Skyfall

With a staggering 91% "Fresh" rating from Rotten Tomatoes, you can quickly understand why I may be hesitant to post a negative review of the latest James Bond movie: Skyfall. The truth though, is that I don't mind running against the crowd (of critics) and that it's the opinion of my peers that is more than likely to prevent me from posting the fact that I was disappointed by Skyfall. Indeed, I spoke with Matt this morning - as we typically do - and he was eager to hear my thoughts on the film, as he had just seen it a few days previous. When the first word on screen is disappointed, the conversation takes a nasty turn into the corn fields where the sun is at high noon: I can't find a direction to make my way out. We got oriented though, and came to the accusation that no new movies can possibly appease me. It's possible that my mind isn't in the right space, or that simply new movies really are not that good. He cites another recent critic and fan favourite Looper, which I found disappointing. Certainly, it was a good movie, but did not meet my expectations. Skyfall is the same way, even though I explicitly went in with no expectations (perhaps it's entirely subconscious).

In fact, my friend (let's call him Art - he's into privacy and paranoia) leans over to me just seconds after the lights dim and asks what expectations are for the film. Art and I have had so many conversations over the years about this problem that we have both come to the unspoken, agreed-upon terms that we don't even venture into that rabbit hole before the film starts. Or at the very least, we wait until the last possible moment. It's very easy for both of us to shake it off and just say I don't know like it doesn't matter: but it does. It brings - for me - the thought that I had stuffed behind some old memories of ALF and Moonraker that I did indeed have many expectations for this film. It's because Quantum of Solace was so terrible, and the time to bring this one to screen was so long, would somehow equal a truly rich, fantastic Bond film. It's not until after the movie is over that I can face myself and realize that nugget of idea was in my head all along and I was just ignoring it. If it tried to surface, my many memories of how much fun I had with the ALF franchise in my childhood. It was also hidden behind Moonraker as a reminder that Bond movies have never been that good and they have a history of being ridiculous.

Unfortunately, Casino Royale came out and completely redefined what Bond was for a new generation, and heavily influenced my own generation, which basically grew up with Brosnan's Bond and the unequivocally great Goldeneye. In 2002 both xXx and The Bourne Identity came out, both of which handled the "new" spy in different ways. Vin Diesel's Xander Cage took a direct stab at Bond in the opening sequence, where a spy in a tuxedo is so flagrantly out of place that he is outed and quickly dispatched of. Xander was the new type of spy, complete with tattoos and street-cred. Art and I laughed at it back then, but we weren't laughing when we watched The Bourne Identity. Bourne managed to not only change the landscape of spy movies, but for action movies in general as well. Damon was an every-man  in real places fighting with real instruments (I never get tired of him fighting somebody off with a book). This made him relate-able  but still perched upon a platform of genetically and tortuously-bred super human abilities. Bond was always a fantasy; equipped with good looks, impossible (and awesome) gadgets and a license to kill, he would be the secret agent we picture when anybody brought up espionage at the dinner table (which, as it turns out, is never).

There is no doubt that the Daniel Craig Bond is influenced by Bourne, taking cues from realistic action scenes and heavily influenced by Hollywood's obsession with making "dark" and "gritty" films - an obsession that is welcomed by critics and theatre-goers alike and will not be met with any criticism from me. I mention this because it seems that I was a bit tired of it the other night. When Art, Chip and myself were leaving the theatre (expression disappointment) I kept referring to an offending lack of space lasers in the film. The point I was trying to make at the time was the lack of a villain that had truly grand take over the world type plans. Perhaps I was just in the mood for it; perhaps it was 50 years of Bond movies that have done that, but I felt it lacking. Upon waking the next morning though, I realize that perhaps it was a bit silly to expect such things from this Bond. I was then allowed to take a closer look at the villain, Javier Bardem's Silva. Of course, we initially lambasted the poor guy immediately after viewing, but I can't help but think that he was a very well cast villain for this film. It is also important to understand that this was more of a personal story that fits in with (at least) Casino Royale in that we're witnessing how Bond becomes Bond. As he is portrayed in other movies as being perfect, we see him suffering and battling his own demons here. We see him lose people he loves, we see him betrayed by people he trusts. All I can say about the end of the movie is how it comes perfectly full-circle as Bond's origin.

Silva is the perfect villain because he represents to Bond what Bond could become. One of the themes throughout this movie is that Bond is too old to be running around anymore (and too injured); his time is over but he refuses to give in. Where Bond stays loyal to his country and M, Silva departs and makes space for himself: making himself the leader. Where Bond can be subtle and simple, Silva makes exaggerated entrances and makes things complicated (for what seems like no reason). We can definitely see an influence from the Joker in The Dark Knight in Silva, which also helps to strike fear into audience members who struggle to put a face on terrorism and random acts of extreme violence. Silva, working in the grounded world of Craig's Bond, can cause more damage by storming a public forum with a few guns than he can inflict with a big laser from space and with that, you can see why the space laser would be completely out of place here.

I spoke quite a bit earlier about disappointment, and in advancing it is evident that I was quite pleased with the film. Sometimes you just need to sleep on it or better yet, see the movie again. I look forward to seeing Skyfall again, but none of that negates my initial disappointment: I wanted bigger stunts and big action sequences. What I got was a bit more of a cerebral Bond, an emotive Bond that we are not used to. And it's because of this that Bond becomes relevant in the landscape of today's spy action movies, and the landscape has changed. It's an interesting hybrid actually: you could argue that old Bond movies were family friendly and almost aimed at children. New action movies (and all movies in general) are trying to balance this line of darkness and family friendliness, quite often producing a misguided and confused film that doesn't satisfy any party. Others, like Nolan's Batman series, take the line and places it in new territory that nobody else knew existed. I think these last three Bond movies do a decent job of presenting mature issues (revenge, death, trust, rage, etc) while still appealing to the PG crowd. The lack of blood and deaths on screen is becoming standard practice and while distracting at times, is practically unavoidable. I don't believe inserting those few frames into the film will make it better, as they won't have any real effect on the themes present throughout.

One last thing I want to add is how beautiful this movie looked: we were taken to some really interesting locales and the lighting throughout was amazing. Bond has always been a world traveler and we got a sense that these locations were just as much of a character as the people on screen. Adele's theme song was perfect. While initially disappointing, I believe Skyfall has legs and will be worth venturing to again.

Mediasonic 4-Bay JBOD Enclosure: HF2-SU2S2

The time finally came that my old Mediasonic enclosure had reached capacity, and it was time to look for either a new solution, or buy another box. In the two years since buying the original enclosure, I have purchased very few hard drives, but my method of consumption and computer use has changed a tiny bit. First, I decided to move away from having drives inside my tower computer. This computer, housed in an Antec P183 chassis, served as both home theatre PC (HTPC) and server. It performed magnificently, but times have changed. In July, I moved in with a friend, which brings us to the second change: multiple servers and HTPC boxes throughout the house. See, my friend had a similar setup, and it seemed senseless to duplicate media and purpose when one server/library could handle all of our needs.

I could go on and on about the new client/server setup but the focus here is on the Mediasonic enclosure. Because we had moved to one central server, it was time for my drives to come out and be easily connected to our new server. My roomate did the same thing, and in the end, we now have three of these devices in use: they really are amazing.

Within a short period of time I filled my existing enclosure and needed another; living in a town with a decent computer store has been a blessing, and I found myself wandering downtown to take a look at what they had. And it's all relatively the same: the lowest end model (which I believe I purchased before) was there for less money than what I had paid years ago, and as a bonus, it comes with an eSATA port. The extra speed would be a blessing for file copies, and it's something that I've wanted out of my previous enclosure - but a lack of funds and availability of ports on my server were preventing me from doing so. In this new setup, I would be using my roommate's computer, which had eSATA ports to spare. But we ran into an issue which I had ready briefly about when I was reading a review of Mediasonic's 8-bay enclosure: eSATA drive replication.

The problem with eSATA on these enclosures is that only the first drive (or in the case of the 8-bay model, first two drives) are recognized. The other are missing in the operating system, which is upsetting when you spend hours of troubleshooting, only to learn that you need to buy another eSATA expansion card for your computer - and make sure that it supports port replication. We went back to the store and my friend bought one; it was inexpensive, but the cost was still there, and it only supports two connections. This is fine in our setup: we have two eSATA boxes then my older, USB only box. The most offensive part was putting this card in, then troubleshooting why no drives were recognized: apparently there are actual jumpers that need to be modified, and even though we are dealing with old tech, we are apparently stuck in the '90s and can't get over the use of jumpers. Connect the right pins, and we are flying: all the drives are recognized on both enclosures, and speeds are incredible.

There isn't much more to say that I haven't said in the original review from two years back. The quality is solid on these boxes: they do not feel flimsy. The method for inserting the drives has not changed. The power adapter is still awkwardly located on the side of the box, but it matters little. And the new boxes support 3TB drives; I bought one recently to amalgamate a few of my standalone external drives into one, and after formatting in a Windows PC, it worked without problem in the enclosure. For the older enclosure, we are confined to 2TB drives. Not a big deal by any means, but there will be a time in the future (a long ways away) where we're going to want 3TB across the board. Imagine this: 36TB of space within three enclosures. Excessive? Yes. Geeky and exciting? Definitely.

Mediasonic 4 Bay JBOD Enclosure (Original Post)

Looper

I guess it was back in June, a night like any other except Nathan was in town and we were doing what we do best: watching downloaded trailers for upcoming movies. We don't discriminate (most of the time) but sometimes foreign subtitles pop up on screen and we elect not to "waste" two minutes of our time. We realize that most movie previews are terrible, but sometimes one grabs you by the scruff of the neck and forces you forward. Looper did just that: combining indie-movie icon Joseph Gordon-Levitt and a conceptually interesting sci-fi premise, and you get yourself two excited fanboys. I may have watched the preview a couple of times, but as time is wont to do, over the months I slowly let the memory of this movie slip away.

Then it really hit the fan: the movie was in all-out marketing mode and people were getting pumped. Levitt is on fire, with titles like Inception pushing him into the mainstream and the minds of everyone who has shelled out money to go to a theatre in the past few years. Then you add in Bruce Willis - playing a 30-year older version of Levitt - and you have yourself a film worth going to see on opening day. Levitt plays Joe, a looper in a future where time travel has not been invented yet. Some time in Joe's more advanced future time travel is a thing (outlawed) where criminal organizations send back people they hate (I guess) back to people like Joe, who kill them with a blast of blunderbuss. The reveal is that Joe's older self has been sent back in time to be killed...by young Joe. He has to take himself out. It's an original (well, original to me at least) idea that science fiction loves. So I was pretty jazzed to go see the film.

On a Monday, I send out an e-mail to a half dozen friends, inviting them to go the following day. Many decline, but one stands out and says he'll be there. We make a meeting time and I go, and I wait. And wait. I got a feeling twenty minutes before the show starts that I'll be going home without seeing Looper, and I was right. He never showed up, and I confirm that he believed it was for Wednesday night. A bit of miscommunication from both of us I guess, and two weeks later I found myself doing the same invite, but this time, with more notice and bolded dates and times. It works, and a group of us are going out to see Looper. This in itself is a big deal: it could have been high school where more than four or five of us had gone to a movie together at one time. In an effort to recreate those adolescent "good time" memories, we had inadvertently done just that, although perhaps without as much good times, as we are all being crushed under the load of adult-hood and all the responsibilities that being in your early thirties bring.

This may be significant for a couple of reasons, the first of which is to attest at the level of awareness that Looper is indeed a good movie and that you should go see it. Word of mouth is strong with this one, and reviews are incredibly positive. I spend entirely way too much time on Reddit, and the community there seemed to have exploded in unison over how fantastic the film is. Having a Rotten Tomatoes rating of 93% certainly speaks volumes about the film as well, and everyone in our group was jazzed about seeing it. I don't feel like that happens: we know the movie involves time travel and by definition, those movies require a suspension of disbelief and acceptance of time-travel related plot holes. It's standard for all movies (except perhaps something like Star Trek where any time travel creates multiple realities, or such great films as Primer, where time travel is realistic and nobody can wrap their mind around the film to see if a hole exists or not anyway).

The second significance is how the plot parallels our own thirty year old lives and our attempt to relive the past. While Old Joe is not trying to relive the past, he is trying to correct the future, and aren't those the same thing? Young Joe is living the life free of any real responsibility, and in general, is a terrible person. He's a drug addict, he frequents hookers and drives under the influence. Of course, he also kills people for a living. But those people don't exist - yet. Just as we were teenagers and generally terrible - although we did none of the above, we were simply jerks. And we did stupid things, and we live with regrets. Who wouldn't want to go back and just tell yourself to act in a different way? The lesson of both the movie, and our lives, is the answer to that question: perhaps you should rethink your ways, and you should rethink those regrets. My friend asked me - earlier this year actually - if I live with any regrets. Of course, I do: I could probably give you an itemized spreadsheet of them all. She said that she used to as well, until she received some advice/words of wisdom herself: all the decisions and actions you've made have brought you to where you are now. If you really regret those things, what kind of life would you have then? Would you be happy, or happier? The grass is not always greener on the other side, and when you look at things relatively, you have things pretty good. If you change things, you will lose out on all the good memories, and the bad ones that have made you a better person (which literally happens in Looper). The conversation and expanded thoughts on it have stayed and grown with me ever since.

I've tried to avoid spoilers but the next paragraph may contain some. Be warned!

What's interesting is that Looper embodies the greener grass. Sure, Old Joe was kind of being forced to go back in time, but he's a guy who likes to make lemonade out of lemons. What he discovers is that he should have let the lemons be. In many movies about time travel, this is often the case: the future is practically written in stone and refuses to be changed. In Stephen King's 11/23/63, the past tries its damnedest to stop you from preventing the assassination of political figures, and barely lifts a finger when you change little things. The bigger the change, the stronger the resistance. Perhaps the same past (perhaps The Past should have an entry on the IMDB) is acting in Looper, except instead of destroying the world in the future, it continuously loops thirty years of the same time period until somebody does something about it. That is, until The Past is satisfied that an action will safely protect its future that it allows said action to be carried out. Perhaps we are just witness to the last loop.

Regardless, all six of us walked away from Looper disappointed. Granted, the film crawled to a near stand still, following an explosive first act. It's your standard first act that afflicts all these types of movies: you quickly learn about the world, the characters, what they do and the life they lead. You get a glimpse into the future, which looks realistic and believable here, and is fascinating. Then you have to settle down with the plot, which leaves a bit to be desired. Is it confusing? I don't find that it is, but I don't put a ton of effort into it: I accept that time travel is going to create those plot holes, and I don't care: it's fine. The effects are low key and good; I'm distracted by Levitt's makeup to make him look like a younger Bruce Willis. I wonder why Joe is addicted to this drug, has one night of recovery and is apparently well and fine afterward. I enjoyed the action, the concept, and really enjoyed the humour throughout. I did have a problem with Bruce Willis though: I didn't find he added anything to the film, he only took away. He plays himself (practically) by being a bad-ass dual-wielding automatic guns. He's invincible, and the entire "future montage" is downright comedic.

Most importantly, I wonder if I enjoyed this movie as a whole. I did, but it has to grow on me. It needs a second viewing, a viewing without the crushing expectations put unfairly onto it. I must have seen a hundred Looper posts in Reddit before seeing the movie, but I didn't look at a single one. I wanted to experience the movie without any influence: that in itself, is impossible. I feel responsible for creating hype for this movie in the simple act of trying to organize a group outing to go see it and thereby leading to disappointment in the film for others. And perhaps in doing this, you will go see the film without heavy expectation and be blown away, although if you saw my spoiler warning above, you may not be reading this at all.

Dredd

If you are like most people, you probably groaned and laughed a bit when you first saw the teaser for the (now released) Dredd 3D movie. As if they were remaking the atrocious Stallone film, you may think to yourself. Has Hollywood run out of ideas, you ask? Unlike most people though, I got excited. I'm not sure if it's because I have a genuine interest in "remakes" or that I actually enjoyed Judge Dredd back in the day and I would revisit the film a couple of years ago to confirm that it's still decent and worth a watch. I believe it's moreso the fact that I enjoy the character and mythos has to contribute to a modern day sci-fi action movie: a post-apocalyptic world where only one city exists, where crime is completely out of hand and the justice system has allowed Judge-class officers to act as judge, jury and executioner. All that being said, I've never read one of the comics, but I have a general sense of the series, the character of Judge Dredd and the tone, to a degree that I see how a proper movie could be good, if not great.

So like most people, you may still be bitter on the Stallone driven feature from 1995. Certainly, Hollywood was. So what we end up with is a non-Hollywood, independent film made by people who are passionate about the character and the lore, who want to make a great film. This is the type of thing that gets me excited for a remake. And you can't really call this a remake either, as in no way does it follow the same plot of the movie before. No, this movie is like a snapshot of the comic book. It picks up on just another day for Dredd - in this story he is training a rookie (who happens to have somewhat psychic abilities) on her first day, and things just go to hell. You always get the sense though that this sort of insanity happens on a day to day basis for judges like Dredd and for the people of Mega City One. He keeps his cool, uses his own training and just deals with the situation. The absurdity of the city, of the violence, of the over the top villains and thugs is lost on the inhabitants of the movie. As a watcher of this, you are shocked, almost amused at the ultra-violence dispatched upon criminals. There are no pretenses here and I love the film for that. I will only comment lightly on the plot: it's simple, effective and practically non-existent. The beauty of the movie is that the plot doesn't need to be anything more than what it is, which I believe is like a snapshot of a day in the life of Judge Dredd.

In an era where action movies are watered down for maximum box office dollars, it's nice to see a film that is not afraid to be what it is. Judge Dredd is a Hard R, for incredible amounts of gory violence, drug abuse and whatnot. It's practically refreshing to see something like this in the theatres, and it's another reminder that Dredd is an independent film, devoid of Hollywood influence. After the credits roll (and we did stay to see if anything was there: there is not) I feel a general angst against Hollywood. It's denied me great films through it's denial of genuine talent and passion for projects that could be great. The 1995 Judge Dredd ruined things for any type of franchise, although in a twist of irony it allowed this film to happen: apparently the rights to Dredd were going for cheap - nobody would touch it - and it was snapped up by those talented people who were passionate about the film. But the poor box office it has done means it will never likely see the sequel it deserves (somebody, even in independent films, has to turn a buck). Which is a real shame because there is a lot of potential here. There was no origin for Dredd presented here, and no real representation of the mythos of the world in the comics (I'm sure there were many bits lost on me, but would be picked up by fans of the series). But after reading numerous posts from fans, there are a lot of stories worth telling.

So I highly recommend going to see this film. Put the memory of the original film aside, and you will be pleasantly surprised. The effects are quite good, the action is enthralling and there is a perfect mix of humour thrown in. I've said it before and I'll always say it again: this movie is focused and engaging.

Piranha 3DD

My friend was home already when I arrived - a rare occurrence with his new job - and I could see the grin on his face from outside. We were going through some movies the night before and stumbled upon the new Piranha movie, and knew then that it was available for viewing. Immediately I supposed that his mind was going through how he was going to see this movie. Two years previous he brought his wife to the theatre for the first one (in 3D) and she was horrified. Not by the "horror" aspect of it, I'm sure, but more of the extreme gratuitous shots of naked women and the shameless level of tongue-in-cheek vulgarity present throughout the running time. But mainly the women: it was pretty ridiculous. So there was no chance of him being able to see the second one when she was around (they watch everything together).

It was as if the stars aligned though, not twenty four hours later. His wife was staying with her mother, and he was not obligated to be with her. My other friend's girlfriend was also away, out of town, leaving the house void of women. He knew this, and anticipated it throughout the day. The first thing he asks is: do we watch it now, or later (that evening)? Regardless of when, it happened and yes, it was incredibly terrible (yet incredibly funny).

I wrote about the predecessor a while back, and the way I read it is in a fairly negative tone. I mean, it is a bad movie, but I did watch again with Nathan a few weeks after the first time and must say, enjoyed it more. Perhaps this happens because it has my full, undivided attention. When you're watching a movie with a friend, that is what you are doing. You are not watching the movie and browsing your phone at the same time. You are not watching and making dinner in another room. Together, you can laugh about the shenanigans onscreen; it's social, and the movie is better for it. It also helps that the original was firmly tongue-in-cheek, the sequel has even less shame and is may be trying to be something it's not, which is to say it's trying to be like the original but falls flat on its face.

So it's quite terrible (in a way) that Piranha 3D looks like a cinematic masterpiece complete with acting, plot, suspense and humour compared to Piranha 3DD, which lacks all of the above. The effects are worse, the thrills are cheap (and predictable) and the movie in general lacks any kind of coherency. You wouldn't think it needs to, but apparently Piranha 3D set the bar (relatively) high for a sequel. All that being said, the movie provided some good, cheap laughs, a sense of disbelief and satisfaction that we could go on with our lives.

IMDB Ratings

Just wanted to bring to your attention a new link on the upper right side of the page (underneath Home). It's "IMDB Movie Ratings" and will take you to my ratings list on - you guessed it - IMDB.

I've neglected creating an account there for years, for no good reason. But a few months ago I registered and started adding movies to my watchlist (something I will make public and add soon as well). You may recall that I was trying to keep track of all the movies I've seen, with varying levels of success. The problem with the old manual system I was using (a spreadsheet) was that it was indeed, manual. I would forget to do it, I would neglect it often and I just lost interest. Enter the IMDB app on the iPhone and updating that list is incredibly simple. I realized this after noticing that I check out the trivia and IMDB page for every movie I see shortly after seeing it: one more click and it's there.

So you will see my ratings, and it's nice format: searchable, sortable and full of data. There are not many right now, but I will add them as I see movies: I'm not too keen on going back to rate the thousands of movies I've seen over the past thirty years, but I may get bored.

Also, don't read too much into the numerical ratings. I've stayed away from them on The Chronicles and will continue to do so. If you want the scoop read my take on it, because a 7/10 for one movie could be entirely different than a 7/10 for another. Enjoy!

Fan Expo 2012

A fear washed over me. My forehead broke into a cold sweat. I checked blind spots repeatedly, made verbalization that made no sense that would confuse linguists. Indeed, I had made a left turn into a streetcar lane, which quickly became elevated. The street below felt like miles. Partially, I was in awe: I was driving where no man had gone before, where only streetcars had traversed before. Then reality hit as I checked my rear view mirror and saw a car directly behind me. Probably another tourist, who had followed me onto this railed path of madness. I wasn't entirely sure what to do, although there were very few options. The car following took the lead and leaped off the track onto the civilian road below. The only option had presented itself. I yelled for Cale to hold on, that this was going to happen and it played out just as expected. We hit the road below, bottoming out the car and hearing awful noises from below. But we were safe now. I can only imagine what the locals were thinking, and the only thing to do now was to drive past the shame.

Cale has done a good job of writing up the car incident, as well as the day we attended Fan Expo in 2011. He's right - although he throws in some fiction (I'll leave the what up to you to decide) - that I was flustered throughout the day. Something was off, but I couldn't quite pin what it was. Perhaps it was the crowds. 2012's Fan Expo this past weekend was no different. You have to fight your way through aisles of people to get anywhere; if you stand still for any period of time you were going to be knocked about and lost. And perhaps it was the mass consumerism that was taking place. In years gone by the crowds were less and the items more unique. Now, in today's market, you can find anything online and cheaper than anywhere on the show floor. All the colourful and unique merchandise fails to impress as its mass-produced and high availability reminds me of being in a supersized warehouse store of geek items that flashed the horror of going to Wal-Mart during the weekend across my face. The smell of many of the patrons certainly doesn't help the nauseating experience.

The show is changing; Cale and I have been going for quite a while now and quite frankly, it's becoming a big deal. They didn't used to have a lot of support from major companies, but now it's not uncommon to see a massive, official, DC Comics footprint and media extravaganzas for movies, television shows and video games. At this year's Expo, there was a gigantic Halo 4 area and major representation from Ubisoft. We saw the Wii U in play (and was floored by how big that controller was). The artist alley has shrunk, as has the celebrity signing area. All your favourite vendors are there peddling their goods, and even that becomes tired. Year after year they bring the same things, and the discounts do not run nearly as deep. Indeed, most can only offer "US cover price" which is not a deal at all. I can imagine the cost for them to be there is increasing, and less people would be buying as they spend more time at celebrity Q&A sessions, movie premieres and costume parties. Physically, space wise, the Fan Expo needs more. That could help the experience of browsing the floor that much better, I think.

Last year I bought a few comics (the Knightfall series) and practically had to force myself to make it happen. 2011 was the year that Fan Expo broke me, but 2012 I was better prepared. Actually I wasn't, in some respect. I wanted to go in with a list of comics to get - because there are still deals for comics - but just couldn't get around to it. I wanted to work towards a collection (for instance Amazing Spider-Man #300 to #400) but just didn't prepare myself beforehand. Having the list in the cloud on my Google Drive didn't help as we could barely get a cell signal - too many in a small area, I suppose. So it's my own fault, really. But this year I was mentally prepared for that, although the crowds still wore me down very quickly. I wanted more comic book vendors, but instead we got bombarded with large, corporate driven displays. I imagine "the" Comic-Con is very similar to this, where major things are being announced for Hollywood, and the day of the individual comic book draws near.

So I bought one thing: V for Vendetta (collected trade paperback of course) for less than anywhere I've seen before. I got excited, and am excited to read it, as it's been on "the list" for quite some time. But that's it, and I'm completely satisfied. Next year, perhaps, I will be better prepared and be able to pick up some comics to flesh out my collection. I'm sure you're thinking that I'm insane, as I've pretty much been slamming this event and just doing an about-face now to say I enjoyed it, but it's true. Last year I was caught off guard and was flustered, but this year I enjoyed taking in the madness. There was lots to see and experience, and the event has transcended the actual Expo itself. It's about the time before and after, the drive, the conversation and the time spent with a good friend. Where once it was just a day trip, it has turned into a weekend event (Cale and I no longer live in the same city).

This is annual pilgrimage that I've always been after; the tradition was not forced, it just happened. And I look forward to it every time.

The Great Music Collection, part four: The Aftermath

It's now been months since I first imported my collection into iTunes and really embraced the ecosystem. After months of use, the import has proven successful: the data is clean, the albums are organized and it is an actually joy to work with. Never did I believe you would hear that from me in regards to iTunes. That's not to say the software isn't without it's problems, as the software can be slow, sluggish and a pest with it's need to update all the time. But the initial setup and planning has paid off: I have the Core playlist which syncs with my iPod, and podcast episodes are individually chosen. Subscriptions to podcasts are all setup and download automatically all the time (although iTunes seems to forget the odd one).

One of the goals I had was to have the entire music library available through Subsonic, which runs off my server/HTPC that is always powered on (the desktop housing iTunes is not always on). The previous folder structure I had was good for Subsonic, but iTunes' structure is even better. Folders for artists, then folders for each album inside. I simply copied the entire iTunes music folder onto the server and pointed Subsonic at it: everything worked as expected, and as a bonus I get a simple mirror backup of my music. Now, that was good for a while, but I rarely use Subsonic anymore, as work and life don't really permit me to do so. I don't have a big need for it, so the service has been turned off (as has the server most days).

The other program that requires access to music is XBMC, which I do use regularly. The good news is that XBMC is pretty flexible but benefits greatly from the Artist - Album folder structure that iTunes utilizes. Once the collection was copied over it was very easy to start listening to music, but I noticed something: album art. iTunes stores the album art in it's database, and XBMC (as well as Subsonic) look for local images. The classic "folder.jpg" is widely accepted and used by those these two programs. Previously, I had this setup and all my albums had nice cover art displayed, so it meant that I had to re-insert those files into the appropriate iTunes folder. The major danger here being that iTunes could do anything to that folder and erase any files its not responsible for. But I figure that won't happen often enough to worry about, as each album is imported and tagged with care: further modifications should not be necessary.

I actually found a script somebody wrote that did exactly what I needed automatically. The script would go through the iTunes database and extract the album art and place it in the right folder with the proper naming. This worked for the most part, but I wanted to ensure every album was done properly, so I double-checked and downloaded new art as appropriate. Anytime a new album has been imported, I just download the art (Google Image search of course) and place in the folder. Importing an album or two at a time is a painless operation now.

What happens now though in XBMC is the absence of thumbnails while you are browsing artists. This is harder to resolve than the album art although it's tackled in much the same way, by placing a folder.jpg of the artist in the folder. Album art is fairly standardized: they're squares. Photos of artists are not, and when you search for one you will get a variety of results in different resolutions and dimensions. The secret may be to actually modify images and make them as square as possible. XBMC does like portrait style though, although Subsonic does not. I probably got through 20% of my collection before giving up on this little project; I've just simply neglected it in the past few months but keep meaning to return to it.

The other issue centers on new albums to the collection. While my iTunes workflow is solid, and process of getting that new album onto the server for XBMC is lacking. At first, I thought I would simply just copy the new folder over, but I keep forgetting. What results is fragmentation and just simply a lack of music. Every few months I could copy the entire folder over but that's inefficient. I know where the problem is, and it's me. The only solution is to make copying that folder over a part of the iTunes process. The other solution (and really the better one) would be to keep the iTunes library on the server itself. I'm not sure if I went into any detail before regarding my computer setup, but it has proven to be less than ideal for this.

It is weird to think - for me - that this solution is still working. It's working nearly exactly as planned, and I'll say it again: proper planning pays off in the long run. The next step will be to import the rest of the collection: many of the albums from "Albums B" that I rarely, if ever, listen to. With proper tagging, and use of playlists, they can sit in the main library and simply be accessible. I've already setup smart playlists to make music from different years and genre's readily available, as well as newly imported music. I may dabble in ratings again, and see what else is available for me to further organize this "great" music collection.

Total Recall (2012)

Never did I think that we would have to slap a tacky looking (year) onto one of the greatest sci-fi/action movies of all time. But a couple of years ago the announcement was made; fast forward to now and here we are, with a brand new shiny remake of Arnold's romp through his mind and Mars. After the announcement, would come a trailer, and this is where the true resistence was felt. For hours (or perhaps just minutes) my friends and I spoke about the merits of a remake, and about how old we were getting (that Total Recall really is that old). My friends were dubious about a remake: the film would be sacrilegious and an atrocity affronted to all humankind, but I took a slightly different approach. Perhaps it's fueled by indifference, but I can appreciate re imaginings, reinterpretations and modern updates. I appreciate that what I have loved is loved enough that they want to modernize it for today's youth, and I'm fascinated to see the results. The existence of a remake - good or bad - doesn't sully the original for me; if anything, it will just enhance it further.

As I said before, I'm typically indifferent. While I watched the trailer for the new Total Recall I felt a twinge of excitement, and I can tell you the exact scene: it's when he (Quaid) steps out on the balcony and the camera pans around to show the city around him in all its sci-fi glory. It was a thing of beauty, as you could tell (from these few short seconds) that some time and effort went into its creation. I was excited for modern special effects to deliver me a stunning view of the future, something which I feel has been lacking in other science fiction movies. Indeed, most other sci-fi films are sent on other worlds, in space or otherwise unrecognizable areas. The original Total Recall used the concrete backdrop of Mexico City to give us a glimpse into a "modern" and futuristic version of America. Move forward to this remake, and the cityscape is (completely rendered and) very detailed, but strikes more than a passing similarity to the world of Blade Runner. Indeed, I felt like we could see Deckard running after some replicants in the background. When the film moves into the second act we're transported to The Fifth Element, complete with flying cars and vertically staggering cities.

In this future, there are only two countries left, one of which is the United Federation of Britain. What I love about this one (and this is the one that looks like The Fifth Element) is that it builds upon the original city. They've effectively built a floating city on top of the old one, where cars still drive with rubber tires to the road. The other country is The Colony - in Australia - and effectively takes the place of Mars from the original movie. I guess they just didn't have time to fit a planet into the plot here, and I must say it's not necessarily for the worst action-wise. It is kind of confusing for the motivations of the characters though.

And that's where things fall apart - if you let it get to you. I just don't know why Cohaagen is allowed to be so evil here: when he was out to screw Mars it made sense: it's another planet akin to the wild west, where corporations do as they please. On Earth, things are just a bit too close to home. But that's where the complaints (generally) end: the rest of the movie was fun, full of action and attractive women, and even a third breast for all us fans of the original.

I walked out of the theatre asking myself why they just don't make a shot for shot remake like they did for Psycho. Why bother messing with things that were fine to begin with? And this is really a remake more than anything else - you can't get away with calling it a reboot (like The Amazing Spider-Man). This is all perfectly good; the movie surpassed expectations. Admittedly they weren't that high to begin with, and I'm certainly aware that I'll never see this version ever again. I'll always go back to Arnold for my Total Recall fix and I hope that people who are being introduced to the world now can look back and see that version - and appreciate it. And oddly enough, the older version was the more cerebral of the two, who knew?

Tiny Tower: Completed

In no way could I tell you when I actually started playing this game: my first post is dated September 14, 2011, so I'll just say it's been a year. It's been an addicting run, and where my friends "failed" I built on, surpassing 100 floors in a relative short period of time. The floors just kept piling up, and the time it took to build them increased exponentially. Earlier this year my playtime would decrease, stall to a near halt. I don't know how the citizens of my tower put up with me, but they were glad they did, as I attacked the game aggressively and built into the heavens as no man should.

When you are building so high, so many floors it takes millions of dollars per floor and days to create it. What really frustrated me was building a retail store - for instance - then not being able to staff it because the apartment floor would take me days to build (days to collect the money then days to wait for it to build). So I took out a new approach: save up enough money to build all eight floors at once. The idea was so sound and innovative that architects around the world gasped with joy. So I begin saving money, and it took weeks to get enough for eight floors. But boy, when I did build them all, it was heaven.

I also became loose with bux (in game super-money) to fill slots in the apartments, so that I could place people in the new stores immediately. I would evaluate citizens and freely eject them from the tower if they did not perform well. It took quite a bit of time but it was very fulfilling: spending the effort to do things properly. I chose eight because it works perfectly: three apartments give you fifteen people. Each store staffs three people, so five stores requires fifteen employees. So eight floors is perfect. I did this for a short time (ie months) until I hit the limit.

Not my mental limit, but the height limit on the tower. I didn't think it was possible. But let me explain: you can continue to build floors, but they will remain empty. There are only so many apartments you can build, or so many retail stores available. Once they are all gone, your tower is as good as done - but you can keep going skyward all you like (as far as I know).

And the game was over. With no reason to play anymore, I went looking for others to fill the void, but I know now that will never come to pass. It's been a solid year with this Tiny Tower that has become oh-so-big. There was a blip of hope as well in the form of a software update advertising more floors. But they only added eight: one for each type. I built those quickly and easily, then let the game die again.

Sure, there are other goals that I could come back for, like making sure every person is in their dream job, or completing the missions, but those tasks feel somewhat empty. This game, this way of life as it were - will be fondly remembered.

Here are a few stats on my tower at time of completion.

• 169 floors: 106 retail and 63 residential
• 315 bitizens
• 271 dream jobs (that's 86% dream job rate)
• 46 missions completed
• Retail floors are in descending alphabetical order (as are apartments, which are all on the upper floors)
• 419 tower bux
• 4,267 unread Bitbook messages