Blaine23

I get the feeling Graham may be right on with this. It does seem silly for Yamato to not make more 1/48's since the demand is obviously there, though. But I think the nostalgia wave has about run itself out. I look at my toy shelf and I see some great toys and I'm just glad I got what I did. But ultimately we'll see when we see.

Spoilery McSpoilerness... Well, I had 2 different theories about what would happen should Roland reach the top of his tower. One was a theory I'd heard that just sounded right. That he would wake up back in the desert following the man in black. Despite it's Twilight Zone-ness, that sorta sounded right to me. My other, more personal longshot theory was that Roland would find his mother, Gabrielle, and be welcomed into her embrace for eternity or something like that. It's obvious the guy had many, many mommy issues (don't we all? Okay, well, not as many as Roland) and I didn't think King would be able to resist the chance to write that scene, had it occurred to him. Roland always seemed at his most vulnerable, when remembering his mother. Personally, I like the ending better than I thought. For a couple of reasons. The first was that I enjoyed that Roland had to re-experience his life as he climbed the Tower. Second, I like that Gan (or whomever) gave him the Horn - making it not necessarily an endless cycle. Some have seen this as Roland's "punishment" or "hell" - but it didn't come off that way to me. To me, Roland is simply doing what he was born to do. The journey is more important than the stopping, and thus, Roland continues his path - which gives him something to strive for. As for the Drawing on his next trip around... I'd say he draws new companions. You could really make a case either way - but Susannah's choice to withdraw into the land of Tocuro Spirits really makes me think that she intentionally escaped being drawn into Roland's loop. The only thing I wished I'd read was- 1. Roland not letting one of the guns from the line of Eld leave with Susannah. Not right. 2. Patrick should have re-drawn Roland's hand, enabling him to shoot like he was born to, with both guns blazing. 3. The Crimson King should have ultimately been taken down by one of Roland's bullets. That's just personal opinion - I just think that Roland should've been given the chance to finish the job himself. In my head, the CK would have fought Roland's mind (not thrown Sneetches) and Roland should have prevailed using the skills drilled into him by Cort and Vanay. Roland deserved to kill his nemesis, as that is what he is best at. Ka is a wheel and the wheel must turn. Mayhap next time Roland's ka-tet will be 20, instead of 19.

That makes perfect sense for broadcast TV. Is it true for cable as well? Do the subscription fees offset the money from advertisers? For Cable TV its a different model (even though some DO have advertisers) but there is still the same constraint. There is a seriously limited budget. And just because a show souds "cooler" than maybe the plot of another show doesn't mean they can spend more money on one versus the other. There is no way from a financial standpoint that ANY TV show could be produced for a higher budget than those produced today. It's Star Wars your talking about though. Advertizers will pay out the ass for those commercial slots. Those slots are STILL only worth so much. Just because its Star Wars doesn't mean the entire world will watch it. Even if it could it reached world record viewership for a episode type show (IE: NOT like a miniseries) it would still command a pathetic budget in comparison to movie budgets. You speak the truth... but I'm curious about something you might know. Are they factoring in the eventual DVD sales/licensing into the shows now? It seems pretty obvious that the DVD rights to a big franchise would be worth quite a bit and could help offset the show budgets. I mean, they've got to be making dough off of TV DVDs if they're going to put out as many as they have lately.

Renegade Leader - War and lesbians. Paging Dr. Freud - Dr. Freud we have new visitor in the main lobby. Why not just mix all of your ideas together and have full on lebian sci fi starfighter pilot/vixens vs. Col. marines led by the ghost of Raymond Burr war show? Or not. On another note - I watched the Venture Bros. on Adult Swim that a friend had recorded for me. Awesome show, very witty and the 60's "look" of the show was spot-on. Loved it. And I actually have to admit that Brock Samson kinda reminded me of AgentONE.

What's better? A less crappy VF-0 that doesn't require a parts bin? On the more serious side, I keep a small zip lock plastic container that I stow extra guns, heatshields/canopies, etc on my shelf. I just stick it in the back and that way I have whatever I need without digging out some big ol' box. And yes, I do keep the boxes, but just in case I ever need to sell any of my toys in case of financial disaster.

Man... each day you guys find a new way to make me feel more unimaginative... I just looked and set the thing up right side up... so stupid... Great job, looks good.

yup, went downhill after Sargeant Howard and Pembleton left. Word. No Pembleton = No Blaine watching Homicide.

I don't wanna wait... for our lives to be oooo-ver... Uh, no thanks on the WB Jedi Creek, though I'm sure it's a likely candidate. It'll never happen, but I told my idea to BSU in PM not too long ago. Law & Order: Wookie Justice Scoundrels from Mos Eisley are brought to Kashyyyk to be brought to trial by angry Wookies who seek to bring order to the new Republic. "In the New Republic justice system, the people are represented by two seperate, yet equally important groups: the Wookies who investigate crime and the Wookies who prosecute the offenders... usually by tearing their arms off and beating the offenders to death with their own severed limbs." DUHN DUHN! Of course, I'd probably be the only guy watching... but you have to admit it beats the hell out of CSI: Naboo

Good reason for that... his name is David Simon. Author of the novel Homicide (that the show was based on), The Corner (which was HBO miniseries, similar to the Wire) and he's the executive producer of The Wire. David Simon on hbo.com According to Amazon.com it will be released on October 12th. And Garden State was a good movie... not seeing the Oprah connection, though. Then again, I wouldn't know an Oprah connection if it tackled me and forced me to trust me feeling to Dr Phil.

Hee. Oldbies. I guess I'm coming up on "Ancientbies" because I can't even get worked up enough to care about yet another "why isn't everyone nice to each other all the time" thread.

Mechamaniac - I've only been to Baltimore once, but after The Wire I can probably direct you to all the best places to score smack. The show is very, very set in Baltimore and the city is apparently very cool with letting them film all of the place, even if it's sometimes showing the city's dark side. I love Six Feet Under as well, but it's grown too angsty (which is hard since it was angst-a-riffic from the get-go). I'm always surprised when people think of it as a "gay" show, though. I always see it as a show about family - with awesome writing. Nip/Tuck is one of my fiance's favorites... and I have to admit I don't usually mind watching it. I can only imagine how much like Valhalla it must be to be an attractive plastic surgeon in Miami, a city known for drugs, supermodels and the beach. I'm not really much of a sitcom guy - but I love the Scrubs and I'm enjoying the Father of the Pride show... Siegfried & Roy are just about the funniest things since, well, the real Siegfried & Roy. On the reality front - Survivor, Apprentice. Mark Burnett is a saavy dude. Buffy ended because Sarah Michelle Gellar's contract was up. Angel got cancelled prematurely - but you can pin on that on the WB. And to be fair to UPN, Buffy was getting stale... and a new show costs way less to make.

I'm expecting Sleestaks by episode 3. The doctor reminds me more of Tom Cruise in Minority Report. My fiance keeps calling him "Charlie" and having Party of Five flashbacks. But now that you mention it... he has a Sandlerish vibe.

I watched a few of the show I'd recorded on the DVR last night and I got to wondering if you guys had any favorite TV shows currently on air. I try to check out at least a few new shows, based on what I've read online etc... here's a few that I thought were worth the 50 minutes or so that I spent watching them. Veronica Mars - The commercials didn't impress me. In fact, they nearly stopped me from ever watching this show, but I decided to try it based on a recommendation from a guy I knew who'd seen the pilot he downloaded. I came away really surprised. Essentially, it's the story of a cute high school girl who works for her dad's detective agency and is trying to unravel the mystery of a local death that ruined her and her family's status in town. What was good - the writing, the writing, the writing. The dialogue was excellent and not at all what you'd expect from teen fare. The show played solid homage to it's detective-noir roots while still managing to be current, touching and funny. Recommended: To anyone who was a fan of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, or My So Called Life. Or anybody that enjoys a well-written hour of detective fiction. CSI: NY - No big surprise that this is a good show. It's a solid franchise and it has Gary Sinise in the leading role. I expected the same thing as the other shows, but with a New York skyline used for cutaways. I was surprised to find that the pilot was moody, somber, and actually creepy as hell. Playing up the "gothic" of New York, the sets are routinely gorgeous and somewhat unbelievable - but CSI:NY doesn't look like a world in a vacuum. New York crimes scenes are dirty, the apartments cramped, and the evidence is harder to find. What was good - Sinise. The story. A fresh look at what's already being shown all over CBS in two top shows. Recommended: Obviously to anyone that enjoys CSI or CSI: Miami. The show is darker than CSI and completely lacking the cheezy Caruso in a Humvee factor of CSI: Miami. I'd also recommend it to anyone who likes HBO Autopsy shows or the similar ones on Discovery... the show had a creepy, David Fincher vibe in the pilot and I hope they stick to it. Lost - This is the big hyped show of the year. The creator of Alias brings you a story of a group stranded on an island... where mysteries abound. Like the Alias pilot, Lost grabs you in the first few seconds and doesn't really let up. There's tons of "I know that guy!" people in the large cast - included the oldest Party of Five guy, Merry from LotR, and the replacement pilot from the Matrix sequels. I admired the show's pace and it's obviously expensive as hell look. Who knows if they will sustain itself for very long, but it made for a very cool hour of TV in the pilot. I also like that I'm still not sure what's out there in the jungle. Is it Jurassic Park? Land of the Lost? Gilligan? I'll definitely watch to find out. I just hope it doesn't end up as convoluted and meandering as Alias ended up becoming. Also, Evangeline Lilly, a newcomer, plays the female lead and she's easily as attention-getting as Jennifer Garner... personally, I think she's hotter. Recommended: To just about anyone... the show hasn't really revealed itself as anything more than a story of people marooned, but it seems apparent that there will be some sort of "otherworldly" aspect to it. So far, I'm curious - but I'm not completely sold on the fact that this will be fun to watch every week. And, this one isn't a "new" show, per se... but it is IMHO the best damn show ever to put on TV. The Wire - If you have HBO, you're probably like I was before this summer. You watch the Sopranos, simply because every now and again it's incredible. You may watch Six Feet Under or Deadwood, because you hope it'll be the next Sopranos. You watched Carnivale, scratched your head and said, "huh?" and maybe watch Curb Your Enthusiasm when it's on. Then there's that TV show that all the critics rave about and nobody you know ever watches. The Wire. So, you sit down one day and watch an episode... and you have absolutely no idea what the hell is going on. There's cops, but they aren't like the TV cops on every other show... they don't always get their man, they are often complete wrecks, and they seem to deal with their own inner department politics as much as they do criminals. Then there's drug lords... who don't live on yachts or sip crystal as they discuss cliches about "the hood." They take economics classes and they live in the crappiest places in America and they fear competition almost twice as much as they do the police. Then you have dock workers and their union... huh? I tried to watch it and gave up after about 15 minutes. Eventually, I had heard enough praise to get on hbo.com and figure out when they were going to start airing the repeats from Season 1 in order and began watching. The show demands that from its viewers... it's more like a novel than TV. The plots are insanely intricate and the reality of it is undeniable and depressing. But once you take the trouble to watch it... the show is better than anything else you've ever seen. Season 3 started last week and it's incredible. But I'm telling you not to watch it. Instead, get HBOonDemand and watch the first 2 seasons. Download them off of the internet... anybody with BitTorrent can. Wait for HBO to release DVD sets of the first 2 seasons (a complete shame that they haven't already) and rent them. Or wait until HBO begins showing old episodes on HBO2 later this year. Normally, I'd never ever recommend anyone go through this much trouble, but this show is just that damn good. Recommended: To anyone that enjoyed Homicide or Law & Order. To anybody that is related to a cop or has been a cop. To anybody that likes great television. To anyone who's ever wondered why the War on Drugs could never be won. To anybody that reads books. Okay, that's enough of me blabbering. What do you guys watch on TV when you're not re-watching Macross or examining the Star Wars DVDs frame by frame, looking for more silly Lucas changes?

I wouldn't. I'd be pissed. The book style packaging I have no problem with, in fact the materials are nice and it works very well (unlike the MPC itself). The two main reasons I don't care are that I don't care about toy boxes and the RT box isn't my definition of perfect. Toy boxes ultimately mean nothing to me. If Yamato sold them for $10 cheaper in a brown box, then I'd go for it. I'm not buying a box for any other reason than the pleasure of opening it. The other terrible thing about the RT MPC boxes (IMHO) is the Tommy Yune artwork on the spines. Not only does it not look like the original character designs (different style + photoshop = not even close) but it also ruins the very "antique" look that the packaging was trying to achieve. It's a major style clash and it looks goofy as hell. Honestly, Yamato's best boxes were the original 3 DYRL 1/48's. Simple, black, elegant and easy to open. Can't beat that.

not entirely true. that figure also includes sales from Star Wars: Battlefront. Meh. It sold a sh*tload, no matter how you slice up the dollars. The LotR set looks great. As much as I've enjoyed the previous extended editions, I'm totally looking forward to this one. Not as much for the additional footage (which is great, mind you), but those sets have easily the most entertaining and easy to watch documentaries about the making of the films that I've seen on DVD.

is that before or after she/he start looking like a chick? That would be somewhere in the middle, from what I've heard. As odd as it may be, I still don't see how this guy's gender issues are to blame for the two sequels' going astray and basically losing the fanbase. You can chalk that one up to bad storytelling and lack of inventiveness. This isn't to say they're bad films, but I know very few people that don't think the first movie is leagues better than its sequels.

Actually, monuments are usually built to conquering warriors. Geez, A1, I would have expected you to know that, of all people.

CSI has changed the way we all think, it's official. Seriously though, can't you smell it?

The Thing really doesn't look too bad to me, but I've heard plenty of fanboy bitching already. I guess it really will all come down to how he looks on film, moving, emoting, etc... The Human Torch looks lame to me simply because I think he should have blond hair... I'm usually not the type to bitch about hair color, height, etc in casting - but he looks quite a bit like Reed and visually that throws me. Jessica Alba... I'm much more excited to see her in chaps in Sin City, but she fills out a spandex suit like nobody's business. Good casting. Kelly Carlson is way hot and I totally dig her on Nip/Tuck, but I think she's a bit too... uh, "worldy" to play the Invisible Girl. Kinda hard to go from coked-up Porno chick to all-american hero girl.

... and you forgot to add that it was a blind man that put him there. I swear the Fett family sucks... why do people love him so much? Here is my running total of everything Boba did in the OT: - show up - promise not to disintigrate anyone - follow the Millenium Falcon to Cloud City - hang around Vader looking moody - get whiny about Vader beating up on his trophy - shoot his rifle a lot and miss every time - take Solo back to Jabba - hang around Jabba and look moody - hit on Jabba's dancers - make a half-assed attempt to stop the heroes - get hisself dead at the hands of a blind man On the bad-ass-o-meter he rates a negative three. Boba is a straight up weenie who happened to wear really, really cool suit. Those of you fashion-challenged slobs ought to take a lesson from the Fettmeister. Clothes (and the occasional pieces of armor and wookie scalp) do indeed make the man.

Heh... and 5 different versions of the "Robotech Saga" isn't? Why on Earth would anyone complain about 10 discs for under $60? The Star Wars set sold 115 million dollars worth in one day. For around the same price, with far, far less to enjoy on the 4 DVDs. I say it's pretty smart marketing to give people too much, rather than not enough.

Hmmm... will my blacklight yellow my valks? If you're hangin' out in a room with a blacklight, I'd be more worried about smoke from your bong.

I checked my ANH for the described audio error and my set seems fine. I also skimmed around the movies a bit, and they really have never looked better. Since I didn't watch the A&E broadcast, I decided to watch the Empire of Dreams documentary. Wow. Excellent stuff, there. I'd seen most of the audition screening before (side note - how terrible a movie would Star Wars have been if they'd stuck to that script? Man, it's cringe-worthy.) and I'd heard alot of the anecdotes about the filming from various sources before. But overall, it's a very, very good documentary. I really enjoyed the way it laid out the progression of the films. Who knew how bad the effects could have turned out? Also, I can't help but wonder how much better RotJ might have been had Spielberg directed. The preview footage for Ep3 looks awesome as well. As they played my favorite "new" SW music, Duel of the Fates, and showed Ewan and Hayden practicing what looks like an incredible duel... I gotta admit I was more excited about RotS than I have ever been. Hell, even my fiance liked it and she thinks Star Wars belongs on underoos. It reminded me a great deal of what I think is easily the best part of the prequels thus far - the duel between Darth Maul, Obi-Wan, and Qui-Gon at the end of Ep. 1. Yeah, I hate that it's cut up to show Jake Lloyd somehow not dying in space, but that fight sequence has got more vitality than the entirity of Ep 2, for me. I'm hoping that RotS can pay off better than the CGI Yoda vs. Christopher Lee duel in AotC. Shouldn't be too hard, even if we've all got a pretty good idea how that fight's gonna end.

I disagree, but that's no real surprise. Again, I can respect the guy's ability to make his own decisions and stick to them - but I think it's a shame that he's taken a stand that essentially has his company in the business of censoring his own work. Not just his own work, but 3 of the top grossing films of all time at that. George is no better than the corporations he struggled with in the first place, if he continues to make decisions like this one. And come on, Max... laserdisc? Next thing you know you'll be telling folks they have to dig out an 8-track if they want to listen to Hotel California. Besides, you can all kiss my ass when George goes back on his promise after enough people dare to bitch about this. Or will that just be yet another decision that every fan should respect because the king decreed it? IMO, the only reason you guys are so aggressively against anybody who dares to want the OT on DVD is mainly because of this stupid "raped my childhood" nonsense. Whoever invented that phrase deserves a special place in Hell beside the inventor "don't go there" and "tell it to the hand."

I can see your viewpoint, Max. Like I said earlier, it is refreshing to see him stick to his guns on the issue, even if I totally disagree with it. I think this is what it all really boils down to. Essentially, I cannot really believe that all of the grief being dished out from the pro-SE standpoint is because you guys really, really, really hate the original versions of the movie and want to see it left behind on crappy old VHS tapes. Basically, you're all just sick of hearing people complain about something that doesn't matter to you. It's not as though having both versions in the same set would be a "bad" thing, it's just not a big deal to you. I can respect that too. But it still doesn't change the fact that I want to watch Han shoot first and see an old white guy ghost instead of a young white guy ghost. But if you guys continue to jump down the throats of anybody who says, "gee, I think that change kinda sucks" then we're all gonna just go 'round in circles here. Here are the facts: 1. There is not a single buyer of the Star Wars DVD set that would be bothered if it came with both versions of the films. Except maybe George Lucas. 2. No matter how much I think that sucks, the guy's got a right to do what he wants to. Neither of these to things qualifies GL as an artist or a whore. Just a goob who hit the nerd jackpot in 1977.