Flash Friday: Lego Boomerang

Happy Flash Friday everyone!  This week there have been a few toy shows and the leaks from the Lego summer sets are coming fast and furious.  In fact the pictures I’m going to be talking about come from the website zusammengebaut.com.  There isn’t a lot of Flash news coming from these Lego sets.  We already know that a set with both Flash and Captain Cold mini-vehicles will be released in the upcoming Mighty Micros wave.  But these summer sets also revealed a new mini that Rogue collectors will surely want to add to their collection.

  

In the big set titled Killer Croc Sewer Smash we get the first Lego appearance of Captain Boomerang!  The set features a Bat tank of some sort and a rolling bear trap on wheels.  It’s a odd design to be sure.  The minifigures shine in this set though.  A big fig of Killer Croc, Katana, and Captain Boomerang.  Why do all those characters sound familiar?  It’s almost like Lego wanted to cash in on an upcoming movie without using a name that some might find questionable for a kid’s toy.  So yeah, this is the Suicide Squad set.

Sadly it is a big set.  So to add Boomer to your home lineup you either are picking up a big box or heading to resellers like eBay or Bricklink.  I know that’s the route I’ll be going.  He looks too good not to join my Captain Cold and Trickster.  I mean, look at his little hat!  I need that in my life.  I just don’t need a Batman tank, nor do I need the pieces I’d get from dismantling the Bat tank into spare parts, even if I do only work in black…and sometimes very, very dark gray.

Kickstarter: Greebo Games Un-Renaissance

At a recent event Games Workshop had fliers showing off four new molds for a new version of Blood Bowl with the announcement that the game is coming in 2017.  Obviously great news for fans, that still means the new core set is still over a year away.  And that’s just for Humans and Orks.  Thankfully companies like Greebo have been making “Fantasy Football” miniatures for years.  Their newest Kickstarter shows off all the skills they’ve acquired.  The characters may be dead, but the sculpts are beautiful.

The Kickstarter has a great variety of ghouls, skeletons, mummies, and werewolves available.  That means when picking your figures you could easily create an Undead, Khemri, or Necromantic Blood Bowl team.  The Kickstarter is already fully funded, so you don’t have to worry about pledging to something that has little or no chance to ever seeing production.  In addition to already hitting their goal the Greebo team has a nice set of Add-ons and Stretch Goals set up. 

If you’re in the market for a new Blood Bowl team this is honestly one of the best looking third party teams I’ve seen out there.  Check out the Kickstarter for yourself by clicking HERE.

First Comic Book

I’ve talked about the first comic I can remember liking, but I honestly can’t tell you what the first comic I’ve ever owned is.  I grew up in the era of spinner racks at the convenience store, so my first could have been any number of different things that would have made me happy.  I can without a doubt tell you what my son’s first comic book was though, because we just bought it this weekend.  Sure he had all sorts of kid’s books about superheroes, but he didn’t have an actual comic. 

The week before I had heard him ask for one.  Not in a store or anything.  I think something on television had mentioned them, but I heard him say, “Where’s my comic book?”  At that very second I knew what he and I were doing on Saturday.  I took him down to a local shop.  It wasn’t where I got my first comic, but it was as shop I’ve been going to since I was 8.  By complete chance the owner was there, the same man who helped me start my first comic pull file.  We chatted for a bit and then headed off to the kid’s shelf where my son found Scooby Doo.

Not only was it Scooby Doo, but it had a dinosaur.  Or to be more correct a gh-gh-ghost dinosaur!  The little man was thrilled.  We read it together as soon as we got home.  The book actually has two short stories; one about a ghost dinosaur and another about a town given bad luck by black cats.  The dinosaur one is certainly a favorite, but since we have a black cat at home the second story was still pretty popular.  Sadly there was no Hex Girl appearance in the book, but that’s okay since it was for my son and not me.

The end of the book had some superhero stuff like “spot the differences” and stuff like that.  Oddly it also included character files on Darkseid and the Highfather.  I get the concept, but I found the character choices a bit funny. 

 

Youtube: Kids Edition

I’ve been thinking a lot about today’s update and it was something I’d be totally unaware of if it wasn’t for my 3 year old son.  People, I have to let you know, you’re kids are watching some weird shit on Youtube.  Truth be told, everyone is watching weird shit on Youtube but I was still surprised to see the things that were hypnotizing my son.  It’s not just my kid either; I was talking with a few other father’s and found out that their kids are watching the exact same channels.  I’m not going to directly name or link to any of the Youtubers I’m mentioning here.  And while I may find the content weird, I’m not really attacking them.

Eggs.  I don’t know how my son found them originally, I don’t know how he still finds them; but videos about toy eggs are huge.  So here is the thing.  In other countries there are lots of chocolate eggs with toys inside them, but America doesn’t trust its children no to eat toys so they are illegal here.  Instead these videos focus on toys hidden in plastic eggs, paper mache eggs, or even eggs made out of play-doh.  After the narrator talks about the eggs they then open them up and reveal the toys inside.  Sometimes it’s just the toy.  Other times there may be things like slime or glitter in there too.  The eggs range in all sizes.  Some are barely big enough to hide a matchbox car and others are huge.  These eggs hold a power over my son that I don’t understand. 

Fan Fiction.  This one takes a serious second place to the eggs.  There are a number of videos where people are playing out stories with their toys.  Usually this involves massive crossovers where the Toy Story cast is helping the Transformer Rescuebots participate in a race again Lightning McQueen.  Sometimes narrated by children and their parents, but most of them are just done by adults.  They get odd.  I mean every version of fan fiction gets strange, and this is safe for kids, it’s just strange.

Bootleg videos.  The final one is the most horrifying.  Crappy 3d animated Spidermen in rainbow colors dancing to songs meant for toddlers.  Like the fan fiction these routinely mix characters from different franchises.  Some of these are serious nightmare fuel and I’m glad that my son doesn’t seem to care for these ones.

As I said previous, none of these things are unsafe for kids in moderation.  I was just amazed that these things exist and I wouldn’t even know about them if I didn’t monitor what he was doing/watching.  To the people making these things, more power to you.  You’re entertaining thousands of kids from the looks of your page views.

Disney Infinity 3.0: Marvel

Disney Infinity's 3.0 edition has been going strong with the Star Wars releases.  I haven't played the Force Awakens playset yet, but I can say that the Prequel playset is fun, the Original Trilogy playset is amazing, and the light up figures work better than imagined.  The Marvel news has been pretty quiet though.  We knew that there was a Marvel Battlegrounds playset coming out.  That it would allow up to four people to play and that one of the figures included would be an unmasked Captain America.  Unmasked if the perfect way to symbolize the movie universe because no one keeps their damn masks on, but that is a rant for another day.  But seriously, superheroes in movies and television need to keep their damn masks on.

The new Marvel lineup has been revealed even though many of the figures had already been teased or easily guessed by looking at Marvel's movie lineup.  An amazing looking Black Panther will be hitting the shelves along side Vision, Ant-Man, Black Suited Spiderman, and a pack of Power Discs.  Black Suited Spidey was a Vita exclusive for 2.0, but will finally be available to everyone.  The Power Disc pack includes The Tesseract, Nova Corps, Darkhawk, and Ghost Rider's Bike.  Which means everyone who buys that pack, really just buying it for that awesome motorcycle.

The other interesting thing to note is many of these packages have a wi-fi icon on them.  This is to let players know that these figures will require a software update on Disney Infinity to work.  Most consoles are connected to the internet but this an important fact for those who may have difficulty getting their game system online.

Flash Friday: Rubber Ducky

Happy Flash Friday everyone!  Last week I said I had found my Flash Mopeez while running errands. The Mopeez wasn't the only thing I found that day at Walgreens; I also found a Flash Rubber Duck. The really strange thing is I have no idea where it was supposed to be in the store.  I looked for the box, I was interested into seeing any packaging and what other characters were in the set.  I couldn't find anything and the one duck I did find was sitting on a random shelf that had nothing to do with any other toys.

The odd thing about this duck is it isn't one you actually want to take into the bathtub with you. Under the duck are two metal studs. When you press the studs the duck lights up a number of different colors.  It might be water safe, but I wasn't willing to give it try.

There isn't much you can say about a rubber duck that strobes different colors like a party favor.  I have no idea what other characters are in the series.  I've seen a few of the ducks on ebay if you want one and don't want to randomly explore your local drug stores.

RIP Alan Rickman

It's being reported that the actor Alan Rickman has passed away at the age of 69.  He'll forever be Snape to generations of Potter fans.  To people like me, he'll always be Hans Gruber.  His IMDB is just a list of wonderful roles; Dogma, Michael Collins, etc...  Hell he was even the only thing anyone really remembers from Robin Hood Prince of Thieves.

It's being reported that he lost a short battle with Cancer.  Fuck Cancer.

Muppets Kodachrome

This video hit the internet over the holidays so it's possible that a lot of people might have missed it.  I can't even count the number of times I've watched it.  It encapsulates everything I love about the Muppets in one video.  It also doesn't hurt that it stars the Electric Mayhem.



I really need a shirt with just that Electric Mayhem logo on it.

Party of One

There are a lot was ways to watch or listen to people playing table top role  playing games.  Party of One is a new Podcast that does things a little differently.  Instead of a huge cast of players, Party of One focuses on the Game Master Jeff Stormer and a single player.  Each podcast is a different game and a different player, so they can vary greatly on tone and subject matter.  As of this writing there are four episodes already recorded and they cover things like luchadors and ancient mummy detectives.  While some of them are serious, when they get funny they are very funny.

Each podcast is self contained, so it’s a great study in telling one and done stories.  The longest adventure is just under an hour and a half.  So you aren’t going to get sprawling Tolkien-esque epics.  These are tightly structured, quick stories.  It’s amazing how much gets done in an RPG session when the table doesn’t spend a half hour talking about how to approach the bad guy’s evil lair.

Knowing that these are solo sessions is one of the things that make it so interesting.  In a larger group game, building that special snow flake character can be looked down upon.  Not every person in a party of five can be a long lost prince or time displaced WWII soldier.  But when you’re the only one playing, you’re free to go wild with the wildest of concepts.  You can make that brooding loner character that never would make sense in a team setting.  It’s a very cool dynamic that is fun to watch play out. 

I really can’t recommend Party of One enough.  The Party of One podcast can be found on Soundcloud, Apple’s App Store, and on Google play.  So find it however you prefer and put it in your ears.

Flash Friday: Zoom Mopeez

It’s Flash Friday!  Way back in May I posted about Funko’s newest plush line, the Mopeez.  In that original wave we got all the usual suspects like Batman, Superman, etc.  I was really happy to see that the Flash had made it into those initial seven characters.  I actually found mine while walking down an isle at my local Walgreens to get cold medication or something else completely unrelated.

What I didn’t know is that Gamestop has an exclusive Mopeez of Zoom.  I can’t even take credit for finding him, my wife noticed it sitting on the store counter while I was busy looking for something else.  Needless to say it was an instant buy as soon as I saw him.

There isn’t anything really different about this little guy; he’s just a palette swap of the original Flash Mopeez.  I still find him adorable though and I’m glad I happed upon him.  I haven’t seen anything yet on a second DC wave outside the Rainbow Batmans.  I’ll post it here if I find anything, because I will lose my mind if they make a grumpy little Captain Cold.

Daredevil Season 2 Trailer

Netflix has just released the trailer for Daredevil Season 2.  It doesn't give away anything but still managed to make me even more excited for the show.  On top of that it confirmed the release date as March 18th.

The upcoming season is going to guest star the Punisher, So Matt's reluctance to kill is going to be pushed to the extremes.  In fact some of the released set photos make it look like they are copying a very famous comicbook meetup between the two.  

I'm looking forward to more Daredevil and the eventual Luke Cage.   Hopefully we will get some Iron Fist casting news soon.