PopCult Reviews

Comic Book Review – X-Men: Inferno Prologue Omnibus

X-Men: Inferno Prologue Omnibus (2021)
Reprints X-Factor #27-32, X-Factor Annual #3, Uncanny X-Men #228-238, X-Men Annual #12, New Mutants #62-70, New Mutants Annual #4, Marvel Age Annual #4, and Marvel Fanfare #40
Written by Chris Claremont, Louise Simonson, Tom DeFalco, Walter Simonson, and Mark Gruenwald
Art by Marc Silvestri, Walter Simonson, Rick Leonardi, Jon J. Muth, Bo Hampton, Bret Blevins, Terry Shoemaker, June Brigman, Arthur Adams, Steve Lightle, Tom Artis, Paris Cullins, Ron Lim, John Buscema, and Craig Hamilton

The X-Men are dead. At least, that’s what the world believes in Chris Claremont’s landmark run. The Fall of the Mutants storyline ended with the team dying and secretly being resurrected by the goddess Roma. These are not the X-Men from the animated series or the films but a roster not referenced in contemporary comics or media adaptations. Wolverine, Storm, Colossus, and Rogue are here – standards that we associate with the team over the decades. But there’s also pre-ninja Psylocke, Cyclops’s brother Havok, pop star Dazzler, and Mojoverse refugee Longshot. Madelyne Pryor, Cyclops’s wife & a dead ringer for Jean Grey, is there too. More on them later, as this collection begins with X-Factor.

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Supersworn: The Victory Academy Part Four

Read our previous chapter here.

[Begin a Session: Seemingly unrelated situations are shown to be connected]
Thread: Coup at the Academy & Time Cops on Patrol
Oracle: Initiate Bond

Aiden Bell attends a midnight meeting with Police Commissioner Jeremiah Maxwell at Forge City Central Police HQ. They will further develop their secret plans for the EOD (Enhanced Operations Division), the task force that the Victory Academy will funnel super-humans into. Maxwell greets Bell with a firm handshake, almost an attack, a check to see which man is stronger. Bell half smiles, half grimaces, and squeezes back until Maxwell relents.

Solo Tabletop RPG Review & Actual Play – Solo Liminal Horror Part One

You can purchase Liminal Horror here
You can purchase Jeansen’s Machines here
You can download the Liminal Horror Solo Starter here

Liminal Horror is a game born out of a long series of deviations and hacks that started with the OSR game Into the Odd. Elements of that game were combined with rules-light fantasy RPG Knave which created Cairn. Cairn has become an all-purpose foundation for several other systems – Tunnel Goons, Eco Mofos, Into the Grasslands, and more. Liminal Horror is a modern horror system using these mechanics that lends itself to SCP-style stories, but it is not limited to that subset of horror.

Summer 2024 Digest

Features
Patron Pick – Shanghai Noon [Bekah]
Patron Pick – Federer: Twelve Final Days [Matt]
Patron Pick – The Way [Bekah]
Patron Pick – Enter the Void [Matt]

September 2024 Posting Schedule

This is a sparser month for films as we’re focusing in on the work of Bela Tarr. I also wanted a lighter month without taking the whole thing off. I’m really looking forward into diving into Tarr’s work and have a couple books I’ll be reading after watching to help provide more context.

Film Series
[Bela Tarr: Masterworks Sep 12 thru 30]
Damnation, Satantango, Werckmeister Harmonies, The Turin Horse

TV Reviews
Sep 8 – Batman: The Caped Crusader Season One
Sep 22 – Northern Exposure Season Four
Sep 29 – Ripley

Comic Book Reviews
Sep 7 – X-Men: Inferno Prologue Omnibus
Sep 14 – X-Men: Inferno Omnibus
Sept 21 – X-Men by Chris Claremont and Jim Lee Omnibus Volume One
Sept 28 – X-Men: Days of Future Present and X-tinction Agenda

Solo Tabletop RPG Reviews & Actual Play
Sept 4, 11, 15 – Liminal Horror Solo
Sept 7, 14, 21, 28 – Supersworn: Victory Academy

Podcast Episodes
Sep 1 – Kinds of Kindness/The Teacher’s Lounge
Sep 8 – Beetlejuice/Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
Sep 15 – Rebel Ridge/Evil Does Not Exist
Sep 22 – His Three Daughters/Cuckoo
Sep 29 – Green Border/Didi

PopCult Podcast – Kinds of Kindness/The Teachers’ Lounge

Two tense new releases are our focus in this episode. Yorgos Lanthimos delivers a triptych of tales about twisted versions of love. A teacher in Germany becomes caught in the drama of thefts in her school and decides to record who is doing it.

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Supersworn: The Victory Academy Part Three

Read the previous chapter here.

[Begin a Session: Unexpected return of an enemy or threat]
Thread: The Machine Collective – Aiden Bell
Oracle: Defend Reputation

Aiden Bell is attended to by his personal physician, Dr. Carly Clayton, formerly known as the hero Aegis. Clayton tells Bell he appears to be okay but wants to know how he was able to change into Captain Quantum, given that he was supposed to have expunged the entity years ago. Bell spits at her with rage, throwing his food tray across the room.

“It was a filthy dirty trick by that bastard Silver Sentry!” spits Bell. “And I am going to destroy him!”

Movie Review – Pierrot Le Fou

Pierrot Le Fou (1965)
Written and directed by Jean-Luc Godard

Will I ever watch all of Godard’s films? I’m not sure. Since my college days, I’ve watched them sporadically and never chronologically. Breathless. Masculin Feminin. Alphaville. Week-end. Contempt. Some I absolutely love, others I’m just confused by and probably need to revisit or read up on. This picture, made in the middle of Godard’s most productive period, was an adaptation of a recent crime novel, Obsession. Godard described the book as “the story of a guy who leaves his family to follow a girl much younger than he is. She is in cahoots with slightly shady people, and it leads to a series of adventures.” Casting ended up reuniting Godard with Jean-Paul Belmondo, his star from Breathless, and Godard’s wife at the time, Anna Karina, who took the lead female role.

Movie Review – Wanda

Wanda (1970)
Written and directed by Barbara Loden

The Actors Studio was founded in 1948 by Elia Kazan and his associates. The building in Hell’s Kitchen, New York, became a training ground for many of the mid-century’s greatest American actors, with Marilyn Monroe and Marlon Brando as two of the most notable. There are a host of character actors that developed their craft here as well. The most prevalent style of American acting from the late 1940s through 1980 directly resulted from what happened in this place. Barbara Loden was one of those people to hone their skills in the Studio. She would make a name for herself on the Broadway stage, winning a Tony Award for her performance in Arthur Miller’s After the Fall. In 1970, she wrote, directed, and starred in Wanda, an independent feature that earned her the description of “female counterpart to John Cassavetes” by the New Yorker.

Movie Review – L’Atalante

L’Atalante (1934)
Written by Jean Vigo and Albert Riéra
Directed by Jean Vigo

Jean Vigo was born to parents on the run. His father was a militant anarchist, and so much of his early life involved hiding from authorities with his parents. When Vigo was 12 years old, his father was murdered in prison, but the officials tried to pass it off as a suicide. Vigo would spend his teenage years in a boarding school under an assumed name for his protection. He got married at 26, had a daughter, and died at 29 from tuberculosis, which he’d had for eight years. As a filmmaker, he’s seen as establishing poetic realism in cinema and would inspire many of the French New Wave directors nearly thirty years after his death. Despite not living for that long, Vigo’s work exudes life and a rich understanding of the human experience.