Bears and Woes

( 'Care' Bear )

Growing concerned about Maelstrom packs. Event is this Friday (some people were planning on turning up Thursday!), and they remain conspicuous by their absence. rich_bull seems to have had his, but I don't know if that's because Eidolon players get theirs early or what... Seems to me that they could make use of the website to at least get important character-related information out to the players, but they'd probably reject that on the basis that it would be giving web-enabled players an advantage (or something).

UPDATE: Volcano God has updated the Details thread. Packs are out, should arrive tomorrow/Thursday. We will have the luxury of 1-2 days to digest the race/profession-specific secret player info and consider the ramifications to our characters. Huzzah!

Libel:

Diana Ross is a dirty lush

Xiaolin Showdown

Okay, so yesterday I caught Xiaolin Showdown on Cartoon Network. It's an amiable enough story, involving ancient demons and a squad of elemental "dragons" - chosen warrior types, one for each of the (western) elements - from around the world who have to collect hundreds of magic items from around the world. (No doubt the items are, or soon will be, available for kiddies to collect for themselves ... everybody's hawking something these days.) The squad is reasonably diverse, there being Texan, Brazilian, Japanese and Chinese members. (All kids, naturally.) The first three members are cool, collected, worldly types, while the Chinese delegate ("Omi", mascot of the show) has been raised as a Xiaolin monk and knows nothing of such things as "electricity" and such like.

All, in and of itself, good stuff.

However, I'm generally horrified and appalled by the realisation of the Omi character. Being Chinese, naturally he's a nasty tiny yellow man with slitty eyes. That he thinks himself superior is a reasonable character flaw, given he has been training longer than the others (all his life), but his inability to master the English language is dreadful considering the fluency of all the other monks in the monastery (and the broad US accent of the temple guardian dragon). He's just this comical idiot with a massive yellow forehead.

It's mostly that he's yellow though.

Also, I was disappointed that the team traded their individual clothing in for pyjama uniforms at the end of the (presumably first) episode.

Xiaolin Showdown (2)

( Overanalysis of a children's TV show )