Geek Scope: Agents of SHIELD 1.9

Geek Scope uses 25 years of otherwise useless Marvel comics continuity to look for tidbits in TV and movies that the average non-geek might miss.

Nothing to see here in the way of hidden nuggets of info. Tobias Ford was an original creation, but I would say be on the lookout for him to return at some point.

• Roxxon Oil makes an appearance as the gas station at the beginning of the episode. Roxxon has been the go-to representation of big industry greed and evil in Marvel comics for decades. They're always up to something and generally effing things up whether intentionally or on accident. Their logo appears in the background of almost every Marvel movie and you'll continue to see it.
• The alien world that was accidentally accessed by the particle accelerator had no discernible features that I could see. Tobias thought it was Hell (and I was slightly resentful about the oh-you-stupid-Christians element of the story) and while there are a couple of different realms called or thought of as "Hell" in the Marvel U, I seriously doubt they would ever go in that direction. A shame, because that would be much more interesting than the everything-and-everyone is an alien from outer space angle that they currently have going.

One thought...

Marvel needs to be careful with how far they push their notion that everything can be explained and grounded in their cinematic universe. (I went on to rant for five paragraphs about this and decided it needs to have its own post or video. So that is going to happen.) See you here in two weeks for the next Agents of SHIELD.

Indie Wednesday: Salt

In honor of the big day tomorrow, Indie Wednesday presents Salt, a Thanksgiving story by Colin Miller and Alex Cain.

The Geek Scope for last night's Agents of SHIELD will be up tonight at 10pm so stop back by.

Indie Wednesday: Common Sense for Dummys

There are a lot of weird State laws out there and this is certainly one of them. This video comes to us from a sketch comedy troupe based in Nashville. We met Emily (who appears in this sketch) at Rivers Edge Film Festival and she was as nice as could be. So, if you like this, make sure you cruise over to their YouTube page for lots more.

Geek Scope: Agents of SHIELD 1.8

You wanted him to use the Ghostbusters II accent, right?

Not a lot in the way of easter eggs in this episode, titled "The Well."

• They mention the Berserker Staff and the Berserker Army of Asgardian lore. As far as I know, neither of those exist in comics.
• I was fairly certain there is or was a character called the Berserker, but I had to look it up. There was indeed a Berserker and he looked promising, but the backstory provided by Agents of SHIELD has absolutely nothing to do with him.
• Turns out my best memories of The Berserker come from this guy...

Ask Allen; my love for the WWE WWF's Berserker goes deep.

• Also, all that "Asgardian who stayed behind" junk about Ghostbusters guy... no, not in the comics.
• Agent May and Agent Ward did the dirty. You know that, right?

"Is Coulson a Robot?" Update

• Another reminder of Coulson's mystery tonight, but no revelations.
• He can't remember being revived. (Already made that clear.)
• The Tahiti flashback didn't give us much other than to confirm that it wasn't real with the "Tahiti's too good to be true," line, which surely everyone knows by now. Phil's masseuse responds with, "I know. It's a magical place." Which causes him to wake up in a sweat.
• No updates to my theory based on that.

Come back later today for Indie Wednesday. And just because we can't possibly have enough Berserker on this blog for my taste...

Geek Scope: Agents of SHIELD 1.7

Geek Scope uses the 25 years of otherwise useless Marvel Comics continuity stored in my brain to point out any elements that the non-geek viewer might miss in Marvel TV and movies.

This episode, titled "The Hub" kept me on my toes, so let's get right to it.

• Jasper Sitwell makes an appearance. Sitwell is a longtime SHIELD agent in the comics, but has already appeared in the cinematic universe in Thor, The Avengers, and maybe most notably in the Marvel One Shot, The Consultant. which was tacked on to the Thor Blu Ray. Nice to have a significant piece of movie SHIELD solidifying the connection to TV SHIELD. By the way, the Sitwell of comics has a full head of blonde hair.

• Simmons mentions the Triskelion which is the primary SHIELD headquarters in the Marvel "Ultimate Universe" continuity (not 616) and hasn't appeared (or even been mentioned as far as I know) in the movies. However, there is apparently a rumor that the Triskelion will appear in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

• Victoria Hand is the much cooler appearance of the night because she is only the second character that Agents of SHIELD has adapted straight from the comics to TV (the first being Dr. Franklin Hall), and I would argue the most significant. Hand is generally portrayed as a character who is willing to do whatever it takes to get the job done, crossing some lines that others might not and sometimes falling on the wrong side of the good/bad fence. Just something to keep in mind for down the road.

Pretty close, right?

"Is Coulson a robot?" Update

Writers continue to play with the notion of Phil being an LMD. Tonight the line came from Skye: "He's acting like a robot version of himself right now." Couldn't miss that one, could we? That's a bit much, guys and gals.

There was also a further sense that Tahiti being a "magical place" is a planted response for Coulson that he can't even fully control, as he slightly stutters over it. We also learned that Phil doesn't have clearance to see his own recovery report.

Best guess this week? I'm going to say that Coulson is not a full-on synthetic human like Life Model Decoys of the comics. I would guess that he has some new electronic/synthetic pieces a la cyborgs, the 6 Million Dollar Man, etc. It seems to be certain that there is something different about his physiology since Akela Amador viewed him with her "back-scatter" vision and basically said as much in the fourth episode.

Indie Wednesday: Sleight of Hand

It seems only natural to feature a Rivers Edge film on this Indie Wednesday and none moreso than the Best of Fest winner, Sleight of Hand by Michael Cusack. Cusack hails from Australia and this is only a clip from the 10 minute short.

Food Coma's News and Notes 11.11.13

Pizza By The Pound is pizza king in Paducah. Only sad that it took four years to find it.

Happy belated Veteran's Day, everyone and a huge thank you to all the Veterans. We're running a couple days behind on the blog, so you'll get News and Notes today and the Agents of SHIELD breakdown tomorrow. Anyway...

Around here, we're still recovering from a great weekend and far too much food consumption at the Rivers Edge Film Fest. If you didn't keep up with it, we kept a running diary on Friday and Saturday that you can check out now. Pizza By the Pound got us started on an epic food journey Thursday night and it never slowed down from there.

In fact, the food even followed us home because Cory Greene gave us each a legendary Fillymingo from Flamingo Row before we left town. The Fillymingo looks like a giant roll but is actually bread stuffed with meat, cheese and other goodness. All I can say is I'm already putting in my bid for a trip to Flamingo Row next year. There are several more varieties of Fillymingo that I need to sample.

Paducah Odds and Ends

One of the cooler things we got to do on the trip was explore the abandoned Columbia Theater in Lower Town Paducah. We've walked past that theater for four years, peered through the windows and talked about how great it would be to get a peek inside. This year we actually got to do it and it exceeded our hopes. The theater has been empty and untouched since the 1980s and is everything you'd imagine a grand old theater to be.

As cool as the Columbia looks on the outside, it's twice as neat on the inside. Unfortunately we aren't allowed to post any pictures. All I can say is, if the Paducah townsfolk get the go ahead on their restoration plans, this 1927 built beauty will be one of the coolest theaters in this part of the country. Needless to say, we're really hoping that happens.

Thor

I briefly mentioned in our Running Diary that we stole a chance to see Thor: The Dark World on Saturday afternoon. I'll be going into detail about the movie. For now, I'll say that the sequel got three thumbs up from the WSF boys. The theater was packed and the Marvel movie machine is obviously still cranking along at full steam. In the next few days, I'll revise my rankings of the Marvel films, give a little review, and point the comic Geek Scope at Thor.

See you back here for Indie Wednesday later today and Geek Scope tomorrow.

How about a picture of the Columbia without my big noggin in it?

REIFF Day 2 - Running Diary

8:05am - Better nights sleep after we decided that we could actually turn the air on by ourselves so we didn't wake up hourly in pools of sweat. We get started with (of course) food at the film makers breakfast at Et Cetera bakery. Cinnamon rolls bigger than your head. Unless you're Mickey Rourke. (Allen)

11:00am - Holy moly you can see what we spent the last two hours doing; gorging on sugary goodness. Then we hopped over to buy some chocolates at the candy store and now we're about to watch a short film before we head back to Kirchhoff's for lunch. We're ridiculous.  (SS)

12:39pm - Getting ready to support a tiny little film that needs the money. Thor: The Dark World

3:15pm - Not an official review, but first thoughts on Thor are three thumbs up. Definitely funny. (SS)

7:00pm - The second and last showing of Paranormous went okay. Laughs in some different spots than last night. Now we're sitting in Maiden Alley Cinema waiting for the awards ceremony to begin. No expectations from me. 

REIFF Day 1 - Running Diary

7:35am - One is snoring, one is showering, one is blogging. I'll let you guess. Kirchoff's Deli will open in approximately 3 and a half hours. Let's do this. (SS)

8am - Todd is up and sounds just like Super Dave Osborne. Oh and we're on Central time if you're confused. (SS)

9:40am - We can officially endorse the complimentary breakfast at Fairfield Inn Paducah. Calm before the storm. (SS)

10:27am - we mistimed our arrival at Maiden Alley (this Central Time thing is hard). So obviously, to kill the time we played a few spirited games of Candyland and Sorry. I lost them all. (Allen)

12:15pm - Kirchoff's... mission accomplished. We wait 362 days a year for this. A club for Al, pasta salad for me, and Sheene likes to switch it up.

And there's the obligatory pic of Allen with his sandwich. (SS)

1pm - About to watch the first film of the weekend: Revelation Road. It's a western horror movie about the undead. The trailer had a guy that looks like Robert Duvall. We're excited. (Allen)

3:12pm - We met John Gibson, director of the zombie western we just watched. Nice guy. I bought some homemade crackers from Kirchoff's bakery (a yearly necessity) and Todd had a love affair with a cinnamon roll. It was intense. These trips are seriously becoming more and more about food. Now we're set to watch Can't Stop Me Leavin', a Japanese short and then a documentary about adventure racing.  (SS)

4:12pm - The Americans in this race are the worst. One of them is a professional "life enthusiast."

6:00pm - We have a break before the Paranormous block of short films start. You know what that means. Time to eat. Tonight's feast comes from The Station Burger Co. They fry bacon inside the patty. Uhhh yeah. AND they have TVs AND the UK basketball game just started so jam on it. (SS)

7:32pm - We're sitting in Maiden Alley Cinema right now, about seven minutes away from watching the Paranormous blu ray on this beautiful big screen. Fingers crossed. 

9:30pm - I guess I should say it went well. Laughter! Always a relief. On to some good convo with filmmakers and new friends.

Get Ready: Rivers Edge Updates Start Today!

Our excursion to Paducah, KY starts this afternoon. Departure time is roughly 6pm. That means everyone needs to sync up there communicators and technological doo-dads because we'll be cataloguing this trip in every which way from start to finish. Blog posts, pictures, videos, songs... if you can think it, we'll be doing it. Adventure! Come with meee... and you'll beee...

If Allen buys some buckeyes at the candy shop, you'll know about it the second it happens. If Todd goes crazy and sinks a riverboat, it won't slip past you. If I fall in love on sight with a beautiful lady filmmaker and we elope like star-crossed lovers, you wouldn't want to miss that would you??

I mean, last year we visited Metropolis AND found a vintage Six Million Dollar Man lunchbox. Adventure!

The point is, you need to make regular visits to this blog over the next three or four days. AND find us on all your apps and whatnot right now. Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Vine... Just backslash walksoftlyfilms at all of the above and you'll find us. And if there's anything stupid you want us to try along the way, tweet it at us and we might do that too.

We plan on doing a running diary here on the site every day of the festival beginning tomorrow morning. Plus, I can already tell you that I've done some restaurant research for the weekend. I'm looking at you, Doe's Eat Place.

Twitter:  @walksoftlyfilms
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