Why aren't there any fat superheros?

I have been struggling with my weight for, well, pretty much my whole life. I'm a fat guy but I'm not supposed to bothered by this apparently. Women feel self-concious about their bodies and they rally together to say Barbie is unrealistic as are the myriad of superheroines with large busts and tiny costumes. But when it comes to guys, well, we're lucky, it's okay to be a big guy, but fat girls get it hard because women are expected to be skinny and beautiful. At least, this is what I am told, and if it's true, damn I am sorry for all of you women, because being a big guy has not been easy. When I was in middle school, there were a few boys who would ask me every time they saw me "How's the baby?" implying that I looked pregnant. Of course, they weren't scared of me, because even if i was bigger and stronger, I would have to catch them first and I couldn't because I was fat. I learned not to mind the boys but what really hurt was that the girls didn't seem to find me attractive and I blamed it all on how fat I was. It has taken me a long time to realize that what they really found unattractive about me was how little confidence I had after others broke me. I was, and still am, afraid to talk to women because I am always afraid they won't like me because I'm fat. If you think about it, media doesn't help the fat guys anymore than the fat girls. Yeah Barbie has unrealistic proportions, but have you had a look at the male equivalent? Every superhero wore spandex and had washboard abs and muscles so ripped their veins popped out. They were plastic, but someone took the time to set the molds with veins popping out of their bulging muscles. And spandex, there was no way I was going to pull off spandex, it was clear I was too fat for this. Hw could I be so sure? The only fat guy with super powers was the Blob, and he was a villain. Yeah, that's encouraging, if I want to be among the superheroes, I get to be the bad guy too fat to feel when they are punching me, woo-hoo! Aside from him the next guys were Kingpin and the Penguin, also both villains, and not particularly impressive ones at that. One could argue that all of this was to promote physical fitness, boys were supposed to get into sports and be athletic, if you weren't motivated to get into shape, well then you were just a wuss, grow a pair or go back to the basement. As a boy, there was never any compassion for being fat, it was just a matter of exercising, playing sports and workign for that body, and that's what we're supposed to do, no crying, that's for girls. Grils could complain, femnists had no problem saying there was simply no way for every girl to have tiny waists and giant boobs and we needed to accept women in all of their shapes and sizes. Make no mistake, I feel for women, there are a lot of big girls that I find very attractive and it breaks my heart when they don't have the confidence to present themselves as sexy as they really are because people have told them they are ugly when they are in fact quite beautiful. Only recently has it come to my attention that I am in the same boat. There are women who tell me I am cute and handsome and sweet and they like me just the way I am, but I don't hear it enough. I'm not sure if it's that women aren't saying it, or that I'm just not hearing it because I am so used to hearing bad things that I don't know when a woman likes me. We need to be more vocal about this, there are people who are set on a road to self-destruction because we don't know that there are people who will accept us as we are. We need to stop over-glorifying skinny fit physiques, not that we should villainize them either, there are some people who just are that way naturally. God I hate them sometimes, but there are people with such metabolism that they remain skinny no matter how much they eat and they hate that they have no muscle mass. Of course, that's mostly guys, skinny girls always seem to find a place where they belong, but turning things all the way around isn't going to help if skinny girls are going to feel as awkward as fat girls do now. We need to stop acting like any body type is definitively better, we need more fat characters to balance out the skinny ones, we need diversity of shape as well as color. And for goodness sake, can we please get some decent characters to cosplay as? Spandex simply do not come in XXXL.

Deadpool and Superfrenemies

First things first, Superfrenemies has been published and is available in both paperback and e-book format with a final fifth chapter that isn't up on Write-On. I actually thought of a few more chapters of material, but they will wait because they delved into territory I wasn't prepared to go into in this book. There is a point where a superhero parody can go too far.

Like Deadpool, I'm not sure this movie crosses the line but it gets damn close. I finally got around to watching it this week, and it was hilarious. It was definitely R-rated, if you have heard that it is not appropriate to take the kids to, let me say this once again, it is not appropriate to take the kids to. Fist of all, Deadpool likes saying "fuck" a lot. And then there's the shameless violence, which happens when you realize you're immortal and don't give a fuck anymore. And then thre's the one serious dramatic part of the movie when Wade Wilson gets cancer and suddenly he and his girlfriend get dead serious and he goes for extreme treatment that turns him into a mutant by way of torture. The sequence is necessary for the overall plot, but you have to be prepared to understand that it's a critical part of Deadpool's backstory or else it's just the most disturbing thing you'll ever see. Seriously, Wade goes through some brutal torture, you have been warned. And there's also the fact that Wade falls in love with a hooker who works at a strip club and they don't skimp on the nudity to sell it(Stan Lee plays a DJ, probably his favorite role ever). But still, all of this fits seamlessly with Deadpool's sick twisted sense of humor, because this whole movie is basically an hour and forty-five minutes of Ryan Reynolds being an asshole, and nobody is off limits, not even himself. He actually cracks a couple of Ryan Reynolds jokes, as well as ripping on everyone and everything in sight, even the opening credits are a joke. You will laugh, if you haven't been grossed out by Deadpool's appearance or the bloody gore, you will laugh at everything else. Personally my favorite line was when he goes to the X-Mansion and says "Big mansion, but I only see two of you, it's like the studio couldn't afford a third X-Man." Oh yeah, Deadpool is a dick, hardcore, big time. Wait that didn't come out right...or did it?

Okay, synopsis if you want to know before you go in, the movie starts with Deadpool attacking the bad guys, for very selfish reasons. Deadpool's mutation made him so ugly he has to wear a mask in public and blames Ajax, the guy who did it, and wants him to fix it so he has methodically hunted down everyone who works for him to get the information he wants to set things right, and kills all the uncooperative goons who get in his way. Don't feel too bad, they are bad guys, they are part of a crime syndicate, they do very bad things, and the world is better place after Deadpool kills them. Anyway, just when Deadpool catches up with Ajax, Colossus shows up with Negasonic Teenage Warhead to arrest Deadpool for the chaos he's creating that made the news and drew Colossus's attention in the firstplace. This whole scene is cut with flashbacks to how Wade got here, which is an awesome way to tell this story, because we would have been kinda bored if we actually had to wait through Wade's whole backstory at once before the Deadpool awesomeness, and also the movie onl has two major action sequences and this style helps break it u a bit and create the illusion that more is going on than really is, a brilliant film making trick played so expertly that you don't realize it until it's over and you're actually even more impressed at how they pulled it off. So, yeah the backstory, if you don't know, Wade Wilson was an army special forces soldier who went mercenary after he got out of the service and takes jobs picking on pricks and assholes that are meaner and less funny than he is. His job board is a bar where they have a Dead Pool, a running bet that one of the merc regulars will die on a job, in a bar fight, or for any other reason, first before the others. The point is...well, to give him his name later. Oh, and he also meets a hooker named Vanessa who's a tough bitch that impresses him and he goofs around with her until they fall in love because, and I quote "your crazy matches my crazy". Then just when it looks like they have their happily ever after, Wade gets cancer, then the silly get serious and Wade gets an offer for a treatment for his cancer that includes turninginto a mutant superhero. Wade is desperate because he sees how much it's hurting Vanessa to think of losing him, so he goes for the treatment. This treatment is the worst thing ever shown in a Marvel movie, but it's Deadpool's story so it's kinda gotta happen. Wade ends up being suffocated in a hyperbaric chamber set on reverse and just when the vacuum should have killed him, he transforms into Deadpool and now he doesn't have to worry about dying from cancer or suffocation...or explosions...or gunshots...or anything really. So, good news, Wade beat cancer, bad news he now looks like Freddy Krueger. He now only takes two things seriously, his love for Vanessa amd his desire to look normal enough not to creep her out. This brings us about an hour into the movie and the last forty minutes are all dedicated to how Ajax gets pissed and kidnaps Vanessa and Deadpool has to save her, which involves recruiting the X-Men, which are just the two, because well, his joke is for real. Yada, yada, yada, the end, and the Marvel extra with a tease at the next movie, which will probably involve Cable because he said so, and nobody has used Cable, so I think it's about time...and I eman, what else were they planning? They made good money on this project another has been greenlit, so if Ryan Reynolds could make this happen he's getting Cable for the sequel and he's going to fuck with that shit and we'll love it.

Why are you still reading? I'm done, that was it for this week, log off already. Chicka chicka.

Charlie Bone and the Children of the Red King

Hiding in the shadows of Harry Potter is another similar series that doesn't pack as much power but makes up for it in mystery and heart. I am talking about Charlie Bone and the Children of the Red King. Charlie Bone lives in a weird world where magic is real and subtle. It seems to be the real world as we know it, but once, long ago, there was a wizard known as the Red King who came from Africa and had ten children, each inheriting a portion of their father's power. Five of the children grew up to be tyrants, abusing their power to bring ruin to their father's kingdom, the other five were so ashamed they ran away and disowned themselves. Charlie Bone is among the descendants of the Red King as are the Bloors who run Bloor's Academy, built upon the ruins of the Red King's castle. Bloor's Academy is sort of like Hogwarts except that it isn't a hidden school of magic, it's a school for kids with special talents, mostly the kind that you would find in the real world, music, drama, and art. Then there are the children of the Red King, a small group of about a dozen students who have talents not so neatly defined. Each child has inherited a specific form of magic from their common ancestor, interestingly these are contrasted with other students ordinary talents to show that they are arguably no greater than the artists they share the school with. This makes for a very intriguing dynamic, everyone in the school knows about the Children of the Red King and their magic, it's not really much of a secret, instead it remains hidden because most of them keep it subtle enough that it doesn't stand out any more than the talented musicians and actors that surround them.

For Charlie, his involvemnt begins when he finds he has the power to communicate with portraits,even crossing time if need be to hear what someone said when the portrait was made. His power grows over the series, from hearign, to being able to talk to them, to actually being able to enter their world. He uses the last power once to acquire a wand that once belonged to his ancestor, a Welsh magician with power second only to the Red King, but the wand is only used as a wand for a short time before it transforms into a moth that still performs magic but now of its own accord. As soonas Charlie's power first manifests he is sent to Bloor's Academy where he is paired with a peer mentor, a music student who tries to teach Charlie how to play an instrument so he can fit into the school of music(everyine falls into one of the three regular groups, the Children of the Red King are not formally separated into their own school). Charlie meets a number of other students, some magical, some not, but his main enemies are the Bloors. Manfred, the youngest of the Bloors, has the power of mind reading and mind control, but curiously, Charlie Bone is immune to this power. Manfred's grandfather Ezekiel is the true mastermind but has no magic of his own and covets the power of the children. Ezekiel is in league with Charlie's grandmother and her sisters,two of whom have their own powers, but Charlie has his uncle Paton on his side. Unfortunately, Paton, the brother of the Yewbeam sisters, has a rather inconveninet power, he boosts light bulbs until they burst. For the most part Paton hides in his room and works on genealogy, but when Charlie's life gets complicated he comes out and challenges the Bloors. Then there's the flame cats, Leo, Aries, and Sagittarius, colored red, copper, and yellow, who can turn into fire.They were once leopards until the Red King turned them into housecats so they could blend in, and they have their own strange purpose and power, though they clearly favor Charlie and seem to come him whenever he needs them most.

I highly recommend this book series if you ever wanted to know what it would be like if Harry Potter switched to decaf, which is so much more interesting, because if leaves you thinking "Well now that I believe."

Final Fantasy II

The second installment in the Final Fantasy series gets a bad rap, and it isn't entirely undeserved, unless you consider it was only the second game and they were trying a few thigns to keep it fresh, so they made a few mistakes, they also introduced elements that practically define the series. Among the important innovations, This was the first game to have chocobos and Cid. Cid is mentioned in rereleases of FF1, but that was added after Cid became a thing, this was his first real appearance, and liek the chocobo, his role was a form of transportation, but much more useful. Cid's Airship is necessary a few times, but then becomes a convenient warp point, chocobo on the ther hand only appeared once and is only necessary once, and only useful once or twice after that, but of all of the modes of transportation in this game, it has had the biggest impact. Also, this game introduces the first dragoon, Ricard Highwind, also the first of many Highwinds, including Kain(IV) and Cid(VII). The biggest drawback is that they replaced the level system with a skill system which increases stats based on use, which was a good idea, but is easily abused. The way the system works, the more damage you take, the more your HP and defense stats increase, so you can let your characters get pummeled on purpose to boost HP and defense through the roof.  Another swing and a miss was the system for interactive conversation, which was a good idea to give you options to do more than wandering around and fighting, but it was implemented poorly. You have to collect keywords to say to people to get specific reactions, which seems overwhelmingly cmplicated as you think you won't know which words you'll need for any cnversation, but that is overcompensated for by the fact that any time you need a keyword, it's almost always, with a scant few exceptions if any, the last keyword you recieved and therefore the top of the list, making it more boring than it could have been. The story isn't spectacular either, but it was the first "evil empire forces youths to rebel" story, so the later games owe a lot to this trailblazer.

If you want to know the story it's fairly straight forward. Four characters that you can name (Default, Firion, Maria, Guy and Leon) try to fight for survival when their village is attacked. They lose and only three seem to walk away from the battle and they join a rebel group fighting against the empire. The party goes on a series of missions with a rotating cast characters filling the fourth slot, three of which die, dramatically sacrificing themselves to save the main three characters. What actually happens isn't compelling, it's just "go to the dungeon and get the thing we need" and honestly the dramatic deaths of party members are the most impressive parts of the story, that and when you are finally reunited with your original lost fourth party member who is revealed to be the Dark Knight in service of the evil Emperor who has been dogging you through most of the game.

What really kills this game for Americans is that it was lost in the shuffle when it first came out and didn't get to us until after FF7 came out and by then everything revolutionary about it was old hat and nobody really cared. However, if you can appreciate the classics for what they were, FFII is still a decent game. My most important recommendation, play this game honestly, do not bring your party to the brink of death to inflate their stats, you can but it takes all of the fun out of it.

Voyage of the Jerle Shannara: Antrax

This tuesday will be the season finale of the Shannara Chronicles on MTV, and while I've been watching it I decided to read ahead in the series and start with Antrax, the second in the Voyage of the Jerle Shannara trilogy. Set five hundred years after the events of the original triology including the current TV series, The Voyage of the Jerle Shannara tels the story of an expedition aboard an airship named after the famous elf king who gives the entire series it's name. I chose this book because it features cyborgs called wronks and I wanted to know how it fit into the otherwise magical world. The entire series takes place in a post apocalyptic world where technology has been lost, and the knowledge to get it back is held by an artificial intelligence known as Antrax which was created to preserve the knowledge that was feared to be lost in the impending apocalypse. Ultimately one of its creators was desperate enough to give Antrax a final command to protect its secrets at all costs, which unfortunately translated into it destroying anything that came near, meaning the information is protected, but absolutely nobody can ever get to it, so it's a bit counterproductive. Worse still, Antrax has gotten more desperate, especially since its original power source started to fail, and it discovered that it could replace its power source with magic. It also discovered that it can combine machines with flesh to create servants, though it generally prefers to use full machines known as creepers. It hunts humans and has actually masterminded the voyage of the Jerle Shannara specifically to find magic sources and it hit the motherload when the unfortunate crew reaches its destination. Antrax had been drawing energy from Kael Elessidil and his elfstones, but as Kael started to die, it sent him out to find a replacement, baiting the Druid Walker Boh to collect the treasured knowledge who unwittingly brings more magic users to feed Antrax.

This book begins with the Ilse Witch remembering her origins as Grianne Ohmsford and how she believed her brother Bek died. Confronted by Bek she struggles with the realization that her whole life since has been based on a lie. This plotline switches back and forth between the perspectives of Grianne and Bek. Grianne hunts down Bek, trying to deny the truth with such determination that she will not rest until she hears him retract all that he said to her. Grianne's power is the Wishsong, an Ohmsford/Shannara family trait that allows certain members of the family to sing anything into being and Grianne uses it to transform a wolf into a monster that tracks down Bek. Bek has recently discovered that he also has the power of the Wishsong and tries to persuade Grianne to come back to him, while a shapeshifter named Truls Rohk tries to protect him and teach him how to use his magic.

Meanwhile, Rue Meridian is the point of view character regarding the Jerle Shannara itself. The airship itslef was taken over and Rue is the only one who has a chanc of taking it back. She succeeds, but since they were attacked by the Black Moclips, a federation airship, that becomes her primaary focus.

Meanwhile a handful of the crew made it to Antrax's base Castledown and they want to complete their journey. Walker Boh was the first to be cut off, and Ahren Ellesdil, an elf prince seeking the elfstones and all but doomed to take his uncle's place runs away in fear and ends up paired with the seer Ryer Ord Star to try and find Walker, only to find out their magic was the problem and try to rescue Walker.

Meanwhile, Quentin Leah, the Highlander, Bek's adopted cousin, desperately tries to survive the wronk of his former mentor Ard Patrinell. Antrax determined that while Quentin and his sword have magic, but the only one who has a chance of capturing him is to attach Patrinell's head and sword arm to a cybernetic body, preserving his tactical and muscle memory respectively.

The book is actually these four stories told seperately yet intertwined. All four came from the Jerle Shannara, and all must return so they can go home. This book is in the middle of a trilogy, the first book being the journey to the distant realm of Parkasia where this all takes place, west across the sea from the Four Lands. The next book is about their journey home, but Antrax is all about the destination, the knowledge of the old world and the one who protects it.

This is a good read, and it will help you understand Steel Golem, my story of events in Parkasia five hundred years earlier, concurrent with the events of Elfstones of Shannara/Shannara Chronicles season 1. So read this story, read my story and watch the finale of Shannara Chronicles this tuesday!

Final Fantasy XII, or Star Wars Squenix edition

Okay, I don't know how most people feel about Final Fantasy XII, I know a lot of people consider it to be the turning point of the franchise where things went downhill, but for me this game was pretty awesome, some of the best graphics, a fairly smooth interface, and a good story, and my favorite part it takes place in Ivalice. For people who don't know, Ivalice is where the Tactics spinoffs take place, so this marks the one time the setting is used in the numbered series and makes it canon. But back to the story, it is pretty cool, but it seems that they pretty much ripped off Star Wars, one of the best rip offs I've ever seen, but...okay, let me just use the next paragraph to describe the story purely in the form of similarities.

The main character is a blond orphan living in the desert who gets mixed up with a rougue with a non-human companion who co-pilots his ship and an old veteran knight mentors the hero while they protect a princess who leads a rebellion against an evil empire. The rogue is pursued by a bounty hunter and at one point a major villain reveals himself to be the father of a main character. Did I mention the ship looks suspiciously like the Millenium Falcon? Or that the desert looks like Tatooine, especially when you run into guys who look and sound like Tusken Raiders? Oh and I almost forgot, the evil empire's plot includes a giant ship that can blast away an entire kingdom, and theoretically the entire planet if not kept in check. And boy does the final dungeon inside of that ship look an awful lot like the Death Star.

Despite the obvious influence suggesting a complete ripoff  (and no, it is most definitely not a coincidence, ever since FF6 Biggs and Wedge revealed that Squenix are Star Wars fans) This is still a solid game. Now, let's review the story a bit more objectively.

The game revolves around the conflict between the kingdoms of Dalmasca and Arcadia. It begins when Princess Ashelia of Dalmasca is going to get married and live happily ever after, but then the invasion begins and her wedding is ruined, not only because of the worst party crashers ever but also because the groom is a casualty. This prologue focuses on a soldier who fights to protect Princess Ashelia, and he's successful in saving her but dies in the process. The story picks up with that soldier's brother Vaan, the main character of the game a few years after the invasion. He's grown up as an orphan street rat, trying to act tough, but he's been in the care of a Bangaa merchant along with his best friend Penelo, so he's had a relatively comfortable life for a peasant and Penelo sees right through his tough guy act. As Vaan tries to prove how awesome he is, he manages to get into the palace and gets mixed up with Balthier and Fran a couple of thieves who were stealing a priceless royal treasure. As they attempt to escape, they meet a girl who needs help getting back to her allies in the resistance, who later turns out to be Princess Ashelia. Meanwhile, Vaan, Balthier and Fran get into more trouble and end up in prison and as they make another escape, they meet Basch, a former Dalmascan soldier who's been put away for treason, only it wasn't his fault, it was his twin brother. All six characters end up working together to help Ashe reclaim her legacy. Apparently the Dalmasca legacy is divine and includes magicite, not one but two mystical swords and most impressive, the espers, which are not quite gods, not quite demons, they're just really powerful beings who have been bound into service first to the gods who created them and now to whoever can overcome them where they were left, meaning Ashe is now capable of commanding them. Some of the espers will be out of the way, but five are completely unavoidable(don't worry, these five aren't much harder than any other average boss) and one, Belial actually has to be summoned in order to open a gate in a required area (again, don't worry, this is all pretty easy, they won't give you any required stuff that's really borderline impossible). Along the way, the group meets a few allies that work as temporary party members, the most significant being Larsa, the brother of the emperor of Arcadia who is against the violence and wants to end the war. Eventually they find out that the emperor has been influenced by a rogue god who is basically trying to destroy the world.

You can pretty much guess how this one ends, the same way every Final Fantasy ends, with our heroes engaging in a final battle with a god of destruction wannabe. Mechanically, the definitive traits are the gambit system and the license system which are both daunting until you figure them out then they are ridiculously easy to make the entire game simple. The battle system doesn't involve the usal turn based freeze frame of other games, but rather allows you to move around like an MMORPG. This is confusing until you realize most battles can be handled by allowing two characters to use gambits to auto attack with at least one tanking the target and you just take control of the healer/buffer to hold him/her back and use whatever spells are needed. The license system is ultimately very simple and user friendly so I wouldn't bother wasting my time on explaining it, there are plenty of help guides, but often just tracing the abilities the characters already have by default do the trick.

I highly recommend this game for any FF fan, especially Tactics fans, but you probably already played it, and ifyou haven't you should.

Akame Ga Kill

I have heard some people actually complaining about this show, but I really like it. Of course I'm biased because I love RPGs and it's been clear since Tatsumi made his first appearance holding a sword with those slightly oversized gloves. Sorry folks, but I'm so used to seeing those in JRPGs, from FF Tactics to Wild Arms 2, I can't help but assume it's an RPG. And then there are casual mentions here and there of experience and leveling up. If there's anything to complain about it's that it's a messed up harem anime, and by messed up I mean, all the girls in the harem die. Well, everyone dies, it's in the name for crying out loud.

So here's the deal if you haven't been watching, Tatsumi has been a big fish in a small pond who gets so full of himself he heads to the imperial capital to make something of himself only to find out thta he is less than nothing there and almost gets killed by some sadistic bastards who prey on vagrants like himself. But then he gets rescued by Night Raid, well, maybe rescue is a strong word. Night Raid is a group of assasins who happened to assasinate the people who would have hurt Tatsumi before they can hurt him. Tatsumi decides to join Night Raid when they give him the option that he join them, be their little house bitch, or die. Night Raid are a very special group because they have Imperial Arms, special items made by an ancient emperor who founded the emipre they live in and are fighting against right now. Right now the empire is ruled by a young emperor who is being manipulated by a very evil man who wants the power of the Imperial Arms to himself. Night Raid is mostly composed of women, but they are deadly badass women with their own reasons for having become cold ruthless killers. There's also two guys, one of whom is gay, but in a cool way, and a pervert who was most likely recruited simply because he likes being surrounded by hot women no matter how deadly.The gay guy has an Imperial Arm that is a special suit of armor that can be summoned through a sword, so you can fight with the sword as the sword, or trade it for armor of invincibility and a spear. Sadly this guy dies, but on the upside, Tatsumi inherits this Imperial Arm and becomes th newest badass in Night Raid. As for all the women, they all seem to be hot for Tatsumi, but show it in different ways, from tsundere to yandere. Tatsumi seems to be most attracted to Akame, but she's scared to love because everyone she loves dies. Aside from this basically the emperor hunts Night Raid and brings in ever nastier assasins of his own. Right now the wierdest assasin is Esdeath, some crazy ice witch who is a sociopath but loves Tatsumi.

So yeah, anytime you want to check this story out, tune in  to see what happens next.

Oh and also, Waking Dream is now available on Amazon, so check it out, it's a great Valentine's Day gift.