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muppet-facts · 2 years

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Muppet Fact #217

Oscar has had many pets over the years. These pets include many cows, elephants, a whale, fleas, and many more. In total, Oscar has had around 70 pets.

The full list being as such:

Betsy, a dog

Cranky, a rottendoodle

Preposterous, a puppy

Dick, a goat

Jane, a goat

Lassie, a goat

Grishmippen, a goat

Gus, a goat

Sophie, a skunk

Daisy, a skunk

Rosebud, a skunk

Fluffy, an elephant

Sophie, an elephant

Blitzen, an elephant

Schopenhauer, an elephant

Penelope, an elephant

Wolfgang, an elephant

Sabrina, an elephant

Cynthia, an elephant

Lou, a shoe

Jacques, a sock

Moby Richard, a whale

Moby Jane, a whale

Fred, a fish

Jaws, a goldfish

Camille, a lobster

Myrna, a cow

Chloris, a cow

Bossy, a cow

Esme, a cow

Multiple unnamed cows

Spot, a pig

Petunia, a pig

Multiple unnamed pigs

Anthony, a tiger

Tiny Tim, a cat

Fido, a cat

Freddie, a fly

Frank, a fly

Fernando, a flea

Marie, a flea

Slimey, a worm

Twitchy, a spider

Multiple unnamed termites

A flock moths

Hortense, a dragon

Charlie, a dragon

Hedda, a hippo

Seymour, a hippo

Various unnamed hippos

Jezabel, a chicken

Several unnamed chickens

Stinky, a seagull

Grouch bird

Iago, a donkey

An unnamed donkey

Garfield, a rhino

Portia, a rhino

Slinky, a snake

Boxy, a rectangle

Blobby, a blob

Charles the Robot, a robot

Mud Pie, a hamster

Grover (for a short time)

Multiple unnamed horses

An unnamed giraffe

Several unnamed Buffalo

Sources:

Oscar's Grouch Jamboree. Liza Alexander. 1994.

The Sesame Street Pet Show. Emily Perl Kingsley. 1980.

My Name Is Oscar the Grouch. Liza Alexander. 1994.

Sesame Street Skills for Growing. Learning to Use Your Mind: Oscar Builds a Snake House. Peter Solmo. 1976.

The Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland. 1999.

Sesame Street Stays Up Late. 1993.

Sesame Street All-Star 25th Birthday: Stars and Street Forever!. 1994.

Sesame Street: Elmocize. 1996.

Elmopalooza. 1998.

Abby in Wonderland. 2008.

Sesame Street Presents Follow That Bird. 1985.

The Muppets: A Celebration of 30 Years. 1986.

Sesame Street Home Video Visits the Firehouse. 1990.

Sesame Street Home Video: Learning About Letters. 1986.

A Special Sesame Street Christmas. 1978.

Elmo's World: Farms. February 10, 2000.

Elmo's World: Cats. September 7, 2005.

Sesame Street. Episode 0202. February 17, 1971.

Sesame Street. Episode 0282. November 23, 1971.

Sesame Street. Episode 0307. December 28, 1971.

Sesame Street. Episode 0329. January 27, 1972.

Sesame Street. Episode 0523. April 25, 1973.

Sesame Street. Episode 0524. April 26, 1973.

Sesame Street. Episode 0671. November 11, 1974.

Sesame Street. Episode 0700. December 20, 1974.

Sesame Street. Episode 0756. March 10, 1975.

Sesame Street. Episode 1001. March 14, 1977.

Sesame Street. Episode 1149. April 6, 1978.

Sesame Street. Episode 1170. May 5, 1978.

Sesame Street. Episode 1266. March 19, 1979.

Sesame Street. Episode 1269. March 22, 1979.

Sesame Street. Episode 1441. May 19, 1980.

Sesame Street. Episode 1448. November 26, 1980.

Sesame Street. Episode 1449. November 27, 1980.

Sesame Street. Episode 1451. December 1, 1980.

Sesame Street. Episode 1489. January 22, 1981.

Sesame Street. Episode 1552. April 21, 1981.

Sesame Street. Episode 1555. April 24, 1981.

Sesame Street. Episode 1586. December 7, 1981.

Sesame Street. Episode 1618. January 20, 1982.

Sesame Street. Episode 1661. March 22, 1982.

Sesame Street. Episode 1740. January 7, 1983.

Sesame Street. Episode 1853. December 14, 1983.

Sesame Street. Episode 1856. December 19, 1983.

Sesame Street. Episode 1905. February 24, 1984.

Sesame Street. Episode 1937. April 10, 1984.

Sesame Street. Episode 1959. May 10, 1984.

Sesame Street. Episode 2064. April 4, 1985.

Sesame Street. Episode 2076. April 22, 1985.

Sesame Street. Episode 2269. January 15, 1987.

Sesame Street. Episode 2548. February 8, 1989.

Sesame Street. Episode 2577. March 21, 1989.

Sesame Street. Episode 2886. November 25, 1991.

Sesame Street. Episode 2971. March 23, 1992.

Sesame Street. Episode 3067. February 2, 1993.

Sesame Street. Episode 3664. November 27, 1997.

Sesame Street. Episode 3759. April 6, 1998.

Sesame Street. Episode 4088. April 11, 2005.

Sesame Street. Episode 4127. September 21, 2006.

Sesame Street. Episode 4207. January 21, 2010.

Sesame Street. Episode 4710. March 11, 2017.

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motherland · 4 years

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Ship Spotlight: Raylla [Part 2]

Motherland: Fort Salem’s Taylor Hickson and Amalia Holm discuss the Raylla ship, share photos from set, their headcanons about the show, and more. Check it out:

What is something that you hope to see Raelle and Scylla do or achieve in an upcoming episode?

Taylor Hickson: I'm hoping Scylla gets a chance to fully explain herself. I feel we're still missing huge parts of her backstory. It would be incredibly interesting to hear her justify why she chose the path she did and what led her there. I feel that's at least owed to Raelle and definitely the audience!

Amalia Holm: I hope Scylla gets a chance to properly explain herself to Raelle and that Raelle keeps an open mind. I hope that her senses are not clogged by anger and sadness and that their love will prevail.

Do you have any headcanons about Raylla?

TH: I have a strange feeling (maybe more of a hope) that the mall girl is a different person than Scylla. I don't have much to back this up other than intuition... I know as much as you guys do!

AH: I think they goof around a lot, including make funny voices. I also think they almost compete in generosity towards one another: e.g. fighting over who is giving up the last piece of lobster.

The witches of Fort Salem definitely aren’t perfect (e.g. collateral damage in battle). How, if at all, do you think that these failings can be resolved, and who do you think will be the ones to resolve it?

TH: Even having healers among the military, it's seemingly impossible to save every life. If anyone, I think Tally could petition the best outcome considering her enthusiasm for the cause and need for justice. Maybe even finding a way to please all parties involved- including the government and The Spree.

AH: In accordance with Scylla, I think that there has to be a reset and a rethinking of the entire conscription system. Until then, I think a change of leadership is a good idea: the system might need to undergo a systematic change from within. At the same time, the benefit of having Alder in power is that we know more about her than any other prospect.

What’s the most memorable thing that happened while filming?

TH: On the first day of shooting with Ashley, I licked barbecue sauce off of her pants and Jess licked her face. At the same time. We got real close real fast.

AH: The scene in episode 7 where Raelle and Scylla are united just to be separated while crying. That scene was so emotional and we both gave our all in a sense that created a very intimate moment. I would not want to be without that experience, neither professionally nor personally.

Can you share the funniest photo on your phone from set?

Were there any improvised or spontaneous Raylla moments that happened on the show?

TH: Too many to count. There were so many little moments. So much can change on the day of shooting -- entire scenes can be rewritten! Sometimes because a writer has realizations, or because of a location, or the team thinks it feels better another way. We were blessed to have a collaborative group that truly listened to how we felt. Amalia was an INCREDIBLE scene partner. So innovative. She really thinks on the fly and follows her intuition. After doing something 17 times, she always finds a way to make it feel exciting and new. She sure can keep you on your toes (sometimes OFF)! Ultimately, my favorite thing about sharing a scene with her is her ability to make time slow down. She has such a patient energy to her; very present and grounded. I'm someone who loves to rush through everything, so it's often difficult for me to truly drop in and stay there. Amalia always kept a free and creative air around her and it's incredibly contagious. I really found this allowed for deeper connection and more play.

AH: There were some! I think most of them had to do with mine and Taylor’s physical ways of expressing love, as a cherry on top of a scene. In episode 3, there is a scene by the lacrosse field where the two say goodbye and I felt that the one scripted kiss was not enough for Scylla, so I leaned in for one more. I also improvised a playful lift in episode 5 that just felt natural in the context of the dialogue and the need to cheer each other up.

What’s your favorite Raylla scene? Why?

TH: I would definitely say the first Salva scene. It was iconic in establishing roots for the relationship and giving it a strong sense of direction. The beauty of Jon Joffin's cinematography gave it an otherworldly, almost psychedelic feel, and Brandon Roberts' score rounded out the scene in its intimacy. We shot both in the studio and on location, and seeing the finished product all tied in with special effects (I'm in love with the fireflies), helped me understand the initial pressure around shooting that scene. It paved the way for a legendary love. *chefs kiss* to our team!

AH: My favorite Raylla scene so far is at the end of episode 4 — at the sunrise after the night of Beltane when they walk together, both having had some serious turmoil within themselves. It is so beautifully shot. It’s up there next to the scene in episode 5 where Raelle says “She goes where I go” because the entire scene is charged with so much from all characters. Hmm, I do also love the deathcap scene at the graveyard in episode 2, but that one is so early on in the relationship, it’s kind of before they were even Raylla.

Thanks for taking the time, Taylor and Amalia! Check out Part 1 of the Spotlight here, and tune into Motherland: Fort Salem Wednesdays at 9pm/8c on Freeform. Next day on Hulu.

#motherland #ship spotlight #motherland fort salem #amalia holm #taylor hickson #raylla #Motherland: Fort Salem #motherlandfortsalem #raelle collar #scylla Ramshorn #Raelle and Scylla #raelle x scylla #witch #witches #witchblr

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murdereraisuha · 3 years

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Vargas Camp part 2 (1/2)

Welcome to the first part of my reaction to the 2nd part of Vargas Camp! More of a wild ride than I thought it would be. This post and the next will also summarize the events of the story.

Alright, Equestrian club’s searching for luminous flowers, find a flower in the swamp, oh nooo gotta avoid the mud, nah sebek’s fine, oh nooo fairies appeared around the campfire, whatever found the flower. Sebek scaled a fucking cliff for it ashdsdgdsh.

Okay Riddle’s made the potion, got the badge. Alright we’re going to fishing with magift club. Bro how big is this catfish that they need 2 mobs + epel to reel it in? 2 meters long oh shit. Alright got the fish, got the flower... don’t got the Leona? wow RIP Leona. Oh I love that awkward little bit of birds chirping as Ruggie waits for Leona to respond.

Now over to the track & field boys mining. Oh we’re going back to where we found the chandelier magic stone and the blot monster! Lore please? man, these poor fairies just keep getting beaten up. Anyway we got the badge but no lore :(

oh no Deuce is going back by himself to retrieve his forgotten pickaxe. He’s gonna join the missing gang isn’t he. Yep. I’m gonna theorize that the disappearances are connected to the fairies because the 3 people missing each went missing around a different area connected to the fairies.

Ace, lakeside, water fairies

Leona, forest, tree fairies

Deuce, mines, fire fairies

Here end’s Otome Ayui’s translation part 5, time to flex my own mediocre Japanese skills. Take the rest of this with a grain of salt.

It’s night, everyone did well. Jamil’s finally approaching Vargas about Ace being missing... and Vargas brushes it off the same as Floyd did. “he’ll return as soon as he’s hungry!” BRUH HE”S BEEN MISSING FOR A WHOLE DAY! no Grim that does not just mean he hasn’t eaten for a whole day dhgsldhglskhgds no it also does not mean that he just found delicious food that he doesn’t want to share with anyone else.

WAIT EXCUSE ME? “LOBSTER-SENSEI”????

A. AAAA> AAAA!?!?!? HE. VARGAS IS THE LOBSTER??>!??!?

:( okay anyway Jamil decides to trust Vargas’ judgement and not worry about Ace. bruh. Oh Ruggie and Epel are approaching them about Leona. Ah fuck, Ruggie also thinks they’re just slacking off. Jack’s here too! come onnnn guys. YES

The guys (minus equestrian club) are going to investigate Deuce’s disappearance in the mines! Oh okay no Deuce still has the reputation of an idiot who would slack off, it’s just Jack & Epel who don’t think he would do that. What good bros.

Epel is Guppy-chan! awwwww, cute. Anyway, Epel’s surprised here cause he found Deuce’s pickaxe leaning against a rock. The group finally comprehends how serious the situation is, and Jamil tells them to retreat since going further is dangerous.

It’s episode 5-3 now btw. The group’s arrived at the cottage to tell Vargas of what’s happening. The door isn’t locked, they walk inside to find all of Vargas’ stuff scattered around like someone’s broken in and wrecked the place. They realize Grim & MC are supposed to sleep near the cottage and they quickly go to find them. Luckily, they’re fine.

Grim retells what happened. While in the tent, they heard Vargas shouting “Ah! Stop! Help me!” Then, a big black shadow flew out from the cottage. After hearing that, the group goes back to the campsite to share what’s happened with the others. Everyone decides to wait at the campsite until morning then go back to campus through the mirror of darkness to bring the headmaster back.

At 2AM, people are still outside by the campfire, awake and waiting. Grim’s complaining about being cold, so a big group of people including Jamil and Epel decide to go get blankets. After a while of idle conversation and Floyd annoying Riddle, Silver starts to wonder why the blanket group is late. Ruggie theorizes that it’s just because carrying the blankets is hard work. Silver goes to investigate.

Blah blah blah Sebek saying stuff about Malleus. Ruggie gets worried that Silver and the blanket group haven’t come back yet. He realizes that those who leave the fire are probably getting attacked by the black shadow.

The people remaining who haven’t been snatched are Riddle, Floyd, Sebek, Jack, Ruggie, and some mobs. A rock suddenly comes flying at them and takes out the campfire! Mobs start crying out from being attacked and some start running. Riddle gets snatched when trying to protect Sebek. Floyd uses magic to reignite the fire and the attacks stop. (wow bro you really waited to do that AFTER Riddle gets attacked huh)

All the mobs are gone too, it’s only Floyd, Sebek, Jack, and Ruggie left. Geez this seriously is like a horror movie. Anyway, they still have no info aside from fire = safe. Jack and Sebek briefly argue cause Sebek thinks it was unnecessary for Riddle to try and help Sebek. Ruggie thinks someone should run to get the headmaster. Sebek and Jack don’t agree with running away from the enemy.

Gonna end this post here since I’m about halfway through the story I think. Next part is here!

#twst #twisted wonderland #twst spoilers #update screaming

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i-was-bored-so-this-happened · 3 years

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Rae Watches Wandavision

1x01 Filmed Before A Live Studio Audience

If you’d like to be tagged in future posts, let me know

We wait two days for spoilers to kill us

One of my birthday presents was Disney+ and I was going to watch Mandalorian first but then I saw some Wandavision episode 5 spoilers and my priorities changed

I’m not great at concentrating on black-and-white films, but if I put on subtitles like I usually do hopefully that’ll help me focus

I find it funny how on my laptop [I can’t download the app on my laptop] audio automatically sets to the first language available in alphabetical order - I went to watch a Muppet thing the other day and the audio was set to Cantonese - Wandavision is automatically set to Deustch [German]

I didn’t realise episodes were only around half an hour long. huh

I haven’t even started it yep whoops

YO WHY ARE THERE SUCH HUGE MCU SPOILERS IN THE MARVEL LOGO???????

“A regular husband and wife,” suurree

“My wife and her flying saucers” forgot Vision was English

Oh she’s got a bullet bra on and everything, alright

WANDA DOES LITTLE NOSE SCRUNCHIES

~miscommunicationnn~

Vision is now wearing his Paul Bettany disguise

It’s the 23rd of August - I’m noting that because apparently everything means everything in this show

Agnes!!

So....to the left then

How long have they been living here though?

“My mother-in-law was in town, so I wasn’t”

“Hey, the music isn’t bothering you, is it?” Well, uh....it is turned up full blast and facing away from you, I’m assuming you wanted it to bother him

I’m seeing the name Hart on a door in Vision’s office ~miscommunication intesnifiess~

Eyy, called it

Aww, poor Jones

“No skeletons in your closet, eh, Vision?” “I don’t have a skeleton, sir.”

MISCOMMUNICATION TWO, ELECTRIC BOOGALOO

Ohhh the ticker on the toaster’s red! I like that! Little introduction of something amiss that’s small enough you’re likely to miss it

The...ticking toaster is from Stark Industries? The bomb that killed her parents and the other bomb she was trapped with? wanda’s trauma still finding a way into this perfect reality she’s built?

“Forget the past. This is your future.”

Oof. Suddenly uncomfortable for a second there

Vision is incapable of forgetting or exaggerating but he can...be horny?

Beauty and the Beast style dress! them’s the vibes

I’ve decided I like Agnes

Surprise ukulele!

Huh. That’s interesting, burning the chicken and then reverting it back to eggs

THEY’RE SINGING OLD MACDONALD AJSSDK

PIG

Big fan of Paul Bettany in this

Uhh, lobster sticking out your trousers, Vis

“Good news is more expensive.”

The lobster is gone now

Ohh Wanda

Oh the ticking’s back

Did Wanda make him choke? Because he kept asking?

Oh dear, she’s controlling Vision too, isn’t she. That was not a question, that was an order and he reacted like a robot

Huh. Not a circle?

Bruh that’s...that’s seven minutes of credits for twenty minutes of showtime

#rae watches wandavision #wandavision #mcu #facetiae friday #rae's birthday #wandavision spoilers

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darley1101 · 5 years

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TRR MC ask

Thank you for asking about my TRR MC! Since you didn’t specify which one (I have one for each LI) I am going with Riley, who is madly in love with Maxwell.

Name: Riley Marie Cochran-Beaumont

Height: 5′10″

How do they tend to dress: After making it onto a Worst Dressed list, Riley only goes out in public wearing outfits selected by the stylist her brother in law made her hire. She hated it at first, especially when they threw away her favorite pair of ripped up jeans, but she’s slowly coming to appreciate not having to stress about what (or rather what not) to wear. Thankfully the stylist understands that Riley is a comfort over a couture kind of girl and puts together outfits that combine the two. (Of course Maxwell sneaked her favorite jeans back into their home and Riley wears them around the Estate)

Do they like how they look: From a very young age, Riley knew she was pretty. If her mother constantly telling her how beautiful she was hadn’t driven the point home the countless beauty pageants she won would have. Knowing she is pretty doesn’t make her conceited though. She looks at her pretty face as just one of the many things that make up who she is.

Are they an only child or do they have siblings: Much to Riley’s dismay she is an only child. She envies people who have siblings and likes to remind Maxwell of how lucky he is to have Bertrand...even when ole Bert is being an uptight control freak.

Are they a morning person or a night owl: Morning person by nature, night owl by necessity...that’s Riley. If she had her way she would rise in time to watch the sun come over the horizon, but nobles love ‘negotiating’ until the wee hours. Maxwell keeps saying she will get used to the wonky schedule a noble must keep but Riley isn’t so sure. She just wants to go to bed early dang it!

Are they a cat person or a dog person: Before being adopted by a stray cat that just wandered in and refused to leave, Riley was strictly a dog person. Why wouldn’t she be? She had the cutest puppers ever! Chance the Corgi! Now she is “mom” to Chance the Corgi and his BFF Rosie the renegade cat.

Got any favorite foods: Hot dogs. It probably sounds strange (maybe even gross) to some but to Riley there is nothing more delicious than a New York street vendor hot dog on a warm bun and lathered in ketchup. She’s learning to love the fancier foods served at court functions but deep down, no matter how much lobster or caviar she eats, she still wants a hot dog.

How about favorite drinks: Fruit infused martinis. The can knock them back like nobodies business.

What are their favorite movies/tv shows: Riley is a bit weird when it comes to shows. She will only watch it after is aired in its entirety and she can binge watch it start to finish. She’s too impatient to wait for new episodes to come out. Movies aren’t really her thing but she has to watch one it better have Ryan Sommers in it.

Do they have any hidden talents: Since her mother loved to shove her into beauty pageants, Riley has several talents. The first, and Maxwell’s favorite, is twirling batons that have been lit on fire. She can also play the bagpipes (hey, any pageant girl can play the flute...bag pipes make you stand out...or so her mother says) and has mastered Irish folk dancing.

Do they believe in love at first sight: She hoped a plane with strangers to fly to a foreign country, pretended to be interested in a prince, just so she could be there when Maxwell realized....duh...he was in love with the waitress! Cause, you know, she fell in love the moment she laid eyes on him. And yes, she knows how insane (and borderline creepy) that all sounds.

Who is their love interest: Lord Maxwell Percival Beaumont.

What are their guilty pleasures: Binge watching cooking series on Netflix while wearing nothing but her panties and a tank top while eating ice cream. Its weird, but that’s Riley for you. Maxwell doesn’t seem to mind.

What are they afraid of: Sharks absolutely terrify her. Her older cousin forced her to go to a revival of Jaws where they had to sit in tubes on a lake watching the movie. During one of the attack scenes her cousin thought it would be funny to convince her the fish that kept brushing against her legs were really baby sharks getting ready to eat her. She was six at the time.

What was their dream job as a kid: To be a fairy princess of course!

Is it still their dream: Nah, being a Duchess is so much better! Besides, if she was a princess it would being married to one of her best friends and that just wouldn’t work! She loved Maxwell and Liam was in love with a different waitress. (oops, Maxwell brought the wrong one!)

Have they ever broken a bone: Her big toe. Who knew dropping a bag pipe on her foot would be so painful!

Have they ever been in trouble with the law: Do speeding tickets count?

Three Other Random Facts:

-Riley was the first runner up in the USA TEEN MISS pageant. She’s proud of getting that far but her mother isn’t. “First runner up is really just a nice way of saying you’re the first loser.”

-She really wants a large family; four possibly five kids. Being an only child sucked. There was so much pressure to live up to her parents, particularly her mother’s, expectations. No way she is doing that to a child!

-Rosie that cat has really grown on her. In some ways she, gulp, prefers the feline’s company over Chance the Corgi’s.

#choices #mc asks #get to know my mc #the royal romance #maxwell x mc #mc x maxwell

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eenefangirlanalysis · 5 years

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Cutting back to Sarah and Jimmy’s subplot, the passengers are served their lunch.

While Jonny is served... 9butter and beans?) Plank apparently special ordered.

Did Jimmy cook this lobster? Then he and Eddy have a cooking competition skill.

“What do you mean you special ordered?!”

Ed, Edd n Eddy would be nothing without Jonny and Plank.

As if by some miracle Eddy grabs onto the balloon.

But makes the mistake of spouting out his victory in the direct line of his helicopter hair and goes careening down to the ground.

But, fortunately, and how rather unfortunate for poor Jimmy, Eddy lands right on top of Jimmy.

Instead of worrying about Jimmy’s injuries, Sarah starts her rant at the Eds for continuously interrupting their game. This is only the second time around. Maybe that should have been a more recurring gag throughout the episode. This would have been the third time the Eds interrupted which was the final straw.

Ed tries to make everything better and points out the red balloon.

And then this sweet little moment happens where the Eds all stand close together watching the balloon.

It’s rare to witness the Eds in such a tender moment. This balloon really means something special to them. As I have said balloons represent friendship. Season 3 was where the Eds friendship was starting to get rocky. Still, they have stayed together through thick and thin. They don’t have anyone if they ever broke up.

Even when their relationship is really bad through season 5 they have a day where they experience what it is like if they ever lost their friendship. It is a nightmare.

These three boys who have the same name, but different in personality, are important to one another. They have helped each other learn, take risks, and to be happy.

And just like that Sarah grabs the balloon and runs off.

Jimmy eagerly states, “Ooh, goody! Revenge!”

Once the Eds give chase, Jonny and Plank are left along.

“Looks like we get to fly the plane, huh, Plank?”

I wish we could have seen this turnout!

#ed edd n eddy #eene #ed ed and away #eene season 3 appreciation month #Jonny #Plank #Sarah #Jimmy

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jinghanyang · 4 years

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TV Episodes

THE SECOND WORLD

1. John

In the ward of the hospice, John sitting beside the window, his hair was full of the white. The sunset through the window come into the room and shining on the John’s face. John sitting on his wheel and wrapping in the blanket. He is watching the leaflet on his hand. He saw many words on leaflet said, ‘SAVE WORLD, SAVE HUMAN’,’YOU’RE THE WORLD HERO’,’THE SECOND WORLD LIFE, THE AFTER-DEAD LIFE’,’REMEMBER YOUR CODE: G20738946…’. After soon, John closing his eyes and fall in sleep. John seem like saw his body become the bobbles and flying in the air.

2. Life Cinema

Suddenly, John feeling the noisy around him. And the noisy woke up John. He was slowly opened his eyes impatiently. John found he was sitting in a cinema, but the auditorium only has himself. Then, the screen slowly showing the movie title ‘JOHN’S LIFE’. John looking at the screen. The screen playing the show fast. It was playing ‘the moment of the John to be born, firstly go to school, grow up and be an adult, get married, his first child come out… ‘. John thinking, ‘Is this the second life? The after-dead life?’ Then, ending of the movie and came up the subtitle. ‘CONGRATULATION! YOU ’RE THE 269,380,406 MEMBERS, PLEASE CHECK YOUR LIFT ARM, YOUR CODE NUMBER: G20738946 ON IT’.

3. Who is ‘DEATH’

At this time, a stronger light suddenly come into the dark cinema. John puts hand on his eyes for resist that stronger light. He saw two dark shadows in this light, one tall and one short shadow slowly close to him. These two dark shadows thin and tall, they’re wearing in the big black cloak. And they held their aircraft which shape is seem like the Death’s Sickle. John feeling shocked. The dark shadow is Floch and his intern student. And Floch explain to John, ‘they’re just the worker who are working for people. In THE SECOND WORLD, here have thousands of ‘Deaths’. And the ‘Death’ is a job, it is same to others different jobs’. John hesitated to follow them out of the dark cinema. John feeling scared. Floch and his intern student bring John to GOD COMPANY. There is responsible fore charger of THE SECOND WORLD company. Then, they’re using Floch’s aircraft to fly into the sky.

4. The important GOD COMPANY

Then, they’re arrived the GOD COMPANY. When they come into the company hall, John found here is quiet and peoples are orderly working in here. Floch bring John into the lift, they’re up to the 23rd floors immediately. Then, Floch motion John go into the 33rd room where is front of John. When John walked into the 33rd room, John found a virtual computer person who is standing back to him. He names is Gade No.6, and he is one of the GOD COMPANY managers, came from the main world (real world). Gade No.6 work is help people to calculate their scores and guide people their life in THE SECOND WORLD. Gade No.6 using a screen to showing John’s scores. It’s 365240 points. Gade No.6 explain that scores come from the good things and bad things John did before. Gade No.6 told John he could work in THE SECOND WORLD to earn points for buying any of goods.

5. First meet Gade No.6

Gade No.6 told John here’s people are needn’t to eat or drink anything. John feeling confused, and don’t know how to use his points. Gade No.6 explain in THE SECOND WORLD, here have the score shop, you could exchange your home, your device, your clothes, even your new life in the main world, to start new life in the main life. Then, Gade No.6 showing the works in THE SECOND WORLD. And recently THE SECOND WORLD add one more new work, it’s kind of like a sport work. John feeling surprised. Because he was a successful athlete when he was young. John crazy for sport. John think he is too old and couldn’t work anymore. Then Gade No.6 told John, ‘In THE SECOND WORLD, you won’t get older or get ill or die. You will get the perfect status to working every day.’ Gade No.6 give the score shop’s address to John and told John to go there. John suddenly feeling surprise and happy for his life in THE SECOND WORLD.

6. The score shop

John look at his left arm screen, he found that shop address and going there. He found a colourful shop which is decoration by full of colourful neon. John walk into this score shop. John saw a person who looks like a child in this score shop. He wears a big, circle glasses, and sitting on the chair which is flying in the air. His name is Scott, he was busy to tallying the goods. John looking for the manager of scores shop, John thought he just a child for the score shop. But Scott is the shop manager. Scott manage score shop for many hundreds years. Scott made by THE SECOND WORLD system. Same as NPS in the game. After Scott told John he is the shop manager, Scott check for John’s scores. Then, Scott bring John to show the goods from the score shop.

7. ‘NEW LIFE’

Scott bring John walk into a hall of this shop. Here have many of different shapes neon screens full of this big colourful hall. This hall is selling the ‘NEW LIFE’. It’s not only had the human being choice, also have any species selection can offer people to buy. John ask how many points could change the cheapest species. Scott told John become the ant, it only needs 12.3 billion points. Scott also list the other species. For example, become the kitty, 386 billion points. To become the dog, 588 billion points. To become the lobster, 132 billion points. Then, John ask how many points could change the human being. Scott told John It need 1000 billion. They’re too expensive and John can’t afford anything. John suddenly feeling upset and lost for his life. Scott found John feeling upset, then took John to other room.

8. Home in THE SECOND WORLD

Scott bring John to another hall. This hall is different than last hall. It is full of the white and cool colours. John feeling confused. He looks at this white and rugged hall. Then John take a closer look, he found many of apartment models. Scott told John here is house selling room. The house is just the program for people. To provide people a place to live. John still feeling confused, John thought they’re just the programs, why should them need a program to live. Scott patiently to told John. ‘The house program is more like the shelter. It will protect you. If you don’t have any house to live, you will be the tramp, always stay outside. One day your program will have the virus intrusion, and your program will be crashed. You will be died in real.’ John took a breath and feeling scared. Scott told John the house is cheap, and don’t worry about it. Then, John start to looking at these models and select it.

9. Get my new home

John standing front by a little white apartment model. John’s eyes are attracted by this little model. John decide to buying this little ‘house’, but John don’t know how to pay for it, then John asked Scott. Scott take out a device to John, the device shape kind of like a screen. A stronger light suddenly shining to the John’s eyes. John using his hand to cover his eyes. Then, the payment successful, Scott make that house program into John personal program. Then, Scott told John how to using his personal program to back into his house. Also, Scott give John Miss Walker’s address. She is the work manager. Then, Scott disappeared in the air. Here only has John standing in this hall. John looking at his screen and ready to go for Miss Walker.

10. The Work in THE SECOND WORLD

Miss Walker sitting in an office, and a large floor to ceiling window beside to her. Miss Walker wearing a delicate suit, her neat curls are scattered on her body. Miss Walker concentrated on her works. A knock door sound suddenly come. John walk into the office and sitting front Miss Walker’s office desk. Miss Walker give John a screen and showing the work category for John. But John already decide he want to get the sport work. Then, Miss Walker send sport workplace to John, also arrangement sport staff to John. After then, Miss Walker continue to concentrate on her work. John quietly to leaving the office room.

11. Fantasy workplace

John comes to his workplace. It is a huge transparent glass cover building. John could see their hard working inside clearly. John standing outside this building a while. The glass cover could show John face. John raised his left foot and tried to get in, but suddenly silently took his foot back. John thought, is that my life in THE SECOND WORLD, what do I want in here? Then, John decide to back his home.

12. Rest

John up his left arm and turn on ‘go back home mode’. Then he gets in a white private space immediately. It’s kind of like a white box. Then, John touched the white walls. A menu come out suddenly. That is a customizable room, it could change any mode for you room. For example, ‘DAY/NIGHT’. Also, it could change your room or furniture’s colour. John looks that dazzling menu page and feeling tired. Then, John turn on night mode and get bed for rest. Then John thought, is it going to start my THE SECOND WORLD? Why could THE SECOND WORLD exist? What do I want in here? Is this really what everyone wants? Then, John fall in sleep.

13. The world is the world

When John wake up again, John found he sitting beside the window. John looking at the sunset, he feeling this scene is very familiar. Till John found the leaflet in his hand, he realized. John found the picture in his hand is a photo of the details of the cemetery park that his daughter sent him. He realized, there is no THE SECOND WORLD exist, it’s all the imagine. John smelling at this moment. John looking at the sunset, then he looking at the photo in his hand. Suddenly, he found a string of code on the photo left corner. The code is ‘G20738946’…

#TV series

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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WandaVision Episode 3 Theories Explained

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This article contains spoilers for WandaVision episodes 1-3, and the wider Marvel Cinematic Universe.

The internet is full of places to go and thrash it out with likeminded overthinkers if you become obsessed with a particular TV show. Lost, Breaking Bad, Twin Peaks and Game of Thrones all boasted thriving fan communities who had a blast dreaming up theories about where their series’ story was heading. Now, Marvel’s WandaVision has tapped into the natural curiosity of viewers with its wall-to-wall Easter eggs and mysterious MCU nods, and people have gone full ‘It’s Always Sunny red string meme’ over them.

You don’t need to dig too far to find comment sections, YouTube videos and Reddit threads jam-packed with theories about WandaVision, so we’ve been mulling over what might be going on beneath the surface.

Here are some of the most intriguing fan theories about WandaVision, three episodes in…

Online Catch

Just as Ultron’s consciousness could escape into the internet during Avengers: Age of Ultron, a developing WandaVision theory posits that Vision didn’t exactly ‘die’ by Thanos (and Wanda’s) hand in Avengers: Infinity War, but found a safe space to hide online instead, much like JARVIS did after Ultron destroyed him in the lab.

By creating a new reality stitched together from old TV sitcoms and potentially using the late Tony Stark’s burgeoning BARF tech, Wanda may have found a way to slowly bring Vision back to his body without the Mind Stone as an essential component – hey, Shuri thought was an option – but if these efforts to retrieve Vision from the internet are all above board, why is SWORD so desperate to get information on what’s happening inside Wanda’s Westview nook?

Pinches of Paprika Out of Ten: 10

Camp Lehigh

Camp Lehigh has popped up in the MCU a fair few times so far. The New Jersey military base was where Captain America trained in the 1940s, has been a SHIELD facility, a HYDRA hub, and a storage home for the Tesseract. Lehigh even housed Arnim Zola’s brain after his body died. Since Westview is supposedly in New Jersey, is it really Camp Lehigh?

There’s a theory that after the Avengers compound was destroyed during Avengers: Endgame, Wanda may have been taken to a hastily-rebuilt Camp Lehigh in the midst of her grief, eventually constructing a forcefield around an altered version of it at some point and shutting out SWORD, hence SWORD’s continuing efforts to penetrate it.

Pinches of Paprika Out of Ten: 8

Power Swap

Some viewers were puzzled by Vision’s accelerated speed when he flipped through the playing cards during his magic act in episode 2 and when he ran to get the doctor in episode 3, which we haven’t really seen before as part of his powers. Vision can phase through matter, and can also fly at an accelerated speed, but these moments felt more Quicksilver-ish in their nature. Has Wanda or whoever is behind the creation of Westview pieced this new version of Vision together with shattered memories of others that she’s loved and lost?

Pinches of Paprika Out of Ten: 8

Welcome to Skrullville

Wanda’s Westview neighbors may not be willing or able to reveal their true nature yet, but some people are wondering whether they will turn out to be a gang of shapeshifting Skrulls, just like Ben Mendelsohn’s Captain Marvel character, Talos. How the Skrulls could have possibly become roped into the scenario is currently anyone’s guess, but we do know the alien race will play a pivotal role in Marvel’s upcoming Nick Fury-centric Disney+ series, Secret Invasion.

Pinches of Paprika Out of Ten: 7

Young Avengers

Now that Wanda’s twins could conceivably grow up to become their Wiccan and Speed comics counterparts, it may be a chance for Marvel to pave the way for Young Avengers, a team whose line-up has previously included Kate Bishop (soon to be introduced in Disney+ series Hawkeye), Cassie Lang (Ant-Man’s now-grownup daughter) and America Chavez (already reportedly cast in Doctor Strange in the Multitude of Madness). We wrote more about Billy and Tommy, and what they could mean for the MCU, right here.

Pinches of Paprika Out of Ten: 5

The Butterfly Effect

We’ve been told that WandaVision will set up the events of Marvel’s Sorcerer Supreme sequel, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, so fans have been keeping their eyes peeled for ties to Strange’s comics history and his MCU story so far. Episode 3 seemed to make a couple of nods to the good Doctor – after Westview’s OB-GYN Dr. Nielson checks on Wanda’s pregnancy progress, Vision assures him he has nerves of steel, and calls him “Mr. Doctor”, a callback to Strange’s banter with villain Kaecilius (Mads Mikkelsen).

There are also the butterflies that materialize as Wanda is preparing to give birth to her twins, one of which lands on Vision and looks very similar to the first ‘out of place’ thing Strange sees after he’s taken on a mind-melting tour of the multiverse by The Ancient One in Doctor Strange. As he heads up into the Earth’s atmosphere, Strange notices a single butterfly remarkably like those that flutter into Wanda’s nursery, and when The Ancient One begins to talk Strange through opening his mind’s eye, she asks “What is real? What mysteries lie beyond the reach of your senses? At the root of existence, mind and matter meet. Thoughts shape reality.” Hmm…

Rewatched Doctor Strange and noticed something…..interesting from WANDAVISION

Pinches of Paprika Out of Ten: 5

Westview Is Mephisto’s Womb

There’s a theory flying around online that Westview is acting as a kind of mystical womb that will eventually give birth to a fully-realised Mephisto in our world. The Marvel Comics villain and all-around pain in the ass has already been teased in a trailer for Disney+’s Loki series, but may first come to fruition inside Wanda’s powerful-but-twisted reality.

A specific creature has featured in each episode of WandaVision so far. Some fans think these are Mephisto’s evolving “animal stages” – first appearing as a lobster to represent “mating for life” (they don’t, but sitcom Friends played a large part in the myth), a rabbit representing reproduction, and a stork manifesting during the “birth” stage of episode 3. Will Wanda and Vision get a young puppy in the next episode? Probably!

An trailer image from a future episode of WandaVision, where you can see a doghouse marked “Sparky”

Pinches of Paprika Out of Ten: 5

Hawkeye Will Save the Day

Apart from Vision, Clint Barton is the Avenger with the closest relationship to Wanda. He inspired her to take action and fight her way through her fear during the final battle with Ultron and his hoards in Avengers: Age of Ultron, and it was Clint who came to her aid when Tony Stark put her under house arrest in Captain America: Civil War.

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At the time, Tony took his frustrations out on Steve for helping to concoct the plan to pull Wanda out, saying Steve rescued Wanda “from a place she doesn’t even want to leave, a safe place.” Scarlet Witch didn’t take much convincing to leave the Avengers’ compound during Civil War, so Tony’s assertions felt off, but in WandaVision she genuinely doesn’t seem to want to leave her safe bubble.

Though many online rumors point to Doctor Strange facing off against Wanda at the end of the series, will Hawkeye actually be the one who breaks through to her?

Pinches of Paprika Out of Ten: 5

No It’s Becky

It’s long been rumored that Evan Peters has a role in WandaVision. The actor continued to play the X-Men’s Pietro Maximoff, aka Quicksilver, long after the MCU had killed off its own version of the speedster at the end of Avengers: Age of Ultron, and he quickly became a fan favorite. Could WandaVision’s upcoming Roseanne homage be key to how Peters briefly enters the MCU?

If you recall, Roseanne Barr’s successful sitcom replaced her daughter Becky with another actress – Scrubs star Sarah Chalke – when original star Lecy Goranson left, and the audience was expected to accept it. With Wanda’s mind now lingering on the loss of her twin brother Pietro, this could be the kind of classic TV trope we could expect to see, and it would also be a fun-but-bittersweet appearance for Marvel fans who have probably seen the last of Peters as Quicksilver in the X-Men film franchise.

Pinches of Paprika Out of Ten: 4

Ad Infinity

HYDRA has clearly been a factor in WandaVision’s commercial breaks, with the organization’s logo appearing during two of them so far, but what if the theme of the ads goes beyond its callback to Wanda’s pre-Age of Ultron experiments under HYDRA boss Baron Wolfgang von Strucker, and represents the unique capabilities of the Infinity Stones, too?

A growing swathe of MCU fans think the Stark toaster represents the Power Stone, the Strucker watch represents the Time Stone, and that the team behind WandaVision weren’t really hiding Hydra Soak’s likeness to the Space Stone/Tesseract during episode 3.

Post-Endgame, the stones were reduced to the atomic level by Thanos, but the Space Stone may still be out there in its Tesseract form thanks to Loki’s thieving hands. It can’t be a coincidence that Hydra Soak is the more fully-formed MacGuffin here, can it?

Is it just me or those the “Hydra Soak” look a lot like the tesseract… from WANDAVISION

Pinches of Paprika Out of Ten: 3

Have you heard any compelling new theories about WandaVision since episode 3 arrived? Let us know in the comments.

The post WandaVision Episode 3 Theories Explained appeared first on Den of Geek.

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thereleventist-blog · 6 years

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The turkey is in the brine, the football is inflated to a perfect 50 psi, and the television is on a timer to turn off exactly when those stupid parades start. It seems you’ve prepared for everything. But there might be one thing you’ve overlooked: thinking of all the things you should NOT talk about on Thanksgiving. Most people open their mouths and let words fly out without thinking a single thought about it. Many a misspoken word can be forgiven, but there are some boundaries which cannot be uncrossed. Here are 12 Topics to Avoid at Thanksgiving Dinner.

1. Local and/or Ancient Roman Politics

You have invited people from all over to your Thanksgiving Day dinner. They have all brought different desserts and guess what? They’ve brought different baggage from their local political situations as well. Everyone thinks their own mayor, sales taxes, and bad roads are so very interesting that they never stop to realize it’s all boring. Stan doesn’t even live in the city limits and he’s getting upset about the water department taking over the duties of the city waste disposal department. Then he goes on about how the aqueducts couldn’t carry away the trash of the Roman populace. At that point cousin Nate slams his fist down, grabs his dinner knife and screams “Yes, they could! That’s what they killed Caesar over! And I’ll do it to you, too!” At that point the children start crying. And we have to reassure them that the Senate was actually upset about his being named dictator for life. And though it helps, it doesn’t always pacify the young’uns. All the while you sit there, poking at the peas with your fork, bored out of your skull. Just put down that knife and sit in the awkward silence that family deserves.

2. Squid vs Octopus

Science has yet to prove there is a difference between the two, yet everyone still believes they know which one is which. It’s embarrassing. None of your family are scientists, and yet they all take hard lined stances on the subject. It’s almost exactly the lobster vs. crab debate from last year or the horse vs. zebra discourse of ‘09, but much more pointless and volatile. Steer clear of this subject. Don’t serve any seafood that could spark such a debate. If this does happen, the best of you will wake up from your tryptophan comas and wonder what the heck you were thinking, the rest will carry resentment over the matter well past Boxing Day.

Can you “spot” the difference?

3. What was the Best Episode of Jeopardy

Let’s face it, pretty much every episode is the same. This discussion always devolves into whether Alex Trebek should have shaved his mustache or not. If you want to have a conversation about types of mustaches and if they are a good idea in general, then knock yourselves out. But don’t have this important discussion under the guise of ranking episodes of Jeopardy. It’s not fair to you, it’s not fair to Alex Trebek.

4. The Best Way to Start a Retirement Fund

If there is one thing that brings a family together it’s money. But money doesn’t always bring happiness and contentment. I once heard from my mutual funds manager that most fights about money are about how to save for retirement. Although the general consensus is to invest in trinkets and subscription based services there are those that often disagree. Financial advisor Ira Roth has been the source of many family squabbles. He suggests stocks or accounts or something less fun. And more and more people are taking hard stances nowadays. So we recommend avoiding this subject all together.

5. Christmas

It’s still November, yet the shrill voices of children singing Yuletide songs has been scraping against your eardrums for at least six weeks now. Your job has essentially laid you off for four days when you need to be away from the house the most. And to top it all off, Aunt Kathy has decided it’s the perfect time to talk about what to do for a holiday that’s a whole month away. You aren’t even done with this drudgery and you are summoned to negotiate an even bigger ordeal than the one you’re currently trying to navigate as you rapidly slip into a culinarily induced coma. Not only that, but half of your family are Jehovah’s Witnesses. Which just adds to the drama because they are upset about celebrating Thanksgiving in the first place. If the subject comes up, the most diplomatic way to handle it is to start singing “The Monster Mash” as loudly as you can followed by “How do you like mixing holidays now? Huh?”

6. Cousin Gerald’s Seat on the First Shuttle to Mars

The ticket is bought. It is non-refundable. It was expensive and probably a scam. But he’s proud of it. He’s proud of the fact that his score on the 20 question IQ test he took on the internet was so good that he was automatically offered 20% off the already low low price. He’s proud that they waived the required physical because he paid with a money order. It’s a time to be THANKFUL. Don’t go around bursting Gerry’s bubble. That’s the kind of conversation for St. Patrick’s Day. Change the subject.

7. What Knot is Best

Possibly the best knot for these kinds of situations.

Dinner is over. Every belly is full. The dishes are stacked to the ceiling with care. And we all know what that means: “Let the Thanksgiving festivities begin!” So you try to take the initiative and hang the Pilgrim Piñata (something no one ever wants to do) and immediately you get an earful from your uncle Jack about how your square knot is the wrong knot and how you should be using a hogshead knot (something you’re not sure actually exists). Uncle Jack’s chastising under the pretense of ‘helping’ is quickly interrupted by your Grandpa’s two cents on how how a fisherman’s knot used to be all you needed to know. Soon all the men and most of the older women in your family are in a heated discussion about knots that no one wants to admit is getting heated, so everyone is talking in aggressively pleasant tones and fake laughing way too much. And the worst of it is, you were initially really proud that you had perfected the square knot in the first place. Avoid the conversation by not trying. Who’s ready for the Thanksgiving piñata?

8. The War of the Roses

You DO NOT want to go there. You don’t have enough information to make a valid point and you’re just going to end up looking like a FOOL. Everyone thinks they can hold their own when entering this conversation but no one has actually done any research beyond the occasional episode of “The White Queen” or a historical treatise here and there. The whole thing is a vain attempt to look smarter than your idiot cousin who’s only real skill is BSing his way through life. Good luck with that. Just stuff your mouth full of mashed potatoes and let it go.

9. The Beatles or The Rolling Stones

Pictured from left to right: Micky Dolenz, Peter Tork, Davy Jones, Michael Nesmith

Most people either don’t realize or refuse to accept the fact that The Beatles and The Rolling Stones consisted of the same musicians. The Beatles were so famous and out of their minds that they had to create alternate personas just to keep their brains from exploding. In fact they did it twice more. Once as Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band and the other as The Monkees. So forget arguing an essentially moot argument. Instead argue if the Rolling Stones were better than Elvis. That’s a valid argument. Argue that

10. How Dry/Moist the Turkey Is

Ugh. Small talk. The Thanksgiving version of talking about the weather. It only serves to hurt the cooks feelings or stroke their ego. It’s stupid, pointless, and sadistic. I want to blow my brains out.

11. Grandma’s Will

Although we’ve known for years that Mam-Maw only has days left, I must advise that it would be prudent to leave the subject of her Last Will and Testament alone. Remember five years ago, when we found out that she didn’t have one? Well, you nagged her into writing one on her own because you didn’t want to force her into doing something she wasn’t willing to do. But she had already slipped so far from reality that it turned out completely incoherent. And what did make sense would ruin the family for years to come. Well, next year you suggested she write a new one. Too bad for you, because Great Aunt Gladys hired a lawyer and threatened to sue you and cut you out of the will completely if there was any suspicion of foul play or tampering. And it only got worse from there. Cut your losses and get over it.

12. Any Shared Family Memory

We use the term “shared” loosely. Any memory that more than one family member might have will invariably be variable. More than that most events from long ago will be so downright contradictory that any outsider would wonder if these people are related at all. A good way to deflect this is to bring up a memory that none of your family share. Unfortunately, this will come at the price of your dignity. That’s right. Revealing your most shocking and embarrassing secrets is a surefire way to keep the rest of the family from shouting you down in dissent and instead keep them shouting you down in disgust. Who are you kidding? There is no possible way to keep your family from fighting. But at least this time they won’t be calling you a liar. Except for your mom, who believes she raised you better than that.

Surely another successful Thanksgiving is at hand so long as you let these sleeping dogs lie. Memories will form like never before and, who knows, maybe some new traditions will be formed, too. Just remember, if some uncouth relative brings up one of these subjects, you don’t have to get involved. And, if there’s any doubt, have a seat at the kids table. No one there is going to write you out of their will.

Horace Dunmar

#thanksgiving #politics #family #the beatles #the rolling stones #the monkees #squid #octopus #zebra #horse #turkey #war of the roses #the white queen #jeopardy #alex trebek #pumpkin pie #turkey day

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truemedian · 4 years

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Even a lesser John Mulaney-hosted Saturday Night Live is pretty funny

John MulaneyScreenshot: Saturday Night Live TV ReviewsAll of our TV reviews in one convenient place. “I mean a lot to a small group of people.” If your third SNL hosting gig is your weakest yet and is still consistently funny, well, you’re probably John Mulaney. The former SNL writer turned award-winning stand-up and almost apologetic actor is just funny. That’s perhaps not an enlightening way to describe the guy, but there’s a certain kind of comedian who just is. That’s Mulaney, taking the mic for his third opening monologue since he left the writers room and slaying with habitual, deceptively effortless ease. Joking about his eccentric career path to date, Mulaney explained that he is the host who’d done the least between his second and third hosting stints, his self-effacing shtick both cheeky and spot-on. (A set-ender about a Make-A-Wish girl confessing that her second choice Mulaney introducing her to that week’s guest Lin Manuel Miranda actually made her wish come true struck exactly the Mulaney sweet spot of potentially edgy and hilariously apt.) Mulaney’s always going to be Mulaney (even as a cartoon pig) his specific, knowingly oversized delivery marking him out as the funniest voice in any room. That doesn’t necessarily make for the most versatile Saturday Night Live host, but, with Mulaney’s intimacy with the show to guide things, tonight’s episode made typically fine use of one of its funniest, if most unlikely, superstar alums. But back to funny. With a sketch veteran like Mulaney in house, jokes just work better. He knows the rhythm of a sketch inside out, and slots himself into a role with the confidence of a guy who simply knows how the machine operates. (A little cue card hesitancy notwithstanding.) Which is a good thing, as the sketches tonight weren’t themselves stellar. The big news any time John Mulaney hosts these days is just whichever aspect of New York culinary-mercantile sketchiness will be the subject of a lavishly produced musical number, and, while tonight’s Broadway ode to LaGuardia Airport sushi is third in line behind (in order of undeniable delightfulness) “Diner Lobster” and “Bodega Bathroom,” it follows the overall theme of the night that third-best Mulaney on SNL is still thoroughly enjoyable SNL. Look, nothing’s ever going to capture the surprise victory of that first sketch—just like any recurring bit, there’s an element of giving the audience what they’re there to expect that saps some of the initial live-wire weirdness from the enterprise. But, apart from the central players in the set-up (Chris Redd and Mulaney as the New Yorkers horrified at Pete Davidson’s unwise choice of NYC convenience amenity), there’s a no-doubt inexhaustible well of petty New York gripes and vomit-worthy eccentricities for Mulaney and his fellow Big Apple veterans to plumb for extravagantly silly numbers whose disproportionate response is part of the gag. Here, we get Kenan as a plane-downing goose Phantom, Cecily Strong as an operatically remorseful, long-ago sushi chef (that spicy tuna is from 2018), Kate McKinnon as pretzel-hawking Auntie Orphan Annie blaming everything on de Blasio, Beck Bennett as the somehow unaccompanied baby on your flight, and—capping things off with a double dose of Mulaney’s Sack Lunch Bunch shenanigans—musical guest David Byrne as a “Road To Nowhere”-singing “baggage handler who throws your luggage into Long Island Sound,” and Jake Gyllenhaal, rigged up to fly as the traveler in pajamas who’s creepily enthusiastic about the TSA pat-down. (“You don’t have to use the backs of your hands!”) Taking the whole show into the audience to end the sketch amidst a shower of loose-wire sparks with Byrne singing the way, the whole thing was delightfully, goofily unnecessary.

Best/Worst Sketch Of The Night

So, apart from that one, I thought Mulaney’s stand-up persona found its truest home in the Sound Of Music sketch, a musical dissection of just how creepy that whole “I am 16, going on 17" romance subplot is. With Cecily’s Liesl (in ridiculously fine voice as ever) beginning to question her beloved sort-of Nazi suitor Kurt’s blond, Aryan suitability, Mulaney keeps slipping in the sort of wise-ass asides his comedy is built around, as Kurt keeps confessing to being more like “17, going on 47" as the song goes on. (Oh, and he’s planning to move them into an apartment with a lot of suspiciously Aryan roommates, including one named Goebbels.) With Mulaney’s Kurt alternating between snarking about his beloved’s growing number of reservations (“Wow, she’s got a list.”), and smoothly crooning away her reservations about the whole Nazi thing (“Focus on the age stuff.”), the piece was a perfect use of Mulaney. Him assuring Liesl, “This is Austria, nineteen-thirty-bad: In a few weeks this will be the least of your worries,” was the ideal synthesis of host, delivery, and premise. Any sketch matching Kate and Aidy at its center is an automatic contender, and the return of their melodramatically feuding 1950s sisters in the classic Say, These Two Don’t Seem To Like Each Other gave the ever-delightful duo a chance to outdo each other with bitchy period skullduggery in advance of their shared suitor’s arrival. The joke is, once again, that their Davis-Crawford (pretty much literal) back-stabbing proves helpless against the unwitting charms of a much more conventionally attractive family member (here, Mulaney’s returning sailor and “pass-around party bottom”). Having the joke that Beck Bennett’s Admiral (somehow being promoted from Corporal last time) is in a closeted frenzy at Mulaney’s oblivious nautical sexiness (shades of Kimmy Schmidt’s “Daddy’s Boy” and Hail, Caesar!’s “No Dames”) is hacky but funny, with Beck, Kate, and Aidy all doing absurdly over-the-top mugging (including a straight-up “Ha-ga-goo-ga-goo-ga-gaaa!”) while maintaining their 1950s film noir demeanor, and I laughed at pretty much all of it. Mulaney’s gift for straight-manning (as opposed to party-bottoming) was used to fine effect again in the meme sketch, where his suburban uncle angrily whips up a slide show of college-age nephew Pete Davidson’s reddit jokes at his expense. Mulaney makes the uncle’s outrage at being the internet’s #whitecollarvirgin simultaneously righteous and comically out-of-touch, as the memes keep coming. (His awkwardly grinning Facebook profile picture overlaid with “When ya’ll kissing and she say, ‘That’ll be $200'” is introduced with Mulaney’s hilariously perplexed, “This next one was tweeted by rapper Ice-T!”) There’s not much more to the sketch but watching Mulaney flesh out a portrait of out-of-touch suburban dudgeon, but’s just so great at it. Like more than a few sketches tonight, there were some pacing/timing issues, here mainly at the expense of an ending. Beck Bennett and Kyle Mooney got to do their behind-the-scenes thing with a filmed sketch about Mooney—tired of all the “geek” roles coming his way—deciding to turn their shared office into a gym in order to get cast in Mulaney’s proposed male stripper sketch. The pair’s signature self-parody here clanks alongside the admirable monstrousness of Mooney’s post-transformation prosthetics, as he immediately becomes a smugly buff, absurdly pumped-up dudebro (thanks to, among other things, the absurdist delight that is guest trainer Justin Theroux as himself), scooping a muscles-smitten Chloe Fineman into an offhand sex-date and allowing a bashful Lorne Michaels to pet his newfound bulges. Good Neighbor pals Mooney and Bennett’s humor traffics in such light cringe comedy, as clueless strivers inevitably find their lowest level, as, here, the horrifying, gravel-voiced, ’roid-gremlin version of Kyle, having made himself “less interesting” for glory, is summarily fired from the show by an unimpressed Mulaney. Lurking at the heart of most of these sketches is a mingled affection/contempt for the bottom-dwellers of the entertainment industry, pitiable losers whose lifelong consumption of TV and movies has left them convinced that they are just one big break (or Tupperware full of lean, broiled chicken breasts and a 5 p.m. bedtime) away from the stardom they just know is their birthright, and Mooney, especially, is most comfortable playing around there. (Also, filming schedules being what they are, it’s unlikely this sketch is in response to Pete Davidson’s off-weeks’ interview about being typecast on the show, but there’s a harsh but essential truth about living or dying on SNL that’s resonant throughout the bit.)

Weekend Update update

Che continues to successfully play around with his role on Update, here breaking from a joke about the growing coronavirus threat to muse about his fears that they’ll play an Update clip of him mocking the typically lame and self-serving Trump administration response to the crisis at his funeral. In what former SNL-er Al Franken would call “kidding on the square,” Che confessed to “sitting here pretending to care about politics,” before whipping off his clip-on tie, whipping out a tumbler of something brown (“Why am I hiding my drinking problem?”), and, finally, donning a crooked baseball cap as he essayed the role of a Michael Che who’s finally been broken by all the world’s unrelenting horseshit. It’s a blessedly funny move, carried out through the rest of Update (“You know, I just found out I might have a kid?,” he’s heard mumbling after the camera cuts back to the straight-faced Colin Jost), and it adds a frisson of reckless abandon to his side of the proceedings that’s sloppily energizing. “I feel free,” he exclaims at one point, and his story about his beloved grandma telling him, “We are living in our last days,” lands satisfyingly, before Che rambles on to rebut granny’s “no white girls” rule. (“I work in show business, that’s unrealistic.”) Joining in on the cold open’s queasy mockery of the prospect of noted fundamentalist and science skeptic Mike Pence leading the uninspiring cadre of sycophants, yes-men, and non-doctors Trump put in charge of fighting a potentially deadly outbreak of disease, Che did resort to yet another SNL “Mike Pence is secretly gay” joke. And I could have done without the “Chinese people eating dogs” joke when supposedly defending the virus hotspot, too, although, for Che, loosening up seems to come yoked to being sort of an asshole. Otherwise, Update’s cracks at the news of the day went as usual. Jost let Trump hang himself with his own slurred nonsense (Thank god we have “different elements of medical” on the coronavirus front), and—echoing Trump’s rhetorical gambit of using supposedly overheard chatter to disseminate patently absurd nonsense to the world—deftly managed to get the hashtag #TrumpSlump trending during the show when talking about what he’s definitely heard people calling the precipitous stock market losses since Trump started babbling incoherently about the “hoax” outbreak of a rapidly accelerating infectious disease outbreak. Hey, if that’s the world of public discourse we live in at this point, then fighting hashtag with hashtag is fair game, so good on you, Jost. Chris Redd, taking the well-known SNL path of making yourself a showcase on Update when you’re being underused elsewhere, put together a solid few minutes as himself, commenting on the just-concluding Black History Month. As with most such pieces, the jokes sprayed all over the place, although nominally anchored to the central premise that, as Redd put it, black people “took too many Ls” for Black History Month this year. Straying into politics while keeping his eyes on the joke, he ably described SC primary winner Joe Biden as Joe “I have a black friend” Biden, and noted how watching the garrulously long-winded Biden give a speech is like “watching an old man parallel park his thoughts for 20 minutes.” On Trump’s hastily disseminated photo of himself surrounded by the handful of black Trump supporters he could get to pray over him, Redd, in his best turn of phrase, described the gathered worshipful as “White House negroes,” and ran down some of the more egregiously misguided corporate appropriations of Black History Month, including that credit card that makes it look like Harriet Tubman is either saluting Wakanda or “she got recaptured.” Weekend Update has long been a place for cast members to present their own, individualized versions of the newsreader gig, and, should Jost follow through on his suggested post-election departure, this is about as good a tryout as Redd could give.

“What do you call that act?” “The Californians!”—Recurring sketch report

The John Mulaney “I hate New York” Musical Showcase; the Kate-and-Aidy 1940s Femmes Fatale Extravaganza.

“It was my understanding there would be no math”—Political comedy report

Hey, everyone’s going to get super-sick! So that’s funny. Or it could be, I suppose, if the cold open didn’t shy away from the aforementioned flop-sweat generator that is Mike (“condoms don’t work, pray away AIDS, smoking doesn’t kill, climate change is a myth, intelligent design”) Pence is in charge of mustering the nation’s medical defenses to wheeze into another underwhelming Democratic slate sketch. Again, the joke that noted frothing gay-basher Pence is in the closet is (whatever the truth may be) beyond played out at this point, although at least Beck Bennett’s strident Pence nodding toward his willful disregard of scientific truth by calling the coronavirus a test of his faith “like dinosaur bones, or Timothée Chalamet” was half-smart. And Kenan Thompson coming out as Ben Carson (“the brain surgeon that they put in charge of house development”) was the usual hoot, with Kenan’s approximation of Carson’s singsong cadence making his dire predictions about the toll of the virus extra alarming, especially to Pence, who hurriedly shoves Carson aside for straying from the administration’s sweaty “All is well!” public stance on the topic. That things veered suddenly into a another stealth Dem candidate sketch could have served to hammer on the theme, I suppose (although simply following through on the premise might have been an idea, too.) But things quickly turned into the same unsatisfying quick-hit impressions and internecine sniping among the candidates, an exercise that’s seeming more and more like a slightly unimpressive audition process for who’s going to be the eventual nominee. (Sort of like the much of the actual remaining Democratic field, but I digress.) Honestly, only the (increasingly unlikely looking) prospect of a four-year Elizabeth Warren-Kate McKinnon reign holds any interest for me at this point, McKinnon’s spot-on impression the only one to go much beyond the surface into something more substantive. (You know, like the actual Warren, but I digress.) As for the rest, we have ringers like Larry David’s Bernie Sanders and Fred Armisen’s Mike Bloomberg. And while who doesn’t like David’s gabbling, kvetchy Sanders, there are some issues. Namely that SNL can’t think of much to do besides grumpy old candidate jokes with the surging potential nominee (although a passing reference to Bernie’s “Castro wasn’t all bad” remarks this week at least nodded toward actual engagement). Also, as much fun as Larry seems to be having coming back to 30 Rock every other week, it’s unclear if he’s on board for a theoretical Alec Baldwin-style regular gig should Sanders win. As for Bloomberg—meh. He’s not going anywhere politically, and, as primly humorous as is Armisen’s shrugging rich guy approach to this whole “let the poor people decide” thing is, it’s yet another role whose farming out to a higher profile outsider continues to signal the show’s lack of confidence in its in-house talent. Same goes for Rachel Dratch’s Amy Klobuchar, whose best hope at this point is a Vice Presidential gig (on both fronts). There’s nothing wrong with any of these funny people or what they’re doing per se. It’s more that there’s no reason for them to be there, and that these sketches remain irritatingly shallow. On the in-house side, that seeming lack of confidence appears not so much borne out in these openers as untested. Sure, Colin Jost barely tries to conceal how unsuited he is to play college chum Pete Buttigieg, and the absence of other ringer (and other Dem impersonation I could stand to see more of) Jason Sudeikis saw the Joe Biden spot going to Mulaney (who would likely be the first to admit that celebrity impressions aren’t in his wheelhouse). But, what with SNL’s proven disregard for gender-appropriate political casting of late, the fact that able mimics Melissa Villaseñor and Chloe Fineman and nimble actresses Heidi Gardner and Ego Nwodim remain on the bench is increasingly vexing. As for the actual sketch, it was the same too-glib drive-by, with only Warren’s gloating over her debate trouncing of Bloomberg registering, in McKinnon’s lived-in performance, with any juice. Meh.

I am hip to the musics of today

Goddamn, that was great, as David Byrne (late of the aforementioned Sack Lunch Bunch), joined Mulaney and delivered a pair of electric live performances. He did “One In A Lifetime” first, and it’s striking just how Byrne keeps that well-trod Talking Heads song from receding into classic hits predictability in performance. That song is as weird and satirically biting as ever, as much as its ubiquity threatens to turn it into just another toothless oldie, and, with his identically grey-suited backup musicians all channeling that old Stop Making Sense spirit with their non-stop individualized choreography and musicianship, the song—with the 67-year-old Byrne holding center stage, as deceptively limber as ever—was a showstopper. So, too, the rousing second number, the Byrne-penned “Toe Jam,” where Byrne ceded even more time for each member of his expansive musical team to shake their stuff in the individual spotlight. Easily one of the most enjoyable musical guests in years, Byrne remains a one-man show unafraid to let others steal the show. Just bottomless fun.

Most/Least Valuable Not Ready For Prime Time Player

Not building sketches around the proven talents of performers like Nwodim, Fineman, Villaseñor, and Gardner just seems perverse at this point. SNL’s second line looks thin in the talent department because nobody’s making use of them. The LaGuardia extravaganza gave Cecily, Kenan, Kate, and Beck plenty to sink their teeth into, but Cecily’s second singing showcase of the night puts her on top.

“What the hell is that thing?”—The Ten-To-Oneland Report

Well, at least we got Chris Redd’s welcome and funny comic tribute to Black History Month on Update, so the muddled mush of the Jackie Robinson sketch can stay the ten-to-one oddity it is. Kenan is delightful, don’t get me wrong. As the lone black man to boo color-line-busting legend Robinson, his Dodgers fan Terrence “The Enlarged Heart” Washington was a funny construction, his petty jealousies trumping any sense of racial pride or loyalty. As the 1940s white fans around him look on puzzled at Washington’s animosity toward the first black MLB player, Kenan makes his frustrated non-ballplayer’s grudge almost but never quite hilarious, although the way his bewildering heckling keeps igniting pockets of revealing racism beneath the white fans’ sporting loyalties is fairly pointed. Beck Bennett’s loudmouth fan immediately starts an “Oh, so it’s all right to boo white guys?!” side-argument that ultimately and inevitably sees him getting carried away by telling Robinson to go back to the Negro Leagues where he belongs. Still, the funniest joke is when Kenan, berated by bleacher-mate Mulaney for talking that way in front of his kid, notices the young black child sitting next to him and exclaims, “I don’t know this kid!” Stray observations Kate, as The Sound Of Music’s Maria, sings her own reassurance concerning her relationship with the Captain, “I’m old enough, but it’s still kind of dicey.” Jost, on Joe Biden’s resurgent Democratic primary win in South Carolina: “But, in keeping with South Carolina tradition, the losers will get the statues.” (In front of photo of a Confederate monument.) Mulaney’s monologue has me scanning the internet to see if he’s scored another Netflix special yet. (Not yet, apparently.) From going as close to the edge as he gets with jokes about Jesus forgetting to do magic on the one occasion he could really have used it, to that Make-A-Wish anecdote, to a great run about how crappy the Founding Fathers really were, to a straight-up joke about Trump being stabbed to death Caesar-style by some senators, it was tight and focused and very, very funny. On that assassination joke, Mulaney reassured everyone, “I asked my lawyer if I could make that joke, and he said, ‘Let me call another lawyer,’ and that lawyer said yes.” Mulaney’s Kurt, to Liesl: “Oh, age is just a number that the government keeps track of.” Redd kids on the square that the withdrawal of all black candidates for president has meant less airtime for him. After Che—still in booze-swilling carefree mode—jokes that Ash Wednesday is the one day a year when Catholics can indulge in “a little bit of blackface,” Jost signs off, laughing, “For Weekend Update, I’m Catholic . . .” All welcome Che’s proposed new Houston Astros mascot, Cheatie the Camera. Before Davidson’s customer makes his ill-gated sushi purchase, he and Redd buy “a Chobani yogurt with no spoon to eat it with” and “a $15 dollar Dasani, extra plastic.” Once more the show ended awfully abruptly, so here are the full goodnights again. Good night! Daniel Craig and The Weeknd next week! Read More Read the full article

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chojin-cu-chulain · 4 years

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Captain Starmaster 3010

**Content warning, and Trigger warning for suicide: Even though it is depicted as a fictional event even within the confines of the story, a character commits suicide. This isn’t to glorify it, but to show an in universe shocking twist in the fictional game, and because the character was experiencing an existential crisis. I apologize to any survivors, or loved ones of people who have committed suicide who might get offended**

The following is taken from a now deleted blog called “Games Addiction” run by a user calling themselves “OldHerbz” or Herbz for short that mostly specialized in the review of obscure video games from the 8 bit, and 16 bit eras occasionally going to into other types of games.

March 15, 2015: Yo Yo everybody it’s your boy Herbz here, and welcome to another installment of Games Addiction were I find old games no one’s heard about, and see if they’re Class 5 classics for Class 1 crud.

So today I was at the local flea market like always scoping out for new games when I saw a counter run by some old guy I had never seen before.

The counter had a bunch of games I had seen before like sports games, shooters, Zelda 2, etc but there was this one Sega Genesis cartridge that caught my eye.

It didn’t have a sticker on it just a piece of white tape with the words “Starmaster” written on it.

I thought it sound like a spaceship shooter like Raiden or R Type, so I asked the man running the counter, and he said it was $5 so I poneyed up the cash and bought it.

So, let’s see how this game plays shall we?

So, we got the usual stuff like “Licensed by Sega of America”, and some logos from a company called Cytek or something that I never heard of before, but the copyright stuff says 1990.

Now there’s a shot of the Earth in outer space, and some white text crawling up.

The text says “Earth: the year 2010. War, and pollution have taken their toll on the Earth, and it cannot continue to support human life.”

We see what looks like a futuristic city with some flashing explosions, Then the screen goes white, and when it clears the city is in ruins

There’s a clip of some scientists working in a lab which pans to show this giant spaceship that looks like some giant tower poking out of a flying saucer

“The surviving governments of the world have decided to put aside their differences just once to come together to combine their collective intellect to create a space colony called the Eden”

there are some guards in futuristic military clothes leading a crowd of faceless people into ramp that leads into the ship.

“The Eden will take a small 10, 000,000-person population into space in the hopes that someday when the effects of man’s ravaging of the planet undo themselves man can return to his home.”

It goes back to Earth in space only now it looks all weird, and alien, and post-apocalyptic, and all that stuff

“The year is now 3010, Scientists on the Eden have determined that the Earth is once again fit for human inhabitation but there is one problem:

In the intervening millennium Earth has been overrun with dangerous, and carnivorous life forms.”

We see a bunch of weird looking monsters the most normal looking ones I can think of look like some humanoid mammal monsters with claws, and slanted eyes but even then they have horns coming out of their elbows, their arms are held out like a mantis’s, and their walking like their sitting down.

The weirder ones look like flying blobs or lizards with what look like moaning human faces, or they look like something out of an old episode of Star Trek.

Then one of these monsters looks directly at the player, and slashes at the screen leaving these white claw marks

“The only hope for humanity is to send down the Eden’s greatest, and bravest soldier Captain Starmaster down to Earth to eliminate the predatory mutants so mankind can reclaim the Earth.”

We see some guy step out of the darkness, and he looks like something out of VR Troopers or Ropcop with this white or silver armor, a black visor, and all sorts of glowing lights on him.

All the while there’s this bad ass sounding super heroic music playing.

“Captain Starmaster is equipped with the most powerful, and deadly weapons in human history as well as various tools which can help him explore any terrain no matter how treacherous”

Now there’s a POW show that looks life your typical red screen with techno crap all over including a target.

Next, we see Captain Starmaster firing some futuristic machine gun that shoots lasers.

We then see the various monsters from earlier being hit and blown up by the lasers in the most PG rated way humanly possible.

Then it shows Captain Starmaster, and the title screen shows up in these futuristic silver letters that say “Captain Starmaster 3010”

There’s a thing that says, “Start Game”, and another that says “Menu”

I go down to “Menu” first, and hit start, and it shows the usual stuff like Passwords, Dificulty, Music all that Jazz.

Anyway, on to the actual game itself I go up, and hit start game

The first level seems to rocky mountain level.

A green text box with a red orb of light next to it shows up.

The text box reads “Captain Starmaster this is Eden do you read us?’

Then the red orb is replaced with a picture of Captain Starmaster’s face.

He says “I read you. My goodness it’s worse than we thought”.

The Red orb replies “Starmaster we need you to clear out all the mutants in this area. We are sending you a Sonic Wave Gun, and some Climbing Claws to help you with your mission.”

Starmaster than says “Understood Eden commencing mission”

The red orb replies with “Good Luck Captain you are only hope”

The game itself seems to be some Metroid knock off.

I don’t think Sega had too many of those except for Slime World but they did have a lot of Mario, and Zelda clones.

The controls are pretty simple you use the D Pad to move around, A jumps, B fires your weapon which is the laser machine gun from the cutscene Start pauses, and C brings up a menu where you equip weapons, and gear which is blank for now.

I move around the level there’s all sorts of weird flying turtle monsters with Xenomorph looking teeth, and rocks that look like they’re part of the background but then when you get too close, they turn out to be some centipede looking creatures.

Eventually I get to some futuristic white pods I can go into.

When I do Starmaster glows green, and a text box says, “You now have Climbing Claws”, and “You now have Sonic Wave Gun”.

When I go to the cliffs, I can now climb up them, and when I switch to the Sonic Wave gun Starmaster’s gun now shoots this yellow wave at enemies that can shatter certain rocks so I can move forward.

After what seems like forever I finally get to the boss.

It looks like some weird mix of a gorilla, and a mole on top but the bottom looks like an earth worm or a snake.

It attacks by shooting its own wave attack, and then launching a couple of rocks that attack the player in some circular motion.

It takes me forever but eventually I find out you supposed to hit the monster’s eyes until some green jewel like orb shows up on its stomach, and fire at it.

Eventually I win, and the monster explodes in typical 16-bit fire effects.

That’s all for now but tommorow I’ll get to the other levels.

I’ll try to be as brief as I can with the next few levels.

So now we have a forest level.

The trees are a mix of the kind you’d see in a forest in California, the kind you’d find in the jungle.

Some of them have seeds that look like angry faces with sharp teeth, and move around with spider leg like roots, and attack by waving their branches around like whips.

Some of the monsters look like a cross between a wild cat, and some bug like a termite or a wasp.

I’m supposed to get a weapon called “Homing Sniper”, and an item called “Wood Saw”

The homing Sniper ends up being some blue laser that locks on to enemies in an L shape, and the wood saw clears trees you can’t get past.

The boss is weird I don’t know if it’s one creature or two.

The top part looks like some yellow, and black insect with dragon fly like wings, spider eyes, and a grasshopper like body while the bottom looks like some tumble weed with a billion purple eyes, and these giant white, and red flowers that shoot lasers.

I find out the weak spot is the wings, and the tumble weed part, and move on.

Next is an ice level with these creatures that look giant balls of fur with teeth and tentacles, and giant sea urchins that look like they’re made of ice.

I get these boots that let you walk on ice without slipping, and a flame thrower for melting blocks.

The boss is some weird lizard creature that looks like a brontosaurus with a turtle shell, and a t rex head that breaths freezing mist, and shoots lasers out it’s eyes that I have to shoot the neck of when it’s not attacking.

Next is volcano level where I get a heat shield, and an ice beam.

Some of the monsters here are weird looking like these green blobs that turn into humanoid shapes, and some hoping stick insects that fire spread shots.

The boss reminds me of Gudis from Ultraman towards the future only skinnier, and purple.

It attacks with these blue energy rings, and this green gas.

I’m supposed to use the freeze ray to freeze the gas into a platform that I can use to climb and use my other weapons to attack the exposed brain which is the weak spot.

Now it’s a water level there’s all these weird monsters that look like a cross between a crab or a lobster, and some coral.

Another looks like some squid or octopus, but its tentacles are electric eels

I’m supposed to get an item that allows Starmaster to move through the water without sinking, and an “Electro Gun” that fires electricity in a weird trident formation.

I get to the boss, and it’s some cross between a shark, a whale, a manta ray, and a bunch of other sea animals.

The weirdest thing is that sometimes it points itself up, and the bottom which is now the front looks like some deformed mermaid or something.

I’m supposed to hit this angle like tail it has when it goes to the mermaid stage.

After that I get another cutscene where the red orb of light says “Captain Starmaster we believe we have found your last target enter the ruins, and eliminate the mutant menace once and for all”

Starmaster replies “Affirmative Eden I will not fail”.

The next level is a sewer level they bring back some of the monster from previous levels and include some of the monsters from the opening cutscene.

It also seems like a final exam level because I’m supposed to use all the weapons, and items I collected so far.

I also have to get one last time that lets Starmaster go through radiation clouds without getting hurt, and this thing called “The Super Laser” that’s this big laser that takes up a third of the screen.

Not only that but I have to fight the bosses again.

Then I get another section and it looks like the surface of the ruined city from the opening cut scene.

I fight all the various monsters until eventually I get to the final boss.

I’m trying to think of a good way to describe it other than it’s like a PG rated version of something you’d see in John Carpenter’s The Thing.

It’s got four legs, and four arms, it has insect wings, and bird wings.

The legs look like a mix of reptile, and mammal.

I think has fins, and gills, and it has some weird mollusk like head with a billion eyes, and some melting looking human face for a stomach.

It’s not surprisingly the hardest boss in the game since you have to use every weapon in the game to hurt it.

It swipes at you with its arms that your supposed to freeze into platforms to climb and shoot the head.

Then it fires lasers and breaths fire, and you’re supposed to use the electro gun, and homing sniper on the head.

Next it spits acid, and you’re supposed to use the Sonic Wave gun to disorient it while you use the flame thrower on its acid sacs.

Finally, it fires a wave attack from the melting face while you use the super laser to finish it off.

At last we get one final cutscene.

Captain Starmaster then walks through the ruins of the destroyed city and enters a building.

He walks up to a computer, and a spike comes out of his arm like in Robocop and he enters it into a port.

Some binary code flashes on the monitor, and then we see an image of a man in a recording.

Some text appears on the screen.

“They abandoned us. They thought no one else was left on this planet but we were”.

The man continues “Please if you can hear us there are still people trapped on Earth. Pleas rescue us”.

The recording continues “It’s no use we’re stuck here our best bet is to try to survive, and repair what’s left of the Earth”.

Then the recording shows the man only now his teeth looked like fangs, and his eyes were all yellow.

The man said “It’s too late. Our scienitsts say because of all the lingering chemicals, and radiation those of us left behind are starting to mutate.”

He adds “At first it will be physical but at some point, our minds will revert back to knowing only how to kill or be killed. Oh god why us.

Then finally it just shows one of the monsters from the game, and the text now says “Meat. I must have meat”. Then it shows him roaring, and it plays the sound file for the monsters roaring.

Starmaster then asks, “Did you see that Eden?”

Then the red orb of light appears and replies “unfortunately yes captain”.

Then it flashes back to the Eden leaving Earth.

Then it shows a still image of people on the Eden as the text says “At first when humanity left Earth in the Eden everything was peaceful, and everyone was happy”

Then it shows the people looking frightened.

The text says “But it didn’t last the survivors realized they weren’t enough resources to survive a permanent existence in Eden”

Then it shows Eden’s computers, and the inhabitants looking at the Eden’s robotic workers.

The text now says, “Faced with a difficult decision the survivors made the hardest choice they could make”.

It then shows the people in tubes next to computers with glowing lights, and then cut to the lights on the eyes of the Eden’s robots lighting up

The text continues “The inhabitants of Eden downloaded their brains into the ship’s computers, and then uploaded them into robotic bodies.”

It then cut back to Starmaster in the building saying “So that’s it. It was all for nothing”.

Then it shows Starmaster taking off his helmet to reveal a Terminator like robot skull.

Next Starmaster reaches into his own chest plate pulls out a device that looks like a cross between a mechanical heart, and a miniature nuclear reactor, and crushes.

Then his red eyes go dead.

Next, we see the Eden land, and its robotic inhabitants walk out.

We see the robots doing experiments on the mutants.

The text says “Unfortunately the inhabitants of Eden were unable to return the mutants to human form but they after continuous experimentations were able to restore the inhabitants’ sentience.

Then it shows the robots growing mutants in tube, and then showed them going back into the mind transference machines.

Then it shows the mutants in the tubes waking up, and it showed the robots, and mutants living in harmony.

Then the text says “And so the sad tale of Captain Starmaster came to a happy end. Humanity maybe extinct but life will find a way to continue who knows for sure if this is truly the fate that awaits us but if we continue on our current path it might”.

Then it shows the Earth in space again with the letters Game Over The End.

Well that’s Captain Starmaster.

The graphics are great for the time.

The gameplay is awesome.

I wonder why they never released it publicly other than obviously the big twist would have been seen as a bit too intense for young kids.

Not to mention I can’t help that a lot of players would have thought the twist would seem like a fuck you ism to them.

Still considering that environmentalism was a big deal back then, and this was just before the USSR ended, I can see why they felt the need to make a point on what the aftermath of war and pollution.

That is why I’m declaring Captain Starmaster a class 5 addicting game.

This is OldHerbz saying stay addicted.

#creepypasta #tw suicide #cw suicide

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shonikado · 7 years

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Warning: Contains "Shonikado Does Tabletop: Episode 6"

I waited all week for this, this was basically my experiment with doing D&D fights in a more engaging way (with mixed results, good feedback though)

First up, there's some stuff that the human barbarian went through that wasn't RP'd out, but instead I just sent the player the stuff that happened so we could get to the next session where another player would be joining in. Here's what that all was:

The barbarian and the frogs traveled onwards, reaching the mountain range between them and their destination. But a magic storm hit (those happen this time of year) and they took shelter in a cave to wait it out. She got bored waiting in the cave though and explored, and found a peaceful cult town full of blind cultists and bat-winged beholders. She didn't really care to find out what was going on, although the cultists were niced and offered her the opportunity to trade her standard eyesight for the ability to have a vague psychic sense of the whole continent. But standard eyesight is useful, so she declined

The storm passed and the party continued onwards, a day behind schedule, taking with them an old dwarf cultist who was meaning to go on a supply run later anyway. There was a tribe of orcs-and-miscellaneous that watched the group from afar but they didn't make any moves, they just scared the frogs a bit. But the mountains were left without issue, at which point the party ran into a giant who collects the toll to enter the city. They paid the toll, but the giant saw the merchant frog's amulet and was like "hey gimme that too" and it was reluctantly handed over. And then they went onwards

So then they arrived in the city, at which point the frogs and cultist departed and Ulyana went to the giant-hunters guild. There was a giant who seemed to be helping run the guild, which was confusing, and also he was a bit condescending. Anyway, Ulyana learned that the guild only accepts 100 members total and they're careful about who they pick, and the most convenient way to tell them "hey I'm a good pick" would be to win the Azure Tournament happening in a few days. So Ulyana was like "sure I'll go have fun fighting people to prove I can fight even more people" and went off.

OKAY SO THAT'S WHERE THE SESSION BEGINS

Started off introducing an elf monk, who used to be a sailor but got into boxing. He's very old. He wanted to enter the tournament so he was tasked to fight three little anima (my world's word for animated constructs, pretty much simple robots) and display his fighting prowess. He used flurry of blows or something to destroy them all in a single turn.

Later in the day, the barbarian applied, and smashed one with an axe and had her displacer beast destroy another, and then finally tore the last one apart. Which was maybe excessive but definitely displayed ability.

But since a lot of people had been applying to the tournament and they didn't want to overdo it on applicants, they were both asked if they'd be cool with partnering up, and ended up getting teamed up with each other. So a monk, a barbarian, and a displacer beast all show up to kick some butt

but first they were like "hey let's spar" which gave me an opportunity to do a silly joke regarding the arena I had prepared, and then I sat back and let two players basically drive things for me and get some character development going on. (The monk won because the barbarian forgot to rage and dodge and stuff at first and the monk is GOOD at damage-dealing.)

so at this point I introduced the system where they got double EXP for going into a fight without researching their opponents prior to the fight, the idea being "figure it out on the fly" is more challenging than "know what you're getting into". To start off, the monk went off to try and figure out who they'd be doing their tournament-entry-culling match against (there were too many applicants still so they were being pitted against each other to determine who the public-audience-getting fighters would be), and ended up finding a place where bets were being put on the fights. The person running the betting booth said it wouldn't be fair to divulge that sorta stuff to a fighter but offered to tell in exchange for a bit of gold. As it turns out, the monk is very cheap and immediately walked out of the roleplaying closet. (We went into the closet so the barbarian's player wouldn't know what went down.)

they needed 3 EXP blocks to reach level 4, 7 to reach level 5. Going in blind meant 2 blocks, going in prepared meant 1.

i gave them half a block for their spar since neither of them tried to actually kill the other

Anyway, having failed to research their opponents, they went in blind and encountered a bugbear who seemed dressed for much colder weather than was actually present, wielding a malicious-looking green longsword. The other creature was a new race they didn't learn the name of, that looked somewhere between a lobster, a cockroach, and a fish, with eight arms and totally decked out with weapons. The bugbear was super nice and said hi.

then they proceeded to curbstomp them both, meaning I never got to even show off the bugbear's special abilities and the other combatant just barely got to hint at what their moveset was

ALSO the bugbear looked at Ulyana weirdly but then decided it was probably nothing. That was before the fight. The bugbear was unconscious after the fight. So was the monk, which was fun!

Also, some extra stuff about the arena: there's some height-advantage parts of the arena, also you can only have as many potions as you have team members, also there's these clerics called the "angels" who are there to let you fight lethally because they prevent anyone from dying. The way it works is that they focus protective magic on people, and if they'd die, they instead go into a sort of near-dead state that it takes a few weeks to recover from. So they'd be out of the tournament, but not out of life in general.

anyway, the party won, the monk didn't die so he got to continue fighting (I basically explained the death rule to the barbarian in an effort to convince her to stabilize the monk since he made two death fails)

ANYWAY they went on to the next round, and the barbarian decided to investigate who the opponents were - she ended up interviewing drow twins who had been in the entry-to-actual-tournament fight against two dragonborns (the next opponents) and lost. They explained one was a paladin with healy stuff, and the other was a warlock with spooky spells. The barbarian nodded and half-understood and then left.

when they got to the arena the next day I introduced the fact that the grass in the arena has flowers planted in it to make mosaic ads, the first of which was "Rope! You Can Never Have Enough" which was a reference to a character I made for a campaign that never really happened, in which my char owned I think several miles worth of rope because we were given a lot of starting money and I didn't know what to spend it on.

anyway so the fight happened, the paladin proved to be ridiculously hard to kill, and also made it very hard to target the warlock because of two tiers of protective stuff going on. So the paladin got downed, then was revived by the warlock's potion, then the paladin was downed again and the warlock revived her with her own potion, and then she was downed a third time and the monk was very mad about the whole thing and curbstomped her face. Seeing defeat was already gonna happen, and not wanting her to get dead'd or himself to get curbstomped, the warlock surrendered and the party won.

also the warlock cast a spell that had a bunch of grabby tentacles that was supposed to do damage but when the drow twins were explaining it they were like "oh but it doesn't do damage it just grabs you" SO WHOOPS I FORGOT. WHOOPS. WHOOPS. I don't think it would have been more fun if it did do damage though, maybe just more frustrating

anyway the party was like yaaay we won and then they leveled up and it was too late to move on to the final 8 fighters (so 3 more fights, although the final fight is gonna be a bit weird) so the session was ended, more like paused but basically ended.

~DING~ SO WHAT WENT WRONG

missing happens a lot and it's frustrating for the players. Also I didn't really get to show off what made most of the fighters cool because they immediately got pummeled by the rush-and-deal-all-the-damage team.

My current ideas are this: since everyone begins at the same time, the first round of combat lacks any movement, and is just what you do IMMEDIATELY as the fight begins. This means my enemy characters can set up any fancy interesting fun fight-changing stuff that they've got (for instance, the warlock had a weird spell that would deal a lot of damage but required casting it/some prep time, and the paladin was gonna defend him while that happened, but then the party rushed up and immediately attacked so he was like "I'm getting out of here" which was not the best tactical decision maybe. There are things I could do differently.)

My second idea is that, if you miss, you can choose to automatically hit instead, but this invokes an opportunity attack. I don't know if the attack would happen before or after (so miss -> opportunity -> autohit, or miss -> autohit -> opportunity?) and this would just be a mechanic in the world. I think I'll consider it the "baiting" mechanic, like, you get the opponent to strike at you, giving you a chance to land your own hit.

Maybe I'll make it so the opponent can either opportunity attack, or take half damage. Maybe make it so that you can respond in one of the following ways: 1. Defensive. Take half damage. 2. Neutral. Opportunity attack, then take full damage. 3. Aggressive. Opportunity attack. Take half damage if you land the hit, get critted if you miss.

Both of these ideas are things that ANYBODY can use, player or enemy, making it fair but also making it easier for me to deliver on better experiences overall.

also I think I'm gonna inject a bit more roleplaying into the sessions. I was planning on skipping it to mostly experiment with combat, and it was mentioned this hurt things a bit - the fights were largely just "okay we're fighting these people now". I have ideas on how to make the fights more engaging on a narrative level (basically having the party MEET the other combatants, though learning what they can do is another story entirely and retains the EXP thing).

overall I think it was decent but I'm definitely glad it ended earlier than expected because that gives me time to refine what I have coming next.

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z-hen · 4 years

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THE BEST YEARS OF HIS LIFE: AN INTERVIEW WITH GABRIEL GARCIA MARQUEZ

By Marlise Simons

April 10, 1988

FOR Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the pleasure and turmoil of writing change from novel to novel. In the case of ''One Hundred Years of Solitude,'' he thought so long and hard about the story that when he finally sat down to commit it to paper, it came in a great burst. But he had difficulty writing ''The Autumn of the Patriarch,'' a novel he published seven years before he won the Nobel Prize in 1982. With that book, he recently recalled, ''I was doing well when I could finish four lines a day''; the whole project occupied him, off and on, for seven years.

By contrast, the years when he worked on ''Love in the Time of Cholera'' were among the happiest of his life. Nostalgically, he wrote about the courtship of his parents and his own journeys by riverboat, both of which were important sources for the book. In Mexico City, his longtime home base, we talked about what writing the novel had been like:

This book was a pleasure. It could have been much longer, but I had to control it. There is so much to say about the life of two people who love each other. It's infinite.

Also, I had the advantage of knowing the end beforehand. Because in this book, the end was a problem. It would have been in poor taste if one or even both of the characters died. The most wonderful thing would be if they could go on loving forever. So the reader is given the consolation that the boat with the lovers will keep on with its journey, coming and going. Not only for the rest of their lives, but forever.

A kind of Flying Dutchman of love. Have you done a lot of traveling on boats yourself?

I've known that boat for a long time. I traveled a lot on it, beginning when I was 12. I lived on the coast [ in Colombia ] but I got a scholarship to study in Bogota. So I would take the boat from Baranquilla to La Dorada and then the train to Bogota. That was about the time the river began to deteriorate. Between my first trips and my final ones, I saw the decay in the river that appears in the book.

I had to have two river journeys in the book. The first was that of Florentino Ariza, when he is named telegraphist in the interior. There is no purpose to this one because he arrives, regrets it and turns back. But I had to invent it to be able to describe the river and the landscape. If not, that whole description would have had to come at the end of the book, when the two old people go on their journey. And that would have overshadowed the relationship between the two, which is what mattered there. So that device helped me also to show how the river changed from a fresh and thriving stream and fell into decadence. I must have taken the last trip when I was at the university, when I was about 22. Then the boats stopped running.

All these things for me are part of a nostalgia. Nostalgia is a great source for literary inspiration, for poetic inspiration.

You wrote most of the book in Cartagena?

Yes, and those two years when I was writing it was a time when I was almost completely happy. Everything went well for me. People spend a lifetime thinking about how they would really like to live. I asked my friends and no one seems to know very clearly. To me it's very clear now. I wish my life could have been like the years when I was writing ''Love in the Time of Cholera.''

I would get up at 5:30 or 6 in the morning. I need only six hours of sleep. Then I quickly listened to the news. I would read from 6 to 8, because if I don't read at that time I won't get around to it anymore. I lose my rhythm. Someone would arrive at the house with fresh fish or lobster or shrimp caught nearby. Then I would write from 8 till 1. By midday, Mercedes [ his wife ] would go to the beach and wait for me with friends. I never quite knew who to expect; there were always people coming and going. After lunch I had a little siesta. And when the sun started going down I would go out on the street to look for places where my characters would go, to talk to people and pick up language and atmosphere. So the next morning I would have fresh material I had brought from the streets.

I also had one of the most curious and enjoyable literary experiences I've ever had. One of the characters was Fermina, an 18-year-old girl living in a Caribbean town in the late 19th century. She lived with her father, a Spanish immigrant, and with her mother, who I could not figure out. And there was an aunt, her father's sister, who I saw very clearly and who had the same name. I just could not grasp the mother. I would seat them around the table and I could see how they all behaved - except for the mother. At first I thought the aunt was in the way. And I took her out and put her back again. But the mother was the problem. I could not see her: not the face, the name or anything about her. And then one day I woke up and realized what had happened. The mother had died while the girl was still young. And when I saw that the mother was dead, she became alive and real. She grew and had a great presence -in the house, in everyone's memory. It made me so happy to resolve this. I had been stretching the logic of the book. I had been trying to put a dead person among the living, and that was not possible.

And the men? How did you feel about Florentino?

I don't really like him. I think he is very selfish, like all men are. And as for Fermina, I think she became more bourgeois than she realized. That changed her a lot and made her very pretentious. She only understood that by the time she was very old, when she agreed to go on the boat. To do that, she had to break with her whole life.

But there is another important character, one that has no name - and that is the society of the Caribbean coast, its prejudice and superstitions, its old-fashioned ways. This is what really drives the whole story.

You have said that the thwarted early courtship of your parents served in part as a model for this book. Has your mother read it?

I don't know if she's read it all the way through. She's 84 years old now. I think they have read parts to her. Anyway, she knows what's in it. When I first started writing it in Cartagena, I would go to her house every afternoon and I would question my mother and my father separately. He was still alive then.

Have you read the English translation?

My English translator is [ Gregory ] Rabassa. I always trusted him so much; I never had to pay attention. But this time he had other commitments, and another translator was sought. I can read English, but not well enough to judge the way I dare judge a text in French or Italian. But anyhow, there were all sorts of test translations. Of the three sample translations, I read only the first chapter of this one and it was the best, without a doubt. The editors at Knopf agreed. Anyhow, what can I do? I can't worry. There is also the Japanese and the Swedish and the Dutch and so on.

Do the translators contact you and consult you?

Sometimes it's an editor who sends notes asking little things. Sometimes translators send a list of things they have doubts about. The strange thing is that, regardless of the language, the list of doubts is almost always the same.

I know you get a lot of mail from your readers. What sort of things do they write to you?

The letters I find most interesting are from people who ask me where I got this theme or that passage or such and such a character. Because they feel it is about something or someone they know. They will say: So and so is just like my aunt. Or: I have an uncle just like him. And: that episode happened exactly like that in my village. How did you know about it? People from all over Latin America wrote such things, especially after ''One Hundred Years of Solitude.'' They felt it was part of their lives.

That's why you still refuse to let the book be filmed? Because that identification will be lost?

It will be destroyed. Because film does not allow for that. The face of the actor, of Gregory Peck, becomes the face of the character. It cannot be your uncle, unless your uncle looks like Gregory Peck.

Will ''Love in the Time of Cholera'' be filmed?

Maybe. I don't mind as long as it's a Latin American movie. By that I mean one that is directed by a Latin American, that exudes the atmosphere of Latin America, that shows our character, our way of being, our society, because those are the things that define this drama. Anyway it's a problem. But the answer is for me not to get involved. It has already happened with Francesco Rossi, who made ''Chronicle of a Death Foretold.'' He showed me the screenplay and I said, ''Don't show it to me because if I read it the film will probably never be made. I am thinking of my book and you are thinking of your film. I wrote the book alone, you make the film alone.'' And that's how it happened and he thanked me.

#inspiration

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