Michael Hopcroft

The OSS 117 series was resumed this century but as satires of Western cluelessness about other parts of the world.

Q: What did Ben Franklin use to edit Jefferson's first draft of the D of I? A: Moscow Is Still Standing!

And oh, so apropos. Was the police detail able to account for all their hats?

The International Festival of Military Parades and Chicken Eating Competition

Q: We haven't seen any Orcas in ages. Where could they all have gone? A: Nuts to your white mice!

Q: Why are all these superpowered people having an all-out battle in Downtown Manhattan? A: For the record -- no, that is not a time machine. So get out of there before the thing switches itself on by mistake!

Far away, across the fields, The tolling of an iron bell Calls the Faithful to their knees To hear the softly spoken magic spell

My first anime I remember much of was Voltron (Defender of the Universe). Then I saw Akira in 1988 (I ran into an oild con friend there) and referred to it as a crossover of 2001: A Space Odyssey and A Nightmare on Elm Street. The big moment was when I rented the first episodes of Urusei Yatsura. That's what got me to the club at one last and it would be decades before I looked back.

And even though there wasn't a preview for it, I went home to find this, and all I was thinking was "How the\ heck are they going to be finding apart for Bugs Bunny in MIddle-Earth" Lord of the Rings New Movies Set at Warner Bros - Variety

I'm still in a bit of a shock several hours after seeing Knock at the Cabin. The staging and acting are exquisite (Dave Bautista is a revelation(, and the premise is both fascinating and frightening. But the shakenness afterwards was not pleasant, and being alone with this film in a darkened auditorium (49 seats and nobody but me was occupying any of them) had me wonder if I was getting sick -- not as in upchuck time but as in how the Hell am I going to get downstairs, and what if nobody comes lo0oking for me time. Bautista's gentle giant making impossible demands of himself and the inhabitants of said cabin was well worth the price of admission by itself.

Which means I really should stop wondering who decideda gujy with 15 career munytes or so in the NBA was a significant pro that people want to see in the contest, and will root for to win. I would be deeply offended if I was one of the other participants in the contest who's actually playing in The League.

This. The thing was they were masters of mind games. After all, why shoot a dictator when you can drive him mad and provoke a leadership crisis in his country? An assassination would have been like killing Putin in a very obvious way that points to you, and exponentially increases the chances of getting caught and facing a firing squad or worse. The movies turned the concept into action thrillers with stuntwork and fight scenes replacing the true focus of the series on deception and ingenious planning and execution. It would be like Lupin III, which would be difficult to capture in a live-action film unless you truly understood the character and the world he lives in.

Manga has lost one of its giants with the death of Space Opera legend Leiji Matsumoto. His best-known creations are the legendary space pirate/rebel Captain Harlock, the pioneering Space Battleship Yamato (one of the first anime series to be released in the US, under the title Star Blazers) and the proto-transhumanist fantasy Galaxy Express 999. He also created the music video series Interstellar 5555 for Techno masters Daft Punk. He was known for his distinctive art style with languid lines contrasting with detailed and realistic technology, his controversial relationship with war (to this day his film The Cockpit is banned in much of the world), and his powerful mix of space and seeming-anachronisms like space cruisers modeled on WWII battleships (which always held a fascination for him) and spacefaring railway trains. His legacy, as I mentioned, is complex, yet there is astonishing beauty in much of his work.

Q: Where's the dog? A: Dogs only know where I'd be without you.

Q: So what was your trip to the Pentagon like? A: Looks like we're running low on air again.

M3GAN has to have been the creepiest and most disturbing horror movie I've seen in years. The idea is a sort of variant on Frankenstein, in which a robotics engineer builds a robot designed to look and act human, and intended to protect her "primary user", in this case the engineer's new ward who was brought to her after her parents died. But, while the little girl adores the robot and sees her as a person, and the engineer's boss wants to start a M3GAN production line, M3GAN starts to transcend her boundaries, and gradually starts building a frightening demeanor, until finally she has no problem with killing even dogs and children if it serves her purpose. Like the original Frankenstein, it poses questions. Is M#GAN a person, albeit an evil one? If she isn't, then who is culpable for her crimes?

The Bad Guys has been compared to the classic anime/Manga series Lupin III, about a master thief, his crew, and the femme fatale he wants to bed (buit she has other priorities). The inspiration was a French series from the turn of the last century about a master thief named Arsene Lupin -- "Lupin" was originally supposed to be his part-Japanese grandson, although he may have slipped to great-great-grandson over the years). There have been two-score or so Lupin III theatrical films -- the most notae, The Castle of Cagliostro, was the director debut of Hayao Miyazaki. It's the Japanese take on the James Bond franchise.

Has Strange New Worlds been renewed?

The Flash, on another of his escapades in time, shows up in various points before the rise of Man. When he finally gets home, he declares himself terribly upset at Humanity. "I met your gasoline!" NT: Subtle signs the entire nation of Paraguay is laughing at you behind your back.

I saw The Fablemans tonight with my mother, about a Jewish youth who learns to make home movies and throws himself into making movies with and for his friends -- until he films something he shouldn't, and his world starts crashing around his ears. Sounds like normal family drama stuff, until I tell you it was inspired by the life of his director -- one Steven Spielberg. Some of the things that happen to Sam Fableman and his family are things that happened to a lot of people in that generation and the generation that followed, and that makes the film relatable in a way that few coming-of-age pictures about art and artists manage to do. Sam Fableman's journey takes many turns as events outside his control influence his life. His family moves from Jersey to Arizona to California with the work of his engineer father, while his glides through life as it becomes clearer and clearer that she has issues. In California, Sam encounters Anti-Semitism on a personal level for the first time as the new kid in school. The film ends with Sam encountering an aged, irascible John Ford (played by auteur director David Lynch) and learning an important lesson from a two-minute visit. (There is a similar scene with Judd Hirsch as an elderly relative). Since this is, with the serial numbers filed off, Steven Spielberg's own story -- showcasing in a fictionalized setting some of the things that got him started and went into making him the giant he is -- there was absolutely one question I need to find an answer for -- what directors from the current generation will become the sort of towering figure Spielberg is?

Clark Kent is a beloved teacher of English and Journalism, with a dose of Ethics thrown in on the side. Because being faster than a speeding bullet more powerful than a locomotive is not what makes a Man Super... Lex Luthor (under a false name) teaches Philosophy down the hall, but he draws mostly from Nietzsche and Ayn Rand. All he knows about Mr. Kent is that he despises him. Most students hate his classes and some hate him\, and the few that do admire him are the worst bullies on campus..

Q: Taco Bell? How can you possibly think taking me to Taco Bell or Date Night was a good idea? A: Barack Obama has fewer legs than your cat.

Q: Why can't I get my data, and why does my computer smell like chocolate, caramel, and pecans? A: We really did not think through what to name this newly discovered civilization.

In a way, Truck-kun is the ultimate plot device "character". But there is one key question -- does it hit people accidentally, or deliberately? If it hits people on accident, then it is merely the plot device that launches the campaign (or at least one character's entry into it). If it has a human driver who deliberately hits people, then it's a standard Vehicle with an extraordinary powerset. And since the abandoned "body" remains in the original world, he would appear on his side of the wall no different from any other serial-murdering psychotic who may or may not actually believe he is stocking another world or worlds with newly minted heroes and heroines (and the occasional obnoxious feline sidekick). Now what really gets interesting is what happens if Truck-kun does not have or need a driver. The truck itself is, from the point of view of characters in the original world, running around killing random people for no good reason. It is possessed to kill. Never mind that it grants a second chance the victim might never get any other way -- the people it kills remain dead as far as their original world is concerned -- especially their family, fri9ends, and loved ones. Although a psychotic driverless car has been used as a plot device in films and stories from good to bad (Stephen King used them to good effect in two different stories I am aware of, most notably Christine), any adventure about Truck-kun would be based on stopping it before it kills again -- and again. (Truck-kun doesn't even have to be a truck. KARR, the evil counterpart of the iconic KITT, is not something you want to play chicken with, even though in its initial appearance in Knight Rider it does meet its end in a literal game of chicken.)

Those who hasd the foresight to purchase a 6d6 Mental Defense power, OAF Otherworldly stainless "Steel" Helmet, from Foxbat Industries (purveyors of fine comedic weaponry since last Tuesday!). NT: More surprisingly useful things you can buy from Foxbat Industries (purveyors of fine comedic weaponry since last Tuesday!). Those who hasd the foresight to purchase a 6d6 Mental Defense power, OAF Otherworldly stainless "Steel" Helmet, from Foxbat Industries (purveyors of fine comedic weaponry since last Tuesday!). NT: More surprisingly useful things you can buy from Foxbat Industries (purveyors of fine comedic weaponry since last Tuesday!).