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With a large number of medical based drama series like Grey’s Anatomy, Nip/Tuck and Scrubs inundating the television schedules, I tried to make myself focus on viewing one series at a time. However, most of the above programs focus mainly on drama and conflict of the surgeons within the surgery room, with emotional tensions thrown into the fray between the doctors and patients. I feel that House, M.D. offers a new insight at what it means to be a doctor as well as a new brand of medical drama.

The English actor Hugh Laurie assumes an American accent to cast as the eccentric Dr. Gregory House, a rebellious medical genius. Joining him in the fictional Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital in New Jersey, are the hospital director, Dr. Lisa Cuddy(Lisa Edelstein), his best friend-cum-tumour specialist, Dr. James Wilson(Robert Sean Leonard), as well as his team members, Dr. Eric Foremen(Omar Epps), Dr. Allison Cameron(Jennifer Morrison) and Dr. Robert Chase(Jesse Spencer). His job in the hospital is simple, it’s not dissecting people within the surgery room, but instead a new twist, he’s a diagnostician. He and his team finds out what is wrong with the patients.

Instead of adopting a serious and emotional theme within the story, the scriptwriters instead opt for something new and never seen before, comedy. Indeed, Dr. House, despite being a respected and known medical genius within the hospital, is known for his odd behavior and sometimes obscene quirks. Having personally watched a few episodes myself, I can assure that audiences are amused when they see the lovable Dr. House in all sorts of predicaments, for example taking a dare that he can diagnose patients in a clinic without touching them, leading to scenes of him forcing the patients to take their own temperature, as well as other medical procedures on themselves. And the list goes on and on.

Despite his very unorthodox treatments and extremely terrible bedside manners, Dr. House is still almost always right as he readily accepts the most bizarre cases, shocking both his team members as well as the patients with his stunningly accurate answers, despite taking a very unprofessional route to it. A reoccurring theme is that Dr. House uses his theory of “Everybody lies” within the story, referring to the fact that every patient always lies about their medical situation and lifestyle in order to hide them from their loved ones. By pressing this theory onto them, House gets on the nerves of almost every single patient with his witty remarks and sardonic personality, but at the very end, never ceases to amaze them with a correct judgement.

Drama still is present in the very “battles” House has with his patients, irritating them, in addition to the side plots about House’s own personal problems which includes an ex-lover and medical issues as well. Along the way, he occasionally falls out with his team members due to the extremity of his tactics and cause conflict within one another.

Using a delightful blend of comedy and drama, it is not a wonder that the rare and unique character of Dr. House has led to the program earning so many awards. Despite the show frequently using incomprehensible medical jargon, as well as a sophisticated sense of humour which might not strike you the very first time, the series is still a great choice for a wide range of audiences.

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(5 votes, average: 4.8 out of 5)
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The genre of water based disaster-cum-action flicks were probably defined way back when Titanic was produced and broke the charts as one of the most successful films ever. Since then, there have been a few similar flicks with roughly the same storyline, and I’m afraid Poseidon (2006) is perhaps wannabe imitation of these movies, being a film remake of a movie of the identical name back in 1972.

The plot line of Poseidon is stereotypical. A number of guests are aboard the luxurious ocean liner, the S.S Poseidon on a transatlantic crossing during New Year’s eve. As the story builds around a number of characters’ background and stories during their first day on board the cruise, disaster strikes upon the ship, causing a crisis to all the passengers and crew on board. The story then focuses on a small group of survivors who work together to escape certain death.

The group of survivors who eventually band together includes a wide range of different characters. Robert Ramsey(Kurt Russell) is the doubtful father of Jennifer Ramsey(Emmy Rossum) who is hoping to be engaged to her boyfriend, Christian(Mike Vogel). Elena(Mia Maestro) is a stowaway of her friend Valentin(Freddy Rodriguez) who works as a waiter in the dining room of the ship. 9 year old Conner James(Jimmy Bennett) is the young son of Jacinda Barrett (Maggie James), Dylan(Josh Lucas) is a professional gambler on board along with Nelson(Richard Dreyfuss), a homosexual architect. The list continues on, including the famous singer Stacy Ferguson, better known by her stage name “Fergie”, playing a minor character of the story.

Within the movie, the first half an hour or so is dedicated to exploring the histories and tensions between each and every character, introducing each of them to the audience in a different way, before moving on to the crux of the story. A gigantic rogue wave is spotted by a passenger heading straight at the ship, and any evasive action is futile. The result is that the ship is horribly overturned, capsizing the ship, dealing a significant damage to it, throwing the guests all into panic.

One of the few things which amazed me are the elegant visuals within the movie. As the story began, we are given our few glimpses of the S.S. Poseidon, a luxury cruise liner indeed. Beautifully crafted sets modeled after rooms within of the renowned Queen Mary 2, as well as computer generated images of the ship’s destruction and demise creates an extremely life-like image for the movie. I personally can say that their huge $160 million budget was well spent this sector, given how the movie was a nominee for an Academy award for visual effects.

With a stale plot, an overused genre and mediocre acting, Poseidon (2006) is not a movie one would go expecting something fresh and appealing. The only spark of light which shines within this movie would be the impressive visuals, however, I am afraid that graphics alone, do not make a good movie.

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With the Harry Potter series at its end with the 7th book finally being published this year, I took some time to search for other books with roughly the same genre, teen fantasy. Through a friend, I stumbled upon the Artemis Fowl series, written by the Irish author Eoin Colfer which began in 2001. This series has been ongoing with roughly 5 books, with the last one projected to emerge in 2008. Although it lacked publicity compared to the Harry Potter series, it still made up by becoming quite successful, receiving a favourable response.

The setting is relatively simple to understand and intriguing at the same time. Artemis Fowl II is a child prodigy, a genius, at 12 years old, he has an IQ debatably one of the highest in the world. He is the sole heir to the affluent Fowl family line, a long line of infamous Irish criminals who reside in their traditional Fowl Manor. Accompanying him are his personal bodyguards and servants, Juliet and Butler.

The story begins with Artemis brooding over his family’s recent misfortune. His father, Artemis Fowl I was recently lost in the Arctic during a business transaction, driving his mother to insanity due to his absence. Normally, a 12-year-old kid might be stunned with not knowing what’s next to do, but not Artemis. Immediately, this classical “evil genius” tries to hatch a plot to reinstate the Fowl name as the wealthy family they were once were, by amassing another fortune, illegally. This leads to the main plot of the first stolen gold from fairies.

The stereotypical image of fairies are little “pixies”, small hand sized humanoids who fly around with their wings, accompanied by the Irish myths of leprechauns with their magical pots of gold. However, in Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer not only utilises this myth thoroughly, but pushes it beyond our wildest imaginations. In the story, fairies are a large colony of humanoids including pixies, dwarves, goblins, the usual mythical group. Centuries ago, they had war with us (humans) and after being defeated, they fled underground where they stayed hidden for centuries using their superior technology and fairy magic.

Artemis, through someway was able to come to the knowledge of their existence, and knowing their secret, plans to steal gold from them to help reinstate his family’s wealth. What we are given in the end is an interesting plot full of mythical twists and turns as we see this boy, not even a teenager, attempt to outwit the other races based on his cunning plans. Artemis, in this way, plays a lovable “evil genius”, whose plots for personal power and greed against the fairies form the basic plot line of the series.

As with the Harry Potter series, one thing I noticed was that as the series progressed, the themes of the books become more and more mature. Having read the entire series, I can safely say that the unique setting would draw the interests of both the young and old into the very possible scenario that we are not the smartest beings on this planet. I personally recommend getting hooked onto the series, which has its last book coming out some time in 2008, in addition to a movie in the works.

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If you do some typing work frequently on the computer, may it be for work, digitalising an essay or perhaps just writing a story, you would surely understand the enormous number of distractions which can easily throw you off your work path. It might be a random friend instant messaging you, or perhaps a bad habit of surfing the web at the same time and you have encountered an interesting enough article that it beckons you from your work. This is what exactly Writeroom/Darkroom is made for.

Writeroom is actually a program which was coded solely for the MAC OS, being advertised as an application which is able to keep out all the distractions from a writer. The program’s slogan is “Distraction free writing”, which is exactly the type of environment it tries to emulate for the users. It’s a program which blocks out everything else except a blank screen for you to write on in full screen mode, and it also gives the basic utilities of being able to save, count your words and even a spell checker. What it basically promises is a place you can focus on your writing, nothing else.

When I personally first started up Writeroom, upon a friend’s advice, the interface looked sleek and smooth. The basic skin, which can be customised, is just a black screen, with green text which appears when you start typing, giving the user a “matrix” feel. It blocks out everything else which might be present on the background, such as IM’s popping up or even your Mozilla Firefox or Internet Explorer standing by with loaded contents. It reminded me of writing in real life, where the only things on your desk would be a writing pad and your stationery, just like a blank screen for you to type on.

However, despite what it was made for, a distraction blocker, it does not exactly grant full immunity to such distractions. In the end, it’s just a helping tool, and writers still have to rely on themselves to be able to fully concentrate on their work. With easy hot keys to exit, and the usage of certain hot keys of whatever operating system one is using, you can easily tab away the Writeroom to other programs, overriding whatever use it may have. Furthermore, it does not exactly block out sounds in the background, so one would still hear the familiar pings of instant messages in the background and easily tab out to reply them.

In the end, Writeroom is still just a tool to help a writer get going, it still boils down to the person himself or herself to concentrate on their work. Still, it is a helpful program which can be downloaded here for the Mac version, or here, for a ported PC version.

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When anyone mentions the American band OneRepublic, the first song which would spring to most minds would be their hit single Apologize, produced in collaboration with producer Timbaland, which broke the records as one of the most successful singles ever released. One would have to agree that this band has came a long way from a lowly beginning within MySpace back in 2004. Dreaming Out Loud is OneRepublic’s debut album, containing “Apologize” and it’s remix version with Timbaland, as well as 11 other pop-rock songs, with another 3, “Hearing Voices”, “Dreaming out loud” and “Something’s not right here” available at certain locations only.

To get the ball rolling, I’m sure many have heard their single “Apologize” before. With that song in mind, I have to say that the rest of the songs within the album bear the same genre and some resemblance to it. I’m no music guru, but they have a heavy emphasis on acoustics and drums as well as the occassional piano. Most of their songs combines this and Ryan Tedder’s(Their lead Vocal) unique voice to craft brlliant songs. For example, the much acclaimed “Apologize” uses the piano as well as the guitars to produce a melodic and addictive beat, providing the platform for this song to be the success it is today.

Despite OneRepublic claiming themselves as a rock band, I personally find “Dreaming out loud” somewhat contradicting it. Most of the album’s songs are more of pop and non-metal, being what I myself would consider “soft” in nature. Their songs all follow one main theme, that would be emotional struggles, relationships and such problems. Another example, “Stop and Stare” is a catchy song relating to the act of trying to move on from something of the past, only realising later that although you try to get away, you would end up being unable to move away from that incident.

Furthermore, I find some of their music extremely repetitive. Perhaps one of the problems with this album is the lack of variety, some of the tracks sound alike, all bearing identical themes, and to put it bluntly, I would get sick of hearing the similar melodies or beats over and over again in several the songs. In addition, one nitpick I noticed is that they like to reuse the chorus repeatedly, for example, in “All fall down”, as well as repetitive lines in “Prodigal”. Sure, in the end, it may produce a great sound, but after sometime, it gets monotonous.

All in all, despite just falling short to the hype and high expectations one would expect after “Apologize” came out some time before the album, I still find the album still containing some solid music, a recommended buy for pop-rock lovers.

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(4 votes, average: 3.75 out of 5)
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