Martial Arts, Recaps, Television2 Comments

NOC Recaps Into the Badlands: Warriors vs. Clippers

December 7, 2015December 8, 2015 Keith Chow

Last night’s Into the Badlands — clunkily titled “Two Tigers Subdue Dragons” and not to be confused with this — was tasked with propelling us into the end of the season. In addition to a promised Baron v Baron showdown, the episode was the first to effectively use an episode-ending cliffhanger to guarantee viewers will tune in for the final two entries of its debut season. But did it deliver?

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Martial Arts, Recaps, Television

NOC Recaps Into the Badlands: Who Run the World? Girls!

November 30, 2015December 2, 2015 Keith Chow

The third episode of Into the Badlands — “White Stork Spreads Wings” — will be the last one to follow The Walking Dead since last night was the mid-season finale for everyone’s favorite zombie show. How Badlands will fare without its massive lead-in will be a question to be answered next week. If this episode is any indication, viewers should be coming back in full force even without a zombie pre-show.

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Martial Arts, Recaps, Television2 Comments

NOC Recaps Into the Badlands: #WheresWidow

November 23, 2015November 24, 2015 Keith Chow

For obvious reasons, we’ve been riding the Into the Badlands train from jump, and now that it’s here — and a huge hit — we couldn’t wait to add the show to the Recap rotation. We’ve been holding on to this one for a while too, since we got an early look at episode two a few months ago. As much as I dug the pilot, I always thought the second episode was where the series was going to take off with audiences. And if nerd twitter was any indication Sunday night, everyone else agreed.

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Martial Arts, Television7 Comments

NOC Recaps Into the Badlands: The Time is Now

November 13, 2015November 24, 2015 Keith Chow

Originally posted at Angry Asian Man

As we near the end of 2015, one thing is for sure: it’s a great time to be an Asian American television consumer. For the first time in history, you’ll need two hands to count the number of major television programs to feature Asian American leads! On ABC alone, you have shows like Fresh of the Boat, Dr. Ken, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and Quantico.

This Sunday night, the biggest network of them all — AMC — throws its hat into the ring with Into the Badlands, a dystopian martial arts drama starring Daniel Wu. And I can safely say the show is unlike anything you’ve ever seen before.

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Comics2 Comments

Concrete Park Vol. 2: R-E-S-P-E-C-T: Another Huge Endorsement

August 4, 2015August 5, 2015 Shawn Taylor

I can only talk about the second volume of Concrete Park, “R–E-S-P-E-C-T,” in relation to music. I wanted to use other graphic novels or films as benchmarks, but I’d be talking more about the evolution to make the book, the shift in materials and not the meta-shift I want to capture here. While I enjoy what GeekCulture has to offer, it doesn’t transform me the way that music does. There has yet to be a geek-influenced film, comic, graphic novel, or anything else that has affected me the way Bad Brain’s 1983 life defining album Rock For Light did.

Well, that is until now.

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Hard N.O.C. Life, Movies, Sci Fi1 Comment

Talking Advantageous with Jennifer Phang

July 3, 2015August 25, 2015 The Nerds of Color

Last week, one of the most-lauded science fiction films of the year was released digitally, on demand, and in cinemas in New York and the Bay Area. The film, Advantageous, a special jury award-winner at Sundance, tells the story of a single mother and the sacrifices she makes for her daughter in a pre-dystopian, near-future not unlike our own time.

Starring Jacqueline Kim (Star Trek Generations), Jennifer Ehle (Zero Dark Thirty), and Ken Jeong (The Hangover), the film’s writer/director Jennifer Phang recently joined Keith for a special one-on-one edition of Hard NOC Life.

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Literature, Movies, Sci Fi8 Comments

Why I Hate All Things Mockingjay

December 12, 2014October 22, 2018 Jordan M Calhoun

Originally posted at Black Nerd Problems

While the book Mockingjay was released in 2010, this is your spoiler alert for both the book in its completion and the movie, Mockingjay: Part 1.

Several years ago I was introduced to The Hunger Games, a new book gaining popularity as a young adult dystopian novel featuring a female lead. I borrowed a copy from the library and was introduced to Katniss Everdeen from District 12, and she was everything I wanted her to be. Clever, bold, and independent, The Hunger Games’ leading lady was instantly a crowd favorite, and the world of Panem made for a breezy thrill ride as I sped through it in 3 days of subway rides and bedtime reading. When the second book came out, Catching Fire expanded the world from the Battle Royale of the games, to the larger theme of dystopia and revolution. “Tread carefully,” I remember thinking. But most of my thoughts were still preoccupied with wishing Katniss would finally leave Peeta to die and ride out with Team Gale, so I was still a fan, to say the least. Before the first movie was even announced I tried to pre-order tickets by holding my Fandango app in my hands and concentrating really hard.

All of that ignores the existence of Mockingjay.

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Movies, Roundtable, Sci Fi4 Comments

NOCs of the Roundtable: Fangirling over Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1

November 24, 2014November 24, 2014 The Nerds of Color

Now that The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 has finally been released in multiplexes the world over, it’s time to finally talk about it! There is so much in the film to digest that we decided to convene the Roundtable once again. And who better to talk about the continuing adventures of Katniss than the two newest Nerds: Connie and Christelle!

So proceed with caution because after the jump, there will be many spoilers and SO MUCH CAPSLOCK!

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Movies, Sci Fi5 Comments

Mockingjay’s Big Box Office: Why Audiences Love The Hunger Games

November 24, 2014November 24, 2014 Christelle G.

This weekend, Mockingjay Part 1, the third installment of The Hunger Games film franchise, was the victor of the box office with a $123 million haul. On its opening Friday alone, the film made $55 million, making it the best opening day debut of 2014, in addition to having the year’s largest domestic weekend debut (beating Transformers: Age of Extinction’s $100 million opening weekend from June ). Despite being “the weaker tribute” compared to the first two films domestically (The Hunger Games: $152.5 million; Catching Fire: $158 million), Mockingjay Part 1 grossed $275 million worldwide. Those are some kickass numbers, Katniss.

So how do The Hunger Games movies manage to hit the target — you’re welcome, reader, for this archery joke — year after year? Is it the draw of a dystopian society that is so popular in young adult novels? Is it the idea of kids killing each other for TV ratings? Is it Jennifer Lawrence?

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Comics, Horror2 Comments

The Yellow Plague: Asian Americans in Zombie and Post-Apocalyptic Fiction

October 17, 2013August 12, 2022 Bao Phi

I originally wrote this as a guest post for Angry Asian Man back in 2010. I rewrote it recently for Nerds of Color with some updates. I still have chosen to write more about The Walking Dead comic than the television series, primarily to avoid confusion.