CINEMA REVIEW: The Avengers

Because I refuse to call it Marvel Avengers Assemble. 

 

Well, it finally arrived. After 4 set up films, and a couple of Hulks, it finally hits our screens, and happily it doesn’t crumble under the weight of expectation. 

It’s pretty fantastic. 

 

It brings together everything from the movies that preceded it and turns it into a true ensemble piece. No one character hogs the spotlight and everyone (and I mean everyone) gets at least one moment to shine, but a certain green hued character walks away with the entire movie. 

After a quick glimpse of what will be our villains, and the return of the magnificent bastard Loki, we get to see each of the Avengers separately. The assembling of the team takes up most of the first third of the film, but doesn’t once get boring. Just seeing all these characters again, in the same movie, is a thrill. If you’ve seen all of the preceding films you’ll know what to expect from the characters but just in case, here goes; Tony Stark gets recruited as a consultant, Cap gets recruited as a service to his country, Thor doesn’t so much gets recruited but comes to bring Asgardian justice to his little brother, and Bruce Banner is there for his smarts (and also, off the record, to turn into the Hulk later on). However, just because the team is assembled doesn’t mean they get on. A lot of scenes are just talking (or arguing), yet it never becomes dull or uninteresting. Just watching these different personalities bounce of each other is a joy to behold; Cap sparring with Tony Stark, Stark and Banner’s banter, Thor and the Hulk. In fact, this film more so than any of its setup films, is much much funnier. There are literally a dozen laugh out loud lines and scenes, a lot of them coming from not just Tony Stark but Bruce/the Hulk. However, Thor had my favourite line of the film.

Thor: He’s my brother

Black Widow: He’s killed 80 people in 2 days

Thor: He’s adopted. 

 

But as I said earlier Mark Ruffalo just about walks off with the movie as the Hulk. He’s a softer, gentler Banner than Edward Norton, but he nails the tragic nature of the character perfectly; one early scene dealing with how he tried to kill himself, but ‘the other guy’ spat the bullet out. Even his big hero moment is tinged with sadness (“That’s the thing, Captain. I’m always angry.”), but he’s also the wittiest interpretation of the character we’ve seen so far. And the most smash happy. Honestly, in the final battle he kicks so much alien ass, and gets the most memorable move when dispatching puny god, Loki.

Ah yes, the action. Well, it’s superb. It feels epic in nature, which is a word I’m loathe to use, but there’s no other word for it. Taking place all over Manhattan it’s warfare on a massive scale, yet it never loses sight of what makes it so thrilling. Because we’ve had such a long time to get to know these characters, and have watched them begrudgingly become a team, we care about the stakes. Sharing battlefield banter makes them seem more real, despite being a god, or a super soldier. 

Interestingly, there’s not much in the way of fan service. No winks or nods to the audience which is surprising considering you could have had every character spin off their own particular catch phrase just for the sake of whoops from the audience. The only concession to that is an utterance of HULK SMASH! and it’s not even the Hulk who says it. 

Anyway, overall I thought it was brilliant despite a slightly saggy middle section, but once the battle starts you’ll not care. Also, the event that causes this merry band of heroes to finally become a team is actually quite moving and unexpected. 

As for a score, 5 stars.

Even More Gaming Annoyances

#11 -Parents playing videogames

 

Ok, this one is true of a lot of different groups, not necessarily parents but they’re the most frequent culprits. Sometimes you want to try and get you parents to play games. I’ve tried for manys a year. I first remember trying with Sonic back on the Mega Drive. My dad could play that no problem. It’s not hard. However, as parents are inclined to do, they moved the controller with the character on screen, in a vain attempt to move Sonic just that little bit further or jump a little higher. Rookie mistake. 

This is not usually what happens.

You see, parents just aren’t gamers. The majority anyway. And if something as straightforward as the run and jump mechanics of Sonic stumps them, then God forbid you try to introduce them to a modern first person shooter that requires you to use one stick for moving, another stick for direction and then you also have to shoot things. All at the same time!

The process goes a little something like this:

 

Me: Ok, move forward.

Parent: Ok.

[Moves forward]

Me: There’s a guy shooting you on your left.

[Stops dead, looks left, continues holding left and spins in a circle until they die]

 

[Respawn]

 

Me: Ok, look up.

[Looks up. At the sky]

Me: No, not that far. Look down again.

[Ground]

Me: No, look about halfway up so you can see the building.

[Sky. Followed by death]

 

[Respawn]

 

Me: Ok, jump over that wall.

Parent: Which one is jump?

Me: That one.

[Character jumps on the spot]

Me: No, you have to press forward and jump.

[Character looks up at the sky. Jumps]

Me: No, do it at the same time.

[Character jumps on the spot. Then upon landing looks up to the sky. Dies]

A little later, once we’ve got the sky/ground thing worked out.

 

[Respawn]

 

Me: Right, walk along to the end there. And take a left towards that building.

[Walks forward, gets to crossroads, stops, turns 90 degrees, then after some sky/ground action, walks forward again. Gets shot. Dies.]

My dad can however play Guitar Hero pretty well. On the easiest setting. But by jove it took some patience getting there. 

#12 - Gaming getting blamed for mental kids

 

So, just last week the story was in the papers of the kid who killed his mum. Horrible story, no doubt. But the following day in the papers the shocking revelation came out that this kid had a copy of some violent video game in his room (I can’t remember what it was, but it involved killing folk for points. Like most games then?). The story then went off on a sensationalist tangent about how these games are training our children to be murderers. 

No, they’re really not. 
 

And calling for them to be banned is just as stupid. 
 

Kids who kill their own parents are probably unstable to start with. I’ve played games my whole life and have not once harboured any murderous intentions once the console is switched off. I have plenty of violent DVDs and books. Should we ban those as well?

Games are rated just like films. If your 12 year old child wants to buy Modern Warfare 3, which is rated 18 and you do, you’re to fucking blame for not being a responsible parent. It probably wouldn’t have turned him into a killer though, but at least if he murders his parents they will find age appropriate games in his room, and blame the kid and not the game. 

#13 - Multi stage bosses

 

You’ve fought you way through countless drones and nameless baddies to reach the end of level/game boss. You persevere, getting your ass handed to you on multiple occasions but though sheer force of will you defeat the blaggard. He falls to the ground defeated. You are victorious. You bask in the glory of besting your foe. 

But wait…

 

He starts to get up again. In a seemingly larger form than he was previously. And inexplicably with a larger health bar. 

What the fuck, gaming? Seriously? I just kicked seven shades of shit out of this dude and he just gains some extra strength/arms/weapons from nowhere? The equivalent of every Power Rangers episode ever. Of course, you’re always nearly dead anyway from the previous fight, so now you’re expected to do it again, to a harder enemy, with less health than you had fighting the easier one. Fuck that. 

The most recent example of this. F*ck you, Poison Ivy.

Stop doing this games. Please. Or at least don’t have a little cut scene in between leading me to believe that I’ve actually killed him only to pull the rug out from under me, and causing me to die loads me times trying to kill the bugger. 

And don’t get me started on games that do this more than once.

#14 - Driving games

 

Now, there’s nothing wrong with driving games specifically, except for the fact that I’m shit at them. Honestly. 

 

I mean actual driving games now. Not one where you have to drift round corners and have nitro boosts. I’m awesome at those. But with actual driving games? Your Forza’s and your Gran Turismo’s? I suck. I just get bored with driving very very easily, and wish that the game would suddenly cause something to explode in front of me or give me a corner that I can drift around, instead of just having to brake slightly.

 This is my kind of racing game.

I mean, I can drive properly in real life with nothing exciting happening. Why would I want to do it in a game with other people who are doing the same? Often the only excitement in a racing game comes from someone doing something out of the ordinary, when that should be the norm. A game should constantly have you on edge, or at least excited. Trundling round a track never overtaking, and being afraid to crash just ain’t fun. 

#15 - Tails

 

What a dick. 

 

All he was good for was providing the occasional laugh when he accidentally died.

CINEMA REVIEW: The Cabin In The Woods

New review coming up after I read some Latin from a creepy book.

So, a lot of reviews have critiqued this film without giving away any plot details, as it’s best to go into this movie knowing nothing about it. I shall not be doing this; the blog is called Contains Spoilers for a reason.

The Cabin in the Woods, marketed as just another horror film…with a twist, sets out what it wants to do within the first minute. A creepy title sequence featuring all sorts of macabre paintings covered in blood smash cuts to a government facility with two shirt and tie wearing folks, discussing the success rate of their current experiment over a coffee machine. This isn’t your granddad’s horror film.

It transpires that the teens that are going away for a weekend at the titular cabin are the experiment in question. The teens are your standard horror movie stock characters: The Virgin, The Nerd, The Jock, The Slut and The Black Guy. So far, so normal. However, it’s the Cabin that’s not at all it seems. After not long at all the film plays it’s hand; the cabin and even the teens are all being manipulated by the aforementioned suits, for reasons that aren’t given away. Yet.



The best way to describe Cabin in the Woods would be half piss take of horror movies, and half loving homage to them. It embraces all the clichés of countless horror films and subverts them all; for example, at one point the characters decide to search the rest of the house together, in a group. The puppeteers are having none of it and pump in gas that gets them all to change their minds, and they decide to ‘split up, so they can cover more ground.’ It’s an obvious joke, but it’s still funny. And then there’s the scene which kicks the whole thing off, which is a treasure trove of meta-humour; the characters are lead down to the basement which has an assortment of creepy looking artefacts and items. Each character picks up something in their search, each of which in your usual horror film would trigger the plot (a necklace, a Hellraiser like sphere, a book kind of like the Necronomicon). The gag being…they all do. Each item relates to a different scenario that the puppeteers would visit upon the teens. They further pile on the meta references by having the employees behind the fiction run a sweepstake on what doom the teens will bring on themselves. The winner being Zombie Redneck Torture Family.

And in perhaps the funniest gag in the movie, the puppeteers get a phone call from the Creepy Gas Station man, the character who appears in every horror film, including this one, who gets our teens to where they want to go, who begins a long speech which would be a portent of doom in most horrors, but keeps getting stopped when he realises he’s on speakerphone and his warnings are being laughed off by everyone in the room.

The film has fun subverting all the clichés but eventually this kind of loses its fun factor and becomes another ‘oh look, we’re poking fun at this hoary old horror movie schtick now.’ Thankfully, at this point the film takes a drastic U-turn which again subverts everything that has come before it, and it becomes something fresh again. The two remaining characters, the Nerd and the Virgin, find their way into the underground base and discover all the monsters held below; any one of which could have been unleashed had they chosen a different artefact. In an attempt to get back at their tormentors, they release all the monsters in the facility against the puppeteers, leading to the most insane monster mash you’ve ever seen. And probably the bloodiest, goriest but also most fun scene you’re going to see in a mainstream horror film.

The final revelation (that the teens are being killed as a sacrifice to the Old Gods) is quite fun and plays into an old horror movie cliché itself; that it requires the archetypes of characters always seen in horror movies to work. And the addition of a horror movie icon as the person behind it all just adds more layers to the joke.

Overall, it’s not as good a post-modern horror film as the granddaddy of the genre, Scream, in that at times it’s not as clever as it thinks it is, but it certainly is a lot of fun. And thankfully something different than the slew of horror remakes that have been churned out recently.

And the Japanese version of the same experiment is a very very good gag.

3 and half stars.

GAME REVIEW: Alan Wake

A quick game review coming up right after I turn on all the lights.

So, Alan Wake is something of a gaming milestone for me. In two ways actually. One, it’s the game during which I finally pushed my Gamerscore over 20,000 which is either awesome or depressing depending on your viewpoint. And two, it’s the first horror game I’ve ever seen through to the bitter end, having previously shat out of all other horror games I’ve played before.

Hooray for me!

Anyway, the game itself is an absolute delight. Structured like a TV show (complete with cliff-hangers, and ‘previously on’s’), with a beautifully realised environment of a small-town community and a hell of a lot of fun to play. Oh, and it’s pretty scary too.

The premise is this: Alan Wake and his wife Alice go on holiday to the seemingly idyllic town of Bright Falls. Soon, Alice gets taken by…something and it’s up to Alan to find her. Unfortunately the thing that has taken her is the ultimate evil of all evil. Or The Darkness, as the game calls it whose minions, the Taken, have uh…taken over a lot of the townsfolk and are trying to prevent Alan from getting her back.

The core mechanic of the game is dark versus light. Playing as Alan, you’re hardly ever without your trusty flashlight which is as important, if not more so, than your pistol. The Taken a shrouded in darkness and are unkillable until you’ve destroyed it first. So blast them with your torch, and then shoot the bastards dead. That’s basically the whole game summed up as it doesn’t change much throughout the 8-10 hours it takes to complete. But saying that does it such a disservice. The game design is nothing short of breathtaking with stunning environments that while linear are open to some exploration (Apparently. I didn’t stray too far from the obvious path lest something unexpected caused me to scream like a little girl); the sound design with have you constantly checking around you to make sure you’re not about to get attacked (seriously, I lost count the amount of times a creaking floorboard has had me shitting myself) and the episodic nature of the game is like crack. I hardly put the game down this past weekend until I had it finished.

The set pieces are glorious, especially the ones where you get surrounded by a metric fuckton of Taken and have to decide the best method of taking them out. The standouts being an old abandoned stage from a festival, being swamped by Taken, however you have the rock bands fireworks and flamethrowers on your side. The other being the dash away from the police, with their cars and helicopters getting destroyed by The Darkness as they pursue you. In fact, most of the action is very well done. There’s nothing amazing or brand new about it but the two pronged attacking (torch the shoot) makes it different from just shooting everything that moves, and refreshingly the game sometimes gives you no option but to run away from fights you have very little chance of winning.

Anyway, I’ll not spoil any of the story, mainly because I don’t really know what happened at the end, but throughout the whole game its very Twilight Zone-esque mixed in with a bit of X-Files/Twin Peaks-yness mystery. It even has you collecting coffee thermoses for the achievement called ‘A Damn Good Cup of Coffee.’ Also throughout the game, you find pages of a novel that Alan has already written which foreshadows events to come. It’s quite an interesting device, which you’d think would spoil the surprises somewhat but it actually ramps up the dread.

Especially when you read ‘chainsaw.’

Overall, 4 stars. Highly recommended.

CINEMA REVIEW: This Means War

I posted this by mistake in my other blog (thanks for telling me, ardent readers of that(!)) and only just realised, so here it is in the right blog, about a month later.

http://jcsbrainstew.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/cinema-review-this-means-war.html

Enjoy!

CINEMA REVIEW: 21 Jump Street

After a slew of middle of the road movie remakes of popular 70’s and 80’s TV series (Dukes of Hazard, Starsky and Hutch), I was a little apprehensive of this one; a movie remake of the Johnny Depp starring 80’s TV show about police going under cover in high school. But from the trailers this looked at least better than average, so I gave it a go. And I’m so glad I did.

Easily one of the funniest movies I have ever seen. It’s not big and it’s certainly not clever, but it is laugh out loud hilarious. Not a minute goes by without at least one good laugh. And not 5 minutes will go by without at least one belly laugh. Jonah Hill is on great form, playing basically the same character he plays in all his movies as Schmidt. But Channing Tatum as Jenko is the real revelation, showing real comic chops and impeccably good humour when it comes to sending himself up.

If I could compare it to any other recent movie, it would be Hot Fuzz. I don’t think it’s a better movie than Hot Fuzz, but it’s easily a funnier one. And as with that movie the action isn’t toned down simply because it’s a comedy you’re watching, with the final chase being just as exciting as it would be in your standard action film. But with slutty prom girls thrown in for good measure.

As with comedies though, most reviews boil down to funny or not funny. And this one is definitely funny. Painfully, side splittingly, gut bustingly so. The comedic highlight for me being the scene after the two guys take the drug they’ve been tasked to stop supply of, and end up tripping balls but still having to go back to class. Jenko wrecking band practice and Schmidt performing lewd acts with a baton had me struggling to breathe. It’s that funny.

4 stars.

More Gaming Annoyances

Some more gaming vitriol. Enjoy!

#6 – People on TV playing games

Television never never gets gaming right. Any time characters on TV are gathered around playing games, they press every button possible in as short a space of time as you can imagine like some sort of spasticated monkey. There is no game on Earth that requires you to press that many buttons that quickly (well, maybe some mental Japanese one, but no game I’ve ever played.) I understand that they want to make a scene as exciting (or whatever) as possible, and having a person slumped on the sofa in their underwear, with empty Coke cans and crisp packets scattered about, barely moving their hands, like real gamers do, wouldn’t look all that great. But if you don’t take the time to do it right, don’t do it at all.

But please don’t have your character hammering the controller like a mentalist.

#7 – the cardboard box in Metal Gear Solid.

Metal Gear Solid is a stealthy game; sneaking around military bases, taking out guards, and uncovering massive (usually boring) secrets. Occasionally though, when stealth fails you, you have to run and hide. Sometimes however, there are no good hiding places. So what does Snake do? He whips out his trusty cardboard box, that’s what. Never mind that this whole charade feels completely out of place, it’s the physics of it I can’t wrap my head around. There’s no way Snake could fit in that tiny little thing. I don’t care how good a spy he is.

Also, it never worked as a hiding place. Not for me anyway. The guards always came round the corner, and lifted up the box, no matter how well concealed I was, and shot me to death because it’s pretty bloody obvious that there shouldn’t be some random cardboard box sitting about a military base.

However, it did work once when I was fighting a helicopter. Odd.

#8 – Post-Mega Drive Sonic games

They have all been awful. Even the ones I tried to pretend weren’t, like Shadow the Hedgehog and Sonic Heroes. Sonic just doesn’t work in 3D. And they’ve added so many characters, it has become almost like a soap opera; there’s Big the (retarded) cat, Amy Rose (Sonic’s girlfriend apparently), as well as some shadowy government organisation called G.U.N. but worst of all is that they’ve changed Dr Robotnik’s name to Dr Eggman. That is sacrilege. I mean there's even a game where Sonic turns into a werewolf FFS.

Sorry, werehog.

Bring back the simple days of ‘Sonic wants to free his friends by running really fast.’ That was awesome in the 90’s, when every problem could be solved by running really fast.

Or so I’m told.

#9 – Giant spiders

I’m fairly certain that 1 in 3 new games released will have a giant spider in there somewhere. They’ve become the new zombies. Although unlike zombies, giant spiders freak me the fuck out. Seriously. After a battle with one in Skyrim my skin crawls for like ten minutes. They’ve been freaking me the fuck out since Abe’s Oddysee in 1998 and that game’s Paramites (more or less giant spiders) and no doubt will continue to do so for some time.

I mean just look at that! It’s horrible.

#10 – Movie tie-ins

Big blockbuster movies are big business. The games industry in an attempt to cash in on the hype fires out a licensed game with the same title. I’m not talking about your Arkham Asylum’s or even your Force Unleashed’s here; I mean rushed games that are released a month or so before the movie and hope to get people excited enough to buy them. Or get their parents too. Because most of these games are designed for kids who want to be Iron Man, or Harry Potter. I swear there has been one Harry Potter game churned out per film, and they always come down rapidly in price. Why? Well, because they’re god awful is why.

Although the exception to the rule is the actually far better than it has any right to be X-Men Origins: Wolverine game. Maybe the rule is terrible movie, great game.

Anyway, that's enough for now.

JC