Henchman Publishing

2:10AM - In the end, RC eagles swoop down and carry off the minis of Frodo and Sam...

ShaunCon at the KC Game Fair is well underway, and the assembled include miniatures gamers with some really impressive "Battle for Mordor" props. They even have a Mount Doom. I will dutifully keep an eye out for vinegar and baking soda.

My "next door dealer" is a table selling some very spiffy stained-glass dice. They also make d12 tealight lamps, but they sold out of those already. The table's proprietor assures me a website for their wares will be up soon, and I assured him I'd keep an eye out. He also guaranteed that each die would produce at least one roll, though subsequent attempts may vary depending on the outcome of the first.

Someone has made the case that we nerds are spoiled. Compared to geek life a few decades ago, the article states, we nerds have got it easy. The internet is one big fanzine, where shows are argued about and saved or canceled based on the tides of the geekosphere. Several statements are made that I do have to take issue with:

1. "If we can’t watch a show online within a day after it’s broadcast, we dismiss the network it’s on as out of touch." While I agree that bittorrent has made insta-TV out of just about any show that's within reach of a DVR and an internet connection, the behavior is hardly limited to geekdom. Lots of sporting events, talk radio programs, and media of every entertainment stripe hits The Pirate Bay after someone edits out the commercials. The networks themselves are starting to put their content up on the web for viewing less than 24 hours after broadcast as well, so I'd say this is just a symptom of changing delivery methods than something unique to the geek.

2. Incredibly creative people who could be doing amazing original work are stuck trying to figure out how to make “GI Joe” into a movie that will appeal to 18- to 30-year-olds, when the toys themselves are intended for 6- to 12-year-olds. They're also remaking films that are less than 30 years old, re-adapting Shakespeare to new settings, or making sequels to movies that really didn't need one, and those are outside of the realm of nerditude. Right now, the money backing these projects wants sure-fire winners, and that usually leads to reworking proven formulas and properties across the board. I just wind up scratching my head when a property is purchased and bears no resemblance to the original beyond the name (I'm thinking of stuff like "Underdog").

3. "I think it’s time for us, as true nerds, to relinquish some of our power. To let bad shows get cancelled without complaint and to quit obsessively searching for details about movies in development." I'm perfectly happy when bad shows get canceled. He seems to miss that more often, good shows get canceled. "Firefly," even if you hate it, was one of the most critically acclaimed works from Joss Whedon (perhaps leading to the "Dollhouse" campaign he notes earlier in his article), and it was taken off the air. So, too, was the live-action "The Tick," "Witchblade," "Babylon-5: Crusade" (love or hate B5, Gary Cole was awesome, and speaking of him...), "American Gothic," etc. I don't know too many shows that were kept on the air by nerd-force that were bad (aside from, and this is only my opinion, "Jericho"). But even if a show isn't one's cup of tea, if enough fans can convince a network to keep their show on the air, I think that's not entirely negative, especially when one looks at the history of classic TV programs that were allowed more than a handful of episodes to find their legs. I would add, however, that if enough of these shows see a groundswell of "support" with no resulting support of viewership or ticket purchases, the powers what is are less likely to listen in the future.

More "Under the Dome" news, in that Steven Speilberg is already looking to develop a TV series based on the book. Unless they plan on giving it a definitive beginning, middle, and end, it could get old quite quickly, unless they plan on altering how the story ends (or goes on, as the case may be). If it's on HBO or another cable channel that allows pretty much anything to happen, I'll be more intrigued... but still wondering why nobody's developing a "Dark Tower" series. :)

Back to the KC Game Fair for me, but for you, we have:

- I may have to sneak some of these onto the wife's Kitchen Aid. I wonder if she'd notice?
- She has noticed when I've creatively used a lawnmower to... ah... "landscape." However, I've got nothing on these guys.
- Now it's time for irresponsibility with motor vehicles in I Hate Traffic. Check your goals for each level, and I hope you enjoy "curling" a semi as much as I did.
- The internet, or parts of it, as compared to other vices.
- Okay, forget going to Mars, we need our own ring system!
- I'm obliged by law to post this next clip (with a small language warning, in regards to a reference of female anatomy above the waistline): the ballad of the Monster Manual.
- I'm also required to post this gag reel from the latest 'Star Trek' movie.
- And we finish with Ninjaglove: Defeat these minigames as quickly as you can to demonstrate your mastery of martial (time wasting) arts.

3:30AM - Meet me at the Fair...

The KC Game Fair starts tomorrow, and I've got a lot of loot to haul in for the Gamer Garage Sale as well as the charity auction. I'm not sure which venue of item distribution will get what, but among the treasures are several unopened action figures from "Star Trek: The Next Generation," an unopened but battered "Spawn Alley Playset," the boardgame "Dragon Strike," and a few packs of "Babylon-5" Micro Machines. Yes, our son's arrival means he's going to get new toys so all of these have to go. I'm looking forward to eventually housing a very large Lego collection, just as soon as they're not misinterpreted as food (and [language warning] Penny-Arcade had a very good point about another Lego product on this topic).

I'm about halfway through Stephen King's "Under the Dome," and we've hit more than a few standard King-isms: Everyone who has a computer owns a Mac Powerbook. A character mentions one of his movie adaptations ("It's just like The Mist!"). Psychic (or at least, telepathic) phenomena give the characters information to act on they otherwise wouldn't have. Characters too young to remember Def Leppard utter slang phrases and song lyrics that might have been current about 20 years ago (what skateboarding 13-year-old would say "video at 11"?). This isn't to say it's a bad story, by any stretch; So far, it's a decent page-turner, and what's driving the story's central event has yet to be revealed, so I'm still hooked.

Turning to graphic novels, for those, like me, who thought the pilot episode of "Global Frequency" should have gone on to series, take heart: it looks like it's going to the CW. I hope they get the same effects team as the one that works with "Supernatural." A lot of the effects needed for the stories (at least from the comic) will require some pretty creative thinking if they don't want to break the bank. For those who missed the original pilot, "this video has a few select clips, though it really doesn't deliver the scope of the concept. I will miss Michelle Forbes as Amanda Zero, though; she did an excellent job.

To restore balance in the universe, some evil entertainment news: I never played "Far Cry," and about all I know is that it was a decently reviewed first-person-shooter on or near a tropical island and the hero wears a Hawaiian shirt. I'm hoping the director of the movie based on it knows more than me, but that director "is Uwe Boll, and this is the trailer for the film. I think we need to make a deal: if Boll gets to keep working, then we get MST3K back on at least one standard-tier cable channel.

If pixelated entertainment is your bag, I have to endorse "Gratuitous Space Battles." It reminds me a lot of how me and my gaming pals used to play "Car Wars": You set a budget, armed your vehicles, and then tried to blow each other to kingdom come. That's basically the gist of "GSB," and it's great to watch. Huge, hulking ships laser the cookies out of each other, shields fall, not-so-serious banter between ships scrolls in the communications window, and ships end their service with most satisfying kabooms. I could watch it all day as a screen saver.

And to those still awaiting orders from our store (at least those whom the post office can deliver to), my new helpers have gotten everything ready to go, more supplies have arrived from the warehouse, and everything remaining will ship out tomorrow. While the elves get cracking on figuring out how to get postage to come out of our Dymo printer, we offer the following:

- This game, Bru is an interesting twist on Popcap's "Zuma" game. Knock at least three balls of the same color together to keep the board from becoming too crowded.
- Some guy compiled a list (though he grants it might not be definitive, as many sites had been lost) of the most popular MIDI music files on Geocities.
- If you're like me, and I know I am, you've seen a ton of sci-fi shows that try to guess what music will be like in the far-flung future (most of them kind of embarrassing, like "the band 'Andromeda' from "Buck Rogers"). Today, we have some actual examples of some new high-tech instruments.
- If you like those slingshot-based games where you get cash for upgrades by going the distance, then Fly, Squirrel, Fly may be what you've been looking for. It takes a while to build up a decent set of powerups, but it's still a decent descendant of "Nanaca Crash."
- Here's a new image blog that might crack a smile: Autocomplete Me shows a few of the rather odd results people have received when Google tries to guess what it is you're going to type.
- Someone invented a "laptop desk" that attaches to a car steering wheel. This invention is for sale, but be sure to click on the customer images (below the main product image).
- I found this interesting: A New York Times bestselling author posts about her income from one novel, which shows how tough the biz can be.
- Though not everyone's cup of tea, I kind of enjoyed Rave Rider. It's a variant of those "physics racing" games, where the goal is to keep the car upright through a side-scrolling obstacle course. Collect cash and powerups as you make your way through the various levels.

11:32PM - Of Doctors and Hawkmen...

The latest installment of Doctor Who, "The Waters of Mars," has aired on the BBC and... in other places, and it really exemplifies how strong characters can carry a show. It's kind of why I like Stephen King books most of the time: If I believe in the people the story is about, it doesn't matter how ludicrous their opposition is. And "The Waters of Mars" had a pretty lame monster, in my opinion, though not the lamest by far (I think that honor still goes to the Zygons and their hand-puppet Loch Ness monster). What really made me like this episode was Tennant and what his Doctor went through. We got to see him introspective, resolute, manic, reflective, and horrified at himself and what he's done. He's really bringing an interesting "close" to his version of the character, and his will be a very tough act to follow.

I don't watch "Smallville," but I think I need to start. I didn't watch it because I didn't dig "Lois and Clark" too much, and besides, I was certain (like a lot of shows I like) that it would get canceled if I started tuning in. Plus, I didn't think it could top "Superman, the Animated Series" for stories that better fit the character. The last live-action TV version of Supes I'd followed regularly was "The Adventures of Superboy," which probably set the character back a few years (though there were some bright spots. I thought the Johnny Casanova episode, where a romantically inept hunk drinks a formula and turns into an unattractive yet irresistible ladykiller had a humorous charm). They had two different actors play the "teen of steel," and the show was a pretty low point for the career of Michael J. Pollard as Mr. Mxyzptlk.

But back to Smallville: They're bringing in more of the DC Universe, which is clashing with the usual hazards of live-action comic book adaptation. They had The Wonder Twins appear last week, and now we're going to get Hawkman. What brings this to my attention is that he's going to be played by SG-1's Michael "Daniel Jackson" Shanks in a very faithful and therefore completely dippy-looking outfit. Hawkman is also one of those heroes that has a very confusing past, even discounting the retconning. There needs to be at least one winged hero in every comic book universe, and they're accepted because they look cool, not because they're effective. I mean, Superman types (the F.I.S.S. set for ps238) are a dime a dozen, but getting a dude with wings (even artificial ones) on your super-team is kind of like having a Klingon as a bridge officer; you get a little extra gravitas for the cast photo. But in a live action situation... I dunno. I would have hired Brian Blessed, myself, but mostly for the extras and cut footage that would show up on the DvD collection.

And I mentioned Stephen King in the opening 'graph, and so he appears again, announcing a new Dark Tower novel. Now, I loves me some King, but I'm among the first to list the things I didn't like about The Dark Tower series (most of "Song of Susannah," the way that Mordred was squandered as a character, the ultimate fate of Randal Flagg, etc.). I will say, however, that I liked the "Lord of the Rings through the heroes of a kid from the 50's" vibe it had. An author grows up on cowboy movies, pulp sci-fi/fantasy novels, and movies from the age of drive-ins, and he synthesizes it all into a seven plus volume epic. Even his self-insertion as a character isn't too overly done, more with some self-depricating navel-gazing than "Mary-Sue" behavior. But anyway, while I am glad to see more from that universe, I kind of wish he'd write perhaps the "final" journey to the Dark Tower as a story, but that might be asking too much, I guess...

The article also mentions developing a script for "Cell," which I think is one of his weakest stories, mostly because whoever told him how computers and viruses work either knew next to nothing or just wanted him to stop asking questions and leave the Best Buy he was hanging around in. Given all the tween-oriented supernatural stuff in the pipeline, I wouldn't mind seeing his short story, "Everything's Eventual" being worked into a series, perhaps for HBO.

In the meantime, I need to crack open his new novel, "Under the Dome," and offer up the following:

- We're coming to the end of a decade, so it's time to start up the best lists, this one for TV... though I have to say they've picked some durn good ones.
- Here's one for the Tetris fans: Drop 3. Maneuver shapes that mostly don't stack to eliminate groups of three.
- Here's a few things (seventy, in total) you may not have known about Marvel Comics. Like that Michael Jackson almost bought the company, once...
- In the same vein, I was unaware that Rocky Balboa was almost a member of GI Joe. A crossover with "Rambo" would have been interesting, especially if you pitted his bow against Rocky's boxing-glove GI Joe stick.
- Time for a puzzle game that reminds me a bit of "Lemmings": Meeblings. Use the powers of your various Meeblings to rescue the rest of your "tribe" on each level.
- The Nerdic Empire needs a king, for his throne has been made ready.
- Here's a list (with videos) of seven totally sweet enemy spaceships. I would have included the Shadows.
- Another list, this one from his Weirdness himself: The nine most underrated funny songs according to Weird Al.
- We wrap up with martial arts that looks a bit inspired by a certain Samurai named Jack: Forever Samurai has a nicely animated mouse-oriented hack-n-slash system that's very satisfying, with fluid animation and bonuses for not getting killed (beyond the benefit of not dying).

2:25AM - Just one more shirt design, coming soon...

"Star Trek" is currently one of the "evergreen" geeky-tee topics that everyone recognizes on sight, along with "Star Wars," "Super Mario," and C'thulhu. Hmm... I need to do another C'thluhu shirt soon, I think, just to keep up with the quota. Anyway, after reviewing the ELO and comedy-ridden musical ode, "Redshirts," I think I've finally figured out what purpose the disposable crimson-clad personnel serve in the procreation of our most vigorous genetic code. Anyway, it'll be available in the coming weeks, and I'll post a little notice when it materializes.

On to artifacts/relics, and a garage sale find: An original "Magic 8-Ball," complete with box. This was only a buck, so I couldn't pass it up. The packaging lists, among its many functions, "conversation piece" and "paperweight." What struck me was that it's not very round, tapering towards the base, and is kind of distorted. From what little I can find, this was common for the first-run balls. The bottom window looks to be made of glass, and the fluid level, sadly, is less than ideal. The fortune-die is also unreadable, appearing to be totally black. I don't think there's a way to restore it to its original future-guessing function (this page has a dissection of a modern 8-ball, and it seemed to provide quite the challenge), so I'll just have to enjoy the campy box graphics and let the coming years remain a mystery. Still, cool deal for a dollar.

Okay, I've been advised that "Dragon Age: Origins" is fun, awesome, and that I should stay the heck away if I want my life to continue. I have a friend that's actually playing "Champions Online" to prevent himself from playing "Dragon Age." A bit like quitting smoking by taking up heroin, but to each their own, I suppose. :) It does appear to have its fair share of bugs, including NPC heads enlarging, detaching and flying towards the viewer. I'm sure calls in to medication help lines has increased among players.

Not learning from "Tripping the Rift," SyFy is embarking into animation again, with Outer Space Astronauts. It looks, from the still, like a color version of those animated stings at the end of every "Battlestar Galactica" episode. Sci-fi, as a genre, is ripe for comedy, so I hope they pull it off in their initial 5-episode mission.

Speaking of sci-fi, there's a movie in theaters called "The Box." A great many fans of genre fiction were probably already quite familiar with the tale thanks to the "New Twilight Zone" episode, Button, Button" (here's part two). I'll don't know if the film does anything new or interesting with the concept, but the best flavor of the story I've seen is this hilarious clip. I think I know people like that...

Here's a sentence I never dreamed I'd read: "Murray says the warning was needed because students didn't heed his "reasonable request" to stop the meeping." Yes, students managed to disrupt class by forming a Facebook-fueled "Beaker Brigade," and generally making everything a bit more surreal.

So since we've segued into the surreal, here's the internet:

- A fan-film addition to "Doctor Horrible" has been made! It's a ten-part YouTube (or whichever service you pick from their page) festival of prequelity where our story takes a Horrible Turn.
- Fireworks + toy cars + slo-mo filming = every 10-year-old boy's dream clip.
- Here's a movie tie-in that seems so incredibly obvious that I have no rational explanation why it hasn't existed for years: Garden Jawas.
- Ninja Cat has returned, stalking his nemesis, the Black Feather.
- Any flaws in game mechanics are made up for by the fact that you're beating zombies into pulp: Zombie Exploder has you dragging either your fists or feet into the path of hungry zombies in an effort to pummel them back into motionless corpses (or parts of corpses, at any rate).
- Auto Tune has been a part of popular music for a while, and the "Know Your Meme" YouTube show has the history of the invention, accompanied by Prof. Weird Al Yankovic.
- Yo Ho Ho Cannon is a pretty cheesy pirate game, but I kind of liked the challenge of having to aim sequentially-firing cannons at one target...
- Here's a link to 15 questions asked in Google job interviews. I feel soooooo dumb now...
- Remember when computers in movies were futuristic? They had to create those graphics without the benefit of said future-machines.
- And we close with another game, Spectro Destroyer. Bounce your beam off of colored walls, changing its 'spectrum' to that of your final target.

11:53PM - I feel cheated out of several Earths, but I'll cope...

Other than the cumbersome name, the new Justice League animated movie, 'Crisis on Two Earths' looks pretty durn spiffy. It doesn't replace what I would have loved to see, which was allegedly canceled when "Justice League: Unlimited" was ended: A whole season covering "Crisis on Infinite Earths." But I'll take what I can get, even if it's only two measly Earths (grin).

This was unexpected: J.J. Abrams to tackle 'Micronauts.' If you don't remember this toy line, it was almost like someone mashed Lego with a line of sci-fi action figures. Every "Micronaut" set (consisting of one action figure and some accessories all the way up to huge vehicles with more parts than a car engine) could be taken apart and fit together with bits from other sets. In addition to having spring-loaded missile launchers, motorized robot parts, and more futuristic thingamabobs (both in opaque and translucent plastic), the toy line got enough of a following to get a Marvel comic that really enriched its background. Much like how they did for "ROM: Spaceknight," the writers created a pretty neat hidden universe (the "microverse," naturally) and even got a crossover with the X-Men. I'm no purist, and I couldn't even recount what most of the stories were about, but I just want the toys back... for my son... yeah, that's it... him...

And it's remake time again. On the block, "Clash of the Titans." This is the trailer for the new version. It looks like big, dumb fun, though I hope whoever composed it got a pay cut for resorting to the "[MOVIE TITLE NOUN] will [MOVIE TITLE VERB]" trope. I don't know why it bugs me so when I hear that "Stars will Trek" or that "James will Bond" or what have you. Anyway, given the music they picked, I find myself thinking it would be completely awesome to make the movie in the form of a heavy metal rock opera. But for those who may have somehow missed it, here's trailer for the original movie. Normally I'm mixed on remakes, but this one's pretty much fair game. The first had its charms, including Sir Lawrence Olivier as Zeus, but it was cheese. Yes, Ray Harryhausen was an amazing special effects pioneer, and I could watch his work all day (especially his skeletons from "Jason and the Argonauts"). But the film had a clockwork owl in it for comic relief. And looking at the effects on the new one, I can honestly say I'm glad the money didn't go to another "Mummy" sequel, and I count myself lucky. :)

We knew it was happening: Dollhouse is being canceled. I'm just hoping that hastens work on the Doctor Horrible sequel. And hey, comics! There's going to be a prequel funny book! I hope it comes with a CD or something...

In video gaming stuff, if you downloaded "Torchlight," you can now also get the level editor and see what other users have been doing with it. Also, more details are being released about the Bethesda vs. Interplay fight over a "Fallout" MMO. I think Bethesda is winning, but I'm not a law-talking-guy, so what do I know? And for those playing "Champions Online" or who just want to get some more nuts-and-bolts info about the game, they've launched Champedia, a kind of wiki-tabbed thing that lists player stats, mission spoilers, etc.

But enough of such frivolity. Here's frivolity that's entirely different:

- Ever wondered if you should have stayed to see past the credits of your favorite movie (or sat through the ones on a video game)? What's After the Credits is a handy wiki guide to all things apres "The End."
- Mankind's "signature litter," doomed to spend 100 to 1,000 years decomposing: Golf balls. I suspect that the 300,000 million lost every year must eventually contribute to increased plate tectonics.
- Modern day druids and those who can't afford a trip to across the Atlantic might find Clonehenge handy. Find your nearest Stonehenge replica.
- It's got some bugs, but Siege Master should fill any "Crush the Castle" addictions you might be nursing. It'll fire your catapult on the first mouse click for every level, so wait for the camera to pan back to your weapon before taking the first shot. Also, there's either a random wind mechanic or it's somewhat capricious on angle/power consistency (or I'm a bad shot, whichever).
- Strange things are afoot at the Circle-K. Many of the old buildings have been repurposed, and one person decided to photograph several of them. It put me in the mind of another franchise that fell on hard times, and I was glad to see I wasn't the only one who still remembers Nickerson Farms.
- NASA has a page debunking the 2012 doomsday thing. Suspiciously, they make no mention of John Cusack whatsoever...
- We end with a clever puzzle game, Wake the Box. Attach wooden shapes to other wooden bits on the playfield to set them in motion and wake (or knock off the screen) a sleeping boxman.

11:05PM - New t-shirts? And they're on SALE?

It's been a while, but I've been dutifully jotting down some tee ideas and finally finding some time to set them down on cloth. "Edward & Bela" sums up a lot of attitudes towards the current trends in vampire fiction. I forced myself to watch the movie. Really, the "sparkling" scene was one of the most dumbfounding visuals I've run across in the past ten years. I can only deal with the baseball game if I consider it to be a ham-fisted homage to the bowling scene in "Fright Night 2." But if I remember an interview with Stephenie Meyer correctly, she considers most horror movies "too icky," so I doubt she ever spent an evening on the couch with that particular bit of cinema. Anyhoo, that's my opinion, it's only one, and anyone is free to disagree. All are free to purchase a shirt anyway (grin). The other is a little ode to the thriving siege engine appreciation that appears to be sweeping the country. It's the original way to rock out, right? Anyway, Offworld Designs is having a sale until the end of December! Just type in the code "DOgooder" (no quotes, case sensitive) and get $5.00 off your order of $20.00 or more. Sparkling not included.

The road to fame and fortune is often an odd one, though I don't think I've seen one this odd. There's a Twitter feed I've enjoyed perusing, though I hesitated to post it here as the language used on it is most unladylike. However, since it's part of a larger story, consider yourself warned. Be warned it's also funny and apt to leap from your lips as you read it to roommates and co-workers. The feed is called (in edited form) "[Poop] my Dad says," and it's hysterical. Then I see it's going to be turned into a book... and then into a sitcom. That's right, a Twitter feed is going to become a TV show. A "twitcom," if you will. There have been worse ideas and thinner premises, but if a decent "grumpy old man" show comes out of it, I figure it could have been worse. Besides, I was under the sneaky suspicion that the feed was really from a mellow version of Alan Moore... :)

As everyone no doubt knows, I liked "Fallout 3." The makers of that game Another software company with a 'b' starting their name have has now come out with another RPG with first-person-shooter bits called "Dragon Age: Origins." I'm scared to touch this one, as Fallout sucked away more time than I'm comfortable thinking about, and it looks to have even more content. Plus it has Claudia Black doing voicework. And then there's a 'toolkit' that purports to allow users to create their own adventures. Has anyone braved this game yet and is able to report back? How all-consuming is this beast, and should mankind be wary?

I think I will have to buy the game "Gratuitous Space Battles" when it comes out, though. That one still looks like loads of fun, especially with a subwoofer. It's like a Michael Bay version of "Star Trek," but without his usual efforts towards storytelling. :)

While I avoid other distractions and finish recovering from my Ginger Ale Diet, here's some new stuff I've recently turned up:

- If "Bob the Angry Flower's Guide to the Apostrophe" is too rude, there's a more polite yet still graphically pleasing version.
- Also graphically appealing is this poem for those hapless doomed souls on 'Star Trek' entitled, 'Red Shirt blues.'
- I think we have a winner for next year's top video game tie-in to sneak into someone's luggage before they go through airport security.
- I only point to this "jumping brain" toy because it looks a lot like the 'Intellect Devourer' from AD&D. Also of note are these D&D Dice-headed toys.
- Monday was Carl Sagan's birthday. Here's a tribute to his work, with videos and images both deep and amusing.
- Mechanism 2 is similar to a game we had here previously called (I believe) "Splitter." Slice through bits of the playfield to get the glowing ball(s) to the goal.
- There are many "free" online games out there, but some have rather shady and underhanded methods of getting your money.
- Because this would make a cool premise for an Indiana Jones film, I direct your attention to a lost Persian Army, possibly one whose disappearance was chronicled by Herodotus.
- Speaking of ancient history (well, in rock years, anyway), a purportedly "lost" tape of unreleased Beatles songs (which sound an awful lot like mashups of solo projects and existing songs) is available for download.
- I'm a sucker for giant robots doing cool stuff (like invading places). So here's a film from (I think) Uruguay called Panic Attack which gives us a most compelling hulking metallic menace indeed.
- And because I'm also a sucker for bow-n-arrow games (though I wish more "Bowmaster" games would come out), here's B.C. Bow Contest. Shoot against other prehistoric opponents with a variety of arrows to claim a trophy.

1:17AM - Quarrantine in effect, chicken soup placed on stand-by...

Ugggghhhh. We're hoping that our household has been infected with only the 24-hour variety of "you might want to carry a bucket" virus. Thankfully, we've been able to endure via unconsciousness most of the day. We think we caught it from a wayward nephew, whose school informs us it's most likely something that'll keep us down for a day or so. In the meantime, I've discovered that I may need to invest in more comfy couches at some point. :)

But neither sickness nor sleet nor ion storm will keep me from my appointed blogging(eventually), so let's start off with Wil Wheaton sneaking into JJ Abrams' "Star Trek" movie. He did some voiceover work for one of the Romulans, which can be heard in this clip. I was also a little late to finding out about his role in "The Big Bang Theory," where one of the show's characters challenges him to and then plays against him in a Magic-like game.

Both TV series starting with "S" pleased me this week. "Supernatural" pulled out the tongue-in-cheek, trapping Winchester brothers in "TV Land." This could have been a disaster, but the actors and writers managed to make it quite fun. There was even an appearance of "Smeat," the Spam/Treet product that has made quite a number of appearances in other productions. The commercial for a "flare up" remedy was also a scream. In "Stargate: Universe," the show took an immediate up-tic the second someone claimed their name was "Philip Fry." Whoever is writing Eli's dialogue is doing a bang-up job. I'm not so sure about how the episode concluded (it seemed a little pat), but what concerns me is that the next episode appears to deal with time travel, which is almost always a bad sign.

"Flashforward" may have gotten to something the novel pointed out regarding the visions. Maybe. We'll see.

And the film "2012" is apparently going to continue on TV. This could be a solution to the "sequel problem" a lot of franchise seem to have. I mean, nothing's deader than being canceled on TV, right?

Lastly, we're coming up on the KC Game Fair, where not only will I be in attendance, I'll be selling off some of the geeky items I've collected over the years that are now taking up valuable person-space in our house. A lot of them are Star Trek: The Next Generation toys, including the shuttlecraft Goddard and the Transporter playset, among other things.

So while I go see if I can face a bowl of chicken broth, here's some items of potential interest:

- Because I love how MST3K will usually have someone call out "and we have a title" whenever a character in a movie says the name of the movie, I really dig this compilation of title utterances in films.
- Reminding me of all those old Sears toy catalogs from days of yore, here's a list of the most popular Christmas toys since 1960 to the present.
- "Red Storm" is a mech game along the lines of "Smash TV," with upgrades and explosions a-plenty.
- I wish this thing had been invented when I was working in an office with a community fridge.
- Will Smith and Columbia pictures are making a Risk movie. What could go wrong?
- Anyone out there writing a ghost story? Here are 10 consistent story elements to tales of the ectoplasmic.
- Activision hired a private investigator to take down a thief selling hot copies of 'Mondern Warfare 2' along with one of the buyers who wanted to make illegal copies for sale. Hmm... sounds like the plot of a video game, maybe? :)
- This game has a marvelously "hand made" look to it: How My Grandfather Won The War. Navigate your plane past obstacles, or "splat" them with paint to render them harmless.
- Lastly, a preview of Prep & Landing, one of the first new holiday specials I've seen since I wore footy-pajamas.

7:20PM - "V" v2.0

A quick note to everyone having trouble getting to my main site: I've got a trouble ticket in with one of the tech support dudes and he's taking a look at what the trouble could be. Hopefully it'll clear up soon, if it hasn't already. Thanks for your patience!

V was rebooted on Tuesday. While a decent update with some cool moments, it had some odd decisions, mostly in the early going. Like having pointless action (Tyler riding his motorcycle, dodging heavy traffic) while interesting stuff is already going on (like a freakin' spaceship flying over the city). They also used water as one of the reasons the Visitors came to Earth. There's abundant water in the solar system that isn't in a gravity well. I'm also not sure what mineral would be available on Earth that couldn't be found in the asteroid belt (though I could easily be mistaken). And true, it's a ruse, but you'd want a ruse that wouldn't raise alarm bells among scientists. What I didn't like outright was the first scene of someone spraypainting a red "V" was on a YouTube video of some pro-Visitor youths tagging a wall in support of "the V's." And the show lacked a creep-tastic theme like the first mini, though sacrificing theme tunes for more commercial time is the trend these days. Also, that original tune didn't survive the transition to a series, and an appropriately 80's-esque version was composed.

Mostly, though, the structure of the first program seemed designed to "hurry up and get to the bit where the resistance starts," which is where it got really interesting. If the show gets more coherent and less scattered after this, I'll probably enjoy it more. We're going to get four episodes at least, and if the ratings work out, we'll get more "V" in March.

Oh, and a "location 4400" was mentioned, a nice hat-tip to previous work by scriptwriter Scott Peters... who is now no longer helming the show and has been replaced with a producer from "Chuck."

Now a video game item that even non-video gamers might find intriguing: apparently, a game was released in Japan for the Wii, and it had a dismal opening, garnering only 100 sales in its first week. I predict that will change soon, as it's a game so off the wall, I think it will be purchased out of morbid curiosity. From what I can gather, you're a cat trying to pass initiation into a company run by another cat. This is what the trailer looks like, and there are several videos of gameplay which border on mind-boggling. I think we might be seeing the beginning of a legendary title, though perhaps not in the way intended by the creators.

"North 40" continues to do well among critics, scoring an "unequivocally one of the best horror comics in years" from Comixtreme dot com, and the guys from Tales from the Parents Basement were kind enough to let me yammer about it and other things over the phone at them. On the topic of horror writing, it looks like Stephen King is continuing to spend his retirement from writing as a writer, putting out a book called "Under the Dome." It even has a teaser trailer. Is it me, or do you think he got the idea after seeing "The Simpsons Movie?

There are worse places to get inspiration, I suppose, like:

- An interesting experiment in childhood culture: Four children list what they think the names of various Lego pieces are (scroll down for the chart). I just called most of them "that darn piece I can't find."
- I didn't realize that Scientology celebrated the winter holidays or that they had a gift catalog. Someone found it put it online for our shopping needs. I'm not sure I can think of a book set of any sort I'd plunk down 2 grand for, goatskin covers or no...
- After recently posting about the world's largest rubber band ball, I felt I had to offer equal time to the world's largest meatball.
- What with "Ghost Hunters" and other paranormal offerings becoming more common, the webcomic Wondermark gives us the proper plurals for most supernatural entities.
- Here's a cute puzzle game where you explore via clicking and dragging to give a bunny what it desires: Full Moon. To get started, click repeatedly on the rabbit.
- This is either awesome or disgusting, depending on the ingredients: Leftover Halloween Candy Pie.
- Most of these, however, are just plain awesome: New design concepts for teapots. I think Captain Picard's ready room would look spiffy with several of these.
- Here's a clip from the upcoming Doctor Who animated special, Dreamland. I sure hope the writing is good, because the animation looks very low-quality. I think I prefer the previous technique to this "Shrek on the cheap" look. This anime version ain't too shabby, either.
- Weird Al has written a tribute to 'The Trashmen,' the group that gave us the 1964 hit, "Surfin' Bird."
- I don't think I've ever posted a flash-based pinball game before, so here's Power Pinball. It gains extra cred from me because you can use the flippers to "hold" the ball, just like in real pinball.

11:12PM - Tell me of your homeworld, Usul...

It looks like we might be in for a remake of 'Dune' hitting our theaters sometime in the near future. Frank Herbert's novel has, I think, helped bring together the "big idea" sci-fi crowd with the "epic hero" aficionados, both in the Lynch film and the Sci-Fi/SighFie mini series. While I wouldn't put the David Lynch film forth as perfect by any means, I still prefer it to the miniseries for several reasons:

1. The movie's cast was better: From the Shaddam IV to the Shadout Mapes, the movie has the miniseries beat hands down. Sting is always going to be the greatest Feyd Rautha, and Dean Stockwell is a hard Dr. Yueh to top. You can't beat Patrick Stewart as Gurney Halleck, and any movie with Max Von Sydow in it automatically gets several awesome points from the get-go. Even the comparatively unknown Kyle MacLachlan's Paul Atreides bests Alec Newman's performance, who came off as "whiny" to me.
2. The movie's soundtrack was really good: I still can't believe the band that wrote Rosanna came up with the soundtrack which included Take My Hand, which played over the closing credits. And don't think we didn't notice the attempts at replicating the electric guitar riffs in your own prodution, miniseries...
3. The movie's sets and costumes were amazing: The Harkonnens were geniunely scary. You could almost smell the Baron. The nobles looked like decadent royalty (a look used to good effect by the Centauri in "Babylon-5"). The Spacing Guild Navigator was scary and fascinating to behold, and his retinue were pretty creepy as well. The miniseries, however, put Feyd in a toga with a triangle on a stick coming up out of his collar. Princess Irulan had that weird butterfly dress in the first episode, and the Baron looked like he came from a production of "Something Funny Happened on the way to the Forum."
4. The movie was often more true to the novel: Sure, they had to cut stuff, and the Weirding Way probably had to change from a martial art to a kind of zap-gun because they couldn't pull off Matrix-y "wire fu" to demonstrate a nigh-unbeatable fighting technique. In the mini, they had hours to play with, and they still either re-wrote stuff or cut key things out. It's been a long time since I suffered through the mini, but didn't Princess Irulan and Paul meet in the first episode (which doesn't happen until the end of the novel), followed by her exit with her Sardaukar bodyguards? For those who haven't read the novel, Sardaukar are basically intergalactic survivors of an "Escape From New York" type planet who are then turned into soldiers that you drop on planets inhabited by people you think are breathing too much and not bleeding enough. Having them guard a princess is probably about as wise as having my gaming buddies guard a pizza.

The mini also had lackluster effects at times that would have made Doctor Who producers blush (I think every scene involving the underside and loading ramp on any flying vehicle had the actors casting shadows on the "sky" behind them) and it didn't compel me to give it a second viewing like the film does. That's not to say the film doesn't have flaws. The movie has dated special effects (lots of bluescreen work is in evidence) and the bits it had to edit out from the novel can make it very confusing for those who haven't read the book. The original opening dialogue from Princess Irulan starts out well but flushes any sense of gravitas down the sandworm when she utters her "I forgot to tell you" line. A different opening was created for the extended version, but while it's a more complete look at the Dune-iverse, it probably confuses more people than it draws in. It also has illustrations that are a bit campy (though they remind me of science fiction novel dustjackets of yore).

So we're possibly going to get a third crack at the first novel. On a technical level, they should be able to make it look like a solid, huge universe, but I believe casting is going to be even more important. Believable performances by good thespians would make or break the effort, I think. And I really wouldn't mind if they went back and used H.R. Giger's original concept art for the '84 film (click the titles for larger versions) that was largely passed over.

Turning to other movies, a trailer for an upcoming game in the Alien vs. Predator (vs. Space Marines) franchise looks pretty durn fun. I got a taste of the last version of this first-person shooter the last go-round, but only enough to realize that (1) I stank at it and (2) I needed a computer that didn't make so much smoke and fire when I tried to run games on it. I'd love for there to be a "story" mode in it, but even if there isn't, it'll probably be more enjoyable (or at least make more sense) than the last few films. That's gotta hurt a few Hollywood egos, given the usual result when video games go to film. :)

Speaking of film franchises, Joss Whedon is allegedly offering a whole ten grand for the "Terminator" franchise. This should happen for a number of reasons:

1. It can't possibly get any worse.
2. Joss in charge most likely means more Summer Glau as a cybernetic killing machine, which I approve of.
3. Ah-nold, were he to return, might get some better dialogue (or, in the case of "Terminator 3," at least some new material that isn't a callback to every previous film in the series).
4. The resistance would have snappy conversations with each other as they fight in a cowardly valiant sort of way.
5. And finally, after all the monkeying with the timeline, John Connor will be erased from history, and the true savior of humanity will arise: Mal Reynolds, great-great-grandfather and namesake of a certain starship captain, who will use the machines' technology to begin the great migration off of Earth and into the 'verse. Shiny...*

* this is the closest I want to come to writing fanfic... though technically, if I do get work writing for established comic book characters, I would be doing fanfic, but for money, which makes it okay, right?

And now, a comic book follow-up: "Planetary" recently finished its 27-issue run, and for fans of the book, it was a long, long time coming. The blog, "The Post Game Show" has compiled a list of all of the things that have happened or started during "Planetary"'s rather irregular installments. Not that it's wasn't worth it, and I hope for more.

I think I've more than run off at the keyboard in an overly-geeky way, so I figure it's time to bring on the traditional dumping of the links:

- We start with some Halloween leftovers: A kid in an amazing Jareth costume, an idea for next year that could blow the minds of your targets, and if you want to mess with the minds of those coming to your house for candy, #6 on this list sounds like a winner.
- Here's a game I think those smarter than me will enjoy: Exploit. "Hack" into fictional computer systems using a puzzling array of packet routing/bending/stopping icons representing security obstacles.
- Black and WTF is a collection of odd black-and-white photos that make you wonder what their origins were. Nothing appeared to be a workplace hazard, but if anyone runs across anything unsavory, give us a shout.
- Reason #44586 why I love the internet: Big Ben's Twitter feed.
- So you think you know your fonts? Give Typewar a try and test your desktop publishing mettle.
- I'll give this the title I saw when I found it: 2 people, 1 guitar.
- This needs to be a screensaver: JavaScript Tetris on autopilot.
- From the "so evil it's cute" files, we bring you The Adventures of Little C'thulhu. Gather the kids around the computer; it's time they learned of the Elder Gods by way of "Hello Kitty."
- We close with mindless blowy-uppiness: Pyroblossom is a good ol' top-down scrolling shoot-em-up. Pilot your 'chopper with the arrow keys, blast everything, and get powerups.

11:48PM - Well, that just leaves me thor...

A Marvel Comics version of "Thor" is headed to our silver screens, but... Brian Blessed won't be Odin as some had hoped. I've got nothing against Anthony Hopkins, but how could they assume he'd make a better Norse deity than the man who played Vultan? They still appear to be assembling the cast, as a supposed casting call has surfaced for tall, non-bodybuilders who are comfortable wearing prosthetics. I think I just heard the employment rate among hard-core LARPers drop... :)

"Stargate: Universe" hit a bit of a stumbling block for me this week, in that the plot structure was very similar to that in the episode "Air." Something was needed, the ship got them to a planet that had it, but not without risk, etc. It may have furthered what could be an alien life form "character," if we see it again, but if not... well, I hope they get some more interesting stories out in coming installments.

"Supernatural" did a decent job with a non-apocalypse storyline, and I give them bonus points for not using the show's monster to "fix" a major character. Next week's installment looks to be another "goofy" installment, but as long as the writing stays snappy, I'll goof off with it while waiting for the devil and his minions to come back into the picture.

I'm still tossing some short story ideas at Marvel and seeing what sticks. They want them to be "evergreen" tales, ones outside of current continuity, which is kind of harder than it sounds. I've talked with a lot of other writers, and quite a few of them could give a rodent's nethers about continuity to a certain degree. M'self, I kind of dig that stuff, when a callback or an event is revisited. I see it as rewarding the reader for having been with the character for some time and it makes the previous story as well as the one I'm reading more "solid." Naturally, I'd want to avoid making the more recent tale depend on having read the previous one, but it's nice to drop in a detail or two ("Still smarting from when I dropped that whale on your death ray, villain?"). Anyway, if any fruit is borne, I'll post about it when I'm given the all-clear, and, if they let me, I might see if I can't put up some of the "rejected" ideas at some point.

In other comic news, the final pages of the first six-issue "North 40" arc have been inked and lettered; We're still keeping our tentacles crossed that there will be more, though with incredible reviews from places like 'Fangoria,' I'd say the chances are looking pretty good. :)

In honor of horrific fun, we start with some Halloween-themed items:

- You know those pop art pieces that look like blown up comic panels? Someone decided to turn that 'look' into a costume with striking results!
- A while back we linked to the new "Blood Energy Potion," made to look like an IV unit of blood. "Nerd Approved" did a taste test.
- There probably isn't enough time for this next project, unless you live in a warm climate, but making your own concrete tombstones could be a year-round hobby, right?
- I'm still pondering my much-delayed model train project, but I'm pretty sure it won't be nearly as insane as this ultra-tiny working model train layout that was built for a window display in another model train set! Scroll to the bottom of the page for the video of it in action.
- I've not tried "Google Wave," though I understand it's a combination of social media, chat, blog, forum, e-mail, and kitchen sink. Anyway, it's apparently useful for playing Dungeons & Dragons.
- I thought I'd seen all of the "funny" that could be created with the game "Grand Theft Auto IV," but someone had to come along and make a believable opening credits sequence for the game as if it were from 'Police Squad' or 'The Naked Gun,' though the airport part drags a little bit. A warning: It's not gory, though the police car does "thump" several people.
- A man has created the world's largest rubber-band ball. I only mention this because it reminded me of an epic Weird Al ballad.
- Here's a tricky puzzle game: Growbox. Click and drag the box over the gold dots to consume them and grow, but don't grow so large you can't get to every dot in the level.
- Here's a growing Flickr set entitled Stormtroopers 365. It'll eventually be a year's worth of amusing Stormtrooper snaps, and it started in April of this year.
- One of the proposed sequels to "TRON" was called "Rise of the Virals." A preliminary soundtrack (along with a little history of "TRON" as it headed towards sequel-dom) can be had here. Of special note is an interesting remix of Journey's "Any Way You Want It."
- We close with CCCPirates. Click and drag to point and power your cannon, then blast the treasure chests into the water to collect them. But don't let any canisters of toxic waste hit the water! Okay, you'd think most pirates wouldn't be so environmentally conscious, but a gaming theme only goes so far...

1:41AM - Avatars by Torchlight...

I bought my first game via "Steam" last week, as I wanted a more hands-on subject for my "Backwards Compatible" strip instead of poking fun at the industry in general. I got "Torchlight," which was the top release for the 27th of October, and for only 20 bucks it wasn't bad... for a Diablo clone. Admittedly, the devs are former Diablo developers, so it's no surprise. In a way, I'd call it a "re-imagining" of Diablo, with enough of the original's gameplay to make veterans happy but with the (and I love this term) Hanime-Barbera cartooniness that a lot of "the kids" like in games these days (and I include myself in that, sometimes). You can also go fishing, which seems to be a requirement in adventure games as of late. There's also going to be an MMO out in about a year and a half based on this game, though I'm not sure what's going to distinguish it from current offerings that would pull people away from other fantasy games.

But speaking of things that remind others of other things, i09.com thinks it might have spied where the inspiration for the movie "Avatar" might have come from. Leaving aside whether or not Cameron borrowed from this novel, the core idea isn't a new one anyway, and I'm thinking we're going to see even more of this as sci-fi movies become more mainstream. Much in the same way that large swaths of romantic movies are similar, I'm betting that we're going to see a lot more "classic" ideas on the silver screen that a lot of us have seen or read elsewhere. Science Fiction took on racism, religion, war, philosophy, and countless other topics that were considered box office poison, too expensive to film, or both. Now that CGI lets filmmakers do nearly anything, and with larger audiences ready to go see media featuring spaceships and lasers, they're going to mine just about every trope that's been done from pulp novels to "Star Trek: The Next Generation" umpteen times over. I don't completely begrudge them that, as I do appreciate when an old idea is done again, but better than the last time. Though I do hope they'll occasionally try something new; authors haven't been writing about the future for nothing, you know. :)

And the topic of authors brings me to Terry Pratchett's latest: Unseen Academicals. If you like Discworld, you'll like this novel. It's not completely new territory for Pratchett (covering the usual follies of racism, the journey of self-discovery, how people behave, etc.), though we do get to see wizards play football. That's this sort of football, not the one with the helmets (and before anyone says I'm being unkind to the NFL, I don't watch either version). Though as much as I enjoyed this latest installment, it was a reminder that we only have Mr. Pratchett for a limited time, and I thank him for the amounts he devotes to us.

Back to sci-fi for a second. If you haven't seen it yet, you might want to hunt down the movie, "Moon." The less said about it the better, and going in blind might make it more enjoyable, as it's hard to describe the plot without giving away major spoilers. I liked it, and I think it's worth checking out.

Until then, check these out:

- Because it so reminds me of what my mornings are like, here's 60 seconds of confused cats.
- Anyone out there in med school? I bet they haven't covered practicing medicine in a comic book universe, have they?
- "College Humor" is getting better at making original funnies, as evidenced in this send-up of Batman's habit of 'vanishing', or at least trying to...
- What's 'Babylon-5' scribe J. Michael Straczynski up to? Penning a script for Jerry Bruckheimer based on a 2005 video game called "Shattered Union" in which Washington DC gets nuked and the rest of the states fall into civil war.
- A game for the wordy typists: Clockwords has you typing words (any you like) to be fired at invading clockwork spiders, out to steal your invention ideas.
- Here's an interesting Hierarchy of Movie Monsters, with accompanying explanations of the rankings they receive.
- Rumor has it that Spider-Man 4 will have a returning character become a classic villain, to which I'd say it's about time.
- From the creator of the "Red Remover" puzzle game comes the holiday-themed Pumpkin Remover.
- Khan couldn't take Nimoy out of "Star Trek," but Nimoy himself might be removing himself from 'Fringe'.
- And finally, a little real-time strategy resource fun with Eridani. Colonize planets, build ships, defend your stuff!

1:54AM - Journalism at its finest... though I might be biased...

"North 40" got some major exposure last week, and I would have posted about it sooner, but I wanted to make sure the migrating servers had made it to their winter destinations before spreading the good news: "North 40" was featured on USA Today's new comics news section! I did a phone interview, from which the very capable John Geddes took what I babbled and made me sound all intelligent and stuff. He's trying to make the coverage of comic books and graphic novels as interesting and newsworthy as movies and books, which is a noble goal that I heartily endorse with a rather unavoidable amount of self-interest. :) Anyone who wants to bookmark their main page of comics scuttlebutt can do so here.

Speaking of comics, I picked up the last issues of the "Planetary" series, and I think it wrapped things up pretty well. I wouldn't mind seeing more "stories of the weird" with Mr. Snow and his companions. Ironically, for this industry, books like "Planetary," "The Authority," and "Top Ten" managed to take the "multiverse" model of having alternate universes pretty much next door and make them plausible, if not an unobtrusive part of the narrative. Other established universes (ones spawning major motion pictures) have to shoe-horn in the Alt-U idea as crossover events that seem tacked-on and predictable, much like the ones from "Star Trek: Voyager." That is, if you see Major Character #4 die, you know that was Alternate Major Character #4, or that an alternate will come along that's exactly like the original in every way except he isn't married, didn't lose his powers, isn't dying of a radioactive ingrown toenail, or whatever the plot needs to bring the character back to "standard" mode. So anyway, it was a decent wrap-up, I'll be buying the trade, and I'm still amazed my wife likes it so much (I figured it'd be a bit on the bloody side for her, but maybe she likes guys in white suits. Maybe I need to get a white suit).

"Champions Online" is still improving and evolving, adding "evergreen" missions for when you've run out of others to tackle (or the ones you can accept are a wee bit difficult until you can level up), and their Halloween event starts tomorrow, I believe. But best of all, someone has demonstrated that you can create Agatha Heterodyne with it! I tried making Carl Sagan, but they just don't have the right hairstyle available. That said, there are some features I think are lacking from the Champions game:

- No access to zone stats. Unless you're entering or exiting a "shard," you can't see how many people are in your instance with you. They also don't have those bragging-rights terminals like in CoH that says who has killed arrested the most of whatever kind of bad guy.
- If your character has a gorilla head, there are no hats for you to wear. I mean, really, who thought that apes wouldn't want to wear hats?
- Sword-carrying characters run like their sword is a banister rail fixed at about knee-height, giving them a weird lope-run when they're unsheathed.
- No boxing gloves are in the costume creator. I have never felt so sorry for a fellow gamer than when I saw an amazing rendition of "Strongbad," but without the boxing gloves.
- No "Batmobile" equivalent. I'd even accept the "Spider-Mobile," so long as I got to pick an appropriate theme song to blare from the radio as I tore across the landscape.

But enough about superheroes and on to post-apocalyptic car movies (nice segue, eh?): Mad Max 4 is getting made! I only vaguely remember my first viewings of the Mad Max films, and then there were my school days where even the teachers walked around humming "We Don't Need Another Hero" all the time. What has me interested in this movie is the halfway-decent car designs (scroll down) that look like something that should have been in "Fallout 3." I think this might be one film property that I'm willing to toss any love of plot out the window for, pretty much, so long as I get strange people in spikey outfits acting in scenes that I'll want to adapt rules from "Car Wars" for the following weekend.

From mindless entertainment we go to... well, it's not that big a switch:

- A video of a cat in the corner. I'm thinking hours of training must have gone into this unique toy-retrieving ability.
- Some cakey goodness sent to us by alert reader "klkeesler," who thought tasted delicious on the outside! Then there's another cake that I actually have the skills (and pan) to make: the Sarlaac Surprise.
- This has got to be the greatest papercraft castle to date. Any future contenders for the papercraft throne will have to top the inclusion of a ferris wheel.
- This is an odd exploration game, Small Worlds. Now that I've put up one that's poignant, I need to go find an explodey one for balance...
- I now know what I want in my back yard: A mile-long zipline.
- The Gun Game is a sort of "hold the line" game where you have to shoot targets multiple times using gravity and rebounds to efficiently dispatch the oncoming circular horde.
- Why? Why not? Here's a ferret dance cartoon. Hypnotic...
- As if Iceland losing McDonald's,/a> wasn't bad enough, their symphony was taken over by dark forces about halfway into a performance.
- This next link has a language warning on it (though I think it might be warranted, you be the judge), but it also contains photoshops of boardgame boxes that may more accurately describe the experience of playing them. Especially "Settlers of Catan."
- And we close with a puzzle game involving paintballs: Darkness: The Cage has invisible platform-puzzling levels that can be revealed through the judicious use of black pigment.

- Addendum: Hang on to your wallets. It looks like a Woot-Off is afoot.

12:35AM - Quantifying sugar rushes, among other things...

The Imperial Jack-O-Lantern image comes to us from fantasy pumpkins dot com, full of amazing carved produce that I couldn't hope to match even while channeling Leonardo Da Vinci and wielding the finest Roto-Zip money could buy.

Halloween means candy. It gets rated every year, from best to worst, and I often find the ratings a bit lacking in scope. this one, for example, seems to forget that as a kid (and as an adult, in some cases) the most important thing is "does this taste like sugar." I mean, "Smarties" are among the worst? Sure, it's chalk-discs, but it's part of a larger chalk family of sweets that includes Pez on the blander end of things up to the more palate-pleasing Sweet-Tarts and (for the daring) Shock-Tarts. I do have a few specific candies that I don't care for, but there also needs to be some things that are "candy experiences" in these lists. So here I go with more of a personal trick-or-treat goodie breakdown:

- No-name candy: This is usually among the least desirable, mostly from an aesthetic standpoint. Sure, we'll eat it, and if they're sourballs, that's even better. But mostly it's colored gel-like stuff in a plain cellophane wrapper lacking a brand name, cartoon characters, or anything else that would give it some cache in the playground candy-swapping market.
- Brach's every-kind-of candy: Brach's is a hair up from generic, and they only have themselves to blame. They make a ton of different candies, few of which ever rise to a recognizable level of "yum," as they're either copies of existing candy or copied by others.
- Candies that make you gag just thinking about them: Everyone has at least one they can think of. My own personal list of candies to be avoided are Circus Peanuts, anything licorice flavored, most things that are or appear to be made of colored wax, and chocolate flavored things that lack any actual chocolate (kind of like Tootsie-brand stuff or Oreos). One personal item for me that made me trick-up my treats, so to speak, on no less than three occasions is the "Zero" candy bar. My father tried to get me to like these things, and I don't know if I was just queasy at the time or if they genuinely are my DNA's answer to kryptonite, but those white-chocolate logs do not get the grand tour of my digestive tract for long.
- Candy you'd never heard of but turned out to be pretty tasty: For me, this came in the form of the Atkinson's Peanut Butter Bar. They're almost like a crispier version of a bit of peanut brittle, or like eating just the inside of a Butterfinger, if it had a little more structural integrity. I traded for all of these I could get.
- The Name Brand Stuff: This included pretty much all chocolates or other sugary items that came from Hershey, Willy Wonka, or anybody who had bothered to develop a logo. Even if you didn't like what it was, someone you knew did, and bargains could be struck.
- Gum: This is a bit of a mixed bag, especially if it comes in an exotic flavor (like "Blackjack"), has been sitting on a shelf for too long (becoming a jawbreaker that doesn't dissolve), or had a very trying summer ("Bubble Yum" went straight into the freezer, unless I felt like leaving half the gum stuck to the wrapper before I even chewed it). But this was also a premium commodity, having a semi-illicit status among schools and homes with strict ideas about dental health or things getting stuck in one's hair.

I only regret that games like "Magic: The Gathering" hadn't been invented when it was socially acceptable for me to request candy from stranger houses. If it had been, I'd have had a further category about which treats were best used as life points.

"Stargate: SGU" ended predictably for some of us, who had kind of figured out what the "solution" would be just from seeing the last five minutes of the previous episode (and having read loads of sci-fi or seen a few episodes of "Star Trek"). It did raise a bit of an alarm in that if they're going to make Dr. Rush at least a semi-villain, he probably needs to know something that the others don't. Just being a jerk for the sake of being a jerk isn't going to be too compelling a trait, especially for someone who's a genius. I'm hoping he's got some line on the ship's function or a place it'll visit or something that he hopes to benefit from at the cost of the others, rather than just being a curmudgeon for the sake of having a mustache-twirling object of audience distrust.

I usually don't post a lot about my software installations, but I just freed up some speed on my computer and thought I'd share a bit. I recently upgraded my MS Office suite from 2000 to 2007 (I tend to upgrade some software like I do my cars; never doing so until about a decade has passed, at least in computer-years). It ran VERY slowly, mostly when I would bring up a document or app after it had been minimized for a while. I found that the culprit was something called "Groove," which is a way for the Office suite to share documents across a network for collaborative projects. Following these instructions, Groove is no more, things open and close a LOT more quickly, and I'm sure I only discovered this now because I'm looking to upgrade to Windows 7, making this sort of thing moot. But the important thing is I learned a something that may come in handy when impressing people at parties... maybe.

And the site's servers are back! Yay! I've posted comics that were supposed to have gone up Wednesday as well as today, so we should be back to what resembles normal 'round here, and that includes stuff like:

- I think we've topped "Shoe-Megatron" for "most undesirable movie collectible available, especially for the money": Indiana Jones from 'Kingdom of the Crystal Skull', complete with the fridge for $175. I have a theory that some marketing departments think Google results equate to popularity.
- Stuck for where your story is supposed to go next? Use this handy chart of 3rd act plot twists.
- Halloween is coming, and so we can turn to the classic costume advice offered from the fifth season of MST3K. If you're like me, and I know I am, you'll also appreciate the appearance of a Joel-ism I shamelessly lift every chance I get.
- I've finally discovered a bluetooth handset I'd let my nephews use. It's also good for fans of certain internet memes, accompanied, of course, by an appropriate ringtone.
- Out of my love for classic cartoons, here's a guy who launches anvils with explosives. Conversely, here are some guys who don't quite have their technique down.
- Fly Me To The Moon is a game of geometry and rotational skill as you launch a mouse from theater-prop moon to theater-prop moon, collecting cheese. Just don't let the "closure" meter run out, or the show's over.
- More games, but sadly for PC only (or other platforms with appropriate emulators): Remedy Entertainment has re-released their addictive 1996 game Death Rally for free! Now if I could get someone to do the same to the goofy "Big Red Racing," life would be closer to perfect.
- While not an overly original game, I do love to close on blowin' stuff up, so here's Saucer Strike. Destroy buildings for points, energy, and unlockable weapons.

8:02PM - We apparently forgot to tip our Servers...

As far as I can tell, any difficulties with the home page (including me uploading new comics and so on) is due to a server migration with my webhost, and will (hopefully) be resolved soon. The second I can FTP to my folders again, I'll update all tardy comic strips/pages and what have you.

A note about an oddity I noticed about the shows I touched on in the previous post: It says something when you watch lots of TV involving ghosts, demons, aliens, and other threats to organic life, and the one that gives you the best jump-scare of the week is "House," during an autopsy. Odd, that.

I know I'm not going to see the next "Twilight" movie, but moving in the internet circles I do, I happened upon a clip of some teen wolves from the upcoming second film, "New Moon." Uttering some very banal dialogue, they appear to make the case that today's teens aren't doing extacy, they're doing steroids. So without the benefit of the books or more footage, let me see if this clip tells me something about these wolves. In the transformation sequences, their clothes explode in a cloud of screams of elation from the audience lycanthropy. Given that the three wolf-punks Bela accosts (and slaps. What happened to animal-like reflexes?) have only shirts on, do we assume they've been only transmorphing from the waist up, or that they just walk around like that to increase the target demographic profits because it's hot steamy due to unusual weather with above-average temperatures? Or perhaps they have a more advanced form of "Hulk" pants that not only stretch when transforming, but re-form after being rent asunder. I believe I might be thinking about this more than the screenwriter and director did. I can distract myself by contemplating how much money they're going to make and what that's going to do to monster movies for the next decade, not to mention alcohol consumption amongst us old codgers talking about how real vampires behaved back in the good old days. Maybe I can change the way studios are altering horror legends if I sent them things like this handy 'If I Ever Become a Vampire' list. Maybe...

Or I could destroy all time for such worries and finally get on Facebook. I've been complained to by people that there are many thousands of Aaron Williamses in Kansas City, but I'm not one of them. Well, in 2010, I might finally have a reason to sign up: Civilization, the video game, is coming, which makes the time spent there worthwhile, right? I mean, nobody ever accused a centurion for wasting his productivity when they were sacking a city-state, did they? And dibs on Leonardo's Library.

Speaking of video games and the art behind them, here's a 5-page look at 'Epic Mickey' and how they're handling the character design and animation. They even do a bit on how Mickey's ears maintain their position on his head, no matter where his face is pointing. I think I'd buy this even if using the Wii caused me physical pain; the concept art is just too groovy.

So while we wait for the servers to get their act together and come back to us, here's a bit of the ol' bookmark bin:

- While we don't have new "Doctor Horrible," we do have new Goblin Bloggin'.
- Where was this for 24 hour comics day? Marvel has released an online comic creator. I might have to try this out soon...
- Just when I thought they'd thought of every way they could to light up a pumpkin in an appropriate fashion, someone thought of a new one. So when will we get the pirate cutlass?
- And speaking of lights, the last time I saw this it was just a production concept, but it looks like the 'Alien Abduction Lamp' is finally for sale... though it's pretty pricey. Maybe it'll be on a future Woot-off.
- Another pretty good science-autotune song starring Carl Sagan has arisen: 'We Are All Connected.' The link contains an embedded YouTube video as well as mp3 download. It's no 'Glorious Dawn', but it's got Phil Nye, so that's a plus. Now where's Beakman?
- It's kind of like someone took "Dungeon Siege" and combined it with an evil version of "Lemmings" and produced Trap Master. Pick a monster to play with and defend your "doom chest" from invading adventurers. Upgrade your dungeon with death dealing devices as you progress.
- I have seen the future, and it is the Microsoft Surface Table loaded with a touch-screen D&D game installed. But it will only work if able to survive a soda spill of at least 52 ounces and about a pound of Chee-to dust in the fans.
- We wrap up with a game called Obechi. You click and hold to generate "rings" to encompass and grab moving dots on the playfield, trying to meet the requirements of each level. Like so many things, it starts out easy...

10:39PM - Books of Fail, Power, and more!

Firstly, thanks for all the well-wishes from everyone! I'll be replying/posting on 'em as soon as we get everyone settled tomorrow!

"Full Frontal Nerdity: The Big Book of Epic Fail" entered its second printing, and with that came the opportunity to correct a few errors. However, I thought that would detract from making the title even more appropriate, so I kept every one. I did decide to let the guys comment on it in their usual, sensitive manner, so here is a PDF of the "new" pages, downloadable, printable, and instertable into the now-collectible first printing version! The second one, so far as we can tell, is incredibly error-free, though I don't discount the possibility that by saying that, every page in every copy has just transmogrified into the tax code for Narnia (written in Latin, of course). But it's fun to tempt fate, right? :)

That also means that the new ps238 volume is up for sale, as are the issues we had for sale over DragonCon. I thank everyone for bearing with me, as even though I've been working to get our house more "efficient" in some manner, I seem to have underestimated how much wiring, hauling to curbs, and remembering unfortunate garage sale purchases would be involved.

Now, we come to bad dialogue. It plagues many a TV show. Last week, it plagued "Fringe." The plot was so-so, and the weirdest "spooky" thing for me was Agent Dunham's "jumble" puzzle, but what stuck out was Peter's words near the end. Without spoiling it, the show was about dreams, sleep, etc. Using phrases like "the dream became a nightmare, one he couldn't wake up from" and so on makes me wonder if they're pulling lines from the shoebox marked "David Caruso sunglasses quips" to fill space. "Spooky" and "goofy" can work together, but "lame" needs to be shown the door.

The other shows I had time to catch via the interweb on my laptop between naps on a hospital room couch included:
- Supernatural: A well done show that pulled some "interesting" out of what started as decent horror farce. But am I getting old, or would most people not even blink to meet "FBI Agents Page and Plant?"
- Flashforward: Still staying intriguing. I'm waiting for a revelation from the book to arise, but I'm guessing they're saving that for later (if at all), as it would throw the premise everyone is running with into question.
- Stargate Universe,: Another good installment. I could do with less of the "beauty and the geek" subplots, but nerd-boy still manages to remain less annoying than I'd feared. Also, kudos for keeping the "reality show confessional" videos nice and short. I'm not too sure the cliffhanger of the episode is indeed a cliffhanger, if the first two-parter is any indication of how the ship behaves. Next week will tell, I presume...

Now I must prepare to bring home the wife and new addition on the morrow, which means wrasslin' with a car seat (someday I need to post my theory that nearly all modern things designed for new family members owe their existences to "Transformers" toys), so over to our Breaking Links desk for:

- If only they'd had these Hello Kitty anatomy toys when my sister was into Sanrio products, she could be making big bucks as a heart specialist today.
- It's a gravity puzzle game with a twist (in the form of a cloud that wants to destroy your oranges): Cover Orange has you placing pieces that have to survive a storm of spiky death to protect your hapless citrus!
- Here are a pair of links about "Rock, Paper, Scissors." First, a very weird commercial starring the combatants, and (language warning) Demetri Martin on why the game makes no sense.
- Surprise, Michael Bay didn't start Transformers 2 with a script.
- Wow. Here's a post-impressionist-style cake I'd give my right ear for. Yes, my high school art teacher is no doubt writing me a terse letter at this very moment...
- I remember a lot of the weird tail-end "Transformers" style toys (the old "Rock Lords" leaps to mind), but in this day and age who would think we'd shell out almost $200 for a Megatron toy that transforms into a shoe?
- Not to panic anyone, but it seems that the Chinese made a black hole in a laboratory. I think "black hole" is used loosely here, but yay for possible solar powered stuff.
- It's only a demo (and the full version is about 20 bucks), but here's a look at Machinarium, a gorgeous game from the same guy who made the classic "Samorost" games.
- By the way, it's so well-predicted that I'm assuming it's a spoiler for nobody, but it looks like Captain America will be back in "Avengers: Siege."
- And let's close with another point-n-click of the heartwarming variety, Colour My World is a pencil drawing-ish game where you try to help the protagonist stickman find his true love. Sentimental piano included free.

10:03PM - Project: Wargames Reference is over! Or has just begun...

Joshua Williams has been booted up and appears to be running properly; installation of his operating system and applications are expected to begin immediately. He was born at 4:09am Saturday, probably much to his annoyance. Both he and his mother are resting comfortably, both coping with their new lots in life: Cristi, finding a new center of gravity and the uncanny ability to see her toes, and Joshua, no longer being in what he probably mistook for a very low-content "Matrix" pod. Anyway, everyone should be home early next week, any outstanding shipping mistakes from the store will be sorted, and a new person I'm actually paying will be put in charge of getting stuff out on a more regular basis... and new books will finally go up for sale!

This also means any news about nerd TV and what have you will probably have to keep until Monday. But I can relate a few things from this experience I found interesting beyond the usual baby-gushing stuff which has ruined many a blog:

1. If some place in a hospital is hard to find due to incorrect signage, it may not be due to incompetence, but by design as a security measure.
2. Hot cocoa is never a good idea to have around someone who hasn't eaten in 24 hours. Drinking it in front of them is really just asking for some kind of traumatic experience.
3. If you order a new camera for an event you think is 3 weeks away, that event will take place three days later.
4. Telling someone who has an automatic blood pressure cuff on that death-grips their arm every half hour that it's "just giving your arm a hug" is about as bad as item #2, above.
5. Nurses are great. Nurses who you give boxes of chocolates to are awesome.
6. There appears to be no socially appropriate way to tell the dark-haired doctor who's briefing you on what to expect over the next day or so that he's got a piece of white fuzz by his right ear; you just have to deal with it and hope he finds it on his own.
7. Sleeping in a room with a sonar-based gizmo letting you hear a heartbeat might make you dream that you're riding a bicycle with a flat tire.
8. Trying to relate to a Doctor Chandra who has never seen or read "2001: A Space Odyssey" is a lot more awkward than I thought it would be.

So that's where we are baby-wise at the moment. Relatives are headed this way, the house is a disaster area (though less of one, thanks to efforts of a self-admitted OCD suffering friend), and I'm up to the ol' eyeballs in deadlines. In other words, not a lot has changed. :)

But you didn't think I'd neglect finding oddball things, did you?

- Though it's only a work of art, how long before someone makes a working version of this, allowing them to be the first to twitter from their own deck?
- Sam Raimi is gearing up to do "Spider-Man 4," realizing that too many villains can ruin a movie. Apparently, he hadn't seen any of the Batman films after Michael Keaton and before Christian Bale.
- "Auto-Tune the News" has produced its ninth music video, which is notable for a more ambitious song-and-dance production style and what appears to be Hugo Chavez playing air guitar for some reason.
- I can't believe I hadn't run across this sort of fan-film earlier, but Doctor Who: Alternate Empire is a pretty decent production.
- One man's dislike of Star Trek, and most other sci-fi. He has a decently well-considered reason, so it's not just blind rage, and it's something I find myself criticizing in a lot of genre TV.
- We close with a cathartic game where you smash cars into piles of other cars. Pick a launch vehicle, adjust the ramp, and let 'er rip.

10:38PM - No actual sperm whales were harmed for science...

NASA brought a little bit of Douglas Adams to its latest mission to the moon, as the probe destined to impact the surface Twittered some rather famous thoughts that went through the mind of a blue whale called into being by an Infinite Improbability Drive. For those not familiar with the scene, here's a rather good video version set to the original BBC radio broadcast clip.

And there are rumblings that a Dirk Gently TV series might someday come from the Beeb, though these things take time. Also, I'd really want them to get it right, not so much to faithfully capture the books, but to get that same sense of humor that was present in the Hitchhiker's Guide miniseries that seemed (to me, anyway) to be absent in parts of the movie. Getting Neil Gaiman on board as some kind of consultant for the Norse Gods might not be a bad idea, either.

More from across the pond that looks bloody interesting: Simon Pegg and David Tennant are making a film called "Burke and Hare," based on the murderers and body-snatchers. It's a story that's been told in film before, but with these two actors, I'm hoping for some good "graveside" humor. It'll certainly be interesting seeing "The Doctor" and "Shaun of the Dead" on the side of creating corpses rather than trying to prevent them.

From the "deals other than a Woot-off" file comes "The World of Goo" on sale for whatever you want to pay for it. Cristi got addicted to this game the second she saw the demo, and I must admit to a Goo-shaped monkey on my back that sometimes needs satisfying, myself. It comes on multiple platforms and consoles, is a puzzle game, and doesn't require any motion-sickness meds to play it (a plus if you're using a big-screen TV).

And I must bow to a greater level of geekdom when it comes to reviewing episodes of "House" than I could ever achieve. Here's a review of last week's episode, 'Instant Karma'. The best I can do is look at shows for plot holes or sci-fi tropes that are sillier than usual. This guy is an actual GP and knows enough to figure out where some medical technobabble or hokum is going on (in the same manner we might have a problem with rigging a food replicator to a dilithium bomb to produce an explosion that covers the Klingon home world with ice cream). Still, the point of the show is to enjoy the wonder that is Hugh Laurie (and when is Stephen Fry going to guest star, anyway?).

While I gear up for some probably big news on Friday, if not Monday, can I tempt you with these?

- From the "is it baloney or not" file comes possible news that Kellogg's may laser-etch its logo into its Corn Flakes. I'm doubtful, or we would have seen this in "Blade Runner," next to the serial-numbered snake scales, right?
- To anyone who saw the original "V," this is pretty darn funny.
- Originally, I was just going to link to the magnificent TARDIS cake this page has, but the whole site is loaded with darn cool stuff.
- One of the most recent "Simon's Cat" cartoons featured a cat versus a fly. The 'toon in question was apparently based on a true story.
- The graphics aren't great, I died a lot, and it's very difficult to control, but I found a half hour had disappeared while I tried to play Momentum Master. Swing your spider with enough "oomph" to get him past the right-hand side of the screen.
- You know that artificial muscle stuff that "Mechwarrior" technology is based on? Yeah, we're getting there.
- We've all heard the instrumental "Popcorn," but have you heard what it would have been like if it were composed in days of old when knights were bold?
- If Classic Videogames had Achievements. I'm posting this mostly because my wife is a black-belt master of "Oregon Trail."
- This has the odor of a viral something-or-other, or an escaped SCP, but it still begs the question, have you dreamed this man?
- Finally, here's a very odd game, Must Eat Birds. Use a slingshot to fire your bird-eating sphere at parachuting feathered fowl.

10:34PM - Dare we hope the forecast calls for "it's cold outside, there's no kind of atmosphere?"

"Red Dwarf" might be gearing up for a tenth season. While I wouldn't rank "Back to Earth" as being among their best episodes, I wouldn't put the miniseries among their worst. Looking back at its history, what (in my opinion, which may or may not be those of this station or affiliates) would make another season of "Red Dwarf" good?

1. Keep it set 3 million years in the future. The isolation was part of what made Red Dwarf compelling. Finding the remains of humanity's legacy in the galaxy was half the fun. If the scripts must have other characters from the past involved, bring them to "the present" rather than the RD crew traveling back in time.

2. Get a "big" sci-fi idea, if not several. Luck viruses, time-manipulating judgmental robots, questioning whether or not your life is really a video game, etc. Tackling tropes from sci-fi and giving them a touch of "Douglas Adams" was what I liked most about the series. The 10th season needs a goal (say, trying to find a black monolith so Lister can touch it and solve a riddle on the door of an ancient tomb containing a terraforming device that can create a "backup copy" of the Earth) for the guys to pursue while they tackle lesser threats to their lives.

3. Keep the cast small, with no permanent authority figures. I didn't care for the revival of Captain Hollister, as it reduced our "heroes" to UK versions of Gomer Pyle. I'm torn on whether or not we should have Christine Kochanski as a cast regular; she works as a love interest and single goal for Lister, but not so much as a comedic foil.

4. Holly. I don't care which at this point. There needs to be a ship's computer, especially for the opening intro. One with the I.Q. of 6,000 P.E. teachers.

5. The toaster. The "Battlestar Galactica" jokes alone could fill an entire episode.

But I'm not being asked to write for the show, so I'll take what I can get, when and if it comes. I am, however, throwing a few pitches towards Marvel. This is nothing along the scale of "North 40," mind you, but more like what I did in "Spider-Man Unlimited" #13; shorter "evergreen" ideas involving the primary characters. I've already got an idear noodling around for a way that vigilante heroes could "train" and have an unofficial blessing of the powers that be in New York...

And I might have to re-submit that "Symbiote Satisfaction Survey" idea I had a while back. It's pretty much "Spider-Man Meets Red Dwarf," so why not? :)

Sadly, I've been neglecting "Heroes" the past few weeks, which is too bad. If the story starts to hurt my brainmeats, I go over to Toplessrobot.com's "live blog" of the show, which reads like an IRC version of Mystery Science Theater 3000. I've heard it's better, but having difficulty pulling itself out of the mess it made in previous episodes. I'll try to catch up, but childbirthing classes are eating up the Monday nights. :)

So while I help Cristi practice her breathing and figure out how to stream live video from her room (for the nephews; they're not allowing anyone in to visit who's under 18 due to H1N1 concerns), here's something we hope you'll really like:

- In all the hubub over what's-his-name winning the Peace Prize, I forgot to check who won the Ig Nobel prizes! Now I have to sit back and wait for Thanksgiving to listen to the ceremony on NPR's "Science Friday."
- This next site isn't what you think. Aside from some very suggestive language (kids and workplace computers might want to steer clear), RITPorn.com has the filthiest (server) racks on the net. If your idea of a "group activity" is a photo of every handheld phone and game system you have in a nicely arranged pile, this is the hot 'n' heavy site for you.
- "Time" Magazine reports that the ninja nuisance can no longer be ignored. I would ask if it's being ignored, or if it's hiding in the moonlight shadows...
- Caps is a puzzle game reminiscent of all of those wooden peg-jump puzzles they used to sell in roadside tourist traps that your parents let you frustrate yourself with in the back of the station wagon.
- Even if you don't play "Team Fortress 2," you have to admit this is pretty clever. They've made a mod for the game where one team hides from the other by becoming bits of scenery.
- This Dark Knight vs. Blade trailer mash-up makes me want to see a fusion of both movies this weekend, even if I have to purchase overpriced eats from the concession stand.
- This is one small step for plane-mounted lasers, and one giant leap towards me having a phaser bank on my Honda.
- Now here's a puzzler that will either be a snap or about as intuitive as most of the "Infocom" games of our misspent youths: Take Something Literally presents you with kind of logic puzzles to solve in unusual or "out of the box" ways.
- And in case you'd rather platform-game, here's Cave Chaos, where the play area is created and destroyed as you try to make it to the finish line.

9:43PM

"Supernatural" needs to give their writers a raise. They're managing to do some of the goofiest and funniest things I've seen in genre TV without making their show, itself, a joke. When a show can have people attacked by the phantoms of Abraham Lincoln and Gandhi with a guest appearance by a young lady most famous for appearing in night-vision and still keep me watching... I just have to sit in wonder. And the scenes from the rest of the season look to have some pretty imaginative things in store, a great many of them of the "zany" variety, and... for some reason it doesn't bug me. Either they've perfected subliminal messages or they're managing to do as the writers on "SG-1" often did, delivering laughs by poking fun at themselves without crossing the line.

And speaking of Stargates, "SG:U" continued on a strong note, if not an intriguing one (especially the last scene). It's definitely of a different breed than its predecessors, taking elements from the Galactica reboot as well as "modern" genre TV. Gone are the orchestral movie-style soundtracks, replaced with semi-pop songs over montages of the characters doing something tangentially related to the lyrics. The cinematography seems different as well, favoring odd camera angles (through a lot of legs in one part) and other camerawork that makes the original Stargate show seem more static. Anyway, we got some decent character development, a believable way to communicate with Earth, and, amazingly, a nerd character who was only mildly irritating and somewhat amusing at points.

One quibble: Their "solution" to beating the clock. Either this is a different model Stargate, or there's a Goa'uld from the SG-1 series that would like the back of his skull (not to mention half of his symbiote) returned.

On to "Flashforward": I'm adding this to regular viewing. The apparent cause and aftermath of the titular event has now diverged radically from the novel. The book's flash was caused by an experiment at CERN coupled with a neutrino phenomenon, the flashes only happened twice, and they didn't involve any dead crows or weird places in Africa. So color me curious, and I'll be sticking around until at least we figure out what that place is the boy in the final scene saw.

And "Fringe" is moving at an oddly brisk pace. I say "oddly" because they've done away with the usual "you have to believe me" trope that plagued shows (good shows, mind you) like "The X-Files." I also thought I wasn't going to like the shapeshifting assassin. I was wrong. They gave the guy/whatever a story and it's looking creepily grim (though I was rather hoping he was a different dimension's life form, rather than a construct). Also: Mercury Slurpee.

And now your preparation for (hopefully) a three-day weekend:

- What is "Scribbletalk?" I think it's a new YouTube series. Why should we care? They snagged Weird Al Yankovic as their first guest. Well done, "Scribbletalk."
- Some "bullet time," but in real life: Bullet impacts at 1 million frames per second! The best YouTube comment: "So this is what ninjas and Chuck Norris see."
- I think I posted a prototype version of this game before (I recall jumping with a fireball-wand), but this new one is decently fun: Hey, Wizard! Quest for the Magic Mojo is a nicely-styled platform-quest game. Just don't lose your hat!
- If you ever wanted to wear Eau De Hellboy, Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab is waiting to take your order.
- This may be the largest currently living dog. I do not envy the person cleaning up the yard in that house.
- Who wouldn't want a Steampunk wedding cake? Of course, you'd need a steam-powered limo for after the ceremony (or a locomotive, if you can afford to lay the track).
- An inspiring place if Stephen King wanted to write "Christine II": A hauntingly beautiful car graveyard.
- Who knew there were 866 palendromes? I didn't see any about Bolton or Notlob, though.
- And we close with an interesting (yet probably disturbing) flash game called Gibbets. Use your bow and arrow to release the hanged people before it's too late. Unfortunately, they are prone to accidents resulting from poor aim, and even when released, they don't make "happy" noises when they drop...

7:59PM - More on that "Epic Disney" game - Obscure characters are the villains!

According to the news leaking out about the upcoming "Epic Mickey" Disney game, obscure and nigh-forgotten characters are going to be the villains in this piece. "Oswald the Rabbit" is apparently responsible for the black ink-stuff seen all over the landscape on the supposed cover art for the box. This opens up a whole realm of possibilities for the game's adversaries, especially if we grew up on some of the characters that are almost unknown to the younger generations. I have a few suggestions for some that might be interesting, though "obscure" is debatable, and I'm omitting characters that were already villains, even though they, too, may be in the "obscure" camp.

1. Elliot, aka "Pete's Dragon": One of many classic animation and live-action combo movies, "Pete's Dragon" was a film I saw many times in many venues (our local library had a projector they used outdoors in the summer, throwing the movies up on a nearby white garage). Turning this drake to "the Dark Side" would probably be good for him, giving him a little street cred among other invisible friends to children. And he might find out how tasty all of those kids would have been.
2. Mary Poppins: I don't know if Disney owns the rights to the likeness of Julie Andrews as portrayed in Mary Poppins, but as has been shown before, Mary can be downright sinister in the right light.
3. The animated cast of Mary Poppins: That British band from "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocius" could snap and decide to dispense "a little of the ol' ultra-violence," and those penguin waiters were made for video games as they have a built in "trip" attack.
4. The not-Goofy Goofys: All of those "everyman" Goofys we mentioned last week would make a decent mook army.
5. Just about anyone from the TV show "Raw Toonage": Bonkers D. Bobcat, Fawn Deer, etc. I'd even like to see Badly Animated Man show up, though he'd most likely be an Easter Egg or tutorial villain.
6. The entire cast of "Oliver and Company": It's not like they're household names (outside of the original play), and besides, Billy Joel could probably use the paycheck.
7. Ludwig Von Drake: Every army of evil needs a scientist with an accent, and I'm sure after all of those educational films, he's just begging to build a death ray.
8. Any actor who was in a Disney live-action film in the sixties and seventies: This includes Buddy Hackett, Annette Funicello, Dean Jones, Don Knotts, Kurt Russell, Dick Van Dyke (and his cockney accent), etc. A black-and-white legion of "Mousketeers" leaping out of an old TV would look incredible.

And I'm not saying any of the above characters or actors are bad or anything. And granted, many aren't obscure due to being lost in an archive somewhere, but more due to being replaced by other, more recent, productions; I'm just thinking of some nostalgic properties that Disney might present for us to (virtually) kick the stuffing out of via our Wiimotes. Also, the "obscure" factor makes me wonder if we're going to get a master villain in the same vein as the mysterious "Adversary" from "Fables." How weirdly awesome would it be if it turns out the guy behind trying to destroy the Disney universe was someone like Evinrude or the Aracuan.

A last Disney "thing": In my casual research, I saw that I'd totally missed the announcement last year that they're going to make a movie called"King of the Elves," based on the Philip K. Dick story of the same name.

The oddest TV news I saw recently has to be the creator of "Chuck" landing a new show at Fox. The show is described as an epic Western with a sci-fi twist. That sort of thing sounds familiar, and since it's Fox Entertainment, I think we can all agree that it's probably got a thunderous looking cloud marked "DOOMED" hanging over the pilot script.

While we contemplate what Joss Whedon will have to say about it, let's take a gander at the following:

- I've not watched David Letterman in some time (recent scandal notwithstanding), but you gotta love any Top 10 List as read by Optimus Prime.
- Fallout 3. Lego. Together at last. So when will Bethesda do a Lego version?
- Fans of Top Gear's "Stig" will be happy to see this page of Stig-related merch, including Stig-soap-on-a-rope.
- Hungry? Wish there had been one more "Jaws" sequel? Try playing Miami Shark, where you can munch on swimmers, boats, and even the odd helicopter if you jump high enough.
- Gizmodo takes a look at what could be a revolutionary boon to Photoshoppers everywhere.
- It looks like the Federal Trade Commission will be regulating disclosure of "freebies" given to bloggers. Let me just say that I'll happily disclose the source of any free vehicles, computers, or tropical cruises that are bestowed upon me.
- Speaking of blogs, here's a nifty one that sounds like a Royal Society from Monty Python: Tiny Versions of Bigger Things.
- Because I dig "Fringe" and "Star Trek," I am compelled to post this article about Leonard Nimoy's concerns for sci-fi TV. On a related note, I love this photo.
- Also, because I like "Star Trek" and probably won't have time to play the upcoming MMO (maybe... we'll see), I'm impressed by the extensive array of ships they'll have (though I wish all of them had representative images).
- And we close with a game that crosses "MechWarrior" and "Smash TV": Juggerdome. Equip your death-dealing robot and upgrade it with your winnings... if you survive!