Aberro Specus

It’s not too frequently that I geek out on here, in the  common sense of the word. I am a geek though. I enjoy comics, sci-fi and fantasy novels and movies, etc. And currently, I have something very awesome to geek-gasm over.

A little while ago, George R.R. Martin’s fantasy series, A Song of Ice and Fire, was picked up by HBO for a series, starting with the first novel, A Game of Thrones. Martin has posted a little about the goings on of this deal on his blog, Not A Blog. After picking a director and writer, they went into chosing film locations, specifically Northern Ireland for primary filming, and Morocco as a remote filming location (if you’re familiar with the series, this will be the location for the Dany* scenes).

Recently, most of the news related to the series has been about casting for the pilot, and it is this most recent news that has gotten me excited. It was just confirmed that Sean Bean has been cast as one of the major characters in A Game of Thrones, Eddard Stark*. For those unfamiliar with the series, the majority of the plot centers around the Stark family, and Eddard is the father of the Stark children, as well as one of the other main characters (and my favorite) Jon Snow*. I doubt any of you are unfamiliar with Sean Bean, but just incase, he played the part of Boromir (excellently, I might add) in the Lord of the Rings films, as well as a major role in the first Pierce Brosnan James Bond film - GoldenEye, Ronin, Equilibrium (which I mentioned recently), and Troy, just to name a few of the excellent films he has been in.

A few of the other casting choices announced are Peter Dinklage as Tyrion Lannister*, Mark Addy as Robert Baratheon* (most well known for his parts in the Heath Ledger films A Knight’s Tale and The Order), Jack Gleeson (who plays the little boy in Batman Begins) as Joffrey Baratheon*, Harry Lloyd as Viserys Targaryen* (who played Will Scarlett on BBC’s Robin Hood series which I have heard excellent things about), and finally unknown actor Kit Harington as the previously mentioned Jon Snow*.

I am rather excited about all of these choices, in particular Sean Bean and Mark Addy, both excellent actors I think. Besides the fact that this series will be bringing my favorite fantasy book series to film (TV, but same difference), I became rather excited over this when they announced that David Benioff would be writing the script adaptation of the book. Benioff worked on 25th Hour, Troy, The Kite Runner, and most recently X-Men Origins: Wolverine. I thought that 25th Hour was an amazing movie, with some amazing writing, and Troy and Wolverine were excellent movies, so this is extremely exciting - to have such an accomplished film writer working on A Game of Thrones.

As long as they stay true to Martins writing, and cover the intense political drama and character development in the series, this TV adaptation of the books will be amazing, and will keep fans extremely happy. Oh, and a rumor flying around is that they have cast Gillian Anderson (the hotty from X-Files) as Catelyn (Tully) Stark*, Eddard’s wife, which would be pretty awesome if it’s true.

If you would like to keep tabs on news about this, check out a fan’s blog for news about the series - Winter Is Coming.

*The links to the character bio’s on Tower of the Hand contain many spoilers, so don’t look at them if you have any interest in reading the series.

~Ian

For various reasons, certain movies were left off of my Top 10? list, and rather than deal with the angry comments “RAR you left off my favorite movie X” I figured I would just give a short explanation. So without further ado, here they are.

Society Rebuilt: The movies in this list were left off before they are Post-Apocalyptic, but take place when society has already been rebuilt after the Apocalypse, so I don’t see them as survivor  films, but more “What would happen in Y scenario.”

Akira - This movie is amazing, and I struggled between it and “Vampire Hunter D” for my list, but decided to go with D because Akira is more a “society rebuilt” film to me.

Equilibrium - This movie is fantastic, and very well done.  But it’s a society rebuilt film.

The Planet of the Apes (Series) - I know I’m going to get some hate-mail for leaving this one out, but it’s simple really. Just because it’s not human society that was rebuilt, doesn’t mean it’s not civilization. The world was rebuilt and is thriving again, it’s just not humans who rebuilt it. Deal.

Escape From New York - I don’t remember this film very well, but I seem to recall it’s a society rebuilt one as well.

Localized Apocalypse: These movies didn’t make the cut because, while they are Post-Apocalyptic… the Apocalypse only happened in a (relatively) small area, such as England, or America. Therefore, they aren’t world-wide, and I made that one of my criteria in order to shorten my list.

28 Days Later - It’s not shown in the movie, but the rage “zombies” are only affecting England at the time, so it doesn’t count as world-wide. Now, if you want to argue “but in ‘28 Weeks Later‘ it starts to spread to the rest of the world” (Yes, it’s a spoiler, but the movie’s been out for a few years deal) I would then tell you “Yes, but in ‘28 Weeks Later’ they are trying to rebuilt England, it’s still localized, and they only hint at it spreading to France, plus, it’s not the same movie, so shush.”

Doomsday - I think I liked this film. It wasn’t amazing, but it was fun. However, the Apocalypse here only hit Scotland, so it’s even more localized than in “28 Days Later.”

Resident Evil: Extinction - I love this movie. I think they did a really good job with the Resident Evil film franchise, despite them being distinctly different than the games. I enjoyed this movie a lot, and felt like (up until the end) it was a bad ass Post-Apocalyptic film. Then the end happens, and it’s a giant action sequence (I like those too, don’t get me wrong) and Alice is all “I’m going to tear down Umbrella woo!” Now, this probably would have made it to my list, except that, while it isn’t confirmed, it’s implied that the Zombie Apocalypse is only affecting North America in the film, because of the whole deal with Japan at the end… We’ll see in  the 4th movie though.

Currently Apocalyptic: The movies in this list are excellent, and the only reason I ended up cutting them is because they are more “the apocalypse  is happening right now” than Post-Apocalyptic. Therefore, I can’t really call them Post-Apocalyptic can I?

The Terminator (Series) - These movies are excellent, fun, and entertaining. I haven’t seen the newest installment (though I plan on seeing it as soon as it hits DVD), but from the first three I can definitely call these “current Apocalypse” not Post-Apocalypse.

The Day After Tomorrow - This is a damn fun movie. I’ve been a fan of Jake Gyllenhaal since I watched Donnie Darko, and I was  a fan of the rest of the casting. It’s a well done movie that explores the idea of a new Ice-Age very well. However, it’s a “we’re trying to survive while the Apocalypse is happening” film, not a Post-Apocalyptic on.

Television Miniseries: Normally, this wouldn’t be criteria to cut something from my list, but in order to make the list shorter, I had to. There was only one “movie” that fit it anyway…

The Stand - An amazing mini-series based on the Stephen King novel. I absolutely loved “The Stand” and would definitely watch it again, just had to cut the list down to “10.”

Others: These movies didn’t fit a category that I was able to cut, they just simply weren’t as high on my list as the ones that made it.

Waterworld - Because I, for some strange reason, always lump “The Postman” and “Waterworld” together (probably because of Kevin Costner) I decided to only choose one of them, and I think “The Postman” is simply a better film.

Reign of Fire - Excellently dragon-y movie, with dragons, about dragons. Made by dragons (okay, probably not). For dragons (also… probably not). Did I mention dragons? Sorry… inside jokes aside. Fun movie, just not as good as the others on the list to me. I mentioned the dragons though, right?

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind - An amazing anime film, I had the same issues with this as I did trying to pick between “Akira” and “Vampire Hunter D.” I ended up using the “there are too many films to pick, so I’m only picking one anime” excuse for cutting this one. And I simply prefer “Vampire Hunter D” because A: Vampires, and B: It’s dark and creepy and I love that.

Dark City - This movie I actually figured out a category for cutting it. It’s very “alternate-dimension”-esque. This made me decide that cutting it was okay, because while it’s absolutely-brilliant… it’s just “too far out there” for my list. It’s more straight up Sci-Fi than Post-Apocalypse.

Well there you have it. These are all the Post-Apocalyptic(ish) movies I could think of that I’ve seen. If you can think of another one, I probably haven’t seen it yet (I’ll get to it) and that’s why it didn’t make the list. If you think of one I have happened to see that I didn’t explain why it wasn’t on the list, feel free to bring it up!

~Ian