Cranky T-Rex's Blog

We have finally reached the next phase of using nostalgia to sell people on entertainment. It used to be you had to reboot a property people already loved, or at least make a sequel or prequel to it, but with Ready Player One , they decided to try just cramming one movie full of references to every video game, movie, TV show, book, band, or concept you ever might have found memorable. DeLorean from Back to the Future ? Check. The Iron Giant? Check. Chun Li? Check. Akira's motorcycle? Check. King Kong? Check. Jurassic Park T-Rex? Check.  And that's just some of the stuff you can spot in the trailers. For me, the shamelessness of this sort of product placement seemed almost insulting, as if Spielberg was saying he doesn't even have to tell a story anymore, he can just flash things you love on the screen and you'll love his movie.  After all, it seems to be working out pretty well for Star Wars. On the other hand, this is ba...

Our yearly Star Wars event has come and gone now. The Last Jedi didn't last nearly as long at the box office as we all probably expected, but then again, the movie wasn't nearly as good as we all hoped. That kind of cuts right to the chase, but the fact of the matter is it's an objectively badly constructed movie. You can like it anyway, that's fine, but it's just not good storytelling. So here's seven minutes or so of me talking about why:

Well, we knew once Disney had control over Star Wars they were going to put that brand back to work, and so they have.  This year, they've given us Rogue One,  a prequel about stealing the Death Star plans, to hold everyone over until Episode VIII comes out next year.  Since Episode VII was a total retread of the original Star Wars , it's a pretty safe bet Episode VIII will be a retread of The Empire Strikes Back .  Rogue One though has a shot to be something we haven't seen before. Unfortunately, it's a little hampered by the premise.  After all, if you've seen Star Wars you have a pretty good idea as to whether or not they actually get the Death Star plans and put them to good use.  But, sometimes you can overcome that with good character work and a fun, engaging story.  Did Rogue One succeed in doing that? Well, I'm sure most of you have seen it a few times already and have your own opinion on the matter, but here's what I thoug...

"Get over here!" It’s no secret conservatives lag way behind liberals when it comes to almost all aspects of the entertainment industry. Fortunately they’re starting to come around to the idea that engaging that part of the culture is absolutely necessary to change the tide of politics, but when people think of entertainment as a battleground, usually they stick to movies and television while ignoring a very large elephant in the room: video games. Video games are a huge part of the lives of the American youth and over the last couple decades have become a juggernaut industry.  Just a few months ago, Rockstar Games’ magnum opus Grand Theft Auto V grossed $1 billion in three days. If that’s not reason enough for us to take the uncontested battleground of the gaming industry seriously, Microsoft gave us a new one at CPAC. As Brian Fung writes over at the Washington Post :  Microsoft is trying to [ersuade[ sic ] politicians to take out targeted ads on Xbox L...