ThaOGDreamWeaver

I see what you mean about the animation style. It looks... less refined than classic TAS, a little bit like 2000s-era Flash animation, though I think it's supposed to be modelled after early comic books: some of the villain faces resemble Dick Tracy more than Batman. I'm much more a fan of the backdrops and buildings that are styled after 20s/30s travel posters and such.

Just posted the new trailer on the other thread and... well, still not sure if this is one I'll wait for streaming on. But given I took a punt on the D&D movie and loved it... maybe? (Oh, and I think if they do the Wonderlands movie next I'm definitely in)

New trailer is up... and, well, it's better than the last trailer.

Like many things in life, it's delicious when used sparingly.

Off topic, but if you like having a freshly-flamethrowered nasal cavity, please enjoy this American lady trying my home town's most famous export. (And since Hugh Jackman's mum is from round'haaaiir, I'm surprised he doesn't have more resilience.)

I haven't seen it, but I've already had two of the big reveals spoilered by people on General Chat. Very, very much looking forward to it when I get can my kevlar-clad butt to a seat. However, I have been enjoying a lot of the promo stuff around the movie, including Ryan & Hugh's episode of Hot Ones. Partly because there's some genuinely good questions about moviemaking in there - Ryan's impassioned speech about character is almost as good as Matt Damon's money talk. But also there's Hugh being tortured till he's tripping on capsaicin. (Side note: I've only done that once, when my date ordered us Tom Yam and I thought it would be toned down for pasty people. It was not. But for some reason, as it had been bought for me, I had to finish it. By the end, I could smell colours, see forever and my eyes were bleeding visions from eight different timestreams.)

No, that was all wild speculation. I have no spies that dare provoke the wrath of K.E.V.I.N. and his dark army. (Side note: I was at a Salesforce conference once where their head of Marketing brought out Benefact Clumberspaniel, for the alleged reason that sales is about performance - and the rather more obvious reason that she was fangirling wildly. There was drool. We all saw you, girrrrl. And I saw him nervously check the roof when he accidentally let slip about performing with Patrick Stewart. The spoiler ninjas are REAL.) However, with Armour Wars not featuring on the Phase 6 release schedule, maybe it's been cut-and-shut into the new Doomsday plotline?

If I was writing it - let the wild speculation begin... Victor Von Doom is from Earth-1969 (or whatever the Fantastic 4's Universe is). In that universe, Howard Stark is still his father, but for whatever plot reason, he was raised unaware of his legacy in Latveria by the Von Dooms and their Romani tribe. Possibly Maria Stark was a Latverian spy, it was a casual fling, he was kidnapped, or Obadiah disappeared him. Who knows. He's still a natural-20 genius and uses technology (rather than technomagic, as in DOOM's original origin story) to help his family and tribe. This leads him to the attention of ESU, where he moves to New York and begins researching alongside one Reed Richards. Fast forward through their friendship, split, nemesis bit, and whatever the actual movie turns out to be... Where and the end, due to the accidental crossing of the high-polarity McGuffinator streams, the F4 and Doom wind up being thrown into MCU continuity. Doom is initially very puzzled as to why everyone keeps calling him "Tony", for he is DOOM (etc) ...but very, very quickly works out a game plan to capitalise on that, gaining access to money, technology and secrets. After all, in an age of public distrust, only the handful of heroes who survived Thanos and saw his sacrifice play can 100% confirm Tony's dead and buried.

It does kind of feel like Steve Jobs coming back to Apple if RDJ is back. Also: like the retitle of the Avengers flick. For it will be the day of DOOM, and no-one else but DOOM. For DOOM is the mastermind, the genius and all-around visionary! It was DOOM who laid the original plan and set it into motion! Don't you see!? All you Kangs and HYDRA and TVA and SHIELD are DOOM’S plan! So your plans are DOOM’S plans, because you made plans and DOOM’S plan was to make you! DOOM never planned for his plans to make plans to stop his plan! DOOM plans to rule the multiverse, not to have DOOM’S plans plan to stop DOOM! The planner of you! So stop, cease, desist! DOOM IS your creator! AND DOOM SHALL BE YOUR DOOM! …something like that, anyway…

Life advice. (Seriously, try it).

Small update: Marvel invited everybody at SDCC to watch an after hours drone and fireworks show. Guess who crashed the party…

One of James Gunn’s animation passion projects comes to life with a top-line cast, including Frank Grillo as Rick Flag Sr. (who will also appear in Superman), and Viola Davis and Sean Gunn reprising their sarcasm / random burbling from Suicide Squad. We also add Indira Varma as The Bride and David Harbour as on-again/off-again love interest Eric Frankenstein, the inimitable Alan Tudyk as Dr Phosphorous, The Witcher’s Anya Chalotra slightly typecast as Circe, and Zoe Chao as neurotic amphibious genius Nina. Anime style puts me slightly in mind of Aeon Flux… what do we think?

So I had a go at the comic book generator. Can't get any of the ones I use regularly to render the title (DreamWeaver: As Heaven Is Wide) accurately, but... Microsoft Designer: Playground (Real Comics XL preset) Playground (Photorealistic preset)

Emerson Lake & Palmer - Lucky Man

Cicero Blake - See What Tomorrow Brings

You're just not Australian. Them's high-end formalwear boardies, mate. Of course, for date night, budgie smugglers all round. Ripper. On that note, I am slightly disappointed that those Lululemon jackets aren't denim, for a proper Canadian tuxedo look, eh.

UK kit is by Ben Sherman, and much as with that brand, looks... Wetherspoons*-ready, rather than fit for action or the catwalk. https://news.sky.com/story/team-gb-unveils-very-patriotic-olympic-kits-featuring-union-jack-13117912 La France: by Berluti and Le Coq Sportif, and... well, it's neat, NICE ceremony jacket, colourful but not loud for competition kit, quite smart and restrained for the podium outfits, and I might need a pair of the shoes. https://www.lecoqsportif.com/en/collections/collection-village-equipe-de-france If there's anything else I'm slightly coveting, it's the Aussie ceremonial jacket. And maybe the skirt (or the guys' boardshorts, because they're a bunch of bogans.) https://wwd.com/pop-culture/celebrity-news/australia-olympic-uniform-1236501025/ *Wetherspoons: think Applebee's, but with more beer, depression and drunken 2am fights

Netflix's infamous 3-and-out model explains a lot of the casualties - which (for legal/arcane/infernal reasons you'd need the crew from Wolfram and Hart to explain) stops them having to pay extended royalties. https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/tvs-new-math-what-100m-netflix-deals-actually-shortchange-creators-1203846/ Also, since a show can live on a platform more or less forever, there's no other second-window opportunities like syndication. (Without syndication, ST:TOS would never have evolved into the cultural icon it is today. It's also why TOS episodes still look pretty fresh and have been easy to restore: back in the day, everything that wasn't news, sports or light-ents like quizzes was distributed to local stations on film, rather than videotape. And there's dozens of copies kicking around.) In fact, it's gone backwards. With platforms being voracious for content to suit any given mood - Amish True Crime? Horror Cake Reveals? Extreme Gardening? - they hoover up national, international and local productions like one of Escobar's hippos in a Miami dance club VIP room.

Final trailer's up... is this gonna give the people what they want?

So I went too far down an internet rabbithole, and have found the heroine whose (terrifying) gig it is to end the hippo invasion and save the world. Her name is Gina Paola Serna, and I shall raise a glass of fine rum to her. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/oct/22/vet-sterilising-pablo-escobar-hippos

Hint: watch WandaVision from episode 3 onwards, then rewatch the first two.

Prince & The Revolution - Raspberry Beret

I'm not usually into YouTube explainers, but I gave these a crack. I knew about Praying Mantis's mission and background from my teaching days but not, of course, all the BTS yahoo c***erf***ery by the air wing that is more the province of the USAF. (Frankly, they're probably still jealous to this day.) I am now five minutes into the hippo video and have had to stop because of literal tears of laughter. I was already fully aware of hippos being basically two velociraptors welded together and then given a Cheesecake Factory VIP card, but his descriptions are even better. The video is also a neat object lesson in why we should not screw with ecosystems. To quote Douglas Adams... When you spend much time with naturalists you will tend to hear two words in particular an awful lot: endemic and exotic. Three, if you count disaster. An endemic species of plant or animal is one that is native to an island or region and is found nowhere else at all. An exotic species is one that has been introduced from abroad. And a disaster is usually what results when this occurs.

I've not met that many sharks in business. Well, except real estate, and there I'd guess it's mandatory.