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Snowpiercer currently has a 95% fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes. Reading through the capsule reviews most all of them really like the movie. I must be in the minority 5% because I did not like the movie one bit.

Snowpiercer is science fiction movie about a future Earth covered in snow and cold with the remnants of human civilization living on a train that constantly circles the world. If it stops, humans will go extinct. Passengers on that train are either the haves, the upper 1% who inhabit the front of the train with sushi, clubs, and books, or they are the have-nots the sorry passengers at the back. They yearn for the type of stuff that the haves have. Into this world is Chris Evens who wants to go from the back of the train to the front. He leads a revolution.

With that set up, Snowpiercer would lead you to believe that the film will be an allegory. Except, it wasn't. Yes, there was the battle between the haves and the have-nots. But there was also the musical number in the middle. And then Bong Joon Ho's favorite, the key master and his daughter. They came from another movie. The allegory was lost. The movie had many different tones to it. How can you really make it an allegory when it was all over the map?

I think that Sucker Punch had a better train fight. This is the second Bong Joon Ho film that I didn't like as much as others had. The first film? The Host. I didn't like that one as much. This film makes me feel like I did during The Dark Knight -- I think I'm missing something.

2 of 5 stars.

Labels: hunh?, movies, review

I swore off eating ramen after coming home from the Philippine escapade earlier this year. Now that it's summer time, I feel like some. Ramen! I haven't tried the ramen shop that just opened up in Baltimore. I heard that it was only okay. I haven't cooked any cup noodle or made my own from the dehydrated noodle square. I would like to try the noodles from today's link. It would be easy to. They only service some of the hippest ramen shops in the US. I guess I should mosey on over to one of those and get a nice bowl of shoyu ramen.

http://sunnoodle.com/

Labels: lotd, mmm

How to Train Your Dragon 2 gets the thankless task of being the last film to open before the big juggernaut of Michael Bay's Transforming dinobots or as I like to call it: The End of Days! Dragon doesn't have the same action cache as a Michael Bay film, but it is a part of a better, coherent franchise.

Dragon 2 begins a few years after the first one ended. Dragons are the norm in Hiccup's town; they are embraced, loved, and cared for. The town spends their time doing dragon races. Hiccup spends it exploring the world for more dragons. He's grown up and may be ready for being the leader of his town. His dad thinks so. He doesn't.

While exploring Hiccup eventually finds his mom. She's a recluse living in a dragon world communing with dragons. She's a natural dragon rider who believes her son has inherited her skills. Hiccup has but is not in a league like her mom. Hiccup has inherited his mother's dragon nurturing skill. He's nothing like his dad. But the movie will show that he will be his father's son.

The mother could've been a more interesting character. She's strong willed and talented. She knows dragons showing Hiccup a thing or two about the Night Fury he rides. Yet, as the movie progresses she becomes boring. She doesn't get to use her dragon prowess to defeat the big bad. She disappears from the plot in the tail end of the movie. She could've been used better.

The animation looked phenomenal. The famous DP, Roger Deakins, is a consultant, and the camera work is absolutely amazing. It'll wow you with its depth of field, shading, and lighting.

Finally, as with Godzilla, this film had kaiju. It's a big kaiju lovefest.

3 of 5 stars.

Labels: kaiju, movies, review

USA! USA! USA!

The bombastic chant heard at sports stadiums around the world

Labels: empty, qotd

Links of the day don't usually show up this late, but this can't wait for tomorrow because it doesn't match the celebratory mood. Nor can you wait for the weekend for this because no one would read it. It wouldn't be read even this evening, but it's going up anyway.

Sailor Moon is coming back. I haven't really followed it. I've read the first couple chapters of the manga. I haven't seen the original anime, but its being redone and will start broadcasting on the 5th.

Today's link will give you an over view of the anime. It's a good explainer not just of Sailor Moon, but of the "Magical Girl" (Mahou Shoujo) genre. Learn it. Know it. Live it. And once you do, you can graduate to Madoka whence we'll talk.

http://grantland.com/hollywood-prospectus/sailor-moon-the-explainer/

Labels: anime, lotd, madoka

Because I need to step up my blogging game, here's a post about visualizing algorithms. I think its rather cool, but YMMV.

I haven't written much because no one's been reading. I also need to write code. More code rather than blog posts. Need to write iOS code. Need to just code. I like this about algorithms though. It's all about the code.

http://bost.ocks.org/mike/algorithms/

Labels: lotd, software development