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Category: TV

Legions of Things

It took what seemed like years to finish “Watch Dogs: Legion” and literal Years for me to sit down and finish “Legion” from Marvel Television and I didn’t plan it, but I finished them both the same night.

Watchdogs: Legion is the continuation of the series started with “Watchdogs”, continued in “Watchdogs 2: Silicon Valley Monsters!” and now “Watchdogs: Legion” and I think this latest edition might have finally figured out the formula for the games, and that is to not have a primary character.

“Watchdogs: Legion” is (like the previous games and pretty much every Ubisoft game) an open world with a bunch of stuff to do while following a main mission. The “twist” for WD:Legion is that you can recruit “anyone” to join your fight. Including “bad guys” which is really where the game play system shines, you recruit someone, do a couple missions (sadly repetitive ones) and they join your team. All you can customize is their clothes, and the clothes and “battle mask” (my name, but you put it on to fight so “battle mask”) The main plot takes FOREVER to get through, there were what seemed like over 100 plot missions to get through and who you embody (the operative) matters, so choose your team wisely! I had a blast in the game, but the writing was kind of weak for the main plot, I had it sussed out in the first cinematic so I spent the whole game waiting for what I saw coming in the first minutes of the game. Which is sad, but there are only so many plots in the world and when it looked like I was going to be wrong, I was intrigued, but the mystery the game does a masterful job setting up really doesn’t “matter” in the game, you had to seek it out and the payoff isn’t great storytelling, but it *is* good world building, I think they were going to go somewhere else and left in the bits. I’m tiptoeing around the plot details as i don’t want to spoil it for anyone. The game is good, I WANTED to finish it, so yeah.

LEGION (from Marvel TV) WAS great, but I think they had wanted to go in a direction and had to swap motivations around a bit to make drama and it all got very “Manson with Powers” and if I’m honest, they went all cosmic, they didn’t need to ground so much of it after that.

What I loved: Behind Blue eyes!
What I hated: Problematic Protagonist and a heel turn that wasn’t

The New BSG sucked, and you know it

After the new BSG (Battle Star Galactica) premiered all the hardcore Nerds I worked with proceeded to lather themselves up in a frenzy over how awesome it was.  I was passingly familiar with the “Original Flavor”  BSG from the 70s and the two things that were acceptable about that (three if you count Lorne Green)  where the Cyon Space Fighters (the toys were great) and the Bear-Dog-Cyborg Daggit.  I Confirmed it was called Daggit using IMDB which has actual editors and not Wikipedia because even I’ve altered the basic facts about a real person and they stayed in place for weeks.  No, I don’t think Strom Thurmon led the First Autogyro Kamikazi squad, but for a while there his Wiki said so [No it didn’t I’m not about to to own up to the actual edit I made, what would be the fun in that?] Anyway, I was familiar with the Magic Underwear angle on the original and decided to avoid the “new one” because I figured that it would end up being some form of Religious Propaganda. If I wanted to watch a show about people on the run from Robotic Religious Zealots, I’d just finish my 700-Club/Litellest Hobo mashup video.

I watched episodes here and there (I’m not so closed-minded that I wouldn’t give it a fair shake)  and felt fairly justified in my “Oh Gee it’s the God Bots versus the Sinner Fleshbags”  opinion.  With all the Greek allusions they at least tried to make it not all about the big Granite Temple, but in the end the new BSG was all about the Magic Underpants and while I was correct; I wish I hadn’t been.  Because when you take the eschatology out of it, the New BSG could have been an alright SF series; the actual actio sequences were fairly good and the Characters were at least, oh hell I can’t even lie that I liked it.  It was crap from top to bottom and filmed by an insane 8 year old with a machine and switched focus  fetish.

The Jumpy camera work and “fun the first time, but crappy forever” blurry and or shaky over the shoulder camera work were just the signature moves of the “we have no content” writers and producers of this show.

The thin characters, the Deus Ex Machina writing.  Why did anyone like this crap?   It came so highly recommended I can only posit that there was some form of addictive substance in the initial broadcasts, and like “Extra Tasty Crispy” formula, people were hooked.

You now what? I could really go for some KFC now.

Fringe Episode 18: Scarier than a Hunting Knife

Yes, that's some spine
Yes, that's some spine

After they went on an on about it being human teeth, wtf are those?
Hey Baby, I haven't even touched you yet!

I saw him twice this episode
I saw him twice this episode - The Witness

fringe118_thewitness2

The big scary this week was killing people by biting their spines open and sucking out their juices.  They made a big deal about the teeth being human:

Teeth: Not Human
Teeth: Not Human

Fringe: The Witness again

This week’s Fringe revolved around Hybrid monsters and NOT the Transporter Enhanced Monster I suspected.  Shoot

Anyway; The Witness was there again, popping up in the background during an “on the spot” news report:

thewitnessagain

thewitnessagain2

Fringe Episode 15: 80s, 90s and Whenever; We play all the Hits!

Fringe this week did little (overtly) to move the over-arching plot along. However, there was a bit of covert 80s and 90s action to check out!

heyitsprocter
This is Teddy from "One Crazy Summer" Matt Mulhern

It's Becky from "Rosanne" Not "Sarah Chalke" Becky though.
It's Becky from "Rosanne" Not "Sarah Chalk" Becky though.

Hey! Becky! Almost didn’t recognize her until she sneered; that sneer is going to be burned into my memory for years. OH HOW I HATED THIS BECKY!  When Sarah Chalk took over, I was a fan of Rosanne again; I will admit that Alicia Goranson was a better fit for the character, Canadian Sarah Chalk was too pleasant (which is why I preferred her over snarky scowlpuss here)

Anyway; this episode had two hairless freaks in it.  One is involved in the main plot. so I won’t spoil him here; but check out who appears for a few moments on screen again:

The Witness appears again
The Witness appears again

The Witness is here again to watch over the proceedings again; this time from the sidelines of the episode.

There was one clunker of a line in the episode when a character (Played by Erik Palladino of Law and Order) walks out and says to his cell phone “I’m at the hospital, we have another one”

He Worked on SVU before, That's where you recognize him from
He Wored on SVU before, That's where you recognize him from

WHAT HOSPITAL?  This is Boston right?  Aren’t there more that one?  Another What? That isn’t enough information for a phone that doesn’t contain a greeting or jargon.

Also; this happened:

Dr. Bishop Pops his Collar, gives himself a teddyboy curl and struts around to some soul music
Dr. Bishop Pops his Collar, gives himself a teddyboy curl and struts around to some soul music

Who is "The Witness"?

Look who showed up in the latest episode of Fringe:

The Witness

Who is this guy?  He appears to be some sort of Time Traveller, hairless and damaged.  He shows up to witness things related to the Pattern, but he didn’t cause this.  He just witnessed it.

Fringe is intriguing without being maddening (like Lost)