Time for a Fantasy

Well, here we are…all not dressed up and nowhere to go!  I, for one, don’t mind the restrictions of the virus too much.  I don’t like the illness or the death, for sure, but being at home?  It’s okay.  I am used to it and am making due.  I blog, at times (though not enough), and write some (less than blogging, truth be told), help Mom, email, Facebook, play video games, Scrabble, and… ta da binge Netflix.

I have come across some well-known and not-so-well-known shows and movies that have helped to bide my time and make my days.  I thought a brief, but good old-fashioned review of some of them might be in order: I love the scary-ish, dramatic, sci-fi genres most of all, so that may influence me, but not all…

1. Cursed (1 season) Fey Girl (think fairies) who thinks she is cursed may just save the world.
2. Supergirl (5 Seasons) – self-explan for most, I think
3. Sherlock (4 Seasons) – Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson now
4. In the Dark – (1 season) – Blind girl goes through a lot of changes when best friend is murdered
5. Star Trek Voyager (7 seasons) I I have watched this series 2 1/2 times so far plus the one-at-a-time deal when it first came out.
6. The Shannara Chronicles (2 seasons) A great book trilogy (The Sword of Shannara, etc…). Sword and Sorcery, romance and all the rest.
7. Homemade (1 season) short films made by people during this virus quarantine while in quarantine.
8. Star Trek Enterprise (2 seasons) The prequel to Star Trek.
9. Better Than Us (1 season) about what happens when you remove the Asimov Rules of Robotics from a robot.
10. Locke and Key (1 season) A family (Mom plus 3) move back home to a magical house and danger.
11. Black Mirror (4 seasons, I think) British-based strange, usually horror stories (don’t bother with the first episode)
12. Warrior Nun (1 season) a non-nun becomes part of a world-saving Catholic group of nuns when she dies and has an angel halo put into her.
13. The Old Guard (movie)  Charlize Theron – a nearly immortal group who helps keep the world peace.
14. Daybreak (1 or 2 seasons) An off-beat zombie-kinda show about a time when only kids are left to run the world.  A lot of vocal documentary added with the show (worth the listen, too)
15. Penny Dreadful (3 seasons) Penny Dreadfuls were the dime store horror stories (think Frankenstein, the Mummy, Dracula, Jeckle and Hyde) put together in one show – scary, interesting and good.
16. Lost in Space (2 seasons) The old 60s show updated and really good.
17. Z Nation (5 seasons) a fun, scary, dramatic, good, though gory-at-times zombie series in which a group of “heroes” tries to get a possible cure of a virus from East to West coast.
18. I Zombie (4 seasons?) zombie show in which not all become crazed killers.  This one is about a girl who works in a forensic morgue is bitten and infected.
19. Travelers (3 seasons) Group of people sent back, mostly 1 at a time, back to stock an upcoming apocalypse by changing key events in the past.
20. Flash (6 seasons) the Scarlet Speedster from the comics.

Okay, hopefully, just the first installment. Enjoy!  Let me know what you think and would you like other types of movies and shows from my past included?

Namaste,

Scott

Really Mad, not “Acting”

I got up rather early for me, this morning, about 8:30.  That’s early because of going to bed at 3:00, but still…

Anyway, got up, got breakfast ready, then computer time for email, and beginning-of-day stuff.  While I was going through email, I saw one of those ads about seeing pictures of all the stars and their children taken at the same age.  It is basically to show how much they look alike.  And, they do, for the most part.  What was, at first, annoying, then, infuriating, was the person assigned to write the captions to all the pictures.  I think it is so cool to see the resemblances between parents and children, especially if I haven’t seen or, perhaps, don’t know the children.  That is what I wanted to see and hear about.  Yes, I wanted to know if they followed in their parent’s footsteps.  Yes, I wanted to know how they were doing.  What I didn’t need was a caption-by-cation talk about how “we hope so-and-so got a good inheritance”, “so-and-so doesn’t need a good inheritance”, and so on and so on ad adnauseum (yeah, that may not be right, but you know what it means).

It’s as if not a single actor or actress today would think of doing anything but living off of Mom or Dad’s money.  I know there are a few…mention those.  But to keep harping on the financial independence so much made me so upset, I quit looking at the pictures and stopped to write this post.  I mean, really, kids are not truly that bad.  Yes, there are some (read that as “a lot”), however, many many kids in their 20s and 30s do work and work hard.  To have to keep saying that “so-and-so certainly does or doesn’t need the money” only tells me that the caption writer did no research, had no time to write, did not care about the subject.  All of these are good reasons not to publish such stuff until it is done right.

Maybe I am just flipping out, maybe I am just tired, but it seems to me that there is more to the stories if people would just take some time (something not prone to do in today’s world) and study their jobs at hand.

*The “” were mine for emphasis, not to be construed as a direct quote.

Namaste,

Scott

Absence Makes the Heart…hmmm

Just a reminder that I will be very sparse (if any) posts for awhile.  I still hope to read several posts a day.  We shall see.  In my absence, here is a list, in no real order, of some films I like that were not particularly watched by the big-time audience.  You may have heard of some, but have you watched all of them?

1)  Benny and Joon (The Dep in an interesting romance)

2)  Wrong Turn 2 (Horror, gross and fun)

3)  Awake (Suspense, bordering on horror)

4)  Darby and the Little People (Old-style comedy)

5)  Army of Darkness (scary and funny, what more could you want?)

6)  Taken (Good Old Liam)

7)  Unknown (Liam again)

8)  The Intention of Lying (comedy)

9)  King Arthur (Clive Owens and Keira Knightley, 2004)

10)  Bicentennial Man (Dear Robin, at his best as far as I am concerned)

11)  Serenity (Sci-fi, comedy, and suspense – Movie based on series “Firefly”)

12)  The Reduced Shakespeare Company

13)  Kiss Kiss Bang Bang – Funny, kinda gross, really weird, I love it!)

14)  IQ (Meg Ryan, Tim Robbins, and Walter Matthau, who could ask for more?)

15)  I will add the newest “Into the Woods”  which was excellently moved from stage to big screen!

_______________________

Namaste,

Scott

Guardians, Movie Review!

Source: Google Image Search licensed for Reuse Click on pic for page

Yep, the above pic looks like it has absolutely nothing to do with “Guardians of the Galaxy”, right?  Well, it’s one of the pics that came up when I typed “Guardians of the Galaxy” into the Google Image search engine, so there….

Yeah, I know.  I usually don’t post on Monday nights, especially on a holiday weekend, but this was special.  Two friends and I decided to attend a movie that we hoped we would all like.  One friend does not like the bad violence, so we opted for “Guardians of the Galaxy”.  I knew we would be okay when I saw how many kids were there as well as entire families.  The theater was not packed, but it was full.

The crowd (normally, I don’t like crowds when I go to a show) added a lot to the movie this time.  It all took me back to “Star Wars” in the 70’s.  That’s right, I went to see it when I was ONE (okay, older, high school is almost like being one).  I actually went to see “Star Wars” (the original episode, first one out, was, ahhh, episode 4?) three times the first week it hit the theaters.  Dad, if I remember correctly, was upset when I went both the first and second days (with different friends).  I believe I took my first wife (during college) to see it when they brought it back for a repeat showing a year or so later.  Then I bought the “tape” of it (still have the VCR Tape of those 3 episodes).

Why do I tell you about “Star Wars”?  Well, “Guardians” is a lot like “Star Wars”, but I and my friends decided it was even better (not better than “Star Trek” though, NO).  So, I give it 4.75 of 5.  Hard, really hard, to give anything a perfect 5, but that’s awfully close ( A-, almost A).

So, if you want something that is sweet, fun for all, funny, exciting, and just Star Warsy great, you got it in “Guardians”.

Namaste,

Scott

Trailer to both below.

Star Wars Original

Guardians of the Galaxy

Hanging on by a Thread, I mean a Cable

Source: Google – licensed for reuse

I decided to do a simple little post tonight about your TV/Movie habits. I have finally gotten my $ stuff down to a science, at least on TV matters, so I thought I would pass them on.

Let’s see where you are:

Last time I only got 2 votes on my poll. That would not bode well with this one either. However, I can still let you know what I used to do and what I do now.

Time was when I would have cable TV and a couple of the premium channels running on my set. Now, that was a reasonable cost then (about $40), but, then again, you were very limited in today’s terms as to what you could watch.   You had your regular stations, then the 14 and up stations (usually to about 60) and your premium channels.

Satellite TV has offered so many stations and options to the regular person that I am not sure how you actually choose what to watch. I mean, you can’t really surf 300+ stations and find something to watch that isn’t almost over when you find it.

Cable TV has been my choice of evils, not because it is so much better, but the weather seldom bothers it at all and I didn’t really want to change my Internet provider. I have 5 ways of watching shows right now:

1)      Hulu – hulu is a computer-based station that gives the ability to watch a lot of regular shows for free on your computer. I watch Arrow, Revolution, and Grimm. You normally have to watch them 24 hours after they air on regular stations. Hulu is free (Hulu-plus isn’t).

2)      Roku – By far the best money I have spent on any of this. A roku box is very small and attaches to your TV. Then it picks up on your Wi-Fi and brings most of the computer channels to your set. It also gives a great menu and search program. Roku is a one-time cost of about $50.

3)      Amazon Prime – Amazon prime saves me the most for my money. It costs $99 a year and you get several things. Here are the big two for me. First, if I buy an item on Amazon that is listed as a Prime item, I get two-day shipping for free. That’s $3.99 per item saved. Adds up quick. Second, there is a list of streaming movies you can watch for free if you own Prime. Decent films and they get new ones each month.  There is also a borrowing method for Kindle if you have prime.

4)      Net-Flix is a rental service for renting DVDs and Blu-ray movies.   Thousands of movies sent to your computer or to your TV (through your Roku box).

5)      On-Demand. This is through my cable service (Comcast). It is a large collection of movies, shows, documentaries, etc…that can be watched mostly all free.

What I think is the cheapest/best way for someone is to buy cable and a roku box. Then you have hulu, and all the roku items. Past that is up to you, My combo above has never left me with nothing to watch.

So what do you think? Are we too preoccupied with our shows and movies or is this now an integrated part of our lives and simply needs a little adjusting?

Let me know.

Namaste,

Scott