Well Dave over at toosurreal did one so I thought I would too. Like Dave I too lament the passing of TV Tuesdays which for those not in the know is the day after many of the TV shows we watch are aired in the US. If you don’t get why that is a ‘thing’ then I’m not going to help you. I’m too lazy to count how many BSG actors have turned up on other shows either so you can read toosurreal for that. I never got into 24 either because I felt it made Star Trek seem realistic. By the way I watch way more TV than toosurreal’s eloquent webmaster. Plus I am adding pictures of the totty from each show.

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I saw it last night and I really enjoyed it. It isn’t quite as good as the first film but all the returning characters are exactly as we left them. The film as less action sequences than you might expect and it loses its way a little in the middle. However War Machine is awesome as is the new Iron man armour. Scarlett Johansson’s (see above) part is not as big (but man is that woman hot) as you would expect and it has clearly only been put in for either an Avenger link or spin off potential. She performs adequately and she certainly looks the part. Rourke is chillingly awesome. Vanko really makes your skin crawl. Sam Rockwell is also very good as the desperately-trying-to-be-tony-stark-but-failing Justin Hammer. Robert Downey Jr. naturally steals every scene he is in and I still think the guy was born to play Tony Stark. In fact all the actors acquit themselves admirably and the film certainly got the audience laughing and gasping at all the right parts.

The racing sequence filmed in Monaco really had me reminiscing of the days when Formula 1 racing was actually worth watching. Which I guess makes me show my age if nothing else. The Hammer armour prototype testing video and the unfortunate outcome for the pilot makes the film worth seeing alone. UK cinema audiences are usually pretty restrained when watching a film but that certainly got a reaction.

What lets the film down is that the plot feels like a slightly reworked and inferior version of the plot of the first film. Thankfully I felt that the characters were enough to carry the film. It’s a shame it isn’t as good as the first film but it still isn’t a bad film. There are a lot of really negative reviews of the film out there from professional critics. However having read a few of them I feel they come across as spiteful reactions to unfulfilled expectations. They were expecting an equivalent improvement as we got between X-Men to X-Men 2 or Spider-man and Spider-man 2. They didn’t get it so they are acting out with their reviews

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To start with I meant to put this up over the weekend but I forgot. Still better late than never. Last week Lily Allen got her knickers in a twist over illegal file-sharing. It all started after several successful musicians (I use the term loosely) stated they didn’t mind their work being the victim of copyright infringement by internet Pirates. Sadly it kicked off a few days too later for “International Talk Like a Pirate Day”, which is a shame. Anyway Lily objected to people who have already made a fortune from music having such a slack attitude to people who, according to her, cost session musicians, engineers and others money and jobs. You know people who only get paid once no matter how successful a song is unlike Lily herself. So she started a blog she could whine about it and have all her little fans agree with her. Naturally she claimed it was to encourage discussion and debate on the subject. Funny how once the debate had got into full swing and people on the internet who actually know what they are talking about started to tear her arguments to pieces she closed up the blog and deleted all the content.  Which is pretty much the internet equivalent of taking your ball and going home because you are losing the game of football in the park.

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Geek Flow Chart

Seems these days that the ‘Geek Chic Myth‘ has everyone wanting to be a geek because it is apparently hip to be square. Thing is not everyone is cut out to be a geek. Some people think that just liking gadgets and being above average intelligence is enough to be classed as a geek. This is not true and frankly would make around 1/3 of the population geeky. If this were true humanity would probably die out in a handful of generations. To be a geek or indeed a nerd you have to have certain obsession about your interests. To the exclusion of other things other people consider important. I think it is best if I demonstrate by illustrating my geek credentials:

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Lord knows what they did to deserve crucifiction.

Well of course they don’t, all they do prove is that The New Scientist is only one step above a UK tabloid as far as science journalism goes. The top 10 things that science cannot explain:

Funny how real scientific mysteries like the nature of gravity, where all the mass of the universe comes from and the theory of everything are absent from the list but picking your nose is included. Oh how great these mysteries truly are. Except they aren’t as they all can be explained or at least explained away. At least how a Bumblebee flies isn’t on the list.

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