Luckin Coffee Available at NTUC

 I was somewhat surprised to see Luckin Coffee beind sold at NTUC. Heh nope not the normal version at the Luckin shops, but rather the different instant mix version. Even the Coconut flavour version (I thought unique and seasonal?) is available - per box of 9 cups being sold at $10.90 (discounted from $11.90). Not a bad thing but I wouldnt feel that uniqueness (or should I say experience) of getting a Luckin coffee via such an instant mix isnt it?

Luckin Coffee Coconut at NTUC

I can understand why Starbucks x Nespresso capsules work for some (me included) because all you want is a traditional coffee made quickly at home, i.e. an instant "cappuccino". Whereas the Luckin coffee experience is a different one - one order from their app prior to reaching the store with different vouchers to offset the price plus getting some varied flavour of the month. The latter would not be offered via a box of instant mix.

Oh well, who knows, maybe there are as many varied coffee drinkers with different preferences who might like it. Besides Coconut flavour, the mix traditional black coffee version is also available at $9.90 for 8 cups. Nope I didnt buy either - would still buy from their shop instead.

Luckin Instant Black Coffee

I think normal grocery food items being packaged with known brands is a thing - so while I was looking for that Demon Hunter Instant Ramen (not available yet), I came across this macadamia mixnuts with the Netflix brand instead. Maybe give them, i.e. Netflix, another month or so to get that spicy ramen flavours in all three versions right, and we would see them in stores all over. Heh with likes of Saja Boys' Your Idol topping the US charts, I think the related KPop Demon Hunter merchandise should be something made widely available soon.

NTUC Netflix Macadamia Mixnuts

KPop Demon Hunters - Movie Review

I've just spent my Saturday night watching the latest top movie / animation "KPop Demon Hunters" and I would say this is a really good movie. It has topped the Netflix charts in twenty over countries since the release on 20th June for the summer break. The plot revolves around three girls who formed a Demon Hunter  girl band group - HUNTR/X, a tradition from generations, who use voices and songs to form a barrier that shielded humans from demons. Here's the song from the starting section:

Heh the shield is named as "hon moon" - basically soul gate (hon = soul, and moon = gate), which is illustrated as a blue lined barrier formed from the souls of their fans in the animation. The aim of the three girls (Rumi, Mira, Zoey) is to create a golden hon moon so that the barrier stays "permanent". Of course, along the way the demons sent their own band Saja Boys, a boy band of five, who sought to steal the fans from the HUNTR/X and break the barriers so that demons could steal souls from humans. Some interactions among the two bands

Ok no more spoiling of the storyline. The big attraction of the movie would be the various songs. Plot wise pretty standard - self-discovery journey of the heroine(s) where fears, identities, dreams etc were played out. Here's the YouTube of one of the popular songs:

I'm guessing that Sony Pictures Animations (producer of KPop Demon Hunters) would likely release a sequel, and minimally some merchandise (instant noodles would be one track, toys another). I think there are some merchandise for sale on Netflix shop now. Looking forward to watching more on Netflix, the distribution platform for this move.

Movie - Iron Man 2

We watched Iron Man 2 when it was released last weekend. Overall it was an entertaining movie, and you can expect the usual from such comic-turned-big screen movie, i.e.

a) hero demonstrating his power,

b) hero gets into trouble (he was suffering from palladium poisoning),

c) hero gets into more trouble (attacks from villian, typically using same genre of super power, i.e. special armour in this case),

d) hero gets some form of teaching / revelations (in this case, it was combination of Nick Fury from SHIELD, and Tony Stark's father's message about a new element)

e) hero gets into a fight with villian (aided by hero's friend)

f) hero wins, and is rewarded with favourable response from the hero's love

g) hints of another episode

For some reason these same elements were also present in other superhero movies, e.g. Spiderman, Hulk etc etc. Yes, they are all adapted from Marvel Comics.

Ok, other than the predictable plot, I must say the whole Iron Man 2 movie is good because of the cast and the many humourous dialogues inserted in the script (remember the super explosive named 'ex-wife'?).

The armours were also pretty well designed and there were some attempts at real science in the movie (no, I don't think a super particle collider can fit into the basement of that size).

Oh, for those who have not watched it yet and intend to do so, do stay till the credits roll is over, because at the end there is a short additional clip that links to the next Avengers related super hero movie. Yes there will be Iron Man 3, but no, the additional clip deals with Thor, and the movie on Thor is set for the big screen next year.

Movie - Avatar 3D ... Simply Fantastic!

We've just watched Avatar in 3D today and it was simply fantastic! The official website of Avatar is here.

The 3D effects of the movie is great and there are noticeable depth differences for most scenes. Some of the scenes even give that 'images floating out of the screen' effect, e.g. there was a scene at the tree of souls and the floating seeds simply floated around, giving a feeling that they were floating to my face. You need these glasses below to watch the movie in 3D. For those who are not used to watching such shows, do eat something before the movie or else you may feel nauseous due to the 3D effect.

The CGI is also the most advance so far for these sci-fi movies. Of course, all these were made possible and that is why it took so many years before the technology is advance enough to make a movie like the Avatar.

As for the plot, well, the story flow is somewhat predictable. A guy was thrown into a warzone, he met a girl, learned about the girl's culture, fell in love with her, got caught between the conflicting cultures, war broke out, he fought for his new 'homeland' and justice, sweet ending. Yupz, typical I guess. For those who are interested to find out more about the Avatar movie, here's the wiki.

What is more interesting is the questions raised by the show, i.e. the reminder about the effects of colonial imperialism, the uncontrolled capitalism and the resultant greed / destruction, and the corruption of certain individuals who want to feel that they are in control / power regardless of the costs.

It is also to the credit of the producers that they can narrate so much of the new world in this movie of a few hours and yet make the whole plot realistic. The actors / actress are great in conveying their emotions / conflicts. It is actually amazing to see CGI characters reflecting such clear emotions in their faces.

Ok ok, for those who have not watch the movie, go watch it (in 3D please) and be amazed by the advance of movie technology. I think after this Avatar movie, there should be more movies employing such technology. I wonder when will the sequel be out.

Monsters vs Aliens: Movie Review

We watched Monsters vs Aliens over the weekend. It was a super funny show, but it was super lame too. Actually it is a bit of a misnomer since there is technically speaking only 1 alien in the show and not 'aliens'.

The show is about how a girl named Susan, became super huge and powerful after being hit by a special meteor named quantonium. Then she met other monsters after being captured by the US special forces.

The alien was after the quantonium, and thus came to Earth to retrieve it. A fight started and voila they the monsters won (as expected).

A relaxing show with all the lame jokes. Worth viewing, but not at weekend prices I think.
Here's a trailer of the show.

Movie - Sing to the Dawn

We watched Sing to the Dawn over the weekend, hoping to support some local production, and I'm somewhat disappointed actually. While I understand that the graphics will not be as great as some other animations, I didn't expect the script to be that chessy.

I don't think they follow that much of the original story from Ho Mingfong, other than the basic plot of a girl in a village who wanted to get the scholarship to go to the city for study. Some lines inside don't exactly gel well with the developments, e.g. "Dear, I want a new pair of shoes." coming from demanding female bats while the main characters are trying to flee from a fire scene, seems quite ridiculous.

Overall impression that I had was that the makers of the movie were trying out different styles of animation (dancing monkeys, spinning 'modern casino', and some weird monkey god thingy), and made use of the opportunity to screen them in movie.

WALL-E (Waste Allocation Load Lifter - Earth class) - Great Movie!

Walle.E is a great movie to watch! The animations was done relatively realistically, and much emphasis was placed on the 'voices' & sounds of the machines. This makes the movie comes to life. While it is an animations, the designers have skillfully craft the 'facial' animations of the robots such that all human expressions are projected through simple movements of the robots. I like the way Wall.E's binoculars-like eyes move to depict his various emotions. The parts when he 'replaced' his faulty eye and tracks are also quite funny. Of course, it really helps that Wall.E is also such a cute, innocent, and brave robot. Eve, the female robot lead, also has very expressive 'facial' expressions through movements in her 'visual' head display.

Story plot wise it is a simple movie. Afterall, it's a Walt Disney 'cute' production with a happy ending. Let's not spoil the pleasure for readers who are going to see the movie, and so I'll not go into the details of the plot. Instead let me highlight a few simple 'facts' of the movie.

Wall.E stands for Waste Allocation Load Lifter - Earth class
Eve stands for Extraterrestrial Vegetation Evaluator
There are also gigantic 'Wall.e' in the mother spaceship (Axiom) known as Wall.A, i.e. Waste Allocation Load Lifter - Axiom class. There are many other cute robots, including the little guy who insisted in cleaning up Walle.E's 'foreign contaminant'

Before the movie begins, there is a short clip (very amusing) of 'Presto' which is also produced by Pixar. 'Presto' is about a magician and his pet rabbit. After the movie ends, there is no 'special' clips. Instead, at the showing of the credits, there are some animations by the two sides of the scrolling screen.

The local distributors for this movie have put in a lot of efforts to promote the movie, including many of these life size Wall.E as well as postcards. I quite like the idea of a bench with Wall.E at one side, looking at Eve hovering at the other end, and so I took a pic of myself in it. Lolz.

Red Cliff Movie - 2 versions?

We watched Red Cliff during an early weekday evening at Filmgarde (cos I took off that day) and found it a good show. I guess the film has been out for quite some time, and so there weren't many people in the theatre. We were among the 10 odd people in the theatre. For those with some knowledge of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the film will be more enjoyable.

There are a lot of movie reviews about this show, so I'll skip that. Just suffice to say that it is a money / time worth to watch it :).

I read later on the Wiki that there are two versions of the film, one for Asians and the other for rest of the world. Seems like the Asians' version has a combined total length of over 4 hours, while the shortened version for rest of world is about 2 hours plus. Wonder what are the parts which were cut? Maybe the part about Zhou Yu and Zhu Geliang's playing of zither, which I felt is a bit long.

The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

Just watched the Mommy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. Well, it's just another show with a lot of special effects. The plot is pretty standard, and you can read it at this Wiki. Actually China tombs don't have Egypt style mummy (got mummified burials, but still different style lah), and the 'special abilities' used by the mummy in this show seems a bit weird. They explained it by saying that the Emperor has mastered the five elements. A bit lame actually.

The effects are nicely done, and the 'merging' of the flying dragon or the terracotta warrior to Jet Li is quite seamless. I'm also impressed with the mechanical setups, especially the part of the automatic bow and arrows at the beginning of the show. They also did some research on how the Great Wall was built. The only part which is not as perfect is the rendering of the terracotta Jet Li when the emperor first awaken.

Other than special effects, the other not so great part is the funny mandarin used in the show. Luke Ford who acted as Alex in the movie really cannot speak mandarin, so they could have put some effort in his pronunciation. I wonder if the western audience can appreciate the mandarin used in the movie, even for those who know some basic chinese, because Jet Li was speaking in more 'chim' version (i.e. ancient grammar). Ok I understand the need to cater to the Chinese market, especially when the Olympics is so near.

Overall, an okay show to watch, but if you have other better shows like Batman or Red Cliff, watch them instead.

Hellboy 2: The Golden Army

It was a (another) hectic week, so was quite glad to go for the movie on Sat night to relax a bit. This time round the group watched the Hellboy 2: The golden Army.

It is a good show! The story plot is somewhat predictable, i.e. bad guy come out, seized some power, threaten the world..etc. Good guy (i.e. Hellboy) jumps in, embroiled in some level of personal conflict, teamed up with the rest of good guys, and beat the bad guy. Show ends. Lolz. Here's the plot on wiki for those interested.

The good part about the show is the computer graphics, plus the sense of humor in the little things. For example, the way the dead and later animated tooth fairy complained about Hellboy being uncouth is quite funny. The part where Mr Wink and Hellboy both complained to each other (one about the broken tooth and the other about his broken fist) is again quite humorous.

There is also some level of save the Earth element inside, when the Prince described how human has destroyed the truce by killing off the trees to make way for carparks...etc, and how Hellboy felt undecided about killing the gigantic forest spirit. The romance part between Abe and the princess is a bit far fetched though, but the way Abe reacted is interesting. Abe and Hellboy drinking beer together while singing off-key love songs bring a human aspect to the otherwise inhuman characters ... lolz.

Overall worth watching.

Panda & Hancock

Watched two movies this week! This is an accomplishment in itself because I've seldom watch more than a movie per week.

I watched Kung Fu Panda and Hancock. Both are good movies. But I like the Panda better becuase it is simply soooooo funny.... muaa haa haa. Guess I kept laughing non-stop throughout the whole show. It's a family movie, for both adults and kids. The only irritating thing is that after the credits there is an additional scene? Really? How come I don't see it in the cinema... I stayed till the end!! zzz....

Ok I watched Hancock later. I guess I got high expectation for it cos in part it's acted and produced by Will Smith. Moreover, after Panda, I sort of expect an equally good movie experience with Hancock. Hancock is unlike your usual Super hero movie by painting a hero who faced rejection by society and also suffered from some measure of low self esteem. Hmm it's a good movie, worth watching... but between the two, I'll still choose the panda.

Afternote: I didn't realise that McDonald is selling Panda meals lolz... bought some Panda nuggets to try, and yupz the nuggets are not bad!

Iron Man Movie - stay after the credits!

Watched the Iron Man over the long weekend at FilmGarde (Kallang). Interestingly the cinema is not bad. We were a bit skeptical when we realised that the cinema is not GV, Eng Wah...etc (the usual cinemas), but turn out that the movie theatres are quite alright.

The movie Iron Man is good! Worth watching, even for those folks who don't follow the original comics series. The plot is richer (compared to Jumper), with Tony Stark (i.e. Iron Man) being kidnapped by the rebels in Afghanistan and made his first Iron Man suit in captivity. He escaped (with the help of a doctor Yinsen) and subsequently enhanced his suit as a weapon to destroy the other weapons (e.g. Jericho) made by his company.

What he didn't know is that his long time friend (and friend of his father), Stane, is actually the guy who ordered his kidnap and execution. Stane obtained the original prototype Iron Man suit, enhanced it, and stole Stark's power generator (i.e. his 'heart') to power the new version. Stark has an old generator, which he used to power his suit, and battle Stane.

The good guy wins of course (well, this is a Marvel comic adaptation, quite unlike Batman series which is darker). What is interesting is that viewers should stay after the credits, cos Nick Fury made a guest appearance at the end and invite Iron Man to join the Avengers. :) Oh, and the artist Stan Lee also made a guest appearance in the movie (the gala with 2-3 girls)! Another interesting point is that many of the technologies displayed in the movie are already in prototype modes. :p

For those who didn't stay, you could search for the ending clips online. Here's one (hopefully it didn't get remove). During the movie, we saw the preview for Hulk, seems quite alright. I think the Iron Man has a part 2, and I will be quite interested to watch it.

Spiderwick Chronicles - Good Movie

Watched the movie "The Spiderwick Chronicles" and find it's quite a good movie. The plot is simple and somewhat predictable. Heh it's fantasy setting movie adapted from children's books of the same name so I didn't have any high expectation in the plot sense. But the effects are quite good and there is no lull in the movie, i.e. every part is presented with a bit of surprise.

It's not an epic style kind of fantasy setting like Lord of the Ring but is entertaining enough for those who like goblins, griffins and faeries. Some parts are funny, especially the last few scenes when Hogsqueal threaten the griffin that he will eat the big bird someday. Overall a good enough choice if you have no other movies in mind, but not a great loss if you miss it.

Bought the Spiderwick combo popcorn set that comes with this luggage tag (pic below) but wonder who will ever use it for their luggage? Maybe I can try using it next time... hmmm.

Read in the wiki entry that there is even a game based on the Spiderwick Chronicles, wow. Oh and below is the trailer for those interested. The website of the Spiderwick Chronicles books is also quite interesting with illustrations of the different creatures.

The Leap Year Day

Heh today is the unique day that occurs once every 4 years (mostly). The origins of leap year could be found in wiki. And nope, it's not as simple as once every 4 years because some years like 2100 or 1900 are not leap years despite the year being divisible by 4. The wiki article got more details.

Watched the show 'The Leap Years' by Raintree Pictures. Not a bad show, but not that great either. One of those shows which you wouldn't mind watching on special days (another example is the CJ7 for watching during CNY). Hmm the producers could have done more enhancement...e.g. the guy lying on the hospital bed certainly bears no similarity to 'Jeremy'. What is interesting is the different Singapore sceneries in the movie, and I didn't know about "the n Irish leap year tradition that no man will refuse any request of a lady and invites him out for a date".

For me, my Leap Year day is not that exciting compared to what happened in the movie... it was spent mostly in bed to catch up on sleep :p

"Jumper" is a crap movie

Watched the movie "Jumper" this weekend. I think it sucks.

Why? Cos' the show focused too much on the couple. So many things are left unexplained, e.g. why the Paladins hate jumpers? Colin, the paladin, said that the power to jump should not be owned by a human and only God should have it, and that jumpers all turned bad eventually... heh... so what exactly is the background for such accusation? More details pls ....zzz

And the equipment of the paladin... nothing much was explained about it. I thought the electric hook thing is quite cool... and that 'power generator thing'... but again nothing much was explained.

I also think the plot should have more substance... common' the main character is acting precisely like a 'himbo' zzz... can add more substance to him? And Griffin's lair... there are so much more that could be explained there... those details on his walls... what are they? So Griffin's parents have been killed when he was a kid... but then who taught him about the history of Jumpers / Paladins? The third jumper who was killed earlier... who is he? Any jumper organisation... etc etc... nthg... zzz...

O.k. rant enough... should have watched other shows and not waste money on this one... :p my fault.

881 is very interesting to watch!

hee... watched 881 and it is a great film...cos of a few reasons... one reason is the local flavour... the very liberal use of phrases and expressions that are somewhat more for local use. Another reason is the very interesting songs inside... I think quite a number of the songs are written by the late Chen Jin Lang. Hmm one person one half... here's the song (yeah first time i upload youtube onto blog...so mountain turtle right?)



Also thinking that i would go buy the OST for 881... and maybe blast in office!! kekeke.

Shit! Pirates after the credits got stuff!

EHHHH! For those who watched pirates 3... stay for the ending part after credits.... i left...cos fren said nthg after...

BUT!!! Got... apparently Turner returned and see his son!

Shit... missed it.... waaahhhhhhhh... haiz.

Protege

Watched Protege today with a bunch of frens... unplanned movie trip actually...

And it's a great movie! And yes... Zhang Jing Chu is quite chio... hmm big eyes effect with fair fair skin...waaaahhhh... only part I didn't catch fully about the movie is the part when she put something in the letterbox (when her husband and kid moved ahead)... what's that about?

At the beginning and the end, it was asked 'which is more lethal, drugs or emptiness'... the movie is about the drug trade. It's pretty ironic that emptiness could drive people to do so many other lethal things which result in emptiness. What then is the opposite of emptiness? Purpose? It's also pretty ironic that those with supposedly 'purposes' in the movie (Andy Lau and his protege, nick) end up with nothing as well.... one dead when he was about to leave the trade... the other nearly become a drug addict (or was he already one?).

So is apparent 'purpose' better than emptiness realised? Blessed then is the fool with apparent purposes and woe to the smart who realised his emptiness. Maybe we all know this... which is why in the modern day city... many people rush about with apparent purposes... we're happier that way? ... dunno... only know that at this point in time, Bailey's on the rocks is still a good drink compared to Yakult with Bombay Sapphire.... and my purpose right now is to fully enjoy the drink...