Monthly Archives: March 2018

Ready Player One – A Review

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Ready Player One

I went back and looked. I didn’t realize that it had been almost 5 years since I read the book. You can read my old review of the book here.

IF you’re interested in a synopsis of the book from a slightly different point of view (with spoilers), feel free to check this guy out (he’s really clever and I like his work) THUG NOTES.

The movie itself.

If you haven’t seen the movie yet – yes, there will be spoiler stuff in here. There has to be in order to cover my specific thoughts on the film. Before I get to that part, here’s the short, non-spoiler version:

It was a well done movie. There’s a lot of visual stuff that’s worth your dollars to see it on the big screen. I didn’t see it in 3D, but I bet that would actually help this movie. Go see it and support it, we want stuff that isn’t a sequel or a remake of TV shows from the 70s or 80s.

After this is the spoilery bits – you are warned.

I really did like the movie, but I went into the theater completely prepared to be disappointed. That might have helped my outlook by the end because it was better than I was afraid it was going to be when we got to the end. A number of my fears DID happen to come true and that made me more than a little sad.

There are a number of things that were different from the book. Yes, we know this and it happens to every film. The book ranged over worlds and games and took a really long time to cover certain ground. It wasn’t descriptive so much as pointed out pop culture from the past. There were going to have to be changes in order to make the movie work. The problem is changing or tweaking just the right thing and not losing the tone or message that made the book the success it is. There were three parts to that in my mind – the pop culture, the challenges and the characters. One at a time, in reverse order –

The characters. I know the story centers around Wade. The book has had some criticism about how his character plays out. The movie actually doesn’t do badly with him, and helps to get away from the stalker aspects of his character as he is shown in the book. The rest of the characters however have been ‘adjusted’ by Hollywierd. Wade gets taken to work for the sixers, not Art3mis. The movie takes her instead. Aech’s story is mostly background, but the part in the book where she’s playing as a white guy because she gets more respect didn’t need to be chopped out. Her avatar for the game should have still been a white guy. That bothers me. The movie hints at danger for the characters, but this is the movies – none of the main team actually dies. That’s not the case in the book. I don’t know if it was a ratings thing or if it was deemed to be bad for the story – I’m not sure. Whatever it was I think it weakened the movie when it didn’t need to. I loved that Simon Pegg was in there. I could have done without the changes to Og’s character, but it was less noticeable. His part was small but very good. The portrayal of Halliday was exceptionally well done. Much more than I had hoped for. That part of the characters was fantastic.

The challenges. I know there was some effort made to engage with people who don’t remember the 80s and don’t particularly care about any of the nostalgia related things in this story. I get it. You need to make the money back that you put into the product. WHY would the Dungeons and Dragons portion of the challenges have to be dumped? They only call outs – despite appearing to have the go ahead from WoTC (and I watched for that in the credits) – were a t-shirt, a couple of posters on a bedroom wall and the face on the back of the van. Yes, that face is from the original art in the module that is the challenge in the book. WHY? I fail to understand that. It can’t be some leftover garbage from the days of the satanic panic can it? Has the film maker in this case fallen back onto news from the 80s in the decision making process too? The Shining wasn’t even in the book! IF there was going to be a movie that would be referenced it should have been Ladyhawk. Cannon! IF the argument for removing the dungeons and dragons references is some attempt to connect with a modern (non-80s) audience The Shining sure isn’t the way. In fact, since Stranger Things hit there’s been a resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons. It would in fact make MORE sense to include it than not! That leads me into the last of the three portions.

The Pop culture. Fine, I’ll give you Iron Giant over Leopardon for a giant robot. Fine. We got Rush music in one trailer and then it wasn’t in the movie. Sure, there are scads of background things that you could pick out – but get them right. Atari 2600 plays a central role to all this AND THEY GOT THE DETAILS WRONG. The controllers on the one game console they show are for the Colecovision! IF you’re going to send people looking for Easter Eggs expect to be called out on that sort of thing. People are going to be pulling this apart for a long time. Again – a little bit of effort and it’s soooo much better. There were a lot of things that just dragged at my willingness to go on this ride and tried to pull me out of the story.

In the end, yes this is a good movie. It should be supported on the big screen so that we all continue to see many and varied offerings like it on the big screen. If you go in with low hopes, no nostalgia hooked into your brain nor any desire to see a particular portion of the book displayed ‘just so’ then you won’t be disappointed. I did like it, and I will own it at some point but maybe not until it falls into the discount bin or the clearance shelf with all the other nostalgic things that got put back in the closet.

The Secret Counted

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Well, it counted a little anyway.

This is another in the few remaining posts of my thoughts from when I was part of the Neilsen rating system. I’ve mentioned before about the company’s request to keep this a secret. This was one of those times when I didn’t want to, but it would have felt entirely self serving. It in fact feels entirely too self serving to “tag” the person I mention in this post. I did what I could, when nobody was watching.

April 4, 2017

Miraculously, when the end of our trial period came up in late December / early January the company we get our TV from extended our ‘bonus’ time for signing up out another year. I did not call them to complain. I did not call them at all – they simply did it.

I can’t say they know, but doesn’t that seem suspicious? When has a cable company ever given you anything for free without you demanding they make up for being shitty?

Suspect I say. Suspect.

It’s been longer between my entries here than before. I think it’s because we’re coming up on the two year mark for this and it has just… faded. I still know it counts, I still log in when I start up the TV but there’s no enthusiasm. There’s nothing on the program schedule that I really want to see. There’s very little I’ve been really interested in supporting. I can say the one exception to that is when Myke Cole started promoting a show that he was going to be on. THAT was exciting. I tuned in live and logged in to have my ‘vote’ count for as much of the season as I possibly could. Anything I couldn’t get to live because of my schedule I went back and looked at on demand via the television provider service (rather than an on-line service). I have no idea if I made a difference or not. This was another one of those times when I desperately wanted to say something – but had to keep it to myself. I tend not to watch, like or enjoy reality television, but the CBS show “Hunted” fell into the exception category. It was very interesting. If you can still dig it up on demand someplace it’s worth some of your time to check it out.

The End Is Nigh!

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I know there’s at least one person out there actually reading these posts and the stuff I’ve been pushing out here about my time as part of a ratings family has been uneven in its release. Honestly, it was uneven when I was writing it and more so when I was actually clicking the box. I think I’ve only got 2 left after this one. From football / election season, it’s interesting to look back.

November 11, 2016

I ran for cover since the last time I wrote something for this. It was election season. It was such an acidic, nasty and overpowering beast of a race that I just couldn’t watch. If I was watching something, it was an on demand show where I could hide from the commercials. I attempted to watch some football, but the commercials that bombarded me approximately every 3rd play were horrific. I turned away.

Along those lines there have been any number of news articles lately about how the ratings are way, way down for the NFL this year. The NFL regularly draws big numbers, but not so much this year. Guess what? Part of that is me. Most people say that, but this time it’s actually kind of true. I’ve tuned out. I couldn’t stand the political stuff grating on my last nerve after long days. The games themselves have become slow, angry affairs where grown men argue like children in the playground. Multi-millionaire players dance and flash finger symbols and whatever else after every play. EVERY PLAY. How about be a professional and just play the next play. Don’t dance. Don’t gesticulate or gyrate. Nobody gives a flaming bag of dog shit that you made your 53rd tackle of the season. Do you job and shut up. Nobody working double shifts wants to hear how a 6 year 48 million dollar contract wasn’t enough and you had to do right by your family. Shut UP.

The NFL also suffers from the old contracts it’s got with television stations. I say this because it was another reason I turned the games off. I was watching a team that I like and don’t get to see very often. They were winning. Rather than letting the game play out somebody decided to go to a game that was tied and likely to head to overtime. More competitive, more exciting. I was angry that I wouldn’t get to see my favorite team, but a more exciting game would be good. Fine. The teams were in the same conference and one of them was likely to end up in the playoffs against my favs so worth a look.

THEN THEY STOPPED PLAYING THAT BROADCAST JUST BEFORE THE POTENTIAL FINAL SCORE BECAUSE THEY HAD TO SHOW THE LOCAL TEAM THAT CAN’T WIN A DAMN THING AND COULDN’T BEAT A SOLID HIGH SCHOOL TEAM.

Needless to say, I was somewhat upset. I simply shut it off and walked away. My voice actually counted this time though. At least a little.

Along those lines, this is supposed to be a secret. Secret so that our family is not unduly influenced in any way about what we watch or how we interact with sponsors. Well, if everything about this is supposed to be a secret – why would Nielsen plaster their name all over the remote controls they left here? Like it’s a brand somebody would shop for. I ask this because it’s difficult enough trying to get the data put into the little box on the TV when we have guests without arousing suspicion about what we’re doing. I have some very clever friends. Nobody has to be clever when they are over for an evening, pick up the remote and say, “Huh, Nielsen. So you’re doing the TV ratings thing, right?”

So much for secret.

I’m supposed to let the company know when somebody knows, but I have become suspect of this whole ratings thing. It has become something that is so routine now as to be defaulted to where it was when we turned the TV on, no matter who is here or what’s going on. My ID has become the one that gets left on when my wife walks away and doesn’t want to change the music channel we listen to. I’ll have taken the kiddo out to the dojo and will come back 2 hours later – but my ID is still the only one logged in. I hit the button and it’s all logged, even though I wasn’t actually here. Suspect at best. Flat out skeptical most of the time.

We’re coming up on the end of our promotional (free) time for the TV channels that we have. It’s actually the only reason we have TV beyond what we can stream from the internet or Netflix. It will be interesting to see what happens once that changes.

Incredible(s)

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I went back and searched to see if I had mentioned anything about The Incredibles before and it turns out I hadn’t. I should have mentioned it because it is easily my favorite Pixar movie.

I relate to Mr. Incredible WAY too much. No, I’m not a super, but I totally see myself sitting in the cubicle at the insurance company (been there, done that). I see the exhausted parent parts and could just watch a well written movie about nothing more than parenting as a super.

I can’t say I’m usually excited by “Part II” of any franchise really. It didn’t feel like a great idea to make another movie with the family, even if Jack-Jack would be hilarious. I could be wrong. IF you haven’t had the chance, go and check out the trailer. It looks like this might be a sequel that will work.