Off-Topic Tuesday!

[icon_uk]

In the comments to these weekly posts (and only these posts), it's your chance to go as off topic as you like. Talk about non-comics stuff, thread derail, and just generally chat amongst yourselves.

Attempting to discuss the talking points of the UK or US political situation would probably take about

Paul Rand had to be taught how "Insurance" works, but that's okay, because Trump had to be taught how NATO is funded (AFTER tweeting about how NATO is funded). I

Angela Merkel demonstrated on multiple occasions during her visit that "WTF?!" is a facial expression that transcends any spoken language.

The US has banned electronic equipment like cameras, laptops, and DVD players as carry-on luggage from eight Middle Eastern and North African countries.

The FBI are investigating claims of interference in the 2016 US election by Russia. At the same time they have flatly contradicted the POTUS claims about him being wiretapped, and confirmed that the UK hadn't done it at their behest either, to the surprise of no one other than the POTUS.

A reminder to UK based members that the clocks go forward 1 hour this Sunday, and our society goes back 60 years starting next Wednesday.

Just to be reminded that there IS still good in the world though, here are four young women who have used Gofundme to better their community and the world in general.

And today is World Down Syndrome Day, a global event to raise awareness of the condition, and seeking to give those who have Downs Syndrome, and their advocates, greater influence on the Government policies and actions which impact on them.

Comments

[scorntx]

Spent all of Friday watching Iron Fist on Netflix.
It... Hmm.
It wasn't as bad as the reviewers seemed to think it was.
But... it is definitely the weakest of the Defenders series so far.
Danny is kind of bland, and there's far too much focus on some supporting characters and their subplots than there should be.
Colleen Wing is pretty good, and Rosario Dawson continues to steal scenes unabated.
There are good moments, definitely, and the second half is an improvement over the first...
Though if there was any serious criticism I would make, the largest and most damning would definitely have to be that...
SPOILER ALERT

Not once do we actually see Danny fighting Shao-Lao the Undying.
Not even a five second flash. Not even a hint.
Not once.
What the Hell? What the actual Hell?

[icon_uk]

I haven't watched it yet, but I've heard very few positive things. The best seem to be "It's not as bad as some of the critics made it out to be." which seems to be a bad sign.

I've said all along that another character whose singular skill is punching things (albeit REALLY HARD) seems to be a mis-step. Given they already have Daredevil, they don't really NEED Iron Fist, and I would rather they had gone in a slightly more varied powerset direction.

I think it's a shame that Cloak and Dagger weren't used instead, (I don't think their show is destined to be part of the MCEU) as they have a very street level mission, a very cool visual and some variety in their abilities.

[beardedjellybean]

The first six episodes are easily the worst (apparently that is what most critics got in which case I can understand why they hated it), but the second half was a lot more enjoyable. I mostly got annoyed that most of the Iron Fist mythology got stuck with a quick aside or a flashback.

The Bride of Nine Spiders is basically a throw-away member of the Hand who gets taken down fairly quickly when she is a legitimately awesome Immortal Weapon in the Matt Fraction run.

And it was frustrating to see nothing of Shao-Lao the Undying, I can understand that it would be difficult to film something like him but even a brief shot would have been nice.

[kamino_neko]

Not once do we actually see Danny fighting Shao-Lao the Undying.

The general lack of K'un-Lun was weird. How low was this show's budget that they couldn't show more than that one room of the monastery and the pass into the city?

there's far too much focus on some supporting characters and their subplots than there should be.

The only legitimately interesting characters in the series who weren't imports from earlier series are the Meachums (mostly Howard) and Colleen AFTER the reveal about her history, so....

But speaking of the Meachums...is a little consistency of characterization too much to ask for? Howard's apparent inconsistency ends up being pretty consistent once things become clear, but Ward and Joy both bounce all over without any real logical connection.

[starwolf_oakley]

I wonder if "The Defenders" will confirm or deny I theory I've got connecting Daredevil to Iron Fist: Stick trained Matt Murdock because he thought Matt was going to be the next Iron Fist.

[mrstatham]

I've only watched the first episode so far, as it's about all I could stomach, but Danny is one of the single most awful leads I've ever seen. He's.. He's insane. He assaults people, he breaks and enters, he accosts people, he flatout abducts a man and holds a loaded gun to his head while having the equivalent of a temper tantrum about things he's brought on himself, and the scene where he keeps on pressing Colleen for a job was one of the single most uncomfortable things I've seen in a while. Just.. I don't know as I want to watch beyond the first episode, he's that unappealing.

[zachbeacon]

I had the same reaction. It wasn't bad but it certainly wasn't good and it failed to deliver on pretty much everything I wanted in an Iron Fist story.

No Luke. No Misty. No other Immortal Weapons except for that terrible version of Bride of Nine Spiders and non-Steel Serpent Davos. No flashbacks to K'un-Lun (which means no training montages and no Shao-Lao the Undying) because the writers would rather tell than show. No Martial Arts tournament that gives them an excuse to bring in other notable fighters like Shang Chi.

Heck, there was disappointingly little in the way of decent fighting period ... though I loved the fight with the Hatchet Men.


I did like most of the supporting cast. Jeri Hogarth was surprisingly likable here and I think everyone loved Colleen and Claire. The two Hand leaders and Howard Meachum were pretty solid villains. Danny himself was terrible (and really stupid) though.

And what the heck is up with Davos' accent?

[owlbrigade1]

Yeah, that whole Empire 2.0 operating system goes live next week and I'm not convinced they should be rushing straight to beta on that one. I hear it has failed every alpha test and has so many bug reports on it that it might just cause a fatal instability in the hardware itself. And they still have not accepted the documentation on why Empire 1.0 failed.

I'm sorry, I'm trying to dress the stupidity of the whole thing up in other terms so it doesn't seem so damn stupid.

[skjam]

I had an interview Friday for a long-term assignment starting in mid-April, will find out sometime this week if I passed. Sure hope so as the money is tight.

My most recent review at my blog is "Treasure Island" (the book); next up will be a scholarly magazine on F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald. http://www.skjam.com/2017/03/18/book-review-treasure-island/

[janegray]

Break a leg!

[kamino_neko]

I've been watching AMC's Into the Badlands, due to it being mentioned positively in a discussion of Iron Fist (don't actually remember why...maybe it was just 'these are both martial-arts TV series).

It's a lot of fun (I described it to a friend as Fallout meets Legend of the Five Rings), and the fight scenes - especially unarmed - are really spectacular.

But good lord, the treatment of their weapons. Not once has anybody cleaned their blade - not even in the first episode when Baron Quinn pointedly grabbed some clothes from his victim's clothesline to wipe his face. I keep hoping someone gets killed because they can't draw their weapon in time because they sheathed it when it was still coated in blood.

[janegray]

Maybe they are wielding Sephiroth's magical swords that remain perfectly clean after going through somebody's torso :P

[icon_uk]

Maybe the humans are all simulants a la Westworld and what you're presuming to be blood is red WD-40.

[thezmage]

Beethoven came home on Thursday. He doesn't like the cone, and he doesn't like that we won't let him jump up on things, but he's pretty much acting like his old self again. Well, plus peeing wherever he damn well feels like it. And it's awfully hard to get all seven medications down his throat.

My sister, brother-in-law, two-year-old nephew, and their two cats moved into my two bedroom apartment this weekend. Mozart has made several valiant attempts to save us from the cats and their insidious plan of minding their own business. Add in my mother, who came down to help me with Beethoven during his surgery, and we've got a very full house. I have never really enjoyed my family role of "guy everyone complains to about other family members," so April looks like it's going to be a pretty stressful month.

[janegray]

-It's the most unfait thing that it only takes a second of distraction to get a bruise, but the damn thing will take weeks to fade.

-I'm going to watch Beauty & the Beast tonight. I'm not normally into live-action versions of Disney movies (I thought Maleficent was overrated, and I skipped Cinderella), but I like Emma Watson so I decided to give the movie a try.

-They announced a King of Fighters CG animated series.

http://kotaku.com/the-king-of-fighters-is-getting-a-cg-animated-series-t-1793472190

Last time they did something like this, we got Another Day. Its plot was pretty much inconsequential, just an excuse to show off the characters, but the characterization was good and the animation looked nice. Overall, I enjoyed AD.

Here is hoping that this time the episodes are longer than 3 minutes, though.

-Season 5 of Samurai Jack continues being very strong. I was very impressed with the second episode.

Though...

*SPOILERS*

...I'm not sure why killing humans is supposed to be such a big deal, when Jack has always been killing highly advanced AIs that for all intents and purposes are real people. "Just nuts and bolts" may be accurate for the insect things, but not for sentient Vision-like robots.

I could understand if the issue were "oh no, I killed a kid!" since the Daughters of Aku look like teenagers. But the writers specifically said in an interview that Jack is horrified that he killed a human being instead of a robot, and that makes no sense to me in a setting where robots can be fully sentient.

[janegray]

Just got back from the theater. Really enjoyed Beauty & Beast :)

[trooper924]

So at this point, is there anything that can be done to stop Brexit?

If not, could it be reversed once sane people are back in control?

[icon_uk]

Opinions differ as to whether it could be stopped once Article 50 is triggered, but I think the technical answer is "Yes, it could" but it would not be easy.

To back out of Article 50 would require politicians with backbone, probably a different PM and the public losing faith in the implied benefits of Brexit,

It would probably take another referendum and possibly a General Election, and May has no interest in the former and is unlikely to want to latter.

So, personally, i think we're screwed, but not nearly as much as we will be when the cack-handed incompetents trying to negotiate a deal get started.

[scorntx]

Also, speaking of things facing daunting release prospects...
Almost, almost, feel sorry for Power Rangers going up against Beauty and the Beast on its opening weekend.

[icon_uk]

Nothing I have seen of Power Rangers has really enthused me, and I say that as someone who still watches , mostly for the completely shallow cheerfully-good-looking-fit-actors-leaping-about-all-over-the-place factor. (But will also admit that it can produce some good series, RPM remaining the standout for me)

If you're not going to embrace the cheery, cheesy, brightly coloured ethos of the Americanised Sentai, and have darker colours, masks that keep retracted so you can see the cast's (admittedly pretty) faces, Rita looking slinky (and sans Madonna-style pointy bustier) and weirdly inconsistent story beats (The Pink ranger has elements in her backstory that I would suspect as being tough to explain to any kids watching) what's the point of making it Power Rangers?

Oh, and the Yellow Ranger being oh-so-coyly teased as gay, but using the teeth-gratingly bad "Oh, I don't like labels" when asked outright is such a chickenshit thing to do in this day and age.

[informationgeek]

Two things:

1. Anyone listen to PostmodernJukebox? They do a lot of covers on popular songs in older styles and genres, like How You Remind Me in Mowtown or Bad Romance in 20's Gatsby style. I bring them up because they covered Nothing Else Matters by Metallica in a soulful style using a 15 year old singer. Give it a listen!

2. My favorite parody creator is back and doing work! She or he did an amazing take on Jonathan Hickman's Avengers & New Avengers run here

Their new target? Bendis' Civil War II: Chipwrecked! Have a look!

[icon_uk]

Postmodern Jukebox is GREAT!

Reminder: The people who want to repeal The ACA....

[7dialsmystery]

...get their gold-plated health insurance paid for by American taxpayers. Yes, that's right the very Congress that gives zero f---ks that 45,000 American citizens died each year from treatable health conditions because they had no health insurance is the same Congress who's lifetime health benefits are paid for by you, the taxpayer.

Please vote these %^&*U out of office Mid-Terms 2018!

Re: Reminder: The people who want to repeal The ACA....

[bradygirl_12]

Americans have known this for years. They always re-elect the same scoundrels. Maybe it's the devil you know...*shrugs*

[lamashtar]

Hope everyone is enjoying the US Presidency reality soap opera! I can barely turn off the news!