Beauty and the Beast: The Best Movie of 2017?

Following the start of spring semester at George Mason, I had always hoped that things would get better than last year. This week on Monday night, the second Beauty and the Beast trailer went online, and I was so excited that I clicked on the link to view it on the ComingSoon.net web article to see what else I can expect from the live-action version of the 1991 Disney animated classic.

As always, Emma Watson never fails to impress me with her beautiful accent which made me feel absolutely sure that she will deliver an enchanted performance as Belle like Lily James did as Cinderella. But by the time the theme song was heard, I was left with nothing but full of nostalgic happiness. From what I've learned about this new take from bringing back the original music and songs written by Alan Menken, along with the still-and-always faithful elements and the memorable scenes and exact quotes that everybody will surely notice when compared with the traditionally-animated film, it is possible that this year's Beauty and the Beast might be the biggest movie of 2017 until Star Wars: The Last Jedi! Hard to believe that Ariana Grande and John Legend would actually pull off singing such a timeless and magical song as Celine Dion and Peabo Bryson have!

While different as they may be from how we used to remember, I know that Emma Watson (Belle), Dan Stevens (The Beast), Ewan McGregor (Lumiere), Ian McKellen (Cogsworth), Emma Thompson (Mrs. Potts), Luke Evans (Gaston), Josh Gad (Lefou), and Kevin Kline (Maurice) will do an astounding job and bring back what made Beauty and the Beast a huge masterpiece in Disney history! The same way that last year's The Jungle Book have successfully achieved (aside from being a $966 million hit) by bringing our favorite lovable characters to life as anything but cartoon characters! I can only hope that Emma Watson will impress me with her singing voice in her musical number scenes and deliver the same kind of feeling we got from Paige O'Hara, as does the "Be Our Guest" sequence sung by Ewan McGregor's Lumiere! This will certainly be an enchanted tale as old as time once Spring Break begins in 2 months! I can't stop thinking about what my experience in seeing the first movie I've seen from my childbirth more than 25 years ago will be like when brought to life by live-action movie stars as opposed to the stars of the Broadway Musical Theatre! Emma Watson will always look so beautiful to me whether in her pink Yule Ball dress or in her gorgeous yellow dress! Bring it on!

The 2017 Oscar Nominations Are In!

While I am back at George Mason for my spring semester this year and hoping things will be much better than last year, here are my favorite Oscar nomination categories announced this week.

Which one of the 2016 movies will win an Academy Award for Best Picture of the Year? Will it be...?

• Arrival (8 nominations)
• Fences (4 nominations)
• Hacksaw Ridge (6 nominations)
• Hell or High Water (4 nominations)
• Hidden Figures (3 nominations)
• La La Land (14 nominations)
• Lion (6 nominations)
• Manchester by the Sea (6 nominations)
• Moonlight (8 nominations)

Best Director?

• Arrival (Denis Villeneuve)
• Hacksaw Ridge (Mel Gibson)
• La La Land (Damien Chazelle)
• Manchester by the Sea (Kenneth Lonergan)
• Moonlight (Barry Jenkins)

Best Actor?

• Manchester by the Sea (Casey Affleck)
• Hacksaw Ridge (Andrew Garfield)
• La La Land (Ryan Gosling)
• Captain Fantastic (Viggo Mortensen)
• Fences (Denzel Washington)

Best Actress?

• Elle (Isabelle Huppert)
• Loving (Ruth Negga)
• Jackie (Natalie Portman)
• La La Land (Emma Stone)
• Florence Foster Jenkins (Meryl Streep)

Best Supporting Actor?

• Moonlight (Mahershala Ali)
• Hell or High Water (Jeff Bridges)
• Manchester by the Sea (Lucas Hedges)
• Lion (Dev Patel)
• Nocturnal Animals (Michael Shannon)

Best Supporting Actress?

• Fences (Viola Davis)
• Moonlight (Naomie Harris)
• Lion (Nicole Kidman)
• Hidden Figures (Octavia Spencer)
• Manchester by the Sea (Michelle Williams)

Best Original Screenplay?

• Hell or High Water
• La La Land
• The Lobster
• Manchester by the Sea
• 20th Century Women

Best Adapted Screenplay?

• Arrival
• Fences
• Hidden Figures
• Lion
• Moonlight

Best Animated Feature?

• Kubo and the Two Strings 
• Moana
• My Life as a Zucchini
• The Red Turtle
• Zootopia

Best Production Design?

• Arrival
• Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
• Hail, Caesar!
• La La Land
• Passengers

Best Costume Design?

• Allied
• Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
• Florence Foster Jenkins
• Jackie
• La La Land

Best Cinematography?

• Arrival
• La La Land
• Lion
• Moonlight
• Silence

Best Film Editing?

• Arrival
• Hacksaw Ridge
• Hell or High Water
• La La Land
• Moonlight

Best Makeup and Hairstyling?

• A Man Called Ove
• Star Trek Beyond
• Suicide Squad

Best Original Score?

• Jackie (Mica Levi)
• La La Land (Justin Hurwitz)
• Lion (Dustin O'Halloran and Hauschka)
• Moonlight (Nicholas Britell)
• Passengers (Thomas Newman)

Best Original Song?

• La La Land ("Audition (The Fools Who Dream)")
• Trolls ("Can't Stop the Feeling!")
• La La Land ("City of Stars")
• Jim: The James Foley Story ("The Empty Chair")
• Moana ("How Far I'll Go")

Best Visual Effects?

• Deepwater Horizon
• Doctor Strange
• The Jungle Book
• Kubo and the Two Strings
• Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Best Sound Mixing?

• Arrival
• Hacksaw Ridge
• La La Land
• Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
• 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi

Best Sound Editing?

• Arrival
• Deepwater Horizon
• Hacksaw Ridge
• La La Land
• Sully

Tune in to find out during ABC's 89th Annual Academy Awards ceremony on Sunday, February 26th. Hosted by Jimmy Kimmel!

An Apologetic Analysis of Spider-Man 3

So here are where, in what is now 2017. Call me a traitor, but I've just seen Spider-Man 3 like twice before and during my winter vacation in Amsterdam and Berlin with my parents and my sister. Not only will it be the 10th anniversary of Sam Raimi's final Spider-Man film in 4 months, but it is also the year where we finally have the first Spider-Man movie to be under the Marvel Cinematic Universe banner (while Sony still retains the movie distribution rights to the character) to hopefully achieve the success that the Amazing Spider-Man films have failed at.
Following my first viewing at The Amazing Spider-Man 2 after completing my spring semester at NOVA college, I thought for sure that it was gonna be better and actually wipe away the bad taste of Spider-Man 3 like the first film (the 2012 reboot starring Andrew Garfield) thanks to a couple of things that I know has plagued pretty much everything that was well-remembered in the first two films. But after learning that its $709 million gross didn't satisfy Sony and that plans for an Amazing Spider-Man 3 and its spin-offs were put on hold until the Sony-Marvel deal a year later, I was very upset with it and I even blamed Spider-Man 3 for being so bad (as most people would say) that a reboot had to happen before next thing they know, the studio had no confidence that they were gonna make a direct follow-up happen immediately. Since then I've been coming up on comments on sites like YouTube saying stuff like "the trilogy is better than ASM" and "I would watch Spider-Man 3 over Amazing Spider-Man". After seeing how the time-traveling in X-Men: Days of Future Past retconned all of the events that leads to the futuristic war with the deadly Sentinels, including the disastrous and anti-climatic X-Men: The Last Stand, I became so obsessed to finding which of the sequels/follow-ups that were so bad or very forgettable (Spider-Man 3 was one of the them) I would declare them as non-existent which would spare the more enjoyable ones from being tainted. After all, we all dislike the Emo Peter Parker moments as well as the Uncle Ben death Sandman retcon and Topher Grace playing Venom, don't we? But while I was getting pretty annoyed by the whole "Spider-Man 3 is better than Amazing Spider-Man" this and that, I came upon the unexpected source claiming that the novelization was better than the movie because it fleshes out the characters' motivations and contains some missing scenes that can be found in the Spider-Man 3.1 extended cut that fans have been petitioning for. But I didn't believe a single word of them, so I desperately searched for more evidence of what makes Spider-Man 3 better than the Amazing Spider-Man movies and if it truly plagued the greatness of 1 and 2 like it happened before with the original X-Men films. When I finished up reading the Spider-Man 3 novel that I got for Christmas in TWO DAYS, I discovered that there are a lot of pages with several written lines that may help clarify the ridiculous amount of plot holes that I know are what made SM3 the most disliked installment in the trilogy such as the frail butler telling Harry the truth about Norman Osborn's death two movies too late, the purpose with the random demolecularization machine that turned Flint Marko into Sandman, Mary Jane's bitchy attitude including why she didn't bother telling Peter that Harry made her broke up with him to "save his life" at the bridge, and whether or not the Sandman retcon diminishes the entire reason that Peter Parker became Spider-Man since the first film as much as Sam Raimi did it to incorporate the forgiveness moral and connect Sandman to Peter's life. I underlined phrases and sentences in the book that I find most helpful in assuring me that not every character in Spider-Man 3 were entirely stupid nor are their subplots really unnecessary when it comes to "too many characters." At first, I wasn't convinced if that'll be enough to make it far from the worst movie that everybody thought it was before the ASM films. But when I thought about the other blockbuster threequels that were not everybody's favorites while still having moments fun to watch and were decent enough to conclude their trilogies, such as X-Men: Apocalypse and Iron Man 3, I realized that maybe I was being too hard on Spider-Man 3 after all. I mean, I know that minus the Venom and Gwen Stacy characters, everything in that are all conceived by Sam Raimi himself before having a difficult relationship with the studio which resulted in the cancellation of Spider-Man 4. Plus, it did have some pretty spectacular moments, like Spider-Man saving Gwen from the building wrecked by a malfunctioning crane, his fights with Sandman, and Spidey and New Goblin working together to battle Sandman and Venom, that at least felt like they share with Spider-Man 1 and 2 in a more cohesive way unlike the ones where Andrew Garfield take on the Lizard, Electro, and the too-little-too-late Green Goblin and the Rhino. While we didn't get a Spider-Man 4 as planned, at least the critically-mixed trilogy closure didn't resort itself to too much sequel-teasing which would require whatever amount of money it needs to recoup its very expensive budget based on the word-of-mouth. Perhaps I was a little too focused on the "what it could have been" scenario to hopefully make Spider-Man 3 not much of a depressing trilogy ending like I thought, given that it came out a year after the disappointing X-Men 3 which was so bad that Bryan Singer had to be brought back for DOFP to undo the mistakes that the Brett Ratner-directed threequel made. Because there do appear to be some fans wanting a 3.1 cut which is right now 10 years too long, I think the only way that Spider-Man 3 would be an acceptable entry in the trilogy without being too bothered by the noticeable flaws is if they'd only excised or fast-forward parts that I know almost hurt our most beloved web-slinging hero and future Avenger, including the Emo Parker dancing scenes and the very painful-to-hear lines like "How's the pie? So good," and "Look at Goblin Jr. Are you gonna cry?" And if it is to be less depressing conclusion to the trilogy and end on a worthy note like Return of the Jedi and The Dark Knight Rises, I would totally add a final swing scene to complete the pattern that was clearly been used in 1 and 2 that Raimi and the studio somehow didn't bother putting in after going through a lot of craziness of stuff that they know that not everything has to be "bigger and better" (especially the rehashed Pete/MJ relationship problems and Peter being so melodramatic that he is clearly not how we want to see Spider-Man acting that way). It's just that I feel like the "Go get 'em, tiger" ending in Spider-Man 2 is the happy ending and the conclusion to Peter's difficult journey of balancing his normal life and his superhero gig we so rightfully deserve! Heck, the novelization that I read even ended with Spider-Man swinging through the buildings with Mary Jane in his arms despite suffering a tragic loss that is their best friend Harry Osborn who died saving Peter from Venom's "carnage"! Now THAT would have been a great way to end the trilogy (if they really filmed that scene) than just have Peter and M.J. dance slowly together in the jazz club! When I read the part where Peter thought about still continuing his Spider-Man mantle when he learned that he was not directly responsible (like he told Aunt May in SM2) for his uncle's death since it was Sandman who (though, accidentally) shot him, which lessens the impact that works effectively well in the first film in the same way as the comic book if that retcon didn't happen, I thought that perhaps it wasn't really such a pointless change after all when I think about Joker being the killer of Bruce Wayne's parents in Tim Burton's Batman and Two-Face's role in the death of Dick Grayson's family in Batman Forever, which I don't mind if that's the way it's gonna be when it comes to comic book movies being different from the comics that they were based on. The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a perfect example of that. And if Jesse Eisenberg's over-the-top take on Lex Luthor, Jr. and the Cave Troll lookalike Doomsday in Batman v Superman taught me something, maybe I should accept Topher Grace's portrayal of Eddie Brock (now matter how shoehorned he is as Venom) if Sam Raimi wanted an anti-Peter Parker, if only that I would block that goofy teeth makeup of his every time he unmasks to speak out of my head. I still think that the animated shows handled Venom with great ease to really make him a huge (and I mean HUGE!) threat to Peter and all that he has hold dear to him! And that we could have had more of the Black-Suited Spider-Man action like the trailers had promised instead of going through more of the Emo Parker nonsense!
That doesn't mean that I "like" Spider-Man 3. I still see it as my least favorite Spider-Man film, just not in a "so bad I want to erase it from my mind" attitude, the same way like I feel towards god-awful films like Shyamalan's The Last Airbender and Battlefield Earth. If a Spider-Man 3.1 version does get released sometime in the future, then it might be the next Alien 3 Assembly Cut which is of course a third installment of the series that was considered inferior to the excellent previous 2 predecessors while greatly improved by a number of added scenes that better fleshes out underdeveloped characters. I am so glad that I asked my sister that I would like a Spider-Man 3 novelization book from Amazon for Christmas. Right now, the REAL #1 worst movie in the world for me is:.... (drum roll) Fant-4-stic! Fox, and even Josh Trank, should never have made the Fantastic Four so dark and mopey! So I guess as Peter would say to Flint: "I forgive you."


I pray that Spider-Man: Homecoming will overcome the fatigue-ish Amazing Spider-Man problems and be exactly what made Spider-Man our favorite Marvel superhero of all time since 2004's Spider-Man 2! And even if it's not Tobey Maguire or Andrew Garfield, whose franchise will now stay unfinished and forgotten thanks to its poor box office returns and lukewarm response while the former's trilogy will be frequently remembered for launching the golden age of superhero movies, there can be no doubt that Tom Holland will do a much better job and prove that he is the Spider-Man we truly deserve in the still-going-strong Marvel Cinematic Universe!

Post-Fall 2016 GMU Recap!

Phew! Boy, did I work so hard over the course of the semester at George Mason this fall! Not only did my sister Christine came home to spend with us for the holidays, but I finally finished up History of Game Design (GAME 230-001), Critical Theory of Art (AVT 472-001), Basic Game Design (GAME 210-004), Music & Sound for Film & Video (GAME 250-001), and of course Package Design (AVT 417-001)! I have the final grades to prove it!

At first, I thought for sure that Professor James B. Hicks was gonna be a touch teacher to handle with, but after having a nice talk with Jessica Machado, Wayne Adams and my mom, things are becoming less stressful and next thing I know, his attitude with me and the other Package Design students has slightly improved and is actually being quite easy with us! I know I got a B- on my first project which is the Heartland Soup cans, but in the next following projects, my grades and the reactions I get from the teacher and the classmates have greatly improved and almost everyone, including Ben, Angela, Ryan and KC, in what was a very difficult subject have started supporting me and gave me some confidence that I need to complete my projects. Angie even helped me with the purchase display project and convinced me that I actually don't need to include the boxes containing 9 soup cans that I was struggling to work on. I was happy that I got an A- by the end of the semester instead of a B like I thought I might get! Even better, I got an A+ in Seth Hudson's History of Game Design class where I worked VERY HARD on the final paper about the Pac-Man topic! An A for Lynne Constantine's Critical Art Theory class and Josiah Lebowitz's Basic Game Design, and I also got an A- for Thomas Stanley's sound design class where I create my videos (including the hilarious Charlie Chaplin short) and incorporated my own sounds and my own music that I make in the work station! Although, I was disappointed that I got a C+ in the online exam for the sound class and on the final Basic Game Design project that Cooper, Ali, Bryce and I have worked since the midterm. But that doesn't stop me from getting the A grades like I always have!

From November to December, I got to see Doctor Strange, Trolls, Rogue One, and of course Sing! Never thought I would actually enjoy them all even after being so underwhelmed by critically/financially disappointing summer movies that aren't Captain America: Civil War, Finding Dory, or The Secret Life of Pets! But that's not all!

Trailers to all the upcoming 2017 movies have been popping up! Including Transformers 5, Fast & Furious 8 (or "The Fate of the Furious"), Pirates of the Caribbean 5 (the one with Javier Bardem), Pixar's Cars 3, Despicable Me 3, the final Wolverine movie Logan, and the long-awaited Marvel Cinematic Universe Spider-Man movie starring Tom Holland himself! But what I'm most excited to see next year are the live-action Beauty and the Beast remake, Transformers: The Last Knight, and Spider-Man: Homecoming! However for Transformers 5, I can only hope that building a writers' room starting with the aforementioned will mark a significant improvement from the 2-year-old thought-to-be-pointless-cash-grab that proves that the Bayformers are the "worst thing that's ever happened" since the Milla Jovovich Resident Evil movies. Because watching the teaser trailer has given me the suspense and a lot of questions of what I can really expect besides learning about the happy returns of familiar faces from TF 1-3 including Josh Duhamel, Tyrese Gibson, Barricade and Megatron (Galvatron from #4?), further development of Transformers mythos as promised by the new writers hired by Akiva Goldsman, lack of uninspiring Age of Extinction stars minus Mark Wahlberg and Stanley Tucci, while hoping that TF5 will deliver the same TF movie experience that I have been missing so much since my 2nd year at Oakton High School without repeating the same tiring and upsetting mistakes that has absolutely hurt the sequels since Revenge of the Fallen! And as for Spider-Man: Homecoming, the moment Tom Holland's Spidey was all "'Sup, guys? Wait a minute. You guys aren't the REAL Avengers!", it was that exact point that I know for sure is exactly the Spider-Man we so rightfully deserve after being so impressed with Ben Affleck's Batman. Even if it's not ANOTHER origin story nor does it have a familiar villain like Green Goblin, Doc Ock or Lizard, what I really want is for the new Spider-Man movie to cleanse the bad tastes that we fans had to suffer through Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 3 and the now-uncompleted Amazing Spider-Man franchise! No matter what people say about Tobey Maguire being the "best Spider-Man ever", what's to stop them from wanting to see the Spider-Man who should be making hilarious quips JUST LIKE IN THE COMICS that I know most kids like? Whether it will earn the same amount of money as the first three from when I was in elementary and high schools, I hope that it will once again make Spider-Man a blockbuster hit that Sony has been desperate to achieve!

Speaking of Spider-Man 3, though I can't believe that I have to say this. But maybe Spider-Man 3 is not the "#1 worst movie" I have ever seen. It still is in my view, but not at #1. I basically called it that because it was overwhelmed by a huge number of things that I know tarnished (or did it?) the greatness of the first two films like X-Men 3 once did to the 1st two Bryan Singer X-Men films as soon as we got an Andrew Garfield reboot (and its now-wasted sequel) instead of a Spider-Man 4 (with or without Vulture or "Vulturess") that would have redeemed the original cast's reputation. In fact, after Sony marked The Amazing Spider-Man 2 a "disappointing failure" for earning just $709 million worldwide and being given a 52% rating by Rotten Tomatoes, I blamed Spider-Man 3 for causing the death of what could have been the most memorable blockbuster movie franchise up there with Harry Potter and Shrek. But yet, every comment I would find, whether on YouTube or other movie database sites I would usually browse on Safari, all I would find is that Spider-Man 3 is "terrible but does not deserve a lot of hate". It's like despite a lot of things that people dislike in that threequel, they just acted like it's a continuation worth remembering unlike Independence Day 2 or the Matrix sequels when it comes to the word "trilogy" (think Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings, Back to the Future, and The Dark Knight)! It's no wonder there are petitions for a Spider-Man 3.1 Cut which restores some much needed extra footage such as Sandman and his tragic relationship with his daughter, Eddie Brock trying to approach Gwen Stacy, and Venom's alternative way of convincing Sandman to team up with him (that doesn't involve "Interested? Yeah, sure") to kill Spider-Man. Even though the studio is to be blamed for forcing Sam Raimi to include Venom and Gwen which interferes with his original vision. I wasn't sure how can it be so when nothing in Spider-Man 3, besides the more familiar aspects that was still retained from the first two, has given an indication that what was once likable can remain so. Do they not have a huge problem with how Mary Jane disses Peter for not understanding her Broadway career downfall (her career dream is to be a theater actress (NOT as a singer), right?) and for stupidly going along with Harry's plan to break up with him despite that she will always "support" Peter at the very end of Spider-Man 2 ("Go get 'em, tiger")? Especially when Peter/Spider-Man does the upside down kiss with Gwen IN FRONT OF MARY JANE, as though he is nothing but a self-absorbed idiot before he made contact with the alien Symbiote? How does that make Tobey Maguire's Spider-Man "likable" as he was in 1 and 2? And there's no way that I would call the Peter/Harry fights "awesome" when they're like super cheesy and the fact that their second fight inside the Osborn Mansion is filled with awfully-written dialogue that tried to be funny when they're NOT! I treated the moment when Peter and Aunt May found out from Captain Stacy that it was Flint Marko who actually killed Uncle Ben (revealed that he actually shot him by accident when the carjacker carrying the stolen cash startled him) in the more enjoyable first one, as a cheap motivation to gain our attention to experience our first look at the Black-Suited Spider-Man on the big screen when all we got is nothing but TOO MUCH EMO PETER PARKER that pretty much made a mockery of Marvel's most beloved comic book superhero. And why would people enjoy Spider-Man 3 and not erase it from their minds (like most other certain awful/bad movies) when they have the worst depiction of Eddie Brock/Venom since Deadpool's transition to Weapon XI in the should-be-non-canon-even-before-DOFP X-Men Origins: Wolverine? But even if Spider-Man 3 is "improved" by extra scenes (in a novelization by Peter David or in the 3.1 version) that makes the multiple characters and storylines far from superfluous like most reviews say, does the Sandman retcon still ruin what was already well-handled and similar to how it was in the comics in the first Spider-Man movie unlike in the forgettable Amazing Spider-Man? Maybe the only way that Spider-Man 3 would be more watchable than the so-called Amazing Spidey films, is that I would skip out almost every cheesy as f**k Emo Peter Parker scenes (including "Now dig on this"), parts with the news reporter and the crowd ("Awesome! Wicked cool!") during when Spider-Man was about to be overwhelmed by Sandman and Venom, the Harry & Mary Jane "Do the Twist" dance, the butler's too-little-too-late revelation to the facially-scarred Harry Osborn, the Tobey Maguire crybaby faces, mute Sandman's "and the gun was in hand" line and have myself say that his partner with the stolen cash "shot him", thus removing the retcon that made everyone loses their mind on and everything that led Peter to becoming Spider-Man in the first film wouldn't be because of a little "accident", and to make the Peter/Mary Jane slow dance ending far from depressing (in my opinion), I would view the happy final swing video on YouTube (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dSeUJy_X5o). I mean, why would I "give Spider-Man 3 a chance" when from now on, the only Sam Raimi Spider-Man movies that are canon in my head are 1 and 2? Just like I see the first two Alien movies as canon only,  and then disregard Alien 3 (no matter how better is the "Assembly Cut," if it still killed off poor Hicks and Newt at the start due to an Alien egg that WASN'T SUPPOSED TO BE ON THE SULACO IN THE FIRST PLACE!) and/or Alien Resurrection. After all, X-Men: Days of Future Past was able to give the original X-Men trilogy cast an actual happy ending by erasing everything that led to the X3 disaster and thus brought back Cyclops and Jean Grey from the dead. How can the way that Spider-Man 3, that was tainted by an awful amount of stuff that made the characters we so love more than the Amazing Spider-Man characters completely idiotic, ended be truly "happy"? Spider-Man 2 ended on a HAPPY note, like the journey of Tobey Maguire's Peter Parker to accepting his true destiny as Spider-Man is already completed since he finally have Mary Jane (b*tchy or no) as his girl, if we ignore the part with Harry discovering the Green Goblin lair when he clearly said no to his dead father's hallucination yelling "Avenge me"! Yet people keep saying "trilogy" like Spider-Man 3 is an entirely important chapter like Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, The Dark Knight Rises, and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King always were despite knowing that every third installments are "always the worst"!

But when I read over the review (https://bradleybasement.wordpress.com/spider-man/spider-man-3-film/) on the Spider-Man 3 novelization, it says that it was a "great improvement on the actual movie", given that author Peter David "enhances on the darker nature of Peter Parker's character when he gets increasingly over-confident", as well as exploring that, for example, "MJ is trying to protect Peter as well as her when being threatened by Harry" and "thinking about Peter when kissing Harry, as she realizes that what she's doing is wrong" (yes, but does it still make her likable unlike in the movie?). And when I piece that review with the other comments that "Spider-Man 3 doesn't deserve a lot of hate" after being upset with Amazing Spider-Man 2, that was when I had some second thoughts about if I should permanently ignore Spider-Man 3 like the time-traveling at the end of X-Men: DOFP did to the pre/post-X3 events. Perhaps I was being a little too hard on the threequel that I thought pulled the same franchise-killing technique as Superman IV and Batman & Robin. If the Ultimate Edition version can make me change how I feel about Batman v Superman, which contains like a lot of stuff that most people had a problem albeit with some enjoyable parts like Wonder Woman, perhaps the extension and further development of some random scenes (when I read the novelization that my sister has just ordered from Amazon as a late Christmas gift) in Spider-Man 3 will change my opinion of what was thought to be a very depressing ending for the Sam Raimi Spider-Man trilogy that everyone claims to be "great" even though we actually have a much more likable Spider-Man (whose own solo movie is coming next July) in the ever-expanding Marvel Cinematic Universe.

So to conclude this blog post, I had a hard day's work over the past 3 months. Mom and I had a nice talk with Linda Barajas about considering taking a job internship next summer, yet I was unsure of what I can expect as I move ahead to spring semester at George Mason next year.
I should be ready for Christmas Day this weekend! I hope I have plenty of time to see all the holiday specials like Shrek the Halls and the Chuck Jones' How the Grinch Stole Christmas cartoon, or the Christmas-themed movies like The Polar Express and Gremlins on the night of Christmas Eve before I would go to bed so Santa may come to our house to deliver our presents, even if we're not little kids anymore. So as Santa Claus would say, "Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!"

Quick Review of 'Warcraft'

Could this be the first "good" live-action video game movie adaptation? For people who are fans of World of Warcraft, hm maybe. Me? Meh. I probably wouldn't say so. Because of the supposedly good word of mouth (critics on Rotten Tomatoes gave it a 28%) despite not doing so great at the domestic box office (obviously) while actually a much bigger hit in China like Transformers: Age of Extinction and Terminator Genisys were, I now wanted to see the Warcraft movie for myself after skipping it in theaters. Given that it's made by Legendary, the studio that brought us the monster-sized blockbuster hits Pacific Rim and Godzilla. Mostly because of one character that I deeply care about more than the Alliance humans: Durotan, chieftain of the Frostwolf Clan. Why does it feel like I'm better off rooting "for the Horde" than the humans even if the Orcs are vicious and merciless like the other Orcs in The Lord of the Rings? Why? Because of a bunch of nobodies like Travis Fimmel (Anduin Lothar), Ben Schnetzer (Khadgar), Ben Foster (Medivh), and of course whoever the hell that poorly-developed young man is as Lothar's (SPOILER: deceased) son Callan. Do they expect me to cheer for the humans who unfortunately don't seem to be interesting enough for us to even care? No wonder this movie failed on the opening weekend 3 months ago. At least Game of Thrones have much better acting from stars that are already famous as of now! I do think Paula Patton is kind of hot, though. And seriously? No Director's Cut? Maybe Warcraft would have been better if the pacing is less abrupt and actually had MORE SCENES to properly develop the characters! Where's the part with the Orcs rushing through the snow? What's with the studios cutting out very important scenes nowadays since Batman v Superman and Suicide Squad? The best thing about Warcraft for me, are the motion-capture CGI Orcs. Especially Durotan! His interaction with Orgrim and his wife Draka have proven how much of a good actor Toby Kebbell was than his disgustingly awful Dr. Doom role since Koba in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. That's why I consider Warcraft as one of the great examples of how to really make CGI characters like the expensively-animated Autobots more than just visual props, which Michael Bay and Paramount should definitely learn from when building their own cinematic universe! And man, what an awesome fight between Durotan and Gul'Dan! Overall, Warcraft is visually enjoyable since Transformers, but the way it ended just made me despise Gul'Dan and Lothar (because he thinks Garona murdered King Llane in cold blood when the king forced her to in order to "bring peace between humans and Orcs") so much deep down once my favorite character Durotan is dead (and maybe along with his entire Frostwolf Clan minus Orgrim). Don't know why they're saying that they loved it. I doubt that it was worth watching again and again like the 1st Transformers movie and Pacific Rim. The ending shot of that cute now-orphan Orc baby Go'el definitely screams "sequel!" despite unsurprisingly flopping hard big time! And even if with over $433 million thanks to China, shame the studio still treated it as a box office disappointment. That's what I hate most about failed movie franchise starters (ex., The Golden Compass, John Carter, The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones). Thanks to this movie, now I really wanted explore more of the Warcraft video game concept even if we don't get sequels to the film that had such potential! For the Horde (that's right, people)!

Gabe's 25th Birthday Week!

This week is officially birthday week! I have just turned 25 (my birth date was 9/20/1991), and I'm expecting some fun stuff happening around me even in the face of tough assignments, projects, and study review for quizzes for my required classes at GMU! After being so hard on myself for being criticized by my Package Design teacher James Hicks, Jessica Machado, Wayne Adams, psychiatrist Tamatha Barber, and especially my mom were able to cheer me up and encourage me not to worry about what Prof. Hicks says about the soup can label project I've been struggling with.

Three days ago, I went with my mom to Cici's Pizza for lunch after my class time with Lynne Constantine. Then, we went to Best Buy where I can get the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows Blu-ray 3D. Cowabunga! Later that night after my swimming at Oak Marr, we held together a nice, yummy birthday cake. We even got to skype my sister Christine Mayuga! I opened my birthday presents, and what I got are the Suicide Squad Joker and Harley Quinn action figures that Christine ordered from Amazon, the Star Wars Rebels Season 2 Blu-ray, and the Civil War Black Panther (finally!) and Agent 13/Sharon Carter Toys R' Us exclusive pack that I bought from the store ON THE EXACT SAME DAY. It's like my birthday week is gonna be lots of fun before it would get even more exciting in the next 2 weeks when I invite my Mason Swim Club friends to Bowl America for my birthday party! Today, mom and I got the chance to see the laugh-out-loud/cute animated movie Storks at Regal Fairfax Towne Center this afternoon. I hope that the birthday party at my house will be tons of fun no matter how important is my preparation for the History of Game Design quiz and the full priority submission of the soup can labels for the hopefully-more-friendly critique with Prof. Hicks! 25 years really is a long time for me!

Welcome to Game Design at George Mason!

Image taken from Gaming Blog

*Sighs* So here I am. Back at George Mason after my LOOONG summer break. Only this time, the Critical Theory of Arts and Package Design classes aren't the only subjects I'll be taking this semester. 'Cause this time, I've just got myself declared a minor in Game Design!
Where do I start? Well, after my mom and I had a brief meeting with Jeremy Tuohy two weeks ago, we agreed that it would be great if I could have game design as my new required/elective subject after I am using up a lot of required classes for graphic design. At the same time however, it was decided that I may have to have one more school year prior to graduation and my earning in the BFA degree. Specifically, instead of May 2017, my graduation date would now have to be May 2018 which is two years from now.
I have already entered my new semester as of Aug. 29th, and so far, I seem to be having a good time if not so easily challenged by the new subjects I now have to deal with. Of all the game design classes, they are History of Game Design (GAME 230-001; Seth Hudson), Basic Game Design (GAME 210-004; Josiah Lebowitz), and Sound and Music for Film and Video (GAME 250-001; Thomas Stanley). While these classes have these intriguing gaming details, what concerns me more are the upcoming assignments and forthcoming deadlines of projects or inevitable quizzes and tests. But with some helpful assistance and advice from my trustworthy teachers and my beloved mother, I hope that I will have no problem accomplishing all five of these subjects in one entire semester before I would be ready for the holidays! I better not let them down!