637

Genchu doesn’t kill children, unlike Anakin Skywalker! Also, on a new note, the pages we post moving forward will be 700px wide instead of 600px, which lets me show off the art a little more!

WARNING: I’M GOING TO TALK ABOUT MAJOR STAR WARS SPOILERS!!! Everything below assumes you’ve seen the movie.

 

 

I liked the Force Awakens, I would probably rate it my third favorite Star Wars film after Empire and New Hope, but we’ll see how it holds up on repeated viewings. What I liked most was the affability and chemistry of the new cast, Rey, Finn, and Poe are really likable! Even Kylo Ren, despite murdering his father, comes off as a sad puppy that needs a hug, albeit one who would cut your head off if you made him angry. The movie is a Star Wars film for the internet age. Several parts made me go “THINK OF THE MEMES!!!” I can’t wait to see all the Kylo Ren hissy fit skits and comics, or the inevitable flood of “THAT’S NOT HOW THE FORCE WORKS!” animated gifs. I laughed, smiled, and had a great time through the whole darn film! BUUUUUUUT, being a life long Star Wars fan and obnoxiously critical thinker, I saw some problems with this movie! I just wanted everyone to know that I really enjoyed it before I go on my inevitably long, whiny rant!

Perhaps one of my biggest disappointments with this film is the soundtrack. Maybe it will grow on me, but this movie did not deliver any new memorable themes. It’s a bummer, because each trailer leading up to the film had a custom score by John Williams, and they all used the classic trilogy themes to great effect. But, in the actual film, instead of just giving us the Imperial March to accompany the First Order, we get, I dunno, something I certainly can’t recall. Since there’s so much fan service in this film already, why not just give us our classic themes in full thundering force (pun intended)! Blast us with the Force theme when Poe makes his trench run, make us shiver with Yoda’s theme when the CG lady with big glasses starts spouting wise advice. Hit us with that Imperial March when the First Order is all gathered together. We all want it, just GIVE IT TO US!! Or at least give us new and exciting, memorable themes! I LOOOOVE John Williams, he even did stellar work on the Prequel trilogy. But Force Awakens’ soundtrack is disappointingly subdued and unmemorable.

OH GEEZ the plot redundancies in this movie bug me! Finn and Poe crash the Tie fighter, later Finn and Han crash the Falcon. Finn busts Poe out of the First Order ship, Finn and Han go to bust Rey out of the First Order base. Poe’s X Wing squad gets into an aerial dog fight with TIE Fighters, later Poe’s X Wing squad gets into an aerial dog fight fight TIE Fighters. Poe gets captured, later Rey gets captured. Han does a risky hyperspace jump to escape the freighter, later Han does a risky hyperspace jump to infiltrate the Starkiller. How risky is hyperspace jumping again? Because it’s not feeling all that risky anymore! My problem with these plot redundancies is that the danger for the characters does not escalate in this film so much as it maintains a constant level, which makes everything at once feel too dangerous and not very dangerous at all. If the lightsaber duel at the end of the film didn’t feel like a step above everything else, we would have a serious non-climax problem similar to Star Trek Into Darkness.

In a film where the vast majority of aliens are practical effects, why did they make the alien character with the largest part in the film, namely the short orange lady with big glasses, a CG creature? It bummed me out! I didn’t dislike her character, even though there’s no explanation as to who she is or what she knows or why we should consider her an authority on anything other than that she’s old, but it took me out of the film a bit when this little orange CG lady showed up in a room filled with practical effects creatures and characters.

Leia hugs Han goodbye, Leia later hugs Rey in bittersweet reunion. Leia’s super into hugs! I dunno, all the hugging felt a little saccharine. When I went to remember what Leia did in this movie, hugs were all that came to mind!!

I’m not opposed to Han getting deaded by his emo son. It’s compelling and sad and cool all at the same time, but now we’ll never see Han and Luke reunite, and that sucks!

Luke’s ‘plan’ for going into exile makes about as much sense as his ‘plan’ for busting Han out of carbonite. Either Luke wants to be found, so he left a map that both his allies and enemies could find, or he doesn’t want to be found, at which point he picked a really lousy hiding spot that could be easily located on a map that he left with some friends in hopes they’d never show anyone. Listen, Luke! Either don’t leave a map, or give the map to Leia and say “come find me when this or that particular event happens”. Maybe Luke’s ‘Map Plan’ will be explained in Episode 8, but something tells me the whole ‘Find the Map’ macguffin won’t get an explanation. Heck, if R2D2 had the second part of the map and was staying shut down to hide it, why did he reactivate to reveal it at the end of the movie? R2 was just like “Oh, are we getting to the end? Better give them the rest of the map so Luke can make his teaser cameo!”

The Millenium Falcon is GODS DAMN INDESTRUCTIBLE. It bounces off the ground and other ships like a bumper car. It maneuvers as if it’s a TIE Fighter, despite being, like, an 80 year old freighter (110 in the original EU). Even if it is modified, considering it was done so on a scoundrel’s budget, I have to wonder why every ship in the universe isn’t as equally indestructible and maneuverable. Or maybe they all are, I dunno.

The whole sequence on the freighter with the Guardians of the Galaxy rejects confronting Han, and then getting assaulted by giant CG squids felt kind of out of place to me. I kept wondering if they could’ve used that screen time for some more character banter and plot clarification. Maybe that would’ve been boring, but I like these characters so much that I just wanted to see them spend more time talking to each other instead of watching slapstick action! The physics of this movie sometimes get very slapstick and cartoony and I do not like it, but that’s just how these types of big budget effects films roll, so even though it messes with the tone of the film, I guess I just have to deal with it.

DID THEY BLOW UP CORUSCANT?? We see the Starkiller fire five shots that blow up five planets, one of which kind of, but maybe not quite, looks like Coruscant. If it was, well, they sure didn’t spend much time emphasizing how big a deal it is to blow up such a storied planet in the franchise! At least the loss of Vulcan in the Star Trek reboot felt like a big deal. Also, the members of The Resistance are able to SEE the five planets get blown up when they look into the sky. Are all of these planets in the same solar system? I find that hard to believe! I think this is another case of JJ Abrams not knowing how SPACE works. Kind of like that time Old Spock was able to look up in the sky and see Vulcan being destroyed despite being stuck on what was supposedly a far away remote ice world. And another thing, why did the First Order even blow up these planets? I may have missed some dialog about the First Order wanting to take out the New Republic Senate, but even so, it was certainly glossed over. When Alderaan got destroyed, at least I knew what Alderaan was and why it was getting blown up! And one more thing, if the First Order is not as big and powerful as the old galaxy spanning Galactic Empire, then how did they manage to make a waaaay larger and more complicated weapon than the Death Star?

Why are there three factions? There’s the New Republic, the Resistance, and the First Order. So the Resistance is fighting the First Order? Why is the New Republic not fighting the First Order? Is the Resistance part of the New Republic? Is Leia part of both the Resistance AND the New Republic? Why not just have the New Republic fighting the First Order? Wouldn’t that be a lot less complicated? I mean, maybe the New Republic doesn’t want to be in a war or something and the Resistance is made up of people who don’t like the New Republic’s peace policy, but, come on, it’s called STAR WARS, just let there be a war going on between the New Republic and the First Order. Keep it simple, people!! Also, a better explanation of what the First Order’s goals are would be good. I mean ‘Take over the galaxy’ is a given, but WHY? Is the New Republic doing a bad job of running the place?

C3PO’s design looked kinda terrible up close. He had this ugly matte finish instead of being a shiny metallic gold. There was also this one particular shot of R2D2 where 3PO was just behind him. It clearly showed a close up of 3PO’s wire exposed midriff, except it didn’t look like wires, it looked like a black body suit with a couple wires taped to it. I can’t believe I’m saying this but C3PO looked better in the prequels.

Supreme Emperor Snoke is a stupid main villain. Firstly, he’s a dumb CG cartoon man. Secondly, he looks like Voldemort. Thirdly, his name is SNOKE. Forthly, he’s not mysteriously cloaked in shadows like the Emperor was, he’s just some guy with an ugly face. He does not do or say anything that comes off as intimidating. If he’s going to be our main baddie moving forward, I hope they replace him with a guy in makeup and give him a more looming presence.

I wish they’d just revealed Rey’s past to us in this movie. I know they want to hold on to it so it can be a big reveal in Episode 8 or maybe even 9, but it causes me to ask so many questions about what’s motivating her and why she does the things she does. Clearly she knows about the Force, and has some idea of its capabilities. Maybe she received some rudimentary training when she was 8 years old or something because I find it hard to swallow that she just naturally KNEW how to do a Force Mind Trick or pull the lightsaber to her. I won’t say that I wasn’t emotionally invested in her story, because I totally was, but it would’ve made a world of difference if I’d known exactly where she was coming from. I suppose there’s always subsequent viewings after the sequels have revealed that information. But, by contrast, in A New Hope, we knew what Luke’s life had been like up to that point, which helped us understand his motivations and how crazy the events of the first film really were for him. Also, I might as well say I’d have liked more of Finn’s history revealed, too. Maybe instead of fighting squids on the freighter, Finn and Rey could’ve shared their pasts with each other, further cementing their bond and helping the audience understand them more.

So I think that covers all my complaints about The Force Awakens (also that title means what again? Is it referring to Rey’s awakning Force abilities? I vaguely recall dialog mentioning something about the Force awakening). I just want to mention again that I did greatly enjoy it despite all the problems I listed. The film’s characters had a lot of heart and plenty of great moments and fun dialog! That goes a long way to allowing me to forgive a wishy washy plot that requires some Jedi mind tricks to make sense of. If any one has a defense, explanation, or clarification for any of the points I brought up, feel free to let me know! I have, admittedly, only seen the film once at this point, and may have missed some exposition.

Published on by | 50 Comments on 637

636

Nataku enjoys a little tumble.

So, wait, they actually did it? They actually made an Independence Day sequel? There are so many reasons why this is a stupid idea, but I guess the main reason is that it’s like making a sequel to Titanic, or The Day After Tomorrow, or whatever other disaster movie. Disaster films don’t get sequels because the story is over, it’s done! This sequel is also retconned from a narrative point of view because in the original ID4 they specifically state that the alien invaders are a nomadic race that move from planet to planet depleting resources until they move on. So is this a NEW alien race that wants to attack Earth, or was there more than one evil nomadic mothership wandering the galaxy? The trailer says “we knew they’re return”, implying there were even MORE of these same aliens out there! Either way, it’s got Jeff Goldblum in it so I’m there opening night!!!!!!

Published on by | 48 Comments on 636

635

Genchu: “Or not.”

I feel bereft of interesting things to prattle on about, so I’ll just mention again that signed copies of NN4B Volumes 1 & 2 are available for purchase at a reduced on the Hivemill store. Maybe you have a friend or loved one who digs bizarre, hilarious, anachronistic action comedy political dramas set in historically inaccurate depictions of foreign countries and, yet, has somehow never discovered No Need for Bushido! Well now’s your chance to BLOW THEIR MIND this Xmas! I’m just sayin’…

Published on by | 39 Comments on 635

NN4B Volumes 1 & 2 On Sale for Holiday Season

NN4B Volumes 1 & 2 On Sale
Hello, Bushido readers! Our printed volumes 1 & 2 are currently available on sale at the Hivemill webstore for the remainder of the holiday season. Each book is lovingly and tenderly hand signed by Joe and Alex. At last you have the opportunity to read NN4B the way it was meant to be experienced (after we spent many hours formatting it for print)!! Now GO, buy books! LET THE LEGEND COME BACK TO LIFE!

Published on by | 3 Comments on NN4B Volumes 1 & 2 On Sale for Holiday Season

634

So I bought into the hype and got a Microsoft Surface Book. Heck, I had it on preorder! But now I’m returning it. For those of you not in the know, here’s a nice video of what the Surface Book is, essentially a high end tablet/laptop hybrid. I’d had aspirations of it becoming me primary mobile digital art tool. I currently have a bare bones refurbished Asus tablet for on the go art, but it is a years old machine that can’t even run the latest version of Photoshop smoothly, and only has a 32 GB internal hard drive (24GBs of which are taken up by its Windows 7 OS). So I was/am in the market for a new portable art device. The problem is, the Surface Book does not feel like a Wacom device. I have a Cintiq as my primary digital art tool, plugged into my desktop. It’s wonderful, and drawing on it feels very natural. When I got the Surface Book on Monday, my initial impression was “yeah, i can use this to art!” But after trying to draw the current comic page, I became acutely aware of an issues that I’d had with a previous non-Wacom device, the Yiynova MSP19 (which I had accidentally purchased at one point when I’d meant to get the much better MSP19U a couple of years back).

Basically, the pressure sensitivity for the Surface Book seems to be directly tied to the amount of force applied to the pen. Maybe there is more to the tech, I wouldn’t doubt it, but when I put the tip of the Surface Book’s pen on the screen, and wiggle it back and forth without applying any direct pressure, it does not make a mark. Comparatively, if I took a regular 2B pencil and put it on paper and wiggled it back and forth, it would leave a light line. This sounds like a minor thing. After all, who doesn’t apply pressure to a pencil when they draw? But I draw with a lot of light, rapid marks. I found that often the beginnings and ends of my marks wouldn’t even appear, leaving a truncated line as I drew, or some strokes wouldn’t appear at all. When it came to inking, it was even more frustrating because I had to significantly slow down how quickly I worked, consciously thinking about where I wanted each ink mark to begin and end and to apply the necessary pressure. I visited the parents’ for Thanksgiving, but when I came home, after having struggled all weekend with drawing a single comic page on the Surface Book, I knocked the inking out in under four hours on the Cintiq. The difference in pressure responsiveness was like night and day.

Any time I try a digital drawing device that is not specifically Wacom technology, it trips me up pretty bad. The Surface Book itself is a powerful machine, durable and light weight and it looks good, but it’s expensive and if you can’t use it as an art device, you might as well spend the money to just get an even beefier laptop, or a really nice tablet. I’ve never used Windows 10 before, but it’s a pretty slick looking OS, barring the occasional glitch or crashed program, which is frustrating for a supposedly top of the line device.

So would I recommend the Surface Book? I honestly really wanted to love the thing, it seemed like the kind of dream device that could act like a portable version of my desktop. But I can’t draw on the thing like I can on my Cintiq or on paper, and it bums me the heck out. I’ve troubleshot every possible solution, and looked online for other people complaining about this issue. It seems as though very few others have this same problem with the Surface Book’s pen pressure, so maybe the problem is specific to me. But for any other artist feeling like dropping a pretty penny on that shiny new Surface Book, this has been my word of caution!

Published on by | 41 Comments on 634

633

I’m pretty sure Ricardo’s just pretending to be angry as an excuse to run away. Or maybe he is really angry. You can never tell with that guy.

I finally got around to watching Daredevil on Netflix, and it’s pretty much my favorite live action Marvel thingy to date. Well, I was pretty disappointed in the second half of the last episode. Let’s just say the ‘final showdown’ felt weak and anticlimactic, and also Matt looks way cooler in his black ninja outfit than his dumb red superhero outfit. But that will not dampen my eagerness for Season 2! And I’m sure I’ll be jumping into that Jessica Jones series right away, which, apparently, is also quite good. Netflix is pretty great, guys!

Also, the greatness of Netflix’s Daredevil got me thinking about their 2014 big budget low fantasy epic. Confession time, I liked Marco Polo quite a bit, even though it was tropey as heck and full of eye-rolling cliches. But it was a lot of my favorite tropes! It had some of the same problems as Game of Thrones, like those rather juvenile sexposition scenes that prioritize objectivity over characterization for female characters, without the positives of a extremely memorable characters. The titular Marco Polo is the epitome of ‘bland white guy’. At least Kublai Kahn is super rad. Also, Hundred Eyes the blind Taoist Wushu master, so great (but I have a bias there). I appreciated that the series actually had a very appropriately mixed race cast for the story, unlike the majority of big budget Hollywood productions. It also had such great fight scenes! Supposedly, Marco Polo was a financial bomb for Netflix and I figured I’d likely never get a season 2. But I’ve also read that Netflix ordered another 10 episode season, although there’s no other information beyond that.

But I got off topic! Netflix’s Daredevil = Great. Everyone already knows it, I’m just adding my thoughts to the masses.

Published on by | 16 Comments on 633

632

Ricardo ain’t goin’ nowhere without his guns!

I’m kind of a James Bond lover. I can’t say I’m a super fan or anything, but I likely have an above average knowledge of the franchise. The reason I bring it up is becase I saw Spectre a couple days ago, and now I’m gonna rant about it!

It was disappointing. Spectre has this problem where it still wants to be a Daniel Craig Bond film, with all its gritty realism, while also being a silly Sean Connery Bond film, with the impossibly polite yet evil Spectre organization and the hilariously grudge-driven Blofeld. I mean, I don’t dislike Spectre or Blofeld, I love ’em! But the film started to fall apart for me when Bond walked into a Spectre meeting full of well dressed bad guys and overheard the evil organization discussing their prostitution and drug trafficking rings like as if it was a dull executive board meeting. For all the previous Craig films’ efforts to keep the bad guys in the realm of possibility (or as possible as Bond villains can get), Spectre is too much of a cartoon concept to work in the Craig Bond universe, or at least in the very Connery-era manner it was portrayed here.

The movie is also TOO LONG. It keeps wanting to slow down to a crawl and let Bond angst out stoically while someone psychoanalyzes him. That stuff worked in the other Craig films because they were all about deconstructing the Bond character archetype. It was the sort of thing the series needed to become relevant again, I suppose, but in a movie where the bad guy sends butlers to drive you to his secret desert lair and serve you wine while he shows you his personal museum, the idea of a frank look at the murder/sex machine that is 007 feels rather out of place. If they’d cut down all the mopey scenes, the film could’ve been under two hours instead of the 2.5 hour slog it is.

The action scenes are also a kind of dull in comparison to the last three films. There’s a particularly unspectacular car chase in which Bond drives in a straight line ahead of a single henchman in a following car. It’s just one guy, Bond! And your car is a lot more advanced and such. Could you think of no other way to escape than to eject just before driving into a wall and losing your vehicle? Usually when Bond loses his cool car, it’s because the odds are slightly less in his favor.

A lot of reviews I’ve seen have loved the opening sequence during Mexico’s Day of the Dead parade, and although that beginning action sequence is pretty much the best in the movie, it doesn’t feel nearly as tense or exciting as the opening of Skyfall. It’s also notable that even though Bond blows up a building and a helicopter lands in the middle of the parade, those people just keeping parading like it’s no big! The same thing could be said for Bond’s fight on a train later in the film. Did no employee think to stop the train or call the authorities when a huge brawl and gun fight broke out? The world around Bond seems surprisingly unphased by his destructive antics this time around.

There was also a lot of talk about Monica Bellucci being a bond girl this time around. I was like “what, the nearly 50 year old Daniel Craig pairing up with a girl that’s not half his age? How progressive for a Bond film!” And then he paired up with some girl half his age anyway and it was a little weird. Bellucci was only in it long enough to get seduced and then abandoned, about five minutes. She didn’t get killed, at least! Normally every woman that sleeps with the Craig Bond DIES, he is the black widow of James Bonds.

And then there’s the continuity. I was curious how this version of Blofeld somehow created the events of the previous films and caused ‘all of Bond’s pain’. Well, I have no idea, because it’s never explained! Blofeld simply claims he did it so there. It’s also weird how much they reference Casino Royale because, I mean, wasn’t Skyfall a sort of soft reboot? In Casino Royale, Bond’s a brand new agent, Quantum of Solace (which is hilariously ignored) is a direct sequel. Then Skyfall comes along and Bond is old and washed up. Was there a huge time skip? Normally I wouldn’t have to think about it because Bond films have such loose canon connections anyway, but with Spectre, I have to take note of the discrepancies and now it’s just confusing!

On the plus side, I did like that Q, Moneypenny, and M all got to be actual characters involved in the story this time. It felt like Bond really had a team. Granted, the last two Mission Impossible films did the same thing WAY BETTER. In fact, Spectre felt like a less fun version of MI:5. I mean, you could argue that the Craig era Bond films have been wildly derivative of whatever movie is currently popular, but at least that James Bond coat of paint gave them their unique identity. But Spectre just isn’t really doing it for me this time, it’s derivative while failing to sell me on the James Bond charm.

I didn’t hate Spectre, it was watchable. But it committed the one sin that a Bond film must avoid at all costs. It was boooooorrrrrring.

Published on by | 42 Comments on 632

631

OH GODS WON’T SOMEONE PLEASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN? Even if those children are whiny heirs to feudal lords.

Usually I have some social media tidbit to rant on about, but nothing stands out in the immediate. I’m still playing MGSV (73% completion and counting, also that link is hilarious, M for language). I also tried the Overwatch closed Beta, and I’ll bet that game is super fun for people who like multiplayer shooter/moba hybrids! Turns out I do not, though, despite being very drawn to the colorful characters and great art direction. My experience with the game can be summed up as ‘spawn, run to the front lines, die immediately, repeat’. I suppose I just need to Git Gud, but that likely requires far more time than I’m willing to put in!

I’m also rewatching Star Trek TNG and Cosmos (2014), and I’m an episode behind on The Flash and Arrow, which have both been quite entertaining so far this season, even though I still find myself face palming at the cheesey dialog every few minutes.

So that’s my current media intake! Not all that much,  I guess. I definitely need to get to the theater to see Spectre. I refuse to acknowledge the middling review scores so I can be disappointed on my own terms!

Published on by | 61 Comments on 631

630

Well this situation is just getting more and more uncomplicated by the second!

Um, Star Wars rant incoming I’M SORRY!

So I enjoy Star Wars Rebels, but oh man, is it hard to feel like the Empire is much of a threat in the series! Obviously from a narrative point of view, the Empire needs to be at least one step behind the main cast so that they can keep being rebels, but whenever the Empire catches up to them, which has been frequently, they escape again pretty darn easily and it kind of cheapens the drama of fighting a huge galactic super power. In the films, even when the Rebels are winning, they’re bleeding casualties like nobody’s business, and it feels like a real struggle. To be fair, I did love the ‘Siege of Lothal‘ two parter where Vader takes a crack at the main cast. They still escape, but the small rebel fleet supporting them takes a serious beating, and it feels like a major loss and a narrow escape, unlike the most recent episode. In ‘Always Two There Are‘, Ezra, Sabine, and Zeb get ambushed by TWO Sith Inquisitors. Although it is revealed that the Inquisitor from season 1 was their leader, these two are still played up as super intimidating. In the end, though, the Inquisitors do a hilariously sloppy job of securing their prisoners and blunder into an obvious escape plan setup, allowing Ezra and company to just kind of get away without much effort. Yet after their escape, Ezra, Zeb, and Sabine act exasperated, as if escaping from the Inquisitors was as harrowing an experience as escaping from Vader. No it wasn’t, guys! You made the inquisitors look like total chumps, and have, for the time being, at least, robbed this season’s big bads of any intimidation points they’d built up!

Normally I’d just let it slide, but Rebels is making a bad habit of this type of scenario. I think what these big confrontations are hurting for are some casualties, even temporary ones! If the inquisitors had heavily damaged the rebel’s ship as they’d escaped, or if they’d taken one of the main cast out of commission, and the following episode would require our protagonists to seek medical treatment or mechanical support, then at least it would feel like the rebels couldn’t just run into an Inquisitor without incurring some losses. I still dig Star Wars Rebels, and I look forward to each episode. I just really want to LOVE Rebels, but its inability to hold on to the tension between its most dramatic scenes kind of bums me out!

Published on by | 41 Comments on 630

629

Thanks, Ricardo. The situation’s a lot less complicated now!

So we went and saw Crimson Peak. It’s a very pretty movie with some great period costumes, sets, and cinematography! It’s also kind of boring with very little in the way of legitimate scares, and a plot that doesn’t offer much in the way of twists. The trailer is also somewhat misleading, making it seem like more like a ‘Haunted House‘ scenario than it is in actuality. Granted, Guillermo del Toro kept selling it as a ‘Victorian gothic love story’ more than a straight up horror movie. But considering there’s not much emphasis on the romance after the first quarter of the film, I’m pretty sure it’s just a lackluster horror movie! I still love del Toro, though. I just wish he’d gone with his more bombastic style on this one!

Published on by | 40 Comments on 629