Sorry to be away so long.  I’m sure you’ve missed me…what?  You never noticed I was gone?  Oh well.  🙂  I’ve been busy and haven’t gotten around to blogging.  I’ve got a number of items to cover week including the Patriots and Red Sox, Comic TV and Movie news, some TV and Movie reviews, and lastly a few Transformers related items, including a new weekly feature, Transformers Artifact of the Week!

A few weeks back the Red Sox signed Hideki Okajima for a one year deal.  I think this was a good move.  After he returned from the disabled list, he was much better than he was earlier last season.  The signing of Bobby Jenks puts the bullpen in great shape, and gives them options in case Papelbon struggles, though I don’t think he will.  He’s only signed for this year though, so they may be setting up Jenks as the closer for 2012, but I think Papelbon will surprise a lot of people this year and get a long term deal next winter, hopefully from the Red Sox.

Terry Francona said this week that Marco Scutaro will be the Red Sox starting shortstop and that Jed Lowrie will be a backup infielder.  I can understand why he said it, but honestly, I need to see Scutato be worthy of that first.  He had a great year, there is no question about that, but it was his first year as a full time player.  I’m not willing to assume he can duplicate that success next year.  Lowrie, if he’s over the injuries that have plagued him for the last two years deserves a shot to win the starters job.  On the flip side, if Scutaro does start and struggles, then they have a replacement already.

There has been some Comic related TV & Movie news in the last twenty-four hours.  NBC has picked up David E. Kelley’s script for a Wonder Woman reboot pilot.  Kelley has written and created some amazing television series in the past including, Boston Legal, Life on Mars, Boston Public, The Practice, Ally McBeal, Chicago Hope, Picket Fences, Doogie Howser, M.D., LA. Law, and the recently premiered Harry’s Law, which I highly recommend.  I’ve never read DC comics, but I’ve always liked DC characters in TV and movies.

Also in comic news, Don Cheadle says that they are working on a script for a War Machine movie.  As a huge War Machine fan, I really hope this happens.  One unfortunate piece of news is that Cheadle says War Machine will not be appearing the Avengers movie.  That’s a little disappointing, but I can see why they would do that.  You already have a team consisting on Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Hulk, Hawkeye, and Black Widow.  As much as I’d like to see him in the movie, I don’t think they need War Machine.

The great television series Medium (no spoilers) came to an end last night.  Early on in the series finale episode, I was a little disappointed.  What they seemed to be doing just wasn’t good.  However, as Medium often does, it wasn’t at all what it seemed, and in the end it was a great way to end the series.  I hate to see it go, but sometimes you can just tell when a show has gone on a bit too long and it’s time to be over, and I’ve had that feeling about Medium for the last season or so.  I’ve had the same feeling about other shows in their later seasons like Ghost Whisperer, Cold Case, Law & Order, Numb3rs, and 24 when they ended recently.

Here are reviews of two movies I’ve seen recently, The Green Hornet and Season of the Witch (very minor spoilers).

I enjoyed The Green Hornet, but I thought it would have been better served with a little less comedy in some scenes.  For example, the scene when Kato and Britt are beating the crap out of each other seemed to be going for laughs, when it should have been more serious.  A few punches were all that really had to happen.  Other than little complaints like that, I did really enjoy it and would recommend it.

I’ve been hearing a lot of bad reviews of Season of the Witch.  In my opinion, those reviewers don’t know what they are talking about.  This movie was AWESOME.  The story does a great job of misdirection.  At one point you think one thing, then you change your mind completely, then find out it’s something else entirely.  It’s beautifully shot, and the landscapes are amazing.  The effects are excellent, though there are a few places they aren’t perfect, like the dead monks crawling on the ceiling.  I will say, that the early scenes when Behmen and Felson are in the crusades were clearly shot cheap.  They could have done Braveheart-esque epic battle scenes, and instead, the camera focuses tight on the main characters, and the rest of the battle can only be seen in glimpses behind them.  I don’t think this takes away from the movie at all.  It’s just a fact of the budget. Admittedly, I’m a huge Nicholas Cage fan, so I might be biased, but I highly recommend this movie.  It unfortunately may not be in most theaters anymore, so if you don’t get to see it now, be sure to see it on DVD.

I’ve been transferring all my home movies to DVD over the last few weeks, and am in the process of ripping all of my footage from the Botcon, the Transformers Convention, to my computer.  Sometime in the near future, I’ll be uploading some of this footage to my YouTube channel, but I’m not sure when.  I’ll let you know.

During some of my earlier blogs, I included pictures of some interesting Transformers items I’d acquired.  I haven’t gotten anything terribly interesting lately, but I thought I’d feature an item from my collection every week.  I’m going to be picking an item each week, unless I get something new.

Transformers Artifact of the Week: This is a 2005 Transformers Energon Foodoodler Party Pack.  It includes cookies with line art pictures of Transformers and edible ink markers to decorate them with.  I never was able to find this, or any of the other Transformers Energon Foodoodler items in stores, I had to order them from the Foodoodler web site.  You can go to TFMuseum.com for this and other Transformers Artifacts.

Lastly, I have only one thing to say about the Patriots and Jets.  The Jets are a bunch of loud mouth arrogant bunch.  They were poor losers when the Patriots beat them and they were poor winners when they beat the Patriots.  They disgust me.  I hope the Steelers end careers tomorrow.  I don’t particularly like the Steelers.  I think Ben Roethlisberger is way overrated, but I don’t hate the Steelers.  I’m rooting for the Steelers and Bears and I hope the Bears win the Super Bowl.  I’ll be watching mostly for the commercials.

On that subject, there is supposed to be a new Transformers: Dark of the Moon commercial during the game.

Thanks for reading!