2006 vs. 2007, Parts 2 and 3: June and July

In an effort to determine whether this year is better than last year, going solely by the movies that came out, I decided to compare the two years, weekend by weekend, in monthly installments that cover the traditional summer blockbuster season. In case you missed it, here is a link to part 1:

2006 vs. 2007, Part 1: May

It took me a while to get to parts 2 and 3 because I didn't initially see all the movies on their opening weekend. But now I'm caught up enough to adequately judge the months of June and July.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Many of these weekends saw the release of more than one movie at a time. I probably should have chosen each weekend's representative by the most widely distributed release, but I decided to go with my opinion of what the best movie of the weekend was, so that each side would always be judged on its best representative. So, for example, disasters like EVAN ALMIGHTY will not bring down a weekend that happened to also see the release of 1408. And that kinda thing makes all the difference when stacked up against the likes of CLICK. So, anyway. Here you go.

Part 2: JUNE

THE BREAK-UP (2006) vs. KNOCKED UP (2007)
What we have here is a decent movie about the end of a relationship and a much better movie about the beginning of one. So we don't have to waste too much of the court's time on this one.
1st Weekend Score: 2006 (0) vs. 2007 (1)

CARS (2006) vs. OCEAN'S THIRTEEN (2007)
While Cars was probably one of the worst Pixar movies, it was still really good. Saying "the worst Pixar movie" is like saying "the least beautiful diamond." But Ocean's Thirteen really delivered. So, based on how well each movie achieved its own goals, I'm gonna have to give the slight edge to Thirteen.
2nd Weekend Score: 2006 (0) vs. 2007 (2)

THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS: TOKYO DRIFT (2006) vs. FANTASTIC FOUR: RISE OF THE SILVER SURFER (2007)
Tokyo Drift was a threquel nobody asked for with no returning characters and everything stacked against it, but it turned out to be a pleasant little surprise. Rise of the Silver Surfer was a galactic improvement on the original Fantastic Four. But that doesn't change the fact that it was still kinda dumb.
3rd Weekend Score: 2006 (1) vs. 2007 (2)

CLICK (2006) vs. 1408 (2007)
The trailer for Click seemed to give away everything about it, which soured me on ever wanting to see it, but when I finally did, I was relieved to find that there was slightly more to it. Too bad it was only slightly.
4th Weekend Score: 2006 (1) vs. 2007 (3)

SUPERMAN RETURNS (2006) vs. RATATOUILLE (2007)
This is a really tough choice. Superman Returns is one of my favorite movies from the past few years, because of the love for Superman that Bryan Singer clearly put into it. And Ratatouille was an unmitigated success unto itself. What makes it a difficult decision is that the two movies are good in such different ways. But because the overall winner has already pretty much been determined and this weekend's point is essentially irrelevant, I feel comfortable just picking one.
5th Weekend Score: 2006 (1) vs. 2007 (4)

THE WINNER OF JUNE: 2007. A serious hot streak of kickass movies, marred by an embarrassing loss to a no-name threquel.

Part 3: JULY

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN'S CHEST (2006) vs. TRANSFORMERS (2007)
Dead Man's Chest was seriously excellent, and Transformers was just kinda silly and weird. I mean, it didn't suck, but talk about somewhat disappointing.
1st Weekend Score: 2006 (1) vs. 2007 (0)

YOU, ME AND DUPREE (2006) vs. HARRY POTTER AND THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX (2007)
You, Me and Dupree looked like ass. Then I saw it and it was kinda sweet, but still ass, but it was okay because it wasn't aspiring to be much more than that. But it also kinda ripped off way better movies like What About Bob. Doesn't matter anyway because Harry Potter was a gabillion times better.
2nd Weekend Score: 2006 (1) vs. 2007 (1)

LADY IN THE WATER (2006) vs. HAIRSPRAY (2007)
I really liked Lady in the Water. I know that everyone hates everything M. Night Shyamalan does or says or thinks, but I guess I'm just different then, huh. And I know that Hairspray celebrates people who are different-- aha, nice try! Point 2006.
3rd Weekend Score: 2006 (2) vs. 2007 (1)

SCOOP (2006) vs. THE SIMPSONS MOVIE (2007)
Maybe not everyone would have picked Scoop here. But let me just put it this way. I could have represented the 4th weekend of July with Little Miss Sunshine, Miami Vice, The Ant Bully, or even John Tucker Must Die. But none of these shits were ever in any danger of losing to The Simpsons Movie.
4th Weekend Score: 2006 (3) vs. 2007 (1)

THE WINNER OF JULY: 2006. I've noticed that every month so far has been one point short of a flawless victory. This time it's Dupree who ruins everything. Dupree!

The tally so far has 2006 leading with May and July against 2007's June. August will either seal 2006's victory or tie everything up, forcing an unprecedented September tie-breaker. Stay tuned!

Cheers,
Diego

Corrections & Updates.

Sometimes the narrative threads of my life appear to remain unresolved because I will blog about them and then never follow up. So here is a series of corrections and updates on some of the entries in this blog.

In Ripped off (3.28.07), I blogged about how a Supercuts overcharged my debit card and I didn't notice till I got home, and then I did nothing about it.
UPDATE: If I'm reading my online banking history correctly, the charge never went through. So what I took as a ripoff actually turned out to be a free haircut. I hope this will be the last update on that.

In Entourage (4.23.07), I blogged about how Entourage is a good show, but that a lot of the storylines were stupid and/or frustratingly paced.
UPDATE: No change. The best part of every episode is Ari.

In New Shoes (5.3.07), I blogged about how my new shoes were going to facilitate my hiking at Runyon Canyon.
UPDATE: They do indeed grasp those slippery crags way better than my old shoes. So there's some bad news for all my potential mortal enemies.

In Robots in Disguise (5.13.07), I blogged about how my brother and I attended a promotional Transformers event and were promised free passes to an advance screening of the film, but how I probably wouldn't go because I wanted to enjoy the movie at a good theater on Independence Day.
UPDATE: After a lengthy silence, we finally received our invitation to a 7:30pm screening on Thursday, June 28th, at the Pacific Culver City theater. We did not attend for three reasons:

1. We were getting over a cold.
2. We had already long since purchased our tickets for Transformers at the Arclight Cinerama Dome -- about a month in advance, to be exact, to guarantee excellent seats.
3. That whole Independence Day thing.

So on July 4th, we went and saw the movie at the Dome, where they had four cars from the movie on display. I think we made the right call.

In The Upfronts: ABC (5.15.07), I blogged about all the shows ABC was cancelling this season.
CORRECTION: Apparently, According to Jim has not been cancelled, even though I said it was. I guess next time I will have to use a source that isn't completely retarded.

In The Upfronts: Fox & The CW (5.18.07), I blogged about all the shows FOX was cancelling and cited the fact that the last two episodes of Drive would be airing on Independence Day.
UPDATE: FOX pushed the two episodes back to July 13th, and then pulled them from the schedule altogether, thereby proving that it is always possible to lose respect for a company that you already have no respect for.

In The Rialto (5.20.07), I blogged about going to the theater where they shot the exteriors and lobby for the opening of Scream 2 (The Rialto) and how I had already been to the one where they shot the auditorium (The Vista), and how I was going to determine if the men's room scene had also been shot at the Vista.
UPDATE: I went to the Vista and scoped out the men's room. The layout was all wrong, but the green floor tiles and black stalls were identical to the ones used in the film. So my determination is that the men's room scene was shot at the Vista along with the auditorium scene, and that it had to be in a restroom that is either private or has since been renovated in some way.

In Big D Hot 10 (5.28.07), I blogged about the top ten celebrity women I would like to have sex with.
CORRECTION: My list remains essentially the same. I'm not crazy about Claire Danes with her constant anorexic look, but she stays on the list for now. However, there was news that Milena Govich (the girl detective from Law & Order) is going to be replaced on the show's next season, so I guess it's probably time I get her off the list. It just wouldn't feel right to keep her on as my #9 if she's gonna be off the radar like this. It's bad enough Colleen Haskell's on there. Since the writing of the list, I have also become keenly aware that I neglected the inclusion of Jeri Ryan. So Jeri gets the plum #6 spot, everyone slides down one, and Shannen Doherty maintains her disgraceful #10 spot, where she will precariously remain until I become swayed by a sexually charged photograph of Tiffani Thiessen or something. Here's the new iteration:

10. Shannen Doherty
9. Colleen Haskell
8. Neve Campbell
7. Claire Danes
6. Jeri Ryan
5. Angelina Jolie
4. Gina Gershon
3. Naomi Watts
2. Hilary Swank
1. Linda Cardellini

You see any of them on the street, you tell them you have a weird friend who put them on a perverted list. If this turns them on, give them my info and I'll handle it from there.

Cheers,
Diego

Aniston Brushes Teeth in Shower.

From IMDb:

The Break-Up star Jennifer Aniston has a novel way to save the environment - she brushes her teeth in the shower. The actress revealed her eco-friendly tip on the eve of Al Gore's Live Earth concerts on Saturday. She says, "I take a three-minute shower. I even brush-wash - brush my teeth while I shower. Every two minutes in the shower uses as much water as a person in Africa uses for everything in their life for a whole day." The 24-hour Live Earth concert launched this past weekend in Sydney, Australia and continued across the world with events in Japan, China, South Africa, Germany, London and Brazil, before concluding in New York.

Now wait a second. You take a three-minute shower? How the hell do you manage that? AND you brush your teeth? Jennifer, let's get real here. In order to properly brush your teeth, you're supposed to do the outer and inner surfaces of both your upper and lower teeth, as well as chewing surfaces, at least ten times each, not to mention your tongue. The whole thing is supposed to take, at the very least, two minutes. And we've always been told that you shouldn't leave the water running in the sink while you brush. But what you're doing is letting water run all over your body while you brush. This sounds more wasteful (and inefficient) than smart. But perhaps you've figured out a way to masterfully brush your teeth with one hand while scrubbing your entire body with the other, all in the span of three easy minutes.

I think a full frontal demonstration is in order. Someone send this blog to Jen.

Cheers,
Diego

Dane Cook.

Dane Cook is in an upcoming movie called Good Luck Chuck. In it, he plays the titular Chuck, a man who discovers that every time he sleeps with a woman, she goes on to meet the man she will marry, so women start seeking him out as a service so they can have a quick fuck and then go on to meet their soul mate. But he becomes conflicted when he meets Jessica Alba and falls in love with her. The movie comes out this August.

That same month, Dane starts shooting another movie called Bachelor No. 2. In it, he plays the titular bachelor, a man who specializes in taking women out on nightmare dates. Recently-dumped men start seeking him out to date their ex-chicks, so that they will then go running back to their great-by-comparison boyfriends. But he becomes conflicted when he is hired to take out Kate Hudson, who I think is his best friend's ex or something.

I would just like to know what Dane's doing here. Is he trying to start his own sub-genre? The romantic comedy where people hire Dane Cook for sex? Is this going to be a section at Blockbuster someday? For now, let's just keep our eyes open.

Cheers,
Diego

Standoff.

Back during the upfronts in May, I blogged about all the shows that were cancelled off the big networks' new fall schedules, and how devastating or appropriate each cancellation was:

The Upfronts: NBC.
The Upfronts: ABC.
The Upfronts: CBS.
The Upfronts: FOX & The CW.

It has now come to my attention that I completely neglected to mention a few shows (I guess the list I had at the time was incomplete). But the most noteworthy oversight was the FOX action drama Standoff. So...

FUCK FOX AGAIN
- Standoff -- This is an awesome show about two wisecracky hostage negotiators (Ron Livingston and Rosemarie DeWitt) who share a turbulent relationship. First FOX made 13 episodes, then they ordered 6 more for a grand total of 19, then they pulled it (after airing only 11 episodes) for a six-month hiatus and cancelled the show about a month before it came back (to a Friday night death slot). The remaining eight episodes are airing now through July.

Interesting to note is that Gina Torres was part of this show's supporting cast. She was also in the cast of Firefly (which was murdered by FOX in its first season back in 2002), bringing the grand total of Firefly alum-starring shows cancelled by FOX in their first season this year alone to 2. The other is Drive, which I believe airs its final two episodes on the Fourth of July.

Foxy, you're doing a heck of a job.

Cheers,
Diego

Shirley You Jest.

This past season, Scrubs was at its all-time shittiest comedy low. It was, shall we say, on life support. So, in an effort to (as Scrubs creator Bill Lawrence put it) "shake things up," they did an episode where the sassy Nurse Laverne Roberts dies in a car accident. See, throughout the episode, she had been trying to convince Dr. Cox that God has a plan and that "everything happens for a reason." So when a sweet little girl comes in with a gunshot wound or something, Cox quips, "So what's the reason for this?" It later turns out that they find an operable tumor in the girl when they X-ray her, so in a way, getting shot saved her life (or something like that). At the end of the episode, Cox comes in and is told that Laverne was in a car accident and is now in a non-responsive coma. It actually ended in a "to be continued" and the whole next episode was devoted to everyone saying goodbye before she finally passed away. The characters all briefly grieved in that lifeless mock-serious mumble they all do about once an episode and were back to their zany antics by the following week.

Now Variety is reporting that the actress who played Laverne is being brought back next season in the role of her "single, alcoholic, non-religious" twin sister Shirley. This is because Bill Lawrence evidently promised her that she would still have a job on the show in the unlikely event that they got renewed. So it's not enough that they're churning out these lumbering, hackneyed ratings stunts, now they're going to actually shit all over them. Turns out death is only temporary, kids. So if your friend dies, don't worry, because their twin brother or sister will be along shortly and you can play with them. That's a great message to put out there; very responsible.

I don't really have that much of a problem with this. I just think this show is stupid.

Cheers,
Diego

The Ballad of Isaiah Washington.

Once upon a time, there was an actor named Isaiah Washington. He was in a lot of movies for almost twenty years, but not everyone knew who he was. In 2005, he appeared on a new show called Grey's Anatomy, playing a cardiothoracic surgeon named Dr. Preston Xavier Burke. This show was a piece of shit, but there was a lot of sex and music and bullshit in it, so it became one of the most popular shows on TV, and now everyone knew who he was.

In October 2006, when the show was in its third season, reports surfaced about vicious backstage battles between Mr. Washington and his co-star, Patrick Dempsey. During one of these fights, Mr. Washington reportedly said to Mr. Dempsey, "I'm not your little faggot like T.R." This was in reference to their privately homosexual co-star T.R. Knight. After this news, lots of people started to hate Mr. Washington, and Mr. Knight was forced to publicly come out of the closet and abandon the privacy he had been enjoying up until that point. Mr. Washington felt very embarrassed about all of this, so, while emphatically denying using the bad word, he stated to the whole world, "I sincerely regret my actions and the unfortunate use of words during the recent incident on-set."

In January 2007, Grey's Anatomy inexplicably won the Golden Globe for Best Drama. When the cast was taking questions backstage in celebration of this fine award, one of the reporters started talking about backstage conflicts and Mr. Washington blurted out, "No, I did not call T.R. a faggot." Saying this word made everybody angry with him again, including all the people who worked with him. His bosses at the ABC network reprimanded him for being such a hateful prick, so Mr. Washington made it a point to publicly ask for help in dealing with the issues inside his soul and entered a rehabilitation program to undergo psychological analysis and take anger counseling for his apparent homophobia.

In June 2007, ABC announced that they would not be allowing Mr. Washington to act on the show anymore, and he was fired. Because of this, the third season finale of Grey's Anatomy ended with the derailment of a wedding between his character and another character on the show, leaving the door open for his impending departure. Mr. Washington publicly stated, "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore," paraphrasing a famous line from the 1976 movie Network, but everybody was just perplexed and unimpressed by the quote. He also said something about doing charity work and making an independent movie, but nobody really gave a shit anymore.

Cheers,
Diego