Because the world needs a little fun, and what better than National Treasure, all things considered?
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": This call for extras has caught my attention in more ways than simply alerting the good people of Kamloops as to what I'm sure they already know. I'll talk about that, next.
Part of this one was actually filmed on location, so there are cases of what you see being exactly what you get. However, giant octopus as an actual creature does not exist (there is a giant squid, however). I know a good deal less about what's really in the Smithsonian archives (it was never explicitly discussed in the commentary) but I can say this: the Gate of Kahmunrah does not exist, I have my doubts about there being a security guard named Brandon but pronounced Brundon, but it could happen, and this goes for both movies: the actual waxworks do not look like the actors set to play them. The waxworks used in the film were modeled off the actors in order to lend credence to the idea of them coming to life and actually looking like that. (Reasons for not doing the same for Dexter remain elusive.)
As far as everything else goes, if anyone in the audience has a take on the matte
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": National Treasure movie night
This is pointed out at length in the DVD commentaries for Night at the Museum, but a great deal of the Museum of Natural History has been rearranged for the sake of the movie. For example: Rexy is not in the front hall, nor is there a giant globe. The dinosaur skeletons are on the fourth floor and the globe is nonexistent. Also, Ahkmenrah's temple is based off the Temple of Dendur in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The blue whale exhibit is real, though.
The general trend for the first Museum movie is that a given exhibit more than likely comes from the Metropolitan Museum of Art: this goes not only for Ahk's temple but also the Moai, and several others. Another trend is the rearrangement and/or omission of a large number of exhibits, such as the entire fourth floor which features the real skeletons of real dinosaurs and the moving of Rexy into the foyer. Additions are not all that common, at least not as far as prominent displays go (the globe), but they are there. I'm pretty sure the colorful signs which show what's where are additions, but don't quote me on that.
I'm also quite sure I'm forgetting a great deal, so please feel free to remark on this in the comments. Constructive remarks are very welcome here.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Real, Fake, and Misplaced part 2 - The Smithsonian.
Remember Katy Perry's "Dark Horse", where she could either be Isis, Cleopatra, or both? That song is a huge thing now, and that post I just linked is from just over two months ago. Post in the comments if you experience the following: You're now hearing this song everywhere, and you've heard of it months ago, which is then making you feel like a hipster. Even if you're not feeling this exact scenario play out, surely you've felt something like it. Experiences welcome.
For those of you who are confused about why this is here, please check the link above, to my previous post featuring the Egyptian-themed and set video, which gets a shocking amount right and cleverly represented.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Returning to matters at the museum, I think it's high time I took a look at everything that was real, fake and misplaced, the first of a two-part series.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": The Dark Horse phenomenon.
Countdown: 240 Days to NATM 3.
NATM 3 ALERT: IF you have not already done so and you live in Kamloops, British Columbia, march your ass down to the Campus Activity Center and try to be an extra in this goddamned movie! DO IT!!!!
It is a very little known fact that the movie Night at the Museum was inspired by a 1993 children's book of the same name, by Milan Trenc (even though this is mentioned in the credits, but who pays full attention to those?). The book starred a night guard named Hector who discovers that every night, the dinosaur skeletons in the Museum of Natural History come to life, and he has to feed them, let them go for walks in nearby Central Park, and above all make sure they all get inside by sunup. The book is 23 pages and doesn't explore in depth the exact reason why the dinosaurs come to life and need care (with the moral that "If you ever see a night guard sleeping, this is why" (he was up all night caring for reanimate skeletons)), and so while the movie was in development, one of the tasks was to come up with a reason behind this. This is the genesis of the notion of the tablet.
Because the studio was convinced that there was a story in that slight children's book, they wanted a movie made out of it, but having dinosaur skeletons come to life just wasn't enough. There apparently needed to be more: more depth to the world, more richness, texture, more everything (and of course a plot centered around why everything is coming to life in the first place). So the movie stewed in Development Hell while a lot of the basics were hashed, rehashed, and re-rehashed, and then hashed again, until finally, c. 2004-2006, there was a workable script everyone was happy with (this was also after some changes to personnel over the course of all this), and in 2006, we were finally given the final product: a movie about a down-on-his-luck divorced dad and newbie night guard at the Museum of Natural History who discovers that every single exhibit comes to life every night thanks to a magical Egyptian tablet.
It's also a little known fact that the original book that started it all was re-released, with the slight alteration that the main character's name is Larry instead of Hector, to reflect the 2006 and 2009 movies.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": A collection of interviews with the cast and crew of Battle of the Smithsonian.
I'm speaking, of course, of Egyptian, which, like Latin, has a nice, long legacy via the Church. In this case, Coptic, the living language in question, is the official liturgical language of Egyptian Christianity. It followed a process of evolution aided by the Greek alphabet, but at its core, Coptic Egyptian is essentially Egyptian. It's had an influence on Arabic forms over the years, while at the same time sustaining external influences, as well.
I've said that Coptic is the official language of Egyptian Christianity. It's really the language of the Copts, who are a Christian people native to Egypt, and specifically there is a dialect which serves as the liturgical language of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria. In this way it's very much like Latin, except it seems to have more staying power. To my knowledge, Latin is not the one and only liturgical language of Catholics everywhere anymore, and I think it's been that way for quite some time.
Revitalization efforts for Coptic as a lay language are currently underway.
For more information (and also qualifies as a source):
Magic was woven into the fabric of ancient Egyptian daily life, influencing everything that could possibly be associated with it. There were no coincidences, for example, and everything had meaning. Magic was even thought to be older and more powerful than creation itself, existing before it and providing the "spark" to bring it about. But magic was also practical and sensical. Since there were no coincidences, everything could be explained, and that is extremely appealing to humans. After all, the unknown is very frightening, so having an explanation for it makes it infinitely easier.
Magic was also thought to be a dangerous force for mere mortals to deal with, "and coming into physical contact with the divine deadly" (Heka, the ancient Egyptian magic). That didn't stop a lot of humans from trying, however. There were good luck charms, protection spells, amulets for the living and the dead, curses, even. Medicine was also deeply involved with magic, shocking as that may be to the modern Western reader. It was believed that diseases were caused by evil spirits, so a lot of ancient medicine involved the banishing of these spirits (for example, exorcism)--I should note here Imhotep (the real one, not the one of Mummy fame) was famous for looking at medicine in a strictly non-magical fashion (Imhotep, Wikipedia the Free Encyclopedia), noteworthy for his time and place to be sure.
Magic could also be manipulated and abused. By itself it was not good or evil, but a tool to use to either of those means. The view is coming back into fashion as Neo-Pagan faiths gain footholds in today's world, but by no means is it a new one. Nor is it new that certain spells and rituals required elaborate preparation: right place, right time, right attire, right materials, and everything involved (including the person doing the working) had to be ritually pure (according to the article on ancient Egyptian magic cited above, this is a chiefly sexual concern: "a boy who has not been with a woman" and "being pure for three days" are example requirements/qualifications). It's interesting to note that certain ingredients being not what they're advertised as was a big deal back then, too: "in a temple which specialized in mummifying hawks there was a major scandal when it was discovered that the mummies contained anything but hawks" (Heka, the ancient Egyptian magic).
Another key element of both magical and religious practices (as divorced or unified as those may be in a given scenario) is the importance and power of words. Intoning something or writing it down and reciting it later were both said to have power. Saying and/or writing something was said to make that particular thing so. This is the principle behind the heavily mythologized tales of the births, lives, and deaths of numerous pharaohs over the course of Egypt's long history. It's also the principle behind Egyptian magic. Writing is associated with the divine just as much as magic is, so having a spell written out for later recitation (besides helping the caster come back to it later) makes it twice as divine as using either of the two media separately would have done.
Suffice it to say, a lot went into the ancient Egyptian magical system, both a product of the thousands of years it had to morph and develop and the human drive to explain the unexplainable. For more information:
The polls are now closed, and my thanks to the one to two people who actually cast their votes. And the results are...interesting ones. The "winners", with one vote each, are: for most anticipated new character, the Egyptian Pharaoh, and for most anticipated returner, Cecil. Perhaps the voter(s) would like to post in the comments their exact reasons for this, but I found this rather interesting indeed and so would like to speculate.
It could be the mystery of having Cecil back and introducing the pharaoh, whoever he may be and whatever connection he may have to the tablet and the Brothers Egypt. After all, this is essentially all we know about these two characters (save for Cecil's back story introduced all the way in Night at the Museum 1), and what roles they are intended to play here are still very, very heavily under wraps. Maybe it's looking for a return to something more familiar, more like Museum 1, where we were introduced to both Cecil and a pharaoh. Maybe it's both.
Again, if the voter(s) would like to comment regarding reasons for their choices, that would be lovely.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": I will be providing an overview of the real-life ancient Egyptian concept of magic, to be compared to what's known about the way the tablet functions, because quite frankly it's very long overdue.
Or, that scene which made every Star Wars nerd in every theater either laugh hysterically or boil over in rage. According to the commentaries, Hank Azaria certainly enjoyed it.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": It's Poll Results Day! The masses (or lack thereof) have spoken and their opinions shall be examined.
Let's face it, the mummy is interwoven deeply and irrevocably with the Night at the Museum franchise, not to mention The Mummy, Tale of the Mummy, and popular consciousness in general. But how much does Hollywood get right?
Not much, to be honest. Hollywood loves the (fictional) stories of curses and cruel emperors, slavery and pyramid power. I've touched on this before, but it's worth reiterating here: as much as ancient Egyptians believed in magic, magic didn't exist, at least not in the way special effects artists get paid to make it look the way they do.
But by far the most popular object of Hollywood's Egyptomania is the mummy. Long-ish time readers of my blog are familiar with Mummypocalypse, I should hope, and so should know that I spilled a lot of beans over the exact nature of the mummy, but the mummy's portrayal in Hollywood deserves a mention here, as well, being both relevant to the subject at hand (Night at the Museum) and the culture that makes a concept like Night at the Museum's possible.
Mummies are on par with zombies when it comes to movie monsters: more often than not, they're resurrected dead people, and by necessity they are resurrected long-dead people. It's usually a curse or other form of magic which brings these mummies to life in the modern world, and the mummy may become obsessed with obtaining everlasting life here in this realm rather than the hereafter. Of course, sometimes the mummy is not evil (for example, Ahkmenrah), but this is a very rare instance. After all, dead things coming back to life is seen (at least in Western culture) as the Devil's work, especially taking into consideration the magic element, which Western religion has a long and colorful history of demonizing. And of course, once it's alive again, it wants to stay that way (Imhotep, who also wants to use dark magic to resurrect his dead girlfriend; also, Talos of Tale of the Mummy). Therefore, mummies have a great tendency to cause problems in the movie-verse, especially for the select few protagonists who actually know about their power and the power that created them and can actually do anything about stopping them.
Mummies, and other reanimate dead things, are vastly underrepresented and receive such a bad rap from past movies that it truly is unbelievable.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Surprise! Again.
I know, it sounds ominous, but it's really not that bad. In short order, a poll will be going up on the blog asking a simple question: What new character from Night at the Museum 3 are you anticipating the most? I will also be running a concurrent poll asking: Which returning character are you anticipating the most? Considering the Loads and Loads of Characters, I felt the need to keep these as separate groups. A week following the posting of the polls, I will discuss the results if I find anything interesting or noteworthy.
That's all for now!
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": The mummy in real life and Hollywood.
It has recently come to my attention that Mickey Rooney is dead at the age of 93 (again, where's the tablet's power when you need it), and so would like to take this time to remember him and his work.
Aside from his work for Night at the Museum, the deleted alternate ending for Battle of the Smithsonian, and his work for the upcoming Night at the Museum 3, Rooney has starred in an adaptation of A Midsummer Night's Dream, a series of movies focusing on the character of Andy Hardy, The Muppets, and numerous others, outside of his television and short film career. Personally, I find it saddening that Night at the Museum 3 is the last time we'll ever see Gus.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Considering the weight of everything that's occurred over the past two weeks, in the blogosphere and beyond, I say it's time we put our feet up a little.
Sorry, I got my night numbering off for a while, but it's fixed now.
In any event, the epic and rousing conclusion of "Let's Play Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian" has finally arrived! Over the past ten parts we've seen plot changes, questing, complete changes of voice which have led me at least to tell people that these beloved characters have been replaced by pod people, mind-numbing frustration, terrible rendering, random characters, and monkey antics. And we finally made it. I hope all my dear readers aren't in insane asylums right now, because I promise. It's finally over.
Evidently Kahmunrah has an obsession (at least in this game) with the trope Doomy Dooms of Doom.
The narrator doesn't seem to pay attention to the text on the screen informing her of the quest: "Unlock the first obelisk with your key chain." Hence, the intensely frustrating and continual professions of confusion.
Fuck you and your confusion, BJK, because it's really starting to piss me off.
"Phenomenal cosmic power." But is unlocking the obelisks a good thing? I assume so since that's what we're told to do. And if Kahmunrah is working against the will of the gods (disorder/isfet, hence the columns), then putting the columns to right should at least symbolically mean restoration of order. Or I'm thinking way too much about a video game that hardly thinks at all.
Hurricane of puns.
She totally missed the yellow jewel. Maybe I'm frustrated because I'm doing this from a YouTube videos standpoint rather than actually playing it, but even so.
I love how the miniatures cheer for victory but they didn't do shit. I don't love how Kahmunrah is even more of the spoiled little shit in the video game than he is in the movie. In the movie I can actually figure some of his neuroses and attribute them to causes. Here, I just want to slug him soundly.
Flying out is actually somewhat reminiscent of the end sequence of BOTS the movie.
"What do you mean you don't serve sasparilla? What kind of operation is this?"
My summation: Overall it looks like it's good as a game, but as an adaptation of the movie, there are more holes than there are not: for example, where did Kahmunrah get mystical powers? Where did the tablet all of a sudden get all these powers? Half of them don't even make sense in the context of what the tablet is (for newcomers, here's my take). I liked that we got just slightly more background on Kahmunrah than we do in the movie, and get to see his sarcophagus, but the background information is wrong based on the canon date which Ahkmenrah himself gives in the ending to the movie. Kahmunrah himself they reduced to a whiny, demanding little shit who emotionally isn't more than six years old (which a friend of mine and I consider canon anyway, but in the movie it's more bearable and we, as I said, can pull apart what makes him tick after some good, hard thinking). To make it more bearable for hardened fans of the movie, you can think of it this way: the characters have pretty much all been replaced by defective pod people, or you can lose yourself in the huge bulk of the game spent questing for ingots and not talking to people, because that part is actually kind of soothing. For everything/everyone else, sorry, you're SOL.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Remembering Mickey Rooney.
Countdown: 256 Days to NATM 3.
NATM 3 Update: I just learned, much to my dismay, that Mickey Rooney has passed, having gone this past Sunday at the ripe old age of 93. Gee, where's the tablet's magic when you need it?
The penultimate segment in the saga of alternating failure and triumph, confusion and clarity, witticism and abject torture, and it's called "The Lincoln Memorial". In my view, about damned time.
Wherein we open with an explanation of the final events of Part 9 and then commence with the taking out of Napoleon's guards with the help of the Lunar Lander. She's actually a lot better at this than the plane earlier. This part is peppered with French jokes of various sorts, Octavius' sincerely useless commentary, Amelia's suggestion already in effect by the second or third time she makes it, and toward the end Larry is granted the powers of Zeus.
Yay, the Wright Flyer!
Dramatic Godfather-esque music still in effect.
"You were dropped on your head as a child, Mr. Daley." - Amelia. Evidently the narrator finds this a riot.
"I'm getting a crazy idea." "That's the only kind you seem to have." - Larry and Amelia respectively.
Masochist!Ben Franklin (Which BJK pronounces "mah-zo-chist")
At least the Lincoln looks okay. Sound is just slightly off (more crotchety and old), but oddly I'm jiggy with it. Or I've basically said "Fuck it" and threw my sensibilities out the window with the butter dish by this point.
I think they're using shitty lighting to make up for the fact that the Horus warriors are badly rendered. You can't see them very well, so they claim (at least in this regard) you essentially have no right to bitch.
We also get into the first parts of the final showdown. For some reason Kahmunrah's voice is more bearable, probably because I know he's going to end up royally screwed by the end of this, which is actually quite heartening. Means I don't have to put up with this for much longer.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": The final showdown! *Cues western music* Part Eleven, called "The Obelisks", a clue into how we get things done, it sounds like.
Cleopatra sounds like someone from Alabama or something weird like that (that truly is the best way I can describe it), and dear Christ this is going to drive me insane.
Also can be called, "Wherein we learn how to lead animals around while committing very high profile theft because a spoiled brat of a caricature of Cleopatra won't spill the beans unless she gets something in return."
We learn that polar bears are so well-insulated that they are almost invisible to infrared cameras, which is actually kind of cool.
Alternate title #2: Wherein we finagle with ramps, polar bears, and animal magic until we get an end result we're satisfied with.
According to the narrator, Cleopatra's accent is New York, and inexplicable. But for that matter, how can she speak fluent English right out of the gate?
9 Parts in and we finally learn that Kahmunrah is holding Jed hostage (which he announces over the intercom I seriously doubt he has the ability or desire to use, and mercifully his voice is muffled in the middle of dinosaur-themed chaos), and even later that we learn the method has changed from hourglass to sarcophagus. "Man, it smells worse than month-old long johns in here." (I don't want to ask.)
"Next time we will figure things out at the Air and Space Museum, shut Napoleon's operation down and interfere with...Kahmunrah's dastardly plan to be evil."
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Part 10 "The Lincoln Memorial". The plot went by the wayside in favor of all the random little side quests, and I think we're an ingot or two short.
"Anubee" - Please reference last night's promo for my mixed feelings regarding this term. Vaya con Dios.
I think this narrator confuses too easily, because this game is fairly simple to me.
I do get it, though. This column puzzle is mind-numbing. Evidently, though, "Anubee" is supposed to mean "Anubii", plural of Anubis, the jackal-headed "servant statues", as Octavius likes to call them.
"God, it's like trying to train an actual dog." In the midst of the montage of fail. This is probably the segment which pisses BJK (Blackjackkent) off the most at this point, and I don't blame her. I would be, too, if nothing cooperated with me.
"This guy looks like he's doing, like, a pin-up pose."
We don't get quite to reawakening Cleopatra as promised in the description, but that's only because the narrator spends the bulk of this part arguing with an Egyptian column puzzle.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Part 9 "Animal Magnetism."
"Ivan the Feeling Pretty Good" - Sounds like a version of "I'm okay".
Hooray, property damage.
"Alright, blow yourselves up again, thank you."
This really is a weird series of puzzles, though. Pick a painting, open a portal, go through it, kick open chests, with no clear rhyme or reason as to the why. And then, once that's done, chase Ivan around the cherub fountain hoping to get him long enough for the cherubs to shoot him.
Evidently the title comes from Ivan's state of loopiness after being shot up with Cupid love juice.
Again, fairly enjoyable, but remember we're still in the quest-based second act of this game and have yet to see the utter horror which is Kahmunrah again.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Part 8, "Anubee" - Oh, God. I can't tell if that's the name of a terrifying creature feature hybrid or a pet name for the Anubis warriors (or a set of them guarding Kahmunrah or something).
"Fixing What's Baroque" - If it ain't Baroque don't fix it. :)
The music for this part sounds an awful lot like the Godfather theme music, but maybe that's just me.
"In the morning, some maintenance person is gonna be thrilled."
The cherubs laughing like maniacs is terrifying. Evidently they're Weeping Angels.
"Those things hurt, but, uh, in a good way!" "That's awkward, but whatever you're into, Larry."
"Amelia..." "Are you falling for me, Mr. Daley?" Well, considering he's falling literally into her arms after taking hits from cherub arrows....yeah. (This is also the part where the narrator has discovered that this follows the plot of...not the movie she was thinking of (same franchise, however)).
"Call me old-fashioned, but I like my art to look like something."
That Thinker literally looks like a pile of shit. It's that godawful.
Overall, still relatively entertaining, especially when you get to the part where the painting boxer punches out one of the Cossacks. The narrator does have an interesting question, however: "I wonder how many kids playing this game are gonna know what a Cossack is." I've kind of come to the conclusion at this point that so long as the game remains game-like and there's not a lot of character-character interaction and plot exposition, I'm cool with it. When we get to shitty renditions of beloved characters and the Swiss-cheese-esque plot, though, I'll have issues. Just as a warning as we head into the last five parts of Let's Play Night at the Museum 2.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Part 7: "Ivan the Feeling Pretty Good". Dear God, what happens to him here? More character rape, that this game seems extremely fond of doing for some reason? Tune in to find out.
"We should take the high pass across the mountains! The Egyptians have not forgotten the battle of the squid!" - Thank you, Octavius. But where's Jed in all this mess?
Overall, another entertaining part, but mostly because we get to listen to the narrator gripe about vehicle maneuvering in video games and make a few other snide remarks and other forms of commentary as we go through completing the quests. Though I have a feeling it's not long before we get into meeting Kahmunrah again and I have to shoot myself in the head. But this is a nice breather.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Part Numero 6: "Fixing What's Baroque" - Take it that means we're finding this hammer and chisel thing then. And the brush ingot, too. God this ingot concept is really weird.
So the quest for the ingots begin, it looks like. Those things can, if this is canon, be pressed, busted out of place, rotated, and God knows what else. How did this thing even survive thousands of years? Or even transit to New York from Cambridge? It has next to zero structural integrity. Anyway, here goes.
Amelia sounds like one of those computer voices, or possibly a femme fatale from a thirties movie. Seriously. Where's Amy Adams for this? We need her spunk now more than ever.
Yay, theft. Octavius, Octavius, Octavius. And, "Have at you, snack food!" Him in the vending machine is pretty great. "I shall hear the lamentations of your cookies, and the cries of your salty chips!" "My blade thirsts for the sweet frozen milk of my adversary!"
All in all, this part is actually mildly entertaining, and gets really entertaining once you get to the mini-game of Octavius in the vending machine. It's a nice break from the physical torture of hearing the characters in part three and having to put up with that nonsense. I've decided, then, that I'm square with this game so long as I don't have to sit there and listen to my beloved characters spout voices which are not their own. It's as if they're possessed by demons or something.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": On to Part 5, which is pretty pressing, actually, because of the weird cut-off.
Called "Trouble in Washington," and from the sounds of things, I think we're finally getting back on track, but after learning last night that "Flashback" was an achievement and not actual character back story, I really don't have very many expectations going in. Please, let us pray.
Okay, now that that's over, let's keep going and hope for the best.
"We who are about to be packed salute you!" - HELL yes!
At least this part actually shows us Dexter committing the act of thievery behind the plot in the first place, if only for, like, two seconds. I feel like something more important should be given a little more weight.
Oh, Christ. I kind of forgot how grating it is to me to hear some foreigner speak Jed's lines. You're not Owen Wilson! GTFO Mo-fo! And what's more, the scene doesn't even play out right: in the movie, it was Nick and Larry back-and-forthing over Larry setting up dinner for three with take-out Chinese when the phone call comes in, just a bit before eight. Here, it's 1:47 in the morning and Larry is long since in bed. In fact, his son isn't even in this. Is that supposed to be our part? What the hell?
"This is the sarcophagus of the pharaoh Kahmunrah, a Fourth Dynasty tyrant chiefly known for his reign of terror across Egypt. A sarcophagus is a funeral receptacle for a dead body, most often carved or cut from stone and designed to stand above ground."
Why the hell does he have an awards room in the Smithsonian. I know this is an achievements-based game, or at least I get the concept, but still: it is the most illogical place to put such a thing.
Is Brunden "Mitch" in this version? And where's the pages and pages of improv? Seriously! I don't think I'll survive this game at this rate.
The Amelia Earhart waxwork in this game looks pretty good, though.
The gigantic octopus made it into this game! Huzzah! But for real: "Magic time"? That sounds like a euphemism for sex, or something someone who's really good at sex would say to describe the experience.
Oh, my God, Kahmunrah sounds like shit! This is nothing like his "Boris Karloff is lisping" impression. DEAR GOD WHY?????????? WHY WHY WHY WHY WHYWHYWHYWHYWHY? At least now I know what to use as torture should I ever become a totalitarian dictator.
How does Kahmunrah know Larry? Does the tablet confer instant magical knowledge on who all has guarded it? Me no gets it!
So in the game, Al, Ivan, and Napoleon signed on before all the men got stuck in the V-J Day photo. I'm not sure whether to start begging for death or throw up my hands and say, "Ah, fuck it." And his fangirl moment is done terribly. So, sooooooo badly.
The spell...the point of which is apparently to summon the birdmen/prep the gate for opening...again, suspension of disbelief pretty much shot.
"Take me to it. NOWWWW!" "You ever tried breath mints?" -Kahmunrah and Larry, after the Cube of Rhubarb/Rubik exchange. It is, in fact, a small puzzle box of doom.
It took much longer than is shown (and a death) for Blackjackkent to figure her way to the proper exit without dying. And apparently health is a concern, because why the fuck not?
"By Jupiter I was drowning in lint!" - And Custer sounds just as bad as pretty much everyone else. Let's just accept the fact that people in this game sound terrible, look worse, and have the brain cells of the Goldfish I'm currently eating.
Poor disappointed Octavius. Doesn't get to lead his great, glorious army into battle against things sixty times his size or bigger. I almost feel bad for him, except that it's funny, too.
This is the part where I discover the game's use as a torture device. As usual the voice acting and the rendering of the characters (in an age with such realistic CGI, too) are terrible. The plot loosely follows that of the movie so far but takes huge liberties with structure, timing, intros, and mythology (and that's the worst, really, in my book, because you're fucking with the one cohesive, coherent thing which pulls everything else in this franchise together). It's starting to feel like Star of Heaven at this point, but has two saving graces instead of the one: witty repartee, and a funny, every-girl narrator. There are a few interesting things to learn, like the sentence above about Kahmunrah, which I dearly wish was expounded upon (and for the record, Fourth Dynasty was closer to five thousand than three thousand years ago. I ran the numbers here and figured the fictional reigns of our two brothers to fall somewhere toward the end of the New Kingdom and start of the Third Intermediate Period). Other than that, however....again, let us pray.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Part four of this back and forth infernal mess: "Napoleon and a Monkey." Oh, dear God, what have we gotten ourselves into?
"Flashback", or, Part 2 of "Let's Play Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian".
OK, in the first part, not a lot happened, and there were a few deviations from the movie's plot but they served the same purpose as they did in the movie. And there were fewer exhibits to handle.
"Hopefully Ahkmenrah has a step-ladder or something." We love you narrator.
"Anubis is the jackal-headed god of Egyptian mythology, associated with death, mummification, and the afterlife. He is particularly important as a guardian of the dead and their tombs." Again, because EGYPT!
Holy fuck! Ahkmenrah is TERRIBLE! (It's not like the Larry Daley is a work of art or anything, but still.) And PS: how does he know where his brother's at and that he's evil? And why does he sound oddly relieved that he doesn't get to see Big Brother (I mean besides the obvious)? And I get that he's supposed to come off a bit naive in the ways of the world and have a tendency to compare modern things to ancient, but here he just comes off as slightly insane. Maybe it runs in the family. (The narrator apparently agrees with me on this point.)
"Let me give you an overview." I'll be sitting here a while.
"It lets you summon bolts of lightning." Like fucking Zeus. Sorry, but I find it very hard to believe that Ahkmenrah would literally sit there, say all this in his tutorial, and spit it all out with a straight face. I simply can't. And I can't believe the scriptwriters came up with this noise. I mean, I understand that he'd be willing to discuss the tablet, answer any questions possible, but if the second movie is anything to go by, he'd certainly be a bit more jazzed, I think. Here it's just him delivering a lecture on, oh, I don't know, proper diplomatic tact. Something boring like that. Maybe that's part of what makes this so hilarious.
It's nice to know the narrator is feeling the same way I am at this stage, because let's face it, I've seen the movie and I still think this is fucked up.
Larry said he was the son of Milton. For the love of God! Or a god! I don't care which. Whichever god, goddess, pantheon, or other form of higher power will spare me.
So apparently in this version of the video game the flashlight and key chain are "ritual tools of office" and can wield magical powers. This ain't canon. WTF?
Where the fuck did Ahkmenrah come from?
The narrator is clearly sane. "The animal ingot allows you to soothe and tame animals. This is a bit of a stretch, I would've thought the art ingot would've been more appropriate in this case." So would I, to tell the truth, but in all honesty, my suspension of disbelief is shot.
I could not believe this section at all, but evidently in game world, the tablet has a shit-ton of mystical powers that are conveniently useful for a night guard working in a magical museum. Ahkmenrah is completely out of character, and I swear it's physically impossible to describe how. (He's not hot, and he doesn't sound like Rami Malek in any capacity whatsoever, so any hope of continuity that way is out the window.) I went from laughing my ass off to wondering what the hell on pace with the narrator, and I even watched the movie. BTW, Blackjackkent, if you're reading this: watching the movie doesn't help. You're reading the proof of that. However, I find you entertaining and it helps soothe the wound a bit, as it were, so I'll keep watching.
Next on "For the Love of Night at the Museum": Part 3, "Trouble in Washington" - Finally, sounds like we're getting back on track.
