Rolling Review Part I

As I'm assuming you've heard, GTAIV came out yesterday. I picked it up and toyed with it a bit, but given that there's upwards of 50+ hours of gameplay (with some estimates in the hundreds) I'm not going to wait to finish the game before reviewing it, else you'd be waiting months. Instead I'll give impressions as I get them, beginning with...

This is the first GTA game I've played. I've been well aware of it for a while, but never played before because I never felt a burning desire to virtually beat up a digital hooker. Plus, the earlier iterations had legendarily iffy graphics, due to the amount of processing power devoted to making a "sandbox" city that characters have complete freedom to roam thru. Previous comments tended to say that the main story was less effective than just driving around, listening to funny faux radio and killing people without remorse. All of that is supposed to change with the latest installment – promising a truly interactive "living, breathing" environment, a compelling plot with a sympathetic lead character and a dramatic graphic upgrade. Based on about an hour of gameplay, does it deliver?

Maybe.

Liberty City (GTA's spin on Manhattan) is, indeed, breathtaking. Playing the game doesn't seem like a series of levels, it feels like... existing. No load times, no artificial boundaries, no rules – instead there's an actual environment with legitimate geography, different neighborhoods and populated by people who appear to be living their own life as opposed to being arranged for a main character to interact with. On a pure technical and artistic level, it's a staggering achievement.

As Niko Bellic, I haven't hit the main plot yet, having just arrived in the city to meet up with my loser cousin Roman, who's been filling my head with American dreams and has, instead, been eking out a criminal existence in a roach-filled apartment, drowning in debt. I've driven him around a bit, saved him from loan sharks, met some of his, uh, "friends," etc. Tough to say at this point how much we'll identify with Niko, altho I'll give him some points for not showing up on our shores with a "kill 'em all' mentality.

One thing that feels missing is the purported sense of reality that's part of the hype. Because for all the detail applied to the environment, it's clearly glossed over when it comes to how you interact with it. Within fifteen seconds of the first time I got behind the wheel, I'd crashed into several cars, knocked down a few streetlights and accidentally mowed down a couple pedestrians. Several of these things happened while the girl I was driving around commented on my clothes. Illicit thrills are designed to be a part of the game, and I guess I'm supposed to pump my fist and shout with glee every time I slaughter an innocent Liberty City-ian, but it's a little weird to have no one comment on the fact that instead of dropping them at their house, I overshot it by a block and smashed into a dumpster, pinning a hobo to the wall in the process. Add the fact that whatever car I drive apparently goes several times as fast as anything else on the road and the game's got a few questions to answer.

Which won't happen until I boot it back up and dive back in. More later...

When Irish Eyes Aren't Smiling

So Carly Smithson got voted off last night and, while I can't say I'm too upset about it, she prolly didn't deserve to go.

Yet.

I've never really "gotten" Carly Smithson. Not that her brogue is that strong – it's just that past beyond said brogue, she always came across as basically a fine singer, particularly if you're looking for someone to front a Heart tribute band.

Which I sincerely hope no one is.

That said, she belted out an acceptable version of Jesus Christ, Superstar. It was maybe a little bit on the shouty side, but it was a step up from Brooke, who was a bit on the forgetty the words side, and Jason Castro, who was a bit on the whatty the hell were you thinky side.

I still think it's David Cook's contest to lose, but for those concerned about the order of losers, you can rest assured that Carly got a wee bit robbed.

Aaaannnddd... we're done.

After last night's take on Mariah Carey's "Always Be My Baby," it no longer matters whether David Cook actually gets the most votes – he's won. He could turn out to be Kelly and take the title, he could be Daughtry and score a career, but that performance may have rendered the rest of the season irrelevant.

So You Think You Can Step it Up and Walk the Runway to America's Top Dance Crew Project?

What this latest installment from Bravo's reality tv factory lacks in innovation, it makes up for in presentation... almost. It's almost exactly the same show as So You Think You Can Dance, but instead of perky Cat Deeley as host, it's... a different kind of perky Elizabeth Berkeley. Why? Well, she showed off her... um... moves in Showgirls where she insisted that she's not a stripper, SHE'S A DANCER! And the judges, instead of being American Idol knockoffs (streetwise black guy, effusive woman, snarky Brit) are a bunch of industry pros that you've likely never heard of.

From the initial episode, I'd say it's better than America's Best Dance Crew (sorry, Randy Jackson Presents America's Best Dance Crew) but worse than So You Think You Can Dance. It's definitely slicker than the MTV show, but it's missing some of the spirit that the younger cast of SYTYCD brings. There's just something more innately appealing in watching undiscovered kids trying to break into the business than mid-tier semi-pros trying to land a somewhat bigger job.

Actually, all of the dancing shows suffer from a rather indistinct prize – I'm not sure what the next Top Dancer actually means, or where they Think They Can Dance or whatever. It's not like the American Idol machine, which pumps out a winner's album even if it's Ruben.

Regardless, is Step it Up and Dance worth a watch? Aside from the terrible title – sure, particularly as most shows are still recovering from the writer's strike. As far as Bravo rip-offs go, it's notably better than their take on America's Next Top Model, called Make Me a Supermodel. It's well-produced, the dancing is good, the cast is a combustible mix of talent and ego, etc. I don't see it spurring an NBC/Lifetime war like Runway, but it's ok for a Thursday. At least for six more Thursdays, when the Cat comes back.

Take Another Little Piers of My Heart

In a showdown about as thrilling as you'd expect from two competitors helping each other on the same task, Piers Morgan won the battle billed (by The Donald, at least) as The Ultimate Fight Between Good and Evil. Uh huh. What this basically boiled down to is that country star Trace Adkins is an absolute gentleman with a great cause and a few fairly well-off friends, while Piers is an absolute prat with a great cause and a ton of filthy rich friends.

Which is all well and good, really – you kind of know what you're getting if you sign up to watch The Celebrity Apprentice. Unfortunately, what you're also signing up for is a hackily produced live finale which amounted to Donald and his kids sitting on a fake table on the Saturday Night Live set while the taped episode played out on TVs in the studio, serving as an uneasy laugh track for the home audience.

Say what you want about Survivor (and what I say is that even tho this season is getting better ratings and raves, I can no longer muster up interest in watching a bunch of Type As sit on the beach and eat bugs) but they do their finale well. There's a healthy amount of cheese, as the taped ep often ends with host Jeff Probst apparently spanning the space/time continuum by leaving tribal council months in the past and showing up in the present seconds later wearing exactly the same outfit. But they reserve the live stuff for the reveal of the winner and then a reunion show Q&A with those who didn't Survive. Works.

The Apprentice, however, flips that formula on its ear, presenting two hours of live table-sitting and awkward narration capped by an extremely brief (and seemingly redundant) boardroom, a final hiring/firing celebrated by a smattering of shiny confetti, and a promise – or threat – from Trump that we can join them next year, because they're gonna be around for a looooooong time.

Frankly, I hope he sticks with the Celebrity version of The Apprentice, as it brings some interest to a flagging franchise. Round up another odd collection of has-beens, never-weres and who-are-theys and have at it. It's pass-the-time fun with a nice charitable angle. Just leave Omarosa at homearosa. Enough already.

Really thought this was gonna be more like Splash

Enchanted looked fun. A quirky twist on the classic fish-out-of-water story, with an animated princess turning up in modern-day Manhattan. Supercute. And it is... if you're five.

Unlike the best kids' or all-family films, Enchanted pretty much only works on one level – the "I buy all the Disney Princess merchandise" level. There's a bit of humor that isn't strictly for kids, but it unfortunately boils down into garden variety "Welcome to New Yawk" type jokes.

So for all my young readers (??), enjoy. It's well done for what it is. Parents, if you've seen the previews, you've seen the laughs. Beware.

Baseball, Hot Dogs, Carne Seca and Roller Derby?

Yeah, I know what it looks like. But don't try to tell me you don't want a Super Dog, too.

I'm back from Sox Spring Training in Tucson and the score looks something like this: 2 wins, 2 losses, 3 rounds of golf, at least 6 hot dogs (not sure how many the above one counts for), 3 plates of seca (a treat only available in Tucson), 2 books read cover-to-cover (The Last Best League and Say it's So) and 1 night of women's roller derby.
Yes, women's roller derby - a doubleheader in which the Furious Truckstop Waitresses defeated the Copper Queens followed by Iron Curtain falling to Vice Squad. Hard as it might be to believe, I'd never seen roller derby before, and even harder to believe – I may see it again. The traveling team (the Saddletramps) is coming to Chicago to face off against the best of the Windy City Rollers, and that may just be too much to pass up – the chance to see ladies like Sloppy Flo and Cheap Ore face off against Beth Amphetamine and Goldie Shocks! There are a surprising amount of leagues across the country – oddly worth checking out if you get a chance.

On a more, you know, real sports note – tough to say what the Sox are gonna look like this year. Javier Vasquez has serious stuff but Jose Contreras and Gavin Floyd were not in good form, Orlando Cabrera and Nick Swisher are definite upgrades while Juan Uribe didn't look half bad at second base. And Joe Crede looks like Brooks Robinson at third but below Mendoza at the plate while Josh Fields hits the hell out of the ball but boots the hell out of it as well. God, I love baseball.

Going going gone

I'm off to see the Sox for a week. In the meantime, watch these:

Welcome to the Jungle

I pretty much assumed this would be Lipstick Bungle, but surprisingly, not so much. Compared to the other recent sex in the city clone, Lipstick is much more appealing than Cashmere.

It's the same premise - a look at the lived of sexy, high-powered women who have it all... or do they? But the difference is that Nico, Victory and Wendy are somewhat more "real" characters than... whatever the women of cashmere mafia's names are. Failing careers and struggling relationships are more relateable than prep school power mom squabbles and bi-curious dabbling. As an added bonus, the men of lipstick are a mix of features and flaws, rather than a parade of people pulled from central casting to answer the cliche of men are pigs.

All is not perfect in the jungle, however - Shields' movie studio job feels increasingly unrealistic. The pilot subplot was about getting into a bidding war over dueling films about Galileo, and the last episode featured a paparazzi-fuled party to support "a potential huge hit" that was about... the slums of India in the 1930s. Uh huh. Victory's speeches tend to be a bit on the nose ("they're not just my friends... they're my family!"). And kim raver as a cougar isn't the newest story in the world.

So overall - dunno that these three will dethrone Carrie and crew any time soon, but four episodes deep it's still worth tuning in. If you've got the
money, honey, they've got your disease.

The Guys Can Blow, the Girls... Just Blow

The ladeez of American Idol were almost uniformly terrible last night. The lone voice singing in the wilderness that was worth listening to was Brooke, whose hippie Sheryl Crow vibe is working, if a little grating. But otherwise you can pretty much sum the evening up with this:
It's Overmyer, Amanda – the Janice Joplin-meets-Cats competition, that is.. As for the rest of 'em, Alaina's angling for the Haley Scarnato "pretty girl, pretty bad" award, Alexandrea Lushington, aside from having a perfect pornstar name, looked (and sounded) like she'd just come from a parkour session, Asia'h should be voted off on name alone, Carly, despite endless praise from the judges and nearly that much money spent already trying to make her a star, appears to me to be just an ordinary singer with a fun brogue, Kady Malloy (the Rich Little of the bunch) nearly missed both falling down the stairs and every note she sang, Ramiele apparently picked her song so that people couldn't make a "lullaby" joke off her last name "Malubay," Syesha showed a commercial in which she appeared as a middle-aged fat guy's trophy wife, and Kristy Lee Cook, despite being a hot cage fighter, stomped and posed all over the stage while belting out a bad song.

But she remains, fortunately, a hot cage fighter, so she'll stick around. The rest of the hacks? Send 'em back.

David vs. Goliath...

...who is, like many of the contestants, also named David. Last night two guys separated themselves from the rest of the Idols:
The first David, last name Archuleta, is this sweet kid whose self-deprecating smiling would be annoying if he wasn't so damn good. This kid can sing (or "blow," as Randy Jackson unfortunately often says). Remarkably talented and charmingly young, he'll face his toughest competition among the guys from...
David Cook, who's much more musically established – older, has toured, etc. He's also carving out a niche for himself as the next Daughtry, unlike Robbie Carrico, who purports to be "a real rocker" but was, alas, in a bubblegum pop band called Boyz-N-Girlz United.

Seriously. Boyz. N. Girlz. United.

Anyway, the rest of 'em, with the possible exception of now one-named Chikezie, are pretty much a loss. The other David is an over-the-top loon, Danny Noriega's got an interesting... uh... vibe to him, but I think it'll turn into a novelty act at some point, Jason Yeager seems to be auditioning to play the gay younger brother in a Dane Cook vehicle, Jason Castro looks like he got lost (and stoned) en route to a Halloween party, the Orlando Bloom guy ought to be in a Queen cover band instead, and WhatsHisFace is lost outside of songs that Bush would've sung. Bring on tha ladeez.

Not that I'm the world's biggest Kanye West or Amy Winehouse fan, but...

Herbie Hancock?
Album of the Year?
Seriously?

Eli McBeal

Ok, his last name is actually Stone, but Eli's a pretty direct descendant of the miniskirted lawyer with a penchant for whimisical visions. I suppose I should say he's a spiritual successor, as the "o" in Stone is made with a halo.

See, Eli's a big-time, big-city lawyer who takes on big cases for big clients and big money, caring only about cool cars and sharp suits, until... George Michael shows up and tells him (yes, via song) that he's gotta have faith. Ah-faith, ah-faith. He's gotta have faith-ah-faith-ah-faith.

If several reprises of the chorus don't make it clear enough, several characters directly reinforce the show's main theme, which is... wait for it... faith. Eli makes discoveries that restores his faith in his father, he argues a case that restores his faith in the justice system, and restores our faith in the institution of marriage by sticking with his fiance who dumps him when -spoiler alert- he's diagnosed with a brain aneurysm.

So do I have faith that there's a show here? Not so much. The pilot has a particularly strange vibe of over-the-top heartstring pulling (did I mention the major case concerns an autistic child going up against Big Pharma? An autistic child who's the son of the girl Eli lost his virginity to?) combined with shoot-from-the-hip philosophical meanderings. And Jonny Lee Miller plays Eli Stone with an odd sense of deliberate stammery awkwardness that I assume is supposed to be disarming and charming, but instead comes off as a hyper-intelligent insect in Armani fantasizing about George Michael.

And speaking of Jonny Lee Miller, ABC's trumpeting him as a prime reason to tune in (as in "Johnny Lee Miller IS... Eli Stone!"), which I also don't get. Here are the three things that come to mind when you say Jonny Lee Miller: he was in Hackers, he was in Trainspotting, and he was in Angelina Jolie. None of those are particularly impressive - I know, I know, visionary and harrowing Trainspotting and all that... but don't tell me that this faith-baiting show is assuming a bunch of heroin chic flick fans are part of the audience.

Regardless of who they hope will be the audience for this show, it won't include me. Pass.

Looking for the Best Show on TV?

Found.

Rerun Redux

Normally I'm not a fan of "special encore presentations," but last night's Lost did it right. ABC replayed the spectacular season three finale, Through the Looking Glass, with a pop-up video style scroll that added extra information to the on-screen action.

It served as an official peek under the tent (or at least into the writer's room ;) that illuminated some secrets of the show. The CW got in on the action, too, albeit for a different reason. They re-ran the Gossip Girl pilot with interviews and behind-the-scenes stuff – not so much in an effort to dive deeper into layers of twisted mysteries, but to court new viewers beyond the Facebook crowd buzz.

It's a perfect solution to this strike-shortened season – almost the equivalent of a free DVD-style commentary track. Rather than flooding us with wretched reality, let the writers pick up a mic while they put down their pens.

It's the end of the world as we know it...

...and I don't feel fine. In fact, in the spirit of this wretched show, I'll share a shocking revelation of how not fine I felt: during the broadcast, some leftover chinese food gave me a ripe case of the runs... which was more pleasant than watching Moment of Truth.

If you haven't followed this train as it prepared to run off the rails, Moment of Truth is a game show of sorts. Think of it as 500,000 Pyramid... of Lies! It goes like this: some desperate loser, in front of his family and friends, answers questions designed to rend his relationships apart in pursuit of a bigger bank account while a feral crowd hoots and hollers. Oh, and it's hosted by someone named Mark Wahlberg, but unfortunately he's not the one with the Funky Bunch, he's a puffy exercise in smuggery shoved into an ill-fitting suit.

If it's not clear by now, this thing is a repugnant disaster. It feels like one of those misguided faux shows that you see in near-future science fiction shows designed to illustrate how society has broken down and we'll all be living like Lord of the Flies soon. You know, like how they don't play football in 2010... instead it's "KillBall," complete with spiked walls and firepits filled with robot sharks. Or like those "I'll buy that for a dollar" segments in Robocop... except replace the satirical elements with abject humiliation and failure.

On the premier episode, a pompous personal trainer "won" $25,000 by admitting he checked out other guys' packages in the locker room and has done things in his marriage that would make his wife not trust him before he got bounced for lying about whether he's inappropriately touched any of his clients. Of course, by lying, his wife found out that he had, but that's beside the point... I guess. Then we moved on to an addictive gambler who fessed up to the fact that not only was he a member of the hair club for men, he stuffed his pants in the past to bulk things up south of the border.

At all of these things, the laugh-track like crowd went "woooooaaaahhhh" and applauded, while the wives and girlfriends alternately looked dismayed and urged their men to keep dialing for dollars. It's hideous.

And worse, it's hideously slow. The host puts a pregnant pause between every question, and the results of the lie detector tests are announced by a futuristic robot female voice that waits so long before saying true or false that her pauses prolly need to be induced. To push this metaphor into the realm of bad taste that this show revels in, Moment of Truth should have been aborted several trimesters ago.

It's supposed to be surprising and titillating, but it comes off as horrifying and depressing. If you can't stay away, DVR it and watch in the morning before you get ready... 'cause you'll gonna need a shower after.

Look! On YouTube! It's a Bird, it's a Plane, it's...

...well, we never really find out what the thing ripping New York a new one is in Cloverfield, but let's call it the Blair Witch Monster (aka the Anti-Snakes on a Plane), because for a film built entirely on buzz, this one delivers. This shakycam story of a Godzilla-esque monster attack and a group of twentysomethings attempting to survive it is a thrilling piece of filmmaking.

What starts as a going-away party for a friend turns into a going-away party for the entire city as the monster announces its presence with authority by ripping the head off the Statue of Liberty and hurling it across the Hudson. It lands at the feet of our partygoers, and we follow their quest for safety and to save a friend entirely thru the lens of a camcorder.

It sounds like a gimmick, and it is. Much like the teaser trailer that only released the date (and not the name) of the film. As well as the viral websites that fill in the backstory that's not shown on screen. But here's the thing about gimmicks – sometimes they work. There's a sense of immediancy that the camcorder conveys – I don't really wanna test this theory, but I'd guess this is pretty much exactly what it'd be like to be terrorized by a multi-story monster for an hour and a half.

So put aside your concerns about camcorder battery life or durability and get your tension on – Cloverfield's a killer.

And the Nominees Are...

...not terribly inspiring, given that I haven't seen most of the stuff that's up for awards. Sorry, but titles like No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood just don't scream "get off the couch" for me. I'll prolly get to the big hitter of the year (Atonement) and I've seen the little movie that could (Juno) and Michael Clayton was... you know... a nice tight thriller, but I didn't come out of the theater with Clayton-mania runnin' wild. Far as I'm concerned, the best movie I saw all year was the six-minute Batman short that played in front of I am Legend at IMAX.

So instead I'll comment on the poster.

This year the Academy turned to Drew Struzan, best known for collages of photorealistic heads of science fiction stars. Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Harry Potter, Hellboy, Back to the Future... he's done 'em all. Apparently he "conceived" it, while the actual illustration was executed by his son Christian. I'm not quite sure what the conceptual role was here, given that it's... you know... the Oscar statue backed by flashbulbs.

But it's a solid effort. Doesn't measure up to a recent fave from another well-known comic artist, Alex Ross, but it's worlds better than, say, this one which has a definite thrown-together-in-the-last-ten-minutes-with-clipart feel to it. And given that if it stuck to true Struzan style, we'd be looking at the blended heads of Javier Bardem, Tilda Swinton and an animated rat, I'd say we made out ok.

I Come Not to Bury Simon, But to Praise Him

Apologies to Shakespeare (and unscripted television haters), but based on last night's premiere, season seven of American Idol looks pretty good... and sounds even better.

I'm assuming I don't need to detail the show – if you don't know, you prolly don't read this blog. What's encouraging about these auditions (so far) is that the producers seem less fascinated with the seamy underbelly of attention-starved America and more interested in creating compelling stories about singers.

Oh sure, we met the misguided Gen Yers who've been told that they can do anything! Even be a star! Don't let anyone tell you different! Even people who know a lot more about singing than you do! Plus the hideous losers who still crave their proverbial fifteen minutes even if that time is spent laughing at them. And the sad cases of hopefuls who desperately want to validate their existence by winning a contest they have no business entering.

But we also met singers who – get this – can sing. Rather than parade an endless procession of increasingly awful freaks in front of us, the cameras actually swung around to track endearing Olympics-style stories that turn these kids into characters.

Finally, the judges are in good form. Bear in mind that good form for Randy is incoherent patter (now delivered from behind an odd pair of muttonchops). And Paula sticks to her I Heart Everyone guns, but Simon seems to have put his pistols away. Or at least clicked the safety on, reserving the real rancor for the people who deserve it – unfunny fame whores dying to degrade themselves on a national stage.

So we'll see - traditionally I tire of the auditions pretty quickly, but as last year they outdrew the finale, they're not going anywhere anytime soon. Here's hoping they continue along this plotline path.

No Fate But What We Make...

...particularly if we keep re-making it. I suppose it's not surprising that Fox went back to the well in lieu of new material; what is surprising about this extension of the Terminator franchise is that, so far, it's pretty damn good.

Based on the "Two-Night Premiere Event" (which I believe means airing the first two episodes ;) I think that Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles could have legs. Shiny metal robot legs. Shiny metal robot legs with guns hidden in them, in fact, if the new Terminators have anything to say about it.

I won't drown you in arcane mythology, because the show doesn't either. If you've seen T2, you're good to go. The show picks up a couple years later, where Sarah Connor and her son John drift through life, apparently safe from the threat of SkyNet, the computer system that, in the future, is due to become self-aware and destroy humanity. Emphasis on "apparently," because both good and bad Terminators show up quicker than you can say "it's not a tumor... at all."

Speaking of tumor, these Chronicles, while clearly following in T2's giant cyborg footsteps, does give a nod to T3, where we learned that Sarah Connor died of cancer – in ep 2 of this show, she learns the same and gets herself tested. The showrunners have stated that their intention is to lead into the new franchise, not T3 specifically, but it's nice to see that little Claire Danes film not left out in the cold. The kid cast as John Connor in the show, too, seems to be a bridge between the films, as he looks sort of like if T2's Edward Furlong and T3's Nick Stahl had a son. If that were possible. Of course, we are talking about time-traveling killer robots, so who knows.

And speaking of nods, the Sarah Connor Chronicles tosses quite a few affectionate ones to the fanboys. The opening and closing shots mirror the iconic dark highway and apocalyptic swingset images from the films. The Connor's initial alias is "Reese," as in Kyle Reese from T1 – John's father from the future. The good Terminator (played by Summer Glau as a spin on her River Tam character from Firefly/Serenity) is named "Cameron," as in James, the director of the first two films... and she also delivers the classic "come with me if you want to live" line. No one's said "I'll be back" yet – perhaps we'll have to wait 'til sweeps.

But it's not all fun and games. While the show preserves the occasional offbeat note from the films (Terminator Cameron gets blindsided by a car, raises her head from thru the windshield to calmly tell the family inside to "please remain calm" ;) it also retains the sobering undertones of humanity's responsibility in their own destruction. A sequence where Sarah learns about 9-11 is actually pretty moving.

So overall, a big thumbs up. A worthy successor to the Terminator saga with a nice time-travel twist. Give it a whirl – we've got to find something to watch until the computers grow up and destroy us all, right? Or at least until the writer's strike ends, whichever comes first.