Reviews

Just thought I'd get another update in.

I've started up a review blog where (hopefully) I'll get monthly reviews out. I'd be reviewing any sort of media I feel like, so yeah.

Just an FYI, this blog isn't really for people to read as much as it is for me to write. So don't bother with it if you don't want to, and if you do that's your biz.

http://criticalmediamass.blogspot.com.au/

TBA

So, what have I been up to...

Well, not all that much. Then me and Mist decided to do a Podcast.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_QFHyrD-Wo

So yeah. We're hoping to have a few more people on next time, it was just due to awkward timing all around that it ended up being the two of us. If you want to jump in next round, feel free to ask.

Aaaah, right. This is a thing, isn't it?

Man, am I feeling nostalgic today? Updating two of my major blogs? Wow. I doubt anyone that follows this still checks their dashboard, but hey. If you do, welcome.
I'm aware, if you follow Read This Mortals, it sounded sort of like a goodbye. In a way it was. Goodbye to that blog. Not really this one though.
Most of us don't talk that often, which is okay I guess. I've said several times I'm not good with real time conversation, but the main reason I don't comment on Derek's blog anymore is that I don't find the conversations as... interesting. People are involved in some over-arcing RP which I don't feel like joining, and I don't know most of the people anymore. There are a few people I still enjoy the company of, but eh... It's not as good. It's probably one of the main reasons we all don't go. Impracticality aside, don't we all have those times we go on just to check if one of our good friends are on, and when they aren't we leave without comment. If I made an effort, I'd comment regardless, and maybe one day one of you could see and join me. But truthfully, it's a dream and nothing more.
I'd like to see me and Mist and Sparky and Eve and Lynxia and Flame and Star and whoever else on and talking, and I miss most of you incredibly. But it's impractical to wish for it to happen, and I'm not living in the past.
I'll continue to go on occasionally, and I'm thinking of a day where I can try to get most of the old people on, but I'm moving forward. Am I leaving? No. There's no such thing as leaving. That'd be like saying I'm just going to stop caring about you all. It can't happen. I'll always be there, not as in a cheesy 'in your heart' way, or in a physical way where I'm commenting all the time. But in my head, the blog will always be a place I can go. And if I ever need to, I will go. But life doesn't stop because we grow apart.
I like to think I didn't leave the blog, I'm just developing my life in a way that doesn't have me go on, at least as often. I'm moving forward and happy I'm doing so. And I hope you all do to. Because life never stops, whether you stay on a blog and talk to people ever day, or you do something else and remember those days with fondness, there's no stop. I'm not going to stop my life in the hope of reclaiming a few minutes of happy conversation. I'll continue. Whether I not I see you on the way, I'll always care about you.
Sorry if this sounded like another goodbye, it's not. Just a momentary cheesy, nostalgic thought I wanted to share with people I care about.
See you around. Take care

Calling all Drawers... Anyone want to do me a solid?

Right, hi there. What's new with you? Me, there's not much.
So, probably noticed the title by now. If you haven't... Why?
So, the drawing thing. Should elaborate. I've recently decided that I'm going to make more than a 5 second bouncing ball with animation. I know that's not exactly a big accomplishment, but I have done more. Unfortunately, I won't be publishing those as they're lost.
So, animation. I'm going to be one of those guys who steals of other YouTuber's fame and animate scenes from their videos. Going with Let's Play (part of RoosterTeeth, which some of you know I'm a huge fan of). I've got the audio, after a few problems. Half an hour cut down to six minutes, which is a lot to animate, but I'm sticking to the simple. No fluid moments, and definitely no lip-syncing.
So, I've found something out though. I absolutely hate drawing. I have everything perfect in my head, but can never get it onto the screen. Maybe it has something to do with me using a cheap mouse on a bed, while the pros use a drawing pad. Whatever, I'm not going to do that.
So, since I am certainly not going to draw, I need some help from... someone. I've got a couple of drawn pics of the guys faces, found on the internet, which I could use, but I don't want to use some random persons work. So, if anyone wants to help me out, I'd give you the picks, and you'd send back a drawing of the guys faces based off them. I'd use the pics, give you credit, and we're all happy.
So, if anyone would like to help me out, email me. If for some reason you don't have my email, just... comment with yours I suppose. If no one wants to help me out, I'm going to have to start guilt tripping a few people.
So, the drawings would just be sort of cartoony, none to complicated since I have to redraw them a few times. Colour isn't necessary. Any takers?
Oh, and can I tell you, animating does stuff to your head man. I can't watch a YouTube video without thinking about how I'd animate it.
Whatever. Let's see how long it takes for me to abandon this project...

Those Superhero Shows

I'm not one for comic books. There are several reasons for that: I find them boring a lot of the time, they're extremely hard to get around here, I'm so far behind that there's not much point in starting now. But I do like Marvel and DC superhero shows. Sometimes.
Yeah, I never really got over that stage. I watch kids shows still, within reason. But I'm also at that stage when I don't like my shows to ever change. So when two of my favourite superhero shows, Spectacular Spider-Man and Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, were cancelled... Well, it wasn't pretty.
I'd started watching Spectacular Spider-Man a long time ago, when it first started. What was that, 2007? So yeah, it held some sentimental value to me. It was a good show. Fans of the comics said it stayed true to the comics for the most part, it had likable characters, and an alright plot. It was far from my favourite show, but it was good.
Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes matters more to me. I started watching this a little latter, but liked it a lot more. Why wouldn't I? It started off with the Avenger's forming, starting to get along, which is half the fun, and new members appearing every so often. The humour was good enough, the plot was very good in my opinion, and I liked the characters.
And both of these were cancelled, to be replaced by new shows. Ultimate Spider-Man, and Avengers Assemble. I tried the first episodes of both of these.
Ultimate Spider-Man was one of the worst shows I've ever seen. And if you think I might be comparing it to the other show too much- I am comparing it. As I should. They cancelled the show and replaced it with this. It was built for comparison.
The humour is downright painful, the plot is boring at best, and- Well, there's nothing redeeming about it. Spider-Man is a useless person, is hired by shield and forced to work with a 'team' of other teenage superheroes. It's painful. He rides a Spidey-Motorbike or something.
Quick derailing here. The guy who voiced Spidey is Spectacular Spider-Man was taken on to voice Spidey in an episode of Earth's Mightiest Heroes. He recording all of his lines. So when the episode premiered... they had replaced his voice with the one from Ultimate Spider-Man. Without telling the Spectacular guy or anything. This made me very sad.
So- I just watched Avengers Assemble. It's average, and that's the best I can give it.
It starts off with these characters already knowing each other, having disbanded the Avengers a long time ago. So, no need for character development of any sort. In the first few minutes of the show, Cap dies and Iron Man gets the rest of the old team to avenge him. And by the old team, I mean Hulk, Thor, Hawkeye, Black Widow and Falcon. Yeah, good characters, but where are the others I love? I know this is meant to take an approach like the movie, meaning using the characters from the movie plus one new guy. But the best aren't there. Ant Man- the pacifist. Black Panther- the calm awesome guy. Ms Marvel- One of the few tough female superheroes. I can deal with not having Wasp, she annoyed me.
Maybe they'll appear later in the series. But if they were Avengers for years before disbanding, then surely that would be a good chance to meet these people? Or am I meant to believe that they disbanded shortly after coming together? I find that hard to believe. Yeah, I know I was complaining that they didn't show any of the characters joining and getting to know one another. But you're either going to do it or not. Don't flip flop.
So, a few minutes later, Cap turns out to be alive, Red Skull switches bodies with him, shortly switches bodies back and steals Iron Man's armour. And that's episode one.
Riveting stuff, isn't it?
Episode two is getting Iron Man back to the mansion for a new Arc Reactor, having these little nanobots take over the Avengers and having them fight each other, and then them disarming a bomb. Boring stuff.
First off, MODOCK, allied with Red Skull, says his nanobots can make the Avengers do anything he wants. So... he has them fight each other? Instead of having them under his control? I mean, nothing seemed to be wrong with the nanobots. It was Iron Man, never taken under control, that freed the rest. There was never any reason shown that he couldn't do this.
It feels as if the creators tried to cram too much into these first two episodes, and nothing really had time to settle. Cap's dead, no he's not, Red Skull took his body, no he didn't, Iron Man's dying, no he isn't, the Avengers are trying to kill one another, that's over, Red Skull is defeated, no, he teleported away.
I could have tried the third episode, but it was too painful to go on.
People are going on about how the animation is so much better than EMH. I didn't really think it was anything special. EMH was outdated, but unique. AA just seems like generic animation to me. Except for the god awful panning shots. Also, some of the character designs seem off to me. Cap, Iron Man and Hawkeye especially. Hawkeye is meant to be a brilliant archer. But he wears purple sunglasses? Wouldn't that just get in the way?
They're also saying the voice acting as improved. That the voice of Iron Man is no longer someone trying to sound like Robert Downey Jr. Well, for one, this new voice actor isn't that good. For another, the old one may have sounded like Downey, but that's not saying he was a bad voice actor. He was good, even if one of the reasons he was cast was that similarity. All the voice actors seem out of place, bar a few. One of the few is the same person that voice Hulk in EMH, and does it well evidently. Though the character design for Hulk make is seem strange.
What else... Oh yeah, the character relationships seemed forced. They go on and on about Hulk and Thor fighting each other for fun. Also, if for some reason you watch this, count how many times they repeat that joke about Hulk hitting people next to him without looking. Ugh.
It just comes down to the fact that Earth's Mightiest Heroes had two seasons of plot an character development, while Avengers Assemble is trying to act like these people already know each other. It just doesn't work.
But the painful thing is that I know these shows are going to do well. Because I'm at an age where I value characters and plot relevance above all else, but kids just want to see the Avengers beat up villains, which is what they'll get.
Sorry for ranting guys. Ciao for now.

Endings are horrible

I don't like endings. Endings of things I actually care about, at any rate.
For example, the ending of Harry Potter was horrible. Both the book and the movie, by the way. And by horrible, I mean depressingly horrible, not bad horrible. The plot itself- whilst brilliant- doesn't amount to the feeling I get when I know that this is the end of a series.
I recently finished the last book of Septimus Heap. I read the first few when I was really young, and out of nostalgia read the others, but haven't really enjoyed them. To be honest, I didn't enjoy this one all that much either. I've grown out of it. But knowing that it's over it just all too depressing.
It takes a certain type of book to get that feeling at the end. The Gone series, being one of my favourite books, didn't get that feeling from me. The Eragon Series (Inheritance if you want to be picky) made me sad. Artemis Fowl didn't.
What makes that sad, depressed feeling when a series end? It couldn't simply just be how much time you've put into the series. With both Septimus Heap and Eragon, I started reading them at a young age. But I started reading Artemis Fowl at a young age as well. Does this mean I won't get sad at the ending of Skulduggery Pleasant? I read that later in my life than I read many other series.
So, it got me thinking. I have my dreams for being an author, and I already have characters that I've fallen in love with. Such fun to write. But how to end it? How to get the sad, depressed reaction that I think the ending of every series should get. Obviously, the reaction isn't just from seeing the character die. I don't think I could see myself doing that anyway (although I probably will end up doing that just to throw people off).
The answer, it seems, is when a series has a definite ending. Harry Potter and Septimus Heap both had endings where I knew what happened to the characters in the next few years, I knew that the adventure was over. Eragon doesn't quite have the same ending, but it left me thinking it was over in a different way, so I could guess what I think happened next.
Again, as an author, can I bring myself to make such an ending? Where I know it's the end of the line for the huge adventures? At the moment, I don't think so. I'd like to think that I merely scratched the surface of the story, and the rest is unknown. But to get the sad feeling, I think I would have to have a definite ending. I guess I'll see what happens. But however the series, if I ever get it published, ends, I'll be extremely depressed. Because my journey with my characters will be over.

New Cover

So, Derek unveiled the new cover

Impressed? Well, the thing is, I'm... not
This is by no means meant to be an insult. I's beautifully drawn. Well done Tom Percival. But the context of the image doesn't impress me.
I know most people look at this, and see something tragic happening. But when I look at it, all I see is another fighting scene, where Skulduggery's checking on Val. I don't see her mortally wounded, or dead. I just see another fight.
If I looked at this, and saw the tragedy everyone else seems to see, I'd be impressed. But I don't see it. Sorry guys