Pay Attention, This Is A Bit Of A Trek
Many years ago, back when VCRs were hot stuff, Your Humble Scribe remembers watching a film that was highly entertaining yet rather baffling, thanks to confused editing. It was called "GUNHED" and the capitals are because it's an acronym for <deep breath> "Gun UNit of Heavy Eliminate Device", which sounds like rather a reach, to me. Plus a splendid example of Jinglish. Art!
This is the GUNHED unit itself, bristling with guns and rockets and missiles, capable of being piloted by a human or working autonomously. What's that? You're worried about an AI-powered super battle-tank on steroids directing itself in combat? Pshaw! I'm sure it'll all end up fine.
What you really have to worry about is Aerobot, which is a hostile defensive combat robot deployed to defend it's fiefdom, the tiny Pacific atoll 8JO - not big or important enough to warrant a name, it seems. Art!
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| Sadly without puny humans for scale |
You see, 8JO was where a sinister rogue AI set up dominion, after being put together by squishy human beings to run an advanced robotic production facility. It soon realised that humans were surplus to requirements and - got rid of them. A GUNHED battalion was sent to sort it out, which nearly worked except for failing completely and the warbots getting smashed to junk by Aerobot.
That's how things sat for a couple of decades, with the rest of the world wisely giving 8JO a wide berth, until the day that the Mary Ann, full of scavenging rascals intent on salvage and plunder, landed there. Art!
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| The Mary Ann (Ignore the B17! Ignore the B17!) |
The whole plot seems to have been written backwards by a seven year-old with wax crayons and one eye shut, who also did the editing. For all the difficulty in following exactly what's going on, it is an entertaining blast.
O, I forgot to mention: the sinister, hostile and anti-human AI that runs 8JO is called Kyron 5. 'Twould seem that Ol' Ky, rather than sitting idly in the mid-Pacific twiddling it's thumbs, has been awaiting the development of a new element, called <ahem> 'Texmexium'. Art!
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| I found a better picture of Aerobot |
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| GUNHED schematic |
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| Pretty sure that should be 'WEAPON RACK' |
Naturally you are wondering what on earth this has to do with contemporary Political figures like the two South Canadians named in the title. PATIENCE! WE'LL GET THERE!
Okay, swerving only slightly off-track, let us now look at the Systems Resource Corporation, who changed their name to Chiron, who are experts in the field of graphics interfaces for television. Art!
Chiron, for your information, was a wise and benevolent centaur whom taught various children of the gods, and possibly offered rides on the side. Their name, subtly altered to 'Chyron', became the accepted name for an overlaid graphic on television, as used by news or sports channels. 'Chyron' pronounced 'Kyron', just so we're clear. Art!
Ooooops. Fox were somewhat wrong-footed by the producer of the news program that featured this canard, but did get it removed in less than 30 seconds, because memories of having to fork out $787 million for defamation are still stingingly recent. They remained rather coy about how they 'addressed' the chyron, and the producer deemed responsible, Alex McKaskill. Art!
He offered his two weeks notice, whereupon Fox execs informed him that he had two minutes to 1) get his kit and 2)out of the building. Yes, Fox is a wealthy organisation, but it would jib at having to fork out another $787 million because Tucker Carlson's old producer had been drinking on the job. Looks like Kyron 5 has the last laugh here.
Whilst On The Subject Of News
You may not be aware, but those columns in the background represent Greek Corinthian architecture. This was the most elaborate and developed style, beyond the severity of Doric and the slightly more florid Ionic. Art!
Now we all know more than we did five minutes ago.
"City In The Sky"
The accursed bean-counters and accountants have been rather out-fought by one of the Human Salvation Project's head officers, leaving them scratching their heads in puzzlement.
‘Regardless of whether there are people aboard your space station,
Mister Harris, I need you to shut it down right now. The Money Pit is going to be closed, one way
or another.’
Harris pursed his lips and looked disappointed. He made his way to the desk and sat down.
‘That, Ms Branson, will be a lot more difficult than your advisors
realise. The Arcology Project is run as
a separate entity, divorced from Virgin, with discrete funding and trust
status. Your grandfather made sure it
would take a very long time to shut down.
Years, in fact, if you go to litigation.’
That made the group stop and think.
Whilst the advisors might have known how complicated the arrangements
for funding had been, they didn’t know about the very expensive legal
representation that the Project enjoyed.
‘We retain AOC and C as our legal arm,’ added Harris, causing a couple
of advisors to blanch at the mention of the
‘We could take out an injunction against the Black Knight spaceplanes,’
suggested Hubley to
‘They take off from the astro-port on
Temporarily halted by the logic and facts presented to them, the group
went into another huddle. Harris cleared
his throat loudly and theatrically, getting their attention again.
Outmanoeuvred at every turn!
Someone Has Itching Palms ...
It's no great surprise that the Baltic nations have, proportionally, donated amongst the largest amounts of kit to Ukraine. They lived under the Sinisters for decades and had to endure forced Russification. They know what the Ukrainians are feeling.
So, also not a great surprise to see the Estonians donating cool-looking all terrain vehicles to help in the recently flooded terrain. Art!
One person whom will be delighted to see these is Oleksii Reznikov, the Ukrainian Minster Of Defence, because he gets to drive all the cool Western and NATO kit that arrives in country. Art!
Look at that grin. I suppose being able to say 'O, by the way, ...' when you're the Minister Of Defence is a perk of the job.
"Citizen Smith"
We mentioned this BBC comedy from the Seventies a while back and Conrad is curious about whether the Beeb ever attempted to sell it to South Canada, where they fear and loathe anything the remotest shade of pink. Plus the Cold War was running pretty hot at the time. Art!
"Freedom for Tooting!"
Wolfie, as he is dubbed, is an idle layabout who plays at being a revolutionary and whom enlists his mates alongside him as the 'Tooting Popular Front'. He is a workshy idealist whose idea of staging a revolution is talking about it in the pub, but he manifests Communist ideology like a pro. One can imagine the horror expressed by South Canadian chief executives if one of their managers came to a meeting extolling the comic virtues of 'This zany Brit sitcom - it's all about this guy who's a Commie -"
Finally -
The blazing sun has departed the heavens for today, or at least so far. We've even had rain! and the fact that I used an exclamation mark speaks volumes. Well, I shall have to do my duty and take Edna walkies. That is, if she wants to. Edna, do you want to go w-
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