When Kristen Kreuk was cast to play Chun Li in the latest Street Fighter movie, I was pretty stoked. But could she fight? Could she act? Would the battered Street Fighter brand be finally redeemed on the silver screen? These were some heavy questions everyone was asking, including myself.  But really – and I think I speak for a lot of men people here – my main interest was seeing this stunning half-Chinese, half-Dutch girl donning the Chun Li outfit, looking sexy, and making angry-cute faces at the bad guys!

To summarize my thoughts, Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li is one of the worst action films I have ever seen, and will hopefully sound the death knell for live action attempts at the series.

The fight sequences, and there aren’t as many as you might expect, are barely a cut above daytime television standards. The wire-fu is particularly egregious, with excessive edits and fast camera pans unable to mask the lack of athletic ability of the cast. For a good reference (if not the golden standard) of what can be performed by a group of well-trained and choreographed actors, see Zhang Ziyi versus Michelle Kwon in Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon for a martial arts masterpiece.

I could go on and on about what makes Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li such a bad film, but that would be giving far too much attention to a movie that nobody should have to see. Unless, of course, you are a Kristin Kreuk fan!

Yes, there are plenty of interesting shots of Kristin Kreuk in this film, and she shows her complete range of acting emotions, notably: anger, sadness and anger-sadness. Or, pretty much exactly what she delivered on Smallville for all those years.

Unfortunately, she doesn’t seem to wear any sexy outfits during this outing – not even the high cut skirt worn by Chun-Li in the videogame that is infamously popular among the otaku crowd. It seems that the makers of the film deliberately tried to downplay Kristen’s sex appeal, perhaps to make her a better role model for young women. This was obviously a mistake.

So, if you are a diehard Kristen Kreuk fan, and can stomach the terrible plot, script and acting in this film, at least you can enjoy staring at this magnificent beauty for a solid 90 minutes while you simultaneously try to scrub the rest of the show from your bleeding senses. Also, there are a couple cool tracks by rapper Ace Hood to give the soundtrack a bit of gangstaness, although it’s hardly enough to save the film.

Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li gets a 2/10. One point for Kristin Kreuk’s adorably strange facial expressions, and another for featuring Ace Hood on the soundtrack.

Do you like car chases in movies? How about ones that are mostly done in computer graphics – an experience that’s little different from watching someone else play a videogame, but at 24 frames per second? Because that’s how I felt after watching Fast and Furious, the latest Vin Diesel flick that also stars Michelle Rodriguez, Paul Walker and Jordana Brewster.

In truth, a few of the chase sequences are probably worth watching once, but largely, the film fails to deliver anything new or exciting to the series. But what were you expecting? It’s the third bloody sequel, and the original wasn’t anything special to begin with. Check out Ronin if you want to see car chases done right. If they only put Deniro behind the wheel of a tricked out Nissan Micra…

The one thing that got me interested enough to watch Fast and Furious is the casting of Jordana Brewster, who plays Mia Toretto, not that you need to learn anyone’s name in this film. Which gets me thinking, why bother calling Vin Diesel’s character anything other than Vin Diesel!? He plays the same character in all his films.

Jordana, who also appeared in the original The Fast and The Furious and did a stint on NBC’s Chuck earlier this year, is known for her attractive girl-next-door appeal. With her straight brunette hair, naturally tanned skin and big wet eyes, Jordana Brewster is a major, major babe. Unfortunately, the makers of Fast and Furious inexplicably dress her up like someone’s Italian grandmother! It’s unbelievable that they don’t make her look sexy at all. Aside from a brief but fully clothed make-out scene, there’s no sex or skin to be had in this film.

Concerning Jordana’s role in the film, it’s like she’s doing a cameo appearance. Saying hi and giving friendly hugs to her cast mates is a horrid waste of Jordana’s talents. When is this chic going to get naked, or at least have a mildly erotic sex scene? Certainly not while Vin Diesel is around hogging the spotlight with his goofy mug. But somehow I doubt Jordana, a Yale grad and former child soap star, will pursue roles that exploit her sexuality. This is a girl that has skillfully dodged the scandals and tabloid fodder of her Hollywood cohorts. It seems that she’s chosen a more private and modest existence than some of her media whore friends. Pity for us.

The best part of Fast and Furious is probably near the end, when Jordana Brewster is seen driving a JDM Acura NSX. A sexy girl in a sexy car! Why wasn’t the whole film based around this concept? Instead, we’re forced to watch a creepy looking bald dude and a Zack Morris look-alike drive their high school prom cars through silly computer generated tunnels against a politically-correct-because-they’re-racially-diverse field of competitors that always seem to crash or drive slower cars. At least video games have the element of uncertainty to make them exciting.

Fast and Furious gets a 2/10, after losing a point for starring Vin Diesel and another for featuring Souljah boy music.

How accurately can we guess another person’s emotional state from just looking at their eyes? Without looking at the rest of their face, or other parts of their body, can we correctly determine a person’s inner state, desires or intentions?

Why not test yourself online with this test developed by Dr. Simon Cohen-Baron (Ali G/Borat’s real life cousin– I kid you not!).

I found this challenge extremely interesting, and although I struggled on a few of the faces, I did better than expected. See if you can beat my score of 31! In the results section, it’s pretty clear that females score higher than men, especially in the upper range. Maybe I have a less masculine brain? I’d never admit that…

Unfortunately, in the age of text-based communication, these innate and fine tuned skills have become somewhat debased; yet, the popular use of smiley’s and emoticons reveals that we’re still reliant on these signals to correctly decode the intent of others.

Do you ever find that your text-based messages are wrongly interpreted by the other end? Do you often hesitate to use satire or sarcasm online because it might be taken seriously?

Occasionally, I’ll catch an episode of NBC’s Chuck, a comedic drama about a man who lives with a supercomputer inside his head. Chuck is both funny and smart, yet never takes itself too seriously. Much of the show’s success stems from its solid cast, which includes the beautiful blonde, Yvonne Strahovski.

Yvonne Strahovski plays the character Sarah Walker, an undercover CIA operative that is in charge of protecting the man with the supercomputer in his head, Chuck Bartowski.

As any fan of the show surely knows by now, the writers of Chuck will occasionally pen in a scene where Yvonne Strahovski must forgo wearing some of her clothes! It’s pretty obvious that such scenes do little to push the plot development and are merely presented for the appeasement of the mostly male demographic that tunes in each week. I’m not criticizing the use of sex to garner more viewers, but I think they could be more creative in how they insert these scenes.

Australian native Yvonne Strahovski has a killer body, and fortunately, I found some screen caps of her latest panty-walk. These shots come from the same episode where Chuck finally makes his move on Sarah, which results in some tongue-locked, ass-grabbing bed wrestling. But don’t get your hopes up too high – the whole sex scene is cut short when Chuck realizes he doesn’t have a condom! I guess when you have an unparalleled amount of knowledge stuffed into your head, you know your exact chances of catching an STD from the CIA’s hottest agent!

I wouldn’t call myself much of a fan of the televised series Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles, but I have faithfully watched most of the episodes spanning its last two seasons, including the latest finale, which aired just recently. The problem with the show is that its producers decided to switch the brilliant cliff-hanger saga format of the first season, for a more episodic, standalone product for the second. I found much of latter’s content boring and non-crucial to the main story arc, which greatly lowered my expectations for the show.

Concerning season two’s finale, one point of interest that the show’s creators finally give some attention to is the obvious sexual tension between teenage John Connor and his fembot bodyguard. Although often referred to as siblings in the storyline (to disguise their identities from outsiders) many implicit hints are dropped that either or both characters have feelings for each other. This moment is captured in a preposterous scene where the android Cameron asks John to climb on top of her, while she’s half-naked on a bed, to inspect some of her hardware. Uh-huh. The scene ends with John failing to get his disk into her floppy drive, or something like that.

Filling the cast’s roster with Lena Headey, Shirley Manson, Stephanie Jacobsen and other sexy actresses reveals the producers’ ostensible approach to attract a bigger audience – sex appeal. In fact, I bet many followers of the show simply tune in just to catch another glimpse of Summer Glau in her underwear. And hey, I’m all for seeing Summer Glau in her panties, but it’s a shame that they’re now ignoring the story’s original draw: badass sci-fi action.

Oh, and they’ve somehow outlawed the great comedic moments of the first season. Does anyone remember Cameron being called a bitch-whore in the girl’s washroom in high school? These hilarious terminator moments have seemingly disappeared.

So back to season two’s finale – without giving away any spoilers, I’ll just say that it ends with a sudden shift of events, no doubt fueling anticipation for a third season. But I won’t empathize if the show eventually gets shit-canned. In my opinion, they simply lost what good they had in the series, with the exception of maintaining a sexy cast. But even then, these one-dimensional characters do little more than just play out their simple roles, teasing us with sex, presumably because the show’s ammo and SFX budget got slashed with the rest of economy.

Is it fair to the Terminator legacy to let the show continue?

It’s a bit embarrassing to admit, but the other day I gave in to curiosity and watched the teen vampire flick, Twilight. To summarize my thoughts, it was pretty terrible.

Unless you’re a 13 year old girl who’s in love with the eyebrow monster vampire, Robert Pattinson, I think you’ll find it pretty hard to sit through the film’s brooding, juvenile nature. But judging from its success at the box office, I guess that’s what its target audience is asking for.

You see, I remember growing up with movies like Robocop and Total Recall – total masterpieces of storytelling and violence. Sure, they were a little light in the romance department, but when you have explosions and gunfire in almost every single scene, you’re hardly going to miss it! But I digress…

Regarding the plot in Twilight, very little happens; it feels rather like a filler episode from some weekly teen melodrama series:

Basically, a girl meets a guy, someone gets angry, and then the credits start rolling. After they’ve done about five of these films, I think it’ll make a lot more sense to just queue up all the movie trailers and watch them in sequence. Seriously, they just didn’t deliver enough of anything in this film!

Acting wise, it’s a mixed bag. Robert Pattinson, with his British heritage, offers a bit of depth and mystery to his character, but unfortunately he’s tied to a silly script that makes him seem suspiciously homosexual, and perhaps partially retarded.

Kirsten Stewart in comparison, downright butchers her lines. Couldn’t we just have the same vampire fall in love with a pretty, but comatose hospital patient? I mean, what does a 100 year old man have in common with a high school girl, anyway?

Despite my personal disdain for Kristen Stewart’s acting, I’m sure some misguided fan will post a video collage of her ‘best moments’ on Youtube. In fact, I’ve already seen some of this crap the other day, and I don’t know what I find more hilarious: Kirsten Stewart’s attempt to portray a serious character in a movie, or her fan’s warped perception of her acting skills.

So is there anything that I like about Twilight?

Well, Kristin Stewart is pretty cute – I have no problems admitting that. She’s attractive in an unconventional way, as a girl that’s hot, but doesn’t really act like she’s hot, but knows full well that she’s hot. And it’s a subtle hotness, that’s probably more rooted in her relative youth and unblemished look than to any superior genes. I’ll settle for whatever it is, because I have to believe that something is redeemable from this film, other than providing the confirmation that I won’t be seeing the sequel (well, unless Kristen Stewart gets naked or something).

Twilight gets a 3/10.

Do you know that many cable and over-the-air TV channels are being streamed live over the Internet using P2P software? Now you can watch TV from around the world, in real-time, absolutely free!

Before I begin, as a responsible content publisher, I have to say that Aibal.com does not condone the use of file sharing TV channels in countries where it is strictly prohibited. So please be informed of your country’s filesharing and copyright laws before using any P2P software. Furthermore, streaming pay-per-view shows, like the UFC and HBO boxing, without actually paying for them, certainly raises some moral concerns. As with all filesharing technologies, it is up to the end-user to decide on how it is used.

To get P2P TV running on your computer, it is easiest if you are using Windows, or like me, running a copy of XP in a virtual machine on my Macbook Pro. There are several applications that will allow you to see live TV channels on the Internet, but today I’ll introduce the one that is currently popular among UFC fans and those who wish to view Asian TV channels from China, Japan and Korea.

The program is called TVAnts. It is a free P2P TV app that was developed in China (where most of these P2PTV programs are made) and allows the viewing of such cable channels as the Irish-based Sentanta Sports. TVAnts uses P2P file sharing to assemble live video streams and play them back smoothly on most broadband connections.

Once TVAnts is up and running, you will see a window like the one below, populate a list of channels currently available for viewing. If you don’t have Far-East languages installed, you will likely see meaningless characters where, for many of us, equally meaningless Chinese characters are supposed to be displayed!

Fortunately, some of these channels are from the West, so you should be able to make out which ones provide non-Asian content, like Sentanta Sports, CNN or BBC News. Also, in the search tab where the channels are listed, you will notice an ‘Audience’ column. The channel  list by default is sorted by audience, or the amount of peers who are currently sharing the channel. Often, channels with larger audiences are quicker to load, so keep this in mind if you are having problems streaming a particular video.

To launch a video stream, double-click on a channel and you will see a video window pop-up. It can take several minutes for the actual video to appear, and several more minutes before the stream has buffered enough data to provide smooth video playback, so just be patient!

You’ll be presented with some static Chinese ads while the buffering happens, but eventually the video should begin.

With any luck, you’ll be watching TV from around the world, but just keep in mind that watching PPV events and exclusive TV shows may very well be less-than-legal in your home country. Always use common sense, like you would with Bittorrent or other filesharing services, when using P2PTV.

I’ve been playing Valve’s brilliant co-op based shooter, Left 4 Dead, since its launch back in November. Although its visuals aren’t quite as stunning, as say, Call of Duty 5 or Far Cry 2, the game features great style, atmosphere and game play that has made it a must-have game for PC gamers (or Mac gamers that use Bootcamp, like me).

Letting the game choose its graphic settings is not a terrible idea, but you will notice some choppiness when the action ramps up – which is often in this game! Thus, I would recommend turning off FSAA and lowing the resolution from the default 1440 x 900 to 1280 x 768. Furthermore, I would tweak the shader, model, and texture settings to meet your personal needs. As you can see from the video, I’ve found a combination of settings that I like, but if I was playing L4D on expert campaign mode, I’d probably lower the settings further.

Many MacBook Pro owners seem to choose a combination of medium to high settings when playing Left 4 Dead, and many of them choose to keep the native 1440 x 900 resolution. Whatever choices you settle on, just keep in mind that the newer unibody MacBook Pro’s comes with the faster 9600M GT CPU (the old models have the slower 8600M GT), and this should let you play most games at decent frame rates with graphics similar to what you’d find on a Xbox 360 or Playstation 3.

I’ve been a big fan of Showtime’s Dexter since a friend recommended the series to me during the summer months. After getting hooked on the pilot episode, I quickly ate up seasons one, two and three, relishing every episode for its amazing cast, beautiful photography, and its, erm, killer script. I’m going to share with you some of my thoughts, covering a bit from each season, but I’ll leave out the specifics so as not to offer any spoilers.

Season 1

The first season does a great job of introducing the star of the show, the world he inhabits and the secret he keeps. The show uses a saga format, blending each episode into the next, giving the viewers a personal and engrossing experience throughout. The parts of the first season that I enjoyed the most were the little moments where Dexter tries to blend in as an ordinary, quiet forensic specialist amidst a group of overzealous cops trying to find killers who are just like him. There’s also quite a few comedic moments, which helps to lighten the otherwise dark and grizzly nature of the show.

Season 2

Season two starts with a bang that’s so loud you’re basically guaranteed to watch all 13 episodes after the opening scene! In stark contrast to the first season, Dexter’s sophomore outing begins at a much faster pace. With the kid gloves off, the reserved, careful plodding of the first season’s storyline is completely abandoned for a much faster velocity. A host of new characters are swiftly introduced and many interesting interactions take place.

Some people have remarked that season two loses some of the first season’s purity, but others protest that the quicker pace is simply a natural progression if you view both seasons as one continuous storyline. Seen in this way, the first season does a great job of setting things up, with the second season allowing the fireworks to really light up. Opinions aside, season two is a wild ride with Dexter being attacked from all angles. Often it feels like he’s juggling chainsaws on top of a house of cards; you really begin to feel that at any moment his web of lies, cover ups and murders will come crashing down upon him.

Season 3

Season three has just completed, and I can say that they’ve returned the series to a style and pace more reminiscent of season one. Because of this, I initially felt that the writers had burnt themselves out, as not much was happening and some segments were – dare I say – boring. But as the pieces were being set and the story began to unfold, I realized that they were simply focusing on a cleaner storyline with less subplots and characters to muddle things up. In doing so, they’ve created a highly polished product that I think is unparalleled on television today. The level of acting, directing, and script writing is nothing short of phenomenal.

In retrospect, season three seems to assume that you’re already a fan of the show; they don’t compromise their method of storytelling by forcing cheesy moments and injecting meaningless action. The result is a deeper and more believable world for Dexter to inhabit. Sometimes I stop and think about how every character, relationship and setting is geared towards creating this reality. Eventually, you really begin to feel as if Dexter’s secret is your secret.

Are you a fan of Dexter? What’s been your favorite season or moment so far?

After a full month on Youtube my faux unibody MacBook Pro review has broke 7,000 views and has garnered over a hundred interesting comments. I didn’t know exactly what to expect when I posted the clip, just days after the notebook arrived in my hands, but I knew my review would stir the waters with its unorthodox mix of facts, fantasy and pure flame bait!

A few people seemed to have grasped that it’s impossible to take my review seriously if you actually consider what I’m saying and doing in the video (like ‘docking’ a load of Apple crap onto the display!), but apparently many others are completely oblivious that my piece is purposely ridiculous. Indeed, I didn’t want things to be too obvious. Where would the fun be in that?

What I was hoping for was to bait a variety of emotional responses, and judging by the vociferous nature of the comments posted thus far, I’ve certainly succeeded. From barely legible insults to congratulatory praise, I think I’ve heard it all. But the best comments are those that scold my incorrigible parlance to butcher the names of various Apple products and my inability to recognize that the English pronunciation of ‘aluminum’ is the exact same element used to make pop cans and car frames.

Right now I’m sort of torn between continuing with this series of misreviews or just keeping my content straight and honest (as it is with anything that I write for this blog). Having said that, it’s kind of hard to stop when I’m having this much fun and apparently entertaining a good portion of viewers as well!