INTO. THE PIT.

Testament/Metraya

Oxford Art Factory 26/02/14

A small crowd of mostly men outside a venue in Oxford Street isn’t surprising, even more so as it’s coming up to Mardi Gras night. A small crowd of mostly men clad in band t-shirts, with a few fantastic 80’s era denim cut-off jackets covered in patches, that’s different. Well, as far as I know – if anyone wants to prove me wrong, please do so.

The mighty Testament, veterans of the Bay Area thrash scene have returned to Australia on the Soundwave tour, and are playing several sideshows. I’m flying to Perth to see them at Soundwave, but the chance to see them in a tiny club? There was no way in hell I was missing this.

The support was a welcome surprise, with Wollongong band Metraya replacing Newsted at the last minute (According to one of their guitarists, who’s also a former co-worker of mine, at 2:30 that afternoon…) and got the crowd going with an energetic set. My list of funny stage banter* also has a new entry, with “We are Metraya, and this is a song called METRAYA!” (I love bands who write songs about themselves – see also Hammerfall and Manowar) Despite having a fairly thankless job (Several people in the crowd were wondering why they didn’t just let Testament play longer), they got a good reaction with 40 minutes of early Slayer esque thrashing and left the stage to cheers. Check em’ out.

Metraya doing their thing

40 minutes later, (Which featured a section of audience near me having a sing-along to Master of Puppets) and the strains of Hendrix’s Star Spangled Banner and Testament hit the stage, storming through Rise Up to applause and roars in equal measure.

Guitarists Alex Skolnick and Eric Peterson and new/returning bassist Steve DiGiorgio (Mjolnir pendant round his neck) were in fine form, frequently stepping up on the monitors to shred (Ala Steve Harris) and nearly hitting the ceiling in the process. Drummer Gene Hoglan smacked seven shades of shit out of his kit and singer Chuck Billy’s habit of air guitaring using a half-length microphone stand never get’s old. We got a good mix of old and new, with the highlights mostly the sing along songs, such as More than Meets the Eye (Which isn’t, as far as I know, about the Transformers), Dark Roots of Earth and an utterly storming Into the Pit, while Native Blood was dedicated to the local indigenous population. What was most evident though, was the sense of how much fun the band were having – there were smiles all round, with Skolnick’s goofy grin as he unleashed another brutal riff a sight to behold. I could grumble about the set only being an hour and 20, but it was worth it for the atmosphere. You can take your stadium gigs and shove them – give me a tiny room and the ability to make eye contact with the stage any time. Oh, and Gene Hoglan brushed past me on his way outside pre-gig. *swoons*

Alex Skolnick (Left) and Eric Peterson (Right) duelling axes

Heads were banged. Horns were thrown. Beer was drunk. It was a metal show. What more is there to say?

*The top of the list is Down singer Phil Anselmo introducing a song about marijuana legalisation with “This one goes out to… Where the fuck are we?”

STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND

Is an underrated Iron Maiden song, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m here to talk about gaming, specifically live action gaming.

The New Zealand LARP scene is awesome – seriously, it’s freaking awesome. Thanks to having the best wife in the world, I got to spend a day LARPing, on a holiday that was primarily about attending a family wedding. Do I have the best wife? Yes, yes I do). I’d previously gone there to game for the opening of St Wolfgang’s Vampire Hunters (I’m still embarrassed that they wrote plot for me, but couldn’t wake me) back in 2007 and itched to go back ever since.

We were talking part in the introductory games for the up-coming campaign Crucible, which sees several nations arriving on a mysterious new island. We, the crew, were playing members of the Wild Hunt, a grouping of the children of the forest such as trolls, satyrs, dryads etc and were made up as such.

A very exhausted, slightly dehydrated troll with half his face melted off

The 2 games that took place on the day saw the arrival on the island of the two of the game’s factions, the Drazhar and the Alteraanians. The Drazhar (Who are basically the Dothraki from Game of Thrones with a little less rape and pillage, a little more action) arrived, only to find themselves confronted by angry natives (That’d be us, the crew) and mostly unarmed (Whether a player had their weapons at the start was decided by a game of Rock/Paper/Scissors beforehand). Wisely, they chose to surrender.

After taking them back to our encampment (Around the corner from a pair of sunbathers, who were giving us some very strange looks), they were prodded with questions, tested on their skills and told to pick 3 of their landing to chase down a captive of ours, a sorcerer of the Ebon Legion, an NPC (Non Player Character) faction of demon worshippers despised by all. In this, they failed miserably, but it was A: stupidly hot and B: several were wearing armour. The game ended with a rousing fight between the new allies and a group of the Legion, which was a rousing victory for the good guys. (I played little part in the battle, but I’m open about the fact I’m a fairly shit fighter.)

The second game had a lot less details – basically, fight, rest and fight. The Alteraanians (A race of merchants and the richest of the factions) were confronted by an angry group of the Wild Hunt as they picked themselves up off the beach. We’d been instructed not to kill any of them, but give them a good scare. This, we managed quite well, as they’d left themselves spread out and unable to protect many of the more squishy members of their band. The second battle saw them much improved, bottle necking an opening with fighters with heavy armour and shields. Needless to say we tried, but got battered down repeatedly. And thus ended the day…

It was a blast and made the ensuing exhaustion, mild sunburn and feeling of “Oh gods, I’ve not used those muscles in far too long” worth it. It’s also made me want to do more work on getting the Sydney scene in shape, so we could one-day have games that Kiwis want to come play. Of the two games that I know of, Journeyman is the closest to getting going (And by which I mean it needs a lot of work), while Swordcraft Sydney (An offshoot of the Melbourne game) is still in the early stages. Not to mention, the I kind of owe the Freeform Collective a game…

SOUNDWAVE SUPERIOR, CONSTRUCTICONS INFERIOR

First off, if you know what the title of this post references, you have taste. *light applause*

Secondly, I’m back from New Zealand and am busily catching up on all the news I missed while I was stuck with shitty Wi-Fi. Still coming down from a fantastic LARP experience (Which I’ll be writing about later) and walking through Hobbiton, which is eyeball meltingly beautiful.

It’s a week till Soundwave Perth and they finally released a timetable. There’s only one major clash and I’ve got enough time between bands to hydrate etc. Anyhow, here’s what the timetable looks like:
11:00-11:40 The Porkers / Amon Amarth – The Porkers bring the awesome, but Amon have a longship as part of the stage show. Well, half of a longship, but it’s still HALF OF A FUCKING LONGSHIP. Tough choice. Boils down to songs about beer and not getting laid or songs about Vikings and mead. Tough choice.
12:00-12:30 Nancy Vandal – Cheap jokes, teenage nostalgia and songs about the Simpsons. Who could resist that?
1:20-2:00 Testament – A large chunk of the reason I’m going. So long as they play ‘Into the Pit’ I’ll be happy, but if they play ‘The Persecuted Won’t Forget’ I’ll be ecstatic.
2:40-3:20 GWAR – It’s for the stage show.
5:40-6:20 Skindred – It’d be too much to ask for a Dub War cover or two, but a man can dream right? Still, watching Benji Webbe do his thing is worth it.
7:15-8:15 Rob Zombie – As with Gwar, it’s for the stage show. Maybe a White Zombie tune or two?
8:45-10:00 Avenged Sevenfold – What I’ve heard of them I’ve enjoyed, but they apparently insisted on playing in the dark so I’m guessing they’ll be a lot of pyro and more KABOOM is good in my book.

So, only one question remains – do I wear my kilt or not? Readers?

Trailers, titles and television.

Welcome dear readers!

Sorry for being a bit late this week – the heat has once again conspired against me. Not much has happened of interest, outside of booking for the Soundwave Festival! I’ve resisted festivals in the past, but there’s too many bands at this one I really want to see who, as a bonus, are touring here for the first time, primarily the mighty Testament and ragga metallers Skindred.

It’ s been a week for new trailers, with a gorgeous spot for Amazing Spider-Man 2 stuffed full of Easter Eggs for fans, the new Muppets Most Wanted cheerfully mocking studios use of Twitter quotes for press and a pair of jaw dropping new trailers for Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which drops more hints about what’s going on without actually spiling anything. Compare and contrast that with the first teaser for Transformers: Age of Extinction, which is 30 seconds of slow motion CGI, explosions and Mark Wahlberg looking dramatic. Well, that and the AWE INSPIRING -sight of Optimus Prime riding Grimlock into battle like GIANT ROBOT DINOSAUR CALVALRY. (You have no idea just how much fun that was to type)

Grimlock love you, but only have 14 hours to save Cybertron!

Some interesting casting news happened, with the news that Jesse Eisenberg is Lex Luthor and Jeremy Irons is Alfred in Batman vs Superman. Eisenberg’s an interesting choice for a younger Luthor, while Irons is British, so, yeah. We also have another possible title for the film, Man of Steel: Fight or Flight. That’s terrible, but it’s the least terrible option so far – yay for the lesser evil! In more British casting news, Paul Bettany (The voice of JARVIS in the Iron Man movies) will be playing The Vision in Avengers: Age of Ultron. This – this I’m a fan of.

It’s now time to play the unverified casting rumour game! First up, Evangeline Lilly is said to be in talks for the female lead in Ant-Man (We don’t know if it’s Janet Van Dyne yet either) and Dwayne Johnson tweeted #LanternCanWhupSuperman and thus set the speculation train moving again. So we’re ignoring the Ryan Reynolds version? If it means we get him playing Deadpool, I’m OK with that.

Moving back to Captain America 2, there’s a gallery of new pictures, a preview clip (Taken from the Thor: The Dark World Blu-Ray) that has a pretty massive spoiler in it and there’s a competition running over what TV show Cap will be watching during the film. Sadly it’s only for the UK release, but I still voted for Doctor Who, which is coming second behind Sherlock, with Father Ted a distant third. It’s also set to have a knock on effect for Age of Ultron and Agents of SHIELD, which, if you aren’t watching, means Clark Gregg doesn’t like you.

How can you say no to a face like that?

Plans are apparently in the works for a sequel to Guardians of the Galaxy by 2016, Drew Pearce (Who wrote the Marvel one-shot All Hail the King) has been talking about Runaways (About a group of children who discover their parents are supervillains) and the gag reel for Thor: The Dark World as is awesome as you’d expect. We have what could be the first look at Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch of X-Men: Days of Future Past and director Marc Webb has announced actor BJ Novak’s role in Amazing Spider-Man 2. We’d just tell you, but there’s possible spoilers, so yeah. Consider yourselves warned!

We’ve had some movement on the Fantastic Four reboot – several blogs were threatened with legal action after reporting a strange synopsis. Said synopsis was, well, different, so the threats were initially taken as evidence that it was genuine. Thankfully, director Josh Trank has debunked it, saying the only similarities are ‘there are characters named Reed, Sue, Johnny and Ben,’which is nice and reassuring. Meanwhile, casting has indicated they’re open to a female Doctor Doom. I’m not totally against that, but can’t they just use Lucia Von Bardas instead?

A sequel to The Lego Movie is already being planned and while I really want to see the movie, it’s more than a bit depressing that it’s Wonder Woman’s cinema debut. That’s right DC Comics and Warner Brothers – LEGO BEAT YOU. In more uplifting Lego news, a Lego version of the X-Men’s mansion has been proposed and it is downright amazing. Seriously, it’s even got a Danger Room in there. A new clip and details of the soundtrack for Knights of Badassdom have been released (It’s Bear McCreary – I’m buying it) and staying with gaming, we recently had the 40^th anniversary of Dungeons and Dragons! By the way, did you know that Ice-T recently narrated a D&D audiobook?

Yes, that’s Ice-T playing a mutant kangaroo. In his defence, it was the 90’s…

Painkiller Jane (Previously a TV movie and series on the SyFy channel) may be headed for the big screen and the adaption of JG Ballard’s novel High Rise will star Tom Hiddleston. In mixed news, Snowpiercer will be uncut upon its released in the US, but it’ll be getting a limited arthouse cinema release. So equal amounts of yay and booo!

Turning to the idiot box, alternate history comic The Red Star is coming to television, as is a series based on John Scalzi’s book Redshirts, about the more expendable members of a starship crew, and it’s been confirmed that Preacher will be airing on AMC. SyFy US are developing a series based on the DC Comics series DMZ, Studio Ghibli are working on a new anime series and the CW’s The Flash series has cast Iris West.

There’s some new propaganda posters for Star Wars: Rebels and if you’re (Quite rightly) concerned about the Constantine series, he’ll be from London and will have the accent. Neil Gaiman has given an update on the TV versions of his books American Gods and Anansi Boys and read Dr Suess’s Green Eggs and Ham. It’s glorious, trust me. The only thing that could out cute that this week has been Benedict Cumberbatch’s appearance on Sesame Street and that was magnificent.

Ia! Ia! Gaiman fhtagn!

The adaption of video game Uncharted has a director, Zachary Quinto will be co-starring in the reboot of Hitman, but we won’t be seeing a 6^th Resident Evil film this year, for which we must be thankful for small mercies. In things we should be thankful for without sarcasm, a CG Chip and Dale: Rescue Rangers film is being planned. My inner child would like to argue about how it’ll be butchered like all the other movies based on 80’s cartoons, but it’s too busy singing the theme tune to care.

We end this week discussing, as I frequently do, the glory of the lightsaber, which is still my favourite sword of all. Yes, the longsword is a beautiful and elegant weapon, as are the katana and rapier and I have a lot of love for the simplicity of the gladius, but none of them have the same effect on me as the hum of a lightsaber. Anyhow, there’s an example of a lightsaber fight in the dark and a series of lightsaber combat academies have opened in Italy. Sure, it’s a geekier version of sport fencing, but if that get’s more people into swordsmanship, than I’m OK with that.

Quote of the Week:

“Hey,” said Shadow. “Huginn or Muninn, or whoever you are.”
The bird turned, head tipped, suspiciously, on one side, and it stared at him with bright eyes.
“Say ‘Nevermore,'” said Shadow.
“Fuck you,” said the raven.”

Neil Gaiman, American Gods

Cheers,

Gavin

Huh? We’re back on?

Hey all,

So, there’s not been much blogging of late. I’d like to blame the heat, or any number of other factors, but the truth is I’m rubbish without a deadline. The last few days has mostly been writing for a LARP I’m in and listening to Dio era Black Sabbath. There’s far worse ways to spend the time, but possibly more productive ways. Anyhow, we’re back, so let’s get this going.

We start this week with more than the recommended dose of “You’re joking, right?” I’d love to find a witty way to introduce this, but I can’t, so here goes: Back to the Future: The Musical. Robert Zemeckis is directing, as well as writing the show with Bob Gale (Who co-wrote the film), with composer Alan Silvestri scoring. So, anyone expecting a song about your mother hitting on you?

OK, something less strange. *rummages* Well, the new Doctor’s costume has been unveiled and it’s mighty spiffy. Well, except for the cardigan, but we can’t have everything. As numerous others have pointed out it’s very reminiscent of the Third Doctor Jon Pertwee’s outfit, with Capaldi further adding to that with the post he’s striking. While we’re talking Doctor Who, there’s a fan made Who themed version of Cards Against Humanity called Cards Against Gallifrey and a trailer for the fan made documentary, Who’s Changing?

That’s the most work-safe combination I could find.

Fun Fact: Jon Pertwee was one of the back-ups in-case Sean Connery didn’t want to play Henry Jones Snr in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. As much as I’d love to say I came up with the line ‘Only the penitent man shall reverse the polarity’, it’s not one of mine.

The rumours around the Agent Carter TV show continue to rumble, with new word that the show has a script and producers. In more welcome news, Lady Sif will be appearing in Agents of SHIELD and Batman vs Superman has been pushed back 10 months, with Ant-Man taking it’s release date. Anna Paquin might be back in X-Men: Days of Future Past, Gal Gadot has signed up for three Wonder Woman films, but sadly Stan Lee won’t have a cameo in Guardians of the Galaxy.

Thor 3 has been announced, we have a couple of stills from Tom Hiddleston’s audition for Thor (It’s on the Blu-Ray for the second movie) and has appeared, along with Mark Strong and Ben Kingsley, in a Jaguar car ad that asks Why are all Bad Guys British? Thanks to merchandise we’ve gotten a look at the Guardians of the Galaxy and the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, as well as a closer look at the Falcon from Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

Yes, it’s kinda creepy, but not as bad as the underwear…

There’s trailers for the straight to DVD movies Justice League Adventures: Trapped in Time and Son of Batman and a look at Necessary Evil, a documentary on the villains of DC Comics and which I’m slightly ashamed to admit I only just found out about. We also have a teaser for the anime styled Avengers Confidential: Black Widow and Punisher (Gee, I wonder who’s in that one…), a TV spot for Amazing Spider-Man 2 and a deleted scene from Thor: The Dark World.

X-Men producer Lauren Shuler Donner wants to make a Gambit movie starring, you’ll want to be sitting down for this part, Channing Tatum. Yeah… I’m not sure where to place that on the scale of bad ideas – it’s somewhere between ‘getting hit in the crotch with a brick’ and ‘invading Russia in winter’, but below ‘Batman and Robin.’

Both the creator and star of the Leprechaun movies (Mark Jones and Warwick Davis) are working on a reboot of the series called Vamprechaun, the live action version of Ghost in the Shell has a director and Vin Diesel has been a busy boy – he’s announced that not only is a new Riddick film in development, but a script for a new XXX film is a month away from completion.

Vin Diesel contemplating another Pacifier movie.

There’s new trailers for Malificent and 300: Rise of an Empire, which might not be a very good film, but they’ve sampled Black Sabbath’s War Pigs, so they’ve done something right. We have another teaser for the TV adaption of From Dusk Till Dawn and new spots for Scarlet Johansson’s Under the Skin and Terry Gilliam’s latest, The Zero Theorem. There’s also trailers for Sinbad: The Fifth Voyage, which boats stop motion animation and a voiceover from Patrick Stewart, and the movie Occulus, which stars Amy Pond and Kara Thrace. (Or Karen Gillan and Katee Sackhoff for the pedantic)

The rumours about Pixar making a Star Wars movie are most likely false, Billy Dee Williams would love to return for Episode 7 and we also have details on a new character from the upcoming Star Wars: Rebels, a cranky astromech droid known as Chopper. *waves $10 note* This goes to the first person to overdub the droid noise with dialogue from Chopper. C’mon, you know you want to do it…

In the ‘Too Good to be True’ category comes word of a rumour that Dame Judi Dench is to play Mon Mothma in the next Star Wars movie. (For what it’s worth, Caroline Blakiston, who played her in Return of the Jedi, is still active.)

You can’t tell me that’s not true – I REFUSE TO DISBELIEVE.

The TV remake of Barbarella is still on the way and some casting news for the Rosemary’s Baby adaption. We’ve a collection of new pictures from season 4 of Game of Thrones and if you were spooked by the announcement of a John Constantine TV show, there’s some god news – the mighty Neil Marshall (Who you may remember from directing such films as Dog Soldiers and Centurion) will be directing the pilot. No, that doesn’t guarantee it’ll be good, but there’s a slightly better chance of it!

The week’s most important news is that Lego are releasing a Ghostbusters set this year and in the week’s least important news, it’s been confirmed that Ian Ziering and Tara Reid will return for Sharknado 2. The movie adaption of Stephen King’s Dark Tower series might be back on and the producer of Transformers: Age of Extinction is insisted the film isn’t a reboot. How about you just make a good movie, can you do that?

We end this week with a gloriously nerdy internet flame war between the Star Wars and Marvel Twitter accounts. People are getting paid to do that, with actual money. Alec Hardison was right – it truly is the age of the geek.

Quote of the Week:

Marty: Wait a minute. Wait a minute Doc, uh, are you telling me you built a time machine… out of a DeLorean?

Doc: The way I see it, if you’re going to build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style?

Back to the Future

Cheers,

Gavin

Holy Licensing Issues Batman!

Welcome dear readers!

This week (Outside of trying not to melt in the heat) I’ve been re-watching Leverage to prepare for an upcoming game and sorting out my costume for a live action game I’m in. So, basically, I’ll be very dodgy sitting around a table and dodgy dressed up in costume and wielding foam swords. Hey, do I mock your hobbies?

There’s been a fair bit of big news this week, but there’s one story that overshadows them all. It’s something many thought would never happen, but finally, after almost 40 years, Batman 66 is finally getting a home release. The show was long tangled up in rights issues between Fox (Who produced the show) and Warners (Who own DC Comics), with further legal issues over celebrity cameos muddying the waters even more. The news was broken by a tweet from late night host Conan O’Brien and appears to confirm a complete series box set would be released this year, though there’s no word on special features or whether it’ll be on Blu-Ray and DVD.

Hurry Boy Wonder, we have to get to JB Hi Fi in time!

There’s also the trailer for Doomed, the untold story of the Roger Corman Fantastic Four movie. What’s that, you’ve not heard of this? Well, that’s because it was never intended to be released. The film was shot on the cheap as a way of holding onto the rights, with the cast and crew not being told of this at the time. Bootlegs exist of the film, but I’m pretty sure Marvel would like to forget about it, like the two Captain America TV movies made in the 70’s, one of which has Christopher Lee as the villain.

More directors have been linked to a new Masters of the Universe film, the killer in the next Friday the 13th movie might not be Jason Voorhees and Disney are said to be working on a live action musical version of Frozen. We have a list of actors said to be reading for Kyle Reese in the next Terminator film, Sam Neill won’t be in Jurassic World and both Sam Worthington and Zoe Saldana have signed up for 3 sequels to Avatar. Kristen Stewart has signed on to Equals, which (Brace yourself for this part) is described as a romantic version of 1984 and a movie based on the card game (And just behind crack cocaine in it’s addictive properties) Magic: The Gathering is being prepared.

All the power of Grayskull and he still has that haircut…

There’s been some big casting news in the world of comic book movies of late, with the announcement of Michael Douglas as Hank Pym in Ant-Man and German actor Thomas Kretschmann as Baron Von Strucker in Avengers: Age of Ultron. Pym was the original Ant-Man, succeeded in the role by Scott Lang (Who Paul Rudd is presumably playing), while Baron Strucker is one of the heads of Hydra, last seen in Captain America.

Now the really awesome part hasn’t been confirmed, but word is that Jason ‘Khal Drogo’ Momoa was up for a role in Batman vs Superman. The part? Arthur Curry, better known as Aquaman. Momoa has denied any involvement, but a list of things I’d do to see that casting happen would be both A: Very long and B: Would get disturbing fast. There was also talk that Marvel wanted Johnny Depp to play Doctor Strange, but mercifully that was debunked quickly. It’s not that I don’t think Depp can’t act, I just don’t want him in the role.

Who’s laughing now?

There’s a gallery of pictures from Captain America: The Winter Soldier and the mere mention of cloning in the viral marketing for Amazing Spider-Man 2 has made me very nervous. No, I’ve not read the Clone Saga, but I know enough to know it’s a continuity mess that makes the history of the X-Men look calm. Meanwhile, word is that the Justice League film will be shot back to back with Batman vs Superman, which, oddly, makes a lot of sense.

Gotham will feature the origins of many of Batman’s villains and the CW has appeared to have cancelled the young Wonder Woman show Amazon. Boooo! The mighty Bill Paxton (AKA the only man to have been killed by an Alien, Predator and Terminator) will have an upcoming arc in Agents of SHIELD and a pilot for a Constantine TV show has been approved. Can we please get John Simm or Tim Roth for the lead? Pictures of Doctor Who filming have Peter Capaldi riding a horse while in his panamas and did you know that Steven Moffat wanted a shout out to Peter Cushing’s Doctor in the 50^th Anniversary special?

Just forget this, except for Tilda Swinton. Don’t forget her.

Anna Silk has revealed that George Takei will be appearing in the next season of Lost Girl and the next season of American Horror Story will take place in 1950, with the only other clue that Jessica Lange has been ‘brushing up on her German.’ The first trailer for season 4 of Game of Thrones was released this week and it can’t come soon enough for my taste. We also have the first clips from Knights of Badassdom, I, Frankenstein and Robocop, the first teasers for the TV shows Outlander and From Dusk Till Dawn and a fresh teaser for Penny Dreadful. Lastly, there’s a clip from the new Marvel one-shot All Hail the King. If you’ve not seen Iron Man 3 yet, the spoiler warning still applies.

We have some plot details for Star Wars Episode 7, as well some details of a now scrapped script. Actor Peter Mayhew (AKA Chewbacca) has uploaded a stack of pictures from the classic trilogy and there’s a new publicity shot for Star Wars: Rebels that looks very close to that last one we got. We also have a somewhat disturbing storyline intended for the non-canon Star Wars Infinities that would have seen Leia fall to the Dark Side and well, we won’t say any more.

Yeeeee-haaaaaaa!

Gillian ‘Dana Scully’ Anderson is co-writing a sci-fi book series, a new female Transformer has been announced and we’ve a gallery of Game of Thrones based propaganda posters. Lastly, we have an awesome young Doctor Who fan, who decided to dress up as all 11 Doctors. I don’t care what the commenters say, I choose to believe that he did all that with no help from an adult. Why? Causeit’s more awesome that way and I want a world with more awesome in it.

Quote of the Week:

Dyson: Hey. Did you guys get anything yet?
Bo: A lecture from the vice principal and 27 invitations to the dance. One delivered in soliloquy.
Kenzi: How nice!
Bo: You?
Dyson: A fist bump. Kenz, you?
Kenzi: Well I was attacked by rabid Muffys, manhandled by Coach ‘Bitchy Butch’ and I got detention.
Bo: We are not getting far are we?
Kenzi: Teen angst. Our greatest foe.

Lost Girl – School’s Out

Cheers,

Gavin

A new beginning…

Hey folks,

So, I haven’t exactly updated things in a while, or at all. We’d like to say we’ve been off on glamorous adventures, but it’s more a combination of camping with the in laws, Motorhead’s latest album and the new Tomb Raider game that have kept me away. I also picked up the board game Lords of Waterdeep, but haven’t had the chance to play it yet. Soon…

Anyhow, given that this is the first proper post and all, I guess I should outline any plans I have for this humble thing. Basically, I want to continue the weekly news blog I was doing for the late, lamented and much missed SF channel, interspersed with freeform ramblings on whatever comes to mind.

The week’s top stories are!

An English town will be changing it’s name to Kings Landing for a week as part of a promotion for the Blu-Ray release of season 3 of Game of Thrones. As naming stunts go, it’s a lot better than the AFL player who was known as Whiskas for a week.
Sega have formally announced the next Alien game, Alien: Isolation. It’ll star Amanda Ripley, Ellen’s daughter and is reportedly focused on stealth and survival, with the player being stalked by a single alien. I’ll be behind the sofa cowering in fear OK?
Direct from the ‘Japan WTF?’ section: Disney Princess lingerie.
It had to happen – My Little Cthulhu Pony.
The world of wacky themed weddings took a post-apocalyptic turn with a Mad Max themed wedding taking place at the Weekend Wasteland festival in Southern California recently. Who was the celebrant? None other than the Ayatollah of Rock and Rolla himself, the Lord Humungous! Ask me there’s something wonderful about a ceremony that ends with the line ‘You may now ravage your man,’ but I’ve always been a hopeless romantic.

Moving to the rest of the news, there’s plans to open a HR Giger themed bar in the US (Based on the Giger Room in Switzerland) and a fascinating interview with Ron Friedman, writer of Transformers: The Movie and who tore the hearts of out the best part of my generation, THE UNFEELING BASTARD. (To be honest, the smelting pools inside Unicron scarred me more, though nothing has matched Judge Doom from Who Framed Roger Rabbit? for childhood trauma)

He wasn’t dead, but came back later as a zombie. No, I’m not kidding.

Trailer wise, we have ones for the live action version of the anime Kite, starring Samuel L Jackson, yet another trailer for Snowpiercer (Just release the original cut Weinstein!) and Donnie Yen’s new film Monkey King, an adaption of Journey to the West, or as I know it Monkey! There’s a new viral ad for the remake of Robocop, another trailer and some posters for The Lego Movie and the opening credits for Black Sails, the Starz network’s new pirate show. The fact that Bear McCreary is doing the soundtrack almost justifies the shows existence as far as I’m concerned.

You can watch the first 15 minutes of Helix, the new Ron Moore show, a clip from indie horror film Blood Glacier, Stan Lee introduces a short promo clip for Amazing Spider-Man 2 and the first part of an Argentinian Robotech fan film, Valkyrie Project, has been released. The first poster for the web series Street Fighter: Assassin’s Fist has surfaced, as has a clip from the new Powerpuff Girls special and a short piece from Justice League War.

In comics news, the big recent announcement was that Disney have given the license for Star Wars comics to Marvel, replacing Dark Horse Comics, who’ve had the license for the past 22 years. They’ll be getting one last hurrah though, with the four part finale for The Clone Wars being adapted to comics, titled Darth Maul: Son of Dathomir. Disney are also attempting to refine Star Wars canon, which in recent years has become dangerously overstuffed. Isn’t there one day when nothing happens in that galaxy?

No sir, I didn’t see you playing with your dolls again sir!

Word is that Lawrence Kasdan will be writing the Boba Fett spin off movie, the Marvel animated film Big Hero 6 has a new director and Kevin Smith has given an update on his next projects, saying Clerks 3 will be shooting in May. Gareth Roberts will be writing for the next season of Doctor Who, which began filming this week. Some on set pictures have leaked, showing the return of several old friends.

Anna Paquin has been cut from X-Men: Days of Future Past (Bryan Singer said it was one scene and should make the DVD) while Evan Jonigkeit (Who is, I believe, in the TV show Girls) will be playing a younger version of Toad, played by Ray Park in the first movie. The first official image from Guardians of the Galaxy has been released and it was finally confirmed that Vin Diesel is the voice of Groot. There’s some concept art of the Valkyrie that could have featured in Thor: The Dark World and Edgar Wright tweeted a curious image titled ’Homework.’ . Stan Lee is said to have a big role on the upcoming episode of Agents of SHIELD and while there’s been rumblings about Haley Atwell moving to the US for 6 months to start work on the Agent Carter series, it is just a rumour at this stage.

The next Marvel short film, to appear on the Blu-Ray of Thor: The Dark World, is called ‘All Hail the King.’ Now, we know that Ben Kingsley has shot something, possibly in his Iron Man 3 role or it could be related to [THOR THE DARK WORLD SPOILERS]. The film will be released in the US late February, so the wait won’t be too long. The rumours about an X-Men/Fantastic Four crossover movie have come up again and word is Robert Downey Jr wants to bring Mel Gibson and Jodie Foster into the Marvel universe. In all fairness, Gibson spent a long time championing Downey Jr when no-one would hire him, so I can’t blame Downey Jr for wanting to return the favour, but I’ve no idea who Gibson could play. (There’s an easy joke about him playing Hate-Monger, but I’m not going to make it)

I know more than a few people who’d pay to see that…

Over on the DC front, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson tweeted about a big meeting with Warner Brothers about a DC Comics project and the rumours about Wonder Woman’s origin in Batman vs Superman are ludicrous enough to be believable. They also make me want to BURN ALL THE THINGS ALL OF THE TIME, but I’m normally that way. Oh, and if you need another example of just how much DC is failing, there’s a letter they wrote in response to a young reader, which is a mighty fine example of corporate double speak in claiming their movies are outselling Marvels. Maybe if you put Wonder Woman on the screen before Marvel did a talking tree and Raccoon, you might be able to claim that…

We have a few details on the new show Sense8, which is being developed by J Michael Straczynski and the Wachowskis for Netflix, Danny Cannon (Judge Dredd) will direct the pilot of Gotham and the first couple of pictures from Guilermo Del Toro’s new series The Strain. Matt Reeves has been hired to direct the third Planet of the Apes movie and some leaked toy pictures have given us a look at the Dinobots of Transformers: Age of Extinction. Michael Bay, if you screw them up…

We end this week with video of what happens when you fire a super soaker of boiling water in sub-zero temperatures. Let’s just say don’t try that at home and I have an idea for an improvised weapon in the next zombie apocalypse game I play in.

Quote of the Week:
Rose: Who are you, then? Who’s that lot down there? [The Doctor ignores her] I said, who are they?!
The Doctor: They’re made of plastic. Living plastic creatures. They’re being controlled by a relay device on the roof. Which would be a great big problem if — [he pulls a bleeping bomb out of his coat] — I didn’t have this. So I’m gonna go upstairs and blow it up. And I might well die in the process. But don’t worry about me, no. You go home, go on! Go and have your lovely beans on toast. [suddenly serious] Don’t tell anyone about this, ‘cos if you do, you’ll get them killed. [closes the door, then opens it again] I’m the Doctor, by the way. What’s your name?
Rose: Rose.
The Doctor: Nice to meet you, Rose. [holds up the bomb, shaking it slightly while grinning.] Run for your life!
Doctor Who – Rose