Thirty-three Of Fifty-Two

Characters

Rapunzel

So I'm betting you didn't expect to see this little lady on my of 52 list, huh? She's the lead princess in a Disney film. But I did have tangled up as one of my favourite films so it's not that unexpected is it? But anyway, she's great.

Rapunzel is full of wonder, self conscious, beaten down by her mother, yet she still finds it in her to make her dreams come true.
She's cute, awkward, endearing, a little naive and beautiful. Seriously; if it was a possibility I would marry this girl. I say that, knowing full well she wouldn't take me.

I don't really have much to say on this subject, she's just so awesome, beating people up with a frying pan, singing songs and getting the trust of all of the people she comes in contact with.
Oh and that smile and her myriad of expressions... damn. If she was a part of the UK royal family I would be a royalist.

Seriously; one of my exs I dated specifically because for a short while she reminded me of this character.

In the past year I've bought a bunch of Disney soundtracks for the first time since the lion king came out, and this girl is the one who started it all. I mean look at her! She's wearing pink n purple while adventuring with her frog... chameleon.

Just watch this film and try not to fall in love with her. It's impossible.

Just-a-great-example-of-Rapunzel's-character.
- James

Thirty-Two of Fifty-two

TV Shows

Doctor Who

So Doctor who is awesome. It's one of (if not the) longest running sci-fi having started in 1963 and still going strong today. It had a hiatus - a long one for sure - but there were books, comics, radio plays and films to fill in the gap.


At it's heart Doctor who is a story about exploration. A story about wonder. Really it's about children. About how every child in the world gets into the little box and it's something they didn't expect, be it a boat a car or a time travellign space ship. Every one of us, when we were kids and we were handed our first card board box by our parents, the seemingly impossibly old and impossibly smart people in our lives, it could take us practically anywhere, sometimes even places we didn't want to go.


Doctor who takes us to so many places that it's unbelievable - literally, you have to suspend your disbelief - and we love every minute of it.
One of the most interesting things about it is it's main character, the Doctor. It's been the same character for fifty years, but eleven different actors, all with their own uniqueness. It's not like Bond, where they say it's the same person and don't remark on their appearance changing, they make it a part of the story. when the doctor is too badly injured to go on he changes every cell in his body and comes back as a completely knew person, character and all. From the serious stuffy first doctor of William Hartnell and the clearly insane but often equally serious eleventh doctor played by Matt smith to the charming and 'just want to have fun' tenth doctor of David Tennant and the selflessly hopeful fifth doctor played by Peter Davidson, they were all so different.


Another thing that's great about the show is the companions. popping in and out throughout the Doctor's span are a myriad of companions to help him through his long life. He has time lords, humans and even tin dogs running around with him.
Some of them fall in love with him, some of them learn to hate him, and others are just his really good friends. and honestly the ones that are just his close friends are the best. I dont really remember everything from doctors one to eight but nine, ten and eleven are fresh in my mind, and of them the best two companions are Captain Jack Harkness and Donna Noble.


Go watch it and tell me I'm wrong.



Anyway, go watch it, it's great (Christopher Eccleson's doctor, the ninth, is a good starting point, its where the hiatus ended.) Plus, for all you American girls out there; English accents.


Two-David-Tennant-Doctors-and-ones-naked. More-fun-is-never-to-be-had.
- James


P.S. so I missed 1 post last week and I game a bit of money to charity on the way to work today.
P.P.S. All the mobile links to the podcast were dead so I replaced them with the mobile website instead of just the file.

New Years Resolution Update

So, this last month I worked on my audio editing skills in the form of a podcast. You can listen to them  here; Stuff and Things .

I think I did ok with it and I'm going to continue to do it in the future. I'm going to continue posting once a week on Wednesdays. We have already recorded the next 3. The next one is Science Fiction then Disney movies then Time Travel. In the time travel one I get a new microphone :)

so yeah;
New Resolution 5, part 2 of 12; Learn something new every month.
Done.

Next month will be the lock picking. I've bought a lock picking set to practice, and I have a bunch of padlocks I can probably use, if not I'll just get a hold of the cheapest lock picking practice board and go at it on that every night.

In other news I have a job, it's only temporary (a month) working with FGOL as a QA tester for their mobile games. It's a completely uninteresting story how I got it (my previous boss called me up, told me he'd moved there and offered me a months work, completely uninteresting) but that should tide me over with a little bit of money so I don't have to lock myself away from society for fear of spending money.

Speaking of which; I get to order my new TV on thursday! Yay! Full HD, 3D, smart, etc... etc... I'm looking forward to it, it'll be put on the wall next to my computer so I may even end up with a third monitor, you never know!

Anywho; I don't have ny more interesting news and I apologise for beign so boring :P

Tubey
- James

P.s. the job means later blog posts, they'll still keep coming.

Thirty-One of Fifty-Two

Games

Final Fantasy VIII

Final Fantasy VIII is the first final fantasy game I ever completed. Lots of people didn't like this one because of it's differences to FF7, but I came late to the game with Final Fantasy so by the time I played FF7, FF9 was on it's way and I just didn't care about 7. It looked awful. graphically it's one of the worst games I've ever played so, try as I might, I never completed it. As I expressed in Wednesday's podcast I'd love for them to re-make it exactly as it was but with next gen and beyond graphics so that I can complete it and have the awesome .

But Final Fantasy 7 isn't why I'm here today, Final Fantasy 8 is. FF8 is the story of Squall Leonhart a member of the Garden school, a mercenary system that trains young people to fight wars and go on missions. Early in the story he graduates to the elite SeeD and is caught up in a series of events that lead him to face off against the evil witch that's taking over the world.

It's a long story that took me well over a hundred hours to complete that delves into the main characters histories and their futures to show how intertwined everyones lives were. From soldiers in the last real war right up to the witch from the future.

It's a love story, an action story, a detective story, and a high school story and I think they work really well together. Plus; Squall uses a gun-blade, that's a sword that fires bullets. you can't beat a sword that fires bullets!

I loved the gameplay I loved the story I loved that it took a significant portion of your life - not like the games these days that you pay £50 for and your done before the day is over.

Not only that but it has some of the best CG animation, even to this day. I'm fairly sure I've posted this scene before but it's well worth watching it again, I can't stop. Dance dance. It's such a simple idea, a graduation dance, but I'd never seen it in a game before and it's still awesome... for the most part.

Anyway; if you have a PSP or a PS3 (or possibly vita, I'm not sure) it's on the PSN, so go buy it.

FF8-Opening-sequence. It's-Awesome.
- James