Fish and Cherries Productions

Five Nights at Freddy’s. This game series has been sweeping the internet for the past year and earning a reputation as both a nightmare factory and a perfect laxative to those who play it. If you’re not into gaming, avoided the craze, or have been living under some kind of rock, let me explain the premise. The Five Nights at Freddy’s series casts you as a security guard working the night shift at a low quality children’s restaurant called Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza (the internet refers to this type of establishment as Suck E. Cheese’s). Unfortunately, for some reason or another, the extremely creepy sideshow animatronics are out to kill you, so your goal is to monitor them on your security camera display to keep track of their locations, make sure that they don’t get into your decidedly unsecure security room, and survive until 6 AM… then do it for four more nights to increasing difficulty. The really amazing thing about these games is how different they are from other games. There’s no moving about the pizzeria or weapons to defend yourself with, just you inside the security room. What this does is deliver a great sense of claustrophobia and helplessness, making you raw to the scares of the stalking animatronics. The fact that it was able to deliver such an experience with a limited budget and crew, just like the first Paranormal Activity, makes it all the more impressive. So suffice to say, it’s a fun fright fest for those brave enough to try and survive the nights.

But is that all it is? A lot of YouTube personalities have certainly shown us the scares and even profited off of them, but several eagle-eyed players have noticed that there is a narrative in the background. Those who piece it together reveal a tale of sorrow, murder, and restless haunting, yet there are quite a few details that are left ambiguous enough to have devoted fans guessing and piecing together theories about the truth behind the terror. After watching Markiplier play through all three games (which you should all totally do because Markiplier is one sexy human being as well as an amusing one) and looking around the internet, I’ve come up with my own theory which I think holds up really well. Sit back, grab a slice of pizza, and let me tell you a terrifying tale.

The full story lies this way.

DC Comics, we need to talk.

Oh, sorry, I forgot. It’s DC Entertainment now. Hmm…

I’ve been a fan of yours for a while ever since I picked up a copy of Blackest Night #0 at Comic Con. Remember Blackest Night? You know, that big mega-crossover between all of your stories where the dead superheroes came back and started an invasion of life itself? You remember, it had brilliant writing by Geoff Johns and stunning artwork by Ivan Reis. I do. That was the moment I got into comics. After that issue, I bought every comic that was leading up to it from big crossovers like Infinite Crisis to single comic lines like Green Lantern or Teen Titans. Ever since then, I was hooked on your stories and your universe. I was even a big defender of yours when you started most of your stories from scratch in 2011 in the infamous reboot. I figured if anyone deserved the benefit of the doubt, it was you guys.

Now, in 2014, I’m starting to wonder if I was wrong.

I can’t help but notice that there are some disturbing trends cropping up around you. There was the suicide art contest that turned out very poorly for you and the infamous comic where a previously fleshed out and prevalent female character asked someone for sex just because she was bored, but I’m not here to talk about how you treat your fictional characters. I want to talk about how you treat your creators and even fans.

Let’s talk about the sheer amount of talented writers and artists who have quit or walked out from DC. George Perez, Joshua Hale Fialkov, Andy Diggle, John Rozum, all of these amazing talents have left your company, all of them citing constant micromanagement and last minute changes to their stories as creating an unbearable working condition. That’s not even getting into when Gail Simone, one of the most universally loved comic writers, got fired from Batgirl over an e-mail by an editor and got rehired twelve days later after the backlash from fans. Personally, I think that firing someone over e-mail is about as wussy as breaking up with someone via text message, so suffice to say, not your most endearing moment.

But the big one I have to mention is when Batwoman talents J.H. Williams and W. Haden Blackman left the company after a last minute change banning Batwoman from marrying her girlfriend. The reason given behind said change was that heroes shouldn’t lead happy lives, which is a baffling argument in itself. On a conceptual level, since when are marriages automatically happy? And on a reader level, why should readers care about their heroes if they know that they can never be content? And did you not realize that you would get heat from LGBTQ groups over this?

But the real crime is how this was handled on an editorial level. From what I understand, stories are planned out months, maybe even years in advance, the writers submit their story outlines to the editors, the editors write out notes and changes that they want, and then the writers are free to go from there. These last minute changes are, in a world, unprofessional and unbecoming of a company that has been around for 75 years. What exactly is your plan? What was so important about this that you had to jump in at the last minute? Because this seems like the absolute wrong way to run a work environment.

But you know what? I was going to let it be water under the bridge and move on with my life. After all, most of the stuff I’m bringing up was years ago. I should give you the benefit of the doubt and assumed you learned your lesson, no? But then, come the end of last year, I looked over some facts and discovered that in the 3+ years you’ve been doing the New 52, you have canceled no less than 61 titles. 61 titles? That’s insane! You have gotten rid of more titles than you allow yourself to run. If you do the numbers, that’s as if you canceled a title every two-and-a-half weeks. Fish and Cherries may be a very young company, but even we know that isn’t how you run things. Forget heroes always being miserable, why should readers invest in any of your books when they could be canceled after only eight issues because of some obsession with the number 52?

Maybe it’s the union worker in me talking, but I’ve seen things like this happen before at Wal-Mart, Sears, Dish Network, and countless others. If there was some sort of union in comics, do you think this sort of thing would stand? For crying out loud, this is exactly the sort of thinking that led to the incident with the Bangladesh factory. Haven’t we learned by now that when we treat our workers workers badly, everyone, including the employers, suffer for it? Famed comic writer Neil Adams told me that comic companies sometimes lose money unless they print a license that ties into a movie, but I don’t see how keeping your creators on such a tight leash is going to help you make a few extra bucks. I can also assure you: there has never been a time where mistreating the staff for profit has ever ended well for a company.

So where does that leave me, a once proud fan? Hard to say. It’s hard for me to continue to support you knowing the work conditions that you perpetuate. The big question is, since my dollars are important to you, how do you plan to keep me around and paying? What’s to stop me from, say, giving my money to small comic companies like Mark Waid’s Thrillbent, which was made after he left you guys, or other comic companies like IDW or Pantheon who both create great, forward-thinking stories? I’ve been picking up Image Comics’ stories as of late and I have to tell you, I’ve been more invested, enthralled, and challenged than I have with your books in a long while.

Brian Heinz, a video blogger known as the Last Angry Geek, accused DC Comics of not caring about what the readers want, but rather telling them what they want. And really, he has a point. Few people outside of your staff would say that they want a story with no marriage or personal connections or heroes that are constantly unhappy. So, in response to twisting your creators around, as well as firing then rehiring the most beloved woman in comics, botching an art contest in which suicide was sexualized, refusing to let dissenting bloggers interview your creators until they posted more positive things about you, and making poor marketing decision after poor marketing decision, I ask you the same question I ask myself when I think about picking up a DC book:

What’s the point?

A few weekends ago, I lived a nightmare. I was deep-sea diving in shark-infested waters with no way to defend myself against them except hiding myself in patches of seaweed until they passed by. Of course, sharks weren’t the only things I had to worry about; there were moray eels waiting to leap out of hiding and bite me and jellyfish floating in my path to navigate around. I had no diving suit or even an air tank, but had to go into barrels with air pockets in them to refill my lungs before going off into the dark unknown and wondering if that gulp of air would be my last.

Okay, to clarify, that didn’t happen to me in real life. It was something I experienced playing Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag. (Yes, I’m aware that this game has been out for a year, but I like to get games late when the price goes down or when publishers inevitably release the Ultimate Edition with all the extra add-ons.) Regardless, it touched on a very real terror that doesn’t seem to crop up as much in fiction: that of being in a hostile and very lethal environment cut off from anything comfortable and familiar to any regular person.

That really is a shame because there’s something very powerful and terrifying about having an environment as your enemy rather than some psychopath or monster. There’s no central thing that can be destroyed, yet everything about the scenario can or will kill you. Now it’s true that the jungle, desert, and tundra have harsh climates and deadly creatures to worry about. But with the deep sea, it’s a much different story.

In the ocean, as in space, the environment is literally toxic to a person’s wellbeing by nature. You are surrounded by a foreign element that will lead to your demise if it penetrates you. The only thing keeping you alive is an airtight suit, a piece of glass over your face, and a very limited air supply. Take away any ability to reconnect with an environment you can survive in and the suit becomes a slow execution chamber. Your heartbeat mingles with the noises from the outside as paranoia starts to set in. You try to control every breath that you take, keeping on the lookout for any danger that might speed up your demise, whether it’s a hungry barracuda or, in the case of space, a wayward meteorite. Your hearing becomes extra-sensitive, listening for any telltale pops or cracks that would indicate that your personal life line is beginning to come apart. And all the time, you’re keeping an eye on that slowly-dropping gauge on your air tank, praying between ragged breaths for something to either save your life or end it quickly…

Sounds pretty terrifying, right? So why don’t more works of fiction capitalize on this option? Well, apart from the fact that most Hollywood audiences like seeing the hero triumphantly vanquish a foe, most of the ones that have attempted this… sucked. The first Open Water movie, focusing on two people stranded in the middle of the ocean, may have pleased some critics, but audiences didn’t seem to warm up to it and the sequel got torn apart by both. Apollo 18, following two astronauts trapped on the moon, got ravaged on all sides for being boring, suspense-free, and just downright goofy in some areas. Gerry, which was about two people walking through the desert… and nothing else… for over a hundred minutes… yeah, it was as boring as whale shit and didn’t even break $300,000. Suffice to say, people don’t seem to know the potential of the environmental menace. It’s true that Gravity was a successful movie with a similar idea and Buried was able to deliver the terror of being trapped in a small box underground, but most people seem to eschew it for drama, found-footage, or attempted artiness.

That said, there really is a goldmine of terror just waiting to be mined in such a scenario. Perhaps it wouldn’t be something for a summer blockbuster or a novel you’d pick up at the airport bookstore, but if someone really wanted to run with this, it could be a classic in the making. Something like that could revolutionize the world of horror and open up new venues for people to explore. Granted, this would give rise to a lot of pale imitations as a lot of successful movies do, but I’d rather see more of that than Found Footage Haunting the Seventy-Billionth. Don’t be shy, writers; take the plunge.

It is with a heavy heart that I must once again take to my keyboard to write about a tragic loss to the online community. Monty Oum, the artist behind Haloid, Dead Fantasy, and RWBY passed away yesterday due to a severe allergic reaction during a medical procedure that took place some days prior. I am told that he died surrounded by loved ones from his family and from the offices of Rooster Teeth as well. I have never met the man, even though he and I allegedly attended the same Fanime Con together, but his loss is still felt.

Monty was a great artist, pouring a lot of passion into his work. RWBY was his foray into writing and creating a whole world and while it wasn’t always perfect, his passion for the project was still felt by many. He never resorted to unnecessary fanservice or cheesecake, treating all of his characters and creations with profound respect. Even if you’re not a fan of RWBY, you can still tell that he put a lot of thought and detail into the world in its look, its feel, and its internal mechanics. I don’t know how or if RWBY will continue without him, but the loss of such a great and devoted artist certainly makes the world at large a bleaker place.

Fate can be cruel sometimes and such a man dying at 33 because of a mere fluke definitely qualifies. But this isn’t a screed to make you paranoid, it’s a call to celebrate life. Monty Oum wasn’t one to sit back and hide from the world, he worked tirelessly day and night to make something worthwhile and give it to his community. The blood, sweat, and tears in his projects, his animation, and especially his Dance Dance Revolution moves were always felt and I will never regret experiencing any of it. Remember Monty Oum and with him, remember that a moment expressing yourself is never a moment wasted.

With 2014 behind us and 2015 just stepping out of its cradle, most of us tend to reflect on the year gone by. In doing so myself, I came to the realization that 2014 was a great year for movies. From mainstream to potential Oscar candidates, we had a slew of high quality flicks that made us laugh, feel, and think. And since this was the year that I really made my Reel Snippets a priority, I’m doing my first top movies of the year list. But since a Top Ten list is so common today, I’m breaking the mold by giving you Ronin’s Top 13 Movies of 2014.

First, a couple of ground rules. The first, obviously, is that I have to have seen the movie and done a Reel Snippet of it, so Foxcatcher and Unbroken will not make this list. Second, which is a little more obvious, it had to have come out this year, which is an important distinction because Reel Snippets aren’t restricted to movies that recently came out. Finally, don’t expect a Top 13 Worst Movies of 2014. I tended to avoid a lot of the stinkers this year like Dumb and Dumber To and Left Behind, so the list would basically be populated with movies that were just okay and the like. The worst movie I saw was A Million Ways to Die in the West, and I’ll admit that had some genuinely funny moments. With that said, let’s start the countdown.

13 (tied). The Grand Budapest Hotel

I feel bad putting this at the bottom of the list because Wes Anderson is an inspiration to me, what with his quirky writing and out of the box thinking. And those qualities are exactly what put the movie on this list. While I can’t quote it as much as other entries, I remember so many of the situations, characters, colors, and emotions that came through the film that I can’t help but include it. The few things that I do remember in precise detail still crack me up, so this is definitely a hotel I’ll be checking into regularly when it comes out on DVD.

13 (tied). A Brony Tale

Let me make something clear: my being in the fandom has nothing to do with the movie being on this list. While it’s nice for a subculture to be noticed (especially if you’re a part of it, that’s not why this is here. No, the reason it’s on this list is its effect on people outside the fandom. Those that I talked to thoroughly enjoyed it and were able to understand where bronies were coming from and empathize with them. In that respect, the documentary was a complete success. Also, in the age of uncovering dark truths in our system and proving how unhealthy or taken advantage of we are, it’s rare to find a documentary that actually makes me happy to be alive. That alone is enough to earn it a spot on this list.

12. X-Men: Days of Future Past

Want to know the quickest way to a fan’s heart? Writing all the poor decisions of the franchise out of continuity. But even beyond that, the latest X-Men film is a huge treat, combining both X-Men casts into a great story that anyone, fan or not, will get a great kick out of. The acting is great, the stakes bring you to the edge of your seat, and the effects make it look like the mutants truly are gods among men. I’ve gushed about it before and I’ll be gushing about it for a while now. The seven-year-old kid inside me that used to get up early every morning to watch X-Men: The Animated Series couldn’t be happier.

11. Captain America: The Winter Soldier

What’s better than retconning the bugs out of your franchise? Turning it right on its head. Captain America: The Winter Soldier is one of the most poignant entries of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, taking one of its most sympathetic characters and tearing down everything he knows. Yet in spite of all these hardships, he is still able to rise up and persevere. That is the essence of what a superhero should be: an inspiration to everyone who watches him and a role model for overcoming one’s own challenges. Unlike a certain other American icon that got a big screen release recently (*COUGHMANOFSTEELCOUGH*). Everything else in the film just works, from the action to the side characters to the titular villain that made the internet explode. Until the next Avengers movie comes out, this is sure to be the benchmark for the MCU.

10. The Fault In Our Stars

We can talk all day about great action films and comedies, but 2014 was the year of the slice of life. The one that most people think of is the one that showed us life in the face of death. Augustus and Hazel feel so real in both their love and struggles that it’s hard not to feel for them. It’s got its share of detractors (particularly those unhappy that Fault beat out Edge of Tomorrow… or was it Live. Die. Repeat.? Gah, that title change was asinine…), but it’s hard for me to agree with them when so much of the characters and situations ring true. I’ve had friends pass away from cancer and other life-threatening illnesses, so I’ve seen a lot of these scenes play out. That’s why it’s so good, because it feels real.

I’ve gone into quite a bit of why I like the movie in my Snippet, but there’s one thing that sticks with me that I haven’t touched on: Peter Van Houten. This character intrigues me so much, partly because there’s nothing else like him. He’s not just an old, jaded curmudgeon, there’s a real sense that he’s thinking on a higher level than other people, but he lacks the ability or the knowhow to say it. I honestly want to dissect everything he says to find out where he’s trying to say. I don’t think I’ll get any answer from John Green – author of the novel – because of his belief in the death of the author (referring to a state of mind where a story stops when the book does, a theory I have a love-hate relationship with), but the character, like the movie, will stick with me for a long time.

9. The Theory of Everything

Anyone who’s been following me closely will know that I absolutely despised the 2012 Les Miserables movie. Since I never wrote a Reel Snippet on it, I should probably state that one of my biggest gripes was with Eddie Redmayne as Marius. Whether he was in love, tormented, or under pressure, he always had the same almost-smile facial expression and it really irritated me. So the irony hits hard when the role that he acts well in forces him to emote through limited facial expressions and he completely knocks it out of the park. And really, that’s what makes this movie. If Redmayne was really the limited actor I thought he was, The Theory of Everything would have fallen flat. I have never been so happy at being wrong before.

8. Big Hero 6

For a time, I was worried that I had perhaps been too caught up in the hype of seeing something so visually breathtaking that I had perhaps been a little overly positive about this movie. Recently, I saw it again and… nope, still as amazing as when I first saw it. True, the side characters aren’t as developed as they could be, but Baymax and Hiro more than make up for their slack. Not much to say, other than that I still love it.

7. How To Train Your Dragon 2

But if I had to be honest with myself, my animation award would have to go to How To Train Your Dragon 2. Yeah, it’s a sequel, but like the Hellboy sequel it improves upon what it had before and advances the characters rather than rehashing the plot of the first movie. Also, unlike Big Hero 6, there were a lot more twists and turns I couldn’t see coming and the gut punches hurt a lot worse. I think if the side characters in Big Hero 6 were as developed as in Dragon, it might have been a tougher pick. But in this race, the Night Fury’s wings beat Baymax’s jets.

6. Guardians of the Galaxy

Did you miss my first review of this? Then let me sum up.

I am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot. I… am Groot. I… am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot! I am Groot? I am Groot. I am Groot! I am Groot. I AM GROOT! I AM GROOT! I am Groot?! I am Groot. (I AM GROOT!) I am Groot? I AM GROOT! I AM GROOT! I am Groot? I am Groot. I… am Groot. I am Groot?! I… am Groot. I am Groot?! I am Groot?! I am Groot! I AM GROOT! I am Groot! I am Groot? I am Groot?! I am Groot. I am Groot! I am Groot. I AM GROOT! I am Groot. I AM GROOT! I am Groot. I am Groot. I AM GROOT! I… am Groot. I… am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot. I AM GROOT! I am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot! I am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot. I AM GROOT! I AM GROOT! I AM GROOT! I am Groot. I AM GROOT! I am Groot. I am Groot? I am Groot? I am Groot. I AM GROOT! I am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot? I am Groot. I AM GROOT! I am Groot?! I am Groot. I am Groot! I am Groot. I AM GROOT! I am Groot? I am Groot. I am Groot? I am Groot! I am Groot! I am Groot?! I am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot?! I am Groot. I am Groot. I… am Groot. I… am Groot. I AM GROOT! (I… am Groot. “I am Groot.”) I AM GROOT! I am Groot? I am Groot. I am Groot. I… am Groot. I AM GROOT! I… am Groot. I AM GROOT!

Was the cheapening of the universe’s deadliest woman irritating? Definitely. But it was still some of the most fun I’ve had in cinemas in a while with memorable, quotable dialogue. And I even liked the post-credits stinger. Yeah, I said it. Come fight me about it.

5. The LEGO Movie

Actually, I take it back. THIS is what I’d give my animation award to. Is it high art? No… actually, maybe. That twist at the end is so brilliant and such a great commentary that I would actually recommend this film to as many people as I could. This should not have been as good as it was, but it perfectly encapsulated the creativity and fun of childhood and I would be surprised if it didn’t do that for other people too. What else can I say, but… everything is awesoooome~!

4. The Imitation Game

Initially, I was turning over in my head whether to put Chef or Mockingjay on this list. In the end, it didn’t matter because this late entry bumped them both off. Benedict Cumberbatch has quite a few forays into American cinema, but whether it be disappointing like Star Trek: Into Darkness, average like August: Osage County, or downright awful like The Fifth Estate, he had yet to have a bona fide hit. This movie changed that. The fact that he was able to play a character so like Sherlock and yet completely distinct from him is a testament to his acting skills, but the fact that he can make him seem so sympathetic and real just blows the doors wide open for him.

Oh, and the rest of the movie’s great too. Sorry, I wrote about it very recently, so I don’t feel I need to reiterate too much. However, I will note that it’s nice to see Mark Strong not play the villain for once (anyone who brings up the Green Lantern movie will be shot).

3. Whiplash

If I could give an award out for the movie that surprised me the most with its quality, it would have to go to Whiplash. The amount of character study you can draw from this is astounding and the sheer brutality of the music world that this movie depicts should be a nice wake-up call to those who think that music isn’t real work. This might have gone on the top of the list… if the director had kept his mouth shut. See, he stated in an interview that the ending was supposed to show how broken and meaningless the main character’s struggle was and that his pursuit would lead him to an untimely end. That… does not gel at all with what I took away from that ending or even fit with what I saw on screen. I think this is one of those times where the Death of the Author would be more beneficial. You know, let people draw their own conclusions on what happened to the characters. As it stands, though, this is still a great movie.

2. Gone Girl

Picking between the top two was very difficult and I have no doubt that my choices changed many times as I wrote and edited this list. Regardless, it would be a crime not to give Gone Girl a place here. You will never find a more gripping mystery that makes you question what you know to be true or an ending that will leave you feeling so shocked. Hyperbole? Perhaps, but that’s how I feel. Any talk of Ben Affleck’s talent and the Daredevil movie can now be put to rest as this role brings out the best in him. It’s not a perfect representation of reality, but it shows a very dark side of humanity that needs to be examined. Psychopaths do exist and can trap your life in ways you can’t imagine, and in today’s society, where people young and old give out their trust online so easily, that’s not a lesson that can be ignored.

1. Boyhood

But perhaps it’s best to also be reminded that life goes on after you’ve moved past the psychopaths, that there’s beauty in simplicity, and that people are complex layers upon layers of good, bad, and everything in between. And no movie encapsulates that better than Boyhood. Oscar Wilde once said that life imitates art more than art imitates life, but this movie seems to be the glittering exception. This actually felt like I was watching a person’s journey through adulthood captured in a bubble. I didn’t feel like I was watching characters on screen, I felt like I was watching people that I was getting to know. I have no doubt that there will be a lot of college papers exploring and interpreting this film, which is why I think everyone should see it. Everyone will be able to take something different away and interpret things differently from this movie as they go through it. And that’s life.

Did I miss any of your favorites? Which movies did you think were the top and the coliseum? Let me know in the comments below (and please keep it civil). This was a great year and I look forward to this year’s movies.

When I was still passionate about Ronin’s Rants, I was going to widen my scope from TV to include internet original content, my reasoning being that the internet is becoming a new form of art and media distribution. From there, I would eventually do a video critiquing Anita Sarkeesian; it’s not because I disagree with what she stands for in the long run, but because she represents a brand of feminism that, on the whole, gives the movement a bad name. The fact that she has made huge errors in her research certainly makes things worse. Today, however, even if I were still doing the show, I would officially put that idea in the bin forever, due to recent disturbing events.

There exists a game developer named Brianna Wu, who developed a relatively unheard of but well-received mobile game called Revolution 60. Recently, she has fled her home with her husband after a slew of death threats were launched at her on Twitter, included one that posted her home address. This would normally be just horrible, but the fact that has happened to other women in the gaming community recently turns this into something downright disgusting. Wu now joins Zoe Quinn and Anita Sarkeesian herself in a group of women that has undergone the same harassment and left their home for fear of safety. I don’t know how many others there are, but here’s how I look at it: once is a case of misanthropic asshole, twice is a disturbing fluke, but three times is a trend, one that I had seriously hoped we as a people had grown above by now.

Earlier in the year, in the wake of Zoe Quinn’s Depression Quest, there came to light a post from one of her jilted ex-boyfriends. He claimed that Zoe had been cheating on him with other people, including a game journalist covering the game. Suddenly, accusations were flying about how Zoe slept with the journalist to get a good review, bringing up questions about journalistic integrity and nepotism in the gaming community. Firefly alumni Adam Baldwin discussed the matter and coined it #GamerGate. Backlash ensued, but there were two strange things about it. First off, said journalist was not reviewing the game, but simply mentioned it, so any existing bias would be minimal. Second, it was Zoe who received the majority of the backlash, not the journalist boyfriend.

Since then, the whole thing has turned into a shitstorm and became sort of a haven for a lot of the more vitriolic attackers. Recently, something even more disturbing has come to light. Apparently, the post that incited #GamerGate, made by the ex-boyfriend Eron Gjoni, was actually spiced up to add fuel to the fire, meaning the inciting incident of the movement’s existence was based on a spin story. In short #GamerGate is the video game equivalent of FOX News or the Tea Party, an organization/movement spawned from hype and lies that they have bought into, full stop.

At this point, the hashtag #StopGamerGate2014 is in full swing, supported by countless game developers, game studios like Naughty Dog, and celebrities like Seth Rogen. Cracked even did an article about how #GamerGate just makes the human race look bad. #GamerGate is now destined to forever live in infamy. Whatever goal they were trying to accomplish has been obliterated by the people that make threats while invoking their name.

Let’s pretend for a moment that feminists are the rage-filled bags of hot air that their detractors say they are. They still would not deserve attacks against their privacy and threats against their lives. Wu and Quinn weren’t even championing a feminist cause like Sarkeesian was. They were simply creating games they felt passionate about and apparently that was enough to piss people off. The pretense is gone. These are attacks fueled by misogyny. And I’m not talking about the dollar-store kind of misogyny that Frank Miller or the remake of The Wicker Man pedal out, I’m talking about misogyny in its original definition: “dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women.”

To bring it back home, I will never be Anita Sarkeesian’s biggest fan. I find the flaws in her research astounding, her unwillingness to give credit to the people she takes footage and art from insulting, what she thinks passes for anti-feminism at times head-slapping, and I just find her an all-around terrible feminist. But I will still not go forward with my critique video of her, even if Ronin’s Rants comes back to life. Why? Because I refuse to let the points in that video become ammo for the people launching these sick attacks. I am not willing to let my name be associated with these people or my words be repurposed by them to justify their death threats. Some people may say that I don’t have control of that, but I disagree. This is the internet, where the interaction between creator and audience has never been closer. If Anita and I have a face-to-face confrontation, I will tell her these things myself so that there is no miscommunication about it. But I will not allow myself to give power to the hateful aggressors in this hateful witch-hunt.

I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that most of you have become aware of the new remake of Annie coming out this year, the spin being that the cast is almost entirely African-American. Naturally, as with every time a character’s race is changed in a remake or adaptation, this has caused a bit of an uproar with some uncomfortable words attached. To give my personal thoughts briefly, I’m not thrilled about the film, but it’s less about changing the race of the characters than wondering if we really need another adaptation of Annie. Also, as a person from a musical theater background, I have a problem when classic showtunes are “updated” by adding a hip-hop back beat or a pop remix. However, seeing as two of the movie’s producers are Jay-Z and Will Smith, it’s entirely possible that was part of the contract.

But that situation brings my attention to a controversy of the same nature that cropped up a month or two ago. This may have slipped under the radar, but 20th Century Fox is rebooting the Fantastic Four film franchise with a completely new cast and crew. The big twist? Johnny Storm, also known as the Human Torch, is now black. Sure enough, copious amounts of people got their undies in a bundle over this, since Johnny has always been white in the comics. The question then becomes if this whole thing is worth all the fuss. Personally, I would say it’s worth some concern, but not for the reasons you’d think.

There’s nothing wrong with changing a character’s race in an adaptation to give representation to the POC section of the population. After all, it worked for Heimdall in the Thor movies, seeing as he was one of the best parts of it. However, changing the Human Torch’s race comes with a little more baggage than that. You see, the Fantastic Four are known as the quintessential Marvel family in every meaning of the word, since Johnny and Sue Storm are siblings and Sue eventually marries Reed Richards (Ben Grimm is… um… the best friend that’s like family and crashes on their couch, I guess?). But here’s the thing: they made Johnny black, but kept Sue white and this just raises a lot of questions. Is Johnny a foster child? Are they step-siblings now? Have they been changed to cousins in this version? Now, if the movie addresses this, I’ll be completely fine with it. It could even be a great statement about what family truly means in the 21st Century and how blood relation isn’t the only definition.

UPDATE: I am told that Sue is the foster child in the Storm family in the upcoming reboot. However, given this next bit, I don’t think that helps matters.

But really, my issue isn’t that they’re making Johnny black. No, my issue is that they’re keeping Sue white.

If the filmmakers wanted to go all the way with this concept, they would have made both of the Storm siblings African-American. But for some reason, Sue, who I remind you is the one who gets married, kept her ethnicity. I’m not normally one to deconstruct things too excessively to look for discrimination, which should disappoint the faculty of UC Santa Cruz. But the more I think about it, the more this rubs me the wrong way.

Maybe it’s the possibility that a much grander statement was denied by not changing the marriage of Reed and Sue into an interracial marriage, or the idea that her race was kept the same because there was some weird societal standard that Caucasian women are somehow prettier or more desirable than African-American ones, or that the womanizer character got a race lift rather than the one in the stable relationship. (Wow, UC Santa Cruz really did get inside my head.) Really, though, what bugs me the most is that on the surface, it seemed like a character’s race was changed for a publicity stunt and no one at any point seems to have asked, “So why don’t we change his sister’s race too?”

At the end of the day, changing race should involve a lot of passion from the people doing it. We may not have asked for a racially different update to Annie, but the people behind it probably felt that this was a big step for the community. I detect no such passion behind the Fantastic Four change. To me, that strikes as a lazy attempt to try and seem like they’re progressive and with the times in order to trick more money out of the hands of moviegoers, as well as Fox’s attempt at being edgy and trying to keep up with the mainstream Marvel films. So when all is said and done, I do not believe the sun’ll come out tomorrow on this reboot.

I think everyone can agree that Les Miserables by Victor Hugo has become a smash hit. The story has gone through many adaptations, most notably the sensational Broadway musical and several films, the latest of which I still maintain was like having your teeth pulled with no Novocain. But did you know that it was also adapted into a fighting game a la Street Fighter? If you watch the Nostalgia Critic regularly, your response would be something akin to, “well, duh.” But if you are currently finding yourself with a slack-jawed and confused expression, sit yourself down and drink with me as I recount a very strange tale.

In January of 1998, a single Japanese developer named Takase coded from scratch a game based on the Bible-length novel. The game was ported into the United States under the name Arm Joe, which is a bastardized localization of the Japanese title for Les Mis, Aa Mujou, which literally translates to, “Ah, Cruelty.” Yes, as some of you may have noticed in the nineties, American localization was about as graceful as a runaway cart slamming you into a building. The really astounding thing is that he did all of this as a one-man team over the course of five years. When asked why he devoted this much time to the project, he simply answered, “I have no friends.” I am honestly not sure whether to give this man a hug or applaud awkwardly.

This is normally where a reviewer would talk about his experiences playing the game, but this is the thing: I haven’t. A ROM is downloadable from various sites, but it only runs on Windows 7 and the only working Windows 7 computer even remotely near me runs poorer than, well, les miserables that rose up and built the barricades. That said, I will do my best to describe what the game is like. There are about nine playable characters, most of them ripped straight from Hugo’s novel. There is the sinner-turned-saint Jean Valjean; his daughter Cosette with a heart full of love; her pretty-boy boyfriend Marius; the revolutionary Enjolras; Eponine who embodies the term “forever alone”; the ruthless Javert; the amoral (and surprisingly fat in this version) Thenardier; a random policeman, and (I swear by the stars this is real), Cosette’s doll Ponpon; RoboJean; and the spirit of Judgement (spelled exactly like that).

Again, I can only speculate on how the game handles, however, having seen some YouTube videos the gameplay is pretty standard fighting game fair. Each character deals out punches, kicks, combos, and even special moves. While there are no epic finishing moves, each character has a special move that they can use when their health is low, like Marius summoning a legion of dead revolutionaries, Enjolras dropping the barricade on his opponent, or Ponpon hitting them with a car. Seriously, I’m not joking. In theory, it works, but in practice, the game looks heavily unbalanced. From what I can tell, anyone who knows how to use Marius well will never lose, as a few of his attacks can reduce the opponent’s health bar by half and I have not seen any other character in the game come close to doing that. On top of that, Judgement as the final boss of the single player has been described as impossible by some and not that hard by others. That said, the game looks like it was not properly tested or balanced, so it is no surprise that this game was condemned to spend eternity in the first vault of the two hundred and forty-sixth sub-basement level of obscurity (take a minute to think about that one).

So why am I bringing up such an un-noteworthy game in the first place? Honestly, I think this game should be remade for the novelty alone. It is true that I do not hear the people singing for a Les Mis fighting game, but I truly believe that this has a niche cut out for it. If someone were to revamp the controls and play, this could have a lot of potential. In fact, why stop with the game play? Why not make new characters too, even unlockable ones? Add some of the other soldiers like Grantaire, Combeferre, or Courfeyrac or perhaps some of Thenardier’s gang of thieves. You could even add in Fantine and her super move would be giving her opponent tuberculosis! And if you really wanted to draw from the book, you could have Napoleon be an unlockable, given the punishingly long attention to detail paid to the Battle of Waterloo in the book’s unabridged version. Or if you really wanted to provide a huge gem for fans of the book, make a final unlockable in the form of Victor Hugo himself, whose special move involves setting an angry hunchback against his foes. There could even be a stylized story mode that changed with each character. Maybe the more sins the character has committed, the harder Judgement as a final boss is. I honestly think that if this were given the proper work over, it could be a great cult classic among gamers. Just keep Russell Crowe as far away from it as possible.

Like you, I am shocked about the video that was leaked from inside DHX Studios containing what can only be described as “shocking debauchery.” We don’t know who the source is, but clues point to someone inside Hasbro or perhaps the head of Jan Animations, who was recently brought onto the facilities for a possible job interview. Whoever took the video did so at great risk to show us that behind the technicolor horses and friendship letters lies a bed of corruption that even the worst frat party would call extreme.

Things started out rather innocuously when Tara Strong was found eating grapes in an outfit that can best be described as a cross between Twilight Sparkle and Harley Quinn. Reliable and scrupulous sources such as TMZ report that she does everyday grocery shopping in this outfit. However, things started to get strange when Andrea Libman walked in wearing a red negligee and then threw it off to reveal a Princess Leia metal bikini underneath, all while the soundtrack to Flashdance was playing. The two women started dancing as the fire sprinklers went off and spewed whipped cream, prompting M.A. Larsen to strut in wearing nothing but a banana hammock patterned with Discord’s colors.

More and more staff began to come in as the degenerate sight increased in magnitude. We thought that things were bad when Meghan McCarthy and Sibsy started limboing under a live python and doing something unspeakable with cherries, but that was just the icing on the cake. Speaking of, it was at this point that a large wedding cake was rolled in and from inside popped out Amy Keating Rogers and Josh Haber, both wearing see-through white dressed and merged at the sides to be Siamese twins by a strange concoction of butterscotch and curdled goat milk.

However, the true horror came several minutes later when the doors swung open and in came Michelle Creber, fully dressed as Ming the Merciless, on a palanquin carried by the Living Tombstone, accompanied by a dog that had Black Gryph0n’s head attached (and talking, like a crazy experiment out of Mars Attacks). It was then that the Living Tombstone started dropping a mad beat and Michelle proceeded to call Cthulhu, Hastur, and all of the other old ones who all appeared and started warping reality around them. It was at this point that the hitherto unknown videographer ran away screaming, sounding a lot like Donald Duck singing Gwar while underwater and further escapades were unknown.

Look, I get that the studio’s motto is, “Whatever happens at DHX stays at DHX,” but I feel like a line has to be drawn somewhere. I fear that if the higher ups of Hasbro see this, this may be the end of ponies as we know it. Or… maybe they’re in on it.

Justin Carmical, a well-liked contributor on renowned website That Guy With The Glasses known as JewWario, died this past Thursday. While I did not watch many of his personal videos, I saw him in other people’s works and he seemed like a very fun and likable person. Many of the site’s other contributors talk about what a joy he was to work with. But this past Thursday, for whatever reason, he shot himself at age 42 in his bathroom.

I cannot judge Justin because I don’t know what kind of pain he was going through. At my very core, though, I feel that if I had gotten famous on the internet and had been picked up by That Guy With The Glasses, I could have done something, talked to him maybe. I know what it’s like to wrestle with thoughts of not going on and even though I don’t like them, those thoughts are hard to truly banish as you go forward in life. So perhaps, if I had gotten to know him earlier, I might have been able to help his wife talk him down, maybe even give him a perspective on what it’s like to stand at the edge, looking down into the abyss and thinking of jumping. But I can’t know for sure.

In truth, it hits close to home because this is another example of a person on the internet that I’ve respected falling into a dark place and I can’t help but wonder if it could happen to me too. I don’t know what it is to be famous outside of a small community, so I don’t know what all that exposure does to a person. I imagined that as long as I knew there were people that cared about me and fans that loved me, I would be fine and happy. But Justin was one of the most beloved people on the site and that didn’t help him. I honestly don’t know how I would cope if the world just came crashing down on me.

It feels strange mourning a man I’ve never met. There are some who believed Justin is forever damned, but they know nothing. God does not seem like a being who would condemn someone just because they were suffering in life. Again, I have struggled with feeling of suicide in the past and will probably continue to struggle with them for a long time. I implore everyone reading this to reach out to their friends and let them know that they are loved. Be there for them, look out for them, and step in if they look like they are overwhelmed by life’s challenges. To suffer is not to be weak and they need to know that they have support. Cherish the moments you have with your friends, for it might be those moments that could save them.