Rogue One - Still a Star Wars Prequel

"Rogue One" has its head in the right place, at least.

Currently Disney is threatening the world of pop culture with a superweapon whose power is beyond imagination: an endless series of Star Wars sequels and spin-offs for the rest of our lives. If you want a picture of the future, imagine Darth Vader’s boot stamping on a human face – forever. So it is good that "Rogue One" looks and feels like a very different kind of SciFi movie. This is not grandpa George Lucas' space opera.

Rather than the operatic joy of a typical Star Wars episode, "Rogue One" goes for a more dour and gritty view of the universe. It is stylistically darker and more serious than even "Empire Strikes Back" or "Revenge of the Sith". The heroes do not get huge action scenes and victories. Giant weird monsters and fun quips are missing. This is a Star Wars film without an idealistic Jedi hero. It shows just how essential those Joseph Campbell protagonists are, because without them, this series ends up in a much uglier and more desperate mode. With a cast of badly broken people and morally gray decisions, "Rogue One" gives us a view of the hard underside of the Star Wars universe.

But what I really love about "Rogue One" is the design of this movie. Most Star Wars cinematography is very plain, if even deliberately retro. No other film series can get away with cheesy side-wipes anymore, but Star Wars can. "Rogue One" uses a digital camera rather than film to create a grimmer tone, but also beautifully complex shots. This is the best looking Star Wars movie by far. The typical bombast of the John Williams score is replaced. We don't even get an opening crawl. Director Gareth Edwards makes it clear he's telling his own story without the old formula.

So far so good. The only problem is that "Rogue One" forgot to have characters.

The Last Guardian - A BlueHighwind and His Dog

There have been three games that I have been waiting patiently for in my little corner of the world. Two of those games came out in the very first week of this month. The last, "Kingdom Hearts III", will probably be released in my lifetime. Hopefully. But it’s definitely a weird feeling. All of a sudden I have very little to complain about at future E3s. I can’t be automatically disappointed at Square Enix for not showing "Final Fantasy XV". I can’t wonder if "The Last Guardian" was secretly cancelled. That part of my life is gone.

The world has become somehow a less magical place now that all my dreams have come true. That’s probably the worst lesson of becoming an adult. It is more enjoyable to want than to actually have. I spent six years on the Final Fantasy Wiki working to become an Admin, and when it happened I felt no joy. If all of a sudden tomorrow somebody hired me away from my day job to work full time as a video game/movie commentator/reviewer… whatever thing I am, I imagine I’ll be disappointed in that too. Because once you’ve achieved your goals you realize how hollow they really were. Life just becomes all the more empty.

And what do you know? It’s also appropriately Christmas, the time of the year when we get all kinds of bullshit and junk that somehow never satisfies us.

It should come as no surprise that both "The Last Guardian" and "Final Fantasy XV" have not lived up to expectations. After you’ve spent six or ten years waiting for a game, they can never match the emotional investment you’ve already put into them*. "Metal Gear Solid V" last year turned out to be badly flawed in story and excellent in gameplay. But after years of watching perfectly directed trailer after perfectly directed trailer, that was not enough. "The Last Guardian" and "Final Fantasy XV" are both not enough in their own ways. I’ll cover both on this blog before the year is done.

But "The Last Guardian" is much much shorter, so I beat that one first. Thus it gets the first review:

Political Correctness, Ghost in the Shell, and Doctor Strange - This is Why We Lost

My last post was a bit too negative, I'll say. It's been a terrifying week here in the United States. But now that week is over, Donald Trump is president. And so far the world hasn't ended. The world still could end. There's a lot that Donald Trump represents that is truly scary. But you know that. It might be time to wonder: are you being made to be afraid? (Just a thought.) This nation needs to calm the fuck down for a moment. We can panic when Trump does something. Protesting his (semi)-legitimate election*, I mean, sorry, legitimate election is doing nothing. It's only making us angrier, more scared, and making things worse.

So instead, why don't we do something that we should have done and look inward. Hillary Clinton got the majority of the vote, the Democrats are the majority opinion in this country, yet they've lost every step of government. Why are we so ineffectual?

Well, I have a theory: the liberal media sucks. I'm barely a media person, so I can only slightly count myself in this camp. But let's be real here: we've done a bad job. I'm not saying reporting has failed. I'm not saying Breitbart and Fox News should be the new standard for reality. Yet I can say the liberal side of the equation has been focused on the wrong things. I can't tell you every answer. The media can be blamed for making Donald Trump the only Republican candidate, they can be blamed for never talking about the real issues in this election.

They thought a sex scandal from eleven years ago was what should decide the election. Not the economy, not trade, not foreign policy, but that Donald Trump isn't very polite. I'm sorry, this is delusional. We are lecturing to people. The liberal media is telling people what to think and focusing on the wrong things.

And one of those things is going to be the subject of this article right now: political correctness in film criticism and why it isn't helping.

The End of the Real America

It is now 1:17 AM at the moment I begin writing this. I have attempted to sleep for the past two hours. I've tossed and turned for a few minutes, tried to stay my beating heart. Then I flip the TV back on. The talking heads can only show the inevitable. Hillary Clinton has lost. The final results are not in, but she has no path in Pennsylvania. It's over. Donald Trump will now be our next president. And god, I wish any of these news people could say anything positive. Because I need a sign of something good. Anything.

My only silver lining is imagining that I'm wrong about this man. That I am as wrong as pollster and every pundit. However Donald Trump offers absolutely nothing for me. I could run down his entire run of campaign promises (even the ones that contradict the other ones, even the ones that are so vague as to be utter bullshit) and not find a single one I agree with. And this man has a mandate. He was the smartest person in the room today. He has a Republican Party that controls the Congress that can only sniff which direction the mood is going. There's a Supreme Court vacancy he can fill. There's an army of state politicians who will follow him. Donald Trump has power to remake America. You were told to be terrified during the election by Hillary Clinton.

I want not to be terrified. I am terrified anyway.

 These are bad years coming forward. I want to write about reconciliation. About how maybe with united government we can have a successful nation. I want to find something good to take away from this election. I can't find one though. I am 2016's Liberal Tea Party.

The America I knew is gone. I had a Real America. A Great America. I don't know if we'll ever see it again.

13th Review and Other Fandom Articles

Fandom does not really seem like the type of place to be very politics friendly. Most of the crap that gets written there is Star Wars and Batman speculation. And I'm not anti-Star Wars or anti-Batman. But I also understand that the site has a particular audience and they want to see video games and Luke Cage and nonsense.

But I sort of broke the rules this time using Ava DuVernay's newest move, "13th". Even though the post is just a review, and a short one, it felt like important writing. So I'm sharing it here, I'm sharing it everywhere I can. Because "13th" is an essential movie. Here's the article: http://fandom.wikia.com/articles/nyff-preview-13th

"13th" is going to be released to Netflix on October 7th. I strongly recommend you give it a watch. If you want to know part of the reason that 2016 has been such a shit storm of a year, why racial tension in this country has hit a twenty year high, you must see it. (And read my review, of course. Like, comment, subscribe, etc. etc.)

While I'm here, I might as well share everything else I've written recently. It's the New York Film Festival so I have a pile of reviews from there, along with other content.

Beyond the Bikini: Why 'Metal Gear Solid V's Quiet Deserves to be Heard Published 10/3

NYFF Preview: 'Manchester by the Sea' Published 10/2

NYFF Preview: 'Moonlight' Published 9/23

NYFF Preview: 'Fire at Sea' Published 9/23

NYFF Preview: 'I, Daniel Blake' Published 9/22

Is 'No Man's Sky' an Indie Game? Published 9/21

The Bleak World of 'Command and Conquer: Tiberian Sun' Published 10/2

Weird Watch: 'Inland Empire' Published 9/25

On Election 2016: Pick the Least Worst Candidate

Tonight America will get to see two people they hate remind the nation why they should hate each other. 2016 is turning into one of those “the other guy is worse” elections. Only a tiny minority of voters actually want Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump to be president. Only about 10% of the population even voted for these people to represent the Democratic and Republican parties. These candidates do not need to promise a thing. They don’t need plans or legislation or even to govern, just as long as the other guy does not get to rule.

If you listen to the rhetoric around this election, both of these candidates will lead this country to disaster. Hillary is a crooked spymaster, a wicked scheming eunuch of her husband’s court that has been bought and sold by powerful interests. And Donald Trump is a fascist leading a white supremacist revolution that will turn this country into Columbia from “BioShock Infinite”. They're both old, they're both crooked, they're both ugly, they're both out to steal America away from you.

The problem for me is that once you cut out the hyperbolic bullshit, I think both of these candidates are terrible choices. I’m still going to vote for Hillary Clinton, but I’ll do so with my eyes open. Neither one of these candidates will solve the dysfunction in Washington, neither one will bring this country together, neither one can solve our foreign policy issues, neither one can fix the economy. If either candidate wins, we are looking at a circus of four bad years in Washington to follow.

Do not think for a second that the moment your least favorite candidate loses that you can breathe a sigh of relief. Do you really think the Republicans are just going to sit back and let Hillary Clinton be president unchallenged? Do you think Trump will just build his wall and bomb families indiscriminately without backlash?

Fandom Articles Catch-Up

Tragically, blogger-bros, I don't have anything new for you right now. (Writing schedule has been busy.) But I haven't forgotten about the blog, I'll try to keep you in the loop better. If you want to follow along with non-blog articles, make sure to follow me on Twitter (@BlueHighwind) if you haven't already. As you can see, I haven't been lazy, just... distracted.

There's also a Facebook page that's even more barren than this place.

Anyway, here's the articles that have come up in about the last month or so:

‘Sonic 3 & Knuckles’ Was the Best Ending to Sonic’s Golden Age - Published 8/8

Weird Watch: ‘The Spirit’ - Published 8/20

A Look at ‘Overwatch’ Hero Memes - Published 8/22

Crash Course: Dragon Quest - Published 8/31

The Failure of Final Fantasy Movies - Published 9/5 (For some reason people really seem to like this one.)

Fall Movie Preview: Movies for Nerds - Published 9/12

Metroid Fans Still Want Metroid Games, But Does Nintendo? - Published 9/12

Batman's Trouble With the Ladies - Published 9/17.

Also, got a press pass to New York Film Festival this year! Haha.

Kingsglaive vs Kubo: Try Not to Cut Yourself on Your Cutting Edge

Last weekend two revolutionary cutting-edge animated feature films came out. This is unusual since on most weekends not a single revolutionary or cutting-edge animated feature film comes out. Just watch the trailer for "The Wild Life" - this is the kind of ambition-less crap that we usually get. But last weekend we were spoiled. Two ambitious studios, Laika and Square Enix, both dropped two of the most visually impressive films of the year. On two separate frontiers of animation, stop-motion and photo-realistic CG, their movies pushed the envelopes. On a technical level this is incredible stuff.

"Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV", the two hour trailer for the upcoming video game, is a step way beyond anything Square Enix has made before. There is serious graphical horsepower on display here, featuring a world and characters that could very easily fool you into being live action. The people still are slightly mutated Final Fantasy beings, with eyes a bit too large and their movements not quite right. But otherwise, it is a startlingly realistic-looking film.

Meanwhile, "Kubo and the Two Strings" is an incredible jump up from Laika's previous films, "Para-Norman" and "The Box Trolls". They're attempting a full action fantasy film with the artistic elegance and style of a Studio Ghibli production. They've kept their slightly twisted Laika style, but have something legitimately beautiful. All this is possible thanks to the possibilities of 3D printing for more detailed characters and faster production. Laika is showing that there is no limit to the potential of stop-motion animation.

But when you get past the technical level, one of these movies is a pile of shit. Unfortunately, Square Enix still can't actually tell a good story. Laika can.

Can Anybody Tell Me Why I Liked Suicide Squad?

At the moment things are not going too well for Warner Bros' last-minute race to catch up with Marvel. Actually things are not going too well for the entire film industry in general. This summer has been a disastrous wasteland. Ever since I wrote up my list of the Best Movies of 2016 So Far, it feels like nothing at all has come out. Sure, there have been huge blockbuster movies, but does anybody care about a new Jason Bourne? Did anybody really care about "Ghostbusters" once the controversy died down? Did you even know a fucking Tarzan movie came out? I didn't. And to nobody's shock, the box office is hurting.

"Suicide Squad" was released last Friday to reviews that ranged from "OH MY GOD, MY FACE IS ON FIRE" to "OH MY GOD, THE WORLD IS ON FIRE". This coming just six months after Warner Bros farted out "Batman v Superman: Dawn of Possibly the Worst Movie of the Decade". It is not good for anybody at Warner Bros or the industry. "Man of Steel" was Strike One, "BvS" is Strike Two. In order to save this ballgame, DC needed a grand slam. Instead they got "Suicide Squad", a movie everybody hates. Just when you thought it was safe to go back to the movies - fuck you, 27% on Rotten Tomatoes. If you ever needed evidence that you should have just stayed home and finished "Stranger Things", this was it.

I'm not going to mince words. Why should I? People are going to be a lot meaner than me when it comes to this movie. "Suicide Squad" is a mess. It was clearly torn to pieces in editing. Director David Ayer seems to have had a gritty Tarantino-esque superhero movie by way of crime thriller in mind. But the studio wanted a new "Guardians of the Galaxy"... oh wait no, they wanted a new "Deadpool". The results are clear. The movie is half flashback. Then those flashbacks are followed by exposition that explain the flashbacks. There's a desperation in the editing as the soundtrack goes from one Top 100 Hit of Yesteryear to another in a truly sad attempt to inject fun in the proceedings. And Jared Leto's Joker is shit.

So can anybody explain to me why I liked "Suicide Squad"? Could you explain why I'm even going to give this movie a recommendation?

Ghostbusters (2016) Review

So after months and months of bitter warfare between horrible sexist GamerGate nerd assholes and SJW tumblrite militant FeminiNazis... the movie was fine.

Meh.

Decent enough.

I have nothing to say about this movie, gonna be honest. The cameos were a bit obnoxious. The jokes landed here or there. Too many fart jokes. Melissa McCarthy wasn't very funny, Kate McKinnon probably saved the movie, Leslie Jones wasn't bad, Kristin Wiig was... I don't even know or care.

I don't remember anything about this movie already. "Ghostbusters" (2016) is probably the least interesting thing to talk about of the entire year. Was Michael K. Williams in this movie? I can't remember. After all that bullshit. All the crap on my twitter feed. It was this. ...It was okay. Doesn't even begin to compare with the 1984 original. So what?

Meh... I was hoping for this whole thing to write here. I could have pulled together 5,000 words easily if "Ghostbusters" (2016) was as bad as the remakes of "Vacation" or "Red Dawn" or "RoboCop" or that fucking "Total Recall" movie with the stupid gravity train. I wish it were worse. I could have gotten good and mad and written a review. Or it were in any way spectacular I'd have material. Instead I got nothing to work with here. Three out of Five, whatever. You can do worse.

Sorry for wasting your time.

Some of What Might Be the Best Movies of 2016

The year of Our Lord Lena "Tracer" Oxton 2016 is now half over. Actually it’s more than half over but I’m typically late about everything. It seems that since I rarely have time to write movie reviews, I should just update you all on what movies you should have seen in the last six months. Obviously it is now too late to see most of them because they’re already out of theaters. So well… Yeah, I wish I had something to help you with how shitty that is. Anyhoo, speaking of incredibly late, it’s now closer to 2017 than 2015, and I realize I never wrote a Best Movies of 2015 List*. (See footnote.)

My plan in 2016 has been to watch what I call "good movies". Once upon a time when this blog was in its prime I would watch every single piece of shit that Hollywood produced. Now I can look at the wonder that is "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2" and say "no". I'm very happy about that. 25% of my life has passed, I've seen enough shitty movies. I can tolerate some cheese like "Warcraft" or "X-Men Apocalypse" every now and then, but if its "Divergent 3"? I don't need to see it. I'm free of that crap! So here's ten good movies from 2016 that I saw instead:

10) Captain America: Civil War – Okay, so a superhero film is on the list. But it is not Deadpool and it is definitely not "Buttfuck v Superfuck: Dawn of Fuck". Actually I think "Captain America: Civil War" really only hangs on this list thanks to my eternal hatred of "BvS", which is already the Worst Movie of 2016. (Debate is over.) "Civil War" is how you do that movie right. You have real characters, you have real stakes, and you have humor. It also does not hurt to have a giant Ant-Man fighting Spider-Man fighting androids fighting robots fighting mutants in the greatest and silliest comic brawl of all time. "Civil War" gives you the taste of everything the Marvel universe can do. It can hit sillier highs and lower emotional blows than any movie Marvel has done before.

Game of Thrones Season 6 Reaction: The Good, the Bad, and the Sand Snakes

Season 5 was not good for "Game of Thrones". If you remember my post from last year, I summed up the season with something along the lines of:  "There is a point where it is just not fun. Watching a TV show should not feel like an extended funeral every week. Maybe that's what you're into in your entertainment, I won't judge too harshly. But I'm not." Or to put it another way: Season 5 fucking sucked. Between the rapes, the child murder, the terrible plotting, and Dorne, it was a disaster of a season.

The problem with Season 5 was not just the unrelenting misery or the "bad poosy". It was a victim of the same larger problem that ruined the last book of A Song of Ice and Fire, "A Dance With Dragons". That's the same larger problem that will cause "The Winds of Winter" to miss my pessimistic 2011 predicted release date of August 2016*. That problem is that George R. R. Martin is stuck. He's been stuck for over a decade now. He does not know how to get from his plodding middle section to the third act. We all know what has to happen:  Jon has to become King in the North, Dany has to beat the Slavers and go to Westeros,  and (eventually) the Wall is coming down and the Others are invading. But how do you get there? How do you line up all your pieces and just get there?

While GRRM has been struggling with this unsolvable problem, the show has suffered. Season 5 was not just bad bad because the villains won all the time in diablo ex machinas after diablo ex machinas. It was bad because the show was padding itself out. You could see the padding all the way back in Season 4 with entirely created arcs involving Night's Watch deserters and the fookin' legend of Gin Alley, Karl Tanner. Dorne didn't just suck because the Sand Snakes were bad, it sucked because it was irrelevant and took forever. Meereen is awful because it is a sideshow in the books and the show. Ramsay became an annoying character because he was not important to the overall story and to stall for time he was transformed into this ridiculous Hannibal Lecter-esque supervillain.

So Season 6 is not perfect by any means. It has padding, it has bad plotting, it has mistakes. But here's the thing:  it gets there. By the end of this season we are at the final act of the story. We are ready for the final wars. And even an uneven season with several mistakes requires a nod of recognition from me. At least it got there.

EHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH3 2016 Reaction - Part Dos

This whole post is just more game reactions. But a lot of games did not get a full reaction from me, so I’ll write up quick ones reviews here before the detailed ones:

"Battlefield 1" is about World War I, which is cool, but also it’s a Battlefield game, so it’s instantly un-cool. "Dishonored 2" could be really cool but the story seems dumb and it only makes me wish I were playing "BioShock 4". "Prey" should be called "Prey 2" because if you call two games 'Prey' that just gets really confusing. "Watch_Dogs 2" should not fool anybody in 2016. "Gears of War 4" is more like 'Gears of Bore 4'."Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE" is a game that only I will ever enjoy. "Titanfall 2" is not "Overwatch". "Spider-Man "won’t be out until 2019. And I don’t know what "Mafia III" is.

Anyway, onto the reactions. I'll break this post up into categories:

Games I Really Want to Hate But Must Begrudgingly Admit Don’t Look That Bad:

"God of War 5" – I hate God of War. These games have been symbols for a very long time of everything that was wrong with gaming last decade. The first "God of War" was fun in a pretty shallow way. Now that "Bayonetta" and "Metal Gear Rising" exist I cannot really think of a good reason to play "God of War" in 2016. When I think of Kratos I think of teenaged boys who think they’re mature, eating Doritos, sipping Mountain Dew, and raging against the Wii for being “kiddie”. That’s probably unfair, but God of War really collected a lot of bad trends like QTEs, lame linear game design, and stupid empty-headed plotlines. If God of War was in anyway aware of its own insanity that was all lost in Kratos’ unrelenting brotastic fury. It was assholian to a degree that aesthetically turned me off.

Weirdly Seems like the guys making the games agree with me. "God of War 5" is a curiously specific answer to all my complaints.

E3 2016 Reaction - Parte the Firste

Guess what? It’s E3! And unlike last year where I pretty much did nothing for the show, I’m actually going to write up some reactions. Because there isn't much else to talk about, other than really depressing serious issue like gun safety in this country, Islamaphobia, and the slow disintegration of the electorate into bickering groups screaming past each other in an endless national flame war. Games are a much easier topic, so I’ll talk about them.

While I did not go to E3 this year, I have done all I can to try to be there in spirit. That includes watching the long industry conferences, watching playthroughs on Youtube, and downloading the "Resident Evil VII" demo. But also I’ve simulated the experience by sitting in long soul-crushing lines of traffic, eating gross fast food breakfasts, and sleeping like trash all week. No, it isn’t the same thing, but at least work is slow so I have plenty of time to write up my reaction posts. Also I can pour all my frustrations at my failure to ever return to E3 into Reinhardt players in "Overwatch". You slow bastards never know what hit you.

On some level of topic: Every year the question is brought up: "who won E3?" Well, I cannot really say there were winners of E3 2016, because right now everything in the gaming industry is in such flux. Nintendo is holding its cards close to its chest while it transitions to the NX. At the very least Nintendo knows where it wants to be and seems to have a roadmap to get there. But Microsoft seems totally lost. The Xbox One is clearly the second place finisher after the PlayStation 4 and Microsoft does not know how to get back on top. Everything Microsoft has tried since 2010 has failed. Scorpio seems more like a threat than a promise of the future to me. These gaming half-steps show a console industry that has prepared itself badly for this generation and is looking for a way to catch back up to PC, consumers be damned. VR is here but it’s been floundering to make a true beachhead. Sony is giving it a big push but how serious they are is hard to say. While Ubisoft is celebrating thirty years with giraffes and dancers without bellybuttons, Vivendi is plotting a hostile takeover. Heck, E3’s showfloor itself is largely a ghost town this year I’ve heard. Konami and Disney are gone from the industry, EA and Activision left the showfloor, Nintendo has just Zelda and a treehouse. E3 as an institution itself is very much in doubt.

So with all uncertainty in mind, I’m just gonna talk about games. Because despite the industry's state right now, 2016 has been a phenomenal year of gaming so far, and this E3 was very good for games. Scorpio seems like a rip-off, VR might not work, Nintendo might be doomed, but while we all ride this train to our collective doom, we'll have games to play.

This is going to be a two-parter. I'll post the second part tomorrow night.

Overwatch vs Battleborn

So here's a topic I didn't think I would ever discuss in detail here.

I don’t play FPS games or multiplayer games very often. I don’t really know what a MOBA is other than it has something to do with eSports and lots of RTS games my friends played in college that I was not interested in at all. I do know that my natural inclination is to hate anything new and popular and that makes me suspicious and fearful of this MOBA thing. (What does "MOBA" even stand for, anyway?) However I do know one thing: one of these FPS multiplayer games is the best thing I’ve played all year, and the other hates me.

"Overwatch" has been on my radar for over a year now, ever since I played it at PAX East 2015. Normally a multiplayer shooter of any kind would be the very last thing ol’ BH would play. I’m a lone wolf, I got anime RPGs to finish. Also the FPS games I have played have reminded me again and again with horrifying KD ratios that I am utterly and completely terrible at those types of games down to a fundamental atomic level. But "Overwatch" was bright and appealing and there was a hint of what I did know at the time would eventually blossom into a full on romantic love with the character Tracer. I played a round, and sucked hard at McCree and did not suck as hard at Tracer, and that was that. Or so I figured. "Decent game, going to be cool for the folks that are down for it, but I’ll be busy with 'Bravely Second' or something when 'Overwatch' comes out in 2016." Instead "Bravely Second" has been ignored for over a week and I fucking love "Overwatch".

Now there’s "Battleborn"… the Pepsi to "Overwatch"’s Coke. Or more accurately, the decades-old can of Crystal Pepsi bought on EBay to "Overwatch"’s Mexican real sugarcane Coke. This is a game that stinks of “also ran” syndrome. "Battleborn" just looked bad. I did not have the heart to tell Randy Pitchford this when I interviewed him at PAX (hash tag shameless self-promotion) but I did have to bring up "Overwatch", because it was the game we both knew was going to kill "Battleborn". The only reason I’ve played "Battleborn" at all is that I was able to score a review copy. I have all the respect in the world for Pitchford, since he really seems to love his game or at least bullshits with a level of sincerity that I can only envy, but man… it’s just not good. And being “just not good” when you’re competing against what might be the best game of 2016, that’s going to hurt any game.

PAX East Blogging Round Up Extraganza Ultra Sexy Posts

Wikia sent me to PAX East last weekend (well, I paid, they just supplied the press pass), and I've been writing posts about the show since. Figured you might want to read some of them, maybe. I dunno. How you been? It's like 10:30 right now and I'm super tired so this turned more stream of consciousness than I wanted. Eh.

Warframe Panel and Developer Interview

Total Warhammer Hands-On and Developer Interview

Battleborn Hands-On and Developer Interview

Pyre is really amazing, yo

Pit People was pretty alright in most ways

Thumper is the greatest fucking thing ever! It's the Raid: Redemption of games

I don't really know what this is or why I wrote it

I try really hard to not be too negative about the Warcraft movie at a panel, and try to convince myself it might be the next John Carter

SEVEN BEST INDIE GAMES OF THE SHOW

I think that about catches you all up. Presumably this makes my resume look better. I've never actually done an interview before so that's like games journalisms stuff or something.

Hoping next PAX I'll be allowed to just go as a tourist and just have fun. Also if I missed any good games, tell me. I kinda miss talking to you.

Broodman v Supergrimdark: Dawn of Misery (Rant)

I'm not even going to try to post this review on any other website. Nobody is going to want to publish one of my rants. But I'm mad and sad and depressed and I have a lot to talk about. So I'll dust off this blog and use it again. To talk about sad things. I'm sorry the first real post in a long time has to be about this. But hopefully it will be fun for you to read.

I think a lot of the reason I really stopped writing reviews was because I'm just... tired. After five years of watching any awful shit that came out of Hollywood I'm tired of doing this to myself. I looked at 2015's slate of bad comedies, bad superhero movies, and after things like "Age of Ultron", I just don't have the energy to say the same things over and over about the same kind of mistakes in the same kind of movies. Ironically I've seen a lot of really special, amazing, and original movies since I basically retired, "Room", "Anomalisa", "Hateful Eight", "Sicario", "Midnight Special", "The Boy and the Beast", "The VVitch", and I'm not writing about any of them. As a matter of fact, I think I'm just too old to watch shit anymore. I'm old enough to realize that life is too damn short to get hung up over the "Green Lanterns" of the world. One of these days I'll be dead and certainly nowhere on my list of regrets will be missing "Fantastic Four".

So here's my recommendation for "Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice": don't see it. Don't do it yourself. There's nothing here. Trust me. I only saw this movie last night because a friend from high school wanted to hang out and why not see a superhero movie? I was on the fence about seeing it at all before that. I gave you a list of half a dozen great movies, watch those! Or see "The Revenant", "Trainwreck", "Turbo Kid", "Ex Machina", "Me and Earl and the Dying Girl", or "Krampus". Your life can be enriched, it can be improved, you can learn new perspectives, see new things, experience new emotions. Don't see "Batman v Superman". In the great cosmic scale of positives and negatives of entertainment, this is pure negative. It's a hateful, depressing, dreary movie that has a bold new vision for superheroes: mainly that superheroes are not fun anymore. And it's boring.

On Thursday I was tired of Marvel and didn't want to see "Civil War" and thought it was just all too much. On Saturday I am a Marvel fanboy. Bring it on, Disney. They make colorful and fun movies where people crack jokes. They're not perfect, but they're trying to entertain. They're not... this. It's so awful. It is corroded with misery. It's like a funeral. I've seen cancer movies with more joy than "Batman v Superman". I've seen Holocaust movies with more joy. You could make a Holocaust cancer movie that ends in a funeral and it would be more fun than "Batman v Superman". Just don't. Really. I can explain more after the pagebreak, but please, trust me even if you've never trusted me before. Don't.

(Also this is Batman Movie Batdown: Week 1,000 or something. It is also the very first time I have not enjoyed a Batman movie. Yay...)

Weird Watch: White God

Hey, an update!

If you haven't noticed, this blog has been deader than a terrible lab accident mixture of Disco and Adolf Hitler. I call him "Disco Hitler". And he was stillborn, it was very sad. Did not have the funk or the authoritative National Socialist militarism I had in mind.

Anyway, um... I'm sorry. I had a terrible thing happen to me called a new full time job.

The blog is not dead-dead, since at some point I'll have to review "Star Wars: Episode VII" here, just because I have to review it. It must be done. Anyway, I've been contributing to Wikia's new Fandom site for awhile, and here's the latest post, a review of "White God":

http://fandom.wikia.com/articles/weird-watch-white-god 

I'll have things to share coming up. The future is bright. Brighter than the rotting corpse of poor Disco Hitler, who god decided was not allowed to be born.