Archive for June, 2009
25 items.
In today’s incentive image, Tom and Cami enjoy a refreshing summertime treat. Vote for Theater Hopper at Top Web Comics to see for yourself!
I don’t know how fair it is to compare Eddie Murphy’s Imagine That to Adam Sandler’s Bedtime Stories. The children’s imaginary world translated into a fantasy/reality situation. They weren’t the source of out-and-out business predictions like they are in Imagine That .
Still, it’s noticeable that there are two movies with such similar thematic elements coming out so close to each other.
Maybe it’s not so weird when you consider how different studios have outright stolen from each other and put competing films back to back over the years.
A Bug’s Life and Antz. Volcano and Dante’s Peak. Mission to Mars and Red Planet. It happens a lot. I’m sure there’s more if I actually sat down to think about it. Maybe you guys have some similarly-themed movies you can share in the comments section below?
I don’t have much more to share except we’re still trying to get to the problem of this malware error people are getting when they are trying to access the site.
From what we’ve learned, it seems to be only affecting Safari and Google Chrome users. I’ve been doing some searches online and have discovered we’re not the only one suffering this problem, but I’m not finding much in terms of solutions.
I’ve been bombed with e-mails and Tweets from people telling me that they can’t access the site. I feel personally responsible to everyone who notifies me of the error and is trying to help. But I can’t respond to all of you. I’m sorry. Please don’t take it as a snub. I’m just trying to focus my efforts on solving the problem.
I’m doing everything to update security on my own machine, we’ve combed through the code of the site, we’re trying to isolate ads from our network that could be causing the problem. We’re even looking through the THorum to see if it could be originating there. It’s a lot of trial and error, but it’s all part of the regular maintenance that goes into the site.
If it’s any consolation, please know that I am not DELIBERATELY trying to infect your machines with malware. Frankly, I’m not that smart (which is probably how the site ended up in this position to begin with.)
Please trust that we’re doing everything we can.
In the meantime, let me know your thoughts about Imagine That. Are you planning on seeing it, maybe taking your kids or a younger sibling? Or have you grown tired of Eddie Murphy’s family movie shtick and are secretly hoping he makes a sequel to Eddie Murphy: Raw instead?
Thanks again for everyone’s patience and have a great weekend!
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Today’s incentive image is of Eddie Murphy’s character from Up Yours taking a swig from a bottle. Vote for Theater Hopper at Top Web Comics if you’d like to see it.
I was kind of at a loss for what to do about today’s comic. I feel like last week we were in some kind of weird holding pattern in terms of interesting movies. Between The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 and Imagine That, a great case of “Meh” washed over me.
I guess I wasn’t the only one. The Hangover and Up basically held their positions as the number 1 and number 2 movies at the box office this weekend. Most notable? The Hangover is the only movie so far this summer to hold on to the top spot two weekends in a row. That’s maybe not an indicator of quality as much as fantastic word of mouth, but it’s still a pretty amazing achievement – especially when you consider that there are no real “stars” in the movie. Familiar names, sure. But not an actor you would hang your movie off of.
I think what shocked me most is how far down the list Imagine That really was. 6th place. That’s pretty bad considering that it has an A-list star with Eddie Murphy, is a family movie (which generally do great when the kids are out of school), an it’s in it’s first weekend.
To give you some further perspective, Imagine That did $4 million less than Land of the Lost did in it’s second week. And Land of the Lost lost more than 50% of it’s audience.
Need further perspective? Imagine That is Murphy’s second worst performing film since The Adventures of Pluto Nash – a film SYNONYMOUS with Hollywood bombs. That movie earning roughly $1.3 million less despite inflation and the fact that The Hangover played on nearly 1,000 more screens.
$5.7 million is what Imagine That ended up taking home this weekend. Between the out and out failure of this movie and the robust success of The Hangover and it’s strong “R” rating, you have to wonder if Murphy is reconsidering that hissy fit he threw after he didn’t win Best Supporting Actor in Dreamgirls a few years ago.
Switching gears, I want to let people know that I think we’re making some headway on the malware error message Safari and Chrome users are seeing. I got a tip from Phil Chan over at Martriculated as to what the problem might be. I’m just doing a little cross-referencing at the moment to make sure I don’t delete something important by accident. But we’re close to getting this thing resolved.
It’s been tough for me to field e-mails and tweets the last few days from readers telling me about the malware errors. I feel like I’ve been letting people down by not addressing it sooner. It’s not out of laziness. Just a general lack of availability. I was at my cousin’s wedding in St. Paul over the weekend and that slowed things down a bit.
Not that I regret going to the wedding, of course! We had a blast! Oh, and if Paul and Jill are reading, congratulations again. You make a lovely couple and we can’t wait to see you again in August!
Not much more to talk about right now except for a few links I wanted to point you to.
First, be sure and check out the list of Top 10 Sci-Fi movies over at Movie Make-Out that I contributed to. In case you didn’t know, Movie Make-Out is a movie news and opinion site run by Gordon McAlpin of Multiplex. Gordon runs a tight ship and he has a few people writing for him as well, so you know he’s taking it seriously. Check it out.
Also don’t forget to listen to The Triple Feature podcast tonight at 9:00 PM CST over at TalkShoe.com. Not sure what we’re going to talk about, but I’m sure The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 will be in the mix there somewhere. We might also be talking about our Top 10 Sci-Fi list, as well.
If not, I might be talking about Death Proof, which I plan on watching later today. We got a suggestion from someone over at The Triple Feature Facebook community that a DVD review from time to time might be a nice change of pace. I agree! So we might be adding that to the show soon!
By the way, we love answering listener questions on The Triple Feature. So if there’s something you’d like to ask the group, feel free to send it to us by e-mail at group@thetriplefeature.com.
Joining our Facebook group is also a great way to submit questions. Plus, you get the added benefit of a quick reminder just before we record the show. That way, if you’re at your computer, you can come and listen to us live!
If you’re a fan of the show, listening live only enhances the experience. There’s a chat field where you can interact with other listeners and ask the rest of us questions in real time! Give it a try and I know you’ll be hooked. We see a lot of the same people in the chat field from week to week and I know they enjoy it.
Anyway, that’s it for me. Have a great day!
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Hey, guys.
I wanted to let you know that I pulled what I was told was malicious code from the site and (with any luck) you guys should stop seeing malware errors.
Except… I don’t think that’s happening.
I let people know about the code change yesterday through my Twitter account and asked people to let me know if they were still seeing the error. Some people said the error messages stopped, others said they were still getting them.
My suspicion is that people using Safari and Chrome were the ones getting the error messages in the first place. After I made the code change, things look clear for Safari users, but not Chrome.
My guess is because, like an elephant, Google never seems to forget and I’m wondering if I have to send a letter to them to have the site reindexed.
Are there any readers who use both Safari and Chrome? Or, can I ask everyone to reply to this blog post and let me know 1.) If they see the error and 2.) What browser they’re using?
We need to narrow this down and I think we’re getting closer, but we need your help!
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The one thing about Ghostbusters I never really understood was adding Winston to the team. He kind of sticks out. Here you have three scientists walking around with proton accelerators and then… Winston. And we never see him go through any extensive training on how to operate the equipment. It can’t be as simple as throwing on the pack and going to work, can it? Don’t you think you’d have to be eased into it? Vote for Theater Hopper at Top Web Comics to see what I mean…
I know I say this a lot, but I had a really hard time coming up with an idea for today’s comic. Lately, the ideas just aren’t there. It’s like scooping a frozen block of ice cream out of the back of my mind.
Thank goodness for Twitter. I can go online any time of the day or night and say “I have no idea what tomorrow’s comic is going to be about” and I’ll receive at least a half-dozen replies with suggestions.
That’s not to say I’m stealing ideas from readers. But they do provide valuable inspiration. I wouldn’t have come up with today’s comic if someone hadn’t reminded me that Ghostbusters came out on Blu ray yesterday. I had completely forgotten about it. Bill Murray’s acne scars, however? That’s vintage me.
Speaking of scary, let me tell you about my first encounter with Ghostbusters. I think I may have told this story before. So if you’ve heard it, bear with me.
The year was 1984 and I was 7 years-old. As a present for doing something good (I can’t remember what), my parents were going to surprise me with a special gift.
In my mind were visions of Go-Bots – or, dare I? – Transformers. Imagine my shock when my parents rolled up on a movie theater and said “Surprise! We’re going to see Ghostbusters!”
I’m 7 years-old. I haven’t seen any commercials for this movie. I barely know what movies are (we never really went to movies as a family). All I see on the marquee is “GHOST” and I freak out, convinced that the movie is terrifying and that my parents are playing a cruel, sadistic joke. I am crying in the back seat and BEGGING my parents not to take me to this movie.
Instead we ended up going to an educational toy store next to the theater and they bought me some Mad Libs. I remember clearly the disappointment on their faces. They tried to do something nice for me, something they thought I would love, and I turned it into an ugly mess.
It becomes ironic, then, that as an adult, Ghostbusters is probably one of my all-time favorite movies.
I don’t remember when I came around to appreciating Ghostbusters for what it is or when exactly I shed my irrational fear of the film. Probably after the Saturday morning cartoon version of it came out. But these days I watch it probably 5 times a year, easily. It’s infinitely quotable, fascinating conceptually and entertaining from start to finish. I can’t stress enough how much I love this movie.
That said… I’m kind of on the fence about buying the movie on Blu ray.
I have a funny relationship with Blu ray. Snobbish, in fact. I love my Blu ray player, but I resent having to buy old movies in the format – especially for $25 – $30 a pop. As such, I’ve developed all these rules about which Blu rays I pick up and which one’s I won’t.
If I already own the movie on DVD, chances are slim that I’ll buy it unless it’s something recent like Wall-E or Iron Man. I tend to snub older films because I actually think some of them look WORSE in the format.
If you don’t believe me, watch The French Connection on Blu ray sometime. They applied this kind of high-res grain to the film to make it look 1970’s gritty, but it comes off as manufactured and soulless. This coupled with the fact that if the movie wasn’t captured at least partially digitally, I’m convinced a Blu ray transfer won’t look good.
In other words, watching a film like Ghostbusters in the format for visual “Ooh’s!” and “Ahh’s!” is kind of like squeezing blood from a stone. There’s only so much a digital transfer is going to give you.
One might argue that, similar to how audiophiles listen to records on vinyl and not CD, there are certain advantages to watching older movies in an older format.
VHS and DVD do a better job of hiding some of the effects work in older films. The roto-scoping, the green screen… Blu ray drags everything out into the light. Sometimes you see more than you should.
This, perhaps, only makes sense to me. But it’s how I feel.
I know most of you guys are probably more excited about the Ghostbusters video game that also game out this week, but what’s your opinion of picking up the original film on Blu ray… or your opinion of Blu ray in general? Do you have any rules you follow? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!
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I’m continuing to fight the good fight in terms of the malware errors the site was generating. I pulled a second line of (presumably malicious) code from the site yesterday and wanted to collect another round of feedback from you guys to make sure the site is clean.
Last time I checked, Google Chrome was the only holdout still returning errors. I’m thinking we might have done the job for good this time. Again, please let me know what browser you’re running and if you’re getting any errors.
Second bit of feedback I need is in regard to WordPress itself. I don’t know if this has anything to do with the code I removed yesterday, but it now appears I can’t add tags to my blog posts. Does anyone have any idea what might be causing this or know where I should start looking so I can fix it?
Your help is appreciated.
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Ryan Reynolds isn’t the only one who can grate cheese off his abs. Vote for Theater Hopper at Top Web Comics to see what I’m talking about.
I think we can all agree that Ryan Reynolds is a very attractive person. I have no shame in admitting this. In fact, I’m certain that were I disciplined enough, having abs like Ryan Reynolds would clear up roughly 43% of my self-esteem issues. If this acting thing doesn’t shake out, he could be a full-time Men’s Health cover model.
Cami’s line about me nursing a crush on Reynolds since Van Wilder wasn’t an exaggeration. In addition to his physical appearance, there’s just something about his delivery I’ve always enjoyed – even when he’s playing it broad. Van Wilder is an infinitely more enjoyable film because of what Reynolds brings to the role. For proof, watch the Reynolds-less Van Wilder 2: The Rise of Taj. It’s basically the same movie set in a different location and putting Kal Penn in the lead role.
Although can someone please explain to me how National Lampoon got away with calling the film “Van Wilder 2” when Van Wilder is nowhere in that movie?
The Proposal comes out this weekend and it looks like a boilerplate Sandra Bullock rom-com piffle. I didn’t mean to be harsh with the punchline of today’s comic by pointing out Bullock’s age (she’s actually 45). But it really sticks out to me in the commercials and trailers for this movie when she’s been paired with an actor roughly 15 years her junior.
Of course, with leading men, this is never an issue and sometimes even MORE prominent. Actors in their 50’s being paired up with actresses in their 20’s you see it all the time. Don’t misjudge me and assume that I don’t think Bullock is allowed to do the same.
But look back at Bullock’s career. She’s usually been paired with actors roughly her same age or older. And Bullock is nothing if not a creature of habit. She’s been acting in the same kind of movies for roughly a decade now. So even if the formula changes a little bit, it’s note-worthy.
I know I’m making a mountain out of a molehill, but I kind of hope they work it into the script somehow. It would be an opportunity to make it funny.
Switching gears, I wanted to talk about some of the issues we’ve been having with the site for the last week and a half. By now you pretty much know what’s going on with the malware errors, Google Chrome, Safari and the like.
I can tell you that we’re doing everything we can to scrub the site at every opportunity, but we’ve been compromised in a way that we can not immediately fix. Someone shared with me a link to this article that will hopefully shed some light on the situation and give you some insight as to the problems we’re dealing with.
I can only hope at some point someone will develop some kind of defense for this thing because every time I locate and strip the malicious code, it’s back on the site a few hours later. Until then, I feel like I’m twiddling my thumbs.
On top of this hacker problem, I’m also experiencing difficulties with the recent upgrade to WordPress 2.8. As you can see, the comic ranking system is frozen and the calendar and search functions normally to the right of the blog are missing.
Behind the scenes, the post tagging system does not work and I cannot edit the status of my posts. It’s a real drag.
Combing the internet, I can see there are several unhappy customers. People are pretty much saying it’s completely bungled on WordPress’s part.
I was thinking I would roll back the site to 2.7, but I guess I didn’t make a backup. I thought I did, but now I can’t find it. Maybe I e-mailed to myself and deleted it before I realized the problems 2.8 was having. But it’s a mess.
Anyway, that’s my problem, not your problem. But I just wanted to give everyone a status update.
Let’s talk about the weekend! In addition to The Proposal, Year One is also coming out and it looks like it’s getting trashed in the reviews. It’s a shame, because I really respect and admire Harold Ramis. But you could kind of tell from the trailers that the movie didn’t have a clear direction. What’s up with Jack Black and Michael Cera skipping through time? It looks confusing.
Is anyone still planning on seeing Year One? What about The Proposal? Or is everyone waiting for Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen to come along next week and step on everything? Leave your comments below!
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Okay, so I guess ranking is working on the site again? That’s weird, because I certainly didn’t do anything.
Oh, well. If you wanted to rank the last few days of comics, feel free. If you need a place to start, there’s always our rankings page, which lists the Top 25, Bottom 10 and Most Ranked comics on the site.
Have fun!
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I was up late Sunday night working on today’s comic and right now I’m at home watching Henry as he’s now going to day care three times a week.
As such, I’m going to need a little bit of sleep before I dive into the blog post that will accompany this strip. I have a couple of important things to talk about and I want to be sure I have my ducks in a row mentally before I proceed.
You can expect an update to the site in the afternoon while Henry is down for his nap and I can dedicate a little concentration to what I need to say.
In the meantime, please enjoy this interview of Shia LaBeouf from last Friday’s Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien. Apparently, Shia was being paid each time he used the word “outrageous” because I counted 6 times his vocabulary made employ of the word.
Then again, I probably shouldn’t be surprised considering how fond he is of repeating certain words.
Enjoy. It’s outrageous!
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Okay, this was the post that you were meant to read this morning, but the one I couldn’t get to until I put Henry down for his afternoon nap.
Regarding Transformers, that can wait. I’m going to be talking about it all week, so there’s no need to dive neck-deep into it now.
Although, I must confess today’s strip is autobiographical. I’m less interested in seeing the movie than I am in finding out how they wrote Shia LaBeouf’s hand injury into the storyline. I anticipate that it will be richly satisfying.
Anyway… onto business.
As you know, a few weeks ago I lost my job. This came at a bad time for a lot of reasons, but one among the myriad of reasons is that I was about to send my registration for Artist Alley at Wizard World Chicago, August 6 – 9. Losing my job halted that action in it’s tracks.
Although Theater Hopper is its own entity and has its own money, I wasn’t sure if it was appropriate to attend a convention when I might have to dip into that money once my severance is gone.
I won’t bore you with the mental tug-of-war I put myself in the middle of. But, eventually, when I talked to Cami about it, she didn’t see where there was a problem and told me to go for it. Bless her for being as supportive as she is.
So, long story short, I’m going. I’m sharing a table with Zach Miller from Joe and Monkey, hanging out with the guys from Digital Pimp Online and hopefully selling some new merchandise.
Ah, but there’s the rub. I don’t exactly HAVE any new merchandise.
People who pre-ordered Theater Hopper: Year Three know this. I’ve been sitting on a finished draft of that book for months, but I haven’t had the money to have it printed up. Pre-orders stalled and I’m still trying to raise funds.
I thought I would bolster that effort by designing a new shirt – Spoiler Alert! – in hopes that the revenue from the sale of those shirts would help bridge the gap on the funds I need to print the book.
That didn’t happen, either.
I’m not pointing fingers at anyone but myself. In all honesty, I haven’t been talking about Year Three or the new shirt. So, beyond the intifada announcement, why would I expect there to be any orders? I haven’t been talking about it, so people haven’t been ordering. It’s really that simple.
Well, here’s what I’m going to do: I’m going to kick my plan back into gear and I’m trying to push the Spoiler Alert! tees hard before I go to Wizard World Chicago. I’m confident that this design will be a big seller in Chicago and I want to get this shirt to the printer before I leave for the convention.
With your help, I can raise the money I need to get the shirts printed up, take to Chicago and produce the profit I need to put Year Three back on track for publication.
To help us with our goal, I’ve created this handy bar graph:
As you can see, I need a minimum of 50 shirt orders before July 31 to make this work. If I can sell more than that, great. If the sale of merchandise extends beyond the Spoiler Alert! shirt and into the Spoiler 1 and 2 shirts, the Theater Hopper: Year One or Year Two books… that’d be great as well! Every little bit helps! What’s important is that we inch that bar to the left as far as we can before July 31.
I’ve been gun shy about this kind of promotion since Theater Hopper: Year Two came out in the fall of 2007. Well, I can’t afford to sit on my hands any longer. I’ve set a goal for myself and I need your help! So let’s see what we can do about racking up some pre-orders!!!
As always, I appreciate your support, patience and enthusiasm. Thanks again and I will talk to you soon!
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Before I forget, I want to remind everyone to check out The Triple Feature podcast at 9:00 PM CST.
Tonight we’re discussing Moon, The Proposal and Year One.
Also, as a special treat, in partnership with MovieMake-Out.com, we’re discussing our picks for the Top 10 Best Sci-Fi movies with special guest Trisha Lynn!
We might go a little longer than our usual hour-long recording time, so know that you’re going to get your money’s worth!
BE THERE!
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