The worst The Walking Dead season yet

So, the first half of The Walking Dead's sixth season is over, and the show is going into hiatus. I'm feeling pretty comfortable saying that this was the worst season yet, and this is not a particularily high bar to crawl under, mind you. When the whole show grind to a halt in season 2 because of all the talking, talking, talking, they could at least point to budgetary problems as the source. But that is no excuse now, and the levels of stupid that this show has reached are incredible. Not even that, it has committed the worst sin of a show of its calibre: it's simply boring. 

A Flight of Links

- 11 episodes of various series that work as standalones
- Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos diss each other
- Anita Sarkeesian reviews The Martian
- Ok, McShane is playing Septon Meribald and the Hound is alive
- Fargo more violent than Walking Dead
- Mockingjay 2 review
- Wonder Woman poster
- Good Catelyn meta
- Why Euron is Bloodraven's pupil
- Who are the "false friends" of the Pink Letter
- More about the awesomness of ADWD
- Why should Euron wake the Old Ones? 
- Iron Fist should be Asian
- Why Halo 5 is nonsenical
- How nostalgia is hurting video games
- Wertzone reviews Phantom Menace
- And Attack of the Clones
- And Revenge of the Sith
- Good meta about Jon's endgame 
- Jon VII
- Meta about a succesful North secession
- This brillant thought never crossed my mind. 
- Why did Citadel and Faith never come to blows? 
- Stannis' ideology of leadership
- The problem with Fallout 4's character being voiced

Supreme Court of Westeros, ruling 105

Thursday is court day! 

Welcome to the Supreme Court of Westeros! Every week, three pressing questions from the community will be answered by the esteemed judges Stefan (from your very own Nerdstream Era) and Amin (from A Podcast of Ice and Fire). The rules are simple: we take three questions, and one of us writes a measured analysis. The other one writes a shorter opinion, either concurring or dissenting. The catch is that every week a third judge from the fandom will join us and also write a dissenting or concurring opinion. So if you think you're up to the task - write us an email to stefan_sasse@gmx.de, leave a comment in the post, ask in the APOIAF-forum or contact Amin at his tumblr. Discussion is by no means limited to the court itself, though - feel free to discuss our rulings in the commentary section and ask your own questions through the channels above.

One word on spoilers: we assume that you read all the books, including the Hedge Knight short stories, and watched the current TV episodes. We don't include the spoiler chapters from various sources in the discussion, with the notable exception of Theon I, which was supposed to be in "A Dance with Dragons" anyway.

Casting Call: If you want to be a judge, please email us! 

Please note that our new ebook is up and available on Amazon, collecting the first 60 rulings and the best comments in one place. It's only 5,99$, so what are you waiting for? 

And now, up to ruling 105! Our guest judge this week is Anders Frost Bertelsen. He first read the books shortly after the publication of AFFC and became an instant superfan. While he isn't particularly active on forums, he does keep up with most major fan theories and has spent countless hours wondering about Jeyne Westerling's hips and the motivations of Myles Toyne. In real life he lives in Copenhagen, Denmark and designs educational board games. He is also fond of american football, nordic freeform roleplaying and all kinds of strategy games.

A Flight of Links

- Review of the new Kim Stanley Robinson novel, Aurora
- And the author about the science behind it 
- The storytelling problem of the Fallout 4 intro 
- Bastard Executioner cancelled
- George Lucas about Star Wars
- This explains quite a lot about The Battle of the Five Armies. A must watch. 
- Westeros.org reviews The Ice Dragon
-  Midnight Special sure sounds good
- A George Miller tribute. Worth the watch for sure. 
- Oldboy: A Greek Tragedy

Supreme Court of Westeros, ruling 104

Thursday is court day! 

Welcome to the Supreme Court of Westeros! Every week, three pressing questions from the community will be answered by the esteemed judges Stefan (from your very own Nerdstream Era) and Amin (from A Podcast of Ice and Fire). The rules are simple: we take three questions, and one of us writes a measured analysis. The other one writes a shorter opinion, either concurring or dissenting. The catch is that every week a third judge from the fandom will join us and also write a dissenting or concurring opinion. So if you think you're up to the task - write us an email to stefan_sasse@gmx.de, leave a comment in the post, ask in the APOIAF-forum or contact Amin at his tumblr. Discussion is by no means limited to the court itself, though - feel free to discuss our rulings in the commentary section and ask your own questions through the channels above.

One word on spoilers: we assume that you read all the books, including the Hedge Knight short stories, and watched the current TV episodes. We don't include the spoiler chapters from various sources in the discussion, with the notable exception of Theon I, which was supposed to be in "A Dance with Dragons" anyway.

Casting Call: If you want to be a judge, please email us! 

Please note that our new ebook is up and available on Amazon, collecting the first 60 rulings and the best comments in one place. It's only 5,99$, so what are you waiting for? 

And now, up to ruling 104! Our guest judge this week is Our guest judge this week is Anton Jumelet, a philosophy student from the Netherlands, who previously judged on rulings 65 and 81 of this court.

A Flight of Links

- Rise of the Tomb Raider review
- A brief history of Blizzard's cancelled games
- Blizzard cancelled Titan
- The Peanuts review
- More ADWD praise
- Mace and Stannis
- Have you played Unreal? Actually, yes.
- Why did Activision spend 6 billion for Candy Crush? Fuck if I know.
- Assassin's Creed is running on fumes. But I liked Brotherhood and Revelation as well.
- Rise of the Tomb Raider review
- Yahtzee reviews Halo 5
- How can somebody miss the point so wide?
- System Shock 2 remake in the works 
- Why the new Mystery Sciene Theater 3000 is too good to be true
- This list REALLY doesn't sound good for Fallout 4 in my opinion
- Bran and Bloodraven
- Martin's writing flaws
- Legacy of the Void multiplayer and singleplayer reviews
-

Star Wars and me

One of the questions I get asked the most when talking about pop culture is: "Are you a Star Wars fan?" It's often said in this way that suggests that everybody expects you to answer in the affirmative, because Star Wars is still the one franchise that everybody knows and accepts somehow over which you can be a geek or fan. They're usually surprised when I answer "No, not really." I'm not a fan. That doesn't mean that I hate or dislike the franchise. I watch the original trilogy as everyone does, I'm just not over-excited about it. Of course, it hadn't always be thus. 

The first Supreme Court of Westeros ebook is available!

Rejoice, everyone! With proven editor Marc Kleinhenz from Blue Buddha Press on board, Amin Javadi and Stefan Sasse finally published the long-anticipated ebook with a collection of the first 60 rulings of the Supreme Court of Westeros! Expect a book packed full with deliberations about theories, critical analysis and great opinionating about the best fantasy series that was ever written. 

The Supreme Court of Westeros, now running for close to two years, presents one ruling per week, taking on three questions from the fandom. Amin Javadi from the Podcast of Ice and Fire and Stefan Sasse from The Nerdstream Era, Tower of the Hand and the Boiled Leather Audio Hour serve as recurring judges, alternating in writing a main opinion or commenting on it, with a third judge commenting on the main opinion drawn from the fandom. Some judges are known participants in discussions on sites as widespread as Reddit, Tower of the Hand, Boiled Leather, westeros.org or the POIAF-forums, while others are distinguished writers or only silent readers - in the court, we are all alike. 

More than simply collecting all the rulings, we also made a selection of the best and most insightful comments that the rulings gathered. The discussions about the rulings are what keeps us out of the ivory tower and deep in the weeds. This allows you to have a look at the ongoing discussion of these topics. 

Without further ado, let's present to you our official anouncment text and guide you over to Amazon: (German Amazon)

"Who do you think will win the Battles of Meereen and Winterfell, and why?"
"Is Ser Meryn Trant part of Varys’s plan? He always seems to be on guard when something goes wrong or Varys’s plans spring into action."
"Is A Song of Ice and Fire ultimately an analogy to climate change?"
"Who would win in a fight between Bronn and the Hound?"
"Does Varys know that Sansa is in the Vale? He keeps a close eye on Littlefinger and knew of his desire for Sansa."
These are just a sampling of the 180 questions that the justices of the Supreme Court of Westeros convene to address and definitively answer. Using their intimate expertise of both A Song of Ice and Fire, specifically, and George R.R. Martin, generally, from their years of writing, studying, reporting on, and podcasting about the phenomenon that is Game of Thrones and its source books, they are able to provide an analysis that is always penetrating and occasionally irreverent.
Who, exactly, are the judges? Amin Javadi is a co-founder and -host of A Podcast of Ice and Fire, the longest-running (and award-winning) podcast devoted to all things Ice and Fire. Stefan Sasse is an essayist at the venerable Tower of the Hand, co-host of the Boiled Leather Audio Hour, and the purveyor of The Nerdstream Era, where the Supreme Court of Westeros goes into session every week. Both are contributors to the two Tower of the Hand ebook anthologies, A Flight of Sorrows and A Hymn for Spring, providing some of the strongest sections of each.
Joining them are a cavalcade of guest judges, ranging from such big-name celebrities in the Song of Ice and Fire fandom as Elio Garcia and
Linda Antonsson (authors of The World of Ice and Fire alongside George Martin himself) to average readers and fans from the various forums and communities from around the Westeros web.
Looking to reconsider your theories of what is happening in Martin's sprawling story or, even, to stumble across your new favorite crack-pot theory? Look no further – The Supreme Court of Westeros will be the perfect companion in your wait for the next novel, short story, or television season.

Supreme Court of Westeros, ruling 103

Thursday is court day! 

Welcome to the Supreme Court of Westeros! Every week, three pressing questions from the community will be answered by the esteemed judges Stefan (from your very own Nerdstream Era) and Amin (from A Podcast of Ice and Fire). The rules are simple: we take three questions, and one of us writes a measured analysis. The other one writes a shorter opinion, either concurring or dissenting. The catch is that every week a third judge from the fandom will join us and also write a dissenting or concurring opinion. So if you think you're up to the task - write us an email to stefan_sasse@gmx.de, leave a comment in the post, ask in the APOIAF-forum or contact Amin at his tumblr. Discussion is by no means limited to the court itself, though - feel free to discuss our rulings in the commentary section and ask your own questions through the channels above.

One word on spoilers: we assume that you read all the books, including the Hedge Knight short stories, and watched the current TV episodes. We don't include the spoiler chapters from various sources in the discussion, with the notable exception of Theon I, which was supposed to be in "A Dance with Dragons" anyway.

Casting Call: If you want to be a judge, please email us! 

Please note that our new ebook is up and available on Amazon, collecting the first 60 rulings and the best comments in one place. It's only 5,99$, so what are you waiting for? 

And now, up to ruling 102! Our guest judge this week is Keelah Rose Calloway, a graduate of Cornell University, currently living and working in Poland. She has been a fan of A Song of Ice and Fire since before the TV show debuted, thank you very much. She enjoys the series almost as much as she enjoys being smug.

A Flight of Links

- Theon IV
- Tyrion's arc in ADWD part 3
- Aegon's endgame
- Rebel game preview
- BattleTech preview
- Could the new Ghostbusters movie be too funny? 
- OK, consider me pretty interested in the WarCraft movie. 
- James Bond facts
- New Hateful Eight trailer
- New Star Wars trailer
- How to become an astronaut according to movies
- Spectre review
- StarCraft: The Past, Present and Future
- Star Trek series announced
- Blizzard to remake its old games
-Good meta about Dany as a mass murderer
- Crusader Kings 2 ASOIAF mod goes 1.0
- This seems interesting
- Overwatch Beta thoughts
- WoW Legion trailer
- Wertzone about the WarCraft trailer
- Yahtzee reviews AC Syndicate

Supreme Court of Westeros, ruling 102

Thursday is court day! 

Welcome to the Supreme Court of Westeros! Every week, three pressing questions from the community will be answered by the esteemed judges Stefan (from your very own Nerdstream Era) and Amin (from A Podcast of Ice and Fire). The rules are simple: we take three questions, and one of us writes a measured analysis. The other one writes a shorter opinion, either concurring or dissenting. The catch is that every week a third judge from the fandom will join us and also write a dissenting or concurring opinion. So if you think you're up to the task - write us an email to stefan_sasse@gmx.de, leave a comment in the post, ask in the APOIAF-forum or contact Amin at his tumblr. Discussion is by no means limited to the court itself, though - feel free to discuss our rulings in the commentary section and ask your own questions through the channels above.

One word on spoilers: we assume that you read all the books, including the Hedge Knight short stories, and watched the current TV episodes. We don't include the spoiler chapters from various sources in the discussion, with the notable exception of Theon I, which was supposed to be in "A Dance with Dragons" anyway.

Casting Call: If you want to be a judge, please email us!

And now, up to ruling 102! Our guest judge this week is Andrew Geertsen, from Santa Cruz, CA. He began reading ASOIAF since a few years before the start of the HBO series, looking for the best fantasy series he could get his hands on. Since then, he's gone through the first three books six times, the fourth and fifth once separately, and twice using Boiled Leather's "new-reader" Feastdance order, as well as once through TWOIAF. You can contact him through his portfolio at ageertsen.daportfolio.com or check out his ASOIAF blog at notesoficeandfire.blogspot.com.

A Flight of Links

- One Chance is an incredible free indie game. You can play it in about ten minutes and it will kill you with its emotional impact. Take the time, it's in browser, no worries. 
- Dumb reason for Steve Jobs to win an oscar
- TIE fighter is unlogical. Yeah, you know what, who cares?
-  Wertzine reviews The Wire season 2
- And season 3
- And The Martian
- More Batman v Superman rumors 
- Tyrion Defense 2
- Daenerys IV
- What should Dany have done?
- GOT season 6 spoilers
- Harassment creates more harassment
- Good points about the Ironborn
- SOMA is worth playing
- SOMA review by Yahtzee
- Undertale is well written
- What is Survival Horror in games?
- Horror games are not scary
- Super Mario Apocalypse will never come
- Paradox bought White Wolf, huh?
- Steve Jobs and the triumph of the worklife 
- On the longevity of a succesful King in the North
-  Jeyne Westerling, part 1

Supreme Court of Westeros, ruling 101

Thursday is court day! 

Welcome to the Supreme Court of Westeros! Every week, three pressing questions from the community will be answered by the esteemed judges Stefan (from your very own Nerdstream Era) and Amin (from A Podcast of Ice and Fire). The rules are simple: we take three questions, and one of us writes a measured analysis. The other one writes a shorter opinion, either concurring or dissenting. The catch is that every week a third judge from the fandom will join us and also write a dissenting or concurring opinion. So if you think you're up to the task - write us an email to stefan_sasse@gmx.de, leave a comment in the post, ask in the APOIAF-forum or contact Amin at his tumblr. Discussion is by no means limited to the court itself, though - feel free to discuss our rulings in the commentary section and ask your own questions through the channels above.

One word on spoilers: we assume that you read all the books, including the Hedge Knight short stories, and watched the current TV episodes. We don't include the spoiler chapters from various sources in the discussion, with the notable exception of Theon I, which was supposed to be in "A Dance with Dragons" anyway.

Casting Call: If you want to be a judge, please email us!

And now, up to ruling 101! Our guest judge this week is is Johnny from Philadelphia. He began reading the series after the 1st season of Game of Thrones and began listening to BLAH and APOIAF shortly thereafter. He is on the forums at APOIAF as The Smiling Knight. This is his third time as a member of the Supreme Court of Westeros.

Supreme Court of Westeros, ruling 100

And it is there! For 100 rulings, Amin and I have delivered verdicts on questions from the fandom, aided by alternating guest judges. To mark out 100th anniversary, we have looked way back to our humble beginnings, when this little endevour was still "Stefan's Theory Hour" and I invited Amin, Steven Attewell and Sean T. Collins to maek its 50th anniversary with a podcast about the topic. So, we're doing that again - Sean T. Collins, Amin and I dissect questions that have been collected exclusively for the 100th ruling, and we do so in a massive podcast. You find it here. 

Correction: Contrary to what was stated in the episode, Steven Attewell was not part of the last anniversary. Sorry for the mixup.

Boiled Leather Audio Hour #42

Fire and Blood: The Third Reich

We’re traveling from Westeros to Nazi Germany in this unusual—and, to us, urgent—episode of the Boiled Leather Audio Hour. Why are we venturing so far afield from our usual topics of discussion and debate? Because we’ve always believed that A Song of Ice and Fire, like life itself, is best viewed through an unsparing ethical and historical lens. Lately, however, that lens has been clouded. In recent weeks, numerous right-wing politicians—most notably Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson and his supporters in the United States—have distorted and repurposed the rise of Adolf Hitler and the roots of the Holocaust to suit their preexisting positions. Astonishingly, in the day since this podcast was recorded, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu followed suit. We believe this to be an act of tremendous disrespect for the dead, one that also does a grave disservice to the living. Given our personal and professional interests in this pivotal epoch in history, which have shaped our interaction with ASoIaF in ways large and small, we decided to explore the era’s real lessons as best we could.

What role did privately held weaponry and paramilitary organizations actually play both in the Nazi Party’s ascent to power and the resistance against it? How should we view Europe’s failure to act in the face of Hitler’s belligerence, and Germany’s failure to capitulate in the face of certain defeat? What parallels can be drawn between the forces that fueled the war Hitler ignited and those at play in Westeros and Essos? What makes World War II different enough from other conflicts for the likes of Vietnam-era conscientious objector George R.R. Martin to say it was worth fighting? Is there such a thing as a “good war” at all? In this experiment of an episode, we try to answer those questions.

Two notes before we proceed:

1) We are deeply indebted to the work of the historians Ian Kershaw and Richard J. Evans, particularly Kershaw’s two-volume Hitler biography and Evans’s Third Reich trilogy. 

2) On a much lighter note, this episode (hopefully—with iTunes, god only knows) marks the debut of our brand new logo, created by Sean’s partner, Julia Gfrörer. We are in her debt.

Download Episode 42

Additional links:

Mirror.

The work of Ian Kershaw.

The work of Richard J. Evans.

All Leather Must Be Boiled’s Ian Kershaw tag.

Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History series on the Eastern Front.

Previous episodes.

Podcast RSS feed.

iTunes page.

Sean’s blog.

Stefan’s blog.

A Flight of Links

- Favorite ASOIAF chapters
- Damphair's rebellion
- Lovely passage
- Who will die in TWOW
- Sansa meta
- What really killed the dinosaurs?  
- The White Walkers aren't good
- Pulp Fiction in Breaking Bad 
- The collaborative brillance of The Martian 
- Tarantino likes his own movies 
- Steam machine review of sorts
- Euron's wizard eye
- Wyman Manderly's imminent death
- Arya XI

Supreme Court of Westeros, ruling 99

Thursday is court day! 

Welcome to the Supreme Court of Westeros! Every week, three pressing questions from the community will be answered by the esteemed judges Stefan (from your very own Nerdstream Era) and Amin (from A Podcast of Ice and Fire). The rules are simple: we take three questions, and one of us writes a measured analysis. The other one writes a shorter opinion, either concurring or dissenting. The catch is that every week a third judge from the fandom will join us and also write a dissenting or concurring opinion. So if you think you're up to the task - write us an email to stefan_sasse@gmx.de, leave a comment in the post, ask in the APOIAF-forum or contact Amin at his tumblr. Discussion is by no means limited to the court itself, though - feel free to discuss our rulings in the commentary section and ask your own questions through the channels above.

One word on spoilers: we assume that you read all the books, including the Hedge Knight short stories, and watched the current TV episodes. We don't include the spoiler chapters from various sources in the discussion, with the notable exception of Theon I, which was supposed to be in "A Dance with Dragons" anyway.

Casting Call: If you want to be a judge, please email us!

And now, up to ruling 98! Our guest judge this week is Talha Naushad, a professional researcher working in the middle east. When he is not working, he is dabbling his wits in contemporary history and politics and immersing himself in all things concerning A Song of Ice and Fire. He is a member of the community at JonSnow123 at Tower of the Hand and usually lurks around various forums, blogs & podcasts engrossing himself in the theories and analysis of the ASOIAF material and show.

A Flight of Links

- Alan Sepinwall about Fear the Walking Dead season 1
- And Sean T. Collins
- In what can only become a major artistic debacle, German trash-channel RTL wants to produce a ten-hour-miniseries about Hitler's life, "showing the fascist dictator form a radical new angle". Oh. My. God. (German article)
- Trailer for the Good Dinosaur
- Ant Man 2 announced
- How Jon and Dany connect
- Summerhall
- Westeros development plan
- Bran VI
- Catelyn VI 
-A look back at System Shock
- FarCry Primal sounds interesting
- This looks good
- In case you didn't know
- Hail Caesar trailer 
- DAMN IT MAKES SENSE

Supreme Court of Westeros, ruling 98

Thursday is court day! 

Welcome to the Supreme Court of Westeros! Every week, three pressing questions from the community will be answered by the esteemed judges Stefan (from your very own Nerdstream Era) and Amin (from A Podcast of Ice and Fire). The rules are simple: we take three questions, and one of us writes a measured analysis. The other one writes a shorter opinion, either concurring or dissenting. The catch is that every week a third judge from the fandom will join us and also write a dissenting or concurring opinion. So if you think you're up to the task - write us an email to stefan_sasse@gmx.de, leave a comment in the post, ask in the APOIAF-forum or contact Amin at his tumblr. Discussion is by no means limited to the court itself, though - feel free to discuss our rulings in the commentary section and ask your own questions through the channels above.

One word on spoilers: we assume that you read all the books, including the Hedge Knight short stories, and watched the current TV episodes. We don't include the spoiler chapters from various sources in the discussion, with the notable exception of Theon I, which was supposed to be in "A Dance with Dragons" anyway.

Casting Call: If you want to be a judge, please email us!

And now, up to ruling 98! Our guest judge this week is Rick Davids, a student of Linguistics in a German city that doesn't exist (like an uncool R'hlyeh). In his spare time he writes, reads and procrastinates. He has been a fan of ASOIAF since the early 2000's and blames GRRM for ruining his appetite for fantasy with his unmatched masterpiece.

A Flight of Links

- Sean T. Collins rips into yet another episode of Fear the Walking Dead
- Yathzee reviews Until Dawn
- The Martian reviw
- Nintento is the bad guy here
- Why do games need to restart when you change graphic settings? 
- Mad Max is generic
- Pacific Rim II indefinitely on hold
- Gears of War got a superflous HD remake
- An annotated history of boss fight battles
- Why you shouldn't root for Littlefinger
- Favorite/least favorite POV
- Good catch about Tyrion
- Really good stuff about Feastdance
- Meta about the battle at the Green Fork
- Damon Lindelof about the pressures of producing television
- Daeron II analysis