Sarcasmatron Audio Time Go Episode #1 - The Macho Man Appreciation Station

Well, it took a little while but here it is: my first podcast.  I probably could have had this up a few days ago but I procrastinated a bit.  All I really had to do was edit in some music and upload it, a process that should only take about a few hours, but I stretched it out over the course of a few days.  Yeah, I'm lazy.  As you'll figure out pretty quickly, I've never really done this on my own before so PLEASE leave some sort of feedback as to how I can make this better.  I realize it's kinda all over the place and I do stumble on my words quite a bit so I need to know what I can do to not suck.  Anyway, the topics for my first episode:

My Blockbuster Closing Haul and the Insane Videogame Backlog

I haven't had the chance to write about it lately but, for any long time followers of the blog, I love me some video store closings...as sad as that may sound when you factor in the people losing their jobs.  It's been over a year since the Blockbuster near my apartment closed down, and since then, there's been a few other store closings.  A few days ago, I was alerted that not one, but two, Blockbusters were closing down, leaving just one brick-and-mortar store (as far as I know) in the great city of Toledo.  So I've made a few stops in between the two and here's what I managed to snag.

Mini-Random Movie Roundup and Wrestlemania 27 Predictions

Ok, so I'm still struggling to get that article I had planned down on paper.  I don't know why it's so hard for me to sit down and write something that's 75% in my head already.  I guess I just need that 25% to come together.  Anyway, I have a stack of movies that's accumulated over the past month or so that I haven't talked about.  Honestly, I haven't even watched all that many movies.  With Wrestlemania coming up (more on that later), I've been watching quite a bit of wrestling, especially now that WWE has put up some of their DVDs on Netflix Instant Steaming.  And now I'm watching Sealab 2021, though I think I'm gonna stop before Season 4 because, let's face it, Season 4 sucked.  Nevertheless, I did get in a bit of actual movie watching so, what the hell, it's Random Movie Roundup time!

Sarcasmatron's 2010 In Movies: The Top 10 (Part 1 - #10-#6)

I guess it's kinda convenient that I do a Top 10 list considering I only saw 10 movies last year.  But still, that's a good 5 or 6 more movies than I normally see at the theaters, at least.  So really, this isn't a "Best Of" considering all the stuff I missed (see the last blog post for my opinions on some of those movies), but really ranking what I saw from worst to best.  Luckily, I've seen more bad than good, so let's start off with what I consider the Most Disappointing Movie of 2010.

Sarcasmatron's 2010 In Movies: The Stuff I Missed

As I've talked to people online, I've found it odd that I've heard so many people say that 2010 was one of the worst years for movies in recent memory.  However, to me, 2010 was probably the best year for movies.  Normally, I go to the theaters maybe once or twice a year, three times tops.  But this year, not only do I have enough movies to fill a Top 10 list (which will be coming soon) but I also have a list of notable movies that I missed out on.  You see, I'm not a professional critic, no matter how much I'd like to be one.  Can you imagine complaining about crap you hate...and actually getting PAID for it?  But no, I have to spend my own money, of which I don't have much, and therefore I have to be much more judicious in what I see.  In some cases, it works out in my favor.  As much as I'd like to see how bad The Last Airbender really was for myself, I don't want to actually waste money on it.  But in other cases, there are movies that I genuinely want to see but missed out on just because I didn't want to see them badly enough or was just plain broke.

Random Movie Roundup (And Rollout!)

Sorry about not posting anything new lately.  Since I wanna keep this brief, I'll just say that I had a close family member being admitted to the hospital for emergency surgery.  Then in the days that followed, I kinda melted down from all the stress that's been building up in my head lately.  To make things worse, the only day I was in any sort of mood and had any time to write, my computer got a virus and I spent almost all day trying to get rid of it.  Yeah, this past week was horrible.  It's kinda weird how quickly things can change from good to bad.  Or from bad to worse.  But seriously, I did have a great time spending my birthday weekend with friends then suddenly, I was quickly reminded of the living embodiment of Murphy's Law that is my life. 

Anyways, enough of that.  In other news, thanks to all one of you reading this...OK, let me sidebar for a second.  I joke about how little my readership is quite often, but seriously, I know more than 1 freaking person reads this so you'd think I'd have more votes whenever I put up a poll.  Anyways, thanks to the 1 person that voted, I will be reviewing Ghost Rider next.  However, it won't be a standard movie review...I don't think.  I realize that I'm still trying to figure out which format I should go with reviewing movies but I'm going to try something new yet again with this.  As you can probably infer from the range of choices in the poll, I'm toying with making reviews of Nic Cage movies a recurring feature here on Sarcasmatron, seeing that he's pretty much the unofficial mascot of the blog at this point.  So it looks like Ghost Rider will be the first.  Eh, could be worse.  I was seriously hoping you guys wouldn't pick The Wicker Man.

So, in an effort to get some sort of new content up here, I'm just gonna talk about the random stack of movies I've been watching the past few weeks, complete with arbitrary grades.  How fun!

A Look At The 2010 Summer Movie Season - Part 2

Before I start looking at the movies opening in July and August, I will say that I actually did go to the theaters last night.  And what did I see?  Well it wasn't The Human Centipede since there were no places near me playing it.  And it wasn't Nightmare On Elm Street because reviews haven't been kind (going so far as someone from the New York Times saying "this is why your generation sucks", which is a statement I need to make more often).  Surprisingly, the only person I've found that actually liked the Elm Street remake was The Cinema Snob.  I usually trust his opinion so I may check it out on DVD someday but I'm in no rush.  So what did I see?  Kick Ass.  Yup, for a second time.  And it was just as awesome as I remembered it.  I rarely go see a movie in theaters more than once.  The only movies I can remember going to see twice were Spider-Man and Jackass: The Movie.  Other than Nightmare on Elm Street and Kick Ass, the only real option presented to my friends and I was The Losers.  I was pretty psyched up to see The Losers a few weeks ago but Kick Ass looked so much better, even when presented with the decision of going to see it a second time.  And with opinions ranging from "Don't bother" to "Pretty good", with no one saying "OH MY GOD! You have to see this movie right now!", I figured I can wait until DVD.  I'm pretty psyched for Iron Man 2 next weekend and would like to see it in IMAX but I think the only IMAX theater near me is in Detroit.  And who wants to go to Detroit?

Anyway, let's dive back in, starting with July:

A Look at the 2010 Summer Movie Season - Part 1

Even though we're technically still in Spring, I feel that after having seen Kick Ass a few weeks back, the Summer Blockbuster Movie Season has started off already.  And surprisingly enough, unlike years past, there are quite a few movies that I actually want to see this Summer.  Despite my love for movies, it seems like I make it to the movie theater less and less because Hollywood doesn't crank out a lot of movies I want to see, and even if there is something I want to see, usually it's something not worthy of $10+ for a ticket or something I can wait for the DVD release.  Which explains why my "Best Of" list last year only had 5 movies (and 1 Worst Movie), because that's literally all I've seen.  The only movie that didn't make the list was Boondock Saints II and that was only because I had seen it after I compiled my list.  And really, what other reason would there be for Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li for cracking a "Best Of" list.  Luckily, I won't have the problem of putting a crappy (yet enjoyable but for all the wrong reasons) movie on my end-of-year list this year.  So I'm going to go through the Summer release schedule week-by-week (according to IMDB, so if I miss something it's their fault) and pick out what movie I personally would like to see and try to predict which movie everyone will go see.  But somehow, between those two criteria, I probably won't touch upon what movies are actually WORTH seeing.  That's because the general public is stupid yet I still watch crap...just a better kind of crap, I guess.  Anyway, let's start with tomorrow night:

Results Are IN! (Kinda) And Yet More Random Stuff.

Alright, even though there's like less than 24 hours left to go in the poll, considering the fact that the Mega Movie Review is leading the pack and no one has bothered to vote in the last couple days, I'm just gonna say that Mega Movie Review is the winner.  It'll be interesting to see how it turns out as I'm going to be doing this kinda like an experiment, seeing if this sort of format would work well with future reviews.  It might take a little while to do as I have to get reacquainted with the movie (of which I'm keeping a surprise), get screen caps (and possibly .gifs) and hopefully make it funny and enjoyable (and spend more time trying to get things into parentheses) so I have to have it done within a week (PARENTHESES!  DO IT!).  Thanks for voting!

A Bunch of Random Crap and YOU Choose My Next Article!

So I don't really know what I'm going to write about here right now, probably just catch you guys up on what I've been doing lately.  Honestly, my motivation to do anything but surf the net for random crap, lurk on Facebook and maybe watch a movie in the background has dropped down to nothing.  I've hardly even logged on to Twitter to post random crap, though that makes sense as hardly anyone follows me on Twitter anyway.  So forgive me if this entry is a bit scatterbrained.

Trying To Keep Up

I was getting a bit worried for a little while there as I didn't get many readers after my "return" (I'm using finger quotes because I still don't feel like I've come back into the norm) but it seems that my blog's feature of automatically updating my Twitter (which in turn updates my Facebook and MySpace status) for my Monday entry didn't update until TODAY!  Yup, there's some technology for ya.  Anyway, this isn't going to be anything major, just a few things that I've been trying to keep up with.  It seems like I'm getting backlogged with movies AND video games AND books and instead of spending my time trying to get through them, I'm spending my time writing about trying to get through them.  My brain hurts.  Let's move on.

I Return and Spoil Suprises.

Even though I didn't leave a specific timetable for my hiatus, I really didn't want to be away from regular writing for this long.  To make things worse, I didn't want to be away for these specific reasons.  Much like last time, I don't want to go in specifics but last week I suffered a bit of a mental breakdown.  I've been diagnosed with depression before but have gone without medication or counseling for the past few years.  And with the combination of recent events and my general station in life, it came back to bite me in the ass.  I'm on the road to getting help but it's going to be a long road.  Until then, I guess all I can do is keep myself occupied.  I'm going to try to do that via the blog but don't be surprised if I don't post with regularity or if my heart doesn't seem to be in it for a little while yet.

And with that out of the way, it's time for me to ruin the surprise I had been touting for the past month or so.

HIM Screamworks Review, Along With Another Movie Store Closing And More.

Coming off my Valentine's Day blog last week, I've been growing increasingly depressed.  First of all, if you think that blog was depressed, obviously you don't know me very well but I can see how it was a downer.  But honestly I wasn't as bummed as I normally am during V-Day due to being more paranoid about paying for car repairs.  But now that that's over with and the sticker shock is worn off (though I am mad about having to devote most of my tax refund to it), I think the Valentine's Day depression is coming a week late.  Honestly I was fine earlier this week then suddenly it all snuck up on me at once and I couldn't sleep (which is VERY rare for me) and I was getting major headaches from the stress.  So, with all of this stress caused by a holiday celebrating love while I'm suffering from a severe lack of it, I find it a tad bit ironic that I'm reviewing an album that focuses on love by one of my favorite bands.  Much like most American fans, I discovered HIM (short for His Infernal Majesty though they don't really acknowledge that anymore) due to Bam Margera's rabid fandom and his flashing of the iconic "Heartagram" at any opportunity.  And while constant shilling has died down in recent years, that hasn't stopped HIM from releasing albums stateside, the most recent of which being "Screamworks: Love In Theory And Practice - Chapters 1-13."

Ryan's Underrated Movies of the Decade

Since I'm being secluded to my apartment due to near-blizzard conditions, it looks like I might as well do some writing that doesn't pertain about me taking a trip to Blockbuster, though this one still has to do with movies.  Originally, I was debating doing this as a possible video-blog (I hate saying "vlog" as it sounds like a regurgitation sound effect) but since I don't own a video camera and by the time I might be able to afford one, this list would be pretty irrelevant.  Hell, it's a couple weeks into February so the whole "End of the Decade" gimmick is outdated by a month already.  Plus, this would've just consisted of me holding up DVD copies and talking about them so I figured I'd just type it out, cutting out the middleman and passing the savings onto you...or something.  I will put up a word of warning though.  I realize that I'm on the Internet so any of these movies I list as "underrated" while probably be met with scoffs by cinema snobs and internet nerds.  "Pffft, you call that underrated?  You obviously haven't seen Le Cirque De Scat Eaters, you troglodyte."  Sure, maybe I haven't seen that movie that I just made up for this argument (and oh god I hope it doesn't actually exist out there somewhere) but you have to realize that I live in Northwest Ohio, which is pretty much a cultural wasteland.  The odd thing about where I live is that there are quite a few opportunities to find something outside of the normal entertainment options (the Internet being the biggest of those opportunities) but people here are perfectly content to just listen to what Top 40 or Country radio tells them to, watch whatever crappy reality show is being shoved down our throats and pay good money to see a shoddy remake of an infinitely better movie.  So that makes me a goddamn visionary!  Or not, I'm just saying that's the way things are around here.  Anyway, with that tangent out of the way, here are my picks for some of the most underrated movies of this past decade.

The Super Bowl XLIV-aganza...Where I Write About Going To Blockbuster Again.

I swear, I'll stop going to Blockbuster...soon.  And since I could literally give two craps about the Super Bowl (which,after having some Chinese buffet for lunch, I'm sure it'll only be a matter of hours until I can), I might as well write about it.  I'm hoping this'll be the last time I go considering they close next weekend and I'll be taking my car in for repairs then.  Plus, there's not a lot more to choose from (though there's plenty of crap left that I could enjoy) but if they drop prices low enough, I might be able to squeeze in one last stop.  Anyways, here's what all I picked up this time.

Oscar Nominations, Ong Bak 3 and A Bunch Of Other Random Crap

If you haven't heard, this year's Oscar Nominations were announced earlier today.  Of course, considering all of the movies nominated in all the categories, I've only seen...well...oh yeah, ONE nominated movie!  So, I'm probably the last person to be dishing out predictions but I'll give it a shot anyway.  And how about we start with the ONE movie that I did see: Inglourious Basterds.

My Massive Blockbuster Haul (Part 3) And Some Grammy Thoughts

I have some good news and bad news.  Bad News: I went to Blockbuster...AGAIN, making it twice in the same weekend.  But the Good News is that I don't think I have much of a reason to go back anymore.  Since I had some spare cash, I had decided to go ahead and pick up that copy of WWE Smackdown vs Raw 2010 for the Wii.  Unfortunately, I should've gotten that feeling earlier as the game was gone.  Ah well, I'm not too bummed about it.  I figured that'd just give me more money to spend on movies but as you'll see, I didn't get a whole lot this time.

My Massive Blockbuster Haul (Part Deux)

Considering that the Blockbuster down the road from me is still open for a few weeks and seeing that the movies were dropped down by another couple bucks to $5.99, I decided to pick up a few more last night.  Despite the fact that their inventory is shrinking, they still have a lot to choose from but this time my haul isn't as massive as it was before.  Maybe I showed a bit more restraint but I think either next week or the week after, hopefully they'll be even cheaper and I'll just go nuts on the leftovers.  But this is what I got last night, along with a few thoughts of what I've been watching.

My Massive Blockbuster Haul

As I mentioned in my previous blog entry, the Blockbuster Video down the road from my apartment is closing down, so they're selling off their inventory.  Last week, ended up not buying any movies due to buying an Inglourious Basterds wall print instead but this week I more than made up for it when I went back yesterday (especially since the Fight Club painting I wanted was gone).  So, what did I end up getting?

Movie-Mania! (Including Yet Another Horror Movie Marathon!)

I've been watching my fair share of movies lately.  Seriously, between movies and watching videos online (The Spoony Experiment and The Cinema Snob being my current fixations), I've put off finishing the video games I've been playing as I've given up on New Super Mario Bros. Wii for the time being (damn ice world) and haven't even touched Yakuza 2 on the PS2 for about a month now.  Anyways, to help get 2010 off to a good start, I spent New Year's Day trying to stay awake by going to Best Buy and spending whatever else I had left on my gift cards on movies.  I ended up walking out with Inglourious Basterds (the 2-disc edition), Sukiyaki Western Django, Let The Right One In and Martyrs.  Of course, you should know by now how much I loved Basterds seeing as I ranked it the best movie of 2009 and, even though I finally got around to watching it again last weekend, my high opinion of it hasn't changed.  Sukiyaki Western Django was a movie I've been wanting to see for the past couple years now, especially considering its a Takashi Miike film and I'll watch pretty much everything he makes.  Basically, it's a Japanese twist on a Western, which has the actors speaking in slightly-broken English throughout the movie (the only non-Japanese member of the cast being Quentin Tarantino himself), so it's pretty off-kilter meaning it's a typical Miike film.  But what I was most impressed with is the fact that it's basically a remake of Django, which in turn was a "ripoff" (for lack of a better word) of A Fistful of Dollars, which in turn was a remake of Yojimbo.  So, in a way Sukiyaki Western Django kinda took all those films and combined them, yet made the whole thing go full circle.  Oddly enough, I was really wanting to seek out those movies after watching Sukiyaki, which is quite a feat because I don't consider myself a fan of Westerns at all.

Anyway, I'm not here to talk about Inglourious Basterds or Sukiyaki Western Django but the other two films I bought, Let The Right One In and Martyrs, which ended up becoming a little sequel to my Christmas Day Horror Movie Marathon as I played the two back-to-back in a doubleheader a few weeks back.