Second Shot

When you see a film advertised as being the best horror comedy since Shaun of the Dead, then you should have high expectation, because SotD truly was one of the best I’ve seen. But, as much of a horror comedy Slither is, it wasn’t quite as good as SotD.

Set in a quiet American town of Wheelsy where it seems most people know each other yet keep to themselves. There’s no hanging around as a piece of space rock crashes into the nearby forest, within which contains an alien creature in the shape of an giant green slug.

Having been put-out by his wife, a townfolk by the name of Grant Grant (Michael Rooker) visits the local public house for some quiet time, until he is joined by a lady who recalls past fancies with him. Stumbling off drunk, they enter the forest and encounter the slug-like creature. And this is where the fun starts.

With Grant acting more and more peculiar, wild-life, animals and pets start to missing, and you’re soon treated to some rather horrific additions to Grant’s abdominal region. The alien wants to bred, spread and generally take over the world, and does this by millions of giant slithering slugs that infect the townsfolk in a rather disturbing fashion. Where the slugs come from, I won’t tell, but needless to say they are revealed in a half-hearted comedic/harrowing scene.

The storyline and plot is easy to follow (well, there’s not much to horror comedies other than the general idea for the protagonists to survive as long as possible) and moves along at a fair pace other the initial setup scenes. The main characters are introduced quickly, with Nathan Fillion (Firefly/Serenity – highly recommended) taking the leading role of the well-like local Sheriff Bill Pardy, along side Elizabeth Banks (Grant’s wife, Starla). I wouldn’t say that either steals the show even if Fillion appears through the majority of the film, and although he does have some good lines there seemed to be a lack of ‘zing’ to them, giving only a brief chuckle rather than a good laugh as he can provide in Firefly/Serenity. I’d go as far to say that the foul-mouthed Mayor pulls out one or two quips short of Sheriff Pardy, yet they are as funny. Whether it’s the script or poor execution, I don’t know – but I doubt the latter as Fillion plays his character very well indeed.

There were some jumpy moments in the film (nicely executed with camera changes, sound effects and music), with a few slightly disturbing scenes but nothing actually that horrific as there was a good balance of comedy and horror. The only thing I found lacking was the comedy, which was there, but not as much as I thought it would be or as strong. I wasn’t expecting anything like Scary Movie (if that can be called a horror comedy), but when it’s said to the best horror comedy since Shaun of the Dead, well, you really have to take that literally. It really was the best I’ve seen since SotD but it just wasn’t as good.

However, don’t miss out on it – Slither is a well-thoughtout, well-acted film by all the cast, and really does take you into the town of Wheelsy. It’s was great to Fillion reprise another role in which he effectively takes a beating but still struggles on. He is very much the next Harrison Ford, and hopefully he’ll be able to get roles just as good as Ford.

Those of you who previous visited my sausageandmash blog will have seen some of my single-panel comics and pictures. Well, I’ve brought them over here but have got rid of a few of the off ones. You’ll find them in the ‘Extras : Comics’ section.

Enjoy.

During a visit to Southampton last weekend, I met up with Nav and showed him my website.  Of course, Nav being Nav doesn’t use Internet Explorer nor even Windows, but chooses Linux as his was of tormenting himself (when using computers is difficult enough as it is).

And this was the first time I saw Second Shot outside of Internet Explorer, and boy it wasn’t good.  Konqueror, Firefox, Mozilla, Opera – none of them displayed the layout as was intended (although I think Konqueror was the closest).  So I’m going to have to think about optimising it for the next most popular internet browser and, by my stats, that’s Firefox (followed by Konqueror).  Although I may just optimise it for the standard Mac browser to capture both markets first.

So, apologies if I’ve had to make you use Internet Explorer, I’ll try better next time.

Thinking back three or four years ago to specific things seems to be very exhausting – writing up 15 entries in a row for the ‘Nav on Art’ project gave me a brain drain that I haven’t experienced since studying for my final year Uni exams.

Anyway, all the hard work has paid off as I can finally reveal that ‘Nav on Art’ is (mostly) ocmplete, minus a few pictures that need to get developed and uploaded. But crucially, the entries for the missing pictures are there for your reading pleasure.

I believe that there are 50 pieces of art around Southampton (at time of photography project, year ending 2003), so that your time having a look at each. For those living in Southampton, why not click on an Art Point in an area that you frequent regularly and see if you remember seeing that piece of artwork.

Comments? Post one on this entry.

Just so it doesn’t seem like I’ve left the premises, I thought a short update was in order.

Firstly, I’m still finishing off the ‘Nav on Art’ Flash application, just putting in the comments for each picture and I need to collect/upload the pictures that are missing (but that won’t happen before the upcoming weekend). I’ll make it available as soon as I’m done with the comments.

Secondly, I should actually finish off the Round England 2005 commentary as well, but I think a change in task is in order to keep me sane. So, I’ll be setting up my Food section shortly, with clickable meat and vegatables to find recipes. Some PHP search-code needs to be dev’ed/found too.

Lastly, I’ve decided to put three new areas (Gaming, Technology and Dev’ing) into the Extras section for the time being. They aren’t something I’ll frequently report into but it’ll be nice to have some sort of documentation.

Cheers

[second time lucky...]

Welcome to Second Shot, and to those who have come before, it’s good too see you again.

Firstly, let me explain something.  Many of you will not have encountered the previous incarnation of Second Shot; it was a project borne from the trial and error of Macromedia Flash.  I had ideas of interactivity and general whizz-bang but it didn’t turn out quite as I hoped, due either to:
a) Flash’s limitations, or
b) my own skill.

Also, one, that Flash really is only seen to be used for static or infrequently-updated information.  Two, that I was going to be linking out from the Flash front-end to numerous HTML files. And three, stylising the font and layout the whole of Second Shot would involve learning two (slightly) different CSS formats.

But you will find some Flash applications here as they do provide a great way for you to interact with my work.  In fact, I’ve nearly finished one and I’ve plans for dev’ing some mini-games for coding practice.

The only other major change (since Second Shot ver.2) is the way in which I’m keeping you guys updated.  Thanks to my sister finding Simple PHP Blog at Sourceforge.net and through a bit of hacking, I’ve managed to set up this blog on the homepage (instead of a separate page, if I had given up the chase).  Ultimately, this has saved my quite a bit of cash from having to upgrade my server account and also makes it damn easy to update the homepage content and the RSS.

Speaking of which, if you haven’t already, grab the RSS (found on the right-side menu, or at the top).  Right-click and ‘Copy Shortcut’, paste the URL into your RSS reader, and you’re set.

Anyway, having gone from one format to another it provided the opportunity to learn and improve my web development skills.  I think I’ve learnt more in two/three weeks than I ever would have, had I not decided to buy some webspace.  If nothing else, I’m impressed with myself.  But if anything on Second Shot is buggered, please e-mail me.

There’s any chance that this blog and website will replace sausageandmash.blogspot.com, my previous place for verbal diarrhoea.  If you’ve been reading that one, no doubt you’ll have found it empty and boring of late.  I generally don’t blog all that much, and when I do it’s quite dull – maybe this time I’ll do a little better, might even do a technical diary for web dev’ing.  However, much like sausasgeandmash, I still want to hear from anyone who reads this blog and/or website, all feedback is welcome.  I just like to know what you all think about it – like I say above, you should take your time here and think about the things you’ve never got round to starting/completing.  I want to hear what you’ve been putting off all these years, or if you’re planning on getting your hands dirty, or if you just want some help with ideas.

Before I sign off, here’s something a little funny.  Take a minute to read the About page (‘!?’ at the top of the webpages), and just think about what you’ve read.  Second Shot is proof that projects rarely go according to plan, especially the first time.  There have been times throughout this project where I’ve thought “sod it, that’ll do”, but lately it’s been about having one last dig to sort out the problem.  From the very beginning, Second Shot was always about giving previous projects and ideas a second chance to bloom and become something that I always wanted them to be.  In fact, you could view this website as a Second Shot project.  Ironic, isn’t it?

Yes it is, Ms. Morissette.  Your song isn’t, however.  Now that’s ironic.

Extracted from sausageandmash.blogspot.com

…in fact, I had some yesterday for dinner. Anyway, You all may well know that I started a project, a new website called Second Shot, a couple of months ago. After a lot of stopping and starting and general faffing about, I’ve finally got it the way I think is best for a long running website.

I won’t bore you with the whats and whys – that can be found at Second Shot – all you have to do is investigate the site and grab the RSS that’s there. As with everything I do, I like to get some feedback from readers/viewers (good or bad) as it can only make things a little better.

And as for this place, sausageandmash, it’s unlikely to get updated. It’s been fun and a great place to vent out, and I was especially pleased with actually getting this blogspot name. So I’ll be keeping it for as long as possible, but ultimately it’s now redundant. The same goes with the Round England, Round Ireland and Round London blogspots, but again I’ll keep those names because, well, because I can. I’ll probably use them when I get round to doing some more travelling (they are the best and easiest way to document things).

Right, I’ll see you at Second Shot.