Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Electric cars- not quite dead

A few weeks ago, my sister showed me a cool trailer for a documentary called "Who Killed the Electric Car?"- an examination of the life and death of General Motor's pioneering electric car, the EV1. Released in 1996, the car was fast, efficient and a big hit with the select group of people who drove the car. Sadly, the EV1 line of cars was discontinued in 2002 and commercial development of electric cars in America seems to have died with it.

However, electric vehicle enthusiasts are a passionate lot and it looks like the fate of the electric car isn't quite sealed yet.

Behold the Eliica:

Developed in Japan by Professor Hiroshi Shimizu and his team at Keio university, this 8-wheeled beast of a machine can accelerate from 0 to 100km/h in under 4 seconds- faster than a Porsche 911 Turbo- and has a top speed of 370km/h. UK motoring magazine Auto Express reports that the car is both speedy and fun to drive- it's lack of a transmission means that it can accelerate smoothly with no jerks between gears. The prototype car has been in development for quite a few years and was recently officially unveiled at Togu Palace with the Crown Prince and Princess in attendance. The team intends to produce at least 200 units of the car once they receive corporate sponsorship.

As cool as the Eliica is, it's mostly intended as a demonstration of power- proof that electric cars aren't the slow, cumbersome vehicles that they're popularly perceived to be. Back in the USA, however, some enterprising companies are planning to bring electric cars to the commercial market- in a big way.

One of those companies is Wrightspeed, with their Wrightspeed X1- the fastest electric car in the world and one of the world's fastest cars, period.

This speed demon beat both a Ferrari 360 Spider and a Porsche Carrera GT in a quarter-mile drag race (which you can watch here!), going from 0-60mph (or 96.6 km/h) in approximately 3 seconds. Entrepreneur Ian Wright is the man behind the X1 and he's got a plan to turn the current prototype into a production car for the high-end speedster market.

Interestingly enough, Ian Wright's background is in information technology (he's engineered routers and switches for companies like Cisco in the past)- according to this Business 2.0 article, he's part of a new wave of Silicon Valley upstarts (see also: Tesla Motors, who have bold plans and the venture capital to back them up) who intend to do what existing automobile makers have been failing at for years- bring an electric car to the mass market. They believe their technological expertise will enable them to design the highly-complex electronics and battery systems that will drive the electric cars of the future.

Speaking of batteries, they are commonly cited as the biggest problem with electric cars (as well as the main reason for them never taking off) as they're still too expensive and don't deliver the desired level of performance. However, a few start-ups down in Silicon Valley are working on just this problem and claim that big advances are on their way that will drive prices down significantly while improving performance to acceptable levels. With oil prices soaring sky-high and unlikely to ever come back down significantly, the time may finally be right for the electric car!

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New Windows Live Messenger unimpressive, VP in charge of Windows Live disappears! *UPDATED- 2*

UPDATE2: MICROSOFT- DON'T RELEASE BUGGY SOFTWARE AS AN OFFICIAL RELEASE! This stupid program crashes on me with near-clockwork regularity. Now I'm just plain irritated. This isn't a Beta version and I didn't expect it to perform like one. Even better, the damn thing installed itself over my old MSN Messenger installation (which I really wasn't expecting given it's Brand-New name) and I can't go back to using that... Whoopee. Oh and the offline chat feature that I was so in love with is totally broken! Half the messages I send my friends while I'm in offline mode don't get to them- and vice versa.

I can't un-recommend this program enough. Argh!!!

UPDATE: OOH FINALLY MESSENGER LET'S ME CHAT WITH PEOPLE WHILE I'M IN OFFLINE MODE!!! Yeah, ICQ had this feature like a decade or so ago so Microsoft is busy playing catchup, but I still really appreciate the feature. OK I'm a convert- if for that feature alone.

So I've been using the recently-released Windows Live Messenger client for the past few days and well, it's basically MSN Messenger with a new coat of paint. OK, it's got VoIP but... oh wait, MSN Messenger did voice chat too. OK OK, so Windows Messenger Live also lets you call normal telephones from your PC! Whoa! But oh wait, Skype already provides an excellent VoIP solution- and it runs on Mac OS X and Linux too! So there's that. Well, colour me totally unimpressed.

Also, what's the deal with this "Windows Live" branding thing? Who is Microsoft trying to fool? Windows is an operating system. Sticking it's brand-name on everything from the new version of Hotmail (speaking of which, dropping Hotmail- one of the Web's most recognizable brand names- for 'Windows Live Mail' is just plain stupid) to the new version of MSN Messenger is just going to dilute the Windows brand.

Stupefyingly enough, the VP in charge of marketing Windows Live mysteriously left Microsoft just after the release of the new Messenger client. Very bizarre, considering he was scheduled to give interviews about the program's release on the day he left! Just what is going on at Redmond these days? I hope these guys have a plan. I'm quite ambivalent towards MS these days, but the company has done so much to push computing into the mainstream over the past decade and a half that it's just downright sad to see them floundering like this now.

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Tuesday, June 20, 2006

Meanwhile, India gets it's own superhero

On June 23rd, Bollywood's first superhero movie (correction: Wikipedia claims he's the sixth- but nobody remembers the first five anyway), Krrish, will hit cinemas in India. Krrish is the sequel (a rarity in Indian cinema!) to "Koi... Mil Gaya," an 'ET-meets-Forrest Gump' science-fiction movie that made oodles of money in it's homeland and swept quite a few awards, too. I thought it was kinda crap but I couldn't get past the pseudo-ET stuff, frankly (though I have to admit, star Hrithik Roshan- who's daddy directed both movies- wasn't too bad in it).

I wasn't very interested in the sequel given it's pedigree but I must admit to being piqued after reading this New York Times article about the movie. Since the Times tends to block access to their content after a while, I'll just cut and paste the relevant bits (emphasis is my own).

Rakesh's biggest concern was making Krrish look sufficiently world class. After all, audiences that have lapped up Western heroes — "Spider-Man" and "Spider-Man 2" are the No. 3 and No. 2 Hollywood releases in India, after "Titanic" — would have little patience with cheesy special effects. So Mr. Roshan turned to the Hong Kong-based action choreographer Tony Ching, acclaimed for his work on "House of Flying Daggers" and "Hero."

This Bollywood-Chinese martial arts combination presented some distinctive challenges. Because Mr. Ching speaks no English, Mr. Roshan narrated his script via an interpreter. In an e-mail interview (also translated by interpreter), Mr. Ching said that what attracted him was the story, which "was very romantic and touching."

"Their ideas of the action were beautiful and exactly fit my style," he said. "Everything just matched well."

To fit Bollywood's comparatively smaller budgets, Mr. Ching slashed his fee — though even that bargain rate, Mr. Roshan said, was more than the paychecks of India's biggest stars. Last January, Hrithik went to Hong Kong and trained for 30 days, learning how to wield sticks and swords and adopt the correct postures for the harnesses. At the end of the daily six-hour sessions, Hrithik said in an interview in Mumbai, he "barely had enough strength to crawl into bed."

The action sequences, which Rakesh described as poetry, were filmed over 90 days, mostly in Singapore. To perfect the visual effects, Rakesh imported two experts from Hollywood, Marc Kolbe and Craig A. Mumma, who worked on "Godzilla" and "Independence Day" (and also on "Koi ... Mil Gaya"). The orchestration for the film's background score was done in Prague.
That's quite a team they got there- though it must be said that good action choreography and visual effects does not equate to a brilliant movie.

Will this be India's Spider-Man or it's 3 Dev Adam (i.e. so baaaaad that it's good!)? More importantly, will it rake in the big bucks? 3 more days 'til we find out! One thing's for sure- this movie is going to usher in Superhero Season into Indian cinemas (Superman Returns on June 30th!).

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Monday, June 19, 2006

The advance buzz on Superman Returns is hot, hot, hot!

Superman Returns is by far and away my most anticipated movie of the year, simply because of the trust I place in director Bryan Singer. His first X-Men movie was amazingly non-sucky- the second one was just flat-out brilliant. Still, the question remained: Was this man up to the Herculean task of creating a Superman movie that could possibly live up to the collective expectations of audiences around the world?

Judging by the first few reviews that are trickling out, he's succeeded magnificently. Time Magazine loved it. As did Newsweek. Variety.com's fairly-glowing review of the movie predicts that it will "pull down stratospheric B.O. around the globe."

Perhaps the most encouraging sign of all is the reception the movie is getting from the geek crowd. Harry Knowles', head geek of Aint It Cool News, ecstatic review of the movie. Now, the man does occasionally display questionable taste in movies, but where comic book movies are concerned he's been right on the money every single time (at least for my money :P). Aint It Cool's Massawyrm has a similarly positive review. Comic Book Resources' Jonah Weiland claims "with total confidence that it was everything a comics fan - and movie fan - could hope for."

So far, the movie's garnering praise from both the mainstream press and the geek set! A backlash is inevitable, but I dare say that this movie might turn out to be the Lord of the Rings of comic book movies. What I love most about is the sentiment echoed in every review I've seen: that Bryan Singer has, in Superman, made a summer blockbuster that's filled with heart (the one element that is notably missing from his otherwise excellent X-Men 2). My froth-meter for this movie is redlining. ANTICIPATION OVERLOAD!

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Sunday, June 18, 2006

An MS developer speaks up about Vista (plus, mad system requirements!)

"Vista. The term stirs the imagination to conceive of beautiful possibilities just around the corner. And “just around the corner” is what Windows Vista has been, and has remained, for the past two years. In this time, Vista has suffered a series of high-profile delays, including most recently the announcement that it would be delayed until 2007. The largest software project in mankind’s history now threatens to also be the longest."
Quoted from this blog entry by a Microsoft manager who formerly worked on Windows. The operating system has (in)famously been delayed multiple times, losing features in the process. It's finally nearing release but the system requirements, which are formidable indeed, indicate that the system is very bloated. Everything I hear about Vista just makes me more and more apprehensive.

I wouldn't care if I could just stick to XP for the forseeable future, but I'm a gamer and some 'killer app' game will no doubt force me to make the switch to Vista. Ugh... the insanity. This, along with the recent news of Bill Gates leaving Microsoft to focus on his philanthropic activities (good on you, Bill!), makes me wonder about the future of the company. Well, as the saying goes, time will tell. Meanwhile, I'm thinking seriously about switching to Linux for day-to-day use.

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Online Resume-writing tips and resources

Writing a compelling resume is no easy task. It's not something they teach at school (at least, not at the schools I went to!). Thankfully, there are some really good tips and guides to resume-writing available online.

Rockport Institute, who specialize in helping people choose their career paths, has a really good multi-page article titled 'How to write a masterpiece of a resume.' The article teaches readers how to wriet a resume that markets themselves well and is compelling for employers. Good stuff.


Purdue University's Online Writing Lab has an extensive resume-writing section, including a sample resume and an online workshop.

Montana University's 'Tips on Resume Writing, Interview Skills, and Job Hunting Techniques' page has lots of links to relevant resources online.

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Saturday, June 17, 2006

Mona Lisa made out of PC parts



I am oddly bemused by this reproduction of the Mona Lisa, made out of motherboards and other PC parts. Entitled 'Technology Smiling,' this art work is on exhibition in Beijing. The use of the garishly-coloured innards of our dull, everyday PCs to create a tangible reproduction of an artwork and the choice of artwork itself- the Mona Lisa, with her ever-mysterious smile- add up to a very clever commentary on our relationship with technology indeed.

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Brainfuel's Top 10 Photoshop Tips

Brainfuel's list of 10 Photoshop tips & techniques is very useful indeed. It's especially good for beginners (and casual Photoshop users like me!).

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Nature Magazine on the Future of Computing

In this web feature, Nature Magazine examines how computer science techniques and concepts may transform mainstream science by 2020. Amongst other things, they look at quantum computers, ubiquitious computing and most interestingly, the Internet as a 'creativity machine.'

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Steve Jobs' presentation secrets

Steve Jobs is well-known for being one of the most charismatic and exciting speakers in the corporate world. Business Week has a great article that details his five keys to delivering a superior presentation. Some great advice in there.

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Superheroes meet Fine Art

Worth1000.com recently ran a Photoshop contest challenging people to incorporate superheroes into pieces of fine art. The results are amazingly creative and well-done.

This is one of my favourites:



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New Beginnings

I'm back and I'm armed with a degree now! That's right, I have officially graduated from NUS. Soon I'll be venturing out into the "working world." It's the end of an era and the beginning of a new one. In that spirit, I'm making some changes in my blogging activities too.

Firstly, I've started a new blog- Robot Eel- which is exclusively focused on entertainment (movies, music, animation, comics- you get the picture). A lot of the kind of content I'd previously post here will now go to Robot Eel.

So what happens to this blog? Well, I'm going to turn this into my primary web research tool. Here, I will pick out stories and links of interest from the vast amount of information that I read on the Web every day (via RSS feeds, news sites, etc). A record of my surfing activity and what I consider to be interesting/important. My own personal BoingBoing, of sorts (though hardly as prolific). At the same time, I hope it'll be appealing to others as well.

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Tuesday, June 13, 2006

Twitchfilm reviews 3 Dev Adam & Seven Swordsmen!

Twitch, that font of news about indie, cult and world movies, has posted 2 reviews that rather pique my interest. Both of the reviews are by Todd, Twitch's founder and editor, who's a true movie buff and has great taste too (or so I gather from his reviews and posts).

The first is for the Turkish cult film 3 Dev Adam- which I wrote about 3 posts down. Sounds like Todd liked it:

3 Dev Adam is essentially the equivalent of the Dozier produced Batman TV show on acid. Played resolutely straight faced it is nonetheless a monumentally ridiculous film loaded with goofy action sequences, bizarre set pieces and absolutely littered with plot holes. The script is the flimsiest of things, existing only to get these three unlikely co-stars from fight to fight. It's as camp as camp gets, a film that aspires to B status, and appreciated on that level it's great fun.
Mmmm... sounds tasty! I'll be placing my order for a copy of the 3 Dev Adam DVD.

The second review is for the Tsui Hark-produced TV series Seven Swordsmen- based on the same story as his movie Seven Swords, which I reviewed quite positively for Aint It Cool News here. Mind you, that review should be taken with a grain of salt- I really did enjoy the movie but I glossed over it's many, many faults in my review. Now, it's main problem was that Tsui Hark was trying to cram too much story into too little screen time. Todd describes the problem well:

The edit was rushed and cramped and far too many supposedly key figures – including most of the titular heroes – slipped by the wayside doing little more than poking their heads on screen to remind people that they were still around.
Now, the Seven Swords TV series is 39 episodes long- ample time to tell the long, convulated story of the Seven Swordsmen of Mt Tian (who give both the and the movie and TV series their titles). Todd gives Seven Swordsmen a pretty positive review overall, though he didn't like it's soap operatic tendancies (unavoidable for a Chinese wuxia series, really). Here's his final word:
While it stops short of being a classic or essential viewing and is not without some serious shortcomings Seven Swordsmen represents a significant step forward over the theatrical Seven Swords in the area where fans felt it needed it most: in the story. Very similar in tone to the theatrical release this version gives fans far, far more in terms of characters. While Swords often felt cramped and rushed Swordsmen has ample space for everyone to stretch out and get their moment.
As a fan of the movie who really wanted to see more of the intriguing story it told, I can't want to see this series!

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Friday, June 09, 2006

Ratatouille trailer is online... again!



UPDATE: You can watch the trailer, in English this time, at Apple's trailer website here.

The French trailer for Pixar's next big animated feature film, Ratatouille, leaked onto the net a couple weeks ago but was quickly taken offline. Well, a quick search for Ratatouille on Youtube uncovers 5 videos of the trailer- I guess they can't stop every single uploader. Also, blogger and animator Bartek Kujbida has kindly mirrored the Quicktime version of the trailer on his site. It's a lovely trailer- the visuals are gorgeous, as always with a Pixar movie, and the animation is great! I really like the main character's design. This movie's being (co-)directed by Brad Bird (The Incredibles, The Iron Giant), so I've got high hopes for it.

The trailer's in French, but here's a rough English translation, courtesy of Ain't It Cool News:


[Beginning]

And tonight before dessert, for your enjoyment, we introduce the cheese plate. We have this delicious goat cheese bell, real lite, real sweet. Then, an ewe that will satisfy you with its generous perfume. But, last but not least, a real old and real special...

It's a rat!

[freeze]

- And there I am. I think I have to reconsider my life. There's nothing I can do, it's over my strength, I love good food, ok? And good food is very hard to find for a rat.

- You would find I you weren't so requiring.

- I don't want to eat in dustbins, dad... What's that?

- I have no idea.

- You have no idea, but you eat it anyway, don't you?

- You know, if you can close the exit after you throw up, you have a whole lot of possibilities for food.

- VoilĂ ! That's exactly what I meant.

(Over the movie title) Nothing of this would have happened I we did not live in Paris! And it's sooo easy to find good food in Paris! But... it's dangerous. [un-freeze].

- You have to reconsider you life!

- You know, he is right!

- Dad, it's enough!

[End]


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Batwoman is gay!



Sweet costume!


There's a new Batwoman in town and it seems she goes for girls! This juicy piece of news has been stirring up the comics world- heck, even the mainstream media's gotten ahold of the story! Pretty interesting- now a cynical observer would say that DC Comics is just doing this to get publicity and for the opportunity to put loads of cheesecake girl-on-girl smooching scenes in the comic. However, she isn't the first major gay character in Batman's world (no bad Robin jokes, please :P)- the very best story in the excellent and sadly-cancelled series Gotham Central had Detective Renee Montoya outed as a lesbian. The mature and nuanced handling of that story makes me think that DC could actually make this new Batwoman's sexuality more than just a cheap novelty. I'll be interested to see where they go with this.

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In Turkey, Spider-Man has face-eating gerbils!

EDIT: Replaced another missing Youtube video!


The insanity!

I've seen some crazy movies in my time, but nothing as amazingly weird as 3 DEV ADAM (3 Mighty Men)- a movie in which Captain America and mexican masked wrestler (and national icon) El Santo team up to battle the evil... SPIDER-MAN!!! I kid you not. Apparently in the 70's and 80's, mere trifles like lack of a budget or copious copyright violations didn't stop Turkish filmmakers from making movies with, well, whatever they felt like.

Case in point: The Man Who Saves The World, AKA Turkish Star Wars- a movie that used footage from the original Star Wars along with music from Battlestar Galactica and Raiders of the Lost Ark to tell a completely different, and completely ridiculous, story! Check out the video clips at ifilm and see for yourself (the one simply labelled 'Fight Scene' is really great- the hero beats up a dozen muppet-looking monsters, killing one by ripping off it's arms and impaling it with them!!!).

OK back to 3 DEV ADAM! Spider-Man is really, really evil in this movie (I'm guessing he's bitter at losing all his powers and having grown a beer belly and bushy eyebrows). How evil? Well, in the opening scene he orders his hench-men to bury a woman up to her neck in sand and then gets them to back up a boat towards her. Propeller meets head = DEATH (don't worry folks- the nasty death occurs off-screen. The audience just gets to see a splash of blood)! If that wasn't enough, he later uses gerbils (yes, GERBILS) to eat a guy's face (it's in the trailer, folks!). This Spider-Man also enjoys strangling girls in showers and stabbing Mafiasos with switch-blades. For a full breakdown of the crazy plot, check out I-Mockery.com's multi-page review.

Oh boy, the Turkish translators for Marvel comics must've been terrible if they gave people the impression that Spider-Man was a super-villain, and an INSANE one at that! Anyway, this marvel-lous (hyuck, hyuck) movie just got re-released by Onar Films- I figure it's worth checking out for sheer humour value alone. What I really want to see, though, is a 1966 black-and-white Turkish Spider-Man movie, the existence of which I found out from this FFWD Weekly article about the world of Turkish cinema. Look at his costume!!!


Psychedelic, baby!

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TRANSFORMERS movie is coming!


More than meets the eye, indeed.

Ain't It Cool News got this new teaser poster for the upcoming Michael Bay-directed Transformers live-action movie. Hoo-boy. Bay's always been a very on-off director for me, but The Island was almost a good movie so maybe he'll get it right with his second science-fiction effort. One thing's for certain though- it's gonna be awesome seeing everyone's favourite Autobots and Decepticons on-screen in all their CGI'ed glory.

Also, the official Transformers movie site is up and it's counting down to some event 26 days from now. I'm guessing we'll see the first teaser trailer then.

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Thursday, June 08, 2006

Movie Review: Cars



When I first heard about Cars, I was doubtful. The movie's premise (a remake of Doc Hollywood set in a world full of cars!?!) just didn't excite me. Neither did the fact that NASCAR- a sport that I have little to no knowledge about and no interest in- seemed to figure heavily in it. The various trailers didn't do much to change my mind- the movie looked good enough, but I expected nothing short of brilliance from Pixar (by far and away my favourite movie studio) and Cars didn't look brilliant. Heck, a month ago when I watched 'Over The Hedge', I was convinced that this would be the first year in which Dreamworks would make a better movie than Pixar- and I declared so to my friends!

Well, Pixar, you've made me eat my words. I will never doubt this studio again. Not only is Cars a truly GREAT movie, a movie made with obvious love and passion, it's also one of Pixar's most emotionally mature works- one that, while appealing to kids, will only be fully appreciated by adults. On the surface, the story really is 'Doc Hollywood with cars' but Pixar's genius is that they always manage to make an old story feel fresh. The secret's in the characters. The studio's movies are always, first and foremost, character journeys- no Pixar hero is quite the same at the end of the movie as at the start. This is especially true of Cars.

The protagonist of Cars, rookie racecar Lightning McQueen (played by Owen Wilson) starts out brash and cocky, so obsessed about winning that he has no time for other people. He's a bit unlikeable, frankly, though he earns our sympathy when it's shown that his lifestyle and behaviour has left him bereft of any real friends. The movie introduces McQueen and his world of NASCAR racing perfectly, beginning in a loud and almost-obnoxious manner with a visually-kinetic race scene.

The sudden change in pace that occurs when McQueen, through a series of mishaps, gets stuck in the small town of Radiator Springs is jarring enough to be noticeable (indeed, I got a bit restless for the first ten minutes of the movie's 2nd act) but the movie quickly regains it's footing as we are introduced to the cast of characters who inhabit the town. The three main players here are the world-weary but wise Doc Hudson (Paul Newman in a great performance), the beautiful lawyer Sally (Bonnie Hunt) and Mater (comedian Larry the Cable Guy)- the dim-witted, rusty but loveable tow truck who takes a liking to McQueen.

No doubt you'll hear this from others, but I'll say it here too- Mater is the heart and soul of this movie. He's not just the comic relief sidekick that he's shown to be in the trailers (make no mistake, though- he's hilarious in the movie), he also teaches McQueen about the value of friendship by being the first person (car?) to ever befriend him and completely place his trust in him. The friendship that develops between him and McQueen is truly touching.

Cars also manages to give each of it's large cast of supporting characters their own little moment to shine in the movie, in a manner similar to the Toy Story movies. In fact, my very favourite scene in the movie features a character named Guido, a little Italian forklift and racing fan who only speaks one phrase in English. I won't say anymore- you'll know the scene when you see it- it made the audience at my screening fairly howl with laughter.

I said Cars holds greater appeal to adults than to children- that's because the movie is also a celebration of one of the icons of 20th Century America: the famous Route 66 (which ran all the way from Chicago to LA). Immortalized in song, fiction and even a TV series, Route 66 was a symbol of freedom, exploration and romance. Through Cars, director John Lasseter (the man who we're all counting on to save Disney) communicates his love for this now-defunct road.

The movie laments the loss of the communities that sprung up around Route 66 with the advent of modern Inter-State Highways that just take people from Point A to Point B, too fast to appreciate what lies in between (the fictional town of Radiator Springs in the movie is said to be strongly inspired by the real-life town of Amboys, California). Now, it's possible to get overly-preachy with this kind of thing- and in one speech given by a main character, the movie nearly does. Ultimately, though, the movie's nostalgia is endearing and fits in well with Lightning McQueen's character arc.

What's left to say about this movie? It's just great, heart-warming stuff. The movie commemorates Pixar's 20th year and serves as a tribute to the late, great Joe Ranft (who worked on the stories of all of Pixar's films, including Cars, and famously acted as Wheezy the penguin in Toy Story 2 as well as Heimlich the catterpillar in A Bug's Life). It's sad the man didn't live to see the movie, but I think he'd be real pleased with it.

Incidentally, in case you're wondering, the movie is also visually gorgeous. You won't even notice that this is a computer-animated movie- it just feels like a really well-shot, well-animated movie (which really is the highest compliment you can give Pixar on their animation). The music's great, too, with a surprising number of songs and a decidedly Southern flavour.

Alright then, I've said enough. Now just go watch the movie already. You'll love it. Oh and don't go to the theatre late- you don't wanna miss 'One Man Band,' the animated short film that airs before the movie. It's great stuff. The screening of short films at the beginning of each of their animated feature films is just another thing to love about Pixar.

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Wednesday, June 07, 2006

In Japan, Spider-Man has a Giant Robot!

EDIT: Updated the embedded Youtube video of the show's opening sequence as someone had taken down the first video!


Supaida-Man!

Strangely enough, it seems that the style of Japanese superhero show that was popularized in the English-speaking world by the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers may actually have it's origins in a true-blue American superhero- Spider-Man. It's true! In 1978, Toei (the same studio that produced Kamer Rider and the shows that the footage for Power Rangers was taken from) made a Spider-Man TV series. Instead of following the comic book storyline, this series gave Spider-Man a uniquely Japanese spin. Here's a synopsis, taken from Wikipedia (emphasis added by moi):

Young motorcycle racer Takuya Yamashiro sees a UFO falling to earth, in fact a combat spacecraft named the "Marveller". Takuya's father Dr. Hiroshi Yamashiro, a space archaeologist, investigates the case. The incident also brings the attention of Professor Monster and his evil Iron Cross Army (Tetsu-Jyuuji-Gun), an alien group that plans to rule the universe.

The Iron Cross Army murders Dr. Yamashiro, and also attempts to kill Takuya. Takuya's life is saved by Gallia, prince of the Spider Planet, who came to Earth in the spacecraft. Gallia gives Takuya a bracelet that injects him a liquid which not only heals his wounds but also gives him super strength, the ability to climb walls and a special sense of danger (i.e. Spider-sense). The bracelet give him his web-shooting ability, is also a communication device used to summon Marveller, and finally can be used to store the costume.

Takuya battles Professor Monster's "Iron Cross Army". After Spider-Man beats up on the human sized monsters they turn into giants. Spider-Man then calls on the Marveller to fire missiles at the monster, then transform into a giant robot, Leopardon.
What'd I tell ya? The Japanese Spider-Man totally has a giant robot! According to this review on Japanhero.com, this series was responsible for popularizing the Japanese superhero standards of giant transforming robots and monsters that enlarge in size when defeated (and hence need to be defeated again, by said giant transforming robots)! That's incredibly cheesy, and yet totally awesome. Mmm... Giant Robots and Spider-Man, two of my favourite things. Who'd have thought they had such a deep connection?

You can watch the entire first episode here, as well as a comedy fansubbed version. It's actually pretty entertaining. Even though the show strays far, far, faaaaaaaar away from the original Spider-Man in terms of plot, they did a great job in depicting the way he moves and fights- heck, he strikes all the right poses, too! Oh and I love this clip where Spidey gets saved by an el mariachi singer with a machine-gun guitar. Brilliance!

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Movie Review: X-Men 3

Funny thing- I was actually pretty entertained the first time I saw X-Men 3, mostly because the movie is so loud (so VERY loud in the theatre I watched it in!), fast and stupid that I scarcely had time to think about the ridiculousness of the proceedings while I was watching it. Even so, I left the theatre with a bad taste in my mouth because of something the X-Men did near the end of the movie- a morally questionable act toward one of their enemies that none of them had the slightest qualm about. Something so completely out-of-character for all of them that I couldn't believe a fan of the comic books had written the script.

The movie is full of moments like that. The more I thought about them after the movie, the more I didn't like it. By the second time I watched it, I outright hated it.

It's not director Brett Ratner's fault. The opening scene with younger versions of Magneto and Professor X (complete with the much-vaunted de-aged versions of Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart) meeting an adolescent Jean Grey is very well done indeed. So is the rather harrowing follow-up scene with a young Angel. Clearly, Mr. Ratner can do a good job if he sets his mind to it. No, what really lets the movie down is its script. The premise was awkward from the start- both the Cure and the Phoenix storylines could each be a movie by themselves. Stuffing them both into the same movie was just a terrible idea as it's impossible to do them both justice at the same time. One of them had to get short shrift- sadly, it was the Phoenix story that suffered here.

That's not the end of it, either. For such a short movie (it's barely over one and a half hours long), it has way too many extraneous characters. What's Beast doing here (looking terrible, despite what Halle Barry as Storm might say)? Or Angel, for that matter? A character important enough to be introduced in a pre-title sequence should not get all of 5 lines in the movie! Oddly enough, with the sheer amount of useless mutants in the film (like, every single mutant in Magneto's army- none of whom he needs because they all get massacred by US Army troops and the X-Men, after which he ends up fighting the good fight with just Pyro at his side anyway), they forgot to bring back the coolest mutant of all (at least in these movie versions)- Nightcrawler. They don't even refer to him in the movie.

Now that's lazy script-writing. Bah. One of many examples you can find in this mess of a movie. Eventhough I followed the debacle of this movie's production online, via sites like Aint It Cool News, so I knew it'd probably turn out as bad as it did, but somehow I went in hoping it wouldn't be a pile of crap. So much for that.

That being said, people who aren't big fans of the series are likely to enjoy themselves- this is very much a summer movie- big, loud and stupid, like I said at the start. The Armageddon of comic book movies, if you will. But as someone who really loved the first two X-Men movies (especially the second one), I was just incredibly disappointed- especially as it looks like this is the last real X-Men film we're going to get. Way to end a series, people.

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