Let's Do The News! (June 12, 2014)

The big scoop today...

- There's going to be more upcoming episodes of Disney Junior's hit animated series, Sofia the First, coming soon. It includes an episode tentatively called "Sofia the Second" where Sofia used a magic spell to clone herself and turns out that her clone is an evil version of herself. Then, there's going to be a special episode coming late 2014 titled Sofia the First: The Curse of Princess Ivy. In the upcoming special, Sofia and her stepsister Amber team up to stop the threats from Princess Ivy, a once exiled princess destined to take over Enchancia and turn the whole kingdom black and white.





- GET READY! The opening match of the FIFA WORLD CUP 2014 BRAZIL kicks off tomorrow at 04:00 AM Philippine Standard Time. That's 17:00 Brazil Time and it starts with Brazil vs. Croatia at Arena Corinthians, Sao Paulo.

- The European Union warns that they will ban imports of fisheries from the Philippines if it fails to control illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing.

- According to the Commission on Higher Education (CHED), all colleges will remove the Filipino subject starting the 2016 school year. Wait, what?!

- Korean soldiers in Tacloban honored Filipinos who fought and died at the Korean War.

- BMW noted that their next 1-Series will be front-wheel drive. We say BOO, BMW say it's for its own good. Remember, the Bavarian luxury car maker done a massive plot twist when they've introduced the 2 Active Tourer, which is the first BMW model to be front-wheel drive, infuriating BMW fans knowing what are they thinking of.

- An Audi R18 e-tron quattro was crashed during a practice run at Circuit De La Sarthe, moments before this year's 24 Hours of Le Mans, and the driver, Loic Duval, is hospitalized.

- Tuner SpeedART is back from the dead with their newest tuning program for the Porsche Macan compact crossover.

- MEANWHILE IN BANGKOK: Nissan revealed their brand new pickup and because this isn't made for Japanese consumers, I can't tell you what is the name of that pickup because of search engine query reasons but I do tell you that it's a successor of the N_v_r_ (sorry vowels removed for search engine query reasons). This promo video will sum this up.

Due to search query reasons, I can't tell you what is that new
Nissan pickup officially revealed from Thailand.

- June 12, 2014 marks the 116th anniversary of the Philippine Independence.

TTFN!!!

Top Gear USA: Desert Trailblazers

The boys of Top Gear USA are on an off-road adventure of a lifetime as they find out if they can find the Grand Canyon without the help of navigation systems.

Tanner goes for the Land Rover Discovery LR4 while Rut's in a more Japanese-y Toyota FJ Cruiser, an offroad classic no longer offered on the US market, and Adam went for the AEV Brute, a Jeep Wrangler converted into a pickup truck.

They have two days to demonstrate their offroaders' natural capabilities in search of the Grand Canyon with their wits.

From crazy terrains over crazy situations, this perilous journey to the Grand Canyon has been quite an enjoyable one but at the race to the canyon, the Brute came first. The Brute came to the canyon first but it all ends when all three raced through the cargo plane and jumped in safely.

Let's Do The News! (June 11, 2014)

The big scoop today...

- Game 3 of the 2014 NBA Finals finished with San Antonio Spurs leading the game against Miami Heat at the score of 111-92 so now, Spurs lead 2-1.

- Ford Australia's high-performance FPV division finally revealed the epic finale of the FPV saga; the limited edition FPV GT F 351 saloon and the FPV Pursuit Ute. The FPV GT F features the Boss 5.0L supercharged aluminum V8 engine which develops 351kW (471HP) of power output, making this the most powerful engine ever made from Ford Australia. The Pursuit Ute uses the same V8 engine as the GT F but it produces 315kW (422HP) of power. Only 500 of the GT F models will be made as well as 120 Pursuit Utes but still, these are an appropriate grand goodbye to FPV.

- Raini Rodriguez (Trish Dela Rosa from Austin and Ally) and Adam Irigoyen (from Shake It Up) will star as two adult parents mysteriously turned into teenagers themselves in the new series, Growing Up and Down, coming soon on Disney Channel!

- In a latest See the Real Me advert for Clean & Clear, we get to see actress Bridgit Mendler living her normal life as a USC student.

 

- In an interview with Boy Abunda at last night's Aquino & Abunda Tonight, Krista Miller admitted that she met with high-profile drug lord Ricardo Camata at Bilibid.

- Nissan teases their Vision Gran Turismo concept coming to Gran Turismo 6. It will be revealed next week.



- Doctor Who takes on the world! BBC Worldwide announced the Doctor Who: The World Tour for the first time. Throughout the month of August, 12th Doctor Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman will tour around the world from Cardiff, London, Seoul, Sydney, New York, Mexico, and Rio. More details at http://www.doctorwho.tv/worldtour 

- A recent assessment shows that in an event of a heavy typhoon in the Philippines, Pampanga is most likely to be flooded and Benguet is very likely to be vulnerable from landslides.

- To honor Porsche's return to Le Mans, the German sports car maker unveiled their special edition 911 Carrera S Martini Racing Edition.

Porsche 911 Carrera S Martini Racing 

TTFN!!!

Leopaul's Heaven and Hell: Saturday mornings, why would history let it rot...

The CW's Vortexx kids' programming block will be
replaced by One Magnificent Morning block late 2014,
signalling the end of Saturday morning cartoons

As you may heard before, the Vortexx kids programming block on The CW will be replaced by some boring E/I programming block this late September called One Magnificent Morning, signalling the end of traditional Saturday morning kids programming in the US and I find that very sad because this has been a past tradition for the Western children to enjoy some Saturday morning cartoons in the morning when they wake up and eat their cereals.

Why? Why would children's programming on Saturday mornings had to die on US broadcast television? Nobody knows why but because the inevitable is going to happened, it pains me to say this but for them, it's goodbye childhood. Saturday morning cartoons on broadcast television is gone forever! Anyway, no time to exaggerate this sad condolence to this traditional American past time because there are some possible theories why Saturday morning programming is doomed and I think there's a really good reason for that.

During the Cold War years, I think, US television networks ABC, CBS, and NBC starting their own kind of Cold War. Not the big scary ones with the Russians in it, it's the animation cold war.  In the 60's, Saturday morning cartoons are off to an early start with shows like Captain Kangaroo, Mighty Mouse Playhouse, Top Cat, and The Bugs Bunny Show, among many others. In the 70's, when the world plunged into the energy crisis and the age of disco came, the list of Saturday morning cartoons keeps on growing. There were Scooby Doo, Looney Toons, the Jackson Five, Woody Woodpecker, the Harlem Globetrotters, and some of Hanna Barbera's greatest hits. Then in the 80's, a decade of fashion disaster, the list keeps on going with the rise of Hogan's Heroes, Alvin and the Chipmunks, Super Friends, some Marvel superheroes, The Smurfs, there's even some Star Wars spinoffs where the one stars with the Ewoks and the other one with our droid companions R2-D2 and C3PO. In the 90's, when the Cold War well and truly over and NBC pulled out of their morning cartoons (we'll talk about that later), there has been addition of syndicated stuff from networks such as FOX and The WB as well as some Japanese-y stuff from the late 90's aired on North American televisions; mostly famous ones like PokeMon and the Power Rangers franchise. (Sigh...I still remember the first generation ones; the Red Ranger is my favorite because he's the leader). Even in the new millenium, the list of shows kids to watch on a Saturday morning keeps going on and on and on until right now where this traditional American past time has come to an imminent end.

So, the imminent end of Saturday morning cartoons? How did this pastime slowly killing through the years like a cancer? The end game for this genre began when networks NBC and CBS dropping most of their cartoons from the schedule in the late 90's, it's the same decade when FOX joined the Saturday morning warfare with their FOX Kids block. In the early 90's, NBC got rid of their Saturday morning lineup with their local affiliate news all morning long and that was superbly boring if you asked. That was just the beginning because as the new millenium rose and technology has evolved; it's like when this programming block is slowly killing like cancer in our bodies. There is no treatment for cancer and let's face it; like us, things like these won't last a lifetime and that's life...if you know what that means.

Thanks to cable television, the end of analog TV circa June 2009, and the internet, it seems that children of all ages are just shying away from America's network giants. Back then, watching cartoons is for all children regardless of their family's income because you don't need a cable subscription and some fancy gizmos to enjoy watching cartoons on a Saturday night, but now, it seems that watching cartoons is only for the privileged some and in today's climate; only families with digital cable subscription (with internet connectivity as optional for some) will only let kids watch cartoons not from network broadcasts but from either of the kids channels such as Nick, Disney, and Cartoon Network.

Sadly here in the US; kids programming on Nick and CN are limited from the moment kids wake up until 8 in the evening. That's all BS for the little tykes but that schedule is for their own good...as a theory. However, for those who subscribed to their family packages on their cable provider, kids get unprecedented access to some of the kids channels that all goes 24/7 with no boring stuff occurring on late evenings. Expensive but it's worth keeping kids staying up all night long but these parents don't like the way kids are doing now because they still have time for school, time for family bonding, and time for...well, you get the idea.

This is how it imagine when you were in some sort of a mission from the KND when some evil tyrant want to get rid of Saturday morning cartoon from television but come on. The evil tyrants won, this mission from the KND is a failure, this is not KND, THIS IS REALITY just LET IT GO. He he he...Get it? That Frozen song! ♫Let it go....Let it gooooo....♫ Ahem...this isn't time for jokes. This is serious and OH MY GLOB! THINGS GOT CRAZY SO FAST!!!

Yes, things has gone crazy so fast and everything we loved and cared for in the past has change. Everything changes and change is inevitable. The traditional Saturday morning cartoons on broadcast TV is gone and because of cable networks, syndication, and streaming, the American childhood memories are well and officially ruined and in a Mabel-as-Dipper kind of way...Goodbye Childhood.

What started is an age when kids spent their Saturday mornings eating their cereal from their bowls and then rushed to the sofa and turned on their TVs to see their cartoon heroes; especially G.I. Joe, Transformers, Thundercats, and He-Man, into action but now, it's been sadly consigned to the history books thanks to the advent of the digital revolution much as when VHS and cassettes are sadly defunct.

So farewell to you, Saturday morning TV. Just fit for the television graveyard. You made the American children proud since your advent in the days of the Cold War.

Further reading:

1) Exclusive: Traditional Saturday Morning Programming Ends This Fall as Saban Brands Pulls the Plug on the Vortexx

2) SABAN AXES VORTEXX; FINAL DEATH KNELL FOR TRADITIONAL SATURDAY MORNING CARTOONS

3) The Disappearance of Saturday Morning

Let's Do The News! (June 10, 2014)

GSRMTH DV OVZIMVW HL UZI...

- What went wrong? The MTRCB called in last week's Pinoy Big Brother challenge to be "gender insensitive" and wants to summon the producers behind the show. It happened last week when housemates Jayme Jalandoni and Michele Gumabao pose nude for their painting. Quite a rare incident to be ever happened in the PBB house though...

- Treasure hunter Nathan Drake returns in an upcoming PS4-exclusive game titled Uncharted 4: A Thief's End, the latest installment from Naughty Dog's Uncharted franchise. It was announced on the eve of E3 2014.

- Koch Media's Deep Silver announced Dead Island 2, the latest installment of the zombie-killing Dead Island series, on the eve of E3 2014.

- Set your calendars; Forza Horizon 2 is coming on the XBOX consoles at the end of September 2014! Here's the E3 2014 trailer:



- Hibiki Ganaha from THE iDOLM@STER gets the figma treatment!

figma Hibiki Ganaha

- Lotus revealed a special-edition Exige LF1, an Exige S donned in Lotus F1 livery and it's limited to 81 units.

Lotus Exige LF1

- Senator Bong Revilla tries to fight against PDAF scam allegations with his privilege speech.

- Over 9 million voters in the Philippines might not be able to vote on the 2016 elections because of the biometrics data registration. Voters registration is until October of next year.

- Somewhere in the Toyama Prefecture, last Sunday, there was a car got crushed by a falling tree and that car in question was none other than...a very rare Toyota 2000GT?! Yes, a big tree just crushed an ultra-rare Japanese sportscar worth over a million dollars.

TTFN!!!

Forza Motorsport 5: The Return of the Ring

After half a year of waiting since Forza Motorsport 5 came out, the much-awaited return of the Nurburgring race track really sends gamers harking their trumpets saying that the Ring is back in Forza. That sounds good news to us because not only the GP Circuit and the challenging Nordschleife were here but the combined track is featured for the first time, giving hardcore racers the challenge they so richly deserved.

So, how did they do it? Thanks to their laser-scanned technology and over 13,000 man-hours spent to bring the legendary track to life on Forza 5, it's now more alive and more challenging than they've ever faced. Even for a seasoned Forza veteran, it will take a lot of skill you've learned from numerous tracks to conquer the world's most challenging racetrack known to many.

Like Road America and Long Beach, the Nurburgring is now fully integrated into Forza Motorsport 5 via update. There are new events that will challenge your wits, rookie or veteran alike, in the deadliest racetrack known to racers. Your concentration, hand-to-eye coordination, and alertness are strongly needed if you need to master the twists and turns of the Nurburgring.

With the Nurburgring's return, there's also a Booster Pack featuring five new machines for you to explore, drive, and upgrade such as these;

1989 Audi #4 Audi 90 quattro IMSA GTO
1967 Brabham BT24
2013 Ford Formula Ford EcoBoost 200
1939 Maserati 8CTF
1956 Lotus Eleven

Just like any add-on car; the Nurburgring Booster Pack is covered on the FM5 Season Pass and every add-on car you purchase is free to buy in-game one time. So what are you waiting for? The Ring is waiting for you...

Edge of Tomorrow

When you come across the movie titled "Edge of Tomorrow" on various anime websites, you might find yourself scratching your head, wondering how anime-like this film is, even though it's not an anime at all. It's a sci-fi flick based on the concept of "Live, Die, Repeat." Is there anything distinctly Japanese about this must-see movie of the season? Some say there is. "Edge of Tomorrow" is heavily inspired by the sci-fi novel "All You Need Is Kill" by Hiroshi Sakurazaka. If this movie were to debut in Japan, people might question why a Hollywood film has taken inspiration from a Japanese sci-fi novel. They won't find out until they actually see it.

 

In the movie, Tom Cruise plays Major William Cage, an officer assigned to a dangerous mission despite his lack of combat skills. Earth is under attack from an alien invasion, and the military forces are struggling against these extraterrestrial threats. Cage is killed in combat but discovers that he can relive the same moment over and over again. As he experiences the cycle of living, dying, and repeating, Cage begins to show signs of improvement. With the help of his ally, played by Emily Blunt, they edge closer to ending the alien invasion.

 

I admit that this movie draws some inspiration from an action film called "Source Code." When it fails, it restarts, continuing until the mission is complete. You get the gist of it. It’s interesting why most anime-related websites are discussing this film even though it isn't an anime. However, this discovery may take some time to appreciate. "Edge of Tomorrow" feels like a mash-up between "Source Code" and "Pacific Rim." Sci-fi never goes out of style, and "Edge of Tomorrow" stands out as it combines being a hardcore film with a lot of excitement for your dollar, yen, pound, euro, dirham, or whatever currency you use.

 

While "Edge of Tomorrow" may not be the perfect summer movie of the year, it certainly knows how to blow the opposition out of the water. Just like the main character in the film, it will continue to "Live, Die, and Repeat."

My rating: 3.5 out of 5