WWE Wrestlemania III: Championship Edition

Before the launch of the 'WWE Network' this past February, for a decade from 2004-2014 we got its predecessor,' WWE 24/7,' which later got rebranded as 'WWE Classics on Demand.' It featured a random assortment of 40 hours of rotating content each week available by picking through menus from your digital cable box. I subscribed to it for a few years, and back then it seemed like a bargain for $8/month, which is now outrageous compared to everything you get now for $10/month with WWE Network. 24/7 reposted a lot of old episodes of RAW, Nitro, WCCW, ECW and even Tuesday Night Titans and Prime Time Wrestling in chronological order every couple of weeks. 24/7 also had some exclusive mini documentaries each month highlighting a random hall of fame legend, and threw up several random classic matches, but my favorite exclusive programming were their 'Legends of Wrestling' roundtable discussions where several past stars talked shop on a variety of topics. If you have missed out on these classic features, then you are in luck because they are all archived on the WWE Network.

Another cool feature of 24/7 back then was it had recent and older full length PPVs. Usually they would have the most recent PPVs available on a three month delay, but they also had random classic PPVs. To make the classic PPVs a little more appealing for fans rewatching them, they would sporadically insert pop-up factoids and interview snippets with some of the wrestlers on the featured PPV reflecting on their memories of the event. In 2007, WWE decided to give this treatment to one of their most successful PPVs of all time, and also went on to release it on DVD which is the subject of today's blog entry for WWE Wrestlemania III: Championship Edition.

WWE did not go out of their way to give this a video remastering or anything, the only edits they did I picked up on were dubbing over entrance music they no longer have the rights for. The only time I noticed this was for Ricky Steamboat's entrance. Only dubbing over one entrance theme is way better because in more recent years WWE is notorious for dubbing over damn near everything in today's litigious world of music copyrights. As much as I would have liked a few more video snippets of wrestlers reflecting back on their memories of Wrestlemania III, WWE seemed to spread them out pretty evenly so they do not seem too much in your face as we average about two or three interview snippets and two or three factoids a match.

Sometimes the wrestlers have some interesting insight and backstage anecdotes, sometimes what they say has nothing relative with the match at hand, so it was interesting to see what the wrestlers were going to spout out whenever a pop up happened. The factoids are just that, facts and provide nice background on most of the wrestlers and celebrities throughout the show. Combined, they make it not a whole new earth-shattering experience of Wrestlemania III, but a nice alternative way to watch it again. It is worth mentioning this is a two disc set, with the first disc not having the pop ups so you can watch it in its original format, and the second disc having the pop ups.

Fans today are use to recent Wrestlemanias having some type of battle royal, or Money in the Bank ladder match to help get a lot of mid-card talent on the show. Some early Wrestlemanias had a battle royal, but most featured a lot of shorter, underwhelming matches with little or no backstory to get everyone a slot on the show. We get a lot of that here starting with the show opener The Can-Am Connection against Don Muraco & Bob Orton. Other blink-and-you-miss-it matches on here with barely a grudge at stake include The Rougeau Brothers vs. The Dream Team, British Bulldogs & Tito Santana against The Hart Foundation & Danny Davis, Koko B. Ware against Butch Reed and The Killer Bees vs. The Iron Sheik & Nikolai Volkoff. The only highlight of these five throwaway matches are the Dream Team having the most confusing break up of a tag team I have ever seen after WINNING their match and Rick Martel being over-the-top excited about being on the card, and even doubly entertaining in his post match 'gee golly' celebrating. WWE still found ways besides matches to feature wrestlers on the show with several wrestlers making featured run-ins and interference with legends like The Fabulous Moolah, "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan and George "The Animal" Steele not competing, but finding memorable ways to make their mark on the show.

That covers five of the 12 matches on the show, but at least some mid card matches had a smidge of a grudge at stake for a little bit of fan investment like Billy Jack Haynes and Hercules feuding over who had a better Full Nelson hold, and Hillbilly Jim and King Kong Bundy both teaming with two little people each in a debacle of a match, Jake "The Snake" Roberts came out with Alice Cooper at his side to seek revenge in the ring against the Honky Tonk Man, and Junkyard Dog & Harley Race squared off to decide who the real king of wrestling was.

There were only two truly meaningful non-main event matches on Wrestlemania III. One was billed as the "Farewell Match" for "Rowdy" Roddy Piper. Back then, Piper was predicted to have a huge Hollywood career ahead of him after his well regarded performance in the film They Live. After a couple Hollywood flops, the 'Hot Rod' was back to wrestling, but at this time everyone thought this was his last hurrah with many 'Farewell Piper' signs in the crowd as he faced off against Adrian Adonis. I forgot how invested the crowd was when watching this, because the audience popped huge for Roddy's entrance and victory, with even a fan rushing the ring and eagerly shaking Piper's hand before security dragged him away.

The other big mid-card match is the historically acclaimed bout of Ricky Steamboat and Randy Savage for the Intercontinental Title. Growing up I remember WWE Magazine touting this regularly as one of the best ever matches. I must have seen it at least a few times this past decade on other DVD collections, and the match is still good, but it does not hold up that well in my opinion. There are a lot of near falls, with the crowd getting more excited with each one, but today it looks like a random mix of moves with no smooth transitions that come off kind of ugly in some spots. It is still worth seeing now, especially on here with insight from Steamboat and other pop up facts touting this match's legacy, and it was a pivotal match for WWE history which was a landmark for putting more emphasis on the in-ring product than just the bombastic characters WWE was known for at the time.

Finally, we have the legendary main event of Hulk Hogan defending his then-WWF Title against Andre the Giant. This is the match that has the legendary build up of longtime friend Andre turning on Hulk to meet him at the Silverdome in front of what WWE touted as over 91,000 in attendance. Whenever I hear of this match, thanks to WWE repeating this clip on television at least several times a year, I instantly think of announcer Gorilla Monsoon's infamous line, "The Irresistible Force meets the Immovable Object!" The match itself is not a mat classic, especially factoring in the limitations of a rapidly deteriorating Andre, but the crowd was electric for it beginning to end, and Andre and Hulk played off them and had them along for the ride well after the three count. Even watching it on this viewing I still had a few goosebumps reliving some of the key moments of the match like the legendary bodyslam on Andre. Vince McMahon, Hulk Hogan and Hulkster megafan, Edge all provide fascinating insert interviews throughout this bout.

Each disc has a short smattering of DVD extras. There are several, short-but-sweet one minute backstage interviews with talent on the show hyping up their matches. Each disc also has an exclusive match, with disc one having a match between Randy Savage and George Steel from an early 1987 edition of Saturday Night's Main Event and disc two having a battle royal featuring an unlikely winner taking place shortly before Wrestlemania III.

It is hard to recommend this DVD if you can manage to track it down because WWE Network has Wrestlemania III, along with all their other PPVs available on demand. The few DVD extras are not really anything too special, and you really got to go into this wanting that alternative experience with the added pop up interviews and facts. With that said, if you see WWE Wrestlemania III: Championship Edition in a bargain bin for under $5, go for it, otherwise you can save yourself the money by watching it on the WWE Network.

Past Wrestling Blogs

Best of WCW Monday Nitro Volume 2
For All Mankind
Goldberg Ultimate Collection
Legends of Mid South Wrestling
OMG Vol 2 Top 50 Incidents in WCW History
RoH Supercard of Honor V
RoH Supercard of Honor VI
Warrior Week on WWE Network
WWE Wrestlemania 28
WWE Wrestlemania 29

Batman: Mask of the Phantasm

Recently I noticed 2014 was the 75th anniversary of Batman's original comic book appearance in Detective Comics #27 from 1939, so latching onto whatever reason to dig into my movie backlog box I noticed I have two Batman films in there. Perhaps I will get to The Dark Knight Rises by the end of the year, but today I am covering the only animated feature of Batman to hit the big screen that was released on Christmas day, 1993 with Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (trailer).

Over the last several years, Marvel and DC have pumped out plenty of straight to video animated films based on a lot of their hit characters. From what I have gathered online and from other comic/movie buffs, DC treats these videos with a little more care. I have only seen several of them, but do remember preferring DC's work with the excellent two part, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns and Batman: Assault on Arkham, over mediocre recent Marvel animated features I saw featuring the Avengers and another with a Punisher and Black Widow crossover. In the early 90s however, animated comic feature length movies were practically nonexistent.

There were animated cartoons based on Batman, Spider-Man and the X-Men back then kicking in high gear, but they were all part of the then mega popular Saturday morning block of cartoons. Warner Bros. wanted to take their chances and do a feature length special on the booming Batman: The Animated Series that was all the rage on FOX and make a direct to video release, but at the last minute and with less than a year notice, Warner gave the go ahead to make it a theatrical release. So just in time for a Christmas release in 1993, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm hit theaters.

This is a real quick watch at 75 minutes. A new masked vigilante going by the name Phantasm, is wiping out some of the top crime lords of Gotham, and not-quite-accurate eye witness accounts are putting Batman at the blame. It would not be an early 90s Batman animated adventure without the devious Joker being along for the ride, and he makes sure to mettle with Bats in ways never before seen on the cartoon show that only a multi-million dollar movie budget can afford. To top it off, an old romance interest of Bruce Wayne returns for his affection, and that side story of getting Bruce to drop the Batman act once and for all to win over the girl helps bring the running time to a theatrical length.

To be clear, this is done with the same animation style of the hit cartoon show of the early 90s, and most of the original voice cast is here for the movie. Kevin Conroy does the honors of Bruce Wayne and Batman, while Mark Hamill does an exquisite job at voicing the Joker like only he can. I loved the cartoon so much during its original run, and while it was a hit with kids, it featured a more darker and mature animation style that it ended up doing well with a wider range of demographics, and old episodes still hold up splendidly today. This cast is in top demand and returns often for a lot of other recent Batman animated specials and videogames, including the critically acclaimed Arkham line of games from the last several years.

Mask of the Phantasm comes as no surprise as another hit from the team responsible the cartoon. While the plot is pretty straightforward and leaves plenty of hints at who the new Phantasm menace is, it is still a fun ride along the way. Kind of like how The Simpsons Movie had some grander animation sequences with their new budget, so does Mask of the Phantasm with more dynamic chase and set piece sequences that really pop and stand out more than what I was accustomed to from The Animated Series.

It has been a long time since I saw Mask of the Phantasm, but I have seen too many other Batman features in recent years that has Batman chasing after a long lost love interest as one of the driving narratives. So to see Bruce Wayne chase down an old flame in Audrea Beaumont is a little too much of the same, although it was probably a newer dynamic back in 1993. Antagonists The Joker and The Phantasm helps keeps things interesting for The Dark Knight however. As predictable at who the Phantasm is, seeing him peck away at Gotham crime bosses is a delight, as is The Joker's hideout being an old, abandoned "Gotham of the Future" amusement park that is full of his trademark tricks.

The DVD I picked up has a release date of 2005, and this version along with the other various releases from over the years I researched online come with no extra features other than a trailer. This is a little disappointing as I remember a lot of the DVD releases of The Animated Series come with a pretty decent amount of extras, and even a little throwaway 10 minute feature on what it was like to bring The Animated Series to the big screen would have been something that would have went a long way.

Speaking of the cartoon show, a big part of me wants to re-watch the series since it has been forever, but the four season set fetches for a pretty penny online. While it would be nice to own that, I just do not think I want to invest that price for only four seasons of content, so I think I will be happy with my copy of Batman: Mask of the Phantasm as a far more cost effective, yet still highly entertaining substitute.

Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs

3
21 Jump Street
Bounty Hunters
Captain America: The First Avenger
Faster
Field of Dreams
The Fighter
Good Will Hunting
Ink
Running Films Part 1
Running Films Part 2
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Source Code
Veronica Mars

OMG Vol 2 - The Top 50 Incidents in WCW History

What is this, a timely wrestling DVD blog? That is correct, the one I am covering had a release date of August 12, 2014, just over a month ago with today's entry for OMG Volume 2 - The Top 50 Incidents in WCW History (trailer). And please let me point your attention to the cover art I have attached to this entry because nothing screams WCW with only Shane and Vince McMahon on the cover! Yes I know it is from the Simulcast show where Shane McMahon appeared on the final Nitro episode, but still, if there ever was a DVD destined for the Shockmaster cover treatment, this is the one!

Before I can continue, I must go into a little back story on why I am covering a newer release, so stay awhile and listen, or read I mean, yes read! My BFF Matt and I both had a tongue in cheek infatuation with the first OMG installment titled, OMG: Top 50 Incidents in WWE History, from a couple years ago. We saw it on Netflix when WWE was oddly releasing almost all their new home video releases on Netflix streaming day and date with their retail release, they have trimmed back significantly since, but still have a small smattering of releases on streaming if you do a search.

Sadly, neither OMG volumes are on Netflix streaming now, which is a pity because Matt and I absolutely love the so bad it is good OMG theme music. Check out the linked trailers above to hear it in all its glory. It is used consistently while transitioning between each countdown video. Why WWE could not come up with a few other house tunes for a little variety? This music is so annoying, the consistent grinding of the "Oh my god" lyric that kicks in between every numbered countdown video so often that you cannot help but get that damn tune stuck in your head just like the latest annoying top 40 chart topper chorus. Matt and I use it as an inside joke way more often than we should while conversing in reality, much to the bewilderment of others.

Shit-astic theme music aside, OMG Vol. 1 was actually a pretty entertaining release. It does the reality show countdown format, with interviews from a wide array of past and present WWE talent on the most shocking moments in WWE's past. A lot of them were pretty entertaining OMG moments to relive like the Pillman gun controversy, the Montreal screwjob, Bishoff debuting in WWE, etc. A lot of them were shocking moments in a good way, that eventually lead to bigger and better business with a few OMG amusing moments where WWE put their pride to the side and were able to laugh at a few things they could not believe they did like the Brawl for All for example. I have no idea how they determine the rankings for these, but it is hard to resist the intangible force that draws me to watch countdown shows, much like the same force that gets me to easy click-bait countdown articles online.

Needless to say, Matt and I were both jacked for WCW to get the OMG treatment and Matt insisted on getting it right away as we both chipped in on it. Unfortunately, WWE home video releases are getting harder to find in town, usually Wal-Mart and Best Buy had the best selections, but what few releases they do carry lately usually consist of just the DVD format. So the DVD is what we get to cover today, which I guess is not that big of a deal because WCW went under several years before the HD era went mainstream on television.

Now do you think WWE's revisionist history would give WCW the same kind of OMG treatment, focusing on more positive shocking moments that lead to bigger and better things, or just the sheer plethora of ridiculous ones that more or less helped WCW go out of business? If you guessed the latter, then pat yourself on the back because this video is nearly a burial of WCW. Remember in my blog last month on The Best of Nitro Vol 2 that I wished if they did another Nitro release that the producers throw in a few more final couple years of Nitro content on there? Well, I got my wish with OMG Vol 2, but in the worst way possible.

Let us focus a little bit on the fewer, fonder moments they include on here that helped lead to a few boom periods for WCW in the 80s and 90s. The Magnum TA/Tully Blanchard "I Quit" match still is shocking and gut wrenching to watch today, and I was glad to see it ranked fairly high. The surprise debut of Scott Hall in 1996 is still a joy to watch, as was Hulk Hogan being unveiled as the third man that brought on the birth of the nWo, and the ring instantly filling with trash as Hogan ripped on the fans afterwards is still a landmark moment in wrestling history. I still am a little baffled that throwing trash mostly was an nWo thing to do among wrestling fans and that it never caught fire in WWE. I always looked forward to keeping a keen eye towards wrestlers not paying attention and getting pelted with a flying beer cup back then.

WWE got a bunch of new interviews recorded for this release. I have been watching so many recent WCW documentaries from WWE lately that I have been witnessing some recycled interviews recently between this, The Best of Nitro Vol 2 and the new Monday Night Wars series on WWE Network. All is well and good though, because besides getting insight from current WWE stars like Cody Rhodes, John Cena, Dolph Ziggler and others, WWE went out and interviewed former WCW talent that are both on and not on their payroll such as Dusty Rhodes, Dean Malenko, Mean Gene, Magnum TA, Scott Hall, Kevin Nash, Kevin Sullivan, Harvey Schiller, Tony Schivane, and yes, even former booker Vince Russo. Props to Vince Russo for at least trying to defend his many outrageous WCW booking decisions, but that does not atone for you sinking the WCW ship way faster than anyone could have thought.

I am surprised, well I should not be in hindsight, but still the fact that about half of the 50 moments on here are from the Vince Russo era and beyond explains a lot on why WCW went away. The very first moment on the list is the Junkyard Invitational, where a dozen WCW midcarders fought to get out of a junkyard filled with randomly exploding cars and falling obstacles and resulted in several legit injuries. Besides legendarily bad WCW moments like the 'fingerpoke of doom' and David Arquette winning the WCW World title, there were many other oft-ignored over the years bad WCW moments on the list. The quintessential 2000 WCW booking moments usually include something on a pole, like a pinata, a photo of Scott Hall, and yes, "Buff" Bagwell's mom Judy Bagwell, well except they decided to put her on a forklift for her safety at the last minute, and yes all three pole vaulting moments made the list! Thank you Vince Russo! Not to be outdone, there are some early days WCW debacles on here too such as Cactus Jack with amnesia, Robocop, yes the one and only Robocop saving Sting from the Four Horsemen, and of course the infamous debut of The Shockmaster.

I own the DVD release of this, so there are five hours of extra content, which are just an assortment of 21 matches and moments featured in the countdown in their entirety, with the BluRay getting an extra hour of five more full length matches. Some of these are also reused from the same earlier WCW video releases like Goldberg vs. Hogan, and a masked DDP as La Parka against Macho Man, so it made going through some of these extra matches a quicker watch. I never saw the 'Chamber of Horrors' match in its entirety though which was a hoot to watch, and it was also the first time I saw a match with Scott Hall in his 'Diamond Studd' persona. I have never seen the Junkyard Invitational before, so I am envious it is one of the five extra countdown matches in full for BluRay exclusive extras.

Sorry for spoiling about a good quarter of the list, but I could not help myself. Rest assured there are plenty of other very atrocious for the time, but funny to look back on moments to relive, especially with former WCW talent commenting on it in disbelief today. Doing this list in the countdown format with a ton of interviews of past and present stars is the right way to do this, and while I feel a little bad at points where it feels like WWE is kicking WCW's legacy on the ground and rubbing salt in the wounds, I guess they earned the right to do so by winning the 'Monday Night War' so more power to them. If you want a good feature to sit down and crack open a couple of fine Steve-weisers to have a good time with WWE trashing their competition's past, all while watching Vince Russo do a terrible job at defending himself, then OMG Volume 2: The Top 50 Incidents in WCW History is the video you have been dreaming of for years! I am very much looking forward to the inevitable day when WWE buys TNA Wrestling's video library and we get OMG Volume 3: The Very Best of Abyss, ODB, Shark Boy and Eric Young.

Past Wrestling Blogs

Best of WCW Monday Nitro Volume 2
For All Mankind
Goldberg Ultimate Collection
Legends of Mid South Wrestling
RoH Supercard of Honor V
RoH Supercard of Honor VI
Warrior Week on WWE Network
WWE Wrestlemania 28
WWE Wrestlemania 29

Good Will Hunting

I know I am a month late on this, but it only felt appropriate for my next random movie backlog blog to be on a Robin Williams movie since his tragic death last month. When I think of Robin Williams, I try to forget a lot of the unappealing films he has appeared in this past decade, and remember instead how much I loved him as I grew up through the 90s. My first memory of him was vaguely remembering him in Hook, but I have not seen that since it came out in 1992 when I was 9 so my memories are quite hazy, but I will never forget his outrageous performance in Mrs. Doubtfire that I must have seen countless times as a kid.

Williams was amazing in his more passionate, dramatic roles in films like Patch Adams, What Dreams May Come and the film I will be covering here in more detail shortly. I also learned not to count Williams out in a few films in the 90s I went into with low expectations. Jumanji, Jack and Death to Smoochie all sounded like ridiculous premises I thought would flop, but all three won me over. Maybe I should take a look back at some of his recent films, there are likely a few gems in there I probably dismissed too easily. I loved his stand up act on Broadway he put on DVD around the turn of the century, with his bit on how the Scottish invented golf cracking me up the most. Upon reading some other tribute articles online, I instantly added a couple other well regarded Robin Williams movies I have neglected to see in my Netflix DVD Queue such as Dead Poets Society and The Fisher King.

Now concerning today's blog, I looked through my backlog box, and sure enough I had my all time favorite Robin Williams movie in there. It was in there because I replaced my old DVD copy earlier this year with the 15th Anniversary BluRay put out two years ago of the movie I am covering today, 1997's Good Will Hunting (trailer). Today, Good Will Hunting is known as the launch pad for Ben Affleck & Matt Damon's careers as the duo won an academy award for the film for best screenplay, and Robin Williams received one for best supporting actor. However, I did not see the film until 2002, and was not even aware of it until 2001 when a naive 18 year old version of myself giddily rushed out to the opening of Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back, which contained a scene of the mini spoof 'sequel,' Hunting Season, that clued me in about Good Will Hunting in the first place.

Will Hunting (Matt Damon) appears to be another 20 year old party bopper janitor slumming it up with his pals Chuckie (Ben Affleck), Morgan (Casey Affleck) and Billy (Cole Hauser) in the south Boston bar scene. Will cleans at Harvard, where he likes to crack extremely difficult math proofs between jobs from acclaimed Professor Lambeau (Stellan Skarsgard). A local scuffle looks like Will would be facing jail time, until Lambeau steps in and takes Will under his wing at Harvard, and also assigns him to therapy with his old friend Sean Maguire (Robin Williams). Mix in Will's love interest Skylar (Minnie Driver), and Will Hunting has quite the plateful to manage as he attempts to overcome past demons and establish his future.

The first thing that comes to mind about Good Will Hunting is how quotable it is. If you checked out the spoof sequel linked above, the catalyst for that was the classic scene where Will stands up for Chuckie at a pub where a local student is trying to embarrass Chuckie in his failing attempts to win over Skylar which climaxes with the legendary line, "How do you like them apples!?" There are so many other great lines and gags in here, but in case you have not seen this yet I will hold back from spoiling them all here. The second thing is how remarkable a job the casting was for this. Here you have the movie that led to both Ben Affleck and Matt Damon breaking out, and Casey Affleck was not that far behind them either. Throw in established veterans like Williams and Skarsgard to lead the way and I still find it surprising all these years later how this pot of big names managed to have a perfect chemistry on screen.

Another reason I love this movie is just a collection of great moments throughout that keep getting grander with bigger payoffs. It could be Will outshining Lambeau at Harvard, Chuckie telling off Will or Lambeau and Sean fighting over what is right for Will. The best moments though are easily the slow building relationship between Will and Sean. I love every therapy session scene in this movie, as the initially standoff-ish Will gradually opens up and trusts Sean more and more, all leading up to the epic "It's not your fault" payoff that exploded off the screen in a powerful way like few movies have resonated with me before. They reminded me of the also awesome therapy session scenes in 1980's Ordinary People that I hope served as an inspiration here.

Director Gus Van Sant did a masterful job shooting this, as this movie flows and gels smoothly from beginning to end. The transition shots are the little things that go a big way here to keep things clicking and allow ample time to digest all the said big moments of the film. Sant, Affleck and Damon do provide commentary for the film from the original DVD release, and I jumped around and caught about a half hour of it and they are all pretty relaxed and constantly throwing out facts from production throughout. Part of me wishes that Miramax would have included a new commentary mixing in some of the supporting actors for a new take on this anniversary edition, but they make up for it later. There are some other old DVD extras also available including two short production featurettes, a music video and 20 minutes of deleted scenes, with or without commentary from Gus, Matt and Ben. Make sure to give the deleted scenes a look as there are a couple that I wish in hindsight would have made the final cut, and the guys admit in the commentary that they wanted them in, but they were really trimming to make that two hour mark.

There are two new extra features in HD well worth going out of your way to check out. The first is Matt Damon Remembers Good Will Hunting. It is a 17 minute interview with Matt as he reflects and comments on coming up with the screenplay, working with Robin, auditioning for Dead Poets Society and eventually coming to trust Gus as his go to director for the film. The second is just over an hour long feature split up into four parts called Reflecting on a Journey: Good Will Hunting 15 Years Later. Here Affleck and Damon are interviewed together, and later we get interview snippets from Williams, Van Sant and executive producer Kevin Smith, among others. There are a ton of great anecdotes here including Kevin Smith telling the tale on how he helped get the film to be made by Miramax, how Mel Gibson came extremely close to becoming the director, Matt and Ben crushing over the acting and improv prowess of Robin Williams, and what their first trip to the Oscars was like. There is an unexpected touching close to this feature with Robin Williams signing off.

I have no problem saying outright that Good Will Hunting is one of my all time favorite dramas, if not one of my all time favorite movies period. I remember at least a few occasions when discussing favorite movies with friends and peers, and Good Will Hunting is always one of the first movies I throw out there. For fans out there who have yet to own an HD version, this anniversary BluRay is well worth the upgrade for the two new extras alone that go a long way honoring the legacy this movie has left behind.

Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs

3
21 Jump Street
Bounty Hunters
Captain America: The First Avenger
Faster
Field of Dreams
The Fighter
Ink
Running Films Part 1
Running Films Part 2
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Source Code
Veronica Mars

Angry Videogame Nerd - Volume 7

I remember when I first heard of the Internet/YouTube series, The Angry Videogame Nerd. It was around 2004 when I caught a link off an old gaming forum I use to frequent. Initially I found his first episodes a bit too hyped up and could not really buy into the "Nerd" character James Rolfe has been portraying for nearly a decade now. In case you are not familiar with it, you can catch his entire library of episodes on his website right here for free. Basically, it is the ultimate gaming nerd raging out to (mostly) undesirable NES games while on a Rolling Rock binge.

He was pumping out videos pretty regularly for several years, but his output has been sporadic the past couple of years with him putting most of his efforts on the recently released The Angry Videogame Nerd Movie. For the last seven years, AVGN has been releasing a DVD at the end of the year with the latest year's worth of shows. I love the show, and James Rolfe has been doing this as a passion project on the side and releasing his shows for free, so I do not feel terrible supporting the show by purchasing a DVD at the end of the year, and of course Rolfe makes it worth your while by including a bunch of bonus content on each DVD. These last couple years I went in a little trepid into the annual DVD with far lesser shows released last year than usual, but Rolfe somehow bundled in a ton of extras to make his latest DVD I am reviewing here, AVGN Volume 7, another three disc set like the previous six.

Disc one is all the AVGN episodes released from October 2012 through October 2013. Once again, all these episodes are free on the AVGN website. The disc one episodes total out to just over two hours of content and there are far more hits than misses on this release. Ghosts 'n Goblins is universally recognized as one of the toughest and challenging games out there, and it is a delight to see the Nerd go bonkers at its mercy. The Atari Sports episode is a montage of the very first generation of sports games from the late 70s and early 80s, and I can tell you from my playtime with them that most of them are brutally awful, and the Nerd has a lot of fun tearing them apart.

Ikari Warriors was one of the first NES games I owned, and I remember it for its many unique traits like the insanely long levels, unforgiving controls and the A, B, B, A code for extra lives. The Nerd makes sure to highlight all these traits and more as he busts out his occasional coop gaming partner and theme song composer, Kyle Justin to suffer along with him in a classic episode. There is one other episode on here though that just barely squeezes by as my favorite on this disc, which is an episode dedicated to Tiger Games. That is correct, if you grew up in the 90s like me you know what I am talking about, those godawful LED games our parents gobbled up for us for $20 that are based on nearly every license imaginable. And yes, the Nerd makes sure to dedicate precious time and hatred towards other Tiger atrocities like the 'late to the GameBoy party,' Tiger Game.com and 'yes, we even tried to rip off the Virtual Boy,' Tiger R-Zone.

Disc two is the first bonus disc, and the main attraction here is a near half hour long feature where Rolfe profiles his own account of the 16-bit wars between the Genesis and Super Nintendo. James is not in character for this video, but still makes it interesting by splicing in old home movies of him reciting old Nintendo Power passages as an eight year old on why Nintendo is the superior brand. There is plenty of classic 'Sega Does What Nintendont' propaganda featured in here, and Rolfe does a fine job at making his own to show what devastating fuel Sega was unleashing on the playgrounds during the 16-bit wars. It is a fun video that brought back a ton of memories growing up. Also on disc two is a mini commentary on the year in general, not on each video, but on how the year went for James and what went on in making each episode. Rounding off disc two is outtakes from a handful of episodes, the annual tour of the Nerd room with the latest additions, and several assorted collection of clips from Q&A Panels James Rolfe attended throughout the year.

I do not know who put them together, if it was James himself, or a group of fans or the gang at screwattack.com that AVGN is associated with, but disc three is made up entirely of a series of top 10 moments throughout the history of the show. There is around 20 of these top 10 videos, totaling just over a whopping three hours in length. At first I thought this seemed like a throwaway extra to pad out the DVD set, but it was great relieving many classic moments of the 110+ episodes of the show. Some of my favorite clip collections on this disc I recommend first checking out are the 10 Worst NES Games, 10 Worst Endings and 10 Worst Consoles.

Again, I only picked this up because I am a huge fan of the show and want to support James to keep the videos coming. It is also nice to have a tangible back up copy on the shelf too with some exclusive extras. One more time, if you are not that familiar with the show, I linked to a lot of the videos in this blog, so make sure to watch any or his entire collection for free on the AVGN website before you decide on ordering some of the DVDs. If you have ordered past DVDs though and were a little skeptical on the content to value ratio on this release, then rest assured that AVGN Volume 7 does not disappoint and is packed with nearly as much content as past releases. Yeah, there are not as many main AVGN episodes as before, but the extras easily make up for it.

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