character saturday: adventing 2025, part four

Welcome to the weird portion of the year... and also to the fourth week of the Hero Forge Advent Calendar.

I also made a definite decision to lean into red this week. But it tells you something that normally I would add an extra head in order to display both the hair and the helmet in their full glory. But I hated the top of that hair so much that I was perfectly fine covering it up. 

This also makes the second sword for the month, the second polearm, the second helmet, the second set of sandals and the fourth set of shoes overall. And not a single pair of pants. That is something they just never do. Not once since 2021. And thus far we've had just one jacket this year.

What I will say is that the decision to make the Christmas Day's item(s) socks was both very meta and one of the items from this year that I will absolutely use repeatedly. I mean I've already added them to about half a dozen minis when I was messing around yesterday. They're just a little detail layer piece, especially given the number of variations of both length and style, that will finish off a number of minis nicely.

Just one week left.

Anyway...

I decided on quiche for the start of this week, knowing that I only needed to fill in the first three days of the week.

This week's Mini Media Review is all movies, all the time.

I started with The Nutcracker and the Four Realms... because Christmas. Keira Knightley is doing The Most, and I was here for it, but generally speaking it was all a bit of a limp squib. They tried to turn Nutcracker into... I dunno... a Narnia movie? Honestly, they just tried to be too clever, and the whole thing just doesn't really work.

Next up... Tenet. I kind of knew what to expect, I mean at least the whole "backwards and forward in time" thing. And I'm not sure how early you're supposed to work out the main thrust of what is going on, but I feel like I worked it out fairly early on. Or noticed things early on that clicked in once those things showed up again. But I really liked it. I like it much better than, say, Inception.

It was also fascinating to me that the majority of the cast are the people that would have been the leads in any other Nolan movie...Robert Pattinson, Kenneth Branagh and Aaron Taylor-Johnson, but John David Washington does a fantastic job in the lead.

Next up... The Witches, 2020 edition. And much like Nutcracker, Anne Hathaway is doing The Most. But transporting it from the UK to the US and moving the timeline back from "present day" to the 1960's introduces a collection of issues that the movie doesn't bother wanting to address. And while I think this sticks a little closer to the book in certain ways (especially the ending), the whole thing, again, just falls flat. It definitely doesn't hold a candle to the 1990 version.

Next up... Queer, starring Daniel Craig and Drew Starkey in a story by William S Burroughs and directed by the director of Call Me By Your Name, Luca Guadagnino. And so, knowing that it was by Burroughs, it didn't really come as a surprise to me when the third act kind of descended into drug fueled insanity after two acts of incredibly 50's era queer content.

It's also just this side of too awkward for me. Because you're never really certain of Starkey's character, Eugene Allerton, and his motivations towards Craig's William Lee (the Burroughs stand-in). But Starkey is amazing throughout. And just stunningly gorgeous.

The other thing that I loved was the visual style where most of it is filmed on giant sets and a lot of the establishing shots are clearly models. Beautifully made models, but intentionally so. Which make the whole thing feel like a 1950's movie.

I'm not sure the ending really worked for me, but the movie is beautiful throughout, much like Call Me before it. But very strange.

Lastly, Christmas Eve was Red One. Which, despite it's flaws, I really enjoyed. It was the perfect Christmas Eve movie, but at the same time was trying to do entirely too much and not quite sticking the landing at any of it.

However, Chris Morgan and Hiram Garcia as the writers, and Jake Kasdan as the director really tried. Morgan and Garcia absolutely wrote this with the Wikipedia page on Christmas Mythological Figures open too one side, so they definitely thought about it. The issue is that there are a few too many threads that don't really go where they need to go.

But Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson and Chris Evans do a great job, Evans playing his general type. And the make up and costume people earned their paychecks, absolutely.

Some highs, some lows, but they kept me mostly entertained.

This week was also the week of Christmas goodies... Monday was Christmas Crack ala B Dylan Hollis. And then Tuesday I made two trays of my Rocky Road.

We already covered Thursday...

Friday, all of the standing up the day before really caught up with me. And the general flatness descended.

But Friday Night DnD was good. We did the present thing, had a table full of Christmas goodies, fought a magical drilling machine and found a bunch of magic items. So not a bad session overall.

Anyway...

Today was good. Simple, but good. The usual supermarket stuff. And then I wanted to swing by the Burnside Library again to drop the things I'd watched off and grab a couple of other things to watch this week. And Ma ended up getting more stuff than me.

I did also make a note of a few other things to grab later, so a trip well spent.

post christmas round-up 2025

Well... it's that time of year again. Time for the Christmas Round Up that is functionally the same as the last however many Christmas Round Ups.

We start out with the Krampus inspired warlock I came up with earlier this month after being inspired by an Instagram reel. She came out pretty well actually, just as a thought experiment. And then I realised that a good use for her was for today. So here we are.

Today, like always, wasn't terribly exciting, but it was, relatively speaking, very laid back. It was also, because I am contractually obligated to mention the weather, it was a pretty mild day. I wore jeans the whole day.

I'd already said to Ma that I wasn't going to rush down for breakfast, also so that she didn't need to rush in getting herself organised this morning. So I basically got up at my regular time and then went for my walk. 

Then I came home, had my usual breakfast and pottered around a little, got ready and headed down to Ma's about 9:15. The downside being that I didn't walk into Ma's place to find goodies fresh out of the oven, the upside being that Ma was fully organised by the time I got there.

We threw on the MTV Christmas songs special on the TV, while I pottered around Ma's place doing some prep work, setting the table, organising the kitchen for me to use, that kind of thing. Once I was done with that, we did presents, such as they were, relatively early.

It was a very DnD Christmas... 

• Dice Advent Calendar (from Mr and Mrs)
• 2024 DnD Players Handbook
• Forgotten Realms: Heroes of Faerun book 

We haven't done Friday Night Christmas yet. So, there's at least that to look forward to.

Once we were done with that, I started on the cooking and whatnot.

I chose to do all the cooking and tidying up and whatnot today, for a variety of reasons, but also just to let Ma chill.

While watching a couple of movies I brought down (that I'd already watched). More on that in the Mini Media Review on Saturday.

I was unsure whether or not everything was going to actually be ready on time and work out properly, because Ma's oven is smaller than mine, and we had turkey and sausage meat and potatoes all to cook at the same time. And I just shoved the potatoes in raw and let them cook the entire time.

I had a little bit of a... not meltdown... let's call it a crisis of faith about how I'd organised things, reorganised them, also didn't like that, re-reorganised them and then went back to the first version.

In the end though it all worked out. And after I pulled the turkey and the sausage meat I let the potatoes keep cooking for a little bit, and was a little lazy and instead of cooking the haloumi, I just threw it in with the potatoes for a bit. That actually worked. What I didn't do was read last year's round-up that told me to take the sausage meat out early. Ah well. Worked out anyway.

I also didn't read the note about putting the basil in the bowls either. I should remember to read last year's advice.

But it came together well. I did my usual trick and just threw together a salad dressing with what was either in Ma's fridge or pantry. And a little mustard and some cranberry sauce goes a long way.

Then afterwards, I cleaned up the kitchen, put the leftovers away, all that stuff, before we put another movie on. And we did the usual thing of having dessert midway through the afternoon. I didn't take a photo of that one though, because, honestly, it was less visually appealing than previous years. Just go look at last year's version. That. 

Once we were finished with the movie it was about 5pm and I packed up my stuff and headed off.

So, you know, relatively normal, relatively boring, relatively the same as every other year. 

character saturday: adventing 2025, part three

Without meaning to, this year's Hero Forge Advent Calendar images are ending up very green. It is what it is. I go where the design gods take me.

Also we were deep into the wood tones this week before the leaf cloak dropped, so it is what it is.

We're still not really doing real well in the "I would use this" tally. This week... maybe the hammer, probably the shillelagh. The wedge versions of the sandals on the right character.

And if we can just ignore the one random leg in the back there... I'd appreciate it.

Anyway...

This week was Tuna Noodle Doo... always a solid option.

The Mini Media Reviews for this week... we start with The Favourite. Damn. Just damn. Damn that is a good movie. It does have Dangerous Liaisons vibes, which certainly helps, but it's just a really good, very weird, beautifully shot movie.

I followed that up with the first season of Peaky Blinders. Which I didn't care for. It just didn't hit the spots I needed it to hit. Which is fine.

And we rounded out with a movie that was both intensely stupid and very sweet. Monster Trucks. I know, I know. But it's just fun nonsense. And I enjoyed it quite a lot. It is essentially just a movie that copied Transformer's homework? Yes. Also fill in that blank with, I dunno, a dozen other movies. I enjoyed it regardless.

Friday Night DnD was fun. I got to debut my replacement character. She's delightfully unhinged. We'll do a full break down on her in the new year. I'm still slightly dialing her in, especially the voice. And it's an adjustment, but I'll find the balance.

But her introduction went pretty much how I wanted it to. Which is nice.

Anyway...

The Last Full Shop Before Christmas. You know what, it wasn't as bad as it could have been. Granted I need to swing by to pick up some of the last minute stuff on Wednesday, so talk to me again next weekend.

We did keep it short and sharp though. So that was basically it. 

character saturday: adventing 2025, part two

This week's Hero Forge Advent Calendar was... rough. We started strong with the mask, but everything else really fell off a cliff for me. Most notably the sword, which I swear somebody let the Work Experience kid or the boss's nephew design, because it's rough as hell. And I found the inspiration image, and it's not even as detailed as that. R-O-U-G-H.

Likelihood of using any of these... low. Maybe the mask, maybe the boots, possibly a version of the jacket (there's a long sleeve version). But I'm not holding my breath. 

Anyway.

I moved officially over to "Salad Season" this week. I went back and forth honestly, but in the end decided it was time. And it wasn't terrible. I definitely didn't use enough chicken, but otherwise it was decent.

Mini Media Reviews as we move into the final length... Peacemaker. No. Absolutely not. No thank you. I have no idea who the audience for this is supposed to be, but I absolutely do not want to spend any time with those people. Nor do I ever want to watch any more of it. And can somebody check in with James Gunn's dad, because the way Gunn seems to feel about fathers in general is... worrying.

I also snuck in a the 50th Anniversary Rocky Horror documentary, Strange Journey: The Story of Rocky Horror, directed by Richard O'Brien's son, Linus. If you're a fan of the movie, this is excellent. Although seeing everybody 50 years on is, in spots, hard to do.

No Friday Night DnD this week, so Fluffy and I did Movie Night again and I got to introduce him to Torch Song Trilogy, which we'd only had a conversation about a little while before. Given that is one of the movies that is Very Important To Me. More so, actually, that movie is, as I said to him afterwards, one of the building blocks that I built large segments of my personality upon. And even though I probably haven't watched it in the last 15 years, there are swathes of that movie's dialogue that are just committed to memory and live in my head rent free.

So if you've never seen it, consider this my early Christmas present to you.

Anyway...

Today was a little bit all over the shop.

We started with the supermarket as usual, and although we have both said that we're not just going to buy random shit just because it's the lead up to Christmas... guess what happened.

I also got the third free cast iron thingy this week... the baking tray or roasting pan or whatever it is.

After the supermarket, my car needed a run because it's been a little neglected with the on again off again D&D nights and us not really doing anything on a Saturday. But it's also two weeks til Christmas and only insane people are going to the shops for run. Instead we headed over to Burnside Library to give Ma a change to potter around a different library, and then we did a lap around Burnside Village with is still incredibly underwhelming even with all the renovations. But at least we got our steps in.

character saturday: adventing 2025, part one

Welcome to the pure nightmare fuel that is the first week of the 2025 Hero Forge Advent Calendar. It really started out strong and wrong with the Cyclops face (the only thing worse it putting on the eyebrows, because it just defaults to two eyebrows around one eye.

If we had to count the number of things from this week that I'll actually use... we're at like one and a half. The ruff on the right character. And maybe the spear, but it's just entirely too long. I want a shorter version. And yes, I know, ungrateful at Christmas on Advent Calendar items. The weapon swipe might be potentially useful, but I seldom even use the spell effects we have now, so I doubt it.

I very much look forward to a much less... eclectic... week two.

Anyway.

You can tell the weather we're currently having when I tell you that, in the first week of December, the soup was lasagne soup. But the lasagne noodles I had were... a little old, maybe, I don't really know, but they very much shattered in a way they normally don't. It didn't really affect the soup overall, just the texture of the noodles.

This week's Mini Media Reviews are the first season of The Musketeers. Costume and set design, 15/10. I just found that the least interesting characters were the titular Musketeers. Like, there really wasn't much there beyond the things that we all already know about the Musketeers. Athos is the grumpy noble one. Aramis is the religious slutty one. Porthos is the rough, fighty one and D'Artagnan is... the one who gets mostly led around by his dick.

I'm also not sure how much I cared about their version of Milady De Winter. Like, she was okay, but I like a really villainous Milady... and this just felt a little Discount Cerci Lanister.

I followed that up at the end of the week with the anime The Colors Within, which I saw on the shelf and picked up on a whim. It was... odd. If you combine queer coded teen girls with Catholic school run by nuns and creating a band with the two queer-coded girls and a random teenage boy who write songs that use Amen in the lyrics entirely too much... like, it wasn't bad, I just don't think that anybody involved really understood that they were making these teenage girls so very fucking obviously queer-coded.

Not terrible by any metric, but just a little confused and confusing.

Tiny bit of drama this week when the smoke alarm in my next door neighbour's empty apartment and I ended up having to call the fire department. Thankfully it only turned out to be that the smoke alarm was dying, but they still send two fire engines. Drah-ma! Thankfully less drama than it otherwise could have been.

Friday was Chiro Day... and after over a year of looking for the new PHB in Dymocks and talking to people in store and basically giving up... and literally having just been to the game store about bought a copy finally...

There were two copies on the shelf at Dymocks.

Fuck you Universe.

Granted, it was slightly cheaper at the game store.  I also picked up the new Faerun book as my actual Christmas present this year. So there's that.

Friday Night DnD was thankfully the result in me having to sit on my impulse control issues for two weeks. But I made the choice to leave my boy Whisper behind and send the party off to get things done. Because, honestly, I wasn't the only one who thought that we'd been slightly going in circles for a few weeks.

And in the intervening two weeks I did have a replacement character kind of drop out of the sky... and I wrote, as I have said a number of times now, what might be the most unhinged backstory I've ever managed. For very specific reasons.

It was also one of those times when the backstory just flowed out somewhat like water. Yes, I went back and edited it and finessed it. But the raw idea did kind of fall into my lap. It was also one of those Hero Forge models where the basic idea was essentially perfect, and all the changes I made were just finessing that idea.

My only uncertainty right now is how this character will actually manifest at the table. Like, I know who they are, I just don't know how that comes out in play.

I will only say that when I showed DM Mr the backstory document, it got halfway through the first line before he said "oh god" or something similar [evil cackle]. 

Sadly we never got to the point where the character showed up, so I was playing the dwarven cleric NPC that is travelling with the party. Which puts some space between Whisper and The New One.

And unfortunately no game next week.

Anyway...

Not much to report for today... we've definitely entered the portion of the year where we avoid stores. So it was just the supermarket.