These Would Have Made Nolan's Trilogy A Bit Different

Heavy On The Ass

I don't play too many video games, but I sure do read a lot about them on the interweb.

Edward Kenway, the protagonist of the upcoming Assassin's Creed IV is a typical hero for an action video game.  But Reddit user Zinadello13, noticed that Kenway bears a striking resemblance to Capt. Edward Reynolds.  No, not a historical figure.  He's the main character from Pirates.

The most expensive porn movie ever made.

Evan Stone, who starred in the 2005 film (and other such fanfare as Anal Kinksters 2, Sweet Summer Sex Kittens, Sailor Poon: A XXX Interactive Parody, My Stepdaughter Tossed My Salad 6) does look to be a possible model for the character.  And both are named Edward. But the true comparative test will be when Assassin's Creed IV comes out - if there's an attack move with your dick...

News Of Thrones

In recent promo tour for the 3rd season of Game Of Thrones, Charles "Tywin Lannister" Dance alluded to a 4th season...and that's only some of the recent awesome news.

It didn't take long for previous seasons to get green-lit, but getting a fourth season before the debut of the third is excellent.  Plus the third novel of the series, A Storm Of Swords, was split up, with only the first half being included in the new season, so it not be left unfinished...at least that book.

And as far as completing books four and five (and the unfinished book six), showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss have it under control.  “We have the opportunity here to tell a coherent story that lasts for 80 hours,” they said, assuming HBO keeps re-upping the rest of the story.  “We gave up other opportunities because we love these books and want to do them justice."  And there's no reason not to expect them to see it through, as ratings have steadily grown, from 2.2 million viewers when the show debuted to 4.2 million on the final Season 2 episode.

Of course, everything related to the show is hot, including Emilia "Daenerys Targaryen" Clarke, who is currently on Broadway in Breakfast At Tiffany's.  So hot that management at the theater had had to beef up security to enforce their no photography rule. Clarke, who has been going from a strategically placed towel to naked in a bubble bath.  Folks in the balcony are getting a better view, but the best, and certainly least expensive one is a web search for her Season 1 scenes.  Plus you're spared having to deal with the theater crowd. 

Beach House - "Wishes"

Comic Album Homages

See them all here...

The Only Terrorist To Comfortably Seat Five

Car manufacturers usually make up a stupid name for their newest products...and that usually works better than using existing words that are poorly researched.

Kia's new concept car, the Provo, is rankling British lawmakers, who are asking the South Korean car makers to change the name.  "Provo" was the street name for the dominant branch of the outlawed Irish Republican Army. Y'know, the Provisional IRA that killed nearly 1,800 people during a 27 year campaign to force Northern Ireland out of the UK that ended in 1997.

Kia insist their experimental prototype was named to suggest "provocative," and would not market any future car as a Provo in the United Kingdom or Republic of Ireland.   Cars also not getting released in certain parts of the world are Ford's Slavemaster mini-van in the US, the Peugeot Colonist SUV in Africa and southeast Asia  and the Mercedes Kristallnacht coupe, well, everywhere. 

Maserati @ The Satellite 3/5

 

Killer show by Maserati, who are touring behind their latest album with new drummer Mike Albanese.

Pantone On The Menu

More pairings courtesy of David Schwen...

Hebroobs

It's not just the pictures that will have the native tongues wagging - Israelis can now read Playboy in a Hebrew language edition.

Playboy has been widely available in Israel for years, but this is the first local edition, which features Israeli models and articles by Israeli writers.  The Israeli edition of Penthouse (the magazine's natural adversary) flopped when it debuted here in 1989. Owner and publisher Daniel Pomerantz said he got the idea for the Hebrew Playboy while working as a lawyer in Chicago, former home to the magazine's headquarters.  As he became friends with Playboy lawyers, he was also making visits to Israel, and noticed they did not have a Hebrew edition.

The success of the magazine remains to be seen where Jews, Christians, and Muslims live by strict modesty rules. And besides competition from internet pron and other sexy publications, they'll have to contend with zealots that have frequently burned down bus stops with ads of fully dressed women (which prompted major advertisers not to use female models regardless of how modestly they are covered up). But hey, at least now there will be Hebrew honeys in the local language. 

Helms Alee - "8/16"

Disney's Politicians

Cory Booker - Rajah

Chris Christie - Baloo

Dianne Feinstein - Big Mama

Paul Ryan - Copper

Rahm Emanuel - Timon

Rand Paul - Lumiere

Marco Rubio - Panic

Nancy Pelosi - Lady

Chuck Hagel - Akela

John McCain - Mr. Busy

John Boehner - Kaa

Lindsey Graham - Flower

Elizabeth Warren - Giddy the Elephant

Denis McDonough - Shenzi

Hillary Clinton - Mother Rabbit

Debbie Wasserman Schultz - Dinky

Joe Biden - Sebastian

Plague Eight (אַרְבֶּה)

This is what the LORD, the God of the Hebrews, says: 'How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go, so that they may worship me. If you refuse to let them go, I will bring locusts into your country tomorrow. They will cover the face of the ground so that it cannot be seen. They will devour what little you have left after the hail, including every tree that is growing in your fields. They will fill your houses and those of all your officials and all the Egyptians—something neither your fathers nor your forefathers have ever seen from the day they settled in this land till now. - Exodus 10:3–6

Yes, if you haven't figured it out, there are hordes of locusts, and they have descended on Egypt.  and not a regular horde.  Like 30 million.

Just three weeks before Passover, Egypt's cities and farms were inundated with the swarm.  It's said they're not the apocalypse, and just part of their annual natural migration pattern...only incredibly large. As the plague made its way from the Red Sea through Saudi Arabia, Egyptian Agricultural Minister Salah Abdel Moamen explained the situation, "The current inspection teams at areas targeted by locusts did not witness swarms damaging a single inch of crop". He added that the locusts are "sexually immature and do not depend on plants for energy since they mainly rely on fat stores."

He added Egyptian armed forces and the border guards are attempting to fight the swarm with the means at their disposal, though he did not elaborate how soldiers would battle insects.  Of all the things from his attempt to calm the Egyptian citizens, this was my favorite: "I ask the families living in the locust-plagued areas not to burn tires. This does not chase away the locusts, but only causes damage and could ignite large scale fires that would cost in lives."

Egyptians and their tire burning...oh, don't ever change.

Top Secret Drum Corps

An Avengers Assemblage

Half a century of superheroes, available for purchase!

Like V-J Day, But With A Hard On

Back when Dennis Miller was still funny, he made that awesome joke about what would happen when they finally cured AIDS.  Nearly 25 years after his wry comment, it is getting closer to actually being true.

Doctors are saying a baby born with the virus that causes AIDS appears to have been cured.  The child, who is 2½, has been off medication for about a year, with no signs of infection.  Traces of the virus' genetic material are still present, but if they're confident enough to claim it's a victory over the disease, adding only the second mark ever into the cure column.

The baby was given a faster and stronger treatment than normal, starting with a three-drug infusion less than 30 hours after being born - this was before tests confirmed the infant was infected and not just at risk from the mother (whose HIV wasn't diagnosed until she was in labor).  Dr. Hannah Gay (are you fucking kidding me?), a pediatric HIV specialist at the University of Mississippi, believes the fast action knocked out HIV in the baby's blood before it could hideout in the body. Those reservoirs of dormant cells usually rapidly reinfect anyone who stops medication, and though the child is "functionally cured", it may truly be more accurate to call it long-term remission.  The aggressive treatment will continue on other high-risk babies, with the intent to block this reservoir seeding and replicate this success.

The only other person considered cured of the AIDS virus underwent  a bone marrow transplant from a special donor, one of the rare people who is naturally resistant to HIV. Timothy Ray Brown has not needed HIV medications in the five years since that transplant, but is also a very unique case like this baby.  Perhaps the hyperbole about curing AIDS makes for better headlines and is not quite the reality, but it is progress.  Personally, they should just give people whatever the hell Magic Johnson is taking, because he's the most robust and healthy looking HIV positive person ever.

Imagine 500 Times The People And Booze And You've Got Halloween in I.V. Circa 1992

This fad has come and gone, but I have to support my alma mater.  Plus they're now doing undie runs.

Weekend Edition

Counting down the top 20 links we didn't cover during the week...

20 • McLaren P1 Claims Mantle Of World’s Ultimate Supercar - It's a pretty sweet mantle.  And fast too.

19 • Why Frank Kelly Freas Was Possibly The Greatest Science Fiction Artist Who Ever Lived - Retro sci-f, FTW.

18 •  Fraternity Raises Money For Member’s Sexual Reassignment Surgery - She's becoming a he, and frat boys are always looking for members who they can have towel-snapping shower room shenanigans.

17 • The World Needs These Star Wars And Indiana Jones Versions Of Donkey Kong - If only they were playable and not art...

16 • 13 Instances When It's Perfectly Okay To Use The C-Word - Fourteen if you count making a joke.

15 • Mind Melds Move From Science Fiction To Science In Rats - Now they can share thoughts of cheese...or product testing.

14 • UNC Student Faces Possible Expulsion For Speaking Out About Alleged Sexual Assault - Because no good deed goes unpunished.

13 • Hipster Bulldog Gains Cult Following - We live in a world where 84,000 people find a dog in costume worthy of following.  Ugh...

12 • Milwaukee Brewers Racing Italian Sausage Costume Returned To Wisconsin Bar - The town was at a standstill until that wiener casing was found.

11 •  Scientist Stumbles Onto A Cure For Color Blindness - No word on fixing color deafness though...

10 • Joe Flacco, Baltimore Ravens Reach Agreement, According To Source - And now he's the most overpaid QB in the league.  One bowl championship in a contract year and you can make more than Brady, Rodgers, Brees, and the Manning of your choice.

09 • The World's Smallest ARM Chip Is Going To Be Inside You - Soon, your pills will be more than just 1000mg of vitamin C.

08 • Ghana's Turkson Is Irish Bookmakers' Favorite For New Pope - Just think what a black Pope will do to people's minds!

07 • Wonder Woman Fan Film Shows Us What The TV Show Could Have Been - Another blow to DC and their attempt to duplicate Marvel magic, where the fans outdo the billion-dollar studios.

06 • ‘Executive Chef’ At Camden, New Jersey Charter School Makes $95,000 A Year - In a city filled with crime, there's still some white collars getting away with it too.

05 • This Black Hole Spins At (Almost) The Speed Of Light - Not bad for something that weighs more than two million times more than our sun.

04 • Miss Delaware Teen USA Resigns After Porno Surfaces / Miss Teen Delaware Lies Like A Porn Star - Yeah, she says it wasn't her and resigned anyway...and then the damning evidence came out.

03 • Damon Lindelof Hilariously Goes Off On Justin Bieber's Hat On Twitter - The hat was epic...an epic awful choice.

02 • This Insane 400,000-Piece Lego Hogwarts School Is Larger Than Harry Potter Himself - I do not know from the seven books, but Legos I get, and 400,000 of them are impressive.

01 • Florida Man Swallowed By Sinkhole Under Bedroom - Yes, the most Florida of all headlines.

Saturday Morning Video - "Kid's Police"

I don't need subtitles to know WHAT THE FUCK?

Food For Thought...And Eating

Define "Insane"

The wheels of justice turn slowly, and often, senselessly.

Nearly eight months after the attack which killed 12 and wounded 58 at a Colorado theater, the defense for James Holmes is still heel-dragging on what plea to enter.  They do not want to use not-guilty by reason of insanity, because it simply does not benefit their client.  You see, if you want to go that route, you have to turn over all documents and information pertaining to your client's past, including those records previously protected by doctor-patient confidentiality.  And in the case of Holmes, it's a particular notebook given to a psychiatrist prior to the attack.  So how to you get around the evidence that would clearly implicate your client and his premeditated actions?  Challenge the constitutionality of the state insanity law!

Trying to make a whole separate issue challenging the law you're looking to take shelter under is a stroke of pure genius scumbaggery.  Only a defense lawyer could complain that a law is not serving enough of their plans and try to have it changed to suit them better.  I assume they'd prefer they could just plead insanity as a defense without having to present or prove anything.  My legal scholar hat got lost many years ago when I opted out of going to law school, but my bullshit detector has been working just fine.  You can't cry self-incrimination if you're claiming insanity, because 1) you have to establish the insanity, and 2) you're not challenging the act - just whether or not they were sane when committing it.

Sorry guys, either he did it and you want to say he was crazy, or he didn't do it.  Pick one, and then promptly lose.  And as usual, a giant big fuck you to any and every media outlet, reporter and source who continues to refer to Holmes as the "alleged" shoooter or "suspect" in the case.  When you are arrested on site with weapons immediately following the attack and you deliberately booby trapped your apartment in case of your arrest, you get no luxury of speculation.  He is the defendant, period.

Your In-Flight Movie Is A Movie In Flight

Shot on route from San Francisco to Salt Lake City to Philadelphia. Way more relaxing than, say, other things happening out the window...