31 Nights of Horror: The Retrospective

First things first, the full list for my 2013 31 Nights of Horror

1: Funny Games
2: The Possession
3: Don't Look Now
4: High Tension
5: I Spit on Your Grave (1978)
6: Dead Snow
7: Don't be Afraid of the Dark (2010)
8: Audition
9: I Saw the Devil
10: Suspiria
11: Frankenstein and the Beast From Hell
12: The Wolfman (1941)
13: Session 9
14: The Corridor
15: 6 Souls
16: Grave Encounters
17: The Woman in Black
18: The Bad Seed
19: The Prophecy
20: Maniac (2012)
21: Stake Land
22: Blood for Dracula
23: Repulsion
24: Grave Encounters 2
25: The Conjuring
26: Night Watch
27: Mama
28: Pet Semetary
29: In The Mouth of Madness
30: The Fog (1980)
31: V/H/S/2

The Best of the Bunch

I Saw the Devil

I Saw The Devil was without a doubt the best movie I watched in this experience. Its a South Korea Revenge Thriller about a government agent whose fiance is killed. So he takes a week off from work, hunts the killer down and begins torturing him. The two quickly escalate things into a cat and cat game where they're both just trying to do as much damage as possible to the other and its fantastic. Some of you will even recognize the actors as the Government Agent was played by Byung-hun Lee of Red 2 and the G.I. Joe movies and the Serial Killer was played by Min-sik Choi who you might recognize as Oh Dae-su from Oldboy. I can't recommend this one enough and if you've got any interest in Revenge Thrillers, South Korean movies or even just really well done insanity then check it out. Its even on Netflix.

Suspiria

This wasn't a movie it was a god damned experience. The sound and color in it were like almost nothing I've ever seen before. I'd love to see a good, high quality copy of it in a theater so that I can fully immerse myself in it instead of the sort of crappy You Tube rip I got to watch it on.

Repulsion

Roman Polanski is one of my favorite directors but for some reason I've never seen him as a Horror director, despite all the evidence that piles up. This movie was dark and disturbing, not because of the rapes or the arms stretching out of the walls but because of just how mundane it was. This girl didn't go insane from some horrible trauma or dark incident. She was just ignored and shoved aside. She was unstable and when left to get own devices she decided to hang out with a dead rabbit and kill the only person that showed any real level of concern. And as we see in the news it happens fairly regularly. Some people need help and we just ignore them, going about our lives. And then they do something terrible.

Maniac

Elijah Wood is creepy. Very, very creepy. And here he manages to improve on the original Maniac while spending almost no time on screen. See this version is shot almost entirely in first person. We're in the killers shoes at every turn, feeling his awkwardness with women, his inability to connect, his jealously and rage and his sickness. Its excellent.

The Worst of the Bunch

Grave Encounters 2

Now I normally look at Horror movies as films where you get to see characters making bad decisions. And that's fine as long as it makes some degree of sense why the character would do what they did. This movie should have been subtitled "What are you, a moron?" for how little sense its protagonist made. He's a film school student that comes to believe that the movie Grave Encounters actually happened. Which is pretty stupid, but then he hunts down the asylum it was supposedly filmed in, breaks in with his friends and camera equipment and decided to spend a night there himself filming it. You know, like the people that you think died doing just that. And I don't blame his friends for following. They were promised Film Credits and for film school students that's like offering crack rock to a junkie. But the lead? He's accepted murderous ghosts are real and then puts himself and his friends in their path. Its incredibly stupid.

High Tension

I know a few people who have a high opinion of this movie and I probably would too it it wasn't for one thing: the terrible twist ending at the end of the film. See at the end of the movie we find out that our Heroine has a split personality and that she's the one who killed everyone and kidnapped the other girl. And that doesn't really make a whole lot of sense given what we've seen. It also robs a lot of the previous scenes of their tension and kills rewatchability. The worst part is that without the twist we'd have had a highly effective slasher flick that incorporates a cement saw. Which is pretty cool!

Audition

This is another one that people seem to love and to that I ask: Why? The first three quarters of it is fairly dull and depressing and the final act is almost nonsensical peppered with horrifically disgusting imagery. Maybe I just don't get Takashi Miike. I'll freely admit that this isn't the first film of his that I've watched that I came out of thinking "What the hell was that?" I'd really like someone to tell me what is supposed to redeem this movie.

I really enjoyed doing this, even if I did have to scramble some to get to some movies that I haven't seen. Next year should be even more interesting.

Thirty One Days of Horror Days 6-9: Dead Snow, Don't Be Afraid of the Dark, Audtition, I Saw The Devil

Day 6: Dead Snow

This is a movie that knows EXACTLY what it is and what it wants to do an delivers perfectly. We've got Nazi Zombies, attractive people in a cabin, makeshift weapons, self amputation, and some of the best brush off lines I've seen in a while. The creators on this have made a love letter to Zombie horror and if you're a fan of the sub-genre then check it out. Definitely Recommended.

Day 7: Don't be Afraid of the Dark

Guillermo Del Torro loves two things: Faeries and putting eyes where they don't belong. As he was only a writer and producer on this movie he couldn't force creepy eyes into it but if you're looking faeries then this is the place for you. We've also got all the stock characters for a child against evil movie, from the oblivious dad to the gruff older man who's really looking out for the child, to the mother figure, in this case a girlfriend, who eventually believes the child's story after some research and a trip to the most awesome library ever.

I couldn't find a picture of it so this will have to do.

Despite being a bit paint by numbers it was nicely moody and did everything well. It was a quality film with an unexpected part at the end. I'd recommend it.

Day 8: Audition

This is one fucked up movie. I mean really, really fucked up. It starts pretty innocently with a man whose son thinks he should get remarried. The only problem is that he's not sure how to go about finding his new bride to be. His buddy offers a suggestion: Hold and audition. He'll dig out an old script and they'll audition actresses for the lead, he can try and date the one he likes and hell, if they get financing they can even make the movie. So far it sounds like the set up for a Kate Hudson/Matthew McConaughey romantic comedy. He starts dating her and, spoiler alert, she's insanely fucked up. I mean this woman is the gold medal winner in the what the fuck Olympics.  She was tortured by her dance instructor as a child and now goes around mutilating and killing men. Except for the one she keeps in a bag in her apartment. I don't even want to think about how she feeds him but it does help her keep her figure. The end of the movie cuts between hallucinations and a torture scene in which the widower has his feet cut off. Why his feet? Hell if I know. I don't know if I can recommend this one. I expect you already know if its for you or not.

Day 9: I Saw The Devil

I was torn over wither or not I should include this movie because dispite having a serial rapist/killer, cannibals, torture, and a man hunting another man it never felt like a horror movie to me. But it seems to fit broadly so I decided it counted. Oh, and I god damned loved it. This movie is fantastic. Now I'm the first to admit that I'm a sucker for a good revenge flick and South Korea seems to put out the best of them for a while now. The plot is fairly simple. A man's wife is killed and he hunts down the killer who did it. The killer is played by the fantastic Min-Sik Choi, who you might remember from Oldboy. The man is just built to be abused. No one suffers quite as well as he does or has that perfect look of manic glee when he retaliates. The hunter is played by Byung-Hun Lee. He's nearly emotionless for most of the film, deadened inside by the death of his wife. He's the picture of intensity. I can't recommend this movie enough. 

Thirty Days of Horror Days 3-5: Don't Look Back, High Tension and I Spit On Your Grave

Day 3: Don't Look Back

I don't feel that I gave this movie the proper attention. From where I was sitting it was a series of random events that ended in a midget stabbing Donald Sutherland in the neck. Its well regarded enough that I'm fairly certain that its a problem with how I watched the film and not with the movie itself. I'm going to re-watch it in the next few days and give it a proper shake.

Day 4: High Tension

French lesbians in a slasher flick! How could it go wrong? With a shitty twist ending! In general I'm not a big fan of the twist ending that changes everything.

But this is one of my favorite movies ever.

Most of the time it comes off to me as "Oh, look how smart I am, you didn't know what was happening! Ha!" while not actually working. For example the killer girl wasn't ever depicted as particularly strong in the movie, except for when she was the killer, then she was kicking furniture so hard it could sever a head. Having said that without the twist I'd have been fine with the movie. Its a solid home invasion/slasher flick. Nothing revolutionary but well done.

Day 5: I Spit On Your Grave.

This movie has a twenty five minute rape scene. Twenty five minutes. Its only 101 minutes long. A quarter of this movie is dedicated to raping this woman. Its fucking terrible. I'm the first to admit that I'm a little more messed up than most people, and that I've got a pretty dark sense of humor, but even I couldn't stand watching the TWENTY FIVE MINUTES OF RAPE. You can't argue that we needed that long a scene for any good reason other than to make the audience sick. The movie also featured the lynching of a character that was at least regarded as being handicapped by the other characters, even if he didn't come off quite that way. It was more like watching a snuff film. There's no entertainment here. Go somewhere else.

Tomorrow I'm watching something fun.

Flavor Wins of Theros #3: Witches' Eye and Fleetfeather Sandals

We're doing another double dip on Flavor Wins of Theros this time because both the Witches' Eye and Fleetfeather Sandals are from the myth of Perseus!

Sweet kicks ya got there, lemme get a closer look.

So Perseus, one of Zeus' many, many, many, I can't stress this enough, many bastard children, is most famous for killing Medusa the Gorgon and staring in terrible movies along side Liam Neeson.

He looks like he's trying to remember if he left
the stove on.

But these mythical equipment didn't make the films.

But this guy did And Perseus still looks confused.

First we have the Witches's Eye. In Greek Mythology there were three witches called the Graeae. Among the three of them they shared one eye and one tooth. Just stop for a moment and thing about how you won't let someone else drink out of your water bottle. The three of them were instrumental in Perseus' quest to kill Medusa since like most Greek Heroes he had no god damned idea how to go about it. But unlike out friend Hercules he was more clever than most and when seeing that the Witches shared an eye between them he slipped his way into the rotation and held it hostage until they told him what he needed to know. Nothing like extorting information from the elderly to get your story going! But knowing is only half the battle, next he needed to actually get the gear. Thankfully this proved easier than you'd think. At one point Hermes and Athena got bored of watching him wander ancient Greece and just dropped by and armed up their half brother. Hermes gave him his winged sandals, made by Hephaestus (Purphoros?) himself and granting him the ability to fly and move extremely fast. As for what Athena gave him? I'm not going to go into it today because I expect we'll see something for it before the end of the block. Thanks for reading folks and I'll see you next time.

Thirty One Days of Horror: Day One and Two

Once again I've decided to take part in 31 Days/Nights of Horror, where I watch a horror movie that I've never seen before every day in October. Now I attempted this last year but due to work being horrible I had to drop out about a third of the way in. Thats not going to be a problem this time. So lets get into it!

Day One: Funny Games (1997)

Michael Henke wanted to make a statement with this one, I'm just not sure what it was. He made a home invasion film, normally one of the more indulgent sub-genres of horror, then didn't show any violence. He didn't show any exploitation. When one character is killed we focused on a man making a sandwich. He also peppered it with fourth wall breaking commentary as one of the invaders continuously spoke to the audience about what they were watching.

Seen here, literally winking at the camera.

And overall I don't think that it worked. The audience for a movie like this is looking for the visceral thrills found in the movie, from the violence that we don't see to the satisfaction of seeing evil punished at the end, which doesn't happen at all in this. I think that Cabin in the Woods did a better job of exploring peoples fascination with brutality and making statements about the emptiness of it, and it still functions extremely well as a horror movie. This sets up all sorts of audience expectations then leaves them laying on the floor and tells us we're bad people for it too. It doesn't function as a horror movie, it doesn't function as a drama. It seems to come up short in every direction.

I will say that the ten minute long single take scene in the movie is fantastic. As is the performance by Susanne Lothar. If there's any reason to watch this movie it's to see her perfect rendition of pain and loss.

Day Two: The Possesion

This one is a little more by the numbers. A little girl gets a wooden box at a yard sale and it turns out its got a demon in it. Hijinks ensue. There's a moment in this movie where you can tell the writers decided to say "Fuck it" to subtlety. We change gears immediately from the girl acting a bit off to blood pouring from one of her teachers eyeballs till she throws herself out of a window. Now I know exactly how hard the transition from acting odd to demonically possessed is thanks to my work on Lucifer's Unholy Desire. Part of me wishes that we had just said fuck it instead of trying to play it straight. Here once they jump that hurdle they do give us some great special effects. The fingers escaping the throat shot was awesome, as well as the moths entering the girl under the streetlight.

On a side note I mainly watched this one for Jeffery Dean Morgan

Also known as pudgy Robert Downey Jr.

I'm sure you've got them. Actors that you enjoy but never seem to break through, or even be in a movie that's best descriptor is fun? Jeffery Dean Morgan is one of those for me. If he shows up I've got a solid +10% interest in the movie but I know they're not going to knock anything out of the park. 

Flavor Wins of Theros #2: Titan of Eternal Fire is Chained to the Rocks

This time we're going to double dip on Flavor Wins of Theros with Titan of Eternal Fire and Chained to the Rocks.

I wonder who gets chained to the rocks...

Titan of Eternal Fire is a riff on Prometheus. Prometheus was one of the Titans, the generation that ruled before Zeus other threw Chronos, his father and notorious baby eater, and brought about the rule of the traditional Greek Gods. This is important because it basically casts Prometheus as a traitor to his people to fight with the Gods. 

Not the first Prometheus to betray people.

But Prometheus loved us. Us being humans. You see in Greek Mythology we didn't always have fancy things like Tools or even Fire. We were huddling naked, cold and alone, pretty much existing to give Zeus something to have sex with that wasn't his wife. And Prometheus didn't think that this was good enough for humanity. So he stole fire and gave it to the humans, and in some versions brought them enlightenment with it, creating arts and music. Music being represented by pinging for a red.

But this left Zeus pretty unhappy. Like chain a guy to a mountaintop unhappy. Zeus had Prometheus chained to a rock with eagles to tear at his liver until Zeus saw fit to release him. Then he forgot all about it, probably because he was busy having sex with women while in the form of a swan or something else equally ridiculous.

So was that it for Prometheus? Of course not, the Greeks weren't one to leave a plot thread dangling, even if it took them a while to work it out. Prometheus was eventually freed from his chains by everyone's favorite oaf Hercules!

Nope, still not this guy.

Herc was on his way by while doing the 11th of his twelve Labors, gather golden apples, he found Prometheus chained to his rock with an eagle eating his liver and did what any sane person would do. He killed the eagle. Then he talked to Promethues and let him know that he had no idea where the apples were or how to get them. Lucky for Herc Prometheus knew where he needed to go and even walked him through the trickery he'd need to execute to get them. Hercules breaks the chains free with his freakish demigod strength and Prometheus was free!

Flavor Wins of Theros #1: Hercules and the Lion

The new Magic: The Gathering set is almost out and its shaping up to be one of the sweetest sets for Flavor in years. One of the coolest things is that so many of the cards are pulled directly from Greek Mythology. Cards like Fleecemane Lion.

But while you might think that thanks to the name Fleecemane its a reference to Jason, The Argonauts, and the quest for the Golden Fleece I think you'd be wrong. It's totally a Hercules riff.

No, not this guy.

The first Labor of Hercules was to kill the Nemeian Lion, a seemingly invulnerable lion that had been stalking... Nemea. Hercules found that both arrows and clubs were unable to damage the beast, so he did what any idiot would do. He went into hand to hand with a freaking monster lion and god damned choked it to death. Hercules was many, many things but he wasn't a quitter. Or overly intelligent. And to add insult to injury some versions say that he skinned the bastard and wore him as a cloak after.

Nah, it was no big deal. Lemmie tell you
about the snake in my nursery...

And this was just Herc's first Labor. It's also not the only one that gets referenced in Theros, but that'll be for another post.

MTG Stats!

So recently a website called Kavu.ru has put up a program that you can use to generate your lifetime stats for sanctioned play at MTG and I thought it would be fun to break mine down some.

Overall Stats:

Overall record: 993-539-62

Win percentage ignoring draws: 64.817232
Win percentage including draws: 62.296110

A nearly 65% is pretty solid. I'm a little sad that I haven't gotten 1000 match wins yet. I might have to keep track of the next event I play in so that I can know when match 1000 is.

Booster Draft:

Overall record: 461-235-17

Win percentage ignoring draws: 66.235632
Win percentage including draws: 64.656381

Hey, I'm slightly stronger in booster draft that I am overall. That's a bit of a surprise as I've never considered myself much of a limited player. Of course part of this is mitigated by most of my drafts being played at the local FNM level. The competition isn't as fierce as GPs or PTQs. But these are just raw numbers, not the whole story.

Modern:

Overall record: 25-16-2

Win percentage ignoring draws: 60.975610

Win percentage including draws: 58.139535

Well this is disappointing. I really enjoy Modern as a format. I think that part of this is because I rarely play any of the tier one decks in older formats, preferring to rock cards that I love over the pure strongest strategy. Lets see if I can't get this stat up some if I get to go to GP Detroit next month.

Casual - Limited:

Overall record: 5-4-0

Win percentage ignoring draws: 55.555556

Win percentage including draws: 55.555556

I have no idea what this was. At all. Nothing to see here folks, move on...

Casual - Magic League:

Overall record: 6-1-1

Win percentage ignoring draws: 85.714286

Win percentage including draws: 75.000000

When was I in a Magic League? I guess I did pretty well in it.

Legacy:

Overall record: 28-23-1

Win percentage ignoring draws: 54.901961

Win percentage including draws: 53.846154

This is even more disappointing than Modern. I don't remember ever really tanking out of a bunch of Legacy Tournaments. In fact one of my Day Two appearances at a GP was in Legacy. Maybe events I played in were sanctioned as Legacy as a catchall and I sucked at them? I dunno man.

Extended:

Overall record: 33-13-8

Win percentage ignoring draws: 71.739130

Win percentage including draws: 61.111111

I was clearly the end boss of Extended when it was a format. Thank you Scepter Chant. Thank you Chase Rare Control.

2 HG Sealed:

Overall record: 4-1-0

Win percentage ignoring draws: 80.000000

Win percentage including draws: 80.000000

I remember this one! That was a Pre-Release back when they still did big events for them instead of in store. We lost round one to mana screw then wrecked the rest of the day. As a side note my buddy Pete was in that event with a random partner, got at least two unintentional draws and still made prize.

Trios - Constructed:

Overall record: 0-3-0

Win percentage ignoring draws: 0.000000

Win percentage including draws: 0.000000

I remember this one too. That day was terrible.

Standard:

Overall record: 247-136-14

Win percentage ignoring draws: 64.490862

Win percentage including draws: 62.216625

The main event. Standard. over 64%, but like draft I think that a lot of that is down to mainly playing locally. I've never made top 8 of a PTQ in standard.

Sealed:

Overall record: 179-100-16

Win percentage ignoring draws: 64.157706

Win percentage including draws: 60.677966

I only play sealed when I have to so this is 100% made up of PTQs, GPs and Pre-Releases. Hoenstly, I'm glad that the release event is gone because its one less time I have to play sealed.

Block Constructed:

Overall record: 4-5-3

Win percentage ignoring draws: 44.444444

Win percentage including draws: 33.333333

I hated Block Constructed back when it was regularly ran as a PTQ season. Hated it. My record shows it too.

Trios - Limited:

Overall record: 1-2-0

Win percentage ignoring draws: 33.333333

Win percentage including draws: 33.333333

I think that this was a PTQ in Columbus... which makes me wonder where my GP Pittsburgh event is. It was team sealed and I remember doing fairly well, even with one teammate passing out after every round. Maybe I've got another DCI number out there that I need to get merged.

So what did I learn from this? Not much actually, but I do think its sweet that we can check this now. Especially since the ELO rating is gone. Lifetime win percentage seems like a good way to rank players. Or possibly seasonal win percentage. But right now players can only check their own stats so whoever compiled that would be unable to update the data themselves. Sounds like a mess

I didn't like Gone Baby Gone.

When Marvel started making their movies they didn't rely on star power. I know its hard to remember but before Iron Man Robert Downy Jr was doing supporting roles in movies like Charlie Bartlet and leading Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. Did you remember that he was in Gothika? I didn't. But he was a known talent. And a perfect Tony Stark thanks to his own struggles with addiction. And we can see Marvel make the same choices over and over. Chris Evans, aside from being part of the utterly forgettable Fantastic Four movies had done charming work in a variety of movies that he wasn't the star of. Chris Hemsworth’s biggest role before Thor was playing Captain Kirk's dad in the Star Trek Reboot. The only time they deviated from finding a known actor who is about to break out was their casting of Edward Norton as the Hulk and he fits with their behind the camera approach: Get talented people and let them do their work. Make good movies. And of course when they recast The Hulk after finding Norton difficult to work with they went with excellent indy actor Mark Ruffalo, someone I’ve been waiting to start showing up in bigger movies ever since The Brothers Bloom.

Then there’s DC and Ben Affleck. And before I start in I want to say that I’ve got all the respect in the world for Ben Affleck the Director. He does damn good work. But that’s not who they hired. They hired Ben Affleck the Actor. An actor who’s overly goofy and was taken far, far too seriously a decade ago. An actor whose career tanked so hard that when The Town was released they advertised it as “From the Director of Gone Baby Gone” without ever using his name. And he’s built up a lot of good will since then. But I think that the main reason he was cast was because people know who he is. They think that name recognition will help drive this movie to be a success.

That's extremely flawed, and Marvel has shown us why. These movies aren't a success because of the big stars in them. THESE MOVIES MAKE THESE PEOPLE INTO STARS. If you cast a good actor as Batman, say Christian Bale right off of the moody action flick Equilibrium, and add a Director who fits the material, like say Christopher Nolan, who was just coming off of a mature but ultimately gimmicky Memento, you get a good movie that people will flock to. If you continue like Time Warner/DC is you’ll keep casting once hot lead Ryan Reynolds as Green Lantern. You’ll get a director known for his dark and gritty realism for your space opera. Or in the case of Man of Steel you’ll get a director who’s known for his highly stylized approach and lack of depth.

And in the end it's why the Batman/Superman movie is likely going to both be huge and fail. Time Warner/DC is trying to put in pieces without looking at the puzzle. An actor here, a director we know here, Batman and Superman. Fanboys will love it! And if they don’t fuck em. We’ll make enough in the first weekend to cover it.

But we know how that approach ends up. Ask Joel Schumacher about it.

Advanced Review The Bunker #1 *Light Spoilers*

What would you do if you knew the future? Not specific, but the broad strokes of what's coming, and more importantly that it's going to be pretty terrible for everyone involved? That's the question posed in the new digital first series by writer Joshua Hale Fialkov (I Vampire, The Ultimates) and Joe Infurnari (Ultraboy)

It's starts with five friends looking to bury a time capsule. They're all about to start their respective lives and they want something to come back to later in life. Instead they find the titular bunker, filled with files and a hand written letter from 4 of them.

The fifth isn't so lucky.

This is my first comic by Fialkov, who I've heard consistently good things about his cult I, Vampire book from the New 52. Here he shows good pacing, well defined characters that have a realistic dynamic about them. One is clearly marginalized by the rest of the group which is pretty common is the real world and fairly uncommon in fiction. There are a lot of balls in motion here as well for the plot. We've got the future, what everyone knows is coming, the characters unease at the letters, and a character based twist in the final page that could play out a hundred different ways.

The art is black and white and fairly scratchy, with lots of ink and shadows. It fits the bleak tone of the comic perfectly, but I could easily see it not being to everyone's preference. Each of the characters are clearly recognizable in both there present and future incarnations. Future and past sequences are shaded differently to provide a nice visual cue to when we are. Its little things like that which are often overlooked that help pull this book together.

This series is digital only at the moment. It's releasing similarly to BKV's The Private Eye as a direct, drm free download from the creators website for $1.99 US. It will also be available on Comixology in the future. My only complaint with this release is that the pages were clearly sized for tablets in the 10" range and since I read on a first gen Nexus 7 right now I had to scroll a bit. 

If you're a fan of time travel stories and want to support creator owned releases outside of the print system you should really check out The Bunker when it releases on August 4th.

www.thebunkercomic.com

The Holes in my Game, On and Off the Table

Week before last I went to a TCG Player Platinum Qualifier at the Empire Game Center. I did... poorly. But since then I've been thinking about why and what I need to do to improve as a player.

1. I can't play aggro. At all.

People talk about how much they hate skill-less aggro decks. One drop two drop three drop burn spell burn spell! Fun game! Derdeeder! And when you get steamrolled by one it looks like it was the simplest thing in the world. If that's the case then why can't I buy a win with a deck that's dedicated to attacking in a tournament? Probably because I don't have the skill-set to play the deck. I don't know when to hold back my guys, I don't know when the right time to burn a removal spell or to let my guy trade. I sure as hell don't know what to do against an opposing Boros Reckoner. Its something that I need to work on.

2. I get bored with a deck easily.

I've been on junk since Ravnica came out, but I've play a donze different versions of it. I started by just trying to build a midrange deck, then i went to tokens, then I went to reanimator, then to Aristocrats, then to BG control. And those are just the decks that I can remember. And whenever I sweet brew shows up in top eights, like that Zvi Mowshowitz built GW Elf/Ramp deck I want to build it. I want to play it. Instead of thinking about how I can adapt what I'm playing against it I get infatuated. Its not good for my results in tournaments and its not good for my collection.

3. I won't play the best deck.

The only time in the last five years that I can remember playing the defualt vest deck was UB Fairies. And I didn't want to play it then, I had RG Snow Ramp built too and jammed that whenever there wasn't something extremely serious on the line. Let me tell you how good RG Snow Ramp was then. It wasn't. But I had to be different and not in a good way.

4. I don't listen to Pros

I played Naya at the TCG Player. I looked up a bunch of different decklists before I built mine. Then I ignored common threads and did what I wanted to. Some of what I did, like maindeck Domri Rade has, been adopted by most players as seen at the StarCity Invitational. Some of what I did was fucking stupid. When I'm working with an established deck like Naya I need to trust the collective instead of being convinced tat I know better.

5. I don't playtest properly.

When I playtest, which is rare enough, its an unorganized affair against my roomate where we jam untuned lists against each other. No gauntlet. No records. And never any mirror testing. They're just bad brews being slammed with most of the players involved knowing that they're not playing what they've got infront of them. This plays a big part in the next point.

6. My sideboards are normally terrible.

This is mainly an extension of the lack of playtesting. If I don't know my deck well enough how will I sideboard properly? Even when I know what cards are supposed to come in I rarely know what to take out. I need to make sure I have a plan for common matches going into the tournament.

7. I play too fast.

I missed an Obzedat trigger today. I pass turn after attacking without dropping the elf that will let me play Angel of Serenity next turn. I say OK with a counterspell in hand to something I NEED to stop. I just act without thinking. I need to slow down and make sure I do what I need to so that I don't loose games to stupid mistakes.

So I have some work to do, don't I?

M14 Standard: The First Weekend

On the first weekend of M14 Standard I went out to Empire Games and played in a TCG Player Platinum. I did...poorly. Which I can attribute to having both a less than stellar sideboard and to generally being unfamiliar with playing an aggressive deck. I played a Naya aggro deck that topped out at 5 with Thundermaw Hellkite. I also made some mistakes building it, like putting Domri Rade in the maindeck. Not everyone I knew at the tournament did poorly as Mike Lannigan managed to take second with what looked like an ugly BW Humans deck. The other big event this weekend was the StarCity open in Richmond where BW Humans took down the room, beating Jund in the finals.

I don't think it should have won.

This is the type of deck that Jund is supposed to prey on, especially staring in Game 1. Instead we saw the match go to three with the final game being decided on a risky keep. even with that a green mana or a bonfire miricled within the first 4 turns still would have turned things around for the Jund deck. I think that if they played that match out ten more times then Jund would come out on top at least 6 or 7 times. It just doesn't look favorable at all to me.

But we did get some really sweet decks in the top 8. Like Mono-Green Ooze! More imporantly we had Bant Hexproof taking 10th, 11th and 12th. And finishing just outside the top 8 of the TCG player event. This is a deck we should sideboard for. It does exist. It is angry. And it might not be top eighting but if you ignore it you will loose to it. Pay the tax people.

The deck I like the looks of the most is the Naya aggro, although its more of a big naya deck. Unfortunatly for me to play it I'd need to get Bonfires, Thundermaws, and huntmasters, all of which are nearing the end of thier time in Standard. I'm just not willing to do that. I mean we've gotten some Theros information!

Dibs for Commander!

Comics for the Week of 07/13/2013

DC COMICS

LEGION OF SUPER HEROES #22 $2.99
WONDER WOMAN #22 $2.99

MARVEL COMICS

ALL NEW X-MEN #14 NOW $3.99
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IRON MAN #13 NOW $3.99
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CONAN HC VOL 14 THE DEATH $24.99
CONAN THE BARBARIAN #18 $3.50
DREAM THIEF #3 $3.99
EMILY & THE STRANGERS #3 BUHLER VAR CVR $3.99
GATE 7 TP VOL 04 $10.99
LEGEND KORRA ART ANIMATED SERIES BOOK ONE AIR HC $34.99
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DC COMICS

100 BULLETS BROTHER LONO #2 (MR) $2.99
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BATMAN THE DARK KNIGHT TP VOL 01 KNIGHT TERRORS (N52) $16.99
BATWOMAN #22 $2.99
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BIRDS OF PREY #22 $2.99
BLACK ORCHID TP (MR) $16.99
FABLES #131 (MR) $2.99
GREEN LANTERN NEW GUARDIANS #22 $2.99
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HE MAN AND THE MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE #4 $2.99
JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #6 (TRINITY) $3.99
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JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #6 COMBO PACK (TRINITY) $4.99
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LEGION OF SUPER HEROES #22 $2.99
SUPERGIRL #22 $2.99
SUPERMAN PHANTOM ZONE TP $14.99
TALES OF BATMAN ARCHIE GOODWIN HC (RES) $39.99
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DC COMICS/DC COLLECTIBLES
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X-FILES SEASON 10 #2 [DIG/P+] $3.99
COLONIZED #4 [DIG/P+] $3.99
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DOCTOR WHO CLASSICS #3 $3.99
GI JOE A REAL AMERICAN HERO TP VOL 07 $19.99
GI JOE SPECIAL MISSIONS #5 [DIG/P+] $3.99
HALF PAST DANGER #3 [DIG/P+] $3.99
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MARS ATTACKS TP VOL 02 ON ICE $19.99
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STRANGE WORLD OF YOUR DREAMS COMICS MEET FREUD & DALI HC $29.99
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TMNT VILLAIN MICROSERIES #4 ALOPEX $3.99
TRANSFORMERS MORE THAN MEETS THE EYE TP VOL 04 $19.99
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X-FILES SEASON 10 #2 SUBSCRIPTION VAR $3.99

IMAGE COMICS

APHRODITE IX #3 CVR A SEJIC [DIG] $2.99
APHRODITE IX #3 CVR B FINCH $2.99
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ARTIFACTS #29 [DIG] $3.99
BLACK KISS II TP (A) $14.99
ELEPHANTMEN #50 CVR A QUITELY (MR) [DIG] $5.99
ELEPHANTMEN #50 CVR B 25 COPY QUITELY SKETCH INCV (MR) $5.99
GLORY TP VOL 02 WAR TORN (MR) [DIG] $14.99
INVINCIBLE #104 [DIG] $2.99
KAFKA HC [DIG] $29.99
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PROPHET #37 [DIG] $3.99
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THINK TANK TP VOL 02 $14.99

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A PLUS X #10 NOW $3.99
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CABLE AND X-FORCE #11 NOW $3.99
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MIGHTY THOR AND JIM TP EVERYTHING BURNS $19.99
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ULTIMATE COMICS SPIDER-MAN #25 $3.99
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X-FACTOR #259 $2.99

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ADVENTURE TIME #18 MAIN CVRS $3.99
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D. E.

DAMSELS #8 $3.99
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DEVILS DUE ENTERTAINMENT

PLUME #5 $3.99
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MAYO CHICKI GN VOL 03 (MR) $12.99
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FARLAINE THE GOBLIN #1 $5.00

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ARCHER & ARMSTRONG (VU) #11 20 COPY INCV DOE $3.99
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GFT UNLEASHED TP VOL 01

M14 Pre-Release and Post Standard Thoughts

We did a few M14 pre-releases here this weekend. I played in two of them, the midnight and the 1 pm and in an impressive display of unevenness I went undefeated in the midnight and couldn't buy a win in the 1 pm. My deck at Midnight had everything you could want. spot removal in the form of 2 Liturgy of Blood, Quag Sickness, Corrupt and a Plummet, solid creatures including double of the new Muscle Sliver, Megantic Sliver, Syphon Sliver, Mutavault, Scavenging Ooze and of course good old Sengir Vampire. My 1 pm had... nothing. I mean nothing. the only pieced of removal I had in the entire pool was a Claustrophobia and a Plummet. My white had almost no actual cards, instead it was primarily Suntail Hawks. My red was full of Wild Guess and Dragon Hatchlings. my green was deceptively playable. I ran it in addition to my black in round one and got demolished by Blue White flyers. Seraph of the Sword into Serra Angel into Charging Griffin into Jace's Mindsheeker is pretty good against my one plummet. Which the Mindseeker hit and killed my blocker with. So After that beating I took a look at what I had and rebuilt into Black Blue hoping that limited all stars like Cancel and Negate would be better than double Elvish Mystic into nothing. So of course my next opponent was in a blue white flyer deck, chock full of cards I can't beat like Serra Angel, Charging Griffon, Air Servent, and for extra style Fireshrieker. Then, at the end of game three he conceded to me because he accidentally mulled to seven. Which we caught before the game started. So he beat the hell out of me on a mull to 6. So going into round 3 I'm 1-1 when I should be 0-2. What do I play against? UB flyers! With Jace! Because if you're going to get your ass kicked then at least do it consistently. Mark of the Vampire on Sengir Vampire when I can't get to a second blue for Claustrophobia is pretty good.

So what did I take away from this? Honestly, not a whole lot. Its core set sealed, and while its noce about... once a year as a bit of a pallet cleanse after a year of shenanigans I;m certainly not about to do it all the time. I do think that Draft will be better because I can see archetypes forming already. I'm eager to see how crazy the Naya or 4 color sliver deck can be/ RG beasts is always a favorite to draft for me and Advocate of the Beast is amazing. And if I don't get to open the Witch at least once and dive in as deep as I can go there I'll be extremely disappointed.

So as far as new Standard, I think its might rotate around how much play one card is seeing. 

If Burning Earth is a card everything changes. Right now we have some INSANELY powerful manabases in Standard. Insanely powerful and extreme lazy. 4x of each dual in a three color combination, maybe shaving one or two for an appropriate utility land. Shuffle up and go! Except if Burning Earth is a one sided Manabarbs then pretty much every deck in Standard that isn't RG Aggro looses. Right now I've been kicking around the idea of GW Little Kid aggro for week one. Rancor, disruptive guys like Imposing Sovereign and Thalia, and resiliant creatures like Voice of Resurgence and Strangleroot Geist all seem like they're well positioned in a Burning Earth heavy world.

But if its not a card... Then nothing changes. We keep the same decks but Jund gets Scavenging Ooze and Junk Aristocrats likely runs some number of Archangel of Thune. Bant hexproof gets more guys. 

I really hope its a card. I want to see a big shakeup in Standard. I want to see something change. And I want to see people put some thought into their lands instead of just jamming as many duals as possible.

Revising the Pull List

As it stands my current pull list is this

DC

Batman
Nightwing
Talon
Wonder Woman
The Legion of Super-Heroes

Marvel

The Avengers
New Avengers
Uncanny Avengers
Young Avengers
Captain America
Thor: God of Thunder
The Indestructible Hulk
Iron Man
Hawkeye
X-Men*
Uncanny X-Men*
All New X-Men*

Image

Saga
The Manhattan Projects
Lazarus
Fatale
Jupiter's Legacy
Bedlam
East of West
Satellite Sam
Nowhere Men
Ten Grand

And thats too damn many comics. Now some of this is being handled by the publishers for me. Legion of Super-Heroes is being cancelled and relaced by some kind of JLA based book that I'm really not all that interested in. Nightwing is getting sucked into the maw that is Forever Evil and the closest I'm getting to that is picking up the tie in issues in September that are still being written by the regular creative team. After Sept my pulls from DC will be.

Batman
Wonder Woman
Talon

Marvel is going to be culled a little more heavily. Avengers, New Avengers, Hawkeye, The Indestructible Hulk, and Thor: God of Thunder are being cut. None of them are bad. The Avengers books are dropping off because of thier connection to the upcoming Infinity crossover which I'm going to have to sit out. Thor is gone because issues are either awesome or nothing happens. I don't have room for that level of inconsistency. The Indestructible Hulk had an amazing first issue but only the most recent has come close to matching it and I've got a feeling thats more because of its Daredevil appearance. Hawkeye I get digitally and I can always catch up once the price of the issues drop. That leaves me with the following for Marvel.

Uncanny Avengers
Young Avengers
Captain America
Iron Man
X-Men*
Uncanny X-Men*
All New X-Men*

Now there's two reasons I'm doing this. First is I recently lost my job and I need to curb expenses. The second is because of the Image Comics Expo that was held recently. The only book on my Image pulls that I'd consider dropping right now is Satellite Sam. I didn't even dislike Satellite Sam. It just feels more like it should be an hour long TV series and I just saw the first ten minutes. There's clearly a lot going on in it and I've got a feeling its going to be an excellently developed series. Why is this a problem? Because it looks like my Image pulls are going to nearly double based on what they announced. I need to prepare now. Its possible that by the time the new books start coming out in October I'll be down to just a few of the big two. And thats a good thing/

*I get these books digitally by buying the redemption code found in the back of the book via certain online forums. I'm probably not dropping them because they only run me $1 an issue.

Whats Missing in M14?

I know thats kind of an odd question, but bear with me.

Without an addition from Theros we're not going to have a Rampent Growth in Standard come October for the first time in... I think forever. 

Now newer players might not know this but Rampant Growth effects being tournament playable is a pretty new development. Before the Ramp decks took off thanks to Zendikar blocks the only time the effect really saw play was in Mirrari's Wake decks thanks to Krosan Verge, and it had the double benefit of both being a land so that it didn't take up valuable spell slots and it for you two lands. There were also the Explosive Vegetation decks in Onslaught Block Constructed but most of them disappeared when Astral Slide and Lightning Rift teamed up. The last died with the release of Scourge and its hordes of hasty goblins. 

But thats about it guys. The world where Jund is the best deck in standard when it hits its Farseek is totally different. A huge part of that is that creatures are so very, very much better than they used to be. Especially the larger ones. Playing Serra Angel, or even Archangel a turn earlier isn't that big a deal. Cutting a turn off of Huntmaster into Thragtusk into Runic Tharr is huge.

So what does a lack of Rampant Growth mean for standard? Even more importantly, the analogue card for it in M14 is Verdant Haven? Well, if Wizards is really looking to scale back the power of the mana base as was said in this article then this is a huge step in that direction. Multicolored fixing not coming into play until turn 3 makes it inefficient enough to be nearly unplayable. I've considered running Verdant Haven before but cooler heads prevailed. This, combined with the lack of duals in M14 likely mean that we're looking at two color decks being the primary set of color combinations. If the Theros duals work well with the shocklands, like say the M10 lands did or possibly the Nimbus Maze cycle then we might be able to splash a third but without spell support I doubt it. 

This means that quantity and color will be equally important in our mana base. It means that the days of cards like Acidic Slime (another none reprinted card that has repercussions) cutting off a color are likely over and that if you're trying to disrupt your opponents mana you're likely trying to keep them off of a critical number.

It might be enough to put Midrange as an archtype back to bed. It was unplayable for a long time and its entirely possible that the use of Rampant Growth effects is what made it finally shine.

Comics for the Week of July 10th

DC COMICS

BATMAN #22 $3.99
NIGHTWING #22 $2.99

IMAGE COMICS

EAST OF WEST #4 [DIG] $3.50

MARVEL COMICS

HAWKEYE #12 $2.99
INDESTRUCTIBLE HULK #10 NOW $3.99
UNCANNY X-MEN #8 NOW $3.99
YOUNG AVENGERS #7 NOW $2.99

And teh rest of the shipping list

DARK HORSE COMICS

AVATAR LAST AIRBENDER TP VOL 05 SEARCH PART 2 $10.99
BREATH OF BONES A TALE O/T GOLEM #2 $3.99
BTVS SEASON 9 FREEFALL #23 NOTO CVR $2.99
EERIE COMICS #3 $3.99
SKY ART OF FINAL FANTASY SLIPCASE ED $89.99
STAR WARS #7 2013 ONGOING $2.99
STAR WARS PURGE TP $17.99
TOKYO BABYLON GN VOL 02 $19.99
TRUE LIVES O/T FABULOUS KILLJOYS #2 $3.99
X #3 (MR) $2.99

DC COMICS

ABSOLUTE BLACKEST NIGHT HC (RES) $125.00
ASTRO CITY #2 $3.99
BATGIRL #22 $2.99
BATMAN #22 $3.99
BATMAN #22 COMBO PACK $4.99
BATMAN ARKHAM UNHINGED #16 $3.99
BATMAN LIL GOTHAM #4 $2.99
DEMON KNIGHTS #22 $2.99
DIABLO SWORD OF JUSTICE TP $14.99
GREEN LANTERN CORPS #22 $2.99
GREEN LANTERN THE ANIMATED SERIES #14 $2.99
HARLAN ELLISONS 7 AGAINST CHAOS HC $24.99
HE MAN AND THE MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE TP VOL 01 $14.99
JUSTICE LEAGUE #22 (TRINITY) $3.99
JUSTICE LEAGUE #22 COMBO PACK (TRINITY) $4.99
JUSTICE LEAGUE DARK TP VOL 02 BOOKS OF MAGIC (N52) $16.99
KATANA #6 $2.99
NIGHTWING #22 $2.99
SAGA OF THE SWAMP THING TP BOOK 04 (MR) $19.99
SMALLVILLE SEASON 11 #15 $3.99
SUICIDE SQUAD #22 $2.99
SUPERGIRL TP VOL 02 GIRL IN THE WORLD (N52) $14.99
SUPERMAN UNCHAINED #2 $3.99
SUPERMAN UNCHAINED #2 COMBO PACK $4.99
THRESHOLD #7 $3.99
WORLDS FINEST #14 $2.99

IDW PUBLISHING

BEST OF EC ARTIST ED HC PI
GHOSTBUSTERS TP VOL 05 NEW GHOSTBUSTERS $17.99
GODZILLA ONGOING #13 [DIG/P+] $3.99
JUDGE DREDD CLASSICS #1 $3.99
LOCKE & KEY TP VOL 05 CLOCKWORKS $19.99
MY LITTLE PONY MICRO SERIES #1 TWILIGHT SPARKLE COMICFOLIO PI
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MY LITTLE PONY MICRO SERIES #6 APPLEJACK [DIG/P+] $3.99
TMNT NEW ANIMATED ADVENTURES #1 $3.99
TMNT ULTIMATE COLLECTION HC VOL 02 RED LABEL ED PI
X-FILES CLASSICS HC VOL 01 $29.99

IMAGE COMICS

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CHEW #35 (MR) [DIG] $2.99
DARKNESS #114 (MR) [DIG] $4.99
DAWN SWORDMASTERS DAUGHTER [DIG] $3.99
EAST OF WEST #3 2ND PTG $3.50
EAST OF WEST #4 [DIG] $3.50
GHOSTED #1 (MR) [DIG] $2.99
GREAT PACIFIC #8 (MR) [DIG] $2.99
PETER PANZERFAUST #12 [DIG] $3.50
PROPHET TP VOL 02 BROTHERS [DIG] $14.99
SAVAGE DRAGON #189 [DIG] $3.99
SAVAGE DRAGON ON TRIAL TP [DIG] $16.99
SHELTERED #1 [DIG] $2.99
SKULLKICKERS TP VOL 04 EIGHTY EYES ON AN EVIL ISLAND [DIG] $16.99
STORM DOGS #6 (MR) [DIG] $3.50
WALKING DEAD #112 (MR) [DIG] $2.99

MARVEL COMICS

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ESSENTIAL CAPTAIN AMERICA TP VOL 07 $19.99
FEARLESS DEFENDERS #6 NOW $2.99
FF TP VOL 01 FANTASTIC FAUX NOW $15.99
GAMBIT TP VOL 02 TOMBSTONE BLUES $15.99
HAWKEYE #12 $2.99
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INDESTRUCTIBLE HULK #10 NOW $3.99
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