Whee! A new WL! Now, I'm only halfway through but I just had to post on this..

> and some unlikely inspiration from "Changing Rooms"

Hmph? Geeze, never expected to hear THAT! How the smeg can anyone fit that show into this?

> "My name is Bowen," said the man. He paused to light the
>cigarette with a battered black Ronson lighter, then added, "Laurence
>Bowen."

*slaps face with palm, getting strange looks from co-workers*

Gryphon, you sick, sick monkey. I didn't even catch this until a couple pages later. I got distracted with work (perish the thought) and my mind finally got the two bits to click. I would have paid money to see my face when that realization struck.

Great work and wonderful stuff! Hope to see more soon!

Shaithisx (the stunned, but amused)

>> and some unlikely inspiration from "Changing Rooms"
>
>Hmph? Geeze, never expected to hear THAT! How the smeg can anyone
>fit that show into this?
>
>> "My name is Bowen," said the man. He paused to light the
>>cigarette with a battered black Ronson lighter, then added, "Laurence
>>Bowen."
>
>*slaps face with palm, getting strange looks from co-workers*
>
>Gryphon, you sick, sick monkey.

Wow! Somebody else who's watched enough Changing Rooms to spot the reference. So, are you British, or just one of the lucky few who get BBC America? :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

>Wow! Somebody else who's watched enough Changing Rooms to spot
>the reference. So, are you British, or just one of the lucky few who
>get BBC America? :)

Now that I know what to look for...

Bastard. That's evil, you know that? I've seen the British version on pay tv, and the mental image is very weird indeed.

- Matrix Dragon, RCW #123
"What happened to -you-?"
"I had an argument with the United States Air Force."
"Oh. Who won?"
"Her Majesty's Special Air Service."

American with BBC America. Thank gods! Between Changing Rooms, Ground Force and Father Ted, I'm bloody hooked.

You are no more stunned than I was to see another guy who watches the show. The only people I've been able to chat about it with have been women. (Not stereotyping here, just personal experience) I love how you made reference to the way he dresses at the start of the show with the smoking jackets and ruffles. DEFINITELY not what I expected to see for a Brit super-spy, but then again if you are a spy who looks like a spy that must be a heck of a disadvantage.

I swear.. you really should have seen my face when I made that connection. Any chance we'll get to see Bowen's home? Lord, what a sight that must be!

BTW As a side note, I liked the references to the Ralley Vincent from Gunsmith Cats as the bounty hunter from Chicago who taught WLGryph how to combat drive. Hope we get to see her someday as well, but it was a good in joke.

>I love how
>you made reference to the way he dresses at the start of the show with
>the smoking jackets and ruffles. DEFINITELY not what I expected to
>see for a Brit super-spy, but then again if you are a spy who looks
>like a spy that must be a heck of a disadvantage.

Heheh - he's not actually dressed that way in that particular encounter. He's wearing a tux like every other guy in the casino. It's just that the way he carries himself, he looks like he should be dressed that way.

Although, next time we see him, who knows? Like the end credits of James Bond movies used to say, Laurence Bowen will return! :)

(If you care, he's agent number 004.)

>I swear.. you really should have seen my face when I made that
>connection. Any chance we'll get to see Bowen's home? Lord, what a
>sight that must be!

I think the only word that's adequate is "theatrical". :) BTW, have you noticed that the designs people hate are almost always Laurence's? I tend to like his work, but he's definitely not for everybody. :)

>BTW As a side note, I liked the references to the Ralley Vincent from
>Gunsmith Cats as the bounty hunter from Chicago who taught WLGryph how
>to combat drive. Hope we get to see her someday as well, but it was a
>good in joke.

It's quite likely that we will see Rally and May at some point, though I'm not 100% sure of that. They're part of the background tapestry that I've got in my head for the WL universe, along with Trailing Edge Air Lines' first customer (an English explorer who's also appeared in NXE a few times), the guys' main contact in the New York Police Department (detective name of Pezzini), and the little hairy Canadian samurai guy Gryphon met on an anti-ninja training tour of Japan back in 1986, and who now stops by at least once a year to go out to the Sakura Tokyo restaurant in Worcester for sushi with Our Hero. :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

>the guys' main contact in
>the New York Police Department (detective name of Pezzini),

What would really rock was if she had colleagues named Maza, Bluestone, Montoya, and Bullock ^_^.

-- Sean --
Rabid Crack Weasel #42
"All tribal myths are true, for a given value of 'true'." -- Terry Pratchett
The Broken Link
Follow my creative process

>>the guys' main contact in
>>the New York Police Department (detective name of Pezzini),
>
>What would really rock was if she had colleagues named Maza,
>Bluestone, Montoya, and Bullock ^_^.

I dunno about the other two, but Bullock and Montoya aren't New Yorkers.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

>>>the guys' main contact in
>>>the New York Police Department (detective name of Pezzini),
>>
>>What would really rock was if she had colleagues named Maza,
>>Bluestone, Montoya, and Bullock ^_^.
>
>I dunno about the other two, but Bullock and Montoya aren't New
>Yorkers.

Elisa Maza and Matt Bluestone are partners in the NYPD -- specifically, Manhattan (see Gargoyles). Bluestone's ex-FBI, and a conspiracy/weird phenomena buff, which always meant to me that he's friends with Fox "Spooky" Mulder -- and that's downright odd for me to think, since I don't interpret things transfictionally, normally.

As for Montoya and Bullock, I've always translated "Gotham" as "New York," except when the comics render that impossible. (The TV show never did, and, hell, Gotham is New York.)

-- Sean --
Rabid Crack Weasel #42
"All tribal myths are true, for a given value of 'true'." -- Terry Pratchett
The Broken Link
Follow my creative process

LAST EDITED ON Mar-26-02 AT 05:02 PM (EST)
 
>Elisa Maza and Matt Bluestone are partners in the NYPD --
>specifically, Manhattan (see Gargoyles).

Ah, that would explain it. I never liked Gargoyles much.

>As for Montoya and Bullock, I've always translated "Gotham" as
>"New York," except when the comics render that impossible. (The TV
>show never did, and, hell, Gotham is New York.)

Heh. According to certain clues that turned up in a couple issues of Detective about ten years back, post-Crisis Gotham is actually Boston. Given the nickname, I know that doesn't make much sense, but hey - in the pre-Crisis DCU, it was Jersey City, so I think Boston's a step up...

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

>Heh. According to certain clues that turned up in a couple issues of
>Detective about ten years back, post-Crisis Gotham is actually
>Boston.

Hmm. Doesn't look much like Boston, though. Ah well.

Though I've always thought Bludhaven was meant to be an amalgam of Connecticut cities -- it's as dense as Hartford, south central Connecticut is crawling with "Havens" (New Haven, East Haven, West Haven, North Haven, Fair Haven), and the crime level reminds me of Bridgeport when I was growing up there.

-- Sean --
Rabid Crack Weasel #42
"All tribal myths are true, for a given value of 'true'." -- Terry Pratchett
The Broken Link
Follow my creative process

>>Heh. According to certain clues that turned up in a couple issues of
>>Detective about ten years back, post-Crisis Gotham is actually
>>Boston.
>
>Hmm. Doesn't look much like Boston, though.

Doesn't look much like New York, either, post-Crisis. :)

My favorite of the location clues from that run of Detective was the letter to Commissioner Gordon whose envelope is visible in one panel. It's at an odd angle (it's sitting on his desK), so not all of the address can be seen because the edge of the panel cuts off part of the envelope, but what you can see says

Commissioner James Gordon
Police Headquarters
Gotham City, (illegible) 021

They were very careful to make the state unreadable, but with that ZIP code... :)

>Though I've always thought Bludhaven was meant to be an amalgam of
>Connecticut cities

Providence, Rhode Island, actually. About an hour south of Gotham, very Old Colony, lots of organized crime.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

>Commissioner James Gordon
>Police Headquarters
>Gotham City, (illegible) 021
>
>They were very careful to make the state unreadable, but with that ZIP
>code... :)

Ya -- that's a MA zip code.

Which kind of makes you wonder where it fits, since I know Boston has appeared in DC comics.

Though the Waynes are a very typical wealthy New England family, so I shouldn't be that surprised.

(I'm just amazed that Aquaman can move through Gotham Harbor, if that's the case.)

>>Though I've always thought Bludhaven was meant to be an amalgam of
>>Connecticut cities
>
>Providence, Rhode Island, actually. About an hour south of Gotham,
>very Old Colony, lots of organized crime.

Ehh, shows my upbringing, then. The architecture in Bludhaven reminds me of a lot of southeastern Connecticut with a strong Hartford influence... but then, I've never been to Providence to compare. Usually, when going elsewhere in New England, I found myself in central MA or VT.

-- Sean --
Rabid Crack Weasel #42
"All tribal myths are true, for a given value of 'true'." -- Terry Pratchett
The Broken Link
Follow my creative process

>Heh. According to certain clues that turned up in a couple issues of
>Detective about ten years back, post-Crisis Gotham is actually
>Boston. Given the nickname, I know that doesn't make much sense, but
>hey - in the pre-Crisis DCU, it was Jersey City, so I think
>Boston's a step up...

Jersey City? That's a new one to me. The two candidates I always heard for pre-Crisis Gotham were Newark and Philadelphia. (The latter seemed marginally more likely because Gotham and Metropolis just didn't seem as close as Newark and NYC -- as I recall it was a bit of a ride between the two, a bit more than a quick jaunt.)

-- Bob
(Proud member of the Legion of Rabid Crack Weasels)
-------------------
Kosh:  "Who are you?"
Morden: "What do you want?"
Ivanova: "I'll be in the car."

>Jersey City? That's a new one to me. The two candidates I always
>heard for pre-Crisis Gotham were Newark and Philadelphia. (The latter
>seemed marginally more likely because Gotham and Metropolis just
>didn't seem as close as Newark and NYC -- as I recall it was a bit of
>a ride between the two, a bit more than a quick jaunt.)

Er, no... before the Crisis, Metropolis and Gotham were twin cities, right across a river from each other. Gotham City was like Metropolis's dark shadow. This made World's Finest easy to set up, since Batman and Superman were thus practically neighbors.

Nowadays, it's a several-hour drive.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

>Er, no... before the Crisis, Metropolis and Gotham were twin cities,
>right across a river from each other. Gotham City was like
>Metropolis's dark shadow. This made World's Finest easy to set
>up, since Batman and Superman were thus practically neighbors.
>
>Nowadays, it's a several-hour drive.

According to the 'Atlas of the DC Universe', they put Gotham as, well, Jersey City, and Metropolis on the Delaware Inlet, in Delaware. (consult http://www.geocities.com/karridian/dcatlas.html for details). This also puts Opal City in NEW HAMPSHIRE, Ivy Town in Rhode Island, Keystone and Central Cities north of Kansas City (on the Mississippi), and Smallville a bit south of Wichita.

Interestingly, Fawcett City is in the middle of Illinois, not really near ANYWHERE, this making poor Captain Marvel having to go a couple of hours for help... and the nearest hero is, depressingly, the Question.

And I feel really sorry for some of the guys that break out of Belle Reve prison (the ones taht don't get sent to the Slab) - they get to walk through miles of swamp. And the Swamp Thing gets very cranky sometimes...

....now that I've taken this COMPLETELY off-topic (but given a potentially neat resource)....

--
Geoff Depew - Mephron
Haberdasher to Androids, Malakite of Lightning and Angel of Tech Support Professionals
EPU RCW #1

>According to the 'Atlas of the DC Universe', they put Gotham as, well,
>Jersey City

Um, Geoff, I just checked out the page. That ain't Jersey City. That's Atlantic City.

Gotham is Atlantic City? Gaaah.

-- Bob
(Proud member of the Legion of Rabid Crack Weasels)
-------------------
Kosh:  "Who are you?"
Morden: "What do you want?"
Ivanova: "I'll be in the car."

>Um, Geoff, I just checked out the page. That ain't Jersey City.
>That's Atlantic City.
>
>Gotham is Atlantic City? Gaaah.

....sorry, looked out the window and brain crossed.

(I work in Weehawken - look out the windows here and you see Hoboken and then Jersey City....)
--
Geoff Depew - Mephron
Haberdasher to Androids, Malakite of Lightning and Angel of Tech Support Professionals
EPU RCW #1

>(I work in Weehawken - look out the windows here and you see Hoboken
>and then Jersey City....)

And on a clear day you can see Stygia, Malebolge, even Cocytus if you go up on the roof and put a quarter in the binoculars.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

>>(I work in Weehawken - look out the windows here and you see Hoboken
>>and then Jersey City....)
>
>And on a clear day you can see Stygia, Malebolge, even Cocytus if you
>go up on the roof and put a quarter in the binoculars.

That's silly.

We can get all the way to Dispater from here.

--
Geoff Depew - Mephron
Haberdasher to Androids, Malakite of Lightning and Angel of Tech Support Professionals
EPU RCW #1

>>>(I work in Weehawken - look out the windows here and you see Hoboken
>>>and then Jersey City....)
>>
>>And on a clear day you can see Stygia, Malebolge, even Cocytus if you
>>go up on the roof and put a quarter in the binoculars.
>
>That's silly.
>
>We can get all the way to Dispater from here.

Well, that partly explains New Jersey.

-- Sean --
Rabid Crack Weasel #42
"All tribal myths are true, for a given value of 'true'." -- Terry Pratchett
The Broken Link
Follow my creative process

>Well, that partly explains New Jersey.

Unfortunately.. nothing can completely explain New Jersey...

Then again, this might be a good thing...

;)

>>the guys' main contact in
>>the New York Police Department (detective name of Pezzini),
>
>What would really rock was if she had colleagues named Maza,
>Bluestone,

oh great, stick Witchblade in with Gargoyles and spanish ninja? I could almost (but not quite) feel sorry for the spanish ninja ;)

>oh great, stick Witchblade in with Gargoyles and spanish ninja?
>I could almost (but not quite) feel sorry for the spanish ninja ;)

I dunno. As soon as I saw Spanish ninja, I felt sorry for the Spanish ninja.

And I am so tempted to use them as comic relief bad guys when I start as the next GM for Warriors' World. Kind of like the furiously-yipping chihuahua of villains...

-- Bob
(Proud member of the Legion of Rabid Crack Weasels)
-------------------
Kosh:  "Who are you?"
Morden: "What do you want?"
Ivanova: "I'll be in the car."

>little hairy Canadian samurai guy Gryphon met on an anti-ninja
>training tour of Japan back in 1986, and who now stops by at least

Actually, I must correct myself. "eight years before Battle 01" is the way I should have said this, since I'm in the process of transitioning Warrior's Legacy into "un-time" so that I don't have to keep track of whether things I'm coming up with fit into the original 1994 timeline. You may have noticed that Battle 05 doesn't mention what year it is anymore...

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

>It's quite likely that we will see Rally and May at some point, though
>I'm not 100% sure of that. They're part of the background tapestry
>that I've got in my head for the WL universe, along with
>Trailing Edge Air Lines' first customer (an English explorer who's
>also appeared in NXE a few times), the guys' main contact in
>the New York Police Department (detective name of Pezzini), and the
>little hairy Canadian samurai guy Gryphon met on an anti-ninja
>training tour of Japan back in 1986, and who now stops by at least
>once a year to go out to the Sakura Tokyo restaurant in Worcester for
>sushi with Our Hero. :)

(Pauses for a moment, then shatters completely.) You evil man. This'd make a great team-up though. Bison would never know what hit him. As for the Spanish Ninja's, most of these people would laugh their ass off, then beat the crap out of them.

- Matrix Dragon, RCW #123
"What happened to -you-?"
"I had an argument with the United States Air Force."
"Oh. Who won?"
"Her Majesty's Special Air Service."

>>Gryphon, you sick, sick monkey.
>
>Wow! Somebody else who's watched enough Changing Rooms to spot
>the reference. So, are you British, or just one of the lucky few who
>get BBC America? :)
>
>--G.
>-><-
>Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
>Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

Just so I'm on the same page here, is this the same show as TLC's Trading Spaces? Um, http://tlc.discovery.com/fansites/tradingspaces/tradingspaces.html
I had no idea it was an import.

Dan Brandon
-------------
in .sig nificant

>Just so I'm on the same page here, is this the same show as TLC's
>Trading Spaces?

Same concept, not the same show. Trading Spaces is longer (an hour vs. Changing Rooms' 30 minutes) and newer (I think they're only in their second season), with an all-American cast and more than one carpenter. If you look closely at the end credits of an episode of Trading Spaces you'll see that they mention it's based on Changing Rooms. It's basically the American version.

Which is infinitely better than what TLC did to Channel Four's Scrapheap Challenge. They brought the first season of SC to the US as Junkyard Wars (because, apparently, Americans are too stupid to know what a scrapheap is, and we don't like challenges - everything we do has to be a "war"), saw that it was popular, and took over the show, in the process making it (IMHO) quite naff. They let Cathy stay on, which was quite nice of them given that she created the show, but they replaced the host and started getting all American competitors.

Luckily, they couldn't get away with that with Changing Rooms, probably because it's a BBC program and not a Channel Four production - so CR is still on in its unadulterated form. Which is good, 'cause Paige Davis is cute and all, but she's no Carol Smillie.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

>Which is infinitely better than what TLC did to Channel Four's
>Scrapheap Challenge. They brought the first season of
>SC to the US as Junkyard Wars (because, apparently,
>Americans are too stupid to know what a scrapheap is, and we don't
>like challenges - everything we do has to be a "war"), saw that it was
>popular, and took over the show, in the process making it
>(IMHO) quite naff. They let Cathy stay on, which was quite nice of
>them given that she created the show, but they replaced the host and
>started getting all American competitors.
>
It should be noted that even amoungst us JYW fans there is a marked prefference for Robert Llywellin's dry welsh humor.

>It should be noted that even amoungst us JYW fans there is a marked
>prefference for Robert Llywellin's dry welsh humor.

Definitely...

>>Just so I'm on the same page here, is this the same show as TLC's
>>Trading Spaces?
>
>Same concept, not the same show.
>*snip*
> Which is good,
>'cause Paige Davis is cute and all, but she's no Carol Smillie.
>--G.

Yea, but Alex McCLoud was damn fine... Paige just annoyes the heck out of me. Still, as long as Gennivive(sp?), the redhead, and Amy Wynn are on the shows, I'll be amused. And Tigh always makes me laugh.

To drag it back to the WL world, I had a horrible thought last night watching Changing Rooms. I had this image of Handy Andy as some lower league Street Fighter who uses home repair tools in the combat. *shudder*

Shaithisx (who now can't stop thinking of Bowen in a tux when I see him on the show...)

>of me. Still, as long as Gennivive(sp?), the redhead, and Amy Wynn

I imagine it's spelled "Genevieve", but I haven't actually seen it written out. I suppose you could check TLC's website - they probably have a 'meet the cast' page.

They really weirded me out when they crossed over two of their shows and did the episode of A Wedding Story about Paige's wedding. Not that I watched it; if there's one thing in this world that fails to interest me even slightly, it's the weddings of total strangers. But I saw an ad for it during an episode of Trading Spaces, which gave me a false "ah, they're back from commercial" reading and caused me to punch the TiVo out of Fast-Forward prematurely. :)

>To drag it back to the WL world, I had a horrible thought last night
>watching Changing Rooms. I had this image of Handy Andy as some
>lower league Street Fighter who uses home repair tools in the combat.
>*shudder*

Heheh. Having seen some of the episodes where Andy gets a bit testy, I could easily see that. (Have you noticed that when he gets annoyed, his accent becomes completely impenetrable? :)

Now, if I can just figure out a way to work in Alan, Tommy and Charlie from Ground Force...

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

>I imagine it's spelled "Genevieve", but I haven't actually seen it
>written out. I suppose you could check TLC's website - they probably
>have a 'meet the cast' page.

Yah, it's Genevieve. She's easy on the eyes, certainly enough, though I'm more partial to Laurie (redhead... rrrr...) and Amy (who's just too cute for words.)

I don't catch the show very often, seeing as I don't have cable or satellite at home, and I don't normally seek it out when I'm somewhere that does have cable, but both of my sisters, my niece, and my former roommate in PA all watch the show all the time, and I do enjoy it, especially when one or more of the attractive female crew members is on the show. (It does help that they tend to have better taste; Frank's work is fine but a little too flamboyant for my taste -- and I'll avoid the obvious joke about that -- and Vern's is usually just odd, though it works more often than not. I haven't seen enough of Hilda or Douglas' work to form an opinion, but everything I've seen Ty do I've either disliked or outright hated.)

And I haven't yet seen Changing Rooms; we get BBCA here, but, as I've said, I don't have cable at home.

-- Sean --
Rabid Crack Weasel #42
"All tribal myths are true, for a given value of 'true'." -- Terry Pratchett
The Broken Link
Follow my creative process

>Which is infinitely better than what TLC did to Channel Four's
>Scrapheap Challenge. They brought the first season of
>SC to the US as Junkyard Wars (because, apparently,
>Americans are too stupid to know what a scrapheap is, and we don't
>like challenges - everything we do has to be a "war"), saw that it was
>popular, and took over the show, in the process making it
>(IMHO) quite naff. They let Cathy stay on, which was quite nice of
>them given that she created the show, but they replaced the host and
>started getting all American competitors.

To be fair, it's hard to get Brits to compete when the set is in the US. As for the hosts, Robert Llewellyn hosted Series 1-3 (the imported ones), then was replaced. When that guy didn't work, they replaced him for Series 5. Apparently they decided that the Brits knew what they were doing after all, and brought Robert back for Series 6... We'll see what happens with Series 7...

As a side note, one of the replacements went on to host Weakest Link at least once. I was very surprised by the caustic redhead's transformation when I saw it, let me tell you...

-Z

Rabid Crack Turtle 3.14159
---
Welcome to Hell. Here's your accordion.