I've been watching Defiance but I don't really care for it that much.  There's not that much interesting to me, I don't really get where they're trying to go with it...eh.

As far as the 2013-2014 season goes, blah.  It's all crap with the possible exception of SHIELD.  Everything just looks terrible so far.  I haven't done a final look at everything, but what I've seen so far is not interesting, it all has a been there, done that feel to it.  There's not much original. 

I'd rather still have CSI: NY and the original Law & Order back compared to anything new they showed, they're spinning off Chicago Fire, which I like, with another lame cop show and the comedies?  I don't watch network comedies.  At least CBS had the common sense to not go with that NCIS Red show they tried to spring on us.

My main complaint is that my cable feed doesn't include The CW because I think they've got probably the best lineup of any of the networks.  And I'm not happy that FX is splitting off with a second channel that's going to lose me a couple of shows I do watch, like It's Always Sunny and The League.

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Quote from: efranks on May 12, 2013, 10:22 AM

No matter what they end up doing, I have to be honest, I'm not really looking forward to these new films.  I'm especially not looking forward to a film every year.

Why? 

Because I was content to think that we had the "whole" story according to Lucas.  That from here on out we would have the Clone Wars, for some period of time, a live action TV show (also from Lucas) and that everything else fell into the EU which I could largely ignore since my opinion has always been that if it wasn't in a film from George, it didn't really "count."

Now we have a new trilogy plus some other one-off films, which may or may not have much input from Lucas, that will be considered (at least for the trilogy) canon.  Love him or hate him, the six films plus The Clone Wars all came from Lucas and his vision.  Now, we have someone else doing it and I can't seem to get excited for it.

Did I like Abrams' Star Trek?  Yes.  But other than character names, it didn't feel a lot like the Star Trek that I grew up loving; which was mostly created while Gene Roddenberry was still involved.  The Original Series, Next Generation, the movies up to The Voyage Home (The Final Frontier was an exception), even Deep Space 9 which came on the heels of Next Gen.  Most of the stuff through the rest of the 90's and 2000's?  Varying degrees of crap.  So Abrams may have given me a good movie, but the fact it was Star Trek was almost incidental. 

I'm worried I'm going to feel the same way about future SW films.

And from a strictly collecting standpoint?  I'm out.  There are still things that I'd like to see made to be purchased, but even thinking about collecting stuff from these new films leaves me shaky.  I don't have the room, don't want to invest the money and from the work side of things, can't imagine what it's going to be like trying to cover it for a collecting website.  That thought alone is almost so overwhelming that I'm seriously thinking about either closing my whole site or moving to a straight pop culture site, covering everything, so that I don't feel that I have to cover everything.

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Even though it's possible that we could see the Skywalker and/or Solo kids in the movies, I think everyone may be sticking with the (possibly incorrect) assumption that ANYTHING we know about the EU will, in any way, be used or even kept as we move forward into these new films.

While I like some parts of the EU, there's so much contradictory stuff out there, some generated by new EU stories and some by Lucas himself as he made the prequels and The Clone Wars, that I won't be surprised if they dump all of it.  Or most of it, and start over with a clean slate.

I would like to see Fisher, Hamill and Ford at least have cameos in VII to kind of pass the torch, but them move past that and not see them again in the new trilogy.  But I don't really want any of them to be part of the main plot. 

No matter what they end up doing, I have to be honest, I'm not really looking forward to these new films.  I'm especially not looking forward to a film every year.

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Yes (and it's awesome). No (or, sorta).

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With Iron Man 3 opening later this week, kicking off the real 2013 movie season, I thought I'd look at last year's predictions for the top 5 and pick mine again for this year.  Here's how the top 7 sorted out for 2012:

1 The Avengers
2 The Dark Knight Rises
3 The Hunger Games
4 Skyfall
5 The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
6 Twilight: Breaking Dawn 2
7 The Amazing Spider-Man

I picked, in no order:

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
The Dark Knight Rises
The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2
The Avengers
The Amazing Spider-Man

And had The Hunger Games as my wild card to knock out The Amazin Spider-Man.  I also thought Hobbit, TDKR and Twilight would be in the race for number 1 but The Avengers owned all...TDKR did take number 2, though...even though it was over $175 million behind.

I never saw Skyfall coming.  It way over-performed for a Bond film and I think shocked everyone taking over $300m.  Good for the Bond franchise, though.

This year there are some biggies, but most of them are sequels.  I think I'm looking at these for the top 5, again, in no particular order.

Iron Man 3
Star Trek Into Darkness
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

And I'm back and forth on number 5.  I think it'll be either The Hangover Part III or Monsters University.  I'm not sure how Hangover will be, 2 was down and I think this could drop out as well but Monsters University...eh.  There's usually one good animated film each year and Monsters, Inc did do $289m.  Thor: The Dark World could get up there with the bump from The Avengers although Thor did a relatively low $181m.  It did outperform Captain America...it could do a lot better this time around with a trailer that's pretty solid.

The next round of films with some potential, IMO, include:

Fast & Furious 6
The Lone Ranger
Pacific Rim
The Wolverine

I think The Wolverine sinks on the poor performance of the first film, while the Fast & Furious films have been doing better with Fast 5 ringing up $209m when they added The Rock, who is back again. 

We've also got Man of Steel but unless it's huge and gets good word of mouth, I expect a lot of people to pass.  World War Z is coming but that type of movie usually has modest box office, there's a new 300 film and Kick-Ass 2 is coming, but both franchises started kinda low.  I guess Ender's Game and The Mortal Instruments could do something, w/ Mortal Instruments trying to cash in on the TWilight and Potter crowd while Percy Jackson also has a sequel, that might not do much.

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Yeah, I watched it.  I wasn't impressed.  It wasn't completely terrible, and I plan on watching more to see where it goes, but it felt like old territory being covered with some of it.  The main guy, Nolan, is just a rolled up version of Mal Reynolds, Han Solo, and half a dozen other archetypes we've seen before...quite often done better.

We've seen the story before from shows such as DS9 and Babylon 5 and a few others.  I thought the CGI was bad in some places and downright terrible in others making me wonder if they really tried to pass that off on us or if they were letting it look like the video game it's tied into.

I'm just hoping it doesn't get any worse, that we maybe see some improvement.

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Mallrats.  That is all.

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I think I have just about everything posted from the GI Joe Con this past weekend.  You can get to it from the front page of my site or go to the all of the Con articles here:

http://imperialholocron.com/?cat=454

It was a fun time, there was a ton of stuff to buy.  I came home with a couple vintage vehicles, including an APC for a great price.  That's one I never had as a kid but always wanted and was able to find one in perfect shape.  Picked up a couple vintage figures, an AT 12" piece and the 12" Convention souvenir.  Also snagged the new Iceberg figure, the paradrop KRE-O Hit & Run figure and the accessory set for the membership figure that will be shipping in a month or so.

There was a decent crowd but it wasn't packed, you could get around and spend time sorting through booths to look for stuff without problems.  The dinner Sat night was excellent and I had fun at the casino night but came up short for buying anything at the auction.  I guess I didn't know what to expect on that end.

My main complaint was missing out on several of the souvenirs even though I wasn't that far back in line when the Club store opened on Friday.  I don't even think they need to adjust the limits, I just wish they'd make some souvenirs available Thursday night for early reg but keep some back for Friday.  If you buy a Con package and you're there at the store opening on Friday and have no shot at the souvenirs, I think there's a problem somewhere.

I'd love to go again next year but it'll definitely depend on where it is.  I don't think it's a big enough show to warrant flying to, but I'd go anytime I could drive to it.

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