Kevin Is Right: Captain America: The Winter Soldier Trailer

This one is just a quick hitter because I just watched the new Captain America: The Winter Soldier trailer and I am pumped.   Check it out below:

Wow.  There's so much to love here in such a small package.  (Yes, you may insert joke here).

First and foremost, it looks like Marvel will be cribbing liberally from Ed Brubaker's amazing run on Captain America (November 2004 to October 2012), which for my money is one of the best runs in a comic, ever.  If you want to read the books before seeing the movie, that's the place to start.  The Winter Soldier is the title of one of the best Brubaker's arcs, and it looks like the plot beats that characterize the arc are central to the film.

The high points all appear to be represented.  On the surface, we have the mystery of who is The Winter Soldier.  (We won't spoil it here).  However, even within the trailer we see the layers of subtlety of theme being peeled back.  The genius of Brubaker's run on Captain America is that he didn't utilize Captain America as just another super hero, or even as a sort of jingoistic American power fantasy.  Instead, Brubaker's run was a meditation on what it means to be American in the 21st century, and the tension between the legacy of the idealized American past, particularly "The Greatest Generation" and the realities of an ever-changing, frightening and menacing world.  The use of Captain America was a lens in which we could envision how "Old America" would view "New America" and thereby reconcile the two rapidly diverging ideas, and the nexus at which our American ideals converge upon our American realities.  In this case, the tensions between pre-emptive warfare and our idealized sense of justice, and even more subtle meditations, as manifested in Cap's suit which appears to have eschewed the more idealistic, symbolic Red White and Blue for a an approach that can be simultaneously be described as practical and stealth, or perhaps sneaky, covert and, even Anti-American.  I'm sure the symbolism that the only sign of America left on Caps' costume, the star, is also featured within the trailer on the Winter Soldier's metallic arm, will not go unremarked upon.

On top of this substantive work, we see some of the other special sauce that's going to make this All-American burger so tasty.  The character list is impressive.  Natasha Romanov, "The Winter Soldier", Nick Fury, and Robert Redford as Alexander Pierce, who appears to be directing S.H.I.E.L.D. (even I don't understand this mystery, but it looks awesome), as well as The Falcon, who not only is a fantastic and underrated companion character to Captain America, but looks to be given a phenomenal character design for the movies.

I also want to commend the first 30 seconds of this trailer in particular.   I felt it was a bold move to lead your action movie trailer with a relatively quiet character moment between Romanov and Rodgers.   The gamble paid off in a big way, though.  The acting and interplay between Evans and Johansson is extremely engaging and playful, and yet the end beat of the scene is the sort of heroic moment that immerses you in that Captain America feeling.  I have to confess that after that 30 second clip, I had to readjust my expectations.  I was ready for a movie to start, and, sadly, only had a trailer.  Ultimately, that scene served to give me the intangible feeling of quality which really shaped my impression of the rest of the trailer.  Something whispered to me "Don't worry Captain America fanboy, we'll take good care of you, we understand."

Despite their excellent track record, I've never been this excited for a Marvel movie.  Sure, it's just a trailer, but this one may end up ranked with the first Iron Man film in terms of quality, if this trailer is any indication.  Obviously, too soon to tell, but boy do they have me excited!

Kevin Is Right: Why Your Kickstarter is Bullshit

Over the course of the last year or so, we here at Loaded Dice have really changed our tune on crowdfunding.  Indeed, we discussed the issue in a lot of depth in a recent podcast on the subject.  Suffice to say that we have gone from very excited about the possibilities of democratized crowdfunding, and the empowerment of participating and patronizing the projects that you wish to see come into the world, to a sort of wary feeling of disillusionment, fueled by the myriad delays, disappointments and occasional outright frauds which have come to pass over the course of the last 18 months or so.

The problem with kickstarters is that they can prey on a group of unsophisticated "investors" who have wallets that are both loose and fat.  In place of the traditional model of video game investment, which relies upon the tried and true concepts of business plans, legal vetting, budgeting, and a bunch of other stuff you learn in business school, developers are allowed to tug on the strings of nostalgia and empowerment fantasies to sell you rainbows, ponies, unicorns and wishes. None of the vetting that goes with taking a potentially good idea to market is required, and often, it is not even begun until the money is already in hand.

I wanted to deconstruct what I felt was a typically problematic kickstarter video, the primary "elevator pitch" of most, if not all,  kickstarters, for the purposes of exposing the manipulations.  I have chosen the recently fully funded (and fully stretch goaled) Mighty No. 9 kickstarter.  I want to emphasize that although it is of necessity that I have singled out one particular kickstarter video, it is not because this one is particularly more egregious or terrible than the rest.  My goal is merely to use it as an example to demonstrate a wider pattern of the manipulations and illusory promises that are typical of this sort of pitch.  Mighty No. 9 just happened to hit many of the high notes.  Oh, and Dubs is kind of enthusiastic about it, so it's always fun to shit in his cornflakes.

Analysis After the Break....

Kevin is Right! Football: The Secret Best Gamer Hobby

What if I told you about half of my gamer friends ignore the best game there is?  It is a game that has more strategy than Magic, more tactics than X-Com, more excitement than the most tense dice rolls in D&D, requires more physical skill than Starcraft, and despite being over 100 years old, challenges the top minds in the game to bring out new innovations all the time.  Now, what if I told you that game was football?

Some of you get it.  There are some of you that don't.  Every year, right around this time, I fall right off the edge of the traditional nerd Venn diagram.  I have friends say to me, "Dude, I don't get it."  I start cosplaying as my favorite football player, and start breaking down film instead of watching MTG Draft videos.  Do I miss being a nerd?  Not even a little bit.  The reason is this: I'm in full-on nerd out mode.  Let me show you the game for jocks and meatheads in a whole new light.  Let me show you the game of football.

What Happened to Mechwarrior Online?

Heady Times for Robots

You should have been there, man.

Mechwarrior Online, published by Infinite Game Publishing (IGP), and developed by Piranha Games Interactive (PGI) was not a splashy AAA title with a huge marketing budget when it was announced in November 2011.  It was going to be free to play, and used a grassroots strategy of exposure to the press, targeted advertisements, and the strength of the battletech/mechwarrior brand to get the word out.  

I've mentioned it on the podcast before, but as a huge fan of giant stompy robots, particularly of the Battletech variety, I will never forget the moment when I first saw the banner ad, attached to the Penny Arcade Report article about modeling the mechs, and found out that I could be part of the closed beta.  The ecstasy was palpable.  Finally, a convincing, online multiplayer, beautifully and lovingly rendered modern Mechwarrior!  I had been waiting for this moment since my mid-teens, when AOL cancelled Multiplayer Battletch: Solaris.  I had prepared for this moment by reading the mostly god awful licensed novels, filled with the sort of  fetishistic descriptions of lasers melting armor that George R.R. Martin reserves only to describe comestibles.  I could not throw my $60 at "The Founders Program" fast enough.

An example of when you can, pretty much completely, judge a book by its cover.

I was not alone in my revelry.  Indeed, I was exceeded by the individuals who volunteered to make it rain to the tune $120 to become "Elite Founders" within the ranks of IGP's independent kickstarter-like funding program.  Indeed, they made 5 Million fucking dollars off of it.  The times were heady.  Mech Romney was not only president, he was a king.  The enthusiasm was grand.  Communities were popping up, with ridiculous vim and vigor, wanting to stomp around in robots, pretend they are the great houses depicted in the works of great literature mentioned above, and shoot mans in robots-erm, excuse me, Mechs.  The forums were frothing with joy.  People were loving it. I was screaming about how awesome the game was on the podcast.  To sum it up succinctly, I had never seen a more enthusiastic pre-launch community for a game.  Like I said, heady times.  

Off With Their Heads!

I'm telling you now:  This community is now in open rebellion against PGI.  Hostility is set to maximum.  Accusations of "LIES!", boasts of "Holding PGI Accountable" and outright jabs at the competence of the developer occupy the permanent and public banners that represent forum user signatures.

What caused everything to change?  Find out after the break.

Kevin Is Right About Movies: Pacific Rim

I'm 31 years old.  This means I was shitting my pants when Return of the Jedi came out.  Literally.  Diapers.  I often listen, wistfully, and not without jealousy, to people ten years older than me talk about some magical day in 1977, when they took a jaunt to the movie theater and saw Star Wars on the big screen for the first time, and how their life was changed. I look back with a palpable, dripping bitterness on May of 1999, when "The Phantom Menace" robbed me of what was to be my "Star Wars" moment.  However, I'm going to make a bold statement here, and it is not made lightly or without contemplation as to its import.  On July 15, 2013, Pacific Rim was my Star Wars.

I'm not a man prone to hyperbole, because as we all know....

So let's take a moment to quantify what I have said; to give it shape and form apart from the naked grandioseness from which it is born and likely floats within the reader's head.  Although Star Wars hardly needs an introduction, I am referring to specific aspects which made it unique.  For one, Star Wars was a remarkable spectacle.   It was visually unlike anything that had proceeded it.  Surely, there had been science fiction, space ships, action, and sword fights all depicted upon the screen, but no one had put together the sort of action sequences and convincing aesthetic on such a grand and engrossing scale as did a pre-turkey neck George Lucas and the scrappy, upstart effects house Industrial Light and Magic.

This guy could make a movie.

Also, Star Wars presented more than just visual effects. It presented a fully realized universe which challenged our imagination to play within it, and discover its' secrets.  The mythos captured the imagination of several generations-and for good reason; when you watched Star Wars you felt as if you were in the middle of history, as surely as if you had come upon the battle of Waterloo.  You felt as if there was a universe with a past, and a future, and that future was filled with the consequences of the present, and the present was filled with the consequences of the past.  Further, most effectively, should the camera turn suddenly, instead of seeing a sound stage, and a befuddled visionary/future-turkey-neck sitting in a director's chair, you would merely see more of that universe.  Dirty, dingy, and ripe with possibility.

Finally, Star Wars was a magical combination of unique and familiar.  George Lucas would be the first to tell you that he is standing on the shoulders of giants (harf harf obvious fat joke.)  The classic hero's journey, the films of Akira Kurosawa, WWII propaganda films, and the science fiction and adventure serials of the 1930s are all plain as day to see within Star Wars.  In a way, they are comforting, classic.  Friends along with us on the journey, giving us context from which to interpret what is around us.  And yet, 31 years later, I'd do anything to hop into an X-Wing and go explore the Outter Rim.  Not because I would find it familiar, but the opposite.  It will be strange, and new, and filled with things I've never seen before.  One quick pint at the Mos Eisley Cantina tells me that.  Surely, this is a fantasy, but one born out of the compelling originality of the Star Wars story, and its singular place in pantheon of film-born universe building.

So how does this all apply to Pacific Rim?  Find out after the break.

Kevin Is Right!: A Beginner's Guide to The X-Files

If you were to ask me how I met my first true love, I would tell you a story about a gruesome baby corpse unearthed in a baseball field, riddled with every genetic mutation known to man, and the legless, armless, toothless mother, strapped to one of those rollerboards that mechanics use to look under cars, who birthed it.  Although, appealing as this particular woman sounds, she is not, as you might have guessed, the first girl I ever kissed, but, instead, merely the subject of an investigation performed by the object of my teenage affections: 

Recently, as I mentioned in this article, one of the most cherished intellectual properties from the 90s has made a bit of a resurgence, in the world of comicbooks: The X-Files.  Based on the success of our Beginner's Guide to Star Trek, and working up a well of enthusiasm brimming with a teenage hormonal cocktail, the likes of which have not been seen since 1998, I wanted to provide a similar missive to help you figure out if The X-Files is the nostalgic 90s franchise for you.  I, for one, want to believe it is.  And as we all know....

So now we set about our task of curating a television show which, inevitably as a consequence of its age, carries with it some sour notes along with the sweetness.  And thus, we must squeeze the juice and distill into a potent cocktail, enjoyed like a finely aged whiskey.  

Kevin is Right: Comics Preview: X Files Season 10

An old love and a new love have collided for me, and I'm very excited about it.  If you someday aspire to be a reasonable and respectable human being, worthy of the rare gift of life bestowed upon you and deserving of the admiration and respect of other organisms, you have watched and love The X-Files.  If not, please make one of two choices:  1) Jump off the nearest bridge so as to stop potentially polluting the gene pool.  2) Grab a Netflix account, start watching, and thank me when you're done.  These seem like your only two options from where I'm sitting.

In any case, now that we're all on the same page, (having eliminated all the tasteless scum from the face of the planet,) I wanted to let you know that, whatever your feelings on Doggett, Reyes and I Want To Believe, you can now breathe easy.  All indications are that the X-Files you fell in love with is back, albeit using a different medium, the Comic Book.

IDW Publishing, following in the footsteps of other well received continuing, canonical stories (such as Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season 8 and 9) has launched, this month, X Files Season 10.  This series represents the continuing, allegedly canonical, adventures of the two greatest characters (both in terms of nuanced charm and raw, visceral sex appeal) world literature has ever known, Fox Mulder and Dana Scully.

Kevin is Right About Movies: Man of Steel

Generally, I prefer to write my reviews without spoilers.  This will not be one of those reviews.  However, before I put down my all caps indication to you that you should read no further should you wish to experience the plot in a manner that the filmmakers intended (if such a generous interpretation of intent can be made), please accept a humble explanation in two parts.

The first, the plot of this movie was so convoluted, poorly thought out and terrible that revealing the plot to you, in my opinion, can in no way diminish your enjoyment of the movie any more than having the plot revealed to you through the normal cinematic process.  Simply, the plot is so worthless that having it spoiled is simply not offensive to the conscience.

Secondly, the terribleness of this movie is so profound that it demands specific examples to convey the depths of idiocy to which it stoops.  In order to truly bring how badly written this movie is to light, I must pull back the curtain.  Further, I feel it is my duty to do so.  So now, if you still give a shit: SPOILERS!

XBox One: Highlander in Your Living Room

I just got finished watching the new reveal for Microsoft's Next Gen console, dubbed XBox One. My thoughts and reactions will assume you know what the fuck I am talking about, so if you are not up to speed yet, you can read a brief rundown of the presentation HERE

With the caveat that this is a preliminary announcement that delineates direction, rather than details, I am extremely encouraged by the Xbox reveal. Those of you who listened to Season 2, Episode 3 of the podcast know that I was not a huge fan of the PS4 reveal from a few months ago, and the difference is this: Microsoft understands the role of the console going into the next generation, and this presentation was a clear expression of that vision.

What Microsoft understood, and Sony did not, was that they are simply not going to compete based on "This is the ultimate gaming platform" as was the case, more or less, when the last generation debuted, but since that time has become increasingly specious as a claim for any console. Their hardware is simply not going to be able to compete with anything but the most basic gaming rigs, by necessity, at launch, and will soon be outpaced by them. I'm not really interested in how sweet your gigamawatts are, nor how many tiny tyrannosaurus rexes with lasers are running on hamster wheels to power it. These things are table stakes. Move on.

And so, after approximately 30 seconds of confirming that there is, indeed, a computer in this thing, the pitch was given and it was perfect:The XBox One is a very good gaming platform, with exclusive IPs, some of which are new and revolutionary, and there are gaming things it does well (like Sportsballs). Ultimately, however, this piece of hardware is going to be about the experience of your living room, not just the games you play on it. It is going to be the point device to control all aspects of what you experience as entertainment and living room interactivity, with your family, friends and the world.

(Continued After the Break)

A Beginner's Guide to Star Trek Part I

In the most recent episode of LDC, Dubs and I took our phillistine co-casters on a journey into SPPPPAAAACEEEEE.  Functionally, we just barraged them with reasons that Star Trek is awesome, and they left convinced that maybe this is something worth checking out.  Yet, the problem persists: where does the proto-Star Trek fan, poised to take it's first awkward flipper-steps on land, eyeing the water's edge nervously (as if a giant oil monster might burst forth and kill it unexpectedly and somewhat meaninglessly), begin?

Fear not, gentle reader.  Dubs and I have taken time from our busy schedules of debating other equally meaningless topics for the express purpose of assembling a guided introduction to the best Star Trek has to offer.  We felt this list necessary because a guided viewing allows the reader to ignore the warts of late 80s/early 90s television production. There isn't a single series of Star Trek that didn't take time to find its voice.  There's a lot of rewarding stuff in those lesser episodes, but they took place in a different era of television.  Additionally, there are some episodes that require a certain prior knowledge of the universe, and thus, although tremendously rewarding, can be inscrutable to a new viewer. We're here to provide a modern filter; a hammer to crack the tough, mollusk-like, seemingly impenetrable shell of things like the below image, so you can get to the juicy, life sustaining inner meat of what truly makes Star Trek great.

We're as confused as you, buddy.

We have built the list in a specific order, not necessarily chronological, but with the episodic nature of Trek (versus the serialized TV of the post-LOST DVR era) chronological arrangement is not a requirement.  The idea is to gradually introduce concepts.  Some concepts build upon each other (Deep Space 9, the height of Trek on TV, is a spinoff series).  Our hope is that once you have completed this list you will have grasped what is great about Star Trek, and can then look past the warts, grease make up, and man skirts, to enjoy what we have been talking about this whole time.

Kevin Is Right! About Movies: Oblivion

Last night I had the pleasure of watching Joseph Kosinski's film Oblivion.  Not a bad flick.  First off, the real story here is in the credits, and that needs to be taken into account, first and foremost.  Who wrote the Graphic Novel?  Kosinski.  Who wrote the screenplay (Along with Carl Gajdusek and Star Wars VII writer Michael Arnt)?  Kosinski.  Who directed this high effects budget film?  Kosinski.  Transcending that many different skill sets to put forth your vision is a feat that should be lauded in and of itself.  How do you do that?

A wholly plausible depiction of what would happen to the Meadowlands if the Jets ever won a Superbowl

The film itself was a very good, if imperfect, work.

The briefest of plot lead ins is as follows:  Tom Cruise and Andrea Riseborough are left on Earth after a war with an invading alien species known as the Scavs.  As Cruise puts it in the trailer, "We are the mop up crew."  Cruise and Riseborough are left to supervise the last remaining steps human beings have to take before evacuating the planet, and sailing off to Titan.  Most of humanity is on a space station orbiting the Earth, supervising, and waiting to leave.   Two weeks before they are scheduled to leave, Cruise is having problems with memory and not wanting to leave...

The first half of the movie was truly riveting.  The audience is immediately pulled in with an intriguing mystery in a dystopian, post apocalyptic future.  To me, it is the best type of mystery.  It is not a "Whodunnit?" It's a "Whatisit?"  Or maybe a "Whyisit?."  In any case, I found the dramatic tension to be positively tactile in its presence.  It was like a taught bowstring cutting through every scene.  You felt that at any moment you, or one of the characters, would reach out and pull, and hear a satisfying thrum as a consequent.  It felt masterful, and had me on the edge of my seat, my mind working as fast as the years of booze fueled brain damage would let it.

D&D 5e? NEXT!

A Taste of What is to Come

At PAX East, I had the dubious privilege of playtesting D&D's next edition, cleverly titled "D&D Next."  Ostensibly, one day soon, Wizards of the Coast will realize (or has realized, but is just being stubborn) how absolutely silly a name this is for a variety of reasons.  But for now, that is the appellation we are saddled with.  Not only, once D&D 6e inevitably comes out, will this name, should it stay, feel as anachronistic as that really sweet-at-the-time Staind tattoo that your shitbird friend has, but it so inaccurately reflects the sentiment and feeling of this latest version of D&D as to boggle the mind.  This sort of decision making has set the tone for the entire process.  The tone is set.

Edition Wars Declarations and Caveats

And now as any good discussion of D&D must contain, the caveats and declarations:  Firstly, I am a 4e kid.  Despite fervent childhood aspirations to actually play Dungeons and Dragons, the closest I ever came to manifesting them was a couple of games of Hero Quest with my loving but completely-not-into-it father.  I finally had the werewithal and the lack of shame to start playing D&D in my mid 20s, and the edition to play was 4e.  I love this version, and I think there are good reasons for that, but I would be remiss if I didn't acknowledge that everyone has "their" version of D&D.  Additionally, I'm basing this opinion on, essentially, one playtest and a perusal of the material made available (which is changing in inexplicable ways all the time.)


Playtest Impressions:

Myself, Derek and Mikey C sat down with a couple other dudes to try D&D Next. All of us, to a man, 4e kids or blank slate D&D Noobs. We essentially were flying blind.  "Wow us, WOTC!," we said.

An immediate adjustment was needed;  We were informed by a very affable, cooperative (He allowed us to rename the main villain to Bub Rub) and seemingly competent Dungeon Master (who, self admittedly, did not have a ton of experience with Next) that the helpful minis and grids that we had clung to were gone.  We were in a dangerous place known as "The Theatre of the Mind."  Wow, that's different...I wonder how combat is going to work?  (Spoiler alert:  Shitty.)   Well, let's exercise them brain muscles.

Now let's examine these character sheets.  Hmmm, this is...short.  One page?   Well, I'm a dwarf fighter. That should be fun.  Let's kick some fucking doors in and get this adventure moving.  I was glad to get this character because it meant that, in many ways, I could control the pace of our adventure, and ensure that we delved deep and didn't durdle about.  Oh, what a naive fool I was.

Examining my powers, I discovered that the list was quite short.  Although my stats and modifiers were essentially familiar to anyone who had ever looked at a character sheet, my abilities were...sparse.  Verisimilitude considerations aside, I was rather disappointed to discover that in regards to combat my dwarf could essentially do one thing: Swing his axe at someone.  In regards to special powers, I had the ability to expend additional d6 to either parry blows or add extra damage.  How overwhelmingly thrilling.  Besides that I had some "Dwarves know stuff about rocks and digging" ability ostensibly used for exploration.

In any case, there is still much to be hopeful about.  After all, this play test is probably going to be action packed, and show off all the new mechanics.  Everyone will have their chance to shine, and everything will become clear in time.  What is our adventure?  Oh, a repurposed 1e adventure called "Danger at Dark Shelf Quarry"?

(Reaction after the break)

SimCity: Layers of Garbage

As card carrying members of the greater society of internet reactionaries, we here at Loaded Dice wanted to hold off for a bit on the whole SimCity thing.  Last night on the cast, it was about to be discussed, but we thought it was best left for some bloggery.  Here it goes:

I want to start with an apology, because I have very clearly done something wrong, which likely affects you.  I pre-ordered this pile of sewage.  The Deluxe Version.  The $80 version.  Like a true, recividist idiot.  I even crowed about it on the podcast when we talked about how this is a different case than Aliens:Colonial Marines.  I ignored the warnings about always online DRM, I bought into the carefully tailored marketing message.  I hungered for videos on the game, thinking they were a gift to me, rather than a carefully designed illusion to part a fool and his money.  So now, EA gets to stuff my $80 in their pocket and can say to themselves "Welp, we got that going for us, which is nice."  I'm sorry for encouraging them.  You have my word, I won't do it again.

I'm pretty sure the internet at large is by now aware of the initial wave of problems with this game.  The launch week (month?) issues associated with the forced always online nature of the game led to a debacle that made Blizzard's incredibly blunderous launch of Diablo 3 look like a well executed professional production of Swan Lake in comparison.  As of this writing they are still trying to strip out all the glorious functionality that made online play so "key" to this installment in the series, (regional trading!  Worldwide Marketplace! Online Leaderboards!) so their servers can handle the basic tasks of scanning your retinas, probing you through the orifice of your choice and whatever else they can do to ensure their game is not falling victim to the wanton tender attentions of internet pirates.

The irony, of course, is that as of this writing, their ingenious DRM equivalent of trapping Batman and Robin in a giant clam has somehow failed.  SimCity, despite EA and Maxis' most sincerely delivered protestations that due to the ultra complex nature of the simulation (more on that juicy one later) could not possibly be contained purely on your puny several thousand dollar gaming PC, and simply must be simultaneously run on whatever duct tape constructed weevil infested pizza box farm that they call servers, has been hacked to run in offline mode successfully, as well as any number of other basic pieces of functionality that we were told were clearly impossible.  See HERE for some evidence, and see this Blue's News rundown for further info.  It should be noted that Rock, Paper, Shotgun has been all over this story from the beginning.

Are you ready for the fun part?  Because here comes the fun part (After the break):

Kevin on Kevin

Evan's post inspired me to write one of my own about the illustrious and prolific Mr. Kevin Smith.  Kevin Smith, is in many ways a personal hero of mine.  The birth of Loaded Dice Cast can be traced directly to him and his series of podcasts known as Smodcast.

I doubt there's many in my generation that don't hold Clerks, and possibly the other members of the "Jersey Trilogy" somewhere in their pantheon of influential movies.  In my mind, those three films have to be considered in any serious accounting of the cultural touchstones of what you might call the millennial generation.  It would be nice to stop the conversation there, but we can't.  Kevin Smith has directed some stinkers.

As he's transitioned into middle age, he's flirted with abandoning his career as a writer and director in favor of a career as a prolific podcaster.  The same pattern has emerged.  The hour I spend listening to his flagship podcast, Smodcast, is hands down the most hilarious hour of my week.  Fatman on Batman is an engaging study in passion, pot smoking,  and an engrossing interview style.  However, Smith does other podcasts, that to my mind, are just not in the same universe.  Jay and Silent Bob Get Old is a prime example.  Born of a desire to keep Mewes (as in Jay) off the drugs by giving him a microphone and an audience, this live show (which, it should be noted, often gets sell out audiences, so take my tastes with a grain of salt) is often a wreck of format.  Formulaic, oftentimes awkward, and, for some reason consistently containing large swaths of visual content.  I salute Kevin wanting to help out his friend, and I wish him all the best, but it's not worth an hour and a half of my time each week.

So here is why Smith is one of my heroes: He is an average guy from Jersey who consistently overcomes his fear of failure by employing and harnessing a truly singular passion for creative expression.  It would be great to lionize him; to say he is unafraid to fail, but I think this is not only untrue, but does him a disservice.  The man knows Jersey Girl was a joke and Cop Out was ridiculous, and yet he goes and he makes fresh content every day, and ultimately, makes the world a better place for it.

Will Clerks III be his best movie ever?  Sorry, Kev, I doubt it.  But that doesn't mean I'm not rooting for you.  I pretty much hated Clerks II and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, so I hope you get back to your roots.  I hope you get back to saying something important, or at least relevant.  I hope I don't have to sit through a two hour self referential dick joke fest.  Say something new, say something from the heart.  I know I'll be rooting for it.

Batman Year Zero

This morning something pretty big was announced.  DC Comics (via Associated Press) announced the next storyline for Scott Snyder's flagship Batman Book.  Batman: The Zero Year.  This is something I'm very excited about.

Snyder, along with artist Greg Capullo, has done a really good job on the book ever since he came on at the start of the New 52 DC Relaunch back in 2011.  He's written two major arcs: The Court of Owls, and Death of The Family.  Both were satisfying for a couple of reasons.

First, they felt big and important.  This was not "Batman fights the riddler.....again."  Snyder has a way of setting the stakes high and getting the reader to buy in.

Capullo's visuals have been top notch and aided the pacing and tone tremendously.  I always hate to see a talented writer paired with an artist that doesn't fit his style.  However, that is not an issue here.

Finally, Snyder is a man who is talented at big arcs.  It has been tremendously rewarding to watch these stories develop over a fairly large timespan, and yet feel not only internally consistent, but infused with a sense of constant forward momentum.

If there is to be any criticism, it simultaneously is not Snyder's fault, but more promisingly, may be alleviated, at least temporarily, by this new arc.  DC needs to sell bat-books, and so you need bat characters.  Although the New 52 was supposed to be a fresh reboot of the entire DC Universe, because of this aforementioned need, the Batman title was saddled with a murky, unclear continuity (analyzed as effectively as is possible here) in which he has a ten year old son conceived while he was Batman (probably), 3-4 Robins, some of which have died and come back to life, and only been operating as Batman for, seemingly, a couple of years.  Because: Comics.

Zero Year ( A clever hat tip to Frank Miller's Batman:Year One...available in movie form on Netflix) has the opportunity to pare all this silliness down by taking us back to Bat Basics. Batman in his simplest form.  No Robins 1-4.  No pre-existing rogue's gallery.  No "Bat Family" to be saddled with.

(Interesting Thought:  In Death of the Family, Joker's point to Batman is this extended Bat Family has made him weak and diluted.  The Joker wants to, in essence, remove him of these burdens so he can go back to being the Batman, Joker loves.  Good writing or Snyder actually BLOWING YOUR MIND WITH META COMMENTARY?)

Let's see what Snyder does.  I, for one, am really looking forward to it.