Tag Archives: Writing

Writing

The Rise and Fall of Vince McMahon, a review of Netflix’s Mr. McMahon.

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INTRODUCTIONS: Let’s get two things out of the way before I begin this review. First, I had a micro investment in WWE in 2014, having bought stock. About 25 shares total. I sold those stocks in November the same year, due to ineptitude of the industry. Second, My entire family, going even back to my late grandfather, all loathe McMahon with a passion, so we’re highly biased. I have no doubt that all the allegations were true and hopefully him and everyone involved get what they deserve in court. That said, this documentary isn’t without flaws from the beginning.

WRITING: Fine

VISUALS: Fine. It’s a documentary, not much to deal with.

EDITING: Swamy and misleading.

CONTENT: Worthless. It’s billed as being about Vince, but is an an unstructured mess that deals more with wrestling in general than the subject matter.

CONCLUSION: This thing is plagued with Swamy Micheal Moore style editing from the beginning. This automatically brings into question its journalistic integrity. They quote-mine and edit things out of context to make certain people or peoples look worse than it is. Bill Simmons is no better than McMahon is with the way he edited this documentary to favor his anti McMahon bias. Which, while I share his bias, still think it’s a disingenuous thing to do. Mind you, this is the problems with this “series” from episode one and I’m only 20 mins in and it’s insufferable.

This doesn’t really know what it wants to be. It wants to be journalism, but fails. it wants to be about its subject matter, but fails. it wants to be about wrestling, but fails. It stacks the doc with ass kissing McMahon sell outs, whilst being a hit piece at the same time. Billy Simmons is proven incompetent as a director and we’re no better off for see this documentary. Maybe in the future, someone could do a legit piece and have it make sense. Perhaps Netflix would have been smarter to have sold this to McMahon and let him destroy it.

2 out of 5 stars

Writing

Ghostbusters 4 1/2: Frozen Empire movie review.

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INTRODUCTION: So I waited a bit to see this movie until the BS died down, much like with the 2016 Ghostbusters. I think it’s helpful, especially when approaching a movie you loved for decades.

PLOT: The New Busters move back to NYC and fight a new big bad.

CHARACTERS :Very good and very well developed. Even the introduction of new characters is interesting. Pecks characters change is intriguing and interesting.

ACTING: excellent! Everyone brought their a game here.

DIALOGUE: Very well done.

STYLE: Excellent!

FX: Awesome. The mix of CGI and Practical work so well.

SUBTEXT: None. Regardless of what some people seem to say on the internet about an interpersonal relationship between one of the characters and a ghost be more than friendly ain’t there either.

CONCLUSION: Very slow burn of a movie that sets up a lot of interesting characters and equipment for a third installment. Gil Kenen did an amazing job with this movie and it made it Al the better. I very much look forward to a third installment.

4 out of 5 stars.

Writing

Fireball Wiskey BBQ

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Remember this in The 40 Year Old Virgin?

Well, apparently the good people over at Fireball decided it needed to be a bbq sauce flavor. It taste smoky, cinnamon flavored with a hint of booze and pepper. While I can discern all three, it’s hard not to notice that the real discripton should read

“Warning, taste like that “girl” your frat brothers introduced you to, your freshman year of college and all you could remember the next day was thinking your mouth tasted of Virginia Slims, booze and big red chewing gum.”

To be fair, if you don’t use it as a dipping sauce, like I did and you put it on the food that you cook, it’s almost tolerable, given most the flavor burns off.

This video sums up how one should feel about it, not just the bad sex you had that night but the taste of this fuckin bullshit!

1 out of 5 stars

Writing

That 90’s Show

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INTRODUCTION: My like the predecessors, I wasn’t and still am not the core audience for this show. Both shows lean heavily on nostalgia for a decade that you were born into or grew up in. Being born in 1986 undoubtedly meant that I would end up having to watch That 70s Show at some point, as my parents grew up in the 1970s. Still, in spite of the weird 70s motif, it had a certain charm and was just pretty good. Red Forman and Hyde being the two best of the original cast. It gave that 80s show a tall order to live up to and it failed. Would this show be equally as weak?

CHARACTERS: Well you have a new cast and they obviously have the onus of living up to yesteryears characters. The original characters returns help make up for it. That said, these kids are not millennials. They lack everything that the reality of these people are. I mean, they have a “cool” kid hanging out with dorks. That’s not how that worked. Still, they keep the basic law breaking aspects of their boomer predecessors that’s the closest to a reality for being a millennial for these characters.

ACTING: Not bad. better that 80s show, not as strong as the original show.

SET: The original sets are spot on to the originals. too bad the attention to detail ends there as the brands are wrong.

FX: Still kinda dated to 90s tv sitcoms, but that’s kinda the point.

CONCLUSION: I’m not going to be shocked if this show meets the same fate as that 80s show. Ironically, this would have worked better as a show if they had turned it into a revamp of That 80s Show and ditched the 90s bullshit. For the right audience and by that I mean the everyday overly nostalgic millennials that miss that peice of shit decade. For those that never experienced the 90s, you’ll walk away with appreciation for being born long after that decade. for me, well the only reason to keep watching this is Red Forman.

3 stars out of 5

Writing

Thanksgiving by Eli Roth

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INTRODUCTION: So about 14 years ago, a movie came out called Grindhouse. It was making fun of 70s/80s exploitation films of the past. Not a bad couple of flicks in Tarantino later, but far from his best. The best part of the whole double feature billing was the faux trailers during it. Thanksgiving was one of those trailers that really stood out besides the Rob Zombie one and the other from Shaun of the Dead director Edgar Wright. So, all these years later and this movie is a trailer no more. What to make of it?

PLOT: Thanksgiving is upon Plymouth Massachusetts and there is a killer on the lose. Oh noes!!!!!

CHARACTERS: Not bad, but a tad bit more development would have been nice.

ACTING: Very strong given the source material was a joke, throw away thing.

DIALOGUE: Excellent

STYLE: Excellent

FX: Very good

SUBTEXT: Zero

CONCLUSION: I normally hate everything Eli Roth has ever done. Hostel sucked, Cabin Fever sucked, everything but this trailer sucked. Incidentally, this movie, trite in certain ways though it may be, really worked. A few jump scares got me and Eli finally struck a nice balance between gore/fx and nuance. There only a couple small flaws, but otherwise this is a horror movie and I would love a sequel.

3.8 out of 5

Writing

The Meg/The Meg 2

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INTRODUCTION: So I never see these films until today, during a fuckin heatwave and to be honest, I’m pretty sure the hundred degree heat was better than either of these fuckin flicks.

PLOT: The 1970s delivered a movie so awesome, called Jaws and it took nearly 50 years for someone to want to make a completely different shark movie and make a sequel to it.

CHARACTERS: Not developed well. This was just a reason to cast Jason Stratham as a badaas for like the millionth time. Like we need another Jason lead action flick? Well, we did, but not this one.

ACTING: Acadmy award winning! How these mutha fuckers made it through this movie straight faced is beyond me. Someone pay these muthas scale+20 million, please.

DIALOGUE: it ain’t cringe, but it ain’t anything likeable either.

FX: Worsa den de Jar jar Binks! Is that fuckin shark even go scale? It looks worse than Jaws! Seriously, fuck this series.

CONCLUSION: I have no clue what the fuck was going on in either of these movies. Why they needed to happen or why they felt a need to sequelize it. All I know is that I’m glad I waited to watch them and didn’t see them when they were new.