Five With Flores

This blog post has basically nothing to do with Magic: The Gathering. To find out why you can skip way ahead to the “Irony” section (ctrl+f “irony”). But it should still be a super cool blog post simply because — let’s be honest — your old pal michaelj penned (and by “penned” I mean “typed”) it.

Part I: Laying the Blame

Blame Brian David-Marshall.

One of my best friends.

My podcast teammate over at Top 8 Magic (buy Deckade at Top 8 Magic!)

This is a man with 13-17 favorite movies in his top 3 favorite movies. So as embarrassing as it may be to have started plotting out this blog having forgotten completely about The Wire ain’t gonna stop me. Yes, The Wire is probably better than most of the television shows outlined below, but like I said, blame Brian David-Marshall.

Part II: My Top 10 Television Shows of All Time… In This Top 10 List

People are always asking me “what to watch next” so I put together this blog post. This Top 10 list is going to focus more on shows that aren’t on the air any more. For the most part you can get them all on DVD or in some cases you can watch all the eps online via Hulu, YouTube, or the WB (or in the middle of the night on the Disney Channel).

Number Ten – Robotech

Robotech was the first cartoon I ever saw that, despite being a cartoon, dealt with adult themes and more complicated storylines. Characters — even majort characters — died, people’s houses got thrashed when there was a battle, women got pregnant. I watched Robotech largely around age 9, but when I moved to the Cleveland area from western Pennsylvania it played at a terrible time slot relative to when I could, you know, watch tv / cartoons / etc.

Adult themes, and the trials and consequences of war were not the initial hook, of course.

Robotech was about transforming robots blowing up aliens. The main character of the first 1/3 — Rick Hunter — was the quintessential candidate for the Level Up. He went from stunt plane pilot to admiral over the course of a couple of years, and not only got the girl but had every looker from the naive pop star to the jaded older woman fawning all over him.

I was completely obsessed with Robotech for years. Keep in mind this was during a time period when there was no public adoption of the Internet, but involved really cool foreign transforming robots and interesting characters. I bought tons of art books as a kid and consumed every possible Robotech-related tech I possibly could until my sister bought me the complete saga on DVD around 2001 or 2002.

Luckily for you (if you haven’t watched it), all three arcs of the initial Robotech saga are available on Hulu!

I am including a relatively accessible ep; the saga as a whole is an involved, multi-generational, one with plots rebuilt from multiple different Japanese sources. The first part has a brief space battle and some story advancement, but the reason I chose the ep is the last part. The beautiful (and green haired) alien infiltrator Mirya is sent to the good guy space ship to learn more about us earthlings, and mistakes a video arcade for a training ground.

Young hero Max Sterling battles Mirya in a video game (Mirya is the best pilot the bad guys have) and… You’ll have to watch the ep to see what happens next. Rest assured that if all gamers had Max’s skills, we’d all be a lot happier. The internal monologues are priceless.

Number Nine – The Tomorrow People

The Tomorrow People is basically the opposite of Robotech. Rather than a cartoon that dealt with more serious themes, The Tomorrow People was basically the first show I was ever interested in that had actual humans / actors / etc. rather than cartoon characters. The tragedy of The Tomorrow People was that it came on on Nickelodeon about 6pm, i.e. when my Dad was trying to watch the news. So I basically never got to watch my favorite show circa 1984.

To be honest The Tomorrow People — being British — just reminded me of my favorite tv show circa 1980, Dr Who. The fact is that it was just a more terrible version of Dr Who, with worse special effects.

The Tomorrow People was about the next step in human evolution… back in 1974

Number Eight – Disney’s Gargoyles

Gargoyles is basically the best cartoon of all time.

It blends everything from Shakespeare to Iron Man-type concepts with power sources as disparate as magic and science to plain old money. There has really never been anything else like Gargoyles on television, ever, as far as I can recall.

And then it got cancelled.

What happened?

Gargoyles was re-launched as The Goliath Chronicles for a third season of sorts, but it wasn’t the same at all (Saturday morning cartoon rather than daily cartoon with incredible long term plot development and more twists and turns than the letter S). What was the problem?

Mighty Morphin Power Rangers.

Sadly around 1995 or so I was part of the problem, tuning in for Tommy Oliver and his Drgonzord rather than Disney’s Gargoyles. Unfortunately, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers was more or less the most popular television program of all time, so it wasn’t just me… But it was enough.

Gargoyles has had new life breathed into it in graphic novel form, under the direction of the original creator, so that’s something. You can watch it at 4am on Disney XD every night. In fact, tonight’s ep is the first ep ever. I mean if you’re going to be up anyway…

Number Seven – Battlestar Galactica

Yes, the re-imagined mid-2000s series!

I watched the one from 30 or however many years ago as a kid, but who are we kidding?

Battlestar Galactica starts off at the worst possible position — essentially the genocide of the human race — and just gets worse from there. The heroes are outnumbered, out-gunned, and actually infiltrated by the villains from day one. Heck, the heroes are the villains half the time. Battlestar is thought to be a commentary on the War on Terror, and you can see the themes quite clearly if you are looking. The writing is unbelievable. The good guys are in so deep in the first couple of eps of season three, even as an educated Western-raised lad from the U S of A, you may find suicide bombing a completely defensible activity when used against superior forces.

Number Six – Angel

I love Angel.

I like it better than Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

When I want to get pumped up, I watch the last two episodes of Angel, in particular “Not Fade Away” (the last one).

I actually watched those live when the show was first going off the air, right before the birth of my daughter and didn’t like them at the time. When I watched them with director’s commentary, I appreciated what Whedon was trying to do much more. Like I said, I watch these eps to get pumped up… I am pretty sure Sadin and I watched them the night before a PTQ we made the finals of (sorry for punting Steve and Paul).

Number Five – Malcolm in the Middle

Before Arrested Development, there was Malcolm.

Malcolm in the Middle is the story of a boy genius born to a lower middle-class family, and constantly dropped into difficult situations because of the brash natures of his troublemaking older brothers, or sometimes the soul crushing love of his well-meaning but overbearing mother.

Malcolm in the Middle is like The Wonder Years, but without any of the sentimentality. At one point I think it was probably the best comedy on television, but suffered with the emergence of Arrested Development, at which point it got shuffled around a bit in terms of time slot and even night of the week.

The first two seasons are works of inspiration, and the season two ep “Bowling” is probably the best half hour of television you will ever see. I remember watching it with John Shuler at Grand Prix Detroit back in 2001 before we went to dinner… and we just stared at each other after staring at the television screen. What did we just watch? “Bowling” is a work of staggering on-screen choreography, hilarious, and incredibly accessible.

I don’t normally talk things up this much, but I know how good “Bowling” is. It’s not too hard to find online, but I couldn’t find a link from a real / official / well-known site so I elected not to embed it this time around.

Number Four – Rome

Rome transports you to another world.

Actually it is our world, but 2,000 years ago.

All our understanding of the universe as seen through a Judeo-Christian lens is blanked. Our notions of the body, propriety, and so on go out the window.

You want to have an affair? Your body slave is there fanning you.

You step out of line? Your commanding officer threatens to crucify you… and means it.

I think there are only 24 episodes; I heartily recommend tracking them down on DVD or HBO On Demand.

Number Three – Babylon 5

Babylon 5 was my [at least nominal] favorite show until I fell in love with this list’s #1 show. It is without exaggeration the most complicated and layered drama in the history of television.

Babylon 5 was kind of like Lost before there was Lost. The setting — a space station — was one of the main characters. None of the players was 100% what he or she seemed. There were several interplanetary wars, several opportunities to get pumped up or recoil in horror.

Amazingly, the entire saga is available on TheWB.com!

So if you want to explore more, you can do so there.

Just a warning: The entire first season is kind of terrible. The exception would be Signs and Portents (embedded below). The problem is that you can’t not watch the first season because, again, this might be the most complicated and layered show in the history of television; you can’t just skip the entire first season just because it is nowhere near as good as, say, the third or fourth seasons, or the latter part of the fifth.

Just be forewarned: “Signs and Portents” was an awards magnet and hands-down the best episode of the first season, but it is far from the best ep in the series.

Number Two – The Simpsons

Apparently my favorite show on television circa 1997 is still on television!

You go Bart!

Number One – Veronica Mars

Veronica Mars is my all-time favorite television show.

I became acquainted with it via old Top 8 Magic listener Pselus, who recommended it to me just as I am recommending all these ten to you.

Veronica Mars is the kind of show writers love. Obviously the writing is there (including dialogue), but more than that, the story is layered and engaging — and constantly re-engaging — as it explores themes of class, resources, violence, and high school

For those of you who are not familiar with it, Veronica Mars details the adventures of a Nancy Drew-type girl detective (Veronica, obviously)… But imagine this Nancy Drew as a ruthless anti-hero with absolutely no qualms about using her detective skills to destroy her enemies, whether in terms of reputation (it is high school), resources, or literally. Veronica — lovable as she might be — has no qualms about setting her pet biker gang against rivals… and that darker tone is part of what makes her such an amazing character.

I would have just run the first episode ever as an embed, but it wasn’t available on Hulu or the WB. Instead I chose this one “The Rapes of Graff” which is about a rape investigation while Veronica tours a potential college. I ultimately picked it because it is a self-contained episode that guest stars George Michael and Maeby from Arrested Development.

Part II: Oh, the Irony

I actually played a bunch of relevant MTGO since coming back from US Nationals.

I am not going to report on any of that until my most recent article goes up on TCGPlayer (probably Monday), as I don’t want to report any conflicting deck choice data. Suffice it to say that I tried a bunch of the breakout archetypes and there is definitely another deck besides Pyromancer worth sleeving up.

I am probably not going to play much MTGO the next couple of days… Too busy working on this:

Flores Rewards*

Be there.

LOVE
MIKE

* I don’t even know where that email address goes

Just a short one.

Basilisk Collar: Pretty Awesome

I actually wrote a long-ish article for TCGPlayer on how I rebuilt the sideboard for Vengevine Monster Truck; it will be up later today.

But for those of you who just want the deck list for the Grand Prix this weekend, this is what I came up with:

Vengevine Monster Truck version 1.2

2 Malakir Bloodwitch

4 Bloodbraid Elf
4 Putrid Leech
4 Sarkhan the Mad
4 Sprouting Thrinax

4 Borderland Ranger
4 Lotus Cobra
4 Vengevine

4 Cunning Sparkmage

3 Ancient Ziggaraut
3 Forest
3 Mountain
4 Raging Ravine
4 Savage Lands
2 Scalding Tarn
3 Swamp
4 Verdant Catacombs

sideboard:
3 Basilisk Collar
2 Malakir Bloodwitch
4 Sedraxis Specter
1 Master of the Wild Hunt
4 Goblin Ruinblaster
1 Island

Thanks to everyone — in particular Brightbo and GerryT — for advice on the deck. Basilisk Collar was exactly what the sideaboard needed… Even gassier than Vampire Nighthawk (in fact makes everyone into a Vampire Nighthawk).

Thanks for reading, and good luck this weekend.

LOVE
MIKE

Concerning:

The Danger of Cool Things ∙ Chad Ellis ∙ Eldrazi Conscription
Sovereigns of Lost Alara ∙ “the stack” ∙ … and Eldrazi Conscription

Eldrazi Conscription

A new version of the Mythic deck centers around Sovereigns of Lost Alara setting up Eldrazi Conscription. You attack, the Sovereigns of Lost Alara goes and finds that normally cost prohibitive enchantment, sticks it on your guy, and all of a sudden you have a gigantic monster that should kill the opponent in just 1-2 blows. The second time you attack with such an Eldrazi-proxy, you probably get to set up Annihilator 2 as well, which is just cool (on top of being wicked deadly).

Recently my new protege Kar Yung Tom stated that the only way that King Hulk / Raka XXX can possibly lose to Mythic is to be smashed by this Eldrazi Conscription combination… So plan for it, anticipate, prevent, etc. For King Hulk — a deck with precious few ways to interact with the Sovereigns of Lost Alara combination itself — must use mass removal or Planeswalkers on its own turn to prevent getting smashed. But what about decks with actual instant speed removal, viz. Doom Blade or Path to Exile? How should they play against Eldrazi Conscription?

This is how the combination works.

The opponent attacks.

Any of the “attacks alone” text abilities go on the stack; these include both Exalted and the Eldrazi Conscription-finding ability on Sovereigns of Lost Alara. Let’s table Exalted for the moment. How do you deal with the second ability?

I think most players — acting “automatically” — will be tempted to let the ability resolve, let the opponent attach Eldrazi Conscription to the attacking creature, and then point the Doom Blade at the attacking bugger. After all this is “cool”. This is “card advantage”.

Or is it?

True, if you point a removal spell at an Aura’d-up Eldrazi wannabe, you are technically destroying two cards — both the creature and the creature enchantment. Is this card advantage? At that instant, the answer is yes. You are using one resource to remove two resources. But for practical purposes it isn’t. The Eldrazi Conscription in this case is “extra” … The opponent went and got it for free. Your “card advantage” play — your “cool” card advantage play — is really just a break even, despite the fact that at that instant, the exchange itself is card advantageous.

Let me propose a counter-automatic play:

What if we respond to all that jazz, and kill the creature before the Eldrazi Conscription hits the battlefield? Or even in response to all of it, before in many cases the Exalted triggers hit (when our removal spell is Lightning Bolt and the Eldrazi-to-be is a Noble Hierarch, this may actually be a necessity)?

I would argue that leaving the Eldrazi Conscription in the opponent’s deck is actually desirable.

First of all, if we prevent the ability from resolving, we are preventing the opponent from getting an extra card; we don’t have to make up the card on the two-for-one… because the opponent never got the Eldrazi Conscription for us to two-for-one. Grok? Good.

The reason this might be subtly better is that now the opponent can accidentally draw Eldrazi Conscription. Awesome, right? That is a card he never wants to draw. Not only is it essentially dead in hand, drawing both basically turns off Sovereigns of Lost Alara.

Now of course if the opponent has an army of little guys, and the ability to reload next turn and the turn after, you might want to pull out his Sovereigns’ teeth (especially if you have, say, two copies of Terminate). But if he isn’t long on threats on the battlefield already — as will often be the case — I think giving him the opportunity to get unlucky can be desirable.

Neither play is right all the time… But I figured presenting the opposite as a viable option might be a useful suggestion to many of you with automatic — but not necessarily automatically better — MO’s lined up.

LOVE
MIKE

P.S. For those of you who haven’t read it yet, I heartily recommend The Danger of Cool Things by my friend Chad Ellis. Chad was a former columnist at Star City and the mother ship, a Pro Tour Top 8 competitor, and a hell of a strategy writer. The Danger of Cool Things is his best work, and kind of a companion to Who’s the Beatdown if that makes any sense.