The 'Star Destroyer' Moment

Right, here’s a question for you all. What would you consider (y)our generation’s Star Destroyer moment?

In case you don’t know, a ‘Star Destroyer’ moment is the defining moment of your young film-going life. You often hear of people saying that the opening shot of Star Wars, with Tantive IV being chased by a massive, seemingly never-ending doom bringer, or a Star Destroyer, was the defining moment of their cinematic childhood. So, what was ours? [I say ‘ours’ because I’m speaking for my generation. People who are currently 25/26/27.]

For me, it has to be this:

I was 8 when Jurassic Park came out, and it’s the first movie I can remember seeing in the cinema that wasn’t animated. And is still one of my favourites. I reckon it’s easily top 10 of all time for me. And this scene is something special. We’d seen the brachiosaurus grazing earlier, we’d seen what a raptor can do to a cow, but this was different. This was up close and personal. It’s tense; it’s exciting; real fingernail biting, edge of your seat stuff. And still is today, nearly 20 years later. There’s a reason it’s the most iconic part of the movie.

The build up is perfect. It’s been parodied so many times now, but the ripples in the glasses of water ramps up the tension to near unbearable levels. The leg of the goat landing on top of the Jeep. The bars of the electrified fence snapping off as the Rex pulls on them. Remember, we haven’t actually seen a dinosaur yet, aside from friendly ones, so we’re already anticipating something special. But also something scary. And it delivers. What makes it so good is the fact that unlike today where the T Rex would be CG, this thing looks real. I mean really real. I mean, ‘Steven Spielberg travelled back in time and brought a dinosaur back to the present and taught it to act’ real. Never once do you believe that this is not a real dinosaur. It’s there, its flesh and blood. And it will kill you. Stan Winston is a fricking genius. And again, nearly 20 years later, the effect hasn’t aged one bit.

There’s one bit in particular, where the T Rex moves its head into the light coming from the torch, and its eye dilates. That’s attention to detail. A tiny thing that you might not notice on first (or even second or third) viewing, but a small touch that makes it all the more believable.

Anyway, that’s my Star Destroyer moment? Anyone care to add theirs?

JC

My Gaming History Part 2: The Playstation and Beyond

Perhaps the most famous of all the initial games on the Playstation was Tomb Raider. An absolutely fantastic game, where you went looking for treasure and killed many different endangered or once-thought-extinct species as well as a few monsters along the way, while a British woman foiled you at every turn, then got killed at the end by you. After turning into some weird ass giant skeleton monster thing, if memory serves. It was an immersive game too, and I still remember most of the entire first level. Bats; arrows shooting out at you from the walls; being attacked by three tigers and shooting them in the face; trying to stand in the right place so the heroine, Lara Croft, somehow managed to move a gigantic stone block with her bare hands (and even more impressively, pull it backwards in some cases); swimming underwater and frantically trying to come up for air before I spazzed out and drowned. All good clean fun. At the time, it was gaming at its best. And still looks rather impressive today, despite everything being blocks and at right angles to everything else, and the puzzles are probably still bastard hard in places.

And yes, I tried the cheat to get Lara naked. Show me any 11 year old boy who didn’t, and I will call him a liar to his face. At that age, we were all after a glimpse of the pixellated, oddly triangle shaped boobs. Although, looking at the current Lara, I would probably still do it now.

Weird thing was that almost all of the games on the Playstation were single player. There wasn’t really any kind of multiplayer experience yet. Well, unless you had an N64 and a copy of GoldenEye, but it didn’t (and boy, didn’t the bastard N64 owners constantly tell you how good it was?). You went into school and talked to your friends about what point of a certain game you were on (well, I did anyway) because you were all playing what’s now become known as ‘the campaign’ as that’s really all there was. That was the game.

Perhaps the best single player experience was the Metal Gear Solid. An absolute masterpiece of a game, which was more cinematic than any other game had been previously. An espionage game that actually rewarded, hell, demanded stealthy play, it was an altogether different beast. Sneaking around military bases; working out the patrols of the guards so you could slip past or take them out; stuffing them in lockers so other guards wouldn’t see the bodies; going apeshit when you got discovered; tapping buttons so you could withstand torture and save Meryl; listening to interminably long cut scenes that didn’t make a huge amount of sense (but more so than MGS’ subsequent sequels). It was immense. Perhaps the height of its cleverness was its use of the Dual Shock controller when fighting Psycho Mantis (“Ohmigawd, he’s making my controller move, with his miiiiiiiiiiiiiind.”) and the fact that a clue to getting the right frequency on your Codec was on the back of the game box. Genius.


Altogether now: “Snake? Snake? Snnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaake!!!!!!”

But my favourite game on the Playstation (and possible favourite game ever) has to Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee. A 2D side scrolling game with a wicked sense of humour, some brain melting puzzle elements and a dash of the old ultra violence. Genuinely difficult, wildly inventive and containing some of the best cut scenes of its day, it often makes me wish I still had my trusty old Playstation. Gaming at it’s finest.

And it was bloody funny too.

(sidenote: I’ve just looked online and apparently they’re making an HD remake of said game. Sold!)

The great thing about the Playstation for me was that it was the first console I owned that had the capability to save games. Before with the Mega Drive, if you wanted to complete a game, you had to do it in one sitting, which meant you had a higher chance of ending up like the aforementioned kids on Gamesmaster, with the square eyes, dribbling out of the corners of their mouths. Now, you could get, say, a third of the way into the game, save it, and come back to it later. Simple, but genius. I tell you, kids these days don’t know they’re born.

Unlike my Mega Drive, my Playstation never broke. It just got usurped, by the shiner, slimmer, sexier Playstation 2. The PS2 was a thing of beauty (you could stand it on its side FFS), and it came along just as DVD’s were getting really popular, although if you played a DVD on it, after a while the picture and sound went out of sync. But that didn’t matter because it was an exciting time in gaming. A time where these things were more than just consoles, they became entertainment centres.


I can’t really remember a lot of games that I played on the PS2 aside from the behemoth that was GTA Vice City. I remember that taking up a lot of my time.

And also, there was the only great movie tie in there has ever been; Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. It was basically a hack and slash through the locales from the first two movies, (Weathertop, Moria, Amon Hen, culminating in a stupidly exciting battle at Helms Deep) but it looked and played magnificently. I remember manys a night (and manys a missed lecture) furiously button bashing to get through that final level, kicking the orc’s ladders and then stabbing them in the face with my sword; getting my level 10 power up as Legolas and pwning orcs like you wouldn’t believe, getting the sword of Isildur and taking the Uruk Hai to school as Aragorn. Gimli, however, was a crap character to play as. The equivalent of the kid with the skateboard in Streets of Rage 2, and nobody wanted to be him.

I mean, really, you alwats picked Axel, didn't you?

However, this stage in my gaming life was where things got kind of serious, and the fun left. Which is kind of indicative of a lot of games in this era; an era where everything seemed to take itself very seriously. Perhaps it was me. I’d grown up a bit and the wonder of games had worn off and now I was seeing them for what they were. Staggeringly similar, especially as I was still playing only the campaign really.

But soon, all that changed.

And it was all thanks to a guy called Master Chief.

I’ll not go into specifics about how Halo: Combat Evolved revolutionised what we’ve now come to know as the modern FPS (you can find that elsewhere, and also because I don’t think it did; it just got lucky). I do, however, think it made multiplayer gaming what it is today. Now I didn’t have an Xbox when it first came out. I was still playing Fifa on my trusty PS2 and loving it. But my good friend flipmofoxx got one, and bundled along with the console was a copy of Halo. And then something strange happened…other people also had these new fangled Xboxes. And copies of Halo. And system link cables. And then without warning, we were sitting in our uni kitchen, with 8 TV’s, 8 Xboxes and there were 8 of us shooting, grenading and mêléeing each other in Blood Gulch.

It. Was. Amazing.


For me, the original Xbox really is where multiplayer gaming took off again, not just paving the way for the eventual online gaming which is now commonplace, but more the social aspect of it that had been missing since the days of Mario Kart.

And it’s where I fell in love with gaming again, after the slightly cold days of the PS2. Although, once I did get my ‘box I didn’t have Xbox Live on it, but I did have a system link cable, and a friend within cable length distance who also had an Xbox. Flipmo and I played many a game via this lovely cable and it’s really where my love of gaming with others started. It didn’t matter that the console was the size of a chest of drawers, or that the controller was humongous. The thing played like the beast it was. Oh, and I had a crystal one. Don’t remember why, although it was probably cheaper.



Notable games on the Xbox, aside from the Halos were Burnout – a ludicrously fast racing (or rather, crashing) game involving retina searing speeds and stupidly entertaining crashes, Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory which is to this day my favourite co-op game I have ever played, and of course, both of the Star Wars Battlefront games. There are many more but I’d bore you if I went on.


And then we come to today. And in my home, with my wife, at the ripe old age of 26 I’m still as big a fan of games as I ever was. My Xbox 360 is possibly the console I’ve owned the longest and shows no sign of getting boring any time soon, and I’m showing no sign of giving it up.

To summarise, I love gaming.

In case you hadn’t worked that out already.

Cheers

JC

DVD snobbery

I have a vast collection of DVD’s.

It’s probably pushing about 400 (I’m aware that depending on the type of person you are this may seem like a ridiculous amount or hardly a ‘vast’ collection at all, but to me, it’s pretty freaking big). But despite having a lot of them, I’m astoundingly snobby when it comes to my collection.

For example, today I was browsing in a shop selling a lot of DVD’s. I had an interest in some of them, seeing as they were 2 for £10. However, there was a problem. These particular DVD’s were discontinued stock from a rental store that had gone out of business. And as such most of the DVD’s had the words RENTAL COPY on both the front and the spine of the case.

And therefore, I would never, ever buy it.

I know that the disc is probably fine and that there would probably not be any problems with the actual movie, but because of those two little words it will never grace my collection. It’s the same reason that back in the day where some bloke down the market had cheap knock off DVD’s that I was loathe to buy them.

To my eyes, it makes it look cheap. I take pride in my DVD collection. It’s nerdy, I know, but I can’t help it. The movies I own and the condition they’re in are a reflection on me. Of the 400 odd I own, all (or at the very least, 99% of them) are in perfect condition, just as they were the day they were bought. Beautiful, pristine, and official. I think ‘official’ is the most important word. Maybe it’s just me being a proper snob, but I can’t stand anything I own being less than perfect, or cheap looking. And for that reason I could never have a rental copy or a copied DVD adorning my beautiful shelf. Anyone else this particular about the collections? Or am I just that sad?

On a similar DVD shelf related note, I saw something else today that I’m surprised hasn’t been done before. It was a boxset for all the Saw movies that have been released on DVD so far, which is you’ve been following the series is 6 movies (not that many are following it; while the first Saw was truly brilliant, the sequels have become a convoluted mess, solely existing to find disgusting ways to kill people, although I do commend it’s committal to weaving an intricate back story that does actually adhere to rigorous continuity). But this boxset was different, and what drew my eye to it was the fact that on the front it had a sticker saying that this boxset had a space for the as yet unreleased (supposed) final chapter in the Saw franchise; Saw 3D.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Saw-1-6-Box-Set-DVD/dp/B003YUBZ84/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1297436794&sr=8-1

Such a simple idea, but one that I have not seen before in my years of DVD buying. And I think more franchises should adopt this new packaging revolution, as it would rid us of the horrible decision of whether to put a new addition (usually a fourth movie in a series) next to the already released boxset, or in the with the normal alphabetically organised single DVD’s. It’s a dilemma we all face. However, as I tried to come up with an example of my own for this, the only one I could come up with was Indiana Jones. But it gets a pass as the fourth one was made like 20 years after Last Crusade. And also, I try and bury Crystal Skull in with the others so as to try and wipe it from my memory. I’m sure there are more examples; I just can’t think of any right now.

So, if you’re in charge of a movie and think there may be sequels down the line, release your DVD with some extra space for a possible trilogy. And if you trilogy never happens, at least you’ve given us an extra place to hide our dirty movies.

Ta
JC

My Gaming History Part 1

Let me be honest here for a little while: if someone put a gun to my head and told me I could only enjoy one of these things for the rest of my life, out of gaming, film and TV, I reckon I would pick gaming.

Actually, that’s a lie. I’d pick TV.

But my point is I love gaming. I mean really love it. Have done since I was a small child. And I think I’m really the generation that ‘gets’ gaming the most; the 24-35 age bracket. People in this age bracket (also, bear in mind that I’m slightly uncomfortable grouping myself with people over 30. I’m still young, me. I go to all the cool parties) grew up with gaming. And I don’t mean they had every console that was released, though they did. I mean gaming has grown up alongside these people, as well as vice versa. In fact I’m probably on the outskirts of the ‘grew up with gaming’ stage. My first console was a ZX Spectrum, and it was terrific, but there were consoles before that. I can’t really offer an opinion on them. It would appear that while not there for gaming at its infancy, I was certainly there for the awkward first steps and teething stage, or the third generation of consoles to give it its proper name.

Anyway, to the mighty Spectrum. And it was mighty. In that there were so many pieces of kit to actually play the bugger. The massive power unit, the tape player you needed as the games for it came on cassettes (!) and the keyboard. The lovely ergonomic, streamlined, rubber keyed keyboard. It was a thing of beauty, and looked exactly like the type of keyboard used in underground Russian bunkers to launch nuclear missiles, except this had a little rainbow bit in the bottom right corner. It was cool. It’s still in my house somewhere, probably tucked away in a box in the roof space, gathering dust but still looking cool, and all pleased with itself.



The Spectrum itself was a time consuming console, mainly because it took so long to actually load up a game that when you eventually started playing you daren’t stop. Imagine dial up internet, but one that took about 15 minutes to connect and you’re almost there. Although you were treated to a nice display of multicoloured loading screens, that probably caused many a child to go into convulsions. But once it started, oh baby, were you ever treated to a wide variety of games. A wide variety of startlingly similar games with different skins, but it was still immense. The game I believe was the first I ever truly loved was an absolute gem. Jason’s Gem to be precise. You controlled a little space ship thing that had to manoeuvre through dangerous terrain, and you could either blast your way through it or carefully navigate your way around it. Blasting through was fun and got the job done but skilfully mastering the course was much more satisfying. It was simple, but I loved it. It was kind of like Space Invaders but in reverse. You were the invader, moving ever downwards to reach your goal. Come to think of it, maybe Jason was an evil overlord conquering every world he came to. They didn’t put that on the box though.

Anyway, the other game I loved on the ZX was R-Type. And if you’ve never played R-Type before, I take pity on your soul. I’m not even going to bother reviewing it, because everyone should know how good it is. As was indicative of this era of gaming, and for a while after too, the covers for the games were so awesome that the game couldn’t possibly live up to them. R-Type broke the tradition however, as it more than lived up to its bad ass cover.



After the glorious Spectrum days came the 16 BIT days. Twice the power, twice the awesomeness, twice the price probably; almost too much for this 7 year old boy to comprehend. My brain nearly exploded from sheer excitement. I still remember coming down on Christmas morning 1992 at 4AM, opening the door to the living room, and seeing the outline of a Sega Mega Drive box lit by the street lights outside, with a copy of Sonic the Hedgehog 2 sitting in front of it. I remember kneeling down beside it and practically salivating over it as my sister was next to me doing the same with a Polly Pocket dream village (or whatever) box. I remember loving the fact that Santa (yes, Santa) had bought me this. I also remember waiting for another 5 hours before I could actually play the blasted thing. Stupid parents, not waking up at the same time as me.

Anyway, the Mega Drive era was where I really fell in love with gaming. Sonic was the coolest video game character of all time (and still is) and was the perfect mascot for the faster, better, stronger Mega Drive. Sega does what Nintendon’t. Too bloody right.



First of all, the console itself, as it was a thing of beauty, with 16 BIT emblazoned on the front as if it’s screaming at you “That’s right, motherf*cker. I’ve got 16 BIT worth of power, and I’m going to remind you of just how f*cking awesome I am every time you look at me. 16 BIT FTW! Look at this grate on the side of me; it’s not to cool me down, it’s to warm you motherf*ckers up. Also, I’m all streamlined and sh*t. Screw your SNES, it looks like a grey box full of sh*t. I’m all rounded and smooth, and jet black and sexy.” Or is that just me that thinks that?

The controller was also a gorgeous little (big) thing. Unlike the SNES controller which was just a rectangle, that caused indentations in your hands during moments of intense gaming, the Mega Drive controller fit perfectly in your hands. It didn’t matter that the buttons A B and C did the same thing in most games, it looked sexy.



Up down left right A start, anyone?

And then there were the games. I’ll not go into in depth reviews of them all, because we’d be here all day. I’ll just name a few of my favourites: obviously all of the Sonics (special mention goes to Sonic and Knuckles onto which you could put other Sonic games and play as Knuckles; class. The SNES didn’t have that now, did it?); Mickey Mouse in the Castle of Illusion; Tiny Toon Adventures; Columns; Shinobi; Golden Axe; Italia 90 (the birds eye view footballing game); PGA 94; Fifa 96 (in which you were guaranteed a goal by running up the right flank and shooting from about 25 yards out) and of course the mighty Streets of Rage. All amazing.



And who doesn’t miss the days where if a game didn’t work, for whatever reason, all you had to do was rip out the cartridge, blow on it, slam in back in, and Bob’s your mother’s brother.

Also, back in the 16 BIT days, games were hard. I mean, really hard. You started off with three lives, and if you lost them, barring any continues you may have had, that was it. GAME OVER. Tough shit, basically. I remember reaching the part 3 of the Labyrinth Zone in the original Sonic the Hedgehog (Labyrinth Zone was the Aztec-y looking one that filled with water), following Robotnik up a shaft (oh-er!) in which arrows and badniks were making things more difficult. I had died a lot of times already and was on my last life. No continues left. This was it. I had hit him 7 times, 8 being the number of times that you had to hit one of the good doctor’s inventions before it blew up (Serious design flaw, that). I hit him the eighth time, he began to explode, but I wasn’t celebrating. Mainly because on my descent from hitting the underside of Robotnik’s wee hovercraft thing, I had hit a fucking protruding spike and died. Died my last life. No continues. GAME OVER. I could have cried. Games were hard back then, yo.

I loved my Mega Drive. I played until my eyes began to turn square, from both the amount of time playing it, as well as the fact that every game used REALLY BRIGHT COLOURS. I take pride however, that I never ended up looking like those kids on GamesMaster, who appeared to be in a vegetative state, only surfacing from in front of their TV’s to ask Patrick Moore how to get the best time on Super Happy Fun Time Racer 4.



[Wee sidenote here, but how awesome was GamesMaster? I often wish there was a show like it these days. Patrick Moore could probably still do it, despite him being about 406 years old]

But then my Mega Drive broke. I was inconsolable (pun semi intended). For a long while I had nothing to play games on. It was a dark time.

Then…the Playstation came along.

And that’s when everything changed...

With its demo disc and a T-Rex simulator which was simultaneously brilliant and pointless, the Playstation heralded a new age of gaming. An age where gaming suddenly got serious.

And it got serious in three dimensions.

More game history next time, folks.

Toodle pip

JC

Life, the Multiverse and Everything.

So, I finished watching the first series of Fringe a while back and have just started the second. It’s a great show. Yes, it does come off as a bit of an X-Files clone, using science instead of the paranormal, but that’s not to say it’s not good at what it does.



People heads explode, there’s a grotesque monster every now and again, the central trio are all brilliant in their roles, John Noble especially as the brilliant but mental Walter Bishop. It’s fairly disgusting most of the time and there’s even a character whose function is somewhat of a Where’s Wally game (The Observer*; if you watch the show, you’ll know what I’m on about).



* The Observer not only appears on Fringe itself, but has been sighted at certain real life events (only in the US, natch) like football games and in the audience of American Idol. Now that’s viral marketing. Also, I’m fairly certain I saw him one night as I was heading home from Donaghadee but that’s another story entirely.




The first season was mainly monster of the week fare, as most fantasy shows are when they first start out (Smallville, Supernatural, Buffy, even Lost to an extent; you know the type of show I mean, one where in every pre-title sequence somebody gets killed or something weird happens). But towards the end of its inaugural year, Fringe started to delve into the idea of alternate universes. The main character, Olivia, travelled to an alternate universe where the Twin Towers are still standing to meet the elusive William Bell, played by Leonard Nimoy who’s been doing his fair bit of universe hopping, between this and Star Trek. And from the two episodes I’ve watched of the second season, it appears as if most of this season will be dedicated to this type of story.

And I can’t wait.

I love the notion of the multiverse. It’s such an interesting concept; that there are an infinite number of universes in which things are drastically or minutely different to the universe we currently inhabit. Who wouldn’t love that? Lost dabbled in this alternate universe thing in its final season (unfortunately, although it did provide emotional closure to the series, it dropped the ball in terms of offering answers, and looking back was a real cop out in any episode but the finale) but Fringe embraces it with all it’s geek heart.



So far, we’ve only seen one alternate universe in Fringe, and I think that’s all we’re going to, as I imagine any more than that would get a little confusing (see DC Comics many different “Earth’s” if you want proof. Don’t even think about starting 52 or Infinite Crisis. It’s freaking impenetrable; I tried reading it once and had no clue about what was going on. I asked a big DC fan, and when he mentioned that there were many different variations of Earth, and that characters who may been dead in the core universe may not be dead in another but are somehow affected by events in the origi….oh no, I’ve gone cross eyed.), but it got me thinking about which other universes I’d like to visit.

The universe where there are actual superheroes; the universe where everyone is a Gerry Anderson puppet; the universe where dogs are humans and humans are dogs; the universe where people walk on their hands; the booblehead universe [note: that was a typo, but I like booblehead better than bobblehead so it’s staying]; the universe without shrimp; the universe with nothing but shrimp; the universe where that fucking Go Compare advert, Two and a Half Men and The X Factor don’t exist; the universe where the word ‘universe’ doesn’t exist (which would have made this blog really hard). Personally I’d like a universe where hay fever didn’t exist, that would be awesome.

Oh, and obviously there’s the Rosario Dawson universe.



I freaking love the multiverse, you may have noticed. I mean, I watched Sliders FFS. And it was terrible.

So, what do you all think?

JC

They’re coming to get you, Barbara

I’ve always thought a full scale zombie apocalypse would be cool.

Cause let’s face it, it would.



Once you get past the whole harrowing business of maybe having to kill your friends and family, it would be pretty awesome.

But you have to first of all work out what kind of zombie you’re facing, as it changes the survival chances pretty significantly. If we take the classic zombie (the ‘Romero’ zombie, if you will) I’d say your survival chances are pretty high, but there are many many problems with that. Cabin fever and depression namely, for what the classic zombie lacks in speed, it more than makes up for with persistence, and well, numbers. It’s the unrelenting nature of these guys that will likely drive you mad, and if you’re locked up in relative safety, you could well be there for a while, for as the movies have taught us, if the zombies know there’s people inside, they just moan and groan at the door until they get in, which they might never do. So basically, you’re trapped.



I remember when I worked in the Spar, we had discussions about how it would be quite a good place to hold up if it ever happened. Big shutters covering the doors and windows, access to a (albeit limited) supply of food, as well as the ability to get onto the roof if needs be. But, as I said, you’d be trapped. And eventually, you’d go insane. Maybe after a few months, maybe after a year, but if you’re locked up inside a small building, with the same people every day, with hordes of zombies outside whose only purpose is to get in to eat your face off, I wouldn’t blame you.



Thing is though, if you were just as persistent, you could easily survive on the road during a Romero invasion. A lot of literature on the subject (and there’s a lot of it, trust me. If you’re after something, pick up The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks) says that if there is a zombie invasion, you shouldn’t travel, but if you have to, travel alone. Be a lone wolf. I disagree. I think two people, travelling together and taking shifts, would be the best way to survive. One person sleeps while the other keeps watch, as Romero zombies aren’t fast, you literally could just run away from them, and their subtle satire on consumerism. The best thing is, assuming you could procure one, is that you wouldn’t need to use any form of firearm too often. Just as long as you stayed fit and healthy enough to run away, no weapons would be needed. But you should still carry some form of heavy blunt object with a long enough killing distance, like a spade or cricket bat. And cool as computer games have made it look, a chainsaw is really not a good thing to use, if such an invasion were to happen in real life.



However, if the zombie apocalypse was of the 28 Days Later/2004 Dawn of the Dead ilk, your survival chances drop significantly. We’ll call them the modern zombie and basically…these fuckers are fast. So you’ve got to be prepared.


Numbers are key in this situation. You need as many people around you as possible so as you can take shifts easily so other people can get some sleep, and be alert enough to cover your back whenever you need to sleep. And having more eyes about the place never hurts, as with more eyes, you can cover more places that the zombies could come from. Also it’d be best to find as wide and as open a space as you can find, but while still inside. Outdoors is a big no-no in this kind of invasion. Actually, a shopping centre is probably the best place to mount your offensive, as you can see in all directions (more or less) from a central focal point. If we take Ards Shopping Centre as an example, if you stationed folks at the both of the crossroads in it, you could see in all directions and would be able to ping a modern zombie’s head off before he got too close.




Which leads me to my next point. With the modern zombie, you’re going to needs guns.

Lots of guns.

You will not be able to run from these guys. You could maybe outrun one or two, but if there are a lot of them, you are screwed. That zombie bite has made them better, faster, stronger. They have been rebuilt, they have the technology, and they will chew your arm off for a laugh. Guns are an essential aspect of a modern zombie invasion. Get them however you can, and horde ammo like your life depended on it. Cause it will. I won’t go into gun specifics, cause I wouldn’t know what I’m talking about, but get some long range bad boys as well as something a little more close quarters. The shotgun has been immortalised as the weapon of choice for zombie killing, and I’d have to agree; it probably would be your best friend. Actually, your best friend should be a guy with a good aim.



And now, just a couple of general rules, no matter what kind of zombie you’re facing:

Do not go anywhere alone. This is good advice for the Romero invasion, but especially so with a modern one; as zombies have no regard for their own well being they will smash through anything to reach you. So don’t think because you’ve locked yourself in a room that you’re safe. Always take an armed partner with you wherever you go. You should also be armed at all times.

Always know where the exits are. In case you get cornered by a horde of blood thirsty undead prinks or if they’re blocking your usual exit, make sure you know that there are other ways out. No point running around an unfamiliar place, and running into a dead end. It’s zombie chow for you then. Never run upstairs while being chased unless you have a plan (as you’re effectively trapping yourself) and never lead them in to places that are secure.

Medical supplies. Carry them, and have someone who knows how to use them.

Be ruthless. You get bit, get someone to kill you. Someone gets bit, kill them. Has to be done. Or you could let them go out in a blaze of glory, preferably involving explosives, mainly cause this is what Every Zombie Movie Ever does.

And after all that, have fun.

I mean, it is the end of the world. Time to nut up, or shut up.

JC

What? You think just because a guy reads comics he can't start some shit?

Comics.



I'm something of a novice when it comes to comics. Only just recently getting into them in a big way. When I say that it's not in a 'get every single issue on the day it comes out' kind of guy. I'm more of a 'buy the trade paperback after a lot of research into exactly what it is I want' kind of guy (Hey, I've just got myself a mortgage, I can't afford to buy every comic that looks cool).

But it's been bugging me recently that a lot of people still think that comics are the arena of the nerd. The geek. The spaz. The social retard. And to some extent...that's kind of true.



But in this day and age where The Dark Knight is one of the top grossing films of all time, you'd think people would be getting into comics more and more.

This is not the case.

Example, before the Watchmen movie came out I decided to read the graphic novel, as I hadn't done so before. And while I don't think it deserves all the praise it gets (mainly cause Alan Moore pisses me off), I thought it was pretty damn good nonetheless. People in work saw me reading it and gave me looks of derision. Fair enough says I, they're uneducated in the ways of comics. But then these same people went to see the movie when it came out. So why should they be so willing to scorn people who read the comics. Are they still considered to be a children's hobby by the masses, reading the funny pages. Is liking a movie based on a comic, better, more socially acceptable, than liking the thing on which it was based?

Although, one person in my work didn't like Watchmen movie at all. His review, verbatim, was this: What the fuck was that all about? And why was that blue queer walking about with his dick out?



I'm currently enjoying Y The Last Man at the minute. It's probably the best work of fiction I've read in a while, has some truly stuning artwork and the the srory and lead charcters are compelling, yet when the eventual movie comes round (depsite that it's been stuck in Development Hell for a while) the people who will go and see it will do so because bloody Shia Leboeuf is likely to land the role of Yorick.



I don't have a problem with the movie adaptations themselves, but the double standards that go with the people who watch them yet would never think to pick up the source material, or worse still, dismiss them as being childish and stupid. Watchmen made Time Magazine's 100 best novels. That's novels, not graphic novels, folks. Give them a chance, you might like them.

So, what do you all think?