CHUD

Special Features:

MTV Making Of Special
Deleted Scenes
Outtakes
Time Magazine Trailer

Jackass 3 is punk rock on film. A lot of the CKY guys were missing, so you don’t get full crazy like you did in Jackass 2. But, you get extra lulz from Steve-O and his newly sober status. This film goes beyond carnival geekery, as Dickhouse Productions tries to create art out of freakshow theatrics. Whether it’s getting kicked in the face, nearly gored by animals or impaled on dildos…this film has it all. I’d like to go on with some sort of fake intellectual approach, but I appreciate any film that embraces my 10 year old mentality. Men beating the shit out of each other with humor-filled violence is the kind of thing that made America great. The Blu-Ray comes with 3-D glasses that don’t require buying stock in Samsung.

THE WALKING DEAD: THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON

Anchor Bay/AMC

Special Features:

Extra Footage and Featurettes including The Making Of THE WALKING DEAD
Inside THE WALKING DEAD Episodes 1-6
A Sneak Peek with Robert Kirkman
Behind the Scenes Zombie Make-Up Tips
Convention Panel with Producers
THE WALKING DEAD Trailer

The Walking Dead: The Complete First Season was a great way to introduce mass audiences to Robert Kirkman’s only thing worth reading. Audiences grew to care about survivors in the Southeast, as they fought for survival against the zombie hordes. Most of the story elements were skewed from the source material, except for the pilot. Reedus and Rooker show up to give the material some nerd character actor cred, while Frank Darabont struggles to keep this bitch on the rails. Anchor Bay has really loaded up the Home Video releases with amazing transfers and tons of featurettes that examine the production of the first season. Honestly, this is all pops and whistles until they arrive at the Prison.

FOUR LIONS
Directors: Chris Morris

Magnolia

Special Features:

Nothing

Four Lions arrives on home video for those that don’t live in England or in a major city. While it’s been built up over the last few months, the masses will finally get to experience Brit terrorism humor at its finest. Some of my compatriots have dared to compare it to Dr. Strangelove, but I’m not going to go that far. What we have is a strong work of dark humor handled by a promising director who will continue to have a successful career. Chris Morris’ BAFTA win was much deserved, as you can see a young talent mastering classic camerawork while boldly developing a sense of comedic mastery. I just wish that Magnolia would’ve sprung for some supplements.

MORNING GLORY

Director: Roger Michell

Paramount

Special Features:

Commentary by Director Roger Michell and Writer Aline Brosh McKenna
Deleted Scene: Shampoo Bottles HD

Morning Glory is another example of a romantic comedy that earns a free pass based on my love of female anatomy. I’m not an ass man, but Rachel McAdams’ perfect rear is the kind of stuff that makes the internet go ’round. The film plays like Broadcast News for chicks that don’t read so good. Harrison Ford continues to star in films only to remind nerdkind that Han Solo done died. The film died a quick death in the Holiday 2010 shuffle, but I hope that more people take a chance on renting it. It’s a casual flick that beats expectations ala Easy A. However, it’s far from a quality film.

Music

Section By Jeb D.

COLLAPSE INTO NOW

R.E.M.

The actual fact of a new R.E.M. album can be a little startling: along with U2, they occupy such a Rushmore-like position over today’s indie-rock scene that it can be easy to forget that they’re still around as a going concern. Following on the success of their recent live album, which seemed to connect the band with its strengths away from the obvious hits, Collapse Into Now sounds like an album crafted specifically to keep R.E.M. from being taken for granted. As opposed to the tight aural focus of recent releases like Accelerate, this album feels like a tour through the band’s nearly three decades of musical inspiration. Not in a cheesy “reliving past glories” sense: there’s no hint of laziness or an easy grab for the next “Losing My Religion” or “The One I Love.” Instead, with the help of inspirational predecessors like Patti Smith and Lenny Kaye, and inspired followers like Eddie Vedder, Collapse Into Now feels like a restatement of the wide range of aural possibilities that R.E.M.’s career has encompassed: there’s layered Beatle guitar and bass under the opener, “Discoverer”, arena thunder driving “All The Best,” and Smith’s gorgeous vocals make the atmospheric closer, “Blue,” one of the most hypnotically seductive R.E.M. tunes in years. If the album has a flaw, it’s the crystal clarity of the recording: Stipe’s lyrics carry their ambiguity best when the ear strains to pick them out among the sonic textures, and his “beat poet”-wannabe rap on “Blue” would have been better left on a b-side… if such things still existed.

EXCITEMENT OF MAYBE

Exene Cervenka

Where ex-hubby John Doe feels self-conscious about not being a “real” country artist, Exene continues on deploying country tropes and stylings in combinations that suit her pop instincts, and letting “authenticity” go hang, like the electronically-distorted fiddle set against a “Tomorrow Never Knows” string section on “Half Past Forever,” or the punchy mandolin-and-soul-horns that drive “I’ll Admit It Now.” And where she employed punk as a way of asking difficult questions while refusing its simple answers, what she gives us here is existential angst in C&W clothing: “The jukebox has stopped playing / And the bar is trying to close / I wish I was somebody / That nobody knows,” ,set against a loping minor-key tune that Colin Meloy could have penned. The album might stick with the listener a bit more effectively with a few more rhythmic changeups: for all Exene’s variety in arrangement and instrumental choices, there’s at least a couple too many mid-tempo acoustic-guitar driven numbers that tend to run together in the ears. But Exene’s matter-of-fact singing and the lovely vocal harmonies serve up some thoughtful pop that’s not afraid of ambiguity: after all, you can’t always trust “A Brand New Memory.”

GOODBYE LULLABY

Avril Lavigne

Give her this: producing this album required Levigne to face down the kind of corporate obstacles that we’ve applauded folks like Tom Petty and John Fogerty for standing up to in the past: Lavigne’s original label was bought out last year, and she was told to, in effect, “uruban things up” if she wanted this album out; all this in the wake of accusations of plagiarism, and the dissolution of her marriage. In light of that, the question is whether the continually escalating “crazy bitch” persona she affects is a statement of strength, a cry for help… or some fairly canny marketing. I’ll be generous and call it a blend of all three. There’s attempts to provide a little aural variety, from the tinkly E-Street piano intro of “Black Star” to the “Wonderwall” cop of “Everybody Hurts”, but the musical inspiration dries up quickly: the typical track sets the scene with a bit of acoustic guitar before dragging in the same beats, synths, and harmonies: strip the intro out of the tracks and a good half of the songs on the album would be indistinguishable. And while being honest and open about a life of drinking and fucking may be commendable, it’s only art if you make it interesting or compelling. “Last night I blacked out, I think/What did you put in my drink?” Who says romance is dead, eh?

THE BLACK IRISH

The Mahones

The Dublin-Ontario Celtic-punk rock axis celebrates its twentieth anniversary with an album about… well, being in an Irish-Canadian Celtic punk rock band for twenty years. Just in case listening to The Mahones didn’t clue the listener in as to their litany of influences, many of the song lyrics consist of little more than callouts to The Clash, Pistols, Ramones, and of course, The Pogues, with the opening track “A Great Night on the Lash” recounting an evening (real or imagined) of drinking with Shane MacGowan; they return the favor by quickly rewriting MacGowan’s “Donegal Express” into “Pain From Yesterday,” and the album features the obligatory amped-up trad tunes (“Wild Rover,” “Shamrock Shore”). It wouldn’t be Celtic punk without some ould-sod sentimentality here and there, but “Galway Eyes” never matches its lilting tune with anything particularly evocative: before I heard the song, I didn’t know what a girl with “Galway Eyes” might look like, and I still don’t. The album’s loud, energetic and diverting enough if you’re looking around for something to go with last week’s new Dropkick Murphys, and points for making the obvious connection that “Here Comes A Regular” is an Irish drinking song.

Other Notable 3/8 Releases

Bruce Cockburn, Small Source of Comfort. Committed leftism in popular culture isn’t to be taken for granted, so you give the man respect; you just wish he had a few good tunes to buoy up the commitment.

Dr. John, Zu Zu Soiree. The good doctor’s brand of swamp funk is idiosyncratic enough that two full disks can seem like a bit of an overdose, but if I had to cut this down to one disk, I don’t know where I’d begin.

Billy Joel, Live At Shea Stadium. You want to buy this, I can’t stop you…

Lupe Fiasco, Lasers. “We want substance in the place of popularity.” But I’m guessing he’ll settle for popularity in a pinch.

Nat “King” Cole and His Trio, After Midnight. You may have read that Cole was a highly respected jazz pianist and singer before he became a pop star. This beautiful reissue, with six bonus tracks, is a great place to find out just how true that is.

Sierra Hull, Daybreak. A tasty alternative for fans of Alison Krauss and The Steeldrivers.

VIDEO GAMES

edited by: Justin Clark

DRAGON AGE II
Bioware/EA
360, PS3, PC, Mac
3/8
$59.99

God, how I want to like this series, but I weigh my love of everything Bioware’s good at versus how little I give a fuck about elves, goblins, orcs and shit outside of the LOTR films, and sadly, the fuckvoid is heavier, and this is the same company that got me to play and enjoy an RPG about Sonic the damn Hedgehog. If Anglofantasy potpourri’s your deal though, you’re in for an awesome ride. It’s okay, Bioware, nothing but love for you. We’re cool till Mass Effect 3.

POKEMON BLACK/WHITE
Nintendo
NDS
3/6
$34.99

Speaking of things I give negative fucks about. Pokemon‘s back. Nothing’s changed except a minor uptick in graphical quality. Apparently, someone finally starts asking the questions any rational adult should ask themselves about this series at some point in these new titles, but regretfully, the answer turns out to be a silent, but respectful “fuck you, GO TO GAMESTOP TO DOWNLOAD CELEBI YOU FUCKING PARASITES”

MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL 2K11
2K Sports
Everything
3/6
$59.99 360, PS3; $49.99 Wii; $29.99 PC; $19.99 DS, PS2, PSP

….yep, that’s a baseball game all right.

MLB 11: THE SHOW
Sony
PS3, PS2, PSP
3/6
$59.99 PS3; $29.99 PSP and PS2