The official second installment’s imminent arrival has been garnering further attention thanks to studio Trigger unveiling its first teaser trailer, depicting magical moments aplenty, and I am not even ashamed to say, I want to see it — Little Witch Academia 2:
The first film was one of the pieces released during the 2012 Young Animator Training Project, (also know as “Anime Mirai”) with the 2nd film being funded by a highly successful Kickstarter — bound to be seen as nothing less than inspiring to any budding young animator. The film will premier at Anime Expo July 3rd; Kickstarter backers unable to attend Anime Expo will be provided with a digital copy of the movie — the theatrical release will meanwhile arrive in October.
Kiwi GTA V fan and modder, Andre Hema-Kani, went and modified a city rife with textures of New Zealand companies and local brands. Waipukurau resident and father-of-two, Andre hasn’t made the mod public yet, but plans to at some point in the future, because apparently people want to play it:
“I pretty much wanted to turn the game into somewhere that reminded me of home. Driving around, seeing familiar things. It was more for myself than anyone else, but I’ve had heaps more interest than I expected. I only put it on Reddit to see if my gaming friends were into it, and if people in New Zealand would actually download it.” ~ Andre
Someone did attempt this back in 2008, a Karori teenager named Stacy O’Callaghan, 17, but the police were investigating if they could charge the young man under the Police Act for using the New Zealand Police uniform and car livery. Not sure what the outcome to that story was, but Andre, should he make it public, is mindful of the associated copyrights; “I don’t want to get into trouble,” he said.
As for the gang patch; down here in the Southern Hemisphere, the street gangs look intimidating as fuck — eat your heart out L.A. — Mongrel Mob portraits by photographer Jono Rotman:
Jon Stewart opened up The Daily Show Thursday with a powerful, scathing and heartbreaking monologue about the church shooting in Charleston, South Carolina that left nine people dead. After warning the audience that he had nothing for them “in terms of jokes and sounds,” Stewart launched into a probing examination about how the incident in South Carolina happened and why these shootings will continue to happen:
“Maybe if I wasn’t nearing the end of the run or this wasn’t such a common occurrence, maybe I could have pulled out of the spiral, but I didn’t,” Stewart said. “So I honestly have nothing other than just sadness once again that we have to peer into the abyss of the depraved violence that we do to each other and the nexus of a just gaping racial wound that will not heal, yet we pretend it doesn’t exist… I’m confident, though, that by acknowledging it, by staring into that and seeing it for what it is, we still won’t do jack shit. Yeah. That’s us.” ‘Daily Show’ host says of “gaping racial wound.”
Jon Stewart then apologized to the audience, “Sorry about no jokes.” No apologies necessary in my opinion, his is the sort of opinion that needs to be heard. A great addition to his legacy and yet another reminder to why Jon Stewart will be missed.
YouTuber Clint Blevins managed to take an up close and slow-motion shot of a lightning bolt hitting the ocean along a beach. The brunt of the strike looks like a rip in space and time (@ 0:10; press 5 to repeat).
In a 21st century take on the traditional Zen sand garden, artist Bruce Shapiro invented the Sisyphus Machine, an elaborate kinetic drawing machine that uses magnets to drag rolling steel marbles through a thin layer of sand to create complicated mandala-like patterns.
It also appears that the artist is currently working on a tabletop consumer version and if you’re interested you can sign up for his mailing list here.
Shapiro, who was once a practicing physician, has spent the better part of 25 years experimenting with computerized motion control and many of his Sisyphus Machines have been installed in locations around the world including a large device in Switzerland back in 2003 and at Questacon in Canberra, Australia in 2013.
Screen legend Sir Christopher Lee has passed away at the age of 93. The Telegraph reports he died in hospital as a result of “respiratory problems”.
Possession at first sight; my introduction to Sir Christopher Lee came in the form of British classic Hammer Horror films, which are still, and always will be, great.
Tired of playing Dracula and feeling that the movies had gotten sub-par, Lee tried to quit Hammer films, but studio executives guilted him into returning by stressing how many people could be out of work if Lee stopped churning out hits. Lee agreed to star in 1966 Dracula: Prince of Darkness, he felt the script was so awful he adamantly refused to say any of the dialogue. Hammer decided that it was far more important to have a mute Lee as star as opposed to anyone else, and thus had Dracula hiss and yell through the film.
In addition to his impossibly prolific film career, Lee was a world champion fencer, an opera singer, spoke six languages, was an intelligence officer for the Long Range Desert Patrol, a forerunner of the SAS, Britain’s special forces — He fought the Nazis (before he was even 25 years old), he released his first full heavy metal album in 2010 at the age of 88, titled Charlemagne: By the Sword and the Cross, which won the “Spirit of Metal” award from the 2010 Metal Hammer Golden Gods ceremony; Lee followed that up with a metal Christmas album in 2012, making him the oldest metal performer, and the oldest musician to ever hit the Billboard music charts; and last but not least: despite everything you’ve heard about the “six degrees of Kevin Bacon,” Christopher Lee was recognized as being the most connected actor in the world in 2008, by Guinness — He connects to virtually any actor in 2.59 steps, beating Bacon. Sir Christopher Lee truly is a screen legend by all accounts of the term. May thou eternal slumber be peaceful.
If you aren’t familiar with Uwe Boll, well…good for you. Seriously, you should ignore this post, because this man may trigger your disdain for humanity and storytellers in general.
The story is, basically, Uwe Boll is still making awful movies. How? Well, that’s the frustrating mystery that has been on everyone’s minds for a long time now. German tax exempts had something to do with it, but now, fortunately, that has changed (no more shitty game adaptations). However, recently Uwe Boll took to crowdfunding his projects via Kickstarter, only that venture did not reach the target amount of money Uwe Boll had hoped for, so instead of trudging onward and making a movie with what he has, Mr. Boll went on a rant and bitched against the people who didn’t support him (you), people who pay to see Hollywood movies at the theaters (you), the people who referred him to use Kickstarter as a means to generate money in the first place (his own fans), and all foreign film investors, which basically means his career in movie-making and distribution may be in jeopardy of ending (finally). But let’s hear this straight from the horse’s mouth:
This guy. I had no idea he had a YouTube Vlog channel, and it is exactly what I expected from him. My goodness Uwe Boll, I don’t know how to put this into words…I love, to hate you. The love comes from the fact that you have the means to make movies and I admire that, the hate is from, well, it scares me that you even have a platform to do so, because you suck at it. If your movies were remotely good you might be one of my favourite directors of all time, but they are not. And you hate game developers, which is crazy! Biting the hand that feeds and all. I know what it is; you are an enigma, in the system, which is interesting because technically no one knows how it is that you are so bad at making movies and incapable of learning anything new. If it’s money you want, wouldn’t making something good yield greater rewards? Uwe Boll…I cant even!
I advise that no one wastes their time watching his terrible movies, but watch the video below to get a grasp of the man who makes them, and maybe you’ll understand the complexity of my love hate relationship with this frustration inducing, profane personality:
Minus the racism, he may have a point or two, but his message is lost in his heated delivery, naive as it comes. I suspect Uwe either went bankrupt or he just learnt that no one, not one person, wants his movies. Or maybe this is what Uwe Boll is and was always about — hubris.
Let me just spitball a few elements that make Kung Fury the unique, crazy, nonsense filled, over-the-top 80’s action comedy film that it is; giant laser firing arcade machines, robots, dinosaurs, laser-raptors, bikini-clad vikings, Thor, time-traveling Adolf “Kung Führer” Hitler, awesome explosions, cheesy one-liners, and a renegade kung-fu Miami Police Department detective who was once struck by lightning and bitten by a cobra at the same time! See, nonsense…Glorious, glorious nonsense. Written & directed & acted by David Sandberg — prepare to have your mind blown into smithereens:
“Tank you.” ʱªʱªʱª Hilarious af! The Kung FuryKickstarter campaign that was launched in December 2013 was backed by more than 17,000 people who together gave more than $630,000. The makers put that money to good use, creating supplement material such as t-shirts, a music video, an album, Hackerman tutorial vlog, and a tie-in video game. It was also mentioned that if they manage to raise one million dollars they will produce a feature length film, and considering the official video received 3 million views on YouTube in less than 24 hours upon its upload, it could happen. Fingers crossed.
Obviously not to everyone’s taste, but if you need more Kung Fury, see this; badassery from none other than 80’s icon David Hasselhoff, “True Survivor” the official music video:
This will be epic. The first official trailer for the next game in the Fallout franchise, touting the most impressive environments of any game yet in the series. Fallout 4 — the next generation of open-world gaming from the award-winning creators of Fallout 3 and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Bethesda Game Studios — looks splendid:
🎭 