Blog Archives

Tolkien (Pillarist): There is little doubt that, among the vast—if posthumously published—corpus of J.R.R. Tolkien, The Children of Hurin stands out as his darkest and most openly tragic work. It is a tale of doom set against the prince and princess of the House of Hador, and worse still, the great tragedies they are entrapped […]

James Bond (Hollywood in Toto): John Glen’s “The Living Daylights” (1987) was Dalton’s first vehicle as Bond, after Roger Moore stepped away from the unliked but wildly popular “A View to a Kill” (1985) and series icon Sean Connery had embarked on the enormously successful third act of his long film career. Dalton was a […]

Firearms (Tactical Life): The M9 service handgun, the U.S. military’s version of the 9mm Beretta 92FS, has been in continuous service with the military since 1985. For several years there has been plenty of programmed concern in picking its replacement. Over a decade ago was the Future Handgun System (FHS), which merged with the U.S. […]

Sword & Sorcery (Cobalt Jade): Without dispute, pulp author Robert E. Howard invented the fantasy character trope of The Barbarian Hero, specifically with his creation Conan. But the roots were laid before that in the Tarzan tales of Edgar Rice Burroughs and Rudyard Kipling’s Mowgli. Both pitted a stoic, nature-wise man (or boy) of the wilds […]

Reading (Monster Hunter Nation): Conversations with friends: why men need to read more novels. I agree with this title. More people need to read novels. That’s how I get paid. Never mind the so-called demise of the male novelist, where are all the male readers? Ash Sarkar on why we all miss out when half […]

Comic Books (Bleeding Cool): It was a note to a fan page on Facebook that did it, with a well-connected fan pointing to an upcoming Conan cover by Esad Ribic as his last, as Marvel no longer own the rights to the character. So, at Lake Como Comic Art Festival, I did a little digging. […]

Cinema (Wert Zone): The live-action movie adaptation of the Robotech animated series sounds like it’s getting back on track again, with a new director lined up to helm the project. Rhys Thomas, who recently helmed the Hawkeye TV show for Disney+, is now in line to take on the project. Genre Fiction (John C. Wright): We […]

Tolkien (Tellers of Weird Tales): In 1968, husband-and-wife writing team Denis and Charlotte Plimmer interviewed J.R.R. Tolkien. From that interview, they drew an article entitled “The Man Who Understands Hobbits,” published in The Daily Telegraph Magazine on March 22, 1968, pages 31ff. The article was reprinted in Weekend Magazine on August 31, 1968, for distribution […]

RPG (Walker’s Retreat): Games are created from distinct parts and histories that merge together to form a new set of rules for the gamers to conquer. A game is defined by its rules which the players work with in order to beat. In essence, you should only need one rulebook or instruction manual to understand […]

RPG (Walker’s Retreat): Throughout all of this talk of the True Campaign Model, I’ve consistently identified Pendragon as an outlier. The reason is simple: Pendragon offers a complete and concise alternative campaign model. You play through the entire timeline of Arthurian Mythos–The Great Pendragon Campaign–which lasts about 80 years or so. During this time you […]

Comic Books (Screen Rant): Marvel Comics has changed the digital version of art from King Conan #2 following criticism over a controversial portrayal of a character with a name related to the Native American historical figure, Pocahontas. Last month, Marvel and writer Jason Aaron and artist Mahmud Asrar were heavily criticized for naming an oversexualized […]