What Are You Watching?

[rogatny]

Captain America: Civil War was a darn good movie. Though technically it's part of the Captain America stream, it's very much more an Avengers movie. The screen time is well dispersed amongst much of the team.

Agree it was a fun movie. And as much an Avengers sequel as it was a Capt Am sequel.

[Kellri]

Is that why he can't finish the series? He's too busy playing RPGs? I respect that.

On the other hand SoIaF is as much frpg setting as it is a series of novels.

I don't think he plays anymore. I read a quote from him where he admitted that he became absolutely obsessed with his Superworld campaign - to the point he was spending the whole week doing nothing but campaign planning. Apparently his Wild Cards series was the end-result once he got back to writing.

I bet GoT would make a decent setting for a D&D campaign - but only if George was the DM. Anyone else running the game would almost certainly make it come off like the licensed campaign setting from hell.

I've been watching The 100 and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Watching those two series together kind of makes me want to play some kind of Gamma World campaign involving Pure Strain Humans from an orbital space station reconnoitering the earth a couple hundred years after the End. Kind of a high-tech normal men vs. mutant savages thing - perhaps allowing for some of the normals to eventually mutate as well.

[thedungeondelver]

There was a Song of Fire and Ice RPG; Rob Schwalb did the heavy lifting on most of it. I think it was a d20 product, and it came out prior to the TV show.

BTW my favorite GRRM story isn't from anything GoT or Wild Cards related: it's a short-short-short sci-fi story (may be the first thing published by him). An engineer is having a discussion with a space administration administrator and demanding to know why his various projects to create a hyperspace engine have been stonewalled, why his budgets have been cut, why seemingly silly projects are being funded, and doesn't the admin know that humanity is on the brink, that we desperately need to move offworld as quickly as possible?

The administrator breaks down and tells the engineer that, yes, he realized all of that years ago. Also, that a hyperdrive engine was invented - by him - shortly thereafter. The problem was that once they'd breached hyperspace they found that the limiting speed factor was not the speed of light - it was slower. Much, much slower.

[Kellri]

Has anyone seen the Syfy Miniseries Ascension? If not, spoilers will follow.

Basically, the premise is that the US gov't had a program for a slow-travelling starship in the 1970s. A generation ship in other words, with the goal of reaching, IIRC, Alpha Centauri. Anyways, as it turns out, the entire "ship" is fake and sitting in an underground bunker somewhere being controlled and monitored by the program's bureaucrats. The ship's crew, by this time, all children of the original astronauts, have no idea they aren't actually traveling through space. The big reveal at the end is that the entire program is in fact an effort to breed a human capable of psionically projecting a person to a distant star system.

It's not quite as good as The Expanse, but the idea is pretty interesting from an rpg point of view. My idea for it would be sort of a take on Metamorphosis Alpha. The Warden, is not in fact in space at all but in an underground bunker. The surface world has undergone some kind of nuclear/biological holocaust (a la Gamma World) and there's no longer anyone but possibly a crazed A.I. watching over the 'Warden Project'. The PCs, in typical MA fashion, will explore the "ship", until eventually coming to realize the truth of things - again, a good lead-in to a brave new world style Gamma World game.

[grodog]

New season of Game of Thrones. I have the strong feeling that nothing is going to happen this season as we wait for Martin to finish writing the book

Has he actually made any progress on writing the book??

The VVitch with two capital Vs (not a W). Very, Very cool horror flick set in 17th century New England. Creepy, subtle and authentic feeling with a good script and good acting. Really makes me want to feature a coven as the main antagonists in an adventure. Highly recommended!

I'm pretty excited to hear the director/writer has plans to make a Nosferatu film because I think he'd do a terrific job.

Some folks discussed this on ScottyG's boards, and it sounded good. Did you see it on Netflix, Donovan, or just on video?

Captain America: Civil War was a darn good movie. Though technically it's part of the Captain America stream, it's very much more an Avengers movie. The screen time is well dispersed amongst much of the team.

We saw it yesterday with the boys, and everyone enjoyed it. Included previews for Star Wars Rogue One, Doctor Strange, Jason Bourne, and one or perhaps two others.

[Chainsaw]

The VVitch with two capital Vs (not a W). Very, Very cool horror flick set in 17th century New England. Creepy, subtle and authentic feeling with a good script and good acting. Really makes me want to feature a coven as the main antagonists in an adventure. Highly recommended!

I'm pretty excited to hear the director/writer has plans to make a Nosferatu film because I think he'd do a terrific job.

Some folks discussed this on ScottyG's boards, and it sounded good. Did you see it on Netflix, Donovan, or just on video?

Downloaded through Apple TV. No idea how broadly available it is outside of that service.

[Matthew]

That was last season. This season, they're just saying "fuck it" and doing whatever they want.

Edit to add - and, after 2 episodes, this season is being the better for it.

It does seem to be moving along.

[grodog]

We watched the first three episodes of Agents of Shield for Friday Family Movie Night with Heather and the boys this evening, and it was OK. Nice to see Coulson back, but after that wore off, it was fairly ho-hum. I hear it gets better toward the end of season 1 and that season 2 is much better?

[rogatny]

We watched the first three episodes of Agents of Shield for Friday Family Movie Night with Heather and the boys this evening, and it was OK. Nice to see Coulson back, but after that wore off, it was fairly ho-hum. I hear it gets better toward the end of season 1 and that season 2 is much better?

Each season of Agents of SHIELD has been broken into two half-season arcs. Of the five I've seen (the last half of the current season is sitting in my DVR waiting for my daughter and me to have the me to watch it together) the first arc of the third season is my favorite. That first half of the first season is really just setting the stage.

As far as network super hero shows go, Shield runs a distant is third at best behind Flash and Arrow (not sure how I'd rate Shiled compared to Legends of Tomorrow and Gotham - they're all about the same level) and is nowhere near the quality of the Netflix Marvel shows. But it is a reasonably entertaining network tv show.

[Falconer]

Been watching the Batman (1960s) TV series and the Adventures of Superman (1950s) TV series with my son. Wonderful!

[Kellri]

I've also dabbled in Legends of Tomorrow and it...proves whatever the axiom says about DC never quite equaling Marvel in quality. It's pretty much exactly what you would expect if someone said 'Americans are re-making Dr. Who for American audiences by removing anything that made Dr. Who charming'. That's not to say I'm not watching it - it sure beats Korean soap operas (Boy Loves Girl. They hook up despite family opposition. She dies of cancer) or VNamese game shows (the consolation prizes in an American game show are the Grand Prizes in Vietnam).

Got my eye on the Sean Bean show 'Legend'. Does anyone recommend it? How about the show 'Banshee'? Anything else that's passable?

Kind of digging the latest GoT season. Favorite moment so far is Tyrion unchaining the dragons and then telling Varys to punch him in the face if he ever considers such a thing again.

[Chainsaw]

Kind of digging the latest GoT season. Favorite moment so far is Tyrion unchaining the dragons and then telling Varys to punch him in the face if he ever considers such a thing again.

Hahah! Yes, agreed.

[Terrex]

Kind of digging the latest GoT season. Favorite moment so far is Tyrion unchaining the dragons and then telling Varys to punch him in the face if he ever considers such a thing again.

Hahah! Yes, agreed.

Funny, the moment that scene ended I told my wife that was the best scene of the season.

[TRP]

Got my eye on the Sean Bean show 'Legend'.

I really liked it, but it struggled here in the ratings. It was Sean Bean being badass Sean Bean. Who wouldn't like that?

Unfortunately, it only lasted 2 full seasons, but it did that new popular shtick where each half season is a separate mini-season. I thought the second (and final) season was some of the best television currently around. It was pretty intricate, and you really had to keep up on it.

[Falconer]

The current season of GoT is a soap opera. Too many things are getting costlessly put back together again that in previous seasons had so painstakingly broken apart.