PopCult Reviews

Movie Review – My Night at Maud’s

My Night at Maud’s (1969)
Written and directed by Éric Rohmer

Eric Rohmer is considered the last of the French New Wave directors to be established as such. He was known to be secretive about his personal life, with his name being a mash-up of two people he respected: Eric from director Eric von Stroheim (Sunset Boulevard) and author Sax Rohmer. The filmmaker worked as a teacher in the French Alps but quit in the mid-1940s to move to Paris. Rohmer started attending film screenings where he met Godard, Truffaut, Chabrol, and others. This led to a career as a journalist for the many popular film magazines at the time. When he began to get into filmmaking, he invented his pseudonym to keep his parents from learning he was working in the industry.

31 Days of Character Creation #14 – Symbaroum

For today’s character we look to the grimdark world of Symbaroum. This is a nice blend of OSR elements, but also some of the more modern narrative-driven games. The setting is a step up from Mork Borg which is intentionally vague. Here we have a bleak world with more detail added, if that is your thing. Here’s how the game is described on its official webpage:

Explore the vast Forest of Davokar in the hunt for treasures, lost wisdoms and fame. Visit the barbarian clans to trade or to plunder their treasuries. Establish a base of power among princes, guilds or rebellious refugees in the capital city of Yndaros. Or survive encounters with Arch Trolls, dark-minded Blight Beasts and undead warlords. But whatever you do, never ignore the warnings spoken by the wardens of the forest: tread carefully and do not disturb the ruins of old, for the dark deep of Davokar is about to awaken.

31 Days of Character Creation #13 – Troika!

Troika! is a rule-lite OSR type of game that is incredibly unique. Part of character creation is rolling d66 (two six-sided die as numerals for a two-digit number) and that is your background. This covers your class as well and each one is special to the game and nothing you’ve really seen before.

PopCult Podcast – The Order/A Real Pain

A troubled FBI agent discovers a white supremacist conspiracy in rural Idaho. Two cousins embark on a tour in Poland to reconnect with their deceased grandmother.

Comic Book Review – Daredevil by Frank Miller Part Two

Daredevil Visionaries: Frank Miller Volume Three (2021)
Reprints Daredevil #183-191 and What If? #28 & 35, and Bizarre Adventures #28
Written by Frank Miller (with Roger McKenzie & Mike W. Barr)
Art by Frank Miller & Klaus Janson (with Terry Austin)

Daredevil by Frank Miller Omnibus Companion (2024)
Reprints Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #27-28, Daredevil #219 and 226-233, Daredevil: The Man Without Fear #1-5, and Daredevil: Love and War
Written by Frank Miller (with Bill Mantlo and Denny O’Neill)
Art by Frank Miller, John Buscema, David Mazzuchelli, Bill Sienkiewicz, Al Williamson and John Romita Jr.

The second Daredevil Visionaries volume concluded with the iconic Death of Elektra. I’d heard about that story since I was a kid and even seen it recreated in cinemas with the dreadful 2003 adaptation. Nothing could compare to reading the real thing, a wonderfully tense blend of art & writing that delivered an operatic tragedy into the life of the Man Without Fear. Having never read these books, I wondered where Miller would go now. Elektra was such a big part of the first half of his run. I also learned that his “Born Again” storyline wasn’t part of this initial run but a return to the book in 1987, riding high off the acclaim of The Dark Knight Returns at DC Comics, about to return to them for Batman: Year One.

31 Days of Character Creation #12 – Knave 2e

It’s back to some old school style fantasy but with some modern design twists. Knave 2e is a light system capable of big things. Character creation takes a matter of minutes, but you still end up with a lot of pieces to build off of. Here’s how the game is describe on its official website:

Knave 2e is an exploration-driven fantasy RPG and worldbuilding toolkit, inspired by the best elements of the Old-School DnD movement.

31 Days of Character Creation #11 – The Wildsea

The Wildsea is one of the more unique and interesting tabletop RPGs to have come out in recent years. It borrows mechanics from several other systems, most notably Blades in the Dark. It’s world is one unlike any else, here’s the description from the official website:

Some three hundred years ago the empires of the world were toppled by a wave of fast growing greenery, a tide of rampant growth spilling from the West known as the Verdancy. Now chainsaw-driven ships cut their way across dense treetop waves, their engines powered by oilfruit, rope-golems, honey and pride.

31 Days of Character Creation #10 – Star Trek Adventures 2e

As you might guess from the title of this system, it’s a Star Trek tabletop role playing game. Here’s the description from the official website:

From the 21st through to the 32nd century, join Starfleet, the Klingon Empire, the Romulan Star Empire, and countless other civilizations, and journey across the Star Trek universe with your crew. Explore strange new worlds, encounter fantastical alien life-forms, and engage in dramatic adventures in a detailed and immersive Galaxy.

Tell your stories and unravel the mysteries of the unknown!

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Starforged: Messiahs Part Four

Read the previous part here

I had hoped to get this finished in 2024, but it took me a little longer. Hope you enjoy this final, extra long (nearly 7,000 words) final part to Messiahs.

[Begin a Session: Flashback reveals an aspect of another character, place, or faction]

One of the first things Gerard Linnaeus saw that made him want to go running from Dakhnour was watching a soldier from his house beat a frail al-Raml man to death for stealing a bowl of grain meal. The heir to the corporate house of Celadon felt a rage grow in him that had been there since he was a child. Now in his twenties, as he was being prepped to lead the House by his father, Gerard felt even more disgusted getting to see the Enclave treatment of the natives.

Movie Review – Hana-bi

Hana-bi (1997)
Written and directed by Takeshi Kitano

One of my favorite things as a film fan is coming across a filmmaker doing something all their own. No film exists in a vacuum, so you’ll always see influences from others. But how that filmmaker mixes their ingredients makes all the difference. Takeshi Kitano started his media career as a comedian and TV host in the early 1970s. It was Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, in 1983, where Kitano made his feature film debut. It was a non-comedic role as a Japanese soldier who brutalized Allied prisoners. In 1989, he made his directorial debut with Violent Cop, a neo-noir film. And then it was this movie, translated into English as “Fireworks,” that won Kitano the Golden Lion at the Venice International Film Festival, only the third Japanese director after Akira Kurosawa and Hiroshi Inagaki to win the honor.