Chris Hardwick's Blog, page 2345

This POKEMON GO Knockoff Is Absolutely Terrifying

Fan projects based on existing intellectual properties are usually a fun display of passion that unfortunately get taken down for legitimate legal reasons, like this just-released Pokémon fan game that took nine years to complete but has been removed after a few days online. Then there are the projects that use an established name in an effort to wrongfully make some money for themselves, and oh boy, is this Pokémon Go knockoff wrong in a myriad of ways.

Believe it or not, but in the photo above is Pikachu, or at least something that’s supposed to be like it. That’s a screenshot from an Android game called Pokeball Coach for Pokemon Go, created by Chinese developer Rejected Games: FPS Adventure & Sport Simulation Adventure, and the bootleg Pokémon characters are ridiculously bad and creepy.

Just look at poor, malnourished Snorlax:

To be fair, there’s a legitimate reason this game exists: With recent Pokémon Go updates that have made catching Pokémon more challenging, players have wanted a practice mode to learn how to best and most accurately flick Pokéballs. The official game doesn’t provide such a mode, so leave it to third-party developers. This game has presumably been caught red-handed for copyright issues, so it re-branded as Ball Practice for PoGO, and the Pokémon have been replaced with less nightmare-inducing pandas and turtles and whatnot.

Feel free to give the re-skinned Ball Practice app a download if your flick game could use some work, although reviews of the app are mixed, so maybe don’t lean too heavily on it.

It’s time to go all Pokémon: Sun and Moon up in this piece!

Images: Rejected Games: FPS Adventure & Sport Simulation Adventure

The New MEGA MAN Animated Series Will Have a More Optimistic Blue Bomber

Some call him “The Blue Bomber,” some call him “Rockman,” but for nearly thirty years audiences around the world have known him as “Mega Man,” the eponymous humanoid robot boy at the center of the mega-popular Mega Man video game franchise. Created in 1987, Mega Man is standing on the precipice of his thirtieth anniversary, and Capcom is celebrating by partnering with Disney XD and Man of Action Entertainment for a brand new animated series launching in 2017. To take you inside the upcoming animated series, I sat down with the men of action behind Man of Action: Steven T. Seagle, Duncan Rouleau, Joe Kelly, and Joe Casey.

Nerdist: Tell us, why is now the right time for a new iteration of Mega Man?

Duncan Rouleau: Why did we get on board? Well, obviously Capcom is excited to have this legacy character. You know, there’s going to be all sorts of stuff surrounding his anniversary, rebirth, and his thirtieth anniversary. So for us, he’s kind of a timeless character. What he represents, and that figure, when you see him, instantly, like immediate recognition. Everybody loves this character. So for us, it was an opportunity to take a cool toy, play with it in a new way, and just make a really kick-ass show.

Joe Kelly: I mean, the kind of stuff we’ve done on Ben 10, and making up Big Hero 6 characters and Generator Rex and Ultimate Spider-Man, it’s kind of an interesting thing for us to be able to do that for a character that has a kind of different natural origin, so to speak. Mega Man’s had some other shows, Mega Man’s had a ton of video games, but I think this is the first time and American team gets to be a creative imprint and go, “What would that be like if it was made here in the West.” So we’re still very respectful of all that stuff. We’re working hand in hand with Dentsu America, working at Capcom, but we’re also going, “what would this be like if it had a slightly more American sensibility in the creation?”

DR: So I was just going to add one other thing: He’s a very positive character and it’s just good timing to have some characters out there that are just about doing the right thing and trying to be good.

N: Yeah, it would just be a huge bummer if Mega Man was this cynical jerk. It’s like, “Why was I created?”

Joe Casey: No, but the hundreds and hundreds of robot villains are those guys.

N: So, what was the biggest challenge of taking this character who does have 30 years of history and has so much fan attachment to it and sort of reimagining it for a new audience?

STS: You know, it was kind of the same approach we did with Ultimate Spider-Man. You want to take the character down to his bare bones, his essence because a lot of things can get added on over the years and they might have been appropriate for the time, but we just really went through everything and found the stuff that made him what he is and tried to bring that out. Honestly, it’s just trying to be true to the character is what we did.

N: Mega-Man has a pretty sprawling rogues gallery of his own, but are you guys adding any new characters to the Mega-Man canon?

JC: One of the things we’re doing is keeping names and types you know and then going, “What does that look like right now?” So his family, for instance, has a slightly different shape. They’re all familiar, but they have different kinds of things they’re doing. But if there are characters from Mega Man that you like, for example, they’re probably around, but in a shiny new wrapper in a new way. The villains, I mean, there’s so many of them; we’re still in the geek phase of going, “Oh, I want to do this one, I want to do this one!” While that’s going on, we haven’t needed to make any more yet. New takes on old names, for sure, though.

N: And some of the old names were a little wonky.

JC: Fan Man, love it, especially today when it’s hot! We had brought up a touch of equal rights. Not only are there Fan Man and Shock Man and Elec Man and all of them, but we brought in some women characters as well.

N: The art style is very striking from what we’ve seen so far. I don’t think a lot of people were expecting that art style. How did you guys arrive at this visual aesthetic? What was the development of that like?

JK: Duncan can draw and he drew that stuff. We worked very closely with Capcom and they had a lot of very specifics that they wanted to keep and also that they didn’t want to go near some other things. They’ve got a lot of, well, I can’t say what is happening…

DR: Let’s just say they had some very particular aspects they wanted represented in this style. So, it’s most definitely guided with them, working with them, but also a little bit of my own style. I love Japanese anime, and especially earlier stuff. When I grew up, it was Speed Racer, Gigantor, most of that kind of stuff. So I have a retro feel or appreciation. It was working with them–Dentsu America, Capcom, and us–and we just went through a lot of different styles and modes.

JK: I literally look through 30 to 50 fins on the head, and then you redo those 30 to 50 with 20 more and it’s, like, a lot of fine-tuning. For people that are like, “Why are they doing this?” Well, we spent a lot of time…

N: It wasn’t just thrown together. There’s a lot of thought behind it. Are there any weird rules for making a Mega Man animated series? 

JC: You know, there was a lot of time developing the universe and what the rules of the world are, and that is coherent and informs the Mega Man we wound up with. But like Duncan said, he’s a legacy character. You know, 30 years, many iterations, Capcom picks and chooses the things they care about and there are sort of signposts we have to go by. Generally, though, it’s like, “What is this world and how is it expressed through Mega Man?” and that’s really fun. I mean, the world is crazy.

JK: He’s also appeared in a lot of different forms at a lot of different ages, too, so we most definitely zeroed in on a much younger version of him. That was the one we thought squeezed the most optimism, too. And also, we can play a lot, what Joe said, in the world, and his purpose inside the world that he’s operating in in the show. So, if there were any rules, it was just making sure he was the little robot that could. So, every bit of his design was an intent to make sure that he looked young.

N: So there’s never a version where he’s, like, late 30s Mega Man still living in Dr. Light’s basement?

JC: No, but there are dark elements in the show. They’re just not him.

N: What do you hope the folks take away from this new iteration?

STS: Oh, gosh, I don’t know. They should have fun. It’s a fun show. What Duncan really hit on the head is that so many of the characters we’re surrounded by are cynical and they’re not just doing the right thing just because they want to be heroes. Like, we’re overcomplicating these characters all the time for younger audiences. He’s just a fun, optimistic character who screws up a lot and is trying to figure out his way. He’s not perfect, but he wants to do the right thing.

JC: We’re spending more time with Aki, the human side of the character, and we mentioned that so we can come clean that it has a little more than the fighting element. It’s got some life in it.

DR: And, you know, like Steve said, there are plenty of darker elements. It’s still very fun, but we aren’t shying away from some more heavier elements in it. I think it’s about time we have a character who just does the right thing.

Mega Man premieres on Disney XD in 2017.

Images: Disney XD/Man of Action

Dan Casey is the senior editor of Nerdist and the author of books about Star Wars and the Avengers. Follow him on Twitter (@Osteoferocious).

GAME OF THRONES Season 7 Details Revealed

For Game of Thrones fans, it’s gonna be a long wait for winter. Everyone’s favorite fantasy series isn’t coming back to HBO until next summer and season 7 hasn’t even started filming yet. But the rumors have started, and we may have the first word on some of the new characters coming to Westeros today on Nerdist News!

Game of Thrones fan site Watchers on the Wall broke the story about the new casting breakdowns, which includes a priest, city guards, a few warriors, a merchant, and a “lovely lady,” whom the report notes will be required to be naked. Nerdist News host and Master of Whispers Jessica Chobot has a few theories about where these new characters are located, and it involves some of the previously unused parts from the novels.

Remember Euron Greyjoy? If the show follows the books, then Uncle Euron could be targeting Old Town with his rebuilt fleet of Iron Born ships. That may mean that these new characters will be populating Old Town prior to Euron’s attack, which would also give Sam and Gilly people to interact with before the enemy fleet comes in. We already know that Daenerys is on her way to Westeros with her armies, her dragons, and her new allies from Dorne as well as Yara and Theon’s renegade fleet. Could Daenerys make a splash by saving Old Town from the Iron Born?

What do you think will happen next season on Game of Thrones? Let’s discuss in the comment section below!

THE LOST BOYS Will Be a TV Series on The CW

One of the greatest vampire movies of all time, 1987’s The Lost Boys, is getting a new lease on life (un-life?) over at the CW network. According to a report over at Deadline, Rob Thomas—the uber-talented creator behind shows like Veronica Mars and iZombie—is bringing Joel Schumacher’s cult classic to the network. So you vampire fans who are bummed out that The Vampire Diaries is ending next year after eight seasons? Think of this as your awesome consolation prize. The original film, which just celebrated its 29th anniversary, starred Jason Patric, Kiefer Sutherland, Corey Haim, and Corey Feldman.

According to the original report, the new show is “being envisioned for a seven-season run,” and will tell a story “spanning 70 years, each season chronicling a decade.” Season one will be set in San Francisco during the Summer of Love (1967). As they move forward ever season, “the humans, the setting, the antagonist and the story all change — only the vampires, our Lost Boys, who are like the Peter Pan characters [that] never grow up, remain the same.” It’s also stated in the original report that the show “will explore what it really means to be immortal.”

What is unclear is if these vampires are meant to be the same ones we encounter in the original film — it seems doubtful, as those vampires didn’t seem to make it out of the ’80s in one piece. Hopefully the show will tie into the film in a creative way and not just be The Lost Boys in name only.  Whatever they end up doing, it will no doubt be better than the awful straight-to-DVD movies that came out a few years back. The Lost Boys is also coming back as a comic from DC/Vertigo, but it’s unknown if that book ties into this new series in any way. The Lost Boys doesn’t yet have a release date.

Now, if only someone would make a proper Anne Rice Vampire Chronicles show on cable, or extend Joss Whedon’s Buffyverse on TV again, maybe that would all finally wash the taste of Twilight out of our collective mouths for good.

What do you think of a potential Lost Boys TV show? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

Image: Warner Brothers

Zendaya’s SPIDER-MAN: HOMECOMING Role Revealed

Since she was first cast in next year’s Spider-Man: Homecoming, fans have wondered just who Disney Channel actress Zendaya is going to play. Although initial reports had her labeled as a new character from Peter Parker’s high school named Michelle, the folks at the Wrap have revealed that she’s actually playing Mary Jane Watson instead.

Fans of course know that Mary Jane, or MJ for short, has long been Spider-Man’s main squeeze, and she was even married to him for the better part of 20 years in the comics (until their marriage was undone by Marvel editorial). Mary Jane was famously brought to life in Sam Raimi’s original Spider-Man trilogy by actress Kirsten Dunst. The character wasn’t included in the Amazing Spider-Man reboot, since director Marc Webb wanted to focus on Peter Parker’s relationship with his doomed high school girlfriend, Gwen Stacy.

This casting news is no doubt going to bother less open-minded fans out there, since Mary Jane Watson has traditionally been portrayed as a red headed white girl, both in the comics and in the movies. Of course, nothing precludes this version of Mary Jane from having red hair either — it’s not like Kirsten Dunst was a natural redhead —  but whether she does or not is neither here or there, because more diversity is always a good thing. (Also, psssst: Jason Momoa’s blonde highlights as Aquaman aren’t natural either. Just sayin’.)

Sony and Marvel Studios’ Spider-Man: Homecoming is directed by Jon Watts, and stars Tom Holland as Spidey, Marisa Tomei as Aunt May, Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, and Michael Keaton as (probably) the Vulture, and will focus on a John Hughes-esque Peter Parker in high school.

What do you think of Zendaya as Mary Jane? Did Marvel Studios and Sony just “hit the jackpot”? Let us know your thoughts down below in the comments.

Image: Disney Channel

Audio Rewind: The History of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” Video

There are only a handful of songs that have significantly altered the course of music history. Lennon’s “Imagine.” Dylan’s “Blowing in the Wind.” Cage’s “4’33.” Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit.” Another, unassailably, is “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” Nirvana‘s benchmark single that unexpectedly rocketed both the band and alternative rock to new heights. The subsequent video, too, was instantly iconic. “Teen Spirit” would go on to net Nirvana Best New Artist and Best Alternative Group honors at the 1992 MTV Video Music Awards, and in 2000 Guinness World Records declared “Teen Spirit” the Most Played Video on MTV Europe.

Yesterday marked the 25-year anniversary of the video’s filming, when it was soon to debut on a late Sunday night on a then-niche MTV program, premiered by a man that didn’t even know who Nirvana was. He would soon enough, though, and so would the rest of the world.

To shoot and direct the now-seminal video, Nirvana hired first-time director Samuel Bayer (he’s since helmed the 2010 remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street and shot and directed music videos for David Bowie, Green Day, Metallica, The Strokes, The Rolling Stones, and a slew of other eminent musicians). Bayer, according to the 2005 Nevermind documentary, believes he was chosen because his test-reel was so shoddy that Nirvana was guaranteed to get a “punk” and “not corporate” video out of him. He was also affordable and willing to shoot the video on a relatively shoestring budget ($30,000 – $50,000).

To those that have seen it (420 million have seen the above version alone), you know that the video is decidedly “not corporate.” But, of course, it’s also not shoddy. Set in a high school gym (which is actually a soundstage in Culver City), the video takes cues from the 1979 coming-of-age film, Over the Edge, as well as the Ramones‘ cult classic, Rock ‘n’ Roll High School, borrowing the model in which a school concert devolves into riot and anarchy.

To capture that aesthetic, Bayer used cheerleaders garbed in black outfits with the Circle-A anarchist symbol and restless, bleacher-bound high school students—all actual Nirvana fans that answered an open casting call. At the end of the faux pep rally, unable to constrain their angst, the kids destroy the set and the band’s equipment, which actually happened. After a day full of shoots and reshoots, Kurt Cobain convinced Bayer to let the kids mosh, so they did. “Once the kids came out dancing they just said ‘fuck you,’ said the late frontman in Michael Azerrad’s Nirvana biography, “because they were so tired of this shit throughout the day.”

The video would eventually premiere on September 29, 1991 on MTV’s alternative music program, “120 Minutes.” At that point, despite the fact that Bleach had arrived two years earlier, Nirvana was still relatively unknown. Even the host of “120 minutes,” Dave Kendall, didn’t know the band. “I hadn’t heard Bleach, I wasn’t that aware of new, American rock … when I first heard the Nevermind record,” he told MTV in a Nevermind retrospective. “I thought it was going to be another Seattle record, so I was a little suspicious and a little resistant to it because I thought it was going to be a lot of guitars, sort of a ’70s feel. I didn’t think it was going to be something new,” Kendall continued. “And then when I heard it, I knew I’d been wrong. It wasn’t just heavy, it wasn’t just rock, it was real melancholy, real passion, real vulnerability, the way it married intense rage with deep melancholy and sadness. And that really touched me.”

The perceived authenticity of the video is really its crowning accomplishment, especially considering Cobain admitted to Rolling Stone that he was “basically trying to rip off the Pixies” when he wrote “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Still, nothing about the video comes off as dishonest, and its success helped paint alternative rock as a more relatable, viable source of mainstream music. Moreover, on the tail end of the synthesized, keyboard-heavy ’80s, “Smells Like Teen Spirit” helped reintroduce the guitar as a relevant rock instrument.

“Teen Spirit” was a breath of fresh air, plain and simple, and it reached an audience that had been left out by a formulaic pop industry that Bayer decried in the aforementioned documentary. Unlike other artists he worked with, Cobain was devoid of vanity and intent on capturing “something that was truly about what they were about.”

And what they were about, as we all know now, was impassioned, guitar-laden grunge that made otherness feel inclusive. “Teen Spirit” was one of the first documents of that revered Nirvana authenticity. It’s the gritty mirror image of the chemical-clean sterility of a gymnasium. The foil to high school hallway decorum. An alternative option for high schoolers not keen on cosmetic, homecoming rally pep. The ultimate rebel yell of the past quarter century.

Image: Sub Pop

BRIGGS LAND is a Uniquely American Crime Comic You Need to Be Reading

America is the land of the free and the home of the brave, but the new comic Briggs Land by writer Brian Wood (DMZ, Northlanders) explores the seedy underbelly of those ideals and what happens when they get warped and twisted into something nearly unrecognizable. Briggs Land is a sordid, violent, roiling story of the titular Briggs Land, a hundred square miles of rural wilderness in Upstate New York where the Briggs family runs a highly secretive antigovernment secessionist movement in the United States’ backyard. When the family’s matriarch, Grace Briggs, makes a power play and seizes control of the business from her imprisoned husband, it ignites a powderkeg within the community–and her own family–that threatens to blow up everything they’ve built…as well as bring the federal government down on them.

The first issue of Briggs Land, published by Dark Horse Comics, illustrated by Mack Chater, with colors by Lee Loughridge and a cover by Tula Lotay, was released on Wednesday, August 17 and feels uncomfortably relevant given the current sociopolitical climate in the United States. And with a television adaptation for AMC already in the works, you can bet that you’re going to be talking about Briggs Land for quite some time. To take you inside the seedy American crime story, I caught up with Wood about the real-world inspirations for the book, what we can expect, and what to listen to while you read the first issue.

Image: Tula Lotay/Dark Horse Comics

Nerdist: Briggs Land seems to be a deeply American crime saga. Where did the impetus for this story come from? Is it based on any real-life figures?

Brian Wood: If I pulled from any one real life thing, it would be Ruby Ridge. There’s obviously other examples—Waco, Timothy McVeigh, the Bundy ranchers, maybe the Unabomber—but Ruby Ridge is just the perfect example, and a tragic story. It’s what got me reading, and researching, and turning the idea over and over in my head that would eventually become Briggs Land. And its obvious to anyone who watches the news that this sort of culture is pretty relevant to today, from the themes of the election to homegrown extremism and the lack of trust in the government coming out of rampant class division.

This is the sort of comics I love to make! And it’s right in line with past series I’ve written. You can draw a perfectly straight line connecting my earliest book, Channel Zero, along down to DMZ, The Massive, Rebels, and now Briggs Land.

N: Who are the Briggs and what kind of operation exactly are they running?

BW: So there is the actual Briggs family, the biological family consisting of several generations all living together on the same land that a particularly savvy ancestor purchased following the American Civil War. Located in the extreme wilds of Upstate New York, its a refuge from the outside world for all subsequent generations. At first it was just meant to be a chunk of nature that would stay untouched by population growth, the Industrial Revolution, and real estate development. As the decades wore on, it took on other roles and other meanings–sheltering Vietnam-era draft dodgers, for example–and as the 1980s arrived, it has devolved into an outpost for the growing religious extremist movement and the armed militias that inevitably follow. There’s also an unfortunate white supremacist movement mixed up in all of that.

Jim Briggs, the current patriarch of the family, really embraced the criminal side of that, and is responsible for the larger “Briggs family,” meaning the organized crime syndicate that operates off the land growing and cooking drugs, selling weapons, smuggling pharmaceuticals over the Canadian border, and all manner of mafioso crimes: extortion, money laundering, murder for profit, and so on. I often refer to Briggs Land, casually, as The Sopranos on a militia compound, and while that’s an incomplete description, it gives you an idea. Family drama is a big part of this series. The tagline is “An American Family Under Siege.”

N: Grace Briggs is a fierce matriarch and a shrewd operator who must navigate a roiling ocean of testosterone and violence. Tell us a bit about her and what we can expect from her in Briggs Land.

BW: So I mentioned Jim Briggs, the patriarch of the family. He’s actually in prison, and has been for quite some time, ever since he tried to assassinate the President. But like any true mafia boss, he’s been running the family from jail, with the help of sympathetic guards and the larger white power movement. But in recent years, his personal greed has been getting the better of his political convictions, and he’s in talks with the feds to sell Briggs Land, this vast and incredibly lucrative hunk of land in exchange for his freedom and a pile of cash. Never mind his family and the hundreds of like-minded people who have settled on the Land. He’s looking out for number one now.

Grace, his wife, has stood by his side for more than 35 years, but unlike Jim, she still believes in Briggs Land. Not the current corrupt Briggs Land, but the original ideal: a place where people can disconnect from the immoral world and live free and self-sufficient. So she’s taking over. She’s going to do what she can to block the sale and restore the Land. But there’s no precedent for this; she’s a wife, and she has three adult sons who could very easily make the case that they, as male heirs, should be the ones running things.

I love Grace. She’s a 50 year-old woman who at first seems a little bit of a throwback in her rubber farm boots and gingham dress, but she’s spent her entire adult life in this culture, and is as hard as steel as she is idealistic. She’s not to be underestimated.

N: It seems that Grace will not only have to contend with a civil war breaking out within her family, but a potential war with the federal government too. Which is more dangerous?

BW: Yeah, the ATF has sent a couple agents to the area to just keep eyeballs on Briggs Land while this sensitive deal is being worked out between Jim Briggs and the feds. All they have to do is sit and watch and make sure nothing crazy happens to disrupt things. Well, obviously it does, and they are the first ones to figure out that Grace is making a move. One of the agents, Daniel Zigler, also has ties to the Land that I’m pretty sure his bosses don’t know about.

N: In our current climate of deeply polarized politics, Briggs Land seems to tackle issues of gun control, race, and notions of freedom head-on. Is this intended to be a politically charged piece? What sort of discourse are you hoping to create with Briggs Land?

BW: It’s all in there: guns, extremism, terrorism, politics, taxes, religion, racism, and whatever else you can think of. Gender politics, prison themes, environmental issues, conspiracy theories… and one of the sons is recently back from Afghanistan with PTSD. It’s this capsule of all the hot button American topics playing out in a world that is entirely plausible, as we can see just by watching the news.

But like I said, this is also a family drama, so it’s not just politics. Its all centered around Grace as she struggles to hold the dream together while everyone around her seems to be working to tear it all down.

N: You are simultaneously developing this for a television adaptation with AMC. What about this story makes it ideal for television? What is the challenge in adapting this for TV? Do you approach writing the comic differently knowing that it is headed to the small screen?

BW: I think I’m in a unique situation here, simultaneously writing the source material and the adaptation. Usually, as we all know, there’s a comic or a book first and then a show or movie is created based off an existing body of work. AMC hired me to write a pilot based off the pitch, even before I had pitched it to Dark Horse Comics. So I have two versions of Briggs Land in my head right now, and it can get pretty tricky to keep it all straight.

BUT! It gives me a cool opportunity to look for ways each version can help support the other, with the two combining to create something that is more than the sum of its parts. That’s the idea anyway, but so far its working out great. The fact AMC was eager to make a deal right away speaks to the relevance of the material, and the strength of the story to last. I see Briggs Land as a series lasting years and years. I have the notes for it.

N: What music would you recommend as an accompaniment for reading Briggs Land?

BW: It took me some time to answer this, since I don’t really listen to music when I write, and there’s no obvious connection from the world of Briggs Land to a specific musical genre. This is such a niché culture and nothing seemed to fit. But a few hours ago I was designing a Briggs Land promo image and one of the characters needed an image dropped onto his t-shirt, and for some reason I started digging up logos for old New York hardcore bands like Judge, Sick Of It All, Breakdown, and Warzone–bands I used to like. So that’s what I’m going with, with Sick Of It All’s “America” as the theme song. Let’s see if I can sell AMC on that idea.

Briggs Land #1 is available now.

Image: Dark Horse Comics

Dan Casey is the senior editor of Nerdist and the author of books about Star Wars and the Avengers. Follow him on Twitter (@Osteoferocious).

 7 WTF-worthy comic nook moments:

This ‘Googly-Eyed Stubby Squid’ Looks Like a Muppet on Acid

Players of No Man’s Sky may be proud that they’ve racked up more species than have been discovered here on Earth, but that doesn’t mean that Mama Nature and good ol’ evolution can’t still dazzle us with their own seemingly endless array of quirky, adorable creatures. Case in point: the Rossia pacifica—a.k.a. the “Stubby Squid”—which is featured in the above video and looks like it’s a big fan of “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” if you catch our oceanic drift.

Gizmodo recently reported on the finding of this particular Stubby Squid, which is actually more closely related to a cuttlefish, but hey—it is a Cephalopod. It was spotted by the Exploration Vessel Nautilus (or E/V Nautilus) off the coast of California at a depth of about 900 meters, or 3,000 feet. This is an especially impressive depth considering how high this little heavily veined purple brain bag looks. Seriously, this aquatic sock puppet has seen some things.

According to the description posted along with the video, “this species spends life on the seafloor, activating a sticky mucus jacket and burrowing into the sediment to camouflage, leaving their eyes poking out to spot prey like shrimp and small fish.” (By the by, “sticky mucus jacket” is on the exact opposite end of the cool-jacket spectrum from Poe Dameron’s.)

If you ever wanted to find one of these little cuttle buddies (get it?!), they usually hang out in the Northern Pacific from Southern California to Japan, and have been spotted at depths of up to 4,260 feet. ‘Cause, you know, these Stubby Squids like to go deep man, like, real deep… 

What do you think about this Stubby Squid and its penchant for looking like it’s getting its mind blown by literally everything? Blow our minds in the comments below!

Images: The Ocean Exploration Trust

Home Geekonomics: Back To School Backpacks

Home Geekonomics is a series that features the best in geeky home decor, food, and DIY. Each week will focus on a specific fandom and highlight the best of geek for your home and everyday life.

August: the month where most kids head back to school. After a long summer of fun and freedom, why not make going back a little more entertaining by picking up a tricked out backpack to haul your gear? Choosing wisely can be a tough choice with so many good TV shows, movies, and video games out there—and in almost every fandom imaginable, there are packs to be had.

Whichever favorite fandoms you or your kids choose, know that they’ll be fashionable and back in the swing of things in no time.

Star Wars Rebel Backpack from Spencers

This is a rebellion isn’t it? You’d better pack accordingly. This cool Star Wars backpack is X-wing pilot orange and even better? It comes with a hood for those rainy days on Endor! Nothing like a little light cosplay to make school days a little brighter.

Pokémon Pikachu Backpack from Hot Topic

This summer everyone was playing Pokémon Go so you have to roll up to school looking your very best, like no one ever was. This Pikachu canvas rucksack has room for water bottles, a laptop, and as many Pokéballs as you can fit.

Wonder Woman Backpack from Entertainment Earth

We’re seriously loving the look of this stylish Wonder Woman backpack. From the rich colors to the cool golden lasso detailing, it’s a cool way to show off your inner Amazonian. With the much anticipated movie on the way, you’ll be ahead of the game in style. You can even keep the keys to your invisible jet in the front pocket.

Legend of Zelda Shadowlink Backpack from Spencers

When it comes to hauling goods there’s nothing better than multiple water bottle pockets and zippers, zippers and more zippers. This tactical pack makes it easy to carry all your back to school essentials. Make sure you check out how good it looks in the Dark Mirror.

Adventure Time Jake Backpack from Cartoon Network

Backpacks with added accessories are the hottest trend, and a bag that doubles as cosplay makes it even better. This cool Adventure Time backpack is big enough for trekking through the Land of Ooo and even comes with a fun detachable Jake mask sure to make everyday Mathematical!

Which are your favorites? Let us know in the comments below!

Images: Spencers, Hot Topic, Entertainment Earth, Cartoon Network

Schlock & Awe: METALSTORM: THE DESTRUCTION OF JARED-SYN

You guys, I’m not gonna lie to you: sometimes I run out of weird cult movies to talk about. I’m a busy person, same as most of you, and sometimes–especially after three years of writing this column every week–delving back into my archives of things I haven’t written about yet gets pretty dang difficult. And then sometimes, friends–OH MAN–I get sent a movie that makes me remember why I do Schlock & Awe in the first place: A 1983, shot-in-3D, budget-of-nothing The Road Warrior ripoff with added lasers and spaceships called Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn.

I’m not going to pretend to know everything about every single crappy B-movie made between 1960 and 2000 or anything, but I’ve at least got some kind of awareness of a great many such dubious classics; not only hadI never seen Metalstorm prior to receiving it from the good folks at Scream Factory (coming out September 13 on two-disc Blu-ray with both 3D and 2D versions), but I’d never even heard of it. At all! I thought I knew all the Mad Max pastiches from that time, including Exterminators of the Year 3000, but oh how wrong I was.

The story goes that producer-director Charles Band, who is the producer behind Full Moon Features and such “beloved” titles as The Puppet Master, Dollman, and Demonic Toys, made a low-budget 3D horror feature Parasite and that was a big enough success that he got a bit more daring, wanting to make a sci-fi epic in 3D on a small budget, from a script by Alan J. Adler. He managed to sell the movie mid-filming at Cannes to get enough money to continue filming, and then by chance was able to piggyback on the release of Universal’s Jaws 3-D and was shown in 2,000 theaters at the end of the summer 1983. I mean, of all the movies to carry a Universal tag, this has to be one of the least Universal.

The story takes place on another planet–a desert one that looks suspiciously like those rocks from every movie and TV show ever–where a “finder” named Dogen (Jeffrey Byron) is driving around in a strange psychically-linked vehicle. He’s attacked by a nomad on a jetbike and after Dogen (which rhymes with Jojen) shoots it down, he finds a strange translucent crystal. Elsewhere, prospector and his daughter Dhyana (a 21-year-old Kelly Preston) find a crystal and think it’s their key to wealth and happiness, but they are likewise beset by the Cyclopian nomads and a strange alien-cyborg called Baal (R. David Smith) who sprays the father with a strange acid which sends his consciousness to a dream-realm where warlord Jared-Syn (Mike Preston) pulls out the man’s soul into one of those crystals, killing him. Yes, guys, this REALLY all happens in the first few minutes of the movie.

From there, Dogen finds Dhyana and the two decide they’re after the same person–the aforementioned Jared-Syn. After getting the crystal analyzed, they learn that it holds people’s souls (Sidebar: What machine tests for souls?) and then they’re attacked by our old pals the Nomads where Dogen is sprayed by Baal’s acid arm. However, with Dhyana cradling him, Syn is unable to absorb Dogen’s soul, citing that together they’re too strong. So, of course, he immediate uses some kind of thing to teleport Dhyana away and send a translucent monster to fight Dogen. Both Dogen and Dhyana fend off the baddies in their respective places, though Dhyana remains captured.

Then there’s a bunch of gobbledygook about a lost civilization or what-have-you, and Dogen goes to find a prospector named Rhodes (Tim Thomerson), a washed-up soldier, who might be able to help. From there, the pair run afoul of the Cyclopian nomads again, this time the group not beholden to Syn, and led by a giant named Hurok (Richard Moll) who also hates Syn, but needs to duel Dogen out of honor. Dogen wins (somehow) and spares Hurok’s life, creating an ally for life. At Syn’s compound, the warlord reveals to Dhyana–for plot purposes–the massive crystal that houses all the souls of the people he’s killed. He uses their souls for energy and fuel (because it burns so cleanly). Dogen finds a magic crystal mask and puts it on and it takes him to the dream world where he hacks down an ancient tree that bleeds….and then there’s the final battle and stuff…I don’t know, man.

Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn is one of the strangest and most lopsided movies I think I’ve ever watched. On the one hand, for only a couple million dollars, the effects and cinematography are terrific. Everything is done in-camera, as was the standard of the time, and save a bit toward the end with a jetbike chase between Dogen and Syn, everything looks pretty damned great. The storyline is even pretty good, if hard to follow because nothing is really fleshed out. But then, at the same time, it feels like nothing really happens and then it’s over. It’s only 84 minutes long but only about 70 of it is movie (the rest being credits). The above theatrical trailer which got lots of people excited actually contains all of the most awesome moments of the movie, so you aren’t missing much. I looked at the run time at one point and it was 46 minutes in. Over half the movie was done and it didn’t seem like we were anywhere near a conclusion.

The other major weird thing is the title. Metalstorm means nothing; metal doesn’t feature at all in the plot and there isn’t a storm to be seen. But, that’s not necessarily bad; plenty of movies have dopey, cool-sounding titles that don’t factor in to much. Hell, even Blade Runner, which they tried to pretend was the name of the job he was doing, was just a title Warner Bros already had the rights to and decided to use it for that movie. (Blade Runner was a book about people smuggling surgical supplies in the third world, fun fact). But Metalstorm‘s subtitle–The Destruction of Jared-Syn–is a complete and total misnomer. Jared-Syn does not get destroyed at the end of the movie! He escapes. Further, he never destroys anything nor is his wrath in any way a plight on society. He’s a soul-stealer.

All that being said, there are things to enjoy about the movie, many because of the inherent silliness. Watching any old 3D movie is hilarious because of the strange and forced ways they had to poke at people with guns or tree branches and the like. Also, the character of Baal looks awesome. The makeup effects are very impressive and reminiscent of Buffy‘s Adam character. The actor, R. David Smith, was missing his left arm, so they fitted him with a mechanical thing that could extend for when he shot the green acid, and of course that was used for 3D effect. The music, by Charles Band’s brother Richard, is also very good. And, hell, I even like most of the actors, particularly Moll and Thomerson who are frankly way too good for this movie. Mike Preston, who plays Jared-Syn, was actually in The Road Warrior playing the good guy leader Pappagallo. Fun fact. He’s not super good in this movie.

So, friends, if you need a good schlocky movie to watch with friends and kill no more than 85 minutes of an evening watching cheese and scoping out hot early-’80s Kelly Preston, then Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn is the flick for you.

Want more bad movies? Watch Kyle try to explain the snake mutant movie Sssssss!

Images: Universal

Kyle Anderson is the Associate Editor for Nerdist. He writes the weekly look at weird or obscure films in Schlock & Awe. Follow him on Twitter!