20 Years of Movies

At Disney's Hollywood Studios one of the classic attractions is The Great Movie Ride. It takes the guests through areas filled with audio-animatronics of classic movie scenes. At the end of the ride, a short 4 minute montage of movies scenes is played for the riders. This video has inspired me to make my own version with scenes and lines from my favorite movies. So over the past week I have created what I call 20 Years of Movies.

1/12 Rankings and Performers

Now that a week of shows has finally finished I am gonna bring back my power rankings and performers of the week. It is going to get difficult when shows start running out of episodes again because of the strike.

Here's what I got to watch this week.

Sunday:
American Gladiators x2
Desperate Housewives
Family Guy
Cashmere Mafia
Monday:
American Gladiators
Tuesday:
One Tree Hill x2
Wednesday:
Cashmere Mafia
Thursday:
My Name Is Earl
30 Rock
Grey's Anatomy
Big Shots
Friday:
Friday Night Lights
Las Vegas

Weekly Performers

1. Danny McCoy- Las Vegas
2. Tim Riggins- Friday Night Lights
3. Mike Cannon- Las Vegas
4. Jack Donaghy- 30 Rock
5. Tracy Jordan- 30 Rock
6. James Lucas Scott- One Tree Hill
7. Mark Sloan- Grey's Anatomy
8. Samantha Marquez- Las Vegas
9. Earl Hickey- My Name Is Earl
10. Derek Shephard- Grey's Anatomy

Power Rankings

1. Heroes
2. Lost
3. Las Vegas
4. The Office
5. 30 Rock
6. Friday Night Lights
7. 24
8. Curb Your Enthusiasm
9. Grey's Anatomy
10. Chuck
11. Journeyman
12. House
13. Entourage
14. Family Guy
15. American Idol
16. My Name Is Earl
17. Dirty, Sexy, Money
18. Cane
19. American Gladiators
20. Scrubs

American Gladiators

I'm so glad primetime tv is back in action. I got started on Friday with the return of Friday Night Lights and Las Vegas. For all of the great critical reviews FNL gets I am surprised at how much the writing is similar to Las Vegas. And by that I mean, not good. The situation with the neighbor football team sharing facilities with the Panthers mad ridiculous situations that would never occur.

On to the main event. American Gladiators is back. I love the new gladiators and some of the new events, but what I could do without is the tremendous amount of lame talking between, Hulk, Leila and the contestants. The only good commentary during the show are the weird comments by the gladiators. The eliminator would be so much fun to do. It continues tomorrow night so we'll see if it gets better or worse.

Favorite Male Gladiators after first episode

1. Justice (right)
2. Titan
3. Wolf
4. Mayhem
5. Militia
6. Toa

Favorite Female Gladiators

1. Crush (right)
2. Fury
3. Siren
4. Venom
5. Stealth
6. Hellga

Walk Hard

Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story is a complete spoof on music biopics, specifically Walk the Line and Ray. John C. Reilly does a tremendous job at taking on the persona of many great musicians, while making me laugh every step of the way. My favorite aspect of this film was how the characters so blatantly mentioned ages and names. For example when Dewey is talking to the Beatles he refers to all of them by full names "What did you think, George Harrison of the Beatles?" Or when Dewey is setting out on his movie career and mentions that he is 14 years old three or four times.

Also, after recently watching I'm Not There and No Direction Home, the 15 minute section where Dewey personifies Bod Dylan was so much funnier because these other two films were in my mind.

On a side note, I love seeing actors from The Office in other movies. For example, Pam (Jenna Fisher) plays the leading lady in Walk Hard, while Andy (Ed Helms) and Darryl (Craig Robinson) have small but funny parts.

Return of the Jedi

Return of the Jedi was easily better than Empire Strikes Back. Everything got wrapped up perfectly and Anakin Skywalker's story was finished with his death. I am really glad I watched them I, II, III, IV, V, VI. I feel better off for it. When Darth kills the Emperor I got chills.

Favorite Characters of Episode VI

5. Head Ewok- so cute and did some great fighting.

4. Han Solo- funny and charismatic but too much of a side character.

3. Yoda- More like the Yoda of the early Episodes in this one.

2. C3PO- Continued excellence in being a funny robot.

1. Darth Vader- there was still a little good left in him after all. watching him from beginning to end, made me like him more than any other character.

Favorite Order of Episodes

6. The Phantom Menace- Episode I
5. Attack of the Clones- Episode II
4. A New Hope- Episode IV
3. Empire Strikes Back- Episode V
2. Return of the Jedi- Episode VI
1. Revenge of the Sith- Episode III

Empire Strikes Back

One of the most disappointing moments in my movie watching history. My entire life I have heard people say "Luke, I am your father." It is always said in the same inflection and that's what I was expecting to hear when Luke and Vader were fighting. Here is the actual dialog. Luke: You killed my father! Vader: No, I am your father. Now that isn't that bad, but the inflection that Vader uses was completely different than the way I had been hearing it for the past 15 years. Anyways, I had heard before hand that Empire Strikes Back was the best Star Wars and IMDB agrees with that. After watching it I did not like Episode V nearly as much as Episode III. It was good but not as exciting or heartfelt as the final installment of the second trilogy.

Favorite Characters from Episode V

5. Lando Calrissian (on left)- Very charismatic, and I loved how he was helping the Empire for a bit but then came back to help the rebels.

4. Darth Vader- He killed a lot of anonymous generals with his telekinesis, which was great. I loved when he was trying to bring Luke to the dark side.

3. Han Solo (on right)- I wish Han was Vader's son. It would make for some more laughs.

2. Yoda- When we first see Yoda in this Episode I was turned off a bit by his craziness and weird voice. Once he became serious about his business he started talking in his normal great voice.

1. C-3PO- Just continues to crack me up with everything he says.

One Episode to go...

A New Hope

I can't explain how much I believe this strategy has already paid off. The first 30 to 40 minutes of Episode IV were so much better because I had already watched I,II, and III. If I had never seen anything Star Wars, the great conversation between Luke and Kenobi would've been wasted because I would have had no idea what was going on. This way, everything that talked about was incredible. Seeing R2 and 3PO go through so much before this movie made their interactions that much better. Overall I liked A New Hope better than the new trilogy movies, but it wasn't as epic as Revenge of the Sith. The story was short and the end result was a bit anti climactic. Oh, also Luke was quite a little pansy boy.

Favorite Episode IV Characters

5. Chewbacca- A great lovable character that made me laugh quite a few times because of how scared he was. When they are trapped in the trash compactor and he keeps banging on the door it is priceless.

4. R2-D2- I loved R2 before this movie but I didn't feel he did enough to make the list. In this movie he had a lot of funny comments that 3PO had to translate. I especially loved when R2 would lead 3PO into danger.

3. Obi-Wan Kenobi- I don't know if I would've loved him this much if I hadn't already seen I, II, and III. All of his comments had so much "mmph" because I knew everything he'd been through with Anakin.

2. Han Solo- Very funny performance and a pretty big stud. He was so cocky and all about money which always makes for a good character.

1. C-3PO- He finally gets to the top spot because he was basically in the entire movie this time. He's a very nervous, gay robot. I love when R2 gets him into trouble.

Stay tuned for Episodes 5 and 6.

Revenge of the Sith

Confused, evil Anakan of Episode III was much better than winy, annoying Anikan of Episode II. This movie was much better than I and II. The fight sequences were great and watching Anakan turn into Darth Vader was fantastic. I actually don't have much time to write because I can't wait any longer before watching Episode IV. I do, however, have to list my favorite characters.

Favorite Characters From Episode III

5. C3PO- I love how he gets so scared while R2D2 gets the two of them into trouble. At the end, when they are kept together, he does not like the sounds of it. I do.

4. Mace Windu- I was sad to see him fall to his death, but extremely satisfied that he handled Darth Sidius until Anakan turned sides to save Sidius.

3. Anakan Skywalker (right)- He was very confused throughout this film which made for great stuff. He was trained by Jedi and reinforced with Jedi ways his whole life, but inside he was always going to the dark side. When he would want to be good but couldn't help be bad, it was fun to watch.

2. Yoda- He was just as good here as in Episode II but Obi-Wan was so good that Yoda couldn't keep the top spot.

1. Obi-Wan Kenobi (right)- He had a lot of good jokes at the beginning. His speech to Anakan during the final fight scene put him over the top for me. He had so much love for him, and trained him for so long that it hurt him that he was supposed to take him out. It was great to see him cut off Anakan's legs in mid-air.