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Y2kk Update: - Smallville: Vengeance small Smallville Week in Review (Spoilers...) -

Or if that product placement ain't blatant enough for you? Then how about... well?...

"Acuvue to the rescue? WTF?... If anything, I want hot girls to be wearing glasses, not the other fucking way around..."

I don't even remember the name of the Angel of Vengeance character. All I do remember, was that she was hot with the glasses as a reporter by day, and fucking ugly as a bat when she took them off... I know that the writers were trying to tout her assets or something, as if she was Ms. Marvel Universe or some shit like that. But the CG jumping effects were just so bad, that the Angel of Vengeance reminded me more of just a bad Birds of Prey ripoff than anything else... and that says a hell of a lot...

I admit that Chloe was decent in Vengeance. I mean, when a girl can't have glasses to inflame my fetishes, at least wearing a cute little toque while being mugged always helps... The thing is, most of her comedy just felt out of place in Vengeance. While Clark was brooding about losing his father (and about it being his own damn fault in the end, really), Chloe was making wise cracks about how Metropolis could really use a glasses-wearing reporter during the day and a superhero at night?... I dunno, no matter how cute Chloe was in Vengeance, she just didn't fit in with the mood of the episode. If anything, I felt more chemistry between her and Martha when they were feeling each other up than either of those ever had with Clark...

Now, Tom Welling did a better job with his pent-up, Hulk rage in Vengeance than he did in that shitastic episode last year with the Sand-thingy man. I mean, you could actually feel some of the fury of his during that scene when he was strangling that noname criminal, even if his rage was really just directed at himself... Of course, then Tom Welling became completely wussified again, as Clark once again reduced himself to being the good boyscout with the kryptonite lapel pin as his badge of honour. He went from being deranged one moment to being a pure criminal sympathizer as soon as that Angel girl swooped onto the scene. And he should've just fucking bitchslapped Lana Lang for all her backhanded shit for all I cared...

Do I really need to talk about Lana? Must I always reiterate the same old shit, about how she must be sucking a whole lot of dick to be staying on the show?... The thing is, the writers keep shoving her into our faces (and unfortunately doing so face-first, not breast-first so to speak...), so why the fuck wouldn't I reserve the right to complain that once again, she was backstabbing Clark at every turn?... I mean, sure I know that a) Clark has basically left her out to dry since he got his powers back, and b) the actress has always had more chemistry with Lex than Clark, but really? Must she always be making fucking cutie-eyes at every fucking guy who walks into the Talon but Clark, especially during the times when her fucking boyfriend just lost his fucking father?...

She did alright with the watch at least, as apparently the spoiled bitch can do no wrong when it comes to shopping. And yes, I do understand where she's coming from, that essentially Clark will have to walk it alone when it comes to his loss... But does the actress really have to make it always sound like she's screaming in his ears, "I told you so?", as if she's feeling all smug and warm inside that finally Clark got a taste of her own bitched-up rage (when it comes to the death of her own parents long ago)?... Just get over it, you fucking bitch...

And ah, good ol' Lex. I mean, he may be one of the most pussy-whipped villains out there on television today, but man can the guy get reviled for just trying to pick up the vulnerable chicks all the time... I loved his scene when he was trying to seduce Lana. I mean, doing it all behind his so-called best friend's back, stealing his girl while Clark's father was just buried six feet deep? Heh... Now, that's cold. That's Lana bitchy Lang stone cold, as the two of them deserve each other really...

But when it came to Lionel Luthor trying to do a hostile takeover of Luthorcorp? Not only am I left wondering how the fuck Lionel mustered up that kind of money from the Chinese, but I'm also left shaking my head at just how fucking abrupt the whole B-plotline ended up being in Vengeance... So what if there was a power struggle? Was it supposed to make Lex look like a cheap badass, by pulling another skeleton out of Lionel's bag of closets?... Or was it supposed to make Lionel Luthor look like a threat again, even though the guy was shot down by one frickin' threat from his son, and had to be fucking saved by Clark from a fucking Bird of Prey wannabe? What the fuck was the purpose of this plotline anyhew?...

Well, if the whole hostile takeover thing proved one thing, it was that John Glover was indeed back as the great character we've always known him as. And if anything else? Well, at least Lionel backing off so quickly from Lex's threat, proved without a shadow of a doubt what we've known since the second season at least... That just like Lex has a thing for Lana? Lionel Luthor has had his eyes set on Martha Kent for a very long time, even or especially when he was blind apparently...

So, Ma Kent was given the Senator role of her late husband? WTF?... Can this actually happen in real life? Couldn't Hilary Clinton just have offed her husband during their threeway with Lewinsky and then called it a presidential day? WTF?... Either way though, how dumbass can that Martha Kent bitch really be? First, she goes to a Metropolis slums alleyway in the middle of the night fucking alone, not even with the protection of her goddam superhero son. And then she makes old skool Lana Lang cooing eyes, when it comes to Lionel Luthor being a soft-ass with her in the barn? WTF?...

There was really only one decent scene in all of Vengeance, and that came near the very end... Smallville is very rarely an emotional rollercoaster for me, except for screaming at my television at just how dumbass every character on the show may be. But I do admit that I did feel a bit of sentimentality for poor Jonathan Kent smiling and waving on the ol' Kent video, as if the actor actually still had a job that is...

Poor unemployed bastard. Now that the actor homeless, does this mean he's going to have to accept the clothes that were donated from Jonathan Kent's closet?...

Now, I didn't give a damn about the whole watch thing that Clark was wearing. But the tear down his cheek definitely does deserve some merit from me in the end... And the final moment of the episode, with Pa Kent together with his son on the tractor? That definitely saved this shit hour of an excuse of a show from my fucking full wrath, for one more week at least...

Sad thing is though, John Schneider had more to do in Vengeance than he did for most of the past two seasons combined...

But oh dear God, that still doesn't change the fact that I want my fucking time back...

Can they spin the earth backwards on its axis? Can the fucking writers give me back my fucking time?...

Fuck... Even just a full episode of hot sweaty broads wearing sexy, scintillating glasses, and I would've been perfectly complacent!....

I would rather have fucking Birds of Prey back than this fucking, goddam chicken shit...

Yet instead? I'm sure next week, we'll all be humbled and fucking chicken littled...

... as it'll just be Lana Lang and another fucking product placement to the rescue...

Y2kk Update: - Stargate SG-1: Stronghold & Battlestar Galactica: Black Market Reviews (Spoilers...) -

Stronghold was not the strongest of episodes... hell, it wasn't even the strongest of titles...

What the fuck is "Stronghold" supposed to mean anyhew? The Goa'uld Ha'tak vessel that Ba'al was using? The stronghold that he had over the Jaffa's minds? WTF?... I know that after nine seasons of the show, the writers are running out of original titles to use, but really? Couldn't they have just called the episode, "Ba'al Brainwashes Teal'c in his Ha'tak and Calls it a Night" or some shit like that?...

And what the fuck was with the name of "Kal-el"? Was it just some fucking no-name reference to the 100th episode of Smallville?... Or did the writers simply have a braincramp of a brain-fart when they were trying to think of names of hot fucking women, and somehow came up with Tom Welling in their fucking, brainfucked minds instead? WTF?...

And let me just set the record straight, that I am tempted to actually give the episode of the week award to Smallville for once... No, I have not been brainwashed. But Reckoning did give me pretty much everything I ever wanted out of a half hour of entertainment (except for a fucking hot Replicarter, that is)... But then of course, Smallville took it all away like the motherfucking shit writers that they are in the second half of the show...

Stronghold and SG-1 therefore once again gets my nod as episode of the week, simply because the series pulled off the exact opposite that Smallville's 100th Episode did. While obviously the first half of Stronghold was slow as hell with really no interesting dialogue exchanges whatsoever, the second half simply kicked ass in so many more ways than I can count on one fucking hand...

Now, I don't really get what Ferguson's impending death has to do with the whole brainwashing A-plotline. But hell's bells, I was a sucker for The Tok'ra (Part 2) when Jacob learned of the Stargate program, I was one of the few who actually liked Chimera for Pete discovering the truth as well... And apparently? I'm still a sucker for this "truth is out there" kind of shit, even when it came at the cost of someone as boring as Mrs. Ferguson being the whiny bitch behind the wheel...

... although he gets points from me, for fucking being disappointed as hell in a goddam, shit-ass PS2 game at least...

I don't know whether any technology at the SGC would've been able to save the guy, although a combination of an Asgard transporter and the Goa'uld healing device probably would've gotten that shrapnel out of his cranium. But I must admit at least, that I did like the reuse and return of the memory PVR device from a couple episodes back or whatever sort of crap...

I don't know why I'm such a sentimental fool for shit like this, but I really did enjoy the moment when Ferguson was going through all the shit that Mitchell had recorded from the past year. I loved Ferggie's instantaneous, newfound shared loyalty for Teal'c in the end just like any SG team member would have had, and I even got a bit choked up when he gave his whole pep-talk about how Mitchell is The Man for relying on his gut instincts in the heat of the moment...

Although running straight into gunfire, arms flailing in the air like a suicidal maniac, may not have exactly been what Mr. Ferg-boy there had quite prescribed?...

The first half of the episode was slow as hell, and there's absolutely no denying that. We got a bunch of wild conspiracy theories from Ferguson, a bunch of wild denials from Mitchell, and a whole lot of scenes of Teal'c just making constipated looks at everyone's favourite Goa'uld system lord...

But Ba'al has always been the brightest of the Goa'uld, and he still remains my favourite to this day. He is absolutely the only System Lord who has been able to adapt to new situations over the course of the SG-1 series, and it's no wonder then why he's at it again with his whole brainwashing of the Jaffa council technique...

If there was one truly memorable scene in the first half of the episode, it was when Ba'al was laying the smackdown of truth on Teal'c, even going so far as to mock the Goa'uld's overzealous pursuit of wanting to be perceived as gods. There were a ton of classic quotes there from the guy... To be honest, I actually found his speech to be perfectly written and performed, as Ba'al without his Goa'uld voice actually seemed to be every bit as devious with the truth as a true businessman would be here on earth...

And I see the guy has fallen in love with big bad business suits from our own fair planet here as well. But up in space, where no-one can hear you scream, where the fuck does he get his cheap, ugly-ass clothing?...

It was interesting to say the least, to hear the fear in Ba'al's voice about the Ori. He mentioned later that he tried to use reason and logic with Teal'c, and sadly enough? I saw the logic in his speech as well...

The Jaffa are a splintered nation right now, with no real experience or unity to even begin a true tactical war against a foe like the Ori. Ba'al has always been the smartest of the Goa'uld (his only disadvantage was always being second in technology to Apophis, Sokar, and then Anubis later on), and he would probably be able to lead the remaining Jaffa forces in victory against the superior might of the Ori... Afterall, if Hitler could be voted into power after WW2, and Hamas of all groups could just recently win a majority in Palestine? Then why the fuck couldn't Ba'al actually get the support of the free Jaffa nation at such a time of need?...

... or at least, I'd prefer a snakehead like him to the snakes we actually do get up here in Canada in parliament...

Teal'c did his usual thing of claiming he'd never give in to brainwashing, and that he'd never submit to a Goa'uld again. It was predictable in the end how he'd defeat the clone of Ba'al, feigning allegiance (and hell, even Ba'al knew it before getting staff blasted thrice)... Still, while this was no Fourth Horseman performance, Christopher Judge still always does an amazing job whenever he has to display and prove his love and loyalty for the freedom of his people. I even laughed at a few of his quips, like how apparently kidnapping him against his will counts as "working together" when it comes to Ba'al's reasoning...

Sam was shit. She mentioned Pete when we had all but blocked him from memory, and therefore she deserves to die... On the other hand, she did exceptionally well as the Lt. Col. somehow in charge of Col. Reynolds as she was briefing the squads in front of the gate. And she did look decently cute in that casual jacket she was wearing outside... Besides that? I don't really remember what she did, except apparently take her damn sweet time in ringing Cameron Mitchell up to the Ha'tak platform...

And WTF were with the Jaffa in that scene? Sam, Cam, and Daniel were literally standing around aimlessly, chatting over a cup of tea, and yet still the blooody hell staff blasts hit a mile away? Does being evil again automatically make every Jaffa have goddam worse aim than even a fucking five year old sold on the Black Market? WTF?...

Daniel got to do his sidekick thing with Bra'tac, and most of that was just doing his usual stares of carebears as poor Bra'tac was apparently convincing all his best friends to suicide themselves... I forget if Daniel really did anything else, except give his patented "oh shit" looks when it came to the ominous music that accompanies the brainwash effect. I do remember that Bra'tac at least kicked some asses and took some names in an Alkesh... But why the fuck was he too lazy to actually take out the Jaffa high up with the turrets, the kind of shit which ground units actually have trouble against and need fucking help with? WTF?...

There's really one reason and one reason alone why I put Stronghold as the top of the mountain for episodes of the week, and that really is all due to the brainless action as the SG teams rushed the Ha'tak stronghold... I guess that after the Ori story arcs had taken over, I have really missed the good old fashioned, Jaffa-slaughtering moments that I always used to take for granted on the show. I think I really have missed all the suppressive fire and all the big ass explosions that Stargate SG-1 was always known for before the Goa'uld get swept out of electoral power... And it was just nice to see it back once more, even if it was all amidst Jaffa politics and goddam elections that felt and screamed just about as convincing and interesting as our own up here in Canada...

Cameron Mitchell was certainly in a bad mood in Stronghold. And I don't really know why, but I just happened to actually enjoy his supreme badassness when he went around zatting every man and woman like crazy, proving to the Atlantis team that they're insane for sticking with tasers and pathetic Wraith stunners instead...

It's not just that though, but the whole Ferguson thing weighed heavily on his shoulders the whole time... I don't think we'll ever really find out why the writers decided to work the A-plotline with the B-Ferggie storyline in Stronghold. But Ben Browder as an actor managed to make it all work together as one anyhew... like an ol' chip off the block or an ol' chip in the brain, really...

Now, I don't think we'll ever truly understand why the writers named this episode "Stronghold", or why the fuck they named the fucking whiny, griping bitch in the episode as "Kal-el" (oh wait... maybe that's why they named her so...)...

I mean, the last half hour of an episode is always so much more important than the first...

And even if I had been brainwashed by all the fucking brainless action in Stronghold, with a piece of shrapnel to the fucking brain?...

Well, at least I got to walk away from the whole show with a head-full of new memories...

What the fuck kind of name is "Black Market" anyhew? If the writers wanted to be any more obvious with their title, why didn't they just call the episode, "Lee Apollo Adama Fucks Little Girls in a Supermarket"? Wouldn't that have been more clear?...

And what the fuck kind of name was "Prometheus" for a ship? Is this fucking reference-and-bash-other-shows week or some shit like that?... Stronghold over on Stargate SG-1 tried to outwhine Clark Kent with their own bitchy Kal-el (and failed miserably in that regard). And now we have Ron fucking Moore, trying to show how damn dirty and corrupt and fucking useless the spaceship Prometheus is in the end?...

Wouldn't it have been better then, to have shown this episode next week if you know what I mean?... but, umm... nevermind...

Let's face facts here. Black Market was shit in almost every aspect and retrospect...

... the only issue is, perhaps this episode still stands for the true spirit of Battlestar more than almost any other episode this season?...

Because just like with absolute crap episodes such as Litmus last season, BSG has always tried to be a serious soap opera set in space. And Black Market definitely didn't have that kind of poppy, feel-good nature of being Star Trek or Stargate. A dark, edgy feeling that the second season of BSG has thus far had too little of as of late (aside from Pegasus)... Black Market as a result was completely stripped down to the nitty and gritty, ugly facets of humanity with their pedophillic market, and with even Lee having a taste for a hooker as a replacement blonde...

... damn, that man sure is obsessed with his fucking, dumbass blondes... though sadly, I can relate...

Chevonne or Chevron 9 or whatever the fuck that hooker's name was? Well, she was ugly as fuck to me, and I wanted her fucking daughter to bite the fucking bullet (death wise at least... not the other kind of bullet that sick, perverted minds may have...)... I seriously didn't get why the fuck Apollo was now whining and griping about some pregnant bitch that he left to fend for herself back on Caprica. Why the fuck would he start caring now, about ditching the love of his life to go back and bitch to his father on Galactica?...

Or more to the Ron Moore point, why the fuck are we only learning about this fucking bitch now?...

This was a Lee Apollo Adama backstory all the way through, even going so far as to removing Starbuck, Grace Park, and Helo (thank the gods for that one) completely out of the episodic equation... Hell, while Kara had absolutely as many lines as Pete did back on Smallville's 100th Episode, we got Dualla slutting it up here with Apollo instead. How the fuck can she be that damn horny to go after Apollo why she's still fucking up Billy over on the other end? What the fuck?...

But if anyone was more of a bitch than double-lack-of-D, it was the Madame President. Not only did she completely piss over Baltar's face, essentially demanding his resignation, but she actually was upset with Lee over letting the black market continue? I know that she's supposed to be a utopian idealist at times or some shit like that, but has she really gone mad enough to massacre the entire Prometheus crew and let another Black Market rise up unknown on just another ship (say, the Daedalus)? WTF?...

Her trade policies would only work in an environment with an actual economy. She must've realized (just like everyone else) that gold becomes worthless when you don't have enough food, water, or one-eyed dolls. So why the fuck would her trade policies ever goddam work in a world where demand will always outstrip supply? WTF?...

Col. Tigh sadly lost a drinking partner, as the writers absolutely wasted no time in removing Col. Fisk from the show (though we got a decent Doc Cottle scene out of it for once). I wouldn't be surprised if the writers also somehow blew up Pegasus with the fucking nuke that Dr. Baltar gave away, considering I think it's become transparently apparent that Ron Moore wants the isolated feel of having just one Battlestar back in commission... Col. Tigh at least got a moment to shine during his own interrogation, as he admitted to trading away a few trinkets for fruit and of course booze. But that was essentially all he did in Black Market, and that's essentially all he has done in the second half of the second season so far as well...

Maybe he should trade himself on the Black Market to a real show, where he can get a real personality or some shit like that?...

Dr. Baltar at least had a decent moment himself, being interrogated in Col. Fisk's quarters (which I'm sure no Commander will ever want to step foot in again, out of fear of being the third to go in about as many episodes...). Of course, that interrogation went nowhere except to point out that Dr. Baltar still somehow has a steady supply of cigars, and that nobody on the cast and crew trusts the man as far as they can throw him...

Now, I've always loved the character for being all self-righteous and only self-interested. It's just that in the second season, Baltar's gone really bonkers with his ideas of what will save his life or give him power, as he seems to be siding with the Cylons either out of spite for the president, or out of genuine misguided belief that the Cylons would preserve and worship him... I don't think he's ever really been that damn deluded and dumb before, but I'll save my reservations for another day...

If any one sole character shined in the spotlight in the dismal Black Market, it was James Edward Olmos as Admiral Adama once again. He was subdued as hell and didn't really say a thing, but Olmos has never really needed a script to be the fucking man on the show... Take the final scene of the episode for instance. Just his little comment, that Lee should've told him about "the girl", sadly felt more intriguing and more deep to me than any of the forced and contrived shit that the writers had thrown at my television screen beforehand. Hell, that one line alone left me wanting more as the credits began to scroll, no matter how much the episode sucked ass even moments before...

But alas, no matter how the final seconds went, this episode was shit overall right from the get-go. Why else would Ron Moore waste the opening teaser yet again with another fucking flash-forward scene, to Lee aiming a gun at some no-name, black guy in a suit?... What the fuck is this anyhew? A bad clone of 24 (not that 24 wasn't shit in the first place, mind you?...

And goddammit, must the black guy always be the first to die?... Even if he actually dies 24 hours after everyone else?...

Lee was back to his Seppukku, suicidal ways again, although at least it had some meaning for once when he was begging the thug guy to just pull the fucking trigger on him. I also expected him to be at least decently badass with the shards of glass in the hooker lounge, yet Apollo got his ass kicked and name taken anyhew by just one measly piano cord. WTF?...

I really don't get why the writers decided to shove all this shit on us so damn suddenly, about his ex-girlfriend wanting a child with him or some shit like that. And I especially don't get why we got Dualla forced on us as well (well, I wouldn't mind if she forced herself on myself alone... just D and me...), rather than giving us a super-horny Starbuck in the end (when wasn't it her who got her ovaries removed by the Cylons)?...

I don't know, but somehow I could just really use a good black market or a decent SG-1 memoir device, to trade these shit memories of this episode away for something that's actually decently worth remembering...

And yet still? Black Market still felt more like a true, first season episode of BSG than almost everything else in the second season of the show so far...

You'd think that with a title like Inferno? That Stargate Atlantis of all series would feature a fucking hot bitch...

I mean seriously, in almost every single episode of Stargate Atlantis to date? There has been a fucking hot bitch that I couldn't help but adore, no matter how bad fucking second season episodes can get at times...

Noreena or Norina or Doyle or whatever the fuck her name was, was just plain over-the-top, fucking ugly to me...

What kind of dunce of a scientist was she? Seriously, all she did was strut around the place, flirting her eyes and exposing her skin around to the male members of the cast, bobbling like a complete and utter doll of a bitch while she walked... Hell, she couldn't even make sense of the few, rare technobabble script lines that she actually was given in the goddam episode. She wasn't convincing at all as a person who was actually competent at the job. More like she fucking slept her way to the top, really... both as a scientist, and as an actress...

I mean honestly, since when did Stargate Atlantis actually lower itself to the goddam standards of fucking Andromeda?...

... talk about a Tok'ra Barbie here... didn't she already die in goddam Endgame?...

At least the Tok'ra Anise (from the fourth season of SG-1) had an actually plausible reason to be flirting with two fucking men at once. What was Noreena's fucking excuse?... fuck...

Couldn't they at least have gotten an actress in the same vein as Sora or Cadman? The kind of bitch who is fucking irresistibly cute, yet doesn't seem like a complete and utter slut?... I mean seriously, the Atlantis auditions seem to get it right nine out of every ten episodes. So why did they fuck up the one episode that ironically is named "Inferno"?...

If Noreena hadn't been completely repulsive to me, I'm sure Inferno would've been my episode of the week. While the girl was definitely not worth a damn in my eyes to fight for, the banter between John Sheppard and John Schneider and Rodney McKay was simply classic this week. I mean, this here was definitely the kind of comical writing that the series has been sorely lacking since the events of Trinity (which ironically enough, were even mentioned in the episode was a joke)...

Many on the net are absolutely sick to death of Sheppard's 'Kirking' routine. But what other reason would there to be to constantly cast super hot fucking chicks on the show, if Joe Flanigan didn't get to chance to do his best Kirk routine (both on and off the set)?... And he was absolutely classic in Inferno. I loved the way he constantly manipulated McKay, motivating the guy to shut up and put up with the work handed to his ass, by constantly reminding Rodney that he does his best or sexiest work or whatever, under dangerous lighting conditions and honest to God terror...

And you gotta love McKay. Because as soon as Sheppard made the above boast of a claim, what else does Rodney do but shut up, put up, and wink to the mistress that his middle name indeed is "dangerous"?... I mean, sure some Rodney moments definitely felt forced, as hiding under the table during a volcano tremor while Sheppard got to protect the girl definitely did feel a bit out of place. And his whole speech about Yellowstone National Park being a super-volcano on earth, definitely felt a wee bit too Discovery Channel blunt from my point of view as well...

But how the fuck can I possibly fault a guy who not only blows up planets for a living, but shares in Jack O'Neill's pursuits of finally naming a goddam interstellar battleship as the goddam Starship Enterprise (I just hope "Voyager" wasn't his second choice, that's all)?... I absolutely loved how dejected the poor guy felt, when not only did he learn the original lame-ass name to the Ancient Aurora-class warship they had found, but also at how just lameass Sheppard's new name of "Orion" sounded for a warship that size...

I mean, wasn't the Orion class in Star Trek some shit ass science vessel? Fuck...

... they should've just called her the fucking Defiant, if they wanted a compromise...

Or why just not cut off the last two fucking letters from the name?... The Starship "Ori" sure sounds like a saving grace for the galaxy, now doesn't it?...

Meanwhile, the Daedalus in orbit gets absolutely no love. I mean seriously, why is it that every fucking race in the fucking galaxy doesn't give a fucking damn that we earthlings have FUCKING INTERGALACTIC BATTLECRUISERS... Why the hell did Ronon never even flinch at the thought of a fleet of Daedalus-class battlecruisers? Why the hell does Teyla act as if nothing was out of the ordinary as she's fucking flying through space faster than the Wraith ever have?... And here, why didn't the chancellor even give one damn about the fact that we have the capability to fucking nuke every planet from high orbit? Why the hell doesn't anyone in the Stargate Atlantis universe care that in some aspects, we are MORE advanced than the fucking Wraith ever were? WTF?...

Instead, the Chancellor gave all his praise to the fucking Atlantis city instead. Just like the Prometheus never wows anyone back on SG-1 anymore compared to everyone's first sight of the Stargate, I guess the Pegasus galaxy only bats an eye when something of the Ancients comes their way...

The chancellor himself was a waste of a casting role. They opted to go the path of a Bill-Murray-looking old foggie for the spot, instead of hiring the hot kind of Cadman bitch that they should've gotten for Noreena in the first place... I admit that I did like some of his negotiations with Dr. Weir however. He did raise some valid fundamental, Bill-Murray eyebrows, that the planet did coincidentally start igniting as soon as the Aurora-class warship was discovered by us in the hanger bay. But then of course, like a fucking Michael Bay movie, the plot and character just completely fell apart, as the Chancellor lost all sense of spine and became pussy whipped by the one goddam bitch on the show who always ends up on top...

Really, pretty much the only moments I enjoyed from Dr. Weir were the ones where she didn't say anything and gave nothing but her little bitchy "oh shit" looks, of whether Sheppard and his team were still alive or not... Now, I do suppose her little discussion with Sheppard about Noreena being "hot" was a nice change of pace, considering I am the no-name lesbian in a man's body afterall. And it was refreshing for Dr. Weir to actually act like a modern day woman for once there, instead of a fucking Margaret Thatcher with better boobs... Still, did she really contribute anything to the story? Hell, she even sounded like she was threatening the fucking chancellor, by claiming she wasn't threatening him with the fact we could nuke his ass into high orbit...

Teyla and Ronon were as useless as ever in Inferno. What the fuck was wrong with the writing in this episode, when literally one second before they get saved by the Asgard beaming array, they cliche claim that they're all going to die?... Ronon really should've been kicking ass and taking the names of all those suicidal, illegal alien morons who decided to make a run for the border. Yet instead, as he's holding some helpless little child in his arms, he simply makes a pansy-sort of laugh once he learns that everyone on the planet was pretty much just magically saved by the Orion?...

God, it's really damn pitiful and pitfall painful to watch the pussification of such a character with potential badassness. Where the fuck are the 80's when you need them?...

And couldn't Sora, Dr. Weir, and a fucking naked Cadman have been the saving grace of sweaty, hot and bothered rescuers on the planet instead? Fuck the writers... fuck them for choosing Sir Conan Doyle Noreena over this shit...

But Inferno really wasn't about anything but the new Orion ship that Sheppard got the captain's chair on. Hell, the bridge alone provided some of the best damn banter in the entire damn series to date, as McKay and Sheppard bickered over its name, and poor useless Beckett off to the side had to play musical chairs when it was all said and done... I personally hate the look of the warship, as it lacks any of the beauty of the exterior that Atlantis as a city seems to possess. I understand that it was built during a busy time of war, but really, couldn't they have at least given it fucking nacelles and a fucking saucer section so we could fucking call it the fucking Enterprise in fanfic?...

The end of Inferno was cheesy as hell though. I mean, let me get this straight... Thanks to taking back hundreds if not thousands of drones from the volcanic settlement, the Atlantis city is now fully restocked with Ancient weaponry. Not only do we have the fucking Daedalus in orbit (which if the writers were smart, would fucking fire BSG-style mini-nukes or explosive salvos with their fucking rail guns), but now also the fucking Orion just drum-rolling along in space?...

Add to all that the fact that we now have a ZPM that can consistently use the weapons chair platform and provide unbreachable shielding against a Wraith armada for at least a few fucking days, and then seriously, how the fuck did Dr. Weir and co at the end come to the same fucking conclusion, that it simply all won't be enough? What the fuck are they smoking?...

I know that the Wraith are supposed to swarm en mass and overwhelm in numbers. And from a modern day point of view, I personally do find the hundreds of Wraith darts scrambling from each motherfucking Hive ship to be impressive to say the least... But I seriously can't understand how the fuck the Ancients could have possibly lost the war, when they possessed at least tens of thousands of Ancient drones, weapons that not only bypass all known SciFi defenses with fucking pinpoint perfect accuracy, but can also take out a fucking entire fleet in orbit with fucking one-hit kills as well?... Tell me then, with shields and weapons and a technological gap like that, how the fuck could the Ancients ever possibly lose a war to even a fleet of hundreds of fucking Wraith ships in the end? WTF?...

That's why I was fucking laughing my ass off at Cameron Mitchell back in SG-1's Ripple Effect, when he was trying to explain to his doppleganger why we needed the fucking ZPM in Atlantis instead of earth. I mean seriously, how the fuck are the Wraith really a threat?... Even if they can somehow ever defeat Atlantis and find a way to the Milky Way Galaxy, wouldn't they just get this asses kicked and alien names taken not only by the Ancient defenses left in Antarctica, not only by the few Asgard ships that occasionally still patrol the protected planets, but also by the dozens if not hundreds of Jaffa Ha'tak motherships left in our galaxy?... And wouldn't the Ori just eat their Wraith asses for breakfast? What kind of threat from the Wraith is that?...

I say, if push comes to shove, just cut our losses in the Pegasus Galaxy. Take the ZPM back into orbit, download the Atlantis database to earth, beam up whatever technology they can to the Daedalus, and then blow the lost city of Atlantis the fuck up... What the fuck is the problem is that? What the fuck are the Wraith gonna do then? Really then, what kind of measly threat are they in the end? WTF?...

And yet still, we got Smallville "oh shit" looks from the entire cast and crew from one measly Hive ship on their long range scanners...

... well, maybe the Voyager Borg... but definitely not the Starship Enterprise Borg, at least...

But hot damn, "Orion" as a name for the Aurora-class warship fucking sucks ass. Why not just rename it to "Gateship 1" for all I care?...

Inferno definitely had its flaws, namely Noreena and the lack of fucking Star Trek conventions, aside from the Kirking at least... I still don't get why the Daedalus gets no appreciation either. I mean, sure they were dumbass as hell for not just transporting the population of the planet to the nearest Stargate (rather than ferrying them to Atlantis for twelve bloody hours at a time)... but, well?... still...

Inferno was still definitely a fun episode, with amazing special effects and a McKay super-solution in the end that may have been ridiculous sounding, but definitely felt right in the context of the episode. His speech alone, about how brilliant his plan was to rocket the ship into orbit using the volcano eruption as propellant, merits a definite return to the classic days of patented McKay technobabble from the ever glorious first season of the show...

Stargate Atlantis has always been the John Sheppard and John Schneider and Rodney fucking McKay show in the end, and Inferno was definitely no different. And thank God it wasn't any different, because the series has been sorely lacking in the fun romp factor of banter and bicker between the two of them, for God knows how long between two goddam fires... whatever the hell that means...

Now, I'll definitely admit that Inferno wasn't the greatest of episodes... but it definitely could have easily been...

... if only Noreena had been fucking hot enough to make me erupt in an inferno...

... if only Sora and Cadman had to get naked and huddle together on the ash planet to survive...

... if only fucking dragons were the goddam reason for the fucking reign of fire...

Y2kk Update: - Smallville: Reckoning small Smallville Week in Review (Spoilers...) -

I wish (or not?) that I could also say that this is the 100th ever small, Smallville week in review... but, well?...

And death by toaster? What the fuck is this? Final Destination: Smallville?... This is what the writers consider a reckoning? WTF?..."

But still, there was literally one damn moment in the episode, where I leapt off my seat and cheered my ass off in glorious relief and delight. It was as if the Toronto Raptors had won the NBA Championship and the Toronto Maple Leafs had won the Stanley Cup, all at the same fucking time for me...

The first half of Reckoning wasn't a bad episode at all. And quite frankly, if only the episode had kept that same kind of quality throughout? Reckoning probably would have been my episode of the week...

The first scene in the show was one of the best the series had ever done. For once, Kristen Kreuk wasn't a total bitch when she was left gasping and gaping in awe at the wonders that had been laid out before her... The Fortress of Solitude looked amazing in that scene, and Tom Welling just sold his role of pure naive happiness so damn well as he finally got to show off his powers to the fucking love of his life. The Superman-leap to the top of the ice cliff was definitely one of the few pinnacle moments and highs of the series...

Now sure, I didn't fucking get why the moron would try to ruin the moment with an out-of-the-blue marriage proposal. But hell, at least even I got a laugh out of the fact that he was too fucking cheap to buy his own fucking diamond ring...

... well, the only thing that the writers probably meant for me to laugh at, that is...

And in the midst of the first half of Reckoning? We got a great scene between Lana and Lex, where Michael Rosenbaum literally acted his ass off, where you could actually see the moment when Lex tweaks and twists into the villain we all know him as... As soon as he felt that rock on Lana's bitch of a finger? He became deranged and demented, and you could almost feel how epically sinister his character would one day become...

... when Lana fucking Lang finally got what was coming to her... when she fucking got run over by a fucking school bus of all damn things...

Oh, how ironic... apparently, a school bus doesn't quite mix with a fucking dumb bitch...

I literally wept in happiness at the blood on Clark's fucking hands as Lana was fucking dead in his arms. I fucking thanked the fucking gods and powers that be behind the scenes of the show, for finally giving us the kind of priceless moment that you expect from a goddam series based on the goddam Superman comics...

... and saw that there were still thirty fucking minutes left in the fucking show...

The second half of Smallville was simply atrociously rushed... Maybe it would've had some sort of meaning if the episode had been extended to two damn hours, but as it stands right now? I felt absolutely no emotional connection to Jonathan Kent's death whatsoever...

So, Pa Kent finally croaks from the same shit that was supposed to kill him off last season. Except that his heart hasn't failed once on him for over a year, as the fucking writers have pretty much completely ignored everything they wrote from last season (have they even mentioned Jason or his mother once? WTF?)...

And having Jonathan Kent just plain roll over and die was just so damn anti-climactic, that I literally rolled my eyes at just how pointless and cliche it was as he keeled...

And where the fuck was the epic fucking father-son speech in the end? Shouldn't the character at least get some final departing words to leave a lasting impression on his superhero of a son for the rest of his life? And yet here, in Reckoning, Jonathan Kent gets killed off in about five seconds flat without uttering even a single damn last word? WHAT THE FUCK?!?...

It was obvious from the start that it would be the father who would get his ass kicked and name taken to the heavens. I just didn't think that he'd somehow kill himself by apparently turning Lionel Luthor into too much of a fucking punching bag for his own good... Who would've thought that a superhero show would have a fucking death of a man who apparently got too tired from beating the crap out of somebody else?

And the pay-off at the end of the episode was just so pointless. Annette O'Toole actually looked happy at times that her co-actor wouldn't drag her down in the series anymore... And the fucking music during the funeral scene was just way too serious for an episode that literally featured time travel and a fucking flux capacitor of all things...

I mean, a funeral with fucking time travel... It just doesn't fly with me, you know?...

... like fucking spinning the world backwards on its axis... but that's a debate for another day...

Reckoning was truly the definition of a schizophrenic episode, as almost every character was decent in the first half of the hour... and then suddenly became as goddam moronic as they've been all series long once the goddam reset button was finally pressed and shoved in our faces...

Lana Lang for once was actually bearable in the series, at least before she was risen from the fucking grave. I mean, sure she was still a complete bitch to Lex Luthor. But isn't that expected considering he is the villain of the story?... She was warm and caring and actually compassionate to Clark when he revealed his secret. She even took it better than Pete or Chloe did... And somehow, the actress actually didn't seem out of place with her magical understanding of all his fucking lies over the years. She actually forgave the poor bastard, and seriously looked like she actually meant it for once. WTF?...

But in the second half of the episode? God... She cheats on Clark with Lex, doesn't really give a damn when she's almost run over by a fucking bus, and then fucking ditches Clark yet again even after his fucking father dies... I mean, the writers were able to make her into a decent enough character for thirty fucking minutes of the show. Why the fuck couldn't they have managed to do the same damn thing for the rest of the series, by at least keeping her fucking dead?... uggh...

Chloe was cute in the first half of the episode. She didn't have the same spark that she did when talking with Clark about super-semen, but she definitely was both adorably jealous yet supportive about his whole marriage proposal shit when push came to shove... Problem was, Chloe became a complete dunce in the second half of the episode. She had only one damn job, of watching fucking Lana Lang at the fucking election party. And yet she fucked that up, all because Lana Lang decided that a fucking toaster sparkling in the water would somehow make a lovely champagne toast to the fucking election victor? WTF?...

Lana Lang was utterly useless in Reckoning, even before the goddam reset button was pressed. She did have a nice lesbian moment with Lana, when she shared her feelings of trust about Clark... But in the second half of the episode, what the fuck did the writers do to Lois? Did Lionel set her up with the fucking toaster from cheesy Final Destination hell, or was she really just that damn stupid the second time around? It made no sense whatsoever for that toaster shit to happen... Was it supposed to point out that she's hot? What the fuck?...

Lionel Luthor tried to cash in the favour of loaning Jonathan Kent the money needed to beat Lex in the election. And at least John Glover got to flex his evil acting chops again, blackmailing the father with what we can only assume is a picture of Clark using his powers... It's just that, all of this meant jack Jonathan shit considering a) Lionel got beat up by a man having a bloody hell heart attack of all things, and b) this all lead to Jonathan Kent dying meaninglessly from the same fucking heart attack, without even a fucking dying breath of a speech to mutter to his son... What the fuck kind of poetic justice is that? What the fuck kind of Justice League shit is that?...

At least Lex Luthor was decently consistent in both halves of the episode. The ironic thing was, he was the sole character who was actually meant to be schizophrenic in the damn story in the first place... Now, I loved how he twinged and cringed and essentially went batshit insane from Lana not only accepting Clark's marriage proposal, but also from the fact that she was lying straight to his face about Clark's secret. His lust for her and the truth about Clark have always been the two deciding factors that have made Lex into the villain that he is today. And it was great that the writers finally let the actor push the character past the boiling point for once... even if the goddam reset button was pressed...

But still, the problem was, what the fuck did Lex Luthor do in the second half of the episode? Exactly the same damn thing he did in the first, which wasn't really compelling television... considering the second time around? Lana fucking Lang didn't even get to fucking die for me again...

The episode was definitely far too rushed, as the end of the episode didn't even get a chance to make an actual storytelling statement, that Jonathan Kent's death was all because of Clark's fault of not realizing the consequences of his goddam Marty McFly actions. I mean, instead of a decent moral to the story (that time travel apparently fucks somebody over no matter who you try to save), we were all left with the dumbass impression instead that apparently, it was Pa Kent's fucking time to die from a fucking broken heart? WTF?...

Tom Welling was good in the first half of the episode, when all the spinning and panning camera angles helped to actually make the Clark and Lana scenes bearable to watch for once. Problem was, he went right back into his usual "oh shit", teen angst, constipated shit in the second half of the episode. And of course, I do blame him for that... considering that he should've just let Lana fucking Lang die all over again...

... and of course, satisfy the audience with her bloody hell demise a second time around...

The thing is, the first half of the Reckoning may stand as some of the best damn storytelling that the series has ever done...

... it's just too bad then, that I kept watching the godddam show after the fucking mid-break commercials...

Killing off Lana Lang and shocking (yet appeasing) Superman comic fans around the world would have been bold, and yet so damn appropriate... considering her death would have driven the final wedge between Clark and Lex, slowly leading them both into the Superman mythos and moving the series on to Metropolis and Lois Lane...

Sure, Jonathan Kent may have been the more logical choice to whack off the show, considering he hasn't had a decent character arc in God knows how long. But he was also the safer choice, a choice that really doesn't concern me one damn bit for the future of the series... He was even more fucking pointless to the sum of the story than even the Sheriff ever was. And it's not like he even got a decent farewell speech for us to remember him by...

I mean, seriously?... Smallville of all series manages to reach one hundred fucking episodes? WTF?...

Y2kk Update: - Stargate SG-1: Ripple Effect & Battlestar Galactica: Epiphanies Reviews (Spoilers...) -

I guess I can't really say that I enjoyed this week's offering of Stargate SG-1 as much as I would've liked to the first time around...

But you know what? After multiple viewings?... this episode has sort of grown on me...

Because let's face facts here. Ripple Effect was designed solely for the long term SG-1 viewer at heart...

And considering I am the no-name nostalgic? I guess it was no wonder that it ended up as my own personal episode of the week...

The basic premise deals with our Stargate Command turning into the bloody hell, Union Station of the multiverse when it came to SG-1 teams arriving through the gate. Carters and Daniels and Mitchells and Teal'cs were showing up from all sorts of alternate universes... Now, the usual suspect of a problem here lies in the fact that I've always hated alternate universe, shit-ass stories in any science fiction series out there. I didn't care about it SG-1's Moebius or any alternate universe story they did beforehand, so why care about it now?...

It's not that I don't see the science behind the whole quantum universe theory. It's just that, it makes no fucking logical sense from any actual point of real life view (sort of like Shit Theory... or String Theory, I meant...)... Let's say that in our universe, the SG-1 team does stop the Ori plague. But really, what's the point of doing so, when simultaneously they just created an infinite number of worlds where the Ori destroyed our entire population? Or if in our universe, the Ori do take over, why really fucking cry and care about it when we know that in an infinite number of alternate universes, the Ori instead got their asses kicked and names taken?...

I've always hated how this stupid quantum theory shit ruins every single belief we as a people have about good and evil, right and wrong, and the fucking consequences of our actions. And normally when it comes to SciFi series, my beliefs here don't change worth a damn...

But there has been the odd Star Trek Enterprise episode or so, where they used the fucking quantum leap effect to my decent liking. Hell, I even dug the whole Mirror Universe reference that Mitchell had about his bizarro twin... And thankfully for this week's episode of Stargate SG-1? Ripple Effect had the same kind of wacky entertainment factor here too...

Because with all the presented possibilities of Carter's fucking love life? Fuck, it was like a bloody hell, fanfic convention...

I'm sure the writers are still kicking themselves for killing off Dr. Janet Frasier, just like I'm sure the vast majority of fans are still doing as well. It's not that Lexa Doig was a bad replacement or anything, but Ripple Effect did sort of have the effect of showing just how much more touching and warming and vibrant Janet Frasier was and still is compared to her counterpart... Teryl didn't have a lot of scenes to herself, and one was even wasted on giving a speech about ethics to bloody hell useless Landry. But damn, even I was feeling all choked up and nostalgic at seeing her face and hearing her voice yet again, just like Daniel and Teal'c did when they were explaining to her about her own hero's funeral...

Absolutely the best scene of Ripple Effect came at the end, without a single shot fire, all thanks to the return of an old friend... Now, I'll never understand how a bitch as hot as Amanda Tapping could ever willingly take maternity leave (...), so the thought of her doing so during an Ori plague didn't sound right at all. But still, Amanda and Teryl Rothery were pretty much best friends on the set for seven years of the show, and it definitely showed as they gave each other their proper lesbian goodbyes. It was touching really, how Daniel and Teal'c stepped up the plate as well and really gave the Janet Frasier actress a true salute and a true hero's departure...

Now, I didn't give two shits about the return of Martouf, considering all he did in the past was provide a goddam useless love interest to Amanda Tapping as the show was becoming more and more like a bloody hell soap opera (in the fourth season, that is). And I will never understand why Carter seemed so damn desperate to kiss the motherfucker here and now, when she's had Jack and Cam and, well, hopefully even Lam, to keep her company in the ovaries and ovaltime meantime...

Still, I know there's still a ton a female viewers out there that have been begging for Martouf's return for some reason or another. And that's exactly how a good quantum multiverse episode should be created - as a gateway (or a Stargate, really) to new worlds and new possibilities, and especially to both new and old characters... to give us old skool, fanboy viewers the kind of shit that we normally would never be able to get in our own universe of the series...

She was the one good thing about Moebius... and you've just got to believe that in this geeky Carter's universe? That she's married to everyone's favourite Mr. Fantastico of McKay... just like I'm sure our Carter will be too, don't you know...

Seriously, why the fuck couldn't that geeky Carter at least have been able to stay in our fucking universe? WTF is wrong with the writers?...

But still, Amanda Tapping did a solid role in her job as Samantha Carter... and as Samantha Carter... and as Samantha Carter too, I guess...

If Battlestar Galactica can have a room full of naked, horny Boomer chicks, then why the fuck couldn't we have had the same with fucking Sora, Lt. Cadman, and I guess Samantha Carter on the side as a dish?...

Now, I never bought into her whole evil counterpart (although 'misguided' rather than evil would've been a better description), but I did love the banter whenever the two Carters bumped heads. I mean, who else here didn't chirp in delight at not just Sam's sheer happiness when she had finally found someone who could "keep up with her" in intelligence, but also at the thought of what else those two could have be keeping themselves busy with outside of work?... ahem...

Cameron Mitchell really only had one great scene, and it wasn't with the Asgard Kvasir (he stole Sheppard's line, afterall). But hot damn, I'd be lying if I said I didn't laugh out loud, at whatever he and himself were laughing at loud with each other about on the Prometheus...

The whole evil Cameron Mitchell schtick was kind of amusing though, despite being contrived and predictable. I mean, who here didn't suspect something was wrong, when that one team alone stayed in ever conspicuous black the whole damn time on the base?... Still, that didn't change the fact that Cam had another good speech with himself about stealing the ZPM from Atlantis. I mean, I guess Ben Browder really had good chemistry with, umm, himself, when they were debating over the age old adage of whether the ends do justify the means...

I just don't get it though. Why the fuck does the alternate SG-1 really need the ZPM, when our own Mark II naquada generators can power the Antarctic chair for short intervals at a time? Just have a fucking steady supply of those motherfuckers ready at hand... And can't the fucking Asgard rig something up for that earth if their planet really was in that much jeopardy? Or double McKay jeopardy, really... WTF?...

I did like the whole play on words when it came to Mitchell explaining the plan on the Prometheus in the end. I guess I should've seen it coming, that one team would predict what the other team would do, and then make a prediction based on that shit. I guess I should've seen it coming, but I was still surprised somehow when our Carter and Daniel snuck up from behind with zats... But still, there's one damn thing that I still don't get. Why the fuck did the black SG-1 team need to let our crew escape, to find out just exactly how they would escape (in their own words)?...

I mean, seriously. WTF?... It's called walking out the front door, you stupid fucks...

But at least, there was quite a few nice jokes in-between, to lighten up the mood of the episode quite a bit...

And oh, just to get it off my chest? I know I may sound like a broken record here, by pulling a Walter and an SG-1 iris code over and over and fucking over again...

But still, I just have to say it. Landry fucking sucked balls yet again... and, well?...

Teal'c was mostly useless as well, except for when it came to Janet Frasier. It was touching just how much he seemed to miss her, even though it was awkward as hell at just how much Christopher Judge really seems to tower over the dear doc... I guess I also snickered at just how much the alternate Teal'c enjoyed sucker punching our Cameron Mitchell into a wall. I mean, it's not like that Teal'c was exactly evil or anything... I guess he just had a bone to pick with his own Mitchell or some shit like that, that's all...

Daniel Jackson wasn't really given any great moments or lines, but Michael Shanks did his absolute best to form the heart of the show yet again. And he definitely proved that he is still arguably the star of the series, by just how much of a soft, subtle connection he seemed to bond with the alternate Janet Frasier so quickly... I don't really remember what else he did this episode, except for looking all confused at points about the whole quantum universe thing (which made no sense, considering he was the first human on earth to experience this shit back in season one). But the actor still certainly did his thing with whatever script lines he was given, and made the whole episode somehow fun in the end to watch...

As I've said before, I've always traditionally fucking hated quantum multiverse storylines, as the technobabble that comes out of Carter's mouth in episodes like this is just plain Star Trek: Voyager unbearable at times. I mean, it's not like it's complicated or anything for any true SciFi fan to interpret, but it just doesn't make any damn logical sense in the end anyhew...

Take Dr. Lee's comments about the lack of entropic cascade failure. I guess Carter also surmised that the other SG teams coming from "near" or close universes to our own, allows our verses to share entropy or some shit like that. You know, simple shit like that... But back in season three, entropic cascade failure made no fucking sense in the first place (why the fuck would added entropy in the universe make a person suddenly spontaneously combust and dissolve?), so why the fuck bother to even bring it up again?...

And oh God, while it wasn't a problem to understand for me or anything, all the talk about quantum subspace rifts from the fucking Beachhead black hole was still giving me a fucking Lana Lang migraine in the end... I mean, it's not like it was all complicated, as it's understandable from Stargate season 2 that a large amount of energy directed at the Stargate wormhole (as its traveling through a black hole) would fuck things up. They did do it with time travel before as they mentioned in the episode, so why not alternate universes as well?...

It's just that, whoever built the fucking Stargates in the first place really has to take a goddam damn look at their fucking security precautions, and wonder just how the fuck they've let so many goddam programming bugs through... Were the Ancients fucking high at the time when they built this shit? WTF?...

And how the fuck did the alternate universe SG-1 even know that we had a working ZPM, and how we used it at Atlantis? Did the writers even begin to try to explain these kinds of inconsistencies?...

But bah, while I will forever detest all the unnecessary technobabble and the very underlying theory of fucking quantum multiverse shit in the first place, that doesn't automatically mean that I'd hate every episode based on that very same quantum shit...

While newcomers to the Stargate SG-1 universe may not quite understand why I've declared Ripple Effect as my own personal episode of the week, despite all its shortcomings?... I mean, I admit that even I didn't think I'd ever like Ripple Effect, simply because of the fact that it deals with this kind of screwed up, SciFi bullshit...

But the fact of the matter is, just the return of Janet fucking Frasier?... that alone was enough to put this episode over the top for me...

I guess it figures then, that after a multitude of viewings of the goddam multiverse?...

... that a wondrous roomful of horny, Moebius, geeky Carters would eventually grow on me as well...

You know, it just kinda dawned on me while I was watching this week's episode of Battlestar Galactica...

... that Battlestar Galactica has been really, really, ridiculously rushing their space opera storylines as of late...

Think about its first season. How many episodes was Helo stuck on Crapica? How many days really passed on Galactica as our own weeks flew right on by?...

Now compare that to the current second season, where the Pegasus shit was originally planned for just two episodes...

... and where now, Laura Roslin's cancer was treated in just five fucking minutes of the fucking show...

Now, I know, I know. This is really no different than a real soap opera in that aspect, in which Roslin would've came back with her brain transplanted in a super hot 17-year old bitch if this was Days of our Caprican Lives... I know, and yes, I know that the fallout about the whole prophecy bullshit from last season is what the writers really care about in the end. Now that Laura Roslin is alive and well (and all thanks to the Cylons to make it even worse), then how will the fleet react? How will the Galactica crew take it, when they learn that the woman they've been worshipping as their emissary from the gods may just be a common, goddam bitch in the end with fucked up blood?...

But it's not just the whole Laura Roslin thing that was the only part of the episode that the writers seemed to rush. Because was it just me, or did the Peace Movement with the Cylons sort of just pop out of nowhere, with absolutely no build-up during the first half of the season whatsoever?...

Now, judging from 9/11 and just how many damn Americans blame their country's foreign policies for "making" the terrorists in al Qaeda into the animals that they fucking are now (or how many goddam conspiracy theories there are about that shit...)? Then I guess it would be possible for such a fucking insane group to show up in the Galactica fleet as well, even after 12 fucking planets of fucking tens of billions of friends and family were just fucking nuked... But I don't know, the peace movement's desperation just all felt so rushed and forced anyhew, as there was absolutely no build-up to these people becoming traitors and fucking suicide bombers of their own. There's normally a longer transition period for dementia than just five fucking minutes, I'm sure the writers know...

And was it just me, or did Baltar or someone else mention that literally weeks have gone by since Resurrection Ship (Part 2)? Fuck, it was like the events of that episode didn't even happen... I mean, nobody gave a damn that the Cylons had finally gotten off their backs. No-one cared that they just got some hope that they could actually survive or win the war...

Instead, we got about ten seconds of Apollo pouting like a bitch again... Now, I'm sure the writers think his suicide death wish is interesting on paper, but having an actor sound deaftone and monotonous on camera is not what I'd consider as the best entertainment on television. And it certainly didn't help that the only thing he even got to show up for, was a damn PDA in some bitch's bag... Maybe there will be a decent pay-off in a future episode about Lee's depression, I don't know. All I do know, is that it's really no surprise that I'm completely not interested in a character who specifically has lost all interest in being on the show. Ironic, ain't it?...

And WTF did Starbuck do? She was simply muted there, as the only thing she got to contribute was a busted windshield after punching a goddam mountain in space... She barely even seemed concerned for Lee. WTF was up with that?... And was it me, or did neither Starbuck nor Lee have any interaction whatsoever with the president in her hospital bed (the very woman who has acted as a mother and mentor to the both of them)... or even with fucking Helo, as he was being pussy-whipped by fucking Grace Park...

And oh, by the way, just so I can get it off my fucking chest? Helo sucked his own balls... yet again...

It's not that the actor did a bad job at the material he was given. It's just that, I personally preferred him as a pussy whipped Replicator back in the sixth season of SG-1 (did he even have a line in that episode?), than the fucking pussy-whipped bastard who has simply no purpose but to give Grace Park and viewers a reason to bash their fucking heads over and over again on a goddam glass window...

Grace Park must've realized just how diminished her own role has become, and started suiciding herself to get some sort of attention on the goddam show... She's just become too passive over the past few months, being overly protective of the baby with really no purpose but to look hot during pregnant Munich sex. I don't honestly believe she's done a real thing in the series this season besides Flight of the Phoenix, when at least she looked cute as hell instead of just being goddam fat... Still, it did make sense how her child did provide the miracle cure for Roslin's cancer, even if the exact same solution has been used in fucking Star Trek: Voyager God knows how many times...

And if Battlestar Galactica ever officially becomes as bad as Star Trek: Voyager? I will personally fucking put a bullet between Ron Moore's eyes before doing the same to myself... or at least, I'd bash myself in the forehead with a goddam ugly stick, like I already do for fucking Smallville...

Even Doc Cottle was useless this episode. Where was his charisma, where was his sarcasm, where was his charm, and where the fuck were his smokes?... I know that the whole Laura Roslin thing set a mood where none of the above would've been appropriate. But I was bored out of mind in every single scene that dealt with the infirmary already, so why not lighten up the mood at least with a frakkin' light?... C'mon, I know the motherfrakker wanted to. What better way would there be to cure cancer and save a Cylon baby, then to puff on a couple of cigarettes as he's doping them with drugs?...

I don't think any character really did a decent job in Epiphanies. Pegasus was nowhere to be found, except as a slight backhanded mention somewhere down the line. And Col. Tigh looked utterly clueless as always, with no purpose to be on the show whatsoever as long as he doesn't have a drink in his hand...

... or should I call him Admiral Adama, even if he doesn't deserve the fucking rank the way he was pussy-whipped all episode long in Epiphanies?...

I don't know, but he just didn't have a commanding presence at all here. I mean, he had kept Boomer's child alive for all this time, yet just submits to Roslin's demands to off the fucking baby as soon as the order is even muttered by the bitch?... He was trying to be a hardass with the terrorist leader and all, claiming that he'd hunt each and every traitor like him down in the fleet. But what point was there to all that really, when the reborn Laura Roslin in the end just reneged on everything he had just achieved with her own fucking negotiations?...

Hell, Adama even tried to reason with fucking Helo of all pussy-whipped people, practically begging him to see the logic in their actions, when the Admiral really should've just beaten his officer senseless to the ground with his own fucking shoe instead... I would've cheered at that thrashing at least. I bet that fucking pussy was used to that kind of shit from his Asian girlfriend anyhew...

Dr. Baltar did have his moments. His moments were just kind of weirdly on and off, that's all... Sadly, the sole highlight of the episode was the return of the Number Six comedy in his head. Watching him just standing there in the corridor, holding his own tie in his hand like a moron, was perhaps the only damn time that this episode even got a positive reaction out of me...

But was it just me, or was Dr. Baltar both too smart and too damn dumb in Epiphanies at the very same time? He saved Roslin and the day with his whole bloodworks thing about Sharon's Cylon baby, as if he actually knew what he was talking about. Yet when it came to the vagina of Gina over on Cloud Nine, he sends over a fucking nuke because he's pissed that Roslin doesn't trust his ass? WTF?... I'm hoping that at least he was intelligent enough to disarm the nuke or some shit like that, as it just makes no fucking sense why he's willing to risk his own life amongst the rest of the fleet due the potential goddam ramifications of his own actions. How the fuck does giving a nuke to al Qaeda solve his problems. WTF?...

But Epiphanies was always meant to be a true revelation about Laura Roslin, even if we already knew that fucking bitch was sleeping with Grand Marshall Adar of Crematoria from all the fucking times she fluttered her eyes when mentioning the asshole president in the past...

First she fucks the president, then Admiral Adama... and now she's suddenly swapping fluids with fucking Grace Park?...

Just like any real bitch out there? As soon as she's got nothing to lose, Roslin goes on a real fucking killing spree. I mean seriously, one week she's all into pulling the trigger on Admiral assassinations, and now she's suddenly taking up the pro-Abortion stance as a hobby? WTF?...

I hated all her lost flashbacks from Caprica, or Tollana, or Vancouver, or wherever the fuck she was. I mean, they tried to make her MILF hot when it came to getting her feet wet in the fucking fountain, but then she fucks up the mood with some shitastic tale of teachers becoming terrorists?... What kind of lameass parallel was that? Sure, Roslin was a teacher before, but what fucking kind of planet was Caprica if the teachers were willing to go to arms against the military? WTF?...

Here in Ontario, the teacher's union may literally own the Canadian military with the fucking Maple Leafs and shit like that. But even they aren't dumbass enough to go to fucking war. What the fuck was wrong with Caprica?...

What a fucking bitch. She goes behind her married boyfriend's back to ruin his own negotiations, and then fucking bitches when she has her job taken from her? And all this on the very same day when her hair suddenly reverted and changed to sheer ugly stickness as she met with the doctor about her cancer? WTF is wrong with the bitch? Why won't she just fucking die already?... uggh...

... then again, I can't quite tolerate Lana fucking Lang over on Smallville, now can I?...

... that the series has fucking screwed itself with what can only be described as a big, fucking reset button...

Sure, there are fucking ramifications to all this miracle cure bullshit. The fleet will lose all hope in Roslin leading them to earth, Adama may back off from his horniness, now knowing that he actually has to wake up with the bitch rather than just fucking and leaving her for dead, and yadda yadda yadda...

Apollo was pissed off at life one year ago. He's fucking maniac depressive as hell once more...

Starbuck was Apollo's sidekick just a season ago. And now she's riding shotgun all over again...

One fucking year ago, Roslin was just fine and plain and dandy as a complete bitch and as the newly appointed president of the colonies...

And now, after a fucking lameass flashback show? She's back as the president, all fine and plain and dandy as a complete and utter bitch yet again...

... sigh... it's like running on a fucking treadmill... or like watching Smallville, really...

Y2kk Update: - Smallville: Lockdown small Smallville Week in Review (Spoilers...) -

Fucking goddammit, my brain was under fucking lockdown for fifty goddam minutes...

"They shot the Sheriff?... but they did not shoot the deputy... Or did they? Well, ain't that a mother..."

Talk about the most anti-climatic death ever... It wasn't until after the end of the fucking episode did I even notice that Sheriff Adams or McAdams or Reba McNeil or whatever her fucking name may have been, wasn't wearing a goddam bullet-proof vest in the end. Oh how so goddam ever convenient...

Lockdown was a fucking blister on my brain, simply from the fact that we got fifty fucking minutes of Lana fucking Lang on screen. And believe me when I say I fucking slapped myself on the fucking forehead more times than I can even recall, at the fucking god-awful exchange she had going with Clark near the start, about alien ships and 'shippers and being a fucking whore while studying...

What the fuck is wrong with that bitch anyhew? That's how she kisses her cousins? If so, then the only goddam way the actress can ever redeem herself, is if she starts fucking kissing all her hot female cousins on the show that very same way...

The oddest thing was though, that Lana fucking Lang wasn't really that damn bad in Lockdown. Sure, I was rolling my eyes at the sheer soap opera stupidity of it all, when she offered to become "friends" with Lex at the end. And God was she ever a goddam bitch with the looks she gave, even with Luthor dying at her fucking fingertips from a bullet he took for her, when Lex finally revealed the truth about the missing ship...

But if Lockdown proved anything? It's that yes, sadly putting Kristen Kreuk in a fucking panic room and turning up the fucking temperature, sadly brings out the fucking best and the only true decent use of the actress... Apparently, she's only even remotely bearable when she's fucking undressing herself, all hot and sweaty and bothered and horny at the thought of pussy whipping a man so damn badly that he's even willing to die for her... What a fucking bitch. But she really did shine as she glistened from the heat...

Or was she merely riding on the coat-tails of Lex Luthor? Because once again, Michael Rosenbaum put in a wonderful performance, as he alone was the reason why strangely enough, Lockdown wasn't the worst of episodes to wrack my mind... Lex is a villain, and Lana is a bitch. Somehow, the two have always gone hand and hand, the same way they did in Lockdown...

Now, I don't really get what the writers are trying to do with Luthor though. One moment he's a bad ass, the next he's a pussy whipped son of a bitch. Because I mean, he was actually more likable and more of a good guy than Clark was in this episode, simply because he acted like a pure hero when it came to Lana... Sure, he was only trying to get into her pants and shit like that. But in the meanwhile, Clark was acting all jealous about Lex taking credit for taking the bullet, when Kent was really the one to save her in the end from the generic weekly villains and the C4?...

He does realize that doing all that batshit, supershit stuff is like lifting a fucking finger for him in comparison, right? WTF?...

With that said, the sight of Clark just blasting his way through a C4 blast, cutting a swath across the explosion as if he was parting the fucking red sea, was perhaps the only truly decent scene in the entire damn episode... Why the fuck don't the writers give us this kind of shit normally, I'll never know...

Instead, what we got was perhaps the most dipshitted Clark we've gotten in ages. I mean, out of all the times to not check the Luthor mansion for intel, this is the one time he decides to go off with Chloe instead in search for help? WTF?... God, he wracked my brain in fucking half with his god-awful "oh shit" looks at the start, diverting attention again from the fact that he's a fucking illegal alien in the country, and doesn't deserve the right to fucking vote. And God, did I ever receive a clustered mind-fuck, and not in a good fucking way, from all his other "oh shit" looks about being in love with Lana and never being able to love anyone else...

Fuck, if they're so much fucking in love, why don't they just get fucking married?...

The only real member of the cast that Tom Welling does seem to have chemistry with is Chloe, and at least we got a few decent exchanges between the both of them here again. Poor Chloe has even found Clark's powers to be so damn routine these days, that she actually nagged on the guy for ruining her stack of homework... I didn't particularly care for more of their later scenes, as even the super-shake of the cola can seemed completely out of the mood for a "Lockdown" panic room sort of episode. But still, there's no denying that if Chloe will truly be the one to die next week? Then we'll all especially miss her smile... we'll all especially miss her golden hair...

... and fuck, the show will just go fucking downhill without all the fucking Chloe cleavage...

Well, if this was early last season, I would've argued that Lois Lane would've been a nice replacement. Afterall, she had great comical chemistry and banter with Clark when she was first introduced on the show. And yet now, I wouldn't mind if the fucking bitch was killed off, only for Chloe to take her name and place for some dumbass writer reason...

I mean seriously, has Lois Lane done anything in season five so far with Clark? Besides that predictable turn-up when Tom Welling was mentioning that Lana was the love of her life, Lois had basically no interaction with the guy whatsoever... Instead, she just whined and griped and apologized away with the Kent parents, who's storyline sucks so much ass right now in the first place...

This is what they're wasting the actress and her cleavage on these days? An election? WTF?...

It's probably no damn secret that next week, a beloved cast member will be killed off of the goddam show, and WB ain't giving any real hints about that shit... Now, the inner child of innocence in me is still praying to the Lords of Kobol that both Lana Lang and fucking president Roslin get fucking kicked off of their respective shows. But unfortunately, Kristen still brings in a bunch of fucking teeny bopper ratings to the series, so chances of her demise are sadly slim...

And if anything? That trailer at the end of Lockdown, that pretty much showed Lana getting run over by a rogue Alias vehicle, was simply making it too obvious that she would be the one to go... Unless the writers are really goddam clueless in the end, it's a safe bet that they're using the Usual Suspects philosophy here, and that the most obvious candidate is actually the least likely candidate in the end (unless they've now got it backwards...). Which sadly probably means that that Lana Lang teaser shit trailer was a fucking red herring of a great white hope in the end...

I can also guarantee that Chloe won't die. You can book me on that, considering she's had no purpose in the series lately... Now, while that obviously indicates that she therefore is disposable, even fucking Pete got a few bones and boners thrown to the guy before he was shoved off as shovelware...

Lois Lane is also a candidate. But somehow, I just don't see that one going through, as the writers have tried to state time and time again that this is the real Lois Lane (and not Chloe in the end). And I don't fucking think that they can wipe out the future wife of Clark, no matter how dumbshitted the writers may truly be...

Lionel Luthor is always a prime suspect. But while we the audience would cry foul if the actor ever was fucking fired, I seriously doubt that Clark would flinch even a fucking unibrow if Jor'el or Zod or whoever offs the Luthor dad in the end... Sure, Lionel's time will come eventually. But if he was to die, then it better be at the epic hands of Clark or Lex or even some fucking random witch bitch in the end, otherwise there will be hell to pay...

Chances are then, that one of the Kents at least are sure to go. I mean, why the fuck else would Jonathan be riding high on an actual storyline for once? Seriously, what the fuck is up with that?... I mean, I sure as hell wouldn't vote for the motherfucker. He's as bad as the NDP is up here with his whole fucking arrogant smugness, minus the Jack Layton sinister mustache at least...

It is a bit conspicuous though, ain't it? That for such a mundane storyline, of the Kents trying to pay back the money that Lionel Luthor had given them the week before, that the writers in the end practically gave half the entire damn hour to the both of them? WTF?...

Now, I suppose that canon-wise, getting the Kents out of the fucking picture works best... especially considering that it was Pa Kent's final words in the comic books, that started Clark Kent on a path to becoming Superman in the first place or whatever sort of crap...

Still, it would be even better in my fucking mind if it were Lana Lang who really was the first to go on the shitter. Not just because I hate the fucking bitch as much as Clark claims he loves her, but because her death would probably blamed as Lex's lovely fault in the end... Lex would blame Clark, and Clark would blame Lex. It would be the fucking perfect Broca Divide to diffuse the two into fucking black and white shades of good and evil, if only the writers would be that damn smart and that damn bold...

Or actually, you know what would be fucking best? If somehow, in a battle of Doomsday proportions, Clark fucking Kent and Lex fucking Luthor square off one on one for Lana Lang's fucking bitchiness... And then somehow? The two of them smite each other with simultaneous blows to the same fucking balls that they've been missing for goddam years...

And then on the fucking screen, with the two of them dead on the floor while Lana fucking Lang counts her fucking pussy whipped cheques? Then the writers will then spell out in fucking bold letters...

And then suddenly? Ah, yes... it'll be like Star Trek: Voyager all over again, reborn...

Unfortunately, that shit gonna ain't happen either, no matter how atrocious the writers may truly be. So besides at least one of the Kent parents being killed by some random Lana Lang bitchy ass gaze, then that really only leaves one remaining, final usual suspect...

Now, are you all locked and loaded, from a fucking Lockdown of a letdown? I know I sure as hell still am...

Damn, somebody's been watching too much of their goddam, Canadian Broadcasting Crap television...

Now, the thing is? Michael wasn't exactly as crappy as the CBC may be... But still, it just wasn't the most stellar of episodes in the end. Mainly because it tried too damn hard to be serious, and tried too damn hard to be morally ambiguous...

Every single character felt like a caricature of their former selves, rather just supplying different moral viewpoints on the whole Michael debacle and of what really separates us from the Wraith and shit like that... But hasn't Stargate SG-1 (or fucking Star Trek, for that matter) already explored that same damn shit countless times before? What really separates us from our enemy, I mean?...

What really does separate us from the Wraith? Hmm, well, for one thing?... We don't suck the fucking life out of the souls of the sentient people we torture. And we don't fucking play with our food... but it seems that the Atlantis cast and crew were just a little too damn moronic yet again to remember that little, single trait in hand...

Dr. Weir was a bitch, plain and simple. But sadly enough, we've come to expect that from her... Still, it caught me a bit off guard as to why she was such a complete, stone cold, merciless bitch when it came to Michael. She only saw him as an experiment, never as a person, and not even as a fucking prisoner of war... She never even flinched once when it came to the thought of killing Michael, although it never really came down to that since she seemed so damn satisfied to keep him caged and tortured like a lab rat instead. She had absolutely no compassionate for her victim whatsoever... Sure, the bitch has fallen deeper and deeper into the dark side of the force as the season has worn on. But really, since when was she more animalistic and more goddam opportunistic than either Sheppard or Ronon have ever been before?...

It's Dr. Beckett that I was more surprised with though. I mean, I know he felt all remorseful of what he was putting Michael through all in the name of science. But really, there's a stark contrast when it comes to saving life at any cost possible as a doctor, and perfecting a goddam bioweapon to win a galactic war... Perhaps Beckett's guilt was what did the expedition team in at the end? If he had simply chosen to end the experiment, Michael would've been slain and there would've been no further threat to the city... But Michael sure as hell acted like a human, sounded like a human, looked like a human, and seemed just as innocent as any of us at first. And as the gullible, Scottish sons of bitches we are from Kenmore, we often forget the fact that there's a goddam good reason why we consider the Wraith to be our enemy in the first place...

Sheppard and Ronon were pretty much the only characters with any reasonable sense of precaution. I didn't like how John never once mentioned his own conversion to the Wraith side of the force, but I definitely did appreciate how the both of them at least kept their wits up most of the time...

While McKay in the meantime was absolutely useless, complaining about the goddam blue jello ("Blue Jello, my favourite?" WTF?... And yet, how did all of us Stargate fans already know that he loves blue jello? I honestly don't remember hearing about it before. Amnesia? WTF?...)? Well, at least Sheppard always had his weapon ready at hand... Ronon was one-dimensional as always, but at least he was kicking ass and taking names. He provided perhaps some of the only exciting or enjoyable parts of the episode, stringing poor Michael up high on a wall not only for kicking Teyla's ass, but perhaps for getting too close to her ass for his own comfort I'd assume...

It's just that, even if Ronon never let his guard down, and even if Sheppard was keeping his wits about him, that doesn't change the fact that the Stargate Atlantis team was fucking moronic as Peter Griffin hell to pull off a retrovirus stunt like this in the first place...

I mean seriously, why the fuck do we want to turn the Wraith into humans anyhew? As long as they still have their memories, wouldn't they still want to kick our asses and nuke us to motherfucking hell out of revenge with their hive ships?... And the last time I fucking checked, if we actually had a delivery system for the fucking retrovirus against Hive Ships? Then I'd assume we could rather just fucking nuke the hell out of them instead... Why fucking make them into pansies, when you can just fucking blow them all to hell instead?...

Dr. Weir was stupid as ass for moving Michael to the new Alpha Site, where the DHD was naturally completely free to use without passwords by the gate. Why the fuck didn't she just keep him locked up in the Atlantis cell, zatting or stunning him whenever he needed a retrovirus dose?... Why the fuck did nobody watch Michael in the infirmary for that matter? You'd think that one of the goddam security guards would've stuck by his side to keep an eye on what he was doing, rather than the both of them just conveniently flirting with that hot fucking nursing bitch in the background...

Speaking of bitches, was anyone else here really hoping that Michael would start feeding off of Dr. Heightmeyer instead of just goddam flirting? Was it just me, or did anyone else really want to see Mike grab the fuck out of her breasts and start fucking the life out of them? There's got to be some good reason why the Wraith have a fucking vagina for a hand...

Well, not only was that psychologist bitch really grating on my nerves? But I had also assumed that Heightmeyer would get a sexual high out of that sort of handjob shit, considering how goddam perky her breasts were beneath her tight T-shirts and shit like that... Now, don't get me wrong, I do love staring at the blonde bombshell. The only problem is, just like with Lana Lang on Smallville? She just can't fucking act like she's actually intelligent... She always gives these bitchy slutty looks, like you know she's lying through her fucking blowjob-shitty teeth... And she constantly keeps teasing us with her fucking hot titties, tempting us all to suck the fucking life out of them for hours on straight. It just ain't right...

And of course, leaving Michael in a room with her alone while the guards stood ineptly far outside the door, was perhaps the biggest goddam cocktease of them all. I was channeling Lana fucking Lang through her fucking bitchy eyes, afterall...

And who's bright idea was it to leave fucking Teyla alone with Michael at the Alpha Site? I know that the two had a rapport, but didn't anyone goddam remember that she was taken over by the Wraith in The Gift last season?...

Now I do admit, that if Michael as an episode belonged to any core cast member? It was Teyla's chance to shine... She really did provide a whole wealth of acting, from her compassionate and concern for Michael's predicament, to even her little kickass martial arts moves in the training room...

But did she really have to be that damn dumb? She's with a fucking Wraith, for goodness sake. I know she felt a connection since she was part-Wraith herself, but didn't she ever once consider that maybe he was still a fucking threat?... Sure, maybe Michael at his core was a good person. But didn't Instinct and Conversion prove beyond a shadow of a doubt, that being a good person just can't stop the fucking Wraith instincts in the end? And yet Teyla was still advocating being Michael's "friend" in the end?...

Fucking goddammit, man... Must Trip Tucker always go for the bitchy, coloured alien chick?...

Doesn't he ever learn?... First he loses the Vulcan, then he fucking dies, and now this?...

Teal'c took T'Pol over on SG-1, so I guess it was only fair for Connor Trinneer to take the female clone of Teal'c over on Atlantis...

Why couldn't they just have called this episode "Charles" or "Charlie" or some shit like that in the end? Because really, the return of Charles Tucker the Third was the only decent thing that Michael had going for it...

As always, Connor was brilliant in almost everything he did. He was classic Trip when it came to his early naivete and innocence, and yet poured on the mirror universe version of himself when Michael finally learned the truth of his origins... His character itself was pretty one-dimensional, as it was predictable as hell that a captured Wraith would eventually fall prey to his own instincts and kick the asses of the Atlantis crew. But Trinneer definitely sold the role as best he could, looking betrayed as hell when push came to shove. And he even shoved and kicked some ass pretty damn nicely when it came to his sparring bouts against Teyla and Ronon...

And hell, he must've been one hell of an engineer as well, considering he figured out our fucking laptop computers within a matter of goddam minutes...

The only thing truly missing from his repertoire was the goddam warp engine of the goddam Daedalus... Because where the fuck was the fucking ship? Once again, the Atlantis crew was dumb as hick fuck for not using their intergalactic assets to their fucking advantage. Instead of keeping Mike holed up in fucking space, they let him roam about free on Atlantis just so he could run amok and tell all the other Wraith about the city's apparent lack of demise? WTF?... If they kept him even at Atlantis, couldn't they have just been able to beam him into fucking space if he ever acted up? WTF?...

But you know what? Trip Tucker the Third would've been too fucking smart to ever let that shit happen...

... unless Berman and shitty ass Braga were writing the fucking episode, but I digress...

Because Trip Tucker the Third was once again the absolute best thing of an episode, no matter which show he may be on, and no matter how the writers tried to screw him over... It's a shame then really, that the actor has turned down a reoccurring role in the third season of the show so far. Stargate Atlantis could've just been so much more...

Now sure, Michael on a whole still felt like a goddam bad Star Trek: Enterprise episode in the end, with hollow characters and a bare-minimum storyline that made absolutely no logical sense whatsoever...

But sigh, it still felt like Star Trek: Enterprise in the end... and I am the no-name nostalgic, afterall...

And at the end of the day? So... Teyla was a clone of Teal'c, the episode Michael was just a bad rip-off of last season's The Gift, and now the Atlantis team is right back where they were at the end of the first season, with Wraith Hive ships bearing down their throats?... How is this supposed to be original writing again? And where exactly does this leave us in the fucking series?...

Y2kk Update: - Stargate SG-1: Collateral Damage & Battlestar Galactica: Resurrection Ship (Part 2) Reviews (Spoilers...) -

This was definitely the week of classic Stargate standalone episodes reborn, even if Atlantis' Coup D'Etat did sort of fit into more of an arc than just a single goddam show...

But Stargate SG-1's Collateral Damage was truly the definition of a standalone filler episode, in the same vein as The Gatekeeper and Revisions and Lifeboat were in past seasons before...

... well, as in almost exactly the same exact vein as seasons past, actually... even down to the very core plotline of the episode, really...

Collateral Damage had predictable pacing and a completely predictable outcome, I'll give you that. As soon as we knew that Dr. Mor'el had been married to Reya before, we knew the old Usual Suspects law would come into effect... The villain of a murder story is always either the most obvious or least obvious candidate. And sadly enough, Dr. Mor'el was kinda both at the same damn time in Collateral Damage...

But I will tip my writers hat off in respect to one aspect of the episode in retrospect. Even if it was blindingly obvious to anyone who's seen Minority Report or any other shitty ass sci-fi movie with a goddam memory chair (Total Recall, anyone?), it was still solid writing how the murderer of a doctor had actually wiped his own memory clean of the incident... as he ironically enough, was also the man who solved the murder case in the end as well...

Collateral Damage was a character episode all the way through. The problem was, most characters were goddam ignored throughout the whole of the Stargate hour on hand...

What the fuck did Daniel Jackson and Teal'c do? I recall Daniel getting his ass handed to him by Landry in the briefing room, for blaming the Galerans for artificially accelerating their technological advancement. And Teal'c sort of just stood there as a Wallflower, both at the party and whenever he was backing Daniel Jackson up with muscle and sheer brute force in his stares...

Colonel Carter was the sidekick to Cameron Mitchell or Cameron Diaz or whoever she was honeymooning over in this episode. She didn't contribute a single damn thing, except for looking all concerned and horny and fucking flirty whenever she asked Cam whether he was alright or needed a sweaty towel... I mean, she did bring up a few decent points about the benefits of having memory implant technology, since she's obviously become a big fucking fan of instantly learning Kung-Fu (ala the Matrix). But besides that, she was like a fucking housewife to Cam this episode, and that just didn't jive well with me...

And oh, Landry sucked ass by the way again. Hell, he even tried to save face with his god-awful speech at the end, about Cam's friendly fire incident or whatever sort of crap... But that was a pep-talk that General Hammond would've been able to pull off with ease. But not fucking Landry, the sick pedophillic, frakkin' freak of an uncle that he is...

But let's face facts here. Collateral Damage may not have been the most flattering episode of the ninth season, but this was faithfully still a classic Stargate scenario full and through... right down to the fact that for the umpteenth time, a main character on the team gets his mind fucked over by an alien device, and the hour becomes devoted to just that one character alone...

I'll give it to you straight up, that Cameron Mitchell was actually pretty damn decent in Collateral Damage. Sure, I got sick as shit of all that shaky-Cam-Cameron footage when it came to the constant replays of Reya's murder. But that's pretty much the only negative I could think of to bring up about him... He was determined and driven as ever, and his sarcastic Jackisms actually worked well in the situations he found himself in. He had a lot of good banter near the start, and a lot of decent "oh shit" looks by the end. I never really cared about his stump of a father, but the flashbacks of the Enterprise Shuttle launch and the fucking kickass F-16 dogfight (or whatever it was) definitely gave far more depth to his character than was ever established before...

Some have definitely complained about his John Sheppard "Kirkisms" with Reya, how he shouldn't have jeopardized the whole mission by just trying to get his fucking foot through her door and his dick in her pants... but seriously, how the fuck can I blame the guy?...

I'll give it to you straight up, that I'd fucking give it to Reya straight up for ten fucking nights in a row...

I don't think Stargate SG-1 has ever had a guest bitch that turned me on as much as her face did at the goddam party. She had god-perfect hair, the most enchanting of smiles, and God was her face ever fucking Jennifer-Connelly fuckable as goddam hell... Suddenly I have an urge for her face to be the one on all fucking Sentinels in fucking X-men movies. Because if only every fucking planet in the galaxy had scientists as fucking irresistible as her? Then can I really blame the Stargate series for the new age Kirking across the stars?...

The only real problem with this episode, is that they fucking killed Reya off so damn early in the fucking show. Couldn't they have just kept her around at the SGC base at least, sort of just like an extra doctor for Lexa Doig to make fucking house calls with?... please?...

And the only other real problem with the episode, was the fact that all the other Galerans were pretty goddam, glaringly awful in the end...

Mor'el was just the obvious murderer right from the start. Now sure, I liked his "punishment" in the end, of simply having the whole ordeal wiped from memory yet again. And yes, the doctor and his actions did bring up a whole host of potental moral ramifications for the Matrix memory chair... but it just all felt so goddam redundant with all the shit we've seen before in not just Stargate, but in Star Trek series over and over and over again as well...

Fuck, he was anything but Die Hard with a fucking vengeance with his fucking, pussy-whipped performance...

He wasn't Total fucking Recall either in badassness... and considering how badly that movie sucked, that's pretty damn sad...

Hell, he wasn't even worth a Collateral Damage. Where the fuck were my killer firefighters with Colombian axes and shit like that?...

You'd think an episode with a title of fucking "Collateral Damage", would've given us at least more action than just Cameron Mitchell getting it on with absolutely the hottest SG-1 bitch I've seen in years...

Still, we got solid (though limited) acting performances out of the SG-1 cast, some excellent backstory when it came to Cameron Mitchell, and pretty much the oldest of skools of Lazy Sunday episodic formulae that Stargate SG-1 will see all year...

... and I still wish I could've at least seen Lexa and Sora with Reya get the job done...

I really do get why this episode was done and finished and even polished... and I do appreciate it...

Resurrection Ship (Part 2) was built up in my eyes as the very episode that would rise Battlestar Galactica from its grave, and fucking seat it back up on its pedestal as absolutely the best damn space opera I've ever experienced in my life...

That's the way it left the throne last year, after such classics as Hand of God and Kobol's Last Gleaming (Part 2). But except for perhaps Pegasus, no episode this season has been able to even nearly match the quality and calibre of the latter half of season one...

I was hoping and praying to the frakkin' gods that Resurrection Ship (Part 2) would be that very goddam episode. Because after being so disappointed with the first half last week of what was once a single script split into two, how the hell could I not be rolling the dice and gambling all the marbles on this week's one frakkin' episode alone?...

Truth be told, Resurrection Ship (Part 2) was a damn good episode, but just not good enough. It may edge out Stargate Atlantis and Stargate SG-1 and John Cena for episode of the week, but it just wasn't nearly as fulfilling to me as Pegasus was...

Simply put, Resurrection Ship (Part 2) just couldn't help but be remembered as nothing really more than a relative disappointment and a goddam lost opportunity in my eyes... no matter how good the actual episode may have been...

Yeah, yeah, I've heard it all before. Because just like with the Deep Space 9 series finale? The writers chose to concentrate more on the fucking character arcs and on the fucking budget, than of fucking giving us the space action drama that scifi addicts like me always crave...

Yes, I do understand why Ron Moore chose to focus on Apollo's shitty ass suicidal tendencies rather than the battle against the Basestars in the background, considering BSG is a space opera first and foremost. Some have even applauded his decision, as the mere shadows and echoes of the epic battle in the background have cast the show in a completely different light than its fellow SciFi, special-effects obsessed brethren... and perhaps purposely so...

Couldn't you have just concentrated on, you know... both aspects of the fucking episode?... like you did with Hand of God?...

The entire space attack consisted of the Battlestars just constantly pelting and lighting up the Basestars with really no challenge whatsoever, and of the Vipers treating the Resurrection Ship as if the Cylons had just dropped the fucking soap in the shower... Sure, the strafing run by the Vipers in space was an awesome effect and absolutely must be copied into a video game sometime. And sure, it was a nice effect to see not one but two fucking Basestars get blown to bits by the combined Battlestar forces, but still?... meh...

There was simply no tension or drama in those scenes. I suppose we were supposed to be concerned about Apollo, whether he was going to survive or not. But I didn't give two shits about a main character who I knew could only really die either if a) it's a season finale, or b) he's a fucking Cylon. And I unfortunately didn't give two shits about the battle in the background either thanks to absolutely no suspense whatever... The Basestars were fucking jokes, as they could barely even touch the Battlestars with their missile ordinance. And where were the fucking Raiders when the Vipers had absolute free reign over the Cylon floating bodies and asses?...

This battle had the potential for being absolutely the best damn space attack scenario since the fucking Hand of God, but there was absolutely no threat from the Cylons in that scene whatsoever. It felt like I was watching stock Doci footage again from the lame-ass, generic DS9 series finale or some shit like that...

And I dunno, but just like with the first half of Resurrection Ship? While I loved Pegasus in an almost Star Trek kind of way, considering how the Galactica crew rallied together against the inhumane Pegasus team, I felt like the series had reverted back to the shitty ass, melodramatic, whiny teen angst that has plagued the second season since day one...

Now, I do understand why Apollo wanted to die. Not only did he have absolutely no faith in Admiral Cain leading the fleet, but his faith in humanity was definitely shaken and stirred by the fact that even the president wanted to assassinate the Pegasus bitch. And of course, being demoted to a fucking errand boy didn't exactly take to the man either...

But did we really have to spend the entire fucking battle against the Resurrection Ship as just some lameass excuse to show off the actor's bare chest in the fucking Vancouver waters? Did Ron Moore really have to disappoint Trek junkies like me by making the Basestars in the background literally a mere afterglow of an afterthought?... Even worse than that, what the fuck did Lee do for the rest of the fucking episode? Just whined away in his bunk, weeping that not only did he almost die, but that he certainly ain't happy that he didn't die?... Didn't we get this kind of fucking sappy writing back when Xena was kicking ass and taking lesbian names on the show? Couldn't he have at least gotten handjobs from fucking Starbuck in his bunk? WTF?...

And oh, Chief Petty Officer Dualla. Poor, bittersweet, petty bitch Dualla... She was used as nothing more than a sweet ass prop in the background for Lee. It's obvious she has the hots for him... and it's sadly even more obvious that Ron Moore is going to concentrate on this soap opera crap more in the remainder of the season, than anything to do with the Cylons or shit like that...

Colonel Tigh in the meanwhile? Was it just me, or was he completely goddam clueless when it came to Col. Fisk and his marine detachment?... Tigh simply signed some papers and nodded his head in complete befuddlement at the fact that a fucking legion of armed men had just come to Galactica under the Admiral's direct order. What kind of a fucking dunce is he?... Now, I know there was nothing neither he or Adama could do about the reassigned Marines. But did Tigh really have to look like he was as naive as a five year old kid when it came to this shit? WTF?...

And God, was I ever disappointed in the shit that happened to Helo and Chief Tyrol. I mean, once the bondage started happening and the soap showed up, I was praying to the motherfucking gods that the two of them would get ass-raped then and there. It's not like I wanted to see that, but the two pansies still fucking deserved it for being such fucking pussies in love... Then Ron Moore somehow fucks that up as well, dropping the ball rather than the fucking soap, as it turns out the soap bar was just there for a fucking literal gut check. WTF?... What kind of fucked up writing is that, when there is absolutely no real fucking up of the ass? What kind of fucking shit is this, when the writers back off from the fucking chance to push the envelope just as much as Grace fucking Park did back in Pegasus?...

Still, as goddam petty Dualla as it makes me sound to say? Grace Park was once again trying to play off her attempted rape as if she was just gang-humped for the twelve days of Christmas straight... The thing is, the acting just doesn't work when sadly enough, I wanted to see her bare ass more than we got in those scenes, as we didn't even get a single goddam iota of her shit stained on some guy's cock...

Yeah, yeah, I know. I'm quite a sick motherfucker, but I demand more when some random Pegasus guy is pushing the television envelope open with his cock... Grace Park's performance here in this episode with tears in her eyes, when she was basically telling Adama that perhaps humanity does not deserve to die, was therefore just so way over the top that I couldn't help but laugh... I mean seriously, if a little nudge on the ass by a stick and sick stranger is enough to make a Cylon think that the genocide of tens of billions is alright? Then no wonder we got our fucking asses nuked and handed to us, rather than just getting a fucking handjob...

But despite all my criticisms? Resurrection Ship (Part 2) was still the episode of the week, all thanks to some strong acting and characterizations, at least...

Kara Thrace was probably the star of the episode for once, if only thanks to how shaky and sweaty and fucking nervous she was when it came to Cain's "downfall". I don't think I'll ever forget how she was completely unlike the calm, cool-headed Starbuck we've always known her as, when the Admiral handed her the phone in CIC that is...

And probably the best scene in the entire damn episode belonged to Kara and the Admiral as well. In the previous episode, I had just assumed that Cain had made Thrace the new CAG out of respect for the Blackbird reconnaissance mission. But the private scene between the two of them here definitely proved without a shadow of a doubt, that Cain wanted to die just as much as fucking pansy Apollo ever did... It will forever be 100% impossible to ascertain whether the Admiral really did know that Thrace would be ordered by Adama to assassinate her or not. All we do know, is that the "flinch" speech sounded far too close for comfort, and that the Admiral was watching Starbuck's trigger finger like a horny fucking bitch when it came to that phone call from Commander Adama...

Sure, it was a bit of a cop-out in the end, how both the Admiral and Adama backed out of their assassination plans (even if it made for a decent scene in the end). It was sort of a Star Trek solution, where the good guys are all nice and dandy and cozy with their morals, while the Cylon supermodels all have mustaches that twirl... Except for maybe Lee's and Cain's suicidal tendencies, the humans weren't so damn bad in Resurrection Ship (Part 2). Hell, Ron Moore even made us almost like Admiral Cain before fucking Number Six popped her in the head...

Couldn't he at least have let them fucking pop each other first in the fucking cherries instead?...

... and added Starbuck and fucking Grace Park to the fucking cocktail party as well?...

Fuck you, asshole. Frak you and your fucking cock-tease, motherfucking disappointments...

During the actual Resurrection Ship space battle, the only real scene I concerned myself with came from Dr. Baltar and Number Six in the brig. Later in the episode, sure it was far too convenient for the Cylon to just waltz through the Pegasus undetected all the way to the Admiral's room, but that didn't change the fact that she and Baltar had an amazing scene earlier on... It was great poetic justice (quite literally poetic, really) how Baltar threw the whole pyramid sports bitch of a story right back into the virtual face of the Number Six next to him. Which begs the question, if the real Number Six model with him knew nothing about the other, who or what really is that Cylon swimming around in his head?...

Commander Adama was awesome as always. The real surprise was that President Roslin wasn't so bad herself... It helps that she was only in one fucking scene (with Billy in tow, as if to shout to the audience that yes, the actor is still alive...). And it helps that the bitch had a reason to be bitchy (dying from cancer and all)... But it was also kind of touching how the whole Admiral promotion ceremony came and rang, how she popped open the two command pipes for him as if she was popping the very question to the Commander himself...

... and he responded with a kiss... which, according to Ron Moore's online podcast, was complete improv on the actor's behalf...

But the scene definitely worked, which was probably why Ron Moore kept it in the episode I'm sure. The surprise and happiness on Laura's and Adama's faces was both heartfelt and genuine. And their naive giddiness was simply infectious, even to a fucking nerd like me...

Because with just one scene? He fucking resurrected the episode from the fucking fat grave of Ron fucking Mandy Moore, and gave new life to pretty much every single character arc that the show had running...

Now sure, Resurrection Ship (Part 2) had just so much potential... if only it had concentrated less on the whine and cheese, and more on the actual chess match going on in fucking space...

The writers ignored the space battle to concentrate on the whole fucking assassination plot, which I can still understand. But once the latter fizzled out far too quickly and far too pointlessly for its own good, then Ron Moore worked on fucking suicidal ape-shit cheese grating and a fucking laugh-out-loud "frak you" from the Admiral, as if we could ever take those two words seriously? WTF?...

Yeah, well... The episode may not have been the very resurrection of the series that I had hoped it would be...

But still, it was a damn good episode. And one that will forever stay close to my heart, if only out of sheer hope and promotion and potential...

... and for being much better than that shitty ass Deep Space 9 series finale, at least...

Y2kk Update: - Smallville: Fanatic small Smallville Week in Review (Spoilers...) -

What kind of fucking name is Fanatic, outside of the fucking WWE world that is? WTF?...

Ah, yes... The stupidity of the title has been explained. All is right in the universe again...

"Lana actually grows a fucking brain... and then Clark gives us the biggest Oh Shit orgasm he's ever had in his fucking life? WTF?"...

There was exactly ONE decent scene in the entirety of this episode, and naturally it would feature only Clark and Chloe. The poor gal may have been relegated to being Clark's sex friend "hag" or whatever, but at least she'll always look hot and actually intelligent in the viewers' eyes... It was only a matter of time until they brought up the whole "super-sperm" concept about Superman. And to be honest, if Clark really wanted to know what would happen in the heat of the moment? Then why didn't Chloe just fucking volunteer for a test experiment?... I'm sure she wouldn't have minded. And neither would the fanatical fans...

Chloe and Clark definitely had chemistry, as probably the only joke in the entire episode which I even snickered at, happened to be her "awkward factor 8" bit. Though it was therefore a bit disappointing then, that in comparison? Lois Lane and Clark have had such little interaction with each other for the whole of the fifth season... I mean, what the fuck did Lois really do this episode? Showed off some cleavage as part of Jonathan Kent's campaign (hell, I'd vote for her then...), and then fucking decided to off her boss with a sniper rifle? WTF?...

It was kinda weird too, that Clark had so much fucking trouble catching up to the sniper round that Samantha Drake had fired. I mean, sure I was pleased that for once he wasn't that much faster than a fucking speeding bullet, considering sniper rounds often do accelerate far quicker than handgun or machine gun ammo ever do... But has Clark put on a bit of weight from fucking Christmas or some shit like that, considering he even had to fucking dive for the fucking bullet in the end? WTF?...

And Clark himself? Well, he was just sort of just there in the background... He had a good scene with Chloe. But really, the only things I do remember from him in the end, are his god-awful oh shit looks that he kept giving back to fucking goddam Lana Lang... as if he was having fucking orgasms in his pants every time he lit them on goddam fire with his lies...

Lana Lang was a bitch. You just know that both the character and the actress are utter bitches in life... I mean, first she moves to Metropolis University before even telling the fucking love of her life about it. But then she starts researching a whole bunch of shit about the meteor showers, while completely ignoring her boyfriend in the process? WTF?...

I mean, I can understand why she'd be bitchy from a lack of fucking sex with Clark or some shit like that, considering I'm still bitchy about my own lack of sex with Chloe. But seriously, the man just came back from the fucking dead, and yet she blames him for all their problems?... Not only does the selfish bitch care nothing about how he felt about the whole ordeal, and not only is the bitch too damn dumb to realize she was now dating a fucking zombie? But apparently, she's also goddam dimwitted enough to have thought that Clark's whole fucking experience would make him even more sensitive and even more goddam horny to her needs than before he even fucking died in the first place? WTF?...

But at the end of the episode, even I'm man enough to admit that the fucking bitch put one and one together, and actually managed to deduce that a fucking spaceship had landed in the first meteor shower that had killed her parents...

And in the meantime, did Clark just come in his pants there or some shit like that?... Seriously, WTF?...

Lex Luthor was kind of a joke this episode. He just looked dumb and slow witted, and even seemed like he was trying to be friends with Clark in the hospital again. I mean, weren't they just enemies the episode before? Whatever...

I mean, I did think there was at least some chemistry between him and the evil Samantha, MWAHAHA bitch at the start of the show, before the actress shaved herself bald for just one paltry Smallville paycheck. And she definitely was hot with her fucking evil-Hilary Duff sort of bitchy look, especially considering I certainly have a thing for all women obsessed. But that's kinda besides the point...

But bah, in the end? Lex Luthor, even after his whole maniacal epiphany around Christmas? He still refused to hurt the Kents in the end, and got himself knocked out by a fanatical bitch in the process... Not only did he wuss himself out of the race in that way, but he got punk'd out by his own father as well. Not only did Lionel Luthor completely steal the show by stealing Griff from Lex and Martha from Jonathan, but the Art of War quotation scene (where even Milton Fine was finally mentioned again) was probably the only bearable scene in the whole episode that didn't have a naked or horny Chloe in it...

Jonathan Kent was pretty decent this episode, although the red pills that went unexplained reminded me more of the fucking rabbit hole from the Matrix than anything remotely resembling the Superman series in the end. His speech about putting the heart back into the Heartland or whatever sort of crap, was cheesy and cliche as hell... Yet I personally couldn't help but start believing, that I'd rather vote for this poor loser or even fucking Lex Luthor, over the three shit candidates that we Canadians are having to deal with in our federal election right now...

And Martha? She was sort of just being a bitch back there. What else could I expect from the woman who played Lana Lang in the fucking movies?... Still, was it me, or did she have more chemistry with Lionel Luthor throughout the episode than she ever had with her husband? I mean, sure I may normally hate soap opera shit. But somehow? Well... The possibilities of Lex lusting and hustling after Lana, Clark and Lois eventually getting it on, and a blind Lionel wanting to get his diapers changed again by Martha frickin' Stewart, all sadly seem to me as more intelligent writing than the rest of the fucking scripts that the Smallville writers have ever done...

I may never be a fan of the show. But hell yes, I'm with every other guy on the face of the planet, in being a goddam Superman fanatic in the end...

And quite frankly? The Smallville writers have made nothing else than fucking goddam, Superman murder porn...

I mean, seriously! Their script-writing is just so damn cliche, just so damn moronic, and just so damn completely off-the-charts illogical?...

That it's probably only a matter of time, until the goddam fanatics in the US vote the writers into the goddam Senate and the fucking powers that be...

And yet still, I'd rather choose these motherfuckers over the goddam mothercanuckers we have here in Canada...

As Lana Lang for both president and prime minister?... Hell yes, I'd vote for her...

Too bad this episode couldn't have come sooner in the year, when Stargate Atlantis really needed a goddam decent story to save the season...

... "Stargate Atlantis: Episode VI - Return of the Genii", or some shit like that?...

... and, well... Star Wars: Episode VI really did suck, by the way... along with the whole goddam prequel trilogy, might I add...

But I definitely did enjoy Coup D'Etat. Although by following Critical Mass (and to some extent, some of the passable scenes in The Long Goodbye)? This week's episode of Stargate Atlantis did sort of pale in comparison...

... even if the 'old skool' is simply the Atlantis series' first goddam season...

It was about bloody hell time that the writers staged a goddam coup, took back the show from the fucking morons who have ruined it, and actually started developing some goddam decent episodes again... While Coup D'Etat didn't have the budget nor the action to really solidify it as a classic? It did indeed have the same kind of strong team interaction, dynamic, and goddam comical writing to really remind me of just why I fell in love with Stargate Atlantis in the first place one season ago...

I mean, who would've thought? A coup that turns out to be a French fucking fraud, turns out to be a real coup in the end? WTF?...

I do love action in my episodes. But if The Long Goodbye proved anything? It's that there's only so much goddam stupidity and nonsense that I can goddam take... Coup D'Etat really had no classic battle sequences, except for perhaps Rodney McKay talking about "tango" positions while raiding the factory. But completely unlike the previous episode, there was actually some intelligence behind the goddam script for once...

The Atlantis team pretty much took every single goddam precaution that they could against betrayal. They were hesitant to even talk with Ladon at first, in case it was all just a ruse to expose the continued existence of Atlantis... They searched him first with a MALP on another planet, then wouldn't even let Weir shake his hand in the base, just in case. And they even wisely chose to stay as allies with Chief Cowen O'Brien on the Genii homeworld, rather than just become an arms dealer for a ZPM that they knew they could find and take by themselves... or so they had thought...

And while I do admit that it was dumb how absolutely none of the marines stayed outside of the compound as backup while Sheppard and co were gassed? Still, the whole factory raiding sequence was incredibly well done... From flash grenades to well placed stunner hits, to even McKay bragging about almost getting a goddam shot in? I was very much impressed with the way how the whole ambush went down...

... it all seemed pretty damn professional if you ask me... way more than fucking Carter wearing a tight leather jacket for no apparent reason whatsoever in End Game, at least...

Hell, I was even smirking at just how overcautious Sheppard was being with Ladon and the goddam knife. The apple did look just about as threatening as goddam Gwyneth Paltrow, afterall...

If there was any one fucking complaint about the Atlantis team this episode? It was simply that they didn't even try to get the Daedalus en route to the fucking goddam Ladon coup planet in the first place. I can understand it not getting there in time, but not even bothering to try?... I mean, with Asgard beaming technology and alien sensors and fucking Mark IX, multi-gigaton nukes, what the fuck were the Genii supposed to do?...

Dr. Weir did threaten them with war afterall, in her lovely tight and black ensemble...

... and ah, yes... I see that perhaps the bitch has gone over to the dark side of the force, indeed...

Because this was indeed one of those few select episodes, where I actually was not annoyed with Dr. Weir. I don't even really know how this could be possible, but she actually seemed competent and in charge for once... Like I mentioned earlier, she took every precaution possible when it came to Ladon, and even chose her allies and politics wisely in the end. She was learning and attentive when to came to Dr. Beckett's findings, and definitely (to my pleasure) a little gung-ho trigger happy when it came to the whole ZPM-raiding thing...

Now, I may have personally hated The Long Goodbye, simply because it made the entire Atlantis cast look like chimpanzees of chumps. But Torri Higginson was still so great last week as a complete and utter bitch. And her darkening in Coup D'Etat (both figuratively and literally) was definitely a welcome change of pace as well...

Heh... an American in charge, helping an enemy nation with a goddam, bloody hell coup?...

And if there was any point to the ending? I know that Dr. Weir will definitely be experiencing the repercussions to her decisions in seasons to come...

The thing is, I was strangely enough rooting for Laden or Ladon or Jack Layton or whatever the hell his name may be, simply because he was written as a cocky, arrogant, WWE son of bitch of a heel of a villain. I just loved all the one-liners and backhanded quips he had for Sheppard, especially his remark about him being just the "errand boy". And yet he was amazing as a stone cold merciless killer as well, all ready and prepped and and set to sacrifice Sheppard and team for his cause, and barely even flinching when it came to murdering an entire battalion of Genii with a primitive Atomic Bomb...

And to be honest? Strangely enough, yet again, in Coup D'Etat? I found myself actually enjoying the goddam Genii...

Is it simply me, or do the Genii remind anyone else of Earth back in the first and second seasons of Stargate SG-1, before we somehow developed intergalactic battlecruisers and the most powerful bombs in the goddam galaxy? While we're all safe and cozy with our innate knowledge of Atlantis drones and puddle jumpers and shit like that, can we really blame the Genii for acting the way that they are?...

From our current standpoint, they're still a primitive race, experimenting with UHF video transfers and pathetic atomic bombs. But just like the Asgard did with us, we did seem to help them definitely in the latter nuclear category of technology at least. And things don't always go as planned, when "the young do not always do as told"...

Just recall what the nations of earth were like during World War 2... and then suddenly, the Genii nuking their own people doesn't look so bad...

... of course, I'd pay good money to see earth go to war with those Genii motherfuckers any day of the week... but that's besides the point...

The point is, Coup D'Etat was an extremely well written episode on almost all accounts, and was definitely helped by the fact that the villains were both intelligent and multi-dimensional. Afterall, it was great to see Chief Cowen again if only for one last time, even if he was badly outsmarted by his Chief Science Officer or whatever sort of crap... The writers made sure that Ladon knew exactly what both the Genii and the Atlantis team would do all episode long. He was a complete hard-ass with almost no morals whatsoever, and a fucking brain to boot...

... not to mention a fucking hot sister that I would sure as hell love to fucking fuck, all the way to motherfucking nuclear winter hell...

Ah, yes... Didn't she ask, why would Beckett want to save her?... what a blonde dipshit...

Truth be told, I think any guy with fucking eyes would simply state back... ahem...

... hell, I'd plow that bitch to next July... I'd make the fucking sacrifice... nuclear radiation burning her loins, hot and horny or not...

I mean seriously, what the fuck is with the Genii and fucking hot blonde chicks?... not to mention the fact that being all doped up on pain and actual pain-killers, made Ladon's sister seem as fucking seduced and desperately horny as Sora did while wrestling and tussling with Teyla...

There really is no skool like the old skool... in tight school girl uniforms next time of course, preferably...

Teyla was decent this episode. She didn't say much, and she didn't actually fight or contribute anything to the general cause. But she definitely did stand out like a hot Leia bitch in Episode IV with her Oriental-styled up hair. And perhaps she even showed a bit of chemistry and passion for Ronon, whenever he flexed his mammoth arms around some guy's ass of a neck?... just like my motherfucking cousin always used to do to my skinny ass frame (much to my chagrin, of course... touching is not good... bad memories, uggh...)...

Ronon was just Teyla's sidekick in Coup D'Etat, but he definitely had more highlights in this episode than pretty much any other hour this season other than Critical Mass or his introduction in Runner... Wrapping his arm around that bartender guy was a nice touch from the writers, as it was both simultaneously a threat and a welcoming chance for the man to open up his fears. And hell, I even felt bad for Ronon, feeling all left out about not being on the Genii wanted posters and all... And I just loved how damn aggressive Ronon was during the negotiations with the Genii, as it would've been fucking nice to fucking go to war and wiped those fucking Genii from the Jedi galaxy once and for all...

Dr. Beckett has had tons of great moments over the course of the season, but Coup D'Etat may have been his absolute strongest acting-wise. He was as compassionate as the best of doctors when it came to Ladon's hotass sister, and looked just as concerned for Ladon's sake when Chief Cowen O'Brien refused to talk over the radio...

I didn't particularly like how rushed the whole tumour operation was in the end, or how abruptly the sister was saved. And it's not like Beckett really saved the day or anything. But I dunno... There was just something so earnest and so littlefoot and so realistically serious about the man, whether he was doing DNA tests on the dead bodies or begging Ladon to let his sister live, that seemed to fit the darker atmosphere of the episode to sheer medical perfection in the end...

Rodney McKay was used sparingly, and thank God for that. Lately his comedy has been a bit overdone (even if I still enjoyed it), but David Hewlett really got to shine again in Coup D'Etat by simply being the sixth man of comic relief in the background... I laughed so hard at just the little lines he had, like his attempt to con Sheppard into risking his life for the second ZPM (and see Atlantis fly), or his utter cluelessness at how to handle a Wraith stunner while trying to speak in goddam military tongue... The look on Sheppard's face there was damn priceless...

The episode really belonged to John Sheppard though, as he had absolutely some of his most classic lines of the season... With McKay, I loved the way John sarcastically quipped about whether it was the gas or the jail cell tipping him off to the trouble for the team. With Lorne, I loved the stoic banter they exchanged, as I'm sure the Major was loving every minute of his rescue... With Ladon, I loved the blushing reaction on Sheppard's face when the Genii man made nice words about the whole face trauma thing in The Eye. And hell, even with Weir? Sheppard had quite a few moments of his own... With the mention of The Brotherhood, who here didn't laugh out loud at the returning mention of Sheppard's MENSA obsession? And who here didn't love the character contrast in the ending, when Sheppard was spinning the whole coup situation to their favour while Weir was brooding ever so sexily over what she had just done?...

And yes, I did love this episode because of that... because there really is no skool like the old skool...

... where the fucking bitches like Weir cock-teased me with their bloody hell, motherfucking assholeness in the end...

The only thing truly keeping Coup D'Etat from becoming a classic second season episode, is the fact that there was not a single great scene that I can watch time and time again... Then again, I thought the same exact thing about Underground and The Brotherhood from the first season at first as well. And yet I've popped those two into my DVD player this year just as many times as I ever have The Storm or The Eye or even The Siege...

With amazing acting, an intelligent script, and absolutely perfect comic relief from fucking Sheppard and McKay? Coup D'Etat was absolutely a real coup of a steal of a fucking sigh of relief for the goddam writers of the show...

As finally, they proved yet again (along with Critical Mass) that maybe, just maybe?...

... that maybe, Stargate hasn't become as shitty ass in the end as a goddam George Lucas film...

Y2kk Update: - Stargate SG-1: The Fourth Horseman (Part 2) & Battlestar Galactica: Resurrection Ship (Part 1) Reviews (Spoilers...) -

Stargate SG-1 finally aired The Fourth Horseman (Part 2) on SciFi Channel last night, making it about the fourth or fifth best episode of the season... and about the fourth or fifth more than decent SG-1 episode in a row, to be honest...

The series in its ninth season has been experiencing a sort of renaissance, or a resurrection if you will...

Meaning what? Meaning, while the conclusion to the Fourth Horseman wasn't nearly as effective to me as the first half of the two-parter was? It was still a decent hour of television, and probably my favourite episode of the week as well...

Now, it was plagued by about the same problems as the first part of The Fourth Horseman did, namely that the pacing was a bit slow and the disease spreading across the globe just didn't have the same feeling of dread as you should get from a global pandemic...

The problem was anemic really, whatever the hell that means. We were constantly being told of just how many people were dying, as if I was reading up on a daily list of shit on the internet... But except for a few Hazmat suits and Landry of all people trying to get compassion from me for dying, I really didn't see really feel or perceive anything deadly about the plague. It was just sort of there in the background, as I normally get a far worse feeling of seriousness and dread from reading about one goddam death from Big Bird Flu in the papers now and again...

I mean seriously, he and his daughter aired their dirty Landry laundry over the fucking comm speaker, in a fucking emergency war in front of everyone else dead and dying? WTF?...

At least Lexa Doig was fucking smoking hot as hell with her hair down and cleavage showing in the fucking conference room in the end, but Landry just fucking sucked ass... though dare I say it, he wasn't the only one...

Orlin was absolute shit here again, as Cameron Bright (or Blight? I forget... whatever...) is about the dullest and most dimwitted actor I've ever seen outside of goddam Smallville. Sure, I understand that he was trying to seem as if he was losing his mind and losing his memories. But did he really have to act as if the Ancients deserve to partake in the goddam Special Olympics or some shit like that?... Most of his scenes were just goddam pointless. Most of his lines consisted of nothing more than him complaining that he has to finish his work before his mind goes kablooey. And we were fed the same shit over and over again, as if the writers had Alzheimer's disease and had completely forgotten that these same goddam points about Orlin had already been hammered home a dozen times already in the episode, let alone the prequel...

But there were definitely some bright spots to his performance, namely Orlin's unfortunate end... Maybe it's just because my own grandmother is sort of going through the same thing, but I felt terrible for Orlin after seeing him in a nursing home or a mental institution or whatever. His condition was all too reminiscent of Alzheimer's, which to me feels like a far greater plague than the fucking Ori flu ever will be...

It's disheartening to know that the most intelligent or even the most loving and caring people on earth will live out the rest of their lives no longer knowing who they are, what they've done, who they've done, and whom they've ever loved. Like I said, my grandmother is going through the same thing... and I couldn't help but feel bad for Orlin as the greatest of Ancients had sacrificed all he had known, just to die as a mortal with no memory of his millions of years of existence or whatever...

Oh, to give up immortality just to help out a few insignificant people. Trading omnipotence for impotence... Maybe what the Ori promise ain't so bad then from the sounds of things? Although the Encyclopedia Brown salesman metaphor was indeed a bit over the goddam top...

And I suppose the Cigar Smoking Prior was as well, to be honest... though in the end, he really was the best damn salesman I've ever endured...

Everybody knows that Cigar Smoking Man from the X-Files, and it was fucking funny as hell watching Cameron Mitchell try to "test" out his new anti-Prior emitter by getting his ass kicked and name taken by you know who. And was it just me, or was it just ironic as hell that Daniel was trying to turn the Prior to the light side of the force, by teaching him that the 'truth is out there' about the Ori?... This was Orlin's only other decent scene, as even his slow-ass, dumbshit speech patterns couldn't ruin the mood of the poor Prior who looked like he was going to piss in his pants and cry...

I mean seriously, I felt just as bad for the Prior as I ever did for fucking useless Orlin on the side. Not only did Landry have a decent moment of a revelation, talking about the Prior's prior life (no pun intended) of a wife and children. But I also just felt bad for the way that the Prior got offed, you know?... Every other follower of the Ori at least has gotten a huge ass send-off, of burning themselves at the stake or getting nuked by the biggest fucking bomb our galaxy has ever fucking built. Yet for the Cigar Smoking Prior, after a tear almost started shedding down his pale cheek at all the hurtful things Daniel and Orlin were speaking about the Ori? He just seemed to lose all hope in life, and got himself wiped out by just one fucking lousy bullet in the back at the end... His body never ascended. He just sort of rolled over and died from a single, fucking Ronon, wussy flesh wound. How sad is that?...

The Fourth Horseman (Part 2) was indeed an episode for self-sacrifice. The Prior gave his life for his beliefs, Orlin gave his very existence and identity for Carter... But what I was most pleasantly surprised at? Was just how powerful Garak's plotline turned out to be in the end... I mean, all season long, I've been inundated with boring Jaffa council episodes and shit like that, hoping that it would get over and done with as soon as goddam possible. But really, The Fourth Horseman really redeemed the whole civil war aspect of the season, as Teal'c, Bra'tac, and Garak really stole the whole fucking show...

I've always hated Garak as a character, as he's always been more annoying of a half-villain than he ever was a guy you loved to hate. But he really did redeem himself in The Fourth Horseman, both in terms of his character and as an actor... I'll admit it when I say that I didn't see the solution to the episode happening. I was happy when Orlin's miracle cure didn't turn out to actually be miraculous, I was relieved when the Cigar Smoking Prior didn't just have a change of heart after untold years of Ori servitude, but I was especially surprised at the fact that Garak truly died with honour and freedom...

His final farewell, of curing Landry and co in the base while fully knowing the Ori would burn him up for his treachery, really somehow felt natural for his character. Some have said that his change of heart from Prior to loving Jaffa was far too quick in The Fourth Horseman, but I personally just felt it went perfectly with his reactions when he saw his father's grave. He really did seem to remember long past painful memories, a complete contrast to what was happening with Orlin on the other side... After hating fucking Garak as an annoyance for the entire ninth season, I can safely and soundly now admit that I will miss his character. Unless he fucking returns and becomes a bore again, that is...

But make no mistake. This was an episode for Teal'c. And Christopher Judge fucking acted his socks off, providing his best damn performance of the past several years... He really does see Bra'tac as a father figure, doesn't he? He certainly acted that way, as he asked his mentor to become the leader of the new Jaffa nation. Even if the script in that scene was simplistic in a Jaffa-grammatical way, the heart and soul of Stargate was definitely there, as Teal'c looked like he had so much respect for his comrade in arms... Christopher Judge just made that scene work and work goddam well, by willing his way with his sheer loyalty and support...

But absolutely his best scene in God knows how many years came with Garak by the father's grave. I can't really explain how, but somehow Christopher Judge made me completely forget I was watching a SciFi show then and there. And I couldn't help but feel sympathy for his plight as he begged Garak to remember just who he is and what it means to be free...

All season long, the writers have tried to make allusions as to just how the Ori are really no different or better than the Goa'uld. But they never really stuck home with a home-run until Teal'c absolutely nailed the speech about his former gods being able to raise the dead or kill enemies with a wave of their hand... Christopher Judge was just amazing there. He somehow looked vulnerable in a leadership-role sort of way, reaching out to Garak the same way he respected Bra'tac and his elders just a few scenes prior. Not only that, but Teal'c showed true unwavering belief in what it means to be free, of what it means to be Jaffa, as if Christopher Judge had been saving the very nature and soul of that speech in his heart for years and goddam years long past...

Now, unfortunately almost every other character on the SG-1 cast just wasn't acting up to their full potential. Either that, or Teal'c just made everyone else look goddam bad in comparison... The Sodan were utterly useless, uttering and muttering absolutely no lines whatsoever as they just stood around the stone circle with the captured Prior... And hell, I almost screamed at my screen at how fucking bitchy Dr. Lam was being with her father in the medical ward. The man is dying, yet she still puts more emphasis on the bitchy parts of her emotional speech, rather than on the admittance and understanding of her father's situation? WTF?...

The temporary return of General Hammond (no longer a General) was decent, though it was far too much of a cock-tease, considering he gave me false hope that Landry would just roll over and die from his two minutes of pointless sickness... Unfortunately, all that Hammond really did contribute in the end were literally a hello, a handshake, and a long goodbye. He said nothing of value, but it was still great to see the actor back in some fashion or another...

Likewise, Carter was sort of just there. I guess Orlin sort of dragged her down, as all Samantha really did was glare her fucking pedophillac, soap opera stares as the Ancient guy complained about losing his fucking mind. She was completely reactive in The Fourth Horseman, and was never really active in doing anything but watching the sappy kid flex his muscles... Yet I was still touched by her slight little reaction in the mental institute, when Orlin couldn't remember just who she was. The puzzle scene was definitely one of the highlights of the episode, even if it obviously has no replay value in the future (I always did suck at puzzles, afterall... fucking goddam puzzles were too fucking hard...)...

The self-sacrifice and speeches in The Fourth Horseman definitely made the episode into quite the experience the first time around, though I know I will definitely roll my eyes at just how pretentious all that shit may be by the third or fourth times I watch this episode... It's the comedy and banter that reproduces rewatch value in a Stargate hour. And while Mitchell's and Michael Shanks' exchanges about exchanging pie crust recipes with the Prior definitely did feel out of place and forced, I still chuckled a bit... And I did appreciate the fact that some of the old Daniel and O'Neill chemistry was returning in form. Even if RDA still seems to have a restraining order from the goddam show...

Because like almost every single episode in the ninth season of the show so far? The Fourth Horseman was not only an overall great experience, but the IvanFian episode of the goddam week as well...

Part of me still wonders whether I would've enjoyed Resurrection Ship a lot more, if only I hadn't known that the second half of Pegasus had been split in the offseason into two separate episodes?... I was so looking forward to a real showdown between Adama and Admiral Cain, or at least a big honkin' space battle against the Resurrection Ship. Yet all we got was sort of a filler episode before the real deal instead...

Pegasus was a spectacular episode, simply because it featured the good guys completely versus the bad guys. The problem was though, in Resurrection Ship (Part 1)? That perhaps the distinction between good and evil had become too blurred like the rest of the series once more...

Adama was no longer the noble hero trying to rescue his men from savage execution. Now he was simply the executioner, listening to fucking Roslin the bitch, bitch about assassinating Cain before she even knows what hit her... Meanwhile, Cain didn't seem that damn bad on the other end any longer. She demoted her CAG, promoted Starbuck for having guts, and provided the first real compromise on Colonial One about the whole Pegasus vs Galactica situation. WTF?...

And once again, Madame President was left behind as the goddam bitch to take the blame, whatever the hell that means. Though to be honest, she benefited from the Lana Lang and Dr. Weir complex when it came to supreme and utter, open bitchiness...

She was actually kind of calming and considerate in this episode, the way that she had no real remorse when telling Adama that he had to off Cain for the sake of the fleet. She was sadly less of a bitch than she normally is that way, as she didn't really hide anything or lie between her teeth while lying in bed with Adama by her side... Hell, even her talk of wishing she was in the body of a blonde Cylon made her more bearable than she has been for ages. I liked how she was pretty honest and open in Resurrection Ship with all her evil bitchy slut shit, and somehow? In my honest opinion, that was a fucking huge step up for her...

But that Colonial One scene just seemed to drag on, as Admiral Cain just didn't provide the same strong suit of acting she gave us in Pegasus. And Adama was just sort of there, spaced out in a fucking Superman Returns, Kevin Spacey sort of shit way... That scene alone set the tone and conveyed the whole atmosphere for the entire damn episode. Simply put, the pacing of Resurrection Ship seemed way off base, or basestar or whatever, if only because it was never really intended to be a single damn episode in the first place...

I mean seriously, the two of them just bitched and whined and aired their dirty loins and laundry in the fucking Pegasus brig, like whiny little teenage bitches or some shit like that? WTF? Without detailed, naked pictures of Grace Park for me, then WTF was the point of it all?...

I dunno, but something just seemed off in Resurrection Ship, as if every character had their lines dubbed and doubled without any real reason to deserve that kind of screentime whatsoever...

I've already mentioned just how pointless the whole Tyrol and Helo exchanges about being in love with a Cylon are, but what about Grace Park herself? Sure, she looked fucking irresistible as hell in hospital clothing, but did she have any point besides looking fucking adorably rapeable in bed (no offence to all those offended by the term...)?... Judging from what we heard, if we had seen the whole rape scene in Pegasus, then we'd feel bad for the bruises on her wrists. But all that Ron Moore did show in the end was a slap on the wrist and a few screams and shouts, which fucking Boomer there has suffered through a hell of a lot worse before or whatever sort of crap... so really, what is there to really feel bad for?...

Starbuck had a few decent scenes here and there. The Blackbird reconnaissance mission was pretty suspenseful, as you'd think one of the damn Cylons would have infrared sensors to detect her or some shit like that in space. And I guess I did hold my breath along with her as she challenged Admiral Cain during her promotion, but that's about it I think for anything memorable...

I mean, something just felt off about the way she swung her head around in her helmet as she was telling the Viper fleet to be "friendly". And she just had no real chemistry with Apollo as he was complaining to her about being demoted as an officer to one of his former pilots... Judging by the end of the episode too, Starbuck just didn't seem to have her heart into the whole assassination business. I thought she was super-sniper-Starbuck though? What happened to her fucking amoral sense of goodwill and cheer?...

Apollo was useless. What did he really do? He got bitch-slapped around by both Starbuck and Admiral Cain, and barely said a word to his father... He even seemed whiny as he pretended to Stinger in the Raptor that he had nothing to do with the whole Blackbird situation. He really was pussy-whipped this episode, though at least he never once had a speech as goddam eye-rolling as Helo's was...

And what the fuck did Col. Tigh do? Tie the fucking guy to a goddam chair on a mountain in space and just leave him there, since that's all he's apparently good for... He seems to be gathering a rapport with the XO of the Pegasus, sure. Tigh got the information about the conscripts on the Pegasus and what the Admiral did with the families who resisted, true... But somehow, that scene was just boring to me, rather than surprising or suspenseful like the similar one was back in Pegasus. Simply put, we've had an entire summer of putting one and one together in our minds about who exactly Cain is and just what she stands for. So can I really be blamed for not giving a damn about a big revelation about old shit I had already figured out long ago?...

I've already spoken about how the Admiral was a letdown this episode. She seemed more bitchy than evil or commanding while on Colonial One, and she oddly enough reminded me of Starbuck as she was asking whether Thrace always gets what she wants.... Surprisingly, Cain felt like the good person here, even when she was filling in her XO on the details for taking out Adama at the end. While obviously I don't agree with her whole idea of a war against the Cylons over the survival of the fleet, I still couldn't help but cheer when she argued in favour of returning to Caprica and kicking some Cylon ass... Even if the humans all got their asses kicked and names taken back home that way, at least it'd make for one hell of an episode. So what's really to hate about the Admiral in Resurrection Ship?...

The president was nice and open about her bitchy feelings to Adama on Colonial One, and somehow I wasn't so surprised when she was the one who brought up the subject of the assassination... Now, Adama definitely had a presence in this episode. But was it just me, or did he seem just too reactive and lazy-ass compared to the hard-ass, Die Hard motherfucker I thought had returned in Pegasus?... I mean here, he was taking orders from a fucking school teacher on how to take out a dictator, rather than dictating the plans for Napoleon dynamite or poison himself. And then later on, he seemed so damn iffy on what to tell Starbuck about the whole assassination situation, as if I was watching a bad reenactment of goddam procrastinating Hamlet (as if Hamlet wasn't boring enough, I'm afraid...)...

Now true, there were definitely a few classic moments in Resurrection Ship, though nothing that I would watch time and time again. The dogfight without actual fighting at the start was interesting, if only because I was left in wonder at who would fire the first shot (and kind of relieved when nobody did). And while I don't think I've ever really admitted this before, I really do think that Number Six put in a spectacular performance in Resurrection Ship... if only for identifying the very snapshot photos that Baltar was holding in his hands...

So, the Resurrection Ship is the fucking ship where dead Cylon consciousness' get downloaded into new bodies? That alone was a pretty damn cool idea on the writers' behalf, but I was personally more impressed with how they handled that revelation in the first place... The Number Six on board the Pegasus wanted to die. She wanted to kill herself, and never be reborn. She actually wants to help Adama and co take out the fucking Resurrection Ship, just so that she knows she will be completely dead and never have to remember what the fuck happened to her on board the Pegasus... I definitely felt like her explanation of it all wasn't forced, as she really did seem desperate. I really did feel this was the best acting that Tricia as Number Six has ever damn done on the show. And I really did feel like it was the most fitting way for the BSG team to learn the truth about the ship in the first place...

But once again, we were left with a fucking cliffhanger. And this time, I was more goddam annoyed than I was left frothing in unbridled demand... Many have complained that Resurrection Ship was absolutely a filler episode, since it ended almost identically in both atmosphere and plot as Pegasus did way back in September. And at times, I doth believe that I'm quite inclined to agree... I mean, the only real differences between now and back then? Are that the stakes are now higher, with a fucking Resurrection Ship and a fucking assassination in the mix...

... though at least I don't have to fucking wait four fucking horsemen of months for the conclusion to finally air...

Still, I was hoping for a sort of renaissance for the series, considering BSG had just begun to redeem itself with several strong episodes after pure and utter complete crap at the start of the season. I was sort of expecting a resurrection of the classic Battlestar Galactica feel, and I don't feel we got that... considering Resurrection Ship was split and stretched from one single hour into two separate episodes, both of which may barely be able to stand on their own two feet...

But considering how great Pegasus was in the first place, and how amazing both Admiral Cain and Commander Adama were in that one episode alone? Then how can I really blame Ron Moore and maybe Ron Artest, for trying to give us more of what we wanted in the first place?...

... when the real Resurrection Ship, and the real resurrection of the show finally airs...

Was it just me, or did this episode feel just about forty minutes too damn long?...

But either way? I still couldn't wait until I could wave goodbye to this goddam episode, as there's only so much of goddam stupidity that I can take in one bloody torch of an hour...

Honestly, what the fuck was wrong with the Atlantis team this episode? Did they all take their stupidity pills that morning or some shit like that?...

You see, The Long Goodbye was intended to be a lovely tribute to such legendary films as Ecks vs Sever and Mrs. and Mrs. Smith...

... problem is, both of those films fucking sucked ass... and to a large extent, The Long Goodbye was just more of the shit-stained same...

Now, Stargate SG-1 has really improved in its ninth season, simply because the writers have been coming up with team-based episodes where the crew actually are one step ahead of the damn audience in thinking... Take Prototype for instance. I personally had thought that Stargate Command had taken every precaution possible in securing their prisoner, yet the Anubis clone just blew right past everything before I even knew what hit me. And then the writers fooled me again by providing a brilliant solution to the episode that I never really did see coming... Solutions that aren't just magical like McKay hacking through a bunch of invisible shit. But rather, endings that make real and logical sense in the context of the standalone episode...

Suffice to say, Stargate Atlantis has not been achieving the same damn thing... and the Long Goodbye was one hell of an example of such Smallville stupidity on the writers' behalf...

Okay, so Dr. Weir accidentally got herself taken over by an alien entity. Sure, that's already become cliche (after both Rodney and Caldwell had other consciousness' fucking with their minds already this season), almost to the point where I actually fucking expect captain fucking Kathryn Janeway to show up in the next odd numbered episode, after being taken over by a bunch of alien spores yet again or some shit like that... But hey, shit happens right? There was no warning label on the fucking black box, so how can I really fault the SGA crew then for being as dumb as Voyager?...

Has nobody ever read fucking Stargate SG-1 reports or some shit like that? Did nobody fucking remember just how convincing the Goa'uld was inside of Caldwell's head just a few episodes ago?... Why, oh why, did even McKay of all people fall for Phoebus' impression of Dr. Weir? Doesn't he fucking remember the fact that even the Goa'uld can perfectly pretend to be the normal people they've possessed?... Why didn't Beckett at least try to confirm that it was Dr. Weir speaking and not the fucking alien entity, by hooking her mind up to an EEG or some shit like that? Why oh why, was the doctor moronic enough to simply fall in love with the fucking Mr. and Mrs. Smith, husband and wife story? WTF?...

And why, oh why, did John Sheppard decide to partake in the whole possession thing? Why the fuck did he voluntarily go headfirst into being possessed, when he knows that he's fucking second in command of Atlantis? Not only would getting infected by the whole mind imprint thing therefore ruin the chain of command in Atlantis, but it also gives fucking Thallan full access to security codes and the Atlantis base specs and all that shit as well... If Phoebus in Dr. Weir had been lying about being peaceful explorers, wouldn't we need John Sheppard and his military expertise to take her out if force is necessary? Yet he willing chooses to give up his own body, just for the chance at a fucking kiss with the goddam bitch? WTF?...

Caldwell wasn't completely dumbass this episode, considering he did have two guards right outside the doors during the whole memory imprint exchange. And considering he had a Goa'uld in him before, he definitely did not trust the words of possessed people... But not only was he still dumbass enough to not lock the doors to the room while Sheppard was getting infected, but fucking Caldwell also completely forgot to put the Atlantis base under security lockdown, letting somebody like fucking Dr. Weir roam about until she found a way to kill off the entire damn base... Shouldn't it be the first ever protocol, to fucking lock every door and fucking lock out Dr. Weir's fucking security codes as soon as she's fucking possessed by an alien consciousness, let alone an evil one? WTF?...

McKay's whole lockdown system doesn't even make fucking sense. We saw in The Siege that two people are required to activate the self destruct, which is indicative of how it is in real life... Well, in real life, it also takes two fucking ranking personnel to put a base under a fucking lockdown. And yet McKay designed a fucking system, where Dr. Weir (who's security codes were not locked out for some damn reason) can simply take over the fucking base with her one fucking code alone? And yet two ranking personnel aren't even allowed to fucking override her commands? WTF?...

And Ronon? WTF was wrong with Ronon? I guess this episode helped to show off just how much trust he has in Sheppard, but didn't he just kick the ass out of the Goa'uld Trust not so long ago? Yet here, he was still willing to believe Thallan's whole acting routine? WTF?... I admit that I did enjoy the scene where the ol' runner was shot, simply because it was about time he figured out just how powerful and painful our own earth weapons can be. But dammit, was it just me, or was the guy just plain clueless this episode? Not only did he fall for Thallan pretending to be Sheppard, but he fucking let Thallan out of his sights and let himself get shot in gut by the fucking bitch of the base in a trap?... Not only that, but he only got shot by one lousy bullet and then lost consciousness? What a fucking wuss. Seriously, WTF?...

... yeah... the entire cast and crew and especially the writers had definitely taken their stupidity pills for this episode... which was a huge disappointment compared to just how high octane and suspenseful Critical Mass was in comparison...

That's not to say I absolutely hated and loathed The Long Goodbye, however... it wasn't a bad popcorn of a filler episode, if you just closed your eyes and shut off your fucking brain, that is...

Joe Flanigan wasn't so bad in this episode. A lot of complaints abound that he acted as Thallan almost identically as he does Sheppard, but wasn't that the point? John is a soldier, and so was Thallan... Obviously, Thallan was a lot more ruthless than Sheppard ever will be. But compared to Phoebus, Thallan was just a soft teddy bear... I loved the scene where Ronon got shot, not just because Thallan taunted the poor bastard as he bled to death, but because Thallan noted that Sheppard was screaming like a bitch in his head. And then Thallan called for medical help, which either shows that he ain't so bad of a guy in the end, or that at least maybe he had some compassion for Sheppard afterall...

Beckett was a complete moron when it came to falling for the whole love triangle shit thing. But hey, at least the actor was pretty damn good when it came to the "dark ages" of no bloody hell lights in the infirmary... He helped make the Ronon operation scene actually seem terse and decently exciting in the end. Almost makes me want to watch ER or House sometime, really... until I remember just how shitty ass those shows are, making even Voyager look like fucking Battlestar Galactica, of course...

McKay was a moron this episode, but he still got his fair share of comedic quips in. He definitely didn't trust Caldwell, but at least he made a few jokes out of it, such as fighting over the chain of command and bitching over access codes... Was it just me though as well, or was McKay the only one who seemed to enjoy watching Sheppard and Dr. Weir kiss like that? I would've done the same, and gone one step further and hoped to be able to watch Dr. Weir get fucking goddam naked in horny passion in the goddam room... but it seems that Caldwell was strangely enough adverse to that...

Caldwell himself actually was at the top of his game in The Long Goodbye, relatively speaking of course. There have only been two previous episodes where he wasn't a complete pining bitch (The Siege and Critical Mass, ironically enough for the latter), and thank the Ori gods that he actually took command and didn't grate on my nerves in this episode... He was dumb for not having enough "space marines" guarding the ZPM control room, and even dumber for not locking the section down in the first place. But meh, at least he was the only one who didn't trust Phoebus in the first place, and that gets some decent props from me at least... relatively speaking of course, considering the Daedalus was conveniently spinning in circles without even a hello in space...

Teyla also had one of her better episodes of the season. Most of the time, she was just standing around while getting shot by Thallan, or looking completely dimwitted as Dr. Weir was jumping off of bridges. But at least she managed to save the day in the end... Some have criticized that Caldwell saved Teyla's ass in the end, as Teyla didn't have to choose between the lives of the expedition or John's. And yes, while I would've preferred if she had thought up a solution of her own (shot Sheppard in a place that she knew Beckett could save him, perhaps?), I did enjoy Rachel Luttrell's acting in that scene... She definitely did look torn as she held the P90. And her solution of giving Sheppard the stunner in the end (Wraith stunner, not a Stone Cold Stunner, unfortunately), while an obvious solution, I guess wasn't so dumbass for the bitch either... better than lip-singing like Ashley fucking Simpson, at least...

Because was it just me?... or was Torri Higginson at her absolutely hottest in this fucking episode?...

... because, ah hell yes... the true Dr. Weir finally shows her true colours, and her true fucking skin in a tight fucking T-shirt... sigh, how I ever want her to stay this way forever so...

Because just like with Lana fucking Lang in Smallville? It's obvious that Torri can't act worth a damn when she's trying to be kind and compassionate. But fucking goddam, did she ever excel as a total bitch with a P90 cocked in her hands... She was absolutely ruthless, and Torri was absolutely fabulously evil with her eyes every time she threatened Thallan's life or hunted him like prey. She was definitely the predator of the two, maddened after a lifetime of war. And I definitely did feel that it was a bloody revelation for the actress, that she was that damn convincing and that damn fucking hot as a fucking streaky, evil horny bitch...

Now, obviously I still thought the Long Goodbye felt way too fucking long for a filler episode. My head was hurting from all the fucking stupidity in the end, as I still can't even get over the fucking fact that Sheppard let himself get taken over by Voyager alien spores or some shit like that...

... pretty please, oh writers?... with their fucking cherries on top?... fuck...

That sure as hell would've fucking skyrocketed The Long Goodbye to the fucking top of my list, to the point where I would never fucking say goodbye to this episode ever again in my heart... But the writers just weren't fucking smart enough for that kind of brilliant script writing, now were they?...

But even so, despite all the stupidity? As least we got a couple of classic scenes in there as well, as Ronon crying like a little bitch was classic, and I suppose the ending scene in the infirmary wasn't so bad either... Even as Dr. Weir, Torri Higginson was still fucking hot in her fucking hospital clothing. Sure, she was a complete bitch, not only caring little for the fact that she almost killed a ton of her own team members while possessed, but also rather by fucking flirting with John about her "strangest feeling" while being completely evil... But meh, at least it was still cute and kinda memorable actually, how she just slumped away in her hospital bed as soon as she was reminded about the whole fucking kiss goodnight...

Now, on the Atlantis season 2 DVD boxset that I know I'll eventually buy, no matter how horrid this season truly sucks? If they just replaced Sheppard in every fucking scene with fucking goddam Lt. Cadman, that all will be simply forgiven in the world...

But until then? I don't think I'll be Orlin damaging my brain anytime soon with just how fucking amateurish and dumbass every single character on set was in this episode...

... as it will be a very long time I'm sure, until I ever willingly say "hello" again to the fucking Long Goodbye...

I guess it's true, oh it's true... that good things really do come in even numbered packages... whatever the hell that means...

1998 can be considered perhaps the greatest year of gaming ever conceived considering Final Fantasy VII, Metal Gear Solid, and the Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time were all huge by the time Christmas rolled around. 2000 wasn't nearly as eventful, but even that year had the full force of Dreamcast games to contend with (though I only cheered when the DC finally died...), along with the introduction of the PS2... 2002 however, will forever go down as one of the biggest years of gaming, simply because of Super Mario Sunshine, Metroid Prime, Zelda: Wind Waker in Japan, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, and Final Fantasy X here in NA or some crap like that...

And 2004? Who can possibly forget 2004?... when thanks to the likes of Halo 2 and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, the video gaming industry actually made more money than the fucking box office return for the shitty ass movie films for that year...

But is it really any wonder than, that in 2005, NPD reports claim that video gaming sales are down more than 30% compared to the holiday season before? Has there really been any decent games this year on consoles for a fanboy to even remotely try to argue against such a stunning figure of a financial drop?...

Now, I loved both Resident Evil 4 and Fire Emblem with all my heart, not to mention both Brothers in Arms games for the Xbox. But all of this software sold like complete shit in comparison to almost anything that went gold and reached platinum status in terms of sales in 2004... The Xbox 360 was also released this year, and demand for it on eBay was just insane at times. That doesn't change the fact that either due to "shortages" as MS claims, or either due to the fact that perhaps demand wasn't as high as we urban dwellers would like to think, the Xbox 360 had a pretty mediocre sell-through number both in terms of hardware and in terms of software...

Simply put, nothing sold on consoles in 2005... and it really ain't hard to see why...

With both the PS3 and the new Nintendo Revolution arriving on the scene in 2006, I'm sure that the even-numbered theory will remain steadfast and true, and I'll be obsessing over my new games library soon enough by the time I write my next bloody hell, noname video game award ceremony that no-one will ever read...

But until then? With consoles so fucking dry and devoid of any gaming goodness for the better part of 2005, I actually turned to the portable gaming market for once... And apparently, if the sales numbers and legions of fanboys on both sides of the war are of any indication? Then I'm sure I ain't alone in believing that 2005 truly was the definitive year for portable gaming systems...

This was the year of the Nintendo DS versus the Sony Playstation Portable. And this was also the year, where I experienced more fanboy threads and wars and goddam clashes on the internet, than ever before since the Playstation 2 took out the Dreamcast in just one fucking year...

If you ask almost anyone here in North America off the streets, you'd get the same ol' response, that the Sony PSP is absolutely decimating the Nintendo DS. And if I only used my own eyes and ears outside of the bloody hell internet, I'd definitely be inclined to agree... If Sony has managed one thing, it's that they suckered a bunch of wannabe rich hipsters across this continent to buy the Sony PSP and fucking use it to play fucking UMD movies. That's all I ever see in public transit or on the fucking streets... 99% of the time, the only thing you'd ever witness someone using in public is a bloody cellphone or iPod. But that 1% of the other time, it's a fucking PSP playing a fucking goddam movie. And I don't think I've ever once seen a Nintendo DS being played, outside of a general WiFi hot spot area that is...

... but the sales numbers across the board definitely don't back this theory up...

Because you see, over in Japan, it ain't even a contest anymore. In December, the Nintendo DS has already sold over 1.4 million systems (with a whopping 600K of those coming in the past fucking week alone), while the PSP has barely reached the 400K mark for the entire month, I believe. And this hasn't been an isolated incident either, as during the so-called GAF "Easter" months? The Nintendo DS has been doubling PSP sales on a regular basis after the release of goddam Brain Training and Nintendogs of all games...

In Europe, the one continent where Nintendo has never done well (not even during the NES and SNES days), the UK has been eating the Mario Kart DS bundle up like crazy, selling out of all those combined with the Nintendogs bundle at a rate of two or three times that of the PSP at times. The rest of the Europe, France and Germany definitely included, never really minded the Gamecube that much, so it's not that surprising that similar DS vs PSP numbers as the UK's were being echoed there as well... But when you couple all that with the fact that Spain, Italy, and almost every frickin' Sony-loving European country has been selling more DS systems than PSP ones almost all year round? Then you just get a fucking Nintendo-domination, goddam situation that even I almost never thought would've happened just one year ago...

It's obvious why any casual gamer over here in North America would think the PSP was single-handily handing the DS its own ass across the globe, as North America is really the only continent where the sales numbers are even close. Even so, Sony has actually been forcing the NPD to hide monthly PSP sales, simply because they can't fucking take the fact that the DS is managing to outsell it by 10K or 20K a month... I have no idea why Sony is so fucking afraid, especially considering America would therefore be the only major country where at least PSP revenues outstrip those of the DS by a favourable margin. But I suppose all their early corporate predictions, that the DS would be deader than the goddam Sega Dreamcast by year's end, might not be exactly the best for their Sony stocks at this point in time if they admitted number-wise defeat in every frickin' continent of the world...

Now, I like to say I called it, as just one fucking year ago during this Noname Award Ceremony of mine? I clearly stated (I think...) that the Sony PSP would eventually become the "first nail in the coffin" for the Sony video gaming empire. They simply cannot fight a war on two fronts, with the Xbox 360 in North America and the Nintendo DS/Revolution overseas. But even I have to admit that there were times when I questioned my own beliefs and Nintendo-fanboy theories...

I really was fearful at times that Winning Eleven 9 in Japan or Madden NFL 2006 in the US would jump-start the sagging PSP sales in the two separate markets, yet neither game did anything for the system in the end. I was terrified that Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City would do for the PSP what GTA3 did for the PS2 in America and Europe, yet it mustered up absolutely nothing but a minimal software boost in the end either... I'm still worried about the eventual price drop, as the casual gamers out there would probably love the chance to pick up a fucking Sony Gigapack for just $149 US or some shit like that. But as it stands right now, the PSP hasn't steamrolled the DS like so many were predicting a year ago...

... but rather, for once, just for once?... the Nintendo fanboy in me was right...

And as icing on the cake? Both in terms of fanboy wars and in terms of actual gaming bliss, the DS has been my best friend this year. I picked one up in the summer and have simply never looked back... The dual screens at first did seem like a cheap gimmick, until Mario Kart DS proved to me just how damn useful even a simple map could be in a goddam game. And the touchscreen, while not nearly as sensitive or accurate as I was hoping it would be, was simply a goddam godsend for certain games like Meteos...

And the WiFi? I've always hated Xbox Live since it costs annual fees to fucking play, but I've never technically been against online gaming. Sure, I hate how it takes away development time from old skool, splitscreen gaming on current console systems, but really?... there's simply no real, traditional multiplayer shit to take away from when it comes to portable gaming systems... So who am I to complain?...

I've never cared for the Gameboy or GBA simply because all they ever had were single player games with low replay value... But I've just gotta admit, that even if the implementation was half-assed at times? The Nintendo WFC online gaming for Mario Kart DS and even Animal Crossing: Wild World has seriously been the best damn multiplayer gaming I've had since the days of the original Halo and Super Smash Bros. Melee...

2005 may have been anything but the year of consoles, but it definitely wasn't a bad year in gaming overall...

And hell, I suppose there were some pretty decent games released for consoles during the year as well...

Best Game of the Year - Resident Evil 4 (Gamecube... NOT PS2)
Runners-up: 1 - Mario Kart DS (Nintendo DS), 2 - Fire Emblem: Path to Radiance (Gamecube)

Was there even a real debate as to what would receive the award for the best damn game of 2005?... The only real competition was the PS2's God of War. But seriously, the only gaming publications that would ever think about yielding the award to that game, are the Sony-based ones who played through the shit RE4 version on the fucking PS2...

The true, definitive version of the game came out for the Nintendo Gamecube in early January. And if it had just been released a couple of weeks earlier? It still would've easily mopped the floor with Halo 2, Metroid Prime 2, and GTA: San Andreas for the best fucking game of 2004, let alone 2005... What can I possibly say about this game that hasn't been already said?...

I've absolutely hated literally every single Resident Evil game that came before, as it was just a complete fucking chore for me to work through Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil REmake (which were sadly the best two in the series at the time). And yet somehow, not once could I put the controller down while Resident Evil 4 was spinning in my Nintendo Gamecube. Why was that, really?...

The tank controls in previous games really did feel like you were walking around in a fucking tank, yet here, they actually added to the suspense in RE4 somehow... Was it because of the new over-the-head camera shoulder, the kind of which that made Resident Evil 4 more into a first person shooter? The same camera angle change that also quite possibly forged RE4 into becoming the best damn third person shooter game ever devised?...

It was all about atmosphere in Resident Evil 4, and I still remember how much my hands and nerves were fucking shaking and trembling, the very moment I first got my head sawed off in the first fucking village... This game was intense. I literally couldn't sleep properly for weeks thanks to RE4. Not because I was terrified or any shit like the previous RE games had tried and failed to do... but rather, because every single moment of action in Resident Evil 4 was a fucking pure adrenaline rush...

I don't think I've ever felt that damn enamoured and engulfed by a gaming atmosphere since way back to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time... And for a Resident Evil game of all series to be compared to the best fucking game ever created by man? Then if that ain't saying something, than I don't know what will...

Mario Kart DS takes the runner-up spot, mostly because I keep getting the runner-up spot myself when it comes to the online gaming...

Now, I've always been a huge Mario Kart fan considering I loved the SNES version, I played the N64 version for years without end, and I even managed to adore Mario Kart DD for all the parties that I played it through... The GBA Mario Kart game was shit though. But even when it came to that one, I played it sparingly on road trips simply for the fucking retro tracks I so loved in the original Mario Kart...

I don't quite know if Mario Kart DS is really the best game in the series, but it definitely combines the best features of all the previous incarnations of the series... It has the wonderful cornering at times of the SNES version, yet manages to combine it with the speed of the N64 version and the framerate of the GC version. I still wish it had a better selection of retro tracks, as so many of my favourites from both the N64 and GC were missing in action... but a lot of the new tracks meant solely for the DS version are surprisingly addicting as hell...

The real deal of the game comes online though... I don't know whether Mario Kart DS will ever truly be considered the best single-player Mario Kart experience of all time (even though its tight controls now make Mario Kart 64 and DD virtually unplayable by my hands). And without splitscreen co-op or whatever sort of crap, it will never replace the original SNES or the N64 one in my eyes for pure multi-player fun...

But when it comes to online? When it comes to the sheer replay value, or seeing your opponent get a fucking red shell in hand, and you just manage to perfectly time a banana drop to block the motherfucker's sure-fire attack? Is there any greater feeling in a Mario Kart game than using the dual screens to your advantage and fucking powersliding your way across the finish line?...

Sure, a legion of gamers out there are complaining about "snaking" (powersliding on straight-aways, which I also cannot do...), just like so many goddam gamers claimed "strafing" was an exploit in fucking Quake and Goldeneye back in the day... But I solely play my online gaming sessions with friends, so snaking will never be an issue. And I have to admit, that even if the online implementation is not perfect? Mario Kart DS is still the best damn multiplayer game I've experienced in such a fucking long time...

The second runner-up for Best Game of 2005 was a tough one to pick. I admit that I did love the two Brothers in Arms games for the Xbox with all my heart, but they just didn't deliver the type of true definitive gaming experience that I always seem to get from Japanese developers...

I've lived fifteen years of my life avoiding the Fire Emblem series, simply because I refuse to import games, simply because I refuse to emulate games, and simply because I was always too damn cheap to just buy the fucking GBA versions of the series... But finally, thanks to the Nintendo Gamecube bringing Path of Radiance over to North America? My long wait was finally over, and the game certainly did not disappoint...

Fire Emblem is simply an old skool strategy game, in the same vein as Civilization used to be. It's a forgotten genre really, after Warcraft II and Starcraft and the RTS genre wiped it off the map. But sometimes there simply is no skool like the old skool, really...

Because it definitely says something about the calibre of a game, when I literally played Fire Emblem for forty damn hours while I had fucking homework and fucking real job work to finish at times. It really shows something about the quality of a series, when no matter how frustrated I got with my goddam controller every single time I died and had to reset to save my characters? I still just kept on playing for hours upon hours into the depths of the night...

Perhaps in almost any other year, Fire Emblem wouldn't have made the top of my gaming list, considering it was only one of a select few RPGs released this year. But no matter how starved the console systems were in 2005 for any deep or involving series, there still is simply no denying the fact that Fire Emblem enraptured me in a way that only few games can...

Now, I've put 35 hours into Resident Evil 4 and beaten it twice. I've put countless hours into Mario Kart DS, thanks its immense online replay value... But for Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance? I put 30 fucking hours into just the first playthrough of that game. And then I managed to still finish the game another two damn times... does that mean anything, really?...

The game may not be for everyone, but it definitely made my top three list of the year for a reason...

... I just hope I don't have to wait another 15 years to reward myself by awarding it again...

Best Story of the Year - Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance (Gamecube)
Runners-Up: 1 - Baten Kaitos (Gamecube), 2 - Resident Evil 4 (Gamecube)

Ah, the old broken record syndrome. As didn't I just finish my rant about Fire Emblem above, placing it on the highest of pedestals?...

The thing is though, I wasn't just surprised at the quality of the gameplay of Path of Radiance. But I also was shocked to learn that it followed that Halo-style of storytelling, the kind of which that always gets fucked up in sequels like Halo fucking 2...

The Final Fantasy series is the absolute worst when it comes to defying this law. Hell, even Advent Children (the UMD movie released this year) absolutely made no fucking sense, as the series' storytelling these days has become so damn complicated and so damn convoluted just to appease the hardcore fans of the series or whatever sort of crap, that it loses me by the five fucking minute point...

But Fire Emblem's storyline was kept just so elegant and just so straight-forward, that I really did end up appreciating just how deep the plot became unraveled as the stages went on. Instead of just heaping onto the audience an entire fucking university full of intricate details and storyline nuances, Path of Radiance kept to the simple tale of a boy losing his father and protecting his potential love like any NES RPG had back in the day...

While I'm sure tons of modern, griping gamers would then suddenly complain, "Sorry, but the princess is in another castle? WTF? I played this shit 15 years ago!", I definitely had the patience to wait out the storyline until it eventually evolved and unwove itself. And the series definitely delivered in the end, through a series of bloody hell revelations and simply some of the most beautiful anime artwork I think I've ever seen in years...

So the moral of this story? Just keep the fucking story simple... but also keep it deep...

Archetypes are archetypes for a reason... and Fire Emblem is considered a fucking classic for a fucking good reason as well...

Okay, now here is where I start contradicting myself, as Baten Kaitos had anything but a simple storyline like I was just complimenting Fire Emblem up above...

The thing is though, I'm a sucker for plot twists that I don't really see coming. Because just like I gave the best storyline of the year award to Knights of the Old Republic a couple of years ago? I can't help but think back to Baten Kaitos (which I played this year, even if it wasn't released this year) and remember just how shocked I was when my fucking lead character actually betrayed the rest of my group... How often does that really happen then? Of course there's always one damn traitor in the damn group, but for it to be the hero? It shocked me in Knights of the Old Republic, and I got suckered into it here as well...

Besides that though? I don't know... Baten Kaitos wasn't exactly the most stellar of storylines, but it still had its specialities. The voice acting apparently wasn't so damn bad once you turned on surround sound (I was in plain stereo mode for the whole game, though... uggh...), and there was some decently strong writing when it came to the Magnus cards infecting people with sin and shit like that...

Either way though, I'm still praying that the sequel arrives on North American shores this coming year. And that's gotta mean the game left a positive impression on me at least, right?...

... and when you're dealing with RPGs, often enough the storyline is the game... so that's gotta mean something...

It was kind of hard for me to pick my second runner-up for Best Story of 2005. I mean, Brothers in Arms may have had a generic WWII plotline, but it still had some brilliant writing along the way (which is more than I can say for the shit dialogue in Call of Duty 2)... And Jade Empire? Some of the side-characters had their moments. But when I could see the fucking plot-twist coming from miles away, let alone from fucking Europe with Marco Polo in tow, then you know something just ain't right with Bioware up in the head...

Resident Evil 4 therefore takes the cake, simply because the game was so damn good that it didn't need a story. The action itself was the story, as Capcom managed to actually make me feel like I was part of the fucking atmosphere, the kind of way that games always made me feel back when I was a child... and I am the no-name nostalgic, afterall...

But more than that, it followed the KISS style of simple storylines that I only wish more game developers would adhere to. You knew who was evil in the game, you knew who was good, and you got both the giant, giggly breasts and exposed panties from the president's daughter at the same damn time. What could be really wrong with that?...

There was nothing special about the B-movie type plotline, of parasites mutating people to the point where they become almost an insect-like Hive. Haven't I seen this before in tens of sci-fi television shows just this past season alone?...

But still, the execution of it was what counts. And just ask anyone who experienced this game first-hand, and they will tell you flat-out that Ada was a stunningly beautiful mystery, or that the Regenerators felt like a bigger threat than any other villain of the year... Hell, even Leon had some decent writing along the way. Just listen to the shit he says with Luis during the defence of the house in Chapter 2, and then you suddenly realize exactly why a Resident Evil game of all series managed to get my fucking game of the year...

Hell, Resident Evil 4 may even challenge The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker as the best damn game of this entire generation of gaming...

... and there's absolutely no fucking way in hell I would have ever admitted to that, unless there was a decent enough story behind the action to hold the sum of the whole together as one...

Best Multiplayer Game of the Year - Mario Kart DS (Nintendo DS)
Runners-Up: 1 - Timesplitters 3 (Multiplatform), 2 - Animal Crossing DS: Wild World (Nintendo DS)

Do I really need to explain Mario Kart DS again? It's online, and it's great. Now play it.

I forced my best friend into picking up the Nintendo DS bundle with Mario Kart DS back in November. He was hesitant at first of course, considering he hasn't really played video games since the NES and SNES days... But the Nintendo DS really is the system that's drawing back the gamers of the old days back into the fold. Whether it be from the touch screen or the beauty of the simplistic controls for games like Mario Kart DS, the system is definitely drawing millions of gamers back. And now my friend, the non-gamer, is actually upset with me when we don't get to play Mario Kart online every fucking night...

Now, obviously there are some concerns with the Nintendo WFC implementation that I have... I have no quarrel with Friends Codes, considering that I understand Nintendo's plight with potential pedophile cases. And besides, I've always hated to hear motherfuckers shout and sprew profanities online, claim that they're "so high", or brag that they're getting their cock sucked over Xbox Live or some shit like that. And I understand that having voice chat during online games may be just too much for the Nintendo DS processors to handle as well...

However, why not have voice chat between friends before and after online games? And when it comes to random gamers on the net, why can't we just have a standard lobby system (with simple text chat of preset words, for instance), so that the Nintendo WFC servers wouldn't be so strained in auto-assigning three other P2P gamers to play with all the time?... A ton of gamers who have tried to have Mario Kart DS tournaments have failed to even get online against each other properly because of this. And it still bugs me to this day that a) a lot of courses are not playable online (I mean, even the SNES Donut One isn't? WTF?...), and b) we can't play battle mode online...

But that doesn't stop me from literally going onto the internet and playing with my friends in Mario Kart almost every single fucking night of the week. It's just a quick pick up and play game, one that I picked up from the store and never fucking looked back... Even with more players on Nintendo WFC than Xbox Live has ever had at once, the P2P nature of the Nintendo DS has allowed me to have absolutely lag-free WiFi gaming almost every single time (except once on Wario Stadium, when I saw the other karts jumping up and down like grasshoppers... but that was only once...)...

And there's simply no denying how damn convenient it is to play the DS online, as I can do it from almost anywhere in my house, whether I'm watching TV or surfing the goddam net. And hell, even my friend (who didn't want Mario Kart DS in the first place, since he thought he wouldn't be able to set it up online) has found the WiFi nature of the system to be fucking second nature to him... Aside from a few potential router problems (which were on his side in the end, not the DS), he was online with me within a matter of minutes. He set it all up with barely any guidance from me whatsoever. And he hasn't had a single real problem on his router side since, not even fucking once...

And I haven't even talked about how fucking good the gameplay is itself online. That's how fucking amazing Mario Kart DS truly is in the end...

So instead of making me write all my shit out again, just do yourself a favour and just buy the game already, 'kay?...

Multiplayer wise on consoles, it's been a pretty bleak year. I mean, I'm sure X-Men Legends II would've made it here if only I had played or bought it, considering Activision supposedly fixed all the fucking problems I had with the original... And Star Wars: Battlefront II was a pretty decent game as well. But since I don't have Xbox Live, I can only judge it by its shitty ass splitscreen mode, and not by its online multiplayer mayhem... And surprisingly, I've found Mario Party 7 to be right up there with Mario Party 5 as the best of the series. But more of the same doesn't necessarily secure a spot on my award list roster...

I loved Timesplitters 2 though, and I found Timesplitters 3 to be a decent enough companion. While inferior to the original, considering multiplayer gaming sessions now seem darker and somehow less intense than they were in the original, I still have to admit that the game is a hell of a lot of fun at parties... The grenades still work great, the framerate is mostly steady, and the massive multiplayer mayhem against monkeys (or MMMAM for short...) beats the hell out of any first person shooter other than the HaloBox with 16 players at once...

Timesplitters 2 has always been the best splitscreen first person shooter game released this generation of gaming, just like Goldeneye and Perfect Dark were back in the day... Timesplitters 3 suffered from possibly being a bit too different from the original in retrospect, just like the feel of Halo 2 differed too damn much from its prequel for its own good. But I still adore the Timesplitters series, for making the silliest damn combat I could possibly supply at a goddam birthday party with FPS kids...

The final runner-up for multiplayer game of the year is Animal Crossing: Wild World, even if my Mario Kart-obsessed friend thinks its the fucking worst game in the world...

Fact of the matter is though, that tons of people online are fucking obsessed with this game. Hell, when it comes to time travelers, I've actually seen people pay other AC gamers online 100,000 bells just to go into their town through WiFi and fucking pluck all their overgrown weeds... It's like a fucking Everquest economic system in there, as people are literally posting their "Stalk Market" turnip prices daily and asking if people will pay duty fees to enter their fucking towns to shop at Nook's... unbelievable...

Now, I've never cared about the Animal Crossing world to nearly that extent. I personally bought AC: WW as just a fucking chat device, as I'm too fucking cheap and lazy to just buy a WiFi card for my goddam ancient laptop... And I must admit, that I'm a bit disappointed at how laissez faire the whole Animal Crossing online arena really is. The Friends Code and hub system I don't mind, but what is there really to do in each other's towns except to buy and sell shit?... Fishing competitions, tag games, and even fossil dig ups are all shit that you have to make up and organize yourself. Why didn't Nintendo just implement a few sanctioned gaming areas, where you and your friends can play simple soccer or tennis or fish or shit like that?...

Still, for what it's worth, Animal Crossing is still one of the best multiplayer games of a very weak gaming year. The chat system may be primitive, as I can't type worth a shit with the stylus (and why not let us hold L or something to capitalize stuff?), but it still gets the job mostly done... And while I've never cared for the economics of AC shit, somehow I still get excited when exotic fruit is brought into my town and I get a few seeds to plant into trees of my own...

My friend may hate this game, and I may be neutral about it, but one thing's for sure...

If I hated the original Animal Crossing, yet I still played it for half a fucking year by just checking Tom Nook's store every single night of the year? Then how the fuck long will I stay addicted to this online sequel to the game, which I definitely feel is superior?...

Not nearly as long as I will with Mario Kart DS, I'm sure... and perhaps I will never have as much fun with AC as I do with the Timesplitters series...

... then Animal Crossing DS may ironically become a better online game six months down the road for me, than it strangely is now...

Most Surprisingly Good Game - Brothers in Arms: Road to Hill 30 (Xbox)
Runners-Up: 1 - Meteos (Nintendo DS), 2 - Resident Evil 4 (Gamecube)

Ah, finally I get to give Brothers in Arms just some of the props that this game from Ubisoft definitely deserves...

When I first picked up the first Brothers in Arms, I just expected it to be another generic first person shooter. I mean, I hated the entire Medal of Honour series, and I absolutely despised Call of Duty (yes, even the decent PC version)...

Yet as soon as I started controlling my squad and realized the potential that both my men and this series had? I absolutely fell in love with Brothers in Arms: Road to Hill 30, as it was perhaps the only damn WWII game that felt more like an actual war than a fucking Quake III clone on Vietnam drugs...

So often more than not, fucking epic war games try to create an atmosphere intended for online gaming, where only headshots count and every fucking n00b just runs for the sniper positions first and foremost. But in Brothers in Arms, oddly enough, you barely ever get to use the sniper scope, as most of the whole game is devoted to fucking over the Krauts with pure fucking, flanking strategies...

Instead of running and gunning in this game (even on easy mode, until you learn how to utilize your assault team well), Brothers in Arms completely consists of strategy. While some have complained that the strategies are way too straight-forward (entirely consisting of flanking from either the side or high ground the whole time), I personally just welcomed it over being the solo-destruction team in almost any other first person shooter... While other companies have tried to create squad-based gaming (Rainbow Six 3 and Halo to some extent come to mind), Brothers in Arms had the most pinpoint accurate system when it comes to being the leader of your men. While moving, suppressing, and assaulting may not seem like enough commands at first for controlling your squadmates, surprisingly it's all you ever needed in the game, and the focused simplicity of the gameplay made for one hell of a wartime experience...

And the most ironic thing of it all, was that even after falling in love with the original Brothers in Arms? I was still expecting the sequel, Earned in Blood, to completely suck ass, considering it was released just a few months after the original... Yet still, I found myself absolutely shocked and surprised that even the sequel just screamed out a level of polish and quality, at least in terms of gameplay and fun factor...

... and through the simple fact that I was fucking addicted as hell to the series once more..

I've already implied at least a dozen times by now, that the Nintendo DS was perhaps the best fucking damn surprise I could possibly get from gaming. I mean, I loved the NES, SNES, N64, and I suppose the Nintendo Gamecube as well with all my heart, but never once have I ever been so impressed with a system (let alone a portable one) right out of the gate... With the NES, I was playing Mario Bros and Duck Hunt for ages, and it was Super Mario World and Zelda: A Link to the Past for the SNES. N64 had Goldeneye and Mario Kart 64 early on to tide me over, and at least the Gamecube was reasonably solid with Luigi's Mansion and Super Smash Bros. Melee...

But with the Nintendo DS? Already I've fallen in love with Mario Kart DS, Metroid Prime Pinball, Animal Crossing DS, and even the goddam minigames in Super Mario 64 DS... And I'm sure that if only I bought them as well, Advance Wars DS, Mario and Luigi: Partners in Time, and even fucking Nintendogs would've sucked the hours from my life as well...

Whoever thought that a game I bought for fifteen fucking bucks would ever be this fucking good?...

Puzzle games have always been my bane, as I could barely pass the second damn stage in the original fucking Tetris for Christ's sake. And things are certainly no real different on the DS, as I haven't even broken the 1000 point mark yet in Meteos (while I believe so many others have reached the millions. WTF?...)...

That hasn't stopped me from pouring so many hours of my nightlife (sadly enough) into Meteos, which is absolutely the best fucking puzzle game since the original Puzzle Bobble. This is absolutely the best fucking experience I have had with a touchscreen in my life, as flipping around blocks and igniting Meteos rockets works so damn perfectly with the stylus...

The awesome feeling you get as soon as you clear the screen is something that I'm sure would've sold tons of DS systems, if only Meteos had been sold in every bundle just like Tetris was with the Gameboy. I really don't know why it wasn't... Then again, looking at the sales charts? It's not like the DS needed another boost to rocket into first place or anything...

While the Nintendo DS has obviously been the biggest damn surprise for me this year, that's not to say the Gamecube didn't have it's fair share of surplus pluses as well...

I won't talk about it much here, considering I've already written about it twice in this fucking noname award ceremony of mine that nobody will ever read. But really, I bought Resident Evil 4 for the Gamecube as a collector's item, never expecting to play it considering I fucking hated the Resident Evil series up to that point...

... and then I found that I couldn't even fucking put down the Wavebird controller for two fucking weeks straight, as long as there were fucking Las Plagas parasites to kill...

Now, I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I hated, I hated, I absolutely hated the Resident Evil series until Resident Evil 4...

And now suddenly? Resident Evil 4 has become not only one of my favourite games of this entire generation of gaming, but also one of my favourite fucking games of my entire fucking video gaming life, dating all the way back to the Atari 2600 and Intellivision?...

Most Disappointing Game - Jade Empire (Xbox)
Runners-Up: 1 - Star Fox Assault (Gamecube), 2 - Star Wars: Battlefront II (Xbox)

And here we get into the shit of the year of 2005... too bad I can't extend this list, otherwise Doom 3, Half Life 2, Call of Duty 2, Geist, and even Far Cry Instincts would've made lovely showings on the list (and that's not even including all the games that really did suck this year...)...

Jade Empire by far was my biggest disappointment of the year... That's not to say however, that it was a terrible game. Afterall, it couldn't be that bad, considering I fucking beat the whole thing twice, finishing every single goddam sidequest in the process?...

Problem is, I fucking beat the entire game in just over 12 fucking hours the first time through, when I was expecting a goddam 30 hour game for the shitty ass money I paid... And I beat the game a second time with all sidequests finished in less than nine fucking hours? WTF?...

Combat in Jade Empire was simply atrocious. I could literally beat every single opponent, including the last boss, without even getting hit most of the time by just jumping behind them, whacking them a couple of times, and then rinsing and repeating. WTF?... Not only was this a complete mockery of any Chinese/Japanese RPG beforehand, but it was just a complete embarrassment compared to the deep and involving D20 rules that Bioware had implemented for Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic...

Obviously, Bioware's accomplishments in the Star Wars and Neverwinter Nights realms had raised the bar of expectations in my mind to near ludicrous levels. But even so, I was willing to give the game the benefit of the doubt considering I am Chinese, and considering I loved the Hong Kong atmosphere in Shenmue II (and was hoping for a similar effect here)... But rather, not only did Bioware completely tarnish their name by producing an RPG that felt too much like a bad NES Kung Fu game, but they completely fucked up the atmosphere of the Chinese world as well. Except for a few decent Oriental tunes, it was like I was living in some fucking New York, gangsta-style, anime shit version of the Japanese world or some shit like that...

It's that while Jade Empire is my own personal, most disappointing game of 2005?...

Ironically enough, it's also IGN's best fucking game of 2005 thanks to a fucking 9.9, "underrated" rating...

The thing is, the real negative surprise for me this year came from Star Fox Assault. I mean, I had heard all the rumours of just how much the game sucked at E3 and beyond, but I tried my best to cover my ears and ignore it all... Afterall, this was the Star Fox series we were talking about. Sure, Star Fox Adventures was shit in a lot of people's eyes, but when has the main core series in space ever really gone wrong?...

The Arwing stages in space aren't that bad, considering how hard could it possibly be for Namco to fuck up an on-rails shooter? This was the Ace Combat team we were talking about who were developing the Star Fox game, and have they ever really gone wrong with flight?... The second stage especially was absolutely beautiful in Star Fox Assault. And the Asteroid Field stage was definitely the one saving grace that preserved the Star Fox series from suddenly reaching mediocre status...

... or like putrid feet, really... as I mentioned time and time again in my review...

I really would prefer not to rip the Star Fox series apart here, considering I loved Star Fox 64 and I was mostly pleased with the SuperFX chip of the original... But short story short, how the hell could I not bitch and complain to Nintendo, for ruining one of their great franchises with a Fox McCloud that handles like a fucking retard at the Special Olympics when he's running about on the ground?...

I may love Nintendo, and they have done no wrong so far with the Nintendo DS (besides some poor filtering effects here and there...). And I do love my Gamecube... just definitely not when I had Star Fox Assault in the disc tray, that's all...

... especially after I had just finished Resident Evil 4 for the second damn time...

Now, I'm hard pressed to put Star Wars: Battlefront II here, considering it is a pretty good game... and especially considering how many Xbox games (and even Gamecube games) have stunk it up in the year 2005...

But the thing is, simply because the original Star Wars: Battlefront had made a run for the most surprisingly good game of 2005? How can I possibly not be disappointed when I realized that the sequel to one of the best Star Wars games ever, turned out to be sadly worse than the original in almost every aspect that I gave a damn about?...

The split screen combat had been increased to four players and the framerate seems to have mostly stabilized, but at what cost? Four player mode ironically looks worse than it did in fucking Goldeneye for the N64, and it all plays worse thanks to altered controls compared to the original (and not for the better)... Aiming and precision and targeting all now feel off, both on land and in space. And I just can't fucking get over the fact that weapons now feel slower and bulkier than they did before, and they can't even fucking reload the way I want them too...

A first person shooter game is only as good as its best weapon... But what weapon would that be in Battlefront II, exactly?...

Now, don't get me wrong. Star Wars: Battlefront II is still a much better game than most of the shovelware shit released on consoles in 2005... It's just that, considering I loved X-Wing vs Tie Fighter back in the day, and saw with wide eyes that LucasArts had tried to recreate it with Star Destroyers in this game? And considering my expectations for the land combat had been just so goddam raised from the original?...

Well?... I guess that 2005 was definitely a year for disappointments in consoles...

... though I suppose the industry was not alone in that department... considering Star Wars: Episode III sucked Jedi ass as well...

And yup, that was the year of 2005 in a fucking Nutcracker of a nutshell. There were a hell of a lot of stinkers, and there was a hell of a lot of shit as well, as almost every single console went months, if not even half the year, with absolutely nothing decent to play... The PS2 had God of War, the Xbox had Brothers in Arms, and the Gamecube has Resident Evil 4. And seriously, those were the only decent games to come out before the holiday season finally arrived. We're talking about nine or ten fucking months here, for bloody Christ's sakes...

2005 was definitely a piss poor year for consoles, just like the same can be argued for 2001 and 2003 as well to a lesser extent...

By why the fuck would it matter to me, when my fucking Nintendo DS got more playing time than almost any other system since the SNES, and the PSP vs DS wars got more of my attention and reading time than almost any other industry battle beforehand?...

Now, 2006 is looking to be an exciting year, both in terms of consoles and handheld systems... it is an even numbered year, afterall...

The Nintendo DS will be prepping for the inevitable PSP price drop, by releasing Metroid Prime Hunters in March and hopefully a hell of a lot of decent RPGs come summertime as well... Because who really knows? I pray that I'll never know the taste of crow, but even I have to admit that a PSP with a built-in harddrive could take over the market, just like it took the iPod a couple of years in obscurity before suddenly becoming the hot ticket item on everybody's goddam wish-list...

Console wise, the Xbox has been left for dead, and the PS2 is really faring no better. The Nintendo Gamecube has The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess still coming up in April, and that alone may make 2006 into one of the best years in fucking gaming. But that one release alone also has a lot of other help from separate sources to back up the latter claim... whatever the hell that means...

Both the Sony PS3 and the Nintendo Revolution will be launching this year, and I fully expect a real war to be brewing now that advertisements for Halo 3 on the Xbox 360 are finally beginning to appear... I have never really given a real damn about anything that Sony has produced in the gaming market, but I am definitely interested in the gaming market itself. And I will now be on record in stating, that Nintendo will be far closer to the PS3 in terms of worldwide sales than they ever were with the Gamecube against the PS2, as the Nintendo Revolution will undoubtedly be able to replicate at least some of the success of the DS in Japan...

... I'm almost expecting the two new systems to be neck and neck in the oriental homeland, really...

Over in North America, I know that the hype train will bury Nintendo, as so many gamers right now are holding off on the Xbox 360 thanks to shitty ass kiosk demos and the promise of the fucking goddam, faked PS3 Killzone video (which even I was amazed at for the time, might I add... until I realized it was all goddam faked...)...

Still, the mindshare of the Xbox 360 is currently far stronger in the casual market than it ever was for the Xbox. And if the PS3 simply cannot deliver on the types of graphics and the incredible, Incredibles experiences that Sony has promised? Then I fully expect the Xbox 360 to pull ahead in the console race, at least in the short run of things...

It's true, oh it's true, that 2006 may very well turn out to be one of the biggest fucking years in the entire video gaming industry... with Halo 3, Zelda: Twilight Princess, and possibly even the next Grand Theft Auto all in line...

But all I care about right now, is that until the heavy hitters of the year start showing up in April and May around E3?...

... that I will continue to thank Nintendo and my seven lucky stars, that my Nintendo DS is simply that damn good and that damn fun...

[c. visitors too bored to return...]
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