welp, looks like they couldn't go one full game without an implausible bikini top
Nintendo and Tecmo Koei have revealed a pair of new playable characters featured in the upcoming Zelda-themed beat-'em-up Hyrule Warriors -- newcomer sorceress Lana and previously announced Twilight Princess veteran Agitha. Lana wields powerful...
Address is 7290 NE Butler St in Hillsboro, between Dick's and Winco.
We will have a raffle basket, free nail trimmings provided by Ultimate Dog, and a Brightstar Canine Dog Training on site. Also, we will be offering free food samples for dogs and cats, as well as our doggie popsicles. See you on Saturday!
Just when you think you've uncovered all the possible types of unethical human experimentation ever done, history throws a new wrinkle at you. In the early 1970s, a birth control clinic in San Antonio gave indigent women fake birth control as part of a medical study.
KING KHAN AND THE SHRINES, RED MASS (Star Theater, 13 NW 6th) Known far and wide for a stage show that can include bare asses, bare chests, sequined suits, and punk-rock James Brown panache, King Khan and the Shrines are a spectacle, and a damn talented band to boot. Not content to rely solely on their sometimes outlandish plumage, King Khan and the Shrines possess the ability to pull off soul-revival revues and garage-punk rallies; their swaggering rock 'n' roll sendups make albums like last year's Idle No More blisteringly fun listens. The group isn't exactly a foreign presence in Portland—they're one of the harder working road dogs on the circuit. You never know exactly what you're gonna get, but it's still the best thing you'll see all week. RYAN J. PRADO
THE DOUBLECLICKS (The Secret Society, 116 NE Russell) Sound the conflict-of-interest klaxons! Not only does one of the Doubleclicks (Angela Webber) write about videogames for the Mercury's blog, I was one of the Kickstarter backers for the Doubleclicks' latest album, Dimetrodon. Pretty sure we'd still be writing about the Doubleclicks, though, even if interests weren't conflicted: Portland's charming sister duo continues to crank out nerd-folk ballads like "TableTop," an ode to both games like Carcassone and the web series about games like Carcassone. With niche songs like these, your mileage will almost certainly vary, but everyone with a heart should find something to love in the Doubleclicks—whether they're paying tribute to Portland's winter survival supplies ("Cats and Netflix") or bringing an unexpectedly anthemic beat to social apathy ("Ennui [On We Go]," the only song I can think of where a dejected sigh counts as a lyric). ERIK HENRIKSEN
DEAN WAREHAM, THE PARSON RED HEADS (Bunk Bar, 1028 SE Water) Even at his most musically gregarious, Dean Wareham has always been a bit understated. First fronting narcotic-paced dream pop trio Galaxie 500, and later the beloved Luna (with a bit more gusto), Wareham has tended to prefer to say more with deadpan observations and turns of phrase than with the volume of his famously laidback vocals. Following a handful of releases with his wife and longtime musical partner Britta Phillips, Wareham has been focusing on a little more "me" time in recent years, releasing an autobiography, his first solo EP in 20 years, and now his self-titled debut full-length. My Morning Jacket's Jim James produced the new effort, and while there are some occasional backing "oohs" courtesy of James' familiar voice, and a crescendo or two reminiscent of an MMJ build, Wareham's sound remains intact, and as understated as ever. Word is, Wareham's been dusting off some Galaxie 500 numbers for recent performances, too, which makes this a dreamy, languorous can't-miss. JEREMY PETERSEN
ASH BORER, HELL, EPHEMEROS, HAIL (Rotture, 315 SE 3rd) These days, the West Coast pulses with impressive heavy bands, and relatively big cities like Portland and Oakland are receiving lots of attention for their metal scenes. But metal has never really been the domain of urbanites, and on Thursday, two excellent acts from smaller Cascadian towns will descend on Rotture for a night of depravity. Ash Borer is from Arcata, California, where their ambitious, atmospheric black metal must stand out among the dreadlocks and footbags. With songs that stretch out 10 minutes or longer, Ash Borer's sound is all about the build: from bittersweet drones and swirling blackened fuzz to sweet, howling, blast-beat-powered release. They'll be joined by Hell, a rising one-man band of misery from Salem whose hulking sludge/doom moves at the pace of a death march. Still okay with your life and the world in general? Then get there in time to see local despair-dealers Ephemeros and Hail open. BEN SALMON
I just love the way Sims devs talk. "some of you will be disappointed that pools and toddlers won’t be available"
"Babies and Toddlers were not combined"
The Sims franchise has certainly changed a lot since its first game was released in late 2000. But according to EA, some of the latest innovations to Sims 4 are going to come at the expense of some of players’ favorite past features, as well as an architectural staple that’s been with the games since their inception.
In the latest blog post on The Sims News website, “Sim Guru Ryan” takes time out of praising all the new features of the game (Emotions! Better build options! Incredible levels of Create-a-Sim detail!) to confirm that there will no pools or toddlers in it when The Sims 4 launches in September:
You can see we’ve made some key decisions to focus on new aspects of the game – things like our all new Sims, vibrant neighborhoods, and powerful creative tools – just a to name a few. And while we recognize that some of you will be disappointed that pools and toddlers won’t be available when The Sims 4 Base Game launches in September, you should know that we’re building an incredibly strong foundation that is capable of fulfilling every one of your desires in the years to come.
What? But how are we going to drown sims by deleting all the ladders? Scandal!
Pools have been a part of The Sims games for as long as there have been Sims games; toddlers, the life stage between baby and child, were introduced with The Sims 2 in 2004 and were expanded upon in The Sims 3. While some critics called this stage “inactive,” the toddlers were capable of learning how to walk, talk, use the bathroom, and develop other sim skills. So I don’t know, maybe those people just didn’t know that being inactive is kind of the point of toddlers.
When asked whether the baby stage and the former toddler stage had been combined, another The Sims employee responded on Twitter:
@_lovcat_@TheSimsBoi Babies and Toddlers were not combined. We know they’re distinctly different and didn’t want to shoehorn them in.
Their disappearance has, naturally, angered the Sims community a whole bunch, because people don’t like it when they think their (literal) toys are being taken away from them for no good reason.
“I don’t know how I’m still surprised when EA does something disappointing… I just thought that toddlers were so important and basic that it was completely unrealistic to assume they wouldn’t be in the game. Clearly, I was wrong,” one commenter said on the blog post.
Even more infuriating, the fans say, is that these features will most likely appear in later expansion packs for the game instead, so players who really enjoy building pools and teaching their tiny sim toddlers to walk will be expected to fork more money over to EA at some point in the future. Which, let’s be real: they are totally right. Those expansion packs can get pretty ridiculous.
Personally, I was always planning to wait a year or two until the modding community caught up with the new game (let’s face it, I only use The Sims 3 to make fandom families and the sim version of Sailor Moon just isn’t the same without a custom pair of odangos), but now I’m not so sure about wanting to pick up The Sims 4 at all. Is this news going to turn any other The Sims enthusiasts away?
'Renee was immune to having her free will removed by the powerful Anti-Life Equation, because she’s just that bad-ass and in control of her identity.'
ugh, go away new 52 Q, bring Renee back
There is a faceless vigilante who has stalked comics since the late 1960s. The legacy started with Vic Sage, a journalist who dedicated himself to fighting crime and exposing truth no matter what. It continued with Renee Montoya, a Gotham City detective who marveled at superheroes and then became one herself. Both of them, when wearing a faceless mask and a fedora, were called the Question. Who are they, and what is their connection to characters such as a certain near-forgotten Batman villain, the group called the Global Peace Agency, the violent vigilante Rorschach of Watchmen, and the strange man called Mr. A? Glad you asked. Read on!
THE COLD MASK OF MR. A
Before we delve into the Question, we should speak of a similar character also created by Steve Ditko. The mysterious Mr. A debuted in 1967 in the pages of Witzend #3, an underground comic that was released irregularly until the 1980s. Being an underground comic meant that Witzend didn’t worry about the Comics Code Authority and its rules concerning what made a comic safe for kids. Mr. A was really Rex Graine, a newspaper journalist sick to death of corruption and cowardice. He was a stoic man who believed that people needed to live up to moral absolutes. There were no extenuating circumstances for crimes, no justifications for breaking the law. Crime was Crime. A equals A.
Mr. A was inspired by Ayn Rand and her philosophy of objectivism, Ditko having become a fan of her work over the years. Her influential book Atlas Shrugged was published just ten years before Mr. A was created. Rand once said: “There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil.” Similarly, Mr. A used a calling card that was half-black and half-white, saying there was good and evil and nothing in between. People who believed otherwise and spoke of shades of gray were people who invited the corruption of evil into their lives.
Mr. A had no origin. We had no explanation for why a journalist would become a vigilante. He wasn’t a character—he was a force of order unswayed by personal bias or emotion. Sometimes he fought crime as a journalist, other times as Mr. A, whose disguise symbolized his cold, unsympathetic nature. Along with a simple suit and fedora, he wore a metal mask with a frozen expressionless face and metal gauntlets. There was nothing “superhero” about this character. He was just a man who acted… and sometimes aided criminals to a fatal end.
The cold and sometimes cruel Mr. A didn’t inspire a huge fanbase. He appeared in less than a dozen short stories throughout the 60s and 70s. But the same year he first appeared, readers met another suit-wearing journalist/vigilante, also created by Ditko: the Question.
STEVE DITKO’S QUESTION
Vic Sage debuted in a back-up story of Blue Beetle #1, published in 1967 by Charlton Comics, and continued to appear in short back-up features over the next several issues. He was a crusading TV journalist whose station was considered a herald of truth and decency. Even the station’s head of PR was seen as a paragon of virtue by other people. But sometimes, Vic’s journalism wasn’t enough to stop evil. Sometimes he needed to operate as the seemingly faceless vigilante known as the Question.
The outfit is simple. Suit and tie, fedora, simple gloves, overcoat. It immediately puts the Question into the realm of detective stories and city corruption. This is a guy whom you can tell will spend most of his time fighting mobsters and crooked politicians instead of straight-up super-villains. Sometimes, Vic wore a turtle neck and loose jacket, which wasn’t quite as striking a look but was saved by the fact that he still wore that odd, faceless mask that has helped make the Question so memorable.
The mask was created by a scientist friend of Vic’s named Aristotle Rodor. Though it looked like blank flesh to others, it was a thin, collapsible disguise designed to let Vic see, breathe, and speak normally. A gas invented by Rodor caused the mask to adhere. The same gas, released from Vic Sage’s belt buckle, reacted with chemicals that had been sprayed on the journalist’s hair and all his clothing to cause a color change. Whatever clothes he wore, they always became pale blue, and his red hair always turned black. It only took a moment or two for Vic Sage’s special gas to turn him into the Question. Another gas agent caused the reverse effect.
Similar to Mr. A, the Question had a literal calling card, this one specially designed by Rodor. It would appear blank at first, but a moment after a criminal picked it up, a wisp of smoke would rise from it and a question mark would suddenly appear. How it worked wasn’t explained. I always assumed that it involved a heat-sensitive chemical agent that reacted to a person’s bare thumb and/or finger touching the card (whereas Vic’s gloved hands were insulated).
You might ask why Vic Sage called himself “the Question.” Was it a comment on how his job as a journalist focused on asking tough questions? Was it an existential ideal? Nope. From the looks of these original stories, it was just so that he could repeatedly say, “The Question wants answers!” Hey, it’s not the silliest reason a comic book character adopted a certain alias.
This Vic Sage didn’t exactly have dialogue with characters. He gave a lecture about justice, honor, and society just about every time he opened his mouth. He had no apparent interest in personal relationships, humor, or activities beyond fighting crime and injustice. He was more of an archetype than a character. We weren’t meant to think of him as a person as much as he was an instrument of faceless justice, unrelenting and incorruptible.
THE WATCHMEN
Charlton Comics stopped publishing superhero comics in the 1970s. In 1983 AC Comics published a story introducing the Sentinels of Justice, a team composed of the Question and fellow Charlton heroes Captain Atom, Nightshade, and Blue Beetle. In this adventure, the Question wore a trenchcoat rather than an overcoat, which I think suits him better. This incarnation of the Sentinels of Justice never had a second adventure.
The Charlton superheroes were then acquired by DC Comics. Alan Moore wanted to write a swan song for the Charlton characters, revealing that they had largely retired from superheroics in the 1970s (explaining why their stories stopped being published) and were now reunited by the death of a hero called Peacemaker. Since the Question had regularly appeared in back-up features of Blue Beetle’s comic before getting his own feature, the story would treat them as longtime allies.
Following the 1985-86 crossover Crisis on Infinite Earths, the superhero stories of DC Comics were rebooted and a new universe was introduced. DC wanted to integrate the Charlton characters into this new Post-Crisis universe and felt that Moore’s story, originally entitled Who Killed the Peacemaker?, would render them unusable. So Moore altered all of the characters into analogues of the Charlton characters. The Sentinels of Justice became the primary heroes of the 12-issue series now titled Watchmen. The Blue Beetle became Nite-Owl. Vic Sage aka the Question became Walter Kovacs aka Rorschach, a boy who had spent many years in the Charlton Home for Problem Children.
Rorschach didn’t use chemical and gas agents like the Question did, but he did don a trench coat, suit, and fedora along with a mask that completely disguised his features. The black and white designs on the mask that constantly alter but never mix or become gray recalls Ditko’s Mr. A.
Just as Captain Atom was overshadowed by his Watchmen analogue Dr. Manhattan, it is arguable that Rorschach’s fame has eclipsed the character for whom he was a stand-in. Popular fiction can be funny that way.
VIC SAGE, POST-CRISIS
The first Post-Crisis version of the Question showed up in Blue Beetle #5, published in 1986 and presented by Len Wein, Paris Cullins, and Bruce Patterson. This is fitting, since Ditko’s Question first appeared as a back-up feature in Charlton’s Blue Beetle. Rather than repeat the back-up feature idea, the Question actually appeared within the Blue Beetle’s story and helped him out on a multi-issue adventure.
This Post-Crisis version of the Question seemed just about identical to Ditko’s version, though perhaps a little less emotionally stiff and a little more human. He also was a big risk taker. At one point, he leaped out of the Blue Beetle’s aircraft and then surprised the other costumed hero by using acrobatics and specially insulated shoes to land safely rather than fall to his death. Readers then saw that the Question himself had no idea that this stunt would really work, but he’d been determined to impress the Beetle. You could almost wonder if the guy was an adrenaline junkie or had a bit of a death wish. That implication became an idea that was explored much further the following year in the new Question series written by Dennis O’Neil.
Critically acclaimed for his work on Green Lantern and Batman, writer/editor O’Neil, joined by artist Denys Cowan, reimagined the Question for the Post-Crisis DC Comics universe. The new series lasted from 1987 to 1990. The DC Comics Question was still a TV newsman named Vic Sage, but he had been born Charles Victor Szasz, an orphan prone to violence and questioning authority. Vic bounced around various cities, including Chicago and Gotham, until finally returning to his home of Hub City, a place that even Gothamites would called “Hellish.” He still knew Aristotle Rodor, who was now a not only a scientist but a philosopher who answered to the nickname of “Tot.” Rodor still supplied Sage with his mask and gas agents.
It was later revealed that this version of Rodor had originally developed the mask as a form of concealing bandage, called Pseudoderm, for people with burns and scars. In 2007, Mark Waid revealed that Psuedoderm’s development involved Gingold extract and technology recovered from the criminal Bart Magan. This was a very clever way of connecting the Question to other aspects of the DC Universe. Gingold extract, you see, is the chemical responsible for giving Ralph Dibny the elastic skin powers that made him the heroic Elongated Man.
Bart Magan was a much more obscure connection. He only appeared in one comic, Detective Comics #319 (1964), where he showed up as the faceless criminal who called himself, wait for it… Dr. No-Face! The story featured scientist Paul Dent inventing a rejuvenation ray that could smooth out wrinkles and completely remove scarring. A criminal named Bart Magan used the device on himself, hoping to remove a facial scar that made it easy for people and authorities to recognize him. But he messed up, and the ray smoothed out his entire face, leaving it blank. Magan then embarked on a new criminal career as Dr. No-Face, allowing people to believe that he was actually Dr. Paul Dent, who had accidentally removed his own face and gone insane. But Batman and Robin stopped Magan and he went to jail, where he no doubt creeped out prisoners who wondered how he could speak, breathe and eat without the presence of a mouth and nostrils. Not to mention the whole being able to see bit.
Vic’s gas agents worked the same way as they did in Ditko’s version of events, with a few minor tweaks. Rather than Vic spraying his hair with a special chemical, O’Neil decided that Rodor would be equipped with with a special shampoo that did the trick. Vic’s aftershave was a special concoction of Rodor’s as well. When the gas from Vic’s belt was released, it caused the aftershave residue on his face to act as a bonding agent with the mask, securing it in place. This chemical was designed for Vic’s body chemistry, and other chemicals such as nicotine could interfere. So Vic gave up smoking to ensure that his mask didn’t fall off at random times.
Initially, the Post-Crisis Question did have his hair turn from red to black when he donned his vigilante identity. Instead, it went from reddish blonde to a darker shade of red. It was sometimes tough to tell that a change occurred, as sometimes Vic’s hair didn’t seem different and his clothes occasionally just altered in shade rather than full color. This coloring element changed in later issues. In any event, I think the darker, more saturated blue makes the Question stand out better. It’s a lot more striking and intimidating than the pale blue he wore in his Charlton days. Still wish he wore sneakers rather than dress shoes and a trench coat rather than overcoat, but I guess it got cold.
O’Neil also used the Question’s calling card, but only for the first issue.
When we first met the Post-Crisis Vic Sage, he had been operating as the Question for a couple of years. He was a cynical man with no interest in “psychological blather” that sought to explain his actions or those of the criminals he fought. Basically, Ditko’s version but angrier. But then Sage had a near-death experience, followed by a visit from Batman. The Dark Knight confronted Sage with the fact that part of his reason for becoming the Question was because he didn’t know how else to feel excited about life outside of being in a fight. Batman accused Vic of having a death wish and told him that if he was truly going to lead this double life as a vigilante, then he had to truly dedicate himself to it and to a higher ideal. Vic then went to the countryside and trained under Batman’s ally Richard Dragon, a martial arts master.
Vic spent months learning martial arts and expanding his mind. Ditko’s version of the Question fought crime without hesitation, but now O’Neil’s Question sought to understand the motivations of those he fought and ponder what criminal activity indicated about humanity in general. He was a philosopher warrior who was very aware of his own capacity for violence. Batman didn’t kill for moral reasons. Vic Sage didn’t kill because he feared he might find himself enjoying it and then wanting to kill again. Years later, he did finally kill when he shot a criminal in order to save a child. He felt awful about the act, yet recognized that a small part of him wanted to do it again and relive the sense of power behind it. He decided never to use lethal tactics again.
During O’Neil and Cowan’s run, Vic didn’t always don a trench coat and suit. Whatever he was wearing could serve as the Question’s outfit. Maybe one day it was a muscle shirt and jeans. The next, a leather jacket. It was all good for the no-faced vigilante, though I still think the suit, tie and trench coat look work better. Starting in The Question #10, the gas now changed his reddish blonde hair to a dark shade of brown.
Despite some dedicated fans, The Question was cancelled in 1990. It was then followed by Question Quarterly, though this only lasted a handful of issues. Starting in Question Quarterly #2 (1991), Vic’s gas once again turned his hair black when he donned his disguise. After Question Quarterly ended, Vic showed up in different stories from time to time and got two one-shot specials: Azrael Plus The Question and The Question Returns. Still, none of these were enough for a new monthly series to start.
Most of Vic’s Post-Crisis stories were written by Denny O’Neil until 1998. That’s when Greg Rucka wrote a short story in Batman Chronicles #15, with pencils by Roger Cruz, inks by Sean Parsons, and colors by Pamela Rambo. In the story, the Question (now with his natural hair color showing and once again donning a trench coat) arrived in Gotham City and took an interest in Helena Bertinelli aka the Huntress. Often judged by Batman as too reckless and too harsh in her treatment of criminals, the Huntress resented the Question’s determination go give her advice and constructive criticism. But she found that she benefited from his lessons and the questions he asked. This set the stage for the two to become even closer in the 2000 mini-series Batman/Huntress: Cry for Blood.
Vic largely vanished again until Rick Veitch wrote a mini-series about him in 2005, where he turned Vic into more of a shamanic warrior. The gas he used to become the Question was now said to be hallucinogenic, giving him insight into the dreamtime and allowing him to access a higher level of knowledge to help his quest against evil. This new direction for Vic didn’t catch on. But by this time, the character became more popular due to his appearances as a detective and conspiracy theorist in the cartoon Justice League Unlimited.
THE LEGACY CONTINUES
Renee Montoya was created for the cartoon show Batman: The Animated Series but actually appeared in comics before any of her episodes aired. Her creators are Sean Catherine Derek (who won a Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Writing in an Animated Program for her work on Batman: TAS), Laren Bright (who also worked on The Pirates of Dark Water), and Mitch Brian (who co-wrote the series bible for Batman: TAS).
Debuting in Batman #475 (1992), Renee (first called “Rene”) was a new cop assigned to Gotham’s Major Crimes Unit. She was a little green but good enough at her job that she became a trusted aide to Commissioner Jim Gordon, who proudly introduced her to Batman. As time went on, Renee became a detective and continued to grow as a bad-ass. In the series Gotham Central, which focused on the GCPD, Renee was further developed by writers Greg Rucka and Ed Brubaker. One storyline dealt with her being outed as a lesbian and the consequences that followed, such as judgments from those she had deemed friends and having her family turn their backs on her.
At the close of Gotham Central, Renee lost her partner Crispus Allen along with a lot of her self-respect. She left the GCPD, falling into heavy drinking and self-destructive behavior. Which is when she was visited by the Question.
In the 2007 weekly series 52 (written by Greg Rucka, Mark Waid, Grant Morrison, and Geoff Johns), our boy Vic recruited Renee to help him figure out some strange mysteries. He also pointed out that she needed help in getting her act back together, despite her own objections. They worked as partners but also as mentor and student, with Vic guiding her as Richard Dragon had once guided him. Under Rucka’s direction, their journey led them around the world and into the lives of various villains and heroes. Along the way, they encountered the mythical city of Nanda Parbat and ran across old friends Aristotle Rodor and Richard Dragon.
In time, Renee discovered that Vic was dying of cancer. He finally died in Renee’s arms, leaving her terrified: While she now felt whole, she also wasn’t sure who she was without him. Vic pointed out that the real question was not who she was, but who she would become. Renee pondered this for days afterwards. What would have more power over her? Her fear or her curiosity? Some battles, some questions, could only be solved with a mask. To be the Question was to serve justice and truth without ego, agenda, or personal distortion, to be selfless and ideal. She was no longer a Gotham City cop and no longer a lost soul looking for purpose. She was the Question.
She was given a new mask designed by Rodor, one with a built-in adhesive layer that didn’t require a gas agent to cement it. She explained to him and Richard Dragon that she would not just be a copy of Vic, and they agreed that he wouldn’t have wanted that anyway. Renee needed to be a hero on her own terms. The gave her Vic’s most recent fedora and trench coat, and she embarked on her new path.
Renee quickly proved to be a a worthy successor. She maintained her street savvy and indulged in a sense of humor that the often introspective Vic had usually lacked. Renee went on to star in Greg Rucka’s mini-series The Question: Five Books of Blood, which featured her former lover Kate Kane aka Batwoman. She starred in several back-up features with the Huntress, who also mourned Vic’s passing.
Cully Hamner drew these back-up features starring Renee and made sure that she stood out as her own Question rather than just a woman copying Vic’s look. He made sure that Renee’s chin dimple still showed through the mask, making her Question face appear just a tad different to Vic’s (along with the noticeable skin tone and hair style difference). Whereas Vic’s shampoo and gas mixture turned his red hair black (except for those times it didn’t), Renee’s hair became lighter when she operated as the Question.
Vic’s Question looked like an old school version of a detective or reporter, while Hamner made Renee’s outfits a little more current, fashion-wise, and tailored them to her body. This was a sleeker, more stylish Question. The little touches worked very nicely and emphasized that Renee was continuing a legacy rather than simply following someone else’s path and identity. I think it definitely works better for her than Vic’s neck tie and trench coat.
Renee played an essential role in the crossover Final Crisis. In Greg Rucka’s tie-in mini-series Final Crisis: Revelations, she went against the immortal DC villain Vandal Savage, revealed in that story to be the inspiration for the story of Cain. The same story revealed that Renee was immune to having her free will removed by the powerful Anti-Life Equation, because she’s just that bad-ass and in control of her identity.
During the events of the main Final Crisis crossover, Renee is recruited by government agents who deal with supernatural, superhuman, and other weird phenomena. She winds up inspiring the creation of new faceless soldiers called Global Peace Agents. The Global Peace Agency had originally only been seen in the possible timeline depicted in Jack Kirby’s OMAC series in 1974. In that story, the GPA was made up of people who took on faceless identities to objectively protect all of Earth rather than one group, nation, or interest.
That is some fun cross-continuity there. Basically, if you lived in the DC Universe and were someone who wore a faceless mask (or were stupid enough to remove your own face with weird science stuff), you were sure to have a connection to the Question.
I personally kept hoping Renee would star in a full-on monthly series as the new Question. It could’ve been great. But in 2011, DC Comics rebooted its superhero universe, replacing its comics with 52 new titles. Many characters were reimagined, some in drastic ways. The Question became one of those latter cases. Just about everything we knew about the character was removed, except for his appearance.
In the New 52 reality, the man who would become the Question originally lived in ancient times and is one of three people who eventually known as the Trinity of Sin. The other two members are the woman Pandora (yes, that Pandora) and Judas aka the Phantom Stranger. A council of sorcerers judged the not-yet-Question guilty of terrible crimes, the details of which are still unknown, and as punishment they take away all memory of him from the world. They remove his face and sentence him to wander the Earth, unaging, obsessed with finding answers and asking questions. By the modern day, this faceless man is acting as a vigilante and has been nicknamed the Question. He’s not a journalist. He has no other identity. He doesn’t use scientific means to disguise himself. He actually is a guy without a face.
It’s weird enough how removed this mystical character is from the grounded vigilante that Ditko, O’Neil, and Rucka crafted. What’s more, Renee Montoya has not been seen at all in the New 52. I find that sad. Comics can seriously use a positive lesbian Latina hero. Along with that, I personally simply miss the old concept of Vic Sage as a journalist who decided to act. And I miss seeing how Renee grew as a character when she succeeded Vic.
Time will tell what further changes the Question may undergo and whether or not Renee will don the mask again. With that, we’ve wrapped up another article. Hope you enjoyed this. Comment with more suggestions for who else you want to see covered in Agent of S.T.Y.L.E.
SPECIAL NOTICE: This Friday, the collectibles shop Blast from the Past in Burbank, CA is hosting a ladies night starting at 7 pm. All geeks and geek allies are welcome to attend. There will be food trucks, and I will be there signing books. So come say hi!
Alan Sizzler Kistler (@SizzlerKistler) is an actor and freelance writer who moonlights as a comic book historian and geek consultant. He is amazed no one has made The Question into a live-action series yet. He’d be happy to do it himself. He is the author of Doctor Who: A History.
'Simplicty? Yes, perhaps. But it's the kind of bland simplicity that you would expect from the Microsoft design language.'
More ’roids for Android
"Android is an operating system based on the Linux kernel with a user interface based on direct manipulation, designed primarily for touchscreen mobile devices such as smartphones and tablet computers. The operating system uses touch inputs that loosely correspond to real-world actions, like swiping, tapping, pinching, and reverse pinching to manipulate on-screen objects, and a virtual keyboard. Despite being primarily designed for touchscreen input, it also has been used in televisions, games consoles, digital cameras, and other electronics." (Source: Wikipedia)
Design by: N/A
Opinion/Notes: To clarify upfront: the Android robot droid green thing is not going away. The wordmark is what has changed. So, despite my glowing, optimistic review of the new Google visual language I am sad to report that none of it is reflected in the new Android logo. Simplicty? Yes, perhaps. But it's the kind of bland simplicity that you would expect from the Microsoft design language. The minimal "n"s and stumpy "r" make the whole thing look weak and very strangely spaced. If Google made such a big deal about moving to Roboto as its main typeface, they could have used the Android wordmark to drive that message home.
Leaving the Garden, many seemed unaware of or unfazed by the large number of people who became ill. One group of men emerged from the building clapping rhythmically and chanting, “Let’s go Bruins.”
THIS MOTHERFUCKING CARTOON ABOUT HOW ASH ADOPTS CHARMADER RUINED MY ENTIRE FUCKING CHILDHOOD
ASH AND GANG FIND THIS LITTLE GUY, SICK AND INJURED ON THIS FUCKING ROCK AFTER HEARING THIS FUCKING DOUCHEBAG TRAINER BRAGGING THAT HE ABANDONED HIS CHARMANDER BECAUSE HE WAS WEAK. AND CHARMANDER IS LOYAL AS FUCK SO HE’S WAITING AND WAITING AND HIS TRAINER THINGS THIS IS FUCKING HILARIOUS BECAUSE HE’S A TOTAL ASSHOLE.
DO YOU KNOW HOW A CHARMANDER’S TAIL FLAME WORKS? WELL LET ME FUCKING TELL YOU. IF HIS FLAME GOES OUT, HE FUCKING DIES.
SO ASH AND GANG RUSH TO SAVE CHARMANDER BECAUSE IT’S RAINING FUCKING HARD, AND WHEN THEY GET THERE HE’S BEING ATTACKED BY SOME SHITTY BIRD POKEMON AND HE’S STRUGGLING SO HARD TO STAY ALIVE AND HE’S HOLDING THIS LITTLE FUCKING LEAF OVER HIS TAIL FLAME WHICH IS SO SMALL AND ABOUT TO GO OUT
AND LITTLE 8 YEAR OLD ME IS JUST FUCKING HYSTERICALLY CRYING OVER THIS FUCKING CHARMANDER AND THE CRUELTY OF MAN
Mer-Maid Manor is an incredible illustration by Zac Gorman that depicts a fictional arcade game cabinet. It’s the first in a series of fictional arcade game cabinets by Gorman.
Can you clean the manor before the Sea King comes home? In Mer-Maid Manor, you play as two lovely Mer-Maids tasked with cleaning the home of the angry Sea King in time for his daughter’s coronation.
Anyway, this is a new little thing I'm playing with…creating imaginary arcade machines. I want to do 100 but we'll see
In this clever ad campaign for Jeep, animal illustrations reveal a second, hidden animal when the images are flipped upside down. The ad campaign was created by Leo Burnett France.
The InMoov robot is worlds first Open Source 3D printed humanoid size robot which you can 3D print yourself with a home 3D printer. The InMoov robot was created by Gael Langevin and is powered with Arduino boards. You can download the parts for the InMoov robot at Wevolver.com
Every Thursday is #3dthursday here at Adafruit! The DIY 3D printing community has passion and dedication for making solid objects from digital models. Recently, we have noticed electronics projects integrated with 3D printed enclosures, brackets, and sculptures, so each Thursday we celebrate and highlight these bold pioneers!
Have you considered building a 3D project around an Arduino or other microcontroller? How about printing a bracket to mount your Raspberry Pi to the back of your HD monitor? And don’t forget the countless LED projects that are possible when you are modeling your projects in 3D!
The Adafruit Learning System has dozens of great tools to get you well on your way to creating incredible works of engineering, interactive art, and design with your 3D printer! If you’ve made a cool project that combines 3D printing and electronics, be sure to let us know, and we’ll feature it here!
Loki’s primary weapon in The Avengers was a Chitauri Scepter. It has an elegant design, and Instructables user KyleofAsgard made one using a couple of types of foam (EVA and expanding), silicone, and Plaster of Paris among other materials. He started by scaling the scepter to the right size by using a grid. He then transferred the stencil to cardboard and covered both sides of the new cardboard template with expanding foam (specifics on doing that here). After he cut off the excess foam around the scepter template and shaped it, he covered it with Builder’s Bog:
Builders bog is a very popularly used costume/prop makers material, It takes 2 parts, the bog, and the hardner.
Usually for every golfball sized bit of bog you use, you would squeeze a 25mm line of hardner from the tube to mix with the bog.
What you are going to do here is basically cover your entire foam sculpt of your staff in bog, a really easy way of doing this is to wear latex gloves and use your hands, If you dont have gloves, then usually covering your hands in canola oil will do the trick to stop it sticking.
Make sure that you give your model atleast a 3mm thick coat all the way around ‘minimal’, Ideally if you can make it 4 or 5mm then you will have a stronger finished product after sanding. The cleaner you can put this bog on, the easier detailing will become.
Read more about the rest of the project at Instructables.
The legislation would significantly weaken elements of the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law dealing with derivatives -- the complex products at the heart of the 2008 meltdown. Many components of the bill approved Tuesday had previously passed the House with bipartisan support. However, Democratic backing had been weakest on the most controversial measure, which allows U.S. firms to skirt domestic regulations on some derivatives by conducting trades through offshore affiliates in other major financial centers.
Republicans were almost uniform in their support, with Rep. Walter Jones (N.C.) the lone GOP holdout. Democratic opposition was broad, with only 46 Democrats voting in support -- a marked change from several recent House votes on Wall Street deregulation that have drawn substantial backing from dozens, and in some cases an overwhelming majority, of House Democrats. The White House issued a formal statement last week saying that it "strongly opposes" the legislation that passed Tuesday.
The bill includes several separate deregulatory measures sought by the largest Wall Street banks and the Koch brothers, who control significant financial and energy derivatives operations. Americans for Financial Reform, the premier policy analysis organization among bank watchdogs, advocated strongly against the bill alongside consumer groups and the AFL-CIO.
The bill also reauthorizes the existence of the primary derivatives regulator, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Bank reform advocates, however, are confident that the agency cannot be shut down, unless it's defunded by Congress. The CFTC's formal authorization expired in October 2013.
The association between marijuana and schizophrenia is historically fraught. In the 1960's and 1970's, scientists thought that smoking weed could trigger psychosis in just about anyone. Today, these findings are more nuanced, but researchers still think that cannabis can trigger schizophrenia in people who are predisposed to the disease — meaning those with family histories of the disorder. Yet, in the last decade, some scientists have actually started to look at the effect in reverse. The resulting studies suggest that the neurobiology underlying schizophrenia might also put people affected by the disorder at increased risk for smoking pot. But these results haven't garnered nearly as much attention as studies suggesting the opposite.
part of the association might be caused by genetic overlap
Now, a new study, published today in Molecular Psychiatry, lends further support to the idea that schizophrenia plays a role in an individual's likelihood of smoking weed, by showing that the genetic variants predicting schizophrenia can also be used to predict a person's tendency to smoke pot, regardless of their mental health history. This, researchers say, demonstrates that the causal relationship between cannabis use and schizophrenia might not be clear cut, and that at least a small part of the association might be caused by genetic overlap, where the same genes that predispose certain people to enjoying weed might also predispose others to developing schizophrenia — or both.
To tease apart this relationship, researchers took genetic data from recently published studies of schizophrenia, and identified genetic variants associated with the disease. Then, they applied that information to a random sample of about 2,000 healthy Australians to see if those variants could also predict cannabis use.
"more likely to use cannabis, and in greater quantities."
"There is a well established link between people who use cannabis and schizophrenia," says Robert Power, lead author of the study and a genetic psychiatrist at King's College London. But this study indicates "that people who are at risk for schizophrenia are more likely to use cannabis, and in greater quantities," he says — which means the causal relationship might actually go both ways. Moreover, the genetic variants associated with schizophrenia were predictive for cannabis use in healthy individuals, so there is appears to be some genetic overlap between the two.
"These findings are very valuable," says Eden Evins, a psychiatry professor at Harvard University who was not involved in the study, "and suggest that increased genetic risk for schizophrenia increases the chance that someone will use cannabis, and use it heavily." But Evins doesn't think these results rule out previous findings that cannabis use increases a person's risk for developing schizophrenia. "Both may be true," she says. This sentiment was echoed by Wolfram Kawohl, a psychiatrist at the University of Zurich, who said the results show that "the connection is more complicated than some people may have thought," and that "both connections may exist parallel along with possible others."
"I am suspect that this finding will hold out with the test of time."
But Lynn DeLisi, another Harvard University psychiatry professor, isn't convinced. "I am suspect that this finding will hold out with the test of time," she told The Verge in an email. Delisi points to her own work, which showed there was no difference in family history of schizophrenia between people who smoke weed and people who don't. So, although there might be an interaction between smoking weed and schizophrenia, DeLisi said, it would be need to be shown in "studies of people using cannabis compared with those who don't, both having a family history of schizophrenia."
Furthermore, DeLisi thinks that today's high rates of cannabis use among teenagers and adults make it hard to link drug use to mental health issues or their genetic predispositions. "Everyone uses cannabis these days, and I don't think they necessarily have genetic predispositions to do so."
An ongoing debate
"The relationship is an ongoing debate in the scientific world — at least what the nature of the association is," said Matthew Hill, a cell biologist at the University of Calgary in Canada, who recently published an article dissecting this very relationship, in an email to The Verge. In the article, Hill argued that "there is little evidence that, at a population level, cannabis use during adolescence is a primary contributing factor in the development of psychiatric illness." But he also noted that "there is evidence that in high-risk populations, cannabis can be highly adverse, so arguments claiming that cannabis is innocuous are equally flawed."
Weed affects people with schizophrenia differently
When I asked about the risks associated with cannabis use, Hill said that "there are detailed studies which have demonstrated that cannabis can have very different effects on the brain of someone who is at risk for schizophrenia than someone who isn't." One 2013 study, for instance, demonstrated that the increased release of dopamine from smoking marijuana is amplified in the brains of people with schizophrenia, as well as in their close relatives. The results of this amplification are poorly understood, but some scientists think that a chronic elevation of dopamine can increase one's likelihood of experiencing psychotic episodes, and make the disorder harder to treat. Moreover, some studies indicate that people who find themselves in the early stages of schizophrenia and who also smoke weed experience larger brain modifications — such as changes in their white matter — compared to those who don't.
"cannabis use worsens the course of schizophrenia."
"There is definitely some kind of genetic basis to increased vulnerability to these adverse effects [in people with schizophrenia] that go beyond the correlational association discussed in this paper," Hill says. Evins agreed. "It's well known that cannabis use worsens the course of schizophrenia," she said, "so people with schizophrenia should be discouraged from using it."
Furthermore, some studies have found that smoking pot accelerates the development of schizophrenia in those who are genetically predisposed, but that association took a hit in 2010, when researchers found that accounting for things like gender, lifetime mental health history, and socioeconomic status erased the effect. Still, some studies continue to point to this risk.
Perhaps the reasons for these contradictory findings is that some individuals with schizophrenia react more strongly marijuana than others with the same disorder. This was the finding of one 2010 study that demonstrated that 44 out of 121 schizophrenic participants either developed schizophrenia within a month of beginning to smoke marijuana, or saw their psychosis amplified by drug use.
A complicated relationship
Given all of this conflicting evidence, it seems likely that the relationship between marijuana and schizophrenia is even more complex than we once thought. No single gene has been associated with either drug addiction or schizophrenia, so these illnesses are the result of many genes working in combination, Evins said, "each with a small contribution to the overall risk of developing the disorders." There's also a plethora of environmental factors that need to be taken into account — most of which we barely understand.
This "doesn't get a lot of attention."
Still, Hill said, the idea that cannabis use and schizophrenia share common genes "is interesting," partly because it highlights a dimension of this relationship that doesn't get a lot of attention. But causality is never easy to confirm, so this study will need to be replicated multiple times. And even then, Kawohl said, researchers probably won't be able to say that "cannabis use has no consequences for the risk to develop schizophrenia."
Regardless, it's important to remember that schizophrenia only affects a small number of people — about 1 percent of the US adult population — so "the vast majority of adolescents and young adults who use cannabis won't develop it," Evins said. And that's actually a crucial point, because despite all the studies that link schizophrenia and cannabis, few have been able to explain why schizophrenia rates have remained stable — and may actually be declining — in the face of pot's increasing popularity among teens.
the economic benefit of limiting pot use is "pretty small."
"There may still be a causal role between cannabis and schizophrenia, but our results suggest that this causal role may have been overestimated," Power says. This is important, he says, because some people have used cannabis' relationship with psychosis to argue against its legalization. "Already the actual economic benefit of limiting cannabis use in terms of schizophrenia is pretty small," Power says, pointing to a study that found that policymakers would have to stop at least 3000 adolescents from smoking weed to prevent one case of psychosis from emerging.
Still, Power thinks people with a family history of schizophrenia should avoid weed. "The clinical advice is to stay away from events that might have a potential to cause stress," he says, because genes and environment are interconnected. Thus, "people who are at-risk should try to avoid things that might damage their mental well-being." These things, he says, include weed.
The Pallas´s Cat, also called Manul, is a small wildcat living in the grasslands and steppe of central asia. It is named after the german naturalist Peter Simon Pallas, who first described the species in 1776.
That is the most expressive and gelatinous cat I have ever seen.
schwit1 (797399) sends word of a new and exciting use for all of the data various entities are collecting about you. From the article: You may soon get a call from your doctor if you've let your gym membership lapse, made a habit of ordering out for pizza or begin shopping at plus-sized stores. That's because some hospitals are starting to use detailed consumer data to create profiles on current and potential patients to identify those most likely to get sick, so the hospitals can intervene before they do. Acxiom Corp. (ACXM) and LexisNexis are two of the largest data brokers who collect such information on individuals. They say their data are supposed to be used only for marketing, not for medical purposes or to be included in medical records. While both sell to health insurers, they said it's to help those companies offer better services to members.
Nintendo and Tecmo Koei have revealed a pair of new playable characters featured in the upcoming Zelda-themed beat-'em-up Hyrule Warriors -- newcomer sorceress Lana and previously announced Twilight Princess veteran Agitha. Lana wields powerful...
