Watch The Thrones, Week Two

Episode 2, Season 3

For this installment DJ Undacut decided to post a series of correspondence between Dublin and himself via text message.

D: First of all: “Everybody hates the cave people!”

UC: ??????

D: Nevermind.

UC: You like?

D: Yes. You?

UC: Fa sho. Any episode that got that much Margaery cleavage-I'm on board.

D: A lot of changes from the book right?

UC: ???

D: It's different. The big one for me was the scene between Catelyn and Talisa. Where she tells the story about praying for Jon Snow.

UC: Not in the book?

D: Don’t think so. I think the show wanted to make Cat more likable- they threw that in.

UC: She’s a bitch.

D: She has a rough go of it.

UC: Word up. No one get’s shit on more than Catelyn Stark!

D: I liked that long shot of Sansa when she was questioned about Joffery by Margaery and her grandma. You know what it reminded me of?

UC: ???

D: The Sopranos.

UC: ???

D: Remember that episode where Dr. Melfi got raped and the whole time you're waiting for her to tell Tony so he can dish out some revenge? There’s the same sort of long shot of Melfi after he asks her if she’s alright during a session.

UC: O.K.

D: You want Melfi to tell the truth so bad! In this case Sansa does.

UC: And theTyrells don’t trip. They’re just like: “Joffery’s a monster. Okay.” Like it’s no big deal.

D: The Tyrell’s may be underestimating just how evil that little bastard is.

UC: Or the Tyrell’s are some serious bad ass’s.

D: True. BTW, let’s give a shout out to Jack Gleason for playing Joffery to the hilt. He kills it.

UC: If I was him I would make sure that my agent had some nice guy parts lined up ASAP. Otherwise he’s going to be Joffery for life.

D: He’s that good!

UC: BTW, besides Jack Gleason these kids be getting big.

D: ???

UC: You see Bran? He’s like 35 already.

D: Good point. This season is supposed to be a few weeks or some days since Season 2 and Isaac Wright has gone from kid to young man.

UC: Sansa too. The girl sprouted!

D: I guess so.

UC: Another reason why these books be unfilmable.

D: Don’t say that! I’m loving the Merry Men btw.

UC: ????

D: The Brotherhood. They remind me of Robin and his Merry Men. They did in the books too.

UC: I like the wolves. I want a wolf homie to hang with.

D: Almost forgot. Theon!

UC: What’s he doing there? He’s not supposed to even be around.

D: In the books he wasn’t. The torture scenes were all “off screen”.

UC: I guess HBO can’t resist showing a pick going up someone’s finger nail.

D: A nipple last week, a finger nail this week. What’s next?

UC: We’ll have to wait and see. Peace!

D: Bye.

Watch The Thrones: Week One

Episode One, Season Three.

By DJ Undacut.

Bam, we back in it like we never left.

How dope is it when a show starts with just creepy noise on the soundtrack and black on the screen? Game of Thrones did it to ring in the new season and I loved it. Fat Sam is running like he’s late for dinner and we’re scratching our heads like, ‘huh? What? Where we at?” The Night’s Watch has just gone through some shit obviously but we don’t know what for (well we kind’a know. Zombies you bitches!). That first scene made the hairs on my neck salute because it reminded me of the first scene of the very first season, when some Brothers of the Night’s Watch run into weirdos with blue eyes and we didn’t know what the hell was going on but we knew we were intrigued.

So, after a long hiatus Game of Thrones is back and everybody is horney for it. We all need something good because there still ain't shit on TV. We would go to the movies but all they got is dipshit James Franco in Spring Breakers in one theater and dumb shit James Franco in a bullshit Wizard of Oz in the other and we don’t give a flying rat’s ass about either of ‘em.

HBO needs some good shit bad right now, because you know what? Phil Spector did not cut it Home Box Office, that shit sucked. Written and directed by David Mamet: still sucked. Starred Helen Mirren: still sucked. Starred Tony Montana is some of the wackiest Nicky Minaj meets Mozart wigs and it STILL sucked. Nothing like some dragon’s breath to just clear all the bullshit away.

Within the first ten minutes of Season Three’s first episode we got one of the best scenes ever with your boy Tierrion getting told by Poppa Lannister just how much he hates his own halfling son. Some harsh shit right there. Infact, that kind of made me wince more than when the slave master cuts off another man’s nipple. Let’s hear it for Charles Dance people! Nobody could have pulled off a better Tywin Lannister and without a good Tywin then this show just ain't gonna float, feel me?

Has the show ever looked so pretty by the way? Maybe it was this dank but the scenes shot in the harbors of Kings Landing were off the chain. Long rocky battlements surrounded by a vast blue ocean, that’s my shit. Especially after I have my bowl of grapes.

Seeing these characters interacting again was like seeing your best friends at school after a long summer. Call me a sick bastard but Queen Cersei still turns me on, especially when she’s at her coldest, plotting someone’s demise. Davos is my dog and is finally becoming the defined character that he is in the book. And it’s always good to see little Miss Dragon pants Daenerys Targaryen hanging out with her fire breathing pitbull pups.

You know who Ser Jorah Mormont reminds me of in this show? Roger Moore, for real. Which is way off. In the books he’s this big hairy dude (he’s called The Bear for pity’s sake) but on the show he’s James Bond from the 70’s. Either way it was good to see him again too.

It really is some shit to watch how the show creates the same situations and characters from the book but in a quicker and simpler way. I know haters be hating but I can’t. I like how David Benioff and D.B. Weiss pull off the world without going into mad detail and getting bogged down. They nail all the little things that are so essential to this series, the main points that make the characters of the Seven Kingdoms come alive.

I gotta say though: I feel bad for all you newcomers trying to jump into the show without seeing the first two seasons or reading the books. For you it must of been like: “Hmm, well those actors seem good,” and “Oh wow, that’s a pretty shot of an ocean” but overall you must have been like: “God damn this is some boring ass shit!” All we really had this episode were some one on one scenes between characters with dialogue. There were about five seconds of dragons, the nipple chop, and Bronn about to get his dick wet, but other that, not much action and very little sex.

So what are you waiting for?? Get streaming or DVD’ing and catch your ass up on the world of GOT because shit is about to go down. And don’t sleep on the books! My man RR made everything you're seeing up in his mind, years before Sean Bean ever bent over for a head chop. Get it cracking!

See you next week.

04-01-13

Watch The Thrones

Starting this week:

DJ Undacut will be truly getting his nerd on by following along to HBO’s Season Three of Game of Thrones and making snide comments, comparisons to the books, etc. Since there are only 4,677,982 places on the internet that blog about GOT we thought we would make Dublin’s World the 4,677,983rd place just so we can hit that magic number.

For those not aware, DJ Undacut has fallen very much in love with the world that George RR Martin has created and is fascinated to watch television try to recreate it. These books were written in reaction to the limitations of the film and television world, so to see that world try it’s damndest to keep up with a massive epic is enjoyable. DJ Undacut doesn’t get mad when the show fails, that’s too nerdy, he embraces it. There were times that both Season 1 and 2 went off the master script that Martin wrote but for DJ Undacut, that is just as interesting as watching a faithful recreation of the books page by page.

DJ Undacut’s Predictions:

- they are going to have to chop maaaaad chunks of Book Three for this season or else the actress that play Aria is going to be 67 years old by Season 5.

-there is going to be hella sex.

-this season is going to end with a wedding.

For his previous thoughts on Game of Thrones the television show click here:

http://dublinsworld.blogspot.com/2012/07/my-weekend-with-game-of-thrones.html

After watching an episode on Sunday night feel free to make it your ritual to join us here on Dublin’s World on Monday and get DJ Undacut’s round up on how the television show succeeded, failed, fell flat, whatever. And no spoilers.

-Happy Easter!

When Dumb Songs Win

We try to tune it out: the traffic, the constant barrage of people's opinions, environmental meltdown, the economy, and most difficult of all, the current commercial radio play list. Many of us find ourselves in conditions where we have no choice but listen to the top 40 "hits", and holy Christ, just when we think it can't get any worse, it gets worse.  
        Unfortunately, after hearing a song 345,666 times, and no matter how much this song may insult our intelligence and sense of decency, no matter how much our conscious mind hates if, we’ll still catch ourselves humming it while we wash the dishes at night. That's when we realize we're part of the problem.
        So we except that we're a brainwashed slobs like everyone else while also coming to terms with the fact that some of these current hits might appeal to us. I'll offer myself and the song "All Gold Everything" by Trinidad James as an example.
        I don't know anything about James, I haven't heard his other songs or followed his career, but "All Gold Everything" is a pretty dumb song. The lyrics mean nothing, just gibberish where he name drops both strip clubs and colleges (gotta love the irony of our age). It breaks no new ground, with lyrics so dumb they almost take pride in being "anti-clever". In fact, the delivery itself is so weak that the phrasing becomes hesitant and off beat, making the listener wonder if Trinidad James even possesses the most basic of rap skills. In the end it doesn't even matter, I still like it.
       Mostly it's the beat I like, one of those simple loops with just enough menace to it to where anybody can bob their head and feel cool. My fondness for the song also stems from a misunderstanding when I first heard it. After James says: "Gold all in my chain / Gold all in my ring / Gold all in my watch" he says: "Don’t believe jus’ watch". I thought when I first heard it the line was "Don't believe in your watch". I thought: ‘huh, don't believe in your watch? That's weird. I guess he's saying he's so dismissive of his rival's belongings that he doesn't even believe in them. That's quirky and kind of original. It's still pretty dumb but it shows a funny kind of twist on bragging.'
        Of course I was wrong, which was pointed out to me by a friend's eight year old daughter. Not that I minded much because I still like the song. Just to be clear: this happens rarely. I really don't care for any of Clear Channel's playlist these days. Drake's radio hits make me sleepy and "I'm Different" just sucks no matter how many times you hear it (I don't want to be harsh, I think 2 Chainz may have a severe mental disability, God bless him). But when "All Gold Everything" comes on I can't help but grin and nod my head a bit. Sometimes a dumb songs wins.

 03-22-13

Hope Dies in a Dental Chair

My war with the dentists continues. For those of you not aware of this, I touched on it some years back right here on Dublin's World: http://dublinsworld.blogspot.com/2010/11/soul-of-dentist.html

My latest run it with the Dental Establishment came about because of my wonderful teeth grinding habit. Due to anxiety and stress I grind the hell out of them while I'm sleeping to the point that it is effecting my jaw and the only means to battle it is a special mouth guard (doesn't that sound relaxing? Sleeping with a chunk of plastic in your mouth?)

A few years ago, after going through a long and torturous experience with a Dentist from Hell (actually Tehran, but who gives a shit), I found a new dentist and explained the whole mouth guard situation to him. This new dentist then counter explained that before getting fitted for a mouth guard I would first need a couple of caps, my wisdom teeth out, and a redo of everything the Dentist from Hell had done. This wasn't good news to say the least but who was I to argue? I hadn't spent numerous years and pissed a ton of money away to get through dental school. I wasn't a "doctor" (I wish with all my heart that I could type those quotes four times bigger so I could mock the bastards just a little more).

I mean really, how unimaginative do you have to be to decide that you're going to be a dentist? And don't tell me the line about "wanting to help people". These people are sick and greedy, there's no "help" or charity involved. Regardless of the money, who wants to spend their days up in people's mouths, scraping and gouging with metal instruments? I would say: the same people that took part in the Spanish Inquisition 500 years ago; sick psychopathic freaks.

Back to my current battle: a year goes by and various projects are performed on my mouth, not by the new dentist himself but his many assistants and other doctors that lurk about the office after being recruited from various dark corners of Eastern Europe. Not only do they have thick accents but they all seem to mumble for some reason and that’s only when they speak. Mostly they are silent. They don't explain what it is that they're actually doing, forcing you to drag everything out of them. It's MY mouth! I've made money with this thing you lazy marble mouthed morons (and not on the street you sick bastards).

This last time was the worst. I was supposed to come in and have a crown put in that had been prepped a few weeks before. The procedure was supposed to take thirty to forty minutes and due to my own shitty schedule, it had to be done on a Saturday.

I come in around noon and one of the "doctors" from beyond the Iron Curtain goes to work on it with a couple of her dickish assistants. It's the weekend and no one wants to be there. I choose to keep my resentment on the downlow, hiding it behind a thin mask of false cheer while the german dentist and her assistants hide nothing, answering my questions with short curt replies, their faces permanently sour with carved frowns.

The German then pops the temporary and attempts to insert the new cap, pushing and shoving it between my remaining healthy teeth. Her breath is bad, pumping point blank into my face. The cap doesn’t fit at all, it was either made by someone who didn’t know what they were doing or, more likely, the German doctor and her assistants have grabbed the wrong cap and are trying to apply it to the wrong mouth. She tries to grind it down to make it fit but it’s no good. This goes on for forty five minutes until I suggest that they insert another temporary and order another cap.

“No, no, no,” she mumbles through a thick cloud of breath. “It vill verk. It vill verk.”

She grinds it down ten or fifteen more times, an hour and a half now gone by, then she disappears. Forty five minutes pass in which I make phone calls and send texts cursing her and all her fellow dentists. I take the opportunity to go on Yelp and pull up the dentist, just to see. There is one yellow star marked with ten reviews, all negative. Not only are there mentions of bad attitudes and shoddy work, some also make claims of impropriety regarding the bills and rates. One reviewer goes as far as saying the main dentist is a criminal and that his brother’s practice is being shut down one town over due to charges of fraud.

I’ve got to say, I don’t use Yelp much at all, maybe once or twice a year for a restaurant, but this makes me a believer. I am going to Yelp the shit out of everything now. Here I am, in the middle of a negative experience, and I’m able to go on-line with my phone and read about others that have gone through the same thing. Granted, it does me little good at this point. If I had Yelped these bastards in the first place instead of just choosing them because they were a block from my apartment, I could have saved myself a lot of time and money.

The german woman finally did come back an hour later and said she would have an assistant stick another temporary in because the cap wouldn’t fit. I was too angry to reply. After waiting for nearly a minute for me to say something, breathing hard and filling the air around us with her putrid breath, she just walked off. The assistant, an ugly girl with fat wrists but better breath, stuck the temporary in and I left immediately, four hours after first showing up.

That was two weeks ago, tomorrow I have to return to that hell hole and have the cap put in, only because they already have my money and I feel it’s a bad idea to change horses mid-stream in the middle of a dental procedure (I haven’t used that term since the 2004 Election!). After that, we’re finished. I’m going on Yelp and I’m going to find me a nice dentist that’s close to my home and see’s me as a human being, not a single man with a steady income that they can milk for years because I neglected my teeth through most of my twenties. I may be just another asshole but they have no soul.

In conclusion, no matter how friendly or skilled or professional the next dentist is, and no matter if they earn my respect or not, they will never earn my trust. They are still a dentist and you must never lose sight of that.

-03-15-13

Zero Dark Thirty, a Review

When I was sitting in a theater a few weeks ago and happened to see a preview for Zero Dark Thirty my initial thought was: “Hmmm, a little too soon perhaps?” And I wasn’t just thinking in terms that it might be distasteful to make a film about that subject, i.e. make money by cashing in on an entire nation’s revenge fantasy turned reality turned back into recreated revenge fantasy on the big screen. It was more like: do we have perspective? What can we learn? What’s the point?

 What I mean is that I think it’s hard for people, especially Americans, to have any sort of perspective, personal or historical, on anything that we experience until we can have a buffer of time pass between our present lives and the experience that took place. When we get to Zero Dark Thrity’s climax, the night of Osama Bin Laden’s killing, the date May 2nd 2011 flashes up on the screen and you can’t help but think: “Jesus Christ, that’s a little under two years ago. That’s like flipping yesterday. I’m still processing my feelings about this whole thing!”

The film starts with another date, September 11th, 2001, along with the audio of a 911 worker talking a woman through her last moments on Earth while the twin towers fall. There is no doubt that the moment is powerful, there are no moments from that day that aren’t powerful, but what gives this movie the right to present that moment? What does it want us to learn? I guess it’s just a reminder of how God fucking awful that day is so we can get back into that mind state of fear and hurt and anger and get ready for this crazy ride called “The Search for Osama Bin Laden”.

And what a crazy ride it is. When the CIA isn’t torturing people in creepy secluded locations they’re making stupid mistakes that lead to their members getting murdered by crazed Islamic militants. What the movie ultimately presents as the key ingredients to tracking down Old Gray Beard himself is a series of hunches, thousands of hours of agents trying to spot a guy on a cellphone, and finally, simply following a white SUV. One of the most interesting parts of the movie for me was when the CIA is desperately trying to convince their higher ups that this 8th heat signature they're picking up in a house in Pakistan could very well be the most wanted man in the world. But they can’t prove it because the guy never comes out of his room and when he does he steps behind bushes and other obstructions. All these satellites and technology and you can still hide from the US military behind a bush. Holy cow.

Our protagonist Maya never has any doubts. Maya is played by the overused Jessica Chastain and I understand she’s obsessed and super into tracking down Bin Laden, it’s her thing, but I just don’t really care for her. It’s odd because I’ve watched some of the show Homeland who’s protagonist Carrie is based on the same real life CIA agent as the Maya character in this film, but I like the woman from Homeland, even though she’s a complete nutcase on top of being obsessed. Maybe it’s just Clare Danes performance, she creates a real person that I can like, and hate, and understand, and root for. Chastain’s Maya? Not so much.

When asked if she believes that heat reading in the house is Bin Laden Maya says: “100 percent,” and it’s not really clear why except that she’s weird and obsessed. Even with the evidence at her disposal, which we’ve all been witness to as viewers, I’d say it’s a 70/30 really. She says at one point that she would rather drop a bomb on the house then send a Seal team. What if he wasn’t in there? That’s kind of a bitch move don’t you think?

During a high level briefing someone asks her who she is to which she replies: “I’m the motherfucker that found that house,” which all the men in the room sort of nod solemnly at. I cringed, because it was weird and a little inappropriate frankly.

Maya’s big day finally comes when she and her CIA colleagues send a Seal team in the middle of the night and they begin going through the house room by room in a scene that’s drawn out to milk every moment of tension while we wait for the mastermind of 9/11 to get shot in his jammies. When it happens it’s odd, there’s women and children all around being herded by expertly trained Navy Seals armed to the teeth with hi tech weapons and state of the art gear and you just think, okay, we got him. It took ten years, trillions of dollars, thousand and thousands of lives, but we got him. Now, what does it mean? Did we learn anything?

At this point I want to acknowledge that no matter how many movies are made based on real events, it doesn’t make the events depicted true. I’m not saying I’m on some sort of conspiracy theory trip but here we are presented with scenes of torture, and backroom deals, and shadow operations, and characters made out of combinations of real people, and we don’t know for sure for sure that what we’re watching is true. So if someone makes a film that wants to be cutting edge, in the moment, dealing with the black heart of truth that beats within the central conflict of our time, and the filmmakers themselves don’t even know for sure that it is the God given truth, then what is the point?

There may not be one. We may just be seeing what I had originally sensed from the preview; someone cashing in on a nation’s revenge fantasy, turned real, turned back into fantasy on the big screen. The climax is the killing of a man in a dark room presented as realistically as possible, like a big budget snuff film that we can all get behind. Not really my thing.

Again, that’s just one man’s opinion.

02-19-13