We join The Doctor, Amy and Rory in the Wild West (they missed their intended target, the Day of the Dead festival by a sizable margin). Turns out that the town they have entered is stuck in a force field that will let no food or weapons in but will let people cross over. The reason for this is because on the horizon there is a teleporting cyborg called The Gunslinger that is out for revenge against the Doctor. No, not our Doctor, but a Doctor called Kahler Jex, who seems like a nice guy. He supplies the town with medical supplies and electricity by using his advanced alien ways and the power from his crashed spaceship.
Daily Archives: September 16, 2012
New Fringe Season 5 Promo!
Here comes another noteworthy Fringe promo. They’re going full bore into preparing us for this whole flash forward thing they showed us last season, this time with a more viral video approach rather than a straight up preview. As we know, the Observers turned from an interesting story element of the mythology of the show, to the forefront of the threat to humanity as we know it. They have become the one, big bad, unifying thing that ties all of the “Fringe” events of Fringe all together in its entirety. The promo itself is fairly simple, with an Observer describing “Residency protocol”, which is just code for the installed curfews on us. He also frequently references “A scan”, which as we saw last season, is tantamount to a horrific psychically induced death, a la Scanners. In fact, assuming it’s intentional, I’m fairly positive it’s a reference to that film.
But of course they can’t show this on TV, but we all know that’s what they mean.
Here’s the promo:
I’m really antsy for this season to come already, as Fringe is a show that is truly unique. Never has a show gone from being truly awful, like it was in Season 1, to one of the best examples of Science Fiction in recent memory, and by far the best Sci-Fi show on television today. If you had asked me that the fifth season of this show would be as good as it is, and be where it is, in relation to the first season, I would have slapped you for trying to trick me into continuing to watch a terrible show. It took the coaxing of several friends repeatedly telling me “it gets better, it gets better, just watch it!”, to trudge all the way though the full first season. When I did, I got to that admittedly pretty clever and enticing last episode, which opened up the show in such a beautiful and revelatory way. It’s climb in quality since then has been exponential, and created some of the best hours of TV I’ve ever seen. Season 3’s “White Tulip“, featuring Peter Weller, also known as goddamned RoboCop, is an incredibly moving and brilliant time travel story that never manages to lose its emotional center, or get bogged down with technical minutiae. That episode alone puts Fringe up in the echelon of brilliant modern TV shows, alongside Battlestar Galactica, Lost, the first season of Heroes, Doctor Who, Carnivale, and even The X-Files.
The flash forward in this season isn’t exactly a new idea itself, as Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse employed the same tactic for its season finales, for both its seasons. Unfortunately, Dollhouse was a muddled, plodding, slow paced show that never found its footing, and meandered about for the whole first season until that decent finale. It’s a bummer that the finale, which might as well have been an entirely different show, was a much better show than Dollhouse ever was. Then Season 2 rolled around, and went back to the same boring, plodding pace, and that was enough for me. Fringe has taken the sudden flash forward concept and ran with it. What will happen to our Fringe team? What happened to Olivia in between now and then? And will the Observers be stopped? Will timelines be changed? Can they be changed? Is there truly no fate but what we make?
There’s even a few noticeable Easter eggs in the promo, that compelled me to grab screenshots for you to analyze and speculate further. Enjoy!
Goddamn, I wish it was September 28th already.
iPhone 5: Luxury or Necessity?
On September 12, 2012, the worst secret in the field of technology was released into the wild. Yes, the iPhone 5 was coming out and yes, millions of people want to love it and have millions of its babies. It also exposed an interesting fact about our society. With estimates of up to 10 million iPhone 5s sold by the end of September – NINE DAYS mind you – this is obviously going to be one of the most anticipated products launches in recent memory. But the question is this: do we actually need an iPhone 5?
Let’s start off with the facts. The iPhone 5 is going to carry a larger screen, have access to the LTE network, and be more powerful than previous iterations of the phone that revolutionized the industry. It will still have a retina display and with the new A6 chipset, the phone will run faster, smoother, and more efficient so that your battery life will be extended (or so we’re promised). The price points are the same as the previous versions with the 16gig going for $199, the 32gig going for $299, and the 64gig running for $399. The preorders began on September 14th with phones being available in retail stores and shipping on September 21st.
Admittedly, the reaction has ranged from excited to apathetic. The excited usually revolves around the bigger screen and the added functionality of LTE. The unimpressed concentrate on it being just another smart phone with a longer screen and the fact that it doesn’t make breakfast for you. “Yay, we have an extra row for apps! *fart sound*” Legitimate and sarcastic concerns indeed, but the more glaring concern I get from this is our expectations of our “phones”. I’m not a fan of excessive air quotes but I feel it is deserved in this case because how much do we actually use our phone for calls? I have an exorbitant amount of rollover minutes because quite frankly, I don’t like talking on the phone and if I can deliver a text to get my point across, boom, problem solved. And all without the awkward silences. It’s really an organizer, toy, time waster, camera, however you want to define it. It’s the do-it-all to end all do-it-alls. It’s the symbol of our generation that relies on convenience to be an arm’s reach away.
Before I got an iPhone, I had a Motorola Q which was complete and utter garbage. The reason I got the iPhone was because I needed a new phone that didn’t make me want to reenact Office Space and take a bat to it. I didn’t realize that I would get sucked into the world of “there’s an app for that.” All of a sudden, I had instant access to the internet, my music from my iPod synced into my phone, my calendars and contacts at my fingertips… it was pretty much the perfect phone to keep me organized. Then came the iPhone 4. Now I had Facebook, Facetime, Final Fantasy Tactics (alliteration much?), Angry Birds, Words with Friends, Instagram…these apps that I never would’ve used in 2006 that now dominate my life in 2012. It was ironic to have an device that can keep me on an organized path and then ruin it with distractions at the same time. The fact that I can go to the airport and check my work e-mails, check my gate with my scan-able boarding pass on my phone, with my headphones on listening to Spotify, and then walk to Starbucks and have them scan my Starbucks gift card off my screen…it’s not only a testament on how far we’ve come with technology, but also how absolutely screwed I am if I ever lose my phone.
As much as I am a fan of technology, I’m curious as to the turning point when I became a slave to it. Obviously it’s not just myself as many people suffer the same dilemma. Of course, there is a segment of the population that looks to the iPhone as a status symbol. Which is understandable because it is probably the trendiest technology out there, which Apple smartly marketed its products to be since the release of the first iPods a decade ago. However, while I try to take advantage of all the features on my phone, there are others that just want to purely show it off, not unlike a new outfit or accessory. It also doesn’t help that some people can’t even tell the difference between the iPhone 5 and 4s as evidenced in the video below.
I get it, it’s the new big trendy thing so not everyone is going to get on board with it. Especially when it should not be such an essential part of living and breathing that some people make it out to be. Unfortunately, in this day and age, for those handcuffed by technology, it might as well be the second coming of Jesus. I did get up at 3am in the morning to pre-order the iPhone 5 just like all the other ‘crazies’ on the east coast. It’s a valued piece of technology for me and while I can most definitely live without, I just choose not too because it simply makes my life easier to organize and also, from an ego standpoint, I like to have the new big thing to show off. That and my old iPhone looks like to got into a fight with the Expendables.
It really just depends on the perspective on the user. While I wish I can say this will be the end all be all of all phones, but it won’t. There will be an iPhone 6 or 7 that I’m sure will boot this phone and its features back into the stone age. The iPhone 5 is very evolutionary and will provide souped up features that will enhance your experience as a smart phone. That being said, this is not the game changer people are making it out to be. I think hardcore Apple users will champion its cause out of loyalty. The general public will probably identify this as an unnecessary device that only adds features that promote gimmicks as opposed to functionality. This phone is far from a necessity to the regular person but if you need to upgrade from an iPhone 4, or heaven forbid, a 3 or 3s, it may be worth a shot. We will find out on Friday and hopefully I’ll get a review up to see if the iPhone 5 will match the hype. Spoiler alert: It never does.
Grizzly Bomb 