Absolutely. I've seen a recent re-emergence of the deus ex machina used without irony a few times now, and it's so lazy. At least the ancient version of the plot device was a god literally raised out of the floor to save the main character. Even then, it was lazy, but it's good for a show.

My least favourite example would have to be movies like 28 Days Later. So ... there's this virus ... that allows you to run full-tilt and vomit blood for more than a day? No. That's stupid. Anyone who has even had a hangover knows that's stupid. Solution: wait indoors for three days, everyone infected is dead. Case closed.

On the other hand, I really enjoyed the last few years of the revived Doctor Who. Well-formed stories, cute story arcs, tons of scientific-sounding mumbo-jumbo, and the Doctor character serves as an entertaining and funny version of the deus ex machina.

Add Surrogates to the list of massively disappointing science fiction movies. It's a computer virus that blows up your brains, yeah. BTW, the FBI has control of the entire world's technology with a simple Yes/No prompt on a computer screen. Oh, and Machines are Evil, don't forget.

I watched a decent animation the other day.  Battle for Terra.  Bit cheesy, yeah, but it was a nice take on environmental responsibility.

Otherwise ...there weren't any films I thoroughly enjoyed other than for their action/effects.  Jennifer's Body is truly funny, however.  There were a few other film fest (TIFF) movies I liked, but I can't think of their names presently.

I agree that 9's problem wasn't with the machines' portrayal.  It was supposed to be a cautionary tale.  It failed miserably.  I'm fairly certain that the short film on which the feature length is based must have been better only because it didn't have to expand on a plot that didn't really exist and didn't have to develop literally one dimensional characters for one hour and a half.

Well natural, everything that you found in Pandorum was there. However, I did not find any of it to be so overplayed as you did. Yah sure, the last message from Earth closed with the word “godspeed”. Really though, it was sent only a couple of hundred years ahead of our time. If whomever sent it was of the bent to say such a thing, then big fat hairy deal.

 

Past that, I found it to be fairly standard as a hack and slash type of movie but set on a spaceship. Entwined with that, of course, were the remaining plot threads (figuring out what was actually happening/had happened, how/if they could be fixed and so on).

 

I did find the cannibal guy to be rather less than necessary though. Really, would it have been so hard to fire up a computer terminal in the earlier scene where they were in the bio lab/repository and just access the ship's log? Instead, the log had to have been saved by someone and recorded onto what amounted to an old style vinyl record. I find that rather less likely as someone would have to have had an idea of just how to make such a recording in the first place.

 

Apart from that, I must add that I read the plot on wikipedia before I saw the movie and even so, I really did not see major plot elements coming up ahead of time. That alone made it worth something more than the usual movie fare, where even without advanced knowledge, one can often tell where a movie is going before it actually goes there.

 

Overall, I would say that it was a fun movie but one that probably will not amount to much. I will give it 4/10 stars.

**Maybe Spoilers**

 

 

To be honest I think you're being waaaaaaaaaaaaay too twithcy on language and reading way too much into Pandorum in regards to any "anti-atheist sentiment".  I watched it the other night and that's not the message I got at all. 

At most I think the message is that without a functioning society or any form of social tether we find that morality becomes less absolute - a point I find it hard to disagree with.  The closest it comes to an "anti-atheist" point is the same "anti-science" point that it's easy to come across in all science fiction and even then I think it's clutching at straws: pandorum afflicts the hero when he's isolated onboard man's greatest acheivement and he's only free of the condition and truly awake when back in a natural world.  In that instance I would also tie the "forced evolution" thing into that bracket as well.  Man shouldn't fuck with nature because terrible things happen when we intervene.

I don't even see the evolved aliens as being an indictement of evolution.  All we know about them is the bodies were conditioned to adapt through the power of MAGIC.... ahem... SCIENCE (TM) and they've done just that.  Evolved in a scenario where it was kill or be killed.

In other words I thought it was an ok sci-fi horror which carried the same standard messages on humanity and hubris that you'll find in a million other things.

 

Half way through Wheel of Time?  You might as well read the last book (which will be published in two separate tomes) when it comes out.  Give your self some semblance of closure.  I stuck through all the books.  My eyes may have bled.

You want a good series that will definitely end and has good story line?  Malazan Book of the Fallen.  Starts with Gardens of the Moon.  It's ten books and they'll be done by 2011.

Wheel of Time.  Goddamn that fat, dead bastard.

 

These books don't meander.  Each one is an entire story unto itself.  These are big books (1000+ pages in Trade) with fully padded plots, intriguing sub-plots and excellent character development with an interconnectivity that blends the tales wonderfully together.  The back story is impressive and what I think is the most masterful aspect of the writing is that the stories span a world telling separate and connected tales that culminate or will culminate in a great convergence.  (Convergence is, if a cliched plot device, the basis of Erikson's story telling.)

Yeah.  You gave up, which was smart.  My comment about the fat, dead bastard wasn't just for fun.  Robert Jordan died before he finished writing the series.

 

Yes. It is a good series. Be aware however that several sagas in the world of Midkemia move to other characters, and at a later date from previous titles. It is a developing world, and some characters end up staying...while most do not.

 

However, it has gotten back to it's roots with the latest saga, and are back to dealing with the characters that introduced me to the series. Start with Magician. 

 

http://www.amazon.com/Magician-Apprentice-Riftwar-Raymond-Feist/dp/0553564943/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1255164806&sr=1-2

 

Theres a link. Raymond Feist does a good job, even if he frequently leads you off on a false path of thinking how it will develop with tricky foreshadowing.

 

Which you don't see until after the event happens. Then you smack yourself in the face for thinking about the situations all in the wrong way, and predicting an entirely different outcome.

 

However, I find Jim Butcher to do an even better job of this. I'm hooked on the Codex Alera series right now. The main character, Tavi, is on a world where (from what I can gather, speculating here) citizens from Rome somehow fell through a portal or something and developed instead of technologically, on symbiotic creatures of this new world. They tie in both Roman military, honorary titles, and logistics/siege weaponry...everything. The only thing that was confirmed was that the humans on this planet were not originally from there. Anyway, Tavi is basically the only person that can't use these symbiotic creatures, so he has to compensate by use of his mind. He is generally treated as an invalid, but repeatedly proves himself capable.

 

As for wheel of time, Robert Jordan is a good writer. He is very detailed. Unfortunately, he gets into great details about things that don't concern the story or anything of real interest. He can go pages describing a wall, or a meadow, castle, building...etc. 

 

Also, I DESPISE his depiction of women. I want to strangle them. I remember getting to a section with the women..and then skipping ahead, glancing at the end of that section, and moving on. I recall doing this more than once.

 

They are just badly made characters. Now Perrin, Matt and Rand are all interesting in their own respective ways. Rand less so than Matt and Perrin.

 

I would say Matt is probably the best designed character in that series.

 

 

 

Anyway, I would suggest Codex Alera first, as it is a shorter romp. http://www.jim-butcher.com/ should have some information on it, as well as prologues into the books so you can read a little first.

 

After that I'd move to the riftwar books. They are fun, and there are characters from them that are so well fleshed out you can't forget them. Jimmy the Hand was probably the most infamous one.

 

 

 

I could recommend a large number of other series...I have a great love of fantasy books. I generally find character development, plot, and believability of character actions to be the most important things.

In other words, characters that are thoughtful and surprise you with things that you might not have considered in their place. There is nothing worse to me than watching a character panic, and the solution is right in front of them.

 

That is one reason why most horror films I don't see how anyone can find frightening. The characters are not believable, they are only there as a matter of convenience most of the time for someone else to fulfill a role. 

 

I don't find that good entertainment unless the movie is so bad it is laughable. Of course, your preferences may vary. What I like you might not!

 

 

Fire and Ice I found to be pretty good. I would say, I give it a 7/10. The boxes thing was priceless, as well as the "pure" people.

Codex Alera I give an 8/10. I am repeatedly surprised by Jim Butcher's talent at storytelling. (If you want a more modern-themed fiction there are the Dresden Files he writes as well)

Wheel of Time I give a 4/10. 6/10 without the female characters dulling it up by not doing anything entertaining but gossiping with each other. 

Riftwar I'd say starts at a 9..then drops to a 6. It goes from 6-7 until the latest saga where it comes back up to an 8. (it's like 30 or so books) Expect a lot of intrigue in these books. They revolve around it.

Chronicles of Amber I'd give a 7-8. The first book is kind of terrible, but then it gets progressively better and better. 

Wizard of Earthsea series (from the 60s ad 70s) I give a 5-6. It's a good story. The Sci Fi movie doesn't really do it justice. There is little intrigue though honestly, it is pretty much a straight-cut story, with pretty predictable characters.

The Innocent Mage, and the Awakened Mage (Kingmaker, Kingbreaker) I would give a 7/10. It is only two books, but pretty enthralling for a short story.

 

There are so many others...I would suggest Kingdom for Sale, and a whole slew of other good books and series. I don't really know where to start. 

 

 

Magician was actually the book that got me into reading, it is a very good book, i cannot imagen someone not liking it. Then again people have differant tastes. It is far better than any of the Wheel of time stuff. Just ignore that the main charicter has the worst name in all of history "Pug", maybe that is just me though who is annoyed by that name.

 

Robert Jorden was a good writer, i like how he writes he just got some very bad ideas. I 100% agree about the woman in the books, tbh they were pretty much just steriotypes and annoying ones at that. I quite liked Perrin but god matt annoyed me some times, atleast he was interesting most of the time. Rand was ok, good in the begining and boring by the time i stoped reading.

 

 

 

ARGH.

 

OK I made a mistake.

 

I mixed up the wizard's first rule series with fire and ice. Wizard's first rule gets that rating.

 

How did you not like that series? The last few books were fairly well done I thought. It didn't start out the smoothest, but it progressed pretty quickly.

 

Anyway, on to George R.R. Martin's Song of Fire and Ice...I FUCKING HATE IT.

 

IT IS TERRIBLE.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hate it because I want to read the next one and there is no real release date. It took 5 years for the last book..and it's already been 4 years since the last one.. It was 2 years between the first two!  I'm convinced he just wants to make me suffer. I think I dreamed about that damn frozen wall after reading about it again and again and again so much through that last book.

 

I have to say, he is a good writer. But I hate that it takes forever for a new book. 

 

 

 

There are some books that I go through like drinking something. I went through this series like that, and then was left with nothing and no conclusion, as well as no time frame for the next drink. I go through the Codex series as well like this, but  Jim Butcher releases a new novel in the series yearly. I can't stress how happy that makes me, especially with no diminished quality whatsoever. He also manages to continue writing Dresden novels. I'm not sure how he does all of it at once. 

 

 

He originally planned for Codex Alera to be a 3 book series, but he ended up having to split the story up into more books as he wrote it. One month two weeks until the last book, book six....

 

 

*glee*