#William is not a fan of the whole “getting replaced by AI” thing

[paigelts05]

"Olive B." [FNAF Renegade AU, TalesVRWorld]

https://www.deviantart.com/paigelts05/art/1090792387

Published: Aug 25, 2024

Prior to Fazbear Entertainment releasing a series of stories set in the megaplex, several of Mike's contacts had managed to infiltrate a VR environment that Faz Ent had been running.

That was at the begining of the year. Mike had not heard from them since.

Then, Fazbear Entertainment started releasing books about the megaplex, chronicling events that could never have happened in the real world, which made sense as these tales were peddled as fiction.

But Krasnyy begun to spread a code word among investigators.

TalesVRWorld

A code phrase that quickly informs investigators and journalists alike of the theory that the events chronicled in the books that Fazbear Entertainment released about the megaplex are part of an elaborate cover story to cover up the experiments that Fazbear Entertainment had been running within that VR environment and conceal what the moles had found.

If the contents of the stories were based on events from the VR environment, it would offer an explanation as to why the moles have not yet returned.

It would not be the first time Fazbear Entertainment has attempted a cover up on this scale, and it makes sense that they would: missing persons reports had been filed for the MIA moles prior to the release of these collections of tales. It would make sense that Faz Ent would be proactively discrediting the moles. Especially considering that Faz Ent knows that even death cannot silence whistleblowers. So they have to be keeping the moles captive somehow.

After Mike infiltrated the VR environment to try and find his missing associates, Fritz had also sent out VR headsets to a handful of other people, as he knows Mike can't investigate the whole digital world alone, and Krasnyy received one of those headsets.

Now using a defunct AI assistant as his character for this infiltration and switching its main "job" to journalist, Krasnyy Guy can begin investigating the dark mysteries that Faz Ent intends to hide.

•°°•🌹•°°•

Digital infiltration, a tie-in game for Renegade Interference, this game chronicling Krasnyy's investigation into Faz Ent's VR environment will be released when I have the art for it and have the fic completed.

I'm uploading this as a part of phone guy month under the prompt 19 - scavenger because he and Mike become information scavengers during the events of RI/DI and this would not get posted out of my backlog otherwise.

[chussyracing]

latest f1 related news and rumours

Steiner is replaced by Komatsu as Haas team principal (there's mostly rumours but apparently this whole thing stems from disagreements over financial matters in the team, Steiner asking for more money and Gene Haas wanting more value for the money already invested, the rumours also say he wasn't even allowed to say goodbye to the team members)

Mahindra Racing in FE decided to scrape the AI Ambassador after a huge amount of hate the project got over the last days

Chloe Chong (from Prema in F1 academy in 2023) will continue in British F4 in 2024

Vesti joins COOL Racing in endurance to drive European Le Mans series, but is still supported by Mercedes and still very much wants to get into F1

RRB car launch is rumoured to be on 8th February

Mercedes got approval for expansion of their facilities despite the locals protesting that decision

despite having a valid contract until 2025, ESPN claims two team tried to buy Alex out from Williams, there are also rumours he is looking for a better team on his own (btw it goes well along with what he said himself on a podcast recently about being ready to compete in a top team with Merc, RBR and Ferrari being mentioned)

Alex joined some other athletes in investing into San Francisco golf team, which means he should potentially join their charitable events in the future

it's confirmed Kubica, Shwartzman and Yifei Ye (recently became part of fda) will drive the third ferrari hypercar under the name AF Corse

from fan's point of view: Val got a haircut (or more like. bleach), it's Toto's birthday and Oscar chose Charles into his imaginary basketball team (along with Alex, George and Logan)

[sineala]

What are your thoughts on Riri Williams (Iron Heart)? She gets mixed reviews....

I like Riri a whole lot, but I feel that she was introduced very poorly, in a way that wasn’t likely to get her a whole lot of fans. I think that for a while they then did better with her, but she is definitely not being used to her full potential currently in 616.

There are ways to introduce legacy characters and get people to like them. Kamala Khan was introduced very, very well and I don’t think any fans of Carol are, say, out there being bitter because Kamala exists. They also did a really good job with Miles; usually killing off the first character is not a good look, I think, but I also think it worked in Ults because they’d already established that Ults did permadeath, they made Peter’s death really meaningful (he got a whole event about it), and also if anyone missed Peter he was still right there in 616, and after they yanked Miles into 616, 616 Peter was still there.

And I don’t think they did this well at all with Riri. When she was introduced, Tony pretty much immediately got knocked into a coma in Civil War II and then stopped playing a role in the narrative (except the AI, who was also maybe evil? that plot thread never went anywhere but it sure made him more difficult to like). So at that point Tony was effectively “dead” and there were two Iron Man comics and one was about Riri and the other was about Doctor Doom. Now, I’m not saying I object to other people being Iron Man -- my actual favorite run of Iron Man features Rhodey as Iron Man -- but I feel like, at minimum, an Iron Man comic should have Tony alive somewhere in it. Unlike the introductions of Kamala and Miles, there wasn’t still a comic somewhere where Tony fans could read about Tony still being alive even if he wasn’t Iron Man... because he wasn’t, y’know, still alive. There were two Iron Man comics and neither of them had Tony!

She was also introduced basically in the thick of two massive events, Civil War II and then Secret Empire. And, yes, she did several exciting things in them, but if you’re trying to sell people who don’t read comics or who only casually read comics on this new character, it’s difficult to do because she comes in entangled in these two events that are not even about her and yet if you try to follow her first appearances you are going to need to read the other events to understand them, and, frankly, it’s a lot of work. No one wants to have to read about how evil Captain America is a fascist to understand who Riri is.

I really loved Eve L. Ewing’s Ironheart solo, and I honestly think that’s a better introduction to the character than her actual introduction -- it doesn’t rely on knowing outside events to make sense, and I think it’s easier to recommend to people who just want to get to know who Riri is. It’s certainly the one I’ve recommended. Unfortunately, it got canceled, and I don’t think they’ve announced a new solo to replace it, so people who just want to read a Riri solo -- say, people who are hyped about the MCU announcement -- have a couple of trades they can pick up and that’s it. You can’t read a current solo comic about Riri because there isn’t one. I think she was used to good effect in Marvel Action: Chillers recently but I also don’t think there’s a lot of people reading that.

I think it would be easy to do better with Riri -- just make another Ironheart solo! -- but I think Marvel currently isn’t doing that. Unless they announced another solo I haven’t heard about.

[smokeybrand]

Weak of Heart

I'm a guy who loves a great legacy character. Cassandra Cain, Jaime Reyes, Jessica Cruz, and Helena Wayne, are favorites. Ben Reily, Kate Bishop, Robbie Reyes, and Carol Danvers, are also worth mentioning on the Marvel side of things. Hell, Laura Kinney is top ten all time for me. When you want to extend the mythos and shake up the continuity, bringing in a Legacy character is a great way to do that. If it's done properly. When it's not, you get Riri Williams. I don’t care for Riri Williams. The fact that Ironheart is getting a show chaffs me to no end, man. Now, before you label me ass a self hating black person, i need to be clear; I don’t like Riri because she’s a non-character Mary Sue, not because she’s black or a replacement for Tony Stark. Riri has the dubious honor of being the poster child for lazy, woke, virtue signaling, comics of the early Tens that plagued the industry. Cats, especially at Marvel, were more interested in pushing agenda and forcing diversity rather than writing dope stories. I can;t say that all of those narrative were sh*t because i did enjoy a few. I rather liked the Mockingbird run but i assume i am in the minority on that, considering all of the ridiculous discourse around “Ask me about my feminist agenda.” Admittedly, i didn’t evade the sting of this whole virtue signal renaissance as my darling Carol Danvers became this total b*tch with a dude’s haircut around this time. For me, Ms. Marvel was one of the best things about that Mighty run of the early Aughts but, you know, superheroes can’t be hot anymore because of Patriarchy or some sh*t even though they are, legitimately Olympic level athletes with bodies to match but okay. I’m getting a little off-topic here, my point is that Ironheart is the worst of this super-woke stunt writing and i hate her for it. he most frustrating thing about all of this? It’s worked before.

Kamala Khan is a similar Legacy introduced around the same time as Riri If i remember correctly, she predates Ironheart by a few years and was met with similar resistance from the fandom. Being very much Pakistani and very much Muslim, Kamala got ALL of the xenophobic, racist, and islamaphobic hate. It was very transparent how f*cking dumb that sh*t was but, over time, she’s developed into kind of a bullet proof character. Seriously, she had a great run in her own book and really rounded out as the leader of the Champions. Kamala Khan is one of the most well written, fan friendly, representative charters in comics, and she earned every bit of that shine. I, personally, don’t care for Kamala, i finder her personality grating, but i understand the merit of who she is and why she’s important. More than that, i see how well her implementation and pushes worked for her. Ms. Marvel has seen all sorts of success outside of the books. She’s had a ton of appearances in various cartoons to varying success but got the nod as the POV character for the once lauded, now derided, Avengers game. They did her dirty with that but I've heard that her game play is pretty fun. Kamala is a success story about how you diversify your pantheon organically, successfully, without it coming off as pandering. There is only one character who has had a better rise in the zeitgeist and is arguably the genesis for this brand knew age of representation first in comics, whether that be for better or worse.

Miles Morales is, unquestionably, the reason we have characters like Kamala, America, and Riri. He predates them all and has had the most success as the Spider-Man of 1610 after Pete died. People HATED Miles when he first swung though Brooklyn. It was vitriolic. Incandescent. And i understood why. Spider-Man is Peter Parker. That’s who he is. Miles didn’t even have his own origin story, it was literally the same spider that bit him. A good deal of the hate had to do with Bendis as well. We were knee deep in his whole “Make all the heroes black” situation and it was wearing thin. He had positioned Luke Cage and Spectrum as principal powerhouses of the Marvel Universe and it just wasn’t there for those characters. He didn’t do the work to make those characters compelling, especially Luke Cage. He wrote Cage as a power fantasy for himself, i imagine he wants to be black more than anything, and it was incredibly transparent. Cage went from a D-Lister with roughly Captain America class strength, to a primary Avenger with Hulk class strength, over night. That’s corny. Miles got the same treatment but to a lesser extent. He didn’t get his shine until other people came through and cleaned up the mess Bendis left of the character. A decade on, and Miles has been accepted has the best Spider Jr. out there, earning clout with the best Spider-Flick released to date and a principal role in the best Spider-Game out there. In the books, he’s developed into a solid character, different from Pete in a ton of ways, but familiar in all the ways that count. More than anything their relationship is dope as f*ck. If Kamala was the first, real, success, then Miles was the dry run to get there.

Riri Williams has none of this development. None of it. She was in the Champions book, too, right along with Kamala and Miles, and she still sucks. Hell, Kid Nova, Sam Alexander, also makes an appearance in that book and i forgot he existed until i wrote this sentence, but even he has more of a character than f*cking Ironheart. Sam is f*cking adorable. He’s had a ton of crazy adventures and, for a while, was literally the only Nova around. He was the Kyle Rayner of Marvel and the kid did a great job with that. When Riri Was the only Iron Man, she was indistinguishable from Tony. It was so bad, her AI WAS Tony. That’s how little faith Marvel had in the character after her introduction. Kamala, by this pint, had her own solo and Miles had been Spider-Man in Ultimate comics for, like, four years or some sh*t. Riri couldn’t even be Ironheart without Tony having an intimate role in her “independent” book. Sh*t was whack, son, and that’s my point. Riri Williams, Ironheart, is not a character, she’s a PR move and that sucks because the bones of something really compelling are there to be explored. Riri could have been dope especially if she had the room to grow Kamala and Miles. Riri had every opportunity to be the Marvel version of Ahsoka Tano; A brash, brilliant, reckless apprentice to the seasoned veteran hellbent on training her to reach the potential that only he sees within. Riri could have been written with the most depth, the most growth, of these diverse replacement heroes but none of that happened. Riri is the same f*cking character she was when she was introduced. There’s been o growth, no change, and her armor is ugly as f*ck. It’s a goddamn shame because i adore the idea of Ironheart but that execution leaves a lot to be desired. I hope the writers under Feige do the character justice. I hope they find a way to make Riri compelling, to make her whole because the potential there is staggering. It’s unfortunate that no one at Marvel Comics knows how to properly actualize it.

[thatguysamaniac-blog]

The community is up in arms, pitchforks have been raised, picket boards have been lovingly crafted with catchy slogans for social media. The mob is revolting. What's This Noise Then? There is no National Dex (terms in bold appear in the glossary at the end) in the upcoming Pokémon game, Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield, it's not #brexit, its #dexit. There is a grumbling controversy fluttering in the forums and the social medias as people are furious that a thing has been 'taken' away from them because not all of the currently available Pokémon will be catchable or transferable in the upcoming games for the first time in the mainline series of the games since last year's Pokémon Let's Go Pikachu and Pokémon Let's Go Eevee 2002's Pokémon Sapphire and Pokémon Ruby. And as semi-professional contrarians, we straddle that high horse and RP a bit of devils advocate. Is taking the National Dex away a bad thing? As of the end of Generation 7 there are 809 pokémon, including the Meltan and Melmetal caught in a seventh and eighth generation limbo. Given past additions to the dex we have seen that number increase by roughly 100 each generation following this trend we could assume that this number would be 900+ for Generation 8. And yes it would be nice to have the option of all against all, but if Gamefreak say they are dropping that number down, ultimately it just means for a different meta. Yeah some of your buddies wont be allowed into the new region, and since Galar is based on the UK, and given the time we live in... we could call it an immigration policy? That being said, we don't know how or what or how many pokémon are not making the cut, maybe its 700, maybe its 200 maybe they are changing it up by cutting out a whole type (or two)! Technically it wasn’t in Pokémon Sun or Pokémon Moon either… Sun and moon did not have a national dex, Yes you could have all your pokémon, however your "living dex". in  fact your "numbering" of the national dex is only from Pokémon Bank and references outside of the games themselves. Has it actually been taken away? (Pokémon Home) My living dex does not live on my game, it lives on Pokémon Bank, occasionally a Pokemon will be checked out an brought to the real game as part of a breeding program whereby it is forced to fuck a Japanese ditto (Masuda method) or it's offspring, several hundred times until I have favourable set of stats and/or pretty alternative colours. Think of it as a grotesque library of genetics where by the mons are caged in limbo and some of the luckier ones are allowed out to a breeding centre whilst I ride about on my bike beside the breeding centre endlessly hatching and destroying its young, until the egg I want hatches. At which point the mon is returned to it's electronic limbo. What is "Home"? Pokémon Home is the new Pokémon Bank, we know very little beyond it being a new storage system, but how much interactivity will it offer, what functionality will it have? It could be like ranch offering you the ability to play with them all, it much offer even just EV training or Pelago style interactions. Until we get more info I reckon surfacing and getting on the dexit hypetrain is silly. Is this generation only going to have one game? Obviously it is impossible to say at this point in time but realistically, probably not and Game Freak have suggested that this is the plan. So far every generation of 'mainline' games has had multiple entries per generation in addition to a healthy stack of spin-offs. However, significantly for the first time we may have a scenario in which RPGs in the same generation aren't strictly compatible with each other. We'd love to have more data on the spread of players across different games within a generation i.e. how many people were trading, battling etc. across Pokémon X and Pokémon Y with players of Pokémon Alpha Sapphire and Pokémon Omega Ruby our suspicion is it's a lot of players who just had the older game. This new change implies that this won't be the case from here on out (because if players of Pokémon Kettle and Pokémon Pot can battle with players in Pokémon Sword and Pokémon  Shield, they can see the animations so why aren't the pokémon just in the game?). Next year, there will be an 'Ultra Sword' or a 'Gen 4' remake, which will either bolster or offer a different set of Pokemon for a different "season" of competitive play, making Home even more relevant. Other things that have been taken away? Oh man, and out of the woodwork it comes, gripes moans grumbles about aching old mechanics from past generations. Last/This gen we had it sweet with the pelagic islands, reducing EV training and berry growing to a minimal task, no longer needing a notepad and pen or excel sheets. In general I will not hear any moans about super training, or chaining, they are awful mechanics that deserve to have died and been replaced with the quality of life improvements we got this time. The only Contentious point I can see is the removal of Z Moves and Mega Evolution, however, seeing we are getting a new megasizing mechanic (dynamax) I am up for this, again in all actuality all this does is shake up the end game, and will change which pokemon may end up being the most powerful for this generation. What does it ultimately mean? There will be missing Pokémon there is a chance that your favourite niche Pokemon wont make it to the game and you cant add it to your team, and that is sad times. This means you will have to choose from the other X amount available to you and at end game there will be a tidy collection of pokemon that were only available at in Galar, while you wait for the next entry in this generation (SwordShield 2: Ireland). In the online competitions for a year we might not have any Ultra Beasts, or Incineroar, or rapid spinners etc etc. I still guarantee that the competition will be slow as shit and twice as boring. Enjoy the game with the new 'mon's that's actually the best part, getting to know the new guys, playing with their new abilities and moves, that is a big part of the heart of the game! these new strange different creatures add them too your party, even though their stats are awful, Battle through the gyms (or events). At the end of it all find the 'mons that you want to create some niche hook  doubles team with fight against the AI and get trounced by a fucking Bibarel/Zebstrika combo! Glossary of Terms Generation (Gen): /dʒɛnəˈreɪʃ(ə)n/ A generation is an arbitrary fan decided word that breaks up and describes the chronology of the video games when a new set of Pokemon are 'released'. It used to be an important shortcut word to talk about the games as Pokemon from across generations were always compatible in the latest games. Sword and Shield potentially end the usefulness of talking about generations, starring Patrick Stewart and William Shatner. Dex: /ˈdɛks/ Short for Pokedex which is a portmanteau of Pokemon Index. A catalogue of virtual monsters which offers flavour text, but most importantly a number, which upon relieving a specific monster of it's freedom is presented to you. Depending on the game the catalogue provides habitat data, sexual dimorphism and other appearance differences, average heights and weight as well as multilingual descriptions (see also National Dex). Digimon: /nɒk,nɒk, ɒf/ Fuck off Dynamax: /ɪˈrɛkʃ(ə)n/ The reason there will be an upsurge in the use of the Penis names for your pokémon : Richie used Dynamax. Penis became massive. Penis used Harden. Living Dex: /ˈlɪvɪŋ ˈdɛks/ A living dex is an achievement that some players choose to undertake and it is catching and owning one of every kind of pokémon, including having each evolution stage rather than just evolving a Pokémon and keeping the last stage. This is done partly as a fan constructed extra achievement but also comes in useful for breeding Pokémon. A standard living dex is just one of each species and stage of all 809 Pokemon, some players try to collect as many forms as possible, so all the different male, female and appearance variants taking the maximum total up to over three billion (the vast majority of these are Spinda forms which only the insane try to catch). There are then much rarer shiny versions of each Pokémon doubling this to more than six billion different individual animations. National Dex: /ˈnaʃ(ə)n(ə)l ˈdɛks/ This is the catalogue of virtual monsters that traditionally opens up after the main story is completed and allows the player to see information about pokémon not collectable within the game itself and only available by transferring from other games. In some games, finishing the main story then makes pokémon previously unavailable start appearing. Pokémon Sun and Moon did not have a National Dex although pokémon from other games could be caught (from Ultra Wormholes and other methods) and transferred over. Although this uproar is called 'Bring Back the National Dex' it's not actually about the national dex itself, more the availability of pokémon from other games. (see also Dex) Pokémon:  /ˈpoʊkɪˌmɒn, -ki-, -keɪ-/ Pocket monster, also a euphemism for a penis. Love and make Galar great again, TGAM X

http://www.thatguys.co.uk/2019/07/yeah-national-dex.html

[daleisgreat]

Star Trek: The Next Generation: Season 2

-Greetings and welcome to my continued logs of my chronological voyages through the seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG). Click here to catch up with my entry on season one. It would be hard to tell by looking at the number of episodes in season two of TNG, but a writer’s strike in 1988 delayed the season premiere by a few months which resulted in them rarely taking many weeks off afterwards to finish the season off with a regular slate of 22 episodes. -I want to kick things off by mentioning the changes to the cast this season. The primary addition to the show is William Riker (Jonathan Frakes) now sporting the most dashing beard in all of TV history! Gone is the incapable Dr. Crusher (Gates McFadden). Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) gave the official plot reason in the season premiere for her removal being so she could help train new recruits at Starfleet Academy. Replacing her is Dr. Pulaski (Diana Muldaur). From the first two seasons I thought Pulaski was a far superior character than Crusher, and Muldaur delivered a strong performance throughout the season with her standing up to Picard better than Crusher and Pulaski having some entertaining supporting arcs with Worf (Michael Dorn) throughout the season. Apparently there was enough fan outrage for this swap that the powers that be brought her back the following season.

Other cast changes is Geordi La Forge(Levar Burton) transferred from helmsmen to his more recognized role as the primary engineer for the remainder of the series. Transporter Chief Miles ‘O Brien (Colm Meaney) is now a more frequent recurring character after only making a few miniscule appearances in the first season. Finally, I will give a big hoo-rah to the addition of the bartender Guinan (Whoopi Goldberg) to the new lounge in the Enterprise, Ten-Forward. I forgot how legit awesome Whoopi was as an actress at this time and how much I loved her in the show as a kid and I recall at that time being intriguingly mystified with her unique hats and attire. She absolutely steals every scene she is in as she lays down her wisdom to various Enterprise crew seeking advice. She is only a recurring character however and only goes on to appear in four or five episodes a season which is only more reason for her guest spots to standout each time she is on. -A big improvement this season is dialing back on Counselor Troi (Marina Sirtis) and Wesley Crusher (Wil Wheaton). Troi was written too over-the-top with her obvious telepathic deductions last season, and they are used far more effectively and sparingly in season two. Wesley Crusher is less annoying too as he settles in his role on the Enterprise and starts to gain more responsibilities. Both characters have a couple episodes where they are in the primary story arcs, but for the most part they are now more supporting roles. -Season two of TNG sees the addition of the occasional poker scene that became one of the trademarks of the series. Having the infrequent poker game and scenes transpiring at Ten-Forward were a recurring treat where we got to see the Enterprise crew relax and fraternize for a breather from the serious threat of the week. One of my favorite scenes of the season is where Riker teaches Wesley how to talk to women after engaging in a sample of flirting with Guinan that winds up going to a whole new level to the dissatisfaction of Wesley.

-A few other random favorite moments and scenes from the season feature Picard and Wesley stuck with each other on a shuttlecraft for several hours playing out exactly how I wanted it to. Data trying to best a grand master at the fictional game ‘strategema’ was fascinating for its similar parallels to the cancelled Wii Vitality Sensor and having a computer AI trying to best grand chess masters several years later in the 90s. The fictional futuristic version of joust Riker and his father engage in is so over-the-top cheesy I could not help but crack up throughout it! -Hats off to some good Worf episodes this season where the Enterprise crew team together to throw a holodeck klingon ceremony to Worf’s surprise and Worf mastering a plan to avoid a battle with a klingon ship. I was initially trepid with the holodeck episodes in the first season, but they won me over with the batch of holodeck-centric episodes in season two where Picard relives the adventures of one of his favorite PIs, and the crew has a memorable encounter with one of Sherlock Holmes’ top adversaries.

-The most standout episode of the season is ‘Q Who,’ the only Q (John de Lancie) episode this season where he introduces the Enterprise to the Borg (AKA Space Zombies). It is a tremendous introduction for what would become one of the Enterprise’s top antagonists for the run of TNG. From what I can recall for what I saw so far in the first two seasons, ‘Q Who’ is also the first episode of TNG to have an engaging back and forth dogfight between two space vessels that were some of my more prominent childhood memories of the show. It was also the first episode of TNG where they fired the vintage ‘Photon Torpedoes’ artillery of the Enterprise. If you have to watch just one episode of season two, make sure it is ‘Q Who’ because it is a big hint at what to expect of the rest of the series. -For as improved as season two is over the premiere season I would be remiss to not mention there are still a few dud episodes cluttering up season two. The episode where the Enterprise encounters a mute negotiator is a challenge and a half to get through, while another has the Enterprise taking on a group of refugees overflowing with Irish stereotypes. Due to the nature of the strike before the season, it resulted in budget cuts and there are some episodes where it is apparent where the cuts were made with the primary case in point being the season finale being a clip show. According to the behind-the-scenes interviews it was met with such disdain it resulted in being the only clip show of the series. -I do not know if many of you dear readers are keeping up with Seth McFarlane’s lighthearted homage to TNG, The Orville on FOX. As long as you can tolerate Seth’s over-the-top brand of humor, it is an entertaining take on TNG. A season two episode of TNG saw Riker teaching Wesley leadership lessons for his first assigned team he was in command of. Ironic timing a few days later happened for me when watching the then latest Orville episode paying tribute to that exact scene, but with their style of humor in a fun homage.

-I will once again raise my hat to whoever Paramount hired for their excellent HD re-mastering of the season two BluRay. There are many great SD-to-HD comparisons in the first season extras and floating on YouTube I recommend checking out to see how well they make TNG hold up to the latest sci-fi shows on TV today. I never fail to light up with every panning, transitional shot of the Enterprise! -I will once again plug the podcast, Star Trek: The Next Conversation for their thorough and entertaining breakdown of every episode in the series. It has been a great way to keep up with extra details that went over my head, and with the hosts also working in TV production it helps bring a unique perspective to TNG. -Speaking of extra features…..damn…..season two is jacked with exponentially more than the first season. There are many hours of original on the set interviews, new interviews and features for when TNG first hit DVD in the early 2000s and all new extra features for the BluRay. I kept a running tally in my notes of all the extras and not including a handful of episodic commentaries there are a little over four hours of extra features! Thank you Paramount for spreading out a couple of features per disc instead of having one disc with all the special features which made it more manageable to consume throughout watching season two. About half of the extras are brand new HD bonuses.

Nearly all the bonus material appealed to me, but I will try and isolate a few I enjoyed the most so you do not have to indulge them all. There is an awesome 17 minute piece where Levar Burton reminisces about his other then-concurring job hosting the hit PBS kids show, Reading Rainbow and how they did a Star Trek themed episode during this time and through interviews how it was the catalyst for many new Star Trek fans. Once again the gag reel does not disappoint and it has a fun singing cameo from Roddenbery. Making It So: Continuing TNG is a two part, 80 minute BluRay exclusive feature I highly recommend where the cast and crew reflect on the big cast changes for season two and the evolution of the show and how they noticed how everyone was starting to feel more in sync and the show was hitting its groove. There are too many big interview moments to mention here highlighting key and controversial moments of the season, but believe me it is a must watch! My final extra feature recommendation, and my favorite of all the bonus features is another BluRay exclusive, Re-Unification: 25 Years After TNG where the entire primary TNG cast sits down for a huge roundtable discussion reflecting on memories and anecdotes from the show for an hour. It was fantastic to take this in, and I could not help but get the feeling that this cast has no doubt stayed in touch through conventions and such over the years because they instantly were gelling with camaraderie and old stories and I could not help but feel like a lucky fly in the wall that happened to be in the room with them overhearing countless memorable moments and interactions from their time on the show. -And that wraps it up for season two of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Minus a few episodes I am real excited with how the show is progressing and as I elucidated above, how everything is falling into place as the show I remembered from my childhood. I cannot wait to start up season three later this week, and from what I understand, that is the perfect jumping on point for the show as nearly the rest of the run of the series is top-notch from there on out. Please join me here once again in a few months for my take on season three! Past TV/Web Series Blogs 2013-14 TV Season Recap 2014-15 TV Season Recap 2015-16 TV Season Recap 2016-17 TV Season Recap 2017-18 TV Season Recap Adventures of Briscoe County Jr: The Complete Series Baseball: A Ken Burns series Angry Videogame Nerd Home Video Collections Mortal Kombat: Legacy - Season 1 OJ: Made in America: 30 for 30 RedvsBlue - Seasons 1-13 Roseanne – Seasons 1-9 Seinfeld Final Season Star Trek: Next Generation – Seasons 1-7 Superheroes: A Never-Ending Battle Superheroes: Pioneers of Television The Vietnam War: A Ken Burns series X-Men – The Animated Series: Volumes 4-5

[paigelts05]

Agent Morgan Smith [FNAF Renegade AU, TalesVRWorld]

https://www.deviantart.com/paigelts05/art/Agent-Morgan-Smith-FNAF-Renegade-AU-TalesVRWorld-1079417361

Published: Jul 28, 2024

Prior to Fazbear Entertainment releasing a series of stories set in the megaplex, several of Mike's contacts had managed to infiltrate a VR environment that Faz Ent had been running.

That was at the begining of the year. Mike has not heard from them since.

Then, Fazbear Entertainment started releasing books about the megaplex, chronicling events that could never have happened in the real world, which made sense as these tales were peddled as fiction.

But a code word begun to spread among investigators.

TalesVRWorld

A code phrase that quickly informs investigators and journalists alike of the theory that the events chronicled in the books that Fazbear Entertainment released about the megaplex are part of an elaborate cover story to cover up the experiments that Fazbear Entertainment had been running within that VR environment and conceal what the moles had found.

If the contents of the stories were based on events from the VR environment, it would offer an explanation as to why the moles have not yet returned.

It would not be the first time Fazbear Entertainment has attempted a cover up on this scale, and it makes sense that they would: missing persons reports had been filed for the MIA moles prior to the release of these collections of tales. It would make sense that Faz Ent would be proactively discrediting the moles. Especially considering that Faz Ent knows that even death cannot silence whistleblowers. So they have to be keeping the moles captive somehow.

When a Faz Ent executive was rushed into a civilian hospital after falling into a coma as a result of something with the VR environment going horribly wrong, Mike found himself with the opportunity to investigate the virtual world for himself so he could find and rescue the MIA moles by once again taking up the moniker of Morgan Smith.

•°°•🌹•°°•

Renegade Interference, a multi-chapter fic that will chronicle Mike's investigation into the VR environment, will be released when I have the art for it completed and once I have completed it's tie-in game, Digital infiltration.