Recent things seen and done reviews:

Fantastic Four: 4 out of 6

Wow. A lot better than expected. I was wary of how they'd pull off the special effects and shit. Especially Reed's stretching. Very wary. All in all a decent flick though. Johnny Storm was easily the show stealer, making every scene with him by far the more enjoyable parts of the movie. Dr. Doom was also done nicely and it was nice to see Alicia Masters, Willie Lumpkin and Latveria all getting in the film. My only complaint was that if you are unfamiliar with the comic book source material you may find yourself a little lost at first.

An Evening With Kevin Smith: 10 out of 6

Just got back from Vancouver after seeing Kev rock the mic at the Vogue theatre. Easily a highlight in my life. I always hoped I would be able to see on of his Q and A's ever since I first read about them at www.newsaskew.com. What a fucking show! This man is pure genius. His stories range from J. Lo wiping with a handtowel to his recent tiff with Affleck to him swearing in front of his kid. All this and he farts in the mic twice, proving yet again no matter how old you get farts are funny. Jen and Harley were there, and so were Mewes and Malcolm. Very cool indeed. The only problems with the show was that Vancouver Film School (VFS) had bought a large block of tickets and these fuckwads seemed to think Q and A meant "Pitch my movie ideas to Kevin". You think after he didn't want to do the first two guys movies people would give up. Alas, but no. The VFS students are persistent little fuckers. Also some dude threw pizza at a guy that got on stage, which I thought was a fucking dickwad thing to do.

Lots of great lines last night too. Some of my faves were:

"If it's hard it won't bend, and if it's soft it won't reach."

"Nigger, this ain't Deadwood."

"Hopefully you'll be shitting better in no time."

"Maybe my gut would swing down onto her clit..."

and finally:

"She's not J. Lo or Jenny from the block, she's just latina broad crying in my house."

If you ever have a chance to see this man live, run to get tickets. It is truly a beautiful thing to hear Kev tell a twenty minute story about taking a shit while stoned. I was kinda hoping for an autograph though, but I guess it wasn't meant to be. Too bad cause I printed off some nice pics of Jen, Mewes and Kev for framing. If you're somehow reading this Kevin let me know if there's anyway I can get your autograph! It also kinda bugged me how he seems to not like Jersey Girl that much right now. Maybe he's not aware of how fantastic that movie is, but it definitely touched home with me. I too am a single dad who at one point just wanted my old life back. Only differance was my kid's mom wasn't dead, she just moved away. I think it is a brilliant film and is in my top ten of all time. Also some surprises there last night. Mewes being one of them. Kev got honored by VFS with an honorary certificate even though he dropped out four months in, and Mae showed up. For those unfamiliar with Mae she is a post-op tranny who Kevin filmed a documentary on (well sort of...) while he was at VFS. Sorry if this review dialogue is disjointed, but I've been up for almost 34 hours and still have three more to go until I'm off work... why you ask? Read the next review.

Downtown Vancouver: 2 out of 6

Yes, that's right. I am reviewing a city. Joe and I wandered around downtown Van all last night, as Kevin let out at like 1:30 and we had to catch a 6:30 bus so I could get to work. To paraphrase Ben Kenobi: "Vancouver city, never will you find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.". Fuck around man. I watched a homeless man make out with a hooker and had people ask me for change every five fucking minutes. The only thing that made it not seem so bad was that I had seen Kevin Fucking Smith live!!! Oh and Roxy Burger was great. If I'm ever in Van again I will definitely eat there. I will however walk there without passing the McDonald's that smelled like their urinals emptied directly into the alley behind it. That was fucking awful. Fucking crank heads were everywhere, cops were all over when the bars let out, the streets were fucking littered with trash, and the whole place has a weird smell that Vancouverites are probably just used to by now. Fuck Vancouver. Fuck it right in it's ear. Maybe I'm just too used to Victoria where we don't have a 24 hour heroin supply on every corner like they're selling hot dogs.

It just feels like a large dirty city with no real culture or soul, and I've been to a few other big cities, but nothing as dirty and horrific as this shit-hole town. Again, fuck Vancouver. Fuck it right in it's ear. If this offends anyone... well I'm not really sorry. My opinion is my own and if you don't like it find another blog to read. Or make fun of me. Either way I don't give a fuck. So the only reason it gets two stars is solely based on Roxy Burger and our super nice waitress and ummm... well that's it really. That place was Vancouvers only redeeming quality last night.

- R