pReview: Batman Versus Superman (plus Wonder Woman and maybe Aquaman).

Boys! Mm, Bruce Wayne meets Clark Kent. Ah, I love it! I love bringing people together! How are we?  

Lex Luthor, Batman Versus Superman

I haven't seen Batman Versus Superman yet, but I'm quite curious as to how good or bad it actually is.  Reviews have not been kind, but the box office results are more positive - so far BVS has pulled in close to $500 million dollars globally after only four days in theatres.

Personally, I wasn't surprised by the negative reviews I saw in advance of the film's actual release. The trailers I'd seen had left me cold, and let's face it, if a superhero movie doesn't provide the editor with 90 seconds worth of excitement for a trailer, there's something very wrong.

The reviews seemed to match that opinion, and yet there's that impressive box office total.  It's difficult to think of another movie which has been panned to this extent by critics, but has still managed to attract so many viewers.

From the perspective of the long-term comic book fan, Batman Versus Superman appears to be an odd mashup of three or four different comic book storylines.  The base concept comes from The Dark Knight Returns, a brilliant and innovative four-issue 1986 miniseries by Frank Miller.  The story is set many years in a future where the government has outlawed superheroes. Batman has retired, Wonder Woman has returned to her people, Green Lantern has left Earth for the stars, and Superman leads a shadowy existence as a tool of the government, accepting anonymity in exchange for permission to continue saving lives and averting disasters.

An aging Bruce Wayne sees a world in chaos, and can no longer resist the lure of the cape and the cowl in spite of the prohibition against vigilante crimefighting.  In the final issue, the government dispatches Superman to put the Batman out of business, but with the help of a one-armed Green Arrow, a female Robin, and some synthetic Kryptonite, the Batman shows his old friend who’s really in charge.

The second source is the equally classic Death of Superman sequence from 1992, wherein an ancient Kryptonian monster named Doomsday goes head-to-head with the Man of Steel, resulting in the death of both combatants. As is often the case in the wonderful world of comics, both eventually get better.

And then there's the whole Wonder Woman thing...not to mention the Justice League of America tie-in as per the Dawn of Justice subtitle for the film.

On top of all these disconnected storylines, there's the question of how Batman and Superman originally met in the comics.  For that story, we have to go back to Issue 76 of Superman (Volume 1) from 1952, in which Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent are forced to share a stateroom - and a bed - on an overbooked cruise ship.*

 

When a fire breaks out, the two crimefighters catch each other changing into their costumes - marking the start of an ambiguous friendship that would last throughout their careers (not to mention several reboots and a LOT of retconning).

From what I've been able to tell from trailers and online hints, the plot of the movie combines a lot of elements from the source material - okay, probably not the cruise ship thing. Some of it looks interesting, and I'm hoping that there may have been some clever combining of comic book storylines and the events of Man of Steel.  However, I've also seen some things that don't appear to have been well written or well executed.  Oh, well...I guess I'm going to have to see the film in order to find out what the real story is.  Wish me luck...but really, half a billion dollars worth of ticket purchases would seem to indicate that it can't be that bad.

- Sid

* This is actually the most improbable story idea in this entire posting - why in the world would a rich playboy have to share a room with a penniless newspaper reporter?    

It's all about knowing the right time.

As the previous posting would suggest, there are times when I feel a bit over-extended at my place of employment.  Because I'm a one-man band in terms of my role there, I frequently find myself balancing deadlines and prioritizing jobs in order to keep my head above water.  I don't view this as unusual, I don't think I've ever had a job where I didn't have to do this sort of thing, it's just the nature of the beast.

However, there are times when it can be challenging trying to keep up with everything, and the past few weeks have involved a lot of juggling in order to keep all the balls in the air. To my intense amusement, someone was kind enough to leave me a random little gift in the middle of my trials and tribulations, something to help take my mind off my problems - to be precise, a bottle of Doctor Who hand soap in a convenient TARDIS shaped container.

Because I'm a reasonably clever person, it didn't take me long to figure out which of my co-workers would have both the requisite knowledge to find something like this, and the good sense to know that it was a good time for it!  Thanks again, Christi - it couldn't have come at a better time!

- Sid

Is it okay to call you Bill?

 

Hey!

HEY!

HELLO? 

HI, EVERYBODY!  IT'S ME, SID!  ANY RICH SCIENCE FICTION FANS OUT THERE WHO WANT TO PAY ME TO DO THIS?  SOMEBODY LIKE BILL GATES MAYBE?

Seriously, I'd love to do this for a living - it would be great to be able to dedicate a lot more time to The Infinite Revolution, I'm constantly trying to balance my desire to do blog postings with everything else in my life! 

I'd treat it as a full time job, and I'd be happy to do at least one post every day - maybe more if inspiration strikes, and to be honest, inspiration strikes more often than I have opportunity to take advantage of it - at least in a timely fashion, I have a long list of stale draft postings that will never see the light of day. 

Sadly, I doubt that anyone other than someone like Mr. Gates would be in a position to pay me a living wage for blogging - where would the payback be?  Right now it's a pretty casual thing, although that would certainly change if this was my full-time career.  After all, right now I make no effort to market this site, because it's just a hobby, and as such I rather enjoy not having to take it seriously.

However, if someone wanted a proven level of readership in exchange for their contribution, I'd certainly want it to be worth their while, and I'd branch out to Twitter™ and Instagram™ in order to start building an audience.

So, if there are any would-be patrons of the arts out there, drop me a line and we'll talk.  Especially you, Bill, I'd be happy to swing down to Washington State and discuss this over lunch - my treat.

- Sid

(Sorry, just some wishful thinking, the last few weeks have been a little over the top in terms of workload...)

"If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world."

Aragorn: Gentlemen! We do not stop 'til nightfall.
Pippin: But what about breakfast?
Aragorn: You've already had it.
Pippin: We've had one, yes. But what about second breakfast?
[Aragorn stares at him, then walks off.]
Merry: Don't think he knows about second breakfast, Pip.
Pippin: What about elevenses? Luncheon? Afternoon tea? Dinner? Supper? He knows about them, doesn't he?
Merry: I wouldn't count on it.

The Fellowship of the Ring

My friend Chris recently informed me that last month the Storm Crow Tavern had opened a sister location more or less in my neighbourhood.  I quite liked the original Storm Crow, but it was a bit of a hike to get to it, and as such I was pleased that they'd added a location closer to home.

Karli had also enjoyed visiting the Storm Crow, so we decided to pay the new bar a lunchtime visit to see how it measured up.  The original Storm Crow was a gamer-friendly location, and we had no reason to expect the satellite bar to be any different, so we packed along a couple of our more portable games.

I found it surprisingly busy and loud for noon on a Sunday - I can only imagine what it's like in the evening. Apparently it's been quite busy from day one:  not a huge surprise, the Commercial Drive location quickly developed a loyal following.

The Alehouse is probably a bit larger than the Tavern, and the decor looked considerably more expensive:  a life-sized copy* of Han Solo in carbonite, a mounted rancor head, and backlit transparencies of Tank Girl, Dengar the Bounty Hunter, and genre movie posters. It's a bit reminiscent of the original Storm Crow during its early days - right now it's looks like everything was carefully planned and set in place, whereas the original has gotten a bit funkier and more lived-in over the last couple of years.

During our visit, a professional Starcraft II tournament** was playing on one of the large TVs mounted around the place - in my mind, a perfectly acceptable alternative to football. Other screens featured the Teen Titans animated series and the first Tron movie - they're obviously doing their best to cater to a mixed audience.

After we finished eating, we played a few rounds of Lost Cities, and we weren't the only gamers there: two people at the next table were having a spirited match of Kings of Tokyo, a kaiju board game - good choice for a geek bar.  For people who don't want to haul along a box, the bar also has a nice selection of games shelved in the back. For old school bar goers, there's also a Game of Thrones pinball machine beside the bar.

 

The owners have been quite faithful to concept in other ways as well.  The menu layout is done in standard Starfleet LCARS format**, and features things like the Brew of Cthulhu, a "non-Euclidean lager" from Red Truck, and cocktails like the Sonic Screwdriver or Nuka Cola Quantum.

However, I have to say that some of the actual menu items didn't impress me as much as the design.  Personally, I think that you should be able to order lunch at noon, and the brunch options didn't completely thrill me. (To be fair, Sunday brunch is probably not a fair test.)  In  addition, our waiter was well-intentioned and eager, but if you'd told me it was his first day, it would certainly have explained a lot about some of the more non-standard aspects of his performance.

Overall, I'd give the new location a B, verging on a B+, and I'm confident that with time things will settle in and they'll work their way up to an A. I'd certainly recommend it to anyone who is looking for something a little different in their evening out.

- Sid

* I assume it's a copy - the original prop is supposed to be touring with the Star Wars Identities exhibition, currently in Vienna.

** Library Computer Access/Retrieval System - it's the distinctively geometric computer operating system interface used in Star Trek: The Next Generation and the related spinoffs.

"The world is plunged into darkness."

How long would it take you to destroy civilization on Earth?

It took me about 26 days.

As part of the promotional push for its new post-pandemic game The Division, French game developer Ubisoft has created an online simulator called Collapse that graphically illustrates exactly how long it would take for civilization to fall apart based on a single disease-carrying human vector.

The simulator adds a grim twist: it asks for your home address, and then directs you to the hospitals, drug stores, potential vaccine distribution points and airports near your actual location.  Based on your decisions, the site details the number of people you would infect - followed very quickly by the resulting number of deaths.

The simulator uses information from the World Health Organization, NASA, the International Air Transport Association and Open Street Maps to calculate the impact of your actions, and explains the various problems that would arise as a viral apocalypse overwhelmed humanity.

The concept of a global pandemic is almost not science fiction - the simulator bases its infection pattern on smallpox, and as 2014's Ebola epidemic in Africa illustrated, it takes constant vigilance to ensure that the problem is contained in the originating area during the battle to stop an outbreak. Collapse clearly shows just how quickly a similar situation would escalate in a North American urban centre rather than isolated African villages.

And now, you'll have to pardon me - I think I need to lie down.  I seem to be feeling a bit feverish...

- Sid