Ah yes, the merry month of May. We’re nearly halfway through 2021 and school is wrapping up, Cons are starting to pop up again, and E3 is just around the bend. Despite the delayed nature of the past year, there have been more than a few exciting announcements and developments in the past month. Some of them could have definitely been predicted—others couldn’t have been planned even by their creators.
We’ve picked just a few of these awesome things from May and offered up some of our favorites below:
1. Love, Death & Robots Returned
We still remember watching the first season of LD+R back when it first aired in 2019. It came out of nowhere and wow'd folks everywhere with stunning animation, dark storylines, and compelling acting. Season 2 feels like it came and went just as quickly as the former, except with less than half as many episodes.
Season 2 brings that same unique stylish mixture of animation styles that it brought with it’s freshman entry, but the sophomore slump may have sunk in with some of the reviewers. All in all, Season 2 only averaged around a 6/10 for IMDB viewers, compared to the higher average of 7.5/10 in the first season.
On the outside looking in, this might appear to be a reason to avoid the second season, but that couldn’t be less true. Season 2 of Love, Death & Robots is still bringing it with the production and storytelling—it’s just a smaller package. All in all, the amount of diamonds in the pack are the same proportionally and each episode brings something with it that some will enjoy more than others. There are still some that are true masterpieces and others that are so bizarre they will take multiple viewings. Even the worst episodes in the pack are still absolutely breathtaking and worth the watch.
Our only hope is that Season 3 will be closer than two years away—perhaps the lighter load of episodes is a good sign that more is on the horizon.
2. Amazon Buys MGM
In a move that no one saw coming, Jeff Bezos took a quick reprieve from building his Superyacht™ in order to buy up MGM and the whole James Bond franchise all at once. It was a drop in the bucket for the biggest kid on the playground Amazon, but still took the market by surprise for a grand total of $8.45 billion. Most speculate the company is worth considerably less, even with it’s hallmark collection of classic films and spy thrillers.
With the acquisition seeming to provide Amazon with 4,000 films and 17,000 hours of television, it will be an interesting thing to see how this berth of media is used in the coming years. If Daddy WarBezos is able to do things right, maybe we’ll see him fully embody his look and actually become the James Bond villain that his net worth and shining dome makes him out to be in the media.
Did Jeff ask his Board for permission here? That’s a debatable one, but here’s to hoping we finally get to see Idris Elba don the persona and bring us a performance that will leave us ‘shaken, not stirred.’
3. 'Think Mark' Invincible Meme Blew Up
In more news that no one was expecting, the world was graced with a new super-meme that has absolutely taken off in nearly every demographic.
In the classic scene from the finale of Invincible (which we did a devotional on btw), super-dad Nolan Grayson is beating his son to a pulp trying to get him to understand the ways of their people. After plummeting him from the heavens into a crater, Nolan beckons for his son, Mark, to “think” and use his brain to see what is so obvious to him.
The scene is so shocking that meme-r’s everywhere just couldn’t help but utilize the format to make hilarious jokes from other franchises. From Obi-Wan to The Room, this meme has taken on a life of its own. To be frank, we’re totally here for it.
4. RE Village Finally Let Us Meet Tall Vampire Woman
Yet another thing that no one saw coming, especially not the fine folks at Capcom, was the vampiress Lady Dimitrescu being such a… powerful figure in the Internet world. It didn’t take long at all for fans to develop a fascination with the 9’6” domina- *ahem* domineering presence of this villain from the upcoming Resident Evil Village title.
With the release of the game finally upon us, fans got to meet the Lady at long last and she certainly didn’t disappoint, at least not to most fans. She and her daughters were terrifying, but not the scariest baddies from the series (and certainly not the scariest in Village, can anyone be alone in a dark hallway yet?)
More fans seemed to latch onto the shopkeeping character The Duke once the game actually released, but the loyal foot soldiers (( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)) have remained on the side of the Dimitrescu fam.
5. Disney Debuted the Next-Gen Lightsaber
This was a smaller story at the start of the month, but we haven’t forgotten that short teaser trailer of a lightsaber blade slowly extended from the hilt. We’ve all been anxiously waiting to see how Disney continues to develop the Star Wars franchises with more toys and accessories. Make things quicker and TAKE MY CREDITS!
6. Nerd Pastor Nate turned 27 Years Old
That’s right! Our one and only Nerd Pastor Nate officially completed his 27th revolution around the sun this month. He got to spend his time with friends and family at the beach and definitely wasn’t thinking about getting home to play video games even once. Thanks to any and all who wished him a happy birthday! He greatly appreciated all the love.
7. We Reached 500 Followers on Twitch!
That’s right - we finally did it! We were able to keep pushing forward and reached our 500th follower on Twitch last month. We also reached 50 members in our Discord, which is a huge deal for us and we couldn’t be more excited. As our community grows, we keep welcoming in more and more awesome people (like you!) and we couldn’t be happier about it. Thanks for supporting and sharing what we do.
To celebrate, we are having our first ever charity stream on Friday, June 11th, 2021 from 4pm until midnight to support AbleGamers to the tune of $500 for our 500 followers. If we raise more, we think that’s amazing and we’ll be setting goals for every step along the way. We hope you can join in the fun!
And that brings May officially to a close, but June is upon us and filled with gaming news, announcements about the next season of anime, and plenty more to do as the weather gets warmer. To get us prepped, here are just a few things we are excited for in the next month.
What We’re Most Looking Forward To In June
Sweet Tooth (Netflix)
Luca (Disney+)
Loki (Disney+)
Mario Golf: Super Rush (Nintendo)
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart (PS5)
The Check-A-Thon (Twitch Charity Stream)