Rogue One: A Star Wars Story trailer - original stormtrooper costumes? milking for merchandise?

So I just realized that Star Wars are releasing another movie for this December. And it is not the sequel to Star Wars series - it is a Star Wars Story apparently. You can see the trailer here if you're curious.

I just watched the trailer and it is good to see the familiar costumes and vehicles like they use in original Star Wars (episode IV-VI), only now it is in CGI - so expect more acrobatic and over the top movement sequence as we see the AT-AT walker performs backflip or cartwheel etc. Though very unlikely, I'm just saying that they could do that with their current resources. I mean imagine the pilot now using VR to control the AT-AT.

Anyway - I kind of lose interest since I think it was pretty rude that the production team is instead of releasing the episode VIII, they go with a spin-off starring Jynn Erso? I don't know how to spell the name, so maybe that's right. 

Now - I'm a casual fan of Star Wars, by which I watch all the Star Wars movie from episode IV V VI, and I II III, and now episode VII. Saying that, I don't really care the story outside the movie, like Star Wars Clone War cartoon series, Star Wars Rebels, nor the comics and novel. I only saw some clip like from the Star Wars game made by BioWare, but I never count it as the main references of my knowledge in Star Wars series.

So - I don't really understand what's happening with Rogue One. I think it is wrong to say I'm a little hyped to see all the original Stormtroopers costumes and war vehicle, but it goes only so to the point that I realize I don't know who the characters are.

I guess it's good to reminiscence, but I don't condone the milking that the production team make from Star Wars, and this is probably just the beginning. Using similar formula for Marvel movies, Disney probably tries to expand the characters of Star Wars to promote the B-list characters. Maybe I'm wrong, this probably either sink or launch.

Anyway, I'm already a sucker for the Star Wars merchandise, it's already a hobby of mine. With this additional another dark looking trooper and tan looking one, I don't know if I want to add it up for my collection. Looking forward to December, but maybe not for the movie - only as gimmick to see when there's nothing else to see.

Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice - a late review

I have waited 2016 with such big anticipation. After last year we have been treated with some superheroes movie - and have been with the absence of DC release, this year it finally opens up with Batman vs Superman. It is much anticipated, especially since the trailer has been nothing more than going round and round of Batman vs Superman, and Suicide Squad. Dawn of Justice - we all know what that means, finally DC stepping up to the superheroes mash-up on the big screen. Or at least, moving on to that point... since well, it's Dawn of Justice - sorta like the teaser for the superheroes team.

Released in March 24th worldwide, I couldn't be more excited as it is just nearing my birthday. It seems like the studio, production, distribution, marketing, and whole other team has been sync up with the universe to present me with such a blessing to see the release of Dawn of Justice on my birthday period. It was all just a coincidence though, because I don't know any of the production team even on the distant relation, as well as they don't know me. So I guess I'm at least one out of the 7 billion people out there who wishes this kind of things.

However, since I wanted it to be perfect, I wishes to watch it on the most well deserved viewing option I could have, and that is on IMAX. For that though, I have to wait for the weekend to arrive - and it's a terrible idea.

Why? Not because of the weekend - but then I have to hear on the radio, see on the social media and reviews - and it crushes me to see how POORLY it received by the audience. I am one of the people who believes in rating - and it leads to the cancellation of my weekend IMAX experience of Batman vs Superman.

It is nearing a month after the movie has been released before I decided to watch it. On regular, weekday, no IMAX experience - I decided to watch Batman vs Superman on the theaters that still decided to put it up on their list. So I spend some 2 hours - maybe less, to watch of what I think the summarize of few Batman and Superman comic books into this feature length film.

It was NOT A BAD movie, but then I also realize why most reviews would score this movie poorly. Not getting ahead of myself, let's just break it down from the beginning. (I write this review almost a month of the movie release, so I won't say spoiler alert since well, I guess if you haven't watched it until now, then maybe you're not interested on watching it and wouldn't be bothered by the spoiler).

Batman vs Superman starts from Bruce Wayne - that famous story that has been repeatedly told about how Bruce become Batman. Nothing new here - because Bruce's parents died, told in a quite beautiful but quick story rendering, et cetera et cetera - but then we get to see some different angle of clip from Man of Steel, but focusing on Bruce Wayne. Ever since the thing that happened in Metropolis and Indian Ocean, Bruce gets angry, and Lex Luthor is in motion for his plot.

Along the movie we get to see how Bruce is becoming more and more edgy about the whole Superman, and Clark become more critical about Batman vigilance. We might see how this all has been plotted by Lex Luthor - who in this movie I sadly say is more like a successful Start Up owner rather than as intimidating business magnate tycoon.

With more plot here and there, it all sum up to Batman and Superman in the near end forming an alliance to fight another threatening plot developed by Lex Luthor - Doomsday. At this point, when Luthor says Doomsday, fans should know that it will lead up to (Not Spoiler Alert, Read Above Statement Again) Superman's death. We all know it - Superman is dead, stabbed by the bones formed by Doomsday.

Eventually, this made the world a better and happier place. Superman is dead, Bruce is without Luthor competition as he goes to jail, and Wonder Woman is there also - being independent and strong, just like how we see today's generation be. And just before the end, some dirt lift up from Superman's casket.

I summarizes the story as such because that's what I thought could be digested by the audience. And I think, this is not such a bad movie. Unlike the rating that gave this poor review, I gave it actually a moderate review. I'm interested with the new storyline generated, although at few point I rather annoyed by it.

But I understand why this got a poor review, and I think it relieving to know why. Ever since the success of The Dark Knight trilogy, people nowadays expecting a much better rebooted story from the original. I was actually among the skeptics who taught Batman Begins is an abolishment to Batman story, and more prefer to Tim Burton's Batman. It was not until I try to open my mind and saw The Dark Knight quite long after it released, and realized how it has been a great movie started by new cast and everything.

But then Man of Steel, directed by Zack Snyder and produced by Christopher Nolan, gets a bumpy road after it release. Many has been criticizing it - and though I loved the movie, many aren't. Some reviewers even say that it is quite wrong to bring kids to watch that movie, only to see in the end that their idolized Superman snap the neck of General Zod and killing him.

The same reviews maybe also think the same in Batman vs Superman. The thing is - I think people just not ready to see Superman's character is rebooted. To err is human, and Zack Snyder tries to put the element of human in the new Superman character - but then Superman is not a human. Like many who idolizes him, he is a figure of savior. If Batman is the dark knight, Superman is a god-like in a shining armor.

Now we see him killing Zod, being manipulated by Luthor, fights Batman abruptly, and the worst of all - DEAD. Audience by general population must've been like - ease up Zack, give Superman a chance. And I think this is probably what scares the movie-goers, seeing Superman just have been viewed twice ever since the rebooted franchise.

For me, Batman vs Superman is a good movie. A great superhero movie in fact, the thing that I want to watch it again. But then there's Jessee Eisenberg's Lex Luthor that I just couldn't take seriously. Watching Lex Luthor in that movie is just exactly like looking at Jessee Eisenberg. I don't get the feel that it is Lex Luthor he was playing, and felt that it is Jessee Eisenberg tries so hard to play Lex Luthor. And I guess that's all my beef about this movie.

We are now living in such a fast development - and we can see how the new generation has been quickly absorbing the new lifestyle that we are getting harder and harder to catch up. We've seen may things nowadays has been rebooted or reintroduced into new form. Some we accept, some don't - and rebooted character Superman may be among the things may people don't want to see. I think it is great that people still want to see the Superman they once knew. We can imagine Superman in our mind as tall strong handsome man, who always looking up to the sky and smiling - watching all of us with kind eyes, swiftly catch us whenever we fall.

But we forgot one thing. Superman is a born Kryptonian who is raised by the care of Kent family to put humanity first. Superman is still raised as human - and is still just one person. Superman is god-like and most powerful, and putting humanity side in his character is just natural.

-EasyThoughts- Planning an entertainment on a 24 hour airplane trip

So my whole family and I are planning on long holiday in western civilization. And all I could think off is - how to keep sanity during the 13 + 8 hours airplane trip

I used to own three laptops - one is a children friendly use (for my daughters), one is my wife's work laptop and one is my work laptop. Since we lost all three, so I decided to buy two new laptops for us to use. If you read my previous blog, you know I already own one ROG ASUS laptop - and although it is a gamer oriented laptop, I use it also for work which is quite nice for virtual machine and installing several linux server as cloud server ... but most of the time I use it to fight Raiders and Gunners on Fallout 4.

But that thing weigh too much on my shoulder to carry. It is not that heavy, but with all the stuff I had to carry for my wife and my daughters, it is going to be a sore aching trip to carry that thing around. So I decided to use my other laptop - which is more ... I wanna say sophisticated - it's a New MacBook 12 Retina Display 1.2GHz Intel Core M with 512 Flash storage.

I am not going to promote anything here, just speaking out the fact. So please, before any PC fanboy or Mac fanboy begins to either rant or cheers - let's just read it out.

I am an occasional PC gamer - and I have to tell that using Macbook for gaming is a disastrous experience. At the beginning of my transitioning to use Mac, I find it so confusing and hard - the mice is weird as I can't found secondary button to click, the spec is low for high end gaming, etc. But other than for gaming - like office use for example, this thing is quite comforting. Browsing web, typing stuff, looking at movies and pictures - especially in the new macbook with retina display, it is amazing.

All of that though is not without any disturbance here and there - especially with 12 inch display, though with sharp images and everything, I still find it small to look at even to type at. The USB-C connector, which is one and only connector you have for data transfer and/or power is becoming a nuisance as the reliance on flash disk or external storage is still needed (at least currently).

This and all can be seen at almost every other review - but one concerning me is how well will this macbook work by performing a virtual machine in it. Sharing the processor and memory process might not be great for this mac - so I tried doing the other best thing... is to play games on it :D

I have tried several of my games that I had on my STEAM library, most of them works also in mac, but many others not. Luckily I don't need all games, just some games that will took my thoughts from the flight and into the time consuming entertainment. One of my favorites is Civilization, so I installed Civ V and Civ Beyond Earth. Both runs well and good on this new Mac, but Beyond Earth may be needed more resources to keep the diplomatic animation goes - as it is just stood still as it is during any diplomatic interface.

I looked for other games and decided to install Roller Coaster Tycoon 3. As default, it sets on the lowest setting, but as I pushed it to the highest setting - it runs but not smoothly. But still, 20-30fps is not that bad, as it is just a simulation game - I haven't played it yet, only test running it - the draw distance is not as good, it is borderlining to suckiness. But it still run, the animation and all of it.

I want to say Minecraft next, but instead I install another from my library, which is Cities Skylines - and I gotta say meh... even without any tinkering the setting and all it already run like 10-20fps at most. New landscapes with all car running in the background already consumed the processor and in board GPU - so it may as well not the game of choice for this mac.

And lastly - Borderlands 2, and it runs smooth on lowest setting - and I mean lowest. Still playable, smooth running, 40-50fps, but it is not on a retina display material anymore.

So I guess that is it - macbook for me runs well for you to socialize, browse the web, play movie, write a story. Playing games? still doubtful - but okay enough if you are into low to mid end gaming that requires small amount of your processor memory and gpu process. I am still into Heroes 3 - but not to play repeatedly in a 24 hour flight.

But I am stuck, I had no choice only to make this mac be as much as entertaining to relieve me from boredom. And no, I don't want to write a novel during the flight.

Deadpool : a review

Probably one of the movie to be anticipated in 2016, Deadpool stars Ryan Reynolds in this superhero wacky silly comedy satire dark gory action movie. Pretty much living up to its name in comics and everywhere else, Deadpool movie delivers one quirky yet stunning and full story of the character. With long history of how this character's story had been trying to stay survive from the danger of extinction on the live action movie - as well as the disappointing portrayal in the X-Men Origins Wolverine,  Deadpool survives and delivers to the fans as well as general audience as the Merc with a Mouth. And when I say general audience, I mean 17+ - this movie is totally not for young viewers.

So - SPOILER ALERT - but I'm not trying too much of the story here, because pretty much you see in the trailer sums up the whole action scene of the entire movie. There will be big difference with the trailer of course as the duration of the movie tells a pretty short story. And I think that it is, because this movie delivers as spin-off of the X-Men movie instead of being an independent stand alone anti-hero movie (Thanks whoever owns the license of the X-Men and related franchise).

Originally released on February 15th world-wide, in my place (Indonesia) this movie released on the 8th - I don't know why, but during the first viewing, I find myself in the not so crowded audience. Of course it will changed during this weekend - probably, but watching this movie with audience in a country where cynical and breaking the 4th wall comedy is not common, is not that fun. Many of the jokes that I thought funny and hilarious produce low reaction from the audience. I try keeping myself not to laugh like an idiot, but it is hard to do so especially when most of the jokes actually teases the background of the development of the movie itself.

Probably the point of watching this movie is to see what Deadpool would be like in a live action movie. Have you ever played the Deadpool game? I haven't - but maybe the same reaction can be seen from watching this movie with reading the comic book. At least that is my impression of Deadpool even from the beginning of the title and opening credits - the production staff slipped so many mini jokes that is just easy to spot on.

One downside of watching this movie in theater in my country is there just TOO MANY censors that is done in a weird way (zooming in to specific area too close, that would erase around 80% of the viewing) , which later you can view on the red band trailer on youtube anyway. It doesn't affect much of the plot of the movie - but watching that shocking moment that makes you goes pale, could be the roller coaster effect of watching this movie. Again - it didn't affect the plot at all - because the plot is easy and predictable - a story of a guy gets the girl, guy met bad guy, girl get kidnapped by bad guy, guy kills bad guy, guy saves girl.

I felt not a disappointment of this movie, and I think it is the whole point of my judgement from watching Deadpool movie. You finally see the Deadpool you probably know in the comic book, as fan or just as regular movie go-er. You finally can see what the Merc with a Mouth is all about. Most of all - it can get rid of the stain  of the horrendous portrayal of what "Deadpool" has been in X-Men Origins Wolverine.

There will be a lot of superhero movie up ahead this year - but for now, watching Deadpool will be a great exercise or warm up of the superhero related movie, before we are faced with such a huge and heavy plot and combination of superheroes later this year. For now - I enjoy Deadpool - and I think it will be another great year for comic book superheroes movie.

PS: When you watch, make sure you stay until the end of the credits - because there will be something of a Ferris Bueller kind of thing in the end... but with news update from X-Men productions...

ASUS Republic of Gamers (ROG) - a review

I hit low last year after I sold my notebook and some of my item to pay the bills and all, but now I bounce back. Everything is looking pretty well right now, and I have almost completely paid off all my debt. But I do still require a sort of personal computer to continue with my things - so I am looking for one and decided to buy one. Paid in instalment, and not quite sure how it will turn out, but I am pretty satisfied with my choice.

I might have been missing a lot of PC game-playing just by not having a suitable device from Q4 last year to early this year. That is why I thought I need to purchase one that could fulfil the requirements of the era of Next-Gen Gaming. The launch of MGSV, Fallout 4, Witcher 3, and GTA V on PC - at least these are some games considered of current PC gaming... I think.

ASUS ROG probably one of the lineup I could chose easiest. At least for its class and service in my area (Indonesia - Jakarta), this one can survive quite long. Purchasing the one in the low-mid area of the high-end notebook, ASUS ROG G551JW suffice with the current game testing I need. I'm not going to describe long here or a bit too technical about it, but I have been using it for gaming and it is quite sufficient with my needs.

I am not a hardcore gaming, because let's just say I still am INTO Red Alert 2 Yuri's Revenge. Because let's face it, it is probably the best Red Alert 2 game before EA took over and minced over Westwood studios. But for some current game like Fallout 4 can be set to high setting with no problem - at least on 30-50fps can be achieved during gameplay.

There is however a problem for another game, such as Witcher 2 - yes, the prequel of Witcher 3 - on a high setting it achieve only around 20-35fps (probably) especially during camera turn. Now I said I am not going to be technical around here and I stick to it, because there is still a possibility to tweak the performance of the CPU and GPU - but since I just recently bought it, and with 5 more instalments to go, I am sticking to the vanilla version of my current laptop.

That all being said - I do enjoy this laptop. Due to dual graphics performance that is also supplied in the Intel motherboard, this one still sometimes mixing the performance with Intel GPU. Sometimes the valuation of the gaming performance would recommend you to play on low setting, and that is the only thing that bugs me (other than it is pre-installed with Windows 10 and requires some setting to do for privacy and everything else).

Overall - I am quite happy with this laptop. At least it supplied with my needs for work and gaming. Supplied with oddly 12GB of RAM, I installed VMWare for virtualising network configuration for my work and class and the shared performance still sufficient to both work at the virtual and desktop mode. I just wished at least this would stay suffice to the next 3-4 years :)

Hot Toys' Scarlet Witch from Avengers Age Of Ultron - a preview

It is almost been a full year since the release of Avengers Age Of Ultron in the cinemas, and finally one of the iconic character from the series is released as merchandise part of the franchise. Scarlet Witch may not be always known as part of Avenger's team, since the dispute of her and her twin brother's with Tony Stark's warfare as told in the movies.

With her ability to alter reality, she is later known to even change Vision - the android created by Ultron Prime to revive its vision of a new evolved living kind - into a person she would later marry. But enough with the comic book and movie history, let's talk about the figure which later will be released on mid of Q1 of 2016.

I collect figures, and one of it is from Hot Toys. I don't actually exclusively collect Hot Toys' figure (since it is actually quite a bit higher from my price range), but I do collect some worth collecting for. Hot Toys with now promoting its Movies Masterpiece line, releasing many of their products with the likeliness of what can be compared on motion pictures. With many things released now, the production team of Hot Toys are now releasing more and more products that collectors can place the figure on their shelves and adored them to reminiscence of the movies.

After what I saw on their home page at hottoys.com.hk, one figure that caught my eyes is this Scarlet Witch. Portrayed by Elizabeth Olsen in the movies, this figure generate a superb resemblance of the actress and the character on the movies.

What seen in this facebook fan page account, we can really see the resemblance of the character and the actress, at least about 95-99% at the right angle.

Of course it may not have been a perfect, but this figure is the one that need to be placed in the right angle to see the perfect similarities of the character.

Right now some reviewer might already get a hand of the figure and reviewed it. One of them I follow the review is ShartimusPrime in YouTube. Although there has been some cons of the figure, but overall the likeliness of the character and the range of pose it can made is generating a positive reviews.

This might be another that I will collect when it already released. Adding up to some of my small collections of Hot Toys figure :)

Terms and Conditions Apply - how online store is better than physical store

Sales and Marketing are what driven the product to make profit for the continuation of the company. We can't deny that it is actually affecting our lives, and that we live by the influence of good marketing and salesmanship. With the timeline, so these has adapt to more influencing our minds and way of transaction.

Promoting a product, especially in store showcase can sometimes drive us to make a deal of an item or not. With intriguing words and pictures, we sometimes felt like we're being hypnotized into taking an action. Words like "SALE 50% off" or "FREE for any purchase", can make an impulse decision that sometimes later we weigh on the regret and the value.

But of course those words are sometimes not as what they seem to be. Yes - I am talking about the meaning of the "*" behind every promotion word that mislead us. There are many word to describe it, but it usually means "terms and conditions apply".

Terms and Conditions apply may be sound great when facing with legal documents that require times for you to study before making any necessary action that leads to both party bonded by the transaction. This is sounds fair, but when promotion starts taking over to boost up sales, this too can be bent into the likings of the decision-makers.

One thing that happen recently is to cut the middle way through, store nowadays somehow just put a big promotion up front with terms and condition later explained if goes noticed. This is probably one of the cause why people hate doing transaction anymore.

It happen to me just today as I went into this Lego Store at Cilandak Town Square, Jakarta. Sine it is close to Chinese New Year, it is just appropriate for them to put up promotion of "Free Of Any Lego Purchase" with the picture of Lego Creator Chinese New Year Zodiac's Monkey. Being a customer there, of course I am curious about that promo. So I asked the store supervisor there and said that it is free with a purchase of a minimum amount. There it is - the first term and conditions.

I did a quick math on my head and apparently my purchase will earn me that free Lego Creator's Monkey. Because I already did ASK - and the term and condition is just for the minimum amount of purchase. SO there I was completing the transaction, when then the cashier told the SECOND terms and conditions. Apparently the minimum amount is for SELECTED ITEMS only.

One thing for sure is that I will NEVER go to that LEGO STORE AT CILANDAK TOWN SQUARE JAKARTA again in purpose. I even felt it was more of bargain for me if I buy in e-store such as TOKOPEDIA (www.tokopedia.com). One thing I didn't like is how the store supervisor is badly managed the whole situation, instead of apologizing for giving such a misleading info, he instead defending the condition of the promo in which he failed to inform completely.

This is why I prefer online store. They at least put the terms and conditions on writing. There is a page that they wrote long and in difficult words, but at least we have the option to read it first in order to agree with the terms and conditions. Even if they put a wrong remark that they couldn't deliver later, we have the option and opportunity to capture the misleading text information and bring the case to the administrator of the e-store.

People should be aware of this -  I mean online store, it is like a building. You need to plan before you take an action, because your action can later be brought as evidence of what failure of act could lead in the future. Of course there is a tolerance of the failure -  but once you put it in writing, it bond with the condition you have with your store.

I think this should be publicly known.