Not Always anti-Dead

I know I've been trashing this season of "The Walking Dead" but I want you to see the video I made when I started watching it last year. And as a Christian I was seriously putting my reputation at risk by what I say. I mean, Jesus knows what I am, but I'm not sure my fellow church-goers knew how dead was my strange-ness went.

The Walking Dead: Season 2

Now let me start by saying that since I am a Christian I do not often watch movies or TV shows that involve aliens, vampires, werewolves and especially not ZOMBIES! It’s not that I’m particularly holy, just that I find that type of genre rather boring. It seems to me that Zombie stories are pretty much like slasher flicks; mostly for boys under 12 years old who get a kick out of looking at gross stuff. But I was very surprised last year when a zombie show called, “The Walking Dead” on AMC (American Movie Channel) caught my attention. It's when the actors and makers of the show kept talking about it being a metaphor for life today. As one actor from the show said, “It’s less about zombies and more about how a small group of very different people keep their beliefs and morals alive in a world where the majority are dead people without any humanity at all and the main goal of everyone is survival.” That definitely piqued my interest and I tuned in. I watched every episode of the first season and then watched it again. Then I went on the internet and raved about this show and told everyone (including all my Christian/Church friends) that this was no ordinary horror show. These stories had depth, posed interesting questions and kept you well entertained (even if I did have to close my eyes for some of the grosser moments).
So it is with some hesitation and much disappointment that I must retract some of my opinions after watching Season 2 of “The Walking Dead”. It seems to me that the scripts have gotten bogged down a lot into how everyone “feels” and the entire show has taken on a soap opera atmosphere. Last year there was non-stop action and we discovered everyone’s feelings and beliefs through their actions, not through a bunch of yakity-yak. In Season 1, just when people started arguing and getting petty, the “Walkers” would descend upon them and there would be no time for talking just for moving. Everyone was revealed through their actions and alliances were formed among very unlikely people out of instinct and not prejudice. This season, an attack from the Walkers appears just when the writers believe their audience is about to fall asleep, change the channel or go to the bathroom (which may actually be more exciting than watching this show).
Plus, also like a soap opera where nothing happens for the entire first part of the show,  you need only tune in for the last 10 minutes to get all the plot information and action they mean to give us.
Before all you fans come down on me for being more harsh than Deputy Shane and dumber than Merle Dixon, I must state that I started this season with great expectations and I am still tuning in each week in the hope they will prove me ‘dead’ wrong. But if you take a moment to imagine yourself in the same situation as our motley bunch of survivors, would you be acting the same? Aren’t there many questions you’d like them to attempt to answer, many relationships you’d like explored? Just sitting here on my bed I am wondering why Sophia’s mom isn’t constantly wandering the woods looking for her daughter. If your 12 year old daughter was alone in a forest filled with Zombies , would you just sit around looking worried, or would they have to tie you down to keep you from looking?
What happened to the “French” whom Jenner said “might be onto a cure”? Why  aren’t they trying to contact overseas? Why aren’t they trying to find other non-dead survivors? Do they plan to continue “bumming” off the Vet and his family at this little farm or are they going to try and find supplies or maybe plant a garden or maybe do some chores? They keep acting like they are VIP guests there instead of pitching in and helping the others. If your son’s life had just been saved would “cooking dinner” be the best “thank you” you could come up with? And with all the family problems and dysfunctional families in the world , do you really want to see Rick and Lori continuing the same marital arguments through several episodes? Boy, there is nothing like a boring, mundane husband/wife argument to entertain us all.  And with all the Dead people walking around didn’t it occur to anyone to put up better defenses than Andrea on top of a Winnebago?
Now with all the negative things I just said, let me end on a more positive note. There are several actors I think we should really give credit for doing their characters well, making them three dimensional and keeping our interest (even with some pathetic story lines) while working in 100 degrees (+) Fahrenheit weather. Whatever is going on , you can’t take your eyes off them! (Click on their names to get more info on each actor and their character - and follow the links below that to the official WALKING DEAD site)

Walking Dead: JEFFREY DEMUNN (Dale)



Walking Dead: NORMAN REEDUS (Daryl Dixon)


Walking Dead: STEVEN YEUN (Glenn)


Walking Dead Official Site/ AMC

Walking Dead: CAST & CHARACTERS

William Shatner School of Acting: CLOSED !

The first time I watched an episode of Star Trek (the Classic one), I was sitting in my diapers on the floor in front of our black and white TV in Alberta, Canada. I had no idea what I was watching but my mother, in her mid-20s, had become an avid fan of the show. She was an attentive mother; seeing to our every need, but for 1 hour a week we were not allowed to interrupt her unless we were on fire. I may not remember the first broadcasting of those original Star Trek episodes, but it went deep into my impressionable little mind. In fact, since my father’s name was also William (Bill) and absent from our home, I was 3 years old before I realized that William Shatner was NOT my “daddy”.
Now over the years, since those first days of Star Trek in the 1960’s, William Shatner (now known as “The Shat”), has gotten a reputation for over acting. Hamming it up , if you will. But whether you think he was merely doing a great job of acting or over-acting, you must agree that all eyes were on him. He is electric, full of life and definitely has “IT”, if anyone can figure out exactly what “IT” is.
Now let’s warp forward into our recent past. A few years ago some very talented and ingenious people realized that special effects had grown to a point where just about anything could be visually represented, by just about anybody, in a very cost effective way. So they went back over all the episodes of the Classic Star Trek and “ramped up” the special effects. They didn’t change the look of the ship or star bases or aliens, but they were able to change the space, planets and Enterprise manoeuvring to make them more accurately represent what the script was depicting and how the actors were reacting. Basically, they took cheap-o effects and made them more realistic, while still staying true to the original Star Trek stories.
Now enter actor William Shatner. When the actors were performing their roles they had to use their imaginations for everything. There really wasn’t anything on the screen, they really weren’t flying around in space and what we saw at home was never there for them to react to. It was all in their imaginations.
Now I’m watching these episodes with the new special effects and I see Captain Kirk react to them and he seems to be doing so very appropriately. It’s not OVER acting at all.
For example:
In the episode, “The Squire of Gothos”, the Captain and crew believe they have just escaped a very dangerous alien and are high-tailing it out of there as fast as possible, only to discover that the planet is following them. They try 90 degree turns (a hard left), but the planet is still in front of them and accelerating towards them. Then a hard right, then a 360 degree turn (which is a complete spin in  a circle) , yet the planet is still in front of them and they are about to splat right on it, like a fly on a newspaper. When Mr. Spock declares “Cat and Mouse” you feel the frustration and fear of being trapped and unable to get away. With Captain Kirk’s ship and crew’s life hanging in the balance, no escape possible and death very probable, is any reaction too much?

It’s the same with “The Doomsday Machine” (aka. The Planet Eater). You finally see how tiny the Enterprise is in comparison to this massive planet-eating carrot and that no matter what  weapons they hurl at it, they make no more dent than a mosquito trying to penetrate a suit of armour. So, I ask you again, is it possible to over react to watching your ship and crew being dragged into this device to their absolute destruction?
   Doomsday: Old Effects
                                              
  Doomsday: New Effects

I submit to you, that William Shatner never over acted or “hammed” it up, but that it simply took all these years, and advancements in special effects for the rest of us to catch up with his imagination. He, as an actor, was imagining and reacting to situations and threats that were so lame when it came to the final depiction of them that his performance seemed out of proportion.
So, I also submit to you , that William Shatner has never gotten the accolades he deserves and that the jokes about his acting should cease and desist. From here on out, the William Shatner School of OVER acting is now CLOSED!

P.S. If the Enterprise really is being whipped around like the Special Effects now make it appear, it certainly would explain why all those crew members are falling out of their chairs and being flung around the bridge. But as my Mom said, “That’s still no excuse for not having seat belts.” And after all, she was a Star Trek fan before I was. When we first watched the episodes together, she understood them, I was drooling and pooping my diapers. I bow to her experience.   

Machine Gun Preacher

More than three years ago I started a group at Yahoo dedicated solely to Christians who wish to discuss and pray about actor, Gerard Butler. We have always been at about a membership of 15 people . Enough people to have a good discussion, but not so many people that you lose track of anyone.

Then came along Sam Childers , the drug-dealer-biker turned preacher and defender of the small and defenseless in the Sudan (and many other areas of the world). God only knows how these two men (Gerard Butler & Sam Childers) got together, but they have and the end result is the movie, “MACHINE GUN PREACHER”. Both Gerard and Sam have been out and around promoting this movie, which is now in theatres and I would encourage you to go and see it. It is in limited release and some of you might have to hold out until it comes out on DVD, but  I hope you do eventually see it. Especially all the people  who believe that following Jesus means becoming a “sissy” and “whimp”!

It’s the true story of a man going nowhere, except down, fast and hard and then learning that Jesus will accept , forgive and love him just the way his is. Then you add talented actors and film-makers, who have taken the time to tell this story. That equals a very good movie (and an even more exciting life for Sam Childers).

But I must remind you of several important things:

1) any person who places their life completely in the hands of Jesus better be ready for a life of drudgery turned into a life of adventure,

2) that no person is truly a man or woman until they reunite with their God who created them and loves them still, and

3)  it only takes a small group of praying and faithful Christians, from all over the world, to effect the lives of those they care about and make a worldly impact. Gerard Butler learns what it means to be a “REAL MAN”, we got our prayers answered and a movie that shows God listens to anyone who  speaks plainly and honestly to Him will be seen by millions who are craving for hope. Following Jesus may be very hard sometimes but it is always purposeful and NEVER boring!

Our prayers continue for both Sam Childers and Gerard Butler.

 Go out and see “Machine Gun Preacher” , then please come back here and give us your opinion.

IMPORTANT LINKS (click and follow):

Jesus 4 Gerard Christian Fans

Jesus 4 Gerard TWITTER

Another Man's War: The True Story of One Man's Battle to Save Children in the Sudan By Sam Childers Meet the real-life inspiration behind the movie Machine Gun Preacher. You'll be transfixed by the story of Childers's transformation from a violent young drug dealer in the hills of Pennsylvania to a motorcycle-riding, gun-toting, Christ-honoring defender of orphans in Uganda and Sudan. A remarkable story of courage and action in the midst of unimaginable suffering! 240 pages, softcover from Nelson.

Christian Book Distributors (Sam Childers "Another Man's War")

MACHINE GUN PREACHER  Official Movie Site

Cowboys & Aliens: the Review

  

 

Well, I finally got to see this movie that I raved about and looked so cool when it his the theatres several months ago. since I am homeless right now, I am staying in a hotel/motel where you can rent movies in your room. Some that are still in the movie theatres and so I was able to see, “Cowboys & Aliens” in the privacy of my own room.

With stars in it like Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford and Sam Rockwell, how can a person expect anything but a great movie. PLUS, one of my all time favourite actors was also in the movie, Clancy Brown. But none of those thing could save this movie.

There are sometime that I refer to a film that just can’t “get off the ground”. I suppose it comes from having a father who spent his life around airplanes. An airplane can have all that it apparently needs but when it comes times to actually leave the runway, it just doesn’t make it. That is this movie.

The story is there, but it drags on too long. The special effects are great but too many of them so that you notice them instead of them just enhancing the story. The actors are great but all the characters are arch typical that I imagine it would take a great amount of talent and a bit of a miracle to keep everything from being formulaic. And that is this movie in a word: Formulaic. It’s all been done and seen before.

You would at least think that by placing an alien invasion in the “old west” you would at least be able to get a different slant on it, but everyone is acting like spaceships dropping from the sky and kidnapping their loved ones with a massive grappling hook is something they see every day. Or at least once a year. Maybe we’ve all become desensitised with the idea of alien invasion but one would imagine that the people of the old west would be so shocked they would be unable to move for hours and probably soil themselves. Instead of what happened in this movie, they got themselves a posse to round up the aliens. I mean , these people don’t have telephones or internal combustion engines but a spaceship swooping through town doesn’t seem to phase then much.

I usually have a strict rule that I don’t judge anything without giving it a second watch but I’m begging you, DON’T MAKE ME WATCH THIS MOVIE AGAIN. I could barely stand it the first time.