RandomFailure

Time to geek out a little more. I finally got around to seeing Episode III Thursday night.

Spoiler Warning!

I discuss some plot elements of the latest Star Wars film. If you haven’t already seen it, I might spoil some of the story for you. But, then again, you already know how it’s going to end even without seeing it, so I don’t believe I’d be ruining anything.

I have to disagree with writer/director Kevin Smith who said that Episode III was “f-ing awesome”. I was entertained, but I would not call it awesome, and most definitely not “f-ing awesome”. Some of the effects shots were amazing, and there were a gazillion things flying around on screen, but that alone does not make the movie good. There’s still the stunted dialogue, some horribly wooden acting, and no sense of time. I had no idea how long it lasted, in movie-time terms. Was it months? Don’t know. Based on Padme’s quick pregnancy, it’s rather difficult to tell. Of course, that’s just a minor quibble.

There were some neat continuity shots. Meeting Chewbacca for the first time. Seeing Uncle Owen standing on Tatooine in the same pose that Luke does with the two suns in the background in Episode IV. Seeing the interior of what is to be Leia’s ship at the beginning of Episode IV. Seeing the start of the Death Star construction. (Did it really take 19 years to build?)

The problems:

• How easy it was for Anakin to turn to the Dark Side. Again, somewhat of a movie-time related issue here. He was obviously being manipulated for years by Palpatine, but the sudden change and the way Anakin dispatched Mace Windu seemed too simple.
• How did the Jedi not know that Palpatine was the other Sith lord? Must be a Dark Side ability to be able to conceal one’s power like that.
• How come Obi-Wan in Episode IV doesn’t recognize R2-D2 and C-3PO? We know that C-3PO has his mind wiped, per instructions from Bail Organa, but it doesn’t explain why R2-D2 doesn’t recognize Obi-Wan in Episode IV.

Due to the approval of the “.xxx” top-level domain, you will soon be able to find porn faster. See the ABC News article and the CNET article. Practically speaking, it should be easier for people to block that domain on their computers, but I seriously doubt that all of the existing porn Web sites in the various domains will migrate over to the new “.xxx” domain. Especially since the marketers make money by people making typos when entering Web addresses into their browsers.

Excuse me while I geek out for a minute here. First, check the CNET article on this subject.

Now, think practically.

• Would an Apple fan, such as I, really want this? Not really relevant, I guess. And I don’t really care all that much. While I use Windows at work, I do prefer the look and feel of OS X (the Mac operating system, in case you don’t know).
• Would it increase Apple’s overall market share? That’s not really all that important to me.
• Would OS X run on any Intel-based machine, or just Apple-branded hardware? A pain in the butt option, but probably not out of the question.
• If OS X could run on any Intel-based machine, would this increase the chance of viruses on OS X? While I know that viruses generally target operating systems, and not the specific processor, it would not be inconceivable for a virus to be developed that jumps from Windows to Mac on the same machine. And don’t think for a minute that people won’t be trying to natively run both OS’es on the same box.