Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome @ Wikipedia
Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome @ IMDb

This web series (to be released as a TV movie in 2013) follows the adventures of young Ensign William Adama, the later commander of the Battlestar Galactica. Now he’s just eager to get into his Viper and wipe out some Cylon raiders in the ongoing war. But for the time being he’s being ordered to pilot a Raptor instead of a Viper.

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Categories: Short Review, Web
Tags: Battlestar Galactica · Star Trek
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Grindhouse (2007)

11 Feb – €14.99 @ Media Markt

MacGruber (2010)

11 Feb – €9.99 @ Drogerie Müller

My 900th movie:

Pulp Fiction (1994)

11 Feb – €16.99 @ Drogerie Müller

Mallrats (1995)

16 Feb – €7.40 (CA$13.99) @ Amazon.ca (paid partially via gift certificate)

Hobo with a Shotgun (2011)

17 Feb – €9.38 (£6.94) @ Amazon.co.uk

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Categories: DVD / Blu-ray, Purchase Diary 2012
Tags: Cat Run · Dogma · Down to You · El Mariachi · Gamer · Grindhouse · Hobo with a Shotgun · MacGruber · Mallrats · Mamma Mia! · Mission: Impossible · Mr. & Mrs. Smith · Pulp Fiction · Red Riding Hood · Reservoir Dogs · Star Trek · Stargate · The Adjustment Bureau · The Change-Up · The Expendables · The Fast and the Furious · The Karate Kid
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Love Happens

03 Nov – €7.19 (£4.95) @ Amazon.co.uk

Rawhide: Season 1

03 Nov – €17.74 (£13.88) @ Amazon.co.uk

Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle

04 Nov – €0.00 ($6.99) @ Amazon.com (paid via gift certificate)

Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay

04 Nov – €0.00 ($7.65) @ Amazon.com (paid via gift certificate)

Starman

04 Nov – €0.00 ($9.99) @ Amazon.com (paid via gift certificate)

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Categories: DVD / Blu-ray, Purchase Diary 2011
Tags: Batman · Billy Madison · Grease · Happy Gilmore · Harold & Kumar · Love Happens · My Name Is Earl · NCIS · Picture Perfect · Rawhide · Scream · She's the One · Smallville · Star Trek · Starman · The Object of My Affection · White Collar
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Deutsche Version | CW 13-17 | CW 13-19

Chuck 3×15 Chuck versus the Role Models
Again, I’ve enjoyed this episode very much. Loved the tiger even without Mike Tyson.
I also liked the hint to an oncoming arc in the end. I strongly suspect that the Chuck gang and the Awesome family will soon cross paths again.

And I loved this little spoof of Hart to Hart (not to mention the blink towards LOST at the end) (warning: contains spoilers if you’re not up2date):

And here’s the original:

LOST 6×14 The Candidate
Just like with Supernatural they seem to be cleaning up the game board for the Grand Finale.
What disturbed me most about the Kwon’s death was not that it happened after they reunited after being apart for three years (bad things happen…) but that neither Jin nor Sun thought about their daughter at that moment, a child that will now be raised without parents. I understand that a little more from Jin’s perspective since he never saw his child and it was three years since Sun had been pregnant but Sun should have said something!

The Big Bang Theory 3×20 The Spaghetti Catalyst
I loved it how Leonard and Penny behaved like divorced parents (IMHO with switched gender roles – she takes him to Disneyworld and he has to deal with his nightmares afterwards) and how Sheldon – who loves them both – has a hard time deciding of whom to hang with.

How I Met Your Mother 5×21 Twin Beds
This story was not well constructed. I get that Barney and Ted might have regrets but how it played out was not well executed IMHO – especially since Don is basically an unknown to me. How often have we seen this guy? Three, four times? And now I should care about him?
I also didn’t like the twin bed story, it felt contrived.

Community 1×23 Modern Warfare
I can’t even count how many references this episode alone had – and still was able to tell a fully fledged story: First there were the named references to Friends and Cheers then it seemed like a post-apocalyptic movie, then Abed quoted The Terminator and fought like in The Matrix (including bullet-time at a later point), then there was this doomsday movie scene where people are warming their hands over a burning barrel in the midst of destruction (Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow), the mention of the Neutral Zone (Star Trek), The Prize (Highlander), the gun taped on the back (Die Hard) and I’m pretty sure Señor Chang’s golden guns were from some movie, too.
I’m also sure I did not mention every reference here nor do I think that I caught all of them. Two words: Absolutely hilarious.

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Categories: TV Season 2009/10 Diary
Tags: Bones · Cheers · Chuck · Community · Die Hard · Doctor Who · Friends · Hart to Hart · Highlander · How I Met Your Mother · Independence Day · LOST · Smallville · Star Trek · Supernatural · Terminator · The Big Bang Theory · The Day After Tomorrow · The Matrix
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Deutsche Version | November | January 2010

December, 15th

Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country

William Shatner … Captain James T. Kirk
Leonard Nimoy … Captain Spock
DeForest Kelley … Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy
James Doohan … Captain Montgomery “Scotty” Scott
Walter Koenig … Commander Pavel Chekov
Nichelle Nichols … Cmdr. Uhura
George Takei … Captain Hikaru Sulu
Kim Cattrall … Lieutenant Valeris
Mark Lenard … Ambassador Sarek
Grace Lee Whitney … Commander Janice Rand
Brock Peters … Admiral Cartwright
Leon Russom … Starfleet Commander in Chief
Kurtwood Smith … Federation President
Christopher Plummer … General Chang
Rosanna DeSoto … Azetbur
David Warner … Chancellor Gorkon
John Schuck … Klingon ambassador
Michael Dorn … Colonel Worf

Synopsis: Three months until Captain Kirk and most of his senior staff go into retirement. Sulu has got his own ship now, the Excelsior. But then the klingon moon Praxis explodes. This polutes the atmosphere of the klingon homeworld Qo’noS (Kronos). The Klingons have no choice but to negotiate a peace treaty with the Federation. But there are forces in motion that want to prevent that this happens.

My Opinion: “There will be no peace as long as Kirk lives” (Star Trek IV). This time one had to fear that they mean it. VI is my favourite movie of the old Star Trek series. There is a great final battle but that’s not the end but is marking a new beginning.
Nicholas Meyer is directing a Star Trek movie for the second time after II and he did again an excellent job. Besides being the director he also worked on the screenplay for II, IV and VI and thus for three of the five best Star Trek movies.

January 2010

Categories: DVD / Blu-ray, DVD Marathon, Movie Watchings 2009
Tags: Star Trek
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Deutsche Version | October | December

November, 3rd

Rambo

Sylvester Stallone … John Rambo
Julie Benz … Sarah
Matthew Marsden … School Boy
Graham McTavish … Lewis
Jake La Botz … Reese
Tim Kang … En-Joo
Paul Schulze … Michael Burnett

Synopsis: In Burma a civil war is causing countless deaths on a daily basis. But John Rambo isn’t interested in war anymore. He lives a quiet life in Thailand and doesn’t care about the world. But one day christian missionaries want to rent his boat to get into that war zone. And when they don’t return he does what he was born to do.

My Opinion: A very bloody movie. Make sure you have a bucket under your TV to catch all the blood that is dripping out of it. But it’s also a very honest movie; it does not hide or glorify the truth of battle. After the first, this is the best Rambo movie and it brings the story full circle. I don’t think Stallone should make another one. Just like with Rocky he finished the story of the character in a satisfying way and he should leave it at that.

BTW: Check out the body count chart.

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Categories: DVD / Blu-ray, DVD Marathon, Movie Watchings 2009
Tags: 1984 · Ben Hur · Catch and Release · Gladiator · Harry Potter · Rocky Rambo · Spartacus · Star Trek · V for Vendetta
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Categories: DVD / Blu-ray
Tags: Gladiator · Independence Day · Star Trek
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Deutsche Version

I can’t remember how it started but I can’t seem to stop it now.

Every time I watch a movie or a TV show I think about what could be the earliest time one could premiere this without destroying the pop culture references.

I am not talking about stylistic means, I am talking about visual or textual references to the real world or other movies/shows.

To make an easy example: In the opening of Dirty Dancing baby makes a reference to JFK’s murder. Thus you couldn’t premiere this film before 1964 without making that comment a un-funny aneurysm.

Yesterday evening I watched Kill Bill Vol.1 and apart from the indirect references to eastern movies in general (and to Hattori Hanzo) there were two references that stood out: The owner of the restaurant is referred to as “Charlie Brown” and Sophie looks like a “villain from Star Trek” with ST being the later time anchor (Charlie Brown strips have been around since the 50s).

Interestingly there are only a few main anchors that pop up all the time: Fixed anchors like JFK’s murder, the moon landing in 1969 and it recent movies 9/11 and variable anchors like Star Trek and Star Wars. The latter ones are variable because if I can move a movie back in time I surely can move the referenced movie, too.

Luckily both Stars are basically endpoints, especially Star Wars. Since it plays in a galaxy far, far away it does not contain textual references to our real world and can be moved back in time to the dawn of cinema. Star Trek makes historical references to the 2nd World War and the Chicago of the thirties but I tend to play that game only until the beginning of the 50s.

The more references a movie/series uses the more fun it is to think about but the more likely it is that it will be “anchored in time”. To move Buffy as a whole back in time is a sheer improbability even if you accept to lose a third of the references. So I break it down to an episode level (so when Spike mentions that he fed of a flower person, it makes Woodstock the fixed anchor for that episode).

Once I’ve established the earliest premiere date I try to imagine how the movie would look like in the eyes of that year’s people. For example, premiere Back to the Future in the actual year 1955. That would work since people would assume that Marty’s car and the music and everything from the “future 1985″ were invented by a writer. Like the same writers imagined a year 2015 with hover cars and a holographic Jaws movie.
Although there is a reference to a “John F. Kennedy drive” it mentions nothing specific and JFK was already a senator at that time, so that wouldn’t be a problem.

This way my mind keeps active even if I have seen that movie several times. Imagine Top Gun in the early 50s where the US military was testing their first jet engines. Imagine Armageddon (with all its special effects) shortly after the founding of NASA (although that would be prevented by the actual naming of Neil Armstrong as the first man on the moon -> fixed anchor; Armageddon also mentions Star Wars (several times), the Kennedy murder, Evel Knievel and some other things which have to be taken into consideration).

Somehow it can be a lot of fun.

Categories: Thought Storm
Tags: Armageddon · Back to the Future · Buffy the Vampire Slayer · Dirty Dancing · Jaws · Kill Bill · Peanuts · Star Trek · Star Wars · Top Gun
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Deutsche Version | April | June

May, 1st

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

William Shatner … Admiral James T. Kirk
Leonard Nimoy … Captain Spock
DeForest Kelley … Dr. McCoy
James Doohan … Scotty
Walter Koenig … Pavel Chekov
George Takei … Hikaru Sulu
Nichelle Nichols … Cmdr. Uhura
Bibi Besch … Dr. Carol Marcus
Merritt Butrick … Dr. David Marcus
Kirstie Alley … Lt. Saavik
Ricardo Montalban … Khan
Judson Earney Scott … Joachim Weiss

Synopsis: The Enterprise has become a teaching ship and Captain Spock is in command. When Admiral Kirk is on inspection and takes the ship for “a tour around the block” they get a disturbing call from Dr. Marcus. Someone is trying to get his hands on the “Genesis” project, a secret research project to create life on lifeless planets. But this Genesis device could also be used as a terrible weapon. And Kirk’s enemy is no other than the genetically enhanced Khan. He tried to kill Kirk and take his ship fifteen years ago.

My Opinion: Still a great movie. I really liked how they used the fact that space is three-dimensional, a fact that even especially Sci-Fi shows forget too often. I also liked how Khan used quotes from Moby Dick, but replaced some of the places with astronomical locations. Technically he couldn’t have this knowledge, he was in stasis and shortly after his defrosting he was banned to Zeti Alpha 5. He also couldn’t know that the Klingons have a proverb: “Revenge is a dish best served cold”. But I am willing to overlook that because Montalban was awesome when he said it.
And I loved those close combat scenes, it reminded me of the old battles between sailing ships.

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Categories: DVD / Blu-ray, DVD Marathon, Movie Watchings 2009
Tags: Big · Clerks · Master and Commander · Son of Rambow · Star Trek · The Final Countdown
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I have just come back from the theatre (I watched it together with 12 friends) and I can only put it that way: I had an incredible fun time.

I went into that movie with exactly the expectations that I believe were necessary: To see a new interpretation of Star Trek TOS. The time travel was a bridge to the old Star Trek world but it was a metaphorical bridge, not a canonical.

Thus I didn’t see it as constructed that the crew came together they way they came together. The fact that it were the same people as in the original TOS was fate – the same fate that always brought the same characters together in the mirror universe – in TOS, DS9 and ENT. If we had never seen a TOS series or a TOS movie nobody would have found it curious that these people took the seats they had taken.

I also couldn’t find large logic holes – I didn’t look for them but there also wasn’t one that jumped me right into the face.

What they have overdone at some points was the silliness of the characters. There were some scenes which weren’t necessary, where they slid into a absurdity. Since much of this goofiness was expressed by voice, I will re-watch the movie in its original language and check how much of it is due to the dubbing. The original series had also a “funny” dubbing because the dubbers thought it would be “better” that way. Of the crew it was only Chekov who was overplayed, he seemed like a bad imitation of Michael Mittermeier’s (a german comedian) Chekov imitation.

In regards to audio and video I was once again disappointed of the theatre. There were vertical lines in the picture at all times that were either black or green as well as some bad transitions from one film reel to the next, including audio breaks. The general audio was also flat when there should have been some serious basses. One could as well watch a bad internet copy.

Summa summarum: This movie is definitively different from all other Trek movies and he wanted it to be. He combines the easiness of The Voyage Home with the action of First Contact and the characters are    likeable. I also liked the visual appearance, including the “brewery engine room”.

Original audio track, here I come!

Categories: Cinema
Tags: Star Trek · Star Trek TOS
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