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Shmee Takes a Tour of Tormay!

tormay-trilogy

Being in a Kauai affords you a lot of down time, so while I was there I read the Tormay Trilogy: The Hawk and His Boy, The Shadow at the Gate, and The Wicked Day.  They were all written by Christopher Bunn.  Like a lot of indie books, none of these books tells a complete story, and they were meant to be read together, but since I got them all as part of my indie book bundle that was not a problem.

The story follows a young thief named Jute.  While doing a job for the Thieves Guild he unknowingly opens a box containing a magical knife.  He accidentally cuts himself on the knife, and is soon on journey to save the land of Tormay from the Dark with his new friend The Hawk.

At first when I started to read this book I was a little put off by its generic nature.  Young orphan who finds out he is special, save the world from the Dark, gods of Wind, Sea, Earth and Fire, and words of power, but Christopher Bunn’s excellent writing won me over.  He wrote the characters so well, I didn’t care that they are all a little familiar, and he developed his lore for the land of Tormay so well that you could almost believe that it was real place.  Even his magic system made sense.

If you are looking for a good fantasy novel to read, you could do a whole lot worse than the Tormay Trilogy.  Like most indie books the first book in the series is free right now on the Amazon store, or if you want the entire trilogy it is only $3.99, so it is cheap reading no matter how you get it.  I will no doubt be looking up more of Christopher Bunn’s books.

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Kauai Wrap-Up!

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As many of you may have noticed, Shmee.me has been silent as of late, and that is because I have been on vacation, and as you may have seen in the title I was/am in Kauai.  It has been a great trip to the Garden Island, and I am going to give you some “Best of”s.

Best Snorkeling: Ke’e Beach

Ke’e beach is great (pictured above)!  Tons of sand and shade, plus it has a large protective reef around it, so it is safe to swim in.  The reef is full of fish and coral, and for the most part is only waist deep, so being a strong swimmer is not necessary.  The fish are used to people, so they come right up to you and beg for food like dogs, but sadly for them, I am cheap and never brought any food.

Fun story about one of our trips to Ke’e.  We went there on stormy day and there were twenty foot swells beyond the reef, but some ocean kayakers decided it would be a good place to come in at, and like most times when you make a mistake: you pay for it.  They got pummeled against the reef, but luckily they paid for their ignorance with cuts and bruises and a good story, but they gave the life guards a good scare.

The beach is easy to find since it is literally at the end of the highway. Just head north and when the road stops you are there.

Best Adventure: Princeville Ranch Adventures: Zip and Dip

This was my first time zip-lining, but it probably will not be my last.  It was a blast!  There are nine zip-lines, and towards the end there is a nice swimming hole to cool off in with a small ledge to jump off.

The guides were a ton of fun, and kept everyone in good spirits.  The views as the guides put it are Jurassic Park, and Tropic Thunder, but after the long hot day of hiking and zipping, the lagoon to swim in was the best part.

Best Fish Taco: Happy Taco

Happy Taco is a truck in Kapa’a, but their fish tacos are wonderful.  With big chunks of ahi tuna, and some sort of sauce all for $3, and if you get two, you get free rice and beans!

Best Restaurant with a View: The Beach House

The view from The Beach House is unreal, and all the surfers coming in with the sun setting it doesn’t get more Hawaii than that.  Duke’s was in the running and it may have had better food, but if you want a view with your expensive tropical drink (well expensive everything really), there is none better than The Beach House.

Best (And Only) Luau: Smith’s Family Luau

This award isn’t fair since it is the only Luau we went too, but food was really good, and they put on a decent show.  I only wish that they had better seats for the show because the padded bleachers get uncomfortable real quick, especially after I stuffed myself on the all you can eat buffet and bar.

Best Surf: Hanalei Bay

The surf in Hanalei is perfect.  The waves keep coming in just like clockwork.  Not to big, and not to small.  Though every now and then a monster wave would come in and destroy me, but it is part of the fun, and a good way to prove the worth of my Waviator floating sunglasses!  The rip tide can be strong here, so don’t go too far out in to the water unless you are a strong swimmer.

Best Tourist Trap: Hanalei Town

My wife loved it there and it is easy to see why. Cute shops and restaurants all framed in by Kauai’s famous giant cliffs.  My wife would love to spend our next trip to Kauai exclusively in this little town.  I have no objections (my wallet might).

Best Hiking: Everywhere

HA! I have no reviews on Kauai’s legendary hiking because if you know me, you that hiking is not a thing that I like to do, but if you are a hiker you will have fun in Kauai, but I would rather be snorkeling, but to each their own I suppose (but I am in the right here).

It was a wonderful trip, and it saddens me to leave it tomorrow, but as they say absence makes the heart grow fonder.  I just hope that it is not a long absence.

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When is a Movie a Success?

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I was reading a report about this summer’s box office busts and a surprising title was listed: Pacific Rim.  True Pacific Rim did not light up the North American box office, but it made over $400 Million world wide in box office receipts, so I have decided to dig in to this number a little more and see what it means to truly decide if Pacific Rim was a bust or not.

First off lets break apart that $400 million.  Just over $100 million came from North America, and about $110 million came from China.  The remaining $190 million from the rest of the world.  In most parts of the world the studios take 60% of the receipt price with the remaining 40% going to the theater, but in China the studios only take in 25%.  This is because piracy is rampant in China, so the ticket price has to be low for people to go to the movies.  Over all Legendary/Warner Bros took in $174 million from most of the world, and only $27.5 million from China, but still that is $201.5 million, not bad for a box office bust, but there is still more to dig in too.

The budget for the movie is estimated at $190 million.  That means the studio has only cleared $11.5 million, and of that they are still probably paying for the advertising costs which are usually about a quarter the budget of the film, so in this case it would be about $50 million, so the studios are still in the hole about $38.5 million dollars.  That sounds bad, but there is still money on the table.

The movie has yet to come out on home video.  This used to be a major earner for films, but as streaming video and the internet has taken off, fewer people are ponying up for the price of a DVD or Blu-Ray.  Still, $38.5 is well within reach, and they still get to sell the TV rights to various TV stations around the world, plus random merchandising like comic books, t-shirts, and toys.  This movie will make a small amount of money, and considering the make or break nature of the film business, I bet a lot of executives are happy about that.

But the major money maker is still to come: the sequel.  Very rarely does the first movie in a franchise make tons of money.  Batman Begins only took in $375 million world wide, and sure that was eight years ago, and it didn’t have the China tax, but still had they stopped there Warner Bros would have walked away from billions.  The reason is, as much as people complain about sequels and the lack of creativity, they like a sure thing.  Once a movie has proven it is good and worth their money usually the second and third movies make bank.

In the end I think Pacific Rim was a success, critically and financially, and it makes sense why Guillermo del Toro is talking sequel, so if anyone else wants to call Pacific Rim a bust they should look at the numbers first.

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Muppet Treasure Island: Airport Edition!

Muppettreasure

If you know me than you know that I love the Muppets, so Muppet Treasure Island is a guilty pleasure for me.  It came out in 1996, and it was directed by Brian Henson.  It may not be the best Muppet movie, but it is certainly not the worst.

The movie for the most part fallows Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic tale of a boy Jim Hawkins (Kevin Bishop) and his friends, Gonzo and Rizzo, who are given a map by the ex-pirate Billy Bones (Billy Connelly).  They are soon off on an adventure on the high seas, or the big blue wet thing as Squire Trelawney (Fozzie Bear) calls it.  The cook/pirate captain Long John Silver is played by the always wonderful Tim Curry.

Billy Connelly and Tim Curry are perfect for Muppet movies with their exaggerated acting ability and over the top perfomances.  Kevin Bishop on the other hand tries his best, but he is not as talented as the Connelly and Curry.  It is a shame too since he has so much screen time.

The musical numbers are mostly good in this movie with Cabin Fever and Professional Pirate as the stand outs.  Curry directing the staging as the pirates sing always cracks me up.

The puppet work by Jim Henson Studios is fantastic as always.  If I could act or use my hands well, puppeteering would be a dream job!  It is always amazing how quickly I forget that all the Muppets are puppets.

This is not the greatest movie in the world, but for me it is always fun to watch because I love the characters so much, and there is something about felt puppets preforming classic literature that just does it for me.  I watched this movie on HBO Go, but I am sure that you can get it any number of places.

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Disney Has A Problem!

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Disney’s new big project is Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, and it is supposed to relate back to the first film in some way, which sounds good, but I can’t help but feel that Disney’s live action studio is in trouble .

Their Marvel and Animated houses are doing great, or even better than that with Iron Man 3 doing over $1.5 Billion world wide, and the people behind Tangled are releasing another princess movie this fall Frozen, but to release ANOTHER Pirates of the Caribbean seems like they are scraping the bottom of the barrel.

With the huge failure of The Lone Ranger, I was hoping that they would circle their wagons and come up with something more interesting, but I guess Johnny Depp acting weird is all they got.  I have heard no one screaming that they need more Pirates.  It has been a profitable series, but only the first one was good, so now most people hold the franchise with a little contempt.

I wish the studio the best, but it sounds like they are throwing good money after bad to try and fix their creative debt, but what they should be doing is trying new things, so they can have new franchises to milk until they die, but hay who am I, just some guy ranting on the internet.