by

Aftermath

Hey Everyone,
I wrote a novel and reviews have been awesome so far! Thank you all so much for your support and comments. It's available in ebook as well. Let me know what you think

https://www.amazon.com/Aftermath-Joe-Reyes/dp/1681111128/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1463015938&sr=1-4&refinements=p_30%3AWasteland+Press

by

Crisis on Two Earths Vs The Flashpoint Paradox

 

I wanted to compare two Justice League based movies with similar plotlines. Both have the plotline of parallel universes with chaotic differences.

Crisis on Two Earths, still a very good movie, takes an already done and genetic approach to the paradox. Lex Luthor is in charge of the Justice League and the members of it are the villains of the other universe. And vice versa where Superman and Batman are bad guys of the parallel universe.

Luthor travels to our universe to ask the Justice League to help stop the villains of his universe. Obviously the League accepts and goes to battle against their counterparts. Again, it’s a good movie, just very generic in its approach. Batman and his counterpart Owlman are the geniuses of the groups. Superman and Ultraman are the same as well in both universes.

The Flashpoint Paradox on the other hand takes the plotline to an entirely new level. The Flash tries to go back in time to stop the murder of his mother and completely ruins the timeline for everyone. Upon coming to the new universe he created, the Flash discovers he isn’t the Flash. Just mild mannered Barry Allen….who is a homosexual?

Aquaman and Wonder Woman are having a chaotic war that is quickly threatening the lives of everyone on Earth. Superman is a captive by the government and has been imprisoned since he landed on Earth. Bruce Wayne was the one who actually died in the mugging as a child and not his parents. So his father Thomas Wayne became Batman. Hal Jordon never acquired the green power ring and became Green Lantern. Also…..the Flash is gay now?

Both movies are good in they are reviewed seperatly, but The Flashpoint Paradox is far better than Crisis on Two Earths. Not to say it wasn’t a good movie. Even though I keep saying the storyline in Crisis on Two Earths has been overdone, it is still a good movie.

I give Crisis on Two Earths a 3/5 and The Flashpoint Paradox a perfect 5/5. This might be the best DC movie to date and I know I wrote that when I reviewed Assault on Arkham, but this could very well be better than that.

Joe Reyes

 

 

by

Superman/Batman: Public Enemies

If you ever wanted to see Batman and Superman pound the crap out of everything that moves, then this is the movie for you. I only have 1 question that seems to happen in every Justice League movie. How does Lex Luthor keep getting elected president? Somehow Luthor got elected and his first act as president, to make Batman and Superman fugitives.

Luthor started a superhuman employment service where they serve the US government. Any hero who refuses will be arrested. Obviously Superman would never join forces with a man who has tried to kill him countless times and Batman is Batman so he would never join up with Luthor.

Luthor puts a 1 billion dollar bounty on the duo and then the all hell breaks through. Every villain imaginable comes after them. The bad guys aren’t a problem, but the heroes that Luthor now employs are the deadliest to the duo. Captain Atom, Power Girl, Major Force, Captain Marvel and Hawkman all joined the US government and are trying to bring them in.

The problems only get worse as a meteorite is on a crash course for Earth. So besides fighting a smorgasbord of other supers, there is a meteorite on its way to kill everyone.

This was a very action packed movie that well worth the watch. The only problem I have is with Luthor getting elected….again. This is a storyline in many Justice League stories that doesn’t make any sense to me.

Besides that, loved the movie. The plot wasn’t so deep, but that was because of the constant action scenes. I give it a 4/5.

Joe Reyes

 

 

by

Tony Jaa vs. Scott Adkins

This isn’t a VS of who would win in a fight because CLEARLY Scott Adkins would wipe the floor with Tony Jaa. This is more of “Who’s Movies Suck The Least” type of article. Both actors have pretty damn bad movies. The only redeeming qualities of both careers are the awesome fight scenes that take up the bulk of their movies.

Tony Jaa has the Ong Bak series…which started off as a movie about underground street fighting and stolen ancient artifacts. The last 2 movies had absolutely nothing to with the first one at all. In fact the last 2 movies take place in a different era and have 0 to do with anything. It was a pretty terrible movie that….was just a flat out disaster.

The Protector was about stolen elephants and the second one took a Hangover 2 blueprint and made the plotline about stolen elephants. Equally a terrible pair of movies in their own right.

Scott Adkins filled our screens with…..I guess Ninja was his big series. Also Undisputed was kinda good, but it was still pretty bad as well. Adkins was the villain in that movie and still the villain in the second one, but was the good character by process of elimination. Bad characters surrounded by worse character I guess.

You know what…..I don’t know where I’m going with this one. Both actors have amazing martial arts skills, but waste their talents on terrible bit movies that usually come straight to DVD. They need better agents if anything.

I guess Adkins had the better career because I’m in America. His movies are easier to find than Jaa’s. I guess if I lived in Korea or China…..or Thailand (just to be safe) where Jaa’s movies come out then it would be easier to find his movies.

Nobody wins this one.

Joe Reyes

 

by

Life Of Percentages

We, as a society, try to use words like “beliefs” and “positivity” as explanations of how we overcome certain things. I realized recently that it doesn’t matter how positive or how much you believe in something, things can always take a negative turn.

There are thousands of Self Help Books designed to make us better people. Authors like Tony Robbins talk about how positivity can solve your problems. People use literature and research as methods for constructing positivity.

Let’s use the scenario that I have a life threatening illness and there is a chance I may die. On one hand I am the roaring Ra-Ra confidence of the American spirit. Where I believe I can overcome ANYTHING! Let’s say I live…is it because of my positivity or because I took the right things? People will talk about how confident I am and how nothing can take me down because I believe. Not “just” because I took the right things.

On the other hand I am negative and depressed constantly. I feel like I have no value in this world and will die alone. But let’s say I take the medicine still (which I will go into later on) and I live. Do you think it was my negative attitude that rewarded me with life? Again, maybe me taking the right things cured me and not a mindset.

I had 2 life threatening concussions. I had bleeding in the brain and doctors were shocked that I had no symptoms at all and didn’t miss a step. At the same time of my first concussion, actor Liam Neeson’s wife (Natasha Richardson) hit her head on soft snow and died of a head injury. I hit my head on ice so hard that my skull cracked and I was perfectly fine while she died. So did I overcome my injury with my positive sensibility? Did my body say “Heal now” and it did? Or does this reside in the category of “shit happens”?

Jim Valvano gave one of the greatest speeches in history. He was diagnosed with cancer and gave an emotionally roaring speech at the ESPN awards ceremony about how anyone can overcome anything. A few months after his speech he died…..of the same cancer that he made us all believe that he can overcome. Meanwhile people who maybe have a more serious diagnosis of cancer and who aren’t as positive may live.

The reason I put in parenthesis the part about the medicine was because (even though I am mostly bashing the notion of positive attitudes as methods for success) you still have to have a small notion of positivity to want to take something in the first place. If there is a 1% chance that you may live after hearing that you have a life-threatening illness, then you have a chance. I could be a devout Christian and have my heart filled with the Holy Spirit and still die. Meanwhile, I can be a negative atheist who has the same thing and live. Putting my hands together in prayer isn’t going to guarantee success.

Mercer College beat Duke in the NCAA tournament last season. Are you going to make the argument that Mercer College was more positive and wanted to win more than Duke? Or can you make the argument that Duke’s shots weren’t going in and Mercer had a better game plan? There are 68 teams in the tournament so therefore you have a 1/68 chance of winning it all. There are no certainties in sports. If you make it to a tournament, then you have a chance to win. Don’t let odds makers determine outcomes.

We love the David vs Goliath type of stories. Movies like Rudy and Miracle show us how people overcome impossible odds and come out on top. What a better story? How LeBron James has overcome adversity and has finally achieved all he was predicted to or how Bill Russell has won 11 titles in a row because he played on the best team in the league at that time?

I don’t mean to shit on people’s beliefs or positive energy. I trying to be a best-selling author and overcome disappointment constantly. I get rejection letters from publishers and still I send more out. Why? Because it’s something I want to do for a living. There is a big chance that I may never achieve my dream and have to settle for another career choice.

So I believe in being positive because without taking that first step you might not get what you want or take what you need to survive, BUT I don’t believe that thinking positive or reading the right material will automatically solve your problems.

Like I said about sports and certainties, there are also no certainties in life. If you have a 1% chance of living, then you have a chance of living. If you have a 99% chance of living then you still have a 1% chance of dying.

We love to hope that there is some otherworldly force that can help us in times of peril. That our positive energy can therefore challenge the laws of the universe so we may come out on top, but sadly that is hysterically untrue. Sometimes, to be blunt, shit happens. And there are no guarantees with medicine, self-help books and Ra-Ra speeches.

Joe Reyes