We aren’t in those times anymore. There’s an enormous amount of comic book content from Marvel on screens big and small. Sure, the Netflix shows were around, but it became clear that while “it’s all connected” was a fun catchphrase, those shows operated on their own. And their place in the MCU now is questionable at best. Same with Agents of SHIELD. They weren’t part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, in that they didn’t affect the movies. In contrast, Phase 3 was almost 25 hours just in movies. Phase 4 is already at 44 hours *before* counting She-Hulk, which is rolling out now, and two more specials and a movie. That’s so much! And with those extra hours, there’s a bigger variation of content. It’s not all big summer blockbuster tentpole action movies. There’s heist films, dramas that mess with your mind, lawyer shows, teenage angst dramedy, sci-fi, you name it.

With ALL of that already out, and more on the way, it *should* go without saying that YOU DON’T HAVE TO WATCH IT ALL TO BE A FAN. No matter what the gatekeeping dipshits tell you! Don’t like Bucky? Don’t worry about Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Not in touch with your inner teenager? Maybe Ms. Marvel isn’t for you. Don’t worry, something else will come along in a few weeks, and nobody will be pestering you about the last thing you skipped.

HOWEVER, one parting thought. If you were chugging along, watching every Marvel movie, dutifully following Agents of SHIELD around the dial as ABC did it’s best to alienate the viewers the show managed to attract and keep, if you even watched Inhumans (!), but you drew the line at Captain Marvel…or objected to the barest hint of same-sex couples in Thor: Love and Thunder (and seriously, it’s BARE MINIMUM representation), maybe take a look at what your actual reasons are for avoiding something. It might not be a bad thing to go outside of your MCU comfort zone. Maybe it still won’t be for you, and that’s okay. It might help you to understand someone else in your life just the same.

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Believers is the 10th episode of the first season, and to be honest I’d forgotten about it until it came up in the rotation. That may be because it’s got a plot that every medical drama has tackled. There’s a child with a treatable disease, but the catch is, his culture’s religion prohibits surgery. An aghast Doctor Franklin (avowed atheist) struggles with the idea that someone would let their religious beliefs get in the way of saving a life.

Franklin even goes so far as to appeal to Commander Sinclair to force a ruling that the parents are unfit. This is where Babylon 5 breaks from the formula. Other shows typically go one of two ways with this plot. One, the doctor concedes, and is there at the end for his patient, perhaps learning some humility or respect for the culture. Two, the doc does the surgery anyway, saving the patient. Often the parents come around, or are at least resigned to what happens. Not so here; Sinclair has to deliberate and that’s where things get interesting.

The parents begin asking for help from each of the major races on B5’s council, and it is a great world-building bit deftly snuck in to an episode otherwise unrelated to the greater plot of the show. They speak to Ambassador G’Kar of the Narn Regime, who turns them down because their world offers his no material advantage, no quid pro quo. Ambassador Mollari basically asks for a bribe. “Just how much justice can you afford.” The Vorlon Ambassador Kosh turns them down as well, in typically cryptic fashion. He gives them one of my favorite lines of the series:

The last Ambassador approached is Delenn of the Minbari, the one you’d most expect to be helpful. Unfortunately, they are forbidden from interfering in other races beliefs about the soul. “Whose belief is correct, and how do we prove it?”

Sinclair, for his part, struggles mightily to make the right decision. Franklin points out that he ordered the doc’s predecessor to operate on Kosh (in the pilot movie) despite the fact that the Vorlons did not want it to happen. It’s a discussion with Garibaldi that helps Sinclair make a decision. He’s reached out to Earth for advice, and they wouldn’t even give him that much. Seeing his friend struggling, Garibaldi says “it may be your responsibility, but it isn’t your fault.” A reminder we could all use at times.

Finally, Sinclair talks to the kid, seeing that he too is a believer, and gets to the heart of it. He refuses to sign the order, and has a powerful philosophical argument with Franklin. Of course, Franklin does the surgery anyway, but it doesn’t go the way he wants. Shon gets better, but his parents react like he’s not even a person anymore. There’s a bit of a fakeout version of option 2 above, where the family bring a special ‘travelling robe’ for Shon and take him from the Medlab. Too late Franklin realizes that it’s a funeral shroud. The parents ended their own son’s life, believing that the surgery destroyed his soul. The episode ends with a dejected Doctor Franklin sitting alone in the darkened Medlab, no Star Trek happy ending in sight.

I’ve been thinking about this episode for days. Believers runs in direct opposition to other media that covers this same idea. See the TNG episode Ethics, where Worf gets saved by a miraculous cure as an example. It shows that the people aboard B5 are all flawed, realistic individuals. Politics, philosophy, killer dialogue. All this from an episode that’s *NOT* setting up the war against the Shadows. I can’t wait to keep going, after I recover from this one that is.

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Honestly, read his thread there, I’ll wait. He talks a lot about how he’s changed as a creator, how the new show will be different because of that, etc. It’s interesting to note that Claudia Christian (Ivanova) did say that JMS has kept her and the other original cast members in the loop. She even mentioned she was thrilled to be “uttering the great maker’s fabulous dialogue” again, so it’s clear she wants to be involved and *is* involved.

Sadly, as JMS pointed out, you can’t just do a continuation of the original show. So many of that original cast have passed away. Could you do a story about Londo with no G’Kar or Vir? So much of what made them work on the show was the chemistry between them. You could really see G’Kar just barely restraining himself from strangling Londo. That was impressive considering the makeup Andreas Katsulas had to endure to play the role. For their relationship to believably progress from that to where they were at the end of the show, not just any combination of actors could do that.

So…are we excited?

I’m trying to hold myself to cautious optimism. Having the original creator back is huge. JMS still has his fastball (see Sense8), so something new and good is definitely possible. More than anything, it’s the fact that Straczynski is coming back at all that has me excited. Consider this quote from him a few years ago:

The fact that JMS is ready to come back to Babylon 5, to me that means he has more to say. I’m ready to hear it.

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The character of Black Widow is currently dead (and with the issues going on with Scarlet Johannsson and Disney, she’s probably staying dead), so the movie is set in the past. There’s so much that has happened since Civil War that revisiting this time period feels weird and unnecessary. The ONLY reason we’re still getting this movie is to set up Yelena as a new Widow. It serves no purpose in the MCU. It advances no greater plot, introduces no new tech or mystical force that will come up again, we only meet one new character that’s going to matter. Sorry, Red Guardian.

Everyone I talked to about it said that the excitement ship for a Black Widow movie had sailed long, long ago. The Marvel Cinematic Universe is clearly in a weird spot, where they’ll green-light an entire movie that basically just serves as an introduction of a character who is not the star of the movie. Like the original MCU movies did that, but it was brand new. Doing it now, in a movie ostensibly about someone else is just a strange flex. The early movies felt important, this one feels superfluous.

Look, it was enjoyable, but the Marvel universe has been blasted wide open, with basically every major team and source of power available for movies. There’s no kudos available for finally making a movie about an OG Avenger, especially when the movie really wasn’t setting anything up for her. Natasha didn’t even get to be the first female lead in an MCU movie! Her ship sailed long before now. Marvel should’ve realized it. They got where they are by moving forward, and this was looking into the past.

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Diop (played by Omar Sy, my fellow nerds will know him as Bishop in X-Men: Days of Future Past) is the son of a Senegalese immigrant, a single father trying to do his best. Babakar Diop gets a job as a driver for the family of Hubert Pelligrini. However, he gets framed for the theft of a necklace that once belonged to Marie Antoinette, and ends up hanging himself in prison. The teenaged Assane becomes obsessed with the last gift from his father, the book Arsène Lupin, Gentleman Burglar.

Omar Sy’s Lupin is the perfect charming rogue, and the heist scenes have many of the classic elements – double crosses, disguises, narrow escapes. We also see Diop’s life and how it intersects with him being a conman and a thief. He has a son, and is separated from Claire (they say ex-wife at one point but I’m not sure they were married, could be a translation thing).

If there’s one negative, it *is* the English dub. Lupin is fine, but some of the other characters have a rough go of it, and sound out of place. It’s not a deal-breaker for me, but be aware. You could watch in French with subtitles instead. I’m not one to judge.

I enjoyed it quite a bit! Five episodes are out now, with five more forthcoming in the summer. Note that it ends on a cliffhanger, if that’s something that would bother you. Here’s a trailer:

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I really enjoyed Lupin III: The First! As the odd name suggests, this is a great jumping-on point if you’ve never watched a previous Lupin III movie or show. Based on the manga by Monkey Punch, Lupin III has been adapted numerous times, including The Castle of Cagliostro, Hayao Miyazaki’s directorial debut! This is the first time Lupin’s been in CG and it looks great. They kept the cartoony proportions and antics in the transition to 3D animation, no mean feat.

The action and story would fit with a goofier version of Bond or Indiana Jones – a hidden sect of Nazis seeking a powerful artifact to help restore the Reich. There’s gadgets, crazy car stunts, biplanes, swords that can cut a bus in half, it’s great. I’m not going in depth on the plus, because I want to keep some of the surprise.

The English dub cast is great. They are all industry vets who in many cases have been voicing these same characters for decades. You may not recognized them by their names, but if you watch anime or play video games, you’ve heard them. They are ably directed by Takashi Yamazaki.

If any of this sounds like your cup of tea, you can rent/buy on Prime Video or get the Blu-Ray. Trailer’s below if you want to get a sneak peak. Enjoy!

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At the same time, I know we’re insanely lucky. Neither my day job nor my wife’s have been severely impacted by the pandemic so far. We’ve managed not to get sick. There’s some money set aside for emergencies, honestly haven’t had that since having kids. We also *had* an emergency where we had to use some of it (roof) but that would’ve destroyed us for years so I consider that an absolute win.

Where does that leave me for 2021? Well, I’d like to take streaming to the next level. I’ve done it mostly for fun so far, and I’d like to continue having fun, just with a bit of growth. :D To that end, I’m going to set some goals for my stream. In the first six months of the year:

• Set a schedule for two days a week (leaving it open for bonus streams)
• Get continuously above 5 average viewers (unlocks more opportunities)

That’s not much, but considering we have no idea what this year is going to look like, I’ll take it! Stretch goals for the rest of the year:

• Get continuously above 15 average viewers
• Unlock the rest of the affiliate emote slots
• Earn more consistent Twitch payouts

Can I do it? I sure hope so! On a personal level, I’d like to be better at getting folks to join me on stream for games. I’m always too nervous to ask, and I tend to let my brain tell me people aren’t really my friends, even with a lot of evidence to the contrary. So I guess what I’m saying, wanna play Apex? Maybe you want to get your farm on in Stardew co-op? Let’s make something happen, and get that rising tide going!

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I *almost* can’t blame Square-Enix for this. Having the excellent Spider-Man game on the PS4 before this came out is a killer. It’s a tough act to follow. Slick combat, great story, with fun collectibles filled with sly references to the comics, movies and even previous Spidey games. It is one of the few games I took the time to 100%. Marvel’s Avengers wasn’t designed to mimic that, but you can’t help comparing the two.

What’s Good

The story is a lot of fun! Very typical alternate universe sort of story, with the Avengers disbanding after failing to stop a cataclysmic event. Kamala Khan, who survived the event (A-Day) and was exposed to Terrigen, is using her new Inhuman powers to try and prove that the Avengers weren’t at fault. Pretty classic stuff.

I love the costumes for the most part (the original Captain America suit they have sucks), and they have a large variety to find and craft. They were obviously influenced by the movies for the visuals, but kept things just legally distinct enough.

The choice to have Kamala as the lead is inspired. Sandra Saad voices her well, and is joined by a cast of industry vets like Jennifer Hale, Nolan North, and Troy Baker. It is very much an MCU-inspired set of performances, but they handle it.

What’s Not

The combat is repetitive, and so are the enemies. This wouldn’t necessarily be a deal-breaker in a single player game where all you want is to get through the story, but they want us to keep playing new raids and content for years to come. Not sure it’s fun enough now for that to work. Currently I’ll probably pop back in when new characters release to give them a shot. That’ll be the window Crystal Dynamics has to make me a believer again.

Things are TOO balanced. Normally that wouldn’t be a bad thing, but we all know that fights with the Hulk should be far different than with, say, Black Widow. But since the multiplayer content has to work for everyone, an under-geared Hulk is going to get his ass beat, while Black Widow with killer gear has an easier time. That’s the nature of a live-service Destiny clone, but it feels weird attached to Marvel characters.

Conclusion

Marvel’s Avengers has a good enough main story to be worth playing, just not at full price. You can already score half price pretty easily (this Humble store link works as of now) and at least for now, there are still new characters and updated content coming. Let’s hope they can improve the game so it has signs of life outside of the main story. I’ll embed part 1 of my playthrough from Twitch below if you want to check it out. Excelsior!

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The conceit of this game allows them to make Battle Through Time a clip show – you dodge, roll, and slash your way through Jack’s greatest hits. It does this by interrupting the final battle in the new final season of Samurai Jack, so spoilers abound if you haven’t watched that yet. Jack must fight his way through his memories, whether it’s meeting the Scotsman or fighting Demongo, the Soul Collector.

The gameplay feels like a PS2/Gamecube-ish sort of action beat-em-up, in a good way. Once in a while the camera gets wonky, but on the whole it works. One tip I’ll give you – use all the weapons. I loved Jack’s iconic look with the sword but you get materials to level and skill up by using the other weapons.

The main story took me just under six hours to complete. There are challenge modes and collectibles, but I don’t feel the combat was SO good that I need to re-play levels or do the challenge modes to get all the achievements.

The graphics work well. It’s always difficult to translate a 2D traditionally animated show to 3D for a game, but they were successful here. Every voice actor is back except for Mako as Aku (may he rest in peace), but they have Greg Baldwin filling in, as he did for Uncle Iroh in the past.

Samurai Jack: Battle Through Time was a fun romp that took me back through all of Jack’s history. For me, $39.99 is probably more than I would spend on it (but YMMV if you enjoy this kind of action beat-em-up more than I do). It’s available on all the typical platforms, PC, Switch, PS4, and Xbox One. Thanks to Clara at Sandbox Strategies and the developers for the code to review! If you’d like to see my playthrough of the main story, this is the YouTube archive:

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The humorous elements are there from the beginning. Gamers will laugh and be horrified in turn at the idea of microtransactions in the afterlife. There’s a boy who was uploaded at 12 who hasn’t aged physically in 6 years. It’s played for laughs, as he acts like an obnoxious 18 year old, but then you see that his mother had him put there and he’s got no recourse, no control over his life.

There’s also a mystery surrounding Nathan himself. He’s missing memories, especially surrounding his work. He was running a startup but can’t exactly remember what for. The plot thickens when some of the corrupted memory files are moved by an unseen force. Is there more to Nathan’s death than his girlfriend is letting on? Aren’t self-driving cars “safe”?

I enjoyed Upload a lot! It’s an odd science fiction/comedy/drama/mystery but my wife and I were both sucked in. I’m definitely curious to see season 2 whenever they are able to make it. It’s on Amazon Prime, and if you need a free trial, click the image below.

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