Dining Room Table Presents: Addiction

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i Hate Hollywood.

So I only write in here when I feel as if I have something at least semi intelligent to say. This is why I have been quiet for the last week and a half. Mid terms and papers have been numbing my brain. Thankfully a debate was sparked on myspace with a good friend of mine Ricky Brandt that got me thinking.

I was quite ecstatic when I heard Beowulf was coming to the silver screen. However like always, I was hesitant as to how good it would be. I posted this online using Troy as an example of an awesome idea turned can to shit through the glorification of Hollywood fucking with originality. Ricky replied to me as if bewildered that I didn’t like Troy. Here’s a little fact about Joe Hickey, I love mythology, and I have read quite a bit of it during my studies. I am by no means brilliant with mythology, but I know my stuff to the extent I know when people fuck up the story. Granted I haven’t seen Troy since I wasted the eight dollars on it to go see it -so I can’t use specific examples- but I know they changed the story quite a bit from the epic poem that I read and was mesmerized with.

After the LOTR series and Potter series, I was hoping that Hollywood was learning a lesson, and keeping the stories basically unchanged. Granted LOTR’s kept a lot out of the books out of sheer size of the stories, but they kept very well with the storyline and did an amazing job, ditto for Potter flicks. So I thought maybe…just maybe.

So there I sit in the theater and I will say at first I am stoked. The 3D is actually very well done, the animated aspects which I was upset with at first proved to be quite engaging. Then I see Grendel, and I was pissed. But I won’t knock the movie for their artistic version of what Grandel looked like. That’s open for interpretation and I respect others opinions on such matters. I am fairly certain that within the epic poem of Beowulf they never actually describe Grendel’s physical features, and if I am wrong please correct me. Either way, personally I did not like Grendel.

For those of us who have actually read Beowulf you should know it’s a three part episodic structure; the killing of Grendel, the killing of the mother, and the killing of the dragon. Now I haven’t read Beowulf since last semester (yet I know the story well) but I don’t feel like researching to double check my Beowulf story, so if I am wrong as always correct me and I will gladly retake everything I am about to say.

The first episode is amazing, and done almost for verbatim from the original epic, they even incorporate the swimming story where Beowulf slays the water serpents, which I honestly thought would have been left out. Kudos, so far so good, it really has been awesome thus far.

Then we meet the mother and this is where one of the most ancient and well known epics turns from an epic to a fucking episode of Jerry Springer. From this point out the writers rewrite the Beowulf tale and turn it into a modern shitty version of broken family structure, jerry Springer episode, with a revenge tale tossed amidst. They make Beowulf flawed in so many ways he completely looses his epic heroism.

This is Beowulf, an epic hero! He is supposed to have certain personal characteristics that make him the amazing hero that can battle a demon with no armor or sword. But oh no! I know exactly what Hollywood was thinking…and their fucking idiots. We have to make Beowulf more modern, he needs to be flawed, and he needs to represent modern society so the viewers can relate to him. All fine ideals when creating a movie, except one that already been written and has already passed the test of time! Nothing any Hollywood writer will ever write will ever be greater then Beowulf, you dumb bastards. Way to destroy one of the most beloved stories known in mankind? Way to ruin it you fucks.

How does everyone else feel about this? Agreed? Disagree?

Gamers

This isn't going to be much of a blog, more of a shout out and a push for a good friend of mine who has created an awesome gaming site.

http://www.digitalsomething.com

its already getting 300 hits a day and growing.

For those of you who don't know i am an avid gamer and a lot of my fantasy writing is very influenced by the japanese culture that i have been exposed to through role playing games such as the Final Fantasy Series, Chrono Trigger, Suikoden, amongst others.

Currently i am playing:
-Eternal Sonata
-Final Fantasy Tactics (remake for psp)
-Alot of NBA 2k7

And as alway you are able to read the first few chapters of my novel for free through my storefront: www.lulu.com/ackio

if you like what you read you can purchase it online, or if you know me personally get ahold of me, i sell them myself for 15 dollars, and that will benifit us both moreso.

thanks again!

I will be doing a legit post on something within the next few days so keep coming back!

-Joe