Hardly surprising. WB is absolutely clueless when it comes to superhero movies, Batman notwithstanding. If they have any ambition towards a DCCU (DC Cinematic Universe, a counterpart to the MCU), they are a good ten years behind Marvel/Disney at this point.

Hopefully the courts in America will rule that the GW trademark would be too far-reaching and broad if it were permitted to encompass every single use of the (pre-existing) term in any entertainment context.

I should be fair and say that it's not just TVD or Charlie Jane in particular that makes me wonder about the potential love/hate relationships the io9 editorial staff has with their subjects. I see the same sort of odd mixture of glee, snark, disdain, awe, bewilderment, etc. from all of them. Just read the recaps of…

You're right, the characters don't always act too rationally, or intelligently, or consistently with past behavior. You're a writer who is keenly aware of the rules, how to break them properly, and what it looks like when other writers drop the ball in this regard. Doesn't that part of your brain scream "This is dumb!…

Well, in Charlie Jane's case, she's a writer by trade and can't really help but experience her entertainment through that lens. When a writer, whose job it is to review/recap a show on a blog, offers critiques that speak to the (quality of the) writing on the show, it makes me wonder whether there is any conflict…

So Charlie Jane, are you conflicted over your affection for this show? I can't quite get a read on whether you genuinely like it, or if you just like that it makes itself such an easy target for ridicule. On the one hand when I read these recaps I detect a bit of exasperated resignation towards the show's lack of…

When I was in high school (30 years ago) I played AD&D and didn't give much thought to the ethical ramifications of the routine hack & slash & take-their-stuff behavior we all engaged in during standard dungeon crawls. But then I discovered Champions, along with an exceptional gaming group who took the idea of playing…

I agree with all of the above. But then, I would also say that the "iconic" notion of Supes as a Lawful Good boyscout has been the albatross around his proverbial neck since the 1950s. There have been numerous attempts to add some shadow and grit to the character in the comics, some of them successful even (Kingdom…

I like Abrams work in general. But I hated his take on Star Trek. Even his nods to fan service were wasted, IMO, because he got those wrong too (the Federation would never permit Orion women in the academy, and anyone who doesn't understand why—or thinks it is a funny idea nonetheless—shouldn't be working with the…

After the steaming pile that was the prequels, there's no way Abrams could make this franchise any worse. But I hope he does a better job with Star Wars than he did with Star Trek because I really loathed his Star Trek movie.

DC doesn't really know how to make movies out of their superhero properties outside of Batman (and occasionally Superman). At this point, Marvel would probably have greater success with a Namor movie than DC would with an Aquaman movie. And if The Avengers has proven anything, it is that for the most part, a superhero…

The Geneva Convention was written before the era of surgically precise ordnance, and so the notion that it would prohibit a "berserker" soldier who created a potentially "unsavory" degree of collateral damage (i.e., civilian or friendly-fire casualties) is hard to fathom. Grenades, when thrown into a crowd or a…

If Vegas had a line on what is most likely to lead to the Singularity, I think smart money would be on a convergence of technologies, each of which on their own is mostly harmless and relatively non-intrusive, and appears to be very very clever and reasonably helpful in our every day lives. It is only when several of…

I remember being excited by HD when it was first being developed. Back when it was going to be an analog format. Then it got derailed, for the better I grant you, when computer companies got involved and lobbied for a digital standard instead. But the cost of upgrading all the broadcast cameras led to a very slow…

Wow, gullible nerds are so gullible.

Plenty of people here will handwave the whole thing away, pointing out how characters don't usually stay dead in comics. The truth is, however, that whenever a powerful emotional reaction is generated by a character's death, unkilling them does indeed rob that event of all the emotional currency it had previously…

Um, visit a thousand comic book stores and count how many girls you find in them over the course of a month. The preponderance of males proves the validity of the stereotype.

A (new) set of chess men from Jaques of London typically runs around $2000. A lot of older chess players try to acquire such sets because of the history/prestige behind the company, the quality of the craftsmanship, and their love of the game. Most (non-chess playing) folks who see such a set would have no…

I knew the Internet had failed us as an instrument of socio-political enlightenment when twitter comments began to be consulted during so-called news broadcasts. While this sort of thing is really just a ratings grab, an attempt to "involve" viewers by pretending to curry their opinion via social media, the unintended…

I assumed the location got renamed to LV-426 along the way. The fact that the Engineer's ship crashes and lands in a position matching that of the original film is either intended to connect the location to LV-426, or is a very very bad case of fanwanking. And I just know that Ridley Scott wouldn't do something so…