Things I discovered this past weekend:
1. The lights in the front of the basement, and correspondingly the electrical outlet on the base of the light fixture, are on the same circuit as the back of the living room where my linux box is plugged in, the back of the office where the rest of the computers are plugged in, and the front of the office where the air conditioner is plugged in
2. The light in the back of the basement is on the same circuit as the washing machine
3. Leah's vacuum cleaner plus the three computers in the office plus the air conditioner plus the one computer in the living room all together draw more than 15 amps.
4. So does Leah's vacuum cleaner plus the washing machine.
Apparently, the previous purple dragon was... Evil. And Spyro's girlfriend will be unable to resist his evil. And soon there will be an evil eclipse of... Evil! And then the well of souls will do something and some stuff will happen and boy will it be... EVIL!
Ian McKellen's plan is for Frodo to just hang with him in the temple until the Armageddon has passed. Frodo, of course, readily agrees and the game ends...
Well, no, Frodo says he can't leave the other dragons to die, so he insists on going back, and Sir Ian caves instantly. They make an exciting escape from the temple, which is told in the form of a cutscene, and Frodo and Fry instantly arrive at Skeletor's castle on Mt. Doom.
At the top of the castle, Frodo meets the monkey king in a cutscene so important that it's on film instead of tape. He makes Frodo fight his girlfriend, but she turns out to still be good, and they pull off a gambit they've tried before to disarm the monkey king. It doesn't work, though, and she gets incapacitated, leaving Frodo alone for the big fight.
After the first phase of the battle, Spyro and the Monkey King fall into a lower arena, where Frodo is hit by a purple light that turns him into a scary-yet-dopey black form that can shoot purple energy blasts.
After losing to Gaul the Monkey Queen a few thousand times, Leah cottons on to the fact that with time stopped, his first form takes a few extra hits each time he's safe to approach, and this makes his first form not "easier" but perhaps less tedious.
After an arduous fight (Seriously, Leah can swear like a sailor when she's riled up), The Pirate Queen orders Frodo to finish him -- if he doesn't, he just recharges and you have to play this segment again. Using Frodo's Purple-mode finisher, he vaporizes Gaul, and then has to be talked down from destroying the world in a Purple Rage. Unfortunately, the mountain they're in explodes in a ball of green snot, trapping Spyro, Cynder, and Fry . Recalling the words of Sir Ian -- Who I have just learned is actually Gary Oldman -- Spyro decides to Wait It Out by using his dragon powers to freeze himself and his friends in a block of ice, to keep them safe inside this volcano until the next game.
Inside... This... Volcano...
Anyway, that's where the game ends, which Leah found mightily disappointing. I'm inclined to agree, except that it does redeem itself right after the end credits finish, when Samuel L. Jackson shows up to talk to Spyro about The Avenger Initiative.
Spyro's adventures will continue in: The Legend of Spyro 3: The Quest For Peace...
We do, however, see no issue with assigning human traits to inanimate objects or video game characters, particularly if there is a cheap joke to be made of it. In that spirit, the author apologizes for calling Gaul the Monkey King gay. He meant to say "Gaul the Monkey King is totally homosexual."
The next day, Alice finds the note, and Bray reads it aloud: "Forget about ever seeing them again". Ned freaks out and doesn't believe him, then suspiciously runs off.
Seline, who has no right to be snooty, gives Ellie grief about hooking up with Luke. Jack has run away.
Bray and Pride get in a fight, then Bray has a breakdown. Ned would feel guilty if he were capable of guilt.
Bray runs away and gets roughed up by street punks. Ebony extorts Ned. The Guardian scares Ron Weasley a little more, still no one believes him.
KC interrupts Bray's bender looking for a buyer for the Guardian's ring. He trades it for a horse, though even he isn't sure why. Bray wanders around in a stupor until he happens upon the Mozzies, which is surprising since for people bearing a dangerous grudge, they sure took their own sweet time.
Alice starts to become suspicious of Ned when he starts treating her decently. KC gives May a horse, because he's still sweet on her and not very bright.
A party of wandering Klingons find Bray. May tries to draft Pride into a leadership role, which finally makes Seline grow a pair and bitch out everyone.
Pride and Lex go to look for Bray in a rough part of town, but are saved by bad foley. Lex questions Edward Scissorhands's motives, but as Pride speaks only in fortune cookie, not much progress is made.
Ebony confronts Moz, and draws a metaphor about mosquitoes: "Always like a mosquito to think it's found something only to find out it's bitten off more than it can chew." So, Ebony's skills: ass-kicking; lying; cheating; psychological manipulation: check. Metaphor: well, no one's perfect. She goes on to propose a complex alliance.
As part of her ridiculously circuitous plan, Ebony goes back to the Mallrats and proposes Lex declare himself Sheriff. Lex asks Pride to be his deputy.
Bray wakes up and reflexively macks on Moon, Hot Chyk of the Horse-Training Tribe. They sold KC the defective horse (Who. by the way, Seline is going to ride to prove Pride wrong), but they seem to be mostly okay. I'm guessing they'd gotten the horse in a trade themselves.
Ellie tries to get Luke a job with Ebony's new order. Ebony points out that Luke isn't liked or trusted.
Lex shows up in his new Sheriff Duds, which make him look like a cross between Marshall Dillon, Mad Max, and Boy George (Seriously, does everyone really need facial makings?).
The Guy Who Looks Like Pride But Isn't, Leader of the Horse Trainers, finally recognizes Bray as a Mallrat, and mention that they've met a mallrat before, a sort of big dumb guy whose name they didn't catch -- Bray, despite his concussion, rexognizes this as a pretty accurate description of Ryan.
Ebony catches The Guardian terrorizing Ron Weasley, but doesn't do anything about it, because her plan is just that complicated
Bray returns to the Mall, having left a Dear John note for Moon that The Guy Who Looks Like Pride But Isn't destroyed. Once he tells Seline that he's got news about Ryan, she rides off on the freshly tamed horse.
Sidebar: The end theme from The Tribe, Abe Messiah, was written by John Williams and Matt Prime. John Williams, as you probably know, wrote "Every Song In Every Movie You Have Ever Seen". Matt Prime, of course, is the lesser-known younger brother of Optimus Prime.
Luke, showing his industrious can-do spirit, has minted money. Lex tries to use this new money to hire a posse (Dagnabit, Deputy, I told you to round me up a little posse!), but they won't buy it. Also, behind Lex are posters of others who are vying for the job of Sheriff, including Moz, and, so far as I can tell, The Predator.
Of course, the whole "Money" thing doesn't work because money is only worth anything so long as everyone agrees that it's worth something. And, being children, they lack the sophistication and education to fall for that sort of shit.
After Moz's next little outburst, Ebony proposes a free election and nominates Bray for president of the city, on the premise that while the tribes may not like the idea of the Mallrats leading them, they probably like it better than any of the other candidates.
Ned has had enough of Ebony's failure to give him unbounded wealth and riches and threatens to tell the tribe what he's up to. Edward Scissorhands beds May.
Ebony bitches out Ellie for not wanting to use her newspaper as a pro-Bray propaganda machine, but she's dedicated to being impartial and giving both sides and not pointing out that Moz is a petty little tinpot dictator and bully. She interprets "give both sides" as "treat the truth told by one side as being on an equal footing with the lies told by the other side," so basically, she's the US media from 2001-2008.
Also, for some reason, the Mozbians all decide to be Lex's deputies. Lex does not support a trap. I'm not saying it's a trap, but my god that's an obvious trap.
It's hard for Ellie to convince Moz to give an interview, because Ellie's willingness to betray her friends is hard to believe. Then Moz decides to rough up Ellie for no clear reason. Ellie is sure to still write a Fair and Balanced article which wins Moz the election. Fortunately, Lex shows up looking for his posse. (Always say these lines aloud. It's funnier that way).
Ebony tells the Guardian that Ned plans to bust him out to trade him to the kidnappers for Amber and Trudy. As usual, because Ebony is lying, the Guardian believes her.
She orders Ned to take the Guardian to Moz. I think her plan is for the Guardian to kill Moz for her. Or possibly Ned, though I have a hard time seeing what advantage Ebony sees in killing Ned. Well, other than being rid of Ned. Oh. Actually, that is perfectly adequate reason to launch a scheme this complex.
With the Guardian missing, Bray can't possibly win the election, so Luke suggests Ebony instead, but Ebony doesn't want it and has to be convinced. Then she has an epileptic fit the third time they offer her the crown. Well, seriously, how does ANYONE not get it at this point?
The Guardian hits Ned with a crowbar, prompting the question: Why did Ned leave a crowbar in the coffin with the Guardian? And, really, this was Ebony's plan? Really? Wile E. Coyote came up with simpler plans than this.
Stopping only to change his clothes and redo his makeup, the Guardian goes to spring Trudy and Amber.
The Mozbians find Ned's body and are polite enough to return it to the Mallrats. Lex launches the most ineffectual investigation ever. The thing is, he doesn't have a pair of sunglasses to dramatically put on.
YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
The Guardian unlocks Amber and Trudy's cell, and is all threatening to them, because though he's not really catatonic, he's really nuts, and believes that he needs to kill Trudy to get back in Zoot's good graces.
Ebony busts in just in time to save them, because Amber and Trudy's death isn't really part of the plan. The Guardian body-slams her and runs away.
The democratic election goes for Ebony, despite heavy cheating on both sides and a surprising number of votes for Pat Buchannan.
Out in the wilderness, Jack tries to learn how to fish, and stops some people from roughing up a young girl who turns out to be Chloe. Amber has a nightmare about the Guardian.
Lex catches KC giving paid Guardian tours, and shakes down both KC and his customers for their comically large currency.
For Ebony's second act as leader, she raids the treasury. (Her first act was to move back into the hotel). She's working some sort of double-deal with Moz, and keeping Bray distracted.
Tyson gets attacked by the Guardian, but she manages to talk her way out of it by coming back with a posse Brady. Ebony agrees to send a posse to capture him, but independently contracts the Mozzies to assassinate the Guardian ahead of time.
When Chloe comes back, KC falls for her, and May gets all creepy and jealous toward Amber, Chloe, Trudy, maybe even Brady.
Amber shames Pride into going after May. Ebony fucks with Luke's carefully controlled economy, ordering that Luke increase his cash production, and Luke notices that he's basically just repeating the same old pattern as with The Chosen.
The Ambush of the Guardian nearly fails, with Ebony's hired assassin being no more useful than the others.
Luke leaves, Jack stays, The Guardian reveals Ebony's evil scheme to seize control, but no one believes him quite enough. Ebony sends a distraught Ellie off to visit her sister and tell her that The Guardian confessed to offing her boyfriend. Ellie delivers the message, because for a journalist, she is pretty thick, and it doesn't occur to her that Ebony just wants Alice to go off in a homicidal rage.
Alice goes to kill the Guardian. Luke talks her down. Then The Guardian uses his super human strength to rough up Luke.
When they find Alice, she claims to have killed the Guardian. Ebony pardons Alice, banishes Bray and Amber, and celebrates her new-found absolute power. The Guardian, however, is sneaking off with Luke, telling him about his vision. When they reach the docks, The Guardian sets Luke free, because there's a Chosen waiting to take him away. He offers to take Luke with him, restored to his rightful place as a Chosen.
Amber goes into labor outside the city, despite the fact that she's only been pregnant for about a week.
Ebony toasts her power. There's only really one thing that could stop her now.
A C4 cargo plane flying over the city.
Piloted by the Cybermen.
Paratroopers descend on the city and announce into their metal facemask microphones that "The invasion taskforce has landed."
The reason I bring this up is that during the commercial they show a CGI sequence of some piece of fruit being rendered into juice by this device, just like in CSI, when the criminalists theorize how some piece of evidence relates to the crime.
I use this analogy because in this CGI dramatization, the millions of tiny rotating blades of the sarlaak juicer basically cause the small CGI peach (or maybe it was a nectarine. It's hard to tell in CGI) to liquefy instantly, exploding in a shower of peachy (or nectariney) gore. And the first thing I thought was "My god, can you imagine what that would do to a man's hand if he got caught in one?"
And then my mind concocted all sorts of wild scenarios whereby the mafia might grab you for defaulting on your shady debts and, say, make you stick your hand or face or penis into a Sharper Image Juicer.
I think maybe I watch too many crime dramas.
Also, the preppy tween boy and girl that mom hands glasses of their pureed father ocra juice to at the end are absolutely adorable.
Luke agonizes over his past evil, Bray agonizes over the fact that Amber's seriously considering an abortion, and The Guardian goes full-on-crazy and has a conversation with his paperweight (Probably he's actually talking to Zoot's picture on the opposite wall, but the paperweight is in the frame and Zoot's picture isn't.), which Leah thinks is a marriage to Tyson, but The Guardian is so crazy by now that it's hard to make much sense of it.
Ned The Leprechaun and Alice try to tunnel their way out of the mall, and Ned nearly confesses to wanting to jump Alice's bones.
So Yeah...
Ebony tries to seduce Edward Scissorhands, pointing out how alike they are. He sagely notices that they are in fact not even a little alike.
The next time the Guardian sees Zoot, we're allowed to see him too. Zoot thanks The Guardian for his hard work, but he will not be requiring his services in this world, and would he please off himself and the rest of the Chosen. The Guardian goes all mua-ha-ha evil and decides to leave this world in a giant world-destroying shindig.
Selene, the poster-child for codependence, laments that Zoot has so often punished her, and refuses Luke's offer to help her escape. When she finds that Luke isn't willing to die for Zoot, she immediately loses faith in Zoot, and throws herself at Luke. When Luke shuns her, she either recovers or goes off to do something suicidal. Not sure which yet.
Alice and Ned break through a wall in the sewers, uncovering an open space with a chain link fence beyond it, where it is night time. Strange, mall architecture in New Zealand. Ned tries to escape through the hole, which works as well as it did for Winnie-the-Pooh when he ate all of Rabbit's honeyhunny.
The Guardian unveils his plan: he's gonna blow up the mall with himself and the Mallrats inside. He'd let them go free, he says, except that Zoot told him not to.
Which goes to show just how crazy The Guardian is: He actually did have a crazy vision of Zoot. And now. on Zoot's orders, he's going to off himself. But in his vision, Zoot didn't tell him to kill the others. He's lying about his crazy vision.
The countdown is set at 30 minutes, so we probably only have two or three hours before it goes off.
Alice and Ned decide to be all heroic and hold off the guards so the kids can escape through the tunnel. This fails utterly, and only KC escapes. Luke emerges from hiding and challenges the Guardian for being crazy. He gives an impassioned speech about spreading the word of Zoot and how it's madness to follow the Guarian, and how everyone should follow the path of Zoot on their own.
The Guardian makes the fairly accurate retort that the reasonable religion that Luke proposes is a pre-virus religion. His argument boils down to "Sure I'm crazy, but our religion is kinda predicated on crazy, which makes me a good fit."
However, Amber and Trudy show up and try to convince him that he'll be forgotten in a week if he blows himself up. Tyson is still convinced she can talk sense into him, but, well, she is wrong.
With mere minutes to diffuse the bomb, it seems all hope is lost, because no one is willing to run away. And then, the one person who might be able to talk the Guardian down shows up: Zoot.
(Well, actually it's Bray wearing his brother's clothesZoot Suit, but I think they somehow expected that we wouldn't work this out, as it's a big cliffhanger)
Incidentally, that was KC's idea. Now, this is a clever bit of actually setting something up ahead of time, because earlier in the season, KC was running a scam selling Zoot memorabilia.
Tyson asks the crying Guardian for the code to disarm the bomb.
The full code is 666, obviously, but The Guardian says "660". Fortunately, no one falls for that. In the aftermath, Ellie tries to smuggle Luke out of town, but he wants to stay and stand trial instead. Bray gives a rousing speech, Lex and his wife make ammends, and Ron Weasley picks up Bray's discarded Zoot Hat and stares at it creepily transfixed.
Later, Bray has flashbacks to Zoot's funeral, and has some crazy time over the loss of his brother. He and Amber canoodle until Ebony of all people interrupts because she wants someone assigned to guard the Guardian so that he doesn't get assassinated before his trial. She doesn't want him dying in a suboptimally painful and humiliating way.
Tyson goes to the Guardian, because even though she's made up with Lex, she's still obsessed with the idea of "fixing" him. Lex shows up, and Ebony has to cold cock him to stop him killing the Guardian.
Alice and Ned sneak off to bonk. Seline sneaks off to jump off the roof. Trudy and Bray fail to talk her down, but Tally brings Brady up to the roof, and Seline decides, I dunno, that she won't commit suicide in front of a baby.
The next morning, Alice wakes with a deep sense of regret, and some girls wearing fetish gear and bug-eye masks besiege the mall shouting "BRING HIM OUT!"
Amber has to give a speech about the importance of Justice and Not Just Lynching The Guardian, butI think the wind or her makeup is hurting her eyes, because she's squinting like French Stewart the whole time.
Lex tars and feathers May, and Luke turns himself in, then privately intimates that it's important he be convicted and executed, as it's the only way to keep the city from turning on them.
At his trial, Luke confesses, which is good enough for everyone involved except Ellie. Amber finds him guilty and sentences him to freedom (consumed by his own guilt, of course), which pisses off everyone, including Luke, who was sort of hoping to commit suicide-by-angry-mob.
Ellie hugs Luke in relief, which is, of course, when Jack finally makes it back to the mall.
Edward Scissorhands packs up to return to his tribe, who have been called the "Ecos" for some time now, because the writers forgot that they were originally introduced as the "Gaians"
Luke tries giving himself up again, this time to the fetishistsMosquitoes, but Ebony saves him, because she's convinced he's just acting repentant, and, um... Well, okay, she does it just to be contrary.
The Mallrats hold a rededication ceremony, but Amber is busy whoring herself up when she's attacked by someone in a trenchcoat.
Bray waits until the kidnapper has made off with Amber and Trudy -- until this single attacker who is obviously also a child manages to slip out unnoticed with two women -- when he decides he's waited exactly long enough and goes to not find them. Everyone goes off searching, but most of them end up making out instead.
Lex catches KC leading the Weasleys in hiding some food, and he yells at him for being an incorrigible scam artist, and today Lex has decided not to be antisocial. "When will you learn to think about others?" Lex demands. Leah answers, "When he grows up and becomes a power ranger."
Eventually Ned finds a ransom note, saying that Trudy and Amber will be released only if they hand over the guardian. Unfortunately, it's unsigned, so they have no idea to whom they ought to hand him, but the fetishistsMosquitoes are the only other tribe they've bothered naming, so they'll probably assume it's them.
Which they do, but it's not them. They find a second note giving a meeting place, and requesting "No Trix", which either means that the kidnappers are illiterate or it's a clue that they're adults (Trix are for kids).
Bray totally decides to sell the Guardian up the river, but he's conflicted because he knows Amber is going to dump him for abandoning their principles.
Ellie has an awkward date with Jack, then rushes off to profess her love for Luke.
Alice beds Ned again, and discovers that Ned has been chewing the same piece of gum since before the fall of civilization. Sigh. Gum does not work that way. (Seriously. Alice points out that it must have lost its flavor. Screw its flavor, the latex should have broken down by now).
Bray's conscience wins, and he decides to try to pull a fast one on the kidnappers. Jack laments his breakup.
Ron Weasley steals The Guardian's ring, but as he does, The Guardian seizes him and threatens him. Fortunately, no one believes him that the guardian isn't quite as crazy as he seems. The kidnapper fails to show, which is because it turns out that it's Ned.
Yes, Ned. Alice's Boyfriend Ned. Ned the Only Person Who Was Alone When it Happened. Ned The Guy Who Wears a trenchcoat. Ned who freaked out when Bray announced his plan to not hand the Guardian over. Ned the guy who's illiterate. Ned who hates that rabbit with the breakfast cereal. Ned who -- well huh. I guess it's actually entirely obvious when you put it that way...
Seline breaks down and for the first time demonstrates that she actually gives a damn about him. Tyson decides that it's time for action, not for warm thoughts. So she... writes a letter.
Sideshow Luke Perry tells Seline that he's managed to smuggle Ryan off to safety, but she's not to tell anyone, and he claims that he's done this behind the Guardian's back. Unfortunately, Ellie sees him comforting Seline and decides that Luke's in love with her.
Edward Scissorhands is sold into slavery by the redheaded Leprechaun, but, to his shock, despite the fact that Edward Scissorhands has spent the past ten episodes warning him of this, the Chosen decide that a fair trade would be "We'll take Pride and also the three of you as slaves."
May smuggles an important map to the resistance, but it's in code, which stymies our heroes until they realize that "FD" means "Fuel Dump". And "GS" means "Gas Station". And "Refueling Depot". Basically, The Chosen have as many words for "Place To Get Gasoline" as the Eskimos do for Snow.
Sideshow Luke Perry finally delivers Tyson's note to the Guardian, which just says "Do you like me? Check One: [] Yes [] No." The Guardian checks "Yes", and May makes googly eyes at Edward Scissorhands.
Bray, Ebony, and Lex work together to blow up the fuel depot, and in the first really just utterly moronic thing she's ever done, Ebony lights the fuse to blow it up before Bray even makes a token attempt to exit the depot. This would be brilliant and Machiavellian, except that it's entirely clear that she's just, I dunno, not paying attention.
Bray escapes, of course, and they decide to booze it up in celebration, forgetting that Lex is like two days from getting his six week chip.
Sideshow Luke Perry and the Guardian are starting to do some role-reversal, as the Guardian is by this point sufficiently crazy that he doesn't think the destruction of the fuel depot should prompt, say, going and hunting down the rebels, but rather, say, reflecting on Zoot's deeper purpose and marveling at the wonderous miracle of Big Honking Explosions. He summons KC to interpret it, in the hopes that it's a sign from Zoot that it's okay for him to sleep with Tyson.
May reports Edward Scissorhands's fate, and also that she is totally warm for his pasty form. Bray thinks that's awesome, since it means that Pride isn't off sexing up Amber.
"Are you there, Zoot? It's me, Seline," she asks, actually praying to Zoot to bring her husband back. Meanwhile, Tyson gets to seducing the Guardian, but this is cut short when the Guardian has a revelation, and names her the new Supreme Mother.
KC proposes himself as Sugar Daddy to Telly, the Leprechaun's kid sister, which suggests to me that this term does not mean the same thing in New Zealand as it does here.
Bray, Ebony and Lex take in a Punch and Judy show about their exploits. Afterward, they rough up the puppeteers and put on their own show, which is not nearly as well written, but gets the point across.
The rebels hear about the impending coronation, and Lex pushes them to use this as a change to execute the Guardian and also whoever the new supreme mother is, who he is so sure is a self-seeking opportunist who has betrayed them, that he's not even going to wait and find out who it is. So Bray is elected to go all Book Depository, since he knows how to use a crossbow.
KC and the redheads make commemorative T-Shirts for the coronation.
Alice bitches Seline out, she runs up a flight of steps, then falls down, and miscarries.
Lex, predictably, decides that his wife has betrayed him and is really on the side of the Guardian. Bray, unexpectedly, thinks that maybe Tyson is just playing the Guardian. Lex claims that he'll kill the Guardian if he lays a hand on his wife, which is not much of a threat when you consider that the whole plan was for them to kill the Guardian regardless.
Ebony finally tries to comfort Lex by pointing out that he wouldn't exactly be the poster child for monogamy, though Lex think's that's different, because he is a man. That's the douchebag we've come to love.
May sets up a meeting between Lex and Tyson so that she can explain herself and Lex can get his end away.
Seline goes into an entirely reasonable depression over the miscarriage, and she swears Luke to secrecy about it. Because no one will notice when she never gets any more pregnant.
Tyson has a vision of Lex shooting The Guardian, which is fair, because Lex plans to shoot the Guardian. Meanwhile, the Guardian offers one of the Mallrats amnesty, and they choose Ned the Tall Leprechaun, since they want to be rid of him (KC's got a good scam going and doesn't like his chances on the outside; Ellie is no good in a fight, and Alice won't leave anyone alone with Ned), but they have to trick him into thinking they're not trying to get rid of him, so KC arrainges the most obviously rigged craps game ever. The Weasley Twins work it out, but since they don't like their big brother all that much, they're willing to extort KC for their silence.
Ebony and Bray fail to find Lex, mostly because he's staked out a place near the coronation, while they're searching everywhere else in the city.
Ned is immediately arrested for drunkenness and rabble-rousing, and ends up back at the mall.
At the coronation, the foley is off, causing the metal-on-metal sound of the Chosen's scythes to be way out of step with their movements. Bray finds Lex, but Ebony turns on him, refusing to let Bray stop the assassination. He's shocked, shocked to find that Ebony lied to him. Because Bray has no long-term memory.
Ebony is shocked, shocked, when Bray kicks her ass, and then rushes off to stop Lex. However, showing that can-do effectiveness he's known for, instead of stopping Lex, Bray just spoils his aim, so that Lex shoots Tyson instead.
Later, The Guardian fires Luke, and he immediately changes into a garish neon-colored outfit, changes his hair, and changes his face painting. He also swears to stop the Guardian, but just the Guardian personally, as he still believes in The Chosen. Pride and May kidnap Brady, tell Lex that Tyson is okay, and then Amber shows up with a deprogrammed Trudy.
As Bray asserts, "This is great; it looks like it's the beginning of the end!"
Uh... I bet that's more upbeat in New Zealand.
May, Lex and Ebony won't forgive Trudy, and she looks very upset that the three most morally bankrupt characters in the show are passing judgment on her.
Without Brady, the Chosen start to come off the rails, and Bray holds a meeting of tribal leaders, who are too scared to join the rebellion.
Meanwhile, at the trial of everyone the Guardian could get his hands on, Tyson convinces the Guardian that the abduction was Ordained By The Mighty Zoot, and so he releases them as instruments of Zoot, except for Luke, who confessed to save the others. Fortunately, as the Chosen desert their posts, they take him with them.
Trudy gives an impassioned speech to the tribal leaders, and Ebony for some reason tries to argue her down, but she manages to rally the troops all the same.
Amber tells Bray, because no one in this show is clever enough to work it out on their own, that she's pregnant, and Bray immediately pisses her off by asking if it's Edward Scissorhands's.
As the Praetorian Guard looks for Luke, he confeses his love to Ellie and she implies hers for him.
Amber rejects the idea of actually just telling Bray that, yes, she loves him and needs him and trusts him and is not doing Pride, because as she's having his baby, telling him how she really feels is out of the question. Even Trudy thinks that doesn't make sense.
The Guardian is left with nothing now but his Extra Special Guard, who wear hockey helmets and have extra serrated scythes.
The Guardian has a crying fit over his lack of Guidance from Zoot, so he is naturally pleased when, in an unexpected cliffhanger, Zoot actually does appear to him....
]]>This movie is very good. It is very very good. Infact, this movie is not simply a very good Star Trek movie, it is a very good movie.
The first great thing about this movie was the four teenagers sitting behind us. In the half hour before the film started, they talked at length about which films they think were most popular for having sex in the theater (Rocky Horror Picture Show), and how she didn't mind who he told about them having sex with each other, but he did mind who she told`. Also, apparently Lisa Hanover (not her real name) is such a giant slut that she agreed to have sex with Billy Gweebinski (not his real name) for fifteen dollars even though he's totally filthy and a loser. Also, Ms. Hanover got in trouble at school for letting two guys suck on her breasts after a basketball game. Also, both the girls liked Cloverfield, and one of the guys always lost at Gay Chicken, which I gather is when two guys go in to make out, and the first one to bail out loses. The last one to bail out, of course, is branded gay.
The cast is pretty much excellent. I don't think anyone ever questioned that Quinto would be awesome as Spock. As McCoy, Urban looks the part and sounds the part, but I will concede that for much of the film, he seems to be, well, "McCoying it up". More like someone doing a McCoy impression instead of actually playing McCoy. I'd expected not to like Chris Pine as Kirk, but he really does pull it off. I'd been suffering from visions of a "Totally Awesome" Kirk tryng to be all hip and streetwise. Thankfully, it was not to be. The only thing I really missed -- and this is really the script's fault and not Pine's -- is that we never get to hear him give one of those classic Kirk Speeches, with Kirk telling... us... that... the indomitable human spirit... yearns to be... FREE! or something.
I was going to say that Zoe Saldana varied the most radically from her predecessor as Nyota (Yes, it's canon now) Uhura, but then I realized that Uhura never really had any sort of characterization worth speaking of before. So yeah. she differs a lot in that. Anton Yelchin is basically a non-character as Chekov. John Cho's is competent as Sulu, but nothing to write home about. The biggest disappointment in the cast, for me. is Simon Pegg. I know most people liked him, but I think they're confusing liking Simon Pegg as a comic actor and liking Simon Pegg as Scotty. Pegg's Scotty -- I will not mince words about this -- is The Comic Relief Character. He's a joke. Scotty should not be a joke.
But for my money, the real surprising role, was the one I didn't really go in with any preconceptions about: Bruce Greenwood as Captain Pike. He's basically Dad for the Enterprise crew, and he really ties the film together.
Watching Star Trek get the Crisis on Infinite Earths treatment is something which has sort of affected me at a weird emotional level. Even though Trek doesn't speak to me the way it used to, it's something sort of foundational to my brand of geekery. One of those things which was supposed to always be there. It's the sci fi geek's equivalent of mom remarrying.
Anyway, it's visually stunning, it's got a coherent plot, it respects its roots, and it makes Star Trek all shiny and new.
And to say more, would be spoilers...
Also, Uhura is sleeping with Spock.
Now that I've got that out of the way, the story...
The starship Kelvin happens upon a negative space wedgie which emits a gigantic and slightly lovecraftian Romulan ship which blows it to pieces. Her first officer, one George Kirk, takes command and sacrifices himself to but the crew, including his wife, who is in the process of giving birth (attended by an alien from the planet of the anime girls), to escape. Among those lost in the destruction of the Kelvin is apparently the guy responsible for the "Art Deco" movement in Starship Interior Design. The Romulan ship is captained by a guy named Nero, and he's looking for Spock, but he's 25 years early.
A series of vignettes shows us that that child grows up to be James T. Kirk, a rebellious jackass who totally isn't going to go into Star Fleet, at least not until he fails to pick up Uhura in a bar, gets his ass kicked, and has a heart-to-heart with Captain Pike. Even at a young age, he shows a profound skill for pulling himself back up when he's dangling over a precipice, a scene you have seen in the trailer. Kirk enlists in Starfleet, which for some reason means that in three years, he'll be in the academy.
Meanwhile, on Vulcan, Spock grows up, and demonstrates that while he's as logical as the next guy, he loses his cool whenever anyone insults his mother. For example, when he is admitted to the Vulcan Science Avcademy, these very rational, logical Vulcans tell him that he's a credit to his race, and that it's amazing that he's so smart in spite of the fact that his mother is a lowly human and inferior in every way, which is why Spock went to Starfleet Academy instead.
The vignettes imply that these events happen at roughly the same time, though it's clear by the next scene that Spock's scenes are taking place a few years ahead of Kirk's, since Kirk, as legend foretold, cheats on the Kobyashi Maru, which pisses off Spock, who has him brought before the honor council for cheating. Spock is already a decorated officer, and author of the test. Before Kirk can get detention, though, word comes in that Vulcan's having some natural disasters, and the only ship in the quadrant is...
Well, actually, there's like seven ships in spacedock, but all the proper crews are off in some other sector doing something important, so Pike decides to man all the ships with cadets, since this is just a disaster relief mission and nothing too major. McCoy smuggles Kirk aboard the Enterprise by initiating a five minute unnecessary comedy sketch where he induces unpleasant allergic reactions so that he can take Kirk to sickbay. Uhura also wants on the Enterprise, which Spock hadn't wanted to do, for fear it would appear to be favoritism -- this is one of those great moments of foreshadowing in this movie. I realize it shouldn't be surprising in a film that they establish something as a possibility before it happens, or hint at something before it's revealed, but I'm so used to plot developments coming out of nowhere or relying on the characters being functionally retarded that this was really shocking later when we discover that they're a couple.
This is Enterprise's maiden voyage. This is important, because everyone has been working from the assumption that this movie is set "just prior to the original series". That's not true: Kirk is only 25. Thanks to Nero's interference, Kirk ends up on the Enterprise years early.
Sulu, who is new, leaves the handbrake on, so the Enterprise stalls when he tries to go to warp, which turns out to be a good thing, since the trip to Vulcan takes exactly long enough for Kirk to realize that the reports from Vulcan, crossed with a Klingon radio intercept he'd heard about from Uhura while he was nailing her green-skinned roommate adds up to Vulcan being under attack by the same super-powered Romulan ship that killed his dad. Thus warned, the Enterprise goes ahead and shows up at Vulcan anyway, pausing only to raise shields, which don't stop Sulu from scratching up the paint job on a piece of debris. However, Sulu's wacky antics getting them started means that by the time Enterprise shows up, the rest of the fleet has been conveniently blown into confetti.
Nero is about to blow the Enterprise into humorously colored paste, when he notices what the name of the ship is, and decides it would be totally awesome to spare Spock so he can watch what comes next. He invites Pike over for drinks and torture, and Pike takes the opportunity to drop Kirk, Sulu and A RedShirt Who Will Soon Die Of His Own Stupidity on Nero's combination drilling and transporter jamming platform. It occurs to me now that I maybe ought to have questioned the fact that for some reason Nero's ship has a mining drill which also blocks transporters and communications.
Kirk ends up hanging off the precipice at the edge of the platform, then Sulu fights a Romulan using his Swiss Army Sword. A lot of people are going to say it's a katana, because everyone knows that katanas are Just Better. But it's not; right before he uses it, Sulu says that he's trained in fencing. That's a fencing saber.
Anyway, they manage to disable the platform, then fall off it. Chekov runs down to the transporter room, because only he has the skill to beam up a moving target. The tension in this scene comes from the fact that dematerializing is incredibly slow in this movie. Seriously, it takes like a full minute after you're encased in transporter sparkles. They dematerialize just in time. Nero takes a break from torturing Pike and telling him his life story (He's just a humble mining ship captain, and his ship is just a civilian mining ship. Romulus was destroyed. He blames Spock. He's been waiting 25 years to take his revenge. This is one of the entirely reasonable and yet mildly disappointing thigns about this movie; the big bad is just a gruff old miner with a grudge against Spock. He's not out for universal domination, he's not working for the Romulan government, he's not God, he's just an old miner in an old mining ship, and he manages, almost by accident, to make the biggest and most permanent change to the Star Trek universe ever.) to notice that his drill is broken, which is okay because they'd hit the core already and were just continuing to drill for shits and giggles. They launch a bit of Red Matter, so named because it is red, into the core of Vulcan, causing it to become a black hole. Spock beams down to rescue mom and dad (and also the Vulcan Elders Who Are Tasked With Preserving Their Cultural Heritage) as there are only seconds before the planet is destroyed. Half of the elders get crushed as the cave they're in collapses, but the survivors emerge onto the surface, which appears to just be a matte painting of Kirk's Rock, cloned a hundred times in photoshop. Unfortunately, in the fifteen minutes it takes a person to dematerialize, the ledge under Spock's mom breaks, and she falls to her death. And then, at the last minute, when it seems nothing could save the planet... Nothing does. Vulcan implodes. What. The. Frak.
Spock wants to go meet up with the fleet, but Kirk wants to rescue Pike and stop Nero before he can destroy Earth -- Nero has a giant ball of Red Matter, and it only takes one drop to destroy a planet, prompting the question of what the hell Spock was doing with that much Red Matter to begin with. For the benefit of the audience, Spock explains that by destroying the Kelvin, Nero has totally altered history, and no one's destiny is the same, which is good news for them as it means that Nero can't beat them just by looking up how to beat them in a history book. Basically, Spock turns to the audience and says "Yes, This is a different universe now and continuity is different, and Mr. Abrams does not need to receive hundreds of letters complaining that Kirk isn't supposed to serve on the Enterprise for another six years yet, and Spock kicks Kirk off the ship, marooning him on Delta Vega, a planet close enough to Vulcan that it takes up about a 20 degree arc of the sky, or rather, it would except that it's been destroyed. After a pointless chase across the ice by a big scary ice monster, Kirk meets Spock in a cave. And by "Spock", I mean "old Spock", who is pleased as punch to see Jim, and intent on making sure Kirk grows up to be good friends with young Spock as history dictates. He explains, via mind meld flashback, that he's from the future, where he'd been sent to save the galaxy from a supernova by hucking a black hole at it. He succeeded, but took too long, and Romulus was destroyed before he got there. Nero, in a crazy rage, tried to off Spock, but they both fell into a black hole and ended up in the past, Nero in time to kill Kirk's dad, and Spock about a week ago. Nero captured Spock, to make him watch as he destroyed Vulcan, but for some reason decided that Spock would have the best and most painful view from Delta Vega. Together, Kirk and Old Spock walk the 14 km to the nearest machine shop, where they meet Comedy Relief Scotty, a cadet who got dumped here with his midget alien buddy for killing his commanding officer's dog. Spock gives Scotty the secret of beaming onto a starship at warp speed, which Kirk and Scott use to return to the Enterprise, which is still within range despite it being the next day. Nero, of course, hasn't reached Earth yet, and the Enterprise has been traveling toward the rest of the fleet in a distant part of space. That's okay, though, because it's only going to take them thirty seconds to return to Earth. Old Spock does not warn Kirk about the dangers of falling bridges.
Now, you all know that scene from the trailer where Kirk and Spock fight, and everyone's been wondering what's up with that. Well, it happens here, and it happens because Old Spock has convinced Kirk that telling Young Spock about him will cause a massive temporal paradox. This turns out to be a lie, to try to engineer Kirk and Young Spock into liking each other, because Old Spock is wacky like that. So instead, Kirk has to assume command the old fashioned way: by getting Spock to try to kill him. Kirk insults Spock's mother, Spock tries to kill Kirk, Spock's dad yells at his son to get his act together, and Spock relieves himself of command as emotionally compromised. Since Pike's last act before giving himself up was to put Spock in charge and name Kirk the acting first officer, this leaves Kirk in command.
And then the Enterprise drops out of warp within the atmosphere of Titan for some reason. They say something about it being to shield them from detection by Nero's ship, but all they do is just lift up immediately out of the atmosphere and fly up to earth, so it seems likely that Sulu is just showing off at this point.
Kirk and Spock beam over to the Romulan ship just before the drill fires up. Or something. This bit was a little confusing. The important part is that there's no way for them to get off the ship until the drill is destroyed. Kirk orders Chekov to take his shot if he sees a tactical advantage against Nero's ship. He won't; the Enterprise basically just sits back and watches for this part. Spock, by the way, decides to go with Kirk after a pep talk from his dad, about how Spock shouldn't try to control his anger, but instead be true to his emotions. Yes. Spock's dad. Now, we all know that in movies, the answer is always "Don't think, feel!", but geez -- if there is one time in your life when it's probably a bad idea to let your emotions overrule you instead of thinkign about things rationally and behaving responsibly, it's when you've got to stop the guy who just committed genocide against your race, blew up your planet and killed your mom (Incidentally, Spock's mom, as you know, is played by Wynona Rider. Coincidentally, Kirk's mom's name is "Wynona Kirk".)
A Sidebar Here...
In the original series, Spock and his dad had always had a very strained relationship, starting with his dad being disappointed at how human Spock looked as a newborn, and culminating in Spock and dad not talking for twenty years or so when Spock joined the academy. Ultimately, the destruction of their planet presumably has curtailed that falling out, but frankly, I see no evidence that their fight happened at all. In fact, Sarek seemed, if anything, to be very neutral on the question of what Spock should do with his life.
Now, all this can be easily ignored; after all, we don't actually see Sarek between Spock joining Starfleet and the destruction of Vulcan. But it gets me thinking. A few years back, Shatner wrote a Star Trek novel called "Avenger", which expounded on the "real" reason for Spock's falling out with his father. In Avenger, it turns out that in his wilder days, Sarek was a member of a group of eco-hippies who were Very Concerned about the long-term effects of randomly moving living stuff between ecosystems. As a protest, some of the more radical members introduce a foreign organism on Tarsus IV which causes all its food crops to fail. If you're a giant Star Trek Geek, you'll know that Tarsus IV was governed by a guy with the unfortunate moniker "Kodos the Executioner", and he decided to deal with the food shortage by executing half the population. Pity his mom didn't name him "Kodos the Guy Who's Clever At Rationing". A very young Kirk was on Tarsus IV, and he saved a very young Kevin Riley from being culled. All this was related in an episode of the original series. Avenger adds in two extra elements: first, that Sarek intervened to save Kirk (then used a mind-meld to erase his memory), and second, that Kodos is the guy who told Kirk that he's going to die alone.
Anyway, in Avenger, the reason Spock joining Starfleet caused his falling out with his dad -- the real reason -- is that with Spock in Starfleet, he'd be duty-bound to turn his old man in as a terrorist if they ever mind-melded.
The reason I point this out is that in this new universe, Kirk wasn't a military brat, and he wasn't on Tarsus IV, and he never met Kodos, and never mind-melded with Sarek, so the rewriting of Kirk's life has changed the outcome on Tarsus IV -- thankfully, Kevin Riley never reached adulthood.
Back to the story... Spock snogs Uhura, and calls her by her first name, before beaming over to the Romulan Abomination Ship. Kirk and Spock fight their way through the Romulan ship, full of exciting tense scenes where we arent' sure if Kirk shot five phaser bullets or six, and ultimately, they liberate Future-Spock's Future Ship, which Spock can command, much to his surprise.
Kirk rescues Pike as Spock uses the Future Ship to blow up the drill, then he gets chased out into deep space. Kirk ends up hanging off a precipice again. Spock crashes the Future Ship into Nero's ship, causing that giant ball of red matter to make a supergiant black hole which destroys Earth because it's only thirty light-seconds away. Nah, actually it turns out that a gallon of Red Matter makes a much smaller black hole than a drop, since instead of planet-crushing-size, the black hole isn't even as big as the Starship C'thulu, so it gets stuck in the black hole and very, very slowly gets torn apart. Again, they rely on slow transporters for tension, as Spock takes fifteen minutes to dematerialize from the cockpit. Kirk offers to rescue Nero and his crew, but Nero refuses. Spock also suggests that it'd be way more fun to let Nero die. So Kirk instead orders the Enterprise to fire on the already-doomed ship as the wormhole eats it. Of course, the Enterprise's weapons have no effect on the futuristic Romulan ship, and the ship is already doomed, and Nero is already going to die. But it makes Kirk and Spock feel good about themselves to shoot at Nero. Clearly, James T Kirk and Spock are heroes of the highest caliber!
Afterward, Kirk is granted command of the Enterprise from the newly-promoted and wheelchair-bound Admiral Pike, who congratulates Kirk by beeping once for yes, twice for no.
Classic Spock talks New Spock into staying in Star Fleet instead of resigning to make pointy-eared babies, so he goes back to the Enterprise and applies for the vacant "First Officer" position. As the Enterprise flies off, we get one last go at hearing Nemoy deliver the "Space, the final frontier" speech, which is a nice touch, though I bet Chris Pine felt a little ripped off. Frankly, I've heard Nemoy do it before, and I think it woulda been more fair to the new cast to let them do it.
So. Wow. Huh.
A big, huge, universe-changing Trek Event. And it ended without a reset button. But...
Man. Everything we knew is gone.
Except Enterprise. Enterprise is still canon.
Anyway, it'll be okay. We'll get through this. Mommy and Daddy still love you.
More to come...
]]>Call it a whopping case of seller’s remorse. The moral of “The Gingerbread House” would appear to be that retailing your children to strangers will not bring satisfaction. Glad that’s been cleared up.]]>
The last verse of that Big and Rich song from a few years back now strikes me as perhaps the worst foreplay I've ever heard of.
"Hey baby, hows about I take you home to meet my dog, and then we stab some frogs with a spear?"
]]>Frodo wakes up, and has to fight a flying boat with the head of a shark. From time to time, the boat crashes, and you can kick the ass of the pirate inside, which hangs out the tail end of the boat while it's crashed for extra damage. Unfortunately, once you deplete its life bar, the game does one of its favorite tricks: refills the life bar and makes the monster more dangerous.
Frustrated, Leah goes off to get some soup, leaving the game unattended, whereupon we learn the trick to this boss: if Frodo just stands stock-still in the center of the ring, the flying boat can't hit him more than once every two of three minutes
The Power of Earth turns out to be a red herring, as Leah spends four hours trying to defeat the damned thing, before I suggest she switch to her much upgraded Power of Fire, and kills the thing on her third try. Back in his cell, Frodo laments that he can't escape because of the wooden gate that blocks his cell, and a mole named Moliere gives him some fan mail. After that, Frodo is sent to fight the Dilldozer executioner, who can kill him in one hit.
The Executioner nonetheless proves to be a much less aggravating adversary than the flying boat, whereupon the pirate king brings out Frodo's Girlfriend and orders them to fight. Before they can, though, flying monkeys attack, kidnap the girl, and bust shit up enough for Frodo and Fry to have a go at escaping.
Hours later, Leah's still fighting her way though this fleet of flying pirate ships, fighting enemies with names like "Tribad Whitespace" and "Ebikat Snakebeard"
Finally, Frodo defeats the boss pirate, and he and Fry fly off into the sunset, revealing that he can fly, so why the hell does he keep on dying by falling to his death when jumping between platforms?
In mid-air, Frodo the Narcoleptic Dragon has another metaphysical experience, gaining the Power of Electricity,, which means he can now summon Captain Planet, and also perform her new Fury move, the Electric Boogaloo.
Sir Ian goes on break, so Frodo has a vision all on his own, seeing his ex, who is bound and being threatened by the monkey goat thing who is going to turn out to be the penultimate boss of the game. (Right now, he's the boss, but he's planning to ressurect some sort of ancient evil force of some sort, which undoubtedly he will, and you'll fight.)
Frodo wakes up on a ruined island, where Fry claims they're stranded, as they can only fly when the plot demands. This appears to be the same place as the temple of Magneto that Frodo keeps narcolepting to, except that it's ruined, and possibly sideways. Fortunately, someone set all the broken ionic columns to "levitate" so Frodo can use them to jump around the ruined temple.
Eventually, Leah hits upon a section where Frodo must solve puzzles to awaken enemies. This gets me thinking, Spyro's very egregious about it, but you see this throughout the genre, say, in Zelda. There's a huge element of "The goal of this puzzle is to cause monsters to show up and attack you, because real progress is only made by defeating monsters." If Spyro had any sense, he'd just stop lighting braziers and electrifying switches and pushing things onto pedestals. It never does anything good.
]]>And maybe, in the unlikely event I ever get a working video capture device for my MythTV, Leah and I might start taking videos and such to show you our progress. But until then, please just enjoy my sarcastic thoughts on the subject of Spyro: Eternal Night
First off, I'd like to point out that this is the most unlikely game about a former vice president I've ever seen, and that includes Aaron Burr and Dick Cheney's The Most Dangerous Game You play Frodo Baggins, a purple dragon who can fly, but only well enough to make difficult jumps, and, as is apparently standard for purple dragons, HALT THE FLOW OF TIME. He's got a little dragon-fairy sidekick, Phillip J Fry, who serves to offer "hillarious" commentary.
I should step aside here that, unlike pretty much every other person who has ever written a review of a video game, I actually like the color-commentary-wisecracking sidekick archetype. I liked Arthur in The Journeyman Project, and Dalboz in Zork Grand Inquisitor. I liked your paraplegic tele-psychic friend in The 11th Hour, and I liked the Cheshire Cat in American Macgee's Alice. I even liked Clippy the-- no, wait, actually, I didn't . And, HEY! LISTEN! I did not like any of the god damned faries in the 3D Legend of Zelda games. But still, there's a reason I included Julia in my game. It's saying a lot when I tell you that I do not like Ninja Butterfly Phillip J. Fry. Billy West seems to be playing the role under the impression that he's meant to be channeling Gilbert Godfried.
Anyway, the game opens with Frodo the Dragon getting dumped by his girlfriend, at which point he falls into a coma where the helpful ghost of Patrick Stewart reminds him how to use the game controls. This involves jumping on a bunch of spinning platforms as you learn to control DragonTime (tm), which is a lot like BulletTime (tm), except that it is slightly blue. I assume this is a gimmick based on Prince of Persia, but I've never played that, so instead, it reminded me of Braid, which I'd just played a few hours earlier.
After we tired of hearing Elija Wood's terrified screams as he fell to his death off the edge of a platform a few times, Leah got about the business of actually jumping across abyss after abyss, and was rewarded with "re-learning" the power of Fire, allowing Frodo the Dragon to summon elemental powers based on Fire. So, Spiro's powers right now:
At this point, Patrick Stewart has some leftover Staffloses from Zelda attack Frodo so he can show off his attack skills: "Breathe fire", and "run towards something while breathing fire." This is when I notice one of the most interesting details of this game. Like lots of games, when Frodo engages an enemy, you get to see the enemy's life bar up in the corner of the screen. Along with the life bar is the enemy's name. And this is the cool part: when I say "the enemy's name", I don't mean something like "Skeleton Knight", I mean an actual, individual name, for Every Single Monster. Like "Skeletor McLovin" or "Keith Richards". Well, actually, the names all look to fit a fixed formula of taking four random nature-or-fantasy-related words and stitching them together according to some simple part of speech rules, so the names are all things like "Deathmaul Underhill" or "Honeylocust Meadowlawn" or "Dickmonkey Marshmellow".
This section also introduces us to the game's number one door-opening mechanic: lighting braziers. Any video game fan will tell you that in a room with a locked door and a bunch of unlit braziers, it's patently obvious that the door will only open once you light all the braziers. Also, I like saying "braziers". Braziers! Anyway, you eventually prove yourself worthy and Patrick Stewart sends you back to reality, where you and Phillip J Fry are immediately beseiged by insects and mollusks of unusual size which explode into disgusting goo when you kill them. Leah incinerates the first few, then discoveres that her magic doesn't automatically regenerate here, as it did in the land of Professor X. So Leah switches over to using Frodo's non-limited "just whack the bad guys with your body" technique. This isn't as effective as fire, but it can be used without stopping to recharge. Still, in the heat of battle, I keep having to remind her to use her fire attack from time to time, by shouting 'Immolate!" occasionally in my Angry-Homer-Simpson voice.
The first boss we encounter is a thingamajigger riding on a giant snail. His name is "Snail Rider". What, really? You can name every mook we run into, but not the boss who gets his own cutscene?
Shortly after defeating the snail, Leah is halted momentarily by a room one of whose braziers is behind a barrier.
This game's favorite brazier trick is that lighting the brazier opens the door, only to disgorge a couple of enemies, then close again. Lighting the final brazier here releases a pair of enemies whose last names are, I am not making this up, "Snakekiller" and "Snakefeltcher".
Other enemies we encounter in this area include spiders who shoot a white, sticky goo at Frodo and Fry, and these sort of bipedal elephant things with scimitars.
Another Snail Rider requires Leah to take a few stabs at it. It's at this point that I'd like to mention that when Frodo's "Rage Bar" is full up from fighting, he can unleash the "Eruption", an attack so devestating that it causes a cutscene to happen wherever he happens to be. This would make short work of the Snail Rider, except that Leah went into a Wii Gesture Fit just before he emerged and swung the nunchuck when she meant to swing the wiimote, causing premature eruption.
Incidentally, everything in this game makes a sort of squelchy sound when you whack it and then explodes into goo. Just sayin.
Eventually, Frodo comes upon a battle between a bunch of elephants and a very large red dragon played by Sean Connery. His name is St. Ignatius of Loyola, unless Leah is having me on. He beckons you to help, then promptly vanishes leaving you to fight some kind of giant demon bat thing by yourself. Fry buggers off, leaving you alone for the battle, as opposed to previous battles, in which he was there but useless. Once you kick the flying thing's ass, St. Ignatius reappears and asks you what became of your girlfriend. Frodo cops to being dumped, and they do some more cutscenes in which Frodo reveals his creepy nightmares, which turn out to be prophesy about the coming evil. A bunch of big dragons discuss his prophetic dreams in cryptic, vague terms and incredibly overblown accents. They're especially worried about Frodo's encounter with Patrick Stewart, since they know that he's only ever cast in big epic movies where the fate of the world is at stake. The old powerful dragons decide that they can't just sit back and do nothing, so they decide to bugger off and do nothing, and let Frodo do all the actual work.
St. Ignatius decides to wait back at the temple while Frodo, the chosen one and the only one who can defeat the Eternal Darkness (Hey, that's an entirely different game! Holy crap! This whole game is just one of those hallucination sequences whne your sanity gets too low!), treks through a poisonous swamp.
In the swamp, Frodo sees some pirates, and then his narcolepsy kicks in again. Fry attracts the attention of the pirates by being a dumbass, and Frodo is sent off to have another zen encounter with Patrick Stewart. (Actually, he sounds more like Sir Ian McKellen now that I think about it). He hands over the power of Ice, which leaves Frodo only two more elements to master, Air and Boron.
Leah masters Ice after quite a few tries at not falling off some more frakking platforms, and learns the Ice-based Rage move, which is like Eruption, but icy. Since I wasn't paying attention when they explained the move, I'm going to call it "Blue Balls".
After defeating the pirates, Leah spends the next hour making her way through a cavern that can be navigated only by jumping on jellyfish. Eventually, she makes it to the wizened old tree, which is somehow linked to Ian McKellen, whereupon it turns into a giant wooden monster attacks noble Frodo, eventually, and this is not snark, wiping Spyro's entrails off his foot
Immolation ensues.
Afterward, the game decides not to let Frodo duke it out against the pirates, so it is assumed that while he could take out a gigantic tree monster five times bigger than she was, it's not even worth giving you the chance to try to beat the pirates.
Thus do we end tonight's gaming adventure, locked in the hold of a pirate ship. Fortunately, the USS Baimbridge and a team of Navy SEALs is on-hand to rescue our hero.
No, I'm not outraged that our taxes are so high, especially because they're not; taxes in the US are lower than pretty much anywhere resemblign civilization, and if you want to know how great it is to live in a tax-free society, ask a Somalian.
I'm outraged at CNN for repeating someone else's lie. This particular lie comes from The Tax Foundation, an organization whose raison d'etre is to announce that everything you earned between January 1, 2009 and April 13, 2009 was stolen by the government, and only now are you earning money for yourself instead of being a slave.
I suggest that we immediatelyt let anyone who wants it be declared exempt from all taxes. And then, at the end of the year, send them a bill for their usage of the roads, all public services, their share of national defense, police service, the fire department, and a hefty bill for the education of their children. After all, they'll all be so much richer from having that extra 28% of their income that they surely won't mind paying a fair market rate for all the tax-supported services they normally enjoy. Of course, that fair market rate would have to be two or three times as much as they'd pay in taxes, since they wouldn't be able to leverage the same sort of government protections that tax-supported services do, but, hey, it's their money.
(I'm declaring 2 PM "Boss Freedom Hour", when I celebrate the fact that up until that point in the afternoon, the money made by my labor goes to my employer, not to me. But I actually totally made up the calculation since I have no idea how much my employer actually makes from my labor)
Anyway, about that outrage. I make a good living. I make a very good living. I'm not rich, even by the standards of pundits who claim that anything under $250k is "poor". And my housing costs are ridiculously low. I bought my house shortly before the whole housing insanity that drove us into this recession. So I'm making a very good living, better than most. And I'm paying less than most for housing. (As a data point, Leah, until she moved in with me, rented. My monthly mortgage payment is less than half her monthly rent). A quick, back-of-the-envelope calculation tells me that I spend 15% of my income on housing. If, as the Tax Foundation claims, the average American pays April 13 -- sorry, 28% of his income in taxes, and that's more than he spends on food, clothing, and shelter, then that means I must spend less than 13% of my income on food and clothing...
Now, I was taught in school that you spend 1/3 of your income on food no matter what. I thought this was impossible then, and I think it's impossible now (It turns out that the 1/3 number came about because back in the 50s, the US government hired a Czechoslovakian immigrant to work out the poverty level, and she did, based on the fact that in Czechoslovakia, housing was incredibly cheap, and food was incredibly expensive), but if it were, that would mean that 33% + 15% + x% < 28% where x% is the amount the average American spends on clothing. So, the average American spends -20% of their income on clothing. I go down to the store, and I buy a new shirt, and the store pays me fifty dollars.
But let's just assume for the moment that the Tax Foundation is right, and that the average American loses 28% of their income to Uncle Sam, and they lose a further something-less-than 28% on food, clothing, and shelter. That still leaves 44% of the average American's income unaccounted for. So, 44% of the average American's income, according to the Tax Foundation, is disposable, not used for anything necessary (Yeah, yeah, health care, but real men don't need health care. God gave you two kidneys for a reason). Almost half the money you make, you can use for anything you like.
Which makes July 25 "Necessity Freedom Day", the day after which any money you earn is not used for food, clothing, or shelter, and you can just blow it on, I dunno, booze and hookers if that's where your heart lies.
Call the office, I'm taking off the rest of the year.
]]>Dal shows up at the last minute before the ambush, having decided to do one last act of active violence before settling down and being the farmer he's always wanted to be. He goes off alone to play his important role in the fight.
This. Can't. End. Well.
About ten seconds later, Dal runs into the army of the Chosen. May doesn't know this, so she gives the signal for Bray and the others to come ambush them. Dal shows up just in time to warn Bray and Amber off before they get ambushed, but then falls to his death when he tries to escape by climbing over a railing and then... Um, well, falling I guess.
Amber doubles back to find him, taking advantage of the Chosen's lack of peripheral vision (It's the hoods, Leah reminds me). When she finds him, she shouts his name, which Leah thinks is a dumb idea with the Chosen around. I remind her that the Chosen have amply demonstrated that they can't hear you unless you address them directly.
After a few dramatic mutterings, Dal shuffles off this mortal coil, whcih would be a lot more touching if he hadn't buggered off mid-season last year to run the farm instead of being part of the powerful Jack-Dal dynamic.
Amber breaks up after they bury Dal. She talks about their past, when they were neighbors, "He was younger of course, but you wouldn't know that," aside from the fact that he's two feet shorter than the rest of the cast. She also decides to sidestep the whole question of whether she's going to stay with Edward Scissorhands (who Ebony is close to convincing to murder Bray) or go back to Bray by deciding to bugger off to raise an army.
Fortunately, Edward Scissorhands is noble and stuff, so he definitively steps aside, leaving Bray and Amber to do the whole sex thing, after which Bray swears to someday find Katy Perry so he can tell her it's over, which he thinks she'll be okay with, because deep down she always knew he liked Amber better. Which kinda makes Bray look like a lech given just how much sex he was having with her.
Bray falls immediately into a funk when Amber decides to leave anyway, as raising an army is still a good idea. He is roused only long enough to change his face makeup.
Cloey's career in espionage ends off-screen with her capture and deportation to the spice mines on Rurapenthe, as related to us by Trudy while she's being passive-aggressive to May. Later, Trudy marries Patsy to Zoot in a creepy ceremony. May enthuisiastically rats Trudy out for being all creepy and weird while relating the story of her conversion. This is important, because if they ever try to convince us that May was never really into the Chosen and this was all an act, it is going to be a gigantic load of bullshit.
When he brings The Guardian some anti-Chosen leaflets and the Guardian gets all weird and babbles about the glory of being hated, Sideshow Luke Perry starts to cotton on to the fact that the Guardian just might be making this shit up as he goes along, and is just a little nutty.
Trudy goes to throw herself at the Guardian, failing to notice that they've both got new Sci-Fi clothes and hairstyles, but he freaks out and shoves her.
Ellie makes another flier, this one says "Say no to Shavery" because she can't spell or maybe because Brazillian Waxes aren't available in the post-apocalypse. (None of the men on this show have ever had even a hint of stubble, though. Just saying.)
Rejection sends Trudy spiraling further into madness, and I think they missed a good opportunity to work cutting into the laundry list of dysfunctions the gang exhibits.
Alice and Ellie confront Tyson about her little meetings with the Guardian, and they insist that it's to her to prove that she's not a traitor. Leah and Tyson point out that the Mallrats are seriously lacking in the Trust department, which will be exemplified later when Ryan freaks out and thinks Selene is trying to recruit him over to the Chosen and storms off. Selene is sad, because she's one recruit away from earning the toaster oven.
Tired of Trudy's shennanigans, The Guardian thinks long and hard about what to do with her, by which I mean, he thinks long and hard about how to justify offing her. He eventually decides that Zoot wants her to join him. Fortunately for no one in particular, Lex was in the midst of a booty call when the announcement was made, so he will be able to report this. Good thing Lex is such a stand-up guy.
The Guardian plans to hold a big public execution to show everyone what happens to those who defy him the highest honor Zoot can bestow on one of his loyal followers. And he wants all the representatives of the former tribes and all the Mallrats, and everyone who wishes them any ill-wil and everyone the resistance might want to rescue all together in one big open indefensible public place. Sideshow Luke Perry continues to be bugged by the transparency of the Guardian's evilness.
Ryan finally grows a pair and tells his wife that she's got to choose between him and The Chosen. Everyone spends a sleepless night having Trudy flashbacks, except for Lex, who always sleeps through flashbacks. Even Luke plots mutiny, having decided that The Guardian is being too rash, and he's got to keep Trudy alive until he calms down.
By the way, there are two burning cars outside the Gaian hideout, while outside the mall, the Chosen have Mad Max's car. Just sayin.
Once Trudy is locked up, KC creates a distraction by claiming to have seen Zoot, bodily ressurected, and the Chosen all run off to see. It would be awesome if every time someone claimed to see Zoot, the Chosen totally bought it. Trudy escapes, but Luke makes her leave Brady behind.
Three seconds later, Ellie throws off her Trudy costume and leaves the cage, making it unclear why she'd have gotten in in the first place. May totally sells out KC in order to be appointed Brady's permanent nurse, despite the fact that she hates caretaking.
KC fesses up to having seen The Mighty Zoot, but claims that it was a for-real vision. The Guardian challenges him to describe Zoot, and KC does to a tee. Of course, since there's posters of Zoot on every wall, this is not a tremendous surprise. After the Guardian has had him hauled off, he notices that the teacup was made by the Zoot China Company of Portland.
Bray sends Trudy off with Edward Scissorhands to see Amber, and Sideshow Luke Perry gently nudges the Guardian into deciding that KC had a vision of Zoot because he happened to be in the right place at the right time, and not because KC was in any way special, and the Guardian reaches the conclusion that Zoot appeared to warn the Chosen that Trudy was about to escape. This is because the Guardian isn't quite unhinged, but he's certainly sub-optimally hinged. As evidenced by the fact that The Guardian declares KC an Oracle, and then gives him a creepy backrub.
Commercialsign in 5... 4... 3... 2...
The wacky adventures of Mentos the Freshmaker, and a foray into the world of Power Rangers RPM, the eighteenth season of the show you were just surprised to discover is still on...
I like shows with giant robots, okay. So I do watch Power Rangers from time to time. This season is set in a post apocalyptic wasteland where most of the human race has been wiped out by an insane AI and its squadrons of killer robots, including some which look exactly like humans.
No, really.
I swear I'm not making this up.
Anyway, the reason that I bring this up is that John Connor -- irm, Flynn, the current blue ranger, is none other than Ari Boyland, little KC, all grown up and with a ridiculous overblown Scottish accent.
1... 2.... 3... 4... 5....
May misplaces Brady because she's useless. Lex bitches Trudy out for sending Trudy off with Edward Scissorhands. Ellie throws herself at Sideshow Luke Perry in order to get some insider information. The Guardian, being crazy, decides that Ranger Blue's latest vision means that the Chosen should take all the babies and care for them personally. Ryan shouts over the crowd for Selene not to fess up to being With Child, which you'd think would be a dead giveaway, but remember the immutable laws of this world:
So, Selene gives herself up anyway, because she's basically half-brainwashed.
Edward Scissorhands isn't back yet, because he stopped along three way to help some kids, who I will call Hansel and Grettle, and their older brother, a leprechaun, captures him and makes him their pack animal. The Weasley family (they're all redheads) are a bunch of grifters who take Edward Scissorhands about ten minutes to set at each other's throats.
Meanwhile, Ryan starts a fight and Luke has to bail him out, and Lex Luthor, who is all torn up about the absence of his wife, tries to seduce Ebony.
As the Guardian becomes more and more crazy, he calls for Tyson, to whom he talks about how depraved and evil Trudy was for throwing herself at him -- of course, Tyson responds by showing him how to rationalize sex into his notion of "purity", which causes him to nearly grope her, then to freak out and call for his guards.
Selene has second thoughts upon finding out that Zoot's her new baby-daddy. She relates how hard it is to be without a dad, because her dad left when she was -- WHAT THE FRAK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? EVERYONE IN THE WORLD KNOWS WHAT IT'S LIKE TO BE WITHOUT A FATHER!
May decides to leave the Chosen because the writers have changed their mind about her being an unlovable character. Patsy, by the way, has been carted off to the spice mines or something. I don't remember this happening, it's possible that it happened some time ago, and her appearance when May was looking for Brady was an anomaly. It's also possible that Leah and I missed an episode or something.
Ellie and Sideshow Luke Perry have a heart to heart about their respective political philosophies, and Ellie totally falls in love with him.
Ryan blows his top when he finds out that part of the Guardian's master plan is that the fathers will never get to see their children, getting so angry that he sounds Scottish for a moment, which prompted Leah to point out that the future-KC, in his life as a Power Ranger, will look (and, for that matter, move) like Ryan. Seriously. Present-Ryan and Future-KC could be brothers.
Poor Ryan. He stages an incredible action sequence in which he tries to assassinate the Guardian. He fails, though it's a close thing.
As he's being drug off, he bizarrely shouts, "I'll be seeing you!" I suppose that quoting The Prisoner is as good a way as any to end one's tenure on the series, because Wikipedia informs me that this is the last we'll ever see of Ryan.
You will be missed. Dumbass.
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