PLEASE NOTE: The mp3 file links for this post are outdated. To listen to this episode please visit  The SBU Podcast Archives.  Sorry for the inconvenience. Reviews of the "Evil Dead" remake, classic horror flick "The Car" and Marvel's "Superior Spider-Month"! Plus, Paeter shares some verses from scripture of personal significance.

Review by Nathan James Norman 2007 saw the release of the motion-capture computer animated film Beowulf directed by Robert Zemeckis. Along for this adaptation were superstar writers Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary. Armed with the digital acting abilities of actors Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins, John Malkovich and Angelina Jolie, the film looked like it was going to be a hit on all levels. What I Didn’t Like ·          Hrothgar is a weak-minded, drunk, Bacchus-like character. Unlike the in the poem, he has no sons and no heirs. This simply doesn’t work, though. To be an effective king in Denmark in those times, he needed to have physical strength and mental prowess. This Hrothgar should have been deposed long before the film begins. ·          The Grendel design is more disturbing than monstrous (see comic below). ·          Unferth is portrayed as a...

Review by Ken from Honolulu “The Car” was made in 1977 by director Elliot Silverstein.   Starring James Brolin, Kathleen Lloyd, and John Marley, it tells the story of a sleek black car that unfortunately happens to be possessed.   The titular car attacks everyone it comes in contact with, eventually becoming the terror of an entire town. I give film this a quality score of 9.0 and a relevance score of 9.0. The movie is extremely violent, and a lot of people are killed. However, it is not a blood-and-guts, slasher-style film. You don’t see any blood and you don’t really see the actual moments of death, either. You just see the terror of the victims immediately before they are killed, and once in a while the body afterwards. You’ll catch on almost as soon as you start watching the film there is something unusual about the car, and you won’t be surprised when it starts actually doing strange things. However, the story still feels suspenseful, with the tension buil...

Review by Paeter Frandsen I'm not a fan of the Sam Raimi "Evil Dead" movies. It's not that I don't think horror and comedy can be combined. I just never found the comedy parts of those movies working for me at all. But when I heard that a remake of Evil Dead was planned and that they were taking a purely serious approach to the film, I was curious- even more so when I saw the trailer. Four friends take their drug-addicted friend Mia to a cabin in the remote woods to serve as her support while she attempts a weekend of going cold-turkey. But when one of them discovers a book filled with ancient evil incantations, a dark presence is unleashed that begins horrifically manipulating the unwitting protagonists. Mia is the first victim, and so naturally the others assume her strange behavior is a result of quitting her drug habit so abruptly. By the time they realize their mistake, it's already too late. The serious premise of the film is welcom...

PLEASE NOTE: The mp3 file links for this post are outdated. To listen to this episode please visit  The SBU Podcast Archives.  Sorry for the inconvenience. A review of the animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender, our final "Summer Of Free" Segment for 2013 and what it means for geeks to "honor thy father and thy mother".

Review by Paeter Frandsen I loved the original "Kick Ass" movie. It was independently produced and the concept in general is a tough one to market: R-rated superhero movie with gory action and rough language, based on an unknown cast of characters. What they pulled off in that film was amazing, especially given the kind of movie it was. I've never read any of the Kick Ass comic books, but the original movie blew me away with its unique combination of humor, character drama, and brutal superhero action. It was a deconstruction of the superhero genre that still knew how to be fun, despite some heart-rending moments that still leave me in tears even during my recent fifth viewing. Was there any hope of capturing that lightning in a bottle again? I sat down to watch Kick Ass 2 hoping for the best, but expecting the worst. Kick Ass 2 picks up about four years after the events of Kick Ass. Dave has long since retired from being Kick Ass, focusing instead on ...

I saw this film long before I ever read The  Beowulf Poem, so I did not know that this 1999 pseudo-historical movie was based on Beowulf . Based on the Michael Crichton novel Eaters of the Dead , the film went through several years of development, re-shoots, edits and even re-scoring before it was finally released. Once released it was panned by critics, and bombed in the box office. The film is narrated by Ahmad ibn Fadlan (Antonio Banderas), a Muslim Arab who was punished into exile as an ambassador to the Northlands. While there, he is forced to become the 13 th Warrior on a quest to stop the malevolent Wendel from their non-stop slaughter of men. So what did I think? What I Didn’t Like It is unfortunate that Crichton decided to use a Muslim to frame/narrate the story rather than a Christian. He was basing his story on Beowulf and a Christian character would have better served as narrator since a Christian narrator is featured in The Poem. Ahmad ibn Fadlan...

PLEASE NOTE: The mp3 file links for this post are outdated. To listen to this episode please visit  The SBU Podcast Archives.  Sorry for the inconvenience. Our reviews of Kick Ass 2, and Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2! Plus a look at one of the most misunderstood of the Ten Commandments!

Review by Paeter Frandsen I am mostly a console gamer. Largely because I am unwilling to invest the money required to keep a gaming PC up to date. I also loathe the numerous problems I seem to run into when simply trying to install and run a game on my computer. For this reason, I tend to play PC games about five years or more after the height of their popularity. In 2008 I fell in love with Bioware's "Neverwinter Nights"(released in 2002). Now, five years later, I'm finally getting around to playing Neverwinter Nights 2(released in 2006). With the recent launch of the Dungeons And Dragons Neverwinter MMO, I thought the timing might be right for a retro review of these classic games. Neverwinter Nights owes a large debt to Baldur's Gate and Baldur's Gate 2, two fantastic, classic, PC RPGs also developed by Bioware studios and similar to the Neverwinter Nights games in many ways. The Baldur's Gate games were an attempt at taking the paper and penc...