. Don't do it, Ned! Stay the course! Listen to Logan White!

NEWS: First John McCain For President TV Ad Spotted
REACTION: Eh, it didn't do anything for me. Nothing inspiring. Nothing memorable. Just the same ol', same ol' wrapped up in a different package. But then, of course, I'm probably not the target demo for him. I've never voted Republican before and I'm not likely to start now. But since I was watching Deadliest Catch when it came on, I have to wonder exactly who that ad was aimed at. It's going to be an interesting few months leading up to election.

That's it for me! You guys have been great! Don't forget to tip your waitress!

R.I.P. George Carlin

Like I said during the Winston piece, some amazingly talented and legendary people in their fields are dying these days. It's an odd "trend."

George Carlin was never my favorite comedian. I didn't run around reciting his bits or watching everything of his I could get my eyeballs on. But I did recognize that he was widely considered one of the most brilliant, most controversial comedians to ever take the stage - and you've gotta appreciate that. And I did recognize that whenever I saw him in something... whether it was a standup special I wandered upon or those awesome cameos in Dogma and Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back not to mention how endearing he was in Jerseu Girl... he entertained me, he made me smile and laugh - and I know I appreciated that.

I also said in the Winston piece that it seemed far too frequently you could look at a death and start a story with, "It's weird that he just died because..." Well, I've got one for this one. When I saw this news this morning when I woke up, my stomach sank. Not because I'm some huge megafan of Carlin but... well, during the planning stages for our recent Vegas trip, we were looking at different shows that we might want to attend. Some wanted to do Spamalot, some wanted to do Phantom or the Beatles' Love. I remember seeing that George Carlin was going to be there while we were and pointing it out. But as often happens while on vacation, we got wrapped up in other stuff and didn't end up going. Even while we were there, I saw a billboard promoting his show and said, "Aw damn. I totally forgot he was going to be here this weekend. _That's_ what we should have gone to."

But we didn't - and now we'll never be able to.

R.I.P. George Carlin.

Training Day Pt 2

This shit's chess, it ain't checkers!

It's a shame that Corporate America isn't kicked back enough to style the training for every job off Training Day.

You get to drink good booze in the morning with a drug dealer.

You smoke some LSD laced weed with your boss on his orders.

Eventually you have to hold a gun on Macy Gray - major perk there

You cap said dealer and get a shitload of cash for it.

You have a gang member ask if you've ever had your shit pushed in.

And in the end, your boss gets shot

It's training day, baby
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