Da Dominion: Home of DOMINIONCAST!

OK, so Frank Miller is starting to slip a bit.

I say this after having just seen his latest comic adaptation to the big screen, The Spirit. A movie that makes up what it lost in tension with lots of ass … and I mean a lot of ass. A shame it still doesn’t compensate.

Did you see Sin City? Great flick wasn’t it? It had a new illustratively gritty style of shooting and a series of interconnected stories that captured the pathos of the characters. The Spirit has Pathos, a henchman to the big bad guy played to comic relief effect ably by Louis Lombardi (Edgar from 24), but that’s the only pathos it has.

The Spirit, former slain cop Denny Colt turned charismatic vigilante golden age heroic zombie, warrants none. He’s unkillable, super athletic, and gets to fight for justice above the law and EVERYONE with a vagina wants him in it - even death itself is wet for him. Protecting Central City - named this only because Gotham is still taken - is his only committed relationship though . Sad, if he didn’t spend most of his time hitting on everything and stringing along the love interest/cop commissioner‘s daughter Dr. Dolan.

Ever catch 300? Good flick wasn’t it? A dramatically epic vision of one of the greatest military battle in history was crafted. Leonides was defending his freedom from a freakishly alien but ambitious foreign conqueror Xerxes. Pose Fu action done masterfully in each bloody combat scene. Samuel Jackson plays the nemesis of the Octopus, a stylistically insane mad scientist with the same powers as the Spirit, whom he created by experiment. He’s named for the cephalopod cause his tentacles are everywhere … supposedly. The name fits cause he’s mentally everywhere. He’s some kind of super pimp in the first scene, samurai in the next, Nazi officer then Cossack. Character concept is obvious: let’s play dress up with badass Sam Jackson, muthafucka!

The Spirit does Rapid Fu combat direction mostly, not very herky jerky but lots of pans to the shadow of what’s going on when he‘s beating the hell out of the 12th stupid clone of Lombardi. Otherwise, it’s mainly The Spirit getting shot by somebody until he needs to catch his breath whistling through multiple bullet holes like Daffy Duck when he takes a drink of water and it fountains out. Very cartoony violence abounds. When Jackson hits him with a toilet in the beginning you catch the theme.

The pluses are plus sized hips all through out. Eva Mendes. Scarlett Johansson. I was very disappointed when they couldn’t find walk on roles for Vida Guerra nor Kim Kardashian. The best scene was when our hero tracks the jewel thief Sand Seref (Mendes, cause Latin Wide Bottom isn’t a font name) through the city by showing a Xerox of her butt. It and Silken Floss’ (Johansson) chestiness were the highlights.

Wait for the DVD, and make sure your pause button is strong.

The New Years brings good news: Fantasy Action has returned to TV!

Stop! I didn’t mean the Spice Channel - or other spank channels for that matter. I mean by Fantasy that genre of fiction that infuses it’s plot, theme or setting with the supernatural unfettered by advanced technology (Sci-Fi) or the macabre (read “muh-COBB-bruh” as in Horror). Lord of the Rings type shit, for the mundane minded.

The program is actually the aforementioned Legend of the Seeker, which was surveyed for excellence in its premiere early November. Seven episodes into its first season, it has bound over several pitfalls of past TV sword and sorcery predecessors to grasp the Obsidian Ring of Dominion Approval. Why not brass ring? It’s clichéd. Obsidian is hard, black, smooth and sharp - like our humor. Brass is more expensive than the brittle volcanic glass, we can’t afford it - but you can! Check our store for the Obsidian Chakram of Approval ™ coming soon! WARNING: chakram is too sharp to be held with human hands. Side effects include loss of fingers, acute pain in the fingerless hand and bleeding from the hands.

Legend of the Seeker, from the producers of Hercules and Xena, based on the Sword of Truth novel series by Terry Goodkind, is a worthy representative of both sets of artist. The first temptation it refused was camera winking. There were a lot of times in Herc and Xena when the comic relief in effect said, “this is just fun fantasy myth.” A lonely Cyclops is angry cause he hasn’t had a date in centuries. I can relate to that shit! Har har hee.

Seeker has avoided a lot of this disbelief strain by not doing monster o’ the week. The central conflict is rightfully focused on Richard Cypher being the first True Seeker in hundreds of years. One day he’s chopping wood shirtless, as a young farmer’s son is expected to do when you’re trying to rope a decent number of female viewers - by the way, writing a blog shirtless doesn’t have the same effect - now he’s the savior of the world with everybody expecting big things of him. His Obi-Wan, the wizard Zeddicus Zu’l Zorander (alliterative name: + 50 pts), is always harping on how he has to become this mythical revolutionary heroic warrior leader in a way that imparts gravity of destiny more concretely than “here’s a light saber, let’s go to Alderaan”. They must overthrow the evilly named Darken Rahl, tyrant of the West, East, Mid, left, and corner adjacent lands of New Zealand - or whatever world the Big Kiwi is meant to model.

On the action front, they’ve kept with the Pose Fu to great effect. Another annoying Fantasy trope they’ve dodged is the cartoon violence. There’s no breaking vase over bad guy’s head or disarming to take them out of the fight. They successfully walk the safe side of the gore line, but the Sword of Truth does cleave many a baddy. Zeddicus burns evil men, not CG monsters, to death with his spells. Specifically, two dagger wielding Kahlan the Confessor whirls like dervish with cuts to the joints, neck and face that leave no doubt whether or not minion #12 survives - unless she‘s cutting extra breathing hole, nah. With the camera safely behind the back of her foes the gore guard is preserved without being lame.

Destiny ain’t easy. They’ve covered Richard having a shot at a normal life in the episode Identity and faced with the temptation of magic abuse in Elixir. Cypher has no time for the fancies of a young lad, and is tragically forced to adventure with Kahlan - played by the pretty Bridget Regan - another specially gifted person with the power to know the hearts of men, steal their wills, wear low cut corsets and bathe in rivers when the Seeker shouldn’t be distracted. Even sadder, she’s not even his sister! Their attraction has developed predictably, but besides inherent problems of sheathing your sword in your ally’s scabbard - her powers make her dangerously untouchable. So it’s not just another “when is Xena gonna get down and lez-out all up in Gabriel” cock tease schtick.

I plan to check out Goodkind’s Sword of Truth once I’m done with a couple of more Dresden Files novels. If the show is this good the books must be even better.

Our very own Tribune of Thought Hunin takes a turn a the moderator’s desk - well chair … actually old couch in the basement - and guides us through this discussion of common Sci-Fi themes and tropes. Wordsmyth joins us again to express his Oedipal fear of the past, and joins me in defending Star Wars. The Chocolate Lady Lira remembers Johnny Five as one of the robot greats. Rib dreams of Beligium buttocks and immortal abs. Me, I swear and bicker over Terminators and fake ten year olds.

Cast biness as usual.

Dominion Cast 21 download (59 mins, 54mb)

Music from fuori quarantena by Miguel Prod
Time Travel -
Big Bang: LoLs-free
Time Cop
Back 2 da Future
Star Trek TNG: Cause and Effect (5×18)
2001 > Star Wars? : Round 1
Rhobutts: reflection of humanity or cool badguys
Post Apocalypse - When lord, WHEN!?!?
Psionics: Mental Car Science
Weirdbadwrong Science: Rise of the Mandroid.

With the arrival of 2009, we take this time to reflect on our progress so far - look forward to future growth - and drink (maybe a little less than Santa here). In doing, so we’ll be taking this week off to not distract you from your holdiay’s entertainments - hopefully not including seeing Valkyrie starring Colonel Crazy McLefty here. Dominion Cast 21 will be going up Friday to save you from curious temptation.

You citizens and lurkers of the secret army have our thanks for your readership, listenership and feedback. We resolve to become bigger yet sleeker, expansive yet focused, insightful yet ridiculous. Some tweaks to the site will become evident. You’re free to peek and comment as they’re made.

You are wished luck on your own resolutions, until you give them up February first. HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Egg Nog and Japanese beer fueled ramblings about holiday movies, Oscar season and snatch. If there’s any cast to put the parental locks on, it’s this one. Rib, Hunin, The Chocolate Lady, Felicia and myself have a merry time in this our last recording of the year. Hope you enjoy! … and forgive us.

Dominion Cast 20 download: 67 mins. & 61MB

Music from Les Stances Sibyllines by Niconoclaste and fragments of stories by Wasaru
Snatch for the Holidays
Favorites: Elf, Friday after Next, Home Alone, Dick in a Box
The Gift of Roots (Rutz)
Who the hell is Elizabeth Pena
Feliz Navidad
Oscar Buzz: Furry Aussie, bub.
Cadillac Records? Mos Def is the other one, playing Chuck Berry
The Spirit of the Season
Lady Blockbusters
Make bread, not Guiness
Four Christmasezzzzzzzzzz