Monthly Archives: December 2009
The Best Of Biff Bam Pop – 2009
The last day of 2009 and the last Biff Bam Pop post of 2009. It’s pretty amazing that we’ve been around for over a year now. I noticed the other day that we had reached what I’d consider to be a milestone with our 500th post (which happened to belong to this week’s DVD Tuesday with Scotty G). Looking back there were lots of great highlights in all the pop culture stuff that we write about on the site, but there were also great moments that came specifically from the guys who contribute to the site. On that note, I thought it would be worth giving you some of Biff Bam Pop’s highlights from the past year.
Biff Bam Boo! – Leave it to JP to come up with what could have been a whackadoo idea. 4 stories, written by Biff Bam Pop contributors David Ward, Scott Guest, Ian Rogers, and myself, and illustrated by one man. Did I think it couldn’t be done? Possibly. I though it would be pretty hard work, but not only did JP do a fantastic job illustrating all four diverse stories, he also created unique covers for each story. With David laying out all the text, Biff Bam Boo turned out to be something very special. Here’s a link to the four issues if you missed them:
Issue 1: Charnel – story by David Ward, art by JP Fallavollita
Issue 2: Cellar Door – story by Andy Burns, art by JP Fallavollita
Issue 3: The Patch – story by Scott Guest, script by Andy Burns, art by JP Fallavollita
Issue 4: Wendy – story by Ian Rogers, art by JP Fallavollita
Interviews: 2009 also featured some pretty cool interviews and encounters from some of pop cultures more interesting figures. JP went the indie route, talking with Toronto comic book artists Jeff Lemire and Willow Dawson. Author Charlie Huston reflected on his work on Marvel’s Moon Knight while Jonathan Maberry talked about writing his first comic, Wolverine:Ghosts. We also had a massive three part interview with legendary X-Men writer Chris Claremont, which gave a lot of insight into the man hailed as the real architect of the mutants we know and love today.
Articles: Over the year we had lots of solid standalone pieces as well from all of our contributors. A few of my favourites:
Scotty G And Andy Burns: Two Takes On Paranormal Activity
Pdawg On The Black Crowes Before The Frost
Biff Bam Pop Remembers Michael Jackson and John Hughes
So there you go – highlights of Biff Bam Pop’s 2009. Thanks to Scotty G, JP, Pdawg, JMT, Ogmios, and Ian Rogers for all of their great work throughout the year. And thanks to you for dropping by and reading. Here’s to 2010!
The 2009 Boxing Day Diary of JP, Age 36 ½ – Conclusion
A group of Biff Bam Pop! friends have an annual tradition: they get together every Boxing Day, grab an early morning coffee at the Starbucks at Yonge and Wellesley in downtown Toronto and then head out on a post-Christmas shopping binge. On their lists: comics, books, CD’s, DVD’s and electronics. It’s an event they all love: friendship and explicit consumerism, all wrapped up into a half-day affair. The build up to this happy occasion can be just as exhilarating as the day itself. Here then, is a multi-part, behind-the-scenes-look into JP’s exuberance over 2009’s Boxing Day extravaganza. Enjoy!
Saturday, December 26 – Boxing Day
I gave myself plenty of time. You know, like I always do.
My alarm went off at 7 but I was still running late for the annual 9 a.m. meeting with my Biff Bam Pop! Boxing Day pals at Starbucks. A few last-minute, tissue-wrapped gifts set me back. Flying down the Gardiner Expressway, excitement rising, I threw on some music. Elbow’s One Day Like This hit my airways, a live recording with the BBC Orchestra at Abbey Road Studios from earlier this year. Strings. Choir. Wonderful.
And perfect. One day like this a year would see me right!
Only fifteen minutes late wasn’t bad considering the time I actually left my place. I said my “good mornings” to the gang, threw my jacket over a chair and made my way straight to the ordering counter.
Does anyone else know that Starbucks no longer serves Peppered Bacon Breakfast Sandwiches? Oh, they have a bacon sandwich all right. Apparently, a marketing genius at the company changed the product mix around some time ago. Big mistake, to my mind. Maybe if I had purchased the product with more regularity, it would still be around. But then surely my cholesterol level would be higher and my waistline a little larger. I don’t dwell on these thoughts for very long. Really, it’s only a minor despair. Perhaps the early morning loss would have affected me more had I been on time (or early) but sitting down at the table with the rest of my chums, I don’t let the lack of pepper ruin my morning.
With a creamy hot chocolate in my other hand, wherein Starbucks makes mighty amends, we’re a gaggle of laughs, of wrapping paper, of gifts and of lists. I take mine out from my coat pocket, slowly unfolding it to the peering eyes of my pop culture cohorts.
“That’s a lot of stuff,” someone says with a measure of incredulity.
“Yes it is,” I reply, proudly staring at my list.
Elias shows us a variety of sketches he made over the holidays, images of us, the Biff Bam Pop! crew, as superheroes. (We look mighty, indeed!) David regales us with tales of family Christmases present and past. (They sound adventurous!)
As much as I anticipate and enjoy the crossing of items off of my list, this is, undoubtedly, the best part of the day for me: the initial chit-chat of the last week of our lives. We discuss how family has been, what gifts we’ve received, what movies we’ve seen and what movies we want to see not to mention the specific items we’re looking for on this Boxing Day. Everything up until now has been prologue, but here we are, together, of singular mind (and wit), enjoying each other’s company during the holiday season, a full day of economic socializing in front of us.
There’s no snow in Toronto today – just a grey, overcast sky that doesn’t dare rain on our parade.
We make our way down Yonge St. from store to store, from line-up to line-up, always checking to see how each other are doing; ensuring someone is not lost in HMV’s second level, music DVD section or the World’s Biggest Bookstore’s non-fiction area. Instant messages are sent to Andy B. Where are you? A tap on the shoulder. “Right behind you.” A cell phone rings. Where did Scotty and Denny go? A relieved sigh. “Bottom floor, sci-fi row.”
Strangely, smiles broaden in relation to the amount of cash spent and the number of times credit cards are swiped. It’s a strange, once-a-year dynamic.
We have brunch together and I partake far too much of the buffet: eggs, sausage, french toast and a second helping of bacon. Third, if you count the sandwich earlier in the morning. (I don’t.) This time, there isn’t even room for Jello.
Some of us go our part, going our separate ways in the afternoon while the rest of us head back to Andy B’s place to drink some tea, look over our spoils and watch movies. It’s a relaxing finale.
Boxing Day 2009 was a perfect day. I did everything I wanted to do.
And my list?
U2? Check.
Hamlet? Check.
Puma shoes? Check.
Comic books? Oh, yes. Check.
Friends? All here. All together. Check. Check. Check.
Boxing Day 2010 is less than a year away. Time to start writing a list.
DVD Tuesday with Scotty G
9 – This is a post-apocalyptic film where mankind has been destroyed. Some burlap sacks and machines have survived, and are at war. The film is based on a short film, and has a nice pedigree with Timur Bekmambetov and Tim Burton on board as executive producers.
Paranormal Activity – The indie-sensation and scariest film of 2009 arrives on DVD. The film follows a young couple who believe their house is haunted and decide to video-tape the things that go bump in the night. Easily the scariest film I saw all year (it was also the most fun). If you liked The Blair Witch Project, you should like this film.
Jennifer’s Body – Megan Fox and Amanda Seyfried star in this horror-comedy about a girl who becomes possessed and begins to kill off all the men in her high school. This is Diablo Cody’s first feature film script since Juno, and director Karyn Kusama’s first film since Aeon Flux. It didn’t get much support in theatres, but I think it will do better on DVD.
A Perfect Getaway – This film was released at the end of the summer, as the studio didn’t have very much faith in it. It follows two couples who are vacationing on an island, that find out there are murderers killing tourists. They try to escape and not get killed. Steve Zahn and Milla Jovavich star.
The Marine II – WWE Wrestler Ted DiBiase stars in this sequel in name only to the John Cena action flick from a couple of years ago. The main plot is that DiBiase’s character and his wife are staying in a Thailand resort, and then terrorists take it over. Violence follows.
TV on DVD
Glee: Season One Volume 1 (Road To Sectionals) – It’s very rare that a new series that has not been cancelled comes out on DVD, before the first season is even over, but today the first half of the first season of Glee makes its way on DVD. The show follows a teacher who transforms an underachieving Glee squad into a contender, despite the protests of a phys-ed teacher. New songs are sung every week, and Glee has a strong following already, which will be out in full force today.
The United States of Tara: Season One – Another Diablo Cody project comes out on DVD. This critically acclaimed show also has Steven Speilberg as an executive producer. The main focus of the series is that of Tara, who has Dissociative Identity Disorder, and her different personalities come out all the time, to the dismay of her family. Toni Collette and John Corbett star.
Underwhelming: Andy Burns On Avengers/X-Men: Utopia
While JP had be entertainingly chronicling his boxing day hopes and dreams over the last few weeks, I myself didn’t have any real set purchases in mind, other than picking up a few comics which I’d missed out on over the last few months. High up on my list was the X-men/Avengers Dark Reign crossover titled Utopia.
For those of you who aren’t aware, the main idea behind Dark Reign is that Norman Osbourne has become head of SHIELD, the worldwide peace keeping organization which he has rebranded HAMMER. This is interesting because Norman had a pretty tainted history, what with him being the Green Goblin and all. But because of his heroic actions during the Secret Invasion, the world has forgiven and forgotten. But still a baddie at heart, Osbourne has created his own Avengers and X-Men out of villains (hence the Dark Avengers and Dark X-Men logos that have been appearing on various covers). In Utopia, Osbourne’s groups take on the tried and true Marvel mutants, whose numbers have been dwindling and who currently reside in San Francisco.
The Utopia hardcover compiles a storyline that went through the Uncanny X-Men and Dark Avengers monthly series, along with a variety of affiliated stories that were published around the same time revolving around the Dark X-Men and their origins. While I was looking forward to reading the main story in the book, I have to admit that I was bored by everything that was going on. It seemed as though there were just a series of battle after battle, along with a question of whether or not Emma Frost, the Dark X-Men’s leader, had really abandoned her students and Scott Summers, her lover and leader of the X-Men and all remaining mutants. The answer is totally underwhelming, as is the solution to the mutants constant lack of a stable home (something a character even references at the end of the series). The end result is another retread from past X-men storylines.
Around a year ago I picked up Uncanny X-Men: Manifest Destiny, a hardcover that featured the X-Men first arriving in their new San Francisco digs. Having shied away from the series for a few years now, I really enjoyed the storyline. It felt fresh and I thought the mutants had been revitalized, but reading Utopia, I just felt as though the whole X-Men world was tired again. It lacks the strength of the work Brian Michael Bendis has been doing with his New Avengers work or that Ed Brubaker has achieved with his run on Daredevil. Maybe it’s the fact that there are so many new mutants running around that if you haven’t been reading every X-series for years, it’s hard to walk into a storyline and actually care about the characters.
The new X-Men storyline coming out of Utopia is titled Nation X. I think until something earth-shattering happens in the world of the mutants, I won’t be visiting their latest new home.
Scotty G’s Box Office Wrap-Up Report
I have never predicted the Christmas weekend box office before, and boy did it show. I predicted 4 of the 5 films in the top 5, and got only 2 in their correct spot. People definitely went to the theatres this weekend, as THREE films had grosses that were over $50 million. Here’s the breakdown:
Avatar remained the #1 film for the second week in a row, slipping a scant 2.6% for a gross of $75 million (I predicted a 2nd place finish with a gross of $53.9 million). Audiences are really digging James Cameron’s latest film. It had the strongest per theatre average in the top ten with $21,701, and even the doubters of the film have to admit that it is off to a very impressive start. Have you ever heard of a film that opened with over $70 million, having virtually the same gross in its second week? The Dark Knight dropped 52.5% in its second weekend as a point of comparison. This is far and away the biggest story in Hollywood right now. In two weeks Avatar has taken in $212.2 million.
Opening strong in 2nd place was Sherlock Holmes with $65.3 million (I predicted a 1st place finish with a gross of $55 million). It’s not often that a film opens this strong, and it doesn’t finish in 1st place, but it happened this weekend. Warner Bros. has a hit to end the year, and there is a chance that Sherlock Holmes could be #1 next weekend, which is what the marketers want to happen. It had an excellent per theatre average of $18,031, and movie-goers were interested in Robert Downey Jr.’s take on the classic character. I’m telling you, this Robert Downey Jr. is going to be a star someday J
In 3rd place is Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel with a gross of $50.2 million (I predicted a 3rd place finish and a gross of $50 million). The film had a better opening weekend than the original, and was definitely the family film of the weekend. The per theatre average was great at $13,568, but sequels see a larger up front demand, and then fade away. We’ll see if that is the case with this film. Since its mid-week opening, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel has grossed $77 million.
Debuting in 4th place is Nora Ephron’s It’s Complicated with $22.1 million (I predicted a 4th place finish and a gross of $18 million). The per theatre average was a relatively low (compared to the three films ahead of it at the box office) $7,660. The adult comedy starring Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin, and Steve Martin overcame some disappointing reviews to have a strong opening weekend, but I don’t think it will have much in the way of staying power as adult audiences tend to see strongly reviewed films.
5th place is a very tight battle as two films are battling it out, and are separated by $25,000. Right now Up In The Air is the 5th place film with a gross of $11.755 million, while The Blind Side is the 6th place film with a gross of $11,730 million. Up In The Air expanded its theatre count and saw a 266.2% (that is not a typo – 266.2%!!!) increase in business. It had a per theatre average of $6,203 and is really building some Oscar buzz heading into awards season. The total gross for Up In The Air stands at $24.5 million after four weeks. The Blind Side also saw an uptick in business going up 17.1% from last week. It had a per theatre average of $4,241 and in six weeks, the film has taken in $184.3 million. We’ll see where these films end up when the final numbers come out.
As I mentioned The Princess and The Frog in my predictions, I should tell you where it finished up. It was a disappointment to me finishing in 7th place with a gross of $8.6 million (I predicted a 5th place finish and a gross of $15 million). The film suffered a 28.7% drop from last weekend’s gross. I thought it would have a bigger impact at the box office with families, especially over the holiday season (it’s a Disney film after all), but I was wrong. It’s per theatre average was $2,499, and in five weeks it has taken $63.3 million, and is nearing the end of its run.
There was only one story in terms of films in limited release, and that is the opening of Heath Ledger’s last film The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus. Playing in 4 theatres, the film took in $132,000 for a per theatre average of $32,500 (highest of any film at the box office this weekend). Terry Gilliam films are definitely polarizing, and tend not to be very commercial, but everyone involved with the film has to be happy with the start.
To recap, here were my predictions:
1) Sherlock Holmes – $55 million
2) Avatar – $53.9 million
3) Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel – $50 million
4) It’s Complicated – $18 million
5) The Princess and the Frog – $15 million
And here are the final numbers:
1) Avatar – $75 million
2) Sherlock Holmes – $65.3 million
3) Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel – $50.2 million
4) It’s Complicated – $22.1 million
5) Up In The Air – $11.7 million
My predictions were off by 20 + 10.3 + .2 + 4.1 + 6.4 = $41 million
Next week there are no major new releases. Two films opening in limited release are The White Ribbon and The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond. Check back on New Year’s Day to see my predictions for next weekend!
