Truths of human behavior

If you're walking on any kind of thoroughfare, like a sidewalk, people will stop at the narrowest point to block passage so they can check their phone or whatever the fuck.

Related: if you're walking along any sort of thoroughfare and someone is stopped to do some kind of personal adjustment (texting on the phone, putting something away in a pocket or purse, whatever), they will conclude their activity as soon as you're within a pace of them and they will start moving without looking, usually to cross your path so as to crash into you.

Deadpool and Wolverine

So I saw Deadpool and Wolverine last night.

Loved it! It was geeky in the extreme and laden with cameos galore. I expect one really kind of has to be deep in the comic books and a number of the movies to make sense of the film, such as there was sense to be made. I'm positive I missed tons. Didn't matter. Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman were pure win and everyone else rocked it. Nice entry into the MCU.

Godzilla: Minus-One

So I finally caught Godzilla: Minus One on streaming.

Simply outstanding!

This movie was so far and again superior to the latest Godzilla and Kong flick that it defies description. They're completely different in just so many ways.

Godzilla: Minus One, set in the last days and the first few years after World War 2, centers areound a Japanese kamikaze pilot who opts to not do the whole kamikazee thing. He initially encounters pre-radioactive Godzilla on an isolated Pacific island and survives an attack that kills pretty much everyon other than him and one other guy. The story then follows the pilot as he makes his way through post WWII Japan and tries to make a life for himself, helping a young woman who is a fellow survivor, and adopting a little kid.

Yes, there's human interest in a kaiju film and it's actually engaging and interesting. Hollywood could stand to take some notes here.

Anyway, the story follows the familiar tropes. US nuke testing mutates Godzilla and we get a radioactive fire breathing monster that's decided to stomp on Japan for some reason. There's attempts to stop Godzilla. They don't work. And then they do.

All told, it's simply the best Godzilla flick I've seen in years. I'm curious about the last few moments with the human characters. There's something that happens to a character that's a bit mysterious. And, of course, there's the indication that Godzilla will be back.

I hope this studio does more. That movie was just outstanding.

Godzilla x Kong: The New What-now?

So, I just went to see Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire.

That was a thing.

It's good to see the studio is learning not to waste money on big-name actors in kaiju films. I couldn't tell you who any of the lead actors were. Not at all. The only one I recognized was the little girl from the previous film who could do sign language with Kong. Now she's a sullen teen. That's a thing.

Yeah, so... Godzilla x Kong... what to say about it. Hm... let's start with the good stuff, shall we?

• Kaiju dentistry. Yes, I'm being serious.
• Kong getting his Kong on a lot.
• Baby Kong.
• Utterly pointless destruction of humanity's creations from ancient times (good-bye pyramids!)
• Godzilla's preferred bed.
• Crystal gravity pyramids.
• The little girl has superpowers.
• MOTHRA!
• Lots of monster on monster action. Eventually. Like in the last half hour or so.

Right, so the bad...

• Waaaaaaay too much pointless exposition.
• Just who the fuck were all these people on screen?
• Really awkwardly-bad attempts to add human interest to the film. I'm fairly confident the audience gave zero shits about the main heroine and her relationship with her daughter.
• Hippie kaiju dentist.
• Taking waaaaaaaaaay too long to get to any sort of point.
• Technobabble.
• Camera angles. Unnecessarily weird camera angles.
• Kaiju cavities.
• The script could have benefited from any sort of editorial process to trim down the bullshit by a good 90%.
• Incredibly awkward title.

So, in the end, I enjoyed seeing Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire. More accurately, I enjoyed the last... oh... 25% of the film. There were some nuggets earlier on, but the film was mostly a meandering hot mess that tried to hard to come up with a plot that wasn't there. I'll admit, I was a bit unimpressed with the villain monsters, too. Oh, the fights were good, but they lacked the real oomph that Ghidorah or Mecha-Godzilla had. Such is life.

Strange New Worlds

I spent New Year's Eve binging season 1 of "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds".

Billed as a spin-off of "Star Trek: Discovery" (which is, itself, allegedly a spin-off of the Star Trek franchise), its association with "Discovery" kept me from watching it.

I tried to get through some episodes of "Discovery" while on an international flight. It was shockingly-bad. Like, horrifically bad. Weird alternate-Klingons and lots of labels that were vaguely "Star Trek" while having a show that was painful to watch.

I switched to something else mid-flight and wrote off the franchise.

A friend suggested I give "Strange New Worlds" a chance. It's a sort-of prequel to the original series of "Star Trek". Set during the time Christopher Pike commands the Enterprise, before James T. Kirk takes over. It's got a quirky and fun crew and it really captures the explorer's feel of the original series. There's sime time-travel shenanigans in it, but they keep that sparse, thank goodness. And the stories feel solid and self-contained.

I loved it. I'll have to give season two a try at some point.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year!

And fuck 2023

2023 can go f*** itself

The blog title expresses my sentiments regarding 2023 well enough.

This year has been a shitshow.

I was one of the waves of tech layoffs early in 2023. Finding new work has been... challenging... amid the ocean of other people in the same situation.

I sustained several injuries from hobbies. None serious, but all-together, they've been problematic.

Several friends died over the course of the year. Each one was a shock.

And the capper was when my father passed away.

Gotta say I'm still struggling with that one. There's a 'Dad-sized' hole in my life that I can't quite figure out how to process.

In the interests of fairness, it hasn't all been bad. The layoff meant I could spend time with my father before his passing, and that worked out remarkably well. I've also been able to help out family in the midst of all this, which has also been nice.

And I can't recall the last time I've managed to get so much sleep!

The year's been a constant source of anxiety, from the personal to just watching the news and seeing the wars and the violent rhetoric and the rise of - let's be honest here - nazi-like sentiments in my homeland.

Fucking shitshow all around.

I will not look back on 2023 with any fondness. If 2023 were a person, I'd be tap dancing on its face until it stopped being fun. And I think I'd get a lot of fun out of that.

I certainly hope 2024 is better (though the jury duty summons I got suggests that won't be the case... that's almost funny, really).

So, as I raise a glass... fuck you, 2023. Fuck you and good riddence.

Ah, that felt good.

For anyone reading, I hope the coming year brings you good fortune, good health, and all the good things.