Tonight, the dolls come out to play.

Then

The Slayer

March 10, 1997

The Vampire

October 5, 1999

The Independent

September 20, 2002

The Doctor

July 15, 2008

Now

The Doll

February 13, 2009

9:00pm

Dr. Horrible on my Doorstep

I finally scrounged for $10.50 and ordered the DVD of Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog on Amazon. I came home yesterday to find that it had arrived on my doorstep!


More than re-watching the film, I look forward to viewing it with Commentary the Musical featured on the DVD. I've heard good things about it and if you don't yet have the DVD, much of the Commentary is available on YouTube. Whedon has said that it actually took twice as long to make it than the 45 minute piece itself!

Visions of Warcraft

I used to play the first Warcraft game back in 1997. Back then, the world of Warcraft was fairly, based on the same platform as many other popular games in the mid to late 90s such as Command & Conquer. The player built forts and bases, spawned soldiers, waged mini-battles from an all-seeing perspective. World of Warcraft completely changed that basic gaming structure to something far more dynamic.

Engineers at Blizzard really did create a world and though I have not played the "new" incarnation of Warcraft, being the geek that I am, I would say I am fairly well entrenched in the kind of social circles where players of the game are common. I even had the game installed on my computer for a good period of time when my roommate and our mutual friend would have WOWnights that involved them playing in my roommate's room and mine respectively, yelling across the apartment as they sought after powerful artifacts, completed missions and walked around the digital world created for them in the Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game.

Naturally, there has been talk of making a cinematic adaptation of the game for some time. In 2006 Legendary Pictures-Batman Begins, 300 and Superman Returns-announced that they would bring World of Warcraft to the screen in 2009. With 2009 just around the corner, it doesn't look like that will happen at this point. the A trailer for the newest World of Warcraft expansion, Wrath of the Lich King, however, does give us a taste for what a live action World of Warcraft movie would be like.



If an eventual WOW movie does look like this, I will definitely be there. What I love about this kind of storytelling is that it is rooted in pure fantasy. Even the environments are lavish, outlandish. Colors are richer, magic is a given. Other fantasy films have come close but are still for the most part, highly mainstream features and rarely have as bold of styling I think true fantasy media necessitates.

In other online-role-playing-game news, I just discovered the web series, The Guild, which explores the clash of the online and real life with always comedic results. The series is penned by Felicia Day, newly in the spotlight after her role as Penny in Dr. Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog. In fact, some of the humor in The Guild is reminiscent of that on Dr. Horrible. Felicia Day also runs a blog on her own site.

I give you the first episode of The Guild:



I watched all ten episodes of the first season of The Guild-which is available on DVD-with a friend of mine who is going to start to play World of Warcraft. I suppose that in making him watch the show I was poking a little fun at him for playing but I feel that I can do so only because I have plenty of geeky obsessions of my own (see: model lightsaber above my television).

He's going to be a Paladin.

A Gnome Paladin.

Keep an eye out.

Talented Kid

An acoustic rendition of one of my preferred songs from Dr. Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog, "My Eyes/On The Rise."



And the lyrics so you can have your own sing-a-long in your bedroom in your underwear tonight:

My Eyes

Any dolt with half a brain

Can see that humankind has gone insane

To the point where I don’t know if I’ll upset the status quo

If I throw poison in the watermain.

Listen close to everybody’s heart

And hear that breaking sound

Hopes and dreams are shattering apart

And crashing to the ground

I cannot believe my eyes

How the world’s filled with filth and lies

but it’s plain to see evil inside of me

is on the rise.

Look around

We’re living with the lost and found

Just when you feel you’ve almost drowned

You find yourself on solid ground

And you believe there’s good in everybody’s heart

Keep it safe and sound

With hope you can do your part

To turn a life around

I cannot believe my eyes

Is the world finally growing wise

Because it seems to me some kind of harmony

Is on the rise

Horrible: Anyone with half a brain

Penny: Take it slow

H: Could spend their whole life howling in pain

P: He looks at me and seems to know

H: Because the dark is everywhere and

P: The things that I’m afraid to show

H: Penny doesn’t seem to care that soon the dark in me is all that will remain

P: and suddenly I feel this glow

H: Listen close to everybody’s heart

P: And I believe there’s good in everybody’s heart

H: and hear that breaking sound

P: keep it safe and sound

H: Hopes and dreams are shattering apart

P: With hope you can do your part

H: And crashing to the ground

P: To turn a life around

H: I cannot believe my eyes how the world’s filled with filth and lies

P:I cannot believe my eyes how the world’s finally growing wise

H: But it’s plain to see evil inside of me is on the rise

P: And it’s plain to see rapture inside of me is on the rise

Who else is looking forward to the soundtrack?

Geek Update

With this receipt from my favorite comic book store in Seattle, Zanadu, I am officially caught up on the 8th season of Buffy. What I love about season 8 is how cinematic it is. The authors and artists are doing such an incredible job of expanding the Buffyverse and giving its characters the ability to go anywhere and do anything-things that would not have been possible during the television series. At first, I was a little uneasy with how different the world is from what we are so familiar with on the show itself-it was a bit jarring for me to see the advancements in technology and the change of locale. It has been growing on me with every new "episode," and I realize that the world we see in season 8 is a world we only got a tease of in the last episode of the series. It is certainly a bigger world, a more colorful world and we are witnesses to the effects of the broadening power of the Slayer. Season 8, for me, is a clear justification of Xander and Willow's exchange at the end of "Chosen."

XANDER
We saved the world.
WILLOW
We changed the world. I can feel them, Buffy. All over.

Issue number 16 of the series comes out this week!#16 marks the beginning of a four-issue story-arc prominently featuring a Buffy/Fray crossover. I still have not read "Fray", Whedon's comic book about a future Slayer named Melaka Fray. I'll have to pick up a copy before I read this next installment of season 8.

The official description reads:

"On a hot tip, Buffy and Willow head to Manhattan hoping to unlock the secrets of Buffy's mysterious scythe, but something goes terribly awry when Buffy suddenly finds herself transported to an unknown world, and into the path of future Slayer Fray. Buffy creator Joss Whedon teams with his Fray co-creator Karl Moline in "Time of Your Life." Jo Chen and Georges Jeanty join the team for covers. Available July 02, 2008"

In other Joss Whedon news, the official trailer for his upcoming, three-episode web musical series, "Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog" went live over on the show's website over the weekend. The show stars Neil Patrick Harris as the titular super-villain and Nathan Fillion as his arch-nemesis. Also, speaking of slayers, the female lead, Felicia Day, had a recurring role as a potential named Vi in season 7 of "Buffy" Joss Whedon has written a great open letter to his fans-his Master Plan-about how the release of the show will work. The first episode will be available on the aforementioned website starting on July 15th, the second on July 17th, and the third on July 19th. All three episodes will be available online until the 20th. At that point, they will be available for a fee before being released on DVD. From what Whedon has said about the show and the DVD, I cannot wait to see what all he has up his sleeve!

Also, a close friend of mine bought me this t-shirt from the NBC/Universal store while he was in New York a couple weeks ago.

I love it! I wore it last week when I introduced my dad to "Battlestar"-we've gotten through just the miniseries so far. The back of the shirt has both the Sci-Fi Channel and "Battlestar Galactica" logos. It fits well too, which is always important.