Pacific Rim

One simple thing is all I ask of even the most cheesy of movies, please keep me in the world of the movie.  Once I am jerked out of the movie's world then my perception and judgement of the movie becomes more critical.

With del Toro's new movie Pacific Rim I was jerked out from the onset.  When in the opening a kaiju is simply defined as a giant beast.  Under this loose interpretation King Kong and the dinosaur from The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms are kaiju not just Gojira, Rodan, Gamera, and King Ghidorrah to name a few.

Another problem is making connections of scenes from this movie to other movies.  Riley and Mori remind me of Kodai and Yoko from Space Battleship Yamato.  The brash Australian Jaeger pilot reminds me of Iceman from Top Gun.  The Level Four kaiju dragging Gipsy Danger on the ground and carrying it into the air, too many skirmishes between Gojira and Rodan or King Ghiddorah.  When Gipsy Danger deploys it's sword, it will be hard not to think of Ivy from Soul Caliber and her sword.  The sub-sea rift is either inspired by X The Unknown or since we are talking an inter-dimensional rift then perhaps Battle Fairy Yukikaze.  The transport of the Jaegers by airlift and how the pilots synchronize reminds me of Neon Genesis Evangelion.  Once you see the ending you will go that's almost Independence Day.

The reduced science team is the most annoying thing in the movie.  Which is saying something since Ron Perlman is playing the guy who runs a black market selling kaiju parts.  One part of the team is this cliched crippled stiff upper lift British boffin, all he was missing was a pipe.  The other one the boffin called a 'kaiju groupie.'  Think of Rick Moranis' character in Ghostbusters but loves playing with the guts of alien creatures and getting tattoos of them put on his body.  At one point the boffin is madly playing with his chalkboards before the Jaeger commander while the groupie was sitting just a  few feet away without any protective gear tossing kaiju entrails on the floor.  At a guess they are supposed to be a bit of comic relief, but they are also the science team.  They might be a split version of Brent Spiner's scientist character from Independence Day. The British one is a far cry from Dean Jagger's Dr. Royston from X The Unknown or Prof. Quatermass from The Creeping Unknown.

Which brings me to another problem with this movie.  Earth has tried to seal the undersea rift before and has failed.  And until the science team rushes to Shatterdome to give the Jaegers the critical information they need to travel the rift, it seems they were just going to do the same thing they have tried before and failed.  That sounds too much like insanity and suicide all rolled into one though it could also be called a plan of desperation - a kamikaze move.

I will mention one other thing that bugged me in this movie and give it a rest.  Gipsy Danger is fighting a kaiju in Hong Kong that spits acid.  Audience goers have seen this acid partially dissolve another Jaeger and instantly dissolve the facade of a skyscraper.  So when Gipsy Danger grapples with the kaiju and Riley reaches into the mouth and rips its tongue out without dissolving Gipsy Danger's hand, it is another moment of being jerked out of the movie by a lack of internal consistency. 

Overall I would grade it as a B movie.

Drone Debate

Sen. Rand Paul [R-KY] just concluded an almost 13 hour long filibuster of the US Senate. This filibuster has delayed the confirmation by the full Senate of Brennan to head the CIA. The reason why Sen. Rand spoke, with able assistance for 13 hours, is very simple as he wants a simple answer to a very serious question.

Sen. Paul wants to know if the Obama administration, via the CIA that Brennan is nominated to head, is willing to use drones to kill American citizens on American soil without the due process of the law. Yes or no, that is all Sen. Paul wanted to know.

The response he got from Attorney General Eric Holder can be charitably called a 'maybe' answer. Two strawmen were brought out by Holder in his answer – Pearl Harbor and 9/11. There is a simple logical fault in using these two examples, neither attack was carried out by American citizens. Unlike Hassan Nidal at Ft. Hood or Timothy McVeigh at Oklahoma City.

In the case of Nidal and McVeigh, regular means were used to apprehend the killers. A routine traffic stop detained McVeigh long enough for them to connect the rental truck VIN to him. Nidal was bodily tackled and stopped in his killing spree.

So this administration wants a blank check to determine if an American citizen is an imminent danger. Without recourse to the American judicial system to rule if they have enough evidence to make such a finding. And then to send a remote control aircraft to kill that American citizen. Let me rephrase that, this administration wants to have the ability to assassinate American citizens on US soil without any oversight.

If you are not disturbed at that thought, just contemplate the government getting bad intelligence and sending out a drone on that information. Remember that wedding party in Iraq that American aircraft bombed by accident? Now imagine that happening on Main St in Peoria, IL – a drone fires a Hellfire missile at someone's SUV. Its noon in Peoria. The Hellfire hits and detonates, exploding the gas tank for good measure. Besides Betty Sue and her twin girls getting murdered because of bad information, how many people in the surrounding area just got killed or maimed also.

Now do you think armed drones over the US is such a good idea?

P.S. You may want to look up a movie from the 1980s called 'Blue Thunder' with Roy Scheider. LAPD is loaned a new helicopter. An armed helicopter that can also spy. Scheider's character Murphy finds out the organization supplying Blue Thunder has an ulterior motive of eliminating domestic threats. This administration is trying to replace Blue Thunder with something almost like a video game, just press the R1 on your X-Box controller to fire a Hellfire missile to blow up the target and get Achievement Points which is now a medal that can be worn between the Silver Star and Bronze Star.

Why Robin Has To Die

Perhaps this is why the new Robin is being killed off by DC Comics?  He sold out as any grandson of Ras al Ghul would?  So Batman had to fix the problem?

Facebook's Floating Chair

So I wanted to log into Facebook.  This floating chair greeted me.  So is Facebook now in the tank for Romney?

Laughing O Man

A Reuters photographer caught President Obama right behind his favorite crutch, a teleprompter.  So like others in the blogosphere decided to have fun with it.

Fans of Masamune Shirow's Ghost in the Shell will recognize what I Photoshopped in.  I couldn't resist.

For Romney and Ryan

Death Star Fires

Lets hope this works better AllenG.

Alderaan Screen-Cap

For AllenG at Ace of Spades.  Is this enough laser beam from the Death Star?

Armoured Women

Back in 1934 Robert E. Howard help create a whole new genre of sword fantasy, the fearsome woman warrior.  Her name was Red Sonya and the story was The Shadow of the Vulture.  This inspired the later comic hero Red Sonja and then a movie was made which put Red Sonja into the Age of Conan.  So the ring linking two Robert E. Howard characters was forged.

Red Sonya/Red Sonja had another impact in the world of fiction.  More than a new genre was created, a new term was also birthed.  From thence onwards any story that featured a woman warrior in skimpy armor was called a 'Chick in Chainmail' story.  Esther Friesner and Baen Publishing then proceeded to turn the concept on its head with the publication of Chicks in Chainmail, a collection of short stories featuring woman warriors who proceed to prove who's really the baddest warriors.

So where is this going this post?  Is it supposed to be just on fiction and fantasy?  Not really.  Like the authors in Esther Friesner's book, the United States Army has come to a realization of a different sort, body armor designed for men really does not properly fit all the women in the military.  So they have gone back to the design board to address this uncomfortable matter.  I just have a problem with the Army invoking another fictional female warrior in their attempt to sell the new designs - Xena.  One thing I can say is, if the new armor is based on the Xena armor then the US military won't see any chicks in high-tech chainmail.  I am reserving judgement on the whole idea after the Army finally realized that the $5 billion ACU program was a dangerous bust.

Looking forward in time, if the Army is successful in creating more female friendly body armor, will the Knight Sabre HardSuits be far behind?

Prometheus - Spoilers Ahead

Do not read what follows if you have not seen this movie. 

First off, this movie was pretty decent.  Knowledge of Alien and Aliens robs some of the thrill while giving birth to wondering when a chest will burst.

Opening of movie will leave you puzzled.  Pale gray humanoid with muscles on top of muscles and no hair eats what seems is a bio-weapon that dissolves his body as it tumbles off a raging falls.  Meanwhile this classic giant saucer departs the planet.

The planet that humans think is referenced in these multiple ancient drawings or steles leads them to a planet orbiting a ringed gas giant, this planet is labeled LV-223.  Nostromo follows a radio signal to LV-426.

The Weyland survey vessel Prometheus lacks any drones to survey the planet.  So the whole ship goes into the atmosphere to find things.  And they quickly do.

They enter a giant stupa with a ring wall.  In the movie they are constantly calling it a pyramid.

The android David, whom Weyland calls his son except for lacking a soul, has been studying during transit such things as Hindi, the implication being he is trying to learn from the Indo-European languages the mother tongue that gave birth to this linguistic family. - One must also note, David becomes enamored with Peter O'Toole's portrayal of Lawrence of Arabia and tries to imitate him. - So when David sees inscriptions on the wall, he start pushing buttons because it seems he recognizes what they mean.

Almost as soon as they enter the stupa and detect the atmosphere is breathable, everyone starts taking off their helmets.  No one is worrying it seems about airborne pathogens in the stupa.

David activates a hologram recorder and they follow the aliens running to find their first body.  Missing it's head.  David opens the hatch before anyone can stop him.  They find the severed head plus all these odd containers arrayed around a giant humanoid bust.  I am reminded in some way of the bust of Hel from Metropolis.

They run a carbon scan on the dead alien and get a reading of 2,000 years.  Wait a minute.  How do they know with any certainty what their instrument is calibrated to read C-14 decay matches this planet?

Then suddenly this killer dust storm loaded with silica just happens to blow up with the survey crew in the stupa.  So we get drama of the doctor, toting severed alien head, getting bumped around before being rescued by David.

They drag the head to Medical. Run scans saying its clean.  Ross and the doctor are merely wearing normal surgery garb and masks.  Then they decide to feed electricity to the head to trick it into thinking it's alive.  Shades of The Modern Prometheus?  And naturally the alien is infected with something and they slap the head back into containment before it goes splatter.

Ross and the doctor don analysis of the alien DNA and compare it to humans.  100% match.  Even though the alien is taller, stronger, hairless, pallid in color, and eye structure is different.

While all this is happening aboard ship, including David infecting Holloway with the alien bug, back in the stupa two guys are still in there.  They had told Ross they were leaving because aliens was freaking them out.  And they manage to get lost in the stupa.  Meanwhile the smart balls are busily mapping the stupa and it seems no one thought of getting directions.  And when they stumble into the chamber where the giant head is, suddenly they are nonchalant as these alien serpents start approaching them.  You can imagine what happens next.


I am going to skip ahead to where speculation runs rampant, the end and what it leaves unanswered.  We get to see one Alien burst out in almost the form we see in Alien.  Ross and David manage to leave LV-223 in one of the alien ships. Ross wants to ask the Engineers why did they change their mind and set out to create the means of wiping out humanity.  The alien might have also found the same Engineer's ship.  Or Ross was still infected, though she had surgically removed the half-alien fetus in her womb that which later turned into a tentacled elder god out of Lovecraft.  Nostromo responds to what they think is an SOS on LV-486 and find an alien corpse, well one of the Engineer's spacesuits with chest blown open, in the chair.  Who is to say that is not Ross in one of their spacesuits?

Update - I guess I should not blog at 3:30am ever again.  Character's name is not Ross but Elizabeth Shaw.  I do not know where I got that name.

Leftist Civility

This is how some seem to define civility.  Notice they have a cartoon version of Sarah Palin who is putting a gun to her head.  Notice they toss in a disclaimer that they are not advocating that Sarah Palin should be assassinated, but I would say their picture belies that statement.  I find, you decide.

Campaign Signs?

Thanks to Ace for this picture.  It has inspired so much.

Probably create more from this.  If anyone has suggestions/ideas, have at it.

Fluke's Followers are Fools

The media circus abound the Obama administration and Catholic charities continues.  The Catholic charities have dug in their heels because the ruling threatens their very existence.  Democrats have tried to shift the focus from the threat of government diktat to it to be a threat to a right they hold sacred, access to birth control with the testimony of Democrat activist Sandra Fluke.  Meanwhile HHS, IRS, and other alphabet agencies involved in this effort have just issued a call for suggestions on how to improve/change this contentious issue.

About page 10 of that document something becomes clear, even though President Obama promised accommodations right now, HHS has another idea.  They will review and accept advise on this accommodation but any change will not happen until the expiration of the one year grace period which they call a safe harbor time.  Which can also mean these agencies could decide at a later date not to implement any accommodation. Perhaps after the November election which sees Obama re-elected or Obama sent packing.  It kicks the problem down the road while hoping everyone falls for the promise the controversial issue has already been taken care of.  This is the peril of administrative law, no Congress enacting the specific law while a cabal of bureaucrats decide to enforce a law of their creation.

But lets get back to Sandra Fluke.  She testified under oath to Congress that contraceptives costs for law students at Georgetown like her will cost $3000 during her whole time at school.  She says this a hardship.  Lets guess she will be at law school for the average three years.  That is thirty-six months.  Now divide the $3000 by 36.  The monthly cost then should be $83.34.  My question is, like many others, is why is this a hardship for Ms. Fluke and where is she shopping?  The costs for attending Georgetown are very expensive as this listing of tuition and fees show, perhaps she is tapped for cash. However as the Wall Street Journal article I link to shows she could have visited Wal-Mart or Target for contraception pills, spent about $150, and have enough pills for three years of frolic.  Ms. Fluke's grasp of costs seems a bit flawed which raises questions of what her billing practices will be when she is in the real world, unless she just wants to work for the government where it seems costs are never a factor.

Of course the worse thing about Ms. Fluke's testimony is the damage it does to the concept of female empowerment.  She is refuting everything Aretha Franklin and Annie Lennox are singing about in this video about Sisters Are Doin' It For Themselves.  It seems the song Ms. Fluke sings is "I Want Someone Else to Pay for Me."  She wants to be a kept woman, this time kept by the government and paid with other peoples money.  Yes she has come a long way, right back to dis-enfranchisement.

This is a job for Super PAC!

In honor of President Obama endorsing the creation of a Super PAC that is supposed to ensure him getting four more years in the White House, I offer the perfect nomination to lead this Super PAC.  The perfect example of naked want - Wylie Coyote.

Some Christmas Music

First Annie Lennox sings God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman in her own style.



Then Pat Benatar with her song Christmas in America.

A Charlie Brown Christmas

We all have memories of the Charlie Brown Christmas Special when the only tree Charlie Brown could afford was this scrawny twig of a tree. So when the Dept. of Agriculture announced they are levying on all Christmas tree growers a 15 cent tax on each tree to promote the Christmas trees, I flashed back to poor Charlie Brown. In these dire economic times it makes no sense for the Obama administration to act like Scrooge and add yet another financial hardship on people struggling. But they are doing it.

And I do apologise to Mr. Schultz, I only use this image to make a not so subtle point.

UPDATE: Good news everyone. Scrooge Obama has kindly decided not to impose this tax on Christmas trees. Stay vigiliant to see if the Christmas turkey and stuffing get promotional taxes imposed on them.

The Economy Stupid!

As the Democrat owned economy 'unexpectedly' continues for the 32d month to have 9% unemployment I figured I needed to repost a political cartoon. The above political cartoon I originally posted on December 9, 2005. Long before the financial crisis happened.

For almost 3 years under President Obama the economy has sputtered and lurched. After wasting over $800 billion unemployment has gotten worse than when Obama became president. In contrast after only one year President George H.W. Bush was run out of office. Next November Obama needs to be shown the door and told to get lost.

OWS Idiots

Well last night and this morning I tried to pay attention to what the Occupy Wall Street crowd were doing. They have a Livestream with video and chat. It was educational, but probably not in the way the people doing it would like.

Lets see one of the people they interviewed last night said, "Hi my name is Henry. I am from Mobile, AL. I quit school and I quit my job to be here." One word for this guy - IDIOT!

Their idea of 'public' safety is something to behold. The one 'security' person who was clad in The North Face jacket they talked to spoke of de-escalation. Also last night they had someone try to take stuff and the concern of one commentator was not the theft itself.

They also had a playlist. The Beatles Revolution was played but the lyrics about 'count me out' I did not hear. Odd. Next song was California Dreamin. Then they switched to something modern and well all that song sounded like was a depressed stoner.

The height of their debating skills boiled down to calling each other denigrating or derogatory names. What egalitarianism and erudition they displayed in this discourse.

Finally lets talk the use and mis-use of technology that was on display.

They assured their followers they had plenty of power and they were running on bio-diesel. Ah it must be good for them to pat their ego for using bio-diesel to save Gaia as they use their Made in China Mac laptops to protest with.

Their live video feed was amusing. It worked most of the time. But other times it would just drop out and see nothing. At one point they put up a banner saying 'obviously not live.' Another point the live video had odd sound effects, sounded like the protesters were talking to their alien overlords because it seems they had cross-talk interference. Their dismounting of the livestream camera took about ten minutes of discussion and then the camera guy had to tote the Mac laptop it was connected to so the video would go online.

After just about an hour of experiencing this I came to one conclusion. Count me out since all of you seem to be idiots.

Obama's New Job

Wonder how long this ad will remain up? Luckily no chicken sandwich was harmed in the filming of this ad starring an Obama double.

To further prove how Obama's 'smart' diplomacy has worked here is some news from Beijing, Peoples Republic of China. There is now open Obama's Fried Chicken in that country's capital. With a grinning President Obama dressed as a skinny Col. Sanders. Naturally the likes of Al Sharpton are offended by this. This is yet another example of reality being far stranger than any humorous fiction.

Unimaginative Tripe

I seem to complain a bit about how horrible current entertainment has become. I have done it before so here comes another little bit of ranting.

Fox has a new science-fiction show starting tomorrow that is called Terra Nova. Like in the Lost in Space movie re-make, Earth is about exhausted and only finding a new place will save humanity. Unlike Lost in Space, in Terra Nova the humans are smart enough to invent a time machine. But the humans are not smart enough to colonize other planets. Unless they deal with that problem in the series premier, its pointless to keep watching.

Keeping with the lets rehash something that has already been done, lets talk movies. One would think after Howard Hawk's turned John Campbell's Who Goes There into a gem of a science-fiction/horror movie called The Thing from another World that it could not be topped. But then John Carpenter thought he could and gave us The Thing which really freaked people out. So like I Am Legend/Omega Man got badly trashed by Will Smith's third version, there is a new remake of The Thing coming out. I hold no hope out for it since it takes place in the Arctic, like the original movie, but has the shape-shifting alien from Carpenter's version. I detect no originality to this movie and will give it a pass.

Addendum - How can I forget the movie Real Steel coming out? If it had been called Rockem Sockem Robots it would have given away how unoriginal the movie is.