reality's fantasy

The Comebackers

2007-11-10T17:03:00.000+01:00

Has anyone else noticed this, that the year 2007 seems to have more Comebackers than usual.

Every year we have some singer or rapper even an actor/actress that has been lost to our memories try and make a comeback and kick start their dead careers, but through out this year I think there maybe a higher number of comebackers than usual.

Let us try and name some of these comebackers and see how many We get.

Ja Rule: Whose last album was in 2005 and I think I am not alone in thinking that he would never make a come back to music, after the damage to his rap reputation at the hands of 50 Cents, but lo and behold Jeffery Atkins has a new single called Body for his upcoming album The Mirror (Its safe to say I will never check that shit out)

Redman aka Reggie Noble aka Funk Doc : About 5 or 6 years after his last album, Redman release his sixth solo album Red Gone Wild and it was well recieved by the fans because it encompassed all the elements that made us fans in the first place but yet still managing to update his sound to fit in with the modern times.

Spice Girls: This out of all the comebackers seem to be the most desperate, with the only sucessful solo career belonging to Geri Halliwell (and damnit that woman can sing). The new single though I dont see doing too well, unless they've paid some radio djs who would then shut off their common sense and feel the need to play the songs 5 times in every 30 minutes and thus implanting it everyones head and making most of us being addicted to it regardless of whether we hate it or not, but even I (as a renowned skeptic) dont think thats gonna happen with this single.

Dave Chappelle: I don't want to go into the whole discussion of Dave Chappelle missing and but would just like to point out that he made his comeback to stand up comedy on the 15th of April of 2007 in the laugh factory, where he performed for 6 hours (and I can't wait to watch that)

Jeru the Damaja: Jeru released his latest album Still Rising October 2007, after missing for about 4 years .

Jay Z: After telling all of us he quit rap but still appearing as a feature on various songs, it came as no surprise that Mr Shawn Carter finally dropped an album. The title of the aforementioned album is American Gangster inspired and named after the upcoming film of the same title.

David Slade : Director of Hard Candy(2005), which did moderatley well, made his come back to the film industry with the comic book adaptation with the same title; 30 Days Of Night.

Michael Jackson: Yes even they King of Pop is a comebacker for 2007. I have heard a new single but not sure yet if it is official but his name has been popping up so much that I felt the need to include him in this list.

Wu Tang: Even though I am not overly excited (which is what I thought I would be) about the upcoming album, I am glad that at least some material is coming out from the Wu Tang Clan, it is just a shame that all the singles released thus far are all average and somewhat boring even.

Craig David, Celine Dion & Boys 2 Men also some people making comebacks for 2007.

I am sure that I am missing a lot of names and would appreciate it if people could add some more Comebackers for 2007 or at least tell me if they think that the number of Comebackers is not that high or maybe even very small compared to other years. Thanks For reading and please post your thoughts.

My Majority Conflict

2007-11-06T13:20:00.000+01:00

I have many faults....many many faults, but one that I have always been aware of is the fact that I tend to (intentionally or unitentionally, I am not entirely sure) shun most things that are popular. I tend to ignore or avoid or dislike a lot of societies fads and craze, and I have been known to go out of my way to make my feelings known.

To elaborate my point further I would like to point out a couple of instances when I have delved into such mind frames and avoided a product or idea that was popular or even considered the norm and the reasons why I have done so.

A couple of years ago the world went Digital Audio Player rampage, more specifically ipod rampage (because there were many mp3 players years before the arrival of the ipod but people were still largely into discmans and MiniDisc players) and people had now found a new fashion fad...and if you thought the ipod was nothing but a device used for listening to music, podcasts and watching videos, you would only be half right.

Being that I am music junkie, I have gone through my fair share of personal audio devices (about 8 discmans, 4 minidiscs and countless flash based players) so it was only right that I moved on to the next level, which was Hard Disc Drive; for which to sedate my beastial musical cravings. You would think I would just go out and buy the most popular gadget that (on the surface) satisfied my needs, but then you probably never had a conversation with me so you cannot be blamed for thinking that.

I researched on various Hard Disc Drives in the market and ended up buying the Creative Zen Vision M, for two main reasons. 1. It is renowned for having great battery life, unlike that of the ipod which most owners complained about. 2. It wasnt an ipod. So now even though I had something to sate my music listening hunger, and I wouldnt be one of those people that thought they were somehow cooler than you because they had white (shitty, i feel i must add) earphones in their ears.

I know it seems sort of harsh, but the truth is that most people that do own an ipod only buy it because everyone they know owns one and it is the in thing.

I would like to point out another instance that I have avoided something that was popular and I have to warn you that from this point on you might start to get an idea of how strange and weird I can be sometimes.

I am an avid reader, most of you reading this probably already know this. My taste usually tends to be confined to fiction but every now and then I will read something non fiction. But my love truly lies in horror and mystery genre and so I am always on the look out for something that challenges my beliefs and rocks my imagination. With this in mind you would think it would be apt that I would be willing to or already read The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown.

The reason why I havent or refuse to read it? well it annoyed me when the world went crazy over a book that covered a subject matter that was not even original and also the fact that i meet a lot of people who didn't even enjoy reading but picked up the book and acclaimed it for it's "greatness". I'm sorry but if you only read Harry Potter novels and the few novels you had to read in your english class and yet proclaim a book as one of the best things written this century, I cannot respect your opinion.
Even I have some gripes with my favourite authours and I believe that if you are going to give a book or authour criticism you should be able to spot the greatness and the shortcomings but I have never ever meet anyone of these Dan Brown lovers (and I have meet a whole lot of them, the world seemed to be filled with them a couple of years ago) that has a problem with him and they just go on about how great his works are and I am convienced most of these people dont know what they are talking about and only say how good he is because they feel they need to and everyone else around them is saying the same thing.

There have been a lot of instances where I have avoided something because of how popular it is but that there are also many instances when I have rejoiced and enjoyed over the popularity of something. When I have tried to get people that arent interested in something famous or popular interested in it. The quickest example I can think of is with the Lord Of The Rings films, practically everyone loves the films but I have meet a couple of people that arent into fantasy films and yet I have tried to persuade them into the awesomeness that is Lord Of The Rings.

I do admit that I do have an unexplainable lure to the underdog but even though I have avoided popular crazes and fads I dont do it because everyone else is in it; I do it mostly because I cant stand it when people don't think for themselves and just follow the general population.
You should be able to enjoy something because it appeals to something inside you (regardless of whether it is famous/popular or not) instead of that trying to fulfill that shallow and capricious desire to fit in.

I Don't Know But I Do Wonder...

2007-09-05T18:52:00.000+02:00

Last night I was in the kitchen with a cousin of mine (Simi) and we got into an argument over something I thought was inane at the time. She said that a survey was carried out in Africa to determine who were the happiest people in the world and statistically Nigeria came up on top and that she agreed with it.

I immediately disagreed with her, stating that apart from the fact that surveys always have so many holes in them and so to rely on them especially when it comes to a capricious topic such as "happiness" is really....well sort of silly, and also the fact that most Nigerians I know, even though they are some of the most friendly and nicest people are not the happiest of people.
Her defense was that Nigerians suffered hardships of a third world country in what is supposed to be a developed country and yet the people still live their lives with determined fortitude and gratitude (which was sort of evident in them being some of the most religious people in the world)
I countered what she said by pointing out that it is a condition most humans are blessed with, even during the most dire of times we still seem to unconsciously find something to hold on to, something that keeps us going, we also seek comfort in each other knowing that we are all living in hardship. I also said that yes Nigeria maybe afflicted with some really fucked up donkey shit but if you were born in hardship and that was all you knew you would be used to it and you may not realize how bad things were until it was pointed out to you.

Granted neither of us was so eloquent during the argument... the whole discussion was more of us just yelling at each other and neither really listening to the other but Simi then said something that stuck with me and made me actually think she had a point.

She said that we didn't hear of any Nigerians that committed suicide or that suffered from depression (yes I know just because you don't hear about it doesn't mean it doesn't happen but it does mean that theres is a very small percentage of it happening) but it got me thinking and even though I still skeptic about the survey, I found it intriguing that there is a lower number of suicides and depressed people in African countries than there are in more developed countries.

It is an interesting phenomenon, where by people that live more comfortably are the ones that are more mentally unstaible, and even though very little data is collected that documents the suicide rates in Africa I think its easy to see that there is a lower number of suicides just by talking to a Africans you meet about. Granted that there are a lot of different reasons for suicide and not all involve stress, depression and loneliness/isolation; some do it for religious reasons others for honor and in some cases protest (as in the case of Thich Quang Duc) but I am specifically talking about suicide which involves people depressed and unhappy.

Does that mean that you have to suffer to appreciate life and want to live? Maybe there is some truth to that irony but it might be something much different and I apologize for the insinuation of this statement. But maybe it is a race thing, maybe some races are just more susceptible to be more depressed and suicidal, I know it sounds very far fetched and even I dont believe it but it is still a possibility and I would appreciate it if anyone could provide or inform me about any research that might have been taken relating to this train of thought.

I think the first theory holds more water than the race thing though.

It would mean that the will to live is somewhat paradoxical, and people that stricken by poverty or some sort of suffering usually have a strong will to live and find a way to enjoy life and live life. (e.g Terry Fox) On the flipside people that are rich, relatively comfortable and are seemingly in good health find ways to destroy their lives with drugs, alcohol and Et cetera.(e.g countless amount of famous people)

I don't know for sure if any of this is true but I do wonder.

The Art Or The Artist?

2007-03-07T00:19:00.000+01:00

Someone asked me today if I had read any H.P Lovecraft books, and my answer was; Yes I have but I don't own any of his books.
It got me thinking why I didn't own any of his works since I am an avid collector of not just books but horror books, and since Lovecraft is/was one of the most influential writers of the horror genre it was indeed strange I owned nothing of his. Then I remembered why I had never bothered buying any of his books was because I found out he was racist and that lead me to the point of this Blog.

Should an artist's life or way of life affect your thoughts on the art? I'm on the fence about the whole issue. If a rapper came out that he was gay, should it affect how much I enjoy his music? I don't think it should but I know it probably would, I'm sorry for that bad example cause it makes it seem like I'm saying homosexuality is wrong.

Its like the whole Michael Richards issue, should I stop enjoying the Kramer character or enjoy it less after his idiotic "nigger rant"? I checked and it doesn't affect how much I like the character, but then why does it affect me in the case of Lovecraft? I am not sure really, maybe it depends on how much you love the art and if we do we become hypocrites and shun the negative aspect of the artist's life or maybe it just depends of the severity of the negativity.

If Hitler painted one of the most beautiful things ever would people still view it as something beautiful without judging the art cause of the painter?

I would like to hear any and everyone's thoughts on the whole issue so please drop some comments.

Unheard Words

2007-01-29T19:32:00.000+01:00

As known by most, I am an ardent reader of fictional works and I have been ever since I was yay high.

I don't feel I need to go into an indept speech about why I love reading so much but I feel I need to point this out, that picking up reading a good book will enthrall you into it and will capture and stimulate your imagination in a way films will never be able to....or maybe its just me.

With the preposterous amount of Ipods out there and the creation of the podcasting feature I have noticed that there has been a massive increase in people listening to Audio books. While I am happy that more people are interested in listening to something much more than music (not that I'm a music hater...far from it) I find it almost a travesty that people are resorting to audio books instead of actually buying a book; one with pages and words.
Maybe I am missing something but arent audio books meant for people with disabilities like bad eye sights and general problems reading. I try to be open to all sorts of things and give them a fair chance until I have actually tried it out myself and being that I have never listened to an audio book I'm trying not to pass too much of a harsh judgment on the medium.
I have decided that I will give it a shot and see what all the hoopla is about but now the problem is that I have no clue as to what book to read, i mean listen to (see the confusion this shit causes). So far I am leaning towards Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman and read by Lenny Henry, I'm leaning towards this because I have read the actually book and i think it will help in the transition of listening to an audio book, but I am open to any suggestions people want to throw at me.

So, we will see how my little trail goes and I will be reporting back on my thoughts on the whole issue. Wish me luck people.

Note*: The picture posted is just a few of the novels I own, I'll take a picture of my complete collection when I get round to buying new batteries for my damned camera.

If You Had Any Doubts...

2006-12-29T07:17:00.000+01:00

This post will eradicate any and all of them...check out the youtube link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8u2tuKF6yxU

Read my Father Where Art Thou post and you'll understand what I'm on about...If that video is not confirmation I dont know what is. I know what you're all thinking, but shes a singer; yes, she is but you'll notice that in the chorus she raps and thus acknowledging and confirming my notion that rappers have no fathers.

Good Writer, Shitty Storyteller...

2006-12-11T23:52:00.000+01:00

Truth is I dont know if I can rightfully classify myself as a nerd, I not am not of above average intelligence, I dont have a multifarious array of trivial knowledge sparsely stored away within my head that I can pull out any given time and impress people with.
The Only thing I can justifiabley say that sets me apart from unnerdy folks is my love for reading and that alone places me in the realms of nerdiness(even if slightly)....can't say that I'm happy or not about slightly being a nerd, its just who I am and I accept it.

As for my reading, it has developed into somewhat of a major problem, I spend so much of my money on novels and it's become so bad that I cannot function normally through a week (which it usually takes for me to finish reading a 500 plus page novel) if I dont read a novel. When I'm out of money and can't afford to buy a new book, I pick up one of the old ones and re-read it. I've read most of the novels I own at least 3 times...some 4 or 5 times, and I'll be posting a picture of my collection for you all to see for yourselves.

Through my reading escapades I have read many a great books by good writers, terrible ones by bad writers but I am here to talk about (as the smarter ones amongst you might have already gussed from the blog title) bad books by good writers.

The concept is very easy to wrap your head around, just think of it in this sense; a good director making a crappy film for example...Ridley Scott's Kingdom of Heaven. You can actually see the potential the film has to be very good but through a number of obviouis bad decisions (like casting Orlando Bloom as the lead role) it has fallen into the section of shittiness.( again sorry for lack of a better word)
The same can be said with novels/novellas and truth is not too many writers are guilty of this because it is easy to confuse a bad writer as a good writer that has written a bad book, but thats another discussion for another day.

I think one writer that is the most guilty of this is Dean Koontz and it does hurt when I read his books because I can actually see the potential to be great instead of corny, cliche and trite works of literary fiction which most of his books always end up being. I read a short Bio of him on Wikipedia.org and it said he grew up in poverty and with an abusive alcoholic father and I was a bit suprised because it doesnt show at all in any of the books I read of him...usually a writer incorporates a dark part of themself within their books and you can sort of detect the kind of person they are from reading a number of their books, but with Koontz all his books seems to be too happy go jolly, you pretty much know what you'll get with a Koontz story. The main character wins effortlessly at the end, even the bad guys dont die all the time and it usually some alien or creature thats the cause of distress. All in all I dont think I have ever read a memorable bad human character in any of his novels, he just doesnt seem to possess the skill to create a character that is trully evil and I find it weird that someone thats actually got good skills as a writer and been through something as fucked up as an abusive father cannot do that....I guess it boils down to him having being a very kind person that doesnt see the world with any malice and but with hope and an almost annoying naivety.

Another Writer that falls into this catergory and although a lot would disagree with me is Jeffery Deaver. I like Jeffery Deaver, its hard not to but I think a lot of his books have the most ridiculous plots and they are the most implausible crap ever written on paper. Come on a magician serial killer that wears more than three costumes and change in 30 seconds or so, wtf?
And his signature suprise endings, where you can never guess who the hell the killer is untill the very end, I won't be suprised if in one of his books a chicken is the killer and i'm serious thats how ridiculous his endings are...some random person that is not even related to the story or plot whatsoever happens to be the bad guy...think along the lines of the idiotic ending of the film Saw.

I would have been convienced he was a really bad writer but I had to change my mind when I read his collection of short stories, pure genius and I wonder why he doesnt write more of his longer stories like that. I do appreciate the research he does for his books, because if one thing is guaranteed in a Deaver novel is that there is always a new topic you will learn about and its usually correct facts. point in case his novel The Empty Chair, where he talks and explains a lot about insects and theres something he says (and i'll have to paraphrase because I don't remember the words exactly) "If all the humans in the whole world dropped dead right now, life on earth would continue for millions of years, but if every single insect dropped dead right now life on earth would probably die within a few week" I have no idea if this is a fact or not but it is something very interesting to ponder.

Father Where Art Thou?

2006-12-01T20:07:00.000+01:00

Being a fan of hiphop music, and after listening to the music for years and years I have come realise an unspoken and often over looked rule of being a rapper and it is if you wanna become a rapper you have to be fatherless.

The proof?

listen to the number of songs that rappers dedicate to their mothers, now compare that to the number of songs dediated to their fathers. Well as you can see for yourself there is a very large number of songs devoted to mothers, in fact it seems to be a trend that rappers have ascribed to with every other rap album having a slow song about dear their old mama. But I doubt many of you can think of or name a single track dedicated to a rapper's father in fact I could only come up with two out of a thousand and more. Nas: Poppa was a Playa & a track on Shyiem's album Greatest Story Never Told (I can't quite remember the name of the track, but when I do I'll be sure to edit this) just like the trend of dedicating songs to their dear sweet mothers, rappers also feel the need to always express how their father's left them at a young age or how they never knew who he was.

As you can see for yourself the proof is irrefutable so remember if you're thinking of becoming a rapper...make sure you have no biological father or you'll never make it in the industry.

Culture Speakers

2006-11-28T00:19:00.000+01:00

On another of my cerbrate moments, where I think of random and seldom useful subjects and topics; my mind wondered to something interesting, the subject of how different countries/cultures speak and sound in relation to their behaviours and how they are generally percieved.

The French language is (for lack of better words) prissy and sissified, and the French people are usually viewed as effeminate, and although I am sure there are some hard and unfuckwithable French men out there its just very hard to imagine any.

The spanish language which I personally find to be the sexiest language in the world is very sensual and countries that speak Spanish are usually regarded as having the finest women, well Brasil is an exception because they speak Portuges and also regarded as having the sexiest women...but Spanish is the major language closest to Portugues so I guess I'm still on the right track on this.

Russian language sounds very aggressive and most of us percieve the Russians as hardened and tough muthas, in fact they are to me the total opposites of the French.

I cannot cover every country and every language but I think you get the point; which if you missed it, is that the tone of accents, the phraseology and general manner in which different people speak from different cultures always seem to emulate behaviour or is it vice-versa?

Granted a lot of the views of people from different countries are stereotypes reinforced by media, I am thinking about the stereotypes that to apply.This then lead me to think about whether the people modify their language to fit these views and thoughts of them or is it just a thing that happens by chance..... hmmm.

FemBot Gone Banananananas

2006-11-04T22:59:00.000+01:00

A couple of days ago I got a link to this site www.munkyking.com and I found a lot of the items on there very aesthetically appealing, and a latent part of me awoke and I came to the peculiar and (sanity questionable) decision; which is, I am going to start collecting Monkey related shiznizz (thats snoop doggin doggy dog-neo-wigga-hiphop-gangster-terminology for Stuff). I am going to be collecting Monkey Keychains, Monkey toys, Monkey posters, Monkey t-shirts, Monkey fridge magnets, Monkey stickers, Monkey bags and many other items with cool looking Monkeys attatched or drawn on them.

The great thing is that there are a thousand Monkey figures and characters over a range of items and merchandize to collect. This fact is also an obstacle during my new found hobby...so wish me and my wallet luck on this.

I don't know what it is about Monkeys that I like so much (granted there are certain Monkey sub-species I don't like, but I have a soft spot for them as a whole race) I guess one of the reasons though why they appeal to me is that they seem to have some sort mischevious cunning but also a deep understanding for things....also they can be cute and adorable furry bastards.

Some of the Monkeys I will be on the look out for include...
Monkey Magic
Monkey King
Munky King Toys and clothing
Diddy Kong
Mannila Gorilla
Super Robot Monkey Team
Super Monkey

.....and any snazzy looking Monkey items, I will be sure to post pictures of the coolest items I collect (pray for my sanity people, I think I may have gone over the edge this time, but I dont care because I am really elated about this).

The Coolest Bots

2006-07-10T16:26:00.000+02:00

Hello there people. Firstly I want to apologise for not having posted anything on here in a while. I wish I could say there is a genuine reason why I havent been updating the site with regular blogs but there really isnt. The truth is I've just been lazy, but I do intend to try my possible best to post a new blog every two weeks at least.....soooo enjoy the new blog and sing along to the song.

Look out! Look out!
Cool Robots on parade
Here they come!
Hippety hoppety
They're here and there
Cool Robots everywhere

Ok, I stole some of that off Disney’s Dumbo, but you pretty much get the whole gist of what I’m getting at and if you don’t just read on…erm…reader.

For this blog I’ve made up a list of (IMO...just had to clarify that before some nerd comes on here and bites my head off for being wrong on the list) coolest fictional robots.

I don’t want to get into some lengthy explanation of what a robot is, so I’ll just give a brief summary of what I consider to be a robot and what I will and will not include on the list of Cool Bots.

Robots are intelligent devices that are - mostly and usually – mechanical. They can be operated or controlled directly by a human being or operate on their own by the means of Artificial Intelligence.

So this list can include: Droids, Mobile Battle Suits, and even Nanobots. So here we go:

Mr and Mrs Roboto.

10. KITT

While all the other robots on the list all have physical humanoid type features, KITT seperates itself by having none of those (even Mek-Quake of the ABC Warriors had a face, well some sort of face). With KITT, it was just a cool and slick looking car that talked.Even though KITT had a number of cool gadgets and features, the Coolest thing about KITT was his personality. KITT reminded me of refined Johnny 5 being that it was sarcastic, funny and intelligent but with class.

9. Bender

The Hedonistic, Kleptomanical, narcissistic, alcoholic and self obsessed robot gets the number 9 spot on my list and if you dont like it why dont you just bite my shiny metal ass (hey I couldnt put him on the list and not quote that line).

8. ABC Warriors

The ABC Warriors might not have been too popular amongst the American comicbook readers (even most Brits will not be familiar with them) in fact the ABC Warrriors are probably only popular amongst deep comic heads but i'm not here to talk about their popularity, i'm here to talk about their overall awesomeness. I wish they would have would have got higher up on my list because i hold them in high regard but alas I could not.

The ABC in ABC Warriors stood for Atomic, Biological and Chemical, forms of warfare which human beings could not survive but the robots were designed to. I cannot go into the history of the ABC warriors because it is just too long and there are other robots to go through. I cannot even post pictures of the members all I can do is post a link that has detailed history and information on the members....please check it out if you're interested in reading about narcissistic transvestite robots (Joe Pineapples) or occultic robots that are highly skilled in treachery (Blackblood).
411 on ABC

7. Robby The Robot

I am sure some of you are not familiar with Robby the Robot but recognize it's iconic figure. Robby's first appearance was in (one of the greatest science fiction films ever made) Forbidden Planet (which if you have not already watched it I suggest you stop reading this right now and get on that). Before Robby, robots in films had been very bland and were only seen as mechanical devices. Robbby brought personality to the screens and was even supposed to be first robot to walk (even though it looked very clumsy). Robby gets a cool 7 spot on the list for not just defining how robots in films looked and acted but for also being one cool mutha.

6. T800

What can I possibily say about The Terminator T800 that you dont already know. It was possibily the only films were people actually saw that Arnold Schwarzenegger could act. I mean a machine that looks human but kills without remorse or emotion, you know how hard it is to pull of that part, the only other person thats done it better than Arnie is Robert Patrick.

5. T1000

A Liquified Killing Machine. Seriously whoever came up with the idea for the T1000 deserves an award (I dont know what award would be appropriate but something that sounds really impressive). His body could take the shape of any sharp basic weapon and could morph and impersonate people, I dont know about you but thats pretty fucking cool in my books. The T1000 beats the T800 any day because of his superior features for killing and lack of Austrian accent.

4.Data

The naive and highly intelligent robot from Star Trek: Next Generation series gets number 4 spot on my list. He was eccentric, innocent, and always trying to learn what it was to be human. One of the really cool things about him was the fact that he didnt move like the cliche robot but there was still something very mechanical and alien about the way he moved. Data's weird and quirky personality, his ignorance in the simplest of emotions and above average intelligence made him not just my favourite character in the show but also one of the most memorable and coolest characters in the history of all Star Trek.

3. Voltron

Like KITT, Voltron sperates itself from the others on the list but in a very different way from KITT. While KITT had no human type features it had a personality that more than made up for it. Voltron on the other hand, had Human features but no real personality. Voltron was giant robot made up of five other robots (Lion robots) and controlled by five young pilots (each controlling the limb or part with which they formed) without any of the pilots Voltron could not function and thus making him the only robot on the list that lacked any form of personality or emotion, it could not even speak a single word.

So why have I put it so high up on the list, you may ask yourself, well Voltron itself might have lacked personality but its pilots gave it personality and pizazz. And the viewers were always dying to see how Voltron would dispatch whatever enemy was on that day. It usually ended up with Voltron slicing them up with it's magic sword, but the technique in which he used his sword that day was what most people were trying to see.

2.Transformers

Whenever I think of The Transformers some peice of my childhood resounds within my heart and i feel a sense of sweet nostalgia that will forver be lost to me. I know that sounds a bit far fetched but its true to the word. I remember waking up on early saturday mornings, running downstairs and sitting on the floor in front of the television just to see my favourite robots in disguise kick some (in the words of number 9, Bender) metalic shiny ass and I know that feeling of innocence and looking at the world through a view of utter awe will never be regained.

I do not feel there is any need for me to go into how and why the Transformers were so awesome, chances are if you were an 80s/90s child (GO US!!!) you already know and if you dont know, well you should stopped reading at number 10.

1. R2D2

You know one of the reasons why it took so bloody long for me to post this blog was that I could not think of exactly what to write about R2. Truthfully I've found myself sitting in a position for hours and just wondering what I could possibily say about R2 to justify why he (and I'm not even sure if it was a Male Bot or not) but i couldnt think of a single thing. In the end I decieded to just start typing and see what my fingers come up with.

Why should R2D2 be number 1 in a list of coolest fictional robots? well one reason is that he is part of one of the greatest Science fiction films ever made but that fact alone is not why I put him up on the list.Another reason is that R2 seemed to be a mutli taskable robot capable of doing some freaking nifty things and that appealed to practically all children, but that is not why I decied to put him as number one either.

One thing that made all these robots so cool to us as we grew up was that we all wanted them to exsist or dreamed that they did or they could at some time be a reality, but in none of the others has that actually seemed possible unless in the case and for that alone I think Artoo deserves to be number one, and I believe thats all I need to say about R2.

What's the score?

2006-06-03T20:41:00.000+02:00

My passion and love for the films lead me to another great thing which I have suddenly developed a deep love and hunger for. I am talking about Film Scores.

The thing is a lot of people don't realize the amount of work that the various people involved in a film contribute to the film. They just see the directors and actors/actresses names and give them all the credit for a good film (or if its a shite film they get all the blame) people fail to realize a lot of credit is due to the cinematographer (camera man in layman terms) the editors, the script writers and the music composers (the point of this blog).

I have always been interested in film scores, but only through the proverbial sidelines. In fact the only three names I ever knew were Ennio Morricone, John Williams and James Horner; and even still I knew of their works on only a couple of films:

Ennio Morricone for The Good, The Bad & Ugly. John Williams for Jaws and Star Wars series. James Horner for Aliens.But over the past few months I have immersed myself more deeply into the splendiferous world of film scores and whenever I come across a classic gem like Masaru Sato's work on Yojimbo (directed by Akira Kurosawa) I am tempted to slap myself silly for not involving into the world sooner.

The thing I love about film scores is that when you are watching a film, it appeals to a person on mostly a subconscious level and enhances the film's energy and mood (well, when done properly).

A film score has the power to It be grand and epic (Joe Hisaishi's work in Princess Mononoke) or tragic and sad (James Horner on Braveheart), which is something a lot of music genres cant achieve. ItÂs really sort of sad that not more people are not into scores because they are truly amazing and riveting pieces of music.

Here are lists of names I think you should check out...along with all the names that I have already mentioned:

Joe LoDuca (Brotherhood of Wolf & Evil Dead 1,2 &3)
Wendy Carlos (The Shining & A Clockwork Orange)
Jerry Goldsmith (a must)
Mark Mancina (Bad Boys & Training Day)
Danny Elfman (Batman & Big Fish)
Tan Dun (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon & Hero)
Howard Shore (Lord of the Rings 1,2&3)
Dave Grusin (Goonies & The Firm)
Thomas Newman (American Beauty & Road to Perdition)

There are countless others great music composers that are in the world of film scoring but I cannot name them all and even though the names mentioned might seem like a short list, their works are far from that.If you have any obscure film scorers I would appreciate it if you shared names with me...or if you have anything on the subject matter please feel free to tell.

P.S I would love to see Sam Hardaker & Henry Binns (Zero 7) do a score for a film once...I'm sure it'll be great.

Marvelywood

2006-05-28T22:54:00.000+02:00

I just came back from cinema and I saw X-men3-The last Stand. For people that know me; even those that know me remotely, know that I am into comics big time. I grew up reading most of Marvel's comic books and (even though fewer than Marvel) a number of DC comics books as well.
And like most comic book fans I enjoyed and loved such series like Spiderman, The Hulk (which happens to be my favorite character till date), Thor, The Avengers and The X-men etc.

When I decided to write this blog I knew there was a big risk of sounding like a fretful type fan because I know for a fact that most fans complaints are in vain, because most times the fans take the books too bloody serious and hate any single deviation from the comic books they grew up on, which ends up making them look like losers with nothing better to do. Also the men in charge don't really give two kuso simply because their making their money.

With all that said, can you really blame most of them? Everyday people complain about the government and how blah blah leader was better than blah blah blah (I apologies for the blahs but my knowledge and interest in politics are extremely and embarrassingly poor) and even though to some people politics is much more important compared to comics to me it all boils down to interests. So seeing comic book fans complain about the adaptation of their favorite comics to terrible, trite, cheesy, unoriginal, shallow, idiotic and childish films and I can honestly say that it is usually justifiable bitching.

so here goes my justifiable bitching.

One reason why I got into comics was that it was always a good source for originality and totally out of the circle of thinking kuso. I mean where else would you get to read about a guy with a Jekyll/Hyde syndrome whose Hyde was a raging green bashing smashing machine? The action were superb, the stories fantastic and the characters (which was the most important thing) wondrous. Then comes in Hollywood, who always manage to fuck such things that should be left alone up. I know there seems to be a trend to diss Hollywood and I wanna remove myself from the trend by stating I love Hollywood for bringing out some of my favorite films ever, but I guess its like a person that saved your life but wants to fuck you..A sign of your appreciation. So even with all the shit I'm gonna talk about Hollywood I guess I still love it cos I know there's good in there, you just have to look hard.

X-men3, directed by Brett Ratner whose famous for directing Rush Hour 1 & 2, took the directional reigns for the third installment of the X-men series. When this film was still in production I read that Ratner left the Superman Returns for this and took most of the staff with him. Bryan Singer who did the first two X-men films went on to direct Superman Returns (lets see how that one turns out) it was said that Ratner is a actually a comic fan, after seeing this book I'm pretty sure the guy has never come in contact with a comic book let alone read a X-men comic.

I really do try and see the good points in films even when their bad, but truthfully I couldn't find much that was good in this. So much was wrong and not the fact that it in no way had anything to do with the comic book but because it was such a terrible film to watch.

Ratner do you know why people liked wolverine so much? I don't think you do, its simply because he's always been the underdog, like most comic book readers that are nerds, geeks and other fellow losers they have always loved him because he was different to the other members. He wasn't handsome like Cyclops,he wasn't as cool as Gambit, his powers weren't even great compared to the rest of the members, he smoked and he was mostly the prick, I remember him being the only X-men back then that they said killed, the guy just wasn't a proper superhero compared to the rest of them....Wolverine was more like a stubborn kid in the midst of proper super heroes and that's why a lot of people liked him. But it seems like Ratner doesn't know this and then gets it into his head to make Wolverine the main guy, the guy that gets the girl, the guy that gives advice, the guy that does things his way and doesn't care much about team work at all.
The portrayal of Wolverine in this film is retarded to the extent I actually ended up hating one my fav comic characters.

There was so much wrong with this film, the obvious things like them killing off Cyclops so bloody early, not giving Angel enough screen time, letting Vinnie Jones speak, making Pyro to be some sort of Fabian Cortez (look him up if you don't know who he is), the stupid part with Jean Grey trying to kill wolverine but not being able to (his healing powers aint that great, she would kill him in a second) most of this I could forgive but I will never forgive them for making Jean Grey, Wolverine's love interest, acting like she cares for him more than Cyclops. They actually managed to make Cyclops the underdog and I wanted him to be the main character....I kept expecting him to come back somehow.

Suprisngly the only character worth watching in this whole film was Storm. There really wasn't anything in this film that did justice to the comics that many of us grew up on, for that fact I implore all of you to boycott it.

They might as well have called this film Wolverine and others.

I think the saddest thing I felt after watching this film was the fact that Marvel is now run by unoriginal, greedy, twats that are getting it up the ass by Hollywood (which was the reason I choose the title MarvelyWood...Get it wood as in cock? I made a funny) so we're going to be seeing many more of terrible and idiotic adaptations of comic books into films.

Animies

2006-05-15T03:24:00.000+02:00

Recently I have been watching (for research purposes) a lot of japanese animation (animie)...and I have found out quiet a number of things i am (unfortunatley) going to share with you.
before we go into that, i'd like to explain why i've been watching so much of them. a friend of mine sent me a text; asking if i wanted to creat a manga novel with him and being that i'm not doing anything worthwhile with my life at the moment i said why the fuck not.

So we droped down a our ideas (although my friend Reza came up with almost everything and i just nodded my head in agreement) and i decided that if we're gonna do this right, then i should make sure we know what the hell we're getting into, which thus lead me to my (unhealthy amount as Jeremy so put it) of mangas and animes viewing.

heres a list of some i've seen recently, Bastard!!!, AirGear, Angel Cop, GetBackers, Vampire Hunter D (bloodlust) Cowboy Bebop,Lupin the third, Escaflowne and many others that i cant remember.
anyways after watching hours and hours and hours of these japanese cartoonies i have come to realise that its an unwritten rule that the dialouge of anime series have to be idiotic, retarded, cheesy, annoying, frustrating and utterly ridiculous....i am not in anyway joking. at one point i could feel my head swell and almost implode as the idioticy set itself in my head. the weird thing is that even with all that power of stupidity that could surely kill a man, i found myself watching more animes and more mangas.
i dont understand why but i just kept on watching, maybe its all the sexual inuendos(hey i'm not some sick perv, you should see the things they put in these cartoons it does get very erotic....ok maybe i am a bit of a perv but only just a bit: who the fuck isnt these days)

the dialouge is the most annoying thing when it comes to animes, the plot usually are entertaining, even though a lot of them are just revised versions of some other anime/manga. but the dialouge are always (not always though) so bloody shite and i swear to God i have seen anime/mangas where the characters suffer from over acting...over acting, in a cartoon? just watch Hellsing and you'll know what i'm talking about.
their also the cheesiest things ever, yes cheesier than Sun Set Beach, cheesier than O.C and even cheesier than white boy bands.(ok maybe not, but their almost neck and neck), i mean i understand why they have to include such themes but why all that cheese?

although i have just say that not all animes fall into the retarded catergory, there are quiet a number of them that are just amazing beyound words, the dialouge sharp, witty, intelligent, mature and on point. the plot refreshing, the characters enjoyable and unqiue and over all just great. i would recomment any and everyone to watch these ones. Trigun, Cowboy bebop (the series and the movie) Escaflowne (avoid the movie, watch the series) Akira (if you havent already seen it, get it now) theres too many to name that are great but you seriously check those listed out.

i feel as if my anime phase is coming to an end and thats why i felt i had to write this down. i just hope Reza's and my manga lite novel will be good enough for people to wanna read it.

2006-05-11T16:32:00.000+02:00

Before i made this blog I pondered for a long time just what i could write about continously and would keep people coming back to read it, and i couldnt come up with diddly shit.
The problem was i didnt want to create a blog site that would be unoriginal and played out, i wanted to do something fresh and original and as we all know thats an almost impossible task. so i continued to ponder and ponder with no success.

i wanted to write something on a peice of paper one day (dont remember the day, dont even remember what i wanted to write, but thats ok cos its not imporatant) and i needed a book to rest it on and i picked up this huge calender, dairy book from my uncles books and wrote what it is i needed to write. instead of just returning the book to where i took it from, i could feel something telling me to check inside, (I wish i could tell you that it was some sort of holy calling but i'm pretty sure it was me just being nosy and not minding my bsuiness)
So i look into the book and found that it was full of nothing.....it was an unused Dairy, which meant i could keep it for myself......wait why did i start talking about this? erm....oh yeah i remember.

anyways i went to see my uncle in his room to tell him that i would be keeping the Diary (not to write my feelings in....Homie dont play that). i wanted to use it for my Sketches and ideas for comics and novels.

So i go to his room and i tell him and he says ok, but on my way out i noticed a quote on a calender in his room, which is the point to this whole pyscho babble. and it said "Say what you want and do what you please, cos those you mind dont matter and those who matter dont mind"
i forgot whose quote it was...and i'll be sure to write down the name when i remember....but all i know is i felt so inspired at that moment that i wanted to do some writing.

so i leave with my new book and start writing down ideas for what the blog should be...and came up with a list of my interests. i decided to write about something that i cared about, fuck trying to come up with something original and please people...if people dont read or enjoy blogs then as my frog eating brothers say "Ces't la vie" which i think translates to "shit happens, accept it and move on"

on my list i had Comics (those that know me, know i am the most annoying nerd when it comes to comics) movies (which are usually obscure, i will watch anything) music (i listen to everything i can and give every genre a chance) novels (i read any and everything apart from romance, because in my opinion it is the dingleberry of writing)

i still couldnt think of a way i could write and i told me sister who look at me with disgust and say "get away from me you nerd" and so i have decieded to create a blog that deal with all things that are cool but nerdy.

so there you have it....this blogsite deals with what i consider to be cool but nerdy things and i hope you enjoy what i write about and if you dont well.....shit really does fucking happen.