Collateral Damage

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Ripple Effect

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Summer Break

It’s been a quiet time around the Grapefruit office while everyone’s away on summer break. Or at least, that sounds like a good excuse for the lack of things around here. I have been watching films and television, and playing games — I’ve just been a bit lax writing about them. I’ve only got three episodes of Battlestar: Galactica season one to watch and it’s still awesome. I won’t start reviewing it until I get to season two, though. Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time was great, too — I’ll probably review it too, at some point. Yes, I’m a little behind.

We got the yellow pages the other day. L-Z is now sleek and black with yellow highlights, an inverted A-K. I reckon A-K must be getting jealous. L-Z looks awesome. Speaking of awesome redesigns, the DS got a whole lot more sexy yesterday (or rather, it will) after the announcement of the DS Lite. A hot Australia Day was made even more annoying when I had to wipe the drool off Andy’s keyboard as he gibbered in the corner.

Finally, X3 seems to be getting a subtitle: ‘The Last Stand’. I don’t like subtitles. I don’t know where to put them on reviews. When X2 came out I saw ‘X-Men United’ bandied around the place but it’s not on the actual film. IMDb calls it a “promotional title”. After the film’s release they’re lost in the mists of time. Besides, what’s the point of doing subtitles when “The Secret of the Ooze” has already been taken? Nothing’s going to top that. X3 is apparently “the conclusion of this trilogy” according to some 20th Century Fox executive. I like how studio bosses are getting artistically involved in movies these days.

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Expose

Channel Ten is promoting their new US import, Supernatural as coming from “The Director of X-Files“. So, just who is the director of The X-Files, given that the show ran for nine seasons with the usual cycling of directors? Is it writer/creator Chris Carter, who directed a about an episode a season? No. Is it Rob Bowman, the director of numerous episodes as well as the 1998 movie? No — he’s too busy making quality films like Elektra.

So who is it? Well, it could be David Nutter, but it seems that Channel Ten mean be Kim Manners — who has directed boodles of times for The X-Files and twice for Supernatural, and is also co-executive producer on both shows. So it’s “from” him. And not, say, “from” Eric Kripke, the creator and writer of the show. Why not? Why, because then they’d have to say “From the co-creator of Tarzan” and I think we can all see that that’s not so impressive.

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Therapy

A few random points of TV interest:

  • I’ve watched the first two episodes of Battlestar Galactica season one, and they’re awesome. I doubt all the episodes will be this tense — I don’t think I’ve been closer to the edge of my seat since the first season of 24. I’m particularly looking forward to getting to the final five episodes of the season, because there are downloadable commentaries from SciFi.com.
  • Speaking of which, there was a downloadable commentary for ‘The Christmas Invasion’ as well, where Russell T. Davies revealed that Doctor Who‘s second season will show us the establishment of ‘Torchwood’. Hopefully, it’ll be an historical episode, just because that would be much cooler. How much cooler would it have been if The X-Files had been set in 1897?
  • And while I’m on The X-Files — I’m on a segue-roll here — I’m halfway through season two, and I’ve just seen the two-parter that introduced the shapeshifting alien bounty hunter. Which reminded me just how awesome we all thought face-morphing was in the nineties. We’ve come a long way.

Meanwhile, I’ve spent today wrestling with Word. In a 53 page document, I changed one group of bullets to roman numerals, and went on to find that every other set of bullets in the document had suffered a similar fate, and had to change them all back. Even the ones that were supposed to be roman numerals refused to reset their numbering for different lists, greying out the option to do so. This is tremendously uninteresting, I know, but I’m writing it down as therapy. Just ignore me.

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The Christmas Invasion

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Yuletide

Everything’s a bit quiet around here at Christmas time. I’m busy, of course, buying presents, and relaxing, and watching The X-Files, and gleefully anticipating Doctor Who‘s ‘The Christmas Invasion’. But I thought I’d just blog about a few random things to keep things ticking over here.

  • There’s a bit of a TARDIS invasion going on in the ‘Recent Weblogs’ section. Can no one save us?
  • Talkback callers continue to whinge about Christmas not being as Christmassy as it usually is. I haven’t actually noticed anything different, but if there is I wouldn’t be surprised if it were a reaction against the commercialisation of Christmas.
  • But then, Southland has been insanely busy all week, so that’s not likely.
  • I’m rubbish at watching proper television now. I need to get an EyeTV, or a DVD recorder, or something. I have only the vaguest of awareness of what day it is at the best of times.
  • I’m in the next St Leonards Old Collegians Association musical, in the chorus, but I have one scene as a crazy spiritual therapist called Dr Mandril. And I’m supposed to do it in an American accent. If Jess or Sara are reading this they’re probably cringing already.
  • Speaking of, where’s the Harry Potter review, Jess? Don’t give me that “I’ve got a full time job and a life and it’s Christmas and I’m busy” excuse. Do you know how often I hear that?
  • Finally, Andy and Matt have gone to Perth for the holidays to be with their families. This slightly reduces the number of gaming systems Andy has access to, and it’s my fervent hope that he might write something for Grapefruit again.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

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Powerless

So, we let someone turn our power off today, in order to upgrade something. I’m not sure of the details, they’re not important. What amused me was just how stranded I was without power. But my brain kept trying to make the oddest compromises with my situation.

When there’s no power…

  • You can’t use your computer, not even just for offline stuff.
  • You can’t cook hot food — not even toasted cheese sandwiches.
  • You can’t play Xbox. Not even the free, crappy version of Top Spin you got with it.
  • You can’t watch DVDs. No, not even if you don’t want to see any of the special features.
  • You can’t make a coffee. Not even instant coffee.
  • You can’t vaccuum. Every cloud has a silver lining.

In other news, the rating sticker on my Doctor Who Box Set did come off, but the first disc is damaged and I think I need to take it back. Which is a pain. I think I’m also going to have to spend $120 to get both the Neverwinter Nights expansions for the Mac. I could hack it and spend $40 on the PC versions but I’m uncomfortable with hacks.

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Team America: World Police

Warning: the following review may contain coarse language, and puppet sex. Continue reading at your discretion.

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Angel

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