Sunday, May 28, 2006

X-Men 3: The Last Stand Movie Review

Cast: Hugh Jackman, Halle Berry, Ian McKellan, Famke Janssen, Patrick Stewart, Kelsey Grammar, Shawn Ashmore, Ellen Page, Anna Paquin, Aaron Stanford, Ben Foster, Dania Ramirez, Daneil Cudmore, Cameron Bright, Vinne Jones, James Marsden, Rebecca Romijn

SPOILER ALERT: THIS MOVIE IS FULL OF IMPORTANT SCENES THAT ARE HARD TO LEAVE OUT OF A REVIEW, SO IF YOU DON'T WANT THE MOVIE RUINED, SKIP THE PLOT SECTION OF THE REVIEW. THANK YOU.

Plot: The movie starts out 20 years ago. Charles Xavier, also called Professor X (Patrick Stewart), is with his very old friend Erik Lensherr, Magneto (Ian McKellan). They are in a small neighborhood going to the house of young Jean Grey. She is a very gifted girl. They go in to persuade her to attend Xavier's School For Gifted Children. They talk a bit and then the story goes 10 years back from the present day (10 years ago) where we join a young boy in a bathroom, hand on his back, crying. His father comes to the closed door and orders him to open it, but he won't. The boy was scraping his back which had wings on it. We then go a few years in the future from today (I know, a bit confusing, it means the near future) where Storm (Halle Berry) and Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) are in a virtual training course with three students, Iceman (Shawn Ashmore) who can make ice, Kitty Pride, also called ShadowCat (Ellen Page) who can walk through walls, and Colossus (Daniel Cudmore) who can turn into steel. These three are training to be X-Men. They are battling and stuff. Finally, Wolverine finishes the fight and Storm and he think the three students are ready to be X-Men. Just then we join Scott Summer, Cyclops (James Marsden) who is still grieving over Jean's death in the last film. He travels to the dam from the last movie where she died. There he hears voices and all of a sudden, Jean pops up out of the water. They kiss and hug and Cyclops discovers that Jean can now control Cyclops' eye beams. So they kiss a little more, and she opens her eyes scaringly, and next scene. Well anyway, we join the wonderful big blue guy Dr. Henry McCoy, Beast (Kelsey Grammar) who is a cabinet member to the president. The government has captured Mystique (Rebecca Romijn) and they are trying to get the location of Magneto. She kills them of course and it taken on a truck. At the school, Storm and Professor X see Beast for a nice reunion. He tells them that a pharmecutical company has developed a mutant power antibody. What this means is is that it takes your mutant powers away if you get injected. Not all mutants are for this. Some mutants have a meeting about this "cure". Mageneto then tries to recruit these mutants for an army to battle the humans over this. Him and his sidekick, Pyro (Aaron Stanford) recruit one named Callisto (Dania Ramirez) who is fast, Arclight who creates shockwaves, Psylocke with telepathic powers, and Kid Omega which had the powers to cover his body in spikes. With these, he's made. They then try to find Mystique who is still on the truck along with a few other mutants. Magneto intercepts the truck and rescues her along with Juggernaut, who's strong, and Multiple Man, who can multiply. But then the guard shoots Mystique with his gun that has needles containing the mutant "cure" and Mystique loses her powers. Magneto leaves her there, nude.

Back at the school, Professor X senses something happened to Cyclops at that lake and sends Wolverine and Storm to investigate. They find Jean lying there in rocks and take her back to the school to treat her. There, Professor X tells Wolverine that Jean has a different personality known as "Dark Phoenix". Professor X is trying to control her so she doesn't wake up as Dark Phoenix. Then later, the professor leaves and puts her under a machine, Wolverine by her side. All of a sudden, she wakes up and almost has sex with Wolverine (go Logan!) Then Wolverine stops her and asks where Cyclops is. She tells him that she accidently killed him, but it wasn't her, it was Dark Phoenix. Then she escapes. She goes back to her old house. Magneto wants to recruit her now, her being so powerful. They both travel there to get her, and Professor X and Jean end up getting into a big mind battle. Jean kills Professor X. He explodes and Wolverine is witness.

Tons of mutants are protesting the mutant "cure". The first mutant vaccinated is planned to be Warren Worthington III, Angel (Ben Foster) who's father invented this vaccine. Angel refuses and flies away.

Back at the school, there is a funeral for Professor X. Everyone is sad. Especially Kitty. So Bobby (Iceman) goes into her room to try to cheer her up. He sees that she has ice skates and takes her to the fountain in front of the school. Rogue is watching out the window, jealous that Kitty is skating with Bobby. So Rogue decides that she wants the mutant vaccine. She wants to touch people.

Magneto takes his mutant army, including Jean Grey, to a forest area. The army discover this area, thanks to Mystique, and they travel there. They find out that all the people that they found on their radar were just copies of Multiple Man.

Magneto and his mutant army are trying to go to Alcatrez Island where the mutant "cure" was created. Magneto moves the Golden Gate Bridge over (AWESOME SCENE) and they are intercepted by the army. The army is now equipped with plastic weapons being that they know if their weapons are metal, then Magneto can take them. Magneto is on the island to capture Jimmy, also known as the Leech (Cameron Bright) who's mutant power is that if you go near him, your mutant power doesn't work. This is how they invented the mutant "cure". But the X-Men are ready. Wolverine, Storm, Beast (to replace Rogue), Kitty (ShadowCat), Iceman, and Colossus. They get on their ship and travel to the island. There, there is an epic battle between Magneto's army, and the army and the X-Men. Kitty needs to go inside to rescue Jimmy (Leech) but is chased by Juggernaut. She finally gets to Jimmy and defeats Juggernaut. Outside, Storm, Beast, and Wolverine find some of the mutant "cure" that were used in the army's guns. They decide the only way to stop Magneto is to give him the cure. They trick him, and he is vaccinated. No more Magneto. Jean Grey then takes over by using her amazing power to destroy everything. Wolverine has no choice, he has to kill her. He does. The war is over, and everyone is safe.

At the end, Beast is promoted in the government. Everyone else is happy and the school is better than ever, Storm taking Professor X's place. Then at the end, Magneto is sitting in a park with a chessboard with metal chess pieces. After being injected with the mutant "cure" the great Magneto is a normal person. He then puts his hand in front of a chess piece, it moves a bit, then credits.

IMPORTANT: When you see X-Men 3, make sure you stay after the credits. There is a special scene that hints a possible X-Men 4. But really, it's a crutial scene.

My View: This movie was great. There's eveything you want in an X-Men movie. It has great Wolverine fight scenes, awesome special effects, more emphasis on the Storm character, and a ton of mutants and their amazing powers. It's awesome to see these powers. Definitely a great movie worth seeing over and over again. Ton and I have been waiting for this one for years, and the wait was worth it. X-Men 3: The Last Stand gets 5 mutants that join Magneto to fight again the mutant "cure", out of 5. Zam, out.



Red Bull Gives You Wings

Thursday, May 25, 2006

Red Steel On Your Wii (Ouch)

Nintendo has shown us plenty of games for their brand spankin' new console, the Wii, but so have some third-party companies. Such as the popular Tom Clancy licenscees Ubisoft with their brand new first person shooter/sword slashing/ fight/ a bunch of other interesting things game. This game looks interesting. We love interesting. Oooooooooh yeah.

Let me tell you a bit about this game. It is set in both the United States and Japan. Yay, overseas superslashin'. Well anyway, you use an ancient art of the katana and a modern arsenal of amazing guns. Great stuff.

Now the big thing is the controls. Of course it is going to use the wonderful Wii-Mote. You will get to swing and block with your sword and aim and shoot with your guns. You will be able to hide behind rocks and such just by a flick of your Wii-Mote. Great Controls.

The graphics are pretty cool. A ton of things in there are destructable and look great. Ubisoft is trying to put gore into the game, but doesn't know yet as it wants to stay to its T rating. Oh well, good either way.

This game looks great and we can't wait to get our hands on it. Look out for this one in November around the launch of the Wii. Zam, out.



No, Not Pokemon!!!!!! NOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

Sunday, May 21, 2006

Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy (YAY!)

That's right, the very addictive game that keeps you glued to your seat and brings you closer to your lego sets is back, and this time it's about classic movies from the 1970s that we all love. The original Lego Star Wars was a game that took you as Star Wars characters made out of Legos through lego the three Star Wars prequels (for more info on all of this, read my review here or here.) In the game, they had an unlockable that let you play about half of Star Wars Ep. IV, but it wasn't really much. Now they have a new game that takes you on a journey through the original three movies (IV, V, & VI)! This game brings so much more to the table from is predicesor though.

First off, the different movies. As I said, this game takes place through Star Wars Ep. IV: A New Hope, Star Wars Ep. V: The Empire Strikes Back, and Star Wars Ep. VI: Return of The Jedi (or Revenge of the Jedi for you guys who are like that.) You will be traveling through every planet and play most of the characters from these movies. You now have Leia, Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker, and all of the characters from these movies and over 100 of them are playable.

Speaking of the characters, there is a great new feature. Lego Free Play mode. You can take lego pieces and build your own or take pieces from excisting characters and put them together making characters such as, "Leia Wan Kenobi", "Yodabaca", and many others that you can all use. You can also build tons of pretty, legoey, vehicles that you can only dream of. Your Yoda could be driving in style in his Sith Death Star Escalade, or his Millenium Falconbird. Great new features.

Well all I can say is that I really can't wait for this game. It's going to be great. I hope it is longer than the first one though. Definitely can't wait for this title, hitting the Xbox, Xbox 360, PS2, PSP, GBA, PC, GameCube, and Nintendo DS this fall. Zam, out.

My Milkshake Brings All The Droids To The Yard



Super. Smash. Bros. Brawl!

I’ve got a great idea for a game…. I’ll call it Super Smash Bros…. I can see it now; you play as all these cool game characters like Solid Snake and Meta Knight and whack each other with big inflatable bats…. Yeah, that’s how it’ll work… Oh, crap, what? It’s already been done? Really? Damn I thought I had something there. Can I preview the new Wii one then? Okay, here goes.

It’s called Super Smash Bros. Brawl, and it’s looking hot. The first thing that’s cool is, it’s on the Wii, so you’ll have the motion control of the Wii-mote to control your dudes, lady dudes, and gelatinous pink balls of mush. Oh wait, what’s that? You won’t be able to? Well, Miyamoto said “don’t throw out your GC controllers yet”, then confirmed that the game will definitely use regular controls because trying to use motion sensing too much can get in the way of a game, which kind of makes this a whole lot less exciting.

But hey, you can get your Wii-mote in on the SSB action! Just go out in your back yard, get a few people, get some Wii-motes [or home-run bats…], and Smash away! And there’s SSB with a Wii-mote for you! So, now that you’ve got your Wii-mote all black and blue, let’s get back to the real game. So, after the disappointment of it not having motion sensing, Nintendo tried to bring the game back up.

First they announced at least 5 new characters: Solid Snake, Meta Knight, Samus without her suit, Wario, and Kid Icarus’ Pit. Wow, they put Solid Snake in. For some reason I don’t think any one saw that coming. I think the original roster is all intact too. Even cooler is the fact that they announced a definite possibility for other 3rd party characters. That excites me. I mean, they could have Sonic, some of the X-Men, and hell, even Master Chief!

So… what else did they announce… Uhh… Nintendogs are going to be an item in the game. Yeah, you can throw puppies at your enemies. CALL THE FRICKIN’ SPCA! Now that that’s over, I guess I could talk about something else… Finally, they’re adding online to the series, along with a bigger single player. Online!! When this game comes out, I personally invite you all to get pwned by me, online. :-D That just about wraps up this Post E3 preview…. Oh, one last thing. Sadly, SSB Brawl is no longer a launch title, but a 2007 release. It doesn’t really matter though, as no one will have Wiis till ’07. All I have to say now is: Wii will, Wii will, ROCK YOU!

Ton, out.