The Disclosure

So by stealing the orichalcum the assembly line starts to break down causing the city to go into self-destruct mode. The kids unite and search for Ambrosius in the assembly line and they try to escape together. While sprinting over the closing city Kokapetl is caught under some ruble so the kids stays to dig him out while Ambrosius escape. Meanwhile I believe, if my ears ain't mistaken, they actually play the same music when first city of gold was destroyed. YES!!! The kids then escapes and trying to cross the lake they fly on the back of the dragon, but in the last minute a rock hits the dragons tail and drags it into the deep and the children are stranded on different ice blocks. Tao seems to be falling when the Shaolin monk shows up again rescuing all the children and of course the dog is with him. How he escaped I don't get (you know, french).

Meanwhile Mendoza and his gang is waiting in some snow covered forrest with the Mu-pyramid. And then a man appears in the same robe as Zares, but shorter... and thinner... and with a leather mask on. No, this is the prophet... or more commonly known as the High-Priest of Eldorado (aka the first city of gold) who sacrificed himself to stop the solar reactor to destroy all life on earth... or as Esteban's father. YAY!!! HE'S ALIVE!!! HAPPY DAYS!!! And now we finally uncovers the mysterious of the Mu-pyramid... in french, so I have no clue what's important with it or why Ambrosius had it. Well, at least I finally know who was on the ship and explains the changed behavior of Mendoza after waking up on the futuristic ship. I'm also glad I guessed right although not quite right. But if that wasn't Zares... who was?

Well, the last scene is Ambrosius arriving to his ship that has frozen in place, discovering that he can't fly away and that the Mu-pyramid is gone. He climbs down below the floor to a secret compartment... with an exoskeleton and he dresses up as... DAM-DAM-DA Zares!!! Called it, a damn robot, I knew it. He jumps out, breaks the ice and fly away, ending the episode. One episode left, oh I can't wait. Funny thing about that is... The Final Episode Won't Work. Not in french, not anything... GOD!!! So I had to buy it, so I'm waiting that the whole season will come with the mail. In English so I will hear what all are complaining about. Hopefully it sound better than the Swedish one.

The Nest of the Condors

The kids and Ambrosius finds this lake, accidentally drops the golden dragon statue into it and for some reason this turn it into a huge robotic dragon that takes them to a door opening in the mountain side. There they find elevators to the top of the mountain and they enter... the second city of gold as the solar panels stars the whole city up. Beautiful... breath taking... musically extraordinary. Here they split as Esteban and Zia walks to the middle building, the same building in the first city where the solar reactor was hidden. Tao and Ambrosius goes deeper into the city discovering a library with scroll like containers, but the scrolls appears like the the map the Olmec had, but contained holographic paper of different constructs like... THE SOLARIS? AND THE CONDOR? (For you who don't know the Solaris was a solar powered ship the kids found in the first season that took them from the Galapagos islands to the South American mainland as well as destroying the Spaniards ship with a concentrated solar heat beam burning their wooden ships to a crisp, until the kids had to destroy it so it didn't fall into the Spaniards hands). They continue downwards and finds a assembly line... for mass producing condors? What? Are you telling me that as soon as the city powered up it mass produces condors? Do this mean that one of the cities of gold lies on the bottom of the ocean mass producing solarises? Are there gonna be a solar powered submarine?... Well, that seems kinda impossible due to the sun not reaching that far into the ocean meaning it is kinda worthless if it doesn't store it, but that seems like a hazzle.

Well, anyway, Esteban and Zia stumbles into this building in the middle of the city using their necklaces and as they enter they are locked in. They get surrounded by these holographic screens showing a couple of old men and women telling them some important things... in french so I have no idea what it was. They also get a new set of amulets that are whole once again. Tao goes  to find them while Ambrosius prepares to steal one of the continuing producing blobs of orichalcum. End of the episode. Now, I'm also gonna mention this after the episode information notice. Usually discussing people, places, historical events and such thing, educational thing. In this episode (I think it was this one at least) we are discussing the workings of the golden condor. I'm gonna agree when someone wrote that you don't do this if you intend it to be educational for children. Me personally finds it interesting in how the writers thought how it theoretically would work, but make an extra on the dvd's, not part of the actually educational material. Then again, I don't know more about what they said on the show since it was in french.

The Expedition

So now the kids know where they are going so they go to Ambrosius airship and discover Mendoza caught in the act. Ambrosius tie him up, but are distracted by Sancho and Pedro so that Mendoza can talk Esteban into releasing him. What he said I don't know, and I think I missed that he also stole the Mu-pyramid. Anyway, after they are gone the kid and Ambrosius sail of toward the mountain (I also seemed to have forgotten what ever happened to the condor, why take the airship?), dressed in their new mountain climbing gear and clothes. And now, the return of the best thing of the whole series... the music, damn it's awesome. The synth as they walk the mountain, fantastic. And the return of the shaolin monk which we haven't seen since the beginning of the series. Anyway, the kids walks over a glacier and Zia falls down as the ice breaks beneath her, the other seemed to fall down as well. And here... A F***ING OLMEC TRAPPED IN THE ICE!!! OH MY GOD THE FAN SERVICE!!! He seems to have a map of some kind... I think since I don't understand much since it was in french. They are saved by the monk who tell the kids about why he came to find them, you know the prophesy, which I don't understand since it's once again is in french.

Really the most important thing is actually to focus on Ambrosius who seems very upset about someone showing up. Which gets to it's logical conclusion when they have to cross a glacier gap with ice spikes so they jump across. I forgot to mention that they also have the dog from the last episode with them, and it wont jump so the monk, who was the most adept goes back for it. The wind grows stronger so Ambrosius sends the children away and when they are gone throws a bomb on the monk and dog... saying something important on why in french. When the wind has calmed down the kids and Ambrosius returns showing the destruction and I guess saying something like the spikes breaking or what not. Damn, you can't trust the french.

The Dragon's Fire

I finally cracked down and decided to watch the last 5 episodes of The Mysterious Cities of Gold, but since I can't find them in either swedish or english I had to resort to watch it... in french. Meaning I don't understand one forth of what they say, but I might puzzle it together on the context alone. So it began were I left of, searching for the original fresco with the face in the Himalayas. They find a padoga or whatever it's called in a village, guarded by... a caretaker? A priest or monk? I don't know, he has a dog and seemed to be knowledgeable in tibetian music/sound technology, you know those spinning things that makes a sound? Lucky I played a lot of The Journeman Project 3 which took place in Shangra-La (as well as Atlantis and Eldorado) which explained some of the things seen here so I'm not completely in the dark. Ambrosius keeps the man occupied while the kid first sneaks around the temple, but finds nothing until some children and an old woman points them to a cave (we also learn the way to say hi, by sticking out your tongue, glad I've read Tintin in Tibet so I don't missunderstood that).

Meanwhile Mendoza and his companians are infiltrating Ambrosius ship in order to steal the Mu-pyramid, but a trap is realeased knocking Mendoza out while Sancho and Pedro is hiding on the deck. The kids and Ambrosius finds the cave and uses the infused gold dragon on a circle plate in the cave which unleashes the titular dragon fire showing them the way to the next Mysterious City of Gold... which mountain it was I didn't catch, but we are getting close folks.

The Princess and the Frog

 

I finally watched the Disney movie The Princess and the Frog, the latest classic animated movie from the studio in the typical fairy tale set up that Disney likes to bring out from time to time. Critically acclaimed at the time of release, but not a smash hit by the audiences. It did decent enough, but if you look at the Disney movies of the 90's, not as well. Well, animation was nice, music worked and I really liked the voodoo themes, but that might more be due to me enjoying occult themes and games like Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers. Interestingly enough both takes place in New Orleans. Really, the shadow figures and the shadow man (the main villain) was interesting ideas, but I wish they would have taken it further. Some gritty Don Bluth darkness and Ralph Bakshi gore would have made it really awesome occult voodoo movie. Of course, that wouldn't have been Disney.

To be honest I can appreciate it for being a "hand drawn" animated movie, but something don't click with me. I'm probably not the target demographic, but shouldn't great movies pull you in even though you aren't the target demographic? Or is it acquired test? Really, compared to Disney's 90's movies will this movie be remembered as fondly or is it nostalgia standing in the way? Hell, even older Disney movies can still be enjoyable on different levels. Maybe not in pacing. Snow White is pretty boring at times when the story slows down (I'm thinking about when she sings about the prince for the dwarfs, it gives nothing to the story and just breaks of the story), but you can enjoy the fantastic animation, music and the story can suck you in. The Queen is scary at times and the transformation scene is terrifying for a child (again, my nostalgia might be in the way since I actually watched this in theaters... no I'm not that old, they re-released them in theaters in 1993 so mom took me and my sisters to see it). 

The story of this movie then. A poor African-American girl dreams of owning her own restaurant and works all the time making her seem to boring and stuck up for her friends. Her best friend is a daughter to some landowner that wants to marry this prince from... Maldona since he's a prince. The prince (is he African, or African-European, or African-Asian?) is a free-loathing leech who wants to marry this rich white girl to get money again. Meanwhile this shadow man voodoo priest wants to kill of the landowner and take over New Orleans using the white servant of the prince as a doppelganger to gain access to the money of the landowner. It's here my suspension of disbelief starts to malfunction. This is the 1920's. An interracial wedding with an African (?) prince who has a white servant in the southern states of America? I might not know that much about the times in this place, but through American entertainment I assume this is a pretty racist and segregated place. I know it's a fairy tale, but at least the french peasant did what french peasant do from the 16-17th century in Europe in Beauty and the Beast. This might be my misconception of the American South in the early 20th century. The voodoo plot? I buy it, seems fairly logical if accept the possible occult themes. Also, I like the small throwbacks to other Disney movies. You have Triton from the Little Mermaid showing up, a couple dressed as Aladdin and Jasmine at a costume ball, a line from Lumiere from Beauty and the Beast and a dance sequence directly taken from Sleeping Beauty. The last thing to mention, and this is a huge spoiler for the movie. The death of the firefly. Crushed by the foot of the bad guy and permanently dies (resurrected as a star... might be a Lion King reference). It doesn't happen often, bad guys die fairly often, but good guys? Bambi's mother and the Atlantean king (though he was what 3000 years old?) are the closest, we also got Cinderellas father and such, but that is back story and often attributed to sickness or old age. This... straight up murder.

Hyrule Warriors (Post 500)

Post 500 and I will write about a Legend of Zelda spin-off, Hyrule Warriors. It's a button-mashing hack and slash game where you take control of famous Zelda-characters across the series as you fight the dark evil trying to pry the triforce from our heroes. I guess this was inspired by the final stretch of Skyward Sword where you are running down a spiral hole being attacked by hundreds of Moblins and you swing your sword and they fly. Awesome then, fun now. It doesn't get as awesome since then you were alone and that was pretty much the only time it happened. Here it's all about that. Enemies flies all over. Get's repetitive, but as I understand it that is the core gameplay of this type of games. I played through the main campaign and the story is pretty standard. Someone causes trouble, by the end of the second act Ganondorf returns and the twist is you got to play as him and the final is you defeating him. Around 20 hours. This isn't the main game. The main game is the adventure mode in where you travel across the original Legend of Zelda over world map doing missions to earn item cards too use to unlock secrets so that you can get new characters and weapons. I get it's at least 300 hours to complete it. You can have 2-players as well, sad for me there is no one around and the internet isn't the best.

So overall it's a fun diversion who knows how to cater toward action-oriented Zelda fans. The fan-service is all over... and with fan-service I don't mean catering to male sexual fantasies, even if its there as well in one case:

No, I meant more like the sound effects from Zelda when using some weapons, opening chest, even starting up the game. You have rupees, the music is rearranged hard rock covers of songs from the Zelda games and bosses have weakness that was from the games they come from. You at least have 300 hours to play away. A pity Smash came out last Friday taking up even more hours. At least the big console release isn't until December 5.

RoboCop (2014)

 

So this weekend I was able to watch the remake of RoboCop, and as some of you know, I love the original movie. So you can guess in certain degrees I didn't like this as much. It's an ok braindead action movie with nice visuals and definitely a more star-powered cast with Michael Keaton, Gary Oldman and Samuel L. Jackson than the original (although those who played their roles did it good and felt more like the characters like Bob Morton, Dick Jones and Clarence Boddicker). It starts out ok, a homage to the TV satire from the original, but with more modern standards of a agenda driven talk-show about US use of robots in an insurgence in Iran where suicide bombers try to be martyrs on live TV and a kid of one of the bombers get a knife and attempts to stab a robot, but are killed on live television. And this for some reason is the political backdrop for this remake. In the original it was a corrupt society in where a private company owned even the police, and the police threatened a strike and therefore OCP tried to bring forth a replacement that they then wanted to sell as a military unit. Here it's the opposite, the damn ED-209's and other robots work flawlessly, the kid was a threat since it had a weapon and attacked the robots (compare to the original where ED-209 had a glitch that killed an unarmed man when he gave up his weapon) and the American people for some reason feared to put the machines on the streets. Granted, we have all seen terminator and the matrix, but they never showed to malfunction or anything, really, RoboCop himself seemed to be the most unstable machine of them all since he was able to override the security and kill someone (yes, he was the bad guy, but in the original RoboCop never circumvented directive 4). Anyway after the news we get the best scene in the movie. The original RoboCop theme song to a scene mimicking the original Alex Murphy entering the police station. This also shows the problem with this remake. The original was a dystopian Sci-Fi. I don't see it in this remake. In the original the police station is in a mess, criminals thrown everywhere and the chief of police trying to get it working and the news spread out death of police and serious crimes. Here it looks rather nice. It's only in talk we get to see corruption and problems, but nothing serious. Where's the dread, missing hope and just the cynical views?

In here we get to learn about this gang leader Alex Murphy and Jack Lewis are hunting and there suspicion about traitors in the police (and they seems to know pretty well who they are). The corrupt cops tell the gang leader and gives them a car bomb. At night Murphy goes out to look at the car and gets blasted. Meanwhile OCP are trying to fix the opinion about robots among the public so they try to create a cyborg cop, but those they have are to unstable so they need someone balanced. Now, I'm gonna be unfair here, but the original wasn't stable, they say that much in the second one. Really, they explain why Murphy was able to handle the pressure of being turned into a robot. The reason being his immense sense of justice and his strong catholic belief and therefore he didn't want to self-destruct. That is gone here, in this movie he want's to die rather than live as this robot, but Gary Oldman guilt trips him into staying alive because of his family. That is also the thing, he knows who he is, what he is. In the original that was part of the story as he regained his conscious and became man again. Here they create him and decide that the human elements are interfering with his job as a police so they get rid of that. Of course only after they show him functioning for his friends and family and it was a last minute fix due to putting the whole Detroit camera footage from 10-20 years in his head. He works though, but is more machine than man. Gets the job done and public relations goes through the roof. But for some reason he gets more human and starts to investigate his own attack (since he wasn't murdered). He kills the gang leader and one of the paid cops and learns that the chief of police is the one protecting the gang. So he tries to arrest her, but is shutdown by OCP. Why? Why they stopped there I have no idea, in one end they see this as a potential to sell real robots as they can't be corrupted, but they bring up that the buyers are politicians and don't want someone to look on their dirty stuff. A pity we don't see a dirty politician. Really, this Detroit looks a lot better than current real Detroit, why need the robots? Still OCP decide that they need to get rid of RoboCop since he is acting out of line and they have a hard time controlling him coupled with that they won the PR battle. Oldman turning tails rescues RoboCop and RoboCop looks for revenge at the OCP HQ. At the roof Keaton is trying to escape and uses Murphy's wife and kid as shield together with a red tag that work as this movies Directive 4. RoboCop can't shoot, but after fighting his human way wins and he kills Keaton.

You know, this OCP is rather stupid. And really, the gang leader I have a hard time grasping what's his deal. Is he a drug lord, weapon seller or... ? Really, OCP, are they powerful or are they just rich? In the original they run the city and were cynical bastards. They sacrificed policemen/women to use as guinea pigs (that they contractually owned), they killed their own people and they used gang lords to cause destruction in Detroit to go with their plan on rebuilding it as Delta City. Boddiker was a psychopath since he didn't care about anyone and killed Bobby, Morton and Murphy. Another problem is the age. The original was 18+, this 11+. No blood. No gore. GOD!!! The original was smart, philosophical, cynical and satirical together with fun action, even awesome action and a soundtrack, visuals and even drama... THIS ONE!!! It would fit better as an origin story for Cyborg. Well, it probably did enough so we might get a RoboCop 2 and I know I will look at that, but still, it misses something.