SHTFriday: Radioactivity for Dummies

Today's Blue Collar Prepping blog post is brought to you by a combination of "I was watching very good hard sci-fi last night" and "Hey, Chaplain Tim has already done a lot of the heavy lifting by talking about atoms."

Something Strange, And It Don't Look Good

Cards on the table time: When I first heard "Ghostbusters reboot" I cringed. Very hard.

The original movie (and even its sequel) are fond childhood memories: I remember the first movie playing on television when I was very, very small, and hiding my face behind my Ultra Magnus figure. Given the results of reboots of various other 80s-90s properties such as Transformers, Ninja Turtles, and the like, its chances were not good. Transformers is remembered more for Megan Fox, amateur gynecological exams with cinema cameras, humping dogs, and making me hate Shia Lebouf. Ninja Turtles is remembered for those nightmarish faces, a Shredder wearing a cutlery set, and more Megan Fox. Given that history, Ghostbusters couldn't possibly be good.

I cringed again when I heard "all female cast." Not because (it should go without saying) I didn't think an all female cast was capable of carrying a film, but because I can smell stunt-casting a mile away. Then they announced who was in it and I stopped listening at Melissa McCarthy. I have nothing against her personally, and again (it should go without saying) I don't hold her gender against her. Her style of comedy just seems nigh-identical to that of Kevin James (lol fat jokes) and I can't stand him, either. In fact, I'd go on record right now saying that I'd be looking forward to this Ghostbusters "reboot" just as much as I am now were Will Ferrell, Jack Black, Kevin James, and Adam Sandler doing it. In fact, I'd probably hate the idea more, to the point where I'd have been disappointed if there wasn't a tragic on-set accident that involved the Ecto-whatever-number-they're-using running them all over.

Now I've seen the trailer. This trailer:



And I don't hate it. There are some things that annoy me, and some that I actually liked. But overall, it's an overwhelming sense of... nothing. I feel nothing for this. Not even a feeling of nostalgia.

I do like Kate McKinnon's character of Holtzmann, who seems to be the analogue of Egon Spengler of the original cast. She's got an interesting visual style, and seems to deliver her lines in a way that is far less grating than at least half the cast, and looks completely at home with the tinted safety glasses and insane gadgets in her lab. I do like the design of the ghosts, with a heavy emphasis on 1920s flapper style and vintage carnival design, and I'm interested in how well they hold up on-screen compared to the dated special effects the original movies used. There's been about 30ish years of on-screen movie ghosts between then and now, and I'd like to see what direction they take monster design in this one. I don't hate the Cadillac as much as I thought I would, but it's certainly no vintage Ecto-1.

The movie's already catching heat, though, from the same crowd that previously defended it by accusing its detractors of misogyny. Patty, the only black character, isn't a scientist. She's a regular schlub, a city transit worker who is only there because she has street smarts and, from what the trailer tells us,  a car. Which, predictably, is garnering the movie accusations of racism.

When the original film did it, it fit with the times: it was much more common to see a black man as a construction worker instead of a scientist in the 80s, and I loved Ernie Hudson's take on Winston as a regular dude who didn't even believe in the supernatural but was there for the paycheck. His character's evolution was probably my favourite part of the series. But now, while I debate the accusation of racism, it is incredibly lazy just to rehash Winston as a woman.

I'm not looking forward to Melissa McCarthy's character, primarily for reasons I've outlined above. And I don't have an opinion either way on Kristen Wiig's character, despite her being the most accomplished comedic actress out of the entire group (which doesn't bode well. She should be the Bill Murray of the group, but I'm getting nothing out of her at this point).

I'm not loving Chris Hemsworth's part in this, either; he's Captain Kirk's dad and Thor, and he's playing what seems to be a joke role at this point. Compare that to Janine, who was a very layered character who contrasted a sharp, grating vocal style with an 80s 'sexy librarian' look, while Hemsworth seems to be... just a sexy fireman? Janine was a subversion of femininity, whereas Hemsworth just seems to be a pin-up.

So in short: I don't hate it. I don't love it. I'm not feeling much either way, aside from this sick feeling of dread in the pit of my stomach that a franchise as beloved by so many people as Ghostbusters has just put out a trailer that looks like the sequel to Pixels.

In the meantime, if you're looking for a true sequel, head on over to Steam and check out the Ghostbusters video game.

Traveller Tuesday: Intrepid Gadfly

Another NPC (sans stats -- my players don't have that information yet) from my game.

My use of Traveller setting and dress falls under
fair use guidelines for both Mongoose and Far Future Enterprises.

"BootsBootsBoots" is an immensely popular blog within the Spinward Marches that analyzes the politics between the Zhodani Consulate and the Third Imperium. Hosted on Esalin (and taking advantage of that world's balkanized state by maintaining mirrored servers on both Imperial and Zhodani side to avoid censorship), it offers insight into the affairs of the day served with a biting, darkly satirical wit.

"The everybody get along, hug you until you die Zhodani say that their goal is for everyone to live in happy harmony and equality and right-think, and so naturally their right-thinking psionic overlords decided the best way to do that was to valiantly colonize a planet already colonized by the Vexx and put them in a reservation. Harmony!"

Named after the Rudyard Kipling poem, BootsBootsBoots was started in 1092, on the 10th anniversary of the beginning of the Fourth Frontier War, with the title "Ten Years Later: Humans Still Massively Stupid". Its contents is best described as "What you'd get if Perez Hilton worked for Wonkette but wrote like it was for Manolo's Shoe Blog" -- in other words, a very bizarre first-person account of dirty politics and political gossip (but I repeat myself) from a superfantastic raconteur and muckraker.

Despite being an opinion blog, BootsBootsBoots doesn't take sides; it takes the position that both the Imperium and the Consulate are full of idiots. This is to be expected because the writer of BootsBootsBoots, Intrepid Gadfly, is a Hiver and they believe all non-Hivers are idiots. They just normally aren't so blunt as the Gadfly.

"Of course the boohoo boomboom Vexx cry a lot about it. How dare these humans with supertechnology take over our planet and increase our standard of living and healthcare and feed us and give us amazingly comfortable homes. We only managed to destroy our homecradle by being too buffoonish to properly maintain our nuclear reactors! And then we came here and had our newhomecradle taken from us by a people who actually know how to run things!"

Why a Hiver has chosen to journalize (and sensationalize, and on more than one occasion antagonize) border politics is unknown. It's widely assumed that this is a manipulation of some sort -- after all, a Hiver is doing something, clearly there's manipulation afoot -- but most manipulations involve the improvement of a culture on some level, and it's not clear how raking muck, throwing verbal tomatoes and calling someone and/or their politics stupid is an improvement, let alone a subtle manipulation.

"Dateline: Occupied Chwistyoch/Non-Radioactive Chachtinch -- Goodwill Ambassador Baron I'mADroyneWhyAmIEvenANoble of Jewell admits that Imperial decisions cannot be made without the advice of at least one psychosociopathological fruitbasket. A question is put before the committee, and whatever Amoral Mixed Fruits suggests is noted as being the insane selfish murderous option, and (usually, it is hoped) avoided. 

Such forthrightness of admitting is a refreshing smell of clean air in the usual fetid miasma of inter-humaniti politicking."

Despite the name-calling, Intrepid Gadfly is loved for the same reasons it is hated: despite the mockery, it brings up genuinely good points about how the border conflict between the two polities is stupid, and both sides are to blame for it. Having grown up with the IronicallyBloodthirstyForVegetarians K'kree polity coreward, it understand how easy it is for one species to hate another. But Zhodani and Vilani and Solomani -- they're all humans. Killing each other over differences in government, Gadfly likes to point out, is akin to shooting your brother because he can't agree with you over what to have for lunch.

"Readers have said that The Gadfly finds nothing redeeming in culture of humaniti, but this is not true. The Gadfly is immensely impressed with social commentary of such works as the Blackadder and the Monty Python. Humaniti mocks itself better than Intrepid Gadfly ever could... but foolishbipeds think it comedy and not constructive criticism."

NPC Notes
It is widely believed that Intrepid Gadfly is linked to a third party in the intelligence business, because otherwise it would have been neutralized or turned by either NavInt or the Tozjabr long before it became this popular. The most believable theory is that it's funded by the Hive Federation Development Agency, but there is a plausible paper trail connecting some of its funding to SolSec, and the Confederation does enjoy seeing both of its ideological opponents mocked. There are also rumors that the Idyll Hands is involved in some manner; perhaps Gadfly is an asset of True Thomas, or perhaps the broker just enjoys the pot-stirring and all the secrets it churns up, but either way there is someone who transmits email copies of BootsBootsBoots posts across the Imperium in defiance of censorship requests. Of course, all of these could be true at the same time. 

In person, Intrepid Gadfly is a typically unremarkable Hiver save for the ancient Terran-style fedora with press credential it carries on its dorsal dome. Its artificial speech is modulated to be precisely artificial, and its vocoder has the ability to override many forms of speakers via wifi so that its provocative questions are always heard (and are often too outrageous to leave unanswered -- think the political equivalent of "Have you stopped cheating on your wife?") Other than asking terribly inappropriate questions at inopportune times, its social behavior is unassuming and inoffensive; think "Oh god, not this pest again" and not "Guards, take this fool outside and shoot it," because 1) its behavior isn't that bad and 2) no one wants to find out the hard way who its backers are. If it truly is an intelligence asset for another polity, it may well have bodyguards and/or other forms of 'insurance' against violence.

 

A few other interesting points:

• Its press credentials are always valid. Even when they get revoked, they somehow become un-revoked later. It's become conventional wisdom to let the little pest in and have it ask its question rather than try to keep it out, because once it gets back in it finds something worse to say. "Take your medicine by mouth now, rather than by suppository later."
• It doesn't specifically have access to top-secret material (or if it does, it doesn't seem to care about that); it's far more interested in dirty politics than state secrets. 
• It has no interest in blackmail, either. If it wants you to squirm, it will do it publicly. 
• It has a sense of adventure (that's the Intrepid part) and likes to jaunt across the Imperial-Zhodani border in pursuit of a story. 
• It sometimes shows up  in systems without warning, as if it has hitched a ride without buying a ticket. This lends credence to the Idyll Hands rumor, especially since a similar Aquemna-class ship known as the Serene Gadabout is often seen in the area. Either Gadfly has the money to purchase and maintain a capital-ship sized oiler, or this is one of the Hands' disguises. 

Essentially, the Gadfly lives up to its name: a goading annoyance that is impossible to swat.

Gun Blog Variety Podcast #80

http://tinyurl.com/nmwoenx

It's another great episode of The GunBlog VarietyCast!

• Erin Palette discusses the pros and cons of Behavioral Scripts.
• Britain is reconsidering exiting the EU. Nicki Kenyon gives us her views on the situation. 
• Our Special Guest this week is our Sponsor, Attorney Andrew Branca. Andrew explains how the old "Never Talk To The Police" mantra is just plain wrong when it comes to lawful citizens using force for self defense. Seriously, who are you going to believe: some random guy on the internet, or the guy who wrote the book on The Law of Self-Defense?
• In one of his longest segments to date, Barron B gives us his view on the legal battle between Apple and the FBI.
• Weer'd notes that that nasty little fascist, Michael Bloomberg is branching out. He was just trying to ban guns and salt and soda, and trans-fat. Now he's decided to start giving dating advice. He's directed his minions make videos telling women not to date gun owning men. You know what that means. It's time for another patented Weer'd Audio Fisk™!
• And next week, our new contributor Beth Reoch Alcazar joins us!

Thanks for downloading, listening, and subscribing. Please like and share The GunBlog VarietyCast on Facebook, and if you use iTunes, give us a review!

Please consider donating or subscribing at the PayPal link in the show notes. Our podcast runs on your donations.

Listen to the podcast here.

Read the show notes here.

A special thanks both to Firearms Policy Coalition for their support and to our sponsor, Law of Self Defense. Use discount code "Variety" at checkout and get 10% off.

SHTFriday: Apocabox Unboxing #10 (February 2016)

Oy frigging vey, you guys. This video. This video.  I have NEVER had this level of trouble with one (which is why this post, despite being dated Friday 26th Feb, is actually being published on the 27th) and it made me seriously wonder if making this damn things is worth all the aggravation.

I had sound problems. I had video quality problems. I recorded this four times and on that fourth time, a telephone rang in the middle of the session. Editing that out was a pain so massive that I said I would literally pay someone money to fix this for me. (Thankfully, someone did, and he was such a sweetheart he refused payment. Thanks Donavan!) And then the time it took to upload it... ugh.

The point of all this complaining is this:  Do any of you readers really give a crap about these videos? Because if no one cares, I'm just going to save myself the aggravation and stop doing them. Please leave a "Yes please keep doing them/ No don't bother" comment either here or on my YouTube channel.

Anyway. Despite all the technical problems, this box (like December's) is full of really neat stuff. I particularly like the fire piston kit, but the bird snare looks useful and the tarp book is full of great information.

Enjoy the unboxing.

The Finest Redemption Story in Superhero Movies

My first attempt at watching Deadpool did not go so well. It had nothing to do with the movie; that, without going into too much detail too early, was really quite good. No, it was the case of grinding stomach cramps that started about halfway through the film, followed by my car not starting after the movie, capped off with nearly a week of gastroenteritis that put a damper on the evening. So I did all of you, my faithful readers, a favour and went to see it again. In IMAX. I swear, the things I do for you lot...

I've been aware of Deadpool for a very long time. I've seen his start as just another terrible Rob Liefeld creation, be-pouched and violent with a name made of two gritty words, generic as all hell in his fight against gritty, be-pouched and hyperviolent sort-of anti-hero Cable, another terrible Rob Liefeld creation. But I've seen him grow in the hands of more creative writers and artists into something different, something almost beautiful, one of those tragedies that just can't stop laughing because if he does, it'll hurt too much to go on. His finest redemption came with that of Cable, his brother-in-90s-badness, in the simply-titled Cable & Deadpool, and it's one of the best series I've ever read. Since then, he's been on a meteoric rise to pop culture fame, and now he's every-goddamn-where. Like it or not, Wade Wilson has struck gold.

But how was the movie? The FOX X-Films have been varying in quality, with the two decent-to-good and one poor X-Men, one terrible and one much better Wolverine, and the First Class trilogy, 2/3 complete with the excellent First Class and quite good Days of Future Past, and the concluding X-Men: Apocalypse on the way. Deadpool is, quite frankly, the best of all of them, possibly even the one with Apocalypse. It's on par with the better Marvel Studios films, with a faithfulness and wit that no one saw coming.

Add caption

Let's get a few things out of the way (as well as a spoiler warning): this is a film that more than earns its R rating. The language is crass. There's nudity, female as well as... well, Deadpool wang. Floppy, scarred Deadpool wang. The violence is visceral, detailed, and astoundingly gratuitous. And all of it grabs you and does not let go and shouts in your face “THIS IS NECESSARY.”

To release a family-friendly cut of this film would more than likely render it perhaps half an hour long. But every decapitated body part, every glimpse of flesh, every foul word serves a purpose to paint a picture of the world Deadpool inhabits and the circles he moves in,  places which were heretofore unexplored in the X-Men films.And speaking of the X-Men, there's another character with a true redemption here: Colossus, last seen as the hunky member of a boy-band covered in chrome paint, has been fixed. 

He's now ENORMOUS, not just above average tall and muscular; the chrome has been toned down; and his attitude matches what it should have always been: a farmboy raised under Communism who is now living in America with a supportive family unit. He's simultaneously the ultimate cuddly big brother (no pun intended), human wrecking ball, and source of some of the movie's best laughs -- not at his own expense, but at his optimistic reactions to the situations he finds himself in as well as the faith he shows in Deadpool.

I dare you not to love this guy.

Deadpool himself is a gem. He's portrayed with just the right amount of weird (not the lol-so-random that some writers saddle him with) and he moves perfectly. Agile, fast, accurate, he's a real menace on the field, elevated from minor threat to nigh-on unstoppable force by his regenerative powers, taking only a moment to stick his finger through a bullet hole in his arm and swear at the guy that shot him. Ryan Reynolds really gets the character, and I feel happy for him about it. He deserves this. He's been working a hell of a long time to make this happen, and he's redeemed both himself and the character from its dreadful portrayal in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, which is alluded to several times in the film (including showing the action figure, for which I've supplied a visual aid). This is nearly everything we wanted from Deadpool on-screen, and certainly far more than we ever expected to get considering a) the last time he was on-screen and b) it's not a Marvel Studios film.

Yep. That's the one in the movie, and I have one.

And speaking of that, it's really a shame that it's not, but it wouldn't surprise me if there was some form of crossover being set up. The final battle does appear to take place on a decommissioned helicarrier that looks like it's straight out of SHIELD's fleet. Reynolds's Deadpool is now added to the Downey Jr. Stark/Jackman Wolverine teamup I dearly want to see.

The film wasn't perfect, though; some pretty hefty details from Deadpool's origin were missing. The organization that performed the experiments on him didn't seem to be Weapon X, but they didn't explicitly name it anything else, so it still could be; Vanessa wasn't a mutant or a mercenary, and she was a much more morally sound character than she was in the comics; Colossus's trainee X-student, Negasonic Teenage Warhead, looks nothing like she does in the comics and seems to have Cannonball's power; and most damning of all, Deadpool's inner monologue does not speak in little yellow boxes.

But all in all, this is a mark in the win category, not only for how good it was, but how much money it's made. As I write this, I think it's past the 500 million mark, and it's cleared the record for highest-grossing R rated film ever. The viral marketing campaign for it was genius, allowing Reynolds to ham it up in-character in all manner of situations not in any way related to the film, just for us to get a taste of his performance and assure us that the movie did, indeed, know what it were doing.

The trailer cuts were smart, too. The “pity the guy that pressures her into prom sex”line is there, but it makes perfect sense in context, but Vanessa's line about not being a damsel in distress is gone from the final cut.

If you haven't seen it, and you've survived the cascade of spoilers, please go see it. It's great fun, as long as you're not easily offended. And Ryan Reynolds, of all people, deserves this. This was the man's last chance; he'd already screwed up twice in comic films before the great Marvel Studios flood that started with Iron Man. If he messed up again, he was done. But he didn't.

He deserves this film, and so do you.

I am reminded of a Wesley Snipes quote

Specifically, this one.

So here is what happened, via a series of emails (names have been removed), when I ordered a nice $40 hardcover with an Amazon gift card from a company that is NOT Amazon (but fulfills their orders)

Email #1: Wherin Erin Complains About Damaged Merchandise

Me: Bought brand-new hardcover book for $40. 

You: Wrapped $40 hardcover booked in soft envelope with minimal bubble wrap and shipped via FedEx. 

FedEx: Promptly dropped brand-new $40 hardcover book right on the corner, damaging it and making it no longer brand-new before I even took possession of it. (Pictures of damage attached) 

Me: Now has $40 damaged book. 

You: Need to make this right by either shipping me another book in a container that your shipper can't damage (the way Amazon does), or refund me the price differential between a brand-new book and a book with damage.

Email #2: The Ineffectual Response

Hello Erin,

I apologize for the inconvenience. Typically we don't have any issues with our shipping methods and when we use Fedex. 

We can offer either an additional 15% off ($6.60) or we can do a free return of the item. If you would like to do the return, please send the estimated weight of the item and I can send you a free return shipping label.

Email #3: Wherin Erin Tries to Find the Win-Win

This book with its dented corners is now Good at best. Even with the refund, it's not worth $34 dollars. So if I pick that choice (Option A) I'm actually taking a loss.

Or I could return it to you (Option B), in which case you lose a $40 sale, get a bad Amazon review, and have to unload a damaged book.

I would like to choose option C, "You replace my damaged book and I send you this one." This is the only way we both win. I get my new book; you get to keep the money, get a sterling review from me, and still get this damaged book to resell.

Email #4: The "No, We Really ARE That Stupid" Reply

Hello Erin, 

I spoke with my manager and the most we can do is $10 off. Even at the lesser amount we are already taking a loss on the item but we want to try and reconcile the situation. I understand your frustration, but those are the best options we have at this time because of the back end systems we have setup for our business. You are welcome to place a new order once the refund has been placed. 

Again, I apologize for the inconvenience and please let me know what works best for you.

Email #5: Wherin Erin Decides to Let the Company Ice-Skate Uphill

Why you decided to do it this way when you still have new versions of this book for sale is beyond my reckoning. But since you'd rather take the loss than send me a new book, I guess we do it the hard way.

I officially announce I am returning this item because it is damaged. Please refund my money.

The shipping weight on the FedEx envelope says 2.45 pounds, so send me a label for same.

Email #6: Wherein They Admit They Have Lost 

Hello Erin,

Attached is your free return shipping label. Again, I apologize for the inconvenience. I've made note of your feedback and hopefully it is something we can fix in our system in the near future.

I don't understand people. I ordered a new book; said book was damaged by their carrier; and they have the ability to replace said book. Replacing the book would have made a customer happy, they would have kept their sale, and they could have recouped their loss by filing a claim with FedEx and/or reselling the damaged book.

Instead, they made a token offer, and then requested I re-order (and therefore pay the shipping charges again). This resulted in them losing the sale, paying FedEx to ship it back, and a bad review of the company.

In what realm is this even good business sense?