I’m not entirely sure what’s happening with DC Comics at the moment, but a lot of people I talk to are really starting to go off them. I am not a full fledged comic nerd. I like to read comics and my house is chock full of the blasted things, but I’ll be honest and say that I’m not up to date with all the ins and outs of the industry. What insider knowledge I do know I usually get from the website “4thletter” or the occasional chat with my pal Phil.
The whole comic industry does seem like a bizarre and interesting place to be. I’ve always secretly wanted to write a comic or graphic novel. I have never given it more than a glancing thought though because I can’t draw for toffee and it seems like such a weird industry to get in to. It’s mainly the drawing though. Seriously, I struggle to draw a convincing looking stick man, the idea of drawing a sprawling fight scene across a murky dystopian landscape would be far beyond my piddling abilities.
The thing is, whenever I’ve thought about writing a comic I usually always want to write about the DC characters, this despite the fact that right now I’m enjoying reading Marvel much more than DC. This seems to be the general consensus from other people that I talk with. Everyone just seems so much more into Marvel. Some aren’t even buying any comics from the supposed “Big Two” and instead are buying comics from independent companies.
That being said, if someone offered me a contract tomorrow to write a story for an existing character from DC, Marvel or anywhere else, I’d still likely pick a DC character just because I find them so interesting. Make no mistake, the DC universe is a grim and depressing place filled with a host of brooding dark characters. With characters like Batman, Jason Todd, Deathstroke, Lex Luthor, Sinestro and others, DC has a very rich talent pool to draw from. Why then, is the current drop of DC books seemingly failing to grip people’s attention? I mean, I buy quite a few DC comics and I’m sure DC makes a reasonable amount in sales each week, so commercially I don’t think they’re failing. But critically, the stories really seem to have missed the mark with more long time readers.
As someone who buys DC, I find most of the time that I am buying the books I buy more for the characters they contain than the actual stories they offer. For instance, I’ve been a regular buyer of “Red Hood and The Outlaws” since its inception. We’re at issue 20 now and none of the narratives have gripped me in any noteworthy way. I keep buying the book because I’m a fan of Jason Todd and occasionally he has an interaction with Starfire, Arsenal or someone else in the Batman universe that I find intriguing. Outside of that, there’s no other reason why I buy it. The current story of Jason wilfully having his memories wiped and the team having a bounty on them isn’t a bad story but it’s not exactly rocking my world either.
The book itself is a collection of good moments but the actual substance of the stories themselves never really infuses. For instance, in one of the earlier stories, Jason and his date end up getting roped into an interplanetary war. Cue plenty of nice scenes where Jason’s date is freaking out that she’s on a space ship while Jason is off shooting aliens. But that’s the only real joy I got from it. I found the actual story of Starfire trying to repel invaders to her home planet rather dull if I’m honest.
I seem to buy DC books now more as a force of habit than actually being interested in the story. Batman and Robin, Red Hood, Batwing, Green Lantern, Red Lanterns and Suicide Squad have all become things I just buy when I’m in the comic shop. In fact, from issue 21 onwards I think I’m going to cut all of them. I might stick with Red Hood and possibly Red Lanterns, but the others are just taking up space now. Suicide Squad in particular has been a massive disappointment for me. I’d been such a huge fan of “Secret Six” and was dismayed when it was pulled. “Suicide Squad” started off looking like it would be the natural successor to that book, and it was probably intended as such.
Ultimately though, it’s gone from being quite interesting to being pretty much a slog. It really is a shame because a comic whose main characters are Deadshot, Harley Quinn and King Shark should really be a great read. King Shark hasn’t been as funny or as entertaining in “Suicide Squad” as he was in “Secret Six”. I really don’t like the new design for him either. It’s weird how a character who is essentially one dimensional can actually lose depth of character, but it’s happened in this book.
Deadshot is by far the best thing in the book and he’s the only character you truly find yourself rooting for. He’s not a traditional bad guy. To call him a bad guy is probably going too far. Deadshot is a selfish person who does bad things because of it. He can equally be capable of doing good things as well, but again it will always be for a selfish reason. That being said, I still kind of like him. He’s the main reason I’ve stuck around as long as I have in all fairness.
Quinn has just kind of got annoying now. I think, more than any other character in DC at the moment, Harley Quinn is the most over-exposed. I just don’t think we need anymore Quinn right now. For the past 10 years they’ve just been shoving more and more Harley at us to the point that I think I’ve hit my Quinn Tolerance Level. She’s a great character but I really think it would do her good to disappear for a little bit. Character’s need a break now and then. For instance, I’d be highly interested in a Killer Croc comic right now because it seems like ages since I last saw him (It likely isn’t of course).
One of the reasons why I’m so into the new “Justice League of America” and spin off “Vibe” comic is that it’s using some characters that we either haven’t seen in a major role for a while (Martian Manhunter) or incorporating some of the brand new ones they’ve just brought in (Vibe, New Green Lantern). JLA has a feeling of freshness to it, even when it also contains other regular characters that have been popping up elsewhere (Catwoman, Green Arrow, Amanda Waller etc)
I tapped out on Catwoman somewhere around issue 11 or 12 I think. I can’t remember. I kind of liked it at first and even when I didn’t, I stuck around as I wanted to give it a chance. It just got to the point where I wasn’t enjoying it anymore and even my admiration for the character couldn’t get me to stick with it.
On the other side of the coin, I’m really starting to get more into Marvel at the moment. A vs X was excellent and felt like a proper “event”. It left the Mutant and Marvel landscape in such a way that I’m excited to see where it goes. Marvel was also smart to introduce a slew of new mutants to enrol at Wolverines school and work hard at giving them recognisable personalities. Quentin Quire in particular has been a stand out but I like Kid Apocalypse too. X-Force went out in a blaze of glory and I was genuinely upset to see it fall by the wayside. Fantomex and Deadpool were excellent with Fantomex being toned up, while Deadpool was toned down. It also had a major role for Daken towards the end, which always scores comic points. Daken’s book getting pulled caused me to lament for a long time, so it was good for him to get a run in the finale of X-Force.
So yeah, Marvel is rocking my world more than DC right now. The number of DC books I buy is going down where as the number of Marvel ones I buy are on the up. I’m sure financially DC will do just fine, but we’re swiftly moving to a time where I will be buying a mere 4 DC books a month, where it used to be nearly 10. Meanwhile, my Marvel intake is going to swell from about 3 to something like 7 or 8. Take into account the ID books I buy and the percentage of income I send DC’s way is going to be considerably lower than it used to be.
Sort it out DC. I want to like you, but you’re not making it easy.
Monday, 20 May 2013
Thursday, 9 May 2013
Football Re-Heated: Romania Vs Argentina, USA '94
Football Re-Heated – Romania Vs Argentina – USA 94
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1994_FI...a_vs_Argentina
I’ve never liked Argentina. In football obviously. I have no beef with them outside of the sporting arena. I don’t think I’ve even met an Argentinian before. But when it comes to sport, I despise them. I think everyone outside of Argentina hates them too. They are the archetypal villains. They will cheat outrageously and do whatever it takes to win. Other teams are guilty of this too, but what sets Argentina apart is the sheer brazenness of the way they cheat. For them it’s a way of life. Win at all cost. Sod the rules, They are only there to be broken! The sad thing is that if Argentina ever actually played the game fairly they probably would still win quite a lot of matches and be universally well liked. When Argentina actually play fairly they end up producing some excellent football as this match readily shows.
USA 94 was kind of a miserable experience for Argentina, highlighted by their star player Diego Maradona getting suspended for failing a drug test. The terrifying clip of Mardona celebrating a goal against Greece, his eyes wide as saucers and his mouth frothing like a gopher with rabies, will live in my mind forever. Whatever he was taking, it seemed to be working. I find the story of Maradona a living example that there is such a thing as karma. I know a bunch of people are going to be falling over themselves saying “Don’t have a go at Diego, he won a World Cup in 86’ single handed!”
This one has always rankled me. Yes Argentina won the World Cup in 86’ but outside of England (Who they had to cheat against to beat) and Germany, who of any consequence did they play at that World Cup? I’m sorry, but getting a soft draw to the Quarters and then having to PUNCH the ball into the net to beat ENGLAND leaves a lot to be desired. “But Mike, that other goal he scored was amazing!”. Yes, it was a very good goal and Maradona fans cling to it like a security blanket. To them, this is the proof that Maradona isn’t the cheating scum bucket that he’s made out to be. This one goal has somehow rose this cocky little scoundrel with small man syndrome into one of sports greatest heroes. Look, the goal is excellent, that I’m not disputing, but that doesn’t excuse Diego’s prior actions. If a man saves a child from a burning building but then murders 15 others in a bank robbery, does that make him a good person or a bad person? I know which side of the fence I’m on in this one.
Anyway, a Maradona-less Argentina had made it to the second round of the World Cup where they were scheduled to face an impressive Romanian side. Romania had got to the second round by beating pre-tournament favourites Columbia and also sneaking past tournament hosts USA 1-0 in their final group game. The Yanks, by virtue of also beating the Columbians, had pretty much already qualified at that point.
Despite a shock loss to Bulgaria, Argentina had qualified with relative comfort from their group and most fancied them to do well despite the loss of Maradona to a drugs ban. Maradona, always needing to be centre of attention, still attended the game and did some commentary for Argentinian radio, a mere stones throw from where Motty and Trevor Brooking were sitting. The version of the match I watched was the BBC TV version and despite the fact it was clearly taped off a VCR and then copied to a DVD, the quality was surprisingly good.
Romania had done well in Italia 90’ and had ended up going out in Round 2 to Jack Charlton’s Ireland on penalties. Key players for them were the uber talented Hagi and a determined Dumitrescu. Argentina of course had used every single trick in the book to make it to the final at Italia 90’ and, in true panto villain style, had managed to knock the hosts out in the semi-finals before going on to enter a performance so vile in the final that it went from being infuriating to just plain embarrassing. Their play in USA 94 had been a lot more positive and that was a trend that continued here in this match.
The action was hot a heavy with both teams playing counter attacking football. Pretty much every goal in the game was a result of a counter attack as both defences were exposed on a number of occasions. Ortega had been shuffled into the Maradona role and performed admirably. Rather than diving all over the place when tackled, he often stood firm on his feet and had a number of very good chances towards the end of the first half.
Romania were able to take the lead after a mere 11 minutes into the contest. Hagi won a, admittedly soft, free kick outside the Argentine box. Dumitrescu aimed to cross the ball in to the box and find the head of one of the two Romanian defenders who had come up for the free kick. He needn’t have bothered. The “cross” swung over a helpless Islas in the Argentine goal and landed in the corner of the net. Dumitrescu quickly acted like he meant it all along but he wasn’t fooling anybody.
Argentina were very quick to get back into the match and at the 15 minute mark Batistuta (sporting what I could only describe as a lions main on his head) went down in the Romanian box and the referee pointed to the spot. The penalty, similar to the free kick earlier, was pretty soft. At most he fell into the Romanian number 3 Prodan. Batistuta stepped up and coolly slotted the spot kick home. 1-1.
Argentina had little time to relax though as Romania were soon straight back up the pitch. Hagi went on a teasing run down the right side of the pitch and played in a peach of a through ball into the box to Dumitrescu who tapped it past Isla with alarming ease to put the Romanians back into the lead. The Romanians had essentially created two goals from nothing and only 18 minutes had passed by!
You’d think the match would settle down this point but you’d be dead wrong. Romania had another run up the pitch where Isla barely denied Dumistrescu his hat-trick with a great save. Argentina immediately broke down the other side with Ortega almost clean on goal before being smothered by both a defender and the goal keeper. Romania then went up the pitch AGAIN with Petrescu’s long range shot smacked away by a desperate Isla. This all happened in the space of 45 seconds. It was like watching your mates play FIFA.
The first half continued in this vein with both teams taking it in turns to attack the others goal. Argentina made a conscious effort towards the end of the half to try and slow the pace down and build attacks up slowly but the Romanians stuffed 4-5 guys in the box and waited to steal the ball back. The Argentinians continued to give the ball away at silly times and Romania aimed to punish them at every turn. Batistuta did a fine job of scuffing a shot wide at the 25 minute mark.
Argentina dominated the first 15 minutes of the second half, instigating attack after attack on the Romanian goal. However, every attack was subdued by the Romanian defence. The fourth goal in the match came from a, say it with me, counter attack. Ortega’s corner kick at the 56 minute mark was headed out to Basualdo who was easily dispossessed by Dumitrescu on the outside of the Romanian box. Dumitrescu stormed down the middle of the pitch. All three Argentine defenders pounced on him but none of them noticed a sprinting Hagi stampeding down the right hand side of the pitch. Dumitrescu played Hagi a peach of the ball and Hagi easily tucked the ball away to put Romania 3-1 up.
Argentina was not to be outdone and continued to pressurize the Romanian box. Romania decided to keep it on the ground and hold on to the ball whenever they had possession. Watching them calmly hang on to the ball and pass it between themselves reminded me a little bit of the famed “Tiki-Taka” style of play that Spain employs.
The game didn’t so much fizzle out at this point but the pace did noticeably slow as Romania were trying to hold on to their lead. Both sides were still willing to attack with Argentina desperately trying to drag themselves back into contention. At the 75th minute, they managed it. Caceres had a long range shot from way outside the Romanian box. The shot was saved by Prunea in the Romanian goal but he couldn’t hang on to it and Abel Balbo knocked the rebound into the net to make it 3-2.
Despite this goal, Romania were able to hang on and get a famous win. The Argentinian fans, in a show of class, applauded Hagi as he left the field at the 86th minute to be replaced by Galca. The game itself was played in a good spirit and the usual cheating and chicanery that you expect from Argentina was not on display. This may have been the most fun I’ve ever had watching Argentina play football. It was miles away from the horrid displays at Italia 90. That being said, playing exciting and relatively clean football against a talented Romanian side led to Argentina crashing out of the tournament. Maybe this is why Argentinians prefer to play dirty?
Overall, this match is not just the best match at USA 94 it may very well be one of the top 10 greatest matches in World Cup history. Unlike some other matches, this match stands on it’s excitement factor alone. There’s no grudge between the two sides or intense rivalry between the players. That being said, it’s captivating stuff and is a constant and dizzying exhibition of attacking football. It certainly helps that Romania get the early goal. This forces Argentina to chase the game and leaves them open to more counter attacks from the Romanian Mega Powers of Hagi and Dumitrescu. Hagi’s performance is excellent throughout as he is a constant threat and causes the Argentinians no end of bother. That being said, I’d go with Dumitrescu as the man of the match. He really had something to prove here and stepped up to the plate to deliver a cracking performance.
Ortega would be the player who stood out most to me for Argentina. Filling Maradona’s shoes is not a task most men would inherit happily. In fact, pretty much every attacking chance that Argentina had involved Ortega in some form or another. Batistuta, despite winning the penalty, entered a below par performance up front. He really didn’t play up to his potential at all and really should have done better with some of his chances in the first half.
This match is certainly “must see”. If you’re never seen it before, it’s worth trying to hunt a copy down or watch the highlights in the youtube link below
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1994_FI...a_vs_Argentina
I’ve never liked Argentina. In football obviously. I have no beef with them outside of the sporting arena. I don’t think I’ve even met an Argentinian before. But when it comes to sport, I despise them. I think everyone outside of Argentina hates them too. They are the archetypal villains. They will cheat outrageously and do whatever it takes to win. Other teams are guilty of this too, but what sets Argentina apart is the sheer brazenness of the way they cheat. For them it’s a way of life. Win at all cost. Sod the rules, They are only there to be broken! The sad thing is that if Argentina ever actually played the game fairly they probably would still win quite a lot of matches and be universally well liked. When Argentina actually play fairly they end up producing some excellent football as this match readily shows.
USA 94 was kind of a miserable experience for Argentina, highlighted by their star player Diego Maradona getting suspended for failing a drug test. The terrifying clip of Mardona celebrating a goal against Greece, his eyes wide as saucers and his mouth frothing like a gopher with rabies, will live in my mind forever. Whatever he was taking, it seemed to be working. I find the story of Maradona a living example that there is such a thing as karma. I know a bunch of people are going to be falling over themselves saying “Don’t have a go at Diego, he won a World Cup in 86’ single handed!”
This one has always rankled me. Yes Argentina won the World Cup in 86’ but outside of England (Who they had to cheat against to beat) and Germany, who of any consequence did they play at that World Cup? I’m sorry, but getting a soft draw to the Quarters and then having to PUNCH the ball into the net to beat ENGLAND leaves a lot to be desired. “But Mike, that other goal he scored was amazing!”. Yes, it was a very good goal and Maradona fans cling to it like a security blanket. To them, this is the proof that Maradona isn’t the cheating scum bucket that he’s made out to be. This one goal has somehow rose this cocky little scoundrel with small man syndrome into one of sports greatest heroes. Look, the goal is excellent, that I’m not disputing, but that doesn’t excuse Diego’s prior actions. If a man saves a child from a burning building but then murders 15 others in a bank robbery, does that make him a good person or a bad person? I know which side of the fence I’m on in this one.
Anyway, a Maradona-less Argentina had made it to the second round of the World Cup where they were scheduled to face an impressive Romanian side. Romania had got to the second round by beating pre-tournament favourites Columbia and also sneaking past tournament hosts USA 1-0 in their final group game. The Yanks, by virtue of also beating the Columbians, had pretty much already qualified at that point.
Despite a shock loss to Bulgaria, Argentina had qualified with relative comfort from their group and most fancied them to do well despite the loss of Maradona to a drugs ban. Maradona, always needing to be centre of attention, still attended the game and did some commentary for Argentinian radio, a mere stones throw from where Motty and Trevor Brooking were sitting. The version of the match I watched was the BBC TV version and despite the fact it was clearly taped off a VCR and then copied to a DVD, the quality was surprisingly good.
Romania had done well in Italia 90’ and had ended up going out in Round 2 to Jack Charlton’s Ireland on penalties. Key players for them were the uber talented Hagi and a determined Dumitrescu. Argentina of course had used every single trick in the book to make it to the final at Italia 90’ and, in true panto villain style, had managed to knock the hosts out in the semi-finals before going on to enter a performance so vile in the final that it went from being infuriating to just plain embarrassing. Their play in USA 94 had been a lot more positive and that was a trend that continued here in this match.
The action was hot a heavy with both teams playing counter attacking football. Pretty much every goal in the game was a result of a counter attack as both defences were exposed on a number of occasions. Ortega had been shuffled into the Maradona role and performed admirably. Rather than diving all over the place when tackled, he often stood firm on his feet and had a number of very good chances towards the end of the first half.
Romania were able to take the lead after a mere 11 minutes into the contest. Hagi won a, admittedly soft, free kick outside the Argentine box. Dumitrescu aimed to cross the ball in to the box and find the head of one of the two Romanian defenders who had come up for the free kick. He needn’t have bothered. The “cross” swung over a helpless Islas in the Argentine goal and landed in the corner of the net. Dumitrescu quickly acted like he meant it all along but he wasn’t fooling anybody.
Argentina were very quick to get back into the match and at the 15 minute mark Batistuta (sporting what I could only describe as a lions main on his head) went down in the Romanian box and the referee pointed to the spot. The penalty, similar to the free kick earlier, was pretty soft. At most he fell into the Romanian number 3 Prodan. Batistuta stepped up and coolly slotted the spot kick home. 1-1.
Argentina had little time to relax though as Romania were soon straight back up the pitch. Hagi went on a teasing run down the right side of the pitch and played in a peach of a through ball into the box to Dumitrescu who tapped it past Isla with alarming ease to put the Romanians back into the lead. The Romanians had essentially created two goals from nothing and only 18 minutes had passed by!
You’d think the match would settle down this point but you’d be dead wrong. Romania had another run up the pitch where Isla barely denied Dumistrescu his hat-trick with a great save. Argentina immediately broke down the other side with Ortega almost clean on goal before being smothered by both a defender and the goal keeper. Romania then went up the pitch AGAIN with Petrescu’s long range shot smacked away by a desperate Isla. This all happened in the space of 45 seconds. It was like watching your mates play FIFA.
The first half continued in this vein with both teams taking it in turns to attack the others goal. Argentina made a conscious effort towards the end of the half to try and slow the pace down and build attacks up slowly but the Romanians stuffed 4-5 guys in the box and waited to steal the ball back. The Argentinians continued to give the ball away at silly times and Romania aimed to punish them at every turn. Batistuta did a fine job of scuffing a shot wide at the 25 minute mark.
Argentina dominated the first 15 minutes of the second half, instigating attack after attack on the Romanian goal. However, every attack was subdued by the Romanian defence. The fourth goal in the match came from a, say it with me, counter attack. Ortega’s corner kick at the 56 minute mark was headed out to Basualdo who was easily dispossessed by Dumitrescu on the outside of the Romanian box. Dumitrescu stormed down the middle of the pitch. All three Argentine defenders pounced on him but none of them noticed a sprinting Hagi stampeding down the right hand side of the pitch. Dumitrescu played Hagi a peach of the ball and Hagi easily tucked the ball away to put Romania 3-1 up.
Argentina was not to be outdone and continued to pressurize the Romanian box. Romania decided to keep it on the ground and hold on to the ball whenever they had possession. Watching them calmly hang on to the ball and pass it between themselves reminded me a little bit of the famed “Tiki-Taka” style of play that Spain employs.
The game didn’t so much fizzle out at this point but the pace did noticeably slow as Romania were trying to hold on to their lead. Both sides were still willing to attack with Argentina desperately trying to drag themselves back into contention. At the 75th minute, they managed it. Caceres had a long range shot from way outside the Romanian box. The shot was saved by Prunea in the Romanian goal but he couldn’t hang on to it and Abel Balbo knocked the rebound into the net to make it 3-2.
Despite this goal, Romania were able to hang on and get a famous win. The Argentinian fans, in a show of class, applauded Hagi as he left the field at the 86th minute to be replaced by Galca. The game itself was played in a good spirit and the usual cheating and chicanery that you expect from Argentina was not on display. This may have been the most fun I’ve ever had watching Argentina play football. It was miles away from the horrid displays at Italia 90. That being said, playing exciting and relatively clean football against a talented Romanian side led to Argentina crashing out of the tournament. Maybe this is why Argentinians prefer to play dirty?
Overall, this match is not just the best match at USA 94 it may very well be one of the top 10 greatest matches in World Cup history. Unlike some other matches, this match stands on it’s excitement factor alone. There’s no grudge between the two sides or intense rivalry between the players. That being said, it’s captivating stuff and is a constant and dizzying exhibition of attacking football. It certainly helps that Romania get the early goal. This forces Argentina to chase the game and leaves them open to more counter attacks from the Romanian Mega Powers of Hagi and Dumitrescu. Hagi’s performance is excellent throughout as he is a constant threat and causes the Argentinians no end of bother. That being said, I’d go with Dumitrescu as the man of the match. He really had something to prove here and stepped up to the plate to deliver a cracking performance.
Ortega would be the player who stood out most to me for Argentina. Filling Maradona’s shoes is not a task most men would inherit happily. In fact, pretty much every attacking chance that Argentina had involved Ortega in some form or another. Batistuta, despite winning the penalty, entered a below par performance up front. He really didn’t play up to his potential at all and really should have done better with some of his chances in the first half.
This match is certainly “must see”. If you’re never seen it before, it’s worth trying to hunt a copy down or watch the highlights in the youtube link below
Thursday, 18 April 2013
Mike Watches A Movie: Angels and Demons
Angels and Demon’s Review
Please note that I’m going to spoil the plot here, so don’t read on if you care about that.
I’ve never read any of the Dan Brown books. “The Da Vinci Code” has been in my “to read” pile now for about 5 years and I just haven’t read it. There’s no real reason for this other than the fact that I’ve just had other books I’ve wanted to read. I’ve heard that some people love these books and I’ve also met people who give a hearty “harrumph” every time Brown’s books are mentioned. What may have swung me to not reading the books is that the Harrumphers (Which I think is a word I just made up) are usually people who’s opinions I trust, where as the people who loved the books are people who I usually disagree with on what constitutes “good”.
A while back I did actually see the TDC movie and my overall opinion of it was, meh. I didn’t think it was bad and there was some lovely camera work, but it just didn’t enthral me. Tom Hank’s was quite good as the lead character Prof. Langdon and Ian Mackellen did a decent job as the traditional eccentric British Old Man™ that has graced films for decades. It’s been a while since I watched the film, but at the time it just didn’t do it for me. I’d probably sit through it again but it would be if I was stuck in a hotel room on a Sunday afternoon and it just happened to be in the hotel’s DVD collection, you know?
I actually saw Angels and Demons before I saw TDC and, at the time, I kind of liked it. It didn’t rock my world or anything but I appreciated it. This is a movie I would actually choose to watch under less duress (Poet, didn’t know it)
We recently got a Blu Ray Player, so I’ve been picking up some Blu Ray’s that I thought would make the most of the set up. I’ve bought The Hobbit and Blade Runner, which are two films I have never seen and thought I’d try them out and I also picked up Angels and Demons off Amazon for £8. I ultimately plumped for this for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I hadn’t seen it in a while and wanted to see if I still liked it. Secondly, I recalled the movie having a lot of sumptuous shots of Rome and The Vatican, which would no doubt look nice in glorious HD. Thirdly; my mum likes Dan Brown and had never seen the film, so I imagined she’d like a chance to see it.
After watching it again, I still enjoyed it but on a second viewing there are a lot of things about the story that I don’t like, that I didn’t really notice the first time around. I should mention that there are two versions of the movie on the Blu Ray Disc. There’s the Theatrical version and the extended version. I watched the Theatrical version. There may be bits on the extended version that address some of my problems with the movies overall plot. I went with the Theatrical version though because this is the version most people would have seen and I also wanted a viewing experience that was true to the first time I saw the movie, so my eventual viewpoint would be balanced. If any big fans out there have seen the extended version and think there’s anything in it that counter acts any points I make in my review, go stuff yourself! I keed, I keed! Feel free to comment and I’ll take it on board.
To lay out the basic plot for you, the story begins with the much loved Pope dying of a stroke. The Cardinals are in the process of trying to elect a new Pope when disaster strikes, as the four leading Cardinals in the Papal Race are kidnapped. Enter our hero Professor Langdon, played by Tom Hanks playing Tom Hanks. He’s a bit tetchy with The Vatican as they won’t let him into their precious archives. He’s writing a career defining book but needs to view one of the texts that The Vatican have stored to complete it. However, he is invited to help with the search for the cardinals due to the possibility of The Illuminati being involved; a subject which he knows a lot about.
So far, so good. We are soon introduced to his sexy accomplice (I believe this is a common theme with Dan Brown books) who is played by Ayelet Zurer. She’s a researcher from the Hadron Collider in Cerne. Her research partner was killed and a tube of anti matter was stolen. To both our main characters horror, not only have the cardinals been cardinal-napped but the container holding the anti-matter is stashed away somewhere in The Vatican and will explode at Midnight! Cue running around Vatican City for 2 hours trying to find the cardinals and stop the bomb going off!
Now, as a plot, that’s quite good. The idea works quite well. Hanks enters a dry yet firm performance and the supporting cast who put this story together are equally strong. The problem with the plot is that it just tries to be too cute at times and really does shoe-horn a twist at the end, when a twist isn’t needed. The actual story of Hanks using his super special sign decoding abilities to try and locate the cardinals is a good one. What makes it even better is that they don’t turn Hanks into a completely infallible genius. Yes, he does eventually get the locations right but he’s usually always 1 or 2 steps behind the killer, so it’s normally too late to be much good.
The first time he tries to find a Cardinal, he gets the location wrong, pretty much damning the poor man to death. The death scenes for the Cardinals are all well done and suitably gruesome. They are all branded with one of the four elements (Earth, Fire, Wind, Water) and then killed in relation to that theme. For example, Cardinal number one is branded with “Earth” and is then filled with soil. A horrid yet thematically pleasing death, I think we can all agree. In fact, all 3 of the first cardinals die, but every time Hanks gets a little bit closer to saving them until he finally gets it right on the fourth one. I like that a lot because the film makes Hanks earn his success. He has to work at it and fail a few times before finally succeeding on the last Cardinal. That bit of the plot gets thumbs up from me.
Sadly, the plot starts to get silly and convoluted at this point. It comes to light that The Pope was actually, *gasp*, murdered! E gads! This news leads the Pope’s aid, played by Ewan McGregor, to decide to clear out the whole of Vatican City until peace is restored. The Cardinals, led by Armin Mueller-Stahl, stubbornly refuse and also refuse to clear St Peter’s Square. This is one of the bits in the film that really costs it credibility. Mueller-Stahl’s main reason for not evacuating is, and I paraphrase here, “We’re all going to go to heaven anyway, so it doesn’t matter if we die”. What? Now I know that the higher ups in the Catholic Church have a reputation for being a bit odd sometimes, but there is no way that a leading Catholic Cardinal would condemn and entire square full of innocent Catholics to death in that manner. I’m all for suspending my disbelief and everything, but that’s a pretty big jump to take. I just don’t buy that Mueller-Stahl would be that cold, nor that extreme. This is The Vatican we’re talking about here, not Al-Qaeda.
Still, I can accept this for the sake of drama (There’s less at stake if there isn’t a square full of people who can die in a blazing inferno of death™ so I’ll be a bit lenient). Ewan McGregor has what I consider to be the best acting performance in the film. I really like his portrayal of the character, at least until the final act when it gets silly. For most of the film he plays a quiet and thoughtful character, whose only motivation is seemingly to stop everyone dying in a horrific explosion. It’s quite hard to dislike a character with that motivation to be fair. It’d be like disliking a character who wants to stop puppies being drowned or a character who wants to prevent the spread of AIDS by letting people wear condoms (SATIRE!)
Ewan is made to look like a dedicated Catholic and an all around good egg. We’re informed that he was orphaned at a young age and the Pope adopted him. It’s also revealed that he learnt to fly helicopters while undertaking his military service (Could this become important later? Hmmm, we’ll have to see). As you can imagine, this whole Pope dying thing has upset him a tad, and the fact there’s a bomb due to vaporise The Vatican and a large chunk of Rome as well, really has made this the wrong week for him to quit smoking.
The movie eventually introduces us to our lead villain who is an unnamed assassin played by Nikolaj Lie Kaas. There’s deliberate mystery behind the character and Kaas plays him with a cold detachment that makes him both un-nerving but also not that memorable. They immediately try to make you think he’s all mysterious and professional by showing him having money wired from whoever is hiring him to a super duper secret bank account, on the Isle of Man. Seriously? The Isle of Man? Since when did deadly assassins stop putting their blood money into Swiss banks? Has the credit crunch hit that hard that he had to get an account on the Isle of Man instead? I mean, at least give him an account in Monaco to give him a bit of Bondesque street cred.
So anyway, Kaas is alright as a villain and they try and give him a bit of character depth by insinuating that he only kills people he has been told to kill or people who are armed. This explains why he doesn’t just sneak up and shoot Tom Hanks in the head, which would be advisable considering the fact that he’s TRYING TO UNDO HIS EVIL PLANS! The assassin and Tom Hanks eventually have a big face off where the assassin simply tells him not to follow him, otherwise he’ll shoot him. Hanks doesn’t follow him, because his character isn’t an idiot, and the assassin lets him go and save Ewan McGregor from supposed danger.
It should be noted that Hanks and Zurer run right past Kaas at one point on route to saving Macgregor and he doesn’t care. THIS ASSASSIN IS TERRIBLE AT HIS JOB. Tom Hanks had seen his face and could possibly identify him yet he still lets him run off to save the day. If I’d paid Kaas for this assassin job, I’d want my money back! It should also be noted that Kaas is sent an email telling him that a get away vehicle is waiting for him. Everyone and his brother can clearly see that this car is going to explode once he turns the key in the ignition and, low and behold, the car blows up. I mean, I was practically yelling at the TV at the assassin not to turn the car on and he still does it and it still blows him to smithereens. Good riddance to bad assassin is what I say. You wouldn’t catch Ezio Alditore falling for that one.
I do feel a little harsh on Kaas here as he does the best with the part that has been written for him. When his character is coldly killing people, he does have a genuine menace to his actions. Everything he does is both clinical and also exerts that kind of melancholic ease that only a cold blooded European Assassin can provide. It would have worked better if he was just a killer, killing people who got in his way, rather than trying to give him a warped sense of ethics. This sort of character doesn’t need that kind of development. He’s a hired gun, hired to do a job. He’s also got his own liberty to think of. If you were an assassin and someone was getting dangerously close to ruining your plans, you’d bump the guy off using your mad assassin skillz (the “z” makes it cooler) to ensure that he couldn’t, I don’t know, RUIN YOUR EVIL PLAN!
Now it already takes a leap to accept that they wouldn’t just empty the square when the bomb threat came through, and they had video proof of the bomb. Add to that the fact that the assassin is letting our protagonist live for no other reason that he doesn’t seem to care about doing his job properly, then the plot hole sharks are starting to circle this movies drowning narrative as it thrashes away in the story sea.
So anyway, I mentioned that Hanks and Zurer are rushing back to The Vatican to save McGregor from his impending doom. This doom is in the form of our other main character, head of the Swiss Guard and general old grumpy man in a suit, Commander Richter, played by Stellen Skarsgard. Skarsgard is openly hostile to Hanks from the minute he shows up and spends a large part of the film scoffing at his ideas. He’s your run of the mill sour authority figure, who spends the movie barking at anyone within a 1 mile radius.
As the movie progresses, it begins to tease is that Skarsgard may be our villain of the piece. It is revealed that Zurer’s research partner kept a journal. A very thorough one it would seem, so thorough in fact that it might hold clues to his murderer. Skarsgard steals the journal and locks it in his Bond Villain style drawer in desk (You know, one of those ones that slides out so it no longer looks like it’s actually part of the desk and also has a computer monitor in it). This prompts Zurer to ask “what are you hiding?” to which he replies “What are you hiding?”. Well, considering that she left the journals out in the open, in an unlocked drawer, I would say she was pretty much hiding nothing in that regard. She couldn’t have done a worse job of hiding those journals, if that was her plan.
Throughout the movie they continue to build drama between Skarsgard and McGregor’s character. McGregor eventually cracks and orders a full evacuation of the square, along with a helicopter for the Cardinals. Skarsgard countermands the order and then locks himself in the office with McGregor for some Good Ol’ Fashioned Swiss Guard Priest Killin’™ (Or so it would seem)
Hanks and Zurer get to The Vatican just in time to get the door to the office broken down. McGregor is on the floor, branded with the symbol of two keys in the shape of an X , while Skarsgard is standing above him with a gun. Naturally, the guards shoot and kill him instantly, rather than capturing and killing him. Another priest runs in and leaps across the room to strangle McGregor. Again, rather than pulling the priest off Macgregor and taking him away for questioning, the guards shoot him dead. But don’t worry friends; the nonsense has only just started!
Hanks, Zurer and McGregor find the bomb but there isn’t enough time to diffuse it. By this point the helicopter has landed outside The Vatican. Oh if only there was a priest somewhere in the vicinity to the bomb who knew how to fly a helicopter! Praise the Lord for Deus Ex Machina!
So yes, McGregor takes the bomb, flies the helicopter to a safe distance, and then parachutes to safety while the helicopter explodes in a brilliant show of light. The Vatican is saved and it looks like The Cardinals are going to vote McGregor in as Pope. But then the twist kicks in. Remember the Bond Villain desk? Skarsgard’s last act is to pass Hanks a mysterious key. This is, of course, the key to the Bond Desk. While Zurer fiddles with the desk to find the journals, the mysterious TV screen presents itself and wouldn’t you know it, the key Hanks has is for the TV screen. The TV screen has recorded what really happened in the office and, in a completely unnecessary storyline twist; it turns out that our lad Ewan was the bad guy all along!
His reason for such villainy? He can’t bloody stand science that’s why! The scientists were experimenting in Cerne to try and create the “God Particle”. The Pope thought this was a good idea as it would scientifically prove that God existed. McGregor disagreed and murdered him, with the ultimate goal of a much stronger and anti science Pope like himself taking over. Hanks rats the now evil McGregor out to the Cardinals who sick The Swiss Guard on him. McGregor decides it would be a better idea to just kill himself and he does so in brutal fashion. The movie ends with the Cardinal who Hanks saved becoming Pope. Hanks, due to saving the Pope and all, is finally given the material he needs to finish his book, provided he agrees to leave it back to the Vatican in his will.
Angels and Demons is a film that I was enjoying just fine before the pointless twist at the end. Sure, there are quite a few plot holes in the story at times, but the film also kind of earns these plot holes because it needs them for the story to actually have something at stake. We need to have the square full of people because it puts more pressure on our heroes to save the day. The reasons why the people are in the square don’t really make sense and they really have to make The Cardinals look pretty cold and uncaring to pull it off, but you are prepared to let it go in order to progress the story.
All the Deus Ex Machina things make a bit more sense with the twist ending, which is one of the positives about it. The fact that the helicopter is there makes sense because McGregor orders it personally, which plays into his plans.
I honestly think that this movie would have been a better film if they had just had McGregor save the day and then perish in the helicopter. Everything else from that point could still happen. They could have still elected the surviving Cardinal as The Pope and Hanks could have still got his book. I actually like how the ending would be much more a downer too. The twist ending just has a forced feeling of triumph about it.
The twist ending does tie up a number of loose ends and they do their best to make it fit the plot, but I just don’t buy it. At no point do we see if McGregor is doing this on his own or whether he has help. If he is doing it on his own, then I don’t believe he could, no matter how much I suspend my disbelief. If he has help, why don’t we explore that part of it more? Sure, he hires Kaas’s assassin, but does he put the bomb in Kaas’s car? Does McGregor’s character even have the knowledge to place a bomb in a car like that? Did he hire someone to do it? I actually think this is quite important. If you’re going to have a car bomb go off to conveniently kill a character you need out of the way for plot reasons, I think you need to earn it through a proper explanation. The writers here don’t earn it. They just say “oh there’s a bomb in the car” and leave it at that. Come on, you could at least have McGregor have a throw away line like “I’m not the only person to feel this way” to at least tease that he might have had some help at some point.
Surprisingly, despite complaining about this film for nearly 3,500 words. I do quite like it. I enjoyed watching it and, as mentioned before, I would watch it again. Rome and The Vatican look lovely in HD and the main characters hit most of the marks they’re supposed to. You could argue that some of the characters are a bit simplistic at times, but I actually don’t think that’s a problem. A character can have a simple motivation so long as they own it and aren’t afraid to chase it at every turn. The problems arise when you start trying to give a simple character extra depth when extra depth isn’t required. All of the characters in this film are better when they follow their basic principles and motivations. Kaas is best when he’s an assassin coldly killing people for a pay cheque, McGregor is best when he’s trying to keep people safe from the bomb and Skarsgard is best when he’s stomping around and sneering about how this poncy “sign reading” stuff is a load of old knackers.
Up to the ending, this film was hovering around a 6.5/7.0 out of 10. However, the ending drags it all the way down to 5.0. I’m all for a twist now and then, but there has to be a reason for it. This film would have been much better with a straight regular ending. The twist is honestly there for the sake of having one. It doesn’t enrich the story or make it more enjoyable. It’s a forced “happy” ending when one just isn’t required.
Final Score 5 out of 10
Conclusion:
I’m not going to tell you not to see this film. If you’re prepared to accept what it is, you’ll be able to enjoy it. I’ll be honest and say I did enjoy it but that still doesn’t mean it’s a critical success. There are a number of movies that I enjoyed that completely fall down when you try to critically analyse them. The question is would you want to spend 2 hours of your life with these characters? At the end of the day, I answered yes. The movie will hold your attention. Its story flaws drag it down in my opinion, but they didn’t drive me to turn on the film entirely. While the flaws mean that this isn’t a good movie, they don’t make it without worth. Hence the rating being bang in the middle of the spectrum.
I hope you enjoyed this review. I apologise for the absurd length of it. This is the first time I’ve ever tried doing a film review. If I do anymore in the future, I’ll try and chop the length down. Please feel free to let me know what you didn’t like in this and offer some improvements.
If you’ve made it all the way here, thanks for reading!
Please note that I’m going to spoil the plot here, so don’t read on if you care about that.
I’ve never read any of the Dan Brown books. “The Da Vinci Code” has been in my “to read” pile now for about 5 years and I just haven’t read it. There’s no real reason for this other than the fact that I’ve just had other books I’ve wanted to read. I’ve heard that some people love these books and I’ve also met people who give a hearty “harrumph” every time Brown’s books are mentioned. What may have swung me to not reading the books is that the Harrumphers (Which I think is a word I just made up) are usually people who’s opinions I trust, where as the people who loved the books are people who I usually disagree with on what constitutes “good”.
A while back I did actually see the TDC movie and my overall opinion of it was, meh. I didn’t think it was bad and there was some lovely camera work, but it just didn’t enthral me. Tom Hank’s was quite good as the lead character Prof. Langdon and Ian Mackellen did a decent job as the traditional eccentric British Old Man™ that has graced films for decades. It’s been a while since I watched the film, but at the time it just didn’t do it for me. I’d probably sit through it again but it would be if I was stuck in a hotel room on a Sunday afternoon and it just happened to be in the hotel’s DVD collection, you know?
I actually saw Angels and Demons before I saw TDC and, at the time, I kind of liked it. It didn’t rock my world or anything but I appreciated it. This is a movie I would actually choose to watch under less duress (Poet, didn’t know it)
We recently got a Blu Ray Player, so I’ve been picking up some Blu Ray’s that I thought would make the most of the set up. I’ve bought The Hobbit and Blade Runner, which are two films I have never seen and thought I’d try them out and I also picked up Angels and Demons off Amazon for £8. I ultimately plumped for this for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I hadn’t seen it in a while and wanted to see if I still liked it. Secondly, I recalled the movie having a lot of sumptuous shots of Rome and The Vatican, which would no doubt look nice in glorious HD. Thirdly; my mum likes Dan Brown and had never seen the film, so I imagined she’d like a chance to see it.
After watching it again, I still enjoyed it but on a second viewing there are a lot of things about the story that I don’t like, that I didn’t really notice the first time around. I should mention that there are two versions of the movie on the Blu Ray Disc. There’s the Theatrical version and the extended version. I watched the Theatrical version. There may be bits on the extended version that address some of my problems with the movies overall plot. I went with the Theatrical version though because this is the version most people would have seen and I also wanted a viewing experience that was true to the first time I saw the movie, so my eventual viewpoint would be balanced. If any big fans out there have seen the extended version and think there’s anything in it that counter acts any points I make in my review, go stuff yourself! I keed, I keed! Feel free to comment and I’ll take it on board.
To lay out the basic plot for you, the story begins with the much loved Pope dying of a stroke. The Cardinals are in the process of trying to elect a new Pope when disaster strikes, as the four leading Cardinals in the Papal Race are kidnapped. Enter our hero Professor Langdon, played by Tom Hanks playing Tom Hanks. He’s a bit tetchy with The Vatican as they won’t let him into their precious archives. He’s writing a career defining book but needs to view one of the texts that The Vatican have stored to complete it. However, he is invited to help with the search for the cardinals due to the possibility of The Illuminati being involved; a subject which he knows a lot about.
So far, so good. We are soon introduced to his sexy accomplice (I believe this is a common theme with Dan Brown books) who is played by Ayelet Zurer. She’s a researcher from the Hadron Collider in Cerne. Her research partner was killed and a tube of anti matter was stolen. To both our main characters horror, not only have the cardinals been cardinal-napped but the container holding the anti-matter is stashed away somewhere in The Vatican and will explode at Midnight! Cue running around Vatican City for 2 hours trying to find the cardinals and stop the bomb going off!
Now, as a plot, that’s quite good. The idea works quite well. Hanks enters a dry yet firm performance and the supporting cast who put this story together are equally strong. The problem with the plot is that it just tries to be too cute at times and really does shoe-horn a twist at the end, when a twist isn’t needed. The actual story of Hanks using his super special sign decoding abilities to try and locate the cardinals is a good one. What makes it even better is that they don’t turn Hanks into a completely infallible genius. Yes, he does eventually get the locations right but he’s usually always 1 or 2 steps behind the killer, so it’s normally too late to be much good.
The first time he tries to find a Cardinal, he gets the location wrong, pretty much damning the poor man to death. The death scenes for the Cardinals are all well done and suitably gruesome. They are all branded with one of the four elements (Earth, Fire, Wind, Water) and then killed in relation to that theme. For example, Cardinal number one is branded with “Earth” and is then filled with soil. A horrid yet thematically pleasing death, I think we can all agree. In fact, all 3 of the first cardinals die, but every time Hanks gets a little bit closer to saving them until he finally gets it right on the fourth one. I like that a lot because the film makes Hanks earn his success. He has to work at it and fail a few times before finally succeeding on the last Cardinal. That bit of the plot gets thumbs up from me.
Sadly, the plot starts to get silly and convoluted at this point. It comes to light that The Pope was actually, *gasp*, murdered! E gads! This news leads the Pope’s aid, played by Ewan McGregor, to decide to clear out the whole of Vatican City until peace is restored. The Cardinals, led by Armin Mueller-Stahl, stubbornly refuse and also refuse to clear St Peter’s Square. This is one of the bits in the film that really costs it credibility. Mueller-Stahl’s main reason for not evacuating is, and I paraphrase here, “We’re all going to go to heaven anyway, so it doesn’t matter if we die”. What? Now I know that the higher ups in the Catholic Church have a reputation for being a bit odd sometimes, but there is no way that a leading Catholic Cardinal would condemn and entire square full of innocent Catholics to death in that manner. I’m all for suspending my disbelief and everything, but that’s a pretty big jump to take. I just don’t buy that Mueller-Stahl would be that cold, nor that extreme. This is The Vatican we’re talking about here, not Al-Qaeda.
Still, I can accept this for the sake of drama (There’s less at stake if there isn’t a square full of people who can die in a blazing inferno of death™ so I’ll be a bit lenient). Ewan McGregor has what I consider to be the best acting performance in the film. I really like his portrayal of the character, at least until the final act when it gets silly. For most of the film he plays a quiet and thoughtful character, whose only motivation is seemingly to stop everyone dying in a horrific explosion. It’s quite hard to dislike a character with that motivation to be fair. It’d be like disliking a character who wants to stop puppies being drowned or a character who wants to prevent the spread of AIDS by letting people wear condoms (SATIRE!)
Ewan is made to look like a dedicated Catholic and an all around good egg. We’re informed that he was orphaned at a young age and the Pope adopted him. It’s also revealed that he learnt to fly helicopters while undertaking his military service (Could this become important later? Hmmm, we’ll have to see). As you can imagine, this whole Pope dying thing has upset him a tad, and the fact there’s a bomb due to vaporise The Vatican and a large chunk of Rome as well, really has made this the wrong week for him to quit smoking.
The movie eventually introduces us to our lead villain who is an unnamed assassin played by Nikolaj Lie Kaas. There’s deliberate mystery behind the character and Kaas plays him with a cold detachment that makes him both un-nerving but also not that memorable. They immediately try to make you think he’s all mysterious and professional by showing him having money wired from whoever is hiring him to a super duper secret bank account, on the Isle of Man. Seriously? The Isle of Man? Since when did deadly assassins stop putting their blood money into Swiss banks? Has the credit crunch hit that hard that he had to get an account on the Isle of Man instead? I mean, at least give him an account in Monaco to give him a bit of Bondesque street cred.
So anyway, Kaas is alright as a villain and they try and give him a bit of character depth by insinuating that he only kills people he has been told to kill or people who are armed. This explains why he doesn’t just sneak up and shoot Tom Hanks in the head, which would be advisable considering the fact that he’s TRYING TO UNDO HIS EVIL PLANS! The assassin and Tom Hanks eventually have a big face off where the assassin simply tells him not to follow him, otherwise he’ll shoot him. Hanks doesn’t follow him, because his character isn’t an idiot, and the assassin lets him go and save Ewan McGregor from supposed danger.
It should be noted that Hanks and Zurer run right past Kaas at one point on route to saving Macgregor and he doesn’t care. THIS ASSASSIN IS TERRIBLE AT HIS JOB. Tom Hanks had seen his face and could possibly identify him yet he still lets him run off to save the day. If I’d paid Kaas for this assassin job, I’d want my money back! It should also be noted that Kaas is sent an email telling him that a get away vehicle is waiting for him. Everyone and his brother can clearly see that this car is going to explode once he turns the key in the ignition and, low and behold, the car blows up. I mean, I was practically yelling at the TV at the assassin not to turn the car on and he still does it and it still blows him to smithereens. Good riddance to bad assassin is what I say. You wouldn’t catch Ezio Alditore falling for that one.
I do feel a little harsh on Kaas here as he does the best with the part that has been written for him. When his character is coldly killing people, he does have a genuine menace to his actions. Everything he does is both clinical and also exerts that kind of melancholic ease that only a cold blooded European Assassin can provide. It would have worked better if he was just a killer, killing people who got in his way, rather than trying to give him a warped sense of ethics. This sort of character doesn’t need that kind of development. He’s a hired gun, hired to do a job. He’s also got his own liberty to think of. If you were an assassin and someone was getting dangerously close to ruining your plans, you’d bump the guy off using your mad assassin skillz (the “z” makes it cooler) to ensure that he couldn’t, I don’t know, RUIN YOUR EVIL PLAN!
Now it already takes a leap to accept that they wouldn’t just empty the square when the bomb threat came through, and they had video proof of the bomb. Add to that the fact that the assassin is letting our protagonist live for no other reason that he doesn’t seem to care about doing his job properly, then the plot hole sharks are starting to circle this movies drowning narrative as it thrashes away in the story sea.
So anyway, I mentioned that Hanks and Zurer are rushing back to The Vatican to save McGregor from his impending doom. This doom is in the form of our other main character, head of the Swiss Guard and general old grumpy man in a suit, Commander Richter, played by Stellen Skarsgard. Skarsgard is openly hostile to Hanks from the minute he shows up and spends a large part of the film scoffing at his ideas. He’s your run of the mill sour authority figure, who spends the movie barking at anyone within a 1 mile radius.
As the movie progresses, it begins to tease is that Skarsgard may be our villain of the piece. It is revealed that Zurer’s research partner kept a journal. A very thorough one it would seem, so thorough in fact that it might hold clues to his murderer. Skarsgard steals the journal and locks it in his Bond Villain style drawer in desk (You know, one of those ones that slides out so it no longer looks like it’s actually part of the desk and also has a computer monitor in it). This prompts Zurer to ask “what are you hiding?” to which he replies “What are you hiding?”. Well, considering that she left the journals out in the open, in an unlocked drawer, I would say she was pretty much hiding nothing in that regard. She couldn’t have done a worse job of hiding those journals, if that was her plan.
Throughout the movie they continue to build drama between Skarsgard and McGregor’s character. McGregor eventually cracks and orders a full evacuation of the square, along with a helicopter for the Cardinals. Skarsgard countermands the order and then locks himself in the office with McGregor for some Good Ol’ Fashioned Swiss Guard Priest Killin’™ (Or so it would seem)
Hanks and Zurer get to The Vatican just in time to get the door to the office broken down. McGregor is on the floor, branded with the symbol of two keys in the shape of an X , while Skarsgard is standing above him with a gun. Naturally, the guards shoot and kill him instantly, rather than capturing and killing him. Another priest runs in and leaps across the room to strangle McGregor. Again, rather than pulling the priest off Macgregor and taking him away for questioning, the guards shoot him dead. But don’t worry friends; the nonsense has only just started!
Hanks, Zurer and McGregor find the bomb but there isn’t enough time to diffuse it. By this point the helicopter has landed outside The Vatican. Oh if only there was a priest somewhere in the vicinity to the bomb who knew how to fly a helicopter! Praise the Lord for Deus Ex Machina!
So yes, McGregor takes the bomb, flies the helicopter to a safe distance, and then parachutes to safety while the helicopter explodes in a brilliant show of light. The Vatican is saved and it looks like The Cardinals are going to vote McGregor in as Pope. But then the twist kicks in. Remember the Bond Villain desk? Skarsgard’s last act is to pass Hanks a mysterious key. This is, of course, the key to the Bond Desk. While Zurer fiddles with the desk to find the journals, the mysterious TV screen presents itself and wouldn’t you know it, the key Hanks has is for the TV screen. The TV screen has recorded what really happened in the office and, in a completely unnecessary storyline twist; it turns out that our lad Ewan was the bad guy all along!
His reason for such villainy? He can’t bloody stand science that’s why! The scientists were experimenting in Cerne to try and create the “God Particle”. The Pope thought this was a good idea as it would scientifically prove that God existed. McGregor disagreed and murdered him, with the ultimate goal of a much stronger and anti science Pope like himself taking over. Hanks rats the now evil McGregor out to the Cardinals who sick The Swiss Guard on him. McGregor decides it would be a better idea to just kill himself and he does so in brutal fashion. The movie ends with the Cardinal who Hanks saved becoming Pope. Hanks, due to saving the Pope and all, is finally given the material he needs to finish his book, provided he agrees to leave it back to the Vatican in his will.
Angels and Demons is a film that I was enjoying just fine before the pointless twist at the end. Sure, there are quite a few plot holes in the story at times, but the film also kind of earns these plot holes because it needs them for the story to actually have something at stake. We need to have the square full of people because it puts more pressure on our heroes to save the day. The reasons why the people are in the square don’t really make sense and they really have to make The Cardinals look pretty cold and uncaring to pull it off, but you are prepared to let it go in order to progress the story.
All the Deus Ex Machina things make a bit more sense with the twist ending, which is one of the positives about it. The fact that the helicopter is there makes sense because McGregor orders it personally, which plays into his plans.
I honestly think that this movie would have been a better film if they had just had McGregor save the day and then perish in the helicopter. Everything else from that point could still happen. They could have still elected the surviving Cardinal as The Pope and Hanks could have still got his book. I actually like how the ending would be much more a downer too. The twist ending just has a forced feeling of triumph about it.
The twist ending does tie up a number of loose ends and they do their best to make it fit the plot, but I just don’t buy it. At no point do we see if McGregor is doing this on his own or whether he has help. If he is doing it on his own, then I don’t believe he could, no matter how much I suspend my disbelief. If he has help, why don’t we explore that part of it more? Sure, he hires Kaas’s assassin, but does he put the bomb in Kaas’s car? Does McGregor’s character even have the knowledge to place a bomb in a car like that? Did he hire someone to do it? I actually think this is quite important. If you’re going to have a car bomb go off to conveniently kill a character you need out of the way for plot reasons, I think you need to earn it through a proper explanation. The writers here don’t earn it. They just say “oh there’s a bomb in the car” and leave it at that. Come on, you could at least have McGregor have a throw away line like “I’m not the only person to feel this way” to at least tease that he might have had some help at some point.
Surprisingly, despite complaining about this film for nearly 3,500 words. I do quite like it. I enjoyed watching it and, as mentioned before, I would watch it again. Rome and The Vatican look lovely in HD and the main characters hit most of the marks they’re supposed to. You could argue that some of the characters are a bit simplistic at times, but I actually don’t think that’s a problem. A character can have a simple motivation so long as they own it and aren’t afraid to chase it at every turn. The problems arise when you start trying to give a simple character extra depth when extra depth isn’t required. All of the characters in this film are better when they follow their basic principles and motivations. Kaas is best when he’s an assassin coldly killing people for a pay cheque, McGregor is best when he’s trying to keep people safe from the bomb and Skarsgard is best when he’s stomping around and sneering about how this poncy “sign reading” stuff is a load of old knackers.
Up to the ending, this film was hovering around a 6.5/7.0 out of 10. However, the ending drags it all the way down to 5.0. I’m all for a twist now and then, but there has to be a reason for it. This film would have been much better with a straight regular ending. The twist is honestly there for the sake of having one. It doesn’t enrich the story or make it more enjoyable. It’s a forced “happy” ending when one just isn’t required.
Final Score 5 out of 10
Conclusion:
I’m not going to tell you not to see this film. If you’re prepared to accept what it is, you’ll be able to enjoy it. I’ll be honest and say I did enjoy it but that still doesn’t mean it’s a critical success. There are a number of movies that I enjoyed that completely fall down when you try to critically analyse them. The question is would you want to spend 2 hours of your life with these characters? At the end of the day, I answered yes. The movie will hold your attention. Its story flaws drag it down in my opinion, but they didn’t drive me to turn on the film entirely. While the flaws mean that this isn’t a good movie, they don’t make it without worth. Hence the rating being bang in the middle of the spectrum.
I hope you enjoyed this review. I apologise for the absurd length of it. This is the first time I’ve ever tried doing a film review. If I do anymore in the future, I’ll try and chop the length down. Please feel free to let me know what you didn’t like in this and offer some improvements.
If you’ve made it all the way here, thanks for reading!
Monday, 8 April 2013
My Favourite 11 Wrestling Shows
I love pro wrestling, so I thought I'd write a blog about my favourite wrestling shows. Big whoop, wanna fight about it?
Enjoy
Enjoy
11: ROH Super Card of Honour 1
This show is from Wrestlemania weekend in 2006 and has two
of the greatest matches I’ve ever seen on it. One is a 6 man tag match
featuring wrestlers from a Japanese company called “Dragon Gate”. The match is
insane with all sorts of high spots and crazy head drop moves. My MOTY for 2006
in fact. The main event is Daniel Bryan facing Roderick Strong. They go for
nearly an hour and it’s one of the finest bouts I’ve ever seen. Two classic
matches on one show. The rest of the card is the usual ROH stuff, but the two
main events make it amazing
10: WWF Royal Rumble 2001
The Rumble match on this show is fantastic. Kane is dominant
and eliminates 11 guys on route to making the final two. Honky Tonk Man makes a
cameo and takes a guitar to the face. Steve Austin bleeds so much you’d think
he’d need a transfusion. One of the best Rumble’s ever. Under card is amazing
too with Jericho and Benoit having
perhaps the best ladder match of all time. Kurt Angle and HHH have a great
title match too. All in all, perhaps the best Rumble from top to bottom ever.
9: WCW Spring Stampede 99
Best show WCW did during the Monday Night Wars in my
opinion. Opener is Blitzkrieg Vs Juventud Guerrera in what is a contender for
best opening match of all time. From that we go to Hak Vs Bam Bam Bigelow in
what is perhaps the best hardcore match WCW ever put on. Benoit and Malenko
team up to face Saturn and Raven, stealing the show in the process. Even the
matches you’d think would suck (Disco Inferno Vs Konnan) are still a lot of
fun. It’s amazing to watch a show this good, when you consider how horrid the
product was in general during this time.
8: ECW The Doctor is in 96
One of ECW’s best arena shows. Main Event is Rob Van Dam Vs
Sabu in a stretcher match, which may be their best match together. Mountains of
crazy spots and some actual psychology to boot. This was also Chris Jericho’s
last ECW show as he takes on Scorpio in a near fall fest that never fails to
excite. Shane Douglas and Pittbull #2 have a match that is straight out of
Memphis as Douglas hits Pittbull with everything not tied down in an effort to
steal a win. There’s an insane tag title four way dance featuring The Gangsta’s.
Louie Spicolli and Johnny Smith also have a solid match on the under card.
Great show that highlights why ECW was so popular in it’s heyday.
7: TNA Unbreakable 2005
This was TNA’s last pay per view before getting on Spike TV.
The build up for the show had been online only and had actually been some of the
best TV that the company had ever done. Raven and Rhino take part in a great
match that harkens back to their Hardcore Title Feud back in 2001. Bobby Roode
and Jeff Hardy have a pretty good match, which was the first time they’d really
tried to push Roode to any level up the card. But the highlight is the main
event. A triple threat match between Samoa Joe, AJ Styles and Christopher
Daniels. Simply put, this is one of the greatest matches that I’ve ever seen in
my life. All 3 men were “on” in this one. I can’t do this match justice, you
just have to see it. There is no shortage of huge moves and unique double teams.
Each man has a role to play (Joe as the monster, Daniels as the conniving heel,
AJ as the gutsy face) and all 3 do it to a level of perfection that I don’t
think I’ve ever seen them do as well before or since. An all time classic that
elevates a very good show to an excellent one.
6: WWF Backlash 2000
The WWF had countless classic shows in 2000 but this would
be my pick of the litter. All things considered, Wrestlemania 2000 was a relative
disappointment, so WWF needed to rebound with a great show, and boy did they
EVER! From top to bottom, I think only one match is bad on this show and
everything else is perfect for what it needs to be. The opening match (Edge and
Christian Vs Road Dogg and X-Pac) gets the crowd pumped and features some great
action. The match between Dean Malenko and Scotty 2 Hotty is probably the best
Light Heavyweight Title match the WWF ever did, featuring great psychology and
story as Malenko attacks Scotty’s legs to slow him down. The 6 man hardcore
match is zany fun that doesn’t outshine the other matches. Big Show Vs Kurt
Angle is a comedy match that is
genuinely funny (Big Show dresses as Hulk Hogan and NAILS it!). The Dudley Boyz
(The z makes it cooler) finally put Trish Stratus through a table after weeks
of trying (Turning themselves face in the process). Jericho and Benoit beat the
ever loving crap out of each other in a hard hitting semi-main. And then there’s
the main event. Good grief. The Rock and Triple H have a match that pulls at
every part of your emotions. The Rock is perfect as the hero who has the odds
stacked against him. The story is timeless and the match is a classic. One of
the greatest shows ever
5: WCW Wrestle War 92
Old School WCW here people. This show is just one of those
shows that is chicken soup for the traditional wrestling fans soul. It’s a show
that features not just great wrestling but also one of the best violent main
events of all time. WWF/E’s greatest gimmick match may just be Hell in a Cell.
It’s the match that carries the most reverence in WWE’s litany of stipulation
matches (At least it used too anyway before they watered the concept down in
recent years). WCW’s answer to that match was The War Games. The War Games
featured two rings surrounded by a giant cage. Two teams of 4 or 5 competed in
it with a member from each team entering after time intervals. It was traditionally
one of the most bloody and violent matches the company had. I think the War
Games from Wrestle War 92 might be the best War Games match ever. Some may disagree
but I honestly think that none of the others are as good as this one. It
features Bobby Eaton, Steve Austin, Rick Rude, Sting, Barry Windham amongst
others (How’s that for an all-star cast?). It’s bloody, it’s violent, it’s
drenched in drama and I could probably watch it every day of my life. Just
epic, epic stuff. The rest of the show holds up though. The Steiner Brothers
face Tatsumi Fujimami and Takayuki Iizuka in an excellent tag team match that has
great technical wrestling and hard hitting suplexes. Brian Pillman and Tom Zenk
have an excellent match too that features a good story, being that both men are
friends as the match starts. A great show that I always enjoy watching.
4: Pro
Wrestling NOAH Tokyo Dome Show 2004
Oh my.
Words fail me on this one. The early parts of this show are solid, if
uneventful, but the second half will rock your world back and forth! Where do
you start with some of the matches on this one? First off, you have Yoshinobu
Kanemauru Vs Jushin Liger, which would be a MOTN on any other sane show, as
exciting as it is. It’s not even the second best match on this show. KENTA and Marufuji
defend their tag titles against Kendo Kashin and Takeshi Suigara in a brilliant
match, which may honestly get better every time I watch it. Great double teams
and the makeshift pairing of Kashin and Suigara work so well together that they
actually make you believe they can win against the established champs.
Wrestling legends Mitsuharu Misawa and Keiji Mutoh face off for the first time
ever in a hard hitting tag encounter. However, the main event is what steals
the show. Kenta Kobashi and Jun Akiyama beat two shades of nonsense out of each
other in one of NOAH’s most epic main events. Kenta Kobashi is the reigning GHC
World Champion and shows in this match why his reign may be the best ever.
Heart stopping near falls and incredibly scary looking head drops. This match
may be NOAH’s greatest match, and that’s saying A LOT! Don’t like Japanese
wrestling? You will after this, you’ll have no choice.
3: WWF
Wrestlemania III
This show
just makes me happy. Every time I watch it, I find something new about it that
I liked that I didn’t recognise the first time around. Some of the matches are
bad but are saved more than not by the excellent crowd, who seemingly pop for
everything. Everyone has gushed over how great Randy Savage Vs Ricky Steamboat
is. Everyone has dissected the Hogan Vs Andre match. Yes, it’s a horrid
wrestling match. It may be one of the most awful matches ever, but I don’t
care. The actual wrestling may suck but the story is brilliant. Hogan is on the
defensive from the first 30 seconds onwards and spends the whole match trying,
and failing, to get any traction against the monster. Finally, he manages to
get the Giant off his feet and they go home almost immediately after. I don’t
care who you are, you have to admit that the booking of this match is
spectacular. The show itself is just so much fun. There’s such a feeling of
optimism about it. The crowd are having the time of their lives and you can’t
help but get wrapped up in it. It’s that optimistic joy that grabs you and
holds you to its bosom. Wrestlemania III just makes me happy. I look at that
crowd and listen to them cheer and it raises my heart above the trees. One of
the best of all time
2: WWF
Wrestlemania X-Seven
Similar to the NOAH show, this one is a slow starter but the
second half is the best the WWF has ever done. Any show with the following list
of matches can only be classed as one of the greatest in my eyes. You’ve got
Chris Benoit Vs Kurt Angle, Shane McMahon Vs Vince McMahon, TLC II, Triple H Vs
The Undertaker and Stone Cold Vs The Rock. I mean, good Christ alive, has there
ever been a show that loaded where all the matches actually deliver?
Unbelievable stuff. The only downside is the way the show ends. Stone Cold wins
the title but becomes a villain in doing so. Vince McMahon and Stone Cold
shaking hands is the moment the Attitude Era died. I think it’s all been down
hill since. That being said, this show is awesome. We may never see it’s like
again.
And finally!
1: ECW Heatwave 98
I love this show. It only has 6 matches and I love every
single one of them. I could recite this whole show in my head from start to
finish. The opening match is Jerry Lynn Vs Justin Credible and they go hell for
leather. No one ever got the best out of Credible like Lynn did. Justin
Credible owed his main event run in ECW to Lynn. Lynn selflessly made Credible
look like a star every time out. This match is no exception. Lance Storm and
Chris Candido keep the momentum going and then Masato Tanaka and Mike Awesome
steal the show! Seriously, I almost crapped my pants the first time I saw the
Tanaka Vs Awesome match from this show. I think it would be impossible to get
across just how much I enjoy this match. There have been better matches, but I
just love it. The combination of the hot crowd and the fact that both men are
letting it all hang out make this one of the all-time ECW classic matches. The
show follows it with Rob Van Dam and Sabu Vs Hayabusa and Jinsei Jinzaki. This
match goes about 5 minutes too long but does have some good spots in it. Taz
and Bam Bam Bigelow face off next and have a really intense brawl that has an unforeseen
and unforgettable ending! The main event is an insane 6 man tag match featuring
The Dudley Boyz against Tommy Dreamer, Sandman and Spike Dudley. A crazy brawl
that involves, amongst other things, a blow up doll getting piledriven, Spike
diving off a ladder to the outside and a run in from “The Original Gangsta” New
Jack. This show never fails to excite me. It has 6 matches that are all unique.
You have a fast paced opener, followed by a much more old school technical
match, followed by an insane Japanese Hardcore Match, followed by a tag team
spot fest, followed by an intense scuffle with a “big fight feel” and finishing
up with an insanity filled 6 man brawl. My favourite show ever!
What’s yours? I’d love to know!
Thursday, 21 March 2013
Politics is Rubbish
Politics in Britain is rubbish. Genuinely rubbish. If, like
me, at the last election you voted for the Liberal Democrats, it's even more
rubbish. See, I don't like the Tories and I don't like Labour. So I went out
and voted for the Lib Dem's. The Lib Dem's then used the votes given to them by
people like me and joined up with the Tories. Thus we have a Tory government.
You can see why this has me a bit merked. It would be like going to Burger King
and ordering a Whopper but then getting a Big Mac because Burger King had
decided to go into a partnership with McDonalds but have also decided to no
longer sell their own food. Essentially, Britain is now like walking into a
Burger King but all the food is being sold by Ronald McDonald. It doesn't
attract anyone. The Burger King fans are annoyed because they can't have a
Whopper and the Mcdonalds fans are annoyed because they've got to eat their
McNuggets in an unfamiliar interior. It's all a giant mess.
Disgusted by what has happened, I've decided no longer to
support the Lib Dem's. They will not have my vote again, unless all the people
who were responsible for making this decision leave the party. This is going to
take a while. I am morally and ethically opposed to the Tory Party, so they are
out as well. I am neither a racist nor a fascist so the BNP is a definite no.
I'm actually reasonably pro Europe so UKIP won't be getting my vote. I'd rather
wipe my bum with sand paper than vote for any party linked to George Galloway
and I think the Green Party is a wasted vote. That all leaves Labour.
I'm not sure about Labour. Never have been. Labour will
always be the party of Tony Blair to me. The party that led us into an illegal
war in Iraq and the party that pretty much 0amde us into a CC-TV nation. What
with ID cards and everything else, Labour's genuine disregard for our civil and
personal liberties is the biggest reason to NOT vote for them in my eyes. That
being said, Unemployment did drop for quite a while under the Labour government
and they did bring in the minimum wage too which has been a giant positive step
in worker/employer relations. Forcing employers by law to pay workers a guaranteed
minimum amount was a huge victory for every day to day working person and I
hope we never forget what a momentous act it was. That being said, I'm still
not a Labour supporter and as of right now they do not have my vote.
The reasons are mostly due to my own prejudices’ but also
due to the fact that I am getting increasingly annoyed by their form of
opposition. The Labour approach to opposition these days is to basically come
out and say "the government is doing everything wrong. WRONG I SAY!".
Now, this is perfectly fine, for a party who've just announced a new leader and
are trying to find their voice. Ed Milliband has been Labour for quite a while
now. Even longer than quite a while actually. In fact, you could probably say
he's been leader for a decent amount of time. He's certainly been leader enough
to actually have some policies by now. Problem is, Eddy Baby doesn't have any
policies. I mean literally he has none. Not a single one. I couldn't tell you
his stance on anything. All I can tell you about Edward Von Milliband Esq is
that he thinks David Cameron is rubbish. He thinks David Cameron is a bad prime
minster. That's it. That's all I know about his political views. I'm sorry but
how am I supposed to do anything with that? You'd expect him to think that
David Cameron is a rubbish PM because otherwise he'd be in the government and
not THE LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION. The clue is kind of in the name there really.
What really set me off was Millibands latest performance in
Prime Minsters Questions. Mills took Cam-Bone to task for doing a U-Turn on his
cheaper alcohol policy. He made a joke about how Camzilla couldn't organise a
you-know-what in a brewery. Everyone on the labour side laughed and guffawed
(somewhat like Tories from the 80's actually) and clapped away because
Millidizzle had smacked Cam-Dog with a giant zinger. It was a reasonably good
line that I'm sure Eddy had practiced in the mirror 50 times before PMQ's. It
really wound me up though. It would be one thing to take a cheap shot at the PM
if you had something else to offer instead but Labour have nothing. Literally
nothing. I've yet to see Ed Milliband declare a stance on anything yet. I'm
begging him to come up with a policy. Seriously, any policy. "No more
money for nuclear weapons", "More money for nuclear weapons",
"More immigration", "less immigration", "disband the
house of lords", "free corsets for the under five's",
ANYTHING!!!
To all Labour supporters I really only have one question.
Why do you support them? It can't be because you connect with their values and
policies because they don't have any. I have come to the conclusion that the
only people who support Labour are people who think the Tories are rubbish and
just want to vote for somebody different in the vague hope that different =
better. If that's the way you are going to be, you might as well not vote. I
will only vote for someone if I think they are going to do a better job than
the person already voted in. That's the whole point of politics as far as I'm
concerned. You vote someone in, they do something, someone else comes along and
says how they would do it differently and then you base your next voting
decision on that information. This has now been twisted to the point that you
vote for someone but they then join up with someone completely opposite
allowing them to get into power, they do something, someone else comes along
and says they are doing a bad job but gives no information on how they would do
it differently and then you somehow try and work out how the frick you're going
to vote. NO WONDER LESS THAN 50% OF THE ELECTORATE VOTES!!!!
People seem fixated that Ed Milliband sounds a bit weird and
looks kind of nerdy. All the commentators seem to care about is his personality
or lack there of. This is immaterial. Ed Milliband could have the charisma of a
damp rag and the personality of a nursery school janitor and STILL get into
power if people felt he had any idea on how to run the country. Look at John
Major for proof that personality is no where near as important as people
thinking you'd be better at the job than the other guy. Maggie Thatcher (the
Baboon from the Lagoon) was pretty widely disliked and seen as an un-caring
person who stole kids milk money but she appeared to have the better policies
(And unlike Blair she won her war) than Michael Foot who's manifesto for the
1983 election was called "The longest suicide note in political
history". Say what you want about Thatcher, Major or Foot but by gum they
knew where they stood and they weren't afraid to show it.
This insistency from politicians to try and get away from
policies and beliefs is that eventually no party will have a clear idea on
anything and extreme right wing and left wing parties (Like the BNP and Greens)
will see a surge in their popularity for the simple reason that they actually
believe in something. Labour need to show us where they stand and what they
plan to do, otherwise the already waning interest in politics in this country
will continue it's never ending erosion.
Friday, 1 March 2013
Room
Don't give me disposable income. Just don't, because I'll spend it on anything. Seriously. Comics, Video Games, DVD's, CD's, Wrestling Gear, Magazines, Football Tickets, Oreo's and anything else that takes my fancy. Every room in my house is groaning with DVD's and CD's. I can barely bloody move. I had a clear out around Christmas time and ended up bunging 4 bags full of stuff to the charity shop and I STILL can't fit everything in my house. I've had to cut down on my DVD purchasing and I've stopped buying comics altogether. I told myself that I did this to save myself some money but really I did it because I just didn't have enough room to store 15 issues of "Bat-Wing" and another 15 issues of "Invincible" (Which was one of the non DC or Marvel comics that I quite enjoyed along with "Hell Yeah". Only "Hell Yeah" survived the cull though, probably because I only have 5 issues of that)
I am a little down about this because I was really enjoying the Doctor Who/Star Trek cross-over comic "Assimilation Squared" and "Death of the Family" had just started as well. I guess I'll have to wait for the trade on those two. I would love to jump back in at some point if for the only reason that I love discussing comics about as much as I love discussing sport and wrestling. This must be why I like CHIKARA so much as it seamlessly combines athletic endeavour with wrestling showmanship and comic book incredulity. Having a drunken discussion about how awesome Jason Todd is with my friend Phil in a MacDonalds late on a Saturday night are the kind of moments that I live for.
At the moment, the things in my house taking up the most space are my ever growing collection of football DVD's. It started with me just picking up some Everton DVD's online (95 FA Cup Final, Cup Winners Cup Final etc). I then started getting some of the Everton matches not officially released on DVD from certain unnamed sources. I know that you shouldn't really buy bootleg DVD's but these were matches that weren't sold in the shops or online. I actually contacted SKY Sports and ITV, who own most of the rights to the matches, and asked them if they would have any intention of releasing any of the matches officially. ITV declined to answer and SKY essentially fobbed me off with a "we'll take it under advisement" reply. I for one find it a crying shame that I've been reduced to getting hold of the games this way.
Anyone who knows me will be able to tell you that I am more than happy to buy the official release of DVD's and CD's. The only time I would ever buy a bootleg DVD would be if it was impossible for me to acquire the footage legally. There are so many VHS's of old WCW shows that you just can't get any more. In the UK, you can't even get WWE on Demand so you are essentially left with only two options
1. Not watch it
2. Get it via illegal means
There's nothing more frustrating than being denied something when you are practically begging the people involved to take your money. How WWE don't have a service where you email them, pay a fee and then have them send a DVD of whatever you want baffles me to this day. It would essentially give them a license to print money as there would always be a nerd like me who will happily shovel money into their coffers in return for every episode of ECW Hardcore TV (uncensored with real music. WWE could do this with an on demand DVD service as it wouldn't be a mass marketed DVD. It's impossible for Metallica's lawyers to check EVERY personalized DVD WWE send out. The man power alone would make it non-financially viable)
Since buying the Everton DVD's I've since tried to add to my collection by picking up other matches. I started collecting FA Cup Finals on DVD and thankfully it's easy to pick most of these up through ILC Sports. You can buy most of them from the ILC website or through Amazon. DVD prices range from about £3 to £11-12 for the rarer ones. DVD's of league cup finals are a bit sparser so I've had to rely on bootlegging to pick some of those up. These are mostly ones from the 80's. However, if they start selling some of the bootlegs I have on official releases, I will pick those up, mainly because a nice official DVD looks better on a shelf. My house is filling though with random football DVD's that I keep picking up, both official and bootleg. World Cup and European Championship matches prove much harder to get hold off through official channels so most of those reside in my bootleg collection.
A large chunk of my wrestling collection is official releases. Pretty much anything WWE and ECW is official mainly because they seem to have been most on the ball when it comes to releasing DVD's. ECW, despite being arguably a much smaller company, completely eclipses WCW when it comes to releasing events on DVD and VHS. ECW released every PPV from 97-2001 in the space of two years. They were even bringing them out after the company had folded. WCW released a pitiful amount of pay per views during the same period. They released Uncensored 99, Spring Stamped 99, Bash at the Beach 99, Starcade 99 and then the first 6 of 2000. Yes, they skipped about 6 shows in 99. This may have been a blessing in disguise because most of the 99 PPV's were horrible.
Still though, who the hell was overseeing the Video department during this period? WCW's internal woes seemingly translated from the incoherent booking of the product to incoherent schedules for their video releases. There was a market for WCW Stuff in the UK as well. I still haven't seen most of WCW's pay per views during their big boom of 96-98 because getting hold of them is next to arduous. ECW not only released their PPV events but also re-released most of the home video shows (granted with over dubbed music) and a couple of compilations of Hardcore TV. WWE are miles ahead of both companies though, especially as regards to making most of their releases available to UK customers. WWE not only releases pretty much all of its DVD's in the UK (aside from The Billy Graham DVD from years back) but also release "WWE Tagged Classics", which is where they pretty much weld their old VHS releases onto DVD and release them for sale.
The only downside is that WWE will soon no longer be dealing with Silver Vision which means that we can probably say goodbye to the tagged classics range which sucks mighty hard. Thankfully, I've plugged most of the gaps in my collection using the Tagged Classics series as far as PPV shows are concerned, which was the main benefit I got from the series really. It may have been cheaper to traipse between e-bay and amazon to pick up the original In Your House Shows on VHS but to just pay £15 and have them on a DVD really simplifies matters (And more importantly, takes up less space on my shelf). If it hadn’t been for years of collecting WWF/E pay per views on VHS, I would just take the financial hit of buying all the tagged classics and would sell/throw out all the VHS’s I have. This would be far too much hassle though so I haven’t really contemplated it.
I wouldn't consider myself a hoarder. It's not like I can't bring myself to chuck away a used tissue or an old bus ticket. But when it comes to DVD's, CD's. Books and Magazines I suddenly don't want to see them go. At some point I'm going to have to get rid of more stuff, if only to avoid the strain it will put on the emergency services to dig me out from under a mountain of 4-4-2 magazines. The only other thing for it is for me to become vastly better off and move to a house where I can have a special room where I plonk everything down in continually rising stacks. . That would be the biggest perk of being rich, being able to afford a room big enough to store my DVD and Comic collection. That and a brand new Honda Accord straight off the car lot! Sadly, that is a mere pipe dream so it looks like I'm going to have to keep finding nooks and crannies for all the nonsense I collect for many days to come.
Oh and to all the companies complaining about piracy, maybe if you made your product easier to purchase, people would actually purchase it through official channels? Just a thought.
Wednesday, 6 February 2013
The Astounding Rory
“Welcome, welcome one and all! Step right up, step right up! Come and see ‘The Astounding Rory’! I give to you the man that the forces of the universe forgot. This man has an unbelievable power, an unimaginable gift! He has the strength of a silverback and the accuracy an arrow. No man, nay beast, nay GOD can throw a football further than this man. He is to throwing footballs what Zeus was to throwing lightning bolts. Step right up, step right up. I am offering ten, yes you heard correctly, TEN Shillings for any man, woman or beast who can throw the football further than The Astounding Rory. Come forth, come all! Who has the muscular clout? Who has the blinding accuracy? Who amongst you has the strength, the gall and the guts to defeat Rory? Is it you sir? How about you madam? How about you sir? Yes, you! The blond haired man with the cute hamster face? Can you defeat Rory? What is your name young man? Phillip you say? Ladies and Gentlemen, please give a warm round of applause for our challenger!”
Yes, I'm sorry to everyone else, but this bit here is about football. Please feel free to skip to the next blog post if the mere thought of association soccer causes you to break out in hives of dismay and disinterest. For those of you not acquainted with the bizarre pastime that myself and many other nutters decide to follow on a daily basis by the name of Football, "The Astounding Rory" is none other than Rory Delap. Rory Delap is a footballer who is renowned for having a long throw. Is he the goal keeper I hear you ask? No he is in fact an outfield player. Your face may now be screwed up in confusion. "How is having a long throw relevant to a footballer? Surely being able to KICK the ball a long way is more favourable talent for a man in such a profession? Ah but dear reader you are forgetting a key part of football. A strange part of the game that actively encourages an outfield player to pick up the ball and fling it to his hearts content. I am of course speaking of the "throw in"
WIKIPEDIA Tells us that,
"A throw-in (or shy) is a method of restarting play in a game of association football when the ball has exited the side of the field of play."
Thanks internet! Thinternet!
Now throw ins are usually a gigantic waste of time. The attacking
team will usually throw the ball pretty short to the nearest available player
so that they can get back to doing whatever it is they actually want to do. To
some teams though, the throw in is a valuable and devastating weapon. One such
team was Stoke City ,
where Rory Delap used to ply his trade before being loaned out to Barnsley . You see, what Stoke would do is fill the box
with loads of really tall people. They would then have Rory fling the ball into
the box with pin-point accuracy. This would usually lead to one of the freakish
giants getting on the end of the ball with a foot, head, chest or buttock
(anything to get the ball over the line), which would give Stoke a goal. Delap
has the ability not to just throw the ball really far but he also has the
ability to make the throws super accurate. He's also seemingly able to control
the balls height and trajectory, which I can only surmise is down to him having
a high number of midichlorians in his blood. This means that Rory Delap's throw
ins are both long, highly accurate and fly in at a difficult angle. Basically,
they are an absolute nightmare to defend, especially with the cast of
"Young Frankenstein" waiting in the box to get on the end of one of
them. It's no surprise that for a while at Stoke the fans would cheer the
awarding of a throw in the same way they would cheer the awarding of a penalty
or the awarding of free Bovril to the over 60's.
I'll be honest and say that I am over simplifying this situation
slightly. Stokes prolonged progress and status in the top division has not
soley been down to Rory Delap's circus strongman act. However, to say he had
nothing to do with their success would be unfair. Most Stoke fans I speak to
like to play down Rory's contributions. From one angle I can kind of see why.
Non-Stoke fans are generally fascinated with Delap's ridiculous throwing
ability. Whenever anyone mentions Stoke
City
However, I can kind of see where the Stoke fans are coming from.
It took years of effort and hard graft for Stoke to make it to the Premier
League. There were many years spent scrapping in the lower leagues with teams
like Stockport County ,
Crystal Palace England
No matter what success they have enjoyed, Stoke have had to make
do with constant negative labelling. They are a “long ball” team. They are
“dirty”. They don't play attractive football. Stoke are a team that live with a
constant negative image. This is a negative image that The Astounding Rory has
only perpetuated. Stoke are currently trying to make strides to dispel their
image as a bunch of gruff long ball merchants. A host of new players have been
brought into the club. They've even signed a new striker in Michael Owen who is
considerably shorter than the usual Stoke forward. I've always imagined that
Stoke have one of those cardboard cut outs at their training ground. He's a
giant clown in red and white stripes in my mind for some reason. He's holding
his arm out to his side and he has a speech bubble coming from his mouth saying
“You must be this tall to sign a contract”. Since this season began, Delap
couldn't get a game in a Stoke shirt. Coincidence? A large part of me doubts
it.
As mentioned earlier, Rory Delap has currently gone out on loan to
Barnsley . Maybe this is it for him at Stoke?
If so, is this the right decision for the Stoke management to make? It's not as
if their form this season has been ground breaking. They are currently in the
lower half of the table although I would be surprised if they were to be
relegated. Maybe if Rory were to come back their fortunes would improve? Maybe
there would be no change at all. My colleague Rich at work is of the opinion
that if it wasn’t for Delap’s insane throwing ability he would barely be able
to make it in League Two. He is a Port Vale supporter however and they tend to
not be too warm on Stoke
City
Roll up, roll up! Ten Shillings for anyone who can match The
Astounding Rory!!! Step right up, STEP RIGHT UP!!!!
Here’s some clips of Rory
doing what he does
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