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Salutations and Greetings fair reader. Apparently i am the music man around these here parts, as i have a gargantuan and varied collection of music at my disposal with which to bore you. To start i am going to give y'all a review of a recent release and then after that we will see what comes.

"i'm leaving out the whistles and bells so the room must listen to me filibuster vigilantly."

If you have not figured out who the quote is from then i will entreaty to enlighten you. They Might Be Giants has just released their 12th studio album entitled "The Else" which has been produced by The Dust Brothers, Pat Dillet and They Might Be Giants. It is available through Amazon.com as well as the iTunes store. The first run of the album comes with a bonus CD so it is worth buying it through Amazon. There are 13 songs on The Else and 23 on the "Cast Your Pod To The Wind" bonus CD. Now on to the main attrition.

Though the album is a solidly good one i find it lacking in a few areas. The album was billed by Flansy (John Flansburgh) as "All Killer, No Filler." To which i must disagree with the following correction, "Some Killer, No Filler." As there does not seem to be any tracks that were put on as an afterthought.

By far the best song on the album is track 2, "Take Out The Trash" which is a very Top 40 friendly piece that seems to be a Girl Power styled anthem. The other four songs that i liked were very much in the vein of what TMBG is known for. Odd songs with catchy tunes that make you wonder and think. The stand out track of these is "The Mesopotamians". This is very reminiscent of their earlier work circa the John Henry album. When they moved from a Duo to an actual Band.

Now to more of my gripes, with all of the fanfare on TMBW.net (a They Might Be Giants fansite/Wiki) about them working with The Dust Brothers i really do not hear them much. This seems like a solid TMBG album with The Dust Brothers beats prominent on two or possibly three tracks. Those tracks sound like the whole band not just John OR John. It makes the album less cohesive. i really do not like how one track sounds like TMBG and the next one sounds like John or possibly John. Sadly this makes the Bonus disk far more cohesive an album than the actual album! More on that later.

Lastly i would like to complain about a visual aesthetic. i absolutely HATE the album artwork. Not because it is something weird or strange, but that it is so amateurish. It really looks like something i could do with some paper, glue and a camera. My rule is this, "If it looks like i can do it then it is not very good." If you need to know more about what i can do then go here. Even though TMBG may happen to like Marcel Dzama's work, i have not seen much of his that i really like. He did the artwork for the TMBG story book "Bed, Bed, Bed". i merely tolerate it so that my progeny will sleep.

Now on to the bonus disk "Cast Your Pod To The Wind". This is supposedly only coming in the first run of the album so get them while you can (and NO you cannot have mine Archibald! So there!). This Bonus disk contains the most popular songs from the various TMBG Podcasts and sadly this makes for a more cohesive album than the studio album. Mainly due to the content having already been put into a radio styled format.

So in closing The Else is a three and a half star album. Hopefully their next album "Here Come The 123's" will rate better (it is a children's album, Hooray!).

--the god of atheism.
"My heart is human, my blood is boiling, my brain IBM."

Green Street Hooligans

So this is not a review that I was planning to write, but this is a movie that I have been planning to watch for several years. Starring Elijah Woods as a fish out of water character Matt Buckner, He journeys to England, after being wrongly expelled from Harvard University to spend time with his sister, played by the beautiful Claire Forlani, but unexpectantly enters the world of football hooliganism.

I am not quite sure what I was expecting from this movie when I saw the trailer years ago, but the fight sequences looked well done, and the idea of these “firms” or gangs surrounding the football clubs was intriguing, given that I knew very little about soccer in general. What I got was a heart rending tale about a young man searching for a family, finding a group of brothers, and learning to fight for what he believed in.

The editing was excellent throughout the film, and the fight sequences were visceral and riveting. While not a movie for the younger set, this is a must see in my opinion. I really enjoy picking up a title I had forgotten I wanted to see, and just being blown away. Do yourself a favor, and see this film.

TV Show Review: Batman: The Animated Series

Howdy hi, folks. This one is not gonna be nearly as lengthy as the last one…what can I say, sometimes I talk too much…heh

Today I wanna talk about Batman, The Animated Series. There have been several animated variants of the Batman Legend, starting way back to the 50s and 60s, and including everything from the Superfriends to Scooby Doo. This particular series aired originally from 1992 to 1995. This was the first in what is known as the Dini-verse, so named for series co-creator Paul Dini. (Also called the Timm-iverse, for the other series creator Bruce Timm)

There are numerous things that set this show apart from other cartoons. First of all, there is the styling of the shows themselves. Filmed and edited in a very film noir style, it relies heavily on shadows and light, and quite often the shadows can be almost considered a character in the show. The pacing and cuts are reminiscent of old school Hollywood, and the style reflects it as well. This show, while originating on network TV for kids, eventually ended up on prime time for a while, showcasing that kids and adults could both enjoy this series.

The character acting in this series is also above board, featuring Kevin Conroy as Bruce Wayne/Batman, and my personal favorite, Mark Hamill as the Joker. The characterizations are perfect and realistic; unlike most other cartoons, there is a real sense of character development. One of the more remarkable things is that unlike most comic book shows, which feature characters from the series, this show introduced several characters who grew so popular that they were later introduced into the comics series. Characters such as Harley Quinn, the Joker's psychopathic gun moll, and Detective Renee Montoya, who is now filling the role of The Question in DC Comics continuity. [Maybe insert the such as Harley Quinn...continuity part into the previous sentence - "...several characters, such as Harley Quinn...continuity, grew so popular..."]

Beyond all of this, however, this show also won a Daytime Emmy award for Outstanding Sound Editing, and it won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program. This series spawned other award winning and popular series such as Batman Beyond, the adventures of Batman in the future, Superman The Animated Series, following the Man of Steel, and The Justice League.

All in all, this is one of my favorite animated shows of all time, and on the top 5 list of favorite TV shows in general. Cartoons today don't have nearly the scope of acting talent, editing and storytelling, and flat out fun that this series embodied. They just don't make 'em like this anymore…

ALPACA

So the other day I was working in the Really Big University Astrophysics Laboratory when I came across a poster for this:

the Advanced Liquid-mirror Probe for Astrophysics(Ooo!), Cosmology(Ahhh!) and Asteroids(Whaa?), or ALPACA.

Now the instrument itself is pretty cool, an 8 meter telescope with a primary mirror that is a spinning paraboloid of liquid mercury that will cost a fraction of a glass mirror that size. That's pretty kick ass to us astro-nerds.

But why the silly name? Well it turns out that the KAT (Kick Ass Telescope) is being built in Chile. Can you guess where alpacas are from? I can just imagine how the naming meeting went....

Astronomer 1: "Let's call it the KAT, Kick As Telescope!"

Astronomer2: "No, we'll never get grants. We need a clever name. Let's see....Chile.....whats in Chile?

Astronomer 1: "Alpacas?"

Astronomer 2: "That's perfect! The Advance Liquid-mirror umm, Probe for Astrophysics, Cosmology and, ummm, ummm,..........more Astrophysics?"

Astronomer 1: "Asteroids!"

Both: "Brilliant!"

If that weren't bad enough on the drawing board is LAMA, the Large Aperture Mirror Array, which is actually a sensible acronym so they either got lucky with the cute name, or now are just designing things on purpose to have clever acronyms. (As a side note, LAMA is also a KAT)

I started to wonder if this nearly pathological obsession for witty acronyms was a local phenomenon or if it reflected the general mindset of the astronomy community. So like any good researcher, I hopped the Interwebs looking for more funny astronomy acronyms. I didn't have to search long. Glen Petitpas at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (HSCA? That's not clever.) has complied DOOFAAS the Dumb Or Overly Forced Astronomical Acronyms Site. It's well worth a gander. Some of my favorites include:

11HUGS.................11 Mpc Halpha and Ultraviolet Galaxy Survey

BIGRAT.................BIcentennial Gamma RAy Telescope
PROSAC.................PROtostellar Submillimetre Array Campaign
POLARBEAR.........POLARization of the Background millimEter bAckground Radiation
SHIT.......................Super Huge Interferometric Telescope

Suddenly ALPACA doesn't seem so bad. Who said scientists don't have a sense of humor? Either that, or staying up all night makes astronomers a little daft.

Transformers: More than Meets the Eye, or Michael Bay Disaster...

Welcome to Critical Point, Every Peoples. My name is The Director, and I am sort of the TV and movie geek around these parts. I watch a lot of movies, and an unfortunate amount of TV, so it just kind of fits.

Today, we are going to be talking about one of the biggest movies out right now, Transformers. Now before we get started, I feel it is in the interest of full disclosure that I tell you all that I really enjoyed the cartoon series growing up and was a huge fan of the toys, like most boys my age when they first came around. Cars and airplanes that changed into robots were pretty much the coolest thing around at that point. But I digress, we are here to talk about the movie.

When one talks about Michael Bay movies in general, there are always two schools of thought, a very divided audience: people who love him and people who hate him; people who admire the spectacle, the whiz-bang atmosphere of his movies, the fast cuts, the huge explosions, and who don’t really mind the plot holes or the sometimes scant story - and those who can’t look past those marks of a Bay movie. I was always able to watch his movies with a grain of proverbial salt, enough to suspend disbelief at the right times to get me through the movies. But then I heard that Michael Bay was going to attempt the nigh impossible and bring a beloved staple of my youth to the big screen, in live action no less. For more than two years, all I heard from people was that “Bay is gonna screw this up, all he does is big explosions movies...yadda yadda yadda…” I have to admit, I was a bit worried that the fate of one of my favorite cartoons was in the hands of Michael Bay. But then again, to be fair, I would have been worried no matter which director took the helm. Enough about all my reservations; let’s dig into the movie.

Alright, let’s start with the good. The choice of which of the Autobots (the “Good Guys”) and which of the Decepticons (the “Bad Guys”) to include was pretty solid. They didn’t go overboard trying to bring on the massive numbers of robots that even the smaller episodes of the cartoon series had (one thing that could be said about the original series is that they knew how to sell toys). The movie, however, kept the numbers small, about five per side. The robots looked brilliant and their transformations looked clean and fluid rather than forced or sloppy. Peter Cullen reprised his role as the voice of Optimus Prime, but that was the only voice carryover from the show.

Shia LaBeouf was fantastic, simple as that. He is maturing as a young actor and is certainly one of the rising young stars of Hollywood. Megan Fox was alright in her role as Shia’s love interest and prerequisite action movie eye candy; nothing really special here other than a miniskirt and a smile. Her action sequences seemed a little bit forced, but not overly so. Josh Duhamel was good as Captain Lennox. Again, he was kind of still at places, but not enough to distract from the film. Tyrese Gibson as Sgt. Eps was wholly believable and he did a wonderful job. The surprise actor in this movie, in my opinion, was John Turturro as Sector 7 Agent Simmons. He was a great comic foil when he needed to be, but also served well as dramatic sub-plot.

And let us not forget the robot characters: the Transformers, who we all were dying to see in this movie. In the Decepticon camp, we start with Blackout the helicopter, who methodically destroys the military base in Quatar. It's a fantastic sequence to begin the movie. He was truly terrifying and not at all cartoony, as most Decepticons were in the cartoon. Next, we have Scorponok, who was a crazed animalistic killer, and his scenes were also pretty damned intense. My only gripe with his character was that he didn't really seem to be a Transformer per se, but rather just a scorpion-shaped robot who liked to kill. Frenzy, the smallest Decepticon, was indeed a frenzy of movement, an ADD-riddled character who destroyed with reckless abandon and handled the spy-master talents of the cartoon series' Soundwave with aplomb. Barricade was by far my favorite Decepticon. He was fast, mean, and slick, and when he was face-to-face with Sam, we felt a real, palpable sense of danger. Megatron was also a very evil, very dangerous character, but we only get him for the last battle of the movie. I would have liked to see more of him and his menacing growl. The other Decepticons (Starscream, Bonecrusher, and Devastator) get relatively little screen time, which was a shame. I personally was a huge fan of Starscream back in the days of the cartoon, and I think the film could have benefited from a bit more Megatron/Starscream interaction. And for as much screen time as Bonecrusher got in the trailers, it would have been nice to see a bit more of him in the movie as well.

Bring in the Autobots. The heroes of the film are the robots people most wanted to see. Leading the pack was the ultimate robotic John Wayne, Optimus Prime. Voiced by Peter Cullen, Optimus represents what all Autobots strive to represent: honesty, integrity, and a great, big, open can of whoop-ass, ready to be unloaded on any Decepticon. Bumblebee, the advance scout on earth for the Autobots, was a quirky, lovable, and downright kick-ass member of the Autobot squad, and any 16-year-old boy's dream first car. In fact, screw first car, I want one right now! Ahem... We are also joined by the Autobot medic Ratchet, who gets such a little amount of screen time that we are not really able to dig into his character much, but I liked what they did show. Next we have Jazz, the Second in Command to Prime and the most fun to watch visually. He had a distinctive voice, a swagger in his step, and a no-holds-barred attitude that seemed infectious. Finally, we have Ironhide, the weapons specialist and all around gun nut. In the cartoon series, he just seemed like a brawler, but his attitude screamed for more definition. This is the definition he was lacking. He fills the role with a lust for action that makes us all want to go out shooting, and he is the Charlton Heston of the Autobot clan. As a whole, good guy or bad, the robots in this movie are impressive to watch, their transformations are clean and incredible, and on the whole, simply brilliant. True to the nature of Robots in Disguise, I was impressed by them all.

And now, for the bad. And not just bad, but terribly bad. The whole government hacker subplot, where they are trying to track the signal that was used by the Decepticons to steal information, seemed half-assedly put together, and just as unnecessary. It was tolerable enough when Rachel Taylor was the “Smart Girl Haxxorz” on scene, smarter than all the boys and is the only one, apparently, able to see the importance of the signal, but when she takes the information to someone she refers to as “the one person on earth who can break this signal”, it takes a turn for the unbelievable. Anthony Anderson plays said genius, who is also an apparently jobless, fat, sad sack who lives with his grandmother, yet happens to have the skills necessary to break the Decepticon code. Anderson’s character was totally unneeded, and the film could have been slimmed down by removing him completely. That whole subplot left me unimpressed and it felt like it took us away from the all-important robot-bashing fun that we were there to see.

All in all, the movie was almost exactly what I expected it to be. It had a little story to get things moving, a whole lot of robot-on-robot destruction, and some very touching scenes involving both humans and machines. The movie, which topped all box office records (raking in a week total of $152 million), shows no sign of stopping just yet. Parents and children alike can both enjoy this movie, which succeeded in becoming a vision unlike many others. For all of Michael Bay’s faults as a director, he certainly knows how to set up a spectacle and how to blow things up well. In a world that involves giant robots fighting, that’s bound to happen, and often. Overall, I enjoyed this movie and have seen it twice so far, and I definitely will be buying the movie on HD DVD once it comes out.

The Inaugural Post

In the beginning there was Blog.......

No wait, that's not how it goes.

Welcome to Critical Point! If this blog goes off as we intend it will hopefully become something worth reading. We will diligently (or maybe lazily) scour the Universe for interesting stuff to share with you and hopefully provide some insightful commentary into the common and not so common experiences we share on this "Pale Blue Dot." All our work and effort shall be for you, Gentle Reader, we hope you will enjoy it.

Now let's see if we can get this puppy rolling!