#because I have seen how some of the characters are needlessly hostile in the early forms

[optiwashere]

what are your thoughts on the differences between Early Access characters and full release? Did you play it?

I don't play early access games. I don't have the time for it, believe it or not, and I also don't want to burn myself out on (usually) shittier versions of games without experiencing the full scope. If someone wants me to beta test their game, they can pay me.

I played the first Darkest Dungeon in the earliest patches, and it's forever tainted my perception of early access games for me personally.

That said, I can only go off of what people say about those versions of the characters and that is exceedingly difficult without just watching playthroughs of those various versions. Why? There are plenty of people who have their heads on straight, but I see enough mythologizing of cut content, older sketches of things, etc. for me to be wary of relying on second-hand accounts. And I definitely don't have time to watch playthroughs of an obsolete version of this video game lol.

Anywho, my point is: I like the game at release. Thinking about what was and what could have been is as useful to me as rocks in my shoes. I prefer to discuss what we have.

[the-firebird69]

sic meaning - Google Search

"Sic comes from Latin, in which it means "so" or "thus." Though it's a useful tool, some usage commentators feel it is bad manners to use a sic to needlessly ..."

https://www.google.com/search?q=sic+meaning&client=ms-android-cricket-us-rvc3&sca_esv=0c6ef13e064fd2d5&sca_upv=1&sxsrf=ADLYWILh7u-86o5k23IZlOpLEUGXauy20A%3A1721598200260&ei=-ICdZuW_D5K-p84PksCR-AI&oq=sic+&gs_lp=EhNtb2JpbGUtZ3dzLXdpei1zZXJwIgRzaWMgKgIIAjIKECMYgAQYJxiKBTIKEAAYgAQYQxiKBTIFEAAYgAQyBRAAGIAEMgUQABiABDIOELkBGIAEGEMYigUY7wQyBRAAGIAEMgUQABiABEjgS1CrEViaLnADeAGQAQKYAfUBoAH7DqoBBjAuMTAuMrgBAcgBAPgBAZgCCKACpQioAg_CAgoQABiwAxjWBBhHwgINEAAYgAQYsAMYQxiKBcICExAuGIAEGLADGEMYyAMYigXYAQHCAhkQLhiABBiwAxjRAxhDGMcBGMgDGIoF2AEBwgIZEC4YgAQYsAMYQxjHARjIAxiKBRivAdgBAcICBxAjGCcY6gLCAgQQIxgnwgILEAAYgAQYkQIYigXCAhEQLhiABBiRAhjRAxjHARiKBcICERAuGIAEGLEDGNEDGIMBGMcBwgILEC4YgAQYsQMYgwHCAhMQLhiABBixAxjRAxjHARiKBRgKwgIKEC4YgAQYQxiKBcICEBAuGIAEGEMYxwEYigUYrwHCAg4QABiABBixAxiDARiKBcICChAuGIAEGCcYigXCAgsQABiABBixAxiDAcICCBAAGIAEGLEDmAM7iAYBkAYRugYECAEYCJIHAzIuNqAHyH4&sclient=mobile-gws-wiz-serp#:~:text=Sic%20comes%20from%20Latin%2C%20in%20which%20it%20means%20%22so%22%20or%20%22thus.%22%20Though%20it%27s%20a%20useful%20tool%2C%20some%20usage%20commentators%20feel%20it%20is%20bad%20manners%20to%20use%20a%20sic%20to%20needlessly%C2%A0...

Thusly or so

Zues Hera

It has special meaning. It really says sic semper tyrannis or thus always tyrant and it is a method that the max use to create what they call super soldiers what we call really mean people who are hostile. They look to elect Jason as vice president as they did back then to create a tyrant and to try and have him overthrow Ken. And the question is when and how since this is the year of the election and it's a little bit early and it's odd we don't think Camilla will be in the picture of the presidential race for what the proper are doing that's what our records indicate but it might happen and we believe that he was shot by Nathaniel Hawthorne we believe that Trump was Nathaniel Hawthorne as was the owner of the Nathaniel Hawthorne Mall it's really the Hawthorne Mall that was BG and the author of the books were mixed and the one who was purporting the work was the actual Nathaniel Hawthorne I have seen in several movies as a very short midget and they modified their skeletons and people said it you've been lifting and things like that and he is in awe really shock and he didn't keep it he was in the low desert as Mr Maserati. He aimed the weapon at our son and said that he was a Russian and they found out who he was he's a mad Mac and he's out of control people say but they're having to do it and that's how it goes if you want to stay topside you have to be a worker and he's vulgar and grass and rude and really he spent but what is his role here his role with Lincoln was to create a tyrant then it went off but it didn't do anything and it was after the fact he didn't come back because he didn't public but it was meant to come back with Grant and they ran the government. And that was what it's for was today these days. It doesn't mean that Ken will be in office or that the civil war reenactment will cause that to happen he does have a character and you saw it earlier it doesn't look anything like Grant or Ken it looks like Brad and that's not who it is and it is Brad no it's Ken and cheesman and it's a weird combination those are the two next Democrats and they really sucked wind but they are under duress Camilla Harris is feeling gloomy her son doesn't want her to run for office because they're threatening to shoot him all the time already and she would be threatened constantly she's threatened all the time and thinks that it's attention but it's really just this idiot and if anything it might be this Mac behind him and that's who the nutty duplicates are and people have been grabbing them and questioning them so we are off to a different chapter we're glad Camilla is standing up for the country and herself and we are not saying no to her she is welcome to be on the ticket I'll send us taking a beating but it changed everything our son has taken a beating but it changed everything in a positive note he says woman fight differently and their way is wicked and can be extremely lethal and these are enemies of hers who have hurt her family and of both. And she knows what he's talking about and Ken could just become the general we're not really sure why but his presidency was nothing to be it was nothing outstanding it might have something to do with it

Thor Freya

He didn't really make any changes or do anything dramatic or even set the stage it was like when he was president here. And you know what you're saying we can pick it up and it's a baton and everybody starts doing stuff I have a wicked temper but I'm not mad at you I know you're afraid and this a****** won't leave you alone and he won't leave me alone and you see me in movies you think I do understand that and he's been thinking about that one with that black detective who writes all the books it's really awful so the Mac came up and shot Abraham Lincoln and you said you're going to be a tyrant and he is he is ugly after Trump and that's what he made him into so we're not really sure we want him to be in office and people agreed it's a lot more than just his mental status it's association and that he works for Trump and Trump would try and take his place and all this vulgar stuff been trying to take my place we were tired of this crap with these people it is a Republican named Trump and it's not funny

Kammilla Harris VP

And we're going to name a few people and so forth but he's right about something this guy has been shooting us and saying is everyone else and we have to get a beat on him he thinks he was the priest in Hillsboro is working on hurting their family and I've had enough of this s*** and my wife fell over and he said thank you and he was very weird and he's saying you're welcome I guess and we did notice that he was helping her and I got a little upset and said who is that and I figured out he's a Mac and it didn't really trigger anything then I remember this guy was pulling a gun on him and he is probably the one who knows about the matrix because of the method and he's using it on me so we have to find that shrimp or whatever it is and he's a Mac this is going to be great he says You must have an area in LA and that's also good and someone said he was a husk no he's involved in taking ships from Tommy f and he's going to get his ass kicked now this is good work and we're going to see about this presidential race he's always involved somehow it's got to ridiculous but now I see why

Trump

And it starts changing but this is reality that's who the guy is and he's riding the war he makes mistakes a big ones

Olympus

[secret-diary-of-an-fa]

“Another Life” Review: Another Hour of Mine I Won’t Get Back

One of the good things about Netlix (particularly compared to traditional TV channels) is that its ability to deliver a wide variety of content simultaneously allows it to experiment with things that might not have wider appeal. This is particularly important where genre fiction is concerned, because you can’t rely on formula to develop something genuinely good in that area. Who’d have thought that a ‘cursed object’ story set exclusively in the art world where everyone talks like they’re delivering a devastating Gustav Klimt review would turn out to be one of the best horror movies of recent years? And yet Velvet Buzzsaw blew me away and gave me a reason not to give up on western culture completely. Likewise, who expected a revenge saga about classical music with (at most) one or two truly graphic scenes to be the most gut-wrenching and powerful psychological thrillers of recent years? Yet The Perfection was one of the only truly transcendent films I’ve ever had the privilege of watching. The same goes for series- it’s hard to imagine that an overwhelming blend of surreal and dystopian imagery, hard-to-grasp technological concepts, semi-obscure literary references, needlessly brutal violence, gleeful depravity, whip-smart humour and a borderline-sociopath with a Hello Kitty rucksack would ever be aired on a proper channel. Altered Carbon, however, turned out to be one of the best sci-fi series of the last decade, missing the top spot only thanks to the existence of Rick and Morty.

The reason I’ve started with all this gushing praise, however, is merely to provide context and a necessary counterbalance to the excoriating review that follows. For you see, an ability to deliver niche or experimental content can lead to abject failures as well as shining successes. For every underrated gem, there must be a meticulously-polished turd waiting to ambush the unsuspecting connoisseur. Ladies and gentlemen, Another Life is that turd.

On paper, Another Life sounds like good, solid sci-fi. A starship captain has to travel across the universe to ascertain whether an alien race that recently dropped probes on Earth is hostile or just curious. Along the way, her journey will be complicated by a crew who’s used to working under a different captain with a radically different style of leadership and all the usual, real-life-plausible dangers of travel through uncharted space (along with a few blatantly made-up ones). It’s not a terrible idea, but every bad creative decision that could be made is made and so the whole things collapses like a poorly-made soufle before the end of episode one.

For a start, let’s talk about the show’s aesthetics and visual decisions. the CG budget clearly wasn’t huge (which is fine), but the show tries to realise as many of its effects as possible using CG anyway, which stretches that minimal budget far too thin and draws attention to how artificial and contrived everything looks. For example, the decision to make the alien probes on Earth giant shimmering walls of crystal that can only be realised through CG is particularly baffling, given that they could just have been big fuck-off metal things that could have been physically built as a set. Meanwhile, the show‘s overall look is... well, bland. If you’ve seen literally any space sci-fi before, you’ve seen the individual elements of the tech in Another Life. I think it’s aiming for Archetypal, but it just looks lazy. It doesn’t help that they liberally borrow terminology from other sci-fi. I know that ‘Impulse Engine’ is technically (probably) the correct name for a slower-than-light engine that works in a particular way, but calling your space engines that just invites comparisons to Star Trek, which won’t be favourable. Back to the point, though: in addition to cribbing heavily from superior shows, Another Life also makes everything look far too smooth and clean. A spaceship is a working vehicle filled with people doing dangerous, difficult, often dirty jobs. Its interior shouldn’t look like an iPhone fucked a trendy west-end bar. Seriously, the ‘future’ set in fucking Crystal Maze looks more convincing.

The problem of everything seeming too smooth and clean extends beyond the visuals and into the casting. Practically everyone in the core cast is in their early twenties. They’re not bad actors, necessarily, but they clearly need older, more experienced hands around them to guide their performances and the absence of these more seasoned actors is felt acutely. There’s a reason why mature sci-fi shows usually cast across a broad age range- you’re asking your cast to deal with conceptual and scientific abstractions that can be challenging for people who don’t have a few performances under their belt. It also feels wildly implausible that a dangerous space-mission would feature a bunch of hormonal twenty-somethings who’s personal drama might get in the way of them making clever decisions. The main lass (whose name I’ve already forgotten), is played by a noticeably older woman. Indeed, that age difference is a big part of her character: can she win the trust and respect of the young hotheads? Unfortunately, one older actress does not a seasoned cast make. Besides, the character she’s playing just isn’t worth rooting for. It’s not that she’s a terrible person- she’s coldly aloof, but so was Picard and everyone loves that dude. It’s just that she has no depth. She has a family back on Earth, and we’re told that she’s missing them and trying to ensure the mission’s success so she can see them again, but the supposed internal conflict has no effect on her behaviour. She just goes about robotically calculating and minimising risk, even though doing so ensures that she’s going to be in space, away from her loved ones, for much, much longer. Within the narrative of the show, she’s making the correct, mature decisions, but shouldn’t they be causing her some introspective strife? No? Yes? Does this fucking show care one way or the other?

Of course, janky characters and budget set designs are kind of par for the cause with sci-fi of a certain type. Sometimes it can be endearing (the fact that the sets literally wobbled sometimes in early Doctor Who was part of its charm, for example). A much bigger problem is Another Life’s total lack of narrative logic. The main character (no I still can’t remember her name, nor be bothered to check) managed to get ten people killed the last time she was in charge of a starship. Surely that’s the point at which you politely ask someone to retire? Even if there were mitigating circumstances (which there probably were because showing fallibility in its lead is not something this show feels comfortable with), why on Earth would anyone put her in charge of a crew of emotional 20-somethings she’s never met before while their previous, trusted captain is still on the fucking ship and clearly feeling mutinous? That’s just bad management on behalf of planet Earth’s top brass. I can only hope that someone in HR got the sack for that one. Or, better yet, that a giant hammer will spontaneously fall out of the sky and hit this show’s script-writer so hard in the head that he loses control of his motor functions and bowels and is forced to retire to a convalescent home for the incontinent.

The captain’s own decision making processes are just as baffling as her bosses. There’s a bit where the crew figures out that they can get back on course and cut down on journey time by slingshotting around a slightly temperamental star using the same shielding they use when traveling at FTL (yeah- FTL space travel is a common thing in this universe, yet humans have somehow never met another alien race before- make of that what you will). They already tried to slingshot round the star once and were forced to abort and break orbit because of the strain on the ship. The plan has an 89% chance of success. The 11% chance of failure doesn’t equate to instant death or anything- logically, it just means the shield would fail and they’d have to break orbit again (because that’s what happened before: remember that we’ve already established that slingshotting around the star doesn’t do anything worse than rattle the ship and give everyone plenty of time to back off). For some reason, Captain Caution decides that the high chance of success, negligible risk of serious repercussions and massive potential benefits just aren’t good enough and vetoes the plan, thereby adding months to the voyage. Isn’t establishing whether the new, technologically superior alien neighbours are friendly or not something of a time-critical op, by the way? Naturally, the crew mutiny (under the leadership of the previous captain), try their plan and it fails miserable.

And there’s the final nail in the coffin for Another Life. It doesn’t play by its own rules. Its established that the FTL shields can’t use much power, because they’re on all the fucking time during FTL. It’s established that nothing particularly terrible happens when you try to slingshot round a star and have to abort. It’s established that combining those two facts to get a speed boost has an 89% chance of success. And yet, when the crew try it without the Captain’s express permission, bits of the ship start to explode, everything goes to shit and the vessel ends up in a decaying orbit around the sun, somehow drained of power. The show’s in such a hurry to show that it’s main character is right and correct and noble in everything she does that it forgets rules it laid down literally five minutes earlier.

The whole shoddy shebang has a weirdly patronising and conservative ethos. “Listen to your elders and official superiors”, it whispers smugly. “They always know best, even when they’re responsible for the deaths of ten or more people in the quite recent past. Don’t think for yourself. Don’t try to improve your situation. The old, safe ways of doing things are always best, even when they seem neurotic or unworkable.” It’s weird, because it’s the exact opposite problem that sci-fi normally has. Normally, sci-fi tries so hard to be forward-looking that you end up with a bunch of wide-eyed fuckwits trusting the power of friendship and love over a more measured, carefully-planned approach. Both sides of the coin are equally annoying since they involve sacrificing the internal logic of the fictional universe on the alter of Some Hack’s personal ethos. However, Another Life earns my full, unmitigated disapprobation, not just a mild slap on the wrist, because it doesn’t even bother to be a good sci-fi show before jumping into the message-mongering bullshit. Remember, all this shit is from episode one. My advice to those of you craving some hard space sci-fi is to re-watch Nightflyers instead. It’s weird as balls, well-scripted, has a properly-established set of hard sci-fi rules and there’s even a romantic subplot involving the hologramatic projection of a hideous mutant. Yeah. Go watch that instead. I think I might, too, come to think of it.

[cipherr]

what kind of dark place is Eralei in and how does our resident cinnamon roll Sith rediscover happiness? if you're comfortable w/ spoiling that much before the Great Eralei Fic, i mean. (i know there's been at least one other anon, probably more b/c your OCs are beyond gorgeous 😍 i totally get you tho, im super shy when it comes to sharing stuff about my characters too)

you are making my life complete, anon. ily

OOH BOY. i think the best way to answer that first part is to go more in depth  on her life and her character. i don’t want to spoil too much, especially about the whole Wrath thing, though if anyone is super curious about that and wants to know please feel free to message me and i will spoil it for you :’D 

this is gonna get long, but it’s important stuff, since i haven’t openly posted this much in-depth about Eralei before c: i uhhhh apologize in advance LOL

and to anyone who cares to read all of it (but please don’t feel obligated bc it is…a lot…) you are a saint, and i love you. amen.

so Eralei comes from a noble Imperial family, long-standing and proud and very steeped in their traditions. she was always particularly gentle, though; inherently kindhearted and soft, she had plans to eventually use her standing to work towards stability and peace rather than squabbling for more power. that all got turned on its head when her Force sensitivity was discovered, a bit later than most maybe, when she was about sixteen. suddenly she wasn’t to become the future Lady of her house anymore… she was to become Sith, to become powerful and strong and be a great source of pride for her family just like all the others in her bloodline before her who happened to have such a ‘gift.’ to that end, she was given her family’s traditional markings on her face, a permanent reminder of who and what she is and always will be. go and become Sith and bring pride to her family…or don’t come back at all.she was given a private trainer for a year or so, teaching her the basics of combat techniques to give her a fighting chance, and then she was whisked away to Korriban, and she follows the Warrior storyline from there.

in her early days, both in the academy and as an apprentice, she was fueled by fear. she was terrified of the other Sith, but of course she couldn’t let it show. she masked it, used its strength to survive. she desperately played the part of the dutiful apprentice, the proper young Sith, because that was all she knew to do. she avoided being needlessly cruel whenever possible, and on the occasions where she’d be expected to enforce her power and authority on ‘lesser’ beings, usually because she was being watched, she did so with great remorse. she didn’t trust anyone around her, least of all Darth Baras. she knew from the start that he was only going to use her and then dispose of her, she just had to do her best to survive and bide her time until then.

but what hurt her the most was how she’d be treated by non-Sith. some would cower and grovel like they were expected to do, yes, and that just broke her heart. but worse than that were the ones who treated her like just another monster, who assumed she’d be like all the rest, who wouldn’t even give her the chance to prove herself. she even ran into Jedi who would immediately taunt or provoke her, assuming she would be hostile, sometimes even trying to goad her into swinging first so that they’d have an excuse to fight.she was quickly realizing that no matter where she went or what she did, she would be met with fear or hatred. 

the absolute last thing she wanted was to be just another Sith monster, but as time went on and she got herself deeper and deeper, into her apprenticeship and into Sith politics and lifestyle, it became harder and harder for her to hold onto her ideals. she couldn’t always talk her way out of violence, or spare someone without getting caught. her survival instinct took over, and in order to not appear weak to the other Sith, she had to act like one more often. and…it became easier. she found herself raising a hand to choke the life out of someone, out of frustration or impatience, without giving it a second thought. she was in a hurry, damn it, and they were making things difficult. if they wouldn’t give her their cooperation, she would just force it out of them, and then leave them on the floor gasping for breath. but at least they were alive, right?

but this terrified her. it came so easily. she was so wrapped up in doing whatever she felt was necessary for her survival, so wrapped up in playing her role, that it started to become second nature. worst of all, for the first time since leaving her home, she started to feel strong. she started to feel that she might have a chance of survival after all. but at what cost?

she has her moments of ‘weakness,’ where she snaps and, fueled by her fear or her anger or whatever else, becomes at least briefly consumed. those moments soon pass and she’s left wondering what’s she’s truly becoming..and eventually wonders if it’s even worth fighting against.

i mean, if she’s going to play pretend and act like a Sith, why not just make it real? why try to deny it all? she’s becoming strong, she’s becoming respected…feared, too, but that’s just the way things are. maybe this really is who and what she was meant to be all along, and trying to fight back against it is just prolonging her misery. why not just give in?

except…that’s not her. it’s not who she is. deep inside, she knows this, and it never really goes away. she finds no more satisfaction in just giving in to it all…in fact, she just feels hollow. and she’s aware enough to realize she can’t sustain that, either.

eventually, she comes into her own and finds more of a balance. she’s not so soft anymore, but she retains her good heart. she finds meaning in being Sith in her own way. you don’t need to be cruel and power-hungry to be Sith, you don’t need to trample everyone else underfoot for personal gain. she allows her feelings and emotions and passions to fuel and strengthen her, rather than hold herself back out of fear. for a time, she’s actually doing pretty well.

then, of course, the entire galaxy gets thrown into absolute chaos :’))

all of this stuff from her past starts to resurface again, later on during the expansions. (spoilers ahead for everything up to where we are now, obviously, but i feel like most people know what’s going on by now)this time she’s making difficult decisions that affect way more than just herself… she has a lot of people watching her and depending on her now. her personal vendetta against Vitiate/Valkorion (for Personal Spoiler Reasons) begins to cloud her mind and consume her as well. she can barely stand to live with herself, knowing he’s rattling around in her head. and her sheer rage against him and his actions, and what she sees his son becoming, almost completely overtakes her. the Eralei of twelve years ago might have seen that there could be a way to give Arcann a chance, but so much has changed since then, and she’s stressed out and struggling and exhausted. in her eyes, Arcann is just on his way to becoming another Valkorion, and she does everything in her power to prevent that from happening…losing a lot in the process. Senya’s death, by her own hand, hits her very very hard. Senya was more of a mother figure to her than her own mother, but she didn’t stand down, and Eralei felt–in that moment–that she had no choice. it’s one of the biggest events that leads to her breaking, and one of her deepest regrets.

and then the whole traitor thing puts her even more on edge, she’s dealing with more Personal Spoilery Things relating to her past that are coming back to haunt her and actually threatening her life, and Theron comes in with that ‘betrayal’ and the whole “you’re becoming what we’ve fought against” thing (which WE know is bullshit, and HAVE known is bullshit, but…she doesn’t know that. all she hears is one of her closest allies affirming her worst–and oldest–fears. that she’s just another monster, and she’s been blind to it this whole time, until it’s too late.)

as for how she pulls back out of it all and becomes herself again… you will just have to wait and see 8) (honestly, i’m still working a lot of the details out myself.)

but yes! that’s Eralei. she’s complicated and confusing and a bit contradictory sometimes, but i’ve never had this much fun with a character or a story before, so i’m just having the time of my life :’D

i hope i’m not sounding redundant but thank you again, having someone else take an interest in my characters and their stories means more to me than i could possibly put into words.

[secret-diary-of-an-fa]

Roll Out the Red Carpet: It’s Time for the Annual Secret-Diary Awards

TRIGGER WARNING: THIS FINISHES ON A REALLY BLEAK NOTE

So, with Xmas gone and just a few days until New Year, 2019 is staggering to a richly-deserved close.. which means it’s time to look back and hand out some entirely hypotherical awards to people and cultural products that don’t know I exist and wouldn’t care if they did. It’s fair to say this year has been a mixed bag of the transcendent and the appalling. Kind of like a sandwich bag full of ferrero roche and cat sick. Without further ado, it’s time to rummage through that bag and pull out the most succulent chocolates and the most nauseating lumps of vomit to give them their fifteen minutes of ill-founded notoriety.

The Jason Voorhees Award for Best New Horror Villain... ... Goes to the kid from Brightburn (who eventually becomes known as Brightburn himself, incidentally). In the 70s and 80s it was easy to grab attention as a horror movie antagonist, because there wasn’t a huge amount of competetion. Jason himself bludgeoned his way into the public’s heart and the collective cultural unconscious just by being unkillable and refreshingly workmanlike in his approach to homicide. Freddie grabbed attention with a nothing more than some surreal nightmare sequences and a glove with knives on it. Nowadays, the standard’s much higher. Luckily, Brightburn brought something fresh to the table: all the powers of Superman combined with the moral compass of a drugged-up rock musician. I, for one, look forward to his next murder project and/or concept album.

The ‘Dog With its Head Trapped in a KFC Bucket’ Award for Most Self-Defeating Move of the Year... ... Goes to the British public, who had an election this year in which they were invited to choose between a kindly older gent who wanted to renationalise the railways and ensure the survival of the NHS and a drivel-spouting upper-class buffoon who wants to destroy the NHS, destroy traveller communities, antagonise the E.U. and repeal the laws that protect against animal cruelty. The British people chose the upper-class buffoon, because (and I have to admit that I’m guessing here, but it’s an educated guess) THEY’RE GIBBERING FUCKWITS DEVOID OF BOTH COMMON SENSE AND EMPATHY.

The ‘I Told You So Award’ for Most Comprehensively Murdered Franchise... ... Goes to Terminator: Dark Fate. The Terminator films have always made intelligent use of both male and female leads, balancing the need for a feminine narrative voice against the fact that their audience are mainly there to see big manly, macho robots beat nine shades of crap out of eachother. In an effort to appear ‘woke’ (to use the parlance of today’s hot young bell-ends), Terminator: Dark Fate elected to sideline the big, manly macho robots in favour of three female leads, only one of whom was Jamie Lee Curtis. This failure to accept that the audience for the Terminator films is mainly men who want to imagine themselves as unstoppable robot killing machines pretty much lead to the film bombing at the box office. The lesson to be learned here is that NOT EVERYTHING NEEDS TO VIRTUE SIGNAL HOW GENDER-PROGRESSIVE IT IS EVERY FIVE MINUTES. Of course, media comentator types have been groping for literally any other reason the film might have failed miserably, but it’s a losing battle: I’m pretty sure even that one with Christian Bale made money, and that was bloody terrible. No disrespect to Dark Fate director Tim Miller, though: he needs to do something with his time in between Deadpool films and it might as well be going from ailing franchise to ailing franchise, putting them out of their misery like an endless succession of Old Yellers.

The Andrea Dworkins Dancing Naked On a Plinth Award for Best Actually Good Woke Movie... ... Goes to The Perfection (spoilers ahead), a film about two classical musician ladies taking a brutal and harrowing revenge on the misogynistic, overprivileged man who destroyed their lives. Easily one of the best films to emerge in 2019, it’s one of only two films I’ve ever described as ‘transcendent’ (unironically). The Perfection is shocking, brutal and feminist in a way that suggests that the writer might actually know what feminism is and what movie writing is- which makes it pretty much unique in the current era of self-consciously progressive films.

The Most Needlessly Elongated Process Award... ... Goes to the impeachment of Obvious Criminal Donald Trump, which is still going on at the time of writing. He worked with hostile foreign powers in order to cheat in his election, he’s boasted about sexually abusing women and he’s the most singularly incompentent, dangerous imbecile in the history of American politics. Just fucking arrest the guy already. How long does it take to get one flatulent old crook into a prison cell? Has he fucking superglued his feet to the floor of the white house or something? HURRY THE FUCK UP!

The Most Painfully Ironic Celebrity Death Award... ... Goes to Carroll Spinney, who gave movement and life the Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch puppets on Sesame Street then died of a degenerative, neurological movement disorder that slowly robbed him of the ability to move his own body. There’s not a lot I can do to make that funny, other than point out the bizarre irony of that coincidence. As far as I’m aware, he was a lovely man who brought joy to thousands of children and dim adults. Definitely worth raising a glass to this New Year’s Eve. It’s just sad for him that he died in a bleakly funny way and therefore ended up in my end-of-year roundup. What a way to finish a rich and fulfilling career. Poor bloke.

The Special ‘Band of the Year’ Award... Goes to The Orion Experience, who actually disbanded quite some time before 2019. However, I only discovered them this year, so I’m giving them the shoutout they so richly deserved, several years ago... when it might have helped. They’re great: a camp, New Romantic sound combined with clever lyrics and deliciously inventive song concepts make them one of the best modern bands I’ve ever had the good fortune to stumble across.

The ‘Chrissy Metz Goes on a Diet’ Award For Worst Thing to Have Happened to an Unsuspecting Planet... ... Goes to Hellboy (2019), which came out at the start of the year and set a high-sewage mark for general awfullness. It was a bafflingly, determinedly bad film in which characters simply stated their feelings rather than emoting, musical cues were misdeployed and wasted and the plot meandered from one bloated set-piece to another without ever feeling big or meaningful. To describe it as a shit-burg floating in a sea of lukewarm cum would be to insult shit and cum. I’ve had eight months and I still can’t get over how bad it is.

The Hellboy 2019 Award for Second Worst Thing to Have Happened to Unsuspecting Planet... ... Goes to Chrissy Metz’ diet. Yeah. She went on a diet. She’s shrunk. Don’t google it: it looks exactly as pathetic, miserable and depresing as you’d expect- another plus-size celebrity knuckling under to the pressure to lose weight and not even being good at it. If I’m ever famous, remind to use my position to elevate some actual motherfucking feedees to the status of cultural icons, just so we get some fat celebrities who actually stay fat.

The Arnold Rimmer Award for most Gratuitous Act of Cowardice... ... Goes to Prime Minister Boris “My Second Name Means Penis” Johnson, who, in the run-up to the election chose to hide in a fridge rather than be interviewed by Piers Morgan. This is particularly funny because Piers Morgan is a toothless, name-dropping suck-up who doubtless would have given the Prime Minister an easy ride while making big, goopy heart-eyes at him and fantasising about how he’ll be able to boast to his friends that he’s met BoJo, the Amazing Guffing Head of State. Maybe Johnson just correctly surmised that if he was in the same room as Morgan, the Craven Bullshit Density (or CBD) would be so high that the universe would implode.

The Dianne Abbot Award For Sexiest Older Black Lady in a Serious Cultural Product... ... Goes to Octavia Spencer, who played Psycho-Cougar Sue Ann in the psychological horror film Ma and who did a great turn as a emotionally manipulative, possesive, terrifying and yet strangely sympathetic borderline sociopath... whom I would definitely have had sex with, given half a chance.

The UK Postal Service Award for Most Delayed Cultural Event.. ... Goes to the arrival of Rick and Morty Series 4, which finally arrived on screens after years trapped in a nightmarish labarynth of production issues, rights negotiations and (admittedly justified) showrunner perfectionism. I haven’t seen it yet, since there’s a very good chance that 2020 will be a barren wasteland in terms of televsion and I want to make sure I have at least one good thing to binge-watch during the early months of the year. However, I’ll give you my hot-take when I do get round to viewing it.

The Brian Cox’ Strip Tease Award for Loveliest Thing to Happen in 2019... ... Goes to TV magician Justin Willman, who, towards the end of this year, gifted the world with a second series of Magic For Humans, probably one of the funniest and most inherently well-meaning street magic telly series ever invented. Speaking as a magician, I have to say it’s nice to represented in the world of televsion by a warm-yet-snarky gad-about rather than pretentious mumbling toss-mage David Blaine.

The Special Award for Most Confusing and Alarming Year of the Decade... ... Goes to 2019 itself, which offered political hope only to snatch it away; produced some amazing films while continuing to shit out virtue-signalling dreck at the same time; and generally massaged us with one hand while slapping us with the other. In many ways, it was a year that refelected human nature itself. Earlier this year, angry arsehole commuters beat the crap out of Extinction Rebellion protestors who were trying to raise awareness of our planent’s ongoing ecological crisis from the roof of a London Underground train. And that about sums up the dichotomy of the human race for me: enlightenment and knowledge climbing high in the hope of broadcasting its message, only to be dragged down by an endless ocean or irredemable thick cunts who’d rather be complicit in the slow death of civilisation than be five minutes late for a job they don’t fucking like. And that’s why 2019 gets a booby prize: it was a year that embodied the brief rise of brilliance from a sea of grime while reminding us of how little that actually helps. Cheers!

So that’s it for 2019. The death of culture, political acumin and possibly the human race continues, though with the occasional high-point thrown in just to keep things interesting. I’ll see you bastards when it’s when it’s time for my New Year’s Resolutions Blog. Sorry that turned a bit bleak at the end, but in fairness, that only happened because I live in a terrible country during a terrible time in history.