Armory

Well, I (and others) have repeatedly stated reasons why Black Panther is quite different from those movies.  Not sure how else to say it at this point.  If you really see a close comparison between Men in Black and Black Panther,  oh well.

I see another parallel between the "representation" in Wonder Woman and Black Panther. Sure, there have been plenty of strong women in movies, even leads in recent decades. But almost always those women have shown strength the way men have traditionally shown it: by being tough, hard, shutting down the "weakness" of their emotions. WW portrayed women as strong as any man, whose strength came from their emotions. Diana didn't sacrifice any of the qualities that women have always valued -- kindness, compassion, love -- to be heroic. Those qualities are what make her a hero.
 
For a very long time, black protagonists in movies have defined themselves in relation to white society. Either they act in opposition to oppressive features of it, or they co-opt its conventions for themselves, and excel at them, to become "as good as" white people. For the Wakandans the expectations of European-descended culture are irrelevant. They built their unique civilization entirely on their own terms, and in doing so have achieved greatness, in some ways even exceeding the accomplishments of white-dominated Western society.

There are, arguably, better-made superhero films than Wonder Woman. But that movie wasn't just an entertainment, it was an event. It was a cultural touchstone that connected with much of its audience, particularly women, in ways no movie in its genre ever had before. Just from the responses I'm seeing from the people who have viewed Black Panther so far, I expect that to do the same for black audiences.
 
You're right that a movie only needs to be entertaining. But if it has a deeper impact than that, then it becomes an important movie. And not having that impact for everyone won't make it less important.

But the hype is so high, even if it does fall a little short, it'll still be great.

Chadwick Boseman and Ryan Coogler on How ‘Black Panther’ Makes History
http://variety.com/2018/film/features/black-panther-chadwick-boseman-ryan-coogler-interview-1202686402/amp/

I agree, I've enjoyed Ralph's progression to becoming a true hero.  I was wondering how they were going to handle the naming bit.
 
As to your running gag, I applied that to the naming of the PCs' team.  When the players dragged their feet on choosing a team name, an article appeared in their news sheet about an NPC hero team, the Virginia Alliance for Global Interdiction and National Assistance.  When one of the players said, "Seriously?!  They picked the name VAGINA?!" I responded, "No, they're a loose-knit collection of regional heroes who absolutely refused to give themselves a team name.  So the editor of the Hero.Net Herald finally just gave them one out of spite."
 
Before the next game session, the players had picked a team name.

Golden Age Champions
 
Zoltan the Magnificent: I didn't know there were rules to car bowling.

It is ironic that the leaders for best new supers game book are for the two oldest supers games still being published. Just goes to show that classic is classic for a reason.

As I understand it, Sentinel Comics: The Roleplaying Game Starter Kit From Greater Than Games is responsible for global climate change as well as Justin Bieber.  It curdles milk if placed in the same refrigerator, and has been known to make babies cry and dogs howl.  I believe it's the favored game of Kim Jong Un.
 
Whereas  Golden Age Champions cures cancer, provides cheap energy to third world nations, and causes spontaneous peace in the Middle East. 
 
I think the choice is clear.

We each started with one hero and we took turns GMing, but it wasn't very long before we each had several PCs.  It was up to whichever one of us GMed as to which PCs the other would run, depending on which one(s) the GM cooked up a scenario for.  So the GM's PCs would serve as that game's NPC heroes.
 
 
It's certainly more challenging with more players.  With just me and my friend, we grew up reading comics together so it was rare when one of us as GM could surprise the other with plot twists.  When I would plan the session it was pretty easy to predict how he would react to things.  With more players, the chances of somebody doing something completely out of left field increases exponentially, and as a GM I like that. 
 

After rewatching the Retro Encabulator recently, my technobabble threshold is reinforced.
 

Exactly. It wasn't that he was stupid. The GM was just a point miser, so Ralph's player did the best he could.
 

Someone else's guess, with colour.
 

Here's the quick-ref sheet I created for my players:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Y_iIChR6rzQTNhU0hwMl9zbE0
 
Here's my customized GM screen:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-Y_iIChR6rzMExxenZOWlVKYUE
 
 

I have a 20 EGO.

I've done it for my wife but usually, in other instances, more players will show up.  Its a very different feel I think.  More role playing goes on in a solo run as I can concentrate solely on a player and not worry the others aren't having fun.  Personally, I think its the same as the difference between a team comic and a solo comic.  Take Captain America or Batman as a solo comic versus him in a team comic.  You get more story telling about the character in the solo comic than you do in the team comic.

That's how I started with Champions, me and my best friend back in '82.  We played like that for a couple of years.  At one point we pulled my then-wife into it but she wasn't a comic book fan nor a gamer so she was terrible.
 
It works pretty well, we had a ton o' fun.  I actually miss it sometimes, I haven't run a group with fewer than four players since the early '90s.

Again, disagree. Textures, padding, geometric contours, placement of tech pieces like wrist bands and shoulder mounts for their backpacks, and especially the shape of their helmets, all look very similar to me, more than enough to suggest a common designer. Color differences don't negate all that IMO. But we clearly perceive this differently, so I won't try to convince you.

Speaking of the theme song... one of my favorite City of Heroes fan videos.
 

Who could ever replace Robert Culp's Bill Maxwell?

It hurts hearing Motley Crue or Guns and Roses on classic rock stations.  Not because it makes me feel old but because they're just... not to me.
 
I like both bands a lot.  I don't understand the hate that GNR's music gets (anger towards individual band members, though, I mostly get).  Motley Crue's Dr Feelgood was a great album for the genre and half its tracks are still on my main Spotify list.
 
Nothing either did, though, can hold a candle to anything the true giants of rock from the 70s did.  Again, that's not a knock against them - most of those giants of rock can't hold a candle to anything they did themselves in the 70s - but it's a feeling I can't shake. 
 
There are a few exceptions, of course - Rush being one - but to find that spirit of the prog rock / 'classic' rock you mostly had to wander to the edges of perception, like Oingo Boingo.
 
It's funny, though, that that's where my tastes turned.  I was born in 75 and 3/4 of the music I listen to now predates my going to kindergarten.  I grew up with the 'hard rock' and hair metal of the 80s and somehow tracked my way backwards (mostly through covers, I think).   And Who Made Who from AC/DC - one of the first albums I ever bought with an allowance.  I 'blame' some of the tracks you have to grow into (like Ride On) for broadening my horizons.
 
 

Only person I think would be interesting, if they did a good version of Wild Wild West, would be seeing Peter Dinklage play it.
one of my other annoyances was that I liked the casting of Smith and Kline. I wish if they had been played the parts  as trusted friends/allies like the original series instead of as rivals, would also have been much better. 

Michael Dunn was an amazing talent all round. The character of Doctor Loveless was literally built around him, and I can't imagine anyone else in the part.