Broforce on PC (8/10)

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I didn’t immediately warm up to this platform shooter. For one thing, it’s very twitchy, chaotic, and brutally unfair at times. Broforce feels like it’s another, more-stylized version of Super Meat Boy. One wrong step and you are dead! You’re expected to try, try, try again. I was prepared to just rage quit this game but then a routine game patch intervened. The game just stopped working for me and I set it aside. (Citrix Workspace and the Unity Engine don’t play nice together)

Fast forward a year or two or ten and a new update to the game was released that fixed my problems and added half-a-dozen or so new bros. I thought it was time to revisit Broforce. In the interim, I had discovered that I like unrelenting bullet-hell shmups. I’m now team spaz-gaming! My attitude had been adjusted and I think I am a Broforce convert.

So, the game isn’t quite as perfection-based as I thought it was. There is a huge random element in terms of which of the twenty or so characters you are forced to play. Once you start to understand the abilities of each of the bros you begin to learn how to use their skills to combat the seemingly overwhelming odds against you. Certain characters are useless on some levels and you just have to die and try again. But when a particular character clicks, it’s invigorating!

The one thing that I loved about this game, even when I hated it, was the Randy “Machoman” Savage-inspired narration. There’s something about the screams of, “YOU CAN DO IT!!!” that tickles me every time. Also, the game has multiple endings based on how you approach the final task that are a direct descendant of Jordan Mechner’s Karateka. Well done and hilarious.

Dressed to Kill (7/10)

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I don’t think I get Brian Depalma yet. The whole time I was watching this I was thinking about how even mid-tier giallo directors’ films are more interesting. The acting and dialogue is embarrassingly bad despite the stellar cast. The solution to the mystery was obvious very early on. I suppose there is a bit of style and envelope pushing in terms of subject matter. I read the subtext as a good girl wanting to be bad and a bad girl wanting to be good and a bad guy wanting to be a bad girl or something. I could be convinced otherwise, but for now this film was meh to me.

Breakout (8/10)

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Good gravy, the 70s were a great time for movies! It seems like they would greenlight a picture based on a single stunt or scene no matter how insane. In this movie there are two! Charles Bronson is excellent as an edge-of-the-law pilot tasked with breaking Robert Duvall(!) out of a Mexican prison. Also in the mix is a skinny, 70s Randy Quaid and screen legend John Huston. So much star power in what is essentially a Canon-level B-movie. Duvall is underused but Bronson shines with his largely comedic take on his role. This is not a great movie by any stretch, but the final act makes up for all the laggy middle bits. There’s some great aerial stunts and a balls-to-the-metal ending for the main villain.

The World’s End (7/10)

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The third Simon Pegg/Edgar Wright collaboration feels much like the last two. Lots of jokes that come from strategic editing and lots of pub culture. There is a science fiction twist that eventually drives the plot in the second half of the film, but, to be honest, I don’t think it really needed that. The story of old friends dealing with aging is far more interesting than the Body Snatchers homage.

The Sword and the Sorcerer (4/10)

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This corny early eighties fantasy opens with some great creature effects and then proceeds to bore the audience for the next seventy minutes until the monster reappears for the finale. There aren’t any great set pieces, it’s mostly ren-fair dudes fighting in hallways. I had no idea how the various characters related to each other (wasn’t Talon the princess’s brother?) and I imagine most of the character development ended up on the cutting room floor. There are two well executed comedic smash cuts and I’ll give the movie props for that.

The Broken Branch by Landon Knepp (7/10)

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The final book in the Tower and the Tree doesn’t quite work as well as the earlier books. I guess that could be expected. By the start of this novel, all of the characters had gone through most of their story arcs. We’re just winding everything up plot-wise and providing some backstory behind the lore. Of course there’s a massive battle to distract from the main magical quest because…. phantasy!! But, with all my complaints, it was an okay conclusion to this mostly entertaining series.

The Hanged Man’s Hand - Wood Engraving

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For centuries, magicians thought that the mummified hand of a hanged man (preferably a murderer) could lead one to buried treasure, unlock doors, or render victims unconscious. Commonly known as the “Hand of Glory,” the hand would be combined with a candle made from the fat of the dead murderer to enhance its powers.

Legend has it that when the Hand of Glory was lit with its special candles, it would emit a powerful light that only the person carrying it could see. Everyone else in the vicinity would be rendered motionless and unable to intervene, allowing the thief to go about their illicit activities without hindrance.

In this print, a trio of ne’er-do-wells has procured a hand thinking it would lead them to riches. Alas, when you play with the demonic arts, only evil spirits will be found!

Process Photos

Early sketches
Some early sketches
Prepatory drawing
The completed preparatory drawing
Transfer paper
Hand transfer via red transfer paper
transfer result
the block at the halfway point
The prints hanging to dry

The Video Trailer

Legend of Dinosaurs & Monster Birds (5/10)

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I had this movie on my DVD wishlist for many years and never got around to buying it. I had heard that it was a gory, bonkers Japanese giant monster movie. Well, it does have one moment of low rent gore for a few seconds, but most of the movie is slow-paced and boring. We really only get about twenty minutes of poorly shot, shaky-cam monsters and then the movie just ends without any sort of resolution. Little bits taken out of context might make a good trailer: the aforementioned gorey attack and perhaps the Japanese country band scene. Most of this doesn’t even rise to level of cheese you’d want from a film of this era (except maybe the disco soundtrack). I was very disappointed in this one.

Sieben Tage Frist (4/10)

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Also known as School of Fear, this krimi is about a boarding school for boys where the students sneak off to visit a lady of the evening™, get in trouble with the professors, then start to disappear. I was mostly bored by this because nothing exciting ever really happens and the culprit, who turns out to be an ex-Nazi, is never shown as a intimidating bad guy. It comes off as a proto-Porky’s sex comedy without the humor and a mystery without the mystery.