BoloOfEarth

Your stomach.  With a chainsaw.

You found the dog garroted in the backyard.

 

NT: Subtle signs that your dog is smarter than you.

Which one of us goes off every morning to work, and which one lies around the house all day -- and then expects a treat upon my return home?

NT:  Subtle sings the cat doesn't like the new puppy you brought home last week.

It's got GREAT trunk space!

What was wrong with mentioning Anita Sarkeesian?

BINGO!!!

(Sorry, I couldn't resist.)

NT: Subtle signs that you really should have applied for an Internship with EVIL, INC on Career Day.

You learn that all of the intern training is being done by Phenomenal Lass. 

NT: Actors you don't want to see in the New Star Wars trilogy.

Frank Sinatra and Judy Garland.  'Cause they're, y'know, dead.

NT:  Actors who would have improved the second Star Wars trilogy had they been included, despite being, y'know, dead.

NT:  If overexposure to Pym Particles makes the Pym's children super-small, what does the lack of radiation shielding do to the children of the non-superpowered residents of the Baxter Building?

NT: Subtle Signs that the world might just be better off with Dr. Doom at the helm.

The helm he'll be at is on a starship on a one-way voyage to another galaxy. 

I said I'd remember you in a thousand years, not for a thousand years. 

NT:  Death Tribble is putting out an album of original songs, and it's sure to go gold!  What are some of the songs on DT's album?

NT: On Youtube, they have a video of Hatsune Miku (a Japanese "virtual idol" computer program that runs on PCs) covering "Let It Go" and another of her covering "Smells Like Teen Spirit". Name a song that even Hatsune Miku would be utterly unable to cover.

Friday by Rebecca Black.  And by "cover" I mean that Hatsune would have to match the sheer horribleness of the original.

If the problem is getting them from the charity banquet fight to the island naval base, the key will be the missing scientist.  He could have worked on a project with another scientist who was Red Winter's first choice, but the scientist bolted and died (hit by a car, perhaps, or fell out an upper-story window) with one of Red Army getting spotted by a witness.  Regardless, the dead scientist combined with Red Army's presence would get the PCs to find the link between the two -- they both worked on the same satellite (similar to the one Red Winter is going to use), or were part of a Pentagon project to protect the nuclear arsenal from hackers.  This gets the PCs onto the right line of investigation.  They could then learn of shipments of key components to the island naval base. 

Personally, rather than Red Winter launching their own satellite, though, I'd consider the possibility that the US (and Russia) put satellites carrying nukes into orbit way back when, and that's what Red Winter is going to use to fire on Moscow.  The scientist and his recently-deceased colleague are both older, retired Cold War relics, and the former naval base was the launch and command center for the orbiting nuke platform which has since been shut down.  By the time the naval base was decommissioned, the secret underground command center was long forgotten, but the automated defenses still exist (and are fixed / upgraded by Red Winter).  But RW still needs at least one of the original scientists to help re-activate the satellite and launch the nukes.  (Hence the kidnapping.)

You can introduce another former colleague to assist the heroes, a crotchety old guy (COG) who insists on going along (and thus needs protecting) when they storm the island, but he can provide key info to help them get past some of the defenses (or occasional bad info, since RW upgraded or changed some of the defenses).  If you want, the heroes could even stop more of Red Winter's forces from kidnapping that scientist (as a backup plan in case the first scientist can't be forced to cooperate).  That would serve two purposes:  gives the players a feeling of success after their pre-ordained failure to stop the other kidnapping, and warns Red Winter that the heroes are quite likely on his tail.

I'm a big fan of colorful NPCs, so the COG would be played up (waxing nostalgic about the 1960s/1970s nuke satellite project, maybe a rambling seemingly unrelated story about the three of them doing something that might actually be useful for the PCs later on), maybe intro his devoted grand-daughter as a possible romantic interest to a PC.  Perhaps some retired admiral who was part of the original project realizes what's up but is anti-cape and at first tries to get the PCs arrested and later uses his influence to get a SEAL team sent in to stop the plot, but mis-informs them that the PCs are working with RW (since the admiral has convinced himself that they actually are).

The mix of older (1960s/1970s) hard-wired tech with some modern upgrades from RW could present amusing challenges to Count Zero.  ("How the heck am I supposed to hack in over a 28k telephone modem?!  Who the hell programs in FORTRAN?!")  But the older tech could work in the heroes' favor too.

Anyway, just an idea.  Feel no obligation to use it.

"Slighted"?!  (Puts on glasses)  Don't you mean "complimented"? 

They reveal the big shocking ending in the trailer.  ("You'll never guess that the main character is actually dead the whole time!")

NT:  Marvel decides that Ultron is not going to be the big bad villain in Avengers 2.  Who's it actually going to be?  (Difficulty:  the more ridiculous and underpowered the character, the better -- though he/she/it still needs to be an actual Marvel character.)

He's going to establish his "street cred" in The Sesame Street Movie, where he plays Oscar the Grouch.

New Topic: Someone from the NGD just created a crack in the space-time continuum. Who did it, and how?

I did.  To restore CLOWN to the Hero Universe.  Bwa-ha-ha!!!!

How, you ask?  Well, I was driving my DeLorean at 88 mph and wasn't paying attention to where I was going.  Crashed into some blue police box.

NT: Not-yet-implement features for cell phones you would really like to have.

Telemarketer-Be-Gone:  An app to send a painful (but non-lethal) charge of electricity to the caller's phone. 

NT: Subtle signs you're going to need a gas mask driving to work tomorrow morning.

The guy you're car-pooling with had beans and pork rinds for breakfast.

NT: Subtle Signs that you drank too much for the Fourth.

The viral video of you dancing naked on your lawn with lit sparklers taped to every extremity.  And I do mean every extremity.  And the Roman candle stuck up your bum was probably ill-advised. 

Nonetheless, it was a good rendition of Yankee Doodle Dandy.

New Topic:  How are supervillains reacting to the United States' recent departure from the World Cup?

A patriotic Foxbat proceeds to steal every athletic supporter in the world.  "Before those other teams can compete for the World Cup, they shall first have to come to me for one of... the world's cups!  Bwa-ha-ha!"

New Topic:  Foxbat got his hands on the fireworks for tonight's Fourth of July celebration in Millennium City.  What's going to happen?

NT: Subtle signs the celebrity couple is only breaking up to advance their careers.

They have a director and film crew on-hand for the breakup, and it takes 4 takes and a script rewrite before they get it right.

NT:  Wacked-out reasons the celebrity couple is giving for their breakup.  (The more ridiculous, the better.)

"Geez, Mom!  NOT in front of my friends!"

Get them to play across the world, I mean who does not like Purple Rain by Prince

Me.  And Raspeberry Beret is held in similar derision.  (I actually had an upstairs neighbor who played Prince songs on the Hammond organ at 1 am, so you can understand my hatred of those songs.)

NT: Someone went a little crazy with the frog-kissing and now the whole town is up to its armpits in princes! What are we going to do with them all?

Get Miss Piggy to kiss them all and turn them back into frogs until she finds her Kermit.

NT: More evil ways to torment your neighbors than playing Raspberry Beret on the Hammond organ at 1 am.

New Topic:  How various supervillains would help their favorite country win the World Cup.

Cleese has appeared on Doctor Who, in a cameo (as a snooty, pretentious art lover who mistakes the TARDIS for a museum exhibit) in the Tom Baker episode City of Death (which was lartegly ghost-written by Douglas Adams during his one contentious year as Script Editor).

Eric Idle, then.  Actually, I think he'd make an interesting and fun Doctor.