Batman vs a Shark
Patrick Swayze in Road House vs Patrick Swayze in Dirty Dancing
Either version of Patrick Swayze vs a T-Rex
Optimus Prime vs the Entire Nazi Army
Bell Biv Devoe vs Dolph Lundgren
Superman vs an Octopus
James Bond vs a Silverback Gorilla
Pee Wee Herman vs a UFC fighter
Ronda Rousey vs the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Zombie Abe Vigoda vs Zombie Bea Arthur
Sugar Ray Leonard vs a Bengal Tiger
The Joker and Harley Quinn vs Bonnie and Clyde
Al Capone vs Al Bundy
Time flies when you’re having fun, doesn’t it 3.5 readers?
Season 6 of GOT is over. Done. Finito. In the books.
Let’s talk but beware for like Melisandre’s mystical vagina, this post is dark and full of terrors…AND SPOILERS.
Mostly spoilers.
From a writing standpoint, so many things happened this season that we’ve all been waiting for a long time:
So about last night –
CERSEI
She’s long lamented that her lack of a dong has held her back. She has argued many a time that she’s wise and brilliant and if only she were a man she’d be taken seriously.
Well, people be taking her ass seriously now because…holy shit…she done went and exploded the Sept of Baelor.
Took out the High Sparrow, all his little sparrows, probably even the Tyrells though technically we didn’t get full confirmation as to whether or not Margery and Loras made it out or not.
The running joke about Cersei is that her schemes always fail. Not only do they fail but they usually make her problems worse. (i.e. she gives the High Sparrow extra powers to go after her enemies only to have him turn on her.)
Did Cersie know that Tommen would kill himself?
You could argue yes because she did put on her Queenly garment before it all went down.
You could argue no because she had Frankenmountain keep him from getting blown up and historically, though she has been douchey to everyone else, she has been fiercely loyal to her children.
At any rate, her butt is on the Iron Throne.
KHALEESI
I know her name isn’t Khaleesi but I like it better and it is easier to spell.
Didn’t you get goosebumps seeing all those ships and dragons crossing the Narrow Sea?
The long awaited invasion of Westeros is on the way.
Though I have to wonder, when that happens, could the end of the show be far behind? Putting the Khaleesi on the Iron Throne and defeating the White Walkers seems like the final plot points that need to be wrapped up.
THE IRON BORN
Bunch of smelly pirate vikings.
If you ask me, GRRM is way too obsessed with turning his male characters into eunuchs. Spare the balls, George. Spare the balls.
But despite being a eunuch, Theon seems to be on the way toward redeeming himself for his douchebaggery. He’s lost his claim to the Iron Islands, but may do something super heroic, die in battle, or end up as his sister’s chief advisor.
Speaking of…
WOMEN TAKING OVER
Hey. Look. I’m all for women’s rights and shit but Westeros is becoming a total vag-ocracy here.
You’ve got Cersei on the Iron Throne and the Khaleesi about to take the Iron Throne (does anyone think anyone in Westeros is willing to be chomped by a dragon to protect Cersei? Doubtful.)
You’ve got Ellaria Sand ruling Dorne after killing her brother-in-law in a coup.
You’ve got Lady Olena in charge of Highgarden even though she’s like a million years old.
Sure, Jon Snow is King of the North but he’s one of those perpetually depressed hipster emo losers who will probably walk away from it all and turn it over to Sansa.
I’m not saying never have a woman ruler but you know, let’s mix it up and have some peen-ocracies and some vag-ocracies.
ARYA
Checked a big name off her list. Got her revenge.
WHAT’S BEYOND WESTEROS?
There was a brief mention this season that there is land beyond Westeros but no one has ever sailed that far.
I wonder if that will become some kind of allegory to Europeans sailing and colonizing the Americas.
WHAT SAY YOU, 3.5 READERS?
What did you like about this season? What did you not like? What did you want to see and or not see?
What’s next?
Discuss.
So many bastards. So little time.
SPOILERS!
Hey geeks. BQB here.
Holy shit snacks, it was a great episode tonight, wasn’t it?
We finally got to see those scaly dragons in battle and battle they did. They’re like giant flying fire breathing lizard tanks.
And then the long awaited battle we’ve been waiting for. John Snow vs. Ramsey Boulton.
Quite a long, extended fight scene. There was a damn phalanx!
Can’t go wrong with a phalanx.
And you know 3.5 readers, I think there was a lesson here for both readers and writers.
You might remember way back George RR Martin and HBO took a lot of heat for allowing a scene in which Sansa gets raped by Ramsey.
At the time, no one, including myself, realized Ramsey would get a well-deserved comeuppance for that.
But hoisted on his own petard, he was. Sansa got her revenge and fed Ramsay to his own dogs, the dogs Ramsay had fed so many of his victims before.
Lesson for the reader? Keep the faith. Trust that the writer will eventually address the point that you’re so angry about.
Lesson for the writer? Understand that a controversial scene will leave you taking a lot of heat and you’ll just have to sit back and wait until the time finally comes when the plot point comes full circle.
This season has gone by way too fast.
Spoilers, you nerds.
Spoilers ahead.
BREAKING NEWS: King Tommen has abolished trial by combat. Vexing legal disputes can no longer be resolved by appointing two barbarians to smash the ever loving shit out of each other.
People will actually have to voice their legal arguments and the court will have to come to an actual conclusion.
In other news, there was a reunion of sorts between Brienne and Jamie. They have some sort of friendship. Bri wants to jump Jamie’s bones, as most women do. Jamie, I don’t think feels the same way though he respects her a lot and there’s probably a part of him that wishes he could embrace the concept of settling down with a woman that’s his intellectual equal.
Sadly, they’ll probably have to face each other on the battlefield one day.
The Hound will likely join up with the Brotherhood Without Banners. With the Brotherhood’s role in the show expanding, could an entrance by Lady Stoneheart be far behind?
Cersei chose violence. Podrick’s too damn old to be a squire.
Finally, Arya is no longer “a girl.” She’s Arya Stark.
As the show ends with Jaqen smiling, it’s hard not to assume that everything Arya went through wasn’t due to Jaqen being mean to her but perhaps part of a larger plan for him to toughen her up.
Poisoning an actress seemed to be an act beneath the Faceless Men so for awhile I wondered if this just wasn’t bad writing. The Faceless Men seem dedicated to sticking to the shadows, blending in, and fighting for good by killing the evil without anyone ever learning of their involvement.
But perhaps Jaqen realized that Arya is of more use to the overall “goodness” of the world as a Stark than as “a girl.”
Varys is leaving. He needs to return immediately.
The Blackfish goes out on his own terms.
Khaleesi returns. The imp wasn’t as smart as he thought he was.
And a new question – what is beyond Westeros? No one knows. No one has ever sailed that far before.
Interesting. A new twist!
Maybe Arya will sail beyond Westeros and find us all there watching Game of Thrones on TV.
By: Special Guest Video Game Movie Reviewer Video Game Rack Fighter.
Ms. Fighter – Currently in Training to Defend Her Title in the Upcoming 2016 Car Thief Mayhem World Championship Competition
It’s here! It’s finally here!
The long awaited film based on an online multi-player game is here.
Did it suffer the “video game movies suck curse?”
Read on to find out but beware SPOILERS.
VGRF here with a review of Warcraft.
Movieclips Trailers – Warcraft
Warcraft. The online game in which humans can choose to be a variety of fantasy characters and fight for virtual power and gold has been around forever, or at least 1996.
That’s right millennials. Some of us were nerding it up before you were born and even before it became chic to declare yourself a nerd.
And now there’s a movie. It broke the box office in China, bringing in over $145 million this weekend just in that country. The Chinese love their Warcraft.
Kind of makes me wish I could go back in time and start my own video game company that allows people to pretend to be wizards, warriors, elves, orcs or what have you.
Speaking of orcs, let’s talk about the movie.
Orcs. Long considered the perpetually raging, possibly misunderstood buttholes of the fantasy realm, they’ve destroyed their world and rather than seek to mend their evil orcish ways, they cross through a porthole into the human realm of Azeroth and start conquering and pillaging and generally orcing shit up in true orc fashion.
Hmm. Maybe the Azerothians need to build a wall and make the Orcs pay for it?
Huh? Huh? Crickets. Hmm. Blame BQB. That joke was his idea.
Moving on. Naturally, the humans aren’t going to stand for all this orcish tomfoolery. From thereon, it’s difficult to figure out who’s who and what’s what because all the human dudes are basically a bunch of long haired hipster beardos who all look alike.
But, if you make an effort to get past that, you’ll see Dominic Cooper as the King Wrynn, Travis Fimmel as Commander Lothar, and Ben Foster as Medivh the Guardian.
I don’t want to give too much away, but suffice to say hi jinx ensue when one orc clan leader has second thoughts about all the evil orcishness and seeks to ally himself with the humans.
Paula Patton plays Garona, the half-human/half-orc and the only one who could possibly bring peace between humans and orcs.
Yeesh. So I assume her father was an orc and her mother was a human. Her poor, poor mother. She probably didn’t walk right for a year after that.
Crickets? Another joke suggestion from BQB. Unless you laughed. Then it was all mine.
Ultimately, I don’t think this movie suffers from the “all video game movies suck” curse.
An actual effort was made to develop characters, a plot, a storyline. I won’t spoil the ending but it is obvious that further sequels are in the works.
If you aren’t a nerd or you dislike the fantasy genre, you probably won’t enjoy it.
It is more in line with the traditional fantasy genre style. Nerds in robes – wizards, elves, dwarves, everyone geeking it up and expecting a nerd audience who knows what all this nerd shit means.
As I watched it, it dawned on me that George RR Martin was able to get a wide, diverse audience into his Song of Ice and Fire (aka Game of Thrones) series because he was able to take so many relatable human problems and insert them into a fantasy world.
But for Warcraft, you’re going to have to be a nerd to enjoy it.
Luckily for you, if you are reading this blog, you already are one.
Visually stunning. Worth to see it on the big screen.
STATUS: Shelf-worthy.
Gratuitous boobies. So many gratuitous boobies.
SPOILER ALERT!
Wow. So much going on. This season really is firing on all cylinders.
The Hound lives! What a twist. Special guest appearance by Ian McShane. I was hoping he’d be on the show longer though.
Interesting what the show does with religion. You’ve got followers of whatever the 7 Gods religion is that then you have followers of the Lord of Light. Looks like the Hound isn’t going to let it go.
Margery is clearly up to something but I can’t figure it out yet.
The Blackfish vs. The Kingslayer. Quite a matchup. Hard exactly to figure out who to root for.
You’ve got the Blackfish avenging his slain niece, Catlyn Stark. But then there’s been a slow but steady progression to make Jamie less douchey so who knows.
I’m left to wonder if Jamie’s progress towards a non-douche lifestyle will one day put him at odds with his sister/lover Cersei, the biggest she-douche ever.
The Stark kids really coming into their own. Sansa and Jon Snow looking and dressing like their father used to, doing all kinds of negotiations and shit.
Arya! Oh my God. This is the first season where spoilers aren’t really out there so I crapped my pants.
This show pushes the limits too much when it comes to kids though.
I mean the show has a lot of gratuitous sex violence and though thankfully the kids aren’t around in the scenes where that happens, it’s weird that you’ll see kids in other scenes in a show that has that.
Except the violence against kids taboo was broken as Arya got totally stabbed. I don’t like to see anyone stabbed but especially a kid.
Assumedly she’ll recover but still. And it’s too bad the Faceless Man group whatever they are called have decided to become so douchetastic.
But ultimately, I wish the show would be more careful to keep the kids out of the more disturbing parts of the show.
Hey 3.5 Readers.
What a great holiday weekend. Got some burgers on the BBQ. Got some brews. Got some Game of Thrones.
SPOILERS! SO MANY SPOILERS!
This show does excel at making you think one thing will happen then something else happens entirely.
For example:
What say you, 3.5 readers?
Ahem.
SPOILERS. SPOILERS. SPOILERS.
You have been forewarned about spoilers.
I have a question about the whole Hodor hullabaloo.
So last night we found out that Hodor’s name is Hodor because in the present timeline of Game of Thrones, Bran worged into the mind of young Hodor, back when he was Willis, and told him to “hold the door” to keep some monsters at bay in the present.
Young Willis had such a bad reaction to it that it broke his mind and he just kept repeating “hold the door” over and over until that was shortened to “Hodor.”
And then the poor guy’s life basically became walking around saying “Hodor” until he grew old and got to the point where he could hold the door for these dumb kids.
OK. Here’s my question. Hodor, at some point, would have had to have gotten the kids to the tree place where this all goes down.
Is there an alternative timeline where Hodor was like a person who spoke normally and got the kids up North while being a sophisticated, intelligent talker and then once Bran worged back in time, the timeline changed and made it so that Hodor had been a guy who just says Hodor all along?
Time travel can be so difficult.
It’s like Terminator. John Connor sends Kyle Reece back in time to protect his mother, Sarah Connor. Kyle boinks Sarah and ends up as John’s father, but at some point, there had to have been some timeline where some other guy boinked Sarah to create John so that there would have been a John in the future to send Kyle to the past to inevitably boink his mother.
What say you, 3.5 readers? Was there a well spoken Hodor before there was a Hodor speaking Hodor?
Bonus Question – Do you think George RR Martin knew from the start that Hodor would one day become a Hodor who holds the door and that’s why he named him Hodor?
Or did he coincidentally name him Hodor because he thought it would be funny for a guy to be wandering around who just says Hodor and then eventually he was like “hey Hodor sounds like hold the door maybe I can use this…”
As others have said, I think GRRM knew from the beginning. But wow. That means he’s been holding onto this secret since the 1990s.
SPOILERS, 3.5 READERS! SPOILERS, I SAY!
BEWARE THE SPOILERS!
Holy crap. What an episode. What a season! This show is firing on all cylinders.
Enjoyed the SNL-esque parody. Robert getting gored by the boar, the actors making fun of Cersei, Ned, Sansa, Joffrey, Tyrion et. al.
People have been poking fun at their leaders for a long time I suppose.
It made me realize this show has been on for so long it can make fun of itself. Where did the 2010’s go? It feels like it just started yesterday.
We learned how the Whitewalkers were made.
Sansa is unhappy with Littlefinger. But she and Jon are off to attempt to whoop Ramsay’s ass.
Varys looked bested for the first time due to yet another red woman i.e. Lord of Light priestess.
And we, very sadly, learned how Hodor got his name.
What say you, 3.5 readers?
By: Alien Jones, Intergalactic Correspondent
“Hmm yes. Hot steampunk chicks with big cannons. I dig it.”
Greetings Earth Losers.
The Esteemed Brainy One here. The intergalactic trade war over irregular pants continues, but alas, I have done all I can. I have since moved on to Dromodo, where the beings are fighting over the right to marry.
I have heard you humans have been squabbling over that right yourselves (i.e. who should and shouldn’t be allowed to marry) but the Dromodons have a different kind of fight going on.
None of them want to get married ever again. The government wants to hitch everyone up in forced marital bliss whereas the Dromodons just want to chill out and let their freak flags fly.
That’s what they call their genitals. “Freak flags.” Very disgusting. Just take my word for it. You don’t want me posting any pictures of that nonsense.
Anyway, I just received this transmission from Earth writer, Dakota Kemp:
Should storytellers cross genre boundary lines? Or should authors like Bookshelf Q. Battler and I be considered clinically insane for their penchant of smooshing together wildly disparate genres?
For example, I’m mashing together the steampunk and sword-and-sorcery genres in my novel, Ironheart: The Primal Deception just as BQB does with westerns and zombie dystopia in How the West Was Zombed.
Are BQB and I unrecognized geniuses or delusional losers?
Hmmm. Like Charlie Sheen on a Friday night, that question is loaded.
Perhaps I’ll start by taking a look at your latest novel, which I’m told just hit Amazon’s virtual shelves on May 12:
Well, you’ve got all the trappings of a good novel here. A serious looking man with a derby. Old warrior who looks like he’s up to something. Hot chick with a big ass weapon.
I like it. And really, the whole secret to good writing is that you, the author, like it. And it appears to me that you do.
People try so hard to put books into boxes and slap labels on them.
The big question is “Are you having a good time while you write it?”
If you’re having fun, then it will show in your writing.
Everyone is different. Some people are old ladies who love to write cozy mysteries in which their precocious kitty cats solve crimes.
Others are lonely housewives who unleash their pent up angst with steamy erotica.
Some people are like Bookshelf Q. Battler who beats himself up a lot over past mistakes and then inevitably writes stories about characters who goofed something up big time and are forever trying to make amends for it in some way.
The general advice I have heard from authors is that you try to “write for market” i.e. slap together a book that fits a cookie cutter cutout of every other book that is doing well, it probably will not do well if your heart and soul isn’t reflected in that book.
In other words, just write what you love to write about. If you love certain genres, and you enjoy mashing them up together, then by all means do so.
Think about it.
Do you want to eat a store bought cake that’s one in a hundred that was dumped off the back of a delivery truck yesterday?
Or do you want to eat a cake that was made with love by a little old lady baker who gets up at four a.m. every day?
The corporate clowns at your local chain grocery store don’t care about your taste buds or the art of cake making, but the little old lady who has studied baking her entire life certainly cares.
And perhaps that little old lady has a few tricks up her sleeve. Maybe she adds a pinch of cinnamon or a dash of nutmeg to her cakes to really make your taste buds sing. Corporate clowns will never do that. They’ll just bust out their calculators, crunch the numbers, and decide they can still sell cakes without the added expense of nutmeg.
You sir, are clearly a nerd (no offense as nerds are held up with more reverence these days) who loves the steampunk and sword-and-sorcery genres.
You took your time, put in the work, built your own world and then birthed it into this one.
Are you insane and/or delusional? No. If you enjoyed writing your book, it will show and once the word gets out, you’ll have way more readers than BQB’s paltry 3.5.
Dakota, there’s an old commercial for Reese’s peanut butter cups in which various humans complain in jest to one another, “You got chocolate in my peanut butter. No, you got peanut butter in my chocolate!”
Once upon a time companies just made chocolate. Then Mr. Reese shoved some peanut butter up a chocolate candy’s butt and people have enjoyed getting that much more obese ever since.
You’ll never know what people will like until you try. Mr. Reese loved chocolate and peanut butter. They’re better together, and I’m willing to bet that steampunk and sword-and-sorcery fantasy will mix just as well.
Sure, there will be plenty of squares who will tell you “don’t do this or that.”
They’ll tell you that genres are a lot like the lyrics to that fine 1994 song Come Out and Play by the Offspring. “You got to keep ’em separated.”
Except, no you don’t. Toss all the genres you want in a big bowl, mix them up, pop them in the oven, serve up your dish to the readers and let them decide.
By the way, don’t compare yourself to the lowly BQB. You two are in different leagues.
You sir, got a book to market, whereas BQB just screws around all day and maybe if I’m lucky he’ll write a chapter or two once a week. He’s not exactly doing his part to stave off the Mighty Potentate’s conquest of Earth.
But you are, and that’s why your name will be added to the protected rolls once the MP rolls into town.
Good luck Dakota and stop by to let us know how your book launch went.
Alien Jones out.
Alien Jones is the Bookshelf Battle Blog’s intergalactic correspondent, graciously lending the power of his brain to answer your questions.
Ask the Alien a question and he may very well plug your book or blog in his answer. Ask questions in the comments or tweet them to @bookshelfbattle
Together, we can promote self-published material and ween the masses off reality television, a form of entertainment that Alien Jones’ boss, the maniacal alien despot known as “The Mighty Potentate” despises so much that he’s plotting an invasion of Earth just to stop it.
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