New Geek DVD Day - 09/30/2008

This was a tough week to choose which DVD's to feature here.  A bunch of good Geek DVD's came out this week.  Most of them were older films being released on Blu-ray, but still, it made for a hard choice.  To get around this I'm cheating a little this week and am featuring two films under The Good listing instead of just one.

 



 

The Good:  The Thing and Daredevil on Blu-ray

 

Why They're Good:  The Thing is a classic of Sci-fi horror.  A true master of the genre, it is unmatched in it's ability to convey the paranoia and isolation the characters in the film must be feeling as they start to die one by one.  Even when done in GI Joe form, the film is still great.  Plus, it has Kurt Russel looking like Grizzly Adams. 

 

Daredevil is a film I think gets an unfair rap by most geeks.  Admittedly, the film has some cheesyness to it, but it also has some really good moments in it too.  And if you've never seen the director's cut of the film, you really should give it a gander.  30 minutes of footage that were originally cut from the film have been put back in.  The additional footage gives the film an R rating due to it making the film darker and more violent.  A whole subplot is added in which Matt Murdock must defend a man who has been falsely accused of killing a hooker.  Overall, this version of the film is much better than the one that was released in theaters.  Plus, the film was directed by Jon Favreau, the same man who brought you Iron Man.

 



 

The Badass:  When We Left The Earth - The NASA Missions

 

Why It's Badass:  The Discovery Channel, hot off of their success with the Planet Earth series, teamed up with NASA to put together this amazing documentary series about the history of the US space program.  I'm a sucker for space exploration documentaries, and this one is pretty much the best one I've ever seen.  It has tons of footage from actual NASA space flights, interviews with astronauts, and it's all told with an excellent narrative that fills in the history of NASA and everything it has accomplished.  Let's be honest here, every scifi geek at some point in their life has dreamed about being an astronaut and getting to ride in the space shuttle.  This set is about as close as most of us will ever get to that, and it's fantastic.

 



 

The Awesome:  Iron Man

 

Why It's Awesome:  I don't even think I have to justify why this film has been given The Awesome spot, do I?  Was there any part of this film that wasn't cooler than hell?  Robert Downey Jr. was the most perfect casting choice for the role of Tony Stark any of us could have ever hoped for.  Jeff Bridges plays a great villain, and even Gweneth Paltrow as wonderful as Pepper Potts.  Throw on top of that great action scenes, pitch perfect comedy moments and even a nod to War Machine and you've got something that surpasses even die-hard comic fans' wet dreams.  This film is my choice for the best summer film of 2008 (sorry Dark Knight, I love Mr. Stark more).