The Avengers is now officially the highest grossing opening movie of all time. The Avengers very easily best the record set by last summer’s Harry Potter finale by well over 40 million dollars. It brought home over 200 million dollars in its US release opening weekend. The movie has turned over 700 million dollars internationally at this point. It has turned shawarma into an overnight culinary must have superstar thanks to a quick quip from Ironman. It has already been greenlit for a sequel. What else can the Avengers do? The simple answer is do a comic book movie correctly.

Joss Whedon, the man who brought us Buffy and Firefly was the man chosen for the job of bringing The Avengers to the big screen and he did not disappoint. The man’s dialogue and creative genius are perfect for the big screen adaptation of The Avengers. He has even written for Marvel Comics before, so he was already familiar with the brand. Whedon brought this assembled team of actors and brought out stellar performances from all of them, even Chris Evans, who I have criticized in the past for lackluster acting, delivered under Whedon’s direction.

The Avengers is a comic book movie done perfectly. The interaction between the characters was amazing. The action was spectacular. It all added up to a wonderful movie. The whole cast does a terrific job. Robert Downey, Jr. continues to be Tony Stark incarnate. Mark Ruffalo joins the cast as Bruce Banner after the studio had a falling out with Edward Norton and easily gave the best performance of anyone to play Banner and The Hulk in the several recent actors to portray the role. His interactions with Downey’s Stark are also amazing. They all work well together to bring it all home.

The special effects are top notch in this film and the visuals are breathtaking. The movie has a huge feel to it and it makes the ending confrontation all that more impressive. The conflict felt epic and really felt like you needed a whole team like The Avengers to save the day. The team will be back to save the world from another impending menace as the studio has already greenlit a sequel to the film. No surprise with as successful and critically acclaimed as the film has been.

The dialogue is comic book dialogue but Whedon makes it all make sense and is perfect. One liners galore fill the movie and Tony Stark’s quip about locating a shawarma place after a battle led to a massive increase in sales of the Mediterranean dish  in the ensuing weekend. Some restaurants that serve the dish saw weekend sales go up by upwards of 80% over normal weekends.

Talking about much more of the film may result in spoilers going out, but The Avengers is a phenomenal movie. It proved comic book movies can be done right, make sense, not be cheesy, stay faithful to the product, and be critically acclaimed while making gobs of cash. The Avengers is a must see and is probably the greatest comic book movie of all time. Marvel has outdone themselves and they have many more potential winners in the pipeline. DC will really have to step up their game to compete in the movie game with Marvel. This is the movie by which all future comic book movies will be judged.

The road to Wrestlemania went into full effect with the events of Elimination Chamber. The February pay per view starts the final six week stretch to Wrestlemania. The WWE and World Heavyweight Champions are finalized to head into the event. Many of the story lines are starting to take shape. But how did the event fare? Did anything substantial happen or are we left with the status quo?

The show opened up with a decent video package previewing the show and we are taken to Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler, and Booker T who will be handling announcing duties. We then go to the first match.

Elimination Chamber Match for the WWE Title: Kofi Kingston vs. The Miz vs. R-Truth vs. Chris Jericho vs. Dolph Ziggler vs. CM Punk

The opening contest is one of significant importance. It’s for CM Punk’s WWE Championship. I am never a fan of a world title going on as the opener. Although I do understand the need to space out the chamber matches, the card order still could have been worked to not have this match open the show. With that said, the match was still good. The match started out with Punk and Kofi going at it and the others came in until the final participant, Chris Jericho came into the match. Jericho took a shot from Punk to send him outside the cell, and being deemed unable to continue. I’m sure something will come of that on RAW. The final two are Miz and Punk. Punk wins via the GTS. Good match given a good amount of time. No one looked bad in the match and this is likely the start of Punk/Jericho at Wrestlemania.

We then get a segment with Santino training for the Smackdown chamber and a video package hyping John Cena for his feud with the Rock. We then get the next match.

WWE Divas Title Match: Tamina Snuka vs. Beth Phoenix

Surprisingly, the WWE does still have female performers who can put on a decent match. The match was back and forth with a number of false finishes including Beth Phoenix kicking out of the Superfly Splash. Decent enough match that was much better than what we see on TV from the divas. It was also given some actual time to tell its story.

Next we get another Santion training segment then it’s off to the ring with John Laurinitis and David Otunga. Several superstar come out including Alberto Del Rio, Chriatian, and Mark Henry. They all tell Laurinitis he should be GM of both RAW and SmackDown.

We then go to our next match,

Elimination Chamber for the World Heavyweight Title: The Great Khali vs. Cody Rhodes vs. Wade Barrett vs. Santino Marella vs. Big Show vs. Daniel Bryan

This match was also good for what we got. Instead of being in first like CM Punk, World Champion Daniel Bryan was the last to appear in this match. The surprising part of this match was the fact that Santino was very over with the crowd. He even scored a couple of eliminations for a strong underdog performance. The match came down to Santino and Bryan as the final two. The action was back and forth for a few minutes, with Santino even hitting the Cobra on Bryan for a near fall. Bryan eventually wins the match by locking The Labelle Lock on Santino.

Next is a backstage segement involving Natalya and Hornswoggle. It was just a big fart joke. Jack Swagger comes in as well as Justin Gabriel. Teddy Long sets them up in a match which is next.

WWE United States Title Match: Justin Gabriel vs. Jack Swagger

This match had the potential to be good with the different styles of Swagger and Gabriel. All we got was a couple of minutes of action followed by a quick ankle lock victory for Swagger. Easily the most forgettable match on the cart.

We get a hype video of the Kane/Cena feud and it’s time for the main event.

Ambulance Match: John Cena vs. Kane

This match was okay. It was just a glorified hardcore match where the legal weapons were whatever items could be found in an ambulance. It featured back and forth action from Cena and Kane with the expected spots happening including shots with stretchers and slamming each other into the ambulance. Cena won the match. My problem with this match was its place on the card. The feud has been abysmal and on an event called Elimination Chamber, one of the chamber matches should have been the main event of the show. The WWE Title match would have been my preferred choice for the closer, instead of having it gone on first.

Overall the show was actually really good. Even the commentary was good. Michael Cole wasn’t even very annoying and the Smackdown announcers (Cole and Booker T) finally seem to understand Daniel Bryan is a heel and were commentating as such. Definitely worth a watch.

“Just A Geek” is the chronicling of Wil Wheaton discovering himself as a person. From the time he left Star Trek: The Next Generation and through a ten year period that followed, the book is a collection of memoirs and postings originally posted on Wheaton’s website. The stories are Wheaton telling of how he tried to move on to a successful movie career and build a family. Along the way, he rediscovers himself and learns what he really wants the most in life.

The best part of this book is the open honesty and candidness that Wheaton writes with. The reader can really connect with him as he accounts going from audition to audition and not getting the part because he wasn’t edgy enough or there was that one better candidate. Many of us can relate to that as we’ve gone through periods of unemployment and can never seem to land a job. The journey of self realization is one that we can all relate to. Wheaton’s writing style and openness make that easily accessible to the reader.

The big theme of the book was him facing the ghosts that haunted him. The big one of the book being ‘Prove To Everyone That Quitting Star Trek Wasn’t A Mistake.’ Facing inner demons and nagging voices can be difficult for anyone. Accepting them and growing from them is what Wheaton does in this story.

I very much recommend this book to everyone. The struggles he goes through are ones that anyone can relate to. Many geeks know of the current Wil Wheaton that has embraced his geekiness and now can be seen on The Big Theory and The Guild. “Just A Geek” is the story of the groundwork that made Wheaton the person he is today. Definitely give this one a read.

If you follow the Florida music scene you may be familiar with Marc With A C. He’s a local legend who’s done quite well for himself with his smooth sounding indie pop music. He’s been featured at Nerdapalooza several year’s in a row and recently won Orlando Weekly’s “Best Indie Act” award for the second year in a row. As he does around this time of year, he has released a new EP of music that wasn’t able to be included in some of his previous albums.

This new EP, entitled Recorded Sound, features five new tracks that are all amazing in and of themselves. The album starts out with “Touchdown”, a funny look into what Marc sees any time he tries to watch a sporting event.

The most well known and most played so far of the tracks on the EP is “Show Me How To Shine Shoes”. A take on a song by local nerdcore artist Rappy McRapperson and MC Wreckshin, Marc intros the song with:

“Rappy McRapperson and MC Wreckshin wrote what might be the catchiest song of 2010. Unfortunately, you can’t play it on the radio, and you can’t sing it around the water cooler. To remedy this problem, Marc With a C humbly presents to you….”

The EP is very fun with a lots of tongue in cheek lyrics that Marc is known for. I would highly recommend this to any fan of indie music.

You can download the EP from his website. It’s on a pay what you want basis, even free. Marc is a hard working artist who’s creativity and passion for music show sin the songs he writes and he gets better with each new album he puts out. He has a considerable catalogue of older songs and albums that can also be found on his site. All of his music can be obtained in the same manner as Recorded Sound and some of his albums can be purchased on CD or Vinyl record which is a great way to listen to Marc With A C.

Birds of Prey #1 Review

by Randy Pence

Birds of Prey was one of the better team books I’ve read so far in the DC Relaunch. The story starts with a reporter in a church looking for facts. The man he is talking to is not happy with what he hasn’t found out yet and appears ready to kill him until two mysterious women come to his aid. The women end up being Starling and Black Canary.

The story then alternates between the fight and the events that lead up the meeting. We see Black Canary trying to assemble the team, even trying to recruit Barbara Gordon, who does not accept but gives Canary some intel on some possible recruits.

The men who tried to kill the reporter are also looking for Black Canary, who is wanted for murdering a man. After the fight is over, Starling and Black Canary take the reporter to an airport to try to get him out of danger. Just before he boards the plane, the man explodes and the issue ends.

I was surprised by this issue. There was plenty of action. The book has a gritty side to it. The team is not afraid to kill. I will keep following this one. Go ahead and pick it up.