Neuroposter Mask.

-  So Disney bought Star Wars.  If you don’t know.  Which is… meh.  I mean, I’m not like a huge Star Wars fanboy or anything so I don’t have to strong of feelings either way.  I do, like 80% of humans, love the old Star Wars movies; and I do, like 85% of humans, hate the new ones.  From what I’m reading from people who know a lot about this stuff, there are novels that act as the official “post-Original Trilogy” story.  Something to do with Han and Leia’s kids, Luke running a new Jedi order, and the resurgence of the Empire and the Sith.  This could be decent I suppose.  The problem with the new ones — and I’m sure this has been written about extensively — is the fear of treading new ground.  This notion that they had to fall back on the old ones to be good.  You can see that in everything from the bizarre and wacky coincidences written into the story, the way the ships are designed, even the way Palatine was scarred to look like a shitty Halloween costume of himself in Jedi.  As long as they don’t do any of that, and focus on a new story, new characters, new designs, they should be alright I hope.

[But hey, I'm one of like 3 million assholes writing my opinions on the Internet about this so what the fuck do I know?]

Brendon over at BleedingCool seems to think he’s courting Hamill and Fisher about being in them… this sounds risky.

-  William Gibson’s seminal novel Neuromancer is being turned into a film as we speak.  Little is known about the project.  The IMDB page is empty, to say the least.  Liam Neeson’s name is on the cast, which may or may not be true, but sounds awesome.  If you don’t know about the novel it’s one of the best science fiction novels of all-time.  It started the genre we call “cyberpunk”.  It also featured characters “jacking into” the Internet which was obviously directly lifted for The Matrix movies.  Anyways, here’s a new poster (the first):

-  A Rioter’s Prayer: Pussy Riot’s Yekaterina Samutsevich on protest, art, and freedom.

I have the impression that this is the opinion the government wants to impose on people, their way of opposing the situation. I think that when a person goes somewhere, she reflects, she thinks about where she is going and why, because she is using her time and energy. It’s a conscious choice. I don’t go to a demonstration because it’s cool. It isn’t at all cool to go to demonstrations today. The forces of order are nearby. They can beat you up. The demonstration on May 6th proved that. Nowadays, many people find themselves behind bars solely because they went to a public demonstration.

-  Chuck Klosterman on why Fantasy Football is bad for the game (and your mental health) over at Grantland.

If I mentally transpose the words “entertaining” and “sport,” Dylan’s sentiment gets close to what I’m trying to express (and what I want to feel, but can’t). There was a time when I watched football in order to not think about my day-to-day life, but fantasy sports slowly changed that — in fact, my affinity for fantasy only makes it worse. I turn the players I draft into tiny parts of my life, which stops me from remembering that they have no relationship whatsoever to who I am. It makes me unconsciously think of them as extensions of myself. And I wonder if this is more problematic than I want to accept. Do I have any right to get angry at Chris Johnson? Does anyone?

-  The Trouble With The Mask.  Great op-Ed on the inherent problems with the new Joker in Batman and featuring a brilliant Bukowski quote.

-Sonny

GV Doom Sector.

-  BBC posted audio of DOOM in their studios this past week, debuting a new track of “JJ DOOM”, coming out on Tuesday.  Very pretty song:

What an awesome year it’s been for Hip-Hop.  Especially for me: DOOM, El-P, and Aesop Rock are three of my favorite rappers.

-  Ernest Hemmingway Was A Lousy Spy…is an interesting name for an article.  Haha… check it out:

While other American sailors were volunteering their boats and their time along the East Coast to spot U-boats, Hemingway’s concept of operations went further. He would pretend to be fishing, wait until a German submarine came alon side to buy fresh fish and water and then attack the enemy with bazookas, machine guns, and hand grenades. Hemingway would use Basque jai alai players to lob the grenades down the open hatches of the unsuspecting U-boat.

-  Back when I was super into writing science fiction shorts, stories like this always fascinated me:  Shamoon Virus Targets Energy Sector Infrastructure.  As the world becomes more and more digitalized, it opens itself up closer and closer to ruin.  Yes, I realize I’m breaking no new ground with that statement.

-  The Pussy Riot prison sentence is, of course, outrageous.  But you already know that.

-  Enlightening interview with Gore Vidal in 2005, which has never before been translated into English.  Like most writers — good writers — the guy couldn’t get enough of himself.  But I can respect that because he was one of smartest men on the planet, and never spoke about anything he wasn’t ahead of the curve on.  Example: this was his response to, “what do you think of religion today in America?”:

It’s the work of the devil. Maybe there is no good God. But there is definitely a devil, and his predominant passion is the religion of those Protestant fundamentalists. I believe my country is beginning to resemble a theocracy. Using television, the evangelists raise appalling amounts of money which they then invest in the election of mentally disabled obscurantists.

Since there is no system of public education, the great majority of my fellow citizens is frighteningly ignorant. They have no idea where Iraq is. They accept as the gospel whatever the government tells them. Good grief, any other normal country would have been against the Iraq war! But we live in an abnormal country, governed by experts in deceptive advertising.

-  1976 doesn’t feel like a particularly amazing year for music, but just look at these lists of releases from back then.

-Sonny