Yarbicus

Sicario: Day of the Soledad

I poor sequel to an awesome original that is made infinitely better when you know that Isabel Reyes is actually the live action Dora the Explorer and imagine that Benicio del Toro is a heavily armed Boots.

They are pure pulp. Fun pulp. No real deep exploration of class inequality beyond "rich people are selfish bastards." Mostly, all characters are selfish bastards. 

On 3/1/2020 at 12:51 PM, InfestedKerrigan said:

 

Out of curiosity, have either of you read the books?  I have not, but it seems as though they are staying pretty faithful to source material.

I have. S1 was mostly the first book with a mishmash of the other books with a massively altered ending.

S2 has almost nothing to do with the books. 

Episode 5 of Altered Carbon s2 and I'm out.  It is just plain boring.  The first season was unique and exciting.  This one is none of those.

18 hours ago, WestRider said:

Nothing Left to Fear: I don't understand why this got panned so hard. Sure, there have been plenty better, but it's a perfectly solid supernatural horror flick. There have been plenty far worse as well. Maybe the reviewers thought Tupper and Heche were the leads, rather than Brandes and Stone? A significant part of the plot is that Tupper and Heche's characters never do learn what's going on. Both of the actresses playing their daughters did some good work here, tho, and Ethan Peck does nicely, with sort of a "Matthew Broderick, but creepier" vibe. Oh, and Clancy Brown, too, who I don't think I've ever seen turn in a bad performance. I was also favourably impressed by how they used their clearly somewhat limited special effects budget, saving much of it for the scenes where it would matter most.

You had me at "Clancy Brown. "

20 hours ago, Ish said:

I do have a similar nose 

On 2/4/2020 at 12:56 AM, Ish said:

Just gonna point out that 12 July 100 BCE was the birthday of Julius Caesar. I’m not a believer in astrology or any nonsense like that, but sharing a birthday with one of the greatest military minds in all of history is a pretty cool omen for a war gamer’s kid. (Especially, since you’re called ROMANS.)

Although, if you can persuade the stork to hold off for two weeks, 27 July 1938 was the birthday of a certain Ernest Gary Gygax. Just sayin’

Um, i was born July 12, 1967 and if you have played against me...well...let's just say sharing a birthday with a historical figure is not all that meaningful. 

We have "What the Pho.

23 hours ago, Ish said:

Hinterland is a very niche sort of show. It’s a police procedural / film noir murder mystery series set in and around Aberystwyth (a small coastal town) and the surrounding rural county of Ceredigion (grey hills, grey rivers, grey sheep, and grey bogs) in northern Wales. It’s grey, it’s raining constantly, it’s grey, everyone’s got an impossible to pronounce name, it’s grey, and half the cast have an accent so thick you need a chainsaw to cut through it.

My god, I love it so much.

A few reviewers have compared it to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, which I kind of agree with. The plot is nothing at all similar and the characters are quite different, but in terms of tone it most definitely is. It’s film noir, but not... It’s a police procedural, but not...

If you like moody, gloomy, noir murder mysteries and gorgeous sweeping cinematography of grey, dreary, and decaying rural farmhouses, you’ll love this show.  

Another interesting thing about the series is that it was filmed, simultaneously, as two separate shows: Hinterland, the version currently on Netflix, is filmed in English; Y Gwyll, which isn’t available in the U.S. near as I can figure, was filmed entirely in Welsh... With the same cast, same actors, same script, etc. 

British DVD box... Actual show not this colorful.

Agreed!  Hinterland, Happy Valley, and Shetland are among my favorite show of any genre.

One of the greatest nerds to walk the Earth. Thank you for the worlds you created with music.  RIP

Have you read the books? She is described as more Samoan than Kiwi but the character is very well written in both the books and show.

And Avasarala is even better in the books now that I have a voice in my head.

26 minutes ago, Ish said:

I just want to watch Frankie Adams and Shohreh Aghdashloo sitting around in a deli or something, complaining about people. 

Those two are examples of how perfect casting can really elevate a show.

S3 was when SyFy gave up on it and S4 is based upon the weakest book in the series imnsho. Really looking forward to S5 since that is my favorite of the books.

11 hours ago, Ish said:

State Flag Adoption Dates

Hawaii: December 29, 1845
North Carolina: March 2, 1885
Alabama: February 16, 1895
New Jersey: January 15, 1896
Connecticut: September 9, 1897
Rhode Island: November 1, 1897
New York: April 1, 1901
Ohio: May 9, 1902
Maryland: November 25, 1904
Tennessee: February 3, 1905
Pennsylvania: April 24, 1907
Maine: June 16, 1909
California: February 3, 1911
Michigan: June 26, 1911
Colorado: December 4, 1911
Delaware: July 24, 1913
Missouri: September 4, 1913
Arizona: January 25, 1917
Indiana: May 31, 1917
Wyoming: March 4, 1917
Kentucky: March 26, 1918
New Mexico: September 18, 1920
Iowa: March 12, 1921
Vermont: April 17, 1923
Washington: August 25, 1923
Arkansas: March 16, 1924
Oregon: April 15, 1925
Alaska: July 6, 1927
West Virginia: November 6, 1929
New Hampshire: November 30, 1931
Texas: August 31, 1933
North Dakota: November 9, 1943
Virginia: February 1, 1950
Idaho: November 2, 1957
Kansas: September 22, 1961
Nebraska: July 16, 1963
Illinois: June 27, 1969
Massachusetts: March 21, 1971
Wisconsin: May 1, 1981
Montana: December 17, 1981
Minnesota: August 2, 1983
Florida: May 21, 1985
Nevada: July 25, 1991
South Dakota: November 9, 1992
Mississippi: February 7, 2001
Georgia: February 19, 2003
Oklahoma: November 1, 2006
Louisiana: November 22, 2010
Utah: February 16, 2011

C'mon, don't pretend you are surprised I would have a list of exactly that.

I think that I love you in a mostly platonic fashion.

Last minute plan change. Looks like I won't be coming after all. Sad panda.

I'll end up at Dark Tower around 11:30 and see who is around.  We'll just go from there!

'Sup, liches?

I should be hitting town about 11 am. Who's up for lunch? And then meet at Dark Tower? Somewhere else?

33 minutes ago, Munkie said:

You seem to be implying that competence is a prerequisite for emissarial work...🤔

I'll be around and I don't play bloodbowl. So if you want to eschew chumpery, we could hang out.

Maybe I'm actually a sacrifice...

On 11/23/2019 at 12:54 PM, JMGraham said:

I sense a disturbance in Cascadia .... what is this? The weaklings from the south send an emissary to treat with their brutal overlords from the north? Very well. I know of this ... Yarb. 

Ill be coming off of a long jag of visiting relatives, but I can escape on the 7th! Afternoon games, beer, and dinner sound good? What are you playing these days? I’m happy to do board games if it means including more folks, but I’m also up for just about any mini game you could imagine. It’ll be great to see you!

The only issue I take is that anyone would choose me as an emissary for anything.

I am up for playing pretty much anything.  For minis, I am ready to go with 40K or 9th Age.  I would love to play Malifaux but I haven't done anything with 3e yet.  I have Infinity but have never played.  So, you, typical Yarb BS.

Ray Donovan 4.5/5

Amazon Prime has S1 available until December 1 so I gave it a shot. I loved so I signed up for the 7 days free with Showtime so that I can binge the rest.

It is like a contemporary Sopranos. I liked the Sopranos but there were so many pointless plot lines that went nowhere. Plus, Tony was, at the end of the day, just a sociopath. Ray Donovan is much tighter and more focused. Ray is also much more nuanced and complicated.

Yeah but I am totally up for learning if it meant hanging with the cool kids.

My dad took me to The Shining when I was 13 and it really got to me. After watching Doctor Sleep, it looks like the Outlook Hotel will feature in my nightmares again! The movie was really well done. I'm not a huge horror fan but I love King's books. So nice to see them turned into decent movies finally.

10 hours ago, Fix said:

Are you bringing Blood Bowl?  That's what we're into now.  Violently into it.  Knives are out for people who arrive in these city limits not carrying blood bowl teams.  We are stacking pass-through Canadians like cordwood and it's becoming somewhat of an industry.  Remote mountain towns' speakeasies and a few governmental structures are starting to be built out of the remains of cross-border dairy buyers who do not present a properly assembled blood bowl team as a mark of passage.  Thus far paint is optional because a lot of us are lazy as well.

Um...no.  

Looks like my wife has a "thing" with her friends in Bellingham on Saturday, December 7.  I will tag along and we will likely stay over night.  So, who's up for hanging out?  Gaming?  Drinking?  Eating?  All of the above, preferred.