Brandon Freeberg

Game of Thrones Recap: The Episode Where S@#$ Goes Down

Posted 5/30/12 1:45 pm EST by Brandon Freeberg in Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin, HBO, Humor

Written by: Brandon Freeberg & Charlie Norwood

And the wildfire's green glare, the Davos' son bursting in air, gave proof through the night, that King's Landing was still there.

Similar to last season's ninth episode "Balon", where Lord Eddard Stark gets his head lopped off (spoiler alert?), the ninth episode of this season titled "Blackwater" is one that leaves pretty much everyone floored. The wildfire explosion has to rank up there as one of the top "swag" moments of the show, right there with Daenerys' dragons first appearing, Viserys getting his golden crown, and the just mentioned beheading of Ned. In other words: It. Was. AWESOME!

It's been a long time coming, but overall we feel HBO did a solid job at adapting the Battle of The Blackwater for television. Of course we also have a few gripes, so lets get into things.

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Game of Thrones Recap: Someone Important Died Finally!

Posted 4/30/12 7:52 pm EST by Brandon Freeberg in Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin, HBO, Humor, TV

Written by: Brandon Freeberg & Charlie Norwood

This season of Game of Thrones has been heavily focused on expanding the world of Westeros and beyond the Narrow Sea. We've met a ton of new characters so far, but surprisingly a lot of the old characters have done a good job at staying alive. That was until last night, when last week's cliffhanger (Melisandre's vagina shadow) crept into Renly's tent and drove a blade through his back, to the horror of both Brienne and Catelyn Stark. Huge plot twist, especially since it sounded like Renly was leaning towards making peace with Robb. Just a heads up from two guys who have read the books, don't expect anything you want to happen in this story to actually happen because George R. R. Martin will never do it. We won't elaborate on what we mean by that, but in a few years when the show is all said and done, you'll get it.

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BTVS Fans Rejoice: Willow and Spike Get Their Own Comic Book Series!

Posted 4/18/12 1:41 pm EST by Brandon Freeberg in Comic Books, Dark Horse

It's gotta be magic: fan-favorite "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" characters Willow & Spike are getting their own comics! Dark Horse just announced the two miniseries today:

Willow is slated for a November 21 release. Details are sketchy at the moment, but we know that the creative team of Jeff Parker (Thunderbolts, Agents of Atlas) and Brian Ching (Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Witchblade) are attached to the project. The plot is described as follows:

Willow is on a quest to bring magic back to the world, and she’ll do anything to make it happen, including forming some unhealthy alliances after cracking the code to travel to other dimensions—something thought impossible since the destruction of the Seed.

Dark Horse also released this nifty cover by David Mack, and that's no small shakes either: Read More...

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Tonner To Put Out Hunger Games Dolls...And We've Got A Sneak Peek!

Posted 4/18/12 11:51 am EST by Brandon Freeberg in Toys

Collectible doll makers Tonner always put out some gorgeous stuff -- everything from Harry Potter to Twilight to DC/Marvel superheroines. So when this reporter visited them at this year's Toy Fair, she wondered aloud if Hunger Games dolls might not be too far behind. Well, it's happened: the company recently announced that they have acquired the license to produce 16-17 inch dolls based on the hit movie.

No date has been set yet for release, but they've announced the characters they will be sculpting dolls for: Katniss Everdeen (as portrayed by Jennifer Lawrence), Peeta Mellark (as portrayed by Josh Hutcherson) and Gale Hawthorne (as portrayed by Liam Hemsworth). Tonner also posted a sneek peek video on their site: Read More...

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It's The Archie Gang As You've Never Seen Them Before: Gender-Swap In August

Posted 4/16/12 4:36 pm EST by Brandon Freeberg in Archie Comics, Comic Books

With the huge popularity of such gender-swapped characters as Adventure Time's Fionna and Prince Gumball, it was only a matter of time for the Archie gang to follow suit. August sees Riverdale turn into "Reversedale" as Archie, Betty, and Veronica gets to see how the other half lives thanks to Sabrina the Teenage Witch. Here's Archina, Ronnie, and Billy:

Yes, that's the sound of thousands of fingers loading this image into Tumblr.

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As The Watchmen Turns: Gibbons Feels Guilty and Moore's Still Not Happy

Posted 4/12/12 4:55 pm EST by Brandon Freeberg in Comic Books, DC Comics

The sheer irony of Alan Moore's continual and quite public angst over the upcoming "Watchmen" prequels is that each episode provides the comics in question more and more of a spotlight -- a level of schadenfreude that garners much mass-market interest in the fruits of an industry often relegated to a niche audience. Moore's in-depth interview with BBC's HARDtalk was no different, and while a number of topics were covered -- the "V for Vendetta"-inspired masks of Anonymous, the role of porn/erotica in "The Lost Girls" -- the author's displeasure with "Before Watchmen" was thoroughly addressed.

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Rorschach + Ron Swanson = Awesome In This Watchmen and Parks And Rec Mashup!

Posted 4/12/12 3:00 pm EST by Brandon Freeberg in Comic Books, DC Comics, TV

My favorite Tumblr at the moment (having just replaced the no less excellent "Batman Running Away From S**t") is "Ron Sworschach" -- which combines lines of Rorschach's dialogue from "Watchmen" with images of Parks and Recreation's Ron Swanson, and vice-versa.

The mumbling objectivist vigilante and the meat-loving libertarian mesh surprisingly well, leaving me unable to exactly recall who uttered such classic lines as "You had me at meat tornado" and "Good joke. Everybody laugh. Roll on snare drum." Would love to see a Leslie Knope/Silk Spectre or Ben Wyatt/Nite Owl.

Here are a few of my favorites, definitely check this Tumblr out:

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Fuller On Munsters Reboot: "We Want This To Be An American Harry Potter"

Posted 4/12/12 1:18 pm EST by Brandon Freeberg in TV

The first image from the upcoming Munsters-reboot "Mockingbird Lane" is up at Entertainment Weekly, as well as an in-depth interview with showrunner Bryan Fuller. While the project -- which Fuller refers to in such high-concept descriptions as "an American Harry Potter" and "The Real Housewives Of Transylvania" -- takes its initial inspiration from the cult 1960s TV sitcom, it's clear from the interview that the show will be going in a somewhat different direction.

For example, there will be more monsters on the show other than the standard Frankenstein, Dracula, and Wolf-boy. Fuller, a big fan of the Universal Monsters, teases that we might go through a whole gamut of fantastical creatures, including possibly a Mummy, Creature From The Black Lagoon, and Invisible Man. There will ironically also be a strong element of realism; Fuller tells EW: "Any story you can tell on Parenthood we can run through a Universal monster prism and tell it in a very twisted off-kilter way." This goes so far as to reimagine Eddie Munster's lycanthropy as a "disability" that his parents have to reconcile. Read More...

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George R. R. Martin Surprises Us With A Reading From "The Winds Of Winter"

Posted 3/29/12 3:56 pm EST by Brandon Freeberg in Books, Fantasy, Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin

As usual, let's start things off with ****SPOILER ALERT****!!!!

So at the end of last year, MTV Geek posted how everyone's favorite fantasy author (not to mention the most famous person currently living in New Mexico), George R. R. Martin had put up on his blog a chapter from his unreleased sixth novel in the A Song of Ice and Fire series, The Winds of Winter. For those of you who didn't read it, the chapter revolves around Theon Greyjoy sharing a couple LOL moments with Stannis Baratheon and company.

With the second season of Game of Thrones getting ready to kick off this Sunday on HBO, Martin must be in a happy, giving mood because he decided in a taped interview to read another scene from Winds. Below is the full interview, with the reading beginning around the 29:54 marker: Read More...

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"Simpsons" Did It: "Game of Thrones" Intro

Posted 3/5/12 4:30 pm EST by Brandon Freeberg in Animation, Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin

Last night's episode of "The Simpsons" had Springfield going Westeros on everyone's ass with a "Game of Thrones" intro parody. Just like in the beginning of the acclaimed HBO series, we see Evergreen Terrace as a gear-heavy, mechanized realm, sprouting up from the ground. Although you never saw him in full knight armor in the show, I like to think Homer is doing his best impression of a lazy, drunk Eddard Stark.

Parody intros have become typical for the show, but there were definitely a few subtle takes on story related concepts that we thought were hilarious and worth pointing out:

Weirwood tree Grandpa was a great touch.

3 eyed crows: Spawned from Bran Stark's dreams or Burn's nuclear power plant side effects?

Congratulations are in order for Matt Groening and his staff for really knocking this one out of the park.

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