Black Panther, directed by Ryan Coogler. What a movie. I’ve been waiting for it for a while and it was very much what I wanted. As a spectator and comic-book fan, I’ve been involved in every wave of superhero movies. I still remember the excitement for Sam Raimi’s first Spider-Man but as everything, things get old. Marvel movies got old, in the past few years. Despite still being enjoyable, they felt more and more like junk-food movies: you enjoy them while you are there but they leave little behind. Black Panther was different: the world-building, the production, the stories are here to stay. And something else: I’m not a person of color and I can’t even begin to imagine how refreshing and right it must feel to see a whole superhero movie where people of color are protagonists. It was about time. (A)
Altered Carbon – Out of the Past, directed by Miguel Sapochnik. Watched one episode and gave up. Everything felt like something I saw many many many times before. Cyberpunk should be about showing us new things and new worlds, this one feels like Blade Runner all over again. (C)
Interaction18. Not really media but… almost? On February 3rd I went to Lyon to IxDA’s Interaction18 conference. It was an incredibly inspiring and humbling event. So so so many smart people are working in so many different directions in the design field, trying to build up antibodies against the current, scary, trends design and technology are moving towards. A few favorites:
– Farai Madzima – Can being African make you bad at design? — Cultural bias in design
– Tatiana Toutikian – Speculative needs XOXO
– Khoi Vinh – Thinking critically about design and criticism
Northernlion plays Xcom 2. Last month I professed my love for Waypoint’s Tactical Tuesdays, this month I expanded on that and started watching Northernlion plays Xcom. Again, there’s nothing particularly interesting or new going on here, but Northernlion is incredibly entertaining and funny and the whole thing is just very relaxing. It’s good junk food. (A)
Everything Sucks, created by Ben York Jones, Michael Mohan. Watched it with a group of friends, and it almost immediately turned into semi-hate watching. The characters are incredibly derivative and act very much on rails. A very sweet relationship saves the ending but there’s very little meat around the bone. (C)
Super Mario Odyssey, by Nintendo. I’ve been playing Super Mario Odyssey in coop with my girlfriend for the last couple of months. I played as the second player, controlling Cappy, Mario’s hat. The game is, honestly, a joy.
Few words on playing as the second player: I really enjoyed playing Cappy. The game is designed to give Cappy a limited set of abilities and the second player is in most cases a helper rather than a fundamental support for player one. It’s a style of gaming I was not used to: I tend to play single players game where I need to pay attention and be focused. Playing Cappy gave me the ability to play a supporting role and with a different intensity. In some cases Cappy can still mess up the thing the first player is trying to achieve but it’s mostly a problem of communication in complex sections. Overall, it was a very good coop experience. (A)
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