The Steam Machine and You!

Three sentences. A metric frick-ton of questions.

So just what is Valve's new console and why should you care? I don't know, but I'm hoping by the time I stop typing I'll have a handle on it. You can watch if you want.


1.The Steam operating system, and Steam itself, is free. This is clearly a shot across Xbox Live's, with it's $60 yearly membership, bow.


2. Odds are it will be cheaper than either the PS4 or Xbox One. Think about it, I certainly will. Infamous 3 will weigh heavily on my conscience though...


3. It's controllers may be fabulously bonkers:

This is a patented prototype for a customizable controller by valve and I just love it so damn much. The first thing to go on my pad is that the sticks start to loose their accuracy. That might be a dick joke... I'm not sure. I'm also not sure if anyone knows that this is definitively the controller for the Steam Machine. Which is actually a perfect segway for number four.


4. Nobody knows what the hell this is going to be. But we do know 300 lucky listeners, uh... or applicants will get a free one if they promise to talk about it. Loudly, I'm assuming. I'll be interested to see if most of those go to the press. Scratch that, if any actually go to the press. That would be the kind of Willy Wonka moxie we've come to love from those folks.

So no, I'm still not sure what to tell you and your Steam Machine. But I am curious and I'm sure we'll know more than speculation soon enough.

If GTA V was Whiskey and I was a Duck...

Almost... there...

Sorry, that's a pretty esoteric blues reference, but it's the right one. The point is, I've been really busy with work and with play. GTA V has got me deep in it's clutches, more than any Rockstar game before it. I tried to get into IV (thought it was pretentious and boring) Red Dead (respected the hell out of it, couldn't like it as much as I wanted to) L.A. Noire (Los Angeles was almost entirely pointless), and now V.

It's every bit the masterpiece it's cracked up to be. I mean, from the medal awards for passing missions the right way, to the trio of spectacularly well acted leads, and the shockingly smooth frame rate... this ain't yo' grandpappie's Grand Theft Auto.

I've tasted the sights and sounds of Los Santo's 2013 face lift; as well as the seriously messed up gender politics of it's strip clubs, and now I'm shotgunning the main story so I can get a review up as quick as possible.
 
*Gulp*  I can do this.

Happy Birthday... Me.

Another year, another inch close to death! But seriously, It's nice to hear from family you hardly ever talk to wishing you well. At least they bother to keep up with that sort of thing, and honestly it's touching.

Today being the kind of day it is I'd be remiss if I didn't treat myself, so... I lucked out and got a unclaimed pre-order of GTA V. It's as good as they say. Sexist or no, I'm loving Franklin and whoever plays his partner. The script might let me down now and again, but the actors rarely do. I'm sure I'll find something to gripe about it the further I get into it, but right now I'm in the honeymoon phase and it. Is. Wonderful.

The Final Chapters of Breaking Bad will be Epic.

 That's me. That's my face during the entire run of Ozymandias the other night. Even... no, especially during the Charmin Bear ads. I'm not sure what I'm going to feel like after it all ends a week and a half from now, but I'm optimistic. This new message from part time producer Peter Gould gives me even more hope.

It all adds up to 15 minutes more running time for the last two installments. That's with commercials, so in TV land, they will be almost feature length. Usually I'm not one for long goodbyes. Sometimes the best thing for a TV show to do is to end on the studio's terms instead of protracted TV movies with diminishing returns. But like most everything Breaking Bad does, this seems like having your cake and eating it too. An extra 15 minutes each isn't going overboard and I'll be willing to bet it's absolutely necessary.

So to sum up my gut feeling about this:

GTA V, Polygon, and Sexism.

Just like the hoopla that boiled over when Polygon.com reviewed Dragon's Crown; a lengthy passage in their GTA V review on how the game's female characters are half baked and have no agency, has sparked another whirlwind discussion on video game gender politics.

The shocking thing is (unlike most comment wars) coherent arguments are heard from both sides. Perhaps a game as large as GTA V shouldn't have to cater tastefully to all genders and races. Perhaps if they couldn't have said anything nice about the opposite sex they shouldn't have said anything at all. I don't have to explain which side I come down on... I haven't played the game. But if it's this obvious to the writers at polygon, no doubt it would bother me if I played it. But more to the point, the comment section is good reading if you want to see the most civilized flame war I have ever seen.

Here.

Chipotle's "The Scarecrow"

I have complicated feelings about "organic farming." I would love for us all to return to a time when agriculture wasn't so cripplingly dependent on anti-biotics and where beef steers weren't packed so tight into pens they can't turn around. But a return to the mom and pop farms would mean an almost 40% decline in production and soaring food prices for everyone else. And even if chicken breast steroids are  stopped, there isn't a true alternatively humane way to butcher. 

But I think we can all agree Chipotle makes a damn fine burrito, and it's shockingly novel to see a major chain get behind a different way to produce food. Which brings me to the brilliant short film advertising their I-phone game, The Scarecrow. It's beautiful, impactful, propaganda and I mean that sincerely. I'd love to see another 74 minutes of this... and I'm sure the game is great too.

The Master Review: What can you do to a Drunken Sailor?

Paul. Thomas. Anderson. After seeing nearly all his films at least once, I still have no idea what to make of him. Is he a genius? I'm not sure. Is he overrated? Maybe just a little. Do I actually enjoy his work? ...No. But that doesn't mean he isn't a once in a generation auteur. His dedication to ponderous, epic, and original character studies is something I deeply respect. So you should defiantly check out The Master, but you'd better know exactly what you're getting into. 

I'm sure you've heard this is an "Anti-Scientology" movie. Hmmm, I'll get to that. Philip Seymour Hoffman is obviously playing a L. Ron Hubbard allegory, but that really isn't what this film focuses on. This is an anti-alcoholism film and in that regard it's one of the greatest ever made. Joaquin Phoenix's performance is terrifying. I was planning on having a beer or two to get through the middle, but I'll have trouble touching the stuff for weeks now. His Freddie Quell isn't played "drunk" he's played as a cripplingly dependent addict that happens to drink. I mean this guy is swiping medical grade rubbing alcohol off nurse's carts and mixing cocktails with paint thinner. Whenever the film focuses solely on Freddie's slow decent into homelessness, it's riveting. But here's the rub... that's only the first 20 minutes. Though it's a sublime 20 minutes.

Somewhere in between realism and broad satire you see the various jobs Freddie flits through after leaving the Navy. I didn't know whether I was supposed to think his self destructive misery was funny or not, but there is a point where you stop feeling sorry for him. He's dim, he's crazy, and he clearly doesn't belong on his own. Eventually he stows away on the eponymous master's boat, (first of many subtle Scientology tip offs) unsure with what Lancaster Dodd really wants from him. He claims it was his bathtub hootch recipes, but it's obvious a person like Dodd doesn't like letting go of people so easily..."influenced."

The plot never develops much more from there, you see a snippet of Freddie's life before the Navy, but the relationship between Freddie and Dodd kinda sits there, puttering around New York and Philadelphia. It becomes a fly on the wall scenario, striving to follow a more biographical structure than a traditional three acts. Everything that goes on is interesting by itself, but it sags when strung together. You watch a bunch of static characters scheme schemes that go nowhere for the remaining hour and a half.  

For a film that started off so aggressive and almost silly, the dry latter two thirds start to seem more and more disappointing. Dodd's wife and son-in-law hate having Freddie in their lives, but Dodd can't get enough of winding him up and watching him dance. Aside form the last ten minutes or so, I just described the entire movie. It's not that it fails in any obvious way, I wouldn't have been surprised if Phoenix walked off with the Oscar, it's just painfully predictable and repetitive.

Also, if you were expecting anything resembling a stance on Scientology you will be doubly disappointed. One dude meekly criticizing Dodd at a party does not a message make. It's impartial to the point of banality. Though there is a kind of Spinal Tap fall from grace thread running through the last half that I thought was cute, but that didn't happen to Scientology. Scientology only got more powerful and lucrative. So as a pure fiction there's nothing this movie says about cult worship that's new, but it does it in style. That's almost just as effective.

But I don't want any of you walking away thinking I said this is a bad film or even a failed experiment. It's impeccably crafted and like nothing you've seen outside of There Will Be Blood. If that's the sort of mood you're in, you'll love The Master... just don't go looking for a masterpiece. See? I could have made a really corny joke just then, I'm getter better.