ARKANSAS TRAVELER: WILD WEST WEB SERIES

Arkansas TravelerFrontierado is on Friday, August 4th! Here is a Web Series that goes with it like your favorite whiskey. It’s called Arkansas Traveler.

A Faustian Western Web Series

“Thanks to its smooth-talking, whiskey-drinking, gun-slinging elements, Arkansas Traveler contains everything it needs to appeal to… western fans… At the same time, its washed out, low-lit style brings something new to the genre…” – tubefilter

Travelin’ Productions‘ Arkansas Traveler web series unravels the enigmatic journey of Wayland McGlowhorn, Starring Garret Dillahunt, Angela Bettis, and Sean Bridgers.  

A mini-series in six parts, Arkansas Traveler is a gritty, dark adventure into the life and mind of a man released by forces beyond his ken from the grip of the bloody last days of the American Civil War.

The series is based on a revered feature-length screenplay by Sean Bridgers, of Deadwood fame as Johnny Burns, and acclaimed shows like Rectify and the upcoming Epix original, Get Shorty. Under Travelin’ Productions’ banner, Bridgers co-directed the series with Michael “Ffish” Hemschoot, an animation and visual effects super villain, who worked on films like The Matrix, and Master and Commander. 

It’s a project years in the making, as the filmmakers have reimagined original teaser footage they produced with Missouri production company, Wide Awake Films, back in 2010, into this web series. The web series carries the same goal as the original teaser short: to intrigue and grow an audience, and inspire them to demand more.  

Travelin’ Productions’ mandate is simply to tell damn good stories, and with this project, the filmmakers hope to rally fans of westerns and dramas with a darker bend. Ray McKinnon once called the screenplay for this Faustian Western, “…one of the best un-produced scripts I have read in the last decade” (Arkansas Online, 2011)  

Watch all the episodes for free online Continue reading →

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SNOPES DEFENDS PRESIDENT TRUMP FROM THE NON-STOP LIES OF THE CORPORATE MEDIA

mapTrump-haters truly need professional help given the nature and scale of the bizarre lies they continue to try pushing about President Trump, our de facto Third Party President.

Snopes defended the President in an article titled, “The Lies of Donald Trump’s Critics, and How They Shape His Many Personas.”

(Map: In red are counties Trump took and in blue are counties Hillary took)

As for Snopes, here are some excerpts and the link:

 From Snopes:

What’s remarkable is the extent to which false claims about the President revolve around body language, nonverbal gestures and symbolism, all phenomena that are notoriously open to interpretation. These lies and misrepresentations are also often based on snapshots — visual evidence presented without proper context.

Take, for example, the claim that Trump was the only world leader at a G7 summit in May not to take notes, based on a photograph posted to Twitter by French President Emannuel Macron. Here Trump was portrayed as unprepared and out of his depth on the world stage, with a “ten-second attention span”.

However, the claim was entirely untrue, with other images and video of the meeting showing that Trump did indeed have notes and a pen. Not only that, but the very image used to make the false claim clearly shows two other world leaders sitting with no note-taking paraphernalia. In this case, even the cherry-picked evidence chosen to make the point undermines it.

They also debunked the Democrat claim that Trump flipped the bird to Italian PM Paolo Gentiloni:

Except that he didn’t. The original source of the claim is revealing — the Twitter account of GiveHimTheFinger.com, an anti-Trump website that encourages his opponents to send the White House postcards designed as a middle finger.

A longer video of the discussion shows that Trump and Gentiloni spoke cordially before the incident, which undermines the implicit logic behind the claim — that Trump was expressing anger or disdain for Gentiloni. Indeed, no one has ever explained why Trump supposedly flipped him the bird.

Another terrific bit here:

And then there’s Newsweek’s claim that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi “evaded” Trump’s “notorious… bone-crunching power handshake”, about which there has been a seemingly endless supply of every imaginable kind of analysis.

“In his visit to the White House Monday,” wrote Tom Porter in June,  “Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi neatly sidestepped the challenge, swooping in for two bear hugs with the president during a joint press conference in the Rose Garden.” What’s missing from this account, in a theme repeated throughout this collection, is historical context, either by deliberate omission or due to the author’s lack of awareness.

Modi, as has long been noted, is famous for hugging world leaders, a gesture he bestowed upon Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama, as well as the last two presidents of France, among others. Rather than being an example of yet another world leader “fighting back” (as the Guardian’s Jonathan Freedland has described what are essentially firm handshakes), this was an example of India’s prime minister continuing to greet another world leader in the way he always has.

Continue reading →

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POSSE (1993): MOVIE REVIEW

 Frontierado is coming up on Friday, August 4th!

POSSE is a terrific western about a gang of African American  gunfighters (plus the goofiest  Baldwin brother) involved in an action-packed epic journey across the American west.

The Frontierado holiday is the perfect time of year to hunker down with this film while drinking a Cactus Jack or a Deuces Wild or two. I’ll review the recipes for those mixed drinks in a few days, for now we’ll focus on this movie on our countdown.

Posse stars Mario Van Peebles, who also directed, as Jesse Lee, the brooding, revenge-driven hero of the saga. He and all but one member of his gang, our titular posse, are soldiers fighting in Cuba during the Spanish-American War in 1898. A dangerous assault they carry out turns out to be Continue reading →

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MUSLIM ATROCITY ROUNDUP: JULY 17th

Qandeel BalochMUSLIM VIOLENCE AWARENESS YEAR CONTINUES.

First off, a tribute to the memory of REAL feminist Qandeel Baloch, a pioneer for women in the Muslim World itself. She was murdered in what Muslim fascists call “honor killings” a year ago.  

Clueless American emotional cripples who pretend to be college students (aka Democrats) try to pretend that their lives of privilege on campus are “just as dangerous” as the lives of women in TRUE peril.

AND BY THE WAY, DEMOCRAT ENABLERS OF MUSLIM FASCIST VIOLENCE ARE SO CLUELESS THEY ARE MORE AND MORE TRYING TO GIVE CREDIT TO ISLAM FOR ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF THE PRE-ISLAMIC ARAB CULTURES OF THE MIDDLE EAST. One percenter Carlos Slim’s New York Times is especially guilty of that idiocy.

At any rate here are just a FEW of the most recent atrocities boasted about by Muslim fascists.

July 12th: Maiduguri, Nigeria – Muslim fascist suicide bombers killed NINETEEN innocent people and injured TWENTY-THREE more.

July 13th: Waza, Cameroon – Two female Muslim suicide bombers killed FIFTEEN innocent people and injured FORTY-TWO more. Continue reading →

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THE HANGED MAN (1974): WESTERN HORROR

Hanged ManFOR BALLADEER’S BLOG’S LOOK AT OVER TWENTY MORE WESTERN-THEMED HORROR FILMS CLICK HERE

THE HANGED MAN (1974) – Steve Forrest starred in this excellent made for tv movie that was a failed pilot for a series. Forrest portrayed a gunslinger who seemingly meets his end on the gallows early in the film but who supernaturally rises from the dead to atone for his misspent life by combating evil in the 1800s west. Continue reading →

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MANTIS 20: ULTRON VS THE AVENGERS, THE FANTASTIC FOUR AND THE INHUMANS

FOR PART 1 OF BALLADEER’S BLOG’S EXAMINATION OF MARVEL’S SUPERHEROINE MANTIS CLICK HERE 

Fantastic Four 150

FANTASTIC FOUR Volume 1, Number 150 (September 1974)  Ultron-7: He’ll Rule The World

Just like during the Avengers/ Defenders War this crossover story alternated between the Avengers’ comic book and in this case the Fantastic Four’s comic book. In fact it was the 150th Anniversary Issue for the F.F, an appropriate setting for the momentous events in this story.

NOTE: This was back when Ultron was still numbering his iterations, hence him going by “Ultron-7” here. For instance, Ultron-6 was the first time the android villain used adamantium for his body and Ultron-5 was when he created the Vision to use against his archenemies the Avengers.

Ironically, though today Marvel’s fictional metal adamantium is mostly associated with Wolverine’s claws and skeleton it was actually introduced as a new discovery in the pages of The Avengers in the 1960s. In fact it was introduced in the very story in which Ultron stole some of the indestructible metal to make himself even more dangerous.

After this current Ultron-7 story, when Ultron returned for the long-running Bride of Ultron storyline he was no longer  numbering his versions.   

Ultron 7 againULTRON-7: HE’LL RULE THE WORLD

Synopsis: We pick up where we left off in our previous installment, in Atillan aka The Great Refuge, hidden Himalayan Mountains home of the Inhumans. It’s the night before the former Avenger Quicksilver and the Inhuman named Crystal are to be married.

Crystal has been kidnapped by the gigantic robot called Omega, but after a battle with the Inhumans plus the wedding guests – the Avengers and Fantastic Four – the enormous figure pulled off its mask to reveal that it was really Ultron-7. (Nicely, this was early enough in Marvel’s history that Ultron had previously never fought the Fantastic Four OR the Inhumans, just the Avengers.)

Ultron-7 taunts the assembled heroes plus the thousands of terrified citizens of Atillan about how they gathered for a wedding but instead of that joyous occasion have found only horror, defeat and death.

Mantis againHe revives the heroes he had put into comas last time around – MANTIS, Iron Man, Medusa, Quicksilver and the Swordsman. Meanwhile the Thing rushes forward to attack Ultron-7 but is easily defeated as the villain reminds him that the Omega body now has all of HIS (Ultron’s) powers, not the lesser powers it used to have.

Before the Thing or any other heroes can renew the attack, Thor, Mister Fantastic and Triton remind everyone that only Ultron-7 knows where the kidnapped Crystal is being held. The villain has the edge until they can learn if she is even still alive.       Continue reading →

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CINDERELLA’S HIT SONG SHELTER ME

Balladeer’s Blog’s “Give Them A Shoutout Before They’re Dead” category strikes again! This time it’s Cinderella’s hit Shelter Me, including the video with Little Richard in it.

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MOTHER JONES: MELANIA TRUMP IS THE GREATEST FIRST LADY SINCE JACKIE KENNEDY

Melania over MichelleWith the mean-spirited slug Michelle Obama slithering back into public view this week, THE Mother Jones – Mary Harris Jones – decided to grant another posthumous interview to Balladeer’s Blog.

Balladeer’s Blog: You seem excited about something, “Mother” Jones.

Mother Jones: I am! I was admiring the way First Lady Melania Trump – who speaks more languages than both Obamas – has been dazzling the world lately!

mother-jonesBB: Now that you mention it, she HAS been, and it’s been fun watching Trump-haters froth at the mouth over it.

MJ: The people who hate the Trumps are the same wealthy pigs who hated me when I was alive. Anyway, Melania’s charismatic tour de force made me reflect on what a nice change of pace she is from that bitter, frowning sow Michelle Obama. Did you see Melania with those children in Italy? Wonderful! Michelle would have been chiding the children about “white privilege” or some such thing. Continue reading →

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ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST (1968)

Frontierado is Friday, August 4th!

ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST is, to me, the definitive Spaghetti Western. This movie incorporates all of the best elements of Italo-westerns and has the additional advantages of actual artistic merit and some location filming in the real American West. One of the most distracting elements of many Spaghetti oaters is the fact that the films were mostly shot in Spain’s Jarama Valley, which is great for a Spanish Civil War buff like myself, but that valley doesn’t really resemble the American west that the stories are set in.

Sergio Leone got to shoot some scenes for this flick in Monument Valley and such authentic scenery definitely helps in a film that exploits visuals to a degree unseen since the age of silent movies. This is undeniably an action film, but Leone and his co-writers on the script ( Bernardo Bertollucci and Dario Argento. I’m serious!) intentionally used the framework of an old-fashioned western plot about the railroad, land-grabbing and westward expansion, yet made it all seem fresh.    

I often jokingly call this movie Evil Is A Man Named Frank, because, in a masterpiece of reverse-casting Leone put Henry Fonda himself in the role of the conscienceless, sadistic and predatory Frank, the lead villain. Watching the black-clad Frank calmly blow away a defenseless child early in the film lets the Continue reading →

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A DARWINIAN SCHOONER (1893): ANCIENT SCIENCE FICTION

baboonsA DARWINIAN SCHOONER (1893) – Written by William Alden. With the latest Planet of the Apes movie hitting many theaters today I figured it was a good time to post a review of this story that’s in a similar spirit.

The tale starts on board a 22-man ship called the Jane G Mather. This vessel is 500 miles or so east of Cape Saint Roque in Brazil when the 2nd Mate – Mr Samuels – catches sight of a schooner barely a mile off.

The schooner has full sails on but keeps listing to and fro almost as if its crew were novices or drunk. After two hours the Captain – Bill Simmons – takes an interest in the careering ship in the distance since it is clearly a potential threat to sea traffic.

Captain Simmons has Mr Samuels round up an away team consisting of Samuels himself and four other men. They are to board the errant vessel and advise the captain to get his crew and his ship under better control. Soon, Samuels and his four men pull alongside the schooner and are shocked to see nothing but large monkeys – baboons, Samuels guesses – aboard the ship.

The 2nd Mate of the Mather is unnerved at the sight and by how calmly the baboons watch him and the rest of the away team board the ship. The primates make no sound and do not jump around or otherwise behave like real monkeys, if you know what I mean and I think you do. Continue reading →

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