Open Discussion – February 11, 2009
Feb 11, 2009 by Vic HoltremanIt’s Wednesday, so that means it’s time for our weekly discussion post – where YOU determine the topics!
As usual – talk about whatever you like …
It’s Wednesday, so that means it’s time for our weekly discussion post – where YOU determine the topics!
As usual – talk about whatever you like as long as it’s related to movies, TV or Screen Rant itself.
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Any news on the possible Half Life movie?
Also, any news on when Aliens will come out on Blu-Ray or when Terminator and Terminator 2 will get an actual GOOD Blu-Ray transfer?
What are people’s feelings on this week’s episode of Heroes? Seemed OK to me, but in reality, if I was ever a fugitive I would get as far away as possible from the crash site, but single Hero stuck around.
And ***SPOILER***, really disappointed they kille off Daphne, and in such a quick and mundane and uneventful way.
every single hero*
Hello. I’ve been visiting Screenrant daily for some time now and I absolutely love the site. I wouldn’t dare go to any other source for my film news. However, there has been something really bothering me lately. It seems like every other article contains at least one reference to last summer’s Dark Knight. Now, it is important to note the huge success of this film and how much fanboys like me fell in love with it and saw it multiple times in the theater.
As good as it was, do we still need to be talking about it so much? Do we need to compare every other upcoming film to it? Do we really need to speculate on which kind of toilet paper the guy in the background of the third scene uses? The movie was awesome and people will look back in 20 years and remark about how absolutely revolutionary it was. However…..can we all move forward? Can we start looking forward to upcoming films, not films that have been out for 8 months? Just food for thought. Still love the site.
@ JMoney
Yeah, I was honestly shocked by the way they took out Daphne. I mean, he knew exactly how it was going to happen, he went back to prevent it, yet he let her stand in the open for what? A whole minute? I dunno, tackle her maybe?
I did like this week’s ep though. And again, thank God for Sylar.
Now on to Fringe. My favorite show this season has to be, but what is up with showing me 3 episodes and then taking off for a month and a half? All that does is p me oh. Neat about the typewriter + ZFT…
BSG: This past episode made up for the CRAP they were giving me since the show came back. Though Ellen being #5… ick.
Legend of the Seeker: Is anyone still watching this? I can’t believe I am. I guess I like yellng at the TV about how much they screwed up the books.
House: How I love to live through him vicariously
I did see Coraline this past weekend with my son. It was a good scary movie for kids I think! I know I would have liked it when I was a kid (given that I started reading Hitchcock selected scary shorts in the second grade and moving on to Poe in the third).
Sorry for the long post.
@Frank Castle
Hmmm… I just went through and looked at our recent posts.
So far this month The Dark Knight was mentioned in 5 out of 61 posts. In January TDK was mentioned in 15 out of 161 posts.
So less than 10% of our posts mention The Dark Knight, and that includes posts that are specifically ABOUT the film. Last month there was a lot of Oscar talk about it plus any talk of Warner Bros. financial situation usually warrants a reference.
Thanks, though – I’d never thought about going back through and doing an analysis like that.
Vic
Vic,
Any News on Justin Long being the new Joker in the upcoming Batman movies, and Justin also playing Ant-Man?
@ Frank Castle
And this time, YOU brought The Dark Knight into this article.
But I agree. Not being the 2nd coming of the cinematic christ anyway, I declare this case closed.
Vic, ban everybody who talks about the Knight.
That’ll do.
@ JMoney
I just stopped watching Heroes after the last “finale”. Just gave up.
@ Ken J
Just for the fun of it: I think, Adam Savage (Mythbusters) should play Gordon.
Kinda feels right. But I’m not really a hardcore-fan.
@Drew
Haven’t heard anything on either front, sorry. I seriously doubt they’ll re-use the Joker in the next Batman film.
Vic
@JMoney
I was sad to see what they did to Daphne as well. She was a cutie!
@Ken
Is a possible Half Life movie really being thought about? That would be cool!
I don’t want to sound like an @$$#0!e for saying this, but I haven’t heard anyone else say it. I love the Dark Knight, and I truly think that was one of Heath Ledgers performances, but I think one of the real reason it did so well in the box office was because after he died, some critics talked about how amazing it was, and people who don’t even care for Batman or comic book movies wanted to see his last movie. My girlfriend being one of them. She even admited that she was lost during the entire movie but thought Heath Ledger was Awesome. So yes, the actors do have some part in bringing in money for the movie, but I think that Marvel is on the right track with not losing money in the long run. Even though the Dark Knight Made almost 1 billion dollars, I believe I read they lost 30 million due to what it took to make the movie.
any buzz about the new replacement series on ABC called Castle? I know it has Nathan Fillion (ex Firefly) whom I like but other than a teaser preview, not much else has been said.
Also, I would like to reccomend Leverage for those looking for some mind candy to entertain themselves, it’s on the same time as Fringe (tyvm DVR) but I find it a pleasure to watch simply because the rest of the cast is able to keep up with Hutton.
Still digging Fringe .
and the writers are giving us a lot of answers before the first season is even concluded.
YES!
Mandarr, there were rumors of it a while ago, but so far I’ve heard nothing else. I don’t know if that means it’s no longer being considered or if that just means the rumors have stopped but real plans are still going. Who knows.
There’s plenty of story in that to make a feature film though, but if they pick the wrong person to play Gordon, that could ruin it. Valve specifically made it so that Gordon NEVER speaks, nor do you EVER see Gordon outside of yourself, meaning you ALWAYS stay in 1st person. And you NEVER miss a second of Gordon being conscious. In the time between Half Life and Half Life 2, Gordon was in stasis, and you pick up exactly as he is awakened. The reason for this is so the player never is thrown by a main character that they don’t agree with. Have you ever played a game that seems fun, but then the second your character opens his mouth and he sounds like a complete moron, it makes you want to play as him less? They wanted to avoid that, since Gordon is, basically, you. So that would be the hard thing to do in a movie, to have a character that everyone can relate to. They can’t use the same technique, because it’ll just be weird to have a completely mute character as the main character in the movie…
I really like that concept and I think more games should do that where you play as a character and they don’t make the character do or say anything you wouldn’t want him/her to say, nor do you ever really lose control over his/her actions. The only times you don’t have control over your actions in the Half Life games is when the character, Gordon, is disabled somehow, either knocked unconscious, pinned under something heavy, being held with restraints, etc. Other than that, you have 100% control at all times.
The one time where a game character’s dialogue actually made me like the character more is in Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay. I’ve never really like Vin Diesel, but that game was awesome, and his character was just so… there’s no other word for it, cool. It made me want to go watch Pitch Black and Chronicles of Riddick, and I really liked them. I wish Vin Diesel would do more CoR movies, it really suits him.
@ Ken J;
There is an old (in black & white, I think) Movie or TV series where the main character, a detective I believe, was done in first person perspective. This character did talk however. Still, it could be an approach to set a Half Life movie apart from the rest of the pack and with todays camera technology could prove to be a wild ride. I’m not a Half Life game player, so what do you think?
@ Frank Castle;
You don’t know any Star Trek fans do you?
Can you say “obsessive compulsive”?
Might remind people of that horrible video game to movie Doom where they tried to do some scenes in the first person view. I am not saying that done right it won’t work, but since there is already skepticism of any video game movie, to do something another video game movie has done that was considered really, really, really bad, I don’t think any production company that wants to earn money would risk financing that…
Oops, thought I put the @ JustDavid thing in front of that, my mistake.
@JustDavid
But even done that way, the fact that the character will talk will make it harder to accomplish what they have done with the game. In the game, they go as far to make sure you NEVER see a reflection of yourself either. So even facial expressions will not be shown unless somehow the player controls it. And since there’s no way to do that, they don’t want to show even facial expressions. They want the player to imagine what expressions he/she would do when confronted with the situation or dialogue in front of him/her. A little off-topic to the movie concept, but typing that just made me think of something. I was hoping for episode 3 to somehow let you use the portal gun. But you can see yourself if you make a portal that faces another one, you can see your back by looking through one. So that means Valve might be against having the portal gun for that reason, which sucks because Portal was soooo fun and I would love to use the portal gun as a weapon like I use the gravity gun as a weapon in Half Life 2, lol.
@ Ken J;
I haven’t seem Doom so I didn’t know about the attempt at the first person camera style. I think your right though, if it’s been tried and failed, it’s doubtful any other studio will give it a shot.
It seems to me that if the game makers go to such lengths to prevent any sort of identity to Gordon, why would they allow a movie that puts a face on there main and faceless character before they have finished the game series?
I don’t mean to rain on your parade, but a movie would spell the end of the game series, don’t you think?
Yep, maybe that’s why the rumors have died, maybe Valve turned down the movie idea for that reason, or they are waiting. Gordon isn’t really faceless per-se, you see his likeness on the box art or whatever, but you never see it in the game while you’re playing. I believe the reason is that they don’t want to assign any facial expression on him afraid it wasn’t what the player expected, thus messing up the player’s perception that he is direct involvement in the story.
I don’t know, as much as I would like to see a Half Life movie, it does seem that what makes the game so great for those who enjoy it is impossible to transfer to the silver screen. The most you would get is a movie with the same story line and characters, but not the same magic.
Hey, any news on Book of Eli by any chance?
Wow, I’m watching the latest episode of Sarah Connor Chronicles on Hulu and I swear they got some 15 year-old playing Kyle Reese… what an insult. He is the smallest person with the littlest baby voice I’ve ever seen on the show… The guy playing Derrick would have made a better Kyle…