New Weird

[Regenbogen]

New year. New weird. For all the weird people and those who pretend they are not but evidence suggests the opposite. LOL

Welcome to a new year everyone!
May it be waaaay better than the last ones.
May a lot of luck, health and the force be with you.
May burning buildings not be your fault (this one had to be there, obviously ).
May the bottom never be visible in your full coffee mug.
May your bread and your jelly be free of mold.
May your bookshelves always be full of books.
May you see magic but no dead people.

May you feel happiness and joy and bring those to other people as well.

Greetings

Regenbogen

[Dina]

Yay!
Thank you for creating a New Weird and for the lovely wishes!
I add:
May you always have a warm blanket in the cold nights
May you always had a good AC in the Summer heat
May the electric power never fails you
May you always find something to wonder

This week I am working but next week I began my annual leave. I am really tired, so looking forward to it
In Christmas' Eve the TV did a rerun of the last World Cup match and the awards ceremony, timed so at 12:00, when everyone was raising their cups for a Christmas' toast, Messi was also raising a cup, the World Cup trophy  . Apparently it was a success, as most people I know watched that. We did it.

A couple of days ago we watched Glass Onion (Knives Out 2). It was fun! We enjoyed it.

I need a cup of coffee right now, you only reminded me about it    *goes for a mug*

[Dina]

Sorry about the double post

Argentina won the Golden Globe for non-English language movie! I am happy about that. It is the movie I told you about I believe, the one about the trial to the last dictators in Argentina. There is a teenager in a major role and I know the parents of the actor playing it. 

[Regenbogen]

It is only a double post, if it is on the same day IMO  .

There is a teenager in a major role and I know the parents of the actor playing it.

Wonderful, what an honour.

I am looking forward to the safe-the-puppies- anthology with the Mouse and Cerberos short story. There will also be one by Patricia Briggs. Theoretically she could write anything out of her werewolf world, because they all are puppies somehow, lol.
I hope our favourite author is done with the Olympian Affair and already writing 12M.

I am reading Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett at the moment and parallel listening to the first book of the Dragon Gate series by Lindsay Buroker for commuting and sports. The book is good, I like the characters and the idea.

It is a fantasy world, in which there are mages (as arrogant and often brutal rulers) and "vanillas" as their servants, slaves or free but oppressed people. Most vanillas despise the mages.

Legend says there once have been dragons and they gave the mages their powers. But they left generations ago. So there are archeologists from both sides searching for a dragon gate. And one "vanilla" found it.
There are different theories about how humans got magic: the mages think dragons gifted some humans with magic to have more powerful allies. Some humans think that too, but that the dragons left, because the humans abused their  powers.
Another theory says that the proximity to dragons caused some humans to develop magic and it was never the dragons' intention.
The last theory seems more likely now, that the archeologist's son seems to have developed magical powers due to the proximity to a dragonmade artifact he's been carrying with him for several years now.

Some mages stole the gate and captured the archeologist and her son to help them open it and bring the dragons back. So far they haven't been successful yet.

I won't say more here. I like the book and I definitely want to read more of it, so I thought I want to share that with you, should you not know it already.
I like the different POV s. Sometimes it's the boy, sometimes the archeologist, sometimes a human mercenary, sometimes a mage ... My favourite character is one of the mages, he sounds interesting.

[Dina]

Hi Regen!

I want to read the puppies story too.
Sadly, I do not think Jim finished The Olympic affair yet. He has not posted "The end". But hopefully we are close.
I have not read Reaper Man yet but it is somewhere in my bookshelves. It is not digital but old traditional paper.
I had not heard of that Dragon Gate series, it sounds interesting.

Yesterday I watched the first episode of Willow, the series. A few days ago I watched the movie again, so I had it fresh. I was not impressed with the premiere, but it is good to see Willow (the character) again. I always love him. I did not adore the movie either but I liked some parts and I was a fan of Val Kilmer's Madmartigan and of Willow himself. I will probably keep watching the show, for the old times' sake.

[Regenbogen]

There are 6 books of Dragon Gate. It seems to be finished.

We are also watching Willow lol. I liked the movie and Madmartigan too.
I remember having seen it with the first20 minutes or so missing on TV as a child. My father tried to record it when they showed it another time, but the recording was so bad, one could just guess how everything looked like by the colours. At this time good fantasy films were rare, so this was very precious. Some time after that I went to a store in the city my school was, as I was waiting for my bus home and I still had some time to spend until it arrived. And I found the VHS per chance while browsing through the store. I had to have that. The next day I came back with all the money I could scrap together but it wasn't enough. One of the workers there found me while I tried to find some last coins in my pockets. I needed about 50 Pfennig (not much) more and I told him. He was so nice that he said, "don't worry just buy it, I pay the rest". I am sure he was a fellow fantasy fan  . And this is how I bought my first VHS, lol. I still have it, though I can't play it any more. I kept it for nostalgic reasons.

Later I discovered that George Lucas wrote sequels to the film. I read them, but the writing was very confusing. I decided that George Lucas would do better to stick to movies and keep his hands off trying to write books, lol.
At first I thought the new series is supposed to be the first book, but they did something completely different.
In the book, teenage Elora Danan was a spoiled princess at first and there was some kind of dragon  who was sometimes a man (but it wasn't always clear which form he was in at the moment) who seemed to be able to travel through the castle walls. And there was some type of red haired warrior woman who was ordered to teach Elora how to fight. There was no other princess, nor a twin brother prince nor a missing or dead Madmartigan (or at least I can't remember). All in all I had the impression that the book was taking itself very serious.

So I am kind of glad the series is sometimes a bit humorous. The plot isn't very good IMO, but it is nice and sometimes fun to watch.
A typical fantasy story: some royalty has been abducted and a bunch of heroes bands together to find them. And they have to go through some dangerous terrain because it's the only way. And some wise person knows how to face the danger even if he should not know because it is soooo very dangerous, that no one ever succeeded or survived to tell the tale. So no one could know, but yet he does, which is not logical but screw that LOL... 

[Dina]

I knew there were sequel books but apparently Lucas himself regretted those books, so I knew the tv show would not be following the books. Perhaps they rescue some ideas though. I do not know.
When I watch more episodes I'll let you know what I think. So far it reminds me as a cheap Wheel of Time (the show, I had not read the books).

[Dina]

I just wanted to tell anyone that I am alive and well, only I am in a cloud of lazyness, as I am still on my annual leave.
I hope everyone is doing well.
Oh, I finished Willow. The latest episodes were better than the first ones but in general I was not thrilled with the show (but I am so glad to have seen Willow himself again).

[Regenbogen]

Maen everyone!

I wasn't that thrilled with Willow either, but I did enjoy the show. It was nice food for the soul.
I watched the Sandman and I liked it a lot.

I have been busy. And sad, because my father is in the hospital right now. I hope he will get well enough to be released next week. The prognosis is 1-2 months now.
I hope he can go home next week so the children can see him. In the hospital there is only one visitor allowed per day

[Dina]

Regen, I am so, so, sorry about your dad. I hope he can be released soon so he can have visitors. I send you a big, big hug. Here:    ((((((((((((((((((Regen))))))))))))))))))

Sandman is a great show, I loved it. I am also a fan of the comic, so I am perhaps biased. I was surprised because the battle with Lucifer, one of my favorite issues in the comic, is even better in the show! I also think the main character was well cast (I did not know the actor before this).

[Regenbogen]

Thank you, Dina.
It looks like he might be released on Wednesday. If all goes well. He is a bit better now. He is eating a lot, which is good, because he needs some calories.


I liked the battle, too. I liked the actress who played Lucifer. My husband first didn't believe me, when I said, hey, that's the one who played Brienne of Tart in GoT!
I have only read the beginning of one comic, so the first episodes were familiar. I imagine they did a good job with it, though I am sure there are several swapped genders in the series. Joanne Constantine? LOL

[Dina]

Of course she was Brienne! I like that actress too. I am watching her now in "Wednesday" (I just watched 2 episodes, so no spoilers, please). I am enjoying that show too.
About Sandman, the fun thing is there is actually a Joanna Constantine in the comics. Only she is an ancestor of John. She met Morpheus in the old times and, if I remember correctly, she was in the first meeting between Morpheus and Hob Gadling.

[Regenbogen]

About Sandman, the fun thing is there is actually a Joanna Constantine in the comics. Only she is an ancestor of John. She met Morpheus in the old times and, if I remember correctly, she was in the first meeting between Morpheus and Hob Gadling.

Oops. Now I am speechless. LOL
We have watched the first episode of Wednesday, too. Or was it the first two episodes? Can't remember.

Mini likes to watch Demonslayer. But she has to earn it by cleaning her room or doing household chores, mwahaha!
If I want to annoy her, I throw in which Japanese words I understood and what they mean, lol.

[Dina]

You are mean 

About Sandman, it is clear they mixed the two characters (Johanna and John) for some reason, probably because they did not want to include a character (John) that had appeared before in movies and shows, so making him too mainstream.

I watched several episodes more of Wednesday and I am really liking it. Funny enough, I like a character (Enid Sinclair) who is cute and sunny and pretty much not Wednesday but she is proud of herself.

[Dina]

Hello Weird!
Hello Regen! What is the latest about your dad?

I finished Wednesday. In whole, I liked the show, but I think the last two episodes were weaker than the rest, and a death or two made me sad. I am now watching the season 2 of The Legend of Vox Machina, an animated show about an RPG campaign. I had liked season 1, even when the humor is not always my preferred flavor. Season 2 seems good but I barely began it.