The green flower-looking things popped up as I progressed. So did the blue guys.

I had intended to do up a review of “Voxatron”, but I’m having a hard time coming up with anything to say about the game. It’s in alpha right now, so it’s not even really a full release yet.

That said, I can certainly see the game has potential. On the surface, it’s a run-and-gun good time with a nice assortment of enemies and powerups and just a touch of puzzle-solving for good measure. Take into account the level editor and the “BBS” option, which allows players to share and play each other’s custom-made levels, and you’ve got an endless amount of fun and variety.

The game’s design is based on voxels, which are kind of like the building blocks of 3D game mapping. If you’re familiar with “Minecraft“, each “block” in that game is essentially a voxel. And like “Minecraft”, “Voxatron” allows players to construct anything with the voxels. On top of that, they can be animated and made to initiate certain actions based on the player’s own actions.

What’s also neat about the use of voxels is that it allows for destructible environments. You control an adorable little robot with a pea shooter, and as you fire away at enemies, any walls or other structures you hit break and deteriorate from each shot. Through the powerups, you are also able to build on or destroy the environment – one grants the power to shoot blocks that can be used as stairs, and another causes a large explosion that takes out anything around you.

I tried out some of the shared BBS levels, and I was impressed with some of the creativity I saw. In one adventure, I found myself on the planet Purpletron, combating wave after wave of little blue aliens. In another, I was caught in a string of bad creepypasta references. In yet another, I was in a cubicle farm overrun by monsters.

The game has a regular adventure mode with many levels, and there’s also an arcade mode for those times when you just feel like taking on wave after wave of enemies. Even so, it doesn’t feel complete yet – probably because it isn’t. It would be great to see a multiplayer option integrated in later updates. Lexaloffle Games, the developer, has already released an update that allows for customized controls, with the promise of more updates in the future.

With the update of the announcement, the Humble Voxatron Debut also added a few more goodies to the deal. They’ve tossed in “Gish”, a physics-based side-scroller starring a ball of tar, as well as three minigames by Lexaloffle. So if you haven’t grabbed the bundle yet, the deal just got sweeter! And if you have already gotten it, get to the link containing your key and download the new additions.

                                      

I can’t tell you how many times I though up some wonderful idea or worked out a catchy lead for a blog article while showering, only to forget it once I am dry and clothed. Few things are more frustrating than trying to remember something word-for-word but not being able to get it just right.

Sure, I live alone and keep my windows covered, so nobody would likely see me running naked and dripping wet out of the bathroom to find a notepad and a pen, but really, it’s the principle of the thing.

So, I tackled the problem by trying to come up with some work-around. I rent, and my landlady probably wouldn’t be too happy about me cutting into the shower wall and mounting a touchpad in there, so that option is out. It’d probably be too expensive, anyway. Maybe I could get one of those magnetic doodle boards for kids, though it’d be rather lo-fi.

It wasn’t until a week or so after my tweets that I saw I had a new follower on Twitter:

Go figure that I’m not the only one to ever consider a solution to this problem. Turns out these guys market a product specifically designed to address the issue of fleeting shower thoughts.

For 7 bucks, you get a notepad with 40 sheets and pencil, as well as suction cups to keep both stuck to the side of your shower stall. They also sell extra pencils and suction cups, as well as “Aqua LoveNotes”, which are just like the regular AquaNotes but with two pencils – for leaving love notes in the shower, I suppose.

Anyway, the important question is, of course, whether or not they work. Lucky for you that I bought a pack.

I’ve had a pad of AquaNotes hanging up in my shower for about a week now, and it’s holding strong. Aside from the waterproofiness, the materials work just the same as the regular sort. The pencil smells of graphite, and the eraser leaves just enough residue that you can kind of make out what was written there.

The edges of the paper are a bit soaked at times, but it dries out well enough. Unlike regular paper, it does not lose its integrity or rip when wet. I even sprayed water directly at it with the shower head, with no apparent effect. All in all, it delivers on its promise while appealing to a certain nostalgic love of mine for the analogue.

That said, the design could use a few improvements. A pencil sharpener would be nice, for instance, though I suppose a regular one would work just as well (as long as the blades don’t rust). I would have also liked a place to store notes that I’ve ripped off, but as the above picture shows, they can be wedged in the top of the pad. Then again, I suppose the point of writing notes is so that you can take them with you and pull them out when you need them.

Inspiration hasn’t struck me too often since I bought the pad, so I’ve only used a few sheets of it so far. Regardless, I imagine this one will last me quite a while, and its usefulness so far has me convinced that I will likely buy another pad once this one does run out.

                                      

Isaac is not having a good day.

Game: The Binding of Isaac

Developers: Edmund McMillen and Florian Himsl

Systems: PC, Mac, Linux

Genre: RPG, roguelike

May appeal to fans of: The Legend of Zelda, Super Meat Boy

Key points: Disturbing content, addictive gameplay, plenty of replayability

It’s pretty clear that “The Binding of Isaac” was made with intent to offend.

It’s gastronomically visceral, with copious amounts of blood and feces cartoonishly depicted throughout. It dabbles in the Christian and the Satanic, tossing rosaries in with pentagrams in a story about religious fanaticism gone off the deep end. On top of that, it has a rather disturbing family vibe, like a young boy caught in the act of trying on his mother’s dresses and makeup.

And it’s pretty fun, to boot.

“The Binding of Isaac” begins with a simply drawn story about a boy whose Christian television-obsessed mother suddenly hears a voice from above, commanding her to protect her son from sin. She takes away all his toys and clothes, locks him in his room, and, when the voice tells her that the boy is still not safe from corruption, she takes a butcher knife and prepares to kill him as a sacrifice – hearkening to the Bible story from which the game takes its name. The boy, Isaac, catches sight of his mother stalking toward his room with the knife, so he searches frantically for a way out. He comes upon a trap door to the basemen, and he jumps down hoping to escape his mother’s wrath.

So begins Isaac’s journey through the horrific depths below. The player must guide the naked, crying child through a series of floors made up of rectangular rooms, in a play style not unlike the first “Legend of Zelda” game. And in this 2-D, top-down, randomized dungeon crawler, Isaac has only the keys, bombs and various powerups he finds along the way.

And what bizarre powerups they are, ranging from the humorous to the horrifying. Find Mom’s heels to gain range to your attacks. Find a former pet dog’s severed head to make Isaac’s eyes enlarge, strengthening his tears (which serve as projectiles), or a dead cat to gain nine lives. Make a deal with the devil to acquire Satanic symbols that transform Isaac into a black, winged, horned, demonic beast that rains hell upon his enemies. And as you acquire these items, they appear on your avatar, until eventually Isaac is nigh unrecognizable under the weight of all his new-found accessories. At one point, my little guy had bat wings and a spelunker’s hat with two floating fetuses and an animated wad of meat hovering around him.

And all of these tools are vital to surviving the basement. The game is brutal and unforgiving. Isaac has one life, and if he loses it, the player loses all powerups and must start from the very beginning. There are strategies to defeating each type of enemy, but the price for learning them is death, multiple times. Should you manage to reach the end and defeat Mom, a new chapter will open, and even more powerful enemies will appear for your next playthrough.

It should come as no surprise that this game was co-created by Edmund McMillen, part of the team behind “Super Meat Boy”. Like SMB, “Isaac” is chock full of splorches and bodily fluids, as the basement transforms into something more organic the farther Isaac goes down into it. Many of the enemies he encounters are anatomical in nature or just downright intestinally disturbing, from the clot and the maggot to the fistula and the blastocyst. To counter Isaac’s tears, many of the enemies’ attacks consist of blood, urine and flies. “Isaac” is not a game for the faint of heart, though all these things are depicted in a fairly bright, colorful way.

Disgusting visuals and subject matter aside, the game stands out for its difficulty and replay value. It’s hard but not impossible, hitting that sweet spot where whatever frustration failure brings is deflated by the excitement of finally succeeding. Arduous tasks, like defeating the level boss or clearing a challenging room, are usually well-rewarded. In additional playthroughs after the player first beats the game, new bosses give new and more powerful items upon their defeat. The list of available powerups is rather extensive, and the player can view from the menu screen which ones have been found and how many are still hidden.

I had some misgivings about trying out “Isaac” at first because it seemed too disturbing for my tastes and, to be honest, I wasn’t exactly smitten with the difficulty curve in “Super Meat Boy”. Even so, I gave it a chance, and now I find myself starting it up for one or two quick runs when I have a bit of free time. The game has no save feature, and none of the items carry over from one game to the next. Yet I’m driven to play again, to unlock new playable characters, or in the hopes of beating it and seeing another ending and some new enemies.

Assuming you’re reading this post relatively close to the date I posted it, and if you’re curious to play the game yourself, take advantage of the Humble Voxatron Debut going on until Nov. 14. Pay more than the average for “Voxatron” and they’ll throw in “The Binding of Isaac” along with “Blocks That Matter”. I hope to get reviews out for the other two games before the event ends.

Anyway, here’s a trailer:

                                      

David Hyde Pierce shines as "The Perfect Host".

Title: The Perfect Host

Directed by: Nick Tomnay

Starring: David Hyde Pierce, Clayne Crawford

Starts off with a great taste, but it’s a bit overcooked

“The Perfect Host” is a twisted movie, in more ways than one.

It’s part crime caper, part psychological thriller. John (played by Crawford, whose slicked-back hair makes him look like a cross between Ray Liotta and Leonardo DiCaprio) is a career criminal on the run from the law for a bank heist. He’s also a bit crafty, sifting through a Los Angeles resident’s mail to put together a back story to get himself into the home. He cons his way into the abode of one Warwick Wilson (Pierce), a proper gentleman preparing for a dinner party.

John may have Warwick fooled, but several tense moments have him worried that his cover will be blown. Inevitably, though, John lets it slip that he’s the escaped criminal the cops are after, and he takes Warwick hostage with a butcher knife from the kitchen. Even under the circumstances, though, Warwick seems more concerned with keeping the place tidy for his dinner guests than he is with whatever threat the criminal poses. John doesn’t realize until it’s too late that the man he’s dealing with is not just some quiet, upper-class socialite. Rather, as the drugs in his wine start to kick in, John awakens to the fact that he’s walked into the home of a rather sick, twisted individual.

It’s hard to say much about “The Perfect Host” without giving too much away. It is a film of surprises, which in a way is its greatest weakness. The bizarre coincidences mount ever higher, especially in the film’s final act, that it becomes a bit hard to follow and even harder to swallow.

Even so, the twisted plot is delivered well. Pierce’s Warwick comes off much like his role as Niles Crane in the sitcom “Frasier”, if Maris finally pushed him off the deep end. He engages in humiliation and torture, at times verging on unwatchable (though not nearly as bad as “torture porn” such as the Saw movies or “The Human Centipede”). It’s clear he’s not right in the head from early on, such as when he responds to John’s threats by replying, “You can’t kill me, I’m having a dinner party,” or when he rushes over to John’s bleeding foot with a wet cloth not to clean the wound but rather to clean his wood floor.

Warwick is portrayed with such manic zeal that he comes off as unpredictable, and rightly so. He exhibits the sort of insanity – and exhibits it well, thanks to Pierce’s acting – where he follows a personal set of standards to the point of obsession. He’s clearly deranged, but he does not recognize his own derision, even when John plainly articulates it to him.

If you can’t tell, I am of the opinion that Pierce stole the show. Crawford does a decent job playing the gruff burglar in a tight situation, but he doesn’t get much opportunity to emote when he spends most of his screen time drugged up and tied to a chair. Even so, and amid the twistedness of it all, “The Perfect Host” drops in a few nuggets of humor. John gets more than a few opportunities to issue witty comebacks to his sadistic captor, and Pierce’s mannerisms add some levity to his character’s persona.

On top of the thriller of John’s attempt to escape the madhouse that is Warwick’s bungalow, there’s a somewhat thin crime story going on. As John endures drugged cocktails and lacerations, a sideplot is unfolding in which a couple of detectives are piecing together the aforementioned bank heist. Through drug-induced flashbacks, the reader is presented with a motivation for John’s actions,  as well as a few hints that perhaps he is not entirely in control of the situation. In this fashion, also, the movie sets up a sort of theme, comparing both John’s struggle and the crime itself with the game of chess – and, at one point, involving an actual game of chess.

Who is the king and who is the pawn isn’t entirely clear until the end – though the denouement may leave some viewers feeling like a bad hangover after a dinner party.

I’m including a video of the film’s trailer, but know that it is a bit spoilerish. Even so, the big reveal is just one of several twists, and it comes up fairly early in the movie anyway. If you watch the trailer and think there’s nothing more to learn about the film, you’re missing out.

                                      

Like a bull in a pixel shop.

The Humble Indie Bundle is back, but this time it comes with a twist.

For anyone unfamiliar with them, the Humble Bundles are a series of limited-time offers through which gamers can buy multiple independently developed, DRM-free games at whatever price they choose. The great thing about the bundles is that the buyer can decide how much money goes to each game developer – and how much goes to the charity or charities that also benefit from the sales.

Of course, buyers can be cheapskates and pay the minimum, or they can be generous and pay well beyond the suggested price. Either way, the money goes directly to the developers and charities, save for whatever portion the buyer chooses to give to the company that runs the series in the hopes of encouraging more in the future.

But like I said, this bundle has a bit of a twist. It’s presented as a debut, specifically of a crazy block shooter called “Voxatron”. But if a buyer pays more than the average price of all the buyers that came before, the sellers throw in a couple more titles (as well as the soundtracks to each game): disturbingly surreal “The Binding of Isaac” and the geometric puzzler “Blocks That Matter”. At the time that I am writing this, the average is $4.40, definitely a reasonable price for the three titles. Of course, there’s no harm in giving a little more, right?

Not to mention the charities. According to the website for Child’s Play, the charity is “dedicated to improving the lives of children with toys and games in our network of over 70 hospitals worldwide.” The organization also assists in setting up wish lists for hospitals so that donors can provide gifts to child patients at particular hospitals.

Also on board is the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The organization’s website indicates that its goal is to “confront cutting-edge issues defending free speech, privacy, innovation, and consumer rights” particularly in terms of technology and the way it affects our society. EFF has had legal victories in cases involving the rights of online journalists and the privacy of users’ online communications.

When all is said and done, though, the Humble Vexatron Debut is a great deal for some great causes. Act quickly, though – the deal is available for a little less than two weeks as of the writing of this article. If you didn’t catch the link up above, you can find the bundle for sale at http://www.humblebundle.com/.

Also, expect reviews from me for each game in the near future. In the meantime, here’s the trailer for the “Voxatron” debut:

                                      

The Adventure Time trio, from left to right: Beemo (Josh), Fionna (Devin) and Marshall Lee (Jeremy).

As I attempt to reboot this blog and fine-tune things, I’m going to throw in a few occasional feature articles – similar to the mouseandhat feature I had going for a while, but they won’t necessarily be posted every week. Even so, I’ll try to make them as frequent as possible.

With that said, I will periodically post articles about craft projects in this feature, Make Monday. Of course, such posts will come on Mondays (provided I get them up in time, unlike this week). It’s in the title, after all.

Anyway.

As an alum to the No. 1 party school in the nation, Ohio University, I had to make an appearance at the annual HallOUween block party. For those of you unfamiliar with the event, it’s a massive street party in uptown Athens, Ohio, during which the population of the little Appalachian campus town triples as people from all over pour in to partake in the costumed festivities and drunken debauchery. As I’m not much of a drinker, I just like to go to see all the great costumes and to show off my own.

Two of my college friends, Jeremy and Devin, planned to dress as Marshall Lee and Fionna, two characters from the gender-swap episode of the Cartoon Network show “Adventure Time”. I decided to join in on their group costume, but rather than going as Prince Gumball or some other character unique to that episode, I opted for my favorite character from the show, Beemo – a genderless video game console, though its voice actress also lends her voice to the Korean-speaking Lady Rainicorn. Now, friends and past readers might recall that Halloween is one of my favorite holidays. I enjoy dressing in costume, and I reallyenjoy making costumes from scratch. Granted, I’m still an amateur when it comes to the more specialized areas of costume-crafting, but I do my best to cobble together a passable imitation.

Body

Given the boxiness of Beemo’s design, it seemed only natural to construct it primarily out of cardboard boxes. I also wasn’t in the mood for messing around with glue, so I went with the, ahem, staple of sticking two things together: duct tape. That’s right, I made my costume primarily of cardboard and duct tape, and on close inspection, it shows.

I had a bunch of shipping boxes left over from when I moved to West Virginia for my new job, so I sacrificed a few of those. After attempts at drawing length ratios between a picture of Beemo and my own proportions, I gave up on that and just figured I would use what I had on hand. As such, a few of the proportions in my costume don’t match up exactly with the character in the cartoon, but that was likely anyway given the physical impossibility of the thing. Take a look at a picture of Beemo in that link up above if you’re not sure what I mean. See where its arms are compared to the location of its face? Yeah, that wasn’t happening.

Despite my lax approach on the dimensions of the whole thing, I did not skimp on the shape and position of the screen and various buttons. I stuck to straight lines and looked for reasonably sized objects to trace the circular parts – for instance, the larger of the two round buttons was traced from a CD.

This should really go without saying, but always make sure to spray paint in a well-ventilated area.

After laying out the location of the buttons and various bits, I took a box cutter to them. I hadn’t worked much with cardboard in the past, but I did learn a few things in the process. For example, it’s easier to get a clean, straight cut if you score the line once or twice with the cutter before cutting all the way through, especially if the board is flimsy. That way, you get a straight line with less opportunity to catch on anything.

I took my cut-out boxes (being sure to save the pieces I cut out for the buttons, so I could later use them as the tops of the buttons) and set to painting them. Here, another lesson was learned: I had gotten the wrong type of spray paint. I wanted matte or gloss, not satin. A few more trips to the store and I eventually had enough paint to finish both boxes in a nice, teal color.

Buttons

The sides didn't match up exactly with the tops, but they had to be a little smaller to fit in the holes.

Originally, I had this crazy idea to make it so the buttons were actually pressable. I concocted this setup where the cardboard buttons were filled with stuffing and sewn onto a bit of cloth on the inside of the costume so that they would pop back out again after being pushed.

When I tried to implement this idea, I quickly realized that it just wasn’t going to fly, so I opted for simply duct-taping the buttons to the inside of the body instead. They still had a bit of give, but prolonged pushing tended to mess up the tape. This wasn’t really a problem until I got out on the street in Athens. I had underestimated the degree to which drunk college students would be drawn to over-sized, colorful buttons. Needless to say, they were a bit beat up by the end of the night.

But that’s okay. They did the trick, and if I revisit the costume later, I might take another crack at making the buttons more functional.

Limbs

My mediocre sewing skills were put to the test… I'm not sure I passed.

Okay, so I can’t get the proportions of the limbs right, but I can still make them the right color.

I recalled reading in this post about a method for turning tights into full-armed gloves. I liked how her gloves came out – heck, the whole costume is fantastic, and an inspiration for amateur costume-makers everywhere – so I thought I’d have a go at it.

The basic idea is to take a pair of tights, cut out the crotch to fit your head through, and cut and sew the stockings to fit your fingers.

I hadn’t done much sewing since I slapped together that No Face costume a while back, so I had to brush up on my whipstitch. A close look at each glove should reveal which one I did first, as it has various flaws and parts that don’t quite fit my digits. Factor in the material’s elasticity and my own impatience, and you can expect the final product to have all sorts of little imperfections. Regardless, the gloves came out well enough, and I felt more confident in my sewing by the end of the process. Plus, using pins to mark the space between each finger definitely helped.

Really, though, for all my difficulty in cutting and sewing the tights, I had the mosttrouble just acquiring a couple pairs of teal tights. Walking around the women’s sections of various clothing stores was embarrassing enough; eventually, I just opted to order them online, and they came the day before I was set to leave for the party. The gloves were the last part of the costume I finished, save for a few touch-ups and re-applied duct tape on the costume as a whole.

Compartment

I won’t say too much about this part. Over the course of the cartoon, Beemo’s design changes. Sometimes, it has two sockets for controllers. Other times, it has a controller that sits flush against the exterior and pops out when needed. I thought I would play on the latter design, converting the controller compartment into a handy place to store my camera and backup batteries. Because of the size of the boxes I used, I didn’t really have full mobility of my arms, so the compartment made it easier to put things within reach. It also served as a way for my friends to pass me things throughout the night – like some delicious French fries from the hot dog place around the corner.

Like the rest of the costume, the compartment was made of cardboard and duct tape, with a coat of spray paint.

What I learned

Like any good crafting project, I came away with a better understanding of some things.

• Your plans don’t always work out how you expect, but sometimes in the process of trying to implement them, you might come upon an easier, more effective approach.
• Don’t be afraid to scrap something you’ve worked hard on and start from scratch with a new idea. I originally tried to make the screen out of plastic wrap, but it was so unwieldy and looked so awful when I got it up there. Later, it dawned on me that a clear plastic table mat or shower curtain would work much better, and I was glad to tear it down and start over.
• Always, always put down newspaper or plastic or some other material when working with paint, even if you’re just doing a little touch-up work. Also, if you’re working with paint, know how to clean up any accidental spills.
• The Internet is a great resource for figuring out how to do just about anything and how to do it right. Chances are, someone else has done something similar in the past and has documented it. If they haven’t, see what works and what doesn’t and share what you’ve found works best.
• There seems to be a contingent of Doctor Who fans who are also Adventure Time fans. Quite a few Doctors recognized our group costumes. It was nice to meet the occasional person who didn’t assume I was a Game Boy or some other real-life gaming console.
• There’s a certain point during the night of the block party when the desire to see cool costumes is outweighed by the desire to get away from the drunk people.
• Cats and cardboard crafts do not mix well. Something about cats and boxes just spells chaos.

Oh, sorry, I did not realize my costume was actually your secret Fortress of Catitude.

                                      

Lately, in my part of the world, we’ve had something of an Indian summer – that is, a period following the actual summer when warm weather holds on into autumn. Driving around with the windows down in this unusually warm weather, I can’t help but turn my mind to what music seems most appropriate to pump out of the car stereo.

After I heard a co-worker use the phrase “Indian summer” to describe the weather, probably the first time I had heard anyone use the phrase, my mind immediately went to the song of the same name on the Manic Street Preachers album “Send Away the Tigers”, in that sort of way that the tickling of one neuron can set off a chain reaction that takes one to a loosely related topic. In making that connection, I couldn’t help but feel that the album the phrase brought to mind seems to fit the weather so well – and, to a certain extent, the feel of the nation amid the threat of another recession; concerns about a persistent unemployment rate; and all of the grief, frustration and uncertainty that comes along with it all.

Image courtesy wikimedia.org.

Album: Send Away the Tigers

Artist: Manic Street Preachers

Genre: alternative rock, whatever that means

Gateway tracks: “Your Love Alone is Not Enough”, “Underdogs”

The phrase “send away the tigers” is of British origin, meaning to chase one’s inner demons away by getting drunk. Though the lyrics of the album don’t explicitly mention anything about drowning one’s tears in a glass of beer, they certainly convey a sense of inner turmoil, of a man reaching the dusk of his glory days.

Even so, that man is not giving up peacefully, not with singer James Dean Bradfield’s biting vocals. Bradfield gives a fair amount of punch as he waxes about social entropy, like a more cerebral and more world-weary version of Billy Idol. Add to that the rock anthem-style guitar riffs that pervade “Send Away the Tigers”, and you have a powerful, angry, energetic, straight-forward bunch of songs.

Listening to the album, I can’t help but feel how much it seems to fit with the general attitude of the country these days. The first and title track, which begins like a football stadium concert and fades away like a resigned, over-the-shoulder glance, reeks of desperation beguiled by the forcefulness of Bradfield’s voice. It is a song for the working man, sitting at the bar and wondering why his life seems at a standstill. It is a song for the abandoned train cars rusting in the overgrown fields, for the boarded up shops with faded signs just off the turnpike. It is a song for the twilight of a waning era.

Yet despite the depressing context, there is a sense of rebellion and a desire to press on against the adversity. Take “Underdogs”, for instance: an anthem – for each of the songs on this album could be considered an anthem in some sense or another – for the outcasts, the beaten down and weird. Or there’s “Rendition”, with its tongue-in-cheek rally for revolution, complete with marching drums that lead into one of the several powerful guitar riffs sprinkled throughout the album.

For anyone unfamiliar with the Manic Street Preachers, the band has an energy that is hard to ignore. “Send Away the Tigers” harkens back to an earlier album of theirs, “The Holy Bible”, but with a more refined, less abrasive sound. With that energy comes a certain amount of repetition, both in lyrics and sound, but in a way that adds to the enjoyability of it. This sort of music lends itself well to impassioned sing-alongs when you think nobody is within earshot. At least, that’s been my experience.

About halfway through the album – some time after the anti-love love song “Your Love Alone Is Not Enough”, featuring a wonderful duet with The Cardigan’s Nina Persson – the tone changes a bit. It takes on a more cynical, perhaps angrier bent, with tunes like “Imperial Bodybags” (an anti-war anthem) and “I’m Just a Patsy”, drawing a metaphor between Lee Harvey Oswald and the shallower realms of love.

Really, though, that cynicism, or the sense of a past failure coming back to haunt once again, pops up from start to finish. Notable is “The Second Great Depression”, which could arguably describe an emotional downturn as much as a fiscal one. The album deals with rather dark and depressing themes, yet it maintains a sort of upbeat feel because of the energy that courses through it.

But alas, I have strayed from my original point, that of the right music for the right season. Certainly, seasons play a part on “Send Away the Tigers”, if only metaphorically, with song titles like “Indian Summer”, “Autumnsong” and “Winterlovers”. Oddly enough, at least from my perspective, those three tracks have a more restrained tempo compared to tracks like “Underdogs” and “Rendition”. They play more like rock ballads than rock anthems. They convey that feeling that the warmth of summer is fleeting, colder times are coming, and we’d best resign ourselves to the passing of the seasons.

Or maybe I’m looking too deeply into it all. The album is neatly packaged and doesn’t overstay its welcome. Symptoms of listening may include involuntary air guitar and strange looks from people in cars next to yours as you pull up to the stop light, banging your head and singing along. For a taste of what it has in store, check out the following video featuring “Rendition”:

                                      

Image courtesy filmonic.com.

Title: Super 8

Directed by: J.J. Abrams

Starring: Joel Courtney, Elle Fanning, Kyle Chandler

Abrams’ tribute to his childhood (and Spielberg) hits home

For purposes of full disclosure, I should say a few things before delving into this review. The depiction of small-town life in “Super 8″ resonated a bit with me, having grown up in Ohio (the film is set in the fictional town of Lillian, near Dayton). Much of the filming was actually done in West Virginia, where I now live and work.

That said, J.J. Abrams’ latest foray into the realm of science fiction is a polished production that has glimpses of previous similar films like “E.T.” – whose director, Steven Spielberg, shares producer rights for “Super 8″ – as well as elements found in Abrams’ previous work.

The movie takes its title from the type of film used by the youths at the center of the plot. These boys plan to spend their summer putting together a zombie flick to enter in a local movie contest. During filming, the young crew witnesses a horrendous train wreck that unleashes some mysterious force on the small town, and it’s only a matter of time before the kids’ production troubles take a back seat to the greater dilemmas occurring around them.

In the camera’s focus is Joe Lamb (Courtney), whose mother passed away four months prior to the main action, leaving his police deputy father (Chandler) to raise the boy by himself. It is soon apparent that young Joe has a thing for Alice (Fanning), a newcomer to the film group, which stirs up trouble because her father had a part in the accident that killed the deputy’s wife. Soon, however, power around town starts blacking out; appliances, pets and even people start going missing; the United States Air Force starts patrolling the town with Geiger counters – and suddenly, the officer has several more concerns beyond simply keeping his son away from what he considers bad company.

“Super 8″ is, at heart, a monster movie. But it’s not the sort where humans are pitted against some high-powered, flashy alien armada, a la “Independence Day”. Rather, the role of the monster is similar to the creature in a previous Abrams film, “Cloverfield”, in which the beast spends most of the time unseen. Instead, its impact on the characters and their lives takes center stage rather than the creature itself. The monster is not so much a constant, visible threat as it is an unseen force, aggravating life’s normal problems and pushing ordinary people to deal with extraordinary circumstances.The creature doesn’t even show itself clearly until long after its effects have been felt throughout the town.

The film is told, in large part, from the perspective of the children, and as such, it has a somewhat childlike approach to conflict. The military, with its authority and omnipresent desire for control, is just as much a danger to them as the monster. This depiction of an untrustworthy government element, trying to cover up the truth from everyday people, is also reminiscent of the time period in which the movie is set. Based in the late ’70s, “Super 8″ does well to remind viewers of the era  – from a passing reference to Three Mile Island to a town hall meeting in which an irate woman insists the Soviets are behind all the mysterious goings-on. This harkening to an earlier, arguably simpler time further emphasizes the sort of child-like innocence of the central characters.

That’s not to say this is an innocent kids’ movie, by any means. Before long, the youths are more concerned about survival than they are about enjoying their summer. They are also quick to express that they are wise beyond their years – and have the language to prove it. Likewise, in those few scenes where the monster makes its presence known, the film is not above splashing a little blood around for good effect. The effects, for that matter, are splendid. As the mayhem builds toward the end, Abrams lets the bullets and explosions fly in a fit of chaos – while still maintaining a clear shot of the action, unlike certain other directors who shall go without mention. Much like he did with “Star Trek”, though, Abrams does get a little over-excited with the lens flare at times.

If you’re looking for a great action movie with a bit of heart underneath, “Super 8″ does not disappoint. Abrams has done a wonderful job of earning his place among great sci-fi moviemakers, and this film is a step up in that position. The actors, though young, have enough character to pull the viewer in, and the movie is paced well enough to maintain the suspense from start to finish.

                                      

To my credit, I have a real job for the first time, and that has been eating up much of my daily energy quota. I don’t get home until late in the evening, and I still have to round up enough motivation to make myself a nice dinner. At least I’m eating well.

But that’s really no excuse, is it? Well, if my lack of updates is somehow leaving you malnourished, you can find some great nerd-centric blogging at Nerd Living, a blog maintained by the staff at the newspaper I work for where I work for which I work. To date, I’ve written only one entry for the blog, but I have more planned for the future. And don’t worry – on occasion, I will post things on here that are too nerdy for the staff blog. Until then, feel free to whet your appetite for all that is nerdy at Nerd Living.

                                      

Well, no, that’s not quite right. If it weren’t for the rain, there might not have been the bucket. But if I keep heading down that path, I could come up with a whole string of eggs before I get to a single chicken.

Maybe I should start over.

I got a job. My excuse for not updating much lately is that, after I was offered this job, my life has sped up a bit. I went apartment shopping, I took inventory of my possessions, I contemplated on my last days of joblessness.

Now, I am settled in West Virginia, though I don’t quite feel settled just yet. I still have a few boxes to unpack. Last night, I bought a skillet to cook ground beef because I did not have one. After I browned the beef and turned it into sloppy joe, I realized I had no plates on which to eat. I’m not settled just yet.

But I digress – the bucket, and the rain. Right.

I had a rough morning. I’ve moved to a new state, away from the home of my parents, and one of the numerous things that you don’t think about until after the fact is the matter of car insurance. So, I made an appointment with a local agency.

Unfortunately, I still haven’t figured out the way the roads are laid out in this town. I’m not settled just yet. I found the street the agency is on, luckily enough, but I could not find the specific building, even after driving from end to end, going both directions, multiple times.

Then the rain fell. Blinding rain. Unusually heavy rain. I had the radio on, and the broadcast was interrupted by a storm warning. It was bad enough to warrant such a warning. If I could not find the agency in clear weather, no way would I find it now.

I resigned, and after waiting it out for a few minutes in a parking lot, I headed back to my apartment.

The road in question. Image courtesy Google.

A bit of background: My new abode is located at the top of a hill, just off a steep and winding road that looks like it is one way but is in fact meant to accommodate traffic from both directions. I am tense every time I drive along it. This feeling might pass, over time, or perhaps not.

By the time I reached this road, the rain had died down a bit. Even so, debris covered the road – leaves, branches, anything else that might have tumbled down from the hill above. At the foot of the hill, a man was raking away at the gunky buildup, possibly to clear the road or at least to clear a path for the runoff.

Before I even reached the first of many bends in the road, I heard a clunk from the front of my car, followed by a scraping sound that followed me up the hill. A busted-up bucket had caught the front axle, and it was being dragged along underneath my car.

I pulled into a nearby parking lot to dislodge the bucket. I figured it would take no more than a minute or two, so I kept the car running – headlights on, windshield wipers wiping, radio playing “Bob & Tom” or some such radio show. Sure enough, I got the bucket out from under, but then it hit me: I had locked the door.

I was locked out. It was pouring down rain. The engine was still running.

But wait – I have a spare car key. It’s in my apartment. If I just run up the hill and -

No. My apartment key is connected to the key in the ignition of my car. Well, that’s stupid.

But if I call the landlady, she’ll have a spare apartment key. Granted, she doesn’t usually answer her phone, but it’s worth a shot.

One problem: I don’t have my cell phone with me. It’s… in my apartment, charging. Well then.

I wasn’t sure what to do, but I knew that standing next to my car in the pouring rain wouldn’t help. So, I ran up the hill – a steep hill, with a thin road – toward the apartment complex. I got there, soaking wet and out of breath. The office door was closed and the lights were out.

I had no other choice. It was time to meet my neighbors.

I looked around at the nearby apartments. They are set up in groups, each one branching off from a shared walkway. Only one apartment in the same group as mine had a light on, so I headed for it and knocked on the door.

After a few knocks and some waiting, I met Roger. Roger has a dog and a cat. He also has a cell phone and a lot of time to spare. I owe him my thanks.

For all the bad luck I had that morning, things could have been worse. Roger was understanding and willing to help a stranger. The landlady did not answer my call the first time, but she got the message well enough. Nobody broke into my car as it sat idling in that parking lot. The insurance agent was not upset that I missed my appointment. The battery in my car did not die. I got the situation worked out long before I was to report to my first day at my new job.

As rough as that morning was, it hasn’t sullied my view of this city, or West Virginia. This place has plenty to offer, and I shall keep an eye out for any opportunities. Before long, I will get into the swing of things, not worry so much about making mistakes, and learn from those mistakes I do make.

I just need to get a little more settled.

Also, it turns out some of my co-workers can be pretty nerdy, so that’s cool. I’m just going to leave this somewhat related video here.