Category Archives: Around the Web

Around the Web May 23, 2014

Unbeknownst to me until last night, today is the 20th anniversary of the series finale of Star Trek: The Next Generation. In honor of this, Yahoo sat down with Ronald Moore and Brannon Braga, who wrote that fantastic finale, to discuss exactly how it came into being. It’s a great interview that provides insight into the process as well as some hints of what might have been.

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I remember watching this episode as a little kid and not quite understanding how good it was.  As an adult, I have come to appreciate exactly how difficult a challenge it was for these guys to write such a fitting end to a much beloved series. As soon as I have two free hours, I’m going to rewatch it.

Those of you who love the superhero genre, which I expect is most of the people reading this, need to check out the teaser trailer for Disney’s Big Hero 6. Although it is sparse on plot information, the trailer is pretty amusing and I’m already hooked. It looks as though a kid designs his own superhero suit (à la Iron Man) but instead of putting himself in it, he squeezes a rather amorphous looking creature that reminds me of the Michelin Man with less definition, into the suit. The whole sequence is pretty amusing.

Between this and The Incredibles I love it movies that don’t take superheroes too seriously.

With San Diego Comicon fast approaching, Hasbro has announced this year’s SDCC exclusives. Included in them are an Infinity Gauntlet figure set with a wearable Infinity Gauntlet, as well as a second figure set featuring characters from the Thanos Imperative. It’s pretty obvious that these sets are intended to push Guardians of the Galaxy, which is making it’s debut in theatres this August.

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Personally, I’d really love my very own Infinity Gauntlet, but I will not be making the pilgrimage to San Diego this year, so I guess it’s Ebay for me.

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Around the Web May 16, 2014

Knowing how much we all love Game of Thrones, NicksplosionFX has combined that love with the cultural icon Super Mario. This this video, Nicksplosion faithfully recreates the introduction to GoT, except that he replaces locations like Kings Landing and Winterfell with various sites from the Mario classic Super Mario World.

I’m also pretty amused by the 8-bit soundtrack he decided to include. It’s a nice touch.

By now I’m sure everyone is aware that Harrison Ford has joined on for Star Wars VII, VIII, and IX, along with Carey Fisher and Mark Hamill. What is nearly as exciting is that Ford will also be reprising his role as Rick Deckard in the sequel to Blade Runner. Ford has made it clear that he was very interested in returning to the role, and recently Alcon Entertainment has made a public offer for Ford to do just that.

He say you Blade Runner!

He say you Blade Runner!

Not only is Harrison Ford on board, but Ridley Scott has also signed on to the project. Scott directed the original 1982 classic.

If you have been living under a rock for the last week, then you missed the internet going crazy over pictures of Ben Affleck as Batman. While many people were busy discussing the newly redesigned Batmobile, several others couldn’t help but start nitpicking Batman’s costume. Now admittedly, the costume looks pretty crappy, especially given how great the costume was in the Dark Knight Trilogy, but it’s also distinctly possible that this costume was made up just to take these pictures and was done so in a hurry. This wouldn’t be the first time that something released way before the film looks like crap. Anyone remember the teaser trailer for Spider-Man?

This trailer was total crap and the movie was just fine so I think the internet just needs to take a deep breath.

Wrapping up this week, we’ve got a brief history of the arcade game. Going all the way back to 1909 and the invention of Skee-Ball, we track the progression through pinball and Pac-Man to the modern era of arcade gaming. Even though it’s brief, there are some great little bits of trivia jammed in there, such as the fact that Skee-Ball lanes were originally thirty six feet long (a little over half the length of a bowling lane).

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I’d love to have a couple old arcade games, but they’re a little pricey. But hey, if anyone wants to donate one to the Therefore I Geek cause (working or not), I’m game for it.

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Around the Web April 25, 2014

It’s well known that stormtroopers don’t exactly have the best life. The Imperial military is a tough organization to be a part of and quite honestly, the average life expectancy of a stormtrooper is like five minutes. But if you’re interested in the more intimate details of a stormtrooper’s daily life, we have some insightful pictures that may give you the insight you desire.

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It’s nice to see they also have some fun between all of the dying and poorly aimed shots.

Publisher’s Weekly performed a survey of comic retailers and recently published the results. While the survey was relatively small, it did provide some interesting information about the state of the comics industry. Obvious to most people was that comic readers are moving away from the big two and embracing new creator owned content. Most interesting was the fact that female comic readers are on the rise, specifically with digital comics. Whether this increase will transfer to brick and mortar stores is still unclear.

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Comics Alliance correctly points out that what we need most is additional research.

With Game of Thrones being the insane hit that it is, it’s hard to remember that at one point it was just an idea in the head of one man.  Rolling Stone recently took the time to sit down and interview George R.R. Martin. The interview is fantastic and provides both Martin’s personal history and the origins of A Song of Ice and Fire. It’s hard to imagine that this epic series all started with the idea that became the opening scenes of the A Game of Thrones,

George R.R. Martin

The interview took nearly ten hours because Martin loves to talk about nearly everything.

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Around the Web April 11, 2014

In a rather surprising announcement yesterday, Comixology announced that they are becoming a subsidiary of Amazon. The digital comics outlet has made quite the name for itself the last few years, and even has the distinction of being the highest grossing non-game app in the iTunes store. It’s currently unclear what this acquisition will ultimately mean for users, but details will likely be coming soon.

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While I’m a fan of both companies, I do get concerned when too many things that I enjoy get clustered under one company. There is always a risk of the market being run by edict instead of by competition to be the best service.

Over the last couple decades there has been a consistent push to blame violent video games for the various violent events that occur in real life, such as the Washington Navy Yard and Sandy Hook shootings.  While events such as these are tragedies to be certain, it is wholly incorrect to blame video games for the actions of these deranged individuals. In a recent article by the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund  two more studies to the existing mountain of evidence to support the fact that violent video games do not increase violent tendencies in individuals.

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In the end, the only “evidence” to support the idea that video games cause violence, is anecdotal, which is, in fact, not evidence of any sort.

There has been some speculation lately about the fate of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and whether or not the show will get a second season. I think it’s safe to say that the show hasn’t been performing quite as well either ABC or Marvel would like, but that is not to say that the show isn’t performing. It has the highest ratings of any ABC show that night, it is not too far below the network’s average, and to be fair, they’re directly competing with N.C.I.S. which is one of the highest rated shows on TV right now. In all likelihood we will get at least one more season out of the show and if the ratings can turn around, maybe more.

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Hopefully the end of the season will gain some last minute momentum, thanks in part to its tie-in with Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

Webcomics are a wonderful thing. Personally, I start off my day by reading several rather enjoyable ones. The only real problem is that sometimes it’s hard to keep up with them, especially the ones that come out daily. For those of you who have this issue, here’s a list of 17 webcomics that have wrapped up their runs and are available for you to read at your leisure. Among them is Starslip, which is one of my personal favorites, and 8-Bit Theater by Atomic Robo’s Brian Clevinger.

 

 

 

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