John’s Blog-o-Rama

It’s FINALLY time for the final Star Wars movie, Revenge of the Sith. I enjoyed the first two movies, even though they weren’t particularly well acted or directed. However, if you realize what they’re actually about, which is the rise to power of Palpatine and how he pulls strings behind-the-scenes, they’re actually very interesting. That being said, ROTS has a chance to be the best Star Wars movie so far. It should pretty much tell itself, and I don’t really see how Lucas could possibly screw it up.

For the first two movies, I pretty much read all of the spoilers on the Internet, and even read the Episode 2 book before I saw the movie. This time, however, I’ve avoided all of that so that the movie will be somewhat of a surprise, even though I generally know what will happen. As good as the trailers were, the movie should be awesome.

In a related story, I came across the Darth Vader blog recently. Whomever the writer is, the person does an excellent job of blending story-telling, humor, and Star Wars knowledge into a compelling read. Every Star Wars fan should check it out.

As I’ve been programming my new DVR over the past few weeks, it has forced me to make a “favorite TV show” list so that I can record them to watch later. Since I already compiled the list, I though I’d share it here:

• CSI - My favorite show for the past few years. I love the use of science in the investigations, it’s well written, and the characters have a lot of personality
• Battlestar Galactica - I’ve been pleasantly surprised with this show. It’s much darker and a whole lot better than the original. A can’t miss for me very week.
• Medium - excellent new show about a woman with psychic powers. Well written and good drama
• American Idol - talent is way up this year
• The L Word - a very entertaining drama, plus a bunch of hot lesbians
• Law & Order: Original, SVU, and CI - hard to beat these
• Numb3ers - entertaining new show about an FBI agent and his genius mathematician brother. Hopefully CBS will move it to a better night so that it doesn’t get killed
• CSI:NY - darker than CSI and not as good, but at least it doesn’t have David Caruso
• Smallville - this season has a nice running plotline throughout the season. I’m hoping that Clark will finally learn to fly, and also hook it up with Lois Lane

The following have dropped off my list: The Apprentice 3 (no talent this season and the contestants are idiots), the O.C. (boring), and Without a Trace (no excitement any more).

I have to admit that I completely ignored the first 2 seasons of American Idol, and didn’t watch a single episode. I also ignored the 3rd season until the finals, and then I stopped watching after LaToya got voted off (Jasmine and Diana really weren’t good), since the talent was gone from the show. However, I’ve watched most of the current season, and I’m REALLY enjoying it. I think the talent is way up, and the performances are better overall. It’s really interesting to see who improves each week, and who really understands how to be a performer, not just a singer.

I have to say that I like watching the females a lot better than the men. However, this week too many of the performances were BORING, and their song choices sucked. Why do so many of them continue to sing slow/boring songs? The most interesting contestants, like Nadia, Jessica, and Bo seem to bring so much more energy than the others. I can’t wait to watch those ones each week, while some of the others just don’t seem to get it, and I fast forward through their performances with my DVR. I think that if I actually had singing talent and made it onto AI, I would hire some type of consultant to help me choose songs and improve my performances. It’s too important to do really well on the show, and too many of them seem to be blowing it. But then again, I guess that’s what adds the drama! I’m really looking forward to watching the finals to see how the men and women match up.