WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew does his best to navigate menus and complex relationships playing Crusader Kings II while D. Bethel gets horribly disappointed while playing Samurai Shodown VI.
A TWISTED LEGEND:The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild has been released to universal acclaim as a launch title for Nintendo’s new console (and as a tombstone for their previous console) but how much is pure nostalgia, how much is hype, and how much is it actually a good game. Well, neither Dan nor Andrew have played it, but with the conversation surrounding the game they do ask a pertinent question, “What is as Zelda game and does this new game meet it?”
WEEK IN GEEK: As promised, Andrew watches (and loves) The LEGO Batman Movie while Dan can’t stop playing Righteous Hammer Games.
EPISODIC SERIALIZATION: With Channel Zero: Candle Cove last week and both Dan and Andrew engrossed in The People vs. OJ Simpson: American Crime Story, Andrew and Dan look at what seems to be a rising tide of season-long anthology television shows. Moving away from episodic anthology shows to a single story told across an entire season and changing stories and cast in the following season, shows like American Horror Story and True Detective brought this format to the forefront of popular culture.
AMERICAN CRIME STORY AND THE FICTIONALIZATION OF LIVING MEMORY: As mentioned above both Dan and Andrew are oddly obsessed with The People vs. OJ Simpson and, frankly, they take some time to wonder why.
FEATURED MUSIC:
-“Stayin’ in Black” by Wax Audio
-“Far From Any Road (Main Title Theme from True Detective)” by The Handsome Family
-“Time” by Titiyo
WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew messes with controller schematics for X-Com 2 while Dan freaks himself out as he delves into Syfy’s Channel Zero and the HBO documentary, Beware the Slenderman.
THE DOCTOR NO MORE: As Peter Capaldi announces his departure from the role of The Doctor in Doctor Who, speculation begins as to who will take his place in Series 11 which brings with it a new showrunner, Chris Chibnall.
EVEN STRANGER: With the only time we’ll mention the Super Bowl on the podcast, Netflix’s Stranger Things debuted its second season teaser trailer during the big game and Andrew and Dan dive into their expectations.
-“Stayin’ in Black” by Wax Audio
-“I Am the Doctor” by Jon Pertwee
-“Stranger Things” by Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein
-“Untitled Self Portrait” by Will Arnett (from The Lego Movie)
*audio clip sourced from Doctor Who, “The Day of the Doctor.”
WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew finds zen in the indie hit, Starbound, while D. Bethel finds zen watching the Syfy procedural, Haven.
DANCING WITH THE DEVIL: For a variety of reasons, Andrew had Dan watch an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine of some renown, from season 6, in which Benjamin Sisko struggle with making huge decisions throughout “In the Pale Moonlight.” In parts a war story and a character study, it is an episode that showcases not only the narrative depths DS9 hit but also how we can use television and movies and other narratives as talking points for what we’re dealing with in the world around us.
UNPLUGGED BUT UNBOWED: The Penny Arcade webcomic/nerd moguls announced a new convention to add to their already impressive PAX roster: PAX Unplugged, a tabletop-focused exposition to be held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in November. Dan and Andrew discuss the implications of this announcement.
-“Stayin’ in Black” by Wax Audio
-“Theme (From ‘Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’)” by Dennis McCarthy (as performed by The City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra)
-“Layla” by Eric Clapton
-“Law & Order Theme” by Mike Post (as performed by The Hollywood Prime Time Orchestra)
Despite suddenly getting sick this week, Andrew and Dan are bringing you quality audio content to help you usher in the weekend.
WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew branches out to watch the first season of Syfy’s The Magicians, based on the series of novels by Lev Grossman, while D. Bethel focuses up and gets emotional playing the latest game (and last game for Sony, at least) from Fumito Ueda, The Last Guardian.
PHOENIX FALLING?: The Phoenix Comicon has come under scrutiny recently as it became public that, essentially, people would have to pay to be volunteers at the show by paying dues to become members of the Blue Ribbon Army Social Club. Dan and Andrew discuss the issues surrounding this controversy, such as “Why is this a controversy at all?”
MINDING THE NUMBERS: In a Bleeding Cool article covering December’s comic book sales numbers, Andrew and Dan dive deep into 2016 sales by Marvel and DC and compare their respective performances and draw some interesting (if very not scientific) conclusions from the data.
WEEK IN GEEK: In honor of the 53rd anniversary of the show, Andrew watched the 1970s Doctor Who serial, “Day of the Daleks,” and follows that up with the new timey-wimey show, Timeless. Dan gets nostalgic to re-read X-Men: God Loves, Man Kills by Chris Claremont and Brent Anderson and finds, to his estimation, that it holds up rather well.
WAR KIND OF CHANGES: Andrew picks up Fallout 4 on PS4 and talks about what he’s seeing with Dan, who still hasn’t beaten it.
THE CRAFT OF CRAFTING: Building off of Fallout 4‘s systems, Dan and Andrew talk about the rise of crafting mechanics in video games, from Minecraft to Diablo II to Skyrim.
Leave your thoughts as comments at forallintents.net. Be sure to join the official Facebook page and YouTube channel for all the latest updates, videos, and listener conversations. To help spread the word, please subscribe and review the show on iTunes.
For all intents and purposes, that was an episode recap.
FEATURED MUSIC:
-“Stayin’ in Black” by Wax Audio
-“It’s All Over But the Crying” by The Ink Spots
-“Building the Deathcoaster” by Joseph LoDuca (from Army of Darkness)
WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew finally sat down and saw Marvel’s newest addition to its cinematic universe, Doctor Strange, while Dan sits down and replays the opening of Mass Effect 2.
BETWEEN TWO WORLDS: After being pushed back in the movie schedule before getting removed completely, The Inhumans finally gets a release date…on television…kind of. While it’s premiere will be in IMAX theaters for a few weeks, Marvel announced that a The Inhumans tv show will air on ABC alongside Agents of SHIELD. Dan and Andrew talk about this newest plan and what it says about the static between Marvel’s movie house and television studios.
NEW WHO, IN COLOR: The Second Doctor’s premiere story, “The Power of the Daleks,” is getting a DVD release in fully animated form (due to the original episodes getting wiped by the BBC in the 1970s), but more interestingly the release will be getting an extra feature of the whole story in color. Andrew and Dan discuss this feature as well as the state of missing Doctor Who, based on the News Blast Andrew wrote about this announcement.
Leave your thoughts as comments at forallintents.net. Be sure to join the official Facebook group for links and conversation with other listeners. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to watch Andrew and Dan play video games. If you want to help the show, be sure to subscribe and review the show on iTunes to spread the word to new potential listeners.
For all intents and purposes, that was an episode recap.
FEATURED MUSIC:
-“Stayin’ in Black” by Wax Audio
-“More Human Than Human” by White Zombie
-“I Am the Doctor” by Jon Pertwee
WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew wades through the neck-deep waters of Civilization VI and loves every second of it while D. Bethel watches the crowd-funded fan film, Cable: Chronicles of Hopeby K&K Productions.
WHAT’S NEXT?: Considering the imminent political event happening in the United States of America, Dan and Andrew examine how television has taken a look at the presidency by comparing and contrasting the pilot episodes (mostly) of The West Wing and House of Cards (though they specifically already discussed the House of Cards pilot in Episode 37).
*Audio clip captured from The West Wing, “In the Shadow of Two Gunmen, Part II.”
INFINITE CRISES IN INFINITE MOVIES: This week, news hit that director Rick Famuyiwa left the DC/Warner Bros. film, The Flash, late into pre-production. This is the second director to leave the project, and the third to leave a film set in the DC Universe established with 2013’s Man of Steel (before this, Michelle MacLaren left Wonder Woman). Andrew and Dan examine the state of the DC Universe movies and wonder what the outcome may be for this grand experiment. Referenced in this segment is the Ghostbusters v. Star Trek Beyond discussion from Episode 101, if you want background on that controversy.
Again, D. Bethel’s webcomic, Long John, has finished up its second chapter. We encourage you to give it a look and to share if you like it.
Leave your thoughts as comments at forallintents.net. Be sure to join the official Facebook page. Subscribe to the show on iTunes and also help spread the word by leaving a review on the iTunes store. Subscribe and like the videos found on our YouTube Channel.
For all intents and purposes, that was an episode recap.
FEATURED MUSIC:
-“Stayin’ in Black” by Wax Audio
-“The West Wing Opening Theme” by W. G. Snuffy Walden (performed by The City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra)
-“I Ran (So Far Away)” by A Flock of Seagulls
-“House of Cards Main Title Theme” by Jeff Beal
Marvel/Netflix’s Luke Cage has a lot of people talking a mere week and a half after being uploaded to Netflix’s servers, and for good reason. While ostensibly linked to the more popular popcorn faire that is the “superhero genre” of films created by Fox, Sony, Warner Bros., and Marvel over the last sixteen years, Netflix has done more to push the genre forward and upward with its four seasons of shows than has really been done since The Dark Knight. Luke Cage alone has elevated the discourse in our popular culture to the point where the greater populace can not only talk about blackness in America, but it’s getting white America to listen to conversations about blackness in America. The last time a live-action superhero production instigated a larger conversation about deep-seated issues in America was not this summer’s Captain America: Civil War, Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, nor X-Men: Apocalypse, but last year’s Jessica Jones––a Marvel/Netflix (Martflix?) show. Like Jessica Jones before it, Luke Cage approaches its issues in a variety of incredibly subtle, as well as not so subtle, ways, but the fact that it’s approaching them at all––and giving these issues narrative prominence––sets it apart from most other entries in the genre.
Perhaps it’s the fact that I’m an English teacher (albeit not one of Literature, but of Composition and Rhetoric), but I noticed right away how many books dominated the show (at least in the front half––I’m not quite done with the season yet as of this writing) and how diverse Cage’s tastes were––in terms of race, sure, but also in terms of genre.
Dr. Tara Betts briefly discusses the books given center stage in the show, but expands that view into a full reading list that addends and complements the show. Some are a bit jokey (the Where’s Waldo? choice), others are referential (picking a Geoffrey Canada book since the writer was referenced by Cottonmouth at one point), and others are thoughtful on a pedagogical level (Acres of Skin, Cutting Along the Color Line), all of which could be used to describe the show itself.
Like I did for the “Worth a Look” about Stranger Things, I’m featuring this article even though I didn’t read it yet because it boldly sports a spoiler warning, and I––wishing to hold onto some aspect of nerd integrity––want to watch the rest of Luke Cage clean.
Evan Narcisse’s article is presented as a dialogue between four writers discussing the major cultural issues as presented and challenged in Luke Cage. In fairness, many articles have been written about this aspect of the show, but this gathering of different points of view on the same subject is an attractive and important approach. Especially as a white dude from the coast of California––and as a teacher––it’s these discussions that I need to find and listen to.
