I loved the new Star Trek. Let's just get that out of the way at the beginning, then continue.

I am a huge Trek fan, from way back (not WAY way back, like the 60's way back, but way back, like from the 80's). I used to watch Original Series reruns on TV as a kid (in the 70's), I went to see the first Star Trek movie in the theater (not that I really remember it, but my parents have reminded me), then stopped watching Star Trek altogether when Wrath of Khan came out because the little brain-worm-things scared the shit out of me. I got back into it when Next Gen started, and just went nuts over it. You ask me how dilithium crystals work in a warp drive, and I can probably give you an explanation without doing any research.

There are tons of reasons why I enjoyed the original series (and Next Gen, and DS9, and occasionally Enterprise), and I'd love to tell you that it was because of the hopeful and optimistic vision of the future, and the way it portrayed humanity as having overcome greed and prejudice and having dedicated themselves as a race to bettering themselves and fighting the just and righteous fight for freedom and cooperation. But really, I loved it because of the characters. The sometimes quirky, sometimes absurd, sometimes hyper-real, sometimes bizarrely unrealistic characters and relationships that populated the show. I loved it because of the stories, and the campy humor, and the glorious over-acting. And, I loved it because it sometimes asked deep philosophical questions, and other times it paraded around in front of you wearing a Nazi uniform. I don't think I really grasped the historical, philosophical, and sociological ramifications of the Trek universe until later.

But, we're here to talk about the new Star Trek movie, aren't we?

Taken on its own merits, I think this is a phenomenal movie. There are issues of science and issues of execution of course, but overall it is exciting, and fun, and touching, and very Star Trek in lots of the right ways.

I think Chris Pine made a great Kirk. All the characters were written (and directed, I assume) somewhat… over-the-top, and very earnest. I felt that, though Pine also suffered this, he had a presence and subtlety that really befitted the character, and that I can see serving him very well in subsequent outings. There was at least one scene (and I've been trying to remember exactly where it occurred, but nevertheless) where I remember thinking to myself… "There's Kirk. That's Kirk. That was right on." And I think it was just a single word, or very short line, delivered with a certain mixture of joy and self-awareness that I think captured the spirit of "The Kirk," and channeled a bit of the old Shatner magic. Suffice it to say, I enjoyed this new Kirk.

There were certain Kirk moments from a story/plot perspective and from a characterization perspective that I didn't like, but those would be difficult to elucidate without spoilage.

Quinto's Spock also had a lot to offer. Maybe he played it a little too close to the chest at times, and maybe he played it a little too "smirky" at times, but neither of those are entirely un-Spock-like qualities. I thought the father/son and the mother/son things were well written and well played, but I did feel that this Spock, somewhat interestingly, was representative of the Spock we came to understand over the last ~40 years, rather than the Spock we met in the first Original Series episode. Our Spock started out (well, after Where No Man Has Gone Before, anyway) as an emotionless, purely logical, and imperceptibly conflicted character who had very much chosen his Vulcan side over his Human one. That was not the Spock we got in this movie. In and of itself, that's not a bad thing, and I did really enjoy this Spock, but I also felt that this new Spock didn't represent where our Spock would have been at this point in his life. It didn't kill my enjoyment of the character, but it stood out to me as a point of unnecessary disunity.

Ultimately though, I thought Quinto's Spock was fantastic. He enabled you to become invested in the character very quickly, and he brought you along for the… yes, emotional ride through the rest of the movie.

The supporting cast was also varying degrees of good.

Karl Urban's doctor was good, but I felt that he was trying too hard to imitate the wonderful DeForest Kelley. I also felt that the writers did him a disservice by restricting his dialogue almost exclusively (I felt) to classic "Bones" catch-phrases. Dixon over at Shelfbound considered that this may simply be the way McCoy talks, which is an interesting thought, but one I don't necessarily agree with. McCoy (the "real" McCoy, you might say buh-doom-tsh!) had plenty of aphorisms and metaphors to go around, but his dialogue was never so heavy with catch-phrases. Ultimately, it's forgivable, but it was irksome.

As an aside, I absolutely adored the way they introduced McCoy's nickname. It was a bit awkward, perhaps, but I loved it.

Simon Pegg as Scotty was a real treat. The character was fun, and lively, and seemed to come off as both brilliant and moronic at the same time. I like Pegg, he's fun. Unfortunately, I never believed he was Scotty. Doohan's Scotty was brilliant but subdued, earthy but not offensive, and excitable but responsible. Pegg's Scotty was mystified, frenetic, and frequently out-of-his-depth. Also unfortunately, Scotty didn't get enough good screen-time to further establish the character. Perhaps there's more to him than this situation allowed to come through.

Uhura was good. Her character had strength, conviction, self-confidence, and power. It is a testament to the actress (and the writers as well) that they were able to establish this, because she was woefully lacking many really meaty scenes.

Sulu was also good, and I felt he fared a bit better than Uhura, scene-wise. He didn't try (unlike Urban) to mimic his predecessor, but inhabited the character he was given. I don't think that I ever really felt he was Sulu, but rather that he was some entirely separate character.

The Christopher Pike character was really great. I felt he got shortchanged in the leadership department in a few spots, but that ties into some movie-wide problems and more potential spoilage. Still, I really liked this character.

Finally, we get to Checkov. What to say… I did really enjoy his introductory moments in the movie, but ultimately I found his character to be very annoying. I also felt that this character was the farthest from the original source material. I won't go so far as to say I didn't like the new Checkov—because he was entertaining, to a point—but he's just not Checkov. However, maybe he is just another casualty of the way the characters were generally over-played. If he'd been more subdued, perhaps he would have fit perfectly. Who knows?

Well, I said "finally, we get to Checkov," but really, the Enterprise is the last (or first?) major character in the Original Series, and we should talk about her as well.

I really liked the new Starfleet ship exteriors, and felt they were true enough to the original. The bridge, on the other hand, was a different story. The old bridge was spacious, and austere but powerful, and it felt comfortable and open. This new bridge was bright, flashy, and claustrophobic. So much of the old Star Trek took place on the bridge—perhaps this is an indicator that the bridge will no longer be the central story-telling vantage point. It will be interesting to see how it plays out in future movies.

At last, we get to the story itself. As I mentioned, it was enjoyable and exciting. Unfortunately, I felt it was also, like most of the rest of the movie, a bit over-blown. It was as if they tried to make every single moment just as tense and dramatic as possible—tried to give the story as much weight as it could possibly carry. The good thing is that it delivered. The question is, is that a good thing? Personally, I prefer my Star Trek a little more cerebral, and a little less "wagon train." Maybe that's the Next Gen era initiate in me, I dunno. I just think there's a line between sci-fi action/thriller and sci-fi action/drama that this movie played too often on the wrong side of.

At this point, I'm not sure how much more i can say without really getting into specifics of plot. I definitely have more thoughts on specific aspects of the movie, and also generally about what it means that we now have this New old generation of characters.

As I've mentioned in other venues, to other people, I loved it, but I also hated it.

(with apologies to the three or four of you who might read this post, as you're probably the three or four to whom i've already talked about it, and you've probably heard most of this from me already…)

Sara and i finally got out to see The Dark Knight thurs. night, and while it exceeded my expectations, i felt it didn't live up to the hype.

let me say first that this was a fantastic movie. all the major characters felt fully realized and deep, and either had strong arcs or a consistency of character that was gradually exposed during the course of the movie… that is, all the characters but one—the Batman. there was a recurring thought in my head as the movie unfolded: "this is a great movie, except for those pesky bits with the batman." after the movie, i reasoned that this movie would have been perfect as a GCPD movie—with all the batman stuff happening off-screen.

the performances delivered by the entire (non-batsuited) cast were absolutely spot-on. Gordon, Harvey, the Joker, and heck, even Lucius and Rachel were phenomenal at every turn. Such fantastic acting, scripting, and directing that there could be an oscar here (or several).

as bruce wayne, christian bale's performance was on par with his co-stars, an unimpeachable rendition of the nuanced billionaire playboy—dashing, vain, pretentious, and ostentatious, while also calculating, serious, and very aware of himself. a perfect bruce wayne. however, once he's in the suit, we're not so lucky.

i do understand that batman is not the suit, but the man inside and the raging, conflicting emotional and philosophical debates that play inside him. however, i feel that bale's portrayal of batman is weak and contrived.

the main thing I hated about the val kilmer batman (aside from the dreadful story and the rest of that horrible movie), was that stupid, insipid, forced gravelly voice thing he did. well, now, of course we've got christian bale doing the exact same thing. it's well established in the comics that batman does speak with an altered, lower voice than bruce, so it's not like the gravelly thing is completely off-base… it's just that it's so bad, and unnatural, and just simply not right. batman just doesn't talk this way, except maybe in one of those weird surreal one-shot trades by some artist with a fixation on the grotesque.

also, this batman just doesn't feel right to me somehow. in the (hand-to-hand) fight sequences, batman seems slow, plodding, and shortsighted. despite the fact that he's just a man with no superpowers, a man who is supposed to be the single greatest fighter in the world should move with more grace, fluidity, economy, and speed. batman's abilities border on the super-human, but with this batman, i don't feel that at all. it just feels like a guy in a suit. as the bat acolyte says, "what's the difference between you and me?" in this movie, the answer is "nothing."

(let me digress for just a sec by reiterating that in the previous paragraph i'm talking almost exclusively about the physicality of batman—we'll deal with psychological and philosophical concepts in a moment)

also, the suit. the keaton suit always bugged me a little, because, like the current suit, it's a little too bulky, a little too stiff, a little too rubbery. however, i felt like in the keaton movies, tim burton worked fairly well around the limitations of the suit, leaving that batman feeling more like a superhero than a guy in a suit. i almost feel that chris nolan just doesn't care to work around his suit's limitations, like he wants it to be more realistic, and thus it ends up being just a guy in a suit. and what's up with the cowl? keaton's was a bit funky, with that stiff rubber, but seems like it was shaped better. bale's cowl feels too ovular, and like he's just got this tiny pointy little face on this great big egg shaped head. i dunno, but i don't like it.

veering away from the negativity a bit, but continuing with physicality, i have to say that the driving and flying sequences were great. all very well done, and enjoyable to watch. batman on a glider is one of my favorite things, and this movie didn't disappoint in this area. some of his toys were pretty nifty too. however, i do have a beef with the whole "skyhook" thing. it's a fantastic idea, don't get me wrong, it looked pretty awesome, and i know bruce wayne is rich as fuck, but seriously, the way that went down was not batman's style. a charter plane, or involving the U.S. military, either way, it's not his style. i mean, you can pursue realism all you want, but there is a line.

i mentioned earlier that all the characters were deep and well-realized. this is also true of batman (even though i don't care for the portrayal). the concepts dealt with in this movie—duality, sanity, purpose versus principles, and escalation—are indeed quintessentially batman concepts which have been dealt with extensively in the comics and other movies. so, yes, the batman's arc in this movie is also fantastically conceived… if only it was executed as well.

finally, we saw the movie in the IMAX theater, with seats near the middle on the second row about 100 feet or so away from the screen. perhaps i was too close, or perhaps i was too engrossed in the movie, but i can't say that i ever noticed a single bit that was IMAX. i will also say that it was very disappointing that there was at least some component of the projection system—the screen, the booth window, the project, or even the film—that was very dirty. there were black spots all over the screen.

given all the above, and my love of batman (in general), i figure that i will like it much better after a second viewing. now that i have traded expectation for experience, and having already said my peace about bale's bat, perhaps i'll be able to sit back and really watch it, enjoy it, and not let the bad bits color my perception of everything else too much.

anyone willing to give it a second look?

so, i'm up here with my lovely wife, doing her res. interview at WashU. i'm just chillin in the hotel room, shooting at my co-workers with the 2006 Power Treecam—a brilliant idea by yours truly, brilliantly embellished and executed by our boy ben.

i've run over to the St. Louis Bread Co., where I got the skinny on the fact that the national chain Panera Bread (as known to most of us) was actually originally the aforementioned St. Louis Bread Co. I picked up my breakfast there (croissant, cinnamon roll, and coffee) and they gave me a soufflé for free.

I've spent most of the morning upgrading our WordPress installation to 2.0.5, and just installed the wordpressReports plugin, so we can see just how many people aren't coming to visit the site to enjoy the dearth of updates.

and now, i'm going to watch the Special Edition DVD of Star Trek III, which my buddy nate so thoughtfully gave to me on my most recent birthday. thanks again, nate!

I spent a few minutes today working on the "invitation only" alterations to the movie night site, so I can now officially link to it in a public sphere. Currently, the only thing non-registered users can do is view the listed movies, and some stats for them. Feel free to drop by movie night and see our movie list. If I know you, feel free to drop me an email if you'd be interested in joining us for a movie night sometime. Casual is the rule of the day, as I can't really get more than 15 or so people (at an absolute max) in my living room to watch movies.

For the rest of you, some of the movies have a "Why Should I Watch This" blurb from the person who added the movie, so there's more than just pictures, links, and stats. In the future, i might make the comments on movies (and the as-yet-secret feature) available for viewing by non-registered users.

wow, we actually got to go see a movie!

seriously, it seems like we've not gotten to go to a movie in an insanely long time (though we did go see Batman Begins on our honeymoon). but, we finally managed to get out of the house to go see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, which i loved. i loved the original movie, and i love this version of the story too… they are so completely different, it's hard to even compare the two. unfortunately, i haven't read the book, so i can't really say which is the more "accurate" version.

finally had a little job interview today, which i think went pretty well. it's actually a little surprising, as generally, one of my hallmark traits (self-promotion wise) has always been a heaping helping of humility. strangely, during the last few interviews i've been much more "at ease" and confident about my abilities and about my inter-personal interactions with the interviewer(s). it's a very weird experience for me to not be timid around people i don't know and who could have some influence on my career. at a few points during the interview, i actually felt like i was delivering some kind of post-shakespearian monologue. perhaps i went a little overboard at points, but i think it was ok. i think i might've overdone the hand-talking… but otherwise, it seemed to go well.

on a more local level (bipolar-local, that is), i've been trying to spruce up the gallery scripts a bit, since they suffered some after the move to the new server and directory structure. i've managed to get the galleries themselves working and displaying properly, but there're some issues with the (still relatively new) "view by date" code that i haven't been able to spend enough time to massage out yet. and thus far, brian's joycamproject is still utterly non-functional, which is probably also a result of directory re-organization more than anything. hopefully, i'll get a chance to fix that up here soon, then help brian get the actual joycamproject implemented with the designs he's come up with. once that's accomplished, i intend to kick up development of a ground-up recoding of the gallery scripts… something i've been contemplating for a while now.

should be fun and challenging.

last but not least, i took a few moments yesterday to register our RSS feeds on Feedburner. so if you're subscribed to our feeds through an RSS reader, you'll want to update your subscriptions to the following:

main feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/x13design/bipolar
brian's feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/x13design/bipolar/left
matt's feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/x13design/bipolar/right

now, the fun aspect of this change, is that Feedburner allows you to integrate a couple other sources into your standard feeds. so, brian's feed is integrated with his flickr account, and will intermix any new images he uploads there with his posts here. for me, i don't have a flickr account yet, so i'm integrating my del.icio.us bookmarks feed into my bipolar feed. so… one beautiful side-effect will be regular updates (of the RSS/Atom feeds) even if we don't necessarily post on that regular of a basis.

now, these things aren't integrated into the main bipolar feed (though they could be if "demand" is there), so to take advantage, you'd have to subscribe to our individual feeds.

another good thing about Feedburner is that we're no longer stuck (well we never were before, but i could never be bothered to create an Atom output for MovableType) with just RSS… feedburner will serve up whatever type of feed your feed reader asks for… Atom, RSS 0.9, RSS 1.0, RSS 2.0 probably others… so… subscribe away!

y'know, i really should have known about this for a long time, considering it's been kicking around in some form or another since apparently 1996-ish. i don't think i even realized that the "6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon" game had been around since 1996, but then, the most of 1994 – 1999 is kind of a fuzzy memory at best. those were dark days. well, ok. 1996 – 1999 were dark days, 1994 – 1996 were actually kind of fun. if i miss any part of my past life, it's that part.

anyway, back to the subject at hand. a buddy at work was telling me that he used to hang with Roger Clinton back in the day, and then, somehow almost randomly (as is our wont) we wondered what his "Bacon number" was. that's when my co-worker mentioned the Oracle of Bacon and i just looked at him in bewilderment…

it was one of those moments where you just sit there and think to your self:
"of course there's an online site that has a database on which you can run '6 degrees of kevin bacon' queries… so, if it's so obvious, why had the thought never even occurred to me before now?"

of course, now i know i've a Bacon number of 4, which probably isn't that impressive (2 for Roger Clinton, 3 for my co-worker, making me 4), but now i'm also trying to think of whether i know any actors personally or not…

hmm…

it's taken me nearly 30 years, but i've finally figured out a few of my favorite things. (i have a hard time limiting myself to just one favorite, so the fact that i've finally done this is a big deal for me.)

Movie – Amelie from Montmartre : the first time i saw this movie, i fell immediately in love with the main character. i knew that i liked the movie a lot, but before i rented it and got to watch it again, i had settled on "So I Married an Axe Murderer" as my favorite movie. shortly after i finally decided on "So I…", i rented Amelie, and my recently picked favorite was quickly deposed.

Album – Monkeywrench – Clean as Broke Dick Dog : i've been saying for years that this is the greatest album of all time, largely tongue in cheek, but i finally realized that this album–of everything i own–is my absolute favorite. This first disc by some of the influential players from the Seattle "grunge" explosion, was an exploration of blues music as the roots of modern rock & roll, and particularly of grunge–the "Seattle sound."

Restaurant – Irish Rover, Louisville, KY : I've long held the Irish Rover to be "one of" my favorite restaurants, but i've finally taken the plunge and singled it out as the numero uno of restaurants in my personal pantheon. In fact, as i was thinking this morning, and to pull out an inside joke from the old days… if Jesus were to give me a plate of fish & chips, he would've ordered it from the Irish Rover.

i've been trying to decide for several years on a favorite color, and it's either black or a dark purple… but then, i don't know if you can really *pick* black as a favorite color. it seems like it's one of those staples that you just aren't allowed to pick… i dunno.

those are the only favorites that i've managed to settle on (well, i've got my favorite girl now, but she knows who she is). just don't ask me for top ten lists, 'cause i don't work that way… i like too many things too much to narrow it down that far. that's why these favorites are such a big deal to me–it's a miracle i managed to figure them out at all.

in other non-news, there's a fun little discussion going on over at the new louisvilleshowcase.com where we started out talking about all the crappy emo rip-off bands, and moved on toward rip-off bands in general.

and yeah, still haven't got the last Paris entries up… i know you're just dyin for 'em.

well folks, it's new years eve… day… or something. it's about time for that yearly wrap-up post wherein we cannibalize old material for new jokes, or just include a bunch of links to old posts so that the old material can provide its own punchline.

i haven't yet started to go back through the posts from this past year, but i have this feeling that it's going to be like a harvest after a drought… not much to pick from. i know i've been negligent this past year (plus some) and haven't posted as much as i should, partially because i've been attempting to develop some sort of social life, partly because some events occurred that took up a bunch of my time without really providing me with anything worthwhile to talk about, and partly because some events have occurred recently that are happily *still* taking up a bunch of my time and i choose not to go into detail about it other than to say that i'm immensely happy.

without further ado, here are the 10 most exciting/interesting things that have happened this year (and that i've previously written about) — (in chronological order, old to new):

1. The France Plan, part 1 — started talking about taking a trip to France early in the year, which eventually became a plan to go for my sisters wedding late in the year.

2. I wrote a story that eventually came to pass.

3. Put my task list up for a vote and released the first public Lucifigous Prick demo track. (which i apparently need to upload to the new server…)

4. I posted some pictures from my and brian's trip to romulus.

5. Spider-Man

6. went to visit nate.

7. Designed some flyers, started revving up for the first Lucifigous Prick show, and continued to make the same realizations about how i really needed to get off my ass and do something.

8. The number of my co-workers continues to dwindle ("Five!" … "Three sir." … "Three!")

9. Lucifigous Prick had our second show.

10. i finally made it to France for my sister's wedding.

and those are, unfortunately, the highlights. that's what i get for being a bum about posting on a regular basis. the majority of my posts are about the fact that i don't post often enough.

but, to stop putting a negative spin on things and reiterate what a great year this has been for anything other than posting to bipolar, the highlights are: Lucifigous Prick gets several shows under it's belt, I get to go to France (and for nothing less than my sister's wedding to a great guy), and i meet an awesome girl who makes me immeasurably happy. all-in-all, a great year to remember, and i think next year will be even better.

so, to all our friends, to all of you who've been reading for almost three years now, and to those of you who just stop by on occasion, have a safe & happy new year!

well, the puff and I took a little trip up to bloomington this weekend to visit (frequent commentator, and long-time best friend) nate, and had a grand ole time. friday night consisted of a lot of PlayStation playing and beam/beer drinking, and just general hanging out. on saturday, after lunch, we met up with a gaggle of nate's friends to go see the new Star Wars flick, at an almost-nice theater (much better than the should-be-condemned Showcase Cinema on Bardstown Road, which is where paul & I–regretfully–saw it the first time).

whether it was the better theater, or some other factor, i liked the movie much better the second time around. i was a bit dissapointed at first viewing… i didn't feel like it fulfilled my expectations from all of the great trailers they had for it. it was quite slow in places, and Lucas' writing has been getting more & more juvenile with each successive film. well, at the second viewing (much like my third viewing of Spider-Man), i was able to forgive some of those faults and just "enjoy" the movie. needless to say, it was, as brian said, 100% better than the crap-fest known as Episode I: The Phantom Pants-Mess. but, unfortunately, it also didn't entirely redeem that movie (in my mind) as i was hoping it would.

it was a bit funny though, coming out of the movie… pretty much all of nate's friends had largely negative reactions to the movie. it seemed a bit absurd, really.

(btw. Spider-Man is still the top dog. Star Wars only garnered $116.2 million in it's four-day weekend compared to $114.8 for Spidey's three-day total. boo-ya.)

anyway, despite the brush with negativity, we had a great day. went back to the house, watched some Batman: The Animated Series that nate had on DVD, hung out, played more playstation. We had an almost surreal experience later that evening at the local Waffle House (a not-Waffle-House Waffle House), with very strange conversation. I told nate & paul both that i'd mention the rather horrid puns being bandied about (courtesy of Paul). We were, of course, talking about the exquisitely gorgeous Natalie Portman, and paul, in response to our discussions about specific portions of her anatomy, decided to call them her "Naboobies." be mindful of the fact that i would never have written that down or repeated it, had it come from my own mouth.

after dinner, more PlayStation, more drinks, more discussion. woke up Sunday about noon-ish, grabbed some lunch, hung out some more, packed up all our crap, said goodbye to the dog, the cat, and the nate, and hit the road for home. we got back in plenty of time for paul to relax before the X-Files series finale came on, and before i had to go to band practice.

All-in-all, it was a great weekend, very relaxing except for sleeping on the floor (which wasn't as bad as it could've been since i went ahead and bought this huge fluffy comforter and a "vellux" blanket) and dreaming about sex with Denise Crosby (A.K.A. Tasha Yar from Trek: TNG). it was nice to get to hang out with nate, who we don't see often enough.

the final piece of wisdom from the weekend, was also from Paul (who may've been attempting to pre-redeem himself for the "Naboobies" comment he'd eventually make the next evening) who provided the title of this post.

damn. looks like ol' Spidey's going gangbusters. I had hoped it would be good, and i figured there would be a good big reaction, but i have to admit that i never saw this happening. $114.8M in three days (final numbers). craziness. that's what it is.

well anyway, so, now i've seen it three times. hehe.

i've hesitated to make a new post because the comments on the last post have been fairly active (compared to the normal comment volume anyway), but i've used that as an excuse long enough.

since the Lucifigous Prick show is now listed on the Louisville Music Index, i took a couple hours to throw together a quick site. and i finally registered the domain name. so now, i don't have to post links to our MP3s here, and instead can do this: http://www.lucifigousprick.com/.

and aside from Spidey, band stuff, work, and hanging out with Nate (who's out of school and in town for a few days), not much has been going on.

exciting (& geeky, as usual) things happening today:
1. will be picking up the Star Trek: The Next Generation Season Two DVD box set
2. i get to pick up the comics (hopefully) that didn't get delivered to the store last week, plus this weeks comics
3. back-to-back new episodes of Enterprise

am i happy? do you have to ask?

i didn't think so.