Of alethiometers and such.

Big word for a Golden Compass, and I can best describe it as a whole new kind of awesome.  Any comparisons you’d like to draw between it and the holy Rings or the Potters are pretty much moot, since Compass really isn’t like either.  It’s unique to itself, full of deep story, characters you cheer for, and – best of all – talking polar bears.  Ever seen a polar bear slap another polar bears jaw off?  You have now.

But besides all the awesome, I also love it for offending the Catholic Church the same way The DaVinci Code and Harry Potter did.  Anyone can see the parallels between the Church and Golden Compass’s bad guys, The Magistrate, and their unsavory habit of suppressing knowledge. The film even includes up some subtle faith vs. science jabs, if you fancy that sort of thing.

 

But it’s a habit of mine to compare my opinion to that of reviews, so I gave Rotten Tomatoes a gander.  Overall score? 44%.  Ouch, right?  But then I read what one of the critics had to say:

"Almost nothing remains at the end – not a glimmer of mystical inquisition, not a teasing loose-end of space-time speculation – to lure a Pullmanite towards a sequel."

I scratched my head hard enough to draw blood over this one, since I felt Golden Compass left me on the biggest cliffhanger since Empire Strikes Back, with just as many loose ends, all of which I want tied up in sequels.  This guy cannot have seen the same movie I did.  Maybe he walked into Enchanted by mistake?  It makes more sense that way.

Another thing to keep in mind:  These are the same people that gave The Boondock Saints an average score of 4.3/10.  Four point three?!  No one has been that wrong since the Y2K problem.

Ending on something less wrong, and slightly more on-topic, I’ll personally recommend that each of you sign up for the Blockbuster GamePass .  Breaku ManneX recommended it to me first, and I’m suprised he never spoke of it on the Show.  But as a veteran of Netflix and GameFly, this really is the way to go.  A mere $23 monthly gets you one game at a time, free to swap as much as you want, or keep as long as you want.  It’s perfect for catching up on the holiday rush of high-profile titles, or checking out those Beautiful Katamari-ish games that are fun, but not $60 fun.

Admittedly, the selection isn’t on par with GameFly, but I’ll take that over paying GameFly to have my games sit in the mail for half the month.  I’ve milked Call of Duty 4, Beautiful Katamari, Ace Combat 6, and Super Paper Mario out of my first month, and I honestly worried if this kind of fleecing was legal in my state.

See you in the game.