So Chris Evans is Captain America...

...and I don't even know what to think. They were originally going to go with an unknown, but apparently wise ass Evans came in and swooped up the part near the last minute. How will it turn out? Well, bizarre at first, but as I keep reading, a lot of people did not think the fairly comedic Michael Keaton could pull off Batman back in '89. And for all the problems the film apparently has (I still see it as a masterpiece to this very day), we all saw how that turned out. But this obviously gets him off the hook completely with Fox and the Fantastic Four, so that ridiculous reboot will clearly be taking off soon enough I'd imagine. I have faith in Evans in the role, with as little I know about Cap as I do. He steals scenes in every movie he is in, and was the only thing that made Four tolerable. But as for being the headlining act? That is what worries me.

So as you can probably guess, I have been playing a lot of God of War III. It is a much harder game than I imagined it would be (probably not helped by my playing it on Titan mode, but hey), but it is visually astounding. The amount of shit going on at any given moment in the foreground and the background is simply amazing. You rarely hear that companies are really pushing the PlayStation 3 to its graphical limits, but this game puts it in high gear from the start and has yet to ease up. I just hope the rest of the game turns out just as well. Oh, and having Kevin Sorbo play Hercules? Awesome.

So, onto the business of TV (movies will have to wait for a post tomorrow). Have a review of The Crazies on deck this week, alongside at least two others. Not as bad a movie as I thought it would be, but not especially scary.

I'm still not onto watching Parenthood yet, but hope to catch up later this week.

On Chuck, things are still very much the same. Last week's "Chuck vs. the Tic Tac" was a much better episode than tonight's "Chuck vs. the Final Exam", if only because it revealed a bit more backstory for John Casey and had a guest spot by the T-1000, Robert Patrick. While I'm still disappointed with the lack of real comedy per episode, the romance is what is really bugging me. It just feels forced, and seems to keep getting dragged up every so often to kind of offset the action. In previous seasons, it was smoldering in the background and kept coming to a head every so often. Here, it practically smacks you in the face at every given moment. I will not give up on the show, but it does make me disheartened to think that the changes they had to make to keep the show alive really seem to be more detrimental than positive.

Last week's Lost, "Recon" was boring in almost every sense. I was tired when I caught it late, but was hankering for some God of War, so I was wide awake. But somehow, I still managed to doze off for part of it. But rather amazingly, I did not miss much at all. I dug that Sawyer was a cop in his "flash-sideways", and I like that we know where his allegiance lies, but the episode just did not do anything for me at all. It was on par with the Kate-centric "What Kate Does" as the worst episode of the season. This week's is a Richard flashback episode, and is one I have been eagerly awaiting. I hope it proves to be worthwhile. Hope being the operative word.

And FlashForward finally came back last week with a surprise two-part episode. Well, surprising to me who wanted to do something last Thursday after 9 PM, but ended up watching the whole thing.

I had missed the fall finale "A561984", and just never got around to watch it. Luckily, "Revelation Zero: Part 1" and "Revelation Zero: Part 2" had plenty of flashbacks to pivotal moments in the episode. So I don't feel like I missed a whole lot. The two-parter felt just as clunky as I remember though. The writing is not as atrocious as the critics say, but the format just feels a little too much like Lost with more payoff. For every question answered per episode, it opens up tons more. But unlike Lost that took some time to introduce new characters, every episode seems to bring on at least five new characters. I know there are some behind-the-scenes problems with producers leaving, but the show is having way too much trouble finding its grounding. I fear it will be cancelled, but it will be for good reason.

It is a show with a wicked premise, some great actors in interesting roles, but it just seems to be running around hoping it will attract enough people to become the next Lost, as opposed to actually attempting to become the next Lost. For what it is worth, the reveals on who and how Suspect Zero survived the blackout and the rather bizarre notion that the FBI is now racing to stop another blackout, was quite riveting. Focusing on Dominic Monaghan's character for almost the entirety of the second half? There were some exceptions, but overall...not so much.

And I crammed and finally finished the entirety of Season 1 of Mad Men last week. Of the final five episodes ("Shoot", "Long Weekend", "Indian Summer", "Nixon vs. Kennedy" and "The Wheel"), I only really enjoyed two of them. The others? Merely okay.

"Shoot" was just an all out crazy episode that left me intrigued and riveted all at once. It made me instantly remember why I wanted to get into the show, and provided enough material to make me want to finish it. The fighting, the backstabbing, the totally clueless and completely off-the-rails Betty Draper who is pretty enough to model but nuttier than a squirrel when it comes to using a BB gun...they were all on display and the episode was just excessively entertaining. My favourite of the season, and one who's motif I hope is repeated in future episodes (with hopefully more dry wit).

"Nixon vs. Kennedy" on the other hand, was just one that helped answer questions and offer up new ones. And of course taught us that everyone at Sterling Cooper smokes, flirts and cheats on their spouse. No one appears to be safe. It gave us another fine Vincent Kartheiser performance, and finely told us the reason why Dick Whitman suddenly became Don Draper after fighting in Korea (I originally thought it was during World War II), and why he was so hesitant to just go with what his brother Adam was saying a few episodes back. Surprisingly graphic scenes in this episode too, but only because of how "wholesome" the rest of the season was. I liked how the creators balanced the Kennedy/Nixon fight with the Don/Pete fight, and how much darker the outlook is for Season 2. I'm just glad his reasoning for the name change wasn't ruined like the gamechanger for Peggy in "The Wheel". I'm glad she will have some sort of presence as a result of the clusterfuck of things that happen to her in Season 2, but only because she was one of the weaker things about the show thus far.

Overall, Season 1 of Mad Men was a bit off balance in parts, but came out swinging in others. It is a really interesting show, packed with an awesome, likeable cast. It is a bit of a slowburn though, and it did take awhile to really become invested in it (unlike other shows I picked up on DVD and instantly loved like Entourage, Curb Your Enthusiasm and in an addicting sense, True Blood). But I think it will pay off in the end, as long as the groove the creators found at the end, is the groove that sticks through into the next season.

And that's about up-to-date on TV. Watched "Part 1" of The Pacific, but want to reserve judgment until I watch "Part Two". More tomorrow with movies...

Really, you wanted more sideboob from Neytiri?

So yesterday, while I only got to play a few minutes of God of War II, I managed to stuff in two more episodes of Mad Men - "Marriage of Figaro" and "New Amsterdam".

Much like my experience with True Blood, the show is appearing to start slow and gradually open itself up. While I doubt it will end up being nearly as awesome and addictive as Blood, it is getting fairly interesting. The third episode (Figaro) was fairly boring and actually put me to sleep, despite showing off how much of a ladies man Don Draper is, but the fourth episode (Amsterdam) was a definite improvement, and a step in the right direction. I think its because they brought Pete back to the forefront, making him the villain and the bane of Draper's existence. The guy who plays him, Vincent Kartheiser, seems to be a really good job with him, showing some great range in how conflicted this guy seems to be about wanting to rise up the ranks because no one seems to want to give him a break. Continuing to love Jon Hamm's work too, even if his character seems to be a lot of things that he is not.

And I also took in a long awaited second viewing of Avatar. The first time I saw it in IMAX 3D and was simply blown away by the effects and the scope of the film. The second time I just saw it in regular 3D, and rather surprisingly, it felt like I was watching it again for the first time. It is just such an impressive feat of film-making on the part of James Cameron, and just about everything in the film still held up. There just seems to be a sense of wonder within the film that manages to make it feel new for a second time viewer. I loved just looking at the effects in action, especially ones featuring water or mud, and the depth of realism the effects go into. Simply stunning. I only hope I feel the same way when the Special Edition Blu-ray comes out in November.

If there's anything I hold against the film, it is the fact that despite knowing where all the beats are, it still feels like a bad train wreck when Cameron hits the breaks after the destruction of a certain important object in the film (while I know just about everyone has seen the movie now, I still do not like spoiling it). The film practically whips by up until that point, and then totally loses momentum until the start of the epic final battle scene. Clearly the exposition is needed, and there is a bad ass scene featuring Quaritch that I love to death that comes after, but it just seems like Cameron could have done a much better job preserving the film's speed. The man is clearly not one for brevity, so if he really feels the movie deserves to be almost 3 hours long, he could at least make sure that it does not feel that long. The "I see you" bits were a little much the second time, but the script still manages to not feel as bad as people put it down for being.

As for Oscars, well, I think it has the shot for Best Picture again, but I really think The Hurt Locker will take it. Just handing it to the audience pleasing film a year after fucking over The Dark Knight seems to be a bit much. More on them in the coming days though...