"Tales from the Gypped"

Sorry for the lack of updates lately, I've had a lot of personal shit going on that has prevented me from writing in any way, shape, form, or fashion.
But do you see that neat little title above this post? That's what my memoir is going to be called. And in my dreams, the picture on the front will be of a zombie losing a card game or something. It'll be a memoir, told in the Augusten Burroughs-like style of a bunch of different unrelated short stories about things that have really happened to me. I have a solid 6 ideas going so far, two of which I've written about already on this blog (the ever-infamous "Flintstones Vitamins" and "Warriors of Virtue" posts). I expect for this to be taking up a lot of my time in the future, so I won't be updating this blog all that often anymore, at least until I either finish writing about all six subjects or get bored with the project.
So, Blogger, I bid thee farewell. Perhaps for a week, perhaps for a month, but definitely for a little while.

I love you.
-Ty "shaky toes" Walters

Mini-movie reviews (#8)

Pineapple ExpressDirected by David Gordon Green
Starring Seth Rogen, James Franco, and Danny McBride
Released in 2008
Good: Rogen and Franco make an excellent team, and Franco plays what is perhaps one of the best drug-dealing movie characters in history. This movie only gets better after repeat watchings (I originally gave it a 6/10, then re-watched it). The "Rancor" joke at the end was fucking golden, too.
Bad: There were a few moments in which the movie was clearly catering to a stoned audience, which sort of bothered me for some reason. Maybe I'm just being a dick.
Rating: 8/10

Step Brothers Directed by Adam McKay
Starring Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly
Released in 2008
Good: It had its moments, most notably the "Boats N' Hoes" music video and a few minor jokes here and there.
Bad: It was just another throwaway "dumb comedy" from Will Ferrell. When will he and John C. Reilly start doing impressively funny and smart movies like Stranger Than Fiction and The Promotion (respectively) together?
Rating: 5.5/10

The WacknessDirected by Jonathan Levine
Starring Josh Peck, Olivia Thirlby, Ben Kingsley, Famke Janssen, Method Man, and Mary Kate Olsen
Released in 2008
Good: Peck has grown up considerably, and become one of the best up-and-coming actors out there with this role. Basically, he plays a weed dealer so well that I wondered if there was any method acting involved.
Bad: Some parts dragged on, and there were tons of things from modern-day that snuck their way into the movie.
Rating: 9/10

Vince Vaughn's Wild West Comedy ShowDirected by Ari Sandel
Starring Vince Vaughn, Ahmed Ahmed, John Caparulo, Bret Ernst, Sebastian Maniscalo, Jon Favreau, Dwight Yokam, and Justin Long

Released in 2006
Good: The comedians are funny. Sebastian Maniscalo has been one of my favorites since I saw his Comedy Central standup bit a few months back. It was interesting to see how he came to be the comedian he is today.
Bad: John Caparulo was funny, but sounded and performed like Larry the Cable Guy lite. There wasn't enough of the standup bits either.

Rating: 7/10

Irrelevance (#11)

"Hack your brain"
Boston.com has a neat how-to chart on their site with a few drugless-but-still-trippy experiments you can try out, including the interesting-sounding "putting halved ping pong balls on your eyes and listening to radio static makes you hallucinate" trick. I really want to try it as soon as possible.
Found on Neatorama.

Worst things in the world
I was at work today, and my friend/manager Ryan and I agreed that shitting on someone's chest without their permission is one of the worst/most unforgivable things in the world. As to how this came about, I'll only say that it had to do with our attraction to Zooey Deschanel.
Anyways, back in the day, I started writing a list with my friend Matt titled "the 100 worst things in the world," and got to writing around 40 of them. I still want to finish this list, so if you have anything that you think deserves to be on it, please let me know. I will give you credit, of course.

Some examples from Matt and I's list:

-When you peel off the wax paper from a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup and the entire chocolate bottom comes off with it.

-When you turn on your iPod or other music player, and the music is REALLY FUCKING LOUD (this is also valid in cars).

Like I said, if you have ANYTHING that could POSSIBLY be in consideration for this list, let me know. When I do write the list, it will be in single-sentence format like the two examples above, to cut down on your time and mine.

Rescue Ink strikes again!

Longtime readers of my blog may remember a small post I did back in August about the groups of tattooed bikers that run an animal adoption agency in New York. Well, they are at it again, this time rescuing 180 orphaned kittens from a foreclosed home (news article here). They also have a website now, located here.

Batman classified ad
I just found this neat print on Turntable Lab's website:

I want it pretty badly. I'll bet it'll sell out soon, since everyone has Joker-mania right now.

My top five most anticipated movies of the first half of 2009

I had originally intended to write this on the 2nd or 3rd of this month, but obviously didn't. Feel free to insult my taste in the comments. Expect another one (dealing with the second half of '09) in July.

#5: The Brothers Bloom (May 29)Starring Mark Ruffalo and Adrien Brody, The Brothers Bloom follows the Bloom brothers (shocking!) who swindle and con millionaires into giving them boatloads of money. It was written and directed by the fantastic Rian Johnson, who helmed the 2005 drug-filled drama Brick (one of my favorite movies). Early reviews state that it is a fun-filled instant classic, and likely an awards contender. I'm hoping it will be something in the vein of In Bruges, which was one of my favorites from '08.

#4: Star Trek (May 8) In a world filled with movies set around space whose titles begin with the word "star," there has been only one set of movies for me: Star Wars. But my faith in George Lucas has been shaken, stirred, ingested, passed through several miles of intestinal tract, and subsequently pissed out over the course of the last ten years, so I've been looking for a new franchise to fall in love with.

Enter Lost co-creator J.J. Abrams' take on the 40-something year-old Star Trek franchise. With a new slew of actors, updated visuals, and no overbearing creators to ruin it (sorry, Gene), his take on the adventures of Captain James T. Kirk of the Star Trek Enterprise is shaping up to be one of the best.
And the best part about it all? Simon Pegg plays Scotty. Score!

#3: X-Men Origins: Wolverine (May 1)Despite the fact that I keep relosing and regaining faith in Marvel Comics' movies after every other film they release, I can't help but be extremely excited for this. Hugh Jackman is reprising his role as Wolverine/Logan/James Howlett, in this adaptation of Wolvie's life before the X-Men, dating back to the early 1900's. Ryan Reynolds was perfectly cast as Wade Wilson/Deadpool a few months ago, following the news of Black Eyed Peas frontman will.i.am being cast as John Wraith. Leiv Schreiber was cast as Victor Creed/Sabertooth, and Friday Night Lights actor Taylor Kitsch was cast as Remy LeBeau/Gambit.
The production photos and trailer have been promising, though I am slightly nervous about their version of Deadpool. You see, in the trailer, we see an unmasked Ryan Reynolds swinging two swords around (Deadpool's signature weapons) while wearing a red tank-top. Hopefully this isn't what he looks like "in costume," because I will be a million times more disappointed than I was when I saw Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer and realized that Galactus was an oort cloud.

#2: Moon (TBA)I want to mention this before I go on a rant about this movie: Sam Rockwell is one of the most underrated actors in Hollywood right now. From powerful roles in movies like Snow Angels to undeniably funny roles in movies like Choke (which I still haven't seen), and smaller (but still amazing) roles in movies like The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, he is definitely on my list of actors to be on the lookout for in coming years.
The movie is set in the not-so-far future in which Rockwell's character (an astronaut named Sam Bell) is stranded on the moon for three years straight. Apparently, sometime near the date he is set to leave the rocky planet, he has a "personal encounter" or something like that. I haven't read the book, so I'm not sure what exactly happens, but it sure does sound interesting.
Besides that, the movie looks appealing to me for three reasons:

-It's a drama. Set in space. Duh.
-It's directed by Duncan Jones, AKA Zowie Bowie, AKA David Bowie's son (who wrote the book that the movie is based on). Once again, duh.

-It's an independent movie with an original story that co-stars Kevin Spacey as the voice of a robot. For the third time, duh.

The trouble with the last one is that it has no known movie distributor over here in the U.S., so no release date has been set. Fingers crossed that it'll be soon, eh?

#1: Watchmen (March 6)I'm so excited for this movie that I maintain an erection for close to four hours after every time I think about it. And I think about it about once every 20 seconds, so life has been painful and embarassing since the time I saw the first boner-ific trailer a few months ago. See, you think I'm kidding, but I'm not. I am more excited for this movie than I was for The Dark Knight's release this last summer. Basically, that means I'm really fucking excited. Really.
Based on the epic graphic novel of the same name and directed by Zach Snyder (of 300 fame) Watchmen follows a few formerly masked-and-costumed individuals as they stave off demons from their past in 1980's New York City. It's action-packed, story-based, and really fucking original and awesome.
To be blunt, if Snyder doesn't fuck this one up, and actually stays true to the book, it will be one of the greatest movies of all time. Lawd knows it's one of the best books.

State of the blog: January 8, 2009

Well, shit. I haven't been updating for the last two or three weeks, and I'm sorry. I have three excuses:

#1: Work - I've been working a lot lately. Yep.

#2: Computer access - Due to my stupidity, I can't access a computer at my house for the time being. Not sure how long this is going to last, but you guys will be the first to know when it stops.

#3: My mother - My mom had her hip replaced on the 29th, and my job has been to keep my house from burning down like she does every single day.

Other than that, not a lot else has been going on in my life. I'm writing, but only by hand. Sure, it's slow and tedious, but I still need an outlet.
So with that said, I have a ton of new ideas for the new year. Expect most of them to be used by mid-March, since I'm an asshole.

I decided to delete the "top 20 of '08" posts. I'm never going to finish it, and it is time to move on. Get over it, kiddos.

Expect a few major updates in the next few days. I won't be on every day, but I'll try my hardest for you people.