T w e n t y S i d e d
Just a few news items for now. I’ll try to get something up later in the week, too. I made it through one family gathering and *just* managed to get through the preparations without shutting down and spoiling everyone’s day. This is actually much better than I used to be, where I would have reached my emotional limit and got really angry and pouty and start demanding things work they way *I* wanted them to work. Even when you’re right about something, getting loud and pushing people around isn’t the way to deal with stressful situations. If you’re stressed, so are they. We feed off it.
I have seen the new Superman teaser poster with the introductory music and the first trailer. I have maintained minimal awareness of the movie because James Gunn creating a Superman movie at least has potential. Gunn has fought hard to create movies that fit his own vision. Sure, I don’t always like the results; I don’t care for the Guardians movies, as an example. But he also made one of the greatest superhero parodies ever: The Specials. I think it’s worth pointing out that The Specials core message was about the primacy of the found family unit. It was also one of several movies from the turn of the millennium that feature commentary on corporate sponsorship of superheroes. ’99’s Mystery Men rotated around B-tier superheroes saving the city when the prominent superhero stages a fight with a paroled nemesis to boost his flagging sponsorship deals, only to get killed in the process. The Specials has subplot that essentially dovetails with the “oddball” nature of the various titular superheroes. If they want to make the headlines, and get invited to solve world-threatening problems, they need marketable images, personalities, and powers.
The world needs a good Superman movie right now. The trailer gives me hope. And I’m not the only person to comment on the trailer with those exact words. We are *all* that small Boravian child raising a home-made Superman flag praying to be saved by the one person who may care. And I suspect that whatever is going on in Boravia (and only a handful of things *ever* go on in Boravia) this segment of the movie is going to be highly filtered except for a handful of images. Because there are some clear parallels that *could* be made with current world events. And I can’t imagine DC being willing to say anything that might be construed as having an opinion on anything other than the conceptual.
Excepting the identity of various characters, most of the rest of the trailer is speculative in meaning. Possibly a corporate-backed Justice Society of America. Hawk Girl is in it, which I’m sure makes my kids happy. The Shayera Thal/Hol Hawk Girl was a favorite character from Justice League/Justice League Unlimited. This movie’s Hawk Girl would most accurately be based on the earlier Shiera Sanders-Hall, although I wouldn’t be surprised if they lean more heavily on the later interpretation of the character.
The music, of course, has been the star. Other than Krypto. The teaser’s use of the haunting, barely-discernible variation on the Superman Theme had me tearing up. Moving from that to the louder, clearer electric guitar version of the trailer was an excellent decision. If they’re smart (no evidence) we will NEVER hear the full, orchestral, Superman Theme until the final act or the END of the movie. Bring the house down.
So, yeah. I’m looking forward to the movie.
I hope everyone is finding the Steam sale to their liking. I haven’t actually checked what all *exactly* on my wish list is on sale. But I also try to avoid spending money *for me* in the days before Christmas. Steam gifting is such a useful tool. It’s a shame other services *still* haven’t figured it out.
Like last year, I’ll be back on Christmas. Because we’re all in this together.
Gamers Aren’t Toxic
This is a horrible narrative that undermines the hobby through crass stereotypes. The hobby is vast, gamers come from all walks of life, and you shouldn't judge ANY group by its worst members.
Mass Effect Retrospective
A novel-sized analysis of the Mass Effect series that explains where it all went wrong. Spoiler: It was long before the ending.
Steam Summer Blues
This mess of dross, confusion, and terrible UI design is the storefront the big publishers couldn't beat? Amazing.
Trashing the Heap
What does it mean when a program crashes, and why does it happen?
The Best of 2015
My picks for what was important, awesome, or worth talking about in 2015.
Boss,
The whole shebang is on the front page :)
On my side it’s back to the family to herd the cats of various ages and dispositions across the holidays which is amazing because of course it is to see the loved ones (we get one or two meetings a year, three tops) and have a chance to try new and wonderful board games but also…. It’s a pain because herding cats is a pain and when we have this many people each with their specific needs and some with no empathy (because too young or too old) it can be a bit tiring…
Games wise, nothing much here, I got the case of the golden idol a while back but only managed a couple of scenarios before needing to do other things. It’s fun and hits the same sweet spot as obra dinner for the moment without the first person induced nausea!
No real opinions on the superman trailer beyond being mildly curious, I’m drifting slowly away from the mainstream superhero films (well mainstream films in general) because I often feel it’s rehashed and there is a lack of originality in the stuff that comes out. That said, it is the spirit of Christmas to see films we’ve seen a million times before and just snuggle up in warm blanket and you know? I kind of love that! My copy of rare exports is ready for the dvd player!
Merry Christmas y’all!
It’s all on the front page because it’s short. If it was split it would hardly make a difference. Only one image, too. I usually try to keep the header image short so that it functions more as a marker than being information for the post.
Interesting to hear that about Obra Dinn; I’ve had it sitting in the “next game” queue for a year and haven’t pulled the trigger. I’ll definitely have to update everyone on the nausea.
I see about the front page thing, makes sense :)
For Obra Sinn, I guess it depends on people… I am amongst the group who cannot really play first person games at all beyond 20′ to an hour (depends on the game) , with the risk of spending the rest of the day violently nauseous…
It’s a shame as it’s stopped me from going for what seem like excellent games (subnautica, outer wilds…) but in truth I cannot say that I’m overly sad, the backlog is just too damn big for me to feel fomo at this point! And for some rare exceptions (Obra dinn) I do power through and take the hit…
Glad about the golden idol though, it’s fun… Feels a bit less freeform than Obra dinn but that may just be because it directs you much more towards the clues and so it feels more “static”. But yeah, having a good time with it
I really thought I was done with superhero movies, but damn, that Superman trailer hooked me.
Same here. I have *not* gone out of my way to see what I’ve seen. I have watched a few…generally if people start saying something is horrible I’m *more* likely to watch it because most movies I see these days are awful, IMO. And I’ve probably seen most of the movies via clips at this point. I mean, the plot is usually pretty short, it’s mostly FX fights. I did really like Civil War. One of the few that had a good message, although it just fell down at the end. Absolutely loved the Black Widow movie and Captain Marvel. Both of those were sold as being “feel good” movies and they worked like that for me.
It’s incredible how much the new Superman is successfully marketing “hope,” because that’s what people are buying in to.
I’m not even interested in Superman in general, let alone the throwback to Hope, and whenever it was I saw that trailer the music *still* got me pretty good.
Looking at the trailer made me go “you had a potentialy far superior version with Sasha Calle in the Flash, and you’ve discarded it already.”
I mean, we’ll see the finished product, but as a result Corenswet has gotten a mighty tall bar to clear. At least he’s got live-action Idefix to distract audience.
At the moment, Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow will be the movie to follow Superman. However, the current cast shows Milly Alcock playing Supergirl. I can’t find anything truly definative regarding the casting choice; only various datum. Calle has a pretty full line-up of projects for 2025 and 2026. The Supergirl movie only *recently* was set as the next entry due to that film’s script impressing Gunn and apparently several other factors falling into place that put it ahead of other DCU projects. And DC (and far be it from me to claim DC is *right* about any choices it makes) wants to draw a hard line between the new DCU movies and anything that has come before. A good example is the inclusion of Krypto, which some people thought might be due to his inclusion in other recent DC productions. However, the story I am consistently seeing is that Gunn brought Krypto in of his own accord and due largely to his own recent experiences with adopting a dog. DC, along with a segment of fans, has insisted Krypto cannot be incorporated into any main-line live-action Superman movie.
Calle has a full line-up (and it’s a good thing, she’s a good actress) because the version of Kara she played was dropped definitely despite the ending of Flash with her in it being shot, and it appears Alcock’s Supergirl will be written in a different direction, which, imo, is a shame given how much “good Kryptonians” are about hope and sticking to it, and how great a work Calle did with the theme and character.
And Gunn already did a pretty solid storyarc about a superhero character picking himself up after a life-destroying tragedy (Drax), so again, we’ll see the finished product.
As for the dog, I fail to see what are the problems with including it (apart from the usual problems of having a live animal having to act in a specific way on demand), I just find it amusing the choice went with one that looks like live Idefix next to Corenswet.
Then again, this might turn out to be the perfect choice, and definitely is a better one than some “model show” retriever.
Merry Christmas!
I couldn’t care less about another Superman movie. Or another Batman movie. Or another Spiderman reboot. Surely we’re due for another Spiderman reboot? I’m sure it’s been at least a minute and a half since the last Spiderman reboot; what if people have forgotten how much angst Peter feels over the hot girl not being into his weird hobbies? Is there another genre of fiction where they tell the exact same story, over-and-over again? Not just “yet another fetch quest travelogue Tolkien-clone fantasy book” but actually the same story, about the same characters?
But I’m glad that the trailer for this version of AmericanGodMan makes you happy, and I genuinely hope it’s an enjoyable flick for you. Happy New Year!
“Is there another genre of fiction where they tell the exact same story, over-and-over again?”
Sherlock Holmes. And Shakespeare remakes.
Talking (semi) facetiously, i believe that the underlying idea to the hero with a thousand faces (full disclosure, I’m struggling getting through that particular book!) is that essentially all stories are the same at heart
I had heard a similar thing about philosophy wherein most of it was covered by Plato already
Not sure I necessarily agree with either of these and not sure I’d consider them negative things… But it does highlight that as humans we do like our formulaic tales and elements…. I wonder if it isn’t because so much of humanity is the preservation and transmission of knowledge and so we’re fine tuned to like repetition to a degree or another?
I removed “Die Hard on a ____” from my list because they at least pretend the characters are different from John McClane. For the same reason we discard the hundreds of thousands of whodunnit murder mystery shows that could all be mistaken for each other.
It’s mainly a question of how much you want to blur your eyes. At some level everything is the same, at some level everything is different.
There is more than one full essay on the topic I could write. For example, formula repetition is clearly a major component of the modern event movie, which is dominated by the superhero genre (I would include the franchise sci-fi movies in this). We have seen the vitriol when the formula is deviated from in *particular* ways. Although, bizarely; broad deviation is accepted if nostalgiac “checklist” items are included. I think “checklist” filmmaking is the default because broad repetition does, in fact, get stale. If the latest XYZ-man movie is just like the last one, which was just like the last one, and so on….maybe you can skip this one until it’s on TV sometime.
Which items from a franchise can be checklisted is a constantly evolving concept that likely can’t accurately be predicted. Not logically, anyway.
David Eddings and David Gemmel also come to mind. Most (if not all) norse, germanic and slavic sagas. A lot of greek mythology.
Repeating the same story isn’t a new concept.
Also, I daresay You’re not done with superhero movies and reboots, You’re done with bad storytelling – and that’s a different thing.
Haha quite. Though I’ll take those over the “turns out significant war event of the past was won by X superhero”.