The 2015 Masterplan

In 2007, the public in New Zealand were calling for Graham Henrys head. Undoubtedly the best team in the world had been knocked out in the Quarter-Finals by, of all teams, they French. A team known for their ability to capitulate at any moment had just gone and performed the impossible. While the victory can be put down to possibly the greatest individual performance in World Cup history from French skipper Thierry Dusautoir, (He made more tackles than the entire All Black XV put together, his figure of 38 still standing as the world record for a professional match) it was also blamed on the injury to Daniel Carter and Henry's lack of a Plan B. Instead of sacking him on the spot, the All Blacks management gave him a chance to find another way to cap what would undoubtedly be another four years as the world's best side.

Come 2011, on home soil, the All Blacks then did the impossible themselves and didn't choke. They held out and won the cup, Henry finding his holy grail before retiring. This isn't a million miles off the situation Wales find themselves in at this moment. Perhaps we're not the best team in the world (yet), but there were points in the match against Fiji, who had been a huge struggle for old Cymru in the past, in which Warren Gatland's men looked pretty unstoppable. Despite the pouring rain and pounding islanders, Wales continued to rack up try after try, playing arguably the most exciting, attacking rugby in the tournament. Even when tournament black horses Ireland came a-knocking, with huge odds in their favour and the presence of some of the best performers of the year in their starting line-up, Wales blew them aside emphatically. Unfortunately, some things happened in the following France match that I'd rather not talk about, and Wales found themselves out of the tournament.

However- We have seen the strength of Gatland's Plan A already, and we've also seen Kiwi-esque foresight from the WRU to keep Warren on as our head coach until the 2015 championship. The Union aren't the only ones with foresight, though, as the man himself has proven himself in the past 12 months to be possibly the world's best at spotting young talent. The likes of Rhys Priestland, Alex Cuthbert, Jonathan Davies, Scott Williams, George North, Justin Tipuric and Toby Faletau have all been transformed from decent club players & prospects to international, if not world, class performers.

However, we can't stop there. At the moment, we have more strength in depth than we have ever had. This is evident in the squad listing bellow, but every year, the Wales u20s team continues to churn out plenty of decent players who could, with a little bit of Gatland coaching, be easily turned into the kind of name that could have us troubling the top Southern Hemisphere sides. The fact he called Harry Robinson, with very little club experience, into the squad for the pre-Six Nations training camps shows that he intends to do this. We're already building a very healthy squad, but we can't be content with that. The All Blacks had to leave four or five genuine, big name players out of their squad on the strength of it alone. We want these issues.

But more important than matching the All Blacks is to beat them. At the moment, the 'Big Three' dominate world rugby. Whilst Wales are dominating the European scene, (Well, at international level, anyway) this, again, can't be enough and we must begin by winning at least two of the three games against Australia in the summer. Even one victory and two narrow losses should be considered a failure. Hoping and praying to win, as has been our approach for so long, is no longer how we should go about things. We must expect to win, and I'd say we're not far off having this approach nailed down. And these are the 50-odd players I believe could not only follow this through, but go on and potentially be a part of our set-up that goes forth and wins the World Cup in 2015...

WALES' DEPTH
Many of these are more aiming towards 2015 than realistic options for the here and now. And, of course, half the 2011 squad I wouldn't've heard of in '08, so we can hope for a few George Norths (Who was only 15!) along the road, too.

Loosehead Prop- Gethin Jenkins, Ryan Bevington, Paul James, Rhys Gill, Rhodri Jones
Hooker- Ken Owens, Matthew Rees, Richard Hibbard, Huw Bennett, Emyr Phillips, T Rhys Thomas, Gerwyn Price, Kirby Myhill, Sam Parry
Tighthead Prop- Adam Jones, Craig Mitchell, Aaron Jarvis, Scott Andrews, Joe Rees, Craig Cross
Second Row- Alun Wyn Jones, Ian Evans, Luke Charteris, Bradley Davies, Macaulay Cook, Cory Hill, Lou Reed, Dom Day, Daimen Welch, James Down
Blindside Flanker- Danny Lydiate, Ryan Jones, Aaron Shingler, James King, Lewis Evans, Michael Patterson, Rob McCusker, Jevon Groves
Openside Flanker- Sam Warburton, Justin Tipuric, Josh Turnbull, Josh Navidi, Darren Waters, Sam Lewis, Daniel Thomas
No. 8- Toby Faletau, Andy Powell, Andries Pretorious, Kieran Murphy, Luke Hamilton, Morgan Allen, Danny Baker

Scrum Half- Mike Phillips, Lloyd Williams, Rhys Webb, Tom Habberfield, Dwyane Peel, Tavis Knoyle, Gareth Davies, Aled Davies, Martin Roberts, Jon Evans, Lewis Jones
Fly Half- Rhys Priestland, James Hook, Dan Biggar, Jason Tovey, Lewis Robling, Steffan Jones, Matthew Morgan, Jordan Williams
Wingers- George North, Alex Cuthbert, Harry Robinson, Hanno Dirksen, Will Harries, Aled Brew, Eli Walker, Luke Morgan
Centre- Ashley Beck, Jamie Roberts, Jonathan Davies, Scott Williams, Gavin Henson, Adam Hughes, Owen Williams, Ashley Smith, Adam Warren, Nic Reynolds, Andrew Bishop, Jack Dixon, Cory Allen
Fullback- Leigh Halfpenny, Morgan Stoddart, Liam Williams, Lee Byrne, Tom Prydie, Halam Amos, Tom Prydie, Dan Fish

The best bit is, I know I'm missing people who are in with a very good shout of playing for Wales in 2013, never mind '15. This is what's most exciting about Welsh rugby at the moment. Not the good hands, quick feet or style of play, it's the ability we have to bring these players through and, here's hoping, we can make enough of 'em good enough to win that trophy in three years time...

An Education On Entertainment: The Shocking True Life Story

That title? It's also going to be the name of my third feature film.

Not too long ago, I made the decision to give up on this blog malarkey. Instead of actually writing lots of words to describe boring events and rather tame descriptions of films that I’d seen with lots of words, I’d simply add five of the blighters an a number onto one post, as I wanted a way to keep count now that I’m seeing more films, but without it actually involving much strain on me, although I do feel some pressure to try and add some wit to the vast ocean of pith on show.

It’s worth noting that the numbers don’t lie. Sometimes, I change my mind on a film a while after I’ve seen it. But while I dropped Woman in Black to a 5 from a 6, and I stand by that decisions, I have since made the judgment that I don’t want to rate films against others. This is a very rough scale of measurement- I’m trying to express both how I feel about what I’ve seen as a film and as a two-hour experience. While I might have given both Hugo and We Bought A Zoo 7/10, I’d say that I enjoyed WBAZ more, but the cinematic flair and know-how Scorsese showed was worth nothing less than that very mark. While those numbers aren’t telling big fat porkies, perhaps they’re not saying the whole truth.

But that’s the thing I’ve learnt about film over the past few months. Whereas before I liked to think I had a well-grounded view of the cinematic world, it’s only going to see two or three films a week that’s made me realise that –actually- I know nothing at all.  Previously, I’d exclusively see big releases and selected other films that nabbed my (Or, in most cases, a more hot-blooded friend) attention. However, I was always pining for films ‘About things’ and for my local multiplex to show some stuff that wasn’t focus grouped to death (This Means War, I’m still looking at you). While the list might not show this, perhaps only Pirates, Avengers and Hunger Games (And then probably one or two other pieces of tosh that just happen to be showing while I’m there) would have got my post-Unlimited Card buying dosh. The likes of 21 Jump Street (Which I feel I probably underrated in hinds sight) and the aforementioned We Bought a Zoo have really opened my eyes to the delights of the middle-of-the-line films that I’d previously unknowingly avoided. They have neither multi-million budgets nor interesting arthouse concepts, but more than delivered in the light entertainment stakes.

The question I wanted to ask myself here, really, before I got lost in a bit of a ramble, was just what this has taught me. A hackneyed, obvious question, yes, but then that’s fitting considering some of the clichéd tripe I’ve seen (This Means War, my beady eyes are yet to move). But, really, the one thing that’s come across more than anything else is that film is mad, film is bizzare and film is far harder to pin-down than anything else I’m aware of. With video games you’re given tens of hours in which to form an opinion, and often the choice to navigate your way around the dull bits, as well as the choice to drop it at any point. A book also lasts a fair while and, due to the incohesive nature of picking up and putting down, transitions suddenly seem unimportant. TV is a shortened form, designed for rewatching and continuation. Films are individual entities that finish in a few hours, during which time they need to establish, develop and finish with characters, scenarios and locations. They’re a medium that’s had time to mature, like books, but unlike their wordy friends, we have a more pre-conceived idea about what we do or do not like in a film. But whereas I knew exactly how I felt about Super Mario Galaxy when the credits rolled, and that ‘Genius’ label hadn’t slipped at all, having seen The Cabin in the Woods a good 10 hours ago now, I’m actually not sure how I felt about it, and am unsure as to whether or not I’ll ever be able to provide a conclusive answer. The first hour had me thinking it had film of the year potential, but one line of the script later and I’m right off it. As we only have 90-odd minutes to go on, every second is suddenly vital and every line of dialogue deserves pouring over, and more often than not, these things take time and I know that I’m… Not going to end this on an irrelevant Smith reference. Instead, I’ll simply keep soldiering on, watching these things and putting pithy and hopefully witty 5-word responses and stick with my numerical system that doesn’t quite work.

Wait, I thought you said you weren’t ending on an irrelevant Smiths reference?

I’m not. Didn’t you read that last sentence?

Bigmouth strikes again…

Telegraphed.

Hull

This evening, I signed up on Klout. For those unaware, Klout is a website that measures your social media standings and not only gives you a score based on it, but also offers you areas in which you are supposedly 'influential' and tells you who has not only the biggest influence on you, but also who you influence yourself. While this all sounded like rubbish to me, it quickly turned into a strangely compelling way to measure myself against the world. For instance, according to Klout, I'm only 13 points less influencial than Nick Clegg, the Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

Whilst I might be more likely to actually reduce tuition fees, the ludicrousness of the system cannot be denied and was brought into further disrepute (That's not the word I'm looking for, but I'll use it anyway as nobody ever reads this.)  when looking at the topics on which I am influential. Apparently, people look to me as a beacon of Park-related understand. Yes, parks. After much musing I could only conclude that it must be my constant abuse of Mr. Daniel Arthur Parks of Scotland & the Cardiff Blues, yet I wouldn't say it's enough of a heckling to win me such status amongst the top anti-kicking fly-half ranks.

Here, in full, are my first Klout areas of influence in order. See if you agree with any of them- (I'm talking to myself again. Need to stop doing that.)

Politics
Parks
Wales
Poland
Eurovision Song Contest
Scotland
Family
Money
Rugby
Homework

Yes, I'm influential over homework. When kids all over the world look to go and sigh as they slowly answer times tables questions, they think of me and my almighty power over their opinions on the subject. Money & Politics, too. Well, I am also on a par with Nick Clegg...

But anyway, as the topic of this particular post hasn't shown, I'm going to MAKE myself influential in areas in which I see fit. The first is Hull, simply because I thought it would be funny to claim "Yes, I'm very influential in Hull" and watch people cower/gawp as they expect me to teach them the way of the back alley slashing. Instead, I tell them that I just tweeted the word a few times. Oh, how funny it would be.

I'm also currently only rated 41. I want to overtake Nick Clegg before the year is out. And I shall do this through tweeting about Hull. This Klout melarky is nonsense. But I'm really rather enjoying it...

Probably the Films of the Year Awards 2011

This blog is like an escape for me, one I haven't used very often. It means I can write about films, which is nice. Also, that poentially nobody will ever read it, but it's still there, lying published like some kind of ill newspaper. It means I can get away with that last sentance, and the fact that I can draw up a Films Of The Year list despite not having seen any of the real 'favourites' for the crown from those in the know- I wanted to see We Need To Talk About Kevin, but have a bunch of particuarly un-morbid friends. My many attempts to see Tinker Taylor Soilder Spy were thwarted time and time again by everything from a broken projector to a man being hit in the head with a dinner tray (Nobody reads, I don't have to explain). As such, the following list simply condems what I HAVE seen with an award, eventually leaving one to collect the coverted Ramblings Blobery Cup For Best Film 2011 Sponsered by Cillit Bang. (Not actually sponsered by Cillit Bang) And, even though I saw it this, no, sorry, last year, I'm counting The Kings Speech as a 2010 movie. Otherwise it would have won everything. Except whatever I'm about to give to Your Highness. That was a stinker.

BEST OTHERWISE GREAT ADAPTATION THAT RUINED THE BOOK'S ENDING: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two

I love Harry Potter. I've read all the books multiple times. I know the rules of Quiddich better than I do Cricket (Although, that said, most people do) and I also happen to have seen, and enjoyed, all the films. Personally, I hold the third book and sixth film as my favourites, although in both the seventh isn't far behind. In fact, all of David Yates' work has been outstanding to me, espechially as he turned the dullest book into a lively and exciting motion picture whilst handling the Order of the Pheonix. So imagine my disapoinment after leaving the cinema following my screening of the final film, having seen the incredibly rewarding ending JK Rowling had written turned into two blokes hitting each other with fireworks. For this, it gets an award of mixed praise.

Most fun rubbish: Real Steel
The broken projector when seeing TTSS I mentioned previously lead to me watching Real Steel, with the worst expectations having despised Transformers. However, just watching Real Steel shows where Michael Bay went wrong with his adaptation of a childrens toy. In trying to make it 'appeal' to an older audience with sex and violence, he purged it of the only thing a toy has going for it: fun. Real Steel was cheesey beyond belief. It has no real likeable characters, let alone notable plot or ideas. However, Real Steel is wonderfully directed and portrays a sense of appropriatly child-like joy in it's take on robots hitting each other. It's terrible, but absolutely teriffic. See it.

Worst Film To Involved A Minitor's Genitle Area: Your Highness

It's also the best film to flounce a horned creature's willy around as well by defult, but to call Your Highness the best anything is a compliment too far. It's a sad state of affairs when a film that boasts the tag "Funniest Film Of The Year" can't raise a single laugh from me, a robot created by scientists trying to identify what humour is, designed to laugh whenever there's a single trace of what you humans call 'Funniness' present. From the deeply uncomfortable scenes involving a paedophillic cannabis-smoking dragon to the general sense of dislike I couldn't help but feel for every single character in the whole piece, it's the worst film I saw in 2011 and is something I really don't want to experience again.

Film I Actually Did Find The Most Funniest Of The Year: Jonny English Reborn

This is not a 'Comedy of the Year' prize. It is an award for the film at which I laughed the most. And for that, there can only be one answer. It's the one with Mr Bean pretending to be James Bond. Perhaps it didn't have anything quite as funny as the best bits in the original, but the gags kept coming as if they'd been writing them for the past 8 years since the original was released. Obviously as a Rowan Atkinson fan, I can't recommend this highly enough. Unless you're looking for a film about a monarch trying to solve a stammer. Then I'd point you towards The Kings Speech.

OVERALL FILM OF THE YEAR (OR WHATEVER I CALLED IT EARLIER): Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Since I wrote my review of ROTPOTA in July, I've managed to see the two earliest Planet of the Apes films, and couldn't help but be blown away by them. Not only were they still culturaly relevent, but they also tied with ROTPOTA in the kind of the way that'd make you think that they were sequels to that, not the other way around. Even when I saw it, Rise was screaming out as a FOTY favourite, showcasing some of the best CGI I'd ever seen and a performance from James Franco that totally worked as an appology for him being involved in Your Highness. It was obviously made as a blockbuster, but it's a smart blockbuster. It's a proper film in it's own right, not just a money making excersize, unlike the majority of motion pictures I saw in 2011. Here's hoping 2012 follows ROTPOTA's lead and keeps the top two inches present admist any explosions.

The Gaming TARDIS: The History of Professor Layton

This article will appear on KN tommorow, as I'm writing this in bed on the smart phone I boasted about in my last post as I have no computer accessn at the momment to write it in a Word document and paste it in. But here are some words about Professor Layton anyway.

Every generation, there is one genre of video game that simply dominates all others. In the NES era, simple exploration and platform games were king, with very few 'mature' titles on the market, a theme that remained amongst the MegaDrive/Super Nintendo platform heyday, as the likes of Sonic 2 and Super Mario World simply churned out. Today, however, the video game market is ruled by the first-person shooter: a genre so childishly adult that any scraps of maturity current titles have are blown away by an encore of blood and guts.

So it's refreshing to have a genuinely grown-up series doing well at the moment as well, as the Professor Layton series goes from strength to strength under the watchful eye of the world's greatest publisher, although it's not Nintendo who deserves the endless credit the Layton series rightfully earns. Level-5 have come from nothing to become a world-class developer, on a par with the likes of Valve, Intellegent Systems and the afformentioned first-party Japanese giant. It's an incredible story for a developer with such a short history to suddenly be producing titles of the quality of Layton, Dragon Quest IX and Ni No Kuni.

Formed in 2000, their first release was PS2 RPG Dark Cloud, often referred to as one of the system's best. The sucsess of this and the sequel, Dark Chronicle, resulted in the most coverted RPG prize in Japan: The Dragon Quest license. In 2005 they'd turn out a memorable entry into the franchise before begining work on an original idea of their own, a new take on the Touch! Generations range Nintendo was pushing on the DS. Originally just a collection of puzzles, based on a popular series of books in Japan, Level-5 grew fond of the idea of linking the brainteasers in some way. The suggestion of a coherant story running throughout the game was such a brilliant idea you had to wonder how nobody had thought of it beforehand.

As for the character of Layton, you've got everyone's favourite Scottish philosophist to thank if Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. While he didn't personally devise Layton and Luke, the inspiration for all the reoccuring characters is drawn from the classic detective stories. Sherlock becomes Hershell Layton, Dr Watson is (somewhat unfairly) a small, cockney boy and James Morriarty can now be percieved to be an over-the-top, camp villian of '60s Baman proportions.

The rather lovely European/Japanese hybrid of an art style was actually a happy accident, with the staff just agreeing that Layton looked best with the shading he did, and designing a suitable world. Meanwhile, the grand THAT THING. *INSERT TEXT HERE* score is unrivaled in terms of wonderful, rousing game themes that don't rely on choirs to get the hairs on the back of your neck standing up and goes hand-in-hand with the slightly more conservative approach taken with the in-game themes, as they conjure up music that manages to not be annoying no matter how often you here it as if by magic.

The real secret to the sucess of Professor Layton as a series is the charm that the above combination provides. Likeable characters (And Luke), a fantastically soft art style, witty scripts, clever plot twists and great music slot together like something from one of those 'Get the ball into the whole' puzzles that populate every single game. It'd probably been a hit if released with these elements alone, but what makes Layton appealing over another Call of Duty/'Call of Duty killer' is that there's nothing like it. Chances are, between CODs or Need For Speeds there are eight billion shooters and racers out there saturating the market. But how many other puzzle-solving English gentleman simulators are there? Not that many, we'll tell you that much...

*We wanted to say none, but then we'd have to overlook staff favourite, the excellent Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure on DS. It's nothing like Layton beyond the character and a 'puzzle element', but well worth checking out.

Witchcraft!

I'm back again, and this time, I've got technology on my side, in order to make closer-to-interesting posts. Yes, I've finally embraced a phone that works (My last call-machine didn't even have a calculator) and as such figured out what a life-changer an app store is.

It's amazing, isn't it? Whilst my flash new piece of metal can't play Snake (In my eyes, the primary use of a mobile phone) it can let me watch endless montages of Shane Williams tries, discover who played the man in the shop that got robbed in Batman Begins and write this here blog, on the off chance somebody cares about my opinion. Which they don't.

Anyway, I've got as far as downloading the Blogger app and using it even though theres a readily-avalible computer with an eager keyboard just waiting to be tapped. It's a miracle. The entire SmartPhone experience is an entirely pointless one, but one that I am willing to accept after being so ignorant of it for so long. Wonderfull.

Oh, and I saw Real Steel a few weeks ago because they'd stopped showing Tinker Taylor Soldier Spy. It was quite good fun. I may do a proper review of it later, but right now, I'm going to rest my thumbs. All this QWERTY-ing can't be good for them. Espechially with SKYWARD SWORD only two days away...

Film What I Saw #6: Johnny English Reborn

It's probably best that I'll start off by saying that I'm a huge fan of Rowan Atkinson. In my eyes, he's the funniest physical comedian in the world, and up there with the all-time best comic actors. Mr. Bean is amongst the most hilarious TV series ever made, and even Atkinson poorer efforts, such as the two Bean movies, have still had numerous laugh-out-loud moments. The original Johnny English was one of the daftest films I've ever seen. The whole thing was extremely predictable, extraordinarily stupid and yet somehow very, very funny. Whilst I'm aware that others may not share this opinion, I thought it best to lay down the fact that I went into JER with higher expectations than I really should for what is, essentially, Mr Bean pretending to be James Bond for 90 minutes.

I was expecting to be disappointed. The 'Aisle or window seat' gag near the start was a total miss, although there had -admittedly- been a snigger previously as the title character bounced his way through the 'training'. The film continued as Mr. English finds his way back to London to rejoin MI9, with my expectations turning to a perhaps appropriate level, although I need not have been so concerned. It wasn't long before the film had set me off again. Perhaps 'serious critics' may turn their nose up at the film, but I think to deny that Johnny English Reborn is very, very funny is to go against the majority's opinion, and I happen to be one of the majority.

It's hard to write about comedy, especially good comedy. And even more so, slapstick comedy. Atkinson's work relies so heavily on the element of surprise that naturally occurs when we see a helicopter traveling along a road as if it were a car. There's plenty of gags that can tease a snigger out, if anything more than the original, which seemed to almost take its plot seriously. This one's jokes are usually hits, but they tend to be around the outside of the dartboard, with only one or two comic bulls-eyes lingering on the tape. There's nothing quite as funny as the muscle-relaxant drug from the original, but it's still the funniest of three comedies I've seen this year, and, as such, is certainly recommended.

7 voice-changing sweets out of 10