A bit off-topic this week, mostly because I need to put more thought into the longer piece I wanted to write about. With this generation of consoles finally coming to a close, I’d like to reflect on a game I think marked this generation the most. I still need to figure out how the blog will go though, especially considering it’ll be an opinion piece. Objectively, I think Call of Duty 4 would be the game but subjectively, well... you’ll see sometime in the coming weeks, I suppose.

That aside, I do want to put some thoughts down on a few other things. I’ll try and close it out with some game stuff.

First and foremost: House of Cards. The show “premiered” on Friday and I sat down to watch the first two earlier today. I had this stupid idea in my head that because it was original programming by and for Netflix, it would be of some sub-par quality. That the lead is Kevin Spacey and the first two episodes are directed by David Fincher flew over my head. Although the first 30 minutes take a bit to get going, the show’s pace picks up almost immediately after that and has been consistent in its quality since. I had planned on getting some kind of work done today but before I knew it, 10 PM happened and I found myself at the end of the sixth episode. It’s way more captivating than I thought it would be.

Not to say it doesn’t have its flaws. I think the direction post-Fincher (only the first episodes were directed by him) is spotty on occasion. It’s good but Fincher’s touch on his directed episodes really showed. They complimented the writing and acting very well. And while the acting is terrific across the board, the writing can feel flat on occasion. It would be fine in any other situation, but the strength of the performances make it so that the faults contrast a little roughly whenever it is a problem. Fortunately, that’s happened once or twice that I can recall. It is, otherwise, an excellent show. It’s a political drama, so you’ll most likely know whether or not you’re on board to begin with, but if it does pique your interest, watch it. It is well worth your time.

Netflix original programming also got me thinking: I wonder if this is what direction television will slowly progress towards. While I doubt Netflix will turn into a one-stop-shop for all programming in the future, I welcome a scenario where I can go onto a service like Netflix, Youtube, or Hulu (Ahahaha... Hulu. Funny, right? Haha.) and watch the entire season of a show if I want to the day it starts “airing”. Especially because it potentially cuts out a television network overlooking every decision, possibly forcing the content or quality of a show to suffer or change because of its policies and whatnot. (Which is why, again, ahahahaha Hulu.)

So yes, House of Cards is great. It took up most of my time today and because of that, I got no schoolwork done. I suppose I’ll be in an all-out rush on that tomorrow. My final semester is picking up some. I’ve got a Seoul Fashion Week poster to design, a commercial for Gillette to pitch and work on, a classical composer portrait to re-imagine, a magazine featuring Dubmood to create, an animation to animate, (durr) a title sequence to start in After Effects, and an environment to create concept art for. A lot of work, in essence. The magazine has me super excited, though. The theme for it was some vague non-sense but the jist of it was that we needed to create a cover and two-page spread that features a musician of our choice. I picked Dubmood, a chiptune/electronic artist who made Overlander, one of my favorite albums last year. We’re free to use photography instead of illustration for our designs, but it was (obviously) enforced that we needed the rights to use the photography if it wasn’t ours to begin with. As a shot in the dark, I emailed Dubmood’s label, which he operates himself, asking if he had any press shots to send that I could use with his permission. He excitedly replied, supplying me with some incredibly well-photographed shots from one of his live shows. Now I have all these wonderful ideas for the design and I have some really amazing assets to back them up!

While working on all that school work this week, (in addition to every other possible second, really) I dove into some more musical exploration... which consists entirely of one band.