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CUTENESS OVERLOAD: Toy Lamb Covers OneRepublic's 'Counting Stars' In Most Adorable Way Ever

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As we recover from YET ANOTHER BLASTED ICE/SNOW STORM in the Northeast, it takes a hell of a lot to make us feel anything close to happy. But this painfully cute cover of OneRepublic's Counting Stars featuring a wind-up toy lamb whose epic search for a home is so frakking adorable, most definitely does the trick.

Sung in a lamby-type voice that would grate on your nerves if it wasn't so sweet, this little ode to The Incredible Journey (if it starred a toy instead of pets) caused liquid to leak from my eyeballs at the end of it and a glowing warmth that filled the inside of my body like a belly full of tea.

In other words, it made me feel less crappy.

Now, if only that same feeling would melt the waist-high piles of snow from my yard so my dog could easily take a shit that would be great.

Video after the break.

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THE STAR WARS #5 (review)

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Review by Tony Pacitti
The Star Wars #5 (of 8) 
Writer: J. W. Rinzler  
Artist: Mike Mayhew  
Colorist:  Rain Beredo  
Cover Artist: Nick Runge  
Published by Dark Horse Comics
On Sale February 5th, 2013 

And with a proclamation of love as uncomfortable and ham-fisted as anything Episode II’s Naboo frolics had to offer, The Star Wars has jumped the shark.

What began as a noble oddity has become a tedious reminder of what it actually is, a draft of a beloved movie that was stripped for parts and abandoned for a reason.

It’s boring.

It’s world of Jedi Bindu and Sith Knights is half-baked at best. It’s set pieces lack the spark that they eventually found in the films. It’s characters are uninteresting.

The one moment I’ve really felt anything besides curiosity, ambivalence or boredom was at the end of #4 when Kane Starkiller tore open his shirt to reveal his cybernetic body and started yelling at people.

It was hilarious.

Also it wasn’t the first time he did that.

Also also, both times it played pretty much exactly like this:


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Walking Down The Aisle and Falling In Love...With Horror

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It was the early 1990s in Potomac, Maryland.

I, a bespectacled ginger child, was deep in the throes of early girlhood. Baby-Sitters Club, Polly Pocket, and Rainbow Brite ruled all in my wide eyes.  If you didn’t know who Shy Violet was I didn’t want to associate with you.

Pillsbury Toaster Strudels were still relatively new and Pepsi Clear was on the rise, at least momentarily anyway.

And of course, video stores were raking in cash by the bushel. This is the part where I say, facetiously, “Back in my day, those old, barren Blockbuster stores weren’t used solely to house pop-up Halloween shops.”  Oh, no. They had purpose! Whether it was a Blockbuster, Family Video, or a Mom & Pop type store, they were a staple in every community.

But, in my local store I stumbled upon three VHS covers that captured my attention, grabbed ahold of my heart strings and have yet to let go.

I don’t know about you, but I would get ultra jazzed every time my parents said we had to go to the video store. Ha, as though it were some sort of chore!  I mean, you needed a membership card for Christ sake.

This was exclusivity at it’s finest to my younger self.

My younger self

Our store was called Video Village. Upon arrival, I would always make a beeline directly to Rainbow Brite.

But, one day while my parents were looking at new releases, which I have to assume somehow involved Michael J. Fox, I strayed from the path.

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THINK TANK - SEASON 1 (Issues #1-#12) — COSMIC TREADMILL

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The last issue of Top Cow’s President and COO Matt HawkinsThink Tank: Season 1 hits shelves next Wednesday, February 12th.

Imagine being a successful comic book bigwig and a physicist and television producer and on top of all that, write a number of titles for Top Cow and Image!

With an insider’s view of the comic making industry, the back matter for Think Tank often has Matt speaking on readership numbers, legal and illegal. The Science Class at the end of the book also goes in-depth to his research and theoretical military tech used in the book.


Issue #12’s glossary announces what is next for the black and white spy-fi series as it embarks on a newly colored life in Season 2 and a one shot in March!

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Win a $50 Redbubble Gift Certificate

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Disclosure: We received a gift certificate from Redbubble.com to pass along to a FOG! reader. As a participant in the Redbubble affiliate program, we may receive compensation if you make purchases from their site after visiting links on our site.
Redbubble is quite simply the finest and most diverse creative community and marketplace on the interlink. There, we said it. With artists and designers hailing from every corner of the globe, displaying eye opening talent, skill, passion and enthusiasm for all forms of creativity there really is no better place for you to get your artistic kicks.

If you’re looking for unique and impossibly brilliant t-shirts, heart-stopping wall art, attention grabbing iPhone cases or any other beautifully designed products Redbubble presents an alternative to the mass producing hordes rudely hawking your individuality back to you on the main street.

For the creatives among you Redbubble is also a  marketplace where you can sell your work with zero hassle on a healthy range of incredibly high quality products. There's a playground of like minded humans displaying work, admiring work and discussing work. We’re into learning and collaborating and making people smile.  And they're free.
And thanks to the folks at Redbubble, we're giving away a $50 gift card to a Forces of Geek reader!

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Infographic: DESIGN STEREOTYPES

THROWBACK THURSDAY: Milky the Marvelous Milking Cow...A Toy That Would Ultimately Kill You

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Hey, you know what would be a great gift for a kid? A toy cow that you can milk.

That's right, just go right ahead suburban kid, grab those soft plastic teats and tug away. And you know what is even cooler? The stuff that comes out of those teats is called "pretend milk", a pale white substance made inside the bacteria-infested toy by combining water (which your stupid asshole toy can drink when you CRANK ITS TAIL) and a mysterious white pellet that may or may not be strychnine.

Not that you shouldn't drink the "milk" (I mean it wasn't totally toxic, sure there are probably a few cases of cancer that evolved 20 + years later but that can't be linked to Milky the Marvelous Milking Cow or anything) it's just that no one ever saw the kids in the commercial put the glass of teat juice to their own lips and down it.

IT NEVER FUCKING HAPPENED!

So yeah, some of us drank it...and now I have spinal arthritis and need my hips replaced.

Great toy Mom.

Watch the commercial after the break and be glad that some of you are too young to know what it was like to open a gift that contained a plastic cow that would slowly suck the life from you via poisoning.

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KICKSTART THIS: Help 'Finn & Charlie Are Hitched' Get A Fourth Volume

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In this age of "All Comics, All the Time", some people forget that the comic medium does not always involve superheroes and villains, sometimes a comic can be about the day-to-day life of a nice gay couple (Finn and Charlie) and their friends. Sure no one turns into a radioactive mutant who tears apart a large metropolitan city, but there is always drama when it comes to relationships.

And let's face it, some of those relationships look like an epic battle anyway.

In this new Kickstarter campaign from cartoonist Tony Breed, the fourth installment of the Ignatz-award-nominated webcomic Finn and Charlie Are Hitched: Everyone Is Somebody's Fetish is in the process of crowdfunding itself into happy town and wouldn't mind your help.

If you are unfamiliar with the story of Finn and Charlie, here's a bit of a breakdown:

 Finn and Charlie Are Hitched is a weekly slice-of-life comic about a gay couple, Finn and Charlie, who are married, and their friends. There's Candy, who has just become reacquainted with the daughter she gave up for adoption 22 years ago, Krys. There's Corey, a young gay man trying to figure out who he wants to be, and his on-again, off-again indie-rock boyfriend, Ken, who has become Krys's best friend. There's Finn's neurotic brother Gus, and there's Nina and Mike and their two kids, the very manic Katie, and their special-needs toddler, Bennie.



This particular edition will not only combine the comics from 2012-2013, it will also colorized them to create a rather handsome edition.

If you're interested in learning more about the Kickstarter venture watch the pitch video after the break and then click HERE to get all the info on the comic (including backer gifts).

Enjoy!

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Here's WILLIAM BURROUGHS ON SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE In 1981

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Yesterday would have been the Old Man's 100th birthday. I've always called Burroughs "Old Man" not in an attempt to mock his age or to belittle his literary accomplishments (no sir) but as a sign of the utmost respect for a man who introduced me to the splendid evolution of writing that not only opened my mind but my third eye as well.

I was 14 at the time I found a copy of Junky at my local library (and believe me, what a treat that was, for a small town, Mac Library was certainly fond of subversive writers and introduced me not only to Burroughs but to Charles Bukowski, Richard Brautigan, Kathy Acker and Hunter S. Thompson...in succession thanks to a very awesome librarian) and from that moment on, I was never able to look at books the same way ever again.

In fact, you can say that Junky, Nova Express, Naked Lunch, The Cat Inside, The Yage Letters, Queer and so many of his other works sparked a certain literary divination in me that has not only made me into the writer I am (even though it is so very obvious I am no where near Burroughs talent and that's perfectly okay with me) but made me exceptionally fond of any author who starts off a blank page by folding in time and space and creating something almost laterally apocalyptic in nature (I'm looking at you David Wong).

Now, to give the Old Man his proper due here's an interesting bit of TV Trivia. In 1981 Burroughs made his very first appearance on American TV, not on some news program, but on Saturday Night Live (yes, once upon a time SNL was every bit as subversive as Burroughs).

No he wasn't doing a skit, simply reading from both Nova Express and Naked Lunch.

Yep, he simply read...how fucking underground is that?

Take a look at the video (which is grainy, I'll warn you now) after the break.

 And Happy Birthday Old Man...Happy Birthday.

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All Hail MALEFICENT, My Favorite Dragon Lady

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I won't lie: Few things make me die of boredom faster than a dark re-imagining of a fairy tale.

That's what I thought when I heard about the upcoming Maleficent starring Angelina Jolie.



First of all, the "dark re-imagining" of a fairy tale is horribly ignorant of fairy tales the way they truly are. These stories, for children, are supposed to be full of danger and evil because you need real stakes for the hero or heroine to overcome.

Children believe in monsters, so their stories must give them monsters. Because they also believe in magic, and magic – spells, love, strength, duty – defeats all monsters. Guillermo del Toro knows; go watch Pan's Labyrinth again.

Second, these dark re-imaginings are so exclusively goth. In 2014. Is anything authentically goth any more? We've been making fun of these fake-tortured souls since SNL did those Goth Talk sketches since 1996. (So long ago that Chris Kattan was funny.) Thank the maker that Grimm stays goth-free and hangs out in hipster haven Portland.

Emo, goth's offshoot, isn't what it used to be.

The original goths are all 60. No one really improved on Siouxsie Sioux, attempts to revive Sandman comics just doesn't feel right anymore, and you can't be all that outsider when Hot Topic sells all your gear.

So, dark re-imaginings of fairy tales neither are re-imagining anything nor are they truly any kind of edgy.

But that won't stop Disney, the reason fairy tales in America lost their bite. Tim Burton's boondoggle blockbuster smash hit Alice in Wonderland has a sequel in the works, and last week, the House of Mouse dropped another teaser for Maleficent.


And I can't look away. I hate these dark re-imaginings of fairy tales. But I can't look away.

Look at all that green fire! The overinflated briar patches! The shining spindle's needle! The horns, that elfin face, those eyes. Even Lana Del Ray's cover of “Once Upon A Dream” slays me.

I don't think Maleficent will be good, yet. Trips my I-don't-know-about-this wires when I see the promos. It's gonna turn out that she's evil because someone broke her heart once, isn't it?

But I can't look away. Because … it's her. Maleficent. One of my all-time favorite villains.


What's not to love about Maleficent?

No character in Sleeping Beauty matches her elegance, her majesty, or her powerful, vampiric design by animator Marc Davis. She's witty, cruel, powerful, bitchy and terrifying, thanks to a vocal performance by Eleanor Audley, also known as the voice of Cinderella's stepmother. (For a real treat, check out Audley modeling, in costume, for the character design.)

The sky darkens when she shows up. In her first appearance, she crashes a party better than a Spider-Man villain at a museum charity ball or the Joker at a rooftop fund-raiser. Then, a true gangster, she issues a threat, says no one can stop her, and drops the mic. And it's a threat that will take 16 years! Hardcore.

Maleficent's so mean and evil that characters in the movie have a full-on discussion about why she's that way.


And Maleficent is so powerful that that the hero of the tale, Prince Philip, isn't smart enough or strong enough to defeat her once she goes into dragon mode, calling upon "all the powers of HELL!" Princess Aurora's fairy godmothers give Philip magic weapons and call him audibles the entire battle. His horse did more on his own – look at how he soldiers on through those thorns.

She's so badass that she doesn't sing a song.

I wonder how, in 2014, Maleficent will be handled in live-action. Jolie is, of course, an excellent get. No doubts about it. But such an arch character – her icy smile, cutting tone of voice, mixing cold-hearted killer with queen bitch – has been played for camp in the decades since Sleeping Beauty was released. With subpar writing and directing, this could go the Joan Crawford route real fast.

But there is hope.

Paul Dini is attached to the script. Dini, the man who reinvented Mister Freeze from a gimmicky Batman villain into a sympathetic agent of vendetta in Batman: The Animated Series'“Heart of Ice,” the saddest children's cartoon ever made.

The man who created Harley Quinn and made the Joker comic, ghoulish and ever-deadly. He ain't afraid of no iconic villain.

Co-writer Linda Woolverton, screenwriter of The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast, definitely knows her way around a Disney villain and monstrous actions in a fairy tale. Scar becomes a Hitlerian figure who bleeds the savannah dry.

But she also wrote Alice in Wonderland. Uh-oh.

And this is a lot to throw on the shoulders of first-time director Robert Stromberg, a visual effects, concept art and production design on Life of Pi, Pan's Labyrinth, The Golden Compass and The Hunger Games. And fairy tale “dark re-imaginings” Oz the Great and Powerful… and Alice in Wonderland. Ruh-roh.

At least Maleficent should look amazing, then. Jolie sure does in the role. As Lana Del Ray drones, those green flames swirl and demon eyes flash, there's a chance.


I hope they do my favorite dragon lady proud.


The Top 3 Reasons SUPERMAN VS BATMAN Will Redefine Comic Book Movies

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Man Of Steel is the Peyton Manning of movies: unwarranted hatred for being amazing. To be fair, I can see how some people might not likeMan Of Steel but you can’t say it’s a bad movie just because it’s not your momma’s Superman. With my praise for Man Of Steel aside, the sequel is already shaping up to be an even bigger bridge for trolls to lurk beneath.

Here you go, you bastards.

With the casting of Ben Affleck, the Internet nearly broke.

Then, Gal Gadot almost broke Google.

Now, just a few days ago, the Internet took another blow to the head with the casting of Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor.

Seeing as how the movie is two years away, and I love the Internet too much to see it self-destruct, read on and hopefully let some of your fears be set to rest (or don’t and keep hating – because we all know what they say about haters).

Hint: They hate.


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SWAG A-GO-GO: reviews for stuff you should check out

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Here at FOG! HQ lots of cool stuff comes in, giving us the opportunity to check out some merchandise, that to be completely honest, we think you should check out!

This time out we've a bunch of gadgets geared toward your more tech-centric interests.


Meze 11 Deco Earphones
 
At any time, I have two or three sets of headphones with me.  No longer.  The Meze 11 Deco are, without a doubt, the best earphones I have ever used. Visually, they are stunning.

The elegant handcrafted beech wood enclosure reproduces crisp but warm, natural sound and a microphone on the flexible, non-tangle cord makes this not only a performant sound system but elegant accessory as well.  In addition the earphone comes with 3 sizes of soft silicone ear-tips and an EVA case for carrying.

The sound quality is so sharp, in fact, that nothing less than a perfect digital source tends to have some background noise or hiss.  That being said, the Meze 11 is a must have for any music aficionado or regular listener.

(sample provided by Meze)


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PAUL BETTANY is THE VISION in AVENGERS 2: AGE OF ULTRON

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That's point for Marvel.

DC, whattaya got?



Win DICK FIGURES: THE MOVIE Prize Package

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Featuring the viral humor of its creators Ed Skudder and Zack Keller, Dick Figures the Movie is a classic story of friendship, love and betrayal. Its heroes Red and Blue (on the solemn advice of a Japanese raccoon) embark on an epic quest to discover The Great Sword of Destiny – and hopefully unlock the secret to the most-awesomest gift of all time for Blue’s super hot girlfriend, Pink. And like the series, the 73-minute movie is set to an all original thumping electronic dance score from Composer Nick Keller.

And we're giving away a prize pack which includes a signed poster, a Blu-ray and a t-shirt.

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A Dame to Die for in FATALE: DELUXE EDITION


Sequart Announces SHE MAKES COMICS Documentary and Kickstarter Campaign

Image Announces 'CBLDF: LIBERTY' – Protect Your Freedom To Read!

Win 'Young Detective Dee: Rise Of The Sea Dragon' on Blu-ray!

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From legendary action director Tsui Hark and the creators of international smash hit DETECTIVE DEE: MYSTERY OF THE PHANTOM FLAME comes the captivating tale of Dee Renjie’s beginnings in the Imperial police force. His very first case, investigating reports of a sea monster terrorizing the town, reveals a sinister conspiracy of treachery and betrayal, leading to the highest reaches of the Imperial family.

And we're giving away three copies!

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Everything You Need to Know in One Minute Video on the Sochi Olympics

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We're hearing a lot of super interesting things coming out of Sochi right now. Like the fact that only six of the nine media hotels are ready (and we use the term "ready" loosely with drinking water that looks like this) and toilets that encourage the buddy system. Couple that with reports of government bribes and human rights violations and we might be in for a long February.

If you're still trying to figure out everything that's going on with the Games, you're in luck- this handy little video from the folks at Everything You Need to Know in One Minute will fill you in on all the details.



THE LEGO MOVIE (review)

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Review by Benn Robbins
Produced by Dan Lin, Roy Lee
Screenplay by Phil Lord, Chris Miller
Story by Dan Hageman, Kevin Hageman, 
Phil Lord, Chris Miller
Based on Lego Construction Toys
Directed by Phil Lord, Chris Miller
Starring Chris Pratt, Will Ferrell, Elizabeth Banks,
Will Arnett, Nick Offerman, Alison Brie, 
Charlie Day, Liam Neeson, Morgan Freeman



I seriously don’t know where to begin with The Lego Movie.

This will probably be my least “professional” review of a film ever.

I am not apologetic.

This film was a metaphysical, emotional roller coaster that I WAS NOT expecting.


From the opening “Everything Is Awesome” intro song to the PIXAR-esque emotional gut-wrenching moment near the end, The Lego Movie delivers a 1-2-3–5-6-7-8-9-10 hit combo of sheer brilliance.

At it’s very basic story, the film is you average “Chosen One” story.

Every trope of this type of story is shot at you like a tee shirt machine gun.

However, HOW it is done and how tropes are spun on their heads and dealt with are magical and sublime.

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