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theworldgate · 9 months

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Set reveals/details from GenCon Summarised

Warning: this got long. Anyway:

Ravnica Remastered: Dominaria Remastered but make it Ravnica! Includes old border shocks [presumably all of them], as well as old border versions of Krenko, Mob Boss [shown on twitter] and possibly Arclight Phoenix [shown in the YT video, unsure why it was swapped out], presumably amongst others. Murders at Karlov Manor: It's a murder mystery set! On Ravnica! Also part of the Omenpath arc somehow? Presumably someone of note will die and also a lot of other people. Recognisable characters in the key art are Aurelia (Boros), Massacre Girl (Rakdos adjacent but not necessarily in the guild), and Krenko. There's also an Izzet Viashino, a woman who is aesthetically a cross between Rakdos and Orzhov, and a guy with a who I do not recognise but has Main Character Energy. (I'd guess Massacre Girl is playing the role of Genocider Syo in this production of Dangan Ronpa, in that she is very much a serial mass murderer but with a very specific method of mass murdering that rules her out. Heck I think her murder method is also scissors adjacent wtf) Main Character Energy guy also appears in another piece of art, with possibly-Kaya in the background? (The colour scheme fits Orzhov, the purple glow is very Kaya, and the gold headband matches "Kaya, Orzhov Usurper" but the outfit is a bit different to what she's been seen in previously) And also possibly Etrata? The art I'm on about:

Also there's a Cluedo variant. Probably a Cluedo-like version of Explorers of Ixalan, which I own somewhere and sleeved up and never got round to playing. Anyway. Universes Beyond: Fallout: A Commander deck release, so more Doctor Who than Lord of the Wings. Covers four factions. Speculation: Brotherhood of Steel are a dead cert but otherwise... like there has to be Supermutants and other wasteland dangers (Raiders feels like a weak basis for a deck), and I'd guess either the Enclave or the Syndicate. 4th is a toss-up. NCR doesn't quite have the iconic characters, Minutemen are only in one game, Ceasar's Legion is Problematic to say the least... doing the whole Nevada would be cool but unlikely... (The Courier as a WUBRG Legendary Scout?). In any case, it will not be coming to Magic Arena.

Outlaws of Thunder Junction: Wild West set and notionally an interdimensional villain team up. Has a new, Native American-coded, character. Mark invited us to recognise 'villains' in a key art picture but at a guess it's not as cut-and-shut as it was in vision design given that said character has a distinctive spiky weapon that is visible in there.

But anyway, returning characters there are: Vraska, Oko, and Rakdos (maybe he did all those murders at Karlov Manor). There's also a very short character who I can't pinpoint (like not "Nissa" or "me" short, "small child" short and so my default guess would be Animatou but she seems more likely to be wearing a dress), and another humanoid who's around Vraska's height. For that last one, I'd guess (and others have guessed) that they're Jace by process of "they're about Vraska's height and also stood next to Vraska". That figure does have very distinctive shoulder pads, but I can't pinpoint where I've seen them before if ever and the cowboy hat really throws off figuring out other parts of the sillhouette.

From inference, this will also mark the end of the "Omenpath" sub-arc of whatever the next big arc will be. Modern Horizons III: The third Modern Horizons, but this time with Double-faced cards! Mark used the phrase "turns into a Planeswalker" as an example so presumably we've got a card that turns into a Planeswalker in there. It will also be coming to Arena! In addition to the snake lady (as in, lady accompanied by giant snakes), we see art of a demon angel (demons and/or angels presumably being a theme) and the three Eldrazi titans in the sea stirring stuff up (literally).

Assassin's Creed: It will have some new kind of booster and I would put money on it being an Aftermath-style "epilogue booster" but called "beyond boosters" instead because "epilogue booster" would be a weird thing to put on the first boxes of Assassin's Creed Magic cards, yes. Bloomburrow: The little mouse vs giant [actual regular-sized] elemental wolf set! It's a no-humanoids set, though maybe we'll see one very confused humanoid who wandered in on an Omenpath. It's also the start of the "Dragonstorm" arc which is probably why Ultimate is (spoilers!) a return to Tarkir. It's the anthropomporphic small furry animals (actually small!) plane. Naturally, there be squirrels. It's also a weird kind of reverse palette cleanser for... Duskmourn: House of Horror: Really going into the 70s/80s Horror tropes. Think "Betrayal at House on the Hill" the entire plane is somehow a single mansion and presumably it's some Oldwalker's murder plane that got linked into the wider multiverse by omenpaths. [Further speculation: I am going to pre-emptively guess that Nissa and Chandra turn up here, if only because ending up on the H. H. Holmes murder house plane (that also serves both Eldrazi and New Phyrexia in one of the images we see) feels like exactly the sort of thing that would happen to the woman who by sheer luck and possibly also a carefully planned trap on the part of the Phyrexians ended up separated from everyone on the strike team but Lukka.] Innistrad Remastered: Ravnica Remastered, but make it Innistrad! Tennis: Interplanar death race! Takes place across three planes, two of which we've seen as settings for premier [standard-legal] sets but haven't returned to, and one that we've seen on cards but not as a setting for a premier set. Concept art includes a spooky jeep (like... an actual modern car but piloted by a beast-demon-ghost), and a motorbike that looks like a bright red collab between Kaladesh and New Cappena.

Ultimate (Frisbee): Hey, turns out all those very strong hints in Aftermath at a return to Tarkir were hinting at a return to Tarkir! We're also supposedly gonna get the best of both worlds [or, rather, timelines] and I am so sorry that I cannot come up with anything that scans to the Hannah Montana theme song as commentary on that. It's also the end of the Dragonstorm (sub-)arc by inference which... yes if the 'Dragonstorm' arc isn't beginning on the dragon plane I guess it would make sense for it to end there. Final Fantasy: Full on proper set by the look-see of it. It's meant to cover all 16 mainline games, unclear on whether it includes all the supplemental sets. Kind of wild, actually, given that Final Fantasy had a trading card game and also... my god that's a lot of characters though it's not like there's not a bajillion mega crossovers anyway. (like presumably it's the Dissidia card game or something). Also man fitting that to the colour pie will be interesting...

Volleyball: Magic the Gathering IN SPACE. Like. Literally that's the concept (well, top down Space Opera a la Star Wars. Not as far out as it sounds - I feel like it's a common old CRPG trope and so probably already in D&D to begin with. Still very in concepting. Also the beginning of the [CENSORED] arc. The name itself is a spoiler! (presumably for the ending of the dragonstorm arc which, as far as arc names go, does seem like it might be spoilery)

Wrestling: Return to Lorwyn/Shadowmoor! It looks like there will be some radical changes, which will be interesting to square with The Invasion of Lorwyn card but tbh I think feeling free to engage in light retcons to make a better game is fine.

eXtreme Sports: Unlike Elon Musk, WotC does not have an obsession with the letter 'X' and so instead we move swiftly on to...

Yachting: Return to Arcaivos! [Speculation: FOR PLOT REASONS because I don't think Arcaivos was that popular but... uh, Will and Rowan and Quintorius and Liliana and also the biggest library in the multiverse and it can show off Omenpaths so it's kinda weird that oh god it's like two years away anyway]

Ziplining: An capstone event set of some description! Mark was unable to say anything, but he did reveal, probably on accident that there will be a villain! Also it will happen somewhere! It is also the end of the [CENSORED] (sub-)arc and the Codenamed-Metronome 3 year arc.

#magic the gathering #mtg #text #long post is long

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romcommentary · 5 years

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Love Actually

It’s been a few years since I’ve sat down and watched this, and with so many ‘Love Actually is actually problematic’ discussions going around lately, I decided to give it another watch with a “fresh set of eyes” to see if the current social climate would somehow diminish my enjoyment of Richard Curtis’s 2003 holiday rom-com.

It didn’t. Are there some issues with this movie? Of course there are. Natalie (Martine McCutcheon) is called chubby and comments are made about her butt and her thighs, although… Natalie is not fat. Not even close. The fat jokes simply made no sense and had no point other than to draw laughs. The majority of storylines focus on men getting their happy ever after (Mark is the exception, although he still gets an uplifting, favorable send off) while the two storylines centering around women (Emma Thompson’s Karen and Laura Linney’s Sarah) end in infidelity and heartbreak.

There is also a distinct lack of diversity and LGBT representation. I’m pretty sure the movie could have ditched the Creepy Colin Goes to America to Get Laid storyline and reinserted the deleted scenes featuring Frances de la Tour and Anne Reid as a lesbian couple dealing with terminal illness. Of course, had that happened we would have probably been talking about the 'Bury Your Gays’ trope that has plagued television and cinema, where the already sparse representation of the LGBT community gets killed off (most notably queer women).

So does Love Actually have problems? Yes, it does. But despite these issues, I was still able to love and appreciate Love Actually for what it is. A movie that shows us what love is 'all around us’, whether it’s romantic, platonic or unrequited. It’s complicated and messy. Awkward and charming. Heartbreaking and painful. Problematic!

There are some hits and misses in the movie. Some of the stories suffer from a lack of adequate screen time to develop the relationships, so to believe in some sudden, all-encompassing love is difficult. But some are a couple of well developed, emotionally nuanced plots that make the movie worth a watch. I’ve ranked my favorite Love Actually storylines from worst to best below:

- Colin’s desperate need to get laid - Decides he’s the god of sex stuck on the wrong continent so he goes to America to pick up hot women and succeeds. Meh. His accent isn’t cute enough to dismiss his obnoxious behavior.

- Juliet, Mark and Peter - 'Self-preservation’ is no excuse for being a jerk to someone you’re supposedly in love with, even if that someone is your best friend’s new wife. Also, don’t confess said love on Christmas Eve while your best friend watches television upstairs. It’s creepy.

- Sarah and Karl - Sarah feels like she can’t follow through on a relationship with a man at work whom she’s been in love with for a couple of years because of her mentally ill brother, who has come to depend on her, even though he lives in a facility. If Karl knew what was good for him, he would be willing to give a try anyway, despite the constant phone calls. Boo on Karl.

- David and Natalie - There is an instant spark between the Prime Minister and his new employee, Natalie. She curses a lot, which is cute. He’s Hugh Grant as the Prime Minister, also cute. He decides to change his stance on foreign policy with the President of the United States (a smarmy Billy Bob Thornton) when he catches the President hitting on Natalie. Then he “redistributes” Natalie because of his attraction to her. Also, there are the fat jokes. The saving grace to this story is when David goes door to door to find out where Natalie lives and ends up singing a carol for three adorable little girls with one of his security guards.

- Jamie and Aurelia - Jamie’s brother is having an affair with his girlfriend, so he goes to France for a while to write a crime novel. There he meets Aurelia, a Portuguese woman who cleans his villa and cannot speak English. Jamie can’t speak Portuguese, so they learn to communicate in other ways. This is a cute story and honestly, the only one I feel could have been its own movie. I wanted to see them get past the language barrier and cultural differences on their way to love. But we don’t get a lot of development here, so the proposal at the end, while adorable, is insanely unrealistic. But… Colin Firth, so I’m willing to let it go.

- Billy Mack and Joe - Billy Mack is by far the most entertaining part of Love Actually. An aging rock star who records a horrible Christmas song only to find it becoming a surprise hit thanks to his No F*cks Given attitude while promoting the single, Billy is soon back on top and invited to Elton John’s Christmas bash. Turns out he would rather spend the holiday with his manager than a bunch of scantily clad women. “You turned out to be the fucking love of my life.”

- Harry and Karen (and Mia) - Okay, yes we know Mia is a tart. They’re sure to overplay just how much of a tart she is, with her overt flirtations with Harry, asking him for a pretty present in exchange for 'everything’. She wears devil horns to the Christmas party and wears racy red lingerie while Karen (a devastatingly good Emma Thompson) laments that she feels like Pavarotti in her frumpier wardrobe. We get it. Mia bad. But as usual, Harry’s role in this extramarital flirtation/affair is sometimes lost in the Mia hate. As painful as this storyline is, it’s also one of the more believable ones. Harry and Karen have a home, and two kids and a relationship that feels comfortable, though not overly passionate. Harry’s attention is caught by his attractive assistant and he buys her a gold necklace while gifting his wife a CD she probably already owns. The brilliance of Love Actually is captured in only one scene, where Karen discovers Harry’s infidelity and stands alone in their bedroom while Joni Mitchell plays. She’s not allowed to lose control or release her heartbreak. She has to keep it together as not to spoil her family’s Christmas. Emma Thompson is truly the movie’s MVP.

- John and Judy - This story doesn’t get enough credit when people discuss Love Actually. We get to witness their cute, awkward courtship as they simulate fake sex as stand-ins on a porno. Perfectly normal and charming, this is by far one of the best stories in Love Actually. I wish they’d had more screentime.

- Daniel, Sam and Joanna - Heartfelt and pure, this was much more about Daniel and Sam’s relationship as stepfather and son after a tragic loss than it is about Sam’s crush on Joanna. This is one of the only storylines we get a true conclusion to, and is it a rom-com if there’s not an airport chase scene?

Love Actually is not in my yearly Christmas rotation, but I do consider it an above average holiday film and rom-com. It’s not perfect, but it’s a warm, feel-good movie with some wonderful performances, and the end montage of friends and family greeting each other at the airport will surely tug at your heartstrings.

Fun Facts:

Kris Marshall (Colin) allegedly returned his paycheck for the scene where the three American girls undress him. He said he had such a great time having three girls undress him for twenty-one takes, that he was willing to do it for free, and thus returned his check for that day.

The airport greeting footage at the beginning and end of the film is real. Richard Curtis had a team of cameramen film at Heathrow airport for a week, and whenever they saw something that would fit in they asked the people involved for permission to use the footage.

According to Richard Curtis they had to put Emma Thompson in a “fat suit” to make her appear heavier because she is actually a very thin woman.

Keira Knightley was only 17 when she filmed Love Actually. Thomas Brodie-Sangster (Sam) was 13.

Richard Curtis had been working on two separate scripts when he decided to merge them and create Love Actually. The two scripts were the Prime Minister’s story and Jamie’s trip to Frane where he meets Aurelia.

Notable Song: Christmas Is All Around by Billy Mack

Rating: 💍💍💍.5

#love actually #richard curtis #2003 #hugh grant #keira knightley #andrew lincoln #emma Thompson #alan rickman #laura linney #rodrigo santoro #Thomas Brodie-Sangster #Liam Neeson #chiwetel ejiofor #martin freeman #Joanna page #rowan atkinson #bill nighy

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