Round 2 of the 6th Annual BSC Book Tournament begins with match-ups between the Female Lead and Male Lead brackets. If you missed it, you can see our announcement of the brackets here as well as the unveiling of the full tournament schedule here. But now it is time for the voting to start!
We are keeping each round in its own post, but don’t worry! They will all be linked together to make it easier for you.
3: Dark Inside by Jeyn Roberts vs The Line by Teri Hall
Be sure to check back next week for the results of round 2 of our book tournament. If you experience any technical issues with the polling, please email Sarah@boomtron.com with the problem. Polls will be open until March 20th, and results will be announced on Tuesday, March 21th.
Round 2 of the 6th Annual BSC Book Tournament begins with match-ups between the Female Lead and Male Lead brackets. If you missed it, you can see our announcement of the brackets here as well as the unveiling of the full tournament schedule here. But now it is time for the voting to start!
We are keeping each round in its own post, but don’t worry! They will all be linked together to make it easier for you.
4: Divergent by Veronica Roth vs 21 Erased by Barbara Rayne
Be sure to check back next week for the results of round 2 of our book tournament. If you experience any technical issues with the polling, please email Sarah@boomtron.com with the problem. Polls will be open until March 20th, and results will be announced on Tuesday, March 21th.
A new trailer has been released for the upcoming Game of Thrones RPG. This time it focuses more on how the combat system will work and what we can expect in player controls.
Official Press Release:
Today Game of Thrones RPG opened its official website, showing off the combat system with an exclusive narrated video trailer that details the gameplay mechanics. This role playing game for PlayStation® 3, Xbox 360® and PC, based on the famous universe from George R.R. Martin’s saga and the HBO television series, should please all RPG players who seek perilous quests, compelling stories and epic battles! Discover today the very first look at its combat system, promising tactical and spectacular battles!
Today’s new video will immerse players into the combat system of Game of Thrones and its bloody battles. All along your adventure, numerous enemies will challenge you. To defeat them, you will have the ability to slow down time during combat to analyze, anticipate and adopt the best strategy to attack or defend yourself. You can plan multiple special attacks for each of your playable characters and activate them at the right moment to amplify their effect. A large selection of armor, weapons and skills will be at your disposal, based on the choice you made for each of your character’s classes and abilities.
…
Game of Thrones is a big role playing game developed by Cyanide for PlayStation® 3, Xbox 360® and PC. The game is based on the famous series of novels A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin, which has already sold over 15 million units around the world, and which HBO® has recently adapted into the critically-praised TV series Game of Thrones.
This is the most ambitious project of Cyanide Studio. Developed on Unreal Engine 3 and written under the supervision of George R.R. Martin, Game of Thrones will allow fans of the series, and more generally adepts of role-playing games, to live an exceptional adventure in one of the most finely-worked universe from the medieval fantasy literature.
Along the 30 hours of gameplay offered by Game of Thrones, play as Mors, sworn brother of the Night’s Watch, and Alester, a Red Priest in search of redemption who is back to Westeros after a long exile. The Hand of King Robert Baratheon has just passed away, and these two charismatic heroes will find themselves dragged in a grand quest that will lead them through familiar and gorgeous places of Westeros, such like the Wall and its region, or the famous King’s Landing. In this grand adventure, they will meet famous faces: Queen Cersei, Varys the Spider or Jeor Mormont, the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch faithfully reproduced from the TV series.
In Game of Thrones, you will choose the class of your characters, find your fighting style, reach a good balance between your strengths and weaknesses, and get ready for epic battles! Find, buy or loot new equipment and weapons to fit your approach of the fights, and gain experience to improve your skills or learn new ones. Slow the time down during battle to analyze the situation and choose your next moves. In game of thrones, political skills can be as lethal as a sharpen sword, so never underestimate the power of a silver tongue to solve a critical situation!
Watching the game play trailer, it definitely shows that time has not fully stopped. I think I saw an axe blade make it’s way towards Mors’ neck as the player tried to make decision in time before getting chopped. It’s pretty interesting that it allows these kind of mid-action changes, but it would probably help if it allowed the player to modify the characters decision making tree. Such as, “Attack the weakest opponent first.” “Run for safety if you fall below 25% health.” and, “Push curious boys off of window ledges if spied upon.”
The skill tree system reminds me a lot of D&D. You can focus in a single class specialization, or divide up your skill points into various classes; but for less oomph as you’ll never fully be able to master all classes one should think. It’s this kind of balance that makes this game sound like an RPG that we can all be familiar with, plus with more game friendly controls.
ATLUS, in collaboration with Cyanide Studios has also unveiled a limited pre-order bonus art book for the game. The bonus art book offers sixty-four full color pages that include sketches, concept art, photos, screenshots and renders from the game, complete with DVD Commentary like text from the game’s developers. The package will also include behind the scenes materials, like a special message from Martin; possibly telling us to drink more Ovaltine; and a portrait of the development team. That’s what I’m missing from my life, more portraits of development teams. The bonus book measures at 8.5″ wide and 11″ tall, hardbound and printed on the most premium of stock papers. You know, the hard glossy kind that resists fingerprints and could kill children with paper cuts.
I sure can’t plum wait for this game to come out. Everything looks so great.
What do you think about this combat-system for an RPG?
Mostly because it’s a sci-fi movie, and I do try to watch most of them. To be honest there’s not a whole lot of a deeper or more compelling reason than that. Nothing in the trailer excites me, and if there were more going on at the movies this weekend John Carter probably loses me. But when my other options are The Lorax or Good Deeds, you know, Mars starts sounding like a fine destination. Fine.
Rachel-
So, I secretly hope that this movie is amazing. How could I not want to see this? Published in 1917, A Princess of Mars, on which John Carter is largely based, is the first of a long series of novels by Edgar Rice Burroughs (the Tarzan guy). We can arguably connect most of the planetary science-fantasy stories of the last 100 years to this book. Conan, He-man, Dune, Heinlein’s The Number of the Beast, Star Wars…the list is endless. Sure, it’s outdated and weird, and the science isn’t even close, and they were inspired by those old theories that you could see evidence of ancient civilizations on the Martian surface (Google the canals of Mars), but this is science fiction HISTORY. Crazy stuff, sure, but mostly awesome.
And come on… THAAARKS! Plus, Michael Chabon wrote the script, and it’s being directed by Andrew Stanton. There’s a part of me that thinks this just might be great.
What would make it awesome?
Elena-
Um…can I be real here and say that, given the amount of CG I saw in that trailer, that I don’t think there’s anything this film can do to be excellent? If I have to pick a path for it, how about some just ridiculous popcorn B-movie fun? There’s a place for that, and maybe this movie could be it.
Rachel-
Despite the sexist overtones, I REALLY want it to look like the artwork I’ve associated with the stories. They just come hand in hand. I find it impossible to disconnect the story itself from the Frazetta naked asses and most especially the super lush, beautiful old-style illustrations of Frank E. Schoonover (who very graciously put some clothes on the princess for us.)
From what I’ve seen of the trailer everything looks nice and red. They’ve kept the barbarian-style clothes, and I’m REALLY impressed with the Barsoonian ships. They look awesome.
I guess what I’m saying is, I want the damn movie to be pretty. That would be awesome.
What would make it suck?
Elena
If it takes itself really seriously and is half-CG (as its trailer makes it look). Basically…if this shit is like Avatard, Mars Edition it is going to suuuuck asssssssssssssssss.
Rachel-
I don’t really care of there’s a lot of CGI as long as it looks good and it’s not a half hour of blurriness like Transformers.
It will suck if the story is a disaster. This is an adaptation of a pretty sprawling novel that has its own problems with pacing, so this could all go horribly wrong. It could be full of confusing lore and never explain anything about why this culture as at war or how anything works. I’m a little worried about the super-powers. The telepathy and the super-strength. The science behind it is pretty silly now; I hope it’s not something the entire audience laughs at every time it happens. I’m pretty worried about it. I think Chabon can handle it, but it’s all the executive driven decisions I’m scared of.
This whole movie could be a hammy, horrible, convoluted mess.
Any additional thoughts on production/trailer?
Elena-
Why is this movie 2 hours and 10 minutes? I may not have read the book it’s based on, but I know this much about Edgar Rice Burroughs: he wasn’t writing fucking Dune. You don’t need a mini-series to tell that story. What the hell? I better come out feeling like it was shorter than it was…and I especially better not feel like it was LONGER than it was!
Rachel-
Yea, I agree. More than two hours? Is this Lord of the Rings? This is a movie based on the king of all pulp novels. Yes, there are going to be large-scale battles in this movie but they don’t need to be Helm’s Deep!
In general I’ve been enjoying the trailers coming out. The Tharks look great, everything looks pretty damn epic. I just don’t know how sincere it’s going to be. Will this be the podraces on Tattooine horrible or will I be enamored of the cinematography? Will I want to be Princess Dejah for Halloween, or will I want to kill her and all the girls I see dressed as her on Halloween? I’ve been hearing via word of mouth that the film isn’t that great, so that isn’t encouraging. But I might like it, I mean… I still watch Conan marathons. This might be a matter of preference.
Reaction to Film:
Elena-
That…that wasn’t NEARLY as bad as I thought it was going to be! In fact, dare I say it was actually kind of good? I mean, it wasn’t like top 10 SF films of the decade material, but it was eminently watchable. And here’s the thing, and why I never take for granted that a film which I expect to be bad can’t possibly be as bad as I’m expecting: Avatar was WORSE than I expected, and I expected that James Cameron self-indulgent-whack-fest to be bad (for me as an audience), so I am by no means damning John Carter with faint praise when I say it was better than I expected.
That is not to say there were not…flaws. There is still a visual divide between characters that are live-action and characters that are animated. The gulf is not as wide as it once was, and the animation looked good, but it still looked like animation. Until it doesn’t I am going to point it out as a flaw. I expect to go to my grave still complaining about this issue.
John Carter’s jumps were also problematic. They looked like someone in Earth-gravity being hoisted aloft or an animated object being zoomed along a CG trajectory. The bounces lacked the true buoyancy that happens in lower gravity. Actually those scenes reminded me of the jumping about in Gentleman Broncos, which is very much an ode to this type of pulp SF story (and, by the by, well worth the watch)…but to extend my point, the rendition of the SF storyline in that movie is very much meant to be comedic. It’s okay if the jumping doesn’t look real because that’s not really the point (in fact looking too real might undermine the point in that movie), but since John Carter was actually taking itself mostly seriously, the silly-looking jumping was an issue.
Now let’s talk about some good things. I loved the casting for John Carter and the Princess (seriously…why bother calling her anything else, especially her goofy-ass Never-Ending Story sounding name?). The rest of the casting didn’t bother me or excite me, and Mark Strong got to add yet another villain to his villainous credits list. Also the Princess had amazing eyes, and while I am fairly sure it was contacts/CG I’m not totally sure, so they sold it better than the Dune movies have so far.
The dog? Was fucking awesommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmme. Best part of the movie! And proof that whatever form life takes, the human-dog bond is universal. (Okay, at least galactic.)
However.
Doggie? With his super-fast zoom run, utter fearlessness, and absolute loyalty? Brought up a pretty damn huge problem with the military strategies of the various peoples of Mars: WHY. THE. FUCK. DIDN’T ANYONE HAVE A MARS-DOG ARMY?! That made no sense. How could they miss the usefulness of that kind of animal in attacks? So that was bit of a plot hole.
Another was John Carter’s Superman status. So, I get that his magical physical abilities happen because he’s used to Earth-gravity. Fine. But…what happens in a year after he’s been living on Mars? I mean, best case for him is that he’s equalized to everyone who is from Mars and built for it. More realistically is that his bones start disintegrating and his muscles atrophy and he goes from being the secret weapon to the same as any other Mars-man/useless. That’s not such a happy ending, is it?
Finally I want to give some props to the framing device. Because it was ace. At first when the movie started with the whole random nephew reading his uncle’s diary, I thought, Jesus Harold Christ, not another stupid framing device that I was tired of after one 19th-century lit class. But the frame turned out to be actually relevant to the story and took the ending up a notch, from bittersweet to kick-ass. So that was good and worth mentioning. Don’t roll your eyes at the frame until you get to the end!
Yeah. In all it was a good two hours at the movies, and I’ll go see any sequels. It might not be profound or profoundly memorable B-movie crazysauce, but it was fun enough and good enough that I don’t feel cheated out of 130 minutes of my life. So I’m going to file John Carter (Of Mars) in the Win column and call it a night.
Rachel-
I LIKED IT!!! I really did!
I mean yeah, it had its issues. It was too long. It had a couple of slow bits; that I didn’t mind so much on the first watch, but I suspect I would if I saw it several times. It glossed RIGHT ON OVER all those issues of racism and classicism and the critique of the industrialized world beating out the “cultured imperialists”. Just RIGHT ON BY. Whatever. I understand why Disney did not want to deal with all the baggage a hundred-year-old novel that started a genre might come with.
They changed quite a lot to make it a tighter story, and to make it more appealing to a modern audience. Some of it I am quite grateful for. Princess Dejah, for instance, was intelligent, capable and did not spend the entire movie being repeatedly kidnapped and sexed. Good job, Disney. They left out the telepathic stuff. Probably a solid choice. That could have been hokey. They handled the super strength really well and quickly, and, yes…it IS funny to watch a guy moon leap everywhere he goes, and they acknowledged that.
The bit at the beginning with the Apaches and the Colonel…kind of clumsy. I think it was much longer and had to be edited, because seriously where is the MARS in this movie? I did absolutely LOVE the flashback to John burying his wife and child when he was fighting that one Thark army. It was actually really well done and does a great job highlighting the fact that when we romanticize violence, we forget that war is terrible and leaves innocent people dead. I think that might have been one of the best scenes in the film. The editing choice there was really spot-on.
Elena-
TOTALLY agree. That flashback sequence gave me chills.
Rachel-
They changed some details with the Tharks, as well. For example, it was Tars Tarkas that was aware that Sola was his daughter in the film rather than the other way around, and they completely cut out the deal with Kantos Kan being an arena prisoner that escapes with John Carter to Helium. Totally understandable, as they decided to expand Dejah to be far more involved in the plot than she originally was. I’m really grateful for that. They did that in a really clever way. She still needs John’s help, otherwise what is the point? But she isn’t just this naked (seriously, in the books she doesn’t wear any clothes. The comment she makes about her outfit being vulgar is pretty hilarious in that light) princess who needs to be CONSTANTLY rescued by the big, strong white man from Earth. They really did that right. All credit to Michael Chabon for that. He did a great job with all this material.
I also thought they did a great job with the CGI. Sure, Woola never looked like he was REAL, but the CGI wasn’t distracting. The ships and the cities and the vistas in general (love the use of tilt-shift for several of the big wide shots) were all really enhanced by effects. Some of the battle scenes got a little CGI heavy. Maybe it was the 3D making the film a little dark, but I didn’t really detect that hated shininess that CGI can cast.
Speaking of Woola. WOOLA IS THE SHIT. Calots are awesome. I love that they made it sooooo ugly. They could have gone with a more lizard-like dog, but no. They went with a weird geko-turd. Love it. Ugly things make me happy. He basically stole every shot he was in. Woola appreciation society. I am in it.
Elena-
ME TOO!!!
Rachel-
Lookit that ugly, runty horrible scrotum-looking thing! We love him so!
That might sum up how I feel about this movie in general. It’s kind of a weird movie in that it’s an adaptation of a book that is now so dated as to almost appear as a farce, or at least an uncreative rip-off of everything produced in the genre for the last 50 years. Except it’s not. It’s the original weird, epic, pseudo-science-fantasy planetary adventure story. Everyone is naked! Everyone seems not to be choking or freezing to death! It’s a crazy world! Just remember to call it Barsoom!
Round 2 of the 6th Annual BSC Book Tournament begins with match-ups between the Global Catastrophe and Future Apocalypse brackets. If you missed it, you can see our announcement of the brackets here as well as the unveiling of the full tournament schedule here. But now it is time for the voting to start!
We are keeping each round in its own post, but don’t worry! They will all be linked together to make it easier for you.
1: Legend by Marie Lu vs Wither by Lauren Destefano
Be sure to check back tomorrow for the Female Leads VS The Male Leads bracket. If you experience any technical issues with the polling, please email Sarah@boomtron.com with the problem. Polls will be open until March 19th, and results will be announced on Tuesday, March 20th.
The first round between our Female Lead bracket and the Male Lead Bracket has concluded! It was a tough round with many close calls, but in the end the fans spoke up and we have the winners for round 1. Round 2 for this bracket will begin March 17th and through till March 20th.
Congratulations to each of the winners from the match-ups!
You can see the winners from each bracket below:
Female Lead Winners
Uglies by Scott Westerfeld
Matched by Ally Condie
The Line by Teri Hall
21 Erased by Barbara Rayne
Divergent by Veronica Roth
Dark Parties by Sara Grant
Helper 12 by Jack Blaine
Male Lead Winner
Dark Inside by Jeyn Roberts
Round 2 match-ups begin tomorrow, March 16th, for the Global Catastrophe vs Future Apocalypse brackets.
The Match-ups are as follows:
1. Matched by Ally Condie VS Uglies by Scott Westerfeld
2. Dark Parties by Sara Grant vs Helper 12 by Jack Blaine
3. Dark Inside by Jeyn Roberts vs The Line by Teri Hall
4. 21 Erased by Barbara Rayne vs Divergent by Veronica Roth
So be sure to check back tomorrow, March 17th, to begin voting on these titles, and check in with us on Twitter for updates on the competition!
Round 2 of the 6th Annual BSC Book Tournament begins with match-ups between the Global Catastrophe and Future Apocalypse brackets. If you missed it, you can see our announcement of the brackets here as well as the unveiling of the full tournament schedule here. But now it is time for the voting to start!
We are keeping each round in its own post, but don’t worry! They will all be linked together to make it easier for you.
2: Ashes by Ilsa Bick vs All These Things I’ve Done by Gabrielle Zevin
Be sure to check back tomorrow for the Female Leads VS The Male Leads bracket. If you experience any technical issues with the polling, please email Sarah@boomtron.com with the problem. Polls will be open until March 19th, and results will be announced on Tuesday, March 20th.
Round 2 of the 6th Annual BSC Book Tournament begins with match-ups between the Global Catastrophe and Future Apocalypse brackets. If you missed it, you can see our announcement of the brackets here as well as the unveiling of the full tournament schedule here. But now it is time for the voting to start!
We are keeping each round in its own post, but don’t worry! They will all be linked together to make it easier for you.
2: Incarceron by Catherine Fisher vs The Eleventh Plague by Jeff Hirsch
Be sure to check back tomorrow for the Female Leads VS The Male Leads bracket. If you experience any technical issues with the polling, please email Sarah@boomtron.com with the problem. Polls will be open until March 19th, and results will be announced on Tuesday, March 20th.
Bereft of low hanging apples to pick from, Warner Bros.; like most studios; are always on the look out for the next easy title to option. This time they turning to the old media, newspaper comic strips. Mandrake the Magician, a comic strip created by Lee Falk; who also created the Ghost Who Walks, the Phantom; in 1934 centers around an illusionist with the power set of speed hypnosis; with but a gesture, he can create illusions real to his foes. Warner Bros. Has picked up the movie rights to this old time comic with Atlas Entertainment to produce, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
As the strip was created and published in 1934, Mandrake is arguably the world’s first comic superhero. If anything, the hypnotist with the fast hands did it’s part in inspiring the golden age of comic books that started in the late 1930’s; like when Alan Scott was the sentinel of the magical Green Lantern.
Mandrake is assisted by his strongman companion, Lothar who together fight various villains. This must have been when creating a comic book character was easy and considered original to do. As the forerunner, Falk could create disposable villains like gangsters, mad scientists, dimension hoppers or aliens. Falk even got ahead of the curve, conjuring up an Evil Twin brother for Mandrake; was his name Mandark? Current day comic book villains are easily borrowed and interchanged amongst superhero rogue galleries.
Hollywood has long tried to capture the elusive Mandrake for the movie screens. Back in 1939 when superheroes were the glittering blood sucking genre, Columbia Pictures made a twelve part serial, and a made-for-television movie in the 1970s. That’s the closest the Mandrake has come to hitting the big screens since.
Disney; the owner of Marvel Comics; had the rights to Mandrake for a while, but the most recent holder of the property was Baldwin Entertainment and Hyde Park who tried their hands at developing an adaptation Chuck Russell and Mimi Leder were to direct, staying Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Hayden Christensen. Atlas Entertainment became involved with the project in 2009, going as far as to develop a script with David and Janet Peoples; they made that weird time travelling movie about 12 Monkeys.
This won’t be the first time that a movie has been successfully turned into a movie. Touchstone Pictures did well with Dick Tracey back in 1990. The concept of miniaturized video conferencing technology was stuff of pulp science fiction back then. Now we have it built into our cellphones. I wonder what Mandrake will show us about the potential future to come.
Warner Bros. Is looking for a 21st century makeover, hopefully going towards another bromance actionfest like Sherlock Holmes. As long as it doesn’t turn into an update like they did with Jules Verne’s books like the Journey series of movies. If it does, they might as well cast that Mindfreak magician to play the part of the updated Mandrake.
I’m sure plum excited about this movie and can’t wait to see it.
Who do you think should play Mandrake in the movie?
Round 2 of the 6th Annual BSC Book Tournament begins with match-ups between the Global Catastrophe and Future Apocalypse brackets. If you missed it, you can see our announcement of the brackets here as well as the unveiling of the full tournament schedule here. But now it is time for the voting to start!
We are keeping each round in its own post, but don’t worry! They will all be linked together to make it easier for you.
2: Birthmarked by Caragh M. O’Brien vs Across the Universe by Beth Revis
Be sure to check back tomorrow for the Female Leads VS The Male Leads bracket. If you experience any technical issues with the polling, please email Sarah@boomtron.com with the problem. Polls will be open until March 19th, and results will be announced on Tuesday, March 20th.
