X FACTOR WEEK FIVE: AMERICAN ANTHEMS

X FACTOR WEEK FOUR: HALLOWEEN

Poor Storm 'Lee Gardner' Lee. Imagine him sitting at home, quietly weeping while watching the remaining X Factor contestants on stage singing with none other than his hero Bon Jovi.

I would think his bitterness levels rocketed through the bitterness scale that night.

Storm is offically the UK's bitterest most deluded man. Let's follow his journey from improvorished L.A. singer-songwriter to gay burglar through his own words...


8th Sept
"Cheryl Cole I love you. I live for you. When I started singing and I locked eyes on you, you got me. I know you did because you know what it feels like. So Cheryl I love you, you have no idea."
BITTERNESS LEVEL: COMPLETELY UN-BITTER
DELUSION LEVEL: BUBBLING UNDER


8th Oct
"I have a special connection to everyone who has been on the show"
BITTERNESS LEVEL: LOW


14th Oct
"Duetting with Lady GagGa would be amazing, I auditioned to be a backing singer for her tour but she wanted girls. I think she’s a little bit of a soulmate.'
DELUSION LEVEL: RISING

18th Oct
"If Brian May called me up for Queen and said that they had a gig coming up, I would be up for trying out."
DELUSION LEVEL: EXTERMEMLY HIGH

18th Oct
"In the future I will be in control of my artistic presentation and things like that. Until now I have been at the whim of Louis Walsh who, to be honest, is a bit out of touch. It's really difficult when you are working with someone like that to be exciting, relevant and modern. You are pushing up against a mountain."
BITTERNESS LEVEL: VERY BITTER


BONUS STORM X FACT! Storm sang backing vocals on Meatloaf's It's All Coming Back to Me Now

20th Oct
"I'm the most versatile singer out of all of the contestants. That’s not me being arrogant but I realized early on that it's not a singing show, it's a popularity competition. I feel really relieved to be out, actually. Right from the start I was pushing against a lot of factors that were really against me, and I knew, quite early on, that I was probably a bit too creative for the show, a bit too polished and too self-realized."
BITTERNESS LEVEL: GETTING TOO BITTER TO SURVIVE

19th Oct
"Louis made me look like Gary Glitter. He favoured Mary because they're both Irish and a similar age"
BITTERNESS LEVEL: WARNING WARNING FAR TOO BITTER

19th Oct
"Louis didn't say anything to me after the show. I had a really amazing talk with Simon, he said he was really sorry to see me go. I'm a songwriter, that's how I plan to make serious money. I said, 'Please let me work with you', and he was up for it."
DELUSION LEVEL: CRITICAL

Oct 26
I feel Katie and Cher are there just to be famous, not to become singers – and I wish I hadn’t spent so much time with Katie."
BITTERNESS LEVEL: LIKE A BITTER LEMON

31st Oct
"I can't see Mary really connecting with the public. She's like my mum. I felt very alone and no one understood my uniqueness. Louis didn't how to handle it."
DELUSION LEVEL: COMPELTELY DELUDED


2nd Nov
"Interestingly, I spent more time with Cheryl and Simon than Louis, my glorious leader.
Cheryl got me, was very into me, loved my shoes and my style."

ACTUAL CONVERSATION:
Storm: 'Hey Cheryl, did you love my performance of Born To Run, with the motorbike and everything?'
Cheryl: 'Um, I like your shoes?'

X FACTOR WEEK THREE: GUILTY PLEASURES

So last week One Direction's musical hero was Kelly Clarkson, and this week their 'guilty pleasure' is Pink. ABSOLUTE NONSENSE.



I've got a new idea for an X Factor theme - it's called 'Producer's Choice Week' and basically it allows the X Factor producers to chose songs for the contestants that they feel suit their voice best, and give the show a good balance of ballads/uptempo numbers. This theme could be applied every single week to maximise downloads/phone votes/viewing figures. EXCEPT FOR OBLIGATORY BIG BAND WEEK.

WAS THIS WORTH INTERRUPTING MICHAEL BUBLE'S HOLIDAY FOR? I think not.

X FACTOR WEEK TWO: MUSICAL HEROES WEEK

STORM 'LEE GARDNER' LEE: Born to Run - Bruce Springsteen
Poor Storm 'Lee Gardner' Lee. Given the cursed opening spot, Lee had little chance of survivng this week. Especially without his army of dancing gimps from last week. Did someone really compare him to Bono on Saturday night? I suppose they are both bell-ends.
3/10

TREYC: Purple Rain - Prince
X-FACT! not as good as Ruth Lorenzo
5/10

ONE DIRECTION: My Life Would Suck Without You
Simon Cowell truely had a sixth sense when he put Two Dimensions together. How could he possibly have predicted that each and every one of the members would regard Kelly Clarkson as their musical hero. But they do and that is why they have such a unified musical vision. Except Zain. He is a tortured musical genius who despises everything that One Direction hold dear (mostly Kelly Carkson).
6/10

MAT CARDLE: Just the Way you Are (Amazing) - Bruno Mars
It also turned out that Matt Cardle's musical hero was R+B superstar Bruno Mars. Bruno has only released three singles in the UK but they are all Matt Cardle's favourite records of ALL TIME. He just slightly prefers Just The Way You Are.
7/10

CHER: Hard Knock Life - Jay Z
Cher's musical hero was little orphan Annie. (That's what she told the producers, but really, it is Eoghan Quigg.)
8/10

DIVA FEVER: Gotta Go Home - Boney M
Why were Diva Fever forced to dress up as clowns and sing novelty songs every week?
It was a shame
2/10

WAGNER: Help Yourself - Tom Jones
I was expecting Wagner to play bongos in every single performance. Still I am glad he has not been deported back to Brazil. (If any contestants misbehave or upset Cheryl, Simon can raise his left hand and they are either instantly deported back to their home country or chained up in Louis' castle in Dublin. Ask yourself why you have heard nothing of Chloe Mafia recently.)

This week it was reported Wagner left the X-Factor Mansion after falling out with his housemates. I can imagine that having a pet lion roaming around the kitchen would get a bit annoying.

And after his advances were rejected by Mary Byrne, Wagner was spotted in the local cafe romancing this woman:

I think he just wants to swap his flip-flops for whatever is in that FootLocker bag.
8/10

BELLE AMIE: You Really Got Me - Kinks
boring
5/10

PAIGE RICHARDSON: If I Ain’t Got You - Alicia Keys
Did Paige actually perform this week? I've forgotten.
2/10

KATIE WAISSEL: I Rather Go Blind - Etta James
X-FACT! Katie has a very square face.
8/10

MARY BYRNE: You Don’t Have To Say You Love Me - Dusty Springfield
Backstage rumours suggest that Mary ate Matt's hat this week.
7/10

JOHN ADELEYE: A Song For You - Leon Russell
5/10

AIDEN GRIMSHAW: Jealous Guy - John Lennon
A bit rubbish, but at least Aiden looked less likely to remove Danni's eyeballs with a biro this week.
5/10

REBECCA FERGUSON: Nina Simone -Feeling Good
boring
4/10

Iron Man 2

Poor Tony Stark. The magnet in his chest is slowly poisoning him, the US Government was his Iron Man suit, and an angry Russian man wants to hit him with a whip.

That's the entire plot of Iron Man 2. Iron Man was always a weak concept and stretching it to two films was always going to be a challenge. The problem with Iron Man is he is essentially a very dull superhero. Alter ego Tony Stark is very entertaining, but as soon as he puts on the suit, he's just a boring robot.

Don't worry though - to snazz things up a bit, this time there's ANOTHER boring robot. AND THIS ONE IS GREY.
The world's most boring colour.
PLUS to make thigs even more boring, the most Tony does during the film is build a special triangle. He does this with the aid of a mystery new element that his dad hid in a rubbish papier mache model village. That is where I hide all my myserty new elements.

SO WHY DOES TONY STARK GET A MEDAL AT THE END OF THIS FILM?

yes he kills some bad robots. But those robots' only mission was to kill him anyway - they weren't out to destroy the world or anything. I don't see why he should get a medal for moping around his flat whining for 2hrs then building a triangle.

And that's the problem really - nothing is at stake in this film. Tony is the only one under threat, and if he's not worried about it, why should we be?

The only conclusion i can come to is that the film is really about beards. Why does every villain Iron Man fights have to have a beard?

Mickey Rourke has a beard. Jeff Bridges in Iron Man 1 had a beard. Why does Iron Man only fight men with beards? What's his problem with beards? You can't accuse him of being beardist because he too has a beard! Maybe he just wants to be the only man on earth with a beard and has vowed to nobble anyone else who dares to grow one.

IN OTHER NEWS: Sam Rockwell (no beard) is amusing as a sort of gay version of Tony Stark, but it's a shame that Scarlett Johansson is reduced to the director's idea of a perfect woman - a secretary for 99% of the movie who then changes into a leather catsuit for no good reason, complete with obligatory bra shot.

Here is a picture of her in the catsuit. (couldn't find the bra shot)


Mark Out Of Seven: 4

Superman Returns

Superman Returns begins as our hero gets back from a holiday in space to find no one really missed him. Even his ex-girlfriend Lois Lane is married off to the bloke who plays Cyclops out of the X-Men.

She obviously has quite bad taste in men - they are two of the dullest super-heroes ever.

Superman was always boring because he was invincible, which made sorting out any world-threatening problems pretty simple.

The other boring thing about Superman is his non-disguise. Some idiots like to mock the people of Metropolis for not realising that Clark Kent is Superman. After all, his disguise consists solely of a pair of glasses and some hair gel. Superman has seen Batman's disguise, you know. He's seen it and he still decided to just go with the glasses. They are a lot easier to take on and off. Also Superman wears his costume under his clothes which is a bit risky if he ever goes to the gym or spills coffee down his shirt. BUT Superman does not NEED a disguise because no one expects him to have a secret identity! Why would you expect that? You would expect it off Batman precisely because he -does- wear a mask. But because Superman doesn't, people just think he is Superman all the time, with no alter-ego. (If Batman tried beating people up without his mask on, people would just say 'why is millionaire playboy Bruce Wayne doing that?. And why is he hanging around with Robin?')

So now you see why Superman's "non-disguise" is so clever.



Anyway, in this film, Lex Luthor invents some sort of magic island out of space crystals.

WHY IS THIS A PROBLEM?

The only people in the film that actually know or care about the island scheme are Superman and Lois Lane. And that is only because they happen to be around at the time. Despite Lex Luthor repeatedly telling us 'billions of people will die!' there is never any sense of real danger - all he does is make an island in the middle of the ocean - made of kryptonite (which, by the way, is harmless to all humans).



Oh well, at least by making it out of kryptonite Lex has stopped Superman from simply picking it up and throwing it into the sun, right?

Sorry - what's that? For some unknown reason the kryptonite doesn't affect Superman when he's underneath it? Unlucky Luthor! You forgot about that didn't you? In your face!

(Watch out for the especially pointless part of the film here when Superman flies to the island, rescues Lois, then she flies back to the mainland, then suddenly changes her mind, flies back to the island AGAIN, picks up Superman, flies back to the mainland with him, and then he changes his mind and flies back to the island. AGAIN.)

Actually, the kryptonite must have hurt Superman a little bit because he has to go to hospital afterwards to recover. It must be because of all the special anti-kryptonite poisoning medicine they have at all earth hospitals. It is standard. So Superman lays in a hospital bed for a bit and then he is okay again, just enough time to annoy Lois, taunting his presence in her face before flying off, leaving her confused and heart broken.

Superman Returns is supposed to be about old lovers returning and stirring up old feelings. But this theme is left completely unresolved. Lois is still in love with Superman but she also quite likes her husband, so everyone is left a bit miserable at the end. Thank God that evil island was sorted out though. I was worried about that.

Mark Out Of Seven: 2

White Noise

Is White Noise a scary film? Not really, only if you are scared of watching blank videos. In fact, if you wanted, you could experience all the thrills of White Noise in your own home by leaving your TV set on after 3am.

But what if a slightly aggressive voice spoke to you from the TV in the middle of the night? Would you be scared then? Because that is exactly what (sometimes) happens in White Noise.



Architect Jonathan Rivers loses his wife in a mysterious car accident and discovers he can still communicate with her spirit by Electronic Voice Phenomenon - recording and replaying hours and hours of "nothing" on cassette tapes and videos to capture voices from beyond the grave.

Just like Bill Odie would rather spend an afternoon with a red-crested meadow lark than any real human being, Michael Keaton would prefer to watch endless videos of static rather than spend time with his young son. (Here in lies the real moral of the film - don't get so obsessed with grief over the dead that you forget the living.)

However all is not as it seems as Jonathan's messages are invaded by some evil ghosts with slightly aggressive voices! They use words like "PIG!" and "ROT!" and even "BASTARD!" which worries Jonathan no end.

(BTW: Watch out for Keaton's "sceptical" face, it's a good one. Sceptical is quite a hard expression to pull off, but Michael does it superbly. Try it for yourself and you will see what I mean. He also does "obsessive" and "confused and also bit scared" quite well too. I bet he spent 6 months working as an architect just for the 30 seconds he appears on screen looking at those blueprints. He is such a professional.)



So who are these evil ghosts and what do they want? And are they responsible for the recent spate of murders in Jonathan's village? (Clue: yes)

It's easy to compare White Noise to The Sixth Sense - A grumpy man investigates a strange spooky phenomenon which gradually becomes more and more odd until the (boring) truth is finally revealed at the end in a series of rubbish flashbacks - but while The Sixth Sense twist is blindingly obvious from the beginning, at least it has an actual twist.

In the absence of one it tries to shove in every stock "surprise" ending in the book leaving a stupid mess that doesn't really make any sense. In the end, not even the wide range of expressions of Michael Keaton can save White Noise from its destiny in the bargain bins.

Mark Out of Seven: 4