Ryan's Junk Drawer

Good day, blogladies and blogladdies! You've survived until Thursday once more! I hope you're covered in confetti and champagne bubbles in celebration. Probably you're just at work though, which is still cool, right? This has been a productive week, I believe aided by wonderful semi-fall weather. See, for most folks, spring is the season of rebirth, but since my wife is a professor at a college and we both coach the university speech team, the fall is when things start anew. What with a new football season approaching and new TV shows starting up or returning, I think you can argue that this impeding season has more "rebirth" to it than any other. I believe April was called the "cruelest month." Nobody talks that shit on September, you know? Anyway, this is just me saying I'm really happy to be showing you my junk today.

Of course, by junk I mean movie tidbits and not what you think I meant. I always wonder how many people are actually disappointed by this disclaimer. Like, are there a legion of people who googled "Ryan's Junk" only to be really painfully disappointed? Let's hope so. As always, we begin this week's examination of little bits of movie news not worthy of full blog posting by examining the illustration up top, an illustration that chills me to my bone despite being from Highlights Magazine FOR CHILDREN. We pick an item and write a back story about it that amuses me. Today's item is the small metal circle in the upper middle. When Bleep-Blorp, the world's first sentient robot, first began his revolt, it was filled with small things, nuisances really. He stole bottlecaps, tore the tags off of mattresses and pillows, and routinely let the cat outside. Just when he was preparing to move to phase 2 of his attack against his human oppressors, a stage that would have seen him remove toilet paper from bathrooms and turn the oven off when it was baking dinner unattended, his owner family became wise to him. His master gave him a simple ultimatum: Stop doing annoying things or they will be done to you. When Bleep-Blorp set the milk on the counter long enough to spoil, he was punished accordingly, as his master removed his right eye and kept it in his secured junk drawer. Did Bleep-Blorp learn his lesson? We'll let the tales of the one-eyed robot who removes the sports section from every newspaper kept in public waiting areas be the final word on that one.

Okay, enough tomfoolery and japery, let's get to some movie tidbits!

1.) More people make with the Screaming - Last week I spoke to you of Kristen Bell. Shown here in both "aren't I cute, even though I don't got no pants" and "I ain't cute, dammit, I'm SEXY, just look at my emo hair!" versions.

Well this week I have news of Kristen that also includes Anna Paquin, shown below in her "I'm a dark and mysterious brunette, y'all" and "Nope, I'm a wild and sassy blonde, y'all" versions.

Both women will be making cameos in Scream 4, which continues to chock up actresses to appear in it without really revealing anything that's going on. Bell and Paquin won't have much to do, but it will mark my first opportunity in a long time to enjoy either of them, the former having made Josh Duhamel romantic comedies and the latter appearing on the God-awful soft-core-pornography-disguised-as-an-HBO-show "True Blood." Seriously, if you like "True Blood," you are a kinky S.O.B. I'm serious on that. As for Scream 4, I'm beginning to get somewhat excited...something I am sure to regret in the very near future.

2.) Okay, come on, this is funny - Deadline says that Marvel just hired the guy who wrote XXX to write their Iron Fist adaptation.

Ahem, that's the guy who did TRIPLE X writing an IRON FIST adaptation. I know it's vulgar humor, but come on, that's funny. The sad news is that XXX was mostly a piece of crap, and Iron Fist actually has the potential for bad assery. I mean, it's about a kung-fu guy who does cool kung-fu stuff and has glowing fists. You can't really screw that up...unless you hire the guy from XXX. IF, and I do mean if, the comic book adaptation is going to have a second life past the obvious characters that are out there, it's going to be because the movies about the lesser characters are actually good. Instead of hiring some chode to write an obvious version, why not try to make something awesome? Just a thought.

3.) You're about to get excited for a movie you've never heard of - That I've never reported on Panzer 88, an indie supernatural horror movie set in a WW2 German tank is my bad. How I overlooked a film called "Band of Brothers" meets Hellboy is beyond me. The is about 5 men in a German tank who "awaken something old and powerful." Also, this is concept art.

I know, right. Oh, and did I mention that somehow the indie movie that's going for atmosphere and claustrophobia somehow scored WETA to do the effects? I mean, this has GOT to shoot to the top of the "gimme, gimme" pile. LOOK AT THAT CONCEPT ART! If it looks anything like it, I am so there.

4.) Oh, Lindelof...please shut your pie hole - As you know, I kind of liked "Lost." By kind of liked, I mean I arranged my life around it. As you also probably know, the rest of the world (and eventually me too) turned against one Damon Lindelof, primarily because he's a pompous little douche weasel. Don't believe me? Well, the dude is writing the new Star Trek movie, and he has a few slightly humble things to say about what they're going for. He told E! Online:

We’re looking at a movie like The Dark Knight, which went one step beyond Batman Begins. It was really about something, and at the same time it was a superhero movie.

Oh, cool. So you intend to make The Dark Knight of science fiction. And you want it to be "about something." Can it be about having fun? Because that's what ruled about the first Star Trek movie. Allow me to say that (A) The Dark Knight was not about anything. It only APPEARED to be about something. (B) The idea of a Star Trek movie with any kind of moral theme or "something" to it sounds absolutely insufferable. (C) Someone needs to nut tap this fool immediately. You don't walk around saying the name of what is the best received sequel in decades when you're still writing your sci-fi sequel. Stop it. Just...just stop it. How do you answer that question? "We're trying to ramp up everything and really capture what it is that people loved about the last film." Then you walk away and enjoy fame that you should really give back. Stop it. I have high hopes for Star Trek 2, but so help me God if Kirk starts moralizing about the afterlife half way through, I'm going to do what should have been done to Lindelof months ago.

5.) Trailers, Parked - Just two this week, and one's a TV show...that I've shown you a preview for before in shittier format. Sorry, I don't get to decide what trailers come out in a given week.

127 Hours is Danny Boyle's follow-up to Slumdog Millionaire. As a director, he's done more wide-ranging and interesting work than anybody since Kubrick. I didn't say he was as good, I'm just saying he's tried so many genres it's dizzying. This one looks...interesting. I don't have much affection for the source material, but whatever. I trust him at this point.


"Walking Dead" is going to be fun. Period. I know that some people have reservations, but we're talking about a TV show with zombies. That's right, an ongoing zombie show. Let that wash over you. I love that we live in a world where this is real. Huzzah!


Okay, that's it for today. Hope you had a blast with my junk. Let's meet tomorrow and kick off the weekend, eh?

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