Now I don't tend to do trailers other than share it and point out how cool it is (rarely) but I was asked to do a post on the third Star Wars: The Force Awakens trailer and I thought, what the hell it's special. Now when people first heard about Disney buying Star Wars and that they were going to start making a movie straight away everyone else was all angry/ scared. Angry because nerd rage and scared as they automatically thought of the Lion King, Little Mermaid, Micky Mouse etc and they instantly thought of Disney as an evil corporation who were going to ruin the franchise even more than the prequels did. I on the other had was pleased to here of Disney purchasing some of my childhood memories as not only do Disney do the rare thing and give the fans what they want, they also have a lot of great live action titles under their belt that a lot of people forget are Disney movies: movies like The Rocketeer, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, The Mighty Ducks movies, National Treasure, Tron and who can forget The Pirates of the Caribbean and The Marvel Cinematic Universe movies. In short my hopes are up for the new movie.
Another reason we should be happy that these movies are going to be made by Disney is that the Star Wars franchise has always been first and foremost for kids. This is something the enraged super-fans always forget. Even the first three movies were made by companies who's target audience is young children and everything Star Wars is made with 10 year olds and the stuff 10 year olds like in mind. There's no one that does a better job of making kids movies that adults like than Disney and that's exactly what we want from a Star Wars movie. A movie we can take our kids, grand kids, nieces and nephews to see without being bored as our parents did with us with the previous movies. Judging from the trailers that's what we're going to get.
As for the trailer itself it's fantastic, it doesn't get me as excited as the second trailer did but it still makes my inner kid bubble to the surface. They've teased all the right stuff, especially the Millennium Falcon and the old characters. It doesn't shadow the new stuff too much though, the new heroes seem like I could back them easy and the villain looks so good, kinda like the Sith from the Knights of the Old Republic games. I'm a big fan of the way this movie looks so far: everything feels new and cool but at the same time there's no mistaking that you are seeing some Star Wars here. Also: Stormtroopers, they are probably the source of my obsession with white military equipment and are probably my favourite thing about Star Wars in general.
One thing's for sure: I'll be seeing this in the cinema, I can't wait to see this and I hope that it's going to be as good as it looks.
I've been wanting to do a post on this for a long time as I've noticed that there's still a lot of people under the impression that women are no good at rapping and it offends me quite a bit as I'm a big fan of many female rappers. The situation got even more annoying for me a while back when someone said that the only female rapper that matters is Nicki Minaj. Although I agree that Minaj is definitely an influential artist and she is one of the most successful female rappers of all time, she is definitely not the only one that matters, in fact there's a whole load out there, especially younger women, killing it. And they are rapping about stuff that matters without being sexist and homophobic and in my opinion they are doing it just as well or better than male rappers.
Iggy Azalea
Iggy Azalea for example is great and, I'm not scared to say, one of my favourite pop-rappers. There's been a lot of hate towards her from a small portion of the internet that seems to stem from nothing as I've tried searching for legit stories of her being a dick and can't find any. Yes the song with Britney Spears was a bit terrible but other than that I've loved all the other songs she's released as a single, my personal favourite still being "Work".
Azealia Banks
My ultimate favourite of the most well known pop-rappers is Azealia Banks. I am a east coast kinda guy after all (I prefer the grittier and darker sound). The Harlem rapper may not be my top rapper but she is up there. You will know her for the single "212" featuring Lazy Jay but what you may not know is that she's been releasing music sing late 2008, originally under the name 'Miss Bank$'. My favourite Azealia Banks song is the 2014 single "Heavy Metal and Reflective".
Dominique Young Unique
I also love the lesser known pop-rappers, you'll recognize their music if you don't recognize their names. Dominique Young Unique has a great, like the name says, unique sounding voice. Her debut single as lead artist "Throw It Down" in 2014 was a fantastic song.
M.I.A.
It's not only Americans doing well with rap in the charts, London born M.I.A. is big world wide and if you know who she is then you're cool. She's more experimental than any the others I've written about and I love the way she combines many different styles of music.
Angel Haze
Angel Haze is another one of my favourites though they're not well known in the UK. Haze has a more traditional rap style and it's bad-ass. It's no surprise that they're from Detroit, the home of many of the best rappers, Haze included. I love the song "Werkin Girls", I love it's pure gangsta style.
Cleo.
One of my favourite genres of Hip Hop is the London Grime scene and one of my favourites in the genre is Cleo. (formally Mz Bratt). She's released consistently good but largely unknown singles since 2009 starting with the pretty funky "Who Do You Think You Are?".
Baby Blue
My personal favourite British female rapper is Baby Blue. She is known for her work with singer Estelle and collaborations with John Legend, Madness, Sway, Shystie, Ms. Dynamite and Lady Sovereign. You might know her masterpiece of a song "Bump".
Awkwafina
Then there's the lesser known and comedy rappers that make up part of the alt-pop genre, one of the funniest is Awkwafine of New York. She's a great rapper and her songs are both good and funny, check out "Daydreaming".
Kreayshawn
Kreayshawn is one of my favourites and she seems to be one of the most popular of the lesser known rappers and when you hear songs like "Go Hard (La.La.La)" its easy to see why. She has a great sound with catchy songs and a great style.
Ruby Ibarra
Ruby Ibarra is a pretty talented and little known Filipino American rapper. Like many of the best rappers, she spits about her life in an old school style. "Fallin' Down" and "The Cypher" with SLTG are highlights.
K.Flay
K.Flay is my favourite female rapper and possibly my favourite rapper in general. I love her voice and alternative style and I love the fact that she can play a large amount of instruments. Her rap career actually started out as a parody of popular rap songs, making fun of the bigotry and sexism a lot of rap artists get away with. Then it turned out she was really good and the rest is history. "Cops" is one of my all time favourite songs, it features pretty heavily on my playlists. And "Rawks" is one of the best rap songs I've heard for years.
Gangsta Boo
Gangsta Boo, also known as Lady Boo is one of the best gangsta rappers I've heard. She was a member of one of the best rap groups Three 6 Mafia (1995-2001, 2013-2014). She's more suited to the hardcore gangsta rap fans, A personal highlight for me is "Just Anotha Crazy Click" - Three 6 Mafia feat ICP & Twizitd.
Tkay Maidza
Tkay Maidza is an Australian singer and rapper, born in Zimbabwe. I must admit this girl is new to me too but I love the way she flows, it's so fast and smooth. I'm surprised "M.O.B." isn't more popular than it is.
Jean Grae
Jean Grae is another rapper with a great old school style, which is no surprise if you know she's been an underground rap star since the late 90s. "My Crew" is a great old school track.
Rapsody
Rapsody is another I've not long discovered but I love every song I've heard so far and as she says she does seem to be one of the best rappers, female or otherwise. "Dark Knights" is a personal favourite.
Lauryn Hill
Now if you where a hardcore rap fan you'd probably forgive someone for not knowing about the girls I've mentioned so far as they are new, alternative or underground stars but what about the classics that have been big since the 90s. Lauryn Hill for example, one of the biggest names in music and the singer and rapper on one of the most famous female rap songs ever, "Doo-Wop (That Thing)".
Missy Elliott
Then there's the freakin' awesome Missy Elliott who's behind actual hip hop anthems like "Work It" and "Get Your Freak On".
Eve
You can't have a list of female rappers without Eve, who you may know as 'the woman that does some rap bits on some pop songs from the 00s but she's much more than that. She's one of the best rappers ever. She has a lot of great solo songs and she clearly still has it judging from the epic 2013 release "EVE".
This has been the largest post I've done and the first one I've done in a while, it's because I feel passionate about the subject. I believe there should be more respect and love for female rappers as well as more recognition because it's been too long that people have been talking shit about women in certain roles in music including rap. Even most girls that like Hip Hop have no idea about most of the women on this list and that's a sad thing. I mean all these women are fantastic at what they do and I hope the amount of women getting into rap continues to rise. Especially since a lot of famous male rappers are pretty crap these days (the new ones, not the ones that have been around for a while).
I've recently and finally been able to play the God of War franchise on PS3 and I've read the basic plot of the 2 PSP games and I loved the story. My only problem with this set of games is that there are rumors of a new game coming out and that bad thing about that is that the rumors say the game will be a reboot of the first game. Now that's not needed, there are a few things that need a reboot or a remake (Power Rangers) but God of War is definitely not one of them. If another God of War game is to come out it should definitely be a sequel and this is my own opinion of what that game should be.
At the end of God of War III we are lead to believe it's the end of Kratos but he has died a few times before and at the end of the credits we are shown that his body has gone but we didn't see it explode or turn to ash like the other main characters that die. The game also repeats that he will forever be haunted by what he's done no matter what happens.
Mysterious Angels
Now what I'd do is have Kratos come around in a lovely looking part of Earth and he thinks he's reached the fields of Elysium but it turns out he's been "saved" by a group of god-like people, some of whom look like angels. One in particular claims he is the rightful and one true God. He claims that if Kratos helps him hunt down and murder the remaining Olympians, Titans and other powerful creatures from Greek myth that he can re-unite Kratos with his family. We'd also find out that these new 'gods' have already successfully killed a few of the minor gods (throw in a few names people might recognize like Eros and Pan).
Eros
Pan
Apollo
Early boss battles could include well known gods like Apollo and Artemis. I'd say round about the halfway point of the game you'll be re-united with Prometheus, who has conveniently just came from the underworld where he learnt of this new guy who has Kratos' family captive. Guess who it is? It's Satan and not only is it Satan it's the guy from the beginning. And the angels? Yup, actually demons. Maybe the 7 Princes of Hell (That would give us a Titan-sized boss fight in the form of the massive Leviathan, the demon of envy). Now Kratos joins forces with Prometheus and goes after the latest bunch to betray him.
Leviathan
Satan
After all the violence is done with Prometheus would take role of top god. After all there is no other old god more like the common image of the Christian god than Prometheus, he's a wise old-looking muscular man in a toga with a beard who created mankind in his own image and who's greatest crime was loving mankind too much (after all they are all his children) and coming to our rescue when we needed rescuing the most. As for Kratos, it would make sense if he was to end up guarding Hades to make sure no one he's messed up gets out. An ending like this would be a great finale and leaves it open for potential sequels.
Smosh Games recently done another 'games that need to be made' video and it got me thinking about my want for a Predator RPG. This is something I've been saying for many years. When I first wished for it the technology wasn't there to make it, or at least make it good. Now we have everything needed to make this game and it has the potential to be one of the best games ever. Think about a space exploration game like Mass Effect with the collectible orientated game-play of Assassins' Creed. You could even have space battles, upgrade your ship and change its appearance.
The game would also need the customization of an Elder Scrolls game. We've learned from the movies and games that already exist that there are many different types and clans of Predators. We should have a system where we create and upgrade a character (like in Skyrim), customize your clan (similar to the saints row gang customization) then pick a side in a multi-faction war taking place between alliances of Predator clans fighting for dominance, get some political strife in there for a reason to play the game.
Another thing you'd need in a Predator RPG is the most obvious thing you'd need, a hunting system where you go to different planets (maybe even Earth) and hunt down the most dangerous beasts and best warriors of the planet and take their skulls to decorate the trophy room. This allows the developers to go wild and design any creature and the player to customize their Predator according to who or what they want to hunt.
And if they have the licence for Aliens they could have missions based on clearing out Xenomorph nests and collecting the heads of "legendary" Queens and special types. Basically there'd be a lot of cranium collecting in this game.
I don't normally do posts like this but I think I will from now on whenever I feel strongly enough about something that I think needs written down. I was a massive fan of horror and horror themed movies (comedies and action movies with an obvious horror influence) when I was a teenager. I must have had 200-300 horror movies on DVD and this was when DVDs were still expensive, we're talking at least £13 for a crappy low budget movie. I was mostly a fan of the classic horrors like Dracula, Nosferatu, Witchfinder General, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Psycho etc... Every time I got paid I would go out and buy at least five more DVDs.
Horror movies where a big passion for me and as a teenager all I wanted to do was make movies of my own. However I completely lost interest in watching horrors during the mid 2000s. I was so fed up with seeing the same old un-scary crap over and over again. By the mid 00s most horror movies were all about the jump scares. No scary monster or ghost, no atmosphere and no decent story. That was the norm for horror movies in the 2000s. Jump-scares aren't even a true scare, all it is is a human reacting to a loud noise. Play back the scariest jump-scares you know without the sound on, almost all of the time you don't jump. It's not fear at all, it's just your body getting ready to rescue a child or run away. I hate any movie that concentrates on the jump scares as I find them boring as hell. The other reason I grew to hate the genre I once loved was the amount of 'twists' in the movies. This is still way over used today. I mean it is extremely disappointing and a little soul destroying to invest so much in a story just to find out it was all a dream in the end. I do think, however, that there where some gems poking out through the mounds of crap in the form of Jeepers Creepers, 28 Days Later, Paranormal Activity, The Mist, Quarantine, The Grudge and Creep there's very few Hollywood movies amongst the best horror movies of the last 15 years.
The -obviously- main reason Hollywood made so many crap horror movies in the past 10/15 years is the same reason people hate Hollywood as an entity: the studios didn't care what they were making as long as it made them as much money as possible in the first few months of it's release. It's the same reason every other genre of movie got stale. The greedy dicks in charge seen one movie become successful so they made everyone make soulless rip-offs of that movie. It was the same with remakes. This is why the decreasing DVD and Blu-ray sales resulting in cuts in actors wages is a good thing. This not only gives smaller movies the same chance as the larger ones (as people are more likely to watch it on Netflix, Sky Store or Amazon Prime than they are to buy it) and it stops actors thinking of movies as nothing more than a paycheck. It also means there's a lot more cases of directors having more control again which is always a good thing. Another thing that's happening more often these days is that people who want to make movies for the passion and love of it are making more movies. A perfect example for the horror genre is Rob Zombie who's love of old school horror has seen him make quite a few movies worth putting on top 10 best lists.
The other reason things are looking up for all genres but horror in particular is the fact the people that make the movies have stopped giving so much time to critics and started to listen to the public. Since the rapid growth of social media and websites that allow me and you to vote on our favourite movies, it has been proven time and time again that in the majority of cases the general public want the opposite of what the critics say we want. This has resulted in the amount of jump-scares in movies being dramatically reduced and we've almost done away with movies that end with 'it was all a dream' or 'it was all in a mad-man's head' all together. The first modern horror I gave a chance was Woman In Black which was fantastic as it went back to the traditional way of telling a ghost story. This is what we want from a horror, to be shitting ourselves at every innocent shadow or every time there's a gust of wind.
I hope we continue to have horrors like The Conjuring, Dead Silence and Insidious where the jump scares are few and the creepiness factor is so high you shit yourself every time the camera pans past a door, window... well every time the camera pans... or doesn't... basically all the damn time.
