Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Indiana Jones is one of the best movie franchises ever! It’s a rare blend of action and humour and doesn’t miss any opportunity to poke fun at itself. It has one of the best, most recognizable theme songs of all time. And it stars Harrison Ford!

My introduction to Indy wasn’t actually the movies though; it was 1992’s Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, an adventure game by the magnificent but now-defunct LucasArts games division. It’s a rare, very rare example of a successful game-movie crossover that retained the qualities of its original, along with a magnificent storyline and memorable characters. It still stands up to any adventure game you’d find on the market today.

If you have been deprived all these years or are in need of nostalgia, here’s the introduction sequence :) :-

I’ve played all the Indiana Jones games and watched the movies more times than I can remember, and I’ve been looking forward to Indy IV for months!Detractors say that Harrison Ford is now too old to play Indy, or that Lucas is just milking an old franchise for money. Well the latter might be true, but Ford will always be Indy like how he will always be Han Solo and the president of the United States. He already has the fedora, the whip, and the Scowl down pat:

Now here’s waiting for May 22, 2008 to see if he has the rest of it still! :).
[Link to 720p Trailer torrent]

Fallout III

Fallout (1997) and its sequel Fallout II are universally considered among the best computer RPGs of all time (I preferred Arcanum, but it was less polished ). In the retro-futuristic Fallout universe, a nuclear war has laid waste to the earth, with the only survivors being the people who took refuge in government-built Vaults. In the original, you are sent out to scour the wasteland and your sister Vaults for a replacement “water chip” for your Vault. Interplay ( I’m so sorry I couldn’t afford non-pirated games back then  :(( ) did a phenomenal job in fleshing out a world of humans dealing with the fallout of nuclear war, as well as implementing a solid game system and an open-ended storyline. The ending of the first game is especially memorable:
If you want to know what it is ▼

The concern everyone is having is that Bethesda Softworks, who bought over the rights to the series, are well-known for focusing more on eye-candy than a solid story ( *ahem* Oblivion ). I’m actually a bit worried for them because there are a large number of scary Fallout fanbois out there!

Whatever the case, we’ll know soon - they are apparently on track (shock) for release in fall 2008.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

My Pottermania has pretty much died down by now, but I’m still looking forward to the sixth movie - the main reason being that I’m very curious how they are going to handle the romance that Harry is supposed to have with Ginny. With all the focus on the big Three, she’s been little more than a wallflower in the movies. Not exactly the spunky, vivacious Ginny from the books.

Context for this still:

[Returning from the village after the DA meets for the first time]

Hermionie: Anyway, at least we know one positive thing that came from today…
Harry: What’s that?
Hermionie: Cho couldn’t take her eyes off you, could she?
Harry: *smirk*
Ginny: *emo*

Popularity: 73% [?]

Picked this up from Digg, Leaky Cauldron is running the highlights of a recent Q&A with JK Rowling on that series of hers.

Among the usual “who-marries-who” and “what-ifs”, Rowling answered a thoughtful question:
“Did Dumbledore, who believed in the prevailing power of love, ever fall in love himself?” by outing him as gay and revealling that he had at one point been in love with the man who would become his nemesis.

In fact, recently I was in a script read through for the sixth film, and they had Dumbledore saying a line to Harry early in the script saying I knew a girl once, whose hair… [laughter]. I had to write a little note in the margin and slide it along to the scriptwriter, “Dumbledore’s gay!”

Interestingly, she got an ovation from the audience. But I doubt this will go down well with the fundies who’ve already accused her of everything this side of murder. She didn’t shed too much light when asked exactly how much Dumbledore’s brother Aberforth liked goats (come to think of it, what a mental family).

Some may think she’s been reading too much fanfic or that she’s just looking for free publicity, but personally I think it gives you another reason to go through the books again and see if you can pick up anything you missed before :). Poor McGonagall…

Popularity: 40% [?]

Magic, pure magic - that’s how I’d describe Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

Anyone who has read any of the books will already know that Rowling is a storytelling genius: the world of Harry Potter ranks right up there with Middle-Earth or Narnia - perhaps higher, given how easily you can relate to her world and appreciate her parodies on society and politics ([edit] I’ll say it again - the Ministry of Magic is sooo like our Govt, have you read about how they’re trying to paint Anwar as a lapdog of the US and the Jews?) without squinting for religious analogy or keeping track of odd names. Granted, her writing isn’t impressive in a literary sense (I believe someone commented that Rowling “never met an adverb she didn’t like”) - then again, I cringed at Tolkien’s attempts at songs too. She also takes pains to flesh out her characters, even the minor ones, and lets them grow with every book. And of course, I’m also a personal fan because of her rags-to-riches story writing the Great British Novel(s).

The last book was like the finishing of an intricate spiderweb. (Seemingly) small details from the previous books came together, nearly everyone has their moment in the sun, and the pace was breathtaking. The final chapters especially were glorious. The only problems I really had were the last two deaths, which didn’t seem to contribute to the story much by that point; and the epilogue, which was horrendous. She’s going to produce a final booklet for charity though, and if you want a better epilogue check out the transcript of a 90-minute chat between Rowling and MuggleNet.

Will end with a quick note about the Deathly Hallows price war: A letter in the newspaper observed that the major bookstores are getting a taste of their own medicine - many small retailers haven’t bothered stocking Harry Potter even before this, because they could not match the prices of the major chains. That said, it was a little… weird to see Deathly Hallows being promoted in a Carrefour newspaper ad - next to a promotion for potatoes. I preordered my copy from Borders, so it didn’t set me back much anyway - RM88 total, with 20% off the next two books.

Popularity: 34% [?]

Was on MSN today and saw Marv logged in with “12 more days” as his status message. I happened to have “13 more days” as my status message. After the ensuing conversation I realized my priorities may be backwards…

Me: 12 more days to what?
Marv: My gf coming back. You? 13 more days to what?
Me: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows!!

Popularity: 34% [?]