Good News, I Think...

Well friends, it seems like superheroes are suddenly cool again. What other conclusion can we draw from the reality that Spider-Man: Brand New Day is by far the biggest movie of the year, while Disney itself just seemingly relaunched the entire Marvel franchise to thunderous applause at their D23 show?

Quick Thoughts: The Mandalorian Season 3 Finale (Spoilers)

Spoiler alert: this post is totally going to have spoilers for the Mandalorian Season 3 finale.

TRON Reconsidered

I didn’t love TRON when I first saw it in theaters. Mostly because I’d had enough programming at the time to understand that, “This is not how computers work.”  Partly, too, because the movie is deliberately weird.

Alas, I missed some of the film’s subtler themes.

15 Must-Watch Movies from Disney+

Disney+ is coming next week, and with it comes a bunch of old movies.  

This is my initial recommended watch list.  I’ve tried to go heavy on relatively older movies for the benefit of younger viewers who maybe missed some of this when it first hit theaters.  Hell, I saw at least half of these on VHS back in the day.  Lots of you weren’t around for that, I know.

I’ve tried to skip the obvious.  You don’t need me to tell you about Star Wars or a blockbuster that came out just five years ago.  Most of these are favorites from when I was a kid, meaning the late 70s to early 90s.  That doesn’t seem that long ago to me, but I’ve got teenagers myself now, so I know it seems like an unfathomably long time to some of you.  The newest entry on this list is 2008’s Bolt.  That might be a little too new for the criteria, but what can you do?

After some internal debate, I’ve decided to list these in the order in which I intend to watch them.

Enjoy!  And feel free to add on if you’ve got something I missed.

Quick Thoughts: Endgame and the MCU

Finally saw Avengers: Endgame over the weekend.  My kids and I felt very much like the last people on Earth to get to the movie, but I know that’s not true.  In fact, I work with a couple of guys who’ve never seen any of the Avengers movies. I mean, I know it feels like Marvel have taken over the movie world, but it’s still a specific niche, believe it or not, and there are plenty of folks who aren’t paying attention.  It’s just a very loud kind of niche.

Lots of folks have published thoughts about Endgame.  It’s unclear that the world needs mine.  I’m gonna give them to you anyway, though, mostly because I’ve not yet had any time to grill or to think overmuch about how I’m going to write about grilling.

*big-time spoilers ahead*

5 Things on a Friday: How to Make a Casa Cabeza App

Happy Friday, everybody!

From MTV's Celebrity Death Match

Friday Mad Science: On Star Wars & the Nature of Rebellion

The last trailer for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story dropped yesterday, and it looks impressive.  Most impressive...

Sat. News & Notes: Ignoring Valentine's Day

Let's start with the Russians...

U.S. Says Images Show Russian Armaments Near Embattled Ukraine Town http://t.co/3x1TWqR2zP
— The New York Times (@nytimes) February 14, 2015

5 Things on a Friday: On to 2016!

Congressional elections are over, and as a result, the 2016 Presidential Election Season has officially begun.  In many ways, it feels like the 2016 Election cycle has been undereway longer and with more enthusiasm than this year’s mid-term elections ever managed, but even so, the elections this year produced a clear, decisive winner.  The people have spoken.  If their expressed will doesn’t get the country moving in at least some kind of direction, I know that I personally will be quite disappointed.  

The GOP now has an opportunity to prove something.  If it wants to win in 2016, the party of Lincoln and Roosevelt had better get to work.  It needs to show people that it can do more than just heckle from the cheap seats, or it risks again being banished to the wilderness like it was in 2008.