Movies/TV

Great Themes for College Parties

2013-02-01T23:48:58Z

A tough task for college party planners is to come up with a party theme that is fun and unique. Toga parties and disco themed parties are tired old ideas. Here are a few suggestions for unique party themes that really rock.

I'm Glad I'm Not _________

See, you were hooked at the name. Guests to the party must dress as the thing they most don't want to be. Ideas for dress can be from a pocket protecting, bow tied nerd to a fat person created with lots of padding. It's a fun way to have a costume themed party that forces everyone to use their imagination.

A Night in Monaco

Formal attire please! Set aside small tables covered in green felt. At each table have a casino game such as Black Jack or craps. At one table set up some laptops all tuned to an online bingo game. Make sure that you give poker chips to everyone as they come in. Prizes can be small gift certificates to the favorite campus coffeehouse. Sometimes, college organizations, fraternities and sororities run fundraisers. It's to turn the theme into a fundraiser just by having an admission price (and a bank) for guests to buy chips. Non-card players can enjoy the casino games online and off - Online bingo on Jackpotjoy is a good game to bring everyone closer.

Seven Deadly Sins Theme Party

Every college guy is looking for a way to make great looking girls even better looking. Well, the Seven Deadly Sins Party is the way to go.

The party's theme is sin - decorating is easy (think apples, vines and snakes as the motif) and dressing for it is fun! Girls can choose Lust or Envy as their sin theme and dress as slutty as they like - the more skin the better. Guys can dress down, super casual (sloth). Gluttony works for both sexes and you can recycle the "fatty" costume from the I'M Glad I'm Not ________ " themed party.
Black Light/Graffiti Party

Alone either idea is fun but not unique. Combined is a new kind of party. Guests are told to wear white clothing items that are replaceable. The party area needs to be decorated with black lights. Under the black lights everyone will glow. After everybody has gotten to know one another reveal the reason for replaceable clothes. Hand out to your guests markers that are sensitive to black light and have guests draw graffiti on each other. Prizes can be awarded to the person with the best or most graffiti and also to the best graffiti artist. To win the artist award graffiti work must be signed.

High School Stereotypes

Most of us were in a clique when in high school and your clique hated every other clique. This party is really an adaption of the I'M Glad I'm Not ________ " party theme but more restrictive. Guests must wear a costume that is "over the top" in mocking one of the well-known high school stereotypes such as:

    Jocks
    Cheerleaders
    Marching Band Member
    Nerd
    Hoodlum
    Preppy
    Drama Queen
    Whatever Else You Think Of

Only your imagination can limit party themes. But themed parties are great fun, themed parties with games are even more fun.

How To Keep People Interested In A Live Baseball Game

2012-07-29T14:12:38Z

How to Keep People Interested in a Live Baseball Game?

Are you, too, sick of your friends and family complaining and frowning that you brought them to a "boring" baseball game? Does your girlfriend always complain that baseball games are boring, and that she'd rather stay at home? This article is for you. Here you'll find a few ways to keep things interesting and make otherwise bored people enjoy the live game. There are many ways you can enjoy watching a baseball game with your loved ones or your friends by incorporating some fun stuff into their experience. You can try the following:

Baseball bingo

One way to overcome boredom when in a live baseball game – play with your phone. It has become a trend for bored people who were dragged to baseball games to play bingo on mobile devices, but baseball bingo is a way in which they can play bingo, but still be involved in the game.

When watching a baseball game, you can also play bingo with a baseball twist. Here, you will need a modified bingo cards in which instead of numbers, the matrix of the cards are composed of plays in baseball such as "fly out to center", "walk", "home run" and much more. You and your friends or loved ones will mark the item in the card if the play occurs in real time in the field. Of course, having some rewards can spice up the game. However, if you opt for some creativity, you can make your own baseball themed bingo cards. You can click here to create your own bingo cards for free.

Baseball drinking games

Watching a baseball game is fun while drinking beer with your friends and you can add more fun to it by incorporating games into your alcoholic beverages. You can try the baseball drinking games of “The Pace of the Game” or the “Total Bases”. In the first game, you will need a beer and some shots and your focus of the game is to “the home runs” and “innings”. You and your friends will drink beer per inning and a shot per home run. The second game will make use of beer or mixes of alcoholic drinks and here, the focus of the game is on the home runs, singles, doubles and triples. You and your friends will choose one team. For every total base your team attains, all of you will drink beer. A beer for single, two beers for doubles, three beers for triples and four beers for a home run. Get ready to get drunk with these fun games!

More Games

There are other games that you can incorporate while watching a baseball game. For instance, you and your friends can call the baseball play. This can be a point system. You can focus on the batter or the pitcher. If you guess the play correctly, you will get a point and if you don't, you don't get any points or point are deducted. Include rewards so that this game will become interesting. Another game is a fantasy baseball. This is similar to the fantasy ball games you can play online, but in this case, you will be picking only to the two teams playing.

There's no reason for your loved ones to be bored with all these creative things we've outlined for you. Just remember to relax and have fun in the company of your friends while watching these games.

A Long Time Ago in a Galaxy Not So Far, Far Away

2012-06-01T23:00:00Z

For those of us whose innate geeky-ness extends beyond sports and well into hyperspace, this week marks the anniversary of a watershed moment in our lives.

It was 35 years ago that a modest little sci-fi movie exploded out of the head of the bespectacled, bearded, not-yet-corporate-demon who’d made American Graffiti and sparkled onto theater screens across the country, forever altering the lives of a generation of complete dorks.

It was called Star Wars - henceforth known as “Episode IV.” Or “A New Hope.” Or “Special Edition.” Or “The First One in the Trilogy That Didn’t Have Natalie Portman.”

Even if you’ve never seen it (and seriously, to have deliberately not seen it at this point suggests such a desperate attempt at superiority that it borders on sadomasochism), you can appreciate how it permanently impacted the landscape of film, television, merchandising, classical music, popular culture, capitalism, cursive handwriting, astronomy, poetry, French kissing, meteorology, politics, Mountain Dew, religious freedom, and the metric system.

Movie Review - X-Men: First Class

2011-06-08T22:00:00Z

The X-Men franchise makes a welcome comeback after two previous misfires with the retro prequel/reboot “X-Men: First Class”, an intelligent, fun filled action flick that manages to breathe new life into a series that had grown quite tired.

The X-Men movies started out with a bang with the original Bryan Singer film, and built upon that momentum with a sequel, “X-Men: United”, that was in many ways even better than the first. But when noted hack director Brett Ratner took over for Singer in the third film, it ground to an agonizing halt. In fact, you could compare the X-Men series almost identically to the Christopher Reeve “Superman” movies; excellent first film, even better second film, and then a third film that was absolutely terrible.

Marvel Studios tried to start from scratch two years ago with the first of what they were calling “X-Men Origins”, telling the back stories of some of the more popular characters. Of course, that meant starting with the most popular of the X-Men; Wolverine. The film was almost as much of a mess as X-Men 3, prompting the studio to do at least one smart thing; remove the designation “X-Men Origins” from this film to try to distance it from the stench of the last two.

What we end up with is a film that stands on its own, while still paying homage to the spirit of the Singer films. With no Wolverine in the early days of the X-Men (his introduction to Charles Xavier came in the first movie in 2000, so you can’t re-write history that much…even in comic book films), it’s up to the “older” mutants to carry the film. This means focusing on the initial meeting of Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr, the men who would later continually face off against one another as Professor X and Magneto.

Crystal Ball - June Releases

2011-06-04T20:00:00Z

The Summer Season has stumbled a bit out of the blocks, but it looks to possibly heat up this month.

Or not.

We have a boatload of superhero movies and sequels coming out this month, so it has just as much chance as not of being as tepid as May.

News and Rumors

~ A Tarzan trilogy? If you say so. “Hustle & Flow” writer/director Craig Brewster has been hired by Warner Bros. to write and direct a rebooting of the old warhorse series. After “George of the Jungle”, I thought this genre was dead.

~ Speaking of remakes, Hailee Steinfeld, the young actress who had such a brilliant debut in the remake of “True Grit”, may be playing the title role in the remake of “Carrie”. Being that Hailee is 14 years old, don’t expect it to be exactly like the original (the onscreen nudity from Sissy Spacek). Supposedly Megan Fox was lobbying for the role. Yeah…like that’s going to happen.

Movie Review - Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

2011-05-27T20:31:21Z

It’s not even Memorial Day, and we have our first dud of the Blockbuster Season. I knew I was in trouble 30 minutes into this film when I caught myself thinking;

“I miss Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley”.

Let’s just sit back and analyze that thought for a moment. I found myself missing two actors/characters that totally annoyed me for the better part of three movies.

Why?

I guess it’s because in the first three films, most of the time that they were on screen at the same time it meant that we weren’t seeing Captain Jack Sparrow, which in my mind was the only reason to watch these films. Consequently; my line of thought was that having Jack get more screen time without the burden of the Elizabeth Swan/Will Turner love story would make a better film.

Movie Review - Thor

2011-05-10T18:06:23Z

Marvel superhero movies are in general a very mixed bag. Yes, there are the huge hits with guaranteed big audiences like X-Men and Spider-Man, but the rest have been very much hit or miss. On the positive side was Iron Man, which was a rousing success. In the middle was the Hulk, which did OK with both the 2003 movie with Eric Bana in the lead role and the Edward Norton effort from 2008, as both earned a little over $130 million at the box office.

And then there were the flops; both critically and financially (and often both). Fantastic Four, Daredevil, Ghost Rider, and (especially) Elektra.

So here they come again with one of the more obscure superheroes in the Marvel pantheon; Thor. First of all, this would probably confuse most people who have never read comic books, but are aware of the myths of the Norse Gods and of Thor, the God of Thunder, who was the most well known. Those types would by thinking “He’s also a superhero? What’s next? Poseidon teaming up with Aqua-Man?”

The Crystal Ball - May Releases

2011-05-06T22:00:00Z

The Summer Blockbuster Season is here, and it looks to be the Year of the Superhero, kicking off today with the release of “Thor”, and continuing on to “X-Men: First Class”, “Green Lantern”, and “Captain America: First Avenger”.

It’s also to be the Summer of the Sequel…but that expression can be used for almost every summer. It actually looks like it started last week, as “Fast Five” has become a surprising breakout hit. Other sequels coming this summer include Pirates of the Caribbean 4, Transformers 3, Cars 2, Kung Fu Panda 2, The Hangover 2, and the one I’m anticipating most; the final chapter of the Harry Potter series.

Strap yourself in and get ready to go.

News and Rumors

~ Will and Jaden Smith doing an M. Night Shyamalan movie. This is the cinematic version of an irresistible force (the boxoffice superwattage of Will Smith) meeting the unmovable object (M. Night Shamalan’s decent into total suckitude). My money is on the unmovable object.

Movie Review - Fast Five

2011-05-04T22:00:00Z

It’s been two days since I have seen it, and I still can’t believe that I’m about to give a positive review to a movie from the Fast and Furious franchise.

This is a movie that stars Paul Walker, for God’s sake, and “actor” who, if any less talented, would be a member of the Kardashian family. But why take my word for it? As Chris Hutchinson so eloquently explained in a recent The Browns Outsider article: “anytime Paul Walker: The Actor speaks one of those English lines, it has all the emotional range and delivery brilliance of a desk lamp. And not one of those cute Pixar lamps either”.

The movie alo stars Vin Diesel and the actor formerly known as The Rock, Dwayne Johnson, who are in a heated competition if the Oscars ever come up with a "Best Use of Steroids" category; three women who are basically interchangable in the "Hot Looking Brunette Who Really Needs To EAT SOMETHING!!!" Department"; and a variety of other painfully obvious stereotypes.

Add to this some absolutely terrible writing, a ridiculous caper, boring villains right out of "bad action movie central casting" and completely implausible action sequences; and that leaves you with...

Movie Review - Hanna

2011-04-15T22:00:00Z

My “losing” streak is over, as I have finally seen a 2011 released movie that didn’t induce nausea.

“Hanna” isn’t a great movie by a long shot, but it doesn’t stink, and it kept me entertained throughout, which is saying something given the incredible amount of crap we’ve seen so far this year. That may not be much of a rousing endorsement, but you’ll have to give me a minute to shake off my cynicism before I get into the positives of this interesting and disturbing little action thriller.

The most unusual part of this film is that “Hanna” is at its best when it’s not a “thriller”. Don’t get me wrong, the action parts are exciting, if not exactly original. But the true heart of this film is the character study of a young girl/woman as she discovers the real world for the first time in her life.