In Time

Even though it's getting mediocre reviews, I wanted to see In Time because the premise intrigued me.  It's pretty original - or as original as a movie that rips off Bonnie and Clyde and Robin Hood can be.  I think it's really well done for a high-concept sci-fi movie -- they successfully sell you on the concept and the world seems real.

It's a world where time is money, literally.  Everyone lives to 25, and then you only get a year longer -- it's up to you to earn or steal the time to continue.  "Rich" people are essentially immortal and "poor" people die young.  I love this concept and thought it was well-executed.  It's a nice allegory for the class system we have now - different neighborhoods are called "time zones", and they range from a ghetto of hard-working people to the luxurious lifestyles of people who are either born into time or have somehow acquired it.  And then the main question asked is, What happens if the time gets redistributed?

The dialogue in this movie is pretty crappy and it's not like the plot's all that unexpected.  Actually, at one point, the heroes survive a car crash so horrific - completely unscathed - that it make me want to punch the screen.  But the whole time-as-currency concept seemed original to me and was cool.  Plus all the actors are young and hot.  So WIN.

Project Runway: Finale

My love for Project Runway has clearly waned when the finale has passed and I have yet to watch either part of it.  I've been able to avoid spoilers, mostly by blowing quickly past the TV-related Google Reader bits.

Kimberly's inspiration is Brooklyn - old-school ghetto Brooklyn, not new hipster douchebag Brooklyn.

Tim visits Anya in Trinidad, and wears a full suit whilst boating.  Of course.  Her inspiration is Tobago and the sea.  She has her fabrics picked out, but nothing resembling actual clothing.  Alrighty then.

Viktor, on the other hand, has been working his ass off.  His inspiration is Mexico and his brother's death.  So it'll be fun, then.  Viktor has an adorably whitebread boyfriend.

Last stop: Joshua.  He's got crazy fabrics and patterns, natch.  It's an awful 80's freakshow.  Picture every color imaginable in the brightest shade possible.  Oy, I knew he'd bring the tacky.  Tim says it makes him want to weep.

Challenge: Present a 3-look preview of your collection. Viktor's stuff was fabulous, Anya's was Anya and very very gold, Kimberly's pink skirt was godawful, and Joshua's was Joshua, starting with those hot pink pants.  I guess I'd kick him out, though again - I'd love for him to stick around just for the tackiness.  The judges hammer Anya for her construction and some of her accessorizing; they don't love Kimberly's stuff either.  I didn't realize that Viktor designed his own prints - that makes his stuff even better!  The judges just want him to edit somewhat - they love his crazy jacket, just pair it with something simple, not a dress that's gorgeous on its own.  Joshua's needed more editing too, but the judges were largely OK with it.  Damn, maybe it'll be one of these girls that doesn't make it!

Bye-bye:  No one.  Well that was a giant waste of time, show.  Can I get those 90 minutes of my life back?

Final "Gift": They get $500 worth of whatever they want from Mood to edit their collection.  Anya buys a bunch of new black and white prints to design 3 totally new looks.  Joshua gets more bright green and makes something that looks like bicycle shorts.  Oy.  Joshua has a wonderful exhausted breakdown.

Final Runway: First up is Kimberly and her stuff looks great.  I love the flowy dress, as well as her final dress and the white pants outfit.  Joshua brings the color.  I loved the one striped tank over pants with a jacket - that was different for him and lovely.  Those shorts, though?  VOMIT.  I didn't like his collection at all, but the judges creamed themselves over it.  Maybe in comparison to some stuff he's done, but no.  Just no.  Next up is Viktor, who has made a lot of changes, including adding too much new sheer stuff.  Viktor's frst look is outstanding - the dress with the wonderful print on the front.  And his white jacket looks so much better paired over some leather pants and a simple black shirt.  Yay Viktor!  Anya's collection is so different from the others - very Caribbean, very flowy, very Anya - that it almost has to win just because it's unique.  She really changed things up, and did her customary last-minute miracle turnaround.

First out is Kimberly.  Viktor's out next.  Now that's some Grade A bullshit -- clearly Anya's winning because I still think Joshua was the worst!  These judges are just dummies.

Winner: Anya.  She really did pull it out in the end, like she did most of the season.  And I'd say her stuff is the most wearable and sell-able too; I can see it on the red carpets.  But Viktor will always have my heart.

TV Is Kind Of Ruined For Me Now

It's funny how quickly Breaking Bad can turn you off from the rest of television.  Those characters, those stories, and that writing is unreal, and I'll never find anything like it. I miss it already and I'm going through withdrawals. I'm hoping that the return of Justified and Mad Men in the new year will help, but until then it's looking like slim pickings. 

I've been watching Person of Interest, but it sucks so badly.  Picture Jack Bauer with no personality and the most ham-fisted dialogue ever.  It's really awful, but I keep watching it to make fun of it.  Same with Terra Nova.  Ugh.  Those characters are laaaaame.

At least things are marginally better over at The Walking Dead.  I really want to love a show that features zombies, but when the living people are too stupid to root for, you end up hoping the zombies win.  The storytelling on that show has been atrocious since mid-season last season, but I'll keep watching because every so often they kill someone off in a cool way.  And also there are zombies.  Looks like I'll be watching for a while more....

"Today we are pleased to announce that the ‘dead’ shall live as we proudly renew ‘The Walking Dead’ for a third season on AMC and, globally, with our terrific partners at Fox International Channels," said Charlie Collier, AMC’s President. “We are thankful for everyone’s contribution in front of and behind the camera as we continue to make ‘The Walking Dead’ a unique television experience. And, we are so proud as it continues to set viewership records around the world.”

Project Runway

Challenge: Design 3 looks inspired by something on Governors Island.  And the looks have to be different - so not 3 flowy dresses, ANYA!  (LOL at Viktor's comment - "Does she even know how to make a sleeve?")  They get a pool of assistants to choose from.  The pairs are: Kimberly and Becky, Viktor and Olivier, Laura and Anthony Ryan, Anya and Bert, and Joshua and Bryce.

Bryce helps Joshua edit, which can only be a good thing.  Joshua is bitchy as hell, especially toward Anya.  But mostly, the contestants are all emo about this being SO CLOSE to the end. 

Guest Judge: Zoe Saldana.  She's seriously the most gorgeous person ever. Love her.

Joshua's skirt was a nightmare, but his other 2 looks were decent, if not boring.  I loved Kimberly's coat and the dress was super cute.  Anya's black dress - gorgeous.  Anya's red tunic/pants - gorgeous.  She has amazing taste and I love her.  Viktor's looks are all amazing.  He's gotta win this thing, right?  The judges seem to think he's too commercial.  Boo hiss.  Everybody's decent, but I think Laura (or Kimberly, if it has to be someone else) should go based on this week alone.

Bye-bye:  Laura.  OK, good, that's totally how it should have gone.

Finale: Anya, Viktor, Joshua, and Kimberly.  I like that Joshua is going because he'll be the total wild card.  Meaning his stuff will likely be fugly, and every runway could use some fugly.

The Ides of March

If you don't love George Clooney and Ryan Gosling, there is something wrong with you.

The Ides of March is very much your typical political thriller with a very cliche story.  But when you've got Clooney and Gosling, you don't care about the cliches. 

I'd vote for George Clooney for President.  And really it's more Gosling's movie than his - that kid's going places.  Check it out for a matinee or once it's on TV - definitely worth a watch, but it's not groundbreaking or anything.

Fringe

Olivia wakes up to a giant blue ball of energy in her bedroom. The ball attracts metallic objects and causes about a minute-long time distortion.  It also appears later and traps her in the bathroom for a little.  Walter theorizes that it's a former fellow Cortexifan Kid (who could do astral projection) reaching out to Olivia and sends her to Massive Dynamic to identify the kid.

In this timeline, Walter hates Nina's guts - it's hysterical.  And Nina and Olivia have some kind of connection - Nina makes some joke about Olivia's prom date.  What is she - her goddamn stepmother?

Walter heads out of the lab for the first time in 3 years to help Olivia track the guy down.  They are absolutely adorable together, especially after Walter trashes his hotel room in a fit of germ-paranoia -- they go get root beer floats.  That damn energy ball keeps appearing; it even appears after they track down the Cortexifan Kid, and he's not the one doing it.

Olivia helps Walter calm down and focus and solve their problem.  None of it makes sense, but he takes the Cortexifan Kid to a power station so that they can - I don't know - make a bigger ball of energy and destroy the other one?  Sure.

During this final confrontation, the ball of energy vaguely takes the form of Peter.  Olivia sees this, stops the Cortexifan Kid from destroying him, and the energy ball disappears.  Cut to the lake Peter drowned in as a child, where Our Peter suddenly rises to the surface.  He looks naked too.  Awesome.

Broyles calls Olivia to tell her that someone was pulled out of the lake and knows all kinds of classified information, and knows the Fringe team.  Oh snap - Peter's going to remember everything and everyone but they're not?  OK - that's interesting!!!

Walter's Food Thing of the Week:  I caught Walter eating Pop Tarts in the lab.  Mmmmm strawberry flavored death.

This Week's Code: RESET

This is another odd episode.  It's really just resetting things to bring Peter back.  The story with the Cortexifan Kid seems unnecessary and doesn't make a lot of sense.  But it has those really nice character moments they've been having lately, like with Walter and Olivia.  I still love this, but I'm suffering from Breaking Bad withdrawal - once you've had that show, everything else looks like crap.  It's tainting things.  Heh.  Taint.

Project Runway

Challenge: Create a high-fashion look inspired by an exotic bird. Yawn. It's a Collier Strong challenge, and that burn victim is looking worse than ever!

It's a random pair challenge too: Anya and Laura (Raven), Joshua and Bert (Amazon Parrot), and Viktor and Kimberly (Cockatoo).

And, if those weren't enough twists, it's also a head-to-head challenge where the couples are just judged against each other. And the overall winner gets $20,000 and a L'Oreal advertorial.

Oh guess what - it's still not enough twists. They have to design a second high-fashion look. Seriously - enough with the elements.

Joshua wisely decides to scrap this fugly green and yellow dress he makes, but he unwisely decides to wear a chest-baring shirt.

Kimberly has a rough time - she's moving too slowly, she sews through her finger, there are random grease stains on her fabric. Cue the obligatory breakdown, as Kimberly recounts all the dead people in her life. Tim even hugs the poor depressed girl during her session with him - that's what Tim is there for, y'all! But the world continues to crap on Kimberly - she ruins one of her looks by throwing it onto a hot glue gun that burns a hole through it. Time to make a new look in 3 hours!

TWIST NUMBER FOUR HUNDRED AND FIVE: They only get to show 1 look on the runway. So now they have to murder one of their children, essentially. Project Runway's version of Sophie's Choice -- finally a twist I like. Kimberly sends down her "3-hour gown".

Kimberly's quickie dress is good, but I still like Viktor's better. The judges don't. They stink. Bert's is dull and I love Joshua's amazingly-tasteful orange dress. Seriously - Joshua + Parrot could have been a disaster. Anya's look is all-black and so unlike anything she's ever done -- and it's still fabulous. Laura's pants and jacket are decent enough but boring. The judges side with me on those 2.

Winner:  Anya.  Well, duh.  It was amazing and so different for her.  Too bad her models can't get in and out of her dresses without assistance.

Bye-bye:  Bert.  Well, duh.  I had his name typed in before they even announced the winner.  You overstayed your welcome, Debbie Downer.

Avengers Assemble!

NERDGASM!  Check out the first official teaser trailer for The Avengers!  Can't wait!  Hawkeye is my comic book movie boyfriend! Also, every trailer should feature a Nine Inch Nails song. Every trailer.

Breaking Bad

So here we are - Breaking Bad season finale time.  And I'm a big bundle of nerves!!!  This recap is likely to be a big jumble of CAPSLOCKOMG!

Walter runs to Gus's car to retrieve his bomb.  He puts it in his diaper bag (LOL! Love this show!) and meets with Jesse in the hospital.  The magnetic bomb gets stuck on the elevator door.  El. Oh. El.  The guys try to think about where they can plant the bomb.  Then the ABQ police show up.  OH GOD!  They're following up on the whole ricin thing.  You can't really drop that word and expect to get away with it....

Jesse uses the House/Discovery Channel defense - he just saw something about ricin and thought that could be it.  I knew he was going to drop the Discovery Channel!  Jesse loves him some cable television.  Better call Saul.

Walter wants to see Saul too, and drops by the office, by which I mean breaks in the office.  Saul's secretary won't give up his location unless Walter pays her $25,000.  "I'll be right back," he says, as he slips on the broken glass and whacks his head on the door.  Bryan Cranston: the king of physical comedy.

Walter goes home to retrieve his money, but first calls his neighbor and asks her to check on something in his house -- so she can be the first one to walk through the door in case it's booby-trapped, Home Alone-style.  Oh, Walter, you asshole.  A couple guys do come out of his backyard area, but his neighbor survives, and so Walter breaks into his own house and gets some crawlspace cash.  The 2 guys come into the house - who the hell are they? - but Walter gets out in time.

Line of Night from Saul, to Jesse:  "If I ever get anal polyps, I know what to name them."  Saul meets with Walter and tells him that Jesse told him about Gus visiting Hector in the old folks' home. Genius -- Walter can get that damn bell ringer to go along with his plan -- ring a bell and Gus is dead.  Walter visits Hector and offers him an opportunity for revenge.  OH SNAP!

Hector rings his bell to let the nurse know -- "NEED DEA". 

Hank continues to analyze the laundry pictures Gomey took.  Gomey comes to get Hank because Hector will only talk to Hank.  You know what this show is?  A massive chess game.  Just got to get all of the players in the right spot.  Hank comes down to the office and meets with Hector (along with everyone else in the office).  Waiting for Hector to spell out words is painful.  He spells out "SUCK MY" and then "FUC".  Love that scary old bastard. OK - so this was a distraction or something.  As Hector is loaded back onto his van, Tyrus is watching -- so now Gus will have to pay Hector a visit to see what's up!

Jesse is finally released from interrogation -- the tests on Brock came back negative for ricin.  OK, so that's good, only Jesse's ricin cigarette is still missing.  On his way out of the hospital, Jesse is tased and put in a minivan by Gus's guys. 

Back to the nursing home!  Tyrus comes into Hector's room and sweeps it for bugs.  Gus takes his usual calm, kickass walk inside.  OH CHRIST this show gives me indigestion.  Gus has a syringe ready for Hector because he's been talking to the DEA.  Hector finally looks Gus in the eye and then rings his bell repeatedly.  Even though I knew the explosion was coming, I screamed.  And then screamed again when Gus walks out of the room, seemingly unscathed.  But he's not -- he's like goddamn Two Face and half his face is blown off.  He straightens his tie aaaand now he's dead.  R.I.P. Gus.  That earns an Instant Rewind.  You know Gus had to go out like that!!!!!!!!!!  Like a champ!!

Now I'm just freaking out.  There's still time left.  Ricin: missing.  Jesse: kidnapped.  Mike: still in Mexico.  Those 2 guys: were in the Whites' house.

Now we're in the Super Lab and Jesse is cooking under the supervision of the guys that tased him.  OK, good -- they only kidnapped him to cook meth, not to do anything bad. :)  Walter comes in, blows the 2 dudes away, and tells Jesse that Gus is dead and they have work to do.  Time to blow up the Super Lab!  This is nearly as sad as when the RV got crushed.  (Seriously, R.I.P. RV.)  Badass.

So Brock wasn't poisoned by ricin, he likely ingested Lily of the Valley.  Now it's my turn to freak out, because I'm pretty sure that Walter is to blame -- when he was spinning his gun last week, it ended up pointing at a flowered plant.  Jesse:  "But Gus still had to go right?"  Walter: "Damn right."  My boys shake hands and part ways.  Walter calls Skyler and tells her he won.

We end with a shot of the Whites' pool area -- and the Lily of the Valley.  So that asshole really did poison that kid -- he did it (knowing the kid would survive, I hope) so that Jesse would suspect Gus so that Jesse would help Walter get rid of Gus.  Walter beat Gus at this chess match.

Loved the ending.  Everything is set up for a blank slate next season.  And I can't wait.

Real Steel

I screwed up the pancakes.  I screwed up the pancakes this morning and made a mess of the kitchen, and my punishment was to see Real Steel.  This will be every 8-to-12-year-old boy's favorite movie. This and that movie where Adam Sandler plays a guy and a girl. (I can't even bring myself to watch that trailer.)

If you're a blissfully ignorant (read: dumb) child you'll love it, but adults are another story. I can't be the only cynical adult who watches movies like this and thinks about how they're made. I mean, somewhere on a soundstage, Hugh Jackman was doing air punches and yelling and there was nothing around him but a crowd of extras. No pumping music in the background, no quick editing and slow-motion. Just a man, his tight tee shirt, and his air punches.

You want a movie with every cliche possible? You got it. Deadbeat dad reunited with his son: check. Precocious, over-caffeinated, wise-beyond-his-years kid: check.  (In the kid's defense, the actor was perfect for this part and made the role a nice mix of goofy and sentimental.  The kid's a riot and he has good chemistry with Hugh Jackman.) I bet you'd never guess that they come together in the end, that the dad learns from the kid. As an added bonus, you get boxing movie cliches too -- training montages, fight montages, counting-the-money-you're-winning montages (the movie is one big montage), slow-motion fights, screaming crowds, underdogs fighting against all odds, and proud trainers. And lots of air punches.

I could see how under the right (drunk) circumstances, one could enjoy this film. If you're on your own couch, you could air punch and shout right along. A guilty pleasure might involve watching this on HBO by yourself one day, drinking and air punching.  Maybe.  But if you're a conscious human being, you'll likely sit there and cringe at the whole thing.  Real Steel: it's cringe-tastic!

Fringe

Walter undergoes his monthly mental health evaluation, a condition of his release from the loony bin.  He also continues to see/hear Peter, and Joshua Jackson continues to have the Best/Easiest Job on Television.  Everybody else on this show plays 2 people, and he can't be bothered to play one.  Lucky bastard.  Elsewhere, Olivia is running facial recognition software on a sketch of Peter.

Freak of the Week:   Two boys are killed by some kind of creeping, vine-looking virus thing (but one tragically buck-toothed boy survives) and their bodies decompose at a crazy rate.  They also eventually burst and spread spores everywhere.  One busts open in containment in the lab, but the other busts open at the morgue, and the team has to don hazmat suits to walk around the fungus-infested room.

Walter has some sweet bonding moments with Bucky Bucktooth.  He needs his son back!  We learn that in this timeline, when Walter crossed over to steal the other Peter, Peter 2 drowned in the icy lake.  So no Observer intervention.

It turns out the surviving kid has some weird psychic connection to the fungus (which Walter names "Gus").  When the team tries to eradicate the fungus with UV light and flamethrowers, the kid's back at the lab, feverish and bothered by bright flashes of light.   Walter has to figure out how to disconnect their link before Gus continues to spread; it's some kind of weird emotional connection and Walter figures out the key to letting the kid know he's not alone, to letting the kid let go from Gus.  And just in time - because Gus started to infect Lincoln!  

Once Bucky is gone, Walter settles in for a little self-lobotomy.  What - LSD isn't good enough?  Olivia comes in before he hammers the long needle into his brain (though it's still inserted into his eye - ICK!).  Walter's worried that he's going insane and will be sent back to the asylum.  Olivia shows him her sketch of Peter and says she's been seeing him in her dreams for 3 weeks.

Walter's Food Thing of the Week:  He makes milkshakes for himself and the kid -- which they enjoy whilst wearing tinfoil hats, of course. He also craves a grape Popsicle after putting the kid in an ice bath.

This Week's Code: REBORN.

I miss my old team.  I want them all together and I want my old timeline back!!!  I still love the show because it's got all my favorite characters, but it still feels incomplete.  Be reborn already, Pacey!

Breaking Bad

So do we think the cancer will be back before the season ends next week? Walt's been coughing a lot lately; I really noticed it when rewatching last week's episode. It's been quiet on the cancer front for far too long.... Something tells me it'll come back as a central player next season.

The DEA pulls up to the White residence to pick them up for protective custody at Hank and Marie's -- Marie is freaking out and wants them all there with Hank. Walter refuses to go because he tells Skyler he's the target and they won't be safe with him there. He says his goodbyes to her and Holly, saying he has to face the consequences; he's dodged death long enough.

Walter sits poolside with a gun.

Hank thinks it's weird that the threat against him comes on the heels of his investigation of Gus. He convinces Gomez to go to the laundry and investigate. Gomez sweet-talks his way into the laundry facility to look around with a camera and a drug-sniffing dog. Crap. I'm freaking out the whole time -- I do NOT want them caught! And that's even before I see that Jesse's down there cooking. Shit. Gus calls down to let Jesse know what's going on, and that it's all Walter's fault. Still, Jesse won't accept Gus killing Walter. Good boy. Gus tells him there will be an "appropriate response." Only Gus could make those words sound scary as hell.

Gomez leaves with nothing but photos. Back to cooking. The operation is so paranoid at this point that Jesse doesn't park there - he parks out in the middle of nowhere and is transported to/from the laundry by a laundry truck. (Walter was transported in dirty laundry last week.) Jesse calls Walter but he doesn't pick up; then he checks his 6 voicemails from Saul.

Saul is packing up his office (by which I mean "shredding") and gives Jesse his money, plus mentions that Gus threatened to kill Walter's family. Jesse doesn't deal well with kids being threatened. Which leads to our next dilemma....

Jesse gets a call from his GF that her son is in the hospital. Suddenly I realize that Gus might have a different "appropriate response" in mind -- one that hits Jesse close to home. And you know what? That's not going to sit well with Jesse. But then when Jesse goes outside to smoke - he realizes his ricin cigarette is missing!!!!! Brock must have come into contact with it! Jesse would never forgive himself if Brock died because of that!! He runs back into the hospital to tell Andrea to let the doctors know that it's ricin, and then he heads to Walter's house. Walter's all paranoid and skittish. Jesse picks up the gun and aims it at Walt. I gasp. Jesse thinks Walter poisoned Brock!! He says there's no way Brock could have gotten it himself. But then there's no way Walter could have done it! OMG was it Gus!? He knew about the ricin!? YIKES!

This scene is intense as hell and Walter starts with the hysterical laughter again. He figures Gus wanted Jesse to think Walter did it so that Jesse would kill him himself. Walter freaking dares Jesse to kill him and I! AM! DYING!!! Walter gets a gun imprint in his forehead and everything. STOP KILLING ME, SHOW!

Of course Jesse doesn't do it, and now he wants vengeance against Gus. Walter won't let Jesse do it himself and insists on helping. Time to get the band back together! Hell. Yes. The next day, Jesse's still at the hospital (even though Andrea won't let him in to see Brock) and refuses to go into work. And Walter's in his kitchen cooking up something good!! It's a bomb!!!!!!!!! Yeah Science!!

Gus comes to the hospital to see Jesse. Parks his car in a garage. IS THAT BOMB READY YET!? At first Gus wants Jesse back to work immediately, but then Jesse tells Gus that he knows Brock was poisoned. Gus tells him they'll just dump the current, ruined batch and Jesse can return to work next week. He gives Jesse a reassuring pat on the back. It's the opposite of reassuring.

As Gus returns to his car, we see Walter spying from next door. Gus stops before reaching the car, clearly suspicious about something. Jesus Christ, they are prolonging this forever and I both hate them and love them for it!!!!!!! Can I use more exclamation points tonight!? Gus finally turns around and walks away from the car. Walter's bitter as hell, clearly exhausted and out of options. The end. CHRIST!!!

Only one more -- sadnessssssssss!!!

Please Make This Happen

On Sunday afternoon, Mitchell Hurwitz tossed a few more crumbs to the Arrested Development faithful at a New Yorker Festival event that reunited him with the show’s ensemble cast, telling the audience that a movie was still in the works, along with a new set of television episodes that would serve as a prelude to the film.
Asked by the event’s moderator, Nancy Franklin, for an update on the movie, Mr. Hurwitz said, “We’re 80 percent of the way to an answer,” which was understandably greeted by some laughter. Mr. Hurwitz went on to say that he and Ron Howard, the director and producer who was the Arrested Development narrator, “had been talking about this for ages and trying to get this going.” Mr. Hurwitz continued: “We don’t completely own the property, there are business people involved and studios and that kind of thing. Just creatively, I have been working on the screenplay for a long time and found that as time went by, there was so much more to the story. In fact, where everyone’s been for five years became a big part of the story. So in working on the screenplay, I found even if I just gave five minutes per character to that back story, we were halfway through the movie before the characters got together.”
So, Mr. Hurwitz said: “We’re trying to do a limited-run series into the movie.” After a wave of excited applause died down, he continued: “We’re basically hoping to do 9 or 10 episodes, with almost one character per episode.” 

This is amazing.  Please be on AMC or FX or somewhere where you can get away with stuff!!

source

Project Runway

I knew going in that someone really talented got booted, and that Tim Gunn was upset by it, so I'm guessing Bert and Joshua are safe....

Challenge: Design for the 70's-revival trend. Ugh, they just did that with the band - but now for women. And they're supposed to do sophisticated, not literal and retro.  Fine - I'll allow it.

During the shopping trip to Mood, Anya loses her money envelope. Jesus - there are cameras everywhere - no one saw anything? That's the biggest dagger on earth -- and if she goes home because of that, it sucks. Anya is able to use whatever the designers have left over - $11.50 and whatever extra fabric they can spare - and muslin. Time to make it work, girl!

Second Part of the Challenge: Design a second, one-piece look for $50.

I hated Kimberly's separates.  The jumper was really cute, but was sewn onto her model last-minute - no zipper.   Anthony Ryan used some crazy-ass awful-ass prints and his looks were fugly and I thought more 60's than 70's.  Nina said his girl looked like she was in a cult.  Zing!  (And accurate.)  Bert's hot pants were gross, but the top and his second dress were adorable.    Joshua's hot pink top with plaid pants made me vomit -- ugliest thing ever.  Anya and Viktor were both really good.  Laura's prints were really gross together; I liked her second look, but could see how it was boring. 

Winner: Anya.  Holy crap - and with virtually no money!  She rules!  Even if everything she makes is printed and flowy, it's always awesome.

Bye-bye: Anthony Ryan.  OK, so that sucks because I loved him, but these looks are fugly as hell, so it's not unwarranted.  Cult indeed.

50/50 and Moneyball

Never let it be said that I don't have ambition. This weekend, I achieved my goal of seeing 3 movies -- and saw them in a 24-hour period.



Of all of them, 50/50 might have been my favorite. I mean, Drive is awesome, but how can you not love a feel-good cancer comedy? It's really about the friendship of these 2 guys - but without being sentimental or false. I want Seth Rogen to be my BFF. He can even help me through cancer. It's a great movie -- legitimately funny and real -- never melodramatic or schmaltzy. It's wonderful. See it.



Moneyball was enjoyable but has one small flaw -- it's about baseball. And baseball is boring. And long. And even if it's about the baseball back office, it's still about baseball. Jonah Hill is great in it -- and it's your last chance to catch Fat Jonah Hill cuz now he's all freaky-skinny. But if you find baseball boring, you can wait for the DVD.