Kung Fu Panda 4 and Borderlands (2024)

Accepting change.

Kung Fu Panda 4

Continuing on from the previous movie, Poh (voiced Jack Black) faces his next task of choosing a successor - something he doesn't want at all because it would mean no longer being "the Dragon Warrior". Of course these movies are really all about accepting change, and his adventure this time has side-lined the other high paid voice actors defenders "the Furious Five" off on single sentence hand waved missions (which is a good idea). Funny and entertaining but only watch it after Kung Fu Panda 3.   

Borderlands

When bounty hunter Lilith (Cate Blanchett) is sent to track down a fugitive on her home planet of Pandora, she learns a few things about herself. Oh, and kills a LOT of people in ther process! As regular readers might know, I've played a lot of the Borderlands game series from which this movie is based of. My advice if you are like me: put everything you know about the games and the meta in a box, set the box aside (and maybe air step over it) when you go watch this as it will be more enjoyable as a clean slate than if you have expectations.

I did that, and I was not disappointed. Sure, it's not as gory-violent as the games but its still very entertaining in a PG-13 way. Claptrap (voiced by Jack Black) is actually funny and not as annoying as his game counterpart, and there's just some ridiculous fun in the chase and action sequences that kept us glued to the screen. My wife, who has never played Borderlands, absolutely loved the show and wished it was a series so that there would be more. While I might not have loved it as much as she, I'm in agreement as it wasn't bad at all.

Borderlands 3: Tannis Power

[Part of the Wasted Land story]

Clay is very capable for the task at hand: starting a revolt against the COV, slaying their witch who makes midgets regular size, and finding a hidden key piece aboard a crashed spaceship out in the dinosaur infested wilds which thanks to some crazy and now deceased scientists, is also home to smart, gun toting giant monkeys and lazertech fused dinos. After he manages to ice the local Calypso leadership, he finds the remaining key components and hands them all over to the Crimson Raiders as to give Eden-6 a chance at no longer being involved with this conflict.

Dr. Tannis and Moze open up the vault and after the mech warrior defeats the giant within (those holes in the floor are super handy for when it tilts the platform), Tannis does some sciencey stuff to make it that Tyreen can no longer absorb its power, like she did with the previous vault monster. Annoyed at this, the twins kidnap Tannis instead and back on Pandora, Vaughn sees an ad over the echoNET that Dr. Tannis is going to be sacrificed at Carnivora, so he hijacks an appropriate golden ride to gain entry to the carnival which apparently is on a giant motorized vehicle itself!

That's one way to make a mobile circus!

After disabling and boarding it, he fights through swarms of COV before freeing Tannis who reveals that she too is a siren now and probably didn't need rescuing. What she does need is her research materials at her secret lab in a shuttered mine so Vaughn heads on over, makes his way past the varkid colony that's taken up residence, defeats a demon, and collects the material the good doctor requires: mainly stuff involving Handsome Jack's daughter Angel.

Borderlands 2: Up Yours Captain Trainwreck

[Part of the Wasted Land story]

Hahahah, the train went boom! Didn't help that we were on it at the time though. Lucky the soft snow was nice to crash in, and put out our fires! Commando DL and Gunzerker Jim seem to be ok too, though they keep saying I might have brain damage or somewhat. Like whaaaaat? No way man. I feel fine. Just a little... psycho.

The annoying Claptrap bot survived too (supposedly the last of his kind?), and offers to take us to the safety of "Sanctuary". I try to break it but it's too stupid to die. Even to the six armed yetis that try to eat it. After painting the yeti's red we reach a village. Of bandits. Or pirates. Bandit pirates! They welcome us with bullets! Afterwards only one resident left. Tells us we need to take the boat of the bandit pirate captain to sail to the mainland so that's where we go. We welcome plenty more bandit crazies with bullets and reach their toll gate, guarded by a German Super-heavy howitzer!

Still no match for DL's placable turret and Jim's dual wielding guns though. So much killing, the snow is all red hahahaha! Finally we reach the dragon ship that shoots fire everywhere and find the super bandit pirate captain who shrugs off bullets - so I carve him up with my buzz axe from behind, right in his ass. The screams are delicious!

That fire breathing ship is AWESOME though!

Insight: Sell junk at any opportunity as your carry space is very limited.

Borderlands Pre-Sequel: Vengeance Begins

[Part of the Wasted Land story]

One piece of knowledge I gleaned from the vault was that one particular claptrap on the Helios has a special code locked inside it which holds more Hyperion secrets. Unfortunately due to the intense security protocols there was no alternative but to send a digital copy of myself into his subconscious - a crazy realm of malware, viruses, insecurity bots and bridges requiring defragging. Unlocking the code from its quarantine sector inadvertently releases a program calling itself Shadow-Trap who steals the H-source for itself.

I need to chase it deep, deep into claptrap hell and eventually fight it - along with mirror images of it, a giant mecha version of it and a flying mini-Helios version before finally putting an end to it and taking the code for myself. Since it gave me such a bad time getting the data I decide to simply destroy the claptrap product line, destroying all the little annoying bots in one fell swoop and dump their metal scraps in some snowfield on Pandora. Good riddance you absolute turd of a robot. Hopefully no one manages to piece one back together or anything.

That's me celebrating on the left!

In the meantime I assist some poachers for "King Greg" in capturing the alien guardians and their babies too to be used for testing, slavery and/or perhaps food. This will teach those pieces of shit that they messed with the wrong guy! It's great that everything is slowly going my way now... it might take a little more time but I will get to that vault on Pandora I saw in the vision and then... oh and then I will make all of them PAY!

Insight: On the "big" boss fights, aim for the turrets and launchers to make it easier for you. Also, just use the wings of the immediate main area for cover where the respawning ammo piles are. Leverage the cover to hit the "eye" of your target while at the same time not letting him shoot back at you.

Borderlands Pre-Sequel: Not Eye to Eye

[Part of the Wasted Land story]

With robot production underway I could take some time to get a few other things done like find Pickle's lost sister who just ended up leaving again with Pickle's hard earned cash, setup a live creature smuggling operation with a Sir Hammerlock on Pandora who subsequently seems to have let loose a specimen called "Threshers", and find a suitable suitor for Nurse Nina who has a penchant for killing them with her love. All pretty cool stuff, but not as cool as finally being ready to retake the Helios with my allies!

I'm sure that smuggling rocket won't attract any attention at all!

The Lost Legion don't make it easy though with further shields setup that hinder progress which the science team, led by Dr. Gladstone, seems to take their time in disabling. That guy just seems to get more and more shifty... so I order him and most his team to be thrown out of an airlock. Can't be too careful with traitors these days! In their place I put a Dr. Nakayama who seems... a little too into me, but has an intellect only slightly higher than a claptrap so it should be fine.

With more gun loader support we finally push to the Eye of Helios, defeating the Lost Legion commander Zarpedon *giggle* what a stupid name. Roland and Lilith are a little shocked that the eye is an actual eyeball from a dead destroyer creature harvested from Pandora, and subsequently betray me by destroying it and half of the Helios along with it before running off! As much as I'd like to chase em down, I have to stay and try to repair the station - starting with the eye. Despite my best efforts, all I get it to do is explode all over again. DAMNIT!

Insight: Ugh, the maintenance space walk section of the Helios is one of the worst experiences ever. Go slow and look for jump pads.