In a pre-Star Wars universe, guys in silly rubber costumes tramping around flimsy sets were awesome. Godzilla x Kong, in its original form, demonstrated this. Give a kid a bunch of cardboard boxes and a crayon, and within minutes, there would be a Tokyo skyline—all ready to be stomped flat by a hunched-over boy, who […]
Disney’s Cash Cow ESPN is Doomed
On September 7, 1979, Lee Leanard said the first words ever heard on ESPN: ” If you’re a fan, what you’ll see in the next minutes, hours, and days to follow may convince you you’ve gone to sports heaven.” This is the case with Disney’s most profitable endeavor. Leanard had no way of knowing just how […]
Book Discussion: Cixin Liu’s The Wandering Earth Anthology
The Wandering Earth is an anthology of novellas by Cixin Liu, the (2015) Hugo Award-winning author of the Three-Body Problem. Which incidentally was the last time the Hugos reflected the voice of the entire fandom instead of just 300-pound, purple-haired weirdos. I found this collection as intriguing as the Three-Body for similar reasons. When I read […]
The Dark Herald Recommends: Cixin Liu’s The Wandering Earth
With 3 Body Problem having been launched on Netflix, I thought the time was right to dig up my review of the movie version of The Wandering Earth. The premise for the film is big and perhaps a little ridiculous but I can accept it for a couple of reasons. One, you have to start […]
Top Ten Video Game FPS Shotguns (Part I, the 1990s)
The Coach Gun, the Trench Broom, the Boom Stick, the Brixton Typewriter? (Seriously?) Most commonly called the shotgun, it is all but harmless at a distance yet so terrifying at close quarters that the Kaiser’s Wehrmacht tried to get it banned by the Geneva Conventions. (Silly Germans, America has never signed the Geneva Convention.) It is still […]
George Lucas Turns to the Dark Side
The Dark Herald examines George Lucas Backing Bob Iger over Nelson Peltz, and other Lucasfilm news, including the Acolyte “Creating magic is not for amateurs. I remain a significant shareholder because I have full faith and confidence in the power of Disney and Bob’s track record of driving long-term value. I have voted all of […]
The Dark Herald Does Not Recommend: Damsel
It’s always obvious when a genre has outstayed it’s welcome. In 1969, Hello, Dolly! was launched into a world where the innocence of the high-production Broadway musical film was no longer welcome. The Sixth Day was arguably Arnold Schwarzenegger’s best 80s-style blast flick but no one was interested by 2000. So it is with Damsel. […]
Walt Disney World Investments SLASHED
The Disney Company has released an editorial reply to Nelson Peltz and Trian’s white paper to their shareholders. Mickey and Great and Terrible’s reply is kind of an embarrassment. It appears as if Bob Iger said the quiet part out loud. Disney seems to have convinced itself its financial legerdemain is so brilliant no one […]
The Head of Disney Imagineering Has Been Fired!
When a business wants an announcement spread far and wide, it’s made on Monday early in the afternoon. When a company doesn’t want to bring attention to it, it’s made on a Friday at 4:40 in the afternoon. When a company wants a piece of news buried six feet deep, with a layer of peat […]
Sweet Baby Cyanide
So why haven’t I said anything about Sweet Baby? Because to me the problem has been so self-evident for so long that I couldn’t see the forest for the trees. Yes, I knew about it. I knew the cancer for what it was and how it spread. I also knew that Sweet Baby Inc. was […]
RE:View – The Forgotten Dune Miniseries From SyFy
The Dark Herald reviews the Sci-Fi Channel’s Frank Herbert’s Dune, the 2000 mini-series that has been largely forgotten compared to the movies. On September 24, 1992, Leonard Nimoy was watching a countdown timer run out. For a few days, this countdown had been running on a new channel owned by USA Networks. It was a […]
The Dark Herald Recommends: Dune II
A positive review of Dune II directed by Denis Villeneuve follows. “Unadaptable” is the word that was most frequently used to describe Frank Herbert’s Dune and not without good reason. People who have had no trouble at all with Tolkien’s Silmarillion have struggled mightily to plow their way through Dune. Herbert stood the convention of […]
