Fenxy

The BBC has flying penguins

(If you are UK based, watched the iPlayer video. Perfect :) )

Erin - I am pretty certain that 28 Days is actually a closer adaptation of Wyndham's Day of the Triffids. In fact, pretty much the entire film (and definitely the first half hour!) are lifted straight from the book. With the dramatic replacement of zombies for killer alien plants.

Article19 - it's not exactly that the ending of the book is 'pro-vampire', it's that it asks you what is the everyday and what is the monster. If the dominant species is vampire and humans are reduced to just one person (so no hope of revival), and that last human is waging a bloody war killing every sentient being (vampire) he comes across just because they are different from him with no effort to talk or compromise, why shouldn't the vampires defend themselves?

I will agree that there is a lot of "yay, book! grr, film!" going around. Personally I think you should evaluate the two seperately as they are distinct genres. What makes a good book quite frequently does not make a good film (and vice versa). So long as you enjoyed the movie (or book), that's what's important. But I'll agree with the majority and say that the zombies in I Am Legend (film) were disapointing and the ending just blew the whole film for me. Not because it was different to the book ending, but because it just didnt' work with the rest of the movie.

Maggie Gyllenhaal

OK, so you need at least one other person for this way to pass the time in the office, but have you ever Dueled with office chairs?

It's like racing, only you crash into each other...

Oh, the things we used to do in the lab to pass time whilst models were rendering!

Alas in our current office, which is open plan hell, there's always someone around even if I'm the only one from our team in.

In my old office however, I have fond memories of one evening in particular: I was in late so, thinking the office deserted and waiting for a database to reindex, I danced barefoot through the halls of the Civic Centre listening to my iPod...

Which was fine till I danced slap-bang into the head of our directorate (my bosses' bosses' boss...) Fortunately he found it highly amusing but to this day I know every time he looks at me he's thinking "there's that crazy dancing girl with the tattooed feet". Which was fine when I was just a lowly temp but now I actually have responsibilities it's really rather embarrassing.

But if you're really REALLY sure you're alone in the office, you can't beat dancing round it.

Again, yeah - how can you have this convo without spoilers? But here's a try:

I loved it and literally couldn't put it down because I had to know what happened. I felt that Rowling possibly spent a bit to much time on the introductory section and the epilogue just annoyed me as some of my favourite characters were not mentioned (grrr).

It was definitely my favourite of the books and I agree with Oli as to the rollercoaster aspect of the book. Jo even had to stop reading halfway through and go do something else for an hour till she calmed down because she was getting too upset by it all! I of course am much to hard to have been affected in that way and the only reason I had the odd tear in my eye was because the sun was bright...

I loved it. I admit that I rushed through it on first reading because I wanted to find out what happened, but I'm now going to go back through and savour it.

Actor - the Departed sticks out for me, but everything he's been in has been brilliant. Except maybe the Italian Job.

strike>stalk

Oh, I'd forgotten quite how funny Fry and Laurie were when you got them together.

But damn you Rich for prompting me to spend an hour watching clips on YouTube instead of revising. Grrr.

Rich honey, I'll mail you a box of chocolates - publicenergy's link is just too good to pass up!

Where's the catch?

Other than you get fat on the chocolate that should rightly be mine and I get no revision done because I'm watching oodles of films?

I enjoyed it on the whole. Yes, it was a tad too long, yes there was too much going on (they tried to hard to actually have a plot this time round), but Johnny Depp was sublime as usual. I even found myself strangely drawn to Orlando Bloom by the end of it.

Then again, that might have been a side effect of the popcorn.

It was fun. It doesn't sparkle in the way the first film did, but it did finish off the trilogy nicely.

The following all have me in absolute tears of laughter, frequently unable to breathe:
Eddie Izzard
Lenny Henry
Billy Connolly
Dawn French
Rowan Atkinson (so long as it's NOT Mr Bean)
Stephen Fry
Hugh Laurie
John Stewart

I don't think it's any coincidence that I've not included some of the more recent comedians in the list. Most of them just don't do it for me, though I do have a big space in my heart for Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, plus a lot of the R4 comedy crews (Steve Punt and Hugh Dennis rock my world when I don't have to watch them!)

Now that one I'll watch a few times more Tam :D

I don't remember the Muppets creeping me out quite that much :|

It got to the point that me and Jo were annoyed that we DIDN'T get nil point - just too funny. Though I was very annoyed at the obvious Eastern European block voting. Give us poor western europeans a chance. The French song wasn't that bad! (In fact it had us in hysterics)

JPhil - it depends what you're looking for. If you're looking for movie greatness, I wouldn't recommend it. If you're looking for some fun, and the next installment of the Spidy franchise, go see it.

@peroty - I think the appropriate term is "homage"

You've got to love a movie that has so many people spitting feathers over how bad it was, and just as many people getting on their soapbox proclaiming how supreme it is.

Having just come back from seeing it, I will admit to being more in the "there's two and a half hours of my life I'm never going to get back" camp than the raving fans, so why am I posting on this note?

Because we had an absolute blast watching the movie.

Let's get the bad bits out of the way first:
1) Three villains is two villains too many. There was no real focus and you're constantly ping-ponging between back stories and having to hate different people when you move from one scene to the next so fast you get whiplash.
2) Sandman is a pants villain. That stripy shirt just takes all credibility away from him and I kept wanting to cry out "I'm melting, I'm melting!" at the important bits.
3) There were five different endings to the film - a direct result of the three villain problem. There were so many moments of 'resolution' you sighed with relief, then had to go through it all again.
4) That corny tacked on 'happy' ending because it's family film and you can't end with a funeral. Grrrrr.
5) That random patriotic Spidy-in-front-of-flag moment. They could have at least cut that on the international release, please!
6) Venom just took too long to become Venom. He was great AS Venom (quite my favourite), but he just wasn't on screen soon enough. Too much boring back story and exposition. Get to the scenery chewing and beating the crap out of each other already!

The good stuff was, as always, the small incidental bits mainly.
1) JJ's buzzing desk. Genius.
2) In fact, any scene with JJ in, especially the camera buying moment near the end ^*
3) When Peter Parker is under the influence of the evil suit and is having his Saturday Night Fever montage... Ten minutes of sublime ridiculousness that had Jo and myself curled up in tears of laughter on each others laps. Class (though with no point whatsoever and leading to the general badness of the movie)
4) The scene in the subway, in fact all the CG effects. I've worked with CG guys so I know the amount of work and skill that went into the entire movie... Phenomenal and more importantly seamless.
5) Topher Grace and James Franco. Got to hand it to the lads, they both do some fine eyebrow acting, steal the show as scenery chomping villains, and don't look too bad in skin-tight suits either.

All in all, MJ deserved what she got, I'd take Harry Osborn over Peter Parker any day of the week - hell, I'd take Eddie Brock Jr over Peter Parker any day of the week! - Aunt May is just so good she makes me want to commit a little GBH myself, and I felt more sorry for Sandman's little daughter and the butler than all the other characters combined, but I still had fun.

Though if it wins any Oscars for anything other than CG I'll have no faith in the system!

^* - bit of knowledge, the little girl in that scene is Sam Rami's daughter.

Wait. Yahoo is Jap? ROTFL! Good one, Cass!

Wish I could take credit - I'm just passing on the link. And clearly inspiring Gollum-like tendencies in people.

Soon they will all follow my preciousssssss....

*cough* ;)

The original strip in sequence.

Plus a related something from a few years back. Read the comments on this post - they're a must!

Genetically, I think I'm a pirate. I mean, half my family live on boats (no, truly, they do!). Alas, I get seasick so I'm not a good pirate though :(

I am, however, a damn good ninja. All of us in the lab a few years back had ninja-names. I was the One True Ninja simply because no one ever saw me do ninja-y things. Well, a real ninja would never reveal their identity, would they?

What's wrong with numbers? 9 for example?

9rules

'nuff said.

My 'have seen' list is depressingly small as I got the 'see bands live' bug late in life. Something about growing up in Glastonbury, kinda immunizes you to the whole gig/festival experience.

That being said, I have seen:

• Placebo - who were very, very good live
• Idlewild - again, brilliant live (though their support act just plain blew
• Imogen Heap - could have been better as she'd lost her voice that night, but still pretty hot. Seeing her mix that stuff live? Impressive
• Bare Naked Ladies - not bad. I would have enjoyed it more I think if I hadn't had to spend the entire gig sitting on the floor at the back because I was on the verge of collapsing...

The 'really narked I missed these' list:

• Jimmy Eat World - actually the supporting band for an act I've never heard of and had no desire to see. Sadly, I missed this gig because of being stuck for three hours in a traffic jam around Bristol. Never did like Bristol
• Bon Jovi - I was spitting feathers when I found out they were coming to Southampton too late to get tickets. Feathers, I tell you!
• Ash - missed them when they were at my Uni. Twice. Can you say unorganised?
• Matchbox Twenty - I just sob into my teacup when I think I missed out on a chance to see these guys
• Muse - chalk one more up to my lack of organisation and general oblivion toward the live music scene
• Pink

The 'bands I will see live at some point if I have to commit GBH to do so' list:

• Everyone on the 'damn, I missed it because I suck' list
• Imogen Heap - I want to see her when she can sing properly
• John Mayer
• Jools Holland - it's meant to be a good show
• Red Hot Chilli Peppers
• Foo Fighters
• Lifehouse
• And lots more I can't think of off the top of my head - this last goes some way to explaining why I always seem to miss out on gigs. I just don't actively follow bands and their schedules, so unless I happen to be looking at a venue listing and see a name I know, I don't realise people are playing...

Josh - you're allowed to semi like it if you won't laugh when I admit I found myself humming it on the way to the bus-stop this morning.

To be fair, I was running a low grade fever when I first saw this last night. Made me fall off the stool giggling like a nutter.

As I said, I'm sick.

And when I saw it again this morning I decided I just had to share the pain. Because I'm nice like that.

Hot Fuzz - it's very, very funny (and Rich, I am disapointed in you :P ) and actually a better movie than Shaun of the Dead which, whilst I loved it, did play more like an extended TV show than a movie.

Go see it!

As for Fracture - Anthony Hopkins is always good to watch, but the trailer just played like it's going to be predicatable and nothing special. Maybe when it gets to DVD.

@Oli - is admitting that I don't use Bittorrent going to get me thrown out of 9rules? Because if it is, I didn't just admit to it... I guess I could download/stream etc, but for some reason I'd rather wait till it was on the TV. Or I could get the DVD. Can't explain it really, other than it's more social than crowding round my 12" laptop screen with my flatmate to watch things!

@ Connor - both?

(And man, Hugh Laurie's accent in that disturbs me so much).

JPhill - that's the exact thread I've been spoiler-dodging since it got created!

I like it - I'm a bit miffed with the UK tv though as they randomly stopped showing season two half way through last year so I've been dodging spoilers for an age now. However, they are restarting on Sunday (Yay!)

It's fast, it's funny, it's clever, the actors are nice to look at - what more do you need? Yes, it's "one more" medical drama, but it's actually rather well done.

Piano, oboe and sax (soprano more than alto for choice). I play less now than I used to as I can't find a band or orchestra in my area that I feel comfortable in. Plus, my flatmate really doesn't appreciate me practicing!

Like ollie I find that it plays havoc with my lips now when I do play, especially the oboe :S

So you already saw it at the weekend, but exploding things is always fun.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrCIx_XMtD8

The main song is "Unwell" by Matchbox Twenty - it describes perfectly a five year stretch of my life that is, thankfully, now over.

A second song would be "Love Song for No-one" by John Mayer.

How about you Summer? What's your theme song?

Having spent the first 19 years of my life in Glastonbury, somehow I can never get as excited about it as other people. To me it was just the local festival were we hopped the fence or our mates on the gate let us in. I do have some happy memories of the place, like the time I worked backstage or the Year of Mud where, when I got home, Mum stood us in the garden and hosed us off before she would let us in the house.

Perhaps it is because I grew up with it, but the price you pay for a ticket just doesn't seem justified.

Considering where I live now (Southampton) I really should go the Isle of Wight this year but... Again, there are things I'd rather spend my money on.