It’s time for another piece of my Diablo 3 review, now that I’ve had more than a single day to take it all in. It’s a game that takes months, not days to really understand, and as such, you’ll probably be seeing these journal reviews for some time to come.

It’s been about ten days since the game was released, and in that time I’ve put in (oh god) about 55 hours across two characters. I have a level 51 Barbarian that I used only to quest with a very specific friend with a similarly powerful Wizard, and a level 27 Witch Doctor that I play whenever I feel like. Which is increasingly often.

If you can’t tell by my current play time, the game is addicting. Impossibly so. Even when I’m not playing, builds and item drops race through my head. I’ve been able to keep a balance in my life despite this fact (hooray gym and girlfriend), but yeah, it’s pretty bad.

I suppose since I’ve now beaten the game about three total times, it’s worth mentioning that yes, there is some vague semblance of a plot. Unfortunately, it’s about the worst excuse for a story I’ve ever seen in a game as it kills off major characters left and right without so much as a head nod in their direction, and the dialogue is some of the most inane I’ve heard since I was a bad enough dude to rescue the President. Continue Reading »

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Between Ali G, Borat and Bruno, most of the world knows not to fall for Sacha Baron Cohen’s tricks anymore. As no one would probably believe a delusional dictator was wandering around the streets of Manhattan, so Cohen decided to go full-on fiction for his latest venture.

The Dictator is certainly a Sacha Baron Cohen movie, as he balances outrageous crudity and humor in a way that many cannot in comedies these days. But what’s missing is that spark from his other films, that wink at the camera as he allows the unsuspecting idiots he fools to be the jokes he needs on camera. When he’s forced to do everything himself, it’s not quite as effective.

The Dictator tells the story of a fictional despot, General Aladeen, from a fictional country, Wadiya who is more or less out of his mind. Out of the real world rulers out there, he’s probably a hybrid of Gaddafi (both men have an entourage of beautiful virgin bodyguards around them at all times) and the late Kim Jong Il (echoed when Aladeen hosts his own Olympics and sets every world record). Continue Reading »

“Un-name me.”

Only two weeks left and the great War of Kings appears to be coming to a head. I’m not sure if Stannis will invade King’s Landing this week or next, but it’s clearly soon, and shit’s going to go down.

This week was the “reckoning of bad decisions,” as various characters had to live with the questionable choices they’ve made.

It’s no surprise that the Starks make up two of the bad decision makers, as Catelyn let Jamie go scott-free and Jon Snow learns he got most of his Night’s Watch troupe killed when they were out looking for him after he failed to execute his wilding girl. Continue Reading »

It’s a concept that’s been mocked for well over a year now. Hollywood has run out of ideas to the point where they’re making movies out of board games. The announcement of a Battleship film was met with jeers, and rightfully so, it’s a concept so dumb it makes the upcoming Asteroids movie look like Citizen Kane in comparison.

It also raises certain questions. For example, is Hasbro shelling out millions upon millions for this feature to increase sales of their archaic Battleship board game? Or did those involved with the film have to pay the toy company to allow them to use the branding power of the game that we all played approximately five times as children? The mind boggles at how equally stupid each scenario is.

The film would have at least garnered some respect if it just dropped the entire Battleship moniker to begin with. An original, blockbuster feature about aliens fighting battleships is not the worst idea for a movie, but with the “Battleship” brand attached, all anyone ever sees is the toy. But I guess you need some sort of brand recognition when you’re spending $200M on a film, even if it’s just grasping at childhood straws.

Obviously Hasbro wanted to replicated the success of the Transformers series, from which Battleship borrows heavily. But while many of us have fond memories of Optimus Prime and Bumblebee growing up, few can say the same about a tiny gray aircraft carrier that was sunk because stupid Billy Sanders totally cheated and looked at my board when I went to get some string cheese. Continue Reading »

It’s tough to walk into a film knowing it’s going to break your heart, but that said, Bully is a must-see for anyone who has a kid, will have a kid, or currently is a kid. I’m not sure anyone is actually left out of that qualification.

The existence of bullying is not a new phenomenon, as the strong have been picking on the weak ever since the first caveman slapped his smaller neighbor and called him a fag.  It’s hard to imagine anyone who hasn’t seen or experienced bullying in their own time at school, and speaking as someone who was a foot shorter than everyone in class (even the girls) for about ten years of school (after skipping a grade), it’s somewhat of a personal issue.

But chances are none of us had it as bad as the poor souls from Bully. It’s hard to tell whether schoolyard bullying has truly escalated in severity over the years, or if because of the internet, we’re now seeing it in daylight for the first time.

The film opens on a sober note, as a tearful father recounts fond memories of his son who recently hung himself after incessant bullying. Soon, we’re transported around the country (well, around the Bible Belt at the very least) to meet a whole collection of kids who are undergoing the same sort of torment. Continue Reading »

If any game ever deserved a journal installment style of review, it’s Diablo 3. I’m not exactly sure how other outlets are running full reviews already, even with early access. It’s all about “the long game” with this title, and even though some crazies already have beaten the game in seven hours, you’ll have to get up to at least a hundred before you can fully make a judgment.

But this isn’t truly a “Day 1″ start. I did play the beta, and previously shared my thoughts about it here. But the truth is, the beta is only about eighty minutes long, and I’ve blown way past that mark already in day one.

I’m currently nearing the end of Act I. Or at least I think I am as I’ve already fought two sub bosses and have to be heading for some kind of dramatic conclusion. The acts are quite long, I’ll give them that, and I supposed they would have to be now that there are four instead of the usual five. Continue Reading »

We seem to be hurtling toward the end of this season of Game of Thrones now, and it saddens me that only three weeks remain. It’s just one of those shows you could watch forever, and I don’t know many that would complain if each episode was four hours long.

Last night’s “A Man Without Honor” might be one of my favorite entries of the season. Yes, there was blood and guts and the plot leaped forward in many ways, but it was the quieter moments that really showed how the show shines because of its writing and performances, not spectacle alone.

I’ll start with my favorite scene from the episode, one that both humanized Jamie Lannister for a moment, then made him perhaps the most monstrous soul in the land a moment later. You know of what I speak. Continue Reading »

Damn you Game of Thrones! Why must you be the best show on television yet have the shortest seasons of anything out there? Ten episodes. What are we British? Bah.

In any case, we’ll just have to enjoy them while they last, and now we’re officially over halfway done with the season after last night’s bloodbath.

Last night may have been the best episode from an action perspective yet, and opened up strong with Theon (not Ian) Greyjoy’s awkward “storming” of Winterfell. I like Game of Thrones because they can take what initially appears to be a background character and fully flesh him out with his own plotline that makes him as important to the story as any king or warlord. Continue Reading »

5 out of 5 stars

They said it couldn’t be done. Combining four giant movie franchises into one palatable package for geek and general audiences alike would seem to be an almost insurmountable task. It would be the end result of an almost decade long build of up feature films, each featuring a unique superhero who was too ” larger than life” to ever possibly share the screen with others.

So who to trust with such a seemingly insurmountable task? Why, someone who’s directed exactly one feature film in his career, one that was a conclusion to one of his own failed TV shows. Here, Joss Whedon ,take our $250M and run wild.

What might seem like insanity from the outside was perhaps the biggest stroke of genius that ever occurred to Paramount and Marvel. Though Whedon would appear to lack experience with anything close to this scale, they saw in his earlier work an unmistakable intelligence and understanding of the two things superhero movies often lack, a smart script and well-rounded characters to deliver it.

Continue Reading »

Yes, it’s yet another romantic movie review, but unlike The Vow and The Lucky One, this one is rated-R. Swearing! Vulgarity! While that alone might now be enough for me to retake my manhood as a reviewer, The Avengers will take care of that this weekend, and I did genuinely want to see The Five-Year Engagement.

It strikes two personal chords with me, as I am indeed newly engaged, planning a rather far off wedding, and also almost the entire film was shot about four miles away from me in my city of Ann Arbor, Michigan. But familiar storefronts and inside Michigander jokes do not necessarily a good movie make.

The plot is an unfortunate circumstance that many couples come across. When two people have jobs, whose takes precedence when moving across the country is required? Even though Tom (Jason Segel) is an up and coming chef in San Francisco, when his fiancée Violet (Emily Blunt) gets offered a dream gig at the University of Michigan doing research, he packs up his knives and heads out to the frozen tundra, which is at least how the state is portrayed. Which is entirely accurate for about seven months out of the year. Continue Reading »