Trade Tales! - Serenity: A Shepard's Tale

Next up for the month is a return to the Firefly franchise. Outside of the TV show and movie, I haven’t ingested other Firefly material. I think part of it just has to do with the fact that I got other stuff to do. It is out there if you look. There are novels, Dark Horse Comics has had the license to do stories with most of Joss Whedon’s properties and Firefly is one of them. Whedon’s even been involved with a few. I ended up coming across this somewhere and something about it really struck my fancy: Shepard Book.

Derrial Book (played by the late Ron Glass) was the Serenity’s holy man. He’s a Shepard which is a priest or pastor in the Firefly universe. While he was a man of God, he seemed to do well with the pretty shady crew of the Serenity. Even he had some shades himself especially if you remember his little moment with “kneecaps.” We never found out more since the show got cancelled. When he was brought back for a bit in the movie, he met an unfortunate end. Since he was pretty popular, the Whedons (Joss and Zack) decided to do a graphic novel surrounding his origins.

Serenity: A Shepard’s Tale was released in 2010. Joss provided the plot while Zack handled the story and dialogue. Chris Samnee, who I know from his run on Daredevil, handled the artwork. The colors were done by Dave Stewart. The letterer was Michael Haesler. Finally, the awesome cover art was done by Steve Morris. So, what did this Shepard get up to in his youth?

"It's a Video Game!" - Star Wars: Bounty Hunter

Well, it’s time for the obligatory Star Wars post. Originally, I wanted to revisit and finish Star Wars: the Force Unleashed on the PS3. Then, I suddenly remember this old gem from my teen years. I saw it on Playstation Network and had to play it again. I don’t know what any of us expected when we saw a familiar figure dressed in Mandalorian armor in Star Wars: Attack of the Clones. I thought it looked kinda cool, and hey, Jango Fett lived up to that coolness even though he gets beheaded at the end of the movie. Thankfully, that wasn’t the last time we’d seen Boba Fett’s daddy.

Star Wars: Bounty Hunter was a third-person action shooter that was released in 2002, sometime after AOTC was released on video and DVD. It was developed and published by Lucasarts during what was pretty much their zenith. They were churning out all sorts of Star Wars games throughout the 90’s and early 2000’s. While you would get something horrid like the Masters of Teras-Kasi (ugh), you’d also get good games like KOTOR and Jedi Academy. They even got Temuera Morrison (Jango Fett) and Leeanna Walsman (Zam Wessell) to reprise their roles here. We even get Clancy Brown voicing another bounty hunter and Corey Burton doing a pretty good Christopher Lee impression.

Bounty Hunter takes place a decade before the events of AOTC. I don’t know how canon this is, and until someone shows me something else, I’m counting it! Count Dooku puts outs a bounty for Komari Vosa, a Dark Jedi who’s the head of the Bando Gora. Jango Fett and another Mandalorian bounty hunter, Montross (Clancy Brown), answer the call. You pretty much end up going all over the galaxy looking for clues, shooting folk, and taking other bounties along the way. On your journey, you have your friend, Rozzatta, feeding you info. You also run into another bounty hunter named Zam Wessell, “and I definitely see her and Jango’s partnership lasting for a long time…”

Oh yeah... that happened.

TV Talk - Star Trek: Discovery Season 2

Well, it’s that time of the year where I get to gush (?) a bit on sci-fi related stuff. I don’t know where a bounty hunter looking for a rouge Jedi fits on that list, but I can fit it on there, dang it! Before I get to the thing that may have wrecked my wrist, I think it’s time for some more Star Trek.

If I remember correctly, Star Trek: Discovery didn’t start out well. While I liked the first season, I’ll admit that it had some pretty big problems. While you’d think I’d itch and moan about its canonicity (is that a word?), the fact that the suits looked different was the least of its issues. At the end of Season 1, we got an inkling of something cool: the original USS Enterprise (Constellation-class, by the way). Yeah, it was updated a bit, but my baby looked good! During the break, we got more behind-the-scene stuff coming out. Honestly, I mostly blocked most of it out, but the whole thing about the writers was pretty messed up. When it started to air on All Access, I was in for it all especially since they took no breaks this time.

Now this is what I call a remix!

The biggest news that came out of the break was that we’d be seeing some old characters return. It was revealed that Anson Mount would be playing Captain Christopher Pike and that he would be a major part of the series. I had only seen Mount on Inhumans, so I didn’t know what to expect. We also found out that Spock would be around and he would be played by Ethan Peck, the grandson of actor Gregory Peck. I think everyone was worried about this one since we got another one in the iconic role. We also got an inkling that things could start to look more familiar. Did they succeed in making a better season?

So, where has Burnham gotten herself this time?

Season 2 starts off right after the end of Season 1. Since the USS Enterprise is somehow damaged, Capt. Christopher Pike is given temporary control of the USS Discovery. His mission is to investigate seven time anomalies that have recently sprung up across the galaxy. He also reveals to Michael Burnham that her adoptive brother, Spock, has gone on leave for some reason. It gets revealed (pretty early so it really ain’t a spoiler) that Spock is somehow connected to these anomalies and something called “The Red Angel.” We then get a season that searches for answers, displays fan service, makes explosions, tells some dang good stories, gives us an awesome captain in Pike, sticks to the freakin’ landing in the end, and does annoy me in some places. This is a second season Trek, after all.

Movie Talk - Ant-Man and the Wasp/Captain Marvel

Well, we got four days until Avengers: Endgame is released. Now that I’ve looked at Infinity War, it’s time for the other two that’s come out. When it comes to Ant-Man and the Wasp, I actually skipped that one for the theatres. I’m not a fan of the character, so I thought I’d save watching it for Netflix. As for Captain Marvel, I just saw this one last Saturday. I was a few minutes late (missed the trailers and Carol’s training session with Yon-Rogg), but I got there right in time.

Ant Man and the Wasp

Ant-Man and the Wasp was released during of July of 2018. Instead of the movie taking place after Infinity War, it takes place sometime before those events. In the movie, we catch up with Scott Lang, Henry Pym, and Hope van Dyne after the events of Civil War. Scott’s been on house arrest while Henry and Hope have been on the run. They reluctantly recruit Scott on a mission to see if they can find Janet van Dyne (the original Wasp) in the Quantum Realm. Unfortunately, they have to deal with a few threats. The FBI is looking for them, some lame crook wants their technology, and a former SHIELD agent called Ghost wants their tech for herself.

Movie Talk - Avengers: Infinity War

Well, we’re on the precipice of a big event… the release of Ma starring Olivia Spencer. I don’t know where this movie’s gonna go but—oh yeah, there’s that independent movie featuring the Avengers and Grimace’s evil cousin, Thanos, being released on April 26th. That’s the one I might not be able to see that day because I haven’t gotten my ticket yet. I don’t think Liz would even  be into a possibly 3-hour movie either. Anyway, we’re definitely in the endgame now. Before I get there, I wanted to look at the other Marvel movies I haven’t talked about here. So, it’s Avengers: Infinity War for this post. The other two will get their own post.

 I saw Infinity War last year when it was released at Pulaski’s theatre. I also recently re-watched it on Netflix. I did plan on talking about it last year, but I never got the chance to. It’s pretty much what the MCU has been building up to over the last 6 years. Here, Thanos and his Black Order start to form the Infinity Gauntlet, a device made up of six powerful stones. When put together, the wearer has the ability to rewrite reality. Since this is a major threat to the whole universe, the Avengers aren’t the only heroes on deck for this one. We got Doctor Strange, the Guardians of the Galaxy, the Black Panther, and Spider-Man to thwart this threat. Would it be enough to stop Thanos and his reign of terror? Well, since Avengers: Endgame is about to be released, you can kind of guess that unfortunate answer.