Wild Tangents
Marc talks about life in Nashville, life as a Catholic and life as a geek.

Here comes those crazy Swiss dudes in Yello with “Oh Yeah”.

Freaky…..

I know I talked bad about this show before it even came out. That was my mistake. Journeyman has been a joy to watch. I really like how they’ve woven the mythology of the time travel into the present day, how Dan’s actions in the past have an impact on his life and his family in the present. Plus, this is one of those shows that just makes you wonder what’s going on, much like Jericho and of course Lost.

I just really hate they’ve decided to cancel. I want to know what’s going on…..

Technorati Tags: 00’s, geek, journeyman, timetravel, scifi, tv

I have to say that I haven’t really had a desire to go see this movie “Walk Hard: The Dewy Cox Story“. It really seem a bit sophomoric to me and I’m a little gun shy after “Good Luck Chuck“, which while the previews didn’t imply it at, was an appalling movie. I have to say though, they have really put together an impressive press kit to promote it. The folks over at hitchmagazine.com got one of them and here’s what they had to say.

Normally, presskits I receive for new movies are just a boring little book of boring production notes with a CD of stills that’s not good for much of anything. Exception: the box just that just arrived for WALK HARD. I shudder to think of the cost-per-piece of this one. Photos of what’s in the “Cox Box” await you after the jump.

I doubt if I’ll go see this movie, but it’s still a pretty interesting press kit…

Technorati Tags: movies

I must have missed this in my last visit to the greeting card section at Wal-Mart. Maybe that’s because it’s on the way to the aisle where they keep the gourmet chocolate. Who knows. Anyway, it seem that Hallmark has a new line of card that parody the celebrity of certain famous people, including Paris Hilton. Well, I guess Paris wasn’t too happy about a greeting card with her image on it. I think her image has been in a lot more places, but whatever.

According to the lawsuit filed Thursday, the card is titled “Paris’s First Day as a Waitress” and shows a photo of Hilton’s face on a cartoon of a waitress serving a plate of food to a patron. In a dialogue bubble she says, “Don’t touch that, it’s hot.” The customer cartoon asks, “What’s hot?” She answers, “That’s hot.”

The suit says Hilton owns the trademark “That’s hot,” which was registered on Feb. 13, 2007.

First of all, how can she register “That’s hot” as a trademark? I mean c’mon! Plus we get this little snippet which describes the complaints in the lawsuit.

The lawsuit claims commercial appropriation of identity, invasion of privacy, misappropriation of publicity, false representation that Hilton endorses the product, and infringement of a federally registered trademark. The damages would be based on profits from the $2.49 cards, said Hilton attorney Brent Blakely.

Invasion of privacy? In the way she has lived her life and allowed people into her most intimate moments, does she really have any “privacy” left? Besides, I don’t really understand how this is an invasion privacy. Of course I’m not a lawyer….

Yahoo also has a copy of the card you can view it here.

Now my question is doesn’t this really count as parody? I’d love to hear some input on what you think.

Technorati Tags: hilton, law, lawsuit, news, Pais, Hallmark

According to Mr. Jay Garmon, Harlan Ellison would the victor if he and James Doohan got into a fist fight.

Ellison also makes an appearance and gets into it a little bit with Scotty in part 5, calling [Trek] ‘a cop show in space.’ I’m wondering who would win in a fist fight between the two.” Given Ellison’s notorious belligerence and Napoleon complex, my money’s on the writer.

I beg to differ. Mr. Doohan was a member of the Royal Canadian Army, landed on the beaches of Normandy on D-Day and lost a finger in the fighting. I kind of think he would have been more likely to walk away without any limp after that fight.

Technorati Tags: rant, scifi, startrek, tv, youtube

WARNING: This post may or may not contain what could be considered spoilers for the Watchmen graphic novel and/or movie.  You’ve been warned! (sort of) 

Is it just me, or does this casting write up on Sci-Fi wire for the up coming Watchmen movie have a major spoiler in it?

I don’t think it’s just me.

Technorati Tags: comics, movies, spoilers, watchmen

Now I just want you to read the synopsis froma story on SCIFI.COM about a new series on NBC that will be called Journeyman.

Journeyman stars Kevin McKidd (HBO’s Rome) as Dan Vasser, a newspaper reporter who finds himself inexplicably thrown back into different time periods within his own lifetime. He can’t control when or where he goes, but he seems to have a mission to change the future by affecting the lives of strangers in the past.

Now is it just me, or do I remember the first time this was on TV? Back then I think it was called “Quantum Leap“…..

From the opening dialogue Quantum Leap:

Theorizing that one could time-travel within his own lifetime, Dr. Sam Beckett led an elite group of scientists into the desert, to develop a top-secret project known as Quantum Leap. Pressured to prove his theories or lose funding, Dr. Beckett prematurely stepped into the project accelerator, and vanished…

HM….”within his own lifetime”…..”within his own lifetime”…..

HM indeed…..

If Journeyman goes down the path of saying that some external or supernatural force is guiding the main character through the past to correct things that are going wrong, then we know this really is a rip off.

Technorati Tags: quantumleap, scifi, tv

Lost is one of those shows you really have to keep track of. You can’t just start watching in the middle and expect know what the heck’s going on. To be honest, you can’t really expect to watch this show from the beginning and know what’s going on. But if you don’t do that, then you’re really LOST. For instance, the show revolves around an island. We don’t really know where this island is, but our heroes (or are they our heroes?) are survivors of Oceanic flight 815 which crashed on the island (or did it?). As new characters have been introduced over the past three seasons, you see the crash from their point of view. Well, it’s amazing how it changes your perspective if you look at all these scenes in chronological order. That’s what someone has made possible with the following video. I’m giving you fair spoiler waning here too. If you do not watch the show, this video could ruin certain aspects of the plot for you.

There’s even more after the jump…..Major spoilers ahead for that though.

Technorati Tags: accident, air travel, airplane, explosion, lost, tv

(more…)

That’s right, this past Saturday i went out and watched the latest in my favorite action franchise, Live Free or Die Hard. And if Laura wants a review, she’ll get a review. It was a great ride too. It had everything you would expect from a Die Hard movie. It had action. It had humor. It had John McClane. But best of all, you got to see Justin Long get punched in the face. As an action movie goes, I could find little fault with this one. It was fast paced and kept you waiting to see what would happen next. All the actors were great in their roles. The exception being Kevin Smith, who was nothing more than a distraction. There was lots of humor, especially inside jokes. By the end of the movie, Justin Long was cracking one liners with Bruce Willis (the best of them).

The only other complaint I have about the movie (besides the presence of Kevin Smith) was that at times it was pretty obvious some of the dialogue had been re-recorded. It’s a well known fact that the producers decided to try and appeal to younger audience. Part of that was ensuring a “PG-13″ rating. I am wondering if the re-recording was done to help this. Excessive language can result in an “R” rating, especially the excessive use of one word in particular. They might have cut these out in order to get the “PG-13″.

Anyway, I highly recommend it. I thought it was good way to close out the series, until I head Bruce talking about possibly doing more. I guess we’ll see what the future holds.

BTW - I’m not the only “pseudo-cool dude” that liked it. Check out Thomas McKenzie’s “one-minute review” of the move. Better yet, subscribe to his “HajjPod cast”. It’s one of my favorites.

Technorati Tags: action, diehard, movies, yippekayay

Suzette and I just went to see Ocean’s 13. I have to say it was a joy to watch. I can’ find any fault with it. Acting, story and filming were all excellent. It was just so entertaining. Like the two previous movies in the franchise, it really doesn’t take itself seriously at all and you shouldn’t take it seriously either. I wouldn’t really call it a comedy, but it was full of humor. With Al Pacino joining the cast, there were plenty of inside “Godfather” joke as well. I highly recommend this movie. Go see it it…..today!

Technorati Tags: movies