George Lucas is a Scumbag

First, a Star Wars/movie question:

If someone has not seen any of the Star Wars movies, is it better to watch them in episodic order (i.e. Episode I - VI), or in order of theatrical release (the original trilogy first, then the prequels)? I'm sure that it is impossible to have "spoilers" for the later films, as most of the major plot points everyone knows, but which order do people think is better?

Second, George Lucas is an ass-hole. I watched Garden State this weekend (how I dated Candace for 4 years and never watched this is beyond me, but I digress), and dammit Natalie Portman is a good actress in it! It took me a while to realize this because for the first half of the movie all I could think of is thats scene is Episode III where she's bitching to Anakin about holding her. *shudder* Once I came to my realization, I was irritated at Lucas for being such a horrible director, and screwing up which should have been good movies. Damn you Lucas.

Now, following is a discussion on the current Star Wars novels, and will contain spoilers to things which have occurred post Return of the Jedi. Be warned.
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Yeah, the dots mean spoilers, read on only if you don't care.
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Ok. I recently finished the book Betrayl, which is Book 1 of the new "Legacy of the Force" series.

So, if you remember, Anakin became Darth Vader mainly out of a desire to save his wife, Padme. He had visions of her dying, and Palpatine/Sidious promised that the Dark Side had the power to save her; thus, in a Faustian manner, Skywalker sold his soul. This, to me, epitomized the old Jedi rule that Jedi's were not supposed to have attachments, as they often led to problems. So far, so good right?

So, following ROTJ, Luke Skywalker sets out to re-establish the Jedi order, training young Jedi and so forth. Now, I read one of the most recent books, taking place some 40 years after the fall of the Empire, so imagine my shock to learn that not only is Luke Skywalker a Jedi, and not only is his sister, Princess Leia a jedi, but both of their kids' are Jedi as well!!! And both of them are married; Luke to another freakin' Jedi!! To me, this makes no sense, and goes contrary to the way that I would think that the Jedi Order should be run. And this particular book proves my objections: Han Solo and the Galactic Alliance, whom the Jedi's work for/with, are on opposing sides of a political dispute. Leia (a Jedi, remember) goes out of her way to lie and decieve the GA in order to protect her husband. The fact that a wife wants to protect her husband is no shock to anyone in love, but, as Leia's own father proved, is potentially disastrous to a Jedi. What else will she to protect Han? Steal? Kill? To me, this seems to be the path to the Dark Side. The only one who stays true to the Jedi form, despite his attachments, was Luke, who did not interfere or try to pursuade another Jedi's decision to take Luke's son, Ben Skywalker, on a dangerous mission. Luke recognized that Ben's instructor was best suited to make the decision on weather he was ready to go, not the boy's father.

Sadly, this isn't the only problem I have with the mythos's changing opinions. The end of the book spends quite a bit of time painting moral equivalence between the Light and Dark sides of the Force, arguing that the "dark side" wasn't inherently evil, but rather, was used by evil people. The dark force user who was making these arguments was trying to seduce a young Jedi, Jacen Solo (yeah, Han and Leia's kid, raise your hand if you didn't see that one coming) into being the newest Sith Lord. Crouched in terms remarkably similar to Palpatine's to Anakin Skywalker, this woman talked about how the Dark Side could bring peace and justice, if only the evil Jedi Knights didn't supress it.

Now, another Jedi was with Jacen, and she wanted to arrest the dark force-user (as she was a confessed criminal), but Jacen stopped her - for the greater good. He saw a future of death and destruction if the dark person was arrested, so he killed another Jedi. This immediately calls to mind Anakin's killing of Samuel L. Jackson, err... Mace Windu, and annoys me because you would think that Luke and Leia Skywalker, of all people, would teach their kids the follies of believing the tempation of the power of the Dark Side. Alternatively, the Star Wars franchise wants to make the argument that the Dark Side isn't evil, in which case I'm just annoyed that they are doing so.

So now I'm trying to go back and read earlier books, to see why Luke made the choices he made in organizing the Jedi in this manner, and trying to read the newer books, to see if the moral equivalence continues. In both ways, I'm hoping that the new Star Wars books don't continue to irritate me.

Gah!

Work sometimes takes so much out of me, I get home and have zero motivation to do much other than sleep. But, alas, there is much to discuss, and, if my brother updated, I had better too.

A quartet of states have been added to my list of "Been there, even if only in passing." Maryland, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Connecticut. Now, I can here The Reva thinking: "Wait, Maryland is near me in DC, why didn't I get a phone call?" Relax, I was in MD for about two hours total, an hour layover waiting for a flight to NH, and one coming home.

So yeah, last weekend I did an overnight job in Connecticut, which is a long flight and drive for me. But I thought about some interesting things, mostly Star Wars related (I'll get to those in a different post, no need to nerd-out here). Brandy's birthday is coming up, and I'm excited about at least some of the gifts I've bought her. Of course, I am half-wondering if my excitement means it would be a great gift for me, not so much for her...

Sometime within the next two weeks (hopefully) I am going to have an important post up: important as in "My life is changing dramatically" type post. Stay focused. In the meantime keep counting down the days until July 4, when Greatness Arrives.

Stupidity at its Finest

eHarmony is being sued because they aren't a gay dating service. From a Rueters article:

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The popular online dating service eHarmony was sued
on Thursday for refusing to offer its services to gays, lesbians and
bisexuals.
A lawsuit alleging discrimination based on sexual orientation was
filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on behalf of Linda Carlson, who was denied
access to eHarmony because she is gay.

*Sigh*

The stupidity of this lawsuit irritates me greatly, but not as much as the fact that they will probably win the lawsuit. I kinda hope that the person suing (a lesbian from San Francisco, no surprise there) is doing so because she wants to make the quick buck, not because she actually believes that all dating services must offer every kind of combination.

More Mini-Reviews

Let's get this out of the way first: I was tired, sore and half-asleep, but yes, I watched an episode of the Bachelor. I was quite irritated at it, to be honest. Watching the season finale I had two choices of women to support: On the one hand, there was the social worker from San Francisco (read: hippie); on the other hand was a medical researcher from Palo Alto. My only thought was: "I have to choose between supporting a hippie from SF or a freakin' Stanfurd girl? WTF?" It was worse than the NBA playoffs (I'm rooting for Detroit?? WTF?)! I tried to mock the show at every opportunity, but I still feel dirty for having watched it.

I also saw Hitch. Now I wanted to see this movie in theaters because I really like Kevin James, and I kinda-sorta like Will Smith. Having now seen it, I'm glad I didn't see it in theaters. Don't get me wrong, it was a decent movie, and I generally liked it, but I'm not sure I liked it enough to have spent nine bucks on it. It was cute though. In a girly-chick-flick type way.

Less girly was Hard Candy, a pshychological thriller featuring the chick who played Kitty Pryde in X-Men 3. I'll never look at her the same; that is a seriously messed up movie. I didn't like it for a variety of reasons, none of them revolving around the quality of the movie. It's worth a look if you are interested in the genre. I'll have more to say on it later, the issues it brings up warrant a full post (though I wonder if I'll actually get around to posting about it, given my track record on these things).

I also saw Shrek the Third; it was... meh. I enjoyed it, but nowhere near as much as the first two. I don't think I would've seen it had Antonio Banderas not been in the movie; he's too much of a badass to not make a movie better. The D&D reference was at once funny and mildly insulting. Thanks for reinforcing a stereotype guys!

I haven't yet seen Pirates, which of course means I haven't played the Wii game of it, lest I get spoilers. But I'm told it's good!

I'm also proud to say that I've made Brandy watch Team America: World Police. Whereas in the beginning of the movie she wasn't thrilled with the theme song, by the end, when I said "America," she vigorously responded. My work then is done.

Well that's it for now; a Happy Birthday to me, I'll be back with all of you before the week is out hopefully.

Updates are A-Comin'

Yeah, yeah, I'll give some more... serious updating soon. On what? Well, Brandy has helped me suffer through a variety of movies and television shows, so I have to share with you all my opinions of Hitch, Hard Candy, and the season finale of the Bachelor. --Oh, God, did I just type that I need to blog about THE BACHELOR??? Sweet Christmas, what have I become? -- But this weekend involves playing WiiPirates - err... The Pirates of the Carribean Wii game - and my birthday! :) So I'll update everyone on those things soon. See, unlike some people, I don't like giving one sentence responses on movies that I watch. Let's see, if this were a television commercial, here's where I leave a cliffhanger that could CHANGE EVERYTHING, so here it is: major changes are a-comin' in the next month or so. I hope to have more info within a week or two, so, you know, keep watching.

And now the best part of my day thus far: I received an email this morning (spam!) dated January 24.
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2038.

Goodnight folks.

Sweet Christmas

Sweet Independence Day is more like it.

It took four tries, but finally, finally, there's a good Transformers trailer. And it's a doozy.

One fan's take:

Is it wrong to cry with excitement over a film based on toys? Oh, we know
it's not going to win any Oscars (well, except effects ones - look how shiny and
photo-real!) and, if you think about it, the plot is as daft as a box of drunk
badgers. But the robots! The big fighty robots! With the smashing! And the being
one thing, then another! One, like, really big thing, then another really big
thing – with guns!

WiiView

God, that's a bad pun, even for me.

I'm sure you will all be pleased to know that I/we finally got through the damn fishing experience in Zelda. And, after two hours of gameplay, finally got a damn sword. Just a wooden one, mind you. So now what are my opinions? I'm not a big fan of the sword slicing technique. You have to swing the Wii-Remote, which is ok, I think I'm just used to having a button to smash, but you put your sword away really quickly. Also, I'm having a bit of trouble adjusting to the camera movement. The Remote/Nunchuk vs. normal controller is difficult mostly because it's different. If in most video games the controller (metaphorically) requires you to pat your head and rub your stomach, this set up requires you pat your elbow while rubbing your knee. I can do it, but it takes me a little while to figure out the best way how. Next week I actually get to go out into the world and meet the Princess; how exciting.

Wii Sports is definitely growing on me. I kinda really like the boxing one; it certainly can easily build up a sweat. Although that shouldn't surprise me, considering the Wii Fitness program says I'm an age of 53. And still I'm carded at bars! I guess I'm gonna have to work on that one...

I also played Paper Super Mario. On the plus side; they attempted to add a plot. On the down side; they attempted to add a plot. What's the plot you ask? Well, basically take Kingdom Hearts, delete any cool Square-Enix characters, replace Donald and Goofy with Mario and a freakin' butterfly polygon and there you have it. Someone other than Bowser has kidnapped the Princess, and now you have to stop him from using The Void from destroying all the worlds!! I would prefer to stick with Sora, thanks, although I can imagine some women-folk finding the game cute and funny. I wonder if it was imported from the DS... The only really interesting part of the game is the "dimensional switch" where you can change from a side-scrolling, 2-D map to a 3-D one for a short time. This reveals special pathways and secrets. I think it is really neat, to be honest.

Oh, and the villain's name is Count Bleck, and he refers to himself in the third person constantly. It's fantastic.

A Blending of Nerdiness

So apparently, National Review Online is having s "Star Trek Day." It seems they will be having Stark Trek-themed conservative gear such as T-shirts which say: "Live Long and Cut Taxes." This almost freaks out even me. Nonetheless, I know I'll be buying at least one of these shirts for Phil, does anyone else want one?

UPDATE: Here are some of the other possibilities. Me, I'm for the Four Lights one.

Goin' Mapping

Behold! A map of the Internet!

I've always enjoyed mapping, from my Boy Scouting youth to my geological mapping college days to even now mapping subsurface utilities, something about mapping is really satisfying to me. Of course, this particular map also has the joy of looking like a Dungeons & Dragons or Final Fantasy map, so maybe that's why I enjoy it so much. Meh. I think it's cool.


h/t Candace.

Reviews

Work once more has kept me away from my adoring reader(s?), but now I am back with some updates! Specifically, some reviews:

Nintendo Wii: Well, after spending 20 minutes playing a friend's, the new girlfriend Brandy went out and bought her very own Wii, along with a variety of games. Needless to say, I've spent some time playing it. And, well, my only reaction is: Meh. Where other consoles (*cough*PS3*cough) have spent an enormous amount of time and effort making graphics improvements, Nintendo seems to have focused on changing the way the games are played. And in that, they have been hugely sucsessful. The Wii remote - which senses your movements and follows it on the screen - is amazingly accurate and sensitive (sometimes too sensitive). And certainly, it's pretty neat to bowl or golf or whatever using the actual motions. But, once the initial coolness fades, you're left wondering "Is this it?" Currently, there are precious few games which could be graciously described as "good" on the system. Wii Sports is basically a tech demo that Nintendo decided to package with the game and has graphics that the N64 could beat; the only Mario game is freakin' Paper Super Mario? Come on. Even the new Zelda game (see below for more on that) has been released on the GameCube, so why bother buying a system for it? I can see the Wii putting out some really neat shooters, the Remote and Nunchuk thing (that's its name, seriously) seem well-suited for that, but where are they now? A new Metroid game in that fashion would've done wonders for the system! Instead, we're left with WiiPlay and Smooth Moves. So, in summary: A fun party system, with a neat, innovative style of gaming, that will make some really neat shooters eventually, but thus far I'll keep my PS2. Maybe the Pirates of the Carribbean game that's coming out this summer wil change my mind.

Legend of Zelda - Twilight Princess: Ah, the new Zelda game for the Wii. Let's start with sometihing positive: It's pretty. Not quite Final Fantasy XII pretty, but pretty in any case. Also, there's still no voice acting, which may or may not be a bad thing. And, unlike the last Zelda game I played, Ocarina of Time, you don't start out as a little kid, and the damnable fairy doesn't keep trying to tell you things. Other than that, it's a standard Zelda game of solving puzzles and collecting items to stop the bad guy. Well, I have to assume most of that last sentence, because I've spent the last half-hour playing trying to do one stupid task: Catch a damn fish! Apparently, the most frustrating part of the game comes right at the beginning, and it's a doozy. Now, I know that - in real life - people spend hours sipping beers and fishing. But, when I play a game, I dont' need that much reality involved. Catching a damn fish within the first hour of play shouldn't be this damn hard! But it seems that Link's a Druid in this game (sorry, D&D reference) since he can turn into a Wolf later on. If/When I get past the fishing, I'll update you all.

Runaways: A friend let me borrow the colleciton of comics titled Runaways. It's good. Really good. The story is: Six teenagers find out that their parents are part of a secret cabal of super-villains and so they run away from home, each gaining or learning about special powers of their own along the way. It also includes a genetically engineered dinosaur from the 87th century. Always helpful with a book. It's really well written and neatly drawn; I would encourage everyone to read it, as it's not your typical spandex-wearing superhero smackdowns.

Spider-Man 3: A great movie. I mean, a really great movie. A lot of stuff goes happens, as contrasted to, say, Superman Returns, where nothing happens. There are a few scenes that don't make sense, but overall, a very well done finale to the trilogy. And Kirsten Dunst is a bitch. Her MJ is going on my Emma Frost list (*sigh* more of my friends need to read comics). Anyway, go see it.