Meet the new July Challenge.

Yep, July is almost upon us. Tomorrow I will watch my first music video and give my thoughts on it. And I'll do that for the rest of the month, unless work interferes. But even then I'll try to keep up with a video a day.

Let's do this!

This Week In Entertainment (6/30/08)

My Pick of the Week is something that's been out already, but we have a thin week. Still, can you believe that they repackaged the campy 60s movie to look like this? I still wish they would release the tv series on DVD.


In theaters we have Will Smith's drunk superhero Hancock. I wasn't excited by the teaser trailer but the regular trailer was a little better. Maybe I'll eventually catch this movie.


On DVD is some animated Hellboy stuff. Say, is there a sequel coming out soon?


Finally, on the WiiWare is Magentica Twist, a game you could probably play online for free. I know I've seen it before. This game is 1000 Wii poins.

Cinematic Titanic: The Doomsday Machine

Ok, now let's do this for real. Hopefully this is worth the wait.

The Doomsday Machine (1972(?)) starts with a slow boring credit sequence before starting properly in China. We see a female spy sneak into a not-heavily guarded at all base. Seriously, there's only two guards and she gets by one by tossing a cat over a small brick wall. She steals a labcoat inside the base while killing a passing a scientist with the victim's own braids. Then, she meets up with another spy who somehow knew when to meet her and they take out the second and last guard. What I'm saying is that this is a low budget movie that couldn't remotely pull off spy stuff at the beginning. It's the least occupied place in China. They find a small item with a dome and sneak out after taking two pictures of it.

Cut to a place which is really a US defense place and not a classroom. The people watch the two slides over and over again. One of the slides shows a bunch of switches. Somehow, the officials figure out that it's a doomsday device.

Cut to a US base where a rocket is going to be sent to Venus soon. We get the obligatory press conference where some guy (who I think is one of our astronauts, but he's so forgettable) gives the obligatory SCIENCE! speech. It's so obvious that I wonder why it was used then instead of now when there's less interest in space, but it does eat up time. All the time we get an annoying announcer interrupting the actors with T-minus whatever crap. I remember being a kid when counting off to zero ALWAYS led to us yelling "BLASTOFF!" I guess that's why people lost interest in NASA. It's very boring and the counting is annoying.

Anyway, we meet our astronauts. We have a crazy pilot, and old man, and the comic relief. The comic relief is played by Bobby Van but I'm not sure who he is. He should be the annoying type, but if you watch this film you'll forget him. The crew is ready to go but are puzzled about the fact that they're being rushed. Even more puzzling is the fact that some of the crew is being dumped for three women. The new crew members are a boring forgettable leader woman, a slutty woman, and a Soviet stereotype. Along with the captain who gave the speech earlier we have a crew of seven who are forced into space a little early.

Now, we get to the rocket, which is where the budget reveals itself. If you've seen the movie 12 to the Moon, imagine that they dropped the international angle, but still had the same budget. I'm talking about a small rocket where the crew members use recliners. Seriously, look at this picture and try not to laugh.



Actually, I'm sure 12 to the Moon had a higher budget. At least they did stuff on a planet. Our crew in this movie never land anywhere. It's mostly just the misadventures of dysfunctional astronauts on their shape changing rocket. The old guy nearly dies on takeoff. The women disobey direct orders but are never punished. The pilot is a complete jerk who becomes a near rapist toward the end. The comic relief is so bad that we can't even bother to hate him.

And thanks to the doomsday device, these are the last seven people alive. The slutty woman completely freaks out when she finds out the news. Good thing they chose her to be one of three women left to (somehow) populate Venus.

Of course, she would have if it weren't for the sudden blast of radiation from what was the earth. Now we learn that the crew might go sterile, and their only hope to reach Venus is to lose four crew members. (What a dark film. And yet I still don't find it as nihilistic as The Oozing Skull. Go figure.) They actually ask their ship computer who will survive, even though it would obviously include two women and the best man of the four. Despite this, they somehow leave it up to the computer and question it when the results are back. Our captain shows initiative for the first time when he suddenly decides that no one will die, but it's too late. The crazy pilot and the slutty woman get jettisoned into space when he tries to rape her. We actually watch them as they get exposed to the vacuum and it's pretty gross. Even though it's not like Event Horizon, it's something the audience could have done without as we watch blood pour from their eyes. This scene is one of the big moments of the film and you can see a picture of it on the DVD.



Somehow our crew finds out about this despite the fact that they're in space and moving really fast. Then they try to get rid of some weight. While doing so, we find out about a small chest that contains food for Venus. It was introduced early in the movie but no one would remember it by the time that's revealed. Anyway, as the crew gets closer to Venus, the ship has problems that Bobby Van has to sacrifice himself to fix. Mostly he sort of climbs on the rocket, straddles it somehow (It's the tiniest rocket ever!) and does something with a crowbar. He has problems until the Soviet (who falls for him despite the fact that she's otherwise unemotional) helps. They get left behind as the Astra takes off. Good one, Russkie. Now the human race is down to one woman.

That is until Bobby and the Russian woman find a ghost ship. This is a Russian ship that was rumored to be lost. As they board the ship, the movie shifts a gear. Thanks to the low budget, from here on out this couple is replaced by stock footage of astronauts from another movie and voice acting by other actors. Not only that, but after it seems that these two are going to reunite with the Astra and a happy ending is to be achieved, the rug is pulled out from beneath them. Some voice (from space?) tells them that there was no Astra. I'm not kidding. They rip off the ending of Monster a-Go-Go.

If this movie doesn't sound terrible and boring, than I've done something wrong. The plot is terrible, the sets are ridiculously cheap, and the actors sleepwalk through their performances. The movie is depressing and hardly worth the trip.


Which means we have a good candidate for the CT Titans. I was really excited about this episode when I heard about it. Unfortunately, the episode wasn't quite what I was hoping for. That's not to say that I don't recommend it, but I was hoping that this would be a big improvement over The Oozing Skull. It's a good episode, but if I gave it a grade it would still be in the C range. It compares more to a mid Joel MST3k episode. Maybe Joel fans would appreciate that but I'm more of a fan of the SciFi era.

I would say that this episode has a slow beginning, a slow end, and a good in between. It keeps a good pace, but it's not as fast as later MST3k episodes would be. I'm starting to wonder if they still haven't quite figured out how to distribute riffs among five people. With three people the riffs can come fairly rapidly. Maybe in a few episodes they'll figure it out. Or maybe CT has a slightly more laid back approach to riffing. It's not as laid back as the early Joel episodes, but it's still slower than what I'm used to.

Another thing that I have to poin out is that while I laughed at most of the riffs, I don't think there were many laugh out loud riffs. That's not necessarily a bad thing (at least I never groaned at anything), but it keeps me from giving it a B grade. My favorite episodes of MST3k had parts where I would lose it. While the riffs are good, the episode never quite reach the level where I'm gasping for air. (For example, there's a scene in Riding with Death where Casey is attacked and Buffalo rushes in to save him. There's three rapid fire riffs that make fun of Buffalo that still crack me up to this day. ("Super Cracker!" "And, he misses the fight completely.") This is why I raise the issue of the ok but not quite fast pace of the riffs, because usually the funniest MST3k moments are when riffs come so fast that you don't have the opportunity to recover.

Like I said before, the host segments aren't very good. The first movie break is so predictable that it should have been an MST3k cartoon. I can agree with the premise, but it goes nowhere and fails to get a laugh. The second one is a little better, in that I laughed when Frank told Mary Jo that she wasn't going to survive the apocalypse. It also features the episode's lone visual gag. (Besides a moment at the end, this episode lacks much on screen action. I rewatched The Oozing Skull and forgot about the Steven Hawking thing. It's weird that they can do anything on stage and decided to go conservative with this episode.) The best host segment is the intro, if only because I like the hallways and the picture intros for the Titans. I realize now that there isn't going to be a premise for this show but I hope they keep the intro for new episodes.





The opening credits are slow and the riffs are hit or miss at this poin, but it's not without a few zingers. I think the best was Trace's "Is this another original screen play by (some guy)?" in a accusatory tone. The movie riffs pick up when we reach the spy lady. Some good gags come at the expense of the poorly staffed base and the Chinese. When one guard is killed, Mary Jo remarks that "Ok, now his parents can have another child." (This joke is darker given the recent earthquake, but still funny.) I think it was Frank that poined out that "Just because you bend over like that doesn't mean you're sneaking around." or something to that effect. Josh gets a good MST3k reference when they seem the bubble dome doomsday device.

Later on we move to the base where we get the annoying announcer. Trace gets the best line when he tells the movie to "T-minus SHUT UP!"

It was odd that they waited so long to comment on the changing Astra. That doesn't mean I didn't laugh when they mocked how quickly the rocket (and space station, and whatever) turned in space, but it was toward the end of the movie where they finally mentioned it. "Just pick a plastic spaceship and go with it, ok?" Inside the rocket, the best riffs came from Mary Jo as she laughed at how small the sets were.

Joel's best riff came when Bobby Van was straddling the rocket and he poined out how gravity didn't work until he sat on the one side. And I liked the I Love Lucy riff if only because it gave Trace a chance to do his "Crow doing Lucy Ricardo" impression.

The last part of the movie is really slow, the final thing holding it back from a higher grade. It also features the second on screen gag as Josh leaves and is replaced by a guy with a bigger head. It was an ok gag. I guess this part of the movie was too much for the Titans to salvage.





That's it for my review. I can't wait for the third episode, and hope that it's the home run that I was hoping this episode would be. We'll see in about a month.

Grade: C+

I'm lazy.

CT review later today or this weekend. I promise. I already discussed the premise in my other review so it shouldn't be as long.

Tork gets political.

I hate politics. I really do. I want to be government to small and unimportant so I never have to hear about which party or candidate or politician really for really really sucks worse than the other one. Be that as it may, I've decided to endorse my first candidate. I hope that my readers can be civilized and respect me for the decision I make even if they don't agree with me. I will respect anybody who makes a comment and delete any comments that are too inflammatory.

Anyway, here goes...


We, meaning me, at Tork's Blog officially endorse...














Professor Bobo for Prime Minister of Spain. By voting for him, Spain will have a great leader. He holds a degree in some science, and he loves nature, which is evident by the fact that he spent the last 8 years in a zoo. Sure, some bloggers out there may claim that his degree doesn't exist and that he's crazy because he claims to come from the future, but who listens to bloggers?

Professor Bobo has already hired a campaign manager. In his wisdom, he hired a man named Brain Guy. Though odd in appearance, he carries around a brain, which reminds us how smart Spain's next prime minister will be. They already have a campaign slogan of "Tortillas and MAYO-NAISSE!"

There are no truth to the rumors that Professor Bobo knows or will be a puppet of the former ruler of Qatar. Not at all.

Go on, Spain! Make the world proud!

Cinematic Titanic: Doomsday Machine

I got my copy of Doomsday Machine and a CT tshirt yesterday. If it wasn't summer I'd be wearing the black shirt right now. My preliminary take on the episode is that it was better than The Oozing Skull, but not quite the breakthrough episode I was hoping for. If I graded them, I'd probably both give them Cs but give Doomsday Machine a C+.

This DVD offered one thing that I asked for since the last episode, which was a premise of sorts. Here it is: The Titans (I've seen that name somewhere so I'll use it) are movie riffing guys. Some nerds are big fans so they eagerly await their efforts. As Trace poins out, they don't use robots anymore. That's about it. It's somewhat vague but I think that the poin is that there really is no premise, unless they eventually discuss how and why the theater was built. Maybe some MSTies built it for new riffing and the Titans obliged. Anyway, this intro didn't explain much but it was neat, and I hope they keep it as a part of the show.

Unfortunately, it was the only segment that worked. They had two host segments during the movie and neither of them were good. The first one was very predictable. The second one was better, but I can't recall it now. I like host segments because they provide a break (it's something I miss while listening to Rifftraxes) but these needed work.

I'm going to add more stuff later to day. Keep checking back...

This Week in Entertainment (6/23/08)

(Clang clang, clang clang clang, clang clang, clang clang clang.) The second Futurama movie is My Pick of the Week. Let's hope this is as good as the last one and Al Gore free.

Also out on dvd this week is 10000 B.C. I thought it would be worth watching for the dumb blockbuster value, but the reviews were harsh, so I'll probably skip this.

Xanadu was reviewed twice at my favorite bad movie site. I even downloaded the clip found at badmovies.org about the cheesy opening and played it several times. I'll have to see this one day, but I'm not getting this one because I can't see me needing the soundtrack.


Out in theaters this week is Pixar's latest, Wall-E. I like Pixar but they haven't interested me since Finding Nemo. However, the trailer I saw the other day made the film look far more interesting. I'll have to give the Short Circuit jokes to rest for now.



On the Wii is the latest version or incarnation or sequel (I don't know) of Alone in the Dark. I've actually played a demo of the original. It was slower than Resident Evil and there was only one room as far as I could tell. The reviews have been harsh on this game so I'll probably pass.


Out on the Virtual Console this week is Alex Kidd and Miracle World. Alex Kidd was Sega's pre-Sonic mascot. We had this game because it was built in to the Sega Master System we got. It was a fun game but I never beat it. The bosses played rock/paper/scissor and they were a pain. This game is probably 500 Wii Poins.

Update

So, you may be wondering why I've taken the last couple months off. Well I just haven't been motivated to do anything lately. I want to talk about stuff, but I rarely sit in front of the computer thinking of stuff to say these days. I do have some plans for the future.

In July I'll do what I did last year. Basically I'm completely ignorant of the music industry, so Lita will make me watch 30 music videos. Each day I'll watch a video and give my thoughts and interpretations on it. Last year I even tried to nail the cool thing about it. I'm sure this will be fun to read if you want to mock a nerd and his embarrassing attempts to understand something he usually tries to avoid.

Earlier this month I went to King's Dominion. I was asked if I wanted to go the night before so it was a bit of a surprise. I did take some pictures, but I have yet to upload those. I've probably forgotten a bit but I could still share a few stories when I get around to it. At least it shouldn't take me a whole month to talk about like last year.

This week I should hopefully get my hands on Cinematic Titanic's second episode. I really hope to write a review about the movie and episode as soon as I can. It's the top priority for my blog that isn't music video related.

I wanted to download a whole bunch of Rifftrax shorts and review those, but I haven't gotten around to it yet. I'm very lazy. Let's see if I do that when I have the free time.

Last night while chatting with Lita I found a fan version of MST3k. It's called Incognito Cinema Warriors XP. After cringing at the thought of a fan made MST3k show (Hey, I was the one who bitched about the fan written Rifftrax) I bought the first episode for eight bucks. (Even I don't understand my thought process.) Maybe I'll do a review of it. Then again, I wasn't a fan of Ryan K. Johnson's fan MSTing of Highlander 2, so these new guys better make a darn good first impression.

For ideas that don't involve movie riffing, I wanted to get around to part 2 of my memories of The Beach. I meant to talk about this during the summer last year but I had the same problems then that I do now.

While I was writing this I just bought another fan MSTing. I'll reveal info about it at a later date. It looks dumb but at least it'll give me a chance to watch a movie that was never released. I think I hate myself but maybe the cringe factor won't be high for either of these.

I'll write my usual Monday post later today. Bye for now.

RIP George Carlin

Usually I wouldn't make a big deal over the death of a celebrity, but in this case, I feel partially responsible. Almost a year after I wrote about the life story of George Carlin, he died.


Rest in peace, you foul-mouthed, burnt out cynic. Let us know if Jesus passes the pork chops.

We're DOOMED!

Just a reminder to MST3k fans: Cinematic Titanic's second episode is avaiable for purchase today. It's The Doomsday Machine, and it should be good. CT also has a new store option on it's front page that leads to their first two episodes which now come in dvd cases. You can purchase each episode through paypal for 14.99 each. They also have a tshirt and a cast photo. (The photo has already sold out.)

I hope to do my review of this film and episode as soon as I can, but you can read a GOOD review here.

This Week In Entertainment (6/15/08)

My Pick of the Week is the second set of Popeye cartoons. These come from 1938-1940. There's less shorts, so the set is much cheaper. I believe that these cartoons are color but I'm not sure. I like the fact that a couple are named "Wimmin Is a Myskery" and "Wimmin Hadn't Oughta Drive." Exactly!!



Also out this week in theaters is the Get Smart movie. I haven't seen any summer movies yet but I wouldn't be surprised if I ended up seeing this one. You may notice that I'm not confident about it, but at least it's not the Mike Myers movie that's also coming out this week.

Speaking of bombs, in more way than one, it's The Nude Bomb, the 1980 Get Smart movie. I'm sure my dad has a copy so I should sit down and watch this someday.

Also out on DVD this week is Disney's The Sword In The Stone. I've seen this movie several times and the wizard/witch duel is my favorite scene.

On the Nintendo DS is Arkanoid. I've never had much luck with this game: I can never get passed the third level. However, this version allows you to use the stylus, which could be helpful.

Finally for the Wii is a Wacky Races game. It's about time! I wonder what a crazy cross-country racing game would be like.

This Week In Entertainment (6/9/08)

I'm picking The Incredible Hulk as my Pick of the Week. I didn't care for the original, so hopefully this is a makeup. Let's hope the Hulk gets more screentime.


On DVD is Flatland: the Movie. I usually skip amazon entries without a picture, but I do want to see this movie. I read Flatland in freshman English class. It's about a square that meets a sphere and has to deal with the concepts of other X-dimensional creatures. The women were squiggly lines and were brutal in the book.


I saw several tv series sets that made me wince, so I'll poin out this fourth season of the Odd Couple if only because I used to watch it.

Just in time for the finals, it's NBA Bloopers. I hope it includes a dvd chapter on that referee who was busted last year.

This dvd includes both versions of The Omen, and this dvd includes both versions of Planet of the Apes. Good or bad, depending on how you compare the latter version to the original.

DIC Gold Collection has movies based on some of their shows. I wouldn't have listed this if it weren't for the fact that I used to watch a couple of these shows, but I have no idea what the movies are about. Probably just four or five part episodes.

Also out in theaters this week is Happening, a film by M. Night Shyamalan where...oh, you've moved on already, haven't you?

On the Virtual Console today is Dig Dug for the NES. Seriously, Nintendo, are you trying any more? This is 600 Wii poins, which is twice as much as it should be.

MST3k.com is back.

It left? Oh yeah, I heard about that. For a while the site just sat there. It had four not funny at all cartoons and several host segments already found on Rhino videos or youtube. Then the front page was replaced with a promise to come back in June. I was waiting for it's return to be late June, and I wouldn't have been surprised if they kept pushing it back.

But it is back, and it's a lot less embarrassing. The cartoons are gone, but will probably be revived some day. Right now the site has a riff of the day, which is worth a look, I guess. Let's hope they don't stick to Rhino only. Besides that they have random clips of theater segments and random host segments. They don't have the host segments they put up before which is weird because they did pick some good host segments before. Also the store is now the MSTie Mall.

It's too bad for Jim Mallon that the MSTies have pretty much turned against him. Cinematic Titanic members confirmed the dark rumors that have been centered on him since the cartoons started. I'm not going to repeat them here but they're easier to believe now.


On a somewhat related note, I hope to do a review of CT's Doomsday Machine when I get my hands on it. It should be a good one.

This Week In Entertainment (6/03/08)

This week's Pick of the Week is the Lego version of the Indiana Jones Trilogy. I bought the Lego Trilogy for the GameCube and enjoyed it, though I still have to get the second Lego trilogy. I'm looking forward to this one.

Also out this week is Get Smart: The Complete Series for about 12 bucks!!! Ok, by complete series I mean all seven episodes of the FOX series. I've probably seen all those episodes by the way.

We have two seasons of the seventies' Incredibly Hulk show. What do they mean by Lenticular on the package? Did The Hulk refrain from eating fish on Fridays?

Houdini was a movie I saw on AMC once or twice. Pretty good movie about Houdini and his wife. I don't think I ever saw the end of it, though.

I'm not a big fan of Onion (or fake news in general) but Onion does produce some great gems. (There's an Onion clip of a September 11th conspiracy nut against a member of Al-Qeada. It's brilliant.) So here's their movie from 2005.

Here's 21 shorts starring Stan Laurel before he teamed up with Oliver Hardy. Am I the only one who has problems remember which one is which?

In theaters is an Adam Sandler movie about an Israeli assassin. Maybe I'm getting the wrong vibe from this movie, but it seems like a film that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would enjoy.

Also in theaters is the latest 3d cartoon called Kung Fu Panda. This despite the fact that in real life pandas are too stupid (lazy? babified?) to mate.