Bruinsfan

Did they get Joe Morton back to reprise his role?

Honestly, that wouldn't have been plausible if they hadn't stated before the movie's release that most of the war convoy stuff was practical stunts. As it is I had to override the part of my brain that pointed out these people wouldn't have lasted a week if this was typical behavior for them.

I've always been a fan of hers because of her un-ladylike rant in her big breakout performance in A Midsummer Night's Dream. It was hilarious how all the other characters were sort of flinching and backing away from Hermia as she got angrier and angrier.

Ironically, it was Pree's common sensical "Bitch, how charming do you think you are?" comment that made me start to really like Dutch. The fact that she has that sort of camaraderie with characters other than her partner/hetero life-mate indicated a well-roundedness that intrigued me.

Maybe they'll let Maleficent turn into the dragon this time around instead of giving her big badass moment to the damn raven?

Based on his performance on True Blood I think Michael Raymond-James might be able to do it. But he's not a big name, so likely the studio would never consider hiring him in a prominent role.

Flash Gordon was WAY more fun. I had the sense the filmmakers of that viewed campiness as the goal, not an unfortunate and unforseen side effect.

Also covered in green body paint that obscures his actual skin color.

I thought Dr. Cho played as big a part in the film as returning supporting characters like Nick Fury, Maria Hill, and Colonel Rhodes. None of whom, incidentally, are white males. The initial Avengers lineup itself is largely constricted by most of its iconic characters being white (or sometimes green) men who were created in the 1960s or earlier, but I think the franchise has done a fairly good job of including women and people of color in the second tier of characters where there's more freedom for casting diversity. It gives those characters agency and important supporting roles to play. And now it appears as if the next generation of Avengers is going to be quite diverse indeed, with Iron Man, Thor, and the Hulk giving way to War Machine, the Vision, the Scarlet Witch, and Falcon.

The thing is, they've committed to doing Civil War as the third Cap movie, and Spider-Man is almost as important to that story as Cap and Iron Man are. He's the fulcrum point between their two extremes, and as such his reaction to the conflict is what drives much of the drama. Well, he's killed his enemies in all three of his solo movies, and loaded his armors full of missiles and laser beams rather than tear gas and tasers, so I think there might be a hint or two about his stand on that particular issue.

As I said earlier today to friends, if he casts J-Lo as Catwoman I'm abandoning internet grousing in favor of sending letter bombs to Warner Brothers.

Yeah, that's not happening unless a filmmaker actually invents a time machine and pulls the original cast from the late 60s to make a movie.

I've found the key to enjoying The Lost World is catching it on cable starting at the point where the ship crashes into the dock at Tijuana. Without the amazing mobile cliffs and gymkata and melodramatic crackle glass it's a pretty good movie. I think the only thing that could save Jurassic Park III is editing out Tick-Tock the spinosaurus and William Macy and Tea Leoni's characters, which would leave you with a 20 minute short about Alan Grant and his hot young boyfriend trying to get the spark back in their relationship with an expedition to Isla Soma.

I wish they'd had Ellie as one of the main characters, since Malcolm and Alan got their own sequels. Of course, she couldn't have been the one in charge of the park since it required a Rube Goldberg-esque sequence of bad decisions to get to the crisis depicted. And she couldn't have been the one training raptors for a living, because she saw the first movie at point blank range and fuck that!

If you have a tape of this year's Oscars, watch it and you'll be cheering Amy on.

I know Star Trek: The Motion Picture gets a lot of scorn, but I think something high concept like V'Ger's search for its own origin might be a good idea. Or, maybe revisit one of the classic Trek stories that should be occurring right about now, like the deadly game of cat-and-mouse with the Romulans from "Balance of Terror" or the incident with the Horta from "The Devil in the Dark." Of course, given how Abrams handled adapting "Space Seed"/The Wrath of Khan, perhaps they should avoid the classic episodes and instead work with "Spock's Brain." Not much chance of people being up in arms over changes made to THAT story.

That hallway sequence was a master class in how slo-mo should be used in action/adventure shows.

While I'll give Pegg props for his comedies, he made Scotty a buffoon that seemed like he wandered in from another movie, the diametric opposite of Karl Urban's eerily faithful DeForest Kelley impersonation. And based on my familiarity with Pegg's past projects I have ZERO confidence in him being able to write a largely serious sci-fi action adventure script. I worry that it's going to be 90 minutes of gags like Scotty being pumped through tubes in the engine room and Kirk waving inflated balloon hands around.

When fully grown it was supposed to be 50' long to the T-Rex's 40', which would translate into about 170% of the body mass given the similar structure. I'm honestly dubious about whether or not an 8.5 ton animal would be able to run on two legs without blowing out its own joints—there's a reason Spinosaurus walked on four legs. I would imagine that the T-Rex is about as big as you can safely be as a bipedal predator.

Star Trek III: Simon Pegg Is Co-Writing?

The impression I got is that maybe attitudes about sexuality are relaxed enough that people don't stress out about occasional activities outside their orientation, as opposed to characterizing what McFarlane was describing as typical of bisexuals who are actually attracted to both genders.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought it was the smoke at the annual Rave of Danger that was weakening the assorted were-folks, not the dubstep.

I'm guessing only people with serious personality problems sign on for nursing/orderly work in an asylum chock full of supernatural freaks.

I agree. There was a nice undertone of chilly menace in his portrayal (except when he showed off that horrific burn-scarred visage and it wasn't an undertone anymore). Really, Guardians of the Galaxy is the only time I've ever seen him turn in a bad performance, and he was woefully miscast in that.

I'd imagine it's more than worth the cost when you're using it to call out of a disaster zone or when trapped on El Capitan or somesuch, though.