You know it's going to be a great day when an amazing band like Finom releases a a new single and announces a brand new album. Finom, formally known as OHMME (and even longer ago as HOMME) is the musical project of Macie Stewart and Sima Cunningham. The pair are an ever evolving musical powerhouse, shifting their sound with every release into stranger and more exciting territory. This latest album, Not God, has Finom continuing on that trajectory, enlisting Jeff Tweedy to produce the record and kicking things off with lead single "Haircut". A quick burst of drums ushers in "Haircut" before Stewart and Cunningham's intertwined voices stroll in. The pair sing lines "written following the stream of suggested words" from Stewart’s phone, making for a dizzying and distorted experience. The strangeness somehow creates some entertaining lyricism that reaches a preposterous excuse in it's chorus: "Yeah, I’m sorry but I’m not gonna wanna. It’s the time of day I can get my haircut." It's as odd as Finom have gotten and it makes for a damn fine earworm of a song. Pair it with the off the wall and eccentric video directed by Alex Grelle and you have yourself an overwhelmingly great experience. You can pre-order Finom's Not God over at their Bandcamp or directly from their label Joyful Noise Recordings. Finom will also be performing at The Hideout on May 24th. Tickets are $20, so don't miss this fantastic show.

With my (almost) weekly "Lets Get Physical" posts reminding why I adore the physical media world, I felt like it would be a good idea to look ahead in the world of the hobby. So once a moth I'll be taking a look at the upcoming Blu-Ray releases for the month and giving my two cents on which you should be keeping an eye on. You can see a good chunk of the upcoming releases over at Blu-Ray.com's site! The James Cameron Trio: The Abyss, True Lies, & Aliens Theses have been a long time coming. The Abyss and True Lies have been out of print or just hard to find in the US for quite a while, so they are sights for sore eyes! Now, not all James Cameron 4k transfers are created equal and some are just out right bad (Terminator 2: Judgement Day I;m not just looking at you, I'm YELLING). Screen shots are showing a bit DNR (digital noise reduction) at hand, making for softer textures and film grain going out the window, but I hope the experience will be better than the stills. Event Horizon 4K Steelbook (re-release) Yes this is a rerelease from the fallen Best Buy movie section, but it bears repeating. I subscribe to the fan canon that Event Horizon is a sneaky Warhammer 40k movie depictibg a particularly hellish piece of lore. Even if you don't, its a pretty fun horror movie set in space! Are there elements of Alien, 2001: a Space Odyssey, and more littered throughout the film? Yeah, but it's probably Paul W.S. Anderson's best movie and every actor is giving it their all. Plus who doesn't want to see Sam Neill in another fantastic horror film! (side note: Sam Neill's horror catalog is pretty damn impressive.) River Terror Vision, your purveyor of lesser seen genre films, recently announced their new sub label Graveface Films. Focusing on the more arthouse/indie/non-genre films overall more "palatable" releases that the far out genre playground of Terror Vision, Graveface Films is set to be a very welcome new boutique label. Their kick off release, River, is touted as a time-looping narrative full of heartwarming and funny moments. As a fan of time travel stories, this one is close to the top of my more anticipated releases. Mexican Lucha Trio from Indicator: The Panther Women, The Bat Woman, & Santo vs. the Riders of Terror Indicator puts out some fantastic collections ranging from old Hollywood classics, forgotten gems from the modern age, to completely off the beaten track treasures. This month it's closer ot the latter with a trio of their releases based on the Lucha Libre exploitation flicks of Mexico. Each one of these is perfect for those who want a taste of the grindhouse that we normally would get in the US (or UK for that matter). While these releases don't have individual posters like their jam packed Enter El Santo , each one still features an 80 page booklet and some exciting extras (including the softcore verison of  Santo vs. the Riders of Terror, Lepers and Sex) Check out  Blu-Ray.com for even more upcoming releases.

Our writer Julian Ramirez is a big proponent of physical media, always lauding formats new and old (mostly old nowadays). Whether is vinyl, cassettes or CDs; 4k UHD, Blu-ray, or VHS, he believes that physical media is an important part of preserving art and imbues another dimension of appreciating the work.  This series will focus on some of his favorite pieces of physical media in his collection. I love Twin Peaks. It's easily my favorite TV show of all time as it somehow manages to be funny, awkward, harrowing, disturbing, and so deep with lore that it still begs to be deciphered even after 30 years. Created by Mark Frost and David Lynch, the show follows the town of Twin Peaks as they mourn the loss of Laura Palmer, a young pillar of the community that has as many dark secrets as the town itself. Twin Peaks just scratches every itch I have when it comes to a good time watching TV. And while I adore Lynch (he's a top 5 director for me and I've attended every Retrospective the Music Box Theatre has put on), the show is as much his as it is his collaborators from top to bottom regardless of what other diehard Lynch fans think. So over the years I have amassed a LOT of the physical releases of Twin Peaks. I didn't stumble on to the show until my early teens, so I missed out on the first DVD release that for a little while felt impossible to find (I have since acquired a copy). Instead I was satiated with bootleg DVDs purchased at comic book conventions. My first exposure to the show was here and it completely hooked me from the first episode. My first official collection was the The Definitive Gold Box Edition which even at the time wasn't entirely true. Even the later Complete Mystery edition which featured the prequel sequel film Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me and the long awaiting Missing Pieces wasn't exactly everything (those initial audio commentaries are only available on the first official DVD release). But it came close especially as those Missing Pieces were deleted scenes from the film that many fans dreamed would contain answers and just as many figured would be just as labyrinthine (its actually both). But with The Return, all these releases would be just a little less complete. The Return saw Twin Peaks expand with another 18 episodes, all written by Frost and Lynch and directed entirely by Lynch. Its truly an near 18 hour long film that explores the world of Twin Peaks 25 years after the end of the second season. For some its a frustrating experience, indulging in Lynch's more esoteric ramblings. For me, it's Lynch at his best, exploring the frighting evil the humanity is capable of in the modern age. So with the end of the series it was time for another collection and Twin Peaks: Z - A, for the time being, is as complete as it's gonna get (those damn audio commentaries still elude us! ) Twin Peaks: Z - A features every episode of the show, including the European version of the pilot which acts a singular film and encompasses the supernatural layer of the story pretty well. It also has Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me and the Missing Pieces in all their oddball glory. The Return is also here with a 4k version of "Episode 8" or "Got a Light" which for my money eclipses previous best episodes of Twin Peaks ("Episode 2"/"Zen, or the Skill to Catch a Killer", "Episode 14"/"Lonely Souls" and "Episode 29"/"Beyond Life and Death""). It's a beautiful collection, housed in a cube adorned with imagery familiar with the series: trees, red velvet curtains, black and white zig-zag patterns. Inside is an acrylic standee of Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee) evoking the original image of her whispering the answer to the show's integral mystery into Agent Dale Cooper's (Kyle MacLachlan) ear, but instead kissing him as she is seen during The Return. Even further in we discover a collection of square images from the show and behind the scenes, perfect to decorate anyone's Lynch Obsesses home. The discs are housed in the bane of every collector's bane: cardboard slips that don't secure the discs. While I've never had an issue with this sort of packaging, but I know it's not perfect and I get a little nervous every time I slip a disc out. As is tradition, I began a rematch of the series last weekend on Twin Peaks day (February 24) and was just as enthralled by the quirky townspeople being terrorized by otherworldly forces as I was during my first time. I won't pretend to know exactly what is going on with every bit of lore or the true meaning of the show (unlike some slightly too self assured and arrogant 4 hour and a half long videos) but I have my theories and will be discussing some of them in the coming weeks. In the meantime, I highly encourage you to watch Twin Peaks. The Z to A edition is currently out of print, but there are plenty of regular edition copies of Twin Peaks on physical media online. It's a wonderful show and you won't regret it. The show is also streaming on Paramount+ if that's your bag.

Despite being almost 20 years old at this point (seriously!), Avatar: The Last Airbender still has a passionate fan base. And thanks to streaming services, new fans have been discovering Nickelodeon’s Avatar: The Last Airbender in waves as it has gone on and off of sites like Netflix. It’s not surprise, then, that Netflix would want to create a live action adaptation of The Last Airbender. While fans are quick to disown M. Night Symalan’s The Last Airbender for his depressing portrayal of the “Uhvatar” and its clumsy adaptation of the source material’s first season. It’s no wonder, then, that news of this live action show was met with some trepidation. Especially when original series showrunners Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino decided to leave over creative differences. But it couldn’t be that bad, right? Well… I just finished binging the Netflix series, and while it does a few things right, it is a disappointing adaptation that fumbles major characters, and suffers from a strange format, poor direction, bad writing, and a whole lots of other strange story mishandling that detracted from the show’s serious potential. I do have some bias. As I mentioned, I’m a huge fan of Nickelodeon’s Avatar: The Last Airbender. The show is nearly perfect, even if it did have a semi-rough first season as it was finding its footing. But it’s a show full of heart, subverted expectations, and some great characters that grow believably over the course of three seasons. The source material for the Netflix adaptation is so beloved that even the animated show’s creators couldn’t win fans over with the follow-up The Legend of Korra in the same was as they did the original. The Netflix show, therefore, was probably never going to make everyone happy. I can’t say that Netflix’s Avatar: The Last Airbender didn’t have a rocky start. From the very first episode it was hard for me to get away from some of the costuming choices and set designs. They also didn’t do enough to establish Aang as a potentially worldly kid. In fact, they do a bad job establishing him as a “kid” at all, immediately showing him flying through the air as the other Air Nomads look on in awe. Aang, portrayed here by Gordon Cormier is a child, like as in the source material–and while I don’t want to bash child actors, Aang’s portrayal is stilted and lacks the main character's trademark charisma and charm. Taking Aang into live action is tough, and while Cormier looks like him well enough, it’s hard to get behind this incarnation. Let me get this out of the way right now: any of the acting decisions, line deliveries, and anything like that may have been at the behest of the director. And, frankly, some of these actors are kids–so there is a certain amount of leeway that I think should be given. However, the real blame here lies on the directors and the writers. Despite the live action show and the source material’s first seasons having similar runtimes, the format of the show required lots of truncation of stories. This lead to a whole lot of expository narrative dumps–and everyone knows that in storytelling it’s always best to show, and not tell. Unfortunately., there's a hell of a lot of telling here. Characters frequently make references to exciting adventures they had offscreen, instead of showing us these moments. This means that a lot of the bonding that is happening between the main characters is happening off screen. And a lot of their growth as characters–their bending abilities getting better, and how they deal with their predicament emotionally–is left for the characters to talk about instead of perform. The direction itself is pretty wanting, too. There are lots of character reactions that are literally missing. There aren’t many reaction shots in the show–at least none that shows the character’s face in close-up. This gives action sequences a cheap, stage play feel to them. And the costuming only helps lend to that feeling. Some of the characters are portrayed well, and some of the casting is spot on. Zuko and Iroh are portrayed well–even despite some significant changes to Iroh’s character. There is a lot of screen time dedicated to showing the audience why Iroh would go on this journey with Zuko, when most of that could have been shown in their relationship in real-time, and not through flashbacks. In fact, a lot of these flashbacks give us too much information about what happened before, while we only get quips about what is happening now. I understand why some of the story decisions were made. And it was interesting to see major plotlines from the source material being mashed together to form new stories. But to do this there were some major sacrifices made to the messages behind those stories, and sadly, to beloved characters. Bumi, especially, was done dirty by the show. There were some changes I appreciated, however, even if they required some contrivances to exist. Seeing Avatar Kyoshi go ham on that group of Fire Nation soldiers was pretty fun. But a lot of Aang’s eagerness and fun lovingness was left behind here for the sake of the narrative. Tonally, Netflix’s Avatar: The Last Airbender is a lot darker than the cartoon. I don’t know if the show needed to focus on the horror of war. Maybe the showrunners wanted to make a point of how a world that has been in conflict for 100 years would react. Spoilers: everyone has PTSD. And how can you blame them? The Fire Nation is pretty ruthless, with people burning to death screaming pretty frequently on this show. But the showrunners can’t grasp a global conflict of this scale, and they don’t realize that the entire world wouldn't be plunged into constant war for 100 years. This is further proved by a sweet (but dumb) story beat where Zuko saved a “divison” of troops, only for them to be ordered to accompany him on his exile instead of die needlessly. Except, a division of soldiers is way more crew than is needed for a boat. I guess I can’t say how the Fire Nation divides its forces, but even so, the battle plan made it sound like this “division” would be a significant force, not just like 20-40 dudes. And the entire show is littered with writing issues like this. Overall, this first season of Avatar: The Last Airbender felt a lot less epic than its source material’s first season. The characters grew, but it was all offscreen. They bonded–again, offscreen. Except for Iroh and Zuko, who had extensive screen time dedicated to making them sympathetic characters–instead of just having it naturally through their actions as the story progressed. It also suffers from a horribly uneven tone–with people burning to death and others suffering PTSD, and the writers still trying to inject some of the lighthearted fun that permeated the source material. They failed. It also doesn’t help that the showrunners felt it necessary to change significant portions of the source material’s lore, as well as character’s personalities and even motivations. What’s left is something that I’d probably enjoy watching on Ember Island, but not really what I wanted out of a live action Avatar. Did anyone even really ask for this? Avatar the Last Airbender is streaming now on Netflix.

Fast food giant Wendy’s plans to test out its own form of surge pricing in 2025, according to comments made by its CEO during the company’s February earnings call.  "Beginning as early as 2025, we will begin testing more enhanced features like dynamic pricing,” Wendy’s CEO Kirk Tanner said on the call, according to Gizmodo . Tanner said the company plans to invest approximately $20 million in digital menus, with an additional $10 million “over the next two years to support digital menu board enhancements for the global system.” The digital menus will allow the company to change its prices easily at any time of day or night, depending on whatever arbitrary justification they feel allows for a “dynamic” shift in price.  Tanner also said the company plans to move forward with “AI enabled menu changes and suggestive selling,” according to Nation’s Restaurant News . Wendy’s will also reportedly spend $55 million over the next two years to market its breakfast menu in the US and Canada.  Thanks to rideshare behemoths like Uber and Lyft consumers have become forced to accept companies worming surge pricing into more parts of our lives. While price changes based on whims has been common in industries like travel and hospitality, with airlines charging more for tickets based on peak travel times and hotels charging more based on peak tourism numbers in an area, the practice is becoming increasingly common in other sectors. As if there isn’t enough price gouging already when it comes to concerts and sporting events, surge pricing dynamic pricing is becoming increasingly common when purchasing tickets.  Changing prices based on vibes is a practice designed to extract as much wealth from both consumer and worker, especially when it comes to goods and services. We’ve already begrudgingly accepted that a Dave’s Single in New York City ($6.99) will be a couple bucks more than in other places like its flagship location in Dublin, Ohio ($5.49). Drivers pay more at the pump based on geographic location and time of year. When the COVID-19 pandemic began, 36 percent of toilet paper increased by 20 percent , and 11 percent at least doubled in price, with the highest price increase coming in at just under $80 ($30.95 to $109.99) for a 36 roll package.  Wendy’s seems to believe that people will embrace and even celebrate the move. "We expect our digital menu boards will drive immediate benefits to order accuracy, improve crew experience, and [prompt] sales growth from upselling and consistent merchandising execution,” said Tanner.  But the reason why surge pricing works for ride sharing or concert tickets is because a very small amount of companies have a near monopoly on the good or service. If you need a ride and are out of other options like public transit or cycling and can’t find a cab, Uber and Lyft are the only games in town. Almost every major tour sells through Ticketmaster. But in a good chunk of America, you can throw a rock in almost any direction and hit a car in a drive-thu. Many times, if there’s a Wendy’s, there’s also a McDonald’s, a Burger King, and probably a KFC or Taco Bell, not to mention any number of regional chains or independent owned fast food joints.  Whether or not surge pricing will be the windfall the company’s executives hope it will be is up in the air, but the really unfortunate part for all of us is that if one of the fast food chains is toying with the idea, it probably means more of them are. Which means as we march bravely into the future, we need to be prepared for a sea of digital signs screaming ever changing prices in our faces that are most likely far too high for what they’re offering.

There have been two fascinating trends I’ve seen growing over the last couple of years. Analog horror in the Youtube space and the fake found game within the gaming sphere. While they can be separate, there is a tendency for overlap. It’s a new groundbreaking way to tell a story outside of the traditional pen/paper and film. These both use multi medium ARG’s (Alternate Reality Gaming) to tell an intricate story, create a mythos and develop something wholly new, but for those without this background knowledge, let me explain. Before we dig into the meat of this discussion, I’d also want to explain to you what an ARG is. This stands as the modern day scavenger hunt. Taking a series of dots and dashes seen in a Youtube video, and deciphering it in morse code to get a URL to a separate website with more puzzles to solve. These generally have a start and an end, but are usually community driven, as Reddit has become a popular place for people to convene and trade notes to progress the plot of the scavenger hunt. One of the more unknown mainstream ARGs was for the film Cloverfield, which had the community decoding and traveling sometimes in the real world, to get more story on the film before its release. These projects are massive undertakings but work as marketing tools in a lot of ways, leaving fans chomping at the bit. Now let’s talk about Analog Horror. The conceit of Analog Horror is using older technology, cryptic messages and late 20th century television style. Things like The Blair Witch Project. Not all analog horror is found footage, but the idea of camera scan lines, jump cuts, CRT static fuzz. There are dozens of different Analog Horror youtube series that are just clips of various cable access programs from the 90s but with hidden messages, secret URLs and an entire rabbit hole of codes to decipher leading you into a spooky tale of demonic invasions or serial killers coming through your TV. The level of polish and quality of these videos are fascinating because they are created out of love for storytelling. Watching clips of Local 58’s channel, you would be hard pressed to think that these weren’t anything but 90’s news briefings when really they are warnings about the moon watching us waiting to strike. I’ve never been one to join in on any active ARG’s but I can’t help but be in awe of it all. Watching explainer videos on The Mandela Catalogue, Don’t Huge Me I’m Scared or The Walten Files have been my late night ritual for a few years now. The stories are great, but the real appeal is  understanding the minds that are running numbers through decoders, or audio signals through spectrograms. Polybius ciphers are lost on me and digging into website HTML code never clicked in my brain but the fans persevere. Similarly, Found Game Storytelling, is another form of Analog Horror, but the old tech used is Videogames. Games like Amanda the Adventurer and Inscryption are promoted as long lost games of the NES and Floppy Disk era while Petscop, and Shipwrecked 64 are from the Nintendo 64 and Playstation 1 days. All seem fairly harmless but after a playthrough, the games all start to go off the rails in their own way. Amanda the Adventurer and Mr TomatoS both pose as edu-tainment styled learning games that when given incorrect answers, the characters in game react in extremely unnerving ways while Petscop’s backwards speech conversations and wall breaking gameplay can lead to mysterious graves. The newest in this trend, Shipwrecked 64, plays similarly to  Mario 64, where you are  Bucky Beaver trying to get his friends off an island full of bossy wolves. That seems simple enough as a premise, and traditionally the game can be completed in 30 minutes, the games in game description talks about its mysterious release and quick removal from store shelves. When failing quests, walking through walls and discovering hidden passcodes, a rivalry between a game publisher and developer is discovered. A sorted tale of suicide, murder and undead mascot monsters all lies underneath the surface for you. Also this year came Home Safety Hotline, a game of answering phone calls for a hotline service, giving people advice and services based on the pests they describe in their home. As you progress you find that the pests end up being more and more cryptids including hobs, slimes and mirror nymphs. It’s as mundane as it is surreal and leads to some very fun conversations, but it’s that shift from the humdrum to the supernatural that catches you off guard. What makes it Analog Horror is its use of the retro style Microsoft ‘95 interface to interact with the calls as well as its unassuming work-like appearance to hide something sinister. It’s the fake out that is common to the genre. I think that’s what makes these kinds of phenomena so bewitching to me. I love learning about niche cultures that lie just underneath the surface and that’s exactly what these games are. Face value means nothing, Analog Horror and the Found Game genre are the epitome of an iceberg. There’s a group of dedicated fans and creators, all working together to create and discover new stories to tell and new ways to tell them. Hell, there’s even a new ongoing series that’s neither Youtube nor Video Game but just a website that is an ARG all it’s own, with a rich unsettling lore inspired by Mr Rogers called Welcome Home. There’s just so much more to explore in this space as far as storytelling. All you have to do is just look a little deeper, I know I’ll continue to do so.

I appreciate the fact that video games of all eras are being represented by contemporary developers. It’s no surprise that even tried and true formulas will be tweaked by modern developers mixing up the formula a bit. WRATH: Aeon of Ruin is an example of a game that has a great retro feel with some “why’d they do it?” tweaks the developer made to the formula that actually end up not entirely ruining the whole experience. WRATH: Aeon of Ruin is a first person retro style shooter in the vein of Quake or other fast-paced 3D shooters that came out of the mid to late 90’s. It's set in a vague afterlife type world with a flimsy story that sets up the most important part: gibbing lots of low poly enemies with extreme prejudice. As with any other “boomer shooter” movement is fast, and enemies are plenty. There are a good variety of different enemy types with behaviors that will make you stay moving. Unfortunately, the enemy types stay the same between the multiple different zones you’ll fight across. There also aren’t many boss encounters, which is a bummer. One of the most important parts of a first person shooter is the shooting, and WRATH: Aeon of Ruin does a great job, even if its selection of weapons is unconventional. I’m not unused to strange weapons in first person shooters. The '90s, in fact, were a time when developers were trying to come up with the most unconventional arms you can imagine. That tradition stays alive in this title, with weapons that fire teeth instead of bullets, or globs of explosive acid instead of conventional grenades. There are normal firearms like the shotgun, and the pistol. But every weapon has an alternate fire mode that makes them more interesting than just a normal gun. And let’s talk about that blade. The Outsider also has an arm blade that is absolutely one of the most fun things I’ve had the pleasure of using in a retro themed first person shooter. While most default melee weapons are boring or just useful as tools, the arm blade is a powerful weapon that gibs enemies and even works as a traversal tool. Instead of rocket jumping, you can blade jump after charging up your blade. It’s very cool. Fights take place in a variety of environments, both tight corridors and open arenas. While there are the normal traps with walls sliding away to reveal enemies and such, I can’t say that any of the levels were particularly clever. They were competently made, and had a flow that made it so I never quite felt like I lost my bearing. I never spent too much time wandering around looking for where to go. The biggest departure that WRATH: Aeon of Ruin takes from conventional retro styled shooters is the save system. Traditionally you are allowed to save as much as you want in these games. However, WRATH: Aeon of Ruin incorporates an item-based system. You can only save when you have a soul tether to expend, or if you come across a single-use shrine. Having limited saves is a bold move, as it feels antithetical to the boomer shooter style. It doesn’t really add much to the gameplay, beyond having a bit of extra stress, but I find it didn’t really detract too much, either. Enemy encounters can be difficult, however–and dying does have the potential to derail gameplay significantly. There are power-ups to employ that can help stave off death, and armor/health pick-ups scattered around the level so you never feel too starved of resources. WRATH: Aeon of Ruin feels great to play. It has great shooting, strange but good feeling weapons, and a nice variety of enemies. I do wish there were different enemies for the different zones you fight through, but the limited enemy types kind of fits with the theme. I do wish there was an option for a conventional save system, however. And lack of controller support is a strange decision, especially since WRATH: Aeon of Ruin is exactly like something I’d want to play on the Steam Deck. If you’re into boomer shooters, WRATH: Aeon of Ruin is a no-brainer. I’d even argue it was essential if it didn’t make strange design decisions. WRATH: Aeon of Ruin leaves Early Access tomorrow and will be available for PC via Steam.

So Night Country won’t be the last season of True Detective afterall. Which isn’t really surprising to anyone who has been paying attention to the sheer amount of viewers that Night Country has attracted due to its controversies. Audiences don’t seem fooled, with Night Country’s fresh rating sitting around a rotten 58% as of this writing. However, critics were much more generous with the Issa López driven season, with the majority of critics giving it a 92 percent fresh rating on RottenTomatoes.com. I wish I could have watched the same show they did, because despite Night Country’s careful depiction of Native Alaskans, I didn’t find the portrayal particularly flattering for that group, and the story itself was a jumbled, illogical mess. The only thing saving the season was the great portrayals of Evangeline Navarro (Kali Reis) and Officer Carol Danvers (Jodie Foster) who really played the hell out of their roles. “From conception to release, Night Country has been the most beautiful collaboration and adventure of my entire creative life," López said. "HBO trusted my vision all the way, and the idea of bringing to life a new incarnation of True Detective with Casey, Francesca, and the whole team is a dream come true. I can’t wait to go again.” Pizzolatto, the show’s original creator, has taken to social media to create backlash against the show. Which, to me, is a baffling move bound to hurt his career more than anything else. And while there are a lot of fans and some critics that didn’t enjoy Night Country, there are some fans (and most critics) that did. Francesca Orsi, EVP, HBO Programming, Head of HBO Drama Series and Films had nothing but kind words to say about Night Country and its creator: “Issa López is that one-of-a-kind, rare talent that speaks directly to HBO’s creative spirit," she said. "She helmed True Detective: Night Country from start to finish, never once faltering from her own commendable vision, and inspiring us with her resilience both on the page and behind the camera. Alongside Jodie and Kali’s impeccable performances, she’s made this installation of the franchise a massive success, we are so lucky to have her as part of our family.” This controversy has definitely led to higher viewership for Night Country. Will this trend follow through the 5th season of True Detective? Or is it the curse of that show’s lead to only strike gold once? Only time will tell.

I'll be honest, there was no way I was heading into Madame Web with an open mind and that kinda sucks. But it's not entirely on me. Sony have sculpted a very, VERY, bad superhero reputation after accidentally stumbling upon a good one in the 2000s. Spiderman and Spiderman 2 were fantastic movies that really let Sam Raimi go wild in creating his particular vision of Spider-man, that 60s nerd turned hero but somehow jettisoned into modern day, and made it work. But almost immediately after Spiderman 2, that gold started to tarnish. The Punisher is not the worst thing ever, but it's far from great. Nicolas Cage Ghost Rider? That's wholeheartedly in the so bad they're good spectrum. The rebooted Amazing Spider-man? So many great ideas overstuffed into two movies, making for an exhausting unfinished experience. For every Spider-man Into the Spiderverse there's Morbius and two Venoms. Pretty much literally. So instead of giving you an in depth review about how bad this movie is (and boy is it terrible) and how much I actively enjoyed watching it (I love this dumb movie), I'm going to give you my slightly abridged notes that I took while watching Madame Web in theatres. I've omitted any of my acting comments (just assume the actors were bored or confused throughout) and focused mostly on plot point so spoilers ahead. But if we're still being honest, it doesn't matter. I could rundown every bit of the movie and they way it actually happens on screen is so unbelievably silly that spoilers may improve it. Also here's the trailer for Madame Web, which after watching the movie I am incredibly confused as to what movie they thought they were advertising. This driving seems erratic for an emergency vehicle Is that supposed to be Ben Parker? Why can't you bend cardboard? Are they not allowed to mention Aunt May? Hey, Mike Epps! If this is Pespi product placement, why does she not want Pepsi? I would say all those names are pretty close to Peter... Wait are they not allowed to mention Peter Parker? These goofy future whispers don't work Is that a Spider-man S (spoilers its better (?)) This ADR or dubbing or completely replacing a characters voice is done REALLY badly. Like old martial arts movie badly. NO MIKE EPPS! Why is she watching a Christmas movie in the summer? FEET Spider-Person? FEET Is he switching in and out of that costume or are they all hallucinating? Wait, those are the only connections between all the characters? Just leaving the teens in the woods huh? The cat doesn't care about your embarrassment Madame Webb. OMG HER NECK I know it's a movie but they probably shouldn't have made the trek to the diner on foot be shorter than a car racing to it from the same spot, short cut or not. Hit more Evil Spider-Persons with cars Why are you returning to the scene of the crime? oh its a dream sequence but also a thing that actually happened because they are psychically connected? HOW ARE YOU LEAVING THE COUNTRY? YOU'RE WANTED FOR KIDNAPPING! Do the spiders slow aging? Didn't Mother Webb write anything about her unborn child's illness in her diary? or did you not read it Madame Webb? WHY BLOW UP THE BUILDING? WHY ARE YOU MAGIC? WHY IS THE "S" FROM A PEPSI SIGN? FIREWORKS ARE DANGEROUS ...Madame Webb is Batman but her wards' families are just assholes and not dead. But the high-tech wheelchair is giving Professor X vibes so maybe that's a more apt analogy. Much like the Fast and Furious series this movie is about FAMILY

2023 was packed full of great video games, so it makes sense if you missed a few. I know I did–I’m still playing catch-up. That means I missed some great games, and Howl is definitely one of them. A delightful hand drawn surprise, more people should be talking about this game. Howl is a turn-based tactics game that is set in a hand drawn fantasy world. You play as a deaf protagonist making her way across a world beset by a “howling” plague–one that turns all who hear it into ferocious beasts. You’re not a trained warrior, but you’re not exactly helpless either, as you have your crossbow, wits, a hell of a strong push and a few other tricks that you’ll pick up along the way. Howl is extremely tight little game, with most of the chaff removed and the meat being a neat hand drawn experience that even manages to eke out some poignancy through its moody music and dramatic voice overs. It also has a sleepy, casual quality to it–but it doesn’t skimp on the challenge. She only has three arrows at a time, so you have to plan your encounters wisely. Two hits and you’re dead, so you can’t suffer too much damage. If you take too many moves to complete a level you exceed “prophecy” you'll receive a lower score based on how much over prophecy you went. It’s best to stay within the prophecy, since you get more points that way to spend on upgrades. There is an assist mode that can be turned on to make some of your tasks easier. While Howl is technically a tactics game, it’s such a tight game it can be argued that it’s a puzzle game foremost. There aren’t many tactical decisions you can make since the margin of error is so low. There was usually room for me to find a more optimal solution, and that was through trial and error. I may not have been playing “correctly” but I found myself playing each level a few times so I can see how the enemies react and respond accordingly. There isn’t much hand holding, so I found myself experimenting with abilities before I locked in my optimal run. Different enemies have different behavior. At first you’ll encounter wolves that can attack adjacent spaces only, but soon you’ll be encountering fiercer beasts that can attack from a distance, while running into scenarios where you have to meet a certain goal–like protecting innocent bystanders. Upgrades are bought with points you earn through level completion. The better you do, the more upgrade points you  have. This is a bit of a novel concept, as I don't remember explicitly running across a system that uses the star rating you earned for the level for currency you use to upgrade your abilities. However, this also gives those who are already apt to do better an advantage over those who may be struggling Its story is told in voice over narration. Unfortunately, for a game touting to be “folklore” there is little lore here. What you read on the tin is pretty much what you get, with the story boiling down to “the prophecy says go here and stop wolves.” I do enjoy its art style, but the hand drawn animated roguelike/turn-based game is pretty commonplace at this point. Howl is an underrated game from a year full of great games. If you’re looking for a tight puzzle-like turn-based tactics game that is close in play style to games like Into the Breach, Howl is a safe bet. It is, however, a game that sits on the shorter end of the time scale–I was able to get through it in about six hours. But because it’s puzzle adjacent, your mileage may vary. Howl is available now for PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store, for Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series S|X and PlayStation 5.

A Florida journalist and media consultant was arrested and charged with more than a dozen federal crimes on Thursday morning. Tim Burke, who formerly worked for outlets such as Deadspin and the Daily Beast and currently runs Burke Communications, a media and political consulting company, has been charged with seven counts of intercepting or disclosing wire, oral or electronic communications, six counts of accessing a protected computer without authorization, and one count of conspiracy. According to Rolling Stone , the charges stem from an FBI investigation on how unaired video clips from Tucker Carlson Tonight made it to Vice News and Media Matters. The clips included an antisemetic rant by Kanye West and Tucker being really creepy with staff on his since canceled show, among other things. Carlson, who frequently promoted fascist conspiracy theories, racist, sexist, and homophobic views, and generally awful and terrible things, was dropped suddenly from the network in 2023.  The leaks embarrassed and caused chaos over at Fox News, who “full on freaked out” over the Kanye clips.  According to The Tampa Bay Times , Burke’s Home was raided by the FBI last year in May. A letter obtained by the Times between a federal prosecutor and Fox News confirmed an “ongoing criminal probe into alleged computer hacks” at the cable news giant. Agents took Burke’s phone, computer, and hard drives in the raid, which reportedly took 10 hours.  Lynn Hurtak, Burke’s wife and a Tampa Bay City Council member, said in a statement “I am confident in my husband’s innocence, and I support him completely.” Burke’s lawyers maintain that the raid violated the law and Burke’s activities are constitutionally protected.  “It’s not hacking, it’s just good investigative journalism,” Michael Maddux told the Times. “We obviously emphatically deny these charges and we’re looking forward to the opportunity to defend him and exonerate him.” In an August interview with the Columbia Journalism Review , Mark Rasch, another one of Burke’s lawyers, explained how his client obtained the footage: Fox, like many other broadcasters, are livestreaming continuously to many different entities—to their affiliates, and so on—and these live feeds are in high definition and encrypted. But at the same time, they are also broadcasting low-definition, unencrypted feeds. They’re internet addressable, with no user ID and password required. All you need to know is the URL. There are third-party sites that transmit these live feeds as a service. They have password-protected websites. And in this case, somebody on the internet provided Tim with the publicly posted user ID and password for a demo account on one of these services that are used by broadcasters. So Tim logs in to the site, and the site automatically downloads to his computer a list of all the livestreams on the site. The important thing to note here is that those livestreams did not require a user ID and password to access them, just a URL. The fact that Burke didn’t do any kind of “hacking,” but merely accessed already available footage of powerful people being shitty and passing it along to news outlets, shows that despite all of their braying about “free speech,” the right isn’t actually interested in it, but the opposite. The fact that the government is going through charging Burke with crimes will have a chilling effect on both free speech and journalism during a time where both of those things - and democracy itself - are under attack from fascists.  Just as troubling is the federal government’s assertion that Burke was apparently not doing journalism when he shared the leaks because he wasn’t working for a news outlet at the time. Burke, as both a freelance journalist and a human being, doesn’t need to wear a fedora and a flashbulb camera around his neck or be the host of a show with millions of viewers in order to be able to do journalism.  A January statement from the American Civil Liberties Union  agrees. “One does not need to work full-time as a journalist in order to engage in protected journalism,” the ACLU wrote, adding that the law “ protects anyone ‘with a purpose to disseminate’ information to the public, regardless of whether their own byline is attached.”  “It's quite common for journalists — including freelancers, producers, researchers, editors, news services and consultants — to provide research and documents for stories they do not themselves write, or even provide written copy without receiving a byline. That does not deprive them of constitutional protection. Courts have rightly warned against limiting the First Amendment’s press clause to established media.” There are countless bullshit traffickers who sit behind comically large microphones screaming fascist nonsense all day. These are people who are literally making shit up which has resulted in people getting killed. They’re also free to do so without being arrested and charged with crimes, though sometimes they get sued into oblivion . That Burke is being prosecuted for his actions amounts to the federal government doing the bidding of Fox News.  A legal fund has been set up for Burke.

I’m a sucker for Vampire Survivors style casual games, and since I’m already a huge fan of Deep Rock Galactic, a game that meshes those two things up sounded like a great combination. And it is. Like peanut butter and chocolate, Deep Rock Galactic Survivor is a great blend of two of my favorite things. Sometimes when you mash up two great things like this, they don't turn out well. Deep Rock Galactic Survivor ends up being an exception. It adds just enough variation on the Vampire Survivor formula to keep it interesting. When you drop into each stage your task is to survive until the next, or until you finish all five stages by killing the dreadnought. Each stage has secondary objectives to complete, like collecting morkite or apoca blooms. There is also gold and nitra to collect on each stage, both of which you can spend on upgrades between stages. Gold is a little more useful, though, as it allows you to reroll upgrades when you level up, and you can spend it to replenish health between levels. There are four different classes to choose from. Each of these classes has 3 subclasses you can eventually unlock. Each of these subclasses has different strengths and weaknesses. You can play as the scout, the gunner, and the engineer.  Each of which unlock as you play the game. The classes aren’t exactly how you remember them. Not only do some characters share weapons between them, characters like the driller do stuff their Deep Rock Galactic equivalent can’t do like place turrets. Sadly, some of what makes Deep Rock Galactic great is lost in Survivor. Most notably the traversal methods aren’t even attempted here, except for the driller’s drill arms. I would have loved to see the Scout get a grapple to get him away quickly–or maybe even the ability to jump over obstacles. Similarly, the Engineer could have had a platform gun that blocked enemies or something similar. Instead we get nothing at all. Unlike a lot of other Vampire Survivor style games, Deep Rock Galactic Survivor has a bit more to do than just survive. Each level has a side objective–like mining morkite or collecting Apoca blooms. These are required to finish the level, however. All you need to do is survive and kill bugs–which goes hand-in-hand for Survivor as there are never ending waves of bugs coming for you. You have to mine gold and nitra for upgrades during your run–but there are also other minerals like Jadiz, Enor Pearls, etc. that you use to upgrade your character between runs. It’s a lot like how Deep Rock Galactic handles things. I mean, that’s okay, it’s just notably different. Lore-wise, it hilariously adds more questions than answers. Which is totally apropos for Deep Rock Galactic, which left us with lingering questions about mini-mules, alien eggs, error cubes and Karl himself. I’m honestly just okay with how inconsistent everything is, because there’s some consistency in that. For an Early Access game Deep Rock Galactic Survivor is pretty well polished. I’ve already spent about a dozen hours and I’m losing time on other games I should be playing because I’m obsessed. Developer Funday Games plans to keep Survivor in Early Access for 6-12 months–and I can’t wait to see how it improves. Rock and stone!