Quick Thoughts: Blues Brothers 2000

For this week's watch along over in my Discord, the featured film was Blues Brothers 2000. Makes sense since the original Blues Brothers film was featured last week.

So right toff the bat, here is a big question, as Elwood doesn't learn about Jake's death until a day after he gets out of prison and is waiting to be picked up.Now we know all the member of the band got out before Elwood did, but the question is, when would have Jake be released and when did he he did within the continuity of the Blues Brothers universe? If we go by date of John Belushi's death of March 5, 1982.... then that means no one told Elwood that Jake died until 1998... which is like a total dick move.

Okay, now I will admit I'm someone who does not have an issue with the character of Buster Blues... however, I am very much aware of how the studio (in this case Universal) pretty much forced the character into existence along with a number of other 'creative' notes that basically neutered what John Landis and Dan Aykroyd were hoping to accomplish with the sequel. Universal's meddling of things basically is what leads to the Joe Morton being in the film instead of Jim Belushi, because the studio, who didn't want to do the film to begin with and insisted on various details, wanted the film out in theaters in early 1998. Belushi ended up being unavailable because he was committed to a show on ABC (and this was before the show According to Jim). Within the context of Blues Brothers lore, Jim Belushi was already portraying the character known as 'Zee' in concert with the Blues Brothers band along side Aykroyd and John Goodman as Might Mack, in particular with the opening of the House of Blues clubs around the United States in the mid-90s, and the Belushi was also apart of the Blues Brothers Half Time show at the Super Bowl in 1996. So with Belushi being unavailable and a studio, the part of 'Zee' was re-written to create a tribute to the legendary Cab Calloway who played Curtis in the first film, with the character being called Cabel 'Cab' Chamberlain. The obvious parallel and Belushi connection is certainly seen in the Revival Tent / John The Revalator sequence will Cab is 'transformed' and the character performs the same backflip sequence Jake does in the first film when he has his realization at the Triple Rock Church.

Some people, probably most notably the idiot known as The Nostalgia Critic, aka Doug Walker, takes issue with the number of musical numbers in Blues Brothers 2000, and to a point that is kind of understandable. But when you look at in the context of how old many of performers were in Blues Brothers 2000 and how many have since passed away, the film becomes more an awesome time capsule and showcase of some of the greatest music performers of all time. Just take a look at the Louisana Gators Boys line up that includes BB King, Issac Hayes, Koko Taylor, Steve Winwood, Clarence Clemons, Bo Diddley and others, then realize throughout the rest of the movie there is Eddie Floyd, Junior Wells, Aretha Franklin, Sam Moore, James Brown, Wilson Pickett and Lonnie Brooks and you realize... Blues Brothers 2000 is rather special and I'm serious when I say, the collection of musical talent featured in it will never be equaled.

That said, I do take one small issue with the Soundtrack to the film... in particularly with some versions of songs performed by the Blues Brothers band not being on it, particularly the version of Green Onion heard after the Bluesmobile runs out of gas. Live recording of Green Onions appear on the Made In America and The Blues Brothers & Friends Live album, but I would love hear the full version of it the band recorded for this movie. Not to mention the band's version of Last Night was also pretty good.... Now don't get me wrong, the sound track album is great, but we probably could've done without John Popper's Harmonica Musings and Let There Be Drums by the Carl LaFong Trio... but that's just my opinion.

Today's Notes 11/21/20

Good afternoon everybody,

The 2020 Gaming Tour added another game finished to the list last night when I finished my first ever console run of Mass Effect, making it the 43rd game finished this year on stream. Now to the shock of some, with my Female Shepard character the Paramour achievement was done with Kaiden instead of Liara for a couple of reasons, one being I can't stand Liara, which is well established and two I've never did that route in my previous PC play-throughs, so it was something different. Add onto that, normally when it comes to the choice on Virmire, normally the one I save is whoever is at the nuke, so obviously the person saved was Kaiden instead of Ashley, but the twist here is we went to save Kaiden who was at the A.A. tower.... which meant I got to see a cut scene I never seen before of the one left behind defending the nuke, which was pretty bad ass. 

With Mass Effect being finished the question of what will be the next game featured comes to mind, at the moment I'm considering Kingdom Heart Chain of Memories in addition to a few other games. Certainly a lot of possibilities but it'll come down what do I think I will be able to finish before the end of the year. After all last year we finished 44 games with 2 that carried over into this year.

Today's Fitness Boxing routine was felt pretty good with Weaving, Defensive and Hook Combos being the three sets done. All were about the same length of time roughly 11.5 minuets each which made the session pretty even with not one set throwing a monkey wrench into the proverbial works. 

In the world of Animal Crossing New Horizons, it seems my daily routine is gifting one item to one resident of the island and if I get something back, starting a chain reaction of gifting that item to another resident and if they give me something back, gifting that to a third resident and so on and so on. It is pretty hilarious on how deep that could go, and thankfully there are only 10 residents on my little island of Ocean View.

Really thinking today's watch along will be Blues Brothers 2000 over in my discord channel, yes it is not as good as the original, but when you realize how much the studio interfered in the creative process, one must realize Blues Brothers 2000 is more about the music than it being a film. Obviously I'll have more to say on this with the Quick Thoughts bit.

Also with it being Saturday that means tonight we're doing Twitch Sings, which of course shuts down January 1, 2021. Some folks are looking for ways to continue doing some form of Karaoke on Twitch and I've given some thought to maybe using Rocksmith on stream to learn to play guitar, but since that uses license music I better not do that. Still we'll have a lot of fun later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden

 

Star Trek Online's Titan Screw Up

The new Tier 6 Titan Class ships was supposed to be for Federation players open... but someone screwed up and the Klingons can get it.... and so it raises questions!

Mass Effect: PC Vs Console Controls

Since lately I've been playing the Xbox 360 version of Mass Effect I can't help but have a slight issues with some of the controls when it comes to switch weapons and using abilities, compared to how smoothly both are on the PC version. Plus: A horrible idea of how to include Shepard in Mass Effect Andromeda 2! 

Today's Notes 11/20/20

Good afternoon everybody,

Today started off real nice as my official N7 Hoodie that I ordered from BioWare's online store arrived and it's really damn comfortable... and in addition to that, so did my copy of Mass Effect: The Complete Comics Collection as well. So that's a hell of a nice way to start the day. Flipping through the comics, I can say the artwork is certainly incredible, but here is a bit of gripe I have... there is no table of contents, which seems like a rather odd thing to leave out. On the other hand Aria is on the cover so that makes up for it in a way... because the first rule of Omega is don't fuck with Aria T'loak!

I already recording this week's commentary video and its focus will be on the controls of the console version of Mass Effect versus it's PC counterpart, as well as a brief sidebar into how to include Shepard in the Andromeda series if people are that desperate for it. That will be posted by about 4 PM EST over on YouTube.

Of course I did do a Fitness Boxing session today, keeping the Strength and Cardio routine at the 35 minuet session, which includes the stretching. Made a few mental mistakes during it where I basically end up screwing up an entire combo which made me glad I did not stream it cause that would've been embarrassing to say the least.

I'm up in the air over what I'll stream tonight, if I figure things right I could probably knock out the rest of Mass Effect because I know all I have left is Virmire, Illos and the raid on the Citadel. Or I could hold off on that and maybe try a general Playstation 2 stream. Was hoping to use the version DaemonsW0lf sent me by it appears the United States Postal Service has slowed down all mail coming out of Texas due to Covid-19.

Last night's Star Trek Online stream saw us wrap up the Gamma Quadrant story arc and being the Discovery content. Did have to cut the stream little short because I needed to take care of something personal, but my Cardassian Captain is within striking distance of the being fully caught up in the current story arc. And apparently there was a bug with the Faction alignment for the new Titan class vessel which was supposed to Federation only but apparently Klingon asspcoated Captain can get it to.... which actually would make more sense for any lockbox or lobi ships.... but still can't complain too much

And that will do it for today's notes, we'll see you over on twitch.tv/fredcasden later tonight!

Today's Notes 11/19/20

 Good afternoon everyone,

It's Thursday or as some call it Friday Eve.... man I've played Animal Crossing New Horizons a lot if I'm starting to quote it. I have noticed that if you keep residents on your island for a long enough people of town and tell them to stay they will allow you to change their catchphrase and give you nicknames. Which is pretty cool.

Anyway, last night's stream of Mass Effect basically cleared out all of Noveria and it's follow up side-missions. But I do have something to ponder, would it not have made more sense for the Rachni Queen to take possession of the body of Matriarch Benezia who basically drops dead in front where Rachni Queen is being held. It really does raise question, particularly of where this random Asari Commando comes from... now if the bodies of those Shepard and company take down didn't disappear into the ether, it would make more sense. 

Today Fitness Boxing stream was pretty solid, I felt my timing was off a little with some of my sway back but it was a solid Strength and Cardio session. Now if you're like me and change the attire of the trainer each day, you'll notice the trainer comments on what you put them in and sometimes they are less than thrilled with the attire combinations. It is a bit silly but I get a chuckle out of it.

Tonight it's going to be the weekly Star Trek Online stream, with the focus being on wrapping up the Gamma Quadrant story arc... and I see there is a lot of new related to STO. The first big thing is the Give of Three Starships packs, From November 20th at 8am PT (17:00 CET) to November 30th at 10am PT (19:00 CET), Captains will be able to purchase the T6 Starship Coupon Gift Three Pack! This item, which costs 6000 Zen, allows you to purchase any three ships from the Zen Store at 100% off. When you purchase this item, it will appear in your inventory as three separate reward packs, one for each coupon, that are tradeable to other players! Lets keep in mind that the average costs of ships in the Zen Store is 3000 Zen, so it's basically buy two get the third free. Hell of a deal.

There are also some standard patch notes as well, which are as follows:

General:  

• Resolved an issue that was causing the Discovery Hologram Boffs obtained from the Legendary Bundle to be commissioned with incorrect costumes that allowed improper customization. 
• Resolved an issue that would prevent completion of the Best Served Cold Task Force Operation, if enemies were destroyed during the mission briefing.  
• Resolved an issue that would sometimes cause the Transports to get stuck in the bases during the Best Served Cold Task Force Operation.  
• Increased the chance for the Avenger to arrive in response to a distress call during Delta Quadrant, Hodos patrol (shuttle race). 

And that will wrap up today's notes! We'll see you later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!

 

Today's Note 11/18/20

Good afternoon everyone,

Had a nice Fitness Boxing session to start the day, really liking the groove I'm staying in keeping the settings on Strength and Cardio at 35 minuets, counting stretching sometimes that pushes up to 39 minuets. Of course as some days have proven, it can be below 35 minutes in length, but hey it's the daily routine, staying consistent is key.I will admit however, that sometimes my eating habits do kind of most certainly counter act any of my workout efforts, I'm a snacker in the worse possible sense of the term. If I hang out in the kitchen I'll end up chewing on something or other. What can I say some habits are easy to get into and others are impossible to stop.

Anyway, Overwatch has a new event running until November 30, called Symmetra’s Restoration Challenge, which basically is win 9 matches and get a new icon, spray and skin / costume for Symmetra. Since I typically don't play damage dealers in normal Quick Play matches, the only chance I'd have of being able to have her wear it is in Mystery Heroes or Mayhem matches if I straight up refuse to be a tank or support. Granted I'll switch to one of those depending on how things are going. Anyway the new skin for Symmetra is nice, but she's a rather bland character normally, with everything about her being based around 'perfect alignments' and everything in being in order. Note for the screen shot you see I had to do some editing to it to make it stand out from the background

Last night's stream was a return of The Division 2 as I tagged along with PowerThumbz and Iceman7667 in helping with the latest Manhunt things. There were laughs to be had for sure, most at Thumbz expense. Took me a little bit of time to remember how to play since The Division 2 is not a game I load up often when off-stream gaming... or at all for that matter.

Tonight we'll be back to Mass Effect, and we're heading to Noveria and dealing with everything associated with it, which probably will include the added side quests. Even though I already have the achievements for playing the majority of the game with Wrex and Tali, we'll continue to keep them in the party because damn it it's Wrex and Tali! 

And what will wrap up today's notes, we'll see ya later over on twitch.tv/fredcasden!