Hot Heart

Ethan is a shit mod

This is the thread for 2017 2018 things, noooooo yeeeeeesss. Dean, ban him! BAAAAAN HIM! Good work, guys. KEEP IT UP!

Okay, so this was a meme that passed me by (you'll see at about the 2:15 mark and thanks to the thumbnail) but the whole thing is just hilarious

Finished a couple of TV shows. Here are my opinions, man. Stranger Things S2 Still good and I think the finale stuff works a lot better with giving everyone more to do. Not 100% on some of the developments and, of course, the mystery is gone but overall, it works. The Night Manager Pretty good overall. The beginning is a bit odd as it sets up a few things across some time-jumps (Four years later, then six months earlier...) but it all comes together well, with a few nice twists and turns along the way. It can feel a little "hollow" and Roper doesn't seem quite as smart as he should be, but otherwise a good thriller. Olivia Colman's Angela makes for a nice change from your typical hero.

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy I'm not sure what drove me to watch this, other than being incredibly bored and lazy and having just finished watching The Night Manager and craving more Le Carre, but I should've watched the TV series like I've been meaning to... since now I've kinda of spoiled it for myself. It's not as if it's bad in anyway; it's definitely got a very strong cast with, er, Mark Strong, Benedict Cumberbatch, John Hurt (RIP) and, of course, Gary Oldman among others. It's just that it's trying to condense too much into two hours. If it had more time to breathe, I think it would function a lot better and probably be far more moving and haunting. As it is, it feels far too blunt and rushed with only the odd moment of tension and can be a little tricky to follow if you're not paying attention (or fully awake *ahem*)

Watched some films over Christmas, some belong here. Bill First of all, this reminds me of someone I did my TV Scriptwriting MA with, who was going to write a comedy about the "lost years" of Shakespeare. It featured jokes with stuff like a girl called Rose, smelling sweet, and followed some rumour about being guilty of killing livestock and fleeing the country, etc. Unfortunately, in those intervening years, the Horrible Histories team got there first and made something far more Monty Python-esque but more kid-friendly. So it tells the tale of how Shakespeare rose from a guy in Stratford (playing in a band called Mortal Coil), his friendship with Christopher Marlowe and performing for the Queen. It's full of fun little gags and some great performances. Wish I'd actually bothered to watch it sooner, since it was on Prime or Netflix for a while. It's on iPlayer now I believe, anyway. This Is Where I Leave You I got this for my sister because she likes Adam Driver and it seemed like it should be good, judging by the cast. By all rights, this should probably be in the "OK" thread, but the rest of the family enjoyed it so much that I view it more favourably. It tells the tale of a dysfunctional family sitting shiva (Jewish tradition of mourning for seven days) after the death of the father and stars comedy stalwarts like Jason Bateman, Tina Fey, Kathryn Hahn as well as a bunch of other good actors. There's the usual drama issues of infidelity, infertility/pregnancy, unrequited teen crushes, etc. and it's all somewhat predictable but there are some fun moments and some snappy bits of dialogue which elevate it.

Got dragged into Homesense with the family. However, I stumbled across this for £8, which was too good to pass up. And "expandalone" to the original that, while the lacking the more recognisable big stars, actually has more powerful cards for building interesting combos. Whereas the original usually meant very close games, I played this yesterday with two other people and it can be far more swingy. Which held true for the first game and sounds bad, but the game we played immediately after was a lot closer and there are actually more interesting decisions going on with which cards you discard, what you're buying as a defensive move, etc. I won the second game thanks to some smart deck building that utilised abilities for extra card draws and retrievals. Highly recommended.

Facebook suggested this frame for my profile pic and it was too funny to pass up.

I didn't think it would be that good, but everyone seems to suggest it is. Might have to pick it up at some point.

Bought Reigns because it was 89p and it's easy to play while hanging out with (waiting for) family over the holidays.

Umm, by default... Destiny 2 But if we're allowing tabletop games then it's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shadows of the Past.

Another minor thing occurred to me.

This is an "outside of the text" thing but with regards to 3.

https://gfycat.com/FondQuarterlyAzurewingedmagpie

I love Wedge's bits

Pfft, that would be too much like Star Trek: Discovery

Oh, and on a hopeful (BUZZWORD) note, it turns out that they got Johnson to write a treatment for Episode IX so it wasn't like the next director being handed a blank slate again. Sure, it's not a script but it at least means there's a framework. However... I hear Abrams was the one who was allowed to scrap the original outline done by Lucas and Kennedy when Lucasfilm was sold to Disney, so who knows?

So, my collected thoughts on The Last Jedi. It's a surprisingly busy film with a lot to say for itself, so it takes a while to process. I know a few folks who were lukewarm (PUN INTENDED) on it until a second watch, which I think is understandable. I'm keen to see where they go, although I feel Rian Johnson is getting a separate trilogy for his vision while Abrams is back on the third film to steer the ship back into safer waters. However, it seems like the original intention was to have the three films anchored around the OT characters with Han first, then Luke and finally Leia; which is obviously not possible now unless they recreate the horrible effects at the end of Rogue One... So, yes, it's a divisive film and I can understand why. Whereas TFA treated its mythology and legends as nigh on sacrosanct, TLJ is fully prepared to both look back while also not afraid to tread new ground. In actual context, it's probably as surprising and refreshing as ESB was at the time. In a nice change, I think it's bound to generate a lot of discussion about what it did rather than what it didn't (endless TFA theories on this and that) or simply just what was (Rogue One). I'll probably have a bunch more to say in discussion but I'll end it here for now on a stray observation: I found it weird to hear the expression "Godspeed". It suggests that there are other religions being practised besides belief in "The Force" or... it's, umm, actually a technical term?

Star Wars: The Last Jedi I applaud the filmmakers for taking some brave, bold decisions when they could easily have taken the safe option and been far less divisive. There are some key lines (and an effective early scene) that clue you into the general approach, one being in the trailer but another one coming from a different source... And there's a lot to discuss (in the main Star Wars thread), but I will just say that this is actually a refreshing departure from what Abrams did with TFA. It wears its politics and themes proudly (albeit, sometimes, abrasively), zigs when you think it might zag and generally feels like Star Wars should feel without being "like poetry: it rhymes". That's not to say it doesn't have its flaws, notably in its runtime, that is most apparent in a subplot that you could argue is mostly a waste of time (personally, while too long, it still suits the themes, builds character moments and becomes relevant at the end).

I'm going to see it on Saturday. I'm excited because I liked Force Awakens more than I expected and I love all that jedi shit, plus I like Rian Johnson (Brick is one of my favourite films) and I hear it dares to be a little different. And to be honest, while Force Awakens was better than I expected, I didn't enjoy it as much the second time, partly because it still felt like it was stuck in the past; so some changes sounds like it might be a good thing. ...then again, I'm also apprehensive because I'm hearing the changes might not be so great. Guess I'll see... If anything, LOTR was the "Star Wars" of my adolescence/young adult years, so something more in that direction would be good, since that still had a bunch of characters but coped with 2-3 different strands.

Good points, it's just so poorly done, once again. When people say they want "lore in the game" they meant that a) they wanted this grimoire stuff visible in a Tower terminal or an in-game menu and b) to actually include important story stuff in the game. Once again, Bungie have just separated it out into crappy cutscenes and (a) Ghost talking at you. We don't see what the real friction was between Osiris and the Vanguard (like you say, I guess he's "cursed" never to be acknowledged for what he's done) or the fact he was the Speaker's apprentice, nor do we get any sense of the current context. Surely, Osiris lost his Light briefly as well. Was that acknowledged? Did it have an impact? Does he even know (or care) the Speaker is dead? Also, with the Infinite Forest, were you thinking as in user-generated content like a new Forge mode? That's an amazing idea.

Played the "Curse of Osiris" DLC and... it's kinda shit. I thought the idea was not to do Dark Below-style DLC that didn't begin development until after launch, but this certainly feels like it. I mean, it's still AAA production values but most everything else is subpar. Lots of recycling locations and the new strike is even just a repeat of one of the new main missions (even though the boss is kinda cool). The Infinite Forest is a nice idea and could've been a lot of fun, but it's actually dull and really emphasises the "hold sprint" to skip combat element. There are new Adventures that send you through here each time and the Heroic versions with Nightfall modifiers are just a pain. Which also reminds me to look up whether Bungie or anyone has actually addressed the Momentum modifier because it's not behaving correctly (wouldn't put it past them after that elemental one) or the UI description is incorrect. It says shield and health generation is stopped while you are stationary but sprinting speeds it up; which is wrong. There is no shield or health generation even while strafing and you need to sprint for a few seconds to trigger health recovery. It also just makes for shit gameplay since you can't even shoot while you sprint, and there's no point sprinting right at groups of tough enemies; so you're pretty much taking a few shots then running away. The new patrol area is just boring, even if the new public event is okay. And they've added this weapon forge thing to get guns, kinda like the artifacts from Rise of Iron except just ones that don't perform better than ones you already have or do anything particularly special. There are some new tweaks here and there (they improved some weapon sounds on ones that sounded like high-powered staplers) and extra stuff to buy, etc. but it's not game-changing or very engaging. I still hope they can improve there but the biggest disappointment is just how lame the story stuff is. Osiris is some major figure but we barely spend time with him, he's not doing anything mysterious or seemingly important (probably a presentation issue) besides fucking about with Vex simulations and, ultimately, there's no real development. More treading water. Just the usual "there's a big bad guy, help me" and then "okay, thx, bye" once it's done. I'm not even sure what the "curse" is meant to be. It sounds so grave for what is surprisingly lighthearted, even going so far as to just turn Brother Vance into some silly Osiris groupie. Oh, well, at least Morena Baccarin made for a nice change of Ghost voice. p.s. I think the other thing is how scummy it all looks when Heroic Strikes are only available to people who bought the DLC, plus those who didn't are now suddenly locked out of the Nightfall and Raid Prestige (Hard) modes. I mean, PC players have had the game how long now? Six weeks? The secret XP throttling was bad enough...

Oh, hey, it's that Snapchat filter.

I'm not super familiar with US history so can't verify this myself but someone pointed out that after Trump was elected that this was the first time since 1928 that Republicans controlled the Presidency, Senate, House, Supreme Court pick and the Majority of Government/Governors. Then something or other happened in 1929...

Thanks, man.