We jump back into the fray with Greg Hatcher, to talk debate the merits of Star Trek Discovery, the future of the franchise and what we want from a Trek property.
We also look at the trailer for the new streaming Titans series, and wonder why such a fun property would want to be dour and overserious. Why do so many fans –and even creators — just miss the point?
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While Casey has to run upstairs and be a dad, Mike continues his talk with Joe Preti and Tobiah Panshin for a full-throated bitch-sesh about the state of the comic book industry. From Marvel and DC’s refusal to change its accessibility, sales methods and whether its time to give up the ghost of the monthly issue, we wonder if the current superhero output from those two great companies just isn’t for us anymore.
And is DC Comics secretly a doomsday cult trying to provoke Alan Moore into ending the world?
Plus, we talk about cartoon voice actors and try to make heads or tails out of the design of K.I.T.T. from Knight Rider.
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The rules have been reset.
We close out Terminator Month with Week Four, where we jump into our homemade time displacement machine with Sam Mulvey of Ask an Atheist to break our brains trying to sort out the continuity of the sequel…prequel…soft reboot(?) that recreates the franchise for a new generation: Terminator: Genisys.
When John Connor sends soldier Kyle Reese back to 1984 Los Angeles to protect his mother and safeguard the future, Reese finds himself in a different 1984 with a different Sarah Connor. The war across time between humans and machines has fractured the timeline. Now the only thing standing between the human race and utter destruction are Kyle, Sarah and an older, obsolete T-800 Terminator acting as their protector. Bring plenty of aspirin and a flow chart.
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“A man chooses… a slave obeys…”
Mike and Casey pile into a bathysphere and flee the surface world, and the clawing hands of Big Government and the Parasites to reserve their tables at the Kashmir Restaurant with first panelists Patrick Johnson, and Carlos Rodela of the Video Game Break Podcast. Our topic, the revolutionary 2007 video game, BioShock and its sequels.
We explore the immersive game world of Rapture, the failed undersea utopia inspired by the free-market Objectivist philosophy of Ayn Rand. We look at whether video games can transcend the reputation of being a fun distraction, and whether they can truly be works of art in their own right. And finally, we contemplate the limitations and possibilities of player choice in games, and whether complex storytelling is at odds with the agency to make character decisions.
Previously titled: “Being a Selfish Asshole Is the Best Thing You Can Be”
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