Saturday 13 September 2008

TV

Spaceballs: The Animated Series Trailer (direct link)
Apparently this series is going to air at 5PM in the US. Based on this trailer, I find it hard to believe they're going to get away with that. Also, I'm not convinced it will be very funny -- partly because I watched Spaceballs again a year or two ago and struggled to be amused, and partly because this trailer has no laughs. Not even one. And it's clearly been done with Flash animation, so looks cheap as chips. And, to be honest, just looks like it wants to be cartoon porn.

Films

Bond from the Beginning #11:
Moonraker (1979)
[1st half; 3rd or so watch]

Articles

Temporary Production Shutdown on Dollhouse by Dave Golder
(from SFX)
"Production on Joss Whedon's Dollhouse has temporarily shut down... Apparently, "Whedon had been busy directing two of the first three [episodes], which kept him out of the writers' room. As a result, the studio, network and Whedon agreed that the show's fourth script needed work. Whedon also requested the production reprieve to get ahead on the next few scripts.” The show will still air as scheduled in the New Year."
Oh dear. This is after the news that the network half-insisted there by a new pilot episode (Whedon claims he agrees, stating the show needed setting up better, and Pilot #1 will now air as episode two). Depending on your perspective, these pieces of news are either:
  • Good! They want to produce the highest quality show possible. I'm an optimist, yay!
  • Bad! It's struggling under network pressure already and will surely go the way of Firefly. I'm a pessimist, boo!
  • Well, we'll have to wait and see won't we. Networks always interfere and quality shows still happen. I'm a realist. So there.

  • Movie Reviews: Righteous Kill
    (from Studio Briefing)
    "Taken purely on its merits as a psychological thriller, Righteous Kill is probably a two-star film. The third star is there strictly for De Niro and Pacino. Playing off each other, they stir up the ghosts of past greatness." A shame, because from the trailer I thought this looked like it could be a great thriller with two great stars. I'll judge for myself at some point, of course.

    Movie Reviews: The Women
    (from Studio Briefing)
    Even the women hate The Women, which sounds to be as bad as the trailer looks. Except Roger Ebert, who praises it, yet again seeming to disagree with everyone else (see: The Mummy 3).

    Unrelated by clydefro [online for a limited time]
    (from clydefro)
    "In 2004, the cities that had been attacked [on 9/11] picked one person as the best man to further protect us while nearly everyone else picked someone else, the eventual winner. With a new election just weeks away, these uncertainties and fears once again feel necessary."

    Be sure to check out today's other Articles post for some Bondage.

    Articles: Bond, James Bond

    Another Way To Drink? by Matt Weston
    (from CommanderBond.net)
    Seems the Coke Zero Zero 7 ad has caused quite a stir -- so much so that I'm not going to quote the article, just recommend you go read it.

    By Royal Command: Judging A Book By Its Cover by Tanner
    (from double o section)
    "I know most of you probably think me certifiable after reading this post, but I also know that there are some readers and collectors who know exactly what I’m talking about."

    Charlie in Command by John Cox
    (from The Young Bond Dossier)
    Fairly extensive interview with Young Bond author Charlie Higson. Contains spoilers for By Royal Command, so do be careful.

    David Arnold Audio Interview: Scoring Quantum of Solace by Devin Zydel
    (from CommanderBond.net)
    Interesting comments on both the film and its score.

    Looks like I just need some articles beginning with E to Z...

    Websites

    Evil Dead: The Musical
    I kid you not. Recent rumours have that it may be getting a film adaptation...

    Adverts

    Coke Zero Zero 7
    The new Coke ad allegedly uses music from Another Way to Die, the theme to Quantum of Solace. If that's true, I can't decide whether it sounds reassuringly Bond-like or depressingly generic-Bond-like -- if the article didn't claim it was the new song being used, I'd just assume it was some Bond-alike track Coke had found/had done. Either way, it's a fairly nifty advert, though most amusing is the Guardian's claim that it "is an homage to the Bond movie franchise's highly stylised pre-credit sequences" -- for a paper so into the arts and claiming such intelligence, you'd think they could tell the difference between the credits and pre-credits.

    See today's Bond Articles post for more on this.