Fringe - Season 2

Title: Fringe

Broadcasting Station: Fox

Status: Ended

Creators: J. J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci

Official Site

Season Two Synopsis (from FOX): "FRINGE returns for a second thrilling season and will continue to explore the unexplained phenomena and terrifying occurrences linked throughout the world – known simply as “The Pattern” – in pursuit of a larger, more shocking truth. [...] Each episode of the sophomore season promises to uncover more about the larger threat and while some questions will be answered, new ones will surface. The intensity accelerates as Season Two opens with Olivia’s shocking return to this reality, and a determined Peter, unknowingly in a race against time with an ominous mobile force, pursues information about Olivia’s blurred and perplexing visit to the alternate reality. Meanwhile, Walter reenters the lab to cook up a bit of fringe science, and of course, some custard for someone’s birthday."

STEPH SAID

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*This review contains spoilers of Season One*

This is the season where the true arc of this series is discovered. The season started exactly where season one ended, but “Over Here”.

By the end of season one, viewers already know about the alternate universe, and in the last chapter Olivia travels “Over There” to meet William Bell in an anticlimactic season finale. Season two starts at that precise moment but “Over Here”. Which means that, unfortunately, we can’t know what is happening between Olivia and Bell. And when Olivia comes back, she can’t remember anything of what happened “Over There”, so we are left in a cliffhanger. It takes a few episodes for the viewers to finally learn what happened and what was said.

The first few episodes are independent procedural episodes with hints at the major story arc. However, in episode four, “Momentum Deferred”, everything came rushing down: Olivia’s memories, the truth about Charlie and about Peter, and some information about the shape shifters. From this moment on, each episode will take more time to develop the Parallel Universe story line, and Walter, Peter and Olivia’s involvement in it.

As the season progresses, we get to know more and more about this Parallel Universe. Thankfully, many questions are answered. Nevertheless, many more are raised. During this season we are introduced to new Observers. We also learn why the two Universes are at war and who’s responsible for it.

By the end of the season Peter learns the truth about his past the hard way and decides to travel to the Alternate Universe, to meet his family “Over There”. In this season’s marvelous and thrilling two-part  finale Olivia, Walter and some Cortexiphan subjects travel to the Alternate Universe to save Peter, all the while meeting Alternate Olivia (Fauxlivia), Alternate Walter (Walternate) and William Bell.

Every episode of this season is important; you may not skip any one of them. However, the essentials are: “Momentum Deferred”, “Grey Matters”, “Jacksonville”, “Peter”, “The Man from the Other Side”, “Northwest Passage” and “Over There”: Part 1 and 2. There is one, less important, episode called “Brown Betty”, which I loved: it is an independent, noir episode that summarizes the drama arcs of season one and two.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid (Movie)

Title: Diary of a Wimpy Kid

Year: 2010

Director: Thor Freudenthal

Rating by MPAA: PG for some rude humor and language

Synopsis by Twentieth Century Fox: To Greg Heffley, middle school is the dumbest idea ever invented. It's a place rigged with hundreds of social landmines, [...] and a festering piece of cheese with nuclear cooties. To survive the never-ending ordeal and attain the recognition and status he feels he so richly deserves, Greg devises an endless series of can't-miss schemes, all of which, of course, go awry. And he's getting it all down on paper, via a diary […] filled with his opinions, thoughts, tales of family trials and tribulations, and (would-be) schoolyard triumphs. [..] So was born the Wimpy Kid's diary.

Official Site and IMDb Page

Official Trailer

ELL SAID

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I first thought this would be an extremely boring story, but I was wrong. The characters and the story are weird, but are also quite catchy. There is no greater good or epicness to it, it really is a diary of a weak kid who is trying to become famous in school. It’s fun to watch, but can at times be quite disgusting, so tread carefully. Overall, a good movie, but there’s not much to say about it.

STEPH SAID

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As a stand alone movie

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The movie overall was really good; not great, not bad either. It was funny and relatable. Nonetheless, there’s not much I can say without having to mention the book.

Comparing the movie to the book.

(You may want to read my review of the book first.)

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The movie wasn’t as good as I expected. Since the author of the book, Jeff Kinney, was the movie’s executive producer, I thought the adaptation was going to be amazing. However, it left much to be desired.

The story adaptation was good. Of course, there were some changes as it’s to be expected. Many parts were left out. Nevertheless, the writers made sure to include some of the iconic moments of the book:  the tricycle incident, Halloween night, the play, Manny eating breakfast while in the potty, Rodrick waking Greg up in the middle of the night and many more. I love that we get to see Rodrick’s band play, and just as I expected: they are awful! Also, the magazine incident, in which Rodrick apologizes to women, made the movie. It was way funnier than I expected.

Some characters, on the other hand, were not adapted so perfectly. For example, I don’t remember Patty being such a brat, annoying and a smarty pants maybe, but not a brat. Maybe that’s just me. Rodrick, on the contrary, was pleasant in the movie. To me, Rodrick is the bad guy of the books, the biggest meanie. In the movie, however, he was likeable, funny and very realistic.

My biggest surprise was Greg. I know he is mean sometimes, but the movie took it to the extreme. It presented Greg as if he only cared about being popular. He tried for the wrestling team and the school’s play just for a shot at being popular, when in the book the wrestling was the topic in Phys Ed and his mom made him try out for the play. In the movie, Greg even tried to change Rowley appearance by throwing out Rowley’s “uncool” clothes and painting Rowley’s bike black. Greg, also in the movie, left the kindergarteners, the ones he has to walk home, inside a hole in the ground, under the rain, and ran away. In the book he just showed them some worms.

Additionally, I didn’t like the two out-of-character moments. Rowley’s was when he told Greg they were done. Rowley is too nice, he would’ve just walk away, like he did in the book. Greg’s out-of-character moment came at the end of the movie. Greg decided to use the cheese incident to evaluate the reality of schools and teenagers’ focus, and encourage his peers to look beyond the standards of society. Yet, he was the one that, for a whole year, tried to fit in. And I don’t think it was a change of heart which prompt him to give that mini speech; I just guess the producers wanted a happy ending.

Chloe Grace Moretz is a great actress, but her talent was wasted in this movie. She played Angie Steadman, a character created for the movie. She would just pop in and say a few lines. Her character didn’t had much depth and didn’t do much either. She was just there. From what I’ve gather she doesn’t appear in any of the sequels, so right now I’m wondering about why the character was created in the first place.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

Title: Diary of a Wimpy Kid

Author: Jeff Kinney

Year of Publication: 2007 

Official Site: Wimpy Kid

Synopsis: Greg records his experiences in a middle school where he and his best friend, Rowley, undersized weaklings amid boys who need to shave twice daily, hope just to survive, but when Rowley grows more popular Greg must take drastic measures to save their friendship.

Read my review of the Online Story (the original Diary of a Wimpy Kid story) here.

STEPH SAID

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The first thing you need to know about Diary of a Wimpy Kid is that it's not a story about a regular kid who found fame or glory or turned out to be the lost heir to a throne, it is actually a realistic and satirical view of a teenager’s everyday life. Greg doesn’t write about how he wishes life would be better or about his dreams of becoming a rock star. He writes about his best friend, his favorite video games, about being grounded, popularity, his problems with his brothers and with girls. And even though his stories are so mundane, they have captivated hundreds of readers worldwide. Probably because we can all relate to his story in some way. Or maybe because the way he tells his story is just plain hilarious.

The doodles help the story greatly. Nowadays kids are growing up watching movies, TV and video games, and as a result have become a very visual generation. This book appeals to this. The doodles make the story visual, funnier and easier to read because there is actually less words in each page.

However, everything that I have written in this review could also work to the book’s disadvantage. I don’t know if it was because I had already read the online story, or because the book is so small, but I actually felt like the story didn’t have any substance, and was left wanting more. It is not due to the topics presented in this story; the Online Story deals with these same topics and I found it hugely entertaining. The book lightly touched on some topics but did not develop them. This is a story that is supposed to happen in a year, so I expected more matter and thickness. Thus, this is a extra light-reading.

This book is actually the abridged version of the Online Story found at FunBrain.com. The book kept some interesting storylines but completely disregarded other. Then again, compressing a +1000 pages story into a 200 pages book is probably hard work, not everything can be fitted. I just hope the following books keep to the original storyline and don’t deviate from it.

Awesome Note + To Do/ Calendar

Title: Awesome Note + To Do/ Calendar

Developers: BRID

Category: Productivity

Cost: $3.99 

Rated: 4+

For a visual description of all of this app's features you may visit BRID's webpage. To buy this app, you may visit its iTunes Preview Page.

STEPH SAID

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Being a college student I have many things to remember: homework, tests, due dates, reunions, etc. I also need to remember birthdays, dinners with friends, convention dates and more. To be able to see everything at the same time I bought a calendar board and put it on my wall. I would write with different colors: blue for college stuff, green for personal stuff, black for free days, red for birthdays etc.  Just by looking at the calendar I would know what I had for that week without having to actually read it. However the big flaw of my plan was that I couldn’t bring the calendar with me. I did have a regular agenda but I would have to skim through pages to find what I was looking for. Awesome notes + To Do/Calendar came to save the day!

It is literally Awesome. It has everything you could think of in one app; I won’t disclose every one of its features because they’re many. But I will tell you about my favorites.

This app lets you write notes, to-dos, handwritten notes, journal entries and more, and for each one you can assign a special reminder, either before the event or at the beginning of it. You can also make special “anniversary” notes (which may be repeated every year) for birthdays, anniversaries or special dates and when you click on the note it will tell you how many days until that date. All of these notes can be divided into different folders, each with a different icon and color. Which brings me to my favorite part: the calendar.

*Image taken from bridworks.com

When you bring up the calendar, you can see every note and task in the date it’s assigned and, since you can divide the notes into different colored folders, you get an easy-to-understand, visual arrangement of your activities. This app’s array of features is what sets it apart from other agendas and makes it a must have for everybody. 

Bleach: The 3rd Phantom

Title: Bleach: The 3rd Phantom

Developers: Sega

Platform: Nintendo DS

Genre: Tactical role-playing game

Rating: T for Alcohol Reference, Mild Fantasy Violence, Mild Language, Suggestive Themes

Official Page and IGN Page

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I'll have to admit that I'm not a fan of Bleach. I don’t know why; I just don't like it all that much. But this game is all I wouldn't expect from a Bleach game. See, it has a deep story and engaging, turn-based gameplay similar to Fire Emblem. It also features many of the Manga's characters, a tag-team element and a make-your-own-decision that  develop the outcome and affect which characters are playable at a certain stage of the game, which gives a new twist to things. This is an extremely good strategy game, perfect for Bleach lovers and not, but it is best to have at least a small knowledge about Bleach, or you'll get lost with some stuff.

Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's Decade Duels Plus

Title: Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's Decade Duels Plus

Developer: Konami

Patforms: Xbox 360, Playstation 3

Rating: E

Official Page

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I used to love playing the Yu-Gi-Oh trading card game and have always been looking for a video game to play, so I don't need to have someone to play with. I found the game I was looking for in the X-Box Live Marketplace. This game is exactly as the TCG, but with a story. Basically, you duel your way to glory, like in every other game based on this franchise. The only bad thing is that this game continually asks you if you want to see the cards in the field. This is good when you're not sure, but it gets annoying after the first three phases. The pace is slower than actually playing the TCG, but it's worth it. If you're looking for a Yu-Gi-Oh game, this is what you're looking for, if you're willing to put up with the annoying promptings and slow pace.

Fringe - Season 1

Title: Fringe

Broadcasting Station: Fox

Status: Ended

Creators: J. J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci

Official Site

Season 1 premise (taken from fringetelevision.com): All over the world, a series of inexplicable phenomena (coined "The Pattern") has aroused the attention of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Special Agent Philip Broyles heads up a multi-agency team called the Fringe Division to investigate the Pattern. They believe science and technology have advanced to unknown, unregulatable levels that put society at risk.    

STEPH SAID

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When I was inquiring about fringe among my friends, the first thing I heard was that Fringe is a mash-up between Supernatural and C.S.I.. Since I like both I decided to give Fringe a chance. After watching the pilot I can say that these friends were, indeed, right.

All you need to do is watch the pilot and you will immediately get a sense of its style and tone. The pilot alone is what a whole series should be. It presents the main characters, the “antagonist” and the topics to be developed later; it had drama, action, intrigue, chases, explosions, betrayals, conspiracies, procedural processes, supernatural topics and many, many plot twists/unexpected occurrences.

However, watching the pilot and knowing it is a procedural mixed with the supernatural, won’t make things easier to decipher. Even after watching the whole first season, you won’t know exactly what is going on. I mean, a procedural show is one based on our reality, on how things are done, step-by-step; a show based on the supernatural is the total opposite, is a show based on fantasy and lore. Mixing these two together alone should be enough to let the viewer puzzled as to what to expect. Furthermore, Fringe has amazing writers that complicate matters much more. I don’t mean this in the bad way “It’s too complicated, don’t bother”. On the contrary! This series is so good at being puzzling that you have to keep watching. You want to decipher the clues and understand what is going on. I don’t want to scare you, so I’ll expand a bit more.

Like other procedurals, Fringe has stand-alone episodes in which someone dies and the focus of the episode is to catch that killer. In Fringe, however, these deaths are related to something supernatural (the ability to control electro-magnetic fields, shape shifters, vampires etc.). The Fringe team investigates and finds a theoretical scientific explanation for these supernatural events.  For example, the shape shifter changed form due to a virus that rewrote his genetic code. At the same time each episode gives you a glimpse into the story arc of the season, this is the part that is cryptic. Apparently, each death follows a “Pattern” of supernatural-related incidents, but nobody knows who is behind them or why are they doing these things. Ever since the first episode you get many clues about what’s to come, but nothing concrete. These clues will develop as the season unfolds. Your only hope is to keep watching and keep getting more clues.

This makes for a marvelous watch. It’s intriguing, captivating and though-provoking. Fringe has now become one of my favorite TV shows ever. However, I have to mention, the finale is rather anticlimactic. I was expecting a lot of answers and instead got many more questions; the episode, and thus the season, not only ends on a plot twist and a cliffhanger, but it literally finishes in the introduction of the real story arc. That’s when I realized that the arc presented in this season continues in upcoming seasons. The first season doesn’t have an arc that gets resolved in its finale; it is just a preamble of what’s to come.

I would love to keep writing and writing about why Fringe is so great, about why you should watch it and about my favorite episodes of the season (“Pilot, “In Which We Meet Mr. Jones” and “Inner Child”), but I don’t want to be accused of ranting. I trust you will make the choice of watching for yourself to see if what I’m saying is true. Hopefully, and probably, you will be hooked from the beginning as I have. That way you will understand my feelings as I wrote this review.

Zombie Death Quota

 Title: Zombie Death Quota

Developers: Edelica Computer Entertainment

Xbox Live Marketplace Page

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I love FPS, but I don't like zombies. But, I was drawn to Zombie Death Quota because of it being a zombie-slaying game in a boxed world similar to Minecraft. At first, I thought it was just another copy, but I was very wrong. It has NO building mechanism. The only things to do here is shoot zombies to death. But, there's a twist in the fact that you have a quota of dead zombies you have to achieve before passing the missions. Throughout the world you'll find sub-machine guns, sniper rifles and other weapons that work quite well, but you'll also find zombies that'll charge at you as soon as they spot you, or as soon as you shoot them. After the quota of zombie kills and the quota of toxin containers are finished, you're not entirely done, because you have to survive until your evacuation method, a helicopter, arrives. But, it doesn't arrive where you are or even where you spawned, but at one location, to which you must head. I personally loved the game, but it might not be for everyone. It needs improvement, but it’s really good.

Xenominer

Title: Xenominer

Developers: Gristmill Studios

Official Page

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Ever since Minecraft was crafted, so to speak, many people have been trying to improve on the legendary formula. One of the results is Xenominer. Xenominer is an indie game in the X-Box Live Marketplace and it draws many aspects from Minecraft and improves some of them, but also has many that are not very good. Among the good things is the fact that the world is, allegedly, endless. It’s based on a moon, so it’s filled with craters and glowing substances that are, obviously, not Earthen. These glowing substances, alongside A.I. servant bots, make the game quite interesting, but its downfalls may just outweigh it. The HUD covers most of the screen and seems to be a copy of Halo's. The character's life support is at the top, comprised of Health, Battery and Oxygen. At the bottom is the Item List alongside other things that are way too tiny to be understood. Problem is, these two things make the actual field of vision extremely limited which makes it hard to play, because you have to constantly look down to see where you're walking. Another problem in the game is that the field of vision is also dark. You can barely see five blocks ahead of you unless there's a glowing block before you. On a good note, the sky above the landscape is extremely beautiful. Overall, Xenominer is a game with extremely high potential, but it still needs a lot of polishing.

Zombie Driver HD (Xbox Live Arcade)

Title: Zombie Arcade HD

Developer: Exor Studios

Platforms: Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Android (Tegra based devices)

Rating: M for blood and gore, language and violence

Gameplay: Single-Player, Vehicular Combat

Official Page

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Lately, there have been many Zombie-themed games, movies and similar things, and the X-Box Live Arcade isn't an exception. One of the games that I found there was Zombie Driver HD. It is an extremely gory game (not apt for children) that delivers epic zombie-killing in an extremely unique way: Driving. You literally drive a taxi around a zombie-infected city, picking up power-ups such as a machine gun, flame thrower and rocket launcher, and fulfilling missions for the military. From time to time, as prices for carrying out missions and kill countless of zombies, you get new cars and money, the latter being used to improve the speed, toughness and such of the cars. Though having a pretty good basis, this game is not for those who prefer games without bad-words, as it has many, and the camera is viewed from above and from quite far away, making the zombies not-so-visible. The game is good to kill time, but I wouldn't suggest it cheerfully like I would do about other games.