Star Wars and stuff

I just got my d20 Star Wars Revised Core Rulebook in the mail the other day. It was just one of those things that I never bought, but I finally did after listening to the first two episodes of The Lost Holocron podcast. So I’ve been reading through that and coming up with plot hooks to throw at my players when we finally get around to playing it. That should be pretty awesome.

Speaking of Star Wars, I finally tried out The Old Republic. I like it so far, but due to my inhibiting work schedule, I can’t see justifying paying for a subscription any time in the near future, so I must be content with the free-to-play mode — which, I might add, feels just fine to me. I mean, yeah, I can’t have a thousand alts, but I’m fine with that. I mean, friggin’ Star Wars (for free) in one of the most interesting eras. I’m not mad.

I haven’t commented on Disney’s acquisition of Star Wars yet. Well, now I am. Remember when everyone thought Disney’s acquisition of Marvel was going to be terrible and then The Avengers happened? I think that’s going to be what happens in this case. Also, I am totally for a live-action series centering  around Starkiller as long as it stars Sam Witwer, and I’m totally against any type of series, whether live action, animated, stop motion, puppets, or what have you, that goes into the younger years of Han Solo or Boba Fett. I heard rumors about that somewhere. I dunno; I’m just not interested. But yeah, it seems that the general vibe is that nobody is really all that mad about Disney’s acquisition of Star Wars, so since I don’t have anything original to say on the subject, that’s that.

In non-Star Wars related news, I’m on volume two of The Belgariad. This is not going to be a proper review of the series; just some general thoughts. I seem to fall into the rare camp in the fandom of this series — not blindly infatuated nor seething with rage, but rather somewhere in the middle. It’s not a bad series. Everybody knows that it’s filled with fantasy tropes and stereotypes and some either love it because they’re done well while others hate it because they exist, so I won’t comment on that. I really have no comment on it — to me, it’s merely a fact and I have no strong opinions either way. This series has been taking me a long time to read, though. It’s not bad — Eddings is a very good writer and I like the story, but parts of it just feel to drag on. I can’t specify any because it seems to be one of those things that creeps up without you even knowing about it — you’re just reading the story, and then you realize you’ve been asleep for the past hour and you’ve drooled all over the book (or maybe you don’t drool, whatever). Anyway, my biggest complaint about the series so far is how damn anticlimactic the battles are. I love a good battle scene. Eddings creates some brilliant battle scenes, especially the final battle at the end of volume one — but something always happens to make the fight abruptly end. I would get all excited and then disappointed. Anyway, yeah, I think it’s a decent series. Read it for yourself if you want to find out if you’ll like it; I’m not here to decide for you. Dammit.

Oh, what else. Not a whole hell of a lot. Helping the Lady with planning our wedding. Watching a lot of Adventure Time and Star Trek: The Next Generation (and I’m not here to debate you on which Star Trek is the best; Original and TNG are the only ones I’ve ever bothered to watch, with a few episodes of DS9 thrown in for good measure).

Some plans.

My good friend Fernando H. Stevens and I are working on some projects. Said projects are probably not interesting to the public as a whole, but let’s say that if you have an interest in things like charts, lore, dice, and maps, you may be interested. So that’s that, and that is awesome.

I swear, I was going to say more. I can’t remember what, though.

Season Two

A few days ago, my lovely significant other asked me if the Starks’ words change when winter actually comes. I replied with, “Yeah, ‘We Told You So.’” Ha. Ha. I’m full of wit and vigor. Well… I’m full of something, anyway.

So we watched the first episode of season two last night. I wasn’t disappointed. With my years of experience with A Song of Ice and Fire, I’m declaring myself qualified to talk about some things. You can declare me unqualified if you wish, but that’s your problem and you should probably go somewhere else. I’ll keep it brief because I have to get ready for work shortly. Whatever.

Thoughts on some of the new characters:
Melisandre – The tall, pale, disturbingly sexy Red Priestess (or witch, depending upon whom you ask). Basically, the way I imagined her while reading is exactly how Carice van Houten is portraying her. When Rachel and I watched Black Death, I started jumping up and down, pointing at the screen, proclaiming that she MUST play Melisandre. After wiki-ing her (because that’s what I do), I saw that she was and I was delighted (and slightly terrified because I know what’s coming (other than winter)).

Ser Dontos – !!! is about all I can say. I honestly thought that he was going to be cut out of the show because he always struck me as a Tom Bombadil archetype: definitely works in the books, but those not familiar with the books would be none the wiser if he was cut out. The actor portraying him is awesome. (I’d look up names, but I’m really running short on time here.)

Der Davos – Another !!! here. One of the most interesting and unappreciated characters from the books. Again, awesome actor.

“King” Stannis – I like the actor, but he doesn’t look scary or severe enough to be Stannis, in my opinion. I ain’t mad, though.

Craster – Fuck that guy. He was scarier, appearance-wise, in the books. To be honest, though, when he was first shown on the show, I thought he was another member of the Night’s Watch. He didn’t look gross or dirty or have nasty-ass teeth, he just looked like a portly British bloke. The actor did a good job of conveying how much of a douche Craster is, though. Also, massive kudos to the set designers: I knew exactly where they were when they came to the keep.

Uh… Anyway, it’s getting to be that time, so just another quick series of closing thoughts:

I want to buy Jack Gleeson a beer for being such a believable fucking douchebag. Damn, but is he a good actor.

Janos Slynt, fucking hell. They’re making him so much more hate-able than he was in the books (and damn, was he hate-able in the books).

Peter Dinklage is my hero. I’m so glad that he’s doing my favorite character in the series such well-deserved justice.

Robb is way more badass on the show than he was in the books.

I can definitely tell the direwolves are CG. I mean, they don’t look bad, but the dragons look a little more believable than the wolves. I think that’s because a mythical creature is easier to create than a somewhat-real-world one, though, because I’ve never seen a dragon in real life (no, I’ve never seen a direwolf, but I’ve seen more than a few wolves).

So, yeah, those are some of my thoughts. Take them as you will, or don’t take them at all. Doesn’t matter to me. I’m excited for what’s to come.

A new name for everything.

Hooray, this thing has a new name (that actually resembles some modicum of language)! New address, too, so…well, you probably weren’t reading this before, so whatever. Anyway, I shamelessly stole the name from a song by Social Distortion because I have no originality — nor do I claim to. I will hopefully be updating this thing once again (now that it’s been, what? A year? Ffff.) so look for me to be polluting your facebook/twitter/whatever with news of new posts at possible times in the near and possible future. And stuff.

Bring on the epics.

Saw Thor. A while ago, actually. Look at me, being a responsible blogger.

Thor. Yeah. It’s in my Top Five Comic Books of Ever, and it’s near the top of that list. I’ve had mixed feelings on the past several Marvel releases…well, since X-men 3 or Spider-man 3, whichever of those came first. The Edward Norton Incredible Hulk was, in my not-so-humble opinion, fucking awesome (I still haven’t seen The Ang Lee Incredible Hulk) and it’s a goddamned shame that it’s being scrapped for a reboot. Iron Man was damn impressive. Iron Man 2 was set up to destroy all expectations for comic book movies, and then my expectations were destroyed for comic book movies when I saw it. Don’t get me wrong! I really liked it! I just feel they could have pulled things off better — most importantly, it needed MOAR MICKEY ROURKE. I wasn’t pleased with the activation of God Mode at the end.

However, I’m getting off topic (what’s new?) and I need to get back to Thor. I had convinced myself that it was going to be utter shit. I was pissed that the visuals were “comic-booky”: I had been hoping that they’d, I dunno, use realistic-looking armor and swords. Hell, I have realistic-looking armor and swords and I’m just some underfed, unemployed, recently-graduated slacker living at his parents’ house, watching The Science Channel all day; I figured they’d pull it off in the movie.

No. We get a rubber Thor. Rubber Odin. Rubber Loki. Rubber Warriors Three, Sif, Heimdall, and Frigga. Frost Giants that, well, really weren’t all that giant (except for Laufey–GODDAMN). Did I mention I’m a Norse mythology fanatic? I probably didn’t need to. Anyway, Straczynski was onboard, so not all of my hope was lost. Just most of it.

So, I saw it opening evening (no, I didn’t go to the midnight release, unfortunately). Some of my friends that I went with were trying to convince me that I’d like it; the others were ambivalent, as they weren’t really one of us few proud Thor fans of the universe.

The visuals were stunning. I still don’t like the costumes or the appearance of Asgard (or how goddamned empty it was), but, taken out of the context of Thor, they were fucking mindblowing. Bifrost, in any context, was awesome and probably my favorite part. I was really glad it wasn’t as rainbow-y as it is in the mythology. That’s a change I liked. Another change I liked was that several of the characters were no longer just plain pasty Scandinavians (even though there was only one real Scandinavian in the movie — Stellan Skarsgård for the fucking win!): Heimdall was portrayed by Idris Elba (Charles Miner is definitely enough of a hardass, even if I didn’t like the ridiculous amount of gold on his armor) and Tadanobu Asano as Hogun (he freakin’ played Ghengis Khan). It kind of adds flavor (and some amount of believability) to the universe-spanning Yggdrasil branches.

The acting — eh. Chris Hemsworth captured the cockiness and unintentional sense of humor of Thor pretty faithfully. Anthony Hopkins hammed it up as Odin (think less serious Hopkins like Silence of the Lambs or Slipstream and more silly Hopkins like Dracula) and I was entertained, even if he was in Odinsleep for 86% of the movie. Tom Hiddleson as Loki…I still don’t know how I feel about him. He was great at going from really sad to really sneaky in the blink of an eye. I just don’t know if he’s a Loki. Well, comic book Loki, I suppose. I need to stop comparing it to the mythology. Colm Feore as Laufey — holy shit. I wanted more of him.

Cameos! Hawkeye showed up. He was never explicitly named, but if you know anything about The Avengers or, well, Marvel, you know it’s him. Same with Luke Cage. At least, I think he was Luke Cage. He was a big black guy who could fight Thor one-on-one, but I really couldn’t get a good look at him. He didn’t look like the Luke Cage I know, but hey, when you’re a body guard for S.H.I.E.L.D. in a new Marvel movie, you’re not wearing a skin-tight yellow T-shirt, skin-tight black jeans, and a huge-ass belt buckle reading CAGE, oh no, you’re dressed like you’re a member of a SWAT team (if they did that, why not metal armor?).

The story. There was a lot missing from the comics, but it’s a movie and there’s only so much you can do. Sometimes you have to settle for less.

The music was, of course, awesome. I’d go on more, but I’m not really a soundtrack expert and I don’t really know what I can say that hasn’t been said before.

So, should you see it? Yes, you should, but under certain conditions. If you’re one of us few Thor fans, yeah, definitely see it. If you want mindless action mated with silly awkward humor, definitely see it. If you want to see all of the relevant movies before watching The Avengers, definitely see it. If you don’t fall into any of those categories, I wouldn’t bother. Wait till it comes out on DVD, have your friend buy it, and watch it together (for free) with some beers (or mead).

Now, the title of this post said epicS. Why plural? Fucking Game of Thrones. I’m not going to give a very in-depth review of it because, hey, there are better ones out there (check out westeros.org for all of your GoT/ASoIaF needs). It’s fairly true to the books, but there are a lot of scenes that I take issue with and a lot of creative decisions that I think would have been better if they were left as they were in the books, but hell, it’s a TV series. There’s only so much you can do with the budget/time limitations and the format. Not having the POV characters and their extensive internal monologues takes a lot out, but the creative team is making up for it by adding new conversations or showing a look or et cetera. It’s on HBO and that’s the only network (except for maybe Showtime) that would be able to portray the books in visual form most faithfully. I think the only way to fit everything from the books into the series would be to make each episode two to three hours long, but that’s just unrealistic. Overall, I’m satisfied with what’s happening so far. I’m re-reading the book alongside the show (for probably the tenth time) to compare the two — and, that way, when I’m not satisfied with something on the show, I can just go back to the book where I know I will be satisfied.

I’m probably going to be doing an analysis of the actors with my inexperienced, pitiful thoughts on them sometime soon.

Buckets and Lists, Oh My

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about things that I want to do – preferably before I die. I decided to make this list so I don’t forget the things that I want to do. This list will appear again if I add anything to it or complete anything on it!

THINGS I AM GOING TO DO BEFORE I DIE

• Hug a bear (preferably polar, but any will do), tiger, fox, skunk, lion, etc.
• Learn how to pilot a helicopter (and eventually own one).
• Publish something (other than the one thing I have already published, which isn’t really mine).
• Learn a martial art (thai chi and/or muy thai).
• Improve my German language skills
• Learn Russian, Swedish, Arabic, Hebrew, Italian, Latin, Old English, etc.
• Visit Europe again.
• Visit Canada again.
• Write the script for a video game, movie, and/or TV show – and have it become real and not a paperweight.
• Direct a movie and/or TV show.
• Be a voice actor.
• Become a certified diver.

FFFFFF.

Nothing like some algebra four mornings a week to make a liberal arts major feel like a fucking idiot, hey?

In other news, it is the last semester (and, yeah, algebra is fucking it up because it’s eating up all of my time–and it’s definitely going to keep me off the honors list/dean’s list. Fuck.) and I have my senior project to work on. I’m probably going to be sporadically updating here to all (zero) of you that read this with updates on my progress. And whatnot.

Fuck algebra.

DAMMIT, MINECRAFT.

My Minecraft addiction almost resulted in me and everyone who lives in my house missing Tron Legacy last night. We made it, though. Oh, Tron Legacy…as a film, it was absolutely terrible. Even as a movie, it was terrible. However, as a sequel to Tron, it was FUCKING AWESOME. I thoroughly enjoyed it and if you’re a fan of the original, you will, too. As a bonus, you can actually see what’s happening on the screen in this one because CGI > Rotoscoping.

So, Minecraft. My nerdery is getting in the way of my nerdery, as I almost missed Tron and I haven’t had time for KotOR or Dwarf Fortress because of it. Anyway, I have two worlds (and, of course, a dwarf skin for my character). In my main one, I am building an epic mountain fortress. In my other one, I’m building a little island fortress.

In the island fortress world, I just finished the fortress proper (just a nice little bastard made of stone, wood, and clay) and I decided to start an actual mine instead of just digging in the basement. So, I’m digging a shaft downward and finding a lot of coal and a few pockets of iron and I’m pretty happy, as I hadn’t found this much of each before. I keep digging downward and I break into a cave. I think, “Dammit, this is going to ruin my mine. Oh well, I have torches. I’ll look around.” Well, said cave has EVERYTHING. Diamonds? Redstone? Gold? Iron? Coal? Red mushrooms? Water? Magma? Obsidian? Yeah, all of that. I think I have a new main world.

At any rate, I’ve been on Peaceful difficulty while I build because I want to be creative and I got sick of Creepers. Bastards. Once I get some good defenses (and offenses, as I have none), I’m going to turn on monsters and see how long I can last!

So, that’s that. Minecraft has taken over.

Well, now what?

NaNoWriMo’s officially over. Well, in ~8 hours. Still.

Now that I’m finished, I have no idea of how to spend my time or what to do with myself. I have several assignments to catch up on for my classes, so that’s going to be tackled in the next few days. I have games to play and whatnot. I have to update Get Off My Lawn, Dammit. Still, though, it seems weird to not be pouring every effort into completing the novel. Damn you, NaNoWriMo. Can next November be here already?

NaNoCoMpLeTeD.

My first year of NaNoWriMo and I’m finished with my novel on Day 22. I hit 50,009 words yesterday and 50,201 today. The novel is, for all intents and purposes, finished. Terribly weak ending, too. I’m going to clean it up a bit in the next few months and get my free proof copy from CreateSpace, and then scrap the whole thing. I will end up recycling it in the future; there were a lot of good ideas in it, but I’m not so pleased with it that I want to get it published. I mean, it’s a short novel that I wrote in less than a month. It’s not the greatest thing ever written; far from it. I did write over 50,000 words in a month, though, and I can’t help but feel proud of myself for actually completing something that I set out to do.

For those of you who care, here’s a tally of my progress through the month.

Day 1: 371 words; scrapped and recycled on Day 2
Day 2: 3,227 – 3,227/50,000
Day 3: 0 – 3,227/50,000
Day 4: 4,214 – 7,441/50,000
Day 5: 2,127 – 9,568/50,000
Day 6: 0 – 9,568/50,000
Day 7: 2,540 – 12,108/50,000
Day 8: 613 – 12,721/50,000
Day 9: 8,077 – 20,798/50,000
Day 10: 2,515 – 23,313/50,000
Day 11: 2,119 – 25,432/50,000
Day 12: 0 – 25,432/50,000
Day 13: 3,306 – 28,738/50,000
Day 14: 1,963 – 30,701/50,000
Day 15: 1,737 – 32,438/50,000
Day 16: 5,332 – 37,770/50,000
Day 17: 0 – 37,770/50,000
Day 18: 3,186 – 40,956/50,000
Day 19: 3,806 – 44,762/50,000
Day 20: 4,399 – 49,161/50,000
Day 21: 848 – 50,009/50,000
Day 22: 192 – 50,201/50,000