hazylium: 2005

Wednesday, December 28, 2005

What Famous Leader Are You

What Famous Leader Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Apparently I'm JFK! Oho!! What an interesting result. I don't do these personality things normally but I was directed to this one by my friend hui (who also got the same result, oddly enough).

Tuesday, December 27, 2005

I'm in Bangalore!

Just landed here this morning! The weather here is pleasantly cool! That's all for now. Watch out for aforementioned listery- coming soon!

Monday, December 26, 2005

Flyin' off to Bangalore and Year-End Listery!

I'm flying off to Bangalore this morning (at 7:50am to be exact!) and I'll be staying there til January the 8th. I hope to have a good time there and get some constructive work done too!

Well, 2005's nearly over and it's time for newspapers, magazines and entertainment shows on TV everywhere to produce their year-end "Best Of" (or "Worst Of") lists! I'm thinking I should get in on some of this action so I'm making my own "Best Of" lists (covering movies, prose fiction, comics, music and videogames). They'll be up shortly!

Sunday, December 18, 2005

KONG IS KING!

Some movies stay with you forever.

I'll always remember the very first movie I saw at a cinema- it was Disney's Oliver & Company. It's not the best Disney movie I've seen, but I gotta say my 6 year old mind found it pretty impressive!

The first movie to completely blow my mind, though, was Jurassic Park. At aged 10, when I first saw it on the big screen, I was a total dinosaur geek at age 10. Seeing the extinct beasts I’d previously only seen as fossils or artist's recreations brought completely to life floored me. From the first scene with the brontosauri (apatosauri, actually) grazing, I believed. Those dinosaurs were absolutely real. The T-rex was a creature of raw fury and power. A predator amongst predators. The velociraptors? Terror incarnate. The movie inspired awe in me from beginning to end.

5 years later, my mind was blown again. The movie was the Matrix. I’d seen the first teaser trailer for the movie a few months prior to its release- a short, evocative clip which had the mysterious URL whatisthematrix.com at the end. I didn't forget that and once I looked up the site, I found a treasure trove of information about the movie, including comics and short stories by major comics creators. That was enough to hype me up to an incredible extent. I was unbelievably excited when I went to see the movie and it exceeded my expectations in EVERY SINGLE WAY. It was the greatest spectacle I had ever seen. To this day, despite its (relatively) disappointing sequels, it's one of my favourite movies.

And of course, seeing the Star Wars re-releases on the cinema was another high point in my cinema-going life. The beloved movies of my childhood, in all their big screen surround-sound glory. Watching the new Star Wars movies, though, was pure heartbreak.

Then there was Spider-Man. Always my favourite superhero (never read much of the comics, but I'd avidly watched the '90s cartoon series), seeing him brought to life in such a spectacular way was just beautiful. Never mind that the Green Goblin had a weird suit and was kinda over-the-top. This was SPIDER-MAN - live, and in action. I wasn't even in Singapore when the movie came out so I first watched it on a crappy pirated DVD in Sri Lanka. Even then, it was a gorgeous experience. When I finally saw it on cinema... I couldn’t be happier.

And finally, there was The Lord of the Rings. When I first heard of the project, I was excited- the Lord of the Rings trilogy (along with its prequel The Hobbit) is one of my favourite books- but I was also wary. Who was this Peter Jackson guy? Oh? He'd made the Frighteners? Nice movie... but was this the really the kind of guy who could make The Lord of the Rings? It was impossible to tell, but I followed the production of the movie closely and the more I read online, the more excited I became. It was clear that the man- and everyone else involved in the production- had great love for the material and something magical was taking shape.

And when it came out, it was clear. Peter Jackson was a bonafide GENIUS. He is the new Spielberg. No... he's George Lucas (from the original Star Wars days, mind you) and Steven Spielberg (circa Raiders of the Lost Ark) combined. He learned from those masters and exceeded them in every way. Fellowship of The Ring, to me, was perfect. When Gandalf first rode into Hobbiton, I must admit I cried. Out of sheer joy. Here was the book that had captured my imagination for so long, brought to brilliant, brilliant life. I need not say more about the next two movies. Despite their occasional shortcomings (mostly related to scenes removed- I haven't seen the Extended Editions yet and so cannot comment on them), I love them whole-heartedly. Indeed, I was sad to see them end.

So when Peter Jackson announced King Kong as his next movie, part of me thought, well he's taking a break from serious movies to make something brainless but fun. Course, I'd read that the original King Kong was the film that inspired him to be a film-maker. I also knew that the 1933 movie was on the esteemed critic Roger Ebert's Great Movies list. I read about the movie during it's production. Sounded like a good adventure story. A great one, even. The much-hyped Kong versus 3 V-rexes (sort of like T-rexes, but bigger and nastier) fight seemed like it would be the highlight of the film by far. But I really didn’t expect King Kong to be nearly on the same level as The Lord of the Rings. How great could a movie about a giant ape be?

If I wore a hat, I'd eat it. I was dead-wrong. King Kong is not just a spectacular action-adventure, it's a movie filled with heart and soul. This, not Lord of the Rings, is Peter Jackson's magnum opus. This is the kind of movie that 9 year olds will watch, and be inspired to make movies like this. My ambition is to make games, but I can only hope that I will one day make something as emotionally engaging as this.

How is King Kong emotionally engaging? Well I’ll get to that! But first, let’s talk about the titular ape himself. Simply put, King Kong is the greatest special effects creation ever. In fact, I hesitate to call him a special effect. He lives, he breathes, he feels. When the camera looks into his eyes, you will see the pain and loneliness of his existence, and the simple joy that Anne Darrow (played by the beautiful Naomi Watts) brings into his life, a joy that he has long since forgotten. Andy Serkis deserves a Best Actor Oscar for his role in this. Nay, they should give the Oscar to Kong himself- the result of the combined efforts of Serkis and the entire WETA special effects team. In fact, everyone involved in this production must be commended. I salute you all! Especially Peter Jackson. What a man! What a director!

Boundless imagination and the pure joy of filmmaking permeate this film. Scene upon scene of unbelievable spectacle abound in the film's Skull Island second act. But the scenes that will stay with you forever are those with just Kong and Anne. Enjoying a peaceful sunset together. Skating on a frozen pond in New York. These little scenes give this film a powerful emotional core. You will grow to care for King Kong, misunderstood ape that he is, throughout the course of the movie. He evokes our sympathy without using any words at all. The ending will tear you apart. Even though you very likely know what will happen, it doesn't lessen the emotional impact AT ALL. That’s a testament to how brilliant this film is.

Some movies stay with you forever. King Kong is one of those movies.

Edited January 3rd, 2005.

Wednesday, December 14, 2005

Melancholia and the End of the Modern RPG

All stories end. It's only natural. Without an ending, even the best-written story would be incomplete, unsatisfying. Want to drive a reader insane? Rip out the last few pages of a novel he's reading (without his knowledge, or the ruse fails completely!). Observe him reading the book. Witness the screaming and hair-tearing that occurs once he reaches the (missing) end of the book. Too cruel is this punishment, for a reader. My point being, endings are important.

The fantasy novel presents an interesting case. Now, most modern fantasy novels are crap. Shameless derivatives of J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings (antecedent of the "high fantasy" genre) or Robert E. Howard's Conan (father of the "Swords and Sorcery" genre) or other such classic works. Let's discount all those. Truely great fantasy literature (those mentioned above, C.S. Lewis, Mervyn Peake) draws a reader into a fully-realised alternate world, be it a familiar one metamorphosed into a mythic space-- as in much of Neil Gaiman's work-- or a wholly alien and fantastical one like the world of Abarat in the Clive Barker's series of the same name. One does not read books like these as much as one visits the worlds described in the books for a while. A fictional vacation, so to speak.

As such, the ending of a fantasy work, while ostensibly wrapping up the story of the novel, also signifies the reader's point of departure from the fictional space of the world. Let's put it this way- you only get to visit the world for a limited period of time. You aren't privy to the events that took place prior to the beginning of the story and the events following the "end"-- which of course is only a marking point (unless its an apocalyptic novel, in which case the "end" really is the End!)-- are closed off too. So if you, like me, tend to get absorbed into a work, the end of a fantasy novel is a melancholy thing. Of course, an ending is essential- no fantasy world, no matter how engaging, is worth staying in forever- but at the same time a feeling of sorrow is experienced at the passing of the story. One could read the same book again, of course. And more often than not, authors, too unable to leave their creations be, create sequels. But there has to be some point of finality for every story.

Such is the case for the modern Role-Playing Game. These games, which have their origins in the Dungeons & Dragons board game (and thus represent a 2nd degree derivative- D&D being inspired by fantasy literature), go even further than fantasy books by literally allowing you to become a character in the fantasy narrative. You're not just reading about a hero vanquishing ancient evil- you are said hero. This creates a feeling of immersion far beyond any other form of media, which goes far in explaining how people can get so fully caught up in RPGS, or Massively Multiplayer RPGs in particular, that they never come out. But MMORPGs are a specialised case of RPG-- one in which the story doesn't really have an end and only YOU can choose to end your own-- and I don't play them so I don't have anything more to say about that. I'm talking about single-player RPGs here. The kind that where you inhabit a fictional world for a time, and then leave at the end of the story. Some (many!) RPGs posit worlds so boring that you feel nothing leaving them (Dungeon Siege, I'm looking at you).

But the very best RPGs, like the best fantasy stories, draw you deeply into their world. I recently completed the game Final Fantasy X- the first PS2 installment of the most famous console RPG of all time. I had played the game for just short of 70 hours at that point, over a period of 2 years. That's a long time! It was a pretty incredible experience, overall. The game's far from perfect but it's really, really good. The game has a mostly engaging set of characters and a unique, beautifully realised and rendered world. It's familiar enough to be recognised as a Final Fantasy title and yet unique enough to have its own, distinct voice. I had a triumphant feeling at having achieved the task of completing the game, but at the same time... sorrowful. It was a bittersweet victory, at best. This has as much to do with the storyline of the game as its immersiveness, though.

*Oh yeah, from this point on, I'm going to be discussing the story and ending of the game. You've been warned.*

Final Fantasy games traditionally have had deep (for a game!) and broody storylines. The heroes are more conflicted than your average RPG (well not anymore for the series made broody characters an RPG staple), the villains more ambiguous. Final Fantasy X could easily compete with Final Fantasy VII for the title of the broodingest (yes I made up that word) Final Fantasy game ever, despite having a rather happy-go-lucky jock of a protagonist and rather bright, colourful settings (at least for the first half of the game). The game, from very early on, establishes that your quest is one that must end with a sacrifice. Someone must die to save the world. Of course, being a Final Fantasy game, there are numerous plot twists and in the end, it's not the character whose fate it was to die that actually does so.

You see, at the end of Final Fantasy X, you cease to exist in the game's world. That can be taken to mean two things. Taken literally, it means that you, the player, stop to be an active participant in the game's narrative and are locked out of viewing any future history of the world. That, of course, is how any computer game with a narrative ends. But more importantly, the game's storyline has the main character-- the one who you control from the very beginning of the game til the end-- disappear from the game world as well.

This is interesting. It's possibly the very first time that an RPG game has directly addressed the issue of the player's role within the story and world of an RPG. The storyline of the game has the protagonist-- Tidus-- being sucked into another world, which seems to be his world a few thousand years in the future. There he gets caught up in a quest to save the world and develops into a heroic figure. Through the course of events in the game, he also comes to realise that he's not quite real- being somewhat of an apparition dreamed up by the spirits of some dead folk. And that saving the world will result in his destruction. Of course, what with him being the hero of the game, he goes through with it anyway. At the end, he really does disappear into nothingness. And the player, too, leaves the world of Final Fantasy X.

While Tidus is arguably a rather poor stand-in for the player, given his rather distinct personality (the best player stand-in characters have flat or non-existent personalities- allowing the player to inhabit the character with his or her own personality. Half-Life and Half-Life 2's mute protagonist, Gordon Freeman, is a good example of this). Perhaps its better to say his journey in the game is analogous to the player's. However, his journey ends as a curious inversion of the player's journey within the game. After all, its the world of the RPG that ceases to exist when the player turns off his (or her) PS2, isn't it? Or is it really the player who ceases to exist in the world of the game? If we choose to believe-- as the graphic novelist Grant Morrison does-- that works of fiction inhabit their own spheres of reality (in a figurative sense), then that isn't such an unbelievable notion at all...

Back to the game. Interestingly enough, the game set a precedent by being the first Final Fantasy game to have a sequel- FFX-2. I'd regarded FFX-2 as a sort of crassly commercial attempt at making money off those who played the first game, especially given its odd shift to a light-hearted tone after the heavy, positively depressing storyline of FFX and emphasis on cutesy costume play. And I'm not sure what to make of the fact that the game apparently has a secret ending where you can revive Tidus from his state of non-existence (though this is foreshadowed by a short video clip of him seemingly being re-born at the very end of Final Fantasy X, following the credits sequence). But having completed Final Fantasy X, I do feel a yearning to find out what happens to the world of the game and the characters within it. Of course, I could just imagine up scenarios for them (like fan-fiction writers do) but I'd rather not write about other people's characters when I can make my own. But that's neither here nor there. So yes, I might actually play FFX-2.

I suspect that Final Fantasy X wouldn't have nearly the same kind of effect had it been made on any platform previous to the PS2. The sights and sounds of the world, which couldn't have been created before the PS2 came along, go a long way in creating the illusion of inhabiting the world of the game. The same goes for the game Dragon Quest VIII, which I'm playing now. The graphics, beyond superficial beauty, play a large role in creating the impression of a living world inside your TV. Extrapolating further, I wonder what kind of vivid RPG worlds we'll see on the PS3 and the recently-launched Xbox 360?

Sunday, December 11, 2005

The New Look is Minimalist

Back to basics! Black text on a plain white background. After all, the writing is the thing, isn't it? No need for distractions.

Coming soon: My first post about videogames on this blog! Well I have been posting about games on my other blog, Zestgames (currently on hiatus but soon to be relaunched), but that's more of a new blog. And what I'm going to start writing here are my own personal thoughts about games that I've been playing. You'll see soon enough!

Friday, December 09, 2005

Renovations in progress!

Ah it's a lovely December in Singapore! Well actually, it's the rainy season now but we haven't had any gloomy all-day rains. Just these really impressive mini-storms which are just like a real storm- complete with howling winds, black clouds, really thick rain with water drops the size of melons and a lightning and thunder show worthy of a Special Effects Academy Award- but last just around half an hour, leaving behind a lot of wet.

The upshot of all this is that the temperatures gone down to a level where air-conditioning is not necessary to survive. Whopee!

Well, 2006 is less than a month away so I'm doing some early spring-cleaning. To fit in with the New Year's theme of rebirth and renewal, I'm in the process of changing the look and feel of this blog. Once I'm done with that, it's back to regular blogging. I've been reading/watching/listening to a lot of stuff lately and my head is full to bursting with thoughts and ideas about said stuff, which will overflow into this blog shortly (the thoughts and ideas, not my head).

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

Something New!

I've just added a linkroll displaying my latest del.icio.us links on the sidebar. Nifty! I usually post a few links to my del.icio.us every day so it'll be updated often. Actually, I wanted to setup my del.icio.us to automatically post my daily links to this blog (as described in this hepful post from theory.isthereason) but I can't find any useful info on how to set it up on a Blogger account- though any pointers would be much appreciated. :) So this is the next best option!

Sunday, November 06, 2005

Warren Ellis' Apparat Podcast

Warren Ellis's Superburst Mixtapes were easily the best podcasts of the year for music lovers- they showcased really excellent independent bands from a wide mix of genres. Each new episode promised brilliantly unpredictable auditory delights. Sadly, he ended the series with number 25.

BUT!

He's back with a new podcast- Apparat. Needless to say, it's brilliant. Programmes one through four are available on his website.

Saturday, November 05, 2005

Trailer for Singaporean CGI Movie 'Kungfu Gecko'

So Nickson Fong, a Singaporean CGI dude who worked on Hollywood films like Shrek and Matrix: Reloaded, and his team at Egg Story are making an animated movie called Kungfu Gecko!

The official site's got Quicktime trailers in high, medium and low sizes.

So how is it? From a technical perspective, it's excellent! Detailed textures, nice particle effects, realistic lighting, they've got it all down. But it's not a tech demo, it's a movie trailer. And from that perspective... it's lousy. The character designs are unappealing (my sister just called them "weird"), the first action sequence rips-off Spider-Man, and the comedy bits at the end are just flat.

Given that this is this is Kungfu Gecko's first trailer, I'll give Egg Story the benefit of doubt. The movie's slated for a 2008 release so they've got PLENTY of time to work on storyline and characterisations. OK they probably won't change the character designs but I could look past that. I just hope they don't suffer from 'Final Fantasy' syndrome- an extreme case of style over substance.

(via twitchfilm.net)

Beijing Rock and African Trance!

Yesterday, I read this Kaiju Shakedown about Jackie Chan's iTunes playlist. I don't pay attention to celebrity music recommendations unless it's from a musician I like, but this made me too curious. What does Jacky listen to? Well, first thing I found out is that the man sings! Indeed, he's got an album out. Interesting, but nothing I'd want to listen to.

Then I spotted the name HANG ON THE BOX. I knew them! An all-girl band from Beijing whose short, snappy punk songs I'd rather enjoyed listening to a few year ago (the songs are still available on their old Sister Records site. But I'd forgotten about them for a while. Time to see what they'd been up to lately! So I googled them and lo and behold, they've got a snazzy new site! I discovered they had a new lineup- with the addition of male guitarist Xiao Gan, they no longer qualified as a girl-band. They'd released a couple of new albums out since I last checked. But best of all, the site had new songs to listen to! I checked out the song Rollercoaster (streaming WMA there), described on their site as an "electro-spacerock number." Intriguing!

Whoa! This song was so different from their old stuff! Punk no more, they were. Electro-spacerock was apt. Sounded... experimental. Bit like Mars Volta (no surprise- their guitarist is a fan!). But very enjoyable! It's been a while since a band really surprised me and HANG IN THE BOX have done just that. I look forward to their next album!

Though, impatient to hear more of their stuff, I took the liberty of downloading their last album- Foxy Lady (actually an EP with a cover of Jimi Hendrix's Foxy Lady and 2 new songs, padded out with older songs. Not that I mind!). Great stuff! The albums on my to-buy list, along with their previous album "Di Di Di" and their compilation album "For Every Punk B**ch & A**ehole". I'll see if I can't cajole a local music store into bringing in their stuff.

What does all this have to do with African Trance, though? Well, while perusing their site I took a look at their links section and spotted a link for "Konono No.1 (the African Neubauten!)." I have no idea who Neubauten is but I clicked the link anyway! And so I ended up at the site for KONONO N°1, a band from Congo whose music is out of this world!!!

The band uses traditional instruments called likembés or thumb pianos, microphones made out of recycled car magnets and a percussion section made of junk! And they use this unusual setup to make totally funky music. But don't take my word for it! Listen to this MP3 and check out this video of the band performing.

Mashed-up Music

I've been hunting for mashups (remixes where 2 or more songs are mixed together) after listenin to the excellent M.I.A. vs Madonna mashup I linked to yesterday. There's quite a few DJs doing this mashup thing nowadays and some of them are pretty darn good. Here's a few tracks I like:

Superlangalang! - M.I.A. vs Super Mario Bros Theme by Josh Console. Quirky and utterly, utterly cool. The Super Mario theme is just... immortal.

Radio Hollaback- Clash vs Gwen Stefani (2nd song in the list. check out the other tracks too!) by Party Ben. Oh yeah, this one's fun. The Clash's superbly dancey 'This is Radio Clash' mixed with Gwen's 'Hollaback Girl'. Funky!

Since you ain't me- Kelly Clarkson's vs Frank Black (4th from bottom) byDivide and Kreate. I love Kelly Clarkson's Since You've Been Gone- total guilty pleasure. I haven't listened to Frank Black's solo work but the Pixies is, you know, legendary. His music adds a gritty edge to her singing. Nice mix.

Friday, November 04, 2005

How does Madonna stay so cool??

Her new song, Hung Up, is eminently danceable pop bliss. Listen to it on her site. Then get an awesome remix, featuring the ubercool M.I.A., here.

Even cooler than the song is its video! Madonna calls it a tribute to dance, and it shows. It's got a supremely-flexible b-girl (who is she???), le parkour (which isn't dancing, but its such a beautiful expression of human motion that it fits right in), a gorgeous sequence set in a Chinese restaurant, some krumping and DDR! Sadly, nobody plays the game- they just dance on the machines. But its still cool. In fact, its very cool.

Check it out in either high and low Windows Media flavours (bleh) or streaming Quicktime.

On a related note, POPJUSTICE's got a rather good interview with the producer of Madonna's new album, Stuart Price (his name, not the album's- which is Confessions On A Dance Floor).

Thursday, October 27, 2005

I want one of these!

Nippon Telegraph & Telephone (NTT) Corp has developed a device that lets you remote-control humans!

Don't panic just yet- it's not a mind-control device. What they've developed is a special headset and remote control combo. The headset sends a low-voltage electric current from the back of your ears through your head in either a left-right or right-left direction- as set by the remote control. When the remote switch is set to right, you'll be compelled to turn right when walking (apparently you can resist but then you'll have to stop moving altogether).

NTT envisions a range of uses for this technology, from games(!) to amusement park rides to music. Defence contractors, on the other hand, are already envisioning ways to use this as a "non-lethal" weapoon.

Now if they could make a device that works without the intended controllee having to wear a headset, it'd make for the ultimate prank device! Oh, the possibilities!

R.I.P. Rosa Parks

You were a true hero. Would that the world had more people like you.

My dad's written a good piece about Rosa Parks on his blog.

Update: This Time magazine piece about her from their 100 Most Important People of the Century special is rather illuminating.

Another Update: Rosa Park's is on Apple's homepage! The picture of her links to a news story about her. Very classy, Apple. Very classy indeed.

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

The Hottest Curry Ever

"Also, I had the hottest curry ever on Sunday. Magic Spice in Shimo-Kitazawa. The hot curry requires a password that is not printed on the menu."

Tim Rogers lives in Tokyo. He's a punk rock kinda guy. He writes about games, music and other interesting stuff. Read his blog.

Saturday, October 22, 2005

Terry Pratchett's Thud! mini-review

Thud! is the 30th Discworld novel. 30! That's a lotta novels. Remarkable then, that Terry Pratchett has managed to keep the fires of his creation so strong through all this time. In fact, I think this latest one's absolutely brilliant. It's a cracking read- I devoured in less than 2 days- and also scarily prescient as it tackles the currently rather-sticky issue of ethnic warfare and ideological fanaticism. At the same time, we get to see a new side of Samuel Vimes' (commander of the City Watch and star of some of the best Discworld novels) character as he's pushed to his absolute limits by the investigation in this book while at the same time attempting to be a good father to his baby son. Both aspects of the book are developed simultaneously and collide in a rather exciting finale. Speaking of which, Thud! has one of the best endings of any Discworld book. One thing I love about the Discworld series is how Pratchett evolves the world with every book. And the events at the end of this one shake up the status quo with great aplomb. Absolutely brilliant.

New Elliot Smith songs online!

Elliot Smith commited suicide on this very day, 2 years ago. He was one of the very best singer-songwriters in America, writing songs that were haunting, lyrical and very very beautiful. Celebrate the music of this late, great musician by downloading this set of 22 unreleased songs by him that were leaked online last week. The track 'New Disaster' is particularly stands out for me.

Edit: And there's more! The blog The Rawking Refuses To Stop! has a compilation of live performances from Elliot Smith's album From A Basement On The Hill available in a link on this post. Download it and share it with all your friends! Spread the Elliot Smith love!

Saturday, October 15, 2005

I Aten't Dead

Well!

I've been keeping busy of late. Been working on loads and loads of school projects. It's been hectic, but pretty darned fun too! No time for a proper post but here's a few of the media I've been consuming lately:

TV:
Densha Otoko (Train Man)- a very cool Japanese TV series based on the most fascinating Internet phenomenon I've heard of in years. This warrants it's own longish post sometime in the future!

Eureka Seven- new anime by the director of Rahxephon. It's got robots who surf through the air. Very nice.

Music:
Goldfrapp's Supernature- A very sexy album indeed.

Sigur Ros's Takk- Absolutely beautiful new album from the Icelandic band. The 1st single Glosoli is a masterpiece. It's got a great, GREAT video too!

Kate Bush's The Kick Inside, The Dreaming and Hounds of Love- I lament never having heard of this lady before! Pure class, this. Some of the finest pop music I've ever heard.

Harvey Danger's Little by Little- What an awesome rock album! And you can download it free on their site! I love you, Harvey Danger!

Super Furry Animal's Love Kraft- I didn't quite like this at first but it's really grown on me! Good stuff, this.

Movies:

The Corpse Bride- Tim Burton's return to stop-motion animation is an absolute delight for an animation fan like me and packs a sweet story to boot! Loved it, loved it, loved it.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory- Deeeeeeeeeeeeeelicious! Danny Elfman's score and songs are out of this world!

Monday, September 26, 2005

COMICS SALE!

I'm selling off a bunch of old comics. Drop me a line at my email address hazylium@gmail.com if you're interested in any of them- let me know how much you're offering for a comic in the mail. But please don't offer ridiculous prices like $0.50! Oh and I'm only selling to people in Singapore (unless you're willing to fork out for shipping costs too).

Here's the looong list of comics I'm selling.

MARVEL:
DISTRICT X #1-6
RUNAWAYS 2 #1-2 (by Brian K Vaughn, writer of Y The Last Man)
Neil Gaiman's 1602 #1-8
ULTIMATES #2 1-6
ASTONISHING X-MEN TPB: GIFTED (by Buffy creator Joss Whedon)
ASTONISHING X-MEN #7-12
NEW X-MEN #146-150 (PLANET X)
NEW X MEN #151-154 (HERE COMES TOMORROW)
HULK: GRAY #1-3
NYX #1-2
MARVEL KNIGHTS: SPIDER-MAN #1
ULTIMATE NIGHTMARE #1

DC:
ADAM STRANGE #1-2
JUSTICE #1
BATMAN BROKEN CITY #1-6 (by Brian Azzarello and Eruardo Risso of 100 Bullets)
CATWOMAN #25-27
BATGIRL #45-48 (Covers by James Jean of Fables)
SUPERMAN #204 (For Tomorrow 1 by Brian Azzarello and Jim Lee)
BATMAN: CITY OF LIGHT #1-2
DETECTIVE COMICS #788-793 (Covers by Tim Sale)

VERTIGO:
THESSALY: WITCH FOR HIRE #1
DREAMING #38-39
SWAMP THING #1 (by Brian K Vaughn, writer of Y The Last Man)

WILDSTORM:
AUTHORITY REVOLUTION #1
COUP D'ETAT SLEEPER, STORMWATCH, WILDCATS, AUTHORITY, AFTERWORD
MAJESTIC #1-3
ASTRO CITY DARK AGE BOOK ONE #1
STORMWATCH: TEAM ACHILLES #20-23

DARK HORSE:
Paul Bagge's APOCALYPSE NERD #1
Matt Wagner'S GRENDEL CYCLE TPB

IDW:
METAL GEAR SOLID #1-2

ONI PRESS:
LITTLE STAR #1
LOVE FIGHTS #7-12

TOP COW:
WANTED #1-6 + DOSSIER
RISING STARS #1

IMAGE COMICS:
CREECH: RAGE AGAINST DEATH TPB
SPYBOY #1
BONE #1

BECKETT:
RUULE: GANGLORDS OF CHINATOWN #1

Saturday, September 24, 2005

Firefox 1.07 out!

It's got some security fixes. So upgrade your browser today!

Thursday, September 15, 2005

Cool Flickr Set of HK Disneyland Opening

Hong Kong Disneyland's grand opening was on September 12th and here's a Flickr photoset of the event. There's neat shots of the parade too- love the Toy Story chracters, especially the happy-looking army man!

Wednesday, September 14, 2005

My iPod sock needs one of these...

An embroidered skull!

I keep my iPod in a purple sock and I've always wanted to have a skull on it (a skull and cross-bones, to be exact). Now, this project shows me how! I'll put up a photo of my modified sock once it's done.

(via, yes you guessed it, BoingBoing)

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

Salon.com's serializing Cory Doctorow's new novel!

This is very cool. Cory Doctorow is, I feel, one of the best talents in science fiction, nay, all of fiction, today. And he's a really cool guy to boot- releasing almost all his stories online under Creative Commons licenses which allow free non-commercial redistribution. He's finished a third of his new novel, tentatively titled Themepunks, and Salon.com will be publishing a new section of the book every Monday for the next ten weeks. The 1st part is online here. Have a taster:

"Why the hell have you done this, Landon?" Kettlewell asked himself into his tie-mic. Ties and suits for the new Kodacell execs in the room, like surfers playing dress-up. "Why buy two dinosaurs and stick 'em together? Will they mate and give birth to a new generation of less-endangered dinosaurs?"

365 tomorrows

365 tomorrows is a project by a group writers to publish a new science fiction short story every day for one year- it began on August 1st 2005. They've put up some really neat stories.

Here's an excerpt from the story for September 1st, Time To Remember:

Don’t wake up yet, Mischa. Please, please don’t wake up.

At nineteen, Christopher Malloy was the youngest person on Io to receive his degree in neuronanotechnology. It was quite an accomplishment, according to his parents and teachers and friends, but at that moment, on the sunken platform of the medical arena, Chris felt as small as the machines he worked with. Seven professors, nine technicians, two medical journalists, and one blinding halogen light glared from the space overhead, waiting for him to make a move.

(via BoingBoing)

Time Magazine article on the making of the iPod nano

This is a fascinating article about Apple's amazing new iPod nano complete with quotes from Steve Jobs. Even though it may seem risky to phase out their best-selling iPod (the mini), I think that releasing the nano was the smartest move Apple could make with their iPod line right now. Apple's not going to be displaced from it's position as king of the MP3 market anytime soon.

Sunday, September 11, 2005

Singapore Writer's Fest: Creating Online Communities Through Blogging

This talk, held on the final day of the SWF, was really fun. Not only did I get Cory Doctorow to sign a copy of his new novel, Someone Comes To Town, Someone Leaves Town (which I bought from Borders an hour before the talk!), the talk itself was very entertaining and quite informative! It was a 4-way talk with Cory Doctorow and Singaporean bloggers mrbrown, Mr Miyagi and the (in)famous XiaXue. Mr Brown was the unofficial "head" of the talk but everyone had something interesting to say. The talk was in the form of a question and answer question so there was plenty of audience interaction.

Got more- click lah!

Highlights:
mrbrown introduced the Singapore blogging community that they started- Tomorrow.sg, a link blog which he said was modelled after the blog that Cory writes for, BoingBoing.net. Not a bad model since BoingBoing's the most popular blog on the Net! He spoke of a controversy they had recently where they posted a link to a single unwed mother's blog (it's this post here) and she got loads of unwanted publicity as a result and her boyfriend was slammed left and right for being a jerk. There was a big uproar with people saying that Tomorrow.sg shouldn't just link to blogs anyhow without permission. Cory chipped in that the Net was "made for linking without permission" and people shouldn't post information on a public medium, which a blog is, if they intend it to be private. Besides, Livejournal lets you publish private, password-protected blogs- so if you want to publish a private diary online, use one of those to make sure nobody else reads it!

Tomorrow.sg's policy now is that if a blog has a notice saying permission is required to link, then they'll ask for permisson (amusingly, Cory chipped in that he'd link without asking for permission anyway!). If not, they'll take it for granted that it's OK to link to the blog. Sounds fair enough. Here's their linking policy in full. Still on the topic of privacy on the Net, Cory recommended this insightful piece by blogger Danny O'Brien. The piece is basically about the kinds of conversations people have on the web (particularly on blogs) and the differences between public register- what you say for public consumption- and private register- like conversation between friends.

Later, someone asked a question about government intervention in the blogosphere here. So far, the speakers said, the government hasn't done anything drastic with regards to blogs, even those with political content- they're content to take a wait and see approach. mrbrown did relate a funny anecdote about a photo of 2 policemen asleep in their car that he put up on his blog- apparently the Chief of that police division came to his house and politely asked him to take down the photo as it negatively affected morale in his division. Apparently this is the only time mrbrown was ever approached by a public official with regard to content in his blog. He did stress that they didn't force him to take down the photo, merely requested it while explaining to him the reasons why they didn't want the photo up.

Another interesting topic of conversation was how bloggers respond to criticism. Xiaxue mentioned that some bloggers get quite upset- and even in her case there's often quite a lot of negative comments on her posts (a lot of people hate on her cos her blog is so popular. It's not really my thing but I don't see why the hating) but she also has quite a lot of supporters who defend her.

Oh yeah! Mr Miyagi's put up a few clips from the talk up on his blog! Specifically, the clips on this post and this post. The first is a hilarious clip of this Mystical Indian Dude (as me and my sister dubbed him cos of his propensity to speak in flowery, deep-sounding language) talking about how opinions are ants. And blogs are honey. Yes, really. He's actually got an interesting point hidden in his multiple metaphors. The reactions from the panel were something to see whenever he spoke. Everyone just did a double-take, a kind of "did he really say that?" moment. He also chipped in with the last comment of the day. Can't remember the details, but he was talking about how blogging is a kind of stress-reliever and somehow ended up talking about Laughing Clubs, the ones they have in India where lots of middle-aged men gather in parks and laugh their worries away as a group. The second clip is of Cory talking about how you can choose to focus on new content for your blog or focus on interacting with your readers.

And that's it for this year's Singapore Writer's Fest! The talks I attended were all quite excellent so I'm really looking forward to next years one. The organisers did a really good job, well, organising the whole affair so kudos to them, too!

Thursday, September 08, 2005

Apple announces the iPod nano!

This is very very sexy. It's amazingly small and thin and it has a color display! My mind boggles at how such a tiny device can have 4gb of space... My goodness though, it's so gorgeous! Judging by Apple's site I guess it replaces the iPod mini in the iPod line of devices. Well I'm happy with my 4gb mini right now but I know what my next iPod's gonna be...

(via Engadget)

More on Cory Doctorow's SWF Talk on Copyright and the Future of Media

As I posted earlier, I was at Cory Doctorow's talk about copyright last Saturday. He gave a really accessible, concise history of copyright and talked about the issues regarding copyright law. It may not sound like the most exciting topic but he made it so with cool anecdotes. At one point he played part of DJ Dangermouse's now-legendary Grey album (an incredible mix of Jay Z's Black album and The Beatles' White Album- google and download it!). He also encouraged the audience to engage with the government to come up with equitable copyright solutions that will benefit both content producers and society at large.

Oh this is neat! A blogger named Ambar has put up 3 short videos from Cory Doctorow's talk on Copyright and the Future of Media on her blog.

What's even better is that you can get an MP3 of the entire talk here, courtesy of blogger Preetam Rai. If you've never heard Cory in person, I highly recommend you download and give it a listen! It's a 20mb file that runs for an hour and 20 minutes. Get it- it's great stuff.

Monday, September 05, 2005

Naoki Urasawa's Pluto

Whew this is the 3rd manga series that I downloaded online. I'm on a manga downloading binge! This one I heard of via this post on jeansnow.net. Jean Snow usually links to cool stuff so I took a look at the article linked to in the post. Turns out that Naoki Urasawa wrote the manga Monster, about a physician who saves a little boy who grows up to be a murderer. I've heard of the anime of the same name that's based on it- it's quite renowned. So anyway, Pluto's quite an interesting manga project. It's actually a remake of a story arc from Osamu Tezuka's seminal Astro Boy titled "The Greatest Robot on Earth." In that story, a powerful robot named Pluto fights the world's seven most powerful robots under orders from his master.

Urasawa's remake focuses on a human-looking robot policeman named Gesicht and his efforts to solve a series of bizzare murders which are connected by a weird visual symbol. Urasawa's interpretation of Tezuka's future world where humans and robots live side by side is both visually arresting and manages to evoke the same kind of emotions that Tezuka's original did. It's very very good stuff. You can download scans here.

Makoto Yukimura's Vinland Saga

Makoto Yukimara's manga Planetes is one of my favourite comics. Its about space exploration in the near future and it's remarkably one of the most human and beautiful science fiction stories I've ever read. So when I read on scanlation group MangaScreener's front page that they had just released the translation of the 1st volume of his new manga, Vinland Saga, I was agog. I fired up mirc and downloaded it straight away.

Wow. It's completely different from Planetes but I really like it. It's about Vikings! It's a shonen manga which means lots of bloodshed and violence, a bit of slapstick comedy and all that kinda stuff. It's still got Yukimura's magic touch, though. This is very much an introductory issue but it hints to a very interesting storyline. And of course his artwork remains impeccable. This is a very cool comic. I hope someone gets the rights to release an English version real soon.

Ai Yazawa's Nana

For the past few days, I've been reading Ai Yazawa's manga Nana. It's very awesome. In fact, it's one of the best comics I've ever read. It's about 2 young women, Nana Komatsu and Nana Okami, who on the surface are just about as different as they come but forge a deep friendship over the course of the story.

Nana Komatsu's a bit of a ditz, always falling in love with guys and having transient relationships while hoping for something more, she finally makes the decision to move to Tokyo to make something of herself and find out what she wants from life.

Nana Okami's a tough punk rocker girl with a tumultuous past who goes to Tokyo with the dream of becoming a rockstar.

What makes this series so cool are the spot-on characterizations, sparkling dialogue (even in the English translation!) and the natural relationships the characters have with their friends (who play a big role in this manga). It's about relationships, punk rock, sex, love, and life as a 20-something. Oh and the art is absolutely amazing. Ai Yazawa is a master of her craft. Her drawings are exquisite and she has a real eye for fashion.

Nana's going to be published in English by Viz Media and the 1st volume will come out in November. But if you're impatient, you can do what I did and download scanlations- the term for manga that's been scanned and translated by fans- on this cool Nana forum here. You'll need to register on the forum to access the download links but it's completely worth it. BTW they'll take down the download links for each volume as it's released by Viz. Besides, you'll want to buy it anyway. It's my most anticipated release for this November.

Comics Quik-Reviews

These here are all the singles I've bought for the past 2 weeks:

Godland #1
Justice #1
Rex Libris #1
Pirate Club #7
Seven Soldiers: Klarion #3
Conan #19
Seven Soldiers: Shining Knight #4
B.P.R.D. The Black Flame #1
NYC MECH: Beta Love #3
The Losers #27
Astonishing X-Men #12

If you wanna read my Quik-reviews of em, click here:

I'll start with the most recent ones. Onto the reviews!

Astonishing X-Men #12
What a disappointment. Astonishing X-Men is the unofficial sequel to Grant Morrison's New X-Men, a comic book that revitalized the X-Men franchise and made superheroes fresh again. Astonishing X-Men takes everything new and cool about New X-Men and throws it out the window. Sure, Josh has a great ear for dialogue. But this storyline is so retro-uncool it's unbelievable. The Danger Room becomes sentient and tries to kill the X-Men! Oh no, Professor X did something bad!

But the fanboys seem to enjoy it. Yuck. This is everything that's wrong with the American comics industry. It's so insular. ONLY fanboys could enjoy this tripe. I lent my New X-Men hardcovers to friends a while back and they loved it, even though they'd never read X-Men comics before. I lent them my Astonishing trade and they just said MEH. They thought the costumes were silly and the storyline, well, underwhelming. That sums this comic. 'Nuff sed.
Verdict: 2 thumbs, way down.

The Losers #27
This series hurtles towards its impending conclusion and the roller-coaster ride just doesn't let up. Pooch has been captured and faces torture at the hands of Roque. Meanwhile, the rest of the team scrambles to find and rescue him. The end of this issue is a real cliffhanger. For the 1st time, it seems like there's really no way out for one our heroes! So will Pooch live or will he die? Oh the suspense!
Verdict: Nail-bitingly tense

NYC MECH: Beta Love
Our hero gets fired from his job and the girl he's romancing (or is it the other way around?) is getting involved with a very dangerous, very powerful man. Andy Macdonald's art continues to shine on this series and the story's moving along nicely too. Writers Ivan Brandon and Miles Gunter really get into our protagonists head. This story may be about robots but it's got heart and humanity.
Verdict: Robot birds rock

B.P.R.D. The Black Flame #1
Whoa! B.P.R.D.s turned into a big fight comic! This issue continues the storyline from the previous B.P.R.D. series and sees the B.P.R.D. team, led by Captain Daimio, exploring a sewage plant to find out what the frog-men are up to. They shoot up loads of frog-men in an Aliens-style bughunt! The last page of the comic gives us a tantalizing hint of old foes to come with the appearance of the word ZINCO, which should send tingles down the spines of Hellboy fans.
Verdict: ZINCO!!!

Seven Soldiers: Shining Knight #4
Awesome. Just plain awesome. The twist presented in this issue was completely unexpected (at least to me) and the issue also manages to tie in neatly with another Seven Soldiers issue, Zatanna #3. It doesn't quite end Justin's story- judging by the end of this issue, I guess we'll only find out the fates of the Seven Soldiers in the bookend Seven Soldiers #1. But that's fine by me. I'm enjoying the ride.
Verdict: 2 thumbs up, way up!

Conan #19
Conan has some lady trouble and encounters a supernatural monster. There's nothing much to say about this comic save that it is one of the most consistently excellent titles on the market and is a fine retelling of Robert E. Howard's original tales. Next month will see the start of the reknowned Tower Of The Elephant storyline. If you like Conan or fantasy or just plain old good comics, you should be reading this book.
Verdict: Read this comic!

Seven Soldiers: Klarion #3
In this issue, Klarion, along with a gang of super-powered delinquents, sneaks into a museum of Golden Age superhero artefacts and steals a drilling machine for the enigmatic Mr Melmoth. By the end, Klarion realises Melmoth's betrayal and decides to save the day, albeit reluctantly. Klarion has been one of the most inventive series in the Seven Soldiers line and this issue is no exception. Frazer Irving's moody, expressive art continues to be a highlight, too.
Verdict: Goth-Punk Superhero Goodness!

Pirate Club #7
So like, Pirate Club's a very imaginative and slightly surreal story about a gang of schoolkids- our titular Pirate Club- who accidentally kill a kid (in the 1st issue!) and find themselves on the run from the police, rival gangs and the spirit of the kid they killed (who's turning out to be much more than just the loser he initially appeared to be). Oh and this issue has NINJAS. So go check out the 1st issue here. Then go order the back issues.
Verdict: Pirates + Ninjas = Ultimate Cool

Rex Libris #1
A book about a librarian doesn't seem very exciting, does it? But Rex Libris is not an ordinary librarian. He defeats an evil Samurai Demon in the first few pages. Rex Libris is such a bad-ass, he teleports into outer space to make an astronaut return an overdue book. He's also been around since the Library at Alexandria burned down and he works for Toth, ancient Egyptian god of writing. This is one fun comic. Read the preview here and run down to your local comic shop and buy yourself a copy!
Verdict: Don't mess with librarians- they'll kick your ass.

Justice #1
Wow I didn't really like this. Not only was the story plodding and self-important, I'm beginning to dislike Alex Ross's art too. Sure, he's a good artist, but more and more it's striking me that superrealistic art detracts from superhero stories. Where's the wonder, Ross? Bring back the wonder!
Verdict: Superheroes Done Wrong

Godland #1
Oh this is so cool. Joe Casey writes and Tom Scioli draws this very excellent Silver Age styled comic about Adam Archer, an astronauts who gets cosmic powers while on an ill-fated mission to Mars. Scioli, who did the art for the criminally underrated Freedom Force games, produces artwork in this issue that would make Jack Kirby himself proud. Joe Casey's script updates the kind of big cosmic tales Marvel Comics used to produce in the '60s for the 2000 generation. This is a BIG SUPERHERO STORY done right for 2005. If my comic shop doesn't get the 2nd issue in by next week, I may throw a fit. Read the entire 1st issue here and tell me this ain't cool!
Verdict: Superheroics Done Right

Singapore Writer's Fest: Cory Doctorow on Copyright and the Future of Media

Hey boys and girls, it's Cory Doctorow!

Yesterday evening, me and my sister went for Cory Doctorow's talk on Copyright and the Future of Media. Twas cool. I'll put up more info later.

For now, suffice to say the man's a great public speaker, very erudite and keenly intelligent. He's very geek-chic too- look at his spam mail t-shirt and awesome PowerBook! I'll be going for his talk on blogging later today too.

I'm switching back to Blogger's built-in comments system

It's just about got all the features in Haloscan's system and it allows me to login and comment using my Blogger nickname. I didn't really that under Haloscan, anyone could post using my nickname (not that anyone did, but it was a possibility). Now I don't need to worry about that!
But I've kept the Haloscan comments on all my old posts so they don't disappear.

Wednesday, August 31, 2005

Spin- A Very Cool Indie Short Film

Spin is a really cool short film by Double Edge Films. Its about a DJ who can affect reality with his console. It's very creative and there isn't any dialogue so it's accessible to everyone! I won't say more cos there are some pretty cool twists in this little piece. I'm really impressed with the standard of filmmaking at show here- the editing in particular is sweet. Watch it here!

(via jay is)

Tuesday, August 30, 2005

Bruce Sterling Live In Person!

Bruce Sterling is a Visionary. No, really. That's his actual job title. He's the Visionary-In-Residence at the Art Center College of Design at Pasadena, California. He's at the College for the whole of this year (except right now, cos he's here in Singapore!), teaching students about the future of design. Pretty exciting stuff.

Taken with my 7210 so it aint the highest quality. But that's Bruce Sterling there. :-)

Sterling (who, by the way, has an honorary Doctorate in Science!) gave a talk titled "From Cyberpunk to Industrial Design – Writing Science Fiction in the 21st century" on Saturday night as part of the Singapore Writer's Festival. Appropriately enough, it was held in the new National Library's Pod, a futuristic egg-shaped structure perched at the top of the Library building. Gorgeous view of the city from there, too.

But I digress. About the talk itself- it was quite awesome.

After one of the talk's organisers briefly introduced him (famous science fiction writer, etc), Sterling began by talking about his current work at the Art Center College of Design and how design has been a primary area of interest to him of late. He spoke a bit about business process reengineering and only half-jokingly said that instead of calling himself a science fiction writer, he now considered himself an artist who's main area of concern is the impact of technology on society.

He then spoke about a bit about science fiction. Specifically, he said there's an inherent conflict between the words "science" and "fiction," science being logical and based on falsifiable theories and fiction being a form of art dealing with human emotions and all that kinda jazz. According to him, design represents a third way of thinking, as design isn't quite science and its not really art either. Design's about, well, interface (he may not have used that precise word though). And he believes design can bridge the gap between science and fiction.

At this point of his talk he took out a designer object, a tube-shaped object that turned out to be a spectacles container with a twist. It had hinges on both sides, allowing him to open the case on one side, flip it around and close it on the other. Neat trick. But as Sterling showed, this wasn't good design. The obvious flaw was that if you flipped the case over while your spectacles were inside, they'd fall right out of the case. Also, his spectacles were too big to fit in the case. Finally, the case itself was pretty fragile. So it wasn't a particularly useful design. Just a good gimmick.

According to Sterling, good design centers around safety and utility- basically, good design is practical. Useful. He explained how rapid prototyping is the designer's secret weapon. Rapid prototyping is form of computer-aided manufacturing where an object is designed as a 3D model in a computer and then automatically constructed by 3D printers or similar such devices. Sterling said that design isn't a precise process. It's extremely hard to get a design right the first time. The beauty of rapid prototyping is that it allows designers to churn out physical model after physical model of their designs til they finally get it right.

Continuing with the design meme, Sterling talked about how working with designers for the past year or so has really changed his mindset. Sitting there at the talk listening to him, I could really feel his love for design. It's clearly something he cares deeply about. He's even trying to apply it to his fiction! His next novel may well fall into, or invent, the genre of design fiction. I doubt he'd be disappointed if it did.

Then he spoke about another topic that's close to his heart- sustainability. Taking a water bottle (a Voda water bottle, no less), he outlined it's life-cycle: from raw materials to factory to distribution to the consumer (him) and it's final destination, a land-fill. This, he said, isn't a sustainable system. If we keep throwing away all our consumer objects like we do now, there won't be enough land-fills on Earth to store all the waste. Clearly there's a need for a sustainable system.

The problem with sustainability as a concept, he said, is that it isn't a very attractive concept. Put in another way, it's not really sexy enough. The problem, said Sterling, is the word itself. It's a dead word. Not one that's likely to come up in a conversation. He gave an amusing example of a man coming home from work to say "Honey, this dinner was really sustainable!" Not gonna happen. His implication ws that the word sustainable seems to denote stagnation, a lack of progress.

But, Sterling continued, sustainability doesn't have to be about keeping things the same- it's about allowing society to continually make new mistakes, instead of repeating the same old ones again and again. No society had ever achieved that, he said, though scientific culture comes the closest- being a system where everything is refutable, offering the possibility of complete upheavals of accepted theory given new discoveries.

The key to understanding sustainability is time, he said. We need to stop thinking about permanence. The common science fiction concepts of utopias and apocalypses have to go. The first implies perfection, which in turn implies stagnation- nothing'll ever change in a perfect society. The second- well there won't be anyone left, will there? So no point thinking about it. Sterling said that we need to reconsider the way we think about the future. It's not a place we're going to reach one day- rather, it's a continual becoming. The future as a process.

Sterling then described three ways of achieving sustainability, the way he saw it. The first was to make everything bio-degradable. Which was what humans did prior to industrialization as they didn't know how to make artificial materials. Even so, he said, there remains pollution from ancient times in the form of stone artifacts. He gave us the example of archeologists cutting their hands on prehistoric flint weapons made by hominids. I think what he was getting at with that example is that it's kind of impossible to make EVERYTHING bio-degradable. Heh. Some of the objects we leave behind'll make archeologists of the future blow up. Hopefully those objects won't last that long.

The second way of reaching sustainability was to build monuments. What Sterling meant by this was objects that are very long-lasting. However, he said, this isn't really feasible because no society wants to use the same old stuff forever. How many people want to use their great-grandmothers furniture?

The third way, the one that Sterling's really interested in, is to digitally track EVERYTHING- all consumer objects, anyway. Using RFID and similar technologies, track objects throughout their life-cycles and then fold them back into the production stream when they've reached the end of their usefulness. Sterling says the individual technologies needed to create such a system exist today- digital tracking, searching, databases, etc. They've just never been integrated in this way yet. In the scenario that he was positing, every object would have it's own story, so to speak. You could find out it's complete history from its factory origins to its movements across the world to when it finally reached you. According to him, the possibilities for such a system are innumerable but also almost unimaginable as it's something completely NEW. This is something that could only happen at this current stage of human history as only now do we have the required skills and technologies.

It's a bit of a complicated notion, this. Hard to see how it'd work as a system. And of course, rife with possibilities for abuse (loss of privacys just the tip of the iceberg). But at the same time, it's tremendously exciting. Especially when Bruce Sterling's the one talking about it. He's got a real gift for communicating his vision, that man. But it's a testament to how much of a brain-bender this idea is that Sterling's spent the last 3 years trying to write a novel about it but has so far been unable to do so.

Sterling predicts that this system of digitally tracked objects will result in a breakdown between the real world and the virtual world (spoken like a true cyber-punk, huzzah!). Every significant object will be linked to something virtual. Imagine, he said, a water bottle with a full history, discussion boards, blogs and other web resources dedicated to it. What an incredible idea! It'd be nothing less than a complete revolution in consumer-product relationships if it happens, thats for sure. By the way, if you're interested in learning more about these exciting ideas of Sterling's, read this transcript of his August 2004 talk at SIGGRAPH. It's a very very good read as long as you don't mind plowing through some slightly technical concepts.

Going back to the topic of The Future, Sterling said that it'll either be unimaginable (propelled by technologies like the above) or unthinkable (we'll all be wiped out by nuclear war- yep, sounds pretty unthinkable to me). He also predicts that almost all of today's pressing problems will be solved purely by accident, as by-products of technological advances of the future.

He finished off by mentioning his blog, which is kind of his own rapid prototyping process. He posts snippets of interesting news about technology and culture and the like.

Following the talk, there was a Question and Answer session. I made some notes of the more interesting questions and answers. I didn't take down the exact questions so I'm just paraphrasing em.

The first person to ask a question was a bit kiasu- he asked 3! Very good questions, though. His first was: How, in a "trackable society," do you track insubstantial objects (like oil spills or gases)?

Sterling's answer was to use sensors. He gave the example of using sensors in bathrooms to detect foreign substances in your body when you shower. Like, if your sensors detect hydrazine (airplane fuel) in your body, you could call up your friends and ask if the've got hydrazine in them too and go online and try to find out where it came from, if there's been a leak in some plane somewhere or something like that. He also gave the example that cars could have sensors to detect emissions from other cars on the road.

The man's second question was about the issue of biodegradability in tracking devices.

Sterling said that silicon, typically used for such devices today, can't biodegrade as it's basically glass. So either a) recycle it after it's been used in a product, b) embed it inside the product it's being used to track, or c) use organic semiconductors that are biodegradable- something like digital ink with transmitters in it that can be sprayed onto the surface of an object. Apparently, there are at least 2 companies that are working on this technology today.

The man's third question was about the difficulty of assigning unique names to mass-manufactured, identical objects.

Sterling's answer was that this was basically a taxonomy problem, a problem of naming. If you've got a thousand models of the Toyota Prius on the roads, what's your specific car's unique name? Grey Toyota Prius? Grey Toyota Prius with modified engine? How about unique names for the parts in the car? Sterling's suspicion is that there won't be a perfect solution. Instead information will be highly mutable. Different people will use different naming schemes (sounds kind of like how tagging works in Internet bookmark systems like del.icio.us). He gave the example of a government automobile body- they'd be more interested in the movements of cars and legal matters and so on. An auto enthusiast site, on the other hand, would be more interested in performance, mod parts and so on. So the two organisations would use different terminologies but they might cross-reference each other for shared information.

The second person to pose a question asked about the issue of privacy.

Sterling recommended the book Spychips by Katherine Albrecth for more information about privacy issues today. He did say that things are going to get very very scary for the forseeable future. Governments and malicious organisations will be able to use information from things like RFID tags to track people. BUT all this information will also available to everyone, so that evens things out a bit. HE also said that privacy is just one area affected by these new technologies- the ramifications are much more far-reaching than just that (I got the impression he's getting a bit tired about people just focusing on the privacy issue).

Yet another person asked a question about the science fiction concept of the Singularity- a future time where technological change will outpace people's ability to understand it, resulting in a society completely incomprehensible to people living before the time of the Singularity.

Sterling answered that he had actually given a seminar on the topic for the Long Now Foundation (the MP3s available here). He said he doesn't believe the original concept as put forward by Verner Vinge is very useful- however, he does believe the world of a hundred years from now will be as incomprehensible to the people of today as the world of today would be to people living in the 19th century.

OK that's pretty much all I got. I'll post up some of my own ideas on the talk later.

Sunday, August 28, 2005

My $0.02 on service in Singapore

Well, I live in the CBD and do all my shopping in the City Hall, Bugis and Orchard Road areas and in general, service at all those places is pretty darned excellent nowadays.

Why, just 2 days ago I went with a friend of mine to Funan Centre so he could buy a new router cos his old one's just given up the ghost lately. Actually it's my old Linksys BEFW11S4 that I gave him after I got a free router from Starhub for upgrading my MaxOnline plan (BTW: Boys and girls- don't buy Linksys routers. Every one I've used has given me no end of headaches). Anyway, we reached there quite late at 8:30pm and most of the shops were already closed. But we found a shop on the 5th floor that was still open and lucky for us they sold networking equipment! We went in and I asked the guy at the shop- knowledgable looking guy in his 40s or so- which wireless router he'd recommend to us.

There was a number of different models on the shelves there but he took one of the shelf right away and showed it to us- twas the Netgear WGR614. It's quite an attractively designed router with an Apple-inspired white color scheme and nice rounded corners. But more importantly, it was one of the cheaper models at S$75.00 and it came with a 3-years warranty! Our salesguy confirmed that a lot of people had problems with Linksys routers but he claimed that so far, he hadn't heard of any problems with the Netgear one. Well, one could be cynical and say that of course he'd say that- he's trying to sell that model! But he also had Linksys routers in his store so I doubt he was just giving us a load of bull to make a sale.

So like, he was really informative and explained the differences between the model he recommended and the more expensive models and why he thought this one was the best buy. In the end it was his the combination of his testimony, the sweet price, the 3-year warranty (compared to a mere year for Linksys) and a nice little PC World recommendation stamp on the router's box that sold me on the router so I told my friend to go ahead and buy it. So far he hasn't had any problems with it. And if he does- got 3 year warranty what!

If not for that salesdude recommending us the Netgear router, I think we'd probably have ended up going for yet another Linkys router- despite their suckiness, we didn't know of any better routers (D-Link ones are even worse). And you know what, he was so nice that he listened to my sob-story about my own router- it crashes once a week for no apparent reason and I have to turn my modem and router off and back on again to get it to work- told me to download new firmware and even offered to help me upgrade my routers firmware if I couldn't do it myself. Like, for free! Coolness.

Today I read the newspaper!

This is an exciting and unusual development. I usually just scan the frontpage but I don't usually read the whole paper- see, I get most of my world news on the net. But this does make me a bit (or very) backwards when it comes to local news. But I'm trying to catch up now- especially cos following the latest news and trends is highly important for 2 modules I'm taking at university this semester- Theories of Communications and New Media and Principles of Marketing.

So anyway, there's a story on the front page about how the government's starting a new Customer Centric Initiative (CCI) to improve service in Singapore, starting with the retail sector. Well I kind of expected something like this after what my Marketing tutor told me on Monday (I blogged about it a couple posts down). Of course, it's a jolly good idea. Who doesn't want better service?

Over in the home section there's a big 2-page spotlight on some big companies participating in the CCI. There's also a couple of interesting anecdotes about good customer service here by Mr Lim Swee Say, deputy secretary-general of the labour movement here (Wow I didn't know there was one! Wonder what they do?).

There's a big section on haze today. It's quite sad how poor farmers in Sumatra have no choice but to clear land by slash-and-burn methods. The Indonesian government really should help them out by providing some kind of alternative. It's a real shame that we had to see a repeat of what happened in 1997. Thankfully Singapore wasn't affected this time becos of wind directions and yadda yadda... but we might not be so lucky next time.

Saturday, August 27, 2005

Hilarious MP3 of an old BBC radio comedy sketch!

British humour is pretty awesome. And so are pirates. So it comes as no surprise that this old BBC radio sketch titled Pirate Training Day from the BBC Million Pound Radio Show is incredibly hilarious. Listen to this and you'll be on the floor in stitches, rolling around while laughing like a maniac. Please don't listen to this at school or work. ;-)

In other related pirate news, Talk Like A Pirate Day is coming soon- September 19th! Arr!

(via Boing Boing)

Anemone Armies Do Battle In Tide-Pools!

Whoa. This article about how sea anemone armies conduct terrotorial battles in tide-pools is extremely cool. Here's an excerpt:

"When the tide is out, the polyps are contracted and quiet. As the tide covers the colonies, "scouts" move out into the border to look for empty space to occupy. Larger, well-armed "warriors" inflate their stinging arms and swing them around. Towards the center of the colony, poorly armed "reproductive" anemones stay out of the fray and conduct the clone's business of breeding.

When anemones from opposing colonies come in contact, they usually fight. But after about 20 or 30 minutes of battle the clones settle down to a truce until the next high tide.

It's not just polyps along the border between two clones that clash. Polyps three or four rows away from the front will reach over their comrades to engage in fights, Grosberg said."

WHOA! Large-scale anemone battles with scouts and warriors! ANEMONE WARRIORS! Wow, even the meekest-looking creatures in the animal kingdom can be pretty bad-ass. If I didn't know better, I'd think the article was describing a battle in a really avant-garde new Real-Time Strategy game.

(via Boing Boing)

Friday, August 26, 2005

UK ISP offers legal file-sharing! Meanwhile, Singapore arrests some more file-sharers...

(via BoingBoing)

UK-based ISP Playlouder MSP has struck a deal with SONY BMG that will allow it's users to download any song in the record label's catalog for free as well as file-share their own music collection with other users of the ISP. Well it's about bloody time someone finally figured out a solution that makes both the consumers and producers of music happy. Bravo!

Meanwhile, back here in Singapore, the RIAS got the police to arrest 3 people for sharing their music collections on the net. Under Singapore's new anti-piracy laws, these 3 barbarous blackguards can face up to 5 years jail time or a S$10,000 fine. Oh and I just found out apparently these guys received prior warnings before finally getting busted. Well in that case the RIAS's tactics aren't really all that hardline. Just a bit over the top... Anyway I bet these guys won't get full sentences. After all, the main purpose of these arrests is really to create examples out of these guys, right? But really, what were they doing sharing their music online on IRC? It's not like they're earning money from it!

Well, it's kind of ironic that these 2 events happen within a week of each other. Seeing as how they represent two almost diametrically opposite ways of dealing with the problem of Internet music piracy, and the underlying problem of the traditional means of music distribution, CDs, being displaced by newer and more efficient means of distribution in the form of P2P networks on the net.

So we see one party co-opting the new distribution systems, legalizing and limiting their use while the other fights to keep the old system viable. Only history will really tell but right now I think its reasonably safe to say the future of music distribution is online. And the bottom-line for the RIAS is that they don't want to lose music sales to piracy. So I think they're better off implementing a similar system to what Playlouder MSP has done rather than keep trying to scare people off P2P systems by arresting a few every now and then. P2P's not going away anytime soon and you can't get it rid of it. So they've gotta find a better way to deal with it.

Note: I edited this post extensively cos well... terrorist jokes aren't funny anymore and besides, no matter how miffed I am at not being able to rip my new CDs to my hard disk because of weird copy protection schemes (though that's kind of a moot point here as it's illegal to rip songs from your CDs onto your hard disk!) ranting about the issue isn't going to change much. Though wow, ripping songs is illegal? Weird. Thats one law I bet is never going to get enforced. C'mon, if people can't convert their CDs to MP3s, Creative Zen MP3 player sales will plummet! Sure die, leh.

Service in Singapore

I found this interesting article about the poor level of service in Singapore. Hmmm... my Marketing (I'm taking an intro to Marketing module at school this semester) tutor was talking about the same thing this week. Her opinion was that most people in service industries in Singapore don't really care about customer service because they don't really have to. Their jobs aren't on the line. I think that's an interesting point. I mean, if your customers are buying stuff from you no matter how rude you are, why bother to be polite? My tutor, who's originally from Hong Kong but has now settled down here, told us that service in Hong Kong industry has improved by leaps and bounds in recent years because the economy was so terrible a few years ago that businesses were compelled to improve their level of service to woo back customers. So does that mean Singapore needs a similar retail crisis for an improvement in service to happen? Well, I don't think so. For one thing, the governments a lot more hands-on here than there. According to my tutor, the Singapore government has already sent some people over to Hong Kong to take a look at how things are being done there now and how they managed to improve their level of customer service.

To be fair, service in Singapore isn't all that bad. You can find stores where the staff are friendly and don't act as if they'd rather you left their store, real fast. But then again, there are some stores where the staff look at you as if they hate you, just for existing. But its up to us consumers to lay our feet down and say No to Bad Service. Why bother buying stuff from a store where the people who are supposed to serve you act like you just murdered their grandfather? I don't. Last year, I bought my PC from a different store at Sim Lim than the one I was originally going to buy it from. I paid about $50 more. But I just couldn't stand the service at the first shop so I let my money do the talking and gave them the cold shoulder. See, if we consumers let shops with bad service know what they're doing wrong by depriving them of sales, then they'll be forced to think long and hard about what they're doing wrong and CHANGE.

Thursday, August 25, 2005

The Singapore Writer's Fest starts tomorrow!

I'm a bit duh when it comes to things like festivals here in Singapore but when my sister told me that Cory Doctorow (my current favourite writer!) is coming to the Singapore Writer's Festival, I sat up and took notice. So this festival... looks pretty cool, actually. Not only will Cory Doctorow be there, so will Bruce Sterling- one of my all-time fave science fiction authors. The mind reels. The idea of getting to see these two literary luminaries in person boggles my mind. I've never actually met any of my heroes... Well there's a first time for everything. Now if they'd gotten Neal Stephenson to come down too it'd be a 3rd strike and I'd be out... cold (gah... what a horrible mixing of metaphors I have attempted).
I think I'll attend all the free talks on Science Fiction / Fantasy as well as the talks on Writings in Cyberspace. Kinda the obvious choice for a blogger I figure. Plus I guess I should really try n be part of the big Singapore blogging community. I only actually read Mr Brown n Mr Miyagi's blogs... but I could make more of an effort to see what else is out there that's cool.
Oh yeah, back to the fest. The talks on Graphic Novels should be interesting. I'm crazy about comics after all. Tho sadly I have no idea who the speakers are for those talks.
All in all, the coming week should be damn interesting.

Ever wanted to know how LEGO's are made?

This interactive flash movie shows you. This is soooooo cool! I've always loved LEGO blocks and it's a real eye-opener to see the manufacturing process at the factory- from molding all the way to shipping! And the factory shown in the flash movie is totally futuristic and pretty awesome. It looks like the whole process is completely automated (complete with ROBOTS!) and it really looks like something out of the movie Charlie and The Chocolate Factory (which I saw last week- full review forthcoming. Short version: Yummy!).

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

Trailer for Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire is magnificent!

Dragons and Death Eaters, Mad-Eyed Moody, a carriage pulled by winged horses, sinister mermaids, a grand ball and and of course, the Tri-Wizard Tournament. It's all in here, folks. And it's all good.
Download it and watch it here!

(via Aint It Cool News)

Tuesday, August 23, 2005

t.A.T.u's new video is kinda awesome

It's been 3 years since t.A.T.u's debut album, 200 km/h in the Wrong Lane, which I thought was rather excellent. Sure it was dumb pop music. But it was supremely catchy dumb pop music. Pure candy. And then they disappeared...
Only to resurface in 2005- with a new manager, and a hella cool video for their new single "All About Us" which you can dowonload here. Mind you this is the uncensored version- not for it's PG-rated fully-clothed sex scene (not between the girls, ha) but for a rather shocking NC-16 (usin Singaporean ratings lah :P) scene of sudden violence.

The video's skillfully directed by James Cox (Wonderland) and the song's pretty great too. It's the kind of disposable pop candy you can listen to over and over and not get sick of. Or it could be just me. ;-)
So unless you have a chronic allergic reaction to pop music (or are easily disturbed by violence), download it and watch it now!

(found via Pop Justice)

Monday, August 15, 2005

Kung Fu Hustle 2 filming in September!

via twitchfilm.

The sequel to one of my favourite movies of 2004, Kung Fu Hustle, is gonna start filming in Shanghai this September! Oh joy. I loved Stephen Chow's 2001 movie Shaolin Soccer and Kung Fu Hustle was one of the few movies that had me grinning and laughing for almost the entire duration of the movie so I really can't wait for his next film.

Nextwave, Warren Ellis' new Marvel book, looks cool

Nextwave #1 cover

Warren Ellis, writer of such awesome series as Transmetropolitan, The Authority, Planetary and Global Frequency and lately, Ultimate Fantastic Four, is writing a new book for Marvel. It's described best by the man himself on his blog as "A Marvel comic about pirate superheroes on an American jihad against terrorist product-testing, by Warren Ellis and Stuart Immonen." He reveals more info about the series in an interview with comics news site Newsarama.

You can find a larger version of the issue 1 cover, a poster as well as character art and info here. The poster, apparently unused, is rather brilliant. This is one to watch out for, people.

Comics I Bought This Week

I love comics. They represent a unique combination of visual and written storytelling that when done right are simply a delight to read.

Needless to say, I read a lot of comics. I only read English ones (we get Japanese and Chinese comics in Singapore but I don't read either language) so I get my friendly local comics shop to order em in from the USA- especially since popular ones sell out so quickly. There's a new shipment of comics in every Thursday which means I usually have new comics to read every week. So I'm gonna start reviewin em. I'll start with the floppies (single issues) I got this week (a few of these are from the previous week- I didn't go to the shop so I got em late). These are the comics I'll be reviewing:

Hip Flask: Mystery City
Pigtale #3- Dark Neon Rain
Intimates #10
Silent Dragon #1
Y: The Last Man #36
Gotham Central #34
The Losers #26
Seven Soldiers: Zatanna #3

Hip Flask: Mystery City

This is the 3rd Hip Flask single by artist Jose Ladronn and writer Richard Starkings. I wouldn't normally pay attention to a book that makes me wait this long between issues (the first one came out in 2002 and the second in 2003!), but Ladronn's art is nothing short of amazing and makes the book absolutely worth the wait. This is the most gorgeous comic being created today bar none. Ladronn combines imaginative designs with beautifully detailed artwork and the result is breath-taking.

And what of the story? Well, the first 2 books in this series were exercises in world-building- creating the setting and circumstances of the story and introducing the main players in it. This latest installment in the Hip Flask saga begins the story proper. It takes the cyberpunk formula of 30% science fiction to 70% noir and adds about 5% humour to even things out (yeah that adds up to 105% :p)- it's a good mix. And the fact that I can still remember the story and characters of Hip Flask even a year after I read the last installment says something about the writing, I think. Overall, I say this is one of the better science fiction books (including prose fiction) to come out in recent years and I'm really looking forward to the rest of this story... even if it arrives 2 years from now!

Take a look at preview pages from Hip Flask: Mystery City here!

Verdict: Awesome.

Pigtale #3- Dark Neon Rain

This latest issue in Ovi Nedelcu's acclaimed debut comic does not disappoint at all. No sirree. Ovi's artwork lives up to the high standards he set in the books previous issues- his black and white, animation-inspired linework is some of the freshest, coolest art in comics today. His drawings have a sense of movement and energy about them- like the images are going to come right out of the page to cartoon life! The book would be awesome even if the art was the only thing it had going for it, but oh glee- it has a great story too!

Our hero in this book is an amateur private eye named Boston Booth. In the best tradition of comics, he's just a nice, normal guy who just can't get a break. And of course, runs smack-bang into the middle of an adventure. An adventure involving a talking pig named Clyde and his megalomaniacal stepbrother, a wolf named Taxx who wants to take over the city with an army of animal underlings. Oh and he needs a socket device that's embedded in Clyde's head to do this.

In the latest episode of Boston and Clyde's adventures, we see Taxx's crazy take-over-the-city plan coming into shape, we learn a bit more about the mystery of the device in Clyde's head, Boston's relationship with his would-be love interest, Carmen, takes a step forward and we get a wonderful comic moment with Boston's grandma. Not much action, but the cliffhanger in the end promises a compelling 4th issue with the first big confrontation between Boston and Taxx. Yep, it's all good.

Take a look at preview pages from all 3 issues of Pigtale here at the official site.

Verdict: Sweet.

Intimates #10

Argh! Another issue not drawn by Gieseppe Camuncilo, the excellent artist who drew the first 8 issues of this comic. What gives? Scott Iwahashi's a good penciller too but Camuncilo's artwork really defined this series for me. Plus I just read that issue 12 will be the last one... Another Joe Casey comic bites the dust. Sheesh.

This issue's a bit of a letdown after the excellent issue 8 and issue 9, which had some really crazy-cool science fiction ideas in it, despite the sudden shift in art. It's still good enough that I'll follow the series to it's untimely end but if Casey doesn't regain some of the energy and spirit of his previous issues, well.. .way to end off with a whimper and not a bang!

Verdict: Meh...

Silent Dragon #1

Wheee! It's a new series by my favourite action comics writer, Andy Diggle! It's pencilled by Leinil Francis Yu- I haven't seen his work before but he makes this book look real impressive. His linework is sharp, angular and distinctive, his designs are cool and most importantly for an action comic the layouts flow well. Together with inker Gerry Alanguilan and colorist Dave Stewart, he brings Silent Dragon's futuristic vision of Japan to life.

This first issue is pure setup- the storyline's composed out of elements that seem a bit cliche but the comic ends off in a real interesting way that leaves a lot of unanswered questions in the air. I've no doubt, given Andy's track record, that he'll take the story in an interesting, unexpected direction by the next issue.

There's a 6-page PDF preview of the comic available here. Check out the awesome robot samurai on the last page!

Verdict: Kick-Ass.

Y: The Last Man #36

Y: The Last Man is one of the most popular titles in DC Comic's Vertigo line, and with good reason. The series took a high-concept premise- a mysterious plague kills all males on the planet save one!- and grounded it with realistic characters, witty dialogue, wry social commentary and fast-paced plots with cliff-hanger after cliff-hanger.

It was recently revealed that the series is going to run until issue 60 so we're just over halfway through the storyline. And we finally, finally get an entire issue dedicated to the main character Yorick's girlfriend, Beth, who's stranded in Australia and has been oft-mentioned and seldom shown. Beth has been captured by an Aborigine tribe and most of this issue takes place as she goes through a series of dreams under the influence of some hallucinogens fed to her by a witch doctor woman.

We learn some interesting things about Yorick and Beth's relationship in the past and Beth learns through her vision that Yorick is still alive. Well she could just write it off as merely a dream but somehow I doubt that's the direction the story'll take.

It's another great issue in an great series and it looks like the story's gonna go in some interesting directions as Yorick and his companions (absent from this issue but no big loss- they'll be front and centre in the next one) are soon to reach Australia themselves, after spending the bulk of the series on a road trip across the USA.

For a taster of the series, you can read the entire 1st issue of Y: The Last Man in PDF form here.

Verdict: Goodness.

Gotham Central #34

Gotham Central, which focuses on the detectives of Gotham City Police Department's Homicide Division, is the best of all the Batman titles DC's publishing these days, and this, part two of the four-part "Dead Robin" storyline, is no different. Written by both Greg Rucka and Ed Brubaker (who is sadly leaving DC's shores to write for Marvel), this latest storyline asks a really interesting question- what happens if the police find the body of a dead superhero?

The superhero in question here is Robin, Batman's sidekick. In the previous issue, the Gotham City Police Department found the dead body of a kid dressed up as Robin. Of course, nobody knows his real identity. So they're forced to assume that it was the real one, eventhough there's no way to tell. Batman showed up at the end of the issue and got shot by one of the police officers- who happens to bear a grudge against him for failing to prevent her partner's death earlier in the series.

Of course, Batman doesn't go down that easy. At the beginning of this issue, he gets up, punches said police officer in the face, steals her gun and runs away with it (Batman's a bit of an asshole in the DC universe these days). Later in the issue, the Teen Titans (a slightly more grown-up version than that shown in the Cartoon Network series) show up to answer a couple of questions down at the police headquarters. With their bright costumes, they're really out of place in Gotham Central's grim n gritty vision of Gotham City and this is used to great comic effect in a couple sequences. At the same time, we get to see the GCPD detectives trying to get to the bottom of the case, which is cool since the police procedural aspect of this series is one of it's biggest strengths.

Verdict: Rockin'

The Losers #26

The Losers has been one of my favourite action comics since it first came out in 2003. This latest issue begins it's penultimate storyline: Unamerica. The regular artist, Jock, who'se angular, stylised art was a big part of the appeal of this title, is taking a break (happily, he'll be back for the final storyline, "Endgame", which begins with issue 29) but Colin Wilson (who drew Point Blank, the fantastic prequel to Ed Brubaker's Sleeper) does a good enough job in his stead. This issue does a lot of things- we finally learn what Max's big plans are (and boy are they BIG!), one of the Losers is captured by Max's men and, well... it's basically all building up to something BIG. I can't say much as at this stage in the story everything's a spoiler just I'll just say this- The Losers is Big Action Comics, the way they should be done. DC and Marvel superhero writers should take note.

Rating: 9 out of 10.

Seven Soldiers: Zatanna #3

Ah, what great days these are when I can expect at least 2 comics by my favourite author, Grant Morrison, every month. His Seven Soldiers project is the most insanely ambitious superhero epic I've had the pleasure to read and Zatanna #3 is the first issue that really firmly ties in with another one of the Seven Soldiers titles, namely, Shining Knight. Zatanna and her assistant Misty run straight into the aftermath of what we saw in the last issue of Shining Knight, where they learn some disturbing things indeed. Like the Losers, there's not much I can say here that won't spoil the story.

There's an interesting commentary going on here about the nature of stories and ideas and how they never really die, and I expect these things will become quite important in the overall storyline of Seven Soldiers as the series progresses. We've almost reached the halfway mark of this series and the disparate storylines of the different series are starting to come together. If Grant Morrison can keep up this level of fantastic storytelling til the end of this series, he'll have created one of the most remarkable epics in comics history.

Verdict: Coolness.

Wednesday, December 28, 2005

Tuesday, December 27, 2005

Monday, December 26, 2005

Sunday, December 18, 2005

Wednesday, December 14, 2005

Sunday, December 11, 2005

Friday, December 09, 2005

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

Sunday, November 06, 2005

Saturday, November 05, 2005

Friday, November 04, 2005

Thursday, October 27, 2005

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

Saturday, October 22, 2005

Saturday, October 15, 2005

Monday, September 26, 2005

Saturday, September 24, 2005

Thursday, September 15, 2005

Wednesday, September 14, 2005

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

Sunday, September 11, 2005

Thursday, September 08, 2005

Monday, September 05, 2005

Wednesday, August 31, 2005

Tuesday, August 30, 2005

Sunday, August 28, 2005

Saturday, August 27, 2005

Friday, August 26, 2005

Thursday, August 25, 2005

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

Tuesday, August 23, 2005

Monday, August 15, 2005

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