Windom Earle? Whoop-doo!

Twin Peaks fans? Whoop-doo! Wow, this is unbelievable. I've gotten through November of 2008 without anyone ruining the ending of Twin Peaks for me. I'm not talking about the revelation of Laura Palmer's killer. Although I never watched the show way back when it first aired in 1990 and 1991, I eventually heard the astonishing outcome of this great television mystery. It came as no big shock to my system. No. What I'm talking about is the conclusion of the actual series itself. From my guestimation, not too many people made it past the midway point of season two. Except for the hardcore fans. It was theirs at that point, and I guess they never felt like sharing. I'd never heard the name Windom Earle until I sat down to watch the entire box set that came out late last year. And was quite astonished upon viewing that final episode in the series. The one that came before Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me. Directed by David Lynch, it has to be one of the greatest series finales ever constructed for modern television audiences. I don't think there has been anything like it before or since, and I have to wonder why Windom Earle isn't a bigger part of American pop cult idolatry and showmanship. Again, I guess the fans that stuck with it until the very end didn't feel like letting us more ignorant folks in on the secret. If you are anything like me (i.e. a giant procrastinator), you should do yourself a favor and finally sit through these twenty-nine episodes. Make sure you get the Twin Peaks: The Definitive Gold Box Edition [10 Discs], though. It's the one that comes with the pilot. Whoop-doo!

The World's End? Boo!

The New Teaser Trailer for 2012? Boo! This looks like another blatant attempt at frightening a mostly uninterested public; a cash-in scare tactic that is using the Mayan Calendar to fist rape the box office. I doubt the film will be an honest and real look at the events leading up to this ominous date. It's a year shouted so proudly in the title, the weight of its deliberate definition might melt a glacier. From the looks of this very short forty-second trailer, we are going to get a heaping helping of rehashed Emmerich. 2012 is a very cool title for a really old song. Its one that Roland has been singing for more than two decades. Seriously. How is this different from The Day After Tomorrow? That, too, if I am not mistaken, was about the end of the world. A bucket of ocean water being washed over some mountains while a monk rings the extinction bell? Fuck, it looks like nothing more than a missing scene culled from The Day After Tomorrow's DVD special features menu. If it were truly the end of the world, there would be no survivors. But trust me. In Emmerich's version, there will be. Just look at the cast listing. John Cusack isn't going to get buried under the weight of a world that is falling apart. He's being put on screen to give us a glimmer of Jake Gyllenhaal style hope. Call 2012 a sequel in sheep's clothing, because that's what it is. There is no need to Google the year in question. It will just build your hopes up about this doorag of a flick. You'll find a lot of awesome information about the Earth's magnetic polarities flip-flopping, Great White Sharks losing there sense of direction, melting polar ice caps, an exploding Yellow Stone Park, the emergence of false Christs, and Walmart. But Emmerich's film has no time for that. It'll be grand destruction served with a side of fries. Nothing more. Nothing less. It certainly won't be based in truth. Flying in the face of an embargo, The Mayan Calendar and the Bible Code have both already published their reviews of the film. And the verdict is unanimous: 2012 sucks. But just like all of Roland's films, it's really fun to watch. Even though it looks faker than the shark in Jaws 19.

Chimpanzee Riding on a Segway? Whoop-doo!

Parry Gripp's Youtube Page? Whoop-doo! Warning! If you are prone to getting infectious pop songs stuck in your head for indefinite amounts of time, you might want to turn away now. Gripp, lead vocalist for the goofy pop punk band Nerf Herder (named after that cosmic racial slur first uttered by Princess Leah in The Empire Strikes Back) has taken a number of cute clips from this popular viral site and added his own soundtrack to them. These contagious confections come on like an ear chigger. They will bury themselves deep into your brain, and later explode unexpectedly like hallucinatory mushroom residual. If you don't want to be absent mindedly singing "He's a cat (meow!) flushing the toilet!" over and over again, in front of your peers, then you better stay away. Just one tiny peek and your hooked. Try watching "Chimpanzee Riding on a Segway" without getting the chorus stuck behind your ears like gum in the hair. Its sweet tasty Mexican candy. I'm counting down the seconds until it makes me puke all over my computer screen and keyboard. Why the fuck did I have to click on this god damn analeptic weapon of mass brain destruction? We're all doomed!

Smith Family Remakes? Whoop-doo!

Smith Family Remakes? Whoop-doo!

Another Smith Family Remake? Whoop-doo! Sort of. I guess. Maybe it deserves an exalted Boo!. Seriously, did Will and Jada wake up one morning and challenge Jaden to a remake-off? Are they keeping score on how many fanboys they piss off in the far reaches of cyber space? Is there a million dollar bet on the line? In his short career, Jaden has jumped from a remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still right into another run at the The Karate Kid franchise. This comes hot on the heels of The Last Dragon remake news that hit last week. With a teenaged African-American protagonist in each film, don't they sort of cancel each other out? Barry Gordy's opus to Kung Fu Harlem is a product of its time, and it should remained buried on VHS. But the The Karate Kid is ripe for a proper retelling. Sure, Donnie Darko, The O.C., and Never Back Down have already sucked huge sips off its straw, that doesn't mean something new can't be done with it. Remake it up! My problem with Jaden is: He seems a little too young for Daniel San. Shouldn't we get an 18-year-old high school senior in there? It needs drama, not diapers. Is this the Muppet Babies version? I'm waiting to see whom they get to replace Pat Morita. I'll literally shit gold coins if Sam Jackson takes the job. I will shove them up my ass and shit stream them all over this goddamn computer screen. Maybe they can just combine the The Karate Kid redo with the one RZA is planning for The Last Dragon. Kill two bad, black karate epics with one stone. And save me fifteen bucks in the process. Maybe they can throw a little Oldboy in there for good measure. Will Smith's Oh Dae-Su busts out the back of a Motel 6 after being held captive for twenty years, and then teaches Jaden's new Daniel San the true meaning of revenge. Joining forces, the two discover that Sam Jackson's 2009 version of Sho'nuff, the Shogun of Harlem, is behind it all. And it's a battle to the death. Talk about a three-way daisy chain of hate. Some people are really bummed that Steven Spielberg is going ahead with his planned American adaptation of Chan-wook Park's modern masterpiece of terror. If Will is willing to go gray (again) and grow his hair out Min-Sik style, and Spielberg is willing to go whole hog Saving Private Ryan style with the hammer, and they make Jay Reatard's "Hammer I Miss You" the opening and closing theme song, then I'm game. It's really Jada that has lost out on this Smith Family Remake Challenge. Not one soul cared that she shit all over George Cukor's The Women.

Burt and Chevy? Boo!

Burt and Chevy? Boo!

Not Another Not Another Movie? Boo! Being both a huge Chevy Chase fan and a Burt Reynolds fan, I was excited to hear that they were teaming up for a spoof bitch slapping of epic proportions. If there's one genre that needs to be buried in the ground and slung with a wreath, it's the so-called spoof cheapie that is ruining our Hollywood savings and loan. What once made a funny comedy work now makes for a painful night at the Cineplex. Despite their waning proficiency at entertaining the masses, these so-called satires have been extremely profitable at the box office. If one drops during the off-season, it usually shoots straight to the top of the charts with enough cash earnings to feed a small Liberian city for a year. In the last couple of years, the spoof has run its course, hitting ever-available film type out there. We were court ordered and served with Romantic and Teen Comedy send-ups, parodies of epic movies, and unwitting diatribes on the super hero genres. It was only a matter of time before these things went Meta, and started poking themselves in the ribs. Call it cosmic masturbation. The Spoof is ripe for its own rib cracking. If done right, a spoof of the modern day "spoof" could be hilariously poignant. Maybe Not Another Not Another Movie could and will be just that. Who knows? No one, until it is released. The problem is, the synopsis for this so-called comedy sounds like the worst in bottom bin video store fodder. And it doesn't really sound like a spoof of spoofs at all. Chevy is playing the head of a film studio that suddenly up and leaves everything in the hands of his son, played by, of all people, Michael Madsen. First of all, that father-son combo isn't funny. Its just down right unbelievable. And it gets worse. Madsen and his goon sidekick Vinnie Jones decide to hire a PA to make a spoof. Sounds like An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn all over again. Reynolds is going to play an actor playing a director in the film-within-a-film. Not exactly what I pictured in my head when I first read about this project. Who knows? With any luck, this might be somewhat watchable. I'd loved to have been on the set for some of the back and forth between these curmudgeons: Chase, Madsen, and Reynolds. Director David Murphy probably has a goldmine of outtakes at his disposal. If there is a blooper reel on the DVD, I'll buy it no matter what the other critics say.

Quantum of Solace Photos

Another Beautiful Bootleg? Boo!

Quantum of Solace Bootleg? Boo! This is what Sony gets for releasing the film two weeks early in the UK. They get a high quality work print screener bootleg in the streets of Mexico Town just days before the film's American debut. Where? How? Why is this available in such beautiful, high quality digital rendering? Shouldn't a bootleg of any movie look like it was recorded off an old inner tube? James Bond's latest adventure has been delivered to the street hustlers in almost Blu-Ray like hues of watchablity. The bit rate is amazing, and if you get your hands on the disc, which is selling throughout Santee Alley for the amazingly low price of just $5 dollars, you won't need to replace it when it is legally released early next year. Did the studio release this into the criminal stream of bootlegs just so they could get their cut of the money? It looks too good for that. A crappier quality disc would insure repeat buyers in the future. But damn, it still must have been an inside job. Was it digitally delivered to a theater in Taiwan? Did the shifty theater manager make this happen? Or is it a disgruntled Broccoli employee? Seriously, this is down right disgusting. No film of this magnitude should be available this far in advance of its theatrical release. Maybe day of, but not when its 007. Where is Dateline's Chris Hansen? If anyone could get to the bottom of this, he could. It just doesn't make sense. The only thing that makes true sense is if Sony released the film via the street corner bootlegger to get the extra cash from those poor, broke souls that wouldn't normally go see the film on opening weekend or buy the DVD in stores. Despite Hollywood's efforts to curb the illegal bootlegging industry, it just seems to get worse and worse as time goes on.

Oh, well. I think that's it for this week. Wait, let me check my watch...Yup, Alex Billington still sucks. Kill Grandma! Eat Food! Whoop-doo!