Monthly Archives - January 2022

Blizzard is Dead – Microsoft to Acquire Activision

That’s it for Blizzard.  Microsoft is buying out Activision/Blizzard for damn near $70 billion.  This isn’t that much of a surprise.  Blizzard is in such bad shape that a buyout was the only way out. (don’t click on the link, it’s from The Verge.) Microsoft is acquiring Activision, the troubled publisher of Call of Duty, World of Warcraft, and Diablo. The deal will value Activision at $68.7 billion, far in excess of the $26 billion Microsoft paid to acquire LinkedIn in 2016. It’s Microsoft’s biggest push into gaming,...

G4 – The Pet Cemetery Version

That really is what it feels like.   G4 came back from the dead but it came back…wrong. Last week, G4’s alternate timeline trans Justin Bieber from 2010 named, Frosk, went off on a prolonged rant on G4’s live stream about sexism. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ps12AWRbqpE Now according to her rant, either Frosk objects to sexism in general or she feels there isn’t enough of it being directed at her specifically, it’s hard to tell which because she’s clearly an idiot.  But the jaw-dropper was claiming that Olivia Munn...

Why The Book of Boba Fett Has Lost Half Its Audience

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRjlJWsVaAs It's not just that the outlaw biker gang Boba Fett recruited is riding around on Vespas. It's the fact that they LOOK like the kind of outlaw biker gang that would ride around on Vespas. Wheelie and Chopper Bunch are on their hover scooters chasing around somebody's Dad in his Space Cadillac Fleetwood. And it is just as exciting as it sounds. This is Star Wars 2022. Possibly the dullest chase scene in the history of science fiction. The...

Friday Open Thread

Off Topic comments go here. Write about what you want, so long as it is related to pop culture. All other comments will be deleted. Get a Social Galactic membership if you want a soapbox. **************** Who is the worst star pilot in the history of Science fiction? In theory, any landing you walk away from is a good one. And I guarantee you there is no crew chief in the existence of all time and space who would agree with that. In...

Another Win for Kathleen Kennedy!!!

Part of this gig involves scanning various showbiz trade media for leads and today I saw something that gave my brain a hiccough.   “Paramount Lands the Rights the to YA Bestseller Children of Blood and Bone.” That put a jingle-jangle in my noodle because I remembered thinking years ago, ‘I have no interest at all in seeing that thing.’  And a quick check says that my disinterest dates from 2019. Most of you, my beloved Darklings, could not care less either.   But for three years...

Another Win for Warner Brothers

I'm still boggling over this one. The marketing geniuses at Warner Brothers social media came up with a real winner. I mean this was genius. https://twitter.com/DCpeacemaker/status/1480652445336358917?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1480652445336358917%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fthatparkplace.com%2Fjohn-cenas-peacemaker-ad-on-twitter-goes-horribly-wrong%2F ... No, this is for real. ... This is a thing they did. ... You knew what was going to happen. I knew what was going to happen. How did any marketing department in 2022 not know what was going to happen? ... https://twitter.com/vasiliosevan/status/1480669315439472640?s=20 UPDATE: Speaking of Twitter The Golden Globes were streamed live last night. The reason it was streamed was that no network or...

The Pillars of Chapek

I didn’t want to write about it but there are too many people treating this like it’s actual news, rather than a distraction from the fact that Coke got jacked up to $5 a bottle at Disney World today. Bob Chapek sent out a companywide memo today outlining his grand strategic vision that will be based on three pillars. I was expecting something like this when Spiderman crossed the $1 billion mark. Disney has had an absolutely brutal year in the theaters.  However,...

Nothing I Can Say Will Make This Funnier

Turning Red Pulled From Theaters

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqdHP2dWQ9M That is the trailer for Turning Red, and Pixar’s animators are doing exactly that. This is Pixar’s third movie in a row to get pulled from theatrical distribution and dumped on Disney +.   Soul and Luca both got jerked from theaters “due to Covid,” and were sent straight to streaming.   Now the pull and dump on Soul was understandable, there was genuine Corona panic when it was supposed to hit the big screen, (as opposed to the pretend panic we have now).    But that...

Friday Open Thread

https://youtu.be/uiB0Gu2fsok Now in English! Talk about what you want but it must be related to pop culture. All others will be deleted. News and Rumors: CW is getting sold. I suppose this isn't much of a surprise. Background for those with poor memories. UPN was started in the 1990s by Paramount and frankly, it always struggled. Its flagship show was Star Trek Voyager and that pretty much says it all. I will grant it had a few bright...