How NPCs Become Characters That Know YOU
Jun 29, 2026
The Top 10 Best Marvel Super Heroes Cards
Jun 24, 2026
Sci-Fi IRL: The Holodeck Is Getting Smarter
Jun 22, 2026
It Came From The Archives! “StuGo: An Absurd Cartoon”
Jun 17, 2026
Iron Lung: Almost A Great Cosmic Horror Film
Jun 10, 2026
Widow’s Bay: Flawed Horror Comedy
Jun 3, 2026
Project Hail Mary: You Owe Yourself To See It
May 27, 2026
It Came From The Archives! “Pluribus: The Best Sci-Fi Concept In Years”
May 20, 2026
The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes Is Important
May 13, 2026
Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen Is Not Lying
May 6, 2026
Star Wars: Maul – Shadow Lord Is Good Star Wars
Apr 29, 2026
It Came From The Archives! “Wolf King Is One Of The Worst Fantasy Cartoons”
Apr 22, 2026
Top 10 Best Secrets of Strixhaven Cards
Apr 15, 2026
Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice: Snark And Violence
Apr 8, 2026
Wicked: For Good Is Bad
Apr 1, 2026
For most of gaming history, non-player characters have had a job to do. They give you quests. They sell you gear. They deliver important lines of dialogue. But even the best-written NPCs usually operate inside boundaries we can feel.
Initially, while making this list for Marvel Super Heroes, I was worried. The monocolored cards were rough pickings for top ten options. Lots of characters I like, but all but a few cards were unimpressive for Standard play. When I went over it all, I only had half a list. But with the multicolored cards, the list rounded itself out easily.
For decades, science fiction promised us the Holodeck: a place where worlds felt real, characters felt alive, and every choice mattered. The first real steps toward that vision did not come from virtual reality headsets. They came from video games.
I don’t have that much to say about StuGo. Some cartoons are made with an adult audience as possible viewers, weaving in more intense plots for fandoms to form. You know them by name, if not by experience. Avatar: The Last Airbender. The Owl House. Gravity Falls. This show is not that, at least not within the first three episodes.
I watched Iron Lung at an odd time. Within the last few months, I’ve seen both Project Hail Mary and Ash, and in a way Iron Lung could be described as a combination of both those movies, taking the cosmic horror from one, and the lone person trying to help investigate an apocalyptic problem from the other.
Widow’s Bay is a horror sitcom. I watched the first three episodes, and I was struck by how it’s a perfect encapsulation of both genres. Each episode starts with a sitcom plotline and then, by the end, has become a horror scenario. And the most impressive part is that it’s good at being both. I laughed often and was spooked out.
Project Hail Mary is a technical wonder. The movie will stick in the mind of its viewers (me included) because of its emotional buddy-duo adventure section, but it cannot be understated how impressive this movie is from both a movie-making technical level (meaning sets and camera work) and from a writing perspective.
Pluribus is a fascinating science fiction show with one of the most intriguing premises I’ve seen in years. For those that love the genre’s propensity for posing interesting, mind-expanding questions, this is it.
The Hunger Games trilogy is important to me. I read the series right before the craze hit. To this day, it may be the first fandom I was on the ground floor for. I recall seeing every movie quickly after they came out.
Let it be known that any and all praise I have for Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen is negated if it turns out that the main couple was dead all along.
Star Wars: Maul – Shadow Lord is so good it’s actually a little difficult to review. I can recall when the first Clone Wars animated series came out, and to see the constant evolution since then has been stunning. Even the much more recent Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld cannot match Maul’s excellence.
I’ll admit—though it’s not exactly a secret—that I sometimes like doing negative reviews. I don’t typically seek out movies/shows because I think they’ll be bad, but I’m not unhappy when it happens.
