Green Zone

Green Zone - subtitles written by goons.

I caught up with Green Zone this weekend; it's a film that I've been meaning to watch for a while, as it was directed by Paul Greengrass and stars Matt Damon. It's set in the immediate aftermath of the fall of Iraq in the second Gulf War and explores the murky politics that made the cause for war, including the falsification of the existence of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs).

The story follows the NCO lead of a team sent to find WMDs, Chief Warrant Officer Miller (Damon) as he gets increasingly frustrated at all the WMD sites his team are sent to being empty of weapons or evidence, despite the information supposedly being confirmed by a source.

He stumbles upon evidence that the US Administration may have falsified the claims for WMDs and becomes drawn into a rivalry between the CIA and White House teams. Miller is horrified that they may have gone to war on a lie; the CIA operative he is linked to is more concerned that if the Army and Police are disbanded, the country will explode into civil war. The search is on for the source who supposedly corroborated the presence of WMDs.

It's well shot, taught and energetic, and sympathetic to the Iraqi people.

I was frustrated by the subtitles though; they refer to the Iraqi soldiers (dressed as civilians) who are defending the senior Iraqi Army officers as 'goons'. Completely the wrong word to use when the film is trying to be sympathetic to a people whose country has been invaded on a lie.

Overall, a good film. It's on Netflix at the time of writing.

27 October 2019

First Impressions - The Sprawl: Mission Files

Mission Files - scenario frameworks for The Sprawl RPG

I've always had a soft spot for cyberpunk ever since I read William Gibson's Neuromancer as a teenager. I had lots of fun playing the first edition of R Talosorian's Cyberpunk RPG and even more fun running several one-shots and mini-campaigns of Cyberpunk 2020. The first edition of Shadowrun also featured pretty heavily in my early gaming.

I backed The Sprawl as a Kickstarter on the premise that it looked like a well-focused Powered by the Apocalypse engined take on the genre. This proved to be the case; it delivers 'play to find out' approach to the neo-noir genre, and the mechanics of actions clocks are used to drive the missions that the characters take. The heart of a mission hangs around the legwork that the characters do to plan the mission, and then the actual action. If you create noise when you do the legwork, the action is harder, or may even come to you. The mechanic uses two linked action clocks to drive it (count down clocks with linked escalations).

Mission Files was one of the stretch goals for the Kickstarter; a collection of ten mission frameworks for the game that the MC can use to run as one-shots or as part of an ongoing campaign. I have the PDF and the hardcover book version (which is lovely). The cover is a neon-noir city at night. Internal art is predominantly stylised photographs. It is a 107-page book, available from DriveThruRPG. There are two versions - midnight (white-on-black text) and noon (black-on-white text). Clearly, the more cyberpunk version is midnight!

The book opens with a discussion on how to use the frameworks that follow, focussed around the unanswered questions. It also describes how to lift and re-skin elements for other scenarios.

Why frameworks? Each mission is described in the same structure. You won't find maps or detailed NPCs; they are left to expand up as the play requires. The framework structure is effective:

1. Executive Summary - the mission in a nutshell
2. Code Dump - key points about the mission including what character archetypes it's best suited to.
3. Unanswered questions - for the players to research or find out in play.
4. The Meet - descriptions of the Fixer starting the mission and how the characters are drawn in.
5. Mission Directives - key milestones that trigger experience.
6. People and Places - key locations, non-player characters and plot elements
7. The Clocks - as a minimum the Legwork and Action Clocks, and sometimes others.
8. Running the Mission - advice on how to run the mission including observations from playtests
9. Hacking the Mission - advice on how you can twist the mission or re-use elements from it.

Each mission is around 6-8 pages in length. They all have simple three-word titles in a very Robert Ludlum style; The Boyle Recovery, The Bogatyrev Jam and The Cazares-Bell Obsolescence to give three examples. They vary in complexity; some have the potential to be world-spanning chases, and others are a 'simple in and out' mission. The missions will need some light work from the MC, but that's entirely in line with the ethos of the game. Much of the events will develop in play.

Overall, I like this book. The missions catch a real Gibson-esque vibe and the way that they are structured leaves the MC plenty of scope and space to make them their own. The framework structure is worth lifting.

The book could also easily be used for another system such as Cyberpunk 2020.

Recommended.

27 October 2019

Thinking of the iPad

The iPad mini in the wild.

Out and about in Wetherby this morning, I needed to get some designs approved for a function and knew I was likely to bump into one of the decision makers if I dropped into the local Saturday Coffee Shop at the Methodist Church*. I’d sent the designs out by email first thing, but knew there was little chance that they’d seen them, so I grabbed the iPad mini.

I’ve had this iPad since the mini 4 came out; it still feel fast. It’s very portable, and I have it in a Logitech keyboard case that is a predecessor of the versions on the iPad Pro models. It’s a really portable computing device, especially as I have a 4G SIM so data access is available most places. 

I met up with my contact, we reviewed the designs and signed the posters off for print. I’d pulled the designs off Dropbox (which I still rate more highly for reliability than iCloud**), and we reviewed the price quotes on the emails.

This set me pondering; could an iPad replace my Mac?

I think - especially when equipped with a hard keyboard - it could go a long way to doing so now. Certainly much further than it could have done back in May 2010 when I got my first iPad. I think it’s approaching an 80% device. I still prefer the familiarity and flexibility of macOS, but for most of my day-to-day activities the iPad would easily cut it.  If I wanted to go the design side of things, I suspect that I’d need to go to a iPad Pro in one of the larger sizes. In fact, one of my dilemmas with the iPad is whether I get a new mini when I upgrade, or go back to something around 10”. It’s something I’ll consider more when I eventually upgrade my iPhone 7; the new iPhones have bigger screens and that may well influence my decision to go large or not.

That said, when writing I do prefer a decent screen and keyboard. I completed most of my work for Lyonesse using the Lenovo Chromebook; this has a decent (but small) screen and a great keyboard. Plugged in with HDMI to an external screen, it handles two monitors with aplomb and gets the job done. I’m hoping to pass the Chromebook onto Nathan next year and upgrade to an ASUS C434, which looks great.

So coming back to my original thoughts; could an iPad replace my Mac? My answer at the moment is ‘no’, but it could go a long way towards doing so.

* Best Bacon Butties in Wetherby
** iCloud is borked on my desktop, refusing to sync so I need to log everything out and in again.

26 October 2019

Live in the City of Angels

A cover that riffs on the classic 'In the City of Light' album art.

I was confronted with this cover whilst walking through Morrisons at the weekend, doing some of the weekly shop (the non-Aldi bits).

My first reaction was "Why the hell have they messed with the cover from 'In the City of Light'?". That album was my first Simple Minds CD, quite possibly the first CD I ever got. I love it and still play it. Well, I play the MP3 files I ripped from it, originally for my iPod.

My second reaction was "OMG it's a new live album, and they're riffing on the one I love!"

The Deluxe Version.

A bit of searching says don't buy the two disk version, buy the four disk deluxe. 40 tracks in a pretty package, for about £2 more. I still love Simple Minds as a band, so you know what I'll be listening to this week.

21 October 2019

On the throwing of Axes...

Hot on the heels of Furnace, I had a team away day with work colleagues. My reporting lines have changed recently with people moving on, and presently I'm reporting through HR. This session was more about bonding the team rather than something more directed and there were a number of 'fun' activities. Now, despite being Head of Health & Safety, I'd not been shown any risk assessments in advance. I'm sure that they were lovely, as the venue was extremely professional, but there's that moment when you're responsible for safety in the business and you see the list of activities being quad bikes, shooting and axe-throwing, and you mentally swear quite loudly.

Anyway, we threw axes. It was the activity that seemed to most scare people. It certainly scared me when I was watching my colleagues. A key tip is not to swing the axe behind your head at an angle; if you have long hair, it snags wonderfully and then I have lots of paperwork to complete.

We had three types of axe to throw; hand axes, some mid-size ones and large ones (albeit smaller than your typical D&D battle-axe). I tried them all in the practice session. Thrown against tree trunks cut across the diameter to form targets like those for archery, I managed to embed a hand axe successfully. The medium-sized axes flew nicely, and hit the target, but didn't go in. The large axe was even harder to direct correctly.

Anyway, we're competitive; most activities scored points, and we wanted to win. I had four throws and opted for the medium axe despite the please from the rest of the team. I had four throws against the usual two because we were a person down, so I was nominated for the extra go. I got three of the axes into the target, which was a great feeling of satisfaction. One of my colleagues got another one in, and we doubled the points the closest team had.

Throwing the axe was pretty technical; it's a proper throw, and you're looking for momentum. You need to release with your hand at the target and then usually it'll hit. Whether it embeds is a different matter. There is something really visceral as the axe-blade embeds. You realise that if you had thrown it at a person, even the failed throw would do a fair bit of damage from the impact.

It got me thinking if Nali the Dwarf should carry a pair of these things; not too much weight to become fatigued, but scope to engage at range. Perhaps if we restart, we can work that through.

The thrill at succeeding at this was superb; it certainly gives a buzz. No-one hurt on this activity, which is a blessing. Medium axes are the way forward.

18 October 2019

Furnace XIV (2019) - Reflections

The Garrison Hotel, Gaming Capital of the North

My preparation for this Furnace was a little truncated as I was running late on a writing assignment for Lyonesse, which took precedence. I’ve spent a lot of the week running up to the con working up game preparation, and then on admin for the convention itself. Friday saw me reach the happy place were plots and characters were mostly locked.

I rocked in late into Slot 0 on Friday night and said some swift hellos as I headed to the bar for a pint. Lovely chats with my One Ring compatriots (75% of the fellowship was present). The topic of discussion was the X-card and its impact, and the management of children! A very enjoyable evening, but I was a little relieved when they called time as I needed to be up early to set up in the morning.

I had a good night’s sleep but woke with the sinuses from hell. Breakfast with friends helped, and then it was the rush to set up rooms and get everything together. Fortunately, this year the Garrison had pretty much all the tables in the right places, so Graham and I only needed to carry one up from the ground floor to the convention space. Signage went up, the badges went out (and we culled the accidentally duplicated names that would have given a definite advantage in the raffle) and we dropped some of the new business card X-cards on the tables.

Graham tried his usual trick and started the opening speech before I was in a position to video, but I got most of it. This year was a little different, as we covered both the fact that we were promoting the X-card and doing a collection for Tony, the Garrison's manager, who was about to retire.

Slot 1 started up smoothly, and after catching up with Jim from Patriot Games I decided to go back to the room for a short nap (to try to lose the headache) and then prepare for my game in the afternoon. I'd last read A Town Called Malice in detail back in August; fortunately, the notes were clear and I was soon happy that I was in a place to run it. I then dug into my preparation for my Cold Shadows game. The game was called 'Det kan ingen tena tvo herrar', which loosely translates to English as 'No one can serve two Masters', a hint at the treachery at the heart of the scenario. Cold Shadows has been on my shelf since the Kickstarter delivered, and it is a flawed jewel. The game is one of the best attempts that I have seen to try and build a spy roleplaying game that would support play in the style of John le Carre's novels. It suffered from the unfortunate early death of Stewart Wieck and is really lacking a final editing pass. In places, the rules are unclear, complicated or have references back to the game engine that it was developed from. However, there's enough good stuff in it that I wanted to get it to the table.

My challenge was pulling together the plot threads; I'd decided to base the game upon the Isdalen woman, an unsolved death in Norway in 1970 which has many Cold War echoes. As it is a real case, I also had huge amounts of reference material. I feared that I was losing the idea of the plot in handouts and data. By the time Slot 1 finished, I knew what I was going to do as a flow.

A Town Called Malice

After a quick lunch from Morrisons, I went down and set up for my Slot 2 game of Malice. Set in the Canadian north, the town of Malice was threatened by the rising river and hundred-year storm that was approaching. Robin set the tone when his character was interested in the 'historical cannabilism' in town. By the end of the first act, things were accelerating rapidly, and Andy (the Law - Mountie Sergeant) and Pete E (the Official - Town Manager) tried to calm the townsfolk in a public meeting at the tavern. They failed, and the town looked to be potentially doomed by the rising waters and the creature that had murdered one of the teenagers in town. By the time we were in the middle of the second act, I was really no longer needed, just giving the odd nudge. The game climaxed with Jag's little old lady character locking the Town Manager and the YouTube Celeb Journalist (Robin) in an old Cold War fallout shelter to starve to death. Her view was the loss of the Town Manager was an acceptable one it protected the town ('It'd be what he wanted'). It was fun; I will definitely run this out again. Shout out to Pete A and John who formed a burgeoning criminal partnership. I actually had to buy a dice block for this as I foolishly left mine at home!

Annual Trip to see the Colonel

Dinner was a lonely quest to KFC, as the rest of the annual walking club (Keary and Ottomancer) couldn't attend. Nearly a close encounter with some pissed up suit-wearing lads, but I sidestepped it.

Slot 3 brought a game of Traveller with Steve Ellis running and Tom Zunder and I playing. Sadly, we didn't get any more players, but it was great fun. A good GM and a player I get on with and can bounce off. I'd wanted to play this scenario for a while, as I missed it a TravCon. Lots of fun, and after we retired to the bar. I really recommend the scenario as it takes the plot of Beowulf and retells it in an SF setting with lots of twists on top.

In the bar, we met as the full Fellowship from our game of The One Ring and shared reminiscences and toast to absent friends. I went to bed soon after last orders as I wanted to be up early.

Let's get Liminal, Liminal...

Sunday, I had an early start; I got up and finalised the preparation for Cold Shadows in Slot 5. Sitting, listening to the Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy soundtrack made the breakthrough for me, putting my head in the right place. My first game was with one of my fellow organisers, Elaine, who was running Paul Mitchener's Liminal. I really enjoyed the game. We played a group of occult investigators who were tasked with finding a lost book, taken from the London Library. The game was lovely; it definitely catches that British urban fantasy feel and the system is refreshingly light, reminding me of Traveller. I will definitely read my copy now and perhaps get it to the table.

Raffle swag including an ace D12 pot!

Lunch was Morrisons again, somewhat rushed as we had the raffle to follow. Before that, we presented Tony (the Garrison's owner-manager) a card and collection that attendees had taken up to say 'thank you' as he headed to retirement. He was a little embarrassed, but I'm glad that we did it, and thanks to Elina for coordinating the collection.

Slot 5 brought my game of Cold Shadows. I had a full house; I'd three pre-signs; Jag, Gary and Paul Baldowski, and then Tom Z and Graham joined me. We started, and immediately I was a bit worried as everyone was a bit tired and it showed. I had decided to leave some of the set up on the Intelligence Agency the team worked for (the Norwegian Secret Police) until the game, and also let the players finish tailoring their characters. No one had played the system before. We worked our way through it, and although the players were interested, there was a palpable lack of energy.

I'd set each of the characters up with a flaw (a Tag) which gave a reason for them to rub up against each other, but not a reason for full-on PVP; examples include stresses in family life, an alcohol problem, skimming the finances, substance abuse and a debauched lifestyle.

We started the game in the director's office, and the characters discovered that they were being sent from Oslo to Bergen just before Christmas (a huge issue for Graham's character, who had the family challenges) to manage a police investigation into a dead woman found in Isdalen; there was a concern that it wasn't being controlled and could cause embarrassment, especially as Norway was hosting military visitors from West Germany and the USA for final trials of the Penguin missile system.

It was fascinating to watch the players become hooked; the maps on the table were followed with crime scene photos, the autopsy report, hotel cards, and other evidence. They were all tired but they so wanted to pull it all together! To their credit, they managed to find their way through the plot, discover the cause of death, the reason for the death and the true killers. That and also manage to get some Soviet illegals deported! The players connected the clues and solved the mystery; it was a near anti-climax in some ways, that feeling you get when the players pull it all off well and it seems so simple.

I like what Gallant Knight tried to do with Cold Shadows, but I think the execution and the game system let it down somewhat. If I ran this again, I would use a tailored version of Wordplay, as I think it would introduce more a sense of jeopardy in the task resolution. That said, it worked well enough.

And with that, the convention was over. Elaine had already left, and Graham had to go at the end of the game. I did a last sweep around the building and left for home, leaving one game playing out its end game.

Furnace will return on 10th and 11th October 2020.

14 October 2019

The One Ring - The Fellowship reconvenes

The serious picture of the Fellowship

Our fellowship met together in the flesh for the first time this weekend at the Furnace Convention at the weekend.

All Smiles!

We reminisced, we laughed and we shared drinks, all in the convivial bar of the Garrison Hotel in Sheffield at probably the best small convention in the UK. Okay, I’m biased about that, but I’m one of the organisers!

To Absent Friends

We toasted our absent fellowship members, including one who sadly (in real life) passed away.

We agreed that we needed to do something about that Dragon in the Grey Mountains.

And Nalí finds his dreams disturbed with images of a Ring of Power as his dragon sickness awakens.

Until 2020 at the earliest...

12 October 2019

The One Ring - Don't Dream it's Over - Season & Campaign Finale

The One Ring

After several years, our campaign of The One Ring is over, climaxing with a brutal, bloody assault on Dol Guldor to drive the shadow from Mirkwood. Our company succeeded, but at great cost. Personally, I'm feeling drained, content but somewhat in shock. I spent most of the game session with my character one blow away from death.

We had spent the previous game year building an alliance of Elves, Men and Dwarfs to fight the resurgent agents of Sauron, slowly convincing and persuading the various rulers to join together rather than bicker and squabble. Meanwhile, we returned to our earliest adventures and killed the final Great Spider of Mirkwood to prevent her joining Sauron's forces.

Before this we had eliminated the threats of the Gibbet King, Barrow Wraiths, 3 Nazgûl, and the Werewolf of Mirkwood (twice). The latter had been a great cost, when the Hunter took the Werewolf and Beorn's spirits at the same time. We tricked two of the Great Spiders into killing each other.

We travelled; the Barrow Downs, Bree, Fornost, Angmar, Rivendell, all of Mirkwood and across the Misty Mountains several ways. We nearly died from exposure crossing the wastes to Carn Dûm. We learnt the importance of planned travel and having sanctuaries available. We ensured that the Dwarf Road could reopen and adopted its Watchtower as a base. We discovered that Courtesy was as useful as the Axe skill.

We had friends in Erebor, the Elven King's Halls, at Rivendell and amongst the Woodsmen. We were Heroes of the Woodsmen and the Lonely Mountain and Friends of Elrond. Radagast was our advisor and ally. The initial company all had winter cloaks made from the Hounds of Sauron we killed.

We won the battle, at huge cost, securing two generations of peace. Five Nazgûl fell permanently in the fighting. The Mountain trolls nearly finished us off. 

Dol Guldur was utterly destroyed, levelled by the Dwarfs of King Dain after the battle. The enemy was killed or scattered.

The cost was high. The fellowship separated, to retire. A ten year reunion was promised, at Rivendell.

• Halbrog the Ranger had left two seasons before the cleansing of Mirkwood, recalled to the patrol the wastes of the North Kingdoms.
• Hathus the Wanderer retired happily and went fishing in Anduin. 
• Rathar the Beorning left before that, fed up of Mirkwood and became a leader of his people.
• Eorgwyn the Shieldmaiden, departed, heading south.

Of those present at the final battle, 

• Miriel the Wood Elf, bearer of the Standard of Glorfindel, possessor of the Werewolf of Mirkwood, cruelly fell into misery having slain her closest elven friend in the madness the enemy brought upon her. She fled into Mirkwood, living as a recluse and shunning all contact with society, consumed by guilt.
• Aeldra became the leader of the Woodsmen, forever married to them and not her true love who was slain by the King of the Trolls in the battle in front of her as she battled the Ringwraiths.
• Nolwë the High Elf was invigorated by the energy of the young peoples and travelled more with them, committing to a future quest to slay a Dragon. 
• Nalí the Dwarf lost his constant friend and bickering companion Miriel, and his life felt empty. He retired to the Lonely Mountain and started to plan an expedition to kill a Dragon in the Dwarven Halls of the Grey Mountains and discover the Ring of Power that he sees in his dreams. Should this ever happen, he risks being consumed by the dragon-sickness like Thorin before him.

The campaign was born from the Darkening of Mirkwood and run by Paul Mitchener. It was a superb, slow burning game which left us massively invested in the characters. I will really miss it.

A big shout out to Elina and Jag, companions in our fellowship from the start. Hat tip to Simon for integrating so well into a long running campaign and becoming a really critical member of the fellowship, essential for our success.

Also fond memories of Jerry, Mik, Glen and Rich for the while they travelled in our company.

And thank you to Paul, once again. Well played, sir! You have scared, delighted and enthralled us.

I hope that our spin off series with the Quest to the Grey Mountains happens.

8 October 2019

UPDATE (21 October 2019): Paul posted his thoughts here, well worth a read as it shows the Loremaster's perspective.

The One Ring image - By Xander - own work, (not derivative from the movies), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1953341

The One Ring - Season 8 - A Sense of Foreboding

A sense of foreboding

Tonight, our game of The One Ring heads towards a dramatic conclusion after 8 seasons of play. Last week, we slayed the last Great Spider of Mirkwood and discovered clues towards a dragon and a Dwarven Ring of Power in the mountains to the north of the forest. However, more important matters are pressing; in the spring, we have pulled together an alliance of Dwarves, Elves and Men to cleanse the taint of Dol Guldur from the forests. We hope to have at least one of the wizards with us, along with artefacts of power from the old days.

I have a huge feeling of trepidation; we have invested a lot in these characters. I fully expect some or even all of us to die tonight. And yet I hope for the spin-off quest when my Dwarf, Náli, has the chance to defeat a dragon and find a magical ring. I hope it doesn’t end tonight, but I expect that it will.

8 October 2019

The One Ring image - By Xander - own work, (not derivative from the movies), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1953341

Website issues are still ongoing

Just a quick note to say that my website https://www.deltapavonis.net/  is presently still broken. The blog is fine as (fortunately) I moved it to Blogger as a platform.

Apparently there is a PHP issue, which I'm working through with the ISP who are being very helpful. This has been ongoing since August 2019, lack of progress is my fault (holiday, then work being a bit crazy and looming deadlines for Lyonesse and Furnace).

I am still migrating pages from the old blog archive onto Blogger, but it's taking quite a while to do as the auto-export doesn't work using the Rapidweaver plug-in anymore. A whole chunk of 2012, 2013 and 2014 arrived last night.

6 October 2019

Trapped on the Bus

I've always enjoyed riding on this bus route. Sometimes I've not liked the contractor that the council have selected, as they've put prices up, changed the number of low-cost tickets, restricted the travel-cards, and used more shoddy, polluting vehicles to push up the margins. The crew have been variable; sometimes they're supportive, sometimes they're nasty pieces of work who are just in it for themselves.

It was nice a few years ago when they put the new buses in, saying they were investing for the future, but since 2010 they didn't haven't spent much on maintenance, and for the last five years we've often had substitute buses when these ones break down. I think that some of them are from companies that the council members are involved with.

The passengers are from all walks of life, and generally, get on fine. Most people are polite, and give up seats when they need to. You get the odd anti-social one, but peer-pressure usually keeps them in line. There's a bunch at the back from the posh school who keep themselves to themselves; some of them are drunk and pass comments, but usually, they've kept themselves to themselves whilst bemoaning the fact that the riff-raff are on the same bus and actually talk back.

The trouble started back in 2016 when they redecorated the bus, and they allowed advertising that told lies and broke all the rules. Some people believed it, others didn't and the passengers were split down the middle. The conductor passed brochures around and asked for a show of hands on the holiday plans. Like the advertising, the brochures lied, promising a glorious holiday in the UK that would save money. There'd be no need to compete for towels at the pool because we'd send all those foreigners home. The show of hands was in favour of the new holiday by one passenger. The conductor, who hadn't wanted to change the route and expected it to stay the same whilst shutting up the awkward passengers, resigned.

All of a sudden, the holiday route for the bus was changed from a European tour to a British beach holiday. They asked for a volunteer to act as the conductor, and the kids at the back fought amongst themselves. One of them came forward, but the comments still flew. 'We're not going fast enough', 'who needs plans?', 'We won the war, don't you forget that, where's your Blitz spirit?!'. We looked at the map book and realised that rather than a beach, it was heading to the cliffs at Dover. When we pointed this out, we were criticised for being negative. 'Of course it'll be fine', they said, 'If some people get badly hurt in the fall it'll be worthwhile.'

The new conductor got a lot of stick with some proposed changes, and ended up quitting in disgust, replaced by one of the posh yobs from the back who's been in trouble for snogging loads of people on the back seats and lying. He's very clear that we'll be on holiday for Halloween; originally we'd planned to go in Easter. He's fallen out with the driver, who has pointed out that they're in control, and there's no way they're letting the conductor navigate us off a cliff. They had to have a word with the police when the conductor ordered everyone off for a few weeks just before we got to the bus stop. They gave the conductor a stern talking to.

 I'd love to get off and have a holiday somewhere else in Europe, but the package holiday airlines are going bust because everyone's fighting over the bus route... Whatever will happen next?

And like that... he's gone

Wordcloud of Keyser Soze speech

One of my favourite films of all time is The Usual Suspects, a movie that's now tainted by the allegations about the behaviours of the director, Bryan Singer, and one of the lead actors, Kevin Spacey. It's a wonderful, twisty and dark tale that was brought to mind recently when a colleague left work ("And like that... poof... he's gone").

I'm hesitant to rewatch it as I don't want to ruin my experience of the film. That said, I enjoyed Baby Driver and managed to detach Kevin Spacey - the man - from the film itself. It seems wrong to avoid the work of a large number of people for the actions on one that aren't directly linked to that work, but  when that individual makes such a critical performance, how much of what I have enjoyed is down to them?

4 October 2019