Lizzie Bennet Diaries: Get Your Austen On

Here at Grizzly Bomb, we know that many of our readers are men. Most of you are not married, don’t have kids, and are under age 35. Based on all these criteria, I’m going to take a wild guess and say many of you don’t read. Those of you who do read probably grab the latest Tom Clancy novel or at the very least a comic book.

I highly doubt any of you have or want to read Jane Austen.

In some sense, I don’t disagree with you. I just finished reading Pride and Prejudice for the first time in my life last month and there were times I wished I didn’t have to keep flipping back to the chapter notes to figure out what that word meant in Austen’s time. However, in the end, I felt like I had not wasted any time and felt deeply satisfied, even rewarded, with finishing a classic story.

I don’t blame you for wanting to watch her.

But how often do your mothers or sisters reference Austen, and they brush you aside as illiterate because you don’t know what they’re talking about? What about your girlfriend who keeps nagging you to watch the 5-hour BBC adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, but you’d rather prefer watching Keira Knightley if you had to watch a version at all? Don’t worry; I know how to save you from further situations like these.

Now I’m not here to argue that you must sit down and read Pride and Prejudice (though it really wouldn’t hurt); what I am proposing is you give at least the basic Austen storyline a chance by watching the Lizzie Bennet Diaries on YouTube.

The Lizzie Bennett Diaries takes the characters, concept, and plot of Austen’s much-beloved classic and converts it into modern-day, relevant videos. That’s right – you won’t need to read about how the word engaged actually means busy because the Diaries use updated language to explain the same themes of Pride and Prejudice. In fact, the web series is written in the form of vlogs, where Lizzie reports on the goings-about of her life, just like we’re used to seeing with people like iJustine.

Lizzie can’t help if her sister Lydia jumps in on her vlog to high-five the audience sometimes.

Here are some other perks to watching the Lizzie Bennett Diaries:

1. There are attractive actresses playing the roles of the three sisters, Lizzie, Jane, and Lydia.  Not to mention they are just plain good actresses, too.

2. The videos are short, around five minutes long at maximum, which is way easier time to commit than a whole 5-hour sitting.

3. Like the modern-day language used, references are made to popular culture to help make the series even more relevant.  For example, in episode 45, George Wickham calls himself Batman.  You can’t get much more relevant than that.

4. If you’re on Twitter, the show creators have set up Twitter accounts for the characters, who regularly interact with each other outside of the show to make the experience more realistic.  Yes, you can tweet to Lizzie if you want to.

5. And as already mentioned, of course, you’ll have gained knowledge so you can get your female friends and family off your back.

Sure, there is some drama involved because when it’s a young woman’s vlog based on Austen it’s pretty hard to leave out her hatred of Mr. Darcy or her little sister’s boisterous, sometimes obnoxious, party attitude. However, each show does tend to cover only what is necessary to follow the storyline, and each episode tends to leave you with a “what will happen next?” moment.

Now it’s time for you to go watch the Lizzie Bennett Diaries instead of just reading about them. The worst that can happen is that you feel that you wasted five minutes of your life. The best that can happen is that you can get some personal satisfaction knowing you can now beguile women with your Austen smarts (or, like I said before, just get them off your back).

Pirates of the Caribbean 4: On Stranger Tides – Grizzly Review

Painfully mediocre. That is how I first described Pirates of the Caribbean 4: On Stranger Tides as the credits rolled. Not the worst movie ever, in fact, barely worse than the 3rd movie – but with less disappointment attached to it this time around. Maybe that stems from my low expectations, and because going in I had heard only negative things surrounding this latest installment. Either way, the movie felt a little stale to me. And I know I’m not the biggest Pirates fan out there, but I genuinely enjoyed the first movie, and I thought the 2nd one was alright. But they definitely seemed to get worse as they went for me. This newest installment though seemed to be little more than quick money grab by Disney. Hell, even the girl who came dressed as a pirate seemed underwhelmed…

Pirates of the Caribbean 5: Yeah, I said 5

Pirates of the Carribean: On Stranger Tides hasn’t even made it into theaters yet and we’ve already been hit with this recent news from Yahoo!:

Johnny Depp’s tour guide on his “Pirates of the Caribbean” voyages is plotting the course for a fifth installment even before the fourth movie sails into theaters.

Producer Jerry Bruckheimer says he has a screenplay in the works for a fifth “Pirates” tale after May’s “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides” comes out.

To Pan or not to Pan

Since the inception of Peter Pan, written by J.M. Berry in 1911, there have been numerous incarnations of the character in the film realm. Starting with the 1953 animated classic from Disney, and leading to the live-action sequel Hook, directed by Steven Spielberg in 1991. Peter Pan has become a household name all over the world. Hell, personally I only eat Peter Pan Peanut Butter!

After Hook there was yet another Peter Pan movie in 2003 starring Jason Isaacs, that was not a horrible watch, but didn’t manage to bring in the big box office bucks.

Now we have a whole bunch of new Peter Pan stuff flying our way (pun intended), some of it is promising, and some if not so promising. Seeing as I’m the type who likes my bad news first, so here it is: Channing Tatum is said to star in a project purchased by Sony, and titled thus far as Pan. The movie would go forth based on the idea that Captain Hook and Peter Pan are brothers, and is said to be an origin story.

The idea of the two foes being brothers is a decent one, but casting Channing Tatum as Peter Pan? Do the letters W, T, and F mean anything to you?

I would hope that this is a complete re-imagining of the story; where Pan left Neverland and aged quite a bit, much like what happened in Hook. But so help me, if I have to sit and watch Channing Tatum fly around in green tights, acting like a happy little child, then I will be thoroughly disgusted and I might stab someone. Now, I am aware that Robin Williams did this in Hook, a movie I enjoyed as a child, but now I can’t stand seeing Robin Williams in the green tights.

Pan is a project that I have little faith but will keep an eye on to see how it progresses. You know, at least until Justin Bieber is cast as Captain Hook. Despite hating Channing Tatum, I’m trying to be open-minded about Sony’s Pan movie, because I do enjoy the story. The thing I want to see most is the crocodile that bites off Captain Hook’s hand, but who knows if they’ll even tell that part of the story.

For more, check out an article about it at The Hollywood Reporter.

Bang-A-Rang!

Now for the promising news: SyFy is also currently developing a prequel to Peter Pan in the form of a four-hour, four-episode mini series event that is set to debut in December of this year.

The project is titled Neverland, and has what so far seems like a very solid cast of actors. The most notable of them being Keira Knightley to voice the magical tree spirit – Tinkerbell.  Bob Hoskins is reprising his role as Smee from Hook, and The Amazing Spiderman‘s recently announced ‘Lizard’ Rhys Ifans as James Hook.

Rhys Ifans and Captain James Hook: Mr. Ifans needs to grow out that mustachio

Below is a description of the series courtesy of Slice of SciFi:

Peter, along with his pals of young pickpockets, have been rounded up by their mentor Jimmy Hook to snatch a magical orb which transports them to another world—Neverland. Filled with white jungles and imposing cities formed out of trees, created by Dr. Fludd and inhabited by a colony of tree spirits led by Tinker Bell, this mysterious realm welcomes unknown friends and enemies snatched from time. These include power-mad Elizabeth Bonny and her band of 18th century pirates who search for the answer to eternal youth, a secret guarded by a Holy Man. As the fight to save this strange and beautiful world escalates, Peter and his crew consider that growing old somewhere in time could be less important than growing up—right here in their new home called Neverland.

Keira Knightley and the ever popular Tinkerbell.

Out of the two projects I am more enthusiastic about SyFy’s Neverland mini-series, because four hours gives them plenty of time to explore Neverland, and develop the characters to the maximum. Plus Bob Hoskins portrayal of Smee in Hook was so brilliant he could perform the role exactly the same this time and I would love it.

I’ll keep everyone posted on the status of both projects, the Channing Tatum one will be under the most scrutiny due to its high probability of fail.

Comment below about both, or even if you just hate Peter Pan.