A Look Back On 2009 and the Decade

Well this posts gonna be a doozy to write. Let it be known that I have the foggiest of memories and can barely remember the finer details of high school, let alone the whole fucking decade. Speaking of High School the begining of the decade was when I first graced the grounds of my high school as a nervous, fresh-faced weiner who stuck to societies rules and social etiquets and didn't want to tread on toes. Now that we're coming to the end of the decade I've actually developed a personality and stopped catering to everybodies bullshit like the spineless, leatherbound gimp I once was. Who knows, maybe another 10 years from now I'll be some sort of oppressive dictator or suicide cult leader? As loyal readers I'm willing to give you some perks if that happens, just drop a comment as proof of your undying loyalty and I'll get the blood signature later. So anyway that's about all my alcohol abused memory can muster for the past decade, so let's move on to the main body of the work and look back on 2009.

2009 marked several special occasions for Infinite Possiblogities. It marked it's 100th post and welcomed it's first birthday. I must say that this old blog has done alright considering my grim predictions of it lasting for about 2 weeks. It's a place for venting, offering critical opinions and expressing ideas (and on the odd occasion it might even entertain someone...somewhere). So "Yay for me, I managed to stick to something and create something that isn't completely awful." Another big feature of 2009 was me finally getting my life together and undergoing my first year of uni. There I discovered that most students are complete morons who seem to think they are far more clever than what they actually are and my distaste for humanity was strengthened.

So now's the part of the post where I dish out awards for stuff that quite frankly nobody will give a shit about. So here we go.

2009 IP Award for Most Shithouse Educational Undertaking
This award was won in a landslide and goes out to Geology 110 and 120. Mountainloads of boring, inaccessable coursework coupled with a horrible excursion that took up an entire Saturday made studying rocks even more boring and painful than I could have ever predicted. Congratulations Geol 110/120, I hope I never see your metaphorical face again.

2009 IP Award for Biggest Disappointment
This one was not an easy task. Hardly a day goes by that something fails to disappoint me so there was a very large number of contenders. "Sadness" (the game in developement for the Wii) has failed to provide the world with any information or indeed any evidence of it's existence at all. You might recall that I listed it as a game I was looking forward to in 2009 but since then I haven't heard shit. Another contender was also from the list and that WAS released. That contender was The Conduit which failed to deliver in any of the areas it promised to. But I think the award has to go to Sam's Warehouse for shutting up shop and leaving me, once again, unemployed.

2009 IP Award for the Game of the Year
Batman Arkham Asylum is probably the winner here, although a special mention goes out to the Metroid Prime Trilogy which contains 3 of the best games of all time, two of which were remade with better control schemes, in one sexy package. If I hadn't already played them all before I'd have given it to them, but Arkham Asylum is so gosh darn good I don't think anything else can beat it.

2009 IP Award for Shittest Movie
This one's only a recent discovery and you can expect a full review of this one in the coming weeks. The award goes to Kicking the Dog, for proudly flying in the face of every single cinematic advancement we've made since the invention of the medium and failing to provide any entertainment to me or my friends.

2009 IP Award for Most Pleasant Discovery
I won $300 on a pokies machine, that was good. I became a frequent trivia goer which was a very nice discovery indeed. We Love Katamari would win the award if it were exclusive to gaming BUT I think the award has to go to The Big Bang Theory. I had initial reservations but some solid characterisation and respect for the subject matter has made The Big Bang Theory a winner in my books.

Lastly we have the 2009 IP Award for the Thing that has my Vagina Most Juiced Up which at present goes out to Bayonetta for the Xbox 360 and PS3 (just a week to go now, expect a review in the future). Honerable mentions include Final Fantasy XIII, Super Mario Galaxy 2 and the next Zelda game for the Wii of which nobody really knows anything. So anyway that's it for this post and all the posts of 2009. I'll be back in 2010 to do whatever crap I usually do. Let's hope 2010 will be an even better year for all of us and that Half-Life 2: Episode Three at least gets fucking announced. I mean COME ON guys, it was supposed to be out years ago.

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation

Well there's no denying it folks, Christmas is once again almost upon us. I've recently been out looking at the local Christmas lights displays around town (one street in particular provides a massively enjoyable experience in that regard) and I've been Christmas shopping, struggling with my brothers to figure out exactly what it is my mother likes. But it never dawns on me just how close Christmas is until National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation makes its annual appearance on NBN (or Channel 9). It is also the time of year for my annual viewing of NBN because as far as standards go, NBN would be to scum what scum is to us (did you follow that? Feel free to read back over it). So anyway it's Christmas time and Christmas Vacation was on last night and gosh darn it I'm gonna review it in what will be the closest thing to a Christmas Special that Infinite Possiblogities will ever produce.

So anyway speaking of Christmas Specials I thought I'd share with you a little secret, they're bullshit in a stocking. They're so sentimental, sappy and full to the brim of little lessons and holiday well wishing. Any TV show or franchise that produces a Christmas Special is ultimately producing the low point for themselves. I particularly loathe appropriations of Charlse Dickens' 'A Christmas Carol.' But as always there's an exception to the rule and for me that exception is Christmas Vacation. As the third and best movie in the 'Vacation' series, Christmas Vacation attempts to systematically destroy and mock all the Christmas values and traditions that other Christmas Specials try to force down our every orifice. Granted, it is goofy and predictable and has one or two abhorrent actors in it but as far as light-hearted Christmas shennanigens go, this ticks a lot of boxes. If you're wondering what to expect the picture from above is quite telling. It's hit and miss the whole way through, for every fantastic 'driving under a semi' scene there is a ham handed, unnescessary and cheap gag like an old lady saying something random. But really, what the fuck do you want? It's Christmas time and there's fuck all else on. Eventually the movie builds into a rather spectacular climax as Clark Griswald (the father and focal point of the story) acts out what I consider to be the best "flipping out" scene of all time. It has an excellent comic rhythm to it that is unparalleled in my movie going experience. I've lost count of how many times I've seen this movie and it is the one part I still find myself chuckling at.

So really what are you, the reader, to make of this rather baffling review? That's a good question really. Clearly this movie is no masterpiece and yet I find it to be something of a holiday tradition. I guess it confirms my fears that having a distinct christmas theme seems to make people lower their standards. Being overtly critical of a Christmas Special is something of a moot point really. Saying a Christmas Special is bad is like complaining that the manure you ordered is a bit smelly because quite frankly what the fuck were you expecting? So as far as completely dumb movies go this one is one of the better ones and is made more forgivable by it's festive associations.

P.S. If you have any information regarding what my mum is into feel free to let me know. At the moment my brothers and I are working off the theory that she doesn't really like anything per se, but more has a long list of things she has no patience for and then just everything else.

Another Free Online Game

Might I suggest clicking the image to enlarge it, just in case you don't much care for squinting at your computer screen.

This time I don't know what the advertising strategy is. Anyway that's all for now, within a day or two I should be posting up something of higher quality so come back soon.

Evony, Kingory and Bloons TD 4

Never let it be said that I don't suffer for my blog. I know I seem to devote many game reviews to games I quite enjoy but on this day I'm demonstrating my devotion by ploughing through 2 games that I know will be complete shit spread on mouldy bread. I'm sure everyone who's used the internet during to past year or so has seen one of Evony's shameless advertisments. I see them everywhere I go. Evony's ingenious ad campaign seems to revolve entirely around the promise of breasts and being the ruler of a kingdom filled with underwear models. Gee Evony, I appreciate your help and all but in all honesty I'm quite capable of finding my own porn thanks. But anyway for those who are unaware this is an ad for an online video game. An online video game that funnily enough features no breasts, queens or anything more erotic than maybe a phallic building design or two. So I guess what I'm saying is that the ads are a big, jiggly pair of double D lies. What the game is is a dweeby little fantasy massively-multiplayer real time strategy game that looks like this.

WOW! How exciting! The game often promotes itself as "free forever" but really what they SHOULD say is "free forever except for some of the really good stuff that you have to pay for." Buy money or no money means very little if the game is good right? I mean I buy games all the time. But Evony is almost instantly boring. I got in and I immediately wanted out. Leaving and unsubscribing wasn't exactly an intuitive process. I'd walk you through it but to be honest I still don't know how I got out of that shit. This was a frustrating experience made even worse by the fact that even my computer didn't like Evony. My once happy, vibrant little friend was suddenly snarling and snapping at me like I'd dropped it in the bath or something. I guess this was because the game runs on your browser and doesn't "require any installations", a fact that the game itself boasts of. Now at this point some of you might be saying "but online games are as much about the community as they are about the game, surely there is a friendly community of loyal supporters behind this slightly troubled game?" Well far be it from me to judge a community, but let me show you a sample from the chatbox and you can be the judge of the Evony community.

"heyy every1 hu wants tah totally go out widd mah?? some hott dude"

- Evony's Finest Wordsmith

But enough with Evony, what about Kingory, that other game I wanted to flame? Well let me show you an ad for Kingory.

No I didn't post the wrong image. Kingory uses the exact same advertising strategy. More than that, when I registered and started playing I saw this.

And I experienced the same boredom, disgust and lack of sexy ladies as I did with Evony. Infact Kingory is the exact same shit just for people who thought the Yellow (asian) Power Ranger was more attractive than the Pink (regular old whitey) Power Ranger.

You might ask yourselves why I chose to dive into two games that I knew would be shit. So what was the point? To prove to myself that I'm right about the sorry state of the world I guess. But not everything on this post is about rubbish. To make up for the crappy online games I just flamed I thought I'd share one last online flash game called Bloons TD 4. Bloons TD 4 is a quaint little tower defence game that is simple, colourful and addictive; which is really what you want in an online game. Something you can whip out for a few minutes while you wait for your cuppa soup to heat up. The simple elegance of Bloons stands in complete contrast to these overblown, overcomplicated sacks of garbage known as Evony and Kingory. It also didn't need giant knockers to get me to play it.

ABC 3 Launch Special

It seems that for once in my life I am able to talk about something cutting edge in my blog. It's not every day a new TV channel is launched and what with it being a channel that revolves entirely around children and tweens I figured I'd be crazy not to sink my cynical fangs into the soft, supple target that is ABC 3. So last Friday I sat down in front of the TV and watched The Countdown to ABC 3.

Ok, so the countdown was actually on ABC HD but it had the same hosts and shit and it played out like a massive ad for the channel so I figured that it was a good place to start. Speaking of the hosts, you know how I'm constantly accusing children's television hosts of being dumbed down goofballs who unconvincingly act excited and enthusiastic but really when you look into their eyes you can see that they are devoid of all humanity? Well consider my hypothesis once again officially supported because these hosts met every single aspect of my low expectations with open arms. You may detect a hint of extra bitterness as I speak of the hosts because my friend sent in an hilarious audition video for the job and he would have been a thousand times the host that they are. I considered entering also but abandoned all hope after seeing my friends video because I knew that as long as his was so much better than mine I would not get the job. For neither of us to get it and instead have these souless clowns grinning obnoxiously in the faces of all the children from accross Australia just doesn't feel right. Stupid mankind has failed me once again.

Anyway so apart from the hosts tossing about there was a buttload of promotions for the new shows, there were interviews with hosts and actors FROM the new shows, trailors for the new shows and basically just a bunch of dicking around. There was this utterly redundant running gag about this reporter guy looking for the remote to switch the new channel on. Luckily the Prime Minister of Australia Kevin Rudd happened to pick it up on the way in. That's right, the PM was the very last special guest on the countdown. It was kinda weird to watch really. About 5 minutes in he stopped being the father of our nation and turned more into the embodiment of everybody's daggy dad. In a strange way I liked it, it actually humanised the man watching him trying to be hip to all these new shows and the like. I also thought to myself "I'm so glad my dad is not the Prime Minister."

So anyway then the channel was turned on and the hosts started gabbing on some more and began to promote the show they were about to run. Let me come clean with you at this point in case I haven't been clear on the matter, but every single show on ABC 3 was overhyped before they had even premiered. So anyway on came Prank Patrol which is basically a "Punk'd" for kids in which some kid gets to play a prank on a victim of their choice. It's a pretty solid idea let down by an abundance of padding. The most annoying aspect to the padding are the "Prank Ninja's." Just in case you weren't already COMPLETELY sick of ninja's appearing half-arsedly in practically everthing then in comes the Prank Ninja's doing nothing but add unconvincing and annoying gags to the show. Nobody in the show seems to be into the idea in the slightest, but there they are, the fucking Prank Ninja's doing useless shit and giggling like fucking chimps (no joke). I have this other friend (that's at least two that I have) who's into the whole ninja scene and I was just so glad that he wasn't there with me to witness this bastardisation. But at its core Prank Patrol has a very good thing going. You meet the kid, you get a walkthrough on the intricate details of the prank and then you see the whole thing unfold beautifully. My suggestion for improving the show would be to cut out all the unnescesary crap and have two pranks per episode rather than one.

Then on came CJ the DJ. Not much I can really say about it really. It basically consists of bright colours and voice acting that Stephen Hawking could do a better job of. By this stage I was completely worn down from all this ABC 3 buisiness and decided I needed some food and a life so I turned it off at this point. I have to say though for all the negative things I've said the channel does show promise. Just as an interesting side note the old episodes of that 90's television classic Heartbreak High will be shown on ABC 3, I have no recollections regarding the show's premise or quality but I have friends on Facebook who are excited. Does that sound convincing to anyone?

The Big Bang Theory Review

Seeing as how uni is out for summer and I've had a buttload of free time dumped suddenly into my lap I have recently indulged myself with watching episode upon episode of the TV series The Big Bang Theory; an American sitcom to which I have recently become attached. So seeing as how this is a blog and I need something to talk about I decided I'd review and discuss this particular show as I have with many others in the past. Blah blah blah, wank wank wank, let's talk TV.

So anyway, in case you aren't familiar with The Big Bang Theory let me say that it stays fairly true to the sitcoms we've all seen before with the big difference being the nerd and science twist. If sitcoms were chips then geekiness would be the flavour. This may not sound particularly appealing because one might easily identify the word sitcom with the likes of 'Friends' or 'vomit' but one must remember that there exist sitcoms that surpass those "standards" and manage to enduce actually laughter and enjoyment beyond that which the laugh-track provides. So let's skip the sitcom stuff and dive right into what makes The Big Bang Theory stand out. First off I'm going to go with the accuracy to which the geekiness is portrayed. This isn't your average "beat up the guy with the retainer" nerd affair. The show references real comic books, real sci-fi and real video games and consoles. There's an authenticity on display here that shows dedication and respect on behalf of the writer. A physicist is actually employed to work with the writers to give scientific credibilty to the writing in the show. Granted, I'm not a big enough nerd myself to nitpick the aforementioned credibility but the feel of the show is genuine, which counts for a lot in regards to sitcoms.

Another strong aspect of the show are the characters. Leonard is a sympathetic character struggling for the affection of the attractive, 'average Jane' character Penny who lives across the hall. There's an Indian geek who goes mute in the presence of women unless intoxicated and there's the Jewish geek who lives with his mother and fancies himself a "ladies man" despite constantly repulsing them. But trumping them all in terms of both humour and holding interest is the character of Sheldon. Sheldon is almost beyond description as a character. He often fails to recognise sarcasm or irony. He is indifferent to and unaware of the feelings of others. Having been extremely gifted as a child Sheldon has seemingly grown up without developing the ability to socialise properly with other people. As mentioned before, it's hard to describe what kind of character he really is and that's what's so intruiging about him. In a genre that has quite the reputation for being stale and predictable in walks Sheldon obsessing and lecturing and shaking all expectations to the ground and stomping on them.

Now onto the murkier grounds where I admit that a show I like isn't perfect and identify areas of weakness. Now be warned, if you haven't yet watched up to season 3 and don't want it spoiled you may want to stop reading right now you pansy-motherfuckers. Anyway so in season 3 Leonard finally lucks out and wins the heart of Penny and for the season so far they have been a couple. Coming from a lonely, disillusioned single man with a certain level of geekiness I often felt sympathy for the Leonard character and was able to identify with him at times. Now that he has a hot girlfriend the romantic thrill from the show has died down a bit and Leonard has stopped being sympathetic. I can't sympathise so well with the man when I know that overall he's happy because he has someone and I don't. But personal issues aside the fact of the matter is that the show is running the risk of playing itself out and turning into a semi-soapie-comedy thing unless it takes a step back and really figures out where it wants to take the overarcing plot. The main story thread for the first two seasons was the friendship/unrequited romance between Penny and Leonard and now that the show has reached that goal it seems to be winging it a bit in trying to extend itself beyond that plot. But despite this the show is still good and still worth my precious, precious free time so at present I recommend it. Now if you're lucky I'll stumple across a TV show I dislike intensely and we can count how many times I curse in the review.

PS. I didn't know quite where to slot this in but the Big Bang Theory has one of the most bitchin' theme songs of all time.

Job Hunt Round 4

Now that exams are over and uni is finished for the year my once chocablock timetable has become a free time overload. So before I swing back into the blog scene brandishing clever observations and insightful opinions I thought I'd serve up a slice of my life and watch as you politely but begrudgingly eat it up. So anyway, after several days of lounging around and catching up with my good old friends (video games) my father expressed a certain desire to see my brothers and I pick up some work for over the 3 month break. I hate these times in my life. I hate job hunting, especially in my town. I have no fucking idea how to get my foot in the door. I dish out my resume and apply all over and I never seem to get anywhere. If I have an interview I can guarantee I'll be chasing them up a week after they were supposed to be calling me. I don't know quite what it is. I am certain that my resume is well presented and clearly identifies my previous work experiences which display a great variety of skills. I have prepared food, cut down trees, poisoned weeds, built fences, planted trees, painted fences, stacked shelves, constructed shop displays and worked registers. All of these tasks I took quite seriously and employers seemed to appreciate a certain level of commitment in me. Then there's my various qualifications such as a Cert. II in Conservation and Land Management and my Responsible Service of Alcohol. Nothing I put on my resume ever seems to improve it and I just don't get it. So it is with a certain low level of expectation that I resign myself to the disheartening task of finding myself my fourth job. It's not that I don't want the work or that I don't try very hard to get it, it's just I hate the slim opportunities and not being given the chance to prove myself a valuable employee.

Yes I realise there's nothing funny or interesting in this post.

Wuthering Heights (The 2009 Two Part Series)

Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights is probably the best thing I've ever been forced to read. After reading it the compulsory one time in year 11 at high school I immediately set out and bought my own spiffy copy of it so that I may read it again. It goes up there amongst The Catcher in the Rye, The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and Catch-22 in my favourites of all time list. There's a delicate interplay of opposing forces in this book that I really love. Love and revenge. Tenderness and brutality. Religion and the supernatural. Sophisticated man and wild nature. At it's very core Wuthering Heights is a gothic romance that goes unrequited and is destined to destroy all those around it. So when I saw the ads on ABC for a television adaptation I immediately stamped it down in my mental diary and waited with curiousity to see how one of my favourite books of all time would be treated.

If you are unfamiliar with the general plot of Wuthering Heights let me fill you in. One day the wealthy owner of an estate called Wuthering Heights goes into town and brings home an orphaned child of possible gypsy decent into his home for adoption for some reason. He calls the boy Heathcliff and raises him as one of his own alongside the initially perplexed biological children Hindley and Catherine. Catherine eventaully warms to the boy and they become really close while Hindley acts like a complete cunt, treating him like a servant or slave. Things only get worse years later when their father dies and Hindley inherits the estate, treating Heathcliff in a most cruel manner for winning the affections of his father and sister. So romances and bitter rivalries are set up. More characters are introduced. Misunderstandings and selfish mistakes ensue. Hearts are broken left right and centre and more bitter rivalries are set up. Then finally the tensions are built into a beautiful crecendo of brutal revenge, passion and cruelty. Then the whole thing ends with cousines marrying each other but that's really not important. The narrative itself spans almost 50 years and it can get a bit hard to follow the different characters within the different time periods (the fact that there is a Catherine Earnshaw and a Catherine Linton is particularly confusing). But the plot is pretty solid and well played out even if I do make it sound like an amature drama, Bold and the Beautiful style dog's breakfast.

'But what of the actual production?' I hear you cry out like the well educated and sophisticated fanbase that you are. Well let me first say that I had some very real reservations about this series. Wuthering Heights is a classic in English literature and many attempts have been made in the past to adapt it to either movie or tv. They range from somewhat lacking to an absolutely souless, abomination made by MTV that took the text out of the isolated, turbulent moors of the novel and into a horrible teen drama world with Heathcliff being renamed Heath. But I am happy to say that this adaptation does the original text justice. It knew which angles to take at which points. It knew how to make each and every character so horribly flawed but yet sympathetic and human. It did everything really well. The cast was unfamiliar to me but I'm sure there is some epic bonnet drama enthusiest who'll know who they are but let me tell you that they were spot on. Sure, I had my initial doubts about the actor playing Heathcliff, something about his voice didn't immediately gel. Sure it sounds fussy but Heathcliff is like the most complex and excellent character in the book and if they fucked him up that would be game over in my books. But the man knew what he was doing and I became really immersed in the drama. That said, the first half of the series is definately the weaker of the two. If this adaptation was a disaster movie, the first part would be the annoying character developing stuff at the start where the hero works a dead end job and has 2 kids that his ex-wife won't let him see. Part 2 is the nice beefy intense stuff that I found myself completely drawn into. I came away from the whole production remembering exactly why I loved the book so much and in my eyes if an adaptation makes you do that then it's definately a success.

Coming Soon to Infinite Possiblogities: Actual Content

First of all...I'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorryI'msorry. I know I missed a post last week and that is simply unforgivable (I ordered my gimp to treat me horribly tonight as punishment, no safe words). It's a busy time of year for me with uni exams and and shit so I guess that's my running excuse. It means I have less time to write posts and less time to live the necessary amount of life to aquire post topics. Unfortunately today is kind of similar. Nothing much to report, BUT I do want you to know that there are many ideas in my brain ready for unleashing in the not too distant future. The second part in the TV miniseries adaptation of Emily Bronte's classic novel Wuthering Heights will conclude this Sunday and I'm quite certain I will have a fair hunk of opinions to express about that. I've also got a few creative works under developement which will hopefully be ready for posting soon. Plus when exams are over I'm going to indulge heavily in video games, books, movies, TV series and even zany, around town antics that may inspire an ingenious observation or two. So once again, sorry for being boring and I'll see you next week.

Over-Analysing the Harry Potter Series

Let me get one thing cleared up before I start todays post. I think the Harry Potter Series is pretty good. It was engaging and every book seemed to surpass the one before it in terms of quality. That said there have always been things that bugged me about the series that I found either hard to swallow or ill thought out. So today I decided to provide a convenient list of what mistakes and such I've spotted in the series. Here goes.

Powerful Wizards
It was never actually ever made clear to me what made a wizard powerful. There are many occasions in the series where characters would mention some person being a powerful wizard but it was never clear exactly what made them so. At times I was put in mind of a Dragon Ball Z-esqu scenario in which two characters would huff and pant at each other until the person who did the loudest, most vein popping squat thrust would emerge as the most powerful and wipe the other off the face of the earth. But did wizards actually have levels of power? Did they have a stock of magic akin to a fantasy RPG? Or was it just the fact that knowing a whole bunch of spells and being clever enough to use them on the fly that made them powerful? If that were the case you'd think there'd be many more powerful wizards in the world. Actually, come to think of it, most of the wizards in the book are retards; happy to stroll through life using nothing more than simple charms and shit so that their food serve itself and the like. There were also the occasions where Dumbledore would claim that things like love and friendship were what made a powerful wizard. That all sounds very nice and good but it kinda makes it seem like even non-magic folk could accidently become a powerful wizard just by being in a really friendly group of people and gettingso drunk that they're hanging off each other and sharing their "I love you man" sentiments. Actually this "love conquers all" theme brings me nicely to my next point.

Harry Surviving The Avada Kedavra
For the early parts of the series the circumstances in which Harry was able to survive the "death curse" Avada Kedavra was left a mystery. It again seemed to come down to Harry "being a powerful wizard by some arbitrary designation." At some point though, Dunmbledore reveals that Harry's mum was able to protect him by essentially loving him enough to sacrifice herself. Ok book, again with the love card, fair enough I suppose. BUT Harry is the only person known EVER to have survived that curse. So what? We're supposed to believe that Harry's mum is the only mother in the wizarding world EVER with strong maternal instincts? What, are you kidding me? The way peoples lives were being torn apart by Voldemort you'd think that there'd be a couple more than just the one wouldn't you? I personally preferred Harry's survival story when it was a mystery. Oh, and one other thing? Remember in the first book how Harry was able to defeat Voldemort by touching him because he was still being protected by that love-spell-thing and then Voldemort is able to overcome it in book four by using Harry's blood to grant himself a new body? How the fuck does that work? Voldemort says something along the line of "your protected blood is in my veins now, so I'm now immune to the spell" but really that makes no sense. Why doesn't Harry's blood burn through Voldemort's veins? Why was a rejuvination spell able to do what The Ultimate Death Spell wasn't? Speaking of which.

The Avada Kedavra Spell is Boring
Ok so there's not a whole lot to say to this one, but I never really liked the Avada Kedavra spell. It kinda ruined magic for me. There we were in a world of charms, potions and clever magical innovations and then they dropped a big fat obvious death spell on us. Actually on the topic of spells I never quite understood how one "made" a spell. Professor Snape made that really hectic, fuck off spell when he was but a young lad and it never really explained how. Up to that point magic seemed fixed, you just used whatever existed. But then how is a spell made? Do you just mash latin words together and see what happens?

Muggles
When book seven wrapped things up I was disappointed. No, not JUST because that horrible epilogue thing felt tacked on and shitty. It was because I always kinda thought the whole muggle/wizard relationship would improve or resolve itself in some way. But no, it was not to be. You see I never really liked how wizards thought they were the shit and that muggles were retarded. Pretty much everything wizards could do with magic muggles could do with technology. So why no unity between the two? Surely a megitech utopia ala Final Fantasy VI is just a simple diplomatic event away? Also, why is it wizards seem completely unable to comprehend anything muggle related? I recall the third book mentioning a gun and having to explain it as being "like a muggle wand that makes things dead." Surely having metal rip through your flesh isn't that hard to figure out? And why is it that wizards apparently shared technology with muggles up to about the 18th century and then decided to get all Amish and timelock themselves? I mean they use quils, the wear robes, they ride around in animal drawn carriages. Why is it that they understood muggle tech up to that point but then failed to grasp the concepts behind a steam engine or a computer?

Why Are Wizards Idiots?
Yeah, you heard me. Wizards are idiots. Whatcha gonna do about THAT, fight me? You see in the series you encounter hundreds of characters and really only about 5 or so come accross as intelligent people. All the students do is complain about homework and stuff. Which seems silly because the homework is extremely practical. I mean if you were a wizard, as if you wouldn't just devote all your time to being powerful? I mean I'm not saying I'd become a dark overlord here, but in the barbaric and relatively lawless wizarding world power is everything. Without being able to stand up for yourself you'll just end up being the supreme gimp to the next inevitable dark wizard who rolls along. It's not like wizard homework is "write an essay discussing the various readings present in Tim Winton's Cloudstreet." Wizard homework is "find out how to fuck up your enemies." Stupid wizards.

Or Should I?

What can I say? I'm in a crazy mood. So here for the very first time on Infinite Possiblogities I've decided to post something...duh, duh, DUUUUUH!...creative. That's right after a year or so of taking the piss and criticising I've decided that I will start putting personal, creative writing and the like on my blog. I wouldn't expect mountains of the stuff, but here's just one example of a song that I wrote a few years back. For the record, I do indeed have accompanying music for it but I don't have the means to record it right now...maybe later if you really want? Anyway, it's a song called "Or Should I?" and of all the songs I've written over the years I have always felt that this one is really the most self-reflective. It's about confusion, a desire to save people and features big fat obvious references to J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye. I also like how the song title seems to reflect my reservations about posting such things on my blog and making myself vulnerable to criticism. Anyway, here it is.

Or Should I?
One day I wondered if I
Could be your saviour
But with these nails in my hands
How could I catch you?
Desire leads me to believe
It will be ok
I don't think I can save anyone
Anyway

I thought what I'd do was
I'd pretend I was one of those deaf mutes
Then I could save lives and dodge the truth
and then I'd never have to listen to your bullshit

What I wanted to be
I wanted to be your catcher in the rye
What I really wanted to be
I wanted to be your catcher in the rye
But I don't dare
and life's not fair
No I don't dare

Then I wrote them all some words
to remember me by
It seems I cannot fix it
I cannot put it right
These trends have led to deduce
that nothing matters
But then I became haunted
by your eternal sadness

I know you'll think it's crazy
what I did
I got myself a gun and a catcher's mit
I swear if I could I would
For you

What I really wanted to be
I wanted to be your catcher in the rye
What I thought I'd be
I'd be silent, or should I?
But I don't dare
and life's not fair
No I don't dare

If you believe that I can catch you
then you will be in my arms after the fall
If you believe that I can save you
then I will do my best lest your trust be misplaced
If you believe that I can catch you
Then you will be in my arms tonight
and if you believe that I am the catcher in the rye
Then I will wait for you here at the bottom in case you fall.

Moccona Iced Coffee

For those of you who remember into the distant, hazy past when I wrote my first post on Infinite Possiblogities you might recall that I had no idea where I'd go with it. A little over 100 posts later and many recurring themes and topics have immerged. I'm pretty happy with where it's at. But every now and then in between video game reviews and ranting about porn I get the urge to branch out and challenge myself by doing something new. Sometimes it works and becomes a new trend and sometimes it fails horribly but I always look back and think to myself "I'm glad I tried that." I like to challenge my writing skills and creativity, explore unknown places. So anyway, I thought I'd review/discuss a new food (or indeed drink) item that I sampled today. It was a Moccona Iced Coffee (Latte flavoured in case you actually care).

Anywho so I have this on and off relationship with iced coffee's. Sometimes they are so tastey and sexy that I wanna propose to it and sometimes they are a dregged out hooker who just makes you feel dirty and want your money back. But for me Moccona has "hot coffee" cred, plus I'd sampled a Moccona icecream sometime ago that was simply incredible, so I thought that the Moccona Iced Coffee was worth a shot. So what's the verdict? I dunno, it was a bit disappointing really. I mean it was ok but it was probably the most amature iced coffee I've ever had. Maybe I should've got the "double shot" flavour? I guess I'll have to wait until the strange urges for refridgurated, sweetened bottles of coffee return to find out. Speaking of bottles, Moccona is the only flavoured milk that I am aware of that is sold in glass bottles, which I kinda thought was worth mentioning. Does it change anything? Not really for me. I guess if you're genuinly concerned about the environmental implications of plastic bottles and cartons you might care? Or if you're a pretentious wanker, but I figure if you do fall into that particular category you won't be happy with an iced coffee unless it was prepared by a blind, Swedish barista who grows his own organic beans at a really specific altitude and charges $10 per glass.

*Aside: It's been a while since I added a picture to a post, so here's me with my new Street Fighter IV Fightpad. Can you feel the love tonight?

Why Golf is the Only Sport That Isn't Evil

I sometimes wonder if my posts ever alienate people. Here I am perched atop my ivory tower casting stones at things that I know some of my readers like and praising things that I don't think my readers would have heard of. I have, on occasion, chosen not to post on certain topics knowing full well that the topic would cause resentment amoungst certain readers. When I grew to dislike many aspects of the show Skins, a show I once thought very highly of and many of my friends still do, I chose not to blog about it for fear of direct confrontation. But that was when my blog was more popular, so now I say "fuck it" and type whatever I want about whatever I want. I say this because I had made a remark several weeks ago to a reader about how I thought sports were a very frivolous and pointless endeavor only to be reminded, to my embarrassment, that she plays hockey. Luckily she's not the kind of person who is easily offended by such bold and careless remarks and so I feel that I am quite safe in not alienating at least one reader of mine with todays post. Speaking of todays post, perhaps it's time I stopped mouthing off and got down to buisness.

Ok so as briefly mentioned just before, I think sport is silly. It occured to me one evening that sports have no artistic merits and don't educate us or make us better people in any way. Sure there's the entertainment value, but sport is so cyclic and endless it kinda depresses me. Your team wins some, it looses some, players are constantly replaced and then eventually you're dead, while your team and your sport are constantly being reborn. I do find myself getting into certain events like the Soccer World Cup or the Olympics, but that's about it and it's mostly for the bonding that goes along with it. So it is for this reason that I boldly implied that all sports are evil in the title.

But then there's the implied exception, golf. Golf is very often thought of as a boring sport, especially in terms of spectating. While I agree that golf is absolutely no fun to watch I have to say I see much more appeal in it. Golf is a sport you play at your own pace, in a variety of nicely landscapped outdoor environments and it's not the kind of heavy, endurance sport that you can only play well for a few decades before permanently fucking up some precious bodypart. I like it like that, I could see myself playing golf more often. Also, with other sports the places you play are very much the same. An olympic sized swimming pool for example is always mostly the same. A golf course on the other hand will display much variety between different courses. It keeps you on your toes and will mean you never get too bored with the scenery.

So anyway I dunno really how I should wrap this all up. I guess it would be inproper of me to slander sport like I just have without also acknowledging that I have always been crap at physical activities. I had shitty motorneurone skills that I needed to develope at a special school thing and I always felt left out because I was so fucking useless at everything. So now that I'm all jaded and emotionally dead with a nice blog I can enact revenge on all the things that turned me into the monster I am today. So golf, I like you, you never made me feel like an inadequate man. All other sport *starts crying* FUCK YOU! *Runs to phone his psychiatrist*

The Endless Eight

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is Fantastic. You may remember me praising it a little while back after purchasing the first season on DVD. I also said I would gladly pay for more. Well thanks to the wonders of subtitles and the internet I have been able to stream the episodes of the second season online so that I don’t have to wait forever for the fucking PAL DVD to come out. I honestly wasn’t thinking I needed to do another post on TMOHS; it’s still the same show, it’s still really good and it still stirs all sorts of dormant emotions in me. But then I saw the Endless Eight.

The Endless Eight is something of a miniseries within the series with the over-arcing story about the characters in the show being trapped in an endlessly repeating summer holidays, a predicament that only we, the viewer, are aware of most of the time. That’s really all you should know about the plot to understand my point, so I’ll leave it at that. But what I found really interesting and indeed conflicting about this concept was that it meant seeing what eight episodes that were virtually the same with the exception of some very subtle differences to the dialogue and the costumes as well as some big differences in presentation and tone at times. Essentially I felt these changes were too little. The reason I’m conflicted about this is because it was definitely a bold creative decision to present the plot in this way and it certainly makes an impact upon the viewer. There’s no denying it was used to immerse the watcher in the cyclic hopelessness of the situation and there were times I really felt it, screaming at the oblivious characters to act differently and break the horrible loop. I can’t deny that I got the same sense of being trapped that the characters felt but ultimately I also think it was too much. It was clever, it was bold and it had a tremendous impact on me. But at eight episodes in length I wondered on several occasions just why they felt it had to be so damn long. If it were four episodes long as opposed to eight I would’ve had no complaints and no conflicted thoughts, but I guess I’ll just have to live with the choices they made.

The Endless Eight

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is awesome. I said so myself a little while back after purchasing the first season on DVD. I also said I couldn’t wait for more. Well thanks to the wonders of subtitles and the internet I have been able to stream the episodes of the second season online way before they’re likely to make a western, PAL region appearance. To be honest I wasn’t thinking I would do another post on TMOHS; it’s still the same show, it’s still really good and it still stirs all sorts of dormant emotions in me. But then came the Endless Eight.

The Endless Eight is something of a miniseries within the series with the concept that the characters in the show have been unaware of the fact that the same three weeks or so have been replaying themselves over and over. I don’t want to give too much of the plot away, so I’ll leave it at that. But what I found really interesting and indeed conflicting about this concept was that it meant seeing what was essentially the same episode eight times. There were some very subtle differences to the dialogue and the costumes as well as some big differences in presentation and tone at times but essentially I felt this was too little. The reason I’m conflicted about this is because it was definitely a bold creative decision to present the plot in this way and it certainly affects the viewer. It was definitely used to immerse the watcher in the cyclic hopelessness of the situation and there were times I really felt it, screaming at the oblivious characters to act differently and break the hideous loop. You can’t deny that you get the same sense of being trapped that the characters feel but ultimately I also think it was too much. It was clever, it was bold and it had a tremendous impact on me. But I felt it all would’ve been much more effective if it had been half as long. If it were four episodes long I would’ve had no doubts in my mind that this was a brilliant idea that took a whole lot of balls to execute.

My Favourite Posts

This is more for people who have not had the luxury of knowing me for very long or not being completely on board with my blog from day one. To make your lives slightly easier I've compiled a list of what I consider to be the funniest or most important of my blogs. It basically halves the content for you, which is handy. The list is in order from oldest to newest, which I felt is the most helpful order to read them in. I haven't included ANY videogame reviews, but I have included some gaming related posts that I feel are entertaining enough to keep.

1. Losing My Blogging Virginity
2. The Vanishing Cheez
3. The Sus Side of DK
4. The Infinite Possiblogities Guide to Doing a Beardy
5. Entertainment Industry 101
6. Victoria Roberts is Shit
7. This Is How I Will Lose My Fans
8. Olympic Opening Ceremony
9. Weatherwoman
10. A Day in the Life
11. Today on Infinite Possiblogities; Mr.B Reviews a Sack of Porn
12. 9 Songs
13. Goodbye Beijing
14. A Look Back on the Games
15. What's the Point
16. Beam Me Up
17. Sonic VS. Mario
18. The Celebration
19. The Infinite Possiblogities Guide to Blogging
20. "i got the hat and the t-shirt lol love em haha x"
21. My Apologies
22. The Infinite Possiblogities Guide to Being a Villain
23. I Told You My Paranoia Would Pay Off
24. If Life Were a Videogame: Lesson One - Sleeping
25. Live from the Shelves of Sam's Warehouse
26. Today's Mystery Shop Item Is Hippie Chick Deodorant
27. If Life Were a Videogame: Lesson Two - Social Interactions
28. The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya Review
29. The Infinite Possiblogities Guide to Taking Down a Christmas Tree
30. Martin Morning
31. Based on Books Part 1 and Part 2
32. The Joys of Physical Education
33. If Life Were a Videogame - Katamari's
34. My Life at University
35. An Update on Morning TV
36. Over-Analysing the Merchant
37. Are YOU Prepared?
38. Watchmen Review
39. Pros and Cons of Having an Afro
40. The Great Facebook Experiment
41. Why Would Anyone Want to Become a Geologist?
42. The Fattest Reject
43. The Infinite Possiblogities Guide to Diabetes Prevention
44. The Real Message in Romeo and Juliet
45. Daria - Review and Rant
46. Welcome to School Girl Internal
47. Channel V and Modern Music - An Infinite Possiblogities Rant
48. An Evening with Jeff Goldblum
49. Christians Uncut - Bashing the Bible Bashers

I know it seems like a lot but there are a fair few short ones in there. I dunno whether anyone will bother using it, but for what it's worth, it's up there.

Doctors, Doctors, Doctors (and Uninspired Titles)

As an ex-epileptic, type one diabetic who's prone to ocassional asthma attacks and grew up with shitty motorneurone skills you might be right in saying I've seen a lot of doctors in my time. At the rate I'm going I'm sure I'll manage to rack up a few more medical impedments along lifes long (or perhaps short) road.

Something I've noticed about the medical industry is how cyclic it is. Every once in while (a year or two, I can't remember) I have to go back to my GP so that he can refer me back to the doctor I see for my diabetes. Then every once in a whie I'm referred to another specialist to check up on various "complications prone" organs like my eyes or kidneys. Don't get me wrong, this isn't my usual bitch sesh, I need to ride the medical industry rollercoaster so that I can go on living and complaining about everything else.

But then there's the medical certificates. When I look at medical certificates I find myself in great confusion. On the surface it seems straightforward. People need proof that you were too sick to perform a certain task and you go to the doctor who confirms it by giving you a medical certificate. It sounds fair enough but upon closer examination it gets a bit weird. Like what if you can't get in to see a doctor right away? That's ok because the whole process is fairly relaxed about it. Doctors will usually write you up a certificate AFTER you've been sick and most places will accept certificates given to them late if they're given some sort of warning in advance. As a very recent example my brother was very ill earlier in the week and lacked the energy and fitness to attend a Chemistry Test at uni. He emailed the lecturer to let him know and then started phoning around for appointments. All the town doctors were booked solid, so he tried the university medical centre and made an appointment for a few days down the track. He said he needed a medical certificate for that day and they pretty much said "it's alright, we'll do you one that'll cover you for a few days back." So basically they're saying that, regardless of how he presents symptom wise on the day, my brother will get a medical certificate saying that he was to sick to do the test. Which I'm ok with, because he really was, but it does make the whole thing seem redundant. Well, redundant for everyone except the doctors who get paid to write out a simple note.

The Latest Buzz

Apparently I'm falling into something of a TV-reviewing rut at the moment but you know something? Fuck it. I saw something I wanted to write about and I'm going to god-dammit. So anyway I was watching ABC Kids this afternoon and good old The Latest Buzz came on and the "soft target" alarms immediately droned in my skull.

"But what is The Latest Buzz?" I hear you ask. Well, Infinite Possiblogitonians (aka loyal fans) cast your minds way, way back (probably about 100 posts ago) to the time I reviewed a truely insipid show called Zoey 101. Well imagine Zoey 101 where the kids write for a magazine and add a laugh track. There you go, The Latest Buzz. As you may or may not recall I applied my usual cynicism to the show and made a general point about how these tween, Disney Channel clones are re-churned, out of the cocain-addled minds that dictate what we watch, every time the young stars are seen to be behaving in any way resembling a normal human being and not merely a larger version of the Officially Licenced Dolls. Sentence too long and confusing for you? In other words they axe the show when the kid is photographed topless and they replace it with what is essentially the same show with a brand new, squeaky-clean cast. And that's exactly what The Latest Buzz is like, as if it rose from the ashes of Zoey 101. It's the same old characters you know and love (or not) from Lizzy McGuire, sure they look different but I promise that after a few seconds you'll be predicting their lines. I've provided a visual aid to help illustrate my point.


See what I'm saying? Yes I know there's no apparent nerd character in The Latest Buzz's cast picture BUT in the episode I saw just now there WAS a nerd character, so suck on that! But, to it's credit, although I could never call The Latest Buzz good, it's not really bad either. When I watch it it just doesn't lacerate my brain the way Zoey 101 used to. Funnily enough it's points that I'd usually consider to be bad that I think save it. The laughter track and the way the show is so self-aware it feels like it's nudging and winking at you somehow save it from being as BAD as Zoey 101, which is interesting. I guess it's mainly because Zoey 101 felt like it took itself so damn seriously even though it was completely rediculous. The Latest Buzz just feels like stupid, harmless fun and when compared to Zoey 101 actually looks decent, which says a lot more about Zoey 101's quality than about the quality of The Latest Buzz.

P.S. I forgot to mention how The Latest Buzz's theme song is *massive sigh* sung by one of the actresses, but I'm sure my cleverclogs readers would probably of guessed that anyway.

The Bitch Genre

Like my Channel V music rant from a while back this story begins with me eating lunch at the university cafe being forced into watching the pay TV. I've mentioned before how I think TV is a dying medium desperately trying to reignite our passion and watching pay TV only serves to magnify the issue. In other words pay TV is shit. If you've seen something on commercial television that you thought was bad then chances are theres a whole entourage of bullshit just like it on pay TV.

Now one of the new tricks that television is slamming down our eyeballs is what I like to call the Bitch Genre. The Bitch Genre has the following generic signifiers

• Girls fighting
• Girls crying
• Girl-on-camera expositional bitch sessions
• Judges trying to be edgey

I'm sure you know what shows I mean here, these shows are self-serving, egotistical, rating grabbing rubbish. I remember seeing an episode of America's Next Top Model in which Tyra Banks spent a considerable amount of time patting herself on the back for coming up with the idea of a photoshoot in which the models emerge from the water. What the fuck Tyra, are you kidding me!?! Practically every fucking magazine I've ever opened in my life has done that, I would go trying to patent that shit just yet. And How many seasons of Idol do we have to endure before we realise that not a single talented person has come out of that fucking competition? Can't anyone see these shows for what they really are? They get a bunch of sexy young morons and lock them into a competition so that they may humiliate themselves in a desperate attempt to grab the spotlight; and for what? So that we develope a correlation between success and incompotence? So we can be reminded that no matter how hard we try there's always someone who's far better and most likely a complete, narcisistic cunt? Who needs this shit? I don't. Most people watch shit like this because it's on while they eat and unfortunately that makes shows like these far more popular than they ever deserved to be. It's one of those things where people say to me "Don't pretend you don't know this show, I know it's bad but everyone watches it" which is a question I seem to cop alot in regard to Friends and Neighbours to which I reply "I don't!" I recently watched the complete series of Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister which is extremely clever and, at the time, very popular. People were astounded that a show so intricate and complex with it's portrayal of political life could make itself available and enjoyable to so many people. The show's creator was questioned on the matter and to completely misquote him said "give the public more credit and stop broadcasting shit" and I completely agree.

P.S. He didn't really say that part about broadcasting shit

The World Ends With You - DS Review

It's been a while since I've reviewed a "sqeenix" game. Actually for any of my hardcore devotees the last and only Square-Enix game I reviewed was Kingdom Hearts, an overated sack of bland, which is actually rather disappointing because Square-Enix have many great games under their belts like, for example, the whole Final Fantasy series and I have been quite happy to play them without going to any lengths to blog about them. Perhaps when they decide to fuck some of their shitty side projects off and decide to finally release Final Fantasy XIII I'll review that. I guess the main reason I haven't been reviewing them is because I'd inevitably end up mostly reviewing the story. Because let's face it, despite tweaks and refinements the gameplay in these games is all very much the same and doesn't leave alot to discuss. Even beyond gameplay there are alot of recurring themes and shit in JRPG's that I wouldn't mind seeing the back of for a while. That said, The World Ends With You is a refreshing take on the JRPG formula and coincidently I have just finished it. So shall I review it? I think I shall.


The World Ends With You see's you taking control of the introverted, society loathing Neku who has ended up locked in a parallel world with a handfull of other characters in a twisted game where first prize is the chance to not die. The story for the first half of the game is quite intriguing. I liked the idea of being one of many pawns in a game of chess that is totally tilted in the other teams favour in a world being manipulated by an omnipotent being known only as The Composer. The story get's less good towards the ending as the game decides to expand and develope the less interesting parts of the story. The ending is good enough but I felt it should've been so much more. I feel the same way about a lot of JRPG's that delve into nihilistic ideas and I suppose the reason is that the designers feel that the characters need meaning in their life in order to fight the antagonist. I mean what's wrong with the motivation of not wanting to die? JRPG fans are probably all familiar with this scenario; characters lined up in front of the final boss each elaborating on the lessons they've learned and the reasons they must win while the final boss ignores them and laughs. Why does a meaningless view of the world translate into not being motivated to live? I honestly would like game writers to consider that sometime soon.

The combat in the game is quite diverse when compared to the usual JRPG method of mashing A to select attacks from a menu. The top and bottom screen can be controlled simultaneously using two different control schemes. It actually feels a little bit like a rhythm style game during combat, akin to Dance, Dance Revolution. Using this control scheme can be difficult to pull off at times but luckily there's an auto-play option that automatically kicks in for the top screen controls if you stop using them for a while. Difficulty can be adjusted in a variety of ways by the player at any point in the game and players are rewarded appropriately for toughing it out by earning more, and better, stuff. This gives the game a replayability that is lacking in most JRPG's. It also gives the game an "easy to learn, hard to master" demeanor that works well and I instantly wished that more JRPG's had adjustable difficulty at any point in the game because it also does away with the need for heavy grinding sessions.


The main thing I didn't like is that the story and gameplay don't mesh, as with a lot of JRPG's. Oddly enough it's probably even more so for TWEWY because moving the story along inevitably involves navigating your character around the same old places. The combat, the dialogue and the world map all have different screens and so they feel disconnected. It's like you'll be getting into the story and then you're interrupted by a battle or required to go somewhere else which cuts everything up a bit. Outside of combat all you're really required to do is search the map for the next round of dialogue. It's all triggered depending on where you are so the game ultimately bloils down to searching and reading with small bursts of required combat tossed in as well.

But overall The World Ends With You is pretty good and certainly worthy of at least some of your time. While it ultimately falls into a few tired JRPG trends it does enough different and has a unique enough style to stand out from the crowd.

Christians Uncut - Bashing the Bible Bashers

At the risk of losing the support and loyalty of all my more religious inclined followers I've decided to rip on a poster I see around the university campus. The poster is a notice for a weekly presentation by the local churchies to try and make Christianity seem cooler and more relevant to the youth of today. I suspect these may have all been presented last semester however so it looks like I won't be able to rock up to any of them and stir the shit. So instead I'll bash the bible bashers on my secret blog so I can cause waves of anti-religious unrest online. Oh wait, I'm sorry. According to the title of Week 2's seminar "Christians aren't religious." Boy is my face red. I guess I was all wrong about the Christian community and as a result I'll just wrap this embarrasing post up right now.

Ok so now that I've reached my minimal sarcasm quota for the intro I thought I'd better attempt to replicate the poster so that it is easy to follow my rant. Everything in yellow is on the poster.

CHRISTIANS
[UNCUT]

*picture of a hammer coming down hard on a small stereo system*
Smashing the Stereotype
(just wanted to interject here to give my nod of approval to the use of pictorial puns. Haw haw, jolly good)

[Week 1] Christians aren't perfect people
[Week 2] Christians aren't "religious"
[Week 3] Why is there suffering in the world? (feat. Bishop Muhima)
[Week 4] Christians love sex
[Week 5] Christians can drink
[Week 6] Christians who love science

Jesus non-existant Christ! They've sure got a lot of explanations here. First of all I would just like to point out that nobody who is against religion or Christianity thinks that Christians are perfect people. Who the fuck would? I'm pretty sure Richard Dawkins is atheist because he believes religious folk are counter productive, morally confused slaves to an ancient, incomprihensible text. So I don't really know what they would say in that sermon, something about everybody being sinners and all we need to do is prey for forgiveness. Some shit like that.

Second week has already been mocked by me but let me elaborate in a more professional way. Christians ARE religious because they have devoted their lives to the service of a Christ-based religion. It's akin to saying that apples aren't fruit or humans aren't animals or that Yes Minister isn't a really fucking awesome and clever television series. It's just plain old wrong. But just to let me put it another way. If Christains aren't "religious" then what the fuck are they, a cult? Or are they just a bunch of people who all like the same book a whole bunch, stunt the growth of humanity as a whole and enjoy getting up early to hang out in churches? So that week is shit. Next!

Ah yes the old athiest argument, "if there's an all powerful god who cares about us why does he let us wallow in our own misery and suffering so often?" This is where they bust out their "the lord moves in mysterious ways" and "God must test our faith" arguments. Let me be perfectly blunt, these arguments are shite. If God is such a fucking enigmatic character then how can the bible be considered accurate. The bible after all is written by a bunch of men vainly trying to understand God, so if it's still a mystery you might as well prop up your piano with it because it will inevitably be unreliable as a guide. Also God wouldn't need to test our faith if he actually made life good. If world hunger was instantly abolished tomorrow I might be more inclined to think that the bible might be on to something, but you know what? God's too busy trying to bully us into Sunday mass. So let's just say that God is as he is in the bible, then he is a bloodthirsty, merciless, self centred bastard who is in no way deserving of our time or effort. According to the bible God's death toll dwarves that of Satan's. So why does bad stuff happen? Because the universe is a place of random chance and undiscriminating chaos. Christians live and die by the same rules as the rest of us.

Christians love sex. Not just like. They LOOOOOVE it. Let me just say that most people do. But what they're trying to clear up here is the fact that sex is a gift from God for married couples. Christians tend to abstain up to the honeymoon point, or at least promote that value. That's why just about every Christian I know at the moment is engaged to wed at such a young age. There's only so much holding hands and dry humping a couple can do before they seal the deal. Now does this sound good to you? I mean you gotta be sure you're ready for marriage. You wouldn't wanna rush into things. Besides sex is one of the deepest forms of intimacy going these days, so how could you be sure about marriage without it? And I mean if you really want it what's the point of witholding it from yourselves? "Oh because it's with the right person and it's all the better because I saved it for the person I really love and blah blah blah." How could it be better? Sex is something you get better at with EXPERIENCE. Everyone's first time is going to be a massive lolnoob fml situation to a certain extent. So why not get good at it so that you can really impress your true love when the time comes? I'm not saying I think all people should have sex all the time with anyone they can but if you actually want to then don't let people tell you not to do it.

Christians can drink. Don't really care about this argument too much. Drink, don't drink, it really feels like I'm retreading the sex ground here.

Now this one is good, Christians who love science. This could almost be a whole blog unto itself. This is a weird debate to take up but ultimately I feel that the bible and science are incompatible. Science demands constant scrutiny, especially on itself. Religion is about excuses and coming up with defensive arguments against scientific progress. Christianity especially is obsessed with tarting up the church in order to make it appeal to the susceptible, vulnerable and confused youth (as this poster aptly demonstrates). So what about these people who sit on the fence and practice science but remain closet God followers? Well this is the part that's weird. There are so many degrees of religious devotion. You could believe every single word your minister serves up to you or you could take it all as vague suggestion and pick out the bits you identify with and leave the rest. Either way seems odd to me. The bible is a mass of contadictions and very strange passages that aren't in the slightest bit believable. Plus is you pick and mix your own parts of the bible then doesn't that sort of nullify that validity of the bible as a whole? If it's whatever you want it to be then why does it need to be there at all except to use quotes to back youself up when you're inevitably in a heated debate over the internet with a no good, indecent, morally abhorrent blogger.

The Final Hours of the Jeff Goldblum Marathon - The Big Chill

I'll bet some of you will be glad to see the end of this review as it signifies the end of the Jeff Goldblum movie review marathon that has been going on for a while now. I decided to end with The Big Chill because although it is not quite as good as The Fly it is an interesting, surpirisingly deep comedy and for once old Jeffy is not, I repeat NOT, a scientist but a journalist which on the surface would be sorta like if Morgan Freeman played a nazi. But there are two compensating factors for this. Firstly Jeff is once again a sly, sexy, quirky motherfucker with some solid dialogue that's well delivered. Secondly is that he stars alongside a cast of about 8 others who are all interesting and well developed in their own right. So basically there's less screen time for him.

The plot of the movie is fairly light. Nine college friends are reunited for the funeral of the tenth friend who killed himself for some reason and catalyses the coming together and healing of these once close but now estranged aquaintences. So they spend a weekend together and that's about it for plot. Instead of playing the story card the movie decides to go for the character developement and it pays off. It's like watching real people with real feelings and real lives. Even the characters in danger of becoming stereotypical are well realised and fleshed out. That's pretty much the movie in a nutshell, just some guys doing stuff. There's no answers, no closure but that's the intent. It reminded me of a weekend I'd recently spent with my friends for a 21st. We all got togther, hung out, traded stories and partied. Then when it was over we went our seperate ways vowing to keep in touch until next time (which incidently is this weekend). The movies end conjured up the same feelings as though I'd actually spent the weekend with these people, comparing their lives and wondering what changed. I gotta say it's pretty impressive to be able to claim that as a movie. I didn't walk away from Spiderman and think to myself "I wonder what Peter's doing right now?" It's like escapism that not all of you returns from.

Now onto the bad points, or point I should say "point" because there is really only one. Sex. There are nine thirty-something adults staying in a big house and somehow it turns into a lusty, sex romp. These characters are married to characters outside the party but they hook up. One character wants to hook up to harvest some sexy man-juice and get a baby. Even the suicide victims girlfriend doesn't give a second thought to boarding the greasy meat train of one of the greiving friends. I'd say it reminds me of highschool parties but then I realise that in comparison highschool hookups were a minor thing. Is this really necessary guys? Then to top it all of Jeff's character tries so hard to get some but comes up short everytime. It's funny. It's painful. But most of all I don't buy it for a second. I mean if young Jeff every came on to me and delivered his sexy wit directly into my excited ear canal then I'd just...*ahem* anyway sorry I guess I started sleep typing or something there. I just blanked out and it turns out I'd written a bunch of...stuff...can't quite understand it myself.

Tune in next time for something a bit more ranty and mundane.

Resuming the Evening with Jeff Goldblum - The Fly

This evenings review is going to be a shorter one for 2 reasons. One, it's a good movie and gushing isn't funny and two, if I discuss it too much I'll spoil it. Anyway, enough excuses, on to the review.

In The Fly a much younger Jeff Goldblum plays (can you guess?) a quirky scientist. I wonder if it was this role that sealed his fate to play eccentric genius characters for the bulk of his career? I certainly wouldn't be surprised as this movie good enough to try and immitate for years to come. But then again he plays a much more tragic, romantic and sympathetic character than his other roles in which he is the wise-cracking smart arse to play off the "straight man" which is usually more the tense situation than another person. "Romantic?" I hear you ask, yes that's right playing the role of Jeff's penis recipient today is his future ex-wife Geena Davis, who is also much younger and looking quite appetising indeed (if I focus on her I can tune out the fact that a young, muscle-bound Jeff Goldblum is doing pull ups without a shirt on). The film is often described as a romantic horror and I think this is a pretty good way of pigeon-holing it. As all horror films do The Fly does really cool special effects. It has that organic wonder where it looks both fake and convincing at the same time. Parts will gross you out and horrify you but all the while you'll be thinking "how'd they DO that?" Now I've already stated that I like the movie, BUT that said I wouldn't go about just recommending it willy nilly. It's sad, it's themes get a bit heavy and it's graphic on several occasions. In other words, it's not for pussies. But it's these things that make it great. On top of that it's very human. Humanity really doesn't pop up in movies as much as you'd think. You only really notice it's been absent after being exposed to it and when you are it's fairly refreshing. So that's about all I can say really, The Fly is good if you've got the balls to stomach it.

You can see why I felt I should keep it short now, right?

An Evening with Jeff Goldblum - The Coffee, Snack and Toilet Break

Ok so we've watched/reviewed 3 movies in a row now and I think it's time to have a little break so we can go to the toilet, have a stretch and stock up on snacks. I also thought it'd be a good time to let you know that after I smash out the rest of this Jeff Goldblum mini-series of reviews (which will be soon enough my love slaves) I will work to a far more rigorous deadline with Infinite Possiblogities. From now on there will be a new I.P. up every Friday at the very least. On the odd occassion I can't make the deadline (curse you higher education) then I'll do my best to let you know in advance and will do my best to get the delayed post up quickly. If I'm feeling particularly clever and find myself basking in an excess of leisure time you may even get the odd extra post. Anyway, you'd better finish up and grab whatever you need for the next movie...it's about to begin...ssshhhhhhhhhhh...

An Evening with Jeff Goldblum - Independence Day

Jeff Goldblum once again plays a leading role as an eccentric scientist in a movie that is, at best, good looking. I saw this movie as a child when it first came out and have seen it many times since and I have come to the conclusion that it is almost complete rubbish. I say almost because of two things, Jeff Goldblum and Will Smith. Jeff and Will seem a rather odd choice to pair up and if I'd been the skeptical douche I am now when Independence Day first reared its' ugly head I'd have said "it won't work." Finding out what a fantastic on-screen pair they make is like finding out Coco Pops go well with Coca Cola (of which I have no idea, so don't ask). It's a shame that it's really only at the end that the two actually talk to one another and exchange their odd-couple bickerings and witty retorts because it stands as a massive plus in a movie that is far-fetched, overblown and sickeningly patriotic. On that note I feel it necessary to say this, the American President is never, I repeat, NEVER a good character for an action movie. Why? Because then the movie inevitably becomes self-indulgent, nationalistic tripe churned out to wring the money out of your average, white trash American patriot in between watching WWII movies and a documentary on the civil war. The President manages to give a particularly moving/disgusting speech at the end that really nails the last nail in his characterisation coffin.

Moving on from the disgusting characters comes the semi-retarded plot. It's not particularly complex so listen up. One day some alien ships come to Earth and place themselves strategically over all the Earth's major cities. Nobody seems to know what to do at this point but if I were in the movie I'd guess that maybe they were setting themselves up for the Guiness World Record for the World's Most Epic Checkmate? Am I right? Of course I'm fucking right! It's a disaster movie, the aliens won't come in peace. The first to go are the nutjobs and losers who are greeting the aliens in order to dick suck their way into a better life. Most of the plot consists of over dramatised "what's our next move." Their next move is retalliation but apparently the super intelligent beings are well and truely prepared and give the pitiful U.S. Airforce the ego bruising arse-rape it so dearly needs. A whole bunch of blah-de-blah later and Jeff and Will are in space in an enemy/alien ship that crashlanded 50 years ago to deliver a computer virus to the alien mothership before the human race is exterminated to make way for an intergalactic superhighway. Oh wait sorry, that would be far too humorous for this drab, takes-itself-way-too-seriously action wank. Naturally they are an evil race akin to parasites who travel time and space exploiting all natural resources they can find and moving on, leaving a destroyed habitat and many extinct species as their legacy. Naturally this goes against the grain of our very existance as human beings and so we vow to end it. So yeah the plot is shit, although I am ready to admit that the computer virus twist is perhaps a hint at genius in amongst the tired stereotypes and loud bangs.

Another thing I am prepared to admit to liking is the presentation. The alien ships as well and the aliens themselves look genuinely menacing. Most of our impressions of the aliens come across in their large, dark and forboding ships as the aliens themselves get very little screentime and this, I feel, is for the better. It's not that the aliens look silly or that you can see them wearing a wristwatch or anything like that, the aliens actually look very cold and creepy. But they are far more sinister, ominous and oppressive when we can only make guesses about them based on their ship. One gets the inpression that the ship "sees all and knows all" as it hovers above the city, monitoring the tiny world below.

So what's to say about this movie overall? When it's all said and done Independence Day is impressive on an explosion and effects scale but fails tremendously in every other area. The brilliance of Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum bump up the movie, but only from an F to a D.

An Evening with Jeff Goldblum - Jurassic Park and The Lost World

You get a special double helping of both dinosaur action and tastey, tastey Jeff Goldblum today as we review the Steven Spielberg films of Jurassic Park and its sequal The Lost World.


In Jurassic Park Jeff Goldblum plays Dr Ian Malcolm, an out-there chaos theorist with a sharp wit and something of a rockstar disposition. Let me just say that Dr. Malcolm and the old guy that founds the park are the best characters in Jurassic Park. Dr. Malcolm has the best lines and is the most likeable whilst the old guy (John I believe his name is) is a sympathetic character who's dreams and ambitions are the foundations for the disasters that follow. The other characters are Spielberg's classic stereotypes that he shoehorns into all his damn movies. There's the sassy woman, the worried lawyer, the stupid stupid kids and the guy-who-hates-kids-at-the-start-but-then-grows-quite-attached-to-them-because-survival-brings-people-together-and-really-makes-you-appreciate-things-in-a-whole-new-light. All THESE fucktards are about as deep and well developed as a cardboard cutout with a speech bubble stuck to it. But at least we have the other two characters who are more than able to carry the rest thr...oh fuck Dr. Malcolm broke his leg and will be ignored from now on. Guess that fucks that up. In the Lost World Dr. Malcolm returns with a much needed increase in his lines and the movie is made all the better for it. Mind you the characters in this one are stupidly stereotypical and flat aswell. There's the child, the stubborn girlfriend, the greedy capitolist bastard, the hunter and the COMPLETE DICKHOLE ENVIRONMENTALIST GUY WHO GETS OTHER PEOPLE KILLED BY ATTEMPTING SURGERY ON AN INJURED BABY T-REX AND BY DELIBERATELY STEALING BULLETS FROM PEOPLE'S GUNS. I mean seriously this guy is a self righteous fucktard wanker who I personally wanted to kick in the balls til they poked through his brain. Sounds harsh but he is truely a douchebag you need to see to believe.

Another problem I have with this movie is how often you'll be yelling at the characters to stop being stupid. Characters carry guns but never fucking use them, they just stand there and scream. Just kill it you moron, you can scream all you want once it's dead. Now that we're on the topic of screaming and acting like mindless servings of food I feel it would be silly not to metion the children at this point. The children who turn on flashing lights so that the nearby dinosaur can definately see them. The chilren who need to be saved regularly by other, less stupid characters. The children who even when they have the brilliant idea to draw dinsaurs away from other characters with noise, execute it in a stupid way by drawing the dinosaurs to themself rather than thowing something as to make alot of noise that is not near them or indeed anybody. You'll resent those goddamn kids lemme tell you that for nothing (the asking price for all my worldly insights).


But complaints aside the movies are both well paced, intense, action packed and funilly enough believeable. I believed that dinosaurs really were feasting on people, especially in the second one which lends more special effects power so that the deaths are more explicit rather than implied. I must say I am a big fan of the second one with its increased violence, death toll and indeed Jeff Goldblum ratio. But then the second movie does something so stupid that it kinda wrecks it all. Within the last half hour of the movie the capitolst wanker character stupidly decides to take the T-Rex off the secluded island and bring it to the city, for the public to enjoy. Of course this is just Steven Spielberg setting up a completely dumb, destructive action aside that fails to serve the plot in any way at all. Sure it's kinda cool to see old Rex headbutt a bus and chase a crowd of Japanese through the streets BUT it came at a very large cost. All of a sudden I said to myself "hang on! Dinosaurs getting cloned from DNA? Frogs filling in the DNA gaps? Animal experts acting inexpertly? This can't happen, it's IMPOSSIBLE!" It is at this point the movie stops being immersive and believable and starts being just a plain ol' popcorn and coke movie. It's the point at which Spielberg coaxes the plot away from Michael Crichton's carefully crafted text and descides to go for a big blockbuster action copout wank. Sure it's cool and might even stimulate your need to see things obliterated but it's at the cost of all the subtlety both the movies had been working so hard at. In the first movie they withold the dinosaur action a fair bit at the start to built suspense. The characters drive past the pens wanting to see them but they aren't in view. Now here we have one smashing up shit in the middle of the city. The rampage itself leaves a lot of questions unanswered as well. Where the fuck is the army? Or some sort of city defence? They have a large preditor tearing shit up for about 20 mins and the only response is for the main characters to lure the animal back to the ship to trap it by using it's offspring as bait. For fucksake KILL IT! KILL IT BEFORE IT KILLS YOU! ARE YOU STUPID? THIS THING WANTS YOU ALL DEAD! STOP CARING ABOUT IT! IF YOU REALLY CARED ABOUT NATURE YOU'D KILL IT BECAUSE TECHNICALLY IT IS AN INTRODUCED SPECIES ANYWAY! THAT AND YOU SHOULD STOP CARING ABOUT NATURE WHEN IT WANTS YOU ALL DEAD!!!