I highly recommend seeing this in IMAX.

Cumberbatch is a BAMF.

IN!

Scientific 7 minute workout:

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/09/the-scientific-7-minute-workout/

Basically 30 seconds each exercise, 10 seconds rest between. The amount of strain/discomfort you should feel should be an 8 on a scale of 1 to 10. while doing these exercises, so you really have to push yourself. The order of the exercises matter since it is planned to give each muscle group rest periods.

This uses all the latest data from research into interval training. Apparently doing these consistently at the intensity required is as good as longer workouts.

I think I'll try this for a week.

You'd think the NYT would get the timing on that workout right.  It's more like 8 minutes, not 7.

LOL.

And I'm going to pay $15 for a legit IMAX 2D showing.  I win!

Tom Cruise has signed to come back as Ethan.  no word on a director or who else may be returning.

IIRC Ghost Protocol is the best received one of the series yet; they'd be crazy not to try and get Brad Bird back, but he's said he probably won't be interested (or he might not have the time to do it either).  I wonder who else they could rope in to direct.

I heard rumors that Cruise might get Chris McQuarrie to direct it in addition to writing it.

that's just a rumor so far though (even though he's mentioned).  I also heard he has an Ice Station Zebra remake lined up, so he may have a scheduling conflict.

Well, whomever is chosen, I hope the choice is as inspired as Brad Bird was for Ghost Protocol.

Tom Cruise has signed to come back as Ethan.  no word on a director or who else may be returning.

IIRC Ghost Protocol is the best received one of the series yet; they'd be crazy not to try and get Brad Bird back, but he's said he probably won't be interested (or he might not have the time to do it either).  I wonder who else they could rope in to direct.

I heard rumors that Cruise might get Chris McQuarrie to direct it in addition to writing it.

Ratings-wise, on Man of Steel, I would expect a PG-13 rating if only because studios seem scared "PG" now is strictly a "kiddie film" rating. Forgetting that in the 1970s, Jaws was a PG film.   I don't expect Man of Steel to have cussing, sex or be Watchmen in content, but assuming there's a lot of comic book violence, I'd still bet on PG-13.

Jaws was rated PG because there was no PG-13 rating in the 1970s.

Epic line brawl in the Senators/Canadiens game tonight.

Video here.

they're estimating $175 million in the US for this weekend, and about the same from international showings, to put it close to $700 million worldwide.

So $175m domestic plus ~$175m foreign is supposed to equal $700m?

It released internationally a week ago.

Have to disagree that "no AC/DC is a crime", as Brian Tyler's music over that end credits montage was awesome, and vastly better than the cliched use of AC/DC again.

Caveat emptor.

This season is excellent and makes up for the lame that was S2

Say what?   

I found a place showing it in 2D IMAX.

W00t!

SO IN.

Anything more after the credits?

Decided not to stick around... curious if we missed anything.

Nope, you didn't.

Saw this yesterday, really enjoyed it.

Definitely worth seeing open frame in IMAX.

I don't know how long it's going to last, but you can buy a 4 Pack of Twisted Pixel's XBLA games (The Maw, Splosion Man, Comic Jumper, and Ms Splosion Man) for 800 points.  Seeing as how Comic Jumper on its own still sells for 1200, this is a great deal.

I bought Injustice for the 360.

How is it?

Assuming that's $50 a year that ends up being about $400. You could have had a second console or pretty much pre-paid your next gen console for that amount. Don't you feel silly now?

No.

StraightTalkinTeggy - OK, maybe not.

Related, did anyone watch Caprica all the way through? I watched the first couple of episodes on Netflix and thought, "this is pretty cool". And then the daughter got turned into a Cylon and I thought, "this is pretty dumb".

Yep, I did, and was getting excited for what they were going to do for Season 2 (which they hint at the end of the season/series finale) before the rug got pulled out from under it.

You can stream it all now in HD and 5.1 on Netflix.

The beginning of Up was one of the rare times a movie made the room get dusty in the first 5 minutes.  Brilliant in every way.

Don't the new 360s take standard laptop drives? Got a spare sitting around?

No, that would be the PS3. 

No, seriously. They dont use the funky enclosure on the slim models, right?

It's not the same funky enclosure, but it's still a proprietary one.

There are instructions online for building your own 360 HDD.  A friend of mine did it.

I guess delaying it and converting it to 3D worked.

Yeah, that doesn't work as a joke.

[Spoiler]

and plot:

    As humanity picks up the pieces, following the conclusion of Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Autobots and Decepticons have all but vanished from the face of the planet. However, a group of powerful, ingenious businessman and scientists attempt to learn from past Transformer incursions and push the boundaries of technology beyond what they can control – all while an ancient, powerful Transformer menace sets Earth in his crosshairs. The epic adventure and battle between good and evil, freedom and enslavement ensues.

Spoiler for Hiden:

Unicron!

Spoiler for Hiden:

That would be AWESOME.

We cut the cable a couple years ago and do netflix, hulu + and NHL Gamecenter Live.  There are some annoyances - I can't watch any Colorado Avalanche games, and and any nationally televised game is blacked out.  The major annoyance is that the playoffs are not available through GCL.  However, we've saved an absolutely *insane* amount of money by not paying the ridiculous cable fees every month.  Overall, it's a plus.  I might try adding an HDTV antennae, which would get me some playoff hockey, I guess, and we would have the option of watching some stuff when it aired.  Dunno though, might keep things as is... we certainly have enough going on that we don't spend much time watching anyway.

Wait, what? The playoffs aren't available through GCL? They were when I had the service a couple of years ago! So does that mean that I've paid $50 for this year's GCL but I can't watch any playoff games with it? That's the whole reason I got it-I don't give a damn about the regular season.

It might be different overseas, but certainly in the US any game that is 'nationally televised' (whether through a major network or any of the NHL's cable options: NHL Network or NBCSN) is blacked out nationally on GCL.  Sometimes the first round of the playoffs are local broadcasts (can't remember what the situation was last year), but anything after that is absolutely, positively not on GCL.

All NHL playoff games are on a "national" channel now (and were last year, I believe), so no playoff games on GCL anymore.  This could just be a US/Canada thing, though.

Gears of War

I ripped countless farts this morning.  It was glorious.

Special edition of God of War.

Will pick up Heart of the Swarm whenever I get around to finishing the SP of Wings of Liberty.

I played for over 2.5 hours this evening (man, what a time sink) after trying for about 5 minutes to access my starter city.  Damn, what a time sink this game has the potential to be.

And yes, I've said time sink 3 times.  Third time's the charm!

My office's budget just got cut 8.5%. Probably won't have to lay anyone off (which would be bad for the economy, of course), but it will impact constituent services. There's just no way around that.

The PTO's budget was cut 8.2%, or $242 million.  There's been no change to our day to day operation, no furloughs, and overtime hasn't been slashed yet, so I have no idea what's going on to cut costs in such a seamless way.

Saw on Facebook that TimeGate's going through massive layoffs.

And the hammer starts to fall....

Yawn.

Got a cite for all your "established knowledge"?

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=did+john+williams+steal+music

Nearly 3.5 million hits

I haven't seen him admit to it, but I can't imagine he denies it.  Doesn't make him any less impressive, though.  Knowing what bits to borrow is still impressive as hell.

That also doesn't provide "Williams's own words".

That's not also not what Tilt is arguing.

John Williams can borrow from Holst, Mahler, Dvorak, Delerue, etc. and it will STILL sound like Williams.

James Horner can borrow from Copland and Rota and Prokofiev, etc. and it will STILL sound like Horner.

Hans Zimmer can borrow from Holst, Morricone, etc. and it will STILL sound like Zimmer.

I know all movie score composers borrow.  They borrow from other composers, and they borrow from themselves.  I know this more than most, as my several hundred CD soundtrack collection attests.  Yet, their music has an identity, a voice, that is THEIR OWN.  

Star Wars may owe something to Holst.  But it sounds like Williams, not Holst.

Got a cite for all your "established knowledge"?

There's a lot more to the hours and hours of Star Wars than just the Mars piece.  The 48 Academy Award nominations, 59 Grammy nominations, and 22 Golden Globe nominations would suggest that you're not seeing the whole picture. 

No, it's simpler than that: You're misunderstanding what I'm saying. You could listen to Venus too, or any of the other pieces. Gustav Holst introduced a certain way of using orchestral instruments in unison, a new way of layering them to create new sounds, and a new way of building mood with each individual one. Brass in particular got a much bigger role in the orchestra, a role it has kept to this day, after having served as background instruments up until then. John Williams replicates this style completely, to the point where his style and Gustav Holst's style are impossible to separate from each other without being aware of the individual pieces. Here's an interesting tidbit: Fantasy Flight Games, which has the Star Wars miniature license, produced a video tutorial for their X-Wing Miniatures game. That video tutorial has a soundtrack. FFG does not have the license to use John Williams' score. Instead they used Gustav Holst's music (Venus, I think. Not quite sure right now). Nobody noticed the difference, except for a few people who went "I don't remember which part of the movies this music is from".

I'm not trying to belittle Williams' music, which I've always admired. Just pointing out that it's not quite so unique and original as many people assume it is.

That's because most people don't pay attention to that sort of thing enough to know there's a difference.

The music played in that video did NOT sound like Williams.

Who cares about lovelorn Andrea, the Governor's schlong and moats? What we really want to know is what you thought about the singing at the end of Sunday's episode?

Yep...I thought that Kumbaya moment was pretty fucked up and completely out of place.  I actually FF'd through a large portion of the scene and when I resumed play, the bitch was still singing.

This isn't the first time she's sung in the series, so why it's fucked up and out of place now is beyond me.

Season 3 trailer is UP!

If you need more proof that Tom Chick sucks as a game review, he gave A:CM the same score he gave Halo 4.