‘reviews’ archive

Last year, I made a list of my most anticipated films of 2008. I think it’s worth going back and seeing how they turned out (and what didn’t make my list, but should have).

Prince Caspian

Once again, the Narnia installment proves to be better than the book (although that’s not quite impressive a feat as last time, as this is arguably the weakest book in the series). Critics have slammed it for deviations from the original plot, but I would argue these deviations only added to the themes of waiting on God, and seeing your own plans fail when you don’t. This took the message of the original and made it only stronger.

Wanted

Unfortunately, I still haven’t had a chance too see this one, but if the few reviews I’ve heard are correct, I should be fine waiting for Netflix. Which is unfortunate, as the trailers pumped this up to be a sort of next-gen Matrix.

The Happening

If Lady in the Water wasn’t fair warning, this film shows Shyamalan may very well have jumped the shark. In fact, this movie illustrates so clearly how good M. Night is at building up expectations, and how miserable he is at following through on them, that it actually hurt my opinion of his past films. Where I had given him grace before, I now see a glaring weakness. Shyamalan will have to pull something amazing out of his hat after this.

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I need to put this down somewhere, or else I will forget, so I might as well post it here. These are the movies I’m looking forward to this year, in no particular order:

• Prince Caspian – I loved the first movie, and while this is my least favorite book in the series, I’m still excited.
• Wanted – Looks really good
• The Happening – You can’t go wrong with Shyamalan, never mind what people say about his more recent works. I’ve enjoyed them all.

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Okay, here is where I confess to playing too many video games. I don’t play many of the big addicting ones, so much as bounce around to every new free casual game that hits the scenes. And I keep up on it all thanks to Jay is Games.

The latest one I’ve taken to is Luminara, a simple little game that showers you with a beautiful display of color as you blast away your geometric baddies. It even has an “awesome” meter seperate from your score that builds up the more you have going on in your kaleidoscope of explosions. A fun little way to kill ten minutes, if you’ve got it.

I love what Derek Webb does for his fans. First he gave away free downloads of his third major solo album. Now he’s offering his fourth for download a month early, so long as you pre-order it and some sort of graphic novel lyric book. It’s definitely worth checking out.

Amazon is offering it for $13 pre-order, if you’d rather not buy the book and don’t mind the wait.

The MP3 of Andrew Osenga’s new single is available for free download on his website. Check it out, and if you like it, order the album, which should be releasing any day now!

I don’t often post to talk about what’s going on “out there” on the internet, but I can’t pass up the chance to help out Andy O.