I thought seeing as their is a pause in comic book films till this summer I’d do a pointless internet top (n) list about them. I chose the number 5 because that is about as high as my attention span will let me get. Plus I’ve also recently re-watched ‘High Fidelity’ so I have Top 5 lists on the brain.

5. X-Men 2

This is the franchise that really kicked off the modern Superhero film, building on the good will created by Blade. X-Men was a good film in its own right but it was a bit self-conscious at times and oddly goofy at others. It was also saddled with introducing many characters and explaining powers and origins. X-Men 2 was where the franchise found its feet and unfortunately thanks to the almost dire X-Men 3 and mediocre Wolverine films it was also where it peaked. It is a nicely balanced film. Superheroics, drama, new characters, better wigs and focusing on the existing characters better all rise it above X-Men.  And thanks to not being saddled with so many introductions there is more plot available for the film. More importantly this is the film we really got to see the Wolverine in action. Read the rest of this entry »

Gives away quite a bit I think this trailer but damn it all looks good.

Nice too see Stark building up his collection of suits. I especially love the suitcase armour and how it doesn’t suddenly become his normal armour but actually looks like it folds out.

I have finally got my finger out and done my own design and theme for my site. Instead of just reusing someone else’s theme and having a site that looks like every other blog on the net I have created this unique little design. It is not 100% finished yet as I need to do some tinkering to add in some of the extra functionality and it has also not yet been tested with Internet Explorer. It looks best in Chrome and Safari but Firefox and Opera are not far behind. However the site needs JavaScript enabled in Opera because it doesn’t support certain CSS3 styles. As I already block IE6 users from the site I haven’t bothered making it compatible with that trash browser. IE7 and IE8 should work more or less the same as Opera and thus will need JavaScript enabled.

Here is a shout out to Mr Anthony McLaughlin for the help and advice with the design. Especially for the advice on the use of colour and leading me to that very funky font. Us programmers need all the help we can get with design.

Let me know your thoughts and comments below. Also if you spot any bugs or where I have overlooked some styles please let me know.

Well I have just played through my first whirlwind run of Mass Effect 2 and overall I am impressed. Bioware really listened to the fans of the first game and cleaned up some of the minor issues that tended to niggle away at you while playing the original Mass Effect. Combat has been tightened up, tedious running all over the shop has been eliminated as much as possible and the very samey side missions have been done away with. Like the original it is like being in control of a Science Fiction film, scenes have a that feel of being directed by someone who knows what they are doing rather than being simply functional and everything just feels high quality. As you would expect after playing the original the game has an awesome plot and is well scripted and acted. The voice cast is enough to make a geek cry with delight.  Yvonne Strahovski, Tricia Helfer, Carrie-Anne Moss, Michael Hogan, Seth Green, Martin Sheen, Claudia Black and Adam Baldwin just to name a few. The full list is here. And the character Yvonne Strahovski plays take its looks directly from the actress too, though they have inflated her bosom somewhat for the character. Shame the characters never interact the same way as they do in Dragon Age though. Read the rest of this entry »

There is no dialogue or indeed that much happening but the final page of Marvel’s Siege #2 made me squeal like a geeky little girl. Just to sum up for those who are no comic fans the situation is as follows:

Norman Osborn (formerly the Green Goblin) has managed to wangle himself the top job at S.H.I.E.L.D (which he renamed H.A.M.M.E.R), drove all the best Superheroes underground (Some literally, others figuratively) and replaced all the major Marvel Superhero teams with his own twisted versions (made up of Marvel’s shadier heroes and villians). Oh and used scavenged Ironman armour to make himself into the ‘Superhero’ Iron Patriot (complete with Gaudy Stars and Stripes paint job). He has decided that Thor and his fellow Asgardians are terrorists and has attempted to invade Asgard which currently floats above US soil (Loki kind of helped along with that line of thinking). Ares, the greek god of war, has just been torn in half (that makes him dead) by the mad, super-junkie the Sentry (he makes Superman look like a pansy) and Osborn has just ordered the Sentry to kill the wounded Thor (who just made Wolverine’s son a chared mess with Lightening). Still with me? Yes? Good! Right Osborn thinks he is still winning (despite already having his ass handed to him by a former S.H.I.E.L.D agent armed with a shoulder mounted missile launcher) and has to be warned by an underling to turn around.

Unfortunately (for him anyway) while Osborn has been happily involved in taking over everything the real Captain America (Who was kind of assassinated after opening a can of Whoop-ass on Iron-man during the Superhero Civil War) has recently returned from the dead and he is not a happy, star-spangled bunny. It looks like next issue the Iron Patriot isn’t going to be either.

The who Avatar hype machine is beyond insane. When it was people claiming how awesome it would be because James Cameron was Directing it was silly. When critics and other in the industry started buying into the hype it was surprising. When reviews started saying how awesome it was despite critics usually flaying alive any film with such a heavy focus on special effects over plot it was stupid. When people got abused by Avatards on internet forums for saying they enjoyed it but it wasn’t ‘all that’ it was pathetic fanboyism. When Avatar’s initially didn’t blow the box office away and we got headlines like “Avatar almost breaks records” it was ridiculous. And when people started naming their kids Pandora (presumably they will have a stalker named Adrian when they get older) and getting depressed because they couldn’t live in the CGI world Avatar had created it was simply sad. Now I am beginning to think money is involved. Read the rest of this entry »