STRANGE LOG: He's The Only One With Rhythm

Yes, yes, another Strange Log (before the end of the year no doubt) and yet here we are, no proper articles (except for a measly review of "House Of Cards" Season 6). Anyways, let's dive in shall we?

Right outta the gate, let's talk "Avengers: Endgame"! A trailer for the final Avengers movie has been released and man is it good! I won't go into Easter eggs and all that jazz, there are more than enough Youtube videos theorizing and the like; instead, I'm gonna focus on who was obviously absent from the trailer and that was the new lady of the MCU Ms. Marvel herself. Now granted, I doubt she'd show up considering her own movie is on the way but just a hint of her role in "Avengers: Endgame" would have been welcomed. The trailer teases Scott Lang's importance very much at the end. I and many others already figured that Scott's connection to the Quantum Realm was already going to play a major part in "Endgame" and with the trailer all but confirming that outright makes it clear that he's a very important cog in the machine. Which leads me to just how exactly Captain Marvel's going to play a role in things seeing as how she's just a heavy...or another Thor.

It's been teased that she's the most powerful character in the MCU...but again I don't see her doing much of anything except for punching Thanos a lot. Seeing as how we already have a character perfectly capable of killing Thanos (Thor) Captain Marvel seems a touch superfluous. But what do I know? I gotta see the movie and see it I shall.

Of course, we all know who really saves the day.

Since we're talking about superheroes, let's talk about a movie that came out of nowhere but now undeniably has my attention and that is "Brightburn", a superhero movie that posits the idea of what if Superman didn't have good intentions? This caught me by surprise and I have to say, I'm interested. We see a lot of superheroes flicks but no super villain movies and this looks to be among the first. It's classified as a horror movie and while I disagree with that classification I can see why it's be labeled as such. The whole thing views like a Superman movie until you get to the halfway point and realize something's off with this kid. This reminds me of how "Chronicle" came out of nowhere and that was an amazing movie in its own right. This looks to be along the same lines and I'm pretty interested to see what comes of it.

Since we're on the topic of superheroes "Glass" is coming out and I couldn't be more excited. What has me curious though is Casey's involvement. Casey is the character introduced in "Split" the only person to survive The Horde. What can she contribute to this movie? Aside from that, the trailer features Sarah Paulson playing a psychiatrist who manages to somehow have David Dunn, Elijah Price, and Kevin Crumb all in one place and in captivity. Kevin & Elijah, I can understand but David isn't a criminal...not exactly anyway so seeing how he ends up there will be interesting. It's also good to see Spencer Treat Clark coming back as David's son, of course, Robin Wright wasn't going to return (she's off making that "House Of Cards" money). Anyways, couldn't be more excited for this film.

Final in the movie department "Godzilla: King Of Monsters" is well on its way and MY GOODNESS does this movie boast a lot of monsters, you got Rodan, Mothra, and ring-leader, the leader of the pack, my personal favorite King Ghidorah! The previous "Godzilla" film left much to be desired with Godzilla laying the smackdown on MUTO but with no familiar faces, focus on human characters and a gross misuse of Bryan Cranston more could have been done. This film looks more like a return to form so long as we DON'T FOCUS ON HUMAN CHARACTERS! The original Godzilla films were a cross between Kaijus and professional wrestling with Godzilla essentially playing the role of Hulk Hogan and his challengers playing the role of anyone who'd dare challenge the Hulkster. There was a time in my youth when I was a HUGE Godzilla fan (same way I once was a fan of Hulk Hogan) so this is right up my alley and I'm really hoping they stick to the format of big monsters fighting with eye lasers and mouth beams...and for the love of God, make King Ghidorah badass.

All of my YES!

Now let's talk Netflix. My wife and I have dived into "The Haunting Of Hill House" and I'm hoping a one Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk have been paying attention because THIS IS HOW YOU WRITE AN AMERICAN HORROR STORY, YOU HACKS! I'll admit the series started off very cold for me, a lot of characters (save for 3) were unpleasant and annoying but after the Luke & Nelly episodes the show REALLY picked up steam. Luke is easily my favorite character next to Hugh, the rest of the kids I can't stand. We've just got the last episode to watch but I really don't see how they can squeeze another season out of this because basically all the questions we've asked are getting answered. Unless this show is an anthology which showcases a different family entering the house and the various goings on but eventually that'll get boring since we all know how it'll end. But I don't see what more The Crain family can do. We'll see.

Now let's talk video games "Mortal Kombat 11" has been officially announced for April with a trailer and everything featuring Dark Raiden as he battles Scorpion. Despite Raiden now being in his dark persona, I'm REALLY hoping he's not the central bad guy and some new antagonist from another realm steps up and tries to take their shot at the title. The thing about the Mortal Kombat games is that each installment the story becomes less and less about the tournament and more and more about simply protecting the realms. But seeing as how the rules were changed by Raiden & Shoa Kahn (in "Mortal Kombat" Raiden agreed to a single tournament to replace the system of 10 and won so basically no Mortal Kombats for Earthrealm..ever?) I don't see how there would be a tournament. Anyways, now that we got a new swath of characters in Takaeda, Jacqui, Cassie, Kung Jin, Erron Black, Kotal Kahn, and so on I have a wish list for some characters I'd like to see moving forward.

For starters earlier rumblings of the game hinted at new characters like Kano's son Dominic and a character named Salinas who was hinted as being a dream goddess...which makes me wonder if she's the chick featured in Jade's ending in "Mortal Kombat";

What's been discussed is this game having a story mode more akin to "Shaolin Monks" which is pretty awesome and a nice step up from the Chapter style character focused story mode we've seen the previous games. However, I'm wondering who will step up as the central protagonist for the series. Cassie Cage was more or less a sleeper protagonist but she doesn't have the charisma to carry the franchise on her shoulders like Liu Kang could. The new group together is likable enough to do it together but the "Mortal Kombat" Franchise needs a new Liu Kang. I'm hoping this game goes over really well. The failure with the previous next-gen MK character is that all of them came after the death of Liu Kang and none of them had the charisma to really take the story from him. Kenshi had a great look and an interesting story surrounding him but he can't carry the franchise either. And while Scorpion & Sub-Zero are legacy characters, they're not main character material.

Thus far, despite being disappointed that MKX was just a retread of "Mortal Kombat 4", the familiar territory does lend it's self to guiding the story toward something we can understandably predict. Plus considering we've had several "Mortal Kombat" games in the past and this current series is a reboot, this gives the creators to correct the problems of the previous games. By problems, I mean introducing a whole lot of new stuff with little to no setup. Now that we know other realms exist (of course we already knew that we've just never seen them) I'm really hoping they get introduced properly and the other characters get introduced properly as well. A few characters I'm hoping pop up are Hotaru (I really liked his rigid order thing) and if they made her hotter Ashura would be a welcomed character to have. Likewise, I'm hoping we get another Edenian character, a Lin Kuei member whose powers aren't ice related (basically I don't want Frost's generic ass anywhere near the series).

Likewise, I'm hoping Dark Raiden isn't the primary antagonist. I'd be fine with Daegon coming into play as he has slightly enough clout to pull off being a major villain (just hope they change his look) OR (and this is far-fetched as far-fetched can get) Rain can actually get some shine as a major villain. Rain has always been an ambitious asshole and his playing Richard The 3rd to nearly every main bad guys has got to pay off eventually! Plus the dude is a half-god (son of an Elder God, yo! Argus!) If that doesn't give him clout, I don't know what will. But more than likely Dark Raiden means the big boy is back, Onaga! Oh well, only time will tell how this story pans out. Rest assured that if I get my PS4 I shall be playing this!

Potential Time Goddess?

Now let's talk about some stuff, some strange stuff. Let's talk about streaming services and how every company with an audio/visual project seems to want to get one. Disney is apparently going to launch their own Marvel streaming service; a service that is currently boasting a number of shows. Currently, a Loki series has been announced but others such as Black Widow & Falcon have been rumored; and now with the cancellation of "Daredevil", "Luke Cage" & "Iron Fist" on Netflix, it looks like Disney is trying to keep all their properties in-house. While I can't say that I blame them, this has gotten WAY out of control. Netflix was the trailblazer with a streaming service offering movies & TV shows but once it produced "House Of Cards" is started a fire. "House Of Cards" was proof that an online service could compete with the likes of HBO, Showtime & so on.

Then Amazon jumped on the bandwagon with "The Man In The High Castle" & "A Handmaid's Tale", hell even Playstation (bless their heart) attempted to jump on with "Powers" and now (bless their hearts) DC/Warner Bros. has decided to come out with their own streaming service as well, boasting the show "Titans" (has anyone watched it? I still can't bring myself to do it) and a few others coming down the pike ("Swamp Thing", "Young Justice: Outsiders", "Harley Quinn"...the actual one not the whore). I'm all for companies wanting to keep their properties in-house but has any of these mofos ever stopped to realizes people aren't gonna have the money for all this? I mean they gotta realize someone's gonna be on the losing end of this. Netflix has already lost "House Of Cards" and all of the Marvel shows that were basically keeping them above water (as I haven't heard anyone geeking out about "The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt" or "Orange Is The New Black" for a while). Amazon is keeping up with the jones but they're a retailer and I have to wonder if their heart is really in streaming their own original content. Then comes DC which is going on full on Netflix and hosting their own in-house product.

Technically, DC should have the leg up or Marvel since they own all of their characters but Marvel already set the gold standard for an HBO style superhero series with "Daredevil", and considering most of the DC stuff is on The CW, DC has quite a bit to move if they wanna draw some of those old eyes to their new streaming service. This is risky business all around and for DC & Marvel/Disney to be putting up money for a subscription style streaming service either shows confidence or massive stupidity. I guess we'll see.

Finally, let's talk about something I haven't talked about in a while and that's Battle Rap. I've been absent from the battle rap scene for a LONG time (basically even since Rone lost the chain) and there are a lot of new battlers I haven't watched and much like the world of The Internet, if you miss a day it's like missing a year...so I've missed basically a lifetime. Now there are new leagues, Murda Mook is out of retirement and battled Aye-Verb (?) and it wasn't on SMACK (?) and somehow Pat Stay is still relevant (?) these things baffle me completely. But one event I'll usually poke my head into is coming up: World Domination. It's basically The Wrestlemania of Battle Rap where battlers from all over the world compete against North America's top battlers. The matchups haven't been announced but if they get Fresco back and a few others I might consider watching this. Also, despite not having the best showings I'm hoping Hollohan returns against an opponent who can match his style (namely Unanymous) and I'm hoping Loe Pesci comes back (although with Bender passing away, I doubt it).

Seriously, this is NOT on URL?

Point is I wanna get back into battle rap but I don't have time to watch every battle and I wanna see some good battles, not a bunch of people joking with each other and playing nice (like everyone wants to do with Pat Stay...except Arsonal...which is why he killed him the 1st battle). Anyways, if any of my old battle rap crowd is reading (not sure why you would) let me know if there are any battles worth watching. Anyways that'll do it for my guys! Here's a GIF of Sonya & Cyrax dancing, why? Because hey, a new Mortal Kombat game! Catch ya'll later!