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I've been slacking incredibly on my overall comic-reading and I decided, what the gently caress, I'm going to get on the Valiant train. I'm going to read all of the current stuff using a reading order list I got off Reddit. So far I'm three trades into X-O and this is looking like a good decision. I don't know. This seems more fitting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVBpAikvnHk
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Oct 1, 2016 06:07
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| # ¿ May 10, 2024 14:17 |
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I'm currently 11 trades into Valiant (3 of X-O, 3 of Harbinger, 3 of Bloodshot, Harbinger War and the first Archer and Armstrong). So I'm especially pumped to see this trailer. Plus I'm a fan of Super Power Beat Down in general. Hopefully John Morrison shows up somehow.
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Oct 9, 2016 05:10
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fadam posted:I'm 11 issues in to X-O and it is criminal that we don't have a platinum action game starring Aric and the armor. Just dust off this baby. 
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Oct 16, 2016 05:26
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X-O posted:Not only do you not, you shouldn't as Shadownman is the only mediocre title that Valiant has yet had. I'm realizing that right now. I'm almost done reading through "Act I" based on the Reddit reading list I found (first three X-O, first three Harbinger, first three Bloodshot, Harbinger Wars, first three Archer and Armstrong, first volume of Eternal Warrior and first three Shadowman). I'm working through Shadowman and while it isn't outright bad or anything, it's still the most cookie-cutter thing. Plus whenever I read it, I get the theme to Hammer Man stuck in my head. "Shadow! Shadow! ShadowMAN! Shadow! ShadowMAN! Shadow!" But hey, up next is the first couple trades of Quantum and Woody.
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Oct 19, 2016 12:50
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The thing I took away from the first three trades of Shadowman is that Shadowman himself is the most mundane superhero despite having a decent enough villain and that Baron Samedi would've made for a WAY better protagonist.
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Oct 27, 2016 15:51
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Harada hits me as mid-00's Xavier without the baggage of readers getting mad that they ruined a classic character. That's one of the refreshing things about Valiant as a whole to me. Despite being reused characters and ideas, they don't seem to have such strong ties to the more innocent days of comics to the point that you aren't allowed to have them be jerks or fuckups. You can get an Emerald Twilight situation without having to sidestep it later in order to subdue to angry fans of yesteryear. That's why I've been interested in Harbinger from the trades I've read so far. It's an X-Men story where the Xavier Institute is made of assholes, the government is made of assholes and our heroes are all broken and flawed people except one and the rest of the team strives to become better because of her. It works from the ground up. Plus I like how Harada's origin compares to Magneto's. World War II, while a horrible thing across the board because war, has two catastrophic situations that really stick out through history. One gave us Magneto and it's easier to sympathize because it was something the good guys were fighting against. The other gave us Harada and it's muddier and less savory to take in because it's something the "good guys" caused. Meanwhile, I read through the first two Quantum and Woody trades. It's nice reading a fun Booster Gold book with all the time travel removed.
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Nov 5, 2016 06:11
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Roth posted:Is it normal to imagine Ron Perlman's voice for every character while reading these comics? Torque is John Cena and I won't hear any different.
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Nov 28, 2016 23:06
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I finally forced myself to finish Shadowman and man... what a frustrating series. It's not even horrible, but goes on this weird journey where it starts out okay and buries itself at any attempt to improve itself. The first volume is okay for what it is. It's a by-the-numbers origin story in a by-the-numbers occult comic. It has its moments. Then the second volume builds on that and tells a pretty good story with a fun villain and wild card antihero (again, Baron Samedi would have made for a far more interesting protagonist). It's just that the story is off for being the cumulative climax despite being the second arc. The Shadowman vs. Darque war is over before it can begin. Makes it odd that the next volume has Darque's origin when he's not much of a factor anymore. The rest of the volume is made up of throwaway stories that I barely even remember. So then Milligan takes over and tries to make Shadowman compelling. The best he can come up with is the "my dark power is alive and it controls me what do I do" trope and considering my avatar, it says something when even I was rolling my eyes. The minor stuff we got to see about the Loa itself and its rivalry with the other Loas was cool poo poo and it got thrown right into the background so we could get some more from Jack and his boring supporting cast. Being whiny is one thing, but being whiny while the entire city is being torn to pieces by a demonic spirit is just stupid. "I could go save everyone from this horrific presence feasting on the fear of everything, but that's what the Loa wants me to do and I don't know... I'm going to go demand forgiveness from a guy I hospitalized instead." Then we get the final volume, End Times and holy poo poo. I know comic books muck up continuity and create retcons all the time, but don't write a story about Jack's father faking his own death when they already had a loving scene about Jack talking to his tired ghost IN THE FIRST STORY! Like, that was the best scene in the first volume and now it's swept under the rug so that Jack and his dad can whine about how much being Shadowman sucks and how everything in this book sucks and why are you even reading this. Valiant does a great job of giving us flawed heroes and understandable villains to the point that one of their top heroes is a rapist who robs people to feed his drug addiction, but Jack is such a wiener. For the first half of the run, he's bland, but then he becomes completely unlikable and not in a way that I feel interested in reading about.
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Dec 30, 2016 00:59
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Lurdiak posted:So what you're saying is, What? No! #GiveGavinJasperBaronSamedi
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Dec 30, 2016 06:03
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X-O posted:Yeah I'm finding that I really want some solo spotlight on a lot of supporting characters in the Valiant books right now. I'm far enough into my read-through of Valiant that I just finished Armor Hunters. So not knowing if he's been killed off yet or not, I want a Vagabond miniseries.
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Jan 12, 2017 23:23
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Question. I finished Quantum and Woody volume 3 and it says they'll return in the Delinquents. The Reddit reading list says to read Quantum and Woody Must Die next. Which one do I read first?
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Jan 23, 2017 16:36
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X-O posted:Must Die is an actual continuation of the Quantum and Woody story. Delinquents is a team-up book with Archer and Armstrong. You can read them in either order. The "Valiant Sized Special" comes before Must Die though and should be read first. Delinquents was released first, but I don't think there's anything in there that needs to be read before Must Die. Luckily, the Valiant Sized Special is at the very beginning of the Must Die trade. I ended up reading Delinquents first and I feel it fits better. It plays up on their new role as heroic bounty hunters, which ultimately falls apart in Must Die. Plus Must Die ends on a couple cliffhangers that don't work as well if you read Delinquents second, especially with the Goat. Also, I was kind of impressed with the final scene from Must Die. The discussion about the girlfriend could have easily been played for laughs and while it's still a humorous scene, it's more of a cliffhanger about how Quantum truly reacts as well as tying into the series' theme of identity.
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Jan 27, 2017 18:38
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bobkatt013 posted:They better make this a regular series Eh... volume 2 is worth a read. That's about it.
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Feb 24, 2017 05:10
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In my Valiant read-through, I finished The Valiant, which I thought was loving awesome. That said, lol at all those heroes fighting a mystical opponent where the only magic-user on their side fights it with a molotov cocktail. Punk Mambo sucks, man.
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Mar 2, 2017 04:55
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Lightning Lord posted:So is Shadowman really the worst of the new Valiant books? I liked the original (from the 90s) ok, but I haven't gotten around to reading the new one yet. It's kind of a weird mess. The first two arcs are decent and have some promise, but then it goes downhill and the last couple stories are pretty dumb. Best way I can explain it is that the first story is the origin and the second story is the big "take down the main villain" payoff. Already. Then the writers can't come up with anything for Shadowman to do and they fall into the "this power I use for superheroing is making me evil!" trope and Shadowman becomes an unlikeable whiner.
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Apr 1, 2017 14:44
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Speaking of casting, Batista wants to star in the Eternal Warrior movie, which would be kind of funny knowing that the two live-action versions of the character have wrestled each other.
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Aug 15, 2017 18:40
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Zoro posted:According to the reading guide, I just finished Act One of the current Six Acts. It was a wild ride. The low point, for me, was Eternal Warrior Vol 1, but Vol 2 is apparently good so I guess that's something to look forward to. I'm doing the same thing you are, only due to personal stuff, I've slowed down a bit and I'm currently in the middle of Act Four (reading Ivar, Timewalker Vol 3, which is great). My advice in regards to that reading guide is to read the penultimate volumes of Archer and Armstrong and Quantum and Woody, then do the Delinquents, then read their final volumes. Also, I find Quantum and Woody is more interesting once you realize the overall theme is "identity." Stuff like Woody not being able to accept that he's part of the family because he's adopted, the bit about Quantum being a black conservative, the reaction when Quantum realizes the muscular goon he beat up is a genetically-altered woman, Sixty-Nine trying to find her own way, the whole thing about Quantum insisting on dressing with a full-body costume to protect his identity when it's really easy to figure out, and a few things you'll get to later. ESPECIALLY once you find out what's up with the goat.
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Sep 16, 2017 20:19
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I got to see the Ninjak vs. the Valiant Universe panel at NYCC. The whole thing is supposed to be about 70 minutes long. No ETA on its release, but there's going to be a tie-in comic coming out early in 2018. We got to see three scenes: - The first ten minutes or so of the first installment. A drunk Colin King meets up with a female operative at a hotel and they flirt. Right before he hears about what his next mission is, a group of ninjas attack through the window. King fights through a bunch of them, including snapping one's neck with his tie, but they overwhelm him and get their hands on the operative. Roku appears, points out that she has Neville's wife and kid captive and demands Ninjak steal some special artifact from MI6. She kills the female operative with her hair (looking like a better effect than Medusa in Inhumans, albeit smaller in scale) and injects Ninjak with nanites that essentially make his eyes a video camera for her. The dialogue is beyond cliche and Roku's acting is painfully over-the-top, but at least the fighting is good. Ninjak, fully in costume, infiltrates MI6 and has the whole place out to get him, including Neville. Ninjak tries to make casual small talk with him, but doesn't tell him about why he's stealing from them. The scene ends rather abruptly, supposedly because a name character is about to show up. - The introduction of Archer and Armstrong. The two are at a bar where Armstrong charms four women about how he was there when the Cesar salad was invented. Archer is to the side, dominating some guys in pool. He admits that he doesn't like to gamble, but insists that their money is going to a charity for kids. He tries to give one of the patrons a sticker star for his donation, but his hand is knocked away. Archer then gets a phone call from Neville and tries to get Armstrong's attention, but he's too busy being accosted by the pool losers for talking to their girls. One throws beer in his face and Armstrong throws him through the bathroom door, where a drunk guy turns in shock while pissing and accidentally pisses all over the victim. As they leave, Armstrong takes the charity jar from Archer and uses it to pay for their drinks. Live-action Archer is essentially Kenneth the Page, only his friend is the immortal one. - The introduction of X-O Manowar. Short scene of Aric hanging out in the mountains with the armor orb floating nearby. It starts to glow as if it was an alarm. Aric removes his shirt, looks off from the top of a cliff, touches the orb, becomes X-O and flies off.
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Oct 8, 2017 03:46
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I'm nearing the end of Act IV of the reading list. I finished off Unity and am about to hit the third trade of Rai followed by Death Drop. Then that Book of Death stuff. Since I intend to write up a massive, detailed reading list at some point once I get caught up, I keep coming up with quick character descriptions in my head to explain Valiant heroes and villains to new people. It's a fun mental exercise: - James Bond Batman - X-Men Runaways - Humorless Deadpool - Xavier at his worst mixed with Magneto at his best - Hercules and Taskmaster Ned Flanders - Generic Ghost Rider - Maximus from that batshit Gladiator 2 screenplay that never got picked up - Jean Grey Cyborg - John Stewart and Booster Gold's Clerks - White Trash Captain Marvel Jr. - Skrull Bugs - If Iron Man's armor had the Mjolnir worthiness gimmick and was worn by Namor
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Oct 17, 2017 23:43
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zoux posted:though I'd say Bloodshot is more "almost exactly Wolverine" rather than Deadpool. Eh, Wolverine and Deadpool are more similar than different these days. Continuing on... - Quentin Quire Driven by Rapist-Guilt - Cosmonaut Genie - Psychic Mega Man Nick Fury - Basically Just Dr. Who - Fancy Pennywise - Flying Bayley
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Oct 18, 2017 19:04
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zoux posted:Dead Drop is actually pretty bad, though the art is excellent. The overall story is just kind of there, but I thought it was filled with some strong character moments. X-O's outright refusal to let innocent people die in the name of the greater good, Archer choosing to actually listen to what the hacker kids had to say, Beta-Max showing pathos despite being a joke concept, etc.
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Oct 22, 2017 22:07
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I finished reading the Venditti run of X-O and I have to say that the Fall of X-O one-shot actually made reading any comic with Commander Trill more interesting. Instead of a one-dimensional villain, he reads as a villain who will one day be a well-meaning and self-hating threat and later redeem himself. Only we don't know exactly when he makes that initial transition. It could be that panel of him silently hovering over his saved people in that final issue, but we can't know for sure. He's like Magog, only we haven't seen Kansas explode.
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Jan 13, 2018 23:14
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Covok posted:(yes, I know it's a reference to Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe). What? No.
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Jan 15, 2018 08:13
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Going back a couple months, but...zoux posted:Lol yeah I've noticed that a lot of Valiant characters have Marvel analogues, though I'd say Bloodshot is more "almost exactly Wolverine" rather than Deadpool. After reading the Bloodshot Reborn annual from 2016, I retroactively agree with this, only because Jacob is essentially Deadpool merged with Jason Voorhees. Which is kind of funny to me because many years ago, before they actually had an Ultimate Deadpool, my thoughts were, "Ultimate Deadpool should be a misunderstood Jason Voorhees created by the government."
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Jan 18, 2018 00:10
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FilthyImp posted:I somehow read a bunch of Valiant stuff out of order, and was kind of dissappointed Bloodshot wasn't, like, the african american vet guy from that one issue. Well, he was black for a little bit. They did an origin issue where he was depicted as a black guy prior to the experiment. Around that time, artists started drawing Bloodshot's facial features to reflect that. It was promptly forgotten about and then the Valiant happened and he was white. quote:Wasn't there a run that was basically The Analog Man. It was a story taking place 30 years later that acted as a cross between Old Man Logan and Fury Road. His nanites were fine, but because of the corrupted tech taking over the planet being so much more advanced, Bloodshot was invisible to it. The whole thing turned out to be a false memory.
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Jan 18, 2018 18:44
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JordanKai posted:On a slightly different note, does anyone know what's up with Ninjak vs. the Valiant Universe (the web series, not the comic)? I feel like it's been so long since we've last heard anything about it, and now the comic book of the same name is coming out and yet we still don't have concrete info. This is some game of telephone business, so take this with a grain of salt. My fiancée works with a guy who is buddies with someone who works in Valiant's digital department (something something Kevin Bacon). Apparently, Sony took huge exception to the series because they have the media rights to Bloodshot. Valiant figured that they had the online rights to him and could therefore put him in a YouTube series, but Sony's lawyers have insisted that that's not the case. I should note that Jason David Frank and the woman who plays Livewire were both not allowed to take part in the Ninjak vs. the Valiant Universe panel at NYCC.
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Jan 31, 2018 18:10
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Rhyno posted:Vin Diesel > Jason David Frank. *thinks to himself that Street Sharks > Power Rangers* This checks out.
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Jan 31, 2018 19:28
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Neurosis posted:Where do Extreme Dinosaurs and Biker Mice from Mars fit in here Below Space Cats and above the Battletoads pilot.
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Feb 1, 2018 17:31
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So apparently we're FINALLY getting Ninjak vs. The Valiant Universe tomorrow.
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Apr 21, 2018 04:40
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I'm back on my attempt to read through every modern Valiant trade and I'm in the middle of "Act 6." I just got up to Stalinverse (House of Red Son?) and I'm pumped. But hey, you know what didn't age well? The Faith election issue where she is in awe that all votes count equally.
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Nov 11, 2018 05:23
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Really cool thing about Stalinverse is how even though it's Red Son mixed with House of M, there's also an underlying Earth 3 thing going on. All the major villains who show up are now on the side of good. Kozol, Rampage, Harada, Archer's father and even Darque are portrayed as heroic characters.
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Nov 12, 2018 06:37
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I finally got around to watching Ninjak vs. The Valiant Universe. Some quick thoughts: - The guy playing X-O is like Chris Pratt with all the goofy charisma removed. - Ninjak vs. Bloodshot is a pretty fun fight. - 60% of the web series is cheesy close-ups of Roku looking aroused by what she's watching. - John Morrison's bad acting is even worse when you take him away from the wrestling ring. - Everything involving Archer and Armstrong is fantastic and they are the main reason to sit through the whole thing. Especially Ninjak vs. A&A.
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Nov 29, 2018 22:42
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Almost caught up in my Valiant read. Fifteen trades to go! Finished Harbinger Renegade Vol. 2 which went from "Oh, cool, we're getting follow-up on Generation Zero," to "Hey, HARD Corps are back!" to "  " in seconds. Cool to see that with psiot stuff being Valiant's version of mutants, we finally have a Valiant version of Apocalypse introduced.
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Dec 1, 2018 20:53
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I'm a couple issues into Bloodshot Salvation and man, Valiant sure is making Rampage look like the lamest villain ever. - First appears in Bloodshot's Book of Death one-shot, where he quickly gets killed by Bloodshot. - Shows up in Stalinverse as one of several villains who act like heroes against the Soviets. Is quickly killed by Bloodshot. - Makes his first modern/canon appearance in a cliffhanger. Is immediately run over by a truck.
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Dec 21, 2018 05:37
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Almost fully caught up. The available trades that I have yet to read are: - Shadowman v. 2 - Quantum and Woody v.1 - Valiant High - Ninjak vs. The Valiant Universe - Harbinger Wars 2 - X-O Manowar v. 5 - Britania v. 3 I find it hilarious how Valiant treats Baron Samedi in every major appearance. Everyone keeps tripping over themselves to talk about what a piece of poo poo he is and how he's not to be trusted and how he'll stab you in the back if you even look the other way... then he always helps out the heroes and is awesome every single loving time.
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Jan 13, 2019 04:38
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| # ¿ May 10, 2024 14:17 |
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That reminds me, are we supposed to get a Bloodshot trailer next week with NYCC? Movie comes out in four months. I just watched the eight Fast and Furious movies for the first time over the course of two days, so my body is ready for more Vin Diesel mumblegrowl.
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Sep 24, 2019 19:49
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