I like Morgan Webb from Tech Tv's The Screensavers. I like Adam Sessler from Extended Play. I do not much care for the combination of the two on the new X-Play. It's just a really forced show. At least the three episodes I've seen are. Since it just started last week though I imagine that it'll start gelling together sooner or later.

Now on to my day at the movies....

I saw a poster for 28 Days Later going into the theater today. I hadn't heard anything about it before, but it was touted that it is by the director of Trainspotting and it's a zombie movie. What's more it's written by the guy who wrote the book The Beach, Alex Garland. Sounds pretty good, but the trailer for it that showed before the movie I saw wasn't. Grainy images of a lonely guy and ending with a couple of shots of what I presume were zombies. If it's a zombie movie, show some damn zombies in the trailer already.

There were some trailers that rocked the body that rocked the party though. Hulk looks pretty damn good. A mixture of good old fashioned Hong Kong monster movie and Hollywood action. The Hulk himself didn't look half bad either. As long as he yells something like "Hulk Smash!" We'll be allright with him looking computer generated.

But the movie that I'm most looking forward to this summer has to be The Matrix: Reloaded. It looks really good, and I share much of the same sentiments as the movie review I linked to earlier.

Trailers and posters are good, but what I went to see today was X2 (I refuse to call it X-men United, I just think that's a stupid title. Call it Uncanny X-Men or X-Men Unlimited. Besides the subtitle isn't in the movie anywhere.)

X2 is quite a bit like Buckaroo Banzai. There's a big group of characters that work together, but if you don't already know the backstory a new person might get confused as to who all the people are. I don't think that's a bad thing though. The first film set up all of the characters rather well, and the New Mutants, such as Nightcrawler, Pyro, Iceman and Rogue are all well defined through the film. Also like Banzai, many of the people in the group have abilities and histories that are not defined in the film, but which don't detract from the expierence. Why is Storm a blue-eyed, white haired 20-something black woman? It doesn't tell us, but that's ok. At least the wig is better this time out, and the annoying accent is gone.

The story is pretty straightforward, if a bit heavy on expository dialogue. Theere were a few too many times that characters had to explain what was going on in the story. I kept feeling like I was in a Chris Claremont issue of the comic (both a good and bad thing). There were also a few too many times that characters were running one way, saw something or someone coming and someone else says, "No, this way." The dialogue could have been punched up in a few places, and, fan that I am of the X-Men, I still think some of it sounded a bit hokey.

The effects in this film are well done, especially Nightcrawler's abilities and the brief scene where Colossus armors up. Though still not up to Yuen Ping standards, the wire work was well done.

Each of the characters gets a little bit of screen time here, and the only one that seems to be shorted in the main cast is Cyclops, who doesn't really have much to do, but then even in the comics he's a bit one dimensional (I do like the revelation of his musical tastes, though I don't think everyone in the audience got the joke).

There were only a few story considerations that I didn't think were well explained, such as the whereabouts and activities of the second group of students from the school with Colossus, and why Wolverine's smello-power didn't pick up some things, but I don't want to get into spoiler country until more people have had time to see the film.

In the background at the school I was pleased to see Kitty Pryde, Mirage, Jubilee, Artie and Siren. They didn't do alot, but it was good to see them there. Hank McCoy snuck in as well and Remy LeBeau's name showed up on a computer screen.

I also like that the end foreshadows that the next film may be a re-telling of one of Claremont and Byrne's most famous X-stories.