F-ZeroOne

That voice. (this will make more sense after you've seen the latest episode). Also, Fifteen utters one of the most chilling lines I think I've ever heard a Doctor say, props again to Ncuti Gatwa for the delivery.

There will be a new "Tales of the TARDIS", at least via the BBC media sources, on the 20th June. SPEC-U-LATE!

Just to be clear, this weeks episode is not an episode of "Black Mirror". You might be forgiven for thinking so. 😄Also, if anyone needs the concept of "Timmy Mallet" explained to them please let one of us Brits (of certain vintages) know... 😁

Some general impressions of the new season: excepting "Space Babies" (which some people seem to like... ) I'd say its been a solid run of episodes. If I had some niggles, its that the last three episodes all felt like they needed just a little more time to wrap up properly. The other odd thing is that we still haven't actually seen a lot of the new Doctor yet; what we have seen hints at a lot of potential, but the last two episodes feel like they lent on the companion a bit (to be fair, in the case of "73 Yards", this was because Ncuti Gatwa still had other commitments at the time and could only appear briefly; on the other hand as it was largely a standalone episode it feels like it could have been pushed further back into the run).

And no, I won't be the first to point out that the current season is leaning quite heavily on the door marked "fantasy". Maybe this is the series where we finally find out how the Doctor becomes Merlin... 😉

I think a good tribute you can give him is that, while you may not always have enjoyed his movies, almost everyone whose movies you did worked for him at some point or another,

On 5/1/2024 at 7:19 PM, F-ZeroOne said:

I realise I'm a touch biased, but it does sometimes feel like the European "G.I. Joe" comics - branded "Action Force" to start with, as the toyline was initially released under that title for some time here before the branding was unified - gets a little overlooked in discussions of the comics (the UK "Transformers" stories seem to be better known).

Little bit of a follow up: I may have got a bit confused about a certain famous UK business personality appearing in "Action Force"; the story in question may have been in the UK "Transformers" comics. However, the events that led up to that story were part of a previous "Action Force/Transformers" crossover; I think installments may have been published in each comic at the time.

Whilst revisiting "Action Force" to check, I was reminded of some of the artists that worked on it - Geoff Senior is probably the most well known internationally, but there was also Robin Smith (a "2000AD" artist, not to be confused with the Galaxys Greatest Comics other Smith-droid, Ron Smith) and the sadly often overlooked Jerry Paris; an artist probably best known in the UK for his video game magazine covers and art, but who also produced comic strips for a couple of them as well. He had a fantastically chunky "mecha" style that I've often wondered may have been manga or anime inspired.

Something else that was dredged up from memory is that almost forgotten in the "Action Force/G.I. Joe" comics history is that "Action Force" had a precursor series of comic adventures; the long-running UK war comic "Battle" (later "Battle/Action Force") ran a series based on the original Palitoy line and which featured some interesting variations on the lore, especially as the "G.I. Joe" line developed more influence over time; did you know for example that the COBRA F.A.N.G. helicopters were developed from S.A.S. H.A.W.K. helicopters? (according to "Battle/Action Force" at any rate!). 

When "Action Force" became its own thing, comics wise, "Battle" implemented a suspiciously similar substitute, "Storm Force", with a hero with an interchangeable weapons arm who led a paramilitary organisation who flew across the world in a weaponised Concorde...!

The company that produced "Action Force", Palitoy, had a long history of doing just that. The 12" "G.I. Joe" figures had a longer life in the UK under the "Action Man" brand (and also partly, I suspect, because World War II history here is kind of like of trying to avoid footbal... excuse me, soccer here; no matter how much you may not like it, its inescapable pretty much all year round). "Action Force" was a spin off into the popular "Star Wars" smaller figure format (which Palitoy also adapted for the UK market, the two most famous examples probably being their version of the X-Wing and the Death Star), and then they started more directly bringing over Hasbro figures though with some changes (it seems to be generally regarded that the "Action Force" APC is a better toy than the "G.I. Joe" original). For further coverage of Palitoy , the "Analog Toys" YouTube channel has plenty of videos covering them.

I realise I'm a touch biased, but it does sometimes feel like the European "G.I. Joe" comics - branded "Action Force" to start with, as the toyline was initially released under that title for some time here before the branding was unified - gets a little overlooked in discussions of the comics (the UK "Transformers" stories seem to be better known). I know they were released as the "European Missions" or something at least once. It'd probably be a complicated rights issue, but don't you want to see the time G.I. Jo... I mean, Action Force had to deal with Richard Branson dredging up Megatron from the Thames again? 😄

When a Black Hawk loves an Apache very much...

After that trailer... this could be something S.P.E.C.I.A.L... 😉

On 2/23/2024 at 5:28 PM, no3Ljm said:

From what I've seen on the manual online, it looks like it comes with 2 antenna. One foldable and one straight. Maybe the one that came attached to it is probably the foldable one(?)

From the instructions there, it looks like the "box antenna" is the mounting for either of the two included antennas.

I've never owned a Metal Build, but assuming thats the packaging material around it, it could be a shorter "shipping" antenna just to keep the slot filled but without the risk of the long antenna breaking whilst its in the box?

I mean, it has "B" at best written all over it, but Jamie Lee Curtis as Tannis? Boy, I hope they keep the thing with the chairs. 😄

I suspect its probably because of the use of common "sound libraries", pre-recorded clips that could be used to avoid having to go out and, say, strike a microphone against a power pylon every time (at least part of the where the sound of the AT-ATs in "Star Wars" comes from). Theres an episode of, IIRC, 80s anime rom-com classic "Kimagure Orange Road" [1] where the TARDIS of all things can be heard briefly.

[1] I may be remembering the series wrong, but I have seen the clip from whichever anime its from and it is definitely the famous sound of a "distressed vacuum cleaner", as others have put it.

Bit of an aside, but “What is this light?!” must be the second most common phrase in mecha anime, after “<Name>, <Mecha Name>, Launching!”… 😀

22 hours ago, graphic revolt said:

I might have to watch Turn A GUNDAM after all it’s design is owed to the Blade Runner conceptual artist Syd Mead!

Its definitely worth it - its arguably Tominos masterpiece (I am a tiny bit biased, as its my favourite "Gundam" series). You do have to put up with Tominos trademark quirks (the guy just cannot bear to have his characters sit still) and one of the story elements relies on a huge coincidence, but if you treat it like a pulp Sci-Fi series where unlikely things happen all the time, you should be fine. Did I mention Yoko Kanno did the music? 😄

Regards other mecha: low end, the AV-98 Ingram. A design so good it still looks like something that could be made ten years from now.

Middle ground: The Big Dai-X from "X-Bomber/Star Fleet". Purely for childhood nostalgia reasons. Perfect for punching cyborg villains through the face! Send a message out across the skyyyyyyyyyyyyyy....

High end: The ID-E-OOOOOOOOON! Now, exactly how powerful the Ideon is is a matter for debate; in the show itself you probably don't want to be standing on any planet it happens to be near, but depending on who you believe it may just be the most powerful mecha ever...

From "Gundam", at the lower end of the scale - The Gundam Mk. II. Always liked that design, especially in Titans blue. Power wise, at least as far as Gundams go, its kind of the kid that gets hassled for its lunch money.

In the middle - the RX-93 Nu-Gundam. Again, always liked the design which reminds me of a Police car and means Constable Amuro is about to lay down the law on that rascally ruffian Char. Its kind of in the middle power wise, able to push asteroids out of orbit with the help of TM Network!

And at the top end of the "Gundam" power scale - the Turn-A Turn, Turn-A Turn, TURN-AAAAAAAAAAAAA... Gundam. (ahem) Not only capable of destroying the whole of human civilisation as we know it, but its also the only "Gundam" with a power no other "Gundam" has - the POWER OF 'TACHE. 😄 (1)

(1) Okay, yes, theres probably one from "G-Gundam" or something that has one but we all know that doesn't count. 😉

For those curious about what it takes to build a Moderoid:

Thanks, I’d forgotten all those! (Though I think most “Who” fans wish they could forget “Dimensions in Time”!).

Small bit of trivia for those of you who may be less familiar with UK TV in general; Rubys elderly neighbour was played by Anita Dobson, who is best known in the UK for having played the character "Angie Watts" in the long running BBC soap opera "EastEnders" [1]; her character was famously married to "Dirty Den", played by Leslie Grantham -  who also appeared in classic "Who" back in the day. Possibly RTD was squaring a circle - as well as nodding to a certain other infamous  "Doctor Who" Christmas episode...

[1] That shows notoriously miserable storylines inspired the latter part of this "Who" quote: " 'Did you have to say that? 'There's no turning back? ' That's almost as bad as 'Nothing could possibly go wrong' or 'This'll be the best Christmas Walford's ever had.' "

Well, the story was pretty much a vehicle. It actually reminded me quite a bit of the first "new" Who episode, introducing our friend from every planets North and Rose, which probably wasn't surprising, given who wrote them!. Where it shone was the characters, which was always RTDs strength. And Gatwa seems like he has a lot of potential; yes, in general hes more upbeat than many of his predecessors, but you also got some hints of some inner anger as well. If he gets well served with scripts, I think he could be a very good Doctor indeed.

Yes, it was a time when comics books were still a major entertainment medium here. Well, we didn't have much else - there were only 3 TV channels (you had some mysterious thing called "cable") which at weekends were almost entirely given over to sport...

It puzzled me when newsagents sometimes got anthologies of "2000AD" strips from... I think... "Quality Comics" (?) and they were colourised strips from "2000AD" that I'd known in black and white. I didn't learn why these things existed until later. Just for those who may not be aware, one major difference between UK and US comics is that UK comics were typically printed weekly, with several different stories per issue. This meant that each individual comic character or strip only had at most five or six pages an issue. It still amazes me what script writers and artists like Gibson could pull off in that amount of space. Later, when licenced properties like "Transformers" or "G.I. Joe/Action Force" appeared, often they would reprint one US story and have an original UK story in the same issue. I think the British "Transformers" stories are fairly well known, but the UK "G.I. Joe/Action Force" ones are possibly a bit under-represented in coverage of the comics today.  

Sorry for going off on a bit of a tangent. Just wanted to give some background on the kind of cultural environment Gibson would have been working in.

I grew up reading "2000AD" here in the UK and among what was clearly an incredible talent pool of... er... art droids Gibsons was one of those that stood out. And then they teamed him up with Alan Moore for "The Ballad of Halo Jones" which I was far too young to grasp at the time - as was, I suspect, most of "2000AD"s readership then - but which of course is now rightly hailed as a classic. Yet another great of British comics who will be badly missed.

So... compared to last week, "The Giggle" is a bit of a mess. It might have been better being spread over two episodes. On the other hand, boy, are we going to be getting an interesting action figure at some point... 😅