What Is Techno Again?

Load Those Shotguns: Zombieland

Ready your popcorn and plop down in a good seat, because Zombieland aims to please. Let’s face it: It’s Halloween and you’re craving blood and gore. If not, you should be! The latest zombie flick caters to your every need, so crawl, drag, and chainsaw your way over to RadNerd now and check out my coverage of Zombieland.

Fasten your seat belts and get ready to double tap—Zombieland brings the brain-munchy, ankle-dragging entertainment in hordes. Directed by Ruben Fleischer and written by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, the latest zombie flick breathes new life into a genre of movies that often staggers.

All fans of the moaning undead know that when you’re dealing with zombies, you’re taking on more than headshots. If you want a good zombie apocalypse, you need survivors who can stand up to character scrutiny, and the key factor comes down to a matter of humanity. Zombieland nails that theme in full—its narrator appreciates the irony of a loner and social outcast thrown into the heart of a zombie infestation—but instead of showing humans who become worse than the mindless savages we so endearingly label zombies, the film chooses to comment on society while bringing its characters closer together: “If you don’t like people, you might as well be a zombie.”

Want to read the full article?

Tags: Abigail Breslin, Emma Stone, Jesse Eisenberg, Paul Wernick, RadNerd, Rhett Reese, Ruben Fleischer, Week of 10/26/09, Woody Harrelson, Zombieland
Posted in Movies/TV, RadNerd, Writing | No Comments »

Showcase: October ’09

It’s that time again: Another Showcase article has hit the Impulse Creations forums. There’s no theme this time around (feel free to make one up for me), just a trio of good, random trades for you to spend your cash on if you so wish, my fellow comic book addicts. So here’s the line-up: Air Vol. 2: Flying Machine, Return to Wonderland, and Nova Vol. 1: Annihilation Conquest. Below are some teasers, but you can read the full article over at Impulse now.

“Air sucks you in from the beginning, rising above the mundane with genuine moments that will make you smile and exhilarate you at the same time.” - Air Vol. 2: Flying Machine

“Return to Wonderland continues the mad legacy of Alice by revealing its tenebrous history and taking us even further down the rabbit hole into a merciless world rich with creativity and its fair share of bloodshed that does more than add lifeless gore to the pages.” - Return to Wonderland

“Like the often reckless but brave Richard Rider, Annihilation Conquest never loses speed and always comes packing the heat.” - Nova Vol. 1: Annihilation Conquest

PS: Return to Wonderland makes me want to go hit up American McGee’s Alice again.

PPS: Air just makes me sick, though. I’m not fond of heights.

PPPS: Worldmind reminds me of a TomTom.

Tags: Air Vol. 2: Flying Machine, Impulse Creations, Nova Vol. 1: Annihilation Conquest, Return to Wonderland, Showcase, Week of 10/19/09
Posted in Comics, Impulse Creations, Writing | No Comments »

Tracing the Lineage of the Maybe Kinda Good Assassin, Ezio

When I attended the Assassin’s Creed II panel at San Diego Comic-Con this past summer, I nearly fell out of my seat. What I watched and heard impressed me and filled me with excitement when ACI had left me so disappointed and bitter. Everyone knows—when you start making pie charts for your reviews, the shit is about to hit the fan.

I’ve been like a hyperactive kid super-powered on pixie sticks ever since July renewed my faith in the young game series, and December simply cannot come soon enough. Ubisoft’s Hybride Technologies is attempting to keep fans’ (or prospective fans, like me) drooling to a minimum to ensure that we don’t drown in a pool of our own devoted slobber. Lineage is coming our way, which means I’m either about to weep graciously or get really angry again and threaten the creation of further pie charts and maybe a slideshow or animated GIF. Only time will tell, and the time is the Italian Renaissance:

Assassin’s Creed II will be slitting wrapping paper in houses everywhere this holiday season, but before its star, Ezio, splatters blood all over your living room carpet, he’s at least showing the courtesy of introducing you to his family. Well, his father, to be more precise: Giovanni Auditore da Firenze. We’ll have to wait to find out how far the deadly apple falls from the assassin tree, and even longer before we learn whether the second AC installment will offer an eye-popping, juicy treat as opposed to the rotten fruit of stale repetition the first game handed us despite its innovation. But on Tuesday, October 27th, Ubisoft’s Hybride Technologies will launch the first of three (get this) live-action and CGI-mixed episodes about Daddy Assassin in a short film series called Assassin’s Creed: Lineage.

The films—the first of which will only appear on Youtube for a limited period of 24 hours—will introduce key players from the upcoming game, including Lorenzo de Medici, who reigned in Florence during the Renaissance and commissioned da Vinci’s and Michelangelo’s works. Actually, Lorenzo and his brother Giuliano were nearly assassinated while attending mass in the Cathedral of Florence on Easter in 1478, a plot encouraged by Sixtus IV, the then-current Pope. Talk about some nasty history.

Head over to RadNerd to check out the Lineage trailer and the rest of the article, and leave your opinions and musings at the RN door (aka the comments section, for the metaphorically challenged).

Tags: Assassin's Creed II, Hybride Technologies, Lineage, RadNerd, Ubisoft, Week of 10/19/09
Posted in Gaming, RadNerd, Writing | 1 Comment »

Marvel Meltdown: October ’09

New over at Impulse Creations is October’s Marvel Meltdown, featuring reviews of Dark Avengers #10, Mighty Avengers #30, and Dark Wolverine #79. As you can see, it’s an Avenger-licious edition, so get it while it’s hot. Mmmm … Avengery. Here are some previews, but you can check out the full article here.

“Mike Deodato matches Bendis’ writing, pairing the strange with the stranger and designing a fair share of panels whose art just might send a shiver or two up your spine.” - Dark Avengers #10

“Brace yourselves, because in the newest issue of Mighty Avengers Hank Pym (aka the Wasp) gets punched square in the face by a personified embodiment of the universe, Jarvis turns giddy with nostalgia, Hercules makes overly dramatic entrances and exits, and humanity’s latest threat is its own past: drooling Neanderthals, oh my!” - Mighty Avengers #30

“With a stiff and uninteresting plot that can barely keeps its head above water, Dark Wolverine #79 doesn’t do Daken and his plight any favors.” - Dark Wolverine #79

Tags: Dark Avengers #10, Dark Wolverine #79, Impulse Creations, Marvel Meltdown, Mighty Avengers #30, Week of 10/12/09
Posted in Comics, Impulse Creations, Writing | No Comments »

Book Review: Atonement

Published in 2001 by Ian McEwan, Atonement unfolds during the years of World War II and is crafted with a Modernist tradition of writing and understanding rare to such a present time in our history. Whether it’s McEwan’s ability to connect a modern audience to a tense and horrific period in time, or whether his engaging grasp on the English language makes the novel what it is, it’s hard to deny the magic of Atonement—a book that quickly became one of my favorites.

Many enjoy Atonement for the romantic and, in some ways, forbidden relationship between the independent-minded Cecilia and the strong-willed Robbie, but to consider the book merely a love story diminishes its worth. Atonement is, simply put, a puzzle composed of words, dubious narration, and complex composition. Arguably split into three sections—whose clarity and certainty declines at the novel’s completion—the final part inspires an emotional reaction of unanticipated strength. McEwan daringly challenges not only the way we read a book, but ideas of truth and history and ironically good and evil. Whether the story is overwhelmingly Briony’s or falsely so can be debated, but McEwan does not allow us one absolute answer. The novel’s end tears up what we thought we knew, betrays us, and puts us in a completely different state of mind than we began or even possessed for the majority of the book. The strong moral and emotional impact of Atonement, as well as the so easily shattered or cemented depth of its characters, proves McEwan’s talent as a writer who lives and breathes the written word.

Atonement presents a rich story that blurs the roles of fiction of nonfiction, of truth and the appearance of it, and whether any of it matters in the long run. Perhaps the most tragic element rests with the frightening reality of how ordinary and commonplace it all seems in our own world. Yet how many books nowadays grasp us by our souls and cause us to cry out in anger or demand justice for its actions—which are, in their purest form, fictional? McEwan understands that a novel’s worth emerges from the reader’s mind, and he fully and beautifully exploits that knowledge. My outrage will remain with me for some time, although perhaps the frustration partly lies with the readers, who are no less flawed human beings than the characters in the story. All personal confliction aside, Atonement is so bursting with life and the tragedy and irony that so often accompanies it, that not experiencing it seems a crime in itself.

Tags: Atonement, Ian McEwan, WWII
Posted in Books, Reviews | No Comments »

Leveling up to Volume 2: When Video Games Hit the Splash Page

If you love video games and comics alike, then there’s a good chance you’ve picked up a video game comic adaptation (say that three times fast!). I certainly have, and there’s plenty out there. But is it a good idea, or an over-the-top, crappy one? In my latest article for RadNerd, I take a look at what’s worked, what’s stunk, and if there’s any hope for the genre. Here’s a preview:

Dark Horse recently released a preview of the Mass Effect: Redemption comic book, born from the creative minds and hands of Bioware’s Mac Walters along with John Jackson Miller and artist Omar Francia. Pixels will turn to sweet comic goodness with a story that precursors Mass Effect 2. But Mass Effect isn’t the only video game on the line-up for translation into hilarious sound effects of the huge and dramatic variety. Sci-fi writer Orson Scott Card’s (you know, that guy who did Ender’s Game in 1985, and some other stuff) adaptation of Dragon Age: Origins will hit stands this January from IDW Publishing.

Video games are being laid out on the 2D page more and more these days. Good or bad, everything from Army of Two, Halo, and Dark Space to Silent Hill, Resident Evil, and Perfect Dark, and Super Mario Brothers to Sonic the Hedghog have graced or splattered on the page in triumph or a messy pile of pretty-colored gore. Lately I’ve found myself exploring the lovechild of the two mediums with strange and perhaps voyeuristic intrigue. Sometimes it works—Legend of Zelda and Super Mario Brothers comics have always been fun, and they’re everywhere from American comics to manga, which almost always makes our “detailed” pencil work look like the product of an Etch a Sketch. But Metroid Prime, Super Mario Bros., Legend of Zelda, and even Starfox were recurring features of ye old Nintendo Power issues, and thus a beloved highlight of my childhood. Actually, more my sisters’ childhoods that I relocated and piled together from the depths of that musky and frigid place we called our basement.

Continue reading the article here.

Tags: Dragon Age: Origins, Mass Effect: Redemption, RadNerd, Week of 10/12/09
Posted in Comics, Gaming, RadNerd, Writing | No Comments »