{"id":3670,"date":"2016-08-03T11:30:48","date_gmt":"2016-08-03T09:30:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/?p=3670"},"modified":"2016-08-03T11:32:25","modified_gmt":"2016-08-03T09:32:25","slug":"mixed-media-wednesday-3-august-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sunpig.com\/martin\/2016\/08\/03\/mixed-media-wednesday-3-august-2016\/","title":{"rendered":"Mixed Media, Wednesday 3 August 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fiona and I recently watched Ghostbusters<\/i><\/a> and Finding Dory<\/i><\/a> in the cinema. Ghostbusters<\/i> was fun, but it spent too much time paying homage to the original. What I’m really excited for is where they go next, now that they’ve got a great set of characters teed up, and have got all the introductions out of the way. Surely there is going to be a sequel.<\/p>\n

As for Finding Dory<\/i>, it’s both a sequel and a homage to Finding Nemo<\/i>. It’s the same plot, remixed with different themes for a different protagonist. Despite trusting Pixar and director Andrew Stanton to deliver a beautiful, fun, and emotionally rich film, I hadn’t been looking forward<\/em> to it. If Fiona hadn’t been so eager, I wouldn’t have made a cinema trip to see it. And I did enjoy it! Just as Dory stole the show in Finding Nemo<\/i>, Hank the octopus<\/del> septopus steals the show here. The two seals struck a curiously wrong note, though. In a film whose core theme is about kindness and emotionally supporting people in need, it was unsettling to see their constant bullying of a smaller, weaker, weird-looking seal being played for laughs.<\/p>\n

Once I got past the initial hump of Person of Interest’s<\/i> first season, I’ve been storming through the episodes. I’m almost at the end of season 3 now. I’m finding it especially interesting in the light of recently having read Nick Bostrom’s book Superintelligence<\/i><\/a>, because the accidental emergence of AI is what drives the entire arc of the show. (It might look like just another altruist vigilante action show, but it’s actually science fiction.) The book’s academic themes and scenarios are still fresh in my mind, and I’m finding more depth in the show than I think I otherwise would. The downside is that I get impatient when they do a number-of-the-week episode that doesn’t move the big plot forward.<\/p>\n

That big comic books haul from a few weeks ago?<\/a> Here goes:<\/p>\n