Green Lantern Movie Review

Welcome back to Chaos Corner, my devotees of the Dark Gods. Hope you're all slaying in the name of whatever 40K deities you believe in.

I have said earlier that I was going to explore a bit more than 40K on this site, and I've already discussed a few movies and such here. So, after my Blood Gorgon's review, I've decided to review movies in a similar fashion. These types of reviews will be brief (there will be larger diatribes for special occasions). So, without further ado: Chaos Corner reviews Green Lantern----

Green Lantern is a DC character not well known to the mainstream. Comics fans sure know Hal Jordan though, and he has some die hard supporters. I've never been one of them, but my brother sure as heck is. My expectations were low for this, as GL doesn't mean as much to me as say Batman or Wolverine and the like. So, here's my impressions:

The Good: The special effects were really good, no doubt top notch here. There were a few "iffy" shots, but the money shots were fantastic. Most of the actors were very good. Mark Strong IS Sinestro. I loved his performance. His voice conveyed so much feeling, dedication, and also fear and by the end resentment. The perfect combination. Also standing out was Peter Sarsgard as Hammond. He's a lame villain in the books, but here the actor had just the right amount of weird/loser genius vibe going. The director did a good job of making Sinestro and Hammond to be inverted mirrors of Hal. I also liked the (brief) turns of Rush, Duncan, and Clancy Brown. The actors brought a lot of spice to their short screen time, and made it a better movie.

The Bad: There was too much going on- it was another "overstuffed" superhero movie. The smart part about X-Men First Class was the focus on Magneto and Prof X- the others mutants were there, but the emphasis was how Charles and Erik are confronting both Shaw and the emergence of a "Homo Sapien Superior" race. In GL, there's too much to explain, and there's too many baddies running around (Hammond and Parallax and the Senator and Sinestro and some of those Guardians). They could have focused on Hammond, making him a pawn of Parallax, without the big P actually showing up ON Earth. Save it for a sequel. There was some good humor, but some of it fell flat. Finally, the flaw of casting Ryan Reynolds as GL is a big issue. Granted, he is not as bad as I feared, but he wasn't great either. In the face of Strong, Rush, etc, Reynolds didn't pass muster. Again, he wasn't horrible, but not the greatest choice. Hemmsworth WAS Thor. Fassbender and McAvoy embodied their parts.  Bale and Jackman ARE perfect. Reynolds was blah. Not awful. Not George Clooney bad. Just meh. You don't feel to strongly for him; you don't feel attached to him really. If he were better, the whole movie might have succeeded.

Bottom Line: So, this is NOT the abomination that many critics have suggested. Not even close to the damnable depths of Wolverine: Origins, B & R, or Iron Man 2 (admit it, it sucks). It is a serviceable intro to GL. If only someone said "Hmmm... not Ryan Reynolds... he's a good guy, just not for GL...", this would be a great comic book movie.

As it stands, I would rate it 2 1/2 out of 4 Marks of Chaos.

Be well, my friends!

Talos (WIP)

Hey followers of Chaos! Old Uncle Chaos here bringing you some pics of my Talos. It is currently a work in progress, though it is nearing its final stages. Some ideas to consider:

The model itself- The model is very impressive, to say the least. The Talos was one of my original favs, and I was thrilled with how GW updated it. Upon opening the box, I was impressed with the various options (heads, weapons, etc.). I also like the size and "grace" of the model. Some have said it's small. I disagree. Its about the size of a dreadnought, but more lithe, in keeping with DE aesthetic . The only thing I don't like is that the bottom ends in a nub... but GW must have thought that way, because they included the parts for a Cronos, which has tentacles on the bottom. Sooooo- I built a Talos with weapons and stinger tail BUT with bottom tentacles. Problem solved, and the model looks great. If I were to rate the kit, I'd give it 4 out of 4 Marks of Chaos, no doubt about it!

The paint scheme- I have only briefly shown my new paint scheme for my new DE. It is somewhat evocative of my old scheme (red and black), but my painting has gotten a lot better, so they reflect my new technique also. The Talos fits into that scheme, though I did his flesh to look very different from other DE units. It's almost done, and I'm quite pleased.

I will show more pics of my DE army soon. I will also begin explaining how I got into Chaos. Indeed, though I'm working on DE, Chaos is still calling to me... perhaps I'll need a Chaos project or two in between my DE work... the wheels are already turning...

Until next time, enjoy!

Blood Gorgons Review

It's old man Chaos here at the Chaos Corner- this week, I will be doing a new segment as a part of this website- book reviews for 40K.

I have been reading 40K books for quite some time now. My first 40K book was Execution Hour by Gordon Rennie. I did not read Storm of Iron when it originally came out either. Strangely enough, I really got into 40K lit when I began reading Sandy Mitchel's Commisar Cain books. They reminded me in a way of the Blackadder series (Cain IS Edmund Blackadder of the 41st millennium, and Jurgen is Baldrick).

At this juncture, I read 40K books off and on until I began to read the initial Horus Heresy books when they first came out. I've been regularly reading Black Library offerings ever since. The most recent book I have read is Blood Gorgons by Henry Zou. This one is a mixed bag. Let's go through the good and the bad:

Good- This was a very good interpretation of a "non-legion" Chaos Marine chapter. They are not the old traitor legions OR Red Corsairs. They have their own ideas, customs, and even their own daemonic patron. Some great ideas about their organization and how these "pirates" might function. I loved the character of Barsabas. Great lead character, and very vividly portrayed. I also enjoyed the overall plot structure. Plague Marines looking to co-opt the Gorgons was a particularly good idea, and well executed. Additionally, the Dark Eldar were handled very well too. They fit into the story well enough. Poor Sindul!

Bad- the writing was a bit sketchy at points. There were some things that I felt did not actually FIT into the 40K universe. Now, I'm all for writers having room to experiment in the 40K sandbox, but there were some wild things here... I can't get into them without ruining the plot, so I won't (I'll just mention warp travel, and isn't it convenient that there seems to be no Plague Marine battle ships around when the crucial battle comes). Also, there is a character that turns up toward the end, and I kept saying "why didn't they kill him!" when they had the chance? It wasn't just a freak accident, it felt like lazy writing.


All in all, I would give Blood Gorgons 2 1/2 out of 4 marks of Chaos. It had a great overall story idea and some of the characters were really cool (Barsabas, Sindul, Opsarus, and Muhr). However, some murky writing and plot holes keep it from achieving a higher mark.

Until next time my chaos fanatics...

Summer's A-Coming

Summer fun is coming soon enough. It's over 90 degrees in NY right now. There's no better way to beat the heat than to check out the old Chaos Corner blog, and I got a few good ones here:

First, I'm very excited by the new DE releases this month. I'm thrilled with the look of the Talos and Scourges (I can't wait to get my grubby mitts on them). I've been working on a few DE things, so watch this space for that...

Next up, there's been tons of Finecast news on the blogs and sites. Some highly critical, others praising it. I'll get one finecast model and check it out. I'm hoping its good. I've always been against metal- I think its a pain to work with, and I've built and converted TONS of metal Daemons (Juggies of Khorne). I just am not a fan of metal. Hopefully, if Finecast is good, that means no more metal, and I think this is a good thing.

Finally, I checked out X-Men: First Class. I think I will do an X-Men movies review at some point (soon). Just a general post to say that it was really, really good. Xavier and Erik are great, and Kevin Bacon is good as Shaw (though his 'look' reminds me more of Arcade than Shaw, but hey whoever thought we'd get any Hellfire Club at all?). The story was good, though I felt we could have used even more time building the friendship between X and Mags. I'll be back later with a more in-depth review.

Oh, and here's a little thing I'm working on right now...

So that's it for now. Once summer hits, I'll be blogging more regularly, so check it out...

Some Ramblings

I will continue my journey towards the forces of Nurgle shortly. I'm thinking about those early days, and I want to organize my thoughts on that a bit more before I post on that again. However, I just wanted to post a few of my ramblings on a few topics...

First, I am currently doing a new Dark Eldar force. Yes, I still have Chaos (I will NEVER abandon the Plague Marines or Chaos in general). However, with the new DE, I did indeed grab them again. My friends (and my wife too- she's so understanding about my nerdiness) bought me a ton of DE for my birthday and holidays and stuff. Just some thoughts on the army...

I'm thrilled with the models. The army is incredible. It may be the best looking army GW has ever produced. The warriors are amazing, the wyches are fantastic. The Raiders and Ravagers are incredible. I love the plastic Hellions. The Incubi are evil looking (though they're tough to put together). The ONLY things I don't like are the warp beasts and the Grotesques.

Strategy wise, they are challenging, though a bit more forgiving than before. I've played a few games, and the wyches are brutal. It's tough, since a ton of things (Talos, etc) aren't out just yet (soon!), so I can't quite see how it'll all fit together yet. I'm excited to play with them though, that's for sure.

In other ramblings, the summer movie season is upon us. There are a TON of movies I'm interested in this summer. Thor already was very good, and my wife and I enjoyed PotC too (forget the critics and such, it's just a fun movie, no more and no less). I'm very excited for XMen, Super 8, Transformers 3, Captain America, and more. I'm going to spend a bit of time at the movies.

Last, I will be writing some book reviews on here. I read many books, but I'll just focus on 40K books. I'm reading Blood Gorgons now. It started off poorly, but it got really, really good. I hope it ends well. I'll review it when I'm done.

Laters...

Old Plague Marines

Here's a pic of my old, old, old Plague Marines. Even with those ancient things, I tried to do conversions (notice the hive tyrant's tale as a Death Guards tentacle arm).

As for the battle, my old PMs were with my brother's (then new) Black Legion (he heard the call of Chaos too) as well as some Khorne Bezerkers I painted (a bit later than the old PMs, but before I really built my PM army).

Its Been A While

It's been a bit since my last posting, and I apologize. Work has since interfered, but now I'm back with some more ramblings...

Now, when did I turn Chaos? Well, I suppose the old idea for GW addicts like me apply well in this instance: one army is NOT enough. Don't get me wrong, I loved my DE (and still do- but that's another story), but I wanted a change. Now, yes the DE were tough to use effectively, but that wasn't it either. No, it was the 40K fluff. I was now falling deeper into the overall 40K storyline. The ideas, images, and characters began to energize my interest in the hobby.

It was at this point that I turned to Chaos. I have always had a penchant for the bad guys- in movies, comics, you name it... you want the good guys to win, but the bad guys can be so damn cool... And so it is in 40K. Above all others in Chaos, I was drawn to the Plague Marines. Nurgle himself beckoned.

At the time it was the old metal models and the really OLD plastic (the ones with the plague knife sticking straight up and no pose ability). I did like the spike helmet and gas mask tubes look. It was evocative of WW I (and I am a history nut). Plus, I like horror movies and zombies, and the Nurgle fluff certainly fit in with that.

I bought my first couple of Plague Marines, and I've never looked back...