Author: Dominic Mah

writer, filmmaker, playwright, nerd for: karaoke, Marvel, Robotech, Wild Cards, casinos, Spider-People, alliteration
DC Comics, MoviesLeave a comment

‘The Suicide Squad’ Set Visit: It’s Harley Quinn’s Multiverse, We’re Just Living and Dying In It

Dominic Mah

In late 2019, which seems a whole world ago, The Nerds Of Color were invited to Atlanta, GA to visit the set of The Suicide Squad, which premieres on HBO Max and in theaters this Friday, August 6. Early reviews of the sequel/not-a-sequel are already out, and here’s a few more things we learned from the set visit about the “shitty supervillain” war caper film, based on the DC Comics.

SPOILERS FOLLOW! Also, possibly, opinions.

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Marvel, SportsLeave a comment

Spider-Man Day with Jordan Chiles, Simone Biles, and Their Amazing Olympic Friends

Dominic Mah

August 1 is Spider-Man Day, celebrating Marvel Comics’ best-known character in all his myriad incarnations. This year, August 1 also happens to be the first day of gymnastics individual event finals at the 2021 Olympics in Tokyo, Japan. If you are in Japan, where it is already tomorrow (relative to the United States): ハッピー スパイダーマン デー! Team USA gymnast Jordan Chiles, an avid Spider-Fan, performs her floor exercise accompanied by a suite of music from the Spider-Man films, including the quote from the classic theme song for the 1960’s animated TV show.

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Marvel, Video Games

‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ Console Game Debuts, Prompts ‘Avengers’ Comparisons

Dominic Mah

Square Enix and Eidos Montreal showed off the first clips from a new Guardians of the Galaxy game for PS5/PS4/Xbox Series XJS/PC at their E3 showcase on Sunday. The preview included the reveal trailer, an extended Alpha-build gameplay clip, and information about the AAA superhero game’s launch date.

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Interview, Nerdcore

Lex The Lexicon Artist on Her New Album ‘Alter Ego’

Dominic Mah

A chat with Lex The Lexicon Artist about her new album Alter Ego, branching into influential anime, the state of being a Chinese-American artist during the COVID-19/coronavirus pandemic, and also deez nuts. A version of this interview originally appeared at Melancholyball.

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DC Comics, Martial Arts, Movies2 Comments

‘Birds of Prey’ is An Asian American Aesthetic Superhero Movie I’ve Always Wanted

Dominic Mah

Holy batshit, batpeople, Birds Of Prey is powerful. It is an action-comedy escapade about a squad of DC Comics’ most beloved women characters, including Harley Quinn, Huntress, Black Canary, Renee Montoya, and Cassandra Cain. The film also does a thing … Continue reading ‘Birds of Prey’ is An Asian American Aesthetic Superhero Movie I’ve Always Wanted

Marvel, Movies

‘The Irishman’ vs ‘Iron Man’: Both Great American Cinema

Dominic Mah

As it turns out, Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman and Marvel Studios’ Iron Man are two great works of American cinema, if “great” is used in the sense of high significance, somewhere between “representative of their respective genres” and “super-sized with extra bacon, please.” Spoilers for The Irishman to follow:

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Podcasts, Sci Fi

‘Occupy Me’, NOC’s Science-Fiction Audio Drama, Continues!

Dominic Mah

Occupy Me is a new science-fiction audio drama/narrative podcast presented by Hard NOC Media / The Nerds Of Color and Melancholyball Media. Episode 2: “Internet Killed The Video Store” premieres today.

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Podcasts

New Podcast ‘Moonface’ Centers Korean American Queer Experience

Dominic Mah

James Kim, podcast producer of The Competition, releases his fictional narrative series Moonface on October 9 (tomorrow!). The independent production features Joel Kim Booster (of NBC’s Sunnyside) in the lead role:

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Podcasts, Sci Fi

‘Occupy Me’ Premieres Next Week, Exclusively on Earth!

Dominic Mah

Here’s the new story trailer for Occupy Me, the first fictional narrative audio drama from The Nerds of Color’s family of podcasts. Episode 1 will premiere on October 14. (Give or take a day to accommodate another highly-anticipated science-fiction adventure thing which MIGHT drop a new trailer next week.) Continue reading “‘Occupy Me’ Premieres Next Week, Exclusively on Earth!”

Podcasts, Sci Fi

Kelly Marie Tran Stars in ‘Passenger List,’ a New Audio Drama Premiering Today

Dominic Mah

That’s right, you do not have to wait ’til December’s release of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker to hear from Kelly Marie Tran, because she stars in Passenger List, a new mystery thriller podcast arriving today from Radiotopia! Our favorite Space Asian actor voices the lead character Kaitlin Le in this fictional narrative involving “a missing plane, a cabin full of suspects, a search for truth.”

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Podcasts, Sci Fi1 Comment

We’re Making a Science-Fiction Episodic Podcast — Casting Voice Actors Now!

Dominic Mah

Do you like podcasts? Do you like moody-snarky science fiction? Do you like The Nerds of Color (you’re here, after all)? Then please read further:

We’re pleased to announce our first fictional narrative podcast, co-produced by Hard NOC Media and Melancholyball Media. We’re casting voice talent and crewing up now and throughout August. Details are in the official casting announcement below. The series is slated to premiere in Fall/Winter of this year.

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Conventions, Cosplay

Into The SDCC-Cosplay-Verse With The NOC, Part II

Dominic Mah

More sights and snikts from the extraordinarily eventful San Diego Comic-Con 2019 (The 50th edition of SDCC!) Check out earlier coverage here and here!

We’ll get into the big reveals from SDCC50 on our podcast; we have plenty of time to contemplate the new Picard series, the Top Gun sequel (Miramar is right there in San Diego, after all), The CW’s Crisis crossover, the multiverse of announcements from Marvel in Hall H. For now, we’re still feeling the sunny afterglow from the melting pot of fandoms, cosplayers, and creative folk who make Comic-Con International such a special gathering, particularly so on this week when our Supervillain-In-Chief was yelling bigotry at POCs to “go back where they came from.” What can I say, fool: We’re from here.

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Animation, Movies2 Comments

‘Mulan’ is Still the Wokest Disney Princess Movie Your Kid Hasn’t Seen 600 Times Yet

Dominic Mah

Originally posted on Melancholyball.

The “Disney Princess” mythos is a genre as restrictive as it is globally-superpowered, but in terms of the Official Princess Movie with the most patriarchy-subverting politics, I think it’s no contest: Mulan is by far the most progressive-minded cel-animated Disney Princess film, while also performing its essential sedative-hypnotic function on your child’s developing emotional vocabulary. (Pocahontas has an argument too, but for my taste, the underlying colonization-conquest story is so far outside of Classic Disney’s natural lane, you kinda wonder what they’re even trying to say, and also the songs in Pocahontas are not my jam.)

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Comics, Interview, Marvel1 Comment

An Interview with Greg Pak about Marvel’s New All-Asian Superhero Team ‘Agents of Atlas’

Dominic Mah

(A version of this interview appeared originally at melancholyball.com) DOM MAH: Hi, Greg! So, for those of us (like me) who sometimes get the Marvel Events out of order in our head canon, can you tell us the overall premise … Continue reading An Interview with Greg Pak about Marvel’s New All-Asian Superhero Team ‘Agents of Atlas’

Marvel, Music2 Comments

Infinity Rain: An Avengers / Prince Mash-Up, Annotated

Dominic Mah

Note: I made this with the intent to commemorate the third anniversary of Prince’s passing on April 21, 2016. Just so happens, Avengers: Endgame premieres this week on April 25 (if you’re reading this blog you probably have heard about that). The premise was to re-contextualize last year’s rather lengthy Avengers: Infinity War, set to all the songs on 1984’s Purple Rain, in the order they appear on that definitive work of pop music. The thinking was, in terms of emotional/dramatic arcs, Purple Rain the album is more coherent and composed than Infinity War (I wouldn’t make the same claim if we were talking about Purple Rain the film, but in this case we aren’t).

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Interview, Marvel, Television

Interview With ‘Cloak & Dagger’ Director Jennifer Phang

Dominic Mah

A version of this interview originally appeared at Melancholyball.com.

The second season of Marvel’s Cloak & Dagger premiered last week on Freeform; graciously returning for a fresh new interview is filmmaker Jennifer Phang, who directed S2’s premiere episode “Restless Energy.” (My earlier chats with Phang on her work on Cloak & Dagger and The Expanse can be found here and here.) Continue reading “Interview With ‘Cloak & Dagger’ Director Jennifer Phang”

Fandom, News

AOC is NOC AF! (Updated)

Dominic Mah

UPDATED OCTOBER 13, 2019 for Rep. Ocasio-Cortez’s birthday. See #12-14 below!

For those visiting our blog for the first time, ‘round these parts “N.O.C.” stands for Nerds Of Color (or Non-Official-Cover if you’ve just rewatched the first Mission: Impossible film).

It’s a term of inclusivity that we wear with pride. And because part of our nerdy duties include ingesting a lot of TV, movies, and Twitter, we feel obligated to note that Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) is, by her choice of pop-culture references on Twitter and other forums, also a Nerd Of Color. (We’ll update this listicle periodically as Rep. AOC continues to use Twitter to do spectacularly nerdy things.)

Continue reading “AOC is NOC AF! (Updated)”