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M&T is almost oppressively purple and it’s kind of awesome. So glad that Katie brought me to this game.
Went to my first professional football game with Katie this past Sunday and it was awesome. I wish the Ravens would have dominated by more, but it was really fun to see them
Movies
Star Trek: Into Darkness – Watched this with Katie and Min last week. I won’t lie to you guys, we were a little tipsy when we were watching, but everything about this movie felt rushed and unearned. It’s almost like they were trying to get away with a lot via nostalgia shorthand. All flash and no powder, but Benedict Cumberbatch was loads of fun in the movie.
The World’s End – I’ve been waiting for this movie ever since I heard that Pegg, Frost, and Wright were reuniting to end the Cornetto trilogy. I was worried it would be more of a horror movie, but it was actually kind of delightful and not that scary. Very cleverly written with an interesting take on the “growing up and maturing” thing that we see in a lot of American comedies nowadays. Worth seeing.
TV
Sherlock – I loved watching this with Katie, but I’m bummed that we’re now fully caught up. Series 3 will come soon enough!
House of Cards – I’m not sure how the Frank and Zoe plot is going to progress, but I will say that I’m not really down with it yet. Other than that, I’m interested in seeing how bad things are gonna get for Russo after he compromised his values to appease Frank.
Music
This one comes courtesy of Katie who played a cover version (followed by the much better actual version) of T-Pain, Wiz Khalifa, and Lily Allen’s “5 O’clock”. Good stuff.
Books
Don’t think I read in these two weeks, much to my dismay.
Video Games
Shin Megami Tensei IV – Finally finished up at Shinjuku for now. I wish there was a better way to get around the world map to make things easier to get to.
Civilization V – Made some really dumb moves in the game with David, but I think I’ve mostly recovered from the setback. The game with Eric is moving fairly slowly, but we’re coming along.
Spelunky – Only a few mins of this. Always a pleasure.
The picture’s from the opening year, but I was definitely there this weekend.
No, but this week, probably!
Sherlock – The Chinese banker episode is so bad, comparatively speaking…
Breaking Bad – Only watched a few mins in the morning while waiting for Katie.
House of Cards – I’m not a fan of the “narration” at all, but a political revenge thriller does sound kind of awesome.
Camila Moreno has this voice that’s smoky and nice. This song is apparently far from her usual political message, but it’s very good nonetheless.
World War Z – Getting close to done on this re-reading. Good times. The book is so good.
SMT IV – Had to use a FAQ to figure out where to go, but I finally figured it out.
Civilization V – The Mesa game is moving along, but I haven’t had a real chance to play over the holiday weekend.
Animal Crossing: New Leaf – In really quick to have townspeople ask what happened to me. Just not much time to play.
Rogue Legacy – Moving through the forest now that I’ve conquered the first boss. Still loads of fun for me.
Spelunky – I can’t remember if it was this week, but I came so close to beating Yama. Next time!
The Limited Edition (read: first printing) comes with so much cool stuff! (Photo by SwatWolf)
SMT IV is pretty good, you guys. It’s hard as hell, but it’s funny about it.
Not this week.
The Bridge – I’m really tired of the “woman with mental disorder” (or man) trope in tv right now. I’d be more interested in Sonya if she wasn’t on the spectrum. Marco is way more interesting to me.
The Newsroom – Nope. Aaron Sorkin is still not for me. Between all the mansplaining and the self-righteous lectures I can only tolerate this show, even thought it has sharp, sometimes funny writing in lots of places.
Sherlock – Watched “A Study in Pink” with Katie. So much fun. I think she was really into it too since she didn’t fall asleep like she thought she would.
Archer – Watched the train episode again. It’s funny, but I still think “Skytanic” is way better.
How about “Adios” by Natalia Clavier
Not this week, but probably next.
Animal Crossing: New Leaf – Beau beat me in the bug-off. WTF! Also added a second floor to my house. No big deal, guys. Took a bath on turnips this week too…
Donkey Kong ’94 – Still loads of fun.
Shin Megami Tensei IV – I wish I had more time to play this (probably this week), but it’s just as hard as you’ve heard. I was getting dominated in the first dungeon until I realized that I could flee the dungeon and heal as I level grind. Tough, but awesome.
I love a capella so there was zero chance I wouldn’t see this (Photo courtesy lissamabcd)
Thanks to the long weekend this is posting a little later than usual. I also jammed a ton of TV in this week thanks to all that extra time.
The Guard – Irish movie about an Irish policeman who is one of those curmudgeonly old man types. Funny, but ultimately not that substantive. Worth seeing if you’ve got a free afternoon.
Pitch Perfect – I loved most of the music in this movie and I always enjoy Anna Kendrick on the silver screen. Mostly I found myself impressed by how well she inhabited her role. The other two movies I saw her in, Up in the Air and 50/50, had her in a much more professional, trying to be respected role. Here she’s aged back to 18 and everything about her performance reflects that. Good, fun stuff. Go see it.
SNL Weekend Update Thursday – Kind of unnecessary. Barely any politics either.
Up All Night – Not digging the new setup. The new brother character is just not that interesting. I did laugh at the trapeze part in the most recent episode.
Glee – Knocking Tremé is not cool. “Celebrity Skin” not that good. The election episode was so boring. The breakup episode, on the other hand, had a lot more emotion and a lot more going for it. Dug it a lot more.
NTSF::SD:SUV: – The time slide episode was so good that everything afterwards has been a bit disappointing. The SDCC episode was meh as was the Dragon Shumway redux.
Childrens Hospital – Ladies Night! Man, Lake Bell is hot. This show is consistently hilarious/awesome.
Homeland – Danes seemed off early in the episode, but that’s probably intentional since her character is supposed to be off her rocker. Loved the way that Damian Lewis is playing this. As for the plot, this season is shaping up to be very cool. Liked the way they pulled Danes back in and I liked the father/daughter bonding over Islam.
Tremé – The included murder mystery doesn’t quite fit in with the rest of the show, but everything else is going well. Nice and slow-paced.
Sherlock – That Reichenbach Falls episode was SO GOOD! I wonder if Moriarty is actually dead (Sherlock isn’t!). Hard to see where the next series goes from here, but that was astounding. It didn’t have the same pounding pressure as Moriarty’s time-limits from last series, but it was still quite tense and fun. Loved the part where Moriarty was pretending to be an actor.
Key & Peele – Not as good as the season premiere, but I really enjoyed that dubstep sketch. Also dug the Luther sketch and the concept of the guy who had to follow MLK’s speech was funny, but it wasn’t executed particularly well.
The Mindy Project – You know what? This show is a lot funnier than some critics are giving it credit. Mindy Kaling has a really sneaky sense of appalling humor that really works. I think this is my favorite new show I’ve seen (so far).
Four Weddings – Sometimes your girlfriend watches stuff that you don’t want to.
Giuliana and Bill – See above…The worst part here is that she thinks this show is dumb too! There just wasn’t anything else on worth watching.
Halloween Wars – Another Food network thing. This has got the Cupcake Wars crew, but they’re carving pumpkins and making Halloween scenes. It’s ok.
How I Met Your Mother – Caught the first two episodes of the season. I’m still kind of bummed that Victoria isn’t the mother. She was the original plan if the show had been canceled. I like her.
30 for 30 – “Broke” wasn’t as good as the other documentary I saw, but I still dug it. This series is worth checking out.
The Daily Show – I’m glad that Stewart went and eviscerated Obama for his debate performance because it was shameful. Not a bad week of episodes.
Parks & Recreation – Two words: Lucy Lawless. Please and thank you.
Saturday Night Live – A lot of bad sketches in this episode, but I did like the lesser known Bond girls one. Daniel Craig can do better? Was it the material?
The Pokemon Reorchestrated project is coming out with fully licensed reorchestrations of Pokemon game music. Pretty cool stuff, if you ask me.
After the Quake – Murakami really likes writing about Jehovah’s Witnesses. I really enjoyed “All God’s Children Can Dance”
New Super Mario Bros. 2 – I was wrong. There are way more hidden worlds than I realized and they’re pretty fun. Liking this game even more.
Theatrhythm Final Fantasy – I technically “beat” the game, but there’s tons more content to enjoy.
Professor Layton and the Last Specter – This series reminds me of Detective Conan. One of the puzzles really stumped me. I’m dumber than I thought I was, haha.
Pokemon White – Wanted to catch the last few legendaries I was dilly-dallying on. Got that done before 2 arrived.
Pokemon White Version 2 – The package here has gotten so much sharper from year to year, but the nearly identical mechanics keeps a lot of people away. I’m playing with a Nuzlocke Challenge: Defeated pokemon must be permanently retired, you can only catch the first pokemon you see in an area, and, one of my rules, you must use pots to heal. Only one pokemon center visit per town. So far I’ve lost a Patrat permanently in my gym battle with Roxie. Tragic stuff.
XCOM: Enemy Unknown – Just started it this morning. Played two missions. Loving it! Look for a Dan Plays series to start soon.
Fun times. (Photo by kow626)
Summer’s gone and the regular baseball season ends this week, but that doesn’t mean the fun is over.
Almost, but no.
Sherlock – The Hounds episode was terrible. I like Sherlock when his mysteries are solved with thorough detective work and deduction, not the kind of gobbledegook that we had with the hallucinogens and the weird hound. Very disappointing episode, way more so than the Chinese smuggler episode from the first series.
Tremé – Really happy to have this back on tv. Underrated, if you ask me. Fantastic music and fantastically real stories.
The Daily Show – The King Abdullah interview was spectacular. I loved seeing a regent talk about policy in a serious way. Kind of funny to go from that to Olivia Wilde the next day.
The Mindy Project – A lot of up and down on this in the critical scene, but I thought this show had an exceptionally strong comedic voice. Funny and I’m down for more.
New Girl – Not sure if I find Schmidt still hilarious or if they’re overdoing it or if it’s just that I know that he’s a breakout character. In any case, the season came back in strong form. Remember when Jess used to be scared of sex? That was not the Jess we saw in the second episode. I’m all for half-naked Zooey Deschanel.
Parks and Recreation – I’m not sure I buy Leslie’s crisis of conscious considering how strong a voice she normally is, but I still enjoyed the ep.
EDIT: Key & Peele – Forgot to mention this one. They had two brilliant sketches about post-win sports interviews and literally/metaphorically and an amazing one about Confederate reenactors. Good stuff.
The Alabama Shakes are pretty cool, y’all.
The Woman in the Dunes – Told you guys I’d read this weekend. The book was a very Kafkaesque look at a man trapped in an absurd situation who eventually loses the will to fight. Very Japanese, but also very interesting. I dug it.
After the Quake – A short story collection by Murakami containing vignettes following the Kobe earthquake in 1995. I bet a bunch of people came back to this at some point this year. Very Murakami so far (read two of the stories), which means it’s very interesting so far.
Mark of the Ninja – S-Rank! Finishing off New Game + kind of sucked.
Theatrhythm Final Fantasy – I’ve been slowly pushing through the main series while completing dark notes each night. Last one I did was FF IX.
New Super Mario Bros. 2 – Managed to beat it last night. Kind of too bad it’s so short. Haven’t played a six world Mario game in…ever? My favorite part was Tiffany watching over my shoulder and laughing every time I died in Bowser’s Castle.
FTL: Faster Than Light – Course I’ve still been doing these! Gotta get back in the groove of it tonight.
Professor Layton and the Last Specter – No matchstick puzzles yet. This is my first Layton and, chronologically, the first Layton. So far so good, but I wish the DS screen resolution was better. It makes solving some of these puzzles unnecessarily difficult.
Ron Swanson and friends are back! (Photo by andyrama)
Not everything’s back yet, but TV! It’s back!
Cabin in the Woods – Watched about 20 mins while Scarlett was napping. I wonder what Danielle’s gonna end up thinking of the movie. I’m a huge fan. Love Fran Kranz
The Daily Show – The Romney gaffe-fest made for some interesting commentary this week. Love the bit about how being Latino would make everything easier. Yeah, try being a minority for real Romney…
Fashion Police – Thought it would be milder because it was being filmed in front of a live audience in NYC, but they didn’t hold back as much as I thought. Still happy to not have to see Giuliana Rancic. She’s a weak link on this show.
Project Runway – Designing for the Rockettes seems tough. Turns out I was right because everyone was really shitty at it. The pandering, “NY is Awesome!” design won because, duh, haven’t you ever seen this kind of thing before? How was Christopher the only one to think of that?
NTSF:SD:SUV – Robots! Bob Odenkirk! Decent ep.
Childrens Hospital – British episode! Absolutely brilliant. I’d watch that version every week too. Great writing.
SNL Weekend Update Thursday – It’s election season. Can’t pass up SNL mocking the election.
Up All Night – Lot of changes, wow. No more Ava show, new supporting character (Reagan’s kid brother), no more Missy (sad, but she belongs on the broader UAN from last year), new film stock or something (it looked really different), and a new direction for Chris. Talk about a massive retool. The show is, for all intents and purposes, a completely new animal. I’m not sure if this will benefit it…
Parks & Recreation – Loved all the DC stuff. Didn’t care so much for the Pawnee BBQ stuff. I could watch Aubrey Plaza be Aubrey Plaza all day long.
Glee – Is this season less bad than last year? I think it is so far. Will it remain so? Not sure…By the way, I bet Rachel hooks up with what’s-his-face next episode and Finn returns in E4.
SNL – Hypnotist sketch was hilarious! Liked Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s monologue too. The cold open and the Finer Things sketches left me a little cold.
Sherlock – When your series are only three episodes long, do you have to spend so much time reminding everyone of all the dynamics and situations? I love that these are little Sherlock movies since they’re 1.5 hrs long. If you took a shot every time Irene Adler said something along the lines of, “I know what they like,” you’d be dead by the midpoint…That character is just a little too much. Still, I found myself fascinated with the Holmes brother relationship and I rather enjoyed the first episode.
New Oneups disc. The PvZ track is solid
<a href="http://theoneups.bandcamp.com/album/intergalactic-continuum">Intergalactic Continuum by The OneUps</a>
Also this more experimental album by Sweet Valley is a rather fantastic/challenging listen:
<a href="http://sweetvalley.bandcamp.com/album/eternal-champ">Eternal Champ by Sweet Valley</a>
This week. For real. I’ve got a flight and everything.
FTL: Faster Than Light – Filmed a nearly two-hour episode on Sunday. Look forward to it by the end of the week. Still love this game. Can’t wait to try some new ships.
Mark of the Ninja – Still working on that S-Rank. It’s just perfunctory playing now. So close, about two levels left.
Borderlands 2 – It’s like Borderlands, but more. I like it, but it’s lonely without Min and Lee.
Torchlight 2 – Ok, to be completely honest, I didn’t actually play this. I just tried to create an account for an hour while chatting with Min and his cousin. That was arguably more fun.
Devil Survivor 2 – TRPGs get bogged down when you get stuck on an encounter. DS2 has a rather conventional (for SMT games) anti-grinding mechanic, so I’m at an impasse. I’ll break through on the flight, I bet.
Theatrhythm Final Fantasy – Everything I wanted it to be (and more!). Play with headphones because the music is incredible. I’ve been putting off getting to FF VI because I love that music so much.
Kirby’s Dream Collection (Kirby Super Star) – One of the best SNES memories that I’ve got is playing Kirby Super Star with David. This game still holds up. Min and I beat Spring Breeze and Dynablade, but I’m going all the way, man. Gonna get to the Boss Rush.
New Super Mario Bros. 2 – Why does everyone hate on this game so much? It’s more Mario. That’s fun, guys. Remember what fun was like? It’s playing Super Mario Bros.
Here's a suggestion: If you're playing Cave Story for the first time, don't pick hard mode (Photo courtesy escaped.monkey)
Busy weekend with lots of media consumed. That kind of thing happens when I hang out with Min.
The Descendants – Shailene Woodley was a revelation as Alex in this movie. Excellent acting. George Clooney was also quite good. Pretty chill movie and worth seeing, even if the land ownership subplot is kind of tacked on and not as interesting.
Evangelion 2.22 – I thought I’d seen this…but I hadn’t. I really missed seeing some of the fun/interesting battles of the old tv show. I mean, cutting Israfel in favor of a school drama plot about making Shinji lunch and a dinner party? I’d rather have that sequence instead. I also get that the movie doesn’t allow for the ponderous and deliberate psycho-analytic battle against Leliel, but it’s one of my faves so I was bummed about losing it too. Did not care for the new pilot, Mari, at all, and I didn’t love the business with mixing up who’s who in the battle against Bardiel, but, whatever, right? Some things are different. 2.22 makes me want to watch Neon Genesis Evangelion instead. The more relaxed pace allows for much greater character development and interesting concepts. We’ll see what happens with the rest of the movies and the new ending.
Tangled – Min hadn’t seen this, it was on instant, and we were bored. It’s pretty great, but I hate the video quality of the Starz movies.
Haywire – Went to see this on Sunday and it cut out 40 minutes in. We could have either stayed to watch it from the beginning or taken a voucher for a new movie. As interested in seeing this as I was, I couldn’t stomach watching the slow opening 40 minutes again. I’ll either try again or wait for Netflix.
Childrens Hospital – Ward 8 and the children stabbing Nick Offerman with pencils was great. So was the Bob Seger joke to find out how old he was. Fantastic show. Can’t wait for a new season.
Up All Night – Megan Mullally and Shayna. So great. The bit about cheating on watching a TV show with your spouse was great. Super awkward.
Glee – Pretty interesting “Summer Nights” recreation, complete with the overlay in the climactic final note. I like songs like “Wedding Bell Blues”, but the processed voices sound a lot like they don’t belong in the show. I guess it was a dream sequence Wow, making Artie move/act like Mick Jagger is surprisingly effective even though he’s in a wheelchair. Whoa…what?! The thing about Finn’s dad came out of NOWHERE.
Justified – I’m cool with case of the week stuff when it’s this good. Sometimes it’s ok for Raylan not to be the absolute center. I hope they get Carla Gugino on the show more. The other new villain is appropriately scary.
Archer – “Cyril?” “No breakfast for you!” Another great episode of Archer this week. I miss Ray as a field agent, but I guess this has a lot of comic potential.
Parks and Recreation – The bit about Tom bowling like a grandma (and Ron begging him to have some decency as a man) was amazing. April being nice is unusual, but she’s been softening up a lot anyway. Still one of the greatest shows out there.
Scrubs – Just put it on for a few minutes to pass some time. Always a good show.
Sherlock – The middle episode about the Chinese smugglers is kind of boring, but the Moriarty episode is fantastic. I love how crazy Jim Moriarty is. So great.
John Oliver’s New York Stand Up Show – Popped this on during dinner for something to laugh to. Pretty good stuff.
The Gregory Brothers – You know they put up a new Auto-Tune (Songify?) the News segment, so that got me listening to all of them again. I even dipped into their non-ATtN music because I love Sarah Gregory’s voice.
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo – Slow and steady. Bloomqvist sure gets around with the ladies, doesn’t he?
The Old Republic – The guild’s got Eternity Vault Normal on farm status so now it’s time to start working on Karagga’s Palace.
Ghost Trick – Making a lot of progress in this game. The mystery continues to deepen as my Spanish continues to improve. I love playing games in Spanish!
Earthbound (Mother 2) – Started up a new save file to play in between bosses in a raid. Fun times. Still very early in the game (haven’t explored the meteor yet)
Rayman: Origins – Min and I beat the game and started going for the prestige levels. Holy god the last one, Land of the Livid Dead, is about as punishing as the game can get. Platforming gets frustrating, but it’s also got a super satisfying feel once you conquer it.
Cave Story + – Thought I’d boot up something different while Min was napping. This game is pretty fun and pretty solid, but deciding I should play it on hard mode may have been a mistake. I’m stuck on Monster X because he’s a beast. Every one of his purple projectiles kills me in one hit, so I’ve got to be perfect. On the good side of the spectrum, the machine gun mechanics are amazing. Love that gun and the ability to float with it.
This is a French video game for sure. (Picture courtesy Giant Bomb)
Evangelion 1.11 – Min has never seen Evangelion all the way through, so I figured the movies would be the best/easiest way to watch them.
Ip Man – I ran into this movie as a “Watch It Again” recommendation on Netflix, so I thought I’d show Min the aggressively pro-Chinese/anti-Japanese parts because I find it funny how blatantly nationalistic this movie is. Also the kung fu is pretty great to watch.
Up All Night – For some reason the runner about Missy being mean to her incredibly good-looking British boyfriend she met off of J-Date is absolutely hilarious. This show is pretty solid. Not amazing, but solid. Good for a few guaranteed laughs.
The League – Finally caught the last three of the season. Allison Williams is hot. WOW! My favorite line, from Kevin to an ex-con: “How were the pick-up basketball games?” “Violent.”
Justified – Strong return. Holy cow that was awesome. The tension in the draw scene was awesome. Best line: “You didn’t have to do that, Ava.” “Of course I did. Otherwise I wouldn’t have done it.”
New Girl – “Frankie Munoz’s” was a great, silly joke. LIZZY CAPLAN! Why is she so skinny?! Too skinny. She punched the guy who played Todd in Community! Pretty good episode, but I wish Lizzy Caplan could stay for longer.
Childrens Hospital – Best line: “I would slit my wife’s throat to be with you”. For Malin Åkerman? I think I might too.
Sherlock – Min didn’t catch this when it was on PBS last year so I thought I’d share. Fantastic update of the Sherlock Holmes mythology.
Parks and Recreation – “Bobby Newport” “Bobby NEWport”. Anyway, Paul Rudd was fantastic in his role as a stupid opponent to Leslie’s campaign. I liked the part where he was upset about them smiling after besting him. Great line. The Andy/April stuff was kind of dumb, but I still laughed a bunch at it.
Project Runway: All Stars – Yeah, yeah…Tiffany makes me watch these with her sometimes. They’re not as terrible as other reality shows, so I don’t complain that much. This one had Miss Piggy on it and all the contestants were talking about how awesome it would be to design a dress for her. Um…I’m pretty sure they were paid to say that because it was a pretty ridiculous show concept.
Archer – Burt Reynolds! Pretty good episode. Strong return to form for the show. I like the maintained continuity with Ray and the wheelchair.
Zelda Step – I got a fever. The only cure, more (Legend of Zelda) dubstep.
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo – Still slowly reading it during lunch breaks. Still kind of dry.
The Old Republic – Making progress as my Bounty Hunter. He just stole a spaceship for himself! As my Sith Inquisitor I’m making good money playing the Global Trade Network and our guild downed Soa in Eternity Vault on Normal.
Rayman: Origins – Been waiting to have Min over before I played this. Super fun! It reminds me of the fun times playing New Super Mario Bros. Wii, but in HD. I hope I can get Eric and Danielle over (or go over to their place) to play it. It’s lots of fun and I think they’d like it.
Chrono Trigger DS – I don’t know why I keep forgetting to mention I’m playing this. Beat the bonus boss and got the “new” ending. I might NG+ it to get the other 9 or so…might not. We’ll see.
Ghost Trick – Finally dug this up to give it some more playtime. Still absolutely hilarious, even in Spanish! That’s right, guys, I’m playing this game in Spanish to practice my reading skills. Tons of character, fantastic animation, and great humor.
