Jamba Juice secret menu

In case you didn't know, I thought I'd mention that Jamba Juice does in fact have a secret menu of drinks that are either back cataloged, or aren't something that a supposedly healthy energy druink provider could ever get away with selling. Seriously just go up and ask the counter person for any of these drinks and they will provide it no problem.

Some of the secret flavors include:
Pinkstar (strawberry starburst flavored)
Strawberry Shortcake
White Gummi Bear
PB + J
Fruity Pebbles
Push-up Pops
Skittles

I'm having a pinkstar right now, and it is absolutely delicious.

mmmmmm.....

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If only this was my workday...

Two New TV Shows

Well there is a bit of new tv out there these day, and really only more to come. Check out Metacritic's listing of when and where you can find all of the upcoming tv shows for the summer season. Personally the shows I'm most looking forward to are On The Lot, and Traveler. Oh, and I suppose the new season of Big Brother... (damn you angie). More on those shows in the coming weeks though. For now I thought I'd tell you about two new shows on the airwaves that I've recently caught.

The first is almost something I shouldn't bother with. Drive is the new big budget car racing 'cannonball run-esque' adventure FOX show. I'm sure you've heard of it by now. They definitely advertised it enough. Well, it's actually just been canceled so my review doesn't really amount to very much. But although it looked really I mean REALLY cheesy, it actually wasn't so bad. It starred your and my favorite hero of the 'verse Nathan Fillion, and a bunch of other people that we really didn't get much of a chance to know. But although a secret illegal cross country road race may sound like a corny 70s movie plot it actually somehow managed to be slightly engaging. Then again, maybe I'm just a sucker for a good car chase ;) If you want to check out Drive, at least for now you can still go and catch the first 4 episodes online over at FOX.com. The rumor has it that there are 2 more episodes that have yet to air and FOX might go ahead and throw them on the air sometime mid May. Oh well, once again opportunity lost. At least I didn't get attached.

The other show I've been watching is the Sci Fi original series (god that feel like a death toll in itself... ok expect for Battlestar Galactica), sorry, the sci-fi original series Painkiller Jane (wiki). This show stars the absolutely gorgeous Kristanna Loken of Terminator 3, L Word, and (the utterly horrible) Bloodrayne fame. This show is perhaps the most heavy handed television series in existence. It is full of beautiful people reading crappy 'emotional' and 'heartfelt' dialogue, then posing to look meaningfully at one another. It shows they really care in the way that only truly exceptional 'smell the fart' acting can... The production value, and I hate to say this, but the production value is totally Vancouver. I used to work in the film industry in van, and trust me I can tell when something has a low budget but is pretending it has a high budget. We get lots of night scenes, rain all the time, shiny wet streets (cause it adds to the effect), way too slow quasi martial arts fight scenes, flawed logic left right and center, and a few slightly futuristic, and/or asian looking pieces of technology and people. Trust me people, I know this, I worked on some truly epic Vancouver shows like First Wave, and Dark Angel. I mean don't you think people would notice that everyone in this world dresses like a Matrix reject... It's ridiculous. And while it's still fun and campy for brief brief moments, this show is really junky. It takes itself too seriously. God just listen to the narration by Loken, its so full of itself I can barely handle it. You might want to check out this show just to see how bad it really is, but I can't imagine you'll enjoy it.

So there you go, two totally useless tv show reviews... ack, I need some better stuff to see :(

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Robot Chicken + Star Wars = funny

Today it was announced that the awesomely funny Adult Swim show Robot Chicken will be making a 30 minute Star Wars themed special for Comedy Central. The special will air on June 17th at 10pm, and I assume will be repeated a lot. This is a very good thing. I love Robot Chicken, I love Star Wars. so really everyone wins. But the really best part is that RC creator Seth Green and Matthew Senreich, have gotten the full partnership of Lucasfilm behind the production. Including having both George Lucas and Mark Hamill voice themselves respectively in the claymated spoof.

Robot Chicken has done spoofs of Star Wars in the past and apparently in particular the one called "Emperor's Phone Call" was so beloved by the Lucas guys that they approached Adult Swim for permission to put the clip on the offical Star Wars website. When Green and Senreich met with Lucasfilm about that, they apparently turned the meeting into a pitch session for the Star Wars special. And that great initiative seems to have payed off. I'm very stoked about this. Just watch the video and tell me you don't think it'll be a really funny show :)

ready to terrorize tokyo

I want this poster framed and on my wall...
this is the International movie poster. so cool.
click to embiggen.

Green Hulk for sure

Once again, a bit of a interweb kaffuffle. As numerous sites had reported the rumor that the Hulk might be going gray, I thought I'd post my thoughts on the subject. Well, apparently the speculation was wrong. The titular character of the new Incredible Hulk film, will definitely be green. just a different shade of green than his last incarnation in Ang Lee's Hulk. Apparently Avi Arad decided to screw around with a reporter and then the misunderstanding ended up getting turned into the story of the Hulk being gray. Ah well, even though I wasn't really down with the idea, at least it was fun to speculate on while it lasted...

Read more of the story at Empire Online.

Harry Potter: OOTP international trailer

Wow. Seriously after seeing the last (domestic) trailer for the new Harry Potter film I really wasn't that impressed, but this much longer international trailer is really great. I'm actually looking forward to this film now. Check it out.

Hulk going grey?

It looks like everyones favorite big, mean, and green hero, The Incredible Hulk may in fact not be so Green in the upcoming film, but Gray. Officially this is still just a rumor, but at a recent press conference promoting Spidey 3, uber-producer Avi Arad let slip that this will in fact be an all "new Hulk, new direction, new size, new color, new attitude." and not just that, he actually went on to say that this Hulk will be much more similar to the beloved television series from the late 70s, in that it will be a much more human story, a real love story... hmmm... Anyhow, when questioned about the possibility of a gray Hulk Arad fumbled with "uh, we'll see." Oh Avi, so excited he said something he wasn't supposed to. That's ok, it happens.

Personally I'm not sure this is a good move. I never really read much Hulk growing up, and while I'd like to catch up on it at some point, I haven't gotten around to it yet. That said as a pretty serious comic reader and former Marvel zombie, I have once or twice encountered the Gray version of the Hulkster. in fact the very first issue of Amazing Spider-Man I ever bought (#328) featured the gray guy himself. Granted the next time I saw The Hulk it was 8 months later in Web of Spider Man #69, and he was back to being green. So while I, a dedicated fanboy, was exposed to the gray Hulk a bit I still don't really understand why there has to be different colored versions of the Hulk. It always struck me as one of those silly plot devices, like how in Superman there are like 20 different kinds of kryptonite. And what does it say about the strength of a character if you have to reinvent him every few years in a new color or variation? Yes there were A LOT of different variations. According to the Wiki the Gray Hulk is weaker than the other versions of Hulk, and has some sort of odd werewolf-like qualities... yes, strange... You know it's not that I don't think people will be able to understand a gray Hulk, but I do think that most people coming to the movie are at a knowledge level less than me, in fact, they're probably coming at the movie only knowing the 70s tv show, and the Ang Lee movie. So is now really the time to jump right in and change things? Yes, I have faith that moviegoers can figure it out, but I just wonder if its really necessary. Wasn't the traditional green Hulk good enough? Especially since this is a 'reboot', I would like to see a Hulk film that works within the characters familiar traditions, and still delivers a kickass moviegoing experience.

My fingers are crossed LeTerrier. Just remember to pace yourself. The worst thing that could happen is if there is just too much story cramed into the film. We've already got a new villian (for most people) in Abomination, and now the gray Hulk sotryline too. I don't want to see another X-Men 3 where we're really watching 4 stories in a single film, and doing none of them justice. This could be really good, at least I hope so...

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Fish Lips

How wrong I was...

How wrong we all were. It's now being reported that in fact our old friend Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne) will NOT be voicing Galactus in the new Fantastic Four movie. He will actually be voicing the Silver Surfer.

Now, while I do really like Fishhead's voice I have to say I'm a little perturbed by this turn of events. I think Doug Jones is a good actor. He is the body behind the CG for the Surfer. He also was the man behind the body and voice of Abe Sapien in del Toro's Hellboy, and motion capture for the Faun in the mesmerizing Pan's Labyrinth. He is a solid actor who I think can put in a decent performance. Why exactly do we need his voice changed? Does he not inflect enough gravitas for the role? I think most people who know, see the Surfer as a thoughtful man, yes hes a man of action too, but he was always very deep in personal reflection and meditation. I don't know how much of that is coming through in this film, but I never really thought he needed the kind of deep, commanding voice Fishburne is sure to provide. He is a character whose deeds speak more towards his character than his voice... Maybe I just feel bad for Doug Jones though. Like the guy put in all this work, only to be screwed out of the vocal performance. It's like how everyone gives James Earl Jones all the credit for Darth Vader. Granted Vader's voice was a HUGE part of the character, but you shouldn't just discount the contributions of David Prowse. I don't like seeing actors gypped out of a spotlight like that.

Finally, I wonder about the CG work. The Weta guys are doing the Surfer using basically the same technology as they did for Gollum in the LOTR trilogy. I know that they did a lot of work in those films to make sure that Gollum's mouth moved in precisely the same way that Andy Serkis' did while filming. That was one of the subtle things that helped make Gollum so amazingly believable. So what exactly does this mean for the Silver Surfer? On the set when Doug Jones was filming did he actually speak the lines? Are we going to have unmatched dialogue? I can't imagine they'd do that. Maybe the Surfer doesn't move his lips when he speaks. I could see them doing something lame like that. But if that's the case, why does he even have a mouth. I don't know when this decision was made to put The Fishman in the film but do you think there's time to put his Fish lips onto the Surfer's body? Will that even work?

If the reports are true and the film is really as bad as it unfortunately sounds, then we might really only have the cool looking Silver Surfer to enjoy on screen. Let's keep our fingers crossed that this development doesn't screw that up for us too.

As a side note, the word is going around the net now that Galactus will look like a big scary cloud. This jives with what I had heard from my friend who worked on the film, and is exactly what I was suggesting the last time I blogged about this. Hopefully it'll work on screen, but I have my doubts...

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A Fishy Galactus?

Just a quick post today for you. Ain't it Cool News is reporting this as a reliable rumor based on a test screening from a few days ago is Seattle, but apparently the role (or voice at least) of Galactus has been cast in Fantastic Four 2: Rise of the Silver Surfer. And the dulcet tones of the giant planet eater belong to none other than Laurence Fishburne.

Reliable rumor as they say, but I can see it. While I stick by my original first choice of Peter Weller, I can totally understand why they would go with Fishburne.

Additionally, and disturbingly the brief AICN article also states that people at the screening were seriously disappointed in the film... god i hope that parts not true. I really want this to be good. At least good enough for us to get a Silver Surfer solo film.... Until we get closer to the June 15th release date, and hear a few more solid reports though, I'm going to keep hoping for the best.

That's all for now. Peace.

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Snow Patrol - Signal Fire vid

It's not that I'm a huge fan of Snow Patrol or anything, they generally strike me as a bit meh, but this video for their new song Signal Fire is just too adorable. It's obviously attached to Spider-Man 3, and I urge you to check it out.

Snow Patrol "Signal Fire"


Add to My Profile | More Videos

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Casting extravaganza

Two cool casting notes for you this morning.

Firstly, something that I'm going assume most of you already saw. at the end of last week it was FINALLY revealed that Shia LaBeouf has in fact been officially cast in Indiana Jones IV. This is despite the fact that everyone officially involved in the film (including Shia himself) was adamantly denying it until right before the announcement. While some in the media are speculating that LaBeouf will be playing Indy's son, alongside Cate Blanchett as Indy's love interest, with a project that is wrapped this highly in secrecy its hard to tell whats real and whats not. For what its worth Shia himself has suggested that he will be playing a sidekick role and protegee to Harrison Ford's Jones, going as far as to say that his role will definitely "not be Short Round all grown up". It's actually pretty interesting reading up on this guy. Since the press for Disturbia and Transformers has started circulating I've been seeing some really great and very candid interviews with Shia. I'd really encourage you to see what he's all about, 'cause its not at all what I expected. I can understand how Spielberg must have seen something he liked in him. Even though I haven't seen much of his work, he's a pretty likable actor and I'm looking forward to seeing him rock the bots later this summer. Check these interviews here, here and here for some insight from the man himself. And as for Indiana Jones IV, the final big casting question remains, will Sean Connery return? For my money I'll say yes, he probably will. You just know that they'll throw money at him to get his participation. Anyhow, lets just keep our eyes on places like TheRaider.net and wait to see what news will come.

The other excellent if surprising casting news from today concerned old big, green, and ugly The Incredible Hulk. Despite a very solid performance in my opinion by Eric Bana in the first Hulk film, with Marvel "rebooting" the series or whatever they want to call it you knew that they wouldn't go with the same thing as before. And its really truly official today, as Marvel announced that none other than Ed Norton will be starring as puny Dr. Bruce Banner. Is this a surprise? Yes definitely. But it's really a pleasant one once you think about it. Norton is a really solid actor, who I think we can all agree has the chops to take on pretty much any role he could care to try. So the fact that he's signed on as The Hulk encourages me to think that Marvel and director Louis LeTerrier, are really going to make a smart and great movie. I am not a original Hulk film hater, nor am I an apologist. But I do think, no matter how much I love the guy, Ang Lee was a poor choice of director for the first film. That's not to say that the man behind The Transporter films is necessarily a great choice either, but I have some faith that Marvel realizes the missteps they made last time. And casting Norton is a good step towards a great new film. I'm definitely looking forward to more on the Hulk front.

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Grindhouse review

This is a weird and wonderful film. Well two films really. And even though they're packaged together underthe very fun Grindhouse banner they really are very separate and as such would really get different ratings from me. Since it looks like the Weinsteins are breaking these two films up theatrically it also means you'll have a choice of which to see, but if you can get out there are catch them both as a double feature. As a package, it's well worth it.

Robert Rodriguez's film is first; Planet Terror. I absolutely LOVED this film. It was fun, and violent and sexy, and had zombies and action, and all sorts of sweet sweet gross out moments. This film kicked my ass, and left me wanting more. Schlock really never looked so good. The atmosphere is intense, and while the story of a chick with a gun for a leg fighting off a hoard of zombies with her ragtag band of heroes is so over the top cliched, it doesn't matter, because we get all those classic action beats we want, and still maintain a style that is uniquely modern and very cool. This is the perfect homage to a genre of films I love.

Tarantino's film Deathproof, while fun, ultimately fell pretty flat for me. Kurt Russell is mischievously wonderful as the villain who drives his car to the limit and beyond, and the women of the film do a solid job of conveying the action. But the film is FULL of 'Tarantino' dialogue, which while love it, was mostly out of place here. Also there were two almost totally separate stories in Deathproof, and I didn't feel like there was really any connection between the first and second acts. Maybe that comes down to a lack of motivation though. How any film with so much smart dialogue can skip out on any kind of real character development is beyond me. But, all that said, it still doesn't really ruin the fun of the film. It's just a bit boring sometimes, when a through line was perhaps all we needed. Still, there is some great action, and for a guy who isn't super into cars this film had some fantastic cars and really great stunt driving.

As a whole Grindhouse is a really fun time at the movies. I didn't even find the 3+ hour running time too bad. And the fake trailers they made to accompany the films are truly top notch. Hopefully people WILL get out and see this film, because I think once they do, they will enjoy themselves. And then maybe we'll can get some more great retro grindhouse pictures. Anyone else want to see Machete on the big screen?

So on their own Planet Terror would get a 4 1/2 out of 5 star rating, and Deathproof would get a 3 star rating from me. I think you should check em out and just enjoy the ride, on the whole I sure know I did.

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for more fun reviews, check out my Flixter page. Thanks :)

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R.I.P. Kurt Vonnegut

Sad news today. Kurt Vonnegut has died at age 84.

I really enjoyed the work of Vonnegut. I'm sure I've read at least 5 or 6 of his books. He had a style and a charm that was so endearing, he will really be missed. In high school I was first introduced to Vonnegut reading Slaughterhouse-Five. Which was unlike anything I'd ever read before. That was back in the formative grade 9, where I also first discovered George Orwell, William Golding, and Tom Robbins. Slaughterhouse-Five really stood out to me though as finally one of the first examinations of the 'human condition' that I could not only comprehend, but actually relate to. And its not that his subject matter was particularly relevant to my life, although I did love the time travel sci fi stuff, but Vonnegut had a way of revealing the often disturbing nature of his characters in ways that were so believable that the circumstance of the plot was secondary. Sometime after that I was exposed to the work of David Cronenberg, who in the same vein remains one of my favorite directors. But Vonneguts influence on me continued over the years.

I have always been a fan of serialized television. Short stories of the weird, or macabre. And while I leaned more towards The Outer Limits usually than Twilight Zone, I remember the first time I saw Vonnegut's short lived Welcome to the Monkey House tv series extremely well. It began with Vonnegut himself on screen introducing the story you were about to see. But while others had done this before, Hitchcock obviously but also Ray Bradbury, I really felt a connection with the man, Kurt Vonnegut. He reminded me of what I imagine Mark Twain was like, a while I know its probably somewhat inspired by most 'televised' iterations of Twain, I also felt like both of them had a kinship in the droll and mischievous.

If you haven't read any Vonnegut I would recommend you definitely check him out. Maybe start with the excellent Breakfast of Champions. Either that or Welcome to the Monkey House (which is a collection of short stories) to get a good overall flavor of the man. You really won't be dissapointed if you do.

As for me I would just like to say thank you Kurt for all the great stories.
You will be missed.

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Iron Man armor

This is the first pic of the armor we can expect to see in the Iron Man movie coming out next year. Not to worry kids, I'm sure old shellhead will get some more modern armor too, but this classic look is reported to be the Iron Man suit Mark 1. In other words its the first suit he builds in order to escape entrapment, from in the comics at least a P.O.W. camp. I think this looks really great. Click for a bigger view.

relax with Justin.tv

Ok, so I've now spent the past hour watching Justin.tv and I have to say I understand how you could get sucked into it. I mean sure, it's boring for the most part but somehow this real life Truman Show/Ed TV thing is also very comforting. As with much of my life, especially when I'm bored I turn to the always top notch pop culture reporting of Pop Candy. Today they hav show me the light that is Justin Kan, and his site www.Justin.tv . It's really something that we should've all been expecting. Justin, a 23 year old San Francisco based entrepreneur (not sure what that really means) and his friends have rigged a system where Justin wears a small camera and microphone around with him everywhere. Then he streams the signal directly onto his web site. What he sees you see. And he never takes the camera off. YES he films in the bathroom (camera pointed to the ceiling), and in bed (not sure how he does that one). Justin is like the ultimate Twitter kid, and even though all I've seen him do is cook up some burgers, and type on his Blackberry, it's still pretty entertaining somehow. It's almost comforting to just have him hanging out there, in the background...

Today Justin is being sponsored by the film Disturbia, which is basically a hipped up remake of Rear Window. So he's under 'house arrest', being encouraged to spy on his neighbors, and has hung posters for the film all over his apartment. Exactly, this is his job?! very odd...

Check out the stream...

rambles and lamentations

So whats the deal? I haven't posted anything since last Thursday!?
I know, I know...Long time no talk.
But there really hasn't been much going on. I'm finally getting better from being sick, but it's been a slow process. After a week of having my left ear all blocked up, with maybe only 50% hearing I finally went to the doctor on this past weekend. And you'll never guess what the doctor did, well probably not, I know I was surprised at least. He reaches into a drawer and pulls out a tuning fork. then he hits it BOING... and puts it right onto the center of my forehead! Seriously I was well on my way to thinking this doctor (not my regular one) was a quack, and then as soon as he touches it to my head my skull starts resonating the sound, and my ear, man my ear just started ringing like crazy, as if I was at a concert with my left ear pressed against the speaker for the whole night.
So anyhow, I have an inner ear thing. I don't know if its an infection or what, but basically it was all filled up with fluid. I got some meds now, and am slowly coming back from the void.
Erica and I have been busy doing wedding stuff too. Finally got the invitations sent off yesterday. Everything is progressing smoothly, but its really coming on fast too. I'm getting very excited though. I know it'll be a great party. Oh and we had house guests for the past week. Which while always nice, takes up a lot of time.
Man this is a BORING POST... I should just stop it now.
But can I? I mean theres so much more nothing I can share with you....
For example I wanted to lament the fact that I haven't posted any new movie or tv news lately. Well, guess what? There really hasn't been anything of much interest lately. Oh sure theres always some random little tidbit hitting the net. But nothing really exciting. Info on most of the big summer movies is already out, the tv season is entering its last quarter before the summer, and news is pretty slow there too.
There's no Heroes on, Black Donnelly's has been canceled. And the shows I'm watching aren't even really interesting me that much. 24?! seriously, I mean yes its ok, but it tends to border more and more on the unbelievable. Also, now that Jack's found the nukes and rescued the world again, are they really going to give us a whole secondary storyline? ugh. I don't know if I can handle that. Lost.... well Lost has some problems. I think it was a much more enjoyable show to watch when I was just catching up on dvd. Dirt is over for the season, and I have to say meh, it was just ok. Yes, Friday Night Lights is great as always, but the season ends I think this week. And then there's stuff like Grey's Anatomy, and The Riches, both of which are slowly getting more and more bland to me...
Maybe its just me. Maybe I should concentrate on the fun things going on. I've been playing some more Wii lately. Picked up Medal of Honor: Vanguard, and despite it being waaaay to easy, have been having some fun with that.
Also, I've started working on a video project that assuming I can actually get my head out of my ass and put together in time for the deadline, should be really fun. More on that in due time though...
Yesterday I spent some time surfing YouTube trying to drum up some interest in the world around me again and I stumbled across some videos I thought I'd share. They go well with this rambled disjointed style post. Oh and go play this game to waste some time: Famousr... Enjoy

a sickly bitchfest

So as some of you undoubtedly know for the past two weeks or so I've been kinda sick. I say kinda because I haven't been really sick, I mean I'm still at work but I have had a stuffed up head and its just not really very fun. Seriously this has been a totally annoying quasi-sick thing and I'm about at the end of my patience. Last Saturday I woke up thinking I had pinkeye. Seriously, pinkeye... totally gross. Then it went away the next day. Starting on Sunday though I have only had like 50% hearing in my left ear. It's just crazy, sigh... I mean, ok it's maybe not crazy; but it's really frickin annoying. I still can't hear right, but the rest of my head is totally clearing up. Really I feel much better overall. not even run down hardly at all. So why the hell can't my body just act normal... arrgh... It's very frustrating to be unable to hear properly. Also, I think I'm really starting to hit the wall of medication. Its been like a solid week and change that I've been self medicating, and I don't think I can take any more. I'm finishing off complete boxes of medicine... I never do that, and it's really not helping much at all. I just feel groggy all the time now.

Ugh, this sucks... oh and i know my sentence structure and punctuation are crap in this post. Just deal with it...

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waiting on Heroes

Two sweet new Heroes clips have shown up online today, and one of them is a doozy. If you want to see an awesome clip with a really great SPOILER in it check out this cool exclusive clip on MySpace. If you're not interested in spoiling the big surprise; all I'll say is that the scene involves Nathan and Mr. Linderman, and should be seen on the first episode after the hiatus ends. 'nuff said.

The second cool new clip can be found at http://www.itstimetosavetheworld.com which will take you to the NBC Heroes site, where you'll see a good clip of Thompson interrogating Mr Bennett, and Candace using her illusion powers. Once there you can also enter into a sweepstakes where you can win a trip to LA to visit the set of Heroes, as well as Universal Studios, and get see an advanced screening of the next chapter in the Heroes saga.

Heroes returns on April 23rd. Not soon enough if you ask me...

no more donnellys

So a bunch of the Networks decided to clean house yesterday. And for me at least, the most significant casualty is the new crime drama from Paul Haggis, The Black Donnelly's. Also chopped, the "God"-awful 7th Heaven (like that one you zealots? eat it sucka!), the re-tooled yet still boring Six Degrees, and the show I watched five minutes of and decided I'd rather be playing Wii, The Wedding Bells. These other shows I could really care less about, but losing the Donnelly's really annoys me. Its been a pretty complicated show I admit, but I felt like it was really building to something, and while admittedly it wasn't always great there were definitely moments of sheer Goodfellas-esque cool in every single episode. This was a show that was really doing something interesting and I'm very sorry to see it go. Also, especially because Olivia Wilde is amazingly hot and its a shame to see he leave my weekly airwaves :(

So what exactly is NBC thinking? I mean Black Donnelly's was basically taking the place of Studio 60. And we already knew that Studio 60 was coming back at some point, so was the future of the one show predicated on the demise of another? NBC should've just buckled up some balls and kept airing both. Not that I think Studio 60 has done anything to prove itself worthy, in fact, during its fall run it progressively let me down more and more each week, but Donnelly's was the kind of show that really could build a hardcore fan base. I just wish the studios would give decent shows a chance to grow. And I don't really have anything against Studio 60; I'd like to see it succeed. Its just that if it came down to a choice between the two shows I definitely would've gone with the one that looked to be building something really interesting, and challenging, as opposed to the disappointments everyone agreed Studio 60 delivered...

At least this past tv year brought us the excellent Heroes and Friday Night Lights. Two shows that have yet to disappoint and the studios have thankfully not screwed around with. Let's keep our fingers crossed that these shows at least can remain untarnished.

Flashback 04 - Mario

So I know I haven't written a Flashback piece in quite a while, but this past weekend I had time for a little nostalgia that I thought I'd share with you. I've been pretty sick with a lousy head cold for about a week now. Basically its put me right on the line of being able to go to work. Honestly if I knew that staying home for a day in bed would really help me get better I'd do it, but seeing as I've really been at pretty much the same level of sickness for days and days now I don't want to take the wrong day off. Its annoying, and pretty frustrating really. I'm too sick to handle going out for any extended period of time, or drinking, or going to the gym; but I'm not sick enough to stay home from work in bed, and sleep it off.

So this weekend I put myself on some heavy meds and tried to just chill out at home and get better. What that entailed mostly was sitting around and playing Super Mario World on the Wii's Virtual Console. Man, that is a fun fun game. How come all the best Mario games are 2D? These old games are just completely great. They have so much gameplay in them its just sad to compare them to some of the elaborate, yet less fun, games of today. While I really love Mario World it's not my favorite game in the series. Nope, that right is saved for one that I used to sit around in my basement playing for hours and hours on end with my buddy Bernard: Super Mario Bros 3. I know that there's got to be at least one or two of you out there who've had experiences like mine. Just hanging out with friends chilling, and doing some good gaming. For some people it was Zelda, or Street Fighter II, but for me, my greatest hardcore game will always be Super Mario Bros 3.

I played the first Super Mario Bros a little bit, but when that was really popular I didn't have a NES so I only played at friends houses. My parents never let me have a system and I only got a console when I stole it from my first girlfriend. Even then it was old though, i think the N64 was just about to come out when I finally scored an NES. Still I loved it. Sure, lots of old games are total crap, and many were way too hard requiring more memorization than actual skill. But some, like the Mario series still really hold their own to this day. And another chance to play these great old games is the real reason I bought a Wii. On Friday I also picked up the brand new Medal of Honor: Vanguard, and I honestly only played like half a level before I decided that I'd rather be playing Mario World. Just shows the power of those old games. Thank you Nintendo.

Anyhow, I know that wasn't much of a memory to share, but it makes me happy so live with it. I think I'll also try to do these Flashback pieces more regularly, only I won't let myself get so hung up on whether I have a fully formed story for you or not. I'd rather just be able to write what I enjoy. And maybe this will spark a memory or two of your own. Ok, that's all, TTYL.

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the voiceover gods

it's so weird to see these guys and hear these famous voices actually coming out of their mouths. Just eerie, funny, but eerie.