Book Review: Django Wexler: How To Become The Dark Lord And Die Trying (2024)

 "Davi has done this all before. She's tried to be the hero and take down the all-powerful Dark Lord. A hundred times she's rallied humanity and made the final charge. But the time loop always gets her in the end. Sometimes she's killed quickly. Sometimes it takes a while. But she's been defeated every time.

This time? She's done being the hero and done being stuck in this endless time loop. If the Dark Lord always wins, then maybe that's who she needs to be. It's Davi's turn to play on the winning side."

  I picked this one up purely because of the title, The author happily admits that it is inspired by the current wave of Isekai manga.

  To explain Isekai for those who have no bloody idea - ordinary dude from our world gets dumped into a fantasy world where he ends up being the hero needed to stop the Big Bad. It's nearly always a dude too. 

Well in this case, our "hero" is a heroine with a good line in snarky inner monologue, a tendency to throw footnotes about with cheerful abandon and a healthy libido.

  Davi is also really, really sick of  her efforts to save the realm ending in a messy death and yet another rebirth/reset. Hence the whole "Fuck this hero shit, let's go down the Sith route instead."

 Despite this, Davi is actually very easy to like and less of a jerkass than most heroes these days.  Big plus point, believe me. 

  I can't honestly describe this as the sort of book that makes you go "Wow." Not quite on that plateau but not far underneath. 

What you do get is  a story that moves along with a nice mix of action, flashes of humour and some interesting takes on what it really means to lead people. I was entertained the whole way through and will be keeping an eye out for book #2. 

Heavy Metal Cover Girls - Actually Wearing Armour

 Hello and welcome to another edition of Heavy Metal Cover Girls. 

 There's a very good reason why I keep posting album covers with women warriors on them. Heavy metal artists have created lot and lot of them. At this point I think I've done six posts and I could easily do another ten more. 

 

 But today I fancied doing something a bit different. Out of all the pics I have saved, amongst all the chain-mail bikinis and topless amazons, how many of these women are actually wearing proper armour. 

 I found six 

Ok then, let's dive in, shall we?

Fiona - Greatest Hits (USA 2009)

This one is cheating a bit because somebody just recycled a bit of Dragonlance artwork.

It's also an odd choice for an artist who has no fantasy influences in her music whatsoever.  

Savage Grace - Sign of the Cross (USA 2023)

Not wearing a helmet but to be honest, I don't know how she'd get all that hair under a bascinet anyway. 

The rest of the harness seems pretty realistic though. 

 I do want to know the story with the bloody guy at her feet. 

Friend? Enemy? 

Is she offering the late rites or telling him "I told you I'd get my revenge."

Scythia - Lineage (Canada 2016)

 In a rare example, she is wearing more armour than he is and look how that worked out.

Simacota - Suando El Silencio Se Rompe  (Colombia 2017)

Why are none of them wearing a damn helmet? 

Anyway, a nice samurai-influenced rig that protects most of the important bits and the 

designer has resisted the urge  to add a boob-window, boob plates or massive shoulderpads. 

I approve. 

A Sound of Thunder - Only One Can Rule EP ( USA 2024)

I guess she couldn't find a helmet that fit her horns.

I also feel those spikes on her should plates are more a menace to her than the enemy.

Minor Quibbles.  

This last one is stretching it a bit but I want to emphasise something here.

Even though her armour is apparently put together from bits found in the bin,

she is still wearing more armour than normal.  

Soleil Moon - Warrior (USA 2019)

 You're not wearing any padding so that's gonna chafe you to buggery. 

Maybe once you kill that wizard, you can upgrade to some leg armour too. 

For those of you missing the chainmail bikinis, normal (fan)service will be resumed next time I do one of these. 

Or I might post Gorgons instead. We shall see how I feel. 

That's All Folks

Going to Southampton to look at a boat.

 It was payday and I was itching to get out of the house and out of Pompey. I hadn't been anywhere interesting for a while and fancied doing something new.  

 People with more money might hop on a flight to Antigua or take off to London to hit the theatre district or wherever.  Me? I was going to pop over to Southampton to look at a boat.

  Southampton has plenty of boats and ships to choose from but what made this one different was that it was firmly inland. More on that in a minute. 

 The weather a was a gorgeous, sunny day so that was good, at least until I got out of Southampton rail station  and into direct sunlight. This is where I realised that jeans and a black t-shirt is not great for scorching hot days, especially if you're a middle-aged couch potato who avoids sunlight and exercise. 

  Some hot, damp, sweaty trudging later I found my way to the bottom end of Western Esplanade and turned right to follow the old, stone city walls.  There it was, the reason for this trip.

 So what you're looking at right now is a replica of a medieval "keel" merchant ship  built 1997ish by local Maritime Skills Centre manager  Alex Ward and refurbished in 2017. (Daily Echo article) 
 If I understand it right, the wall on the right used to be the quayside city walls which were put up after a visit from French and Genoese in 1338 left things in a proper mess. (More about that HERE)

Since there wasn't a fence around it, or a big sign saying "Keep off" I took the opportunity  to climb aboard.

 
  At this point a family walked past and one of the children loudly asked if they could get in the boat, to which the mother loudly responded "No, you're not supposed be on that.." while glaring at me.  I didn't case. I was on a boat and she wasn't. 

By this point I'd explored all the options the boat could offer.  There was another point of interest just up the road though. After a landbound ship, we had a landbound lighthouse. 

 There's a chain of them all along the high street and beyond. 

The next place on my itinerary was the Tudor House museum. 

I didn't have too much trouble working out which of the local buildings it was. 

 Bigger than I was expecting too. 

The building itself was nice and out the back they had a small but interesting garden as well as some Tudor era fortifications. 

 A nice little fountain in one corner

 Plants. Don't ask me what, I am no gardener.

Pretty though

 Looking back at the garden from a stretch of wall. 

  After that I slogged off to the town centre in search of comics and a cold drink. Oh dear gods, I really, really needed that cold drink. Hot weather and me do not get along. 

 I did take a couple of snaps of the tower at the city centre end though. I do like that sort of thing. 

  

 It's weird how this is right next to a big, modern complex made of glass and concrete.  The world has a place for both but I know which one I wanted to take a picture of. 

 One rampage around Southampton's bookshops later I was on my way home with a bag of books, sore feet and mild heatstroke. All worth it for a jaunt away from the same old, same old.  

 I will leave you with a photo I took of some graffiti at Pompey's Hard, outside the bus station.

 I can't disagree. 

  That's all folks. 

This Schnapps advert is totally metal

 I'm a sucker for a beautiful warrior-woman. So when I stumbled across this old Schanpps advert, I had to put it on here. It really ought to be on a metal album cover - a band that loves USPM circa 1986 and thinks that needs to be a thing again.

 Whoever she's charging at is about to have a really bad day

Music From The Weird Part of Youtube: Frog Metal

 One of the things I like about metal is the way it can be adapted to fit so many requirements. Although metal might originally have been seen as something for young white men by young white men, metal has also become a vehicle for other voices and experiences. Muslim youth in Indonesia have their bands, African bands sing about themes that Africans  can relate to. Gay people have metal, gamers have metal, anime fans have metal...

Everybody should - and probably do - have a metal band that totally gets where you're coming from. 

Well I am happy to report an exciting new development.  Clearly spurred on by the realisation that "amphibians don't gots no good metal", somebody created it.  Ladies and gentlemen, boys girls and tadpoles may I introduce you to:

FROG METAL

Pagefire - Morbid Osculation of a Decomposed Amphibian Corpse

RIBBIT, RIBBIT MOTHERFUCKERS. 

Film Review : The Fist Of Death (Mexico 1982)

 

  In an unspecified kingdom that's somewhere in Asia, or possibly Africa, and definitely not Florida, two beautiful princesses fall out over a magical Star of Great Power

 When one decides to become evil and seizes the stone, the good guys decide to call in that international man of mystery ... SANTO.

 There's some other stuff about a "Jungle Girl" who is rather disappointingly dressed in a demure white frock rather than a fur bikini and she's apparently getting married to a Chinese prince.

I think. 

So, you would expect Santo to arrive on the scene fairly quickly, what with the fate of the Stone, the kingdom and two hot women at stake.  Not really.  The first half of the movie has Santo and unfunny sidekick getting off a flight, onto a boat, onto another flight and then onto another boat just to get to where the good princess lives. But since she's already buggered off, Santo and co. end up on yet another sodding boat.  Luckily this lets him arrive just in time for the climax. 

 Just so you don't think you're watching a travelogue, there are a fights en route, as the bad guys try to stop him. None of them last very long or excite interest, although the mook falling into a propeller and getting bisected is a bit different. 

  Honestly, if there's anybody who's really the star of this film it's the voluptuous  Grace Renat pulling double duty as good princess Queria and bad girl Kungyan. 

 See if you can tell which is which here?

  Whereas wholesome Queria is there to be in peril, Kungyan gets to show off her...

Voodoo Dance Moves!

 Can you tell that this woman is a professional cabaret dancer? 

 Now let me remind who who the star of this movie is supposed to be;

To be fair, Santo does look pretty good for a 62 year old. And he does get into some action as the evil Kungyan uses her magic to try and stop him.

 First she changes herself into ..whatever the fuck this is supposed to be.

 Of course he fails because Santo is Santo and this is just a dude with the fluff off a barbershop floor glued to him.  Then Kungyan becomes a tiger.  Although this is not as menacing as the director was hoping.

 

 Personally I'd have advised Kungyan to jsut send a few blokes with M-16s but whatever. 

Finally Santo clashes with our buxom villain's big, bad henchman

Wearing a dark visor indoors in  dimly lit cave. No wonder you got your ass kicked, mate.

Exit Kunyang to rethink her plans and hiring strategy, before coming back for the sequel. 

The Star Of Great Power is returned to the lady who will use the power for good rather than turning into crap monsters and everybody is happy.

 As you can probably guess, there are bits I liked about this movie and by "bits" I mean "watching Grace Renata enthusiastically jiggling"  Otherwise, the story is thin and padded out, the action is lacklustre and Santo almost arrives late for his own movie. 

At no point is there anything remotely resembling a "Fist Of Death"

To sum up: If you like voodoo dance moves then this is the film for you. If you like Luchasploitation movies then Santo's earlier stuff is probably a better bet. 

Thats All Folks!

Music From The Weird Part of Youtube: I have no words.

  Even after years of  searching the internet for the weird and wonderful I can still be surprised. 

Like the song I found last night. I can honestly say it opened my eyes to a whole new musical world.

Can I share it with you please?

And can we take a minute to think about that title. "I glued my balls to my butthole again"   

AGAIN? 

Enjoy that mental image and see you all soon. 

Book review: M M Holt - Fifty Degrees South

 

"1803. The Napoleonic War. A Royal Navy warship is ordered to pursue an enemy frigate to the frozen waters of the Southern Seas.

There it must capture the enemy ship and retrieve a mysterious sea-chest, contents unknown.

Failure is not permitted.

For the determined young captain, this already dangerous mission turns into a battle with a mysterious vessel that appears not in the sea, but, unbelievably, impossibly, in the sky above.

And the mysterious vessel is not friendly." 

**********************************************************

  I saw this one mentioned online and it seemed just my cup of tea so come payday, I was straight on to Amazon to order a copy.  The idea of a Hornblower-style hero running into alien invaders is definitely a fascinating one.  Without giving away spoilers, hero Captain Alex Burns is an interesting character dealing with something way, way beyond his experience.  The mysterious alien ship is not the only problem, either.  The writing is solid without getting cliched and MM Holt gives Burns some memorable characters to play with. 

  For the most part, 50 Degrees South jogs along at a decent pace but I did find the payoff at the end a bit disappointing.  Burns and his ship finally catch up with the French ship they've been doggedly pursuing, the aliens interfere and....

  It suddenly resolves itself, mostly offscreen.   It seemed a bit rushed, to be honest, almost like the author realised he was running out of pages or too close to a deadline.  Usually I don't like books that overstay their welcome but in this case, another two or three chapters would have been nice. 

 There then follows an author's note explaining that there were "Deleted" scenes from the book which could be found at the website. I thought that was a bit naughty, especially since there was space in the book for a preview of the next in the series.  I'm not sure how I feel about books having DLC.

To sum up: Worth reading but the ending left me frustrated. 

MINAMICON 1 AND 2

  MinamiCon is now a regular part of the UK Anime calendar but there's a first time for everything and as it so happens, I was there for the very first event. 

 I think it's fair to say that the scene was very different back then. Put it this way, the number of women at Minamicon was safely in single figures. it was also a bit of a weird period for anime fans. Anime was booming, but a big hunk of the output was the super-violent stuff put out by Manga Video.  MinamiCon was set up for people who wanted something else and at the time they were a minority. The idea that something like "Your Name" would be a critical and commercial success in the UK would blow people's minds.  

 Anyway, here's some flyers I found in an old photo album.  I think the artist was one of the regulars at the much-missed Mondo Comics. (Name withheld for his privacy) I also edited out the contact details for the organiser. 

Japanese Women Wrestling 1969

 Hello out there.

I recently picked up a copy of "Skill Magazine" from 1969. It's a bit of a mixed bag covering boxing, pro-wrestling and bodybuilding but it's the cover that's relevant here. 

I love the expression on Miyuki's face. Definitely an air of "Oh this is gonna suck"

No Way, No Way

  As you may have gathered by now, music is super important to me. I spend a lot of time looking for new music and frequently uncover some real gems. Sometimes it's a new band, sometimes I discover a song from years ago that I never heard before. 

While it's always great to unearth something the world passed by, this is not about that. 

Nope. This is about a record that needs to be remembered because the world needs to know how bad things can get and not make the same mistakes again.

Let me give some background first.  

 The year is 1997.  The Spice Girls have become the biggest band on the planet despite being crap and the hype machine is in overdrive. 

 The Spice Girls

are

 fucking

everywhere. 

One of many reasons why I am not keen on 90s music. 

 Anyway, the music industry does it's usual; "The kids are listening to this right now and there's money to be made. Let's flood the market with something similar."

 So it came to pass that record labels unleashed a flood of girl-bands on the nation: All Saints, Atomic Kitten, Cleopatra, Hepburn, Thunderbug, B*witched, Sugababes and so on. Out of the whole movement there were maybe one or two decent songs released. 

This is not about any of those songs or indeed any of those bands. Nope we're talking about these girls.

 For those who haven't guessed yet, we're talking about Vanilla and their hit song "No way, No way" a song which somehow got to #14 in the UK singles charts and in the process proved once again that some of the British public should not be allowed anywhere near a record shop. 

 Now over the years I've been doing the "Metal project" I've heard some "bad" songs. However this wasn't done by 3 Mexican teenagers in a garage and recorded with a potato. This was an actual song, put together by a proper record label, with proper equipment.

My favourite theory is the one that states that two bods at the label had a bet where one claimed he could get 4 random girls out of a nightclub and get them a hit record.  Nothing else makes sense. 

Screw it, here's the song.  Maybe it wasn't as bad as I remember...

 Jesus Pogo-dancing Christ, what the hell is this and why did people buy it? 

I need to go listen to some  Rush and flush this out of my ears and my brain. 

That's All Folks. 

Welcome to 2024

Hello everybody and welcome to the start of a brand new year. #

 Now I don't really do New years resolutions because it turns out I am really bad at keeping them. 

However, just for a change, here's a short list of things I want to achieve in 2024. Order irrelevant. 

1. Visit the Solent Hovercraft  Museum. 

    I do love a good museum, especially if it's a museum that does big, old machines.  For some reason I've never got around to visiting this one so this year I plan to change that. 

2. Visit the Remembrance Museum in Hilsea. 

    A museum that's relatively close so I really have no excuse for not going. As a bonus, I can have a wander along the Hilsea Lines while I'm at it. 

3. Finally work out how to use the cassette-MP3 adapter I bought months ago. 

   Technology is not my friend. But I do have some old tapes I want to digitise and post to my Youtube.  I can see this one causing my headaches and possibly the odd tantrum. 

 Either I post some songs or I post a picture of the damn thing embedded in a wall.

4.  Visit Chingford. 

 A bit of explanation is needed, I feel. 

  Ever since I was a kid, I've had this weird fascination with Chingford.  I mean, it's called Chingford for chrissakes. Why is it called that?  Why does it exist?  What is the purposes of fording the Ching? I used to make up little songs about Chingford which, thankfully, I can no longer remember.  

I must go there and see this place for myself. 

Some people want to go to Katmandu but it's a long way away and I'm pretty sure you have to walk up a mountain. I would rather go somewhere I can hit in an afternoon.

Yeah, it's not the most exciting list in the world but it'll do for now.

Happy New year and that's all folks.