As 2016 dawns, full of promise and wonder, we at Major Spoilers have taken a look back at some of our favorite books of the year gone by, and Stephen has compiled the top Staff Picks titles for the year, giving you a look at what we had the highest hopes for. But when it comes to looking back, there are also questions of what books disappointed us the most in the last 12 months. Whether it be creator changes, delays, plot twists that went the wrong place or something entirely different, occasionally our pop culture will go south on…
Browsing: Question Of The Day
In a lot of ways, 2015 has been a pain, and it’s a year that I’m not sure I’ll miss fondly the way I do 1989 or 2004, though I’ll never hate it as much as 2006. Still, with so much great pop-culture stuff on the horizon (F’rinstance, I hear there’s a new Star Wars movie!), it’ll be impossible to swing a marmot without bumping into a big pop-culture geekout moment in the New Year, a state of events that never ceases to surprise and please my inner geek. Add to that the fact that the 2016 Super Sentai team…
This weekend’s Doctor Who Christmas special was a lovely experience, and one that firmly underlined one of my core beliefs about The Doctor: He should never be left to his own devices. Previous solo adventures have unfailingly ended poorly (as the Fourth, Tenth and Eleventh Doctors history shows), and with Jenna Coleman’s exit, the position of companion is once again open. I have little idea what the BBC has in mind for the future, but looking at the past, there are a number of fascinating folk who have shared the TARDIS console room with our favorite Time Lord, leading to…
Here at Stately Spoiler Manor, Eastern Annex, our holiday morning gift-giving is complete, with a few major hits, no disappointing gifts (except for maybe my annual package of underwear, which happens every year because my wife is a meanie-pants) and a mermaid tail. (That is not a joke.) All in all, we’ve had a lovely holiday season, and one that has raised a question with The Widget: Because of Doctor Who, I occasionally say “Happy Christmas” instead of “Merry Christmas”, one of many ways that Peter Davison has secretly influenced my behavior in public, leading the child to ask what…
One of the best parts of comics history is trying to figure out which stories are “imaginary stories” (in that they didn’t happen in the character’s continuity) and which are just imaginary stories. The fact that Superman has actually met Santa Claus himself half a dozen times is probably not canon anymore, but in my head the story where Santa Claus is a member of the Morrison Justice League absolutely has to be. It is a moral imperative. Heck, I’m even tolerant of Tim Allen playing the jolly ol’ elf, and I haven’t enjoyed anything Tim Allen has done since…
Maybe I’m weird, maybe my years in small-market TV stations have warped me, but I occasionally like to watch afternoon talk shows. It’s a harmless way to kill an hour, and once in a while, you get great ideas. Remember when Oprah would gift everyone in the studio audience with expensive stuff so people could get on her level (while supplies last)? If I were rich and famous, that’s the kinda thing I’d want for my talk show, handing out ‘Howard The Duck’ omnibuses and ‘Firefly’ box sets, leading to today’s effusive query… The MS-QOTD (pronounced, as always, “misquoted”) is…
As a fan of Val Kilmer ever since the movie ‘Top Secret’, I find myself irritated when his Batman is nay-sayed and underrated by fans of the movie Bat-franchise. Granted, the last few years, everything that’s not Christopher Nolan has been handwaved away as not cool anymore, but it would still have been interesting to see Val grappling with the events of ‘Batman Begins,’ or even squaring off with Jack Nicholson in the Tim Burton nightmare that was the ’89 movie. With his charming Bruce Wayne playing against a scene-chewing Jim Carrey and a sadly wasted Tommy Lee Jones, Kilmer…
With the debut of BB-8, R2-D2’s place at the top of the cutest droid competition has finally been challenged, something we haven’t seen since Old B.O.B. ceased functioning on the hull of the Cygnus right before the ship went into the collapsar. Even in universe, it’s hard to think of anyone as universally adorbs as R2 (maybe that mouse-droid that Chewbacca scared that one time), but everybody has their favorites. Heck, when I was a kid, my action figures included the silver Death Star Droid and R5-D4 as stand-ins, with that one weird boxy droid having to be Chewbacca, which…
Here’s the thing about the 80s: They don’t let go of you. It’s not that Gen Xers aren’t able to move on from things like G.I. Joe, Max Headroom and Joe Isuzu, it’s just that it was the last decade during which you could like terrible things without having to feign irony or explain that you don’t mean the remake… That’s probably too harsh, in retrospect. But, in any case, I still haven’t forgiven Andie, the main character of ‘Pretty In Pink’ for her utterly bone-headed decision to go with pretty boy preppy Blain instead of lovable goofball Ducky. Yes,…
When you’re a fan of superheroes, you become aware of certain patterns in costume coloration. Superman, Spider-Man and Wonder Woman all rock the red and royal blue, while every single movie hero has variations of black, at least until the Avengers. Iron Man’s red-and-gold coloration makes it clear that he’s the modern-day knight, even when the gold is replaced with silver, and fans of Super Sentai known the rules: Red for leader; Blue for thinker/lancer; Pink for gentle; Green for clown. Those rules aren’t always hard and fast, (as the Green Ranger/DragonRanger seen above will attest) but they recur enough…
Here at Major Spoilers, we try to walk as fine a line as possible on the subject of revealing important plot points. My personal working theory is not to reveal spoilery bits of the current season of a TV show or the current issue of a comic book, but movies (like, say, ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’) are more complicated. Those who have seen the movie are already reviewing it, making a complex task for those who wish to avoid spoilers on plots or characters, but the film is not yet inwide release. It can be a tough call as…
As the release date for “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” grows nearer, it’s becoming clear that the location of Luke Skywalker is going to be one of the plot-points of the new film. Is he lost? Gone to the Dark Side? Subletting Yoda’s tiny shack thanks to high galactic real estate prices? Most of us will be able to find out in a week or so, but right now, I’m thinking about all the cool unseen possibilities. Is Luke selling used ships on Tattooine? Hanging out with Boba Fett, making amends for that whole Sarlacc incident? With the full power…
Of all the bits and pieces of the ‘Batman v Superman’ trailer, I’m finding the reactions to Wonder Woman’s brief appearance to be the most interesting. With DC finally willing to take the plunge on a solo female hero feature film, this focus on her lead-in appearance seems to bode well, especially the response to her iconic costume. Of course, that selfsame costume is likely a large portion of why live-action Wonder Woman takes are so rare, with its strange balance of armor-to-40s-bathing-suit being very difficult to pull off. Add to that the dozens of subtle (and not so subtle,…
As a Star Trek fan from way back, I have Strong Ideas about what Starfleet Officers I would want in my personal crew. I totally need Lieutenant Uhura and the engineering brilliance of Geordi LaForge (Scotty’s penchant for drink and getting accused of murder is kind of problematic) but it’s a hard call on other stations. Worf? Spock? Tuvok? Churlimince? (One of those may not be Star Trek crew members, now that I think of it.) Given my deep love of DS9 and the Original Series, 70% of Next Generation, a couple of the movies and that one time where…