Serious Fun

Serious Fun returns with the first of three live episodes recorded in front of a live audience at the Brown County Library Pop Con on October 1, 2022!

First, Bryan sits down with acclaimed, award-winning author Lori M. Lee to discuss her work on books like Pahua and the Soul Stealer, as well as representation in fantasy and science fiction, breaking into the industry, the responsibility that comes with adding Hmong culture to the genre, and more! We also talk a lot more about Kingdom Hearts than I think anyone expected.

Check out Lori on Twitter at https://twitter.com/lorimlee, and get your copy of Pahua and the Soul Stealer, Forest of Souls, Broken Web, and the Gates of Thread and Stone series wherever books are sold!

This week, Serious Fun brings you what you've been craving - academic lectures! Recorded on April 18th, 2022 as part of the Climate Change Teach-In at UWGB, Bryan talks about the movie "Don't Look Up" and the broader question of pop culture metaphors for scientific and social issues. How do metaphors work? Is Don't Look Up a successful one? Are there better ones? How should pop culture talk about climate change? All this and more is yours should you download the new episode of Serious Fun!

If you were waiting for a new episode of Serious Fun, well...your wait is over. Also, maybe get some other things going on in your life? I mean, do what you will, just seems weird that you await this podcast with bated breath.

That said, this is a real good episode! A great one, I daresay! The illustrious writer and author David L. Craddock joins us to talk about his latest tome, "Long Live Mortal Kombat: Round 1". Bryan and David talk about the history and legacy of Mortal Kombat, how public opinion has changed, the process of writing a decades-spanning book, the arcade scene in Bulgaria, and so, so much more in this jam-packed, wide-ranging episode. If you've ever spent your lunch period quickly scrawling down input codes for Fatalities, this episode is for you.

SHOW NOTES:

Check out the Kickstarter page for "Long Live Mortal Kombat" here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/davidlcraddock/long-live-mortal-kombat-the-definitive-history-of-mk

Music:

Dan Forden - "In the Beginning" (Mortal Kombat 1 Arcade Soundtrack)

The Immortals - "Techno Syndrome"

Benjamin Wallfisch - "Techno Syndrome (2021)"

It's another Serious Fun! This week, Bryan dons his brightly-colored spandex and joins forces with artist Joe Hunter and returning guest writer Lan Pitts to talk about their series "Beast Heart Strikers" and its exciting new announcement, as well as the sentai genre and how their cultural influences have shaped the work.

We also talk about a lot of other stuff, like He-Man and pro wrestling. Also Ray Romano drops by a couple times. It's a whole thing. Go ahead and listen, if you want.

SHOW NOTES:

Check out Beast Heart Strikers here:

https://www.comixology.com/BEAST-HEART-Strikers-Vol-1-Volume-1/comics-series/141187?ref=c2VhcmNoL2luZGV4L2Rlc2t0b3Avc2xpZGVyTGlzdC90b3BSZXN1bHRzU2xpZGVy

For more information on Sentai, Tokusatsu, etc.:

- Watch Episode 1 of Marvel's 616 on Disney+ - "Japanese Spider-Man"

- Netflix - "The Toys That Made Us" - Power Rangers and He-Man episodes

MercuryFalcon's YouTube channel and its Tokusatsu documentary:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIeWDKo2xp8rQ8rXwbqH0bg

Vintage Henshin YouTube Channel:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCZjy_fV84o2gOCo9nx6QzJw

Once again, Serious Fun goes into the breach and picks apart the latest offering from the Marvel monoculture – SHANG-CHI AND THE LEGEND OF THE TEN RINGS. This time, however, we have a very special guest – academic professional, martial arts and comic movie aficionado, and beloved spouse Pang Yang! Bryan and Pang talk about her experiences growing up in a media environment where she didn’t see herself represented, where Shang-Chi fits into the MCU pantheon, as well as how the character represents an homage to classic martial arts cinema and marks a new stage in high-profile representation, as well as how it delves into lived experiences and topics blockbuster films seldom address.

(Also we got the name of the hidden village wrong, it’s Ta Lo.)

Show Notes:

Women’s Media Center & BBC – SuperPowering Girls Study:

https://www.womensmediacenter.com/reports/bbca-wmc-superpowering-girls

GQ Interview – Tony Leung

https://www.gq.com/story/tony-leung-tries-his-hand-at-hollywood

Vox – Why Shang-Chi’s success matters – and why it shouldn’t

https://www.vox.com/22638536/shang-chi-review-representation-simu-liu-awkwafina

Music Credits:

“Run It” – DJ Snake (feat. Rick Ross & Rich Brian) – Shang-Chi: The Album

Earlier this year, the Oshkosh Public Museum played host to “The Nostalgia Awakens”, a traveling exhibit that holds the distinction of being the largest public display of the original Star Wars action figures and toys ever in Wisconsin. Such a momentous occasion merits an equally momentous podcast – one that cannot be contained in a single show alone! So this week, Serious Fun crosses over with fellow Phoenix Studios network shows Canonball and Voyageur to talk about the Star Wars franchise and its merchandise, but also the broader concept of nostalgia, memory, and why we long for the characters and fun of our youth. It’s a fun, sassy conversation about a topic near and dear to many of our hearts, so go on and listen already!

Show notes:

The Nostalgia Awakens homepage (with photos, comments from the curator, and more):

https://www.starwarsexhibit.org/

Voyageur Podcast:

https://www.uwgb.edu/podcasts/shows/voyageur/

Canonball Podcast:

https://soundcloud.com/canonballpodcast

It's a new fall season of Serious Fun! This week, Bryan sits down with David and Nadia Oxford, retro gaming power couple and co-authors of the new book “Mega Man X: Maverick Hunter’s Field Guide”. In this wide-ranging conversation, the trio discusses how video game fandom has changed since the early days of fansites and message boards, how the Mega Man series has evolved into new aesthetics and formats, and the work that goes into making a field guide for a fictional universe. We’ll also answer listener questions and come up with a million-seller idea for the next Mega Man game. Come for the discussion of the book, stay for a bunch of old nerds talking about the good ol’ days.

Show Notes:

This is the book with Bryan’s Mega Man chapter in it:

https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442278127/100-Greatest-Video-Game-Characters

Nadia’s “Axe of the Blood God” Patreon:

https://www.patreon.com/bloodgodpod

Poison Mushroom Online:

http://www.poisonmushroom.org/

The “Summer Carnival” Chill Penguin skin:

https://www.rockman-corner.com/2020/07/rockman-x-dives-summer-carnival-starts.html

Credits:

Mega Man X “Title Theme” – Setsuo Yamamoto

Mega Man X7 “Tornado Tonion Voices” – Jack Merluzzi

Serious Fun returns yet again with another group dissection session for a Marvel Disney+ streaming show! This time we're breaking down "Falcon and The Winter Soldier" with Serious Fun production assistant Emily Fecteau and, back by popular demand, it's UWGB History professor and Captain America superfan Dr. Clif Ganyard! Join us as we try to put the series into proper historical and canonical context, explore its intriguing character developments, and challenge whether it is equipped to handle its weighty themes of nationalism, legacy, and racial injustice, all while speculating on what it all means and where it's going. Bryan also marks out for the Dora Milaje, as we all should. Download it now!

SHOW NOTES:

We are indebted to some of the excellent writing on this show, particularly that of Charles Pulliam-Moore and Richard L. Newby.

Read a great piece on the show from Pulliam-Moore here: https://io9.gizmodo.com/the-falcon-and-the-winter-soldiers-head-writer-tries-to-1846772211

And another, excellent take from Newby here: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/falcon-and-the-winter-soldier-finales-moment-of-revolution

A quick synopsis of the excellent "Truth: Red, White, and Black" can be found here: https://www.comicsbeat.com/the-marvel-rundown-truth-red-white-and-black/

The interview we refer to at the beginning can be found here: https://io9.gizmodo.com/the-falcon-and-the-winter-soldiers-director-breaks-down-1846785006

Lordy lordy, Serious Fun is 40...episodes in!

So there's a little TV show called WandaVision. You might have heard of it. It's the talk of the town. This week's Serious Fun adds on to that talk as Bryan welcomes two special guests on to talk about the first proper Marvel Studios streaming TV show - the Director of Oregon State's General Psychology program and former UWGB faculty Regan Gurung as well as UWGB undergrad and Serious Fun research and production assistant Emily Fecteau. The trio discuss the psychology of the series and how we consume streaming media, how its use of old sitcoms as a framing device is more clever than you might think, and whether grief or love is the driving force beyond the strange events in WestView, NJ. And for the record: there are spoilers aplenty, so make sure you're caught up first!

MUSIC CREDITS:

"Agatha All Along" - Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez

We are living in a golden age for globalized pop culture – we have access to television, film, music, video games, books and comics from all over the world on a scale never before seen. Have you ever thought about what it takes to bring pop culture from one culture to another, though? Scott Strichart has – and as the Senior Localization Producer for the Yakuza series at Sega, he has had a hand in bringing some of the most daunting, complex, and beloved Japanese video games to Western audiences. In this episode, Bryan talks with Scott about the challenges and joys of localizing video games, from juggling unique spoken dialects to maintaining the cultural integrity of the original script to casting English voice actors to managing puns and humor. It’s a must-listen for Yakuza fans, video game fans, or anyone interested in managing creative works across cultures. And Bryan only fanboys out…a lot. Give it a listen!

SHOW NOTES:

This is the Twitter thread about the Kansai dialect we talked about:

https://twitter.com/TriggerRedd/status/1355945513749676036

(Follow Scott at http://www.twitter.com/TriggerRedd/ too!)

This is the editorial Bryan wrote for the CAHSS blog about Yakuza:

https://cahsseffect.org/randomencounter/random-encounter-2-in-which-you-are-introduced-to-a-dragon/