Chris Hardwick's Blog, page 2014

Find These Crocheted Superheroes Hidden Throughout SDCC

San Diego Comic-Con International is nearly upon us, and if you are among the lucky 130,000 people who gets to attend the event, there might be a fun little surprise in store for you, if you know where to look.

Thanks to the folks at Bored Panda, we learned about an artist who goes by the name of “Geeky Hooker,” (“Not THAT kind of hooker, the kind armed with a crochet hook” according to her Twitter) who for the past six years has been making crocheted little superheroes to scatter around San Diego Comic-Con for lucky nerds to find.

Geeky Hooker then tags them with her contact info and crosses her fingers in hopes that they’ll go to some good, geeky homes. Here’s her explanation as to how and why she started doing this little project:

“The whole idea came from a perfect storm of events six years ago. In 2011 I had taught myself to crochet out of sheer boredom and was still learning, I was gearing up to go to San Diego Comic-Con for the first time, and I had first heard about Catlanta, an artist based in Atlanta who leaves little cat magnets behind for people to find. Throw that all into a blender and now I had a bunch of lumpy little superheroes that I didn’t plan on keeping because they were just practice runs, a ticket to the biggest geek event on earth, and an idea from an artist in Atlanta. Everything came together pretty nicely from there!”

Among Geeky Hooker’s creations for 2017, we’ve got none other than the summer’s biggest superhero Wonder Woman, along with Doctor Strange, Deadpool (with a little unicorn friend), classic Silver Age Batman and the Penguin, Superman, and from Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol.2, Yondu as Mary Poppins y’all!

How perfect is that? You can see images of each of the little guys down below in our gallery, and for more images, be sure to head over to Geeky Hooker’s blog by clicking here, and be sure to check out her book Literary Yarns.

Are you Comic-Con attendees going to keep an eye out for these adorable little guys? Be sure to let us know down below in the comments.

Images: Geeky Hooker

Ed Sheeran’s GAME OF THRONES Cameo May Mean More Than You Thought!

There’s nothing we love more than when a popular musician drops by Game of Thrones for a cameo. Remember when Coldplay’s Will Champion dropped by for the Red Wedding? Nobody complained about that! But poor Ed Sheeran got the brunt of the internet’s fury for his  appearance on last night’s season premiere. Why, it’s almost as if some fans saw fire! But don’t worry GoT fans, good Ser Ed probably won’t be around for too long…and yet he may leave an unexpected impression on Arya. Today’s Nerdist News is going to tell you why Sheeran’s cameo has potentially huge implications for the future of the show!

There are potential spoilers ahead! As in the kind that you probably don’t want to know regarding the fate of a major character. You have one last chance to remain Unsullied. Consider yourselves warned!

Join host, and the Lord of Light’s favorite singer, Jessica Chobot, as she explains the significance of the song, “Hands of Gold,” which should immediately make you think of this guy.

That song originally appeared in the novels as a very creative way to blackmail Tyrion Lannister about his relationship with Shae. And in a twist, Tyrion actually repeated the lyrics while strangling the life out of Shae in his father’s bed. Why would the producers of GoT bring up the song now? For starters, the song’s soothing tones kept Arya from slaughtering the Lannister soldiers long enough to discover that they were simply normal men who longed for their families, unlike the brutes that she has previously encountered.

The song also serves as a bit of foreshadowing for Cersei’s fate. We’ve long suspected that Jaime will once again have to commit regicide to prevent his sister/lover from unleashing more death upon King’s Landing. That golden hand may have to take the life of the woman that he loves, as prophesied years ago. He is technically Cersei’s younger brother (by seconds) and could very well become the Queenslayer. Although we suspect that Jaime would rather kill himself than go on living without Cersei. Whatever happens between those two, it’s gonna be dark.

What do you think about the implications of “Hands of Gold?” Sing us a song in the comment section below!

 

James Cameron to Be Immortalized as an ALIENS Action Figure

He may be the self-dubbed King of the World, the director of multiple movies that were the highest-grossing of all time in their day, and the mind behind an entire dedicated area of theme park in Florida, but there’s one thing James Cameron has never had until today: a toy of himself.

NECA—who are so determined to keep their lucrative Aliens toy license going that they even announced a Paul Reiser action figure recently—have given the film’s director a promotion: he’s now a Colonel in the Colonial Marines, making him the highest-ranking officer in the movie universe.

You might notice the Canadian flag patch on his shoulder—his outfit also includes the Lightstorm Entertainment logo and a patch for planet Pandora, which, for continuity nerds, doesn’t necessarily mean the Avatar and Alien filmed universes intersect…but they can in your toy box (if we ever get 7-inch scale Avatar figures). In addition to being armed for battle, however, he’s also ready to direct, coming with a viewfinder and a clapboard.

Cameron still has a ways to go before he beats Quentin Tarantino in sheer NECA figure quantity: they’ve done versions of him for Kill Bill, Reservoir Dogs, and The Hateful 8. But the company does have Terminator rights still, so…could we get a cyborg Cameron?

James Cameron will be available as a Toys R Us exclusive in the U.S. for $22.99, or you can preorder him online at the NECA Store from orbit; only way to be sure! We see you, James.

Is your collection ready for a character this titanic? Will he lay waste to your collection and render it an abyss? Or are these questions just true lies? Let us know in comments.

Images: NECA

Elvira, Mistress of the Dark Returns to Comics

You can’t keep the Mistress of the Dark down forever. Just over a decade ago, Elvira‘s ongoing comic book series came to an end, but ahead of Comic-Con International, Dynamite has revealed that Elvira is getting a comic book comeback, along with trading cards, posters, and other collectibles.

Cassandra Peterson debuted her Elvira persona all the way back in 1981, for her syndicated program, Elvira’s Movie Macabre. From there, Elvira took off and became a cultural phenomenon that includes two live-action feature films, numerous TV appearances, action figures, pinball machines, and of course, comic books. In 1986, Elvira was incorporated into DC’s House of Mystery; which became Elvira’s House of Mystery for 11 issues. In 1993, Claypool Comics subsequently published an ongoing Elvira series that ran for 166 issues.

The Claypool comics are actually the perfect road map for Dynamite to use in the new series. The stories in those comics recaptured the spirit of Elvira’s TV shows while putting the title character through her own misadventures. One of the reasons that series lasted so long is that Elvira is a pretty adaptable character and she fits in almost any setting.

Naturally, it would make sense for Elvira to finally team up with Vampirella, now that they share the same publisher. But it would also be a blast to see Elvira meet Ash Williams from Dynamite’s Army of Darkness comics. There’s a lot of fun potential, but first Dynamite has to set up the creative team for their first Elvira project. There’s no word yet on who might take on the Mistress of the Dark’s new adventures, but we’re eager to see them unfold in the comic book realm!

Are you excited to see Elvira make a comic book comeback? Share your screams in the comment section below!

Images: Queen “B” Productions/Dynamite Entertainment

Here’s the HAMILTON/GAME OF THRONES Mash-Up We All Knew Was Coming

We’ve just begun the penultimate season of Game of Thrones, and while we’re all scrambling to figure out who will ultimately win their place on the Iron Throne, the internet has given us a gift to please the old gods and the new: a stellar Hamilton/Game of Thrones mashup.

This music video from Jason Feifer took on a pretty hefty task, rewiting Hamilton’s opening number—”Alexander Hamilton”—and focusing the lyrics on our favorite know-nothing, Jon Snow and the mother of dragons herself, Daenerys Targaryen. That’s a hard job for any writer, but Feifer managed to make a fun and pretty clever mashup. Take a peek for yourself (but be warned if you’re very behind, there are some spoilers)!

Can we just take a moment to appreciate how impressive this mashup is? It perfectly captures the show and that determined, tough, building-something-from-nothing spirit we’ve seen in Jon Snow, Daenerys Targaryen, and Alexander Hamilton himself. Plus, if you weren’t rooting for Daenerys Targaryen to win the Iron Throne (despite the occasional, startling resemblance she has to her father, The Mad King), this video has got to get you excited about her, right? It also reminds me that, after all this time, I’m still not over Khal Drogo’s death…

Sadness aside, this isn’t the first time the internet has paired Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Broadway smash with unlikely pop culture partners (like this Star Wars/Hamilton mash-up or this Batman/Hamilton mash-up). In fact, this isn’t even the first time the internet has joined Alexander Hamilton with his Westerosi pals. If you’ll remember, back in 2016, Miranda himself started the #HamOfThrones hashtag on Twitter, pairing lines from the musical with GIFs from Game of Thrones. But this mashup takes everything to another level, and we are HERE. FOR. IT.

Give it another watch, and tell us your favorite part in the comments!

Feature Image: HBO

SUPER DARK TIMES is a Pre-Internet Thriller with a Teenage Heart (Fantasia Review)

If you give a machine the right fuel, it’ll run smooth as you need it to. If you pour, say, sour milk into your car’s tank, bad things are gonna happen. Super Dark Times is an exploration of what happens when you add the wrong fuel.

The debut feature from director Kevin Phillips starts at Linklater and evolves into Saulnier, introducing us first to best friends hanging out, shooting the shit about teenage conversation classics like which of their high school classmates they most want to have sex with while staticky VHS porn tries futilely to clear up on a TV screen. Josh (Charlie Tahan) is shaggy-haired, long-fingered and over-confident in his virginity. Zach (Owen Campbell) feels weird about vocalizing crass sexual desire for Allison (Elizabeth Cappucino) because they hang out sometimes. She’s real to him. A fantasy to Josh.

Their love for one another is genuine and sweet, and their conflicting status on the median between Forever Alone and the cool kids table bubbles underneath the surface. It’s no surprise that there are bullies, or that they kill time with a classmate they hate (the Farva-esque Daryl, played by Max Talisman) and a hanger-on eighth grader (Charlie, played by Sawyer Barth). No surprise they ride their bikes everywhere, including an isolated forest, where they slice milk cartons in half with Josh’s older brother’s samurai sword.

It’s a good time, until Daryl picks a fight, and the samurai sword accidentally gets lodged in his throat. In an age before AIM (read: way, way before Facebook), the kids panic, and leave Daryl’s body under a pile of leaves and the sword down an animal hole.

This is the sour milk in their teenage engines.

The meat of the film allows us to stalk Josh and Zach as they spiral out from trauma and guilt. Each deals with it in a different, despairing way, augmented by all the normal teenage nonsense that these almost-nerds struggle to navigate on a good day. As it progresses, Super Dark Times adds weights to already-strained systems, injuring their relationship to each other and threatening all others. In that time, Josh turns to his mother Karen (Amy Hargreaves), who is, like Hargreaves’ character in 13 Reasons Why, a concerned, thoughtful, ultimately powerless parent.

The tension and danger of destruction offers an engaging counterpoint to the early sequences of carefree, youthful immortality. High school problems seem life or death until you get the latter up close. Tahan (who plays the young Scarecrow on Gotham) and Campbell shoulder the tension of the film with skill beyond their years. Both ground the film in a naturalistic realism so much so that I would be surprised to find out they weren’t friends in real life. Their nuance and intensity also elevates a taut script (from Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski) intent on damaging their characters in different ways. Just as he decides to cover up an accidental death, Zach opens his eyes to budding young interest from Allison. Cappucino is also a sharp, capable actor who makes Allison a fuller character than the script does. She’s sweet and thankfully not demure in the way a lot of YA makes its young women, and Cappucino adds layers to the girl closest to the edge of the storm. Meanwhile, Josh discovers a confidence and power he didn’t know he possessed.

The film stumbles a bit toward the end with character actions that strain belief just enough to stick out and a shaky balance on where the focus of the story moves. The early promise of the movie shifts into routine thriller territory, which is a shame. The exploration of teenage life under the pressure of an impossible secret is more interesting than where that angst takes them. The climax is unfortunately muddled and jumpy, even a bit confusing. And the credits roll before a handful of threads get tied.

Still, Super Dark Times is a worthy eye on adolescent trauma, loneliness, and envy. There’s also an undercurrent theme of sexuality–displayed in the opening scene, in Zach’s disturbed dreams, and more–that deserves its own, longer exploration.

Because of the nostalgia bomb of answering machines and the bike-peddling foursome, comparisons to Stranger Things will fly, but I like to think of it more as Stand By Me where the kids provide their own body.

The bottom line? Super Dark Times is a worthy, tightly realized thriller of young lives that’s better when it’s thinking deeply than when it builds with stock blueprints.

It should hit theaters sometime this year.

3.5 out of 5 leaf-covered burritos

Image: Higher Content

Flyover of Pluto Shows Beautiful Details of Our Favorite Former Planet

Pluto may not technically be a planet anymore (unless you’re in New Mexico at just the right time), but that doesn’t mean it’s not one of the most beloved objects in our solar system; in fact, losing its planet status probably made Pluto even more lovable. Maybe that’s part of what makes this new Pluto flyover video from NASA so lovely.

To be clear, this isn’t actual video that was recorded in real-time; rather, it was compiled using New Horizons many photos of the dwarf planet and digital elevation models. “Why not just create actual video from New Horizons’ photos,” you might be asking. Combing photos and elevation data together gives us a much closer look at what the surface actually looks like.

The clip’s description lays out where the journey takes us:

“This dramatic Pluto flyover begins over the highlands to the southwest of the great expanse of nitrogen ice plain informally named Sputnik Planitia. The viewer first passes over the western margin of Sputnik, where it borders the dark, cratered terrain of Cthulhu Macula, with the blocky mountain ranges located within the plains seen on the right. The tour moves north past the rugged and fractured highlands of Voyager Terra and then turns southward over Pioneer Terra — which exhibits deep and wide pits — before concluding over the bladed terrain of Tartarus Dorsa in the far east of the encounter hemisphere.”

Watch the video above, and if you’re into that, you may as well check out these recent flyby photos of Jupiter, too.

Featured image: NASA

ROBOTECH Movie Lands IT Director Andy Muschietti

It’s taken a long time for Sony’s live action Robotech movie to take flight on the big screen. Last we heard, the classic ’80s anime franchise was close to landing director James Wan, but now Robotech has a new man behind the camera: Andy Muschietti, the director of the highly anticipated It reboot. The Hollywood Reporter broke the story about Muschietti’s deal to direct and develop Robotech for the big screen. A screenwriter hasn’t been selected yet. Muschietti previously directed the horror film Mama and he is slated to helm the pilot episode of Locke & Key for Hulu.

When it first debuted in 1985, Robotech was actually a compilation of the three different anime series: Super Dimension Fortress Macross, Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross, and Genesis Climber Mospeada. Because each series was stylistically similar, Harmony Gold, the distributor that brought it to America, was able to create a narrative that linked the three previously unconnected shows. Essentially, the storyline begins when the technology for giant robots was reverse engineered from a crashed spaceship before the militaristic alien race known as the Zentraedi invaded. The second generation dealt with the Robotech Masters’ attempt to reclaim their tech, and the third generation chronicled the Invid invasion.

By far, the most popular era of Robotech is the first generation, which used Macross as its jumping off point. Rick Hunter, Lisa Hayes, Lynn Minmay, and the rest of the characters from that storyline are still the best known, and the SDF-1 Macross was an iconic transforming spacecraft that could put even the Transformers to shame.

In many ways, Robotech is tailor-made to become a series of feature films, assuming the audience comes out to see the first one. If the first movie is good (but hopefully great), we could potentially see several adventures with that group of characters before the timeline advances to the next generation. Hopefully Muschietti will also value clarity of action over CGI spectacle. It would be nice to actually see these mechs on the big screen without going in the direction that the Transformers went in.

There’s currently no date for Robotech to begin production, but we will be eagerly watching as this develops.

Are you excited to see Robotech on the big screen? Let us know in the comment section below!

Images: Harmony Gold/Titan Comics

The best anime for beginners

GAME OF THRONES Season 7 Premiere Recap: Ass, Sass, and Dragonglass

Hello, fair citizens of the Realm! It’s that time of year again—the most wonderful of them all— Game of Thrones  season. And, in addition to winter: spoilers are coming! (And maybe a few swears, too. Woops!) As this is a recap, it goes over everything in crazy detail, so proceed at your own risk and don’t say we didn’t warn you!

After over a year of waiting, at last the battle for Westerosi dominance has returned: welcome back to the Throne Zone, y’all! Gosh, it’s been so long we’ve pretty much forgotten HOW to recap, but we’ll do our best. Mostly we’re just so gosh-dang excited that winter is here and we get to witness it at long last! Y’ALL THE END IS NIGH!

Overall, the night focused on one major theme: everybody has a part to play in the wars to come—and they’re all gearing up. That, surprisingly or not, goes double for some of the more unsuspecting characters in the bunch. Sure, Dany and Jon and Cersei are at the top of the heap (for now), but what we gleaned from the dealings of folks like The Hound, Samwell, Arya, and even Bran (fuckin’ Bran, amirite?) gives us far more insight into the future endgame for the series.

Luckily, we got in touch with most of the major players this episode—an unusual feat in Thrones world, given that there are, approximately, 800,000 characters on the series at any given time. But with so many deaths and unifications in the last season, there are, thankfully, far fewer folks to keep in mind. So where’s everyone at compared to where they were? Let’s break it all down!

Night “I’ma Icy Boy!” King

Spoiler alert: the Night King is still at it, making his slow crawl towards The Wall with his army of billions. Thankfully, the dead and their icy leaders don’t have any magic that helps their rotting flesh move faster, so it’s going to probably take 5 episodes before these creepers actually make it anywhere. Something very unsettling about this army, though? THEY HAVE A GIANT (Poor Wun-Wun) and the wind is at their back. Something tells me their destination is “wherever Bran Stark is at.”

Bran “Did I Do That?” Stark

Speaking of the most bumbling member of House Stark: homeboy’s seemed to grow up a bit in the off-season, eh? (Guess that’ll happen when you watch your friend die and realize his name and existence is all your doing!)

After warging and watching the Night King continue his descent from So Far Beyond The Wall It Doesn’t Have A NameLandia—something that is surely going to end up biting him in the butt now that he and the Night King are forever connected by that time they touched—Bran and Meera Reed ended up at Castle Black, Jon Snow’s former Night’s Watch home and the current epicenter of Very Reasonable Freaking Out About The Realities Of The Wars To Come. Edd “Dolorous Edd” Tollett, new acting Commander of the Night’s Watch and Jon Snow’s ol’ Hardhome buddy, was skeptical of Bran and Meera at first, but Bran quickly put his fears to, uh, rest (? relatively speaking) by letting him know he’s the real deal.

It was nice to see Bran step up and have a bit of confidence in his abilities, even if he knows he is absolutely in no way prepared for the job to come. Confidence is half the battle of bullshitting your way through stuff, though, so props to him and fingers crossed it all works out. Gulp.

Jon “King in the North” Snow + Sansa “LittleCerseiFinger” Stark

Elsewhere in the North, Jon Snow’s settling into ruling duties quite nicely—being just and honorable but also not a brute, despite Sansa’s hard-lining and potentially undermining during a Northern Houses meeting. (Sansa: rule number one of being a loosely-medieval woman with foresight and greater understanding is, unfortunately, being quiet in public and then changing the man’s mind in private!) But hey: the series did give us a very obvious nod to its women problem controversy in this scene, and anything that gives us more Lyanna Mormont is more than fine by us!

It’s understandable to see Sansa’s desire to strip the houses of Karstark and Umber of their ancestral homes, but—as Jon so astutely pointed out—it was a real Cersei move of her to posit as much, to which Sansa was all “yeah but like, I learned a lot from her and she’s not so bad in some ways she just drinks a lot and is kinda like, misunderstood, y’know? You haven’t been a woman in this world you don’t understand!!” (I mean essentially.) Which: did anyone see Sansa learning and/or admiring Cersei coming? If anything, we figured she’d be Littlefinger’s little pawn. Which…

LITTLEFINGER IS THE WORST. Can we rename him Littlefucker? This sonuva is really something else, between his creepy obsession with fucking Sansa and being the ruler of the Seven Kingdoms (which, lol), and his constant need to control and manipulate situations, we sincerely hope they don’t end up working together to mess with Jon Snow. Thankfully, Sansa seemed WAY more aware (dare we say woke?) of the situation and people’s wants. At least she has Brienne of Tarth and Podrick (AWW POD!) to protect her.

Which, yes: a moment for one of Thrones‘ best ‘ships: GIANTSBAE RETURNETH. My heart is full of light.

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Cersei “Queens Can Be Mad, Too” Lannister + Jaime “GOB Bluth” Lannister

Down in Delusionsville, Cersei Lannister is having a big big map painted on the floor of the Red Keep in order to be able to see where all her enemies are. Turns out? They’re LITERALLY SURROUNDED BY THEM. Should be chill and easy to fix, right? Just get yourself a bunch of ships by marrying an absolutely unhinged Greyjoy and you’ll be set! Cersei thinks she has it all figured out, but she’s not seeing the bigger picture despite standing right on top of it: ain’t nobody want to bend the knee to her and her rule! CERSEI YOU’RE BEING AN ASS and you WILL pay for it. Hopefully, her arrogance will be the death of her—with any luck at Jaime’s golden hand.

It’s interesting to see just how resigned he seems to his sisterlover’s terribleness, eh? Not too long ago they couldn’t keep their incestual hands off of each other. Now? Jaime seems all to happy to keep his distance and let Euron have a go at wooing his unwieldy sister. He knows he’s messed up huge letting her live and lead without him there to stop her. And now she’s bringing a feral rat into the house to play leader. BET IT’LL GO GREAT!

Which, speaking of Euron “Two Hands” Greyjoy: homeboy wins for joke of the night when he trolled the brothersisterlovers with talk of his two working hands. And Jaime’s reaction was truly, truly priceless. Also: I see your fashion upgrade and I like it, enough to not even raise an eye at how fast you got all those ships together after your niece and nephew stole the entire Ironfleet and gave it to Dany all willy nilly.

SIDENOTE: was anyone else confused by how much time has passed? Especially when it comes to Gilly’s baby Sam Jr.? How is that kid like 2-years-old now?

Samwell “ShitMaester” Tarly + Gilly

Samwell is 100% having the worst go of it on this show. After losing his mentor on the boat ride to the Citadel in Oldtown, Sam has been taking shit for months now, it seems, trying to earn his place and the respect of the other Maesters and Archmaesters that rule the roost (including the—we called it!—arrival of Jim Broadbent to the series, who seems not-at-all concerned about Winter and the Walkers. UGH JIMMY BOY!). You see, even though he’s training to be a maester and has a heaping helping of knowledge at his disposal, there’s a lot of information that he cannot yet see because he’s not yet among the robed ranks. Particularly in a creepy, locked-off wing of the Citadel’s enormous, drool-worthy library. (Seriously: the Citadel set is the one I’ve been most excited for and it does NOT DISAPPOINT!)

But Sam believes he deserves access in spite of that, since he’s seen the White Walkers and the Night King with his own two eyes and most of the maesters are doubtful that they’re even real. Unfortunately, his mentormaester would rather he continue to clean up shit. So Sam goes and steals the keys and a couple of books and he and Gilly discover that there’s more dragonglass—the only thing that kills White Walkers/Wights and the one thing that could save the Realm according to Jon Snow—underneath Dragonstone (probably in the caves where they used to keep all their dragons for millennia?).

Looks like Jon Snow and Dany’s team-up is going to be over a bunch of shiny rocks! Who knew?

AND YES I SEE YOU THERE, SER JORAH OF HOUSE FRIENDZONE!!!!!!!!!! Please get well soon, I mean it SERIOUSLY!

Daenerys Targaryen + Tyrion Lannister, a.k.a. “The Favorites”

Of course we’d be remiss if we didn’t freak out over Dany’s largely silent arrival to her ancestral home (and birthplace), Dragonstone. After years away, it was magnificent to not only see more of the insides of the place, but also how much the return means to Dany. Though we’re largely unsure if she will end up being a savior or a nightmare to the Realm, it’s clear her heart has always been in the right place and she does NOT take her return to Westeros lightly.

Shall we begin?

Arya “STR8 MURDERIN’ IT” Stark

But before all that, we saved the best—Arya—for last, not because she had the most major storyline of the evening (she didn’t), but because she simply rules and it’s our goddamn recap so we can do what we want, mmkay? Because: HOW AWESOME WAS THAT MURDER OF ALL THE FREYS IN ONE SWOOP FOR THE COLD OPEN? At first I did not see it coming, though I should’ve since Walder Frey was killed last season (I kept thinking, “is this a flashback to right before?” but that’s because I am not always the quickest). But whether you saw what was happening or not, we can all agree: there is literally no better way to kick off the penultimate season of Game of Thrones than with a mass-murder of the least-liked family in all of Westeros.

We also got that long-rumored Ed Sheeran cameo and, true to speculation, he did not die (yet), even if the scene went on entirely to long. But he did sing a song! A new one! Because of course! I’ll let the internet do the dirty work of transcribing the lyrics for us (a girl can only do so much), and then we can all speculate about what it might mean together at a later date.

Arya did reveal to us her plan and what she’s going to do next: kill Cersei. Anyone else thinking she might try and steal Jaime’s face in order to do it? OOOH PLOT TWIST!

Other Odds and Ends:

I hope you heard all those references to the Dragonpit — THEY WERE NOT BY ACCIDENT.

Beric Dondarrion is back and hanging with The Hound!
But also: what the heck was up with that non-vision vision in the fire?

If you’re going to have The Hound see the truth in the flames, it’d be nice if WE got to see it, too.
Also also: how was he able to see it so quickly and easily? I HAVE QUESTIONS.


WHERE THE HELL IS GENDRY?!?!

What did you think of the Thrones premiere? Let us know in the comments below and TUNE IN MONDAY at 1 p.m. PST, when we break it all down on our newly All Kings Considered-ified episodes of Nerdist News Talks Back!

Images: HBO

Alicia Lutes is the Managing Editor, creator/co-host of Fangirling, and resident Khaleesi of House Nerdist. Find her on Twitter but only if you really want to because like, I’m not your boss.

Martin Landau, a Genre Staple for Seven Decades, Has Died

For me, he’ll always be John Koenig from Space: 1999, a show about that time in the now-past when the moon was ripped out of Earth’s orbit and the intrepid crew of its moonbase continued to pilot the dislocated satellite through unknown regions of the cosmos. For you, he might be Bela Lugosi. Or Gepetto. Or Mission: Impossible‘s Rollin Hand. To Gene Roddenberry, he was nearly Mr. Spock. As a voice-actor, he was Scorpion in the 1995 Spider-Man cartoon. And while he’s an Oscar winner (and multi-time nominee), he also has on his resume such “masterpieces” of TV schlock as The Harlem Globetrotters on Gilligan’s Island and The Return of the Six Million-Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman. Martin Landau, in short, was everything.

(NSFW audio below…)

Landau began as a cartoonist, but was accepted into the Lee Strasberg Actor’s Studio in 1955 alongside Steve McQueen. Like many other actors of the ’50s, he can be seen in many old TV western episodes, but he went on to work with the likes of Hitchcock (in North by Northwest) and Coppola (Tucker: The Man and His Dream). He could do it all: this was a man who could go from playing president Woodrow Wilson to being a series regular on Entourage. That didn’t necessarily mean his appearance in something guaranteed it would be a great product, but you’d always know it had at least one reliable, quality ingredient.

Landau loved acting more than anything, and felt he had learned so much about it that he wanted to give something back, so he became a teacher himself. But you didn’t necessarily have to take the lessons to learn from him; merely watching him onscreen was a master class in how to work with whatever you’re given.

If there’s life beyond this one, here’s hoping Bela Lugosi appreciates how Landau made him seem that way too.

Image: ITV