Ski-Jump-Nose Month

And the nominees are:

Tuesday, 1.55pm...

I circle the pasta place 3 times. I'm a hungry carb-shark that has body image issues, so I opt for a schnit sambo down the way.
I look at it being picked up en route to the toaster and wonder if it will be heavy enough for me to consider it 'value' for my seven dollars fifty.
I stand back and watch an impossibly hot and tall hoe approach the counter. She is on the phone to her fat friend and what I first mistake for a sniffle turns out to be more. She has been dumped by whichever hard prick she was discovering the 'soft side' of this month.
The happiness curls over me like a warm blanket. I imagine this feeling is somewhere in the realm of watching your first child being born, or tearing open some freshly boxed audio visual product.
My sandwich weighs a ton.
This is a good day.

PWT

I’m not crazy 'cause I take the right pills

I’m worried that my obsession with American girls like the ones above is going to see me grow old and lonely because I never got the chance to move there and marry one.
I’m worried that, despite all the industry events I go to, I’m yet to appear in the social pages or have an image on Getty or Tito.
I’m worried that my office crush thinks I’m a jerk. And now I’m worried that she’ll read this and think I’m even weirder.
I’m worried about when I meet Shia LaBeouf. What if we don’t become best friends?
I’m worried that, having spent the first 25 years of my life putting up with the unoriginal jibes about reddish hair (it’s strawberry blonde, turkeys), now that I’m losing it, I’m actually happy with its colour.
I’m worried that there are songs on my iPod that I don’t actually know.
I’m worried that after 32 years, I’ve never been in hospital. I used to think I was indestructible, but now I just know that when I finally get admitted, I won’t be prepared for the pain I’ll be in.
I’m worried that I’m supposed to be a writer, but nothing I write is ever as honest, funny or insightful as PWT’s posts.
I’m worried that I don’t go to the movies enough, and when I do, I always see the rubbish ones.
I’m worried that this will be my creative legacy. And it doesn’t even mention my name.
I’m worried that one day I’m going to be found out.
I’m worried that I have nothing to do in life.
I’m worried that I call myself a king of Stuff, but I never do anything. And the only time I seriously consider doing Stuff is at work, when I know I can’t.
I’m worried that I won’t go out on my terms, and that my terms involve a great white shark and a small boat.
I’m worried that no one will have stepped on Mars in my lifetime. What happened to the future?
I’m worried that I’ve never put 100 per cent into anything, ever.
I’m worried that I haven’t been to the dentist since I broke my tooth on a Strawberry Chomp in year eight.
I’m worried that I’ll never own a copy of Amazing Spider-Man #1, and I wish I traded my Kombi for it when Costa from The Comic Bug first made me the offer. I can’t see an opportunity for some old guy in a ute to run a red light and write off a comic.
I’m worried that I scare Mark with stories of ghosts in our house, and then when I’m the only one home at night, I can’t sleep.
I’m worried that the Dogs don’t have what it takes to win the comp this year.
I’m worried that the recurring dream I have in which I realise I didn’t graduated from uni will one day come true.
I’m worried that there is no girl I’m in love with at the moment.
I’m worried that I’ll be taking these pills for the rest of my life.

Matt

Transformers 2 review

The movie sucks.
Bay needs Bruckheimer reining him in and introducing him to words like "suspense" and "pace".
Shia is fantastic as always.
Teleporting and human-looking robots? Retarded.
The end.
Mark.

New Beginnings

My mate AB is moving into his first home this weekend. A nice new 2 bedroom vessel for his extended family of audio visual products. To truly appreciate how excited he is about his new sleeping quarters, one must first understand the living arrangement he is about to leave. 

Two years ago, AB worked in a smallish company marketing crazy frog-esque ringtones to big- ass telcos. Here he met a tasty vietnamese rice paper roll by the name of Quinn. They shared plenty of worktime chats which hastily turned into nightly Messenger chatfests that had office tongues wagging. One night following an afterwork drinks session, Quinn asked Andrew if she could crash at his place, the commonly used code for sex that you don't decypher until long after you've fucked up your one and only shot at the title. Being of good moral fibre, AB watched Quinn crawl into his bed, and seeing that she was pretty fuckin' tanked, went out to explore some new virtual worlds with Zelda on the Xbox. 

Face to face and online chats began to dry-up immediately. The level of weirdness that ensued would have been appropriate had he put down the playstation controller that night and bounced his hairy beanbag on her chin for a couple of minutes. Alas, he did not, and would never. 

Some months later she left that job, looking to travel to South America like all the hot little hoes who want a third-world experience to erase their first-world guilt, and to try and get a colombian stamp on their passport so I can't accuse them of being the sheltered daddy's girls they will always be. 'You should come with me' was the carrot dangled in front of AB. How could he say no? He would join her for the 5th month of her 6 month soul searching wankfest. 

Upon landing in Peru he was greeted with a big hug and the great news that she'd spent the previous night fucking a Kiwi engineer she'd met on her own flight there. Joy. To top it off they were soon to be joined by Donkey-Boy, some big cocked london charmer she'd fallen for a month or so prior, who was now racing around the world to claim his kiwi-jiz-infused sticky rice pudding prize.

Despite the growing weirdness between them, AB thought that moving in with Quinn would be a good idea. He hoped that living with her would allow him to see her flaws and move on. I think he also hoped that in addition to her flaws he mite get another bite at her cherry. Alas, all he was chewing on was her excitement at the nightly phone sex sessions she had with Donkey-Boy. He soon made the trip out to Australia just in time for the GFC to remove any job opportunities for media marketers. Not prepared to take anything less than a dream job for fear it would taint his perfect fucken CV, he stayed rent free with Quinn and AB and decided he had a talent for creative writing and was going to pen a bestseller. 

Ed and I arrive with AB to help him pack some his TV and sound system. I really just wanted to be a part of removing one of the many items Quinn and DB had totally fuckin taken for granted over the past year. As he said they would, the moment we entered the apartment they retreated into their bedroom. I looked at Quinn's Ugg Boots as good follow-up to Operation Jizzpillow,  but having the boys around made arousal unlikely. Maybe next time. I read three pages of Donkey-Boy's life story and wished I too had the eternal optimism and total delusion that would have been necessary to write the other 200 pages of what I assume to be the same horse shit. Time to get a day job, cunt.

I should've shot the fuckin' Ugg Boots. 

Goddamnit.

PWT

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen review

It’s nothing new, but films with colonised titles seem to have undergone a resurgence lately. And it’s not just sequels, with flicks like GI Joe: Rise of the Cobra getting in on the act in the hopes of building a franchise. With sequels though, the colon offers the opportunity to sell the movie based on the success of the first by keeping the recognisable name in the title, but also gives the film a freshness that tacking 2 (or 3 or 4) on the end quickly negates.

Which brings us to Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. A lot’s already been said about this sequel to the 2007 blockbuster – Roger Ebert hated on it, fanboys hated on Roger Ebert because he hated on it, and Roger Ebert hated on the fanboys hating on him hating on it. Thing is, they’re both right. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is a horrible mess of a film that lacks sense and heart, but I enjoyed the hell out of it.

Sam (Shia LaBeouf) is heading off to college, but leaving his Autobot protector, Bumblebee, and girlfriend Mikaela (Megan Fox) at home. As he’s packing, a shard from the All Spark (the first movie’s McGuffin) uploads some info into his brain, making him flip out at random times and begin writing strange symbols all over the place. Meanwhile, the Autobots, led by Optimus Prime, have joined forces with the US government to track down Decepticons hiding around the world. When the Decepticons learn that there is another ancient energy source hidden on Earth, and that the key to finding it is now in Sam’s brain, the race is on to be the first to it.

It turns out dropping Decepticon leader Megatron into the deepest part of the ocean isn’t enough to keep him out of the way – particularly when he has his own boss, the Fallen of the title, to answer to. The Fallen, hiding out in space, is powerful, but refuses to come to Earth until the last of his ancient enemies, the Prime, is destroyed. That’d be Optimus.

Director Michael Bay raises the stakes, no doubt. Sam is captured early on and there is a real sense of threat in this film that was lacking in the first one. The climax though – a battle in Egypt – is less impressive than an earlier fight scene in a forest in which Optimus cuts loose. The Egypt stuff is too long, and cutting between four different groups of characters doesn’t help with identifying exactly who is fighting who.

Bay’s love of military porn is in full XXX mode. There’s only so many times you can see a formation of jets zip through the sky or a carrier carve through the sea before you get bored of it though. Get back to the robots, dude.

There are some new Transformers on both sides, but apart from giving the movie some extra grunt, you don’t really care about them. Optimus and Bumblebee are the only guys worth worrying about. Former Home & Away star Isabel Lucas is dead set vacuous and her big revelation is the most moronic part of Fallen, though she does set up some funny moments between Sam and Mikaela.

The thing that made the first movie was the opening 30 minutes of Sam. His interactions with Mikaela, with Bumblebee and with his parents are gold and feel like another movie compared with the military and action sequences. Shia is more confident here, but he has less time to explore the fun and quirky Sam before he is required to run around and dodge explosions.

There’s no doubt who Bay has made this film for. There are those who say that he has ignored the people who love and grew up with Transformers. The fact that Bay has made the movie for eight to 14-year-olds shows he knows a lot more about the brand than these 35-year-old fans. It’s a movie based on a toy line. The toys came before the cartoon – though I’ll grant you it was the cartoon that clearly established the universe. So, even given that, it’s a movie based on a cartoon. A cartoon made for eight to 14-year-olds. Just because those kids are now adults doesn’t mean the movie should be made for them. The target market hasn’t changed – it’s still kids.

Would Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen be better as a cartoon? No way. Would it be judged less harshly if it was a cartoon? Most definitely (despite the success of Pixar et al, cartoons, much like comics, are still perceived by the general population as kids’ stuff). So, in that respect, consider it a cartoon come to life and you begin to see why it’s so enjoyable.

I’m not saying Michael Bay is a film-making genius, but he’s way better than people give him credit for. The guy knows action and he knows how to spend money to make money. This is spectacle and it’s also illusion. Like a magician drawing your attention from his subtle hand movements, Bay covers up the film’s problems with flashy movement and bright lights, and that’s fine by me.

Matt

Transformers - More than licks my ass

I like Michael Bay movies. I love awaiting people's reaction to me telling them that one of my favourite movies to watch repeatedly over the last 13 years is 'The Rock'. Reaction is generally shock and/or laughter but that's ok, it's the last time I will ever speak to them.
The few reviews I happened to read before seeing Transformers:Revenge of the Fallen, promised me much the same as I got with the first film, just 'longer, louder and stupider'. Brilliant. Bring it on.

I normally try to avoid seeing blockbusters on the Friday or Saturday night of opening week, where some young clown is bound to fuck up my movie-going experience by trying to peacock his way into some little hoe's undies. 

There is a little red riding hood behind me and eddie in the queue. She is potentially looking at me but I'll do the same thing I always do: jack shit. She's there with her dad and brother by the looks but she's easily legal. In front of me is a loner. Flying solo on a Friday night? He must really love his transforming robots. Sitting on the floor a few metres away is a muslim chick in full burka kit. I'll spend the next few minutes trying to think of an original sexist and/or racist comment to make to Eddie about her but I fail - a good thing because as the queue starts to move she gets to her feet and joins the 'loner' who wouldn't have liked the terrorist slurs about his sub-missus that never came to fruition. 

Back to the film...

I still can't fuckin' tell what these robots are doing in the action sequences. Not only that, but I thought I could default to coloured robots=goodies, silver bots=baddies. Not even. And not a good start. 

Shia is king(Matt is spot on). Megan is super hot. The forest sequence is ace. Witwicky's parents are gun. 

However, there are only so many dirt explosions I can sit through before I start gettin bored - and yes I can't believe I'm saying that. I was on my seat's edge at the end of The Rock and got all homo and choked up when Harry cops death for AJ so he can fly home and pound his little girl. I felt neither emotion here. Bugger.

For the last 15 minutes I was thinking about red riding hood further along my row, and how a song about her favourite things would include The Rock, Shia and doggy.

I should've been thinking about the movie. 

It's not your fault, Shia. Or yours, Michael.

It's you Steven. You fucked it. But I'll still buy the DVD.

PWT