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The Leila Hann Let's Watch Spoiler Thread: Seriously, Stop Spoiling Stuff

The Narrator said:
The film? I could chip in for that. It's a classic.
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Yep, the original film was definitely what I had most in mind.

That said, while I'd say Highlander still holds up as a 'who wants to live forever?' story, it's kinda weak as a 'death game' story, the other trope it popularised. Later works like Battle Royale and Squid Game do more with their set-up both morally and thematically, whereas Conor (from memory, it's been a while since I watched it) only ever faces immortals who are obviously evil or who he at least doesn't have any attachment to.

Though one interesting thing about the Prize is that there's no sinister catch to it, in stark contrast to nearly every Death Game story that came after
 
ArlequineLunaire said:
That said, while I'd say Highlander still holds up as a 'who wants to live forever?' story, it's kinda weak as a 'death game' story, the other trope it popularised. Later works like Battle Royale and Squid Game do more with their set-up both morally and thematically, whereas Conor (from memory, it's been a while since I watched it) only ever faces immortals who are obviously evil or who he at least doesn't have any attachment to.
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I can't say that I'd ever thought of Highlander as being any sort of inspiration for Battle Royale. The Immortals aren't trapped in a place together and forced to fight each other. They could just ignore each other and coexist peacefully. We see that between Connor and his mentor, Ramirez, as well as sharing a friendly drink another Immortal that he considers a friend instead of fighting him, even when they're entering the final days of The Gathering. No outside force is forcing the Immortals to fight each other like in those "death game" stories. If it weren't for those like the Kurgan who are tempted by the power of The Quickening and The Prize, they wouldn't need to fight each other at all.
 
I guess I associate Highlander with death game stories because many people (more so in the past than now) would automatically compare any story with a tournament to the death to Highlander. Usually not seriously, mostly they'd just make 'there can be only one' and 'so we can't fight on holy ground?' jokes.

But yeah, Highlander's only really similar to Battle Royale, Hunger Games, Squid Game et al in the broadest strokes
 
Well, he does try to to talk it out with wossname, with the Toledo Salamanca at the beginning of the movie.

Sidenote, I do wonder what the plan was for the show before they retooled, given that the original pitch was it being "the undercard"the inevitable result would've been someone taking Duncan's head at some point, no?

...

Now I'm grumpy I only ever got halfway through the first season.
 
I only know the TV series through pop culture osmosis and maybe catching one episode here or there, but they'd already kind of walked back the whole "Connor won The Prize and is the last Immortal" thing by then, I think, on account of wanting to have sequels.
 
The Narrator said:
The Immortals aren't trapped in a place together and forced to fight each other.
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You could argue they actually are by Zeist... but we don't talk about Zeist.

Though on Highlander II, despite how conclusive the original was, I don't entirely agree that a sequel could never have worked. 'What does a man do with all the knowledge in the world?' is a pretty interesting basis for a movie, albeit a movie that probably would've been very different from the original Highlander. Unfortunately, Highlander II definitely isn't that
 
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The Narrator said:
I only know the TV series through pop culture osmosis and maybe catching one episode here or there, but they'd already kind of walked back the whole "Connor won The Prize and is the last Immortal" thing by then, I think, on account of wanting to have sequels.
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Well, they walked it back by having weird circumstances add new Immortals to The Game.

The initial premise of the series was "The Gathering is almost upon us, Immortals can't hide anymore, this is the 'undercard' for how it came down to just Connor and the Kurgan". Of course they rapidly decided that no, they don't want to do that, and stopped having the cops crawling around asking Duncan uncomfortable questions about the headless bodies that keep turning up around him, etc.

EDIT: there's also TAS, which is a completely alternate continuity, where The Game gets called off after the world ends in Nuclear Fire, with the Immortals taking a mystic oath not to kill each other so they can focus on rebuilding; unfortunately, one of them decides "actually, I'm fine with the world being fucked, as long as I get to rule it", and the said oath prevents anyone from doing anything about it until a new Immortal is born (who is, of course, yet another McLeod), who didn't take said Oath and isn't bound by it. And as a bonus, said Oath means they can give him their Quickening without needing their heads chopped off!
 
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Since I've commissioned both Winnie the Pooh and Soviet animation (Skazka Skazok), I guess people may be wondering if I'll commission the 1969 Soviet Winnie the Pooh cartoon (which a Disney animator said was the better than theirs)?
Unfortunately, I have no plans to right now. Partly because I can't find a version of it with English subtitles, and partly because I'm trying to cut down on commissions a little.

One thing I find weird about Soviet Winnie the Pooh though is Christopher Robin isn't in it. Apparently, it's because they didn't want a hierarchical figure over the animals. And since being a child celebrity screwed over the actual Christopher Robin's life, I can understand wanting to leave him out. Still, I feel leaving Christopher Robin out kinda misses the whole point behind the books
 
Leila Hann said:
The rest of the AC1 lineup is variable in quality. It's mostly comics of the vigilante detective, sports drama, or cowboy revenge quest persuasions, but there are also some illustrated prose pieces. One of these in particular, a fictionalized account of the travels of Marco Polo, caught my eye. Mostly by virtue of its accurately garish depictions of period clothing.
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Some day someone should comission Otoyomegatari to Leila, just to see her jaw drop at the first panel.

(Not me though, i am too poor).
 
Speaking of, I'm considering to commission more superhero introduction. I just wanna know if I'm the only one interested, and if so - in who exactly (don't wanna ask for Captain America just for myself, y'know?)
 
Gun Jam said:
Speaking of, I'm considering to commission more superhero introduction. I just wanna know if I'm the only one interested, and if so - in who exactly (don't wanna ask for Captain America just for myself, y'know?)
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I guess that depends on what aspect of it you're interested in. If you want to look at how they've changed since their inception, then Batman and Wonder Woman might be logical next choices.
 
Out of those two, I'd probably go with Wonder Woman. Partly because Batman gets all the attention (like it's still mind-boggling that Wonder Woman doesn't have her own animated series), and partly because Wonder Woman's first story doesn't have Bob Kane stink all over it. I'd be fine with Captain America's too.

But if you want superhero origins that are really contrasting, Wolverine's and The Punisher's come to mind, since they started as Hulk and Spiderman foes respectively.
Edit: Constantine's too since he started as a Swamp Thing side character, though with him we're stretching the definition of 'superhero' pretty thin
 
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Early Wonder Woman is especially buck wild, as the writer's kinks are basically baked into the charcter concept. It's BDSM all the way down. Oh, and she looks like the woman that he and his wife were both sleeping with.
 
Since Leila by extension covered Zatara's origin, maybe we should commission Zatanna's?

Also, Leila reviewing Superman's first story got me thinking about her reviewing his 'last'. The two most famous 'last' Superman stories would have to be Alan Moore's Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? and Grant Morrison's All-Star Superman (which is funny, given those two don't get along), the former fitting the bill a little more.

What'd make All-Star Superman extra interesting is that artist Frank Quitely took a lot of inspiration from Moebius. As I've already commissioned Moebius' Airtight Garage, Leila could compare and contrast
 
ArlequineLunaire said:
Since Leila by extension covered Zatara's origin, maybe we should commission Zatanna's?

Also, Leila reviewing Superman's first story got me thinking about her reviewing his 'last'. The two most famous 'last' Superman stories would have to be Alan Moore's Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? and Grant Morrison's All-Star Superman (which is funny, given those two don't get along), the former fitting the bill a little more.

What'd make All-Star Superman extra interesting is that artist Frank Quitely took a lot of inspiration from Moebius. As I've already commissioned Moebius' Airtight Garage, Leila could compare and contrast
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Would you say Kingdom Come is a "last" superman story? It's not as direct as either of those too, but it also has a feel as a Conclusion, IMO.

Although it's also Kingdom Come - it's got a bit more... debate, shall I say, surrounding it than either of yours mentioned (and, IMO, worse, although given how good those are - especially Whatever Happened - that is a high bar to pass).
 
Estro said:
Would you say Kingdom Come is a "last" superman story? It's not as direct as either of those too, but it also has a feel as a Conclusion, IMO.

Although it's also Kingdom Come - it's got a bit more... debate, shall I say, surrounding it than either of yours mentioned (and, IMO, worse, although given how good those are - especially Whatever Happened - that is a high bar to pass).
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There's also "Death Of Superman" for all its faults it is a good story,


Edit: the animated adaptation "Doomsday" is much better tho since it's also a great adaptation of "Reign of the Superman"
 
Hey, is any cyberpunk stuff on the docket of future reviews right now?

Because I have heard of a work titled True Names, which is an interesting early entry into the genre and it would be interesting to discuss what beats and cliches of cyberpunk the story hits and what it does not feature. See what later works in the genre take away from the story, assess it as a "transitional fossil" of cyberpunk, as it were.
 
101001101 said:
Hey, is any cyberpunk stuff on the docket of future reviews right now?
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I've considered commissioning The Long Tomorrow, a 1976 comic by the aforementioned Moebius and Dan O'Bannon (the scriptwriter for Alien). It's been called possibly the first ever cyberpunk story and was a major visual influence on Blade Runner. Helps it's only about twenty pages
 
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