Seven

Ah my bad, I got confused with the manga. It had been almost 2 years since I last thought about Naruto.

Has anyone kept up on the manga? I read a few of the chapters introducing the characters after the time skip but stopped before Deidara even reached the Sand village. I didn't even know who that pale skinned guy was in that preview when they found Sasuke. It all looks very exciting though!

Maybe Edward James Olmos finally had enough sci fi and the recent ratings have given him a reason to pull out for at least regular appearances?

Hah, so you actually prefer to have a 10 minute recap of what just happened a couple episodes back? I'd rather have those 10 minutes of a 20 minute show as new material. I mean, man how long did it take to get through the Zabusa arc when they kept recapping the happenings of the last episode in the next one? Just because its traditional doesn't mean its good. Not to mention, why do you need a reminder of what the difference in the characters are? Its not like Naruto was off the air for even a year much less a few months. On another note, I really liked the preview of the encounter with Sasuke prior to the intro in episode 1. The animation, background score, and tension in the scene were great. It made me disappointed when it jumped back to Naruto arriving back in town after 2 years.

Yeah, a while back actually.

Yeah, I think it was closer to 2 years. I have to wonder about the logic of running filler episodes for that long as opposed to just ending the series and then picking it up 2 years later when the gap was adequate. I'm sure their thinking was that by keeping it going it didn't lose the audience and that it would be riskier to just end it and try to resurrect it. At the same time, I feel like there are quite a few people that tuned off of it due to the long fillers of questionable quality or relevance. I myself couldn't stand the stupid Country of Tea filler arc that preceded the final arc prior to the long filler eps. So after the flashback eps to Kakashi's youth, I completely tuned off of Naruto until now. I'm glad I have something to watch again. But, I can see they are back to the whole irritating recapping thing again in episode 3. They must think kids these days are all ADD or amnesiac.

Paul Walker as Solid Snake - "Dude, Liquid, I almost had you! If I beat you this time, I take the Metal Gear and all the respect!"

Eric Bana as Solid Snake = WIN. But I highly doubt that and we'll get that focker Paul Walker or Tyrese casted.

Now you're just being glib. :lol:

So how do you guys like the News channel? I turned on my Wii around midnight only to be surprised that the update gave me a new channel. It'll probably end up being my most frequent source for news seeing as how I cannot stand pundits on cable news. I'm loving the channels so far, but I'm wondering have they mentioned what future channels they might be adding?

I saw his return as the white not only as a promotion in rank but also the powers attributed to that authority as well. Gandalf the Grey would not have been able to pull off disarming Saruman or other later deeds but Gandalf the White has that capability and authority.

To be fair to Jackson, he was opposed to the inclusion of the army of the dead at first since he wanted to go for a more historic feeling less supernatural direction. He was vetoed either by fan outrage/disapproval or his writing partners.

For that to happen, something would need to happen to Neo Zeon to bring them back to Earth raring for a fight in a new ZZ storyline. Something would also need to be done to Haman to take her out of the picture since at the end of ZIII, she appears to be at peace with Earth and AEUG to the point of letting the heir to the throne stay on Earth and retreating to outer space. So yeah, for CCA to happen as is, big changes would need to be made to ZZ. It almost seems like ZZ is being effectively erased from the timeline, so maybe no changes to it are needed if it effectively is taken out of canon retroactively.

I wonder what changes to the storyline of Char's Counterattack would have to happen due to the alteration of events in the Zeta movies? For example, Haman choosing to take Neo Zeon out of the Earth vicinity and retreating as opposed to continuing the fight against the AEUG and Federation. Doesn't this screw with Neo Zeon and Char in CC? Also it looks like Axis was destroyed when it hit the Gate of Zedan (Aboaqu) in ZIII, doesn't this mess with the plot with Axis in CC? Man, I'd love to see a remake of Char's Counterattack with all new animation.

Just got done watching it and the changes made were certainly refreshing. I love the scene at the end where you see the Zeta do a slow transform from Waverider to robot then jetissoning the transform parts. What immediately follows that with Camille is definitely more fan friendly as opposed to him being a vegetable. It trades the phyrric victory of the series for a less gut wrenching end. As for the changes in this movie effectively erasing ZZ's storyline, I still think it would be possible for Judau to take over the Zeta. I haven't watched enough of ZZ, but doesn't Judau steal the Zeta while the Aghama is docked? You assume that Camille would stay with the Ahgama, but its certainly possible Camille and Fa could have decided to leave the AEUG and return to civilian life immediately upon arriving at the colony. I don't think Bright would object given the extreme sacrifices Camille endured for the greater good.

All these new animes are starting to look the same to me. I see a plane with a Yukikaze vibe with SV-51 nose and canards, rear section and wings from a YF-19, lower intake of a VF-9, and characters that look reminiscent of Eureka 7 and Air Gear. Maybe I've been watching anime for too long.

While I can appreciate the fact that the guy is one of the few directors in Hollywood that goes against convention and makes movies to tell a story (as opposed to studio directors that just make franchise films or popcorn films), I just had to roll my eyes when I read an excerpt of his book "The Man Who Heard Voices", which was basically very angsty and emo and tells about his constant battle with self doubt as a director and a person. It just leapt out to me how much of a whiny drama queen the guy is. I do like how he adheres to a central theme in his stories and is great at making the characters come across as real emotional people. Not many directors can achieve that today. Out of all his movies, the one that I like most conceptually and thematic wise would be Signs. Sure there are plot holes, but you can poke holes in ANY movie made today. Everything in Signs tied together very well and the montage at the very end that Gibson has in front of the alien helps the audience put all the threads together. On a tangent but still about a director, I just had a chance to watch Ikiru from Akira Kurosawa. Critics rate this film higher than the much more popular Seven Samurai. I didn't realize why until I finally watched it on IFC. It is indeed a great film and very personal as well. I highly recommend it to the Kurosawa fans out there that have watched all his Jidai Geki (samurai period) films and want to watch something else he created.

That better be Oprah's husband with that Vette, cause if not, that man officially has no gonads and no right to that car. I've seen those boxy Scion vans in Japan plastered with Ayumi Hamasaki all over the side, but most of those owners were women. Besides, it's an econobox. Now the Vette, man, how does a guy justify that crap to his friends and fellow enthusiasts?!

So when can we expect the Adolescent Radioactive Black Belt Hamsters movie?

Hahahha, let's not get melodramatic or anything. As for finishing up the car, I swear the worst part of working on any car is waiting for parts. Yeah, I see a grip of Cayenne's all over the place and the scariest thing is when you see a Cayenne Turbo barrelling down the avenue with a soccer mom yakking into her cell while 3 brats are screaming and jumping all over the back seat while she occasionally glances at the road. Speaking about similar platforms, anyone see that vid of the Diesel VW Taureg towing a 747? That's some crazy stump pulling power.

People used to say Porsche would never make an SUV.

It's most definitely a concept car. As for joysticks, indeed it is an old old concept. I just broke open my encyclopedia dated back to 1975 and found pictures of a GM concept with a joystick. Of course it looked all 70s style with tons of cheap plastic chrome, square gauges, and skinny tall fonts for numbers.

Actually, it was quite easy for me once I got my gambits down. Seriously if you think this is hard, then Final Fantasy Tactics would've given you an aneurysm. As for the "Vaan is gay looking" comment... meh, I've heard that complaint thousands of times and you know what, since when has ANY Final Fantasy main protagonist been a macho womanizing hulk recently? You have Cloud and Squall, the emo-boys, Zidane the monkey boy, Ramza the effeminate, Tidus the boy band sports hero, etc. Blame it on the Japanese gamers for responding stronger to more effeminate main characters in their Final Fantasy games and Square marketing on wanting to make the games appealing to teenage girls to capture their market share. I could go on and on, but its just easier to tell you to switch Vaan out and use Balthier or Basch for your main character. Hint for Garuda: Ground based attacks don't work. Use ranged attacks, so I hope you have at least one person that can use bows/guns. Vossler will help anyways. Also, get the berry from the Urutan people after killing the Urutan Eater. Then feed it to Garuda for an easier battle. It also sounds like you are rushing through the game and not leveling a bit before continuing.

After watching it on dvd again, I have to say my opinion on the movie has cooled somewhat but it's still enjoyable. Some of the lines are just atrocious like in the scene with the first meet with Jose Yero where Crockett says my mommy and daddy know me or where they go on about "Oye chico, that's some crazy wallpaper, is that Jackson Pollock? No, that's Jose Yero." The other problem being noticeable is that like others say that some of the actors fail to bond or have chemistry in any of their scenes (Farrell - Gong Li, Farrell - Foxx). I'd also say that Jose Yero was pretty much a lame duck as a main antagonist and many of the things they wrote him to do only served to weaken him as a character. It would have been nice for them to establish what was going to be done about the leak in Washington, but thats left out there like a hanging chad. Other than that, Mann is a master artist with the way he shot things. The locations in all the scenes were always beautiful. Here's a question for people out there that someone can answer. With the scene where Tubbs flew the plane right behind the other plane to get into US undetected on radar, couldn't that be done all the time to sneak in all sorts of planes? Or is that movie magic?

Speak of the devil! I just discovered HybridZ.com, so I've been pretty much drooling nonstop. It's the only thing I can do while I wait for my new ECU to come in. I've already tackled most of the other car projects I set out to do since Thanksgiving.