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I decided to take this out of the RIP thread, but I know we've the end of the world booked for the weekend - for Friday to be specific, which is handy because it leaves Saturday open for last-minute chrimbo shopping - and I was thinking about the last couple of doomsdays we had where the world ended like those plagues in the 13th century and Y2K and wondering what's the next one after the Mayan thing?

I think we've all come across the running joke about how if something wasn't written by John Wagner, it "doesn't count" as Dredd canon, but is there any actual basis for this being a real thing or is it just something fans thought up because no-one liked Book of the Dead and the thought that JW ignores it like the rest of us is kind of comforting?

Anyone checked the Google homepage today?  Go on, do it now and I'll wait until you get back.

The anniversary of the sinking is coming up and it's a bit surreal around here at the minute, with everything from Titanic crisps to television shows to local radio playing a certain horse-faced Canadian ballad all the bloody time.  I would have thought something more dignified would be called for instead of all the cash-grabbing and shoving down our throats what was technically the failure (allegedly derived from shoddy workmanship) of a notoriously sectarian shipyard that resulted in over a thousand deaths like it is something to celebrate.  I'm still sort of holding on to the hope it's a joke I haven't got yet rather than something a bit ghoulish, although the crisps are actually quite nice if you like ready salted.

Any other Northern scumbags got an opinion on the celebrations, or perhaps plans to attend or host a party celebrating hundreds of dead people and/or the 3D re-release of James Cameron's famed documentary?

I recall I got along with these two made for tv Ewok movies just fine when I was about 8, and the cartoon had a boss theme have always hated Ewoks and seeing as we've lost the "how would you have made the Star Wars prequels?" thread somewhere - or I can't find it, same thing, really - I thought I'd start again, mainly by pointing out that technically Caravan of Courage is a prequel so it counts as part of the discussion.  I know a lot of fans refuse to acknowledge Caravan and it's sequel as canon, but the little kid in it actually did turn up in one of the Star wars novels - which Lucas says are canon* - as a grown-up intrepid space reporter, so nyer.

In this theoretical discussion I assume you can't actually travel in time and alter Jedi by changing the visual design of the Ewoks, but being as this is Lucas we're talking about, you can butcher a piece of cinema history by booting up the supercomputers at the ranch and CGI-ing real bears over the Ewoks so that The Battle of Endor becomes not an embarrassment to a franchise but a logical result of what happens when you put anyone at all up against an entire planet of bears who have just discovered guns.  This also retroactively creates an extra layer of security for the shield generator and makes the design of the Death Star make more sense, as before you even get to the Imperial presence you have to wade through a planet-sized forest full of grizzlies.

Anyway, with that redesign in place, I'd make Caravan of Courage about a family who crashland on Endor and discover that the Ewoks are massive creatures at the top of the - now rather sparsely-populated - food chain but technologically not very advanced because whatever God dwells in Endor's trees probably feels that they're dangerous enough.  While repairing their ship, the family begin to disappear one by one at the hands of an unseen monster that the Ewoks insist actually does exist even though no-one ever sees it except the Ewoks who witness it abducting a family member, which usually occurs just before a suspiciously large meat dish is served in the main hall.  The film ends with the mysterious beast never seen and the Ewoks are all very sad that there are no humans left, so they move on to new feeding grounds, which are probably near the Imperial generator seen in Jedi, retroactively also giving a reason for what they try to do with Han and Luke in that movie which is a bit at odds with the fluffy human-lovers of caravan of Courage and Battle For Endor.

Alternatively, I'd just give Wicket floppy hair and black eyeliner and have him mope around the forest like a gimp wondering why there's so much pain in the world and why no-one understands him.  So, any thoughts on how two embarrassing made-for-tv movies one step shy of the Holiday Special could have been improved?


*until he totally ignores and/or contradicts them in Clone Wars or something.

Just a heads-up for any fans of Death's Head, Simon Furman or Hulk - the current issue of Panini's Marvel Heroes (#33) features a ruck between Death's Head and the Hulk on the surface of the moon with the Fate Of Millions At Stake(TM).

It's the usual stuff from MH, with the seemingly omnipresent Ferg Handly doing a competent lead-in strip with artist John Ross for the main event by Death's head creator Simon Furman and artist Simon Williams which looks great, but doesn't do much beyond have the characters punch each other a bit before going their separate ways.
A little disappointing compared to Marvel US' all-ages material which is layered and has writers like Fred Van Lente, Paul Tobin and Alex Zalban treating the format like the audience is capable of getting a joke, appreciating broader themes at work in the narrative, or even just enjoying the outre trappings of the genre without being ashamed of it.  I'd have hoped the UK end of things could make a better showing than this, but it probably scratches an itch if you've been jonesing for more appearances of one of Marvel UK's more enduring characters.

Why it's taken this long for Marvel to join up with an anime studio to produce adaptations of their properties is anyone's guess, and as actual anime shows go it's a bit generic, but the Japanese design aesthetic works well married to the Iron Man concept, and the cgi is a lot more refined here than in shows like Transformers: Cybertron or Zoids.
Might be worth looking at if you're into sci-fi and/or superheroics: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4ES3UJyof4

Forgive me if I missed another thread about this, but I shall dispense with subtlety and throw this out there: The Deep is not very good.  Yes the Abyss was over 20 years ago, but there's this thing called video, which was replaced by DVD, and complimented by this thing called television upon which the Abyss has been shown frequently for the last couple of decades and people have not forgotten that the Abyss is a film that existed and The Deep is a pale, pale shadow of that flawed but notable sci-fi classic that seems to think no-one will notice the similarities, because there is nothing here that isn't derived from the Abyss in some manner, right down to actual FX shots.

Technically, the Deep is quite poor, with the (carpeted) sets looking like wood paneling with bits of pipe stuck onto them when they should look like a submarine interior, something you notice because stuff like the minisubs and computer panels look so much more detailed and impressive than everything else around them, the script drops nothing but exposition, and some FX shots have no visual context so you don't actually know - for instance - that the sub in the opening scene is sinking into an (ahem) abyss, because the actress in the shot is clearly sitting upright despite supposedly dropping backwards and it's actually quite important that you know what's happening at this point because she's buying the farm and it informs a lot of what happens later.  The incidental music is also hilariously jarring thanks to someone thinking aimless drumbeats is the same thing as an actual score - thank you, Battlestar Galactica - and James "some of my best friends are catholics" Nesbitt is one of those hilariously wooden actors I could watch all day, but here he's just wasted making wobbly lips and being acted off the screen by a small child (though fair enough, this is why I can watch him in the first place).

It's not as good as Doctor Who episodes that have covered much the same kind of thematic ground or shared the same kind of enclosed setting, and whatever your opinion of Who, arguably the standards for a trans-Atlantic co-production science fiction miniseries with sort-of-if-I-squint-and-lie-to-myself-they-kinda-look-like name stars should be higher than that of a weekly kids' fantasy series about a ponce and his fag hag gallivanting around in a magic box.

Mind you, this being a BBC production and thus 'ours', standard criticism does not apply.  The Deep is probably actually brilliant stuff and 'original' and 'gripping' and 'well acted' and things like that, but I wouldn't trust Minnie Driver's character to drive a car, yet we're supposed to buy her as a captain of an experimental space submarine which she crashes the first time she takes it out for a drive?  Ach... I despair of stuff like this - if it's successful, everything bad about it will stand out as being what comprises the elements of successful sci-fi rather than objectively poor production ("My magic screwdriver can rewrite DNA!"), or if the show fails, the genre will be blamed rather than a derivative and unexceptional programme, but mileage does vary for these things and Stargate Universe has plenty of fans, so it's entirely possible you will sit down and think this is fantastic stuff - and who's to say you're wrong?

[Big Dave]

Ignoring that there's a Guilty Pleasures thread somewhere where there's far too much qualification and not enough blatant and potentially wrong-headed enthusiasm, I've took it upon myself to start a counter-thread to "Disliked Thrills", stemming from someone (and I'll bet money it was that shite-stirrer Campbell again) saying they hated Simon Coleby's old art style.

Well [spoiler]fuck[/spoiler] you and the horse you rode in on - I loved those chunky lines and beefy characters even when the pairing with a colourist didn't come out so great.

Big Dave was just as much a thickeared racist arsehole as seen in many a 2000AD tale before and since only without the veneer of respectability that came with being betrayed, having your family murdered or living in Dinoland/Planet Leslie, and it was the one strip that I could get other people to read - so if it was intended to expand 2000ADs readership beyond the usual shower of contrarian communist liberals it succeeded.
Maniac 5 - giant robots blow shit up.  APPROVED.  It also looked fantastic.
Judge Dredd: Inferno - "what's the matter, Grice?  FEELING RUN DOWN?"  NEXT PROG: YOU HEARD THE MAN!
That Robo Hunter one with the Fat Slags and one of Sam's doubles being a blaxploitation character - I don't care that this had nothing to do with Robo Hunter, it was basically an early 90s sci-fi action movie condensed to twenty pages.
Babe Race 2000 - "clearly symptomatic of Millar's misogyny" - no, it's symptomatic of Millar's obsession with having a career and writing things someone might want to read: it is a strip drawn by Andy Williams back when he did backgrounds where big-tittied strippers drive around the world while blowing up Frenchmen.  I was always going to read that and so were you.

I also suspect this thread may derail into me telling you all why Space Precinct was one of Gerry Anderson's better shows and then threatening to track you down and set you on fire when you disagree.

Apologies if posted already:
http://www.quietearth.us/articles/2010/03/11/Coming-to-the-BBC-a-new-6-part-post-apocalyptic-comic-adaptation-FALLOUT

Apologies if there's a thread already somewhere back in the sands of time when this actually came out, but in the spirit of COD4 and Pikmin 2 where great games languish unplayed for ages on a shelf before I wander around to them (currently not playing Arkham Asylum, Dragon Age, or the last two GTA add-ons), I just had a wee marathon on Uncharted 1 (which I'd given up on during the Lost Colony bits because it felt too repetitive) and 2, and if ever there was a game that didn't need a film adaptation, it's Uncharted 2.

Some great setpieces like the train battle, or jumping from truck to truck in a moving convoy on a mountain road at high speeds for fistfights with eurotrash, gunfights in collapsing hotels, battles with the goat-men of Nepal, and that's before you even get to the Tomb Raider-lite puzzles that emphasise scale and fun over puzzles that make you want to punch the tv like that Incan/Aztec calender thing with the skull and the motorbike in TR: Underworld that was just annoying.
The voice and motion capture acting is some of the best I've seen in a game, and the characters aren't petulant dicks, which I've always found to be a common trope in lazy VG writing - it all adds up to a pretty good summer blockbustery-type experience from the makers of the PS2 Jak games, and despite feeling a bit light and fluffy to play, I'd go so far as to call it one of the essential next-gen games.

Any love out there?