Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Zoology in the 23rd Century

Star Trek is (C) 2010 & a Registered TM of CBS Studios, Inc. No infringement of those rights is intended. Screencap from Trekcore.com.

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Getting Your A$$ Kicked

Kick-Ass, which was "The #1 Movie in America" last week, was trounced in its second weekend by How To Train Your Dragon (which is in its FIFTH week of release) and a couple of new releases, including another comic book-to-film adaptation in The Losers. Kick-Ass dropped down to the number five slot this weekend.

Kick-Ass was made for a modest $30 to $40 million, so it will make its money back and probably a few bucks on top of that for its studio.

But it recently dawned on me why I didn't like the movie: it's hero really isn't one. Yeah, I know the movie supposedly satirizes comic book conventions, while at the same time being a straight-forward enough comic book adventure, but there's no reason for the hero to do what he does.

Kick-Ass isn't motivated by a personal tragedy like Batman or Daredevil, or a greater sense of good and justice like Superman, the mold from which all other heroes are cast. In Iron Man Tony Stark spent his life making weapons but never experienced their devastating power. Once he did, he desperately wanted to change his ways. And it wasn't just being in a gunfight that changed his mind, but having a piece of shrapnel from one of his weapons permanently lodged near his heart (how's that for a metaphor for ya?).

In the movie, teenager Dave isn't motivated by anything. True, he gets his lunch money and cell phone stolen by some toughs, but that's not motivation enough to put on a costume and fight crime. The only reason seems to be, "Well, we have a comic book movie to put on, so we gotta have Dave put on a costume."

If the hero has zero motivation for what he does, other than "wouldn't it be cool if I was a superhero like in the comics I read," then the audience has the same zero motivation to watch him. It doesn't help that the movie then spends way too much time with the bad guys. We already know what the Big Bad's motivation is, it's money and power, the usual Big Bad motivation.

There was one brief moment of hope in the movie where Kick-Ass refuses to back down from defending a stranger from three goons. The odds are uneven 3 to 1, then 3 against 2 when Kick-Ass comes to the guy's aid. Both KA and the audience have no idea why the three goons are kicking the crap out of this guy, but regardless, its so not a fair fight. Kick-Ass gets beaten up nearly as badly as the stranger but he refuses to back down because the three goons aren't fighting fair. They respect him for that, and so does the audience. But the movie never has another scene like that, quickly moving on to the stories of all the additional costumed folk inspired by Kick-Ass: Big Daddy, Hit Girl and Red Mist. Perhaps if they saved that for a sequel and concentrated solely on the character of Kick-Ass they might have had something on their hands.

The movie even has the temerity to ridicule (or "satirize") Spider-Man's famous credo, With great power comes great responsibility. Kick-Ass turns it into, With no power comes no responsibility, which is a perfect motto for the ADD video game generation. Kick-Ass might as well have said, I don't give a crap and neither should you!

As it is, the fanboys came out, saw the movie and that was it. The general movie going public stayed away. A good story would have generated good word of mouth, but Kick-Ass had a muddled story that wasn't that interesting (foul language and whacking off jokes aside).

Time and again that what it truly comes down to: the story and the characters. Get those right and you have a Star Wars, Spider-Man 2, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings or Iron Man on your hands. Get it wrong and you have Elektra, The Golden Compass, and Wolverine to contend with. Throw Kick-Ass into the heap of the latter set.

If the studios would stop setting release dates BEFORE they have the script and casting nailed down maybe they'd make MORE money.

Crossing Over (Without John Edward)

Fringe - "The Man from the Other Side"

SPOILERS

The alternate universe shapeshifters are back, and they're up to no good (as is their usual m.o.). This means Thomas Jerome Newton (Sebastian Roche, who'd be my pick to play Gordon Ramsay in a bio-pic of the Hell's Kitchen celeb chef) is also back and he's perfected a way to bring something or someone from the alternate universe over to our universe.

This is another strong Walter Bishop show as John Noble, once again, gives an Emmy-winning performance. Walter is still wracked with guilt over whether to tell Peter (Joshua Jackson) the truth about his origins. Just as he's about to confess, Olivia (Anna Torv) calls in and the Fringe team is put to work. Walter gets to put his marijuana knowledge, as well as his pecan pie-making skills to work, and he gets to cut up a shapeshifter embryo. (It sort of looks like a next gen version of the Alien egg.)

As always the science sounds like it could be true or at least plausible (I'd love to sit and chat with the show's science and tech consultants), with frequency harmonics and such.

The scene between Walter and Peter in the hospital is absolutely heartbreaking. Peter, having survived the attempt to neutralize Newton's crossover bid, has deduced the truth about himself, that he is in fact from the alternate universe. I've never seen Joshua Jackson so stone-faced and cold as he was in this scene. It was chilling, and in such contrast to John Noble's Walter as he stood there, eyes welling with tears, lower lip quivering, as his world is being torn apart by the ugly truth of what he, and he alone, had done. Great writing, acting and directing.

One of the things that has really bothered me about the final season of Lost is that the characters seem just so blase about huge, important revelations, things like we know John Locke is dead - we've seen his corpse, and now there's something that's walking around that looks like Locke, and oh yeah, this faux-Locke out and out tells people he's the freaking Smoke Monster and they don't bat an eyelash. They've be more surprised if Locke had a twin brother than by the fact that a cloud of black smoke has taken the form of a man they've lived and fought with and against. I hope Fringe really changes its characters with these life-altering revelations - they may have to still work together but they cannot treat each other the same way.

Please, Fringe writers, don't disappoint me there (you haven't so far).

Thursday, April 22, 2010

What's Up, Doc?


We LOVES us some Bugs Bunny at the space station here. Classic Looney Tunes cartoons are literal works of art.

Now comes word via Yahoo News that Cartoon Network is bringing back Bugs and Company.

Bugs and the rest of the classic Looney Tunes stable have lasted all these years because they are such relatable characters: tough, lovable, curmudgeonly, funny, and even looney. They have real personalities, especially when compared to such characters as Mickey Mouse and his Disney kin.

Just a word of advice, mack: Do NOT mess this up, or...Hassan chop!

Star Trek TNG pic (c) 2010 and a Registered Trademark of CBS Studios Inc. Bugs Bunny (c) Warner Brothers. No infringement of these rights is intended. Screencap from Trekcore.com.

Monday, April 19, 2010

2012: The Sequel (Not Really)

The San Diego Comic Con is a ginormous multimedia marketing extravaganza. I hear it also has something to do with comic books.

In 2012, the contract between the City of San Diego and the organizers of SDCC ends, so other cities are waving bright shiny objects in front of the organizers trying to get them to move SDCC to their city. Somehow the Las Vegas Comic Con just doesn't sound as cool. Maybe it's the tassels. And why'd they pick 2012 anyway? Don't they know we already gotta contend with Mayan calendars (btw, love their centerfold sacrifices), space asteroids, mammoth earthquakes and global flooding? Not to mention postage stamps are probably going to go up again in 2012.

But the City of San Diego isn't resting on its well-tanned laurels. Here's what they are proposing (from slashfilm.com): "A $753 million expansion of the San Diego convention center which would provide an additional 200,000 square feet of exhibit space, a third ballroom, 100,000 square feet of meeting rooms, and a new 500 room hotel directly behind the convention center. This would give the center a total of 815,000 square feet of exhibition space, about the same as Anaheim’s convention center."

All that and I'm guessing they're only gonna add three more restrooms. But then, again, what would comic book conventions be without grossly inadequate restroom facilities?

Sunday, April 18, 2010

Kick- Ass is a Schizophrenic Superhero Mess

Kick-Ass (2010)

A study in comic book schizophrenia. Superheroes have always been a bit schizophrenic, with costumed guises always clashing with their secret civilian identities. The new movie Kick-Ass, based on the creator-owned title of the same name by writer Mark Millar and artist John Romita Jr. and published by Marvel Comics, wants to be a "real world" tale of a teenage boy who dons a homemade costume and becomes a superhero. But it's also a traditional fantasy superhero movie with the same over-the-top, impossible-but-fun fight scenes and more. It's a goofy satire, but then there's a sequence where two characters are tortured and about to be executed on live video which is very chilling.

Let's face it, this movie is bi-polar.

It begins as the story of Dave Lizewski (British actor Aaron Johnson), average eyeglasses-wearing, girlfriend-less teen, who gets jacked regularly by two high school thugs who demand his "money and cell phone." One day the comic book-reading teen decides to send away for some rudimentary supplies - a scuba suit and some nightsticks - and becomes Kick-Ass.

On his first venture out, he not only gets his ass handed to him but nearly dies in the process. He is much more successful his second time out, when he defends a man who is set upon by three thugs. He's beaten (again) and outnumbered, but he won't give up. It's the best moment in the movie for the Kick-Ass character but the movie never provides another moment as good as that one for him.

Meanwhile, we meet ruthless but somewhat goofball NYC mobster Frank D'Amico and his son McLovin, I mean Chris/Red Mist (played by Christopher Mintz-Plasse who with his scratchy voice and slight frame will forever be known as McLovin; sorry, but its true). The mobster tries to hide what he does for a living from his son, but the kid has a pretty good idea how pops brings home the cocaine-covered bacon.

Also meanwhile we meet cute as a button 11 year old Mindy (Chloe Grace Moretz, the breakout star of the movie) and her more than a little unhinged daddy Damon MacReady played by Nicholas Cage (soon to be known by superhero monikers Hit Girl and Big Daddy, respectively). The first time we meet this odd couple is a great piece of storytelling, I mean how many loving fathers shoot their pigtail-sporting little girls point blank with a pistol? And who knew they made kevlar bullet-proof vests for 11 year olds? Where in WalMart do they stock those?

It turns out that Big Daddy has a mad on for Mobster D'Amico and starts killing off his goons and messing up his coke shipments. Kick-Ass gets blamed for this at one point, drawing him into D'Amico's sphere of influence. Along the way there is a lot of punching and kicking and blood and more blood and even some severed limbs.

I liked big chunks of this movie - the major action scenes, especially involving the whirling dervish Hit Girl, are well done in terms of choreography and editing (and pint-size stunt doubles) - but when I step back and try to look at the whole thing I really don't understand it. It tries to have its cake and eat it too. It gives us a "realistic" take on being a real world superhero, but then it more than dips its Doc Martin-wearing toe into the traditional fantasy superhero world. The comic book creators and the filmmakers apparently believe that merely letting the main hero get beaten to a bloody pulp a few times is enough to qualify as grounding their story in the real world. But then the movie only shows Dave doing a few sit ups to get himself ready to go out into the world and kick ass. He doesn't take any martial arts or self defense classes or even check out a library book on karate or something. He's not particularly strong or athletic so how he's able to withstand multiple beatings from big goombah thugs is beyond me. (Yes, the movie states that after his first beating he becomes somewhat oblivious to pain, but it also appeared to give him a "healing factor" because NO non-superpowered person could get beat up like that without being a bruised, shredded, pulpy mess - Dave just wipes the blood off his skin and VOILA he's whole again. If the blood is just on top of his skin, WHERE is it coming from?)

Once Hit Girl and Big Daddy hit the screen they completely overshadow Kick-Ass; this dynamic duo is simply much more interesting than our teal-suited teen (Dave even intones at one point with "No power comes no responsibility" so why should we care about him). Moretz owns the movie, to use a current phrase. I think she could even stand an award nomination or two for her work here, she's funny, confident and self-assured. But it's beyond me why it was necessary for her character to use the foul language (the f word, the c word) she employs. When she does it as Hit Girl you might argue it's to throw the bad guys off balance, but that isn't the case; none of them seem to mind, so it's done for the audience's sake not the story's. But then she also uses foul language when she's not in costume, just as Mindy, who is apparently home-schooled by her dad. Her father doesn't swear and he doesn't seem to notice his daughter using the foul language, so, once again, I don't understand the point (other than British writer Mark Millar and British director Matthew Vaughn think it's funny for an 11 year old girl to cuss like that). Cage does something as Big Daddy that I wasn't expecting. I won't tell you what it was but it was brilliant on his part (if it was his idea). This is a welcome return to earlier form for Cage, who got his start in quirky movies like Raising Arizona and Vampire's Kiss

One thing that really hurt the story of Kick-Ass was that the movie spent a lot of time with its villain, Frank D'Amico, played by Mark Strong. Too much time, in fact, that it hurt the rhythm of Dave's story. D'Amico started out a bit like Dennis Farina's mobster in Midnight Run with some humorous turns, but became much less interesting and more traditional and one-note as the movie went along. I didn't understand why most of his goons were portrayed as total morons, more cartoons than anything. At one point they're trying to get information as to who is messing with the boss's coke shipments and they put a guy in a "giant industrial microwave" used to dry lumber (or so the movie says). Of course all the goons are shocked at the obvious messy outcome of putting a man in a giant microwave. I guess none of them has ever popped a bag of popcorn before.

I don't think I could recommend this movie. Perhaps if I saw it again I might like it better, but as it stands it felt like two different movies smashed together: one the slight story of Kick-Ass and the other one - the better one - the story of Hit Girl and Big Daddy. I prefer the exploits of the latter.

Saturday, April 17, 2010

Habitats of Humanity

Strange and crazy architecture, communities, and cities hold great fascination for us, and the fine folks as io9.com have another amazing post about such things: 10 Weirdest Urban Ecosystems on Earth.

From the sprawling, enviro-friendly and THX-1138-ish former limestone mine now underground office/business complex called "SubTropolis" in Kansas City, MO (super BBQ AND underground complexes, go figure) to the slums of Mumbai and the Garbage City of Egypt (HOW do people live this way?) to the artificial Japanese island Gunkanjima (SOMEONE'S gotta film an end of the world movie there!) to the breathtaking centuries old city of Petra, carved out of the canyon walls in Jordan (yup, as seen in Indiana Jones and the (Next to) Last Crusade).

It's a wild mishmash sampling of humanity's ingenuity, from the insane to the incredible.

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Tall, Blond and Furry

As a fan of all things Ape and Ape-like, I just HAD to post this io9.com piece about BIGFOOT.

They even have the video of the opening theme for...Bigfoot and Wildboy!

For those of you old enough to remember that little gem of a live action show, it's okay to tear up and sniffle. Go ahead, get a tissue if you need one. Or laugh your ass off. Either response will suffice.

Bigfoot and Wildboy, now THERE'S an old show just begging for the remake/reimagining treatment. Any takers?

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

New Jack Kirby-created Superheroes

SciFiWire.com has a post concerning new creations from the late legendary co-creator of much of the Marvel Comics universe Jack Kirby.

Well, they're sorta new.

Kirby left the four-color funny books for a time to work in Saturday morning animation for producers Ruby-Spears. His designs and concepts made it into such series as Space Star and most notably Thundarr the Barbarian. Apparently there is a treasure trove of artwork and concepts that Kirby made that never saw the animation table.

Now it's being shopped around Hollywood.

I think Kirby's best work was with Stan Lee, although his solo turns with The Eternals for Marvel and the Fourth World/New Gods series for DC are both interesting and continue to pop up today (especially Darkseid and Apokalips from the New Gods).

But most of his other solo work was just weird, including Silver Star, Secret City, and Captain Victory and the Galactic Rangers. They seemed to be rehashes of his previous co-creations, complete with some of the weirdest costumes ever.

It will be interesting to see if anything comes of this, but I think animation might be the best arena for Kirby's colorful crazy characters and imagination.

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Girl Types According to Richard Roeper

I absolutely love this quote from movie critic Richard Roeper's blog, "You know how some guys have a ‘type’ they’re attracted to? With Mr. (Jesse) James, it would appear there are at least two distinct types that catch his eye: the kind of girl you take home to Mom, and the kind of girl who would scare the shit out of Mom, Dad, the family dog and just about everyone else who isn’t a trained special ops expert or a vampire hunter."

Well, there's a movie idea right there: Special Ops Vampire Hunters! The poster tagline could be, "This war has fangs."

Saturday, April 10, 2010

Who Knows What Evil Lurks in the Hearts of Men?

FilmSchoolRejects.com has a fun look back at 1994's The Shadow starring Alec Baldwin and John Lone.

The Shadow is such an interesting character, beginning as a radio show narrator in 1930 before graduating to a radio series all his own (and being voiced by wunderkind Orson Welles), then on to pulp magazine novels, movies, television, comic books and finally a big-budget movie directed by Russell Mulcahey. The character was also one of the big inspirations behind the creation of another famous creature of the night: The Batman (created in 1939).

The movie is seriously flawed - they messed with the Shadow's origin to tie him and the movie's villain Shiwan Khan more closely together - but looks great and the costume and make-up to transform Baldwin into the mysterious avenger who "knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men" is fantastic. Baldwin is perfect for the role, convincing as a millionaire playboy and equally convincing as his alter ego, the mysterious and more than a bit creepy Shadow (complete with great use of his deep scratchy voice and laugh). But I think they spent far too much time trying to devise and execute the way the Shadow appears and disappears in scenes - the "clouding of men's minds" - rather than spending the time on the script to make it more interesting and less bloated and obtuse.

Lone, who was great in Iceman and Year of the Dragon (a hero in the first, villain in the latter) is a dull villain here, and there isn't much humor in the film (save for Jonathan Winters' performance). Penelope Ann Miller as love interest Margo Lane is pretty but doesn't have much of a character (plus they made her a telepath, which is most certainly not in the source materials). There's no spunk there, like Margot Kidder brought to Lois Lane in the Christopher Reeve Superman movies; Miller was more annoying than endearing.

Aliens had one of the best ensemble casts in genre movies; the actors fit the characters (the veteran Sgt Apone, Hicks, Hudson, "Frosty," Vasquez and Drake), unlike The Abyss where the large ensemble didn't really come together (can you name just one of the supporting characters). The Shadow's cast of supporting characters who play his various agents are more like the latter film. They may all be competent actors, but for these roles they don't do anything to really get your attention (this is one of my problems with the new V series - flat casting).

Still, The Shadow is one of those movies that you watch whenever it's on. There was potential there, but it wasn't realized to its fullest.

Perhaps Sam Raimi, an admitted fan of the character, will either direct or at least produce a more faithful, fun and adventurous version of this beloved icon.

And always remember, The weed of crime bears bitter fruit.

Friday, April 9, 2010

A case of the sniffles

Feel like going through a box of tissues this morning?

Well, you came to the right place as this post from io9.com runs down 15 of the Biggest Tearjerkers in Sci Fi Movies.

I agree with most of their choices (the recent WALL-E is a no brainer), although I don't think Wash's unexpected (and unnecessary) death in Serenity invoked tears as much as anger and shock (I think Book's death in the same film was the demise that evoked more tears).

I wasn't able to catch Dr. Who growing up so I never sought out the latest revamp that began with Christopher Eccleston and then David Tennant. Yes, I know I have A LOT of catching up to do, but that clip of Rose the companion (Billie Piper) and the Doctor saying goodbye was absolutely heartbreaking. I now need to start saving to buy the entire DVD set that culminates in that incredible goodbye.

If you want a good cry straightaway this morning, watch that first.

Thursday, April 8, 2010

V for Vapid

I recorded this week's V and tried to watch it last night, but after a few minutes had absolutely NO interest in it whatsoever.

I thought the original V miniseries from the 1980s was a fun tale (as fun as update Nazi allegories can be), but this new version doesn't seem to offer anything new. I'm simply not interested in any of the characters. No one "pops"; the cast are all competent actors, but no one stands out. Elizabeth Mitchell is just not a commanding lead, at least not here. Her icy-ness is a problem. I think it's just bad casting (for spot-on casting look at ER (the original cast), The X-Files, NYPD Blue (before David Caruso started hiding behind sunglasses - and look at how veteran actor Dennis Franz brought Andy Sipowicz to life!), Lost, The Sopranos, The Wire and Battlestar Galactica).

In Battlestar Galactica, the humans had to worry about Cylon infiltrators and terrorists among them, since Cylons had evolved to look exactly like humans. In this new V, the Visitors have to contend with traitors among THEM, who are opposed to their leader's plans. OMG, they flipped that on us! But where BSG was totally involving, V is just a big shrug.

They should have stuck with the Nazi allegory.

ps: from what I've read recently about its ratings, V doesn't seem long for the TV world, nor does FlashForward which I've also sorta given up on. But on the good news front, Fringe is a go for season three!

Monday, April 5, 2010

Quiz Show

Here's a fun time waster: A Star Wars sound effects quiz (courtesy of the gang at boingboing.com).

Just doing this quiz makes us want to watch Star Wars all over again, or maybe with the picture off to fully appreciate sound designer Ben Burtt's amazing work on the film.

Splice trailer

The full-length trailer for Splice is finally here.

Splice is the latest film from director Vincenzo Natali, who helmed the great low budget cult classics Cube and Cypher.

Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley are research scientists who play God by combining human DNA with "other" material.

I love that their names are Clive and Elsa (after Bride of Frankenstein's Colin Clive and Elsa Lanchester).

Cloning Around

We must admit, this clip found on io9.com from the season finale of Star Wars: Clone Wars looks pretty interesting.

It features a young Boba Fett, who we last saw in the live action Episode II (forgive us if he appeared in other episodes of the Clone Wars show as we don't watch normally watch it), out for revenge against Mace Windu who killed papa Jango.

It seems light years away from the overly cute tone of the SW:CW "movie" with Anakin and his young padawan learner apprentice protecting Jabba's son "Stinky."

We'd definitely peep this episode with our macrobinoculars, if you know what we mean.

Sunday, April 4, 2010

Less Than Super Movie

Superhero Movie (2008)

The superhero movie genre spoof Superhero Movie starts with not one, not two but THREE head-bashing moments for our hero. Crying out for the school bus to stop, it does and he runs into the side mirror, then the Stop sign - which should be on the LEFT side not the right side of the bus - opens up and he smashes into it (for the sake of this non-joke it was moved to the wrong side), then the bus doors open on his face.

They should have put up Biff! Bam! and Pow! sound effects cards.

This is one big fat waste of a film and everyone's time (the studio should have donated the money to charity, or the coke habits of the upper crust management). It uses the storyline of Spider-Man (instead of a spider our hero is bitten by a dragonfly) to weakly spoof it and the X-Men and whatever other superhero movies it can squeeze into its lamebrained mix.

Drake Bell does not register as the Peter Parker-doppelganger high-schooler Rick Riker. Comedian Kevin Hart, who looks around 40, is his best bud; the comedian, who was great in The 40 Year Old Virgin, does nothing here. Leslie Nielsen and Marion Ross are the Uncle Ben and Aunt May substitutes (please Mr. Nielsen, learn to say "No" and retire with a shred of dignity). Tracy Morgan does generate a few laughs as Professor Xavier (he starts out in a wheelchair and changes his modes of transportation without explanation, to things like a Segway and an entire toilet bowl). Brent Spiner doesn't register (surprise) in the role of the Big Bad's chief scientist.

This movie is lame. Lame, lame, lame. It throws Pam Anderson into the mix as the Invisible Woman (who is fooling around with Prof. X). Newsflash people: Pam is 43 years old, but looks 50; she is NO LONGER the 25 year old hottie she was when she first donned the red Speedo bathing suit for Baywatch. Let her be a sexy 43 year old woman (if that's possible) and let's stop pretending for her sake and everyone else's that she's under the age of 30. She most definitely is NOT. The spackling and whatnot from her numerous boob jobs and plastic surgeries are showing through. It's not pretty. Stop it.

This stupid waste of time is just lame pratfalls, fart jokes and other seriously overused, unoriginal crap. It's "humor" is aimed at stupid 10 year old boys. Even scanning through it will not change the fact that it will steal precious moments from your life. Don't let this super-suck do that to you.

Having said all that, I did like the end title song "Superbounce" sung by Drake Bell. While the movie sinks, it swings.

Friday, April 2, 2010

Lost in all the Smoke

If you've been following BNFOS you'll know that previously we've posted reviews of episodes of Lost, but have recently stopped doing so. Oh, we still watch the show around these parts, but our heart just isn't in it.

Lost has officially jumped the shark.

Even though this final season seemed to get off to a bit of a rocky start, we think we can pinpoint the exact moment of said shark jumpage: when Faux Locke told Sawyer that HE was the Smoke Monster. And Sawyer didn't bat a conman's eyelash.

Sawyer knew John Locke was dead and the "man" who appeared to be Locke was not only NOT Locke, but was the freaking SMOKE MONSTER - the writhing, twisting, mechanical-noise-making, tree-knocking-over, SMOKE MONSTER.

Just look at those two words: SMOKE. MONSTER. Put 'em together now: SMOKE MONSTER.

Sawyer didn't stop to consider this mind boggling revelation, or even ask HOW is this possible? or a very simple WHAT are you? You know, stuff NORMAL people would ask. But they just went through time travel last season, you say, so Sawyer is used to weird stuff.

Well, there's weird stuff and there's time travel but THIS IS A SMOKE MONSTER THAT HAS TERRORIZED YOU FOR SEVERAL YEARS AND NOW IT'S STANDING IN FRONT OF YOU IN THE FORM OF A DEAD FRIEND.

Another thing that's bothering me is I fell in love with a great cast of characters in Lost's first season. Can anyone tell me WHO the frak is the show's central character? Lord of the Rings had a list of characters longer than your arm, but they all supported Frodo's story. He was the central figure. On the show ER, Anthony Edward's character was the linchpin of the original cast, George Clooney even admitted as much. So who is Lost's main character out of the ensemble? Jack? Jacob? Ben? The Man in Black? Sayid? Locke? Desmond? Vincent the dog?

The Lost ensemble grew SO HUGE that it went from a character-based show to a story-based show (that's the inverse of The X-Files which was all business (story) at first, but then focused more on Mulder's and Scully's relationship). There is so much story to put out there - we loved the episode that featured Richard Alpert's backstory, but as good as it was, Richard is NOT one of the main characters. The producers have been dragging out the "story of the island" and this episode revealed more about Jacob and the Man in Black (why the f--k doesn't he have a real name yet?) but for us it's simply too little too late.

We will watch this show to the very end, but our heart just won't be in it. (Unless they do one of their patented slow motion "reunion" sequences with Michael Giacchino's lilting string compositions, in which case we will weep openly.)