Defenestrator

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  1. Quote:
    Originally Posted by MentalMaden View Post
    The Lady in the Water. Paul Giamatti, Bryce Dallas Howard, Freddy Rodrigez, Bob Balaban and Jeffrey Wright (not superstars, but all very good and respected actors) couldn't even make this M. Night ego project palatable. It was awful.
    You know, I didn't think that movie was as bad as the critics made it out to be. Maybe I had low expectations for it going in, but I saw what M. Night Shenanigans was trying to do with the material. Granted, I didn't think the movie was great or anything, but I enjoyed it.

    And I can completely understand why people would hate it.
  2. Pfft. They're marketing flacks. You can walk into just about any restaurant in NYC and order a Perrier from one.
  3. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Local_Man View Post
    Jeeze, you guys really don't know the difference between a mediocre movie and a really, really BAD movie.

    Untouchables certainly had some things going for it (like an actual plot, dialogue that mostly makes sense and actual characters). Robin Hood would have been a pretty good film with someone other than Costner in the lead -- like someone who could speak with an English accent. Rickman, Freeman and Slater were all pretty good.

    Battlefield Earth was pretty horrible. It was actually better than The Visitor but still pretty horrible. Of the movies discussed above, it is the only really BAD movie. None of the others come close. Catwoman was pretty bad, but at least it had Halle Berry to look at. Showgirls is infamous as a bad movie. But none compare to The Visitor. The only other movie I have ever seen as bad was "Frogs," but that one didn't have any big name people in it.
    I had to look up "The Visitor," and while I have no doubt it was a bad film, it doesn't appear to have had any actor of note in it.

    Showgirls is awful, but you can't tell me a cast with Elizabeth Berkeley was good.

    And no amount of looking at Halle Berry makes Catwoman watchable. (I also don't think she's a very good actress, despite having one of those Oscar statues.)

    "Battlefield Earth" stands out because it did have a pretty decent cast, a huge budget, and a pathetically bad script.

    And I just thought of another one:

    The Cast: Kurt Russell, Peter Fonda, Steve Buscemi, Pam Grier, Bruce Campbell, Stacy Keach
    The Result: Escape From L.A.
  4. Battlefield Earth probably deserves mention. Travolta might not be the greatest actor ever, but the cast rounded out pretty well with Barry Pepper and Forrest Whitaker.

    And I'll throw Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull out there. Okay, I don't care at all for LaBoof, but Harrison Ford, Karen Allen, Kate Blanchette, Ray Winstone and John Hurt should have been enough to carry any movie. (Well, except this one.)

    And all 3 Star Wars prequels:
    Natalie Portman, Samuel L. Jackson, Liam Neeson, Ian McDiarmid. How do you mess this up? (Oh,wait...Lucas...)
  5. I can't check out the list yet (I'm at work), but one of my favorites hardly had any appearance by Batman:

    Ra's Al Ghul was in Gotham for some reason, so Batman and Robin were racing to catch him in the act of whatever he was doing. They track him to the Gotham airport where he's getting ready to board a plane with someone he checked out of Arkham Asylum.

    Ra's then recounts a story from the past where he encountered an aging bounty hunter by the name of Jonah Hex.

    It's a great tale written by the one and only Joe R. Lansdale (Jonah Hex: Two Gun Mojo).

    I won't spoil the ending, but it's awesome, if you haven't seen it.
  6. While I would never dictate how anybody plays the game, and while a petless MM is certainly POSSIBLE, I will point out there were people trying this some time ago and I can remember kicking a few of them off my teams because they were entirely worthless. Their damage is miniscule, they have almost no crowd control, and their buffs/debuffs are going to be better from a controller/corruptor/defender. And that's not counting the amount of time they spent faceplanted begging for an Awaken.

    If you're going to solo or only inflict such folly upon your friends who understand what you're doing, go for it.

    But if you're trying to do this to get on teams and contribute to that team, be prepared for people to be angry at you.
  7. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Lothic View Post
    I've read about plans for these "floating independent countries" before and the basic idea is most of them supposedly will only let you live there if you're worth like 100 million dollars or more. I suppose it'd be pretty easy to live in a "Libertarian Utopia" if you're already super-wealthy.
    So...if you were a pirate, it would be a pretty good place to start your career.

    Who's with me?
  8. More suggestions:

    Blast Hardcheese
    Slab Bulkhead
    Bold Bigflank
    Splint Chesthair
    Flint Ironstag
    Bolt Van Der Huge
    Thick McRunfast
    Buff Drinklots
    Fist Rockbone
    Stump Beefnob
    Bunk Slamchest
    Smash Lampjaw
    Punch Rockgroin
    Buck Plankchest
    Stump Junkman
    Dirk Hardpec
    Rip Steakface
    Slate Slabrock
    Crud Bonemeal
    Brinck Hardmeat
    Wip Slabcheek
    Punch Sideiron
    Gristle McThornbody
    Slate Fistcrunch
    Buff Hardback
    Bob Johnson
    Blast Thickneck
    Crunch Buttsteak
    Slab Squatthrust
    Lump Beefbroth
    Touch Rustrod
    Reef Blastbody
    Big McLargehuge
    Smoke Manmuscle
    Beat Punchbeef
    Hack Blowfist
    Roll Fizzlebeef
  9. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Casual_Player View Post
    I was going to suggest the Three Storms, but you've already got the minions covered. And it's hard to imagine Lo Pan as anything less than the boss monster.
    I already claimed "Six Demon Bag" on Victory. I'm full of wind and fire and all that sort of stuff.
  10. Defenestrator

    Falling Skies

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Durakken View Post

    There are cliches, but cliche just means it works. Nothing wrong with that.
    No. Cliches are cliches because they've been used too often that they become dull. There are plenty of ways to bring tension and drama to a pregnant woman beyond throwing something in the screenplay that's been done in just about every TV show or movie with a pregnant woman about to give birth. After watching 60 seconds of a TV show, I should not have been able to predict the next big plot twist. It's sloppy, lazy writing.
  11. Defenestrator

    Falling Skies

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by EnigmaBlack View Post

    By the way, I can't wait to find out more about the alien overseers. I'm assuming they galaxy hop collecting resources and slaves, but that would be too cliche.
    Cliches? In this show? More likely than you think!

    I turned on the show for about 10 minutes, and a woman was about to give birth and Dr. Blood Moongood (Good Bloodmoon? Moon Goodblood? Whatever) was there. I turned to a friend of mine and said, "I bet the baby is breach." Sure enough, a few minutes later, BINGO! Breach baby.

    Ugh. EVERY SINGLE TV SHOW/MOVIE DOES THIS. Writers are horribly stuck in such conventions.

    I didn't watch much more, as I really didn't know what was going on.
  12. Quote:
    Originally Posted by The_Spad_EU View Post
    It is, in fact, breach of contract at best. It is not illegal and, well, moral relativism allows a fair amount of flexibility on the "immoral" side of things but personally I wouldn't say that it is.
    No, it is illegal. Period. End of story. Having copies of things, digital or otherwise, that you did not purchase is piracy.

    Now, is the FBI going to bust down your door and arrest you for it? Probably not.

    Unless you're selling those file copies to other people, of course, then you're going to get noticed.
  13. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Dr_Darkspeed View Post
    (Why are there Russain Chimp Policemen?!?!)
    Because everything's funnier with monkeys.

    It's one of the unbreakable laws of the universe.

    Only "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" has managed to violate that law.
  14. Quote:
    Originally Posted by MentalMaden View Post
    Now, to be fair (and realistic), it's not going to be "LOTR" scale though. I even think one of the producers said that in the interview I saw. They have admitted that it will be a challenge to shoot, but they are committed and will find a way to make it right. And to those who haven't read it (there is no real spoiler here so don't worry) really there are only a couple of key points to the battle that are important to the story, so they won't have to completely break the bank for it. What does worry me though is some of the Essos story coming up in future installments. THAT will be challenging.
    There are definitely ways to film large battles on the cheap. Keep most of the shots nice and tight on the actors and worry about a few larger establishing shots. LOTR went big at pretty much every moment it could, but they had a $300 million budget for about 10 hours of footage.
  15. Quote:
    Originally Posted by MentalMaden View Post
    They claim they are going to shoot the Battle of the Blackwater. So how they shoot that will probably be a good indication in what direction they are going.
    I have no idea what that means because I've only finished the first book, but I am excited by this.
  16. The bigger question is whether or not HBO is willing to pony up the money to produce and do some justice to the more difficult scenes to get on the screen (i.e. big battles). I liked how they got around the battle scene from the first book, but you're not going to be able to cheap out like that for the rest of the series.
  17. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Smersh View Post
    Are you an artist?

    My wife has a photography business as a side project; the first thing she did was work up the contracts, which include details like who owns the rights to the pictures she takes when doing a gig.
    Then she sounds like a smart businessperson.

    But that isn't what happened in Kirby's case, so it's rather irrelevant.
  18. Quote:
    Originally Posted by TrueGentleman View Post
    Kirby was working without a contract.

    That's getting shafted.
    I work without a contract, too.

    I get paid for things I do at my current place of employment.

    Kirby did work for Marvel and created characters while receiving a weekly paycheck.

    That is the very definition of work for hire, regardless of whether or not he had a contract.

    And like I mentioned before, I have no doubt Marvel treated Kirby (and many other creators) like garbage, but that's not the issue in the legal dispute.
  19. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Matthew_Orlock View Post
    That's how I feel about the Superman case. Those sueing had no say at all in the creation of the character, and I'm pretty damn sure they weren't even born at the time so they are owed nothing..but still won.
    But as stated above, the case was fundamentally different. If Kirby had solely created all these characters and THEN brought them to Marvel for Marvel to publish, this case would have had a similar outcome as the Superman case. Siegel & Schuster were not working for DC when they pitched Superman to the publisher, and even though they sold the copyright to DC, variances in our atrocious copyright laws have allowed the Siegel & Schuster heirs to get their legal victories.

    On the other hand, Kirby was working for Marvel when he started drawing all of these characters.

    That's work for hire.

    Similarly, anything I create for the benefit of the company I'm currently working for doesn't become mine when I leave.

    Now, you could go on and complain about how Marvel basically treated Jack Kirby and his legacy like garbage for a VERY LONG TIME and have a legitimate beef, but that still doesn't mean Kirby's heirs are due any money.
  20. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Dr_MechanoEU View Post
    Oh god yes...I didn't mention that since it was a given.

    "And lo did the almighty say that thou kids show shalt not have an annoying animal sidekick!"
    Or an annoying 7-year-old.
  21. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Yomo_Kimyata View Post
    Christopher Lee is great for a character actor in a bit role. Liam Neeson was put on the front stage after Schindler's List and then did various degrees of declining nothing. Don't you DARE put Michael Caine in that same category (although now he does take a lot of jobs).
    Caine doesn't really do much currently unless it's Christopher Nolan on the other end of the phone, but there was a time that guy would do anything for a paycheck (see also: Jaws IV: The Revenge). He was always a solid actor, even in bad roles.

    As far as Neeson goes, he's been hit or miss. I wouldn't call "Batman Begins" or "Taken" a varying degree of nothing.
  22. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Nos482 View Post
    What the...?!
    What´s next? Tic Tac Toe: The Musical?
    Stop giving them ideas!
  23. Quote:
    Originally Posted by VoodooCompany View Post
    I hate you..........now I have more to watch
    For the Gamera episodes, this is not a bad thing. These are some of the very best MST3K has to offer. As the article says, the movies are perfect for ridicule AND the writers were just hitting their stride for high levels of hilarity. It also didn't hurt that these movies were previously used during the KTML season, so they got to take another crack at the material (with much better results).
  24. Probably doesn't say anything fans don't already know about the episodes, but it's some decent reading...

    http://www.avclub.com/articles/mst3k-vs-gamera,59531/

    I am giddy that this is coming out next week.