Month: April 2019

Thoughts on Cobra Kai S2

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Disclaimer: there will probably be spoilers.  Despite the fact that this has little chance of being public for a long time.

Over the weekend, I shotgunned through season 2 of Cobra Kai.  I admit that I liked season 1 more than I thought I would, but it had no shortage of some eyerolling moments that were both funny, but tickled the nostalgia factor to where it was somewhat acceptable. 

However, after the first season, I was very dubious and had plenty of doubts about the direction of the show going into the second season.  As clever as the writing of the first season was, it was somewhat predictable, and I had some very strong predictions going into S2.  Needless to say, given the fact that I had low expectations that were surpassed going into the first season of the show, I was kind of back to being skeptical about the quality of the second.

Ultimately, the vast majority of the things I predicted about S2 of Cobra Kai, basically came true.  The return of John Kreese at the end of S1 meant that there would be something of a faction system within the dojo.  The cheesy love triangle between Samantha, Miguel and Robby came true, although it kind of turned into a square with the introduction of the pleasantly surprising Tory character.  Johnny would get involved with Miguel’s mom, and Daniel LaRusso would have some personal struggles balancing his hectic professional life with the world of karate.

I had all of these predictions, and every single one of them came true.  The writing of the first season basically laid the groundwork down for each of them, and the it’s been so linear, that it’s almost more impossible to deviate from it than let it ride its course.

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Avengers: Endgame and the obnoxious evolution of hype

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Disclaimer: I may or may not say things that might be interpreted as spoilers for the movie.  But then again considering the fact that I am still offline, it could be weeks or literal years before anyone other than myself sees this post.  Always good to maintain good brogging etiquette though.

So mythical fiancée and I went and saw Avengers: Endgame today.  It’s been two days since the formal release date of the film, but because Hollywood ticket sales data is weird and loves to fudge things to make profits sound way more impressive than they might actually be, it could be anywhere from three to four days since other people of the mostly public world has been watching it.

Typically, this is the type of film that I don’t exactly make such an effort to see so immediately after its release.  Frankly, I didn’t even see Avengers: Infinity War in theaters, and didn’t actually watch it until it started to be available for home releases.  But as a person who was raised heavily on comic books, and as someone who actually read the actual Infinity War/Gauntlet/Crusades comic book arcs, it was still something that I’d be interested in, and despite the fact that I’m not exactly a opening night/special screenings kind of seeker, I’ve still kept up pretty well with just about all of the films of the general Marvel Studios Phase 1 series.

However, because the world is so connected and locked into the internet these days, and damn near everyone is attached to social media in some way, shape or form, I felt somewhat of an urgency to watch Endgame on the earlier side of the spectrum, solely for the fact that I recognize that the citizens of the internet, be it through news and pop culture websites, or through social media itself, are completely incapable of not spoiling things, and waiting to watch anything runs the serious risk of having anything and everything spoiled for you, by people on the internet who just can’t shut the fuck up.

So, we went and watched Endgame.  2-4 days after its initial release.  And it was good.  A solid film that tied up just about every loose end that was unraveled throughout the last 11 years of Marvel Cinematic Universe.  Lots of comedic moments here, some very serious moments there, some slightly eye-rolly fan service moments occasionally, and a few nods to the actual comics, which nerds like me probably recognized.  As I said, it was a solid flick that was fairly enjoyable, and didn’t feel like the three hours that many bemoaned was going to be a test to all viewer’s constitutions.

But do I think it lived up to the hype that the internet artificially created over the last few months?  Absolutely not.

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Shop talk

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

It doesn’t happen, by design, that I talk about my job.  Frankly, most of the time it’s nothing particularly interesting, and probably not really any different from anyone else who works a fairly normal corporate job anywhere in the world.  But lately, my work has been a little bit more encompassing in my daily life than I’d really like it to, and I feel like I’m in a not-that-great position currently, and I feel like everyone I’d vent to is kind of tired of hearing the same old stories about my job, but I still have a lot of thoughts and words that I’d like to get out of my system, that writing about it, seems like the only viable option in order to accomplish that.

Imagine . . .

  • You’re an auto mechanic. You fix cars and motorized vehicles for a living.  You use tools and work with your hands in order to fix said vehicles, day in and day out.  One day, a chef walks into your shop, and gives you a bunch of forks, spoons and spatulas and tells you, these are your tools now.  Please fix my car.
  • You’re a chef. You cook food for a living that feeds all sorts of people.  You use an arsenal of knives, spoons and various utensils in order to prepare all the food that you cook.  One day, a graphic designer walks into your kitchen, plops and laptop and a mouse on your counter and tells you, these are your tools now.  Please make me lunch.
  • You’re a graphic designer. You make shit on computers, using a variety of artsy software, specifically made to make shit.  Sometimes the shit you make ends up on the internet on websites and sometimes it is manifested into something tangible.  One day, an IT guy walks onto your floor and installs this shittily-made, outsourced, glorified data entry program and tells you, this is your primary software now.  Please resume creating advertisements at a high volume and high quality.  Except there’s no please, because this IT guy is a fucking asshole

That’s my life at work, in a nutshell.

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I feel like a lack of time is all part of being adults

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Whenever I take the time to write, it’s usually because I’ve built myself a nice little cushion of time to where I can write, fairly uninterrupted, for anywhere from 45-90 minutes.  That, has not happened in quite some time, and therefore I have not really taken the time to write, which in itself gives me a little bit of anxiety, because I don’t ever want to fall out of the habit of writing, because writing is important to me, and it makes me anxious when I haven’t done it in a while.

It’s literally been two weeks since the last time I sat down and did any sort of writing.  This isn’t to say that there’s been nothing interesting or worth writing about, although I will say that the usual bullshit that occurs in Atlanta and/or Georgia itself has been a little on the dull side or a little too darkly serious side, like the prehistoric anti-abortion laws they’re pushing, which are things that I don’t really feel remotely capable of speaking about.  I ran in my first-ever official half marathon, the Star Wars half at Disney World.  UVA won a national championship in an actual sport (basketball).  Women, main evented Wrestlemania, with Becky Lynch winning both women’s championships from Charlotte and Ronda Rousey.  Tiger Woods won the Masters and proved that winning shit in sports absolves anyone of their personal indiscretions because they’re totally related.  Game of Thrones embarked on their final season, and the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris almost burned down, because bad shit always tends to happen this time of year.

Things, have most definitely been happening all around the world; it’s just that I really haven’t been able to build that cushion that I always tend to want in order to do some writing, because it never seems like there’s ever any time in the day for me do such.  Whether it’s the increased responsibilities and the seemingly endless parade of little and large tasks that I have at work, meetings after meetings, I barely have the time to have proper lunches on a daily basis, much less be able to eat food and type words at the same time. 

And then when I get home, whether or not I have to cook dinner or an endless litany of small tasks and daily chores that I feel the need to do in order to have a somewhat kept house, that by the time I’m done with everything, I’m at that awkward point of the day in which I don’t feel like I have enough time to write, or watch anything other than a 30-minute program on Netflix, because I should probably start considering going to bed in order to be a responsible adult and not be tired during work.

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I will never understand people who leave guns in their cars

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

A trend I’ve noticed in the general metro Atlanta area over the last few months is the sheer rise of car break-ins happening all around city proper, and the seemingly hopeless south side of the city that I once lived in myself but just a few years ago.  And not just any ordinary smash-and-grabs, where thieves are looking for whatever free shit that happened to be in sight which compelled them to break-in in the first place that they could flip for some quick cash, but thefts where thieves are searching out, and way more often than I thought should be considered normal, stealing guns.

My old neighborhood’s Nextdoor, that I’ve admitted to not being able to unsubscribe to for the sheer amount of unintentional entertainment I get out of it, has seen way too many threads over the last few months of people detailing all the cars that have been broken into, where among other things, guns were stolen.  Not just at their homes, but when they’re out at dinner, or out at Publix, or any of the nearby shopping areas where people would park their cars in public.

But it really boils down to the fact that I have to ask, why so many people even bother keeping guns in their cars in the first place?

Personally, I have no real qualms with the second amendment.  I do question why ordinary citizens would need SEAL team grade sniper rifles or assault rifles, but ultimately I don’t have a problem with people getting firearms with the intent to protect themselves.  It’s only when things go dark and people are using legally obtained weaponry to do bad things, is where I raise my eyebrows, but we can’t control the rest of the world no matter how much we’d like to be able to sometimes.

Back to the topic on hand though, I’m not so much flabbergasted at the repeated instances where people are having guns stolen from their vehicles, as much as I am curious to why people are bothering to leave guns in their cars in the first place.  License to carry, I get that, but that also implies that you’re actually carrying, and not leaving your firearms in vehicles that are one locked door away from being obtainable by absolutely anyone.

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