X-Men Zombie

Has Kitty Pryde, the X-Men member that can move through solid surfaces, been given a cameo appearance in The Passing in Left 4 Dead 2, or is it more likely to be an amusing glitch?

ConDemned

I’m still stunned after yesterday’s events.

The last few days of Britain’s political climate has been rather shaky and unstable: a lack of a majority of votes for any party lead to a hung parliament, meaning that no party had a majority of seats and thus would have found great difficulty in passing legislation. The country has effectively endured the last few days without a government.

So it was somewhat of a sigh of relief when Gordon Brown appeared outside 10 Downing Street and stated that he would take action to install a stable government that was best for the country’s citizens and as such would be willing to discuss a coalition government with the two other main parties. While it was sad to hear about his intention to resign before September of this year, his staunch attitude, that he must do what is right for the people of the UK at all costs, was admirable. The possibility of a Lib-Lab government seemed like a fair compromise, so the future of the country seemed a bit more certain and so I was contented.

The very next day, however,  Gordon Brown suddenly and unexpectedly resigned as Prime Minister, placing Tory leader David Cameron in the highest position of power in the country.

What happened? In the space of 24 hours, the state of the nation went from one of hopeful optimism to the harsh reality that the Conservatives were now in power for at least the next five years. Many people, myself and a large number of friends and colleagues included, didn’t want this to happen.

Despite the atrocious way in which he was treated by the press, Gordon Brown’s term in office should be applauded. In the space of nearly three years, he was confronted by numerous disasters, such as torrential flooding, an outbreak of foot and mouth and a terrorist bombing of Glasgow Airport, yet he always soldiered on and ultimately got himself, his party and his country through these troubling events.

His biggest achievement as prime minister, however, is his handling of the horrendous state of affairs regarding the global ‘credit crunch’. An expert in financial dealings as Chancellor of the Exchequer under Blair, he took the lead in dealing with the economic crisis, nationalising Northern Rock and virtually doing the same for the Royal Bank of Scotland, reducing the V.A.T. rate to encourage consumer spending and liaising heavily with the U.S.A. and European Union to combat the economic downturn. The man always was always staunch in his belief that he only did whatever he genuinely believed was best for the country, stating at 2008’s Labour Party Conference that he “didn’t come into politics to be a celebrity”.

But become a celebrity he did, falling prey to the unfair and unjust scrutiny and accusations of rags such as The Sun and being featured in entertainment magazines where he didn’t belong. Who cares about a man’s popularity and personal life as long as he’s a good politician?

The public was subsequently seduced by Cameron of the opposing Tory party, leading to the situation that ultimately led to Brown’s departure and an unshakable air of sadness, gloom and doom falling over the nation. Although most of the problems he faced were inherited, he always did what was best for the country: Cameron and Clegg seem like they’re only doing what’s best for themselves and their parties (Clegg’s position as ‘Deputy Prime Minister’ sounds like something out of a bad cowboy movie).

I have a number of questions I want answered by the newly installed ‘ConDem’ government: Why was their no agreement between Labour and the Liberal Democrats, and why were the details of the discussions kept so secret? Who is Nick Clegg to decide which party governs the country, and why after so much campaigning against Conservative policies are they ready and willing to change them so readily? Hopefully these answers will come to light under this new coalition government,as many people I know are outraged that their vote for the Lib Dems was essentially counted as one for the Tories, a situation that they voted against in the first place.

Yesterday, the final day of Gordon Brown’s leadership of the country, was truly a sad one: the man wasn’t the given the chance to implement his plans for further economic prosperity and his departure marks the end of an era.

I, along with my fellow Labour and Lib Dem voters, finish with a message to Conservative supporters: Don’t say we didn’t warn you. The Tories have ruined the country before, they’ve got the potential to do it again.

Luck of the Duck

As part of the Desktop Publishing module on my current college course, we were required to design a three-page magazine article. Here’s the finished result.

It’s not my finest piece: I was writing to deadline so didn’t have a chance to spend as much time as I would have liked to, but I think it turned out okay. There are a couple of horrific puns I’m proud of in there, though.

I hope you like it, and let me know what you make of it in the comments.

I passed, by the way.

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Ducks have always captured peoples’ imagination.As children, we’re taken to the park and given bread to feed the ducks with as they paddle in the pond, squealing with delight as we see them scramble for a share of the crusts we’ve just lobbed in. In spring, maybe we’re lucky enough to see a group of fluffy ducklings splashing about in the water as their mother fights for control of the situation.
Jemima Puddleduck, one of the best-loved creations of Beatrix Potter, was this motherly appearance
personified. The story follows the tale of Jemima, an indignant, motherly duck who incubates her own eggs against the will of an oppressive farmer’s wife. Becoming fed up with the wife always finding the eggs she’s keeping warm, she decides to incubate the eggs away from the farm. The removal of the annoyance of the farmer’s wife brings up another problem, however: a crafty fox intent on eating her invites her to hatch the eggs in his house.  Failing to see the fox’s true reason for his being kind to her, Jemima is rescued from great danger by the farm’s sheepdog Kep, who brings her back to the farm just in time for four of the duckling eggs she was looking after hatch.This heart-warming story was accompanied by charming illustrations of the characters in the story, leading the story to become one of Potter’s most popular books, cementing Jemima’s place in children’s literature history.  Numerous spin-offs of the character were made, including a plush doll, a BBC animation and even a ballet, highlighting just how popular the character has
remained since her creation over a century ago.

The main reason people love ducks, though, is that they make us laugh, and there are a number of more contemporary ducks that do exactly that, with two names being the most popular around the world:
Disney’s Donald Duck and Warner Brother’s Daffy Duck. You’ll be hard pressed not to come across someone that doesn’t like one or the other.
Donald Fauntleroy Duck is one of The Walt Disney Company’s most popular and famous creations. Donald is a white anthropomorphic duck with a yellow-orange bill, legs, and feet and usually appears wearing sailor shirt, cap and red bow tie. He prefers to walk around wearing nothing on his lower half (apart from when he goes swimming, where he usually sports a rather fetching pair of trousers).

One of Donald’s defining personality traits is his volatile and explosive temper. Easily provoked and goaded into violent outbursts, his tantrums usually conclude with Donald making a fool of himself in a hilarious manner. He is also known for his raspy voice, which is always entertaining and occasionally difficult to comprehend, adding a further humorous edge to the character. His short temper and bad luck combine to make him the third most recognisable and popular cartoon character, behind only two other characters: Warner Brothers’ Bugs Bunny and fellow Disney creation Mickey Mouse.
Donald’s had quite an illustrious career. At some time or other, he has engaged in a number of different careers, including running a toy shop, overseeing the operation of a railroad, working as a greengrocer, managing an airport, fighting against the Nazis as a soldier in World War II and babysitting his lovable triplet nephews Huey, Duey and Louie.
From his humble beginnings, Donald has ingrained himself on the public conscience, appearing in a vast range of media, including cartoons, comics, movies, magazines, theatre productions, videogames and even being the mascot of the University of Oregon. The character and his qualities are timeless, meaning we’ll be sure to see himcropping up for the foreseeable future.
If you’re not a fan of Donald (how could you not be, you cold-hearted monster?), there’s always Daffy Duck. Making up a part of Warner Brothers’ Looney Tunes roster of characters, Daffy never seems to have a single consistent personality trait: hemay be a lunatic vigilante in one short and a greedy gloryhound in the next. This malleable character type
therefore allowing directors to add their own personal spin to the character, meaning that he is always a joy to watch in whichever cartoon he appears in.

Much like his character, Daffy’s fashion sense changes just as much as his personality does. When not engaged in any particular activity, he struts around sans clothes, showing off his thick plumage of black feathers. He’s not adverse to donning a particular outfit to suit his current cause, however:  he’ll put on a Robin hood costume when robbing from the rich to give to the poor; keep the peace while patrolling the Wild West in a sheriff’s hat and chaps and float around alien worlds while exploring the darkest reaches of outer space.
These three characters are only a small selection of a myriad of popular ducks.There’s Count Duckula, the enemy of DangerMouse who wascommissioned his own show; The Mighty Ducks, the ice hockey movie that paved the way for the creation of a real Ice Hockey team for Anaheim; the creatures you’re required to shoot in the eponymous NES title Duck Hunt; Howard The Duck, the unfortunate inhabitant of the Marvel Comics universe that has no superpowers or special abilities (unless you call being a duck gifted); there’s even Toilet Duck, the hygiene product that will make your loo cleaner than cleaner.It even comes in a duck-shaped package, complete with a bill-shaped applicator.

There are dozens of other examples of ducks in the media, showing just how fascinated we truly are with this particular kind of waterfowl. Our fascination with them has means it’s not looking likely they’ll be dropping off our cultural horizon any time soon, whether it be feeding them as they swim about a pond in the park, watching as they fly in delta formation over our heads or watching them on either film or television.

It’s time we showed our appreciation for one of our favourite birds; the next time we see these water fowl, we should take a moment to silently thank them for some of the timeless creations they have helped inspire. If we could, we’d take some of those classic characters out to the pub for lunch. Who knows, we may even let them put it on our bill.

Vote Now

I’ve had a hard time deciding on which party to vote for in today’s general election.

Despite being of an age where I’ve only been able to vote once before , I’ve more or less been a staunch Labour supporter all my life, even  from when I was young lad. I more or less agreed with every aspect of the manifestos they’ve offered over the years and I didn’t fall for all the spin and sensationalism proffered by such reliable and trustworthy sources of information such as The Sun (which incidentally displayed one of the worst front pages I’ve ever seen in my life).

Seriously, look at it. It’s bloody awful.

So when the date  for the next general election was set, it looked like a dead certain that Labour would be getting my vote again.

But then the Digital Economy Bill (now Act) was passed.

Focusing on several aspects of digital media, it discussed issues such as the operation of Channel 4 and the functions of Ofcom, which is fair enough, but there was a storm of controversy over one point in particular: infringement in copyright on online content and the punishment internet users can face should they breach it. Endorsed by Labour, it decreed that anyone caught pirating any form of media online could face criminal charges and face having their access to the internet suspended while they are investigated.  A paltry 16 politicians turned up to debate the bill, which was passed in just under two hours, thereby violating the civil liberties millions of internet users via a practice which has been proven to fail numerous times in the past. The Act showed just how ignorant, draconian and out of touch with modern reality the people that run the country really are.

This shocking display of naivety from the Labour Party was enough to make me question my support for it, but who would I vote for instead? There’s no way I’d vote for the Tories: I’m not rich or English, so why should I? The Green Party attracted me with its promise of definitive action to counter climate change (as did their rather nifty stop-motion animated party election broadcast), but their anti-science stance, believing that there is no place for genetically modified foods in modern society, repelled me. I don’t believe that Scotland should be made independent so I wasn’t voting for the Scottish National Party, I’m not left enough to vote for the Communists and there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell that  the fascists in the British National Party would ever get my vote: their astoundingly hateful combination of offensive policies, fear tactics, bullying and outrageous lies only serve to make them unthinkable as the leaders of the country in this day and age.

Are these the kind of people you’d entrust the running of a nation to?

UKIP are just as bad: the only difference between it and the BNP is one letter. You should also never vote for a party that can’t spell ‘independence’, especially when it constitutes an important part of its name.

After discounting all these parties, there seemed to be hope in the form of the Liberal Democrats. The majority of their policies matched the way I felt about a number of issues: they pledged to implement tax breaks for the videogame industry – an entertainment sector that I have a passionate love for – as soon as possible and to repeal the Digital Economy Bill if they came to power. At this, I was certain that my vote would go towards aiding the Lib Dems int their quest to gain seats in parliament…

Until I discovered via Twitter that they want to implement the Euro as the country’s currency. I’ve always been fond of our native currency and wouldn’t like to see it go, especially with the current economic climate and the state it’s in, with some countries in the Euro-zone are currently experiencing or on the verge of economic collapse. This revelation was enough to make me question my conviction in voting for the party.

So for the last few days, I’ve been unable to make my mind up about who to vote for. I’ve investigated policies, taken numerous quizzes to tell me which party my views are most aligned with and hummed and hawed as I changed my mind time and time again constantly waivering, never deciding on one.

In fact, I was still undecided even as I walked into my local polling station, presented my voting card to the official and scanned each party’s emblem. My eyes darted between the names of the two candidates I’d vote for. My pencil hovered hover over one, the graphite touching the box I wanted to cross before being removed and placed on the name of the other. I simply couldn’t make up my mind.

But I knew I had to, so I crossed one, folded my form in half and placed it in the ballot box. Even with the deed done, however, I’m still not sure I made the right choice. Even then, I’d probably still question my decision if I’d voted for the other party.

I suppose the only thing I can do now is wait and see if my vote was worth it. At least now I have the right to complain if things don’t go the way I’d like them to.

Addendum: Bob Bailey, the BNP MP featured in the above video, has subsequently been dismissed from the party.