Mod Post: 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 among yourselves.

The news of a second, even more successful Covid vaccine's test results were very, VERY encouraging, especially as it uses a similar innovative technique to the one announced last week suggesting that it's a pattern, not a fluke. The creation of a vaccine for a previously unknown virus in under a year is ba breathtaking accomplishment.

In the singularly unfunny comedy of errors which is the UK Government, we saw two of Boris Johnson's most trusted (and frequently despised) advisors quit, suggesting chaos at 10 Downing Street is the norm. Any attempt to reclam the initiative and was immeidately undercut by BoJo having to self-isolate for two weeks because he held an event where someone later tested positive for COVID (which also suggests social distancing was not being followed) and he has also now said that he thinks that the devolution of power to Scotland was "a disaster" so he's REALLY building bridges there!

Not to be outdone, Trump STILL refuses to concede the election, but has been busy firing people in the intellegence agencies and seeking to bring troops home from abroad at very short notice,

Perhaps more on that off topic, the CW are in talks to bring a new Wonder Girl to the screen. The Latina character created by Joelle Jones who is the daughter of an Amazonian warrior and a Brazilian River God.

The Mandalorian introduced the live-action version of a long established "Clone Wars" character as Katee Sackhoff appeared as Bo-Katan Kryzz, and we got a name drop of the next such character who is due to shw up this season. We also saw something that's been bugging me a little since it was revealed, as to why Dhan is not aware of the Jedi as anything other than a legend, and why he never takes his helmet off when we've seen plenty of others do so.

Oh, and apparnetly a Fresh Prince of Bel Air reunion special is airing this week Sadly without, of course, the late James Avery, but it will see the return of the original Vivian Banks, Janet Hubert-Whitten!



Random question of the week - Favourite smell?

Comments

[leahandillyana]

2020 is a badly written farce. What is happening inside and regarding Poland is so freaking bizarre the events break the suspension of disbelief.
On 11th was the annual Independence March, a fest for nationalists and neo nazis in Poland. As usual, large part of the capital was destroyed during the march, and plenty of property both public and private was lost. Highlights inlude the flat of famous art historian Stefan Okołowski being set on fire because... a flat two floors above it had banner supporting feminism and LGBT+ people on the balcony (the crowd was yelling "Burn whore burn!"), and the Battle of Empik, when the angry mob attacked the policement guarding the march under a well known chain bookstore. Speaking of police, it is becoming more and more like its American equivalent - no nazi was arrested, not even those who attacked the policemen. Meanwhile, several journalists observing the march have been brutally arrested, including an elderly cameraman who had been shot in the face with a rubber bullet.
Meanwhile, Polish government is introducing a law that makes the whole country an upgraded LGBT free zone. The law will criminalize being openly queer - no prides, no queer orgs, no queer publications. Heck, probably even a common dude coming out will be a crime! Law banning abortion to save a woman's life and new anti-protest law are also being worked on. There's also a bill being written labelling LGBT and pro-choice organisations in Poland as terrorist organisations for writing political grafiti on churches and government buildings. This sounds LAUGHABLE in light of far right marchers recently setting an apartament on fire and attacking police forces.
Poland and Hungary vetoed the budget of the European Union. Why? Because the proposal stated that the money will depend on lawfulness in the countries. Both governments cheerfully break every law that is not favoring them. If Poland had not vetoed the budget, it would have gotten the highest amount of money it ever saw.
In Abhkazia conflict, Russia brokered a "peace" that irl means victory for Azerbaijan and puts the Ormians in Abhkazia in danger. Riots broke in Yerevan after the peace was signed. I'm pretty sure it'll be short lived.
Latvia, one of Europe's most homophobic countries, just legalized parenting rights of same sex partners of a child's parent. Latvia doesn't recognize same sex relationships legally, but this new developement was not controversial in the country.
I like yasminum, wild rose, lily of the valley, lilac, and honey bush (dunno how it's called in English).

[leahandillyana]

I also really, really hate that a character who has not even appeared in comics yet gets a self-titled seried greenlit over two characters who held the title for decades.

[owlbrigade1]

Fave smell?

Swimming pool chlorine combined with fish and chips.

When I was very young indeed abd before my father passed away from non-hodgkins lymphoma, he used to take me to the public swimming pool for swimming lessons in the evenings. Although, to be honest, it was more general splashing about than actual learning, and on the way home we'd stop and he'd buy a fish supper and split it with me. I'll always treasure the smell of the chips mixed with the lingering scent of the chlorine from the pool.

[icon_uk]

That was a lovely memory, thank you for sharing it.

[zachbeacon]

A lifetime on allergies has destroyed my sense of smell. I remember enjoying the smell of old paper (book stores, comics shops, libraries). Why yes, I AM that kind of nerd.

Cancelled Funimation over the weekend because December is for rewatching Christmas stuff. Some parting (mostly) anime thoughts.

Uzaki-Chan Wants to Hang Out – It occurs to me that, if not for the controversy over Uzaki’s* body type, this would just be another generic romcom where the leads never get together. The café owner and his daughter are fun characters though.

*Do people not know Dolly Parton exists?


Good Luck Girl – Thanks for the recommendation, Janegray. It’s pretty funny.


Terraformars – For some reason I was under the impression this was a superhero series. It is not. The end of the second season is terrifying.


First two episodes of Yashahime: Princess Half-Demon – I might need a score card to keep track of these kids; Towa is distinctive but the other two girls blend together. Plus a quick scan of TV tropes tells me I was wrong about everyone’s parentage. Surprised Sesshomaru’s kids seem to be the focus more than Inuyasha’s. Hisui’s look reminded me so much of Kohaku’s that I assumed he was the father, not the uncle.

Honestly – given the first episode – I’m a little surprised the two main couples from the first series haven’t created rival baseball teams.

Also, I think this is one of those times where I think I won’t mind switching to the sub. Apparently the English dub uses mostly the same cast but some sound like they’re doing impressions of themselves. I only know they’re the same people because the “new” Miroku was so distracting that I paused the first episode to look him up.

Anyway, very happy Kaede and Kirara are still alive. Less happy that there’s a second Shippo.


The Anime City Hunter Movie – Heard the series was good but it isn’t streaming anywhere so I watched the movie on Amazon Prime as a sample. Its fine but it didn’t really grab me.


The Live Action City Hunter Movie – Oh, so THAT’S where that Jackie Chan as Chun-Li thing comes from.

[icon_uk]

Never had a sense of smell myself. So whilst I know it is seen as a powerful memory trigger, that's something that's always eluded me.

[zachbeacon]

"Miroku was so distracting"

Well now I just feel like an asshole.
RIP Kirby Morrow
You were my favorite Cyclops

[scorntx]

Apparently the next season of Doctor Who will be a mere eight episodes instead of the previous ten.
Which they're saying is because of the Hot Dumpster Fire that has been 2020 and Covid and such, but... if you're a mildly paranoid person, it also just feels like someone high up in the Beeb has something against Who.
Again.
(And there's still no sodding word on when that special's supposed to be showing up...)

The next Transformers movie has a director. And it's not Bay!
It's Steve Caple Junior, who directed Creed 2.
... having not seen Creed 2, or even Creed, I've no idea what to make of that, but he's not Bay, so it's still a step up.

The more I'm hearing about AC: Valhalla's making the wait of the next month intolerable...
Though the apparent issues with the PS5 vis-a-vis storage capacity are not helping much.

Edit: And there's a new Transformers: Collaborative coming out, crossing with X-Men...
... it looks very 90s. (And it comes with a tiny Wolverine, because of course it does.)

[stubbleupdate]

Valhalla is huge amounts of fun so far.

I punched a nun

And then curb stomped her.

I've been playing with dual shields for a while, and now I've got a hammer it's hammer and shield. Sometimes I swap the hammer out for a flail. If you're in to innovative violence, it's the game for you.


Eivor discovers her inner Simon and Garfunkel

[shadur]

Because the margin in Wisconsin is above the treshold, the challenging party has to pay the costs if they insist on a recount -- and the Wisconsin Election Committee is insisting that Trump's campaign pay up front.

Favourite smell? Tricky, there's lots of nice ones, but... You know that clean moist smell you get in the air after a really long rain shower?

[thezmage]

I mean that's just common sense, getting Trump to pay his bills ahead of time.

I desperately miss that rain smell, although I think it happens before the rain too. Unless we're thinking of different rain smells

[deh_tommy]

Destiny 2: Beyond Light is really disappointing to me so far. The story forces you to basically take the One Ring for yourself and then constantly taunts you with how stupid and foolish you are to think you won’t get corrupted, there are no new multiplayer maps, the maps that didn’t get deleted from the game last week don’t make any narrative sense why they’re still here, the loot pool barely adds anything new, all the Tower vendors sell the exact same armour set, there’s a good bit of tedious and unnecessary grind to pad out progression, there’s a level cap on your gear so you have to grind for the old stuff again, and they killed off a major fan favourite character *off screen* on a *blog post*. Stasis is fun at least, and Europa’s kind of cool (if not just a copy of the Dreaming City).

I don’t really have a favourite smell. I like smelling stuff, but I get scared and paranoid when I smell anything unfamiliar.

[mister_terrific]

Two favorite smells, both related to my baking hobby: first, the scent of rosemary, basil, thyme, garlic and oregano coming together while making a batch of foccacia dough. There's just something about it. Also, the smell while two loaves of cinnamon swirl bread are baking in the oven. There are times it's all I can do to keep from gnawing on them while they're cooling.

Close third is this garlic and soy sauce marinade I picked up from a Japanese cookbook. Whoa...

[cygnia]

Chocolate
Bacon cooking
Garlic sauteing in butter
Port wines

[silverhammerman]

It's hard to have much of an opinion since the character hasn't even had a comics debut (which is, as others have said, a little annoying) but I'm intrigued by the Yara Flor Wonder Girl show. I've thought for a while now that a legacy approach to Wonder Woman is a cool idea which we've never really seen explored, so that's exciting but also seemingly kind of undercut if the show is going to have her be Wonder Girl rather than Wonder Woman. The CW shows are now enough of a known quantity that this isn't as unexpected as it might have been five years ago, but I still hope it'll turn out well for fans.

The Mandalorian developments give me pause, tbh. I watched the first season and haven't yet started on the second, but I'm not entirely pumped that so much of what I've heard about the new season seems to revolve around connections to old characters. It seemed like a big part of what made The Mandalorian interesting was that it was doing its own thing at the margins of the Star Wars universe, which made it easy to get into as a lapsed/casual fan. Bringing in a bunch of characters from The Clone Wars show and setting up that one Filoni character is the opposite of what I want. It feels like there's this expectation that I'll be familiar with and excited to see this stuff legitimized, but it's not stuff that matters to me. The closer The Mandalorian moves to "important" things, the less interesting it sounds to me. I haven't started the new season though, so you know, maybe I'm just talking nonsense.

Favourite smell: Garlic bread? Coffee? Something like that probably.

[cainofdreaming]

Grass after a rain, on a cool day.

[iamrman]

Still enjoying my deep dive in to the classic G.I. Joe comics. 7 of 15 volumes down and things are still going well.

The G.I. Joe comics don't seem as much of a glorified toy commercial than the old Transformers comics did, which just adds to the enjoyment.

Comixology has a big pre-Black Friday sale on DC comics. Two of the trades I got were Mr. Miracle by Steve Englehart and Steve Gerber and New Gods by Gerry Conway.

I really enjoyed the Jack Kirby issues, so I hope these compare well.

[skjam]

Finally had a foot issue looked at and dealt with; not nearly as awful a fix as feared.

Over at my blog, the latest review is The 13th Warrior, but I want to feature "Detectives Inc", a 1935 mystery anthology about a man with a seeing eye dog when that was still a new thing. http://www.skjam.com/2020/11/15/book-review-detectives-inc/

I like the smell of fresh bread out of the oven.

[malurette]

My brand-new little nephew is just one week old, my brother is spamming us with baby pictures and because Baby's got big pointy ears I'm pondering the possibility of mixed Vulcan ancestry.

[icon_uk]

Well, "Spock" IS a nice name... or maybe "Surak"?

[malurette]

Alas they already named Daniel, with his uncles' names as middle names. But I'll still nickname him Baby Spock!

(My sister-in-law just phoned to thank me for the Doctor Who scarf so I have a Big Case Of Warm Fuzzy Feelings at the moment. Yay!!)

[tripodeca113]

Well that’s one essay done, another to go. Actually, looking at course outline, it’s shorter than I thought it would be, and I have a few extra days to finish it. In retrospect I may have gone a bit overboard with all the books I borrowed for the essay, but better too many then too few.

Been playing more Knights of The Republic, I saw a grown-up Baby Yoda, who spoke normally. This has worrying implications.

Assassins Creed’s modern day plot implies once again that time is circular…

Remake of the 2003 video game XIII has been released, and it’s not very good.

I started playing Yakuza 7. There’s been a lot of interesting mysteries and situations so far. Not sure about the new turn-based combat system.

I read Blacksad. I think I’ll try out the video game based on it.

[janegray]

-The Humble Store is currently selling a ton of UDON's Street Fighter comics for as little as $1 ($1 for the whole basket, not per comic), and I highly recommend them.

https://www.humblebundle.com/books/street-fighter-media-do-books?hmb_source=navbar&hmb_medium=product_tile&hmb_campaign=tile_index_9

-Has anybody played Yakuza Like A Dragon? If so, please let me know, I have a few questions.

-Favourite scent is sea salt. Very calming.

-I was feeling extra down lately, so I bought myself a figure of my favourite Disney Princess, Ariel.

It was the very first time I'd ever seen a Disney princess figure where, instead of giving her a "pretty" expression, they give her an interesting one. It's the moment she first walks barefooted on grass and she looks ecstatic and slightly psychotic, like a kid at the candy store. I found it hilarious and absolutely wanted it :P

https://live.staticflickr.com/1945/44387437154_b97735257f_b.jpg

[icon_uk]

I can see why it might appeal! :)

[tripodeca113]

I've started playing Yakuza: Like A Dragon. I'm not very far into it though.

[janegray]

I was wondering, do you need to be familiar with the Yakuza series to understand the story?

I tried getting into Yakuza before, but there were a bazillion characters each with their own long story, I found it very difficult to memorize the info.

If this is a "passing of the torch" between the old protagonist and the new one, I wonder if it could be a good jumping on point for people who have little to no knowledge of the series.

[tripodeca113]

It stars a new protagonist, who missed the previous six mainline games. Most of it takes place in a new location with new characters. Major changes have happened to the series main setting of Kamurocho, but its surprising for newcomers and long term fans alike.

If you've interested in getting into the series, I'd personally recommend Yakuza 0, which is a prequel but mostly does it's own thing. Either than or the spinoff game Judgment, which is pretty standalone.

[janegray]

Thank you!

[mesmiranda]

Favourite smells are vanilla, cinnamon, coffee and roses!

Can anybody recommend some good historical fiction? I'm full up on sci-fi recommendations, but I'm dying for some good historical stuff...

[janegray]

Anything by Kaoru Mori. She puts a ton of research into her stories. Absolutely gorgeous art too, especially her later stuff. Lots of body diversity, and outfits so stunningly detailed they'd make CLAMP die of shame.

Be warned of intentional value dissonance, though. The historical accuracy of her stories means that sometimes they involve stuff that is... not palatable to modern standards.

Like, in A Bride's Story, there is a marriage between a woman and a child. They do explicitly say that they are not going to consummate the marriage until he is older, but still...

[mesmiranda]

(This is a far too late reply, but cheers! I will definitely take a look for her stuff--is there any title I should start with?)

[janegray]

It depends on what you like.

-Shirley is the story of a child who gets adopted by a spinster. Theme = Found Family, slice of life.

Given that this is Mori's first work, the art is nowhere near as good as her later works. It's still pleasant and well done, but here you won't find the stunning super-elaborate masterpieces of her later works.

(For that matter, since Shirley is a child, the art also lacks the classy and tasteful yet very sensual nudes you occasionally find in the other works)

It's only 1-2 volumes though (depending on the edition), so it's really good as introduction to the author.

-Emma is about the forbidden love story of a maid with a lord. Theme = romance.

-A Bride's Story is about the turbulent politics of Asian tribes. Harsher than her previous works (people die a lot, and though most of it is off-panel, you definitely get their struggles), but that's why some people like it better.

As her latest work, it has the most polished art.

4 years and 1 week later, I can finally breathe

[silverzeo]

I kept this to myself out of fear of "jinxing" it...

I still remember in 2016 on this forum, on a Off-Topic Tuesday post... the Chicago Cubs finally won it and the announcement that Young Justice was getting renewed after getting canned... it seemed like the year was turning around... but then I the thought crossed my mind...

With so MUCH good going on at once... the worst is BOUND to appear... so I made a comment about how all those things were a sign to Trump winning... and low and behold... thats what happened... and a good number of you laid that into me...

but now... it is over...

It is amazing how much has changed since then... even before 2016, I have notice a change in things... I remember starting out here with some conservatives views/POV... of course I came out as jerk, but I was naive enough to think people online would just listen to each other different opinions like mature grown-ups... but now, I see that most of antagonistic attitude towards Right-Wing ideas... have been more than WELL warranted..