Netflix Addiction: VGHS season 1

By Mick Neeky

Based on an idea by Will Campos and Chris Pappavaselio, Video Game High School is a clever and quirky series based in a world where video games are the ultimate sport. The story follows Brain D (Josh Bloylock) as he is accepted into the prestigious VGHS by chance due to his pwning of The Law (Brian Firenzi) on national TV. Having beaten the best gamer in the known world, Brian is given a full scholarship into VGHS. Following the typical high school agenda, VGHS touches up on everything from crushes to bullying. It explores what life could be like if video games where taken seriously. And let me just say, it has a flawless execution.

Without spoiling anything, I’d like to point out one of VGHS season 1’s triumphs: its clever twist on cliché and cheesy moments. Where most series fail miserably, VGHS hits the mark. The viewer is always enthralled and kept guessing. Sometimes it does go over the top—Ted Wong (Jimmy Wong) I’m looking at you—but it pulls through.

VGHS nailed its cast perfectly: everything from hardened youtubers like Freddie Wong to move stars like Zachary Levi. But beyond the enchilada of love (Ki Swan played by Ellary Porterfield and Ted Wong), there’s the truth heart of VGHS: Brian D’s spat with The Law. The show revolves a great deal around them; their hatred on screen is perfect and gives games someone to love and hate. It’s up to you who you pick. Yet each character gets a chance to be in the spotlight. They don’t feel bland and pointless; they’re alive! At the end of the day Brian D doesn’t go to school with a bunch of bots.

All the drama, jokes and awesome rivalry aside, there’s still one aspect of that outshines them all, VGHS’s execution on video games. Heralded by Freddie Wong, special effects master on Youtube, VGHS centers on a virtual reality feel, yet it’s not. I know it’s confusing. Truth be told that as your watch Brian D gun his way through a battlefield he’s not really inside the game. It’s just a clever way to add the video games into the mix. After all, it is called VGHS, or would you rather see him tap keys and click his mouse? In my opinion, VGHS nailed its first season. The only beef I got with it, and it’s not a big one, it’s its lack of other gaming types. They only manage to cover a handful in season one like rhythm, racing, fighting, and FPS.

All in all, VGHS deserves your free time. Give it a shout and maybe you’ll get a scholarship.

                         Keep it Neeky.

Netflix Addiction: House

 By. Dr.Sparta

  Behold the greatest doctor! He will heal and insult you at the same time! Brothers and sisters his EPIC story comes with a hilarious and smart combination of everything required to live as a free whale. Who would I be speaking of? Well today you will learn how humanity was saved from utter boredom from 2004 to 2012… This is House MD.

  My fellow whales, before you rush with swords and guns to destroy my living side of life for watching a medical drama, let me explain why I love this GLORIOUS show. Yes, it might include some medical terms. Let me be truthful my friends, I cannot understand most of the words they are saying or discussing while diagnosing patients. I would bet my life again for the fifth time to say, though most of it true, what happens in the show is medically impossible at times (just because a person cannot be this brutal and this joyfully miserable at the same time). House is great fun for those boring nights where your video games and your other favorite shows have ended. It gives entertaining dialogue (when understood) great characters (Australian, sexy and Wilson) and provide the most intriguing medical emergencies that captivate and hook on your vision spheres.

  House has many intense, sad, full of rage, life changing, and frankly hilarious moments that kept this guy going from beginning to end, making a very extraordinary change against hating medical dramas to completely loving one of them. That’s it for today whales, this is Dr. Sparta, NOT prescribing Vicodin because I am not THAT type of doctor and it would not be FOR THE GLORY!

Netflix Addiction: West Wing

By Temper

What if you had access to the lives and minds of the President and his cabinet members? What if you could follow them around on a day-to-day basis and see exactly what it means to run the United States of America? Well that is precisely what Aaron Sorkin brought us on September 22, 1999.

The West Wing is set primarily in the West Wing of the White House, where the Oval Office and offices of presidential senior staff are located, during the fictional Democratic administration of Josiah Bartlet. The show, which won multiple Emmy and Golden Globe awards, includes a cast of memorable characters played by amazing actors.  The cast includes the likes of Stockard Channing, Dulé Hill, Jimmy Smits, Alan Alda, Rob Lowe, and Martin Sheen.

All seven seasons are on Netflix, and though I have fallen behind on watching the show in the last few weeks, it is one of my favorite television shows of all time. The West Wing mixes dramatic, triumphant, comedic and thought provoking moments while providing you with enough insight into what it is like to be there, running the country. Most episodes follow President Bartlet and his staff through particular legislative or political issues. The typical episode loosely follows the President and his staff through their day, generally following several plots connected by some idea or theme.

The West Wing captivated my interest for its use of the political landscape to create its characters and grow them into people you know, people you love, people you can’t stand. There really isn’t much else to say about the show without going into spoilers or criticisms about the layout of The White House being a bit off, like Susan Ford (daughter of former President Gerald Ford) commented many years ago.  The West Wing is one of the best television shows in the last few decades and is very much worth viewing. I encourage you to live through the Bartlet presidency.

Netflix Addiction: X-Men

By Dr.Sparta

 With “X-men: Days of Future Past” coming in very soon, I can’t help but think of all the different X-men shows I’ve seen. There has been, what my guts tell me to be, a thousand different versions, some way better than others. The one that always seems to storm my brain’s beaches is X-men Evolution. Truly I ask, why do a lot of people despise this show so much?

   My brothers and sisters, this show brought everything the X-men formula had to bring, yet again and again people did not approve of the story or the characters. Was it how the show was delivered? Was it because they were in a type of high school now? I don’t get it. The action was intense, the stories were BRUTAL at times. Granted it would get a bit on my manly nerves at times, but it couldn’t have been that since it only happened a few times.

   I am saddened whales and whalettes that this show didn’t get the recognition it deserved for being the entertaining beast that it truly was. Yet it stands up even now, almost a decade and a half later. Not remembering the horrible third installment to the film franchise “The Last Stand”, that movie was terrible and I cast it down to Hades where it UNGLORIOUSLY belongs. I remember this small, short-lived show that truly brought fun to everything there is to bring about people with special gifts and how people respond to them, before the public knew of their powers and after.

   This show gave a new perspective to the X-men while still getting the story lines and the relationships just right. I truly miss it and for it to be on Netflix gives me a very fond nostalgic breeze. I give this show 4 out of 5 shields, as it EPICALLY deserves. With that I take my leave whales, are you excited for the new “X-Men: Days of Future Past” film coming in? This is Dr. Sparta, giving a nice prescription FOR THE X-Men GLORY!

Netflix Addiction: G.I. Joe: Retaliation

My dearest whales and whalettes, back when I was but a wee little Hunter Sparta, my father would give me G.I. Joes to show me the beautiful arts of combat. I would entertain myself with vicious battles that would tear them limb from limb and later on enjoy the spoils of war with my sisters’ Barbies. My memory seems distant of this time so long ago but with G.I. Joe some memories came back and yet others stayed way buried where they belong.

With the first G.I. Joe movie being the catastrophe that it was, the most skeptical of skepticisms invaded me once I sat down to witness the next possible train wreck. Wait a second my brothers and sisters… is that The ROCK? This already seems like an improvement. Upon watching the shootout and apparent the death-stricken Duke, I GLORIOUSLY say this is an EPIC improvement to the previous title. Now, far away from being a solid good, this movie at least gives more action and decent acting, but like my childhood memories of my G.I. Joes, the presence of Bruce Willis and The ROCK weren’t enough to merit a solid stay down memory lane as I almost completely forgot the rest of the movie except for the two previously mentioned favorite actors.  There are ninja fights though, that was cool.

Being a fan of Bruce Willis, The ROCK and G.I. Joe, I cannot complain with what I got. Tons of characters we came to love when we were small, savage creatures on the big screen portrayed with a big budget. I don’t know about you whales, but my thirst for action was quenched and I give this movie 3 and a half shields out of 5. With that I take my leave. Is it just me or is The Rock turning into The Hulk? This is Dr. Sparta, recommending paying a visit into your min, for childhood memories are the foundation to your personality in the future. That is truly where GLORY is remembered best!