via Yahoo!

Classic Animation buffs will, of course, note the irony of a Golden Age Hannah-Barbera character being presented in 33333DDDDD 😉

(intended for posting as a response in the Oliver Stone thread, posted on-page instead because it’s long-ish)

Anti-semitism is the original sin of Western Civilization. Scratch the surface of ANY extremism and you’ll find it down there somewhere. I’m told it’s more pronounced in Europe, where it has a longer and more socially-ingrained history, but it bubbles up here in the U.S. on either “side.”

By and large, Religious Conservatives seem to “support” Israel because of some sort of End Times fixation. POLITICAL Conservatives, on the other hand, seem to “support” Israel less out of pro-Jewish leanings than anti-Arab leanings. Generalizations, of course, but not unreasonably so.

ACTUAL American Jews, meanwhile, remain a largely liberal/Democrat voting base; though many American liberals (IMO) tend to be foolish and reactionary when it comes to appraisals of Israel/Palestine, as though they’re ideology won’t let them “process” the idea of a conflict where the rich nation is the “good guys” (re: democratic, primarily fighting on defense) and the poorer nation is full of “bad guys” (re: terrorism, civilian targets, religious bigotry); reflexively “siding” with Palestine without much regard for history. Though I hasten to add, it MUST be noted (by both sides) that The Palestinians are basically being “used” to wage a proxy war by outside-funded agitators at this point in the story.

One death is not “worse” than another in the broad sense, but the Holocaust IS a special case because of it’s circumstances and what it symbolizes: The Industrial Age – which was supposed to civilize the world – used to committ THE fundamentally uncivilized act. It was the first genocide-by-assembly-line. That’s important. Yes, Hitler DID kill more Russians – but that was a war with both sides taking casualties, something that’s been with us since the beginning. Horrible, but not unique.

That people still need the singular uniqueness of The Holocaust “explained” to them, and why so many can shrug it off as some kind of “overrated” atrocity kept alive for sympathy by the omnipresent “Israel Lobby” is why Stone is WRONG, and we DO need to keep focusing on it. Because some of us still just don’t get it.

And here we go again.

Oliver Stone has been on a slow slide into irrelevance ever since “World Trade Center” and “W” both more-or-less dissapointed, leading some to wonder if the famously erratic onetime visionary had lost more than a little of his mind. Apparently, in an interview with the London Sunday Times, he opted not to help his case.

In discussing a forthcoming documentary touching on the rise of Nazism, Stone laments a somehow-“outsized” focus on The Holocaust, which he blames on “Jewish domination of the media.”

And he didn’t stop there. Continues Stone:
“There’s a major lobby in the United States. They are hard workers. They stay on top of every comment, the most powerful lobby in Washington. Israel has f***** up United States foreign policy for years.”

Yeesh. What, was he reading all Mel Gibson’s press and feeling left out?

(Hey look, another new format feature: JUMP BREAKS!)

Shorthand auto-headline for pretty much every image coming out of Comic-Con in relation to the Marvel Films slate: “If This Is What It Looks Like… This Is Awesome.” See: Yesterday’s web-shuddering revelation of a certain Special Object being somehow involved in “Captain America.” (Note, since that story is a report on something that was publically shown at SDCC, I don’t know that it counts as a SPOILER or not, but just in case call this a light-warning.)

And then there’s THIS rather ostentatious-looking piece of handwear, which was apparently out on the floor along with the already widely-seen Captain America shield and Thor/Loki/Odin helmets. And, well, if this is what it sure-as-hell LOOKS like it is…

…Holy shit.

Fans don’t need me to tell them what they seem to be looking at. For non-fans: That’s almost-certainly a Marvel Universe MacGuffin known as “The Infinity Gauntlet.” Short version: Magic Glove inlaid with six Magic Gems representing absolute power over Time, Space, Mind, Soul, Reality and Power, respectively. If you’re wearing it, you’re pretty much God. Keeping this from certain bad guys is really, really important. So… it’s a more ostentatious “One Ring,” would be the idea.

Now, here’s why this should give fans something close to an intellectual-erection: While this is supposed to be a prop from “Thor,” The Infinity Gauntlet isn’t specifically a Thor element in the books. In fact, it doesn’t “belong” to any one hero’s series or continuity. It’s an “everybody” MacGuffin, most-commonly associated with (in fact, created-by) one of Marvel’s ultimate “everybody” Big Bads: THANOS.

Created by “cosmic”-specializing artist/writer Jim Starlin, Thanos is a nearly all-powerful alien conqueror who is “the ultimate nihilist” – he is in love with Death (literally – in the Marvel Universe, important esoteric “concepts” like Eternity and Infinity have sentient physical embodiments, and Death is nominally-“female”) and typically wants to commit acts of universe-scale genocide in order to impress her. Really.

In other words, EXACTLY the sort of “too big for one guy” threat that Marvel Films’ has kept hinting would be the “only” thing that could bring The Avengers together for the movie. He’d certainly be right up there with also-speculated potential enemies like the Skrulls (aliens) H.Y.D.R.A. (Neo-Nazis, James Bond style) The Leader (Tim Blake Nelson at some point after he exits the “Hulk” movie) or A.I.M. (made scientists), but for whatever reason he never seemed to be at the top of anyone’s list. Hell, I’d never have even thought to consider him, mostly because he’s always been on that list of “Things I’ll Never See In a Movie.” But, then again, yesterday I never would’ve believed I’d see a live-action Infinity Gauntlet.

This is really happening.

Legendary Pictures is prepping another stab at an American-produced “Godzilla” feature, and apparently they’ve been showing THIS image around Comic-Con. It has an AR (Altered-Reality) stamp on it that makes a roaring sound and particle-effect fire when held up to a webcam that’s been teased on AR sites, so apparently it’s legitimate product. Question is, is THIS what the new Godzilla actually looks like?

Because if so, color me 99% “sold.” I just want to see his feet – I’m hoping they’ve opted to accept that Godzilla just “has” humanoid proportions and not try and give him more “authentic” tri-jointed legs or feet like most re-design attempts have.

So… Marvel Films got the entire “hero cast” of The Avengers up onstage at Comic-Con. Everyone was expecting it, but it’s still pretty incredible that this is actually happening.

Also incredible yet wholly expected: Mark Ruffalo is the new Hulk, Jeremy Renner is Hawkeye, and Joss Whedon is directing.

There were also teaser trailers and rough scenes shown for “Thor” and “Captain America,” and from Slashfilm I find some details from a “Cap” scene they showed revealing A.) one of the ways Cap will tie in with certain other Avengers characters (what sort of mythology was it Nazis were obsessed with, again? Heh.) and B.) which HUGE piece of the Marvel arcana is playing a previously-unmentioned part… and my mind is now BLOWN!

http://cdn2.themis-media.com/media/global/movies/player/flowplayer.commercial-3.1.5.swf
click here for the site

Intermission: “Why Movies Suck Now – Part II: The Reality”

Okay, so, along with the new formats (still playing with it, content will remain the same) I’ve decided to go and switch OFF the ability for people to leave Anonymous comments. Didn’t want to, still don’t feel great about it, but it’s the best solution I’ve got right now. The fact is I don’t employ a webmaster to police this stuff, and I have to assume that requiring people to at least IDENTIFY themselves might cut down on some of the trolling.

And to be clear, I mean trolling of OTHER commenters. Say whatever the hell you want about me, fine. Bring it. But I won’t tolerate people anonymously-attacking fellow commenters. Period.

Thanks to ScrewAttack G1 “NovaSpec” for posting a video that I didn’t think anyone had taped the whole run of, which more-or-less marked The Game OverThinker’s impromptu “public debut.”

Here’s how this happened: The bad weather kept Brentalfloss from arriving on time for his scheduled live concert (though he did end up doing the whole show later when he actually arrived – that guy is a MACHINE!) so the SA crew had to fill a timeslot. The solution: Get the site regulars onstage to play “Celebrity” (read: Charades-with-proper-nouns) for game characters with the audience (itself split into “USA” and “International” teams.) Being available and willing, they asked me to come up too (playing for “Team International.”) Please appreciate what a generous “leap” this was on the part of Stuttering Craig etc – most of them had only just MET me, so there’s a certain amount of risk involved in inviting a mostly-unknown quantity to a live mic when YOUR responsible for what they might do. In any case, the whole thing was a ton of fun; and I did pretty good… right up until I blew a would-be comeback win by being unable to figure out how to pantomime Ulala from “Space Channel 5.” Ah, well.

http://v.giantrealm.com/saf/272828ab50091da6eb1ae85133def12ae9a44eb4

These are some funny people, and I reccomend you give everyone a watch, but for fans looking for “my” turns they’re at 9:40, 19:40 and 38:40 plus a random silly-dance at 26:09. Enjoy!

(trying some new format stuff, nobody freak out)

SLASHFILM has yet another gloriously preposterous “Thor” image up. This time it’s a wide shot of the Hall of Asgard, where it appears Thor is recieving a dressing-down from Odin. Frigga (Rene Russo!!??), Loki, Fandral and Hogun are also in attendance. It’s hard to make out costume detail, but fans should take note that you can see Odin and Loki both wearing what look like remarkably faithful versions of their comic helmets (that’s Loki down on the far left behind Frigga with the big crazy horns.

I must say I’m still really digging the “alien-ness” of the design here – the main inspiration is still clearly reproducing Jack Kirby designs in live-action (I really want to know if Brannagh has just been a fan this whole time, or if he and his designers looked at old Thor comics and immediately decided “this is what we’re doing.”) and Kirby was famously fascinated by the Ancient Astronaut/”Chariots of The Gods” theory of mythology, i.e. “Gods” as primitive man’s interpretation of contact with extraterrestrials. Maybe that’s the “answer” of how this ties in to the rest of the Avengers etc. “universe,” that THIS Thor etc. are/were alien or extra-dimensional superbeings and the ones we know from Norse myth are actually these guys as-described by early humans who didn’t fully “comprehend” them? I’ve heard worse ideas, and like the man said “any technology, sufficiently advanced, would be indistinguishable from magic.”