#major general samson glenn

[lenniharrisonsims]

Newcrest Royal Family Returns Home in Triumph

Finally back in Newcrest after their long exile, the Colona Royal Family made their way triumphantly to New Moon Palace during an elaborate military parade!

The first carriage down the street carried Princess Isabella Humphrey, Dowager Duchess of Whitland, her son, Lorenzo Humphrey, the new Duke of Whitland, and the Princess' father, Prince Widower Alfonso Colona.

The little family seemed in high spirits, despite only just recently leaving mourning for the late Duke Wendelin. It was also a cheering sight for the people of Newcrest to see the Prince Widower, who had been staying with Dowager Tsarina Nadia in Glimmerbrooke during his exile, and became a bit of a recluse. Many were wondering if he was okay.

The youngest of the royal quadruplets, Princess Francesca came down the street next, with her wife, Olive Colona, Duchess of Hazel Hills, and their children- Lady Contessina Colona, and the Right Honorable Miss Astrid and Master Anders Colona.

Astrid and Anders were adopted during the exile, when the Princess and Duchess were living with the Duchess' parents in Evergreen Harbor. This will be their very first time in Newcrest! Miss Astrid was also wearing a darling little coat and beret to match her big sister, Lady Contessina.

Next up the street was Princess Adriana and her husband, Major General Samson Glenn, as well as their children, Lady Charlette and Cosimo Glenn, Earl of Wildridge.

Now that the war is over, perhaps the Major General will begin to use his title of Marquess instead, but we doubt it. He comes from a long line of proud military men- his father Antione Glenn was also Major General in the Imperial Military. Major General Glenn's appearnance on the street also marks the first of the royal men who served during the war. The crowds went wild to see their heroes healthy and home again.

The eldest of the Princesses rode together, along with their partners. Princess Emilia joined by her fiance, Petty Officer Gabriel Micheletti, and Princess Lucrezia by her husband, Leo Rose, Duke di Tirabassi.

And of course, how could we forget charming Isidro, Marquess di Montiorre, winning over the crowds with that darling smile! Both of the Princess' partners served during the war- Gabe in the Imperial Navy, and Leo in the Imperial Army.

And finally, in the last carriage, our triumphant King and Queen, Cesare and Misha, joined by their son and heir, Crown Prince Dante, and their new ward and nephew, Master Damien Colona.

The crowd was thrilled to see King Cesare and Queen Misha returning in glory after the long years of exile, but there was a hesitance about the two young men in the cart. The crowd of course was incredibly wary about young Master Damien, being the son of the man who subjugated and abused them during the occupation, and it looks like Damien noticed. A few boos and protests were thrown his way, and he seemed to curl in on himself. On the other hand, the crowd also seemed to realize something as they watched that carriage move down towards the palace- the heir to the throne, Crown Prince Dante, didn't fight in the war. All of his brothers-in-law did, as did many civilians, even those who were refugees during the war, but not the future king. Discussions have erupted online about it, contemplating; if the Crown Prince wasn't willing to fight for his country, is he fit to lead it? And anyway, he looked miserable in that carriage, like he was too good to be there, too high above the common folk of his nation.

It certainly makes one wonder, but nevertheless, we are excited to see our royals home where they belong!

[mst3kproject]

Monster on the Campus

This movie has one of the best MST3K pedigrees I’ve seen.  The cast includes Whit Bissell, the mad scientist from I Was a Teenage Werewolf, and director Jack Arnold also brought us Revenge of the Creature and The Space Children (and four episodes of Love, American Style).  That alone would qualify it as an Episode that Never Was, but wait... there’s more!  Monster on the Campus boasts a veritable menagerie of background weirdnesses that the Brains could have gone to town on, including an inexplicable bust of Genghis Khan, a woman who appears to have her dress on backwards, and a door in constant use despite being marked USE OTHER DOOR.  Add a werecreature plot even more bizarre than Track of the Moon Beast and I am at an utter loss for how they managed to miss this one.

Professor Donald Blake (no, not that Donald Blake) is a paleontologist who has just received an exciting new specimen: a preserved coelacanth, all the way from Madagascar!  He hopes this will take him down roads of science few have ever trod, and oh, boy, will it ever.  When Blake cuts himself on the prehistoric fish’ teeth, he transforms into an ape-man and sets out on a rampage.  The police investigate his trail of murder and vandalism, while the coelacanth (which Blake pronounces 'silla-canth') continues to infect anything it touches with a sort of de-evolution, like the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode Genesis except much, much sillier.

I didn't think coelacanths actually had teeth, but I googled it and it turns out they do.  This is possibly the most scientifically accurate part of the movie.  The rest of Monster on the Campus' science is on a par with things like the carbon-dated metal statue in Terror from the Year 5000 or Glenn Manning's single-celled heart in The Amazing Colossal Man.  As a major part of its premise, this film proposes that somehow, coelacanth blood actually resists evolution.

This is really, really not how evolution works.  If you could sequence the genes of a modern coelacanth and compare them with those of its ancestors eighty million years ago, you'd find that genetically it's about as closely related to them as we are to whatever little possum-like creatures were around back then. Coelacanths might look like they haven't changed, but that's simply because, like sharks or cockroaches, they have happened upon a body plan that works so well for what they do that there's been no reason to change it.  Instead, the tweaking happens on the inside – mutations accumulate whether they cause physical changes or not, and modern coelacanths must deal with completely different environmental conditions than prehistoric ones.  Factors like predators, prey, temperature, ocean and atmospheric chemistry, and diseases are changing constantly and means that coelacanths must evolve, even if they do so where we can't see it.

Another thing this movie apparently believes about evolution is that creatures in the past were innately angrier and more violent than modern ones.  We see several 'primitive' life forms over the course of this story: a saber-toothed German Shepherd that apparently represents the ancestor of modern dogs (and makes about as much evolutionary sense as the saber-toothed squirrel in the Ice Age movies), a giant dragonfly, and the caveman Dr. Blake becomes.  All three are shown attacking anything that moves, and sometimes things that don't.  There is some implication that the caveman has access to Blake's memories even it can't make sense of them, but its reaction to the things it thus 'recognizes' is still violence.  The idea that the past was 'brutal' and modern man must overcome his instincts to progress is a constant running thread in the movie.

This is taken so far, however, that it leaves the viewer wondering – if we evolved from such violent creatures, how did we ever get to where we are?  An argument might be made that the prehistoric dog was vicious because it had not yet been domesticated.  Fine, but how were humans domesticated?  How did the ape-man we see ever stop smashing, raping, and killing long enough to settle down and invent civilization?  Its behaviour shows very little evidence of what we'd recognize as intelligence.  Maybe the female was a civilizing influence.  We never see a prehistoric woman in the movie, and Dr. Blake's display of 'the faces of man' inadvertently implies that woman is the highest form of human evolution.  If, as the stereotypes tell us, men are intrinsically domineering and violent while women are supposed to be kind and nurturing, maybe the more feminine humanity becomes, the better.

Oh, wait, there's one more thing the movie's science gets right: the idea of preserving tissues through irradiation.  This works exactly the way Blake explains: by killing off all the bacteria in the target material.  It's actually a very safe and effective way to prevent food from spoiling – it never really caught on, however, probably mostly because of movies like this one spreading the idea that radiation = oh god, oh god, we're all gonna die.

If we can accept all that, however, the movie is actually very entertaining.  The music is pretty good and the effects are not convincing, but they're fun to look at.  The caveman doesn't appear on screen until nearly the end, but this is done in such a way that it is suspenseful rather than annoying.  We know that something strange has happened to Dr. Blake, and that it's equivalent to what became of Samson the dog and the dragonfly – but the characters don't, at least not at first, and their conclusion that Blake is being stalked by an unknown enemy is an entirely reasonable one given the facts they have.  The theory becomes harder to fit to the facts as more facts appear, and the police struggle to keep it plausible.  The dog and the dragonfly give us some monster action to keep us interested while we wait for the big reveal.

The reveal itself is not as satisfying as it ought to be, because the caveman makeup is pretty damned bad.  The mask almost looks more like a werewolf than an ape-man.  The way Blake gets his doses of coelacanth blood is also pretty contrived.  The first time, when he cuts his hand on the fish' teeth, kind of works, but the second time, he allows blood to drip into his pipe and them smokes it.  This is hilarious in both concept and execution, and even Blake, discussing his theory with his superiors, dismisses a second accident as unlikely.

Donald Blake himself is a reasonably sympathetic character, both the hero and the villain of his own story.  We never entirely like him, but that's mainly a product of the movie's age. The first line we hear him say is as he makes a mold of his girlfriend's face to add to his 'faces of man' exhibit - “the female in the perfect state – helpless and silent!”  This probably seemed harmlessly funny in the 50's – in the 21st century it makes him seem like a pig and it's kind of an uphill struggle to regain any respect for him. The slow burn of him figuring out who the monster is, and the confusion and terror that accompany it, help a lot – as does the behaviour of his colleagues, who understandably think he's going nuts.

At the end of the movie, Blake decides to perform an experiment – he will inject himself with the coelacanth blood a third time and see what happens.  He records a last message, saying “I pray only for the courage to destroy the monster within me.”  Sure enough, the caveman re-emerges and threatens Blake's girlfriend Madeline.  Upon seeing the photographic evidence, he convinces his colleagues to shoot him, so that the monster will die with him.

I think we're supposed to consider this a tragedy: like Oedipus, Blake could not stop pursuing the truth, and the truth in the end destroyed him.  The problem with this is that his suicide seems, quite honestly, totally unnecessary.  To keep from committing any more violent crimes, all Blake would have to do is not come into contact with radioactive coelacanth blood, and it doesn't seem like this ought to be a difficult substance to avoid.  In fact, he probably has the world's entire supply right there in his lab – burn the damn fish, and you're done!  Committing suicide over a problem that easy to solve is the act of a drama queen, Dr. Blake.

It's especially ridiculous when this movie's entire point is that the capacity for brutal violence is latent within all of us, just waiting for an excuse to bubble to the surface.  Is the movie trying to say that we should all kill ourselves to avoid the crimes we might commit?  I could probably kill somebody if I felt it was necessary – do I deserve to be pre-emptively locked up for that?  Blake seems to know that he's not responsible for what his prehistoric alter-ego does, even if the irrational part of him feels guilty regardless. Certainly he doesn't blame Sampson the dog for nearly attacking Madeline while under the influence of the coelacanth blood, so why blame himself?  The point made earlier in the movie was that we must resist our urge to violence, to choose to evolve away from it – but rather than rejecting his animal nature, Blake seems to lose all hope of ever doing so.

Confused as the movie is, this is one of the good ones.  It had me on its side from the moment it included a Meganeura, one of my favourite under-used prehistoric animals – but even outside of that it's a fun story that keeps the audience engaged.  It's definitely not perfect, but the annoying parts don't annoy me enough to detract from the fun ones.  Any lover of silly 50's sci-fi should definitely check out Monster on the Campus.

[lenniharrisonsims]

Selvadorada Wedding

Part II

The small and intimate private church ceremony will be followed by a big, glamorous, formal reception under the stars! And speaking of stars, lets take a look at that sparkling guest list!

The first to grace the photographers with their presence, were the Significant Others of some of the members of the bridal party, who are also staying at the villa, but were not in attendance at the church ceremony. The new Marquess of Lykke, Lord Giovanni Castellano (top), the Crown Princess' long-time love, Mr. Luke Marin (middle), and Prince Benedict's partner, Miss Taylor Prescott.

Next was the contingent from Oasis Springs- the Bride's maternal Aunt and Uncle- Queen Anastasia and King Ivan De La Cru (left), as well as Crown Prince Philippe and his wife, Princess Octavia De La Cru (right).

Next up from Newcrest- more of the Bride's maternal family members. King Cesare and Queen Misha Colona (top), Princess Lucrezia and Duke Leo Rose (middle left), Princess Emilia Colona and fiance Dr. Gabriel Micheletti (middle right), Princess Adriana and Major General Samson Glenn (bottom left), and finally, Princess Francesca and Duchess Olive Colona (bottom right). Notably absent from the Newcrest Family was Crown Prince Dante, who's been in the news a lot recently due to his waning popularity, and concerns over his ability to take over the throne. The reception was restricted to family members over the age of 18, which is why Lady Charlette, Earl Cosimo, Lady Contessina, and others, are not there- so what's Dante's excuse?

Next to arrive were some Glimmerbrooke faves- the Duchy of Eastmeadow. Another maternal Aunt and Uncle of the Bride, Princess Natasha and Duke Jamie Arrington, as well as their daughter, Lady Josephine Arrington, and new boyfriend, Mr. Avery Gibson.

From San Myshuno- a Maternal Uncle this time, Prince Nickolai and Duchess Megan Ivanov (top), as well as Princess Victoria and Earl Louis Yang (middle), and dazzling everyone with her smile, Miss Wren Hathaway (bottom). Miss Hathaway, the Prince's adopted step-daughter, has been known to be a shy and reserved young woman, but she seems to have stepped out of her shell today!

Also from San Myshuno- Princess Maria, the Princess Royal, and Duchess Encarna Dias (left), as well as their daughter, the Right Honorable Miss Yue Dias, and partner Miss Samara Singh (right). Their younger daughter, Rt. Hon. Miss Feng Mian Dias, and her fiance, Lord René Yang, are in the bridal party, and we will see them later.

Breaking up the line of Ivanovs is a Paternal Aunt and Uncle of the Bride- King Caleb and Queen Claire Norton of Willow Creek.

Next up from Forgotten Hollow, it's the earldom of Thornleigh- Prince Yuri and Countess Kacie Ivanov (top), and Prince Yuri's son, the Countess' adopted step-son, Prince Grant Ivanov, and his long-time girlfriend, Crown Princess Claude Pelletier, the Dauphine of Brindleton Bay (bottom).

Last to arrive, to the wedding and in birth, was the contingent from Granite Falls- Prince Ygor and Marquess Francisco Castille (left), and Princess Yelena and Duke Jacob Riordan (right).

Now that all the guests have arrived, we are so excited to see the grand entrance of the wedding party at the reception! Stay Tuned!

Part II

[lenniharrisonsims]

Baby Tirabassi's Christening

This morning at a private service held at the Holy Church of Saint Cecilia, Princess Lucrezia and Duke Leo Rose held a Christening service for their newborn son.

Many were wondering how a Christening would be pulled off for the notably religious Royal Family of Newcrest, since they are all currently unable to hold the service in the traditional Crescent Cathedral in Newcrest. But it seems it's all worked out! Sources say it was Crown Princess Ophelia who tracked down an ordained priest of the Newcrest Church (the Archbishop still under house arrest in Newcrest, ordered by Emperor Victor) and convinced the elders of the Church of St. Cecilia to hold a Newcrest service in their Simsdom Church. There was reportedly a little push-back from the Archbishop of Simsdom, but one word from his patron, and the little boy's Great Grandmother, Dowager Tsarina Nadia, and everything seemed to fall into place.

The Baby's godparents were no surprise to most people, though there was some confusion about church affiliations. According to Newcrest Church law, at least one set of godparents has to be baptised into the Newcrest Church, the other sets can be from any religion. Baby's first godmother is Crown Princess Ophelia herself, who's housed the Princess and the Duke throughout the exile, and was there the night baby was born. Second godmother went to Princess Lucrezia's closest sister- Princess Emilia. Some were wondering why her other sisters- Princesses Adriana and Francesca- weren't asked to be godparents.

The godfathers asked were Prince Benedict, who also has lived with the exiled Princess and Duke at Darkwing House, and Petty Officer Gabriel Micheletti, Princess Emilia's Fiance. Many more questioned these two appointments for godparents. Why wasn't Princess Lucrezia's brother-in-law, Major General Samson Glenn asked? Petty Officer Micheletti isn't officially a member of the royal family yet, a risky move on the Princess' part. Or even her own younger brother, Crown Prince Dante? Perhaps a remark on Lucrezia's lack of faith in her partying little brother?

Despite all the questions about the godparents, the ceremony went off without a hitch, and we're very excited to welcome to the world:

Isidro Leonardo Cesare Alexander Rose, Marquess de Montiorre

[lenniharrisonsims]

Royal & Noble Military Volunteers

As part of an old Royal tradition, all male members of the Imperial Family were required to serve in some branch of Her Imperial Majesty's Military. This is still the case for men born into the family, as well as any men who marry into it- though because the Empire has long been at peace, the service is usually more honorary than active. However, with the war at her doorstep, the Empire's Royalty and Nobility dusted off their orders and uniforms and stepped into active military service, as an example for the everyday folk to volunteer as well.

In light of the Windenburgian invasion of Newcrest, all Newcrest Military appointments have been absorbed into Her Imperial Majesty's Armed Forces.

In the Imperial Navy:

Admiral Matthew Norton

Commander Terry Harden

Lieutenant Wendelin Humphrey

Midshipman Francisco Castille

Chief Petty Officer Simon Milner

Petty Officer Gabriel Micheletti

Naval Cadet Benedict Ivanov

Naval Cadet Luke Marin

In The Simsdom Army:

King General Cesare Colona

Major General Samson Glenn

Colonel Eduard Humphrey

Lieutenant Colonel Nickolai Ivanov

Major Jamie Arrington

Captain Yuri Ivanov

Captain Ygor Castille

Lieutenant Jacob Riordan

Warrant Officer Class 1 Ignàs Medieros

Staff Sergeant Daniel Harden

Corporal Leo Rose

Lance Corporal Declan Harden

Private Grant Ivanov

Private Jefferson Whittaker

[lenniharrisonsims]

Military Ball

Princess Adriana joined her husband Captain Samson Glenn last night at the annual Imperial Military Ball.

The event is a celebration to honor the men and women of the Imperial Armed Forces, and their accomplishments over the course of the year.

The Marquess of Fielmont comes from a long line of military men, the most notable being his father, Major Antoine Glenn, who was promoted to Major-General at last year's ceremonies. And it seems our Captain is following in his father's footsteps...

... because he was promoted to Major at the ball last night! Now he is titled His Highness, Major Samson Glenn, Marquess of Fielmont. The promotion does require a move to the Imperial Military Base in Forgotten Hollow, a small mountain town in the Empire, so the Marquess has decided to split his time between there, and Princess Adriana and his children in Newcrest, which is not part of the Empire. No word yet on how that will work or how the Princess feels about it, but it is an exciting promotion for the Marquess. Congratulations, Major!