World Series of Poker sells out

I've lost a lot of money playing poker. Back in the day I was a part of a real poker group, although in hindsight I think they just kept me around for the extra $20 in the pot. We played often and we played hard. Often I found myself exhausted of chips early on and would be forced to watch the others at work. Our table had it all: the trash-talkers, the cheapskates, the hot-heads and the silent ones. We had a few kids that would bring little good luck charms like an old lady on bingo night. Some kids would think they were hustlers, wearing shades and spinning chips across their knuckles, like the dexterity alone would help them with cards. One day you're losing the money your mom gave you to buy bread, the next you almost won your friend's favorite shirt off his back. Really, what I'm trying to say, is that I didn't mind losing my money. Watching their reaction to every flop and river was worth it. Only in poker could being called lucky be a bad thing.

What I'm getting at is, poker can be a spectator sport. There is legitimate drama to be had on the felt of a poker table. The poker community, however, has lost its roots. The backroom game and playing poker with buddies has little in common with what goes on in the World Series of Poker.

The evil empire of poker.

In 2002 the World Series of Poker introduced the pocket-cam. With the inclusion of the pocket-cam, the viewers at home were able to see what every player on the table had. This new sense of drama added to the viewership and made tools across the nation think that they could be poker champions. These people didn't realize that it's easy to know what to do if you can see everyone's cards. And thus, the poker-boom was created.

Before, poker was a man's game. Unless you had a casino near you you were forced to make friends and have an actually poker group. These games were more social, an excuse to drink Yuengling and smoke cigars. A celebration of manhood and friendship. The serious poker players were relegated to backroom games or living in a casino town.

While the World Series of Poker was founded in 1970, it didn't have the following it does today. Back then poker was ESPN 2 kind of entertainment, broadcast between Scrabble tournaments and spelling bees. Poker did gain popularity after Rounders was released in 1998 but even the star power of Edward Norton and Matt Damon joining the event wasn't enough to put it over the top. Rounders is an amazing movie though. If you are playing poker with friends and not one of them quotes Rounders, you need new poker buddies. A true poker player should be able to recite this movie line-for-line.

"Pay the man his money..."

The poker craze started by the pocket-cams and the celebrity tournaments is over though. Whatever momentum poker had is spent and now it's just sailing off the wake of the splash. What was once a noble game is now a corporation. Players that use to play for the honor of wearing the bracelets are now decked out like some NASCAR driver.

Yo.

Poker is a great game but now it's a business. This is gambling, there shouldn't be corporate sponsors. Now every major poker player has an online poker site backing it. Online gambling is rigged anyway. Every chump in the real money games dream of cashing in checks without leaving their computer but it never works. Casinos try and keep you in the building so you can lose all your money to them. Now all somebody has to do to take your money is to keep you in your computer chair. There are two constants in poker: you will lose money on bad beats and Phil Hellmuth will always be a baby.

Such a pansy.

Poker is a great game, nay, a great sport. Anybody who tells you that it doesn't take any skill doesn't know what they are talking about. To quote Rounders, "Why do you think the same five guys make it to the final table of the World Series of Poker every year? What, are they the luckiest guys in Las Vegas?" With that being said, the World Series of Poker has lost it's heart. It sold its soul for a block on ESPN and a book deal for any pro who thinks they have enough tips to fill 300 pages. People need to remember the poker roots and realize not everyone can be an online champion and become a pro like Chris Moneymaker. He is the exception, not the rule. With a name like Moneymaker you know he was born to make it rain.

Dollar, dollar, bills ya'll.

My childhood crush on Alanna Ubach

I grew up with a crush on Alanna Ubach. She was a child actress during the 90s. Her teenage years were spent in front of the camera and I would spend my childhood watching her movies. Not that she was a big actress or anything or I searched for her movies, she just happened to be in some of my favorite movies growing up. She wasn't so much the girl the guy went for, she was more the funny friend of the girl the guy went for. She was funny though and had a lot of energy and I think that's why I liked her.

I first saw her when she use to be on Beakman's World. Beakman's World was kind of like Bill Nye the Science Guy on crack. A scientist that sounds like Steve Martin in My Blue Heaven does experiments for kids with the help of a man in a rat suit and a girl assistant. The show is like something you catch on Telemundo except in English. Anyway, Ubach was an assistant on the show and it was there I first developed a crush on her.

Beakman's World (Ubach is at 00:53)

After Beakman's World I saw her in three other movies. Each movie I saw her in, I liked her even more.

Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit

Still can't believe Maggie Smith made the mistake of being in a Whoopi movie twice.

To be fair, Ubach was just one of many child stars in this film. Whoopi Goldberg, returns in this unnecessary sequel which, to be honest, I liked more than the original. Goldberg teaches an inner city school how to become choir singers whose singing ends up saving the school from closing down. Her students include Jennifer Love Hewitt, Lauryn Hill before she went crazy and Ryan Toby, whose rap group would have one hit that has been stuck in my head for the past nine years. It was a school filled with the 90s idea of troubled city kids and only Whoopi can set them straight with her patented Whoopi attitude.

I always thought the red-headed nun was kinda hot.

Ubach played one of the students and of course, I recognized her right away. She's a peculiar looking girl and hard to miss. She wasn't a big part of the movie but now and then she always popped in with a nice one-liner. She wasn't Jennifer Love Hewitt or Lauryn Hill but she was adorable in her quirky way.

Airborne

This movie screams out XTREME.

The 90s were simpler times. Kids were just misunderstood and every awesome action sequence involved some sort of guitar-feedback soundtrack. Airborne was a fish out-of-water tale involving a super-cool and chill California dude (this guy was the ultimate dude) who moves in with his Aunt and Uncle in Cincinnati. There he befriends bullies who started out hating him and finds the girl of his dreams. Somehow he is involved in a super rad rollerblading race through the city against the rich kids (think like The Outsiders except with XTREME inline skating). What follows is a twenty minute racing sequence that, if any kid every tried to duplicate, would kill anybody on the spot.

Yes, that is a young Jack Black.

The above is the start of the last racing sequence. Don't worry about knowing the context of the race, there is none. The whole movie is just one set up for awesome inline skating through traffic so you might as well watch the best part of the movie. The love of my life, Alanna Ubach, plays the best friend of the romantic lead. Being the best friend of the hot girl she has such responsibilities as telling the girl its time to leave right before she kisses the hero and adding a few laughs on double date night. Ubach's love interest in this film is played by none other than Seth Green, perhaps you heard of him? Anyway its an awesome movie and Ubach has a big part in it. Plus it's XTREME.

Renaissance Man

Get it? He's short!

Similar to Sister Act 2, Renaissance Man is a about a gruff teacher thrown into a classroom with a bunch of rejects and a young Mark Wahlberg who have yet to find their potential. Instead of being about an inner city though it's set on a US army training base. Hilarity ensues as he tries to teach the lost causes about Shakespeare and, against all odds, gets through to them. Think like Dangerous Minds only instead of a Coolio song you have this:

For some reason all I could find is the German version. I'm ok with this.

Ubach plays Danny DeVito's estranged daughter who he reconnects with after he gets in touch with his humanity teaching the class.

She wasn't the most outstanding of girls in film when I was little but she was cute. She always stood out to me and she had personality. Not only that but I spotted her in three movies I grew up with as a child. These were movies I watched constant every time they were on television. I could probably still quote a lot of the lines. Since she was so adorable to me and in some important movies to me growing up, she will always hold a place in my heart. I wonder what happened to her?

Oh my....

New Medal of Honor game creates controversy

Jimmy Patterson will always be my hero.

Patterson once stole a top secret Nazi airplane, infiltrated the impenetrable Fort Schmerzen, destroyed the mighty railgun Greta, destroyed a V-2 rocket plant and stormed the beaches of Normandy. Patterson single-handedly won World War II. Why is it that you have never heard of him? It's because Patterson is a character in Medal of Honor and Medal of Honor: Frontline.

Do not mess with Lt. Jimmy Patterson.

The Medal of Honor series has always been a favorite of mine. Back when I was a kid I never had N64. So, instead of GoldenEye, all I had to play was Medal of Honor for my first-person-shooter fix. This was fine by me.

Medal of Honor was a favorite of mine growing up. I remember the first time my brother and I played it. It was intimidating, the idea of being surrounded by Nazis. I was already an Indiana Jones fan at this time so I knew how evil Nazis could be. Although WW2 video games are dime-a-dozen now, the original Medal of Honor was revolutionary. Shooters were still played only on computers and the move to consoles was still in it's beginning stages. Medal of Honor helped cement the idea of console shooters and allowing you to go against Nazi added a level of engagement. Who doesn't love to hate Nazis?

A new Medal of Honor game is coming out on Oct. 12. This game, however, is the first to leave the 1940s setting. Instead it's set in modern day with more contemporary enemies. In a deliberate move to copy the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare games, Medal of Honor has left World War II. Medal of Honor, however, may lose its identity as it moves further away from its roots.

Guy looks homeless.

Call of Duty was originally a WW2 series. In this distinction it could be said that Call of Duty owes a debt to Medal of Honor. As consumers began to tire of shooting the SS in the face, Call of Duty moved it's setting to modern times. This idea and the creation of Modern Warfare would prove to be a success.

Shooters don't spend a lot of time in contemporary settings. A lot can be found in World War II or space, but the current atmosphere has always seemed off limits. Then came the release of Modern Warfare, and any body that has ever picked up a game controller can tell you how successful the title is. Modern Warfare was smart not to use actual terrorist organizations though. Medal of Honor did not have this foresight.

The original plan for the new Medal of Honor was to play as the Taliban in multiplayer matches. While team names in multiplayer have never amounted to more than "I'm blue team, shoot red team," this addition would obviously get some people upset. Modern Warfare was smart enough to know that a video game involving real, current examples would cause controversy. That's why they went to the trouble of creating a fictional enemy.

Modern Warfare did meet controversy with their last game, which involved a soldier shooting innocent bystanders in an airport. This scene, while creating controversy, also met with praise for its bravery. This is an example of good controversy that creates a debate. Medal of Honor, in it's ballsy move to set it's shooter in Afghanistan, has created negative controversy. The kind that gets it outright banned.

The Medal of Honor series use to have class. Now the series is just trying too hard against today's market. Don't use the Medal of Honor name if you want to make the antithesis of the series. Whether it makes for a good game or not isn't relevant. Even if the gameplay proves to excellent, the game is still a hollow, shallow shell of the brand.

In the end I guess I'm just selfish. I miss heroes like Jimmy Patterson.

Similar 90s movie showdown

Sometimes, two movies with the same basic plot come out within the same year. Whether one ripped off the other is uncertain, but it makes for interesting comparison. What lead me to this discovery was seeing Volcano in heavy rotation on AMC lately. It took me a few minutes to realize that it wasn't Dante's Peak (once I realized that Tommy Lee Jones looks nothing like Pierce Brosnan it became easy). Searching through Wikipedia I found three pairs of movies that were released within in the same year as its doppelganger. Using my movie-watching ability I hope to settle, once and for all, which of these films is better.

1999: The Haunting versus House on Haunted Hill

Strangely enough, both of these were remakes of older horror films. While the original films weren't competition for each other, these two remakes were released within the same year. Both films are about a group of people that stay within the walls of a haunted house (ironically the house in The Haunting was named Hill House). Each respective group try their best to deal with the houses and fall victim to them. However, while The Haunting was made as a serious thriller, House on Haunted Hill is more of a fun house. This leads to a much more enjoyable adventure than the too serious Haunting. The actors themselves seem to be having more fun in Haunted Hill, including the always welcomed Geoffrey Rush. The Haunting was nowhere near as fun. Even with the badassery of Liam Neeson and hotness of Catherine Zeta-Jones (who just became a household name the previous year with The Mask of Zorro), The Haunting was dead in the water.

Zeta-Jones at her best in Zorro.

House on Haunted Hill had semi-decent special effects, but the pace made up for it. The Haunting relied too much on it's CGI for the ghost and because of this it failed. It almost seems as if The Haunting was made solely to show off CGI ghost. This is disappointing due to the fact that the original Haunting was famous for its minimal use of apparitions. The Haunting went the complete opposite direction as it's source material and its a shame because the original Haunting was a very good film.

The only redeeming part of The Haunting was the gruesome death of a relatively unknown Owen Wilson (this scene gets cut on television which is a shame because it's awesome). House on Haunted Hill with it's cheap thrills makes for a better film. If I was forced to compare the originals than The Haunting would win hands down but House on Haunted Hill is the better of the remakes.

1997: Dante's Peak versus Volcano

In 1996 Twister became a huge success. The following year two new disaster movies came out, both involving volcanoes. I've always wondered why they decided to have two volcano movies in one year. There are plenty of ways that nature kills people, isn't two volcano movies in one year a bit much?

Dante's Peak came first and was, according to Wikipedia, more scientifically accurate than Volcano. Dante's Peak takes place in the Pacific Northwest where a town was ballsy enough to name a dormant volcano after an author synonymous with hell. Just like Chekhov's gun the volcano was bound to go off. James Bond and Sarah Conner than spend the rest of the movie escaping the lava. One scene of note is when they are crossing a lake of acid. Their boat stalls and the old lady in tow, realizing that she has lived far too long in this movie, sacrifices herself by jumping in the water and pushing the boat along. What should be a heartbreaking moment comes off as moderately hilarious thanks to the inept film-making.

Volcano made more money and was preferred by critics. Tommy Lee Jones must save Los Angeles from a newly erupted volcano. Although scientifically inaccurate, Volcano made for a more enjoyable movie and had less old-lady-acid-victims than Dante's Peak, making it a better movie.

1998: Deep Impact versus Armageddon

One was an interesting flick, the other was a phenomenon. Armageddon basically dwarfed Deep Impact in every way imaginable. Deep Impact may have been more accurate and predicted the arrival of a black president (enough has been said of Morgan Freeman's excellence) but Armageddon was the entertaining option. The problem with Deep Impact is that it wasn't about mankind kicking meteor ass but instead man's reaction to an end-of-the-world event. Nobody wants to watch people accepting death, they want to see America do what they do best: blow stuff up. That and the two romantic leads were a young Elijah Wood and Leelee Sobieski. The studios should of realized that nobody wants to watch two teenagers profess their love to each other while the world is ending.

Ben Affleck and Liv Tyler on the other hand? Audiences ate up Armageddon because it was what they wanted. Armageddon offered destruction and man's battle back against the huge space rock. Is the idea of sending a bunch of oil riggers into space stupid? Yes, but I doubt any astronaut looks like or is as fun to watch as Steve Buscemi.

I stand corrected, I guess astronauts can be goofy looking.

Armageddon has Bruce Willis doing what he does best, kicking ass against all odds for mankind. There is nothing to cheer for in Deep Impact. Armageddon isn't as depressing, even as Willis sacrifices himself to blow up the meteor (Willis hasn't faced an enemy this awesome since Hans Gruber). That meteor blowing up is for America. Armageddon gave audiences what they wanted. Deep Impact didn't have an Aerosmith song to slow dance to and that is why it loses. Plus, you don't see Deep Impact with a Criterion Collection DVD.

I slow danced the hell out of this song in middle school.

In summation, scientific accuracy and realism be damned. When audiences have the choice between two similar movies they will pick the fun one. Artistic quality is one thing but, to quote Eddie Izzard, "You can't eat popcorn to that."

Cathy comic strip ends on Sunday

I have previously mentioned my love for the comics page. The basic set-up and punchline routine that comedy has hinged on is perfectly illustrated in each strip. The fact that the writer could come up with something new each day would boggle my mind. I find it hard enough to come up with ideas for a blog, I can't imagine having a nationally syndicated strip. While some comics become pop culture icons (the well deserving Peanuts), others crash and burn under their own weight (For Better for Worse got hit with Boy Meets World Syndrome. What started out as a fun sitcom becomes over bloated with characters and their individual problems.)

Towards the end of its run the only funny character was the brother.

Cathy, which has been around since 1976, is a comic that is comfortable with its mediocrity. Like Dilbert, it panders to its limited audience, leaving the greater sum of the readers scratching their heads wondering what's so funny. While Dilbert's niche audience is cubicle workers and Drew Carey, Cathy finds itself speaking to self-conscious women everywhere. Why those women are seeking for answers on the comics page I have no idea. What I do know is, as I grew up and ate my Cinnamon Toast Crunch over the page I would always skip Cathy.

Best. Cereal. Ever.

Cathy was not fun to read. Cathy was desk decoration for secretaries. Maybe I'm too harsh on Cathy. A comic strip that has validated women all over America can't be so bad. I just can't believe it has run for this long. With women becoming more dominant and gender roles being blurred, Cathy just panders to the old world of womanhood. Cathy should of evolved as women all over the world did. Instead she just spent her time wearing sweatpants and debating whether to eat ice cream. After the millionth joke about eating ice cream you almost want her to quit whining and get as fat as Gilbert Grape's mom. At least then it will be interesting.

Such a sad movie.

With the final strip on Sunday, Oct. 3, is there a reason for anyone to care? This isn't Peanuts we're talking here. When Peanuts ended it was legitimately sad, never mind the fact that the last Peanuts strip was printed the day after Charles Schulz's death. Cathy has no such resonance. And newspapers are probably just going to run old Cathy strips in lieu of new strips. Cathy is going to be in syndication like Seinfeld and the fact that she has not matured at all in the past 34 years means you can just run a randomly chosen Cathy strip and none will be the wiser.

Sorry Cathy.