Sunday, February 28, 2016

My Youtube Favorites

This may not be the most original post I've ever done but I felt like this blog needed a switch from let's be honest, purely movie reviews, because those are all I ever watch anymore.
Jenna Marbles:
I'm going to be honest with you guys, when I first started watching Jenna's channel I honest to god thought that Marbles was her actual last name. But once I was introduced to her cute dog, Marbles, I felt like a complete idiot. The reason why I love Jenna's channel is because she uses humor to cater to all audiences. Then sometimes she just uses her personality to cater to those audiences. Jenna will use her audience as inspiration for her videos and sometimes not. Like in "Jenna's Ratchet Hair Salon," that is just pure comedy in order to get a laugh from her viewers, while in "Some Thoughts On Avacados," she literally uses a whole twelve minutes to rant about avocados being on everything where she lives, and that's just her personality shining through.
Ryan Higa:
I love Ryan Higa because he does a spoof on pretty much every pop culture topic. For example, two of my favorite videos from him are How to Sing Like Your Favorite Artist part 1 and part 2. He finds the humor in the hot topic of the day. About a month ago he made a video spoof on "How to Run for President," clearly a spoof on the presidential race. For me Ryan Higa is a timelessly funny person who I've been watching since "The Big Bouncing Inflatable Green Ball," which premiered around six years ago. Needless to say, I've been watching his channel all the way through the cheesiest of the cheesy videos.
The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon:
You're probably looking at this title like, "What? This doesn't fit in." Well, believe me I laughed at the thought of putting this on my list but the channel of one of the Youtube channels I most frequently watch. I know that I can just record this on TV, but I'm with the generation who can't live without their smart phone. hence me doing everything on it. Sorry, off topic, let's get back to it. I love the Tonight show because Jimmy is one of my most favorite comedians and I watched his show before it was the Tonight Show and is the only reason I watch the actual Tonight Show.

Thursday, February 25, 2016

New Netflix Shows: Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and Daredevil

Looking for a cute comedy or an action-packed drama to watch during the spring season? Well, I have just what the doctor ordered. Season two of Netflix Original's Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and Daredevil return on April 15th (Kimmy Schmidt) and March 18th (Daredevil). Each series is completely different but both equally lovable.
Kimmy Schmidt is a comedy about a 29 year-old who was stuck in a bunker for the majority of her life, then is released, and makes her way to New York to start a whole new life for herself. It's just a wacky, cute comedy with very dramatic and diverse characters. Then there is the theme song. In my opinion when it comes to that show, the theme song is the best part. It is the chatchiest thing ever. It perfectly explains what the show is about, auto-tuned to perfection, in all of about 30 seconds. Kimmy Schmidt is a funny take on a very serious and real topic of kidnapping. I plan on watching the movie Room, also about kidnapping, and it told a very different. In both scenarios both protagonists survive. The difference is in Kimmy Schmidt, it's very dramatic and fantasized, while in Room, it tells the very real story of a very plausible kidnapping story and the ways it impacts a mother and her child.
On the dramatic note, Daredevil is about a blind superhero who, you guessed it, fights crime. But he is also a lawyer, part of the Nelson and Murdock Law Office. During the first season we meet Matt Murdock (Daredevil) and his closest friends, acquaintances, and new people he meets. Plus you get to see a blind man (with a cloth tied over his eyes for dramatic effect) kick some serious butt (oh how I wish to use a different word here). What more could you want? Marvel lovers are in for a treat with this one, but then again if you were a true Marvel lover you would've watched it when it came out last year in April. Either way you get a look into Hell's Kitchen, taking place after the first Avengers movie, where Matt Murdock is trying to pick up the pieces of his city and protect it from the evil it faces. The best part about Daredevil, for me anyway, is the part at the very end of the first season when Daredevil finally gets his own costume and it's like a weight lifted off your shoulders.

Thursday, February 18, 2016

iZombie: The CW (A Compilation of My Thoughts)

A show about a zombie who is trying to find a cure in one of the most unique ways possible. I find this show amusing because it takes a modern and humorous take on the whole gory zombie trend. Liv Moore, a human-turned-zombie who has had to uproot her life, become a medical examiner/coroner, and eat the brains of dead people in order to solve police cases. She also has to break up with her fiance, due to the whole being dead thing. The whole show is very quirky, in the sense that there is indeed a cure for the zombification process. Liv discovered that the Utopium (a drug that got laced with something else and created a whole boat-load of zombies) can be cured with more Utopium. The show has an underlying premise of Liv, Ravi (Liv's partner M.E.), and Major (the fiance), all searching for more Utopium in order create the cure.
 iZombie is also very amusing due to the fact that Liv takes on the personality of the brains she eats. She has these visions that help her learn the true murderer of the victim's brain whom she is eating. People end up thinking that Liv has some sort of unstable mental health resulting in her overall personality changing very frequently. This all changes once pretty much everyone in her personal life finds out that she is a zombie. \
There isn't really one specific reason why I love iZombie. Sure, it has comic book elements, zombies, some good looking people, lots of humor, lots of actions, you get the point. But what I can say is that it is worth watching even though it may not be the most high quality TV show.

Thursday, February 11, 2016

Long Way Down: The Millionth Movie Review

Ever since I heard a song featured on the movie's soundtrack, I've been wanting to watch this movie. As I've stated in an earlier blog post, The Best Soundtrack for Reading, the music that accompanies a story is what makes or breaks it. One of my favorite artists is, Daughter, and her song, Youth, is featured in the movie. The two main reasons why I love this movie is the scenery or the places that it's filmed, and the music that accompanies the scenery. Overall this movie is just a beautifully filmed movie. 
The movie is about four suicidal people who all accidentally meet one another upon attempting to commit suicide by jumping off the top of a building on New Year's Eve. After a very long night, Martin, Maureen, J.J., and Jess, all convince each other not to commit suicide until Valentine's Day, the next most popular day for suicide attempts. Between New Year's Eve and Valentine's Day, the group bonds by trying the spin their fame (Martin and Jess), by making a story about their attempt at suicide. Through this period the group bonds, and even goes on a holiday together. Then after Maureen's son takes a trip to the hospital, Maureen realizes she can't commit suicide and leave her son alone. The day that Maureen's son is taken to the hospital, Jess and Martin meet Maureen there to give their support. They all question where J.J. is, then realize that it's Valentine's Day, and how he must be at the top of the building attempting to commit suicide. I won't spoil it, whether J.J. jumps or not, but I will highly recommend to watch and experience it for yourself.
A Long Way Down is a fairly sad movie, but there are very many happy glimpses. You get to see a background into the life of each character and why they are depressed and contemplated suicide. For me, the way that a movie looks is a big factor in whether I will enjoy that movie or not. In this movie the wardrobe, the scenery, even the hue that each scene had, after editing most likely, was all just set to perfection and made me enjoy this movie, on top of the plot which I also thoroughly enjoyed.

Sunday, February 7, 2016

Comic Books: A Compilation of My Thoughts

I finally realized that there was one style of book, other than magazines, graphic novels, and the rest of nonfiction, that I have not yet talked about. For this post I don't really have a focus towards comic books so I figured that I would just share my thoughts about comics with you readers.
I love comics because they let me live in a fantasy world where anything is possible. I believe I mentioned this point in my earlier post "Why Read?", but being swept away into a fantasy world where there are brave superheroes who defeat the bad guys. Due to the fact that the original comics were mainly written between the 1940's (Captain America) and the 1960's (Every other superhero ever), there weren't any independent female superheroes. While there was Agent Carter with Captain America and Black Widow (Natasha Romanova) with Iron Man, they still haven't got their own movies but that's a WHOLE other discussion. Anyways, these female characters are my main inspiration for loving comic books because they are bada**, independent, and most of all, brave.
I love delving into the Marvel Universe because every character doesn't back down in times of danger, much unlike myself. If I had to face the dangers these characters did, I would be a coward and probably pee my pants, let's be real we all would.
Plus, the whole history behind the first comic books are very interesting. Take Captain America for example, he was created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, who created Captain America because they couldn't stand what was unfolding in Nazi Germany and felt that the United States needed a patriotic hero. Superheroes were basically created because people were overall really sad due to the back-to-back events of WWI, the Great Depression, and WWII.
Overall, I love comic books, because the characters are all very unique, skilled, brave, you get the point. Comics are another source of entertainment that readers/writers like me, use to get away from reality for just a little bit.

Thursday, February 4, 2016

H2O: Another Review

This book is about exactly what the title says: water. Only the water in this book is poisonous with a microscopic alien. The destruction of an asteroid that was hurtling towards earth caused all of these bits of "stardust" containing these microscopic aliens, that were extremophile (an organism that could live in extreme weather/temperature conditions), to "fall" into all of the water supply. They reproduce at a speed that humans can't even imagine. People who touch any infected water immediately start to itch because the aliens have begun to reproduce inside of their bloodstream. Humans will itch and itch until they have itched enough of their skin off to die from blood loss.
Gory right? Let's get into the not-as-gory summary of the book, shall we? The main character of the book is Ruby Morris, a fifteen year-old girl who loses her mom, stepdad, and baby brother to the microscopic aliens. The book is mainly the journey of Ruby trying to find her father after the family she lived with died. Ruby loots what's left of her town, takes her car, a few passengers, and what she has looted from the stores, on her journey to London, England, to find her dad. Did I mention that the story start in a town called Dartbridge, England? Anyways, Ruby has all of these not so fun - excuse me, I should probably say life threatening - "adventures" that nearly get her killed because of the rain. Upon getting to London, Ruby finds out that her dad isn't at his house or in the army camp/base set up right outside of London. But after trying to seek refuge in the army camp, they do a screening of Ruby and decide she doesn't have anything to offer. The British army takes Ruby and a group of others on a bus to a remote village and proceed to dump them there and leave. Now Ruby has to make her own way without the British army and look for her dad elsewhere.
I believe the main reason why I enjoy this book so much is because of how childish it sounds. That may sound unintelligent of me and may make this book seem like an easy read, which it is, but that's the truth. If I were a new novelist/author, which Virginia Bergin is, I believe that I would write like her. I love young adult novels, specifically dystopian ones, and I hope to become an author like Suzanne Collins, Cassandra Clare, or Veronica Roth. Maybe I'm biased because I've read so many dystopian YA novels and know they're my favorite, but I particularly enjoy H2O and recommend you read it.