john

I mean, the sex and the karate are written using the same technique, that just proves Rothfus’ point about brevity. Windmill rushes over rainbow. Is that a sex move or a karate move? You don’t know. See? Brevity.

I’m an optimist by nature too but this seems akin to George Lucas releasing a surprise teaser for a new Star Wars film that consists in it’s entirety of: “a long time ago in a galaxy far far away …”

To be fair, nobody is suing Rothfuss or Martin for not delivering manuscripts. At a certain point of success contractual deadlines are pretty meaningless and I would think Lynch scrapes into that category. I’ve told this on the board before but I was at a local convention in March 2019 where Lynch confidently told the audience that he expected the new Lamora book to be published in September that year, implying it was just waiting for a publishing slot. He even made a joke about promising things in the past and not delivering. Makes me kind of sad to think of the amount of doubt and angst that must have engendered that kind of reversal.

Ah yes, I forgot about this thread. Yeah, I pretty much agree with what’s been said. I thought a lot of the tasks this year were either rubbish in conception or a mess in execution. (Propose to Alex? Put face on upside down? Drink squash with mouth open?) But the camaraderie and personalities were excellent. I was hoping that VCM would be able to take Greg in hand more but even her famous poise generally deserted her when faced with him. The most memorable task was the one where you buy items with time and throw them at a balloon under a portcullis. Greatest injustice was when Greg decided Alan’s bath film was lame because they deliberately cut to a shot from the crew in the middle which ruined the effect.

I’m not sure what you mean (might be worth a discussion in itself!). I’ve read the first two (there seem to be five now) and as far as I recall it was most like a police procedural with the historical elements and the main guy’s personal problems as a background. No idea if that makes it crime or mystery though (am I a noob for thinking those are synonyms? ). I think the solution was revealed at the end and all that, it wasn’t one of these thriller type books where you get the bad guys perspective. So make of that what you will!

Uk Kindle Naomi Novik’s Deadly Education back on the daily deal for 99p just in time for the second one coming out.

Osman is a huge tv personality in the UK. I find him very personable myself but I guess some people don’t like him.

That sounds like an ironic comment on the trend for vegan restaurants or cafes. I haven’t read it but only heard good things about it, even from people who, by their own admission, think Richard Osman is a smarmy git.

This is confusing, I guess deliberately, although I doubt Bakker meant it to be as confusing as it is. As far as the heart goes, I concluded that he pulls out Serwe’s heart and, through prestidigitation, presents it as his own to win over the crowd. Other people think he performed some spell or whatever using his own chest as a portal to Serwe’s. If the Dunyain knew that magic and God and the Outside are real then they’d join the Consult in trying to wall off hell by committing atrocities. The reason Moenghus hasn’t been able to appreciate this is, yeah, because of his brand of sorcery. I forget the specifics, but it’s different from the other kinds somehow.

Sarah Kendall has to be one of the most Ninja winners. I barely remember her doing anything but she kept racking up the points. Mike could’ve won if he hadn’t screwed up a couple of tasks in this episode. Mind you, I think the punk hair, while an excellent gag, is obviously not as intimidating as a bat with a nail in it. Those kind of grand gestures always get rewarded but you could see Greg pushing back at some point. Series overall I thought Charlotte was consistently underscored and Jamali consistently overscored, maybe that’s just a little of my white middle class misogyny coming through. I did enjoy Jamali’s attitude in general. I thought Wozniak was the standout performer though. Alex Horne gave a few details of the new series in Ed Gamble’s Taskmaster podcast. Alan Davies evidently thinks it’s a load of nonsense for the first few tasks he’s doing. And VCM apparently has a very clinical approach of a kind we haven’t seen before. How did you get that impression? I always found him to be one of the most inoffensive mainstream comedians. I have vague memories of seeing his early standup as a child in the 90s and I think that was a bit edgier, though. I’m interested in how Desiree Burch will do, I’ve heard her on a few more serious podcasts and she’s very smart.

I worded that wrong I think, I actually meant I didn’t remember things glow when she levitates them and I also thought she was lifting them like telekinesis. But you’re right, I guess she just makes things floaty and if a lift is lighter than air it would just rise in its shaft.

Yeah, that makes sense, I didn’t recognise her or the effect of her power. It seems a little odd of an application, unless she just levitated it slightly until the mechanism kicked in or something. This seems quite an intense reaction. I’m not entirely happy with the direction of the story but that’s more personal preference than anything, it’s consistent and coherent even with the different elements mixed together. The small number of episodes is a shame, especially when it doesn’t seem outrageously bigger in scope than your average tv show. She’s barely in it after the first two so if that’s your only objection I’d say stick with it.

Steampunk seems like the epitome of “shallow stylism” to me. I don’t know how you could have a show marrying steampunk to actual Victorian era science. Yes, excellent episode. For the first time it felt to me like an HBO show (too much like an HBO show in the Ferryman scene) and not like a better than average network tv procedural.

That’s definitely true of the freelance web writers who saw Buffy and Angel as kids. But I also read reviews in the Guardian and the NYT which I think were more objectively considering it as a piece of filmmaking. Those two were more positive than the pop culture sites I saw but still generally unfavourable.

I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would, judging by pretty much all the reviews I read, which said Whedon had lost his touch. I do think it had a number of flaws, the main one being jamming a lot of stuff in at once. Maybe just first ep syndrome but the reviews (critics have seen four episodes) suggest it continues, apparently to the detriment of character work. But it was fun and I personally thought it was not as overwritten as Whedon shows from 20 years ago but the dialogue was still snappy enough to be entertaining.

I think Greg is totally bamboozled by Jamali “doesn’t give a fuck about Taskmaster” Maddix. This week he told him in the prize task that he’d “settle for three points” for his non shocking child’s bike. Meanwhile Charlotte gets last place for her fairly lame but at least meets the remit bucket of ice.

Daisy May Cooper had an intensity to her that was impressive. She’d get her head down and just do the tasks, which is often the way to win. Witness the garage door task when you had to throw things through the door as it was opening or whatever. She was the only one who tried to do that in an orderly way. She was just let down by her prize tasks, where she just seemed to grab the first thing she saw in her house that broadly fitted the category and didn’t even try to argue it in the studio. If she’d collected more points from that round she’d have easily won. I’ve now seen the latest episode. I very much enjoyed the arguing in less than ten words task and the final most to least studio task. Mike Wozniak is looking very good. Don’t know much about him except he co-wrote Man Down for Greg Davies. He seems like the perfect contestant, funny and creative but genuinely tries to win every time. And he apparently drinks 37 pints of milk a month. Already some dodgy point rewards from Greg, as there always is. Jamali Maddix successfully argued last week that Charlotte should be disqualified from the rat catching task for not being three metres away as stated in the task, conveniently forgetting moments before in his clip we’d seen him ask Alex to edit his hand out as he caught the rat.

UK kindle - Abercrombie’s Trouble With Peace is 99p this weekend, along with a bunch of other Gollancz titles including Nick Martell Kingdom of Liars and MJ Harrison The Sunken Land Begins to Rise Again.

Love Taskmaster. I hadn’t realised the episodes on YouTube were just for foreign viewers, I just thought they were being really generous about putting stuff up for free. Anyway, best champion - Bob Mortimer, best moment - Joe Wilkinson potato throw, best costume - yes, Phil Wang’s jumpsuit. Also Daisy Cooper screaming at Richard Herring for not seeing she was drawing a hippo using only horizontal or vertical lines was genuinely frightening.

Ben Barnes as the Darkling? I’m aware he’s an ancient being or something, but he is a hell of a lot older looking than my mental image, especially when they’re casting Alina with a believably teenage actor. Otherwise, excellent trailer, the sun summoning looks fantastic.

Yeah, I was puzzling over this decision for exactly the same reason too. But I decided I buy too many books.