The Shield teaser song

The song in The Shield's season 6 teaser is "This Night" by Black Lab from their album "Passion Leaves a Trace." A friend of mine had me track this down, so I figure I'd share the info with you all in case anyone else was looking for this song. Good song. Available on iTunes.

UPDATE: Link directly to the song on iTunes.

The Tale of Buddy Israel

I don't have too much to say about Smokin' Aces. I saw it yesterday and thought it was just ok, which is disappointing because I could not wait to see this movie.

The action is entertaining, but ultra-violent. The actors all do a good job, but none so much as freakin' Jason Bateman as the strung-out lawyer. He's only onscreen for about 5 minutes, but he steals the show anyway. That man needs to be in everything! Why did FOX have to cancel Arrested Development? But I digress.

The main problem with Aces is that it doesn't have too much of a story to it. MINOR SPOILER (kind of): there's a twist at the end, and people... I guessed what it was 20 minutes into the movie, and I'm not the brightest cat on the block when it comes to these things. The whole thing was sooooo transparent. To be perfectly honest, I didn't guess one small detail of the twist, but it was inconsequential to the overall story. It's a whole lot of headache for nothing. And Ryan Reynolds' meltdown at the end doesn't mean much to the audience, even if it was well executed by Reynolds.

Smokin' Aces is a movie made from excess. If you can get through the first 5 minutes of the movie without having to shake your head to clear it from overstimulation, then you'll like this movie a whole lot more than I did.

Best comics of 2006

A short best-of list:

Best single issue: Superman/Batman #26 by The 26. This is the issue where 26 industry heavyweights got together to finish a book written by young Sam Loeb who passed away before seeing it realized. Read more here. Runner-up: Mouse Guard #1 by David Petersen.

Best mini-series: Mouse Guard by David Petersen. I know the last issue didn't come out till 2007, but still. This little indy comic has become a sensation for it's great art and compelling storyline. Good for all ages if you ask me. The last issue just came out, and the first issues are being reprinted heavily. A hardcover collection of the mini will be out in April 2007, and then the next Mouse Guard mini begins in June (I think). Read more here. Runner-up: The Escapists by Brian K. Vaughan.

Best graphic novel: Pride of Baghdad by Brian K. Vaughan. Based on a true story, this original graphic novel tells the tale of a pride of lions that escape the Baghdad zoo during the bombings. Their journey through Baghdad is a perfect allegory for the current war in Iraq. Poignant, unrelenting, and heart-breaking.

Best thing I read in TPB: Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Vol. 2 by Ed Brubaker. Bucky is back from the dead. Whether or not you're happy about this, the Winter Solider story-arc comes to a heavy conclusion as Cap deals with reliving the loss of his protege and the return of his friend. This TPB would make an exceptional script for the next Captain America movie. Runner-up: DMZ: On the Ground by Brian Wood.

Most shocking series: The Walking Dead by Robert Kirkman. The quintessential zombie story is still trucking along. The places that Kirkman takes you and the things that happen will leave you feeling gross, all the while eager to find out what happens next. Great storytelling. Runner-up: Marvel Zombies by Robert Kirkman (go figure).

Best ongoing series: Daredevil by Ed Brubaker. Pick up the TPB of his first arc, "The Devil is Cell Block D," dealing with Matt Murdock being in prison alongside several villains that he put there. And there's a Daredevil imposter in Hell's Kitchen. The conclusion of the arc will leave you wanting more, I guarantee. I've never really read Daredevil before, but now I can't put it down. Runner-up: Astonishing X-Men by Joss Whedon.

Best writers: tie between Ed Brubaker (Daredevil, Captain America) and Joss Whedon (Astonishing X-Men).

Best artists: tie between John Cassaday (Astonishing X-Men) and Michael Lark (Daredevil).

UPDATE: I completely forgot about the single most disturbing comic of 2006. See, the most shocking comic was normal to begin with and then went in directions I couldn't image. My pick for "most disturbing" started off in the sewer (figuratively) and stayed there. I am, of course, talking about Fell by Warren Ellis. This $1.99 per 16-page issue is crime fiction at its best, depicting the very worst of humanity. And I mean the real dregs. Detective Richard Fell stumbles onto cases that are so incredibly foul that I feel sick after each and every issue. And I can't wait for the next one (there have only been 6 so far).

Against my better judgment...

...I still watch Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because I hope it'll get better, but it hasn't. In fact, after the holiday break it may have even gotten worse.

The main criticism of this show that I've been reading around the 'net is that it isn't funny at all. And for a show about the behind-the-scenes of a late-night SNL-type sketch comedy show, it really should be. What you get though is more The West Wing than Sports Night (which is so incredibly good that you should stop reading and go get the DVDs right now).

Week after week, I'm disappointed with the story. The main plotline in the most recent episode was how one person is in love with another co-worker. This is not a unique story and quite frankly has been done in every other show EVER! Another plotline dealt with the 2 African-American cast members arguing over a semi-race issue that is trite and beneath any intelligent show. God forbid that Studio 60 put their minority cast members in regular, non-race-related situations. That was the case at the beginning of the season, but not anymore it seems.

Lastly, it's really sad when the most compelling storyline in recent Studio 60 (actual show) episodes has nothing to do at all with Studio 60 (show within the show) itself, but rather deals with the Head of All (played by Steven Weber) and the Super Head of All (Ed Asner in a slightly Denny Crane-esque role) and his fight against the FCC over censorship of the news. OF THE NEWS!! How does this relate back to the sketch comedy show? The deus-ex-machina's daughter is a big fan of the show. I'm not kidding.

Overall, the censorship issue and the way it's dealt with on the show is really intriguing and facinating and engaging and makes up only about 15 minutes of th hour-long primetime drama about comedy.

I can't believe I still watch this show.

"Sparta will burn to the ground"

I've gone back and forth on whether or not I'm excited to see the movie 300 from director Zack Snyder based on the comics mini-series by the legendary Frank Miller. I'm back on the bandwagon saying that 300 will probably be pretty good.

I thought Sin City, again based on Frank Miller's comics, was good. A little long and meandering, but all in all it was entertaining and well-made. However, I was not exactly enthused when I saw that 300 would, like Sin City, be shot completely against a green/blue-screen and then the backgrounds composited in (or at least, it seems that way). It just looks fake (which it is) and it takes me out of the movie. The only reason I accepted it during Sin City was because I'd read some of the Sin City comics and realized that the movie was a shot-for-shot recreation and stylistically it made sense. But when used in a Greek period action movie... I don't know.

I recently came around just because I think the action sequences themselves will look good, and I think the guy yelling in all the trailers will make a good movie hero. And the general story is amazing. So we'll see.

If you haven't seen the various trailers for 300, go here now.

New movie from Danny Boyle

I went and saw Smokin' Aces today (more on that in a later post). One of the previews beforehand was for Danny Boyle's new movie, Sunshine. If you're not familiar with Danny Boyle, or his name just doesn't ring a bell, he's the director of Trainspotting and 28 Days Later among others. I LOVE both of those movies even though the former contains a scene that made me gag the first time I saw it. The latter is not only one of the best and most frightening zombie movies ever made, but it was also shot on prosumer Canon DV cameras which makes it all the more impressive if you ask me. All that said, the trailer for Sunshine is excellent and I can't wait to see the movie:

The Office: a crime drama

This is pretty funny. Someone cut a fake trailer for "The Office" as if it were a thriller:

Scrubs: The Musical

I gotta say... Scrubs is one of my all-time favorite shows and one of the best comedies on TV, but this season has left me a little wanting. The musical episode that aired this week was no exception. I thought it was just plain dumb. The only good part was the last song and even then, after 20mins of mediocre not-very-funny tunes, it was hardly enough to win me over.

And it's not because I don't like musicals; I do. And it's not because I don't like special musical episodes of shows either. The musical episode of Buffy The Vampire Slayer was great! One of the best episodes of the whole series, and probably the best post-season 3 episode (I thought the show went through a very very very slow decline after they graduated high-school, although Seasons 4-7 are still superior to most shows on TV and are highly entertaining). Here's the first song from the Buffy musical episode which was written and directed by the man himself, Joss Whedon:

Watch Picasso paint

Very cool stuff here. This is a time-lapse of Picasso painting from 1955:

via BoingBoing

You know you want one

Apple unveiled the iPhone last week. I thought I'd mention that in case you were on some other planet for the past 6 days. Yeah, I want one. I think it's the coolest thing... which may change when I actually get my hands on one to demo.

Check out Colbert's hilarious rant on Apple and the iPhone:



via Moconews which also has the SNL, Conan, and Craig Ferguson takes on the iPhone embedded.

Sadly, I own the X-Men comic on your right

I'm referring of course to the scene in Weird Al's "White and Nerdy" video when he's holding up a bunch of X-Men comics. My first thought was, "this video/song is hilarious!" (yes, I think in slash/words too). My second thought was, "that's Uncanny X-Men #268 on the left." I'm a dork. What do you want from me? Hey, in defense of my geekiness, the comic is worth around $20 now, which is a hell of an improvement over the $2 I bought it for way back when.

If you haven't seen the video yet, it's great. I hear that this song is Weird Al's first Top 10 hit. In case you're wondering, this song is a spoof of Chamillionaire's song "Ridin'". Weird Al's is better.

Donny Osmond is by far the best part of the video, though. BY FAR! (never thought I'd say that)

Beckham and MLS

I've never really talked about how much I like soccer. I'm not fanatical and I don't have a favorite team, but I try not to miss the major matches of the World Cup from Round 1 on up. I'm enthralled by a good World Cup match. I also enjoy watching European League soccer, English Club Soccer, Euro Cup, etc. The only soccer I don't really like watching is MLS. I can't stand it and I'm not sure why. It just seems substandard compared to the rest. Maybe it's because there aren't any truly great players in MLS.

Well that's changing. David Beckham is leaving Real Madrid and joining the LA Galaxy (link to story on SI. com). Since I live in LA, I'm so gonna try to get tickets to a game 'cause I can't wait to go see Beckham play live, but this will not change my opinion of MLS, at least not in the short term. Beckham is one of the best in the world, and he's coming to the MLS? It won't be until Zidane, Ronaldo, Henri, and other great players come to the MLS as well that it'll become worth watching. Until then, they're just exhibition games. The rest of the MLS, even the rest of the LA Galaxy, is way out of their league.

Then again, maybe I'm being too harsh on the MLS...

Comics without pictures

Here's an interesting thing I read on Marvel Comics Executive Editor Tom Brevoort's blog: in his latest post, he discusses a class he was in where "it was postulated that, if you removed the words from a comic book page and just left the images, what you'd have would still be comics, but if you removed the pictures but left the words, you wouldn't." Brevoort decided to try to debunk the theory by drawing a 6-panel comic without any images, and just words. You can see the result on his original post linked somewhere above.

My 2 cents on this is almost exactly what a commentor on the post said. Word balloons are pictures too. And there are panels! If you ask me, the panels are part of the overall image. I guess it all depends on the definitions of pictures and words. After all, aren't letters themselves pitcures? And aren't words just disguised examples of sequential art? (I think I may be spouting portions of Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics now).

Anyway, I don't want to harp on this because Brevoort himself said that this was merely "an interesting exercise" which it certainly is. More power to him for taking the time to try and prove them all wrong.

Futurama: Super Happy Fun Show

Check out this fan art that is posted on deviantART by someone calling themselves Space Coyote (link to his/her profile on deviantART). deviantART is the site that boasts it's the largest art community in the world. I don't doubt it... freakin' site is huge and very cool! Anyway, check out Space Coyote's anime take on the gang from Futurama:


The piece is called "Futurama: Super Happy Fun Show." Link to the original page on deviantART which links to a larger version for download.

Space Coyote has also done an anime version of The Simpsons cast of characters called "The Simpsonzu." It's cool and it's getting tons of links around the 'net, but I like the Futurama one better. Hope I didn't offend!

If I ever needed pre-existing characters reimagined in an anime world, I'd so hire this cat. That's just really great work.

The Queen

I saw The Queen over the weekend. Yeah, yeah, I know. Not my usual fare. Suck it up. I like these kinds of movies too...

It's also awards season, so every ad for this movie is talking about how incredible Helen Mirren is as Queen Elizabeth II. I tend to never agree with the ads because I find that most of them are just paid Variety ads from the studio.

Well, this is not one of those cases. Helen Mirren is perfect as The Queen. She really is. Michael Sheen is also incredible as Prime Minister Tony Blair. In fact, there are few people in this film that don't shine in their roles; James Cromwell as Prince Philip and whoever played the Queen Mum also come to mind.

I've heard people say that the movie is slow. I guess. I didn't think so, but I can certainly see how you could get that. However, I was enthralled by the actors and the script was really cohesive and well-paced. Aside from Mirren, the most remarkable part of the movie is that Queen Elizabeth II comes off as sympathetic and extremely likeable. It's not that I don't think she is in real life, but rather that the writers did a good job conveying those sentiments in a character who is most well-known as a person of wealth and royal priviledge.

I highly recommend this to any fan of good acting and writing. Just remember, it's a character piece. And if Helen Mirren doesn't win the Oscar for her performance, I will lose all faith in the movie industry.

UPDATE: I had no idea that Michael Sheen (Tony Blair) played Lucian in the Underworld movies. I didn't even think he looked that familiar, and I LOVE the first Underworld.

The movie that made $30

Apparently there was a movie called Zyzzyx Rd., starring Katharine Heigl and Tom Sizemore, that only released in one theater in Dallas for just 6 days in 2006. It made a total of $30 in it's theatrical release... $20 of that was during the first 3 days. You can read more about this sad sad story over at CHUD.

Just because I feel like it, I'd like to point out that Zyzzyx Road is a real road with it's own exit on the I-15 between Los Angeles and Las Vegas. It's still a stupid name for a movie, let alone a street. Even worse is the word itself... according to Wikipedia, the zyzzyx is a species of wasp that was named after the sound it makes! Obviously named by the most uncreative scientists on the planet.

What was that song?

Have you seen the trailer for Smokin' Aces? It's the new film from Joe Carnahan, the writer-director of Narc, a movie that I really like and was highly impressed with. So, the fact that I like the director and that his new flick has an awesome all-star cast including the underrated Jason Bateman... that just means I'll be there opening weekend.

After seeing the trailer a few times, I found that I really dig the song that's being played in the latter half. Now this has been a major problem for me in the past, ie. it's really difficult to find out what the music used in a trailer is... at least for me. Well, it was off to google for me where I found the soundtrack.net trailers page. It's an excellent resource and had the answer I was looking for. If anyone's interested, the song is "Get Back [Sum 41 remix]" by Ludacris featuring Sum 41, and is available on iTunes.

And because I'm thorough (or at least I try to be), here's the Smokin' Aces trailer I was talking about. The Ludacris song starts around 1:17 or so.

Happy New Year! (and Season Pass woes)

2007 is going to be my year! Just a prediction, but I can feel it. Happy New Year everyone!

Moving on... NBC has decided to mess with my Tivo season pass list. We're more than 3 months into the new seasons and I thought I had it all worked out. You see, my biggest problem has always been Wednesdays, especially at 8pm. I started watching Jericho, but when started, I gave up on the CBS drama in favor of the hilarious 30 Rock. All the while, I've also had a season pass for Bones which I thoroughly enjoy but am not terrible heartbroken if I miss an episode. So the pass is there, but just further down the list. But then a good thing happened... 30 Rock moved to Thursdays as part of the all-new must-see TV. That left only Bones in my Wednesday at 8pm slot. The kinks were finally worked out and my Tivo was running smoothly.

Not anymore. NBC has moved their incredible new drama Friday Night Lights to Wednesdays at 8pm. We all know how much I like this show, so it obviously takes precedence over Bones, no question. I'm just annoyed is all. Looks like I'm going to be missing Bones on a regular basis again. Thanks NBC!