Tag Archives: Editorial

John Cena is Headed to ECCC2021!

31 Aug

John Cena "super sad" about Dave Bautista distancing himself from WWEBy Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

Appearing Dec 4th, 2021
Emerald City Comic Con (Dec 2-5)

From World Wrestling Entertainment’s ring to cinema’s silver screen, John Cena certainly made an impact. He follows after a small line of “athletes” turned actors who’s developing a splendid career in the latter. This veteran of crazy dramatics certainly shows he has the chops for good-hearted family films like Daddy’s Home to action-star material with Suicide Squad. In December, he’ll be making a one-day appearance at Emerald City Comic Con! Let’s just hope he’s ready to face the greatest challenge many similar events are facing, is having massive indoor events a good idea while the world is still in the midst of a pandemic?

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Star Wars: The Bad Batch in Review & Commentary

15 Aug

Disney+ Announces Season 2 of Star Wars: The Bad Batch | StarWars.comBy Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

The Bad Batch finished its first season run, and I’m still wondering when and if Hera Syndulla and Kanan Jarrus will meet. Technically, part of the runaway Jedi’s journey was covered in the comic book series published by Marvel Comics and written by Greg Weisman. I doubt the two-parter with Hera can be left just like that, with her and us knowing she’ll become a resistance fighter. As for getting cameos from past fond favourites, like Ashoka, I feel that’s not the direction Dave Filoni is aiming for. 

What this season represents is in how various civilizations are not pleased at the fact The Republic has fallen and the Empire is taking over. Democracy has fallen. 

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This Summer’s for Walkin’. Navigating the Pandemic, Comic Cons and Ausair

12 Jul

SDCC 2020 Exclusive Marvel Zombies Deadpool Bust by Gentle Giant, and MEA Maximum Venom 2-Pack by Beast Kingdom - The Toyark - NewsBy Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

Ever since the pandemic hit, I wanted a reusable mask instead of having disposable ones nearby. Amazon is still rife with tons of sellers because some parts of the world are still in lockdown or very slow in vaccinating their populace. As the Summer season is in full swing and people are hankering to travel, just where folks can go depends on whether border restrictions have eased. Some countries have physical comic book shows going on, but if people can’t get there from afar, there’s nothing anyone can do but wait or have proof of being vaccinated. Most operations are still asking that people wear a face covering.  

The delta variant is concerning. I don’t see an immediate future where masks aren’t mandatory. I predict mask usage will be required at indoor events–especially conventions and concerts–for the rest of the year. As for what brand I’ll be using, that’s still up in the air.

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“No Hope” for a Franchise. Transformers: Heavy Metal AR

16 Jun

Pokémon Go creator Niantic announces Transformers: Heavy Metal AR game - PolygonBy Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

The battle for which faction will occupy Earth is not likely at the core of the upcoming mobile AR game, Transformers: Heavy Metal. The media’s abuzz about bringing this Hasbro property to the videogame world again, and honestly, I’m not excited. I’m more curious in when the reboot will be brought back to the screen again (recent Netflix program notwithstanding).

Niantic Inc is involved in the development cycle, and early images suggest this product may well be another Pokemon GO clone. Seattle-based software house, Very Very Spaceship (known for Truck Stars) is leading the development. This four-year-old business doesn’t have a lot of recognition to get some fans excited.

This company is a self-described, “motley crew of space faring designers, engineers, artists and storytellers from the Pacific Northwest and beyond. For the past three years, under the leadership of BAFTA winning founder Sean Vesce (Never Alone, Tomb Raider Series, Mechwarrior Series), we have been solving the problems of the unknown for incredible partners like Google, Microsoft and others. We are a tight-knit group of makers thriving in our undiscovered future, making shared game experiences in AR, VR, Geolocation, Live Streaming and more. In addition to our client work, we develop and release original indie experiments like the recent Knife 2 Meat U, available at our itch.io page.”

Considering how huge Transformers fandom is, Hasbro’s quality control division ought to squash any bumblebees.

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Is the Pokémon GO’s Snap Celebration Event Broken? My Hopes for May Events…

29 Apr

pokemon-go-logoBy Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)

Taking part in these back-to-back Pokémon GO events can be exhausting. Not everyone has to participate, but they do anyways. Part of the reason is that most long-time players want mega candies for specific ‘mons as spawn rates are increased for a few days. I’m after more Magikarp candy myself. They help evolve the lil’ beasts beyond level 40.

The only aspect of the game which keeps me going are the weekly special event completion quests. The rewards are decent. This week’s celebration of the release of Pokémon Snap for the Nintendo Switch is okay at best, and the one-time special field research tasks are incredibly broken. It’s easy to photograph the same wild beast over and over to breeze through the tasks. There’s nothing unique to “photographing” your ‘mon with the real surroundings, other than to post on it twitter with the #gosnapshot hashtag that you’re is participating in this four-day event. The purpose is more about showing off your trophies and so far, all I got was a shiny Lotad. I’ve done a lot of photos of wild pokémon and only had one Smergle show up out of 60 or so snapshots. The rate seems better after random creatures are caught though. It’s hilarious that I can recursively photograph this artist and get another appearing on top over and over. 

In a world that is supposed to be in lockdown because of the third wave of covid-19 cases, we shouldn’t be encouraged to leave home and find these pocket monsters. Technically, it can all be avoided since parks and outdoor spaces allow for distancing. 

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