Spiderman 3: my review.

MINOR SPOILER WARNING. I'll try to avoid major spoilers, but I'm assuming you've seen the previews on TV or in front of another movie. We know Venom, Sandman and Harry Osborne are in this one. Get over it.

OK, I'm sure the 'net is inundated with Spiderman 3 reviews. And a pretty good take is over at Paxman's Blog, but I wanted to take issue with this particular review.

Specifically with his comment: "Topher Grace delivered a very believable performance."

He has not seen Spiderman 3. If he had, this statement would not have appeared in his blog.

I've seen the movie. I enjoyed it. Absolutely must add to my collection when it is released. Best Spiderman EVAR? Meh, I'm not sure I can decide that right now.

Too many Villians? I disagree. I really think they dodged a bullet here too. During the scene where Sandman is trying to coalesce into a man-like shape for the first time, my wife leans over and asks me "What are his super powers?"

"Pretty much that." He's a guy made of sand. Not a whole heap of plot attached to that one. I'm very glad they didn't try to develop one.

Though there were quite a few slow spots that could have better served the movie had they wound up on the cutting room floor. Well, pretty much every scene chronicling the dysfunctional, junior high maturity relationship that Pete and MJ have.

Paxman make some good points about communication, blah blah blah. He's frikkin Spiderman, there are no prior examples For MJ of how a romantic relationship should be with a superhuman boy. Life will be slightly different than if you were dating, say, the astronaut son of the EIC of the largest tabloid in NYC, or maybe even the President of the United States. I would have to say, dating a human spider hybrid is probably going to be a touch different than anything you've ever dealt with. And just in case you weren't following my line of reasoning, while getting fired from a schlocky second rate off Broadway musical is emotionally difficult, it's pretty lame in comparison to say, the destruction of NYC, or a pile of 400 grit doin' the old smash and grab at First National. MJ, if you were looking for someone who will empathize with your failure, and try to get you back on your feet, perhaps you should have stuck with Harry. Instead you chose YFNSM who has to save the planet from consumption by the fusion experiment of a raving lunatic. Slightly more pressing than whether you're feeling insecure about your career.

Before you get too critical, I know why they put it in there. Because those of us that grew up with Pete in comics and on the small screen are now married, or aspire to be. And the company of that beautiful woman is generally preferable to that of 8 other overweight sweaty comicbook nerds. So they write a script that will appeal to the better half, and we get dates! My point is simply that I don't remember MJ being that shallow and trite. Spiderman wants you to bear his children, who cares about Broadway?

Sorry, got a little man-crush going there.

But back to Topher Grace.

To review, Paxman wrote: "Topher Grace delivered a very believable performance."

Yeah, I haven't seen a performance that believeable since Keanu tried to recite Shakespeare in Much ado about Nothing. Surrounded by brilliance (Michael Keaton, Emma Thompson, Kenneth Branagh, Denzel Washington, Robert Sean Leonard, Kate Beckinsale) Keanu made me want to throw a brick through the TV and find an Icepick to scrape out the parts of my brain where that memory was located. The only convincing performance Keanu has is as Ted "Theodore" Logan in the Bill and Ted's movies. The brilliance of the Wachowski brothers is not in the crafting of a fascinating post-apocolyptic world where hackers walk a virtual earth stuck in the late 1990's, fighting for freedom of thought and escape from the Global UPS, but in writing a script that Keanu could deliver without looking like a drooling labrador. I own all three matrix movies and am amazed every time I watch them. Ted saved the world.

Someone should find the casting director for S3 and punch him in the face. Seriously. I was appalled by the terrible performance put forth by TG, to the point that I'm amazed it got past the censors. I expect performances like that from actors in George Lucas films. He couldn't pick an actor at the SAG awards. But in general, Spiderman movies are pretty good. And this is why I'm blaming Topher and not the director.

James Franco.

He delivered a universally flat, emotionless performance in the first two movies. If my high school director had seen something like that in one of his stage plays, he'd have thrown pencils at him. But he had a small part, it wasn't that big of a deal.

Yet, in S3 Franco pulled of a pretty good performance. He's not going to be taking home an Oscar for it. But I wasn't rolling my eyes after every line, and I actually found myself liking his oafish, happy "everything is great"character. The director seems to have done a great job playing to JF's lack of talent. And yet Topher couldn't tie his shoes convincingly in this one.

"But, he was supposed to be unstable, over the top" you might be thinking. And I would agree. I offer Jim Carey's Riddler, or Jack Nicholson's Jack Torrance. They were believably insane. I knew there was something wrong with them. Things were not going to go well. Not so with TG. His character was simply weird. In the church scene, he was not fervent, or off center, he wasn't even creepy, he was simply strained, forced, weak. There was nothing in his eyes, expressions, or manner that indicated sincerity. He was simply reciting his lines, and not well at that. Not only is Topher Grace not in the same league as either of these characters, but shouldn't be allowed in the same room.

I find myself searching around for that icepick hoping I get lucky and scrape the right parts of my memory the first time. I'd hate to lose Serenity or Band of Brothers.

Transforming Friday workday into excitement

Ok, I used to watch transformers every day when I was younger. I mean what kid my age didn't? The very idea of a car, dinosaur, or gigantic insect changing into an enormous robotic being is enough to get even my 30 something brain cranking! Not only were they extremely cool technology, they were aliens!! Lasers, space wars, fast cars! Oh, man these guys were sitting on a gold mine. I bet they had their own money mint in the back room of the Transformers Inc. office building. Right next to the life sized Optimus Prime.

The other evening, while watching TV, I got to see a short Transformers preview. I jumped up off the couch and stepped closer to the Television so I wouldn't miss a nanosecond. HOLY COW!!!! That jet that transformed was just about enough to make me a happy man had I died right there!!! Any fears that they were going to make them look like the original cartoons has left my brain. No these aren't going to be obviously CG (though they obviously are CG). The short clip I saw on TV almost had me looking out the window to see the Constructicons walk by!

So, it looks like the full length trailer for the upcoming Transformers movie has hit the net.

Talk about making my day!!!

After watching the TV preview my wife informed me that I have to see the movie before taking my 6 year old to see it, to make sure it won't give him nightmares. Can't say that my wife requiring me to watch Transformers twice depresses me all that much.

Nergon, let's plan on doing this one together. I doubt our wives want to wipe the drool from our chins...

Happy Birthday Pong!

So, I'm a slashdot junkie. Whenever I log into a pc 3 webpages get opened. Google, Gmail and slashdot.

While getting my fix this morning, I came across this posting

Videogames Turn 40

There's a great piece of history for all us gamers. Hard to not look back at all the years of great games and smile fondly.

I remember all the hours I wasted at my Commodore Vic20, keying in the code for some game printed in a computer magazine, then looking for the typo's when it didn't work correctly.

How many remember that? Don't be shy, let me see your hands!

Have I mentioned lately that I love my job?

So I was approached today by my boss, who asked me to assist with an interview.

Now, I've taken part in my share of interviews, though up until this point, it had always been on the interviewee side of the conference table. I've had some interesting ones, but for the most part, I think I interview pretty well. Sometimes I talk too much, but that's a nervous habit thing.

Heh, I can still remember an interview I had with the Mac support group at HP. Now, before I get crucified by all those that know me, and are familiar with my opinion of Macs (Steve Jobs is the Antichrist, but I suppose that's the subject of another blog), I want to qualify this paragraph by admitting it was for a blue badge job.

For those of you reading this that are not familiar with the contractors life at hp, the actual HP employees were issued an ID badge with a blue border, as opposed to the orange or brown border of the SCC's. What that meant in the workplace was that it became next to impossible to get fired. Seriously. I mean you always hear about some guy 3 departments removed getting escorted out for surfing porn during work hours, or about somebody smuggling Post-it's out in coat pockets. But I don't recall anyone I worked with actually saying they knew someone first hand that had been dismissed. Though, I can remember one individual, who was by no means the top performer of the contractors in Department X, change nearly overnight, with the receipt of a blue badge. Metrics changed from 6 hours logging calls to perhaps 3 or 4 a day. Not 3 or 4 hours, but 3 or 4 calls a day. It was difficult to receive a pink slip from these guys.

However, I do recall one person getting the boot during my tenure on the 2nd floor of building 4. I wasn't privy to all the nitty gritty details, but something about hacking during his shift. The rumor I heard included a bank calling HP and questioning IT about the repeated intrusions. Totally hearsay, grain of salt required.

In any event that interview definitely gets filed in the "what were you thinking" drawer. But I digress...

Back to the point, I was asked to assist on this interview, with no outstanding instructions. I asked some generic questions, provided some what-if's and chatted with this fellow to gauge his technical agility. Then, I filled my boss in with my impressions. I get to do it again this afternoon.

For those of you who conduct interviews a fair amount, do you have any advice on what direction to go for the technical aspect of an interview (I work for an IT support company)? For those of you who are interviewed on a regular basis, what are things you liked or hated about a particular interview? What can I avoid during an interview to not look like a chump and still get a good honest assessment of the technical aptitude?