Kaunisto
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Registered: 01-2008
Location: Finland
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Re: What are you reading at the moment?
Also there's the comic project of new year, Blueberry (as shown by my new avatar).
And if finishing a game I had started ca. 1993 the other day was something special, here's one up: the Blueberry story I'm starting with is direct continuation of the very first ones I read 1987 (when I really seriously got into comics).
I've read some later stuff, but now I'm going from the point I was left over 32 years ago (because the magazine I was reading didn't publish any further).
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Jan/1/2020, 18:53
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Kaunisto
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Karma: 67 (+69/-2)
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Re: What are you reading at the moment?
Finished splinter of the Mind's Eye (see last page). While in general it was of same questionable quality as much of early Star Wars extended universe, final confrontation of Luke and Leia and Vader was pretty impressive.
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Jan/24/2020, 14:01
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Kaunisto
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Today I read the last part of Blueberry (aside some spinoffs/specials).
End of story I first experienced 1987. That's kind of a record.
don't think I'll be reading anything for a while, even comics.
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Mar/9/2020, 22:36
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Kaunisto
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Re:
Now getting back to an old comic favorite Elfquest as much of it is free to read online
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Jun/30/2020, 22:46
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Kaunisto
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Karma: 67 (+69/-2)
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Re: What are you reading at the moment?
Today I found at flea market a comic removed from library which I had read 21 years ago and have really missed. This might be the second best Finnish comic/graphic novel I've read.
Aquila Oblige by Gene Kurkijärvi is a tragicomic dystopian satire. In near-future Finland government is conspiring to provoke people to rioting (with getting involved in an European military conflict), in order to then stomp down the riots and use the situation as excuse for gaining emergency powers and getting rid of opposition.
Meanwhile a bunch of drunkards, jokingly calling themselves the Brotherhood of Eagle (thus the title "Eagle obligates"), get upset of coming alcohol tax raise and as a drunken misadventure try to set up a demonstration against it.
Some liberal intellectuals are trying to start a real revolution and attempt to join forces with the drunks, but these turn out uncontrollable and end up ruining the carefully planned coup (and getting many of themselves killed).
Among all the chaos two brothers, one revolutionary and other drunk, confront each other first time for fifteen years, with bitter family history.
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Aug/7/2020, 17:38
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Kaunisto
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Re: What are you reading at the moment?
Xerxes: The Fall of House of Darius and the Rise of Alexander
I'm much happier with this than the movie 300: Rise of an Empire.
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Dec/15/2020, 19:14
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Kaunisto
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Re: What are you reading at the moment?
Trying to read Silmarillion (for the Nth time... it's the almost only book I've failed to finish, multiple times).
As january comic - note the new avatar! - XIII
(something I've also read before, up to volume 12, but it's been a while and I've got the remaining 6 to go, plus there'd be a second series of 5 to get)
May also play the related game this year, did it first time ten years ago.
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Jan/1/2021, 18:51
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Kaunisto
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Re: What are you reading at the moment?
With all other things I have going on, Silmarillion hasn't really gotten started. I've just read the couple short bits from beginning and only now am about to start the main work.
I'm done for now with XIII, so a comment on that.
XIII is a Belgian comic created by writer Jean Van Hamme and artist William Vance 1984 and since 2011 continued by Yves Sente and Youri Jigounov.
The enigmatic XIII is a man found with gunshot head wound and the numeral tattooed on him. Once he recovers consciousness, it turns out the damage has made him lose all memory related to himself, with no clue to who he is or what happened to him.
He quickly learns there are people that want him dead - as could be suspected from having been shot in the head - as well as the fact that he has exceptional skills of survival... and killing.
Following the few clues he happens to get, he finds reasons to believe that he is connected to murder of POTUS few months earlier (event he has also forgotten, further suggesting his connection).
He finds himself a name and identity after another in a dizzying web of spies and conspiracies.
After the first story arc of five albums (which to some extent continues in some of the later ones) there are also further and further revelations of XIII's personal and family history, entirely unrelated to the original assassination and conspiracy.
Which is where the series starts to go off the rail. The first five albums, maybe add in 8 & 12 that continue the arc, are good stuff. Cliché, yes, but good enough. The problem is, when you have a wild conspiracy story and it's over, trying to make sequels means coming up with even sillier ideas and in later XIII books that goes not just too far but absurdly so. If albums 6, 9 & 11 and their continuations jumped the shark, the whole Sente/Jigounov series (starting 19/20th album, depending how you count) and particularly its last part so far published in English (23/24) is now jet rocketing above a pool of megalodons.
One thing that greatly bothers in the point where the original creators drop out is that as time has only advanced at most few years in the story and it started in the 80's, the new author and artist made strange leap to modern world with suddenly twenty years newer technology; whereas with the original creators it had been consistent, with each album kind of falling behind "present day". One book, months in story, earlier you didn't have WWW and in the next you have facebook.
Based on the comic, there's a 2008 two-part TV film/miniseries XIII: The Conspiracy and a follow-up series XIII: The Series of two 13-episode seasons. (I think I've seen the film long ago.)
There is also a 2003 PC/PS2/GameCube/Xbox game - which is awesome!
A remake of that was released last year for PC/Switch/PS4/XOne - which, according critics, is absolutely terrible to the extent that they recommend rather playing the 2003 original. (Lucky me.)
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Jan/22/2021, 15:52
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Kaunisto
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Re: What are you reading at the moment?
Just read Portugal by Cyril Pedrosa
This is "slice of life" sort of thing, about man seeking himself and his roots, meeting extended family and learning family history.
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Feb/1/2021, 19:16
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Kaunisto
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Registered: 01-2008
Location: Finland
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Karma: 67 (+69/-2)
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Re: What are you reading at the moment?
Week ago was my annual Babylon 5 Day (anniversary of seeing the series finale) and being on the subject I found online a short story by the series creator/writer J. Michael Straczynski: "Babylon 5: Space, Time and the Incurable Romantic".
I just read that. And I almost hope I hadn't.
It's a fan-fiction-ish retcon for the fate of character or two and while it's well written - I can imagine the voice of the character - it's an overtly happy ending slapped on what was better story and more beautiful in its sadness.
Much worse yet, the way to achieve this questionably happy end is quite disturbing and immoral, leaving a bad taste.
Should by some miraculous coincident any B5 fan ever read this post, my caveat: you may not want to read this and prefer to just leave things as the series showed.
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Mar/25/2021, 17:01
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