After Earth After an injured Ranger Corps officer and his son survive a crash landing on a depopulated Earth, they must contend with the hostile environment and feral Ursa creatures to survive. There was something incomplete going on here, like M. Night Shyamalan just gave up halfway through directing the thing. I want to invoke … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movies and Series Reviews, Part 43
The Adam Project A pilot on the run in 2050 steals a time-traveling plane and jumps to the past to meet himself at 12 years old. You’d be forgiven in thinking it’s really annoying that Ryan Reynolds plays Deadpool in every movie, because we value versatility in acting. But no one else would be able … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movies and Series Reviews, Part 39
The Secret of Kells In an isolated monastery in medieval Ireland, and orphan helps prepare for a barbarian Viking invasion, alongside a legendary script illuminator and a mysterious forest fairy. An animated film for children that isn’t from Hollywood, Disney, Netflix, or Studio Ghibli…though it was distributed by GKIDS Films. At first I thought it … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movies and Series Reviews, Part 37
Though these are recently published, it’s these kinds of videos that made YouTube a goldmine of interesting things. Now the most popular videos are loud and obnoxious political or pop-culture commentators, reaction videos, and mostly-miss-sometimes hit TEDx Talks. Then advertising happened and all grifters stormed in. A guy made a leaf blower from a miniature … A Jet-Powered Leaf Blower and Keanu Reeves
The Polar Express A boy and a group of children ride a fantastical train to the North Pole. This was the first movie ever to use all-digital motion capture, which made for realistic movements in the animated human characters. I’m not quite into that type of CGI—I didn’t like it when Ghost in the Shell: … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movies and Series Reviews, Part 34
Demon Slayer: Mugen Train Tanjiro, his sister-turned-demon, and two other companions, meet (big breath) Demon Slayer Flame Hashira Kyojuro Rengoku on a train and encounter, uh, demons. Though it’s an asterisk achievement, Mugen Train was the highest-grossing movie of 2020 because of you-know-what screwing things up. I’m not familiar with the Demon Slayer series at … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movies and Series Reviews, Part 33
Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV Nyx Ulric and the Kingsglaive, the special forces of King Regis, protect the kingdom of Lucis and its crown city, Insomnia, from the attacks and deceptions Emperor Iedolas Aldercapt and his military empire, Niflheim. That’s too many unusual proper names for a one-sentence summary, but whatever, because the movie was damn … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movies and Series Reviews, Part 32
The story below is a work of fiction. The morning back at work, to the office. All maskless. My state just said to hell with everything and do what you want, and what we wanted, it seems, is to go back to how it was. Mass normalcy bias hypnosis to replace the other fearful hypnosis. … Story: Quarantine VIII
Expendables 2 A group of for-hire mercenaries race to find a stockpile of Cold War-era refined plutonium before the villain, named Vilain, does. I think every 80’s and 90’s action movie guy was stuffed into this, maybe even more than the first one, so it kind of makes it fun in that regard for middle-aged … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movies and Series Reviews, Part 25
From a news roundup article at Anonymous Conservative linked in Vox Day’s “The charade of success”: I always thought it bizarre Erik Prince walked into the CIA, fresh out of the Navy SEALs, heir to a billionaire fortune, as comfortable in a high-society soiree at a five star restaurant as he would be hip deep … The Limits of Ability
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets From the same director who did the mostly excellent The Fifth Element, so the setting is envisioned as a colorful whizz-bang future. Being based on a graphic novel series didn’t hurt, either. This was going pretty good until the trashy Rihanna strip tease scene. A-list celebs cameos … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movie and Series Reviews, Part 12
John Carter Very ambitious offering of a story based on the excellent Barsoom book series from Edgar Rice Burroughs. The worldbuilding was nicely executed but the plot wasn’t anything unusual, but I have to give Disney credit (ew) where it’s due for making it what it was: a strange, action-filled pulp adventure. Hitchiker’s Guide to … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movie and Series Reviews, Part 11
My Hero Academia: Heroes Rising MHA has great animation values in the first place, but this movie added to it with some richer scenery and fight dynamics. You know something’s going to happen when a group of superheroes in training are away from their mentors on a remote island, with a “what could go wrong?” … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movie and Series Reviews, Part 10
Transcendence A mildly interesting depiction of a human achieving singularity and becoming more or less a really powerful AI, like The Lawnmower Man, though with slightly more realism and considering the practical matters an AI has to accomplish in the real world to make things happen. Might require more than one viewing but it didn’t … Sci-fi and Fantasy Movie and Series Reviews, Part 3
Japanese-style public service ads in LA metro Cute, but it feels the novelty could wear off quick. The real reason why network ‘neutrality’ is impossible Interesting technical reasons why this idea is a nightmare. It will cause shortages of service, just like every other time bureaucrats try to make things “fair.” Twitter is done with … Links of Possible Relevance, Part 28
…Because computers would be the ones revolting. Computers aren’t much different than robots, fundamentally: they gather input, process it, and “do something” as an output. This final output, in the computer’s situation, is really just making pixels light up in a certain way on a monitor, whereas robots typically output by moving in three-dimensional space. … The Robot Revolution Would Have Already Happened By Now, And It Wouldn’t Happen Anyway
“Doesn’t anyone have any more missiles!?” Nibiru is the real, cosmic, deal. I know this because all of the theories of Internet-connected folks concerning its arrival into the Milky Way don’t posit the planet crashing directly into Earth like two perfect billiard balls. If it was contrived it would be aiming straight into us, right … The Earth’s Poles Shifted and All You Read Was This Blog Post
I don’t normally comment on these “dawww that’s cute” type of stories, but I’ve been seeing this too much to ignore it. Story here, original Facebook post here. I was about to write it off as another useless social media story with a gratuitous selfie of Julia for maximum attention generation, until I read that … That Julia Price Story is Suspect