Jeff Strand's Blog, page 62
September 12, 2015
Pixels
Several months ago, I saw the trailer for Pixels. Never had I been so conflicted about a movie. Because having ’80s video games attack the earth is the greatest idea for a movie ever!!!!!!! but the preview looked pretty awful.
It came out. Word of mouth and reviews were toxic. I was never quite able to work up the enthusiasm to see it for myself, though deep in my heart I thought that maybe people were just going into knee-jerk It’s-an-Adam-Sandler-movie-so-it-sucks mode, and that it could be a lot of fun.
Last night, because I am an absolute PARTY ANIMAL when my wife is out of town, I decided to go see A Walk in the Woods. Then, at the last second, I thought, hey, Pixels starts 15 minutes earlier, I’ll see that instead!
Yes, kids, sometimes in life we make the wrong decisions. The only other people in the theater were a mother and her 10-year-old son, but they left halfway through, presumably because the 10-year-old felt like his intelligence was being insulted. Rarely has a movie conveyed a more tangible sense of, “Y’know, we just don’t care. Like, at all. Where’s the craft services table?”
Humor is subjective, so when I say that every joke is spectacularly, embarrassingly lame, I may be wrong. I can say that Adam Sandler is set up to be a nice guy, who consoles our sobbing heroine after she learns that her ex-husband is getting remarried. Then he tries to kiss her. She rebukes him for his poor timing. He gets angry, starts insulting her, and treats her horribly for much of the film…and I’m pretty sure you, the viewer, are supposed to be saying, “Yeah! That’ll teach that stuck-up chick!”
The “video games in the real world” special effects are pretty cool, and it’s not the movie’s fault that the trailer shows all of them. I’ll accept that being good with a track-ball and a fire button somehow translates into being more skilled at shooting centipedes out of the sky with a laser rifle than the military, because this motion picture is not supposed to be realistic.
Yes, the beginning is specifically set in 1982, when they send the tape into space that is found by the aliens, and the movie doesn’t give a s**t about whether the games represented actually existed in that year, but I don’t…okay, no, I have to admit it, that kinda irked me.
Q*bert talks. Who the hell decided that Q*bert should talk? The whole POINT to Q*bert is that he speaks in random gibberish! Didn’t they see Wreck-It Ralph???
Anyway, what I guess I’m saying is: Pixels is terrible.
PixelsMy Site Reader New Post Me Notifications
Several months ago, I saw the trailer for Pixels. Never had I been so conflicted about a movie. Because having ’80s video games attack the earth is the greatest idea for a movie ever!!!!!!! but the preview looked pretty awful.
It came out. Word of mouth and reviews were toxic. I was never quite able to work up the enthusiasm to see it for myself, though deep in my heart I thought that maybe people were just going into knee-jerk It’s-an-Adam-Sandler-movie-so-it-sucks mode, and that it could be a lot of fun.
Last night, because I am an absolute PARTY ANIMAL when my wife is out of town, I decided to go see A Walk in the Woods. Then, at the last second, I thought, hey, Pixels starts 15 minutes earlier, I’ll see that instead!
Yes, kids, sometimes in life we make the wrong decisions. The only other people in the theater were a mother and her 10-year-old son, but they left halfway through, presumably because the 10-year-old felt like his intelligence was being insulted. Rarely has a movie conveyed a more tangible sense of, “Y’know, we just don’t care. Like, at all. Where’s the craft services table?”
Humor is subjective, so when I say that every joke is spectacularly, embarrassingly lame, I may be wrong. I can say that Adam Sandler is set up to be a nice guy, who consoles our sobbing heroine after she learns that her ex-husband is getting remarried. Then he tries to kiss her. She rebukes him for his poor timing. He gets angry, starts insulting her, and treats her horribly for much of the film…and I’m pretty sure you, the viewer, are supposed to be saying, “Yeah! That’ll teach that stuck-up chick!”
The “video games in the real world” special effects are pretty cool, and it’s not the movie’s fault that the trailer shows all of them. I’ll accept that being good with a track-ball and a fire button somehow translates into being more skilled at shooting centipedes out of the sky with a laser rifle than the military, because this motion picture is not supposed to be realistic.
Yes, the beginning is specifically set in 1982, when they send the tape into space that is found by the aliens, and the movie doesn’t give a s**t about whether the games represented actually existed in that year, but I don’t…okay, no, I have to admit it, that kinda irked me.
Q*bert talks. Who the hell decided that Q*bert should talk? The whole POINT to Q*bert is that he speaks in random gibberish! Didn’t they see Wreck-It Ralph???
Anyway, what I guess I’m saying is: Pixels is terrible.
September 9, 2015
WOLF HUNT(S) For Cheap!
It’s SALE TIME! That’s right, this week the Kindle editions of Wolf Hunt and Wolf Hunt 2 are only $1.99! That’s a lot of blood and body parts for not a lot of money. Buy one. Buy both. Buy Wolf Hunt and read it really quickly before the sale ends to figure out if you want to buy Wolf Hunt 2. Or be a rebel and read Wolf Hunt 2 first! You have the power!
Get Wolf Hunt right HERE and Wolf Hunt 2 right HERE.
Tell everybody!
September 7, 2015
“Immunity” In Your Ears
Episode 24 of the Bare Knuckle podcast is live! And, by golly, it contains a reading of my short zombie tale “Immunity” read by host Pete Mesling, who also reads a story by Ray Garton, in addition to one of his own. Check it out! It’s freeeeeee!!!
http://thebareknuckle.blogspot.com/2015/09/episode-24-garton-strand-mesling-radio.html
September 2, 2015
Welcome to September!
I’ve been posting regular (brief) writing updates on my Tumblr blog. It’s not meant to be a fascinating blog (especially since all I’m really working on these days is my fantasy novel The Odyssey of Harriett) but for those of you interested in that extra bit of stalking material, it’s there!
I’m more than a third of the way done, which would be halfway if this were a normal-length book by me. But it’s going to be my longest novel, so I’m only a third done. I’m looking forward to arriving at the point where I’d be completely done if this were a normal-length book.
Did I mention that Benjamin’s Parasite is back on Kindle? Of course I did. It’s only one blog update down. But I’ll save you the time of doing all of that tiring scrolling, and give you the link RIGHT HERE. When people say they like my books, I don’t tend to say, “Which one was your favorite? Which one was your favorite? Tell me, dammit, I’m needy!” but if I did that, I’d guess that Benjamin’s Parasite would make the top five.
Hey, look, it’s the link again! That way, if you missed clicking it in the previous paragraph, you don’t have to move the mouse pointer all the way back up there. C’mon, reward my considerate nature!
August 30, 2015
BENJAMIN’S PARASITE On Kindle
Benjamin’s Parasite is one of my grossest, most insane novels. It disappeared over a year ago…but now the Kindle edition is BACK!!! Get it HERE!
August 23, 2015
Greatest Zombie Edits
So, I’ve turned in the edits for The Greatest Zombie Movie Ever. This is not the last time I get to make changes, but it WAS my last opportunity to make changes “just because I like it better this way.” The next time I see it, all of the formatting will be done, and the pages will look just like the pages in the published book, and all I can fix are actual shameful mistakes.
Here is how the thought process works in these two situations:
FINAL EDITS (changes acceptable): “Ha ha ha! This book is brilliant! Brilliant, I say! I cannot wait for the world to read this literary masterpiece!”
FINAL PROOFREAD (only essential corrections are allowed): “Gaaaahhhh!!! I should’ve done this differently, and this differently, and this differently, and this differently, and I don’t know what I was even thinking here, and this differently, and…” [Succumbs to tears.]
August 18, 2015
DRACULAS in Japanese
I’ve had several of my novels published in German-language editions. I’ve had a short story translated into French, another story translated into Italian, and…well, that’s it.
But I’ve just received the contract for a Japanese edition of Draculas. Yeah! Now I can cross another language off the list. Too bad I have to split the money four ways with F. Paul Wilson, Blake Crouch, and JA Konrath…
August 17, 2015
Michael Collings Reviews WOLF HUNT 2
Why, it’s just plain nutty to think that you might not have read Wolf Hunt 2 yet, but if you forgot or something, here’s a review by Michael Collings. Check it out HERE!
If you’re really far behind, that review contains a link to his review of the original Wolf Hunt.
