Eight Cents

American Idol Running Diary: April 17

2007-04-17T21:10:00.000-04:00

It's country week, and they couldn't have chosen a better vocal talent than Martina McBride to coach. Seriously, she is fantastic. Phil, however, is creepy, and not in a fantastic way. The strangely-detached-from-the-situation-that-is-this-show bald dude is first up this week.

Phil Stacey: "Where the Blacktop Ends"

What more do you write about Phil? It's better when he wears a hat, as his baldness weirds me out. I can't explain why, so don't ask. But as always, he's mostly in tune, but it seems like his head is in a different place. Keith Urban rules, and he's got a lot better songs than this that could be used in a singing competition. "You'll Think of Me" comes to mind. Anyway, this is unremarkable.
Rating: **

Jordin Sparks: "Broken Wing"

Jordin has the chops to do this song, but it's either going to be awesome or a complete disaster. There is no in between. The dress she is wearing is a disaster, though I usually don't comment on the attire of our fair contestants. It reminds me of a kimono. But anyway, the song. The first half was a disaster, but the second half was really good. Also, I just want to point out that I quoted the first part of Randy's feedback before he said it. I've seen this show a lot. So yeah, Jordin is really good, and with the toss-up that this season is turning out to be, she's got a serious shot at making the finals. Good stuff.
Rating: ***

Sanjaya Malakar: "Something to Talk About"

Now it's time for our weekly dose of obnoxious. Sanjaya makes my head hurt on so many levels. He's doing Bonnie Raitt, which is decidedly un-fantastic. His goal is to do her justice, so he says, and he will fail. He is curiously dressed like an Indian Bruce Springsteen with a perm, and it does not work at all. Also, neither does his lower register. You know, I could kind of understand when he was getting voted through earlier, what with the shy demeanor and the huge white teeth. But now, count me among the confused masses that watch this kid get more full of himself every week, for Lord knows what reason, while teenage girls and their moms continue to fall all over themselves to vote for him. Lo and behold, this is another horrible performance. Simon is so annoyed that this guy is still on the show, and it's hilarious. His feedback is the one good thing that comes from suffering through a minute and a half of aural cruelty.
Rating: negative *

LaKisha Jones: "Jesus Take the Wheel"

I've never been a huge fan of this song, as I find it a bit corny and contrived, but it's a good way to show off the vocals. LaKisha nailed the first verse, showing great control and restraint, but she got a little shaky on the chorus, and it sounded like she was trying just a little too hard to pour everything into it. That's actually okay for this song, though, because it was obvious that she was "feeling it", as they say. So it was a little shaky, but the voters will probably respond favorably anyway. Jesus is popular, after all. I didn't think it was as bad as the judges did, but it certainly wasn't her best. Rating: **1/2

Chris Richardson: "Mayberry"

He sounds exactly like the lead singer of Rascal Flatts (read: nasal), so this should be pretty "good", as far as that goes. But then he comes out and butchers the first few notes. Of course, it's not helping that the fiddle is WAY out of tune. Seriously, my ears are bleeding. That's embarrassing. They should turn off the fiddle's mic. Chris seems to be distracted by the disaster that is the group of instruments surrounding him, and I can't say that I'm hearing anything he's singing at all. I can't rate this debacle.
Rating: I need a nap. If a song could perform a lobotomy, this one just did. I don't know what that means, other than some of my brains just leaked out of my ears.

Melinda Doolittle: Trouble is a Woman"

Not to sound like Paula, but Melinda looks great this week. I like the song she's singing, too. Julie Reeves isn't all that well-known, but she's good. She's a Gretchen Wilson-type that filled that niche before Wilson was well-known. But anyway, Melinda is nailing this. Shocker. The band is a bit loud, and drowns her out at times, but she's just money. The only problem I see is the fact that this is such a niche song, and it's hard to sing it in a way that's universally appealing. Melinda is tremendously likable, though, and she'll be fine.
Rating: ***

Blake Edwards: "When the Stars Go Blue"

I like this song, but the one that Bono did with The Corrs blows this version out of the water. That version was actually a cover of the Ryan Adams original, and this is the Tim McGraw version. I'm just sayin'. Blake gives a relatively solid vocal, but the instruments are way too pronounced in this arrangement. This is more of a soft song, and the band is killing it. It's rushed, and it just didn't work at all on the whole. It was in tune, but that's about all I can say. Randy compliments the arrangement, and sometimes I wonder how he's a producer.
Rating: *1/2

So altogether, not such an impressive night. There are so many country songs that can really show off vocals, and Jordin was the only one who really took advantage of that. The ratings are out of 5 stars, by the way, so as you can see, I was pretty underwhelmed. I don't know how much I'll re-dedicate myself to the live blog of this show, but it's fun to check back in to this particular blog. As for predictions, you heard it here first:

Should be in the bottom three:

Phil
Chris
Sanjaya (eliminated)

Will be in the bottom three:

LaKisha
Phil
Chris (eliminated)

Music (Concert): Pearl Jam at the United Center; Chicago, IL

2006-06-10T22:18:00.000-04:00

From pearljam.com:

Set 1 Release, World Wide Suicide, Life Wasted, Severed Hand, Comatose, Given To Fly, Low Light, Corduroy, I'm Open, I Got Id, Even Flow, Unemployable, Daughter /(W.M.A.), Present Tense, Do The Evolution, Jeremy, Save You, Porch

Encore 1 You've Got To Hide Your Love Away, Better Man, Come Back, State Of Love And Trust, Black, Alive

Encore 2 Go, Blood /(Atomic Dog), Indifference, Baba O'Riley, Yellow Ledbetter

I’ve seen a lot of concerts in my day.  All sorts of rock, country, blues, etc.  Big venues, small venues, indoor and outdoor venues.  I’ve never been to any show quite like the Pearl Jam concert I attended with Zimm three weeks ago.

You may wonder how I remember a concert well enough to review it 3 ½ weeks after the fact.  The answer lies in the best idea conceived since live music and the internet came together.  Pearl Jam, in case you haven’t heard, makes every single one of their concerts available for download a couple of days after the show.  I don’t know who thought of this, but it’s absolute genius.  There are always moments at good concerts that you remember fondly, but after a while you don’t remember them quite as clearly.  Not so here, for obvious reasons.  So let’s get into why this concert was so awesome.

If you’ve ever read anything I’ve written, you know I tend to throw around adjectives.  I’ve called more than a few things “awesome” (see above).  However, I don’t throw around phrases like “emotional experience” very often.  That’s what the Pearl Jam concert was.  I don’t mean it changed my life or something; I just mean that in a musical sense, the crowd at the United Center that night (and most nights at a Pearl Jam concert, I imagine) were taken on a ride, and Eddie Vedder was the driver.

It goes without saying that the supporting players in Pearl Jam are stellar artists.  Mike McCready is seldom mentioned when people talk about great guitarists of today, and that’s a gross oversight.  It’s a fact that Matt Cameron is makes extremely complicated drumming look easy.  But you don’t hear about these guys because Eddie Vedder is the one who garners the attention for the band, and that’s a good thing.  Vedder pours everything he has into every song, every time they play, and it shows.  From the opening strains of ‘Release” to the end of “Yellow Ledbetter”, the audience was enraptured with everything Ed was telling us.  I think another reason for that is passion of the fans themselves.

If you don’t know the lyrics to a lot of the songs, I can’t imagine it would be the same kind of experience.  So much of what Pearl Jam is about comes across not only in the intensity of the music itself, but in the lyrics.  And the fans know all the words to almost every song.  During the first song, when we all cried out “Release me!” together, we were all on the same page with Eddie and the band.  That’s a major difference between Pearl Jam and a lot of other bands I’ve seen.  Pearl Jam seems to perform with the fans in addition to for them.  We were as much a part of the show as anyone else.  Off the top of my head, we sang by ourselves on eight songs.  Some of those were at least a chorus, and sometimes more.  And whereas other bands stop playing when the crowd sings so that the crowd can hear themselves, Pearl Jam kept playing with us, as if we were a many-voiced lead singer, and enough people were singing that we were easily heard.  It’s an unreal feeling to have that happen.  And it wasn’t always with words.  In “Jeremy”, for example, one of the most intense moments of the whole concert for me was the end of the song, where the crowd did the telltale screaming that closes the song out.

The first set had a lot of great songs, and had it ended with the new alternate version of “Porch”, that would have been a great evening of music.  As it was, it was almost like the set was just a warm up for the encores.  Eddie Vedder came out alone with an acoustic guitar to lead us in Beatles cover “You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away”, after which we sang “Better Man” (a chorus by ourselves, which also happened on the preceding song and “Even Flow”).  This first encore contained songs that, whatever they were inspired by, are very intense and personal, and Vedder plays them accordingly.  I’m referring to “Better Man”, “Black”, and “Alive”.  All three of these songs were unbelievable.  Vedder ended “Black” with the heartbreaking “we belong together” tag, which I haven’t heard for a long time.  And from the heartbreaking to the heartbreakingly inspirational (a weird combination of words, but I think it describes the song well), they transitioned into “Alive”.  We sang along with every word, and then during the final guitar solo, we started pumping our fists and chanting “Yeah!” on the downbeat.  I know fist-pumping is totally 1995, but maybe you had to be there, alright?  It was surreal.  Maybe something like that happens every time they play this particular song, but it was one of those concert moments that’s stuck with me and I see it vividly every time I listen to that version of the song.

When they came out for the second encore and rattled off two of their hardest-hitting songs from the Vs. album in “Go” and “Blood”, it was like they infused adrenaline straight into the veins of an exhausted crowd that had been on its feet for the better part of two hours straight.  Then, of course, it was straight into the mellow, introspective “Indifference” (also from Vs.).  Of course, even though that particular song was considerably slower than the first two, everyone knew the part was coming where we would all yell out the lyric “I will scream my lungs out/till it fills this room”.  And of course, what’s a Pearl Jam show without the rousing Who cover “Baba O’Riley” and “Yellow Ledbetter” with the house lights up to finish the nigh?

So all in all, it was a concert I won’t soon forget, and you can now count me among the Pearl Jam faithful.  This is a unique band that puts on an unbelievable and powerful live show.  If you ever have the chance, go see them.  You won’t regret it. Just make sure you study up on the lyrics first, so that you can get the full effect.

Final Score: 5 cents.

Finale Exam 05-06

2006-05-29T08:24:00.000-04:00

**Caution: Spoilers ahead!**

“Thief”
I liked the first season of “Thief”.  I think it showed a lot of promise.  But the season finale presents a unique dilemma, if you will, for a reviewer not on the inside of the TV business.  I’ll explain:  the finale wrapped everything up very tidily.  That’s fine if there’s no season two (which would be disappointing, because as I said, the potential is still there).  If there is a season two, we got no indication of that, or in what direction the season would head, should it indeed happen.  If the show is supposed to continue, a hook of some sort would have been nice to at least let us know there’s more to come.  We’ve got a couple of team members leaving town, one going to jail (probably for quite a long time), and one that looks like he might even die.  So is that the end?  The problem is that if it is the end, I could deal with it.  I don’t want to be able to deal with it if there’s more to come.  Make me want more.

Season: 3 cents
Finale: 3 cents (if the series is over), 2 cents (if it’s not)

“Supernatural”
I really enjoyed this finale.  The big confrontation with the demon was expected, but the guys getting broadsided by a semi totally took me by surprise.  I think the episode was just kind of cruising until the big ending.  That’s what made it so effective.  This is another one that could be the end of the season or the end of the series, depending on what the new CW network does with it.  Should it end like this, it would be a fitting ending for a show with this theme.  Obviously, though, I’m hoping they bring it back, because I was a big fan this year.  (Edit: The CW has it on the fall schedule.)

Season: 4 cents
Finale: 4 cents

“Veronica Mars”
A season finale should always be a special episode if you ask me, especially in a drama or mystery series.  And as excellent as the first two seasons of “Veronica Mars” have been, the finales have both been exactly what they should be.  The big mystery was solved, and while it came completely out of left field, it also made sense.  Who would have suspected Beaver?  On the other hand, the part with the plane seemed a little forced.  I never really got the feeling that Keith was in any danger, and the fact that the plane blew up in full view of Veronica and Cassidy was a little goofy.  But other than that one element, everything else was absolutely stellar.  And now we’re left wondering what’s so important that Keith would leave Veronica at the airport without going there to tell her what’s up.

Season: 5 cents
Finale: 4.5 cents

“The Office”
This is a unique show.  It’s hilarious (the funniest show on television right now), but it also has a coherent plotline, and they play it out better than a lot of dramas do.  At the end, when Jim and Pam kissed, it was like two people you know who should totally get together finally do.  And with Jim’s pending transfer, there are all sorts of directions the show could take next season.

Season: 5 cents
Finale: 5 cents

“My Name is Earl”

“Earl” is also hilarious, and also has a coherent plotline, but it’s more like a bunch of mini-stories, told within the confines of a big premise (like most sitcoms), whereas “The Office” is one big story where funny things are always happening (the events of previous episodes aren’t forgotten).  But anyway, in this situation, you don’t expect much from a season finale (as far as your cliffhangers, major developments, and other finale-type fodder).  So for what it was, the finale was very good.  We had a potential premise-changing development, some more funny things happened, and the situation got better.  Good stuff.

Season: 3.5 cents (it started off slow I thought, but got better)
Finale: 4 cents

“How I Met Your Mother”

Well, at least they killed the possibility of Ted getting together with Robin, since we already know they don’t end up together.  Oh wait.  They didn’t do that.  Well, at least Marshall and Lily’s wedding was nice.  What?  We’re supposed to think they’re breaking off the engagement?  Oh.  Well, Barney is always entertaining.  (Disclaimer: Yeah, I know this show targets women, but it’s actually pretty funny.  No, seriously.  It’s worth watching with your wife/girlfriend.)

Season: 3.5 cents
Finale: 2.5 cents

“Prison Break”

If you thought Fox would try to stretch this show into a second season, raise your hand.  Okay, now that you’ve all got your hands up, if you thought it would actually work, keep your hand raised.  Personally, I didn’t think it would.  After seeing the season finale, I’m still not sure that it will, but it’s possible.  I just don’t know how they can do it.  Once we find out what happens immediately following the events of the finale, where do they go?  I can see it lasting a couple episodes, but it’s going to take some good writing to get another season out of this premise.  Luckily they can still get some mileage out of the Vice President killing the President.  It’ll definitely be interesting to see what happens.

Season: 4 cents
Finale: 4 cents

“Invasion”

This was definitely an up-and-down season.  It started out kind of okay, then got pretty good, and it ended up being kind of okay.  It felt like everything they did could have been done with one episode fewer than they actually ran.  The finale was alright.  We had the hybrids getting caught by the military, the fools irrationally going after Tom (with one of them coming to their senses), and Larkin even got shot.  So that’s our hook for next season.  Did Tom make her a hybrid or didn’t he?  And where do we go from here?  I think this is another one that could have told its story in one season.  So depending on what happens in the first episode of next season, I might be done with this.

Season: 3 cents
Finale: 3 cents

“Law & Order: SVU”

Pretty much a regular episode, which is really all you can expect from this show if none of the characters are leaving.  These guys can only get shot for a cliffhanger so many times.  So it was fun to get a Tom Cruise “psychiatric drugs are poison” shot in, even though it’s hardly a hot topic right now.

Season: 3.5 cents
Finale: 3.5 cents

“The Unit”

David Mamet’s creation topped off a stellar freshman season with an outstanding finale.  We got an ending to the small picture, but the future is wide open for all the members of the unit, and so much so that the show could literally go in any direction.  Dennis Haysbert has a thing for ending his seasons being injured, but this time it doesn’t look life-threatening (also, there’s no way in the world that they would kill him off with how valuable he is to the show).  And we still don’t really know if any of the wives were shot.  I’m really looking forward to the next season..

Season: 5 cents
Finale: 5 cents

“24”

Call me a sucker, but I believed every second of what I watched on “24” this season.  At least while I was watching the show.  I know that a lot of things are implausible when you think about them, but seriously—why think about them?  Sure, he infiltrated a helicopter that was carrying the President.  But he didn’t ridiculously rob a convenience store, right?  This was the best season since the second one if you ask me (and the fact that Kim didn’t play a major part is no coincidence), and with the premise of the Chinese coming back to get Jack, there’s a lot of promise for season six.  You had to know that was coming when the Chinese guy told him that Kim was on the phone, right?  That was great stuff.

Season: 5 cents
Finale: 5 cents

“House”

“House” is always solid, but every now and again, the show is capable of extraordinary episodes, and this was one of them.  Dr. House is a brilliant, deep character, and that provides a lot of potential for great storylines and development.  Delving into that character while also having an “is it or isn’t it real” theme to the episode was fantastic.  The whole episode had a surreal type of feel to it, but not to the extent that it would have been a shocking if everything had been real.  (The events themselves would have been shocking, of course, but not so much the fact that they were real.  Everyone still with me here?)  Of course, the big shocker came in the beginning.  It’s not a surprise that someone would want to shoot House, but that it actually happened, and in the beginning of the episode at that, was great.

Season: 4 cents
Finale: 5 cents

“Lost”

Maybe I’m in the minority, but I’ve come to terms with the fact that nothing, or at least very little, is going to be resolved on this show until the very end.  Developments can happen, just like in this season finale, but where do the resolutions lie?  I think it’s in the nature of the island.  And if we find that out, that’s the end of the show.  So I’m satisfied with Kate, Jack and Sawyer being held by the Others (we’re bound to get some background on the Others now that some main characters are there with them).  Finding out more about the hatch was great.  So there were some questions answered, and we’ve got a bunch more material for next season.  I’m excited for that.

Season: 4.5 cents
Finale: 5 cents

“Conviction”

This turned out to be the series finale on what turned out to be quite a decent show.  We got legal’d out with the “Law & Order”s and “CSI”s of the world, but we ended up keeping this one.  Anyway, the finale was very good.  It was a two-hour affair involving a couple of guys taking a courtroom hostage and the events that unfolded (obviously that’s a simplification).  No cliffhangers (thankfully), but there were quite a few interesting character developments and some great action.  I won’t be losing sleep or anything about this one being cancelled, but it was a good show.

Season: 3.5 cents
Finale: 4 cents

“Alias”

The series finale was satisfying. I liked how Sloane ended up, and it was fine to see Sidney and Vaughn end up together with kids in some remote location, with Dixon still occasionally coming by to commission them for some special mission.  That was all fine.  That having been said, the last few seasons were disappointing enough that the series finale was a bit anticlimactic.  It’s like I wasn’t expecting much, so I’m just glad that things got resolved, regardless of how.

Season: 3 cents
Finale 3 cents
Series: 4 cents

“Scrubs”

This show never gets boring, just like any good comedy.  Every episode is good, and the finale was no exception.  But did we really need to get everyone pregnant?  It’s fine to have Dr. Cox have another kid, and of course Carla wanted one, but what’s the advantage of making JD’s new girlfriend pregnant?  A baby can kill a show, but if anyone can pull it off, it’s these guys.  The writers have never given me reason to doubt, so I guess we’ll see what happens next year.

Season: 4 cents
Finale: 4 cents

Not reviewed: SNL, Amazing Race, American Idol, King of Queens, Everybody Hates Chris, Simpsons.

Quick Predictions

2006-05-24T19:17:00.000-04:00

I figured I’d get a quick prediction in before the American Idol finale here. I just watched the performances from last night. I think Taylor’s going to win pretty handily, but it would have been more of a sure thing if he’d done “You Are So Beautiful” instead of the obnoxious “Levon” for his second song. But the final songs (the singles that each performer will release) sealed the deal. Neither song was any good (as is always the case with the finalists’ first singles), but Taylor made his song awesome while Katharine just kind of sailed through hers, making it painfully mediocre. That’s about all I have to say about the finals.

American Idol Running Diary: 5/9

2006-05-09T21:57:00.000-04:00

Ah, Elvis week.  This should be interesting.  I’m expecting Chris’ healed vocal chords to help him have a good night, and Taylor will also excel.  Note: Priscilla Presley is frighteningly plastic surgeried, as we found in the opening vignette.

Taylor Hicks: “Jailhouse Rock”

Pre: Should fit him pretty well; Tommy Motolla moved the key up half a step, which should really turn out to be a good idea.

During:  What is with the hair?  I hope everyone doesn’t dress retarded this week.  Taylor sounds great, and his dancing is still pleasantly spastic.  He lost his earpiece toward the end and still nailed the finish.  Impressive.

Post: That was excellent.  Hopefully the rest of the show measures up.  His style fits Elvis very well.  Simon called it a terrible impersonation of Elvis, but I thought it was good because he wasn’t trying to impersonate Elvis.

Chris Daughtry: “Suspicious Minds”

Pre: They’re talking about Chris’ “fan clubs”.  This whole conversation is disturbing.  I won’t go into detail.  This song should be good for him because it’s not one that he has to belt out.  He really does well when he just does clean vocals.

During: We’re rocking the hangover sunglasses tonight, and the backdrop is still red, although not on fire this week.  That’s at least slightly more pleasant.  This song is indeed good for his style, but honestly this has never been one of my favorites from Elvis.

Post: He did it well, but the song itself is just lackluster to me.  Randy said the vocal wasn’t great, which I can’t understand.  How a producer can be so wrong about pitch sometimes I will never know.

Elliott Yamin: “I Can Dream”

Pre: I don’t know this song, which makes me happy.  The problem with songs like “Jailhouse Rock” is that they’re so totally associated with Elvis.  This one shouldn’t have that problem.

During: This is great for him.  The vibrato was a bit much in the beginning, but he’s totally killing it now.  Fantastic.  And the ending was absolutely perfect.

Post: Awesome again.  Perhaps his best so far.  If he can pull out another one like this, he could very well escape elimination this week.  I really really liked that.  Simon called it the best of the show so far, and I absolutely agree.  The nervousness seems to be gone, and he’s picking up his game at the right time.

Katharine McPhee:

Pre: I’m hardly Mr. Blackwell, but her wardrobe has been awful.  She could look so much better with better clothes.  Anyway, this song should be really interesting.  I would not have guessed she’d pick this song.

During: She’s really doing well with this one.  Ohhhh!  She forgot a lyric.  That’s suicide in the early rounds, but she’s earned some points throughout the season, so I don’t it’ll be too bad.

Post: She showed a great range with that song, and I liked it a lot.  Simon is saying it was “manic and shrieky”.  I’m not sure I agree, but I can see where he’s coming from for sure.  I say range, he says shrieks.  Potaeto Potahto, if you will.

Taylor Hicks:  “In the Ghetto”

Pre: He’s talking about a “magical golf cart ride” with Pricilla Presley.  And it’s making me uncomfortable.  I don’t know this song, but the title rules.  Motolla is telling him to ditch the spaz dance for this one, which is a good idea now and then, like he did with the Beatles song last week.

During: He’s pulling this off well, but it’s hard for me to take a song with this title seriously.  Especially with the background singers repeating “In the Ghettoooooo…”.  But again, the vocals are solid.

Post: Meh.  Pretty good, but honestly the way Motolla was talking, I was expecting more.  I think I would have liked it better without the background lyrics.  But that’s just one guy’s opinion.

Chris Daughtry: “A Little Less Conversation”

Pre: I dig this song.  It’ll be very interesting to see how he pulls this off.

During: Ah, the white man’s overbite.  We got a glimpse of it for the first time this season.  Luckily Chris has a good lower range, because that’s all it is before the final hook.  This is alright, but he’s trying to be too intense, and this isn’t a serious song (to me, anyway).  Good ending, though.  That wrapped it up well.

Post:  Good stuff.  Not great, but good.  This is a good week.  Paula thought it showed personality, and I thought the exact opposite.  And Simon agrees with me.

Elliott Yamin: “Trouble”

Pre: Hmmmm.  If he does this one well, it’ll do wonders for him.  At least if this is the song I’m thinking of.  It seems like more of a departure from his usual style, which he needs.

During: I like this a lot, but he should not be smiling during a song with the lyrics “I’m evil”.  Oh, man.  If he gets voted off this week after these two performances, I call shenanigans.  This is great.

Post: Great, great choice.  He really should not have smiled during it, and I think that would have helped, but he was perfect.  He needed a huge week, and he totally pulled it out.

Katharine McPhee: “Can’t Help Falling in Love”

Pre: I think this is a mistake.  This is a great song, but she’s got to make it sound original or it could be bad news for her.  Please don’t make me think of UB40.  I’m begging here.

During: Her voice is superb as always, but she’s over-enunciating.  This song is about being weak.  You’ve got to show that I think.  No smiles.  It’s about helplessness.  She’s not showing that.
Post: She had some good runs in there, but she actually did have a couple of pitch problems this week.  Also, the runs weren’t needed.  The song should have been more simple and heartbreaking.  I think her confidence was wavering, really.  It seemed like she was throwing all the runs in there to make up for something when she didn’t need to.

Predictions:

Instead of the bottom three (since there’s only four left), I’ll just rank the contestants, with number four being my prediction to go home.  Before this week I had Elliott on the bottom.  Not so anymore.  In fact, I had Katharine McPhee winning the thing last week, and this show totally flipped my rankings on their head.  In any other week, Katharine would cruise through.  But now that it’s down to a stellar final four, she’s going to have problems.  Her only savior could be the sympathy vote, but honestly I don’t think she’s going to get it.  Everyone is great at this point, and any one of these four could win in a season prior.  But all of that is moot.  Here are the rankings:

Taylor Hicks

Elliott Yamin

Chris Daughtry

Katharine McPhee

Elliott had a huge week when he needed it, and Katharine choked. That’s the harsh reality. It remains to be seen whether the voters will agree (or admit to the truth).

American Idol Running Diary: 5/2

2006-05-02T22:03:00.000-04:00

I noticed after reading last week’s running diary that it’s pretty unintelligible.  It made complete sense to me while I was writing it, but of course you’re not watching the show as you read it, and hence the unintelligibility.  So sorry about that.  To make it more readable, I’ll be doing some modifications this week.  I’m doing thoughts before, during, and after the song.  If it helps (or not), let me know.  If anyone’s reading, that is.  Enjoy.

Elliott Yamin: “On Broadway”

Pre: Not sure what this song choice is all about.  A funkified version of “On Broadway”?  Whatever.  Good thing they’re doing two songs tonight, because I don’t know who’s supposed to connect with this one.

During: But man, is this guy good.  He could sing the phone book, to use an annoying cliché, and it would be awesome.

Post: Loved it.  I hate the song, but I love listening to Elliott.  Still, hopefully he picks a better song for the next one.

Paris Bennett: “Kiss”

Pre: Very intriguing.  Paris covering Prince just doesn’t sound right, but we shall see.

During: Not sure what to think here.  I think had I never heard the original, it might be alright.  But I can’t help hearing Prince’s falsetto, and this version doesn’t work for me.  And honestly, it’s always bothered me when a woman takes a man’s song (and vice versa), and changes all the gender-specific pronouns.  Maybe it’s just me.

Post:  Paula still likes the old songs (so do I), and Simon didn’t like it.  I didn’t either, but I don’t know whether that’s because it was bad, or because of the version.  Just didn’t work.

Chris Daughtry: “Renegade”

Pre: I dig this song, and it should show off his vocals, which is good.

During: I’m glad they did the first part of the song.  It would have been blasphemous had they skipped it, but American Idol is not above blasphemy.  Chris picked a good one tonight.  He’s right on and nailing every bit of it.

Post: Awesome.  Not much else to say.

Katharine McPhee: “Against All Odds”

Pre: I hate this freaking song.

During: Ouch.  Started flat, but that won’t continue.  And it doesn’t, but even though she’s hitting the notes, I’m not getting anything from this one.  No feeling, really.  It seems like she didn’t even want to sing it.

Post:  Good thing there’s another one coming up, because that was not great at all.  The difference between her performance and Elliott’s is that I don’t like either song, but Elliott made me forget that fact.

Taylor Hicks: “Play that Funky Music”

Pre:  Very interesting.  This song rules no matter how many times you hear it, and I don’t care what anyone says.

During:  Seems like Taylor’s happy to be where he is again.  I was wondering the last few weeks.  The man’s enthusiasm is infectious when he’s on, and he’s on tonight.  The dancing is painful, but also hilarious.

Post:  Way too shortened.  He didn’t actually sing much during the performance, but I still thought it was still enjoyable, which is cool.

Elliott Yamin: “Home”

Pre: I’m not a Michael Buble fan.  Let’s see what happens.

During:  But again, I like Elliott.  The problem with this one, though, is that it feels a bit rushed.  I’ve never heard the song, but it’s…decent, I guess.  It’ll be enough to get him through, for sure, because the vocals are just gold.

Post:  That definitely could have been slowed down some, and Simon’s probably right when he says the song didn’t really have enough of a hook or anything to be memorable.  But I still think he’ll be alright.

Paris Bennett: “Be Without You”

Pre: n/a

During: I love that she’s doing Mary J. Blige, because it shows off her awesome lower range.  This girl has got some kind of voice.  She’s nailing everything, but I could really do without the little “Hey”s and “Come on”s and other adlibbing.

Post:  I think she did really well for the most part.

Chris Daughtry: “I Dare You”

Pre: Chris is a better singer than the lead singer of Shinedown, if you ask me, so this should be interesting.

During:  You know, they really could use a different background during rock songs on this show.  I don’t need the flames every time.  Jessica just asked why we’re in hell.  I’d like to know too.  He started off pretty well, but after the high notes it seems like he lost his breath.  It looks like he’s screaming his way through it.

Post:  Yeah, that wasn’t so good.  He said it’s about the fifth time he’s done it today, and that song can definitely take a toll on the voice.  (After-show note: When they played back the recaps—which is what happened in dress rehearsals—this song sounded waaaay better than what he actually did during the show.)

Katharine McPhee: “Black Horse in a Cherry Tree”

Pre:  What?  That’s the weirdest song title I’ve ever heard of.

During: But I can dig it.  Not sure what the dancing on her knees is all about, but I like the box drummers.  Also the song is interesting for sure.  It doesn’t feel like your typical Billboard top ten song, which is refreshing.

Post:  I actually liked that quite a bit.  I don’t have any idea what it was about, but it had a cool groove to it.

Taylor Hicks: “Something”

Pre: n/a

During: This is the kind of song he needed to do after the first one.  He picked one to show the vocals, and it’s working really well for him.

Post:  That was great.  Solid vocals, nothing fancy, and it was exactly what he needed to do.

I really enjoyed tonight’s show.  Simon was right when he called it “erratic”, and I think that’s not necessarily a bad thing.  Taylor definitely had the best night.  Elliott’s stock fell a little bit, so I hope that doesn’t hurt him, because I always hate to see someone suffer for picking a less than stellar song and singing it well.

Predictions

Bottom Three: Paris, Elliott, Chris.  Tough to pick a bottom three anymore.  This is by far the best top five the show has ever had.  No one was really bad, so here’s where it becomes a popularity contest.  I don’t even know if they’ll do a bottom three, really.  But if they do, I can’t imagine Katharine and Taylor in it.

Going Home: Paris.  She’s good, but she’s too one-dimensional at this point.

If You're Not Watching: "Thief"

2006-04-30T21:06:00.000-04:00

This is something I’ll do every once in a while for lesser-known cable shows, or quality shows that aren’t getting the viewership I think they deserve.

During my hiatus, there hasn’t been much of note as far as new TV shows, but there is one that has shown promise.  “Thief” is a show on FX about a group of—you guessed it—thieves.  This isn’t your mustache-twirling, devious scheme-hatching group of thieves, and it’s also not your fun-loving, non-violent, Ocean’s Eleven type of thieves either.  This is their job, and they take it very seriously.  In the pilot episode, they had to “fire” one of the group because he screwed up and compromised a job.  And by “fire” I mean “shoot”.  But thievery and murder aside, these guys are the protagonists, and as such they are rather likeable.  Andre Braugher plays Nick, the leader of the team.  Week after week he has turned in excellent performances that help carry the show.  In the pilot, Nick’s wife is killed in a car accident, leaving him to take care of stepdaughter Tammi (Mae Whitman, also known as Ann from “Arrested Development”, who gives another MVP performance on the show).

The relationship between Nick and Tammi is strained at the very best, and it obviously complicates things with Nick’s job to have a teenage girl that is continually prying in his business.  But business continues, and the scenes involving Nick’s “job” are always intense and entertaining.  All in all this is a pretty good show right now that has potential to be great.  For some reason the first season is very short (the season finale is this week), and I’d recommend checking out the sure-to-be-released DVDs before the next season starts.

Final Score: 3 cents.

In other “if you’re not watching” news, CBS’ “The Unit” just keeps getting better and better.  If you’re not watching this one, you’re really missing out.  It’s been a good performer ratings-wise, but I know there’s still a few of you out there that haven’t checked it out yet.  Do it, and you’ll be glad you did.

“Veronica Mars”, on the other hand, has not performed as well as it should in the ratings.  As I said in my “Top Ten” post a while ago, this is easily one of the best shows around right now, and I highly recommend you check it out, whatever your TV watching tastes may be.  “Arrested Development” has already gone the way of the dodo, and I don’t think I can handle if this one doesn’t come back next year.  That having been said, I think it will in fact have a home on the new CW network. But if the ratings don’t pick up then, I fear for its future.  So check out the season one DVDs now, and likewise the season two DVDs when they’re released.  That way when season three starts, everyone will watch, and balance can be restored to the TV universe.  (At least as much as possible without “Arrested Development”.  Yes, I’m bitter.)

Ameircan Idol running diary: 4/25

2006-04-25T22:22:00.000-04:00

Here we go with the latest semi-live blog of “American Idol”.  Looks like this week we have Andrea Bocelli.  I’ve heard of him, but I’m not a big classical fan.  Sounds like he’s got a great voice, though.  And it’s a shame they didn’t mention that he’s blind, because people might wonder why he never opens his eyes.  David Foster is the producer this week who’s telling the idols how much they suck before the performances.  About time someone didn’t sugarcoat everything they do.

Katharine McPhee: “I Have Nothing”

I hate it when people do Whitney Houston songs because it’s so cliché, but she’s allowed.  Unfortunately you’ve got to have a hell of a lower register for a song like this, and she’s a bit flat sometimes.  On the bright side, she’s absolutely nailing the chorus.  And the bridge is fantastic, making her dad cry again.  All in all a little shaky, but the good parts were far more memorable than the bad parts.  Randy of course can’t tolerate it when someone sings Whitney Houston, and he brings out the old “she’s one of the best singers in the known world” line.  They’re all tearing her apart, and I don’t get it.  I thought it was good.

Elliott Yamin: “A Song For You”

He’s been waiting his whole life to sing this song onstage, according to him, so hopefully he doesn’t screw it up.  I don’t know what this song is.  Let’s have a listen, shall we?  Again, he’s taking a difficult song and making it look like it’s nothing.  He really excels at doing these highly stylized, if sometimes little-known songs and just blowing them out of the water.  I loved it.  I may just have to check out more from this Donnie Hathaway guy.  Randy didn’t like the arrangement because it was confusing, but it was freaking piano, and I really liked it.  Paula is in tears and Simon is laughing at her. Hilarious.  But they’re all showing Elliott love tonight, which makes me happy because he’s always been one of my favorites this year.  In fact, if I could pick the winner myself, I’d pick Elliott.

Kellie Pickler: “Unchained Melody”

Listening to her is making me dumber.  She says she’s doing the “Leann Rimes twist”, but there is no twist really.  She does a carbon copy of the Righteous Brothers.  But back to Kellie, if my prediction holds true, this song will kill her.  The arrangement does her no favors, as it starts in the middle of the freaking first verse.  Also she’s flat as a tire with a nail in it.  Not to mention that David Foster mentioned in the pre-song vignette that if the song is done without passion, it’s very boring.  We are seeing that his statement is absolutely true.  I’m getting nothing here.  That was horrendous.  The judges are killing her, and rightfully so.  Hopefully…hopefully people don’t vote for the poor little hick girl who got ripped by the judges.  Because she should be finished.  It was a nice run while it lasted, and she could be entertaining at times, but it should really be over now.

Paris Bennett: “The Way We Were”

Streisand?  Seriously?  The theme is love songs, and this is what we get?  Ugh.  But let’s see how it turns out before I get too harsh.  She hasn’t even started yet.
Okay.  Perhaps I was a bit rash.  She’s in the lower range of her voice that I really enjoy with her.  Maybe it’s not Streisand’s songs that bother me so much as it is Streisand.  Imagine that.  See, the difference between this and Kellie’s performance is all in the emotion.  This girl is seventeen years old, and still manages a truckload more passion for the song than Pickler dreamed of.  Pretty good, but not outstanding.  Sounds like the judges feel the same way.

-

A side note here…I’ve mentioned that I TiVo this show and skip through all the banter, but I catch a little of Simon and Ryan’s banter as I’m typing here.  It’s stupid, and the first word that comes to mind is “catty”.  Pretty ridiculous.

-

Taylor Hicks: “Just Once”

Bocelli says he probably picked the best song for his voice, and I’m tending to agree.  He started off a touch flat, but it looks like he’s pulling out of that.  And the personality element with him is absolutely priceless.  That and the fact that he absolutely nails every big part of the song makes this an enjoyable performance.  That having been said, he was still a bit flat sometimes.  Randy is thinking maybe it’s just him tonight, thinking that everyone sucks, and it is indeed just him.  I don’t know where his ears are sometimes.  Of course, now that Simon is agreeing, maybe it’s just me that thought it was a solid performance.  Guess we’ll see.  Actually no we won’t.  No way people aren’t voting for this guy.

Chris Daughtry: “Have You Ever Really Loved A Woman”

I’m not a huge Bryan Adams fan, but I like Chris.  And it looks like they’re teaching
him the mechanics of singing in the vignette, which is helpful.  Gotta love the two classical guitarists to start out the song, by the way.  I don’t have too much to say here.  He’s in tune the whole song, but the song itself doesn’t do too much for me.  You know who does like the song, though?  Women.  And that’s the important part.  He’s sailing this week.

Predictions:
Bottom three:  Kellie, Paris, and Katharine.  I would love it if Katharine wasn’t in the bottom three, but who else do I put here?  Everyone is good enough at this point that (if the right person is eliminated tomorrow) the top five will be a total crapshoot.

Going home:  Kellie.  Honestly I fear that it will be Paris.  I like her a lot sometimes and she does nothing for me at other times, and I don’t think she has the fan base that Pickler has.  But I have to go with predicting Kellie out of principle.  She was the only one that couldn’t be classified as “good” tonight, and she was far, far from good.  Should be interesting to see how this plays out.

Tha Docta's First Live Blog: American Idol 4/18

2006-04-19T22:52:00.000-04:00

Note: I know this is all late and wrong, since the results show has already aired and whatnot, but I wrote it, so I’m posting it.  As I read through this, I’m noticing that I need practice at it anyway, so here’s my first shot.

Chris Daughtry: “What a Wonderful World”

This did what it set out to do.  Chris needed to show that he doesn’t need to belt out a pure rock song in order to sound good.  And he showed that he really does have a fantastic voice.

Paris Bennett:  (didn’t catch a title)

Ever since Paris’ audition, I’ve always thought she sounded eons better in this genre than in any other.  She could put out an album like this tomorrow.  I never really get into her performances in other types of music, though.  She definitely didn’t disappoint with this performance tonight.

Taylor Hicks: (didn’t catch a title)

Fantastic.  I discovered Sam Cooke after Taylor’s first audition, and he really nailed this one. He could do a lot in this genre, goofy gesticulations aside.  You know, people make fun of that, and he does look goofy, but at least he’s not trying to be something he’s not.  Did I just sound like Paula Abdul?

Elliot Yamin: “It Had to Be You”

Elliot has been my favorite for a few weeks now.  That having been said, I’m not thrilled with this song choice.  There’s such possibility with this kind of theme week, and you don’t have to pick a song like this, that’s been so overdone over the years.  The backup singers were way too loud, but even with a song like this that I’ve heard so many times, he’s still such a pleasure to listen to.

(Did Randy just make a good point?  Everyone is relaxed tonight, and you can tell!  Way to go, Randy!)

Kellie Pickler: “Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered”

First of all, Kellie is not as dumb (and probably not as nice, either) as she’d playing herself up to be.  I don’t know what gives me that impression.  Call it a gut feeling.  This was the two-headed performance.  There were good parts, and maybe it was just me, but it seemed like she was horribly out of tune.  But people are going to vote for that face and the accent.  They just are.

Ace Young: (didn’t catch a title)

Let me just start off by saying that Ace looks like an idiot tonight.  What’s with the librarian look?  Also, that was awful.  If there is any justice in the world, he will join Kellie in the bottom three on Wednesday.  I hated everything about that.  For some reason, the judges are fawning all over him about this.  Hopefully Simon is complementing so that he doesn’t get the sympathy vote that always happens when he tears a contestant a new one.

Katharine McPhee: “Someone to Watch Over Me”

She’s my second favorite.  I always enjoy her performances, and she’s definitely easy to look at, but something still seems just a little off about her.  I can’t put my finger on it.  All that aside, she was awesome again this week.  Probably the best of the night.

Summary:
This was probably the strongest week yet, and the theme actually helped the contestants instead of crippling them.  This is far and away the best top seven that’s ever been on the show.  If Ace leaves this week (he should) and Kellie leaves next week, the top five will be unbelievable.

Predictions:

Bottom Three: Kellie, Ace, Elliot.  I don’t think Elliot should be there, but he probably will be.  Hopefully he’ll survive another week and get another chance at his breakout performance (which, admittedly, he should have had by now).

Eliminated:  Ace.  Hey, a guy can hope, right?  He annoys me more every week.

Television: Teachers

2006-04-12T08:33:00.000-04:00

Here's the thing. I want to like NBC's new show "Teachers." I really do. It's got a very attractive cast, at least one actress I've been entertained by before (the principal, whose name I don't know and will not research), a great post-"Scrubs" time slot, and a potentially funny concept. What's more, I plan on being a high school English teacher and have been a teacher for the last two years. This show should be custom built to make someone like me laugh.

The only problem is it's absolutely not funny. I keep trying to watch it and keep regretting my decision ten minutes in to the episode. Oh sure, I've chuckled once or twice, but more often than not I've sat in stony silence while the laugh-track cackles riotously in the background.

The show's writers (and by the way, promos loudly proclaim that one of the writer's was associated with "Scrubs," but if this is the quality of his or her work, there's a reason why they're not writing for "Scrubs" anymore) go for obvious when they could go for subtle, go for physical comedy when they should go for wit, and go for countless stupid sex jokes when they could go for something more intelligent. To top it off, the actor's, while enjoyable eye candy, are predictable and wooden basically down to a person. They've all got a "type," and they play it in such broad strokes that no one here is believable as what they claim to be. It's just mind-numbingly dull and awful. If a student turned in "Teachers" as an assignment, they'd definitely fail in my gradebook.

Final Score: 1 Cent (and that's generous)

More Shows, Less Quality

2006-03-20T12:23:00.000-05:00

“Black. White.”

Here’s the premise:  a black family gets made up to look white, and a white family gets made up to look black.  They go out in the world and experience life as the other race, and they also live in the same house during this time.  Pretty interesting, isn’t it?  The first question I had was whether the make-up would be realistic, and to be honest it’s pretty good.  It looks like they go through quite a session at the beginning of every day in order to look like they do.  My second question was how staged and conveniently edited this whole thing would be.  The answer?  Very.

It would be intriguing to me to see the participants experience everyday life as another race.  Instead, the “white” husband goes to an expensive pro shop and is amazed when he receives great service.  The “black” daughter goes to a slam poetry class and can’t find a way to blend in (in a scene which was actually pretty hilarious).  The “white” son goes to an etiquette school and feels uncomfortable.  I can tell you without hesitation that I would also feel uncomfortable in an etiquette school.

There are some genuine moments among all the silliness, however.  For example, Bruno (white husband dressed in his black makeup) and Brian (black husband with no makeup) walk down a sidewalk together, and they watch the reactions of the people they come in contact with.  Afterwards they talk about how they saw the same reactions, but understood different meanings to them.  Brian thought that people were intimidated when they moved to the side, but Bruno just saw people taking up the sidewalk who were getting out of the way.

So there are some scenarios that are designed to make the families uncomfortable and be amusing, but the better part of the show happens when they experience regular everyday situations (the focus groups about racism, where each family participated as a member of the opposite race, were painful to watch).  If nothing else, this series is worth checking out for an episode, just to see some of these interesting parts.  The big problem that I have (and my wife tells me the families were on Oprah and discussed this) is that some scenes are edited to make racism seem more prevalent in situations where it doesn’t really exist.  This show shouldn’t need that kind of thing to make it intriguing, and it makes me feel kind of cheated that I don’t know what’s real and what’s not all the time.  Still though, it’s worth a look.

Final score: 3 cents.

By the way, if you just want to see the makeup, you can just check the website.

“The Loop”

I was looking forward to watching “The Loop”, what with the positive blurbs I’d seen from critics.  I thought perhaps Fox was taking a step toward atoning for canceling the best comedy on TV (because they surely wouldn’t do it with one show).  Unfortunately, that just wasn’t the case.

“The Loop” is a comedy in the same vein as “The Office”, except it’s at an airline instead of a paper sales office, and also it’s not as funny.  The show focuses on Sam (Bret Harrison), an employee at an unnamed airline.  I didn’t catch the significance of his position, but he seems to be in favor with the boss (Phillip Baker Hall, who deserves better).  There’s also Sam’s brother, who is a slacker and spends his time at home, partying, or playing tricks on Sam; pretty much your basic slacker activities.  Rounding out the characters is the girl that Sam likes, who predictably has a boyfriend and is clueless that Sam likes her.  As far as she’s concerned, they’re good friends.

So that’s about it as far as plot goes.  There were some developments in the pilot episode, but mostly it’s just a bunch of over-the-top, almost slapstick comedy with a lot of name-calling.  Seriously, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a show where so many people are called so many names.  The boss calls his employees “assclowns”, a little girl calls Sam “Gaylord” when he needs to borrow her bike for an emergency, and there’s much more creative names as well.  Among the name-calling are some obscure jokes.  For example, the slacker shaved Sam’s head in one spot while Sam was passed out from being drunk.  He didn’t notice it until the next day at work, which obviously caused some embarrassment.  So to get his brother back, Sam planted mousetraps in a place where his brother was sure to venture (I can’t remember where it was).  This ended up with the slacker having mousetraps all over himself and saying something to the effect of, “Good job, Montezuma.”  Was that…like…because he got revenge?  I guess.

Comedy aside, the storyline was obvious and predictable, which is forgivable if the comedy is good enough (it wasn’t).  The appeal of “The Office” is that it’s realistic.  This seems like it’s trying to go in that same direction, but also trying to make things a bit more WACKY!  It seems to me that the show thinks it’s cleverer than it actually is, and as difficult as it may be, I almost felt like it was condescending with the references and jokes that you would only get if you were following some unknown person’s train of thought.  There were some funny parts, but not nearly enough for all the trying they did.  This is by no means appalling, but also not something you should bother with.

Final Score: 2 cents.

“The New Adventures of Old Christine”

This is one of those shows where you’ll never really know if it’s any good, because it won’t be as good as “Seinfeld”.  It’s one thing for a star on a popular sitcom to get into drama, or into movies, but to venture back into sitcoms is almost always a recipe for disaster.  This one isn’t quite a disaster, but it’s also nothing to shout about.

Basically, Julia Louis-Dreyfus is old Christine, and her ex-husband’s girlfriend is new Christine.  Hence the title.  The other details aren’t that important, to be quite honest.  There’s a laugh track (boo), and occasionally there are some funny parts.  But for the most part, this is more of the same.  I get the impression that the cast is actually pretty good, but unfortunately they don’t have much to work with, which is a shame.

Final Score:  2 cents.

I didn’t review a few shows this week.  “Miracle Workers” was on my TiVo for long enough that I decided I’d never be in the mood to watch it, so I canned that one.  “Sons and Daughters” is on at the same time as “House”, “Scrubs”, and “The Unit”.  So I wasn’t about to get into another show in that timeslot.  I wasn’t interested at all in “American Inventor”, and “Modern Men” looked like another bad comedy from the WB.  I couldn’t stomach another bad comedy this week.

Two Good New Shows

2006-03-10T17:31:00.000-05:00

Are you home this weekend with no idea what to watch?  Well, your good friend Tha Docta is here to help you out.  I’ve got a couple of new shows that are definitely worth your time.  I’ve got “Conviction” and the ABC’s new pseudo-makeover show “Miracle Workers” on the TiVo, so those reviews will be forthcoming.  But these two will be accessible this weekend, so I’m posting them now.  Enjoy.

“Free Ride”

“Free Ride” is a laugh track-free (yes!) comedy from Fox about what happens when a college graduate ends up not liking the subject of his degree and goes back home to live with his parents to avoid working in the field.  If you’ve been to college away from your hometown and then gone back to see what happened to all your high school acquaintances, you’ll be able to relate to this show.  In fact, even if you’ve just envisioned what might have happened to those people, you’ll probably be able to relate.

Nate Stahlings (Josh Dean) just graduated from Santa Barbara and worked for a short time in Chicago, where he found that he didn’t enjoy the field in which he graduated.  He decides to go home to rural Missouri and live with his parents for a few weeks (what they say) or maybe a few months (what he says) until he can figure out what to do.  In the pilot, he runs into some entertaining characters from high school (the guy who is exactly the same, the guy who got married, the girl he liked who’s now engaged).

If the series is as funny as the pilot was while simply setting the premise, this could be a good show.  If you’re interested, check out the pilot here.  I guess Fox must have something going with MySpace or something.  I’d definitely recommend you check it out.  I’m going to give it a few more episodes to see if it can keep up the laughs.

Final Score: 3.5 cents.

“The Unit”

I am only somewhat familiar with David Mamet’s body of work.  I loved The Untouchables, but hated Hannibal; while to me Heist and Ronin were just okay.  With his new TV show, “The Unit”, Mamet has something good on his hands.

“The Unit” follows the members of a team of Special Forces agents as they carry out undercover missions throughout the world.  Focus is also given to the members’ families.  The leader of the unit is Jonas Blane, who is played by Dennis Haysbert (or President Palmer as we “24” fans know him).  In the pilot episode, new recruit Bob Brown (Scott Foley) is introduced, and that conveniently gives us a little introduction into the lives of the soldiers and their families.  The soldiers are a tight-knit group, and so are the wives who stay behind while their husbands are on top-secret missions.

I was hesitant during the first part of the show, as the dialogue was heavy and I wasn’t exactly sure what was going on.  As it went on, however, I got acclimated to the flow of the plot, and things became easier to understand.  The presentation was actually more realistic that way, as the characters wouldn’t be babying some invisible observer by talking slowly and in basic terms so the transparent outsider would know what was going on.

Dialogue aside, the action scenes were fantastic.  The presentation was engaging and the action was intense.  Leading the way in every scene in which he appeared was Dennis Haysbert.  As was the case when he played President Palmer, Haysbert drips charisma and seems to genuinely be in authority.  His interaction with those who question him is extremely entertaining, and it is completely believable that he could get any soldier to follow his lead.

Luckily, the scenes that feature the families are equally entertaining, with Haysbert’s on-screen wife (played by Regina Taylor) being the unofficial leader of the spouses.  There’s more to the plot, but to talk about it would be superfluous—especially when the replay is tomorrow night at 8:00.  That’s Saturday, March 11, at 8:00 pm on CBS.  I highly recommend you watch it.

Unfortunately, CBS put this show in a very tough timeslot against “House”, “Scrubs”, and “Supernatural” (at least until the latter moves to Thursdays).  Despite that fact, I think the show has a future if it can survive until the end of “House’s” season.  At least I hope.  If the pilot is any indicator, this is definitely one to watch.

Final Score: 4 cents.

Thoughts about Oscar

2006-03-07T16:58:00.000-05:00

I had a chance to check out the Oscars on Sunday night (a ceremony for which TiVo was invented, by the way), and I’ve got a few thoughts about things.

Jon Stewart was hilarious.  Let’s just get that out of the way.  The fact that a room full of big-headed and self-important celebrities couldn’t laugh at themselves or the imaginary world that they live in didn’t affect the fact that his jokes were on point and kept the show moving.  In fact, I found it even funnier that the audience didn’t laugh at a lot of the material.  Case in point, the segment where the show came back from a commercial to Stewart advocating Scientology “not just for this city, but for the country” was spot on, but you could hear crickets during the delivery.

I imagine I’m not the only one who enjoyed the jokes about piracy and Hollywood liberalism, but unfortunately those of us who did enjoy Stewart weren’t actually in attendance.  The problem with hosting the Oscars is that the hosts are picked on the basis of how they will entertain the stars, and judged on how the stars reacted.  Chris Rock’s year was awesome, but he’ll never be back because he offended some ever-so-fragile egos; ditto Dave Letterman.  It’s a no-win situation for the hosts and the home viewing audience if we let movie stars dictate who should and shouldn’t host the show.  They’re the ones being honored, sure, but there’s enough butt-kissing going on already that you need a host that’s going to bring the show back to reality.  We already had a segment this year that emphasized how great movie theaters are and how movies aren’t the same when you watch them on DVD.  Do we really need to watch Billy Crystal or Whoopi Goldberg for the other three hours?  And I swear—if either of them hosts ever again, I’m boycotting the ceremony forever.  All right, that’s a lie, but I’ll be mad.

I don’t usually comment on celebrity fashion, but did you see the dress that Charlize Theron was wearing?  The rule should be that if there’s any part of your dress that’s bigger than your head, you should not wear it.  That bow on her shoulder was monstrous.  On the other hand, Selma Hayek looked outstanding, not that she can help it.

As for the winners, I’ve said this every time I’ve talked about the Oscars to anyone, so excuse me repeating myself if you’ve heard this before, but the fact that A History of Violence wasn’t even nominated for Best Picture is a crime.  The only movie that I’ve seen so far (I don’t get to the theater much—screw you AMPAS President, whatever your name is) is Crash, and while it was indeed excellent, A History of Violence was better.  Of course, to me discussing winners of the Academy Awards is pointless.  The performances and quality of movies rarely have everything to do with whether a movie wins in my estimation.

This year, the movies nominated were all movies that addressed some kind of social issue.  Does that necessarily mean they weren’t excellent?  No.  But I guarantee there were better movies and performances out there.  Also, why is no comedy ever nominated in the big categories?  It seems sometimes like the show needs a theme.  This one was social issues and piracy.  A few years ago it was giving awards to black people (Denzel Washington should have won the year before for The Hurricane, and Russell Crowe should have won that year for A Beautiful Mind.  Of course, Halle Berry deserved an Honorary Oscar just for being able to have graphic sex scenes with Billy Bob Thornton.  Gross.  And of course, this is the same night when Sidney Poitier was given the Lifetime Achievement award.)  I’m not saying these aren’t all worthy themes, but why can’t we just have the awards given out to people who deserve them when they deserve them?  I won’t go as far as to say the Oscars don’t honor good movies, but they certainly don’t always honor the best ones.  But that’s enough of my anti-Hollywood ranting.  I still love movies—just not politics.

There’s a couple of reviews coming this week—probably Friday.

Trailer Park: March 2, 2006

2006-03-02T08:52:00.000-05:00

Exciting:

The Sentinel: In my book, an action movie that centers on the Presidency that stars Kiefer Sutherland automatically gets an “exciting” rating. “24” has given him that right. Anyway, Kiefer and Michael Douglas are in the secret service, and someone inside is plotting to kill the President. Not the most original plot ever, but the acting has potential to make this really good.

A Scanner Darkly: I wouldn’t normally rate a movie up here solely on technology, and I’m not doing that here either, but it’s got a lot to do with it. You know those insurance commercials where the people are animated, but not really? No? Just click on the link and you’ll see what I mean. The trailer is awesome, and the movie looks like a real trip.

Unknown White Male: A documentary about a guy who gets amnesia and can’t remember anything at all. This looks absolutely fascinating.

Intriguing:

Illusion: Kirk Douglas plays an old director who watches his son’s life play out on a movie screen…this must be some sort of dream, right? It actually looks pretty interesting.

The Real Dirt on Farmer John: Wow. Another documentary here…this one about a farmer who…has some strange goings on at his farm, and the locals think that the happenings are a lot more sinister than they really are. Looks…interesting.

Ask the Dust: Colin Farrell and Selma Hayek are fantastic when they’re in the right situation, and this looks pretty promising. It’s a love story set in the 1930s. There’s not too much more to say, really. It just looks like a pretty good movie.

I Don’t Know…:

Basic Instinct 2: Surprisingly, this looks like it just might be a decent suspense thriller. Unfortunately, as is the case with many trailers, this one gives away probably the first 75% of the movie. Another thing is, I’m not sure why we really need this sequel. Did the first Basic Instinct leave anything unresolved? No, seriously. I can’t remember.

Open Season: These days, most animated films are usually at least watchable with a few funny moments. The reason I’m not quite putting this one up a level is because the main character (a bear) is voiced by the decidedly unfunny Martin Lawrence. Seriously, I can’t remember the last time I laughed at something he was involved in. Maybe “Martin”, when I was 13. Also, when are animation studios (Sony’s the culprit this time) besides Pixar going to realize that big names doing your voices doesn’t equal a good movie? This one stars Lawrence, Ashton Kutcher, Debra Messing, and Gary Sinise. I’m also pretty sure I heard Billy Connelly in the trailer.

Okay, This Just Looks Bad:

Surprisingly enough, I have nothing to put here for this round.

Don't Write Off The CW Yet

2006-02-15T07:17:00.000-05:00

When I first heard about The CW (which I’m told gets the “C” from CBS and the “W” from Warner Brothers), I was actually kind of excited.  To me, the WB and UPN have always been kind of interchangeable anyway, and neither has really had any kind of credibility.  But each network has a couple of solid shows and a history of cult favorites that will give the new network a good base for long-term success.  That’s why it surprised me to see that some executives aren’t taking the move seriously.

If you look at my top ten list (which, granted, means nothing), there are two shows (“Veronica Mars” and “Supernatural”) on the list that will be carried over to The CW.  CBS didn’t make the list at all.  (Again, that doesn’t mean much since they’re the “most watched network”.)  Add in shows like “Smallville”, “Gilmore Girls”, “Everybody Hates Chris”, and anything Joss Whedon touches—he’s always working on something, so another series certainly isn’t out of the question—and you’ve got yourself some viewers.

The other factor going in their favor is that they’re willing to take chances.  What other networks would base a whole series on an adolescent Superman, or two brothers who fight supernatural forces on a weekly basis, or a reality show about models of all things?  But all three of those ideas have proven to be successful, though they haven’t had the success of the big networks yet.  But I stress yet.  Remember when FOX was just a little guy?  Me too.

Trailer Park: February 11, 2006

2006-02-11T15:43:00.000-05:00

Exciting:

Nacho Libre: Until they do something disappointing, all I need to know is that the director of Napolean Dynamite, the writer of School of Rock, and Jack Black are involved.  This looks to be absurdly hilarious.

Intriguing:

The Tenants: To be honest with you, I’m not sure what this is about, even after watching the trailer.  That’s a good thing.  To me, a trailer should give you a general idea about a movie (not necessarily the plot), and not give anything away.  That’s what this one does.  It looks like a story about two authors, played by Dylan McDermott and Snoop Dogg.  And it’s not a comedy.  It’s got something to do with race, but I’m not sure what.  And Snoop looks like he can give a pretty good performance here.  Definitely worth a second look.

Duck Season:  The power goes out, so two brothers find…more creative things to do than just playing “Halo”.  Looks to be a good time.  And it’s in Spanish and filmed in black & white.

I Don’t Know…:

Silent Hill: If it wasn’t based on a video game, I might put it a category above this, because it looks pretty freaky.  But there’s always the potential for disaster when a movie is based on a game.  Doom, anyone?

The Second Chance:  From the looks of the trailer, it seems to be a movie about a white pastor and a black pastor, where the white pastor goes to the black church and tries to help out in the community…or something.  If you notice questionable acting chops in the trailer, that can’t be a good sign.  I would expect all the racial clichés in this one.  I mean the good kind of clichés, though—the ones where both races find they’re not so different after all, and inspiring music starts to play.

London: Here’s an example of a trailer where I’m not sure what’s going on, but it’s a bad thing.  It looks like someone with ADD put it together.  Though I really like Jason Statham, so it’ll be interesting to see what the reviews say when this one comes out.

Happy Feet:  The fascination with penguins continues.  This one’s about animated penguins that sing and dance.  And one of them has the accent that Hank Azaria uses in The Bird Cage.  That could be good for some laughs in spite of oneself.  Other than that, the trailer makes it looks like there’s not much substance to go with the pretty cool-looking animation.

Okay, This Just Looks Bad:

The Shaggy Dog:  I’m just going to boycott Disney if they don’t stop making remakes of their old movies.  And stop making movies with Tim Allen.  This one might be fun for the kids, but it will probably make adults want to shoot themselves in the face.  Three guesses as to what song they used in the trailer.  (Did you say “Atomic Dog” or “The one with the “bow-wow-wow yippee-oh-yippee-ay” line?  You win.)

The Ten Best Shows on Television

2006-01-31T12:16:00.000-05:00

Other than the announcement of a new TV network, which I’ll discuss in my next post, it’s been a slow TV week as far as news goes, so I’m giving you my list of the top ten shows on television right now.

I’ve been thinking about doing a list like this for a while, but I’ve never gotten around to it.  The hard part is comparing different types of shows—comedy, drama, reality, what have you—to one another and figuring out which ones are better.  I gauged it by ranking the shows in order of how much I look forward to watching them every week.  Now of course, the list could change daily, but these shows will pretty much always be on the list.  I think I’m most satisfied with the top three, and those pretty much remain constant.

The main reason I’m finally doing this is because I look at the Nielsen ratings in Entertainment Weekly and they make me sad.  Shows like Skating with Celebrities and Dancing With the Stars routinely bring in huge ratings, and that’s just depressing when there’s so much good TV out there.  So hopefully, with the sway I have over my millions of readers, we can get the word out there and shake people out of the mental fog that causes these atrocious viewing habits.  Anyway, the list started out with 16 of my favorite shows (yes, I watch a lot of TV, but there’s a lot of good stuff on).  Here’s how it shakes out:

10.  Invasion: Good acting and compelling storylines have helped this show go from okay to really good this year.  It started out slow but intriguing, and then built every week into something you don’t want to miss.

9. American Idol:  I know many will scoff at this one, but I am an addict, and it would be dishonest of me to leave it off the list.  I can tell you this much:  I enjoy the show a lot more with TiVo.  Being able to skip all the fluff and in-show commercials is a big plus.  But as for the rest, I love it all.  The insults to the bad singers (they go on there to be insulted—come on now), the talent, the cheesiness…I dig it.

8. Supernatural:  This is a lesser-known WB show, but despite that inherent disadvantage it really is solid.  The two brother characters play very well off of each other, and there’s enough long-term story development that it’s not just a fight-one-monster-per-week kind of show.  If you haven’t seen it before, it’s easy to jump in and watch, and I recommend it.

7. Scrubs:  Zach Braff and the crew never disappoint in this show.  Even when the whole episode isn’t laugh-out-loud hilarious (which it often is), the show is just so clever that you can’t help but enjoy it (see last week’s Wizard of Oz parody).

6. House:  House kind of came out of nowhere last year on FOX, when they used it as a midseason replacement show, and once they gave it a solid lead-in, it just took off.  Every actor does an outstanding job, and of course Hugh Laurie is fantastic as the grumpy and obstinate Dr. House.

5. The Office:  If you can watch this show and not laugh, I don’t know how you laugh at anything.  Steve Carrell was the breakout star of last year between this show and The 40-Year-Old Virgin.  He has the gift of being able to be outrageous and subtle at the same time.  He can do over-the-top comedy too, if required.  And of course the supporting cast is superb, from Rainn Wilson’s Dwight all the way to Stanley and the HR guy.  This one is comedy at its best.

4. Veronica Mars: I discovered this show on DVD, and I’ve been hooked since the pilot.  Yeah, it’s about a girl in high school, but it’s not a high school soapy drama.  It’s part murder mystery, part comedy, part drama, etc.  The main focus is on the life of Veronica Mars and her father Keith.  There are so many details and subplots that I couldn’t even begin to summarize here, and this isn’t a review of the show anyway.  I’m just telling you it’s a great show (fourth greatest, if we’re being specific here), and you should definitely check out the first season on DVD, and the second when it comes out, and then watch the third season next year.  You won’t be disappointed.  I promise.  This show starts off with the stigma of being on UPN, but they do this one right.

3. Arrested Development: I’ve sung its praises since it’s been on the air.  It is without a doubt the funniest show on TV right now (even though it’s not technically on TV right now).  As you may have seen, the folks at FOX are being bastards about this whole thing, but hopefully some sensible network will pick up the show and get it the audience it deserves.  (Personally, I’d be watching AD over the opening ceremonies of the Olympics, though TiVo makes it a non-issue.  The opening ceremonies are right up there with parades on the list of things I hate watching live, but especially on TV.  No, I’ve never actually been to an Olympics’ opening ceremonies.  I’m just saying it couldn’t be that different from a parade, other than the fact that it’s in a stadium.)

2. Lost: Ever since the beginning of last fall’s new TV season, we’ve had this show to look forward to, and it has very rarely disappointed.  To be as good as this show is as consistently as it is—that is a real accomplishment.  Hopefully creator J.J. Abrams has more magic up his sleeves for a long time to come.

1. 24:  The number one spot was really a toss-up between Lost and 24, but I gave this show the nod because of the difficulty of making it good on a consistent basis.  Basically they have to come up with a new storyline every season.  Sure, the format is the same, and a lot of the characters are the same, but it’s a lot tougher to do this with a show like 24 than it is with other types of shows.  Oh, and also it’s freaking awesome.  Can you deny that you get excited every time Jack Bauer starts taking the bad guys to the cleaners?  He was ready to cut out a dude’s eye last night!  Was that not awesome?!

So there it is.  Your top ten shows on TV.  Some really good shows that didn’t make the list:  Prison Break, Criminal Minds, My Name is Earl, The Amazing Race, CSI:, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.

That’s my two cents.  Now it’s your turn.  Tell me what you think of the list and what you’d put in your own.  I’m curious.

Jan. 1 - 21: New Shows and Old Favorites

2006-01-23T15:44:00.000-05:00

It’s been a big couple of weeks in the world of TV, so let’s get started with some reviews.

Emily’s Reasons Why Not

I sat through about ten minutes of this show with my wife before she’d had enough.  I had planned on finishing it later so that I could give you my own “reasons why not” to watch, but all you need is the one that ABC just gave:  it’s been cancelled after two episodes.  The show was truly awful, so I’m glad there’s no need for me to subject myself to the rest of it.

Final Score: 1 cent.

In Justice

This is a new legal drama that follows the “National Justice Project”, a group that takes on cases where people feel they were wrongly convicted and jailed.  It starts off showing “what the jury believed”, and then goes about showing how they were wrong to believe such things.  The characters gather evidence and do your regular legal drama-type things before coming to a conclusion about whether or not the conviction can be overturned, etc.

This is a pretty solid legal drama.  The problem with a lot of legal dramas is that they focus on cases rather than people, and this show seems to get that aspect right.  The characters have separate personalities that are allowed to manifest themselves, and the show is well acted.  The one concern I have comes with the premise.  It’s an interesting premise in itself, but the first two episodes have shown the team taking on cases after impassioned pleas from family members of those who have been wrongfully imprisoned.  Apparently the process is that people send requests for help in letter form, so as to not crowd headquarters with a bunch of sad and angry people who would yell at the workers all day.  But the first two episodes feature family members who come to the headquarters and are told by the workers that they need to send their request in writing, only to plead with them until they gave in and took the case.  If this worked, why wouldn’t everyone do it?

But all in all, the show is fun to watch.  The first two episodes dealt with people who were actually innocent, though I imagine there will be the occasional person who was actually jailed because they actually deserved it, or someone who didn’t deserve it whom they still can’t exonerate.  Coupled with the political aspirations of the character that runs the Project, there are plenty of storylines to keep the show interesting for a while.

Final Score: 3.5 cents.

Love Monkey

I like Tom Cavanaugh.  I enjoyed his work on Ed, and he seems to have the same “good guy who can’t get it right” kind of vibe going for this new show on CBS.  Cavanaugh has officially mastered the art of delivering fast-paced, clever dialogue, but he doesn’t do it in a way that makes the character feel unauthentic.  The supporting cast (featuring, among others, Judy Greer, Jason Priestly and Larenz Tate) also does well with the dialogue and seems to have a promising chemistry that, if developed, could make the show very good.

The premise is interesting enough. Cavanaugh’s character, Tom Farrell, plays a “Jerry McGuire” of sorts who happens to work for a major record label instead of a sports agent firm, but he still delivers his “it’s about the music and not the money” speech and is promptly fired, contemplates starting his own label, realizes he has no money for that, and lucks into getting a job for a minor record label run by a guy who shares his ideals.  This is all on the first episode, and it’s kind of nice that it’s out of the way.  It establishes his character without dragging out a storyline that we’ve seen before.

Here’s the thing.  I won’t go into a lot of detail about all the characters, because there are several, but the one thing that bothers me with the whole “group of friends” thing is that there’s one woman who is Tom’s “friend who is a girl”.  And already in the first episode, he’s encouraged by his sister (married to Jason Priestley’s character) to pursue a relationship with her.  The title of the show refers, obviously, to the way Tom swings from relationship to relationship like a monkey.  But if we already know whom he wants to end up with, what’s the fun in that?  We don’t need another “Ross and Rachel”, or even “Ed and Carol”.  Couldn’t we just have him be a swingin’ bachelor for a while and then maybe meet someone a few years into the series?

That one aspect aside, the show has promise.  Another interesting part of the series is that it will supposedly showcase multiple little-known musicians, which could be cool.  They started out in the pilot episode with a guy named Teddy Geiger, a seventeen-year-old singer/songwriter in real life, who plays a young singer/songwriter named Wayne.

All in all this is worth checking out, if only for a few weeks to see if it goes somewhere.  There’s plenty of room for development with a good cast, good premise, and what could be a lot of good music.

Final Score: 3.5 cents (with potential)

Four Kings

Four Kings is NBC’s final piece to the “Must See TV” puzzle that they’ve been trying desperately to reassemble since the end of Friends.  It’s not terribly original, but it’s harmless enough.  The premise is that there’s these four guys who have been best friends their whole lives, and when one of the character’s grandmother dies, she leaves him her huge New York apartment, into which all four soon move.

Semi-hilarity ensues, with your basic guy stuff going on.  For instance, in the most recent episode, the game of “chesting” was introduced, where one guy sneaks up on another and punches him in the chest, at which point “the chestee becomes the chester” and must “chest” someone else.  You know the four kings.  In fact, if you’ve been to college, you may have been one of the four kings yourself for a while.  In my case, there were five of us (four of which are contributors to this blog).  While we don’t live close enough to “chest” each other, we could certainly relate to the kind of humor on the show.

Seth Green does a good job playing the angry, cynical friend, and there’s also a kind of dumb and childish friend, along with…the other two who are kind of interchangeable.  And that’s the problem.  It’s an okay show with moments where it’s quite funny, but there’s not been anything yet to make it stand out.  Of course, there’s also the issue of the show’s lead-in, Will and Grace.  I’m not sure that this is such an effective lead-in (though I have problems with the whole idea of lead-ins anyway.  Do people really just watch one channel all night because they don’t care what else is on?  What’s happening to the male channel-surfing population?).  It just seems weird to me that they’re going from Sean Hayes to Seth Green.  And if the plan is to try and tailor a show with this premise to fit Will and Grace fans, just tell me now so that I can never watch it again.

Final Score: 3 cents.

Thoughts and Ramblings on the Week That Was

I won’t put in too much here, considering the already staggering length of this week’s column.  Let me just throw out a big fat “Welcome Back” to 24.  They dispensed with any notion of a big happy reunion between Jack, David Palmer, Tony and Michelle with the first episode.  (Of course, Tony could still come back.)  With that option gone, we really don’t know what’s going to happen, and that’s the way I like it.  I actually predicted some of the plot points last year, which I didn’t like.  So it’s refreshing to have the good old unpredictable 24 back this year.

Also, it’s time for the annual hilarity of the American Idol auditions, which never get old for me.  And if you saw one performer’s rousing (read: I couldn’t stop laughing) performance of “I Shot the Sheriff”, you know why.  So keep it up, FOX.  Oh—and let Arrested Development go while you’re at it, so someone else can pick it up and air it for many years to come (pleeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaase pick it up, ABC!).

I’ll be back with more next week.  Until then, keep smiling, fools.

Plans for 2006

2006-01-16T09:09:00.000-05:00

I’ve said on my personal blog that I’m going to resurrect Eight Cents this year, so this is the first step in that process. Here’s the thing: as I’ve said before, I wish this was something I could do full-time, but since it isn’t I’m going to make a few changes to the way I do reviews. I don’t know if the other guys will follow suit, but only time will tell. I’ll be sticking mostly with TV and music here. As you know, there’s only a couple of times a year when there’s even any reviews to write when it comes to TV, and when that happens, there’s no time to do all the full-length reviews for all the new shows. So what I’m going to try to do during that time is a weekly column featuring mini-reviews for any new shows along with any other thoughts I have on TV for that week. I say “mini-reviews”, but if there’s anything of merit that actually warrants a full-length review, I’ll do that too. During the time when there aren’t new shows to review, I’ll write a few TV and music columns, and knock out a few album reviews. The columns on this site will most likely show up toward the end of the week (Friday-Sunday) so that I have a full week to absorb the media. Oh—and as a side note, I’ll be updating the archives as well. They’re pretty out of date. So that’s my two cents for now. Hopefully I’ll be seeing you more often here.

Music: U2 Vertigo Tour

2005-11-02T21:27:00.000-05:00

U2 Vertigo Tour: Pittsburgh, PA: October 22, 2005

Some things in life improve with age and I would submit that a U2 concert is one of them. With over two decades under their belt and an average age of over 40 years U2 still knows how to bring down the house -- perhaps better now than ever before. Mind you, this is not a band putting on a "greatest hits" or "reunion" tour but a band that is putting out new material that they (and their fans) believe in. U2 has asserted that they believe this is some of their best material. Granted, what band wouldn't say something like this but U2 does more than just saying it -- the play it like they mean it.

The October 22 Pittsburgh concert was over two hours in length and the band played an extensive 23 song setlist including seven (of the 11) songs from their latest release, "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb." They played many well-known favorites along with some older, lesser-known fan-favorites (the kind of songs that only hard-core fans can sing along with). It was a perfect mix for seasoned fans and new-comers alike.

The show opened with an electrifying performance of City of Blinding Lights followed by Vertigo. The band continued relentlessly through Elevation, I Will Follow, and The Electric Co. before letting up (slightly) with I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For. After Beautiful Day they slowed things up a bit with Miracle Drug and Sometimes You Can't Make it On Your Own -- a beautifully emotional performance dedicated to Bono's deceased father, Bob Hewson, for whom, and about whom, the song was written. He prefaced the song by talking about his father -- the working class Dublin man who loved the opera and would sit and listen to the opera on the radio in the living room and conduct with the knitting needles. At the close of the song Bono broke into a few opera refrains while waving his arms in the air (conducting motions). It was quite touching.

The band returned with three political heavy hitters -- Love and Peace or Else, Sunday Bloody Sunday, and Bullet the Blue Sky. Of course, what is a U2 concert without some politics? Bono talked about the One campaign to help eliminate disease and poverty in developing nations. Also, during what I call the "political segment" Bono talked about how we (the religions of the world) need to learn to co-exist. He wore a headband with the logo below -- the crescent moon of Islam, the star of David, and the cross of Christianity.

Bono is a performer in the truest sense of the word. One does not go to a U2 concer to see him sing. One goes to see him perform. He has a special way (don't ask me how) of connecting with an audience. It's what makes seeing U2 live so special: It's not a concert, it's an experience. Somehow the band can take a crowd of 50,000 and make it feel like 2,000. In the earlier years he was more active on the stage with raw energy but I tend to think that his energy today is equally potent, just more focused. I honestly don't know these guys can get up and play for nearly two solid hours night in and night out. I was exhausted by the end of the show and I was just in the crowd for one show!!

Another of the evening's highlights was Miss Sarajevo, a song which (recorded) features Luciano Pavarotti singing two solos in Italian. At the concert Bono announced that unfortunately Pavarotti wasn't able to attend but was celebrating his (Pavarotti's) birthday. Bono sang the opera parts himself (in Italian) quite beautifully. It was amazing, especially considering that he sounded a bit hoarse during the first few numbers but by this point seemed to be singing with ease.

A couple of interesting moments of the performance: 1. While out on the end of the ellipse (the b-stage) doing an acoustic number with The Edge Bono received a request from a fan to sign an autograph. He said, "I think this is a U2 first -- signing an autograph during a concert." He smiled, signed the pad, and then handed it over to a smiling Edge who signed it and returned it. 2. During the second encore Bono invited a fan up to play with the band. Apparently he had been holding up a sign that indicated he wanted to play Party Girl with the band. As the individual was making his way up Bono turned to the band and said, "We've got live one Edge." The man from the crowd, Alan, didn't seem nervous at all and really started to jam. It was certainly a night he'll never forget.

I was pleasantly surprised by a few songs in the setlist. For example, I was afraid that a song like Elevation might end up being relegated to the Elevation tour never again to see the light of day in a concert. It was wonderful to hear it again. It is one of those songs that brings down the house at a U2 concert. Miss Sarajevo was a surprise. The Electric Co. was amazing. It's a song that a lot of people who don't know old school U2 stuff aren't familiar with. It sounded great.

The band closed with another older hit, 40 -- based on the fortieth Psalm (first three verses). I was ecstatic! This was a song that closed so many of their earlier concerts but I never figured I would hear it live. The song ends with a repeated chorus maintained by the audience. The band continued to play as they left one at a time -- Bono, Adam, The Edge, and finally Larry (after a small drum solo). A perfect end to a perfect evening. Thanks again guys.

How long to sing this song . . .

The complete setlist:

City of Blinding Lights
Vertigo
Elevation
I Will Follow
The Electric Co.
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
Beautiful Day
Miracle Drug
Sometimes You Can't Make it on Your Own
Love and Peace or Else
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Bullet the Blue Sky
Miss Sarajevo
Pride
Where the Streets Have No Name
One

The First Time
Stuck in a Moment
Party Girl
With or Without You

All Because of You
Yahweh
40

Final Score: 5 Cents

TV: Breakin' Down the New Dramas

2005-10-15T11:41:00.000-04:00

I know, I know.  We didn’t exactly get around to reviewing all the new fall TV shows.  Keeping this site up to date isn’t a real job for us or anything (unfortunately).  My partners in crime may or may not do the same, but I’m going to rank the new shows and give a quick take on the ones I’ve seen.  I’ve only seen one episode of a few of them, but that’s how it goes sometimes.  This will be the drama edition.  Comedy/reality will follow.  Enjoy.

1. Prison Break: I think it’s developed well since the first episode.  You can read Shoeless Joel’s review here.

2. Supernatural: Call me a nerd if you will, but I dig this one.  It’s about two brothers who are searching for their dad, but the catch is that all three of them are ghost hunters.  Their mother/wife was killed by a…ghost?  Monster?  I don’t know what you would call this particular entity, but it sure was nasty.  Anyway, one of the brothers wasn’t too keen on joining the hunt for dad, but then his own girlfriend was killed in the same manner as his mother.  So now these two are following the trail their father left in his diary, getting rid of all sorts of baddies along the way.  It’s basically as creepy as you’ll see on network TV, and I can give it a solid 4 cents.

3. Invasion:  This is another one that’s gotten a lot better since the pilot.  I wasn’t sure if I’d stick with it after the first one, as much as I like the new trend of sci-fi TV shows.  But I did, and I’m glad.  If you haven’t yet, catch this one.  You can’t miss it—it’s on after Lost.

4. Killer Instinct:  You wanna see a messed up crime show?  Here you go.  It takes place in the FBI’s deviant crime unit, and that is indeed how the show’s crimes can best be described.  I like it, but I’m a crime drama junkie.  It’ll appeal to those who want to see something different and don’t mind something a little…well, deviant I suppose.

5. Threshold: I liked this show better than Invasion at first, but now I’m not so sure.  I still enjoy it, but the other alien show is growing on me too, like so much ectoplasm.  I really liked where the show started, but now it’s got to go somewhere.  You can see my review here.

6. Reunion:  This season’s guilty pleasure for me.  You can read my review here.

7. Inconceivable:  Ming Na goes from ER to a show about a fertility clinic.  She just can’t get out of the medical field.  As much as I wanted to hate this show, I didn’t.  My wife watches the Discovery Health channel a lot.  She enjoys her baby shows like I enjoy animal and history shows.  So I didn’t need fictional baby drama to go along with the real-life stuff I sometimes stumble upon.  I can confidently recommend this show, though.  (Side-note:  It just occurred to me that the show hasn’t been on for the last two weeks, so I looked it up and it seems that NBC has pulled it for an unspecified period…of course we all know what that means, right?  Oh well.)

8. Criminal Minds:  For some reason I was a little wary of this one, but I liked the pilot and it’s gotten better in the couple of episodes since then.  It’s about a profiler in the Behavioral Science Unit in the FBI.  The acting is good and they focus enough on the characters while solving the crimes caused by those whom they profile.

9. Surface:  Started out slow, but has since become…less slow.  It’s not great or anything, but the special effects are good; and as a self-professed animal show nerd, how could I skip a show about sea monsters?

10. E-Ring:  The pilot was pretty good until a bad ending ruined it.  It doesn’t help that it’s up against Lost and Criminal Minds either.  I’ve never been a big fan of political drama, but if that’s up your alley you may want to check this one out.  From what I saw, it’s political drama that doesn’t get too caught up in itself.  (Pilot only)

11. Night Stalker:  Interesting premise, questionable execution.  I can’t remember many details, but the pilot followed a journalist whose wife had been killed in a strange way.  His self-assigned mission was to look for similar deaths and try to figure out what was going on.  I liked that it followed journalists instead of cops or what have you, but I could not stand the main character’s female counterpart, played by Gabrielle Union.  I don’t know whether it was her or the character she played, but I just couldn’t get into it at all.  They had a bit of a Superman vibe going on, with the main character as Clark Kent, Union playing the Lois Lane, and a photographer with Jimmy Olsen-like qualities.  I think I’ll probably give this one another shot after I missed the second episode, but I’m not expecting much.  (Pilot only)

12. Ghost Whisperer:  It’s just your basic run-of-the-mill touchy-feely ghost drama.  Huh?  Well, Sara Michelle Gellar or Jennifer Love Hewitt or someone else who uses three names plays the title character, who does her best impression of Haley Joel Osment by seeing ghosts and helping them out.  I only saw the pilot here, too.  It’s harmless, but nothing to write home about.  (Pilot only)

13. Bones:  I only saw one episode of this one, and it wasn’t enough to keep me sticking around.  As a fan of crime dramas, I think they could have done a better job with a pretty good premise.  Shoeless Joel’s review is here.  (Pilot only)

Dramas I didn’t see:

Just Legal:  I think this was a drama, anyway.  It’s cancelled, so I guess it doesn’t matter.

Commander in Chief:  You couldn’t pay me to watch this one.  I’m not a Geena Davis fan to begin with, and just from the promos, this show seems so full of itself as to be nauseating.  And like I said before, I’m not a big fan of political dramas.

Close to Home:  The lead actress bothered me just on the commercial, so I wasn’t about to tune in for a whole show.  It also reeked of bad melodrama.

Sex, Love & Secrets:  A show about a bunch of women talking.  That sounds like Gilmore Girls.  Who am I to mess with a formula?  Just a guy who isn’t watching.

After looking this over, it looks like the theme of shows I didn’t like so much was “actresses that got on my nerves”.  Luckily there were enough good actresses in Inconceivable and Killer Instinct alone to make up for it.  There’s no Lost this season; no show that’s going to be a huge breakout hit, though Prison Break is pretty solid.  If there’s one show I’d recommend that you may not be watching, it’s Supernatural.

TV: Threshold

2005-09-29T09:42:00.000-04:00

Dr. Molly Caffrey (Carla Gugino) deals in worst-case scenarios. What happens if a virus breaks out all over the country? She’s got a contingency plan for that. What about a nuclear holocaust? Check. What if there’s some sort of extra-terrestrial attack? There’s a plan for that too. And it’s called “Threshold,” which is also the name for this new show on CBS.

The pilot starts out with a strange object hovering over a naval ship out in the middle of the ocean. The object is pulsating and looks kind of like a lit up Christmas ornament with spikes coming out of it. It makes the sound of broken glass shards grinding together. As a result, Dr. Caffrey is picked up in a helicopter and brought to a government building of some sort. There Deputy National Security Advisor J.T. Blaylock (Charles S. Dutton) informs her of the possible alien nature of the object, and she assembles a crew to go out to the ship and check it out. Blaylock assigns “ghost agent” Cavennaugh (Brian Van Holt) to protect Molly and her “Red Team” at all costs. The Red Team consists of forensic microbiologist Nigel Fenway (Brent Spiner), astronautical engineer Lucas Pegg (Rob Benedict) (I bet you didn’t know there was any such thing as an astronautical engineer—but it’s a good thing there is for this sort of situation, huh?), and linguist/mathematician Arthur Ramsey (Peter Dinklage).

When the team arrives at the ship, they find almost all of the crew dead, and the remaining members have been somehow . . . changed . . . by the strange object. The one member on whom we mainly focus is Gunneson (played by the creepy guy who kidnapped Claire on “Lost,” William Mapother. Man, he really knows how to do creepy). The crew has him under control, but before they leave the ship, he is able to break free with seemingly superhuman strength and jumps from the ship into the ocean. Sadly, when the crew leaves the ship, they are informed by Cavennaugh that they need to destroy it, because the North Koreans are on their way, and we wouldn’t want them getting their hands on…well, whatever might be on that ship, right?

Intriguingly, Molly, Cavennaugh and Lucas have all been exposed to the same thing as the crew from watching a video of the strange object in the sky (a crew member taped the proceedings). They all have the same strange dream, and they haven’t been feeling quite right. There are other elements as well that you’ll be able to pick up on if you watch the show. That summary is a bit more lengthy than what I would usually do, but I couldn’t find a decent summary of the first two episodes anywhere online, so that will have to do.

I’m enjoying this show so far for a few reasons. The acting is all very good, and it’s good to finally see Peter Dinklage get more exposure. When you’re doing a show about alien life, it’s easy not to be realistic without too much criticism. The nice thing is that they pull it off here, making the people and their reactions seem real. There’s no way of knowing if any “worst-case scenario contingency plan” would work, and they don’t make the protocol seem rigid. They adapt the plan as they go. Someone like Molly, who drafts these things for the government and then suddenly is thrust into a leadership position probably wouldn’t be extremely comfortable in that role, and Gugino does a good job of conveying that. Each of the supporting cast fills his role well and contributes to the overall believability of the potentially unbelievable premise. They’re not comfortable being in a situation where they can’t tell family members where they are and what they’re doing. They’re essentially sequestered from the rest of the world while they figure this out.

The writing on the show is excellent, and keeps the viewer engaged throughout the whole show. There’s a lot of room for error when you’re talking about physics and math and the like, and there’s also a lot of room for confusing the viewer. The writers do a good job of keeping it relatively simple and not making us feel like idiots. I’ll be telling TiVo to keep this one.

Final Score: 4 cents.

TV: Head Cases

2005-09-21T01:13:00.000-04:00

Here’s the setup for “Head Cases”: you’ve got your straight-man lawyer, Jason (Chris O’Donnell), and you’ve got your crazy guy lawyer with one name (a-la the early Kramer), Shultz (Adam Goldberg). See, the thing is though, really, they’re both crazy! Ha! Bet you didn’t see that one coming! So Jason just got kicked out of the house by his wife, who was feeling neglected because his ambition to become a partner in his big-time L.A. law firm made him to neglect the family. After she kicked him out, he had a nervous breakdown and spent three months in a wellness center. Of course, what’s a big-time law firm want with a guy who’s having nervous breakdowns? So he gets fired.

On the other side, good old Shultz didn’t have any life-changing events in his life. He’s got “explosive disorder,” which sounds to me like a made up name for a short fuse. I don’t know if that’s a real thing or not, so if it is, I apologize to anyone that might have it. Don’t hit me. That’s what Shultz does. If he gets mad, he just starts smacking people around. Not such a good thing for a lawyer, you might think, and you’d be right. So it’s a good thing that Dr. Robinson (Rockmond Dunbar) from the wellness center set these two up as “buddies” who are supposed to keep each other sane.

All the wackiness ensues that one would expect. The two decide they should take on underdog cases together. So you get your weirdo clients (in the pilot, a nymphomaniac who just couldn’t help sleeping with people at her last job) and all the crazy courtroom antics, complete with Jason schooling Shultz on certain laws and codes, and Shultz teaching Jason about street smarts in his own zany ways.

The show is harmless, if not great or even good. There were a couple of laughs, and Chris O’Donnell is better than I expected (read: he didn’t make me throw things at the TV), but it wasn’t funny enough material to fill an hour. Adam Goldberg has annoyed me in the past, but wasn’t particularly awful here. I think one of the problems the show has is that we (or I, at least) didn’t really root for the main characters. It was almost like we were supposed to laugh at them for their misfortunes. Sure, that’s an ingredient in a lot of comedies, but usually it’s in the “loveable loser” sense. These guys aren’t really loveable, just losers. By the end, I found that I was almost relieved that the show was over. All in all, it just wasn’t enough to keep me coming back. There are too many other good shows on to watch a show like this (not to mention “Lost,” which is on at the same time).

Final Score: 2 cents.

TV: The War at Home

2005-09-20T14:19:00.000-04:00

“The War at Home” clues you in to its main focus with its title.  It’s pretty much about parents that only kind of get along with each other and their kids.  Think “Married…With Children,” only not as funny.

The show wants you to think it’s edgy and tackles the subjects that no other sitcom will tackle.  It thinks that in itself will make it funny (or perhaps make up for it not being that funny).  For example, Dave (the dad, played by Michael Rapaport) thinks his son Larry (Kyle Sullivan) is gay, and he doesn’t like it.  He brings up things at the dinner table like, “Hey, that so-and-so is hot, huh?”  Larry, of course, isn’t gay.  Then there’s the teenage daughter Hillary (Kaylee Defer), who tries to put things over on her parents, and who’s dating a black guy.  Her dad doesn’t like that either (Ooh!  Such edginess!).

Of course we find out later that mom Vicky (Anita Barone) has slept with all sorts of men (because they obviously didn’t have that conversation before they were married), including the father of the particular guy whom the daughter is dating.  This isn’t seen as a serious thing, mind you.  It just gets on Michael Rapaport’s nerves so that he can be annoyed all the time.  Isn’t that the only kind of character he plays, you ask?  Actually, sometimes he does scared, too.  There’s another kid named Mike (Dean Collins), too, who I’m sure will serve some kind of purpose eventually, but I’m not going to be tuning in to find out what that purpose might be.

The show does have its moments, but on the whole it seems to run out of steam halfway through the pilot episode, and you get the feeling that they don’t really have anymore jokes.  That’s not a good sign.

Final Score: 1.5 cents.

TV: Bones

2005-09-18T16:27:00.000-04:00

Imagie this board meeting, if you will:

TV Exec 1: "Guys, guys, I totally have a great idea. What if we combine the snappy, witty dialogue of the Gilmore Girls with a procedural drama like CSI or--stay with me on this--CSI: Miami."

TV Exec 2: "Hey, that's fab-o, really, but Miami? It's so 2002. What about someplace where we can toss in political references and storylines that feed into the CSI: Gilmore vibe. I'm thinking the nation's most important city . . . "

TV Exec 3: "But there's already so many shows set in New York . . . "

TV Exec 2: "Right, but I meant Washington D.C."

TV Exec 1: "OK, but what about characters? I mean, I'm thinking a tough as nails forensic anthropologist--"

TV Exec 2: "A what now?"

TV Exec 1: "You know, someone who does cool stuff with bones."

TV Exec 3: "And a woman!"

TV Exec 2: "Perfect! And since it's a woman, we'll flip every stereotype ever on it's head, and make her all intellectual and stuff, instead of warm and friendly. They'll never see it coming!"

TV Exec 1:"And a partner--someone smooth, sophisticated, a people-skills man; the heart to her brains."

TV Exec 3: "I love it! And what if we tossed in a holographic computer for no real reason."

TV Execs 1 and 2: "Awesome!"

--end scene--

This is pretty much how I imagine the pitch session went for Fox's new drama Bones (Tuesdays at 8:00 eastern), which actually makes the show sound a lot more awful than it actually is. There's a lot to like about this show, I think. The dialogue, while not the usual fare for a procedural show, is actually pretty entertaining and makes the characters pretty likeable and interesting. The two lead actors--Emily Deschanel as Dr. Temperance Brennan and David Boreanaz (Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans will know him as Angel) as FBI Special Agent (and awkwardly named) Seeley Booth--are both good fits for their characters and fun to watch. And good procedurals can still be good shows--see Fox's surprise hit from last year, House.

But the procedural genre feels too confining for this show, and I hope that as the season progresses there are longer story arcs and fewer one-shot episodes. The series pilot, while entertaining, wrapped up way to quickly and overall just felt like it wanted to hustle to the end.

My other complaints are mostly aesthetic. Since, when for example, do all scientific labs have 30 foot-plus ceilings and open air tables for experiments--wouldn't that make it hard to keep tests and workspaces free from contamination? Also, that stupid holographic computer: good idea for reconstructing faces on bones, bad idea for showing re-enactments of how someone was killed (watch it, you'll see what I mean). I get the idea that it's a cool new technology to exploit, but let's not be ridiculous.

I'll keep an eye on this show. It's got some kinks to work out, but it's got potential. If the notoriously itchy-trigger-fingered Fox execs allow the show to grow a little, executives (give me a good, long story, and tone down the flashy style in favor of substance) and I'll keep watching every week. Keep it on the 44 minute procedural, and I'll watch it when I can, but I won't make an appointment out of it.

Acting and writing: 4 cents
Style and feel: 2 cents

Final score: 3 cents--say it with me now--with potential (though I wouldn't be surprised if, given the pre-House time slot, this show became one of Fox's bigger new shows)

TV: Twins

2005-09-17T13:07:00.000-04:00

This is an easy one. Sara Gilbert runs the lingerie business that her parents own. She’s smart. Her obviously fraternal twin sister is a lingerie model who surprisingly models the company’s lingerie. She’s dumb. Can you imagine the recipe for comedy this setup brews?! And to top it off, the parents are mismatched too! Melanie Griffith and Cousin Larry? Are you kidding me? It must be hilarious! Actually, no. Hilarity does not ensue. Mark Linn-Baker can do so much better. Did you see his cameo on Law & Order? That was good. “Perfect Strangers” was too. This isn’t. It’s bad. Don’t watch it. It was painful to sit through, and I did it only to save you the trouble.

Final Score: 1 cent.

Tuesday: The New Thursday...kind of.

2005-09-17T08:30:00.000-04:00

Remember when Thursday night was chock-full of good shows for years? I do. For years there was at least something that pretty much any TV fan would watch. You had your “Friends”, your “Seinfeld”, your “Cheers”, etc. Even now there are a few shows that do well in the ratings on Thursday (“ER” and “CSI:” come to mind). Here’s the thing, though. Back when Thursday was “Must See TV” from top to bottom, it was all on one network. That was when NBC was king. Other networks tried for years to horn in on Thursday nights with no luck. This brings me to my question: Why do networks try to horn in on one timeslot when there are so many other good ones available?

Let’s look at Tuesday night this fall season. In the 9:00 hour, we have “My Name is Earl”/”The Office” on NBC, “Commander in Chief” on ABC, “The Amazing Race” on CBS, “House” on Fox, “Supernatural” on the WB, and “Sex, Love and Secrets” on UPN. If you look at NBC, CBS, Fox, and the WB, you’ve got one of the funniest shows on TV (“Earl” is supposed to be good too, but Shoeless Joel will let us know if that’s the case after the premiere), the reality show with the widest appeal, one of the best dramas on TV, a new and promising sci-fi/horror show (review coming after the second episode), and another show that's supposed to be decent (but coming from UPN, who can say for sure?).

I can halfway see the reason behind scheduling all these shows at the same time. They're pretty diverse in the audiences that they seek. The problem with that reasoning is that the appeal of the shows is wide, even with the different target core audiences. The buffoon of the whole situation is NBC, who is putting on a great show that's gotten very good reviews but not good ratings against two proven ratings winners in "House" and "Amazing Race". Remember when Fox kept "Arrested Development" around after its critically acclaimed but ratings-wise lackluster first season? They didn't put it up against arguably two of the overall strongest shows. They kept it on Sunday night. Even now it's on Monday, against the sinking (though still funny) "King of Queens" and the buzz-less "Surface". If NBC had any brains in this situation, they'd put "The Office" on the same night but at 8:00 or 8:30, opposite "According to Jim"/"Rodney", "NCIS", and "Bones". What do they have on there instead? Dead-in-the-water reality show "The Biggest Loser".

My point here is that a show can be successful on any night if it's a quality program. There are hits on every night of the week (except for maybe Friday). Why not find a weaker time slot for your good shows? Everyone knows when they've got promising shows and when they've got stinkers. Why else would there be mid-season relief pitchers out there in the network's bullpen waiting to take the place of the shows that fail? Do they think people will watch a sub-par show because there's nothing else on? While that may be true to an extent, wouldn't more people watch a good show that's up against a couple of lousy ones? I know it'd be going against what they usually do, but why not give it a try?

But hey--that's just my two cents.

Music: Ryan Shupe & the RubberBand: Dream Big

2005-09-14T16:49:00.000-04:00

Regular readers of any of my posts know that I’ve complained about the sameness of the music scene today. Every now and then you get some unique sound, but that sound isn’t always…well, good. Fortunately, this is not the case with Ryan Shupe and the RubberBand. I’ve been a fan of these guys for a while. They were a local band in Provo, Utah, where I went to college, and I actually once saw them play in my buddy’s back yard. I remember talking to Ryan Shupe and wondering how they hadn’t hit the national scene yet with their unbelievable live show (and this was just in a guy’s yard) and their one-of-a-kind style. He said they had a few things in the works, and here we are two years later with their first major release.

They will probably (unfairly) be pigeonholed into the country genre because the band includes a banjo, a fiddle, and a mandolin in the mix. It’s not the instruments used, though, but how they’re used that makes Ryan Shupe and the RubberBand unique. Wishing something in your CD collection had a reggae beat and a mandolin? Check out “Rain Falls Down” (track 8). How about a salsa-type song with a banjo? Play “Oh How I Miss You” (track 10). You never know what you’re going to get with this band, but you know it’s going to be good.

Dream Big is Ryan Shupe and the RubberBand’s first release with a major record label (Capitol Nashville), and it contains a few songs that they’ve been playing for a while combined with some new tracks. The album starts off with “Banjo Boy”, a song about a banjo player with major aspirations (“And all the babes will love me, sell out shows/The only problem is I play the banjo”). It’s a song with an infectious flow and lyrics that you have to sing along with.

Catchy tunes abound in the album. “Even Superman” is a love song about how everyone has his weakness; “Dream Big” is pretty much what it sounds like. My personal favorite track is “Simplify”—a grooving song about slowing things down and not worrying. “Ambush” (an instrumental) shows off the band’s great talent and ability to play lots of instruments (there are a total of nine instruments featured on the album).

I can’t urge you enough, if you like any kind of music, to check this album out. You can get the album from Best Buy for 10 bucks right now. If you want, check out Napster or whatever. Download “Banjo Boy” and “Simplify” if you want something representative of the band’s sound. If these guys can’t get you moving, you’ve obviously been fitted with concrete boots. And if you hear they’re coming to your town, go see them. You won’t regret it. They’ve got a lot of material that isn’t on the album (“Go To Hell” is one song that’s great at a live show), and they just have such a good time playing that you can’t help enjoying yourself. If I seem a little over the top about these guys, it's because I am. But know that it takes a lot for any band to get me this excited about their music.

If you don’t have the album, go buy it. Seriously. It’s awesome.

Final Score: 5 cents.

TV: Reunion

2005-09-10T00:18:00.000-04:00

Continuing in the tradition of 24, FOX gives us Reunion. It's the story of six high school friends and what happens to them over the course of 20 years. Every episode is a new year, starting in 1986. In the pilot episode, which aired last night and airs again tonight, the show starts in the present day where one of the friends has been murdered. "Brutally murdered in their prime by an unknown assailant," to be exact, which is the quote given in the eulogy. Right away I knew we were going to be exposed to some uber-goofy dialogue. Who says that in a eulogy? Someone setting up a premise, that's who. Couldn't the investigating detective (played by Six Feet Under's Mathew St. Patrick) have said something? But I digress. On to the show...

We start off at the high school graduation, where the six friends are introduced. They are Aaron (Dave Annable), Samantha (Alexa Davalos), Will (American Dreams' Will Estes), Craig (Sean Faris), Carla (Chyler Leigh), and Jenna (Amanda Righeti). Interestingly enough, we find out that the guy giving the eulogy was some random dude taking pictures at the graduation. I wonder if we'll hear from him again. If we don't that's kind of weird. Anyway, the six friends are introduced, relationships are established, and things begin their path toward the murder of one of them 20 years in the future. We learn what happens by way of flashback while Carla is interviewed by Detective Marjorino. I won't go into too much of the plot, because if you plan on picking up the show next week, FOX will most assuredly give you ample background for the second episode. And if they don't, check out the thoroughly detailed recap here.

The plot is intriguing, which is the main hook for the show. You don't know what led to the events in the present day, and you get to see them unfold year by year. If you can get past the soapy dialogue and background music, I think you'll enjoy the show. It's a bit much as far as melodrama goes compared to the types of shows I usually watch, but I still found myself sucked into the plot by the end of the show. Of course we get the requisite poking fun at the '80s. The characters make incorrect predictions, ("I'm telling you, Wham! is the next Beatles--Andrew Ridgley is the next John Lennon!"), there's the slutty friend who dresses hilariously, and of course there's plenty of '80s background music. If you tried hard enough, you could probably guess every song they'll play on the pilot without seeing the show.

Judging from the pilot, I'll be sticking with Reunion this season. It's something different, and it's fun. If you like a good mystery, I think you'd do well to check it out.

Final Score: 3 cents, with potential (not to rip off Shoeless Joel...I'm just sayin').

TV: Prison Break

2005-09-06T09:46:00.000-04:00

After 3 episodes of Fox's newest fall show, I have to say, it's pretty enjoyable. While it's certainly no "24"--which is what Fox is hyping it up to be--it is engaging and intriguing. At the same time, however, the show seems intent on playing up every prison cliche around and is led by a protagonist so cocky he makes Clubber Lang look downright bashful.

The story centers around Michael Scofield (Wentworth Miller, who you probably haven't seen before but looks like Ashton Kutcher and acts with the same look on his face in every scene) whose brother (Blade III's Dracula) has lost his final appeal and will be executed in 30 days. Convinced of his brother's innocence and that a goverment conspiracy (which the show allows us to see, though why exactly is still unknown) is setting him up, Scofield has himself thrown in prison (fortunately, he lands in the same prison his brother is in) in order to set up a . . . well, you saw the title of the show.

Subplots include Dracula's re-bonding with his son as his execution approaches, Lucifer from Constantine as a mob boss whose helpl Scofield needs, possible love interests from all angles (including a lawyer and former girlfriend who looks like she's about 18), and the usual prison elements of shivs, race riots, nasty prison guards, and so forth. In fact, much of this show feels like it was cribbed from Greatest Moments of Prison Film (goodbye Hispanic cell mate, hello crazy cell mate!) but fortunately slick production values--the show is filmed in an actual, though no longer working, prison--and an enjoyable story boosted by the "what's going to happen next" factor keep it working.

In some ways the weakest part of the show is Scofield himself, whom Miller played as cocky and sure of everything, despite all the "curveballs" that the show's writers keep throwing in his direction. In some ways the level of detail he's thought through this prison break is absolutely silly and unbelievable, but I'm willing to suspend that disbelief for the show. His smug attitude, though, is just grating, and I hope the course of the season sees him get less and less sure of himself as things continue to go wrong. If not, the show might struggle keeping at least this viewer contained.

Final score: 3.5 cents, with potential

Zimmdance Film Festival

2005-08-31T17:33:00.000-04:00

Recently my wife was out of town for over a week, so I had my own personal film festival. There’s really no common theme to the films I viewed, except that I wanted to watch or re-watch them.

Gerry
I have yet to see Gus Van Sant's Last Days, but it piqued my interest, so I thought I should check out some of his other work. Everyone on the planet saw Good Will Hunting and Finding Forrester, and they pretty much cancel each other out in terms of filmmaking, so I sat down to watch Gerry with an unbiased opinion. Have you ever seen a photograph of the desert? Have you ever stared at it for 85 minutes? If so, then you've seen this film! Van Sant was clearly trying to make an artistic film using minimalistic stylings, which adds up to a really boring movie. The vistas are beautiful, but it takes more than that to make a decent film. Minimalism works in film at times, but the films in which it works are usually trying to convey some message (See Solaris and 2001: A Space Odyssey, among others). Gerry is almost like a great documentary about a terrible subject: two guys who get lost in the desert. After seeing the film, I felt like maybe I missed something or just didn't 'get it'. But I'm pretty sure there's nothing to get, no matter how much Van Sant says there is. Final Score: 1 cent.

Elephant
After Gerry, I didn't even want to try to watch Elephant, but the subject matter—high school violence—was intriguing enough to get me to pop in the DVD. The film is essentially a fictionalized version of Columbine, told from the point of view of average students throughout the day of the shooting. Van Sant continues his simplistic film style in Elephant, but with a little more success. The static camera shots often come across pretentious, as if Van Sant wants to seem like he's being a bold filmmaker or making some kind of statement. The camera work doesn't make the statement, but the subject matter does. Columbine was a tragedy, and seeing a similar story told shows us how the day probably started just like any ordinary high-school day. Geeks were picked on, jocks were cool, nerds spent a lot of time in the library, and kids were late for class. The film is suspenseful because we know what's going to happen. It isn't exactly extraordinary, but taking the time to just ponder the events of the day makes the film fascinating. Van Sant made the right move by not trying to actually explain the events of the day, but his directing too often gets in the way of the plot, and nothing will yank you out of a story faster than that. Final Score: 2 cents.

Kung Fu Hustle
The first thing I can tell you about Kung Fu Hustle is that I barely remember the storyline. Not that it matters; and Stephen Chow must have known that plot was secondary when he made this film, which is essentially a celebration of slapstick cartoon humor, elaborate Kung Fu battles and CGI. If you take it as nothing more than that, you will enjoy this movie. If you're expecting an epic similar to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, you will be disappointed. Kung Fu Hustle references dozens of movies I have seen and probably dozens more that I haven't, but I think most would agree with me that Matrix jokes are getting old. The film is visually entertaining and you'll get a chuckle here and there out of it, but don't expect much more. Final Score: 3 cents.

Taxi Driver
Taxi Driver was released in 1976, and on the surface, it’s the gritty tale of Travis Bickle's (Robert DeNiro) suffering. More accurately, the film deals with a topic that was surely more timely when the film was released--the reincorporation of soldiers into American society after Vietnam. The fact that Bickle is an ex-marine is only briefly mentioned early in the film. Having no education or skills other than those he developed during Vietnam, he sets out to find employment. He is curiously drawn to driving a taxi on the midnight shift; possibly because the isolation and darkness are just about the only things that make him feel comfortable. He desperately wants to have a normal life, but is almost addicted to the immoral decadence of the city, which eventually leads to his descent into madness. This film is possibly DeNiro's best performance, and it was entertaining to see Jodie Foster, Cybill Shepherd and Harvey Keitel in a film from nearly 30 years ago. You wouldn't want to watch this film with your mother, but it is clear why this film is heralded as one of Martin Scorcese's best. Final Score: 3.5 cents.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
It almost seems as if Jack Nicholson was born to play R.P. McMurphy, a rebellious convict who escapes jail time by faking insanity, hoping for an easier life at the local asylum. McMurphy quickly discovers that the hospital is full of patients whose lives have been dampened by drugs, endless therapy and the commanding Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher). McMurphy, being the rambunctious extrovert that he is, quickly has most of the patients rallying behind him, rebelling against the authority of Nurse Ratched. The film, charming and tragic, is a cynical criticism of authority that is also symbolic of the state of the country after Watergate and Vietnam. A young Danny DeVito and Christopher Lloyd are also highlights. Will Sampson, who had never acted before, plays a "deaf and mute" Native American, and gives one of the best performances of the film. Final Score: 4 cents.

Born into Brothels
Zana Briski, an American photographer, set out to document life in quite possibly one of the most miserable corners of the world: the red light district of Calcutta. She lived in the area for over two years, but her ultimate goal changed almost as soon as she arrived. Briski surely found the task of documenting the lifestyles of prostitutes and their families either too difficult or too depressing—or both—and her focus changed to the children of the area. She becomes a mentor to roughly a dozen children who take interest in her photography. The documentary focuses on Briski’s desire to teach the children a valuable skill that may help them escape their parents’ way of life. The children’s photographs are truly amazing; not only do they quickly learn the concepts of lighting and composition, but they also seem to have an inherent ability to find soulful subjects. Granted, part of this is because of their location (I live in central Indiana, so it’s unlikely I would find a third world marketplace around the corner full of interesting subjects), but the fact that the children have enthusiastically developed a useful skill is obvious. And in the end, Briski still delivers her intended message—many of her pupils end up being forced to stay with their families, drop out of boarding school and will likely one day become prostitutes—the lifestyle in this part of Calcutta is almost impossible to escape. However, a few of her students remain in school and have a chance at a better life, and Briski found a more noble goal: to showcase the miserable lifestyle in the area not by focusing on it, but by focusing on the glimmer of hope in a child’s eye. Final Score: 4 cents.

Shaun of the Dead
If you are a fan of black comedy and the occasional zombie movie, then you will probably never find a better movie that Shaun of the Dead. The film follows Shaun, whose lifestyle indicates that he’s a zombie already, as he and a group of his friends, family, and acquaintances board up in a local pub and try to defend themselves against thousands of zombies. Sounds like your average zombie movie, right? The difference is this film knows that zombies are just about the lamest, most boring villains to ever hit the silver screen. They’re slow, very easy to kill, and their only threatening quality is that they come in droves. After it takes Shaun hours to realize almost everyone around him is a zombie, he and his friends immediately head over to his mom’s house, where his obnoxious step-dad needs to be killed. They rescue her, and they all head for the bar to try to survive the outbreak. Much hilarity ensues. Lucy Davis is in the supporting cast, whom I’ve had a minor crush on since “The Office.” Shaun of the Dead is different than most zombie movies in one way…the comedy is intentional. Final Score: 4 cents.

Garden State
Anyone who is a fan of “Scrubs” knows Zach Braff is a talented actor, but his work in Garden State as producer, director and actor has me excited for anything that he does in the future. The story follows Andrew Largeman (Zach Braff) as he flies home from his struggling L.A. lifestyle to attend his mother’s funeral. While he is home, he connects with old friends, attempts to salvage a flawed relationship with his father, and most importantly, he meets Sam (Natalie Portman), a free-spirited girl who seems to embody everything missing from his life. Their relationship becomes far more important than anything else during his visit home, even after knowing her only for a few days. I had seen Garden State a few months ago, but I loved it so much that I though I should see it again to see if the film has staying power. It does. Final Score: 5 cents.

Film: March of the Penguins

2005-08-30T13:57:00.000-04:00

By this point everyone and their dog has reviewed and raved about March of the Penguins, so in a way, this review seems wholly unnecessary. Yet, like the subject matter itself, there is something compelling about the film and its search for--what, "humanity"? emotion? connection?--in one of the most harsh environments on Earth. Director Luc Jacquet succeeds in striking at primal urges common to all viewers (even all species): the nature of motivation, the need to care for and be cared about, the will to survive. In addition, the beauty of Antarctica's landscape, for example, or penguins flying through the water are sights we rarely see, and they are impressive. To that end, the brief 80 minutes or so that the film runs feels, above all, epic and meaningful, even in its simplicity.

The stars of this film are, of course, the penguins. With the help of Alex Wurman's effective (if slightly new age) score and Morgan Freeman's narration (general rule of thumb: everything gains gravitas when Freeman's slow, melodic voice fills the background. It's true--imagine Freeman narrating this review, even. All of a sudden I'm a good writer, huh?) the little birds become heroic, brave, loving, sad, pathetic, and all together human. We don't know, as the narrator points out, what exactly drives the penguins to do what they do, but Jacquet successfully ties in their activities to our own drives and tendencies. The way they care for their chicks, for example, while so different than the parenting process of humans, shares an emphasis on nurturing and tenderness that is moving. Similarly, when chicks die or are carried off by predators--a natural part of the animal kingdom--the director captures the loss and sadness of the parents beyond what we typically expect from animals. It can be powerful.

In some ways, the biggest problem with this film is that it's received so much hype. Like a hole-in-the-wall restaruant with great food, this is a film that would be better served if people were to stumble across it and find it on their own than it would by a large advertising campaign and wall to wall raves. After all, it is a documentary--and a nature documentary at that--so it deserves some of the quietness and dignity that typically denotes that genre. In fact, I thought about whether or not I should review this film for several days. I'd hate for someone to go in expecting too much and not be able to enjoy it like I did. But--like with that hole-in-the-wall restaurant--there's pleasure in sharing one of your own finds with friends. So take my advice: see a side of the world you've probably never seen, and enjoy it.

Final Score: 4 Cents

DVD: The Ring Two

2005-08-24T00:17:00.000-04:00

Here's the thing about sequels to movies like The Ring: they frequently suffer from what I call "The Jaws Syndrome". Remember the first Jaws movie? You know, where they didn't show the shark 400 times, and you were scared of the unknown? How big is the shark? Why's the shark killing all these people? You know, stuff like that. Then in the sequels, they make the shark itself the focal point of the movie and we see it all the time. We see all the mayhem the shark causes close-up, rather than in shadows and through bubbles in the water. It takes away all the mystery. The Ring Two suffers a little from The Jaws Syndrome, but not enough to make it a bad movie for that reason only.

It's six months after the events of The Ring, and Rachel Keller (Naomi Watts) has moved away from Seattle with her creepy son Aidan (David Dorfman). She's still in jounalism of course, but this time she's inexplicably an editor rather than a reporter in a small town paper. I'm sure they must have been thrilled to get a big-time reporter from the city and all, so...oh, wait a minute. This is never addressed. Anyway, I digress. I won't give away too much of the plot, because there's really no need to. Creepy things start happening, Aidan starts acting weird, and we need to find out more about the other creepy kid--the dead one--Samara.

Now let me just say this: I am a big fan of the first movie. It scared me to death in the theater, though I'm finding out that most people who saw it outside the theater didn't get so scared. It had to be the fact that I saw it there that made it so scary, because it's honestly the only movie that's frightened me like that in my adult life. And I don't mean it made me jump. I mean I was thinking about it and still getting creeped out after I got home. The main problem the sequel has is that it doesn't use the elements that worked for the first movie to their full potential. The Ring didn't feel like a horror movie. It felt like a drama that had people pursuing terrifying secrets and stories. Along the way, we got the pants scared off of us. The Ring Two, on the other hand, sometimes resorts to using the goofy horror movie tricks that we've seen a million times. The camera sneaks up on someone who has their back turned, the music builds and, *gasp!* Oh. It was just Frank! Sneaky old Frank, why'd you sneak up on me like that? The Jaws Syndrome shows its ugly face when we actually start to kind of see how the people die when Samara kills them, and we get more extended shots of their deformed faces. I tell you, a quick shot of the face is much, much scarier. With this, we know what's coming. So we see the face for a few more seconds and we say, "You know, that's not as bad as I remember it".

Admittedly we only see that kind of thing for the first half of the movie, but the point is that we didn't need it at all. If director Hideo Nakata (who directed the Japanese original, Ringu) had spent more time in the beginning trying to build the story and less time trying to make us jump, the movie might have been more satisfying than it ended up being. Of course the screenplay didn't do him many favors, giving us a few new things but mostly a story we'd already seen. I got the feeling sometimes that the characters themselves have forgotten the events that happened just six months ago. Maybe they've repressed their memories, right?

All in all, if you enjoyed the first Ring, you probably won't hate the sequel. If you hated the original, you're probably not reading this review. When the story actually starts moving along there are some genuinely creepy moments, and Sissy Spacek provides her own brand of eeriness. Frights aside however, the movie leaves us with questions that we shouldn't still have after a conclusion that (we assume) was supposed to provide all the answers. Confusing? Exactly.

Final Score: 2.5 cents.

P.S.: I should also mention that the DVD is "The Unrated Version". In fact, when you start the movie it says that again: "This Version is Unrated" as if to say "You may have heard that the theater version sucked, but this is way better!" All it means is that they put in some of the deleted scenes that they usually save for special features, then they didn't re-submit it to the MPAA.So if you saw the version in the theater and didn't like it, you probably won't like this one any better. In fact, if you only saw it once, you probably won't even be able to tell the difference.

Music: Nickel Creek - Why Should the Fire Die?

2005-08-21T07:13:00.000-04:00

I've always enjoyed Nickel Creek, though their sound sometimes got tiresome on the first two albums. On those previous outings, the band has shown off their ample talents instrumentally and vocally, but on Why Should the Fire Die? we get to see more of what they can do.

All three members of the band (Chris Thile on mandolin, Sean Watkins on guitar, and his sister Sara on the fiddle) lend equal strength to the album, providing stirring and intriguing melodies and harmonies as well as complicated yet somehow simple arrangements. On the first two albums, Alison Kraus acted as producer--which could provide an explanation for the way the band sounded. This time around, Eric Valentine takes the producer's chair, along with Tony Berg. Valentine has collaborated with acts such as Smashmouth, Queens of the Stone Age, and Joe Satriani, so you can see already that the album might sound a bit different.

After listening to the album numerous times, I can't find a track that I don't enjoy. You get a taste of quite a few genres, though Nickel Creek is often classified as country or bluegrass. They're a hard band to categorize, which is part of what makes them refreshing in today's often-stale music scene.

The album starts off with "When In Rome"--a great intro song with some Celtic undertones and some great harmonies. Nothing groundbreaking here, but it's definitely a toe-tapper, and it's a good start to the album. The next track--"Somebody More Like You"--is where we start to see something different. I'm used to hearing happier love songs amid some sad tales from Nickel Creek. But here we get more of a "bitter ex-lover" feel, with muted strings and a few biting lyrics ("I hope you meet someone your height/So you can see eye to eye/With someone as small as you"). From there we go to the mournful and longing "Jealous of the Moon" and the even-more-Celtic-than-the-first-track "Scotch and Chocolate".

With the fifth track, "Can't Complain", Chris Thile shows more with his vocals than we've seen on Nickel Creek albums before. Toward the end of the song, I was surprised to hear some of the grit come out in his voice, and I really enjoyed it. This is also less lyrically typical than what Nickel Creek usually does, about a guy with a warped perception about his relationship with a girlfriend. Next is a solo performance from Sara Watkins with a cover of Bob Dylan's "Tomorrow is a Long Time." This is the kind of song that makes a man just stare off into space. Watkins' voice is absolutely haunting.

What I've described thus far doesn't quite make up half of the album. Look for other tracks like "Eveline" and "Best of Luck" for more that you wouldn't expect to hear from this band.

Nickel Creek is close to hitting it big. They're not quite there yet, but they're definitely headed in the right direction. With their immense vocal and instrumental talent, coupled with their songwriting ability (all songs were written by the band with the exception of the Dylan cover), it's only a matter of time. This album isn't perfect, but it's a must-have in my book.

Final Score: 4 cents.

TV: Criss Angel: Mindfreak

2005-08-11T00:13:00.000-04:00

On the pilot episode of Mindfreak, Criss Angel says he wants to make magic "popular culture." I'm not exactly sure what that means. If it means having magic on TV, I guess he's gotten off to a good start. Although we've already seen David Blaine and David Copperfield specials, and we've all heard of Siegfried and Roy. But that's all beside the point. Let's get on to the magic...or whatever it is this show is about.

Angel says that his magic touches people "on an emotional level." What is that emotional level? Well, in the next sentence he says "I like to play with people's fears," so I guess the emotion is fear. This makes sense because he's doing things that people are afraid to do (setting himself on fire, laying on a bed of nails and having a Hummer drive over him, etc). Heck, I'm afraid to do those things. So what happens on the show is that there's a main illusion for each episode. Thoughout the show, Angel gets ready by doing a bunch of warm-up magic on the streets with the regular people, who react with your typical cursing and blasphemy when they see the illusions that Angel performs. Of course they do.

During the course of his street magic, his crew (mainly consisting of his brothers, it seems) proceeds to talk unceasingly about how crazy Criss is and how one of these times he's going to hurt himself and how worried they are about him. Then at the end of the show we get the main stunt that this has all been leading to.

Now this all has to do with magic, so you're probably wondering where the "mindfreak" thing applies. Well, the theme song at the beginning of the show is your basic thrash metal song and goes something like this: "I am the Mindfreak! Mindfreak!!!" Then, before each commercial, we get a weird camera angle of Angel and he says (without moving his mouth, of course), "Enter my mind." Then he eats the camera. His eating the camera transports us to his mind, which is a bizzarre place where we are treated to about 30 seconds of abject weirdness. The scene always involves a beach, something dangerous (fire, etc), and what looks like some old-time carney-types. These carney-types also show up during the title sequence, and I'm not sure what their significance is.

So there's your show. There is magic and there's general wackiness. Angel's magic is definitely impressive, which it should be if he's going to have his own show. He's more of an extrovert than David Blaine, and he has charisma, so the show is definitely watchable. That having been said, you'll probably tire of it after a few episodes, and it'll become one of those shows that you'll stay with for a few minutes while channel surfing; maybe you'll flip back to see the main illusion or something. It's definitely not can't miss tv, though.

Final Score: 2.5 cents

Billboard Watch: Top 200 Albums (Jason Mraz: Mr A-Z)

2005-08-09T00:20:00.000-04:00

As you can see, I've changed the name of the Billboard column. After going to the Billboard site the week after I did the first "Weekly Billboard," I realized I couldn't subject myself to some of the things that were topping the charts for consecutive weeks. And since this is not a full-time job, sometimes I just don't have the time. So occasionally I'll see what's on the Billboard and let you know about it. It doesn't necessarily have to be something on the top of the charts. Maybe sometimes I'll go to the bottom and see what's down there. This week I'm doing the number five album on the top 200 album list: Jason Mraz with Mr. A-Z.

Jason Mraz had a hit back on 2002 with "Remedy," and hearing that song piqued my interest. So I downloaded a bunch of his live recordings in addition to picking up a copy of his debut album Waiting For My Rocket To Come. I found that I enjoyed the album, but I enjoyed his live performances even more. In my opinion, one weakness of the first CD was that it took songs that sounded best with an acoustic guitar, vocals, and not much else and then overproduced them. The songs were still solid on the album, but sometimes it was just too much.

That brings us to the sophomore effort from Jason Mraz, Mr. A-Z. I've heard from some that they find the first single, "Wordplay" to be cocky and self-referential. I don't feel the same way, though I can definitely see where that impression would come from. The thing about Jason Mraz is that he refernces his older non-album songs in his lyrics on the first album. It seems to me, more than being cocky, he just gets a kick out of it. So that doesn't bother me. The fact that he talks about himself quite a bit in the song doesn't really bother me either, because he is, as he says "all about the wordplay." If he didn't do it well, that would be one story. But he does.

The nice thing about Mr. A-Z is that the whole album doesn't have to be about the wordplay. Sure, we've got songs like "Geek in the Pink" and "Did You Get My Message?", which showcase Mraz's free-flowing style, but we also get tracks like the haunting "Bella Luna" and the almost Ben Folds-esque "Mr. Curiosity," which display his singing chops. Mraz has extraordinary control of his voice, and he sounds as good singing in falsetto as he does in full voice.

The problem I have here is the same one I had with the first album--the production. The songs on the whole are stronger on this album, and it doesn't show as much as it did with Rocket. But there are times when the songs seem to revel in their overproduction--like at the end of "Did You Get My Message?", when there's a completely unnecessary run of background vocals and general chaos, or the incomprehensible bridge to "Mr. Curiosity" that features wind chimes and opera. I'm not kidding. It's weird.

On the whole I enjoy the album, and I can recommend it. But there are too many parts that make me say "Wha' Happened?" for me to give it a really good score. If you want the best Mraz out there by far, find his live performance at Java Joe's from 2001.

Final Score: 3 cents.

TV: Starved

2005-08-08T08:10:00.000-04:00

Starved is a new show on FX that centers around a group of people with various eating disorders. Sam (Eric Shaeffer) is an anorexic/compulsive overeater, Billie (Laura Benanti) is a recovered anorexic, Dan (Del Pentecost) is a compulsive overeater, and Adam (Sterling K. Brown) is a recovering bulemic. The show has great potential to be very funny. Three of the four main characters are men, working against the common notion that primarily women have eating disorders, and it's something that's never really been done. The problem comes with the execution of the show.

The characters are for the most part compelling, but they are also shallow. This isn't a problem if it's done well (just look at Seinfeld), but it's just not done correctly here. Some of the scenes are funny, and the overall story of the pilot was fine. The problem that I found was that the show tries too hard to be "edgy" and to "push the envelope" (read: there's a lot of sex and swearing and things that are just starting to be accepted on cable networks). This distracts from the story and takes away from the likeability of the characters. There are moments of humor and moments of nastiness; the problem is that the nasty is more memorable than the funny.

The scenes at the Overeaters Anonymous group are hilarious, and there are a couple other good scenes (Adam is a cop, and at one point he pulls over a Chinese food delivery guy on a bike and takes his food), but mostly it centers around shallow dialogue and cheap "shocking" scenes. Don't get me wrong--a show can have profanity and such and still be entertaining (The Sopranos comes to mind), but this is just too much and it doesn't fit the subject matter. It's a shame, too, because there are so few good original comedies on TV--this one had a chance with its solid premise. Unfortunately, it's been sabotaged by people who think vulgarity for the sake of vulgarity is funny.

Final Score: 2 cents

DVD: Primer

2005-08-01T19:47:00.000-04:00

Final Score: 5 cents.

The above score may seem out of place, but for a review of Primer, this is a logical starting point. Primer has been out on DVD for a while, and the film was a favorite during the 2004 Sundance Film Festival. Since the movie is about time travel, just ignore the fact that this review isn’t very timely.

Primer was filmed on a budget of around $7000, but don’t let that stop you from seeing it. Writer/director/actor Shane Carruth is a math geek, and not shy about it. The film begins with a group of four overworked and underpaid engineers who spend their free time working on a project in Aaron’s (Shane Carruth) garage. They know they have discovered something, but they’re not sure exactly what.

The film explores time travel in the most honest, realistic and simplistic way imaginable. There is no flying DeLorean, no trips to the Stone Age, and no lightning bolts or wormholes. The film focuses on what a pair of average young men do when they discover they have the ability to travel back in time, even if for a short period only.

And what do they do? Exactly what probably any one of us would do: figure out how to get rich quick. Thereafter, it doesn’t take long for Aaron and Abe (David Sullivan) to realize the potentials of time travel, which naturally involve lots of questionable behavior and tragedy. I won’t give much more away, but I will admit that upon first viewing, I’m not entirely sure what happened. I have a feeling seeing the movie again isn’t going to help much, but I’m planning to see it again soon. Just the puzzling nature of the film makes you want to come back for more.

Carruth’s debut is well written. It doesn’t shy away from tech talk, which forces the viewer to concentrate even harder to understand the movie. The way the actors deliver the lines make it even more enjoyable—they speak quickly and softly as if we’re in on their secret.
I mentioned the low budget of the film, and it just goes to show that a quality film can be made by a few guys in their garage. It doesn’t take a multi-million dollar budget like Michael Bay’s recent The Island, reviewed below. I look forward to seeing more work by Carruth. And if you don’t remember the final score, just travel back in time a few seconds and read the first line of this review again.

Film: The Island

2005-08-01T08:01:00.000-04:00

Oh, Michael Bay, you’ve burned me before. Things started off bad between us with Bad Boys, but then just a year later you brought me The Rock, and though it wasn’t perfect and had many problems, it was a lot of fun, and I thought you had changed. Like a sucker, I watched Armageddon, thinking its utter ridiculousness was just a phase you were going through. Then came Pearl Harbor, and I knew it was over between us. Ben Affleck, horrible fictional “plot” twists, managing to make one of the most important events in American history look cheesy, silly, and no better than popcorn entertainment . . . you obviously weren’t ready for a long-term relationship. Bad Boys II just confirmed my suspicions.

Then came trailers for The Island, and I thought you’d turned over a new leaf. The movie looked like a smart sci-fi thriller with some fun explosions to boot. In my dreams, I imagined something like The Bourne Identity only set in the future. I thought you’d given up your mind-numbingly ridiculous plots, your focus on crazy effects over character exploration, your decision to cater to the dumbest 3% of the audience. “This looks,” I thought, “like a movie where ideas matter as much as the chase scenes.” You chose an appealing and smart cast—Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansen, after all, are known for choosing interesting roles. Early reports from the film sites said this was going to be a new type of movie, and I believed them.

Wow, was I wrong.

Let me ask you, if we’re being honest with each other. Did you just not notice that you had plot holes the size of Rhode Island in your story? That you never explained how “the problem” that gets the plot rolling happened? That whenever it was convenient Ewan McGregor’s character learned new skills (like driving a car, or speaking in a Scottish accent, or whatever) with no explanation of how? Did you not notice, or did you not care?

I tend to think you just didn’t care. After all, look at your editing! Never have I seen a “big summer movie” where editing mistakes were so obvious on the first viewing. So many times I told myself “Hey, there’s a scene missing here, because that cut just made no sense.” In the car chase scene, for example, at one point the hero is fighting someone in the closed space of the car. Then you cut to an outside view, and the car door is open and remains open for the rest of the film. When did that door open, Michael, I ask you?

The movie was just sloppy, the ideas—though interesting—are only half-explored, the actors play their characters as two-dimensional cardboard cut-outs with little or no development. The only thing that works was the unexpected humor. The script was funnier than I expected, and though it was nice, it wasn’t enough. It’s over between us, Michael Bay. You’re a sub-par director who only knows how to blow stuff up—which admittedly you do pretty well. But that’s just not enough for me. I see from IMDB that your next project is a live action Transformers movie. That’s all I need to confirm it: you haven’t changed, and I don’t think you ever will.

Final score: 1.5 cents

DVD: Hostage

2005-07-31T11:45:00.000-04:00

Hostage, based on the novel of the same name by Robert Crais, is true to the book in that it is fast-paced, suspenseful, and inventive. It's easy to follow the pattern in some of these suspense thrillers, and while this movie does have some of the elements from films we've seen before, we're not seeing these elements and saying "Oh, this again." The nice thing about the movie is that the audience is so sucked into the story and the characters that they don't really notice that they've seen some of these things before. And while we might sometimes be able to guess what may happen, it's the story of how it happens that intrigues us.

Bruce Willis plays Jeff Talley, a former hostage negotiator in Los Angeles who is now Chief of Police in the uneventful upper-class town of Bristo Camino. Basically he's gone from a high-stress job where he's trying to save peoples' lives to little more than a desk job where he tells corny jokes to his staff. We find out why he's no longer a negotiator in the first scene of the movie, and that sets the stage for later.

Things start to get ugly in Bristo Camino when a trio of teenagers decide to try and steal a well-off family's Escalade from their house. Things escalate from there, and it turns into a hostage situation (which you probably could have guessed from the title). The antagonists are Dennis Kelly (Jonathan Tucker), his brother Kevin (Marshall Allman), and Dennis' new acquaintance Mars (Ben Foster). Each plays a different role in the crime, with Dennis trying to be in charge, Kevin not wanting to be involved in the first place, and Mars being the extremely troubled, brooding crazy kid.

This is not a paint-by-numbers hostage drama where you have the crazy hostage-takers who keep making dumb decisions and threatening to shoot people, and then you execute a trade, and then the bad guys keep coming up with dumb ideas and so do the cops, etc, etc. The three kids, while obviously not brain surgeons, are in over their heads, but rather than seeing what they do and saying, "Why don't they just do this?" it's easy understand their decisions and their situation. Caught in the middle of the whole situation are the hostages themselves. Walter Smith (Kevin Pollack), his daughter Jennifer (Michelle Horn), and his son Tommy (Jimmy Bennett) all play a part in how the story unfolds, which is nice to see and more realistic than having them just sit quietly in the corner while this whole thing is worked out.

The main cast members all do a respectable job in their roles, though some of the supporting cast leave something to be desired (you don't see them much, though, so it's not that big a deal). Bruce Willis can do any action movie as he's shown many times, and he can do it with the requisite amount of emotion. The three villains also do an impressive job, playing their characters so that we don't like what they're doing, but at the same time we feel kind of sorry for them. If you like a good edge-of-your-seat suspense thriller, check this one out.

Final Score: 3.5 cents

DVD: Hitch

2005-07-26T11:02:00.000-04:00

There is a formula to be followed in romantic comedies, and Hitch doesn't stray far from the norm. That's not to say it's a bad movie, but it's certainly nothing groundbreaking.

Will Smith plays the too-smooth Alex Hitchens, a bachelor and the mythical "date doctor". He works by referral only, so as not to blow his cover. So the men of the city who know a woman and admire from afar pass his credentials around, and good ol' Hitch helps them out. Enter Albert (Kevin James), the bumbling financial advisor with a giant crush on the rich and famous Allegra Cole (Amber Valetta). To make things interesting, Hitch develops his own crush on gossip columnist Sara (Eva Mendes).

The plot is pretty bare bones, but better than your average romantic comedy. It's the progression of the plot that will remind you of other movies in the genre. But really, we're not watching this one for plot. This movie is about the chemistry between Will Smith and Kevin James, and that chemistry is excellent. They play very well off of each other, and the movie really has its best moments when the two of them are on the screen together. Both of them make scenes and plotlines that we've seen before seem fresh. James is in (if I hear correctly) his last season of The King of Queens, and here's hoping his movie roles keep increasing. He is hilarious in pretty much every scene he's a part of in the film. Will Smith is always entertaining, and no less so in Hitch. He plays his uber-cool persona very well as the title character, and he's believable as a guy who helps men get the women of their dreams.

There is a little character development, and we only really get the backstory of Hitch. One element of the movie that plays to its disadvantage, however, is the performances of the lead actresses. We know that Albert is in love with Allegra (not the medicine), but she comes across a little cold (get it?), and not very endearing most of the time. Of course, part of that in my opinion can be attributed to the somewhat lackluster performance of Amber Valetta. Eva Mendes doesn't really do us any favors as Sara, either. One wonders if the filmmakers didn't want strong female performances to overshadow Smith and James.

Its problems aside, I can confidently recommend this film. Comedy is more difficult than people give comedians credit for, and this movie delivers more often than not. If you enjoy Kevin James and Will Smith in past performances, you'll enjoy them here. James is one of those rare comedians that does excellent stand-up comedy but also has acting chops. I think we'll see a lot more of him in the coming years.

Final Score: 3.5 cents

Trailer Park: July 23

2005-07-23T00:54:00.000-04:00

I'll be back with the Weekly Billboard hopefully this weekend, but now I'd like to take a look at a few trailers and give you my two cents about them. To make things easier and to satisfy my OCD, I will categorize them.

Exciting:

King Kong - Peter Jackson has pre-Village M. Night Shyamalan status with me right now. I'm excited for anything his name is on. Though to be honest, I'll probably be excited for whatever M. Night's next one is.

Grizzly Man - Admittedly, this is the animal show nerd in me that's excited. But even if I wasn't an animal show nerd, this looks really interesting.

Chronicles of Narnia - Zimm might've had my head if I didn't include this one, but seriously...it looks really good.

Intriguing:

Red Eye - I like a trailer where it looks interesting but doesn't give anything away. This is one of those. It's a Wes Craven movie, but it doesn't seem like your regular Craven stuff.

The New World - The Pocahontas story, eh? Hm.

The Edukators - Looks German, but I'm not positive. Interesting idea.

The Warrior - A British film that doesn't look British. I thought this was an Asian movie at first.

Mirror Mask - Did they really need to start the trailer with quotes from reviews? I think the trailer spoke for itself pretty well.

Transporter 2 - I may be in the minority here, but I really enjoyed the first Transporter. Maybe it's because I'm a Jason Statham fan, but still.

I Don't Know...:

Waiting - Some parts of this look really funny, and others look really gross. And the fact that hot dogs are a central theme makes me really nervous. What gives me hope is some of the more underrated actors in the cast (I can't remember their names, but if you've seen Ed or American Dreams, you know who I'm talking about).

The Baxter - Funny, or big-screen version of Stella? Only time will tell.

Flightplan - Where's Jodie Foster been, anyway? Do I already know the ending of this movie? Is it The Forgotten on an airplane? I hope not.

The Brothers Grimm - Matt Damon and Heath Ledger...I like those two (usually)...but the plot...geez. I don't know. Could be really good or really bad. I don't know if "passable" is a possibility here.

The Skeleton Key - I do love a good thriller. Is this one? It looks like it's either good, or another one of the Ring clones we've seen over the last few years.

Okay, This Just Looks Bad:

Stealth - This is a movie about a stealth bomber with a mind of its own. No, seriously. I'm not kidding. Also, Jamie Foxx is in it. Comparisons with post-Oscar Cuba Gooding may begin......now.

Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo - It's movies like this that make me kind of glad that I don't have press credentials yet and I don't feel obligated to review this.

Into the Blue - Jessica Alba was in a really good movie with Sin City. Unless she's in the sequel, I don't ever expect to see her in another good movie again. This one looks like it might have some fun scenes, but most of the time you're just shaking your head.

There are more, but it's getting late. What are you looking forward to/dreading? How do these look? Add your own two cents.

Music: Kasabian (self-titled)

2005-07-21T11:20:00.000-04:00

Kasabian is one of those bands that I want to like a lot more than I actually do. Their self-titled debut CD has moments that make me want to just sit down and jam—or else fly through a neon space tunnel with 3-D glasses on, if you know what I mean. But it also has moments where I find myself incredibly bored, distracted by my own computer’s wallpaper, which really isn’t much of anything. The album feels like Moby with a harder edge to it, but it succumbs to the same weaknesses Moby does: what’s good in small doses can’t stand on its own for a full forty minutes.

Kasabian (named for Charles Manson’s getaway driver, Linda Kasabian) is a group of lads from Great Britain who turned to communal life to create this album, and the music does have a bit of the “I’m living with my friends and we’ve got some great weed” feel, but at times the band’s dabbling with electronica gets in the way of what would otherwise be perfectly solid music. Tracks like “Butcher Blues,” for example, start off interesting, but then get distracted by synth experimentation that drives the song’s real core into the background. Others, like the excitingly named but actually empty “Reason is Treason” are just so repetitive that I have a hard time making it to the end of the song. Indy bands of the 00's, didn’t you learn from the 80's? Your synthesizer can be your friend, but it should never take control of the relationship!

At times, though, I have to admit that the combination works well. The album’s first single, “Club Foot” and the rap-influenced “Cutt Off” are catchy bits that most people will nod their heads to. Overall, though, most of this is just too clubby for me to really enjoy. “L.S.F.” (I have no idea what this means) and “Processed Beats” aren’t bad, but they’re not great either. And that’s really all I can say about the album as a whole. The cover art, the singles, the idea: all of it works, but the final product doesn’t equal the sum of its parts. Though the band has a talent for coming up with catchy song titles, they aren’t quite as successful with the songs themselves.

Late at night, as background music, this album is perfect. But I can’t bring myself to give a spectacular score to anything that works best when you’re not paying attention to it.

“Club Foot” and a few other tracks: 4 cents—download the singles from Napster and leave the album at the store.

Final Score for the album as a whole: 2 cents.

DVD: Million Dollar Baby

2005-07-20T00:00:00.000-04:00

Million Dollar Baby won four of the major Academy Awards this year, and it deserved all of them. I've seen all of the nominees for Best Picture other than Sideways, but I think it's a safe bet that a movie about wine tasting and male bonding isn't going to sway my opinion. As for acting and directing, I haven't seen every nominee, but I can't imagine anyone turning in better performances in their categories than Hilary Swank, Morgan Freeman, and Clint Eastwood as a director.

Eastwood plays Frankie Dunn, an excellent cutman that doubles as a trainer and manager. He's been more successful as a cutman than as anything else, and that's mostly because of his cautious style of managing. Obviously, in a sport as cutthroat as boxing, that style doesn't sit well with a fighter looking for the big payday. Such is the case early in the movie with the fighter that Dunn manages. As he loses this fighter, he sours more than he already had on the managing/training side of the sport.

In the meantime, he owns a gym called the Hit Pit, where the kindly former boxer Eddie Dupris (Morgan Freeman) works. Freeman also narrates the film, and I've found that any film Morgan Freeman narrates is worth my time.

Enter Maggie Fitzgerald (Hilary Swank), a 31-year old aspiring boxer who wants Dunn to train her. Dunn "doesn't train girls".

As the plot unfolds, we see these characters develop and interact with each other in a way that seems genuine. We learn about their backgrounds, and see what makes them who they are. Eastwood's direction is brilliant, using light and shadow flawlessly to help enhance scenes and tell the story.

Hilary Swank is wonderful as Maggie, the girl from the deep South who wasn't supposed to amount to anything. She makes her character sympathetic and yet someone who doesn't want to be pitied. And of course Morgan Freeman turns in another awesome performance as "Scrap Iron" Dupris, the scarred old fighter who could still scrap today if given the opportunity. Clint Eastwood is no slouch himself, giving his best performance in recent memory. He may be a bit overshadowed by his co-stars, but he is excellent nonetheless.

There was one element of the movie that I wasn't ready for, but I won't give that away here. Though it nagged at me at first, this element was part of what made this such a great movie. Where it could have become one-dimensional, the film goes in a direction that one doesn't see coming, and that's refreshing.

As close as this movie comes to perfection, though, there was one flaw that did bother me. Again, to go into detail would be to spoil, but it seemed to me that most people who have seen a moderate amount of boxing would pick this up. It was a small bit of sloppiness in an otherwise very well put together movie. All in all, this one is well worth your time, and is one that I won't soon forget.

Final Score: 4.5 cents

Music (Concert): The Black Keys at the Music Mill; Indianapolis, IN

2005-07-18T01:37:00.000-04:00

The Black Keys are not a widely known band. They're one of those bands where if you see someone wearing a Black Keys t-shirt, or if you get into a conversation with someone and find out that person is a fan, you know they have good taste in music and actively look for quality tunes. But on to more about the band. You can read a bio on their website if you want, but for our purposes I'll just say that it's two guys. Dan Auerbach plays a heavily distorted guitar and does the vocal work, and Patrick Carney plays the drums. That's it. Now usually when a band only has three or four members, you'll see a whole crew of people on stage with them on other instruments or what have you, or you'll hear different instruments on the album. Not so with The Black Keys. It's guitar and drums. They were the only two guys on stage.

I went to the show with Zimm at the Music Mill (capacity 750 people), and not knowing what they looked like at first, we kept wondering who of the myriad of people coming on and off the stage was in the band. Having heard their music, we were pretty much expecting a couple of regular-looking guys. When they came out, it was like you knew they gave off the vibe of being two guys you knew in high school or something. Smaller venues tend to lend a sense of intimacy to their shows, but these guys also seemed pretty accessible. Auerbach was decked out in khakis and plaid, and Carney was sporting a Bob Seger shirt. Having waited around for about an hour and a half listening to the Mars Volta over the loudspeakers (the opening band didn't play due to unforeseen circumstances), we were eagerly awaiting some rocking out. The Keys did not disappoint.

The Black Keys are hard to categorize, using elements of dirty old blues and hard rock. Dan Auerbach has the voice of a 1920's bluesman, and the guitar chops to pull off a fusion of the two aforementioned styles. To give you an idea of how Patrick Carney plays the drums, I'll tell you that he broke a drumstick on the first song. He looks kind of like Paul Pfeiffer from The Wonder Years, glasses and all. The glasses were gone by the end of the show, having flown off of his face, probably never to be found again. Auerbach played a furious guitar, making up for the lack of a bassist by playing the bass string with his thumb while wearing a pick on his index finger (which satisfied my curiosity of how he gets that sound). It looked like he hurt his hand about halfway through the show, which wouldn't be a surprise, considering the intensity with which he shreds. They started out with "Stack Shot Billy", from their latest album, Rubber Factory. From start to finish (a solid hour), the crowd of about 600-700 was on its feet and deafening. If their blazing renditions of "Grown So Ugly" and "Till I Get My Way" couldn't get someone moving, that person must have been nailed to the floor.

The band played in such a way that the crowd knew they were having a good time, and they appreciated the feedback. After their initial set, the crowd chanted "Black Keys, Black Keys" until they came back out for the encore. The show was short but sweet, and well worth the $14 price tag (unless one bought their tickets through TicketBastard, who tacks on six bucks in surcharges--but it would've been worth $20, too). I will say this: I don't know if it was the venue or the band, but it was loud. I've seen AC/DC in concert, and that was loud too, but my ears were still ringing this morning after an hour-long concert. I'm not saying this is a bad thing, mind you. I'm just saying.

I can like a band after hearing some albums, but the true measure of a band in my opinion is their live show. The Black Keys put on a memorable show that will make me an active ticket-seeker for their next tour. If they're in your neighborhood, check them out. In the meantime, try out some of their material. You'll be glad you did.

Final Score: 4 cents

Music: Audioslave - Out of Exile

2005-07-16T11:29:00.000-04:00

Audioslave’s sophomore album is anything but sophomoric. The self-titled debut was exactly what everyone expected it to be: a formulaic blend of Rage Against the Machine and Soundgarden. The debut was full of hard-hitting rockers featuring Chris Cornell’s intense vocals and Tom Morello’s chompy riffs and effects solos. A ballad or two were thrown in for good measure, following a strict formula. It felt like the band didn’t collaborate before hand, as if the sessions were recorded separately. The band was recorded alone, Cornell was recorded alone, and then the tracks were pushed through a mixing board to get: Audioslave!

The follow-up album Out of Exile shows Audioslave has relaxed. Though the sound hasn’t changed drastically, it is clear the band no longer feels like the picked up pieces of grunge rock. Audioslave has developed a sound of their own. Still familiar, but with an intensity and creativity that was lacking from their 2002 debut.

Some of the songs still sound a lot like Rage Against the Machine with a different singer. This is a good thing, and probably the greatest strength of the first album. Zach de la Rocha never impressed me at all, and Cornell brings a new element to the sound, able to portray a range of emotions rather than simple vocal chord-rupturing angst.

Morello’s stylized riffs are abundant on songs like "Your Time Has Come," "Out of Exile," "The Worm" and "Man or Animal." To give credit where credit is due, his effects-laden solos are not digitized effects. Morello prides himself on creating unique sounds strictly from the guitar and a few analog devices. How old school! His sound isn’t unfamiliar territory, but it sounds much better than before.

Lyrically the album has improved. I’d hesitate to call Cornell a prolific songwriter, but he offers more than most of today’s music: “Someone gets excited in a chapel yard and catches a bouquet. Another lays a dozen white roses on a grave.” Imagery and lyrical balance like this isn’t exactly common in modern rock.

One thing I can’t help but wonder is what this band would sound like if Matt Cameron, the original drummer from Soundgarden, were part of the ensemble. I imagine he would bring a strength and complexity to the songs that Brad Wilkes can never offer. Wilkes’ drumming fits, but that’s all it does. Of course, if Cameron were part of Audioslave, he wouldn’t be part of Pearl Jam, and that would be a disaster.

I’m most impressed by some of the uniquely melodic songs on Out of Exile. "Dandelion" is my absolute favorite, and carries an uplifting tone; something you would never expect from the remnants of a band with the word “rage” in their name. The strength of Out of Exile is precisely that—the album features a range of emotion and inspiration. The dark and dismal is still there, but balance is struck with uplifting, melodic sounds as well. Audioslave seems to have learned the importance of contrast.

Final Score: 3.5 cents, 5 cents for great cover art.

Weekly Billboard: Hot 100 Singles

2005-07-16T10:26:00.000-04:00

1. Mariah Carey - "We Belong Together"
She's still making music? This is basically your typical Mariah Carey fare. I haven't seen the video, but I imagine it's got its share of glitter, slow motion, butterflies, and flowing hair.

2. Gwen Stefani - "Hollaback Girl"
I'll say this for Gwen Stefani: none of her songs sound the same (at least the ones I'm familiar with). That having been said, this song is awful. It makes me want to jump out a window. The shoeless one had a post a while back that cleared up what exactly a "hollaback girl" is, so we won't get into that. All I'll say is that Gwen Stefani is too old to make a song like this.

3. The Black Eyed Peas - "Don't Phunk With My Heart"
Surprise! This song is mostly beat and light on the substance. It starts off with some faux Indian rhythm, and then the chick in the band (that's what I call her) comes in with an annoying refrain that is repeated throughout the song. Then there's a bunch of lyrics that make no sense, with an non-creative beat that makes you want to smash the speakers. That's pretty much it. I think the song's about whether the two characters will still be in love if they have sex, but it's not worth looking into the lyrics to find out for sure.

4. The Pussycat Dolls featuring Busta Rhymes - "Don't Cha"
"Don't cha wish your girlfriend was ________ like me?" That's the main idea of the song. Some of the blanks include "hot", "a freak", and "fun". Or as we call it outside the music biz, "a whore". But who am I to nitpick? Busta Rhymes sounds a little more intelligible than his "Woo Ha" days, but not by much.

5. Rihanna - "Pon de Replay"
Rihanna must really not be able to hear the music, because the whole time she's just asking the DJ to turn it up. I'm not sure what "Pon de Replay" means, but I think it means "I like to say these two sounds before the word 'replay'". I don't know how people listen to this song for the whole 4 minutes and 17 seconds. It's like a loop. The last minute doesn't even have any words. Maybe I just don't get it because I don't dance.

6. Missy Elliot featuring Ciara and Fat Man Scoop: "Lose Control"
If I were a rapper, my name would be DJ Nastyfat. It seems we're moving away from "phat", and going to the more traditional "fat". I didn't know about Fat Man Scoop, but I've heard of Fat Joe. Also, I think this is the 37th song with that title, but I'll move on. I must just be missing the whole dance craze, but it seems to me that it would get really annoying to listen to this stuff in the car or something. I'm guessing it must be the fat guy yelling in the background, because it sounds like a guy with some jowls. And I'm not sure why Missy Elliot took main credit for the song, because the other two are more involved in it than she is. Maybe she played the xylophone part.

7. Kelly Clarkson - "Behind These Hazel Eyes"
Being an "American Idol" fan, I have a soft spot for Kelly Clarkson. I enjoy her voice, and this song showcases it well. It is a bit melodramatic (and I have seen the video for this one--also melodramatic), but it's by far the least obnoxious of what's listed here so far. And it even features real instruments! Not exclusively mind you, but still.

8. 50 Cent - "Just a Lil Bit"
This song is just nasty. I'm a fan of the violent 50 Cent more than the horny 50 Cent. His production values are always higher than your average rapper, though I don't know for sure if Dr. Dre still handles his stuff. But really I don't have too much else to say about this one. He just sounds like a dirty old man. And he's not even old.

9. Pretty Ricky - "Grind With Me"
This sounds like a newer version of "Freak Me", by Silk. Oh wait. That's just the first couple seconds. It's actually a pretty schizophrenic song, with a slow jam feel for a few seconds, then a Twista-like rap segment, and then it repeats itself. It's also nasty, but not in the dirty old man sense. This just has a "too much information" thing going on. I hate to get repetitive, but I don't know how people listen to this stuff.

10. Carrie Underwood - "Inside Your Heaven"
Again, I am a fan of "American Idol", and I liked Carrie Underwood on the show. I've found, though, that you can't judge the performers by the first singles they're given to sing. They've all been absolutely awful. For those not familiar with the process, the first single released by the winner and runner up of the show is a song that was written especially for the "American Idol" winner. I don't know who writes them--it's probably been a few people--but they really need to get some new people writing these songs. Underwood's voice is good, but this song is terrible. It makes no sense and still manages to be cheesy. On a side note, I just have to mention that it's incomprehensible to me that the big shots with "American Idol" chose to have the winner and runner-up Bo Bice release the same song (especially since this song is completely the opposite of Bice's style).

So to wrap things up, number seven is the only one worth listening to if it's on the radio or something, but don't go out of your way to hear it. I'll be back next week with more Weekly Billboard. Until then, enjoy good music.

Editorial: Cancelled!

2005-07-09T21:15:00.000-04:00

Well, I've been foiled again. Fox has essentially cancelled "The Inside", my favorite show of the summer. Of course that's not saying much, as the summer season has been mostly pretty painful to watch. For those who didn't know, this show was from the creator of the cult hits "Firefly", "Wonderfalls", and "Angel". The thing that bothers me is that Fox never even gave this show a chance. I've seen promo after promo for the sure-to-be-awful "Princes of Malibu", but nary a commercial for the far superior "Inside". I say "far superior" having never seen "Princes", but I think it's probably a safe assumption that an innovative new FBI character study/crime drama/suspense thriller is better than another spoiled-rich-kids-behaving-badly "reality" show. "Reality" TV, and why I put it in quotation marks, is a subject for another day.

This is the second time in the last few months that a show I've raved about has been yanked after a brief run. "Eyes", the excellent ABC drama, was cancelled about four episodes into the series. My mind still can't wrap itself around that one. I read somewhere that an ABC executive said something to the effect that since this was such an outstanding season for the network, they had to be more picky about what they would keep. This is the same channel that's renewing "The Bachelor" for another season. The ratings have been abysmal for that show. In the meantime, they hyped the heck out of "Eyes", gave it a lead-in of "Lost" and "Alias" (briefly making Wednesday night on ABC the best night of television in my opinion), and they gave us just enough to want more before pulling the rug out.

So this is the story of two different networks canceling two quality shows, and going about it in completely different ways. I don't pretend to know the economics of all this. All I know is that quality has suffered for the sake of...well...who knows?

But that's just my two cents.

DVD: Dogtown and Z-Boys

2005-07-08T01:34:00.000-04:00

I never realized how much I care about skateboarding, which must be a sign that Stacy Peralta’s documentary about the emergence and transformation of skateboarding is a success. While watching the film, I forgot about nearly everything that is important to me. Peralta made the transition from clay to urethane skateboard wheels seem like more of an American landmark than when we landed on the moon.

Stacy Peralta was one of the original Z-Boys, and according to his documentary, probably one of the most important and successful. The rest of the Z-Boys seem to agree, but than again, as the Z-Boys’ stories unfold, they each seem like the most important. Peralta’s documentary may be more autobiographical, but if so, that is its only weakness (aside from the fact that the film is narrated by Sean Penn, who can make any subject depressing—at least his monologues are brief). Maybe the Z-Boys didn’t have that much of an impact on the world of skateboarding. But even if they didn’t, I don’t care. The story, though probably biased and over-glamorized at times, reminds me of a child listening to the wisdom-filled and adventure-filled stories that a grandfather would tell. And just like a child listening to stories from ages ago, I know nothing about skateboarding, so I can hardly tell the difference anyway.

The footage of the Zephyr skate team, Venice Beach and Dogtown is exactly what you would hope for. Scratchy and damaged, the recordings look like they were all created in the ‘60s and ‘70s on 8mm film. Some of this may be post-production for effect, but the look and feel of the footage combined with the excellent soundtrack give the film authenticity.

Seeing the transition from the stiff, technical skateboarding style of the ‘60s to the loose, low-riding, surf-influenced style of the Z-boys was enthralling. Throughout the film, Peralta and his gang talk about how important ‘style’ was—that if you skated stiffly and awkwardly, that it was no fun to watch. You had to have ‘style’. The Zephyr team not only had ‘style’, but also attitude. The Z-boys of Dogtown likely were the first skater punks.

The story of Dogtown is essentially told by the Z-boys today. The present day interviews intermingled with the clips from the ‘70s give a human touch to the story, showing you their successes and failures. The pinnacle moment when Tony Alva does the first aerial skate trick was just about the biggest climax I’ve ever experienced in a documentary. The story also wouldn’t be worth telling without the amazing photography of Craig Stecyk, the Z-boys photographer whose work appeared with the original articles about Dogtown in “Skateboarder” magazine.

I have a feeling the fictionalized Lords of Dogtown won't be half as good as this film. Peralta definitely has 'style.' If there was any question as to who the pioneers of freestyle vert skating were, there’s isn’t anymore.

Final Grade: 4.5 cents.

Music: Foo Fighters - In Your Honor (Disc Two)

2005-07-07T12:13:00.000-04:00

When I heard the new Foo Fighters album would have an acoustic disc, I was very excited. I'm a huge fan of acoustic rock. Disc two of In Your Honor was not exactly what I expected. After experiencing the greatness of disc one, I thought the acoustic disc would showcase the band's ability to show toned-down intensity--like their acoustic version of "Times Like These", for example. Unfortunately this wasn't to be the case.

While I can't really complain about the songs, I can't really heap a lot of praise on them, either. "What if I Do?" was released as a single, and begins to approach the kind of feel that would make this portion of In Your Honor great. But that's as close as it comes. While the tracks are basically fine, they are unremarkable. "Miracle" sounds like your basic song that is written after a rock star has a kid. "Razor", the last track, ends the album on a very subdued note, featuring only vocals by Dave Grohl and guitar from Josh Homme from Queens of the Stone Age. Speaking of guest appearances, there are quite a few; all appearing on this portion of the album. Norah Jones is probably the most notable, lending vocals and piano to the...well...Norah Jones-like "Virginia Moon".

You're probably getting the picture now, since the most interesting thing to point out is the guest appearances. All in all, this disc is okay. Buy the album for disc one, then put this one in for background music when you've got company or something.

Final Score: 3 cents.

Music: Foo Fighters - In Your Honor (Disc One)

2005-07-06T21:22:00.000-04:00

Dave Grohl is like Will Ferrell. Ferrell is convincing in any role, simply because you sense that he believes he is living in that character’s shoes. With Dave Grohl, the listener can tell that he feels every word he sings. In the hands of a lesser performer, his work would not be nearly as good. Such is the case on In Your Honor, the Foo Fighters’ new album. In case you haven’t heard, it’s a dual album with one disc of non-acoustic songs and one disc of acoustic songs.

In disc one, we get a generous helping of Grohl’s signature growling vocals, along with an abundance of grinding guitars and intense rhythms. The title track is first, and it starts off relatively quietly but builds into a hard-hitting finish that sets an aggressive tone for most of the album. The third track and current single, “Best of You”, eases up on the pace slightly, but for the most part the album grabs you by the face with the first track and shakes you until about track eight. The last three songs let up a bit, and they end the disc in a good way. It’s like a roller coaster that starts off high and fast, ends smoothly, and makes you want to ride again.

There’s not much in the way of guitar solos or stylish hooks here. This is Foo Fighters teaching the current music scene a “Rock 101” class. The highlight is Grohl’s vocal work, as he is guttural and brutal when he needs to be, like in “DOA” and “Hell”, but he knows when to call off the dogs, too, like in the catchy “Resolve”. But what reels me in the most is that I believe what he’s telling me. I believe that he’s a jaded lover in “The Last Song”. I believe that he’s held against his will when he screams, “Free me!” in the song of the same name.

The disc is a pleasure to listen to, as it is exhilarating and pulse pounding. If you’re not ready for it, however, it can be a bit exhausting, as the tempo doesn’t let you even get a breath in. There are very few weaknesses in this disc, but as a guitar aficionado, I might like to see a few solos. Disc One of In Your Honor showcases Dave Grohl’s talent wonderfully, but leaves most of the intricacies of instrumentals to the acoustic portion of the album. But if these are the worst things I can say about a rock album in 2005, I’m happy. And this one stands up against some of the better albums I’ve heard in quite some time.

Final score: 4.5 cents

Music: Beck - Guero

2005-07-01T17:15:00.000-04:00

Guero was produced by the Dust brothers, like Odelay, which might explain some of the similarities. But the master of post-modernistic, eclectic alternative folk funk hop, or whatever you want to call it, reaches an ideal blend with Guero. He keeps just enough emotion from the pensive Sea Change, and brings back the quirky Beck from the ‘90s that we all expect. Beck succeeds as an alt-rocker with just enough hip-hop to make him fresh, but not seem like a trader to the genre (whichever genre that is…).

A great opener and the most radio-friendly track, “E-Pro” is a perfect blend of grunge-crunch and pop melody. There’s not any depth to the song’s lyrics, but by the one-minute mark, if you’re not singing your Na-na, na-na-na-na-nas, then you must not like music at all.

Beck and his quirky mexi-fetish are back with “Que Onda, Guero,” roughly meaning “What’s up white boy.” If you turn up your stereo loud during this song, you’ll be looking over your shoulder wondering if you’ve suddenly been transported to a Mexican Barrio deep in the heart of Los Angeles.

Upon first listen to “Girl”, I cringed. Did Beck hack some old Atari 2600 video game cartridge to use the audio track? Soon enough, the upbeat, danceable drums and acoustic slide guitars kick in, and the blips blend right in. The deep, swaying reverb of the chorus when Beck sings, “Hey, my summer girl” just makes you excited for the next chorus to start again.

“Missing” carries the slower, introspective mood from Sea Change. Depending on what you expect from Beck, that can be good or bad. Sea Change is probably my favorite Beck album as a whole, but you definitely have to be in a mellow mood for it. Guero succeeds with a few introspective songs here and there, but keeping the grooves moving. “Broken Drum”, is one of Guero’s best. Sweeping reverb, delicate effects and feedback guitar solos give this song the other-worldy feeling that makes you want to just lie down, close your eyes, and hit the repeat button on your CD player. The only thing that could’ve been done to improve the song would have been to save it for the closing track.

Guero is loaded with excellent groove tracks, reminiscent of Odelay. “Black Tamborine” brings back fast tremolo guitar. “Go it Alone,” has the best drum and bass groove of the CD, along with some smooth and crunchy guitar. “Scarecrow” is another favorite—a classic acoustic blues riff topped-off with some howling, whale-like guitar and delay effects throughout.

“Hell Yes”, “Earthquake Weather” and “Rental Car” are Guero’s muddled, weaker tracks. Beck was wise enough to save the best title, “Earthquake Weather,” for the weakest song. Aural exploration goes overboard with these songs, which don’t seem to have any real direction. Of the three, “Rental Car” is the best, but still meandering. “Emergency Exit” does a decent job of closing the album, with some of the best slide guitar on the album, but “Broken Drum” would have done better.

Final Score: 3 cents.

Film: Batman Begins

2005-06-25T18:53:00.000-04:00

I've always had a soft spot for Batman. His was the first comic book I bought, and the only comic book I ever bought consistently. Tim Burton's Batman was the first blockbuster I remember being genuinely excited about (with the exception of Return of the Jedi, maybe). But the thing about Batman on film is he always seems to be a little bit of a let-down: a pastel Joker who dances to Prince in the first film; a greasy and cartoonishly silly Penguin in the second; a disgracefully misused Two-Face and an increasing cheese factor in the third; and I don't even want to bring up the final film. It's been an increasingly disappointing series that was never quite what it should be to begin with.

Until now.

With Batman Begins, director Christoper Nolan has nailed exactly what a Batman movie should be--jumpstarting the previously dead franchise and, fortunately, paving the way for a new series of films that can overwrite the 90s versions. Batman--at least since Frank Miller reinvented the comic book series in the late 80s--is not fluffy CGI and a hero who Learns Important Lessons while spouting off clever one-liners. Batman is dark, conflicted, damaged inside. The death of his parents scarred Bruce Wayne for life, and in this film Nolan doesn't just gloss over the details and force the viewer to make the jump from childhood trauma to costume-wearing adult as Burton and others did. Instead, he delves into Bruce's wounds, both psychological and physical. He hints at other paths Wayne could have taken, making his eventual evolution into Batman both meaningful and logical. It's genuinely fun to see first iterations of his costume, or the discovery of the batcave, in part because you know what it will eventually become. And heck, they even explain how Batman does some of the things he does.

Christian Bale nails both Bruce Wayne and Batman, and, importantly, the differences between the two. Though Wayne may be spoiled and self-centered, Bale clearly conveys the mental transformation that occurs when the cowel goes on: Batman speaks lower, shouts more, grimaces harder--all to great effect. Batman grows out of Wayne's pain, but he takes on a life of his own.

The supporting cast to this film is wonderful. The villains here are genuinely scary--for a variety of reasons--and the actors give them life and character. Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman provide solid support, and Gary Oldman's Sergeant Gordon is easy to root for as one of the last good cops in Gotham. Even Katie Holmes was fine, though not as commanding as the actors she shares the screen with.

Though Nolan has trouble correctly framing a fight sequence (usually the camera is too close to the action to really see what's happening) for the most part the film is visually engaging. The bigger action sequences--car chases, bat invasions, and so on--are exciting and intense. Though not a CGI fest, like most superhero movies, the computer effects are impressive when used. The Scarecrow's . . . shall we say, powers . . . are genuinely intense and frightening. But why wouldn't they be? This is, after all, a movie that wants to approach fear head on and see what's on the other side of that emotion. Its ride into and through darkness is invigorating.

There are those who will say that Spiderman 2 is still the best superhero film yet, but after this film I'm not sure I fully agree. In a way, the two films are impossible to compare: different tones, different aged heroes--heck, Batman doesn't even have any super powers. Maybe it's just that soft spot for Batman I've got, but Batman Begins had me pinned to my seat for the full two hours and twenty minutes. I liked the journey the characters took, and I liked where they ended up. Once again, I'm excited for the Batman franchise. I can't wait to see where they go next--even if the film does a nice job hinting where that will be.

Final Score: 4.5 cents.

TV: The Inside

2005-06-24T16:57:00.000-04:00

It’s no secret that there are a lot of crime dramas on television these days. Although I do enjoy many of them, it takes something special for a show not to be lumped into the middle of the pack with the already crowded genre. The Inside (Fox, Wednsesdays 9:00 PM) shows enough originality and sparks enough interest to make it stand out.

The show revolves around Virgil “Web” Webster (Peter Coyote) and his team of four agents (handpicked by Web himself) that track only certain cases (also picked by Web). We learn in the first episode that Web chooses his agents because of certain “issues” that each of them has. Agent Rebecca Locke (Rachel Nichols) is the newest member of the team, and we find out in the pilot that she was kidnapped and held for 18 months as a child. Since the incident, she has tried to leave it behind her—even changing her name from Becky George so that she won’t be recognized as “the little girl who was kidnapped”.

The idea is that these agents, through whatever traits they have that led Web to them, can see the crime from the inside out (hence the name of the show). We don’t know what it is that attracted Web to the other three agents just yet, so there is much room left for character development, which is one element that many crime dramas leave out; opting instead to tell the stories of one crime per week (the episode of CSI directed by Quentin Tarantino was one of the few shows in the series where I learned something about any character other than the main two).

While we wait to find out what it is that plagues/drives these other agents, each of them fills their niche nicely. Rebecca is the new girl and a very good profiler. Paul Ryan (Jay Harrington) serves as the conscience of the group, always being wary of Web and his sometimes-questionable tactics. He is also the only member of the group whom we know to be married. Danny Love (Adam Baldwin) is the short-tempered former Marine (though not to the point where he annoyingly always refers to “The Corps” and things like that) who leads tactical operations. Melody Sim (Katie Finneran) is the one who cracks the occasional joke to lighten the often dour mood of the agents, and she is also a psychologist.

The Inside is not for the faint of heart or weak of stomach. The tone of the show is very dark and sometimes disturbing. It reminds me at times of The Silence of the Lambs, Seven, and other similarly themed movies. It moves at a very nice pace, never boring, and often gripping. The music is always well utilized, and the transitions and cut-scenes always complement the tempo and feel of a given episode. It’s been on for three weeks now, and one can easily join the series knowing the simple plot points. It’s the best of the new summer series so far, and I recommend that you check it out.

Final Score: 4 cents

TV: The 4400

2005-06-21T00:38:00.000-04:00

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a sucker for a good sci-fi story. I even like some of the bad ones. Apparently I missed season one of The 4400 last summer. The good news: It was a short, five episode season and they played all five episodes before the season premiere this summer. Thanks to the wonders of TiVo, I was able to get caught up in time for the season premiere on The USA Network.

The premise of the show revolves around 4,400 people who are all returned to Earth at the exact same moment. We don't really know why they've returned or where exactly they've come back from. And the frustrating part? None of the 'abductees' remember anything between the time they disappeared and the time they returned. Another interesting part of the show is that these 4,400 people who all reappeared on earth at the exact same time in the exact same place, near Mt. Rainer in Washington, were all abducted over a range of roughly one century. Some abductees were born in the 1900s, while others were only missing for a few months...and they all appeared by a lake in Washington in 2004.

The 1st season of The 4400 showed a lot of promise. The storyline begins well, because the writers chose less than a dozen of the 4400 characters to focus on (that could've been messy). Each of these characters has the ability to do something supernatural. A young girl can see the future, a teenage boy can give and take life by the touch of his hand, a woman who is pregnant can sense danger through her unborn child, the list goes on. The question is, why do they all have these abilities? Shortly into the show we discover that the 'abductees' were not taken by aliens, but rather were taken by humans in the future. Apparently the future of Earth is rather dismal, and future humans abducted the 4400 and returned them to 2005 to alter the timeline, in hopes of a better present for the future earthlings.

Now I'm completely sucked in. I would've loved a series about alien abductees, but a show about time travel? You don't have to tell me twice.

The bad news, however, is that the first three episodes during this summer season have been frustrating. The show, from the beginning, suffered from poor acting and dialogue, but I was prepared for some of that. The show is on The USA Network, and it's a sci-fi show. Can you say double-whammy? The creative storyline and subject matter allowed me to overlook some of that, but it seems to be getting worse.

The less-than-a-dozen character plan seems to be failing, as even the handful of stories the show is following seem to be meandering and too loosely strung together. At the end of season one, the government agents that were studying "the 4400" were analyzing how the powers given to the abductees were causing events, sometimes positive, sometimes negative, that would cause ripple effects that would somehow affect the future in a positive manner. It seemed like there were dozens of possibilities for the show. Now, the show seems to be meandering into a soap opera-like dialogue, losing interest in tying things together.

Overall the series is fun, and I'll probably keep watching just to see what happens. If the writing and dialogue take a turn for the better, I'll do a follow-up and you can catch it on DVD.

Final Score: 3 Cents

TV: Thirty Days

2005-06-18T17:02:00.000-04:00

The idea behind Morgan Spurlock’s new show 30 Days is to examine life in other people’s shoes. If you haven’t heard Spurlock’s name before, perhaps you have heard of his award-winning documentary Super Size Me, in which he lived on an all McDonald’s diet for (you guessed it) thirty days. In the same tradition of using himself as a guinea pig, the premier episode of 30 Days finds the filmmaker attempting to live on minimum wage for thirty days with his girlfriend Alex.

Spurlock begins his adventure the day after the Academy Awards, moving to Columbus, Ohio, with only a handful of cash and a couple backpacks full of clothing. He accepts every job he can find, often spending up to eighteen hours a day working and traveling to work. His girlfriend also works, but neither of them ever make much more than $7 an hour (actually nearly two dollars more than minimum wage, but always for jobs they found on the street). Spurlock finds how generous people can be when a free store in Columbus provides them with furniture, household necessities, and more for absolutely no cost. He also sees how challenging life can be when his brother’s children visit for a few days and costs rise dramatically.

At times he gets a little melodramatic (after all, many people really living on minimum wage do get some government assistance), and in some ways he already had in mind what point he wanted to make before the experiment even began, but that point is certainly made: the federal minimum wage is just not realistic anymore. And his passion for the project also works in his favor. When he complains about the ridiculous hospital fees he and his girlfriend have to pay (both are uninsured, and both have to go to the emergency room), I knew from personal experience how frustrating that process can be—should it really cost $500 just to walk into an emergency room?

I’m interested to see how the rest of the series—in which other people perform different tasks for thirty days—shapes up, because part of what made the first episode so appealing is Spurlock’s own charisma and dedication to the project. Yet the idea of forcing people to get out of their comfort zone—in future episodes, a conservative Christian lives as a Muslim, and a former military man moves in with a gay roommate—offers the learning experience reality TV often claims to be without the sleazy hook-ups and double dealings. No one wins anything in this show, expect for greater understanding. That’s enough to encourage me to turn in again (FX Wednesdays at 10pm).

Final Score: 4 Cents

Game: Lord of the Rings: The Third Age

2005-06-18T09:36:00.000-04:00

I don't know if everyone's afraid of being first or what but I don't care. Here goes nothing: Lord of the Rings: The Third Age, for Xbox. I realize this game is not new anymore but I'm going to review it anyway.

Unlike the other Lord of the Rings games, this one is fashioned to be a RPG where your characters have experience points, hit points, etc. It kind of reminds me of Knights of the Old Republic only set in the world of Middle Earth. Game play is very smooth and the graphics are pretty good. They use a lot of video clips from the movies which can be kind of cool but at times just seems like too much. You unlock new clips that correspond to where you are in your mission as you go along and are asked if you want to view it now or later. After about five clips you just want to keep playing. I thought it interrupted the flow of the game.

I did have one major complaint about the game and it's not so much about the game play as it is about the setup of the game overall. The premise is that you are a man who is looking to help the cause of the ring. You team up with a female elf because she saves your life. Basically, your quest takes you along the route taken by the fellowship (I haven't gotten any further than that) and you are basically making a fellowship of your own as meet a Ranger and Dwarf who join your party (I imagine a wizard and hobbit are to follow). I just thought that they could come up with something a little more creative than following the same route just a step or two behind the fellowship. In fact, it becomes ridiculous at times to make it work. For example the entrance to the Mines of Moria was blocked due to a cave-in (see the first movie). When your party arrives, the same octupus-like monster attacks and in the battle swings his tentacles and clears the mine entrance. Seriously, they couldn't come up with anything better than that?

Overall the game is quite fun, if you like RPGs. Not the best RPG out there but entertaining.

Final Score: 3.5 Cents