REQUIEM FOR A SOLDIER
BOARDWALK EMPIRE SEASON FINALE SPOILERS AHEAD YOU WAITING FOR THE RE-AIRING/ON DEMAND/MARATHON ANTICIPATING/MUST HAVE BOX SET FIRST MOTHERFUCKERS, YOU'VE BEEN WARNED!!!!
I'll tell you all right now that B-Boy Dram E. Dram doesn't throw around "The Greatest Show of All Time" moniker lightly. Sopranos shot their chances all to hell with those last two seasons of pretending the show had deeper meaning than it did. That allowed The Wire to lay temporary claim to the title but at the end of the day The Wire couldn't match the show in show out, season in season out consistency of Breaking Bad. Breaking Bad is currently "The Greatest Show of All Time" but before that final mind fuck of a season they were trading punches pretty evenly with Boardwalk Empire, and since Boardwalk is on going it has a chance to rise and of course to fall. Tough to give a show the title of greatest when it's still on going as the Sopranos taught us all how easy it is to lose the path and shit the bed.
That all being said Boardwalk Empire is the only show on T.V that I would bet is going to be able to complete it's run without fucking up and thereby giving it a chance of taking the crown from Breaking Bad. Sure to be a really interesting battle considering how different the shows are. Breaking Bad was a visceral action packed day at the amusement park every single episode. If you like the first episode, you like them all. Boardwalk is a much slower boil. Some people didn't realize they liked it until many episodes into season one.
But trust me you have to stick with it. Everything pays off eventually and not much is left hanging season after season. Take for instance the last episode of season 4. The episode is very fittingly called "Farewell Daddy Blues", and really and truly one way or the other this episode is all about fathers, father figures and their children.
Nucky the father figure of both his organization and his extended family, especially given his (contested) mentorship of his brother Eli's son. Eli trying to save his son from a prison term at that cost of ratting his brother out to the feds. Chaulky despite all that's happened trying to go to his daughter's wedding hoping that he can trade the "adopted" daughter of Dr. Narcisse for safe passage. One daughter for another only to see both man lose on that account. But despite those many serious circumstances the greatest tragedy of them all entailed the last story line of Richard "Half Face" Harrow.
Harrow despite being a cold blooded killer of the highest order was always seen as tragic character but more importantly as the series moral lynch pin. In this episode we see him succeeding in finally ensuring that Tommy the son of his best friend Jimmy will not be returning to the custody of his bat shit crazy grandmother. Harrow now married was to raise the child with his new wife but to do so he had to prove that Tommy's grandmother was actually a murderer having killed a boy and claiming it was Jimmy who died so that she could take position of all of Jimmy's shit including his son.
The only way Richard Harrow could prove all this was to find Jimmy's actual body and the only way to do that was to make a deal with the man who killed Jimmy, Nucky Thompson. This unfortunately is the beginning of the end as Richard has to agree to one last job, the killing of an enemy of Nucky's. Taking aim in a very well crafted scene. Richard pauses showing a new found lack of killer instinct he checks his hand which was previously injured but we know that's not the reason. He now lacks the cold heart his job requires. He aims again, fires, and kills the wrong person, Chaulky's daughter who walks into the shot as trigger is being pulled.
A shoot out follows and Richard is mortally wounded and after a scene showing him with his face healed and walking "home" to his loved ones we see Richard dead on the beach under the boardwalk by the ocean where he first made sweet sweet half faced love to his wife. His mask laying discarded on the beach as if he knew he wouldn't need it anymore.
That shit was crazier than Kanye West fuckin a chick with no ass in the ass. Who in the fuck is going to be the moral centre of this show now? Where are we going to find the empathetic characters? All the stars are monsters. Nucky killed Jimmy and was going to kill his own brother. Eli was going to snitch out Nucky and have his own brother sent to the big house. Gillian is an incestuous murdering pedophile drug addict. At least Al Capone...wait he's fuckin Al Capone, not a nice guy. Richard "Half Face" Harrow was essentially the Old Dirty Bastard of the show. Who the fuck is going to be for the kids now?
R.I.P RICHARD HARROW
We Knew You Well, Though We Never Knew You at All.
Salute!
Sweet Jesu this is the Greatest Shit On the Internet Right Now!!*
Kate "Mary Mother of Titties" Upton, Zack Gandfdafiosasdkfnasnkas, Biz Markie**, Muthafukkin Snoop Dogg, and Little Bow Wow, in the same motherfuckin place at the same motherfuckin time!
*In the not porn related catergory
** Biz Markie is not actually in this video as he would most likely have eaten Kate Upton raw. Butthole, pumps, hair weave, all that shit would be digesting in Biz's faster than Snoop bounce a low rider.
DEXTER...I'M GLAD IT'S OVER
By Drama En Sabah
Dexter was a big show for me right from the
start. My first viewing of the season 1 premier was at a movie theatre. The
company I worked for at the time was part of a promotion that allowed employees
to go check out the first two episodes weeks in advance with the full movie
theatre experience, so yeah “A” for presentation.
More importantly though was the fact I have
an on again off again fascination with serial killers. This interest was
definitely encouraged during the year I had a roommate who would leave
biographies on various serial killers laying about the house. So suffice to say
I had more than a layman’s reserve of knowledge on the subject and Dexter
struck all the right cords.
To start at least Dexter seemed really well
researched and this is probably due to the first season strongly drawing on the
novel the series is based on. And being well researched really gave me high expectations.
A couple of the things that always stuck out in my
mind about serial killers were their lack of empathy or conscience in regards
to their victims and the fact that despite organizations like the FBI tracking
dozens of serial killers at any given time the vast majority of them eventually
stop killing. They just fall off the grid, and disappear. There isn't really
any evidence suggesting that this happens because they've been jailed or maybe
even died. They just seem to stop killing, and once their modus operandi
disappears so does law enforcement's ability to track them.
What happens to these guys? Where do they go?
Do they somehow develop a conscious over time? Does the blood lust get cured? We
never find out. I mean never.
So my hope was that the series would
present a fictionalized look at how one serial killer managed to fall off the
grid (though Dexter generally left no evidence). A show where we find out what it’s like to be
wired so differently from your fellow man that your behaviour is abhorrent to
them and yet somehow, someway you get to exist long enough that in effect shed
yourself of the said abhorrent behaviour.
At first Dexter seemed to want to present
exactly that. We had Harry’s Code to keep him on the straight and narrow and in
effect acting as a surrogate conscious. The fact that Dexter had a voice in his
head also alluded to the schizophrenia often associated with serial killers. We
had the fake life (girl friend, step kids, bowling league) designed to make him
seem like a normal person and not mark him with the stereotypical antisocial behaviour usually
associated with psychopaths.
Dexter more or less was set up as a crazy amalgam
of super hero and super villain. His whole shit was Clark Kent
I figured as time went on his fake life
would hold more and more weight and eventually he wouldn't need the ghost of
Harry and that he would develop some real emotion connections and stop killing.
End series.
And weren't we on that path for like 2
seasons or so? Didn't it seem like Dexter was working his way through things and
on his way to becoming a better man? We saw him discover how his psychopathic
tendencies were most likely caused by watching his mother get butchered in
front of his eyes and he then left locked into a storage car with her remains. We
saw him learn how different life had turned out for him and his brother who
didn't benefit from the guidance and understanding Harry provided. You’d think moments that big would have been built on throughout the rest of the series. I
mean by the time season 2 ended it seemed like the series should have been
writing itself.
But things went off the rails pretty much directly after season 2. I mean don’t get me wrong Jimmy Smit’s was incredible but you know giving your serial killer a partner of sorts means the writers have already started pulling some Happy Days season 5 shit. Never mind that they eventually resort to that plot twist at least 4 more times in the following seasons. Maybe have Dexter stalk Mork for dressing like a dick head all the damn time if your this hard up for ideas.
But things went off the rails pretty much directly after season 2. I mean don’t get me wrong Jimmy Smit’s was incredible but you know giving your serial killer a partner of sorts means the writers have already started pulling some Happy Days season 5 shit. Never mind that they eventually resort to that plot twist at least 4 more times in the following seasons. Maybe have Dexter stalk Mork for dressing like a dick head all the damn time if your this hard up for ideas.
But once you spend a good two or three intense years with a character it's just hard to stop watching them. I mean Dexter WAS Sunday night 10 to 11. They could have renamed it Dexter O'Clock and I wouldn't have noticed. So I kept on waiting for the show to find it's course or have the decency to walk off into syndication. But no Dexter wouldn't die, a series I thought had upper echelon written all over it ended it's run firmly a middle of the road product propped up by a great premise. Come to think of it, in my mind
there are really only 4 Dexter seasons worth watching in terms of really being quality programming. Most of the other ones just don’t deserve the esteem this
series has in the eyes of many. That being said here's my ranking of all 8 seasons of Dexter
(1) Season 2
I bet this will be controversial as number
1 pick just because of how great season 4 was. But take away season 4’s huge
finale and I’m not sure it was a better season than 2 which was top shelf
Dexter complete with grappling with his nature as serial killer. An Early
episode of this season contained one of my all time favourite TV shots, the
camera moving along under water capturing the garbage bags filled with body
parts that Dexter has dumped at sea over the years. That was incredible stuff.
I also didn't find Doakes as annoying as I did in season 1
(2) Season 4
Dexter had already lost some of it’s
subtext by season 4. But this was one of the better season finales ever right
here. It didn't seem like what you saw had happened could have happened. Like
there was no way the show just took it where it did. The cinematography on the bathtub full of blood was top shelf as well.
(3) Season 1
Nearly seemed like all the acting was over
acting, especially Doakes but he wasn't the only one. I will say each episode the cast got a lot stronger as well. I mean they were making a quality quantum leap each episode. One of the only “pure”
seasons of Dexter where he still seemed to be evolving as a character or at
least you had hope he was evolving as a character.. I think if the acting where
better this season might be higher rated. It also finished up really strong
with the final few episodes as well.
(4) Season 3
This season of Dexter marks the downward
spiral in quality for many viewers. I on the other hand ignored most of the
suspect plotting because Jimmy Smits was brilliant. He’s like the Rock of cable
television. You see him out there saving Sons of Anarchy right?
(5) Season 7
This season was a mess but coming off of
season 6’s cliff hanger gave it some legs. All sorts of weird characterization
going here, especially with LaGuerta and Deb, I lost count of the amount of
times I asked myself why a given character would do what they did during the
course of the season. That being said
that final episode really saved it. If season 7 and 6 could have been somehow made into one season that would have been some quality programming.
(6) Season 6
Season 6 nearly tried to get back to the essence
in that Dexter actually looked to religion as a means of controlling his dark
passenger. By this point in the series it didn't seem like Dexter was really trying to work his way past being a serial killer so it was good to have that acknowledged again. But this season was all over the place, computer hacker that went no
where, Quinn subplots that didn't matter to name a few issues with the season.
Also how uninteresting were Not Tom Hanks, and Edward James Almos? Is there any
actor outside of Steve Buscemi that you’re less likely to want to look at
after dinner time than Edward James Almos? Being Latino doesn't make you Jimmy
Smits man. Sorry dude, we'll never forgive you for American Me. I watched Mi Vida Loca 8 times while listening to Cypress Hill's first album and I still ain't forgiven the man.
You’d think that people
would have taken note of the fact that the producers of Boardwalk Empire had
already come to the conclusion that no one wanted to look at Steve Buscemi for
an hour straight so they substituted him with a nice cripple boy who has sex
with his mother and hangs around with his best friend who just so happens to
have half a face. Because we rather watch a cripple kid have sex with his
mother than watch Steve Buscemi.
Now if that wasn't enough you'd think someone would have noticed that even when they brought Battlestar Galactica back with a per episode budget of $39.99 they still blurred the camera with Vaseline and turned down the lights whenever EJO made an appearance.
And yet the producers of Dexter don’t get
Edward James Almos a Jimmy, nor a Starbuck, nor a dimly lit bridge. No, they got him Not Tom Hanks. I could have seen
that was a bad idea from across the street. Not sure how it managed to make it
out of a production meeting.
(7) Season 8
This season could be a little bit higher or
lower. It seemed like the writers barely gave a fuck in this the final season
but sentiment helped drag the series a long to conclusion. The worse rival serial killer
since the Doomsday Boys in Season 6. I mean even the suspected serial killers
were entirely uninteresting. That being said there was a lot of emotional
weight to that final scene with Dexter and Debra. Quality direction there so I
would say the final episode had the emotional power it should have, too bad it was
scattered to the winds by writing that made no sense and provided not even the
slightest bit of closure. And I don’t just mean for the series, as it didn't
even successfully close out the season.
So he’s a psychopath that can’t love but he
loves his sister? He loves his son but he leaves him to live with a serial
killer in a foreign country? He wants to euthanize the sister he loves but
doesn't want to get caught so he removes the sensors monitoring her life? Wouldn't
that set off the alarms as that would mean the sensor weren't picking up
anything? Just like if she was flat lining? No one notices you leaving the hospital with a body wrapped in a sheet? Even though the hospital is at a heightened level of security do to a hurricane. The hospital has a dock? An unguarded dock? Then.........Aquaman? Why is the blood splatter guy
checking for gunpowder residue on the sleeves of the guy who shot his sister? Why
would a serial killer stab a guy who just threatened him with death in the
shoulder? Somebody says they’re going to kill you and you decide to hamper
their ability to throw a curve ball? So Dexter ran away? That’s what this came
down to? 8 years so he can grow a beard and do the exact opposite of anything
this show should have reasonably lead up to? I mean did a single person who was involved with the first couple of seasons even work on the last season? Terrible.
(8) Season 5
Just so I’m clear on this, Julie Stiles
will not be fucking any black guys this season? Not one? Why alienate her fan
base AND film one of the more useless seasons of Dexter at the same damn time? Again doesn't
lead to any character development not that different from season 3, I mean they
just replaced Smits with Stiles and that shit just ain't meant to be.
Perhaps the thing that i will take most from this movie is a line that one of the girls gives near the end...the secret to having a successful life is to be a good person...after living a couple of years breaking bad i couldn't agree with that line more!...in the end...will b
Dvd Review: All Dat Azz #29
by Drama En Sabah
SPRING BREAKERS
DIRECTED BY HARMONY KORINE
plus SOUNDTRACK REVIEW
Allright william brown in the house, fresh off a car ride home in a police car...straight off i give this movie 2 out of 5 ufo's on the radar
...the soundtrack 3 out of 5 et's on the radar...i'm a fan of harmony korine...kids, gummo and julien donkey boy...those three movies took me to places and people that i'd never seen too much of before...weird shit...incestuous shit...keep this secret in the family type of shit...right...spring breakers then...girls gone bad...so we got 4 teenage girls that want to bust out of their small town and have some fun down in florida for spring break...they got no cash, so they rob a diner with squirt guns and then hit the road...they party hard and then get arrested...they got no cash to bail out, and so alien a local drug dealing kingpin gets them out of jail...all good so far with me...there's a plot and there's some nice realism to everything...i'm feeling concerned for these young ladies now in debt to this freaky looking guy...is he gonna flip them into prostitutes?...is he gonna fuck em and then beat the shit out of them?...is this movie going to be on some lars von trier shit and make me feel not very good after?...i thought so...and then the entire tone of the movie changes...and i hate when directors do that...the tension is gone completely and you now get a tender love story with alien and the girls...you get a drug beef that is lacking in any kind of substance or chemistry...you get no plot movement...the last half hour is all style no substance...true i did find the scene where alien sits at an outdoor piano and sings a britney spears song to the girls as they do the leatherface dance around him with machine guns and pink ski masks with unicorns on, funny...i'll give you that...
but the ending with a big shoot out between the rival gangs where everyone dies except the girls, is just too ridiculous...maybe some people like the last half hour but it bugged the shit out of me...i came in with some high expectations perhaps...i found out the alien character was based on riff raff...harmony korine denies this, in the face of a 10 million dollar law suit from riff...korine says he based the character off of this guy called dangeruss...who is a florida rapper and dealer...anyway, alien did look like riff raff...but james franco, who i must say it was nice for me to see him kissing women after watching his last two movies kissing guys, made the character his own...i was also excited to see gucci mane...but he's hardly in the movie and his acting skills are limited to be polite...Okay...the soundtrack...skrillex and cliff martinez conduct things here and it's alot of nice airy instrumentals...but i really could've used some more rap on this thing...you got one gucci and one flaka flame and one really fucking bad dangeruss song...i mean, c'mon...it's spring fucking break...let's get some exclusive bangers on here...but i like the vibe for the most part...it's summertime chill...
WEST OF MEMPHIS
A DOCUMENTARY BY AMY BERG
review by www.illiam.brown
When i was a teenager i loved horror movies, stephen king books, serial killers and music by glenn danzig. I had some issues at home and was bullied at school, which meant i had some pent up violence in me. Which is probably why i could relate to Freddy Kruger or Jeffrey Dahmer. Did those interests or feelings make me a bad person? Of course not. Did they make me weird? Yes. But what if those interests of mine made me the #1 suspect in the cold blooded murder of 3 eight year old boys?
Well, believe it or not that's exactly what happened to Damien Echols, one of three teenagers that were charged with murder in the small town of West Memphis in the year of 1994.
I was familiar with the case after having watched the "Paradise Lost" documentaries some years ago but had lost touch with them, until i saw this new documentary at the library.
Damien, Jason and Jessie known as the west memphis 3 had been locked up in prison for 18 years...and the fucked up part about it is...they are innocent.
During the time the murders took place all 3 had really good alibis. There was also no evidence and no motives. But all that meant shit. What took place was a modern day witch hunt. Imagine 3 kids brutally murdered in a small town where everyone knows everyone to some degree. The emotions would be on boil. The police needed suspects and they needed them fast. Damien was perfect...a weirdo that dressed funny, known to walk around with a gandolf sized staff and a black cloak...he listened to Slayer and Metallica...was interested in magic and witchcraft...and had a pentagram on his journal.
So, the police basically concocted this story that the murders were done by a satanic cult and Damien was their leader. The police and the lawyers did everything they could to bring this story to life. They planted evidence, they manipulated a confession out of a Jessie who was mentally disabled and was easily coerced to sign off on some bullshit. They fucked with the coroner's report to make the dead bodies seem like they were tortured by devil worshipping satanists after virgin blood, when in fact most if not all of the cuts and bites found on the bodies were done post-mortem and done by animals and turtles. (man, you laugh at turtles...but let me show you the type of fucking flesh eating turtles they got down there in arkansas!)
Sweet Jesus look at the fucker! Worst of all they trotted out these half assed, crack headed fucking witnesses that would turn their own kids in if they could get some time off their own crimes. This one fucking guy gets up on the stand and says that Jason told him that he and his friends did the murders and that Jason bragged about cutting up one of the kids dicks and then sucking on the blood...fucking kidding me?
What a fucking nightmare...kafka type shit...
...the crazy shit goes on and on...the jury laps it all up...Damien is off to death row...the other two get life. Thankfully the story doesn't end there. Friends and loved ones knowing they're innocent start organizing. Pretty soon shit gets rolling and more people jump on board. Big names like Henry Rollins, Eddie Vedder, Patti Smith, Johnny Depp and Peter Jackson start throwing some money into the pot. Big time lawyers get involved and things begin to get popping.
New evidence is gathered including a key piece of hair found on one of the shoelaces used to hog tie one of the boys. The hair, after DNA testing is not linked to any of the boys or to any of the memphis 3.
Who does it match with then? They get down to two key suspects. Two stepfathers. One who was an earlier suspect readily agrees to testing and the hair is not (wow...i just killed a giant fucking wolf spider that was sprinting across the carpet...jesus i can't stop shivering!)
yeah...right...anyway...the stepfathers...okay...so the other step father, terry hobbs, then doesn't agree to be tested and so a private investigator manages to sneak a freshly smoked cigarette butt from the guy and they were able to test that and...BINGO...a 100% match.
So, Terry Hobbs...step father to one of the dead boys...stevie branch...is the #1 suspect. The guys got his DNA at the scene of the crime. His alibi is shaky. A neighbour sees him with the boys just before they are murdered. They also uncover a super violent past. Domestic abuse, sexually assaulting a neighbour. It's also found he was abusive to stevie and sexually abused his stevie's sister as well. Piece of fucking work this guy is, wow.
Great right? Case solved right!?...well, not so fast...seems like the state of Arkansas has all these fucked up laws that makes it impossible to retry this case. And they sure as shit don't want to retry this case by any means necessary. But there's no quit here...so after many setbacks the case goes to the supreme court and they rule that arkansas is run by a bunch of fucking idiots and let the case be retried.
Yippeee!...but wait...the state of Arkansas doesn't want to lose face with this...they don't want to say that they wrongly convicted 3 innocent people, and they sure as shit don't want to pay out millions of dollars in a civil suit, and so they come up with this obscure plea called "the alfred" which means the memphis three can plead innocent and guilty at the same time. I know, makes no fucking sense but it basically meant that they would be let go immediately but there would be no retrial. And the kicker is that all 3 have to agree to this. If one says no then the whole thing gets vetoed, and they would all stay in jail, until the retrial gets under way and who knows when that would happen and who knows what would happen either.
So, Damien and Jessie agree but Jason is on the fence. He wants justice, he wants that innocent of all charges stamped on his fucking name, and he wants the real killer to be behind bars...fucking tense waiting to see what he would do. But, he ends up coming around and after 18 years in a "supermax" prison all 3 see the light of day again.
It's a fucking crazy story, and i highly recommend this movie.
The moral to this motherfucker, is watch how high you raise your freak flag, cause you might very well find yourself on death row for killing some kids. Fucked up bro, but there it is.
five fucking blips on the radar out of 5
Dvd Review: All Dat Azz #29by Drama En Sabah
I think the first girls name is Dream. It's hard to say because they show her face on the box but you don't really see her face in the movie. I assume the first girl is Dream because a) homeboy is reading a newspaper and as he slowly lowers the newspaper a girl on all fours has materialized on the carpet in front of him and B) Her azz is dreamy! Let me be the first to say that this saucy wench is hot. I mean Hot! Not sure there's a perfect azz but her booty jiggled perfectly during the opening doggystyle scene. Hot!!!!
Scene 2) umm can't remember, recovering from scene one. I think her azz was spectacular though.
Scene 3) can't remember but am willing to bet she had a nice azz too.
Scene 4) Might not even exist as I was asleep by this point. Damn that scene 1. In sleepy haze I do remember coming to long enough to say to myself…Damn that bitch is ugly. She must do anal.*
Scene 5) Woke up hungry... needed a sandwich, but all I got back with was a bowl of frosted flakes cereal because I had no sandwich meat in the damn fridge. Like why do I look in my fridge? There's never any food in it. Plenty of sauces and a jar of weed for some reason, but no cold cuts. Anywho I realize there's a porn on my t.v not because anyone was phuckin' but just because the two slimeballs talking had no reason being on t.v if some coochie wasn't about to jump off. It turns out that this was the performance piece of the dvd as the producer/director and the male lead went on a trip to New York to meet their latest signing, "Phatty Girl". Phatty Girl was big and hot. Thick sista. Looked like she'd eat bacon out of her own azz on Good Friday. Now I ain't the type to criticize a man's porn performance but next time they should get a guy who likes girls. I would have terrorized big and lovely but dude really couldn't umm get up for the role. Boooooooooo!
8.5 out of 10 which on a scale of Strained fingers to Arthritis equals a Corporal Tunnel.
*After a rewind to scene four. Yes "she" was ugly as hell and yes she did do anal! Whoa!
Bring the Drama!