Movie #971: Near Dark

Near Dark is a vampire horror movie directed by Kathryn Bigelow and starring Adrian Pasdar, Bill Paxton, Lance Henriksen, Jenny Wright, Jenette Goldstein, Tim Thomerson, Joshua John Miller, and Marcie Leeds. 

Caleb (Pasdar) chats up the wrong young lady. Mae (Wright) talks about "listening to the night" and living forever, and Caleb, having never seen The Lost Boys (which in fairness opened around the same time as this movie so that's forgivable) presses her for a kiss and winds up getting a bite instead. He stumbles home, already smoking in the daylight, when an RV pulls up, someone yanks him in, and Caleb finds himself in a new family: A group of vampires.

The vampires' patriarch, Jesse (Henriksen), gives him a week to fit in or else he intends to let his eldest "child" (or should I say...childe? No, I shouldn't) Severen (Paxton) kill him. "Fitting in" here involves killing someone, since that's kinda how these vampires roll. Severen cleans himself up and seduces women to feed on them, Jesse and his vampiric bride Diamondback (Goldstein) pick up hitchhikers, and Homer (Miller), stuck as an eternal tween, lures in people by pretending to be hit by a car on his bike. 

Mae, for her part, seems to rely on her looks to get people alone. She and Caleb hitch a ride in a truck and she tries to get him to kill the trucker (Roger Aaron Brown), but he can't bring himself to do it...so she does. 

Yeah, these vampires are monsters, and that includes Mae, though she's a little more ambivalent about it than the others (and she does like Caleb a lot). The family rolls into a bar, intending this as a final test for Caleb, and slaughter the inhabitants in a truly terrifying manner (like, killing off the people one at a time, and in a such a matter-of-fact way that Jesse has cut the waitress' (Jan King) throat and drained her blood into a beer glass before the bartender (Thomas Wagner) really knows what's happening. 

Anyway, the one survivor in the bar (James Le Gros) is meant to be Caleb's first kill, but Caleb can't bring himself to do it, the guy flees, and the vampires are all set to kill him but get stuck in a hotel as the cops blow holes in it and the sun rises, and Caleb grabs their van and saves them!

Questionable decision, really. Anyway, meanwhile, Caleb's father (Thomerson) and sister (Leeds) are out searching for him, and wind up at the same hotel that the vampires go to after their escape! Caleb winds up getting his family out, and winds up cured by a...blood transfusion. 

This is a really good vampire movie that did not do well at the box office, largely because it opened right around Lost Boys (which...I don't think is better, I think they're about even as movies, but Lost Boys had a lot more money behind it). The vampire family has an obvious dynamic, and watching the behind-the-scenes they all came up with backstories and, most important, figured out the timeline for all of them getting turned. That actually made a big difference, I think, because Jesse and Severen have the clearest and strongest relationship, while Homer is perhaps closest to Diamondback and Mae, and Mae is really the odd one out generally (she's only been a vampire about four years). Caleb is actually probably the weakest character, but since he's meant to be our POV character that's probably pretty deliberate. 

I have a couple of niggles. I think the movie peaks after the bar scene, and the ending sequences where the vampires kind of all die inside of a few minutes feels a little rushed. I'm not sure how I feel about a simple blood transfusion curing vampirism, and I'm not sure how I feel about the fact that Mae has been murdering people and drinking their blood for years (and never really shows any remorse) and then gets cured at the end and we're all OK with that. But then again, I like the really tight focus - we start with Caleb hitting on Mae and he gets bitten pretty much right away, so it's a pretty lean movie. 

What makes the movie, though, is the vampire family's performance and chemistry, and how all that reacts to Caleb. I like that the vampires are strong and deadly, but not particularly smart or supernaturally powerful - they can't turn into wolves or mist or anything, they're just strong and fast. The movie isn't a million miles from something like The Devil's Rejects in some ways, except of course that we're not focused on the bad guys. 

My Grade: B+
Rewatch Value: Medium 

Next up: Nobody 2

Epyllion: The Searscale Springs

Last night, after a quite long hiatus during which we played a whole bunch of superhero games, we returned to the fantastical lands of Dragonia! First session of this game is here, the last one we played (almost exactly two years ago) is here, now you're all caught up, on we go!

We pick up with our clutch reuniting after some time apart. They separated shortly after the events of the last story. They didn't really mean to, they just kind of got busy with their own interests. OB took on an apprenticeship with Vizali, the Forge Master, and has learned to work with precious metals and wood. Zeblek has started performing, bringing the classic plays of Dragonia to the Capital stages. Stars has remained in the Capital, never going far from the Library, except to occasionally visit the wilds to verify details about some creature or other. Toverinn stayed with Stars a while, but then went back to Woodsedge to run with the turferant herds.

But then a dragon that they met during their travels, a Bearded Dragon named Rollatha, approaches them all. The Searscale Springs - a group of hot springs in the archipelago northeast of the continent of Dragonia - has begun to lose its heat, and no one is sure why. The Springs are a place that elder dragons go to cleanse their scales (it's far too hot for drakes, but Long-Tooth Dragons can just about manage). Rollatha remembers that this clutch has some skill in dealing with mystical places that are changing or losing their magic (which is pretty niche as these things go), and rounds them up. 

They all agree for their own reasons: Toverinn is in as soon as the location is mentioned. Zeblek is overjoyed to be back with the clutch. OB knows that dris mentor, Vizali, wants some samples of mineral deposits found around the Springs. Stars has heard of a local creature called the tardisnail that is somehow impervious to the heat. 

The clutch gets back together, travel to the coast, and build a boat. Stars raises concerns about its buoyancy and what they'll do if it sinks (remember dre doesn't have wings), but OB patiently explains all this. Besides, it's not that long of a journey, it's just too long for them to fly (even those that can). They arrive at the docks of Searscale Island and disembark, heading up the hill to a plateau with a bunch of springs. Stars tells the others that dre has read in dris books that the springs' heat causes a chemical reaction in the rocks around the edges, turning them yellow. That being the case, it should be possible to tell where the springs' temperature has changed based on the rock color.

They only see two dragons: an elder with ruddy scales and scars relaxing in the largest pool, and a long-tooth moving around the area, pulling stuff out of pools, and generally maintaining the space. They head down to the plateau and dre comes up to meet them, introducing themself as Mxlar'nishka, the Springtender. Dre welcomes them, and confirms that the temperature has been screwy lately - dre points to the edges of one of the outer pools and shows them that the rocks are yellow, but not all the way around. Weirder still, earlier today the yellow formation was in a different place; it looks like the heat is "moving" diesel (clockwise) around the pools, and pretty quickly too. Mxlar'nishka also mentions that there are caverns beneath the pools, but that Zalor, the Cavetender, is who they should talk to about that. (Dre also notes that the elder dragon in the pool over there is called Daishi, and dre is an excavator back on the mainland and comes here to get clean after big jobs, but that's incidental and Daishi spends most of the day snoozing anyway.)

The dragons start looking about for information. Toverinn climbs into a pool and eases into the heat ("OW OW OW"), but then dris tail gets sucked into a hole in the bottom of the pool! Dre try to dislodge it, but can't. 

Zeblek and OB aren't in the immediate area. Stars paces nervously up and down the bank, but realizing that no help is coming, puts dris bag down and plunges in! Dre reaches Toverinn and starts to pull them out, but looks back and realizes that one dris tomes is about to plunge into the water! Stars gives a little yelp, but doesn't abandon dris clutchmate. Dre pulls Toverinn out, but the book goes ploop, into the water.

OB tries to grab it, but misses, and paws some dirt backwards into Daishi's face! Zeblek jumps in and tosses the book out, but then dris hindquarters get pulled in (Zeblek is skinnier, so more of dris body fits). Zeblek's nostrils close and dre can hold dris breath a good long time, but the heat is uncomfortable and this hurts. 

OB pulls a rope from dris saddlebag of potential and jumps in to get Zeblek out ("OW OW OW"), but the rope is too short and OB has to swim down to hand it to Zeblek. Dre manages to pull Zeblek out and onto the bank. Stars, meanwhile, has taken dris soaked book away from the pools and is desperately trying to dry it out. Once OB has finished with Zeblek, dre joins Stars and rigs up a drying fan, powered by tail-swishes, to help. The book is salvaged, though Stars isn't sure how much of it was lost. 

The water continues to drain out, and Mxlar'nishka, by this point, has heard the ruckus and come over. Seeing the water draining away, dre asks if any of the dragons are skilled in the magic of the stone moon (dre has given up that particular moon). Toverinn is, and calls on the moon - but overdoes it. Crystals form on the edges of all the pools and cover them (the one that Daishi's in, too, but dre just flicks the crystals apart with dris claws and grumbles at the young'uns; dre also isn't happy to have gotten a snootful of dirt, but OB was apologetic). 

Toverinn is pretty mortified, and not only are all the pools covered over but the one that dre was trying to plug empties out with a bathtub sort of sound. Mxlar'nishka groans ("ugh, this is gonna take all night"), and goes to get a hammer to start knocking the crystals in. 

Zeblek pokes dris head into the empty pool and shoves it through the hole at the bottom. It's very dark, of course, but dre can see/feel a river rushing by. Dre pulls dris head back out and reports this, and Stars, having now rejoined the clutch, consults the Geographical Primer on Rivers, Mountains, and Magic Islands to see if this river is mentioned. The river is mentioned, but when the book talks about where it empties out, it gets into the realm of myth pretty quickly - something about a massive creature digging out the riverbeds with its talons. Probably not helpful. 

OB asks Mxlar'niskha about the river. Dre says that dre is aware that there is water beneath the plateau, but always thought it emptied into the sea. Dre suggests talking to Zalor when dre comes up for the night (Zalor always warns against being in the caverns at night, but Mxlar'nishka isn't sure exactly why). OB also askes Mxlar'nishka if dre has some rope (for spelunking), and dre says to look in dris shack up the hill.

Meanwhile, Toverinn climbs into the now-empty pool and uses dris wild speech to talk to the land. Dre realizes that something below them, down in the caverns, is stuck, and by freeing it, the clutch can alleviate the problem with the temperature. 

OB does so, and when dre opens the door, finds a dragon! The dragon is a winged drake, so a bit younger than OB and dris clutch. Dre has deep green, jade-like scales on dris back, but dris underbelly is jet black. OB asks the dragon who dre are, and dre responds "Lokken." OB asks if Mxlar'nishka knows that dre is here, and Lokken says "yes?", clearly lying. OB says that probably they should go talk to Mxlar'niskha about this, and Lokken nods, but then says "Look! A distraction!" and disappears in a puff of black smoke. 

OB grabs a length of rope, shaking dris head, and goes back down to the pools. Dre ask Mxlar'niskha about Lokken, but dre doesn't know the name. Dre are, however, confused at OB's description, as dre has seen a dragon with a black underbelly and blue scales hanging around...

The clutch gathers together and discusses their next move. Clearly the need to go into the caverns. Stars advocates waiting until morning, but Zeblek points out that there's no light in the caverns anyway so why wait? That logic appeals - better to get going on this before it gets worse. 

The clutch gathers their stuff, and prepares to head into the Searscale caverns!

Movie #970: John Dies at the End

John Dies at the End is a cosmic horror-comedy (not a combo you see every day) directed by Don Coscarelli and starring Chase Williamson, Rob Mayes, Clancy Brown, Paul Giamatti, Doug Jones, Glynn Turman, and Fabianne Therese. It's one of those movies that, if I were not a gamer, I don't think I'd have enjoyed as much.

We open with the familiar trope of someone giving an interview to tell their strange, supernatural or unbelievable story. Actually, not that's not true. We open with our narrator, Dave (Williamson) explaining the Ship of Theseus thought experiment as applied to the ax used to behead a corpse, which then reanimates (played by Brett Wagner) and comes after the person who beheaded them, and asks if it's the same ax. Then we start the interview thing, where David Wong is being interviewed by a reporter named Arnie (Giamatti) about his experiences. 

Said experiences go back to him meeting a drug dealer (Tai Bennett) with apparently supernatural powers, and then getting a call from his friend John (Mayes), who has, in the words of Kurt Vonnegut, come unstuck from time (inasmuch as he keeps calling Dave from earlier in the evening even when he's sitting in front of him). It turns out that John has tried a living drug called "soy sauce", which has opened his mind to other realities. Dave winds up getting jabbed with a needle and getting on the sauce as well, and from there we get into the weird, Lovecraftian events in which otherwordly insect-creatures come into our world, infest people to use as puppets, eventually make them explode if they can't use them or they get bored, and continually push John and Dave toward their ultimate goal.

Said goal is to enter another universe (accessed through a "ghost door" that can only be opened using the "phantom limb" of the guys' friend Amy (Therese)), where they discover a largely naked congregation of masked weirdos who tell them that this universe is a parallel one to theirs in which the dominant form of science is "beastiology". Anyway, the place is run by a big flesh-monster/living computer called Korrok (voiced by Keven Michael Richardson), which intends to eat them to absorb their knowledge and then conquer Earth. 

There's a lot more I'm leaving out, but suffice to say that the story is very much a Lovecraft/King story as filtered through millennial/Gen X humor. It's based on a book by Jason Pargin (writing as David Wong), whom I know from his work at Cracked, and the style of humor feels very much like a visual adaptation of a Cracked article. That's not a bad thing, but it does assume a lot of...not knowledge, exactly, but frame of reference? Alternate realities, monsters that you only see out of the corner of your eye, that sort of thing? It all makes a lot more sense if you've read Lovecraft and/or played Call of Cthulhu. 

But with that context, it was pretty fun. Coscarelli also directed Bubba Ho-Tep and there are some stylistic similarities, just inasmuch as it's an insane unreal situation presented in a mostly realistic way. The main difference is in scale (Bubba Ho-Tep is about one nursing home, this is about the whole world and possibly others!) and in the attitude of the protagonists (Elivs and JFK view fighting the mummy as their responsibility and are willing to die to do it; John and Dave mostly just bumblefuck their way through it and their attitude is much more "ugh, fine, we'll save the world." And actually it's the dog that really saves the world). 

The pacing is weird and while nonlinear storytelling is fine, keeping "when" we are in the story requires a bit of concentration, though maybe that's appropriate, given the subject matter. Paul Giamatti is fantastic as usual. I wish Clancy Brown had been given more to do (actually that's true of Therese; her character is fun for the little we see of her, but I think a little more variance from the two White Dudes would have been good). 

Coscarelli's films don't tend to be the most accessible in the world, but I always find them a lot of fun to watch. Also the effects here seem largely practical, and that always goes a long way to keeping me in the movie. 

My Grade: B-
Rewatch Value: Medium

Next up: Near Dark

Misspent Youth: The Tangle Finale

Last night we finished out our game of Misspent Youth that we started waaaaay back...oh, hang on, it was just back in March?

Yeah, at six episodes, this is the fastest we've ever gone through a campaign (though actually Celestial Bureaucracy only went seven and Nation of Christ, which I'm not linking, go searching if you care, went nine, so it's really about standard). That's not a bad thing, of course, it just speaks to how people chose to approach their Convictions. I will say that there were far fewer scenes losses than I've seen in previous games, meaning the decision to sell out didn't come up as much, so I think that kinda trained people to sell out when they could. 

Anyway, this remains one of my favorite RPGs. Into the mushroomosphere!

Our Authority Figures:

• The Hounds, the immense fungus-creatures that we met last session
• The Underground Network, the connected mycelium that makes up the heart of the Tangle
• The Other Caretaker, the YOs killed one of the Tendrils controlling the Hounds last time, but there's still another
• Chad, the kind of dick from the characters' school we met back here, now heavily infected

Our Friendship Questions:

• Sandy asks Sparky: "Do you ever think of just leaving?" Answer: "No, you don't leave your team."
• Sparky asks Quinn: "Do you think those creatures were faster than the van?" Answer: "I mean, we got away, so no, but they were fast."
• Quinn asks Tate: "After all that's happened, is your heart still in this? Are you scared?" Answer: "I'm not scared, I'm mad...but I don't know if it's useful-mad."
• Tate asks Sandy: "How are you doing with watching my not-mom burn?" Answer: "It wasn't your mom, it was just a bunch of fungus."
  

Scene One: What's Up

Sparky's player set this up and chose Quinn's question to Tate: "After all that's happened, is your heart still in this? Are you scared?" Answer: "I'm not scared, I'm mad...but I don't know if it's useful-mad"

We pick up exactly where last session left off, standing around the embers of the fire on which they burned the fungus-creature mimicking Tate's mom. Tate's actual mom is still inside, so Tate goes to check on her. She's a little shell-shocked, and Tate talks her down a little and then says they need to go, so she goes to pack a bag.

Outside, Sparky asks what they should do next, and asks Sandy about finding more ingredients for Tonic. Sandy snaps a little, but then calms herself and says that she's not even sure what parts of the woods are safe anymore - maybe they could find some more chemical methods of making Tonic? They decide to get in the car and head to the Resistance HQ to drop Charlotte (Tate's mom) off. 

As Tate and Charlotte are walking to the car, the YOs notice a soft, snowflake-like thing falling from the sky. Where it alights on someone's hand, the skin goes number, and then they realize that these things are fall en masse. They all start to feel sleepy, so they pile into the car and Charlotte starts driving them to the HQ. 

As they're driving out there, they see people on the street collapsing into slumber, and realize that this stuff is causing the "Torpor Timeout" that the Tangle uses to put unruly people away for a while. Charlotte starts to doze off a little, and tries to put down her window to wake up a little. Sandy stands up and puts the window back up, explaining in detail why that's a bad idea (Pedantic) but Charlotte is still dozy, so Tate stands up...and loses. 

Tate grabs the wheel to try and keep the car under control, but wrenches it too hard and the car spins out and rolls. It comes to a rest in a ditch. 

And here's out Kickoff: The Tangle is putting everyone in Timeout.

Scene Two: Fighting Back

Quinn's player set this up, and chose the Hounds. 

The YOs pull themselves out of the wrecked car and help Charlotte out - she's unconscious and they can't tell if it's from the crash or the Torpor Timeout. As they're getting their bearings, they hear a noise in the background...they figure they'd better get moving.

Fortunately there are lots of unused cars around, so Quinn gets to work on stealing one. She stands up (Untrustworthy), smashes the window on an older car, and gets to work trying to hotwire it. The cliques hears the thump-thumping of one of the Hounds getting closer...but then Tate stands up and wins on Quinn's Conviction, checks behind the sun visor, and finds the keys ("wow, people really do this? How stupid"). The clique loads Charlotte into the car and heads off to the HQ. 

Our First Beat is a Catastrophe: The Torpor Timeout in spread. 

The Question is: Can the clique stay awake? 

Scene Three: Heating Up

Tate's player set this one up and chose Sparky's question to Quinn: "Do you think those creatures were faster than the van?" Answer: "I mean, we got away, so no, but they were fast."

The clique is driving down the road as fast as this car will go, but as they watch they see a hippo-sized fungal quadruped - the Hound - chasing them (we pretty much launched right into the Struggle in this scene). Sparky stands up and, realizing this car belongs to one of his coaches, finds a sack of baseballs in the back and hurls them at the creature (Fast). The balls knock chunks of fungus off the creature, but it keeps coming. Quinn stands up and drives Relentlessly, taking a corner and skidding, but the creature crashes through the windows of a coffee shop to keep up the chase.

Tate stands up and, the erratic driving and the repeated sips of Tonic too much for him, barfs out the window at the thing (Perverse). The barf strikes the Hound and, as it's largely Tonic, eats away at its head! The head falls off...but it keeps coming, and its chest opens into a huge, mushroomy maw. 

Sandy figures maybe they can burn it, even just enough to drive it off, by reflecting the sunlight with a mirror, so she breaks off the side-view mirror and reflects the light back (Sun-Lover). The creature smolders a little but doesn't stop. Quinn stands up and loses...and decides she's had enough.

She stomps the break and screeches to a halt, gets out, grabbing a bat, and douses it in Tonic. When the creature runs up, she beats it until it falls apart, the other YOs watching in horror as she brutally and methodically whacks it until it all stops moving. Having sold out Tough to Vicious, she gets back in the car and they get on their way. 

Scene Four: We Won

I set this up, and chose Tate's question to Sandy: “How are you coping with burning my not-mom?” “She wasn’t your mom, she was just a bunch of fungus.”

The clique arrives at the HQ, but right away something is wrong. The whole building is covered with a thin, almost spider-web like coating of mycelia. The splash a little Tonic on the front door to open a path, and inside they find everyone...asleep. 

The Torpor Timeout spores got in here, but how? There's a filtration system. Sandy stands up and uses his skills as a Scavenger to find out; there's a man crumpled under one of the filter slots, with a clean filter and a dirty filter next to him (he was changing the filter and that's when they stuff got in). Tate stands up and wins on Scavenger, and looks around until he finds the blueprints that Quinn's dad was using. Using that as reference they get the filters working away, and people slowly, groggily, start waking up. 

Scene Five: We're Fucked

Sandy's player set this up, and chose Chad (now heavily infected). As everyone is waking back up and figuring out what happened, Sparky gets a text from Chad, calling the YOs out and making fun of them. Sparky tries to answer somewhat politely, but Tate grabs his phone and answers Chad in kind, saying that if he wants to have this out, they're down! They tell him to be at the bleachers, and then start to tool up.

They grab Tonic and a supersoaker, of course, but Quinn's dad also provides a brush-burner. They raid a liquor store (since the people inside are asleep) and steal some grain alcohol (Sparky marvels at how Quinn knows what to take). And then they head for the bleachers.

Right away they can see something is wrong, because they can't see through the bleachers. The entire space underneath them is taken up with ropes and webs of fungus, and there are people wrapped up like they've been caught by spiders - some of them are Sparky's teammates, some are folks the clique knows from around town (Tate recognizes his mailman, Dylan). Chad, for his part, is standing on the ground but half merged with the fungus, and tells the clique how immensely cool this is - you feel so strong and connected!

Sparky stands up and tries to talk Chad down (Trusted), but Chad steps forward a little and sends out little tendrils toward him. Tate stands up and yells at Chad, telling him how lame he looks and how they've managed to beat the Tangle every step (Arrogant). Chad laughs and laughs a softball-sized puffball at Tate's face; it misses and goes paff on the ground behind him. Sandy stands up and loses...and sells out her last Conviction, changing Sun-Lover to Firestarter. 

She hurls a Molotov into the bleachers, heedless of what that means for the people there. The fungus burns, and the people in the bleachers drop to the ground - there are some broken bones, but everyone lives. Except Chad, of course, who burns alive.

Our Second Beat, then is a Reversal: The clique takes down Chad. The answer to the Question is yes, the clique is very much awake.

Scene Six: Who Wins?

Sparky sets this up and chooses the Underground Network. 

As the fires starts to die out and the YOs start working on getting people mobile (Dylan says his mail truck is parked nearby), the streetlights flicker and the PA system crackles to life. "You've become such a bother," says a hollow, inhuman voice. The ground starts to ripple, and little mushrooms start erupting. The Tangle itself seems to be talking to them.

Sandy stands up and lets her own Cloying scent suffuse her, leading her towards the school building. Quinn runs for the parking lot, but slips as fungus pulls at her feet. Tate stands up and once again berates the Tangle (Arrogant), telling that they, a group of four kids, having been holding their own and fighting back. 

"Didn't there used to be five of you?" says the Tangle. Oof.

Quinn stands up and loses...but no way that's happening. She sells out Outrage to Wrathful and, following Sandy, sees that she's walking towards the window to the principal's office. Inside, the room is covered with blue slime mold, and sometimes it moves...sometimes it thinks, and they can feel it. Almost taste it.

Quinn doesn't wait or think. She throws a Molotov into the room and burns the Tangle's brain. The fire quickly spreads to the school building, but the damage is done - all over town, Tendrils collapse but people who are still human spit out spores and reclaim their agency. The clique has won the episode - and the campaign!

Scene Seven: Dust Settles

Quinn's player set this up and chose Sandy's question to Sparky: "Do you ever think of just leaving?" Answer: "No, you don't leave your team."

The clique is driving back into town to get to the HQ. They see that Tendrils in town have burst, spreading fungus up walls and onto the ground (they note with disgust that Perry's body did something similar). But as they pass Tate's dad's restaurant, Tate sees something - someone in the window, moving as though they're fighting something. 

Tate has Quinn stop and runs in, and finds his dad thrashing around trying to expel the spores in his body. Blue gunk is leaking from his mouth; it seems like whatever remains of the slime mold is here! Tate stands up and pours Tonic into his mouth, trying to encourage him to barf up whatever is fighting him (Family Ties), and Sandy stands up and wins on that Conviction. She, too, helps turn him over and expel the gunk, and he flops against the wall, panting, and pulls Tate down into a hug. 

Aftermath

The YOs have destroyed the Tangle, and over the next few days they find that the Tangle had largely cut their town off, but it hadn't spread far. This was just ground zero for its attack, and they managed to stop it before it got out of hand. The Tangle isn't entirely dead (it's far too hard to kill off every single part of the organism), but now that people know what to look for they can burn the slime mold when it shows up. The clique has defeated the Authority and taken back the world. 

The YOs, themselves, go on in their own lives. Sandy doesn't go back to school. Her free, natural way of living has been hit too hard. She becomes something of a hermit, and starts a power-wash company down the line, never quite trusting people or the natural world again. 

Quinn does go back to school, but things don't go well. She starts her own gang and over time engages in various sorts of criminal activities, stealing cars, breaking stuff, and so on. She does have twins at some point, but eventually she winds up in prison. 

Sparky is offered a baseball scholarship at a prestigious school...but turns it down to go to community college. He eventually becomes a teacher and and a baseball coach, and one spring day sees him trying, in vain, to work with a set of twins (one of whom bonks him with a ball). 

Tate starts working in the restaurant after school, and eventually goes to culinary school. He and his family spend a year in France as he learns the craft, and down the line he takes over for his father, running the restaurant. He also goes to therapy to work on managing his anger, until down the road he's only prone to the same outbursts as any other chef. 

And the restaurant does not serve mushrooms of any kind. Just in case.

FIN

Character Creation: League of Seekers

If I heard this title in a vacuum, I'd think it was a pulpy adventure game in the vein of, well, Adventure! or Temples & Tombs or something. Actually, in a vacuum I wouldn't hear anything at all, but you know what I mean.

The Game: League of Seekers
The Publisher: FeralGamersInc? Broken Rat Games? 
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

This game Kickstarted in 2018, it was apparently on DriveThruRPG at one point because it's in my library there, but it's not available for sale anywhere I can see on a cursory glance. And like...yeah, I can kinda see why. 

It reminds me a lot of Dark Aeons, another thoroughly mediocre Lovecraft-inspired game. There are some kernels of interesting stuff, but for the most part it's not doing anything new, and holy hell does this book need an editor. Lots of sentence fragments, misuse of "effect" vs. "affect", and Strong Bad seriously needs to sing the author his Rhythm & Grammar song about "its" vs. "it's." Interestingly, there is no credited editor. 

But never mind that. The game starts out with a timeline that takes us from AD 730 all the way to AD 1765. I think what we're going for here is something like Unhallowed Metropolis where the supernatural has basically taken over, the history talks about "spheres" opening, but it's never quite clear what those mean. Actually if I wasn't as familiar as I am with Lovecraft (and I'm by no means an expert), a lot of that chapter might miss me. 

So we're playing characters who are "Called" or "Awakened" or "Spunky", I forget what the title actually is, and we're working to help protect people from bad shit. And that's not the only way it's like Chill (which is not mentioned in its list of inspirations, and I find that very suspect) - the game system is roll d%, shoot for lower, graduated success based on how much below your stat you roll.

There's some cool-looking artwork in the book, anyway. Cover's pretty dope. Not sure if having "I'll kill you" in funky letters at the bottom of the cover is really in-tone, but whatever. Let's make a character! 

I got all excited because I saw "life paths", but although you could call this chargen system a "life path" system, it's pretty anemic. Better than nothing, though, and it means I don't have to figure out a concept before starting. 

So first we roll to see if we're a peasant, middle class, or noble. Got an 80% chance of peasant, but let's try it...hey, 95! I'm middle class! I could also be a member of the secretive Akhua sect, but it sounds too much like "Hawk Tuah" for me (I'm kidding, I just don't want to bother with the weird shit today). 

I'll note this stuff down later, I know better than to write anything on a character sheet in a lifepath system until things firm up a little. 

My Dark Knowledge starts at 1d6%, whatever that means. Hey, rolled a 6, that's as much I could know!

I get "Logical" as a Trait, and then I can pick Educated, Respected, or Fencer as a Talent. Hell, let's take Fencer. 

Now we roll for a few things:

Birthplace: Town. (As opposed to a city.) I get Commerce 10, Travel 10, Eloquence 1, Fitness 1. 

Education: Church School! That's an interesting combination with Fencer. I get Arcane 1 and Dark Knowledge d6%...hang on, 5, putting me up to 11, meaning I get a point of Insight (again, whatever that means). 

Early Career: Officer. Well, that makes more sense with Fencer. I get Melee, Toughness, and Sneak 10.

Now we do a Tale of Horror! The way this works is that I get a writing prompt, and I take it an run. I can use it to justify a 5% bump to three Skills, but every one after the first also requires a 5% penalty to a Skill (all justified by the Tale). 

Rolling, my prompt is: "As the moon turned red my own men began to change before my eyes...". 

Well, this implies that we were out on campaign or something. Let's say that I was in command of a platoon or whatever, and I'd sent out scouts the day before to find supplies. They found a small lake that contained what seemed to be clean water, so the men camped by it and drank (I and the other officers stuck to our wine, thanks). The lake, it turns out, was connected to...something. The water changed them, they grew...parts that weren't human or even mammalian. The other officers went mad or were swarmed and killed, but I got on my horse and got the hell out. 

So what Skills are implied by this? I think Travel (which covers horse riding), Stealth (because I got away), and Willpower (because I got away and didn't go crazy) all make sense. I need two penalized Skills, though. Let's say Memory (much of his brainspace at any given time is taken up by what he saw) and Diplomacy (talking to people just doesn't come naturally anymore). 

I get a Statement, which just gives me a bonus in a particular situation. Let's say that "I am well-traveled," which gives me a +10% when "recognising other cultures." I don't think "recognize" is the verb you want here, friend. "Oh, look! That culture is German!" Well, whatever, what's next.

Derived traits! Well, guess I should total my Attributes n' shit. Eloquence, Investigate, and Learned start at 4, Fitness, Subterfuge, and Occult at 3, and Conflict and Mind at 2. I get +1 Eloquence and Fitness 'cause I'm from a town, Arcane 1 from my schoolin'. 

Skill Totals: I...huh. I guess how this works is that, for example, for Eloquence, Learned, and Investigate, I get scores of 20, 20, 30, 40, and 50 that I can put into the Skills. There are 5 Skills linked to each Attribute, so presumably I get that spread in each of those categories? This is never explained, and there's no summary or example of chargen. 

Ugh, fine, that means I have to do this for nine different Attributes. Let's start with Conflict (skipping Arcane because evidently I don't get anything in those Skills). I get 5, 5, 10, 20, 30, which is pathetic, but whatevs. I'll put my 30 into Melee, obviously, since I can fence. I'll put the 20 into Ranged, the 10 into Explosives, and 5 into Thrown and Unarmed. I also get a +10 to Melee, so that's 40. 

Eloquence, I get 20, 20, 30, 40, 50, with a -5 in Diplomacy. I'll put my 50 into Etiquette, my 40 into Diplomacy (making it 35), my 30 into Languages, that leaves 20 in Commerce and Deceive. 

Fitness! 10, 10, 20, 30, 40, with a +5 in Travel and a +10 in Toughness. I'll put my 40 in Travel (45), my 30 in Toughness (40), my 30 in Resistance, that leaves 20 in Acrobatics and Athletics. 

Investigate! 20, 20, 30, 40, 50, let's put 50 into Notice, 40 into Search, 30 into Research, 20s in Track and Detect (side note: Detect, Notice, and Search are all discrete skills? Just...why?). 

Learned! 20, 20, 30, 40, 50. Well, 50 into History, 40 into Academia, 30 into Theology, 20s in Mythology and Medical. 

Mind! 5, 5, 10, 20, 30, with a -5 to Memory and a +5 to Willpower. 30 into Cunning, 20 into Willpower (25), 10 into Memory (5), leaving 5 in Dream and Logic.

Occult! 10, 10, 20, 30, 40, why on Earth is this higher than Mind for a Middle Class person? Was "middle class" even a thing in the 18th century? Anyway, 40 into Demonology, 30 into Folk Tales, 20 into Cults, leaving 10 in Divination and Xenology. 

Subterfuge! 10, 10, 20, 30, 40, with a +10 in Sneak and a +5 in Stealth. What on Earth is the difference between Sneak and Stealth? Oh, there isn't actually a Sneak Skill. Probably it was called that at some point and just never changed, must actually mean Stealth, which means I get +15 there. Cool. 40 into Stnealthk (55, making it by far my best Skill), 30 into Tinker, 20 into Forgery, 10s in Disguise and Steal. 

I get a d4 as my experience die and...OK. Every time I get a critical success or failure, I can roll my XP die and bump the Skill by that much. I actually kinda like that. But the die size is based on Mind + Learned. This means that bookworms are better at improving everything, including, say, combat Skills, and who gets a crit isn't meaningfully different, because you get a crit fail by rolling 99 or 00, and a crit success by rolling under the Attribute linked to the Skill you were using (so at best a 5% chance). 

Anyway, my Damage Bonus is also a d4, my Insanity is 12...wait, do you mean Sanity? 'Cause there's no Insanity Trait on the sheet. Whatever. Reason is "the first number of Willpower" JESUS CHRIST DO YOU MEAN THE TENS DIGIT? Ahem. That's 2 for me. Injury is the "first number" of Toughness (4), Wounds are 12 (but that's true for everyone), and Insight is 0 but 1 for me because I have Dark Knowlege (wwooOOOOooooo). 

Now I get a superpower! I'm Awakened, so I get something quasi magical. It's random, so...03 gives me Corpse Tongue, which keys off of Mind. Great, my lowest Attribute. That means I have to roll under 20 to use it. What's it let me do, anyway? Communicate with corpses and ask basic questions. Well, that's not the worst thing I could have rolled; my guy did see a lot of death. 

Oh, Languages. My Learned is 4, so I speak two, obviously English and French (and I probably should read Latin, too, but there's no way to simulate that and I do not care that much). 

OK, so: Jonathan Nelmes attended church school but didn't really have the temperament to be a vicar. He wound up enlisting and becoming an officer through a combination of luck, cleverness, and fencing skill, and when he was finally given his first squad (I'd figure out what war or campaign he was in if I cared, but a) the history of this world is a little screwy because of the monsters and b) I don't) that's when the "everyone's a bug" thing happened. 

Jonathan used to be very put together and clean-cut. He's...rather let himself go. Scraggly hair, uneven beard, dirty hands, he still wears his uniform but it's dirty beyond recognition. Somewhere in here he discovered he can (unreliably) talk to corpses, and that hasn't helped the old mental state any. 

Right, good, done, not a fan of this one. Also there's no reason this sheet couldn't have been a single page.

Character Creation: Midnight of the Century

Cheer up. The world's about to end in ten minutes anyway.

The Game: Midnight of the Century
The Publisher: By Odin's Beard RPG
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Midnight of the Century is a game I wanted to like more than I do. I do like it, mind - it's an investigative horror game that actually does do something different than Chill. It's designed to emulate the dark investigation stories of the 90s, stuff like Millennium, Se7en, Silence of the Lambs, and so on. You're playing Investigators who are tracking down serial killers, but there is also a "you're part of a shadowy conspiracy" and a "by the way, the world is ending" component to the game. Setting-wise, there's almost nothing about it I dislike. 

System...eh. I mean, I think it's probably fine. It's OSR-inspired, but not actually OSR, so it's not like...what the hell was that weird game that the author gave up on? John Silence. Anyway, the stats aren't the standard D&D ones, so the creators obviously put more thought into it than "iunno, rulings not rules". I think I would like it better if it were something like Gumshoe or Forged in the Dark, but that's a personal preference thing. 

The thing that I get hung up on is that the book says it works best with one or two players plus a GM. I...never have only two players. If I do, I cancel the game and do something else. Four is my sweet spot, three is OK with the right game (I ran a whole Slipstream campaign with three players, but it definitely changed the calculus of designing encounters), two or one feels weird to me. And I like this setup of this game so much, I'm sure I could probably figure out making it work with more players.

For now, however, let's make an Investigator, which is like an alligator, only investi. 

I actually do have something of a concept, here; it's a character I've had in my brain for a while but never had the right game for it (and frankly probably isn't a character I'd actually play unless everyone at the table was super cool with it). My idea is someone who was a serial killer, but then had a brain tumor removed from his head and became "cured." It sounds like something that would have happened on Criminal Minds, and in a setting where demons exist, I can also see doing a kind of Malignant thing with it and having the tumor actually be a demon or something. My character doesn't need to know anything about demons, of course, just that he used to have these urges, he acted on them a couple of times, got caught, did time in prison, was diagnosed with brain cancer, and had a lot of sciencey people (from the Ouroboro corporation, in setting) poking at him and theorizing that the tumor fucking up his ability to feel...much of anything, but certainly empathy was responsible. And then he had brain surgery, and wound up being able to remember what he did but to appreciate it like a non-psychopath. 

So after his second suicide attempt, he wound up reading in the papers about an active killer in the Pacific Northwest (where this game is set by default) and contacting someone he'd met from Ouroboro with some insight. Ouroboro pulled some strings and got him released to their custody, but he's basically on permanent house arrest. He's enthusiastic about the work (tracking down killers), partially because he's got skin in the game in a way a lot of other investigators don't, but also because he expects - wants - for one of these bastards to kill him someday. 

There, that's appropriately bleak. There's a table with random names in this book, so let's use it! Rolling a d100 twice, I get...42 and 42. Huh, what are the odds. (1 in a 100, Matt.) Anyway, that gives me "Gregory Howard" as a name, which is fine by me.

My age is 30+4d6...a roll of 15 means I'm 45. Let's say he was in prison for the last 10 years, so he was killing in his early 30s. 

Traits! These are game stats (that's next), these are physical and personality traits. I'll roll them randomly, but I reserve the right countermand anything stupid. 

Physique: Lean. That's fine.

Face: Bony. Aside from rolling two 1s in a row, that's fine too.

Skin: Scarred. Obviously I didn't make it out of prison unscathed, which makes sense.

Eyes: Shining. I...huh? I don't think that tracks. I choose to pretend I roll a 7 instead, giving me "searching" eyes.

Hair: Matted. Sure, that's fine. 

Speech: Blunt. Yeah, that's good. Greg isn't interested in playing around. He knows what other people think of him, they're right, he is a monster, so what if he doesn't have the urge to do monstrous things anymore. 

Virtue/Vice: Cautious/Aggressive. First of all, those don't work for Greg, and second, they're almost antonyms. Let's try again. Ambitious/Cold. I'm OK with "cold," but "ambitious" doesn't work for me. Let's take "upbeat," just because it's such a juxtaposition. Greg is jovial and dry, but that's part defense mechanism for himself and partly for others. If he's never serious, if his humor is kinda gallows, then other people can hate him and that's just easier. 

Clothing/style: We've got an 80% chance of being "corporate" here, and...look at that, I roll within that margin. Eh, Ouroboro probably dresses me anyway. 

Stats! Body, Mind, Will, roll 3d6 in order and then swap any two. This gives me: Body 14, Mind 10, Will 15. Well, I'm gonna swap Body and Mind.

Specialism! Class, more or less. I want Greg to be a Profiler, his insight is valuable because he can think like a killer. That gives me +2 Mind.

Psych profile! More random tables, but I'm probably gonna pick these. But let's see. 

How did you become a profiler? Yeah, "cancer-induced serial killer" isn't on the random table. Why did you leave the agency? Oh, right, this assumes profilers are LEOs. OK, I'm going to skip these questions because they don't apply. 

Bonds! I get three, again rolled randomly, and this time I think it's fine to do so. My Connection Bond is...a lover. Oh, hell. Yeah, I'm OK with that. Her name is Kelly Martel (another random name). Kelly is one of those serial killer groupies who wound up tracking Greg down after his "release" and making contact, and she is literally the one person Greg ever lets his guard down to. My Haven is...a tattoo shop! Yeah, Greg has some prison tats (some of them given against his will) and he's gone into Gone Baby Gone Tattoo (owner's a big Violent Femmes fan) a bunch to get them covered up. And, finally, Vehicle...hatchback. Yeah, that's fine.

Equipment is just common sense plus the stuff my specialism gets me, which is...a picture of Kelly, some painkillers, and some latex gloves. And then I get a pager, a notebook and a pen, and a flashlight. I think I'm also required to check in with Ouroboro every day. 

And that's it! Greg is a white guy in his mid-40s, a bunch of tats on his arms and scars on his face. He's lean because he doesn't eat much, his hair is matted because there's a bunch of scar tissue on his scalp and his hair grows in weird. 

I think, again, that provided the other players are cool with it, Greg would be an interesting character study in silly things like "forgiving yourself" and whether it's possible to atone for doing something terrible. 

Movie #969: Alvin & The Chipmunks: The Squeakquel

Alvin & The Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, in case the clever wordplay goes over your head, is the second (OF THREE) sequels to Alvin & the Chipmunks. Obviously. It stars Justin Long, Matthew Gray Gubler, Jesse McCartney, Jason Lee, David Cross, Amy Poehler, Christina Applegate, Anna Faris, Wendie Malick, and Zachary Levi. 

We pick up with the titular Chipmunks, Alvin (Long), Simon (Gubler), and Theodore (McCartney) doing their schtick where they sing pop songs in squeaky voices, when their manager/adopted father falls victim to a cartoonish injury and winds up in traction in France (if this had happened in the US, it wouldn't have worked because the US health care system would have discharged him the same day). Anyway, the Chipmunks are sent to stay with their friendly Aunt Jackie (Kathryn Joosten), but she almost immediately falls victim to a similar accident and this leaves the boys in the care of their slacker cousin Toby (a pre-Shazam Levi). 

Part of Dave's instructions was for them to have a normal childhood, so they're getting sent to school. This turns out to be high school, which was jarring because before this I realized I had no context for how old these mutant rodents were supposed to be. I mean, they're all "sassy" and talk like teenagers, or rather, they talk like how a middle-aged screenwriter thinks a teenager in 2009 might talk ("oh, it's on like Donkey Kong!" "Right back atcha!" "I can't hear you over [whatever]". Stuff like that). Anyway, they go to high school, where they are immediately beset by bullies who try to kill them (what is this, the 80s?) and the principal (Malick), who happens to be a Chipmunks superfan, tells them they have to represent the school in a music festival because if they win, the prize money will pay for the school's flagging music program!

So we've got like six different cartoon plots already, but we're not done! The evil former music exec Ian Hawke (Cross), living like a mad hobo in the basement of the record company building, gets a FedEx package with the Chipettes, the female versions of the Chipmunks. Like, literally, we've got the sassy one, Brittany (Applegate), the one with glasses, Jeanette (Faris), and the fat/loveable one, Eleanor (Poehler). And sure, let's talk about this here.

The Chipettes are literally just girl versions of their respective Chipmunks, just a little less-than. Brittany is a less-assholish Alvin, Jeanette is a less-smart Simon, and Eleanor is...well, Eleanor is about the same as Theodore. Less cowardly, maybe. They get almost no characterization. I'm not saying the Chipmunks are fleshed-out characters, but they at least all have a little personality. I was there in the 80s when the girl-versions of characters appeared, I know this song. 

Anyway, the plot is stitched together from multiple cliches. We've got Alvin joining the jocks and blowing off his family, the Chipettes vs. the Chipmunks as they're manipulated by Hawke, and Toby learning to come out of his shell and talk to his high school crush, Julie (Anjelah Johnson, utterly wasted in this role). If you've been awake for the last 20 years, you know every beat before it happens, and for those of us in Gen X who watched the cartoon, there's a palpable sense of déjà vu. Anyway, it ends up with both groups performing together (obviously) and the Chipettes moving in with the Chipmunks (obviously). 

I just...I think my biggest problem here is that I don't get the appeal. I mean, the Chipmunks have always had the same gimmick (again, pop songs in a squeaky voice) but the 80s cartoon had the benefit of cartoony adventures n' shit. This is that schtick with cliché plots, hackneyed dialog, and some truly mediocre CGI. And there's a cameo from a...sewer gopher? that the movie clearly thought I should recognize. I had to look him up; it's a thing called Digger (Dave Bauza), who was a mascot for NASCAR on Fox until the head of Fox Sports apologized for him. 

People talk about Marvel movies being soulless corporate affairs, but to me, this is the kind of thing that makes me want to make movies made in the 70s. It's real bad...

...but it's somehow better than the first one. I don't mean it's good, I hasten to add. It's like how stubbing your toe is better than getting kicked in the balls. I don't want either one, neither one is fun or good, but if I have to experience one or the other, I'll pick the one that has a timely reference to another, better movie (that'd be Alvin - remember, voiced by Justin Long - reminding us during a dodgeball game of the five Ds of dodgeball). 

Wish I could've dodged this movie! HAHAHAHAHAHAi'mgonnakillyoutoasty

My Grade: D
Rewatch Value: IINSIAIFWT

Next up: John Dies at the End (for reals this time!)