STUFF: News, Technology, the cool and the plain weird

[MIKA27]

The Wild Bunch being remade, director hired

Jonathan Jakubowicz is set to bring The Wild Bunch back to the screen.

Nothing like a bit of cheery remake news to kick the day off. This time, it’s Sam Peckinpah’s classic western The Wild Bunch that’s getting a modern day make over. Warner Bros is behind the project, and this new take on the material will reportedly update it to the present day.

Furthermore, it’ll now centre around the CIA, drug cartels, and a heist on the California-Mexico border. Sicario shoud be on the watching pile for those concerned, we’d suggest.

The Wild Bunch remake has been doing the rounds in Hollywood for a while, and previously Legend director Brian Helgeland and Suicide Squad helmer David Ayer have both taken a pass at the script.

Now, though, it’s arrived on the desk of Jonathan Jakubowicz, who has been signed up to write and direct the new The Wild Bunch movie.

Jonathan Jakubowicz hails from Venezuela, where he has enjoyed success with the likes of Secuestro Express and the TV show Profugos. The Wild Bunch will mark his American movie debut.

[MIKA27]

Garmin's New GPS Running Watches Bring Bigger Screens and Better Smarts

The Garmin Forerunner family has long been a pretty great way to bring some science to your running. For the latest versions, what’s mostly not broke ain’t being fixed, but there are some neat-looking new features.

First up are the new Forerunner 230 and 235, the lower-end watches. The difference between the two is that the 235 uses an optical sensor in the watch to monitor heart rate, while the 230 needs to be paired with a more old-fashioned heart-rate strap.

Apart from that, both watches are pretty similar—and nearly identical to the Forerunner 220 and 225 that came before: simple, decent-looking GPS watches that sync to your phone to offer fitness tracking and smartwatch functionality. The biggest change this year is a 44 per cent bigger colour screen: it looks like Garmin’s slimmed down the bezel, which looks much better, and should make the watch easier to read when you’re starting to go cross-eyed from exhaustion.

The other interesting feature is one that’s trickled down from the higher-end 600-series Forerunner: VO2 Max estimation. Your VO2 Max is a measure of how efficiently your body uses oxygen. It’s an important number for anyone doing an endurance sport, but measuring it normally involves an awful treadmill test where you run until you puke.

By plugging information about your heart rate, running speed, age and weight into an algorithm, Garmin can not only estimate your VO2 Max, but also predict race times and give you recovery intervals after workouts. It’s not groundbreakingly critical information, but it’s a neat way to bring the more complicated side of sports science to more average runners.

If you live for stats, though, Garmin has an update to its higher-end Forerunners just for you. The 630 is getting the same bigger screen as its cheaper cousins, but with a much longer list of things to measure, ranging from actually-useful cadence measurements, to dubiously-useful stress estimation.

Otherwise, it’s really just the same Forerunner 620 that we know and love: Wi-Fi syncs your data whenever you come home, Bluetooth pairs with your smartphone for all sorts of smartwatch-esque functions, and the GPS will track your every move when you’re actually out running.

Both watches will start shipping in a range of colours before the end of the year. The Forerunner 230 costs £239.99 with the heart-rate strap, while the strapless 235 will run you £269.99. If you want the step up, the 630 will start at £329.99, or £389.99 with the more advanced foot-tracking pod.

[MIKA27]

Review: Steve Jobs Is A Very Entertaining Movie About How It's OK To Be An Arsehole

Five minutes into Steve Jobs, I didn’t think I was gonna make it.

I am, indeed, a product of the attention-deficit generation whose mind was ruined by the “beautiful” ideas of Steve Jobs. I’ve heard the stories about Jobs’ meticulous obsession with details, and his mercurial, uncompromising personality. How could I not be? They have been etched on our public consciousness with an endless stream of books, movies, TV specials, magazine articles. Steve Jobs jumps right into establishing these genius and arsehole personalities right from the start: It’s 1984, and there’s Steve Jobs fretting about the fine points of the Macintosh unveiling event. He’s being meticulous and an arsehole. “Ugh, ****,” I thought. “Not this again. I can’t sit through this again.”

Hella spoilers ahead — but you know what happens at the end, right?

Then five minutes later, I was saddled in my seat barely blinking, my brain chewing every word of Aaron Sorkin’s delicious script. You’ve seen a Sorkin movie before? Characters chat in dense, witty paragraphs. No one in reality talks like this, but listening to the dramatic portrayals of Steve Jobs and Joanna Hoffman (deftly played by Michael Fassbender and Kate Winslet) when they’re written like conflicted heroes in a Shakespeare play is great fun. This is Sorkin, for sure. You’re able to dissociate the story you’re watching from the story you’ve heard a million times. This isn’t a trite tech biopic. It’s just great cinema.

Sorkin’s story benefits from its structure. It’s a three-act play, really. There are three long scenes, each set in the 30 or so minutes before three major product launches: the 1984 launch of the Macintosh, the 1988 launch of the Nextcube, and finally the 1998 launch of the iMac. Each of the scenes takes place in real time, such that a minute of screen time is a minute in the world of the film. Danny Boyle renders the the script to life with wonderful direction.

In each section, Jobs navigates backstage areas like a general parading around a military encampment, arguing with key figures in his life: His former lover Chrisann Brennan, his daughter with Brennan, Lisa, his best friend Steve Wozniak, his confidant and Apple marketing executive Joanna Hoffman, former software engineer Andy Hertzfeld, and former Apple CEO John Sculley.

And argue with them he does! This guy liked to argue, we’re meant to understand. It’s a good thing too, because not a whole hell of a lot is happening in this movie. It’s just people talking, so it might have been really boring if everyone was getting along with each other.

Jobs doesn’t come off real well. He’s unconscionably rude and difficult with everyone around him. He treats everyone like ****. Sure, he’s the boss, and he’s stressed out before a product launch. But his daughter? At first he refuses to even acknowledge that she’s his daughter. He grows into it, and the film ends on a gauzy note between the two. Just before Jobs takes the stage to announce the iMac — the first Jobs product to really change things — he shares a tender moment of light mutual understanding with his then-19-year old daughter. Aw, cute.

The movie isn’t naive about who Jobs was. When Alex Gibney’s critical documentary about Jobs was released last month, I noted that it’s important to acknowledge what a shit**** Jobs was to everyone around him. For its part, Steve Jobs doesn’t shy away off highlighting Jobs’ difficult personality. It does try to explain it away a little bit with a portrayal that says that he was damaged by a sense of rejection from having been put up for adoption by his parents.

Movies don’t need to have morals, and this isn’t a documentary. Theoretically, anyway. But a question I’ve been pondering with all of the Jobs media that’s been released in the years since his death is whether or not we absolve Jobs for his assholishness, just because he was a genius who had a huge positive impact on the world. Is it OK? Do we let him off the hook for the **** ups, and the people he laid off because his hubris led him down the wrong path? Do we forgive the immorality of his throwing executives under the bus to get himself off the hook for securities fraud? Is it all right that he denied his own daughter, because they made up 20 years later?

The Sorkin-Boyle portrait is certainly nostalgic about the man. It’s hard not to be. He was electric. He’s an icon. For all the jerkiness portrayed in the film, of course they let him go.

People on both sides of the “he was a jerk”/”he was a hero” divide have complained that the movie doesn’t represent fact. Sorkin has been upfront that portions of the movie are complete inventions. For example, John Sculley and Jobs never spoke again after Jobs was fired from Apple following the Macintosh disaster, and yet, the ex-CEO appears at two keynotes in the film he didn’t actually attend.

Luckily, I don’t think we’re expected to view Steve Jobs as an expression of fact about the man. Think of it as a gripping, witty drama. That way, it’s not really all that important whether or not they give a happy spin to a the transgressions of a sociopath. It’s just a fun movie to watch! If you want to get bogged down by the meaning and legacy of the Jobs myth vs the reality, well, this movie is probably just going to piss you off.

[MIKA27]

This Is The Most Complete Picture Of The Milky Way Ever Taken

How big is this photo? So big that just by taking it, astronomers found over 50,000 new stars and other bright space objects.

The picture comes from astronomers at Germany’s Ruhr-Universität Bochum. Of course, this wasn’t a simple matter of an instantaneous point-and-click shot. Instead, to get the full spread, researchers spent a full five years taking photos, which they put into a single 46 billion pixel image.

The entire resulting image was so large, that the photo could only be released in sections, like the section showing Eta Carinae above. When put together in its full form, the photo revealed several previously unseen objects in our galaxy. In fact, the 50,000 new bright objects are so new that, though researchers think a lot of them are probably stars, they’re not sure yet. Some of them could be whole star systems or other exceptionally bright space bodies.

To see the whole thing, Ruhr-Universität Bochum built a special tool where you can scroll through the full image right here.

[MIKA27]

A Hiker Found A 1200-Year-Old Viking Sword, And Experts Say You Could Still Fight With It

It sounds like something from a fantasy video game: While trekking the mountainous wild, a man in Norway recently stumbled upon an ancient, intact sword. And with the right treatment, it could still be used to vanquish baddies today, experts say.

CNN reports that outdoorsman Goran Olsen made the rusty discovery when he took a break while hiking an ancient route in Norway, about 242km west of the capital, Oslo. Apparently the sword was just lying under some rocks. Since the region is covered in snow and frost for half the year, CNN reports that those conditions shielded the sword from humidity, which helped preserve the sword’s excellent condition.

Olsen turned it in to the local Hordaland County Council, which then donated it to the University Museum of Bergen for preservation.

The 0.7m blade probably dates from about 750 to 800 A.D., and was likely used by vikings of the day. The sword was found in such unusually good condition, that experts say if you polished it up enough and outfitted it with a new grip, it could actually be used as a weapon over a millennium later.

That’s according to Hordaland County archaeologist Jostein Aksdal, who also says the story doesn’t end here. “When the snow has gone in spring, we will check the place where the sword was found,” he told Swedish newspaper, The Local. “If we find several objects, or a tomb, perhaps we can find the story behind the sword.”

We’ll keep an eye on the story, and our hopes up for a hidden viking weapon treasure horde.

[MIKA27]

The Star Wars Force Awakens Mega Trailer Is A Sight To Behold

Some clever Star Wars fanatics have painstakingly cut together every piece of footage released for the new movie. The result is an almost spoiler-free mega-trailer that will take your breath away.

The above “Supercut” was pieced together by Science Vs. Cinema’s James Darling from all the trailers released for The Force Awakens thus far, plus a sprinkling of behind-the-scenes footage that debuted at Comic-Con.

What we love about this trailer (and all the official trailers, for that matter) is that it manages to invoke huge amounts of excitement and emotion without giving much of the plot away. Hell, we haven’t even caught a glimpse of Luke Skywalker yet. Terrific stuff.

[MIKA27]

Watch A Dog Battle Two Wolves

The dog lives, but this video is still a graphic and potentially disturbing look inside what a wolf attack really looks like.

Klara is a four-year old Swedish elk hound owned by Tommy Berglund. He was on a hunting trip in Värmland County, Sweden when she wandered off.

“My impression is that she was out on a regular search excursion,” Tommy told Swedish Hunting. He didn’t realise she’d been in a fight at all until he found her laying down in the forest and discovered large bite marks all over her body. He threw Klara onto his shoulders and carried her 700 metres out to the road; fortunately there was a vet just 25 minutes away who was able to stitch her up. She’s now recovering at home. Tommy doubts she’ll ever be able to join him hunting again, but is just happy to have his first dog home safe.

[MIKA27]

This Is What The Strongest Tropical Cyclone Ever Recorded Looked Like From Space

Yesterday, NASA’s Suomi NPP satellite passed over Hurricane Patricia, the most powerful tropical cyclone ever measured, and captured this stunning image in infrared.

Hurricane Patricia made landfall on the Pacific coast of Mexico last night, and was downgraded to a tropical storm earlier this morning. The storm is remarkable not only in terms of how powerful it became — yesterday morning, a group of courageous men and women flew into the damn thing and measured wind speeds of 320 KPH and a minimum central pressure of 880 millibars — but how quickly it grew. On October 22, Patricia was a Category one hurricane. By 8 a.m. EDT on October 23, 2015, it had been upgraded to a Category 5 and flagged as the strongest eastern north Pacific hurricane on record.

The storm is expected to dissipate over the rugged terrain of central Mexico this afternoon, but we’ll be keeping a close eye on it. Learn more about this historic weather event over at The Vane.

[MIKA27]

Statue Of Leader From Communist Empire Transformed Into Leader Of Actual Empire

It’s always the most embarrassing part of a fallen regime. All those statues, no longer relevant. Usually they come down, hence the severed head of Vladimir Lenin recently unearthed in Berlin. But what to do with all those Lenins still standing? Turn them into the likeness of a more benevolent leader, of course.

That’s what happened in Odessa, Ukraine, where local artist Alexander Milov managed to turn a statue of the Soviet leader into a post-surgery Anakin Skywalker. The country is in the midst of a decommunization program which requires all symbols of the toppled political party to be removed. But instead of knocking this one down, Milov (a sculptor who also had a piece at Burning Man) encased Lenin in an alloy which is glued to the old statue. Oh, and he added free wifi, which is exactly the kind of tech upgrade Lord Vader would have demanded.

Who was further on the Dark Side spectrum, Lenin or Vader? I’d say Lenin — although Vader had his moments, the Sith Lord eventually redeemed himself. Although there are plenty of Imperial apologists who refuse to believe the Empire was indeed evil:

[MIKA27]

The Plague Has Been Around For A Lot Longer Than We Thought

The Black Death wiped out nearly half the population of Europe during the 14th Century, a blight that swept through the continent in the gut of fleas. But a new analysis of ancient human DNA shows that the dreaded bacteria emerged at least 3000 years before the first plague pandemic — a time before it mutated into its modern and more virulent form.

The new study, which now appears in the science journal Cell, is fascinating for two reasons.

First, it shows that the bacteria responsible for the plague, Yersinia pestis, has been around twice as long as previously thought, and second, the version of Y. pestis that existed more than 5000 years ago was categorically different than the one that ravaged Eurasian populations starting in the 4th and early 3rd millennium BC. Notably, it hadn’t yet evolved the capacity to survive in the gut of fleas. This more ancient alternate version, now known as the pneumonic plague, was passed on from person-to-person via airborne transmission rather than from flea bites.

An international team of researchers from the universities of Copenhagen, Denmark, and Cambridge, UK, analysed the DNA extracted from the teeth of 101 adults from Asia and Europe dating from between 2800 to 5000 years ago. The scientists identified the Y. pestis bacteria in the DNA of seven adults, the oldest of whom died 5783 years ago. It’s the earliest evidence of the plague ever discovered.

From Pneumonic to Bubonic

Genetic analysis of the recovered ancient bacteria revealed a pair of key differences: it lacked a “virulence” gene called ymt, and an “activator gene” called pla.

Robert Hooke’s drawing of a flea

The virulence gene protects the Y. pestis bacteria from being destroyed by the toxins in flea guts, allowing it to reproduce and multiply unhindered. This causes a clog in the flea’s digestive tract, so it starts to starve. In response, the infected flea frantically bites anything it can, thus spreading the plague further.

The activator mutation allows the bacteria to spread across different tissues, converting the localised lung infection of pneumonic plague into the bubonic form where the blood and lymph nodes are affected.

Together, the ymt and pla genetic add-ons allowed the plague to take on a more virulent form, resulting in the 541 AD Plague of Justinian and the Black Death, the latter of which killed an estimated 75 to 200 million people from 1346-53. But as the researchers are correct to point out, these mutations — on their own — weren’t enough to create the conditions for a pandemic. Structural changes to human organisation had just as much to do with it.

Changing Demographics

The researchers suspect that the older, Bronze Age version of the plague was able to spread from human to human during active migration periods.

Skull of a Yamnaya, the people who migrated to Central Asia in early Bronze Age and developed the Afanasievo culture. The Afanasievo are one of the Bronze Age groups carrying Y. pestis

“The Bronze Age was a period of major metal weapon production, and it is thought increased warfare, which is compatible with emerging evidence of large population movements at the time,” noted study co-author Marta Mirazón-Lahr in a statement. “If pneumonic plague was carried as part of these migrations, it would have had devastating effects on small groups they encountered.

Mirazón-Lahr says that well-documented cases have demonstrated the pneumonic plague’s ability to go from a single hunter or herder to ravaging an entire community in just two to three days.

Importantly, however, the transition of Bronze Age societies to a more urbanized mode likely contributed to the success and spread of the new form of the disease. As is well known, cities come with rats — a deadly carrier of the plague-ridden fleas.

“The endemic nature of pneumonic plague was perhaps more adapted for an earlier Bronze Age population,” noted study-co-author Robert Foley. “Then, as Eurasian societies grew in complexity and trading routes continued to open up, maybe the conditions started to favour the more lethal form of plague.”

[MIKA27]

Amazing Photo Of M1 Abram Tanks Surrounded In A Force Field Of Dust After Firing Its Cannon

So. Cool. Here’s a photo from the US Army showing M1A2 Abram tanks and a M2A3 Bradley fighting vehicle during a live-fire demonstration. Because their cannons have kicked up the sand from the ground, they almost look like desert sand sculptures. But then they start to take shape and you realise that yep, they’re war machines.

[MIKA27]

The Difference In Quality And Levels Of Coins

The British Royal Mint makes three types of commemorative coins: bullion, brilliant uncirculated and proof. Bullion is basically made to the same standard of regular coins in circulation, brilliant uncirculated coins (a real mouthful) are finished with more attention to detail than bullion coins and proof coins are of the absolute highest quality and care.

The Royal Mint writes:

The dies used to strike Proof coins are all hand-finished. This is to ensure that all imperfections are removed before they’re used to strike a coin. Each Proof blank is placed into a coin press by hand. Proof blanks are of a higher quality than Brilliant Uncirculated and Bullion blanks. Proof coins will be struck up to six times, at a lower speed and with less pressure than other finishes. This ensures a smoother, sharper finish and preserves the finer details of the design.

After striking, each Proof coin is removed from the press by hand and checked for imperfections. The dies are cleaned with air between each coin to ensure that no marks or imperfections are caused during striking. As a result of the extra care and attention, no more than 50 Proof coins can be struck per hour. Whereas, for example, Bullion coins are produced at a rate of around 3,000 coins per hour. The Proof dies are regularly re-worked and re-polished to maintain a blemish-free finish when striking. Each Proof die may only strike a few hundred coins before it has to be re-polished.

[MIKA27]

How To Poison A Nuclear Reactor

The most famous disaster in the history of nuclear power was the result of many small problems — but perhaps the most important problem was the unrecognised presence of a “neutron poison.”

On 26 April 1986, an accident occurred during a systems test at the Chernobyl Power Plant in Ukraine, involving an explosion and a 10-day outbreak of fire that spewed radioactive particles into the atmosphere — 400 times more radioactive material than fell after the bombing of Hiroshima. Over 50 workers were killed, and the surrounding area remained closed to visitors until 2011.

Nuclear reactors change their chemical composition over time. Atoms are bombarded by neutrons, which makes them split apart, releasing both energy and more neutrons, which start the cycle over again. When fissionable material splits, it doesn’t just disappear. Among the products of fission are substances called “neutron poisons.” These isotopes suck up neutrons, especially neutrons going a certain speed, and can slow down or stop the reaction.

On average you want to get more than one neutron out than you put in, running the reactor right at the point of criticality. Yet you don’t want the neutron recapture rate to be too high. It all comes down to the byproducts.

The most famous of these is xenon-135. Xenon-135 isn’t a direct product of fission, but iodine-135 is. Iodine-135 has a half-life of about 6.5 hours, and decays by turning one of its neutrons into a proton. The newly-made xenon-135 sucks down neutrons, but a high enough rate of bombardment can essentially feed it all the neutrons it can take and destroy it as a poison. With the xenon-135 destroyed, the rate of the reaction goes back up.

The trouble starts when the reactor isn’t at a high enough power level to burn off the xenon-135. After a time, the xenon accumulates, poisoning the reactor and decreasing its productivity more and more.

In the case of the Chernobyl disaster, a reactor’s reaction level was deliberately lowered during a testing sequence, which meant the iodine-135 was still accumulating and decaying, but the xenon-135 wasn’t getting cleared away.

The people running the test were not aware of this accumulation, so they pulled out the control rods, which also soaked up neutrons. This actually increased the reaction rate by obliterating the xenon-135, over-heating the core. The result was one of the biggest nuclear disasters in history, and all for a lack of poison.

[MIKA27]

For Fuzz: Hot Toys' Force Awakens Flametrooper Is Here To Incinerate What's Left Of Your Money

First, Kylo Ren and his Stormtroopers were there to tempt your disposable income out of your wallet. Then, the Snowtroopers came along and straight up demanded it. Now the First Order’s most pyromanic adherents are here to finish the job.

It makes sense that the first salvo of The Force Awakens figrues from Hot Toys are all the different varieties of trooper for the First Order. No pesky licenses from actors to get their likeness, just slap a guy in gorgeously rendered armour and call it a day.

And gorgeously rendered the Flametrooper is. Although they share similarities with their Snowy and Stormy bretheren, the Flametrooper comes with a bunch of extra armour, ontop of the hulking gas pack for the weapon that gives them their names.

Aside from the wacking great backpack/flamethrower (ability to shoot actual flames not included, publicity pictures be damned), the Flametrooper doesn’t come with much else — just a series of alternate hands to either hold his weapon or stand relaxed. You’d think they’d have a spare pistol or something on the occasional chance they need to shoot someone more than a few feet away, but nope. Just like the Empire before them, the First Order loves itself a single-service soldier.

If you plan on army building these guys, then I am so sorry for your wallet (but incredibly jealous of your capacity to spend so much money on badass toys). The First Order Flametrooper will be available in winter next year, and set you back around $US200-225 when preorders go live on Sideshow Collectibles’ website.

[MIKA27]

Mitsubishi Is Developing Projector Turn Signals To Give Early Warning To Pedestrians And Drivers

Positioned at all four corners of your vehicle, turn signals are usually more visible to other drivers on the road than pedestrians trying to cross it. So Mitsubishi Electric is developing a new indicator system that projects the vehicle’s intended path on the road, making it more obvious to everyone around it.

It’s reminiscent of BMW’s new Welcome Light Carpet that illuminates a path to your car’s door at night, but Mitsubishi’s projectors will instead indicate the direction the vehicle is travelling — forward, back, left, or right — as well as when the occupant’s are opening the doors. Any cyclist who’s ever had a collision with a car door that randomly opened should appreciate the heads up.

Powered by LEDs, the projectors will be a minimal drain on a car’s electrical systems, but in exchange should help reduce accidents, collisions, and maybe even a little road rage if they’re able to turn on automatically, eliminating unannounced lane changes.

[MIKA27]

Rare Nazi Enigma Machine Smashes Record At Auction

An exceptionally rare and fully-functional Nazi Enigma M4 enciphering machine used during the Second World War has sold for a whopping $US365,000, setting a new world record at auction.

The item, sold yesterday at Bonham’s “Conflicts of the 20th Century” event, went to an unnamed private collector. At $US365,000, it’s the single largest sum ever doled out for an Enigma machine.

The M4, named for its four rotors, represents the scarcest of the German Enigma machines. Manufactured during the latter stages of the war, only 150 still remain in existence from the 1500 ever built.

The M4 Enigma machines were used exclusively on Naval submarines. Back in 1941, after rightfully suspecting that the three-rotor Enigma machine had been compromised following the capture of U-570 in August, German Admiral Karl Doenitz ordered the construction of the four-rotor version.

After its unexpected introduction on 2 February 1942, the M4 played a major role in the Battle of the Atlantic. Codebreakers at Bletchley Park, who called it the Shark-key, worked frantically to break it. The M4 remained unbroken for almost a year before Allied forces were able to capture new codebooks.

The rarity of the M4 stems from the fact that around 70% of German U-boats were sunk in the later stages of the war — partly due to the breaking of the Enigma code. What’s more, captains were ordered to smash their machines when captured. Historians suspect that, for every ten M3s still in existence only one M4 remains.

Currently, there are a total of 50 Enigma machines on display in various museums around the world. A mere seven of these are M4s, all of which were confiscated from captured U-boats.

[MIKA27]

Cool Photo Of Fighter Jets Flying Over An Aircraft Carrier

This photo shows US Navy fighter jets flying side-by-side with Chilean Air Force fighter jets next to the USS George Washington aircraft carrier. It’s like seeing little ducklings follow the big mama duck, only these are sophisticated weapons worth millions of dollars.

U.S. Naval aircraft and aircraft from the Chilean Air Force participate in a fly-by adjacent to aircraft carrier USS George Washington (CVN 73). UNITAS 2015, the U.S. Navy’s longest running annual multinational maritime exercise, is part of the Southern Seas deployment planned by U.S. Naval Forces Southern Command/U.S. 4th Fleet. This 56th iteration of UNITAS is conducted in two phases: UNITAS Pacific, hosted by Chile, Oct. 13-24, 2015 and UNITAS Atlantic, hosted by Brazil scheduled for November.

[MIKA27]

Exciting Adventures In A Zombie-Powered Steampunk World

Ever wonder what the world would be like if the British Empire had been built upon a working class of reanimated corpses? Well, the new anime film Empire of Corpses brings that world to life — and it is fantastic.

Empire of Corpses begins in the year 1878 and is set in a world quite similar to our own. However, there is one huge difference: Reanimated corpses are used as slave labour across the world. The use of reanimated workers is so prevalent that they handle almost every menial job. On the streets of London, we see them as waiters and porters. In British India they make up entire armies. They pull river barges and crew ships at sea. They can even take dictations or down everything they see happen in the world around them.

These zombie workers (yep, we’re breaking out the “Z word”) were created thanks to two major changes in history as we know it. The first is simple: Dr. Frankenstein was a real person — and so was his monster. This leads to an entire science built around reanimating life.

The other is that Charles Babbage actually built his Analytical Engine in the 1830s — dragging the world into the computing age over a century before our own. With computers, it became possible to program the soulless bodies of the dead to respond to any number of simple commands. But more than that, the zombiefied human brain can act as memory storage — making it the perfect hard drive for the analytical engine.

The adventure of Empire of Corpses follows young medical student John H. Watson — yes, that John H. Watson — and his zombie partner Friday. After showing remarkable skill in reanimating his dead friend Friday in his own personal lab, Watson is recruited by British Intelligence and is sent to the far corners of the Empire to investigate rumours related to new types of zombies being created. He finds himself partnered with renowned Victorian adventurer Frederick Burnaby and repeatedly encounters femme fatale Hadaly Lilith as he races across the globe to stop a plot that could destroy the world as he knows it.

As you may have guessed from the paragraphs above, Empire of Corpses is a mixture of classic literature and historical fiction. Watson, Frankenstein, Hadaly, and Alexei Karamazov are all fictional characters reimagined for a steampunk world filled with domesticated zombies. On the other hand, Burnaby, Seigo Yamazawa, Ulysses S. Grant, and Thomas Edison were all real people. Seeing how they are portrayed in the world of Empire of Corpses is equal parts fun and fascinating.

Thematically, however, Empire of Corpses is focused on one topic: the human soul. The zombies are used as a workforce because none of what they were as living humans remains. Their eyes are dead and they are unable to speak.

Likewise, while they can follow commands, they cannot assimilate information without direct programing via an analytical engine. So while you could program zombies to shoot guns at enemies, they cannot determine for themselves what constitutes an enemy from context alone. In other words, they can be programmed but cannot learn.

This change is attributed to the loss of the soul — the supposed proof of which is that when a human dies, its body becomes 21 grams lighter due to the soul’s escape. Never has there been a reanimated corpse with a soul — except for, as the legends would have you believe, the very first one: Frankenstein’s monster.

Watson is driven to discover if the soul is, if fact, a real thing. For if it is, there may be a way to return Friday’s soul back to him — effectively giving his dead friend a new life. Of course, Watson is far from the only person hunting for the knowledge to bring back the dead. As he, Friday, and Burnaby travel the world, they encounter more than a few people who have taken this obsession to extremes, far beyond what Watson has even dreamed of. And so with each revelation, Watson comes a step closer to returning his friend’s soul — and, in another sense, losing his own.

Empire of Corpses is an absolutely amazing film. It has the action and adventure of a globetrotting adventure; and through its mixture of historical fiction and classic literature, it builds a fantastical — yet, still familiar — world. Yet, beneath all that is a deep exploration of the nature of the human soul and the minds of those driven to understand it. All this comes together to make Empire of Corpses one of the best anime films I have seen in years and one destined to become a classic.

Empire of Corpses was released in Japanese theatres on 2 October 2015. It has been licensed by Funimation for release in the the US in 2016.

[Habana Mike]

Only 552 posts away from the lead Mika. My over/under is 10/24!

48 over right now.

Looks like you hit the date!

[MIKA27]

48 over right now.

Looks like you hit the date!

Can you predict me the Lotto numbers please Mike

[MIKA27]

This Month In Dashcams: When Good People Do Bad Things

Members of the Aussie dashcam community are very used to catching others doing stupid things on the roads, but sometimes — as we see in this month’s dashcam compilation — our friends do the wrong thing too.

This month’s dashcam compilation starts with the admin of the Aussie Dash Cam Owners community running a red light. Whoops. Good on him for owning up and apologising, however!

As with all the dashcam compilations you see in This Month in Dashcams, this one comes with a strong language warning.

[MIKA27]

Strange Creature Found in Paraguay

Firefighters in Paraguay found the decomposing body of a creature that none of them could identify. This being South America, the immediate reaction was “Chupacabra!” but others thought it might be a space alien or a new and different kind of Paraguayan cryptid. What is it?

According to many local reports, the body was found on October 21 near the shore of the Parana River in Carmen del Paraná, Itapúa. It’s not clear whether they discovered it, but a group of volunteer firefighters were among the first to examine the body. Their initial speculation was that the creature was part human or possibly an ape not from the local area. A medical examiner who examined the photos was unable to determine what it might be.

Local witnesses who viewed the body and those who saw it on the Internet speculated it might be a Chupacabra, an alien, an unknown cryptid, an ape or some sort of humanoid. As of this writing, they were waiting for a formal autopsy to be conducted to determine what the volunteer firefighters had found.

Artist interpretations of descriptions of the Mono Grande

If it’s not an ape, Chupacabra or extraterrestrial, what could the creature be? South America is home to a number of cryptids that might match this creature. The Maricoxi is said to be an aggressive ape-like creature living in the jungle and ranging in height from 2 to 6 feet, although there are a few claims of it reaching 12 feet tall. Explorer Peter Fawcett claimed to have seen a group of them in 1914.

The only photograph of the De Loy’s Ape

Another possibility is the Mono Grande (Spanish for “large monkey”), a monkey-like creature that is much larger in size than the New World monkeys. Sightings of these go back to the late 1500s when explorers Pedro Cieza de León and Sir Walter Raleigh wrote about them. A photograph from 1920 of a Mono Grande or another ape-like cryptid named the De Loys’ Ape for its discoverer, François de Loys, is believed by most to be a spider monkey, but other sightings occur periodically.

As of this writing, the body found by firefighters in Carmen del Paraná has still not been identified. Monkey? Cupacabra? Alien? Mono Grande or Maricoxi? A completely new cryptid? Something else?

[MIKA27]

THE METRO STATIONS OF MOSCOW

If you’ve ever been in the filthy, rat-infested, graffiti-riddled tunnels that comprise the New York subway system, or the claustrophobic, industrial parts of the London tube system, then you owe it to yourself to see how Russia does underground tunnels. Beneath Moscow lies some of the most gorgeous, artful architecture you could ask for, all made for transporting people around town.

Created in the 1930’s, it was the dream of Stalin that these tunnels be “palaces of the people” and act as not only reminders of the greatness of Mother Russia, but also bomb shelters to protect the citizenry against attacks during the war-torn years surrounding the two world wars. Drawing from various influences, visitors can see Constructivism, Art Deco, and rococo on display in full glory, since little advertising is allowed and spray painting will likely cost you a hand.

[MIKA27]

BMW R80 BY AUTO FABRICA

British custom builders Auto Fabrica have really achieved perfection in its simplicity with their new build, a stunning BWR80 conversion. The English workshop specializes in a super-clean, minimalist look, and focuses on reducing weight in their custom bikes. The rear is certainly one of the most exciting we’ve seen so far, with a stylish curved orange panel holding slender red acrylic fins that distribute the brake lighting. The perfect ride for commuting in a busy city.

[MIKA27]

JOHN E. FITZGERALD VERY SPECIAL RESERVE BOURBON

Usually, if you're talking about a wheated bourbon from the now extinct Stitzel-Weller Distillery, it's Pappy Van Winkle that you're referencing. But John E. Fitzgerald Very Special Reserve Bourbon fits that same criteria, and might garner the same attention as well. Heaven Hill acquired 12 barrels from the old distillery when they bought the Old Fitzgerald line, and those barrels were aged for 20 years before they produced a very limited 3,000 bottles of bourbon. Each of these hard to find bottles are housed in a handmade wooden box with die-cut keyholes and hinged doors that close with magnets — increasing the appeal for this sought after product even more.