The NFL had a disastrous weekend when it came to ratings. Numbers have been down all season and it was more of the same for the wild-card games. The biggest surprise was that the best game (Panthers-Saints) had the biggest decrease year over year. Yes, markets were a big factor, but that was a competitive and entertaining game. Here’s the breakdown:
Titans-Chiefs (14.7) was down 11 percent versus last year’s Raiders-Texans game.
Falcons-Rams (14.9) was down 10 percent versus last year’s Lions-Seahawks game.
Bills-Jaguars (17.2) was down 10 percent versus last year’s Dolphins-Steelers game.
Panthers-Saints (20.4) was down 21 percent versus last year’s Giants-Packers game.
Hmm… so, what could possibly explain that surprise? What is different about the people down in Louisiana and North Carolina than the people in New York City? Aren’t they a little more likely to be patriotic and to serve in the military?
This is a classic case of the consequences of corporate convergence.
This is what it sounds like, when a moderate moderates:
Ethan Van Sciver@EthanVanSciver TFW Vox Day condemns me and @DiversityAndCmx and as “moderates.”
?
Ethan Van Sciver@EthanVanSciver Extremists: Our hobby isn’t your cultural battleground. You’re ruining comics. Go away.
SJWs ruined comics. A single very specific type of extremist ruined comics. There are literally scores of varieties of extremists who had absolutely nothing to do with what has happened in the comics industry over the last three decades. As for me, how can I possibly have contributed to their ruination when I have been a professional comic book writer and publisher for all of one single day? Of course, the one comic I have written is an Amazon bestseller and hit the top 10 of all comics and graphic novels yesterday….
Nevertheless Van Sciver is wrong, because his hobby has become a cultural battleground and it has been one for longer than my own hobby of computer gaming has. And he is bound to fail, as per Sun Tzu, because he knows neither himself nor his enemy.
In less than one year, I expect that I will be a considerably more significant figure in the comics industry than Van Sciver. Not because I’m more talented, because I’m not. Not because I’m smarter, although I am. Simply because I understand the dire situation his heavily converged hobby is presently in and I am doing something about it, as the following review demonstrates.
UPDATE: Van Sciver allows that maybe, perhaps, Alt★Hero might not necessarily suck because politics. It’s not as if Animal Farm and 1984 were artistic failures, after all.
Secular Blasphemy @SecBlasphemy Why can’t a right-wing comic also be a good comic? And Alt-Hero raised nearly a quarter mill, making it very clear what political direction it had. ‘It’s going to be right-wing!’ is a shock to absolutely no one involved.
Ethan Van Sciver@EthanVanSciver Yes, I know. Look, I’m buying it. I’ll read it. If it’s good I’ll say so. It’ll be interesting to see if this publishing venture survives this market past the money raised to start it up.
Fair enough. All I ask of the doubters and skeptics is to look at what we’re doing and judge it by the same standards they judge everything else. Look, we know, we absolutely know, that the SJWs are going to trash it to the greatest extent they believe they can do so without looking absurdly stupid. The best we can hope for from them is silence, which you will note is exactly how they greeted the literally unprecedented success of the crowdfunding campaign. And how they greeted the very successful launch of QUANTUM MORTIS A Man Disrupted #1: By the Book.
If you don’t like the art, that’s fine. If you genuinely think the story is boring or the characters are vanilla, so be it. If you think the politics overwhelm the story, hey, your mileage may vary. If you dislike me, get in line behind Google, Tor Books, Worldcon, and the SFWA. But, for your own sake, be honest about what it is that you don’t like, even if the only thing you don’t like is the fact that I’m the creator.
And as anyone who has read my fiction – as opposed to my non-fiction – knows, I’m not at all afraid to present different and opposing viewpoints in a realistic and sympathetic manner. I don’t do so to curry favor with the other side, but because I think it makes for more interesting and more compelling storytelling.
UPDATE: Actually, looking at his art, he’s pretty damn good. I wonder if he might like to work with Chuck Dixon? We can certainly provide him with better writing than DC is presently inflicting on him.
UPDATE: Ethan, I’m not pretending not to be mad at you. I’m not mad at all. I’ve even got a considerable quantity of work for you at a healthy page rate if you want it. And I’m not talking about Alt★Hero either.
When Hollywood’s most prestigious organization, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) — the group of nearly 7,000 actors, directors and other industry types who dole out the Oscars — expelled Harvey Weinstein on Oct. 14, audiences applauded. But by acting so swiftly, a mere nine days after the New York Times first reported allegations of sexual assault against the movie producer, the outfit now finds itself facing a dilemma.
Put simply: What to do with the rest of them?
“Harvey opened the floodgates,” said one male Academy member. “Now the Academy’s drowning in a tide of s—t. They don’t know what hit them.”
What hit, of course, were more alleged horror stories about so many other members: Kevin Spacey assaulting multiple young men, Dustin Hoffman sticking his hands in women’s pants, director Brett Ratner forcing himself on actresses. Ben Affleck seen on video groping a female host on “Total Request Live.” Screenwriter James Toback accused of sexual misdeeds by nearly 40 women. (As of this past Tuesday, the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office said it is considering criminal charges in five cases against Toback. He, Spacey, Hoffman and Ratner, deny the claims against them.)
“[We] can’t regret [kicking out Harvey] because [we] didn’t really have a choice,” said one male member of AMPAS’ board of governors. “Some members were quite vehement. But [we] didn’t have time to really weigh out the repercussions.”
The emergency meeting to deal with Weinstein was conducted by the 54-member board of governors — which includes Steven Spielberg, Tom Hanks, Whoopi Goldberg and Laura Dern — after it received a Change.org petition with 100,000 signatures calling for his ouster.
“But they didn’t give themselves time to plot out how to deal with this going forward,” said one prominent female AMPAS member. “Kathleen Kennedy [producer of the ‘Star Wars’ series] and some other female governors panicked and felt compelled to act. They thought [Weinstein] could hurt AMPAS’ cred. Some of them did admit this was a slippery slope. But I don’t think they imagined how slippery. It’s definitely caused some problems and fights among the board members.”
I give it about six months before the media declares that anyone who cares about sexual harassment, rape, and child abuse in Hollywood is a) alt-right, b) sexist, c) homophobic and d) anti-semitic. We’ve already seen from Cat Rambo, the SFWA, and Worldcon that SJWs will tolerate even the most vicious sex criminals rather than accept the imposition of any moral standards on the deviants in their midst.
Glenn Reynolds makes a salient point: Remember, they’re not making a big deal about sexual assault in Hollywood because they found out about it. They’re making a big deal because you found out about it. They all knew. They didn’t care until they realized the public was onto them.
DC comes under fire for taking a more practical approach to diversity by trying to develop new heroes instead of having them wear the old ones like a skinsuit:
Damage DC
Ethan “Elvis” Avery just wanted to serve his country. Instead, he’s been changed into a monster! Tasked as the government’s own living, breathing ticking time bomb, Ethan retains no control when the monster takes over. The beast is cheaper than a nuclear warhead and twice as effective, and Ethan fights to rein in the damage he unleashes when it springs free for one hour a day. With everyone around him in danger, Ethan struggles to contain the DAMAGE he inflicts on the DC Universe. Silencer DC
She’s one of the DC Universe’s deadliest assassins…and you’ve never heard of her. Super-strong, highly trained, armed with devastating and stealthy metahuman abilities, the Silencer is virtually invincible. Or at least she was. After decades as Leviathan’s chief assassin, Honor Guest put in her time and managed to get out with her skin intact. Now she lives a normal life with a normal family in a normal house on a normal street. But the past has come back to haunt her in the form of her old employer and a deadly new mission…and Talia Al Ghul won’t take no for an answer.
Sideways DC
During the events of DARK NIGHTS: METAL, high school junior Derek James accidentally fell through a rift into the Dark Matter dimension! Now, as Sideways, he can create rifts in midair to leap through dimensions at will! But with that much power comes great liability—and tears are starting to form in the fabric of the space-time continuum…
The Terrifics DC
Bound together by fate, and united by the spirit of exploration and hope for tomorrow, the Terrifics are bound from the Dark Multiverse of Metal! When Mr. Terrific, Metamorpho, Plastic Man and Phantom Girl find themselves literally bound together by a tragic accident, our team of unlikely allies must rely on one another to make their way back home. But a startling revelation on their return trip brings them face to face with a new mystery: Where in the universe is Tom Strong?
Worst of all, all of the writing and art credits on these new books – which frankly sound pretty generic – are all men. But SJWs need not fear! The Great Converger, Mr. Brian Bendis, is here!
A Japanese TV programme has sparked accusations of racism and cultural insensitivity after a comedian painted his face to impersonate Eddie Murphy.
The New Year’s Eve show featured celebrity comic Hamada appearing in a Beverly Hills Cop skit with his face blacked up.
Using makeup to lampoon black people – a practice known as blackface – is seen by many to be deeply offensive. Protest over the show have grown over the past days.
US-born writer and columnist Baye McNeil – who is black and has lived in Japan for 13 years – drew attention to the show on Twitter, arguing that black people were “not a punchline nor a prop”.
Seen by many… outside Japan. In related news three months from now, Baye McNeil’s visa expired, he was unable to renew it, and was forced to return to the United States.
The end of season statistics are in for the NFL. Average viewership per game.
2015: 17.9 million 2016: 16.5 million 2017: 14.9 million
That is a 16.8{1a9740d54aaadd1290ec59721f654a3d9aaf924aeae0d9d35ee2fe84bc4370ea} viewership decline in two years.
The NFL appears well on the way to follow the course set by Marvel and NASCAR, which amounts to about a 50 percent decline in ten years. Given that there are 256 games in a season, that loss of three million viewers per game represents 768 million lost game-viewings.
#1: Marvel Chairman Ike Perlmutter continues to be good friends with, official advisor to, and financial supporter of President Donald Trump
Marvel has made a big effort to brush off criticism that they’ve abandoned their commitment to diversity in 2017 after saying that they heard from retailers that people didn’t want it and then canceling a crapload of books with LGBTQ and POC leads at the end of the year. Marvel editor Jordan White even took to Twitter to ask people to please keep buying Marvel books so that they can get their diversity back on in 2018.
But how can Marvel Comics be a positive force for social justice when their Chairman is good friends with Donald Trump and financially supported his presidential campaign? Do a couple of comic books with more representation even out financial support for a President that has tried to ban Muslims from entering the country, wants to deport immigrants, has openly bragged about sexual assault on tape, and done so many other terrible things that it would take a dozen listicles to name them all? For every dollar spent on a book promoting a positive social message, how many ended up in the coffers of the Trump campaign through donations from Perlmutter? What would the ratio need to be before any positive benefit is canceled out?
Right. THAT is certainly the problem. Any more questions about what convergence is?
I love that this set exists. I love that enough people want to do TNG LEGO to create a market demand for these figures. I can’t speak for the rest of the cast, but things like this, based on us, are always awesome. Earlier this year, a guy gave me a little minifig that he made of Wesley, and even though it’s unofficial, it is a delightful thing to own. He’s in his little red spacesuit, and he looks like he’s got a course you can plot. I love it.
In this particular custom set, though, Wesley is depicted as a crying child, and that’s not just disappointing to me, it’s kind of insulting and demeaning to everyone who loved that character when they were kids. The creator of this set is saying that Wesley Crusher is a crybaby, and he doesn’t deserve to stand shoulder to minifig shoulder with the rest of the crew. People who loved Wesley, who were inspired by him to pursue careers in science and engineering, who were thrilled when they were kids to see another kid driving a spaceship? Well, the character they loved was a crybaby so just suck it up I guess.
“Oh, Wil Wheaton, you sweet summer child,” you are saying right now. “You think people actually loved Wesley Crusher. You’re adorable.”
So this is, as you can imagine, something I’ve spent a lot of time dealing with for thirty years. It’s been talked about to death (on this very blog, more than once), but I’ll sum up as briefly as I can: I reject the idea that nobody liked or cared about the character…. it’s “Shut up, Wesley,” made into what would otherwise be an awesome minifig, in a collection of truly amazing and beautiful minifigs.
It’s a huge disappointment to me, because I’d love to have a Wesley in his little rainbow acting-ensign uniform, but I believe that it’s insulting to all the kids who are now adults who loved the character and were inspired by him to go into science and engineering, or who had a character on TV they could relate to, because they were too smart for their own good, a little awkward and weird, and out of place everywhere they went (oh hey I just described myself. I never claimed to be objective here).
Now THAT is funny! You can put the Gamma on camera, but you just can’t reason, talk, or beat the Gamma out of him. Seriously, Wil, just shut up already. The general public would like you a lot better if you’d simply take your well-merited beatings with a graceful smile.
Anyhow, there are probably more pedophiles who were inspired by Wesley than scientists and engineers. No one – NO ONE – loves Star Trek more than pedophiles. I wasn’t even a little bit surprised to see pictures of Moira Greyland and her brother in Star Trek uniforms as children. “We always say there are two types of pedophiles: Star Trek and Star Wars,” says Det. Ian Lamond, the unit’s second-in-command. “But it’s mostly Star Trek.”
The DC Rebirth made it clear that Batman is a transgender ally, and his main comic books are keeping that support alive. Even now, it’s possible that devoted fans of Batman comics missed Bruce Wayne’s stance on the issue – which was the entire point. The company-wide relaunch brought a Rebirth to Batman’s title series, while he united the rest of the Batman Family in the pages of Detective Comics. That team ended up being led by Batwoman, one of the most visible LGBTQ comic heroes. But it also introduced a new, openly transgender scientist to the DC Universe: Dr. Victoria October.
At the time, we couldn’t help but appreciate that Batman supported Victoria’s transition, mentioned and alluded to in vocabulary that non-LGBTQ readers could completely miss. But those in the community would see the exact message being sent by writers James Tynion IV and Marguerite Bennett. In the months since that issue, Detective has kept the conversation going. But as other comic titles and publishers battle the opposing forces of readers calling for diversity and those who claim it’s more marketing spin than progress, Detective is deserving of praise.
I’m not even going to pretend I’m not very pleased to see this. But not, you understand, for the same reasons as DC’s media cheerleaders. Let’s face it, there are few things comics readers enjoy more than witty banter about preferred pronouns.
