Weekend binge, el cheapo book pickups, sayin' goodbye, geek-worthy sightings and some geek acquisitions

If you're wondering what great procrastinations can do, apparently it can make you do crazy things like embarking on an endless wait to update one's blog. In my case, it's coming pretty close to a full year since my last update here on the blog. I'm positive that I've talked about this before and I had conveniently blamed the distractions of other social media platforms for my lack of visit back to this old blog. Still, I like to dust off the cobwebs once in a while. It also warms my heart to see that many other blogs in my  contact list are still active and churning out postings on a consistent basis.

So let's go and see what I've been up to for the past....one...err, two weeks or so.

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I've been binging some shows and films over the past week and some of the notable ones are as below:

I finally caught up with Season 2 of HBO's Winning Time. As a lifelong NBA basketball fan, I've watched endless documentaries about the rivalry between the LA Lakers and the Boston Celtics so I kind of appreciate the fresh view albeit somewhat fictional behind the scene happenings of the people that made the legendary rivalry possible. Although the title suggests that the show was not inadvertently solely about the Lakers, we do get a glimpse of backstory of Larry Bird and how Red Auerbach convinced him to led the Celtics to glory. Admittedly, I was somehow more of a Celtics fan back in the day and I can still recall rooting for the Bird-McHale-Parish attack whenever the Boston team was on TV. Whatever it is, it was such a slap in the face when Episode 7 proved to be the abrupt end to Season 2 (and Winning Time as a whole?) with that sudden and lazy ending. Here's hoping for a Season 3 but everyone knows HBO had already dropped the bomb and cancelled the series. Bummer.

By the way, my favorite character off Winning Time is neither Magic Johnson, Pat Riley or Larry Bird. The honor goes to the very obnoxious Jerry West played by Jason Clarke, even though this portrayal was later refuted by the real Jerry West himself!

When a movie franchise comes to a close, one must surely have some sort of expectations on how it was going to bow out on a grandiose manner. I've actually waited for some time before I got to watch Dial of Destiny, mainly because I was tied up with some stuff, work or otherwise. Many were already saying that 'Crystal Skull was way better than 'Destiny but I beg to differ. In no way it was a perfect swansong for Indy but it was good enough for his final outing and most definitely a better film that 'Crystal Skull. I'm such a sucker for time travel elements so I might be biased here but that time travelling stuff to ancient Greece was totally far out in my books! Still there were a few 'could have beens' and misses notably the absence of Short Round which I think would have 'rounded' (pun very intended) up the franchise nicely.

What about a cheesy and totally predictable sea-monster movie? Check! Always a winner in my books. Loved the first movie and obviously I was really looking forward to the second Meg movie. As a purveyor of the sea-monster cryptozoology lore, I can't recommend this movie enough, especially to those expecting ridiculously violent ancient prehistoric marine animals mightily chomping down everything in their sight but still fall victim to very few puny humans!

Episode 6 of the Ahsoka series on Disney Plus gave us the first live action appearance of the great Grand Admiral Thrawn and a very suspicious looking Captain Enoch who might be directly taken off the Immortal characters from the 300 movie. The truth is that he's probably a throwback to one of Uncle George's character from his THX 1138 student film (you might want to check that one out if you're into that sort of trivia!). The live action Thrawn however looked like he added some extra pounds from the days of Star Wars Rebels. For the record I still cannot get past the fact that Disney made Timothy Zahn re-write the Thrawn books thus canceling out the (now non-canon) original Thrawn Trilogy books, but what they did to my boy Thrawn here is just inexcusable. Gone is the sleek, sharp and slender-looking Thrawn I've came to know from the original Heir to The Empire books. I guess the fall of the Empire does many things to a man....or his gut.

I also take it that many man-tears were shed during that epic Anakin-Ahsoka lightsaber duel and flashback scenes during Episode 5

I've also just finished re-watching all 5 seasons of the X-Men Animated series from the 90s because why not (right)? This one deserves to be re-watched every now by youse X-Men enthusiasts, especially if you're into the Jim Lee-era. Seriously I can't get enough of this series. There's going to be a reboot of this cartoon series, with the 'X-Men '97' toys already out on retail shelves, so you might want to keep an eye on that one. I'm thinking of re-watching the Batman: The Animated Series next.

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I've been on a rampage lately too when it comes to getting cheap AF books from a nearby second hand bookstore near my place. I don't know about you guys but as an avid reader of anything pop-culture related materials, I find the prospect of spending a dollar for a bunch of books (I kid you not) too hard to resist. You just have to spend some time going through the endless stacks of books to look for the ones you fancy, to which I have no problem at all because the fam and I can literally spend hours going through books. Among my notable pickups (also by my better half for me) in recent times:

I love these pre-Disney era novels! These Star Wars books were practically given to us for peanuts because the store owner was clearing out space for his other non-SW arrivals. His loss! I guess I'll have more sleepless nights after this to finish reading everything.

Oh my, this Masters of the Universe picture story book is just screaming my name. I had a few just like this one back in the day, although I'm pretty sure I don't have this one. Am pretty sure they're scalping the heck out of these MOTU picture books online these days.

                                           

Yet a couple of Star Wars novels in this group of books. I was looking extensively for that Tales From the Empire book on the cheap so getting one for mere cents was a no-brainer for me. That's actually my second Jurassic Park novel. I can't resist getting another (relatively better) copy since my first one (also from the same second hand bookstore) was rather beat up. Oh have I ever mentioned before that I totally love movie adaptations or books that inspire their respective movies? It's because you get to read those awesome details that might not be present in the movies itself (re: Tolkien's books).    

                                       

What about these gems? Of course there had to be at least one Star Wars book in any given pile of mine *shucks*. Getting those Apollo 13 and Mortal Kombat books is a must, no matter how terrible some may think of the movies.

                                         

Ok, last one on books, I promise. The highlight from this bunch is for me to finally getting that Forrest Gump book by Winston Groom. I've been looking for it since forever. I'm finally reading the source material after re-watching Zemeckis' film a gajilion times in my lifetime.

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I got to taste the so-much hyped Coffee Bean's pumpkin spice ice-blended the other day when someone got me this during a discussion I had at one...err...Coffee Bean outlet. I don't know about other pumpkin-induced coffee drinks by other designer coffee shops (i.e. Starbuck's or others) but this one ain't up in my alley. Drinking pumpkin laced with cinnamon does not bode well in my taste bud. I get the build up to Halloween and all but I think I'll just stick to my regular mocha or latte after this.

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I bade farewell to a few childhood toys of mine the other week. This time it's those random M.A.S.K. toys to which I've always planned to find parts from eBay to complete them back but never had the time nor resources to do so. They're by no means complete nor in pristine condition but they're still in high demand somehow these days among the M.A.S.K. faithful. Mere moments after my buyer received these he immediately out it up for sale on his online store and guess what? My buyer updated me that those were almost instantly snapped up by hungry M.A.S.K enthusiasts who I think bought those for replacement parts. Glad they went to good homes. Hours of creating memories with childhood friends in the 80s, I shall cherish them forever.

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My fam and I were passing through this (yet another) Korean supermarket the other day and these canned drinks completely caught my attention. I have no clue how they taste like by the way but any Supes and zombie graphics will stop me in my tracks...every time!

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Now howzabout this uber-cool 80s/90s poster shirt for you to proudly wear on your geek-out weekends? Totally sold on the idea but my wallet seemed to disagree with my choice. Let's see how many movies could you identify from this picture.

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A Toys R Us near me was having a sale (still is I think). Many old stocks were on sale but I never expected to see this 1st Appearance Wolverine/Hulk to be back on the TRU shelf. For the longest time I was trying to track one of these down ( I know, I know....late to the game) and suddenly they were back on the shelf...at full price at that! I was having none of that full price nonsense so I'm going to ignore this. Besides, I already picked one up some months ago from a trade with a fellow collector (so long old unwanted NECA figures!)

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What's up with this picture? I've heard of 'comedic effect' but 'stupid effect'? This was at a clothing store where everything else was on markdown except for this one item in the middle of the display shelf (which was nothing fantastic to say the least). What a waste of sticker.

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Fresh from the Hasbro Pulse Con 2023 reveal is the expected announcement by Hasbro to finally give us that 3 MCU Spideys with their respective headsculpts. Many had bought that super expensive No Way Home 3-packs so we kind of understand the backlash from those who pulled the trigger back then for the 3-pack. But this new wave reveal was rather forthcoming really. I'm more intrigued with that Matt Murdock, as well as Green Goblin and Doc Ock (not pictured here). I'm totally hyped up by Tobey and Andrew's headsculpt. Tom, not so much as always.

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So before I log off, here's several geek stuff I've acquired over the past weeks or so (a month's worth I think). When I say 'acquired' it means that I did not necessarily have bought these myself. Sometimes it pays to have friends who don't mind getting you stuff because they have loose change in their pockets...heh. Let's take a gander:

To start off this list, I present to you a Marvel Legends figure which is currently highly sought after by collectors. Ok, this new Black Widow is rather unexpected because I can totally understand why they're pretty much sold out anywhere here in Malaysia. The face scanning technique used for the headsculpt is just so wicked good here in her 3 headsculpts (yes that's right, Hasbro gave us THREE head sculpts of Natasha Romanoff to represent her looks from 3 different eras. This is technically a deluxe Marvel Legends release compressed into a regular box, same like classic Dr Strange from some months ago.

I think this one was sold at a standard Marvel Legends price (what is a standard ML price these days anyway?) but I heard many online stores already marking these up in tandem with the crazy scalper prices going on through the many online selling platforms. I'm not really sure what's the going rate right now but if you do see her at a decent price, you should jump on her. This IS the Ultimate Black Widow ML figure.

Anyhoo, this Black Widow is a complementary gift from a friend of mine who's launching an online store soon. So the dude expects yours truly to do a review of this figure while subtly creating a presence for his online store which I cannot really mention at this point of time...*ehh?*. Modern marketing really baffles me.

Just look at the crazy quality of these SH Figuart-like headsculpts. Dare I say it that these are the best female headsculpts Hasbro (or even from the Toybiz-era ML days) has given us to date. Review for this figure to be up soon.

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Now how about some Hot Wheels? My son picked these up for our HW collection the other day. A couple of rather hard-to-finds so we're grateful for his quick scanning of the Hot Wheel aisle at the convenient stores.

I am actually not sure of which version of the USS Enterprise is this. Can anyone enlighten me? It does look like the one from The Next Generation/Jean-Luc Picard era but I could be wrong.

This Barbie Corvette is pretty much sold out everywhere all thanks to the hype created by the movie (which I still haven't finished watching at this point of time). I think this one and its accompanying 2 other Hot Wheel vehicles were mostly snagged by little girls who happened to be on their way to/from the cinema halls rather than adult collectors.

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To round off my recap today I'd like to show you what a few buddies of mine got for me off an online store sale the other day. I was told that these were at a crazy 50-60% markdown (hey isn't that Indy a relatively recent release?). I didn't really want to start a 6" Indiana Jones collection because I'm already content with my 3.75s which were released over a decade ago. Those MOFOs really know how to get my geek motor all excited.

Indy here is the Raiders of The Lost Ark version. I also kinda like the ripped shirt/Temple of Doom version because I wanna re-create that bridge scene....*heh*. Guys, time to buy me another Indy figure!

The DC Multiverse Martian Manhunter here is a 'Gold Label' release so technically that makes him an exclusive deluxe release and virtually making him a hard-to-find figure here in Malaysia since we don't have any Walmarts/Targets here. He's also currently being cleared on many online stores so my buddies immediately snagged him for me knowing that I'm a sucka to building a JLA team (several more members to go before I even have a decent lineup...haha).

That ML Morph was on my radar for the longest time and most of my geek buddies know that I've been blabbing about how hard it is to find one in Malaysia because of the character's popularity since the 90s animated series. I've been binge re-watching the X-Men animated series so my desire to get Morph into my action figure lineup had been reignited in recent times. I guess my buddies couldn't stand my yapping on how hard it was to find Morph out in the open market so they went and got me one online on clearance. Thank you for paying attention geek buddies!

In case you're wondering, yes I do have friends who get me stuff from time to time. If you have boring friends who do not acknowledge your inner geek, then time to get new friends I say...hahah.

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 Well, that rounds up my jabbering for today. Till next time geek fam!