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‘Ping Pong’ Recap: ‘The Wind Makes It Too Hard to Hear’
This Week’s Game-Changing Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Was Exactly The Problem With The Show
As the credits rolled on Captain America 2: The Winter Soldier, I turned to my friend and said, “That movie was everything that I’ve wanted Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. to be.” But despite what the producers might think, it wasn’t because of the marquee names and big explosive action scenes. I was talking about the espionage, the intrigue and excitement of plainclothes heroes digging deeper and deeper into a conspiracy and trying to do what's objectively “right” in an increasingly complicated world.
Fortunately, this week’s game-changing episode of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. got me pretty excited. Unfortunately, that’s also the problem with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and why I fear it’s doomed to fail. (*spoilers for the show and Captain America: The Winter Soldier* to follow, obviously)
[Read more]
Part of my continuing issue with the show has been its lack of edge-of-your-seat thrills—and again, I’m not necessarily talking about world-threatening villains and big-budget helicarrier explosions. For a show about secret agents in a world full of superheroes, the stakes have never quite been high enough, and the subtle hints of at a larger story have hardly elevated past the winks and nods to Marvel continuity. Yes, the producers have done a good job of seeding along all of the little bits of tech and villany—Deathlok, Ian Quinn, et cetera—but the emotional and thematic throughlines of the series so far have been severely lacking. Coulson’s resurrection and Skye’s origins are both intriguing, but they’re not enough to carry the narrative through. After seeing the Captain America 2 tie-in episodes, I understand now that it’s because the story wasn’t allowed to become anything bigger.
“Our challenge was that we couldn’t say the ‘H word’ until after Captain America 2 . . . so we had to have an ongoing threat that we’ve called Centipede, that we’ve called The Clairvoyant, that we’ve called other things, because we could not say the word Hydra,” explained producer Jeff Bell in a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly. Jed Whedon added, in an interview with Comic Book Resources, “We couldn’t really have anybody bad within the organization, we couldn’t paint the organization in a negative light, and we couldn’t say the H-word. The concept of the Clairvoyant . . . was born out of a desire for us to have our big bad be tied to it, without us being able to talk about it. We came up with the concept of someone who appears to have powers that we can be chasing on our own.”
Or, in other words, “We weren’t allowed to organically build our story to its actual climax because someone else had dibs on it first so we just spun our wheels for 16 episodes instead.”
I understand that the big reveals—that S.H.I.E.L.D. has been corrupt almost from the start, and are now dismantled; the whole Winter Soldier conspiracy and Alexander Pierce and Project Insight blowing up—had to happen on the big screen. But why couldn’t they allow the show to hint at the corruption of S.H.I.E.L.D. from the start? It’s about a secretive organization! Lies and corruption are in the DNA of that kind of story! Even shows like Fringe (which Bell worked on), Dollhouse (which Jed Whedon and Maurissa Tancharoen worked on), and The X-Files all hinted towards something else insidious going on in the background; someone pulling the strings behind the scenes, something bigger than our characters. That’s what keeps people watching and hooked (see also: LOST).
Coulson’s team has barely had to tackle with bureaucracy, and even when they have, it’s been easily resolved. That’s also why the continuing thread of Coulson’s resurrection hasn’t worked as well—of course S.H.I.E.L.D. would have all kinds of crazy technology that isn’t public, and using it to save the life of a prized agent isn’t really all that insidious, even if the circumstances were a bit shady. Instead, the latter half of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s first season has just relied on “dun...dun...DUN!” cliffhangers to end every episode, in hopes of getting you to tune in next week. They couldn’t have an overarching story with narrative tension that pulls the viewer back, so they used quick and easy stingers as if to say, “But next week! Something will ACTUALLY happen! We swear!”
What if Melinda May’s spying on Coulson had been revealed in the second episode and never resolved until this point in the season? Or what if the show took a note from the recent Secret Warriors comic book series and had started off by depicting Coulson’s team as one of Nick Fury’s hand-picked squads of trustworthy agents? Especially considering that Fury knew that something was rotten in S.H.I.E.L.D.? (Maybe tie it in to AIM, who was established in Iron Man 3, and has a Hydra connection in the comics?) Would that really have spoiled Captain America 2? The Hydra reveal could have still been saved for the film, particularly the fact that it went so deep. By then we’d be so invested in the characters that our minds would be even more blown when Melinda May revealed that not only had she been spying for Fury, but that the purpose of the team has been a lie all along as well. A twist within a twist! That’s what happens in secret agent stories!
When Coulson realized that the Clairvoyant was an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., my reaction was, “Well yes, of course s/he is. This is a show about secret agents.” It was made even more disappointing by knowing that the Bigger Bad behind this Big Bad had already lost. (Yes, it’s entirely possible that there’s another twist coming with the Clairvoyant and Ward—at least there’d better be). If the show is now going to be about Coulson’s team hunting the splintered Hydra factions then what was the point of the preceding 16 episodes? Why not just launch the series spinning out of Captain America 2, as Fury’s superhero secret agent cleanup crew? Don’t get me wrong, I’m as excited as anyone else is for the end of this season, but it still has me wondering what the point of everything else was up until now.
I realize that Marvel Studios is in a difficult position, trying to pull off this otherwise unprecedented transmedia crossover, but so far it seems that their insistence on playing it safe is the very thing that’s holding them back. Maybe they should consider looking to some of their own comic book source material for inspiration—the aforementioned Secret Warriors, which influenced some of Captain America 2’s plot, or Brian Michael Bendis’s multi-year New Avengers / Secret Invasion epic for some real clever and dramatic drama of slow-building trust issues.
More importantly, they need to let Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. be a good show that stands on its own, instead of worrying so much about movie tie-ins and celebrity cameos. No one’s going to complain about Iron Man not appearing if the show is compelling and dramatic and the stakes are high enough. Make it a thrilling enough espionage story so that we don’t need Robert Downey, Jr. or another appearance by Stan Lee. As it is right now, the safety net of rules that have been put in place by the studio have essentially relegated the show to the status of Ongoing Hour-Long Commercial To Promote Our Bigger Budget Movies Which We Obviously Care More About. And frankly, no one wants to watch that.
They would, however, want to watch this:
Thom Dunn was once paid $200 to dress up as Spider-Man and sign autographs at a Walmart. It was the best day ever. He is a writer and musician who enjoys Oxford commas, metaphysics, and romantic clichés (especially when they involve whiskey). Thom is a graduate of Clarion Writer’s Workshop at UCSD, and he firmly believes that Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing” is the single worst atrocity committed against mankind. Find out more at thomdunn.net.
Sharing Then And Now
Anytime I see anything about illegal file sharing or privacy, I am reminded of the 1992, classic, public service announcement: Don't Copy That Floppy!See more: Sharing Then And Now
Ask Chris #191: Dr. Doom, The Gold Standard Of Comic Book Villainy
Q: Why is Doctor Doom the gold standard of supervillains? -- @franzferdinand2
A: In case you missed it a few weeks back, I wrote a column about the differences between Lex Luthor and the Joker, and mentioned that while those are two characters I like an awful lot, Dr. Doom is far and away the gold standard of supervillainy. He's compelling, he's sinister, he's got a great design that's lasted, virtually unchanged, for 50 years, and he can be dropped into almost any type of story and work beautifully. In short, he's the single greatest villain in superhero comics history.
Well, unless you count Bob Kane, but that's a whole other thing.
Them: I need it 40x40. Me: 40x40 what? Centimeters? Pixels? Inches? Them: Yes. Me: Okay, I’ll...
Them: I need it 40x40.
Me: 40x40 what? Centimeters? Pixels? Inches?
Them: Yes.
Me: Okay, I’ll make it a square (but in very high resolution) so you can basically resize it to whatever you want. How’s that?
Them: Why a square?
eisuverse: andrewpjohnston: Spent way too long on these for...
Spent way too long on these for how mediocre they came out. Whatever, GUILTY GEAR WHUKOW!
This is pretty sweet actually, I don’t think they’re mediocre.
best. crossover. EVER!
After his friend told him that "the movie sucks 'cuz it's not the same as the book"...
How Mike Judge & Co. Are Turning HBO's "Silicon Valley" Into the Next "This Is Spinal Tap"
kateDefinitely interested in this show now.
"Silicon Valley satire nails the culture, geeks say," the Los Angeles Times read. "Mike Judge's Silicon Valley is satire, but feels like a documentary," Slate notes. "Mike Judge skewers Silicon Valley with the satire of our dreams," Wired raves.
That's because Judge and company really, really did their homework. In crafting the first season of their new HBO comedy series Silicon Valley, the show's creative core (Judge, Alec Berg, Clay Tarver, and Dan O'Keefe) pretty much did everything short of embedding with Tesla Motors to prepare for writing the show.
"We just wanted to get it right," says Tarver, a former musician and an admittedly "accidental" writer. "There's that funny thing when you see [the rock mockumentary] This Is Spinal Tap, you think that, 'Oh, musicians are gonna hate them for doing that!' But then musicians all love it—because it strikes the right tone. And that was our goal: If you knew more about this world than we did, you'd think we got it right."
Silicon Valley follows a fumbling, disorganized team of young programmers and businessmen (a brilliant cast that includes Thomas Middleditch, T.J. Miller, Zach Woods, Kumail Nanjiani, and Martin Starr) as they start their own company and attempt to bring their revolutionary file-compression technology to market. (Before Judge was famous for Office Space and Beavis and Butt-Head, he was a programmer and briefly worked at a Silicon Valley starup. He hated it.) And in the pursuit of getting these things just right, the guys behind Silicon Valley quickly developed a passion for finding the funny in Northern California's hub of tech, innovation, and unmanageably large egos.
It wasn't too hard to find.
David Petersen’s take on Rocket Raccoon is, of course, amazing
HBO Has Renewed Game Of Thrones For Seasons 5 and 6 Thanks To Huge Premiere Ratings
Oh just renew it for infinity already, HBO. Geez.
There was really no doubt about it but it’s official – Game of Thrones will be returning to HBO for at least another two seasons.
“Game of Thrones is a phenomenon like no other,” said Michael Lombardo, president, HBO Programming. “David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, along with their talented collaborators, continue to surpass themselves, and we look forward to more of their dazzling storytelling.”
The news follows huge rating numbers for the Season 4 premiere (which we have recapped here).
“Season 4 of the epic fantasy opened at 9 p.m. Sunday night averaging 6.6 million total viewers, according to Nielsen,” according to the LA Times. “Those are the best numbers for HBO since 2007, when the mob drama “Sopranos” ended with 11.9 million viewers.”
To compare, the Season 3 premiere was viewed by 4.4 million. I hope their PR team gets a raise.
Producers have previously said the show is likely to run for seven seasons so I’m kind of surprised they didn’t just go for it and announce all of them officially. I sincerely doubt the creators are going to do anything to mess up one of the most popular shows on television right now. Oh, I just jinxed myself didn’t I? This is like the time Ned Stark said he would tell Jon Snow all about his mom the next time he sees him. Oops.
(via Collider)
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A Fantastically Detailed Geological History for Game of Thrones
A group of geologists and map designers have reconstructed the geological ages of Essos, Westros, and other regions described in Game of Thrones. The results are incredible — and reveal just how violent and mythic real-life geological changes can be.
Hoteloween: downtown hotels were gone in about 20 minutes
kateThe future of all nerd cons?
It’s the scariest day of the year! Well, scariest if you already have a badge that is. Hotel registration for the San Diego Comic-Con took place at 9 am pdt, and it didn’t take long for the close hotels to go – this tweet went out about 9:23:
No surprise, but: welcome page message on #SDCC hotel request form already updated to say downtown hotels are gone. pic.twitter.com/DcG5zR3DGJ
— ConShark (@ConSharkNews) April 8, 2014
And now the waiting begins. Reservations within a three second block are considered the same time and go into a tie breaking lottery. My own time was 2:20, which is pretty good but…will I ever see you again Horton Grand? One pro tip: autofill, autofill, autofill.
This is as good a time as any to note that there is always some jockeying for rooms and swapping and shenanigans and what not, although the steep two day deposit has limited that. There’s always Airbnb, too although private rooms are going for $400-1000 so not exactly a bargain option.
Still, you know what? It will all work out.
Bandai and JINS Offer "Kuroko's Basketball" PC Glasses
JINS' latest anime collaboration sees the PC glasses label working with Bandai on a line of Kuroko's Basketball eye-wear. Six "Generation of Miracles" school color designs are being offered, along with the collaboration's visual on a cleaning cloth and limited edition clearfile.
The glasses, which are supposed to block blue light from televisions, PCs and Smartphones, sell for 5292 yen.
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Scott Green is editor and reporter for anime and manga at geek entertainment site Ain't It Cool News. Follow him on Twitter at @aicnanime.
buckybarrnes: never trust someone who says they don’t like captain america
Universal Is Doing a Battlestar Galactica Movie. Frak. Me.
What the. I. How do—huh? I can’t… I don’t. Just. What?!
It was only a matter of time: Universal has tapped writer Jack Paglen, scribe of the upcoming Johnny-Depp-as-an-evil-computer movie Transcendence, to write a Battlestar Galactica movie. (Incidentally, he’s also signed on for Fox’s Prometheus sequel.) Original Battlestar Galactica series creator Glen Larson will be involved as a producer. Variety is reporting that the movie will be a “complete reimagining” of the story.
And that’s all we know. So if you’re not feeling particularly inclined to freak out at this exact moment, you can stop reading now.
If not—
What the frak?!
How do you even condense the epic, sprawling story of Battlestar Galactica into 120 minutes?! Presumably it being a “complete reimagining” means it’ll only tell part of the story, not the whole thing, so that’s promising, but… will it even be the same characters, or will it just take place in the same universe? Will it focus on the Cylon attack on the Colonies, or will it avoid the mankind-vs-outside-evil conflict that so many other movies have done in favor of focusing on the aftermath, the exodus of humanity, the freshness of which as a premise is one of the things that made Battlestar great? Does Universal have a film series in mind? Will Battlestar Galactica: The Movie just be two hours of Tigh scowling at things?
We don’t know the answer to any of those questions, save the last one, which is a probable negative. (Sigh. Readers of my BSG newbie recaps, you know I love me some Tigh.) Since we know so little, I’m not excited or screaming in anger: I’m just scared that they’ll screw it up. How about you? Is there a way Universal can make this movie worthy of its source material, or should they airlock it entirely?
In the meantime, I’m bringing this back:
(via: Variety)
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Chupacabra Spotted! News at 11! How Local News Created a Monster
kate"I'm familiar with this problem because, like many Americans, I receive a daily Google News alert for the word 'chupacabra.'"
Arlen "Bubba" Parma of Ratcliffe, Texas, was minding his property last weekend when he came upon something he’d never seen before. Four-legged. Hairless. Making an otherworldly noise. Naturally, he brought it home to his wife.
"I said, 'Bubba, that looks like a baby chupacabra,'" his wife, Jackie Stock, told the local ABC affiliate.
Jackie and Bubba believed they'd stumbled upon a Latin American vampire beast that guzzles the blood of livestock. They decided to take it as a pet. The myth of the chupacabra, the ABC station reported, "has been around for decades."
On further examination, there are a lot of Bubba Parmas out there. Although the wildlife experts who invariably weigh in on alleged chupacabra sightings say there is a simple explanation—a skin disease called mange that cause quadrupeds' skin to fall off—dozens of local news outlets have reported sightings over the past three years. But this rash of reporting on chupacabras isn't just entertaining journalism—it's also bad journalism. With just a handful of exceptions, none of these news outlets ever tell it straight: The legend of the chupacabra is barely old enough to buy cigarettes. It's not mysterious. It's not a legend. It's not "decades old"—not even two.
I'm familiar with this problem because, like many Americans, I receive a daily Google News alert for the word "chupacabra." It's a wonder I ever leave the house. If there's a four-legged creature afflicted with a skin condition, chances are an Area Man and a local news crew won't be far behind. In Falfurrias, Texas, a taxidermist nearly broke down in tears when he came upon a still-fresh corpse. In Picayune, Mississippi, residents hid in their cars from a creature whose true identity they discovered after Googling "hairless coyote." A 13-year-old in Inez, Texas, dropped a suspected chupacabra with a .257 Weatherby rifle after spotting it outside his bedroom window.
The beast can apparently swim. It was spotted in Belarus, and in Ukraine, where residents claimed it killed their rabbits. Russian farmers blamed it for the slaughter of 60 sheep, prompting the government to issue a formal notice that "there are no fairytale creatures in the Lukhovitsky district." Last year, it was spotted in the savannahs of Namibia, where villagers reported a "dog-headed pig monster" terrorizing the community.
These stories would be terrific if they weren't so consistently misleading. In local news reports, chupacabra sightings are frequently presented as a handover from previous generations. "Chupacabra sightings have been rumored in North America, Mexico, and Puerto Rico for more than 50 years," an Arizona CBS affiliate explained to its viewers, after a Tucson meteorologist reported spotting one on the way to work. "The legend of 'El Chupacabra' dates back to the 1970s," reported Biloxi, Mississippi's WLOX after the sighting in Picayune. KLTV of Tyler, Texas, identified the chupacabra as "a bloodthirsty predator of Mexican lore." The Associated Press called it "folkloric legend," after another close call in Deer Creek, Oklahoma.
The real story of the chupacabra is decidedly modern. Although myths of vampire creatures are longstanding, the first known reference and eyewitness account came just 19 years ago, from a Puerto Rican woman named Madelyne Tolentino. Researcher Ben Radford laid out the details in his 2011 book, Tracking the Chupacabra: The Vampire Beast in Fact, Fiction and Folklore. Radford, who deserves a medal or something, tracked down Tolentino and identified the inspiration for her account—she had just seen the movie Species, which came out in 1995 and features an alien almost identical to the animal Tolentino spotted. Radford offered a $250 reward for any earlier reference to the chupacabra and is still waiting.
Every once in a while, a news outlet demonstrates its ability to procure homespun commentary from locals about hairless vampire demons without sacrificing its journalistic cred. Good Morning America, for instance, cited Radford's work in a story about a retired wildlife biologist in Lake Jackson, Texas, who had whimsically reported a chupacabra sighting to the local press only to find himself the subject of a media frenzy.
But the most common strategy is to teach the controversy. "Some people think it exists, others say it's just a mangy dog," reported KENS of San Antonio, referring to a mangy coyote spotted inside the city limits. A Phoenix ABC affiliate offered that an unidentified creature might be a vampire beast or a badger. "What do you think?" the station asked readers.
In the meantime, the flood of sightings seems to be increasing, no doubt buoyed by people who have seen local news clips about previous encounters. "I actually Google Imaged 'chupacabra' and it looks just like the other images," a San Antonio woman said last June, after spotting what local biologists insisted was a coyote with mange. "They said it was one of them chupacabras or whatever," said Matthew Harrell, the Mississippi man who bagged a creature in a place called Pigtown. "That's what I'd call it because it looks just like it." The chupacabra isn't a Puerto Rican phenomenon anymore; it's a local TV one.
The vampire dog isn't real. We're all just suckers.
Comics Sans has been updated!!!
Comic Sans is the worst thing in history, and like many horrible things in history, its growth has spread unchecked, even marking the Papacy with its sinister sigil. But now some humanitarian has updated it! Designer Craig Rozynski has given it a kernlift as Comic Neue writing:
Comic Sans wasn’t designed to be the world’s most ubiquitous casual typeface1. Comic Neue aspires to be the casual script choice for everyone including the typographically savvy.
The squashed, wonky, and weird glyphs of Comic Sans have been beaten into shape while maintaining the honesty that made Comic Sans so popular.
It’s perfect as a display face, for marking up comments, and writing passive aggressive office memos.
And you can Comics Neue for free! Rozynsky even got the original designer, Vincent Connare to comment:
should be more casual RT @craigrozynski:you inspired my first typographical project, http://t.co/Z9UopJrwsu.love to get ur opinion,
— Vincent Connare (@VincentConnare) April 7, 2014
It’s true that Connare did not know the many crimes against ascenders, creating the font as a quickie for Microsoft, and not knowing that it would be used for everything, and would, in turn, make everything it was used for look tacky and silly. But now, we have a new chance to build a brighter more beautiful future for our children and our children’s children.
Let the healing begin.
'Adventure Time' Head Writer Kent Osborne Teams With Mad Rupert For 'Banana Guard Academy' Miniseries
A number of the Adventure Time animated series' most popular supporting characters have taken the spotlight across Boom! Studios' numerous comic book miniseries and backup stories, but only one hero could pull series head writer Kent Osborne from the show to its comic book incarnation: Root Beer Guy. Well, him and the Candy Kingdom's collective Banana Guard police force, anyway. This July Osborne makes his AT comic debut alongside artist Mad Rupert (Regular Show: Skips) for Adventure Time: Banana Guard Academy #1, the first of a six-issue miniseries exploring the world of law and order in Ooo.
"Can you make the Washington Monument look less phallic?"
Client: How will you get the voice over the video? Me: You mean the narration? We film the video...
Client: How will you get the voice over the video?
Me: You mean the narration? We film the video portion and lay an audio track over it in post production.
Client: What? No. Why don’t you just have someone stand behind the camera man, talking into a microscope?
Strolling Down Asagaya Anime Street
What do Sunrise, Shaft and Satelight all have in common? Aside from starting with “S,” they're all animation studios located right next to each other along the Chuo Line in west Tokyo. Other neighbors include Bones, Gonzo and A-1 Pictures with Ghibli, Production IG and Studio 4C further down the tracks. Their concentrated manpower and output makes the area an untapped power spot for anime tourism--until now. First Akihabara, then Ikebukuro and now Asagaya completes the trifecta of otaku holy spots. Welcome to Asagaya Anime Street!
Located ten minutes west of Shinjuku, the Asagaya Anime Street shopping arcade is a renovated warehouse district that runs under the train tracks. Its shops, cafes and classrooms aim to connect fans with the industry while cultivating a new generation of creators. Let's go for a stroll and see our tax dollars at work.
Baroque Cafe
Official homepage: https://bq-club.jp/
This cozy home theater lined with state-of-the art pro gamer seats aims to give back to the studios directly by holding screenings of short films and forgotten gems. Proceeds from sales of DVDs and merchandise at events goes back to the creator without the production committee getting their grubby fingers on it. The cost of admission is a cup of coffee and you also get free wi-fi and a closer look at their moe mascot, Bisko-chan.
Currently they're running Kick-Heart and Nanchatte Vampiyan with Ghost in the Shell: Innocence on the docket.
Human Academy
Official homepage: http://college.athuman.com/game/list/topics/006945.php
Although the classroom wasn't up and running yet, it promises to offer courses visual effects, game cinematic and general digital tools. They even have their own motion capture studio, Digibaco, next door.
Madhouse Asagaya (11:00-18:00, closed Tuesday)
Official homepage: http://www.madhouse.co.jp/
Aside from an assortment of goods and reproduction genga, there is also an exhibit space with a 500 yen entrance fee that displays animation cels and design materials from a rotating body of works. Paprika, Ninja Scroll and Death Billiards were on display when we visited.
Game Life Output
This event space promises to be home to rotating installations in the future. Right now the shop is mainly dedicated to Touhoku Zunko, moe ambassador for the Touhoku region. She's got her own character goods, dojinshi, light novel and there's even a Vocaloid module in the works. Proceeds from every sale go to help the areas struck by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
101 Tapioca Drink and HACOSTA (11:00-20:00)
Official homepage: http://101-oneoone.com/
The bubble tea counter is connected to the HACOSTA event space that features titles in tandem with Animate Cafe promotions. Who can say what series will run after La Corda d'Oro?
GaFo Labo (11:00-21:30, closed Sunday)
Official homepage: http://www.gofa.co.jp/
The "gallery of fantastic art" doubles as a collaboration cafe and currently has Hakuouki on the menu.
Clystal Moon (11:00-20:00, closed Tuesday)
Official homepage: http://homepage3.nifty.com/crystal-moonelia/
Hand crafted silver accessories inspired by anime, steampunk, and chunibyou.
Copin
Outfits and accessories that bishonen heartthrobs would wear if only they existed in real life.
COSMENIA
Rental cosplay outfits, wigs and accessories. Also hosts a language exchange club for foreigners and Japanese to get together and rap about their favorite anime.
Asagaya Camp
Gacha-gacha machines and other trinkets. Offers a print-on-demand service for 3D printed figures.
Picatto Anime
Official homepage: http://pikatto.jp/
Specializes in LCD picture frames and merchandise from the Nihon Falcom RPG franchise, The Legend of Heroes.
Game Life at Asagaya (11:00-19:00, closed Thursday)
Official homepage: http://asagaya.game-life.jp/
Event space for local multi-player gaming and exhibits. This God Eater promotion ended on April 3rd.
Zou-33
Official homepage: http://zou-33.com/
Mini-elephant ears at full prices. You can take them into the cafe across the street, Shirobaco--more on that in our next post!
Official homepage: http://www.jrtk.jp/asagaya-anime-street/
Address: 2-40-1 Asagaya Minami, Suginami-ku Tokyo
Hours: 11:00-18:00 (Core time) *Hours vary by tenant
Things We Saw Today: Robert Downey Jr Hosted a Winter Soldier Screening For Little Kids On His Birthday
Dammit, Robert, why? Why would you do this to me? Geekosystem has more information if you feel like torturing yourself.
- “Dongs All Over the World” from Saturday’s Anna Kendick-hosted Saturday Night Live episode has been stuck in my head all day. Time to pass it on. (The Frisky)
- Rumor has it that The Lego Movie‘s Phil Lord and Chris Miller have turned down Ghostbusters 3, which they were previously rumored to direct. Welp, if this is true, there goes my reason to watch Ghostbusters 3. (/Film)
The One Doughnut, by Lord of the Rings fan Eva B. in Slovakia. Give is to us, precioussssss. (Neatorama)
- The X-Files showrunner Chris Carter is coming back to your TV computer: Amazon has given a full-series order to his The After, a supernatural drama about “eight strangers who are thrown together by mysterious forces and must help each other survive in a violent world that defies explanation.” The ensemble cast includes Leverage’s Aldis Hodge and Heroes’ (and Agents of SHIELD’s!) Adrian Pasdar. (TVLine)
- Wicked composer Stephen Schwartz says “We’ve actually started gearing up on [the Wicked movie] a little bit,” adding “I don’t know exactly how many years away it is.” A Spring Awakening movie adaptation is apparently also in the works, with director McG—yes, Terminator Salvation, Supernatural, that McG—involved. (/Film)
This statue of Jupiter is actually a cake. I am unable to can. Rhiannon of cakecrumbs even has a tutorial. (io9)
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Tetsuya Tsutsui's Prophecy Manga Gets Film Adaptation, Spinoff
Why The Government Just Threw Down $225 Million On Hybrid Electric Trains
A design rendering of the Siemens hybrid locomotives.
CREDIT: Siemens
The Illinois Department of Transportation signed a contract to bring a total of 32 hybrid electric-diesel trains to the United States last month. The trains will start running by 2016. And the project, when all is said and done, will cost the United States $225 million — a number that may sound enormous but that will actually save a significant amount of both money and the carbon pollution that drives climate change.
“The Charger locomotives will be used exclusively in passenger service,” a release from Siemens, the company manufacturing the locomotives, says. The trains “will be manufactured in the U.S. by Cummins Inc., headquartered in Columbus, Indiana,” and, will run in Illinois, California, Michigan, Missouri and Washington. Should all go well with the original 32, there’s an option for an additional 225 locomotives down the line. The hybrid electric engines will make the trains more efficient.
A spokesperson for the Department of Transportation’s Federal Railroad Administration told ThinkProgress that the locomotives will cost about one million dollars more than the trains currently on the rails, which were designed several decades ago. The new trains are a part of the mandate under the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008 (PRIIA), for trains to have “light weight, high acceleration capabilities, ability to operate at sustained speeds of 120mph, compliance with passenger equipment safety standards including crashworthiness, and EPA Tier IV diesel emission standards,” spokesman Warren Flatau explained via email.
The emissions standards, in particular, are what will make the locomotives worth the extra million dollars apiece. Those EPA standards require a 90 percent reduction in nitrogen oxide, a greenhouse gas, and in particulate matter (aka soot), which contributes to pollution and health problems.
Transportation is one of the largest sources of CO2 emissions and thus climate change in the world. But the questions on rail specifically are more complex. Its emissions make it among the most efficient methods of transportation — accounting for about two percent of transportation emissions compared with 70 percent from cars — but trains are not always full, so the emissions per passenger can quickly rise. And most calculations don’t include the emission costs of actually constructing rail lines.
Still, on existing lines, the new hybrid trains can only be good news. A similar train in Germany, in fact, reduced carbon emissions and energy use by a full 25 percent compared to standard trains.
The post Why The Government Just Threw Down $225 Million On Hybrid Electric Trains appeared first on ThinkProgress.
Game of Thrones Killed HBO GO Last Night. We React In Gifs.
As you may have heard, or experienced yourself, the season four premiere of Game of Thrones caused HBO GO to keel over like a beheaded Ned Stark. Or all the people logging into accounts that it’s technically illegal for them to be logging into did it. Splitting hairs. Regardless, we’re here to make you relive that terrible experience through the world’s most sophisticated mode of expression: The gif.
A few minutes til nine! Time to log into HBO GO and get my Game of Thrones on. I wonder what places will be in the opening credits. I wonder whether Stannis will be in this episode. I wonder if…
…OH. NO.
OK, you think. There was a delay for the season three premiere, too. If memory serves, it lasted for 15, 20 minutes? So you’re patient. You give it some time. You reload.
You reload.
You keep reloading.
More time goes by. 9:30. 9:45. You start to get angry.
HBO had to have known this was coming. Did they just not care? Would you have to go all Brienne of Tarth on their asses? Why was this happening?!
Eventually you say screw it and just downl—uh… acquire the episode by other, completely legal, means. You are far too cool for this crap.
So you watch the episode. And it’s awesome.
Even if the new Daario isn’t nearly as much like Fabio as he should be and Stannis isn’t there.
Sure, you could always buy HBO for your TV to make sure this won’t happen again next week. How much would it be to get one hour-long show that’s only on for ten weeks out of the year again?
Yeah, no thanks.
Next week, HBO GO. Next week.
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Women Are The Worst! Why Won't They Be Friends With Me?
Friendzone, Jezebel, 28 March 2014:
I just don’t seem to get along with girls very well. It’s never been a conscious choice on my part. I just find most women to be boring. I know that sounds really bad! I just don’t want to talk about babies or clothes or makeup or dating or diets or weddings. I want to talk about business and gaming and sports and stuff like that. I have a few close girl friends, but they are often characterized as being “like a dude in a dress” (and yes, I cringe when I hear that). I hate it when my boyfriend goes off with his guy friends at a dinner party and I’m stuck with the ladies. What do I do?
Dear Coolest And Most Uniquely Awesome Lady Who Ever Lived Despite The Fact That She Is A Lady, The Worst And Most Boring Thing,
This is always a tough one, because what are you supposed to do about the fact that literally every woman on planet earth, with the notable exception of yourself, is vapid, boring and wholly uninterested in business, gaming and sports, the three most riveting topics of all time, conceived 100% by the superior and fascinating minds of men, with literally no input, assistance, or origination from women?
The total worth of the world’s human females amounts to little more than a hill of lipstick-stained tulle; you are merely the exception that proves the rule. You just have an innate understanding of what is awesome—i.e. business, gaming and sports—and what is not awesome—i.e. things that are not business, gaming and sports, which is to say, things women care about. It goes without saying that since gender is a universal, ever-static experience for all people with the unique exception of you, the magicalest lady snowflake, there’s no reason to expect any diversity either in gender identity or presentation from other humans, and it’s safe to assume that your read of “man” and “woman” is the only one ever of all time.
The only solution I see is that instead of using your time machine to travel backwards to a decade when men and women separated themselves after dinner, use it to go forwards, to a time when you are the last lady on earth and can finally be assuaged of the horrible guilt you feel for not being able to befriend all these terrible, asinine women who have nothing to offer you. You will then be able to take your rightful place as the only cool girl ever. The dudes won’t be able to get over how cool you are while you’re all trying to survive on irradiated cockroaches and neon green rainwater.
It’s Hard To Say Goodbye When Our Favorite TV Shows Overstay Their Welcome
I have a confession to make: When The CW made the announcement it would be renewing Supernatural for its tenth season with no end in sight, I groaned. Audibly. It’s not because I dislike the show. On the contrary, I hold the Winchesters near and dear to my heart. I pause in respectful silence any time I hear “Carry On Wayward Son,” but I’m worried about my beloved series going down in a depressing spiral of mediocre episodes. Nobody wants that.
Sometimes, as fans, we just have to let go.
But can we? When I fall for a television show, I fall hard. Like, Ted Mosby hard. I used to want series to stay around forever and never leave me. If a show was pulled off the air unfairly, like Firefly or Star Wars: The Clone Wars, my heart cracked and I felt personally slighted. Frankly, I still can’t talk about Fox without thinking “you jerks took the sky from me.” I get attached, perhaps unreasonably so.
For me, and maybe for some of you, I think my loyalty and bulldog-like grip stems in part from being a geek and having to defend what I love on a regular basis. I don’t have to do that as much as I did years ago, but I’m always on guard and ready to tell someone how and why Star Wars is so much more than a movie to me.
Those kinds of passionate feelings can lead to loving a franchise blindly, and while deep devotion isn’t bad, it can lead to poor storytelling. If fans will lap up anything and everything regardless of quality, is it fair to expect studios to put in the effort to make it consistently excellent? When I had that realization, I started looking at television differently. And man, it seems like we let less than awesome material drag on and on for the sake of our fandom.
Supernatural is in that category. If they’d have quit after season five, with Sam and Dean going into the pit together, they’d have a darn near perfect television series. But they didn’t. Now there’s “The Time Before Season Five,” and the “Meh Period With a Few Bright Spots After.” How I Met Your Mother is right next to Supernatural. Most of the ninth and final season felt like it was phoned in, and I was only hanging in because darnit, I wanted to know about the mother. I watched each and every episode with optimism, hoping it would be legendary, and kept trucking to the very end.
Seeing stories stretched beyond recognition makes me appreciate and seek out series with shorter seasons and/or a finite plan. Consider Sleepy Hollow. The new show had only 13 episodes in their first season, and that was their decision. They had point A, point B, and a path to get from one side to the other. They didn’t let popularity go to their heads and force their hands to add in a few episodes of filler material just for the sake of doing it.
Battlestar Galactica also had a plan [Editor's Note: No, not that one.]. The vision may have blurred near the end, but Ronald D. Moore knew he needed four seasons to let the drama unfold. Done and done. Journeys with a destination in mind seem like a better way to go. At the same time, I appreciate how aimless wandering can lead to some gems and other unexpected discoveries. We were never supposed to see Helo again. No one thought Star Trek: The Next Generation’s Chief O’Brien was going to be a breakout character. Wonderful surprises can happen. But exploring without a map also makes it more likely you’ll run into sharks that must be jumped.
At the end of the day it comes to this: How often do shows hit their stride in later seasons? Sometimes they are consistently good, but I can’t recall being blown away by season eight of any given series. Your mileage may differ, and exceptions exist (they always do). For example, Stargate SG-1 exceeded expectations when it revamped the cast after Richard Dean Anderson took more of a background role.
Bringing in Ben Browder and Claudia Black in as fresh faces shook the cast’s dynamic up enough to keep the science fiction series fun and entertaining. They kept the engine running on a car that was getting rusty, but they couldn’t quite restore it to new. The quality and endearing camp of seasons two-five wasn’t rekindled. There were moments, and my favorite episode of the entire series is in season eight (“Threads,” if you’re curious), but by and large, it would have been okay to end the show much sooner.
And because I know someone will bring it up, yes, Doctor Who has been on the air for over 50 years. The stories are still enjoyable, but it’s more about a concept than a particular group of characters. It’s similar to Law & Order in that way. The primary cast changes after a few years and though there are many constants, a certain degree of reinvention happens every time the Doctor regenerates. Most television shows do not have that luxury. They just trudge along.
Now, if I want to make my point about Supernatural, I guess I should stop watching the series. Ratings are still high, but if enough people quit watching, we could make a difference, right? But I won’t. For one thing, I review the series for another outlet. Regardless of that, I tune in because I want to know what happens to the characters I’ve adored for so many years. In a silly way, I feel like I owe it to them. So really, I’m part of the problem.
Amy Ratcliffe is addicted to Star Wars, coffee, and writing. You can follow her on Twitter at @amy_geek and keep up with all things geeky at her blog.
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