New GT Web Comic: Endor Cuisine

 

There is a new Geek-tastic web comic online and ready to make you laugh.  To check it out in all of its nerdy glory, just click on the image above.

 

Today's comic comes from something I've been trying to tell everyone for years, but no one seems to listen to me.  Ewoks eat people.  It's true.  Just think back to Return of the Jedi and what those little furry bastards were planning on doing to Han and Luke.  That's all the evidence you'll ever need.  This comic just follows that logical line to where it must inevitably go once one stops for a second and thinks about what was really going on at that big party at the end of the movie.

 

Enjoy!

Wes' Book Review - Twilight: Breaking Dawn

 

Okay, here we go, last book in the series.

 

Breaking Dawn picks up just a few short days away from Bella's wedding to Edward. This is a fairly uneventful part of the book designed no doubt to drag out every smooshy feeling that can be contrived from a female heart. Jacob, who has been missing since the end of the last book, even comes back to town to see Bella on her wedding day. The only thing of note that occurs is that Jacob finds out that Bella and Edward plan on attempting to have sex before she is changed into a vampire. Convinced Bella will die in the process Jacob attempts to start a fight with Edward at his wedding, but is soon stopped by the rest of his pack of wolves. Immediately after the wedding Bella is swept off by Edward to an island owned by the Cullens off the coast of Brazil.

 

Isle Esme (a gift from Carlisle to his wife) is where the first attempt at coitus takes place. Bella wakes up the next morning feeling better than she ever had in her life, on the other hand, Edward is ashamed of the bruises he seemed to have left all over Bella's body. Edward refuses to try again, in spite of Bella's many attempts after that. One night Bella wakes up from a nightmare crying and attacks Edward (sexually) unaware, and makes it through the event without any bruises. From there on out it's a complete fuck fest. Prompting Bella to reconsider being changed into a vampire. If Bella were to be changed, then all she would care for is blood, the lust for it overtaking her every thought, and she couldn't get her sex on like she was currently. Once again I ask; are you sure you want to be a vampire you crazy fucking dame? First it's "oh I love Jacob AND Edward", now it's "I don't want to be a vampire just yet, I'm really enjoying the cock". Edward should punt this bitch into the ocean and fuck the vampires from Alaska post haste. Also once you get passed the wedding and the honeymoon, you realize that you now know how Meyer wants (wanted? is this bitch married?) her wedding and honeymoon to go down.

 

Quickly something becomes amiss as Bella has the early onset of morning sickness and a visible preggo belly. Edward calls Carlisle, who confirms that he thinks that Bella could possibly be with child. Edward and Bella flee back to Forks while Bella seems to grow ever larger by the minute. Edward, Carlisle, and anyone else with common sense, want to get the beast out of her before it can kill her, so Bella calls Rosalie looking for a bodyguard for when she gets back to Forks to protect her and the baby.

 

Then for some unknown reason Meyer decides to mix it up with the formatting of her narrative and switches to telling the story from the point of view of Jacob. Okay, vampire baby I'll give you. It happened in Angel, and it led to the shittiest story lines in the show based on Conner, the worst character to grace a television show since Dawn. I'll let it fucking slide. Switching narrative points is a lousy trick, and you're a hack writer Meyer.

 

There's some inconsequential attempt at getting Bella to have an abortion and then attempt to have a child that won't be born by eating it's way out her stomach like the babies in Alien by Jacob, Bella doesn't go for it.  Bella is determined to have THIS baby, though it's easy to see that it's killing her.

 

So Jacob's pack find out about Bella's pregnancy, and though they're completely cool with Bella becoming a vampire, her having a vampire child is completely beyond them and they decide they have to go kill Bella. Jacob, who wanted to kill everything in sight when he found out that Bella was going to be changed into a vampire refuses to kill Bella to rid them of the baby. Jacob uses his heritage as the official and actual alpha of the pack to leave the group and set off on his own to basically become the Cullen's lapdog.  One of the wolves Seth, goes with him, followed eventually by Seth's sister and scorned woman from earlier in the series, Leah. With Seth Leah, and Jacob protecting the Cullens, the pack doesn't have the nerve to go kill Bella.

 

Eventually the realization occurs that it isn't that the baby is killing Bella, just that it needs blood, and is draining Bella slowly. so starts Bella on her first vampiric act, a steady diet of human blood, as bought with enormous fortune of the Cullens and Carlisle's medical connections. Once again prompting the question, why not just live on donated blood? Isn't that MORE humane that running into the woods every so often to slaughter some innocent animals with your teeth? Maybe I just know too many vegans.

 

Now that Bella was in perfect health again, and so was her unborn infant, the infant uses it's new strength to start breaking her ribs from the inside. Damned if you do, damned if you don't I guess.

 

Slowly but surely the Cullens and Jacob become a tight knit little group of oddities. Even the spats between Rosalie and Jacob, who dislike each other vehemently, seem more sibling like. Even though all of this requires Jacob to be around Bella nearly twenty four hours a day, and takes it's obvious emotional toll on him. At this point you're just kind of waiting for Jacob to imprint on something and get it over with, and actually it seems, Jacob is also. Just when Jacob seems to get most fed with the entire situation Bella vomits a geyser of blood, which I assume is supposed to be the half vampire baby being born to a human version of the water breaking.

 

What follows is the most violently and gory scene in the entire series. Bella's stomach is torn apart leaving only a gaping hole where the lower part of her torso used to be and her back is broken by the infant in the process. Awesome. Bella's heart stops in the process and Edward injects a syringe filled with his own vampire venom directly into her heart, then proceeds to give her CPR to push the venom through her system. Jacob is convinced that Bella is dead but feels strangely compelled to stay near the infant in spite of his gut instinct to run far away. Jacob is pissed at this baby girl, and just when he's about to tear the baby apart, his last act as a living person as he would almost instantly be murdered by the Cullens, Stephanie Meyer pisses right into my fucking eyeballs while laughing what I can only assume is a witches cackle. Jacob imprints on the fucking baby. Fuck this book, seriously.

 

By the way, the babies name is Renesmee, a mix between Renee (her mother's name, and Esme (Edwards "mother's" name). I'll be calling her by the nickname Jacob gives her in the book though, Nessie, as it conjurs images of the Loch Ness Monster and not terrible made up names that idiots are probably going to start using on actual children in real life soon.

 

Hey back to Bella's point of view. Awesome.

 

Bella lays on the bed completely motionless for three days as she burns in agony from the vampire venom in her system changing her. Bella eventually wakes up a vampire (finally) and takes to it like a fish to water. She feels the thirst, but can seem to control her emotions much better than anyone has ever planned. Out hunting with Edward, Bella smells some hikers and takes off after them on pure instinct. While being chased by Edward, Bella turns to fight him off so she can go drink the hikers, but regains her composure and then flees in the opposite direction of the hikers. Something completely unheard of for a newborn vampire. Of course this bitch wouldn't kill anyone, god for-fucking-bid anything cool happen. We get details as told from Bella's point of view of course about the heightened senses. Smell, sight, and hearing all honed to Wolverine like abilities, and Superman style strength and invulnerability. All of the awesome for Bella and none of the entertaining drawbacks. Bella has enough control to even hold her own daughter without feeling the thirst.

 

We find out that Nessie has her own ability, to touch anyone and convey her thoughts to them, which is sort of the opposite of what Bella can do by blocking all other abilities out her head. Nessie, I forgot to mention grows at an accelerated rate. even the pregnancy lasted only a few weeks, maybe a month, I don't really recall any actual numbers being thrown around, just that it was FAST. Bella is scared Nessie will grow old and die quickly because of this, but I'm sure you're not worried as I wasn't either because it seems nothing ever terrible and permanent ever seems to happen to Bella ever.

 

Jacob overhears that the Cullens might move across the country and decides to out himself as a wolf to Charlie. This is so that Charlie would know that the world he lived in was filled with magic, and anomalies and the sort and would be prepared to come see Bella, who he has been told is sick in bed at the CDC in Atlanta. Charlie takes the whole event with the attitude that he doesn't REALLY want to know more than he absolutely has to and that as long as Bella is happy, he is okay. Bella doesn't even have to out herself as a vampire to Charlie in the end, even if being near him was probably supposed to be incredibly dangerous as he was the first human Bella had seen in person since becoming a vampire.One of Bella's super vampire traits, evidently super self control.

 

So Jacob, Bella, and Nessie went out hunting one afternoon, and get spotted by Irina, a vampire who had come to apologize to the Cullens about something that escapes my memory, and honestly isn't important at this juncture. Irina sees Nessie, and is off like shot to tell the Volturi on Bella. I guess another thing the Volturi are strictly against is infant and child vampires. This shit finally has some hope of getting really interesting. The Cullens know what all this means instantly and they begin whipping an army of vampires together hopefully big enough, not to stop the volturi, but to at least get them to hesitate long enough to hear that Nessie isn't a turned vampire, but a freak of nature, and not as dangerous as the children vampires of before who wreaked enough havoc to be outlawed. Alice grabs Jasper and hightails it out of there, leaving the Cullens convinced they had been abandoned by them.

 

So the Cullens get their friends together from every corner of the earth. A lot of whom have their own special vampire abilities. The Vampires who come are mostly won over by the idea that Carlisle isn't actually looking to pick a fight with the volturi, just attempt to get them to listen, and by Nessie using her ability to show them her thoughts and prove that she is of no harm, isn't a full vampire, and thus isn't the product of any broken volturi laws. The Cullens are sure that it isn't really what the volturi are out for anyways, but that the mental abilities of Edward, Alice, and even Bella now are more what they're looking to gain by killing the rest of the Cullen family.

 

Bella learns that as a vampire her ability to block out others mental attacks can be projected onto others to protect them now that she has heightened vampire abilities, this comes in handy later.

 

So the fateful day that Alice had foreseen arrived and the Cullens and their army of witnesses met with the volturi and their own collection of vampire witnesses from all over in a field. If you're thinking what I'm thinking, then we both thought wrong, because these motherfuckers don't even so much as get into a sissy slap fight. God fucking damnit. What happens is Bella learns that not only can she project to proect against others mental attacks, but that she can do so over a very large range over very specific targets. It works out later when the volturis strong mentalist assault from Jane (makes you feel pain) and another who's name escapes me  that can make your senses  fail you, including sight.

 

There's several exchanges between Aro and Edward, Carlisle, and a few vampires who came to bare witness (but secretly agreed to fight alongside Carlisle if that's what it came down to). The volturi discover the truth of situation, and in spite of that want to destroy the Cullen coven anyways to take Edward and Bella as their prizes. there's a great little speech at one point where an Egyptian vampire by the name on Benjamin points out that even though the volturi have seen that the child is no harm to their way of life the volturi press the issue and that it will lead to them all be subjugated by the Italian coven. A very serious accusation to make amongst vampire who all consider themselves above any sort of ruling laws that aren't specifically designed to hide them and their way of life.
Just in the nick of time,  Alice arrives back with Nahuel, another half-breed vampire human! Seeing that a half breed vampire human could grow to maturity (which takes about seven years at the accelerated rate pf halfbreed growth Jacob will be glad to know, but my lunch that I vomited up when I thought about Jacob being in love with a baby wasn't) without ever exposing the vampires or their way of life pretty much clenches the vote up .

 

Pressed into such a hard corner, having to fight what is essentially a fair fight after ages of slaughtering all they came across, the volturi take their votes on how to deal with the situation and decide that they are going to leave the Cullen clan alone. That's it, they just leave. Hundreds of vampires and wolves all just standing around in a field waiting for one cool ass epic battle to break out and they all just walk away. The volturi go down to South America where Nahuel is from to find his creator and deal with him for having purposefully created half-breeds, but we don't even get see them murder him. I mean Irina gets it at one point for bearing false witness against the Cullens, but with armies ready to go, this was a painfully disappointing ending. This was like Battlestar Galactica bad as far as endings go. Everyone lives happily ever after? No one gets killed? What the FUCK. When I read the volturi were just leaving you'll have to imagine me yelling "MEYER!" like I was in Wrath of Kahn.

 

Want to know what I think?

 

Not that you couldn't already tell but I'm pissed. I defended you and your books Meyer. Yes, I hate them, but I hate them for very much more validated reasons than the "vampires don't sparkle" army. I gave them a chance, and I can say time and time again Meyer chose the easiest possible path through her stories. A lot of what was going to happen was painfully obvious long before it ever actually occurred (see; Jacob imprinting on a goddamn newborn). Long before it ever happened my little sister received a text saying "if Jacob imprints on that baby I'm going to shove this book down my own throat and choke myself to death".

 

Not killing any of the central characters? Really? Even Rowling had the cajones to off some of the most beloved characters in her Harry Potter series. Because Rowling knew, like all good writers, if you want to take your story from good to legendary, you gotta kill some people the fans love. Don't believe me? Ask any Joss Whedon fan. End of fucking story. Anya was the best character in Buffy and she got the axe. Wash, log in the chest. Penny, piece of death ray to the torso. It's just how good storytelling works. I went into this book expecting someone to go down. Maybe Bella would eat her own father, thus making the book an instant classic in my heart. Maybe Rosalie would die protecting Bella's child and the two would part being closer than Bella ever thought was possible. Jasper dies protecting Alice. Edward Cullen bites it protecting the child and Jacob marries vampire Bella and they live with the Cullens forever. ALL of these possible plot lines are a million times cooler than anything that actually happened in this fucking book. Why? I have no idea, maybe Meyer is more scared of someone dieing than Bella was before she was changed into a vampire. For whatever reason, fuck you Meyer.

 

I thought I was grossed out when the wolf imprinted on the two year old, but you proved me dead wrong, it could evidently get much worse. So thank you again from the bottom of my colon for making Jacob imprint on Nessie, it was not only painfully predictable storytelling on your part, but deeply disturbing. Even more so when you take into account that Meyer is Mormon and their history of marrying 13 year old girls to 35 year old men. Maybe you can make polygamy a central point in the next book you write.

 

Did I mention I was angry about the ending. No battle? None? Is there like an alternate ending version of this book I can buy where instead of drinking too much potion and sleeping too long, Ash kills a deadite in the middle of a crowded S-mart? I'll be glad to rewrite this review if you rewrite the last four chapters of that hellish book Meyer.

 

Also, lastly, STOP STARTING EVERY FUCKING SENTENCE WITH A CONJUNCTION!!! IT'S JUST BAD GRAMMAR!!! It was REALLY starting to grate on my nerves. That means sentences don't start with the following words; but, and, also etc etc.  "But then Alice shows up" works just as well as "then Alice shows up" without the easily corrected grammatical error you hack writer!

The Top Five Fake Words I Use In Everyday Conversation

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about how my interests in things like sci-fi, cartoons, comic books and other nerdy pursuits have not only shaped me into the person I am today, but also how they have affected my life on a daily level.  I wear nerdy t-shirts with things like Halo or Star Wars characters printed on them, I listen to nerdy music from bands like They Might Be Giants or MC Chris, I even named my car Locutus because it's a Nissan Cube, and a cube is what the Borg fly around in.

 

Of course none of this is new to me.  I've been a giant geek since as far back as I can remember, but in this recent period of introspection, I've also noticed something else I do that most non-nerds probably don't do.  I use a lot of made up words in my regular everyday vernacular.

 

I'm not talking about words like Jedi or Tribble, although those most definitely count as made up words I do use.  No, I'm talking about words that sneak their way even into non-geeky conversations.  Things like Tribble can usually only be included in conversations specifically about that which you are referring to.  It's very hard to include something like that in, oh say, a conversation with your mechanic about why your car won't start, or with your co-workers when discussing projects you're working on.

 

I've realized though that I do actually use a lot of made up words in situations like these.  Strangely enough, they actually fit into regular conversations too.  The key I've noticed is that they are words that are simple enough or similiar enough to other real words or phrases that even non-nerds can understand their meaning even if they don't know the actual definition of the word or its origin.  After thinking on this realization for a bit, I've put together a list of five words that I actually do use in almost every day conversation (I swear) that I have learned only from watching the nerdy kinds of shows that I love.

 



 

5.  Gorram

 

Gorram (Pronounced Gore-Ram) - Interjection/Expletive

 

The Word Gorram is familiar to anyone who has seen Joss Whedon's TV show Firefly.  It was a standard curse word used by multiple characters on the show in place of what would normally be the term "God Damn".  It was most commonly used by the character Jayne when he was upset or angry. 

 

Example:  "My gorram car died on the way to work today!"

 

This is one of those words that just slips out without me even realizing I've said it.  I do admit to having the tendency to cuss like a sailor, but it takes a special kind of nerd to start cussing using fake words from cancelled sci-fi TV shows.  I think it's gorram's similarity to god damn that has really made this one become part of my daily life.  I use the two words interchangably now.  They sound the same, they have the same meaning, therefore in my head they are now both perfectly valid words to be used in normal conversation.  Damn what the Oxford English Dictionary has to say on the matter.

 



 

4.  Jinkies

 

Jinkies (Pronounced Jeen-keys) - Expletive

 

Jinkies of course was first used by Velma on the Scooby Doo cartoon series.  It was her regular catchphrase (much like Shaggy had Zoinks), and was used to express suprise or to announce a major realization.

 

Example: "Jinkies, I think I just found out where my socks go when the washing machine steals them."

 

I was a huge Scooby Doo fan growing up, and Velma was always my favorite character.  She was the smart, quiet one who always was the one who actually solved whatever mystery they were working on.  While Fred was too busy trying to shag the brainless Daphne, and Scooby and Shaggy were hiding in fear somewhere, it almost always came down to Velma to figure everything out.  It's no wonder then that an impressionable young Patrick took on some of the mannerisms of such an unassuming hero.  Even today, I still say Jinkies on a regular basis whenever something suprises me, or I discover something really cool about the world. 

 



 

3.  Shazbot

 

Shazbot (Pronounced Shaz-Bot) - Explective

 

The term Shazbot comes from the late 70's and early 80's TV show Mork & Mindy (which starred a young Robin Williams).  The show was about an alien who lived with you young woman on earth.  Shazbot was a word used by Mork in place of the regular curse word "shit".

 

Example:  "Shazbot! I spilled my beer!"

 

I watched a lot of Mork & Mindy growing up.  I took to sci-fi at an early age, and a show about an alien who ages in reverse was really funny to me.  As for Shazbot, I picked this one up because in my house as I was growing up, we were completely forbidden to cuss.  Therefore, I had to find other words to use in place of actual curse words.  Shazbot was one of the first ones I learned.  So long as I didn't go too far with it and use it all the time, I could say Shazbot in front of my mom and she wouldn't even bat an eye.  I'm sure she knew what I was doing, but I don't really think she cared since the word was fake.  Regardless, since I've been saying Shazbot since I was about six years old, it long ago became a regular part of my vocabulary and even though I can say shit all I want nowadays, I still find myself slipping back to shazbot more often than you would imagine.

 



 

2.  Retcon

 

Retcon (Pronounced (Ret-Con) - Verb

 

The term retcon is actually a shortening of the term Retroactive Continuity.  It was first used by DC Comics in the early 1980's and is a term for what happens when writers or story tellers deliberately change pre-existing facts or events in a work of serial fiction.

 

Example:  "I can't believe they just retconned Superman's origin and powers like that."

 

Retcon is a really interesting word.  I didn't even realize it was a made up word until a few years ago, and I'd been using it for a while too.  Retconning is most often seen in the comic book industry where new editors and writers will come in and completely change characters, their origins, or how previous large events in their stories happened.  A great example of this is the One More Day storyline in the Spider-man comics.  In the story, Spider-man makes a deal with the devil (literally) to save his dying Aunt May.  The price for saving her is that his marriage to Mary Jane is abolished and all memory of it is wiped from his memory and the memories of everyone who has ever met either of them.  For all intents and purposes in the story now, Spider-man never got married.  The whole marriage story, which ran for about 20 years, has been retconned into non-existence.

 

It doesn't just pop up in comics though.  Since it was first created, retcon now shows up all over the place.  One of my more favorite uses of the word happened in the Torchwood TV series.  In that series, they have a drug called Retcon which they can give to people that makes them completely forget everything they've seen or experienced for the past 24 hours or so.  It's a total memory wipe of recent events, which basically retcons the last day's events from their brains.  Yes, it's a cheesy plot device but I love it. 

 



 

1.  Frak

 

Frak (Pronounced....well....Frak) - Expletative/Adjective

 

Frak (sometimes spelled Frack) is the standard curse word used in the Battlestar Galactica universe.  Every character in the show uses it at least a few times over the course of the series.  It's heard at least a good dozen times in one variation or another in each episode.  Variations include such colorful phrases as Frakking, Fraked, Frakker and Motherfrakker among others. It is their replacement word for the word "fuck" which enables the show's creators to have a very foulmouthed cast that can float right by the censors.

 

Example:  "Frak!  This stupid frakking traffic is going to make me late to work!  Stupid motherfrakkers, get out of my frakking way!!!"

 

I love the word Frak.  It's so simple, so elegant, and can be used in so many ways.  Sure, there have been other shows who have used made up words to replace the word "fuck".  Farscape is one that comes to mind with their regular use of the word "frell", but frak just feels more natural and seems to roll off the tongue more easily.  It really is the best made up four letter word I can think of.  It's become rather commonplace too and has started showing up in other shows as well.  You can also find the word printed on t-shirts, coffee mugs and bumper stickers.  Even people who have never seen Battlestar knows what someone means when they yell Frak.  It has a universal appeal, and it is something I definitely use on an almost daily basis.

Introducing The Geek-tastic PatCast - Episode 01

 

 

Hey Everyone,

 

Welcome to the first episode of a brand new podcast that will be featured here at Geek-tastic.  For right now (and for lack of a better name) we're calling it the PatCast.  It's a podcast that features only yours truly as I discuss some of the latest geek news and read some of the reviews that I have posted here at the site. 

 

You can stream the PatCast by clicking HERE.

 

OR

 

You can download an MP3 of the PatCast by clicking HERE.

 

 

This is an experiment that I'm trying out, so it's really rough around the edges right now.  Please bear with me.  I'm striving to be a better broadcaster and I'm considering this podcast as my own personal form of training.  As I get a few more episodes under my belt, I'll hopefully develop some sort of official-ish format for the show.  As for now, I'm just sort of making it up as I go.

 

Let me know what you think of the show.  Do you have any comments?  Suggestions?  Things you loved or hated?  Let me know!  I'd love the feedback.

 

 

 

Show Notes

• My New Year's Resolutions


• Spider Man 4 is cancelled


• Zombieland Writers to write the Deadpool movie


• George Lucas on the Daily Show with John Stewart


• Mark Hamill on Star Wars video game voice acting


• My Avatar Review

 

The intro song heard at the beginning of the PatCast is called 8 Bit Junkie.  It is by George Wood and it can be found at PodsafeAudio.com

 

For more information on the creative commons copyright for this podcast, please go to www.creativecommons.org.

 

And finally, here's the video of George Lucas on the Daily Show.  It's totally worth watching.

 

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A Geek-tastic Update

 

Hey there everyone.  Let me start by saying Happy New Year to all of you.  I hope your holidays went well and that you got all sorts of cool geeky toys or games as presents.  My holidays went well enough.  Things, as they usually are around the end of the year, were pretty hectic.  Now that we're well into the year 2010 though, I'm hoping things will settle down a bit and will get back to normal soon.

 

I also wanted to give anyone out there who actually reads this site (yes, all three of you) a heads up as to the goings on here at Geek-tastic.  Admittedly, I've left the site a tad neglected to say the least.  In the whole month of December I only posted 20 articles, and over half of those were posted on a single day.  Whole weeks have gone by with nary a post from myself nor any of the other contributing writers to the site.  For that I am sorry.  There's a few solid reasons as to why this has been, but for me it really boils down to major loss of motivation in the last few months.

 

When I first created Geek-tastic, it was really meant to be just an outlet for my creative side where I could practice my writing and try to become a better and more creative person.  As the site got going though, I got bitten by the writing bug and suddenly started having these delusions where I would create a popular site that all my fellow nerds and geeks would visit on a regular basis.  I had no real beliefs that the site would ever become popular enough to turn a profit or anything, but I did harbor fantasies about the site getting me recognized enough to start getting offered paid work elsewhere.  As usually happens in such instances though, reality eventually set back in and after a year and a half of writing whenever I could I began to realize just how out of tune with reality my fantasies were.

 

I know I do have a few loyal readers here and there, and I thank you guys for checking out the site when you can, but months on end of posting articles which I hoped would spark conversations in which not a single comment was left has lessened my drive to keep going.  Add to that my excitement over the creation of the Geek-tastic podcast, only to find out later that maybe 20 or so people at most listen to them, and you can see where my desire to keep pumping out material began wain.

 

I do realize that most of this is my fault.  If I want to build an audience for this site, I need to write more interesting things that people want to read.  I can't just keep re-posting things I find on other sites.  I need more original content.  If I want more listeners to the podcast, I need to make a more intelligent and engaging show that stimulates as well as entertains.  I can't just put together a show at the last minute, call two friends, hit record and expect brilliance.  Perhaps if I was a naturally gifted on-air personality I could do that, but I'm not and I need to focus on creating well thought out and well planned shows.

 

In short, for this site to ever have a hope of accomplishing any of my dreams, I need to work harder  and produce better material.

 

I've known this for a while, but I've been allowing myself to wallow in a sea of self-doubt and self pity.  Instead of just sitting down and writing, I've been making excuses as to why I can't write.  This has just furthered my lack of motivation and the end result as you've all seen is less and less regular posts being made.  Have you noticed how all of the former weekly features have disappeared from the site?  No more DVD Tuesday articles, no more Friday Happy Hour's.  Hell, even the podcast episodes are coming farther and farther apart.  We skipped the month of November entirely.

 

Yes, it is true that I do have very little time to write, what with having to hold down a full time job and all, but that's no reason I can't write at least one or two articles a week that are original and are of at least semi-decent quality.  Going forward, this will be one of my many goals for the site.  In fact, I've been putting together a small list of promises I'm making myself for the coming year.  Call them New Year's resolutions if you will.  Here they are.

 

1.  Post at least one (hopefully two) decently long articles per week.  These articles will be a bit more in-depth, intelligent or well thought out.  These have to be original content.

 

2.  Plan the podcasts better.  Actually do some research before sitting down to record.  Have notes ready, have a game plan, have a purpose to every segment on the shows.

 

3.  Start a solo podcast.  This will hopefully be happening soon.  We'll still have the group podcasts because I do feel that intelligent discussions are always good to listen to, but I want to start a small show that is just me.  It will be a chance for me to go in-depth into topics of my choosing and will allow me to try to grow my abilities as an on-air personality.  I aspire to be a great storyteller and reporter.  This will be like my own form of training.

 

4.  Get web comics posted on a more regular basis.  I know that the web comics here at the site are few and far between.  This is due to the struggles of both myself and our amazing web comic artist Matt Jeffrey with finding the necessary time to devote to the project.  Matt, much like myself, has to hold down a full time job as well.  The comics are side project to our regular lives.  It's impossible for just the two of us to pump out a weekly comic.  There's just not enough time in the day.  Therefore, going forward I am hoping to put together a small team of artists (if I can find some) that will occasionally draw up a comic for me when they can.  This way, we'll get more regular comic posts up and you'll get to see a variety of art from a team of very talented people.  If you happen to be an artist and are looking for a place to show your talents, by all means email me and we can talk about what kinds of work you like to do.

 

5.  Embrace new technology.  In the coming year, I am planning on buying some pieces of tech which will hopefully expand the capabilities of the kinds of stuff I am able to present on this site.  I will be buying a better camera and will learn to use it so that I can bring you higher quality photos from the events I attend such as Comic Con and Wonder Con.  I also intend to buy a digital audio recorder so I can get onsite interviews at such events which will be able to be included in future podcasts.  Hell, even my new phone is able to live stream videos to the internet, so look forward to some potential videocasts in the future as well.

 

All I ask of you, my faithful readers, is that you be patient with me.  The site isn't going to change overnight, I still have a full time job that sucks up most of my time and I'm still going to be fighting my own inherent motivation issues for a while to come.  It may be a while before daily posts are being made to the site again, but please don't think that Geek-tastic is dead just yet.  I still think about the site every day and am working on ways to entertain you all.  Just bear with me and be sure to check back in every now and then. 

 

Thanks for listening.

 

- Patrick Roach
   Founder of Geek-tastic.com

Serenity Flies Again On The Printed Page

 

Hey all you Browncoats out there, I've got some good news for you.  Even though Joss Whedon's Firefly may be dead as a TV show and movie franchise, the adventures of Captain Malcolm Reynolds and his crew aren't over just yet.  It has been announced that an officially licensed series of short stories about the folks from Firefly will be released soon by Titan Books, and best of all in my opinion is the fact that the amazingly talented sci-fi writer Jane Espenson will be writing one of the stories.

 

From the Sci-Fi Wire:

 

Writer/producer Jane Espenson—who wrote one episode of the Fox sci-fi series [Shindig] but is a longtime friend and colleague of Whedon's going back to her days on Buffy the Vampire Slayer—told us that she will be writing one of the stories, centering on the characters of Kaylee and Wash (obviously set in a time period before the events of the movie Serenity).

 

"I'm writing a short story set in the Firefly universe that someone's putting together," Espenson said in an interview on Sunday in Pasadena, Calif., where she was promoting her upcoming Syfy series Caprica. "Titan Books is putting together a collection written by various of the Firefly writers. But [it's a] very short story, ... 2,000 words."

 

She added: "Oh, I just came up with a very clever little short story that involves Kaylee and Wash, two characters that we haven't seen together that much."

 

I've actually been wondering for a while now why we haven't already seen a book series about the Firefly universe.  All of the other popular sci-fi properties I can think of have their own book series. Just wander into the sci-fi/fantasy section of any bookstore and you'll find tons of books for franchises like Star Trek, Star Wars, Stargate, Battlestar Galactica and even Doctor Who.  This just begs the question, where the hell have our Firefly books been?  Sure, there have been some comic book mini-series runs here and there, but what about full-on novels? 

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm happy that we are getting a collection of short stories here, but why hasn't a full length book about Firefly been commissioned?  You just know that fanboys like myself would scoop that thing up in a heartbeat.  What happened after the events of Serenity?  How does Zoe handle Wash's death?  How well adjusted does River become after finally getting her issues over the whole Miranda thing resolved?  What happens to the Reavers after their major clash with the Alliance?  All of these questions would make for some great books, and we loyal Browncoats would buy these books in droves.  Seriously Mr. Whedon, why hasn't this been done yet?

 

Maybe these short stories are just their way of testing the waters for a book series?  If so, be sure to buy this set when it comes out.  Maybe if it sells well we'll finally get the full story continuation that Firefly fans have been craving for years.

Pat's Movie Reviews - Avatar

 

Ok, so I've admittedly been talking a little bit of crap about James Cameron's Avatar for a few months now.  I haven't been totally against the film, mind you.  It's just that I was getting annoyed with James Cameron talking about his film like it was the second coming of Christ or something of equally epic proportions.  The trailers and commercials I'd seen for the film didn't look all that great to me, but there Cameron was, swearing up and down that his film would revolutionize the way films are made.  I didn't buy it, but I was willing to keep an open mind and allow the possibility that he was telling the truth.  This is afterall the guy who gave us Aliens and Terminator 2.  Maybe it was all hype, but it was hype from a guy who made awesome films. 

 

Having seen the film now though, I'm definitely one of the people who falls into the "it was all hype" category.  That's not to say that Avatar is a bad film though.  Far from it.  It's a decent film with some major strong points, it's just not the filmmaking revolution that Cameron had promised, at least not as far as the story is concerned.

 

The big thing about this film of course are the 3D special effects, and yes I will gladly admit that they are as awesome as everyone keeps saying they are.  The visuals in Avatar are absolutely breathtakingly beautiful.  The CG in this film is gorgeous, and the use of IMAX 3D technology just helps to immerse the audience into the world of Avatar.  The colors in this film are as lush as the artifical jungle that makes up the film's setting.  Seeing the world of Pandora light up at night truly is a site to behold.  Even the motion-capture tech used to create the blue skinned Navi is flawless.  Yes, I still think that the aliens look like crossbreeds of Thunder Cats and Smurfs, but I will admit that the process used to bring them to the screen is so fluid that I stopped thinking about how goofy they looked after about 30 minutes into the film and was just able to enjoy the story instead of being distracted by the visuals.

 

However, it's when I started paying attention to the story that everything started falling apart for me.  To say that Avatar's story is similiar to stuff we've seen before is a bit of an understatement.  It's more accurate to say it's the exact same story we've seen a few times before, but now it's just set in space instead of the old west.  I've personally taken to calling the film Space Pocahontas because that's basically what it is.  I realize that Avatar actually has more in common with Dances With Wolves' storyline than it does Pocahontas, but Dances With Space Wolves just doesn't sound as awesome as Space Pocahontas, and the films are all similiar enough anyways that I don't think it matters.  So, Space Pocahontas it is.

 

As for the story, it really is point by point the same as that of Pocahontas and Dances With Wolves.  A member of the military from a highly technological society is sent far away from home to "a new world" where he meets an old native culture that is very spiritual and in touch with nature.  Over the course of the film this character is introduced to their culture and ways and is slowly won over by them until the point that he is accepted into their society, but then his friends from his original culture threaten to destroy his newly adopted culture for one reason or another that has to do with territory or mining or something and he has to fight alongside his new family to defend their homeland and way of life.  Oh, and there's a native girl that he falls in love with along the way which really is the main reason he changes sides.  Sound familiar?  Yeah, I can't tell which film I'm describing either.

 

Plot point by boring cliched plot point, Avatar drags along as if it were a "paint by numbers" film in which Cameron took some great moments from other films and smooshed them altogether to create one uber story that is the perfect epitome of stereotypical hollywood storytelling.  Every twist and turn is completely predictable, and the outcome is pretty much known well before you get to the end of the film.  The absolute worst moment for me was when they told us the name of the ore which they were mining on Pandora which was supposed to be the foundation of the whole film's story.  It's called Unobtainium.

 

Yeah, I'll let that sink in for a second.  Unobtanium.

 

That has got to be one of the worst things I've ever heard.  That just screams to me lazy script writing.  Why didn't Cameron just call it Macguffinite, or Reallyhardtogetesium.  And just what does this Unobtainium do that's so god damned important that humans are willing to commit genocide to get it?  I honestly don't know.  It's never really explained in the script.  Does it cure cancer?  Does it power every city on planet Earth in a completely green friendly way?  Can it grant wishes to whoever touches it?  Who knows!  All we know is that it's a rock, it's hard to find, and the Navi Villiage is sitting on top of a million pounds of the stuff.  Sorry, but that isn't good enough for me.  You can't just have a rock be the main driving force of your plot and not explain why it's so sought after.

 

That's just one of my problems with the story.  The bigger reasons are things like the cookie cutter nature of good and evil that are represented in the film.  I would have liked to have seen Sam Worthington's character actually have to make a difficult moral choice at some point about who he was going to side with, but when you have the completely peaceful and wonderful Native Americans, oops I mean Navi on one side and an evil Corporation/military on the other that is led by a Yosemite Sam style trigger happy gun nut, is it any wonder he chose some hot blue alien tail over the greedy money grubbing business men?  Hmm, let's see, in one world he's a parapalegic former marine who doesn't have any friends or loved ones and in the other he's a strong and virile hunter who has a princess with the hots for him and he gets to fly around on these awesome dragon things.  Which life would you choose?  Be honest.

 

I realize that I'm probably asking for too much.  Admittedly, as great as Cameron's previous works are, none of them have had amazingly written thought provoking stories.  There wasn't exactly a lot of deep moral dilemmas in Aliens or T2 either, so why should I expect those here?  What James Cameron is really good at is telling simple stories in cool and pretty ways where lots of things explode and generally look totally badass.  That's what Avatar is really.  Is it entertaining?  Yes.  Is it a groundbreaking moment for cinematic special effects?  Absolutely!  So let's just focus on those and be happy I guess. 

 

A few quick comments of praise though before I wrap up this review.  I really did like Zoe Saldana's performance in the film.  Blue Thunder Smurf or not, she was a classic Cameron badass Sci-fi warrior woman just like Ripley or Sarah Connor.  Speaking of Ripley, seeing Sigourney Weaver in a sci-fi film is always a treat, and this was no exception.  Also, the idea that the whole planet of Pandora is an evolved and interconnected ecosystem in which an animal can link up with and sync with other animals or even with plants is a pretty cool damned concept.  It's like a literal world wide web.  It's just too bad that this concept wasn't developed further.   

 

In the end, I do suggest that you go see Avatar.  When you do though, be sure to pay the extra few bucks and see it on the IMAX in 3D.  That really is the only way to see it.  It's well worth it for the visuals alone.  Just don't expect a lot from the plot and you'll be fine.

 

Final Grade:  B