Bryce's Pipe Bomb Survival Guide*

Really, where do Transformers come from? The exact process for creating new transformers shifted around a bit in the generation one continuity. Sometimes new Transformers could just be built, and then off the went, other times some sort of catalyst was required, commonly the "Creation Matrix" that Optimus Prime possessed. Really, though, it seemed to be up to the whim of whomever was writing the comic or cartoon episode at that moment. Ever since then, depending on what cartoon, comic, or movie you're looking at, it varies quite a bit, although most commonly, it's now depicted are relying on some sort of catalyst, like the Allspark in the live action movies. For me, this leads to thinking about where Transformers as a race come from. In the Generation 1 cartoon, Transformers were built by an alien race, called the Quintessons, as a product to be sold. In the comic version of Generation 1, the Transformers were created by a primal god of the universe, Primus, who co...

If you spend anytime reading about people's favorite post apocalyptic flicks, almost invariably you'll see an item on everyone's list, and that' Six String Samurai. I finally tracked it down and gave it a watch. I don't think anyone quite prepared me for what I was going to see, and I'll admit that my expectations were a little high. Just take a look at that movie poster up there, drink it in for a minute. There's a certain joy in the visual design, with the hero being dressed remeniscent of Buddy Holly, and the villain as Slash. That joy in design pervades the entire movie, with many characters and groups of characters being homages to either musical icons or at least fashion trends. Every new scene reveals something new and delightful to see. The backstory is that Russia nukes the US in 1957, and Las Vegas, being one of the least affected areas, becomes the center of a new society, with Elvis as its king, centered around rock and roll, and ass kicki...

Let's get this right out of the way, this is not a science fiction movie, time travel is just treated as a magical effect that lets our heroes travel back in time, where they do all kinds of stuff that should create any number of paradoxes. The premise is: Three friends and a nephew take a trip to relive the friends' glory days, staying in the same hotel room that they stayed in 24 years prior. After a night of drinking heavily in the hot tub, they dip a Russian energy drink (it's got illegal ingredients!) into the timing control of the tub, and wake up in 1986. They appear as the same to themselves and each other, but reflections in the mirror, and other people perceive them as their 1986 counterparts. Except for the nephew, who wasn't born yet in 1986. What follows is an interesting look at three people, whose lives haven't been going where they thought they would, view living through their teenage glory day again. The humor is good, if more than a little vulgar. ...

I've been in the process of reorganizing my hobby room, (no reason to have a computer desk if I only use a laptop, and can't stand to stay in an upright sitting position for more than 30 minutes) and just this last weekend, I finally go to a point where I have space to take pictures again! Today we've got Full Metal Panic's Arbalest mech, as represented by the Revoltech line. A little background on Full Metal Panic, it's an anime/manga about an independent military force, not officially tied to any government that runs around keeping the peace through highly advanced and superior firepower. The core piece of equipment used in warfare in the world are Armslaves, large humanoid piloted mechs. The Arbalest is their most advanced Armslave, equipped with an experimental and not fully understood weapon, called the Lambda Drive. The Lambda Drive allows the pilot to do all kinds of crazy stuff, like creating forcefields, and weird invisible attacks that just crush oppone...

I'm probably going to sound pretty harsh in my opinion about this book, but really, it was a very entertaining read, and I've not had a book for a long time that sucked me in like this one did, I literally spent every free moment turning it's pages until I was done, rather than watch TV, play video games, or read comics. So, there you are, the one paragraph review. Here's a bit of a synopsis though, the story revolves around a female werewolf who has been captured by a sect of knights of the teutonic order during the time of the crusades, and been raised into their service as a weapon to defeat the pagan tribes of Prussia in order to bring them to the light Christianity (part of what makes this story so compelling is that I can readily believe that that would happen). The story kicks off with the werewolf, Lilly, escaping from the order when their leader is called away, and she's left in the care of a relatively inexperienced/uninformed group of knights. She brea...

Let me just get it out of the way that I loved every second of Supernatural to date, it had wit, humor, cleverness, action, drama, and of course, the supernatural. All in pretty consistently enjoyable proportions. This last week, the finale of the most recent season aired. There be spoilers comin' so avert yer eyes if you've not seen it and you want to be surprised. During the previous season the brothers unwittingly kicked off the apocalypse, and set Lucifer free from his prison. This last season mostly dealt with them trying to thwart the full on apocalypse, and trying to find a way to kill the devil without having to wipe out half the planet. It's further revealed that the brothers are both destined to be the vessels for Lucifer and Michael to possess and do battle to determine who wins. The eventual scheme that could succeed is to collect a ring from each of the four horseman, which when used together, form the key to the prison where Lucifer was confined, Sam lure...

The latest installation in Square Enix's flagship series, Final Fantasy XIII does a number of really cool things. I don't want to take a lot of time going into the mechanics under the hood, but you need to get the basics in order to get a feel for the game. The battle system is real time, the battle constantly goes on even while you're deciding what to do, you're only in direct control over the party leader though, keeps you from being overwhelmed, the other two party members are only controllable only insofar as you can dictate what class they use. Class management is an important part of the battle system, only commandoes can physically attack enemies, and ravagers deal elemental damage, along with a myriad of other classes, each character starts off with access to a small selection, and by the end of the game will have extensive access to three classes, as well as marginal access to the remaining classes. Which classes you use are determined by paradigms, sort of pre...