News Afterburn Dave Bautista and Samuel L. Jackson Will Star in the Comics Adaptation Afterburn If the world ended‚ would you try to steal the Mona Lisa? By Molly Templeton | Published on February 7‚ 2024 icon-comment 0 Share New Share Twitter Facebook Pinterest RSS Feed If the world as we know it ends‚ I am definitely not going to be thinking about the Mona Lisa. But according to Deadline‚ in the upcoming film Afterburn‚ “an unhinged warlord” is doing just that. Afterburn is based on the Red 5 comics by Scott Chitwood and Paul Ens. The summary for the first comic explains: A year ago‚ a massive solar flare destroyed the Earth’s eastern hemisphere with the power of a thousand nuclear bombs. But amid chaos‚ there’s profit. That’s where Jake comes in‚ retrieving valuable items from the remains – when he can outwit the competition and the mutated locals! In the movie adaptation‚ Deadline notes‚ the solar flare was 10 years ago. Dave Bautista (Guardians of the Galaxy‚ pictured above) will play Jake‚ an ex-soldier “who works as a treasure hunter recovering valuable objects from the old world for powerful clients.” He’ll be joined by Samuel L. Jackson‚ playing “freedom fighter Valentine.” This all sounds positively ridiculous‚ and like it could be a very good time if no one takes themselves too seriously. The movie has J.J. Perry as director; Perry just directed Bautista in The Killer’s Game‚ and has done a ton of work in stunts and as stunt coordinator on everything from The Fate of the Furious to Shadow and Bone. So at least the action should be very‚ very entertaining. Writer Matt Johnson was behind the poorly received 2005 Paul Walker film Into the Blue; Nimrod Antal (a director on Stranger Things) did revisions on the Afterburn screenplay. Afterburn will begin filming in April‚ so it’ll be a while before we get to see what this all adds up to. The post Dave Bautista and Samuel L. Jackson Will Star in the Comics Adaptation <;i>;Afterburn<;/i>; appeared first on Reactor.

Book Recommendations book review A Collection of Restless Hearts: GennaRose Nethercott’s Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart Molly Templeton reviews a collection of “restless‚ playful‚ wise‚ heartbroken and rich” stories. By Molly Templeton | Published on February 7‚ 2024 icon-comment 0 Share New Share Twitter Facebook Pinterest RSS Feed If a collection of short stories can be like a road trip‚ that’s what Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart is. GennaRose Nethercott’s characters are constantly in motion: traipsing up and down the Eternal Staircase; traveling to stay with a friend in Switzerland whose barn guest room holds a strange secret; even just moving from room to room in a house. Or becoming a house. Florists go in search of flowers that are also‚ or actually‚ animals. A girl who is always drowning goes outside to smoke. The restlessness is rich‚ palpable‚ and deeply appropriate alongside the kind of magic Nethercott conjures up. You could say she’s working with folktales‚ but how many of these do you recognize? It feels more appropriate to say that she takes the language of folktales and fairy tales—the way people are often named for what they are; the way magical things simply happen‚ no explanation necessary or even permitted—and mashes it into a sort of dusty-road Americana that lingers in the back of the throat. Roadside attractions‚ rambling sons‚ heartbroken artists: Nethercott is writing with old world style‚ but creating her own new world order. Her debut novel‚ Thistlefoot‚ had this same restlessness‚ dancing through different paces as its central characters traveled the country in their chicken-legged house. It borrowed from established tales (not least the story of Baba Yaga) but wove in women in leather jackets and siblings who put on puppet shows. History‚ but also statues that get up and walk. If you love the richly magical work of Kelly Link‚ the uncategorizable tales of Helen Oyeyemi‚ stories by Aimee Bender‚ Neil Gaiman‚ Karen Russell—you will likely find much to enjoy here. All the more so if you are the kind of person who sometimes just wants to pick up and leave your life behind‚ or hopes that under the next leaf you turn over there may be some creature you have never seen before. Nethercott’s stories start with the Eternal Staircase‚ a tourist attraction that claims the attention of the unwary; she writes in warning signs and directives to visitors right alongside the tale of two teens and their messy summer. Later‚ the title story is a bestiary‚ but woven through the entries of creatures that never were is the story of three florists with flowery names‚ their fraught relationships to each other and the creatures/flowers they write about. “Drowning Lessons” is teenage loneliness in a life jacket. Poor Sophie just drowns in everything (she has to drink her whiskey out of a sippy cup‚ lest it reach for her throat)‚ and her poor brother watches her suffer‚ takes her to a party‚ gets rejected. There is almost nowhere for her to go. Buy the Book Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart GennaRose Nethercott Buy Book icon-close Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart GennaRose Nethercott Buy this book from: AmazonBarnes and NobleiBooksIndieBoundTarget There are monsters here‚ sure‚ depending on your definition of monsters—which is kind of the point. Nethercott writes briskly but vividly‚ lingering over her creations but sometimes slipping by the horrors so quickly that they take a moment to register. (They always do catch up.) And sometimes the horrors are beautiful‚ inevitable‚ metaphorical in a way that makes perfect sense; you’re nodding along‚ thinking‚ yes‚ of course‚ a woman whose career is being smothered by her too-perfect partner would become a house‚ the thing he lives in‚ the thing that holds him up and keep him safe. Of course she would. Of course a town would turn a woman into death herself so she could go into the woods to fetch dinner. In “Thread Boy‚” an adventuring young man becomes weighed down by all his ties—lovers‚ friends‚ connections—but can’t possibly let them go. The characters of the incredible “Possessions” find a spellbook at Goodwill‚ which seems as likely a place as any to turn up something magical and spiral-bound. There’s a playfulness to Nethercott’s style‚ and especially in her wide use of forms: a venomous letter‚ a slippery transcribed memoir‚ a transformative bestiary‚ a calendar‚ a dictionary. The dictionary comes in “A Diviner’s Abecedarian‚” a story about powerful sixth-grade girls with a masterful understanding of divination. (Anything to get through middle school‚ right?) “A Lily Is a Lily” is a sweet little love story right up until it’s not—until it becomes a cautionary tale about the kind of young men who only want the idea‚ not the reality‚ of a woman. (The last lines of Nethercott’s acknowledgement have both bite and a smiley face: “Last‚ let’s give it up for my exes. If you think it’s about you‚ it probably is.”) The title‚ after all‚ includes the words “to break your heart‚” and there are a lot of hearts broken in the course of this collection. It isn’t heavy‚ necessarily‚ but it is true‚ full of heart and weight and feeling just as it’s full of cleverness and vivid imagery. “Drowning Lessons” is a story about teens at a party‚ but it is also about class rage‚ about want and need and yearning‚ and the ways in which our hearts and our bodies might lie to us about what we need: “The desire mounts and mounts until eventually‚ the desire is so irresistible that you willingly allow water down your airway and into your lungs. You choose this. Every cell in your body insists‚ This. This is what you need. There is wanting and there is yearning—and then‚ there is a lung filling with water.” Fifty Beast to Break Your Heart stars with a list of rules that are about a roadside attraction‚ but might well be for an unwary entrant to fairyland. (“Do not enter the Eternal Staircase after 8 p.m.”) It ends with forbidden plums. The pages and tales between are restless‚ playful‚ wise‚ heartbroken and rich. If you yourself are already restless‚ this book may make you more so. But perhaps‚ when you’re done‚ it might send you off in a new direction entirely.[end-mark] Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart is published by Vintage.Read an excerpt. The post A Collection of Restless Hearts: GennaRose Nethercott’s <;i>;Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart<;/i>; appeared first on Reactor.

America’s electricity supply is facing a daunting future. A recent report from the North American Electric Reliability Corporation places most of the country at high or elevated risk of electricity capacity shortfalls over the next decade. That means more blackouts and brownouts. But thankfully‚ individual states are springing into action to protect their electricity grids. The cause of the emerging grid problems is quite simple.  Reliable energy sources are being retired and replaced with less reliable‚ intermittent sources. Exacerbating the problem could be disruptions to natural gas supplies‚ which would fuel much of America’s remaining reliable electricity-producing plants. The grid will be thrown out of balance between what American families and businesses demand and what the grid can supply. When that happens‚ blackouts and brownouts will occur. The electricity grid’s multifront war begins with the Biden administration’s extreme green agenda. The administration is forcing American families and businesses to use less reliable and more expensive wind and solar while simultaneously denying them access to affordable and clean coal‚ oil and natural gas.  Thanks to the Biden administration‚ not only is building a new coal plant all but impossible‚ but perfectly good ones are being taken offline.  Now that the war on coal is all but complete‚ Biden is turning his army of bureaucrats on natural gas. Make no mistake: His recent decision to halt pending approvals of liquefied natural gas exports is but the first salvo.  We’ve seen this strategy play out before when environmentalists successfully stopped a major coal export terminal from being built in Washington state.  The playbook is clear: Ruin the economics of “undesirable” industries with policy‚ regulation and propaganda‚ while simultaneously using taxpayer money and mandates to bolster artificially the prospects of preferred energy sources.  The effect of these policies is already being felt. America’s electricity consumers have suffered increased power disruptions and higher prices in recent years‚ and many fear that it will get worse. Then‚ the grid is facing threats from other sources‚ such as the sun. We don’t often think about how weather on the sun could affect the grid‚ but it can. And while rare‚ a high-intensity geomagnetic storm on the sun could cause major disruptions here on Earth. In fact‚ it has happened before.  In 1859‚ in what is referred to as the Carrington Event‚ the sun sent a blast of electrically charged particles 91 million miles in our direction. The result was that telegraph systems around the world began to fail.  Just imagine what such an event would be like in today’s digitized world.  In addition‚ America’s enemies could detonate a nuclear weapon 30 miles or higher above Earth to create an electromagnetic pulse that would bombard the United States with the same sort of charged particles that could be produced by a major solar flare. The effect of such an attack‚ however‚ could be even worse.    We have experience with this as well‚ and we did it to ourselves‚ though not on purpose. The United States government conducted a nuclear weapons test 250 miles above the Earth’s surface in 1962 in an experiment called Starfish Prime that resulted in streetlights going dark and communications going silent in parts of Hawaii.  The grid is also facing increased physical threats and cyberattacks.  Thankfully‚ however‚ state legislatures across the country are springing into action.  Legislators in Kansas‚ for example‚ recently introduced House Bill 2620‚ which would not allow a power plant to be closed unless it is being replaced by something that preserves reliability and protects ratepayers.  A similar measure‚ Legislative Bill 1370‚ was recently introduced in Nebraska that would require that electricity suppliers first certify that any replacement electricity generation be capable of producing and dispatching at least as much electricity as the plant being replaced and that adequate transmission infrastructure is in place to support the new facility.  Utah is considering a bill that would allow power plants scheduled for decommissioning to be purchased at fair market value. This innovative approach ensures that valuable power-producing assets remain online even if existing owners choose to abandon them.   Similar efforts are taking place across in the country in other states‚ including Missouri‚ Arkansas and Arizona. These are commonsense efforts to fight back against the senseless policies being pushed out of Washington. The Founders of our country understood that state governments are essential to protecting their residents from an overzealous federal government‚ and that is precisely what lawmakers across the country are doing.  Have an opinion about this article? To sound off‚ please email letters@DailySignal.com and we’ll consider publishing your edited remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature. Remember to include the url or headline of the article plus your name and town and/or state. The post States Fight Back Against Biden’s Green War on Inexpensive Electricity appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Washington state is considering a set of legislative proposals to provide adult dancers with compensation protections and mandatory security‚ The Associated Press reported. The set of proposals‚ dubbed the “strippers’ bill of rights‚” is the product of years of advocacy from Strippers Are Workers‚ an organization operating in Washington state‚ according to the AP. The group “fights to empower the dancers of Washington state so that they can strip safely‚ positively and lucratively” in order to “keep stripping low barrier entry and accessible to a marginalized and stigmatized group of people who seek upward mobility‚” according to its website. One proposal being considered would cap the fee strippers pay clubs to either $150 or 30% of what a stripper makes during a given shift‚ the AP reported. The proposals also include a number of security measures‚ like mandatory keypad codes for dressing rooms‚ sexual harassment training for employees‚ and requiring security guards at clubs. Strippers are worried that the new regulations could result in strip clubs shutting down absent the revenue from alcohol sales‚ the AP reported. Strippers Are Workers is pushing to legalize the sale of alcohol in strip clubs‚ which is currently illegal in Washington‚ a measure not included in the current slate of legislation. “Alcohol service has been found‚ by strippers and scientific research‚ to actually make clubs safer and more equitable‚” according to Strippers Are Workers. Strippers Are Workers did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment. Originally published by the Daily Caller News Foundation Have an opinion about this article? To sound off‚ please email letters@DailySignal.com‚ and we’ll consider publishing your edited remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature. Remember to include the URL or headline of the article plus your name and town and/or state. The post Blue State Considers ‘Strippers’ Bill of Rights’ for Adult Dancers appeared first on The Daily Signal.

If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties‚ subscribe to Reclaim The Net. The World Economic Forum (WEF) is riding hard for CBDCs (central bank digital currencies). That‚ in and of itself‚ gives pause to critically-minded observers. But it’s worth keeping up with how WEF carries out this campaign aimed at as broad as possible CBDCs adoption. At this point‚ the “elevator pitch‚” pushed by the informal group gathering the most influential globalist elites‚ is to transition from simply advocating in favor of this massively controversial form of money. Now‚ WEF wants to pretend that adopting‚ or planning to adopt CBDCs is a more or less a done deal‚ and move onto the technical nitty-gritty. And yet‚ even while shifting the narrative this way‚ some decidedly policy (and political) decisions‚ to be made by governments and regulators‚ are also pushed for. One of them is referred to as CBDCs “interoperability” as a necessary precondition to making this centralized – government-controlled and tied to people’s identities – currency successful. The WEF site says that CBDCs take two forms: retail for individuals‚ and the wholesale version for banks and other financial institutions. Before getting to the point‚ the article also talks about “continuously evolving ways to engage with customers” being “the only way” to keep them happy. There’s more ways though: how about not building golden financial cages for people‚ instead respecting their privacy and right to unmonitored and unrestricted access to their own assets? Not something WEF will ever consider‚ so we might as well move on – the group thinks that a problem with CBCD adoption is a matter of technical and formal nature – will wholesale‚ retail‚ or both versions be adopted by a given country. Now we come to “interoperability.” WEF has a whole white paper dedicated to it‚ entitled “Central Bank Digital Currency Global Interoperability Principles.” It says something about the big‚ affluent countries’ old ways reemerging‚ when one learns that small (and less fortunate) economies are among the states already using CBDCs: the Bahamas‚ Jamaica‚ Nigeria‚ and the Eastern Caribbean Currency Union. In the Bahamas‚ the retail CBDC has been around since 2019‚ and it’s called “the Sand Dollar” – pegged to the US dollar. And that’s‚ in one sentence‚ a pretty good summation of what CBDCs are‚ and how they must not be confused with decentralized and open source crypto currencies. The post World Economic Forum Pushes for Interoperability of Centralized Currency To Ensure Global “Success” appeared first on Reclaim The Net.

If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties‚ subscribe to Reclaim The Net. YouTube CEO Neal Mohan has a post up on the company blog just in time to‚ well in advance‚ reiterate the giant platform’s policies regarding the upcoming elections. Even though Mohan’s “letter” is supposed to deal with the “four big bets for 2024‚” the bit concerning the elections is of most interest‚ given the ramifications of YouTube’s previous and continued restrictive approach and unprecedented levels of censorship. Just in case anyone worried things might improve‚ the post reassures them: YouTube will use its massive resources and the way the platform is structured‚ such as search and recommendations‚ to wipe out what it chooses to consider “hate speech” and at the same time “boost authoritative sources” even more. Related: Microsoft CEO Says the Company Is Working To Address Election “Disinformation and Misinformation” This will be done when users search for topics related to the elections. Mohan spends a good while talking up the importance of creators and how YouTube intends to make their YouTube businesses even better. But there is one glaring failure by omission in this pitch: explaining what happens to creators and their content and channels‚ often built for years‚ when they cross the sometimes invisible censorship line drawn by Google’s video behemoth. What happens is demonetization‚ deplatforming – “disappearing.” Finally Mohan addresses (obviously not framing it that way) how the censorship machine – the one responsible for destroying many creators – works when facing users‚ and what YouTube’s plans on that front are for 2024. Tucked in the section about “protecting creator economy” and the obligatory “think of the children” bit‚ the YouTube CEO writes: “Another way we uphold our responsibility is connecting people with high quality information. This is more important than ever as elections take place across the globe – more than 50 countries will hold elections this year.” Mohan repeats what’s highly likely contained in some memo circulated to the usual Big Tech/government collusion participants. It might go something like this: “When talking about 2024 elections and how you’re going to censor around them‚ mention the many ballots happening around the world‚ rather than focusing on‚ or even mentioning‚ the only one that really matters to us – the US one.” The YouTube figurehead goes on to say that the platform is “ensuring that when people look for election news on YouTube‚ authoritative sources are prominent in their searches and recommendations.” No details are given as to how YouTube is “ensuring” this. But‚ Mohan is defiant about the past years’ often shocking levels of censorship‚ and he has his own “language” to describe it – and leaves no room for doubt that the trend will continue. “We spent years investing in a playbook to responsibly manage content on YouTube including longstanding‚ rigorously enforced policies against hate speech‚ incitement to violence‚ election interference‚ and more. We quickly evolve and adapt when new challenges emerge‚ and we’ll do so again (…)‚” Mohan writes. The post YouTube CEO Vows To Censor “Hate Speech” and Boost “Authoritative Sources” in Recommendations When People Look for Election News in 2024 appeared first on Reclaim The Net.

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Since the creation of nuclear weapons‚ we have lived in a world where an all-out war could destroy humanity many times over. Studies have found that just 100 or so warheads could plunge the world into nuclear winter‚ which could claim up to 1 billion lives. As of 2023‚ we have an approximated 12‚500 nuclear warheads.But what if there was a way to find these weapons and destroy them‚ from a distance‚ without anyone knowing what's happening? That is the futuristic scenario painted by a pre-print paper titled‚ quite dramatically‚ "Destruction of Nuclear Bombs Using Ultra-High Energy Neutrino Beam"."Our basic idea is to use an extremely high energy neutrino beam which penetrates the earth and interacts just a few meters away from a potentially concealed nuclear weapon‚" the team explains in their paper‚ which is yet to be peer-reviewed. "The appropriate energy turns out to be about 1‚000 TeV. This is the energy where the neutrino mean free path becomes approximately equal to the diameter of the earth. The neutrino beam produces a hadron shower and the shower hits the plutonium or the uranium in the bomb and causes fission reactions. These reactions will heat up the bomb and either melt it down or ignite the nuclear reactions if the explosives already surround the plutonium."The beam would be used to cause a controlled "fizzle explosion". At the time of writing – back in 2003 – the team believed they could cause a controlled explosion around 3 percent of the weapon's strength‚ but that would need to be reduced in order to disarm the bombs safely. Too much energy could lead to a full explosion‚ which is what we are trying to avoid.While destroying nuclear bombs is a cool idea‚ we would also need to be able to locate them. The team believes that a neutrino beam using less energy in conjunction with detectors could be used to detect nuclear bombs‚ making the problem a lot easier. The team proposed that neutrinos could be used to study the internal structures of the Earth‚ much in the same way as we use seismic tomography but without the hassle of waiting around for earthquakes.So‚ what would the downsides to such a tech be? An obvious one‚ acknowledged in the paper‚ is that the weapon's use would not be limited to nuclear weapons."We are certainly aware of the fact that this kind of device can not only target the nuclear bombs‚" they write‚ "but other kinds of weapons of mass destruction and also‚ unfortunately‚ any kind of living object including human."The team believed that the radiation dosage would be low enough that it would not be practical to target people‚ or a group of people‚ in this way. Moreover the technology – still out of our current grasp – would be so cost-prohibitive that it would need multiple countries to collaborate in building it."We strongly object to the ungrounded worry that this kind of device‚ even its downgraded version could be used by certain irresponsible organization as a weapon of mass destruction‚" the team concluded. "On the contrary‚ we sincerely hope that our proposal will motivate and stimulate the revival of the old idea of 'World Government' which has so far been discarded as unrealistic."The paper is published on pre-print server arXiv.