This is one of those posts that came with a surprise. In essence, there are really two components to this post. I always prefer the uplift that comes when good news come follows bad so I’ll take that approach here. The first part was the original focus of the post and quite frankly is a tale of disappointment. However, the second part came about during the prep work for the post and as karma would have it, has a more positive outcome – how wonderlicous is that? Let’s dispense with the bad.
A few weeks back some friends and I decided to catch the premier of Underworld 4: The Awakening. Now for the record I am a huge fan of the Underworld series with what I felt were strong offering for the first and second movies. Actually they even managed to pull off a strong third episode without Beckinsale in skin tight vinyl. Note, there may be some bias there since they essentially replaced her starring role with Rhona Mitra who looks like she could be Kate’s twin and Rhona was in Doomsday which is a fantastic movie (ah yes, Doomsday, three movies – Mad Max, Highlander and Cobra all wrapped into single pure adrenaline movie). The three previous movies may have set the expectations too high which is a polite way of saying this movie totally sucked (do I get points for the pun?). A quick look on IMDB shows the first movie ratings were 6.8, 6.6 and 6.4. On a personal front it would be 7.4, 7.2 and then 6.7. For some unknown reason IMDB is giving this version a 6.8 which is waaaay to high for what I had to sit through. It would have helped tremendously if they found a way to get Bill Nighy back in and at a minimum Scott Speedman to keep some continuity with the other episodes. Without that it barely makes it over a 4 in my rating scale.
To be honest, we did attend the 2D and not the 3D IMAX version – partly due to my lack of interest in 3D movies which I have soap boxed on previously here at Intrigued (link here). As stated in that post, it seems directors are just trying to cover up weak plot lines with gimmick imagery. Guessing the proverbial 3D kitchen sink was thrown at this one because this script couldn’t even be used to strain spaghetti yet we watched the closing credits for at least 15 minutes as it scrolled name after name on the production teams – think they must have gone through the entire French and Sweden phone books. I’ll keep the spoilers to a minimum, but how many of your own kind would you give the gift of life to if you had the ability? – me thinks more than ONE. Hell, I’ll save the finger fatigue, go read the plot summary on IMDB if you want a good laugh…. and what should be no surprise, there is plenty of storyline left unanswered for another sequel.
There was a bright spot in Awakening. Literally, there was a bright spot in the movie – A bright yellow spot that covered the entire right side of the screen in the middle of the movie, and there it remained for 10 -15 minutes prompting many individuals (including one in or party) to go seek a solution. A worker eventually came in and informed the crowd that they would fix the problem (well thanks!) but a reboot was needed f0r the projector. Now that is a sentence I’ve never heard before. After a quick stoppage, the movie was restarted successfully. There was a silver lining in all this. As it turns out everyone ended up seeing the movie for free – in fact depending on how you view it, you could say the theater paid us to watch this movie. A lady was actually handing out free movie passes to compensate for the bad experience. This pass is good for any movie we want to see 2D, 3D or 3D IMAX. I was hoping for some free popcorn or a Coke so kudos to The Rave for going beyond – too bad we can’t say the same for the director of this movie.
Hit the jump to see “The Educated” part of this post
It’s all about the reading output this month! Still kicking myself for a pretty poor performance on last year’s reading stack. Normally I would be optimistic about going into the new year, but this holiday (and birthday) season brought some great additions to the stack. So, this year I’m being a little more conservative and hoping to get through at least one book a month and then crank through three or four during vacations. That is actually a great lead into this book recollection post. The recent trip out to Yellowstone has rekindled my fondness for all things Yellowstone. I must give Amazon some credit here because they recommended Tim Cahill’s Lost in My Own Backyard based on all the related purchases I had over Christmas. At some point it went on my Wish List and sure enough Linda came through for my birthday.
Time to get back at this blog thingy. I’ve been spending most of my open nights on Operation Aunnauld and I must say, it is coming along quite nicely. Check back around June and I will hopefully be about done with that endeavor. For now, back to task at hand and that task is getting those keys pressed. Today’s offering is a Book Recollection. For starters, I have a read a book or two on wolves… ummm okay, maybe more than one… well, actually I have read a LOT of books on wolves. I am pretty much to the point where I’m working on the reinforcement principle since there usually is not a lot of new material but I figure a nice base of wolf knowledge will eventually make it into long term memory. Besides, I enjoy looking at the perty pictures. Then along comes this book by Shaun Ellis called Wolves: Capturing the Natural Spirit of these Incredible Animals. Apologetically, I have to admit that I can’t remember where this came from but definitely a gift from someone (guessing my brother, Linda or maybe one of my nephews/nieces – in all cases thank you thank you). This book was originally published back in 2006, however this particular edition came out in 2011. Now every once in awhile I’ll read a new nugget of information that may be an interesting nuance to a common fact or a possibly even an advancement of a previous theory. Shaun on the other hand managed to provide a wealth of new knowledge. So much so, that I even began to wonder if he might be taking some liberties. His bio indicates a significant amount of time observing wild wolves and even tried to join a pack (the book really did not elaborate on how successful that was). He also partnered with the Nez Perce tribe to learn from them and gain their perspective of their revered spirit. Probably the biggest takeaway from the book is the concept of the Beta wolves in the social hierarchy. This is a first awareness of this level and quite intriguing. They are actually the largest wolves in the pack (even larger than the Alphas) and are the enforcers. They are even allowed choice cuts of the kill to keep their strength. Seems like this would pose a significant risk to the Alphas since that means they would be less intimidated. It may be the special treatment they receive that keeps them in line, but some further investigation is required. Shaun also made the connection to how you can tell the Alphas and why. I have always known that their muzzle coloring seem to be bolder than the rest of the pack but nothing really explained how that results since it would seem it is a birth trait and not something that happens because they take control of the pack – there is not a concept of per-ordained Alphas so that reasoning for the color difference doesn’t come into play. Turns out the Alphas actually have a much darker and continuous defined line on the center of their backs from their neck to the tip of their tail (Betas also have a dark like but is not continuous). Shaun makes an astute observation that this is a byproduct of the choice cuts they get from the kill… and since Betas also get some of the choice cuts they also have bolder lines. I can actually buy that and I find myself looking for that line in every wolf picture I come across these days. The discussion on Alphas instructing their pack on what to hunt through reference body parts and holding training runs to point out the dangers and set the approach was also fascinating. If you want a pretty fast but informative read, I recommend getting your hands on this book as soon as possible.
Life Intrigued 