Pop! Sharknado

Funko has a army of vinyl figures on store shelves right now and it doesn’t look like they are going to stop any time soon.  The group has covered comics, Disney, Star Wars, wrestling, television shows, and horror movies.  There are solicits for new figures all the time and I usually don’t mention them unless they really stand out to me.  Well in June Funko is releasing a Sharknado.  A tiny shark suspended in a tornado that you can place on your desk or shelf.  It’s adorable.  I might need it.  I probably need it.

It’s good timing of course, because Syfy will be debuting the Sharknado sequel this summer; the amazingly named “Sharknado 2: The Second One”.  Just as everyone is talking about the movie the vinyl figure will be showing up on store shelves.  It’s almost like they planned it that way.  I still think Sharktopus is superior to Sharknado, so I hope that Funko one day sees things my way and gives us Pop! Sharktopus.   

Flash Friday: Sticker Scandal

Happy Flash Friday everyone!  I’ve been pretty behind on updates lately and I want to apologize for that.  Life has a way of throwing personal and work issues at you sometimes and I’m just trying to keep my head above water.  Today is possibly the strangest topic we’ve ever had for Flash Friday and quite frankly I’m still trying to wrap my head around it. 

To start with we have to go back to a Flash Friday I made back in March of 2011.  As I was reading the current Flash book at the time I had noticed how often coffee was brought up in the story.  Iris’ text boxes were even notated with a tiny coffee cup.  Because I thought it would be funny, I jumped into Gimp (the art program not the sex slave) and modified a Starbucks logo so it read Flash Coffee.  I joked that it was a million dollar idea and that DC should run with it.

Yesterday morning I pull up speedforce.org because it is an amazing Flash site.  In Kelson’s Instagram feed I see the Flash Coffee logo.  I wonder to myself why he linked to that after all this time and click on the link.  The picture’s caption read, “Flash coffee sticker #WonderCon #theflash #coffee”. I quickly jumped back to my site to make sure I hadn’t gone insane.  I had been ripped off.

Except I don’t own the Flash logo.  And it wasn’t done by some huge company; it was a guy at a convention that sold vinyl stickers.  It’s also possible that someone else had the exact same idea that I did.  The use of the all black Flash symbol makes me think my image was used for the sticker but I’d never be able to prove it.  I’m oddly conflicted about the whole thing.  I did something cool enough that someone wanted to steal it, but someone did steal my work.  It’s not like anyone is going to make a lot of money off Flash Coffee stickers either.  The vendor is probably lucky to break even on them.  I do wish they would have sent me a handful of them though, I was pretty happy with the design.

Dragon Age Inquisition

Thanks to the Dragon Age Facebook page we now have the cover of the new Dragon Age game.  The cover is gorgeous and does something that really impressed me.  Bioware likes to give its player’s choices, I’m not saying all of those choices actually mean anything, but they are there.  One of those choices is the sex of the game’s main character.  When Mass Effect 3 came out they had two covers; so players could show off a male or female Shephard. 

The new Dragon Age cover simply made it impossible to tell which gender the character is.  It’s a simple solution that works perfectly in this instance.  We still don’t have an actual date for the new Dragon Age’s release, but I’m sure as that date gets closer and closer I’ll be completely consumed by it like I have been with the other games.

Warhammer Quest: Free This Week

If you’re on an IOS device than you’ll want to check out the free App of the Week; it’s the Games Workshop branded Dungeon Crawler, Warhammer Quest.  I purchased this game almost a year ago and I’ve spent a lot of time putting down orks and goblins with bows and axes.  The core game gives you four characters to go adventuring with a human Marauder, wood elf Waywatcher, dwarf Ironbreaker, and a human grey Wizard.  Each character will gain new abilities as they level and pick up all sorts of different loot. 

 

I think it’s pretty important to point out that you don’t have to be familiar with Warhammer lore to enjoy the game.  Group of adventurers pick up quests, kill bad things, and get new equipment is a pretty standard set up.  If you do know your way around Warhammer you’ll find the fluff around the game even more enjoyable.

There is also a lot of additional content available for purchase.  If you aren’t happy with your first four warriors you can pick up a high elf Archmage, human Brightmage, dwarf Trollslayer, high elf Shadow Warrior, ogre Irongut, human Warrior Priest, or a human Witch Hunter.  The new character run 3 dollars each.  There are two region packs that add new enemy types and open up new regions on the map.  Each of these are 5 dollars and add skaven and savage orks to the game.

There are a series of Legendary Weapons.  They each cost a dollar if you really want them.  Finally there are Dungeon Packs.  Each of these costs 3 dollars.  One pack adds Necromancers and skeletons, the second adds vampires and zombies, and the third adds vampire themed tilesets into the dungeon.  So you could easily drop more than 20 dollars on add-ons, but you don’t need to.  The core game is a great turn-based dungeon crawler.   I really recommended it to people before it was free, so if you haven’t downloaded it yet I highly recommend you do so.

Teemu Selanne

Yesterday was the last day of the NHL regular season.  The playoffs are just around the corner and I’m excited.  Just looking at the brackets it’s easy to see there are going to be some amazing games.  Even before the playoffs start we are already seeing big changes.  Martin Brodeur received a huge standing ovation in New Jersey Sunday after playing what might be his last game as a Devil; a team that he’s played on for 20 years.  We’ll have to wait till summer until we find out exactly what will happen there.

Then we have Teemu Selanne.  The Anaheim Duck Right Wing announced early this season that this would be his final season of his NHL career.  Now the Ducks are in the playoffs, they’ll be facing the Stars in the first round but Sunday was his last regular season game.  To show their love for Teemu he was named as all three stars in the game.  As he is making a victory lap he sees his former teammate Jean-Sebastien Giguere.  CBS Eye On Hockey has the video below.

Things like this are the reason I love hockey.  Sure it’s fast.  The hits and fights can be entertaining.  When you have players who play with one team for their entire career like Brodeur it just seems special.  When you have players from different teams being celebrated together because they were teammates in the past there is a level of respect that I haven’t seen anywhere else.   I love hockey, I love the playoffs.  I can’t wait to see what happens next.

Flash Friday: Car Emblems

Happy Flash Friday everyone!  I know it’s been a while since I’ve actually had two Flash Fridays in a row.  What’s even more mind blowing is that I should have one for next week too!  Today’s update is about car emblems.  I don’t mean stickers, but the plastic shapes and figures that people stick to the back of their car.  Things like the Jesus fish, Darwin fish, Spaghetti monster, etc…  There have been a bunch of DC themed car emblems recently released and it will surprise no one that most of them are Bat or Super related. 

They did manage to get a Flash into the line though.  Instead of the more common “running straight at you” pose that is used on a lot of Flash merchandise this one goes for a side view.  The emblem is about 4 inches long and close to 2.5 inches tall.  The costume is a pre-New 52 Barry which is actually a plus in my book.  I find it strange how often I’m still seeing pre-New 52 costumes used products.  There isn’t very much more I can say about these; the cost around 20 dollars and you stick them to your car.

I did also want to mention Aquaman’s addition to this line.  Not because I want to make fun of Aquaman, but because I thought it was funny they still included the water lines around him.  I’ve obviously been playing too much of the Marvel Lego game; the first thing I thought of when I saw him was the Human Torch.  I wonder how well it would hold up if you stuck it on a boat. 

Playoff Streak

There has been a lot of talk about streaks this past week with Brock Lesnar defeating the Undertaker.  Last night the Detroit Red Wings lost to the Pittsburgh Penguins in a shoot out.  Wings fans everywhere were celebrating the loss because that one point was all they needed to make the NHL playoffs.  This will be Detroit’s 23 consecutive year in the playoffs, the longest active streak in professional sports.  

Detroit managed to tie the game with only 1:10 remaining on the clock.  Overtime turned into a shoot out and the Penguins were given the win.  In the NHL a team that loses via shoot out is awarded 1 point.  That point was enough to clinch a Wild Card spot.  Columbus also won their game last night so they will be taking the East’s second Wild Card spot. 

It’s very likely that Detroit will be facing Pittsburgh in the first round of the playoffs, so this will probably be the last time Detroit fans are celebrating a loss to the Penguins.

Postmodern Jukebox is Going on Tour

Postmodern Jukebox is one of those things you’ve probably stumbled upon while browsing YouTube or had sent to you.  They take modern songs like “Thrift Shop” or “Royals” and re-imagine them in a different musical style.  Some of the songs are good; most of them are incredible.  In June the band is taking the show on the road.  Sadly this is only a six show tour, so if you’re like me the band might not be playing anywhere near you. 

The tour is taking the band to Montreal, Boston, New Haven, Providence, New York, and DC.  I wish it was a larger tour but you can’t blame them for taking it slow.  It has to be an intimidating leap to see how many YouTube views turn into concert viewers.  If you’ve spent the entirety of this update wonder just who I’m talking about, let me leave you with my absolutely favorite video they’ve done.

Baked Potato

That F’ing Monkey is not a great repository of Mr. Potato Head trivia and news.  Sure I had one as a kid but even then I don’t remember playing with it often.  I do remember walking around with his pipe and pretending I was smoking, so it isn’t surprising that he doesn’t come with that accessory anymore.  For the past couple of years they’ve really been trying to push Potato Head as a pop culture thing.  I believe it started with Darth Tater and then spilled over a bunch of different movie properties.

Coming in September are 3” vinyl potato heads.  These tiny taters are dressed to represent different things like surfers, race fans, and doctors.  It looks like they’re trying to capitalize on the niche the Smurfs filled in the 80s.   Oh, you like coffee so here is a coffee drinking smurf for your desk!  The initial solicits only show illustrations of the product so you can’t even see if the face pieces can be removed.  I’m sure I could do some research here and find that out for you, but I’m not really talking about these guys because I’m excited for them.  I’m talking about them because one of them is funny as all hell.

Among the rapper and the hippie they are releasing a Baked Potato.  Take a closer look at the picture above.  Those eyes.  That smile.  That potato is high as fuck.  Stoners everywhere are going to be buying the baked potato.  If I’m right, he could become pretty hard to find, maybe even a collector’s item if he gets pulled from the line. 

April 1st: Question Everything

It's April Fool's Day so expect tons of fake articles all over the internet.  ThinkGeek has made it a yearly tradition to post fake products.  Some of them are such good ideas that they eventually become real items.  I feel like they've taken the joke and turned it into a strange product testing.  They take some slightly humorous ideas and make a few mockups.  If the internet reacts then they can try to actually create the product.

I mean who doesn't want a giant Nerf rocket that launches Nerf darts? 

Or BMO?  Everybody wants BMO.

Just make that shit already Think Geek, you know everyone is going to want it.