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I've been browsing Den of Geek for a while now, but their reviews and comment are getting more and more irritating as they allow the worst and most shallow kind of "right on" political stuff to creep into them. Now, I have no issue with political discussion even in reviews, but when you get to the stage that you're teetering towards accusing Rebels of doing something in an episode because to do otherwise would have allowed Hera to overshadow the male characters and have too much agency, I think you're either reaching for controversy for clicks, or you really just need to put down the social studies textbook for a wee while before you start seeing misogynists lurking in every shadow.
So aye, are there other similar sites out there with a more thoughtful tone? And to clarify, I absolutely do not want to end up on the type of Trumpian hellpit that claims Disney are ruining all nerdy things by putting women and black people in them, I'm just hoping there's a happy medium between "TLJ ruined Star Wars forever because feminism" brand crazy and "TLJ has saved Star Wars from its evil patriarchal self" brand crazy where I can find out about upcoming stuff and read reviews that talk about the content of the piece.
"Your society's broken, so who should we blame? Should we blame the rich, powerful people who caused it? No, lets blame the people with no power and no money and those immigrants who don't even have the vote. Yea, it must be their fething fault." - Iain M Banks
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"The language of modern British politics is meant to sound benign. But words do not mean what they seem to mean. 'Reform' actually means 'cut' or 'end'. 'Flexibility' really means 'exploit'. 'Prudence' really means 'don't invest'. And 'efficient'? That means whatever you want it to mean, usually 'cut'. All really mean 'keep wages low for the masses, taxes low for the rich, profits high for the corporations, and accept the decline in public services and amenities this will cause'." - Robin McAlpine from Common Weal
I've made use of http://ttfix.blogspot.co.uk for years.
It's basically just a collection of pre-release and release info on model lines; no quips or jokes or much commentary just the pure infodump and link. Great for keeping track of different model ranges, ks and generally everything going on model wise. The only thing not listed is GW
(that's after GW threw a hissyfit a few years back and was apparently threatening some sites with legal action because of rumour info being posted on them).
To piggyback on here a bit - as I'd like to know if there's other good 'geek' sites I don't know about - is there a place to go that's best to see what's what in the world of comics?
I've long since lost touch with who is up to what, but would love to know what's going on at Marvel and DC...
It's more of a tech site, but I read SoylentNews for a while. They'd put neat stuff on there, but it got politically aligned to an extreme I became uncomfortable with, so I kinda got away from it.
They tend to intentionally avoid putting off viewers and readers, which can perhaps cause them to play it a bit too 'safe' with things but they're helpful if you just want to find out geeky things or what's going on. They're a bit like Beasts of War in gaming though, they'll never say they don't like something, at most couching it in terms of, "it could be improved if this happened..."
Oh... and check out G&S's Shield of Tomorrow and Critical Role shows...
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2018/02/21 02:15:02
I don't know about guilt trip exactly, but I'd say it's entirely possible for people who wouldn't typically go and see a film of a particular type to go and see it because of the social statements it makes.
While I'd say that "The Last Jedi" isn't one of those films (as, ultimately, there's no real difference in the statements between that and Rogue One or The Force Awakens in the first place), I *do* however think that, both Wonder Woman *and* Black Panther have very much tapped into that sort of thing.
Shouldn't the movie discussion use a thread of its own rather than dominating this thread which is more about finding sources of news and geek culture (indeed for a bunch of geeks online its rather shameful how few links we've already managed to put together! One would think there'd be a wealth of youtubes and websites and twitters we'd all know collectivity )
Comics-wise, DC seem to be doing alright. Rebirth was a huge success, probably their first real success in like 10 years (52, New 52, with a few exceptions, was very poorly received).
And while they've dropped the 'Rebirth' branding, they're still intending to very much continue with it.
I think the big question now for DC is, is this huge gamble of actively introducing the Watchman characters into the DC universe going to pull off?
And since I'm more reading the Rebirth trades than the individual comics, I don't know how that's going yet.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2018/02/21 23:31:31
Compel wrote: I think the big question now for DC is, is this huge gamble of actively introducing the Watchman characters into the DC universe going to pull off?
Wait, what?
lord_blackfang wrote: Respect to the guy who subscribed just to post a massive ASCII dong in the chat and immediately get banned.
Flinty wrote: The benefit of slate is that its.actually a.rock with rock like properties. The downside is that it's a rock
Compel wrote: I think the big question now for DC is, is this huge gamble of actively introducing the Watchman characters into the DC universe going to pull off?
Wait, what?
It's something they first started hinting at in um... 2011. So a long time coming, really...
I think what comics need is to kill the stupid sharedverses and start introducing stories that are not about superheroes.
So like...
Saga
Wicked & The Divine
Lumberjanes
Rat Queens
Or this really super obscure comic that noone has heard of called um... I think it was "The Limping Moribund." Or something like that anyway.
Let people who like superheroes enjoy their superheroes and people who want a taste of something else... There's dozens and hundreds of other comics, many of which are Eisner award winning series, to go for.
If all you're looking at is Chinese Restaurants, don't complain about them being mostly Chinese food.
Yeah... I think they've officially managed to kill off comics for me. I mean, DC is gak. This is no surprise to me. But they just put the Lucas Touch on the only two not-gakky characters they had. Okay, well, two of the three. The only way they could feth it up more is if Batman and the Comedian (or the one person if they're supposed to be the same guy) had a fething threeway with Constantine back when they were experimenting in college or something.
Seriously, fething Watchmen even. Like, the whole point of Watchmen was that there were no actual super heroes. Just people in masks. Yeah, Batman is a guy in a mask too, but the moment you connect the two, you're not just connecting Batman and the Comedian (which is the weirdest leap already) but you're also interconnecting him to the actual supermen that exist in DC. Especially Superman.
No, just no. You know what. I'm done. It's obviously one of those trollish photoshop jobs designed to cause people nerd rage. It's not real. No one would think that was a reasonable idea.
Turnip Jedi wrote: I think AD's point was TLJ was fairly shambolic in all but the visuals and the 'crusaders' have latched onto any misogynist leaning negative comments in an attempt to shut down ALL criticism of a very sloppy movie, which, like he said, is pretty much par for the course these days
As for Geek sites, I'll second Nerdist, with a tentative thumbs up for G&S which swings wildly from topnotch to utter gak
Geek and Sundry has a couple of amusing shows amongst a lot spam, but its gak for anything resembling geek news, which seems to be the actual request.
As I understand it, the Comedian is still very dead, Manhattan is the "big bad" with Oz I think aiding the DC villain inclined and Rosarch aiding the heroic inclined.
Though I've not read the main action yet, DC are mostly keeping it to sort of standalone books now, like "The Button" or their current "Doomsday Clock" comics, which I haven't read yet as they're not out in trades.
What I have been reading is Batman, Wonder Woman, Justice League and Trinity Rebirth and, on the whole, they've been great, with only the JL books feeling weak, but there's still some good stories amongst the bad.
Deathstroke Rebirth had been winning many awards, Harley is popular too.
And you can read one of the award nominated Batman comics here for free.
Integrating Watchmen into a larger comic universe seems like it would just serve to kind of cheapen Watchmen.
Yeah but it'll engrumple Alan a bit, and whilst I'm kind of a fan the beardy bugger still 'owes' us an ending to Halo Jones so under the (totally made up) rules of symmetrical irritation I have to approve
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2018/02/22 10:48:45
"AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED."
That's *nothing like* what's happening in the story. Clearly none of you are actually reading it.
'Integration' probably isn't the right word here.
Spoiler:
The Watchmen characters are established to be from an alternate universe. The events of Watchmen still exist as they were in that universe. What's happened is that some characters have crossed over into the Prime Earth/Earth 0 universe...some recently, some a while ago. This is very standard DC interdimensional hijinks stuff, along with the concept of other comic lines existing in alternate universes.
Anyhoo, one character in particular (pretty obvious who) has been monkeying around with the Prime Earth dimension, and in fact was apparently the cause of the most recent full reboot (New 52). Which is the kind of thing that the end of Watchmen suggested he'd be doing.
Johns has been laying the seeds for this thing since the inception of the New 52, and while the Doomsday Clock (DC, get it?) story has been slow to get started, it's fairly clearly a kind of commentary about the influence of Watchmen and how it changed comics...and perhaps not for the better.
Regarding Alan Moore, the man is a black hole of negative emotion so dense that no hope can escape. He's such a gifted guy, but if you track his work it seems like his '80s cynicism has just gotten darker and darker, and turned into bitterness and worse. His Lovecraftian stuff (Courtyard, Neonomicon, Providence) are very inspired, but there are some real 'ick' moments in there.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2018/02/22 19:28:20
I was trying to keep stuff behind spoilers there, Mr. Mod.
No, I think 'messed with' is a better way to put it. Rebirth revealed that the New 52 wasn't truly a new universe. It was the post-Crisis universe that had been mysteriously altered to have missing years and some changed events. Since Rebirth, the DC universe has slowly been taking on more and more post-Crisis characters and concepts (such as the JSA being on Prime Earth instead of Earth-2).
And at a more 'meta' level, remember that it's a story about influence. Watchmen influenced the DC universe and comics in general...it didn't create them.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2018/02/22 16:01:28
There is a certain irony in the author of "Lost Girls" and "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" disliking other authors taking his characters and telling new stories with them.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2018/02/22 19:28:41
"The 75mm gun is firing. The 37mm gun is firing, but is traversed round the wrong way. The Browning is jammed. I am saying "Driver, advance." and the driver, who can't hear me, is reversing. And as I look over the top of the turret and see twelve enemy tanks fifty yards away, someone hands me a cheese sandwich."
I think it's been pretty solid so far, if slow to get going. Like I said, it doesn't seem to undo the Watchmen story or retcon them into the Prime Earth universe. 'Rorschach' is in it, but nothing is changed from the original story. You can read it for that explanation. One interesting thing is that Superman is apparently key to the story (Rebirth certainly pointed that way too), but he's been absent so far. Still nine issues left to go, though.
They did introduce a couple of new villains from the Watchmen universe who are based on old Charlton characters like the Watchmen were. I thought that was an interesting expansion of the Watchmen universe. And these villains appear to have a big connection to a major DC villain, which is probably related to an interesting mystery/reveal involving that villain a couple years back.
Something perhaps more spoilery:
Spoiler:
There's a background point going on about the "Supermen theory", which deals with the fact that 90-odd percent of the metahumans in the Prime Earth universe are U.S.-based. That is, of course, a result of these characters being created by Americans in our world and set in the U.S. But in-universe, there are conspiracy theories floating around that it's because of experimentation led by the U.S. government.
Not sure where it's leading, but it seems like a major plot point is growing unrest among the citizens of the world toward metahumans. It's potentially more of Doc's meddling, methinks. Here's a related viral site thing that DC created:
gorgon wrote: I think it's been pretty solid so far, if slow to get going. Like I said, it doesn't seem to undo the Watchmen story or retcon them into the Prime Earth universe. 'Rorschach' is in it, but nothing is changed from the original story. You can read it for that explanation. One interesting thing is that Superman is apparently key to the story (Rebirth certainly pointed that way too), but he's been absent so far. Still nine issues left to go, though.
They did introduce a couple of new villains from the Watchmen universe who are based on old Charlton characters like the Watchmen were. I thought that was an interesting expansion of the Watchmen universe. And these villains appear to have a big connection to a major DC villain, which is probably related to an interesting mystery/reveal involving that villain a couple years back.
Something perhaps more spoilery:
Spoiler:
There's a background point going on about the "Supermen theory", which deals with the fact that 90-odd percent of the metahumans in the Prime Earth universe are U.S.-based. That is, of course, a result of these characters being created by Americans in our world and set in the U.S. But in-universe, there are conspiracy theories floating around that it's because of experimentation led by the U.S. government.
Not sure where it's leading, but it seems like a major plot point is growing unrest among the citizens of the world toward metahumans. It's potentially more of Doc's meddling, methinks. Here's a related viral site thing that DC created:
Batman: White Knight is hitting on some similar themes. The series has a reformed Joker battling for a position as the mayor of Gotham. People are out in the streets protesting Batman.
Both comics offer a very timely take on questions of authority, race, equality, and the nature of Good and Evil. So far, I'm a fan of Doomsday Clock and hope the authors are able to sustain the narrative.
How is there a reformed Joker running for Mayor? How is he even on the streets? Hasn't he killed hundreds of innocent people? Americans don't forgive that kind of thing.
One interesting thing is that Superman is apparently key to the story (Rebirth certainly pointed that way too), but he's been absent so far. Still nine issues left to go, though.
