Holiday Limbo

Much too busy with the holidays to get to the LCS proper. Sometime after the new year and when the finanaces rebound a bit, I will return. For no, I must content myself with the JLU DVD I received for Christmas. I've watched two episodes so far, which may have overwhelmed the nerd relays in my brain.

We did manage to get to a movie on Christmas day. K's mom is a big fan of schlocky, b-grade sci-fi/fantasy, so naturally we saw Eragon. This would be a cool movie if I were an 8-year-old boy, but it had little to offer an adult. I found myself conducting an impromptu MST3K-like commentary throughout, which can be entertaining in and of itself.

It's pretty bad: Bad dialogue, lazy exposition, schlocky performances, unearned sentiment and a kind of cynical allusion that there will be sequels to come along and tie up the sloppy loose ends. Also, there are many scenes that seem to be cribbed (at least visually) from various superior genre movies (Star Wars, Lord of the Ring... ) and even not-so-superior ones (At one point, I thought Podo and Kodo were going to show up and lend a hand... plus Malkovich puts on a performance equal to Rip Torn's in Beastmaster)

The good?: The CGI dragon is very well done and Jeremy Irons lends the whole enterprise an undeserved sense of diginity.

I've seen it; I can't unsee it.

Tags: jlu eragon beastmaster