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 intent of these posts is to chat and have some fun and, sure, vent a little as required. Reasoned debate is fine, as always, but if you have to ask if something is going over the line, think carefully before posting please.

Normal board rules about conduct and behaviour still apply, of course

Britain is currently hot, VERY hot, swelteringly hot... So this will be short as concentrating is hard, and I need to save some for actual work.

England has also opened up completely from COVID lockdown, with no social distancing or mask wearing being legally enforced. Night clubs are opened again with no limits on how many can come in (beyond existing health and safety laws). Businesses can request that people wear masks though, and many are. (Scotland, Wales and Ireland are taking things more cautiously, and boy do I envy them that right now)

Our Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer are having to self isolate after contact with our Health Secretary, who has tested positive for COVID. The first thing the PM did, apaprently, was enquire how he could get out of self isolation. The public backlash to this was so instananeous and powerful that he reversed his decision almost immediately and is now self-isolating like the rest of us plebs would have to. (The fact he assumed it was something he'd be allowed to get away with in the middle of ongoing debates about how there seems to be one law for the powerful and another for the not-so-powerful speaks volumes IMHO)

Watched the first couple of episode of "Schmigadoon" a sort of long form spoof of "Brigadoon" as a couple find themselves trapped in a weirdly staged looked town where people keep bursting into complexly choreographed song (and everything is in various shades of pastel).

Pretty much every song is a direct spoof of a musical classic (from Carousel, The Pajama Game, Guys and Dolls, and Oklahoma! (especially Oklahoma!)) and I think that might be part of why I'm not enjoying it as much as I'd hoped. A terrific cast including Kristin Chenowyth, Alan Cumming and Dove Cameron give it their musical all, but aside from finding the two main characters not that interesting yet, I get so distracted trying to work out what song it's spoofing (and my stage musical knowledge isn't THAT great, so I've never seen The Pajama Game or remember much about Carousel), that I lose focus on what they're singing about as relevant to the show itself.

It's no "Galavant", alas (I'm not sure it's even "Teen Beach Movie" or Supergirl "Duet" yet) but here's hoping.

Just finished a Kareem Abdul-Jabbar penned Mycroft and Sherlock Holmes novel, the first of his I was able to find in the library. That was fun!

John Oliver did a web exclusive clip about Danish animation series 'John Dillermand' which is... quite something. Probably not entirely safe for work viewing given the subject matter, but you decide if you want to risk watching clips from a series whose basic premise is the same smutty joke people have been making about Reed Richards since 1963.

Comments

[leahandillyana]

Forces of nature have been damaging continental Europe. First, there were storms with power of weak hurricanes over Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Poland, causing widespread property destruction but relatively few casualties. Then, the water fallen with those storms caused devastating floods in Western Europe, the biggest floods being in Germany and Belgium, where it became the direst natural distaster after WW2. Hundreds are dead, and the final number may likely reach thousands, as many people are missing and whole villages are still cut off the world. Meanwhile, Greece, Portugal and Spain are dealing with massive wildfires resulting from climate change. Those storms that fell on Central Europe and caused floods in Western Europe? All this rain was supposed to fall in the Mediterranean. What can we do to help? Donations are always apreciated. The organisation I can think of right now is Red Cross, which has national offices all over Europe. Right now they focus on helping people harmed by the storms, floods and fires. You can find info on all the offices here: https://www.ifrc.org/en/who-we-are/
(Speaking of hotness, my hometown witnessed a temperature of 47 degrees Celcius last week.)
Bizarre events keep happening in Poland. There’s a petition for the parliament to ban non-christian celebrations, naming Halloween and Holi in particular. Given that a) it would go against laws against religious discriminations and b) HOW EXACTLY ARE THEY SUPPOSED TO ENFORCE IT????, it will be killed in first reading, but the fact that it’s going to be read to begin with is embarassing. There are honest to god witch trials happening. Like, catholic organisations keep asking police to investigate whether various artistic and non-governmental organisations are not practicing witchcraft. That includes for example the animal charity I am involved in. It’s so embarassing to be living in Poland, I swear.
On a lighter note, Shining Nikki features a guest appearance of… Sebastian Michaelis of all characters. It’s not literally Sebastian, but it’s clear that the character appearing in the second chapter of Mind Maze is supposed to be him. (That game is really dark.) I mean, Love Nikki already had a lawyer-friendly cameo of Ciel Phantomhive, but it was just a cosplay set, and here not!Sebastian plays a major role in the backstory of a supporting cast member. I’m pretty sure Paper Games staff would want to organise a crossover event with Black Butler were they legally allowed to (the manga is banned in China). On the other hand, I’m not sure if Neon Genesis Evangelion is allowed, and that series had crossovers with a handful of Chinese games… Speaking of this game, Chinese friend told me that limited crossover events cost around 25k currency per event, and a player ears about 1k currency per week. I never paid much attention to events, but I am dead set on completing two, which means I have to ‘hamster’ 50k currency, which means about a year of gathering resources. Uh, I really wish I’ll have a year before Sakura and Eva events arrive. Kinda a bummer I’ll have to ignore the beautiful Christmas event.

[tripodeca113]

Oh my God, the new Wikia design is awful. Why man why? So much wasted space, so much gaudy elements.

Well, that's season two of Star Trek done. I understand it's downhill from here. Still the final episode of season two was pretty bad, as the main characters were artlessly crammed into a pretty boring pilot episode.

Well, I watched Spock's Brain. It wasn't as bad its reputation suggested. Sure, it had an absurd premise, but there's been worse episodes.

I read volume two of My Hero Academica. Froppy gets more focus (Hooray!). The purple pervert gets more screen time (BOoooOOoooo).

Well, that's season one of The Mandalorian done. Sadly, I found the season finale one of the weaker episodes. Could have used a bit more work. There was one scene when a character went "I'm dying you have to leave me behind", and they did, but a character stayed behind and went "I can give you this life saving medication". Why didn't this come up five minutes ago, when they were discussing what to do?

Other thoughts:
Cara Dunn is apparently from Alderran. I do hope they addressed that before the actor got blacklisted from the show.
I suggest that Star Wars writers who make jokes about Stormtroopers not being able to hit things, be executed via firing squad. That might sound harsh, but isn't stopping lazy meta humour more important that ethics?
I'm becoming suspicious that the art in the credits, is specially made and isn't actually concept art. I may be wrong.

My DVDs of The Mandalorian season two seem, a lot more unstable than the first ones were, but I manged to get them to work:

I'm fairly certain that The Marshall must have inspired at least 80% of this shows slash fanfiction. There's not a lot of other male characters who fit the bill.

There was an odd joke, about how Baby Yoda keeps on eating a frog woman's eggs. That was kind of unsettling.

It turns out that the Mandalorian was raised in a cult, (at least according to noted terrorist Bo-Katan. I remember when she helped murder all those villages, staged a coup and smacked a teenager...)

[werehawk]

Baby Yoda's eating the eggs was unsettling for sure. And Mandalorian killing that last-of-its-kind dragon was downright wrong.

[icon_uk]

Yeah, even if they were unfertilised (I think that's why she had to get to her partner in a limited time window) it was unfortunate.

If it helps, that was a krayt dragon they killed in The Mandalorian, a massive one to be sure, but I don't think they're even considered an endangered species on Tatooine.

[shadur]

They're considered more of an endangering species, I think.

[scorntx]

Ah, Trek season 3, with such great episodes like Requiem for Methuselah, Plato's Stepchildren, And the Children Shall Lead, The Way to Eden, and of course, Turnabout Intruder.


They do address Cara being from Alderaan in the season 2 finale.

[tripodeca113]

You also missed the hit episode The Paradise Syndrome....

[scorntx]

Missed, completely repressed.
(oof. Yeah, The Paradise Syndrome... yiii...)

[lego_joker]

Holy cow, I thought I was the only one who cared about Wiki layouts...

(I'm not in on the admin policies or anything, but I suspect it was done to bring the desktop and mobile visions closer, for whatever reason.)

And I'm almost done with S1 of Trek myself. There were good eps, and bad ones, and colossally misbalanced ones - can't wait to see if "City on the Edge of Forever" lives up to the hype.

[brerrabbit]

The conservative pornstar Brandi Love who was invited to this year TPUSA conference got kicked out the second day when other conservatives found out she is a pornstar... she's not very happy right now but what did she expect? LOL

[zachbeacon]

"'I never thought leopards would eat MY face"

[janegray]

I mean, to be fair conservatives are STILL praising Melania pornstar Trump as "finally a real lady in the White House! Unlike that gross lowly Harvard graduate or whatever."

So.


(That's not to denigrate sex workers. A job is a job and deserves respect always. But conservatives are all "that slut deserves everything they do to her!" when a little girl has a skirt slightly above the knee, and then praise a woman who did nude posters because she replaced the black woman.)

[zachbeacon]

I mean, her husband was Putin's prostitute and they were fine with that too.

As an outsider I can't help but see the Clinton marriage as a little weird (which was a common GoP talking point) but then they try to make similar claims about the Obamas and I just don't see it. Meanwhile they're weirdly silent about Agent Orange and his series of wives and/or mistresses.

Back to the original point, I can't help but think about Caitlyn Jenner's recent treatment at CPAC. I don't know why she thought a shared hatred of poor people would be enough for the crowd to overcome their other prejudices like transphobia.

[tinygaylaura]

Raoul Silva in Skyfall summed up the endpoint of right wing ideology with his monologue about rats

[iamrman]

I am getting my second vaccination on Thursday, so my transformation into a 5G transmitter will soon be complete. Or whateber the latest bullshit conspiracy theory is. If I do end up with magnetic powers because of the magnetisation, will be family history keep on being retconned due to rights issues? At least I will be able to greet visitors with 'welcome to die!'

In comics news, I am presently re-reading John Byrne's Fantastic Four. I ha e just reached the arc where Doctor Doom seemingly perishes in battle with Tyros the Terrible. Of course, Doom isn't really dead because he used his mind swap ability to swap bodies with some random bystander.

Aunt May is also there for some reason. She compplaims about the vact that the horrid Doctor Doom hasn't been stopped yet and the random bystander tells her 'cease you incessant prattling, woman'. Now, that's either Doom inhabiting the guy's body, or even random bystanders are fed up of Aunt May being a senile old biddy.

I have also finished the rebooted Jughead by Chip Zdarksy. I must say that I think it is one of my favourite rebooted Archie series. Archie is okay, but it's pretty much any teen drama. I have enjoyed the rebooted Josie and the Pussycats, which has been a lot of fun. Meolody is a precious bean. The rebooted Sabrina by Kelly Thompson was a little disappointing as well. It could have been any supernatural teen drama, really.

Question for the Mods

[donnblake]

I've been considering doing a couple of No_Scans posts talking about antecedents to comic book superheroes- totally not just as an excuse to reread Gladiator and assorted pulp novels. Now, there's an obvious connection to comics here, and enough of the characters I've got in mind have subsequently made comic book appearances that I could probably legitimately title the series "We Shall Devour Our Forebears," but since the idea is to focus on them in their pre-comic states, I thought I'd better double check I wasn't straying over the community line before I started that off.

Re: Question for the Mods

[icon_uk]

Hi,

We appreciate the checking, but given the subject matter, and provided it does tie into their comic books descendents, there's no problems we can see with that, so please feel free.

On a personal level, this sounds fascinating.

Re: Question for the Mods

[lego_joker]

Have you checked out Maxwell Grant's Tumblr, perchance? They've singlehandedly reinvigorated my interest in pulp heroes - did a pretty long post on Hugo Danner awhile back.

[scorntx]

In a fit of madness last week, decided to read that Heroes Reborn (the current one, not the old stuff. Not that mad at the moment, even wi' the heatwave).
Speaking as someone who typically... really doesn't like Aaron's writing, it's not terrible. I guess.
It is very Aaron-y, though. But if you can power through that, it's no bother.

Also been reading up on the original Guardians of the Galaxy stories. Whew. Wild ride there.
(Kind of a shame the last attempt Marvel did at collecting the 90s series stopped after issue 9. But, oh well. Maybe one day there'll be an Epic Collection version... juuuust in time for the next movie?)

Hasbro have announced the next releases in Transformers: Studio Series are yet another Bumblebee (that makes eight Bees in the main line alone. Eight!) and, uh, Jolt.
...
Y'know. Jolt.

Also, Kingdom Blackarachnia is getting a retool / repaint designed after her original toy, right down to the bizarre colour scheme.
Odd choice.

Speaking of spiders, really want to go see Black Widow in a proper cinema, but even with the joys of Freedom Day, not wild about risking it, even if I am supposedly jabbed up good an' proper now.
But I also want to see it before accidentally hearing someone gabbin' about it.
(I'm guessing watching it on Disney+ would actually cost the same as going to the cinema anyway, but... and I know this is silly, it's just not the same...)
Hrrn...

Me cat seems very firmly convinced she's a shirt all of a sudden.
I'm pretty sure this is not some bizarre revenge for trying to stop her eating a baby mouse the other week.
... pretty sure.

[icon_uk]

Jolt?

Which one? (The following shamelessly nicked from tfwiki.net )

1994 — Jolt the Decepticon Laser Rod hot rod from Generation 2.
2002 — Jolt the Mini-Con helicopter and partner to Hot Shot from Armada.
2005 — Jolt the Recon Mini-Con Team helicopter from Cybertron.
2008 — Jolt the Decepticon sports car from the 2007 movie franchise.
2009 — Jolt the little helicopter partner to the Autobot Hot Rod from Henkei! Henkei!
2009 — Jolt the Autobot Chevrolet Volt from Revenge of the Fallen.
2021 — Jolt the Mini-Con from Heavy Metal.

[scorntx]

Well, since it's Studio Series, it's the 2009 Jolt from ROTF.
He Who Stood Around In The Background And Did Jack All.
(There were props that got more to do than him.)

[icon_uk]

Given what they did with the characters they focussed on in ROTF, I think Jolt dodged a bullet there.

[tinygaylaura]

"All the best names are taken..."

[skjam]

My father is dying. He's had a good long run, but I am still not coping well. The family is doing at-home hospice for as long as possible, I take my shift this coming weekend.

Not sure now, if I will be able to make it to ConVergence, there's a lot of uncertainty in timing.

At my blog, I look at Devil's Candy, a manga-esque webcomic. http://www.skjam.com/2021/07/20/comic-strip-review-devils-candy-volume-1/

[icon_uk]

I'm sorry to hear that. Wishing you the strength to get through this and the hope that you can both get some comfort from it.

[janegray]

I'm really sorry.

[skjam]

My father passed away this afternoon as I and some other relatives were on the way there. Rest in peace, Dad.

[icon_uk]

My sincere condolences.

Virtual hugs offered

[juniper6]

I’m so sorry to hear that.

[juniper6]

I’m so sorry to hear that. I just lost my mother six weeks ago; she was on home hospice also, and was able to die at home. It was a long, difficult time for the family. But it was worth the effort. Do you have Hospice Care through a hospital? You still have to do the day to day care yourselves, but they provide amazing support. Wishing you peace of mind.

[skjam]

Condolences on the loss of your mother.

Yes, the local hospital (which still has a few employees trained by my mother) was very helpful with the hospice, I am told.

I doubt this will be comprehensible to anyone who hasn’t my played the game, but bleh

[deh_tommy]

I know that’s already fairly contested and I probably should have expected this, but I’m kind of let down a bit with Final Fantasy XIII. The characters are pretty neat and the game looks gorgeous and when things finally open up in Chapter 11 that gets really interesting (even if that is essentially just a series of checklists), but the game’s fairly barebones beyond the combat and the closer I get to the ending the less sense the villain’s goal makes. Lightning is certainly cool and all, but why was she the one to get all the marketing and focus when that’s really an ensemble piece for the first half and Fang and Vanille’s for the second? Heck, why wasn’t Fang the lead character? She’s the one with the unique brand, and she’s got amnesia so she wouldn’t know much about the workings of either Pulse or Cocoon so you learn how the world works with her à la the Warriors of Light from the first game or Tidus in X.

Re: I doubt this will be comprehensible to anyone who hasn’t my played the game, but bleh

[janegray]

Honestly, FFXIII was a massive disappointment for me, but it was at least salvageable because of Sazh. I LOVE Sazh. He is so cool and fun and has such a big heart and, wonder of wonders, is an actual goddamn adult. A father even! PRAISE! Best Character! Easily one of the best in the entire franchise!

...So of course he gets a massively reduced role in the sequels, and is practically there just to act as recipient of torture porn.

*sigh*

[onsokumaru]

Since a couple of days, news are talking about the Pegasus Project, which, to quote wikipedia, is "an international investigative journalism effort to reveal spying abuses by various governments upon journalists, opposition politicians, activists, business people and others using the private NSO Group's Pegasus spyware, officially marketed for surveillance of serious criminals and terrorists."
And all I can think about is "Did ya hear that, Wendell? Wotta revolting development!"

I'm enjoying more and more the shonen jump series "Candy Flurry", an action/battle manga where people are fighting using the power of sweets: giant lollipops, ice cream flood... . While the plot is unoriginal AF, the MC being a girl who actually fights by herself is refreshing. And the humor is great too. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be very popular and may be axed at some point.

[skjam]

I like that Candy Flurry is leaning into the ambiguity of "what constitutes a sweet?" with the running comment, "that's debatable."

[lego_joker]

... I might actually have to start a new manga for the first time in years.

[owlbrigade1]

Britain is currently hot, VERY hot, swelteringly hot... So this will be short as concentrating is hard, and I need to save some for actual work.

I live in Scotland, this is a nation whose normal weather drove us to develop deep fried meat pies as a comfort food in order to cope with it. I cannot take this heat. And ordering a deep fried battered pizza is not gonna give me the endorphin high I need to cope with the weather this time. I don't know how people who live in hotter nations cope at all. Even the night time temps are too warm right now.

and the local supermarket has ran out of Ben and Jerry's ice cream, which is the only ice cream anyone wants here right now after they came out in support of Palestine and ending the occupation there. We're in a heatwave, and people are actually putting ice cream back in the store freezers because they don't want to support a competitor and look like they are supporting the occupation.

In other news, we're getting an actual good Terry Pratchett adaptation for Christmas. One of his short stories, "The Abominable Snow Baby", is getting an animated Christmas special, so there is that: https://narrativia.com/snowbaby.html

[donnblake]

Personally? Mint Juleps and cold showers have got me through a couple rough summers.

[juniper6]

We use air conditioning, thus making the climate crisis even worse.

I have found, when AC is unavailable, that wearing a cotton t-shirt and dumping cold water all over the front of it keeps me cool enough to sleep. It’s a weird hack, but it works. I sleep on my back; you might need to adjust which side to wet depending on your sleeping position. You want it to be able to evaporate.

[malurette]

Almost on-topic, why do characters keep dying in this series I'm reading augh I thought it would be cute, funny and bitter-sweet at most, why is it so heart-wrenching how can I let my mother keep reading it

[cyberghostface]

Sorry if my behavior in the ban post bothered anyone, a lot has been going on. I will try to do better.

[melplayspersonal]

Is there any greater joy than getting a friend into a series you really love?

I shared a clip of it to them for a "Wow this is just like characters from our fandom!" moment. A day later, they're watching the first episode and trying to hunt for more, telling me their favorite characters, making AUs and blaming me plenty. I'm thrilled.

For the record, it's "My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!"

[janegray]

Have you heard that they announced S2 a couple of weeks ago? Great news.

Apparently they are also making a ton of videogames, but they are Japan-only. At least some kind fansubber translated the spin-off manga.

[melplayspersonal]

I thought it already had a season two? They added "x" at the end of the title? Or maybe I got my info wrong - I'd be more than happy for more Bakarina.

But bless fansubbers for all that they do!

[werehawk]

Too bad Schmigadoon doesn't seem as good as its promos. Not surprising but too bad.

In a somehow related (to Schmigadoon) news, I went on a first date last week and the waitress serving us seemed to be the spitting image of what I imagine Cecily Strong's older, meaner sister or cousin would look like. I mean, I mentioned it to my date and her eyes got huge with recognition. She was like "Oh Yeah!". Sadly, that was the best part of the first (and last) date.

[zachbeacon]

Is it at least better than Friends From College?

Key & Peele splitting up sure went a lot better for Peele than Key..

Always weird to spot a doppelganger IRL. I didn't see the resemblance until the Lone Ranger movie a while back but a guy I used to work with looks just like Armie Hammer.

(Then again I apparently have "one of those faces" given the number of times I've been mistaken for other people. Never anyone famous so far.)

[tinygaylaura]

Did Key and Peele have some kind of falling out?

Or do you just mean "Splitting up" in the sense that they are working on seperate projects

[zachbeacon]

I'm not aware of any falling out but they were a duo for quite a while after they started working together on MAD TV (or did they know each other before that?). I think its fair to say one of them has been doing more interesting projects as a solo-act post-Keanu.

[icon_uk]

I'm not big on the whole "dating" thing, but I'm not sure calling attention to the fact you've been paying close attention to the waiting staff is a surefire way to impress your date.