It's really not that racist. Unless I'm playing.

Danny and I beat Resident Evil 5 the other day.

It's ok. Not as good as 4, but solid. There's some really annoying shit in it, though. QTEs that just happen, no warning. Bullshit bosses. Lame bosses. Bullshit AND lame bosses. Weird inventory restrictions.

But on the plus side, you shoot A LOT of black people. I mean zombies. I mean black zombies.

The biggest kerfuffle about this game was due to one of it's first trailers which kinda painted the game as a white supremacist's wet dream. "Wait. Hold on. There's *insert racial epithet* all over the place and I'm encouraged to kill them? Sign me the hell up!" And that kinda made people feel icky about the game. And so, they changed it. Or not. I don't fucking know.

OK, there's obviously some changes to the game that probably weren't in the original design doc. Like I'm pretty sure Sheva was originally a non-black lady who was quickly give a dusky coloring before her reveal to the world. Do I have any proof? Nah. Just a hunch.

And other things, like red glowy eyes, random white people in the crowd and the removal of Chris's 3rd alternate costume, a sheet and hood with special lynchin' rope attachment.

But, as you play the game, you do get the feeling that it's not so much racist as just plain ignorant. Like whoever made it didn't "get" why some people would find, oh, I don't know, natives dressed in grass skirts, covered in war paint, throwing spears at you kinda offensive. Yep.

Still, when it all boils down, it's RE4, in Africa, with co-op. And, as we all know, co-op makes EVERYTHING better. Shooting down wave after wave of zombies while yelling for more ammo and trying to not get your head cut off by Chainsaw Man was very fun and I'm glad I bought the game.

I hear rumors that Capcom is restarting the series for 6. I think that's a good idea. Make it zombies again, not these 28 Days Later infected humans. Or vampires. Or werewolves. Shit, werewolves would be cool. Werewolf zombies...anyway. But whatever they do, they need to lose the co-op and let you walk while shooting or hell, just with your gun out. Because we've moved on as gamers and standing still to shoot ain't cuttin' it anymore.

Damn you, Fatty!

I like Johnny To. Every movie of his I've seen, I've liked. Maybe not loved, but had a good time. PTU : Police Tactical Unit (or Into the Perilous Night:PTU which is just a sillier, cooler title) joins the likes of Exiled, The Mission and Fulltime Killer as movies of Mr. To I had a good time with.

I wonder how many of the names in the movie are real vs. bad/lazy translations. Fatty, Bald Head, Eye Ball...what the hell, man? I won't bother getting into the story, it's just a McGuffin for cop shenanigans to occur. And honestly, that's part of the reason that I didn't find this movie just super badass cool. After you've seen The Shield and The Wire, every other cop thing just feels 2nd rate.

But there's a lot of menace to the proceedings. The main band of roving cops, led by Sgt. Ho, rove the street like a gang, and in many ways, are. Beatings happen, people. And slappings. Slapping...not as shocking as allowing a man to lose his teeth thanks to the help of a law book (The Shield. Watch it if you havn't. You'll thank me, then God.) Maybe a slap means more on the streets where Ho is from.

It's definitely worth checking out for the opening scene in the restaurant, though, which I totally want to homage whenever I get around to making movies. The general air of menace is very cool on the shadowy streets of what appears to be a business district at night. It's Johnny To and he might not make the best movies, but he makes them damn entertaining.

What this is all about.

Maybe this should've been the first post. I don't know. But, what I do know, this is the official first post.

What this blog is all about is somewhere to collect my thoughts on the media I ingest over my life. It's not reviews or anything, just snippets of my headspace when I watched a movie or a great line from a terrible book or a song that makes me sad and I don't know why. There's already the brief tale of an epic duel between big budget action and indie drama and I will have some more stuff upcoming about the end of Galactica, an Asian flick called PTU and why Tokyo Suckerpunch is a great title for a book.

If anybody reads this, I hope they enjoy. Leave a comment, send me an email or just enjoy it silence.

Universal Soldier vs. Rachel Getting Married

In a happy turn of events, somewhat controlled by me, I received both Universal Soldier and Rachel Getting Married from Netflix today. I find that awesome, fantastic and amazing. I only briefly wondered which I would watch first. But the obvious choice was, of course, Universal Soldier.

But only because it would probably try to kick my ass if I didn't.