Finally, it is time. So far we have done eleven editions of Subtitle Subversive, but there was absolutely no way I was going to close out the first volume of a series about foreign film without one of the greatest directors in the world. Today we are going to talk about the one and only Werner Herzog and his masterpiece Aguirre: The Wrath of God. Aguirre is one of those films that is almost more famous for its behind the scenes madness than it was for the brilliance of the film itself. But make no mistake the finished product is…
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Science! For Parties-Water To Wine
We’ve come to the end of the line here at Science! For Parties. But like any good party guest, we’ve saved the best for last. For our final party trick, we’re going to teach you how to pull of the greatest party trick ever recorded in human history. A feat so grand that the first person to ever successfully pull it off was declared to be the son of god. Today dear reader, you are going to learn how to turn water into wine. What will you need to pull off this science feat of biblical proportions? Well, to start…
A Writer’s Tale- Canterbury Wine
Today’s entry in A Writer’s Tale will be shorter than our usual fare, as what I’m about to share with you is less a story and more along the lines of a hysterical, historical tidbit. But to be honest with you it was just too good a tidbit not to share. I’m sure most of you are familiar with the works of Geoffrey Chaucer, his Canterbury Tales being a staple of most 12th-grade literature classes. Well, modern audiences are not alone in their admiration of Chaucer, he was very much appreciated in his own time as well. In fact, to…
World Building 101-Politics
Politics. It’s a dirty word. Lord knows that just about everyone in the world is sick of talking about politics. We could all use a break. So this December I offer up to you a special holiday gift; a chance to completely escape the world of modern politics by creating your own web of shifting alliances and power bases. That’s right for our final installment of World Building 101 its time for you to put the finishing touches on your fictional world so your heroes can put the finishing touches on their fictional foes. To better serve our purpose today…
Troping the Riff- Tech Support
A pitched battle to save the day and stop evil in its tracks. It’s a race against time, the hero has beaten their foe into submission and now all they have to do is solve some sort of hi-tech problem having with computers. A situation that can’t be solved by punching, uh-oh looks like our hero is in trouble. It’s time to call Tech Support. Some tropes are as old as storytelling itself and some are rather modern inventions. In terms of human history, computers are still a relatively new concept. Which might be why Hollywood still treats anyone who…
The Franchise- The Wizarding World of Harry Potter
With the release of Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald today I thought now would be a good time to break down the magical wizarding world created by J. K. Rowling. So let’s delve in to one of the most successful fictional franchises of all time. Core Concept: “The Importance of Tolerance and Friendship” In both the Harry Potter story and now the Fantastic Beasts movies the villains are those who advocate for racial purity and wish to amass a large amount of personal power. They are defeated by a band of heroes who are considered outcasts. People who are willing…
Mind Blown- We are a computer simulation
Despite my overwhelming nerdiness, I’ve never really been much of a gamer. Video games just never held that much interest to me. With the sole exception being Sid Meier’s Civilization series. It’s possible for me to lose entire weeks to those games and not even notice. And sometimes during those sleep-deprived binges, I wonder if it’s possible that I’m just an NPC in some galactic alien simulation. Turns out I’m not the only one who is kept up at night by this idea, more than a few theoretical physicists have put for the theory that everything we know may just…
Troping the Riff- The Trickster
The Trickster is one of the original storytelling tropes, existing in some of humanity’s earliest myths. In Africa he was Anansi the spider, in Europe he was Reynard the Fox, in Asia he was the king of the monkeys, and in the Americas, he often appeared as a coyote. Same archetypal character just wearing a different name and a different skin. After creation myths, tales about the trickster are perhaps the most common across humanity’s myths and folklore. The trickster defies convention and flouts authority, challenging what is known and accepted often through deception and trickery. The trickster is a…
Science! For Parties- The Invisible Licorice
Welcome back readers to Science! For Parties. In this edition, we put a new twist on an old trick. You all remember our previous post Backwards When Wet where we showed you how to change the direction of an arrow using only a glass of water. Well consider this post a spiritual sequel to that one, but in today’s entry, we are going to use that same principle of light refraction we learned before to make a piece of licorice disappear. Just like last time, you’ll need a clear glass, but for this trick instead of water we’ll be using…
World Building 101- Governments
“Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.”- Winston Churchill. Unless your protagonists are adventuring through an untamed wilderness completely devoid of humanoid life they will inevitably encounter societies of sentient beings. Those societies will have rules and structures the will dictate how the individuals in that society interact with one another. When those rules and structures are codified that’s called Government. And in this edition of Worldbuilding 101, you and I are going to see if we can’t up with something that can’t prove Mr. Churchill wrong. We will begin with the simplest and most…