Starting on Monday, I'll be posting the reviews of nearly eighty Japanese-style monster movies as my son and I gear up for Godzilla, opening May 16.
I hope you'll enjoy it.
Newest Book ...
Friday, January 31, 2014
Monday, January 13, 2014
Binding My Books
"don't like to read e-books..or to use an e-reader...which is why we had our @LordsOKobolBook copies bound together! ... BTW, took us 4.5 hrs to get all (797) pages printed on our home printer LOL - it took the guy 45 mins to get them bound"
As flattered as I was and am, I can't help but be fearful that they don't like the books enough to justify the expense.
Fingers crossed.
Friday, December 13, 2013
"The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug"
First things first: I held off on watching the Godzilla trailer when it debuted online because I wanted to see it huge on the IMAX screen first.
Boy, that was worth the wait. It's fantastic. The use of György Ligeti's Requiem from 2001 was perfect. I can't wait for my son to see it this weekend.
Now, The Hobbit.
My wife's deep into Benedict Cumberbatch so she's more happy to see the film than she normally would be. After I told her I was seeing it at the midnight preview, she sent this text:
Elsewhere, the Tolkien geeks are up in arms about it. I saw one call it "The Desecration of Smaug" on Reddit. Give me a break.
Simply put, it is action-packed, fun and thrilling. Yes, there are some serious deviations from the source material, particularly in the last third, but people should get over it.
Go see it.
Now, for an in-depth addressing of some of those criticisms, I will do so after the JUMP.
SPOILERS, of course.
Boy, that was worth the wait. It's fantastic. The use of György Ligeti's Requiem from 2001 was perfect. I can't wait for my son to see it this weekend.
Now, The Hobbit.
My wife's deep into Benedict Cumberbatch so she's more happy to see the film than she normally would be. After I told her I was seeing it at the midnight preview, she sent this text:
Elsewhere, the Tolkien geeks are up in arms about it. I saw one call it "The Desecration of Smaug" on Reddit. Give me a break.
Simply put, it is action-packed, fun and thrilling. Yes, there are some serious deviations from the source material, particularly in the last third, but people should get over it.
Go see it.
Now, for an in-depth addressing of some of those criticisms, I will do so after the JUMP.
SPOILERS, of course.
Friday, November 22, 2013
Giving Thanks ... and Discounts
Thanksgiving is one week away and I'm saying "Thanks" to you guys by creating coupon codes for my books.
On the scifi side of things:
My time-travel action novel Displaced ... it's like LOST, but more concise and with a solid ending.
Use coupon code KA74K when you go to this page and the book will be FREE.
My post-post-apocalyptic teen road trip zombie novel, Diary of a Second Life. Despite that brief description, it's actually very serious and, oddly, one of my most personal works to date.
Use coupon code MA83A when you go to this page and the book will be FREE.
As always, my Lords of Kobol series is FREE. The original trilogy of books still gets great reviews everywhere it's available. You can get a run down of all the different sites to download it HERE. (Smashwords, iTunes, B&N, Sony, etc.)
Oh, Book Five? Yeah, I'm ... uh. Still working on that. Slowly.
Sorry.
Now, on the sexier side of things:
The Red Kick, the story of a costumed hero who works as a stripper to get info on the bad guys in town. Lots of fun. Turned out far better than it had any reason to.
Use coupon code PE68N when you go to this page and you'll get a dollar off the price.
Sexcalation, the semi-autobiographical story of a married couple that decides to ... "have fun" with another married couple.
Use coupon code PP57Z when you go to this page and you'll get a dollar off the price.
That's about it for now. I'm working on a rather short book that will be able for download sometime in December ... more on that later.
Thanks again!
On the scifi side of things:
Use coupon code KA74K when you go to this page and the book will be FREE.
Use coupon code MA83A when you go to this page and the book will be FREE.
Oh, Book Five? Yeah, I'm ... uh. Still working on that. Slowly.
Sorry.
Now, on the sexier side of things:
Use coupon code PE68N when you go to this page and you'll get a dollar off the price.
Use coupon code PP57Z when you go to this page and you'll get a dollar off the price.
That's about it for now. I'm working on a rather short book that will be able for download sometime in December ... more on that later.
Thanks again!
Monday, September 9, 2013
Why You Should Rethink Buying 'Star Trek Into Darkness'
Look. I've been a Star Trek fan for all of my 38 years. It pains me to even suggest this ... but I might not be buying Star Trek Into Darkness when it comes out.
It has nothing to do with "John Harrison," the action-over-substance argument or any of that biz. It's all about Paramount, Bad Robot and how they decided to treat their customers.
See that? That's a fancy set, complete with a QMx replica. I really wanted that phaser. The whole thing costs about $80.
I preordered that months ago. Over the weekend, I cancelled the order.
Why? Because the Blu-ray it comes with doesn't have all of the features that it should. Sounds petty, perhaps, but to a videophile and completist, it's damn near a sin.
You see, they produced hours of bonus content for the video release including all the requisite behind-the-scenes stuff and an immersive commentary.
What you get on that phaser set's Blu-ray is the same thing you'd get if you just bought the plain movie straight out: about thirty minutes worth of features. No commentary. Still missing about an hour or more of other features.
See that? It's a near-priceless set. The "Meteor Edition" they're calling it. You have to enter to win that piece of space rock shaped to look like an insignia because they only made one. What special features come on its Blu-ray discs? The same as on the plain-Jane release.
So where did the commentary and the other stuff go? Retailer exclusives.
No, that's the Walmart edition. It's a plain-Jane movie set with a Hot Wheels Vengeance model. Nice, but we know the other stuff is out there.
Ah, Target. Target, in the US, gets about 45 minutes of the missing bonus materials, in addition to the original plain-Jane's 30 minutes. No commentary. And still missing about forty-odd minutes of stuff.
Oh, great. Best Buy has the other features. Joy. Even worse, the extra extras don't come on a bonus disc. No, no. Best Buy wants to force you to use their crappy streaming service, CinemaNow.
So where's the enhanced commentary?
Swell. That's an iTunes exclusive. Oh, and look. It even shifts to IMAX ratios during the appropriate scenes ... UNLIKE the Blu-ray.
"But Blu-ray can't do that, right?" - Wrong. Warner did it for The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises.
"But that enhanced commentary ... they stop the movie and zoom in and do all kinds of things they don't do on normal commentaries. Surely they can't do that on a Blu-ray." - Wrong. Warner (again) has done it before with something they call "Maximum Movie Mode." It's like a branching DVD to the Nth degree.
...
Why are my panties in such a bunch over this? Because I'm a loyal, paying customer. That's why.
Instead of doling out these features to retailers to make them feel special, they should have accumulated them to make me, the guy with the money, feel special. This is a major release with a built-in audience and we've come to expect discs full of content, especially after 1) the great 2009 Star Trek Blu-ray release and 2) hearing that JJ and crew were making hours more of bonuses for the Blu-ray.
Look, when it comes to Blu-ray releases, I'm an easy lay. You put everything in one special edition set and I'll pay whatever I have to for it. $30? Done. $40? I'll hesitate for a moment and then buy it. But you're, instead, spreading everything I want out so that I'd have to buy it three times, spending upwards of $70, being triple-dipped in the process? Never mind the fact that the presentation we're getting on the medium for the best presentation (the Blu-ray disc) is lacking in that presentation (no IMAX shifting; no commentary; streaming extras).
It's ridiculous.
You might be saying to yourself that streaming is where it's at ... but it's not. Certainly not right now.
The numbers tell us that the rental market (remember Blockbuster?) has moved to streaming. The physical home video market, though, is still doing well. Couple that with my desire to have the movie to watch when I want to watch it and in the best possible quality ...
Streaming, currently, can't give me 1080p all the time. My cable company's speeds change depending on my neighbors' usage. Netflix sometimes pulls titles out of rotation. I can't rely on streaming to watch the movies I want and in the best way. And when it comes to special features, I don't want to have to search YouTube for them and see them in less-than-perfect quality.
As a videophile and as a fan of the movie you want me to spend money on, it makes no sense whatsoever to hold back on features and to not present them in the best possible manner. On this point, Paramount has failed utterly.
(Pics and some details from TrekCore and Digital Bits.)
Digital Bits' Bill Hunt participated in a podcast and it was discussed at length. There's a download of the podcast and a text transcript available here. In that podcast, he notes that he has spoken to folks at Paramount and they, A) were surprised by the backlash and, B) now know they have a problem.
Hopefully we can get a full, high-quality release sometime soon.
It has nothing to do with "John Harrison," the action-over-substance argument or any of that biz. It's all about Paramount, Bad Robot and how they decided to treat their customers.
See that? That's a fancy set, complete with a QMx replica. I really wanted that phaser. The whole thing costs about $80.
I preordered that months ago. Over the weekend, I cancelled the order.
Why? Because the Blu-ray it comes with doesn't have all of the features that it should. Sounds petty, perhaps, but to a videophile and completist, it's damn near a sin.
You see, they produced hours of bonus content for the video release including all the requisite behind-the-scenes stuff and an immersive commentary.
What you get on that phaser set's Blu-ray is the same thing you'd get if you just bought the plain movie straight out: about thirty minutes worth of features. No commentary. Still missing about an hour or more of other features.
See that? It's a near-priceless set. The "Meteor Edition" they're calling it. You have to enter to win that piece of space rock shaped to look like an insignia because they only made one. What special features come on its Blu-ray discs? The same as on the plain-Jane release.
So where did the commentary and the other stuff go? Retailer exclusives.
No, that's the Walmart edition. It's a plain-Jane movie set with a Hot Wheels Vengeance model. Nice, but we know the other stuff is out there.
Ah, Target. Target, in the US, gets about 45 minutes of the missing bonus materials, in addition to the original plain-Jane's 30 minutes. No commentary. And still missing about forty-odd minutes of stuff.
Oh, great. Best Buy has the other features. Joy. Even worse, the extra extras don't come on a bonus disc. No, no. Best Buy wants to force you to use their crappy streaming service, CinemaNow.
So where's the enhanced commentary?
Swell. That's an iTunes exclusive. Oh, and look. It even shifts to IMAX ratios during the appropriate scenes ... UNLIKE the Blu-ray.
"But Blu-ray can't do that, right?" - Wrong. Warner did it for The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises.
"But that enhanced commentary ... they stop the movie and zoom in and do all kinds of things they don't do on normal commentaries. Surely they can't do that on a Blu-ray." - Wrong. Warner (again) has done it before with something they call "Maximum Movie Mode." It's like a branching DVD to the Nth degree.
...
Why are my panties in such a bunch over this? Because I'm a loyal, paying customer. That's why.
Instead of doling out these features to retailers to make them feel special, they should have accumulated them to make me, the guy with the money, feel special. This is a major release with a built-in audience and we've come to expect discs full of content, especially after 1) the great 2009 Star Trek Blu-ray release and 2) hearing that JJ and crew were making hours more of bonuses for the Blu-ray.
Look, when it comes to Blu-ray releases, I'm an easy lay. You put everything in one special edition set and I'll pay whatever I have to for it. $30? Done. $40? I'll hesitate for a moment and then buy it. But you're, instead, spreading everything I want out so that I'd have to buy it three times, spending upwards of $70, being triple-dipped in the process? Never mind the fact that the presentation we're getting on the medium for the best presentation (the Blu-ray disc) is lacking in that presentation (no IMAX shifting; no commentary; streaming extras).
It's ridiculous.
You might be saying to yourself that streaming is where it's at ... but it's not. Certainly not right now.
The numbers tell us that the rental market (remember Blockbuster?) has moved to streaming. The physical home video market, though, is still doing well. Couple that with my desire to have the movie to watch when I want to watch it and in the best possible quality ...
Streaming, currently, can't give me 1080p all the time. My cable company's speeds change depending on my neighbors' usage. Netflix sometimes pulls titles out of rotation. I can't rely on streaming to watch the movies I want and in the best way. And when it comes to special features, I don't want to have to search YouTube for them and see them in less-than-perfect quality.
As a videophile and as a fan of the movie you want me to spend money on, it makes no sense whatsoever to hold back on features and to not present them in the best possible manner. On this point, Paramount has failed utterly.
(Pics and some details from TrekCore and Digital Bits.)
Digital Bits' Bill Hunt participated in a podcast and it was discussed at length. There's a download of the podcast and a text transcript available here. In that podcast, he notes that he has spoken to folks at Paramount and they, A) were surprised by the backlash and, B) now know they have a problem.
Hopefully we can get a full, high-quality release sometime soon.
Tuesday, September 3, 2013
'Adventure Time' at Dragon Con 2013
That's my boy, James, cosplaying as Finn and meeting the voices behind the title characters, John DiMaggio and Jeremy Shada. They were as nice and funny in person as you could ever hope.
Great story about the Sunday morning Adventure Time panel ...
They asked people to line up for questions, kids first, and James said, "I have one." I asked what it was about and he said, "The King Worm."
Now, I'm old enough to remember Shatner's famous "Get a Life" speech on SNL and the simple reality that the actors on a show don't necessarily have all the answers on the show's mythology. But I said he could go ask anyway.
I wish I had been recording.
Here's his question, paraphrased: "In one old episode, it ended with Finn and Jake being hypnotized by King Worm. Then, in a new episode, a few seasons later, they were in a dream and they fought their way out and killed the King Worm because he was hypnotizing them. Does this mean all of the episodes before weren't real?"
There were a few audible "whoas" in the audience and Jeremy and John slowly looked at each other. John said, "I'm leaving," stood up and started to walk off stage. Jeremy said, "Kids ask the best questions." The audience applauded.
I'm an idiot for not videoing this.
John said, "Wow," a few times before saying, "I don't know."
Someone in the audience piped up and said, "Pen says no." (I have no reason to doubt him, but I didn't find an official word on the subject.)
After that, John relayed his theory that the whole show is really the imagination of a dying child in a hospital whose only comfort is his dog. (Yikes.)
Then James was congratulated for stumping the panel and he got more applause.
Thanks to Star Trek and Doctor Who, he's got a mind for paradoxes, I guess.
I also bought John's con-exclusive documentary, I Know That Voice ... all about voice actors. As thrilled as I am to see it, finally, I'm not sure I want to know what Frank Welker really looks like. Still, I'll watch it soon. Here's the trailer:
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Killing Time: Kaiju Movie Challenge
I'm still writing ... just not as much as I'd like. More on that some other time.
MEANWHILE, you're aware of my and my son's affinity for Godzilla and other monster movies, right? Well, looking ahead to the new Godzilla film (May 16, 2014), we've decided to undertake something massive.
It's the Kaiju Movie Challenge. By the time the new Godzilla film opens, we aim to have finished watching all 60+ of the films listed here:
At my Tumblr page, my son and I have been posting brief reviews (along with the posters and trailers) for each one. You can read the ones we've done so far HERE.
Feel free to join us and let us know what you think as you watch along.
MEANWHILE, you're aware of my and my son's affinity for Godzilla and other monster movies, right? Well, looking ahead to the new Godzilla film (May 16, 2014), we've decided to undertake something massive.
It's the Kaiju Movie Challenge. By the time the new Godzilla film opens, we aim to have finished watching all 60+ of the films listed here:
- Gojira (1954)
- Godzilla Raids Again (1955)
- Rodan (1956)
- The Mysterians (1957)
- Varan (1958)
- Battle in Outer Space (1958)
- Mothra (1961)
- Gorgo (1961)
- King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962)
- Gorath (1962)
- Atragon (1963)
- Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964)
- Dogora (1964)
- Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster (1964)
- Frankenstein Conquers the World (1965)
- Invasion of the Astro-Monster (1965)
- Gamera (1965)
- Ebirah, Horror of the Deep, aka Godzilla vs. The Sea Monster (1966)
- War of the Gargantuas (1966)
- Gamera vs. Barugon (1966)
- The Daimajin Trilogy (1966)
- Son of Godzilla (1967)
- King Kong Escapes (1967)
- Gamera vs. Gyaos (1967)
- Gappa (1967)
- The X from Outer Space (1967)
- Yongary, Monster from the Deep (1967)
- Destroy All Monsters (1968)
- Gamera vs. Viras (1968)
- All Monsters Attack aka Godzilla's Revenge (1969)
- Latitude Zero (1969)
- Gamera vs. Guiron (1969)
- Space Amoeba (1970)
- Gamera vs. Jiger (1970)
- Godzilla vs. Hedorah aka Godzilla vs. The Smog Monster (1971)
- Gamera vs. Zigra (1971)
- Godzilla vs. Gigan aka Godzilla on Monster Island (1972)
- Godzilla vs. Megalon (1973)
- Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla (1974)
- Terror of Mechagodzilla (1975)
- The War in Space (1977)
- Gamera: Super Monster (1980)
- Return of Gojira aka Godzilla 1985 (1984)
- Pulgasari (1985)
- Godzilla vs. Biollante (1989)
- Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)
- Godzilla vs. Mothra (1992)
- Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II (1993)
- Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla (1994)
- Orochi, the Eight-Headed Dragon (1994)
- Gamera: Guardian of the Universe (1995)
- Godzilla vs. Destoroyah (1996)
- Gamera 2: Attack of Legion (1996)
- Rebirth of Mothra (1996)
- Rebirth of Mothra II (1997)
- Rebirth of Mothra III (1998)
- Godzilla (US; 1998)
- Gamera 3: Awakening of Iris (1999)
- Godzilla 2000 (1999)
- Godzilla vs. Megaguirus (2000)
- Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (2001)
- Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla (2002)
- Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S. (2003)
- Godzilla: Final Wars (2004)
- Garuda (2004)
- Gamera the Brave (2006)
- The Host (2006; rated R)
- The Monster X Strikes Back (2008)
- Cloverfield (2008)
- Trollhunter (2010)
- Monsters (2010; rated R)
- Pacific Rim (2013)
At my Tumblr page, my son and I have been posting brief reviews (along with the posters and trailers) for each one. You can read the ones we've done so far HERE.
Feel free to join us and let us know what you think as you watch along.
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