In Today’s Modern Society, Riddler Would Be The EASIEST Of Batman’s Villains To Rehabilitate 

from The Memory Palace, by Nate DiMeo

Hulk [2003]

We're gonna have to watch that temper of yours. The third era of superhero films struggled with the question of what a superhero mov...

My review of Ang Lee’s Hulk.

Oscar Nomination Predictions

Once I get around to finishing up a few of the high-praised films I haven't gotten to (Selma, American Sniper, Mr. Turner, a few others), I'll do a best films list, but I don't think viewing those will change my predictions here too much.

On the other hand, finally seeing Whiplash (which is amazing) convinced me that it has a better chance than I thought, so who knows?

Best Picture The last three years have had nine nominees, so I'll put that many, more or less in order of likelihood. I'll be genuinely shocked if one of the top four doesn't show up. Boyhood Birdman The Imitation Game Selma The Grand Budapest Hotel Theory of Everything Whiplash Gone Girl American Sniper And if there's a tenth nominee, I think it'll be one of these, in this order of likelihood: Foxcatcher - [The enthusiasm for this one seems very limited, but then again, Miller's other two movies (Capote & Moneyball) were more of the "respect" than "love" kinda movies, and they got nominated anyway. He definitely has his fans in the academy. Nightcrawler -A solid Dark Horse here. Unbroken - Opinions are very mixed, and even the positive reactions seem to be in the "good, not great" category. It might get in on sheer "heroic WWII flick" factor, though. Mr. Turner - Unknown enough that it might get lost in the mix, but it's certainly universally praised. Interstellar - Probably wishful thinking to even put it as the "least likely nominee", but I imagine it'll get enough support to have a very, very distant chance. After all, it's been hanging on in the lower parts of the charts to make a good $25 million more than expected. Also, I'd love to see this get an Oscar bump at the box office, which should be enough to get it over $200 million and maybe even in the top 10 of the year. Not that box office or awards matter that much at the end of the day, but it would make this kind of crazy ambitious sci-fi - and original films in general - easier to get through the system. Also, it was awesome. Director

These three seem pretty well locked: Richard Linklater (Boyhood) Alejandro González Iñárritu (Birdman) Ava DuVernay, (Selma) But the last two I'm not sure about at all. I guess this is the order of likelihood to my mind: Wes Anderson - Grand Budapest was fantastic, and dazzlingly made. I imagine Anderson will finally get a directing nod on the "It's his time" vote, but it still might be too quirky to get broad support. Morten Tyldum - The Imitation Game is certainly an excellent film and is going to get a lot of nominations, but the directing seems fairly straightforward. Or maybe it's just a shock that something that middle-of-the-road feeling came from the guy who did [i]Headhunters[/i]. Anyway, it wouldn't surprise me if something flashier got in instead. Clint Eastwood - apparently American Sniper is the usual "rough around the edges but highly effective" thing late-period Eastwood does, which has a way of splitting opinions. Plus, he already has two directing Oscars, so there's not exactly an overwhelming sense of him being under appreciated. Still, he'll probably get a number of votes from older members.

Damien Chazelle - Whiplash is absolutely incredible, and it might pull off the final slot on sheer quality.

David Fincher - This probably depends on how much the Academy actually liked Gone Girl. I have a feeling it's just lowbrow enough that Fincher will miss the shortlist.

Actor Michael Keaton (Birdman) Eddie Redmayne (Theory of Everything) David Oyelowo (Selma) Benedict Cumberbatch (Imitation Game) The top four there are probably locks; certain the top two are. The last slot seems like a battle between Steve Carell (Foxcatcher), Jake Gyllanhaal (Nightcrawler), Ralph Fiennes (Grand Budapest), Bradley Cooper (American Sniper), and Timothy Spall (Mr. Turner). I guess I'll bet on Fiennes, but none of the others would surprise me. I'd really love to see Miles Teller get it for Whiplash, unlikely as that may be.

Actress

Since Hollywood doesn't give enough great leading parts to women, this category is a lot more likely to go to more obscure performances. Julianne Moore (Still Alice) Reese Witherspoon (Wild) Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl) Jennifer Aniston (Cake) Felicity Jones (Theory of Everything) Longshots: Marion Cotillard (Two Days, One Night), Gugu Mbatha-Raw (Beyond The Lights), Shailene Woodley (The Fault In Our Stars), Jenny Slate (Obvious Child)

Supporting Actor JK Simmons (Whiplash) Edward Norton (Birdman) Ethan Hawke (Boyhood) Robert Duvall (The Judge) Chris Pine (Into the Woods) Pine is probably a risky prediction; Mark Ruffalo in Foxcatcher might be a safer bet. I would love Tyler Perry to pull a surprise nomination for Gone Girl, and that's not entirely out of the question.

Supporting Actress

Patricia Arquette (Boyhood) Emma Stone (Birdman) Jessica Chastain (A Most Violent Year) Tilda Swinton (Snowpiercer) Rene Russo (Nightcrawler) Meryl Streep is probably a wiser bet, but I think that would be 100% an "It's Meryl Streep" vote. Then again, she got nominated last year for exactly that. Keira Knightley might get swept in if The Imitation Game has any coattails. (she's very good, but not in a particularly flashy way) Carmen Ejogo (Selma) and Carrie Coon (Gone Girl) are longshots. I've also heard Kristen Stewart is outstanding in Still Alice, and I would love for her to get nominated the same way I want to see Tyler Perry get one.

Original Screenplay

Birdman - Alejandro González Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Armando Bo Boyhood - Richard Linklater The Grand Budapest Hotel - Wes Anderson & Hugo Guinness Dan Gilroy - Nightcrawler Paul Webb - Selma

Mike Leigh might take Nightcrawler's spot for Mr. Turner. The LEGO Movie (Phil Lord & Christopher Miller) and Top Five (Chris Rock) wouldn't shock me. Justin Simien (Dear White People) would be a surprise.

Adapted Screenplay

Gone Girl - Gillian Flynn The Imitation Game - Graham Moore The Theory of Everything -  Anthony McCarten Whiplash - Damien Chazelle Snowpiercer - Joon-ho Bong, Kelly Masterson

I doubt Guardians of the Galaxy will get in (if The Dark Knight couldn't nominated), but it'd be a gas if it did.

If every word of this is true, it has nothing to do with whether or not she’s a victim. She was falsely accused of fraudulently soliciting good reviews through sex (something that was so easily disproven it’s insane the accusation lasted more than a hot minute), and has spent years facing an endless barrage of rape and murder assaults, in ways that are quite public and easy to verify... but which are also infuriatingly anonymous and in a legally murky situation where the perpetrators can’t be punished. Not only she, but her family members have been harassed and persecuted for years on end. And this was insidiously camouflaged under cries for “ethics in video game journalism” and similar malarkey to draw in a massive crowd of those ignorant of the true context to unknowingly perpetuate these horrors. This is an organized mob torturing a woman (and other women) largely because she’s a woman. There’s no way to look at the evidence and not come to that conclusion.

It doesn’t matter if all the above is completely true, and she was a ridiculously unprofessional model when she was 20ish, and even if she spun some wild stories to excuse that. If true, it doesn’t reflect well on her, but that is completely irrelevant to the torturous hell that’s been rained down on her for the last several years. A victim is a victim, regardless of their human flaws.

Still think Zoe Quinn is an innocent victim?

The following was writen by Mallorie Nasrallah. Please take the time to read it-

“Alright, story time. I’ve been basically silent on this issue, I am not sure my contributions are relevant, and I have feared being ostracized and ridiculed. I can accept the latter, but I really hate to waste people’s time. In 2007 I lived in New Hampshire, and was working as a photographer with a number of soft core "alt” erotica / porn sites. I traveled frequently to work with models affiliated with the websites I was affiliated with. A model working under the name Locke Valentine - this is the woman currently known as Zoe Quinn - modeled for two websites I was affiliated with - she as a model, I as a photographer. One of those websites is still in business, the other - unfortunately the one we communicated via - is no more. Locke / Zoe was living in Albany, NY at the time. We expressed a desire to collaborate, and set a date for three photoshoots. In fall of 2007 (according to my EXIF data 10/25/2007) I packed up my equipment and drove the 220 miles to Albany, for a weekend of work with Zoe. By time I arrived in Albany, Zoe had cancelled one of the three shoots we had planned. She lived in a tiny apartment with her boyfriend / spouse / lover (I did not ask personal questions) and her roommate. I had been assured I could over night with them, and that they had room to accommodate a guest, and room to shoot in. They had neither. We ended up doing an impromptu shoot in the extremely crowded apartment, in the middle of the night, to try to save the shoot. I was not proud of it, but I knew with a bit of editing, it had potential. While we tried to plan a shoot for the next day Zoe, and Co. chatted with me. She claimed to have stabbed a man - attempted rapist - in the face, who had grabbed her. She relayed to me no less than three other accounts of alleged violent assault. I will not share the details here, I feel that would be fundamentally indecent. I was alarmed at this, and I admit, by the time she made the claim that she stabbed a man in the face with a knife* and ran away, I was skeptical as well. Two claims involved alleged workplace incidents, and were her prime explanation for why she could not hold a job. I was mildly disconcerted, because true or false, these stories have good cause to make one uneasy. She also claimed to have reported nothing to police, or management at her work. That was not all we discussed, we talked about modeling, the websites, and erotica/porn in general. It was what we both did for a living, and candid conversation on the subject was not unusual. The next day I had to drive everyone to the location of our shoot, which was her roommate’s place of employment. An arcade. This is the location where the photo shown here was taken. I was irritated that after driving 220 miles, and having to carry all my equipment to a shoot, I was also deliberately given the false impression that Zoe, and Co. would have their own transport. I was also irritated that Zoe could provide neither her own wardrobe for the shoot - it is normal for the model to use her personal items in these sorts of shoots - nor her own food while on site. Keep in mind, we both are paid by a site, once the photos are sold, everything I spent came out of my own pocket. Otherwise the shoot was unremarkable, it went far better than the one the night before, and we all had a basically good time. We tried for some more photos that afternoon in a forested area Zoe directed me to, but we had neither enough light, or privacy to shoot anything substantial or of value. I returned home, spent countless hours editing hundreds of photos. It was a terrible experience, but so be it. When I was ready to send the photos off to Deviant Nation - the site we worked for - I wrote to her to let her know. It was only a few days, a week at most, since I had left Albany, but I ALWAYS get a model’s final approval before I send photos off. As far as I know I am the only photographer working in that specific industry who had that strict policy. Zoe informed me that her roommate, who had been involved in the shoots, either by being in the apartment, or smuggling us in to her place of work turned out to be a, “ mentally unbalanced cunt,” (her words not mine) among other things, and that it was unacceptable to use ANY of the photos we had taken that weekend. I was pretty upset about this, and sent her several messages asking if perhaps I could talk to the roommate, have her sign a waiver, or something, despite the fact that neither Zoe, nor I, had any legal obligation to ask the roommate’s permission for ANYTHING. Zoe insisted that she was a crazy, evil bitch, and refused to provide me with any sort of contact information. Finally, weeks later, a handful of other models I had worked with on the site messaged me to inform me that Zoe had written them and told them that I forced her to look at, “mutilated vagina,” pictures, which she said, had horrified her, and she had basically sent me away then and there. The models she told this to knew me, and thankfully came to me with these nonsense claims. We had in fact discussed cosmetic surgery, while talking about modeling, and she had looked up Before/After Breast Implant images. The conversation moved on to Labiaplasty, and we looked at a few of those images as well. So, there is an inch of truth, in the really awful lie she told about me. There was never any force involved, and she was the one controlling the computer the whole time. This took place in her home, on her computer, with her boyfriend and roommate both in the room. I decided it wasn’t worth the fight. I was eventually contacted by the roommate, who told me a very different story to the one Zoe had, and I let the issue drop. I was never paid for the images, because I respected her wishes and never published them. I still have the images in archive on my computer, because I archive everything. I was never reimbursed for the gas, wardrobe, or food I purchased on the trip. To someone starting their career, that was quite a dig to my wallet. 7 years later, Zoe is still BY FAR the worst client I have ever had. What does this story have to do with GamerGate? When I realized Locke was Zoe, I was disgusted to see she was still playing the same games. Stealing, cheating, lying and claiming to be victimized by anyone and everyone. Maybe she did stab some guy in the face, and maybe in the first week at every new job she had, some guy tried to extort sex from her. Maybe that doesn’t establish an MO on her part. But I know, I did nothing wrong to that woman, and I did not deserve to be lied about. I did not deserve to have my time and my money wasted, and even now, I wonder if opening my mouth about this means she will think of some new horse shit to spread about me to try to ruin my career. And that does seem to be her modus operandi. If this were a courtroom, I would call myself some sort of character witness, and I’ll let you all make of this what you will. Share it if you feel like it, I couldn’t keep my mouth shut and watch her try to stomp out all the fires she has started by shitting on any more people’s careers. ‪#‎gamergate‬ ‪#‎zoequinn‬ *Edit Upon reading though archived emails, I discovered I can confirm and prove that she claimed to have killed the man she stabbed. (screenshot of email, irrelevant details redacted. https://scontent-a-sjc.xx.fbcdn.net/…/10714582_101522745870…)“

You can see the original post here- https://www.facebook.com/mallorie.nasrallah/posts/10152274324055882:0

reblog if youre still not over the library of alexandria

I sort of suspect this might still play into it - I always remember thinking that shot was weird. Remember the Mistress talking in one of the earlier episodes about how happy she was that she "chose" Clara. It wouldn't surprise me if this came back up as somehow the answer. Not sure how the ring fits in, but it's not like Stephen Moffat has never come up with clever explanations for tiny details before.

Although it might just be a bizarre artifact from using a long lens (or fully zoomed-in zoom lens) with a shallow focus in a fast shot with lots of movement. Nick Hurran's wild, unhinged use of the camera results in a number of bizarre moments, which are usually just kind of charming quirks as a side-effect of his visual flourishes.

When they get out of the painting. -unnoun

The hand is clearly Clara’s - the rings match. (Look a minute or two later, when she’s observing the board.) Whatever’s going on with the camera angle, it’s still clearly Clara.

Terminator 5 just keeps looking worse

The Terminator is having a bad day. It’s a muggy July afternoon in New Orleans—the temperature is loitering in the triple digits—and Arnold Schwarzenegger is...

Look, the title "Terminator: Genisys" actually getting through the sheer number of suits it had to have gone through for approval could just be a fluke. I mean, "Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice" must have had to get through just as many intelligent and/or marketing-minded adults.

Sure, it's written by the writers of, respectively, Alexander and the Dracula 2000 Trilogy. Good writers get screwed over by the system all the time. Looking at Andrew Kevin Walker's resume, you wonder how he could possibly have written something as brilliant as Se7en until you realize all his other scripts were shredded, mulched, and fed to the rats in the basement before they were filmed.

Sure, it's about a T-800 time-traveling to protect a young Connor (Sarah this time), making this a rehash of Terminator 3, which was itself a rehash of Terminator 2, which, let's be honest, was just a particularly brilliant rehash of The Terminator. There are good part 5s out there - Fast Five rocks, You Only Live Twice is... the worst of the 1960s Bond movies, but it had Little Nellie and that Volcano base and Donald Pleasance, and then there's... um... ah... does Batman Begins count as Batman 5?

But now we have pictures. And now we know that title wasn't a fluke. It was a warning.

Jai Courtney's Kyle Reese looks like a constipated kid at a water gun fight. Jason Clarke's John Connor could not look more bored. Matt Smith looks less like a tough soldier from the future and more like a paintball player worried about whether or not the turkey was overcooked in his TARDIS.

Emilia seems to be in the general realm of an actual character, even if that character is "waitress dressing as a biker for Halloween on a bad hair day". But then, here's the description of what Sarah Connor's up to:

Sarah Connor isn’t the innocent she was when Linda Hamilton first sported feathered hair and acid-washed jeans in the role. Nor is she Hamilton’s steely zero body-fat warrior in 1991’s T2. Rather, the mother of humanity’s messiah was orphaned by a Terminator at age 9. Since then, she’s been raised by (brace yourself) Schwarzenegger’s Terminator—an older T-800 she calls “Pops”—who is programmed to guard rather than to kill. As a result, Sarah is a highly trained antisocial recluse who’s great with a sniper rifle but not so skilled at the nuances of human emotion.

“Since she was 9 years old, she has been told everything that was supposed to happen,” says Ellison. “But Sarah fundamentally rejects that destiny.

So... they're not going with the compelling, relatable character from the first film, or the complex, unhinged badass from the second. Instead she's going to be emotionally distant like the second one but also not able to single-handedly take on an army (and with her combat skills apparently reduced to sniper instead of everything), so the worst of both worlds. And it looks like she'll have to be protected by both a Terminator and a buffer Kyle Reese. Hooray for feminism?

But hey, I was one of the poor unfortunate souls who liked Salvation and wanted a sequel to that, so maybe this just isn't directed at me.

On the other hand, they actually named it Terminator Genisys.

man I bet using sin to turn children into donkeys is a pretty economical business strategy but I’ve got to wonder how you would even discover this get rich quick scheme

just ran across this perfect 2000-year-old portrait of a pet who knows what he did.

"Dog Mosaic," Ptolemaic period, 2nd century BCE, floor of a house in Alexandria, Egypt. 3.25x3.25m. (Pitcher is probably gold.)