Movie Review - Wargames: The Dead Code

OK, forget everything you know from the original. None of the original cast are involved in this "sequal" and it's only loosely (emphasis on the word loosely!) based on the ideas of the original 80's hit cult movie which is still popular today. This is set in the modern day as we're seeing a base in Afghanistan get destroyed by a UAV right at the start.

And that's exactly where the movie jumps the shark. UAV's aren't armed. Yes, they theoretically could be but as far as I'm aware it's never been tried for real. We get to see the computer that has masterminded this operation and it's called R.I.P.L.E.Y (you're never told what that stands for either), so forget any ideas about seeing Joshua/WOPR from the original movie for the time being.

Everyone says this one just went straight to DVD so that kind of speaks volumes about MGM's confidence in it's ability to get bums on seats. We are introduced to our "hacker" Will Farmer (no evidence of his hacking ability ever really manifests, he's good at chemistry & electronics which doesn't make him a computer hacker) & what I assume will prove to be his love interest, Annie & Will's 1st attempt at hacking is not only a complete failure (as he's busted while doing it) his IP address is also logged and Annie guessed who he was. We also meet Will's mom who works for a chemical company and is clearly a chemist of some kind.

Wills taking money from his neighbours bank account (Mr Massude) isn't a hack (he clearly says he helped him set up the account and knew the password already), we then get 1 nod back to the original movie where they decide against playing Global Thermonuclear War & they choose to play The Dead Code of the film's title. The trace the RIPLEY office are running is NOT on Will but on Massude's pc so all the evidence they were gathering was useless against Will.

Exactly why RIPLEY shut Will's machine down isn't explained (he's only playing an online game?) & also why it felt the need to have to shut down all the electricity in the entire block he lived in as well. Why a counter terrorism agency would see this as a viable target is extremely questionable also the machine RIPLEY would have "infected" with its track bug wasn't Will's anyway, it belonged to Massude. As for RIPLEY activating his mobile phone? I think not, it wasn't connected to the pc and the message wouldn't play unless he actually answered the phone so there's more bad "hacking" science there too.

The RIPLEY agents arrive at Massude's home the next day and take him away (they didn't think to check if the pc was actually in his house when they arrested him?) and Will is given a envelope from Massude by his mother which turns out to contain a lot of money (enough to make Will say "Holy S**t!").

Will searching for the licence plate of the car that took Massude can't be classed as a "hack" as you never see him break into the DMV computer. Now then, as for Will's friend Dennis being able to get off a plane, go back into an airport to "go look for" Will. I highly doubt it in this age of high Airport security, a passenger has to have a pretty good reason to be allowed off a plane once they've boarded.

Likewise the RIPLEY agents who grab Dennis in the airport as he's looking for Will have no authority to arrest or detain him, he committed no offence & neither has Will. Will's mother had not "been stealing chemicals & Bio agents" either, these people clearly don't have their facts straight. And even if she did they had no right to arrest or detain Dennis. Patriot Act or not.

Will's claims to have hacked various databases to see who took Mr Massude are utter s**t, we saw no such evidence of ANY of those alleged "hacks". I also don't know why Will was worried about being arrested for any possible crime in Canada is its a totally different country with different laws to the US.

Once we cut back to RIPLEY its clear the computer has gone rogue and all the action its taken against Will, his mother and Dennis was very unsanctioned by any Government agency. The phone phreak we see Will do is the 1st demonstration of any hacking skill in the movie, we also then get a proper hack into RIPLEY which just seemed far too easy for such a powerful system.

Clearly the "guy" who ran into Annie at the airport & was also watching them in the street was nothing to do with RIPLEY as their agents were the ones in the black car who ran into the coffee house Will piggy backed off. I did wonder why no bystanders were calling the Canadian Police after seeing 2 cars chasing pedestrians on the street & the hugely laughable notion that RIPLEY could track a cellphone whilst it was underground was really ridiculous as was the idea that a computer can read lips.

We get another reference to the original movie when they mention Stephen Falken as the designer of the system RIPLEY replaced, the Joshua Project. I also don't understand why Will & Annie thought they'd have to speak French in Montreal, its a bilingual place. We also discover that the "guy" who ran into Annie is Falken (not played by the original actor sadly) and that he faked his own death.

Falken reveals he knew Will's father and the truth behind both his father's career & death which helps tie up a few loose ends in the plot. RIPLEY also tries & fails to kill one of the agents who is doubting her mission & abilities. We also get to see the original WOPR prop from Wargames as "what's going to help" them beat RIPLEY and it looks a lot smaller than it did in the 80's, but at least they kept the same synth voice used back then for the "Greetings Professor Falken" line.

It's annoying that Falken & WOPR are destroyed so quickly after being hardly used at all (and that the same explosion doesn't kill Will, Annie & the Russian). It's also very annoying & unlikely that after being caught they'd allow Will to keep his laptop. They do try and explain that away but I was already crying "Bulls**t!" at that point. It's also unlikely they'd create a completely self-contained computer system that has the ability to nuke or drop chemical weapons on the country it operates out of.

The whole "Decontamination" plot & idea are just bloody awful & totally unbelievable. Those kinds of orders would have to go through the President or Joint Chiefs Of Staff. So yet another laughable & unbelievable idea.

The IP hacks against RIPLEY aren't done by Will, he just contacts one of his friends who suggests & then implements the idea. It's excessively laughable that Will would get a login just from increasing RIPLEY's operating temperature. Having Joshua as a backdoor into RIPLEY (especially after it had been blown to bits) is an incredible cop-out and screams of a very desperate writer who had no ideas left and wanted to get this movie over and done with.

There is an awful goof where RIPLEY is playing Dead Code and we see a countdown (saying 17 minutes) then RIPLEY says "Decontamination in 30 minutes", how c**p is that when they can't even keep up with their own timer? RIPLEY's attack mission against Philadelphia is halted (far too easily in my opinion) and it decides to attack Joshua in its internal circuits and reroutes the missile aimed a Philly to Washington where RIPLEY is stationed. The idea of the Nuclear exchange to make RIPLEY realise what she's doing won't work (surely she'd already know if she had Joshua inside her as he'd already learnt this lesson in the original movie?) is yet another nod back to the original movie.

Except it's nowhere near as exciting as the original ending, none of the cool explosion noises & effects, none of the suspenseful music over the top of it. It just didn't have that same "edge of the seat" effect as the original did and still does every time I see that segment. Their utter cop-out at having RIPLEY repeat Joshua's exact same words form the end of the original movie just goes to show how many original ideas they were unable to come up with. And Joshua's attempt at "humour" after a near death situation like that just wasn't funny at all.

If you want to point fingers for bad & stolen ideas the men to blame are Randall Badat & Rob Kerchner.
This is an awful movie and is best avoided as it tarnishes the good name of the original and best WarGames.

My TNA Weekly Catch-up, Impact 26th Jun 08

Ok, catch-up time is here again. Usual caveats apply, I talk about what I feel furthers TNA as a brand and if it's c**p then I say so or just don't mention it if its THAT c**p. I might swear but that's how real people speak, if its likely to offend then either don't read the review or killfile me. ANY feedback on the review WILL be answered if your not in my killfile. Onto the review.

Consequences Creed vs AJ Styles. Clearly TNA management like Creed if their working him with AJ. If you can't get over working off Styles then you never will. This one started off on the mat with some technical wrestling, never a good idea if your trying to get over & in the 1st match of the show. Creed & Styles did then crank it up a few notches from that point. AJ was selling Creed's punches very convincingly. Best move of the match had to be AJ's Pele from out of no-where. AJ took the win off a Styles Clash that Creed sold really well. A good match for AJ & Creed got some good screen time too.

Brother Ray vs Christian Cage - This one was over quick as they had obviously no ideas how to work the match to its expected duration at all. It didn't start well & got thrown out as a DQ for using a foreign object after Johnny Devine tried to help Brother Ray by hitting Cage with a kendo stick & then Ray decided to use it on Cage & the ref called an end to it. As part of the postmatch beatdown Cage was powerbombed through a glass table. You'd never see THAT on a WWE show, that's for sure! Eric Young & Kaz came out to see if Cage was ok.

Once again Awesome Kong comes out with Raisha Saeed to make the $25,000 challenge to the female fans in the Impact Zone.

Awesome Kong vs Danielle (no surname?) from Buffalo, New York (aka Ferrari - manager of Marc Mandrake) - Danielle gave NO offense at all, she took hard bumps (especially against the ring steps). Kong struggled to lift & hold her but eventually Danielle took the Awesome Bomb (thanks mainly on the whole to Danielle's awesomely strong stomach muscles!) & Kong took yet another win against a jobber posing as a fan. During the match we'd seen Kong's competitor from last week Shantelle Taylor at the guard rail and Kong gave her the staredown after the match. Taylor jumped the guard rail and went at it again with Kong. Raisha Saeed tried to interfere and Taylor clocked her hard and continued to take it to Kong just like last week. Security had to separate them and Jim Cornette came out to intervene. Taylor asked to be given a chance saying 1stly she could beat Kong then asked to fight Saeed saying she could beat her. Cornette said they'd talk.

Angelina Love interview segment sticking very much IN character. Nice to see Simon Diamond & Scott D'Amore in yet another of these.

First Round World X Cup Match, The intro's are stopped by MMA star Frank Trigg coming out to the ring to bore us on the mic to sucker AJ Styles out of the locker room so Kurt could sic The Beautiful People onto Karen once he'd gone. Before the actual intro's to this match we get to meet the members of Team International (Daivari, Alex Kozlov, Tyson Dux & Doug Williams from the UK who is now under contract to TNA which hopefully means we'll see more of him in the X Division after this competition is over). We also get to meet all of Team TNA (Curry Man, Kaz & The Motorcity Machine Guns).

First Round World X Cup Match Team Japan (Naruki Doi & Masato Yoshino - thank f**k they gave their names 2 weeks ago) vs Team Mexico (Ultimo Guerrero - no relation to the famous family, apparently the name means "The Last Warrior" & Rey Bucanero aka Arturo Ortiz which means "Buccaneer King" as he used to run a pirate gimmick). This kicked off at a very fast pace & Team Japan were very fluid with their doubleteam on Bucanero but Team Mexico's doubleteam was just as fast & just as good. Yoshino pulled a wicked mad Hurricanrana & they both made an excellent double suicide dive onto Team Mexico outside the ring. Both these teams looked great & worked great (I really liked the reverse faceplant suplex off the top rope that Guerrero made on Doi). Team Mexico got a well deserved win off a wicked corkscrew senton earning 1 point in the World X Cup. The fans gave lots of deserved applause & both teams were excellent here in the kind of match that Rey Mysterio wishes he could get into in the WWE but never will.

Sonjay Dutt (with his 4 guru-ites which are little kids dressed in the guru gear) comes out to bore us on the mic only to get jumped by Jay Lethal. Followed by an overly long & crappy segment from Booker T's dressing room. Followed by a Matt Morgan interview segment.

Anything Goes Knockout Bimbo Brawl, Moose vs ODB. Basically this is a hardcore match between 2 women I've wanted to see fight each other since Moose came to TNA & boy did I get my wish! Moose appeared to be starting this match with a black eye already (look at her right eye, its VERY Bruised & swollen) & ODB gave her a face full of the liquid from the flask and jumped her. ODB was on top and stayed there giving Moose a real hard time, throwing her in the shopping cart & ramming it into the guard rail. ODB showed she could take it as well as dish it out by taking a hockey stick hard to the back. ODB was also convincingly selling being choked by the chain. Moose took 3 hard looking clotheslines and a very good looking fall-away slam as well. Moose really sold the shovel to the head & the kickout was a great touch too. Moose took the eventual win off a double underhook ddt into a chair. Awesome match, WWE Divas couldn't do this on their best day.

Clips from TNA's recent appearances in the UK & the news of more in 2009 as already announced by me, in case you missed it here it is again:-

MAXIMUM IMPACT 2009
Manchester MEN Arena - Tuesday 20th Jan
Birmingham NIA - Wednesday 21st Jan
Glasgow Braehead Arena - Thursday 22nd Jan
London Wembley Arena - Saturday 24th Jan

Tickets on sale from Friday June 27th

Names announced were:-
Kurt Angle, Jeff Jarrett, Samoa Joe, AJ Styles, Jay Lethal, Awesome Kong (all also feature on the advert), The Motor City Machineguns. Gail Kim, Abyss, James Storm, Sharkboy, Tomko, Curry Man, Sonjay Dutt "and many other superstars" (card subject to change).

No DQ Match, Booker T vs Kevin Nash. If it's no dq then we can be almost certain there will be interference from at least 1 person in this. I am predicting that right now! This one kicks off slow as to be expected from Nash & Samoa Joe walks down the ramp and takes a seat ringside to watch. Nash makes every move count, making no extras effort to exert himself here. Booker got in Joe's face, pushing him off the chair then smacking him in the head with it. Booker used the chair on Nash, hitting him in the head and knees. Joe eventually recovered enough to climb into the ring and take it to Booker while Nash was on the canvas. Joe "accidently" superkicked Nash when aiming at Booker, got thrown out of the ring by Booker & then Booker T took an easy win. Nash & Joe were squaring up & it took Security to break this one up. Not a good match at all really, more orientated towards a storyline to create a future match between Joe & Nash. The other matches on the card more than made up for the extremely sh**ty main event though.

The Ulitmate Warrior vs Orlando Jordan mini match review

Being brought to you by NWE (Nu-Wrestling Evolution, an Italian based indy fed) we get the intro of Orlando Jordan (formerly of WWE's Smackdown) with his sexy female valet and token hood/security guy/manager. We then get the intro of The Ultimate Warrior with short hair, some of it gray and wearing his old "One Warrior Nation" long overcoat from his WCW days. He seemed to struggle to run to the ring (he looked like he had shinsplint issues to me) and it appears as Jordan is wearing his title, the NWE World Heavyweight Championship is on the line here. We're shown a woman and 2 young girls sitting ringside who I assume are his wife & kids.

Warriors jacket is taken by his kids who he goes down on 1 knee to take a short moment to talk to. Jordan jumps Warrior as he's watching his kids go back to their seats. Jordan's on top for a very short moment with Warrior no-selling everything then Jordan is thrown into the corner and sells every knee lift and punch Warrior gives out. We get a reaction shot of Warrior's wife and kids applauding. Warrior runs into a knee in the chest & Jordan's back on top again, this time Warrior's selling the punches.

Jordan oversells a hiptoss, we get a rope shake from Warrior and the finger to the sky as Jordan takes a breather outside the ring. We get a long lockup where both guys join heads (clearly to discuss tactics), a cutaway to Warrior's nervous looking wife and we missed some action as Jordan had broken away, Warrior is beating his chest and Jordan applies an armbar. Warrior's selling the armbar and Jordan's elbows to the arm well as we see 1 worried daughter mouthing "daddy".

Jordan says something to the crowd which draws boos and good heat for him. We get a reaction shot of the younger daughter booing & giving Jordan a thumbs down. Warrior reverses the armbar with Jordan selling it big time! Jordan breaks out into some crappy looking bearhug type move (worst looking move of the match so far) but Warrior sells like its hurting. Warrior reverses it and his grab doesn't look great either, clearly its an unrehearsed move neither guy has practiced or trusts the other man to do.

This is a wear down move and it came at exactly the wrong time of the match, slowing down the action when they really should have been taking it to the next level. Jordan breaks out and gives Warrior a classic greco-roman takedown which Warrior turns into a single armbar on the canvas. That's broken after Jordan gives Warrior a few elbows to the head as their both standing again. Jordan goes for the bodycheck and Warrior stands strong, beating his chest - old school.

Jordan sweeps his leg to take him down for a 2 count, and a 2nd 2 count on his next pin. Warrior does a backdrop, goes for what might have been a suplex but gets beaten down and is up against the ropes. Warrior then springs Jordan off the ropes into a nice (and quite high) backdrop that Jordan sold like crazy! Warrior is pumping 1 arm into the air as Jordan rolls out of the ring to take another breather.

Warrior waits in the middle of the ring but is tempted out by Jordan's hot female valet to distract him, Jordan takes advantage punching Warrior in the gut. Warrior is (very lightly) thrown against the high metal barriers and we get a reaction shot of his wife looking VERY nervous indeed. Jordan picks Warrior up and runs him back 1st into the ring post which Warrior WAY oversells. Jordan throws Warrior back in the ring, turning his back on him to mimic Warrior by showboating to crowd beating his chest which gives Warrior time to recover & get back up.

Warrior ducks a clotheslines and catches Jordan on his way back off the ropes into a nice powerslam. The referee is in a fucking AWFUL position having to run halfway round the ring to count 2 when Jordan kicks out and crawls to the ropes. Warrior's on his back & has clearly blown up by this point so Jordan is buying him time. Jordan tries to go high risk and is hit by Warrior before he makes the top turnbuckle. Warrior goes up to the 2nd rope and their duking it out clearly setting up for a superplex (which the ref gives them a nice clear signal to execute) and it looks good and Jordan sells it hugely. Jordan rolls an arm onto Warrior to get a 2 count only.

We get a criss-cross with a few bodychecks then a clothesline, Warrior ducks Jordan's clothesline then takes Jordan down with what was probably supposed to be a spear but was WAY too high. The ref makes THE worlds fastest 3 count and your winner is The Ultimate Warrior (which gets big smiley clapping reaction shots from his wife & kids). After a short celebration on his own, Warriors kids join him for a hug. If Jordan's title WAS on the line we didn't get to see Warrior get given the belt. Not a bad match but a few iffy looking moves by both guys and Warrior needs to work on his stamina.

My Dr Who Trailer (AKA The Last Timelord)

Movie Review - The Happening

Brought to you by M. Night Shyamalan who had the inkling of an idea, pitched it to the studio then realised he had nothing else BUT that idea but made the film with no script, no plot and 1 idea which never turned into anything. Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel & John Leguizamo are the stars here, but Leguizamo is killed very quickly once "The Happening" starts & is utterly pointless. He is only there to bring the young girl to the group, nothing more.

Alan Ruck also appears in a "blink and you'll miss it" role as the principal of the school were Wahlberg & Leguizamo work as teachers. Basically this is director Shyamalan's incredibly preachy message about how badly we're treating the planet & that we should do more to save
plants. It's that bad an idea that plants have identified humans as their biggest threat and are now emitting toxins that kill them or cause them to kill themselves. All it does it give them a reason to leave New York and get stuck in the countryside where Wahlberg thinks he's figured out what's causing the deaths. He also thinks its to do with the sizes of groups people are in.

Eventually the "Happening" or event as they refer to it on the news ends as suddenly as it started and we're left in the slightly emptier city where Deschanel is clearly pregnant with Wahlberg's baby and Leguizamo's daughter has been adopted by them both. The film ends (if you can call it an ending) with the same thing happening somewhere in France. Awful film, really weak idea to base it on, it isn't explored enough or explained clearly enough & people are killed off way too easily. Avoid like it's trying to kill you!

Movie Review - Zathura: A Space Adventure

I'll start by saying this film has nothing to do with the world of Jumanji. There are children in a house who play a board game which comes to life and takes the house into "The Twilight Zone" (Sorry to Rod Serling for sullying his product but I had no other comparison). The similarity ends right there. Take Tim Robbins, a divorced working dad bringing up 2 sons and a daughter. So our first question is why didn't mum get custody? Oh, and in case you were wondering, we never get to see mum anyway. The kids wreck one of his drawings that he needs for a meeting (why his study isn't locked and why he has a drink that can spill anywhere near his work are never addressed.

Dad pops out to work (can you say Home Alone? Quick call Social Services, he abandoned his kids!) and the kids start playing and are very quickly pulled into the world of Zathura where you know they are going to learn moral lessons about getting on with each other and learning tolerance (A film from America is trying to teach the world these things? Get Real! That's like China trying to teach me about freedom!) Big Sister is left in charge and doesn't care about either brother. Again you know by the end she'll be as thick as thieves with both of them. When they run through the house this an obvious set-up to show us how the house is laid out for later in the film so we know how each room interacts with the rest of the house.

The only problem is the dumb waiter, someone "Forgets" how many levels the house has later in the film. Visually the film looks stunning, the Astronauts costume, the Zargon ships and "Goats", the actual game itself looks very 1950's. The Zargons were a bit 1970's Doctor Who type looking. Generally other than that the film is OK. It's a bit slow towards the end and they forget to go right back to the sister after the 5 moves she is frozen for (they go back after the 7th move, I counted) The kids were really annoying, especially the younger one. Tim Robbins could have been in the movie much more. If you want a Jumanji style movie, buy Jumanji.

Movie Review - xXx: State of the Union (aka XXX 2)

Ice Cube is a guy in military prison. He gets 1 hours exercise a day he says. But he's able to defeat an active navy seal team member in a fight. NO! NO! NO! Willem Dafoe is in a desk job. He's most likely been in admin for 5-10 years to get to that position. Most people have lost or forgotten any skills they hadn't used in that long, but he still seems to be able to fight like a special forces operative whose been in constant readiness. Right, we addressed that. The film has a brilliant start. The guy who walked out after 40 Min's who "reviewed" this film? You wasted your money mate! The film had one of the best opening sequences I've seen in a long time. High tech assassins storming a secret NSA base? He didn't like that? And the prison break-out which wasn't as good but still pretty cool. Xzibit was pointless in this film, anyone could have played his role. And he can't act, he was just being his normal self that he is in episodes of "pimp my ride". The girl playing ice cube's girlfriend? I get the feeling there was supposed to be either nudity or a sex scene with her and they cut it to get a lower rating? The outfit she wore, they may as well have left it in, she practically showed all of her breasts anyway.

The car on the rail track (someone should check their physics, I don't think it would have landed on the track at all) was pretty unrealistic. And Ice Cube cant read a speedometer. He was doing somewhere between 140 and 160 miles per hour. Not the bullshit 220 like he claimed, idiot. There aren't many cars on the planet that are road legal that will do that speed. I don't understand why they didn't expose Willem Dafoe's character as a traitor, it would have made for a much better ending. And no-one believes Xander Cage is really dead, not after you state Samuel L. Jackson is dead then suddenly he isn't. I think the next triple x, in order to be a total surprise should be a white girl. And certainly not another black rapper (sorry, ex-rapper has-been) who can't act.