Dangerous Entertainment News – Tuesday, June 28

The RZA shows off a necklace, given to him by his grandfather Old Neat Bastard.

Welcome back to the DEN. In today’s clips from around the web, we have everything you could ever want . . . in entertainment news anyway. News about the RZA as a karate master, Damon Lindelof talking for almost 3 hours about lots of awesome stuff, and we prove once again that Shia LaBeef really is a giant bag of douche. Without further ado . . .

Jon Favreau Interviews Harrison Ford About “Cowboys and Aliens”, “Star Wars”, and “Indiana Jones”! Must Watch! (AICN) – Must watch indeed. Ok, full disclosure; Harrison Ford is my favorite actor of all time and one of my role models. Of course, I grew up to be absolutely nothing like Harrison Ford, but I tried my best. As Homer Simpson once said, “You tried your best and failed, so the moral is; never try.” This series of interviews is amazing though. There’s something about Jon Favreau that just brings people out of their shell and to get a notoriously press-shy guys like Harrison Ford to open up like this is a friggin miracle. All in all, this is going to be the best 30 minutes of your day that you didnt spend sending hate mail to Veena Sud.

My My, It’s American Pie . . . Again

You mean they were able to sign everybody? Wow, what a coup!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Guess what’s getting another undeserved sequel?  Yup, the American Pie franchise (courtesy of ComingSoon.net) is getting a fourth installment.  Now, the first one was actually funny and well-made and I know a number of people that enjoyed it.  It made way more money than anyone ever envisioned it making and naturally it sent us down this horrible sequel spiral which I thought had ended with American Wedding, but apparently was horribly horribly wrong.  Hey, at least we get more Katrina Bowden right?  Ug, not even that can cheer me up and I love Katrina Bowden.

The newest iteration is titled American Reunion and (going out on a limb here) I am guessing centers around the “gang’s” ten year high school reunion.  I don’t know anyone that is the least bit interested in revisiting these characters at this juncture, but far be it from Hollywood to stop pumping out the holy trinity; reboots, remakes, and sequels.  Got a hole to fill?  Let’s see what properties we can dust off out of the closet.  In all fairness to the studio, American Reunion is probably a much easier film to make this time around because literally nobody from the first three films have been the least bit successful.  Ok, I should add that Alyson Hannigan actually has carved out a nice little TV career for herself and is enjoyable on How I Met Your Mother.  Eugene Levy is a quality talent as well, but after he saw his popularity rise with American Pie, he quickly saw it dip back down to its lackluster levels with less than excellent choices such as The Man and Bringing Down the House.  Jason Biggs?  Have you seen his new show Mad Love?  It’s painful to watch with the exception of Tyler Labine and it is not a mystery why it was canceled after only one season.  Mercy killing if you ask me.  Hey, how’s Tara Reid doing you ask?  Let’s just say that her biggest mistake was NOT making a sex tape and leaking it to anyone that could sit through it.  Oh hey, somehow they managed to get Chris Klein back in this one despite the fact that he would not sign on for American Wedding.  First off, what the hell was Chris Klein up to that he was too big for American Wedding?  It’s not a trick question.  The answer is nothing.  How exactly are they going to explain the fact that he missed Jason Biggs entire wedding, bachelor party, etc, but blows back into town for a ten year high school reunion?  Fortunately, series like American (Insert anything here to create sequel) do not need to rely on things like continuity or storytelling to put a film together.  Seriously though, think about how cheap it must have been to put this all-star cast together?  They must have gotten everybody combined for about a million dollars.  Honestly, can you think of a movie that had to so intricately put together its cast and have it be this unimpressive?  It is the exact opposite of Oceans 11.  Can’t wait.

Allow me one last rant about this.  Not only has American Pie gone on to make three shitty sequels, but it has somehow placed itself into the title of the new National Lampoon’s.  What this means is that in addition to making real films, they also release whatever shitty peripheral stories they can come up with.  Check out this list: American Pie Presents: Beta House, American Pie Presents: The Naked Mile (which is a NATIONAL LAMPOON Van Wilder idea by the way), American Pie Presents: The Book of Love, American Pie Presents: Stiffler in Heat, American Pie Presents: Band Camp.  Only one of those is a fake, but can you tell which one without looking it up?  Guess what else?  Poor Eugene Levy is in all of them.  Oh how the mighty have fallen.

In any event, this is just one extreme example of how Hollywood continues to fill holes with cheap and shitty retreads.  Cheap, I fully understand, but why not spend that money on an original idea with a low-budget cast?  There is good material everywhere that is being ignored by studios and the major networks, then gobbled up as independent films or by innovative networks like AMC and HBO.  With online and on-demand content being as popular as ever (and growing), the model for film/tv distribution is changing.  It is time for the studios to re-think their models or to start getting left behind.

Along these lines, stay tuned for a much longer piece this weekend on Warner Brothers purchase of Flixster (you may not have heard of it yet, but you will very soon) and Rotten Tomatoes.  They have some very interesting ideas about how to shape their world and business moving forward.  Until then, Bob out.

HIMYM Season Finale: Shockingly, We Did Not Meet the Mother

When the hell are we going to meet Ted's goddamned wife already???

What is it exactly about How I Met Your Mother that people (myself included) find so endearing?  Is it the cast?  Probably plays a pretty big factor.  Neil Patrick Harris’ characterization of Barney is as enjoyable and well-acted as any in recent TV history and the fact that it is a gay man playing a hyper-heterosexual man only makes it that much more enjoyable.  Jason Segel is always enjoyable as well and the rest of the cast has a chemistry that just does not exist with other sitcoms.  Is it the original writing that attracts people?  Probably comes into play as well.  The style of the series itself is unique in the nature of slowly opening up the story more and more each year until we get to the present day where the story began.  Plus, a lot of times it’s pretty effin funny.  Honestly though I think that what makes HIMYM funny is their ability to make their world seem realistic and surrealistic at the same time.  Now, we’re not talking about Beckett style surrealist (yes, it’s a Beckett kind of week, seriously, look him up), but they easily fall into situations that border on the ridiculous.  It’s commercial surrealism, to be sure, but it is that interplay between real life and fantasy that makes HIMYM so enjoyable.  Are you still reading?  Great, let’s move on.

I found this season of HIMYM was somewhat sub-par.  It was still enjoyable overall, but there were never any of those great episodes that help remind you why HIMYM typically rises above most of the drivel on the networks these days.  Last year was marked by two of the greatest episodes of the series, namely “The Playbook” and “The Perfect Week”.  If you haven’t seen those, I challenge you to watch them both and then tell me that HIMYM is not a show superior to most sitcoms currently on TV.  This season however was just marked by the fact that it was markedly unspectacular.

The finale was the best example of this.  It is almost impossible to give too much away about this season’s finale because nothing actually happens.  I won’t ruin the culminating scene, which holds the only real surprise, but other than that it comes off as a limp mid-season episode written by a writer on spec.  Sure, something happens with Lilly/Marshall and Robin/Barney briefly consider getting back together (does anyone even want to see that?).  Ted has a brief crisis, because Ted has a brief crisis in every episode.  Other than that, there is not a lot to say besides the fact that I was extremely disappointed with the finished product.  I am not asking to find out who Ted’s wife will actually be (I understand that is only going to come with the final episode), but asking for something inspired and with a plot that actually moves the characters along would be nice.  The best part of the episode is actually botched as well; a guest appearances by the always enjoyable Dave Foley and Chi McBride in which they are criminally underused.  Why even bother?  Overall, I still think HIMYM has more potential than most of the crap being pushed out by networks nowadays, but honestly it just makes the finale that much more disappointing when we know what they are capable of.  Here’s to a strong rebound in season 7.

Bob’s grade – 60 (and it’s that high mostly because of Dave Foley and Chi McBride)