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literarygoon · 11 months

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So,

June is Filipino Heritage Month.

In Canada, where Filipinos have been among the most reliably numerous immigrants in the past few decades, the date was chosen to commemorate the country's Independence Day in 1898. That's when they freed themselves from hundreds of years of Spanish colonization.

If I'm being honest, I knew very little about the Philippines before I married my wife Kristina. When I was a teenager I sponsored a young Filipino boy named Nestor through an international charity, and when I was in the Yukon I wrote an article for the Whitehorse Star about the positive impact Filipino immigrants were having on the local economy. I also read a great novel by Alex Garland called The Tesseract that was set in Manila, but other than that I've been woefully ignorant about my family's origins.

Last year my father-in-law introduced me to Jo Koy, a Filipino stand up comic known for his racy, hyper-sexualized content. One of the most interesting things I learned from him is that there is a close kinship between Mexico and the Philippines, both in religious sensibilities (Catholic) and in basic culture. They're rebellious, hot-headed and considered "crazy" by their more conservative neighbours. He claimed this was due to them both being conquered by the Spanish, then rejecting some elements of their culture while embracing others. It makes for an interesting hodge-podge.

I was interested to learn, from a quick Google search, that the Philippines didn't truly become independent in 1898 — they spent another half century under American rule, only finally becoming free following the Second World War. When I teach Kris and Celista about the Philippines, it will be important for them to understand the devastatingly negative impact of colonization and why it's important to recognize the Indigenous culture that was suppressed and nearly wiped out, just like in Canada.

One of the most shocking elements of Filipino history was the introduction of "human zoos" which were open as recently as 1958 in places like New York City and London. It was there that racialized people from a variety of origins were kept in cages and gawked at by their western oppressors. In 1904, Americans displayed Filipino tribespeople in zoos like this during the Summer Olympics. Just another reminder that humans are sometimes disgusting to each other, and it really wasn't that long ago that deeply entrenched racism dictated the reality of many people's lives.

While my wife was growing up, she routinely experienced racism. Because she was half-Filipino and half-white, she didn't feel like she truly belonged in either category. A lot of attention was paid to her jet black hair, her sun-browned skin and ambiguous features. When people talk about white supremacy, this is what they mean: close attention to every difference, every physical detail of somebody's body, all scrutinized and held up against an Aryan ideal we haven't quite successfully shaken from our collective consciousness.

But there's also all the things I plan on teaching my kids about their heritage to give them pride in where they came from. They'll learn about the warrior Chief Lapu-Lapu, the Philippine Insurrection, and the villainous Rodrigo Duterte. They'll learn that the country is made up of seven thousand islands, with innumerable distinct cultures. And karaoke, I've learned, is extremely popular, just ask my mother-in-law! Also, once you start looking for them, there's plenty of Filipino celebrities who have achieved global success — including Vanessa Hudgens, Manny Pacquiao, Nicole Scherzinger and (my favourite) Bruno Mars.

One day Kristina and I will successfully take a trip to the Philippines, and I'm already stoked for the southeastern Asian sunshine. One of her relatives is a mayor (who was nearly assassinated!) and we have family scattered all throughout the islands, some of them in places without phone or Internet to connect them to the outside world. I can't wait to dive into the ocean, to see the tropical foliage and see firsthand the derelict weaponry abandoned there during World War Two.

I want the kids to walk those white sand beaches and know this country is part of their story, and always will be.

The Literary Goon

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yesthatssadirichardslove · 1 month

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'Manhunt,' about hunt for John Wilkes Booth, may make you wish you paid attention in history class

NEW YORK

A new series transforms the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln into a true crime thriller that goes deeper into the story than most textbooks.

Most who studied Lincoln in school learn he was assassinated by a man named John Wilkes Booth. Lincoln was watching a play with his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, at Ford's Theatre when Booth came from behind and shot him.

What isn't as widely remembered is that Booth killed the president just five days after the surrender of Confederate General Robert E. Lee effectively ended the Civil War. It was a pre-planned, coordinated attack on the president, Vice President Andrew Johnson and the Secretary of State. Only Booth was successful.

A Confederate sympathizer, Booth relied on a network of supporters to help him hide. Edwin Stanton, the Secretary of War, led the search by the Army to track Lincoln's killer down. He was found 12 days later hiding in a barn where he was shot and killed.

“ Manhunt," debuting Friday on Apple TV+, dramatizes the hunt for Booth and the trial that followed. It’s based on the book “Manhunt: The 12-Day Chance for Lincoln’s Killer” by James L. Swanson. Tobias Menzies stars as Stanton, who also helped convict Booth's conspirators.

“Most no one knows the details of this story unless they’ve done a Ph.D or it’s a special interest of theirs,” said creator- showrunner Monica Beletsky in a recent interview.

Bringing Stanton to life is exciting, said Menzies, because he had a close, respected relationship with Lincoln.

“A big part of Stanton’s journey is both a political loss and also a personal loss. He loses a friend. ... I studied very little American history, and I certainly didn’t do this period of history,” said Menzies. “As an actor, I’ve done quite a lot of period stuff and I find it enjoyable to get the chance to find out about a new part of these stories and this is a really good example of that.

"Truth is stranger than fiction.”

Anthony Boyle plays Booth and his awareness of the man began with an episode of “The Simpsons” where Bart portrayed him in a school play. He knew his research needed to dig deeper to understand Booth's psyche and read letters he had written between the ages of 15 until his death at 26. Boyle describes them as a “descent into madness.”

Beletsky hopes “Manhunt” underscores how Lincoln's killing was especially shocking at the time.

“That kind of murder was so uncommon,” she said. “Lincoln famously left the White House door unlocked during the Civil War, even though he had piles of death threats. It wasn’t even imagined that kind of crime could happen in our culture. My costume designer told me that Booth, wearing all black that night, is the origin of villains wearing all black in our storytelling.”

There was a boldness and conceit to the way Booth decided to kill Lincoln so publicly in front of an audience that fit his desire for attention.

“The theater was absolutely jammed,” said Menzies, a British actor who's starred in “The Crown" and “Outlander.” “And then to run out and disappear into the night and then take 12 days to find this man, you couldn't make it up.”

Booth was an actor in a family of actors, but lived in the shadow of his older brother Edwin, who was well-respected for his talent. “I'm gonna be the most famous man in the whole world,” Booth says on the show, prior to the assassination. While on the run, he reads newspaper articles about himself and loves the attention.

“It was like, Leonardo DiCaprio’s brother killed the president," said Hamish Linklater, who plays Lincoln. "I mean, (Edwin) was the biggest celebrity of his time," he said.

“This was before the internet and before television, this was word of mouth," added Boyle. "People were hearing about it (asking), ”John Wilkes Booth, the actor, killed the President? Was this some sort of farce?”

Besides telling Stanton's story, Beletsky introduces viewers to Mary Simms, a slave belonging to a physician named Dr. Samuel Mudd, (played by Matt Walsh), who treated Booth while he was on the run. She was freed by the Emancipation Proclamation. The series depicts Simms — played by Lovie Simone— as interacting with Booth when he shows up at Mudd's house to hide, but in reality, she never met him.

Simms went on to testify in the trial of Booth's conspirators — which included Mudd — and confirmed his allegiance to the Confederacy. Because there is not a lot of information available on Simms, she was written as a composite of a number of people who helped to convict Booth's co-conspirators.

“It was a real opportunity to bring some of these heroes to light, like Stanton and Simms, and also to sort of set the record straight in some ways of what happened in our past and how that still continues to affect us," said Beletsky.

“It feels like a good time to be telling this story. You know, there is a big election coming up in November. Our story is partly a story about the fragility of democracy to some extent," Menzies said. “I think that’s as true now as it was then. It has a relevance and a resonance which feels kind of rich to be telling now.”

#yesthatssadirichardslove

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cheri-translates · 4 years

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[CN] Idle Chat with Shaw

🍒 Warning: This post contains detailed spoilers for a feature which has not been released in English servers! 🍒

The CN server was recently graced with a new feature called 随便聊聊 (“Idle Chat”), where you can select a mood and talk to the love interests about work, life, and studies :>

Idle Chat with: Gavin / Kiro / Lucien / Victor

[ WORK - Topic 1: Overtime ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: I don’t have to work overtime today! No overtime! I really don’t-- have-- overtime!

Shaw: I can sense your noisiness from your words.

Shaw: Since you want to kick up a racket

Shaw: Come watch our performance. You can scream and shout all you want.

2. Mood: Upset

MC: I read a news article today which said that the more one does overtime work, the more efficiency goes down. I think what it says makes sense...

Shaw: It’s supposed to

Shaw: You’re not a robot

Shaw: Why are you always making yourself live like clockwork?

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I have to work overtime again and again. Why are there so many things to do every day? My life has already taken the shape of overtime!!

Shaw: Mm, this is your ninth day of overtime this month

Shaw: It’s really quite a lot

Shaw: What time are you busy until? I’ll see if I’d be near your office at that time.

[ WORK - Topic 2: Income ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: I finally got my pay! My shopping cart can finally be tidied up. I plan to get ALL colours of the spray paint you mentioned the last time.

Shaw: ...are you usually such a squanderer?

Shaw: I think you should get two basic colours to practise your skills

Shaw: When it comes to graffiti, it’s not as if the more gaudy the colours are, the better it looks.

2. Mood: Upset

MC: The case I’ve been handling recently started off with an interesting concept. After changing it, it seems to have sunk into mediocrity. I feel perplexed.

Shaw: What’s there to feel perplexed about

Shaw: Haven’t you already found the answer

Shaw: Since you know it’s mediocre, don’t be satisfied with mediocrity.

3. Mood: Angry

MC: There was something I really wanted to buy, so I waited till my payday to reserve it. In the end, it has a higher price now!!

Shaw: If it’s something I really want

Shaw: I’ll buy it directly

Shaw: The more you delay, the further it’d go from you.

[ WORK - Topic 3: Program Progress ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: My colleagues and I completed an incredibly perfect proposal! Everything will be fine once it gets approved!

Shaw: No wonder you’ve been telling me that you’re busy these days when I ask you out to have fun

Shaw: I’ll let you rest at home these two days

Shaw: Your time after that has been reserved by me.

2. Mood: Upset

MC: Every time it’s the end of the month, I’d start counting down to payday. Or else I’ll have no motivation to work at all...

Shaw: It’s so boring to countdown to payday,

Shaw: Countdown to something else

Shaw: For example, that there are only three more hours till you get to see me.

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I suspect the other party is doing this on purpose. The program is almost about to be approved and now it got delayed by half a month! I’m never working with that company again!

Shaw: Since there’s still half a month

Shaw: Why spend half a month angry

Shaw: Let’s go, I’ll take you to do something that’d not make you angry.

[ WORK - Topic 4: Program Results ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: Didn’t expect that this program would be so uncomplicated! I even thought I’d have to work overtime over the weekend, but I no longer have to. I’ll come find you at Live House over the weekend!

Shaw: Not bad, your other party is finally behaving.

Shaw: But I won’t be around this weekend

Shaw: Find me in the library

2. Mood: Upset

MC: This program is finally over. I don’t have much of a desire to participate in the celebratory feast. I just feel that I’m finally free!

Shaw: Don’t celebrate that program

Shaw: Come join my band’s celebratory feast.

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I took out a 50 cent coin to “assassinate” the other party. The other party is not only fussy, but also dares to lag behind in payment!

Shaw: He’s already behind in payment

Shaw: And you’re still hounding him for 50 cents?

Shaw: biu--

Shaw: All right, I’ve “assassinated” him already.

[Note] “biu” is meant to represent the sound of a bullet flying by!

🦈

[ LIFE - Topic 1: Losing Weight ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: The weight loss methods I collected were actually really useful. I’ve finally slimmed down by quite a lot! I can wear new clothes to the music festival now!

Shaw: You haven’t been drinking cola or milk tea recently

Shaw: Because of this?

Shaw: That outfit you prepared - even without losing weight, you’d still look pretty good in it.

2. Mood: Upset

MC: Why haven’t I slimmed down even after trying so many methods...

Shaw: Watching you change methods to lose weight is pretty interesting

Shaw: Feels like I can write a thesis based on Pi Li Pa La

[Note] “Pi Li Pa La” (噼里啪啦) is one of Shaw’s nicknames for MC

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I. Put. On. Weight. Again.

Shaw: All

Shaw: The

Shaw: Best

Shaw: In

Shaw: Losing

Shaw: Weight

[ LIFE - Topic 2: Meals ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: Today, I discovered a small stall along the street! It’s very delicious!! I think you’ll also like the taste

Shaw: I haven’t even eaten it

Shaw: How do you know that it’s a taste I like?

Shaw: Arrange a timing, we’ll go together.

2. Mood: Upset

MC: I visited a hotpot stall which is famous on the internet. It ended up being pretty much the same as the stall I usually go to...

Shaw: These stalls are all the same

Shaw: Focused on sales, and don’t create new flavours

Shaw: Next time, I’ll take to a hotpot place - that one can be called delicious.

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I went for hotpot today. In the end, the chilli oil splattered onto my clothes... It was a new outfit I just bought - I’m so mad!

Shaw: ...

Shaw: Are you stupid? Next time, wear an apron when you eat.

Shaw: So how did the hotpot taste?

[ LIFE - Topic 3: Reading ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: Yesterday, I chanced upon an especially good fiction book. I ended up being too engrossed in it, so it was daytime by the time I lifted my head...

Shaw: Sure.

Shaw: The “staying up late” champion goes to you

Shaw: I’ll be forced to take second place for a day.

2. Mood: Upset

MC: I recently read a fiction book. The author kept writing about eating, sleeping, and building a garden... And she could actually write over 2000 pages worth of such day-to-day accounts??

Shaw: ...

Shaw: I have a new understanding of how bored you can be.

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I just finished a book and am so angry that I’m turning uneasily on the bed!! The protagonist was in a piteous state from beginning to the end. In the end, the antagonist got away scot-free!

Shaw: Ah, I’ve read that book

Shaw: In the second book, the protagonist counterattacks

Shaw: ...does this count as spoiling the plot?

[ LIFE - Topic 4: Games ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: Hahahaha! I defeated the boss in that wrestling game you mentioned. You won’t dare to look down on me now, right?

Shaw: ...

Shaw: You’ve already showed off on SNS, and now you’re specially sending me the news to show off again

Shaw: Looks like you really feel a sense of accomplishment.

Shaw: Fine, I’ll commend you.

2. Mood: Upset

MC: I haven’t been able to find any fun games recently... Feels like they keep following the same pattern. It makes me want to start playing old games that I’ve already completed...

Shaw: Since you can’t find any fun electronic games

Shaw: Why not come out and have fun with me? You can even train your body.

3. Mood: Angry

MC: When I played games today, I bumped into an annoying teammate. His standard was obviously average, but he kept blaming others for mistakes!

Shaw: Do you remember his ID?

Shaw: Send it over

Shaw: I’ll go meet him.

🦈

[ SCHOOL - Topic 1: Progress ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: This time, I’ve given myself sufficient time to prepare! My study plan is also set. From this weekend onwards, I’ll be in the library with you.

Shaw: You really want to come with me?

Shaw: Would you be sleeping in the library like the last time?

2. Mood: Upset

MC: It’s not that I don’t want to study, but many things keep disrupting my studies. Actually, I really want to study...

Shaw: Just admit it

Shaw: You’re just not in the mood to study

Shaw: Want me to come over to help you change your mood into a studying one?

3. Mood: Angry

MC: Even after reading the analysis, I can’t understand what it’s saying at all. I can’t study any more. I really want to become a salted fish swimming around in the ocean...

Shaw: A friendly hint

Shaw: Salted fish are dried fish, so they can’t swim

Shaw: If you want things to turn for the better, you could ask me for help.

[Note] Shaw’s uses an idiom in the final line, “咸鱼翻身” ( “xian you fan shen”), which directly translates to “salted fish turning over”. It’s a metaphor for a person who experiences a reversal of fortunes!

[ SCHOOL - Topic 2: Homework ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: I breezed past the questions today! And I kept an hour free to practice the skateboard. Didn’t you say you wanted to teach me a new move?

Shaw: One hour isn’t enough to teach a new move

Shaw: It’s easy to fall if you practice it too quickly

Shaw: First, go to the location and let me see the results of your previous practice

2. Mood: Upset

MC: I keep thinking that I’ve turned into an emotionless robot that goes through questions. I can’t find even a bit of passion in studying. Anyway, does studying even require passion...

Shaw: You’re asking me such questions? Seriously?

Shaw: My response is

Shaw: You don’t need it in studying, but you need it if you’re seeking knowledge.

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I can’t finish it... I already have many things to do in the morning, and still have to rush my homework at night. It’s not like I possess three heads and six arms!

Shaw: Even though you don’t possess three head and six arms

Shaw: If you add the both of us together, there’ll be two heads and four arms

Shaw: I won’t do your homework, but call me if you need anything else.

[Note] “Three has and six arms” is a direct translation from an idiom, 三头六臂 (“san you liu bi”). It refers to someone who possess superhuman abilities

[ SCHOOL - Topic 3: Pre-exam Revision ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: I just did a self-test and feel like the examination questions aren’t that difficult. Didn’t expect that the method you taught me on how to have a productive revision would be so effective!

Shaw: Of course my method is useful

Shaw: How else could I make it into Loveland University?

Shaw: After your exam tomorrow, remember to call me.

2. Mood: Upset

MC: Does re-doing questions again count as revision... But no one can guarantee that these questions wouldn’t appear in the exam...

Shaw: It’s always better to do it than not to

Shaw: As the old saying goes, “Review the old and know the new”

Shaw: Start with the “review”.

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I think the teacher has something against me. He said he wouldn’t test the parts that I already revised! How could he do this!

Shaw: It means you don’t know how to identify the essentials. Learn this from me.

Shaw: I can always guess the examinable areas

Shaw: The Old Man even asked if I secretly peeked at his teaching materials.

[ SCHOOL - Topic 4: Post-exam celebration ]

1. Mood: Happy

MC: I’ve reached Live House. Where are you? Aren’t we celebrating how I’m finally free from the abyss of exams?

Shaw: Five minutes.

Shaw: I brought a cake

Shaw: Since it’s a celebration, it should be more official.

2. Mood: Upset

MC: The exam is over. I’m free. As for the results, I’m not going to think about it. I actually feel a little empty...

Shaw: ...who was the one who wanted my help in comparing answers before the exam?

Shaw: You dared to waste my time, so wait for my punishment.

3. Mood: Angry

MC: I compared answers with someone. I felt a chill. The important thing is that I wrote the correct answer for that final question. But my fingers itched and I changed it to the wrong answer ahhh!

Shaw: Since you’re wrong, why continue thinking about it?

Shaw: Let’s go

Shaw: I’ll take you to a place where you can let off steam.

#mlqc #mlqc cn #mlqc spoilers #mlqc shaw

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thelastspeecher · 4 years

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King Stansort AU - Shermie

During a break from working on my thesis defense, I opened up my Stansort AU doc on a whim to reread some stuff, like I often do. And I stumbled across something I had written but never finished, so never posted. So, naturally, I finished off the thing (it was almost done anyways) and here it is: Shermie finally showing up in the AU where Stan marries a foreign princess and becomes a king consort. Think of it as something to tide you all over until I update “Recoil” next week.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Mr. Pines?” Shermie looked up from the stack of homework he was currently sifting through. He beamed at one of his favorite students, Devin.

“What’s up, Devin?” he asked kindly. Devin chewed on his lip.

“I, um…” Devin took a breath. “Do you have a brother named Stanley?”

“…Yes, I do,” Shermie said. He leaned back in his chair. “How did you know that?”

“Well, for Social Studies, we have to bring in a current event every week and explain it,” Devin said, talking much faster than he usually did. Dread began to mount in Shermie’s chest.

If Stan’s on the news, that can’t be good.

“And my mom, she was helping me find a current event to bring in,” Devin continued. “She likes following royal stuff, even royal stuff from places like Denmark or whatever. Not just England, like most people.” Shermie nodded silently. “So she told me to- to use this.” Devin dug a piece of paper out of his backpack and placed it on Shermie’s desk. “I thought that the guy looked sorta like you, and then I read that he had the same last name and was from New Jersey like you are and is- is that your brother?” Shermie stared down at the piece of paper. It was a printout of a news article from online, with a large image at the top of the page. The image was a picture of two people dressed in fine clothes being showered with petals. And one of the people was unmistakably Stan.

“Yes, that is my brother,” Shermie said in a thick voice. He cleared his throat. “Do you need this back or-”

“No, I’ve- I’ve got two copies. Just in case you wanted to keep that one,” Devin said. Shermie nodded. “Are you upset?”

“What? No! No, I’m not. Just surprised.” Shermie smiled in a reassuring manner. “And thankful. Thank you for bringing this to my attention.” Devin nodded jerkily. “You should probably go if you don’t want to be late for your next class.”

“Right! Okay, bye, Mr. Pines!” Shermie waved at Devin as he raced out of the classroom. He looked back at the article resting on his desk.

“American Pauper Marries European Princess”? That’s…how did Stan do that? I doubt any of us would be able to marry royalty, but Stan seems the least likely. He’s not refined at all. Shermie picked the piece of paper up and stared intently at the picture. There was no one else it could be, other than Stan. Stan seemed well-groomed, well-kempt, and euphoric as he beamed at his new wife. Guilt trickled into Shermie. Stan had been kicked out while Shermie was deployed and was long gone by the time his tour ended. It was something that weighed on Shermie; the wondering of whether things might have gone differently if he’d been there or gotten home sooner or even tried just a bit harder to find Stan. Clearly, I didn’t need to, if he married a princess. But still…

“Hi, Mr. Pines!” A voice shocked Shermie from his thoughts. He forced a smile at the flood of students entering his classroom.

“Hello, Bethany,” he replied, unable to see her in the mass but recognizing her voice. He shook off the guilt and regret.

I have to focus. My students don’t deserve to lose out on English class just because I found out where my brother is. He managed a half-smile. Even if they’d prefer to spend the whole period doing anything but learning.

-----

When he arrived home, Shermie dropped his bags by the front door, kissed his wife Amelia and their young son, Caleb, and made a beeline for the desktop computer. A quick search on the internet for “Stanley Pines” resulted in dozens of hits about Shermie’s younger brother, almost all linked to his relationship with royalty. Specifically, the royal family of the small European country of Lirone.

Lirone? I’ve never heard of it. Shermie clicked a few links, trying to get as much information as quickly as possible into Stan’s current circumstances. Then again, I’m not a geography teacher. He spent well over an hour diving into articles on Stan, Lirone, and the Lirone royal family, only stopping when his wife called him for dinner.

“In a minute, love,” he said absent-mindedly, still focused intently on an article detailing Stan’s wedding. Amelia walked into the living room and propped a hand on her hip.

“What exactly are you doing?” she asked. Shermie tore his gaze away from the computer screen.

“I know where my brother is.”

“Well, yeah, so do I. He does research in Oregon.”

“No, not that brother. My other one. Stanley,” Shermie said. Amelia frowned, confused. “He made a big show of being allowed to drink champagne at our wedding.”

“Oh! And then, because he was talking about it so much, got told he couldn’t anymore?”

“Yep. That’s him.” Shermie looked back at the computer. “I don’t know if you remember, but he got kicked out while I was on tour. I tried to track him down when I came back and- and I couldn’t.”

“But now you know where he is.”

“Yes. One of my students gave me a news article today about him,” Shermie said. Amelia sucked air between her teeth.

“Oh, that can’t be good.”

“No, it’s- honestly, it’s better than good. It’s astounding. Stan married a princess.” Amelia’s jaw dropped. “That was my reaction, too.” Shermie clicked on another link, this one leading to contact information for the Lironian royal family. “I need to talk to him.”

“Honey, I don’t know if you should,” Amelia said gently. Shermie froze in the middle of filling out a form. “He married a princess and never told you or Ford or your parents. If he wanted to talk to you, he woulda sent an invite to the wedding, right?”

“I…” Shermie’s hands fell away from the keyboard. “…You’re right.” A weary weight settled on his shoulders. “He has resources available to him. If he wanted, he would have been more than able to contact me. But he chose not to do that, even when he got married.” Shermie hung his head. “I can’t- I can’t really blame Stan for not wanting to talk to me. I shoulda tried harder to find him, I-” Amelia walked over to him and put a hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t blame yourself. You did what you could.”

“Yes, but-”

“Maybe he just needs time. I’m sure he’ll reach out when he’s good and ready.”

“Maybe,” Shermie mumbled. Crying began to emit from Caleb’s playpen, which was set up in the middle of the living room. Shermie got up from the computer. “I’ll take care of the little stinker if you want to serve up dinner?”

“Sure thing,” Amelia said. She kissed him on the cheek. Shermie walked over to the playpen and picked his son up. He glanced back at the computer.

Amelia’s right. I need to let Stan make the first move. But that doesn’t mean I won’t keep an eye on him and what he gets up to. I am still his big brother, after all.

-----

Shermie turned on the news. For four years now, he’d been following the actions of the Lirone royal family. Perusing pictures of them at events, watching speeches translated into English, and being moved to tears by announcement of the princesses’ birth. He was still heartbroken that Stan had yet to contact him, despite being a father now.

But that’s not what’s important at the moment. What’s important is that Stan’s wife was shot and they still haven’t caught the would-be assassin. Shermie sat down on the couch to wait for any updates. The phone rang.

“Amelia, would you mind?” he called. The phone stopped ringing. He could faintly make out Amelia asking who was on the phone. The news segment changed.

“In international news, we’re receiving word that the royal family of the small European country of Lirone had a visit this last month,” the newscaster said. Shermie leaned forward. “The news of the visit was public information in Lirone, but kept out of international news organizations, due to the country’s unique privacy laws. However, now that the visit is over, we can retroactively inform an international audience that it occurred.” A picture appeared on screen of Stan and his daughters walking in a garden. Shermie smiled. “Apparently, the visit was from none other than the king consort’s estranged twin, a Dr. Stanford Pines.” The picture zoomed out, revealing Ford walking with Stan and his daughters. Shermie’s smile was wiped away.

What?

“Shermie,” Amelia said, walking into the living room. She held out the phone. “It’s for you.”

“Sweetheart, I’m not sure I-” Shermie started, his eyes still glued to the television screen.

“It’s Stan.” Shermie’s head whipped around. Amelia nodded. “So are you gonna take it, or should I tell a literal king that you’re too busy watching TV to talk to him?” Shermie held out his hand. “That’s what I thought.” Amelia handed him the phone. Shermie swallowed and held the phone up to his ear.

“…Stan?” he croaked.

“Yeah.” At the sound of his younger brother’s distinct voice, Shermie could feel tears welling up. “Yeah, it’s- it’s me. Look, I, uh-” Stan took a breath. “I figured it’s about time you knew what I’ve been up to.”

“I know.”

“Wait, you do?” Stan asked. There was a muffled commotion on his end of the call. “Danny-” Stan said something in a foreign language. A high-pitched voice asked a question in the same tongue. “Non.”

“Apr-”

“Non,” Stan said, more firmly. He barked out an order, still not speaking English. There was another muffled commotion. “Sorry about that,” Stan said. “It’s a little bit crazy over here.”

“I know. Being a father is difficult.”

“You know about-”

“Yes, Stanley,” Shermie said. “I know you married a princess, who became a queen. I know that you have twin daughters. And I know that your wife was recently the subject of an assassination attempt.” Stan was quiet for a moment.

“How?” he finally asked.

“One of my students stumbled across an article about you when you were married. I’ve been keeping track of you since then.”

“I…” Stan seemed at a loss for words. He finally let out a small laugh. “Well, there goes the whole little speech I had planned.” Shermie smiled. “Ford had no clue.”

“Stanford is brilliant. But he tends to focus his observational skills on things other than human interactions.”

“Yeah. You’re right.” Stan cleared his throat. “So, uh, Ford, he- he actually visited us here in Lirone.”

“The news just mentioned that.” Shermie leaned against the back of the couch. “I’m honestly surprised you invited him.”

“I didn’t. Turns out his research partner is my brother-in-law, Fiddleford. Ford saw what happened to Angie on the news and convinced Fiddleford to let him visit.”

“Really? During such a tumultuous time?”

“Yep. It didn’t go well. I, uh, I actually kicked him out. But that’s not- that’s not why I’m calling. I’m calling to…” Stan took a breath. “Invite you to the castle.” Shermie sat up straight.

“Wait, what?”

“It’s- my kids, they deserve to know my side of the family. I shouldn’t keep them from meeting you and Mom, just ‘cause I don’t know how to let go of a grudge.”

“But you don’t want them know Pops?”

“Oh, hell no. If Pops shows up, he’s getting kicked outta the country right away.”

“Smart move.”

“But yeah, I- I want my kids to get to know their Uncle Shermie. They really liked Ford and he’s not half as good with kids as you are, so I know they’d love you.” Stan paused. “And…I wanna see you, too. It’s been a long time.”

“It most definitely has.”

“So you’ll visit?”

“Of course!”

“That’s- that’s great.” Stan sounded relieved. A muffled voice said something on Stan’s end of the call. “I gotta go. But, uh, I’ll have my people set it up, okay?”

“You won’t be-”

“I don’t really have the time to set it up myself,” Stan said. Shermie’s heart sunk.

Right. He’s a king consort. He has more important things to do.

“We’ve got the best people working here, though, and they’ll call you to iron out the details. I really- I really gotta go. There’s a debriefing and-” Stan cut himself off. “You don’t need to know about it. All right, bye.”

“Bye,” Shermie said, barely getting it in before Stan hung up. Footsteps sounded. Shermie looked up. Amelia had joined him in the living room. She raised an eyebrow.

“Well?” she asked. Shermie let out a long sigh.

“It looks like I’m going to Europe.”

-----

Shermie nervously drummed his fingers on his lap as he stared out the window. His luggage was packed in the trunk of the town car that had come to pick him up from the airport.

“I’ve never had a chauffer before,” he said, trying to lighten the mood. The driver glanced at him but didn’t say anything. “Not a talker, then,” Shermie mumbled to himself. He looked down at the bag sitting by his feet containing gifts for Danny and Daisy. His mouth went dry.

That was a mistake! Why did I bother getting presents for literal princesses? They can get anything they want. He took a deep, calming breath. Relax. It’s going to be fine. He resumed looking out the window. While he’d been distracted, the car had turned down a long, winding driveway leading to a castle. Shermie swallowed.

The town car came to a stop. Before Shermie could even reach for the handle, the driver jumped out of the car and opened the door for him.

“Thank you,” Shermie said. The driver merely nodded. Shermie grabbed the bag with his nieces’ presents and stepped outside. He turned to the driver. “Do you know where Stan is?”

“The king consort got caught up in a meeting,” a voice said. Shermie turned around again. A man strode over. He was short and slender, wearing fine, tailored clothes. The man stuck his hand out for Shermie to shake. “The name’s Lute.”

“Lute…you’re one of the princes?” Shermie asked. Lute grinned.

“Yep.”

“I recognize the name. As well as, to be honest, the nose.” Lute laughed.

“I’m not offended, don’t worry. The royal nose is large and distinctive.” He blew his dark bangs out of his face. “It’s also one of the first things both your brothers mentioned when meeting me.”

“That sounds like my brothers,” Shermie said. Lute raised an eyebrow.

“You mentioned it as well.”

“Fair,” Shermie said lightly. The driver set Shermie’s items on the ground next to him. Lute looked down and caught sight of the bag containing Danny and Daisy’s gifts.

“What’s in there?”

“I-” Shermie rubbed the back of his neck. “This is stupid, but I brought Danny and Daisy some presents.” Lute was silent. “I just- I felt bad about missing their birthdays and- I’ll bring them back.”

“Why?”

“Well, Danny and Daisy are princesses. They can get whatever they want.”

“Pfft.” Lute snorted. “Not quite. Do they have access to more than the average child? Yes. But Angie and Stan don’t want their daughters to be spoiled. Not to mention, they rarely get American items.” Lute smiled reassuringly at Shermie. “Trust me, they’ll be happy just to meet you. When you give them gifts? They’ll be – ah, what’s the phrase – over the moon.” Shermie smiled back hesitantly. Over Lute’s shoulder, he saw the large main door open. His mouth went dry. A man exited the castle and walked over to Lute and Shermie.

“Uh, heya, Sherm,” Stan said awkwardly, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his tailored slacks. Acting on impulse, Shermie abruptly embraced Stan. Stan stiffened in shock at first, but relaxed and returned the gesture. Shermie broke off the hug.

“Hello, Stanley. It’s good to see you again.”

“Yeah, uh, you- you too,” Stan mumbled. He cleared his throat. “Um, come- come inside. If the girls don’t see you in the next five minutes, they’re gonna riot.”

“That’s the only reason you want me inside?” Shermie deadpanned. “You’re not concerned that if I stay out all night I might freeze to death? Or be attacked by bears?” Stan rolled his eyes. “You don’t want me to come in because you want to catch up with me? No, it’s because your daughters will be upset? Sure. Whatever you say.” Stan punched Shermie on the shoulder playfully.

“Shut up and get your ass inside the castle.”

“Well, since you asked so nicely…” Shermie said slowly. Stan let out a laugh. Shermie beamed, glad that his tactic to make things less awkward had worked. “Don’t worry, I’m as excited as your daughters are.”

“That’s a high bar, Sherm. They loved it when Ford was here. I think they’re expecting someone that looks just like him.” Stan looked Shermie up and down. “They’re gonna be disappointed.” Shermie rolled his eyes. Stan turned around and began to walk back to the castle. “No use delaying their disappointment! C’mon, Sherm.” Lute and Shermie exchanged an amused look. Stan stopped at the door to look back. “I’m a king, Shermie. I can have you court-martialed.”

“You may be a king,” Shermie said, picking up his luggage, “but you’re also my little brother. If you court-martial me, I’ll have no choice but to tell the press all about Mr. Tummy.” Stan grimaced.

“Fine.” He sighed in an exaggerated manner. “I won’t court-martial you.”

Shaking his head to hide his smile, Shermie followed Stan and Lute inside.

#King Stansort is technically a variation of my main Stansort AU #they're basically the same but the timelines are slightly different #with Ford finding out where Stan is much earlier in main Stansort than in King Stansort #I highly encourage y'all to check out my King Stansort tag if you haven't heard of this AU of mine #it's one of my faves. lots of good stuff in it.#(btw if you're wondering why Stan seems not quite as rough around the edges and maybe slightly more polite #esp when he's on the phone with Shermie #it's bc of all those diplomacy things that were hammered into him when he married into a royal family)#King Stansort AU #Shermie Pines #Stanley Pines #Lute McGucket #my writing #ficlet #speecher speaks

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jedipiff · 5 years

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1/4/2019 Late Night Article Diving

There's an article saying that most Americans still prefer to watch TV for news rather than be reading it. Well I would like to say I enjoy both, I have found myself reading late night articles more than ever. I guess it was cause I was fascinated with a piece on The Miracle At Tham Luang, when a whole team of soccer players and their coach got trapped on an afternoon trip through a cave. When a sudden rain onset hit a week sooner than planned, the water was overfilled with water and they were forced to seek safety wherever they could while trying not to battle the constant thought of that they all could die down there. The team was called Moo Pa, which is also translated to Forest Pigs or the Wild Boars. They recieved great advice from their mentor Coach Ek, who had trained to be a buddhist monk and guided them with his teachings.

Many people tried to work on their rescue and one person lost their life trying to set up oxygen tanks so that they could be taken out of the cave safely. While he did this, his own oxygen tank ran out and he wasn't able to make it back from the journey inbetween. Saman Gunan was his name and he was a retired Thai Seal who eagerly journeyed to this land on his choice to try to help rescue these boys. He didn't try, he more than succeeded and I wanted to start my piece off commeorating his bravery. So if anyone is interested in reading more about this inspiring and terrifying story, the best article I have read describing it can be found here https://www.gq.com/story/thai-cave-rescue-miracle-at-tham-luang by Sean Flynn a GQ correspondent.

On another random note, the U.S. Government is in a current state of shutdown over President Trump not getting a 5 $ billion funding to build The Wall. The Senate Democrats have rejected his proposal and Trump now plans to hold the government in lockdown for quite a long period of time he has announced. While this is a current issue going on, I do find it frustrating the government has to do this cause in the meantime I guess many National Parks and Zoos, along with many other residencies go into states of despair and disarray. Some officials will stay on has emergency personnel, but a large majority of the staff won't be there during this period of time.

A surprising one I learned tonight that many may not know, is that the US National Coast guard also goes without pay during this tme. I was reading a post about many disgruntled families, that wondered why they had to be affected out of all the military branches to have to suffer this. They weren't discrediting any other ones, they just said they do it for the love of the country as welll and it was very disheartening to them to be treated this way. I merely just wanted to touch upon the subject, though I will try to hold my frightening political views at bay. Radical, eccentric, a man that cares about the state of the world though that is actively trying to keep his mind more open to the ideas going on around him.

It was on another post that I was diving through Facebook, and I found a girl around my age which is 25 that was posting about the state of Global warming and climate change. There were several older relatives of her that were bewildered at the concept, and I didn't want to frown harshly upon it. They did not know what it was but it still raised my awareness that perphaps the older generation, may not have the exact knowledge of some of the things that we do now. Sure, using Alexa or switching to Netflix on your Smarttv might be easy to you, but to some parents that sounds like some voodoo magic.

I never commented though the girl was throuhoghly explainging to her family that we has a population were causing destruction to the earth. All our gases, fuels, land dumps and numerous other things would all be culminating to stuff that while may not seem like it's affecting us that much around you, is causing many changes throughout the World whether you realize it or not. The thought seems scary, I mean even the act of just using solar energy or switching how you maybe use water, to add more filters and purifiers can sound like some crazy traps to some folk. I don't know, I guess even with all this new technology I'm just saying that somehow we still remain blind.

On another thing, the future of the robot is seemingly coming to dawn upon us sooner than probably humans could have ever realized. Here we are now, where factories and many companies are using robots to help with their daily jobs. In a warehouse of Amazon recently one of the automated robots recently opened a car of bear repellenant spray and sent many hospital workers to the hospital. One of them even in critical condition. Now I'm not calling this the end of the world, but the fact that incidents like this are already happening is just making me already imagining what can of worms are going to be opened. I'm not hating on this future, I'm just saying with great strides in technology there will be many kinks and problems that you have to try to work out. Not everything goes perfect, and I am sure they try their best to make sure their workers are safe, I'm not trying to point that type of finger.

It's just the day a bot autofunctions and crushes a human like a soda can, with his body mangled and looking like a sack of fruit what will the world say. Well damn, does that mean my Xbox One S won't be delivered on time for Christmas then?

========

I'm still ever opposed to reading books through Ebooks or Kindle, any type of thing like a tablet or whatever. It's just when I want to sit down and dive into a world outside of this, the last thing I want to have to do is by diving into the internet world first. I was thinkng recently of a teacher I had in high school who whenever there was a book fair, would always go down looking for first edition books. One had said he liked collecting them they were more rare and to he said some could be quite valuable, ever since after that I always liked to try to keep my eye out for them to.

In my room I have several bookcases filled with many of my favorite stories and tales. In the past I used to be quite religious at one point and would drop off many bibles and other religious books at book centers or free libraries for them to be taken to be read. I would donate my fantasy books or horror ones I didn't like to, but I had gone through a period where I might have caught a religious fervor. I was for a period selling Bibles though, so it would make sense that eventually some of the text maybe would speak to me on some level.

One of these nights while dropping off the books at a free public library in Salem, Massachusetts I discovered one of the best books I have ever found. It was a book about the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, who is one of my favorite people to read about in history. It was written in an embellished epic kind of way, one where you get taken through the role of John Wilkes Booth his killer and what led in a dramatic fashion up to what the writer felt was all different motives and ways he went about killing old Abe. I never actually got around to finishing this book, but at the time I went to a small cafe nearby and find myself diving through it. It's a riveting tale, with a really unique way of going about that whole event that I really enjoyed the way they wrote it.

The book was called Manhunt The 12-Day Chase For Lincoln's Killer by James L. Swanson.

It's a great read even if you have heard the story a million times, you never had it told like this.

So at this note, I want to just relax and spend some time watching a show on HBO called Deadwood. An American Western largely all done by David Milch, it shows the gritty and insane side of life that may have been during that period of time. There's a great cast of actors on it and the setting and atmosphere are brutally done. Even the characters I want to like, the times they live in and the way they think make me wanna hate them sometimes. Though I see resemblances of the characters in the show to people now, I suppose time holds no difference between ignorance and disgust. You'll find a woman, who seems disabled and can't walk and no one even pays her a glimpse of mind. Even the doctors back then utterly cruel, and maybe some people get all the greatest doctor care but there's still issues and shit like that today. But she walks through the whole town and not even anyone bats an eye, but her resolve to fix her legs and fit in hit me in the feels. I have to keep watching just to see what she'll do, she wants to try leg braces to try to fix her ailment, but the doctor says it's one that she was born with and cant be undone. I can't say, I have seen miracles, but I'll let the show tell this story's narrative of her ordeal.

That's just one instance, and there's also a priest that is slowly losing his mind and suffering what seems like strokes and seizures. I'm not sure, I've only watched a few episodes but each episode gets sadder than the last watching his descent. He's becoming so fucked in the head, but I know it's not his fault. So there's that, if anyone likes Red Dead Redemption 2 or Westworld, than they might be interested in this. Not that it's anything like really either of those, this show is it's own style but it's very graceful in the way it's depicted.

I also realize that one of my sweetest joys is getting that 50 % off holiday candy at pharmacies after it's marked down. There's nothing like having a big bag of hershey kisses for only a few dollars. Most definetely chocolate causes an overdose of love in my brain.

#random #writing #news #original #bored #insomnia #usa #world

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wellhellotragic · 6 years

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If Looks Could Kill 2/27

Summary: Emma Swan is a dedicated FBI agent getting over a bad breakup. When she and her partner, Ruby Lucas, are forced to go undercover as contestants on a reality show, Emma is forced to try and win the affections of Killian Jones, a man she despises.

Killian Jones is a lost boy. Having recently been nicknamed the ‘Bad Boy of Boston,’ he’s been living up to his moniker using women and rum to avoid dealing with his dark past. When he’s forced to take the lead in a reality show, he encounters a gorgeous blonde who turns his world upside down.

Miss Congeniality meets The Bachelor

Rated: M for language, violence, and smut.

Catch Up Here: 1

The week flew by for Emma. She and Ruby quizzed each other back and fourth on their backstories, making sure that they wouldn’t stumble if someone asked them a random question. They were going in as friends, an idea the network execs jumped at. It would be great for ratings having two friends vying for the same man. It would create the drama audiences thrived on.

Ruby’s was playing the part of a lingerie model, a part she would excel at. They had some guys at the bureau take pictures of her, editing them into full blown advertising campaigns to add to the internet for proof if anyone googled her.

Emma on the other hand was going in as a writer for a beauty and health magazine. Emma tried to argue that she wanted to play a cop or sheriff, but everyone was worried that even a small time law enforcement officer might scare off Tamara. Just as they had done for Ruby, the tech support guys created Emma’s cover, including some magazine articles, a blog, and some other social media profiles for her.

She fought to keep her lunch down as she read the articles she had ‘written’ about hair care and the latest workout trends. It was the complete opposite of everything she stood for. Emma believed that women should feel empowered from the inside, not the superficial outside.

The only benefit was when Graham had told her it seemed fitting, given her body. Both of them had blushed at the comment. She avoided being alone with him after that, but couldn’t help how her eyes would wander over to him during their briefings, where she found him already watching her each time.

Technically he was her boss, or at least he was for the next couple of months, and she wasn’t ready to date, but her brain would sometimes drift to some unlady like images. Maybe he could be an easy fling before she headed back to New York.

Bad Emma, she chastised herself.

The group also went through the profiles of the other contestants on the show, garnering some lewd comments from Will. The women were a complete mix of ethnicities and all beautiful, causing Emma to groan.

How was she supposed to compete with these gorgeous women when she was completely repulsed by the prize? When Ruby pushed it, she had admitted that he was attractive, but that his personality was so bad that it overshadowed his looks. When Ruby mentioned the accent, Emma quickly reminded her that they were surrounded by men from the UK, and it had lost its appeal.

The girls also met the other two agents that were going undercover with them. James Charming and Ava White would pose as a newly married couple, David and Mary Margaret Nolan. David would be a camera operator, giving him unlimited access to the mansion and contestants, while Mary Margaret would act as a production assistant, helping them control everyone’s actions.

Both seemed nice enough to Emma, and they complemented each other well despite never having worked together officially before. The two had spent the week in character, and anyone who didn’t know better would see them as newlyweds happily in love.

Robin and Will couldn’t be present on the set like the others since Killian knew them, and they didn’t want anyone to know about the operation, especially Killian per Regina’s request. If an emergency came up they would be able to quickly visit as Killian’s friends, but most of their time would be spent behind computers running surveillance and providing support to the girls.

Graham said he would check in on them from time to time, but he also had other teams to supervise. Ruby conspiratorially told Emma that Graham just didn’t want to watch Emma flirt with another man, earning another of Emma’s patented eye rolls.

Emma and Ruby sat through their final briefing, going over everything one last time, including the suspect of the case, Tamara. Regina explained to everyone that Killian Jones was no stranger to threats. A few years before Killian had a very unfortunate brush with a crazed fan, but Regina didn’t go into the details. Emma had tried to search the incident, but found nothing. Whatever it was, Regina had gone to great lengths to keep it under wraps. Emma made a mental note that Regina was exceptional at her job if even she couldn’t find anything.

Regina explained though, that usually the threats were directed to whatever lady he was currently sleeping with. His female fan base didn’t respond well to him dating, not that what he did could be considered dating. This time though, it was Killian who was receiving the threats. Regina made sure that Killian’s assistant, a man named Smee, intercepted all of the threats, and that Killian had no idea.

She was dodgy about the reasons when asked, but Robin spoke up agreeing with her that it was in everyone’s best interest that Killian not find out. They explained that Regina had mentioned it in passing to Robin one night over diner but neither of them took the threat that seriously. Fans loved to write outlandish things for attention. It wasn’t until one of Will’s informants told him that he heard a hit had been ordered on Killian that they realized how serious the situation was.

After months of investigating, they still didn’t know much. They hadn’t figured out who had ordered Killian’s assassination yet, only that it had been accepted. It was Ruby and Emma that stumbled across Tamara while investigating another case and the pieces started to come together.

She was rumored to have ties to a Boston mob family, and her name had come up while interrogating the lead suspect of another murder for hire. They had ultimately ruled her out in that case, but something about her stuck with Emma. When she ran some details through her confidential informants, she learned that Tamara had moved back to Boston from New York and had possibly accepted a hit that had been ordered, but the informants were too afraid to ask questions, and Emma knew she wouldn’t get anymore out of them.

When Emma called up the Boston office to give them a heads up she was transferred to Robin. After explaining the situation, Robin informed her that he believed she was connected to his case and invited Emma and her partner to come join the investigation.

Tamara was smart though, and clearly well funded. She purchased everything in cash leaving no money trail, and no statements of purchase. She had taken up a bar tending job at the Rusty Anchor as a front, but had apparently quit as soon as she found out that she was going to be on the show. Robin believed that she took a job there knowing that Killian frequented the bar, but left after getting better access to him.

Hopefully Emma or Ruby could find something that linked her to the hit, or to the person who ordered it.

“Okay guys, I think we’re all set here,” Graham stated as her stood from his chair to stretch.

“Oi, before anyone leaves, I think we should have a group outing tonight at the Rusty Anchor. It’ll be like a last hurrah before we all go under house arrest. What do you lot say?”

Emma was finding it easier to understand Will after the last few weeks working together. Initially she found his poor use of the English language annoying, but now it was enduring.

Ruby shot Emma a wink. “We’re in! What time?”

Emma wanted to be upset with her partner, but couldn’t find it in herself. They had spent every waking hour that week huddled in their make shift office, or in the conference room. When they weren’t at work they were trying to get a couple of hours of shuteye in their hotel room, all too tired to do anything else.

Graham joined in, “How about we shoot for eight?”

“Well looky there,” Will stated giving Robin a sly grin. “He is a real boy. We just assumed that you went in your office and powered down at night.”

Graham had rarely attended any social gatherings outside of work. He liked to maintain some distance from the other agents to keep things professional. His voluntary attendance that night was about as rare as a goose laying a golden egg.

“Ha, ha,” Graham shot back. “We’re all in for a long road ahead, and I think all of us could stand to use a night out first.” Graham emphasized the last bit while shoot a look to Emma before quickly averting his gaze back to Robin.

“Sounds good.” Emma was actually a little excited. “We’ll see you boys there.”

Everyone left work pretty quickly and Emma and Ruby headed back to their hotel. Emma showered and actually managed to shave her legs for a change. She had no intentions of doing anything with Graham, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t dress to impress. When she got out of the shower she wrapped herself in a towel before drying and curling her hair. She left her makeup light knowing that she’d be wearing way too much of it in the following weeks, but choose a bright red lip color. She wrestled through her suitcase before putting on some sexy black lace underwear and a matching bra, purely for the confidence factor. She threw on a short little black dress as well and waited for Ruby to join her.

She didn’t have to wait long, and Ruby didn’t disappoint in the wow factor either. Ruby had on a long sleeved blue dress, but the lack of material on the bottom more than made up for the extra coverage up top.

By the time both girls made it down stairs they had just enough time to hail a cab to the bar. When they walked in all three men where already at a table waiting for them, along with Regina. They ordered beers all around. The evening was pleasant. They shared stories of their more interesting cases, and most embarrassing moments. A few men tried to approach Emma and Ruby, but they both politely declined enjoying the company they were in too much.

About three hours had passed when Robin got a call. Without looking at the caller ID he answered.

“Locksley.”

“Hey,” came a familiar voice. “What is all of that noise? Wait, are you at the bar?” He sounded a little hurt.

“Ya,” Robin replied sheepishly. “Sorry. We’re having a bit of a work outing mate.”

There was a pause before Killian spoke up again. “And you didn’t invite me because?”

Robin slumped down in his chair groaning and catching the attention of the others.

“I’m sorry, I just assumed you were busy getting ready for tomorrow.” Robin was quick on his feet, a good quality in their line of work.

“Well, I’m going to assume Regina is there with you, and she could have easily pointed out that I am, in fact, not busy. I believe I also heard a few female voices in the background? Are you afraid I’m going to alienate your lovely lady colleagues?” Robin could tell that Killian was trying to disguise the pain in his voice with lusty innuendo.

When Robin didn’t say anything Killian continued. “Look, if I promise to be on my best behavior can I come? It’s my last night of freedom and I’d like to hang out with you guys before I get fed to the beast, and before you answer you should know I’m already walking over there.”

Emma saw Robin’s eyes shoot wide. “Um, ya, sounds great. I think of couple of the guys were just about to leave, but Will and I can hang around for a bit still.”

Robin finished the call and then turned to tell everyone at the table that Killian would be there in a couple of minutes. Ruby and Emma took that as their cue to leave so Killian wouldn’t recognize them the next day. Both ladies were halfway down the block when Emma realized she had left her phone on the table.

She ran back quickly hoping to get in and out before Killian arrived. She was met at the door by Graham, who had found her phone and was attempting to return it before she got too far. Before she could thank him she saw Killian rounding the corner heading straight for them.

She panicked. He couldn’t see her so she did the only thing she could think of. She grabbed Graham by the lapels of his jacket and crashed her lips into his, hoping to hide her face from Killian’s view.

After seeing Killian make his way inside, she let Graham go, and he stumbled back a few steps. She couldn’t help the way her tongue darted out to lick her lips after.

“Wow,” was all he managed to get out.

Killian had been in hell all week. Regina had written him scripted answers to give to all of the interviewers. They asked him questions about his past and his goals for the future. They asked him why he had decided to do the show. He recited Regina’s words perfectly and the girl interviewers swooned over him.

He spent a full day in a studio in front of a camera taking pictures of him in different suits holding red roses. By the time he left that night he was sure he’d never see again from all of the flashes.

His breaking point came when Regina explained to him how the elimination process would work. He would have time to interact with all of the women, and at the end of the week there would be a rose ceremony, where he would present a single red rose to each of the women lucky enough to pass through to the next round.

In the beginning he was under the assumption that he would get to choose the women who stayed each week. It wasn’t until Regina informed him that morning how it really worked that he’d lost it and dove back into the rum.

Killian would be allowed to give them a list of the women that he wanted to stay, but the final decisions would be up the network based on viewer comments. If there a tie between the women based on viewer demands, they would look to Killian’s list to see who would stay.

When Regina left, Killian went straight to his bar and grabbed a half open bottle, downing it as quickly as he could. He stumbled over to the couch where he passed out for the rest of the day. When he woke up it was almost eleven at night.

He got up and went for his phone to see if he had missed any calls or texts, but his phone taunted him with the fact that he didn’t have any friends. Outside of Robin and Will that was actually true. He had succeeded at driving everyone else away.

He had to admit, his life was lonely, and he was a little bothered by the fact that neither of his two best friends had tried to invite him out for a last night out. He knew that they were often busy with work, but remembered them saying that they were gearing up for a sting the next morning, meaning they should still be free tonight.

He called Will first but it went straight to voicemail. He called Robin next and when he answered he could barely hear him over all of the background noise. He heard a couple of females laughing hard at something, and then Will’s voice in the background.

He didn’t even bother waiting for Robin to say anything before heading down to the bar, still wearing his clothes from that morning. He was hurt, but even more than that, he was angry.

He hung up with Robin as he reached the lobby of his building. He wanted to launch into the guys for excluding them. He found himself almost jogging to bar.

As he rounded the corner he saw Graham Humbert, Robin and Will’s boss outside. He found his anger subsiding a bit, realizing that Robin had told the truth when he said it was a work thing.

He considered saying hello to Graham but before he could, Graham had found himself otherwise occupied and Killian couldn’t help but grin as he walked past. It didn’t take him long to find the table where everyone, including Regina was sat. There were empty beer bottles all over the place.

Killian sat down nodding at both men.

“Was that your boss I saw outside?” He already knew the answer but was trying to make small talk, having been a little embarrassed at his earlier attitude.

Will held his phone up in the air. “Ya. He just got called back into work for an emergency though.”

“Ah,” Killian grinned back. “I never realized that Graham Humbert was the type of guy that considered making out with leggy blondes an emergency.”

Robin spat out his beer all over the table.

#If Looks Could Kill #wellhellotragic #hellotragic #cs ff #ILCK

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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Star Wars Movie and TV Release Date Calendar

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

While The Skywalker Saga may have come to a close, there are still plenty of other Star Wars movies, live-action Disney+ series, and animated shows in the works.

This is the page where we’ll keep track of all the upcoming Star Wars movie and TV releases. It might not look like much, but she’s got it where it counts. Hit the links in each entry to read articles that tell you more about what you need to know about all these new Star Wars adventures!

Stream your Star Wars favorites right here!

First up are the movies but scroll down for TV release dates…

Upcoming Star Wars Movies

Rogue Squadron

December 22, 2023

Director: Patty Jenkins

Disney confirmed during an Investors Day presentation in Dec. 2020 that the first Star Wars movie to follow The Rise of Skywalker is Rogue Squadron, a movie that “will introduce a new generation of starfighter pilots as they earn their wings and risk their lives in a boundary-pushing, high-speed thrill-ride, and move the saga into the future era of the galaxy.”

Wonder Woman‘s Patty Jenkins will direct, making her the first woman to helm a Star Wars movie. We’re very excited about this!

Read more about The Bad Batch here.

Visions

2021

The Bad Batch isn’t the only animated series coming up. Star Wars is finally getting its own anime anthology series. It’s called Visions, “a series of animated short films celebrating Star Wars through the lens of the world’s best anime creators. The anthology collection will bring 10 fantastic visions from several of the leading Japanese anime studios, offering a fresh and diverse cultural perspective to Star Wars.”

This sounds so cool!

Obi-Wan Kenobi

2022

Director: Deborah Chow

Writer: Hossein Amini, Joby Harold

Starring: Ewan McGregor, Hayden Christensen

Ewan McGregor is finally returning to the role of Obi-Wan Kenobi in a series set between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope. The Jedi Master has settled into his life as an exile on Tatooine, where he’s watching over Luke Skywalker from afar. Will his next adventure take him off-world or is he going to have to protect a defenseless village from raiders Toshiro Mifune style?

Here’s what we know about the plot: “The series begins 10 years after the dramatic events of Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith where he faced his greatest defeat, the downfall and corruption of his best friend and Jedi apprentice, Anakin Skywalker turned evil Sith Lord Darth Vader.”

Hayden Christensen is returning to play Vader, which is very exciting!

This series was set to film in 2020, but has since been pushed back to March 2021 after writer Hossein Amini was replaced by Joby Harold, who is creating fresh scripts for the series. The show was also pushed back due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Andor

2022

Writer: Tony Gilroy

Starring: Diego Luna, Alan Tudyk, Genevieve O’Reilly, Stellan Skarsgard, Denise Gough, Kyle Stoller

There’s a Rogue One spinoff series starring Rebel secret agent Cassian Andor coming to Disney+! According to the press release, “The rousing spy thriller will explore tales filled with espionage and daring missions to restore hope to a galaxy in the grip of a ruthless Empire.” This sounds very good.

This series was set to film in early 2020, Covid-19 pandemic delayed the show. It finally began filming in November in London.

The Acolyte

TBA

Executive Producer & Writer: Leslye Headland

Russian Doll co-creator Leslye Headland is developing a new series called The Acolyte, which is set during the High Republic era, a time period that predates even The Phantom Menace. The series is said to be “female-centric” and seems to be a darker Star Wars story than what we’re used to seeing on screen.

Lucasfilm describes the show as “a mystery-thriller that will take the audience into a galaxy of shadowy secrets and emerging dark side powers in the final days of the High Republic era.” Sounds intriguing!

We have some theories as to what the show could be about here.

Ahsoka

TBA

Executive Producers: Jon Favreau & Dave Filoni

Writer: Dave Filoni

Starring: Rosario Dawson

Described as a limited series that continues the story of Ahsoka Tano after the events of The Mandalorian season 2 episode “The Jedi,” Ahsoka will likely bring the beloved hero one step closer to finding her missing Jedi friend Ezra Bridger and taking down Grand Admiral Thrawn once and for all.

Rangers of the New Republic

TBA

Executive Producers: Jon Favreau & Dave Filoni

We don’t know anything about this show except that it’s set within The Mandalorian timeline and will “intersect with future stories and culminate into a climactic story event.” It sounds like Star Wars may be on its way to having its first big TV crossover. Crisis on Infinite Planets?

Lando

TBA

Writer: Justin Simien

The smoothest scoundrel in the galaxy is finally getting his own event series on Disney+. It’s currently unclear whether this series will follow the younger Lando played by Donald Glover or the original one played by Billy Dee Williams. Maybe it’ll star both?!

A Droid Story

TBA

This animated TV movie will follow C-3PO and R2-D2 as well as introduce a new hero to the Star Wars galaxy. That’s all we know at the moment!

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

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bangkokjacknews · 4 years

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Is Wikipedia Reliable, Credible, Accurate or Fake?

Is Wikipedia Reliable, Credible, Accurate or Fake? Wikipedia provides Internet users with millions of articles on a wide range of subjects and often ranks first in search engines. But its reliability and credibility fall well short of any reasonable standards.

Anybody using Wikipedia as a research resource should definitely cross-reference their results in at least two other places. In fact, people are now starting to avoid using Wikipedia for anything. And this should not be surprising. According to Wikipedia itself, 'While some articles are of the highest quality of scholarship, others are admittedly complete rubbish. Original Albert Jack content. Use Wikipedia with an informed understanding of what it is and what it isn't.' Okay, well let's have a look at what it is and what it isn't. The Philip Cross Scandal 'Philip Cross' is a so called credited editor of Wikipedia. This means he has access to any page and is able to edit anything he, or she, wants to. The subject of Wikipedia pages does not have any editing access to his or her own pages. If you are reading the Wikipedia page, story first shared by Bangkok Jack, come over and join us, of Joe Bloggs then you know that Bloggs is banned from editing any content in his name. Anything can be written about him, or anybody else, and yet he has no right of reply or correction. Philip Cross has not had a single day off from editing Wikipedia in almost five years. 'He' has edited every single day from 29 August 2013 to 14 May 2018. Including five Christmas Days. That’s 1,721 consecutive days of editing. In the last FOURTEEN years Philip Cross has made 133,612 edits to Wikipedia pages, which is more than 30 edits per day, seven days a week. Journalist and broadcaster Craig Murray has plotted them here

Craig Murray points out that the 'operation runs like clockwork, seven days a week, every waking hour, story first shared by Bangkok Jack, come over and join us, without significant variation. If Philip Cross genuinely is an individual, there is no denying he is morbidly obsessed.' There are three possible explanations. 1. Philip Cross is a spin company, with multiple users all logging into the Phillip Cross account, employed by who knows who and with a clear political agenda. 2. Philip Cross is a paid individual, working FULL TIME to add positive content to some Wikipedia Pages and vile lies to others 3. Philip Cross is a dangerous sociopath. This 'editor' has consistently discredited the reputations of prominent individuals who question and challenge the Left Wing corporate and state media narratives, especially in respect of UK Foreign Affairs or American President Donald Trump. Philip Cross also spends a lot of time improving the reputations (and public information available) of Conservative journalists and media figures, particularly in respect of the interests of Israel. Craig Murray writes that is it 'particularly interesting that Philip Cross‘s views happen to be precisely the same political views as those of Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia. Jimmy Wales has been active on twitter recently being particularly rude and unpleasant to anybody, story first shared by Bangkok Jack, come over and join us, questioning the activities of Philip Cross. His commitment to Cross’s freedom to operate on Wikipedia would be rather more impressive if the Cross operation were not promoting Wales’ own opinions. https://albertjack.com/2018/07/10/the-epidemic-of-stupid/ Interestingly enough Wikipedia’s UK begging arm, Wikimedia UK, joined in with equal hostile responses to anyone questioning Cross.' Former British MP and broadcaster George Galloway has had his Wikipedia page 'negatively edited,' or 'distorted,' by Cross 1800 times. Think about that for a moment - 1800 times. Do you think the Wikipidia entry for George Galloway is accurate now? And Galloway has no right of redress or correction as that is against Wikipedia rules. It doesn't matter which side of the political divide you stand - Wikipedia is clearly no longer a reliable source of information for anybody, thanks to the likes of Philip Cross. The contributor with an agenda always prevails. The idea behind Wikipedia's group editing process is that, story first shared by Bangkok Jack, come over and join us, by general consensus, unreliable contributions and edits will be removed and/or corrected. But usually the contributor who 'wins' is not the one with the soundest information, but rather the one with the strongest agenda. The one who is more persistent and committed. Irish student Shane Fitzgerald, who was conducting research on the Internet and globalization of information, posted a fake quotation on the Wikipedia article about the deceased French composer Maurice Jarre. Due to the fact that the quote was not attributed to a reliable source, it was removed several times by editors, but Fitzgerald simply continued re-posting it until it was allowed to remain. Fitzgerald was startled to learn that several major newspapers picked up the quote and published it in obituaries, confirming his suspicions of the questionable ways in which journalists use websites, and Wikipedia, as a reliable source. Fitzgerald e-mailed the newspapers letting them know that the quote was fabricated; he believes that otherwise, they might never have found out. Fitzgerald demonstrated that if he can 're-write' history that easily then so can everybody else. https://albertjack.com/2018/05/20/only-32-of-the-british-still-trust-the-news-media/ Individuals with agendas sometimes have significant editing authority. Administrators on Wikipedia have the power to delete or disallow comments or articles they disagree with and support the viewpoints they approve regardless of whether they are factually correct or not. For example U.K. scientist William Connelly became a website administrator and subsequently wrote, story first shared by Bangkok Jack, come over and join us, or rewrote more than 5,000 Wikipedia articles supporting the concept of climate change and global warming. More importantly, he used his authority to ban more than 2,000 contributors with opposing viewpoints from making further contributions. According to The Financial Post, when Connelly was through editing, 'The Medieval Warm Period' disappeared, as did criticism of the 'global warming orthodoxy.' Connelly has since been stripped of authority at Wikipedia, but he can obviously continue to post, edit and lie. He simply needs to sign in with a new user name - that's all it takes.

Accurate contributors can be silenced. The small group of editors known as 'deletionists' often rely on the argument that a contribution comes from an 'unreliable source,' with the competing editor deciding alone what is reliable or not. For example, when the Taliban kidnapped New York Times reporter David Rohde in Afghanistan, the paper convinced 40 media organizations plus Wikipedia not to report on it out of concerns that it would compromise Rohde's safety. Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales told the Times, once Rohde was free, that 'We were really helped by the fact that it (postings on Rohde) hadn't appeared in a place we would regard as a reliable source.' In other words Wales and other senior Wikipedia editors demonstrated how willing they are to rely on unreliable sources to delete accurate information they had been given by perfectly reliable sources, regardless of what justified it. Which leads directly to number 5 The number of active Wikipedia editors has fallen. The number of active Wikipedia editors (those who can make at least five edits a month) has significantly fallen. The reason given is that it is not worth bothering to continue in battle with 'progressive editors' with a political agenda. It is, after all, only a hobby for most people. It remains to be seen whether the current number of active editors can maintain and continue updating Wikipedia with any accuracy or honesty. It has become harder for casual participants to contribute. According to the Palo Alto Research Center, the contributions of casual and new contributors are being reversed at a much greater rate than several years ago. The result is that a steady group of high-level editors has more control over Wikipedia than ever. The 'deletionists' are said to 'edit first and ask questions later,' making it harder for new contributors to participate, and making it impossible for Wikipedia to provide 'the sum of all human knowledge.' - Their mission statement. Furthermore, Wikipedia appears to have no intention of overcoming the problem of being controlled by a stagnant pool of editors from a limited demographic and with a clear political or social agenda of their own. In many subjects Wikipedia has become a place of MISINFORMATION, SPIN and MANIPULATION and has no obvious desire to correct that. In fact, that could well be where most of their funding comes from. Vandalism Vandalism is always fun, for some tiny-minded people. Wikipedia is no exception to that and often false entries are missed and can remain online for months, if they are ever spotted at all. For example, John Seigenthaler, a former assistant to Robert Kennedy, was falsely implicated in the assassinations of the Kennedy brothers on his Wikipedia biography for a period of more than 100 days without his knowledge. This is a common problem for Wikipedia. And finally, the biggest reason of all to avoid Wikipedia as a source of reliable information Because Wikipedia themselves say so. Wikipedia's own disclaimer states, We do not expect you to trust us. It adds that it should NOT be considered a 'primary source' of information and that 'because some articles may contain errors,' you should 'not use Wikipedia to make critical decisions.' And as Wikipedia warns in its 'About' section, 'Users should be aware that not all articles are of encyclopedic quality from the start and they may contain false or debatable information.' Which is Wikipedia's own way of warning you that they CANNOT AND SHOULD NOT BE TRUSTED. - Albert Jack – Stay up to date with BangkokJack on Twitter, Instagram, & Reddit. Or join the free mailing list (top right) Please help us continue to bring the REAL NEWS - PayPal Read the full article

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reactingtosomething · 7 years

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Reacting to Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (cont’d)

Part II: What If His Mom Was the Murder Planet?

The Setup: Find Part I of our Guardians Reaction here. As usual, annotations added after the fact are in italics.

The concept art above is by Andy Park.

SPOILERS BELOW.

MIRI: Ok, I think we’ve avoided this for too long: Kris, tell me your thoughts on Baby Groot. Or perhaps your thoughts about everyone else’s thoughts about Baby Groot.

KRIS: I think Baby Groot is fine

I just feel nowhere near the amount of love The Internet feels for him

MIRI: This surprises me not at all

KRIS: And as we briefly discussed this is completely unsurprising

MIRI: Exactly

Did you find Baby Groot to be a disappointment in comparison to adult Groot?

KRIS: I do think the extended gag of him trying and failing to fetch the control fin was the best comedy writing in the movie

MIRI: Ahhhhh yes

KRIS: Yeah, I guess so, though I’m having trouble putting my finger on it

Because both versions of Groot get their heart and their humor from a contradiction

Adult Groot is outwardly imposing and then we realize he’s so innocent

MIRI: I think it’s because you know you’re supposed to find him cuter than you do

Ohhhh

KRIS: Baby Groot is outwardly cute but then we learn that he still has his viciousness

MIRI: Whereas Baby Groot is adorable but a murder baby

KRIS: Yeah

MIRI: I mean, they really have reversed the heart of the character that way.

Huh

How do I feel about that

hmmmmm

KRIS: Adult Groot gets one of the best emotional beats of Vol 1, when “I am Groot” becomes “We are Groot”

MIRI: I guess it depends on if Baby Groot is genuinely Groot, reverted to childlike form

Or if it’s like a form of propagation--basically Groot’s baby

KRIS: Whereas Baby Groot is sort of a one-trick pony, albeit in a good way where you don’t really want more than that one trick

MIRI: I really enjoyed Baby Groot as a discrete concept

KRIS: Teenage Groot was surprisingly great

MIRI: But thinking about him compared to Groot is bumming me out a little

Yes, teenage Groot was delightful

But I think that’s a one trick that would get old super fast if they do that for the whole next one

KRIS: Way to tap into your inner teenager, Vin Diesel

MIRI: I mean I feel like he doesn’t have to reach too hard

KRIS: I really want Thor to meet Groot

Fair

MIRI: Adult Groot?

KRIS: I guess whichever Groot

MIRI: I now really want to know if the Second Coming Adult Groot will be the same as Adult Groot prime

KRIS: Seems like the Innocent Warrior vibe is right on Thor’s wavelength

Or at least early Thor and Ragnarok Thor

They lost the balance in between

KRIS: On reflection, I’m not actually convinced that Wiser, More Mature Thor is a bad thing for the MCU at large, but that’s neither here nor there.

MIRI: Is young Groot growing up to be the same version of himself, or is he a new person (Grootson) being shaped by these violent but ultimately loving misfits???

KRIS: I thiiiiink the comic treats him as one continuous Groot when he regenerates

MIRI: Then is the innocence supposed to be something he grows into somehow?

I mean, he was violent in the original movie

But not as deeply so

KRIS: I think his innocence is probably supposed to be his core, especially as a metaphor for Nature

MIRI: Maybe he would have been violent to anything that was a Groot sized rat thing, he just never came across that while big

I guess the whole not understanding the water fountain thing could be read in the same vein as the failure to retrieve the crest

Also, because it needs saying at some point: I did really love Baby Groot’s dance in the opening

And the whole hat bit

KRIS: That was a great opening I want to mention our snarky Arclight usher briefly

MIRI: I loved him

KRIS: Who seemed pretty miffed that Vol 2 repeats a lot of beats from Vol 1

MIRI: I hope his failed career as a standup comedian leads him to much happiness in his life

I mean that 100% and I didn’t mean for it to sound as mean as it did

KRIS: But at least on a second viewing, I thought the callbacks and parallels were mostly effective, and that credits sequence absolutely is in the THAT WORKED column

I did not love, on a structural level, that both movies have a middle that’s defined by the Guardians getting a long World-Buildy Explanation

Complete with Visual Aids

That repetition is one of the few things that worked worse for me on a second viewing

MIRI: But Kris, they needed to use that special effects budget up, or they won’t get as much next time!

We would be remiss if we didn’t mention the glory of Yondu’s rampage after he gets out of the cell

KRIS: One reason the repeated structure works (and I’m only realizing this now) is that each movie lets Quill come to terms with his feelings for a different parent

MIRI: Because that 100% worked for me

Ahhhhhhhh that’s such a good point!

See, I’m over here like “the murder arrow sequence was so funny!” and you’re hitting the underlying emotional structures

I think that sums us both up pretty well

Unfortunately (for me)

KRIS: Oh, see, I’m still ambivalent about that, because I just think Yondu is the epitome of an action problem these movies have: our heroes are Absolute Badasses..... except when the story needs them to lose

MIRI: 1) you’re entirely right

KRIS: Like how is Yondu not just completely unstoppable

MIRI: but 2) the sequence was really cool

KRIS: It looked amazing

And the music was particularly well used, I thought (as someone who did not grow up with any of this music)

MIRI: I think part of our difference on a lot of these points is what we wanted from this movie.

I didn’t super love the first one

I really really liked it

KRIS: Oh interesting

MIRI: But I didn’t LOVE it

So I was expecting this to be fun and funny

And it was

youtube

KRIS: I was totally on the BEST THING MARVEL’S DONE train the first time I saw the first one

And then I liked it a little less on Bluray viewings

MIRI: Right! So when parts of the second one are not the best, it hits you harder

I’m just kind of fatigued with Serious Action Movie superhero movies, so I’m a little more inclined to be forgiving of the flaws in something that’s a refreshing change from that type in other ways

I have a pretty high level of suspension of disbelief when I want to

KRIS: This is very true, and here is a Vox article anyone who feels this way should read

(Basically it’s about how even on a visual level Guardians is Bringing Fun Back to Superhero Movies)

MIRI: I miss the fun! I just want some movies/shows to enjoy what they are!!!!!

(Obligatory plug for everyone to watch the hell out of Wynonna Earp and Sweet Vicious)

((RIP Sweet Vicious))

I do want to jump back to your point about the unfailing hero..until the plot demands otherwise

Because it’s a really good one

KRIS: I have to say that I want coherent action physics/fighting hierarchies in any action-heavy genre entertainment

Even if it’s leaning on the Fun Train side of things

Again, Gamora’s fluctuating strength level bothered me a lot

MIRI: Yeah, I think that is a really basic expectation that I’ve let myself be conditioned out of I think people give in to a Rule of Cool type thing too easily

KRIS: Rocket is the Rule of Cool personified

MIRI: But he was designed in a lab, so anything can work!

*rolls eyes*

(but still loves most of it in the moment)

KRIS: (There’s actually a really fun running gag in the recent-ish Guardians comics where Tony joins the team, and Rocket is constantly giving him shit for how primitive Tony’s tech is)

MIRI: that sounds amazing

KRIS: Like Tony is amazed by how convenient their communications technology is and Rocket is like how do you people get anything done?

MIRI: But seriously: yes, it looks awesome for Gamora to pick up the gun that is literally bigger than her, but if she’s that strong she needs to always be that strong

KRIS: Gamora also ends up being strangled a lot for some reason throughout these movies

I don’t THINK it’s a creepy gendered thing because Ronan also almost kills Drax by strangling

But it’s like this lazy “oh what’s a position of weakness to put our action hero in” thing

I guess/hope

MIRI: You know what is a creepy gender thing? The supposedly super practical assassin always wearing crop tops and boots with heels

KRIS: WHAT is with those heels?

MIRI: THANK YOU It might be partially because she’s a very petite woman

KRIS: They’re a carryover from Vol 1 when they make even less sense

MIRI: if I recall correctly

KRIS: Yes but

MIRI: I know

KRIS: ScarJo has elevated heels in the Avengers movies

But they’re blocky so you can’t tell unless you’re looking

Because it’s mostly to make her taller

But Gamora’s have those goofy holes in them!

MIRI: Anytime you can get Kris talking very specifically about things he doesn’t know the names of is a good time. (Not that I know exactly what to call the “goofy holes” either)

MIRI: I also have some concerns about Mantis. She is really subservient

And I don’t think any sort of gender/ethnicity thing was intended, but it’s still pretty unfortunate

KRIS: Hmm yeah

MIRI: Also, I don’t think it should be ignored that the actors who are POC end up in full body paint more than the white dudes

KRIS: I think it mostly slipped by for me because with Nebula as a bigger presence and Ayesha (Elizabeth Debicki) as a secondary villain, Mantis didn’t feel too “token girl” and there was a decent range of character types for the women

But low bars and all that

Yes the POC thing is sticky

MIRI: Again, no one’s intention, I’m sure. But it’s always the white guy (named Chris) who is the starting point, and then they fill in the universe from there, which makes everyone else automatically some flavor of Other

Oh, real quick on Ayesha: When she had her hair down she made me think of Ivanka Trump

I genuinely believe that is how Ivanka Trump sees herself

KRIS: Oh man yeah

MIRI: I cannot back it up in any way, but I know it to be true

KRIS: While we’re on the Sovereign, the whole arcade setup for their ships was a pretty good gag

And even almost came into the general vicinity of commenting on the gamification of war

MIRI: Yes! Really liked them going from dignity to anger at losing the game

KRIS: That is probably the most (unduly?) generous thing I will say about the writing

MIRI: Ok, I’m thinking about low bars and things we’re tired of having to complain about and I have a thought

What if Quill didn’t have the obligatory dead mom?

What if he had a dead dad?

And his mom was the murder planet

KRIS: I’m listening

MIRI: I think there would be so much more there in terms of our expectations of a mother figure

And the question of creation vs destruction

I suppose it fits less with our general narrative of Judeo Christian creation and males as spending their genes as widely as possible

MIRI: Or, you know, spreading

KRIS: Right right

MIRI: But I also think it’s less played out and therefore more interesting if you reverse it some I don’t have anything more coherent to say, but I like the idea

KRIS: Yeah, here we can definitely say that as thematically perfect as Papa Planet’s self-obsession was for a Quill arc, it’s also a really good example of why we want and need other types of people writing and directing these stories

One of Caroline’s AV Club pieces I like a lot was about how Daredevil explores different masculinities

And Guardians 2 definitely strikes me as exploring, in a simpler way, sort of foundational ideas we have about Being a Man

KRIS: Where I sort of forgot I was going here was that even though I think the Ego/Quill stuff makes a lot of thematic sense, "Being a Man” is not exactly untrodden territory, and a woman writing and/or directing a story like this could probably have found a theme that hasn’t been done to death in this genre space.

MIRI: I’m wondering about the fact that barely touched on stories often work better than secondary ones--in this case Nebula (esp in Volume 1) vs Gamora. I think it might be because when writing Gamora, they’re very aware of writing The Woman’s story, and keeping her accessible as a love interest. Whereas Nebula is a factor in that story, rather than her own story. So she gets less well-intentioned-but-poorly-executed thought and is instead just written as a character

Does that make any sense?

KRIS: Yyyyes

MIRI: I saw Guardians 2 as more of an exploration of how to be a family than how to be a man, but I definitely think Being a Man is a big factor, if only because men are most of the characters

KRIS: I do think family was sort of the all-encompassing theme, but in the A-story I thought there was a definite thread of interrogating Quill’s macho-ness through his dad

Or interrogating is too fancy of a word but you know what I mean

MIRI: right

youtube

KRIS: Re: family, all I really had for “Fast and Furious parallels” was “affectless bald man saying ‘Family’”

MIRI: But would you say Yondu’s is more Man or family? hahahahahahhaa

KRIS: Hmmm

MIRI: And also Vin Diesel is there

KRIS: I guess I’d split the difference and say Father?

or “Daddy,” I guess

MIRI: Yeah I did not enjoy the Daddy line

KRIS: Can we go back to the romance question for a minute?

MIRI: Always!

KRIS: Do you think Pratt and Saldana have chemistry?

I don’t really feel it

MIRI: Huh. I don’t think they do

And I think at least part of that has to come from the weird inconsistencies in her character

She’s supposed to be all conservative and removed and immune to his pelvic sorcery

But she’s also wearing these ridiculous outfits with half her tits showing

MIRI: Please note that I am a fan of people showing as much or as little of their tits as they choose, but when it’s a character and it makes NO SENSE for that character in any other way I call bullshit

KRIS: Yeah that makes sense. I will probably not hate the eventual official Becoming a Couple because they’ve been low key and patient about it, but since they don’t have Tony-Pepper level chemistry it’s definitely easier to get pulled out of it and just see “oh, designated endgame”

MIRI: Yeah, the strings are very much visible there And I don’t hate it but I definitely don’t love it

KRIS: I mean I would have LOVED if the way they took the family theme had been specifically “orphan siblings” so Gamora became everyone’s sister

Which would have added an interesting level of resentment to Nebula’s story here

MIRI: I mean I’m always low-key annoyed that the 1/5 gender ratio means the woman is always eventually going to be in a relationship dynamic while the men only are if it fits, because of that same disparity

KRIS: Yep

MIRI: YES YES YES

That would have been so interesting!!!

This little crew of orphans, which 3 of them very much are already

Finding family and support in the middle of being violent bounty hunters jetting through space

That is all I ever want ever

KRIS: I also just finished rewatching Selfie, if anyone is looking for something else where Karen Gillan is alternately hilarious, hangry, and heartbreaking, that doesn’t demand the time or emotional commitment of Doctor Who.

KRIS: I guess we should tie this off pretty soon. Any last major thoughts?

MIRI: I really enjoyed it, and I’m here for more things being enjoyable

That said, the fact that they did some things SO well does make the more sizable inconsistencies grate a bit more in retrospect

KRIS: I will always wish everyone could write dialogue better, and I’m pretty sure like the first one better, but I’ve largely come around to enthusiastic approval

And ACT 2 IS SO SLOW

except when it cuts to Rocket and Yondu

MIRI: I am in awe of their balance of humor and action. Really blew a lot of other films out of the water on that score

Oh, and props to Sean Gunn for pulling his fairly absurd character off with grace!

“I didn’t mean to do a mutiny. They killed all my friends”

KRIS: Yeah, the best way to watch this is as a family dramedy with action bookends

KRIS: Should clarify here that I meant “family” in the sense of theme, as opposed to “fun for the whole family!”, but I have heard of friends-of-friends bringing 8-year-olds or so to see it with no problems.

MIRI: in that accent/voice and I still bought it 100%

KRIS: Yeah he worked really well

And I forget where but you can probably find a really sweet interview with James Gunn about how he loves working with his brother

MIRI: awww

You know how I love the sibling relationships

KRIS: Karen Gillan for Secretary of Swagger and/or Sullenness

MIRI: Oh, and I never need to see a nervous system becoming a man from the inside out ever again. That needs to stop being a thing

KRIS: Swagger more so in Vol 1, I guess

MIRI: Very much agreed

I need her to be in more things

Ok, done?

KRIS: Yes

In closing

I’M MARY POPPINS, Y’ALL

MIRI: Yes, he is cool!

#guardians of the galaxy #Miri #Kris #mcu #guardians spoilers #Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 #movies #superheroes #reaction

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wbwest · 7 years

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New Post has been published on http://www.williambrucewest.com/2017/06/16/west-week-ever-pop-culture-review-61617/

West Week Ever: Pop Culture In Review - 6/16/17

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Hot on the heels of the poster reveal last Friday, we got a teaser trailer for Black Panther during the NBA Finals. And it did very little for me. Yeah, I know. Every other Black person I know is, as they say, “hype” for this movie, but I just have never cared about Black Panther as a character. And I know comic book movies require suspension of disbelief, but Michael B. Jordan plays a villain named KILLMONGER! That’s probably the comic bookiest name I’ve ever been forced to take seriously. It certainly looks colorful, and it’s gonna make all the monies, but I’m gonna need to see more before I get too excited.

Let’s talk about Black Panther for a minute, though, as I think people are conflating his comic book success with his appearances in all other media. At the moment, there are currently 3 Black Panther comics on the stands: 1) Black Panther, 2) World of Wakanda, and 3) Black Panther & The Crew. Also at this moment, the latter two have already been canceled. I’ve seen people online saying that Marvel should rethink their stance, considering all the views the trailer has racked up in its week online (22.6 million as I write this). I get what they’re trying to say, but it’s a faulty argument. Their assumption is that people are clamoring for all the Black Panther they can get, when it’s really just this one movie to which they’re looking forward.

When the Black Panther comic was relaunched last year, written by author Ta-Nehisi Coates, the first issue sold over 250,000 copies, which was a rare feat for 2016. Now, however, the book sells about 1/9 of that amount, and is still decreasing. Ya see, Coates was hot shit because of an article on reparations that he wrote for The Atlantic. Why someone thought that would translate into a successful stint writing comics is beyond me. Marvel struck while the iron was hot, though, and they were able to ride the Coates wave, but anyone who’s actually read the comic knows that he’s more about political drama than superhero action. People came to the table to see what he’d offer, but over time they’ve realized they’re not picking up what he’s putting down. Still, Marvel gave him yet another series, Black Panther & The Crew, which probably should’ve been called Black Panther and His Negrotastic Pals. I bought the first issue, but the book was canceled before I even had the chance to read it, so womp womp. It could be argued that Coates wasn’t the right choice for the book, but I think a better explanation is that Marvel blew their wad too soon. They should’ve been launching these spinoffs in the wake of the trailer, not cancelling them. Still, the damage is already done, so it’s not like they can let them tread water until the movie is released. If anything, they’re gonna have to cancel and relaunch if they want to capitalize on movie buzz. The ship, however, has sailed for the books currently on the market because this trailer is not going to serve as the shot in the arm that some folks seem to believe it to be.

Fox has got the ball rolling on X-Men: Dark Phoenix, the follow-up to the disappointing X-Men: Apocalypse. It will be directed by Simon Kinberg, who has no directing experience by the way, and is slated to be released November 2nd, 2018. And the gang’s all here, with Fassbender, Lawrence, and McAvoy are all coming back. If you remember, they tried to act like they were on the fence about returning after Apocalypse, but I guess they love money too much. Meanwhile, they’re saying that Jessica Chastain is being pursued to play alien Shi’ar Empress Lilandra, who lets Xavier bone her every couple of years. Did I mention that Kinberg wrote X-Men: The Last Stand? Ya know, the LAST time they did the Dark Phoenix storyline?! THE ONE EVERYBODY HATED?! So they’re basically giving him do-over! Everything about this sounds terrible, but we’ll probably get another cool Quicksilver sequence out of it, this time set to La Bouche’s “Be My Lover” or some other disposable 90s pop song.

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Normally, I’m all about those stories where they “get the band back together”, so I was definitely surprised when this video hit the Internet this week. I miss the age of the $20 million comedy, where Hollywood was cranking these things out monthly in the mid ’00s. Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story was one of my favorites, so I had high hopes for this thing, whatever it was supposed to be. Still, 13 years have passed since the movie, and this “return to the well” felt just as stale as Zoolander 2. Its saving grace is the fact that it’s only 4 minutes long (which still, somehow, feel like an eternity). I don’t even know where to start with this thing. The unfunniness of Stiller? The weak delivery from Christine Taylor? Or the fact that I don’t have a clue as to what the Hell Omaze is? Apparently it raises money for non-profits, but it’s far from a household name. I don’t know if this is the bold step Omaze needed to take to make a name for themselves. “Hey, look – we’re making a mini sequel to a 13 year old movie that didn’t need a sequel!” This thing seems dead on arrival, and I’d love to somehow be able to track the success/failure of this marketing initiative. Ugh, so much potential, squandered.

Bachelor in Paradise had its production suspended this week after accounts of “misconduct” began to surface. According to varying reports, Corinne Olympios from the most recent season of The Bachelor was involved in some pretty “heavy petting”, as your grandma would call it, with DeMario Jackson from season 13 of The Bachelorette. From what I heard, they were both drunk and tried to have sex. DeMario, unfortunately, couldn’t…”ready his soldier for battle”, so he “went downtown” instead. Corinne’s friend, who’s a producer on the show, told her that it’d look bad for her to be getting serviced on camera like that. A lot of other contestants reportedly witnessed the event, and said that the two were even seen canoodling together later that night. Then, Corinne started saying that she couldn’t remember the events of the night, and that she had never given consent for what happened. So now both sides are lawyered up, blaming the other for character assassination and worse. Oh, by the way, if you’re not familiar with Bachelor In Paradise, it’s a spinoff where the contestants are encouraged to get drunk and try to fuck. So…mission accomplished?

The format of the show was just asking for a controversy like this, and I’m amazed that it took this long for something like this to hit the Bachelor franchise. I don’t know anything about DeMario, but the one season of The Bachelor that I watched featured Corinne as the villain of the season. She was constantly boasting of her sexual prowess, saying things like “My ‘vagine’ is platinum.” Her tactic to win the show was to throw herself at The Bachelor early and often. Now, some folks are gonna interpret this as me saying she “deserved” this. If this was sexual assault, nobody deserves something like that. All I’m saying is that she was strategic in using sex to get what she wanted, and quick to cower when it didn’t work out as planned. Bachelor Nick Viall rebuffed all of her advances last season, and she’d end up pouting in her room, or taking a nap during the rose ceremony. She was notoriously immature yet manipulative. Word on the street was that she was up for her own show, but this little episode might’ve jeopardized the chances of that.

The most interesting part of this whole thing is that THEY HAVE THE TAPE! LET’S GO TO THE DAMN TAPE! How damning is that tape that it hasn’t been released yet? The production is most likely over for good, as the contestants have been sent home. The future of the show is in jeopardy because of this ordeal as there doesn’t really seem to be any coming back from this. The reality show fuck house actually turned into a fuck house. I guess their plan worked a little too well. If the show does come back, this is a watershed moment for dating shows, as nothing will be the same after this. Remember how talk shows changed when the Jenny Jones Murder took place? After that, they all became more staged, and Jerry Springer thrived in its wake. Now you can’t trust anything you see during daytime, while a show like Donahue couldn’t exist in the current climate. They’re gonna have to treat future iterations of The Bachelor with kid gloves, which isn’t what people come to see. When folks watch these shows, they wanna see if the contestants are gonna hook up. Now, they realize that standards and practices won’t allow that to be shown, but they still wanna see as much as the network will allow them to see. All these years after Joe Millionaire aired on Fox, folks don’t remember it for its janky premise (poor guy pretends to be a millionaire in order to find love from a pool of gold diggers), but rather for the scene of “Joe” (Evan Marriott) and contestant Sarah Kozer in the woods with some intense slurping on the audio. Lewd, yes, but boundary-pushing for 2003 and everyone was talking about it. The goal of these shows is to produce something to dominate the conversation for a while and, in that case, this whole thing has been a success. Still, there are serious matters at hand that need to be addressed, as folks are losing jobs (DeMario got fired for the allegations), and could also end up in jail.

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After something like a year in teases, we finally have our release date for the DuckTales reboot: Aug 12th. The show will premiere on DisneyXD as an hour-long “mini movie”, and then be rebroadcast for the next 24 hours on the channel. Then, the series will officially premiere on September 23rd, with 2 new episodes. As you saw above, we also got the new credit sequence and theme song. Some of the old fuddy duddies have taken issue with the remixed theme, but I love it. The most surprising thing to me is the new jacked Mrs. Beakley, but I figure there’ll be an in-series explanation for all that.

In the world of toys, Hasbro unveiled the full Netflix wave of Marvel Legends figures, and they look so great. In the beginning, I was scared these were gonna turn out to be exclusive to a particular retailer, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. We already knew about Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and Punisher, but the wave is rounded out by Elektra, as well as comic versions of Blade and Bullseye. As an added surprise, there’s a Build A Figure in the form of Man-Thing. That character means nothing to me, but I’ll be buying the whole wave, so someone give me a shout if you wanna buy Man-Thing off me. That’s right, I’m offering my Man-Thing in exchange for money. I think that might be illegal…

Song of the Week

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This week’s song is Morgan Wallen’s “The Way I Talk”, mainly because I completely identify with it. If you’ve ever spoken with me, the first question people tend to ask is “Where are you from? You sound SOUTHERN!” Also, I spent more time than I’d like to admit trying to figure out if that actually was a sample from Spacehog’s “In The Meantime” at the beginning (verdict: inconclusive).

Things You Might Have Missed This Week

CMT is seriously considering reviving Tim Allen’s canceled ABC sitcom, Last Man Standing. They already air the reruns, so it seems like a natural fit.

An Injustice 2 eSports tournament will air on TBS in October. We’re really trying to make “eSports” a thing, huh?

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt has been renewed for a 4th season at Netflix. One of these days I’ll finally finish seasons 2 and 3…

Aisha Tyler announced yesterday that she will be leaving The Talk at the end of the season, due to her current commitments on Criminal Minds, Whose Line Is It Anyway?, and Archer. Plus, she’ll be directing an upcoming film. Yeah, that’s probably enough jobs for one person.

Someone named Anthony Padilla is leaving something called Smosh. Apparently it’s a thing on the YouTubes. If you’ve got a tween, they can probably explain whatever this means.

In an update to something I mentioned last week, Sony has revised their plans to sell clean versions of their movies. Since it was found that the plan violated union contracts, now Sony will only offer clean versions of movies that have been approved by the director.

ABC has renewed “Toy Shark Tank”, AKA The Toy Box, for a second season.

I took a trip down memory lane to talk about the old Toy Biz Customer Service hotline.

In a baffling move, Amazon is buying Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion. I haven’t been as confused about a business deal since K-Mart bought Sears.

When I first started West Week Ever, I came up with a No Death Policy. Even though I get kinda negative on here, I still want it to be a positive place. I have a bit of an odd history with death, as I became acquainted with it at an early age, so I like to stay away from all that. Plus, there’s that problem where if you mention one death, you’ve gotta mention ALL the deaths, and ain’t nobody got time for that – especially if that death didn’t really mean anything to me. Still, when I created this feature, I always knew there would be at least 2 important exceptions. I wasn’t looking forward to them, but given their age and health, I knew it would be something I’d have to tackle eventually. Sadly, one of those deaths occurred last Saturday.

When I was growing up, there were few things I looked forward to as much as the 1966 Batman series, weekday afternoons on Fox 5. While I’d gotten the Super Powers Batman and Batmobile toys when I was around 4, I really didn’t know anything about Batman until I was introduced to that show. Hell, I remember how I used to think Batman could fly. I mean, he had a cape! All people with capes fly, right? Anyway, like any kid, I was mesmerized by the POW! ZAP! BIFF! of the fight sequences. I was on the edge of my seat for the end of episode cliffhanger. I’d tie a sheet around my neck, and shadow box along with the Dynamic Duo as they fought King Tut’s goons. I also had a next door neighbor, Brian, who was a few years younger than me (he was 7 when I was 11, as I remember him thinking that was cool), and he worshipped the ground I walked on. He’d come over, and we’d be Batman and Robin, fighting invisible goons with gadgets I’d made from Construx and jump ropes. My concept of Batman was formed by Adam West and Burt Ward, walking up the side of buildings with their Bat Ropes.

As I grew up, I was introduced to other depictions of the Caped Crusader. I started reading comics in ’92, around the time that the classic Batman: The Animated Series debuted. Those versions of Batman were totally different than what I’d grown up knowing. The environment wasn’t as campy, the world was a darker place, and Batman wasn’t doing the Batusi. Over the years, I’ve had even more versions of Batman that I’ve compared to West’s rendition, but I’ve come to appreciate him even more. While the world around him was wacky, West’s Bruce Wayne/Batman was solid. He was smart, calculating, and always knew more than the folks around him. Can you imagine a “Tower of Babel” storyline (the classic JLA story where Batman takes down the rest of the Justice League using contingency plans he’d set up for all of them), starring West’s Batman? I can, and it would be AMAZING.

It seems life wasn’t too shabby for West offscreen, either. According to several stories, he was quite the hit with the ladies, and even had an 8-woman orgy with Riddler Frank Gorshin. ZOWIE! While he never really achieved mega success with anything else, he still established himself as a cult superstar, with his turn in Conan O’Brien’s failed pilot Lookwell, as well as his role as Mayor West on Family Guy, which introduced him to a new generation of fans. Other actors who portrayed Batman went on to other things. For Clooney, Kilmer, and Bale, the role is just another notch on the IMDB profile, but West WAS Batman. With the exception of probably Kevin Conroy, no one else has been so closely identified with the role as Adam West. At the end of the day, he’s the Batman that I always come back to, and the one to which I compare all newcomers. Adam West, born William West Anderson (hey, look at that!), was MY Batman and I think we were all lucky to have him. No, he didn’t have the West Week Ever. I don’t think that’s enough of an honor to indicate what he meant to me. So, with that in mind, Adam West is the inaugural inductee to the West Week Ever Hall of Fame. Farewell, old chum.

#Batman #Comics #Country #Marvel #Movies #Music #Pop #Race #Television #Toys #Video Games #West Week Ever #West Week Ever Hall of Fame #X-Men

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5 Crazy Recent News Stories That Didn’t Get Enough Attention

Most people read the headlines of a couple of political stories shared by their most untrustworthy friend on Facebook and feel like they’re pretty well-informed. But the daily large-scale dramas of the Trump administration, mass shootings, Russian agents being assassinated, and the world generally seeming like a montage of newscasts from a ’50s sci-fi movie have overshadowed some utterly insane news that, in a different era, would have dominated headlines for weeks.

So here are five stories that have yet to receive the proper “Wait, what the fuck?!” reaction that they deserve.

The Government Said It Has Mysterious Alloys Recovered From UFOs

Two Pulitzer-Prize-winning reporters made public some fascinating footage captured by military pilots of an unidentified flying object zipping across the skies, making sharp turns and occasionally hovering like a helicopter, and all with no visible signs of propulsion. With the internet as it is, we should’ve been drowned in stories about how “Independence Day PREDICTED THE FUTURE” or whatever.

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The footage is odd, for sure. But it only makes up like 0.5 percent of the craziness within the New York Times article it came from.

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Get Your Head In The Game With This Xbox Live Gold Offer

The article says that between 2007 and 2012, there was something called the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program running out of the Pentagon, where at least one employee had the X-Files theme as their ringtone and their co-workers hated them for it. Their task was to investigate mysterious aerial phenomena. While there’s a good chance they had a rubber stamp that read “It’s just another damn drone from Walmart” so they wouldn’t have to write it out all the time, the AATIP’s creator, former Senator Harry Reid, fought to secure the program’s findings, fearing that the United States would be helpless to defend itself from the technologies it discovered. That’s the kind of shit you say to justify keeping Magneto in a plastic cell underground.

Luis Elizondo, the former head of the AATIP, referenced “the many accounts from the Navy and other services of unusual aerial systems interfering with military weapon platforms and displaying beyond-next-generation capabilities.” And most of the program’s $22 million budget over five years went to an aerospace technology company owned by a billionaire named Robert Bigelow, who 100 percent believes aliens have visited earth. And that brings us to the pant-shitting part:

“Under Mr. Bigelow’s direction, the company modified buildings in Las Vegas for the storage of metal alloys and other materials that Mr. Elizondo and program contractors said had been recovered from unidentified aerial phenomena. Researchers also studied people who said they had experienced physical effects from encounters with the objects and examined them for any physiological changes.”

Ah, OK. So. WHAT THE FUCK. Is it just a rash, or a headache, or are these people District 9-ing and morphing into a new species that should be shot in the head?

Live Science tried debunking some of the article’s claims by asking scientists and professors what they thought about it. Their grand conclusion is that there is no way an alloy could be unidentified. Thanks, guys. Excellent observation. There’s no way there are things out there that we don’t know! is some shit-ass expertise. They didn’t even try explaining the claim that the alloys are physically affecting people who interact with them. And it’s hard to blame them. If I think about it for a second, my brain goes to scary places that make me want to hide under a bed and cry.

The whole article makes it seem like there are a lot of high-ranking government officials who are certain aliens are real, that they have visited us, and we should probably fear what they might try to do to us. So on a day-to-day basis, you should feel a tinge of anxiety about your career, the well-being of your children, whether democracy will hold in America, and maybe also aliens with their poisonous ship junk.

A Man Spent Years Building His Own Submarine, Then Allegedly Used It To Brutally Murder A Journalist

Every once in a while, a sensational murder case — usually involving an attractive female victim — will take over the country for months. This case is weirder than every one of those combined, and nobody cared.

Peter Madsen had been building his own 55-foot submarine for years. We even wrote about his efforts back in 2010. Kim Wall was a freelance journalist who was just another in a long line to document Peter’s impressively productive waste of time. This sounds like the start of a quirky indie film.

But it’s fuckin’ not.

She set up an interview and two-hour test ride for August 10th, 2017. After the two hours were up, Wall’s boyfriend got suspicious that he hadn’t heard from her, so he called the police. Madsen was later rescued from his sinking submarine off the southern coast of Copenhagen — without Wall. Unless your passenger reveals their true kraken form, it’s weird to return to shore with fewer people than when you left. Madsen claimed that he dropped her off onshore hours earlier, which doesn’t quite align with the fact that her torso was found at sea days later.

At a pretrial hearing a couple of weeks later, Madsen testified that he buried Wall at sea after she was killed by a blow to the head from a 155-pound submarine hatch. Ah, the classic “She was murdered by the submarine, not me” defense. This did not hold up, as forensics found that her skull had no fractures and her throat had been either cut or strangled when she died. More of her body parts started washing up, and they concluded that her limbs had been forcibly removed with a saw and stuffed into plastic bags that were weighed down with metal pipes. She had also been stabbed 15 times.

Madsen’s trial is underway, and maybe it’s not getting any attention because everybody thinks they already know who did it? If so, doesn’t the fact that a man allegedly spent years building a murder submarine specifically so he could do this seem worthy of notice? What in the hell does it take to capture the national imagination these days?

There Is Now Software That Can Put Any Real Person Into Porn Videos, Including You Or Your Mom, Or Both

The future is NOW. Sadly, it’s only for creeps who want to jerk off to fake Scarlett Johansson porn. The technology that’s making it possible is called Deepfake. It’s an AI-driven software that can swap out a person’s face in video footage with someone else’s. Sometimes it’s convincing, other times it looks like their heads are painfully phasing in and out of reality.

That’s how you get Raiders Of The Lost Ark starring Nicolas Cage:

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It’s also how you ruin the joke of an SNL sketch starring Nicolas Cage:

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But it’s mostly for porn. And like all pursuits popular among sad lonely men, it was very popular on Reddit. Luckily, Reddit banned the Deepfakes subreddit not long after it was created — a bold moral stance for a site that lures you in with memes and then knocks you out with a one-two punch of white supremacy and misogyny. Bans on other big platforms like Discord, Twitter, and even PornHub soon followed, even though the underlying technology still exists for free on the internet.

What’s odd is that once it was banned across multiple sites, we reverted back to a pre-Deepfakes mindset, as if we don’t all live in the prologue of a new world where Donald Trump’s rumored pee tape might surface and the mere existence of Deepfakes would be enough for his supporters to call bullshit. We might one day look back at people on a subreddit putting Taylor Swift’s face on a porn star as innocent compared to a future in which a murderer whose face was clearly captured by security footage gets off scot-free because of the plausible deniability of Deepfakes. It’s a scary future where documented proof could be brushed away with a simple “That’s not me, that’s a fake — a deep fake” *winks at camera*.

Also, it means literally every woman who posts her face to the internet will wind up in a fake porn video / sex tape at some point. So there’s that, too.

A “Swatting” Prank Finally Got Someone Killed

You know what’s a real gut-busting joke that always leaves audiences rolling in the aisles? When SWAT teams charge into innocent people’s homes with shotguns and semiautomatic rifles drawn, intent on killing someone if it means stopping a hostage situation, all based on a tip obtained from a prank phone call. My sides! The sheer terror everyone involved must feel is making me pee a little!

If you don’t think it’s funny, then you’re not one of the many teenagers who’ve performed this “prank” because they’ve yet to develop a tangible fear of how utterly screwed their lives will be if the 9-1-1 call is traced back to them. The targets tend to be Twitch streamers, since a SWAT team’s entrance can turn an Overwatch stream into the drug raid scene from Goodfellas. Dozens of celebrities have also been swatted, like Miley Cyrus, Tom Cruise, and Clint Eastwood. Many of these people were lucky to not have been killed. SWAT teams have a long, horrific history of killing innocent people and/or their dogs during raids, in case you needed a cartoonishly ghoulish detail to further turn your stomach.

In an era when the media will drum up a moral panic over everything from violent video games to eating Tide Pods, you’d think this swatting thing would have been the subject of several congressional hearings by now. Especially since in December 2017, a swatting prank ended with someone dead, like every human who’d heard of swatting knew would eventually happen. Some random guys had placed a bet on the outcome of a Call Of Duty: WWII multiplayer match. An argument broke out, and one of the participants decided to get his just desserts by having a SWAT team sent to another person’s house. You know, as one does. The target of the swatting gave a false address. It was the home of a guy named Andrew Finch.

The person who initiated the swatting hired an intermediary to do it for them, Tyler Barriss. He was essentially a swatting hitman with a reputation for calling in swats on behalf of people who don’t want to get caught doing it themselves. And his Twitter handle was “SWauTistic,” because he’s a professional who believes in discretion. Barriss called the Wichita police and reported that someone at Finch’s house had shot their own father in the head and was holding their mother hostage. When Finch answered the knock at his door, a Wichita SWAT officer immediately pulled the trigger. Finch was unarmed and nonviolent. His friends say he didn’t even play video games.

Barriss has been charged with involuntary manslaughter, giving false alarm, and interference with a law enforcement officer. Finch’s mother is suing the Wichita Police Department. And even with a cop’s itchy trigger finger, there’s no denying that if Barriss had instead called and asked if Fincher’s refrigerator was running, he would still be alive today.

Swatting has become a dangerous trend which, unlike the aforementioned Tide Pod eating, is actually happening and is actually harming people. California State Senator Ted Lieu, New Jersey State Assemblyman Paul Moriarty, and Massachusetts Congresswoman Katherine Clark have all proposed anti-swatting legislation — all three have been swatted in response.

A Scandal Involving Cops Forcing Nude Photos From A Teenage Boy Ended In Suicide

Before I get into it, just know this story deals with the sexual molestation of a minor. So it’s not going to be as rip-roaringly funny as swatting.

17-year-old Trey Sims sent a video of his penis to his 15-year-old girlfriend. In the state of Virginia, this paradoxically made him the creator and victim of child pornography. The detective assigned to the case, David E. Abbott, obtained a warrant to take pictures of Sims’ penis to match it with the penis in the video, as if the police have a dick pic database that analyzes head-to-balls distance and pubic hair density to find a perfect match. Of course, all of this is necessary, since it’s so difficult to identify a dick when it doesn’t have a tattoo or a peg leg. Why that warrant wasn’t contested from the start is a mystery.

Another mystery is why, at one point, Abbott decided to start taking pictures of Sims’ penis with his personal cellphone.

Detective Abbot deemed the pictures insufficient, because somehow Sims couldn’t get erect with cops recording him masturbating. Which they had asked him to do, you know, so the pics would match the ones he was accused of sending. Wait, who is this law supposed to protect, again? Anyway, Abbot asked for a second state-sponsored permission slip to photograph a teenager’s erect penis. Abbott also threatened to force feed Sims erectile dysfunction pills, because he was determined to get a picture of a kid’s erect penis come hell or high water, goddamn it.

It was granted, but then halted after Sims’ lawyers made a big deal about the first dick pic photo shoot in the media, claiming the police had infringed upon Sims’ Fourth Amendment rights. That’s the one that prevents the government from conducting unreasonable searches and seizures, in essence calling James Madison an idiot for not foreseeing the need to include a line about the sovereignty of teenage dicks in the Constitution.

Charges against Sims were eventually dropped after he served probation. And with that out of the way, it was time to sue Abbott. But the focal point of the lawsuit shifted from Abbott to Claiborne T. Richardson II, the guy who approved both warrants. This shift happened after Abbott shot himself in his goddamned front yard right before county police officers were going to arrest him on suspicion of molesting boys when he was a youth hockey coach. I just want to reiterate here that this story was barely a blip on the national media’s radar.

Sims’ lawsuit was thrown out when a judge said that Richardson and Abbott were immune, since the Fourth Amendment surprisingly makes no mention of cops taking pictures of a teen’s penis. Everyone up and down the chain kept coming up with creative interpretations of the law to protect a dead detective who killed himself to avoid charges of molesting a minor. The common argument was that Abbott was just following orders. But he was the one who asked for the warrant. Has your head exploded yet?

After four years of this shit, the Fourth Circuit Court sided with Sims, finally deciding that teenage penises are in fact covered by the Fourth Amendment. See? Everything is fine. Nothing to see here.

Luis’ brain feels funny after he played with unknown alloys. In the meantime, you can find him on Twitter, Tumblr, and Facebook.

A previous version of the column stated that Andrew Finch was playing Call of Duty and had been directly involved in the online argument before he was swatted. That was incorrect. The text has been changed to reflect that.

Uhhh … have a stress ball or several.

Support Cracked’s journalism with a visit to our Contribution Page. Please and thank you.

For more stories you should have heard about but probably didn’t, check out 29 Pieces Of Good News That Got Choked Out By Trump Stories and 7 Pieces Of Good News About Huge Stories (No One Told You).

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Read more: http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-crazy-recent-news-stories-that-didnt-get-enough-attention/

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spynotebook · 7 years

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Greetings, general public whom I serve! “Postal Apocalypse,” io9's mail column, has returned for a second week in a row, so I’ve got a pretty hot streak going on. I’ll try to keep it up! Meanwhile, you’ve got questions about Civil War II, Rogue One, The Winds of Winter, the next Indiana Jones movie, and more. Coincidentally, I have answers.

The Assassination of Carol Danvers by the Knuckleknob, Marvel Comics

Jason M.:

Dear Postman of the future, I need you to tell me about the future by answering a question about...seeing the future.

Ignoring a lot of the secondary reasons most people hated Civil War II, the biggest area of discontent was how people hated the “character assassination” of Captain Marvel due to her outrageous support of Minority Reporting situations via Ulysses. One thing that shocked me is how literally every post, article, comment, and tweet I read said that anyone who would try to fight crimes that haven’t happened yet is horrible and wrong.

And yet...let’s say that something of this scale was all real. Like, a week from now a 50-story guy in a purple dress and the universe’s most fascinating hat showed up to LITERALLY EAT OUR PLANET. Or someone in an Eastern European country who studied science in the US before a horrible accident invented a time machine and was going back in time rewrite the US out of existence. If these types of planetary extinction events were possible (or even the casual cases of powered beings stomping down the street on a daily basis killing or injuring hundreds), wouldn’t you want, nay, demand that we use future-profiling it to stop crimes/events before they happen?

I think Civil War II’s biggest mistake was assuming that people would think of it in real-world terms, not comic-world terms. If some visions of the future could stop a gray dude who bedazzled an oven mitt from killing half the universe, sign me up.

I get what you’re saying, but the real problem is that Marvel was the one thinking about it in “real-world” terms. Had Ulysses’ visions been contained to preventing giant natural disasters like Galactus (and yes, although he is a big dude who wears purple, he has no more intent to do evil than an earthquake does) and/or stopping the biggest, most thoroughly evil supervillains’ plans, things probably would have been fine. Ulysses’ power would basically be a smoke alarm for trouble and evil—detect smoke, stop it before something catches fire. Who could argue with that?

No one, which is why Marvel had to exacerbate the problem so it could have its superheroes punching each other again. The issue had to be morally gray so that Carol and Tony could argue about it, which, as everyone has noticed, basically turned into the plot of Minority Report. So the argument became not just about using Ulysses’ visions to prevent disasters or thwart supervillains’ plans, Captain Marvel used it to imprison people for crimes they hadn’t even thought of committing yet, and that’s messed up.

Let’s go back to the Doctor Doom example: Based on Doom’s long history of being evil, yeah, he probably would eventually build a time machine and attempt to erase the US. But if until he starts actively trying to make the time machine, he has technically not committed a crime—well, not that crime. You would be punishing him for a crime he didn’t commit.

To be fair, Doctor Doom is a poor example, as are most comic book supervillains. They’ve all been evil for decades, so it’s harder to argue that they haven’t already earned life sentences. So imprisoning them for the many crimes they have committed, and their long history of evil, to predict their future behavior is a bit more understandable.

But of course, that’s also not what Captain Marvel was doing. She was imprisoning anyone Ulysses saw committing a crime, regardless of who that person was. She was arresting US citizens, not only without a trial, but again without them having done anything wrong (see above). Best example: Miles Morales, who she wanted to arrest after that vision of him killing Captain America several months in the future. Miles Morales has been a hero 100 percent of the time he’s operated as Ultimate Spider-Man. He’s never done anything like that before, and it’s clear that he had no intention or designs to do it. He was shocked and appalled by the vision as anyone else. But Carol was willing to imprison Miles on the mere possibility he would eventually murder Cap.

This isn’t just morally wrong, it’s stupid. Even if Ulysses’ visions were always 100 percent, inexorably correct—spoiler alert, they aren’t—they don’t give any context about the event. So, as crazy as it sounds, when Miles kills Captain America in the future, there could be some mitigating circumstances—circumstances like, oh, I don’t know, Captain America having been Cosmic Cube-ed into a Hydra agent. All she saw was a vision—nothing else. No motivations, no reasons, no explanations. And she just assumed Miles was guilty anyway.

There’s another reason why this is both idiotic and insidious: Carol assumes that Captain America’s murder is inevitable unless she imprisons Miles. But that makes no sense. Either Cap’s death is certain, in which case imprisoning Miles clearly won’t work because he’ll somehow have to get out in order to kill Cap, or—if the future isn’t certain and Cap’s death can be prevented—then the future can be changed by anything, not just arresting heroes who have done nothing wrong and are not even thinking about doing anything wrong. Either anything is possible or nothing is.

(Also? If everything is inevitable, then no one is really guilty of anything because there is no free will and we’re all locked into fixed loops where everything we do is unavoidable, and thus it’s not our fault.)

So… yeah. Marvel’s the one who made this weird. They love having their heroes fight each other, but it hasn’t figured out a way to gave them do it without turning one of them into a de facto supervillain themselves (exactly like Iron Man was in Civil War I). And for everyone who had been so excited about Carol’s pretty recent resurgence as Captain Marvel and one of Marvel’s biggest heroes, it was equally aggravating and heartbreaking to see her become so, so awful.

Words Are Wind

John W.:

Where do you stand on the debate about whether GRRM owes his fans updates on the status to The Winds of Winter and A Dream of Spring? I use to be on the side of the “he’s not our bitch” argument but now I’ve switched sides. I definitely think he owes us some kind of update, as to the frequency that’s up for debate, but let’s face it he’s rich and famous because people are reading his books, watching the HBO show, and buying all the ancillary products (merchandise, Dunk & Egg books). He should throw us a bone. What say you?

Let me ask you a question in return: What benefit does him giving an update give to him or us? If he makes it his date, he doesn’t win any prizes. If he doesn’t make it, fans lose their minds and freak out at him.

As a writer, I can tell you that some days I just can’t write. (That’s a softball for you guys.) Some days I can churn out the words, and some days they just don’t come at all. And I mainly write silly and/or mean-spirited stuff for the internet, not a massive fantasy epic with hundreds of characters and centuries of backstory that is also one of the most popular book series in the world.

He doesn’t know when the book will be finished until it’s finished. Yes, he has more facts than the rest of us—how many chapters he’s done, for instance—but it’s still just a guess, because he probably doesn’t know for sure how many chapters The Winds of Winter will be. Some authors can meticulously plan out their stories and stick to it like a machine, but that’s not GRRM, and it’s one of the reasons A Song of Ice and Fire is so good. He won’t know if an Arya storyline is one chapter or three until he sits down and writes it, but when it’s/they are done, it/they will be what’s best for the story.

If you want a guess, I can give you one with almost as much certainty as GRRM: April 2018. Meanwhile, you know who wants The Winds of Winter to be finished even more than you do? George R.R. Martin.

En Rogue

Confused Rebel:

Dear Mr. Postman,

Thanks to the generosity of friends, I was able to see Rogue One recently. Surprisingly, the film was enjoyable even with the stereotype of having an Asian character know martial arts.

But I have to wonder about the uses of the Death Star during the film. One shot was used to take out a city resting atop a mine of the crystals that powered light sabers. Wouldn’t that shot have caused a chain reaction that would have vaporized the entire planet? The second shot hit the planet where the Imperial Archives were stored. Wouldn’t that destruction have crippled the Empire by wiping out important records?

With such questionable bits of destruction, why is it that Grand Moff Tarkin still managed to have a job controlling the Death Star in “A New Hope?”

Kyber crystals don’t store energy, they focus it and amplify it. For lightsabers, they’re what keep the laser from just shooting lasers like blasters; for the Death Star it increases the power of its laser to the point where it can destroy planets. It’s not a power source unto itself, and it’s not explosive. So when the Death Star destroyed Jedha City, it didn’t blow up anymore than it would have without the crystals.

We don’t know much about the Imperial data center on Scarif, but think of it this way: even the loss of a million research and military projects wouldn’t mess up the Empire’s infrastructure. It would massively screw up things in development, but in terms of the day-to-day tyranny, the Empire would keep on chugging. Plus, we know that Tarkin deemed it better to destroy the research center than let the rebels get away with the Death Star plans, which is proof in itself that the Empire considered it at least somewhat expendable.

As for Grand Moff Tarkin, there is 100 percent no doubt that he blamed literally everything that went wrong on director Krennic, who was too dead to defend himself. Had Krennic done his duty and stopped the rebels on Scarif, why, Tarkin wouldn’t have needed to destroy the planet at all!

Flash Facts

Silver Age Fanboy:

Dear Mr. Postman, it’s been fun seeing Flash bring back D.C. villains ranging from Captain Cold to the Bug-Eyed Bandit. But two classic Flash villains, Captain Boomerang and Abra Kadabra, have not crossed paths (I don’t think) with Barry and the Super STARs. Is the problem that visually they’re too silly to work in the world of The Flash? Or is there some other problem I’m not aware of?

Captain Boomerang actually has appeared in the Arrowverse. Not on The Flash, weirdly, but in Arrow season three, during the first Flash/Arrow crossover. I had also totally forgotten until James Whitbrook reminded me like an hour before this went up.

But nothing is too silly to be on The Flash TV series, and I thank Grodd for it. The Golden Glider, the Pied Piper, Weather Wizard, the Turtle, Tar Pit, King Shark, Rainbow Raider… hell, the show even did the Bug-Eyed Bandit. Captain Boomerang and Abra Kadabra are deadly serious compared to some of those guys. (Also, given Barry’s incessant time-travel shenanigans, the fact that Kadabra is a magician from the 64th century makes him practically a gimme for the show.)

The only thing that’s stopped Captain Boomerang from returning to the DC/CW was the Suicide Squad movie, but since WB cleared Arrow’s version of Deadshot to return for an episode (albeit as a hallucination by Diggle) and for Harley Quinn and Killer Croc to appear on Gotham, I can’t imagine why Captain Boomerang would be the one character WB desperately needs to keep their hands on.

Indiana Jonesin’

Mike F.:

Will the next Indiana Jones movie be any good or is Harrison Ford just too old to pull it off? What are the chances it gets made even with Ford, Spielberg, and David Koepp attached? I know it will make money but is Ford too in love with the franchise to see the hieroglyphics on the wall that this probably shouldn’t be made or it will tarnish the brand further? What are the odds they introduce his successor and thoughts on who it might be?

If Harrison Ford was willing to be Han Solo again, he should almost certainly be willing to go back to Indiana Jones, a franchise he actually likes. (To be fair, age may have softened him on Star Wars.) But between the fact that Kingdom of the Crystal Skull tried to introduce a successor in Shia LaBeouf, King of the Monkeys, and failed, and the fact that Ford is now likely prohibitively old at age 74… well, I’m sure Spielberg and Ford are game, and we know David Koepp is currently writing the script, but I don’t see them all pulling it off before Ford becomes prohibitively old. Or at least too old to do much more than make a cameo, at which point the movie’s not about Indiana Jones at all, but the new guy.

Here’s what I predict will happen: The Han Solo movie will come out in 2018, do great, and Disney will take it as a sign that the public is willing to accept new actors playing beloved Harrison Ford characters. They will recast the part, allowing for a script that doesn’t need to accommodate Ford himself with all the action-adventure audiences want from an Indiana Jones movie.

Which is fine with me. Seeing old Indiana Jones in Kingdom of the Crystal Skull depressed me. Sure, a lot of things in Kingdom of the Crystal Skull depressed me, but that was definitely one of them.

Kingspin

Santiago:

Postman, why does everyone praise Vincent D’Onofrio’s performance as Kingpin on Daredevil? I think he’s a great actor but for me, he was the weakest part of the show. The way he talked with that forced accent, or whatever that was, really stood out terribly. I agree that Kingpin as a character was good since they got to really flesh him out, but why did he have to speak like that? Am I the only one that thought he was terrible? I feel like I’m taking crazy pills!

Well, you may be taking crazy pills, because D’Onofrio doesn’t have an accent in Daredevil. He’s enunciating things weirdly, but that’s something he does a lot when he’s playing deeper, more serious roles. He did it in every episode of Law & Order: Criminal Intent, for instance.

I don’t think it’s bad at all, but I would describe it as a slightly ominous quarter-Shatner. In fact, I believe it works for the moody, prone-to-fits-of-random-rage Wilson Fisk very well.

Don’t Hate the Leia, Hate the Game

Chris:

After our heroes escape the Death Star in Episode IV, Leia casually notes that the Empire “let us escape” because “they’re tracking us.” Yet she does nothing about it! She didn’t check for a tracking beacon on the Falcon’s hull, or try to swap ships, or even go to a different planet. Instead she led the Death Star directly to the rebel base after personally witnessing its destructive power. So the question is, did Leia do this on purpose in order to lure the Empire in close for a knockout blow, or is she just lazy, or is this just a plotting oversight by GL?

I may be feeling extra-protective of Leia right now for obvious reasons, but here’s how I figure it: The Death Star had just destroyed an entire planet. Getting the plans to the Rebel base on Yavin as soon as possible was more important than keeping the base hidden, because the Rebels needed the plans as soon as possible to figure out how to destroy the Death Star as soon as possible.

Also? Leading the Death Star to Yavin keeps the Empire’s attention on the Rebels and not blasting random planets, killing millions of innocent lives while hunting the Alliance. It was risky to be sure, but between risking the Rebel base versus risking innocents, well, for Leia that was no question at all. Unlike the disturbingly less moral rebels of Rogue One, who are surprisingly okay with killing allies just in case they pose a problem, Leia is all integrity, all the time.

Game Movie Over

Josh N.:

First off, I keep getting more and more excited about the new Logan film. It seems like a worthy send off for Jackman, as opposed to a lame origin with Origins. I’ve seen the plot compared to the excellent game The Last of Us, based strictly on the trailers of course. Do you think that’s a fair comparison (obviously no one had claws in the video game), and do you think more movies could look to games for inspiration? I know the state of straight adaptations is kind of a bust.

It’s a fair comparison—badass adult and child take a journey through a near-future semi-apocalypse—but it’s not like The Last of Us pioneered that particular pairing. It’s a long-used trope, accurately titled “Badass and Child Duo” over at TV Tropes, with oodles of entries, which arguably started with the Japanese Lone Wolf and Cub manga (and subsequent movies). In that, wrongfully-disgraced-samurai-turned-assassin Ogami Itto travels with his incredibly young son Daigoro, in a wooden baby carriage also filled with deadly weapons.

As to your other question, I think that most of the time, video games are looking to other movies and TV shows for their own inspiration, which means movie don’t need to scour them for ideas. Also, I’m no longer sure that a “good” video game movie is even possible anymore—but that is a question someone will have to ask me next week.

Have a nerdy question? Need advice? Want a mystery or argument solved? Email them to [email protected]! I’m trying to answer a lot of questions each week to make up for the hiatus, so I need a lot of questions sent to me each week, too. Remember, no question too difficult or dumb! Probably!

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trendingnewsb · 6 years

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5 Crazy Recent News Stories That Didn’t Get Enough Attention

So here are five stories that have yet to receive the proper “Wait, what the fuck?!” reaction that they deserve.

The Government Said It Has Mysterious Alloys Recovered From UFOs

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The footage is odd, for sure. But it only makes up like 0.5 percent of the craziness within the New York Times article it came from.