July 28, 2026

BW’s Daily Video> Marvel Studios’ Elitist Comic-Con Event

Catch more from JesterBell on YouTube

Sounds like a lot of elitism going on. Hall H goes to the “right” people over the fans. Actors and directors act like they created the characters, even if they existed before the actor or director was born, producers who are openly hostile to the fans, and a Studio runner who doesn’t want to admit events forced them to change plans and they couldn’t adjust while sticking to the formula. Why should I care what the “cool kids” are making when they’re doing it out of things other people liked, as if they stole the nerdy kid’s lunch money?

Posted by on July 28, 2026 in Marvel Spotlight, Movie Spotlight and tagged , , , , , .

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July 27, 2026

Chapter By Chapter> Star Trek: The IDIC Epidemic chapter 6

Chapter By Chapter (usually) features me reading one chapter of the selected book at a time and reviewing it as if I were reviewing an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic. There will be spoilers if you haven’t read to the point I have, and if you’ve read further I ask that you don’t spoil anything further into the book. Think of it as a read-along book club.

In our last chapter we checked in on the plague planet for a bit of a tease to the cause. Not much to say besides it’s getting worse.

This chapter goes back to Vulcan and Sorel. When I first read this book I didn’t read The Vulcan Academy Murders yet, but it’s been so long since I’ve read this novel that I don’t know what level of interest I had in this part of the story. In the first book, Sorel was one of the murder victims, which gave us an idea about how Vulcans grieve, at least in Jean Lorrah’s rendition. The novels are not canon unless they’re worked into the show or movies, the official source material versus the usually unofficial material like the novels, comics, audio dramas, and video games. So how Vulcan telepathic linkage might not work officially as it does in this story.

These were new characters to me, because Sorel, Dr. Corrigan, and T’Mir were Lorrah’s original characters, and as far I currently know never appeared outside of these two novels, or at least ones she made. Dr. M’Benga might as well have been new as he made so little impact compared to Dr. McCoy or even Pike’s doctor in “The Cage”, Boyce, because he was part of a character moment scene for Pike as well as his later appearances in the Early Voyages comic, a better take on Pike’s time as captain of the Enterprise from what I’ve seen of Strange New Worlds. No Spock with mental issues and no Klingon boy bands. As to whether I had any interest Lorrah’s original characters alongside the main cast I couldn’t tell you. It’s been too long. We’re also introducing more new characters that may or may not be important. We’ll see as the book goes on but we should get to the chapter now.

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Posted by on July 27, 2026 in Chapter By Chapter, Star Trek: The IDIC Epidemic and tagged , , , , , , , .

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July 27, 2026

BW’s Daily Video> Supergirl (2026): Superheroes Vs Westerns

Catch more of The Backdrop on the Second Wind YouTube channel

 

Posted by on July 27, 2026 in DC Spotlight, Movie Spotlight and tagged , , , , , , , .

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July 26, 2026

BW Programming Note> At Least The Bathroom’s Clean

I can relate to Kyle here. An overdue cleaning of the bathroom knocked me out this week. Even splitting the work up between days didn’t help, as the most exhausting part was done on Friday. I was wiped on Saturday. It’s why I didn’t get a comic review done this week, just after starting the new schedule of course. It’s why there’s no Jake & Leon, and why Friday gave us the next My Transformers Universe (finished that just in time) instead of talking about the latest Star Trek news, which I won’t get to until Tuesday since I’ll be doing the Chapter By Chapter review of a different Star Trek, The IDIC Epidemic, in the usual Monday slot.

Meanwhile, The Clutter Reports finished looking at G.I. Joe Vs The Transformers by reusing my old review of the last miniseries from Devil’s Due.

So we have the Star Trek news to go over on Tuesday unless some breaking news happens. Otherwise we’ll see what’s coming up when it comes up, and hopefully I’ll have a finished comic strip for next week. I just wasn’t able to work on it. At least the bathroom’s clean. Hopefully I can make sure it never needs that much work at once again along with the other dusting I still need to do. Maybe wait a few weeks on that one so I can focus on other stuff. Have a great week, everyone!

Posted by on July 26, 2026 in Uncategorized.

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July 25, 2026

No Saturday Night Showcase or Comic Review this week

Sorry, folks, but cleaning my bathroom, even splitting it up over a few days, still kind of drained me. Dusting, cleaning the toilet, tub, sink, and floor (I swept that thing like three times and washed it), just kind of drained me. Getting the brain going to do the Golden Age comic review or find a Saturday Night Showcase entry just didn’t happen today. I’m still trying to get my new “work” schedule into gear, and these two series I don’t have a buffer for.

Hoping to get this week’s Jake & Leon done in time but I also have guests coming. I just can’t focus tonight. So please forgive me. I’ll try to work to keep this from happening again. I guess if you want to find something interesting you’ll have to check old Showcases and Daily Videos, or do what you usually do. I’m just not up to anything. I really need get some working out into my schedule. Have a great night. There will either be a comic or a programming note tomorrow and I did have one last buffer for The Clutter Reports. I’m getting there, folks.

Posted by on July 25, 2026 in Uncategorized.

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July 25, 2026

BW’s Saturday Article Link> Nolan’s Odyssey And The Importance Of Language

Here’s a bunch of articles to check out today, actually.

Maybe I should get some more images, because Christopher Nolan’s take on Homer’s tale is still a big discussion topic. Regardless of how it does in the box office, even the writer of the translation Nolan supposedly based his take on has pointed out how wrong the adaptation is, and she turned it into some feminist scribe. Among the complaints like historic inaccuracy despite Nolan claiming changes were made to fit the time period (which was just an excuse to pull as much myth out of the mythology as possible and make a tale about wartime PTSD and guilt) is the use of modern terminology. As Carrow Brown writes for That Park Place, Nolan’s language choices further take the epicness out of the epic story and adds to the mundane. Writers, read this as a warning of how you use words in your story to set the story’s mood. As a final link, Bleeding Fool contributor Michael Fowler goes over other choices that further drain the epic myth of both epic and myth.

Posted by on July 25, 2026 in Book Spotlight, Movie Spotlight and tagged , , , , .

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July 24, 2026

My Transformers Universe> How I’d Start Cybertronian Civilization

It’s been too long since I’ve done one of these. It’s been in my head. I just didn’t have time to put it to text. I finally found the time.

As our chronicler is about to point out, Cybertron didn’t start out like other civilizations. The starter details…food, housing, protection, healing, building social groups and religion…were pretty much handed to them. They didn’t have to learn the basics of living. They just started. They still have to form laws, culture, a stronger society, and become a civilization.

I couldn’t tell that story until I finished going over the basics of how Cybertronian life operates. These are mechanical lifeforms, and one thing that has disappointed me is when writers make them too human. So how do I go about this artificial life without going too far the other way? Is it a balancing act? They’re robots, but they’re robots with emotions and everything that goes with that. They can transform into things and in my version have always been able to alter what that form is, something we’ve seen in TV and comics from literally the first story. Working early toy gimmicks, tech specs that used to give them “powers” (these were the Marvel Comics folks), and even explaining toy engineering and mold reuse all factored into how I approached Cybertronian life.

Now they have to take that and what they know about the universe, which is far more than the caveman, and become a proper civilization; mechanical people but still people. And so we turn things over to the chronicler, to tell us how the 13 Primes got the ball rolling before they went off to who knows were.

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Posted by on July 24, 2026 in My Transformers Universe and tagged , , , , .

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