Blog Archives

Firearms (Tactical Life): The M9 service handgun, the U.S. military’s version of the 9mm Beretta 92FS, has been in continuous service with the military since 1985. For several years there has been plenty of programmed concern in picking its replacement. Over a decade ago was the Future Handgun System (FHS), which merged with the U.S. […]

Sword & Sorcery (Cobalt Jade): Without dispute, pulp author Robert E. Howard invented the fantasy character trope of The Barbarian Hero, specifically with his creation Conan. But the roots were laid before that in the Tarzan tales of Edgar Rice Burroughs and Rudyard Kipling’s Mowgli. Both pitted a stoic, nature-wise man (or boy) of the wilds […]

Reading (Monster Hunter Nation): Conversations with friends: why men need to read more novels. I agree with this title. More people need to read novels. That’s how I get paid. Never mind the so-called demise of the male novelist, where are all the male readers? Ash Sarkar on why we all miss out when half […]

Comic Books (Bleeding Cool): It was a note to a fan page on Facebook that did it, with a well-connected fan pointing to an upcoming Conan cover by Esad Ribic as his last, as Marvel no longer own the rights to the character. So, at Lake Como Comic Art Festival, I did a little digging. […]

Cinema (Wert Zone): The live-action movie adaptation of the Robotech animated series sounds like it’s getting back on track again, with a new director lined up to helm the project. Rhys Thomas, who recently helmed the Hawkeye TV show for Disney+, is now in line to take on the project. Genre Fiction (John C. Wright): We […]

Tolkien (Tellers of Weird Tales): In 1968, husband-and-wife writing team Denis and Charlotte Plimmer interviewed J.R.R. Tolkien. From that interview, they drew an article entitled “The Man Who Understands Hobbits,” published in The Daily Telegraph Magazine on March 22, 1968, pages 31ff. The article was reprinted in Weekend Magazine on August 31, 1968, for distribution […]

RPG (Walker’s Retreat): Games are created from distinct parts and histories that merge together to form a new set of rules for the gamers to conquer. A game is defined by its rules which the players work with in order to beat. In essence, you should only need one rulebook or instruction manual to understand […]

RPG (Walker’s Retreat): Throughout all of this talk of the True Campaign Model, I’ve consistently identified Pendragon as an outlier. The reason is simple: Pendragon offers a complete and concise alternative campaign model. You play through the entire timeline of Arthurian Mythos–The Great Pendragon Campaign–which lasts about 80 years or so. During this time you […]

Comic Books (Screen Rant): Marvel Comics has changed the digital version of art from King Conan #2 following criticism over a controversial portrayal of a character with a name related to the Native American historical figure, Pocahontas. Last month, Marvel and writer Jason Aaron and artist Mahmud Asrar were heavily criticized for naming an oversexualized […]

D&D (Jeffro’s Space Gaming Blog): For two years, countless people told me I was mad. They told me I was reading things into the rules that were just not there. They told me that NOBODY, not even Gygax himself played the game like what I claimed would happen if you just played a few rules […]

Fantasy (Ken Lizzi): Swords and Sorcery fiction provides us with exciting action in memorable settings. It also drops terrific characters into those settings and lets them run free. Some of those characters have stood the test of time. I’ve selected ten of those that I consider the pantheon of the genre. There is no science […]

Firearms (Firearms News): Three decades ago, if you asked anyone who was a handgunner or firearm enthusiast, “What’s the best handgun for self-defense or woods carry?” the majority of the time the .357 Magnum would have been their reply. Its high velocity, impressive terminal performance and deep penetration provides stellar performance not only in terms […]