Starring Kevin Sussman from Wil Wheaton's Tabletop, "Dragon Age" episodes!

Matrimonial Juggernaut

What is remarkable here is that Stuart knows the 22-metre long HAWv A5 Juggernaut. The A5 first showed up in West End Games’ Imperial Sourcebook in 1990. The visual design of the vehicle was based on Joe Johnston’s concept art for The Empire Strikes Back. Since then it popped up sporadically in unlikely locations such as Dark Horse Comics’ Star Wars: Empire issue 29. Most fans are familiar with is the larger 49-metre long HAWv A6 variant – the so-called “clone turbo tank“. This is because the A6s were featured in the 2005 film Revenge of the Sith Later, they also showed up in Star Wars The Clone Wars animated series. As such, all the toys and visual encyclopaedias refer mostly to the A6. There is no reason why Stuart would bring up the A5, even if he’s read the wiki thoroughly. Unless he plays West End Games’ Star Wars […]

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Star Warsh!

Disney Plus Debuts

So as of midnight – last night – coming into the first day of June, we now have Disney+ Hotstar running in this household. Although there is no sign of the Tartakovsky Clone Wars show, Droids toon and the Ewok movies, the sheer amount of content available for streaming here blows my mind. What a time to be alive!

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Sabine was here!

Star Wars Rebels Experience

Mid Valley Megamall held a Star Wars Rebels Experience exhibition last Sunday, commemorating the debut of the series on local TV. I didn’t think I was going to make the exhibition because college assignments had to be submitted by midnight. I had one more to complete and submit. But when it was announced that the deadline was pushed back 2 days, we headed for Mid Valley at Point Five beyond lightspeed. I saw the big helmet at the South Court all the way from the Centre Court. Irfan posed before it for posterity’s sake. The Five-Oh-First was on site to ensure no rebel agents disrupt the proceedings. The Pau’an Inquisitor was also around being all Lucius Malfoy-ish. He has quite a nice profile, but he’s no Inquisitor Tremayne. I hope Tremayne shows up in the series at some point and they both go out for coffee or something. Inquisitors first […]

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Guest starring Katee Sackhoff as Bo-Katan

The Lawless

The Star Wars The Clone Wars episode “The Lawless”. Best Star Wars since The Empire Strikes Back? Hyperbole? No spoilers here. At about minute 9, I was stunned at how the story went. The entire series and the tone it started with in the beginning was a feint. Despite some pretty juvenile episodes, most of the series has been an exercise in solid storytelling in the Star Wars universe. We expect the filmmakers to pull their punches because of several issues: this series is on Cartoon Network, and the prequel movies had Jar Jar Binks. However, it has shown us violence that provided emotional release at some parts, like when Commander Jet’s troops burned dozens of Geonosians alive… onscreen… and we see the Geonosian aflame and shrieking in agony; we’ve seen innocents shot with blaster burning right through their torsos; we’ve seen Ahsoka leap, spin and decapitate four Mandalorians. We’ve […]

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But without the two kids and the monkey

Space Ghost

I has some time to spare one morning and thought I’d draw one of the old classic Hanna-Barbera cartoons. I was then torn between two characters: Space Ghost or Tundro of the Herculoids. Ultimately I thought I’d give Space Ghost a try. Using brush and ink, I tried giving Space Ghost a dramatic central shadow. The illustration was scanned and coloured digitally using GIMP. Finally, the colour layer was run through GIMP’s Ziptone filter to give it a comic book feel. Click here for a bigger image on DeviantArt. Space Ghost, I’ve since learnt, was designed for Hanna Barbera by famed cartoonist and comic book artist Alex Toth.

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The Mysterious Mystery of Alcatraz

[[image:alcatraz-intro.jpg:Alcatraz:center:0]] J.J. Abrams’ new show Alcatraz is sort of interesting. The premise is that on the day Alcatraz was shut down in 1963, everyone on the island disappeared into thin air from inmates to guards. In the present day, one by one the people who vanished are reappearing in and around San Francisco. And the returnees haven’t aged since 1963. A team led by Emerson Hauser (played by Sam Neill) is tasked with stopping the crimes perpetrated by the returning inmates, finding out where they’ve been for 50 years and who took them. However I do believe the show can be improved by having the intro monologue end differently each time, like a Simpson couch gag. On March 21, 1963, Alcatraz officially closed. All the prisoners were transferred off the island. Only that’s not what happened. Not at all. In lieu of “Not at all”, the producers can also insert […]

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Clark Flies

Smallville has ended its 10 year run making it the longest running series based on a comic book ever. I’d like to say it was a great run through and through, but it did lose my attention somewhere during the fourth season due to Clark’s teenaged lovey-dovey hijinks with Lana. I saw the odd episode here and there over the years, but I never had the urge to return to my regular viewings of it… until the 8th season. [[image:clark-flying.jpg:Some Kryptonian:center:0]] It seemed like a switched was flipped and it went into full DC Universe mode. We’ve already had the Smallville‘s Elseworlds version of Supergirl, Green Arrow, Flash, Cyborg and Aquaman on the show beforehand. But they were visually adapted to fit the “no capes, no tights” rule of Smallville. Suddenly we were getting Maxima, Zatanna, and of all characters Doomsday, that very nearly resemble their comic book counterparts! (The […]

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Microlite20

The Zombie Apocalypse with Microlite20

After three episodes of The Walking Dead on AMC, I thought I’d try a zombie game scenario with Irfan. I was itching to try out the free Microlite20 system, so I adapted it the M20 Modern plug-in to come up with a simple zombie apocalypse scenario. Irfan wanted to play a sheriff, he rolled up his three characteristics, chose a Smart Hero class (which gives him +1 to Knowledge) and took a Law Enforcement starting occupation (which gives him another +1 to Knowledge and a +1 to Physical). The game began with Irfan coming back to town from a three-day camp-out in the woods. He had with him a sniper rifle. As he walked up the road to town, he spotted a car at the roadside. Upon a closer look, he noticed a figure slumped back in the seat. It was a corpse, dead for perhaps a day or two. […]

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Phineas and Ferb

One of the cool things about having a kid is that you get to check out all the children’s TV shows that are out there. Well, you know. It’s got to be vetted before Allie is allowed to watch it. 😉 This is one of our new favorite shows: [[image:phineas_and_ferb_logo.png:Mom, Phineas and Ferb are making a title sequence!:center:0]]  It’s just awesome. It’s on the Disney Channel. We love it. Phineas and Ferb spend their days creating cool things while their sister Candace tries to bust them. In the meantime, Perry the Platipus (their pet slash secret agent) goes around foiling the evil plans of Dr Heinz Doofenschmirtz.  You can read all about it here. And they have really amazing and clever song and dance routines. Well, just check out their theme song. Vin and I are certainly addicted to this show. We even DVRed it when we were out of […]

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Padmé finds herself smack dab in the middle of things blowing up... again

Riders of the Malevolence

Clone Wars Episode 4 The GM announced that this week was going to be a standard dungeon crawl, to which everyone shrugged and went, “Meh.” However, after recapping last week’s session, he started out with a bang by shifting the scene to two new PCs. Senator Padmé Amidala of Naboo and her protocol droid See Threepio were both on their way to a secret meeting with the Intergalactic Banking Clan, an enemy faction, when suddenly they reverted back in normal space right in the middle of last week’s closing skirmish. The PCs asked the GM why “Intergalactic” when they were only in a single galaxy? The GM reminded them of the map in Episode II: Attack of the Clones, which displayed a main spiral galaxy and at least one dwarf satellite galaxy. So, “Intergalactic” was technically correct. Anakin’s player thought they’d better update all the official sources with this tidbit […]

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Y-wing hotdogger aces

Strikeforce: Shadow Squadron

Clone Wars Episode 3 After the last adventure, in which the party gathered intel on the Malevolence, the GM now changed the flavour of the campaign from a rescue to a starfighter combat scenario. It was a straightforward mission. A squadron of fighters will take off from the Resolute, take a short cut through a nebula, then attack the Malevolence targeting its command tower at the other end of the nebula before it can destroy the Kaliida Shoals Medical Station, with its load of hospitalised clone troopers and cadre of doctors and medics. There were supposed to be only four players this session. The PCs snapped up by the players this week were Anakin Skywalker, Ahsoka Tano, and two of the clone pilots named Broadside and Matchstick. The GM thought it would be awesome to give everyone a fighter from the original movies, like the Koensayr Y-wing. But since this […]

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Clones in vacuum

The Orbital Debris Field Manhunt

Clone Wars Episode 2 Obviously last week had merely been the gaming group’s test run using a stand alone scenario in a single session. This week, the GM brought out the big guns. Literally. The Republic fleet has been under attack by a colossal capital ship, known as the Malevolence. Which is why this scenario was titled “Rising Malevolence”. Incidentally the Malevolence is a 7.9 km-long Subjugator-class heavy cruiser, which means the first ship of the line, the Subjugator, was still floating about somewhere in the galaxy. Great job by the GM, cause this gives the rest of us another ship to play with in our own campaigns. There were seven players around the table. And the GM split them up into two groups. The first group’s PCs consisted of the Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker, his Togruta padawan Ahsoka Tano and the trusty astromech droid Artoo-Detoo. The second group played […]

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The King with two bodyguards

Battle At The Coral Moon

Clone Wars Episode 1 The scenario titled “Ambush” was designed so that the Player Characters (PCs), on the side of the Galactic Republic, set down on the moon known as Rugosa in a diplomatic mission. Rugosa’s terrain was a thick forest of a multitude of hard, gigantic coral structures. If there was a sea once, it probably had dried out a long time ago. Tiny airborne subspecies of the neebray, like little sparrows, flit between the coral branches. Quite an exotic setting described by the Game Master (GM). The PCs task was simple: Land on Rugosa and make the planned rendezvous with the Toydarian King Katuunko, then persuade the good king to actively support the Republic in the war against the Separatists.The lead PC was Yoda, a Jedi Master with a fair amount of dice in his Force skills. He was aided by a trio of clone troopers, Thire, Jek […]

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A Universe Ahead To Explore

Coming to television this fall is the third series to be set in a very well known, visual-media-based science fiction universe. This time instead of having a proper base of operations (in this galaxy or another), the characters are trapped on a automated ancient starship travelling out of and away from the Milky Way galaxy. That’s one way to put your characters in a spot and have them undergo weekly adventures, I guess. Recently the teaser trailer of this upcoming series was released, showing us a glimpse of some actors involved in the pilot episode. Here’s Robert Carlyle. [[image:sgu-teaser01.jpg:Holy crap! It’s Begbie!:center:0]] Here’s Lou Diamond Philips. [[image:sgu-teaser02.jpg:The Aquaman pilot got flushed… here’s hoping for a hit series:center:0]] Stargate Universe! A team of scientists and military personnel discover an Ancient vessel traveling from galaxy to galaxy — but have no way of returning home to Earth, according to the blurb. [[image:sgu-teaser03.jpg::center:0]] […]

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There Is A Hole In The Bucket Dear Liza Dear Liza

First things first: SPOILER ALERT… This entry will be discussing the series finale of Battlestar Galactica, the double-length episode entitled “Daybreak, Part 2”. But before the day breaks, there is nothing but utter darkness and despair. Death and destruction. As ably illustrated by Tricia Helfer below: [[image:galactica-finale03.jpg:When things get bad, Head Six goes nuts:center:0]] DID I MENTION THE SPOILER ALERT? It’s been dark for quite a while now. First there was that extinction of the Human race with only less than 40,000 survivors being pursued by genocidal robots thing. Then there is facing the reality of having to live out their entire lives in space boxed up in small ships with dwindling resources… if they don’t find Earth. Finally, just before the mid-season break they find Earth and it’s a radioactive wasteland. So, after the darkness, when does day break for the story? Was it ultimately enjoyable? [[image:galactica-finale02.jpg:Admiral Adama thinks […]

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The Lunatic Fringe

Both Sila’s and my household have been following J.J. Abram’s brand new TV series Fringe. As per Alias and Lost, I had a feeling it’s not what it advertised itself to be, which would have been about international spies and counterspies, and surviving a plane crash on a deserted island. Warning: SPOILERS, and I’m serious. SPOILERS! [[image:fringe01-feb2009.jpg:Is the tank an application of the alt universe tech?:center:0]]  What Fringe advertised itself was about a department within the Department of Homeland Security, with agents on secondment from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which deal with fringe science to solve their cases. Naturally this caused a lot of people to draw similarities between it and The X-Files. (And having Darin “Flukeman” Morgan as a producer helped accentuate this fact.) The story starts with a pair of FBI Agents Olivia Dunham and John Scott, who gets involved in a case concerning bio-terrorism aboard an […]

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