Hey, you know what else is kinda garbage?

Russia. To be clear, I'm not referring to all of the people in Russia or even the geographical area that is Russia necessarily, but rather to the chest-thumping, mob-run, burnt out husk of a global super power that beat us to space. So what's my problem with the land that gave us Tetris and...well, mainly Tetris? This.

"Ridiculous! Russia is free and open society! We even spread democracy
around world. Are you saying you don't like president I choose for you?"

-Unrepentant oligarch

Vladamir Putin

Pictured: soccer, which
 I suddenly care about. 

Did you click? No? You didn't? You know what? Fine, don't worry about it, I'll explain. FARE, an organization that works to combat inequality in football (soccer football, not whatever it is we call football) is warning gay soccer fans not to hold hands or show signs of affection while attending the World Cup in Russia next year. How come? Because Russia is a seething, lawless cauldron of homophobic rage and FARE is concerned that foreign attendees might risk assault or worse by being all gay and shit.

"Look, maybe just watch the World
Cup on TV. Russia? Kinda garbage."

According to Piara Powar, executive director of FARE, the guide will:

"...advise gay people to be cautious in any pace which is not seen to be welcoming to the LGBT community. The same message is there for black and ethnic minority fans."

-Powar, agreeing with 

my earlier assessment 

Pictured: Russian riot police bravely
apprehending a kid with a rainbow flag.

Homosexuality isn't illegal in and of itself in Russia, but it is illegal to promote to minors thanks to a law entitled and I'm not kidding: 'for the purpose of protecting children from information advocating for a denial of traditional family values.' What the shit does that mean? Admittedly I'm not an expert on the Russian legal system, but I think the law just means whatever the arresting officer wants it to mean. You might recall anti-gay watch-dogs once went after a milk company because they had a rainbow on their cartons.

This guy made a career out of ranting about
 gay sex. It's just gay-gay-gay with him...

And look, I'm keenly aware that the U.S. is also chock full of petty-minded homophobic jerks, many of whom hold high office. We're still fighting in the courts with cake bakers and repair shop owners who insist that 'because Jesus' is valid legal ground to refuse service to gay people. Lawmakers seem to collectively loose their shit over who gets to use what bathroom, and have even tried to ban the word 'gay.' But at least in America we have the wherewithal to call homophobes out on their bullshit and publicly shame them on the internet.

I'd like to think that if the World Cup were held here in the States, foreign fans could at least feel safe in the knowledge that the danger they face just walking down our streets would be random and impersonal rather than a hate crime. Probably.

"Hey, it's nothing personal..."

-America

Today in too much to ask:

Is it too much to ask that the President stop acting like such a garbage human all the time? And to be clear, I'm not likening him to America's sanitation workers, they're great.

No really, municipal trash removal is one of those things
that separates civilization from chaos. I'm dead serious.

Um, that's a portrait of Andrew 'Trail of
Tears' Jackson back there, you know,
just to set the bar for the proceedings...

What I'm trying to get at is why can't our technicality President stop spewing hateful, ignorant garbage all the time? Like, all the time.  Did you see this thing today? Here, I'll explain. The President was honoring some Navajo WWII veterans at an event today and of course his comments were a shitshow of rudeness and insensitivity.

"I just want to thank you, because you're very very special people."

-Donald Trump, arbiter of specialness

Buckle up guys, it's about
to get racist in there.

Ok, not so bad. Idiotic sure, and I'd imagine fairly insulting but so far not as jaw-droopingly racist as I'm sure you can predict it's going to get. The President continued:

"You were here long before any of us were here..."

-The President, right around 

the time his handlers started to

clench up, knowing what's coming

He's talking out of his absolute
something, but it's not his heart.

"...although we have a representative in Congress who they say was here a long time ago. They call her Pocahontas, but you know what? I like you, because you are special. You are special people, you are really incredible people, and uh, from the heart, from the absolute heart we appreciate what you've done, how you've done it, the bravery you've displayed and the love you have for your country..."

-The President of America

Remember when we weren't constantly
embarrassed by our President? Good times...

Oh for fuck's sake. Does he not get that he's the only one calling her Pocahontas? The Pocahontas in question here is Senator Elizabeth Warren who says she is 1/32 Native American, which Trump insists is a lie. Warren admits that her claim is based on family lore and has produced no evidence, but apparently Trump fancies himself some kind of genealogical genius having previously insisted for years that President Obama is a secret Muslim from Kenya. 

You know, even for a guy who routinely makes wild, demonstrably false claims about things like inaugural turnout and illegal votes, and who is even now saying that that recording of him bragging about sexually assaulting women to Billy Bush is fake, it takes some chutzpah to demand that Warren take a DNA test to prove her Native American-ness to him. 

Above: a picture of a tax return for no particular reason.

Is it me, or does it seem like a lot
of this White House's policies can be
boiled down to calling women liars?

Anyway, he keeps calling Warren Pocahontas because he thinks racism is hilarious. Sorry, it's not racism, at least according to White House Spokesgoon Sarah Huckabee Sanders. When asked about why the President felt the need to shoehorn in an offensive dig against Senator Warren during an event that was supposed to honor Navajo code talkers, she replied:

"I think what most people find offensive is Senator Warren lying about her heritage to advance her career."

-Press Secretary Sanders, 

just going all in, all in

Really? Because I would have thought most people would find an entitled, rich white asshole setting himself up as an authority on racial identity more offensive, but them I'm not the Press Secretary. So then another reporter asked Sanders how she responds to the general sense among the American people that the President lacks decency, to which she stammered:

I know he has no decency, she knows
he has no decency, the whole room
knows it, but here she is, towing the
shit out of the line. God bless. 

"Look, I think the President uh, uh, certainly finds...ah, an extreme amount of value and respect for these individuals, that's why he brought'em and invited them to come to the White House and spent time with them recognizing them and honoring them today. So, I think he is constantly showing ways to honor those individuals and he invited them here to the White House today to meet with him and to also remind everybody about what the historic role that they played many years ago [sic, like all of that]."

-Sarah Huckabee Sanders, tap-dancing

I also kind of admire the reporters who ask
these things knowing full well the line of
preposterous balderdash they're in for.

Just to be clear, I'm not making fun of her rambling, barely coherent response that in no way answered the reporter's question. Calling bullshit on it, sure, but not making fun. In fact, I almost admire the way she consistently defends the President's behavior in the face of cold hard reality. Note that I said almost. I think she is a reasonable, intelligent person, but it's just that she's still someone who gets out of bed everyday and bullshits her way out from under a torrent of reasonable and valid questions we deserve answers to. 

Look, I don't know if Elizabeth Warren is 1/32nd anything and I don't care. What I do know is that an event set aside to recognize veterans isn't the time to get a cheap dig in on your political opponents. And I'm also pretty damn sure that it's like super easy to go through one's day without insulting entire swaths of the American public and I guess I just wish the President would try it. Even for a day. Just to see what it's like.

I kind of feel like these guys should get a whole n'other ceremony to recognize their
outstanding bravery in the face of the President's patronizing comments at today's event.

Here, let me ruin Batman for you...

Why do we, nerds that is, love to rank things so much? Like, I'm going to estimate that fully 9% of the entire internet is devoted to lists and rankings and top 10's. All of them subjective and all of them kind of meaningless.

Yeah, but what else are we supposed to do?
Not obsess over where on a continuum of
ten arbitrary positions something falls?

Above: yes.

That said, I take issue with this list. Go on, click on it. See my problem? You don't? Did you even click on the-fine, I'll just sum up: it's a ranking of the Batmans...Batmen? Bats Man. Whatever, it's a top ten list of the different live action and animated versions of Batman from the last fifty years. Well, the well known ones anyway, and I have an issue with it. The writer, Matt Fowler from IGN, is of course correct when he ranks Kevin Conroy's Batman from the Animated Series at number one, but he puts Christian Bale at number two. Two!

I know this isn't a popular opinion, but Christopher Nolan's Batman movies are overrated and Christian Bale's Batman is the worst Batman. Ok, maybe not the worst, Val Kilmer was the worst. But Bale's pretty low on my list. Not that I'm making a list...

Hey, incidentally, when Dick Greyson's parents die in
Batman Forever how come Val Kilmer adopted him? I mean, Chris
 O'Donnell was an adult, shouldn't he have just gone and got a job?

One of his most formidable foes quacks and
steals bejeweled bird statues. Professionally.

Blasphemy, I know, but hear me out. Sure, Christopher Nolan's films, Batman Begins, The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises, were like super-successful and everybody loved them, but I found their grounded take on Batman kind of uncalled for. It's a story about a kid who, after his parents are murdered in front of him, devotes his life to fighting theme crime whilst wearing tights. I guess I just have a hard time seeing what part of this premise calls for gritty realism.

"This is the only clue we have, we're not 
even sure what to call him. I was thinking
Clownface, but I'm not married to it..."

But I digress, here, let me explain my Bale beef in spoiler-filled detail. So movie one spends more than half its run time explaining in needless detail every single step of Bruce's training with ninjas in Tibet-which, do they even have those there? Anyway, then he and Alfred build the Batcave and get a Batmobile. All that out of the way, he goes up against the conspicuously non-magical Ra's al Ghul, wins and then has a chat with Jim Gordon on the roof. Gordon hands him a playing card and says something like, 'hey, there's a new villain in town, maybe go stop him?'

Which brings us to movie 2. According to my extensive internet research, some time has passed, but we're more or less picking up shortly after the first movie. Anyway, he goes up against Joker, one of the Gyllenhaals-I forget which one-gets blown up and Batman is forced to kill his best pal, Harvey Dent.

Was it Jake? Was it? What? Don't look at me like
that-wait weren't you Katie Holmes in the first one? 

Who, because the screenwriter had
apparently never heard of Batman
before, is a cop whose name is Robin.

Blamo, movie three. We learn that Batman, distraught after the events of The Dark Knight has given up his secret identity and has spent the last eight years bumming around stately Wayne manner. Bane shows up, growls out some impenetrable dialogue and tries to blow up Gotham City. Batman stops him, and is apparently killed in the process. But in a surprising twist he's totally not killed in the process. No, Batman just faked his own death and goes on vacation to Italy with Catwoman, leaving his crime fighting mantel to be picked up by the kid from Third Rock from the Sun.

Now, I'm no mathematician and admittedly the elapsed time between the films is open to some debate but as near as I can tell Christian Bale's Batman was Batman for a total of like eight months before taking an early retirement. Yup, this Batman quit. He never faced the Rogue's Gallery, never decked out the Batcave with souvenirs from crimes he foiled. Again, I'm not a top ten list person, but Christian Bale's tenure as Batman was, at best, eighth place. Maybe seventh depending on how you feel about George Clooney.

He never even got to recklessly endanger the life of a youthful ward...

It's legal 'cause shut up.

Are we really asking so much? Is it crazy to suggest that the President probably shouldn't be a brand? Because the current President, whom you might remember as the catastrophically unqualified former gameshow host who brags about assaulting women and for whom most of us didn't vote, is a brand. Here, lookit this:

Above: the leader of the free word selling shit with his
name on it on Facebook like goddamn yoga pants. 

Why waste time explaining to everyone
that you're a white person with a persecution
complex when you can just wear a hat?

Yeah, that's the President hawking Make America Great Again tchotchkes on his Facebook page. I sure hope you took advantage of his Black Friday sale. I mean, MAGA swag for 30% off! Hats, stickers, yard signs, flags, even dog leashes. You know, for a dog you hate. It's everything you need to advertise to the world that your irrational hatred of Hillary Clinton was more important to you than putting a reasonable person in charge of our nation's nuclear arsenal or that you're totally cool with literal Nazis marching in the street.

No really, all this is real. In fact, check out the online store. You can even buy a three-inch commemorative bronze medallion with Donald Trump's face stamped on one side and the American flag on the other. It's the perfect way to commemorate that time he put his face on a medal and you paid for it.

Pictured: a thing that is real. No, I'm serious.

Trump Vineyards Wine:
"'Tastes so classy you won't
even believe how classy..."

So yeah, the President is a brand. Welcome to the future. It's not just stupid junk with his stupid slogan and stupid, smug face all over it either, he also has golf courses. And hotels. And remember that pyramid scheme/bullshit school he ran? I think he managed to settle out of court on that one. Oh and a winery. A winery that makes wine that is sold at Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. In fairness, according to Snopes, the National Park contracts out the gift shop to a private business who'd been selling the wine for a while now, but you can still buy it there. At a National Park.

Now some may look at this and see a conflict of interest that's questionable at best and criminal at worst, but others see synergy. Those others are, of course, terrible people. Look, I'm not a constitutional scholar or anything, but this can't be legal, can it? The President monetizing his office for personal gain? Right?

"Legal? Who can say? But thirty percent off?
That's a deal. Can't argue with that."

-Some guy selling

useless shit online

In other news, women are very special...

So today reporters finally got the President to talk about Alabama Senate candidate and alleged child molester Roy S. Moore. Here's what they asked:

"Mr President, is an accused child molester better than a Democrat?"

-NBC's Kristen Welker, no really

Pictured: Kristen Welker demonstrating the stunned expression
that was frozen on her face throughout the President's answer.

And that's when I saw the unicorn...

However, to his credit and in a shocking twist, the President replied: 

"Of course we take these accusations very seriously, and I am therefore urging Mr. Moore to step aside."

-President Trump before offering to 

answer other questions on a variety 

of subjects in complete, coherent 

sentences that didn't embarrass us all

Above: some of the women who have
accused Trump of sexual misconduct.
There's 16 in all. 16 to Moore's 9. You
know, not that anyone's keeping count.

Wow. You know, I admit that I was wrong about President Trump. Today's comments really showed that he's finally growing into the role in which he-I'm just kidding none of that happened. He absolutely leapt to the defense of alleged child molester Roy S. Moore, pointing out that since Moore says he didn't harass and assault the nine women who are accusing him, we should totally take him at his word. After all, what would he possibly have to gain by lying about all those sex crimes he committed? Sorry, alleged sex crimes, he allegedly committed. 

So here's what the President said when reporters asked if he was ready to talk about the child molester running for the Senate. Sorry, allegedly. Anyway, here he goes:

Pictured: Roy S. Moore joining
Nazis on the list of things Trump
blindly throws his support behind.

"I can tell you one thing for sure, we don't need a liberal person in there, a Democrat. Jones. I've looked at his record, it's terrible on crime, it's terrible on the borders, it's terrible in the military. I can tell you for a fact, we do not need somebody that's going to be bad on crime, bad on the borders, bad with the military, bad for the Second Amendment."

-The President on how the

people of Alabama would be better

off represented by the sex offender

Wai-wai-wait, so help me out here, the President is criticizing, among other things, Doug Jones' record on crime? But isn't Moore himself accused of committing numerous egregious crimes? Sex crimes. Even if you think Jones is soft on crime, isn't being an actual sex criminal like, way worse? Anyway, the President wasn't finished. Here are some more of the bewildering words that actually came out of his mouth today:

"Women are very special. I think it's a very special time
because a lot of things are coming out and I think that's
good for our society and I think its very good for women."

-The President saying words while 

the First Lady looks on...probably 

regretting some of her life decisions

Nerd out? On the internet? Ok...

"Homaaaaage!"

-Alterna-Spock, just

loosing his shit, again

Last week was the last new episode of Star Trek: Discovery until January so if you're not caught up, please get caught up so I can talk about it. I'll wait. Back? Ok. Now either buckle up or bail, because we're about to head into nerd territory. Still with me? Splendid. We're just nine episodes in and Discovery's been pretty great. There's certainly things I can criticize, but I'm just happy there's new Star Trek being produced that doesn't rely on ripping off-sorry, homages to the original series.

I know what your thinking: Discovery is chock full of references. And you're right, as a prequel the entire series is itself kind of an homage, but I don't think it's leaning on it as heavily as say, Enterprise. Yeah, I know I trot out Enterprise, specifically 'In a Mirror Darkly' everytime I want to rag on Star Trek for ripping itself off, but I mean look at this:

It's mirror universe Archer fighting a Gorn on the
Defiant; the ship that got lost in a dimensional rift
in The Tholian Web. It's an homage smoothy! 

"You know what I'm sick of Commander?
Caves. We live in the future and explore
space, so why are we always in caves?"

-Geordi, kind of over caves

There're some superficial things Discovery does differently that I really like. For example, the crew isn't constantly encountering aliens who look exactly like humans except with some magic marker spots or rubber forehead appliance. No preposertous appearances by historical figures like Samuel Clemens or Abraham Lincoln. And although the ship has some kind of proto-holodeck onboard, it hasn't, to date, malfunctioned. Oh, and this is kind of a first: so far, no caves. The crew of the Enterprise was always visiting alien planets and hanging out in budget-freidnly caves. It was weird.

Does nobody write music between
Carnival III and the 23rd century?

Of course, the show's not free of Trek references, Michael Burnham is Spock's secret foster sister he never mentioned before and captain Lorca's got a tribble in his ready room. And one of the best characters is Dwight from The Office playing Harry Mudd, but mostly the writers go out of their way to not be like other Star Trek things. We heard Wyclef Jean in episode seven instead of some obnoxious piece of classical music. Characters swear because sometimes you're getting tortured by Klingons and 'gosh darnit' isn't enough. Also not everyone is nice all the time.

Voyager's crew also had to struggle
with how to murder Neelix while
making it look like an accident. 

Don't get me wrong, one of the things I love about Star Trek is that it's set in a time in which people are supposed to have gotten past all their petty bullshit and get along with each other. The Federation is this shining utopia where you don't need money, there's free healthcare and everyone has a replicator. It's swell, but the best Trek stories put stress on that status quo. TNG had Q to show the humans how small and insignificant they are, Deep Space Nine threatened the Federation way of life with the Dominion War and Voyager took it away by having the crew lost in the Delta Quadrant.

At first glance it might look like Discovery is covering similar ground to DS9 with its war with the Klingons, but I think it's taking it from another angle. Instead of the external threat-which since it's set before the original series, we know the Klingons don't win-the show focuses more on asking how much of that shiny Federation utopian philosophy the characters are willing to compromise in order to survive.

Well, they're repeatedly stabbing a sentient alien
with needles to work their navigational system, so a lot?

"You murder your crew one time
and you never hear the end of it..."

-Captain Lorca

Like should Discovery keep using their spore drive even though it's harming the Tardigrade and later Stamets? Or should admiral Cornwell fire Captain Lorca for clearly being a monster? I mean, he is winning the war for them, but still, he did murder his last crew. It was to prevent their slow, painful deaths at the hands of the Klingons, but Picard would never do that...ok, except that one time he did exactly that in First Contact. Hm...bad example, but the point is she was going to fire Lorca before he tricked her into getting captured.

The point is that it's different enough from previous incarnations to feel like something new and fresh while at the same time keeping enough of the flavor of Star Trek that you don't feel like you're just watching Battlestar Galactica with Klingons. Oh, and can we talk about how Discovery boldly went where TNG should have gone like 30 years ago and had Trek's first kiss between two male characters? Because they did.

Way to go Star Trek. I mean Dawson's Creek beat you
to it by like 17 years, but still, welcome to the party.

Turns out the kids aren't all alright...

...in fact some of them are crazy gun nuts who love assault rifles. Look, I know it's like super easy to throw one's hands in the air and say 'kids these days,' but holy shit, kids these days...

Oh, and don't get me started on selfies.

Oh don't you look at me like that, we're
the ones that will have to live with the
consequences of your poor decisions.

Here, lookit this, it's a Guardian article about a Quinnipiac poll that shows that Americans age 18-34 are surprisingly divided on whether or not there should be a ban on assault rifles. 49% support a ban while 44% oppose one. This is in sharp contrast to the 65% of Americans of any age that support a ban. So what gives? Why are younger people more ok with assault rifles than old people? Shouldn't that be the other way around? Fair or not, we tend to link age with conservatism which is why it's super-frustrating when old people vote for someone like Trump and then we feel bad for pointing out they'll die sooner than us.

Call of Duty WWII: "way more fun 
than asking Grandpa about the war..."

-Activision's kind of

insensitive slogan

Anyway, what gives? The Guardian interviewed a sociologist called David Yamane who has a theory, and brace yourself because he's about to blame video games:

"There does seem to be something in particular about assault weapons, and it could be due to the normality of assault weapons for people who have come of age playing first-person shooter games like Call of Duty..."

-David Yamane about how the 

vidjagames and are warping the youth

Ok, remember how I told you to brace yourself? Well, un-brace and then re-brace because I'm not sure he's wrong. Sure, on the face of it it might seem like Yamane is just following in the footsteps of a hundred sanctimonious hand-ringers who for decades have insisted, without evidence, that video games are harmful, but I think this is more about a cultural issue than laying blame.

Hey, remember that time when Joe Liberman and the rest of the
Senate lost their shit over Night Trap and Mortal Kombat? Good times...

Somethings are just generational I guess,
like teabagging. What's with teabagging?

Yamane's not saying that first-person shooters make people violent, he's just suggesting that they can make assault rifles seem less foreign and 18-34 year olds less inclined to condemn them. He goes on to point out that kids who grew up in the 1950's were more familiar with things like hunting rifles either from first hand experience or from TV so those, for them, are normal. But kids who grew up in the 2000's playing FPS games where you've got to mow down as many enemies as possible as quickly as you can, appreciate the convenience of assault rifles in a way the rest of us can't.

So yeah, I'm going to have to go ahead and blame video games for this one. Not directly for gun crimes of course, but for helping create an entire generation of young people who think that slinging an assault rifle over your shoulder and heading out the door is a thing reasonable people do.

I mean look at these assholes...

"Finally, a Rampage movie!" said no one.

Also there was a werewolf,

because fuck yeah, werewolves.

I guess the question I'm asking the vast, silent, unthinking void is why is Rampage a movie now? Yes, Rampage, can you believe it? Huh? What's Rampage? That's a very good question and I'm glad I pretended you asked because it gives me an opportunity drop some obscure video game knowledge. Rampage is an old arcade game where you play monsters that resemble, but are legally distinct from classic giant monsters like King Kong and Godzilla.

Above: New York's iconic skyline
faithfully recreated in vaguely
building-themed rectangles.

You smash buildings in level after level of single-screen, virtually identical looking cities which the game assures us are places like New York and Peoria, all the while taking fire from helicopters, tanks and police. These attacks slowly drain your life until you die, transform into a tiny naked human and then feed the machine more quarters to continue. It was an ok game and did what it set out to do: extract money, which is what the movie makers hope to do too. But I'm not sure they're going about it in the best way.

"A movie." raves the New York Times!
The Chicago Tribune gave it a rating!
114 minute runtime confirms IMDB!

I mean, why, thirty years after the game came out and twenty-nine and a half years since anyone really cared about it, is Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson is staring in a film adaptation? Sure there were home ports and some so-so sequels in the intervening years but who is this movie for? People my age with hazy memories of playing the games or kids who were born in the aughts and are young enough to want to see a The Rock movie? Also, the trailer not only admits that the film is directed by Brad Peyton, director of San Andreas, but it kind of presents it as a reason to see it.

It's like the screenwriter has managed
to make the movie even dumber than
the game. Which is kind of innovate.

Weirdly the trailer doesn't even acknowledge that Rampage is based on a video game at all. And that's fine I guess, I mean, they're pretty clearly relying on Dwayne Johnson, monsters and explosions to entice people into the theater and away from the nine or ten streaming options that don't involve leaving their homes, but still, why bother linking it to the game at all? It's not like they kept the story, such as it was. Rampage the game was about scientists who mutated into kaiju, a premise the movie discards in favor of 'holy shit giant monsters, let's shoot them with guns.'

I'm not sure if Mortal Kombat: Annihilation
was on purpose, or just a misunderstanding
 between a film crew and some LARPers.

Look, I'm not saying the world doesn't need more giant monster movies, it absolutely does, I'm just questioning the wisdom of adapting (however loosely) a video game. Name a good video game movie? Well? Tomb Raider, Resident Evil and Mortal Kombat? Well, no. None of these were good movies. Objectively speaking they were just the least terrible video game movies. For every Tomb Raider there was an Assassin's Creed, for every Mortal Kombat, a Mortal Kombat: Annihilation.

But whatever, I'm just judging Rampage on the trailer alone and that's not fair, right? I mean, sure, I'm also judging it based on past experiences with movies adapted from video games and that's not always an indication of-oh, and also the director's previous work. I'm judging it on that too. So for those keeping track, there's the trailer, other video game movies and the director. But all that aside, I'm sure Rampage is going to be just great.

Pictured: Director Brad Peyton's 2010 film
Cats and Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore.
Why am I mentioning it? Oh, no reason.