I Will Review

Why the fuck did I even watch this movie?

That... that "Las Vegas that looks like Reno with Poker Face and Tik-Tok" scene was fucking stupid. The Grover here? I would've guessed he'd know the most about god matters (that bribing the boatman scene? shit!) but noooo... he knows next to nothing. Annabeth? What a waste of airtime. She was next to useless. Percy? Well, at least you can act but the naivete that I loved from the book was GONE.

The only things I'm happy about are Melina Kanakaredes, Sean Bean, and Rosario Dawson. Everything else can suck it.

I should've stayed with the book.

The first one, "The Lightning Thief" is a pretty good book.

Here's a sign where you can tell that I am enjoying a book:

I love Mythology. VERY MUCH. I know a lot about it and when pop culture references them in books, TV shows, and/or movies, I want it to be faithful and consistent. With the movie "Clash of the Titans", apart from Sam Worthington, the EPIC deviation from the mythology of Io turned me the fuck off. I was so uninterested for the remainder of the movie. (And if you watched it, you'll know that they reveal who Io is in the first 30 minutes of the movie.)

The Percy Jackson books depend a lot on Greek mythology. After all "Percy Jackson and the Olympians" - Percy being a demigod and all. There's a camp where all the children of the gods go to train and stuff. There were kids of Poseidon (Percy himself), Hermes, Aphrodite, Zeus (but she died), and... Athena.

But you see... Athena never had a lover. Athena Parthenos. Virgin Athena. Hephaestus attempted to rape her but he failed in that and impregnating her. Yet in the first Percy book, one of his best friends is the daughter of Athena. And I didn't even gripe about that!

So there you go. It's a good book!

[The movie, however, is a piece of horse shit.]

Okay, I'm done nerding out.

Let's face it, Glee Season 1 back nine sucked major ass. The season finale, "Journey" was decent enough to save face. Was I expecting much from the Season 2 Pilot? Not really.

Three new people: Shannon Beiste (Dot Jones), Sunshine Corazon (Charice), and Sam Evans (Chord Overstreet). SRSLY? Chord?! When I first heard about it, I thought it was his character name. And I thought, "Glee's off the deep end. Eh." He looks like a taller and blonder Justin Bieber. A taller twin brother. Charice is... well, Charice. [I voted for her during that kid talent search; the name escapes me right now.] Dot Jones plays the new football coach, replacing Cho - er, I mean Ken Tanaka. Oh man, she's 6'3".

Josh Sussman (Jacob Ben Israel) opens the episode interviewing the characters. Best part was "Did you know that there's a forum on my blog that's begging you to stop rapping?" Eh, Mr. Shue... exactly. Rachel/Lea (eh, I don't know where the line is anymore) is as obnoxious as ever. I seriously do not know anybody like her in real life -- if people tell you you're annoying, shouldn't you at the very least tone it down? I get all the "I don't care what people say" and all but when it starts to drive the persons you're closest to away? I like the Tina/Mike twist very much. They look so cute together. And I'm not just saying that because they're both Asian. Brittany's comeback one-liner came up short. In fact, ALL of her one-liners in this episode were meah. "... I was lost in the sewers"? "Stop the violence"? "Actually, I wanted to touch her breasts"? WTF. Not funny. What happened to the male duck?

I did laugh the fuck out at this one-liner: "I've never had any balls in my mouth. Do you?" from Sam Evans. PERFECTION. And the looks on Finn's and Artie's faces. I had to pause and just giggle. And I find it cute that Artie's term of endearment for Tina is "woman". Haha, and mega "aww...." towards the end when he was watching Tina and Mike dance. :'(

Speaking of Sam Evans - dude, his real name is more interesting than his character name - Bieber doppelganger can saaang. "Billionaire" is... look at Puck's facial expression and that's what I thought. No disrespect to the Glee dudes but FINALLY someone who can legit sing and sing well. (Mark Salling + Guitar = FUCKING HAWT.) Charice, as we all know, can sing her face off. I was talking to a friend on YM while we were both watching and here's what she had to say:

"As a Pinay [Filipino - female slang], I am having secondhand satisfaction watching Sunshine upstage Rachel."

And upstage, she did. Although WTF is that weird sorta choreography Sunshine was doing during "Listen"? Other than that, Charice held up well. And oh, Rachel? "Listen" was written specifically for the movie adaptation of Dreamgirls so shut the fuck up.

The other songs: "Empire State of Mind" and "Telephone". I don't have much to say about that apart from TOURIST SHIRTS FTW! XD And yes, that look/moment between Finn and Biebs was a wee bit slashy.

"What I Did for Love" is absolutely the WRONG song to close the episode with. Especially with her singing it right after Finn voices out her real intentions of keeping Sunshine off of glee club. It came across as conflicting. Finn said that everyone knows that Rachel did it for herself and she admitted to that. Then she goes on to sing "But I won't regret what I did for love"? Love for whom? Herself? I wouldn't put it past her. And her excuse was rather shallow, dear Glee writers. "I don't want other people coming between our family, messing up our closeness" or something to that effect. Remember, you're short ONE member. Without him/her you won't be able to qualify for Nationals. So she'd rather protect her spot in the light instead of helping her fellow gleeks reach Nationals. Girl, "the gift was ours to borrow"... and now, it's gone.

Overall, the pilot episode was so-so. Typical Glee episode. I was left so confused by the ending.

Britney Spears episode is coming next and I feel no shame in saying how EXCITED I am for that.

Covert Affairs stars Piper Perabo, of Coyote Ugly fame, as CIA agent Annie Walker. She's new to the department and her guide is Augie Anderson, played by Christopher Gorham, a blind officer. In the past, she met and spent three "sensual" weeks with this man in Sri Lanka. One morning (after), she woke up to find him gone, leaving behind a cryptic message. I think that is why she decided to join the CIA, to find out the truth -- to find him.

Two episodes in and I have two words for you guys: MARY SUE. Fuck, you don't even need to get through half of the pilot to realize that. Ten minutes in to the second episode and they introduce a Gary Stu character in the form of a teenager in college who is a computer genius uncovering codes which were "impossible" to detect in the past. Really? That's what you have? The CI-fucking-A could NOT detect such radio waves when a KID could? Later in the episode, the CIA was able to "crack" the code. Huh. Whatever.

But going back to the pilot. Why "Mary Sue"? Well:

• Annie is a young CIA trainee who is suddenly promoted to field operative in order to help capture her ex-boyfriend, unknown to her (Wikipedia, 2010). "Trainee" ei? She seems to me that she's handling field operations well.
• she can speak 6 different languages. How did she learn them? By traveling. And "language class" in university. This is entirely possible in real life but... coming from someone who has (unintentional) experience with writing Mary Sue characters, trust me. This is a go-to trait for all Sues.
• she seems to be the BEST in everything that she does. And she fucking knows it. And rubs it on to the audience's face about ten minutes into the pilot. It's like she could do nothing wrong... until she got to play with the big boys. She bumps people, tables, and other inanimate objects. For someone training to be a CIA agent, she didn't know about security passes and protocols. Really? A little consistency here, writers. She should at least know those things.
• She follows the same path as Alias' Sydney Bristow took (thus making her less likable): she thought she's the only/most important person in the world. "I'm Annie Walker, uh... I work here?" in that annoying "duh" tone when guards were checking her ID at the gate. Yeah, you and another hundred or so people.

Casting-wise, my favorite cast member and character is Christopher Gorham's Augie. He's the ONLY genuine character in the show - not overdone. He's probably the only one whom I felt something for. The others, I don't give a fuck. Joan Campbell (Kari Matchett) is Annie's boss and she's this paranoid "wife who works for the CIA - and NOT a CIA-wife". She's married to Arthur Campbell (Peter Gallagher) who also works for the CIA in a different department. They're in marriage counseling. Sheesh, I cannot begin to tell you how unnecessary this part of the plot is.

Piper Perabo's acting is nothing to write home about either. Unlike Jennifer Garner in Alias, she couldn't carry the weight of the character. Trying to act badass but it doesn't cut it. It comes across as overbearing and it's annoying.

I mentioned Alias and Sydney Bristow. I fucking loved Alias. LOVED. I abstained for any CIA-related TV shows and movies after it got... abandoned. I happened to watch Covert Affairs because I needed new stuff to watch. I might continue watching because, while so predictable, it has interesting stuff. Interesting enough to keep my attention and carry me to the next show.

Yesterday, instead of heading over to The Met Costume Gala and stalking some celebrities, I hung around Broadway and attended the free reading of the new musical Volleygirls at The New World Stages. (It's all good. I figured it would be chaos over at The Met. A little audio/visual art is great too.)

Volleygirls is a story about the Saint Agnes Volleyball Team set in Bexley, Ohio during the current fall sports season. The show starts off introducing the current members of the team: Jess (Allison Jill Posner), the team captain; Marisol (Monica Raymund of Lie to Me), who will be revealed as a lesbian later in the show; Liv (Shaina Taub), the "fourth dumbest girl in the school"; and Ingrid (Raushanah Simmons), the tall and "nice" one. Their coach, played by Hairspray's Clarke Thorell is suffering from a case of "loseritis". He separated from his wife who happens to be the sports coordinator of St. Agnes, played by Jennifer C. Johnson (she plays 3 roles.), he dwells on the one bad review he got on his published work, and his team could not complete the roster of 6 players let alone beat the best of the league, Arlington. Eventually, they find two new girls, Katie played by Alex Ellis of Legally Blonde and Crash, portrayed by Joy Suprano. Katie is the new girl in school while Crash was the soccer team goalie looking for a change in scenery, "I don't want to STOP things from happening. I want to MAKE things happen."

At first, the team did not get along well with the new additions. Their "system" was not working - more like a hit or miss. Then Marisol, Ingrid, and Liv devise a new strategy which Marison dubs as "habali", wild pig. They practice in secret and then they start winning again. The team tries out another player, shy girl Jocelyn played perfectly by Leslie Flesner. She then asks Marisol to teach her how to "move like you do", confident and so sure of herself. This leads to Marisol developing a crush on Jocelyn.

Meanwhile, the sports commentator Xavier (Gideon Glick, Spring Awakening) is revealed to have a crush on team captain Jess. He coins the term "Volleygirls" which Jess shoots down initially. Jess' dad played by Eric Michael Gillett (who also plays 3 roles) does not believe in the team's coach and repeatedly speaks his mind to the Coach about it.

Under the high-energy music and (what I can imagine) action, nothing much happens apart from the team winning and losing some games until they get their act together and reach the finals against Arlington. And the underdogs always win, right? ;)

Volleygirls is a real feel-good show. The characters were developed nicely. The music/vocals were great. My favorite vocal performance was Eric Michael Gillett as the Russian referee. He was hilarious! Among the girls, I really enjoyed Monica Raymund's portrayal of Marisol. The music was really engaging. The "Habali" song reminded me so much of Spring Awakening's "I Believe" (this show seems to be following me around haha) because one, they rhyme; and two, it gets stuck in your head like a boss.

I am curious as to how this will look like fully staged. There were a lot of scenes where the team was at play. Somehow, I cannot picture how that will look like just yet. Also, would they bring more people to fill in some roles? Both Gillett and Johnson play 3 parts and even if they change costumes, it may still be confusing. (That was one of the things I didn't like so much about American Idiot - Mary Faber and Christina Sajous playing named roles as well as ensemble. After a while, you'll be wondering why Heather and Extraordinary Girl are in there spazzing with everybody haha.) Overall, the show is really fun. A musical about sports is something new to me and I enjoyed it very much.

Volleygirls is directed by Neil Patrick Stewart, Book by Rob Ackerman, Music by Eli Bolin, and Lyrics by Sam Forman.

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There will be another reading on Monday, 10 May 2010 at The Beckett, Theatre Row. For more information, click here. RSVP volleygirlsmusical@gmail.com for guaranteed seats.