Messages

As someone who already loathed VIII, all this stuff from Mr. Prime and Mr. Panther about gentler heroism and so forth helps further crystallise some of why I hated it. Cheers, lads! (I'm not having a go at either of you, honest - your assessment of the film's attitude and themes features some insightful analysis, but whereas you both warmed to the idea of the movie undermining what you refer to as the tropes of old, I did not.

Arguably Luke in ROTJ had already opted for the 'gentler heroism' route and TLJ just reiterated it.

[Tron Legacy]

Tron Legacy. Considerable improvement on the original, in terms of plot, performances, effects and designs.

I like it a lot. I even quite like the uncanny valley quality of CLU in the computer world — the creepy not-quite-rightness of it, intentional or not, actually works in the story's favour. I'm sorry it didn't do better at the box office, because I'd have happily seen more.

It did well enough that they did a TV series (which I've not seen so can't comment upon).

The cartoon was already in development and deals for cast and crew were in place at the time the film was released. It was promptly cancelled after its first season due to lack of viewers.

https://www.comingsoon.net/tv/news/71470-tron-uprising-coming-to-disney-xd-in-2012

Interestingly enough, An Post - the equivalent of Royal Mail here in the Emerald Isle - have not, to the best of my knowledge at least, had Saturday deliveries for as long as I can remember, if ever. (Of course, I stand to be corrected on this, but I can only ever recall Monday to Friday postal deliveries in this country.)

There are weekend deliveries at Christmas time.

For me there's more of a direct line from Asterix to 2000AD; both existing in the same zone of influence as the old Signet novel sized MAD digests with yellowed pages I was reading at the same time — even though they were from the 60s and 70s the humour and style hadn't aged at all and were a mine of wider cultural references that stuck with me. All that was mixed-in with plenty of the usuals of IPC/DC Thompson humour comics.

Tintin I never took to as it just felt like the Blue Peter of comics, and I didn't like Blue Peter, ever. I can of course appreciate it now though — Tintin I mean. I'll never like Blue Peter.

[Mansions of the Gods]

Mansions of the Gods pour moi.

I'm not sure he has dementia. I don't really recognise in him what happened to my gran, although I guess it affects people very differently. What I do see is someone who has some kind of personality disorder (likely narcissism) combined with huge privilege, and with the more typical issues that come with age (poor memory) and sheer arrogance (talking bullshit, like he has all his life, but now being under scrutiny for it).

Yes, I've seen what dementia is really like, and it's nothing like whatever Trump has.

I think we can safely say Trump has cognitive impairment, much like his friend, Joe Biden.

We've known he's part of SAGE since the Sunday Times reported it several weeks ago.

Just in case anyone was uncertain what actual honest-to-God evil looks like, here's a snippet from today's Sunday Times by Tim Shipman, their political editor:

The final paragraph implies worse.

[Revealed: leader of group peddling bleach as coronavirus 'cure' wrote to Trump this week]

Revealed: leader of group peddling bleach as coronavirus 'cure' wrote to Trump this week

Mark Grenon wrote to Trump saying chlorine dioxide 'can rid the body of Covid-19' days before the president promoted disinfectant as treatment

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/revealed-leader-group-peddling-bleach-cure-lobbied-trump-coronavirus?CMP=share_btn_fb&fbclid=IwAR1YxIxkgmOvWM3wadM4Tx02ja5vzZZGQKz5LoTox2HXUFFh-fO0AeKiM5M

A touch of Jim Baikie.

[How China's "Bat Woman" Hunted Down Viruses from SARS to the New Coronavirus]

How China's "Bat Woman" Hunted Down Viruses from SARS to the New Coronavirus

Wuhan-based virologist Shi Zhengli has identified dozens of deadly SARS-like viruses in bat caves, and she warns there are more out there


The genomic sequence of the virus—now officially called SARS-CoV-2 because it is related to the SARS pathogen—was 96 percent identical to that of a coronavirus the researchers had identified in horseshoe bats in Yunnan, they reported in a paper published last month in Nature. "It's crystal clear that bats, once again, are the natural reservoir," says Daszak, who was not involved in the study.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-chinas-bat-woman-hunted-down-viruses-from-sars-to-the-new-coronavirus1//[url]

[referendum]

We're not out of the woods yet.

Ireland's Blasphemy Law was removed by referendum from the Constitution in 2018.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/oct/27/ireland-votes-to-oust-blasphemy-ban-from-constitution

when I look at diagnosed cases and the current deaths in this country, it's more like nine (and that's only hospital deaths and without post mortems of those who died but weren't diagnosed while still alive).

UK having done so little community testing and tracing so far means the official infected numbers recorded are way too low in comparison to deaths, and most likely far below actual number of infections. Still a high death rate, unfortunately.

Don't tell me people would be happier if the last we'd seen of Judge Death and The Angel Gang had been at the conclusions to Judge Death Lives and The Judge Child? Long-running strips need to keep coming back to their bankable assets and I don't see anything wrong with crow-barring in a little plot amendment to facilitate this. I read Guatemala last year, it was brilliant then and it's brilliant now, and nothing that happens subsequently will change that.

Neither Judge Death nor The Angel Gang got a send-off that approached the sentiment of Dredd's final farewell to Hershey.

"The DUP distanced itself from the comments, telling the BBC Stephen Nolan show Ballymena councillor John Carson was expressing a personal opinion and not that of the party"

Says a lot when even the DUP are all "nope — that's too fucking nuts, even for us".

It's not an unexpected utterance from one of their rank.

I've started this post several times with a few different reports from the NHS but can't really find the words.

Just this: whatever social distancing and personal hygiene regime you're currently practicing please double it. Really. Step it up again.

That's all. I'll see you on the other side.
Eamonn

Thanks, Eamonn.

It can't be stated enough: We only get one chance.

Stay safe.