Chris Hardwick's Blog, page 1932
October 16, 2017
Want to Study Music in Paris with Grammy Winner Chilly Gonzales? You Can!
Chilly Gonzales is looking for musicians. Six to be exact. The Grammy-winning composer and entertainer has opened The Gonzervatory and is looking for anyone who writes and performs their own music (rappers, pianists, tuba players, whatever) to join him for eight days in Paris discussing musical theory and what it means to be a modern musician. The lucky six participants will enjoy one-on-one coaching with Gonzales in the mornings, special guest Masterclasses in the afternoon, rehearsals with their peers, and a big concert finish at the famous Le Trianon in Montmartre.
Very, very cool. That announcement video is a symphony of wacky nonsense and raw artistic energy (as well as a sly way of highlighting his Grammy). If only the hawk played the triangle.
Gonzales has worked with musicians from Daft Punk to Drake, but to get a real sense of who he is as a performer, you should check out his “From Major to Minor,” where he describes his musical education while explaining the psychological differences between songs in the major and minor keys (and, of course, playing popular songs like “Happy Birthday” in swapped keys).
Those chosen for the program will live together in a loft in Paris while they work and, according to the official call for entries, “the experience, with all its inevitable struggles and triumphs, will be documented and shared with viewers all over the world. Livestreams of both of the concerts, daily video debriefs, as well as an online fanzine of photos, illustrations and essay pieces, will allow audiences to witness personal exchanges in real time and develop an emotional investment in the participants’ musical progress.”
Applications for the internship close Friday, December 1st 2017 at 11:59pm London Time (GMT), so get crackin’.
Featured Image: Philipp Jedicke
Mankind Beware! David from PROMETHEUS Married Ava from EX MACHINA
Under normal circumstances we wouldn’t bring you news of a Hollywood wedding, but when it involves two people who have played highly intelligent, conniving robots on the big screen, we have a responsibility to warn the masses. Because who knows what horrible fate awaits mankind after David from Prometheus married Ava from Ex Machina.
The UK’s Metro reports that this past weekend, Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander got married off the coast of Spain in Ibiza. Good for them…but is it good for the rest of us? It’s not that we’re upset two of our favorite robot performers got hitched after three years together, or that they’re yet another impossibly attractive celebrity couple, it’s that we are wary of two of the most sinister androids in recent cinematic history coming together.
Ex Machina was one of our favorite sci-fi horror movies ever, with Vikander’s Ava totally beguiling us before we realized how dangerous she was to human existence. And despite the mixed receptions to the Alien prequels, no one denies just how alluring and terrifying Fassbender’s David really is.
So what kind of evil could the two of them accomplish together? Seduce us to do their evil bidding? Turn us into incubators for monsters? Finally achieve singularity and unite the rest of the world’s machines to go to war with us, leading to the inevitable Matrix-situation we all know is coming?
Or could it be far worse than that? Could it be something to terrible to imagine? Might they teach us how to play the flute in a painfully awkward way?
God help us all.
So congratulations to the happy couple, we hope you have a long life together full of joy and happiness. But we’ll be watching.
We’ll be watching.
Which two robots would make for the most dangerous couple ever? Give us your most devilish android pairing in the comments below.
Need More Bot Stuff?
Look at this dancing robot army!
Sex robots could be hacked in order to kill their owners…gulp.
And finally, this robotic suitcase reminds us of BB-8.
Featured Image: 20th Century Fox, Universal Pictures
October 15, 2017
First LAZER TEAM 2 Trailer Sends the Team Across the Galaxy
Last year, Rooster Teeth introduced fans to Lazer Team, a quartet of unexpected and unlikely heroes who each possessed a piece of an alien battle suit intended for Earth’s champion. Against all odds and kind of by accident, they managed to save the world. But next month, they’ll have to save one of their own. Rooster Teeth has released the first trailer for Lazer Team 2, which sets up the team’s intergalactic rescue mission.
The sequel apparently begins some time after Lazer Team disbanded. Woody Johnson (Gavin Free) formed a partnership with a scientist named Maggie Wittington (Nichole Bloom), but he was seemingly kidnapped by an alien through a wormhole. In the trailer, Maggie recruits the rest of the team to go save their friend, but Zach Spencer (Michael Jones) seems to have have trouble grasping the stakes of the situation. Honestly, that’s pretty much who he is.
Burnie Burns and Colton Dunn are also reprising their roles as Anthony Hagan and Herman Mendoza, respectively. The trailer suggests Maggie will essentially fill the leadership void on this team, and it also makes a recurring gag about Zach’s inability to realize that they aren’t going on a time travel adventure. So far, there are no hints about what’s waiting for them on the other side of the wormhole. But I suspect that Woody won’t be sidelined for the duration of the story.
Lazer Team 2 is getting a limited release in theaters on November 13, before officially rolling out on YouTube Red on November 22.
What did you think about the first trailer for Lazer Team 2? Take aim and fire in the comment section below!
Images: Rooster Teeth/YouTube Red
Read more about movies!
Deadpool 2 wrap photos have a great Golden Girls Easter egg.
A review of Goodbye Christopher Robin .
The first trailer for The New Mutants .
Fall Asleep on Handmade Book Pillows While Reading
I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve fallen asleep while reading. Thanks to Brassington Hollow, I could have a plush, pillow version of a book under my head to balance the sting of dropping an actual book on my face. The owner of the shop, Shanon Smith, turns book covers into hand-sewn pieces of art with cotton fabric and foam stuffing. The handmade items came to our attention via Geeky Merch, and I love the idea of literally cuddling with my favorite literary titles–titles like Neil Gaiman’s American Gods.
Each book has a fabric cover that you can open to read the first page. The inside cover usually has quote from the book. Smith’s made book pillows from multiple genres, including works from the likes of everyone from Jane Austen to J.K. Rowling. For example, if you like trekking through Middle-earth, Smith has crafted the Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit pillows. The fellowship that volunteered to accompany Frodo to Mordor would have loved to get their hands on something this soft and lush for the long journey.
Scroll down to see more photos of Brassington Hollow’s creations, and then go visit the shop on Etsy to look through the available book pillow options. They have some titles ready to ship, and they take custom orders if you don’t see the story you want. Could you imagine covering your sofa in all the Harry Potter books? Accio comfort!
Which of these book pillows catches your fancy? Would you actually sleep on them? Flip the page and head to the comments to let me know.
Images: Shanon Smith/Brassington Hollow
Amy Ratcliffe is an Associate Editor for Nerdist. Follow her on Twitter and keep up with her Disney food adventures on Instagram.
Read more stories about books!
The Die Hard Christmas book.
Invest time in the Hamilton archives.
An illustrated release of Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere.
Halloween Makeup Project Brings Mythical Creatures to Life
For some people, Halloween is on October 31st and only October 31st. But for a whole lot of other more imaginatively inclined folks out there, Halloween begins when the calendar turns from September to October. We certainly feel that way here at Nerdist; it’s why we celebrate Nerdoween all month long.
Now, thanks to Mashable, we’ve learned that one of those people is Loreli Baroldy, who has chosen to transform herself into various creatures every single day for the entire month of October. Because why celebrate Halloween on one day when you can do it for 30? According to Baroldy, “I pick the creature the day of. Usually right as I’m pulling out my makeup. I’ll use photos from online of the creatures as references.”
Baroldy has been sharing her photos each day via her Facebook and Instagram pages. Interestingly, Baroldy isn’t a makeup artist by trade at all. In fact, she’s a pastry chef, but after taking a course on the subject in college, she became an amateur makeup artist just for the fun of it. Back in 2013, she did a series of photos with makeup based on classic Disney villains.
As mentioned, the theme for this year is mythical creatures. Thirteen days in, Baroldy has been a mermaid, a minotaur, and even the legendary Medusa. You can view select images from her special Halloween project down below; to see the rest of her makeup creations this month, be sure to stop by her social media pages each day.
A post shared by Loreli Baroldy (@fallenlore) on Oct 10, 2017 at 10:27pm PDT
Owners of Walter White’s Home Build a Wall to Keep BREAKING BAD Fans Away
Breaking Bad was famously shot and set in Albuquerque thanks to the financial incentives offered by the state of New Mexico. That proved to be a boon to the show on a creative level, and while the series was airing, it created an increase in tourism as well. However, the lingering effects of the show’s popularity have finally caused the family that really owns Walter White‘s home to construct a six-foot wall to keep out overzealous fans.
Via Geekologie, Albuquerque’s Channel 4 KOB spoke with Joanne Quintana, the daughter of the home’s owner, as she related the numerous reasons why the family decided to erect the wall. In addition to strangers constantly taking photos of the home, Breaking Bad fans have stolen rocks from the garden, vandalized the property, treated the residents with great disrespect, and perhaps most egregiously, they kept throwing pizzas on the roof of the house, just as Walter White once did during the series.
To be clear, I understand why the fans are so interested in taking the pilgrimage to Albuquerque in order to see the locations behind their favorite show. And the idea of taking a picture in front of Walt’s house does have some appeal. But it sounds like some people have forgotten that the owners of the home deserve their privacy and respect. Building a wall may be an extreme solution for some, but I don’t blame the owners at all.
How do you feel about the new wall surrounding the Breaking Bad home? Share your thoughts in the comment section below!
Images: AMC/Sony Pictures TV
Want more Breaking Bad stories?
PlayStation 4’s Breaking Bad VR experience.
A fan edit that turns Breaking Bad into a two hour movie.
A realistic bust of Bryan Cranston.
Let This Creepy Bug Puppet with a Human Face Dance Into Your Life
One of the best things about October–other than buying copious amounts of candy at a discount once the month is over–is the fact that all sorts of things hit the internet in order to celebrate the Halloween season. We here at Nerdist sort of have a thing for this time of year and are constantly on the lookout for anything that can help us celebrate our own bit of seasonal spooky goodness, Nerdoween. As luck would have it, a certain YouTuber has given us something to love around Halloween for two years in a row.
Now, taking an Al Jolson song and performing it in a manner that would suit any musical number in a Tim Burton film is one thing. Doing so on a tiny screen attached to an incredibly lifelike hand puppet? That’s a whole other creepy ballgame. YouTuber Barnaby Dixon has been bringing his puppetry to the masses for a while now, and he improves with each video. His talents are truly an art form, and he deserves a huge audience–especially since he seems to bring something new to each performance.
Should the eerie melody of a song that goes back to 1880 be too much for you, Dixon’s also created music with his puppets that’s more suitable for 2017.
We just can’t get enough of Dixon’s perfect proficiency in puppet performance art and can’t wait to see what he comes up with next.
What do you think of these videos? Do you like them better than the one from last year? Let’s discuss in the comments below!
Image: Barnaby Dixon
Get scared with more Nerdoween stories!
Snack on the return of Reptar Bars.
Meet a snot monster.
Watch these Halloween movies on streaming.
Welcome to Nerdoween! Throughout the month of October, we’ll be celebrating everything spooky, macabre, and just plain weird. Nerdoween 2017 is presented by Alpha, our interactive membership service, which offers you exclusive content from Nerdist and Geek & Sundry, as well as a 10% discount on all of our merch.
Real Hogwarts Express Rescues a Stranded Family
The Hogwarts Express is as magical in real life as it is in fiction. The train known for ferrying students to and from the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in the Harry Potter books and films recently took a heroic turn. The steam train known as the Jacobite was used as the Hogwarts Express in all the movies, and it still runs on a regular service around the Scottish Highlands. We learned via BBC that the conductor of the locomotive recently made an unscheduled stop to help a stranded family.
When the Cluett family’s canoe was washed away by a rising river, they weren’t left with many options for getting back to their car from the remote bothy, a small hut like structure, they were staying at. It would have been a three mile walk back to the vehicle across unsteady, boggy territory–not ideal for the husband, wife, and four children. Their canoe was the easiest way to traverse the terrain.
Without the canoe on hand, Jon Cluett called the local police and mountain rescue to see if they had any other suggestions on how to easily get to their car. The police’s unique solution was to contact the Jacobite train because it passed within about 0.2 miles of the Cluetts’ location. They arranged for the train to make a special stop, and the family barely had time to gather their belongings before the Jacobite, a.k.a. the Hogwarts Express, arrived to pick them up and take them to the next stop. Aww! Magic to the rescue!
Have you been on any form of the Hogwarts Express–the real one or the one at Wizarding World in Universal? Use Floo powder to travel to the comments and let me know.
Images: Amy Ratcliffe/Warner Bros.
Amy Ratcliffe is an Associate Editor for Nerdist. Follow her on Twitter and keep up with her Disney food adventures on Instagram.
Swish and flick for more Harry Potter stories!
Snack on butterbeer donuts.
Meet a pup that only responds to Harry Potter spells.
Get sorted with a Harry Potter bath bomb.
Is STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI’s Luke Friend or Foe?
Rian Johnson’s hilariously honest declaration that Luke Skywalker is definitively the last Jedi got us thinking. Maybe there’s a reason he has to be the last of his kind. Let’s be real—the Jedi are hardly Star Wars‘ most perfect organization. Though they’re undoubtedly better than the Sith, they still essentially raise child armies who often die in battle or are murdered by their unstable mentors (#RIPYounglings). Has Luke finally realized that the imperfect era of the Jedi must truly end once and for all? And what ramifications could this have on Episode VIII and the last Jedi himself? Has Luke followed in his father’s footsteps and turned to the dark side… for good?
After Kylo Ren betrayed Luke, we know that ol’ man Skywalker went rogue, ending up on Ahch-To, the home of the first Jedi Temple. But what led him there and what happened to him along the way? During Rey‘s first Force experience in the basement of Maz Kanata’s castle, she saw Luke kneeling before R2-D2. When he put his robot hand onto his faithful droid, Artoo’s blue light turned red… the color of the Sith. In the new trailer for The Last Jedi, we see the same shot but from a different angle. It seems to occur at the same time that the Knights of Ren are devastating an unseen setting. Surely these two things must be connected. Could it be that Luke was inadvertently involved in the founding of the Knights of Ren after using both the dark side and the light to train his most powerful student, Kylo?
This wouldn’t be the first time that the Jedi have turned to studying the dark side in an attempt to master the Force. We’ve talked about the gray Jedi before–Jedi who embrace both sides of the Force–and in this context it’s important to look at their history. The term is an ancient one that refers to Force users outside of either Jedi or Sith disciplines or users who try to use both methods. Even Obi-Wan Kenobi‘s Jedi master, Qui-Gon Jinn, was considered a bit of a rogue due to his regular disagreements with the Jedi Council. So, Luke will likely have discovered the fact that there were curious Jedi before him and could easily have taken their lead.
Leia and Han let us know that Luke had been gone for a very long time, and as far as we know, that time was largely spent alone. Living such a solitary life could have easily driven Luke to the edge, especially living with the grief of losing his student and whatever chaos the Knights of Ren unleashed on Luke and his young charges. In the words of Yoda, we know: “Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” We also saw in the new trailer that Luke regrets not being more afraid of the raw power that he saw before he vanished, so perhaps that fear ate at him and led to him turning away from the light.
We need to go no further back than Luke’s own father to see the damage that fear can do to a lost Jedi. For those who haven’t seen the prequels or read the books/comics/internet, let us fill you in. Luke and Leia’s father Anakin was drawn to the dark side by Senator Palpatine, who used Anakin’s fear of losing his secret wife Padmé to take advantage of the young Jedi’s immense power. Anakin became a living incarnation of Yoda’s famous words and ended up actually causing the very death that scared him so much. Could it be that Luke followed the path of his father and gave in to his fear of the boy who betrayed him?
This seems like a stretch, but we know this new trilogy isn’t afraid of hurting fan faves (#RIPHan). So if, as we fear, Luke has turned to the dark side, what could that mean for Rey? Might Luke’s desperation for the Jedi to end possibly drive her into the proverbial arms of Kylo or Snoke? Rey is driven by a need to belong and if Luke rejects her, or worse tries to harm her, might it be the catalyst she needs to find her family somewhere other than in the light of the Resistance?
If this were the case, then Rey wouldn’t be the first Padawan who strayed towards the dark side due to their mentor. Luke’s own master, Yoda, had a young charge decades before who became one of the most powerful Sith in the galaxy due to their constant clashes. Count Dooku turned to the dark side after becoming disillusioned with the Jedi order and his master. Though we doubt Rey will fully go dark, it would follow a tried and tested Star Wars pattern if she at least strayed from her path due to her master’s reluctance to help her.
Controversial as it may be, we’re putting it out there: it might be good for Luke to turn away from the Jedi. What have they really given him? A master who lied to him constantly, a father figure who did the same, a robotic arm where his hand used to be, and probably some PTSD. Maybe Luke’s path has changed. That could be good not only for him but for Rey too. In the Star Wars universe things are constantly fluctuating, and maybe it’s time for the binary ideas of Jedi and Sith to die. Who better to usher in this new era than the (ex) Chosen One himself?
Are you affronted that we could suggest Lucas’ golden boy might have gone rogue? Had a bad feeling about Luke from the beginning? Let us know in the comments!
Images: Disney, Lucasfilm
Read more about Luke Skywalker
What the middle chapters of Star Wars tell us about The Last Jedi.
Yoda wanted to train Leia, not Luke.
Luke’s new dark look.
Watch as 20,000 Dominoes Topple Over to Display Mobile Games
Nothing is more fun than being handed a set of dominoes and using one’s imagination to stack them in any number of scenarios. The best part is knocking them over and watching them tumble into one another. Right up there on the fun-scale for kids in the technological age is playing mobile games on an Apple or Android device.
Laughing Squid found the perfect mash-up of dominoes and mobile games, courtesy of the creative minds behind Austrian Domino Art. The group’s gaming app series took 20,000 dominoes and set them up in a display to mirror popular mobile games like Super Mario Run and Pokémon Go.
It’s hard to imagine the level of detail and hours required to assemble such an impressive display. There’s also the little fact of needing a steady hand to prop up each domino side-by-side, without knocking them all over. My hand’s shaking just thinking about it! This doesn’t even account for the possibility of the dominoes falling in the wrong way and having to start from scratch.
Other mobile games to be featured with Super Mario Run and Pokémon Go are 4 Pics 1 Word, 2048, The Impossible Game, and Jetpack Joyride. Each display is unique. Along with needing multi-colored dominoes, props like a Pokéball, scorecards, containers, sparklers, and matches are used to complete each arrangement.
If you can’t get enough of dominoes as game apps, watch the first time Austrian Domino Art tackled them in 2014.
How impressed are you with these domino displays? If you feel a sense of nostalgia after watching the video and decide to give these gaming apps a spin, let us know in the comments below.
Image: Austrian Domino Art
Watch more dominoes fall!
A Pikachu-focused domino display.
Rick and Morty in over 18,000 dominoes.
Mesmerizing, color-changing dominoes.
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