May the Fourth be with you

A Happy Star Wars Day to one and all!

It may come as a bit of a shock to some of you, but I'm actually a bit of a Star Wars fan.

There were a few clues if I'm honest. There are several Star Wars toys (yes toys - not 'collectibles' - they are for uber geeks and never get out the packet. Mine are for playing with) dotted around the living room.

I own somewhere in the region of 20 t-shirts that are in some way Star Wars related, possibly even more. I don't want to think to hard about it, let alone count them for fear it is actually much, much higher.

There is an 18" Darth Vader guarding my desk at work.

Even the web forum I use for work related activities has a Yoda avatar.

The more alert of you will have noticed I sport a tattoo on my right shoulder, which is normally hidden beneath clothing, but is now clear for all to see on my profile picture.

This too, is from Star Wars. I've never regretted having it done, but since 1999 have sometimes felt the urge to explain exactly when I had it done, because this makes a world of difference.

Because once upon a time, in a galaxy far, far away.....there were two types of Star Wars fan, those who followed the Rebel Alliance, and those who sided with the Empire.

If you don't know your Star Wars, then maybe being in the Rebel Alliance appeals to you? It sounds..you know..kind of rebellious.

Guess again! It's not. The rebellion are the good guys, and whereas they will ultimately win out, they're not rebellious. They're a crowd of goodie goodies with a semi-Buddhist mantra, and a penchant for brown hooded capes.

But the Empire...now you're talking. They get the best spaceships, best outfits, and a complete disregard for entire planets.

So when I decided I wanted a tattoo, first rule had to be, it should be significant to me. No Celtic Band, or Oriental symbol that had no bearing on my beliefs. It had to be Star Wars, and it had to be Empire.

Considering that a picture of Darth Vader or a TIE fighter might be just a wee bit shit, I looked for something that an unbeliever wouldn't recognise, but would be clocked by a fellow geek.

Now the Empire does have an insignia, but it's not plastered all over everything. You can see it on some of the Stormtroopers uniforms, most noticeably on TIE fighter pilot helmets. So that's what I had.













But then something terrible happened.

The Phantom Menace came along, with it's silly characters, cod mysticism, and plot holes so large you could hid a Death Star in them. There was no Rebellion, no Empire, just a Republic and a Trade Federation.

The Trade Federation were the baddies, with their Droid Army, so in order to protect themselves, the Republic (with Jedi's as their guardians), decided they needed an army of their own.

This didn't arrive until the next film, with Jedi's investigating who actually ordered an army of clones, as unbeknown to them, they were actually part of an Evil plot by the head of the Republic to turn it into an Empire.

So come the end of Attack of the Clones, this Clone Army arrives, and they look suspiciously like Stormtroopers. We know that they are eventually going to be the best baddies in the universe, but for the time being they are the dogsbodies of the Republic, and general goodie goodies.

And they all have my tattoo on them.



Worse still, George Lucas then makes a cartoon series based around the Clone Wars, so the symbol becomes more and more synonymous with Clones not Stormtroopers.

Why oh why oh why when the Emperors plans paid off did he not have a rethink on the insignia? A change of regime always leads to a bit of rebranding, or did they not have PR companies on Coruscant?

As these are set before the first three films, this would of course mean that I get to keep my tattoo, and the designers really should have come up with something different for the clones.

So if strangers recognise my tattoo as being from Star Wars, I am very quick to quantify just when I had it done.

I should say it was pre Phantom Menace, or pre 1999, but if I want to check for myself just how geeky they are too?

I say it's post Order 66

Lesbian Vampire Killers

Lesbian Vampire Killers.

It seems to be lacking some punctuation somewhere. I know from the trailer what this is supposed to be about, but is it;

a) Lesbians, who kill vampires.
b) Lesbians, who are vampires and kill people.
c) Killers of lesbians, who are vampires.
d) People tho kill vampire lesbians.

If you guessed 'd' then you are correct! And have no doubt seen the aforementioned trailer that gives me some concerns that Messers. Cordon and Horne have pushed their popularity a little to far, as it looks like an absolute stinker.

The words 'lesbian', 'vampire', and 'killer' when thrown into any film title increase the chances of 'their demographic' (of which I am one) watching it, but is this a case of the law of diminishing returns?

Call a film 'Ichi', and I probably won't give it a second look, but 'Ichi the Killer' - now that's a hook that's worth a look. Featuring the Yakuza, martial arts, and a psychotic hitman with a Chelsea Smile held together with rings at the corners of his mouth. He can blow smoke through the unhealed slits in his cheeks. It's seriously fucked up bit of surreal Japanese fare, and I have a copy if you want to borrow it.

I film about a D.I.Y? Not interested. But 'Driller Killer'? Another from my personal collection. Before his more commercial love letters to the rotten to the core under belly of the Big Apple, King of New York with Christopher Walken, or 'Bad Lieutenant' with Harvey Kietel, Abel Ferrera directed himself in this low budget shocker of an artist losing his mind, who spends his nights killing time, and homeless people with a power drill. A nice family Christmas film.Check it out.

'Regarding Henry' -schmaltzy nonsense with Harrison Ford. 'Henry:Portrait of a Serial Killer' - seriously challenging film making, with a protagonist who makes Dexter look like Ned Flanders.

Yep, throwing a bit of Killer into the mix generally increases my interest.


But what about some Vampire action? I grew up on Hammer Horror, and there's no doubt that the Vampire genre is both massive, and slightly dubious in some of it's fare. Yes Eddie Murphy, I'm talking to you for your absolutely risible 'Vampire in Brooklyn'.

And the number of Lesbian films is probably even greater. Even discounting the straight to DVD 'special interest films', according to IMDB there are over 50 'proper films' with lesbian in the title ('Song of the Lesbian Pirates' being possibly my favourite). I'm sure that there are an exponentially larger number than that available, but you'll have to Google them yourself.


So Vampire on it's own is unreliable. Lesbian even more so. What if we mix them together?

Several years ago I saw an 'art horror' film called 'Vampyros Lesbos', probably on late at night onChannel 4. More in the style of a mildly erotic Hammer film, and badly dubbed, IMDBb informs me that its English title is 'The Vampire Women'.

Bollocks.

'Lesbos' does not translate as 'women', and even if it does, these women just happened to prefer to drink their blood from a furry cup.

IMDb also informs me of another Vampire Lesbian film that I was not aware of, 'Vampire Lesbian Kickboxers'. There's not much to go on in the IMDb description, but as it's suggestive of a softcore porn meets Jean Claude Van Damme (Kickboxer), then I'll probably want to give it a miss.


Combine Vampire and Killers then you get the charming and funny 'The Fearless Vampire Killers' aka 'Dance of the Vampires. Made by and starring Roman Polanski in happier times ie before he made Chinatown and Rosemary's Baby. Featuring his wife Sharon Tate (later killed by the Mansun family), and pre shagging 13 year olds shenanigans that put him so out of favour with Hollywood, he's now been re accepted, largely thanks to 'The Pianist', for which he won an Oscar in 2002. Dig out this 1967 parody on Hammer Horror. It's a little gem.

So.....

Lesbian = highly dubious
Vampire = unreliable
Killer = good

Lesbian + Vampire = arty/soft porn
Lesbian + Killer = Jean Claude Van Damme danger
Vampire + Killer = good

If only Matt and James followed this little rule, they could have avoided pissing away their popularity on a one joke film that will no doubt please the Nuts and Zoo readers, who once they've finished wanking at a pair of false tits and laughing because someone said 'cock' will be left wondering what they're going to do for the rest of the film.

Putting 3 of your favourite words together does not necessarily make for a good film. Who'd like to watch..

Alcoholic Hillwalking Footballers?
Musical Jedi Cats?
Ninja Cooking Cricketers?

Ok, maybe I would, but that's not the point. The point is that I like James Cordon & Matt Horne. I like Gavin & Stacey. Their sketch show's ok. What I don't like is them cashing in on their popularity by pumping out puerile dross when we know they're so much better than this. Right now, if James Cordon offered to shit in peoples mouths for money, people would pay him to do it. But if you feed people shit, after a while they aren't going to want to look at the menu anymore.

You know you can do better this boys. Stop taking the piss.

Although, true, I haven't even seen the film, and probably won't even when it eventually comes to Sky (give it 3 months..). It might be really good....

If you have seen it, and disagree, let me know.

I'll set my Gay Werewolf on you.

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

My best Latin for 'Who will watch the watchers?'

I'll tell you.


Me.


We're two weeks away from what must be heralded as geek comic fanboy nirvana. Bigger than X-Men, darker than Batman, on 6th March 2009 we finally get to watch.....

Watchmen.



Said to be unfilmable, and tossed around in preproduction/film rights hell for the past 20 years, the Citizen Kane of comics is upon us.

Originally written as a 12 part series in 1987 by Alan Moore, with art by Dave Gibbons, then compiled into a graphic novel, it's the only book of it's genre to make the Time 'All time top 100 novels' list.

In a late '80s America, history has not been written as we remember it, largely due to emergence of 'masked vigilantes' in the late 40's. Normal men and women, not the freaks and genetic mutations of the Marvel Universe, save for one man....It's Doctor Manhattan, one of the most deep and complex (ex)humans ever conceived who changes the events of the Vietnam war, and now Nixon's in power, and vigilantes are outlawed. Old and paunchy, they're trying to have normal lives.

Sound familiar Incredibles fans? Check your dates again. Been there done that by Moore. Not that Brad Birds film isn't wonderful - it is, and Bird is clearly a fanboy himself, doffing his cap more than once to the seminal work that made it ok for adults to buy comics. Check out the reference to the dangers of heroes in capes for one.

Whether you call it a comic book, or the far more grown up 'graphic novel', there's one thing that is unarguable - it's fucking awesome.

I've already read the magazine articles, and seen the trailers, and on the careful lookout for spoilers. I don't know why - I've read it countless time - I know what happens (but I won't tell!)

King of the ubergeeks Wil 'don't call me Wesley' Wheaton has already seen it, and although I'm jealous as hell, I'm wary of checking out his blog just in case he lets something slip. He warns of spoilers at the top of the page, but are they spoilers for the uninitiated, or for fanboys? Best not to check....

But he does love it, and that's enough of a recommendation for me. I don't think Jonathan Ross has seen it yet - he would have been all over Twitter with it if he had, and I'm sure he'll love it too.

Check out the trailers - they are just beautiful (if dark and disturbing can be beautiful). And if you have time I urge you to go buy the book and read it NOW.

This could just be the greatest geek film of all time (sorry Mr Lucas), at least until James Camerons Avatar comes out...

Stick on your Rorchach mask, your Niteowl goggles and your Comedian pin....




It's time to watch the Watchmen