Wintermageddon 2011

Just a few pics from the recent series of snow storms, and what they've deposited at my house.  You can't really tell, but the piles on either side of the path are about 2 foot high.

















Same height for the piles leading to my deck door.



And somewhere under there is my pool and fire pit...

True Grit (2010)

'You go for a man hard enough and fast enough, he don't have time to think about how many's with him; he thinks about himself, and how he might get clear of that wrath that's about to set down on him'


I went and saw True Grit with no expectations.  I never saw the John Wayne version, so I had nothing to compare it to.  I have seen very few Coen Brother's projects, so I had no expectations of directorial style.


I loved this movie.


I have a love/hate relationship with Westerns.  Out of the past few years, I have not come across many that I truly love.  Appaloosa, 3:10 to Yuma, et al were ok, but not great.  By the same token, I LOVE The Quick and the Dead (Sam Raimi).  I wanted to like Once Upon A Time In The West, but never been able to make it all the way through.  I want to like The Man With No Name Trilogy, but have been very reluctant to see them because they are in the style of Once Upon A Time In The West.


But I digress.


From beginning to end, this movie was very well done.  Tense, fast paced, and at times funny.  The casting was perfect.  Jeff Bridges played the drunk US Marshall to the hilt.  I'm pretty sure he channeled some of The Dude.  Matt Damon was such an ass.  Its rare that I see a movie with him playing an ass, but he did it well.


Hailee Steinfeld was great in this movie.  She earned her Best Supporting Actor nomination.  With the strong personalities of Cogburn and LeBeouf, Miss Steinfeld's Mattie was the glue that held this movie together.  Another well deserved nomination was Mr. Bridges Best Actor nomination.  I think that Mr. Damon should have gotten a nod for Best Supporting actor, but since the Academy doesn't ask for my vote, I'll just bitch about it a little.


Of minor note is Barry Pepper and Josh Brolin as the two baddies.  They weren't in the movie long, but that played their respective roles well.


Again, I really enjoyed this movie.  I will seek out the original John Wayne and see how they compare.  I'd like to see this movie take a couple of Oscars, but for that we will have to wait and see.

A Commentary on Badass TV One-Liners, Part 2

The Most Badass TV One-Liners - UGO.com

34 - Darkwing Duck (), Drake Mallard: 'Let's get Dangerous!'
I remember watching this oh so many years ago, when I was younger.  And I loved it.  Thanks to the miracle of DVD I will one day be able to share this series with my son, and in the process re-discover a gem of my childhood.  Ahh the joys of being a parent.


32 - Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (Second Skin), Elim Garak: 'A pity. I quite liked him'
Garak.  The most bad ass tailor you will ever see.  Garak is a subject for a post all his own.  Now, there are many lines that could have been chose for Garak.  I point you to the episode 'In The Pale Moonlight' for a whole episode's worth.  He's cold, ruthless and calculating.  And that's if you are a friend.  If you are an enemy, watch out.


31 - LOST (LA X), Locke (Flock): 'I'm sorry you had to see me like that."
Locke wrecks shit.  Suspicions confirmed.  Awesome commenced.  I need say no more.


28 - Buffy (), Rupert Giles: 'I'd like to test that theory'
By this point in Buffy, I had been hooked hardcore.  Evil Willow was wrecking shit.  Giles had been off being Giles.  So we come to Evil Willow trashing the magic store Anya worked at.  I'm fairly certain right before Giles uttered the above line Willow said something along the lines of 'Kneel before Zod!', but I could be wrong.  Giles walks in, cut to black, and in the next episode we find out what Giles has been doing....learning some serious kung-fu.


And speaking of Evil Willow...


19 - Buffy (), Evil Willow: 'Bored now'
Let's review.  Willow's love gets killed.  Willow goes bat shit evil.  Upon catching he who killed her love, Evil Willow skins her target alive.  Chuck Norris ducked his head in respect for that move.


17 - Star Trek: The Next Generation (The Best of Both Worlds, Part 1), Locutus of Borg: 'I am Locutus of Borg.  Resistance is futile.  Your life, as it has been, is over.'
Ya, talk about your bad ass lines.  Your Capitan (with ALL the secret plans to destroy the Borg) is captured by said Borg.  He is then made part of the collective and sent to taunt you.  I don't know about you, but I would have given up right then and there.


6 - Chuck (), Chuck Bartowski: 'Guys, I know kung fu.'
Spoken as he finished updating himself to Intersect 2.0, Chuck can now fight upon command.  This line is spoiled by a later episode (after he loses then regains the Intersect) he says 'Guys, I know kung fu...again.'  Lazy writing.


And speaking of lazy writing...


1 - Every Horatio Caine line ever.
No.  Horatio Caine needs to stop speaking.  None of his lines are bad ass.  CSI Miami just needs to go away.


Now, I know I skipped some I should have added, but I felt I would have gotten repetative.  I was glad to see several Star Trek lines, along with Firefly.  But, we could have added some lines by Jayne from Firefly.


In the end, bad ass lines are all subjective.  It all depends on your inner bad ass.

A Commentary on Badass TV One-Liners

So one day, the interwebs pointed me to the link below.  Go ahead and click on it, I'll wait.

The Most Badass TV One-Liners - UGO.com

Ready?  Ok, as you can see this is a list of 50 most badass tv one-lines.  Some surprises, some no shits, and some disturbing omissions.  I'll not cover each line, just the ones I am familiar with, and I'll throw in at least one that I think should have been included.

50 - LOST (The End), Kate Austin: 'I saved you a bullet.'
When I first heard this line, I thought it was pretty cheesy.  Predictable too, from lines spoken earlier in the episode.  But, as with other parts of the LOST finale, time has changed my opinion of this line.  It really is quite bad ass, and a fitting finalish line for Ms. Austin

The First Holy Shit inclusion!
49 - Star Trek: Voyager (Year of Hell, Part 2), Capitan Kathryn Janeway: 'Times.... UP!'
Ok, a bad ass line from not just Star Trek, but Star Trek: Voyager? Hello!  This is actually one of my favorite episodes of the routinely uneven series.  Its what Voyager should have been from the beginning.  We see a year in the life of the Voyager after some time meddling by the always watchable Kurtwood Smith.  Voyager falls apart, crew die.  Finally, Janeway realizes what needs to be done to fix the timeline, and as she orders the final course for the Voyager, she cranks out number 49 on this list.  Timeline fixed; Voyager resumes its course of mediocrity.

41 - Dollhouse (Man on the Street), Adelle: 'There are three flowers in the vase.  The third one is green.'
Aww, snap.  With that one line we see that Dollhouse goes deeper than programmable humans.  We see the sweet Mellie, neighbor to the FBI agent who is trying to save Echo, kick some ass.  At this point, the game changed.

38 - Chuck (), Ted Roark: 'A real shotgun wedding.  Just think, that terrible pun will be the last thing you ever hear.'
The creators and writers of Chuck handed Chevy Chase his lines and let him loose upon the scenery.  This was such a great episode overall, but this line stands out.  Of course everybody is rescued shortly after.  But the line was still awesome.

37 - 24 (), Jack Bauer: 'No, you don't'
Oh, Jack.  With those three words, you end what is one of the greatest rivalries in television history. Jack v. Nina.  I mean, we all knew that it would end like this someday, but when it finally happens the fans of 24 gave a collective cheer as Jack's nemesis met her end.

Huh, I seem to be going on a bit more than I planned.  So as not to have stupidly long posts, I'll pick up where this one leaves off another day.  As always, I'd love to hear your thoughts and comments!

The Abyss (1989)

So raise your hand if you think that was a Russian water-tentacle.


Ahh, The Abyss.  Brought to you by the same gentleman who brought us Terminator, Aliens, True Lies, and Titanic.  Mr. James Cameron.


Story here is simple.  Giant underwater alien bitch slaps a US SSBN (that's the one that caries the nukes).  Since there is no one else that can do the job, the US Navy recruits a team of deep sea oil drillers.  Starring Bruce Willis Ed Harris, Mary Elizabeth Mastriano, and the delectably crazy Michael Biehn, I would say this is not one of Mr. Cameron's stronger efforts.  Its a great movie to be sure, but I think it drags at times.  Oh, I should mention that I watched the directors cut which clocks in at about 2.5 hours.  And while it drags, I never lost interest


This movie actually had some scientific accuracy going for it too!  The breathing fluid showcased in the movie is real science.  There's a scene where a rat is used to demonstrate the fluid, and the rat is no shit breathing the fluid.  Now, when Mr. Harris gets his turn with the fluid breathing, he's not really breathing fluid.


But really, the best part of the movie is Mr. Biehn.  He goes bat shit crazy.  Kinda like the bends, but more hardcore.  A series of events leaves him as the last SEAL alive, and then the crew of the oil rig need to stop him from blowing shit up.  Needless to say, they do.  And then, I think this is where the movie falls apart.  Mr. Harris disarms the bomb and then is brought to the underwater alien city where Mr. Harris convinces the aliens to not destroy the world.  After the action and (relatively) quick pacing of the movie, I thought it stumbled to a halt here.


I like it though.  Its fun, doesn't get too preachy, and has some real science to it.  Special effects are awesome, and while they are dated, they are not distracting, and allow you to seamlessly enjoy the film.


I give it 20/24 ICMBs.