The Respites aka Other Things That Helped Me Get Through 2020 (Patreon)

Looking back on 2020 now that it’s gone, I’m going to make up some awards for shows, music, games, etc. that helped get me through 2020. Will this become a yearly custom? Will any of the categories persist from year to year if I do?

Who knows. But the specific labeling of video games in my last post was a useful mechanism, so I’m iterating on that here.

 

The Respite Award for The Future of Action Movies – The Old Guard

I’ve loved action movies since I was a small child, and as I’ve grown, it’s become a bit harder for me to be satisfied by them. I know more about how martial arts and choreography works. I have higher standards about representation and worldbuilding.

But some action films still manage to blow me away: John Wick, The Raid, Mad Max: Fury Road, Atomic Blonde.

This year’s Respite for The Future of Action Movies goes to The Old Guard, directed by Gina Price-Bythewood and written by Greg Rucka, starring Charlize Theron, KiKi Layne, et al. A modern update/riff on something like The Highlander, The Old Guard depicts a group of immortal warriors trying to find a balance between doing good in the world and avoiding capture in an ever-tighter web of global surveillance.

I was already a fan of Greg Rucka’s writing, though I had only read one issue of the original The Old Guard comic. Price-Bythewood brought a fresh POV to action movie directing, and did a great job centering character relationships alongside clear, exciting action sequences that a viewer can actually follow (see shaky cam and quick-cut editing to hide bad choreography or mediocre stunt performances). I’m so delighted to see Charlize Theron take firmer control of her career and embrace roles like her turn as “Andy” here. The Old Guard also has an Epic Tier poetic declaration of love between Joe and Nicky.

 

The Respite Award for Games & Cultural Criticism with Plenty of Smiles and Snark – Waypoint

https://www.vice.com/en/section/games

Waypoint (aka Vice Games aka Vice Gaming aka The Home of Be Good And Rewatch it (RIP to a glorious media rewatch podcast)) has been my go-to for video games criticism since they launched in the fall of 2016. Their motto is “Why We Play” and they consistently delve far beyond the consumer advocacy/enthusiast press level of video games journalism to investigate theme, discuss labor and work conditions in the industry, and put games and their creation into cultural context.

In a single episode of their podcast Waypoint Radio https://www.vice.com/en/topic/waypoint-radio , you could get a deep-dive into the environmental storytelling of a cool indie game like Umarangi Generation, thoughtful critique of politics from everyday news to the merits of electoralism, and a digression about whether a lasanga burrito is an abomination or a potential culinary revolution.

The podcast is my primary touchstone for Waypoint, but I’m also consistently impressed by Save Point, their now-yearly charity stream marathon. In years past, Waypoint streamed regularly on Twitch, but now it’s far more rare (even before the pandemic) and Save Point keeps that chaotic streaming energy alive as an annual event.

 

Some of my favorite episodes from Waypoint Radio in 2020:

303 – The Rob Kitchen Index - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzPKxqLxXD0

366 - The AI Has Anxiety Now - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FOAS5iTJuQ

Waypoints 44: The Democratic Primaries https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNd38s7cXhs

 

And here’s this year’s Save Point in YouTube archives: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pu7AzKu6HZY&list=PLzQtxfcc44TA7QsVnrb6M2f5N0j6E02Vh

 

The Respite Award for Podcast Too Funny for Its Own Good – Not Another D&D Podcast - Bahumia

 I really enjoyed The Adventure Zone: Balance, but haven’t connected as much with this year’s Graduation campaign. But I do sometimes enjoy a beer & pretzels actual play podcast, and while Friends at the Table has beer & pretzels moments, it’s mostly a deep worldbuilding & dramatic RP kind of show.

Enter Not Another D&D Podcast. https://www.naddpod.com/ It’s been recommended for me numerous times, but it was a reminder/recommendation in the early summer that got me to finally return to the show and get fully into it. Pitched as “The Campaign After the Campaign”, This show shows the ripple effects and aftermaths of a traditional D&D kind of epic fantasy. Yes, the Demon Prince was defeated, but what are the lasting effects of a paladin order that answers to no god, just their own idea of The Light? What happens when the Epic Heroes leave a stone unturned and allow a once-defeated evil to crawl back into the world?

That’s the dramatic seed, but the real joy here is in the comedic improv performances of the players ( Jake Hurwitz, Emily Axford, Caldwell Tanner, and GM Brian Murphy). I’m still working my way through the first campaign (Bahumia) but I’m excited to see how this troupe developed as they moved forward into different campaigns.

One of the reasons I think D&D works well in a comedic format and tone is that the dice are much more powerful than the characters. The game regularly presents scenarios where competent characters fail when they *should* succeed. Good players embrace that unfairness and violation of narrative logic and create a bumbling band of boobs such as the characters in this series.

It’s a great show for some laughs and occasional cool bits of worldbuilding or interpersonal rp. Not where I go to see the dramatic heights of how mechanics and storytelling interact to push the boundaries of what rpgs can do.

 

For that, I turn to…

 

The Respite Award for Critical Theory & Giant Robots – Friends at the Table: PARTIZAN

Each episode of this podcast begins with “Welcome to Friends at the Table, an actual play podcast about critical worldbuilding, smart characterization, and fun interaction between good friends.”

I’ve enjoyed Friends at the Table off and on for around four years. But due to a million little factors, I’ve never managed to listen to a whole season. That ends with PARTIZAN.

The third campaign in the group’s science fiction setting, PARTIZAN builds on what has come before but does ultimately stand alone. It features two squads of mech pilots trying to survive in a galaxy-spanning war, in keeping with the structure of Beam Saber by Austin Ramsay, the system they’re using for this campaign. PARTIZAN is often intense and sometimes grim, but also funny and never cynically nihilistic.

Previous seasons have dealt with colonialism, empire, and critical themes, but in PARTIZAN, I feel like the Friends has found such powerful chemistry between the worldbuilding, the use of the system, and the other contributions of the players (especially the original music by cast member Jack de Quidt (https://notquitereal.bandcamp.com/ - turns out that having an accomplished composer in your cast F@$^ing rules.)

Some of my favorite pieces from this season, with very different vibes:

RADIOSTATIC. HIATUS. REDSKY. https://notquitereal.bandcamp.com/track/radiostatic-hiatus-redsky

BOREA. BELLWETHER. INDIGOBIRD. https://notquitereal.bandcamp.com/track/borea-bellwether-indigobird

You can to the soon-to-be-completed (all recordings are done and in editing) PARTIZAN season here: https://friendsatthetable.net/category/PARTIZAN

 

The Respite Award for Making Me Want to Play Tons of New Games – Actual Play

Not just Actual Play the movement, Actual Play the ttrpg troupe. Live-broadcasting on Twitch https://www.twitch.tv/actualplay and then archived on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/c/ActualPlay/featured, Actual Play runs numerous miniseries and some full campaigns at any given time. They play a lot of Forged in the Dark and Powered by the Apocalypse games, which dovetails beautifully with my interests. There’s a core cast for Actual Play, but any given series includes a varied set of players, with 1 or more hosts and then players from a variety of backgrounds and identities.

Some of their series/campaigns I enjoyed in 2020:

Rebel Crown - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkwK6l6TaEI&list=PLNuXiEYyM4ivQZAHtIDs_TYmy7dKbZBxP

Court of Blades - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVuHL-pYons&list=PLNuXiEYyM4isqzExKFLhQFq8hDnKOkm0f

Scum & Villainy: Persephone - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-dgww535qs&list=PLNuXiEYyM4is610_fOqxUxzMmv86-RUMV

 

The Respite Award for The Show That Keeps on Giving Like a Sourdough Starter – Great British Baking Show/Bake-Off

Most of you probably know this one. Meg and I had watched Bake-Off in years past, but in the past few months, we returned to it and have watched entire seasons in a week or less.

In Bake-off, even the heights of worry really only carry the stakes of “Will I be on the show anymore.” The contestants are very supportive, the vibe trends toward soothing, and I’m so glad to have access to many dozens of hours of technical challenges, architectural marvels of cakery, and soggy bottoms.

More than ever, I appreciated this type of Slow TV in 2020, and will probably continue to be visiting the Bake-Off tent until the world is far less stressful.

 

And last, but not least,

The Special Award for Technology Without Which I Would Absolutely Have Perished In 2020 – Video Conferencing

This is mostly a gag category as a way of wrapping up by talking about how important it was for me in 2020 to be able to see people virtually. I already used Zoom and Discord and Skype pretty often, between working from home and playing ttrpgs online, but I leaned on them way harder in 2020, and have often thought that if this pandemic had happened 15 years earlier, I’d be so much worse off without the tech needed to easily chat with friends around the country and world with decent video fidelity to accompany it. From live-streaming ttrpgs together with friends to video-chatting while watching a tv show in order to approximate having a friend over every week for a media hangout to virtual bookstore/convention events giving me a chance to promote ANNIHILATION ARIA when it released smack dab in the middle of the pandemic.

So thank you to Zoom, Skype, Discord, and whatever else. You’ve all had banner years. Please keep working as much as possible.


And of course, thank you to every one of you here supporting me on Patreon. It's been hard to keep up my pace of essays, but it also means a lot for me to know you're here, that I have people to share my thoughts with, from tiny bits of WIPs to dog pictures to my takes on where the publishing industry is headed.

Thanks for being here for the ride.