#2LR: Captain Marvel

Her energy beams travel in straight lines, her morality is as straight as an arrow, and so are the fighter jets that she flies.  Now that there are a few vacancies to fill in the Marvel Cinematic Universe we welcome to the screen Captain Marvel.  Just as her twin-from-another-service-branch Captain America is unflinching and unswerving upon introduction so too is our dear Captain Marvel -- almost one archetype in two slightly different pajamas.  Film noir this most decidedly is not.

Because of the way that this movie has been constructed, like the Superfriends glass Citadel of Truth, any real discussion I have of this movie has to come with copious amounts of SPOILER SPACE.  I'll have some comments below this to give my opinions of the action but seriously, if you are planning to watch this and don't want to know any of the plot beforehand please skip to the end marker below.


Captain Marvel is well-constructed to be one of the capstones of the progress that has been made throughout the 2010s.  Within the first five minutes this movie jumps through the Bechdel test swimmingly.  We meet Veers, the future Captain Marvel, on the Kree homeworld meeting the Supreme Intelligence while getting worked over in a sparring match by her slightly smug trainer. Shortly after both her and Sensei Douchebag get called into a covert op.

Sensei Douchebag happens to also be Colonel Douchebag, the leader of this covert op, as this group of Kree are taking on some Skrulls to exfiltrate an embedded agent on another planet.  Veers gets captured by the Skrull so that they can tickle her medial temporal lobe with the machinery that Syndrome left over from The Incredibles a few years back.

After getting a few images out of her mind, Veers (so-called until she grabs the superhero mantle later) breaks free to try to kill some of the more expendable Skrulls.  She plus four Skrulls ends up crash-landing onto Earth since the Skrulls had indications from Veers' memory that this was where they needed to go.

They happened to crash-land on Earth in the mid-90s.  Between this and the Guardians of the Galaxy films, there are times that it feels like superhero movies are both nostalgia trips as well as chronicles of adults cruelly arrested in their development by outside factors.  After getting all misty-eyed at both the Blockbuster and the Radio Shack in the mini-mall, more action scenes unfold.

It is here on Earth that we also meet Young M*thaf*cka, Samuel L. Jackson, who is made up as if he's straight out of the 90s too.  He looks young enough to be Morgan Freeman's great-grandnephew.  After a car/train chase including some shapeshifting Skrulls, Nick Fury and Veers make it back to SHIELD HQ to witness an alien autopsy and work on their plans from there.

The next setpiece has to do with the airforce base where the previous Carol Danvers used to be a test-pilot on a rather secret project.  She pulls records along with yet another action sequence, where it's established that the Skrulls have infiltrated SHIELD.  Also tagging along at this point is a pleasantly plump orange tabby cat.  After this checkpoint, we move on to Louisiana to one of her coworkers and former friends, RAMBO!  Well, it's her name but it's not the Sylvester Stallone one you might be thinking of.  By the way, at this point Indiana Jones would be jealous of all of the various hops that the movie has taken.  I almost wish they'd included a map.

Here in Louisiana we find out the one and only real swerve that the movie gives us, other than "Rambeau" not being spelled with an X at the end.  (Come on Marvel, product placement!!)  If you haven't respected the SPOILER SPACE warnings above, you may want to make sure to skip from here...

last warning...

In this movie, the Skrulls are attempting to be peaceful.  Yeah, it doesn't match very well with what they were doing in any of their earlier setpieces from the space station to the car chase to the airbase.  Don't think about the first half of the movie when they start talking here.  It'll just make you kind of head-hurty.  They had plenty of opportunites to not act like overly-militaristic death squads but well, y'know, they didn't.

Anyway, we find out more of Veers' swiss-cheesed memory (cut to Sam Beckett nodding sagely) where it turns out that she was a test-pilot for Earth technology that was probably three full jumps ahead in the tech tree than Earth could have handled or was capable of.  Of course the research is manned by an alien, "Mar-velle", but still she's working with late-80s technology here -- this backstory happened just a bit after Li'l Petey Jason Quill was yoinked.  After a convenient plot device where one of the Skrulls upfits a US Air Force plane for extraterrestrial flight, we get some SPAAACE.

So now that we have the Kree and the Skrull effectively doing their respective heel and face turns, Captain Marvel now comes into being.  She, RAMBOeauxxx, and M*thaf*cka all go up to a hidden spaceship orbiting Earth which happens to have a ton of other Skrulls hanging out as refugees.  (Where's the beef here?  Or the veggies?  Or fruit?  Are they cannibals?)  The Covert Ops Kree team follows behind, another action sequence follows, and then we finally get the last pieces of the plot of the abduction of Carol Danvers -- after she crashed her plane on the last go-round testflight she destroyed the core that would power light-speed flight.  The resulting radiation all seeped into her (rather than Sensei/Colonel Douchebag) and instead of destroying her, gave her microwaves shooting from her hands.

After she destroys the Denver Boot keeping some of her powers in check she wipes the floor with the Kree and sends what Skrull are left on their merry way as Team Marvel blasts off again!  Nick Fury on the other hand has had his superhero cherry completely popped and starts descending on his path to paranoid spymaster, but not without some KITTIE SCRITCHIES first.

Ordinarily I would put up the "over" sign here but I really have to discuss the Kree/Skrull flipflop first.  I can't discuss this outside of the spoiler space though because it really is the only swerve in what is otherwise one of the straightest drives in cinematic history.  This is not Se7en, this is not Inception, this is a plate of cheeseburger plus macaroni.  It's not even gouda mac or anything.  You're either going to like it or hate it.  It is what it is and it won't compromise for you.

I had to reach back to my childhood for the next reference, but the Kree are at least protrayed as stereotypical star-bellied Sneetches.  If you don't have that Kree star on your chest you're not worthy.  The Skrull are definitely putting up a massive fight on their end too, and the movie did not do a great job of defining what either side is "for" other than Skrull desire to not be ruled by Kree.  There are white hats and black hats in this movie but that's all they are... without the extensive comic backstory you wouldn't think anything of this switch really.

I don't know how much of the extended metaphor will apply -- the Kree and Skrull-eetch battle may just be one of aesthetics only while the universe burns elsewhere for instance.  As well, Skrulls are rather famously previous antagonists and frankly it still seems as if there's time for them to be antagonists once again... but if you're looking for that level of nuance you're not in the right spot.


SPOILER SPACE OVER

The point in this movie though is that you're not coming into the theater for a rich plot.  You're coming into this theater for action, possibly for some amount of 90s nostalgia, maybe for Marvel being "brave" enough to send a woman to lead a film ten years after they really should have to keep their street cred and two years after Warner/DC proved that it can be done exceptionally successfully.

It's just that this is pretty much the last major film before the last Avengers film comes out in literally a month.  This movie effectively introduced a character and *possibly* some sort of basis for further plot development, but really it's up to the next movie to carry the story far more than they should have to.  There's some comedy in here, quite a crapload of action, and the actors (Brie Larson and Sam L. M*thaf*cka) do well in their roles.

The moment of truth -- is this film worth your money?  For the first time, sure.  This is a summer blockbuster walking amongst the crocuses of March and there's a reason that they put so much budget into blockbusters.  You're not coming for the writing though, you're coming for the kicking and for Samuel L. Jackson's immaculately Bondo'ed face -- which probably took a third of that budget.

To this reviewer art is more impactful if it can be savored more than once and brings something fresh, new, and novel to a conversation.  Will this movie do that?  Naw.  You will rewatch this film under two circumstances -- viewing the entirety of the MCU or if you want to see a rock-em sock-em action flick.  It is what it is.  This movie travels into a straight line, like Captain Marvel's punches or Captain Marvel's energy beams or Captain Marvel's morality.

Without the allure of the MCU I would rank this movie closer to a 2.  It gets extra points as well for the action stuff when you just want to shut your brain down after a full day of adulting.

Final Rating -- 2.8

#2LR - How to Train Your Dragon 3 - The End Credits

Hello again all!

I'm going to be resurrecting the #2LR Too Late Reviews for at least a little while -- I miss writing them and the main conceit of the concept (writing reviews "too late" to warn you) actually will be going by the wayside because I now have a reliable source for free movie watching.  I do apologize for the hiatus and I hope that you all don't mind.

When you want to go to a place to sit, relax, and drink coffee you can choose national chain stores or also the little cafe nooks that people sometimes tip you off to when taking time to actually meet up with a friend.  The national chains bring a certain level of quality.  Those lucky few have found a nice place that makes even better coffee and is far preferable to visit.

This movie series has always reminded me of the coffee place that's about fifty miles out of your way that your friend brought you to sometime.  The first cup of coffee you got here turned out surprisingly good and hopefully you'll get another cup just as delicious.  You wouldn't be there unless you're in town for some sort of other errand.  It's not your preferred home place that makes the best brew that you can count on, but it's at least better than the BarStucks. 

There will be copious amounts of spoiler space from this part, so feel free to jump ahead to the closing bracket for a few comments about the movie if you want to watch this yet also want to be surprised.

The town of Berk has undergone some major changes since the opening credits of "How to Train Your Dragon" lo these many years ago.  It's so lousy with dragons that it looks like your grandmother's dirty finch cage.  Seriously, at least fifteen percent of the human population has to pick up dragon guano on a minute-by-minute basis.  While they are near the ocean, water-dumping that amount of dragon dung would have killed all the fish in a fifty-mile radius.

As with How to Train Your Dragon 2, the dragons are back under attack.  In this movie though the denizens of Berk seem to be on the offensive first, as they are shown liberating a series of dragons from a veritable flotilla of ships.  The Vikings who had their ships raided (oh the irony!) appeal to a master dragon hunter for their aid in... well, capturing them all back?  They really did not go into a ton of reason WHY the dragons were needed really, and the dragon hunter is absolutely clear that he just wants to kill the main dragon of the series Toothless.  And yes, unclear motivations for the antagonists is a bit of a pet peeve of mine, almost as large as New Zealand being left off of world maps.

In order to avoid the dragon hunter the citizens and dragons all find an island elsewhere to live on that isn't as well-known as their previous location.  The main characters also presumably stop freeing dragons to try to keep their location hidden.  The dragon hunter has another plan though, which is to entrap Toothless with another (the only?) of his type for him to become enamored with.  The plan works and through various circumstances Toothless is ensnared.  After plenty of action sequences though, the movie along with the trilogy ends with a finality reminiscent of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2.

**spoiler space over**

Seriously, this movie felt as if they recycled large amounts of How to Train Your Dragon 2.  The conflicts of both movies feel exceptionally close to each other.  You have a main protagonist who is bent on subjugation of others for nefarious ends.  Both movies featured plans straight out of the Underwear Gnomes' playbook.  The question marks in these plans was hiding quite a bit of stuff.

It seemed that there wasn't even a world beyond the universe of Berk, Dragons, and Bad Dudes.  The Bad Dudes are more often than not on boats... we never even see another *town* in this movie series.  What does this world consist of, one town of dragon-loving Vikings and effectively Waterworld throughout the rest of the world?  What are the dragons going to be used for?  Where are the stakes here?  The first movie in the set didn't really need to introduce more of the world than just the town of Berk because the conflict was so very localized, but once the movie series started importing antagonists from abroad the antagonists seemed to forget to import the rest of their world.

How to Train Your Dragon 3 was different in one major way though.  This movie was designed to be the last in the series and the writers placed certain plot points as barricades for anyone else ever resurrecting the main storyline of the movie.  I did not put this under "spoiler space" because the director has been saying for multiple years that they had designed the trilogy to be shut after three movies.  Crazily enough it was reported that they would be happy to allow spin-off stories in the same universe but I honestly don't see how they can do that because this universe is just so tiny.

Which is why your fifty-mile-away coffee shop is good really only for those times you are in the area.  The coffee there is pretty decent, it's worth going to when you're a few blocks away, but to intentionally drive for an hour and thirty minutes there-and-back for a cup of coffee?  Why?  To sit for an hour and a half through the third installment of this series... if you have a good reason for it, by all means.

And without further ado, feel free to watch this movie IF:

1. You enjoy watching stilted cougar-chasing straight out of the Stiffler's Mom playbook.  Seriously, it was even more delusional in this movie than it sounds as I type it.  I am totally not lying about this either.

2. Being better together rather than apart is a perfectly fine message for you and you're not species-ist... both main protags got their brides but can only ever visit each other from now on.

3. You have some pressing need for closure of the "How to Train Your Dragon" universe and have zero interest in thinking about how the village goes on living afterward... being without their primary antagonist/allies for the last 300 years.

4. Rewatching How to Train Your Dragon 2 isn't possible because you've worn through your DVD rewatching it already and you want something just slightly newer.

5. You still don't really mind that they gave characterization to effectively two characters in the whole series, three maybe if you could Hiccup's Dad who was killed in #2 but still manages to have a sizable supporting role in this movie as well.

(special points to Hollywood in this day and age, with the #MeToo movement and everything, giving about as much depth of writing to Hiccup's love interest over three movies as they gave to the girl-dragon they hooked Toothless up to in only one movie)

I have a four-point scale that I usually grade movies on, it's pretty simple really...

0 - totally unredeemable
1 - I might watch parts of it on TV, depending on the scene.
2 - I might watch the rest of it on TV if halfway through but not intentionally cue it up.
3 - I would get a copy and watch it occasionally.
4 - I would get a copy and watch it often.

This movie is pretty close to a 1, if only because I'd probably sit down for the last scene.  The battle scenes are meh, the message is internally inconsistent, and the universe itself hobbled.  Epilogue is fine though.  I would imagine that fans of the series would probably place this into a three trending to four, but unless you're a fan I wouldn't really bother.

(Crossposted at www.rebornknights.com)

#2LR Too Late Reviews -- Europa Universalis IV (EU 4)

Weirdly enough, strictly speaking this is not one of my too-late reviews... the thoughts that I have below are directly related to changes that Europa Universalis IV has undergone since I've purchased the game in March of 2015.  I bought EU4 during one of the discounted Steam sales.  I had heard that it was more complex and interesting than Civilization V, which is definitely one of my favorite strategy games of all time.  The reviews weren't kidding, EU4 was complex and it has a learning curve associated with it.  This learning curve was not helped by the fact that I had an extremely hard time finding any sort of instructions for the game... I played it for about two months until I realized that I could do diplomatic annexations of vassals, for instance.

I was finally getting the hang of the game though, until I ran into the dreaded update cycle.  The developers pushed out an update to the gameplay of EU4 (titled "Common Sense").  When I read about the update it seemed like it would bring a lot of interesting things to the game.  But when I opened the game and started to play it, I was even more confused over what was happening in the game, going to the forums to try to figure out how things were happening, even going to Youtube.  And that's when I found out that unless you paid for the "full" DLC upgrade rather than just getting the pushed-out half-updates, you wouldn't get all of the interesting benefits.  And as far as I can tell, waiting out any of the DLC is not worth it... the developers will still charge for the previous DLC even though they've pushed out a new DLC, so there's no benefit to try to hang on through the game's updates when you don't have much money to spend.

I have played EU4 for a bit over 100 hours, while I have played Civ 5 for somewhere close to 1500 hours.  And there are two reasons that I can play Civ 5 for far more time and have started far more Civ 5 games.  The first is that while the Civ 5 folks have put out paid DLC upgrades to the game, they don't alter the gameplay for the people who don't want to pay for the DLC upgrades.  And the second is that I feel that Civ 5 has a lot of replayability compared to EU4, in that Civ 5 has multiple different ways to "win" the game, where you have to manipulate all of EU4's different strategies in service to basically one goal, expansion... for instance, I have won games in Civ 5 with only one city, but I do not believe that it's possible in any way to "win" a game of EU4 with only one province, or to build a military purely to dissuade others from attacking.

The last note might be related to only having played EU4 for a bit over 100 hours and only against the computer on "normal" difficulty.  However, I would have thought that by this time I would have understood the mechanics of the game much better.  I continue to end up with bad beats rolling dice on military expeditions.  There are more than a few times that I have declared war as a stronger country against a weaker country only to find out in the next forty-five minutes that I can't win... and when I restart the game and try to use the knowledge I just gained from the previous forty-five minutes, I'll get defeated in a new and less creative way.  I can tell stories of armies skirting my main force, of getting beat to a province by a day but getting the complete and full crossing penalties in the subsequent fight, of defeating a lesser force to only 5% of their morale only to have a far larger force join in the nick of time to completely upend the battle, of having better generals and equal forces yet losing anyway, and having my allies never consolidate their forces with mine against my foes when my foes consolidated all their forces the whole time.

TL;DR: I had thought that I was right in the wheelhouse of this game's target audience.  I love history, I love geography, and I enjoy the alternate histories that EU4 can spawn.  However, between an inability to learn the game over 100 hours, not being able to pay for each DLC that comes out, and the fact that the game is somewhat broken without the DLCs, it's not worth playing unless you have a LOT of time and the money to keep up with the updates.

This review has been cross-posted to some Steam board or another as a review.

Let's Play/MST... Witch Night

Hey guys, long time no post!

It's been a busy last few months for me but the last couple of weeks have been busily spent producing my second Let's Play of the AGS Game 'Witch Night' in time for and in honor of Halloween. Zoogz and I both wrote the script and my sister KizzyCaspy and I performed the voices. You can find both the Let's Play and the Blooper Reel on YouTube at the following links:

http://youtu.be/KlsZXdAH7G8
-- Let's Play... Witch Night

http://youtu.be/YpHz4jlBphc
-- Blooper Reel

All comments and criticisms are greatly appreciated and we sincerely hope you enjoy it. :)

Sincerely,

Megane 6.7 and Zoogz

#2LR Too Late Reviews -- Star Trek Into Darkness and the art of the reboot.

Sequels have been around for pretty much forever in the annals of storytelling.  Even the Iliad had its Odyssey following it.  The continuity of characters and of relationships or situations makes it easy for viewers of the original to be able to relate to the sequel very quickly.  Of course, the authors of sequels are helped as well, as they've already created the groundwork for the story to go forward, they can then spend less time on the nuts and bolts and get to the plot, the rising action that will allow their readers or viewers to really enjoy what they're seeing.

Reboots, however, are a more recent vintage.  It's thought that the term literally comes from the computer term for "reboot", where a computer system comes up after being shut down.  There are BIOS instructions for the computer system to set up and run an operating system so that it will act as if it did before, and it will clear up any errors that may have been introduced in the RAM by other programs.

It's a fairly apt term when applied to the literary equivalent and most recently, movie equivalent.  Comic books had to deal with this constantly even decades ago... when artists move on but leave their creations, it's a property that has already been invested in and built up.  When a new artist comes to fill in on that continuity, what are they to do?

A reboot is not necessarily a remake... remakes have been happening for ages.  It's not as if the original actors of Hamlet can come out of retirement to show us how it's done.  A reboot is in a different world its own.  A remake may be straightforward or it may reimagines the source material in a different light and introduces few if any plot changes.  The remake might emphasize or deemphasize certain aspects of the source work, but overall it does not vary nor is there much added to the source work plot-wise.  A reboot keeps the characters and some of the situations of the original work, but ends up moving off in a completely different direction, managing to make up its own plot distinct from the work that it first used as its basis.

With that said, how do reboots work, and what do they do right?  I recently had a chance to rewatch Star Trek Into Darkness and felt that talking about the high points and low points of reboots would be the right thing to do in the context of this movie.


[Spoiler Space ahead]


The movie opens up on Spock being lowered into a volcano and Kirk and Bones fleeing a group of pale-skinned natives on a planet.  It turns out in the prologue that the volcano is literally slated to destroy the planet that they're on and without Spock's direct assistance this rock might never see the miracle of cheez in a can realized someday.

To escape the natives running after, the two end up taking a flying leap off of a cliff into the water below where we find the Enterprise curiously "docked".  (Ha?)  Why the heck it was placed near the planet's surface instead of safely orbiting I don't honestly remember... much less the nerdy objections to how it can operate in a pressure-filled environment when it is supposed to be in a pressure-less environment.  Or, if the volcano is imminent to explode, why have the starship anywhere near the surface??  Technerd objections aside, Kirk and Bones appear in the airlock and Kirk immediately asks about Spock.  Spock, meantime, is doing his level best to reenact the Mount Doom sequences from Lord of the Rings.

The plot contrivance volcano is giving off too much "magnetism" for the Enterprise to just beam Spock back aboard.  The crew theorizes that they need to get into "line of sight" with Spock, so they have to lift the starship out of the ocean.  Spock vehemently vetoes the idea as he places the Prime Directive above his own safety but Kirk overrules him.  Spock is picked up in the nick of time, the planet's natives start to worship a picture of a starship instead of their previous artifacts, and the Enterprise is returning to Earth at warp-speed.

On Earth, Kirk is caught lying on the report of the incident by Spock counter filing his own report.  Kirk gets busted down to first officer and Spock gets reassigned.  (Here's one of the two spots that I'm highlighting below.)  At around this time one of Starfleet's libraries gets bombed and that draws in the senior command for a meeting.  Kirk rightly figures out that the library bombing was purely a feint to get senior command together in one spot.  Too late though... just as he figured it out, the bullets start flying and the body count continues to grow.

The perpetrator escapes.  He leaves behind one major clue... he's going to the Klingon homeworld to hide out.  Starfleet comes up with a massively cockamamie idea to shoot missiles at the Klingon homeworld from neutral space, even providing 72(!!) of them.  Kirk's crew has major misgivings, from Spock's protestations that it is a military rather than exploratory mission and Scotty's resignation over not knowing the missile's contents.  Kirk cares less as it was shown that Captain Pike, who pulled him into Starfleet and gave him his first commission, was one of the casualties of the terrorist attack.  Kirk just wants blood.  Chekov replaces Scotty as head engineer because they didn't train a SINGLE PERSON in Engineering how to work ALL the parts at once.

The Enterprise gets to the neutral zone point but then warp core problems start.  (I think it was sabotage, at least it would have made more sense to the plot, but I don't remember exactly how).  Kirk, Spock, and Uhura then take a shuttlecraft to the Klingon home world... all the while Uhura and Spock are fighting because Uhura thought it insensitive that Spock considered the Prime Directive over HER FEELINGS.  (If the dude was literally ready to die in order to not break the rules, I think that the relationship was like second place...)  After the odd snit, they manage to get captured by the Klingons... but then the fugitive shows up and takes out about thirty of them via hand-held phaser and massive phaser cannon.  The fugitive asks Kirk about how many missiles are pointed at his head.  When Kirk answers "72", he immediately surrenders... and tells us his name is Khan.

(Sigh.  Yes, Khan's back.)

At this point things get even weirder.  First, one of the missiles is opened and it turns out to be a cryogenic pod containing one of Khan's crewmembers.  All of these dudes are packed in those tubes and it is Khan's intention to recover them to recreate his own group of followers.  He also tells Kirk of the skunkworks he worked at somewhere around Jupiter where one of the Starfleet admirals (Marcus) was creating major weapons of war. Khan has been helping to design and build battlecruisers.  I didn't quite catch if it was the case, but it may have been verboten by agreements with other groups (e.g. Romulans, Klingons, etc.).  Kirk messages Scotty back on Earth to investigate Khan's story.

Marcus wants Khan dead because Khan knows too much... and now by association, so does the Enterprise.  Kirk first attempts to run, but the battleship is just as fast and can shoot at them while in warp-speed travel. After enough of the Enterprise is beat up, Kirk stops near Earth, but is unfortunately far enough away for anyone to figure out what's going on.

The Enterprise is helpless... the engines are out, shields are out, and weapons are offline.  Kirk's love-interest, Carol Marcus, pleads with her father to spare the Enterprise.  Marcus responds by transporting her to his battleship and continues to prime the weapons.  It turned out that Scotty had managed to sneak his way onto the battleship and has disabled the weapons in order to spare the Enterprise, even briefly.  Since there's no way to do anything to the battleship from the Enterprise, Kirk and Khan decide to don spacesuits to get from one to the other via space.

Scotty opens a porthole, both fly in, and then they make their way to the bridge.  Kirk and Khan manage to subdue the skeleton crew of the battleship including Marcus.  Kirk then swings his phaser around to stun Khan.  Khan does not stay stunned.  Khan takes control of the bridge of the warship, parlaying with Spock for the return of his crew.  Spock instead pulled all of the cryotubes from each of the missiles and replaced them with explosives, wired to detonate when transported to the battleship.  The weapons explode and both starships are sent towards Earth's gravity.

The Enterprise can't escape gravity because their engines are still down.  Kirk does his best imitation of one of those human fly performers to climb up the warp core.  At the top he literally kicks one of the two "contacts" in the core to bring them back in alignment.  I am amazed that there are not septuple-redundant systems to do this NOT within the warp core, as going in will subject him to Chernobyl-level radiation doses and death.  He does anyway... and he and Spock reenact the scene at the end of the original "Wrath of Khan", but in reverse... Kirk inside and Spock outside.  Yes, there will be complaints below.

Meanwhile, Khan manages to crash the battleship into Starfleet headquarters in San Francisco, and even manages to survive and run away from *this*.  Spock (and Uhura) ends up chasing him down, capturing him, and returning him *to a cryopod*.

Hokay, I've got to take a break to address this.  Hey, movie, mind executing the dude who massacred many civilians by crashing a starship into the middle of a city?  Not to mention the library explosion, a squad of killed Klingons, the senior command shooting in the beginning?  Heck, what about the skeleton crew of what looked like Blackwater contractors flying the Starfleet dreadnought, that were all "stunned" rather than killed and ended up perishing in the final crash?  No, you need him for future sequels?  *sigh*

Last but not least, we find out that Khan's blood has "regenerative properties"... I suppose Wolverine is still alive and kicking somewhere in the universe's equivalent of a Yellowknife dive bar.  This time though it doesn't take another movie to bring Kirk back, just a plot contrivance.  Yeah, I know that Khan's blood was needed for Bones' super-serum to heal Kirk (hey Starfleet, who will you be sharing THAT formula with...), but there's TONS of time afterward to execute him.  THIS is why reboots end up becoming necessary, by the way, these throwaway "super serums" that end up mucking up a continuity.

As the movie rolls further past the two-hour mark the epilogue is a rededication of the Enterprise, which I am surprised even managed to get *re*built... I would have absolutely believed "built again" considering the massive hull holes that sucked out numerous people.



The summary for this movie is over... though some people may consider the below discussion of the nuts and bolts of the ending spoiler space as well. I've attempted to hide as much as possible, but it can't all be pulled from view. You've been warned...



I wanted to point out the best reason for a reboot.  It was in the beginning when Chris Pine's Kirk and Zach Quinto's Spock are getting dressed down for the actions they took in the prologue to the movie.  Spock protests that Admiral Pike is not considering the overall details of the mission, how it was supposed to have happened, and what then subsequently made the mission fail.  Pike dismisses Spock's concern by telling him that they were merely technicalities... Spock then not only tells Pike that technicalities are the soul of a Vulcan, but managed to get into the technicalities of the technicalities.  I absolutely loved the scene even if it was just a minor thing, and to me this showed the heights that a reboot can provide... it may be a new person writing Spock, but they're trying to stay as true to his character (or perhaps Quinto was improvising?) and I thought that it was a cool touch.

However, the reboot has the awkward task of *reminding* people of the original while not hewing too closely.  I can respect that they would bring back not only old characters but also old villains.  That's fine and fair game to me.  However, the scene between Kirk and Spock that I marked with complaints above is getting mentioned here.  I thought it was not only really unnecessary, it was almost as if the movie had to contort its plot just to make sure that the scene could be included.

See, the problem for me was that getting Kirk into the situation was not easy.  They also had a very tough time trying to establish the stakes of the situation... firstly, Kirk's "killer" was much like the "killer" from The Happening... silent, invisible, and "deadly".  There was an "against the clock" situation accompanying it (as the starship was currently non-operational), but according to the internal logic, the moment that Kirk stepped inside he signed his death warrant.  I remain extremely surprised that the equipment to be able to deal with the situation was not present, especially since it seemed that the problem he fixed was something that could possibly happen in other contexts.  This is Starfleet.  There should be systems backing up systems backing up systems... unless of course, the problem Kirk fixed can be dealt with by a few Ensign Throwaway redshirts.

I couldn't find this final scene even halfway believable either.  After two new Star Trek movies, there'd be no way that they'd kill off one of the marquee stars this easily.  So it was almost as if the movie telegraphed the fact that it would be breaking its own continuity.  And it did, in pretty spectacular form.  At this point, they put in the scene between Spock and Khan at the end of the movie.  There was a lack of suspense in knowing that they would bring back James T. Kirk, but you even knew during the *fight scene* who would win because of it.  So, this scene destroyed the suspense for BOTH of the resolutions.

The screenwriters knew that they couldn't spend a movie bringing Kirk back (like the original series did by bringing Spock back in Star Trek 3), so why even attempt it?  And lo and behold, it wasn't attempted.  As above, they used a method that was outlandish for even comic books to bring Kirk back in about fifteen minutes flat.

This is what I just can't get behind with a reboot.  If you're going to have to change your story to try to incorporate plot points, make sure that it's going to fit in your overarching plot.  Yes, there's a touch of the technerd in me, but it felt like they had to open up a few holes in the fabric of the story in order to get these aspects into the movie... and I can't get behind that.  Give me more "The Universe Hates Jim Kirk's Face" compared to this.


[spoiler space officially over]


It's gotta be the first time that I nested spoiler space warnings.  As far as the more generic judging of the movie, I did feel that it went on about twenty to thirty minutes too long (at almost 2:15, it really could have used an editor or two).  Looking back, the previous Star Trek film was just over the two-hour mark at 127 minutes... but the first film also had to carry the task of introducing the whole reboot setup, so I can forgive it the extra time.  This one really didn't have to carry the introduction issues.

I already explained my love-hate relationship with reboots in general and in the plot of this one in specific.  Please don't think that I disliked the movie though... just like in the August Rush review I posted, I enjoyed the movie but felt that it could have worked out even better.  As far as my scale goes, I popped it into my DVD player only yesterday, so that satisfies the level 3 criteria really well.  However, I will also say that I stopped it about three-quarters the way through the movie... and I'm perfectly fine stopping it where I have it, as I remember enough of the rest of the film.  So, it occupies a weird area where I sincerely enjoy the first one hundred ten minutes and can take or leave the last twenty.

So, I suppose that I will give it a flat 3, as an average of the 3.5 that it sustains for an hour and change and the 2.3 that it finishes with.  It's not as if it's the modern equivalent of The Girl in Lovers' Lane, but it does get my nitpicky hackles rising... if you want to lose yourself in the action sequences or the twisty-turny plot, then you'll enjoy it.

#2LR Meta Navel-Gazing Part 2 -- Inspiration

In the first meta navel-gazing post, I tried to go into part of the reason that I write these reviews... wanting to talk about art to other people, finding methods that make movies / television shows / anime series / video games work or not work, and wanting to share my opinions of such.  In this post though, I wanted to go into the idea of inspiration a bit more, and to discuss a bit of how it works as far as a critic (slash MST3k writer) goes.

Firstly, I absolutely love Wikipedia.  I collect trivia like other people collect shotglasses, spoons, or other knickknacks.  There's just a wide range of amazing stories... such as the Great Chicago Fire happening the same day as massive fires in both Wisconsin and in two different places in Michigan.  One of these many places happens to be my hometown, yet I hadn't the slightest idea that this coincidence existed until reading Wikipedia articles.

Another favorite story is about an eighteenth-century queen of Denmark, Caroline Matilda.  In twenty-three short years, she managed to provide an heir to the Danish throne (plus a daughter), ended up taking some sort of charge of the kingdom when her husband became mentally infirm, going as far as to dress as a man to rally the troops, embroiled in scandal when it was implied that the king's doctor was the true father of both her children... it's really just a fascinating story to me, and it happened in only a few short years.  At some point, I think I need to find more books about this because I'm sure that the backstory will be even more surprising.

Cruising Wikipedia became my go-to for stories about accidents and other catastrophes for a while too... for me, I enjoyed reading the accounts of aircraft accidents or other disasters, finding out which decisions were the fateful ones, realizing that there's sometimes just that thin thread even if it didn't seem thin at the time.  I wrote a whole post describing more of my enjoyment of "disaster porn" that can be found at the link.

I suppose that one of my favorite subjects recently has been reading the articles posted about music.  The Beatles in specific have been covered quite a bit, but there are more than a few other artists that have articles up about their songs on Wikipedia.  I'm interested by these because I really enjoy hearing about the creative process... pulling just the most random thoughts out of midair, adding lyrics and music to these thoughts, and then bringing them to life to the point that millions of people want to hear more and more.  In all frankness, I've never been a big fan of the Beatles, but hearing the stories behind their work has actually encouraged me to listen a bit closer to their music, and I have been slowly becoming more and more of a fan.

It's really odd where one finds their inspiration, yet I think that the parallel activities of writing MST3k treatments of fanfiction and writing reviews of various types of media dovetails quite nicely.  As I look back, I find myself wanting to comment most on what other people have done, or said, or played, or acted... it's almost like I care just as much about the execution of the idea as I care about the idea itself being shown.  My inspiration and enjoyment comes in writing humor about creative situations, or commenting about the creative situations, and trying to find the thin line between the creators and their creation on one side and how the creations are perceived by the other.

I'm not sure if I'd ever really write anything original, at least not at present.  I suppose I would need to figure out a way to get inspired by my own thoughts, by bringing life to something completely internal rather than something that piques my interest because of how it affects me and makes me feel.

At present though, I'm more than happy to offer my thoughts on the experiences I share with others.  I certainly can understand the critics' soul far more than I did before I started doing this... right now, I'm comfortable in telling what audience we have my thoughts on watching/listening/playing, and hopefully we'll get a few interesting conversations scraped together sometime about how things will work for some but not for others.

#2LR Too Late Review: Read or Die the TV series

Review: Read or Die the TV Series:

I'm not sure that I can come up with much of an introduction to this anime series, because what I need to say pretty much comes after the summary in order to be understandable.  For those who want to hew to SPOILER SPACE, I'll try to obfuscate as many of the spoilers as I can get to.


The story of Read or Die is not really reading per se, but the story of paper.  In the great Southern Woods... oh, actually, in Hong Kong, a famous Japanese author, Nenene Sumiregawa, found herself in a bit of trouble. She was saved by a group of women called "The Three Sisters Detective Agency".  The three women are Michelle, Maggie, and Anita.  All three of the sisters have the power to make paper bend to their will, to fold itself and stick itself together, and to move as they want it to. Michelle's power is primarily in making a bow/arrow, Maggie's power is to make animal shapes and activate them much like golems, and Anita's power is to be able to use paper in its deadliest form... to cut others.

The three sisters take Nenene back to Japan, and end up acting as her bodyguards so that Nenene can finish her latest book.  Anita is still young enough to need to go to school, so she enrolls.  One of the other students
there is a very effeminate boy, "Junior", who can walk through walls and/or floors without any problems.

To introduce the remaining characters and their backstory are Nenene's agent, the first evil conglomerate "Dokusensha", and the second evil conglomerate -- the British Library (?!)  As well, Nenene's on the search
for one of the teachers that she most learned from, Yomiko Readman (pun likely intended by the Japanese writers).

The story has quite a few twists and turns... Dokusensha, while paying off the Three Sisters to complete jobs on the side, ends up using Nenene's agent to kidnap her.  It seems that they want to use a set of artifact
books to try to rewrite Nenene's brain.  Their plan goes south when the Three Sisters realize what is happening and mount a rescue mission back to Dokusensha's main offices in Hong Kong to get her back.  As probably predicted, they are successful.  The interesting wrinkle is that they're labeled "terrorists" for causing all this damage to the building, so there is a bit of the cloak-and-dagger involved in the rest of the show.  It almost would have been interesting, but it got relegated to the memory-hole within only a couple episodes.

After those events the Three Sisters end up finding Yomiko Readman, in the halls of the Library of Japan based off of a tip from a local bookstore owner.  Yomiko's in there along with another woman, Nancy, who seems as meek and mild as a mouse.  Both turn out to be hiding from the British Library, the arch-enemy of Dokusensha, as both turned out to be agents.  Yomiko can also paper-bend, and not just to make little folded footballs during class.

And that's when the plot really ends up going off the rails.  See, the British's power from the mid-15th century through World War II was due to "Mr. Gentleman", who they managed to keep alive all those centuries.  He's dead now, and as a result the British Library hatched a plan to "bring him back", as it were, through the use of Junior's body as a vessel.  There's really very little reason for Nenene to be involved, except as we find out later... the British Library (and their aptly title leader, "Mr. Joker") need her to write the Gospel of Mr. Gentleman once he revives... as no one knew who Jesus was except through the record of the Bible.  Of course, Mr. Gentleman will bring the British back to prominence, even at the expense
of historical allies such as the U.S. of A.

Wow.  Well, in the final encounter, Joker *literally* invites all of the main characters save Nancy and an American heavy they picked up along the way to see his "moment of triumph", without really even restraining them much.  In this case, it was Nenene who managed to hide the Three Sisters' paper-based ammunition on herself, only to bring it out in order to save Junior at the end.  And it also turned out that Nancy was like Double-O Eight, though in a far-tighter (and far more revealing) catsuit than James Bond ever had.

I'm pretty much skipping the sideplot of Anita going to school, but that's because you would've cared even less than I did had you watched it yourself.


[Spoiler space OVER]


I suppose that I've been spoiled by a few series lately, even finding some good stuff out of series that would pretty much be one-note (Rosario + Vampire).  I can pretty much say that this series was watched out of sheer dedication to finishing rather than any desire to find out what happens.  I obtained the first few DVDs from the local library, and I literally had three of the discs sit on my dresser for almost four weeks before I finally watched all of the twelve episodes contained therein.

There was exactly one good moment, which was finding out which character was responsible for kick-starting the action portion of the first section of the show (the Dokusensha section).  I had to admit that the writers/animators did a good job hiding who it was, though it wasn't as if there was a huge trail of bread crumbs or anything... it was just one of those left-field surprises that catches you offguard and keeps your attention because of it.

After that though, the whole thing pretty much fell apart.  How to characterize why it fell apart may be difficult except to say that it was way too unbelievable.  I couldn't summon the suspension of disbelief needed for the second half's Macguffin to work with any sort of clarity.  I think it was because even the show was pretty unclear as to how it was supposed to work.

The segments of Anita going to school in Japan were also really... boring.  I couldn't have cared less, and it's not like there was emotion overwhelming and the sequences didn't exactly add any depth or plot or anything to the story.  Late in the series, Anita gets into a fight with Michelle, and I realized why I couldn't have cared less about these school segments... it's because the character of Anita is screechy, rather unredeemable, and there's really no character arc to her to rehabilitate any of those features.  Of course she had a tragic backstory (in these things, who doesn't?) but... well, as a character who ended up becoming a... or really, *the* main protagonist... mark me as uninterested.

Of course, that just leads me into the last "unbelievable" comment.  Even after the backstory which was way too out there to be believable, there's two situations (one involving a helicopter, and then the final encounter) where it's so patently obvious what has happened.  I find it annoying when you can see the bait-and-switch the writers are attempting to write as it is happening on the screen.  It's almost like watching a magic trick when you know the secret behind it.  I wish that at some level, they either A) went for smaller stakes / more permanent *results* in the helicopter thing and then B) had another episode or two to do a far better job of resolving the final conflict, as the ten-minute resolution really sucked.  The final assault should have been at least two episodes... dammit, there's four paper-benders and two special agents assaulting a building that had a fricking LAKE built around it and plenty of airborne and mecha defense.  Yet they find the train that goes right up to it and trick the idiot security guard, even as the evil organization's fantastical defenses make mincement out of a US carrier wing.  Screw that.

Yeah, I know, I should be warning you about the spoiler space, but this is pretty basic stuff that the writers of an anime should look into rectifying, especially if you're going to show how many books all the main characters read... yet the writer(s) go for the massive cliche instead of anything new... and that really becomes the basis of the complaint.

Feel free to watch this show for the action sequences, they're kind of cool. The interplay between Nenene and the Three Sisters is enjoyable especially in the beginning.  Other than that... it's old ground tread upon for the umpteenth time, much like watching pretty much anything on American network TV anymore.  And about the only "dying" you'd do in Read or Die is breaking your neck falling through a plothole.


Final rating: 1.4

#2LR Meta Navel-Gazing

Through seven years now we've posted about seventy or so #2LR Too Late Reviews on this blog.  I wanted to write the post in order to try to collect my thoughts about criticising movies, video games, and television shows/anime in one place.

Before I start though, I'd like to thank Megane 6.7 for writing #2LRs for recent video games.  I'm not as plugged into the videogame scene as I once was... and the recent Civilization V review and subsequent strategy guide that I posted to GameFAQs is pretty much the sum total of my hardcore gaming through a couple years now.

One of the most major reasons that I started doing the Too Late Reviews postings is that I've noticed something about movie reviews personally.  When I read a movie review, especially a good movie review, its almost as much art as the movie itself.  A movie review even with a summary isn't the whole movie... but I find that the best reviews not only hit on the high points, but they give me an idea of the movie other than just the main plotline.

I've strived to write these reviews so that you, our readers, will get an idea of not only the movie but to understand some of the things underlying the movie.  As with the most recent Oz review, which was a bit desultory, the point behind it was that the movie was somewhat desultory as well.  I want to give you an idea when things go right of why they went right... for instance, writing about Grave of the Fireflies, in order to tell you why a movie that may be relentless and gripping and depressing is worth watching, the things that the movie did so right that you can't easily find in other movies.  I want to highlight the high points and the low points and to give you an idea of the why behind the reasoning that they're high points or low points. 

Ultimately, I want to try to peel back the story to show an aspect of storytelling, writing, moviecraft... anything that will hopefully give you more of an insight.  I'm certainly no movie insider... but I am someone who tries to notice detail, even the smallest ones.  The training for this is the fifteen years or so that I've been writing Mystery Science Theater treatments of fanfics and constantly trying to focus not only the words on the screen in front of me, but what they symbolize.

One of the most recent MSTings that Megane 6.7 and I are working on is a story that is rather technically competent 'fic.  It's a crossover between two series that Megane 6.7 and I seem to keep returning to.  When we requested permission, the authors expressed a bit of surprise... they thought their 'fic was good.  Well, their 'fic was good.  I loved it because the concept behind it is an interesting read, and hopefully our jokes will add with the interest factor of the 'fic to make it even better.

That's my goal with the #2LR series.  I want to make whatever you watch or play a better experience, whether or not it's something you've already watched.  Not only that, I want to express why something worked, or why something didn't, and my goal is to not only enjoy what I watch but to really concentrate on it, to figure out why I liked it, and then to find similar examples.

Alternately... above all, whether it's good or it's bad, I'll do my level best to make the reviews interesting whether through humor or insight.

We hope you continue to enjoy reading these reviews, our blog in general, and our website.  Speaking for both Megane 6.7 and myself, we feel honored to have you spend your time reading our work, and we hope that you enjoy.

#2LR Movie Review: Oz, the Great and Powerful

Okay, so here's how lazy I am... this was written about six weeks ago and not posted. I have the Read or Die posting scheduled to run midweek as well.

Today’s 2LR is for the movie, Oz. The Great and Powerful.  In full disclosure, I probably have seen The Wizard of Oz perhaps once or twice in my childhood, but it was a movie that I was not really crazy about.  I think I was creeped out by the Munchkins, or perhaps the Tin Woodsman.  With that said, take any opinions I have against the world of Oz with a grain of salt, or perhaps a brick.

(Spoiler space ahead.)

The movie begins at a fairground in 1905, where a traveling magician is about to put on his act at the fair.  After a bit of issue with the local townsfolk, and then an issue with some of the sideshow acts, the traveling magician – Oz, short for Oscar -- takes off in a hot-air balloon to run away.  Unfortunately, being 1905 Kansas, he ends up sucked into a tornado.

You can probably guess where Oz the Magician ends up.  Thankfully, the image on the screen goes from black-and-white to color at this point, and the image finally fills the screen.  I know why the director did this, but it doesn’t mean that I liked it.  At any rate, Meg from Family Guy meets up with the crashed balloon, and she takes our erstwhile shyster to the Emerald City, for it was foretold that the savior of Oz would crash into Oz, and also have the same name.

So, we meet another witch who helps run the Emerald City, who seems nice but quite doubts Oz’s qualifications. She shows him the gold that the King of Oz is entitled to, and Oz’s eyes go wide.  She then tells him that he has to defeat (e.g. kill) a wicked witch, and gives him directions to get there. 

After that, Oz is going down the yellow-brick road on his way to kill the witch.  Meanwhile, we find out that Meg’s older sister is a bit mean… especially once we find out that Oz was sent to kill Glinda, the Good Witch.  It seems that she was chased off from the Emerald City by the death of her father, the king.  The older sister then starts on Meg Griffin, telling her that Oz (who she mysteriously was taken with) is now interested in Glinda.  Older sis uses Meg’s temper against her, tricking her into eating a green apple, which turns her green and ensures that she will turn into Margaret Hamilton in negative seventy years, give-or-take.

Glinda shows Oz the townspeople who they are trying to defend, and then mentions to him that they need to figure out a way to defeat the witches without killing them.  Seems a tall task, but if ever you need someone to resort to trickery, use a con-man.  Oz plans out ways to use sleight-of-hand style tricks and devices to defeat both the Flying Monkeys as well as the “Winkie Guards” (see, this is why I can’t take Oz overly seriously).  He also creates the famous smoke machine, fakes his own death so that the people of Oz treat it as if his spirit is coming back from the grave to help them, and manages to freak out both witches sufficiently to get them running.  Glinda takes care of the other advisor by breaking her magic necklace and starting a Raiders of the Lost Ark sequence on her, and Meg just flies off cackling.

(spoiler space over)

What did we learn?  Good question.  All I know is that in human history, it’s usually not a good idea to turn the governance of a country over to a con-man, no matter how “reformed” he seems.  As for the movie itself, I feel rather ambivalent towards it. I suppose it’s a decent waste of ninety minutes, though it’s not as if you’ll be overcome by the story of Oz’s magical conversion to the most honest con-man who’s still really a massive con-man, nor Meg Griffin’s descent into madness.  I suppose the best message to come out of this movie is, “Never eat a green apple.”

Final review: 1.9

Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag Review (XBOX 360 Version)

(Note: My review of the previous Assassin's Creed games can be found 'here'.)

(Warning: Spoilers Follow)

After the overall disappointment of 'Assassin's Creed III', I was both anticipating and dreading this latest chapter of this series. Anticipating because it looked like the ship battles, which I felt were the best feature of 'Assassin's Creed III', were going to be expanded upon and made the main focus of the gameplay rather than a side mission. Dreading because of how many other things 'Assassin's Creed III' got wrong and I feared would simply be continued with this game as well.

Well, thankfully it looks like Ubisoft listened to the fans for the most part because 'Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag' is a significant improvement. It fixes many of the problems I personally had with Part III and more importantly, it's a great deal more fun to play. It's not without its flaws, to be sure, but I personally enjoyed it and it gives me good feelings and hope for the next part as well.

'Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag' takes place in the Caribbean during the latter era of the golden age of piracy. You play as Edward Kenway, father of future Templar, Haytham Kenway and grandfather of future Assassin, Ratonhnhaké:ton from 'Assassin's Creed III'. Edward is a pirate who claims to be solely motivated by gold but as we learn from flashbacks during the course of the game, he is hell bent on providing a better life for his wife, despite her insistence that she loves him regardless and that she wanted him to get a normal job and live a normal life, something Edward refuses to accept.

Fate leads Edward into the path of a turncoat Assassin, whom he is forced to kill and decides to assume his identity in order to scam his way into more gold. Unfortunately this decision leads to him helping the Templars and causing much harm to the Assassins.

Edward tries to ignore the consequences of his actions by focusing on tracking down the location of a place called 'The Observatory', which he convinces himself will lead to riches beyond imagination, by seeking out a mysterious 'Sage' that knows the location. This single-minded obsession leads to tragedy after tragedy, even as Edward's ship grows strong and his wallet grows fat. Will he be able to change his course before it's too late or will he sail himself and everyone else who follows into hell?

Meanwhile, back in the real world, Miles Desmond and Warren Vidic are dead, (Thank RICHARD for that!), and the protagonist is now... well, you. You are a playtester for a software company called Abstergo Entertainment, testing out the genetic memories of Edward Kenway, which will be turned into a sort of virtual reality pirate game. Gee, how meta. ^_^;

Of course it's all a front for Abstergo and the Templars to discover the location of the Observatory, even though they practically run the entire world as it is, or so the games keep telling us, but I guess they have to weed out the Assassins somehow.

"You", however, are blissfully unaware of any of this, as you cheerfully go about your job, until you're contacted by a mysterious stranger and asked to start hacking into Abstergo's computers. As your security clearance is increased, you'll learn a little more about Abstergo, the origins of Warren Vidic and Subject Zero and Desmond’s thoughts before his death.

It's mildly interesting I guess, but I kinda already knew Warren Vidic was a bastard and Desmond is still dull as dishwater so yeah, don't really care. I did laugh though at the shameless attempts to sully the previous protagonists of 'Assassin's Creed' games by Abstergo, bitter much? ;P

Sadly, Shaun and Rebecca only have small roles in this game, which is a shame because Shaun especially was a highlight of 'Assassin's Creed III' and made the historical material in that game less dry to read with his snarky editorials. The "programmers" bantering back and forth during the descriptions in 'Assassin's Creed IV' came off more meta and occasionally too obnoxious for me. Here's hoping Shaun and Rebecca can come back strong in the next game.

Back to Edward's world for a moment, there were many characters to interact with, several of them from actual history such as Blackbeard, Mary Read, Anne Bonny, Sted Bonnet and Black Bart to name a few. And while the above names made an impression, there were others that I could barely remember later when they reappeared and the story lost me a few times, I remember thinking in those times "Who the hell are you again?" ;P

OK, I admit I'm not as knowledgeable on the history of pirates as I am other eras but some of the characters were difficult for me to distinguish from others and it hurt my immersion into the game at times.

As mentioned before, many of the problems I had with the previous game have been addressed. The Assassination missions now have more of a purpose than simply "Kill Templars Dead!" and require more skill and stealth to kill your targets, as in 'Assassins' Creed II'. There are also Naval Missions which usually involve you destroying certain ships or attacking convoys and stealing their cargo.

The ship mechanic is now a central feature in the game and it is SOOOO much fun! Not only do you get to blast the crap out of a ship, you can now board it and slaughter your enemies into submission and steal their cargo, which you can then either sell for gold or improve your ship. I have to say the first time I grabbed the rope and swung onto the deck of the enemy ship into combat, I had a smile on my face a mile wide. :)

As you face tougher ships, there are more challenges put in your way. You might have to climb up to the crow's nest to destroy the enemy's flag or kill annoying scouts taking pot shots at your crew. Or you have to blow up the powder kegs on the ship, ideally without blowing up your own crew members in the process.

You can get a head start with the smaller cannons on your ship and take a few shots, though it's best to do this BEFORE your crew starts boarding the ship, less you blast them by mistake. The longer you take to subdue the ship, the more of your crew get killed so there's pressure there as well.

But as much fun as I had with boarding the ship, I have to mention a couple of nitpicks. At times it was frustrating to fight on the deck of the ship because there are so many people fighting around you that at times you will have great difficulty focusing on a single opponent and will often lunge towards another person without meaning to.

Honestly, the camera can be your biggest threat during these battles as it tends to zoom in close on the action and either the scenery gets in the way or people attack you from off-screen and you can't defend yourself, giving them a free slash or two. It's not a huge deal but it was annoying, especially when it means you have to start the boarding all over again if you die. The scenery getting in the way can also happen in certain locations of the game and if possible, it's always best to move to an open space and fight there to hopefully avoid that problem.

Also, and this has always been a big issue with the Assassin's Creed series to some degree, it is very easy to leap onto the wrong thing or end up balancing on a railing when you meant to leap somewhere else entirely or jump up on an item when you didn't mean to. This problem mostly rears its ugly head during the ship boarding scenes as there is a LOT of background objects on a pirate ship and it can be frustrating when you want to make a grand entrance into battle, only to be thwarted by a railing or a net or a barrel or a cannon or a crate or a... well, you get the idea. ^_^;

Money now serves more of a purpose in this game as there are plenty of things to buy and upgrading your ship is absolutely necessary if you hope to survive later battles against multiple ships or the Man O' Wars and ESPECIALLY if you hope to have a chance in hell of winning a battle against one of the Legendary ships, which provide a true challenge even if your ship is fully upgraded.

You can also upgrade your base with various shops and places to keep your crew happy, along with your own house, in which you can buy art to display. Personally the art didn't really interest me but I can see how others would appreciate it.

Weapons are also more useful in this game as you actually have a reason to use your pistols this time. I admit I saved my money to buy the best available sword and guns but the option to level up slowly is there as well. You also gain the use of sleep darts which can temporarily put down a pesky sniper long enough to sneak past or assassinate him and berserk darts, which makes your enemy go into a blind rage and attempt to kill any soldier in range. Late into the game, you also get a rope dart which you can hang your enemies with.

Hunting animals now lets you craft items such as extra ammo pouches for your weapons or clothes if you wish. You can also improve your armour and raise your health in the process. The hunting mechanics are pretty much the same as the previous game but at sea, you can also hunt sharks and, yes whales as well. This was a subject of controversy for some people but thankfully the option to hunt whales is entirely OPTIONAL and you can buy, at some expense, any animal hides you require and skip the hunting process completely if you wish, and I personally appreciate the choice being given to me.

There are numerous side quests to undertake in this game. Besides the small chests, you can find treasure maps with coordinates to islands where you then rely on visual clues to find buried treasure with more valuable rewards. There are manuscripts that seem to serve no purpose in the game other than historical curiosity, and are usually under guard for some reason, maybe to make collecting them more exciting? Darned if I know.

Collecting Animus Fragments will provide you with cheat codes and other benefits to multiplayer. There are also glass bottles to collect which gives you more insight into the character of 'The Sage' and helps explain events taking place in the real world as well. There is also a multiplayer aspect called 'Kenway's Fleet' but since I don't do multiplayer, I can't comment on it.

In the previous game, there was a rather pointless side quest chasing sheets of paper across rooftops containing pages of Benjamin Franklin's Almanac that gave no real benefits. In this game, however, the papers are sea shanties and they are far more worth the effort to catch them as you can now sing while sailing your ship across the sea. Not only do the songs add a real touch of authenticity to the pirate feel of the game but chances are, you'll be singing along to several of them yourself as they're pretty darn catchy. ;P

One fun side mission was taking out forts on the map, which act as viewpoints in the sea, letting you spot items and towns otherwise hidden. After you successfully crush their defences with your ship, you storm the fort and can either kill soldiers for the fun of it or just skip ahead to killing the officers and the fort commander to claim victory. This also opens additional Naval missions.

There are Templar hunting missions which lead you to keys that will eventually give you access to the now obligatory ultimate suit of armour, though during my playthrough I couldn't figure out how to trigger the mission to find the fifth key for some reason. Fortunately, it wasn't necessary as there was another side quest involving collecting Mayan stones and this gained me access to a... different ultimate suit of armour. Huh, well, nice to have a choice, I guess. ^_^;

One new and fun side quest are underwater dungeons in the form of sunken ships and caves which you can explore about halfway through the game with a diving bell. What make it more challenging is that you constantly have to worry about your oxygen levels and avoiding the numerous sea creatures that will take off your health piece by piece... and scare the hell out of you if you're not expecting an attack. (Fuck you, eels. FUCK YOU.) But the rewards are well worth the effort as many of them give you plans to vastly improve your ship.

So, my final thoughts are this. While I still consider 'Assassin's Creed II' to be the best game of the series so far, I did have a lot of fun playing this game and unlike Part III, this is a game I'm glad I bought and will definitely be replaying in the future.

There are rumours that the next game could take place in China or Japan, which would be of great interest to me and after watching the movie 'Heroes of the East', which I highly recommend if you've never seen it, to be able to use those kinds of weapons and possibly upgrade the fighting engine to include martial art techniques would be all sorts of awesome. Here's hoping. :)

#2LR Too Late Reviews -- Rosario + Vampire

#2LR review: Rosario + Vampire

Most nights, my daughter is the one to broach the subject.  "Want to watch some anime tonight?" is her usual request.  Some nights, she'll ask to watch old archived Strong Bad emails, but it's typically anime that she asks for.  Other than the current dislike of MST3k, I've trained her well.

My wife and I usually get the younger two boys off to bed by this time, and more often than not we're trying to get through a series.  We can't devour one as quickly as my daughter, who's probably watched the vast majority of Full Metal Alchemist through a couple weekends over the past few weeks, but we try to get two or maybe three episodes in of whatever current series we're watching.

My daughter is exceedingly lucky... paying for Netflix and Hulu Plus is perhaps $20 or so a month, and there's quite a bit of choice for streaming options.  Before having this option, I had resorted to three other tactics to watch anime.  One was renting it from specialty stores, which was hit-or-miss considering how many times we've moved.  At one point, I joined a campus anime club, which had a limited library.  And when I say limited, that meant that they would have the first few tapes of a series *but not all of them*, so you had to figure out other ways to finish most series you borrowed.  And as always, your last recourse was purchasing the whole darned series, which ran into the hundreds of dollars for a single series from a publisher (Pioneer, Viz) who cheaped out by putting only two episodes per videotape.

Now?  Well, the two services will end up being a couple hundred per year anyway, and you don't get to own it after you're done.  But that means that if you've really tried, you will have watched more than a few series by the end of that year too.

Why is this important?  It's because I'm now watching series that I probably would not have given a second thought to starting in the old days.  And Rosario + Vampire is one of those series, for a couple of different reasons.

First, a rundown of the plot.  No spoiler space warnings here yet, but just wait...  Tsukune (or, as the English actors kept saying it, "Skoo-nee") is a human who is just getting out of middle school.  His poor grades ensure that no local high schools accept him, so he ends up finding a private school, "Yokai Academy" that will accept him.  Shortly into the first episode, he runs across the main female protagonist of the series, Moka, who happens to be a vampire.  He then finds out that the rest of the school is a collection of monsters that runs the gamut from traditional Western monsters like vampires, witches, naga, witches, female demons -- succubi, to Japanese monsters like kasa-obake, and even into Hindi mythology (example, the Apsara).

One of the first student rules is that no humans are allowed at this monster school.  However, Tsukune feels safe because the kind and sweet Moka has an alternate form that is activated whenever Tsukune takes her seal of power from her.  Moka's alternate form kicks some major butt, though also with a personality change from caring to blunt, slightly egotistical, and self-serving.  It turns out that the barrier that keeps humans out of Yokai Academy would be threatened if there were too many strong monsters there, and Moka's alternate though true form would cause the barrier to weaken. Both Moka types seem to care for Tsukune, but in the beginning of the series it's pretty clear that the blunt (inner) Moka is happy to have him around as a food source compared to the kind (outer) Moka, who likes him as a friend, her first human friend.

This is a harem anime with heavy doses of fanservice, and as such the first four or five episodes introduce all of the other female members of Tsukune's harem.  They include the succubus Kurumu, who like Moka is attracted to Tsukune because he's a human, and wants to breed with him to ensure her line.  To that end, she is forever flaunting her large breasts in and around Tsukune to entice him.  There's a witch, Yukari, who happens to be a genius and was skipped a couple of grades, so she is therefore a couple years younger than the rest of the high-school freshman friends. She gets to be Tsukune's flat-chested lolita (and the brunt of many Kurumu body-image jokes).  There's the "snow woman" Mizore, who has power over ice and cold and also doubles as a creepy stalker for those who want their girlfriends so interested in them that the girlfriend moons over them incessantly.  And by the way, Moka gets to have a transformation sequence every time she's called into battle.

Ultimately, I'm sure you're pretty much guessing what the show is and probably know a good 80% of the plot if you're familiar with the genre.  It's certainly understandable.  You may be surprised to hear me report though, that both my eleven-year-old daughter and my wife enjoyed watching the show, through both seasons one and two (a total of twenty-six).  I was kind of surprised as well, especially since my wife is not exactly a fan of the fanservice in general.  I'm generally not a fan either, because typically the fanservice means that writers are hobbled in trying to get their creations in body-baring situations.  For the same reasons, I'm usually not crazy about harem stories either.  So, what could make this series worth watching?

I would like to think that the characters do a good job of it, surprisingly enough.  When they're not engaging in fanservice, they seem at least slightly realistic, and while there's certainly more than a bit of cliche abounding, it's not... overwhelming, nor particularly painful.  The series does engage in breaking the fourth wall, and between that and keeping the tone mostly light, it's pretty funny.

There are times that the protagonists find themselves in danger, and the main character Tsukune does a decent job of not making himself insufferable.  The plottish parts of the story always seem to raise the overall level of the show.

I felt that they did a decent job balancing the characters in this show... there are some that introduce as harem shows that end up relegating other characters in the background, which always seems a weird choice.  (If you didn't want to write a character in or couldn't make it work, why did you attempt to adapt that manga then?)  They hand lines and conflict to all characters in fairly equal portions, so it feels at least more realistic to storytelling.

Of course, with this show there is a however.  The however is that the fanservice ramps up in season two.  I won't make a catalog of perversion, but suffice it to say that the animators drew big bouncing breasts plus a metric ton of panty shots in season one, and they drew big bouncing naked breasts with a metric ton and a half of panty shots in season two... and they included bringing Moka's transformation sequence into adult territory.  More profane language also crops up in season two, many instances rather unnecessarily.  If you're watching with younger ones already (why?) make sure that if you're going on from season one to season two they're prepared for these things, and if the fanservice or coarse language is why you watch, then you'll want to rewatch season two more frequently than season one.

I have another however though, and that will come with COPIOUS amounts of spoiler space.  (Now comes the spoiler space warning!)


Season one's ending was the possible death of Tsukune, which you knew full well wouldn't happen.  Season two's setup for the ending was that the sweet and kind Moka may not make another appearance again, as Moka needs to use her power seal in order to keep the barrier between monster and human worlds intact and can't use it to make sure that the "outer" Moka is around anymore.

So, the real inner, flawed, self-serving yet unused to people Moka comes out.  And it is clear, she's grown to like Tsukune as a person rather than as a meal.  I'm loving this turn of events for a couple reasons... one is that one of the characters has "grown", and is now even showing her real self rather than the mask that the writers have had her under for the better part of twenty episodes.  I loved it because I thought it was a challenge to Tsukune... and how often do the protagonists of a harem anime get a challenge?  It's not a challenge to fake-kill a protagonist who you know is going to recover, but would the writers be bold enough to change the equation?

I thought that this could bring this show into very interesting ground.  Within the harem-anime setup, you've got multiple female protagonists all revolving around a male antagonist, and there's always a pretty clear method to figuring out which one will "win", aka gain the affection of the male protagonist.  In this show, it was the number of mushy "moments" that Tsukune and Moka would repeat each other's name in the throes of LUUUUV.  To me, Tsukune started off in the series having feelings for Moka based on her personality and her actions... but the Moka he had feelings for really was a mask, only in effect because of a magical artifact that she willingly gave up.  The real Moka came forward, ironically enough through an action of self-sacrifice and love of others, and the real Moka really did have feelings for Tsukune.

So, how does Tsukune respond?  Not by taking Moka as her true self... not by learning to expand or grow his love, knowing that the Moka he has feelings for is inside the Moka that is now there.  Not even by rejecting her and going with one of the other three girls who do have unrequited feelings towards him.

Tsukune's response is to "try to get the old Moka back".  There's no room in his love for a person to change.  Nor is there any room in his love for a person to grow, or for his own love to change, or for him to even have to make an uncomfortable choice.  The ending does show that Tsukune's dedicated to "the one he loves"... he takes on Moka's father, who is set up as pretty much one of the strongest monsters ever, and ends up not getting killed.  Ultimately though, life has messy choices, and in Tsukune's case the one he loves is not really a true person, just a half-a-person, and he's uncomfortable around the other half of the person.  So... what is love?  (baby don't hurt me.)

At any rate, the ending for season two could have set up a fascinating hook for a season three.  The series uses the ten-minute resolution rather than the season-three five-hour resolution that could have made this into a fascinating show in its own right.  It would have allowed this series to grow just as much as it would have shown its characters growing, but that was not in the cards (nor storyboards).

As it is, and in utterly no surprise, the ending brings everything back to the status quo of about four episodes previous, with the added bonus that Tsukune tells us that he's "not grown up enough" to make his choice.  It's too bad that the girls all didn't say, "In that case, we'll find someone grown up enough to stop stringing us along and who's mature enough to handle a real relationship", but that would have ruined the harem just as much, I suppose.  So, the ending reinforces the same escapism that you probably came into the series with, at least.

(spoiler space over)

And the discussion about the ending colors my final review, because I do feel cheated if there's a fascinating avenue that the writer(s) could have taken their creation but didn't.  As you may or may not recall from all of my Twilight movie reviews, I had quite a few complaints about the movies in general... but I was not truly incensed and annoyed with the storyline until Stephenie Meyer took the amazing opportunity that she wrote herself in the end of Book Four (which was movie 4-2) and squandered it completely.  Same as above... the ending to Rosario + Vampire could have catapulted this series into *rewatchability*, to become more true to life than it was before, to explore things that the typical harem anime does not... to grow into something to contemplate and think about deeply, and to maybe even glean a message or three from....... and completely wrote them off.

There was one previous review where I wrote that the ending completely screwed up watching the show, which was Code Geass.  I can't get down on the ending to Rosario + Vampire as much as I can get down on Code Geass's ending though.  On the surface, this series' tagline is "Japanese Twilight as a harem anime with fanservice".  If that's what you're looking for, with the once-an-episode fight sequence and characters that aren't completely brainless, then this is your show.  And as long as you know that what you see is what you're going to get, that there's nothing underneath the surface, then you will probably enjoy watching this show.  I know that I would not have minded the ending as much had I been warned not to raise my expectations, at least.  It's funny, the characters fight, pine, enjoy each other's company, get mad, and generally have fun, and end up at the beginning.  And most viewers will say the same.

Final review for Rosario + Vampire: 2.6 (stripey pairs of panties)

#2LR Game Review - Civilization V, "Brave New World" Expansion -- with bonus partial walkthrough!

Review/FAQ/Walkthrough for Civilization V - Brave New World

Part 1/?

I know, I usually write reviews in this space.  And yes, there's already a place to upload walkthrough and FAQ information online.  I know that because I've already posted one, quite a few years back now, for Railroad Tycoon III, which also helpfully comes up in Google search if you look for "Railroad Tycoon 3 Walkthrough".  I do still get the occasional feedback from it, and I'm glad that I was able to help more than a few people in understanding the game and also to get through the scenarios/campaign missions.

Additionally, I would not be surprised if someone already has posted something akin to this; I'm sure that there are more than a few members of the public able and willing to write this up, and I also know that I am not one of the best Civilization V players out there.  However, I have won games at level five (out of eight), and I'm willing to at least post some of the things that have brought me success in this game.

So... the review! "Brave New World" is the second add-on to Civilization V.  It introduces new civilizations to the mix and also reconfigures one of the major aspects of the game, culture (and culture victories).  Previously, culture was by itself, representing all of the beautiful buildings that a civ could create.  Gain enough culture, win bonuses.  Gain even more culture than everyone else (quite a BIT of it), and if you'd gained 30 total culture bonuses, you'd be eligible to build a "utopia project" (if I remember correctly) which is an automatic game winner.  Chained to this modification is that the bonuses and headings are reconfigured, and there are "governments" that work through the culture menu that allow the world to split into factions somewhat like the Cold War of the second half of the twentieth century.

Now, culture has been split into culture and tourism.  Tourism is gained via either building wonders or earning points toward "great people", split between musicians, artists, and writers.  Get a great writer and you can create a great work of art, which increases your "tourism".  Or, alternately, build the Eiffel Tower and increase your tourism.  Bonuses come along the way to a Civ's tourism.  If one Civ's tourism number goes above another Civ's culture number, then the first Civ is said to be "dominant" (think US/Canada... sorry, northern brethren, though your culture is kinda cool).  If one Civ manages so much tourism as to dominate all other Civs, the game ends with the first Civ winning.

The other major addition to the game is caravans.  Previously, money appeared on the map on river squares and on ocean squares.  Not anymore!  Caravans now take the place of this money trade.  And, quite like historical life, caravans can be used to boost tourism, to spread science, and to spread religion.  They are also the first to go when one civilization declares war on another.  New buildings and existing buildings add bonuses to caravans.

The last update is now there is a "World Congress".  This is much like the modern United Nations.  For those more historically inclined, it seems to work far more similarly to the Congress of Vienna in 1815 after Napoleon's defeat.  Two nations can advance worldwide proposals, such as increasing either scientist or artist generation, or increasing culture, or proposing a "world's fair", and the group of currently active civilizations can vote on it.  There's more to come for this, I sincerely hope, because the proposals are so very limited.  For instance, you can only raise culture instead of lower it... you could also have a "scramble for Africa" setup where either settlers can come with happy bonuses for making new cities/connecting new luxuries, or nations can get bonuses for attacking the single-city nations that proliferate on the map.  At any rate, it's a new wrinkle in the game, though it could have been so much greater.

Taken as a whole... it definitely increases the complexity of the game, and that's not actually a bad thing.  There are additional nuggets hidden within, such as culture playing a very large role in government types that may or may not work.  I quite enjoy the changes that the developers have made, though I certainly hope that they attempt to take some of the changes a bit further to support other aspects of the game that were ignored.

Of course, for a fan of the genre and of the specific game, I would heartily endorse the upgrade and recommend it.  If you're not a Civ fan, or if you're not crazy about where they've taken the game, then feel free to skip to any of the other reviews/articles posted here.  Below this, I will go into some of the strategies that I've been able to make work for me when playing Brave New World on the higher difficulties.

1. Go in with a plan... before the game even starts

Sounds simple, right?  I mean, who doesn't?  However, this means to figure out the basic path that your game will take based on the civilization that you chose (or have had picked for you via random).  I've noticed many times over that the games I have the worst time with are the ones where I just kind of winged it.  When I prepare, I check to see which units/buildings are available, when they're available, and what aspect of the game (e.g. money, military, culture, etc.) the civ's bonus will take.  One recent for-instance was when I played as the Mongols, who have a mounted bowman with ranged attack as their special unit, replacing the knight.  This means that I have a pretty clear path to take out any enemy city or even enemy civ around the middle of the game when Chivalry is researched, so I need to plan to put in place the basis of this plan... have the horses as a resource ready, or better yet have the horsemen already built for a quick cash upgrade.  (FYI, I was taking out cities all the way into the 1900s with those mounted bowmen... when you get them upgraded all the way with +1 range and +1 attack, a group of six can hit for a combined total of 120 points on even a mature city and still stay out of reach... food for thought.)

2. Use the first few turns of the game to refine or rethink your plan.

Who is around you?  Are you in a crossroads or off in a corner?  Hemmed in by city-states or by the ocean? Within ten turns or so, you'll know the type of lands you're starting on (e.g. islands, continents, or a pangaea), but you'll likely have an idea of some of the other civs.  If you are playing against religious civilizations, they might have already formed their pantheons within ten turns, fifteen at the outside.  In the beginning of the game, you're most likely already waiting on either the monument to be built, or a scout (or two), so there's not a whole lot of variance... but then you will be able to figure out if you can start out as a builder, or if you need to get defending.  If you're surrounded on all sides, getting defense is priority number one, to make sure that you can not only keep the other civs out but to be able to exert force if necessary.  If no one is immediately apparent, you could either squeeze out that extra settler or begin that wonder a bit earlier to reap the benefits of the earlier start.

Knowing what the land will give you can tell you whether or not a tall (few cities with lots of population) or wide (lotsa cities with luxuries, small population) will be the way to go.  Tall civs have the ability to build quicker, but don't forget that defense... you can't trade land for time going tall.  Of course, make sure your culture bonuses match your plan too.  The for-instance is the difference between the Tradition and Freedom paths... Freedom gives you +1 per city connected to the capital, while Tradition gives you both a +1 for each 10 population plus a +1 for each two population in the capital.  So an empire with a capital city of 24 and two additional cities of 12 would have +3 happy via Freedom, but a +12 and a +2 from the capital as well as +2 from each of the two other cities, for a total of +14 happiness.

By the way, a surefire way to tell that you're going to get invaded (especially at the higher levels) is when you see a computer civ that only has one city and a marker in the diplomacy screen saying "They covet your lands!"  That means that they've been building pretty much nothing but military since the start, and they're coming after YOU, especially if you happen to have the last-ranked military in the world.  Sniff these threats out as soon as possible.

3. Losing production is NOT an option.

When building new cities, do not let the computer dictate your food/production ratio.  Do it yourself.... or at the very least, set the flag to "production".  You can make up the food via the granary if you care to, but most likely it will be that much more important to get either defense (an archer) or culture (a monument) to consolidate your new gain.

There's a side-effect to not letting the game grow your cities too much as well.  Production drops by percentage points in each city with the "Brave New World" rules when you go underneath zero happiness.  It's better to get the production and to make your few citizens work smarter, not to grow out the city and make the whole rest of your kingdom suffer.

The other side-effect is that there are wonders that are limited by either culture (e.g. Forbidden Palace, Porcelain Tower) or by terrain (e.g. Colossus, Machu Picchu) that a small city could absolutely build if given the time.  A food focus early could defeat this purpose though, especially if you're also trying to build the national wonders (e.g. National College, Heroic Epic) because food-focused cities rarely build all the buildings you need quickly enough to make the national wonders viable.  And also FYI, the Colossus wonder is really far more useful now than it was before.

Oh, and that losing production is not an option?  That goes for wonders too.  Don't go after wonders if your empire can't support it.  Trusting one archer to defend against a horde of Aztec Jaguars while you finish Stonehenge in a desperate attempt to make up for lost religion is pretty much a white flag of surrender.  The best case scenario is that you're defending your cities with a lone archer while getting +5 religion per turn.  The worst case scenario is that you're defending your cities with a lone archer while not getting +5 in religion while at the same time earning a pittance for not finishing your Stonehenge in time.

Even in a normal situation, losing the production is not ever really a good thing.  That's not to say to never build wonders, but to make sure that your empire can support the possible lost production.  The replacement gold is really crummy when you don't make it, and you could have been building a military that could have taken the wonder from the city that builds it anyway.

In the upper levels, when you get past Level Four (Prince) and higher, the computer goes from being even in production to needing less production to finish buildings/projects.  All you have to do to verify this fact is to get to the midgame on a King-level game and view a city that you've sent a spy to.  The city will only need 90% of the production you need in order to finish everything, including wonders.  If you lose 300 production to a failed Alhambra, remember that it could have meant a trebuchet plus two pikemen to take the city that ended up building it... and the gold that you get for the consolation prize is definitely not enough to buy all three units.

Extra hint... the secret to military in the game is that military is how you steal someone else's production.  Not only in taking over cities that have built buildings/Wonders, but even in tying up an enemy Civ's time and resources into building an army rather than building improvements.  An army costs money and does not come with an immediate boost in any resource, unlike a building or a Wonder.

4. Research what you need (and can use) immediately.

This is in reference to two contexts.   In the beginning of the game, there's just so much that needs doing, such as getting the technologies to develop your resources, building certain units (archers/composite bowmen/horsemen), exploration (trireme), and Wonders that you need to get set up.  It may sound trite, but it's pointless to work on a technology that you really don't need.

However, this also has reference to the middle of the game too.  The computer usually goes into specific tracks, especially to pick up currency (to gain Petra) and to get to Civil Service (to gain both pikemen and Chichen Itza).  You can use this to beat the computer either to the Education track, setting up your research for the long haul, or to pick up the lower end of the spectrum (Engineering/Metal Working) so that you can boost your shields and your defenses.  Another way to go is one of the new bonuses in the Commerce track, which is that Landsknechts are available as the second Commerce bonus.  Of course, your defenses will be more than set if you pick up Crossbowmen, and getting all your cities in shape to start setting up a military to deal with those Civs that go in a different direction would be helpful.

Just remember that if you follow the other Civs into the same track, at higher levels they'll be likely to get the upgraded soldiers as well as the wonders first unless you have a solid plan (e.g. a Great Engineer to help finish Wonders, or a ton of catapults/spearmen just waiting for the Civil Service tech to become a pikemen/catapult invasion force).  Whenever a new tech comes up, have either a plan for what you're going to do with the immediate tech or open up the tech screen to figure out a tech that's two or three downstream that you can really make hay out of.

5. Culture

Gotta have it even in the beginning, or else the end game will absolutely suck the bag.  There's two ways to go about it... either build it yourself or take it from someone else.  Just remember a couple of principles here.

--If someone's building culture nearby you and building it quickly, they may have a weak defense.  Getting them to stop building culture could be as easy as declaring war and putting a few troops in position to threaten... as above, forcing them to build military will be tantamount to wasting their production, especially if you defend via ranged units (archers, catapults) with the occasional horseman to keep their own ranged units honest.

--If someone's building it far away, you're going to have to figure out a way to get others around that Civ to declare wars against them, or to build culture buildings as a defense.  And whatever you do, only engage in open border treaties with them when absolutely necessary, and trade with them (via caravan) only when absolutely necessary.  Those two things will help their tourism bonus overwhelm your culture bonus... but their tourism bonus will definitely go down far quicker if they're defeated.  Also remember, one of the culture tracks will raise the tourism bonus for shared trade routes/open borders/shared religion.  Allowing them to buy your extra luxuries can also lead to them getting more happiness and therefore additional culture as well, so be careful when dealing with the culture hog!

This will likely be a three-part series, as I am planning to cover the middle game next and wrap up with the end game.  Good luck!