Moe Lane's Blog, page 636
November 22, 2021
My mini-review of GHOSTBUSTERS: AFTERLIFE.
Short version: what a charming film.
Slightly longer version: The GHOSTBUSTERS franchise has always had a problem with its movie sequels. The first one was largely unnecessary, and the reboot was… contentious. But GHOSTBUSTERS: AFTERLIFE succeeds where the other two failed as an entertaining movie with fun stuff with it. It’s not exactly deep. In fact, it follows much of the plot of the first movie. But people were happy while making it, it shows, and…
[Spoilers! Barely]
…it takes full advantage of a genuine emotional resonance: Harold Ramis isn’t there. This movie can’t exist without that melancholy detail. The riddle of Egon Spengler – why he left, where he went, and why he died – informs the rest of the film, and gives it just a little more heft than you’d expect, going in. They handled it well. You should see this in theaters.
It Did Not Suck.
Moe Lane
#commissionearned
The COSMIC DAWN trailer.
COSMIC DAWN doesn’t look half bad. I originally had some comments about the likely budget, but I deleted them. I absolutely know what it’s like to have liquidity issues.
November 21, 2021
NaNoWriMo, Day 21: 1,690 / 44,520.
Got a little bit of a groove going.
Patreon!“Well, once I realized the diagnosis was botched, I went looking at the rest of the reports, to try to figure out what had caused it. And there was nothing. At least, nothing inconsistent with the false diagnosis.
“But I saw that Chook had actually printed out a copy of the patient informational summary you give with medical diagnoses. The full version of those usually don’t get kept, because they’re literally just definitions of terms and standard descriptions of procedures, but since there was a hard copy for once, I went to go find it.” Maki opened up her bag and pulled out some papers. “I can’t do the text injustice. Here, read it yourself.”
I started to read — and wished I hadn’t. As Maki said, informational summaries are just there to give you a nice, soothing data dump. We’ve had a century’s worth of desperate linguistic research to learn how to do that better, because it’s a damn scary universe out there and every insight on how to calm people down pays dividends in human lives later. Some cultures are good at war, or science, or art; ours is good at keeping people from losing their shit.
These words weren’t designed for that. They were designed for the opposite of that. The word choice, the slightly nonstandard font, even the punctuation and spacing — they matter. Behold the wonders of our modern age! Weaponized linguistic programming.
GHOSTBUSTERS: AFTERLIFE had an above-expectation opening.
Looking good for when I eventually see GHOSTBUSTERS: AFTERLIFE, although I don’t agree with the very last part here:
Ghostbusters: Afterlife earned a huge win in its first week of release, raking $44 million from 4,315 theaters (following a robust $4.5 million midnight showing), well above industry projections that expected the Jason Reitman comedy to kick off its run with around $30 million, according to Deadline. Considering the extremely positive audience reactions — 96% on RottenTomatoes and an A- CinemaScore — the long-awaited sequel looks like it will enjoy a nice run through the holidays (and hopefully pave the way for a sequel).
I don’t particularly want a sequel. I might actually change my mind when I do see it, but the thought of a sequel doesn’t thrill my soul. An interesting callback to the original will suffice.
Patreon Microfiction: The More Myths Change…
Note that, in “The More Myths Change…”, the narrator does not claim to like humans. It doesn’t. But it’s interested in maintaining cordial relations and a productive working arrangement with us, which is good enough as a long term strategy.
Patreon!Tweet of the Day, You Wanna See Something Messed Up, Man? edition.
Well, you’re gonna see it anyway. Blame @SonnyBunch.
Our local mall Christmas
— Creep Your Socks Off Podcast (@rocketfromthe) November 20, 2021nightmare is back after 15 years.
Woody The Talking Christmas Tree pic.twitter.com/oFlm8Z5tmK
November 20, 2021
If you’ve pre-ordered the Swords of the Serpentine RPG…
…the book is available in your Pelgrane Press bookshelf. Been looking forward to getting SWORDS OF THE SERPENTINE for a while: Kevin and Em are good folks. I was glad to help playtest it. And, as I recall, some of the people reading this were in on that…
Reddit tells me that if you preordered Swords of the Serpentine RPG by @multiplexer and myself, the final PDF is now live in your @PelgranePress bookshelf. It’s out, go see!
— Kevin Kulp (@KevinKulp) November 20, 2021
NaNoWriMo, Day 20: 1,550 / 42,830
Minor crises today, after all. But we prevail!
Patreon!How do you solve an insoluble problem? By figuring out what the rules are, and breaking them. Nice, and hard.
The solution in this case was obvious, once we got around to finding it. We had a living will from Chook, authorizing XHum to loot the body for medical emergencies. The only thing contradicting that was a notation in her file, that locked out any electronic authorization to release the body. So Greg just ordered Maki to pull the body from cryo-storage anyway. What was the computer going to do about it? Fire up the defense grid? It didn’t actually have one: we absolutely don’t give computer systems weapons. Why would we? There’s nobody out here except us.
Defrosting a corpsicle without damaging the cells further takes a little time, so Maki had time to go over things with us. “Sign here and here,” she said to us. “I just need two more senior staff to agree that we needed the body parts for emergency purposes.”
“Body parts?” I asked. “I thought you were just pulling the skin.”
“I was,” said Maki. “But it occurred to me that we might be able to use whatever organs didn’t get hit by the cancer yet. Cartilage and hair, for certain. Maybe even bone marrow, if it checks out. The original diagnosis said that the cancer had mostly gone into the lungs and brain, so I should be able to recycle some of the joints, if nothing else.”
Well, at least she was talking about the whole thing with a certain clinical detachment. You get wary around the doctors who get enthusiastic about looting corpses. It’s not the sort of hobby you want to encourage.
