Bit-size impressions: Mongolian Death Worm

It's not even a B movie, it's a C movie! 
I like Victoria Pratt, but it's almost like they've been asked to act badly. Maybe they only had one take?

Bit-size impressions: Despicable Me 2

Very thin story, lots of unresolved plot lines - but incredibly fun all the way through, and some awesome references. Loads of fun for adults! 

Favourite moment: 'Thank you Gru-stewardess!'

Bit-size impressions: Dark Shadows

Vampires, over the top art design and extreme personalities.. 
Johnny Depp doing the same old role.

Bit-size impressions: The Cave

Finished a playthrough of the Cave with the boyfriend - Scientist, time traveler and the twins. Amusing, dark and some interesting puzzles. 
Also a lot of back-tracking and horrible two-player camera.

Bit-size impressions: Hotel Transylvania

Hotel Transylvania was enjoyable, lots of humour, plot mostly centered around driving the gags. 
Great to hear David Spade in a voice role again, though I did feel most of the celebrity voice cast was under-utilized. 
Would have liked to hear more from Spade, Steve Buscemi and Fran.

New York achievements evening August 10th

Saw #Wicked at #Gershwin Theatre. Amazing performers, really nice set pieces and effects, bought many souvenirs.

Also an achievement from Wicked evening: #walking up five flights of stairs in heels at a tube stop. NEVER AGAIN!

New York trip achievements August 9th to 10th

Didn't expect this climate in New York, extremely humid and hot, it's like being in a tropical country!
Last night we unlocked the achievements: 
#wait 50 min on runway for plane to dock 
 #take airport train into town 
#subway to near hotel 
#wander around the Meatpacking district with suitcases trying to find hotel.

Morning after arriving we had breakfast at the Cookshop in Chelsea right next to the hotel. Where I had american pancakes for the first time!
Today's achievements: 
#American breakfast
#not finding the store we were looking for
#finding a tourist attraction (High line park - park created on old railway lines over 10th Ave) totally by chance
#going cross-Manhattan and changing subways
#visiting Bloomingdales and again not finding the store we're looking for
#shopped at GAP

         

The Dark Knight Rises

It's a good film, a strong film, Gordon-Levitt does an amazing job, and Anne Hathaway's Catwoman is really a new start for a previously muddled character (give her a film!), Gordon and Fox are still amazing, as is Alfred and Bruce, but the ending let me down so much.

I was waiting for one sentence, one sentence the whole movie, and it never came; "that's the Question"

Where you overridden Nolan?

Also missed several characters that deserved an appearance, at least a cameo: Barbara, Renee Montoya, Maggie Sawyer (!!), the Penguin (somebody would have taken care of Gotham's richest) and Harvey, whose been missing the entire series.

The ending felt like such a cop-out, it just... It made me really, really sad.

Posted with Blogsy

Prometheus

When Ridley Scott makes strong female characters, Ridley Scott makes strong female characters!

A genuine psychological and philosophical film, exploring what it means to be human and the big questions about life, creation, alien life and where we come from.

If you go in expecting an action-filled horror film, or the answers to the Alien-quadrology you will be disappointed.

The film asks more questions than it gives answers, and features some strong, stereotype-bending characters.

I especially liked Janek, the pilot, who uniquely is one of the smartest persons abroad the vessel, and the most caring.

Elisabeth Shaw is an extremely strong woman, without being butch or the "all-business" type. She has a dimentionality to her character I rarely see in movies, and especially not thriller/action-type movies. She's also uniquely treated as the boss the entire film without anyone drawing attention to it or questioning her leadership (well, besides her boss).

Michael Fassbender does an amazing job as David, the best acting performance in the movie, and the best I've seen in a long while, in a very challenging role.

Dr. Holloway is the weakest character of the main cast, and his "Indiana Jones"-type and brash behavior makes him more annoying than charming, and you might find yourself hoping for his death after a short while.

Some of the smaller roles are a lot less fleshed out, with diffuse roles and one seriously idiotic biologist, but they do not get enough screen time for it to be a serious problem.

The environments are beautiful, from the sterile Sci-fiesque space ship to the grey alien world, and there's a lot of subtle details in the design of everything they see. Everything from sound to lighting and colour blended together to create the otherworldly world, and I can't remember either music or digital effects, like it should be with a good movie.

The film felt much closer to its predecessors; 2001 and Alien than it felt to any modern movie. It had a quietness and slowness you rarely see these days, and might, unfortunately not be a good thing for it. The two closest modern equivalents I can think of would be Sunshine (which wasn't a good film at all) and Moon.


In the end I felt it was a beautiful, strong and philosophical film, and I enjoyed the whole experience (besides Dr. Holloway, bleh!). I think I'd rate it 8/10.

Bit-size impressions: Avengers

Really enjoyed Avengers. 
Captain America and Thor grew as characters and actors, new Hulk had a great personality, and Nick Fury is awesome! 
Some plot leaps and not well-explained character changes, and Hawkeye was not very likable, or played well, but nothing that impaired the great experience. Entertaining the whole way through!

Black Mirror 3 - Adventure Game review

Good ending to the trilogy!

Ended up enjoying Black Mirror 3 a lot more than I thought I would do, the second game was a bit all over the place, but the developers obviously listened to the criticism, and Black Mirror 3 goes back to the feel and story of the first Black Mirror game.
I absolutely hated Black Mirror 1's chunky controls, progression system, and protagonist, but Black Mirror 3 really expanded on the original story, kept referencing even minor characters and even explained some of Samuel's behavior, and I ended up wanting to go back and play Black Mirror 1 again, a game I swore never to touch with a six foot pole. 

Pros: Updated, strong story, new characters interesting and unique, main protagonist grown a bit more likable, nice backgrounds, good art and good animations, strong horror feel, true to the original in every way 

Cons: Some weird progressions, puzzles seem thrown in and out of place, most do not give enough feedback when solving (Read diary!!), fortune teller felt like a tacked on help system without any impact on game (almost like there were many more death moments that were taken out), voice actors are all over the place in quality, Ralph story comes to a VERY un-fulfilling end. 

The ending sets out to really explain and expand the history of Black Mirror and the Gordon clan, and while I enjoyed both the end puzzles (besides the skeleton-puzzle!) and dialogue, I was very dissatisfied with the epilogue, which just continued explaining unnecessary things, instead of showing the future like I wanted, and hoped for. 
For an ending with so. much. dialogue, it still ended up ending abruptly, and leaving me wanting more. 

Still, it's absolutely worth playing, and Black Mirror 3, as a whole, was both a fitting ending to the trilogy, and the best game in the series (in my opinion).

Gray Matter - Adventure game review

Adventure Gaming and review

Been in an adventure gaming mood lately, not sure how long it'll last, and it has been a while since the previous "AG mood" hit, but trying to get through my backlog now when I'm interested.

First, I finally finished Gray Matter, Jane Jensen's newest game, nearly a year after I first started it... 

It started a bit slow, with some confusing controls, but the story really picked up after the first chapters. Story telling and progression was very strong, but the solution/ending was clear early on, and the finale quite underwhelming. 

Pros: great soundtrack, strong acting from main protagonists, Sam is an engaging and strong character, beautiful backgrounds, Daedalus club/stage magic subplot is fun and challenging. 

Cons: bad/lacking character/contact animation, some progressions don't trigger properly, some bad voice acting from smaller roles, and the comic book cutscenes often drag on too long, ruining the mood.

World Invasion: Battle LA

So, World Invasion: Battle L.A:

U.S military film with the alien invasion really just being an excuse for fighting in America. Immensely American, patriotic and arrogant (America only country managing to fighting back of 20 cities/countries attacked).

Way too big cast of indistinguishable marines and few known/good actors.

Main role - the staff sergeant carries the film; kamikazes himself through the plot, and is the only one showing some initiative to learn about the aliens.

Token though girl (Michelle Rodriguez) having to prove herself as a worthy soldier.

Not the worst military film I've seen, bot not very unique or creative either.

Late night randomness

Some evenings I get this huge urge for unspecified sweets. I do not know what I want, but I know we don't have it in house. So I resist as long as possible, but end up giving up and going to the nearby store, usually an hour/ half an hour before it closes.

There are several problems with this:

I do not like the dark, and get jumpy over strange shadows in my periferal vision. And footsteps freak me out. So after half running to the store, I walk around with a basket, having no clue what I want and just putting in randomness.

Feeling in no way up to shopping I don't manage to follow a shopping list or go to any great effort, but I can't just buy junk either, because then the shop assistant might think I'm only there to buy fatty things (which I am), so I end up picking up random things I can remember from the shopping list.

Not that I really have anything to worry about, as the Rema up the street is the chosen student shop, and really, everyone that was there shopping seemed to be doing the exact same thing I was doing, and picking up some "normal" items just for show, based on their shopping baskets.

So, though I pick up some random things we need, I can't muster to do anything else with them, like putting the bread in the cutting machine. For some reason I really did not want to do that with every fiber of my body.

Also, because I just have an unspecified urge for sweets, I end up buying many different things just to have options.

One last problem, I do not like being in stores when they're about to close. I feel like I'm in the way and causing them to not be able to go home, so when I hear/see things hinting to the store closing (like the shop assistants clearing away baskets) I get really stressed and feel like I have to finish as soon as possible and get out. Which makes going out late at night to shop a rather stressful experience, with really no good reason for doing it..

So tonight I came home with:

sour citrus lips (pick candy)

chocolate pudding

onions

a toothbrush

instant noodles with shrimp flavor (only store that has them in the vincinity, so I always stock up)

cherry tomatoes (offer)

foccaccia w/tomato

two ice creams

mozzarella

bread

chocolate and vanilla cream twist

garlic

Smoothie

Cupcakes

(20. Febuary 2011, Imported from Facebook)

I made (American) cupcakes recently, that turned out great, which is strange, considering my inability to bake.You see cupcake mix should just be gently stirred to mix the ingredients before baked. The thing is, I did not know this, and spent both batches of cupcakes mixing the batter like a mad woman, before giving up and just using it. (it said it should be lumpy, but I assumed they where talking about the chocolate pieces).

So, this tells me two things:

1. I suck at stirring,

2. This works to my benefit with cupcakes..

I've been using ready made packs from the store, but I found an easy cupcake recipie online, and have decided to try making them from scratch next time (somewhat spurred on by the cupcake mix packages costing around 50kr).

So far I've made chocolate cupcakes with chocolate bits and blueverry cupcakes. Would like to try making more healthy cupcakes with hole grain, but I'm afraid of jinxing it.. Oh, and really want to make redcurrant cupcakes!