For this one, I asked some close associates of mine, and went by what the media said. Of course, as I keep saying, it is mainly opinion. But at least I have some other insight into this one.
(I think I should mention that I am not bagging anyone who actually likes these things. If you like them, fine. But if you read this you should know by now that this is basically an opinion.)
So sit back and enjoy the Seven Biggest Let Downs in Media!
7.The music video for Magic by Bob and Rivers Cuomo
I must first apolgise for actually liking this piece of poptastic shite, but it reckon it's not so bad. It's got a good riff, ok rap, incredibly catchy chorus, Rivers Cuomo and it was fun. And it got in your head and made your brain bleed! I had the chorus in my head for about five days before i actually found out what it was.
So I was stoked to see the video for this fun and catchy song. And boy, was I let down!
With a name like Magic, you start to conjure of images of magicians doing silly magic tricks, maybe faries, at least something slightly supernatural! And what do we get? A mosh pit and girls dancing around in underwear... WHAT!
And what is even more annoying is that Bob (he doesn't deserve and acronym!) gives Rivers Cuomo about 4 seconds of screentime! Egotistical or what?
Ok, there is a slight plot about a dude having a dream about himself dreaming or something... but maybe if they'd focused on that instead of stupid scenes that are not necessary, it would have been a better video! Grrr.
6.Artemis Fowl and the Time Paradox
I will be honest, I could not finish this book is was so bad!! The plot is absolutely ludicrous!! Basically, Artemis has to go back in time to stop himself killing a rare breed of monkey that can somehow cure deseases! WHAT!! That sounds the plot to a 1950s sci-fi B-movie!
This killed the Artemis Fowl series for me, and now I almost hate Eoin Colfer. It's stupid, annoying and should be burned.
5.Stephen Moffat taking over Doctor Who
My main problem with the new Doctor Who series in general is that each series has too many episodes, too many extra timelines, and practically no continuation from series to series. Take the Daleks for instance. Why can they not just stay dead!!! It was cute in the first series when everyone was still reliving the excitement of having Doctor Who back, but then it just went on to be ridiculous!
I'm not saying he's a bad writer, some of the best episodes hve come from him. But Stephen Moffat just doesn't seem to know how to keep a whole series going, and I reckon he should stick to writing the one offs as he used to.
4.Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
Well this one came out of left field. I know I might get murdered for this, but this book is so boring! Half of it is describing Bath, and what they do in Bath, and what society is like in Bath, and other such boring nonsense about Bath!! I know it was meant to be a satire, and it was her first book and all that.
But seriously! I have never read another book that was as boring!
Even the characters can't save it! I did not care one bit whether everyone ended up with who they were meant to end up with. They were all dull and uninteresting. The only charater of any interest was the bitchy girl, and she was just as annoying!
This is one of the rare examples of when an adaptation is better than the original, and the BBC TV film that I saw was pretty exceptional in comparison to the book. The characters were defined, the setting beautiful and there wasn't any time talking about Bath!
3. The end of Scream
(SPOIERS)
The real problem with this one was that it was trying to pull Matthew Lillard off as a desperate, crazy serial killer. Seriously? Matthew Lillard?! I can't take anyone from the Scooby-Doo movies seriously, least of all Shaggy!
Another thing they tried to do with Scream that was interesting was the horror movies rules, btu they brought that in five minutes beforethe movie ended! Why couldn't they have based the entire movie around that? It was interesting, hadn't really been done before, and completely wasted!
The final thing that pissed me off was the fact that half the people didn't die, and one of the was David Arquette!! (You may not know, but he's not one of my favourite actors) and another was Courtney Cox (ditto for her!). Both their characters were annoying, and no one would've minded if they had been killed. But apparently someone had to be around for the sequel.
The rest of film was good. There was good suspense, the gore wasn't over the top, and it has a clever and highly effective opening. But the ending was so ... annoying is the only word. Sure the twist wasn't that obvious, but it was kinda expected. For me, it just fell flat.
2.Julie Taymor's The Tempest
This film could've been so much more. I do like the way Taymor couldn't think of any male actors to play Prospero, so she changed the gender and brought in Helen Mirren... but that's about as far as she gets with being original! While the acting is awesome, with legends David Strathairn and Tom Conti as the King of Naples and Gonzalo respectively and newcomers Felicity Jones as Miranda and Reeve Carney as Ferdinand. And of course the amazingly versatile Ben Whishaw as Ariel, and the scene stealing Djimon Hounsou as Caliban. The acting is fine.
The main problems that come from, which many critics also noted, was the way Taymor actually executed the film. As a director who is known for her visuals, this film is almost completely void of them, most of them being used on the character of Ariel. (Although, the scene where Ariel scares away the people of Naples from food is spectacular.) When Taymor does try to use CGI to enhance the plot, it gets in the way and is so brief, you're left wondering if they ran out of budget.
The other problem that many people had was the casting of Russel Brand as the films comic relief, Stephano. To his credit, he wasn't as bad as he could be, but he still wasn't good. There has always been a tradition to use actual comedians in the stage adaptation, and that would've been fine if they had got a comedian who could act.
I suppose the big disappointments came from the fact that Taymor wasn't able to successfully translate the play onto screen. It was almost too big for its own boots. The thing that I had trouble with was that Taymor just didn't go far enough with casting Helen Mirren. It would've been interestin if she had tried to outline the similarities between the plight of Prospera and women to the plight of Caliban and slaves, but as it is she just ignores all of this.
There are moments throughout that stand out as spectacular, but that is largely due to the talents of the cast. If Taymor had tried to make her own version of the play on stage, instead of Spiderman: the Musical, then it would've been so much better than a film version that, in the end, just doesn't do the bard justice.
1.Glee
I can see the pitchforks already! Where do I begin?
I have grown to hate this show, and nothing you can really say will change my mind. The characters are annoying, the plot is ridiculous, there are stereotypes hitting you in the face, the covers that they do are never better than the originals (though they pretend to be), and everyone goes on about it too much!!! But knowing how many of this show are out there, that's not going to be enough to cover it, is it? (sigh)
OK, I should point out that I did stop watching about 3/4's into series 1. So I am not an expert, these are just my opinions.
Right, the characters and their annoyingness. While it is interesting to have a shy boy and an over extroverted girl, they way they execute it is ridiculous. The girl is so in your face without an inch of shame or self control, and the dude is just a wimp for half the time. Also, is it just me, or does anyone else get pissed off at Rachel getting every freaking solo!! And the one episode she doesn't get one, she throws a hissy fit and leaves! Her character pisses me off more than the others. Although the teacher, Shuester, got to be a bit of a pain as well. A lot of the characters are manipulative and only care about themselves. Take Quinn for instance, who lies to her boyfriend about whose father her baby is.
The stereotypes are just ridiculous. They basically say that if girls aren't sleeping around, then they're prudes. And its pretty much the same with the guys; they're put into either jocks, or not fit enough to be jocks. While this might be a satirical comment on high school, it becomes very insulting. Maybe I would understand this better if I went to an American high school, but for me, the Simpsons pull off better stereotypes. Hell, Family Guy and American Dad pull off better stereotypes. This might be because the mood in the show changes very quickly between each scene, so you never really know how to react.
Now onto my favourtie part about the show to bag, the songs. I must firstly state that THEY COMPLETELY DESTROYED ROCKY HORROR SHOW!!!!!!!!!!! Holy crap, their cover of the Sweet Transvestite had me cringing!! (I like Amber Riley's voice, but she belongs to the Christina Aguilera style of singing, where if you can hit a note, you hit it!) And don't get me started on what they did wrong to the Time Warp! And now it's come to the point where you can actually see the writers going "Ooh, here's another good hit song! How can we incorporate that into the show?" Also, with all these covers coming out, it means that everyone all over the bloody world has to go along and sing what they sing!
The other thing that bugs about the songs in Glee is the fact that they are autotuned. I can't listen to a Glee song now without thinking about whether the real actor actually sounds like that or if it's just a machine singing for them. So, now not only do I hate this show, but I also can't trust it!
I think I've spoken enough about the lack of merit Glee has; what started off promising, has just turned into a sill show, with stupid characters and bad covers. AND THE BAD NEWS IS IT WONT GO AWAY!!!!!!!
Yeah, that's it for this week. Sorry about the rant at the end, but goddamn I hate that show!
