Lord Liaden

No hotter First Officer than Spock. Even Jadzia Dax affirms that, and she/he must have seen lots of them.

For a while last year it looked like Texas Republicans might actually boot that @#%&! Paxton. I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up.

Exactly my thought. Spidey's rogues gallery is exceptional. Biggest difference between the Spider's villains and the Bat's is that most of the former's enemies are actual superhumans, while the latter's are mostly normal human psychopaths with some gimmick. I'm not sure how long Batman would last if he had the likes of Kraven, Rhino, and Sandman regularly coming after him. OTOH Green Goblin, Mysterio, or Kingpin would make splendid Bat-villains, while Clayface, Mr. Freeze, or Man-Bat would work great against the Webhead. And of course they both essentially share a female cat-themed frenemy.

Actually, I'm okay with Chewy looking like that after electrolysis.

Anyone posts Carrie Fisher built like She-Hulk, I'm leaving!

That version of Adrian Toomes got a considerable tech upgrade for the movie. The original comic character was much more basic, although his equipment did improve over the decades. Doc Ock's body is supposed to be only human. First punch to the chin by Spidey should have taken him out. Although it's not mentioned anywhere that I'm aware of, I always assumed there was some kind of feedback from his artificial arms that strengthened his body. That was the gimmick applied to the antigrav wing-suit worn by Vulture above. The were called the Enforcers, muscle and killers for hire. Original members were Ox (very big and very strong), Montana (expert with a lariat), and Fancy Dan (skilled HTH fighter and acrobat, shortest of the three but hardly a "dwarf"). Again, just human, but each exceptional in their way, and worked well as a team. So you're okay with a kid in a red and blue webbed leotard and a bug-eyed mask fighting crime, but draw the line at a "deadliest game" hunter in an animal-themed costume?

Remember last year when two black Democrat legislators in Tennessee were expelled by the Republican majority, then won their special elections by a landslide and were reinstated? Tennessee House advances bill to ban reappointing lawmakers booted for behavior

Here's a free sample from an article in Digital Hero #3 expanding on this premise, for a different type of Hero gaming: Pointless Champions.

Wikipedia claims Sue Storm started using force fields in FF issue #22 (January 1964), but it's Wikipedia, so best to wait for confirmation from another source.

I think Trump is the only one who still considers that a great accomplishment. He might have grasped what it was at the time, but after years of boasting he seems to have convinced himself it was an act of genius.

It's anyone's guess who you'd find at the top: Darth Vader, Sauron, or just Surtur taking a whiz.

Early Marvel seemed to go for more mortal superheroes, at a time when Superman was pushing planets. But both companies have cycled up and down over the years.

I agree. At the start of his career, Spidey had trouble fighting opponents who were really just exceptional humans, e.g. the Enforcers, Mysterio, the Kingpin, Man-Mountain Marko.

No argument, but let's not put them in the "evil genius" category either. And I have to point out that the Biden administration has pulled a few pretty slick political moves on the GOP, too. They're far from outweighed.

I imagine it's next to your copy of To Serve Man.

Republicans used to be much better at this sort of thing than Democrats. Recent Republicans look more like the legal and political equivalent of the Keystone Cops.

Duke, thank you for bringing up Dean Shomshak's 4E The Supermage Bestiary. It and its predecessor companion book, The Ultimate Supermage, never got the attention that IMHO they deserved because they were only released in PDF, back when that was far less common and desired. A lot of TUS was reprinted in 5E books, but a great many cool characters, concepts, and background info in that book were not, and very little from TSB was ever referred to again. The books are both in the Hero online store, and ridiculously cheap for what you get.

I remember that in the earliest issues of the comic, when Reed would stretch a limb he seemed to need to physically pull it back to him with his other arm, in order to restore its normal proportions. The powers of the FF were much weaker in the early days: Sue could only turn invisible with no force fields, Ben needed several blows to completely smash through an admittedly very large log, and Johnny's fire could be momentarily doused by a wet mop.

Okay, everybody take a deep breath. The sky is not falling. First of all, the SCOTUS will hear arguments on this case in the third week in April. That's a fast-track, meaning that unless the court drags its feet on the trial to an incredible degree, a ruling will still happen before the general election. Trump did not want that. Second, Trump is arguing that a US President is immune to criminal prosecution for any and all actions taken while in office. That is incredibly, dangerously broad to try to get through any court, regardless of its bias. Third, the court is aware that any ruling about Presidential immunity that applies to Donald Trump, also applies to Joe Biden, and any actions he might take. The SCOTUS may wish to establish the appeals court ruling as universally applicable, ending the controversy. Or it may wish to define the limitations of presidential immunity. The mere fact that it's hearing the case does not automatically mean it will rule in Trump's favor.

The D&D Gazeteer series was a real eye-opener for me. I'd never seen such an in-depth dive into a single fantasy region before. The attempt to justify and make logical a lot of details that the original writers of the setting just threw together; the creation of a consistent historical timeline; the wealth of unique cultural details... I know most campaigns probably won't need all that, but my coherence-loving brain and heart ate it up with a spoon.

I remember the kind of journalist Bruce Maiman asks for in his opinion article. The kind who would hold public figures to account, who would ask them the hard questions. Journalists who took seriously their obligation to inform the public of the truth, as factually and objectively as they could. They used to be common. Now it's all propaganda and polemics. Even the best of "information" media figures almost all come from a place of obvious bias.

Whenever I see Mitch McConnell or Matt Gaetz, I can't help thinking that they look like they should be monitored by the MIB.

So far, every time we thought, "They'd never do X," they do X, or at least try. At this point I put nothing past anyone in the GOP if they think they can get away with it.

Spader's Raymond "Red" Reddington is one of the most fascinating characters ever created for television IMHO. Brilliant, charismatic, mercurial, ruthless. Utterly charming one moment, utterly terrifying the next. He may work with you, but only in service to his own hidden agenda, and you know he'll turn on you if and when that serves his interests. I tend to think of him as being like Doctor Who if the Doctor was an amoral psychopath.