Darylsurat

By @Alan4L

A friend asked me for this, and after writing it up for him I figured it might be helpful to others too. This is pretty much the essential New Japan Pro Wrestling matches from 2014 which should serve as a great primer for January 4th's Tokyo Dome event.

New Beginning (Osaka | February)

- Goto vs. Okada (Heavyweight title)
- Naito vs. Ishii (NEVER title)
- Young Buck$ vs. Timesplitters (junior tag title)

Invasion Attack (April)

- Nakamura vs. Tanahashi (IC title)
- Naito vs. Ishii (NEVER title)
- Young Buck$ vs. Ibushi & El Desperado (junior tag title)

Back To The Yokohama Arena (May)

- Styles vs. Okada (Heavyweight title)
- Ishii vs. Ibushi (NEVER title)

DOMINION (June)

- Ricochet vs. Ibushi (junior title)
- Goto & Shibata vs. Nagata & Honma
- Timesplitters vs. Young Buck$ (junior tag titles)

G1 Climax (July/August)

- Shibata vs. Tanahashi (7/26)
- Okada vs. Naito (7/28)
- Suzuki vs. AJ (8/1) (many people's MOTY)
- Nakamura vs. Ishii (8/1)
- Honma vs. Shibata (8/3)
- Okada vs. Suzuki (8/8)
- Nagata vs. Ishii (8/8)
- The Final (8/10)

Destruction in Kobe (September)

POWER STRUGGLE (November)

- Nakamura vs. Shibata (IC title)
- Goto vs. Ishii (NEVER title)
- Red Dragon vs. Timesplitters (junior title)

Former WWE champion Dave Batista is having a pretty great 2014 outside the ring. He was an integral part of the mega movie hit Guardians Of The Galaxy, playing Drax The Destroyer, is currently filming the Kickboxer remake, and on Thursday, he named to the cast of the new James Bond movie.

The 24th Bond film will be called Spectre and will be released in November 2015. Joining the returning Daniel Craig, Naomie Harris, and Ralph Fiennes is Christoph Walz (Django Unchained, Inglorious Basterds), Andrew Scott, and "The Animal" himself. 

The last Bond movie, Skyfall, hit theaters in 2012, earning more than $1.1 billion worldwide. Safe to say Mr. Batista will be seen by even more eyes in 2015.

Edward Annis, 34, who wrestles as Teddy Hart, the son of Georgia Hart Annis, a daughter of Stu Hart, is wanted by police in Strathcona County (near Edmonton, Alberta) on multiple charges involving two women, including a sexual assault.

The Toronto Sun reported the charges involve two women, one 24, and the other 40.  There is one sexual assault count, one unlawful confinement count and three charges of assault.  

Strathcona County police said that Annis was believed to be in the U.S., but police expect to charge him when he returns to Alberta.  He curently lives in Edmonton where he runs a wrestling school.

His father told the son that the charges were groundless and that he's talking to a lawyer and will be back.

"Hell has no fury like a woman scorned," said his father, B.J. Annis, a former pro wrestler who is best known for running B.J.'s Gym in Calgary, a pro wrestler hangout for decades.

The story is at http://m.torontosun.com/2014/12/04/34-year-old-member-of-hart-wrestling-dynasty-wanted-by-rcmp-for-sexual-assault

Back in 2010, I helped a friend of mine get into blogging.  Like most of us who write our random thoughts on the Internet, Chris “Tentacle Chris” Duplis eventually found his stride regarding what content to produce.  His usual fare: haikus and reviews of western films and televisions shows.

Not “west” as in the United States… “west” as in John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, cowboys, indians, and more of the like.

No – I’m not kidding.

As of this post, Chris has posted 106 reviews on his blog which (by my math) means he’s dedicated at least 212 hour of his life (1 week, 1 day, and 20 hours) to watching this particular genre.  By normal human standards, that elevates him to “subject matter expert” in my eyes for western movies as a whole.

So what’s the challenge?

I’ve recently converted our household into a digital operation and (thus) I’ve been building my iTunes library.  Chris and his wife got me an iTunes gift card for my birthday last weekend and my first thought was “what should I watch?”

Then I figured, “why am I making this decision?”

So Chris (I’m linking him to this on Facebook so I know he’ll read this) – I want you to pick one movie from the annals of western films that I should buy and watch on iTunes.  It should be, in your opinion, the pinnacle of the genre you love.

Once I’ve watched it, I will write a one time “Western Watchins” on my blog rating your choice for what you consider being the greatest western worth my time.

I look forward to the suggestion.

Conservative media have adopted a "blame feminism" approach to many of the world's problems, including rape and the lack of infrastructure funding. Here are 11 times right-wing media blamed feminism for creating the crisis of the day:

1. Ben Carson blamed the unrest in Ferguson, MO on the "women's lib movement."

2. Conservative blogger Glenn Reynolds accused feminists of derailing infrastructure funding.

3. Rush Limbaugh blamed feminism for the NFL's punishment of football players.

4. On Fox News, Laura Ingraham suggested gender equality and "political correctness" were to blame for a security breach at the White House because the intruder was able to overpower a female security agent.

5. In the wake of the Ray Rice domestic abuse case, the extreme conservative website WND blamed domestic violence on feminism.

6. The Weekly Standard blamed the epidemic of campus sexual assault on feminism being "in control of America's colleges and universities."

7. On June 15, Fox News' Fox & Friends Sunday accused feminists of trying to "end" Father's Day.

8. The hosts of Fox News' Outnumbered agreed that feminism is to blame for boys falling behind in school.

9.  During a March 31 Heritage Foundation panel commemorating Women's History Month, conservative columnist Mona Charon cited the alleged "disintegration of family function" as one of feminism's many "failures."

10. In a discussion on Fox News' The Five about a female teacher who had sex with her 15-year old student, co-host Andrea Tantaros claimed "women who do this feel like it's not as stigmatizing as it was before," insisting that "there's something about feminism that lets them know 'I can do anything that a man does, I can even go after that young boy. I deserve it.'"

11. In 2012, Rush Limbaugh claimed that feminism is "ruining women." 

From the December 3 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends:

STEVE DOOCY (co-host): We have talked many times about the state of education in this country. Let's face it -- kids graduate from high school, and they don't know squat. So there is at least one state that is suggesting if you want to pass and graduate from high school, you've got to pass the same 100-question test that we apply to immigrants who want to become American citizens.

ELISABETH HASSELBECK (co-host): Yeah. Students would actually get a certificate that would be printed out and this proposal saying, Yes, you passed. You may graduate because you understand civics here.

[...]

BRIAN KILMEADE (co-host): I just don't understand how you can come up as an educator and ask yourself, Well, if we have to de-emphasize American history a little bit. So many people who are intelligent get straight A's. You ask the most basic thing about American history, like who was fighting in the Civil War, they don't know.

DOOCY: But Brian, these questions are even more basic than that. For instance, here is one of the typical questions. What ocean is on the west coast of the United States? Who signs bills to become laws?

 

[crosstalk]

HASSELBECK: Well, is this test multiple choice? That's what everyone's asking here. And when do we celebrate Independence Day?

DOOCY: Listen. Not only -- okay, you've got to answer those questions correctly to become a citizen of the United States. I think not only would it be great if high school students had to have a proficiency in America, but I think they should have a test before you vote.

 

KILMEADE: That'd be great.

Previously: 

These Fox Figures' Suggestions For Best Voting Practices Sound Similar To Jim Crow Laws

Right-Wing Media Discourage Young Women From Voting

The People Conservative Media Don't Want To Vote

I am gathered here today to pay tribute to Bunta Sugawara whose death marks the end of the modern movie yakuza, the last shot of the machine gun dragons, and the final police sweep of the Showa era...

Discovering Bunta’s 1970s output on dozens of VHS tapes at SF’s Japan Town (egged on by Chris D.’s pioneering reviews in Asian Trash Cinema magazine) pretty much changed my life. Gendai Yakuza – Hitokiri Yota (AKA Street Mobster) in particular wound up a primal scene, and without it, I might never have wandered into the deep end of Japanese pop culture beyond the boundaries of anime and kaiju flicks.

Back then, it was impossible to find a subtitled copy of any of the Kinji Fukasaku / Sugawara films, but Bunta’s hellfire persona was more than enough to go on. There was THAT FACE, twisting and contorting with overclocked emotion. Then there was THAT VOICE, which could go from a deep menacing rumble to something I can only equate with the sound of an entire room filled with beer bottles breaking and ramen bowls shattering (usually over someone’s head). I needed to write about it. I wound up writing books about it...

Looking back, I think I was seeing something of my own father when I saw Bunta and many of the yakuza movie tough guys mixing it up. While he wasn’t an abusive person by nature, explosive rage mixed with remote coolness was something I did experience up close on several occasions. I think I was trying to understand what masculine violence was and where it came from. I wound up looking for answers in post-war Japan; both in real history and in the exploitation “true document” films in which Bunta and directors like Kinji Fukasaku relived their own past traumas in.

Bunta’s death arrives mere weeks after the loss of fellow icon Takakura Ken (that's both of them destroying the world in the picture above). Together, they were the alpha and omega, the ninkyo and the jitsuroku, of Japan’s movie tough guys. Ken was stoic, suffering, and deeply connected to the crisis of Modernization during the Meiji and Taisho era. Bunta was something more primal: a libidinal Frankenstein monster that 20^th century Japan created by proxy, but could not tame with law and order. An outsider outlaw no matter what gang he might belong to.

That both Bunta and Ken are gone means we are on our own now -- death claims victory in yet another cynical freeze frame ending – but at least we will forever have role models, real and imaginary, for how battles without honor or humanity can be fought. 

So let's start everything over right here, right now.... what the fuck are you staring at?

During Fox News' "Mediabuzz," there was a discussion about Friday's document dump of the House Intelligence Committee's two year investigation into Benghazi, which found that all the lame brain complaints and conspiracy theories conservatives whipped up over it to smear Hillary Clinton and Obama were bogus: House Panel Finds 'No Intelligence Failure' Before Benghazi Attack You would think this would be the top story right behind Obama's executive orders on immigration, but instead it's been buried. Howard Kurtz wondered why the media wasn't covering a story as big as it's supposed to be?

Kurtz: The House Intelligence committee Friday issued its result of a two year investigation of Benghazi and among other things the committee, which is controlled by Republicans says there was no intelligence failure, no stand down orders, there was no coverup by administration officials, at least not intending to deceive. A couple of brief items on Fox, nothing on the network newscast, a little bit in the newspapers. Given all the attention that Benghazi has gotten, including on this network, should that have gotten more coverage?

read more

From the November 24 edition of Fox News' America's Newsroom:

Previously: 

Fox News Sunday Ignored Congressional Report Debunking Benghazi Myths

CNN Media Critic: Fox News Kept Its Audience "Largely In The Dark" About New Report That Undermines Benghazi Hoax

Network Sunday Shows Largely Ignore House Report Debunking Prominent Benghazi Myths

In addition to a couple slider-enhanced comparison screens that pit the 2002 GameCube Resident Evil remake against its upcoming HD remaster, Capcom released a handful of new screens showcasing the 2015 version.

For a look at the slider comparisons, head on over to Capcom-Unity.

Resident Evil hits Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, and PC early next year.

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Joseph Luster is the Games and Web editor at Otaku USA Magazine. He also likes to draw comics. His blog can be found at subhumanzoids. Follow him on Twitter @Moldilox.

Back in April Discotek Media announced its license of Horus, Prince of the Sun (AKA Little Norse Prince). The 1968 anime film marks the feature directorial debut of Studio Ghibli co-founder Isao Takahata, with contributions from Hayao Miyazaki and mentor Yasuo Ōtsuka, and on Sunday evening Discotek officially unveiled some of the bonus feature plans. 

Extras include:

Commentary with Mike Toole

Commentary with Daniel Thomas MacInnes

Interview with Isao Takahata

Interview with Yoichi Kotabe

Every Poet is a Thief: Inspirations from Horus

Horus and Hilda: Just like Twins

Reiko Okuyama: A Tribute to a Legend

Message of Hope: Isao Takahata conversation

Production Gallery 

Theatrical Trailer

Horus, Prince of the Sun hits DVD on December 23.

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Joseph Luster is the Games and Web editor at Otaku USA Magazine. He also likes to draw comics. His blog can be found at subhumanzoids. Follow him on Twitter @Moldilox.

The media's short "attention span" has given Gun Owners of America executive director Larry Pratt access to a mainstream television audience despite his "long, multi-decade history of radicalism and extremism," according to journalist Alexander Zaitchik, who recently profiled Pratt for RollingStone.com.

Zaitchik discussed his investigation in a three-part series of videos chronicling the state of the pro-gun movement produced by The American Independent Institute (TAII), which funded Zaitchik's profile, and the gun safety group Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV).

In part one, released on November 12, Zaitchik and CSGV executive director Josh Horwitz discussed how media turned to Pratt for analysis during the gun debate following the Sandy Hook mass shooting in 2012, often while ignoring Pratt's history of extremism. Part two is a conversation about the gun rights movement's embrace of insurrectionist ideology, while part three covers the role of money in gun rights groups and the National Rifle Association's efforts to reach out to a younger and more diverse audience while retaining inflammatory figures like board member Ted Nugent.

Watch part one here:

ABC World News Tonight with David Muir was the only one of the three broadcast evening newscasts to ignore the Obama administration's announcement supporting net neutrality. NBC Nightly News and CBS Evening News both covered the story.

President Obama issued a statement on Monday asking the Federal Communications Commission to "implement the strongest possible rules to protect net neutrality." Obama asked the FCC to put into effect "bright-line rules" that would prevent Internet providers from blocking access to services, throttling Internet speeds or forcing one service to be prioritized over another. He also asked for providers to have to be more transparent in how their services operate.

It is confirmed today on November 7 that Akira Toriyama, the original creator of the internationally famous Dragon Ball manga series, newly draws an illustration for the Japanese promotional poster for Stephen Chow's Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons film. Toriyama also gives the tagline for the posters, "The strongest fun in the galaxy!!"

Both the Dragon Ball series and this film are based on the old Chinese novel in the 16th century, Journey to the West (very very loosely in the case of Dragon Ball, though). Both stories feature the protagonist named Son Goku/Sun Wukong in very different ways.

The Hong Kong-born actor/director Stephen Chow is best known for his martial arts comedy films such as Shaolin Soccer (2001) and Kung Fu Hustle (2004). He also severed as one of the producers for the

infamous live action film adaptation of Dragon Ball, Dragonball Evolution (2009) directed by James Wong.

Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons is Chow's first film in six years since his science fiction film

CJ7 in 2008. It will be released in Japan on November 21.

Promotional poster featuring Toriyama's illustration

Another poster featuring the cast

Japanese trailer

via: Mantan Web