Alex Garland’s ‘Ex Machina’ Sounds Fascinating, Looks Sexy

March 21, 2013 Adam Popovich Leave a comment

I’ve long had a love/hate relationship with robots. On one hand I love them, I want them around to serve and accomplish the menial tasks around me that I don’t want to physically perform. They’re helpful in that way, and at their best they’re probably the most beneficial thing to humanity there could be. On the other hand, they tend to always run into that whole creator vs created, synthetic/organic problem as is so often encountered and philosophized about in Science Fiction.

It gets weirder when you start thinking about them as actual things with wants and needs of their own, and thus comes the REAL dilemma with robots. Basically, it’s never a good idea to make them sexy. The second you make a sexy, human-like F***-Bot capable of doing things a human never could or would, you’re enabling the darkest aspects of man, and more or less encouraging the death of all humanity. What man wouldn’t rather spend all of his life with his immortal, eternally beautiful sex-bot in a holodeck of his dreams, having basically every possible desire fulfilled at his whim?

I know I would.

Ahem, so that’s why I think robots shouldn’t be sexy, but moreso it’s why the recent announcement of Ex Machina has me intrigued.

[box_light]“A billionaire programmer who handpicks a young employee to spend a week at his remote estate and participate in a test involving his latest invention: an artificially intelligent female robot.”[/box_light]

via [Bloody-Disgusting]

So maybe now you see where I was getting at, and not being just a weirdly delusional pervert. I mean, I am a weirdly delusional pervert, but f*** you for judging me. Sorry. Anyhow, the movie itself is an interesting concept made even more interesting by the fact that it’s written and going to be directed by Alex Garland, who you may know from his previous work on 28 Days Later and recently Dredd. The guy’s also behind one of my favorite SF films of all time, Sunshine; a movie so underrated and under appreciated I recommend you go out and watch it right now without knowing anything else about it.

This being Garland’s first time directing I’m pretty stoked to see how he’ll handle his own material for the first time. If his scripts for everything else he’s been a part of are any indication, it’ll be pretty damned amazing. The film itself is gonna be shot either this summer or fall, and is budgeted for about $15 million dollars, and has no relation to the Brian K. Vaughn comic or the anime series of the same name. Now you know everything everyone else does about the movie so far. Except for sex bots. Sex bots are such an interesting thing.

Then again I could be projecting this entire sex bot thing and it’s all actually just about a thriller about the meaning of what it is to be human and have consciousness. But just look at that picture and tell me you wouldn’t at least TRY to f*** that thing! I guarantee you leave any man in a room with a warm hole long enough and he’ll try to f*** it. Whether or not the movie is a spine tingling thriller or 90 minutes of a pathetic man trying to not violate an animatronic sex bot is still technically up in the air, but when there’s an update rest assured we’ll let you know.

Movie News & Opinions

Two Ant-Man Teasers! One Imaginary, The Other Real! UPDATED

March 20, 2013 Adam Popovich Leave a comment

Whenever teaser footage is “leaked” there’s always this infinite battle between the internet and movie companies. They for some reason don’t want everyone to see the teaser, and talk about the teaser, and share the teaser and generally do their PR jobs for them. Or maybe they DO, and by hiding it from us like it’s a weird reverse double bluff situation, we’re playing right into their hands? Which is silly, since this footage that was released is from a test reel that was premiered at SDCC last year, and not even technically a teaser. Regardless, the outcome of the studio censorship is it tends to make sharing and viewing these leaked teasers difficult, and sometimes that can lead to a disparity from your expectations and what actually happens. For instance, I thought the teaser was going to be something totally amazing and mind-blowing.

In fact, if I was to describe my imaginary teaser for Ant Man, I would say my favorite scenes were definitely the parts where Ant-Man finally, finally did what we all thought he would do, and shrunk down and crawled up a guard’s pants.

Then as the guard was trying to take off his pants, he ran up his leg and dove into the guard’s penis through his pee hole, and then rapidly expanded himself while in his urethra, tearing the guard’s dick open horribly, then kicking him through the groin out his butthole, in a fantastic display of gore worthy of an old Giallo film! The next few scenes were of him running around inside the other guards inner ear canal, using the harmonic balance and special lower hertz frequencies to sort of “puppeteer” the guard, making the guard punch himself repeatedly in the face over and over before ripping out his own eyes, in what I thought was a great homage to the work of Lucio Fulci. Then Ant-Man expanded inside the man’s head, creating a head explosion that possibly tops the infamous one from Scanners.

It all ended pretty perfectly when Ant-Man then turned to the camera, pointed his fingers and said his new catch phrase: “It aint easy being cheesy!”, which I found a bit gauche, but I supposed we’ll get used to it.

Right. Well that’s NOT what the Ant-Man teaser was. Here it is as long as it’ll stay up, which probably isn’t long.

VIDEO REMOVED BY VIMEO

Marvel’s Ant-Man Trailer from Anthony Green on Vimeo.

See? Instead of my imaginary awesomeness, it was a fairly interesting fight scene of Ant-Man clearing a hallway with two guards in it, and instead of ripping their dicks or heads open from the inside, he just kinda punches them in the teeth maybe? It was more interesting than it sounds, but only just so. I think my version is a lot better, but for SOME REASON Hollywood has yet to take any of my ideas or use any of the scripts I send their offices detailing my outlandish plans to fix the movie business. I think it’s all a conspiracy against me. Anyway, here’s some screen caps, and gifs courtesy of [Buzzfeed]:

Those are some pretty neat GIFs, but these stills give you a better look at the actual Ant-Man suit, albeit a blurry one. Keep in mind these images are only from a test reel, so the final costume will probably look a lot different.

So all in all, that’s pretty cool, but as always my version is better. But I have trust in Edgar Wright and I presume when the flick rolls by in 2015 it’ll still be pretty great.

A&E’s Bates Motel: 1.01 – “First You Dream, Then You Die”

March 19, 2013 DrKronner Leave a comment

In 1959 Robert Bloch wrote a novel titled Psycho. It was about an unbalanced man named Norman Bates and his mother Norma, with whom he ran a motel…and murdered people. A year later, Alfred Hitchcock cast Antony Perkins as Norman, and turned the novel into a masterpiece of film-making which to this day stands as his more recognized work.

Continue reading A&E’s Bates Motel: 1.01 – “First You Dream, Then You Die” →

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Titan Comics’ ‘Sharky!’ Preview Looks Fun As All Get Out

March 19, 2013 Adam Popovich Leave a comment

I’m a simple kind of man when it comes to my comics. I either like them indie, subdued, about relationships and emotions, or about Superheroes, explosions, bad-ass fights and occasionally titties. It’s the ever present dichotomy in me that really spells out who I am as a person. Regardless however, occasionally a book comes along that clearly looks to appeal more to the latter half of my comic-fandom, by looking to be a balls out nutty mash up of all things awesome. Case in point, Titan Comics’ Sharky!, a book that looks to please with it’s description alone, as given straight from Titan Comics themselves.

[quote] Titan Comics and ATOMEKA are pleased to announce the release of SHARKY – the first in an irreverent, thrilling, genre-mashing graphic novel series by Dave Elliott and Alex Horley.

Perfect for fans of bestselling creators Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Robert Kirkman, Simon Bisley and Richard Corben, SHARKY marks the debut of an all-new hero!

SHARKY has been raised alone by his single mom, with no idea of who his ‘love’em and leave’em’ father was. Hitting the brick wall called puberty, he discovers that the ‘no-good-S.O.B.’ who contributed to his genes is none other than ODIN, king of the Norse Gods – and his mother is a child of ZEUS, ruler of Olympus!

Now, whenever something sets off his hormones, he transforms into the demi-god SHARKY – complete with a pumped-up body The Rock would kill to have – and the strength of Hercules!

When two of the black sheep of his family tree visit Earth and create havoc by raising the dead as an army to take over the world, Sharky has to pick sides, with the fate of the planet at stake. With no time for training, it’s a case of working out Superhero 101 as he goes – and if he fails, his friends’ lives are forfeit! [/quote]

I don’t know about you, but that’s exactly the kind of comic I would probably end up making if I was given free reign. Actually it’d probably be a bit more like Robo-Cop, but mixed with Re-Animator. Also it’d be really gory and sexy. I think I would call it Gorno Cop. Which reminds me, I should really try pitching that out there to some comics publishers, maybe Avatar would go for it! ZING!

Back on topic, Sharky does look pretty irreverent and fun, and it’s weird and funny to see The Mask actually doing things. Most people only remember that weird and awful Jim Carrey movie or it’s horrendous sequel. I was never a big fan of the comics version of the character but I’ve been told it was a neat thing. Regardless it’s fun to see a comic that doesn’t take itself seriously, and is willing to just go apesh** and throw everything at the wall. Take a peek for yourself with these pages from Sharky!

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It’s a book that’s being written by David Elliot, and drawn by Alex Horley, two guys who’ve been in the business a while and have worked on tons of projects including but not limited to Heavy Metal Magazine, 2000 AD, JLA and if you’re a CCG gamer like a lot of folks I know, you may recognize Alex Horley’s art from the World Of Warcraft or Magic: The Gathering Collectible Card Game. I definitely see the Heavy Metal influence in the art style, and that’s pretty great. It looks pretty interesting as you can tell, and it’s something I’ll probably be picking up out of curiosity and appreciation for indie books alone.

SHARKY! will hit book stores on September 11, 2013. The series will also be available to read day and date on the iPad, iPhone, Web, Android and Kindle Fire, exclusively through the comiXology app and comiXology.com

Game Of Thrones: Season 3 Roundup Smorgasbord! New Trailers and Posters!

March 18, 2013 Adam Popovich Leave a comment

In the long wait for season 3 of Game Of Thrones two things have become abundantly clear. The first is that HBO is full of a bunch of sadists, who will leak images, previews, clips and trailers in rampant abundance, all with the terrible prospect of “getting you excited” to watch a season of a show you’re probably definitely made up your mind to watch or not. I’m convinced there isn’t a person alive who hasn’t already made up their mind to watch the third season when it comes on, because you’ve either watched the show, and CANNOT WAIT ANY LONGER HOLY CRAP, or you haven’t and thusly aren’t bothered. Accordingly, the other thing that’s become abundantly clear is how badly my editor loves to get me to write about all of HBO’s sadistic trappings, as if somehow not writing about every single little Game Of Thrones related pop up and mish-mash that comes by will actually personally hurt him and his feelings. [ Or his dog’s feelings or something. It’s gotten to the point where I’m afraid he’ll start sending me pictures of doe-eyed animals like those Sarah Mclachlan PETA commercials, telling me that by not writing up every GoT trailer I’m personally letting more and more kittens die each day. [

So know that by writing this, I’m serving my role as a functioning member of society, and not letting lots of little kittens die for reasons I’ve made up entirely in my head. Mostly because waiting this long for Game Of Thrones is literally driving me insane. Firstly we have the bevy of trailers, starting with the newly released “Trailer #2” for the season, which by writing about here has saved a small black long-haired kitten named “Coco”. She loves to have her belly rubbed and only has one eye!

REMOVED BY YOUTUBE

Next we have a shorter preview, similar to an older trailer I’ve probably written about, the difference is this time by writing about it I’m saving a little tortoiseshell kitten named Gidget. She’s a little timid but once you get to know her she’s very loving!

After that we have the “Extended” season 3 trailer, which is relatively similar to the other trailers only it has more stuff in it because it’s extended! In turn the kittens that are being saved by writing about this are also extended, a pair of brother/sister kittens named Scratches and Patches. They’re Calico and Russian blue, and utterly inseparable. Watching them play together is the bees knees! OR THE CAT’S PAJAMAS! HAHAHA!

And lastly after those three trailers we’re left a final 14 minute primer for season 3 of GoT, which is essentially just one big recap for everyone online who has a short attention span, or no time to sit down and re-watch the first two seasons. Which I suppose some people don’t have the time to do, but when you’re saving kittens every day is a special day of wonder and excitement that can only benefit from watching Game Of Thrones in the background! I watched this 14 minute primer with Larfleeze, a little orange tabby kitten I’ve named after the leader of the Orange Lanterns from DC Comics! Larfleeze loves Tyrion!

Now that all the kittens have been saved, it’s time to move onto the puppies! Yes, this IS the internet where cats reign supreme, but let us not shun the path of adorable puppies in our wake, because they surely need saving too. Also, my editor (and apparently other weird, stupid people) think that little tidbits like the next few things are cute and wonderful instead of annoying, soul crushing and pointless. Well onward, because there’s a corgi puppy who’s waiting at the door, and only by watching this inane High School Style Parody of Game Of Thrones will he not freeze to death in the cold! Winter is coming, Corgi puppy! Get in here!

Coming near the home stretch here, some band I’ve never heard of called The Hold Steady will be confirmed to perform a drinking song from the Game Of Thrones universe. It’s called “The Bear And The Maiden Fair”, but for the life of me I cannot remember it from the books. Which is all good and well because I’m sure I’ll skip or not notice it in the main show anyway. The only song that I care about is “The Rains Of Castemere”, but I can’t tell any of you why without being the most evil bastard ever. Fortunately, by writing about this I’ve saved a whole bundle of adorable pug puppies! They’re so spunky and full of love! Now here, watch a totally unrelated song by The Hold Steady that will hopefully convince you that their version of a make-believe song from a make-believe universe will sufficiently be believable enough to be consistent with that world as a viable drinking song! What’s that Pugsly? You want your tummy rubbed! Sure!

One last thing! Now that you’ve seen every possible Game Of Thrones related video and even a few that are only tangentially related, there are PICTURES TO LOOK AT! WONDEROUS PICTURES! Pictures of the same characters you’ve seen before looking at things! In fact the only one even worth seeing is the comparison picture between Bran from season 1 and Season 3, because apparently time is linear and people age? Also puberty? Also I’m dying inside? Whatever, I’ve just saved a cuddly little bulldog named Francis! He’s named after the Pope and he snores when he sleeps! Just like the real Pope!

And finally here’s a picture of Isaac Hempstead Wright, who is apparently now forcing his life as Bran onto other people in the real world. Proving that Game Of Thrones induced insanity is a real thing. He can’t not make everyone Hodor to him now.

Well there you have it. That’s all of the little annoying Game Of Thrones tidbits, previews, songs, trailers, pictures, previews of pictures, trailer-views, tidpics, pre trailers, songtures, trailpics, picture previews and everything else in between for Game Of Thrones. Which if you didn’t know for some impossible reason, starts up again this month on March 31st. In 2013. Unfortunately all of this is a cycle, and will repeat yet again for Season 4 next year. Now don’t mind me while I start petting all of these kittens and puppies to stave off my lingering, throbbing insanity that looms in anticipation of the anticipation of waiting for Season 4. Now play puppies and kittens!

PLAY!

Could Pushing Daisies follow in Veronica Mars’ Kickstarter steps?

March 18, 2013 Amanda Broyles

The moment Rob Thomas announced the Veronica Mars movie Kickstarter, everyone with half a brain knew that it was going to meet its goal. I don’t know that there were many out there that would predict how quickly it would do so. As a matter of fact, the project, which was already the largest in the film category, was the fastest to reach two million dollars across all categories. So yay Veronica Mars movie!!!

Continue reading Could Pushing Daisies follow in Veronica Mars’ Kickstarter steps? →

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Yearly Archives: 2013