A wizard is never late, Frodo Baggins. Nor is he early. He arrives precisely when he means to

I have chosen Gandalf's words of wisdom on wizards' sense of temporal mechanics for two reasons. The first is obvious - my shameful neglect in the up keep of this blog. The second, is talk in a little more depth about my history with Lord of the Rings and very specifically about my thoughts and feelings on the latest movie, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.

Unlike many of my geeky friends, in fact unlike pretty much ALL of my friends, the non-geeks included, I did not see any of the Lord of the Rings movies when they came out. I had not read the books as a child and held to the incredibly strange and continually baffling logic that, at the time, one could either be loyal to watching The Matrix movies or Lord of the Rings. In retrospect, by gods I really did bet on the wrong horse.

It emerged in later years that not seeing or reading Lord of the Rings is pretty much considered treason in the geek world. Liking them may not necessarily be required, but you at least have to see them and read them so you can form an opinion, which can then lead to late night, Mountain Dew-fuelled discussions on the subject. So far I have completed the watching them requirement, with the full intention of obtaining the trilogy of books and reading them. I already have, and have read, The Hobbit, so I suppose that's something a start. My geek credentials, taken from me by the benevolence of Spike, have since been returned by the same token of benevolence, with the stipulation that I must get my arse into gear and read the frakking things.

But enough on that. Time for my thoughts and feelings on The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.

I'd heard some quite mixed things about this movie. Some said I should prepare to be disappointed, others said I would enjoy it and that it wasn't a bad movie. In short...I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Now I read The Hobbit at the beginning of 2012, just before the GRRM Reaper and Song of Ice and Fire entered and thoroughly took up residence in my life. So by the time I saw The Hobbit in early 2013, my memories of the book had faded a little bit. So I didn't necessarily recognise all of it, but there were a lot of points where I was thinking "Aha, I remember that" and, of course, points where I thought "Hang on a second, I'm fairly certain that didn't happen". However, I was prepared for this. As always, after the release of the movie, the Internet and die-hard Tolkien fans erupted in various states of outrage regarding deviations from the source text. Unfortunately, this is a reality of the movie industry we have to live with. Which is why I take the Douglas Adams, Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy approach and view such things as separate entities to be enjoyed on their own merits. That said, comparative studies can be quite fun too.

The obvious trickiness of movie adaptations is bringing the characters to life. You have to be real careful about who you pick to embody certain characters, because the fanbase you're relying on to bringing in those opening weekend bucks are going to have some pretty firm ideas about what those characters are like. In this, I think there was much success. Thorin Oakenshield's company of Dwarves are indeed a very merry gathering and Martin Freeman quite brilliantly portrays Bilbo Baggins' confusion over the presence of them in his neat little Hobbit-hole. Or at least it was neat before they arrived to pillage the pantry and trod mud into the carpets.

So far, I'm enjoying this trilogy. I know it's only one movie in, but hey, I'll start calling it a trilogy anyway. Saves time later. It felt like they had added a lot of things in that I didn't remember from the books, but regardless of that I really enjoyed it. I imagine that the original Lord of the Rings trilogy will stick out as my favourites, but that'll probably be for all the battles. Saying that, we do have the Battle of the Five Armies to look forward to. Along with many, many other things.

I feel like I should be saying more but it was a fair few weeks ago that I saw it and my mind draws blanks. I really, really have been atrocious with updating. I blame my parade of early morning starts at work. Getting up at 5 am five days in a row doesn't do great things for the energy levels. But I'm getting close to getting used to it (so Sod's Law dictates that my shift pattern is going to drastically change now), so with any luck I'll be able to update more often. That and I'm not playing anymore Skyrim until I send my novel out to at least five agents. Yeah, I'm getting to that exceptionally scary point in my writing career. Actually trying to get paid for this so-called career.

So until next time, here is a little musical gem by a gifted fellow named Peter Hollens that I discovered and relates quite nicely to what I've been babbling about: Misty Mountains Acappella. 

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one

The quotation for today's blog entry is, surprisingly, not from a TV show or movie. No, this quotation is attributed to the one and only Albert Einstein and has some tangential bearing on the topic of this blog entry. Today is going to be a bit of a random round-up of things. Life has been doing its thing, interfering with the regular course of my blogging activities, as well as the recreational activities that lead to blogging. It has, however, occurred to me that I never fully summarised my thoughts and feelings on Battlestar Galactica: Blood and Chrome. So we're going to start there and work our way through the other random things I have to babble about. Because yes, it's random inane babbling time.

Now then. Battlestar Galactica: Blood and Chrome.

My thoughts and feelings on this may be similar to my thoughts and feelings on the first two "episodes". Short and sweet. Blood and Chrome is very enjoyable and manages to do a lot in a small time-span. Luke Pasqualino pulled out a pretty damn good performance as a young Adama, considering where I'd seen him before and how unsure I was that he was the right choice for William Adama. Ben Cotton is a brilliant supporting lead as well, providing the requisite battle-hardened, war-weariness that was needed for an officer serving in the tenth year of the Cylon War.

Now my one continuing gripe with Blood and Chrome is the over-use of CGI. Pretty much all of the sets were CGI'd in some shape or form. Given that it's only a webseries, it can be forgiven. But I just didn't like the ways they changed my beloved Galactica. But as I said in my initial thoughts and feelings, I can get over it.

That one gripe aside, Blood and Chrome is a very worthy addition to the Battlestar Galactica canon. Particularly a scene in the final episode that I won't spoil, but does contain my favourite line of the whole webseries.

Next up is another series, but this time TV - The Unusuals. It's a cop show that ran for ten episodes in 2009. Set in New York City, it follows a group of detectives in the NYPD's 2nd Precinct. A complete bunch of mismatched, secretive yet talented and brilliant investigators. The main characters are Jason Walsh, a veteran of the 2nd played by Jeremy Renner, and his new partner Casey Shraeger, a recent transfer from the Vice Squad played by Amber Tamblyn.

In my eyes, The Unusuals was cruelly cancelled. I have only seen five episodes so far and they are all brilliant. The ensemble cast - which includes Harold Perrineau of Lost and Matrix fame and Adam Goldberg of Saving Private Ryan - are an absolutely brilliant mixture. It's a gem. And while I just said "cruelly cancelled", it might just be a stroke of luck, insofar as this gem won't have had the time to lose it's shine.

Now comes the real gushing. First up, the 2012 remake of Total Recall.

Many, many blog entries ago, I confronted the subject of remakes and nominated Total Recall as the one I had most faith in. Yesterday, I finally managed to get around to watching it. And it did not disappoint.

My biggest concern was the lack of Mars. For it was the secrets of what lay under Mars's surface that were contained in Douglas Quaid's (played then by Arnold Schwarzeneggar) mind. Well, they manage to tweak it and fit their own storyline, but still keep the flavour of the original 1990 Paul Verhoeven movie.

So, a brief note on plot - the time is never specified, but it's likely to be the 22nd Century. Earth has been ravaged by chemical warfare and only two habitable regions remain - the United Federation of Britain, which comprises most of Europe, and the Colony, which constitutes lonely Australia. The remnants of humanity are crammed into these areas, which living space becoming an incredibly precious resource. The Federation and the Colony are connected by the Fall, a massive (essentially elevator) shaft that goes directly through the Earth, passing right next to the core. The Federation is rich and the Colony is poor. Resistance fighters fight under the slogan "The Fall Enslaves Us All", trying to end the Federation's dominance. And about to be caught in the middle of it all - Douglas Quaid, a Colony-born and dwelling factory worker, who lives in blissful ignorance with his paramedic wife, Lori.

Fans of the original 1990 will know exactly where this is going and I don't want to risk spoiling anything, so I'm going to babble tangentially about the film in very general terms. It was brilliant. It contains enough small references to the original to cause the odd giggle or two, as well as many, many parallel scenes/scenarios which I found somewhat comforting but also dealt with in the context of the film itself, not just trying to emulate its predecessor. Colin Farrell was on absolutely top form as Douglas Quaid, with Kate Beckinsale brilliantly portraying his wife and Jessica Biel slipping in quite nicely as Melina. John Cho also makes a neat little appearance as the man at Rekall, the false-memory company. Finally, there's much kudos for Bryan Cranston as Vilos Cohaagen. Stepping into Ronny Cox's exceptionally brilliant villainous shoes was never going to be easy, but by gods the man does it well.

Kudos must also go to the production design team (and by extension the Special Effects team as well) for the beautiful set pieces and urban landscapes developed for the movie. All in all, Total Recall (2012) is a damn fine movie. Good job, ladies and menfolk.

Last and in absolutely no ways least, is Dredd.

Karl Urban deserves a whole frak ton of kudos here. The last time the character of Judge Dredd had been adapted for the big screen...well, let's put it this way - I watched it in my teens and enjoyed it. When it was on TV around the time the new Dredd was released, I couldn't do it. I'd been spoiled by the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Too many good comic book movies highlighted that it...was bad. Beyond redemption. Luckily for Karl Urban and team behind Dredd, I don't feel they were seeking redemption. They were happy to forget their predecessor and do their own thing.

I must say, I'm not at all fussed about 3D. I think it's a bit of a fad and honestly, I'm hoping it'll pass pretty soon. But by gods I wish I'd seen Dredd in 3D. Now I watched Dredd after watching the aforementioned Total Recall and I'll be honest, it doesn't have the same depth of storyline. But it doesn't need it. Dredd is a straight-up, honest and solid action movie. Karl Urban...he is the frakking man. He is absolutely fantastic as Judge Dredd, solidifying my respect for him as an actor. Not that it needed much help, but still. And also, Olivia Thirlby. The only other film I've seen her in is Juno. And I honestly didn't hugely enjoy her character, though she didn't make me hate her either. But as psychic rookie Cassandra Anderson...she is amazing. Her journey through the movie and her interactions with Dredd are just...brilliant. My gods, I can't even gush eloquently anymore.

It appears, all there is to say, is that Dredd is a damn, damn good and enjoyable movie. Oh, but one last thing...

Lena Headey is frakking badass as the main villain. Not that anyone familiar with her performances as Cersei Lannister in Game of Thrones would have any cause at all to worry.

So there we have it. Much rambling and gushing. Maybe next time I'll be less excitable and a little more coherent...