Well, here it is, kids: the Spider-man 3 teaser trailer.

This film’s got everything: shit flying everywhere, black goo, guys going nuts… What more could you want?

What next for Raimi after this film? The arty type in me wants another gripping drama like A Simple Plan, but the fanboy wants Evil Dead 4. Seeing a middle-aged Ash blowing away Deadites in a post-apocalyptic future would be like all my Christmases coming at once!

…in 1978, Bob Crane, the star of Hogan’s Heroes, was murdered, aged 59. Paul Schrader’s excellent movie Auto Focus details the events leading to his death.

Coincidentally, I was born on the very same day. How about that!

To celebrate this, my 28th birthday, I’m giving you, my faithful readers, a chance to be rewarded for your loyalty: in the comments section for this post, simply write your own bad poetry, and the best example will win its poet a CD-R of JT Bruce’s fantastic album Anomalous Material! (Okay, so it can also be downloaded from his website, but the point here is that I’m putting an effort into this!)

Last night I ventured over to pinkfloyd.co.uk and saw the short film of The Final Cut for the first time. Bloody hell, it’s like a sequel to the film of The Wall!

Now, I’m not really a fan of either the film or album of The Wall — both are, at times, utterly brilliant, but both suffer from moments I’d prefer to skip over, such as “Bring the Boys Back Home” or “The Trial”. I’d rather not watch an animated arsehole shout at me, for example.

That said, I own both the album and movie, so what does that say about me? I just wish they had’ve made a film of The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway by Genesis, starring Peter Gabriel as Rael (as was the original plan). Man, nobody would’ve confused Genesis with Richard Marx if that had’ve happened!

About three weeks ago I gave my details to the fine folks at marillion.com in the hopes of receiving one of their free Marillion sampler CDs, and today I received it in the mail… all the way from the U.K.!

I can’t really give an opinion on the music itself at the moment — this sort of thing demands more than a cursory listen. However, they deliver on their promise, so anyone interested would be well advised to do what I did and get a free Crash Course CD.

I’ve had a few really great days in my life: the day I finished high school, the day I was invited to the set of Star Wars: Episode III, and the day I was acquitted on the murder of that homeless guy — these were all great days in my life. Yesterday doesn’t rate that highly, but it was one of those days where good stuff just kept on happening.

One of the good things to happen yesterday was the news that Futurama is back!!!

It’s sketchy as to what the details are and how it relates to the proposed DVD movies, but the gist of it is that Futurama will be back on US TV screens in 2008 with new content, and that pretty much everyone’s back onboard.

Even if the Rapture happens before then, I’ll no doubt be one of the lucky people left behind to watch more Futurama!

In the meantime, here’s the trailer to Al Gore’s new movie, with a guest appearance by Bender. Enjoy!

Hungry Macs was your typical fast-food franchise: plastic decor to match the plastic food, with a strangely sterile atmosphere only added to by the fluorescent lighting.

John stood at the counter, not so much looking at the customers as staring through them. “Can I take your order?” he asked, the total lack of enthusiasm almost causing a vacuum of interest that would rupture the fabric of space-time itself.

“Yes, I would like a MacRib, large fries, apple pie, and large Coke,” the man opposite said, a thick accent causing his speech to be near-unintelligeable.

“We don’t have any MacRibs,” said John.

“I saw them advertised last week!”

“The offer ended six months ago.”

“Do not lie to me, sir,” the man blustered. “Is this establishment racist? I demand to see the manager!”

“Is this going to take long?” asked the woman behind in the queue.

“Excuse me, but this will only take a minute,” the man shot back.

God, thought John, if only I had a semi-automatic rifle right now. Damn those hippies!

It was at that point that the woman’s face transformed into that of a lizard…

As the series on personality type continues, here’s a look at the most well-known (but still misunderstood) dimension: Introversion and Extraversion.

The first thing to note is that this is not about shyness — I’ve known shy Extraverts and quite gregarious Introverts at times. Indeed, I can be quite talkative when the mood strikes.

Two helpful keywords here are “intensity” and “extensity”. Extraverts have a tendency to skim a broad range of topics, whereas Introverts tend to dive deep into fewer areas of interest. Of course, Introverts may have a solid grasp of general knowledge and Extraverts may be experts in a given field, but Introverts often carry an obsessive quality with them into their interests that Extraverts rarely possess.

Extraverts will externalise their experience, placing themselves in the larger context of their surroundings, whereas Introverts will do the opposite. It’s the difference between getting up and dancing to music versus sitting and listening with headphones on. This is a core distinction that you’ll notice again and again once you’re aware of it.

To Introverts, Extraverts appear to have a very shallow, superficial relationship to the world around them, but the Introvert looks to the Extravert like they’re missing out on what life’s all about.

And so ends today’s lesson.

(Thanks to Teacake for the diving/skimming metaphor.)

1. Age: 28 in a week
2. Hair colour: black
3. Favourite Simpsons episode: $pringfield (the casino episode)
4. Favourite Friends episode: The One Where They All Die Horribly
5. Favourite Michael Jackson song: “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’” (seriously)
6. Favourite prime number: 3
7. Age you discovered that Santa Claus isn’t real: He isn’t???
8. Age you discovered that well-intentioned politicians aren’t real: early 20s, maybe
9. Age you discovered that the derivative of e^x is also e^x: see last response (coincidentally?)
10. Elvis or The Beatles? The Beatles
11. Coke or Pepsi? Coke
12. Favourite sport: pissing people off
13. Star Wars or Star Trek? Star Wars
14. Favourite Young Ones character: Rick
15. Holst or Vaughn Williams? Holst
16. Two trains depart at stations 100 km apart; one is travelling at 150 km/h, the other at 900 km/h. Which driver has dropped acid? Both
17. Smarties or M&Ms? Smarties
18. TRS-80 or C64? I had a TRS-80 but wanted a C64
19. Sega or Nintendo? Sega
20. How many fingers am I holding up? Pi

So I just bought four new CDs: V by Spock’s Beard, Parade by Prince & the Revolution, Moving Pictures by Rush, and Going for the One by Yes.

First impressions:

V (2000) is fantastic and just what I was expecting: knotty, quirky neo-prog that recalls bands like Yes, Genesis, and Kansas without sounding too out-of-date. “Thoughts, Pt. 2″ is an epic crammed into four-and-a-half minutes and would have to be the perfect track to introduce people to this band’s particular style (for better or worse).

Parade (1986) is Prince’s soundtrack to his movie Under the Cherry Moon, and I’m still coming to terms with its dream-like running order. Tracks run into each other, morphing and melding together in a kind of funky neo-psychedelia. The first listen was quite a shock, actually, but as I listen to it a second time, some things are already leaping out at me. In particular, the track “Mountains” is a standout mid-80s Prince number, and I’m glad I bought this album for this track alone.

Moving Pictures (1981) seemed good but not great — pretty strong hard rock/prog-rock. It’ll need quite a few more listens yet.

Going for the One (1977) sounds like a continuation of the sounds developed on Relayer and Tales from Topographic Oceans (both from 1974) but in a tighter form. Surprisingly, there are also hints of 90125-era Yes in the track “Parallels”, which is something I was not expecting at all! Relayer really grew on me over the years — its sprawling, hyper-engergised intensity was nothing like, say, Fragile, but it’s actually something I find quite endearing about it now; maybe Going for the One will be similar.

In the last few days, I’d started listening to Launchcast after a long break, and while it’s decent, some of its guesses left me scratching my head…

Richard Marx for fans of Genesis?

Duran Duran for fans of Peter Gabriel?

Only the most superficial understanding of these artists would lead to such conclusions. I mean, sure, if you think “Hold On My Heart” is representative of Genesis, this sort of thing might make sense, but then I’d have to consider the fact that you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about and are in no position to be suggesting music to anyone.

Last.fm is another option, and it’s become a lot more sophisticated since last I looked. However, I’d like to be able to play “Rock Me Amadeus” by Falco without having to turn a plugin off in order to prevent this fact from being broadcast to the world.

So a few days ago, I decided to have another look at Pandora, and it’s surprised me at just how accurate its selections are. The band Djam Karet, for example, I’d not heard of ’til now, and already I’m intrigued enough to want to buy one of their albums.

Okay, so it tried to slip a Celine Dion track in there at one point, but that’s really my only complaint so far.

Musical genius “Weird Al” Yankovic has released a parody of James Blunt’s shit-tastic megahit “You’re Beautiful”, and you can download it RIGHT NOW FOR FREE from his website!!! Grab it while you can.

And for those of you questioning the use of the term “genius”, just listen to something like “Genius in France” (Al’s Zappa imitation) or “Hardware Store”, then get back to me…

(Yes, I realise I sound like Larry Groznic at the moment, but a little-known fact is that he’s based on me.)

Last night I watched Ang Lee’s film The Ice Storm for the second time. (The first time ws several years ago.)

This is such a beautiful film, and now that I reflect on it, it aims for something similar to American Beauty but hits closer to its target. The ice motif, like the rose petal imagery in AB, occurs again and again — it is the emotional state of the adult characters writ large. The rose symbolises Lester’s rediscovery of his passion, his zest for life, whereas the ice is the frozen state of the adults’ relationships with their children and each other.

When Kevin Kline’s character drives his son home after time spent apart, all he can manage are a few stilted questions and an awkward, one-sided discussion about appropriate places for “self-abuse”. Kline’s character’s marriage is largely loveless, and meanwhile, the woman he’s having an affair with complains about him talking too much in bed. This is a case of people going through the motions — a superficial life punctuated by the occasional swingers party.

I’ll have to watch this film again in a week or two, just to really study it. It’s the sort of screenplay I’d want to be able to write, and the sort of film I’d want to be able to write for.