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We Have Seen ‘Ghost Rider 2′ and Now You Must Feel Our Hate

Posted in Action Movies, comic books, Jeff Holland, reviews, Threat Quality with tags , , , on February 21, 2012 by braak

Haaaboy. Ghost Rider 2. OK, let’s just get into this, with a series of thoughts on it, since I don’t feel it’s worth a whole review-type post.

To say Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance is better than its predecessor (which the movie only barely concedes actually happened – it even rejiggers the scene where Johnny Blaze sells his soul so that it looks…well, so it looks more like if Neveldine/Taylor had done the first film featuring a guy who is not Peter Fonda Satan) isn’t just damning with faint praise. It’s implying that the film doesn’t have a whole host of its own problems, so I guess if GR1 got a 1 out of 5, then GR2 gets a 1.5 out of 5.

That’s because the couple things it does right ARE massive improvements over the first film, but even that’s debatable (in that Braak and I debated over whether or not they were actually better).

Non-arguable point 1: Setting the film on the desolate, barren roads of Somewhere In Eastern Europe is much closer to the spirit of the character than having him drive through Dallas or Houston or wherever the first one was set, and having Ghost Rider deal with city cops, which is just kinda stupid.  Read more »

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Ghost Rider’s Satan: Best Dad Ever?

Posted in Action Movies, comic books, Jeff Holland, Threat Quality with tags , , , on February 20, 2012 by braak

In preparation for tonight’s surely 100% positive viewing of Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, I decided to sit myself down and watch 2007’s Ghost Rider, just to make sure there weren’t any nuances of the narrative that I’d failed to notice last time.

I ALSO decided to skip past the prologue, wherein a young man learns his agent thinks he looks like a young Nicolas Cage enjoys a carefree life in the carnival, and also fast-forward past any moments that aren’t necessary to the plot – which meant pretty much every scene involving Eva Mendez and Donal Logue.

This meant I watched a 45-minute cut of Ghost Rider the other night. And…it still wasn’t all that good.  Read more »

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Gullibility, abortionplexes and the skinwich

Posted in crotchety ranting, Jeff Holland, Politics, Threat Quality with tags , , , , on February 17, 2012 by braak

The recent news that a Louisiana congressman posted the Onion “Abortionplex” story to his Facebook page, believing it to be an actual thing that Planned Parenthood is up to, rankled me a little.

I mean, it’s one thing for your great aunt to forward a story outraged over the wasteful spending of Obama’s pledge to give everyone a parrot, but when this is the level of critical thinking employed by an elected member of government, that’s quite another thing.

Please note: Louisiana currently ranks 47th in education. So it does stand to reason that even their elected officials are coming from a background of some of the worst education in the country.  Read more »

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‘Before Watchmen’ – Holland’s Take

Posted in comic books, Jeff Holland, Threat Quality with tags , , , on February 8, 2012 by braak

I had written a three-pager about the announcement that DC was moving ahead with prequels to Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ classic work, but honestly, there’s no sense bloviating about it.

Not about Alan Moore’s relative moral high ground when so much of his work is predicated on previously-existing characters himself, whether DC’s within its rights, as owner of the copyright, to publish what they damn please since they are in the business of making money, what Jack Kirby has to do with any of this, the ins-and-outs of creator-ownership contracts, or…any of it, really.

All this boils down to is: Don’t buy it. See? See how simple it all is?  Read more »

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What the Cyber-Terrorists Want

Posted in Jeff Holland, Threat Quality with tags , , , on January 20, 2012 by braak

Dear The Department of Justice,

I know you’re probably a little scared, learning these Anonymous guys figured out your password was actually just “123456”. And if this whole SOPA business has shown us anything, it’s that you guys are pretty baffled by the internet in general.

And also you don’t realize that when you say you’re not a “nerd,” what you mean is “I don’t know where the IT department is located.”

So I imagine now that you’re on the brink of deciding that Anonymous is a group of cyber-terrorists (which is totally what you’re going to call them, because admittedly that does sound cooler than “internet-surrectionists”). And you’re wondering just what it is they want.

I would suggest you start by watching the 1995 Modern Classic, Hackers. You will find the answer there.  Read more »

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Scattered Thoughts on ‘Alcatraz’

Posted in Jeff Holland, reviews, Threat Quality with tags , , , , , , , on January 19, 2012 by braak

Reviews on the new J.J. Abrams/whoever-else-ends-up-being-in-charge-of-the-story series Alcatraz have been mixed-to-positive. Most have commented on its procedural structure, as though that’s a bad thing in and of itself, but by and large the reviews feel like an unjustified pre-judgment on the show now that Lost is done with.

These reviews seem to forget 1) that Abrams’ name was also attached to the completely (and hey, justly) forgotten Undercovers, 2) seriously, the guy’s a producer, he’s not Aaron Sorkin writing these things by his lonesome (meaning, we don’t really have room to judge Alcatraz the same way we could all laugh at Studio 60), and 3) Every criticism lobbed at Alcatraz seems to echo all the criticisms thrown at Fringe when that one first showed up.  Read more »

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Ghost Protocol: The Best Mission Impossible Since That Last One You Forgot About

Posted in Action Movies, Jeff Holland, reviews, Threat Quality with tags , , , on January 9, 2012 by braak

Remember how after The Incredibles came out, the people making Fantastic Four had to scramble to rewrite their third act because Brad Bird had basically trumped everything they’d been doing?*

Well, it turns out by making Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, he’s basically screwed the next James Bond movie. Sorry, Skyfall, you’re gonna have to make Daniel Craig jump off of some pretty tall and unusual things now to compete.

It’s weird to praise this as the “best” Mission Impossible movie because that implies a level of quality control that’s not really existent in the franchise. Because there’s nothing about it that actually MAKES a franchise, despite the recognizable title and consistent lead actor.

Franchise isn’t the right word, then. Brand name. Anyway, even the presence of Tom Cruise isn’t required for it to be a Mission Impossible movie. If fortunes had turned a different way, Ving Rhames might be the headliner on this thing.  Read more »

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On Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II (and yes I know this is not a new game)

Posted in Jeff Holland, reviews, Threat Quality with tags , , , , on January 6, 2012 by braak

Since friend of Threat Quality Matt Burns was dear enough to provide me with a Playstation 3, I’ve been catching up on all sorts of things, like making use of Netflix streaming in a way that makes more sense than plugging a laptop into a TV, realizing I can copy videos to its hard drive via a flashdrive, and yes, playing video games that all my friends are done with and see fit to lend me.

Which means I finally got around to Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II, a game that is completely inessential and yet designed exactly for me in mind.

And by me, I mean the personal-continuity-obsessive who would also like there to be enough cheat codes that I don’t have to struggle.

I quite liked the first SW:TFU, especially since I played it on the Wii, which at the time was doing its best to provide games where you use the controls as a virtual sword (see also: Red Steel II), and so could wave the wand around and make the lightsaber noises with my mouth even though the sound effects were perfectly audible. And the cheat codes were readily available, which meant I could play the first time through with massive force powers and any costume I pleased.  Read more »

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2011: Holland’s Favorites

Posted in Jeff Holland, Threat Quality with tags , , , , , , on December 30, 2011 by braak

Overall, not a bad year. Not great – it’s kinda fun how the economy reacted to my minor pay raise by making everything correspondingly more expensive – but on the other hand, I HAVE A DISHWASHER IN MY APARTMENT NOW AND IT IS BEAUTIFUL. So things could be worse.

Other than the dishwasher – which, if you are someone who currently has a dishwasher, you do not realize just how many hours of your life end up spent cleaning frying pans – what else was praise-worthy this year?

Movies:
Captain America
Man, I still can’t get over the fact that they finally got around to making the exact movie I’ve wanted to watch since I was five years old.

TV:
Cartoons!
Young Justice is a teen soap opera that also has Jack Kirby characters running all over the place; Avengers is both kid-friendly and has the kind of labyrinthine plotting that can only happen when you cherry-pick all the fun bits of Marvel history and leave out all the crap (for instance, how cool would Secret Invasion have been if we didn’t have to worry about all the continuity and idiot-ball issues it raised? We’re gonna find out in season 2!); AND, DEFYING ALL LOGIC, THUNDERCATS TURNED OUT TO BE AWESOME (and in an odd way at that! So many times – for instance, the aggressively cute “Ro-bears” – did I turn to Megan and say, “This can be a very strange cartoon”).  Read more »

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Christmas Memories: Fox in the 90’s Was Kind of Awesome

Posted in Jeff Holland, Threat Quality with tags , , on December 23, 2011 by braak

Now that I’ve gotten the foamy ragey “RaaaChristmasblargharaggleblaggle” out of my system, I thought I’d share some youtube – or should I say YULEtube? – no, no I shouldn’t nevermind – holiday treats for you, once you get sick of watching Charlie Brown for the fourth time this month.

Because if you’ve forgotten, it turns out Fox Kids had some fricking great cartoons in the 90’s, and that means they had some fricking great Christmas episodes, too.

Eek! The Cat: “It’s a Very Merry Eek’s-Mas”  Read more »

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