We're just a little wintry! We're still good! We're still good. Sad Trombone.

We're back after a frenzied summer and a busy school semester.

News, movies and trailers:

• Lorax trailer! By the Despicable Me studio.
• Freleng-DePatie version from the '70s: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6650219631867189375
• Dangerous Method: Cronenberg directs Fassbender and Mortensen as Freud and Jung.

New TV!

• Community!
• Seneca's group of self-loathing misfits.
• Modern Urban Fairytales!
• Grimm and Once Upon a Time - the de Lint collector?
• Why don't they ever get more inclusive about fairytales?

The Summer!

• Justin and FanExpo Canada!
• Admission policy for gaming. But it's worth it - Aaron Douglas, stand-up guy.
• Feedback on FanExpo gaming?

TIFF!

• Etan Muskat in Sorry, Rabbi!
• Marc Slutsky, Jessica Paré, Jacob Tierney
• Other Canadian shorts: Paris Quintet

• The Day - cannibal hilbillies instead of zombies
• Good guest stars: Shawn Ashmore, Shannyn Sossamon, Dominic Monaghan

• Letter to Momo
• My Neighbour Totoro, Summer Days with Coo
• Monster in Paris
• Extra Terrestrial

Non-TIFF movies over the Summer!

• Attack the Block!
• Utter genius: Bromwell High vs. Predator!
• Another Earth
• Drive
• In Time

Digression: Biff, Bam, Pop! The Illuminatus Trilogy!

• http://biffbampop.com/2011/11/13/illuminatus-trilogy-they-with-a-capital-t/

Next time: on Tim Rice and Michael Bay!

Justin interviews author and RPG designer Matt Forbeck about his latest work. See below for links mentioned during the podcast.

Matt Forbeck's web site

http://www.forbeck.com/

The Brave New World  Kickstarter

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/forbeck/12-for-12-10-bnw-novels?ref=card

Carpathia

http://angryrobotbooks.com/carpathia-matt-forbeck/

This week, Justin is going to interview Writer Matt Forbeck regarding his new Kickstarter project 12 for 12.

In all likelihood, they'll also talk about gaming and comics and DK encyclopedias.

Justin took in <a href="http://thebitterguy.livejournal.com/1435945.html">In Time</a>, starring another Justin, and found it to be as interesting for the timing of its release as for its narrative.  

Low-budget, BBC-funded street-level action/horror movie with a socially-conscientious message, though very litle preaching. I talk at more length over at Stolen Recognizer.

If you get a chance to see this movie, do it so fast.

If you don't get a chance to see it, reflect on what you're missing.

This is the kind of movie that speaks to why horror or science-fiction movies can be interesting as stories, at a human level, rather than as unsettlingly prurient, violent spectacle. This is movie as provocation, not as catharsis.

Also, the kids talk like in Bromwell High.

One of two new small run SF films we'll be talking about in our next episode.

Episode 22: The Library and the Heap

- In which Ilan and Justin develop a pair of regular segments for the show.

Role Playing Games Continued!

• Ashen Stars hit its other preorder!
• Other Kickstarter preorders, incliding Do, Pilgrims of the Flying Temple.
• Vampire 20th Anniversary!
• Like $100
• Released at Grand Masquerade
• Laundry RPG
• Stross books
• The Basic Roleplaying system

The Library!

• Top Secret - The Corporation - 1986
• Conspiracy X - late '90s
• three classic aliens - saurians, venusians, greys
• A game with "default answers"
• Parapsychology resolution system
• Not unisystem - but look for the new ConX, Buffy, Angel

The Heap!

• Chaos in the Old World: Shadow of the horned rat
• Twilight Imperium: Shards of the Throne
• "Subgoals" speed up gameplay
• Cosmic Encounter - Cosmic Conflict
• Alien Frontiers
• Heroscape: Marvel Suporheroes
• Planet Hulk reenactment
• Here I Stand
• "A 7 player Twilight Struggle"
• In practice, "Riskopoly as applied to Diplomacy"

Comics

• Dan Slott Spider Man
• vs. Sinister Six
• Jonathan Hickman's continuing output
• Hickman Fantastic Four - now FF
• incomplte books - Pax Romana and Annihilation
• SHIELD
• Jason Aaron
• Astonishing Spider Man and Wolverine
• all stupid hugely fun
• Wolverine!!!! Scalped
• Pak/Van Lente
• Herc and Alpha Flight
• The Raft, Basilisk, Griffin and Man-Bull
• Eaglesham and Fascist Governments
• Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (Zayne)
• Zayne, schlemazel jedi
• Flashpoint - variant DC universe
• BATMAN strapping flash to electric chair; would have been better in the Silver age

Next time: Movies! Geek Rock videos!

Episode 21: On the Galactic Stage

 - in which Ilan has a cold and we talk about live theatre and videogames.

Give us feedback about our Jim Interview - last episode!

Ilan and culture

• My Fair Lady, community theatre experience
• Countermeasure A Cappella concert "we sold out"
• Album cover suggestion: "Twisted"

Justin: Ghost Stories

• Not played with Wraith: the Oblivion mechanics
• Managing our expectations

Soulpepper Theatre!

• Billy Bishop goes to war (Has come and gone, sadly)
• Midsummer Night's Dream
• Good episodes of Fame
• Canned Heat: Center Stage or Napoleon Dynamite?

Video Games!

• L.A. Noire and the anatomy of a slightly worse deal
• iPad!
• Infinity Blade - on the iPad! Recalls "Die By the Sword".
• Reading books on the iPad! Discworld books: Mort, Small Gods
• Ascendancy! And how can we get Alpha Centauri?
• Mass Effect!
• BioWare is a very open-minded company.
• I'm Commander Shepherd, and this is my favourite podcast on the Internet.
• SPOILERS FOR MASS EFFECT FINALE

Ashen Stars RPG (Stellar Nursery pre-release!)

• GUMSHOE system - detective story engine.

Pixel knocks down so much stuff that we end the episode!

Justin talks with his gaming pal Jim "Zub" Zubkavich, mastermind of UDON studios and author of the new fantasy action comedy comic Skullkickers.  "Like Army of Darkness with two Ashes." How is it made? What to expect? Why is the first trade so cheap? Answers within!

A life lesson, kids: beat the drum as much as possible. We are happy to be part of the shilling for this admittedly hugely fun book that we both really like.

And no-one was hurt.

Wow, it's been a long time since our last episode.  Today we focus on comics, particularly the biggest comic event of the last little while: Jonathan Hickman's run on the Fantastic Four!

We touch on other topics related to media as well.

No superheroes were harmed in the podcasting of this episode.

You've been waiting almost two years for this.

Here it is.

Nobody was hurt in the recording of the episode. And if you already hurt, perhaps the tears will help you heal.

Shownotes for Episode 17 "Optimistic Voices"

With what you've been waiting for.  NEXTWAVE miniatures.  And more.

The news!
Democracy!

• A bunch of miniatures cancellations
• D&D, Rackham, Star Wars
• Things FFG does well

Community: The Official TV Show of SATBG - The D&D Episode

• Dan Harmon and the Dead Alewives
• RPGs in the Media
• So it's on DVD; borrow mine
• A Classical Fantasy Villain

EPIC SEGUE into WizKids Star Trek

• http://wizkidsgames.com/startrek/star-trek-fleet-captains/
• http://wizkidsgames.com/startrek/star-trek-expeditions/ -- Knizia's Co-op
• "The Real Kirk"?
• Squideye: Hugh Laurie as Fourth Doctor. Who's with me?!
• Star Trek 25th Anniversary Video Game
• Federation Commander (with Art Trotman!)

WizKids's new HeroClix set...NEXTWAVE!!!

• Boom Boom and Secret Wars 2
• Nextwave sequels -- Marvel Zombies 3
• Sorry, Joyce, who doesn't like Cilantro
• Original character: THE CAPTAIN! Bad Santa of superheroes
• http://wizkidsgames.com/blog/2011/02/11/his-name-is-the-captain/

Other New WizKids

• -- Vlaada Chvatil designed Mage Knight
• -- How does Multiple Man work? Tofurky Pizza (thanks, Laura!)
• -- Kirkman's INVINCIBLE: Repli-Kate

Other New Stuff

• The King's Speech (HBC as a sane dude)
• Tim Burton Exhibit at Bell Lightbox
• Parallels to tortured cartoonists - Etan Muskat, Dan Zabbal
• 2001 at the Lightbox
• Movies in between 2001 and Star Wars (Logan's Run, Zardoz)
• Doctor Who Cold Open. (Search Youtube for that phrase)

Tron Legacy! And other new movies!

• -- Issues of Control - Clu, the MCP, and Facebook
• -- Not a HUGE letdown; looked great but a little thin.
• -- Olivia Wilde: So Great!
• -- Season of the Witch (Dominic Sena who did Gone in 60 Seconds)

MOVIES IT'S OKAY FOR GEEKS TO CRY AT!