Let's roll some dice, watch some movies, or generally just geek out. New posts at 6:30 pm ET but only if I have something to say. Menu at the top. gsllc@chirp.enworld.org on Mastodon and @gsllc on Twitter.
I hope you all enjoyed your Christmas, even if you don’t celebrate it, but it’s time to move on. We need to focus on getting rid of this horrible, COVID-19-infested year. That can be tough to do, so we’ll need some help. Fortunately, he’s already here, and he’s inevitable.
I know that moving past Christmas can be hard for some, but take down those Christmas lights, or you’ll be next. Now is no time for Christmas. In fact, now is no time at all.
This is a nerdy blog, so even Christmas must be nerdy here. I’m stealing this from a Facebook friend, SMK. In Christmas of 1977, when I was 9, I received this as a gift:
As with most gifts I received, it was really a gift for my brother, but I managed to have a lot of fun with it until he felt it was too nerdy for him. At that point, I was ridiculed for playing it until the Satanic Panic kicked in. Then I was forbidden from playing it, and it was destroyed. No worries, though. I have a close, personal relationship with my lord and savior, eBay.
I played from 1977 to 1982. Other than my sporadic flirtation with the FASA Star Trek RPG in the mid to late 80s (I had no way to connect with gamers back then), there was no RPG gaming until 2005, which is when I started playing Living Greyhawk with the D&D 3.5 crowd. That’s how I met almost all of you, and for better or worse, that’s how most of you got (had?) to meet me. I recently stopped playing, but you represent an extension of the Christmas gift that kept on giving, even if it took a long hiatis.
Sundays are now lazy days for me. Going forward, I’m just going to re-post other people’s work or just do something silly. Today it’s a meme shared on Facebook, and it isn’t silly. It’s a serious commentary as far as I’m concerned.
A while back, I threw out some wild speculation about the lawsuit filed by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman against Wizards of the Coast. Yesterday, I learned that they withdrew their suit. This could mean two things (generally): 1) Weis & Hickman never had a legitimate shot at winning in the first place; or 2) Weis & Hickman won behind the scenes. My suspicion, based in no small part on the arrogance of WotC’s legal department, has always been that the suit was likely solid, so I would assume the latter is much more likely. Adding to the strength of my assumption is the following tweet by Margaret:
I know some of you have seen that our lawsuit against WoTC was dismissed. I can't say anything yet, but watch for exciting news in the weeks to come! And thank you so much for your support!
Replica is yet another movie addressing the nature of the human mind, and whether we could transplant human consciousness from one mind to another. There are a lot of problems with this movie. Disconnected writing, terrible special effects, and cheesy dialogue plague it. To make matters worse, the story needs to cover far more ground than it can in 1 hour and 45 minutes. As a result, characters accept without question revelations that should be mind-shattering. There’s no time for them to come to terms with this information.
All that said, I’ve learned to focus on the ideas that these movies raise rather than how they address them. Who cares if the movie doesn’t handle an issue thoroughly (or even correctly)? My brain does a pretty good job of considering those issues, at least to the extent of my own knowledge base. That works for me.
So, I guess that means I liked it. Replicas is streaming on HBO Max. As always, YMMV.
I have a lot of streaming services. This week, I shifted back to HBO Max to watch a couple of movies. First up was Richard Jewell.
First off, this was a great movie about how the FBI railroaded a hero, Richard Jewell. Clint Eastwood knows how to tell a story, and the fact that this was true (more or less) makes it all the more impactful.
I don’t ever want to get political on this blog, but every so often it’s unavoidable. Being a cop is hard work, and being a good cop cuts against human nature. Only those people capable of living up to a heightened standard should become cops, and that occurs only with training. If you’re not capable of putting the public’s interest in catching the bad guys ahead of your own career goals, you aren’t living up to that standard. It’s frustrating knowing cops like that are out there, but it’s important to acknowledge and address it. It also makes for good storytelling.
But cops aren’t the only ones under the microscope in this movie. So are the rest of us.
Richard Jewell is streaming on HBO Max. As always, YMMV.
Play What You Want 