That's right...it's time to prepare yourself to sit on the edge of your seat for another 24 hours of awesome starting next Sunday, the 11th at 8/7c. And in usual 24-style, they're starting it off with 4 hours in 2 nights. Hopefully you got to catch 24:Redemption when it aired at the end of November since that is supposed to bridge the gap between last season and this one (if not, watch it for free on Hulu or FOX), though as always I don't think it'd be impossible to jump in without knowing anything when this season starts.
I'm even more excited since we'll get to see the evil guy with crooked smirk Tony Almeida!
Some high schoolers in Maryland are tricking speed cameras setup to automatically photograph and ticket speeding cars. They're doing it by simply printing out photographs of other legitimate license plates, causing others to get the ticket. Since the process is entirely automated, nobody catches the mistake. The article mentions that in the UK it's a bit more elaborate, with people actually getting duplicate license plates manufactured.
A speed camera is located out in front of Wootton High School, providing a convenient location for generating the false tickets. Instead of purchasing license plates, students have ready access to laser printers that can create duplicate license plates using glossy paper using readily available fonts. For example, the state name of "Maryland" appears on plates in a font similar to Garamond Number 5 Swash Italic. Once the camera flashes, the driver can quickly pull over and remove the fake paper plate. The victim will receive a $40 ticket in the mail weeks later. According to the Sentinel, students at Richard Montgomery High School have also participated, although Montgomery County officials deny having seen any evidence of faked speed camera tickets.
As an outsider this is pretty amusing, and shows how easily such systems can be fooled. But as someone getting the ticket without having been speeding, it sucks. I'd imagine it'd generally be pretty easy for cops to compare the photo the speed camera took to the actual vehicle (and the system might even photograph the driver...they do that around Chicago so they can prove liability and you can't say someone else was driving your vehicle) and prove the person is innocent (and maybe even catch the actual person that was speeding). But it's a hassle for the innocent person and the cops, and if it happens enough they may be forced to make the system smarter or do away with it, especially if it's costing them a significant amount of money to resolve those cases.
With more and more speeding cameras and red light cameras being deployed everywhere, it'd be unsurprising to see this kind of thing increasing.
You know things are going well for the RNC when even Republicans are annoyed by them...that's the reaction they're getting to a video they put out trying to link President-elect Obama to Rod Blagojevich, since Rod just got caught for major corruption in Chicago.
In a nearly three-minute spot entitled "Questions Remain," the RNC seeks to raise questions about involvement by Obama or his staff in Blagojevich's alleged plan to award Obama's former Senate seat in exchange for political favors.
[Newt] Gingrich calls the video a "destructive distraction" and asserts that the national committee "is engaged in the sort of negative, attack politics that the voters rejected in the 2006 and 2008 election cycles."
Instead, "Republicans should be working to help the incoming president succeed in meeting" the "real challenges" the nation is facing, Gingrich writes to Duncan. When Republicans believe Obama is wrong, the GOP should "offer a better solution, instead of just opposing him," Gingrich also wrote.
The letter ends with Gingrich's suggestion that the RNC "pull the ad down immediately."
Gingrich's letter echoes recent comments from Obama's former rival, Sen. John McCain. In a television interview Sunday, McCain also took issue with the video.
"In all due respect to the Republican National Committee," McCain said, "right now, I think we should try to be working constructively together . . . on the economy stimulus package, reforms that are necessary."
Hey RNC, the election is over. Deal with it. And stop putting out this garbage.
dave submitted a story about a movie called Delgo I had never heard of. However, his title (the title of this post) is highly appropriate. Apparently a guy named Marc Adler wanted to create a computer-animated movie without Pixar, Dreamworks, etc. and spent several years and millions doing it. Then, he decided to go ahead and market it himself since none of the Hollywood studios expressed interest in the movie.
At this point, I was rather interested in the movie. It sounds pretty cool to try and do something like that, and obviously you have to rely heavily on word-of-mouth to get people to see the movie. On top of all that, you're competing with a whole bunch of holiday season movies. So why did the movie only make $511k on 2,100 screens when it even had several (mostly B-list) actors that people know in it? It could have been the "D" rating that it got on Yahoo from critics. In other terms, it got a 14% on Rotten Tomatoes.
So what went wrong? Consensus on Rotten Tomatoes lists a few factors: too many characters, a banal plot, stiff characters, too grim/violent for kids, etc. So it sounds like there's a reason word-of-mouth couldn't carry it. Pretty unfortunate! Especially since Marc sank at least $40 million into it.
I was listening to my Ipod on shuffle this morning and a song I haven't heard came on. It was Black Sheep by Saliva. But as I listened to it, I couldn't help but feel it sounded very familiar to something...
so very familiar....
(The video above includes the totally ridiculous lyrics)
The Season 5 finale was pretty good. The only real downside for me is that Vince always seems unconvincing and out-of-character this season when he starts doing things completely contrary to his normal laid-back attitude. It makes sense given that his life has been imploding, but there's no gradualness or build-up to it, and it ends up feeling fake. Case in point this week, his flipping out and bashing E to the point that it became personal (and their quick and easy reconciliation after the things that were said). However, that was the only thing I didn't like about the episode. And there was plenty to like!
Turtle is still going on with his relationship with Jamie Lynn, and finally the guys decide to find out what's up. Ultimately, Drama steals Turtle's phone when she calls him, and she spills the beans herself: "We're fucking." Around the same time, Drama deals with Ronnie, who has screwed him over on business deals before. But the chance to own and name a bar Johnny Drama's is worth $30,000 to him, and he makes the deal (pic 1, pic 2).
Back to Queens
It was pretty ridiculous how they got treated like kids by their parents even though they had only been home for a few days. At any rate, it seemed like Vince's mom's prying spurred some looking into getting Vince a role in a Gus Van Sant movie, so E called up Ari, only to find Gus didn't want Vince for the part. Ari and Vince were inclined to give up, but E pushed to talk to or meet with Gus to get him to at least audition Vince. He actually did manage to meet Gus after waiting in his office for 6 hours, and Gus indicated he was quite familiar with Vince's work. Nonetheless, E managed to convince him to look at Vince's acting in Smokejumpers, since it is supposedly Vince's best acting, and Gus relented. Right after that there was a quick, random Michael Phelps cameo...E ran into him (literally) on the street while talking to Ari on the phone (pic). Later on Gus called Vince and told him he really liked it and he wanted to work with Vince, but it would be on a future movie.
Back to Queens
This caused Vince to flip out (pic) and then go on a tirade when E tried to say things would be all right. He blamed E for his career ending up as it had, saying E should have been more business-minded and less personal in his decisions, which is more or less counter to how Vince always says he wants to do things normally. At the end of it Vince basically said he knows E tried his hardest and it wasn't good enough, to which E replied "fuck you" and took off to work on Charlie's career.
Somehow, after neglecting Charlie for several episodes, E made a bunch of progress on his career in about 5 minutes! In the meantime, Ari flew in to meet Vince in person at Drama's bar and tell him he had a surprise, which ended up being Martin Scorcese saying he wants Vince for his next movie. When Vince genuinely thanked Ari after the call, Ari made it clear, "Don't thank me, thank E. For once in his life, the little McNugget delivered." At which point Vince of course realized this opportunity was due to E's efforts. He kept trying to call E, but E was ignoring all calls from Ari and Vince (on his broken phone). So finally Vince went to see him in person. The best part was the rest of the gang was hiding in a closet waiting to pop out once Vince told E he wanted him back as manager and he was sorry. But how did they know E would be willing to do so? Of course, it would have been disaster if he didn't in terms of continuing Entourage, but after what Vince had said I don't see how E would have just accepted the job back.
At any rate, the guys are back on top again (pic).
Best line, just for the way Drama said it:
"Correct me if I'm wrong, but was that lawyer giving you a tug?" "In L.A., you can only get an actress or a hooker to do that....God I love this motherfuckin' town!!!!"
Note: No more episodes until Season 6 begins! The season is confirmed but a date isn't, so stay tuned. I'll post more info when I get it.
This was a review of Episode 66. See more reviews. And here's HBO's music credits for this episode (may not be up yet).
This week's episode was
interesting, to say the least. There was a lot of drama and chaos, and it was clear they were setting up for next week's big season finale. Vince and the director went through more nonsense over his acting until VInce finally called him out, saying he didn't want him in the movie because he was giving it his all and the director still wouldn't accept his performance. The director acknowledged that he never wanted Vince for the movie and he was jammed down his throat. That led to a blow-up with the director firing Vince, and Ari trying to convince Vince he could resolve the situation.
Ari even had to call Dana in, but then the director went straight to the studio head who ultimately decided the whole thing was way over budget and he'd shutdown the whole thing. It looked like Dana's job might also be in jeopardy. Somehow in all of this E seems to have forgotten about his other client completely (and conveniently to the plot). With Turtle off on his own adventure (more on that below), Drama was completely useless this episode.
Ari makes an entrance
The whole Turtle/Jamie Lynn relationship is not all that believable, and I'm not sure what the point of it is...are they trying to introduce some conflict in Turtle's life? Is she going to get him to do something useful? And his real name is Sal?? He should stick with Turtle. At any rate, the episode ended on a real down note for everyone, and I find it hard to believe they'll end the season with them all failing, so something big/interesting has got to happen next week.
Some memorable lines:
""
"Kevin Smith isn't doing anything." "Are you looking through the DGA list, or are you staring out the window at the line in front of the Sprinkles fuckin' CUPCAKE STORE?!?" "Oh, Ari...you sound so stressed!" "Shut the fuck up Lloyd."
"All will be well. *Explosion* Unless Edward Norton just blew up..."
"You really think [Dana] is gonna to let you replace the director?" "After what I did for her, she would let us double penetrate her if I asked her." "Ewww."
"He said, and I quote, 'This is why I hire women to blow me, not run my studio.'" "Meaning what?" "Meaning he's shutting down the movie, and I might have to blow him to keep my job."
Note: Finale next week!
This was a review of Episode 65. See more reviews. And here's HBO's music credits for this episode (may not be up yet).
This week's episode was
allright, and that was mostly because Ari's plot was interesting. So I'll save that for last. I haven't been a fan of the Vince and director antics on the set, and this week was more of the same. The only interesting thing with that storyline is trying to figure out if the director will be right and the movie will be great, or if Vince is right and the director is ruining what could be a great movie.
Turtle and Drama didn't even really have an adventure or anything, but they still got quite a bit of screentime so that felt odd. Seth Myers toying with E was kind of amusing, but it didn't make sense why E would ever fall for his tricks, especially with talking to Sloan. Yeah, he wants to get Charlie the show, but wouldn't getting stood up at lunch make him the least bit skeptical? It was satisfying seeing Charlie punch Seth though.
Can't you feel Ari's love for Lloyd?
Ari's sucking up to and then trying to get revenge on Babs was pretty funny. It was clear that the meeting with Andrew wasn't going to go well based on how they set it up, and it was pretty ridiculous that Andrew had a panic attack. I wonder if he will end up making big bucks for the agency, or blowing it like Barbara expects.
Here's some memorable lines:
"No men allowed." "So it's more of a rug-munchin' than a luncheon"
"Congrats again Babs!......You nasty twat! (Imitating Barbara) I can't make any promises...grumble, grumble"
"Ooh, Extreme Makeover: Miller/Gold Edition...I'm so excited!"
"And ladies, I would like to congratulate each and everyone one of you, but unfortunately Barbara's cock is all I can handle."
Note: Only 2 more episodes left this season!! As usual, it feels like such a short run.
This was a review of Episode 64. See more reviews. And here's HBO's music credits for this episode (may not be up yet).
This week's episode was
dumb. I can't believe they'd create an episode like this after how awesome last week's episode was. Vince was out-of-character the entire episode, the "conflict" between him and the other actor (and the director) was not interesting, and E didn't step in to help either...he just kept asking how things went. Turtle and Drama pulled stupid pranks to get back at the other actor, but none of them were smart or effective (pooping in the guy's trailer, stealing his seat back). Also, since when do the guys follow Vince to work and hang out on the set???
Vince sums up my reaction to this episode: Displeased
Even Ari's plot couldn't add much interest to the episode. He finally met up with an old friend because Lloyd insisted and ended up spending the entire episode trying to convince him that he should let Ari buy his company. And when he finally did convince him, Babs said she wouldn't give permission to do it, and Ari can't make the deal without her permission.
Overall I found it to be a pretty disappointing episode. The only highlight was when the guys first walked on the set and saw all the explosions and helicopters.
This was a review of Episode 63. See more reviews. And here's HBO's music credits for this episode (may not be up yet).
The media loves going on and on about negative attacks, so with Election Night just 2 days away, here's some funny and friendlier slams that Obama and McCain have made. The first two clips are from the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Dinner, and the last one is McCain on SNL last night.
In other election comedy news, SNL is doing a 2-hour Monday night special for the election at 9/8c and Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert are doing a live election special on Election Night (Tues. Nov 4th) at 10/9c.
