On the Bookshelf

The Guild, written by and starring Felicia Day, is an online sitcom about the lives of the members of an online guild, The Knights of Good. Together they battle and level their way through a World of Warcraft-esque MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game). Everything starts to fall apart when Zaboo (Sandeep Parikh) mistakenly convinces himself that he and Codex (Felicia Day) are in love and shows up on her doorstep and suddenly the guildies online and offline lives begin to blur together.

Felicia Day plays the online priestess, user name Codex, who begins each episode speaking to the camera, filming an entry for her vlog talking about her life which mostly revolves around her gaming addiction and therapy. The guild is conveniently made up of all local members, allowing for them to find themselves becoming involved in each others AFK (away from keyboard) lives after Codex first calls them together to help her get rid of Zaboo. The other members of the Knights of Good are guild leader and fighter Vork, high schooler and rogue Bladezz, neglectful mum of three and mage Clara, and the ranger Tinkerballa a pre-med student.

Currently into it's third season, The Guild was inspired by Day's own experiences playing World of Warcraft and with gaming addiction. The first season was funded by donations but The Guild is now being distributed by Xbox Live and Microsoft and sponsored by Sprint.

While the plot is centred around gamers and gaming, you do not have to be one to follow the show. There is some gamer-speak but much of the humour is centred around the social awkwardness of these internet shut-ins as they begin for the first time to meet each other face-to-face and encounter other people and real life situations as they venture out into the sunlight.

Click here to go to The Guild website and start watching now!

Apologies about this review isn't more detailed. I am still pretty under the weather, unfortunately.

Terra

Consider this, if you will, a prelude, a teaser even, for my upcoming review of The Guild.

Do You Wanna to Date My Avatar? came into existence after Felicia Day decided to show some lyrics she had been writing to Jed Whedon (yes, brother to Joss Whedon). Next thing we know Day and the rest of the cast of The Guild are filming a music video with Jed as director. This hilarious gem of a clip is the result.


Terra

The plan had been to post a book review today but there was unplanned for busy-ness today and it's not quite ready. Instead I have decided to follow up yesterdays review of Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog with a review of Horrible Turn, the fan made prequel to Joss Whedon's creation.

Horrible Turn, set sometime back in the early nineties, gives you an insight into the pasts of Billy and Hammer. Why did Billy go from thinking that "the world is a mess and I just need to fix it" to "have to rule it"? Where do Billy's issues with Australia stem from? What lead him to creating the persona of Dr. Horrible? Why is it that everyone cannot help but love the idiotic and obnoxious Captain Hammer? Why does Johnny Snow insist that he is Dr. Horrible's nemesis? And where did Bad Horse come from anyway?

Horrible Turn will answer all of these questions. Of course, it all starts with a girl. Billy has a crush on the Australian foreign exchange student, Katie. When he, Wade (presumably Moist), and Kennard "Kenny" Hammerstein (Captain Hammer) discover that the prize for winning the maths competition is a trip to Melbourne (which Americans never seem to pronounce correctly), Australia, Billy sees an opportunity to spend more time with Katie. There's just one problem - Billy is pretty sure that the Evil League of Evil has marked the maths competition for their next attack! Fortunately Billy has invented Potion 10! A formula derived from flowers that will make everyone love each other. But Billy's plan depends heavily on Hammer and Johhny Snow. Are they intelligent and trustworthy enough to follow through?

Horrible Turn doesn't quite manage to achieve the same level of wit and humour that we see from Joss but it is in it's own right a very funny, well filmed, and well thought out prequel to the Dr. Horrible story, complete with Whedonesque tragedy. The songs are catchy and the singing is pretty good. My favourite musical piece from Horrible Turn has to be Hammer's song about how handsome and perfect he is while pulling out some great dance moves, closely followed by Billy's final piece where he creates the Doctor Horrible persona. In place of the Bad Horse Chorus we now have the Outback Sirens and the early nineties setting makes way for the usual gags about brick sized mobile phones being described as being "so tiny!" I loved the sexy cougar librarian.

Much of the plot, particularly the songs follow in the same formula from Dr. Horrible, such as Katie's solo being their version of Penny's Song sing of past loneliness and new hope, Billy's final song being their version of Slipping/Everything You Ever and Everyone's a Hero becoming Everyone's a Winner as Kenny discovers his new charismatic hold over people to match his ego. However, the blogging aspect is completely non-existent in Horrible Turn. It might have been interesting to see how the could have corporated it into the nineties setting. In Dr. Horrible Billy likes creativity and I wondered if perhaps they could have had him keep a diary but such a plot would probably have been too messy to incorporate into the sixty minute run time.

If you enjoyed Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, you have to give Horrible Turn a try. For a fan made project it is of excellent quality and you will definitely get a few laughs out of it.

Follow this link to go to the Horrible Turn website and watch the show. Be sure to watch past the end of the credits for a song from Johnny Snow and bloopers!

Terra

My mind has been set on the creations of Joss Whedon seeing as just today it was announced that his television show Dollhouse has not been renewed for a third season. One thing lead to another and I found myself revisiting Whedon's Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog.

Dr. Horrible came into being thanks to the writer's strike in 2008. Joss, along with his brothers Jed and Zach, called on Neil Patrick Harris (squee!), Felicia Day (squee!), and Nathan Fillion (OMG! Squee!) to help bring their musical vision to the screen.

Your computer screen that is.

Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog is an internet musical television show comprising of three segments, and coming in at just under forty-five minutes all together. It tells the story of Billy, or Dr. Horrible as he is better known, an aspiring super villain who blogs about his ambitions to join the Evil League of Evil, fix all the problems in the world by being the one who rules it, and winning the affections of the kind hearted and community minded Penny. Standing in Billy's way is Captain Tightpants, I mean, ahem, Captain Hammer (wrong Nathan Fillion show, sorry) who not only keeps thwarting Billy's criminal attempts to impress Bad Horse and earn a place within the ELE, but steals Billy's love interest!

The dialogue packs all of the usual Whedon humour and wit, which I love. The characters are just delightful with NPH as the not so horrible wannabe villain Dr. Horrible and Fillion as the obnoxious, cocky, and not always the brightest, self styled super hero, Captain Hammer.

The music is catchy and I always end up singing along and then later humming the tunes back to myself. I find it impossible to pick a favourite song. I'll be listening to one song and be thinking that song is the best but then the next will start and I am instantly in love with that one. Owner's of the DVD while be delighted to find that even the commentary is a musical. In Commentary! The Musical the actors sing about the show, their refusal to sing about the show, who is better, and games on their phones. Even the extras get to jump in and share in the spotlight and Moist (Simon Helberg) finally gets to sing his piece. Again, I find it hard to pick a favourite song but it did get me playing Ninja Ropes.

Funny, tragic, and entertaining all in one, Dr. Horribe's Sing-Along Blog is quite possibly the best thing that resulted from the writer's strike. Go to the Dr. Horrible website for more information on how you can view the show!

Terra