30

So I go into the weekend of my thirtieth birthday blissfully unaware of the dangers in store. Upon reflection, I'm far too trusting which I find ironic considering my past stance on believing everyone had their own agenda.

Maybe I'm growing soft in my old age.

The week before, My Fair Lady was laid off by her law firm. Apparently this is common place among both law firms and manufacturing jobs because no one blinked an eye except her. To their credit, her co-workers immediately demanded her resume and started calling every contact in their respective roll-a-dexes to make sure she could pack her office things and take them straight to her next gig. My dad e-mailed me earlier in the week saying he was having a client get together in the bank that coming Saturday night and it'd be a great networking event for My Fair Lady to attend.

So we had a shindig Saturday night and all was right in the world.

Friday I spent the entire day going over documents for a contract at work. Growing up I'd always heard my dad (a banker by trade) complain about losing days of his life when large contracts were under negotiation and I completely understand that now. It actually made me feel like I have a real job now because up to this point I've never reviewed anything with this level of importance.

We all have to grow older sometime, but hell if I'm going to grow up.

Brother G called me at some point in the day and told me the wireless connection at his house in Cow Town was on the fritz and had been for the better part of that week. I love it when people call me for tech support long after the initial point of failure, then are surprised by my reluctance to move quickly in assisting them. He asked me to swing by Saturday morning and since My Fair Lady had a scheduled shopping appointment with her friend it seemed like as good a time as any.

All this time on Friday, meanwhile, My Fair Lady was at home supervising the installation of brand new carpet in Casa de Skim. When Yours Truly arrived home the installers were trying like mad to finish that night. The work was excellent but since we have a winding staircase with individual stairs each requiring new carpet they asked to come back in the morning and finish then. My Fair Lady and I worked out the time frame and figured she could wait for them while I went to get an oil change prior to trekking over to Cow Town.

Oh, and everything that was upstairs earlier in the week had been moved downstairs to our living room to make way for the new carpet. In short, we presently have about 15 feet of space in which we can actually move around on the first floor. But the carpet looks great, no doubt about that.

The sun rose on Saturday to find us still blissfully happy with our new carpet. Apparently, this is what makes people my age happy and I should just get used to it. I plan to put a stipulation in my will that states as follows:

"Should the subject of said will ever use the phrase, 'Why yes, shuffleboard sounds like a fine idea' then said subject will be subject to immediate termination with any and all extreme prejudice within the surrounding environment. Details related to subsequent funeral arrangements are covered in Section F. Paragraph 2.'"

After my car was detailed I headed over to Cow Town to find Brother G studying away. He apologized once again for not being able to make the planned dinner on Monday night celebrating my birthday on account of the four tests he would stare down that week. As such, he really needed to get on the internets something fierce, as did his roommates. He told me then how Charter had been out earlier in the week for roughly four hours but weren't able to bring their connection back up.

It took me all of five minutes to fix it and here's how:

Step 1. Unplug the small black power chord from both the router and the cable modem. Let both sit idle for two minutes.

Step 2. Plug the modem back in. Let sit idle for one minute.

Step 3. Plug the router back in. Let sit idle for one minute.

Step 4. Test your computer's internet connection. In the case of Brother G, his machine was running slow and took a full minute for Google to come up.

Forty-plus minutes in the car for this and Charter couldn't figure that out inside of four hours? Oy.

Since he had to hit the library for the rest of the day, Brother G and I headed out and hit Potbelly's for lunch. I hadn't been since My Fair Lady has a close encounter with some poorly cooked chicken salad there, but the combination of their meatball sub with one of their chocolate shakes was too good to pass up while I was off on my own. He then drove to the library while I returned to Big D to find My Fair Lady still out shopping. I made a beeline for the couch and took full advantage of my Saturday afternoon to powerlevel my characters in Final Fantasy XII.

A few hours later, My Fair Lady returned home with purchases in hand and said it was time to get ready for the party. We changed then headed out and pulled into the parking lot right around 7:30. Dad's decorating team must have worked overtime when he first hired them because the lobby of this branch is extremely nice. Stained wood floors, plenty of open offices and a roaring fireplace in a brick hearth make things very warm and equally inviting.

Of course it is. They want your money, and if you feel nice and comfortable then you're more apt to willingly fork it over.

Above the main floor is a conference room where the board of directors meets on a weekly basis. There is, of course, a full bar as well so the directors are well taken care of. This is also where my dad hosts as many bank and friend-related functions as he can. We walked up the steep stairs and towards the room. After we rounded the corner and saw the room itself, I had enough time to wonder why two of my friends and three of my co-workers were there before I heard it:

SURPRISE!!!!

I looked above me and hanging in the doorway were red 30's strung up like garland. I quickly scanned the room and saw my co-workers, parents, softball team, and friends all toasting me and I couldn't help but realize just how shifty My Fair Lady and everyone else in my world is.

We made the rounds and shook many hands and as we did so I noticed the decor. It seemed that My Fair Lady had convinced my mother that since I was 30 it would be a good time to bring out all the old toys I used to play with and set them up for the world to see. If there's a personal hell that all of us envision, I was somehow managing to live it right then and there.

"Hey Mitch!," my boss from work shouted at me from across the room. "How about you give us a demonstration of how these things work?"

Personal Hell, live and in technicolor.

My parents had Mexican food catered in and it was fantastic. What made things even funnier was the famous queso dip was snatched up by everyone but Yours Truly. I had two whole chips the entire evening, but it was fine by me. There were plenty of fajitas available and that's what drew my focus as did my birthday cake. Fortunately there were not thirty candles on it for which my lungs were grateful. There were, however, plenty of cameras in attendance so expect pictures to start appearing across the internet at some point this week.

But probably the best part of the evening was when my old friend Haus Frau walked in. Of all the people I never expected to see there, she was right up at the top. She and I go back to our freshman year of college and were tight friends right from the start. That would be 12 years now, for the mathletes among the readership. Apparently My Fair Lady phoned her up to ask if she could come down for this and it happened to be on the one weekend in a series of months when she had nothing going on. As happy as I was that my friends and family (save for Brother G and Diva) were all present, my excitement ramped up to positive giddiness when she showed up.

After making the rounds and speaking with everyone at least thrice, I had to excuse myself to use the facilities downstairs. That's when I noticed how much cooler it was downstairs than up. So when I walked back to the party I kept a conscious mental note of the temperature difference, only to wonder how I never noticed we were partying in a blast furnace.

My mother was busy fanning herself and pounded on the thermostat alternatively screaming at and pleading with it to drop at least a degree. Preferably ten, but even a little would have helped, according to her. Personally, I didn't think it was that bad especially since I kept drinking water from the cold fridge behind the bar.

Around this point is when everyone decided to start breaking up, though not on account of the heat which dad swore to take care of first thing Tuesday morning. Everyone started migrating downstairs and out into the night towards parts unknown. My parents, My Fair Lady, and Yours Truly cleaned up then we also left the premises and returned home where we promptly crashed.

It falls now to thank all who came to the party so please bear with me. I've been asked before where I come up with the nicknames I use for everyone, but that would be telling. Suffice to say that if there is an actual name used below then don't take it personally. I just haven't come up with an appropriate handle for you yet. That doesn't mean I won't someday, it just means that day is not today. So thank you again to My Fair Lady and my parents, to Crayola and The Librarian, Fireball, Travelling Man, Haus Frau, Dutchess, Aggie Babe and Hollywood, El Jefe and Belle, Pam, D&G, The Cowboy, JT & Marilu, The Team, 20/20 and Leia.

Now I get to spend the next thirty years keeping one eye on My Shifty Lady at all times. Happy birthday to me, and here's to a long road ahead.

I've Gone Nintendo.... Again

For the record, I haven't owned a Nintendo console outside of a GameBoy Advance since the Super Nintendo Entertainment System waaaaaay back in the day. By "in the day" I mean before the interweb took over our lives like the nefarious octopus it is.

So it was a shocker to me when I started falling for the Wii at last year's E3. As noted previously, I was not a fan of the name nor am I one now especially when the code phrase "Revolution" was both cool and appropriate at the same time.

But I am no longer sitting on the sidelines scorning from afar, because I braved Target this past Sunday and now a Wii sits in my living room. So My Fair Lady and I have played Wii Sports repeatedly, and since she had a bad day on Monday she immediately came home and threw on Wii Boxing then proceeded to clobber three opponents as though she were Rocky in a pantsuit.

Once I threw the towel over her head and escorted her from the ring she sat down exhausted from her battles. Fortunately, her eyes weren't too swollen so no cutting was involved. I am thinking about getting her a mouthpiece especially if she spends any more time with Wii Sports this coming weekend.

But it appears that in the last two weeks I've somehow managed to explode my backlog beyond all comprehension and it's thanks to Nintendo. I picked up the DS Lite two weeks ago and have mostly been playing with it. On the docket for that I have Castlevania: Portait of Ruin, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, Trauma Center, Brain Age, and Hotel Dusk: Room 251. That's all in the last week, by the way. Add to that anything else I get for the Wii and said backlog has shot through the roof. Now couple all that with yet more role playing games for my PS2, like Final Fantasy XII, which take hours upon hours to complete and I'm set for the year at least.

On the plus side, I've decided to retire my Xbox though it will still be available for the LEGO Star Wars saga. Since Microsoft has abandoned the console completely in favor of the 360 I may as well abandon it too. Heck, out of my stack of games for it I only play a small handful regularly and those are finally starting to appear on the backwards compatible list so when I upgrade to a 360 later this year I can continue to play those. Since this is the year when the "required Five" will be complete I can justify an upgrade.

So how does the "required Five" apply to the Wii since there aren't five must-own games out for it yet? Simple: I knew I'd get one eventually but My Fair Lady wanted one now. I think this is the great lesson of the current generation of gaming consoles - games have been far too complicated for far too long. Compare the Xbox controller to the motion sensor remote of the Wii and you'll realize there is no comparison to make.

One is for gamers, the other is for everyone else. Also, one is intuitive only to people who have played games for the past 20 years, whereas the other is intuitive to anyone who touches it. Now you tell me which one is more appealing to the mass market.

Nintendo will win this generation hands down if they somehow manage to keep the games flowing. Every developer in the world experienced a "holy crap!" moment when the Wii started selling like gangbusters and all of them are working on games for it. We can expect the market to be flooded with Wii games in roughly 18 months and from that point on there will be no comparison. Already the Wii is outselling the PS3 at a 4-to-1 ratio and that lead might even grow to 6-to-1 should the right games hit.

Imagine if LucasArts cranks out a Star Wars game where players can whip out a lightsaber and sword fight with dark Jedi. There isn't a person born since 1977 that wouldn't want to at least try it. The best part though is we know it's coming. It's too obvious a license to print money for everyone involved.

Hence, I've gone Nintendo again after all this time because the Big N finally got its mojo back in a big, big way.

Now Playing: Adv. of Brisco County, Jr.

This show brings up some pleasant memories from long ago. This aired back in 1993 while I was in high school, and it was on Friday nights before a little-watch sci-fi show called The X-Files. My sister and I watched this double-bill every week together and according to the Nielsen ratings it seemed, and felt, like we were the only two watching it. We kinda preferred it that way because while we were and remain close we didn't have a whole lot in common to talk about. I was a guy in high school and she was a girl in middle school. Simple human nature meant we'd have as much in common as an astronaut and OJ Simpson.

But we had Brisco County, Jr. each and every week and it was a fun time to be a Bruce Campbell fan.

At the time, I was new to the Cult of Bruce. I'd recently picked up Army of Darkness and heralded it for the genius that it was. That flick got me to go pick up the first Evil Dead which I quickly followed with the sequel. By this point I was hooked so when FOX announced they were doing a Western series starring him it seemed too good to be true. I have no idea how this managed to get a full 27 episode order from FOX because this is the kind of quirky and original show they tend to axe mid-way through the third episode.

It all starts when Brisco's father, legendary lawman Brisco County Sr. played briefly by R. Lee Ermy, is gunned down during a prison break by the evil John Bly (Billy Drago in full creepy mode) and his gang. So it falls to Brisco County, Jr., Harvard educated lawyer and professional bounty hunter, to track down the members of the Bly gang. He's aided by his horse Comet, who Brisco talks to more frequently than Wilbur did to Mr. Ed, and associate Socrates Poole nervously portrayed by Christian Clemson. Along the way he trades barbs and eventually becomes partners with the awesome Lord Bowler, brilliantly played by Julius Carry, and tempted by the luscious Dixie Cousins who caused me to fall head over heels in lust with actress Kelly Rutherford as she tries to out Mae West the infamous actress herself.

Oh, and since the story is set in 1893, there are constant references to "The Coming Thing" which is, essentially, the future. Brisco is an optimist by nature so he's always cheerful when greeted by something new that is an obvious forerunner to things we have today. Assisting him with these gadgets is Professor Wickwire, hilariously played by none other than the great John Astin. Wickwire is equally optimistic about the advances technology will make in the coming century and the combined glee both he and Brisco express over marvels is a lot of fun to watch.

Overall, the show remains entertaining after all this time, no doubt in part to the stellar casting of the main characters and the way the secondary characters are so hilariously fleshed out. I'm thinking about Pete Cutter in particular, with Aaron Viva a close second. Pete shows up in the first episode and recurrs throughout the season as a sort of constant nemesis for Brisco and he's always hilarious. Witness this brilliant exchange from the pilot once Brisco (masquerading as outlaw Kansas Wiley Stafford at the time) snatches Pete's gun away from him:

Scratchy: "Oh my God! He stole Pete's Piece!"

Pete: "You're... touching mah piece..."

Brisco: "It's alright, forget about it." He hands Pete back his piece.

Pete: "Forget about it? You mean... rip it from my memory like a picture from a book? Picture of a small boy, kinda shy, with big ears who only wanted to be liked. And the laughing faces of all his classmates, mocking him, just 'cause he forgot to wear his pants to school! Is that what you mean?"

Brisco: "Uh, you lost me Pete."

Scratchy: "You touched Pete's Piece. That's not something you wanna do."

Pete: "It's done. I'm calling you out, Kansas!"

I died laughing when I heard this exchange again recently and Pete's bizarre mindset just gets funnier as the season goes on. Not to mention his obsession with using painted rocks to derail his quarry is always good for a laugh.

As for Aaron Viva... well, the less said about him the better. While it's obvious who he's based on, he's played so perfectly that any hint on what to expect would ruin most of the fun. I spent most of the episode where he shows up holding my sides from laughing and it's the performance that sells it. He turns up again towards the end and is again painfully funny. I wish the series was renewed because it would have been so great seeing the further adventures of these people.

But the good news is the show doesn't truly end on a cliffhanger. Sure there are some unresolved issues, but the Bly gang is taken care of by episode 20 and no clear threat for the coming years has emerged by the final episode. Brisco and Bowler ride off into the sunset and I can accept that. But this is a great, fun show to check out and it is well worth your time.

I'm Actually Excited About Gaming Again

Everyone who the tag "gamer" applies to knows the feeling. The sense that no matter what you play you just do not care. Regardless of which console you switch to or whether you pull out the old stand-by's (break glass only in case of emergency) nothing seems to capture your imagination. The chances of this frequently happening are magnified ten-fold if you work for a video game site because you'll find yourself assaulted by one poor title after another and you have to play them.

For examples, no one in their right mind would voluntarily play through Eragon but I have, start to finish. Play enough of these back to back and you start to lose hope not only in your ability to go forward in your life, but in humanity as a whole.

But then you come across something that rekindles that imaginative spark which you thought had long since been snuffed out. In my case, one thing ignited it and the other threw a gallon of gasoline on it.

The first was cranking up Final Fantasy XII. I've been an addict of this series since the NES days but the last one I played all the way through was part nine. I managed to get about three quarters of the way through part ten before I grew so bored I physically couldn't go on. I skipped part eleven altogether since it's an MMO and those have no appeal to me. But I fired up FFXII and all of a sudden I was enraptured.

The story is far more appealing than the majority of the others in the series. Far too frequently, Japanese-based RPG's overthink their story line which doesn't add layers so much as bulk. Go back to Final Fantasy VII or VIII and see too shining examples of how a game can buckle under the weight of too much self-importance. The story for the new game cuts through all that by taking a very basic concept (two nations at war with each other, and people caught in the middle try to figure a way out) and building their characters around it instead of expanding the story so it changes with each new revelation. You never knew what was happening in some of the others because the endgame was never in sight, sometimes not even at the very end. Combine that with an excellent new combat system that keeps the battles in-game and very rarely is the immersion stripped away.

The second thing, and that which ignited my gaming passion into a full-fledged bonfire, was buying a DS Lite. Courtesy of a friend up in Manitoba, Canada, I received a black onyx DS Lite the other day and when I'm not playing FFXII I'm playing on Nintendo's genius handheld. Crayola Smoker lent me two Mario games I have no interest in and a Metroid-based game that I tried and failed to like even remotely. But he also lent me the brilliant Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney and that clicked with both Yours Truly and My Fair Lady in such spectacular fashion that a blog post devoted to just that is forthcoming. I've also picked up Castlvania: Portrait of Ruin and falled in love with how it shows off the map on one screen while I play on the other. It's also cool how you have the option to draw your own family crest at the beginning courtesy of the stylis pad.

I also picked up Brain Age and Hotel Dusk: Room 251 today. To be clear, I haven't gone on an all-out buying spree for anything in the better part of two years. This is a strangely familiar sensation for me, but I'm so out of practice that it feels odd, not unlike going on vacation for two weeks then coming home and trying to drive to the store. You have to remind yourself, however briefly, what exactly you should be doing and how you should be doing it.

I'm frankly stunned that a handheld of all things could re-inspire me but it has. Of course, having My Fair Lady shout "OBJECTION!" over my shoulder while we played Phoenix Wright may have something to do with that. But for now, consider me stunned.

Of all the things I could have missed...

... in my post regarding My Fair Lady playing a Wii...

She read the column tonight and pointed out how I never said anything about her playing two games at once, one on the Wii and the other on the DS. I looked through the column and sat there dumbstruck that I'd completly breezed right past that.

It was, after all, the point of the column itself that My Fair Lady was willingly, gleefully in fact, playing two videos games on two separate systems at once as I sat there in utter shock. Yet it completely escaped my memory when I actually wrote the column.

I could be a smartass and say it actually didn't flow well with what I was saying and then I could look all snobby and highfalutin like some other writers and that a small digression took away from the larger narrative.

But then I'd be completely lying about it and I feel bad enough as it is. Obviously I'm completely losing my marbles as I approach the salad years and I should come to accept that. When I start reposting prior stories and claim them as new it is time to put me out to pasture, boys and girls.

At this rate, that should be about this time next year.

Now Playing: The Shield Season 4

One thing I learned while watching the lastest season of The Shield is not to watch another TV show at the same time and expect to get anything done in the interim. While watching this and The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. I soon realized I wasn't going to have time to do any blogging until they were finished but now that they are I'm switching over to movies for a while. Those are far easier to burn through in one sitting and review so the TV shows will have to wait for a bit.

This season of The Shield finds Vic Mackey and his crew scattered to the four winds after the falling out at the end of year three. Only Ronnie is still working with Mackey and they're focused on monitoring the body shop sting they set up last year. In the meantime, Aceveda moves onward and upward into his position of city councilman and new captain Monica Rowling (Glenn Close) takes charge of the Barn. Is she going to go after Mackey or will she let him do his thing? Those questions and more take center stage as Rowlings quickly institutes a seizure program where the cops can and will take all property bought with drug money and that includes homes, cars, stereos, etc. All proceeds will go to the city, the police, and back into the community.

Naturally, this doesn't sit well with the local kingpin Antone Mitchell (a frightening Anthony Anderson).

While the show doesn't find its footing until roughly episodes five or six, The Shield remains formidable television. Any show where Anthony Anderson comes off as the most evil and dominating badass that show has ever seen is doing something right. Mitchell is brutal, but he's a thinker. He's highly intelligent and determined to rule the streets one way or the other. I think why the show doesn't start off as fascinating as it quickly becomes is on account of Mitchell being relegated to the side lines for the first few episodes. You sense a threat from him, but nothing we haven't seen already until he performs an act that nets him two cops under his thumb. From that point forward, Mitchell is a force to be reckoned with and Anderson is terrific. Frankly, I never knew he had this level of gravitas in him and I hope for bigger and better things happen to him.

Close is equally strong as the hard headed Rowling who is determined to do the right thing come hell or high water. She knows going in that the situation in the Barn is sticky and that Mackey is a particular loose canon, but she believes what she's doing is for the good of the community first and foremost.

That's a far cry from Aceveda who's as politically and selfishly motivated as ever. Benito Martinez gets saddled with the most ridiculous storyline of the season, a rank previously held by the Julian character, as he is still badly coping with his rape from last year. The conclusion to it is good for two reasons: 1) It's satisfying to hear what happens finally to the rapist in question, 2) It finally brings closure to the dumbest subplot this side of Julian's "gay-not gay" saga from previous years.

I also liked how Rowling gets better results than Aceveda ever did because she's thinking like a cop all the time instead of a politician most of the time and a cop some of the time. By the end of the season, things are starting to return to where they were when the show started and whether that's a good thing or a bad thing depends on how they handle it in season five. I'm hoping for bigger and better things when that season finally hits disc in a few months, but The Shield season four is a heck of a good ride if you can get past the bumps in the first four episodes.

Also, The Shield can be gut-bustingly hilarious at times, none moreso than this season, and the writers need to bring the funny more frequently.

Friend's B-Day Induces Shock. Film at 11!

This past Saturday saw a funny thing happen on the way to the asylum. My Fair Lady and I went over to Crayola Smoker's house to celebrate his 30th. Already there were Fireball and The Librarian so it was a full house of fun, especially when Crayola whipped out his Wii and told us to have at it.

No matter how many times I write a variation on "ha ha, I said Wii!" it will never get old. It's the gift that keeps on giving. Thank you, Nintendo.

This was the first time My Fair Lady had actually touched a Wii and up to this point she'd been drooling over the chance to have one in the house. I'd only played the demos at E3 which did not include anything involving Mii's or Wii Sports so my prior involvment was somewhat limited. The first thing Crayola told me to check out was his collection of Mii's.

"Dude, you'll love just how creative some of them are," he slyly hinted.

I picked up the Wii-mote and started cycling through the various Mii's and I had to hand it to Nintendo. The Mii creation all by itself is an ingenius mini-game that stretches players' imaginations. Crayola had Admiral Ackbar and Vitto Corleone among his posse and how he managed to nail them with such accuracy is a testament to just how awesome the tools are.

I went through the process of crafting mine and naturally took in the opinions of all involved.

"What do you think?" I asked when I was semi-finished.

"Not bad, but lower basically everything," said Crayola. "One thing I think Nintendo did was set everything too high by default. You lower all the features right from the start and your Mii will look a lot better."

Upon reflection, the man had a point. I motioned enough with my hand to droop my Mii's face a bit and settled my features. When everyone was satisfied with how my Mii appeared it was time for My Fair Lady to take a spin.

She took the Wii-mote from me and looked at the TV with a "what now?" expression on her face. It wasn't that she was mystified by it, per se, but I could see the wheels turning as she worked to comprehend how something so small with so few buttons could perform just like the Xbox controller she'd used with me on the LEGO Star Wars series. She started waving it around towards the TV and just stared for a second.

"Where's the, you know, the thingie?" she asked. "Oh wait! Is that hand thing me? You know, the one that keeps moving around?"

She figured out which hand was hers on screen when she clicked on the A button and selected the option to craft a Mii. There were four of us playing so three hand icons were transparent on screen at the time My Fair Lady was moving about. She went through the Mii creation process and managed to capture her likeness quite well. As soon as her Mii was finished it was thrown out into the Mii-pasture and she laughed as it stood up and walked around.

Then we were ready for some Wii Sports, the game all Wii's ship with and Nintendo's reigning shining star.

We went through various training stages on Wii Tennis, Wii Bowling, and Wii Golf though regrettably we did not get to the Wii Boxing. Through it all, My Fair Lady steadily improved her Wii-skillz by twirling the Wii-mote through the air.

"Look! I'm getting better! Really I am... ow!"

About then is when she bumped her hand on the sofa in front of her in the middle of a roll during Wii Bowling. That's the caveat about Wii Sports, my friends:

Stand where there is nothing around you and you will lessen the odds of random furniture destruction.

Then Crayola piped in with a suggestion:

"Hey guys, anyone up for Warioware?"

Now, the Warioware games are an odd duck to say the least. Imagine the loudest and most obnoxious anime Japan could possibly conjure then filtered through the prism of 1970's style Saturday morning cartoons drawn by people clearly on ecstasy and you'll be in a good starting point. Warioware refers to the Wii-mote as a "Form Baton" and then instructs you to stand in various poses while it hurls one 10 second mini-game after another at you. For extra points, you play with a group of friends and treat the Wii-mote as a hot potato by tossing it back and forth for each mini-game.

If done right, chaos and laughter will ensue.

The resulting insanity was hilarious. My Fair Lady, Fireball, The Librarian, and Yours Truly tossed the Wii-mote back and forth and between us managed to strike enough silly poses that it makes me happy a YouTube employee wasn't there. Since it was a long week followed by a long day, My Fair Lady and Yours Truly had to leave shortly thereafter. We made it home about 20 minutes later and fell asleep roughly 20 seconds after that. But one thing was perfectly clear:

My Fair Lady wants a Wii, and she wants one right now come hell or high water. To date, I've never seen her express interest in anything video game related outside of the Frogger remakes and the LEGO Star Wars series. But this... this is just something else. It's lust, pure and simple.

Basically I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone whenever the Wii comes up in conversation now because nine times out of 10 she's the one starting the conversation and doing most of the talking.

Now Playing: Thank You For Smoking

About 10 minutes into Jason Reitman's brilliant Thank You For Smoking I was gasping for air on account of how hard I was laughing. After seeing this I've become even more disenchanted with the usual bluster of awards talk because none of the Best Actor discussions I've seen have brought in Aaron Eckhart for his potrayal of Nick Naylor. Per the norm, at least several brilliant performances go ignored by the Academy and I could see the Oscars completely passing Eckhart over and that is a huge mistake.

Simply put, the man is brilliant as Naylor, a genuine snake who is the point man for all PR the tobacco industry puts out. Naylor is front and center and as he points out about 30 seconds into the film, when you think of all the people and industries that hate and actively seek the destruction of the tobacco industry, they all have to go through him first. What makes him so delicious a character is the way nothing sticks to him in the slightest. He's so slick he makes oil seem dry, and Eckhart is hilarious as he navigates Naylor through one awful situation after another.

Oddly enough, some of his best scenes are with a kid actor who up to now has been nothing but a blank for me. Cameron Bright was the creepy empty-space kid in Birth and X-Men 3 so him showing not only life but actual pleasure at being a kid was sort of weird for me as a viewer. His scenes with his dad Nick are terrific because, much to his mother's chagrin, he is his father's son and seeing him learn from the master is pure comedy gold.

On a related note, Katie Holmes again shows a the complete lack of gravitas that caused her to be the lone sore spot in Batman Begins. She plays a reporter who hooks up with Nick for the sake of a story and while I'll grant she delivers on the knock-out line of the film (regarding Nick and his segment on tv) she never comes off as the hard-boiled investigator her character so clearly is meant to be. Maybe it's for the best that Looney Tom and his cult have her locked away in a dungeon somewhere. At least she won't screw up the The Dark Knight when it hits next year.

I could go on and on about the performances with special accolades to William H. Macy as an activist senator and Maria Bello and David Koechner as Nick's compatriots in arms. But for me the buck stops with the great J.K. Simmons who simply demolishes everyone and everything in his path to get to the funny. Just as he does in the Spider-Man films, Simmons fires words out of his mouth so fast you'd think they'd come from a machine gun. Everything the man says in Thank You For Smoking had me in hysterics and for that reason alone I'd recommend the film.

But there is so much more going on here that this demands repeat viewing. What elevates the film considerably is how it doesn't obviously take sides in the issue, as surprising as that may sound. Oh sure, you get a lot of positives and negatives on both sides of the tobacco issue pretty much start to finish and by no means does the industry come out clean. But in the end the film tries to hammer home one fact above all and that is this is a free country and we should enjoy those freedoms to our hearts' content.

Try Thank You For Smoking and I can guarantee that you'll enjoy it.

Ice, Ice, Baby '07 Ed.

So the other day a few storms blew threw north Texas and brought with them a 30+ degree drop in temperatures across the state. The meteorologists were jockeying for position on top of the pile to claim that it was the worst disaster to hit the metroplex in forever. If there was ever any doubt that the media at large thrives on bad news (the more horrific the better) then please bear witness to the way these witless wonders react when a rogue flurry hits their collective windshield.

My Fair Lady and I went to another showing of the particular house we have our eyes on Saturday afternoon during a slight pause in the cold rain. When we returned we spent some time packing our place up in anticipation of selling it within the next few months. After that we took a nap and when I woke up I went downstairs and flipped over to Channel 8 news. The first thing I did was laugh at the cute news chick who was dressed as a matador. The second thing I did was laugh harder at the proclamation that the weather guys had been there since 4 a.m. that morning chronicling the storm systems moving into the area.

Guys, there was a lot of cold rain outside but not any ice as far as I could see. Of course, the section of Dallas I live in may as well be a black hole as far as Mother Nature is concerned. Very rarely does a storm system hit the city and not go completely around us so my objectivity is somewhat tempered by this fact. North and south of us was apparently covered in a sheet of ice yet we were left out of it. What little ice we saw was mainly on my car the next morning which gave me a nice workout as I tried to get it all off.

Of course, My Fair Lady gets to her office downtown and four other people are there. The firm she works for is, shall we say, a little larger than that so when she called me I had to laugh at her expense.

"You'll never guess who's here today," she said.

"Uh, the Pope."

"No, His Holiness apparently has the day off along with all the partners and the support staff. Me, Other Guy, and Secretary #45 are the only ones here. What do you think I should do?"

"Leave." I was really into this conversation right from the start.

"I can't just go home early, even though I should."

"What are you talking about? It's not like anyone is going to stop you. If the security guards have taken the day off too then there's no one left to stop you. Go out to your car and go home."

"I'm thinking about it. But what about you?"

"Well, by this point everyone's made it in so I'm stuck. But you go have fun!"

Just to clarify, by no means was I trying to be a martyr. Everyone who works in my office had arrived by this point (late morning around lunch time) so it would have been physically impossible for me to split without being noticed. My Fair Lady figured that she may as well stay and knock out some contract work she had on her plate.

In the meantime, I fired off some e-mails and burned through the first disc of "Samurai Jack Season 3" which is exactly what I would have done were I at the house.

Was I working from home or relaxing from work?

You decide.

In the meantime, the ice burned off by noon and the weather forecasters were all in shock over how narrowly we averted disaster. Guys, by noon on Sunday, THE DAY OF THE STORM, your estimates of 3/4 to 1 full inch of ice had been scaled back to barely a quarter inch of ice and even that was just a possible. I get that this is Texas where shouting "flurries" has the same impact as screaming "FIRE!" in a crowded theater, but you people need to lighten up a bit.

If for no other reason, when disaster does strike in the future I won't be so focused on whether or not the news chick's co-anchor is going to step off camera then return dressed as Zorro.

Olay!

Now Playing: Invincible

One thing we all know about the "inspirational sports film" is exactly how things will play out. Start to finish we know the hero will face adversity, join something he/she believes in, will find themselves beaten down some more, then will find a way to win when they need it the most thus inspiring not only themselves but also their friends and family.

Absolutely nothing is different about Invincible which is sort of the point. Either you dig flicks like this or you snear at 'em.

Personally, I look at them to see how well they use the formula and to its credit Invincible does an extremely good job at entertaining without preaching. This isn't the story of a young American hockey team standing up for US pride by defeating the fearsome Russians. It's about an average guy (Vince Papale) in Philly with above-average athletic ability who tried out for the Eagles on an "open call" figuring he had nothing to lose. Then a funny thing happened.

The new head coach, Dick Vermiel, asked Vince to join the Eagles on special teams. It's a heck of a story and considering today's NFL it's probably the last time something like this would happen. Since this is based on the real life Vince Papale who really was a part-time bartender in Philly during the extremely hard '70's, we know he's going to suffer before becoming a winner and suffer he does. In the behind the scenes material (which is a goldmine on the real Papale who consulted on the film), we learn that one of the NFL players mis-timed his hit on star Mark Wahlberg and the result was everyone behind the camera afraid he'd been killed. On screen, the hit looks bad but nothing serious however Wahlberg is rather slow getting up.

The best way I could describe Invincible would be to call it comfort food. You know what you're going to get, you know the beats start to finish, but it's still a fun ride made all the more enjoyable by a personable lead in Wahlberg and a solid turn by Greg Kinnear as coach Vermiel. There's nothing Oscar-worthy anywhere, but it's a fun movie that ends right as it seems to be gearing up.

Oh, and the final scene incorporates the actual play Papale made and seeing what actually happened, and Papale's reaction to it, make the movie all by itself.

Now Playing: Layer Cake

One of these days I'm going to stop leaving Netflix discs laying around on my shelf for a month gathering dust. I really am. Honestly. Cross my heart and the whole bit. My reasoning is I'm now two-for-two on friggin' awesome movies that have sat unattended to on my shelf for far too long all the while a host of other gems piled up in my Netflix queue.

Some might not consider Virgins From Hell a gem but those people are merely uninformed.

As for Layer Cake, I was just blown away by Matthew Vaughn's sure-handed direction and Daniel Craig's star making performance. I understand now why the Bond producers thought of him for the role after seeing this because even though the character he plays isn't a badass by any stretch of the imagination, he captures the suave, sophisticated and know-it-all seen-it-all essence that is the very soul of James Bond.

Little wonder then why I fell head over heels in love with Casino Royale, in large part due to Craig's performance.

Both Craig and Vaughn prove themselves the real deal right from the start in Layer Cake as Craig's narration sets up his character the world of drug dealers he inhabits. His character, never referred to by name, runs a small travel business as a front for narcotics traffic in the greater London area. He has three other members on his team and does his primary business with a big boss named Jimmy. Jimmy's right hand man is played by the always awesome Colm Meany whose cherubic face hides a hard-boiled menace that is just wicked to watch unleashed. Meany was easily my favorite character on Deep Space Nine and I normally enjoy a movie more by a factor of 50 if he's in it.

The opening 10 minutes sets the stage in grand fashion and it's to Vaughn's credit that he does more with less than Martin Scorsese did with the entire first hour of Casino which did much the same thing. It spelled out how things work in the business while at the same time introducing all of the majority players. While that sequence was easily the best part of Casino, Vaughn reigns things in and gets down to business quickly. Once the stakes, the world, and the players involved are all laid out, it's time to screw everything up and when things go wrong they go completely off the deep end.

I think I spent the better part of Layer Cake with my jaw on the ground at the sheer awesomeness of it all. Coming off of Brick presented me with the challenge of comparing American crime noir to that of Britain and between the two I preferred Layer Cake. It remembers to entertain instead of wallowing in how clever its screenplay is and while I think the final few double-crosses mute the power of one of the endings, the film nevertheless is a strong and bold announcement of major talent coming into their own.

I realize now what a shame it was that 20th Century Fox and Vaughn couldn't come to an arrangement for Vaughn to direct X-Men 3 as he was originally slated to, but at least he was responsible for Kelsey Grammer as Beast which was a brilliant bit of casting. As for Craig, I think his work here and in Infamous will define him as an actor moreso than the flashier Bond series will. But what I was most surprised by with Casino Royale was in just how good he was with the darker and more emotional side of Bond. He may look like more of a bruiser and less a suave elitist, but he was so good that I can only hope the next few Bond films are as good as Casino Royale was.

This is all a long way of saying that Layer Cake is an excellent flick that will be enjoyed by anyone who digs crime films. Oh, and the love scene with Sienna Miller has one of the best uses of a song I've seen in forever.

An Op-Ed on the Next-Gen Console War

As you can see from the title, this will be a gaming-related article so if you're not interested then skip on to something else.

According to VG Charts, Nintendo's Wii is smacking the crap out of both the Xbox 360 and the PS3. How do I arrive at such a conclusion considering the 360 has double the sales numbers of the Wii? Simple.

The Wii has been out for roughly six weeks.

Now, will the Wii continue to dominate through the course of this generation? It's hard to say considering Nintendo's track record of putting out first party gems every nine months or so with a whole lotta "meh" filler in between. I may give Sony a hard time on the PS3 (deservedly so) but by all accounts it is a solid piece of engineering and Sony does not skimp on the games. From the looks of things, their slate of titles this year will be impressive provided they all ship on schedule. Microsoft falls somewhere in the middle which is a position they should, frankly, get used to. I honestly think for all their bluster, Microsoft is going to have to settle for being the Number Two Man through this generation and possibly the next one as well.

Practically everyone under the sun has weighed in with their opinions on all three consoles and where things are headed, and every one of them (read: us in the gaming press) are talking out of their butts because we've never seen anything like this. By "this" I mean a seismic shift in the gaming demographic which happened virtually overnight as well as skyrocketing development costs by the Powers That Be, micro-transactions that allow the Powers That Be to nickle-and-dime us for things already in the game (read: Viva Pinata), and EA's staunch refusal to do anything about the problems in Madden.

Gaming has now entered the big time, and for the record I believe this generation of consoles will be the one that sets the standard for all that will come down the line. Prior to now, the term "gamers" was aimed squarely at the cliche of angst-ridden teenage boys sitting in their parents' basement playing video games with their friends until 2 a.m. surrounded by empty cans of Mountain Dew. This misconception was recently shattered and at the heart of it all is Nintendo's little console that could.

Take a look at your Xbox and Playstation controllers. Pick them up, weigh them, then examine how many buttons are on each one. Do the same with your PC's keyboard and mouse then recall when we all played flight sims (both on earth and in space) back in the day where we'd use almost every button on the keyboard. Now ask yourself this question: Were we working or were we playing?

Bill Harris made this same point the other day and he's right. What Nintendo has done with the Wii is strip away the complexity inherent to video gaming and made it so accessible to the mainstream that now a grandmother can roll 185 on Wii Sports Bowling with her grandchildren who are used to rolling aliens with heavy weapons in Gears of War on the 360.

Which game can justifiably be accused of bringing the room together?

Almost instantly, the gaming universe shifted. Every woman I've talked with who previously regarding gaming as "that thing my boyfriend/husband/ex does in the living room" is fascinated by the Wii. They all want one of their own because they want to dance around while they play instead of sit on the couch. The question is, how long will it last?

As noted, Nintendo tends to drag their feet on getting quality material for their consoles into our hands in a timely fashion and they have a real chance to storm the beaches and take a commanding lead with the Wii. Head over to iTrackr.com and run a search for Hot Items and see what pulls up. Without question, the Wii will be sold out regardless of zip code. Compare that to the PS3 which will absolutely be in stock everywhere. What the hell?

Simple - it boils down to "fun." Every one of us at E3 last year came out saying that "fun" was what it felt like to play the Wii. It was pure "fun" in a way many of us were unfamiliar with except on a primal level. For the past 20+ years, we've been conditioned to think that the more complex a console was the better it was by default. Sony's entire marketing campaign for the PS3 has been about the awesome fury it would unleash on every household in the world, but not one time did they ever mention how much fun their games would be.

Exactly five seconds after picking up the Wii controller and actually using it results in a euphoric high no other console has matched, ever. The closest approximation is Guitar Hero because it also taps into that same primal level. All of us have played air guitar at some point in our lives, and every single one of us wanted to be a rock god for at least a fleeting moment when we were kids. Then Guitar Hero hit and not only provided an excellent gaming experience by itself, but also captured the essence of "fun" that comes from flailing around like an idiot to your favorite song when no one else is looking.

Now take that very same essence and inject it into a console and the potential you're looking at is limited only by a developer's imagination. There will be plenty of junk released to be sure, but the titles devoted solely to the Wii's control scheme that maintain the essence of "fun" will score and score big.

So what of the other two consoles? I have a few thoughts on each so bear with me just a bit longer.

Sony's mistakes this past year have been so numerous it is literally impossible to count that high. The only thing they should have done is shut up and put out the console. Oh, and slash that damn price tag by $150 at least and then they'll get some better press and attention. Their laughable attempt to force mass acceptance of Blu-Ray technology was boneheaded to say the least because the tech is at least two years away from being properly pushed by the software. Anyone that claims either Blu-Ray or HD-DVD are better than the other haven't seen anything yet from either format because they're still just ramping up. Show me Lawrence of Arabia completely restored in both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray side-by-side and I'll be far more eager to proclaim a victor.

In short, I'll wait a few more years for the kinks to work themselves out so I'll let the early adopters drool all over themselves in the meantime. For me, DVD wasn't worth paying attention to from a consumer point of view until roughly 1999 which was two years after the first players hit. I knew immediately that it was the future and was genuinely excited about it, but with technology following Moore's Law (more or less) it was smarter to hold off then and I'll do the same with Blu-Ray and HD-DVD now.

That's a long way of saying Sony shot themselves in the foot by forcing something on the market that 95 percent of consumers are in no way either informed enough about or ready to commit to. With the requisite hardware costing probably north of $1000 per console, Sony cannot commit to a price cut this soon and John and Jane Doe in Middle Of Nowhere, Nebraska, aren't about to buy one of those beasts for Little Jimmy when his perfectly good PS2 is sitting in the family room surrounded by quality games. This leads to point #2 about Sony - they are their own worst enemy.

The PS2 may not be as strong hardware-wise as the Xbox but it sure has a vastly superior games library, and this looks to continue well into next year. Microsoft has abandoned the Xbox in favor of the newer and shinier 360 (more on that in a second) but Sony still has a viable cashcow with the PS2 and intends to milk the hell out of it for as long as it can. I'm fine with that because since I don't own an HDTV then buying either a PS3 or 360 right this second isn't as much of a priority to me as enjoying the games on the current consoles. With games like Final Fantasy XII and God of War 2 hitting at the end of the generation, I believe the console is better equipped now to maintain a steady pace of solid titles for the next year (or even two).

By contrast, Microsoft has dumped development for the original Xbox completely and this just pisses me off to no end. Their view of hardware is the same as their software - we should upgrade when they say so. Well, sorry Redmond, but that just ain't the case and you can screw off for thinking so. Plenty of millions world wide are lapping up the 360 but more than a few of them have had to send them in for repairs due to faulty hardware. Microsoft's stance of "be gentle with it" and "keep it well ventilated" and "we'll make as much first-gen software backwards compatible as we can whenever we get around to it" is utter hogwash. All of it. This is a gaming console that was the first in a long while that had a viable chance to stab Sony in the heart and take its lunch money at the same time.

Instead, Microsoft let Sony pretty much do that to itself.

Now, here's where I give Microsoft a ton of grief - backwards compatible is important regardless of what people say. The majority of us who have neither the room nor the intention to have multiple big-ass consoles in our living room will need to remove the old and replace it with the new. If the new cannot play the games from the old, and offers very little in the way of attractive new software, then the new console will remain un-purchased. But there's one more kicker Microsoft more or less announced just recently:

Within the next 6-9 months, version 2.0 of the Xbox 360 will be released. It'll use a better chipset (65nm) which means it will be better engineered and quieter, and in theory shouldn't require a power brick to juice it up. Oh, and it should be far more stable than the first-gen Xbox 360's are.

This revelation should effectively kill 360 sales between now and then. It won't, but it should hurt sales among the more "plugged-in" among gamers. Certainly those of us currently on the fence will wait for version 2.0 before committing, and since there's exactly one game between now and then Microsoft is releasing (Crackdown) then I feel even better about the wait. Microsoft's attitude this generation seems to be only slightly less arrogant than Sony's and that just rubs me the wrong way. It's like both companies feel we should be grateful to them for putting out these consoles when in fact I find nothing to sell me on either system.

Yet.

In the end, it all comes down to the games and only Resistance: Fall of Man on the PS3 and Dead Rising on the 360 are the ones that grabbed my attention. The 400th interation of Madden or NBA Live can both kiss off because neither are inventive or push the genre forward. To be sure, I hate sports games exactly for their lack of innovation and nothing those fools at EA say will change my mind short of actually practicing what they preach. They've been going on for a year now about how they were going to work harder to promote new titles and new franchises but all I've seen is the same old thing of pushing graphics at the expense of gameplay. Maybe it's because I've been doing this for 20+ years now but I'm frankly sick of graphics replacing gameplay. For example, while I respect the heck out of how Crysis looks, if it's as boring and empty as Far Cry was then I won't care that it can bring my PC's graphics card to its knees. Fortunately, Nintendo took a "graphics don't matter" approach and focused on the "fun" aspect of gaming and wound up knocking it so far out of the park even they were surprised.

Both Microsoft and Sony were blindsided by the Wii and the rapidity with which it sold and continues to sell, and they must be scrambling internally to figure out what they can do to counter it. Every single Wii Nintendo can make will sell, and neither of its competitors can accurately claim the same thing. When they each decided Nintendo was a non-threat and decided to focus solely on each other they left the door wide open for Nintendo to walk in and steal their thunder.

If Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo can actually follow through on the promise of their consoles then gaming as a whole will benefit from this generation. When companies are forced to dig in and compete with one another then the best all sides have to offer come out. Sure, there's a bloodbath left over but we the consumer reap the benefits. Xbox Live as a service forced Sony to work more on its online service which, to date, has monumentally sucked. Nintendo has uniformly ignored the online marketplace but have embraced it with the Wii and while their service might be a little rough compared to Microsoft's, both have pros and cons that each will learn from and improve on over the next year.

My predictions for where everything will end up depends heavily on the next 12 months. Until Christmas 2007 is over it is too early to call this war and anyone that says otherwise isn't looking at the big picture. Should all three companies crank out software that fully utilizes the strengths of each console then I think the Wii could be numero uno with Microsoft number two and Sony number three. I think the gap between Sony and Microsoft will narrow considerably once Sony drops that price by ~$100 and will continue to narrow when the Sony-exclusive titles keep hitting. Right now though, they're priced out of the mass market but I think they may wise up sooner rather than later. Microsoft needs to focus on getting games to market faster than they have been, and those games ALL need to be triple-A titles to have enough of an impact to keep Sony down.

This is where the playing field stands as 2007 begins. How this field will look when the year comes to a close is anyone's guess. Fortunately, there is plenty of time between now and then for all three parties to work their butts off to impress us with shiny new games. And who knows?

Maybe some of them might even be system sellers.

Now Playing: 24 Season 5

Previously on 24...

Jack Bauer fought valiantly against evil terrorists led by the charismatic Habib Marwan (Arnold Vosloo) and encountered/defeated many foes, including a cameo by Naked Mandy. Yet it all came down to the newly sworn in President Logan's right hand man Walt Cummings who sent a loyalist Secret Service agent into CTU to bring in Bauer. Of course by "bring in" I mean "kill the hell out of" and so Jack faked his death and fled Los Angeles. The only ones who knew he was still alive were ex-President David Palmer, Tony Almeida, Michelle Dessler, and Chloe O' Brian which meant Bauer's lover Audrey Rains was left on the floor of CTU crying her eyes out in anguish as Jack walked off into the sunset leaving his world behind.

The following takes place between 7 a.m. and 7 a.m. tomorrow...

As much of a reboot as Season Four was, Season Five levels the playing field with a wrecking ball. Over the course of 24 episodes, practically the entire original cast is permanently removed from the series so much so I'm convinced that if a character's name isn't "Jack Bauer" in the credits then it is only a matter of time. My main fear going into each season of 24 is how much of it will get derailed by a useless subplot that drags down the whole enterprise.

I need not have worried because there is not a single moment wasted in the entirety of this season. There were a few times when my "Useless Subplot" alarm started going off, but within the span of an episode the new plot development would sort itself out and make sense. What does that mean?

No Kim Bauer screwing things up.

No stupid psycho daughter killing herself for attention.

No cougars anywhere.

No amnesia anywhere.

In short, this is Jack Bauer set on "Pure" and it is a wicked kick to the adrenaline gland. The show just builds and builds to the point where it's almost impossible to take and then it goes deliriously over the edge and keeps the suspense high while racing to the finish. Everything that's worked before is cranked up to an 11 and everything that failed before is thankfully tossed aside. Bauer is pure righteous fury from beginning to end as he tries to sort out who would want him and his friends dead, and who has the means to accomplish it.

President Logan (Gregory Itzin) is a brilliant creation, all twitches and tics and insecurities that is somehow perfectly matched by his wife Martha (Jean Smart). The ways Itzin and Smart play off one another are wonderful because they nail the shorthand couples develop over 30+ years of marriage. They say more to one another in a look or a gesture than others could in a speech. Smart has the trickier role at first because Martha has a history of paranoid delusions and clinical treatment, and as the events unfold she starts seeing through the cracks but no one will help her. Without spoiling anything further, I'll say that everything for her changes slowly as the day moves on and by the end of it she's gone through a personal hell.

The secondary roles are again filled out by the characters we've come to know and love over the last few years. Mike Novick returns at Logan's chief of staff and he's again perfectly played. When the facts are brought to bear on him towards the end he leaps at the chance to do the right thing because of his failings in season two. Secret Service agent Aaron Pierce returns and is surprisingly given far more to do this year than in seasons past.

Also, Pierce gets the best line of the entire season during a confrontation towards the end. All of Jack Bauer's many, many throwdowns pale to the amount of genuine fury and rage that Pierce puts into one line. He's been heartbroken by what he's seen and when placed in front of the source of the day's problems, Pierce looks the villain square in the eye and just throws down. I cheered too because as great as Jack's similar confrontation in the final episode is, Pierce delivered his stinging rebuke with a wounded dignity Jack is physically incapable of managing.

In short, it was the stand out moment in a season of such moments.

If you have never seen 24 and want to know where to start, then I'd recommend picking up season four then five. Season four was more of a reboot of the series than anything else, and since they cover most of the backstory with throwaway bits of dialogue you should be good to go. Season five is worth it though because it is damn near flawless from the brutal beginning to the cliffhanger ending.

Hosed

Over the Christmas season, My Fair Lady ran short of hose and dispatched me forthwith to yon Macy's. Women's undergarments do not normally faze me, yet standing in the middle of an open room surrounded by them while two women stood behind me in line I started mentally humming a song from "Sesame Street":

Which of these things is not like the other....

Word of advice to all men everywhere - when the woman in your life requests you perform this task, do so without comment unless you bring the funny. It is part of the give and take relationship. Besides, will she know if you grabbed a Cinabun on the way out the door?

I think not.

Slight Addendum - 36

So I received a package from GT the other day and it was two other games for review. I burned through Eragon on Xbox in about six hours so that brings the final tally for the year up to 36. There's almost no chance of me ever hitting this high a number of completed games again so I'm just going to take a moment to bask in my nerdiness. Thank you for playing, you've been a wonderful audience this year.

See ya on the flip side.

Now Playing: Brick... Since 10/17

The reason for the addendum on the title is that's how long this gem has been on my shelf. Around this time last month I believe Netflix actually called off the search and shifted resources towards recovery. It's given me a great joy to finally sit down and watch it if only out of pride that it be sent back by the close of the year.

Dear God why did I wait so long to watch this magnificent albeit odd gem?

If the thought of Raymond Chandler and film noir in general scares you then do not rent this movie at all. Do not spend any time on it because I can assure you that none of the joy recently visited upon me will find you. This film fires words at the screen with all the firepower of an assault rifle and it doesn't stop until the credits roll. The entire film is a hardened film noir dropped whole hog into a high school setting, and while I would argue that Buffy the Vampire Slayer used the setting to better effect it is nevertheless a bold choice.

Rob Thomas, crafter of Veronica Mars, explained how he set the series in high school because it was the last place where people across all walks of life, i.e. cliques, were actually forced to interact on a day to day basis. Brick would have been the better for it had it actually applied this lesson, but it chose to walk a different path by choosing to not use the setting to its fullest potential. Every single element down to the authority figure and the femme fatale are ripped straight from Chandler's pen and there is no difference between the use of the high school in Brick and the use of, well, any other setting where class warfare is prevalent.

Were the various cliques actually, you know, present in the movie then I would praise it as one of the boldest films of the year. Yet Brick solely focuses on a handful of characters and the lone authority figure, brilliantly played by Richard Roundtree, is limited to a single scene. The phrase "where people lunch" is used repeatedly but nary was a cafeteria in view. The director obviously chose to not have this high school even remotely resemble reality which, when coupled with how limited parents are seen and used in the film, takes away from any sort of authenticity Brick could have achieved. Does this detract from the fun of watching such a dense story unfold?

Absolutely not.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt delivers a star-making performance as Brendan, the loner who simply hangs back watching everyone and waiting to graduate so he can move on with his life. You get the feeling that he's just trying to survive high school but that doesn't mean he doesn't have his finger on the local pulse. He knows who the players are in the various cliques and he knows what the score on the street is. Rumors abound of various goings-on behind the scenes and while he may know more than he lets on, he's smart enough to stay out of the way.

All that changes when his ex-girlfriend calls him and says she's in trouble then turns up dead two days later. As he looks at her lfieless body (which is the opening shot by the way), Brendan decides to bring everything down to find out who was responsible.

This is a stunning debut by writer-director Rian Johnson who must have watched The Big Sleep, The Maltese Falcon, and Miller's Crossing about a zillion times just to get the flavor exactly right on the dialogue. I was not exaggerating when I said the words fly at you so fast they may as well have been fired at you by a machine gun, so be prepared to rewind and listen again to certain scenes. There are also some laugh out loud funny bits like "The Pin"'s mom fixing Brendan and "The Pin" breakfast. The surreal nature of it just made me howl.

Check out Brick if you're looking for a very unconventional slant on film noir, but stand by with that rewind button. It's a tricky and wordy flick, but fantastic if you're a fan of the genre.

2006 Final Tally: 35

While 2006 may not have wrapped itself up just yet, I have decided to retire from gaming for the duration. I finished off The Thing last night finally and it seemed a good enough way to go out. Fortunately, my backlog didn't explode over Christmas as I was afraid it would. The two games I received I'm anxious to tear into but since they're both 40+ hour affairs (easily twice that in Final Fantasy XII) I decided to let things end now and spend the rest of the week reading and burning off my Netflix queue.

For the curious, the following is the list of everything I finished this year:

Ratchet: Deadlocked (PS2)
Quake 4 (PC)
Shadow of the Colossus (PS2)
Space Rangers 2 (PC)
Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones (PS2)
Sin Episodes: Emergence (twice) (PC)
The Godfather (Xbox)
State of Emergency 2 (PS2)
Half-Life 2 (PC)
Ratchet & Clank: Up Your Arsenal (PS2)
Psychonauts (Xbox)
Half-Life 2: Episode 1 (PC)
Destroy All Humans! (Xbox)
Pitfall: The Lost Expedition (Xbox)
Rogue Trooper (Xbox)
Commandos: Strike Force (Xbox)
Age of Empires III (PC)
Titan Quest (PC)
007 Nightfire (Xbox)
Secret Weapons Over Normandy (Xbox)
Brothers in Arms: Road To Hill 30 (Xbox)
Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood (Xbox)
GUN (Xbox)
Just Cause (Xbox)
Black (Xbox)
Robotech: Battlecry (Xbox)
Run Like Hell (Xbox)
Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence (PS2)
Reservoir Dogs (Xbox)
Destroy All Humans! 2 (Xbox)
Call of Duty 3 (Xbox)
LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy (Xbox)
The Sopranos: Road to Respect (PS2)
Voodoo Vince (Xbox)
The Thing (PS2)

As you can see, there are more than a few back catalog titles on the list. It's actually taken me two whole years to burn off 90 percent of my backlog and I love that it's nearing completion. Here's the caveat for 2007:

A lot of what remains are role playing games which, by default, clock in at 40 hours or more. I'm including Bully as an RPG as well even though it doesn't necessarily fall into that category. But as I look at all of that I feel proud to have accomplished a sort of purge that removes a ridiculous amount of distractions from my life. While I do enjoy this hobby, I would at some point like for it to go back to being a "hobby" and not "a way of life" which is what it's become for the last two years.

This next year looks to be a defining year for a lot of reasons though and I'm anxious for it to start. The biggest one is that I turn 30 come February and don't think My Fair Lady isn't counting down the days to that particular date. While I've never been big on birthdays, particularly my own, I can't help but feel a special fondness for hitting the big 3-0. Maybe it's the thought of growing older or being a true "adult" for the first time but whatever this odd feeling is it remains a welcome one.

My Fair Lady and I also plan on looking for a house this spring/early summer as we're tired of living in apartments/condos. This depends on several factors but if a few things fall into place as they should come March then we should be all set to go for a house and pay off our debts at the same time. So how will all of this affect my gaming?

In the immediate future there won't be much of a change, however around March things may start shifting. If all goes as planned (though honestly when does it ever?) then constant gaming should shift back towards film watching which is where it belongs. It's helpful that the majority of my backlog consists of RPGs because those require constant attention for such a long time that I won't be blowing money on games that I won't finish for another two years.

Vicious Cycle = On the cusp of being broken.

Satellite Radio - I get it now

So the other day I downloaded and installed at work and home AIM 6.0. Having tried out their Triton beta this summer, I knew they were on the right path with a few things (such as all IM conversations in one window) and absolutely on the wrong path with others (inability to use any buddy icons other than ones bought from AOL). One thing I didn't try was their streaming radio stations because since it was AOL I didn't trust them any further than I could throw them.

Out of morbid curiosity the other day though I bumped my machine up to 6.0 and started playing with it. That's when I noticed the satellite radio features at the bottom (provided by XM) so I started playing around with it. I noticed the veritable smorgasbord of choices all of which were dedicated to a particular music, and each one had dozens of sub-categories that were even further devoted to those specifics. Without even listening to tune one I fell in love with seeing such diversification in practice. This is what happens when you focus on a particular goal or product: It lets you make the most out of something by not dividing your focus by trying to appeal to everyone.

This is what I think will hurt the next-gen consoles because only the Wii seems focused on games whereas the PS3 and Xbox 360 have been pitched from the word "go" as all encompassing media solutions. Hey guys, I just want to play video games, not bask in the glory that is Sony/Microsoft.

Getting back to the music, I instantly went to the Jazz/Blues section and for the last two days I've been listening to a non-stop flow of outstanding live performances from Chicago and other blues artists. Since I hate listening to anything other than talk while in the car then subscribing to the service is a waste of money for me. But streaming this at home and the office for free has been absolutely killer this week and I get how much people dig it. A few commercials here and there but otherwise there is plenty of great music to revel in without having to avoid all the useless DJs.

Excellent work, XM, excellent work.

Now Playing: The League of Ext. Gentlemen

This was beat up a lot when it came out by fans of Alan Moore's graphic novel and it's easy to see why. Moore's book was reverent about the literary sources it cribed from and Moore's usual dedication to the finer points of character, which he then twists inward as hard as possible, was evident from the first frame. Now compare that to the movie version which is a bombastic Cliffs Notes version of the same story as filtered through the American studio system.

Again, I get the hate. But if you come at it like I did (i.e. ignorant of the source material except by proxy) then it's actually not half bad. I would never go so far as to call it great but there are quite a few things director Stephen Norrington and his merry crew of misfits managed to nail. While the effects work ranges from solid to shoddy, sometimes in the same scene, quite a few beautiful pieces emerged. Heck, there were even a few performances I enjoyed though Sir Sean was not among them.

The storyline has a group of fictional characters culled from the literature of the time being forced to work together to combat a foe known only as The Phantom. It seems this mystery man who hides behind a metal mask is stirring up trouble in 1899 Europe trying to provoke a global war. A mysterious British operative recruits these select few and calls them the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Some truly are extraordinary while others have a few secrets they'd prefer to keep hidden.

Naturally, their choice of leader is none other than Alan Quartermain (Connery). The sound of crickets chirping means no one else out there knows who that is, which says plenty about the state of literate history in our society. It hardly matters because Connery plays him exactly the way he plays all of his characters for the past 15 years. I recently found out that Connery was the first choice to play Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings trilogy which would have been an absolute disaster. Ian McKellen nailed the nuances of that character whereas Connery would use the exact same mannerisms he does in every film including this one.

On the flip side, Peta Wilson and Stuart Townsend (of all people) nail their roles to the floor and absolutely own them. Wilson plays Mina Harker (of "Dracula" fame) while Townsend plays Dorian Gray (of the Oscar Wilde novel). I've never watched Wilson's Le Femme Nikita but if she was half the animal she is in this film then I can understand the following she's developed. Mina is a dignified Victorian woman with a demon lurking just under the skin that she can barely control. I'm sure Moore milked that metaphor for all it was worth in the graphic novel, but here the film makers went for the violence rather than the social commentary whenever Mina lets her inner side out for a spin. Townsend, meanwhile, is hilarious as the upper crust Dorian who has no trouble throwing out pithy comments while slicing and dicing his foes.

Shane West pops in as American secret agent Tom Sawyer, an obvious addition per the studio, and whlie he fares well as a surrogate son for Quartermain he remains little more than a standard boring action hero. Everyone else has layers of character to draw from, but Sawyer seems to be handy with a rifle and that's about it. Another thinly drawn character was Captain Nemo but at least he had the Nautilus which is easily the coolest, and largest, submarine ever devised. Watching this beast slice through the ocean with ease was beautiful.

While this certainly is the furthest thing from lasting entertainment, it's at least a slick looking actioner. Even the many throw away lines that reference other material (looking at you first mate of Captain Nemo) are kind of fun if you just run with it and don't take them as insults to your intelligence. And did I mention that Peta Wilson is scorching hot as a barely-restrained animal wrapped in a Victorian bodice?

Now Playing: Where Eagles Dare

There's something about WWII movies from the late 1960s and early to mid 1970s that just click for me in ways that the glut of WWII-based video games never do. For every Call of Duty I can point to The Guns of Navarone, The Great Escape, Patton, and so forth. Up until recently the most I'd ever seen of Where Eagles Dare was the last five minutes. For whatever reason, whenever I would catch the film playing it was always during that scene. Courtesy of Netflix I finally managed to check out the whole film and it was terrific. I had a few problems with it to be sure, but overall it was one heck of a fun movie.

Set in the winter of 1943, Where Eagles Dare follows a determined British commando team led by Richard Burton himself who, along with a token American Ranger played by Clint Eastwood, have to break into an impregnable fortress in Bavaria to rescue an American general who is one of the main planners of Operation Overlord, also known as the invasion of Europe. If the Germans are able to break the general and find out what he knows then it could be disasterous for the Allies. But when the team first lands in the Bavarian countryside, they quickly figure out that there is a traitor in their midst who will do whatever it takes to kill them all.

In terms of plot, you don't get better than this and with good reason. The screenplay was churned out by none other than Alistair MacLean who also wrote The Guns of Navarone. It shows because the film feels more like a novel than anything else. There is a lot of setup along the way for a fairly weak pay-off, but if nothing else it entertains along the way. I found it fascinating watching all the little details slipped into the film culminating in a riveting roundtable with everyone held at gunpoint by Burton as he lays out the master plan. What makes this scene even greater is that even the viewer isn't sure whether Burton is telling the truth let alone what he hopes to gain by it.

Eastwood displays plenty of the youthful charisma that makes his early films so much fun, but he's not given much to do other than stand around and grimace. While some might argue that's all he did in his early career, he does score a few times here despite this obviously being Burton's show. Eastwood's physical capabilities loom large over Burton's and this is all the more evident during the fight on top of the ski lift car. Burton fights with a couple of bad guys as the lift descends and it's just hilariously staged. Were Eastwood the one doing the fighting then the dynamic would have been completely different and, I think, the better for it. But Eastwood eventually went on to Dirty Harry while Burton went on to Exorcist II: The Heretic so I'm satisfied justice was eventually served.

But overall the film is a lot of fun despite its rather lengthy run time and a final twist you'll see coming right from the start.