Movie Round-Up 11/14/14

I don't have much money right now, so I can't really go watch movies in the theater.  No "Interstellar" or "Big Hero Six" for me.  I can't use my Roku and the Internet isn't all that speedy here so I haven't been watching Netflix either.  But I did manage to catch up on a couple of movies through Redbox.

A Million Ways to Die in the West:  This was Seth MacFarlane's comedic Western that was unfortunately released the end of May when many of the big blockbusters were still playing.  Thus it didn't do all that well, not nearly as well as MacFarlane's previous "Ted."  Or maybe it was that people just don't want to see Seth MacFarlane unless he's voicing a loudmouthed fat Rhode Island guy or Boston teddy bear.

And watching this movie I'd have to say he's pretty much on par with Justin Timberlake or 50 Cent or Mos Def or one of those other musicians turned actors.  I mean it's not as bad as like Paris Hilton or Tara Reid, but when you're co-starring with Charlize Theron and Liam Neeson it's hard not to look outclassed.

Anyway, there are a lot of the crude jokes you'd expect about shit and farts and fucking; I mean it's written by the creator and two main writers of "Family Guy."  There were some decent laughs about mustaches and such too.  Overall, though, the story is pretty predictable.  I mean you know who he's going to end up with and you know the bad guy has to die.  I wouldn't put it on the same level as "Blazing Saddles" but it's not bad either. (3/5)

Edge of Tomorrow:  or Live, Die, Repeat as they've renamed the DVD release, though in the credits it still uses the original title.  I suppose the latter title is a little more memorable.  It does seem unusual to rename your movie after it has already been released.  They probably should have listened to the focus groups.

The premise is like "Groundhog Day" combined with the HALO video game series or one of those sci-fi shooter games I've never played..  Aliens called "Mimics" (for some reason) have invaded Earth and taken over most of Europe.  Humanity mounts a D-Day type invasion, except as Ackbar would say, "It's a Trap!"  Tom Cruise is a former ad exec who gets busted down to private and becomes part of the front wave.  But when he kills one of the aliens, he gains the alien power to reset the day.  Except it only happens when he dies, so he has to die numerous times trying to fix things.

There's kind of video game logic to the plot as there's the easy tutorial levels where Tom Cruise trains with a female soldier (Emily Blunt) who has gone through what he has only in another battle.  Then there's the tougher levels to get off the beach.  Finally you have the big Boss level fight.  Though unlike "The Matrix Reloaded" for instance it doesn't actually feel like a video game.

Overall I really liked it.  There was a lot of sci-fi action and I'm a sucker for robot suits.  There was some humor, especially early on when he's first trying to figure out what's going on and when he's training.  The romance was a little lacking, but not nonexistent.  Although the Happily Ever After twist didn't necessarily make a lot of sense.  On a side note, Bill Paxton looked in better shape for this than in "Agents of SHIELD" last season when he seemed kind of chubby.  I'm just saying.  (3.5/5)

BTW, there was a preview for "Into the Storm" before the movie.  They showed a storm chasing car and I was like, "Hey I saw something like that!"  It was driving in Tucson on my way here to Scottsdale:

On the right you can kinda see the front

I was wondering what the hell that was.  I thought maybe it was someone preparing for the zombie apocalypse.

BTW, through Sunday you can get two books for FREE.

One is the Tales of the Scarlet Knight comic I've offered free numerous times before.  I just like to keep getting that out there.  Really I should have printed that out and given it away to comic book stores along my journey.  Not that it'd do any good.  Anyway, it's only like 12 pages long so if you have a tablet or whatever you can read it.  It'd be nice if someone other than Tony Laplume ever gave it a review--preferably a good one.

Also free is one of my many Eric Filler erotica books:  Transformed Into a Bimbo (Transformed #9)  Classy title, wouldn't you say?  Like all of these books there are two stories.  The first story is about a scientist who is making an anti-aging drug called FY-1978, which has the trade name Yunagin.  When someone breaks into the lab he gets doused with it and wakes up as a hermaphrodite and then finds himself getting girlier and girlier, until as you might guess, he starts to become a bimbo.

The second story is a pared-down version of Chance of a Lifetime.  A private eye gets tipped to a robbery at the Yunagin Clinic and like the scientist in the first story ends up being doused with the drug.  He's left for dead by some bad guys and wakes up as a really hot blond chick, basically the chick on the cover.  She, with the help of a paramedic who finds her and then befriends her, goes to take revenge on the bad guys.  It'd be nice to get some (good) reviews of that too, though it's longer than 12 pages.

Both stories in the  Transformed Into a Bimbo (Transformed #9) are related and the drug is the same one in Chance of a Lifetime, so there you go.  It already made it to #2 on the Amazon Transgender Erotica category (free), though it couldn't unseat Gender Swap at the Strip Club for #1 in the US and UK.

Download both books free today or pay $1.99/$2.99 after Sunday.