I couldn’t beat Skyrim. Not because it was too tough, or because I kept getting lost in the massive game. No, I couldn’t beat Skyrim because I was one of those people you read about who had a game-breaking bug. I couldn’t open up a door I needed to go through to finish the game because a crucial NPC fell through the floor, in the EXACT second the game auto-saved, and I never saw him (nor ever got to get the door open) again. Considering the hundred plus hours I had spent with the game, the final conclusion I had was that was just not okay. If a game is not finished, what right do developers have releasing it to the public? I may be a small sect of the game playing population, but as awesome a Skyrim was, every single person I know experienced atleast one glitch in that game.

Granted, most of the time the glitches were kind of funny, but in my case, they sucked out the enjoyment and made my OCD ass go crazy because I LITERALLY could not finish the game. That was the single moment that really got me thinking what I want out of the slew of next generation systems coming out down the line. With PS4 announced, and the newest addition to the Xbox family being announced later this month, I thought it an awesome time to write out a wishlist for what I would want from the future of gaming. Keep in mind a great deal of this is based solely off of speculation, and is merely me just dreaming out loud, but feel free to take to the comments and let me know what YOU want out of your next generation of gaming. The future is now, people, but maybe it’s not too late for us to help mold it.

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The series finale of The Office airs tonight. It’s hard to believe really. Through all the jokes about cast members leaving and the quality declining, this final season has actually been rather excellent, and it’s shameful to forget that the first few seasons were some of the best of any comedy ever scripted.

I’ve had a connection to this show for years, one that likely ran deeper than most casual fans. Early on, the show spoke to me, and influenced my life in unexpected and odd ways. You see, I was Jim. And back then, there was a Pam.

I first started watching back in 2005, my freshman year of college. It seems so far away now. I’d seen the British version, but my affinity for British comedy hadn’t really blossomed yet, and David Brent was more irritating than annoying, with Tim more mean than funny when tormenting Gareth.

The American version, other than the practically word for word pilot, was different. It was more lighthearted. Michael Scott was incompetent, but not a sociopath. The humor was subtle, yet present enough not to be overlooked completely.

And then there was Jim and Pam. Continue Reading »

In honor of Arrested Development’s triumphant return, here’s a look at how the show influenced another under-watched yet critically acclaimed show, Community.

The broad-strokes parallels are obvious: both shows are extremely self-referential and leaned heavily on meta-humor and contextual humor as opposed to situational humor.  Both shows found little success on network television but have a hardcore fanbase.  Both were really amazingly good for 3 seasons and then were, well, not.  (AD because it was cancelled, Community because Dan Harmon left/was let go)

But passing up some of the larger parallels, some of the characters from both shows are similar in some interesting ways.  Not just in tone or approach, but in narrative structure as well.  For example…

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Those of you who have been following along over the past month or so know that I’ve just finished reading George RR Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series.  I did this partly to immunize myself against spoilers for the show, but also because well, they’re really damn good books.

Now that I’ve reached the end, I wanted to take a look back and discuss with you readers some of the lingering questions  that accompany finishing the books, and boy, are there plenty to choose from. Below you’ll find a mix of mysteries and cliffhangers that I found whirling around my head as the books ended. I think I’ve got a handle on a few of them, but I’d love to hear your own thoughts below.

Do I really have to say “spoilers ahead”? Alright, SPOILERS AHEAD! Continue Reading »

I’m going to start off by admitting that seriously analyzing a teaser trailer for a new television show is a fool’s errand. Two minutes and thirty seconds isn’t going to tell us much of anything about an entire season’s story arc, and depending on how the thing is edited, it may actually project a general tone that is absent from the final product.

Relationships between characters are touched upon for only the briefest of moments, like a bat’s wings brushing your cheek when you take an evening hike down into a gorge in your college days. No really, I hiked down into a gorge one night while the bats were hunting and one grazed my face when diving for a moth. Terrifying and creepy, if not just a little bit thrilling.

No, one can’t glean much of anything of substance from a show trailer apart from an overall sense of the production value. But it sure is fun to read into things sometimes, isn’t it? Join me after the jump and let’s do it together. Continue Reading »

Yes, I’m talking about Cronenberg again. Hold onto your butts. 

Marketing, in theory, is a pretty simple operation. Well, the operation isn’t simple at all, but the core concept is: Sell your product. Marketing for movies is even simpler. Just copy whatever the latest big trailer did.

I mean, how many of us have mocked the glut of ads aping the “Inception noise?”

Now, you guys want to see a kick-ass trailer that stands out, for a movie that was surely almost impossible to sell? I suggest the trailer for David Cronenberg’s Naked Lunch. Despite the fact that it didn’t exactly light the world on fire, I think its trailer is indicative of the best approach to selling ANY kind of movie. Meet me after the jump and I’ll show you.

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Fanfiction, as a whole, does not have the best reputation.  Name any two characters from any work of fiction, and I guarantee you there is some ridiculously smutty and terribly written fanfiction of them as a couple.  Jean-Luc Picard and Elrond?  Done. Indiana Jones and Lord Voldemort?  Done and done.  Dr. McKay and Jason Fox?  Done, somehow.  Feel the horror.

That’s the bad side.  It exists, it’s out there, but let’s move on.

Here’s the good side.  It turns out, given a large enough population that’s interested in playing around in a sufficiently interesting sandbox (such as the world J.K. Rowling created in the Harry Potter series), there exists some small but significant number of talented, brilliant writers who can blow you away with creativity and passion.

These few, these happy few, can do an incredible thing: they can make you rediscover a world that you loved, and moved on from, a long time ago.  There’s a certain feeling when you close the last book of a beloved series, a very bittersweet feeling.  For me, it was Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials series.  When I turned the last page, I felt completion and a profound sadness.  It was finished, it was over.

But what if you could turn the page and keep going? Continue Reading »

It’s not very often I take to this column to debate one very specific plot point in a movie, but with everyone and their mother seeing Iron Man 3 over the past week or so, I figure it’s a topic that more than a few people might be curious to talk about.

I had an overall positive experience with Iron Man 3, and I can see how it can be called the best movie of the three (though I won’t say I enjoyed it more than The Avengers). But one aspect of the movie has troubled me during and since, and I figured I’d discuss it here. It’s how The Mandarin was handled.

Obvious spoilers follow, so it’s time to divert your eyes and ears. Continue Reading »

Adult Swim seems to cater to a very specific demographic. People on drugs. I don’t think is necessarily a bad thing (everyone gets a channel now a days), but if you are not one of their target demographic, and you sit down to watch one of their shows, it can be a very odd and surreal experience. The humor often fires off with a liberal mix of the politically incorrect and the mildly uncomfortable, sometimes sprinkling in surreal pop culture references to keep their viewers awake. Without having to say anything outright and condemn or encourage certain actions from people, I can only safely tell you that I am a huge Adult Swim fan, and that, in itself, should tell you all you need to know.

Having said that, I have years of unofficial research under my belt regarding the channel, and have decided to compile a list of the Adult Swim shows (some still on, some no longer with us) that can make even the most normal, sane, sober person feel like they just ate a handful of drugs in a creepy van behind 7/11. Also a quick disclaimer, if you hate Adult Swim and think all of this shit is stupid, refrain from coming to the comments and condemning those of us enjoy this stuff. In other words, don’t be a buzzkill, man. Just go read a different article. This site is chock full of great pieces, so if this one isn’t for you, don’t stay in the water just to pee in our pool. Also, kids, don’t do drugs. They’re bad for you and stuff. Except the ones the doctors prescribe. Those are EXTRA bad for you. Okay, on to the good stuff.

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When I finished Far Cry 3, I was actually sad. I had liberated every outpost, and activated every radio tower. I had done every hunting mission and killing mission. I had done EVERY SINGLE SIDE QUEST that was available. Truth be told, Far Cry 3 was the closest I had ever come to (willingly) getting 100% on a game of that size. And I did so because I LOVED the game. I just truly believe it is one of the games that got the “evolution into tough guy” just right. At the start of that game, you are weak and overwhelmed. But by the end, you are firing flaming arrows into camps, silently taking out guys from zip lines, and fighting tigers with your bare hands. You are literally a one man army. Add to that the fun Wonderland metaphors, and Far Cry 3 was just, pretty much a perfect game to me.

So imagine my pure bliss when I heard they were releasing a follow up, stand-alone to Far Cry 3 for fifteen bucks on Xbox live. The idea here is taking Far Cry 3 and placing it in a terrible 80′s sci-fi movie. You still have everything that made Far Cry 3 great,(minus the weapon crafting) but now you have an inch thick layer of cheese making the whole thing that much more enjoyable. While there are games you will play on Xbox live that are, technically, better. And there are games on Xbox live that push the medium much further than this game does, regardless of that, I, personally, have NEVER had as much fun with an XBLA game as I had with Blood Dragon. But you all NEED to understand something, if you were not raised on bad 80′s action and science fiction like I was, most of this will not make sense to you, and therefore, it will be half as enjoyable for you as it was for me. A fun game is here, no doubt, but if you don’t appreciate the B-movie sensibilities layered over Far Cry 3, you won’t enjoy this game. It is that very aesthetic and the fun Ubisoft has with it that makes Blood Dragon the massive, hulking beast of awesome that it is.

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Recently, I had the good fortune of hearing Patrick Stewart tell a story about how he ruined a family’s summer.

Truth be told, I think he ruined many families’ summer, so let me put it in context.

If you’re unaware of Fathom Events, then you’re missing something that’s occasionally pretty awesome. As a division of NCM Media Networks, the folks at Fathom specialize in bringing digital entertainment presentations to the masses by broadcasting these ‘single night events’ in theaters equipped with the proper technology. They airing concerts (no interest to me), big city opera (even less interest to me), or once-in-a-lifetime sport events (even less interest to me).  But, every now and then, Fathom crosses over into total, uninhibited nerdfests (now THAT’s what I’m talking about).

For example, they’ve done simulcasts of Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy, and Bill Corbett skewering ‘Manos, the Hands of Fate’ in a live presentation before a theatrical audience. You do know who Mike, Kevin, and Bill are, right? MST3K? If you’re no idea who they are, then turn in your geek credentials on the way out, please.

To date, Fathom has sponsored four special Star Trek engagements (that I know of).  I’ve attended three of them. To celebrate the kick-off of Star Trek TOS on Blu-ray, Fathom coordinated a high def screening of the two-parter classic, The Menagerie (November, 2007) – note to fans: the audience at my place was nearly at capacity, and classic Trek looked terrific up on the screen. In July of 2012, Fathom celebrated the 25th anniversary of Star Trek: The Next Generation by hosting two episodes from the first season – Where No One Has Gone Before and Datalore – on the silver screen; also, they provided some advertising filler promoting the upcoming release of TNG on Blu-ray. Four months later, Fathom screened Q Who and The Measure of a Man digitally to audiences. Continue Reading »