Well, so this is what I this we are all expecting

It looks like this is what we’re going to receive

There is a strong tradition of great orchestral music throughout the entire Star Wars series, but Space Pirates don’t dance.  Lando looks like he needs a “40,” and darnit, Han shot First!

Yes, this might just be one level in the game (which I’ll likely still buy) but it will make me cry every time Han Solo needs to “kick it.”  Best comment I read this morning was something like:  ”I want to be a good parent for my children, but this…. [Kinect Star Wars]”    

Now here’s a solid Kinect implementation! Check out this “preview” of Assassin’s Creed for Kinect

xkcd

Randall Munroe rocked it last year with the xkcd bash shell, but this year he went with customizations based on region and browser.  Here’s my desktop screenshot from left to right: Firefox, Chrome (linked via reddit) and then Internet Explorer (with Seattle-specific VALVE PORTAL).

Kodak

Taking the magic of photo development into genetic engineering.

Sony

Making the smallest Ultrabook ever, the Vaio Q.

Google Chrome

Google Chrome Multitask Mode for when one-handed mousing is just not efficient enough

Google Youtube

The Youtube Collection, exclusively on DVD

Google Search

Google Really Advanced Search

Google and Nascar

Google automated cars for stock car racing!  No more crashes?

Adblock

Introducing Catblock.  All ads now become cats.

Warby Parker

Glasses for your dog

Cute Overload

Cute Overload becomes the Huffington Post

 Big Fish Games

Ha, MimeSomething, a clever spoof of DrawSomething

A: YES

Yes, I bought the Hunger Games on Amazon Kindle.  Yes, I did like the story.  Yes, I enjoyed the characters.  Yes, I look forward to the movie.   Yes, I felt it was a rip-off of Battle Royale.

I hope the author of Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins, would say, “My inspiration for the Hunger Games was the epic movie Battle Royale by director Kinji Fukasaku and the book Battle Royale by Koushun Takami, and then I crafted my literary masterpiece to be more accessible to US kids and adults alike,” but likely that’s not going to happen.

We know that writers can be inspired by other works of art, and Battle Royale is what would be the obvious inspiration.  Wikipedia says that Collins said her inspiration for the book “…came from channel surfing on television. [combining] people competing on a reality show and… footage of the invasion of Iraq.”   I’ve read in other places online that she has even claimed to have never heard of or seen Battle Royale, and that’s simply ridiculous.

Seriously?  SERIOUSLY????  SERIOUSLY!!?!?!?!?!!?!

Should I write a book based on Romeo and Juliet in Japanese and call it “Two High School Kids Who Fall in Love and Die in the End” (translated into the proper Japanese) but not credit the influence of Shakespeare?  That wouldn’t be right.

note: Hunger Games will be referred to by HG and Battle Royale by BR

The movie Battle Royale is a must-watch, and you can’t be checking your email, updating your Facebook page or tweeting plot points while watching BR.  The movie is shocking, smart, brutal and in some segments deeply emotional.  You will miss many of the side stories if you’re not paying full attention.   I just got my four disc Battle Royale Blu Ray set, but the second BR II movie doesn’t match the greatness of the original, so I’d recommend buying the single disc version from Amazon.  Link HERE-> Battle Royale [Blu-ray] still on sale since it just launched.  Please watch it in the original Japanese subtitled to your native language.

If you haven’t had a chance to watch the incredibly awesome Battle Royale movie and have not read the Hunger Games Trilogy, then please leave now and do both, otherwise you will get the pain of some spoilers.

Hey look, I made a list

I wrote this as a way to start listing out the specific things where I saw Hunger Games “borrow” from the Battle Royale movie rather than speak of this as a total generalization. Here’s a quick list of the similarities between the movie version of Battle Royale and the book version of the Hunger Games.  If I missed any, then please feel to let me know in the comments.

The Two Main Protagonists are involved in a Love Triangle
BR Shuya-Noiko-Kuninobu
HG Peeta-Katniss-Gale

The Two Main Protagonists are unwillingly thrown into the fight
BR Shuya Nanahara and Noriko Nakagawa are classmates are forced to kill, trying to survive
HG Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark are schoolmates are forced to kill, trying to survive

Revolts against authority caused both the HG and BR
BR Youth revolted against Adults, so the adults instituted Battle Royale to keep youth obedient and prevent them from unifying for another mass walkout.
HG Districts revolted against the Capital, so the Capital instituted the Hunger Games to control the districts and prevent them from unifying.

Random Selection of Participants
BR Entire school classes are randomly and secretly selected to participate in the Battle Royale
HG The reaping is a public event of random selection (and/or volunteer) in the Hunger Games

Both main characters lost their Fathers
BR Shuya’s father died of suicide because he could not find work
HG Katniss’ father died at his work in a mine explosion

Both had their own ways of dealing with the grief
BR Shuya found peace with his friends in the foster home and sports
HG Katniss found peace with a friend in the forest while hunting

Teachers forever alone
BR Kitaro was dealing with a family that hated and left him
HG Haymitch never married and never had a family

Backpacks
BR Each student starts with a Backpack containing random weapons, food and water, and other items used for survival
HG The initial battlefield is littered with weapons and Backpacks with random items used for survival

Poison
BR Poison is used as a plot device in a key scene leading up to the end game
HG Poison nightlock berries are a key plot element both in game and at end game

Professional Killers in the Competition
BR Transfer students were added to the class prior to their class trip. Those transfer students were deadly ringers.
HG Some districts train kids to be warriors who may volunteer to be tributes. These tributes are the Careers

Prior Winners to Return
BR One of the transfer students who joined Battle Royale was a previous winner of a Battle Royale
HG Prior victors were reaped again to return to the games in the second book

Controlled forced movement on the Island
BR Map sections are scheduled to blow up explosive collars of students to drive them to the same areas to fight
HG Areas became deadly at different times to force surviving players to go to the same areas to fight

Full monitoring of players
BR All students are forced to wear explosive collars which control their movements and fully monitor them
HG The game is televised, so they are being watched by all of Panem, and there are tracking implants

Start of the Game
BR Initial massacres and team ups and chaos
HG Initial massacres and team ups and chaos

Hackers
BR Students who were tech experts decided to beat the system by hacking into the computers, creating explosives and beating the military and government organizers
HG Wiress and Beetee from District 3 were tech experts who decided to beat the system by hacking the system and take out the computers of the government organizers

Cliques
BR Groups were formed among school groups: bullies, geeks, girls, opportunity, etc.
HG Groups were formed based on alliances: careers, districts, skills, opportunity, etc.

Hot Girls can be Killer
BR Mitsuko is a proficient seducer and killer
HG Johanna is the naked seducer and killer

References to the Prior Winner
BR Movie shows the last year’s winner as a crazy bloody smiling girl
HG Review of prior winners shows one as a crazy bloody smiling girl (I think, fuzzy memory)

The main protagonist is considered a leader who everyone ends up trusting and following
BR Shuya is trusted by most of the students and is only attacked by the desperate and the evil. Others look to him to get them home safely.
HG Katniss is the central figure, the Mockingjay, able to convert others as well as used as a symbol by the resistance to fight the Capitol.

Rules say that there can be only one winner, but both end with two
BR Shuya-Noiko
HG Peeta-Katniss

Conclusion… seriously?!?!

I will still throw my money at the Hunger Games movie, and I bet I’ll enjoy it.  It’s just that so many things from The Hunger Games line-up so perfectly with things from Battle Royale, that it can not be mere coincidence.  Also, for future reference: I’m on Team Peeta.

oh, and about the Hunger Games’ GAME

If you have an iOS device, please download and Play Hunger Games: Girl on Fire.  My friend @adamatomic made it.  :)

Here are a few pics from the Space Needle’s Fireworks Display that I took from my apartment (yup, I live closeby).  All pictures were taken by my trusty Sony Alpha A700.

Click for bigger versions.

I adore the Alamo Drafthouse.  Run by Tim and Karrie League, this chain of theaters is the preferred venue for most Austinites.  You can sit down, order a burger and a beer, and enjoy a movie.  How do they do this?  Imagine a theater that has every other row of seats ripped-out.  In that empty space a row is allocated to a small tabletop and walking space for a server to take your order (written on paper) and serve your food.  There’s a full kitchen and an army of hard-working wait staff who make sure that everyone is served quickly and quietly.  What makes this extra specials? There is a strict talking loudly is grounds for getting tossed-out, and texting is also grounds for getting tossed.  This means that the audience gets the benefit of a great movie without the distractions that plague less well moderated movie theaters.

I remember going to a theater in Rochester, NY watching The Ghost and the Darkness.  Halfway though the movie some kids started screaming and running down the isles.  At first I was wondering what foolish parents would let their little kids into an R-rated movie, and then after a few minutes without a rebuke, I realized that there were no parents.  Apparently some folks were using the movie theater to babysit their kids while they went to the mall.  These kids didn’t really know any better, but I’ve been to some movies where adults are being similarly disrespectful.

Ann Richards

R. Lee Ermey

George Romero

Patton Oswalt and Jason Reitman recreating the famous voicemail PSA.

Nowadays I turn my phone completely off whenever I go into a movie.  I can enjoy the movie completely, and I don’t worry about being distracted or distracting those in the theater. I hope you do the same.

Thank you Japanese Television for making me laugh to the point of pain.

News services have picked up that the delivery date will now be pushed to 2011, but that’s not clear in this release.  It seems that white plastic and glass would not be that difficult to make vs black plastic and glass, but only Apple (and a bunch of Taiwanese/Chinese vendors) would know what’s really up.  I know simple and minimal is good, but Apple’s June press release was weak.  And the second one from July is also weak but it does change around the order of a few words.

JUNE: White models of Apple’s new iPhone® 4 have proven more challenging to manufacture than expected, and as a result they will not be available until the second half of July. The availability of the more popular iPhone 4 black models is not affected.

JULY: White models of Apple’s new iPhone® 4 have continued to be more challenging to manufacture than we originally expected, and as a result they will not be available until later this year. The availability of the more popular iPhone 4 black models is not affected.

If the white iPhone 4 white model has never been sold, then yes, the black model might be just a touch (no, not a reference to the iPod… srsly) more popular by sales numbers.  I feel badly for my coworker who’s waiting for a hand-me-down 3GS from her friend who’s waiting for the white iPhone 4.

AUGUST (I’m guessing here): We are still very sorry for the delay of White models of Apple’s new iPhone® 4.  It has less to do with the problems of producing the awesome screen, and fixing the antenna.  It’s just simply that with the record sales of the iPad and the new i7 MacBook Pro’s, we’ve simply run out of unicorns.  We are improving our unicorn capture, extract and release program, and as long as we can procure the necessary virgins, we should have a strong supply for Q4.  The availability of the more popular iPhone 4 black models is not affected.

So Old Spice has taken over YouTube and started me laughing off my ass this morning.  Additionally these have made me feel guilty about ignoring the gym for… *cough* …forever. The brilliance in the writing is obvious.  Old Spice has proven that it can be relevant and responsive!

The Channel for these videos with Isaiah Mustafa can be found here.

Not only can Old Spice carry a conversation with 4chan, Guy Kawasaki and Ashton Kutcher (and Ashton’s 1.2 kabillion twitter followers), but he can simultaneously seduce Alyssa Milano and Rose McGowan. Suddenly I feel like I need a soap upgrade.  I may also need to go the gym.

Alyssa Milano Series

Rose McGowan