Brian's Best 3 of the Week...June 21-27

1. Movie
Transformers Revenge of the Fallen

On June 24th Michael Bay gets the chance to either add to the greatness that is Transformers or he could ruin it. You see, Michael Bay has a tendency to ruin anything he touches, whether he means to or not. This is the guy that gave us The Rock, Armageddon, The Island, Pearl Harbor and Bad Boys not once, oh no, but twice! Ok, I liked The Rock, sue me, but the rest of his directorial efforts suck. Then came Transformers, which was my favorite toy growing up, and "boom goes the dynamite!", Mikey made a beat ass summer movie. Shia LaBeouf is great, Megan Fox is hot and the robots look ridiculous. I needed the first Transformers to be awesome in the worst way and it was and I was happy. The bar is higher now though. I'm not expecting The Godfather II here but it better be as good as the commercials look or I'm gonna send Jerry Bruckheimer a strongly worded letter of disappointment. I'll be there on the 24th holding my breath hoping that is movie is breathtaking.

2. Music Eminem "Relapse"

I have finally gotten around to buying Em"s new record "Relapse" and I must say that if I'd have known it was gonna be this good I would've got it sooner. Wow. What a great effort from a guy I used to love. I was very surprised by how creative and totally f#cked up ol' Slim Shady got on this recording. I've missed this guy even before his fake retirement because his last record, "Encore", was not good. Not good at all. So you can't blame me for not killing myself trying to buy his latest on the release date like I did "The Marshall Mathers LP" and "The Eminem Show" respectively. But, "Relapse" is the best he's put out since "The Marshall Mathers LP" and possibly the most disturbing. Violence is nothing new for Em, but damn, his lyrics are downright psychotic. And awesome! Where his first disc, "The Slim Shady LP", was a rags to riches story, this is a riches to drug induced rage and total meltdown story. We all got tired of Eminem rhyming about his ex or his daughter. He's way too talented for that. With this album you get pretty much none of that (thank God). What you get are strong beats, amazing lyrics, funny skits and a more mature if not twisted Eminem. The young, smart ass, flipping the bird Eminem may be gone for good, but, I do like this guy again.

3. Book
"Outliers", by Malcolm Gladwell


out-li-er /(outlr)/noun 1: something that situated away from or classified differently from a main or related body. 2: a statistical observation that is markedly different in value from the others of sample.

First I want to thank my father for turning me on to this fascinating and addictive book. Thanks dad. Happy Father's Day. I promise I'll return it one of these days. But, for now, I'm reading "Outliers" for the third time. As the cover indicates this fine piece of literature is dedicated to finding out the meaning of success and how we attain it (or not). Gladwell dissects the ins and outs of some of the most successful people of our time and generations before. In doing so he maps out why for instance the man with the highest recorded IQ has been a relative failure so far. Or why being a professional athlete may have as much to do with the month you were born as how much physical talent you posses. Or why people from the South react to certain situations differently than those from, say, California. We all have a different definition of success and I know I've always thought I understood what truly reaching a successful level is and what it takes, but, after reading this book all of that was thrown out. Success, by Malcolm Gladwell's definition, is affected by every imaginable thing and probably some that are unimaginable. "Outliers", does a remarkable job of analyzing those select few among us who are living in rarefied air. Living in a place that most of us will never even visit. We may get the pleasure of being in the presence of a true outlier whether a musician, a math genius, a fighter pilot or even an exceptional attorney. How these select humans became outliers is as interesting as what they actually do to be one of the select few. If you're looking for a quick and insightful read try "Outliers" and figure out why there are haves and have nots and why they are or aren't.