For this blog... I wanted to write a movie review.  I used to write them all the time back in the "myspace" era... even before Facebook... lol.  I apologize in advance for the length of the review.  I get a little wordy with my reviews...

Today's movie I will be reviewing is  "Prometheus"

******WARNING******

******THIS REVIEW WILL HAVE SPOILERS IN IT********

So...  if you don't want to ruin the enjoyment of watching this movie for the first time... DON'T READ ANY MORE OF THIS BLOG!!!



***** SPOILER ALERT*****


I think that might be enough warning...




Here we go.

If I were doing a "typical" ratings scale, I would probably give this movie a 7.5 - 8 out of 10.

Is this movie perfect... NO WAY!  But I DID find it quite enjoyable. 

BASIC PLOT -
A team of scientists travel to a distant planet on a ship called "Prometheus" to find the answer to the question "Where did we come from?".  They find an alien spaceship on the planet.  Bad things start to happen.  Really bad things happen... people die. 

See, that wasn't too bad.  Then again, you could have put all that together from the trailers...   Now its time for the REAL spoilers...

A lot of people have been expecting this to be a direct prequel to Ridley Scott's 1979 film "Alien".  For those of you expecting that... LOSE that expectation.  This is NOT the film you are expecting.  Prometheus is more about the search for mankind's beginnings.  It DOES have some almost religious overtones, but it doesn't take away from the enjoyment of the film.  Now, even though it is not a DIRECT prequel to "Alien", it does reference it quite a bit, and if you think about it, the movie definitely lays the groundwork for where that movie could have come from.

DETAILED PLOT -

****** MAJOR SPOILER ALERT******

OK... here's the big stuff.
Prometheus starts out on what looks like a lifeless planet.  On this planet, you see what looks like a man walking towards the edge of a waterfall (we later learn that he is what is referred to as an "Engineer").  He drinks some black liquid stuff and he pretty much disintegrates at a cellular level... you even see his DNA breaking apart (a pretty cool idea).

Fast forward to the interior of the spaceship "Prometheus"... a REALLY cool ship that pretty much has everything.  You see an android named "David" doing things to occupy his time while the crew is in their sleeping pods.  After the crew wakes up, they find out the full point of the mission, which IS to find out where mankind came from.  To see if they can find the "creator" of life.  They land on the planet and find a HUGE alien spaceship that has been there for thousands of years.  The crew goes out to explore the ship and they find the body of one of the aliens.  It turns out that these were the "Space Jockey's" from the "Alien" movie.  They find this huge chamber with some canister looking things, and some black ooze starts to leak out of the top of them.  David notices and takes a canister with him when they leave.  You then see a couple little worms swimming in the ooze and the foreshadowing begins...

When the crew returns to the ship, they closely examine the head of the "engineer" that they found.  After testing the DNA of the "engineer", the main character, Elizabeth Shaw, sees that it is an exact match to human DNA.  David closely examines the canister that he took from the ship, and gets some of the black ooze on his fingertip.  Because he is a robot, it doesn't do anything to him.  He puts a drop of it into one of the scientists drink, and the bad feelings continue.

Back outside to the alien spaceship... a couple of guys that had been left outside make their way back to the huge canister chamber.  They see something moving around in the ooze and it turns out to be a big, cobra looking thing.  It attacks the two guys...  Basically... this is what seems to be the origin of the "face hugger" aliens from "Alien".  The rest of the scientists go back outside and we find out what happened to the scientist that drank the tainted drink... he's gonna die (duh).  Also, David has gone away by himself and found the flight deck of the "engineer's" ship.  He figures out how to fly the ship, and finds one of the "engineers" ALIVE in his sleeping pod. 

When everyone returns to the ship, David is running tests on Elizabeth Shaw, and finds out that she is preggers from the guy who just died... she had "done the deed" AFTER he had injested the alien ooze in his drink... Could she have an alien type baby inside her?  Duh.  Instead of it bursting through her stomach though, she has it surgically removed by a surgical "pod" (kinda like a sleeping pod, but with medical tools in it).  Now THIS little guy looks like (and is the predecessor to) the real face hugger...  After the surgery, she finds out that the super rich (old) guy that paid for the whole mission has been there the whole time.  One of the corrupted crew members (from outside) shows up at "Prometheus" and starts attacking the rest of the crew.

After everything settles down a little bit, the surviving crew, plus the old guy go out to the alien ship to try and wake up the "engineer" from his pod.  When he wakes up, he attacks and kills (almost) everyone and rips David's head from his body (seriously, it was like a scene straight out of Alien 3 with Biship... lol). The "engineer" then starts up the ship, and is going to fly his way to earth to destroy the planet.  Shaw has the captain of "Prometheus" destroy the alien ship, and with it, destroy "Prometheus" as well.  When Shaw returns to the broken "Prometheus", she sees that her alien squid baby has survived and is now a BIG alien squid baby.  David's head calls her and says that the "engineer" is on the ship, and is out for revenge.  Her squid baby attacks the engineer and his true "face hugger" self, latches on...  David's head calls again and says that she should come get him because he knows how to fly the alien ship, and there are other ships on the planet.  She goes to David, brings him to another ship, and you see that they were able to fly away from the planet... End of movie........ or so you would think.

****GIGANTIC SPOILER AHEAD, SO BIG, IT IS INVISIBLE******

Scene goes back to the dead engineer on the "Prometheus".  You see what is the absolute origin of the xenomorph "Alien" from the other movies...  It has almost the same shaped head, but his teeth aren't pointy.  It also has a second "jaw" that protrudes out.  The back of his head is sharper than the original "Alien".  

****Back to the review****

Now for my thoughts on everything...

Is this movie perfect... NO WAY!  But I DID find it quite enjoyable.  

The acting was pretty good all the way around.  The standouts for me were Noomi Rapace as Elizabeth Shaw, and Michael Fassbender as David.  They both did a really good job with the material they were given.  The special effects were just about as good as you can get.  I wouldn't have wanted it any other way.  I also liked the musical score of the film.

My problem with this movie is pretty much the script and the plot...  A LOT of the writing was cheesy and there are more plot holes than a piece of swiss cheese.  HOWEVER, I am ok with the plot holes simply because I can TOTALLY see this as a setup for another prequel. 


If you are a fan of thought provoking, science fiction... you will probably really enjoy this movie.  If you aren't... well, why did you read this whole blog if you weren't.  Boredom?  Just kidding. 

I DO recommend this movie if you like suspenseful, science fiction movies... Or if you just like those fun to watch, popcorn flicks.


Josh's OFFICIAL rating of this movie...

Prometheus :   7.5 - 8  out of 10.

The "magic" of the number FOUR...

This week has been kind of an interesting week for me...  I have been thinking about everything that has happened in the last few years... the last FOUR years to be specific... You see, FOUR years ago, I pursued my dream of working at the Happiest Place on Earth... Disneyland.

On June 4th 2008, I started working at Disneyland.  I had wanted to work there since I was very young, and had always thought it was "just a dream".  I never thought I would have the means to leave pretty much everything behind and actually try and GET the job there.  Looking back on it now, I can honestly say it was one of the scariest things I have EVER done.  And while it was a truly scary thing to do... it was one of the best things I have ever done.

Here I am, FOUR years later, and there isn't a day goes by that I don't miss every single little detail about that wonderful place.  I can still hear all the sounds that echo through the Temple of the Forbidden Eye, or the train going around the spiral after B Lift...  I can still smell that musky, natural gas smell that comes out of those jeeps...  I can still feel the joy and excitement every time I heard the phrase "Hit it Skip", or the rush of adrenaline when circular flow stops in the CFA lane in the plaza, and it HAS to be cleared out quickly and safely.  Those are the memories that I will NEVER forget. 

I always thought that IF I ever worked there, I would slowly become jaded to all of the "magic" that happens around the park.  I didn't want it to happen, but I had read too many accounts of that happening to other cast members.  Truth is...  that NEVER happened!  Not a day went by that I wasn't excited to be going to work.  And very quickly, I realized that it wasn't the park itself that I was excited to be going to, or the attractions I was going to be working on... it was the people.

To this day, I don't think ANY of my fellow cast members know how much of an impact they all made on my life.  And to all of you that I had the PRIVILEGE of working with, all I can say is THANK YOU... From the bottom of my heart.  YOU are the reason I have so many wonderful memories of that place...  And while I can still hear the sounds, smell the smells, and feel all of those feelings, YOU are the reason that place is so special to me. 

Even though I can't be there in person, I still might be able to pass on a little inspiration for all of you that are still there.  Whenever you step through those gates, whether it is at the Egg Gate, next to the Inn Between, or even behind Frontierland, remember this...  There will ALWAYS be at least one person that truly believes in the magic...  There will ALWAYS be someone who has never experienced the attraction you are working on... There will ALWAYS be someone who hasn't seen the fireworks over Sleeping Beauty's Castle...  Remember that YOU are that something special that keeps that magic going...  Cherish every moment you have there.  Always try and make somebody else's day special... you never know the impact you will have on their life.

Part of me will always wish I could go back.  And who knows... maybe someday I will.  But that dream will have to wait a while... And even though my entire life has changed in more ways than I could have ever imagined (both good and bad), the thing that sticks out to me is how special my time was at MY Happiest Place on Earth.

Third time's a charm...

As Eddie Murphy once said (as Buckwheat... on SNL).  Once... Twice... Three times a mayday......  or to be more specific... Unce... Tice... Fee times a mayday... lol... anyway... here is my third blog for your reading enjoyment.

Today's blog was an EASY decision about what I was going to write about...  my LUCKY evening!

Let's start from the very beginning (a very good place to start... sorry, I had to).

Last week in the mail, we got an advertisement from a local Indian casino that their buffet was only $9.99 for "club" members... Before my big decision about losing a lot of weight, we had already decided to head out there for the buffet.  And just to be sure you all know... I ate pretty sensibly at the buffet...  Now... while sitting at the table, we had agreed to ONLY spend $20 between the two of us.  I figured that would be fine, since we NEVER win anything anyway, and it wouldn't be wasting TOO much money.  We finished dinner, and since I had a couple one dollar bills in my wallet, I would give the guy a $2 tip (don't judge me... it was a buffet, so he really wasn't working TOO hard for it).

After dinner, we had a quick restroom break, and while I was waiting for Heidi, I decided to (secretly) play the last dollar that I had in my wallet on a penny machine (fact... I was ONLY playing on penny machines all night... an important detail for later).  Well, I got caught...  In about 3 minutes of playing I was up to about $5.  Since we wanted to go up to the main floor, I cashed out, and we walked away.  While we were walking, I jokingly said "I'm so excited... I just quintupled my money!"... little did I know that this would be just the beginning of my evening...

When we got up to the main floor, Heidi split the $20 we had agreed on and gave me $10.  We walked around, not really having any luck (playing a couple bucks here and there).  After a little while, I saw a game I thought I had played at some point before (probably in Vegas or something).  I put in my ticket, which was still at about $5.  After about 20 minutes, I noticed something... I was up to about $20.  I decided to cash out the machine, and put in one of the five dollar bills I had (from the original $10).  Another half hour later or so, I was still playing, and got another ticket for $21...  Again, I cashed out the machine, and put in the last five dollar bill I had...  Then... luck struck again!!!  This time for $27...  At this point I knew I was doing pretty well, and was already up over $60... so I knew I should stop... or at least PACE myself.  I went over to the bill changing machine and cashed in my first $20 ticket... I gave $10 back to Heidi, and decided to play the other $10... Then... my luck started to wear out...... or so I thought...  Now, at one point, I was down to about $0.40 and I got a bonus... That bonus got me back up to around $8.  A few minutes later, I had gotten that total up to about $27...  then, something CRAZY happened... Heidi had gotten bored at the machines near me, so she got up and tried another machine...  At around the $27 mark, I got another one of the bonus games that gave me a few free spins... those few free spins turned into 20 free spins... and with that, MIRACULOUSLY I saw that I had won a MAJOR jackpot (for a penny machine) and was getting something like 16,000 credits... Or... to put it in $$$ terms... $160.  I immediately cashed out the machine and walked over to Heidi and said "You are NOT going to believe what just happened"...  I showed her the ticket and didn't even have to say anything...  I think her response was "are you serious?".  I couldn't believe it!  I have NEVER had that kind of luck.

Now, for a lot of you, having $200 doesn't sound like a big deal.  But for me, who has been desperately looking for a job for the last 6 months, it is SUCH a relief.  Honestly... I don't even want to spend it.  Just HAVING it makes me feel so much better about things.  I know they always say "Money doesn't buy you happiness"... but when you haven't had any money for such a long time... Well, it sure feels like happiness to me.