The Assembly: Iron Man

Here I am once again fresh after watching the first Iron Man. I did however fell off into a very insubstantial nap. Eyes open and close, open and close. Not because the movie was boring, but rather I was and still actually am quite drowsy. I haven’t quite had sufficient sleep in recent weeks. 

Moving on, Iron Man. Gotta admit it, weren’t a big fan before the movie was made. Barely knew the character, never read about him, never seen cartoons with him in it. Back then, all I knew about Tony Stark’s alter ego is the fact that he’s a man wearing iron. And that was all I had going into the movie, one of which I did not watch in the theater that year. Now what were my first impressions subsequent to watching the flick? 

It was…..

FUN !

I remember having a real good time watching it. I very much enjoyed it. There were a lot of positives overall that should be admired upon and used as an example to future comic book movies.

One of my favourite elements that made the movie fun is that it was simply fun. And for a movie to be fun, it must have good pacing in my opinion. Good pacing is achieved when the pace of a movie is well balanced throughout the movie with quick and slow paces. This was leaning a little towards the faster pace. Though it had slower moments, but the pace was good enough that I didn’t feel it. 

Besides being fun, Iron Man was successful in delivering an exceptionally decent story. More than often, movies with big bangs and explosions that are nothing but good old fun popcorn flicks are brain-dead movies with very bad storytelling. This was not the case. The story was in fact, very well developed and very well written. It has a good flow and progress to the story that the film does not bore me with plain reused action.

Another ace in the film is without even the slightest doubt is Mr. Robert Downey Jr.. Tony Stark could not have been casted any better because Rob nailed the role absolutely perfectly. He acts just like Tony, even when he is in real life. He is just like Tony. And he embodies the role of not just Tony Stark, but Iron Man as well. In addition to Rob, the movie overall had a very solid cast that is supported by Jeff Bridges and Gwenyth Paltrow. Lastly, Mr Samuel Leroy Jackson. Nothing much to say about him, just an honourable mention to our Nick Fury, agent of S.H.I.E.L.D

Overall, Iron Man is very good. Highly ranked for a comic book movie and much deserved as well for its effective simplicity. So how do I rate it?
I give it a very solid 4 out of 5 stars.  

~bs

And So We Meet Again

Do you know what’s the toughest thing, not just being a blogger, but being a writer as well? Titles. It is a real big razor-edged syringe in the largest muscle in one’s body. And one does not simply comprehend with sharp objects. 

And so we meet again, after precisely two hundred and sixty-two days.  A lot has changed. And certainly, I am not the man I was 262 days ago, after what happened 236 days ago. And that day being the first day of September in the calendar year of 2011. Things change. Things always change. But I believe that in this world, there are also things that wouldn’t change, no matter how much joy, misery, satisfaction, suffering, smiles, laughs, frowns or cries a person goes through. And as cliche or as cheesy as it sounds, I believe one of it is true love. And I do believe that I’ve found mine, in the form of a young female whom I’ve had the pleasure of reacquainting with once more after a period of desolation for over a year. 

She’s the reason anyone who reads this gets a chance to read this, whatever it is that you’re reading as your eyes stroll from left to right and back to left and all the way to right again, trailing each word as the line progresses until you see the full stop right after the ‘e’ here. Probably not, because you’re still reading this. 

I shall bid you farewell for now until a little later, after I feast my eyes upon Robert Downey Jr. Yes, I’m prepping myself for the upcoming assembly of the Earth’s Mightiest. 
~bs

Man of Steel First Look

There it is, the first look at the upcoming reboot of Superman. Before I dive into my personal reaction when I first saw the picture, let me put things into perspective. I thoroughly enjoyed what they did with Superman Returns. I enjoyed Brandon Routh, I thought he played a good Clark Kent and a very believable Superman. I like the story they gave to the Man of Steel. I like Kevin Spacey as the land-obsessed Lex Luthor, I think it worked. Kate Bosworth was forgettable. I thought the suit looked great, minus the miniature S shield. Initially, I gave it a solid 4 out of 5 stars. But after repeated viewings, it dropped to a 3.5. But nevertheless, I still loved it.

And 4 years later, they announced the reboot of the franchise with a new cast and crew. I was okay with it, not really excited nor was I bashing on it. Slowly, my excitement grow. Then Zack and Nolan got attached. This looks like a job for Zackolan! The vision that Zack brings to screen teaming up with Nolan’s touch of near perfection. There’s so much potential with the two of them together. As I first saw images of a ripped Cavill, that got me a little more pumped. Then came the announcement of Amy Adams as Lois Lane, a week or so before I watched the Fighter. And watching Fighter, got me even more excited. I think that Amy Adams is perfectly casted. I’ll hold judgement until I see footage before I can say if she’s gonna be better than Durance. Soon, a whole bunch of people were casted including Russell Crowe as Jor-El. At this point, I’m sold. Bring on the Man of Steel !

This week, the first piece of news I got was the casting of Lawrence Fishburne as Perry White. And I tweeted, “GREAT CAESAR’S GHOST!” After letting it sink in, I think he has the chops to pull of a black version of the Chief. It will be interesting, definitely. And then as I came home from school yesterday and checked Twitter to find the most unexpected piece of news of the day. The first look at Superman. And this was how I felt.

Instantly, it became the wallpaper to my desktop, prompting me to clean all the files I have sitting on my desktop and hiding my dock so that I could stare at the badass-ness of the red and blue superhero. Every time I check my Twitter, I’ll take peeks at him. Every time I wait for a reply on Facebook or something, I’ll gaze at him in awe, almost aspiring to him. Well I might be exaggerating a little but that is how much I love the picture.

The suit looks amazing. The texturised material used works a whole lot more as compared to the one in the Amazing Spider-Man. The cape is huge, much like what Darth Vader had and more. And the way its placed over his shoulders, I really like it. The boots look faithful to the classics. From what I can see, the belt buckle looks different, but good. And I’ve been examining his crotch quite a bit to see if he’s wearing his red undies. Its still unclear and its probably because the Studio wants to see fan reactions and maybe change things up a little. And the S shield. My least favourite part. That being said, I’m still warming up to it and slowly liking it a whole lot more than I first did. It looks a little the Flyby and Earth-2 shield, which I’m not a big fan off. But I’ll reserve judgement. However, the size of the shield and the small little raise they gave it, I’m loving it.

Overall, the suit looks amazing. Its a combination of everything from here and there. It has the classic look, it has the Flyby/Earth-2 shield, it has a more toned up version of Superman Returns texture. And most importantly, a very mordernised look, which is in my opinion, the most important element in the suit. And this picture raised my excitement level by god knows how many times.

September Already?!?!?!

Yes, perfect! Its September. (ALMOST) 2 weeks break for us and once thats over, really cloudy days are upon us with little room for unimportant stuffs. I, inspired by a long reptile, will set targets for myself. YES.

Target: 3A+, 4A, 2A- and 1C+

BM > 75
BI > 81
HISTORY > 75
MORAL > 55
ACCOUNTS > 81
MATHS > 95
ADD MATHS > 95
CHEMISTRY > 91
PHYSICS > 85
BIOLOGY > 85

Highly impossible to achieve, but at least I have something in mind.

Also, a little to-do-list for the holidays of things that I wish to do.

• Fix my computer
• Watch all 8 of the original Halloween movies
• Watch Resident Evil 4 on its premiere here in 3D
• Get my cup of coffee from Mr. Chin
• Reread History from the beginning
• Self-study from where teacher left off for these 4 subjects : Add Maths, Mod Maths Physics and Accounts
• Revise all other subjects bits by bits
• Finish up at least 80% of Accounts folio
• Complete Bio Activity book work
• SLEEP =)

That’s all I have in mind for now. Obviously I won’t be able to do all, but will try my best!

~bs~

Dream On

Something sparked my memory and brought me right to this video. American Idol, Danny Gokey, singing Dream On by Aerosmith, with this awesome screech.

Heaven

Baby you’re all that I want
When you’re here lying in my arms
I’m finding it hard to believe
We’re in heaven

I don’t know why, but that song has been like in my head for the whole day until now. Now, being the next day at 5:14 AM. And I’ll be going back to sleep after I write whatever I feel like writing. In this case, I don’t know why the words from Heaven just go embedded to the back of my head. So I’ll talk about that song. The version that I listen to is the Rock Sugar rendition which is a mash up of two different Heaven songs. And the new title is Heaven & Heaven. Pretty cool song. And as short as it is, that’s all I have to say about that. Other than the fact that I got to lamely present it with clicks and clacks on a digital on-screen keyboard.

Also, a big congratulations to my favourite Italian team, FC Internazionale Milano, more commonly known as Inter Milan, for winning the UEFA Champions League this year. You truly deserved it and I’m happy for you. The only reason I’m awake is that the match ended not too long ago. I only got to see 15 minutes of it. Why? Well when I woke up at 2 something, my parents were all downstairs boozing with my uncle and aunt from London. So, I didn’t feel like going down. And I went back to sleep. By the time I woke up, it was already 4:15 and I rushed downstairs. My dad was there all knocked out.

Anyways, I was very uncomfortable watching that game. I rest my legs, or at least I tried to. And it felt as if though my muscles just could not relax. I put my legs down, let it go and it felt like I’m still contracting my muscles. I have no idea what’s happening. All I know is that before I woke up, I had a dream about my leg muscles being somehow linked up to my back. And when I triggered it, my body would just roll back to the shape of something like ‘(‘ with my stomach curving outwards and my backbone curving inwards. I sure as hell felt a bit of pain in my dreams. And the pain, it went on into my mouth onto my tooth. It was just plain weird.

That’s that. Gloomy days are becoming much brighter for me. Only two more days left for me to endure the examinations. I just cant wait for it to be over. Then I’ll catch up with all the movies I need to watch and all the TV shows that I’ve been waiting to marathon.

Nothing else to talk already. So I’m going back to bed for as long as I want. Its 14 minutes after the time I had stated earlier. And I’m saying goodbye and goodnight!

~bs

IRON MAN 2

Here we go! My second most anticipated film for the very promising year of 2010. And was this film worthy? Definitely.
Since its my second most anticipated, I was suppose to go on opening day. But unfortunately, I wasn’t free. And therefore, it had to be postponed. And at first, I thought that I won’t be watching it for another 2 weeks or so. But thankfully, multiple outside forces pushed me into watching it. So, I was all pumped up. Going into it, I was expecting a good fun solid 4 star film. And that was exactly what I got from it.

(SPOILER ALERT)

Despite it being criticized by a big group of people, while at the same time being praised, I really enjoyed it. And I do think that it should be praised because it was a pretty good film in the sense that I had a lot of fun watching it and I had minor problems here and there. No biggie. Being an Iron Man film, one should of course expect explosions and action and cool stuffs. And it had all of those elements and a little bit more.

The story itself in my opinion, was pretty solid. In it, the world knows that Tony Stark is indeed Iron Man. And the US government are trying to get his suite, blablabla, Tony Stark’s awesomeness finally wins over the government. And within that scene, an almost villain but not so villainous villain is born. Justin Hammer, who in the end, plays a minor, and very predictable role. And that’s the thing about the script, one weakness, is that it was pretty predictable. You could quite easily see where the film’s going. And the story was a little character driven, till just at the right amount that it didn’t suck.

Characters. There are quite a number of new characters in the sequel. Not to mention, old one who you wouldn’t expect to return, return. More on that later, but first off, Tony Stark. The usual trend for Superhero films is that in the sequel, the hero usually faces problem. Whatever it might be. Well in this case, it was about Tony Stark dying of palladium poisoning from the Ark Reactor. I found it very interesting. But even then, tension wasn’t really built because we all should know that, Tony Stark’s not dying. And they way it was resolved was equally interesting. The only downfall of this character is one of my main problem in the film. The scene where he throws a party and he gets a little extreme, well I was bored. Just didn’t find it fitting in nor was it interesting.

Moving on, Rhodes. My main concern for the film. I hate it when actors are replaced in sequels. And this time, it made me fear. Terrence Howard made the character so likable in the first film and he looked very different to Don Cheadle. I feared that Don Cheadle wouldn’t be able to continue on what Terrence did. And well, it wasn’t really Don Cheadle that I had a problem with, but it was rather the character of Rhodes, War Machine. I don’t know if the script or the actor is to be blamed, but the character just felt very different and at times, out of placed in the film. And the fact that Rhodes decided to just put on the suit and fly away just felt out of placed. And not only that, he got controlled of the suit in like the first few seconds of wearing it whereas Tony in the first film, took ages.

Next up to the new characters, Nick Fury. Samuel Jackson. I like that he’s Nick Fury. He did a very good job. Just that, I was expecting something a little different from him, but what he did was good enough. Then Black Widow, Scarlet Johansson. She was awesome. Her character was awesome and her portrayal was awesome. And both of these characters will probably play a role in the upcoming Avengers movie. And that’s the thing about Iron Man 2 that I love. They insert small small elements here and there to set up Avengers. And one of my favorite scenes, the Captain America’s shield. THAT WAS HILARIOUSLY AWESOME!

Mickey Rourke as the main villain, Whiplash. Loved his performance. Loved his character. While at the same time, he lacked a bit of screen time. I don’t know if its just me or what, but it felt like that. Sam Rockwell, an amazing actor. Played Justin Hammer with style. Loved his portrayal. Though, the character was very predictable from the beginning of the film.

More returning characters. Gwyneth Paltrow. She was awesome in the first one. Equally awesome in this one. She has the best chemistry with Robert Downey Jr. And I think she’s perfect in the role of Pepper Potts. Another returning character, and this time with a lot more screen time, Happy Hogan played by the director of the movie himself, Jon Favreau. I enjoyed him and his character. It added small bits to the comic relief. It worked. Besides that, I loved the return of Christine Everhart! Don’t know why. And the return of Agent Coulson was cool, especially with him in the scene after the credits.

What else I really liked? The action sequences. The scene in Monaco was freaking cool. Much better than what I had anticipated. End battle scene, cool. Stuffs setting up for Avengers, very cool. And the development of the story, COOL. A lot of the things in the film was just plain cool. But things that brought it down, was like I said, Rhodes. And the biggest disappointment is the big scene missing from the trailer. It was an alternate version used in the movie. Pepper Potts kissing Tony’s helmet and toss it down with Tony jumping down and saying ‘You complete me!’ Oh my god! That was one of the most awesome thing in the trailer and it got cut out?!??!?! Disappointing.

End battle, as awesome as it was and as much fun as I had watching them, it was a little disappointing. When Iron Man and War Machine was killing those drones. It felt just too easy. And they way it shot, I wasn’t a big fan. And the ending, didn’t WOW me.

With all that being said, Iron Man 2 is still, a must for everyone to watch in the cinema. Because it is a truly, fun summer action film. And it did a great job setting up what seems to be an amazing few months ahead for movies. It does has it minor setbacks, but its still a great film that deserves to be watch in theaters. I enjoyed and loved it.

Overall, a very solid 4 out of 5 stars.

EPIC

The terrifying Mid-Year exams started yesterday. I went into it with very little preparation. Mostly are last minute. And can you believe it? I’m having one of the most feared paper tomorrow, and yet, I’m here telling my fellow readers about today. Because today, was EPIC.

We had the Principal Of Accountancy paper today. And before that, it was the Physical and Health Education paper. Which I’m sure that, most of us, by us, had our riffles fully loaded for this paper because we knew that, a lot of the questions will be shot at sight. I read the questions and find the answer I like the most and pick them. Hopefully, what I like is what the answer scheme likes. Or at least, good enough that I’m not failing. Imediately after that, was the Civics paper. Nothing special. It was pretty okay. And then, time for last minute studies. I studied a bit, here and that. Going through here and there.

At the same time while the test was in progress, people were outside cutting down an already loose tree branch. And the sound could be heard from my classroom which was about 100 meters from the place where the tree is being cut down. Cool sound effects. And during recess, I went out to the canteen and passing by, I saw that wires and stuffs were all messed up. And it was also said that one of the school’s chemistry teacher, who is SCARY and looks like a crocodile, was injured. She was admitted to the hospital and hand her leg cemented or something like that.

Anyway, the time then arrived. Thankfully, the teacher in charge was our chemistry teacher. Who, tolerates a lot a lot. And I took that to my advantage. Well, I’m not the only one of course. Despite having pretty bad english, she’s pretty awesome! Definitely in my favourite teacher’s list. Anyway, the paper was given out, and almost the whole class were just, I don’t know what, when they read the third subjective question because it was something that the teacher had never taught before. And reading it, immediately, I decided that I’m not even gonna try because I had no idea what to do. Anyway, the first objective question, I forgot the format a little. So while the teacher walked outside the class to talk to one of her students, I managed to get a quick peek at the text book for the format and succeeded(HOPEFULLY). And when she got back in, she just started laughing at our misery, doing the paper.

Anyway soon, she left. BM teacher came in. I expected her to be a little more strict. I was wrong. It was the same. And at one point, she just called me something. Something that I don’t feel comfortable mentioning here. Something. Well, anyone who’s reading this who was in class today should know. And of course, it brought out laughters from everyone. Anyway, I shifted to the back. And I was very grateful. Because I had more reinforcement for the objective questions from a guy who does go for Accounts tuition. I don’t. I depend fully on the teacher. And the teacher, had missed A LOT of classes. He taught till Chapter 4. He set the paper for questions until Chapter 6. I have no idea whats wrong with him. But like I said, I had a little help from a friend for the objective question. And once again, my BM teacher called me ‘something’ and this time, it brought out even more laughters. I guess its in everyone’s nature to tease me. What to do…

Anyway, she left. And the teacher who’s been on maternity leave for 2 months or so, finally came back. Its good to see her without her big tummy. Well, nothing special with her return. What was special, was the joker of the class. I just kept starring at him and uncontrollable laughter struck me. Haven’t had these kinda laughs for a long time and it was fun to laugh out and not stop like no one’s business. Back to the point, his action were hilarious. Especially when he’s serious. I had a lot of fun laughing.

In the end, the misery ended and I set off on my journey home. In my journey, I found out that the wiring and cables were disrupted by the tree branch being cut down today. Traffic had to be diverted for the cars, but not for me. Me route back home was exactly the same. And today, the sun wasn’t hot. So it was a good walk home without sweating. And now, I wasted almost an hour writing this and my Iron Man 2 review. And the review, I will have to continue tomorrow. I still have a lot that I wanna write on about. Right now, I shall return to studying the toughest, but yet one of my favourite subjects, Physics!

tata!

~bs

Gloomy Days Ahead

The night is darkest before the dawn. And the skies start to get gloomy as the Mid-Year Term Exams are edging closer and closer. And the way that time flies in our life, it’s barely a stone’s throw away. And yet, studies have yet to be truly commenced. And I feel so guilty of myself for not studying while everyone is working their ass off trying to get good grades.

1 week has already passed in the month of May. Usually, the month where I reflect on how much useless things I’ve done, how much I’ve learnt. Honestly, I think I’ve learnt a lot. For example, I’ve learnt that I actually enjoy Chemistry a lot more than I had expected to. What else happens in May, awesome movies start hitting the cinemas.

I have this thing that I started last year, that I must watch my 2 most anticipated film of the year in the cinema on opening day. My most anticipated was Clash of the Titans, and I saw it on opening day. My second most anticipated is Iron Man 2. And due to be being out of town the other day, I missed it. And I won’t be able to watch it for another week or two because of the exams. So, it’s really disappointing.

How’s life been for me? Not great. 4 Science Accounts of Anderson Ipoh for the year 2010, is really a legendary class from every aspects of it. And one of the main reason, is the noise. And I’ve been patient, going along with it for a while. Recently, I’ve lost my patience. Time and time again, a few of the fellows at the back just cant keep their mouth shut. And they totally have no respect for the teacher. And the teacher, well her problem is that she wouldn’t fight back. Instead, she would just stand and smile. Well, I still do pity her. And those few ‘bastards,’ though they are my friends, they really do piss me off at times. And I’m just tired of how much they’re distracting the class. Whatever lesson it is, they are a real distraction to not just me, but everyone else who want to study.

Another reason, is that there hasn’t been an accounts lesson for 2 weeks in a row. Because of that, I feel very left out. And some of the lessons before had some problem understanding it. And I feel very left out at times.

Based on these two factors of the terrible class and feeling a little left out with accounts, I’ve actually been considering dropping accounts and changing class. But even then, there’s a part in me telling me to stay in this class, telling me that I’ll regret if I do change class. So right now, I’ll see how my results turn out for the exams. If they aren’t good, I’ll probably be going. And if they are acceptable, I’ll stay.

Anyway, I had a pretty good day today. Played some football, skipped moral class because of the useless teacher and hung out around and had accounts extra class. And it could be my final accounts class. Ignoring the things that happened after accounts class while it was raining and I was waiting for the skies to clear up so that I could walk home, today was pretty awesome.

And that’s it for now. I’ll seriously have to face the proper books soon. I’ve been reading my new comics and Vampire Diaries recently. Love the comics, but getting bored with Vampire Diaries.

~bs

Kick-Ass

Initial thoughts, a fun time at the cinema with funny comedy and good fun action scenes. More or less something like Spiderman, but without powers. Then, I heard from numerous people that it is not for kids. So, I expected something violent, but still like Spiderman without powers. Out of 5 stars, I expected a good fun 4 star. Bought my tickets online. Bought just one. Then someone finally decided to join in. And, he decided to buy it like 3 or 4 hours after I bought mine. Well, someone bought it for me. Anyways, from the time I bought my ticket to the time he’s buying his ticket, only ONE was sold. And I head into the theater, it was soooo badly empty. As in maybe 15 – 20 seats at most. The last time I been to a cinema this empty was District 9. It contained only 8 person. And well, that was during the Swine Flu outbreak. But this? Poor advertising.

SPOILER FREE
but still, read at your own risk.

This time, I’m trying to keep it as spoiler free as possible. If you go into it being spoiled, you won’t enjoy it as much. So with my expectations going into it, I was blown away like 5 minutes into the film. Why? Go see it for yourself. And the more it went on, the more I was blown away with how dark the film really was. Dark in the sense that it’s not really something cheerful. But yet, it was insanely hilarious at times. So, yeah. The only way I could describe it is a roller-coaster ride of emotions that were really well balanced.

Other than that, the action sequences were very well made. And the music that they used in the action sequences and overall in the film, were at times, geniusly done. And those action sequences truly kicked ass. But you must of course, suspend your disbelief and sit and watch and munch on your popcorn and sip your drinks and laugh about it, cry about it and have fun in the cinema.

But what made it much more fun to watch is of course the acting. The acting from everyone was brilliant. Aaron Johnson did an amazing job playing the main character and giving a very believable performance. The supporting cast kicked ass too. Nicolas Cage did an outstanding job playing Big Daddy. I’m a big fan of his movies even though he hasn’t been making nice films. The first one that comes to mind is of course Bangkok Dangerous which was terrible. I had faith in him and he delivered in this film. Not only him but his daughter in the film, Chloe Meretz was awesome. She has a wide range of acting. She went from this small cute girl to this extremely violent little girl, kicking ass. She has a very bright future in front of her.

Overall, I would recommend it. But be warned, it contains a lot of violence, language, minor obscene scenes and a bit of gore. So, do check it out. But don’t bring a child along. Its not at all, a film for kids. I had no problem whatsoever with this film. And, I was wow-ed numerous times in the cinema. For a film to get 5 stars from me, you must have those two elements. The last film to get a 5 star rating from me was District 9. And Kick-Ass, is getting a big 5 out of 5 stars from me.