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Eagle-eyed members of the Word Guy Blooper Patrol have detected a score of linguistic blunders in newspapers and magazines. Can you spot the blots and correct them?

1. "Rather than rant about injustice, reign in your emotions." Be the monarch of your passions! 2. "Climactic differences made sharing of technology very difficult." 3. "Both sides sited previous court rulings." 4. "Everyone waited with baited breath." Were they fish?

5. "To bowlderize Shakespeare a little bit..." Censor the Bard's gutter ball language? 6. "He alluded police by fleeing into the woods." As he fled, did he cite Javert and Barney Fife? 7. "The doctor was pedaling bad Covid advice." Was he riding a bicycle at the time? 8. "Rouge financier may need public defender." To help him "make up" an alibi?

9. "Local teams fair well." Showing good sportsmanship, no doubt. 10. "You have a tough road to hoe." Asphalt is hard! 11. "Thank you for a delightful story with an O'Henry ending." Never realized he was Irish! 12. "She had to fill out a sheath of forms." Was a cover up involved?

13. "Russell's trademark was her long main of voluptuous curls." And the secondary curls weren't bad either. 14. "It's something that has fallen by the waistside." A dieting plan perhaps? 15. "This statement does not tow the party line." 16. By confessing, he's hoping for ablution. A session on the ducking stool?

17. "Today is an opportunity to tell a risky joke or flirt with someone." 18. "(The plan) is to keep the wires taunt in hot weather, but slack when they contract in cold weather." 19. "One sage noted that idleness leads to mental illness and immortality." Which explains why I do nothing all day. 20. "It's taken three years to assess the human toll extracted in the first year of the novel coronavirus pandemic."

Corrections:

1. rein in 2. climatic differences 3. cited 4. bated breath 5. bowdlerize Shakespeare 6. eluded police 7. peddling 8. rogue financier 9. fare well 10. tough row to hoe 11. O. Henry 12. sheaf of forms 13. long mane 14. by the wayside 15. toe the party line 16. absolution 17. risque jokes 18. taut 19. immorality 20. human toll exacted

Rob Kyff, a teacher and writer in West Hartford, Connecticut, invites your language sightings. His book, "Mark My Words," is available for $9.99 on Amazon.com. Send your reports of misuse and abuse, as well as examples of good writing, via email to [emailprotected] or by regular mail to Rob Kyff, Creators Syndicate, 737 3rd Street, Hermosa Beach, CA 90254.

Photo credit: Federico Giampieri at Unsplash

Read more:

Blooper Patrol Settles the Score, by Rob Kyff - Creators Syndicate

You can see it in the discourse surrounding artificial intelligence (AI) over the last year: AI is going to change everything. Some think it’s going to do this for the better. Others think it’s a technological handmaiden for world destruction if its programming goes awry or worse: AI becomes self-determining and sentient.

An insightful article at Vox by Sigal Samuel considers this doomsday/salvific kind of rhetoric and points out that AI developers sound a whole lot like religious priests, prophesying doom, promising salvation, warning the populace to heed the coming armageddon. He writes,

These technologists propose cheating death by uploading our minds to the cloud, where we can live digitally for all eternity. They talk about AI as a decision-making agent that can judge with mathematical certainty whats optimal and whats not. And they envision artificial general intelligence (AGI) a hypothetical system that can match human problem-solving abilities across many domains as an endeavor that guarantees human salvation if it goes well, even as it spells doom if it goes badly.

Samuel argues that Christianity, particularly medieval Catholicism, saw technological innovation as a good that should be pursued in keeping with man’s reflection of the Divine as a “maker.” In addition, when Darwin came along preaching his theory of evolution via natural selection, not all religious believers cried foul. In fact, some embraced the theory and incorporated it into a broader notion of “cosmic evolution.” Such people included Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, a French Jesuit who

believed that human evolution, nudged along with tech, was actually the vehicle for bringing about the kingdom of God, and that the melding of humans and machines would lead to an explosion of intelligence, which he dubbed the omega point. Our consciousness would become a state of super-consciousness where we merge with the divine and become a new species.

Such radical utopian hopes for the human species sound equivalent to today’s transhumanists, who purport that AI will aid us in entering into a post-human future. Samuel’s point, which he argues compellingly, is that such ideas have so-called “religious” roots. I put religious in quotations marks, since orthodox Christian teaching would hold transhumanism in distrust. For instance, Wesley J. Smith, frequent contributor here at Mind Matters,wrote in First Thingslast year that Christianity and transhumanism shouldn’t be melded. They are contradicting worldviews. Smith writes,

First principles matter, and those of transhumanism and Christianity could not be more contradictory. Transhumanism is materialistic. Christianity is theistic. Transhumanism is utopian. Christianity sees the fallen world realistically. Transhumanism perceives immortality as something that can be achieved by men. Christianity identifies eternal salvation as the mercy of a loving God. Its eschatology focuses on Gods promises, not upon advanced scientific applications. 

As we’ve noted here many times, AI’s greatest threat may not be its sophistication, but our own over-reliance on it. As a technology, it has its uses and benefits. As a religion, it fails.

Read the rest here:

AI as Refashioned Religion - Walter Bradley Center for Natural and Artificial Intelligence

Think your roommate problems are bad? Imagine a world where house drama never diesliterally, your roommates are immortal vampires. Fortunately for us, the hit sitcom What We Do in the Shadows lives on for its highly anticipated sixth season.

This mockumentary-style comedy television series, based on the 2014 film of the same name, was co-created by Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi. It follows a group of vampires who share a house in Staten Island, New York, as they navigate the challenges of coexisting in the modern world. Adulting in the 21st century is tough enough, but when your roommates have centuries-old habits, it inevitably leads to some comedic clashes.

With an impressive 97% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, both critics and audiences have applauded the show's witty writing, dry humor, and its knack for satirizing vampire tropes and everyday life. TV adaptations often struggle to capture the essence of their source material, but What We Do in the Shadows has successfully translated the original film's charm to the TV format, thanks in part to the continued involvement of creators Clement and Waititi.

While the series shows no signs of slowing down with Season 5 recently released to once again favorable reviews, fans will have to wait a bit longer for Season 6. In the meantime, here's everything we know about What We Do in the Shadows Season 6.

The renewal of the show for Seasons 5 and 6 was announced over a year ago, shortly before the premiere of Season 4. While fans are aware that Season 6 is in the works, an official release date has yet to be confirmed.

Season 5 was released on July 13, 2023. Assuming the upcoming season follows previous release patterns, we can expect Season 6 to premiere sometime in mid-2024. However, this pattern could be disrupted by the ongoing writer's strike and the SAG-AFTRA strike, which may delay filming. In this case, the release might be pushed closer to late 2024 or even into 2025, depending on the duration of the studio negotiations.

The show will air on FX and be available for streaming on Hulu the next day. As for fans in the UK and Canada, we can speculate that Season 6 will join the previous seasons and will be available for streaming on Disney+.

RELATED: 10 Best Horror Mockumentaries, Ranked

Unfortunately, there has been no trailer released yet for What We Do in the Shadows Season 6.

The trailer for Season 5 was released shortly before its premiere, so it's safe to say that we'll need to wait a bit longer before we catch our first glimpse of the upcoming season.

What We Do in the Shadows was brought to life by the creative duo of Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi. Jemaine Clement, a New Zealand comedian, musician, and actor, is well-known for his work as one-half of the musical comedy duo Flight of the Conchords. His career spans various comedy projects and acting roles in films such as Men in Black 3 and Dinner for Schmucks. Taika Waititi, also hailing from New Zealand, is a filmmaker and actor acclaimed for his talent for blending humor with unconventional storytelling. He directed and starred in films like Hunt for the Wilderpeople and Thor: Ragnarok.

The two have collaborated since 2007 when Waititi wrote and directed an episode of the TV show Flight of the Conchords.

The film What We Do in the Shadows marked Clement's directorial debut and together Clement and Waititi's creative vision and comedic sensibilities have imbued the TV series with the same charm that endeared the original film to cult audiences.

The cornerstone of any great sitcom lies in its ensemble cast. Assembling a group capable of sustaining a series over multiple seasons is a daunting task, but what makes What We Do in the Shadows stand out in the sea of sitcoms (aside from the whole vampire thing) is the extraordinary synergy of its core cast, a group that has proved itself season after season.

Kayvan Novak stars as Nandor the Relentless, a former Ottoman Empire warrior who now employs his centuries-old leadership skills to assert authority over his roommates, although it often results in more inconvenience than actual control. Kayvan Novak is best known for co-creating and starring in the comedy series Fonejacker, for which he won the BAFTA Television Award for Best Comedy (Programme or Series) in 2008.

He is joined by Matt Berry, another BAFTA winner for Best Male Performance in the series Toast of London who plays Leslie "Laszlo" Cravensworth, a 310-year-old British nobleman with a penchant for causing chaos and indulging in hedonistic pursuits. He was turned into a vampire by his current wife, the seductive and alluring Nadja of Antipaxos, played by Natasia Demetriou.

Harvey Guilln plays the unfortunate human Guillermo de la Cruz, Nandor's long-suffering mortal familiar who has worked for over a decade for his master in the hope of being turned into a vampire, a lifelong dream complicated by the fact that he is the descendant of the infamous vampire hunter Abraham Van Helsing.

Rounding out the core group is Colin Robinson, portrayed by Mark Proksch. Unlike traditional vampires who feed on blood, Colin Robinson feeds on the energy of others, specifically by draining people's boredom, frustration, and annoyance. He fittingly works a 9-to-5 office job where he manages to stay quite well-fed.

RELATED: This Was the Best Cameo So Far in What We Do in the Shadows'

While Season 5 had its fair share of comedic drama, the plot line that will have the biggest impact on Season 6 is Guillermos journey to fulfilling his lifes mission to finally becoming a vampire and his transformation back to human once he quickly realized that the whole murdering humans and drinking their blood part of the deal wasnt for him.

The character who experiences the most dramatic turn of fate in Season 5 is Derek, portrayed by Chris Sandiford. He gets to move into the house, gain a close group of friends, and find a place in the world where he is finally wantedall for the small price of having a stake through his heart for the rest of eternity! But, as with any new roommate, there will surely be some growing pains.

With no trailer and no plot details released the plot of Season 6 is only speculation, but it can be assumed that the series will pick back up shortly after the events of Season 5.

Although there was a reconciliation of sorts after Nandor did some soul-searching, ultimately reaching the conclusion to not kill Guillermo, there will inevitably be some tension between the two as we enter Season 6. Can Guillermo truly go back to being a human familiar if he was once a vampire? Has his brief moment of immortality made any impact on his whole genetically gifted-to-kill vampires thing?

Audiences will get to watch this relationship dynamic figure itself out and more in the upcoming Season 6.

Read more:

'What We Do In the Shadows' Season 6: Release Window, Cast, Plot ... - Collider

The Fall of the House of Usher premieres on Netflix October 12. This spoiler-free review is part of our Fantastic Fest 2023 coverage.

The first thing you need to know about Mike Flanagans The Fall of the House of Usher is that its not the story youre expecting. Dont take that to mean that reverence for Edgar Allan Poe isnt front and center, though: Every minute of this series worships Poe. But rather than directly translating the authors tale of a man whose internal rot is symbolized by his crumbling abode, Flanagan uses the short story as what could almost be described as the wraparound segment in an anthology, with each chapter tackling another one of Poes fables while mummified in the wrappings of The Fall of the House of Usher. What comes out of that mummification is some of Flanagans best work.

Which isnt to say that the shows story comes off as disjointed. What Flanagan and his team of writers did wasnt just develop individual odes to The Masque of the Red Death, The Black Cat, The Tell-Tale Heart, and more they married them together to create what is one of the most impeccable shows in recent memory. What makes this House of Usher decidedly not an anthology is the way that the writers intricately weave the main players stories throughout each episode.

The Usher family is quite big. This is thanks largely to Roderick Ushers (Bruce Greenwood), well, lets just say appetite. Only some of the mothers of his children are seen, but the matriarchs that matter to the story are Rodericks sister Madeline (Mary McDonnell), and much-younger wife Juno (Ruth Codd), who youll hear called child bride quite often. Much of our attention is focused on the children, who fall into one of two camps: Tamerlane (Samantha Sloyan) and Frederick (Henry Thomas) are the only two direct Usher heirs born in wedlock, while media mogul and sex addict Camille (Kate Siegel), game developer and drug addict Napoleon (Rahul Kohli), surgeon Victorine (TNia Miller), and screwup Prospero (Sauriyan Sapkota) are The Bastards. There's also a granddaughter in the mix: Lenore (Kyliegh Curran). Joining the Effed-up Family of the Year in their complicated and messy lives are Mark Hamill as Arthur Pim, Carla Gugino as Verna, and Carl Lumbly as Auguste Dupin.

The point of prattling off all of these names is twofold. First, they offer hints for those with a keen eye for Poes work. And second? Every single performance listed above and even some that are saved for later is perfect. Without an ounce of sarcasm, hyperbole, or figurative speech, they are all just perfect.

Over the years, Flanagan has cultivated a stable of actors the Flanafam, as theyre known to fans many of whom are showcased in The Fall of the House of Usher. Whats kept things from getting stale as the company has moved with the filmmaker through the works of Stephen King, Shirley Jackson, Henry James, Christopher Pike, Hasbro, and now Poe is that none of them are ever typecast. Sloyan and Kohli are oceans apart from their Midnight Mass characters here, while The Haunting of Hill Houses Theodora Crain would have smacked Camille into oblivion. The Fall of the House of Usher gives the entire cast a brand new playground, and everyone is having the time of their lives. (Or time of their deaths? You get the idea.)

The Haunting of Hill House set the bar for scares in Flanagans filmography, and The Fall of the Usher meets those expectations with ease thanks to the work of cinematographer Michael Fimognari (Flanagan and Fimognari have enjoyed a long partnership, dating back to 2013s Oculus). Like Hill House before it, House of Usher features a good blend of slow, spooky scares and outright shrieks as Roderick recounts his complicated tale to Auguste in the musty carcass of his childhood home. Both the past and present timelines are filled with the kind of horrors youve come to expect from Flanagan, but he really flexes in the methodology of murder as tragedy barrels its way through the Usher family.

Of course, that tragedy is more for the patriarch than it is for us, and their deaths, while instrumental to the story, arent really what its about. Though their respective demises come in varying degrees and patterns of awful, almost every member of the House of Usher is despicable in their own way. Imagine watching Succession and seeing each of the series miserable players get what they deserve in the most lethal way possible? Thats the type of delicious schadenfreude that The Fall of the House of Usher offers. We watch on as each victim Usher or otherwise makes their proverbial bed despite the grace of the literal warnings offered. After all, hubris, like any of the fine products from the Roderick-run Fortunato, is a hell of a drug.

The Usher empire is propped up by both. In bringing Poes fables to the contemporary world, Flanagans The Fall of the House of Usher centers on some of todays greatest evils. Fortunato the Ushers pharmaceutical company and a name plucked from Poes The Cask of Amontillado is the core driver behind all of Roderick and Madeline Ushers actions. Meanwhile, the latters obsession with immortality is constantly playing on the fringes, only brought to the forefront to appropriately mock AI and any place it has in storytelling or the human experience as a whole.

Theres not a moment where The Fall of the House of Usher doesnt shine, whether its in the gloss of Louboutins or the pools of blood. From Susan Davis costume department to the extensive visual effects team, each crew came together to deliver their absolute A-game. The new entry into the Mike Flanagan pantheon is always firing on all cylinders, and its sure to join many a fans annual rotation of spooky time traditions.

Originally posted here:

The Fall of the House of Usher Review - IGN

Summary

The MCU's Hulk may be an A-list Avenger, but Marvel Studios has barely showed Bruce Banner's backstory and the events that led to the Gamma monster's creation prior to The Incredible Hulk. A founding member of the MCU's Avengers, Hulk has left a mark on the MCU since his debut in 2008's The Incredible Hulk, after which he has remained a supporting character across several movies and his cousin's spinoff series, She-Hulk: Attorney At Law. Hulk has learned how to be a team player, controlled his monstrous nature, became a full-fledged hero, and merged the man with the monster before playing a key role in saving the universe.

But as much as the MCU has developed Hulk's journey, some important parts of his comic book lore remain largely unexplored, including his origin story and his time fleeing the authorities right after Bruce Banner's first Hulk transformation. The main reason why Marvel Studios hasn't dived deep into the Hulk's history is because of the studio's shared rights with Universal, which have owned the distribution rights to the character's solo movies for several years. However, The Incredible Hulk and various brief moments throughout the extensive MCU timeline have at least painted a rough picture of the events that led to the Hulk's creation.

Related: Hulk's Movie Rights: Has Marvel Got Them Back From Universal & Is A New MCU Movie On The Way?

In The Incredible Hulk, General Ross reveals that the U.S. Government and the Army had been working on replicating Captain America's Super Soldier serum for decades, to no avail. At some point, Dr. Bruce Banner having obtained several PhDs throughout the years proposes the use of Gamma radiation, though he doesn't know the project's true purpose. Pressured by Ross, Banner uses a special primer and too much Gamma radiation, causing the experiment to fail catastrophically. After transforming into the Hulk for the first time and injuring Betty Ross and her father, Banner transforms back into his human form and escapes.

Related: Incredible Hulk 2: Everything We Know About Ed Norton's Scrapped Plans

Bruce Banner keeps moving through the Midwestern U.S., Canada, and then Alaska, where he tries to shoot himself with a revolver. However, Hulk prevents Banner from hurting himself, so he continues his journey through Russia, Israel, and other countries around the world before ending up in South America. In Brazil, he practices meditation techniques that help control his anger and finds himself a job at a bottling plant. Meanwhile, General Ross reaches out to Stark Industries and SHIELD for help in his search for the Hulk, which leads him to recruit Emil Blonsky.

The Incredible Hulk's plot revolves around Bruce Banner and the Hulk's attempts to defend himself from General Ross while he tries to find a cure with Samuel Sterns, who ends up helping Emil Blonsky turn into Abomination and going through a monstrous transformation himself. During The Incredible Hulk's bittersweet ending, Hulk convinces Ross to let him escape after defeating Abomination, and Bruce Banner finds himself on the run again before Black Widow finds him years later in India. Other MCU scenes and the tie-in comic The Incredible Hulk: The Big Picture add a little more detail to these and other events in Hulk's backstory.

Related: Who Is Mr Blue In The Incredible Hulk & The Marvel Villain He Becomes

Hulk's MCU powers are quite similar to his comic book counterpart's. The Gamma radiation used in Bruce Banner's original experiment awakens something deep in Banner's genes, which has a genetic predisposition to his Hulk transformations similar to how Steve Rogers' genes made the Super Soldier serum so effective. Since then, any kind of extreme stimulus such as anger or pain triggers an automatic response in Bruce Banner's body, which begins an irreversible transformation into an increasingly powerful MCU Hulk. This transformation provides the creature with unlimited strength, speed, and endurance, as well as an extremely efficient regenerative healing factor.

Although Bruce Banner is able to control his transformations through meditation and self-reflection, Hulk is a distinct persona with his own personality and desires. The more Hulk stays out, the more he develops a life of his own and causes Bruce Banner to lose control of the monster. Hulk's massive body and strength only use Bruce Banner as a vessel. Hence, they prevent Banner from dying at any cost. Still, Bruce Banner's intellect allows him to merge his body with Hulk's through a series of experiments before the events of Avengers: Endgame, and Hulk's rebellious mind seems to leave as Banner enjoys Smart Hulk's superhuman physiology.

Related: How Powerful Is The MCU's She-Hulk Compared To Smart Hulk?

Hulk's MCU origin is very faithful to the source material. However, there are a few major changes the movies made to the character's backstory. Either by skipping certain parts of Bruce Banner's past or by modifying some of the events, Hulk's MCU story lost at least three key aspects that shaped his comic book origin.

The experiment that leads to Hulk's off-screen creation in the MCU takes Bruce Banner as its victim because the scientist caves in to General Ross' pressure to complete the procedure. Banner sits on the machine voluntarily and assures Betty Ross that nothing will go wrong before he absorbs all the Gamma radiation and turns into the Hulk for the first time. In Marvel Comics, however, Bruce Banner receives a massive dose of Gamma radiation when he jumps in front of science student Rick Jones, who enters the testing site for a Gamma-infused nuclear weapon designed by Bruce Benner himself.

The MCU's only mention of Bruce Banner's father, Brian, was included in a Thor: Ragnarok deleted scene, where Banner tells Thor that he missed his father's death because he was too busy with his Gamma ray experiments. But in the comics, Brian Banner made a huge impact on Bruce Banner and Hulk's journey. Bruce Banner's father abused him physically and killed his mother in front of him, only to return years later and attack him on his mother's grave. Bruce Banner's painful childhood experiences led him to develop another persona in the form of an imaginary friend, who would later materialize in the form of a Gamma monster.

Related: Wait, Is Hulk A Mutant In The MCU?!

Bruce Banner's imaginary friend was a sign of a fracturing psyche that slowly created different personas. The first one, of course, was the Savage Hulk, who embodied Bruce Banner's repressed rage and disrupted childhood innocence. Banner's exposure to Gamma radiation only fueled the creature that already inhabited his mind, giving it a powerful body to use as a weapon. Other Hulk alters, like Joe Fixit, Devil Hulk, and Guilt Hulk represent different aspects of Bruce Banner's psyche, and he has developed them separately as different situations push him to the limit.

In Marvel Comics, Hulk is one of many Gamma mutates, all of whom are linked through a Gamma gene that makes them predisposed to transformations triggered by Gamma energy. However, they're also linked to the One Below All, a timeless entity that dwells in the depths of the Below-Place, a realm where all Gamma mutates arrive through the Green Door portal after death. Hulk and the rest of Marvel's Gamma mutates owe their alters, their magic invulnerability, and their immortality to The One Below All and the Below-Place. Yet, the MCU completely overlooks these mystical aspects in favor of a completely scientific origin story for its version of the Hulk.

Read this article:

How Hulk Was Created In The MCU - Origin, Powers & Comic Book ... - Screen Rant