This was a BBC-made short TV series starring Christopher Eccleston (the 9th Doctor on Doctor Who), available through Netflix as a longish movie. A video store clerk in Manchester realizes one day that he's the son of God. His long time friends are predictably skeptical. Then he does something to prove it. Public reaction is about what I would expect, in the best and worst of ways. I can't tell you more than that without spoiling the best things about it. I'll say this much; don't expect a happy ending, and do expect to have your religious views challenged.
Good acting performances all around, especially from Eccleston and the actress playing his best friend Judy. I can't believe it took me as long as it did to realize the significance of her name, which tells you how caught up in this story I was. Fascinating interpretation of the Devil, how he works and what he signifies. The script does a great job of taking a very big subject and emphasizing the human elements, making this the powerful story that the subject demands it should be.
I did not like the ending, but have to admit that it would be very difficult to find a satisfying end for this story. To me, it ultimately ended with a whopping plot hole and too optimistic in tone to fit what came before. Christian Netflix reviewers were very critical of the portrayal of the son of God, and apparently didn't read the whole description before renting the film. The ending does have a consistent point of view up to a point, and only slightly cops out when it would have been easier to cop out entirely with a more ambiguous ending.
Highly recommended if you have an open mind about the subject matter, even with the slightly disappointing ending.
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Four Person Splunge - Not Very Efficient, but Some New Songs
Another session with the core four. We got off to a very slow start this time. Jason had upgraded to a better microphone for his Garageband set up, and I was having some trouble with my pedal board, ultimately going without it. It took us about an hour and a half to get set up to record, and even then, it was with the previous mike.
Jason was off this time out, and admitted he wasn't as prepared as he should be. Even so, we were able to add "She's Electric" by Oasis, "Substitute" by the Who, and "Can't Go Back", written by yours truly. "She's Electric" was best of the three new songs, largely due to Nick being especially well prepared for it. Good vocal, and Jason had at least some idea of what he wanted to do with it. Most of us had our individual parts for "Substitute", but the timing was really bad, so we didn't spend a lot of time on that one. "Can't Go Back" shaped up pretty well from the guitar end, but Jason said he wasn't feeling it, so we didn't spend a lot of time there, either.
Nick effectively doubled the number of songs he is singing lead on, which I was glad to see. My congestion problem was substantially back, since I'd had a cold earlier this week and wasn't fully recovered. There were a few songs that sounded pretty good ("She's Electric", "Margueritaville", "Runaround", and maybe "Suspicious Minds"), and we're continuing to tighten up now that we've stuck with a core group, but damn, it's a slow process.
Jason was off this time out, and admitted he wasn't as prepared as he should be. Even so, we were able to add "She's Electric" by Oasis, "Substitute" by the Who, and "Can't Go Back", written by yours truly. "She's Electric" was best of the three new songs, largely due to Nick being especially well prepared for it. Good vocal, and Jason had at least some idea of what he wanted to do with it. Most of us had our individual parts for "Substitute", but the timing was really bad, so we didn't spend a lot of time on that one. "Can't Go Back" shaped up pretty well from the guitar end, but Jason said he wasn't feeling it, so we didn't spend a lot of time there, either.
Nick effectively doubled the number of songs he is singing lead on, which I was glad to see. My congestion problem was substantially back, since I'd had a cold earlier this week and wasn't fully recovered. There were a few songs that sounded pretty good ("She's Electric", "Margueritaville", "Runaround", and maybe "Suspicious Minds"), and we're continuing to tighten up now that we've stuck with a core group, but damn, it's a slow process.
Sunday, December 05, 2010
Scars of Mirrodin
I'd thought I was done buying new cards for Magic: The Gathering, but they keep dragging me back in...
Last weekend, one of my friends bought an entire box of cards for the current Magic set and held a tournament. Each player received six packs of cards and had a limited amount of time to put together a deck with them. The format was double elimination, each match best of three, which made for a long day. The tournament started at 5 PM and the last match finished at 4 AM.
When I opened my cards, it was obvious that one of my colors had to be red, but it wasn't so obvious what the other color should be. I only had six green cards total, and none of them were anything more than commons, so I put those aside without another thought. My best rares/uncommons were in white, but I had a serious problem with the mana curve in white, not having anything with a casting cost less than three. Black also had some good cards, but again, a serious problem with the mana curve, this time at the 3-4 casting cost level. Blue's rares/uncommons weren't as good as white, but had a much easier curve to work with. I'd attempted a three color deck for our last tournament and lost every game, so I wasn't going that direction again. And so red and blue it was.
I ultimately won two matches and lost two, for a total record of 5-4, finishing in fifth place of eleven players. Not too bad, considering that I often don't do well in this sort of format.
The friend who initiated the tournament apparently plans to continue having them whenever a new set comes out, and I enjoy the game enough to play when it happens. So it looks as though I'm back in after missing a year of cards.
Last weekend, one of my friends bought an entire box of cards for the current Magic set and held a tournament. Each player received six packs of cards and had a limited amount of time to put together a deck with them. The format was double elimination, each match best of three, which made for a long day. The tournament started at 5 PM and the last match finished at 4 AM.
When I opened my cards, it was obvious that one of my colors had to be red, but it wasn't so obvious what the other color should be. I only had six green cards total, and none of them were anything more than commons, so I put those aside without another thought. My best rares/uncommons were in white, but I had a serious problem with the mana curve in white, not having anything with a casting cost less than three. Black also had some good cards, but again, a serious problem with the mana curve, this time at the 3-4 casting cost level. Blue's rares/uncommons weren't as good as white, but had a much easier curve to work with. I'd attempted a three color deck for our last tournament and lost every game, so I wasn't going that direction again. And so red and blue it was.
I ultimately won two matches and lost two, for a total record of 5-4, finishing in fifth place of eleven players. Not too bad, considering that I often don't do well in this sort of format.
The friend who initiated the tournament apparently plans to continue having them whenever a new set comes out, and I enjoy the game enough to play when it happens. So it looks as though I'm back in after missing a year of cards.
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