Just watched 'Planet of the Apes'

Hah, that's the second fairly recent big budget box office failure film I've liked: Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes, the other being Daredevil. In both cases I came to appreciate actors I haven't so far paid attention to, namely Mark Wahlberg and Ben Affleck.
In both cases I can see why other people don't like them. Doesn't stop me from liking them myself.

If a film sets out to be a great movie, trying to dazzle with its clever message (like e.g. Matrix Reloaded with its destiny drivel) and falls flat, I feel entitled to a bit of finger pointing and harsh criticism. If a film sets out to be good entertainment and amuses me with pretty pictures, good acting and nice characters I tend to forgive minor flaws like predictability.

Actually, Planet of the Apes was unpredictable in that I only ever knew one or two minutes beforehand what would happen next (although more or less continuously throughout the film). That's not too bad. I hate it if I see things coming half an hour early.

Anyway, POTA had amazing apes, good use of camera, decent direction and it was amusing, if somewhat anvil-y. The ending I could have done without. Obviously, the astronaut risked undoing the whole timeline by going back, wiping out humans and apes alike, those people he just said goodbye to. I think he should have stayed put. Oh well.

I've seen worse. If a film like Matrix Reloaded has a script that sucks because all the oodles of money had to be spent on actors and special effects, then I actually get cross. And MR was utterly boring, while POTA was decent entertainment. Maybe it's because Mark Wahlberg wasn't forced to warble on about destiny and time and blah blah blah.

I bought myself some 2nd hand DVDs yesterday, namely Minority Report and About a Boy. I haven't bought DVDs in ages. My DVD allowance usually gets eaten up by all the Buffy and Angel DVDs.

It's past midnight and it's still hot. Today I really wish our house had A/C. I'm practically melting.

Miscellanous stuff

LOL. Check out selenak's post about what people would say if LOTR were a new work-in-progress in this day and age. Damn straight!

Writers among you may be interested in friending dictionary_wotd. I like learning new words.

I had a sucky idea for my flashfic story. I'm getting nervous. Time is slowly running out. I'm not a fast writer so I shouldn't wait for too long. Somehow I'm still hoping for inspiration to strike. I so want a plot. I really don't feel like doing a slashy PWP with characters who've never met. And I'm not sure I want to write something that feels seedy and sleazy and bleagh.

TPTP got nominated for two awards. Yay!
And it got recced (but not seconded) for BetterBuffyFic.

Sometimes, when I write and get stuck I waylay people like ladycat777, lordshiva or wesleysgirl via Instant Messenger to bombard them with questions or whine a bit. Last night when I started to whine, lordshiva asked: what's the problem with pan(dora)? can't they just fuck like bunnies?
*rushes off to write some smut*

More Pandora, still a WIP

I present you with... breakfast porn. Well, actually that's a complete and utter lie, because I'm eeevil, a tease, leading you on. Meaning the REAL smut will happen in part 5, but I'm happily working towards it.:-) Enjoy.

Living with Proteus
PAIRING: Spike/Xander
RATING: NC-17
SPOILERS: vague S7, set post-'Him'
SUMMARY: set in the Pandoraverse, directly after Alatheia's Gift, i.e. post-shag. Spike and Xander are happy together but have an uncanny tendency to look the gift horse in the mouth. Tsk. Unbeta'd schmoop (because mahaliem said I should bring it on).
Many thanks to lordshiva and ladycat777.
Parts 1 & 2
Part 3
( Part 4 )

BTW, I've decided to archive the stories as a proper series, but I need a title that fits all the stories. Does anyone have a good suggestion?

News on Pandora

Just finished the last part of the latest Pandoraverse story. Yay me. Still a bit rough. I'll give it a thorough read-through tomorrow. Does anyone want to beta this tomorrow? I'd like to post it on Saturday morning, so ladycat777 finds it first thing in the morning. I want her to be able to enjoy it, without her having to wear her betaing-hat.
It's pure unadulterated porn. :-)

Once that part is posted, I will take a break from the Pandoraverse to concentrate on other stories. I want to finish my Andrew/Anya - because that only requires a bit of a showdown. And I have to write my flashfic assignment. And then I will finally get down to writing more Perdition.