Star Wars Episode III

I saw Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith recently. Yes, I went to the midnight showing. No, I didn't dress up. Yes, I adhered to the theater's ban of light-sabers, masks, and blasters. The scene was better than the past two episodes. I saw a husband and wife dressed up as Jedi Knights but the best was seeing someone in a Darth Vader suit. It was quite a spectacle.

I liked the film. Ok, I liked the first two films too but this one was definitely the best of the three new films. Albeit it being the best, it wasn't devoid of flaws but luckily they didn't completely ruin the movie.

I absolutely loved the opening sequence. The awesome battle between Star Destroyers, X-Wings, and Tie Fighters was fantastic. It was nice to finally see a war in space within a Star Wars film again.

The special effects amazed me once again. It proves once again that George Lucas is a phenomenal technical director. His creativity and attention to detail with regards to scenery and special effects is among the best. The plot and story of the film was good too. There was a dire amount of story to tell and they fit it all in very nicely. They did a great job of tying episode two and four together so that the entire six films were a cohesive sexology (or is it sextology?).

I really enjoyed the political commentary about the United States within the film. Lucas has always been known for blending politics into his movies (THX 1138 is probably the best example). I loved the line from Anakin stating: "If you're not with me, you're against me." Anakin used this as his reason to attack Obi-Wan. I found it extremely similar with what extremists did prior to the Iraq War. They had successfully popularized the belief that if you disagreed with God's will, oops I mean Bush's agenda, then you were unpatriotic and therefore a traitor of a sort.

Now, onto the complaints. Once again, most of the dialogue was absolutely rubbish and made me wince. As much as I praise Lucas for his technical skill as a director, I feel the opposite in his ability to direct actors and write a script. I wish he had relinquished his role as director and only been a producer. This worked fantastically well for Episode V and VI and to a degree for IV, where he was the director but had a massive amount of help. Seems as though Lucas has let his ego get in the way of his filmmaking. Such a pity.

I laughed through the entire scene of Darth Vader being reconstructed after having his feet and arm loped off and catching fire. The entire scene was so reminiscent of Frankenstein and the Six Million Dollar Man. I was just waiting for the line "we can rebuild him, we have the technology."

My last complaint is about Jar Jar. Although I was extremely happy that he didn't speak in this film, why couldn't Darth Vader kill him as a symbol that he had converted to the dark side. It would have been every Star Wars' fan's dream. Imagine this: Anakin has just been persuaded by Palpatine to join the dark side and in walks Jar Jar with some message from Padme when BAM... Anakin busts out his light-saber, splits him in two, and says: "shut the fuck up Jar Jar". It would be awesome. Lucas missed out.

As I said earlier, I liked the film but I would have liked it lot more had someone else written the dialogue and directed the movie. Lucas has a great imagination and the film is technically fantastic but it could have been so much more if only Lucas had decided to let go of his ego and only produced the film.'

The secret of Willy Wonka's workforce

I was watching Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory. It was on HBO and I couldn't resist the classic film. I must have watched it at least a dozen times during my childhood and my Circle K club in college did a Wonka-themed homecoming float. So, despite my familiarity with the movie, I never realized such a glaringly obvious theme within the movie until today.

What did I discover, you ask? No it wasn't the hidden sadistic nature of the movie. Nor was it the typical theme of deceiving children by exploiting their fantasies, in order to sell Chocolate bars. No, I realized both of those themes when I was young. The hidden theme that I finally realized today was that Oompa Loompas must be asexual creatures. Yes, you read it correctly.

Oompa Loompas are asexual.

Here's my proof. Willy Wonka explains in the movie that he secretly transported the entire population of Oompas Loompas from Loompaland in order to save them from the vicious "... Wangdoodles... Hornswogglers and Snozzwangers and rotten Vermicious Knids." He brought them to his factory where they work and live. Now, the problem is the movie never shows a single female Oompa Loompa. Every Oompa Loompa shown working in the factory is male.

If Willy Wonka brought the entire population to the factory, then there must not have been any females in Loompaland. If there were never any females in Loompaland, then traditional sexual reproduction would be impossible. Therefore, I decree that Oompa Loompas are asexual creatures.

a·sex·u·al       adj.
1. Having no evident sex or sex organs; sexless.
2. Relating to, produced by, or involving reproduction that occurs without the union of male and female gametes, as in binary fission or budding.
3. Lacking interest in or desire for sex.

The only possible flaw in my logic would be that the female Oompa Loompas are simply not permitted in the workforce but I disagree with this. The setting for the movie was the early 1970s and in this time period, women were an ever growing population within the work force. Therefore, its unimaginable that there wouldn't be any women in the Oompa Loompa workforce, further substantiating my theory that Oompa Loompas are asexual creatures.

And with that I bid you a bye-good. Strike that, reverse it.

Driving Insanity

Here's a clip that I got from my brother, Dan. The clip involves a car, a ramp, and some intoxication. Additionally, the ramp was made when his fraternity brothers at Northwood University used a plasma cutter to chop off the roof of a 15 passenger van. The car is a Chevy Sprint with the exhaust cut off and driven by an intoxicated pledge whose 6'5" frame barely fit in the car.

Click Here for the video.

A little bit of background knowledge might be helpful. Every year the fraternity goes out and buys a few $100 cars. They're used in a demonlition derby, typically occuring on campus in parking lots. Other times, they are just used and abused until they die. I just wish I had been there.