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Televisionatic

Televisionatic

STAR TREK CORNER: D. Bethel is still getting excited about Star Trek: The Next Generation, so our hosts spend some time discussing the end of TNG‘s season 3 and the start of season 4.

NEWS CRUISE: With all the news coming out in the last few weeks, our hosts decide to skim over a handful over them, including Microsoft buying Activision Blizzard; an indie developer complaining about there being too many indie games; and comics writer, Tom Taylor, taking on Comics Gate head-on.

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RELEVANT EPISODES:

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Episode 159 – Toxic Delivery Mechanism

Episode 159 – Toxic Delivery Mechanism

image source: Universal Pictures

HALLOWED HALLOWEEN: The Spookytober topic for this week is the forty-years later direct sequel to John Carpenter’s breakthrough––and culturally important––hit, Halloween. This new movie, Halloween, sees the return of Jamie Lee Curtis to her role as Laurie Strode but instead of being the prey of Michael Meyers, it is he who becomes the hunted. Andrew and D. Bethel discuss the series and what they’re expecting/hoping from this new movie.

WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew gets his Metroidvania on with Chucklefish’s Timespinner and how eerily Castlevania: Symphony of the Night it seems to be at times while D. Bethel becomes enthralled with the first five episodes of the podcast audio drama produced by a collaboration between Marvel Comics and Stitcher (the podcast streaming website), Wolverine: The Long Night.

RELEVANT EPISODES:

LINKS:

INFO:

For all intents and purposes, that was an episode recap.

FEATURED MUSIC:

-“Disco Medusae” by Kevin McLeod (incompetech.com)*
-“District Four” by Kevin McLeod (incompetech.com)*
*Tracks are licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

Shortcast 66 – Trusty Rusty

Shortcast 66 – Trusty Rusty

WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew finally plays Asmadi’s One Deck Dungeon by playing Handelabra’s One Deck Dungeon, a rogue-like solo/co-op card game that has been adapted into a video game version while D. Bethel follows Laura Kinney’s continuing post-Wolverine adventures in X-23 by Mariko Tamaki and Juann Cabal.

RELATED EPISODES:

RELEVANT LINKS:

INFO:

For all intents and purposes, that was an episode recap.

FEATURED MUSIC:

-“District Four” by Kevin McLeod (incompetech.com)*
-“Disco Medusae” by Kevin McLeod (incompetech.com)*
*Tracks are licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

Shortcast 47 – The Finest in Lottery Scratcher Technology

Shortcast 47 – The Finest in Lottery Scratcher Technology

WEEK IN GEEK: After weeks away, Andrew and D. Bethel return to talking about the geeky stuff they’ve done in the last week. Andrew plays Pandemic Legacy: Season 2 and is much surprised considering his views on the first game. D. Bethel dives into a different kind of legacy by looking at the first volume of All-New Wolverine as Laura Kinney (formerly X-23) takes the mantle of “Wolverine” from her (at the time) deceased…uh…father? Brother? Twin? Whatever. #comics

Also––a News Blast breaking story about All-New Wolverine and its cancellation announcement made this week.

RELATED EPISODES:

RELATED LINKS:

INFO:

For all intents and purposes, that was an episode recap.

FEATURED MUSIC:

-“District Four” by Kevin McLeod (incompetech.com)*
-“Disco Medusae” by Kevin McLeod (incompetech.com)*
*Tracks are licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

News Blast: Marvel Announces Scripted Podcast with “Wolverine: The Long Night”

News Blast: Marvel Announces Scripted Podcast with “Wolverine: The Long Night”

source: Marvel.com

Marvel announced yesterday that it would be tapping into the dramatic podcast medium––citing popular true crime NPR podcasts, Serial and S-Town, as specific inspirations––using one of its most iconic superhero characters, Logan (as Wolverine), set to debut in the spring.

According to the press release, the 10-episode series, titled Wolverine: The Long Night, will be a crime narrative with Logan (voiced by British actor, Richard Armitage, most recently known for his role as Thorin in The Hobbit films) not as the protagonist but as the focus of a criminal investigation by a pair of detectives:

It follows agents Sally Pierce (Celia Keenan-Bolger) and Tad Marshall (Ato Essandoh) as they arrive in the fictional town of Burns, Alaska, to investigate a series of murders and quickly discover the town lives in fear of a serial killer. The agents team up with deputy Bobby Reid (Andrew Keenan-Bolger) to investigate their main suspect, Logan (Richard Armitage). Their search leads them on a fox hunt through the mysterious and corrupt town.

The podcast series will be a timed exclusive to users of the podcast aggregator and broadcaster, Stitcher, but only to those who subscribe to its premium services, and then only until fall 2018, after which it will be widely distributed. It’s an interesting and rather safe experiment with the debut being locked behind a paywall, but it will undoubtedly bring new listeners (and new premium subscribers) to the already prominent podcast-streaming website. In theory, if The Long Night does not perform well, then at least it died in front of a relatively small and curated audience.

British actor, Richard Armitage, is set to voice Logan in the podcast. Source: BBC

The teaming with Stitcher pulls some interest as it will undoubtedly guide a lot of fan attention toward the service, a service which has been under scrutiny about its business practices before. But since the deal is about timed exclusivity and doesn’t seem to be a production partnership, skeptical podcast fans need only to wait six months to listen using their preferred services. It is interesting that rabid fans won’t be able to simply download the episodes directly from Marvel at the outset, which possibly speaks to the fact that Marvel may be hedging their confidence until they see its success.

The prospect of an audio dramatized version of comic book characters isn’t wholly new––characters such Superman and the noir hero The Shadow were staple radio plays back during the medium’s heyday––but the podcast angle is new and seemingly novel. However, podcast-based audio drama is in a veritable renaissance currently, and this move is a logical, albeit a relatively safe, step. Disregarding the commercial availability of audio dramas through companies like Big Finish, fictional podcast dramas have had many iterations and successes through the years, with productions like The Thrilling Adventure Hour, Homecoming, and Welcome to Night Vale having been around for awhile to varying degrees of popularity (with Welcome to Night Vale being the standout from this list).

However, like NPR diving head-first into the podcast medium with Serial (it had been podcasting its broadcast shows, but Serial was its first main effort to produce a podcast from scratch), Marvel’s entry into dramatized podcasting could produce a similar effect, especially using one of its most popular, vexing, and mysterious characters. Logan’s past is a game of retcon darts where anything can be added if it’s thrown hard enough at the board. This canonical malleability makes Logan a logical candidate for a short experiment such as this and likely explains (in the only rational way) why Marvel would not use the current Wolverine in the form of Laura Kinney as the star of this series. With Logan as the focus of their first foray into this new medium (which will directly follow his return to the Marvel universe), if The Long Night succeeds it could really raise the visibility of podcast dramas in the eyes of a wider audience just as Serial did for its user base.

Logan hasn’t been seen in comics since the 2014 “Death of Wolverine” storyline, but returned in November 2017 in Marvel Legacy #1. Art by Steve McNiven.

Overall, this seems like a promising project. Written by Ben Percy, a veteran comics writer though one whose rĂ©sumĂ© is filled with mostly DC credits, it’s emboldening to see this project hire a person already comfortable writing in a serialized format with superhero characters, even if this story will be (and I apologize for using the heavily flogged descriptor) grounded and a bit more subdued. Some may wonder if Fox is involved, but––if I’m correct––this venture doesn’t need any approval nor collaboration with the owners of the film and TV rights to the property. At the time those contracts were signed, new media was probably not part of the deal and, in theory, Fox could do something similar with its filmic version of the characters. As it is, Wolverine: The Long Night is tied to the comic book version of the character rather than extending from the cinematic interpretation. This distinction will surely please the fans yearning for a non-comic book adaptation of the mutants that are separate from version seen from Fox.

The unfolding of this project will be intriguing as it could possibly open up an entire new medium to not only its fans but new fans who may have been unable to fully enjoy other iterations of superheroes, such as those with visual impairments. While audio drama may be viewed as an old or outdated medium, audio books have never been more popular. Even audio book services like Audible are producing original audio book and dramatized content for their subscribers. When looked at critically, audio drama holds a lot of potential in our digital and mobile context. With Marvel dominating the cinematic space and having broke new ground (even if the momentum has waned a bit) in new media with its Netflix shows, that the company is looking at new ways to present its characters to the world outside of traditional media is heartening and, more importantly, smart.

Episode 146 – Bad Games Make Precedent

Episode 146 – Bad Games Make Precedent

WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew pauses his walk down the Star Trek Nostalgia Trail and attended a day of PAX West (starts at 2:14) while Dan dips into the history of his favorite comic book franchise by reading Marvel Epic Collection Vol. 5: X-Men – Second Genesis which collects the early issues of the great X-Men reboot from 1975 when the “All-New, All-Different” X-men were added to the team (Wolverine, Colossus, Storm, Nightcrawler) and started the 16-year run of writer Chris Claremont (18:17).

FINAL FANTASY VII AGAIN: (28:23) September 7th marked the 20th anniversary of Squaresoft’s (at the time, now Square Enix) breakthrough hit, Final Fantasy VII. Dan and Andrew talk less about the game itself and instead talk about the impact the game had on gaming and nerd culture.

NOTE: Sacramento’s Crocker Con | Art Mix is happening September 14th at the Crocker Art Museum at which D. Bethel will be exhibiting with his wares. Come by and say hi!

RELATED EPISODES:

WORKS CITED:

INFO:

For all intents and purposes, that was an episode recap.

FEATURED MUSIC:

-“Stayin’ in Black” by Wax Audio

Shortcast 23 – Special Sickness Edition

Shortcast 23 – Special Sickness Edition

D. Bethel has been hit with a bad case of the sicks, so a Shortcast is in order. It’s a busy week! Emerald City Comic Con is happening this weekend and Andrew will be there, no doubt wandering around. If you see him, say hello [ , ] for all intents and purposes. If you attend, let us know what you thought of the event in the comments!

WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew attended an event celebrating the launch of the Kickstarter for the first tabletop game by friends of the site, Luke and Nicole (from AcrossTheBoardGames.net), Food Truck Champion while D. Bethel decided to deepen his knowledge of Wolverine lore by reading the first fifteen-or-so issues of the long-running Wolverine comic book series by Chris Claremont and John Buscema.

For all intents and purposes, that was a shortcast recap.

FEATURED MUSIC:

-“Thunder Bustin'” by Wax Audio

Episode 107 – Spock’s Screams

Episode 107 – Spock’s Screams

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WEEK IN GEEK: Andrew bides his time until Civilization VI releases by playing a bunch of Blizzard games while Dan swims through the lush animation and Old Norse world of Thunder Lotus Games’ Jotun.

NEWS BLAST – UPDATE – METAL GEAR SURVIVE: Metal Gear series creator and famous non-employee of Konami, Hideo Kojima, boldly said that he has nothing to do with Konami’s upcoming Metal Gear Solid V spinoff, Metal Gear Survive, on stage at this years Tokyo Game Show. Konami retaliated by releasing approximately fifteen minutes of co-op gameplay to a rather tepid response.

LEGACY CHARACTERS 2.0: Building off of the previous conversations about “legacy characters”––superhero mantles that can be passed from person to person rather than being locked to a single identity––in Episode 09 and, tangentially, in Episode 104, Dan and Andrew return to the topic now that the world has a new Superman––officially New Super-Man––and recent Legacy turns with Wolverine and the use of a Legacy character in Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD: Ghost Rider v3.0, Robby Reyes. So, there’s lots of stuff to talk about.

Leave your thoughts about this week’s topics as comments at forallintents.net. Be sure to join the official Facebook page and follow Andrew and D. Bethel on Twitter. Help the show out by leaving a review on the iTunes store. Check out the official YouTube channel, as well!

For all intents and purposes, that was an episode recap.

FEATURED MUSIC:

-“Stayin’ in Black” by Wax Audio
-“New Blood (Here Comes a New Challenger)” by Another Soundscape (Street Fighter II remix)
-“Little Ashes” by Joseph LoDuca (from Army of Darkness)