Kingsman: The Golden Circle: Worth Seeing

Posted on October 8, 2017 by Steve

The surprise hit from a couple years ago returns and the people running things did it well. Circle is a sequel that dodged the pitfalls many run into:

  • More and more characters on top of who was in the original.
  • Another crisis that isn’t too different from the last (sadly, The Avengers falls into this category).

To address bullet-point number two, and this isn’t a spoiler, the threat is a villain named Poppy who controls much of the illegal drug trade (pot, heroin, coke, etc.). Poppy has only one simple demand of the world’s leaders, make her business legal because she wants to live in the open, not in her secret base.

Step one in Poppy’s plan is to destroy the Kingsmen which is pretty obvious in the trailer. Now Eggsy and Merlin seek help from the American version of their organization, the Statesmen. From there they discover that Harry is still alive via a stretched explanation but they all team up to take down Poppy for good.

Circle is as good as the original, following in the foot steps of the goofy, exaggerated spy films made in the Sixties cashing in on James Bond and The Man from UNCLE. It’s filled with numerous fights using 360° pans and slow-motion sequences a la The Matrix, impossible gadgets, a callback to Harry’s infamous ass-kicking method, sly jokes and a demonstration of Elton John’s acting ability.

If you enjoyed The Kingsman, you will be thrilled to see Circle, it lived up to the hype. Never seen either and/or you dig Austin Powers, watch the first one and then get to Cricle at your nearby theater.

Alamo Extras:  Cartoon of bugs having a picnic; super-long beer commercial, another for John Collier clothes and lastly spy toys from the Sixties; cowboys singing “I Saw The Light”; Trailer for Spy in Your Eye, For Your Height Only and The Man on the Spying Trapeze; UK Newsreel showing an American rodeo; parkour sequences inspired by The Kingman; and lastly, the hilarious meeting of Archer and Eggsy.

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Stars win their home opener for the ninth time

Posted on October 7, 2017 by Steve

It’s just an oddity, not a fact or whatever people take as a certainty. They just came out scoring but they let their guard down a little too much against the Chicago Wolves, who are now the affiliate for the Las Vegas Golden Knights (terrible name, it’s too long for starters).

There were three players wearing As so I think the Head Coach hasn’t decided who will be captain this season. I doubt it was like the situation during their first season when our initial coach was often injured.

How awesome it is that hockey season is back!

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RIP Harry Dean Stanton

Posted on October 4, 2017 by Steve

If the celebrities I like could hang in there for a couple more weeks, I may catch up on all the other obituaries I want to post on my site without them piling up.

Which brings me to Harry. He was a great actor even outside my favorite genres, such as Big Love and Paris, TX. I would prefer to go on with the cool stuff he did that’s close to my heart: Alien (first victim of the Xenomorph’s humanoid form), Escape from New York, Pretty in Pink (an usual turn as a single dad) and the horrible Red Dawn. His greatest role was Bud in Repo Man, the repo man who tutors Otto on how the job is intense. Harry had the gravelly, rough around the edges personality you’d expect in a starship engineer or beleaguered man who’s seen it all, he was the Battle of Okinawa.

Thanks Harry. What I’d give to express my gratitude to you in person, namely for Repo Man, the coolest and weirdest film I got hooked on in high school, much of it from your character’s dialog.

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Dada

Posted on October 2, 2017 by Steve

File under “bands that should’ve been more popular” in the Nineties and Dada is on the short list. I finally got to see this awesome LA trio live. They were passing through Austin to celebrate their debut album Puzzle turning 25 (I accidentally put it under my 1993 compilation since you couldn’t find it easily until 1993). Back in the day, everything was all about Nirvana so the labels put all their energy into finding another Grunge act while I’m glad IRS Records bucked the trend. Sadly, Dada was the last major act IRS handled as others disbanded or left for bigger labels: REM to Warner Brothers, Go Gos disbanded in 1985, Wall of Voodoo before the 1990s, Concrete Blonde went to Capitol, the whole English Beat stuff kept turning into smaller acts until being dropped and Let’s Active disbanded by 1990.

I wouldn’t say Dada live is for everyone. Joie, Michael and Phil like to jam, draw out some of their songs while throwing in others at the bridge; “Satisfaction” and the James Bond theme. They also took a little break for Joie and Phil’s side band 7Horse, see below, those would be the songs on the right side/margin. Their cover choices were amusing too, “One” which was written by Harry Nilsson but better known through Three Dog Night’s cover and “California Dreaming” by the Mamas & Papas at the encore before they closed the show with “Dorina.”

They did a couple of my personal favorites as you see, “Bob the Drummer” and “Dog.” No luck with “Posters,” “Trip With My Dad,” “Here Today, Gone Tomorrow” and I highly doubt they ever do “I’m Feeling Nothing” from The Brady Bunch Movie. Other great news, Dada will be returning with a whole new album! They’re currently selling a single on vinyl but they promised next year we shall see Dada’s return with a sixth studio album.

Now c’mon Helen, sing “Dim” with me.

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Welcome October 2017!

Posted on October 2, 2017 by Steve

Normally I would had artwork to go with the theme of Italian Heritage or Pizza, but in light of Stranger Things returning to Netflix for its second season, I made it the header with the show’s typeface. You check out the cool opening credits I had made from the header below. Courtesy of this site. Be nice to them, send them a dollar or two for what they create.

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Summer of 1982 IX: Blade Runner: The Final Cut in 4K

Posted on September 30, 2017 by Steve

Better late than never? Well, five years late since I’m guessing Blade Runner‘s owners have a stake in 2049 being a hit by reminding us how incredible the first chapter is. It was disappointing  to end The Summer of 1982 festival with TRON.

Firstly, I need to lead with a confession. Until this screening, I have never seen Blade Runner all the way through. I know, I know. How did this happen? Well, when it debuted in 1982, I wasn’t allowed to see R-rated movies, being only 14. My parents ditched cable by the time it hit HBO. I never got around to seeing it in college. More years passed and I went to see a midnight showing at the now gone Dobie Theater around 1998…I fell asleep. Now I’m grateful I did put it off. Until 1992, the movie had that awful voiceover narration and uncharacteristic happy ending. Then the “Director’s Cut” wasn’t truly Ridley Scott’s take on how he would tell the story given a second chance. The above version came out, I think 10 years ago but I would like to leave the final answer to my cousin Dana who calls Blade Runner her favorite Sci-Fi film.

As the title states, I attended a newly 4K-restored print. Ridley Scott even had a brief introduction before the movie started, saying this is his definitive telling of the story and he supervised the restoration. It was gorgeous on the big screen.

Blade Runner has become a landmark film in may ways:

  • It solidified Harrison Ford’s status as a bankable star and Ridley Scott as a director, namely in Sci-Fi or Action.
  • Introduced us to Rutger Hauer and gave Daryl Hanna her best gig until Splashed. I think it was also Sean Young’s big debut. William Sanderson and James Edward Olmos received big boosts as they returned to TV: Newhart and Miami Vice respectively.
  • Dystopian future flicks never looked this good before. They usually went with ruins or dilapidated buildings. Logan’s Run would be an exception but its domed city looks cheesy. The point is, the settings on past movies were cheap. Blade Runner‘s 2019 Los Angeles is fascinating, lived-in, depressing and likely. The setting is the movie’s biggest uncredited character.
  • The story is really a futuristic film noir involving philosophical questions and mysteries regarding human existence, the nature of memory and are manufactured beings property or people. We’re still grappling with these matters given how much we’ve progressed with genetics.
  • For a Sci-Fi movie, Blade Runner doesn’t have a “big” ending like its cousins Star Wars or Alien yet Roy’s quiet death is brilliant and memorable.

I was creeped out by Deckerd’s actions toward Rachel in his apartment. He practically rapes her but I’m guessing the character doesn’t see it that way because she’s just a Replicant. Despite this cultural shift in attitudes, Blade Runner easily earned its spot as one the greatest films made both Sci-Fi and “regular.”

Ratings:

1982 (13-year-old me): A. Hands down I would’ve loved this at 14 despite the romance and slow pace. Blade Runner had flying cars, super-strong Replicants, computers, bare boobs and fights. All the Asian influences around Los Angeles fit the mood then as Americans felt the Japanese were taking over the world economically, ergo they would  have succeeded culturally in the near future. The constant rain seemed implausible then as it does today.

2012 and 2017: A+. Blade Runner is almost a perfect movie which is quite a feat with the Sci-Fi genre. The performances hold up after 30-35 years. The effects are still believable. The score by Vangelis sets the mood without sounding dated. This dark future thankfully didn’t happen but it remains a possibility given advances in genetic engineering and corporate power. Most importantly to me, the story provokes thought and questions and not just the easy one…is Deckerd a Replicant too?

Since Blade Runner was slated to be part of the key nine films in the 1982 celebration, I want to close with the three life lessons initiated by Conan the Barbarian:

  1. Question your reality, memory is flawed
  2. Manufactured life might be more human than Human
  3. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain
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New weight-loss plan…stop eating at night

Posted on September 30, 2017 by Steve

Somara has lost a significant amount of weight. Enough that she needed to buy new clothes…and she has been rubbing my nose in it because she hates exercise, says it’s boring. Since I’ve ballooned back up after my leave last Summer and running alone isn’t cutting it, October will be me following her tactic. Oh I won’t be starving all evening, I’ll probably shoot for fruit and/or vegetables.

Let’s see if I can finally swing the other progression bar in the right direction.

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Marquette radio/stream is actually listenable

Posted on September 28, 2017 by Steve

I truly cannot even remember when I hunted it down to add it to my iTunes’ radio but most days Marquette’s stream plays music from this century unlike the attitudes when I attended. One major difference is that the DJs hardly speak. I’m not sure it’s by edict from the administration (always paranoid over students saying what’s really on their minds) or the host’s choice. There was an interruption in the tunes for a talk show about faith. Being an Atheist, I moved on to my own stream since I could care less.

Whoops, this link shows the schedule. I was wrong, there are times the station is on “automation” which would explain the lack of DJ banter.

Whoever is in charge needs to make a couple slight changes. The first is to adjust the software they use to state what is being played. The sports shows are still boring along with the doofus who was giving a Beatles tutorial. Ugh. Well, it’s Milwaukee, a land trapped in time when it comes to cultural matters like music.

They’ve still come a long way from the days when I was at WMUR and there was always a bunch who wanted to play their tired Led Zeppelin collection.

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RIP Stanislav Petrov

Posted on September 26, 2017 by Steve

According to newspaper reports, Petrov may have passed away this May since real news out of Russia is difficult to get.

You probably never heard of him until the reports of his death. I had heard of him indirectly over the years since Petrov was mentioned in some other Russian bigwig’s memoirs.

The world should be grateful to former Lt. Col. Petrov too. Because of his actions, the world didn’t end in a horrible nuclear fireball around late 1983. What happened then was a false alarm reports as a first launch by the Soviet’s newly installed detection system. Allegedly it mistook reflections off clouds as five nuclear missiles heading toward the USSR. Sounds like a pretty dumb computer. However, we got pretty close to ending the world in 1979 thanks to our setup mistaking the moon rising over the horizon for the same dilemma.

Petrov had 23 minutes to think and decide what to do as the duty officer at the Soviet’s defense command center outside Moscow. If he was wrong, the consequences were catastrophic. Do nothing. The USSR gets nailed and probably retaliates automatically. Call his superiors…and given their belligerent mood via St. Reagan’s saber rattling, a Korean jet being shutdown by the Soviet air force and America’s invasion of Grenada…Soviet leader Chernenko would’ve immediately ordered a counter-strike. Well, he applied reason and his knowledge of the new system. Firstly he thought, if the Americans want to destroy us, they’d launch hundreds, thousands of missiles, not five. Secondly, he knew the computer program was flawed and has been quoted as saying, we’re superior to machines for we made them.

He was right. There was no attack.

Sadly, Petrov’s reward for a saving the world was a reprimand by his superiors. It wasn’t over his quick thinking. It was for not following bureaucratic procedure in logging the events properly. In his defense, he said, I couldn’t log because I didn’t have a third arm while he had the phone in one and the intercom button pressed down via the other.

You can read about the rest of post-air force career through the link. He may have been a member of our enemy’s military but I think we still owe him a debt of gratitude for not given into the time period’s paranoia.

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A candle to protect me from ignorant Trumpanzees

Posted on September 25, 2017 by Steve

Can’t go wrong with today’s public spokesman for Science and just generally awesome speaker Dr. Neil DeGrasse Tyson. He’s another reason why I decided to go back to school, to help communicate harder concepts to others…well, and I want to understand them too.

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Happy Batman…uhhh, Harley Quinn Day

Posted on September 24, 2017 by Steve

There’s a bomb in the dumbbell. If I do fewer than five reps a minute, it will go off!

Yesterday, DC chose to honor the 25th anniversary of Harley Quinn joining their comic-book universe through the awesome cartoon. Originally brought in to be the Joker’s number-one henchman and at times, love interest, Harley has since crossed over into the comic books as a member of Suicide Squad. She has her own title too. Personally, I think the character has become DC’s answer to Marvel’s Deadpool.

Above are a trio of very funny and friendly cosplayers who came to Rogues Gallery to help celebrate.

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Dunkirk: Must See

Posted on September 23, 2017 by Steve

Christopher Nolan returns to cover a real event instead of a hypothetical future he failed to impress me with his poor Astronomical knowledge (aka Interstellar). In this retelling of the Allied evacuation at Dunkirk, his style works and frustrates.

I’ll go with what I loved first. Nolan captures the terror the frightened soldiers feel, the tight spaces on the ships, the horrors of what really happens when a large vessel gets nailed by a torpedo and the reserve the commanding officers have to display in a no-win situation. As you know, Nazi Germany outwitted the Allies (the British and French) and successfully invaded France with the use of paratroopers. Poor Belgium, Luxembourg and Holland got caught in the way too. Desperation is the mood throughout the beach. For some, screw who’s winning, getting home is all that matters.

Here’s what annoyed me. Nolan’s signature of jumping around in time. One moment we see a British officer being rescued by a volunteer’s yacht, then we see the same officer commanding soldier’s rowing out to a hospital ship…forcing the audience to go, oh, that was him hours earlier. It ruins the arc involving the RAF pilots too. I know Dunkirk not a documentary but the story should be linear for I don’t believe it would ruin the narrative nor the drama.

If you can handle the jumping around a la Momento or Tarantino overdoing it, you’ll love the movie. I think it’s great yet I would rather see it again, edited “correctly.” Beyond the style element, Nolan’s regulars are present too: Michael Caine, Cillian Murphy and Tom Hardy. Seeing Kenneth Branagh was a highlight for me.

Alamo Extras: British newsreel showing Berlin at WWII’s end, the UK’s WWI guns and what cameras show when they’re in fighter planes; A 1940 films showcase: Chaplin’s The Dictator, Waterloo Bridge and Hitchcock’s Foreign Correspondent; a list of traits in Nolan movies; and the 11 movies that influenced Dunkirk:

  1. All Quiet on the Western Front
  2. Wages of Fear
  3. Alien
  4. Speed
  5. Unstoppable
  6. Greed (1924)
  7. Sunrise (1927)
  8. Ryan’s Daughter
  9. The Battle of Algiers
  10. Chariots of Fire
  11. Foreign Correspondent
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Power to another lady DM I met!

Posted on September 23, 2017 by Steve

With Rogues Gallery having more room, I’m seeing more games happening and I had to applaud encountering another D&D game run by a lady! Right there with the Tech Industry, gaming both video and tabletop, has been the domain of males so I will always welcome…nay, ENCOURAGE, ladies of all ages to follow their bliss! I hope to run into this DM again, buy her a DM aid as a way of saying, don’t take any crap from naysayers.

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RIP Grant Hart & Jessi Zazu

Posted on September 23, 2017 by Steve

With these two great musicians/writers, I didn’t forget, I put them off so my site wouldn’t be just a long string of sad, sad obituaries.

First was seeing Grant Hart passing. Most people my age know him as the drummer for Husker Du and his heroin addiction was why they disbanded right when they were gaining a larger following around 1987-8. Grant continued to perform and make records, he just wasn’t as prolific as Bob Mould. His other legacy? The Posies did a song about him on their great 1996 release Amazing Disgrace.

The other person dying was even more tragic because she was so young. Jessi Zazu was a founder and key member of Those Darlins, a darkly funny act I got introduced to via my electronic subscription to Spin. “I Wanna Be Your Bro” still makes me laugh through its “bratty” vocals about a tomboy rejecting the romantic overtures of her male friend. Jessi’s band only made three albums before disbanded at the end of 2015, when she was diagnosed with cancer. I highly recommend them, especially if you like Voice of the Beehive, B-52s, Drive-By Truckers, Jason Isbell and Southern Culture on the Skids.

Thanks Jessi and Grant for your music. I hope you live on through streaming and whatever the future holds when the next “big thing” happens.

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Cake!

Posted on September 23, 2017 by Steve

It’s been a while since Somara has decorated a cake for a nice person. Which reminds me, we need to look into getting her kick-ass mixer repaired, if that’s possible.

Meanwhile, I need to check into the leftovers Somara may have from trimming this delicacy into a perfect rectangle.

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