Chindie

Thats my response to the suggestion usually. Imagine there was someone prepared to act with a concealed weapon in this situation. It's in a cinema, it's dark, it's full of panicking people, theres gas in the air. How is adding another gun to such an incident doing anything but cause more harm?

They differ state to state, some are harsher than others. There are states, IIRC, that allow a permit for a registered and licensed person to carry a concealed weapon, and there is a clamour from some quarters for more of such legislation in other states. The idea being that a person carrying is able to react to these sort of incidents, and more over the idea is that you should assume everyone is carrying a handgun and thus not start anything. The problem is that assumes people doing these sort of things are thinking logically (which clearly they are not), and secondly, that the addition of more people with death dealing equipment in potentially stressful scenarios makes things better. I'd argue otherwise.

I'm not saying that by having stricter gun laws you will eradicate these incidents. The gun exists - it's a tool that serves a purpose, if someone is driven enough to acquire one and chooses to commit a massacre, they will, regardless of whether the country is a gun free utopia or dripping in arms like the US. What I am saying, is that perhaps the US may not have had so many had gun laws been put in place a long time ago. It won't have stopped these things happening. But it may have made them less common. It's hard to argue otherwise - the countries that have stricter gun laws are not getting yearly reports of some young man gunning down people. The US is getting them at a fairly constant rate. If a person considers doing this, but finds it harder to get hold of the weapons to do it... perhaps some will be prevented from doing it. Many wouldn't - they are driven to it and would find the manner to get hold of such weapons - but some might. Even with gun laws put in place tomorrow the US would still suffer more of these things simply because it is a nation with a gun culture and one dripping in firearms. But perhaps it might put the stop to 1 of these incidents. It'd be worth it. And as you say it would also put a dampner on impulsive gun violence - if theres not a gun in the drawer to reach for when you argue with your wife, it's harder to shoot her. I don't think you can simply say 'Gun laws wouldn't make a difference'.

I completely agree with the feeling that it'll improve on repeat viewings. I think it'll benefit from being watched without the expectation (for many) and without the 'I wonder where this is going?!' element. I now know the story - I know whats going to happen and I think on viewing it tomorrow, I'll find more enjoyment from it. It's strange to say that a film that has issues with pacing in the middle, doesn't feel it's length... but it really doesn't. The middle sags but the time still flies by. I'm seeing it at a different cinema tomorrow and I'm wondering whether some of the audio issues I had (annoying teenagers aside) might be shown up to be the problem of the cinema and not the film...

Tonight: Listening to some podcasts, browsing the net, chatting to a uni friend... nothing major. I'm quite tired. Tomorrow: Might have a few bits and bobs to do during the day, late afternoon and evening will be made up of drinking and watching TDKR again with 2 mates. Tickets booked already which I never do. Not going too reckless as I can't afford it and, frankly, don't want it. Sunday: Recover and prepare for the week ahead. Not a cracking weekend but could be worse.

It's not even in the same league as a masterpiece. Talk of that is hype and excitement talking, and a little Nolan fanboyism. In the cold light of day it's not the kind of film that should win awards for anything outside the technical categories. It's superbly well made but theres nothing there for things like Best Picture or Director. I went in not expecting much beyond a good film - I had no expectation of it beating TDK and... well, it didn't let me down. It should be better than it is, in my opinion. But it's a good watch and fun. It is more of a traditional blockbuster than anything Nolan's done, and as said it's well made. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed Avengers more and they are definitely different approaches to 'similar' fare. No masterpiece but good. Not perfect but with merit.

Bullshit. I couldn't find the words, and you went and did it in one. That comment has genuinely made me angry. Anywho... As per comment on these things - If you will have such a gun culture, this kind of thing will happen. I await the comments that 'if someone in the theatre had been carrying they'd have put this guy down and saved lives, and thats why we need guns and concealed carry permits'. A great shame. People out to enjoy themselves, and find only terror.

Oh, by the way, AICN's Harry Knowles 'profoundly disappointed' review is utter nonsense. I was right, he hates it because it doesn't play out the way comics would play out. Except in some ways it does.

I'm just back from seeing it. Before I put some proper reaction out there, I'll say this - don't make the poor choices I did with this film. I completely forgot that a considerable amount of the regions schools broke up today and thus found my showing was the showing picked by half of the area to watch after school broke up for the summer. To say this was annoying was an understatement. Group of 14 year old lads who couldn't shut the **** up (one of which decided to shout a spoiler out right as the film began - had I not had a damn good idea what was going to go on in the film, I'd have had to prevent myself informing the child just what I thought of his funny talk), a pair of smug girls who couldn't stop talking, giggling, using their **** phones or generally pissing about, and 2 geek lads behind me who couldn't stop relaying elements of the plot to each other. Oh and a dad bringing in a 4 year old girl to sit in front of me. The film requires some attention in parts and the not exactly rapt audience marred the showing for me... Anyway, that aside... It's a very good film, but it's not a great one. There are sloppy moments, there are moments my suspension of disbelief couldn't quite withstand. But first, the good! The cast is great across the board - this is the best we've seen Bale as both Batman and Bruce Wayne. Anne Hathaway's Catwoman stays just the right side of cariacture. Hardy's Bane is mysterious and a genuine presence on the screen. And the supporting cast all return to good form. There is a lot of action, the spectacle of the thing has been ramped up - TDK is a positively small scale film on the scale Rises presents. There some superb stunts, some brilliant sequences. It represents the good ride I expected and is a fitting end to an enjoyable series. It looks great. It is fun. AS much as it is long I never felt like I was enduring it, even when some issues arose. It's not flawless however. It does have a sagging middle, the pace goes out of it for about half an hour in the middle as the second act puts in place a lot of stuff. Bane is inherently not the great, memorable character that the Joker was. A lot of that is down to the mystery behind him, a lot more is down to the film refocusing on Bruce - TDK saw him take a backseat, it's the Jokers film. This most certainly is not Bane's film. Bane has other issues - the audio has been fixed but retains the 'HE'S TALKING THROUGH A MEGAPHONE AND EVERYTHING HE SAYS SOUNDS DUBBED OVER EVERYTHING ELSE' (although thanks to moronic kids, even that wasn't enough for me to miss things - not a criticism of the film as it was true for every other character. Cheers children, **** you). Much was made of his brutality. It largely doesn't translate to the film imo. The rating prevents showing the results of Bane's brutality and barring a couple of choice moments, the only register of just how hideously dangerous this man is that is that when Batman punches him, he don't stay punched, and when he hits Batman, the Bat feels it. A higher rating (that was never happening) would have helped. Still, the character carries weight regardless. He's just no classic. There are some silly issues - an early chase starts in daylight and a cut later (same chase) it's darkness. It's like someone goes round a corner and the sun gets turned off. I bet many people don't notice that, I did and sighed a little. The soundtrack is too much - it's good but blimey it dominates some scenes. And so on. The plot adds... unnecessary additions. To it's credit this means that my prediction for the plot is a little off, they added a few layers of complexity, particularly at the beginning. Unfortunately it feels like some of these were added to allow Nolan to 'say' a few things (make no doubt about it, rather like TDK has a discourse in it on terrorism, this film has similar), but he never seems to reach a conclusion about what he wanted to make a point about. As good as some of the action is, there are other bits that don't have the... wallop is probably the perfect word... that you want. An extension of Bane not being as brutal as you want when he gets his hands dirty is that the fight sequences feels like they lack a little bang. I can't quite put my finger on why, in this film, when Batman is kicking ass, he inherently feels like he's kicking less ass than he did in the previous film. This all sounds like more was bad than good... it wasn't. I thoroughly enjoyed it, even with the hideous audience. It tells a good tale and it's a rather more... straightforward plot ultimately than we might have expected. It'll do crazily well and deserves too, and I can definitely see a select few putting it as the best of Nolan Batman's. Theres much to like. It's not better than TDK. But it is good. It feels like the film that would arise had Begins and TDK had a child. I think you'll enjoy it.

Tessellation!

I think it opens today in a lot of Asia so they might have just got in there early. I'm trying to decide whether to go see it tomorrow alone, fairly early, and then go enjoy it with my mates on Saturday (followed by some mild drinking), or just go Saturday. I'm leaning towards a double watch as I find I actually rather enjoyed going to see a film I'm hyped for ASAP in what is usually a fairly deserted cinema. On the 'weak entry in a trilogy' thing, even if this is the weakest of Nolan's Batmans I sincerely doubt it's going to be Ewok bad. I'm now quite sure that it's going to knock Begins into third for me. Nolan is a better film maker now than he was then and he has the ability to chuck spectacle at the film far more than he had 7 years ago. At the very least, it'll be a big ride. I'm hoping that with that big ride come some major character moments as the arc draws to a close. I'm invested enough in this Batman universe that I want to see what comes of everyone and I want to leave the cinema having experienced something akin to closure, as mental as that sounds. I distinctly remember walking out of LOTR:ROTK with my brother. We both knew that story inside out. We both knew what was coming. But as we walked out instead of the usual 'OMG THAT BIT WAS AMAZING!', we walked out quite quiet. We'd enjoyed the series, for 3 years we'd had things to look forward to at the cinema, to wonder how this was going to be done, will they do that, I wonder what he'll look like, he's got to be done this way... and then after 3 hours it was over. My brother turned to me and said it was almost sad that it was over. I want TDKR to give me that feeling, that enjoyment, tinged with sadness, that you've witnessed something brilliant, but that that is the end. EDIT - Also, this made me chuckle.

Wahey! I doth my cap to thee sir.

Not at all. I'm confident that Nolan will have put out a really good film. The only question all along has been where in the trilogy it will fit in terms of quality. Initially I was sure it would be the weakest. In time I've been coming round to the fact that it might settle in ahead of Begins (helped by a rewatch of Begins last week that enlightened me as to that film's faults) in second. I think TDK is fairly unsurmountable, it has a pretty perfect storm of elements and has inspiration from incredible source materials (both the comic arcs that inspired it, and the movies that are clearly in it's DNA - TDK has the influence of Heat dripping off it and I love that) and even the faults it has can be brushed over. Harry Knowles I guarentee will be whinging about it not being Batman-y enough for him. It won't have enough of the comics in it for him. As much as I am a comic fan, I also understand that Nolan's doing his own swing on things and there are elements/inspirations taken from the comics and he's bent them to his own vision. I'm alright with that. His Batman isn't the same beast that was in the comics. His Batman is rather more the masked vigilante than the comics focus on him being a little more than that. Batman in the comics is scary, if you're a criminal - he'll hide in the shadows and pick you off, you're not entirely sure if it is just a guy in a suit. Nolan's only touched on that once in the entire run so far, his first full appearance as Batman in Begins at the docks. He wholesale chucked the idea away in TDK - and I didn't really care, I was still convinced by this Batman and I enjoyed it, it's just one of any number of takes on the character. His Joker has select elements of the traditional character but twisted to the world he wanted. His Bane will no doubt be similar. There's always been enough of the original characters in these movies for me to enjoy them as both a comic geek and a movie fan. I think Nolan might have stepped a little further away from the accepted wisdom of the characters this time, and that's going to be what will really piss off the fanboys. For me, the things I've heard about the film from the select reviews I've read have me increasingly interested in what the film is and not just excited. It's been described as having Dickensian elements, for instance. Thats an interesting premise.

Yeah theres elements to it I dislike I must admit. The potion/oils thing is interesting but done slightly wrong, some of the menu layout is baffling... The thing that has most annoyed me about it so far is the seeming difficulty in getting anywhere in some quests. I'm still only a few hours in, in Flotsam, and I'm being told 'Go talk to your mates at the inn to find out more' and... well... I can't. They don't talk about what I'm there for. This kind of thing reoccurs again and again. Then theres sloppy stuff like having to read a book on a monster to learn about it before going to fight it - cool, I'm ok with that. But then it neglects to mention where the book shop in the town is. It's not even marked as a shop on the map. I had to use Google to find out. I'm still enjoying it but stumbling around the map talking to everything to get the plot/quests going is tiresome as anything.

Ebert does waiver into crazy on some of his reviews these days. He's usually fairly on the money for me (although increasingly pretentious too) but once in a while he comes out with a completely crazy review - Prometheus was 4/4 and basically given a review suggesting it was not only a great piece of cinema, but an important one too. Harry Knowles from Ain't It Cool News is 'profoundly disappointed' with it. I'm not even going to contemplate reading any more because he has a habit of no holds barred with spoilers in his write ups and also because he's a rabid fan boy it'll be full of stuff I don't give a toss about.

Isn't there talk of our opening ceremony having an artificial cloud being made or something? It's lucky we're not trying to compete with the Chinese in all honesty, wasn't there a rumour that they were so focused on everything being perfect that they were worried the flag wouldn't wave in the wind so installed a small pipe to ensure it blew constantly?

Roger Ebert awards it 3/4 and you couldn't pay me enough to read what he's actually said about it because since he got ill he has a habit of putting out the entire plot at some point in the review.

Stab in the dark from someone who is simply interested in science - Light is effected by gravity. Gravity's strength is proportional to mass, the sun has so enormous a mass that photons (which is what light is effectively 'made of') that it generates at it's core are slowed down by the pull of the sun's gravity at it's core, so their movement away from the core to become what we would think of as 'sunlight' takes far, far longer than it would normally take light to cover such a distance

Normally I try to see a film in the week following release (unless I'm hyped for it then I try to see it asap - Avengers I think I saw at the second showing I could, if the cinema isn't sold out I'll be doing similar for TDKR. My mates won't be impressed but **** it, I've been waiting for this film like a crazy person). With this new Spider-man I was hugely cynical of it (still kinda am but thats waned as the film out did my estimations) and wasn't that desperate to see it, so I waited until my mates wanted to go see it. Which took till last night. As I said it's better than any of Raimi's films on the one hand, and weaker than 2 on a couple of important ones. Had this cast made this film, but with Spider-man 2's plot (tack on the origin/Ben dying at the start/and replace MJ with the Gwen plot), and we'd be knocking on for one of the best comic films full stop. The cast blows Maguire and co away. I don't hate Maguire like many do but his Spider-man and Peter are... not the ones I really like and want. Garfield is far better. Gwen is better than MJ and played better, developed better. It's better shot. The action is immeasurably better - Raimi's Spidey hits people. This Spidey bounces around them hurls webbing at them grabs and whips them around with the webbing, all while wisecracking and being a really... kinda annoying presence which is exactly what you want from a really good Spider-man. It's just massively let down by the plot and the villain and a lot of the art design. It's that that makes me prefer 2 - Doc Ock in that film is great, I buy everything about that character, he's a villain of mistake much like the Lizard but he's a better standard of villain and a better developed one for it. It bodes well for a sequel. Which will happen, because Sony are not letting that license end.

Bought the Witcher 2 yesterday, sparked it up today. Played through the prologue, I've enjoyed it so far. The tutorial had a bit flummoxed but I'm picking it up. Looks great for a 360 game although the framerate has, obviously, suffered. Getting invested in the plot already too - bodes well.

I've said as much on twitter. The fact there's a whole TDKR thread for people to spoil on should mean the film thread is safe ... I'm seeing the film on Saturday, for sure, and possibly Friday. I'm going to whack up a spoiler free review/reaction when I do see it, and a heavily spoilered (but marked) reaction a bit later when some other people have seen it, so don't fear if you see me react unspoilered - you'll be able to read it as a hype piece

Saw the Amazing Spider-man myself last night. It's overall probably the second best Spider-man film, behind 2, but beats that in many departments. Garfield makes a great Peter Parker and Spider-man, it was nice to finally have a Spider-man who was as obnoxious as he should be when he's fighting. Emma Stone was pretty good as Gwen Stacey too, Denis Leary was alright as Captain Stacey and Rhys Ifans does decent work as Dr. Connors. Martin Sheen is a very good Uncle Ben too. And a surperb Stan Lee cameo, possibly the best this far in any Marvel commodity project. It was also great to see a Spider-man film that understood the way that Spider-man should move. Raimi never quite got it, his Spider-man is agile but little else, Spider-man is supposedly to be absurdly agile, his should be all over the place and moving like a confident gymnast who rejects gravity whilst on cocaine. This film got that and all the action looks right, helped by a lot of the less... out there... stunts and the like having the CGI stripped back. You could tell that a lot of it was Garfield/a stunt guy actually doing this stuff (obviously not the case with the swinging by and large but they've got that nailed too, it's believable). The film has excellent cinematography as well, it's a film that looks brilliant, shot to shot to shot, and a world away from Raimi's signature style, for the better. It has it's faults though. It spends far too long with the origin. We know that story - get on with it. The benefit of course is that it's more Martin Sheen as Uncle Ben, but the downside is you spend an age sat there waiting for the suit to get put on. It's around an hour of Peter before we get the full Spider-man. And while the marketing would have you believe they were doing something new... er... they aren't. There are brief nods and hints to a plot they want to develop of what happened to Peter's parents (a story no-one cares about and has been awful every time it's been dealt with in numerous iterations of the comics), an in fairness more developed love plot compared to whats gone previously (which in turn makes Gwen a far more interesting character than MJ), another plot they seem to be foreshadowing involving Norman Osborne, and 'Curt Conners done misses his left arm!'. A good 15 minutes at least could have been trimmed. The Lizard is another problem. I actually like the character, traditionally, but at the same time I accept hes not in Spidey's top tier of his rogues gallery. He's in effect just a monster. The film makes a valiant attempt to make him more than that, by which I mean half an hour before the end it goes 'Shit, he's just a monster and we need a big finish... er, er... DIABOLICAL PLOT!'. Complete with a conveniently made computer graphic explaining the diabolical plot in perfect Moronese. I don't know whether I'd have been more or less engaged if they had just gone '**** it, he's a monster, Spider-man stops him, chuck the budget at the last 20'. As it is, I don't buy the final plot the Lizard has, and it feels tacked on. The design across the board is weak as well. The Lizard design seems to be chosen on the back of 2 things, firstly that they need it to talk at a few moments and if they wanted the design I'd have liked, with the full jutting reptilian jaw, they'd have a nightmare convincing anyone that the thing could actually talk like a human, as it wouldn't have lips. And secondly it's a call back to Steve Ditko's original design. But it's a poor design, it looks dumb - there are a couple of scenes where it looks like it's dopely going to shout 'SURPRISE!' with a big grin. The CG itself is pretty good, the design is stupid. The Spidey costume isn't a classic either. There are numerous other moments where someone in the art department has obviously been given the task of making 'something science lab-y'. This is all minor but it constantly annoyed me. But still I really enjoyed it. It feels long, lacks a classic villain, lacks a truly brilliant engaging plot, has shifty art design, but it looks brilliant, has some top performances, has Emma Stone in constant knee high boots and short skirts, and it feels more like Spider-man than any film thats gone so far. The lack of a great villain and a good plot, keeps it sat behind Spider-man 2, but it bodes well for a future sequel if everyone comes back on board and brings their A game for the plot and art design. Oh, it also has an absolutely unnecessary cringe inducing 'America tugging your heart strings' scene, you'll know it when you see it, but take a sick bucket in time for the scene involving the cranes. Because it's hideous. Imagine the subway 'You'll have to get through me/He's just some kid' scene from Spider-man 2, but somehow worse. Fun though, go see it.

I'd be far from convinced G+ will overtake FB and Twitter inside 2 years. That's a very bold claim.

...couldn't get a ticket?

The Daily Heil awarded it a glorious 2/5. With the curious verdict of 'Spectacular - but overly long and incomprehensible'. Given what the Heil knows about... er... anything, it must be incredible.