Archive for February, 2013

Book Review – Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child’s “The Cabinet of Curiosities”

It’s an ordinary day in New York City when a demolition crew begins destroying an old building dating back to the 1800s.

The demolition process is suddenly halted when the work crew accidentally exposes a hidden chamber underneath the building.  One of the workers climbs into the dusty and decayed world and discovers piles of human bones.

Over at the prestigious New York Museum of Natural History (the same museum from Relic), archaeologist Dr. Nora Kelly is fighting a losing battle with her boss, Roger C. Brisbane III, the Museum’s first Vice Director, over funding for her research projects.  Devastated that her budget has been cut, Dr. Kelly returns to her office only to find FBI Special Agent Pendergast waiting for her arrival.

Special Agent Pendergast quickly recruits Dr. Kelly to travel with him to the construction site and help examine the human bones.  At the ancient crime scene, Pendergast is able to distract the police officers and buy Dr. Kelly some time to enter and evaluate the hidden chamber.  The police are curious as to why the FBI would be interested in a 130+ year old crime scene, but they accept his presence and allow Dr. Kelly to investigate the area.

Inside the chamber are the skeleton remains of not one or two but thirty-six people.  Dr. Kelly discovers that all of the human skeletons are missing part of their spine.  To add to the mystery, it appeared as if some of the backbones were precisely cut with surgical precision.  The archaeologist notices an article of clothing, and she quickly removes a piece of paper attached to the clothes.  Dr. Kelly pockets the evidence before the chief of police has Dr. Kelly and Pendergast removed from the crime scene.

The owner of the building being destroyed, Anthony Fairhaven, a wealthy property developer, doesn’t want an archaeological expedition to slow the process of his demolition and construction of a new structure.  He has the medical examiner remove the human remains and give them a proper burial somewhere outside of the city.  With the remains out of the way, he has the demolition team continue destroying the old building and thus destroying the old crime scene.  Fairhaven has deep pockets and many high level connections, so the police allow the property developer to continue with his work.

Dr. Kelly examines the paper she removed from the crime scene and finds the name “Mary Greene” along with an age and address.  The compelling part is that the information was written in the woman’s blood.  Mary Greene knew that she was going to die in that building’s basement, and she didn’t want to be left as an anonymous victim of a serial killer.

Dr. Kelly’s boyfriend, journalist William Smithback, meets with her and Pendergast, and he takes the information and publishes a newspaper article about the ancient crime scene.  He includes details about how the victims had part of their spines.  Smithback intends on using the article to put pressure on the Museum and have them give Dr. Kelly a larger budget, but the article only infuriates Roger Brisbane. Read more…

Random Topics – 2013 Daytona 500, Olympus Has Fallen, Yahoo! & More!

Today we’re discussing a few topics that have recently been in the news.

2013 Daytona 500

First is this past Sunday’s running of the annual Daytona 500 race in the NASCAR Cup series.

As a whole, the race was fairly boring until the last 20-30 laps when the drivers began making their moves to go for the win.  This is commonplace with today’s restrictor plate racetracks (Daytona and Talladega) as most of the drivers will simply sit back and “save” their car for the end of the race.  Those tracks also tend to pack the cars together, and when accidents occur, they can damage many cars.  As a result, some drivers will intentionally stay in the very front or rear of the pack and try to keep out of harm’s way for when “the big one” occurs.

Jimmie Johnson won the 2013 running of the Daytona 500, but as far as the media and commentators were concerned, it was rookie Danica Patrick (she did run a partial schedule at the Cup level last year, so she does have some experience at a few of the tracks, including Daytona) who led the headlines and commentary THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE RACE.

Danica won the pole position for the race.  Whoop-de-do.  A) It’s a restrictor place track where ANYTHING could happen.  Look at the 2011 race where a nobody won the race.  Again, ANYTHING could happen at Daytona and Talladega.  Winning the pole just means that at that point in time you had the fastest race car on the course.  It’s normally a different story during the actual race.  B) She has a weight advantage compared to other drivers.  Since her car was lighter her car was able to drive a little bit faster.  On a course like Daytona where top speed is more important than braking and cornering, then she has a clear advantage.  This next race at Phoenix will be a different story.  The same will be true for pretty much every other track on the NASCAR circuit.

It was sickening the amount of coverage that the commentators gave the Queen during the Daytona 500.  Apparently we needed non-stop updates on her position along with where all other drivers were in comparison to her car.  After five laps I hit the mute button and played my own music as background noise.  It stayed that way until the last five laps of the race.

Despite dropping from third to eighth on the last lap (that was impressive watching Dale Junior come out of nowhere and almost win the race), apparently Danica was important enough to have the FIRST INTERVIEW with the reporters after the race.  During most races it’s customary to only interview the top five finishers, but since Danica is a woman (a recently divorced one, too), she gets special privileges and extra attention.  Again, let me know IF she ever wins a race.

Olympus Has Fallen Read more…

The Clueless Restaurant Owner, Part VIII – Catching and Firing a Thief

It all began with an accidental miscounting of money at the end of Tuesday’s work day.

Keep in mind that these events occurred during the assistant store manager’s (ASM) days off.  Blackshirt #1 (a.k.a. “Tamara”) needed some time off for a surgery and the recovery period, and since the clueless restaurant owner didn’t have enough managers to cover “Tamara’s” absence, it was up to the ASM to cover those vacant shifts.  The ASM ended up working over two weeks straight without a day off, and some of those days required her working double shifts.  The ASM clocked in around 150 hours over the two week period.  No exaggerating here.

Anyway, “Tamara” finally returned to the work schedule and the ASM finally had some days off.  Tuesday happened to have a planned social event at the restaurant, and the restaurant owner’s wife panicked over there not being enough people on the schedule to handle the event, so she virtually blew up the ASM’s phone with an endless session of texting about her concerns.  It was all bullshit as the ASM worked shifts with fewer workers and handled a greater number of customers, but since the ASM was not in the building, the owner’s wife was having a full panic attack about the restaurant falling apart.

You could look at that and see a major compliment towards the ASM and the way she can handle the stress and responsibility of running the restaurant during busy times and with too small of a work crew, but it’s all virtual at this point.  It’s not like the ASM ever received a financial bonus for her dedication and all of her hard work.  According to these dipshits, it’s an honor in itself to work for this restaurant.  If you don’t like it then don’t let the door hit you on the way out.  That’s their attitude.  Of course, if the ASM were to give up and walk out that door, the restaurant would be f*cked royally as it’s the ASM who runs the show and keeps the place in business.  The restaurant owner and his wife are so clueless and stupid that they would not be able to handle running the place themselves, and the restaurant would have to close its doors within two weeks of the ASM’s departure.

The ASM worked a double shift and closed the restaurant on Monday night, counting the safe like she always does.  The safe was correct and at its required amount of money.  The cash register drawers were correct.  Everything was the way it was supposed to be.

“Tamara” opened the restaurant on Tuesday and left in the afternoon when Blackshirt #2 (a.k.a. “Chris”) and the newest shift manager in training, Blackshirt #5 (a.k.a. “Señor”) arrived.  The restaurant handled the normal crowds along with the crowds from the social event.  Everything seemed fine until later that night when “Chris” called the ASM and let her know that money was missing from the cash register.  A large amount was missing from the cash register. Read more…

The Clueless Restaurant Owner, Part VII – Descent Into Hell

While it’s been a month since our last discussion about a CLUELESS restaurant owner in the metro Atlanta area, our adventures and series of misfortune has only worsened.

The month of January experienced a sales slump for a variety of legitimate reasons from the normal drop in consumer spending after the expensive Christmas holiday season to the worsening economic depression to the inflation and increase in spending for everyday life.  When people are forced to spend more money just to maintain their everyday life, they’re going to spend less when it comes to luxuries such as eating out in restaurants.  This is compounded when the inflation also hits the restaurants and forces them to raise their prices.

This drop in customers has been forcing the restaurant owner to make deeper cuts in the number of labor hours he’s allowing the crew members to use each week.  When the income drops and you still have bills to pay, one of the easiest ways to save money is by cutting the work force and having those remaining workers work harder.  The problem arises when what little work force you have left is stretched so thin that the restaurant becomes understaffed during busy periods.

Unfortunately to the workers, as the weeks have been progressing, the skeleton crew running the restaurant has been stretched so thin that it’s nearing the breaking point.  It’s reached the point where the number of working hours has reached its absolute limit.  The restaurant cannot function with any further reductions in hours.  If the restaurant’s owner wants to make any more cuts it’s going to mean adjusting the restaurant’s hours and having it close early on some nights.

That’s just one of the problems occurring in the restaurant right now.  There are more that are about to be discussed.

The Food Budget

As the overall decline in customers continues, the restaurant’s owner wants the food budget to be reduced at a similar rate.  After all, if there are fewer people entering the doors, then the restaurant shouldn’t be spending as much money on food.  Right?

If this was a counter-service restaurant such as McDonalds, Arbys, White Castle or anything of that nature, then the restaurant owner would be correct.  A reduction in customers would equal a similar drop in the food budget.  Remember though that this establishment is a pizza buffet and that the restaurant’s owner is CLUELESS! Read more…

Book Review – Clive Cussler’s “Deep Six”

Last night I finished reading Clive Cussler’s Deep Six, the seventh book in the popular Dirk Pitt series.

Deep Six begins in 1966 as a woman named Estelle Wallace boards a ship named the San Marino.  The San Marino is an old Liberty ship that’s been reconfigured for civilian use.  There are just two problems with Estelle Wallace’s journey:  1) Her name is really Arta Casilighio, and 2) the ship really isn’t sailing from San Francisco, California, to Auckland, New Zealand.

The fact that Arta Casilighio goes by a different name and recently embezzled the bank where she used to work doesn’t really matter.  It’s just the woman’s bad luck that she picked the wrong vessel to make her grand escape from the pursuing law enforcement.  The woman is drugged and thrown overboard with the rest of the ship’s crew, and the criminals hijack the San Marino and its valuable cargo.  The ship then sails off the radar and supposedly becomes lost at sea.

Fast forward to today.

The Coast Guard cutter Catawaba intercepts a derelict crab fishing boat called the Amie Marie off the coast of Augustine Island, Alaska.  The Catawaba‘s captain sends a small party over to the fishing boat, and the sailors discover that the crew of the Amie Marie is all dead.  They’re still positioned at their last duty station.

Moments later, the Catawaba‘s boarding party fails to respond to their captain.  The captain sends over a medic to investigate the fishing boat, and the medic makes a startling discovery — the Catawaba‘s boarding party is already dead from an unknown virus.  The medic feels the virus start to affect him, so he radios the captain and lists all the symptoms as the virus quickly kills himself, too.  The area is quarantined and an investigation is launched to discover the point of origin of the deadly poison.

Meanwhile, Dirk Pitt, the special projects director at NUMA (the National Underwater and Marine Agency) and his assistant, Al Giordino, are finishing a project involving the Cumberland, a Union frigate sunk during the Civil War.  Dr. Julie Mendoza, an agent with the Environmental Protection Agency, visits the site of the shipwreck and takes Dirk and Al with her on a special assignment to Alaska.

Upon arriving off the coast of Alaska, Pitt and Giordino run underwater search patterns for a missing ship believed to be carrying the deadly poison.  EPA agents periodically take water samples and they determine which general direction to head to locate the source of the spillage.  Pitt, thinking a step ahead, analyzes a satellite map and determines that they ship they’re seeking is actually buried on a nearby coastline.  It’s nearly perfectly camouflaged, but there are slight traces of it on the satellite map.

Sure enough, a ship named the Pilottown is discovered lying on the coast and almost completely covered by volcanic ash.  Pitt, Giordino, Dr. Mendoza and some scientists enter one of the cargo holds and locate the barrels of poison that originated from a top secret government laboratory.  One of the barrels had a leak, and water was slowly running through the cargo hold and out into the sea.  That leaking poison was responsible for the deaths of not only some people but thousands of marine life including fish and birds. Read more…

Movie Review – Deep Impact (1998)

In honor of the massive Russian meteor that impacted near the city of Chelyabinsk, today we’re reviewing the 1998 natural disaster film, Deep Impact.

Released in 1998, Deep Impact is a film that showcases several lives as a doomsday comet is on an impact course with planet Earth.  Astronauts try to disable the comet, but their efforts merely split the giant asteroid into two large pieces.  The larger of the two pieces is several miles wide and capable of eliminating all live on Earth.  There’s little that the people can do as the asteroid hurls on a path towards Earth.

Deep Impact was released in the same year as Armageddon, another science-fiction doomsday story involving a killer asteroid about to wipe out all life on Earth.  While neither film scored highly with the critics, Deep Impact is often viewed as a slightly more realistic story when it comes to the astronauts trying to stop the asteroid.  Despite that, Armageddon was still the box office winner in the U.S.

Directed by Mimi Leder, Deep Impact stars Robert Duvall as Captain Spurgeon “Fish” Tanner, an astronaut on the Messiah spaceship.  Tea Leoni plays the role of Jenny Lerner, a news reporter who learns about the comet and becomes an anchor reporter once the president announces the news.  Elijah Wood is Leo Biederman, a young high school student and amateur astronomer who helps discover the comet and is swept into fame from the discovery.  Morgan Freeman plays the role of President Tom Beck, leader of the United States of America.  Supporting the cast are Leelee Sobieski as Sarah Hotchner, Maximilian Schell as Jason Lerner, James Cromwell as Secretary Rittenhouse, and Kurtwood Smith as Otis Hefter, an administrator in NASA.

Deep Impact (1998) – (c) Paramount Pictures

Deep Impact begins with some students in a high school’s astronomy club looking at the night sky.  A teacher assists the students with their studies and takes note of a star that Leo Biederman (Elijah Wood) notices in the sky.  They take a picture and send the information out to Dr. Wolf.  Out in Arizona, Dr. Wolf (Charles Martin Smith) takes a further look in the area where Biederman noticed the unusual object.  He checks again and is startled when the computer processes the information.  The object is not a satellite as the teacher originally guessed.  It’s a comet and it’s going to impact the Earth.

The network is down at the observatory, so Dr. Wolf has to drive the urgent information to The Powers That Be.  He labels the information with his name along with that of Biederman (look closely and notice how “Biederman” is misspelled versus the film’s end credits).  Dr. Wolf jumps into his jeep and races down the mountain.  He gets distracted when using his cell phone and crashes off the road, accidentally killing himself in the wreck.

Fast forward a year.

Jenny Lerner (Tea Leoni) is a low-ranking news reporter at MSNBC.  The main news story right now is that Secretary of Treasury Alan Rittenhouse (James Cromwell) is suddenly stepping down from his position without stating a reason.  Jenny hears a rumor that he’s removing himself because of a mistress named “Ellie.”  This could be true as Rittenhouse is both a married man and a devoted father. Read more…

Bridges – A Sudoku-like Deductive Puzzle Game

The other day I was looking for more games for my Linux operating system when I discovered the magic of Bridges – a deductive reasoning puzzle solving game that flows like Sudoku.

Bridges uses a grid system with circles representing islands and the number inside of the circle representing the number of bridges that the island touches.  The key things to remember is that no bridge may intersect with another, and you can build parallel bridges on each side of the island.  For example, an island with eight bridges will have a set of parallel bridges on each of its four sides.

With Bridges you start with the information you know for a fact and then work from there, using deductive reasoning to solve the rest of the puzzle.  It’s very similar to games like Sudoku.  For example, if you have an island in the corner that uses for bridges, you know for a fact that two parallel bridges will go one way and then two parallel bridges will head the other clear direction.  And then you take it from there with the information that you know for a fact.

The easy level of Bridges is very straightforward.  If you get stuck on a puzzle it means that you missed something.  You may have only drawn one bridge from an island and forgotten to re-check that island. Read more…

Movie Review – Men in Black (1997)

Since the 1950s, eyewitnesses to UFO events have often been visited my mysterious government agents.

Those government agents, often dressed in solid black suits, would “convince” the witnesses to remain quiet about their sighting.  It’s believed that those agents would use fear and intimidation techniques to silence the witnesses.  Other conspiracies claim that the government agents (often referred to as “men in black”) would go as far as actually erasing the memory of the witnesses, removing their knowledge of any UFO or alien event.

In 1997, a new vision of the men in black was presented to the world in the hit action-comedy film, Men in Black.  Men in Black follows the progress of a new recruit as an MiB agent.  He’s teamed with an experienced agent and the two of them track a menacing alien (referred to as a “bug”) through New York City.  It’s up to the agents to stop the bug before the Earth is destroyed.

Directed by Barry Sonnenfeld and with music composed by the great Danny Elfman, Men in Black stars Tommy Lee Jones as Agent Kay (K), an experienced agent in the MiB agency.  Will Smith plays Agent Jay (J), a hotshot NYPD officer and MiB’s latest recruit.  Vincent D’Onofrio plays Edgar the Bug, an innocent farmer who was killed by a Bug alien and then had his body used as the Bug’s suit.  Linda Fiorentino is Dr. Laurel Weaver, a deputy medical examiner who’s fate is changed by the Bug and MiB agents.  Rip Torn is Chief Zed (Z), the head of the MiB.

Men in Black (1997) – (c) Columbia Pictures

Men in Black begins with the U.S. border patrol stopping a van carrying about a dozen illegal immigrants across the border.  It seems like a routine stop until a black sedan and two INS agents, Agent Kay (K) (Tommy Lee Jones) and Agent Dee (D) (Richard Hamilton), detain one of the immigrants.  They take the immigrant into the desert and the immigrant is revealed to be Mikey, an extraterrestrial alien.  The INS agents, of course, really work for the Men in Black (MiB) agency, an organization that monitors and assists extraterrestrial lifeforms on Earth. Read more…

Movie Review – Back to the Future (1985)

What if traveling through time was as simple (and utterly cool) as hopping into a car, accelerating to a certain speed, and then crossing the space-time continuum?

Back in 1985, Hollywood released Back to the Future, a science-fiction / comedy film that gave us a new visualization of the concept of time travel along with its consequences.  Thanks to this movie, the DeLorean DMC-12 became one of the coolest cars of all time despite the car company’s troubles and ultimate failure.

Back to the Future is a story about an obsessive and innovative scientist named Dr. Emmett Brown who succeeds in his lifelong project of building a time machine.  His teenage friend, Marty McFly, is with him the night he tests the machine.  Unfortunately, terrorists also show up that night and Marty flees them in the time machine car, accidentally sending himself back to 1955.

Upon arriving in the past, Marty accidentally interferes in the moment when his parents meet and fall in love.  If they never get married, then Marty won’t exist in the future.  It’s a race against time for Marty to have the younger version of Dr. Brown to repair the time machine while Marty tries to get his parents together, all while being menaced by Biff Tannen, the town’s bully.

Directed by Robert Zemeckis and produced by Steven Spielberg, Back to the Future stars Michael J. Fox as Marty McFly, the high school teenager who gets sent back to 1955.  Christopher Lloyd plays the role of Dr. Emmett Brown, the genius inventor of the time machine.  Lea Thompson and Crispin Glover have dual roles in the film, each of them playing the younger and older versions of Marty’s parents, Lorraine Baines / McFly and George McFly.  Thomas F. Wilson also has a dual role with the older and younger version of Biff Tannen, the high school’s bully.  Claudia Wells has the role of Jennifer Parker, Marty’s girlfriend, and James Tolkan plays the hard-ass high school principal, Mr. Strickland.

Back to the Future (1985) – (c) Universal Pictures

Back to the Future begins in October of 1985 as Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) arrives at Dr. Brown’s house one morning.  Doc isn’t home, so Marty helps himself to the massive speaker that Doc Brown built for Marty’s electric guitar.  Marty accidentally overloads the power to the amplifier and nearly destroys the garage when he plays the guitar.

Doc Brown calls the house and Marty answers.  He tells Marty to meet him in the parking lot at Twin Pines Mall the next morning at 1 am.  Just then all the alarm clocks in the house chime and Doc tells him that the clock experiment worked and all the clocks are twenty-five minutes slow.  Realizing he’s now late for school, Marty grabs his skateboard and rides across town, grabbing onto car’s bumpers for boosts in speed.

He arrives late and his girlfriend, Jennifer Parker (Claudia Wells), warns him that Mr. Strickland (James Tolkan) is on the prowl.  Strickland catches them and gives them each a tardy note, making it several in a row for Marty.  Strickland tells Marty that he’s a slacker just as his father was when he was in school.  He advises Marty to skip the band audition after school because he’s not any good.  Strickland tells him that, “No McFly ever amounted to anything in the history of Hill Valley!”

After school Marty still auditions to have his band perform at the school’s dance.  The audition ends early as one of the judges (musician Huey Lewis) tells him that he’s just too loud.  This rejection devastates Marty as his goal in life is to be a rock star. Read more…

Movie Review – Hot Tub Time Machine (2010)

Concluding our review of winter movies (at least for now) is a film that combines friendship and bonding along with heavy drinking, time travel, and a wild night at a ski resort back in 1986.

We’re talking about Hot Tub Time Machine, a comedy film that teaches us not to abandon our friends and that it’s never too late to make changes in your life.  That is, as long as you can time travel into the past and correct your previous mistakes.

In Hot Tub Time Machine, Lou Dorchen is hospitalized after what is suspected as an attempted suicide.  His friends Adam Yates and Nick Webber try to lift Lou’s spirits by taking him on a weekend getaway to their favorite ski resort in the mountains.  Jacob Yates, Adam’s nephew, joins them for the trip.  The four of them party hard in the resort’s hot tub and find themselves waking up back in 1986.  A mysterious hot tub repair man warns the guys about the importance of not altering history or the whole “system” could go haywire.  As we later see, perhaps repeating history isn’t the best of ideas for any of them.

Directed by Steve Pink, Hot Tub Time Machine stars John Cusack, Rob Corddry and Craig Robinson as Adam Yates, Lou Dorchen and Nick Webber, three adults who have been friends since childhood.  Clark Duke plays the role of Jacob Yates, Adam’s dorky nephew.  Chevy Chase, Crispin Glover and William Zabka (all film stars from the 1980s) have cameo roles back in 1986.

Hot Tub Time Machine (2010) – (c) Metro Goldwyn Mayer

Hot Tub Time Machine begins in today’s time.  As we see, it’s not exactly a glamorous lifestyle for Nick Webber (Craig Robinson) or Adam Yates (John Cusack).  Nick Webber’s failed music career and low self-esteem have him working at a dog grooming spa while having a controlling and unfaithful wife.  Adam Yates has a better job but he’s unlucky in love as his latest girlfriend has just left him, cleaning out his house in the process.  In Adam’s basement lives his nephew Jacob (Clark Duke), a geeky nerd who spends all day playing video games. Read more…

Movie Review – Snowball Express (1972)

Here we are in the heart of winter, so it’s only fitting that it’s time to review a winter-themed movie or two.

The Walt Disney Company has been widely known for producing award-winning, feature length animated movies since Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs premièred back in 1937.  In addition to producing animated films, Disney also produces a wide variety of live action films, almost all of them being family friendly.  One such film is 1972′s comedy, Snowball Express.

Set in the early 1970s, Snowball Express tells the tale of a New York City family suddenly packing up and moving out into the wilderness of Colorado.  The family had inherited a hotel, and while the hotel’s information seemed promising back in New York, in reality the hotel is in a state of disarray and hasn’t seen customers in years.  It’s up to the family to face the challenges of cleaning the hotel and turning the deserted building into a successful business, all without anybody having any experience in the hospitality industry.

Directed by Norman Tokar, Snowball Express stars Dean Jones as John Baxter, father of the family and heir to the hotel.  Nancy Olsen plays his wife Sue, and Kathleen Cody and Johnny Whitaker play their children, Chris and Richard.  Keenan Wynn has the role of the evil banker Martin Ridgeway, Michael McGreevey is Wally Perkins, a local in town, and Dick Van Patten has a cameo as John Baxtor’s boss, Mr. Carruthers.

Snowball Express (1972) – (c) Buena Vista Distribution

Snowball Express begins in New York City as John Baxter (Dean Jones) arrives for work at the insurance company.  He’s greeted first by an unhappy boss, Mr. Carruthers (Dick Van Patten) and then a probate attorney.  The attorney informs John that his great uncle, Jacob Barnsworth, died, and John Baxter was the only kin they could find.  As a result, Baxter inherited Jacob’s estate, the Grand Imperial Hotel out in Silver Hill, Colorado.  The news of the hotel sounds even better as the attorney informs John that the hotel reportedly made a significant amount of money each month.

Seeing the hotel as a golden opportunity to make something of himself, John Baxter quits his job in a grand fashion.  Unfortunately, John’s family doesn’t take the news of him quitting his job that well.  His wife Sue (Nancy Olsen) is dumbfounded of her husband’s idea of packing up and leaving for Colorado to manage a hotel.  What’s done is done, and the family packs up their belongings and makes the trip cross country. Read more…

Movie Review – Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003)

Twelve years after the release of the epic Terminator film Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines arrived in the movie theaters.

The ending of Terminator 2 concluded with the presumed destruction of Cyberdyne Systems along with its Skynet project.  The research material was also destroyed and it was believed that Judgment Day was stopped.  But as we see with Terminator 3, Judgment Day was merely postponed and Skynet still declared war on human beings.

Unable to locate John Connor as he’s been living “off the grid,” Skynet sends a new model of the Terminator machines back in time to kill future officers of the Resistance prior to Judgment Day.  The Resistance is once again able to send a reprogrammed Series 850 Model 101 Terminator back in time to protect those targets including Kate Brewster and John Connor.

Directed by Jonathan Mostow, Terminator 3 stars Arnold Schwarzenegger in his classic role as the Terminator cyborg.  Nick Stahl plays the role of John Connor this time, and Claire Danes plays Kate Brewster, Connor’s future wife.  Kristanna Loken plays the role of the T-X, the superior Terminator sent back in time to kill members of the Resistance.  Supporting actors include David Andrews, Mark Famiglietti and Earl Boen.

Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003) – (c) Warner Bros. Pictures

Set about nine years after the events in Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines begins with John Connor (Nick Stahl) being paranoid about Skynet and the future war against the machines.  Although Judgment Day does not occur on August 29, 1997, John still isn’t taking any chances.  He lives “off the grid” without a permanent home or credit cards or a cell phone.  There’s nothing that can be traced to his constantly changing location. Read more…