A Clone's Paradise

Pic of the Day 199 - Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T09:58:00.002-06:00

Kamen Rider Skull, SIC, by Bandai

What I Got for My Birthday

2011-10-26T23:15:00.000-06:00

This past Monday was my 33rd birthday. Insert old man joke here. Did I get any cool presents for my birthday? Of course! What kind? Toys, of course! What property? Kamen Rider Double, my most favoritest TV show ever!

From my wife, the Master Grade Figure-rise model kit of Fang Joker (Kamen Rider Doubles most awesome-est form). This makes my fourth MG Figure-rise kit, because I think they're fantastic. Someday I'll even write a post about how awesome.

Following the theme, I also got SIC Vol 58, Kamen Rider Double Fang Joker and Skull. Freaking awesome set.

And finally, I got my first of the Role Play Toys, including my first Gaia Memory (which, honestly, I am completely obsessed with (the memories, in general), I think it's a large part of my fascination with the TV show) - the Skull Magnum (and DX Skull Memory). Awesome.

I can't wait to get more role play toys, in theory I should have 3 or 4 on the way to me soon. And I can't wait to get more memories. There are Deluxe memories with lights and sounds, there are candy toy sound memories, there are capsule machine sound memories. And I want most of them.

What I Got This Past Four Months

2011-10-23T11:07:00.000-06:00

Once again, even though I only get a few items a week, if that, I can't make myself post each week, so here are several weeks worth of What I Got This Week.

A few weeks ago I purchased something I really wanted, that I really shouldn't have spent the money on, and last week I ended up trading it for something I had originally had on pre-order, but canceled in order to purchase that which I shouldn't have. For a few days the Exclusive edition of Sideshow's 12" Red Cobra Ninja figure was mine, but after taking a few awesome pictures I realized it would be better to have the Green Lantern Classics wave 2 figures, so I found a guy willing to swap straight over. So GLC 2 arrived this week (that is, it arrived the week that I started writing this post, something like four months ago). Stel is an awesome build a figure (though the crotch piece on this one is defective, I have purchased an alternate Sodam Yat for the BAF piece, but have not yet opened it).

A week or two later arrived my set of DCUC 17, the Anti-monitor/Skittle Lantern wave, and it is awesome. Hands down this is my favorite wave in a long time, quite possibly my favorite wave of the entire line.

In other DCUC news, I picked up Jonah Hex and The Creeper from the Bane wave a few weeks back, Hex is quite nice. Just a week or two ago, with the use of some $5 off coupons I picked up Toy Man and Bronze Tiger from the Apache Chief wave. I also picked up the Batman Legacy Mr Freeze, but decided to return it so I could buy something else. So now I need another one.

Several weeks ago I got a few really awesome things, like the Transformers Collector's Club Exclusive G2 Classics Ramjet, which is garishly awesome.

A couple weeks after that the free Collector's Club membership figure arrived, Sideburn! This makes 5 repaints of this figure I have, I believe? I'm only missing 3 of the 4 Japanese exclusive decos.

Found the TF DOTM Thundercracker - a G1-esque repaint of DOTM deluxe Starscream, which is supposedly quite a good figure. Of course, having bought one I now hope for G1-esque Starscream and Skywarp repaints, and of course Dirge and Ramjet retools (and might as well do Thrust too). But I'm too lazy to go take a picture of it.

I bought a custom Ultra Magnus from a guy on TFW2005, this one a mash-up of RID Optimus Prime and RID Ultra Magnus, with a decent paint job. Honestly, it looked a little better in the pictures, though in reality, that's just reality not living up to my unrealistic expectations. This is the second custom Ultra Magnus I've purchased, and while I was really excited to get both of them, due to extreme lackage of funds I'm considering selling both of them off. Also too lazy to take pictures of it at this time.

Over the course of several weeks I found the lost waves of Transformers Reveal The Shield, including Voyagers Solar Storm Grappel, Lugnut and Deep Dive, as well as Deluxe Bumblebee, which I don't need, because I already have the first black-stripe repaint of Classics Bumblebee, but why not have two of them with different striping? I don't know, so I bought it. I probably mentioned it previously, but then again maybe not, so somewhere along the way I also found RTS Perceptor.

Because I like the Cybertron Legends Seeker mold a lot, I picked up a TF Dark of the Moon Legends 4 pack at TRU, with a coupon I had so it ended up being only $7 or something.

Speaking of liking that mold, I picked up four of the Cybertron Legends Seekers, Sunstorm, Starscream, and the two con exclusive versions: Ramjet and Skywarp. Awesome little guys. This one's Skywarp.

Through a trade at TFW2005 I finally picked up the final TF Generations figure I was missing (until the new figures start shipping), Wheeljack! Via a different trade I picked up the arm I was missing for Energon Wing Saber, who is awesome, now that he's complete.

Recently I found TF Dark of the Moon figures on sale, and bit on a couple I've been eyeing since the line began: Voyagers Optimus Prime and Skyhammer. I'm about done with DOTM figures now, unless we get some G1 decos of Skywarp and Starscream. Sometime previous to this I had also purchased Voyager Megatron, who's not bad.

Again via TFW2005 (I knew joining that place was a great idea) I picked up a couple more TF Henkei's, two of my higher desired figures, Dirge and Thrust (Still need Henkei Skywarp, Ramjet and Ghost Starscream, if anybody wants to help out). Yes, I already have the Generations versions, and yes, I still want the Botcon versions. Let it be known here and now (if it's not already), I am a sucker for the Decepticon Seekers, and will try to buy pretty much any repaint of my favored ones (Starscream, Skywarp, Dirge and Ramjet), and will usually grab the other two if I can as well. In yet another TFW2005 transaction I picked up my first Japanese Mega SCF figures: Star Saber and Victory Leo, who are kinda cool, I haven't played with them much yet, but they're supposed to combine into Victory Saber, and that sounds neat.

Oh, it looks like I haven't talked about the Kabaya candy toys here. They're awesome! They're cheap little snap together model kits that are sold in Japan, and imported to the US for slightly greater costs, but they're totally worth it. I have 3 sets from the first two waves (of 3 sets each), Star Saber, G1 Ultra Magnus and Classics Jetfire, and picked up all of wave three, which consists of Classics Starscream, Powermaster Optimus Prime, and Apex Armor (which can combine with Powermaster Prime to form their supermode). They're lots of fun to assemble and sticker up, they're small but decently detailed, and they transform (well, they parts-form, but that doesn't bother me). There's a combiner set of six smaller figure that I want to get, and wave 4 has recently been announced to contain Rodimus (MP look it looks like), Classics Inferno, and Victory Leo (I wonder if he'll combine with wave two's Star Saber to form Victory Saber?).

And winding down on Transformers, I picked up two Heroes of Cybertron figures: Megatron and Powermaster Optimus Prime. Cause I'm a bit of a sucker for Prime. In another trade from TFW2005 I acquired a few Energon figures: Ironhide, Jetfire, Signal Flare, and Strongarm, also a Cybertron Legends Optimus Prime.

Somewhere along the line I lost the super cool nifty chrome weapons that came with FansProject G3 trailer, but luckily I was able to trade for them recently. Yay! Also grabbed HFTD Leader Class Optimus Prime at a discount store, and I traded for the pretty awesome Darth Vader / Death Star Transformer.

My cousin spent large amounts of money to go to SDCC this year, and brought be back a few presents, which he kindly let me buy from him. So far I've only paid for DCUC Swamp Thing and TF Prime Matrix Prime, so those are the only ones I have to take pictures of, but he also picked up Gentle Giant's Ralph McQuarrie Concept Snowtrooper mini bust and the DC Bishoujo Evil Supergirl for me, provided I get around to paying him for them before he throws them on eBay (He sold Evil Supergirl like the first week).

The new Women of DC Universe series 3 Harley Quinn was released in June or July, which is awesome, and I finally was able to get the Ame-Comi Harley Quinn statuette for a decent price. And the Ame-Comi Minis wave 2 has been released, of which I so far only have Wonder Woman. And somewhere in there I got the Women of DC Universe series 2 Catwoman.

A new World of Warcraft wave was released a while ago, and I picked up Judge Malthred, and finally found a decent enough price to pick up the Forsaken Queen herself, Sylvanas Windrunner. I also picked up the exclusive Panderan Brewmaster figure, who is completely huge, and I have absolutely not place to put him, as my WoW shelf is full since He-Man and Skeletor moved to it once I had Battle Cat and Panthor.

I've become quite inactive over at the TrekToy forums, but right before I did I was lucky enough to win one of their contests, and a ridiculously huge package was mailed to me, containing Star Trek Scene It? Along with bonus Hot Wheels Star Trek vehicles, including some I think were never released on their own, such as the original, classic Enterprise, the Enterprise A, the Enterprise NX-01, and the Narada, so that was cool.

Speaking of Star Trek, Deep Space 9 is my favorite Trek series, and I've been working at acquiring the DVD sets over the last couple of years, so that someday my wife and I can watch them together, since we've gone through most of the Original Series, and most of TNG. I got seasons 5 and 6 for something crazy like $24 total, now I'm only missing 2 and 4.

I still check up on Masters of the Universe Classics from time to time, desiring the odd figure here and there, like Faceless One, he looks awesome. Several weeks ago I picked up Count Marzo for the excellent price of $12 shipped off eBay, which is $8 plus shipping under retail, and he's a nice figure, I like him.

Marvel Universe. It's a line I've wanted to be into, and I've started collecting it at least three times, but each time I've dropped it after only a week or two. But I still have a few figures from it, and I recently got a couple more, nice big ones: World War Hulk and Apocalypse. These will join the other big ones I have, Juggernaut, Colossus, etc, to face off against my GI Joes.

Oh yeah, and I got the Masterworks Sentinel and it is f-ing HUGE! And I love it! Every time I walk by it I have to push the little button that makes him say things like, "Mutant, halt!" Or, "Unregistered mutant detected!" and other awesome stuff, in his very awesome voice. It's a fan-freaking-tastic figure, and EVERYBODY should go buy one. He's totally worth the price.

I haven't been buying Star Wars items much for a number of years now, probably since the first three years of serious collecting were devoted solely to Star Wars, but one thing I've always had a soft spot for is Clones, and scaled prop replicas, of which I have quite a few. But one I didn't have was the plain, vanilla, scaled Clone Trooper Helmet, by Master Replicas, and I managed to picked it up for the unbelievably low price of 6 dollars and change, off eBay. oh yeah, and Free Shipping. Damn, that's awesome, if I may say so myself. Also, they're fantastic items, very nicely detailed.

The new Mortal Kombat line by Jazzwares has arrived, and they're pretty okay. I'm kinda going back on forth between thinking they're very nicely sculpted, and thinking that they're kinda lacking. Sub-Zero is quite nice, but Scorpion is a little bit messy looking, though it could just be the paint. The 6" figures are so far base on the MK9 looks, while the 4" line that should be hitting soon are based on the more classic looks, like from MK3, and I can't wait to find those. And let me take this opportunity to say, yet again, that Tanya is my favorite figure, and I want her in the 6" line in both her regular and alternate costumes (as seen in Deception and Armageddon, since I guess right now she's NOT going to be in MK9, because they are lame).

And that, I think, wraps up this post, that as been in the works for far too long, and has now lost all relevancy. But oh well. I think if I ever have a huge list of acquisitions to report on, I'll do so just with pictures, and leave off the commentary.

The reason I really wanted to get this post finished, was so I could move on to my newest obsession, Kamen Rider W! Of course, I haven't been able to wait for this post, so I've already posted a few pics of misc W items. But now the floodgates are open.

Pic of the Day 198

2011-10-02T15:23:00.000-06:00

Another picture of Kamen Rider W, Luna Trigger form, Bandai Master Grade Figure-rise model kit.

This picture is meant to show the articulation a bit more, and the balance of the figure, as I didn't have to use the stand for it to stay up, I was impressed.

For more pictures, visit the MG Figure-rise Luna Trigger page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 197

2011-09-30T19:00:00.001-06:00

Kamen Rider W, Cyclone Joker form, SIC line by Bandai.

For more pictures and info, visit the SIC Cyclone Joker page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 196

2011-09-29T19:00:00.000-06:00

Heat Metal / Luna Trigger forms of Kamen Rider W, from the SIC line by Bandai

For more pictures and info, visit the SIC Heat Metal Luna Trigger page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 195

2011-09-15T01:06:00.003-06:00

Kamen Rider W, Luna Trigger form, Master Grade Figure-rise Model Kit.

If you follow me on twitter, you already know my latest obsession is the Japanese TV show from 2009-2010 called Kamen Rider W. If you don't, you'll find out soon, if I get around to posting about the above model kit, and the other one I put together. And the figures I have en route from Japan.

Pic of the Day 194

2011-09-04T00:27:00.002-06:00

Scareglow! Masters of the Universe Classics, by Mattel and the Four Horsemen.

I've probably posted a pic of this guy before, but I've been working on my display room a little bit, and moving him to a new shelf reminded me of just how awesome he is.

And he glows in the dark.

Pic of the Day 193

2011-08-29T20:47:00.002-06:00

Undead Warlock, Meyrl Felstrom, World of Warcraft series 1, by DC Unlimited.

Pic of the Day 192

2011-08-25T10:16:00.002-06:00

Elegy, by iGear (it's a knock off Masterpiece Dirge, because Hasbro hasn't made one yet).

Kamen Rider model kit and Twitter

2011-08-20T12:30:00.003-06:00

Shortly after I started watching toy review videos by Internet Personality Vangelus I was introduced to the Kamen Rider property. Apparently it's a series of Japanese TV shows. It looks fun, someday I'll look into watching it. The point is though, the character designs look neat, and the toys are well made, if rather expensive. But I've wanted to get into the toys since seeing his reviews. A couple of days ago I watched his V-Build video of assembling a model kit of Kamen Rider Skull, and I knew I had to have it. My wife said she'd buy it for my birthday in two months. But that was too far away, so when I found out there are several kits available, and I happened to have some Amazon Reward points available, I bought one.

Master Grade Figure-rise Kamen Rider W Accel. It arrived yesterday and I started assembling it last night. I'm going to do a proper post about it when I'm all done, but I'm also using Twitter to post small updates (with pics!) as I go along, so I thought I'd throw a Twitter widget here in case anybody wants to follow along. See the widget over there ->

Pic of the Day 191

2011-08-10T01:34:00.001-06:00

Warpath, from Transformers Generations, by Hasbro.

What I Got This Week

2011-06-05T23:11:00.000-06:00

Not much to report this week. I'm trying to avoid the new Transformers movie figures (DOTM), for a variety of reasons, but this week I determined that I will be buying the wave 3 Thundercracker when I find it, and I may end up buying the movie deco Starscream, though I'd rather wait to see if they do a G1-esque paint job. I also caved and bought the Voyager class Skyhammer, because helicopters are cool, but then I returned it a couple of days later because I have no money, and also because FansProject announced a clear version of their Protector armor upgrade for Classics Hot Rod, and it is AWESOME. I pre-ordered it immediately.

Unfortunately, I don't yet have the clear Hot Rot to go with it. I also bought a TRU exclusive Legends class 4 pack, because it has a repaint of Cybertron Legends Starscream, which is a great looking figure, but I'm not sure if I'll be keeping it, as it may be a repack, not a repaint, and I found somebody that's selling me 4 other versions of that mold, Starscream, Sunspot, Ramjet, and Skywarp. So I may not need this new one, if it's the same version of Starscream.

The only other things I got this week came in the mail, so I technically purchased them last week: I finally got Ame Comi Harley Quinn (for the second time actually, but the first one was damaged and returned), along with Cheetah (which I probably won't keep) and Hawkgirl (which I already have, but the wing is broken, so I have to either sell the broken one, or fix it and sell the good one). Also got Mortal Kombat: Deception, and Mortal Kombat: Armageddon for the XBox, and they've been a lot of fun so far.

Pic of the Day 190

2011-06-01T01:05:00.001-06:00

Crystal Convoy (KO).

For more pictures, visit the Crystal Convoy page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 189

2011-05-31T17:55:00.001-06:00

Dirge, Transformers Universe Classics 2.0, 2009-ish, by Hasbro.

For more pictures, visit the Universe Dirge page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 188

2011-05-30T17:30:00.003-06:00

Thundercracker, Transformers Generations, 2011, by Hasbro.

What I Got This Week (and the two weeks previous)

2011-05-29T11:00:00.000-06:00

Haven't done a big recent acquisitions post like this for a while. Time to get back into the habit. So, what new toys have I acquired over the last two or three weeks?

Baby girl number three. Annalisa joins her two older sisters, Katie and Elayna, as the three cutest girls on earth. Or probably anywhere.

Possibly the best Prime ever made, Cybertron Optimus Prime (Leader Class). The figure is huge, looks good in standard mode, and the trailer transforms to form a flight back with giant guns. Also, Cybertron Wing Saber (Ok, technically it's the Japanese version, Galaxy Force Wing Bomber) has neat swords that store as the wing flaps in his jet mode, and he can also combine with Cybertron Prime as a flight pack.

I've been wanting to get Cybertron Prime for a while, and I think the trade I made worked out well, though I didn't get as smashing a deal as I initially thought I was (compared to eBay prices), but I wouldn't have realized Wing Bomber combined with Prime had I not made this trade now. Also included in the trade was two different sets of mini-cons that combine to form a sword, a Japanese version of Star Saber, I think it's kinda rare, and also the Dark Saber set.

The majority of these items came in a single big box from Big Bad Toy Store's pile of loot feature. But starting with two that aren't from BBTS, I found Thundercracker and Warpath here locally, from the most recent Generations wave (and the last wave for a while). Haven't found Wheeljack yet, but I may have secured one through a trade. I picked up the new Legends Starscream (unfortunately, BBTS was sold out of the Optimus and Megatron). 3 Japanese candy model kits - they're quite simple and fun to put together. This is wave three, consisting of Starscream, Ginrai (a Japanese version of Optimus Prime) and God Bomber (an armor/trailer for Ginrai). I also have a few from the earlier waves: Ultra Magnus, Classics Jetfire, and Wing Saber.

Next in the pic is an exclusive Henkei figure (Henkei being the Japanese version of TF Classics): Strafe. Strafe is a repaint of one of the best Classics molds, Cyclonus. The one was originally only available through a Japanese credit card offer of some kind, but BBTS had a bunch, and recently put them on clearance for half their eBay value, so I picked up one, since it is one of my favorite robot-modes of the Classics line, and it's a nice deco. I'm now only missing two repaints of the mold, Henkei Cyclonus and Shattered Glass Cyclonus, both of which I intend to pick up someday, Henkei sooner than SG, since that's also an exclusive and costs a bit.

Going faster, I picked up all of TF RID Rail Racer, the three train combiner. Don't like him as much as I thought I would. The train modes look fine, but the bot-modes look strange, and the combined mode is okay, but not great. I'll probably end up sellign those three. I got the ladder and one missile launcher from the TFC Gear of War set (upgrade set for a few Classics figures, like Inferno and Red Alert/Sideswipe/Sunstreaker). Inferno looks great with the ladder.

I also got three third party Transformer-esque figures: Warcry and Flameblast by FansProject, who has to be the best third part company out there. These two figures are awesome, even if they are repaints of figures I already have, they're distinct, much more interesting visually, and just a lot of fun to play with. Perfect Effect is not far behind FansProject in the quality and overall greatness of their third party releases, and the Scouting Force FX Set (PE-11) is pretty awesome. The box is tiny, but the figures are actually a little bigger than their previously releases (of which I only have the Ultimate Form box set consisting of Sun, Night, Ejector and Rewindor), loaded down with weapons and accessories, all of which have storage locations in the camera mode. Unfortunately, that little PE-11 box cost more than any two (or three, or even four in some cases) figures in the above picture, but I think it was worth the price.

Finally, I picked up the new World of Warcraft Human Paladin figure, to go with my other two recent Warcraft figures (neither of which have pictures yet), the Blizzard exclusive Pandaren Brewmaster, and Forsaken Queen Sylvannus Windrunner. And MOTUC Pathor, so Skeletor can ride into battle against He-Man and Battle Cat. I'm not a big collector of MOTUC, but the figures are nice, there are a few I am interested, partly because I had some when I was a kid, and partly because they're neat looking.

And to quickly finish off this overlong post, I picked up a few Harry Potter figures, since I'm a huge fan of the books and films: I grabbed Snape from the 7th movie line when it first came out last year, and recently found Lucious Malfoy, Bellatrix Lestrange, and Prof. Dumbledoor at TRU on clearance from the 5th movie line.

Oh, one more thing, I haven't gotten around to taking pictures of them yet (it's far too easy to get behind on that), but I picked up the RID Optimus Prime and Ultra Magnus figures, which are large TFs, which also combine with each other to form Omega Prime. They're pretty cool figures, glad I was finally able to get a hold of them.

Pic of the Day 187

2011-04-24T05:55:00.000-06:00

Red Cobra Ninja, 12" figure by Sideshow Toys.

Pic of the Day 186

2011-04-24T01:27:00.001-06:00

Dangaioh, Revoltech figure by Kaiyodo.

For more pictures, visit the Dangaioh page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 185

2011-04-23T02:03:00.001-06:00

Fun with Revoltechs

Pic of the Day 184

2011-04-21T00:46:00.003-06:00

Dancouga, Revoltech figure by Kaiyodo

For more pictures, visit the Dancouga page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 183

2011-04-20T01:35:00.002-06:00

Getter Dragon, Revoltech figure by Kaiydo.

For more pictures, visit the Getter Dragon page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 182

2011-04-19T02:28:00.001-06:00

Getter Go, Revoltech figure by Kaiyodo

Time to reload.

For more pictures, visit the Getter Go page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 181

2011-04-18T00:18:00.000-06:00

Neo Getter, Revoltech figure by Kaiyodo.

I picked up a few Revoltech figures on sale from an online store, they're based on some anime(s) I've never heard of, and know nothing about, but they're very poseable, and very fun to play with. SO fun, I had to post two pictures instead of one.

For more pictures, visit the Neo Getter page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 180

2011-04-16T00:12:00.001-06:00

Harley Quinn, Women of the DC Universe bust, by DC Direct.

I feel very lucky to have acquired this bust at significantly less than market price this past week. Being from the first series of these busts, they're quite rare nowadays, despite the somewhat higher edition size than more recent busts. Plus, I have the upcoming series 3 Harley Quinn bust on pre-order, so I'll have both Harley busts as soon as it's released, so that's neat.

For more pictures, visit the Harley Quinn bust page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 179

2011-04-10T01:33:00.001-06:00

Emma Frost, Exclusive Diamond form statue by Bowen.

One of my favorite Marvel characters, Emma Frost is (or at least, as far caught up on reading comics as I am) co-leader of the X-men. And she can turn into diamond.

For more pictures, visit the Emma Frost Diamond Statue page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 178

2011-04-08T01:50:00.000-06:00

Zatanna, Ame Comi Statue by DC Direct.

While I liked the look of this figure, I wasn't necessarily planning on getting it, but though a set of somewhat complicated events I ended up getting this figure for $10. And it was absolutely worth that price, being even better in person than I expected it to be.

Check out all the neat detailing on her cuffs, lapels, hat band, and those ribbon things have a different pattern on them, which is neat. Notice her shoes, and her fishnet stockings are actual material, not just painted on.

In fact, if you follow the ribbon things around to the back, the detailing on them is interesting. Plus she's got some kind of frosted detailing on the ends of her coattails. Also, take look at those nifty shoes.

For more pictures, visit the Zatanna Ame Comi page on my collecting wiki

Song of the Week 10

2011-04-05T20:00:00.000-06:00

Predator 2 - Alan Silvestri - 1990

I heard the soundtrack to Predator 2 long before I saw the film (or the first film). In fact, I've only just recently seen the two films, and while I think they're fantastic films, I probably did enjoy them more because I was already familiar with the music, and I freaking love it. The Predator 2 soundtrack would probably make ANY movie better. I'd go see a Barbie movie with the Predator 2 soundtrack. Hell, I'd even see the Twilight films if they were set to Predator 2. That's how much I love this CD.

The best example of why I love it so much is the End Titles piece. Like many End Credits pieces, it's rather analogous to the Overture of an opera, in that many of the themes from throughout the film are featured in it, so you get a good overview of the entire work. My favorite portion is the final theme brought it, about a minute and half from the end, especially the transition to it with the big gong smash. I like gongs.

End Titles - Predator 2 - Alan Silvestri

If I were buying this album on a track by track basis, the End Titles would be almost just enough to cover all the bases. But there is one more track that I really enjoy, that I don't feel is really represented in it. It probably is, but if so, the stand alone track still really stands enough alone that I don't notice it being present in the End Titles. Plus, it's got a fun name, El Scorpio, which jumps out at me for a couple of reasons, a silly one being that I am a Scorpio. But really, it's just got lots of great sound textures in it. I can't imagine how one could write something like this, it's just amazing.

My cousin and I recently had a big discussion about movie music composers, and he said that all Silvestri's music sounds the same, you can tell it's Silvestri. Predator and Predator 2 are the only things I'm really familiar with, but I just watched GI Joe: Rise of Cobra, and noticed at the end that Silvestri did the music for it. I liked it, and I would like to purchase the soundtrack, but it sounded nothing like Predator. I haven't heard anything that sounds remotely like this music, and no matter what else he's written, or what I think of it (I don't remember the music from Back to the Future, but I doubt it's any good), I will forever consider Alan Silvestri to be a genius, for these two soundtracks.

El Scorpio - Predator 2 - Alan Silvestri

When I was in high school, freshman or sophomore year, something like that, for a friends birthday party we went and played laser tag. It was really fun. It was really dark, smoke machines in some places, black lights here and there, laser lights, a very dark, moody location, lots of boxes scattered around, and sheets hanging from the ceiling, plus a sort of balcony area were you could obsevere part of the playing area (but was still part of the playing area) really great layout for it. They let about, oh, I don't remember, 10 or so people on the field at once, but the area was large enough that you could roam around for a while without seeing the others. It was a free for all game, and there was a very heavy sense of foreboding and hunting and being hunted, and it was just a fantastic mood to the whole thing, not at all like the Halo games I've played online, where it's a frenetic chaotic mess of just running and shooting blindly and dying every 7 steps. It was a slower, dreadful, intense sense of carefully hunt your enemy and kill them before they kill you, you will not respawn, death is the end, sort of feeling.

I think we played two games, and about half way through the second, I realized the fantastic mood was in large part due to the music being pumped over the loudspeakers. It wasn't some loud, repetitive trance music, or God forbid, pop music like the Backstreet Boys or Michael Jackson or whoever was popular in the early 90s, it was moody, hunter/hunted music. I checked at the front desk before we left to find out what it was, and they actually had on display the CD cases to what was being played during the game, and it was the Predator 2 soundtrack. There may have been other CDs on display, but the only one I remember is Predator. The next time I saw my Evil Cousin Rish, I asked him to see if he could find that soundtrack for me (so I must have been a freshman, without my own transportation at the time). A couple weeks later he gave to me one of the first 6 CDs I had, purchased from his favorite used CD shop, and I've had it ever since.

Well, I hope somebody enjoyed all the rambling, or even better, I hope somebody enjoyed the music, I highly recommend this album, it's probably one of my top five albums ever, definitely top five soundtracks ever.

View the Predator 2 soundtrack at Discogs.com

PS: Holy crap! He also did The Mummy Returns soundtrack, I'll have to give that a listen, I love that movie.

Pic of the Day 177

2011-04-03T18:44:00.001-06:00

Revoltech Alien

Revoltech Aliens Warrior

vs GI Joe Pursuit of Cobra Alley Viper

Coming soon: more Revoltech pictures! I've recently discovered how awesome Revoltech figs are, and picked up a few on sale, and just had a lot of fun with them.

Pic of the Day 176

2011-04-03T12:04:00.003-06:00

Crystal Convoy, KO.

Unfortunately, this is an unofficial figure, not by Hasbro or Takara, though based on a figure of their design. Unfortunately, the official figure was an exclusive release of some kind and sells for hundreds of dollars on eBay, so I'll never have it, but this one will do, despite it's inferiority.

For more pictures, visit the Crystal Convoy page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 175

2011-04-03T02:05:00.003-06:00

Harley Quinn, Cover Girls of the DC Universe Statue line, by DC Direct

For more pictures, visit the Harley Quinn Cover Girls statue page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 174

2011-03-29T23:33:00.000-06:00

Black Canary Ame Comi figure by DC Direct.

This is another figure that I appreciate more in hand than I did from pictures before buying. The matte black of her body suit contrasts nicely with the glossy black of her jacket and boots, all the gold detailing works really well, but what I like best of all is the throwing star in her left hand. It's something I'd never noticed in the solicit photos, and I think it really adds to the personality of the character and the figure.

For more pictures, visit the Black Canary Ame Comi page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 173 and Review of Ame Comi Hawkgirl

2011-03-27T16:04:00.000-06:00

Hawkgirl Ame Comi Heroine statue by DC Direct.

Great looking statue, in my opinion. However, there's something a little off with these pictures. Can you tell what?

I tried to photo them in such a way as to hide it, but it's pretty apparent to me that she's gimpy. While attaching her to the stand, her right wing snapped off. :( However, I think she's too interesting looking of a statue to delay posting some pictures of her while I attempt to mend her broken wing.

The first pic allows a good look at clawed left hand, the arm band on her right, and her helm. I like the way the black paint under her hawk-eye doesn't end, it streaks back fading into the gold. I thought at first it was a mistake, but both sides are the same, and I rather like the effect. It is also apparent from this angle that her top doesn't wrap around, and while she's...um, rather large...in the front (less apparent because you can't see how thin the rest of her body is), I'm not sure that covering would stay in place particularly well in actual flight/combat. Although the red strings wrap around her waist as well as her neck, so maybe? I don't know, I'm no fassion expert. I can't even figure out how to spell it: fascion? fasion? phassion? Oh, it's easier than that: fashion.

Anyway, the second pic gives a slightly better view of the armor bit on her left hand, you can see it's got some detailing on the top, reminiscent of the Eye of Ra symbol, plus she's got some nifty necklaces. She's got a battle ready, intent look on her face, and interestingly, she appears to have an impressive scar under her left eye. Right up under her eye. That was a close call. I like that she has eye lashes or something drawn under her right eye, but she's not hiding the close call she had with her left one.

Unfortunately, the following picture removes any illusion of wings, but gives us a good look at her Mace. This hand also has the finger claws and bracer that her left has, but no wrist or hand armor, just the finger claws, the pommel of the mace is carved in an hawk head motif, though obviously my angle was off when shooting it. But the mace head itself is quite cool, I love that the studs are gold instead of the same lead color of the mace, and the collar obviously is supposed to have some interesting detailing, though either PVC is too soft to have picked up the details well, or they weren't very finely detailed to begin with. But it's an interesting texture and color if nothing else. Also, her hair is done up in one really long braid. I like that.

Ame Comi Hawkgirl definitely turns out to be one of the best figures in the line so far, one of my favorites for sure, and I didn't even get any good pics to show off her armored boots with they're hawk claw detailing, but trust me, they're awesome, it's a great figure, I highly recommend it. Plus, it's a variant on her modern costume, which I MUCH prefer to her Golden/Silver Age look, or even her Animated Series look.

But attach the stand to her back first, the hole was just a tad too small, and it took quite a bit of force to get it in (in retrospect I could have easily shaved the hole out a little with a razor, and since I had plugged the wings in first, I inadvertently pushed on her wing more than I thought I was. Stand first, then wings. :(

For more pictures, visit the Ame Comi Hawkgirl page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 172

2011-03-26T13:44:00.001-06:00

Donna Troy, Women of the DC Universe Busts

For more pictures and info, visit the Women of the DC Universe Donna Troy bust page on my collecting wiki.

Pic of the Day 171

2011-03-26T00:27:00.002-06:00

Generic Chinese Dragon desktop statue.

For more pictures, visit the page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 170

2011-03-23T19:45:00.000-06:00

Donna Troy, Ame Comi statue by DC Direct.

For more pictures, visit the Donna Troy Ame Comi page on my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 169

2011-03-23T01:11:00.001-06:00

Thrust, Transformers Generations, by Hasbro.

Pic of the Day 168

2011-03-22T01:11:00.000-06:00

Ramjet, Transformers Classics, by Hasbro.

Pic of the Day 167

2011-03-18T01:05:00.000-06:00

And now for something completely different...

Dirge, Transformers Generations, by Hasbro.

Pic of the Day 166

2011-03-17T01:44:00.000-06:00

Batman Build A Scene Statue Part 1: Robin and Catwoman, by DC Direct.

Resuming the Batman Build A Scene Statue, we finally have Part 1 here, with Batman's protoge, Tim Drake, the third Robin, and his girlfriend, Selina Kyle. Just the Batman assemblage remains.

Additional pictures of this Catwoman & Robin statue at my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 165

2011-03-16T02:22:00.000-06:00

Wonder Woman (version 1), Ame Comi statue by DC Direct

Oh, how long I have been trying to get this figure for a good price. I love the redesign of her armor, and it's really not even that big a change, except for the sides, which you can't really see in the pictures I've taken of it so far. I'll have to get a side view picture up tomorrow.

For more info and pics, visit Ame Comi Wonder Woman at my collecting wiki.

Pic of the Day 164

2011-03-11T23:11:00.000-07:00

Batman Build A Scene Statue Part 2: Huntress and Nightwing, by DC Direct.

Like Batwoman, I've always been fond of Huntress, and her costume, although in Huntress' case, I also know some about her, having read some comics with her in them. She's an interesting character. Nightwing is less so to me, but I much prefer Dick Grayson as Nightwing than as Robin. ANyway, it's a nice looking piece, I thinks.

Additional pictures of this Huntress & Nightwing statue at my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 163

2011-03-09T22:49:00.003-07:00

Batman Build A Scene Statue Part 3: Commissioner Gordon and Batwoman, by DC Direct.

This is something I should have posted weeks ago. Nay, months ago. The pictures appear to date back to August of last year. I LOVE this statue. I got Part 1 months before I got Part 2, and it was at least several more weeks before I managed to get Part 3 at a good price, but the Batman Family Build A Scene statue is Definitely worth getting, especially at the significantly reduced prices that I paid.

As is obvious, Part 3 of the Batman Family Build A Scene statue contains possibly the single most important character in Batman's life, that isn't Batman himself. Or his parents ("My parents are DEAD!"). Or the Joker ("You complete me."). He's a bit of a boring choice for a statue or action figure, but where would Batman be without Commissioner James Gordon? And as I've said before, I just love the modern Batwoman costume, it's fantastic.

Additional pictures of this Commissioner Gordon & Batwoman statue at my collecting wiki

Pic of the Day 162

2011-03-09T03:11:00.000-07:00

Ame Comi Harley Quinn mini statue, by DC Direct

While I hope to acquire the larger Harley Quinn Ame Comi statue, this one is quite nice, nicer perhaps, than the big one. I believe the colors to be very matte on the large one, where as the red of her costume here on the mini version is a very glossy, metallic red, and the white collar piece is actually pearlescent, rather than straight white. I prefer the pose on this one more too. I like the little color details on her legs and feet, which break up the red/black scheme for which Harley is known. The gold-trimmed blue and green sections at the ends of her pants, and the green trim on the shoes really jump out at you, but at the same time, I feel they blend in with the costume very well, making it better. It seems like the oval cutouts all around the thigh portion would make the outfit very prone to ripping while putting it on, if she just catches one with her foot, the whole thing could rip off, but I like the look.

I'm very glad to have gotten this new version, I think I'll quite like the mini versions, it's fun that they're different poses to costumes already released. I'm still not really interested in the blue/gray Batgirl, and though I think the mini Poison Ivy is better than the regular sized one, I'm not particularly tempted to get it. However, if I recall Series 2 correctly, it has Hawkgirl, Wonder Woman and one similar to the Supergirl (v2) I posted last time, so I will have to get all three, and series 3 has Power Girl and Donna Troy, or something like that, I may have the actually characters confused, but I'm pretty sure I want all of mini series 2 and 2 of the 3 of mini series 3.

Pic of the Day 161

2011-03-05T11:30:00.000-07:00

Supergirl, Ame Comi DC Heroines, by DC Direct.

By no means my favorite of the series, but a nice entry nonetheless. I like the Kryptonian writing on the yellow straps of the cape, the metallic blue, and that the bottom of the skirt is kinda translucent. Also like the strange design of the costume in general, with the kinda odd cut-outs on the side/back, as though to remind us the actual costume shows her midriff. I don't really care for the looking in the side mirror of a car thing, and there's something odd about her lower legs, but overall, it's quite good, everything about the costume is great.

For more pics visit my Ame Comi Supergirl page at my collecting wiki.

Pic of the Day 160

2011-03-04T01:22:00.000-07:00

Supergirl, Women of the DC Universe, Series 2 - Terry Dodson, by DC Direct.

For more info visit my Women of the DC Universe Supergirl page, or the complete Women of the DC Universe Checklist at my collecting wiki.

Pic of the Day 159

2011-03-02T23:55:00.000-07:00

Jade, Women of the DC Universe, Series 2 - Terry Dodson, by DC Direct.

For more info visit Women of the DC Universe Jade or the complete Women of the DC Universe Checklist at my collecting wiki.

Pic of the Day 158

2011-03-01T20:30:00.001-07:00

Batwoman, Women of the DC Universe, Series 2 - Terry Dodson, by DC Direct.

For more info visit Women of the DC Universe Batwoman or the complete Women of the DC Universe Checklist at my collecting wiki.

Pic of the Day 157

2011-03-01T00:22:00.005-07:00

Catwoman, Women of the DC Universe, Series 3 - Amanda Conner, by DC Direct.

Wow, I have been horribly lazy at posting pictures lately, which is a huge shame, as I've recently got some great items. Of particular interest, I finally started getting into two lines which I've been interested in from the start, the Women of the DCU busts (now I think it's just called Heroes of the DCU, since they stopped restricting themselves to female characters - and actually, since Joker, Darkseid and Sinestro are also being released in this line, I wonder if it's actually Heroes and Villains of the DCU), and Ame-Comi Heroines line (actually, since they released Batman a few figures ago (which, coincidentally was the first I actually bought) it has also been renamed to Ame-Comi Heroines and Heroes). I'm horribly behind on both lines, the bust line I would definitely be a completist in, if I could afford it, but most those from the first series, based on Adam Hughes art, are expensively hard to find. And sadly, most of the early Ame-Comi's are similarly expensive, in fact, two of my very most wanted from that line sell from $70-$120 on eBay, which is 2 to 4 times retail price at the beginning of the line (when it was $30), though that's only twice suggested retail now (most having an MSRP of $60-$70), though thankfully I've been able to get some of the newer ones for under retail. But I'm talking too much in a post that should really be just a picture, so I'll stop now.

For more info visit Women of the DC Universe Catwoman or the complete Women of the DC Universe Checklist at my collecting wiki.

Chop Sockey Night: Episode 2: Duel of the Brave One

2011-02-26T23:47:00.001-07:00

I really had meant to do this feature about once a week, but of course, I'm too lazy to even watch a movie, if I know that I'm going to have to do some form of work afterward (like write up some thoughts on the movie). But the time has come.

The second film from the self-proclaimed GREATEST KUNG FU KILLERS of all time! collection, is Duel of the Brave One, which sounds like a title for a good movie. Too bad it's not.

This one's going to be short, people. Frankly, I didn't like this movie at all. The long and short of it is, I couldn't tell who anyone was (with one or two exceptions), who was on who's side, what the hell was going on, or why the hell anybody put this movie in a collection called the Greatest anything.

It was basically about a territory dispute between two gangs. I think. Also, how some guy had supposedly betrayed one of the gangs, even though he served prison time because he wouldn't squeal to the cops. Probably. Also, there was a reasonably attractive chick in the film.

I tried really hard to follow what was going on, but while the first movie in this collection had about 8 people total in it, this one had many, many more than that. And they all looked the same. There was no identifying outfit that either gang wore, or even colors (that I could tell) to distinguish one side from the other. I'm not even sure how much we really saw the other side. There was a cop, who was big for a Chinese guy, he was a good 6 inches taller than most of the characters, if not a foot. His boss was some white guy, and I think he said The Empire or the Crown at some point, so maybe this took place in Honk Kong, or some other British held city.

The fighting was faster than in Shadow of the Tiger, but it also felt much less refined, more poorly choreographed, much less real, too unstructured, and too confusing (what with not knowing which side anybody was on).

I tried, I really did, but I could not stay interested in this film. I kept drifting off to sleep, and even though I think it's partly because I was getting sick, that's extremely rare. I kept telling myself the movie was almost over, I felt like it had been going on forever, but when I finally checked the run time, I had barely seen over half of it. There was still 40 minutes to go. And I gave up. I turned it off, and I went to sleep. I don't think I can possibly finish it, I am so lost as to what's going on and who anybody is, that I feel I have no investment in any of the characters, what their plights are, or what the main point of the story even is. And I certainly don't want to start it over again to try and figure out what's going on, so I think I will pass on the rest.

I just went and examined the case again, and there are three people on the cover. I think I know who two of them are, one is the leader of one of the gangs, we've seen him 2, maybe 3 times, all he's done is yell at his underlings. One is, I think, supposed to be the protagonist, because everyone was looking for him for a while, and we're still following him around a lot, but I couldn't tell you why. I have no idea who the third person is. The stills on the back of the box don't even look like scenes I'd seen yet, it almost made me curious to see the remainder of the film, to get to those scenes, but not only did the scenes not look familiar, neither did the people in the scenes, which means it's entirely possible I DID see them, and just don't remember them (although the lighting in one makes me think it came from the other film on the disc, Shadow of the Tiger), so color me completely lost and confused with this film.

My conclusion is, then, don't watch Duel of the Brave One. The blurb on the back makes it sound exciting. It's not. It's incomprehensible and confusing. It's got poor kung fu, and I couldn't stay interested in it for even half of the 90 minute run time. Even the (presumed) promise of better fight scenes at the end of the film can't make me sit through the rest of it. This film has no redeemable features. Avoid at all costs. It's so bad, I wouldn't even scan the cover for you to see. At this point, I feel the $2 I spent on this 6 film collection to have been wasted. $2, for 6 movies. So far wasted. I could have bought some soda which I would have expelled from my body a few short hours later, and gotten more out of it, than I got out of this film. If anyone tries to get you to watch this movie, it means they don't like you.

I hope this "Greatest Kung Fu Collection" gets better.

Chop Sockey Night: Episode 1: Shadow of the Tiger

2011-01-31T20:24:00.008-07:00

I recently picked up Kung Fu Killer Collection Volume One, which defines itself thusly (emphasis NOT added).

Get ready for ACTION featuring 6 of the GREATEST KUNG FU KILLERS of all time in one SUPER 3-PACK COLLECTION! Ferocious fighting and wall to wall thrills and adventure await!

It was $2, so how I could resist? Neither Jackie Chan nor Jet Li stars in any of them, so how good could they be? Neither is Steven Segal for that matter. However, Bruce Li is in one, so could be interesting.

Anyway, I thought they could be mildly entertaining at the least, since I enjoy wire-fu movies like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and the odd kung fu flick I saw as a kid. I watched one a couple of nights ago, and thought it would be fun to review it a little bit. This idea is heavily inspired by everything The Spoony One does at his awesome website The Spoony Experiement, specifically the It Came From Beyond Midnight feature, where in a couple of guys with an old video store watch and commentate on absolutely horrible old films.

The first of the GREATEST KUNG FU KILLERS of all time! is Shadow of the Tiger.

You know it's going to be great when there are two films on one DVD.

Shadow of the Tiger can only be described as kung fu porn. The plot, such as it is, is given to us with five minutes of exposition followed by one fight after another, each as pointless as the next. In fact, there are two fights before we get to the expositing five minutes, and the opening credits showcase the various 'actors' by showing them performing a few minutes of warm up moves in their martial arts style of choice, along with listing some of their credits, which are things like, 'Teaches at such and such school', 'Winner of such and such tournament', etc. Clearly these are actually trained fighters, all quite good at that, and actors not so much.

The box art in and of itself is not bad, showing three of the character faces up close, and smaller in front, one guy kicking another in the face. Awesome! The strange thing is, the guy doing the kicking is the villain. Of the three big faces, one is only present in the movie for one fight, which fight serves to tell us about his opponent. Of the other two faces, neither is actually the Hero of the film.

The movie begins with a bunch of old guys sitting around in a temple explaining out the abbot of their temple has died and left no instructions on who should succeed him. So they determine the leader in the ancient tradition of Mortal Kombat! Wait, sorry, just a regular fight, not to the death or anything. So two old guys get up and fight, and they're surprisingly spry considering one's eyebrows are long enough he probably has to constantly fish them out of his soup. It's got silly stunts in it, it's entertaining and amusing, and eventually they decide somehow that one lost, I didn't quite follow that.

The loser runs off and starts his own school, combining various styles and techniques into a new one (gasp! surprise! the horror, the horror!). They call it Karate, and I guess he went off to Japan to do this, because they kept mentioning Japan when they talked about the actual villain. I don't know, I kind of took it as some underhanded jab from the Chinese at the Japanese, cause historically don't they kind of hate each other? (I'm very white in this aspect, all Asians look the same to me. I can't recognize any of the characteristics that distinguish Chinese from Koreans from Japanese from Cambodians. Sorry, no offense is meant. Seriously, I sometimes can get confused between characters if they're similar enough looking. And don't get me started on the names.)

Anyway, with that racist (hopefully not) sidetrack out of the way, the movie itself takes place some undetermined amount of time after the aforementioned fight, where a student of this runaway monk has come to a town to fight the students of all the schools to show he is better than all of them, and force the other schools to close down. He holds a competition and in turn practitioners of various disciplines get up to face him and get their asses handed to them in seconds. It was pretty awesome. One opponent got kicked off the stage and landed in front of it, unmoving. Several people huddled around him, I don't know, to go through his pockets, or take his pulse, while another challenger arose, got the crap beat out of him, and the next challenger was beaten handily in seconds and kicked off the same point of the stage as the first, landing on top of everybody still huddled around him. I liked it.

The teachers of the schools are all depressed that their students are sissies, unable to face this cursed Japanese intruder, and a few decide to try to hire somebody else to fight him, so they can keep their schools open. The young guy on the cover, whose face you can only see half of decides to go searching for a worthy combatant, leaving the old guys to see after their school. In an amusing scene he tells some fat kid to watch after his students (as if this fat kid, barely more coordinated than I am, can fend off the karate guy). When this guy (we'll call him Sky Blue, because his outfit was and I could track names from one scene to the next) returns home and finds fresh graves at his school, I fully expected it to be the fat kid. Somehow it wasn't, and I have no idea whose it was.

I'm talking too much. Quicker recap. Sky Blue meets up with some guy he knows who was at least thirty years younger than the monks in the opening scene, but kept complaining about how he was old, and slowish and weakish and couldn't possibly fight the Bad Guy (who wore a black karate gi, with a red belt, oooh, black and red, he's obviously Eeeevil). He and his daughter go with Sky Blue to find a Warrior Hero to defeat Bad Guy.

The scene introducing the only female I saw in the picture was quite fun. The dad was showing his daughter off on the streets, he hung some money tied to strings about her neck, and she spun silver plates in her hands. For 50 cents (or that's how I interpreted it) somebody could try to take the money off her, which they could keep ($8 or something). She proceeded to make fools of 3 or 4 guys, while continuously spinning the plates, kicking, dodging flipping, rolling (seriously, the plates spinning the whole time) or occasionally whacking the guys with the plates. Until the crowd bored with the spectacle and left. I like it, even if she was clearly holding plates attached to posts in some of the shots.

Anyway, the trio goes off on a short journey to find the Warrior Hero to beat up Bad Guy. They acquire a drunk guy (the one getting his face mashed on the cover), a waiter who follows them like a lost puppy, even though they tell him repeatedly to leave them alone, a boy he ferries them halfway across a river, then decides to steal their money and dumps them in the water (he turns out to be a famed martial arts expert, who justifies his attempted thievery and murder with the line, "Well, I'm poor". Let's see, there was another guy who liked to gamble but sucked, so he was flat broke, but made in impressive display of disassembling a bamboo scaffolding, and lastly, a reluctant fellow, who fought the guy in the middle of the cover art, as previously mentioned.

When this fight was introduced I didn't know who I was supposed to care about, so I cared about the guy on the cover, because he had cool threads (I didn't realize until afterward he was on the cover). He had a fancy black and red outfit with gold trim, and he also won the fight, so of course they should add him to the group. But apparently he died later, and so was an unsuitable match for the Bad Guy, so the loser got invited to the party. When they approached Loser he was teaching a 4 year old to fight (his nephew or something) and was reluctant to join the group because he had disobeyed his former master by seeking out the previous fight, so now that his master had died of old age he would always honor him by never fighting anyone again. The kid throws a fit about how his uncle told him martial arts were to defend the weak and helpless, yet when such people came seeking aid he turn them away. Guilted into this by a 4 year old Reluctant Guy joined the group. Oh, and there was fighting or some display of martial prowess to introduce each of these characters.

So the group consisting of Old Teacher and daughter, Young Teacher, Thief/Murderer, Drunk, Waiter and Reluctant Guy go fight Bad Guy in Black. They take him on two at a time, which seemed smart to me, but he pretty much kicked them all to the curb, even the girl. Old Teacher did the best, as he noticed that Bad Guy fought barefooted, and he (Old Guy) had shoes on, so he stomped on the guys foot a few times, until Bad Guy beat him to death. Yep, he punched him in the heart a few times and then left so everyone could gather around Old Guy while he died in his daughter's arms. He also gave them Crucial Piece of Advice (something that would have been good to know YESTERDAY!).

Old Dying Guy told them that to defeat Shao Khan (another Mortal Kombat reference) they needed to teach all their styles to one man, so he could fight with many styles mixed together, since that's how Shao Khan was defeating them. Since only one of them hadn't been gravely injured, Reluctant Guy becomes Reluctant Hero. Sky Blue Young Teacher instructs Reluctant Hero in the Monkey technique, although he did so with a broken arm. This was definitely the worst example of fighting in the movie, for when they used the monkey technique, they crouched on the ground like a monkey, pawing at their face, making stupid monkey moves, and there was the horrible chittering of monkeys whenever someone used monkey moves. I know Everybody Loves Monkeys, but honestly, I don't.

The Only Girl had her neck slashed or something, she was bleeding pretty bad after the fight, but somehow taught her technique to Hero-guy, either Waiter-dude or Thief-guy had a broken leg and was holding themself up with a pole while they taught, pretty tricky, and Drunk-guy was blinded. Bad Dude In Black and poked him in the eyes so bad that they were swollen shut and blackened bruises all around them. I've not the faintest idea how he could teach whatever technique was his when he was freaking blind, but he did.

So after the slowest training montage I've ever seen, Hero Guy fights Bad In Black on some rocky shore edge. At first, he's loosing, I think he was only using his own technique, but then he switched (Monkey! shouts the bad guy) and slowly, progressively starts gaining on the bad guy. There were lots of neat moves in this fight, some silly ones, and in the end, Hero Guy kicks Bad Guy out into the water, thereby signifying that the movie was over, as the picture froze before the water finished splashing, the music finished and all faded to black, the end.

All in all, it was okay, I guess, but certainly nothing to go looking for. Made in the mid 70's I think, It was dubbed in English, not horribly done, the picture wasn't great by any means, nor the acting, but the fighting was okay, and I didn't mind it. Apparently it was also rated R, though I couldn't tell you why, unless for violence? I don't know. Sure, it's a lot of fighting, but I wouldn't call it violent. Don't think I'll ever watch it again, but for 33 cents I'm not complaining. The film was 90 minutes long, maybe 10 of which was talking, seriously no more than 7 of that was for the plot. There's probably no reason for anyone to see this film, unless you get it in a collection like this and need something to do while you eat (like I was doing).

Speaking of eating, it's late, I'm hungry, maybe I'll go get some food and queue up the next film in the set, Duel of the Brave One. I love the titles on these films.

Song of the Week 9

2011-01-24T20:30:00.001-07:00

Origin of Symmetry - Muse - 2000

My brother told me I would probably like Muse. I asked where they were from, he told me England and I agreed I probably would like them. I have since found I really enjoy two of their six albums, though I haven't listened to the others yet.

This album is quite hard to only pick two songs from. Bliss, Space Dimentia, and Megalomania are definitely the top 3 songs from the album, and among my favoritest songs ever, but the other pieces are also quite enjoy able. Let's start with Bliss. I love high, electronic sounding, arpeggiated melodies (or really, they're more like harmonies).

Bliss - Origin of Symmetry - Muse

Everything about you is how I wanna be
Your freedom comes naturally
Everything about you resonates happiness
Now I won't settle for less

Give me all the peace and joy in your mind

Everything you pains my envying
Your soul can't hate anything
Everything about you is so easy to love
They're watching you from above

Give me all the peace and joy in your mind
I want the peace and joy in your mind
Give me the peace and joy in your mind

Everything about you resonates happiness
Now I won't settle for less

Give me all the peace and joy in your mind
I want the peace and joy in your mind
Give me the peace and joy in your mind

This song is mostly dark and creepy. I like that.

Space Dementia- Origin of Symmetry - Muse

H8 is the one for me
It gives me all I need
And helps me coexist
With the chill

You make me sick
Because I adore you so
I love all the dirty tricks
And twisted games you play
On me

Space dementia in your eyes and
Peace will arise
And tear us apart

And make us meaningless again
You'll make us wanna die
I'd cut your name in my heart
We'll destroy this world for you
I know you want me to
Feel your pain

Space dementia in your eyes and
Venus will arise
And tear us apart
And make us meaningless again

I LOVE the pipe organ. A couple of days ago I bought an electric guitar, so I can learn to play Through Fire and Flames by Dragonforce (and of course everything by Nightwish), but if there's one other instrument I'd like to learn to play someday, it's the pipe organ. On that note, on to Muse.

Megalomania - Origin of Symmetry - Muse

Paradise comes at a price
That I am not prepared to pay
What were we built for?
Could someone tell me please

The good news is she can't have babies
And won't accept gifts from me
What are they for?
They'll just grow up and break the laws you've loved

Take off your disguise
I know that underneath it's me
Who are you oooh

Useless device it won't suffice
I want a new game to play
When I am gone - it won't be long
Before I disturb you in the dark

And paradise comes at a price
That I am not prepared to pay
What were we built for?
Will someone tell me please

Take off your disguise
I know that underneath it's me

Song of the Week 8

2011-01-20T20:30:00.002-07:00

The Crypt - Red Flag - 2000

In 2000 I bought a new Red Flag CD, and it seemed like quite a departure from their earlier work. It was also my favorite album for a long time. I believe it was late spring/early summer the next year that Red Flag came to Utah and I went to my first concert (of my own volition). It was at a small goth dance club, the place was a dive, not the kind of place my wife and I usually go, but I had a lot of fun. It was the only time I saw Red Flag in person, probably the only time they were in Utah.

Anyway, my favorite pieces from the record are I See You and Heaven In Medias Res.

I See You - The Crypt - Red Flag

I've seen faces on a runaway ghost train
Bound for nowhere, going nowhere
Having no shame

I've seen the light at the end of the tunnel
Oncoming train, captain insane
At the end of the tunnel

I see you, I see you
I see you, I see you
You see me too but I'm getting through

I've seen the righteous
So filled with hate
Define a foe is all they know
Their common trait

I've seen people who lack ambition
Take a life without a knife
For recognition

I see you, I see you
I see you, I see you
You see me too but I'm getting through
You see me too but I'm getting through
I see you, I see you
I see you, I see you

As mentioned in the previous Song of the Week post, Red Flag started making their CDs neat looking, and I think it started with The Crypt. Pressed in glossy black plastic, this is one of the best looking CDs I have, and I think it spawned the 'Megablack' name used for the singles from this album. You can't quite tell from this picture, but the edges and inside of the disc are black, the bottom side is even prettier. I'd take a picture of mine, but unfortunately it's currently trapped in a car CD player that won't release it.

There's not much I'll say about this song, except that it's possibly the most moving song I've ever heard.

Heaven In Medias Res - The Crypt - Red Flag

My love has died and they have lied
There is no heaven
My lover sleeps and no one weeps
Cause there's no heaven

Set the table, try to dine
But I'm unable to pour the wine
Only one glass still remains
Sadly for me, no one complains

Then night falls and she calls
No longer my name, my name

My love has died and they have lied
There is no heaven
My lover sleeps and no one weeps
Cause there's no heaven

I cry out loud but my tears do not fall
They have all cried and died with my love

Song of the Week 7

2011-01-17T21:59:00.001-07:00

End Titles - Blade Runner - 1994

According to Discogs.com, Vangelis started writing music at age 4, and performed his first live concert at age 6. That's pretty impressive. I've heard only 3 of his albums, one is really quite good, one is mediocre, and the third had only one song I liked. Oh, and the theme to 1492 - Conquest of Paradise was also really good. The Blade Runner soundtrack is the mediocre one, unfortunately, I don't particularly care for most of the music (nor the movie, for that matter), but it does have one of my most favoritest songs ever, the song that got me interested in Vangelis in the first place, off a soundtrack compilation CD. The track in question, is the End Titles piece.

End Titles - Blade Runner - Vangelis

View this album at Discogs.com

Pic of the Day 156

2011-01-15T22:45:00.002-07:00

Dragon Skull! Part of the World of Warcraft Premium Series 2, Thrall figure. By DC Unlimited.

Song of the Week 6

2011-01-11T23:11:00.000-07:00

I Am the Wind - Red Flag - 2001

It's time to resume the songs of the week feature.

This week, a band that I was introduced to by a coworker during my early high school years. Red Flag is a synthpop band founded in 1984 in San Diego by English born brothers Chris and Mark Reynolds. They achieved some fame in the late 80's with Russian Radio and If I Ever. During the 1990's they formed their own independent record label to continue producing music. In 2003 Mark, who had been the primary vocalist of the band committed suicide. Chris declared that Red Flag was over, but four years later decided to relaunch the band as a solo project. Coincidentally, Chris sounds nearly identical to Mark as a singer, and has been quite prolific, releasing a number of albums and many singles.

This week's song is from the 2001-2001 Fear Series I Am the Wind single, the remix of the b-side I Love You To Death. One thing that I always enjoyed about Red Flag and the fact that they produce their own CDs, is that the CDs are fabricated to match the theme of the album. For example, the Crypt's CD is cast in glossy black plastic. The Fear Series (from the album Fear of a Red Planet) are in a beautiful translucent red.

I Love You To Death (Suffocation Mix) - I Am the Wind - Red Flag

Lay with me
And after the rhapsody
I'll share my philosophy
The irony, I love you to death

With eloquence
I bathe in your radiance
Savor every utterance
The irony, I love you to death

Love
Fire
Love
Higher (higher) (higher)

Melody
And in your eyes, poetry
Behind your smile, mystery
The irony, I love you to death

I'm your angel
All your fears I'll dispel
I'm not from Heaven or from Hell
The irony, I love you to death

Love
Fire
Love
Higher (higher) (higher)

I know this must be love
I know this must be love
What else would I think of?
Am I awake within a dream?

And every night
From dusk 'til dawn
We'll take flight
With you at my arm
We reign supreme
We're awake within a dream

View this album at Discogs.com

Ultra Leader and Clear Leader by iGear

2010-12-10T23:30:00.005-07:00

I received my iGear Ultra Leader today (for those that don't know, the Leader figures are unofficial scaled down versions of Masterpiece Optimus Prime), and I got Clear Leader last week. Here are some pictures.

Ultra Leader with FansProject G3 Trailer

Clear Leader + G3 Trailer

Clear Leader + G3 Trailer Stealth Mode

For a scale comparison, here is Clear Leader with a KO Crystal Convoy (Classics Prime)

Why I haven't posted lately

2010-12-05T19:30:00.000-07:00

The quick answer is that I'm lazy.

The detailed answer is that I've been busy doing other things, though many of them are just extensions of 'I'm Lazy'.

I spent a week's vacation visiting my wife's brother in Arizona (see my previous post), and since I routinely stay up until 2am, while everyone else goes to sleep around 11, I should have had plenty time to write up reviews of Batman: The Animated Series, or post some of the many, many pictures I've taken of my toys, because I couldn't spend the time watching movies or playing my XBox. But I didn't. Instead, I played a great deal of Poker on Facebook with my cousins. I read webcomics, I watched The Dark Knight, and I might have worked on my new collection wiki a little bit (but not nearly enough).

Then, the first week of December I went through Radioactive Iodine Treatment, which has left me isolated and home alone for a week. Though I did work from home two of those days, I didn't work full days, and I had the entirety of the rest of the week all to myself. And I still couldn't be bothered to make a post.

I spent most of the first day (like 16 hours or more) playing XBox (Bayonetta and Assassin's Creed II), then watched Predator (which is a damn fine film). Tuesday I got a box of 60 or so Transformers that I spent all day sorting through, matching up accessories and pieces, etc so I could decide which ones I'll keep for myself, and which ones I'll sell/trade on forums and eBay. I think I had some Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes playing while I did that. That night I watched half of Predator 2 (another damn fine film). The following day was a mix of working on my collection, trying to sort stuff for sale, consolidate and put some of my stuff in storage for another phase of redoing my collection room (not that the first phase that I started last December ever ended, it just slowed down until I barely worked on it once a month, and a year later it's still not finished. Anyway, I mixed that sort of productive stuff in with playing games, and finishing Predator 2.

The next two days I spent some time working, and working on my toys and playing XBox, Saturday I spent a few hours hanging Christmas lights. I got the bright idea of hanging lights all along the roof, because last year we got a hundred or so universal outdoor anchors for like a dollar at Walmart's after Christmas clearance. Of course, I don't have a ladder that can reach, so I had to walk to my brother-in-law's house (my car wouldn't start) to borrow his, then right as I started climbing all over the roof (I thought it would be easier than having to move the ladder around every 30 seconds) it started raining a little bit, so of course my pants got soaked from sitting on the wet shingles. But it looks pretty good, if I may say so. It comes at the expensive of not hanging lights in the girls bedroom, or all over the downstairs living room like I normally do, but change is nice sometimes.

So I did actually get stuff done in all this spare time that I meant to use to do lots of blog posts, I didn't just play video games and read comics (oh, I did nothing but read webcomics all evening Saturday and all day Sunday - I highly recommend The Order of the Stick and Dr McNinja). Oh, and I re-watched Hellboy and Hellboy 2 this week, because they are awesome movies, and I watched the 3 hours of bonus features on Hellboy and started into the 3 hours of Hellboy 2 bonus features. And I finished Blade Trinity, which was a lot better than I was led to believe. Not as good as Blade 2, which was freaking awesome, but good nonetheless.

Actually, I wrote did a review of the next Batman episode while in Arizona, but I never cleaned it up for posting. I'll do that soon, I promise. And I have hundreds of new toys I should post quick pictures of, half of which I've already taken pictures of, but have yet to post. I swear I'll do that one of these days.

Where I am now...

2010-11-10T19:44:00.002-07:00

Lost deep in the wastelands of Arizona. Why, you ask?

So do I.

Song of the Week 5

2010-11-02T00:09:00.003-06:00

Wild Mood Swings - The Cure - 1996

Wish is definitely possibly the greatest Cure album, and it was also very well received by fans, selling roughly four million copies. I delayed many years in buying the follow up album, Wild Mood Swings, having heard it was not well liked by Cure fans, and that it was a big departure from Wish. I recently picked it up for $4 (or free, depending on how you work the buy 2 get 1 free deal I got), and wow, was I glad I did. I am saddened I waited so long to buy it (much like my experience with Songs of Faith and Devotion, where the first track, I Feel You really through me for a loop, it didn't sound like the Depeche Mode I knew, so I didn't get it for a few years, but once I did it became my favorite album - that long rambling sentence was to lead into the follow) because two of the tracks are definitely two of the best tracks The Cure has ever produced. Granted there are a couple I don't really like at all, but for as good as most of them are, this album deserves to be better liked.

I really feel like Want describes me, almost to a T. Especially the first line.

Want - Wild Mood Swings- The Cure

i'm always wanting more
anything i haven't got
everything i want it all
i just can't stop

planning all my days away
never find new ways to stay
never feel enough today
tomorrow must be more

more drink more dreams
more bed more drugs
more lust more lies
more hate more love

more fear more fun
more pain more flesh
more stars more smiles
more fame more sex

however hard i want
i know deep down inside
i'll never really get
more hope or any more time
any more time
any more time
any more time

i want the sky to fall in
i want lightning and thunder
i want blood instead of rain
i want the world to make me wonder
want to walk on water
take a trip to the moon
oh give me all this
and give me it soon

more drink more dreams more drugs
more lust more lies more love

however hard i want
i know deep down inside
i'll never really get
more hope or any more time
any more time
any more time
any more time

And again with two tracks this week - Treasure is possibly the most depressing Cure track I have heard. It is right up there with, and possibly more depressing than, Apart (from Wish, To Wish Impossible Things, also from Wish, is also very sad). For as often as I say I have a cold, black, shrivled up heart, incappable of feelings, Apart and Treasure are very moving songs.

Treasure - Wild Mood Swings- The Cure

She whispers
"Please remember me
When I am gone from here"
She whispers
"Please remember me
but not with tears...
Remember I was always true
Remember that I always tried
Remember I loved only you
Remember me and smile...
For it's better to forget
Than to remember me
And cry"

"Remember I was always true
Remember that I always tried
Remember I loved only you
Remember me and smile...
For it's better to forget
Than to remember me
And cry"

Pic of the Day 155

2010-10-28T22:30:00.001-06:00

Soundwave, War for Cybertron (video game) design, Transformers Generations wave 3.

For more info on this figure, visit the War for Cybertron Soundwave page on my new Collection Wiki.

Song of the Week 4

2010-10-27T23:30:00.000-06:00

Over the Hills and Far Away- Nightwish - 2000

In 2001 Nightwish released the EP Over the Hills and Far Away, consisting mainly of live tracks from the previous tour, but with a couple new pieces. According to wikipedia, after recording this album, the bassist left the band due to creative differences between himself and the composer/keyboard player. He was replaced by Marco Hielata who also took on the male vocalist role. Marco is still a member of the band.

The song I have chosen from this album is actually a remake of a song from the first album, Angels Fall First, mainly with new lyrics, but also signficantly, having a guest vocalist take the male parts, as Tuomas (the aforementioned keyboardist and composer) never liked how his voice sounded on the first albums.

Every few weeks my favorite Nightwish song changes, but this version of Astral Romance was for a very long time, and still might be, my favorite piece by the band. Well, except for the one from Once, which is probalby my most favoritest song of all time. But we'll get there in a few weeks.

Astral Romance - Over the Hills and Far Away - Nightwish

A nocturnal concerto
Candlelight whispers me where to go
Hymn of gathering stars as my guide
As I wander on this path of the night

Embroidery of the stars
Undress my feelings for this earth
Send me your salva to heal my scars
And let this nakedness me my birth

Macrocosm poured its powers on me
And the hopes of this world I now must leave
The nightwish I sent you centuries ago
Has been heard by those who dwelled in a woe

The distance of our bridal bed
Await for me to be dead
Dust of the galaxies take my hand
Lead me to my beloved's land

"The constant longing for your touch
This bitter ocean of hatred and pain
This loneliness I need to be who I am"

"The oceans are alone as I
Somebody take away this gift of mine
No charisma for the beast! But still I love you forevermore"

"Come to me
Deliver me from you
And from all the days of the Earth"

No last words to say
Only memories remain
A farewell then, my path goes forever on

Thought of the Day

2010-10-25T16:19:00.000-06:00

Dr McNinja. He's a Doctor, and a Ninja. Go read it.

Batman: TAS - Episode 9 - Be A Clown

2010-10-25T00:16:00.001-06:00

Continuing BTAS Vol 1, disc 2, episode 9, Be A Clown, written by Ted Pedersen and Steve Hayes, neither of whom return to write other episodes, so far as I can determine. The director, Frank Paur, goes on to direct several other episodes, among which is the one that introduces the Mad Hatter to the show. As can be surmised by the title, Gotham's Clown Prince of Crime stars as the villain in this episode.

"Together we can make Gotham City a safe place for decent people to live and work and play."

But it doesn't start with the Joker, it starts with Mayor Hill, giving a little speech at the opening of a new housing complex about how he's promised to make Gotham City a safer place to live, cue criminals driving like madmen, tearing through the opening ceremony, chased by the police, smashing things up, nearly killing the Mayor. Of course, Batman comes and saves the day, and Mayor Hill doesn't look quite so good as he would like. He makes a statement about a few rotten apples making the entire city look bad, and further says, "Batman and criminals like The Joker are cut from the same cloth." Joker is not pleased.

"Decent people shouldn't live here. They'd be happier someplace else."

Mayor Hill continues and makes the foolhardy statement that he will make all of Gotham as safe as his mansion. "Oh really?" Joker says to himself, "we'll see just how safe your mansion is!" Cut to the next scene of Mayor Hill's son practising magic tricks, as the servants prepare for a huge birthday party in his honor. Mayor Hill is not pleased with his son's current choice of profession, and we see there's some conflict between the boy and his father (as is quite common, I'm sure). The party is ostentiably for the boy, but only people that are important to Mayor Hill's position as mayor have been invited (and their kids).

But Mayor hill has a surprise for his son Jordan and the kids, and a clown rides in on a unicycle, shakes the mayor's hand with a buzzer, does some magic tricks, and in general really impresses the kid, who asks him how he can become a famous magician. The clown says there are three steps: step one, run away from home; step two, find a magician with a great act; step three, steal it. Ha ha, oh how funny. Conveniently, Bruce Wayne arrives with a large box for Jordan, but the kid doesn't care, he wants to hang out with the clown. Hill yells at the boy, who yells back, and runs off.

"This last trick is pure dynamite!"

While Hill chases after his boy, the clown pulls out a large candle with a familiar face on it, and tells everyone this candle blows you out. He plants it in the cake, tells everyone it's time for Jordan to blow out the candles, and takes off laughing, but Bruce Wayne recognizes the laugh, sees the candle, is smart enough to realize what it is, so he goes barreling through the crowd towards the cake, and clumsily bumps into it, knocking into the pool. Mayor Hill is not pleased.

But Jordan is no where to be found. We find him hiding in the clown's truck, and he follows Joker into his hideout (an abandoned carnival), not realizing yet who he his. He pesters Joker to teach him to be a magician, Joker tries to find a way to exploit the accidental kidnapping, and Batman tries to figure out a way to rescue the child. Hilarity ensues.

Anyway, the Joker plays the kid for a sap, tries to kill Batman, endangers the kid, Jordan helps Batman escape from Joker's death trap, Batman saves the day, Mayor Hill apologizes for being a jerk to Jordan. And everybody lives happily ever after. Except The Joker, of course. And Batman too, really. And pretty much anyone that lives in Gotham.

This is why roller coasters have seatbelts...

Eh, I wasn't really fond of this episode when I first watched it. There's just something off about the Joker episodes early on in the series, but it's not bad by any means, and I like it more than the previous Joker episodes. Mark Hamill is, of course, great as the Joker. His mannerism is great, he's wacky, and an emotional pendulum, swinging back and forth from being happy and funny, to being seriously pissed off at the kid for showing up unexpectedly. And of course, I love his voice, and the many, crazy laughs he can do.

Remember kids: Where's Batman? He's at home, washing his tights! - Joker

Episode Listing

Song of the Week 3

2010-10-19T05:35:00.000-06:00

Wishmaster - Nightwish - 2000

Nightwish's third album, Wishmaster was released in 2000, and is, of course, quite good. It doesn't have quite as many good songs as Oceanborn, but it's definitely a solid album. In fact, it is such a solid album, that I'll bend my one-song-per-cd rule and let you listen to two songs, to show that Nightwish can do meaningful slower songs as well.

Wishmaster - Wishmaster - Nightwish

Master!
Apprentice!
Heartborne, 7th Seeker
Warrior!
Disciple!
In me the Wishmaster

Elbereth
Lorien

A dreamy-eyed child staring into night
On a journey to storyteller`s mind
Whispers a wish speaks with the stars the words are silent in him
Distant sigh from a lonely heart
"I`ll be with you soon, my Shalafi"
Grey Havens my destiny

Master!
Apprentice!
Heartborne, 7th Seeker
Warrior!
Disciple!
In me the Wishmaster

Silvara
Starbreeze

Sla-Mori the one known only by Him
To august realms, the sorcery within
If you hear the call of arcane lore,
Your world shall rest on Earth no more
A maiden elf calling with her cunning song
"Meet me at the Inn of Last Home"
Heartborne will find the way!

Master!
Apprentice!
Heartborne, 7th Seeker
Warrior!
Disciple!
In me the Wishmaster

Wishmaster
Crusade for Your will
A child, dreamfinder
The Apprentice becoming...

Master!
Apprentice!
Heartborne, 7th Seeker
Warrior!
Disciple!
In me the Wishmaster

Dead Boy's Poem - Wishmaster - Nightwish

Born from silence, silence full of it
A perfect concert my best friend
So much to live for, so much to die for
If only my heart had a home

Sing what you can't say
Forget what you can't play
Hasten to drown into beautiful eyes
Walk within my poetry, this dying music
- My loveletter to nobody

Never sigh for better world
It's already composed, played and told
Every thought the music I write
Everything a wish for the night

Wrote for the eclipse, wrote for the virgin
Died for the beauty the one in the garden
Created a kingdom, reached for the wisdom
Failed in becoming a god

Never sigh for better world
It's already composed, played and told
Every thought the music I write
Everything a wish for the night

"If you read this line, remember not the hand that wrote it
Remember only the verse, songmaker's cry, the one without tears
For I've given this its strength and it has become my only strength.
Comforting home, mother's lap, chance for immortality
Where being wanted became a thrill I never knew
The sweet piano writing down my life"

"Teach me passion for I fear it's gone
Show me love, hold the lorn
So much more I wanted to give to the ones who love me
I'm sorry
Time will tell (this bitter farewell)
I live no more to shame nor me nor you

And you... I wish I didn't feel for you anymore..."

A lonely soul... An ocean soul...

Batman: TAS - Episode 8 - Forgotten

2010-10-16T00:10:00.000-06:00

And so, at long last, the Batman: Animated Series feature returns. It only took my two years to review this episode. And that episode is, The Forgotten, BTAS Vol 1, disc 2. Written by Jules Dennis, Richard Mueller and Sean Catherine Derek, and directed by Boyd Kirkland, all of whose names we've either seen before, or will see again later in the series.

Gaff Morgan

The episode starts with Bruce Wayne peeling potatoes at a soup kitchen, the guy who runs the place is telling him that he thinks people are disappearing, transients, regulars he hasn't seen it a while, even volunteers. Of course, being the Great Detective, he investigates, in a different disguise, that of an older homeless guy, Gaff Morgan. He wanders around town, visiting areas frequented by homeless people, until he is assaulted by a couple of guys, after they offer him a job. Of course, being Batman, he makes short work of the two, but a third guy jumps him from the shadows and it's lights out for Gaff Morgan.

This looks just like where I grew up

He awakes in a shoddily built shack in a desert area, filled with bunk beds, several of which have occupants. Two introduce themselves, and of course one turns out to be the missing volunteer from the homeless shelter. They explain he's been shanghaied to work in a gold mine for the fastest character I've ever seen animated, up until I saw the Wonder Woman animated film that came out last year. This guy is massive, and a slob, eating all the time, spilling on himself, and according to the credits, his name is Boss Biggs. But, he's got a gold mine and cheap labor, which he, or rather, his overseers work to death. Disobedience, slacking and causing trouble are punished by a day in The Box, a steel box with a small barred window left out in the sun to cook all day.

That's not chicken he's eating...

It falls to Batman to free himself and the other slaves, without the use of his regular persona or gadgets, and without getting anyone else in trouble. It was a decent episode, not my favorite upon first viewing, but still a good episode, and knowing that I have 16 DVDs of episodes, it's nice to see some that don't revolve around the regular type of escapades.

Some of the highlights that occur are, Amnesia! When his two cell-mates introduce themselves, Bruce says he can't remember his name. Bruce Wayne does an honest day's work for the first time in his life (probably), slaving away mining gold. We start seeing that there's more to Alfred than just an old butler, he's smart and a detective on his own. Bruce has a creepy dream that helps him start to remember who he is.

Once Bruce remembers who he is he escapes the mines, to be found by Alfred, whose having a rough time in the Batwing (on autopilot). Guess who returns to the mining camp later that night? Batman lures the slavers into the mines, kicks the crap out of them one by one, leaving only fatty and one guard. Fatty accidentally blows up the mine, and Batman drags him off to prison.

"Hey, where'd everybody go?"

The episode ends with Bruce's two slave buddies finding out he remembered who he is, and he's freaking loaded, he says good by to them and drives off in a Rolls Royce. "Hit me Riley," one says, "maybe I'll loose my memory and wake up a millionaire, too!"

So, it wasn't an awesome episode, but it was good, and was pretty amusing, and different from the usual super villain fare. Well, that's it for this review. A little shorter than my previous attempts, but one reason I took a break from doing thees is because those reviews would take hours. Hopefully I'll be back next week with the next episode, Be A Clown, featuring everybody's favorite homicidal circus character, the Joker.

Remember kids: Only vampires loath sunlight more than Batman. - Alfred

Episode Listing

Pic of the Day 154

2010-10-14T00:30:00.001-06:00

Black Convoy, a KO based on an extremely limited, or possibly not even released exclusive figure.

For more info on this figure, visit its page on my new collection wiki.

Pic of the Day 153

2010-10-12T00:27:00.003-06:00

Nemesis Prime, Transformers Classics SDCC Exclusive, by Hasbro.

For more information on this figure, you can check out my new collection wiki.

Song of the Week 2

2010-10-11T23:00:00.000-06:00

Oceanborn - Nightwish - 1998

Nightwish follow up their debut album the next year with Oceanborn. While Angels Fall First is very good, Oceanborn has more songs that I like, so I guess I'd say it's a better album. It was much harder to choose one piece to feature for the album. I highly recommend listening to this album in full, in particular, my favorites are Stargazers, Gethsemane, Devil And the Deep Dark Ocean (with haunting melodies and pipe organ lines that make me thing of Phantom of the Opera), Sacrament of Wilderness (this is one of my ring tones), The Pharaoh Sails to Orion, Sleeping Sun, and A Return to the Sea.

However, for all Nightwish albums going forward I'll be listing all but a song or two as my favorites from the album, so I'd better get used to making myself stick to my one-song-per-album rule now, or I'll end up posting 10 songs an album for most of this feature.

Gethsemane - Oceanborn - Nightwish

Toll no bell for me Father
But let this cup of suffering pass from me
Send me no shepherd to heal my world
But the Angel - the dream foretold
Prayed more than thrice for You to see
The wolf of loneliness in me
...not my own will but Yours be done...

You wake up where's the tomb?
Will Easter come, enter my room?
The Lord weeps with me
But my tears fall for you

Another Beauty
Loved by a Beast
Another tale of infinite dreams
Your eyes they were my paradise
Your smile made my sun rise

Forgive me for I don't know what I gain
Alone in this garden of pain
Enchantment has but one truth:
I weep to have what I fear to lose

You wake up where's the tomb...

"I knew you never before
I see you never more
But the love the pain the hope O beautiful one
Have made you mine 'till all my years are done"

Without you
The poetry within me is dead

Song of the Week 1

2010-10-05T01:25:00.006-06:00

Angels Fall First - Nightwish - 1997

Since I've been extra pre-occupied with music lately, I thought it would be fun to try another feature here. I was never able to post a picture every day, but let's see if I can post something at least once a week. Seeing as I have around 360-ish CDs, I thought it would be fun to post one track from each record I have. Let's see how consistent I can be.

To celebrate my new favorite band (along with Depeche Mode), here is Beauty and the Beast from Angels Fall First by Nightwish. Nightwish is a Finnish band, this was their debut album, 1997.

Beauty and the Beast - Angels Fall First - Nightwish

Remember the first dance we shared?
Recall the night you melted my ugliness away?
The night you left with a kiss so kind
Only a scent of beauty left behind

Ah, dear friend I remember the night
The moon and the dreams we shared
Your trembling paw in my hand
Dreaming of that northern land
Touching me with a kiss of a beast

I know my dreams are made of you
Of you and only for you
Your ocean pulls me under
Your voice tears me asunder
Love me before the last petal falls

As a world without a glance
Of the ocean's fair expanse
Such the world would be
If no love did flow in thee
But as my heart is occupied
Your love to me now has to die
Forgive me, I need more than you can offer me

Didn't you read the tale
Where happily ever after was to kiss a frog?
Don't you know this tale
In which all I ever wanted
I'll never have
For who could ever learn to love a beast?

However cold the wind and rain
I'll be there to ease up your pain
However cruel the mirrors of sin
Remember, beauty is found within

Forever shall the wolf in me desire the sheep in you...

Pic of the Day 152

2010-10-05T01:06:00.003-06:00

Munitioner (aka Not-Swindle) by FansProject.

Specifically, this is Crossfire-02B, a third party designed and fabricated robot/vehicle that can combine with the Hasbro Combaticon figures (from the Energon or Revenge of the Fallen lines), taking the place of one of the existing appendages to provide a more G1-esque look to the combined Bruticus figure.

It is awesome.

Also, my picture didn't turn out too bad either. I've been experimenting with the light box my wife got me, learning a little bit about white balance and focus, and other photo related stuff. Really, all I've learned is to keep messing with the different meaningless numbers until the picture looks the way I want it to.

Pic of the Day 151

2010-10-02T02:02:00.007-06:00

Batman, from the Ame-Comi line of DC Statues.

The Ame-Comi line is a series of highly stylized, anime-styled, statues, based on women from the DC Universe, up until this figure.

I finally picked one of these up, I've been watching this line since it began, and had the opportunity to pick up two of the early figures for $18. But I didn't, and now it's going to cost me 2 or 3 times that to get them. There are a few that are particularly excellent, that I really want, but others also think they're excellent, and are therefore expensive on eBay.

If anyone can help me get the first Wonder Woman, Supergirl, Power Girl, or really any of the others, for good, low prices, let me know. Especially the first Wonder Woman, that one is awesome, and I can't wait for the Artemis repaint.

Pics of New Stuff, Finally

2010-09-27T01:33:00.001-06:00

Well, it's been ages since I posted anything about my collection, so I'll make up for it with a deluge of pictures. This is some of the stuff I've acquired over the past few months, starting with the more random items.

I finally got around to buying the Collector's Editions of all Depeche Modes albums from Speak & Spell (1981) to Exciter (2001), and the Best of Depeche Mode dvd set, all for the documentaries, which have been absolutely fascinating. Also picked up a bunch of DVD singles I was missing from the Playing the Angel album. Apparently I forgot to put A Broken Frame and Best Of in the picture, and Exciter hasn't arrived yet.

The best part is that via VideoLAN my laptop can actually play the PAL format DVD singles, so that was an added bonus to buying them. Still missing three live DVDs, or perhaps it would be easier to say of the four released I only have one. New live DVD set comes out in November, I'm totally buying it, since I didn't make it to the concert when they were here.

Firefly Companions vols 1 & 2. Finally was able to pick these up on eBay for cheap ($15 shipped for both and the DVD set). Good to have them along side the Serenity Companion. Nathan Fillion is sexy enough that I can overcome my homophobia enough to say that I have a man-crush on him.

I loved How to Train Your Dragon, almost as much as I love The Incredibles and Toy Story 2. Had to pick up the second version of this figure when the reviews I saw said it wasn't too bad.

I also loved Predators, and so was unable to resist picking up the figures when I came across them. Hope I can find the others.

I stopped buying Halo figures a loooong time ago, but a review of the Halo Reach preview set convinced me to pick them up, and they do look good, so I'm happy with them.

And I'm still buying GI Joes with the Pursuit of Cobra line. I thought I had pictures of all the wave one figures I bought, and wave two, but all I can find right now are the two hardest to find from wave one.

And misc Joes from discount stores.

I caved in and bought the DCUC Green Lantern 5 pack, when I heard Guy Gardner was selling for over $30 on eBay. It looks like he's dropped a bit, and I wonder if I could buy them individually for cheaper than the retail price. But I'm probably too lazy to do it.

And finally on to Transformers, which have been a much bigger focus lately than perhaps they should have been. Oh well.

ROTF Fracture (Classics Mirage repaint)

Custom ROTF Voyager Ultra Magnus

KO Classics deluxe Magnus

Generations wave 1, 2 and 3

Hunt for the Decepticons Voyagers: Battle Blades Prime, Banzaitron, Sea Spray

ROTF Mail Away Recon Ravage

FansProject Munitioner and Explorer

iGear Nemesis Leader and Masterpiece Ultra Magnus

Henkei Dark Skyfire

Animated Prime, Classics Storm Cloud

Classics Cliffjumper, Sunstreaker and Astrotrain

Classics Mirage, Sideswipe, Hound and Ravage

Classics Hot Rod and Cyclonus

ROTF Bruticus and Classics Devastator

New Depeche Mode DVD - Live in Barcelona

2010-09-23T12:00:00.001-06:00

Since my previous post was on Depeche Mode, instead of me doing a new post with all the toys I've bought lately, it seems fitting to mention them again.

On Nov 8, 2010, Depeche Mode will release another live concert, Tour of the Universe - Live in Barcelona. The video will contain 21 tracks recorded over two sold out shows in Barcelona on Nov 20 and 21, 2009.

It will be available in three formats, 2 disc Blu-ray (for those video snobs that have Blu-ray players and hi-def TVs. I wish I cold be a video snob), Deluxe 3 disc set (DVD + 2 CD), and a Super Deluxe 4 disc set (2 DVD + 2 CD), with a bonus DVD of rehearsal tracks, music videos, and a documentary video. (Visit the Official Depeche Mode website for more info)

Guess which one I'll be getting...

And, since my Depeche audio collection is nearly complete, I guess I should start focusing on completing the video collection. I need the DVD sets for 101, Devotional, and Touring the Angel - Live in Milan.

My Best of Depeche Mode

2010-08-30T01:45:00.000-06:00

I love Depeche Mode. They have been my favorite band since the early 90's, and every time I think a different band will supplant them I rediscover how great their music is, and they return to the number one spot. I suppose Nightwish is actually tied with them, but they're still the favorite.

I have an almost OCD like compulsion to own stuff, especially stuff related to things I like, and one of my first collections, one that I still work on from time to time, is my CD collection. It's not large, somewhere around 350 albums I believe, I probably have at least that many toys, possibly more, and I've only been collecting toys for 5 years. But by and large, the biggest portion of my CD collection is given over to Depeche Mode.

I have over 100 Depeche Mode and Depeche Mode related disc. This includes all studio albums (sometimes multiple copies), many singles, live albums, live bootleg, fan remixes, and tribute albums. At one time my goal was to have at least one copy of every song, and every (official) remix of every song I really liked. I have since lightened up on that, as it is time consuming and expensive, but there are still many releases I intend to get. One set in particular I'm working on is the CD/DVD Collector's Edition re-issues of all studio albums up through Exciter, the main draw for that being the 30-40 minute video documentaries that are included on the DVD. Other reasons are to get all the b-sides (again), which means I won't have to replace discs that have been scratched beyond use (such as the Walking in My Shoes single with the absolutely excellent My Joy b-side, which currently I cannot listen to).

Said CD/DVD sets are what prompt me to make this post, as I found the Collector's Edition of Ultra at FYE this week, for the whopping price of $4.99. Then I found an online store (goHastings.com) that had a few others for decent prices, so I have Collector's Editions of Construction Time Again, Violator, and Songs of Faith and Devotion on their way. I'm looking forward to seeing these documentaries, and learning about the process, the troubles and trials and successes involved in the creating of each album. While I'm waiting I wanted to visit all Depeche Mode's albums and let you listen to my favorite song from each.

Speak and Spell was released Fall of 1981 and the first album by Depeche Mode. The line up consisted of Vince Clarke, Martin Gore, Dave Gahan and Andrew Fletcher, with Dave Gahan on lead vocals, Vince Clarke writing most of the music, and Martin Gore writing a couple of songs. Vince Clarke left the group shortly after, eventually going on to form Erasure with singer Andy Bell. This album is very different from the rest of DM's music, largely (I assume) because it was Vince's music, not Martin's. It' fairly enjoyable, though by no means their best album.

My favorite song right now is Shout, the B-side to their second singe, New Life. Honorable mentions go to Any Second Now (Voices version) and Tora! Tora! Tora!.

After Vince left the three remaining members felt like they needed to prove that they could continue on without Vince, and without replacing him. Martin fully took over songwriting, and their music took a darker turn than the previous album, though we had a sample of Martin's writing in the previous album. A Broken Frame was released Fall 1982, and while I believe the album wasn't terribly successful commercially, as it took people by surprise after, it is among my favorite of their albums. It showed the world the path Depeche Mode was going to pursue and is rife with emotion. Alan Wilder was brought on to perform with the band for the live tour, and officially joined the group by the release of the next album, becoming an key part of the group for the next 13 years.

This is one of the easier albums for me to choose a favorite, and that is Leave in Silence, the opening track and first single from the album. It's a beautifully haunting melody, with subtle vocals, and I love the Longer version (on the single and US album release) with the synth instrumental at the end. Honorable mentions are My Secret Garden, Monument, A Photograph of You, Shouldn't Have Done That and The Sun & the Rainfall.

The third album Construction Time Again, Fall 1983, is not one of my favorite albums, though it contains one of Depeche Mode's most well known songs, Everything Counts. I don't really have much to say about it. Alan Wilder wrote a couple of songs for the album, their tone blending very well with Martin's songs.

My favorite song would have to be Fools (by Alan Wilder), the B-Side to Love In Itself. Honorable mentions to More Than a Party and Told You So.

In 1984, Depeche Mode's US recording label decided to release a collection of singles that US audiences might not be as familiar with, and thus came about People Are People. Not much else to say about this one.

The B-side to the People Are People single, In Your Memory is definitely my favorite from this time. I love the instrumentation, and the percussive instruments that make up the harmony. Honorable mention to Get the Balance Right as well.

Some Great Reward in 1984 brought us Depeche Mode's most well known, and most romantic song for years, Somebody.

It has a number of songs that I really enjoy, particularly Lie to Me (which includes the line, "some great reward" which for some reason always fascinates me when a song includes the album title in the lyrics), Something To Do, If You Want, Blasphemous Rumours, and more.

In 1985, The Singles 81-85 was released in the United Kingdom, including all since released to that date, and in the US it was released with a slightly different track list and titled Catching Up With Depeche Mode. I find this release significant due to it having the first released version of Fly on the Windscreen, which is one of my all time favorite Depeche Mode tracks, but I'll save it for the next album it was released on.

Flexible is the B-side to the single Shake the Disease, it's a fun song, not exactly typical Depeche Mode really, but I like it.

On March 17, 1986, one of the greatest albums ever made was released, Black Celebration, Depeche Modes' 5th Studio Album. It's darker than the previous albums, and is one of my all time favorite albums, though it didn't sell as well as Some Great Reward and none of the singles were big hits. Trivia: Black Celebration is the only DM album with a title track. This album's cover art is also one of my favorites.

Hands down my favorite tracks are Fly on the Windscreen and It Doesn't Matter, Two Other favorites include Dressed In Black, Black Celebration, A Question of Time and But Not Tonight.

The sixth studio album hit in late Sept 1987, titled Music for the Masses continuing the band's success. They embarked on one of their largest tours, including a sold-out show at Pasadena Rose Bowl to a crowd of over 60,000 fans. A live album of this tour was released, with performances from the Pasadena Rose Bowl concert.

Like most of DM's albums, this one is full of excellent music, and choosing a favorite can be difficult. I would say that I find To Have and To Hold to be the best track on the album (Spanish Taster Remix), though there are many others that rank very highly on my list: Never Let Me Down Again, The Things You Said, Little 15 and Behind the Wheel. This album also contains what's probably my favorite DM instrumental track, Pimpf.

Violator was an even bigger success than Music for the Masses and this album more than any other is what most people think of when they think of Depeche Mode, at least in my experience. It seems like everyone has this album, even if they're not particularly a fan of Depeche Mode. This album hit #& in the US charts, and stayed there for 74 weeks and as of this year has sold over 13.5 million copies, being their best selling album worldwide.

Without a doubt, Halo is my favorite track from this album, followed by the B-sides Happiest Girl and Sea of Sin. Other favorites include Sweetest Perfection, World in My Eyes, Clean and pretty much the rest of the album.

While Violator was their best selling album, Songs of Faith and Devotion was their highest charting album, reaching number 1 in both the UK and the US. There is a definite religious feel to this album, with song titles like Condemnation, Mercy In You and Judas and other songs which discuss matters of a like nature, such as Walking In My Shoes. Condemnation and Get Right With Me also have a very Southern Gospel feel to them.

The Devotional Tour, was a fourteen-month endeavor, during which time, according to Wikipedia, DM was (along with U2 and REM) one of the three biggest bands in the world. The tour was a grueling experience, with many of the band taking breaks due to stress or other health problems. A live album of the tour was released as well, on CD and DVD, and live versions of songs from the tour were included on two single releases.

One of the saddest moments in Depeche Mode history occurred shortly after the end of the Devotional Tour, after 13 years in the band, Alan Wilder announced he would leave the band, for a variety of reason which can be read about elsewhere. At this commercially high point in their career many people saw this as the end of Depeche Mode, including (for a while at least) Martin Gore, as Wilder had been key in the production, sound and feel of the last several records, many believed the group could not recover from such a loss.

In Your Room, Rush, One Caress are the cream of the crop here, and that's saying a lot as all of these songs are fantastic.

However the remaining members of the band (Dave Gahan, Martin Gore and Andrew Fletcher) may have felt about Alan's departure, one thing was sure, they weren't about to let this stop them, they didn't quite and give up when Vince Clark left in 1981, and they weren't going to do so in 1995. On April 14, 1997 the band released their ninth studio album, Ultra, which debuted at #5 in the US and #1 in the UK. This album has some sentimental attachment for me, as it was released a few days before my then-girlfriend/now-wife's birthday, and she bought it for me.

While I don't often think of this album of being particularly great, it is full of good songs, and a number of them are very good. The music is interesting, and while the album may lack some of the layering of the previous two records, it has it's own interesting feel. My favorite would be The Bottom Line and honorable mentions The Love Thieves, Useless, Sister of Night and Insight. Additionally, some of the remixes of Home are great.

In 1998 the 2 disc set The Singles 86 > 98 was released, along with a re-release of The Singles 81 > 85. The first has a new song that was released as a single at the same time, for which I bought the album (and even acquired the very limited edition bonus 3rd disc), the second was also enhanced with an added song, for which I bought it. I love the artwork for these releases, the coloring, in particular, is amazing, the excessive contrast of the 81-85 cover, the landscapes in th 86-98 art, it's just beautiful. Quite possibly my favorite art from any Depeche Mode work.

Since these are collections of singles most of these pieces are covered by their respective albums, however, since there is one new track on each, and I bought them for said tracks, they should definitely qualify as my favorites.

Photographic (Some Bizarre Version) is actually the first track Depeche Mode ever released, on the Some Bizarre record of 1981, a compilation of some kind, collecting tracks from different bands, I don't remember the specifics right now and I'm too lazy to look it up.

Only When I Lose Myself was the new single in 1998, and is a beautiful song, with great music. And the cover is cool.

By the time the band started working on their next studio album I was firmly plugged into the internet and learning about fan cultures and fan sites, and I followed the creating of the album with great interest. This was the first release where I bought most of the singles on day of release, and the album as well. I was very excited for Exciter to be released at the end of 2000, and it's pretty good. It's about as strong as Ultra in my opinion, which means that while it's good, it's kinda weak compared to most other albums. Still, it as some great songs, and it was fun to be able to follow the news and what info Depeche Mode released prior to release. More importantly, I was able to attend my first Depeche Mode concert in 2001, along with my wife. It was a great experience, one whose memory I will treasure forever. A very excellent live performance DVD was released as well.

The Sweetest Condition is definitely the best track, in my opinion, followed so very closely by Breathe that I can hardly favor one over the other. I'm also a fan of The Dead of Night.

In 2004 a collection of previously released remixes was released under the name Remixes 81-04, in 1 disc format, 2 disc set, and limited edition 3 disc set, the third disc containing mostly new remixes. Guess which I bought. A new remix single of Enjoy the Silence was also released.

My favorite remixes are Little 15 (Ulrich Schnauss Remix), Halo (Goldfrapp Remix) and Nothing (Headcleanr Rock Mix) from the Limited Edition set's third disc also liking Lie To Me (The Pleasure of Her Private Shame Remix) and Enjoy the Silence (Reinterpreted) from the third disc, and Enjoy the Silence (Ewan Pearson Remix, Radio edit) and Something to Do (Black Strobe Remix) from the single.

Playing the Angel (or "Pain and suffering in various tempos" as it says on the back cover) was released on Oct 18, 2005, which day I bought it, and it instantly became my favorite Depeche Mode record of all. Yes, I liked it even more than Violator and SoFaD. For a while at least, I'm not quite sure that it's still that good in my mind, but it is in my top 5 DM records. This was the first Depeche Mode album to include a bonus DVD (or rather, there was a CD release, and a Deluxe edition CD+DVD release, guess which I bought.)

This album is also unique in being the first recording for which singer Dave Gahan contributed music, co-writing three songs with Christian Eigner and Andrew Phillpott. Playing The Angel is the third album whose title comes from a song lyric. This album returns to a somewhat harsher sound, after the more mellow Exciter. Playing the Angel was in the top ten charts, #6 and #7 in the UK and US, respectively.

The B-sides to Playing The Angel are particularly good, we haven't had B-sides this good since Songs of Faith and Devotion. One of these B-sides, Free qualifies as my favorite track of the album, although almost all of the songs are nearly as good, especially A Pain That I'm Used To (which has excellent remixes), Suffer Well, The Sinner in Me, Precious, and so on.

A fifth compilation album was released in 2006, comprised of various DM tracks over the years, most importantly containing one new song, for which I will buy it someday (there's also a CD+DVD version of the album, of course that's the one I must buy). The new track was originally recorded during the Playing the Angel sessions, but the band felt it didn't fit the mood of the album, so it was withheld.

Martyr is the only new track released on this album, and is quite enjoyable.

And finally we arrive at Depeche Mode's most recent release, Sounds of the Universe, released April 2009. This was the groups most ambitious project in terms of different releases available. There was the regular CD release, a limited CD+DVD release with a few special remixes and videos, and a Deluxe Box Set Edition, containing 3 CDs and 1 DVD. Once again I had been eagerly following the band's progress on this album, they released video clips of them working on the album throughout the recording and creation of the album, and I was very eagerly anticipating it's release. And then they announced the Deluxe Box Set.

In case you hadn't noticed, I'm a Huge fan of Depeche Mode, I desperately wanted the Box Set. The second disc would contain bonus tracks and remixes, a few of which were eventually released on singles, the third disc contained for the first time ever, demo versions of songs, from as far back as 1987's Music for the Masses. The DVD was NOT the same as the CD+DVD version, containing 4 live studio session recordings of songs (3 from this album, one from Some Great Reward), a short 10 minute film (which is on the CD+DVD version), a 45 minute documentary of the making of the album, filmed largely by Andrew Fletcher (member of the band), mainly candid shots of the band and others at work, and a 55 minute professional documentary on the band and the new album.

Additionally, 2 84 page hardcover books would be included, one containing the lyrics to the songs, along with photography by Anton Corbijn (who has been doing the band's photography for years and years), the second featuring candid photos of the band and recording studio. A few other odds and ends were included too, the only one I want to mention being 5 collectible artcards. They commissioned a bunch of artists to create their own take on the album's logo, and then printed up a set of 20 art cards. I loved them, and at the time I meant to see if I could somehow buy the 15 I didn't get so as to have the complete set, but I never did. If anyone knows how I can get a hold of the set of cards, let me know.

I desperately wanted this box set. And my lovely wife once again bought me a Depeche Mode album for her birthday, though this one was a bit more expensive than Ultra. Of course, it counted as my birthday presents, and Christmas presents later on in the year, but it was worth it. This album is my favorite, and has been since I first listened to it almost a year and a half ago. The documentaries were fascinating, and what with the Collector's Editions of the other albums I'm getting soon, I will be watching them again. Sounds of the Universe hit number 2 in UK and 3 in USA charts, the highest since Ultra, though it didn't remain on the charts long. As I said, it is currently my favorite of all their albums, I'm listening to it as I type this.

My favorite song has to be Corrupt, but of course many others are nearly as well liked, Ghost, In Chains, Wrong, In Sympathy and more.

Depeche Mode has now been making music for nearly 30 years, and it's been a very enjoyable journey (for me), I hope they can continue to make amazing music for me and other (but mostly me) to enjoy.

Clowns are people too.

2010-07-26T20:36:00.001-06:00

War for Cybertron Optimus Prime and Bumblebee

2010-06-10T21:30:00.001-06:00

New Transformers! War for Cybertron Optimus Prime and Bumblebee.

These guys are really cool, and fun to play with. Bumblebee's robot mode isn't that exciting, but I really like his Cybertronian vehicle mode, and of course, Optimus Prime is awesome. The robot mode is great, but I especially love his Cybertron mode. I really want to buy another one and do a white Ultra Magnus repaint.

Originally these weren't supposed to be out until August, but last week TRU.com had a few and this week Amazon.com. I happened to have had a $25 gift card for Amazon, so the slightly higher price of $14.99 each became a non-issue. Also I got them at least two months earlier than I expected to, and that is always awesome.

Comparisons with Classics Prime and Bumblebee

Classics Prime is a Voyager class the rest are Deluxes, hence Classics Prime is so much larger. It would be really nice to get a Voyager WFC Prime. And nobody is holding the weapons they came with, except WFC BB in the last pic. The chromed weapons are from the FansProject G3 Trailer, Classics Prime has Classics Jetfire's gun. The Bees have the guns from the BTS trailer.

I cannot wait for the Transformers Generations line to begin for real, I'm looking forward to every figure announced so far.

Pic of the Day 150 - Transformers

2010-06-06T23:35:00.002-06:00

Mindwipe, Revenge of the Fallen Voyager Class figure by Hasbro.

Pic of the Day 149 - Transformers

2010-05-29T23:25:00.000-06:00

Inferno, Voyager Class figure from Transformers Universe/Classics 2.0, by Hasbro.

This week's new Transformers

2010-05-29T23:17:00.003-06:00

Legacy of Bumblebee, which I bought for the repaint of the Classics BB, but the Premium ROTF BBB is pretty nice, and I'm more or less a fan of the Animated style, so I'll probably keep the Animated BB as well. And I got it for $10 under original cost.

Classics Inferno and Special Edition OverKill

And I was finally able to grab Classics Skywarp from the Target Exclusive Ultra Magnus vs Skywarp set. I probably never bothered to post here when I got Ultra Magnus a few weeks ago, and I really should have since he was the TF Classics figure I wanted the most. Anyway, I'm glad to finally get Skywarp, and for around $15 under current market value. Additionally, of the now 5 repaints I have of the Classics Seeker mold, Skywarp is definitely the best of the bunch. He has perfectly tight (but not too tight) joints, everything snaps together smoothly and with no gap-age, he's great. Acid Storm is also less loose than the others. Also here pictured are Titanium War Within Skywarp, Robot Heroes Skywarp, Classics Sunstreaker, Classics Acid Storm, and Robot Heroes Ultra Magnus. And I got really good deals on War Within Skywarp, Classics Skywarp, and Sunstreaker. I Love eBay.

New Transformers, Yay!

2010-05-27T20:30:00.000-06:00

In an effort to keep up on my acquisition of Transformers, rather than doing one giant post here are some that I acquired a couple of weeks ago.

Toys R Us Exclusive Animated Arcee. She's some sort of Cybertronian race car or something. She's pink and she has two swords, what more do you need? I should have added Cybertronian mode Optimus Prime to this picture, but I didn't.

Transformers Universe/Classics 2.0 Ratchet, Smokescreen, Tankor from HasbroToyShop.com, and Tread Bolt from eBay.com.

Grimlock, Heavyload, Wedge and Hightower (from Robots in Disguise) and Grindcore from Transformers The Movie line (all acquired in a trade at The Fwoosh). I bought these because the greatest of the Transformers combiners is the Decipticon Devastator, the gestalt of the Constructicons. These are constructions 'bots, but unfortunately they're all Autobots. Oh well, I tried.

The aforementioned four figures from the Robots in Disguise line do in fact combine to form, Landfill!

And that's all for today. Stay tuned for more acquisitions in the Classics and Universe/Classics 2.0 lines!

Recent Acquisitions (over the last few months)

2010-05-15T13:50:00.000-06:00

Sheesh, it can be so difficult to keep up on this blog. I have many many items I have been meaning to post pictures of here, but I just cannot stay consistent enough to make any progress. Let's see what I can knock out with this post.

As you may have noticed from the previous three posts, I finally started buying Transformers, and as with any new property I become interested in, I have to jump in head first, rather than slowly wading in and becoming acclimatized. I have discovered that the Transformers Classics and Transformers Universe Classics 2.0 lines were pretty much designed with me in mind. They're modern reinterpretations of the original G1 designs, trying to stay as faithful to the G1 designs as possible. For example, the Classics Optimus Prime is exactly what I always thought the G1 Optimus Prime would be like, if I had one. He's terribly fun to play with, I've transformed him back and forth, from robot to vehicle mode countless times, and he's so great, that I bought two of him. The only short-coming of the toy is that Hasbro never made a trailer for it, but more on that later. Pics first!

Transformers Classics Optimus Prime, and his evil counterpart, Nemesis Prime. I forgot to put the smokestacks on Optimus, so he looks slightly odd.

Now, as I said, these figures didn't include trailers, but some fans stepped in, designed and mass-produced a trailer that is compatible with this figure, converts into a base (similar in concept to what the G1 trailer does), and it even comes in different colors for the various repaints (ie silver for Optimus, black for Nemesis, and purple for an extremely rare convention exclusive version of Optimus, and when I say rare, I mean it sells for over $400 on eBay, so don't expect me to ever have one). Anyway, I acquired the silver and black trailers for quite reasonable prices, and they look pretty good, though I'll be displaying them pretty much solely in base mode.

And because I started this post over two weeks ago and never came back to finish, I'm going to drop the commentary and just post some pictures.

Ramjet in various forms.

Starscream in various forms.

Skywarp in various forms.

FansProject City Commander Trailer/Armor Add-on for Classics Ultra Magnus (here pictured on Optimus Prime because this picture was taken before I got Ultra Magnus, which has already been two weeks. It takes me so Loooong to post pictures after I take them.)

Walmart Exclusive 6" Iron Man Mark VI and War Machine figures (based on the film Iron Man 2, which was awesome).

I got my set of DCUC 13 Trigon figures weeks ago, and they're pretty fun.

And I got the last Khan figure I was looking for, from the AA/DST Star Trek line.

Pic of the Day 148 - Transformers

2010-04-13T01:04:00.003-06:00

Ramjet, Walmart Exclusive Voyager class figure from Revenge of the Fallen movie line, by Hasbro.

Ramjet is one of the few Generation One Transformers I had as a kid. In fact, that figure still resides at my parents house, though quite worse for the wear. It has none of the attaching pieces, and is banged up and scuffed and scratched and looks like it's been heavily used.

My point being, Ramjet is one of the figures I have a nostalgic attachment to, so he (along with the other jets) is going to be one of the focuses of my new Transformers collection.

Pic of the Day 147 - Transformers

2010-04-12T20:00:00.001-06:00

Skystalker, Scout class figure from Revenge of the Fallen, by Hasbro.

Pic of the Day 146 - Transformers

2010-04-11T20:00:00.001-06:00

Dirge, from Revenge of the Fallen, Deluxe Class, by Hasbro.

Pic of the Day 145 - Transformers

2010-04-11T00:39:00.003-06:00

Masterpiece Skywarp, by Hasbro.

As I understand it, the Masterpiece line is for large scale, high quality Transformers, based on their original G1 design. So Skywarp here is the same F-15 design he was in 1984, and the robot mode looks very similar as well, but it's highly detailed and very articulated, as opposed to the original figure.

Skywarp is a Walmart exclusive, originally retailing for $60 I believe, he's currently on clearance for $30 at the few remaining locations I've seen him. I got this one far from home on an even better clearance price of $15. It was a cheap gateway drug that finally got me to start collecting Transformers, something I've fought against for over the last five years I've been collecting, because I knew that with my nostalgia for the old toys (not so much for the TV shows), I would want to get deeply involved in collecting the toys. As will be seen over the coming weeks.

Anyway, Skywarp is a great looking jet, quite large, and I'll show his robot mode some other time. More Transformers to come.

Favorite DCUC Finals

2010-04-06T00:11:00.002-06:00

You can go vote, I guess, if you want to. I'm not sure if I will.

Honestly, I don't care. Yes, both are really good figures, based on really good characters, but neither is what I what would call the Best DCUC Figure (which it is best, not favorite as I have been calling it. I don't know which I prefer, and therefore don't think I can call either of them the best of the line.

From the final four I would say Deathstroke is the best, great contrasting textures (chain mail and smooth), plus lotsa pouches (which are always cool), and most importantly, a lot of accessories, he comes with a handgun (and holster), a rifle, a bandoleer, a staff, a sword with sheath! Talk about Best DCUC figure. Plus, there was the unmasked variant, which has one of the best heads in the line.

There are probably others that I would contend are the Best, but I'm not going to go into that right now. Some possibilities include Lobo, Ares, Mongol, Cyborg Superman, Tech Suit Freeze, Big Barda, Man-Bat, Power Suit Lex, and Metallo, to name a few. Obviously what I think is best is either different from what others think, or else people were not voting for the best. Oh well, it was fun while I thought a figure I considered really great had a chance. Hope other people are pleased with the result.

Favorite DCUC Vote Final Four

2010-04-03T10:34:00.000-06:00

Get your votes in now!

J W Rinzler returns with The Making of Empire Strikes Back

2010-04-01T01:24:00.004-06:00

One of my favorite purchases during my 2 years of excessive Star Wars collecting was a book. A big, heavy, expensive and monumental book. The Making of Star Wars by J. W. Rinzler. (I should set myself up as an amazon affiliate if I'm going to be linking to $55 books). It had all sorts of fascinating info about what went into making one of the greatest films of all time, all gathered from interviews and such from back then. None of the rose-tinted memories, looking back after all of Star Wars' success, but from before anybody though it would amount to anything.

Well, when I learned earlier this year that Rinzler was coming out with a book based on the making of the best of the Star Wars films, I was quite interested. The price put me off a bit, since it is a hefty price for my current, much lower than three years ago budget, but for as much as I enjoyed the previous book (and have been thinking it's time to re-read it) I just can't pass this one up. So this evening I placed a pre-order for The Making of Empire Strikes Back by J. W. Rinzler. Amazon has a nifty Pre-Order Price Guarantee, and since it is $30 off the cover price, and Amazon's price will go up to list price when the book is released, I thought now was the time, expecting a May release date.

Yeah, it's not due out until October. At least I'll have it in time for my birthday.

The moral of this post is, go buy those books, they're the best ones about how Star Wars was created, that I know of (that's honestly not saying much). Also, the best documentary I've seen on this subject, is Empire of Dreams, from the 2004 DVD set of the Original Star Wars Trilogy. It's awesome.

Quarter Finals in the Favorite DCUC Voting

2010-04-01T00:18:00.001-06:00

Time to vote again! Voting goes through the second of April.

Favorite DCUC Region Finals

2010-03-31T16:54:00.001-06:00

Voting ends tonight!">

Favorite DCUC Figure Voting Round 3

2010-03-29T11:59:00.001-06:00

Vote Today!

It really looks to me that people are voting for their favorite Character instead of their favorite Figure is. There is no way Metallo should have lost to anybody.

Favorite DCUC Figure - Round 2

2010-03-24T22:26:00.003-06:00

It's time to vote in Round 2 for Best DCUC Figure Evar!

I can already see that two of my favorite figures are going to be knocked out this round - Tech Suit Freeze is going to be defeated by Gentleman Ghost, and I wonder if he's getting an undue number of votes due to his extreme scarcity. Also, I'm sure everyone else is going to vote for Green Arrow over Power Girl, and sure he's a good figure, but Power Girl is better.

As for the other brackets, whoever is voting in these things have really poor taste. Despero is better than Big Barda? Katma Tui over King Alexander Luthor? You people are crazy. I am glad to see that in the new match up, Chemo is still barely beating Dr Mid-Nite. Talk about one of the Best BAFs Ever. Chemo had better make it at least another round or two. And Cyborg Superman totally should have beaten Wonder Woman. I demand a recount! Copperhead is undeniably cool, but come on, Imperiex has way better fashion sense. The Mongol vs Copperhead is a tough choice, both are excellent figures for a variety of reasons (Mongol is pink!). I'll probably go with Mongol, but both are the correct choice here. Two Face vs Brainiac is just mean. I'll go with the killer robot, but Two Face shouldn't be knocked out this early.

Vote for your Favorite DCUC Figure

2010-03-22T11:17:00.005-06:00

The people at the Fwoosh started up a vote for the favorite DCUC figure, and voting on the first 8 brackets are up now and ends today. Get your votes in while you can.

Fwoosh's March Madness Commences - Vote Now!

Some of the choices are easy.

Mr Freeze!

Some, not so easy.

More New Stuff

2010-03-16T01:35:00.001-06:00

Who knows if I'll ever post all the pictures I've taken over the last several months of things I've purchased or traded for. But here's some stuff to point out.

Iron Man 2. These are 4 inch scale figures, which hasn't been my thing for a couple of years now, but these are really great figures, both in look and in execution, and they weren't too expensive, so I couldn't pass them up.

Some Green Lantern books I've been trying to get for a while, finally got a good enough deal on. Also 52, which I've been trying to get for a long time, for under $10, this one significantly under.

I finally got my hands on the Batman: War Games series, to go along with the prelude, Batman: War Drums, which I've had for a long time now. Picked up War Crimes cheap to finish off the tale. Good reading, I really liked it, Stephanie Brown/Spoiler/Robin is one of my favorite characters. Pity she dies at the end. :(

A few weeks ago I found the last two figures I needed to complete the Public Enemies mini-line, which I mostly bought for the Collect & Connect figure, Brimstone, but I don't have as much issue with these figures as do others. The new animated movie,Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, is awesome, by the way.

Going along with the Green Lantern books above, I finally bought some of the Blackest Night figures from DC Direct (Blackest Night being the story line that the GL books have been leading up to for several years). Got the wave 2 Black Lantern Martian Manhunter, and wave 3 (Star Sapphire, Black Lantern Aquaman, Orange Lantern Larfleeze, and Green Lantern Arisia). Probably won't be keeping all of these, Aquaman isn't as cool as I'd hoped, though I hear the Black Lanterns look better in big groups, so one solution would be to buy more (and wave 4 is ALL Black Lanterns). Also got most of JLA Classified Classics wave 2, which I am definitely keeping, because I LOVE the Ed McGuinness style figures. Batgirl, Green Lantern and beard/hook hand Aquaman will join the rest of the Ed McG figs proudly on the shelf that will be set aside for them one of these days. Can't wait for wave 3.

I can't recall if I've posted about the World of Warcraft figures here or not. If not, they're gorgeously sculpted plastic statues, and I've followed the line with interest since it began, only taking the plunge to buy a few in the last few months, so I've missed a few really good ones, but great people on the Fwoosh helped me get some I'd missed for good prices. One of the Deluxe figures I've been eyeing has been sitting at the overpriced FYE for a while, starting at $49.99, msrp is $39.99 I think, but with shipping it was about the same on eBay as FYE. I told myself when I saw it at FYE for $30 I'd buy it. A couple of weeks ago, there it was, marked for $29.99, so I took it to the register. However, it didn't ring up at the marked price, but lo and behold, it rang up for $14.99. So I win. She's awesome. And a large figure, takes up too much room, but awesome anyway.

I finally surrendered to something I've been fighting for years, and bought myself a Transformer I intended to keep. Of all the toys I had as a kid, I think Transformers hold the most nostalgia for me. ALthough in analyzing my likes for them, I find I generally don't care for the robot mode much, just the vehicle mode. But I don't really want to buy a toy vehicle, but one that can turn into a giant robot. Even if I don't ever intend to change it. Strange.

Anyway, I've always had a thing for the Aircraft Transformers, I had the Generation 1 Ramjet, and the used and abused remains of it's carcass still resides at my parents house, quite the worse for the wear. When the Masterpiece Skywarp hit Walmart last year I really wanted it, but the $60 price was quite outside my range. Around here they're now clearanced to $25-$30, but that still seemed a bit much for my budget, so I strengthened my resolve not to get into Transformers, because I was afraid of where it would end up (and rightly so, I've started looking through checklists of what's available, and my want list is not small), but when I found them for $15 on the way to Las Vegas last month, I had to buy one. Actually, I bought two, and I'm toying with keeping both, to display both modes, because the Decepticon Jets have always had cool robot modes. Am I talking too much?

I've been watching this 2 pack at Walmart for a while now. It started out at $19.98. Then it was clearanced all the way down to $19.86, but I made myself hold out for the next round of clearances. It finally dropped to $11, which is comparable to the single carded figures, and it has a ton of accessories, so it was definitely worth the wait.

Some misc stuff I've had for a while, or picked up in Las Vegas my recent trip there.

And that's enough for now.

Depeche Mode: Fragile and Wrong

2010-03-11T18:30:00.000-07:00

In April 2009, my favorite band, Depeche Mode, released their 12th studio album, Sounds of the Universe. I knew I would love it, as the single that preceeded the album was fantastic, also, I'm a HUGE DM fan, so when I learned there would be a Deluxe Box Set, with bonus tracks and never before heard demos and documentary videos and other extras, I really wanted it. My wife was kind enough to buy it for me, as a Father's Day, Birthday, and Christmas present, and I was (and still am) very pleased with it. As is par for the course at this blog, I've been meaning to do a write up of the album and the Box Set extras for nearly a year now, so I decided it was time to post a little something about it. Someday I will get around to talking about the box set. I'm sure.

So here's the commercial for the box set.

And a In the Studio video to go with the first single, Wrong.

And the official music video to the third single, Fragile.

Pic of the Day 144

2010-03-01T01:21:00.003-07:00

Karl Kroenen, final battle costume, from Hellboy movie figure series 1 by Mezco.

Sure, Hellboy was an awesome film, and I loved every second of it, but Kroenen was the best part of it.

Pic of the Day 143 - DCUC Darkseid Wave

2010-02-25T17:50:00.001-07:00

Mary Marvel, Justice League International costume, DCUC Wave 12, by Mattel.

Pic of the Day 142 - DCUC Darkseid Wave

2010-02-24T17:48:00.001-07:00

Mary Marvel, original costume, DCUC Wave 12, by Mattel.

Pic of the Day 141 - DCUC Darkseid Wave

2010-02-23T17:37:00.000-07:00

Iron, DCUC Wave 12, by Mattel.