It’s Raining Arrows!

Mainstream rediscovers the original projectile weapon.

I had fun watching the Avengers movie when it opened at the end of April, and while Iron Man is generally the scene-stealer, it can be argued that Hawkeye had the most presence in the movie, almost single-handedly fleshing out Loki’s grand evil scheme and scoring an astronomic hit-kill stats in the final battle. And this is despite the fact that his weapon of choice is a bow and arrow, as compared to the others who used laser beam, lightning, a rebounding shield or sheer brute strength. Coincidentally, some other recent productions also featured a protagonist that’s extremely skilled in archery. With a bit of digging, I’ve come up with a list of the best archers in recent memory:

Waiting for the Next Big Literary Epic

 

2012 continues the search for the next big epic fantasy or sci-fi series, with most of the most popular literary works reaching their end of the line from last year until this year. The Lord of the Rings trilogy came and went, bagging Academy Awards and all, with one last ditch effort to cash in on The Hobbit soon. Harry Potter had all but exhausted all 7 books, producing an output of 8 movies in the process. Twilight is following the same strategy, with the second part of Breaking Dawn to be shown a few months from now. There had been a lot of attempts to replicate the success of these series, but so far, most received lukewarm response from viewers, as was the case with Chronicles of Narnia, The Golden Compass, and Percy Jackson and the Olympians. The pressure is on The Hunger Games, which had its airing last March with excellent results (I’ll reserve my judgment later, having neither seen nor read the title). I wasn’t too keen for Ender’s Game, it doesn’t appear to be a good material for a movie. I am also wondering if a Dark Tower series will ever materialize, with yet another book coming up. And I don’t understand why no one seems to take interest in Wheel of Time, 13 books and all.

I have nothing against books getting the visual treatment. While it’s common knowledge that the book is always better than the movie, and we must not judge a book by its movie because it’s usually going to be dumbed down in order to appeal to the least common denominator, there are benefits to making a movie out of it. One thing I look forward to is seeing the settings and characters come into life, whether it’s Middle-Earth or the castle of Hogwarts or even the sleepy town of Forks, and seeing the cast who will eventually populate this world. 

→ I’m running out of titles.

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Angels & Demons

Actually, I have finished reading the novel way back in 2007, so it doesn’t bother me at all that I’m going to miss the movie version, which is currently making its rounds in cinemas everywhere.

American Idol 8: The Afterthoughts

I have always been an avid follower of AI (and singing contests in general), having seen seasons starting from 3 (it has nothing to do with the fact that one {actually, two} of the finalists were Filipinas. Rather, it’s because that was the year we signed up for a cable subscription). And yet for some reason, I am not too enthusiastic about this season. The probable reason for this is the lack of any real competition within the show, compared to the previous season where everybody had their time to shine (hell, the first Beatles week was easily one of the best AI episodes ever). Sadly, I find this season way too monotonous and predictable.

Slumdog Millionaire: My Own Review

There are only three reasons why I tune in to the Oscars every year. The first was to see who wins the award in Visual Effects. The second was to see who wins as the Best Animated Feature. And lastly, to see if an Asian film makes it big by reaping the big awards.

My Thoughts on the Pacquiao-Hatton Dream Match

Fred Roach knew that Hatton’s weakness lies in his (unusually ugly) jaws, and if Pacquiao manages to hit it, they knew that the fight will gonna be all over. And Pacman managed to do the magical punch in less than 6 minutes, his shortest by far. Pacman has added yet another belt to his collection (6 IINM). Pacman has gobbled another dot (or a Boo?) and forced another boxing superstar into early retirement. It was a wonderful time to be a Filipino.

For the record, I’ve been following Pacquiao’s journey for a long time. The year was 1998, and if my memory served me well, I do remember Pacquiao as a fresh graduate from a boxing reality show on IBC 13. He was matched against a Thai, and to be honest, Pacquiao doesn’t look the part like a future boxing superstar. The titular match took place in the opponent’s homeland. Pacquiao doesn’t have his legion of fans yet (the whole country, that is), he was still an ordinary boxer. And then, suddenly, Pacman scored an unexpected TKO at Round 8 (or 9?), throwing his opponent haplessly on the floor, setting the precedence for future fights. The mostly native crowd was stunned. I’ve seen a brief flash of brilliance.

It didn’t stop there. Pacman took on categorically impossible matches, and finished them with relative ease, even if it took him the whole mountain of a country to do it. It’s funny, Pacman has also been aliased as The Mexicutioner.

And so, it all went to this. Another day, another fight. The Earth stood still, at least on this side of the planet. It was a zero-crime day. Moments like these happens only once in 50 years.