The production values get better and better with each video. What average amount of time spent on these videos, from beginning to end?

Does the crown and lightning mean that the patented Mars sign has been discontinued?

We try really, really hard to write, film, and edit each video in four hours. But lately I've had to learn so much new technology (to include clips, for example, required about six new programs for my computer). So that pushed this one up a bit. But I'm hoping against hope that I only have to learn these technologies once, then I can continue using them with each new episode. We'll see. Each week it seems like it's always somethin'.

The Mars signs...yeah, a little too low-tech for the "new" vlog, I think. Gotta keep upping the ante! ;-)

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Interesting reviews; I'll definitely have to put East Side Story on my to-rent list (I haven't seen a really first-rate gay independent film for a while, now).

As for Beowulf, I enjoyed it quite a bit more than you fellows did!  The film has very little to do with the original poem, however.  There certainly is little enough plot here; don't go to this film looking for deep insight, great dialogue, or nuanced character development.  But taken strictly on its own terms, as an action-adventure type of film, I think it succeeds, and I did enjoy it. 

Oh, I have a few small complaints, though:  I could not understand a single word that Grendel said.  Admittedly, he had few lines, but still he should have come with subtitles.  And as for the naked fight scene---well, very exciting to be sure, but it really was ridiculous at the lengths to which the film makers went to avoid any "weenage."  Always there was some foreground object placed in an oh-so-appropriate spot, presumably to preserve Beowulf's modesty...  Ha!

Of course, a huge part of the visual appeal for me is the fact that it is in 3D---and as such, it is absolutely stunning to look at.  The final battle sequence with the dragon, as seen in three dimensions, was quite frankly one of the most exciting things I've ever seen in the cinema.  Too cool!  The last twenty minutes of the film really do transport you into this world, in a way that a "flat" film never could.  So, if you have access to a theatre projecting the film in 3D, I absolutely would recommend going to see the picture (don't take little kids, though).  I also got kind of excited at seeing the trailer for next summer's new 3D adventure, Journey to the Centre of the Earth.  Though from the clips shown, I can see that the new version of that story also does not follow the book closely at all.  But hey, it looks like a heck of a lot of fun.

(3D viewing tip---if you are having some trouble with the 3D not being very effective and you see a lot of ghosting---it is likely that the lenses in your glasses have mistakenly been placed left for right.  In other words, just flip the glasses and wear them upside down, with what should be the left lens over your right eye, and the right lens over your right eye, and everything should look fine.  I saw the film with my brother and niece, and we ALL had the problem with the glasses, but once they were flipped the picture jumped into life, sharp as anything.  The new digital 3D projection system is absolutely perfect---the images on screen are amazingly lifelike; it really is astounding to look at.  I think that more and more films are going to be produced in 3D in the upcoming years now that all the technical bugs have finally been ironed out of the process.)