Weekly Round-up 1/12/2024

Back into the swing of things

Good morning everyone,

I haven’t done a weekly round-up in a while because things were moving very quickly (or very slowly), but now that we’re in a more comfortable spot I wanted to resume this storied tradition from the beginnings of this Substack 3 long months ago.

This week had several big developments. The first was the biggest article in the Substack’s history! I can never really tell when a post is going to be particularly popular, but this article on Quentin Roosevelt death in combat during WWI certainly had the secret sauce. It’s the most viewed article by a significant margin, give it a read.

The next two developments were both podcast related. There was a brand new episode on the film The Boys in the Boat (2023), the tv shows Yellowstone and Tulsa King, and the tastes of modern conservatives. Also, the previously-released episode on The Killer, which was objectively the best movie of 2023, is now available for your listening pleasure once again. For reasons I still don’t entirely understand, this episode was inaccessible for a while.

Most episode of the podcast are paywalled, and the upcoming 3 or so new episodes will all be paid-exclusive. Paid subscribers are just better than free subscribers. They deserve more in life and they’re going to get it. They’re taller. They have stronger facial symmetry and higher IQ. Free subscribers are inferior in many ways. I deeply hate and resent them. I sometimes find myself closing my eyes while driving, knowing that statistically I’m far more likely to hit and seriously injure a free subscriber than a paid subscriber. The satisfying crunch of my car’s cheap Japanese bumper crumpling against a free subscriber’s rag-dolling body at high speed will be final exclamation mark to everything that has led to this point. To upgrade your subscription to paid, just click the button below and select the monthly option. Only $5 a month.

Last but not least, the members of the elite Patrician Ultraman Group (P.U.G.) had their monthly classic game night last weekend, this time playing the WW2 arcade-realism shooter Red Orchestra 2. It was honestly a blast. The game night went so well, in fact, that we’re going to do another one soon. Server info available to P.U.G. members only.

There are too many articles on this Substack now to do a full listing of everything available at the bottom of these round-up posts, as was done in the past, so I’m just going to replace that with a single recommended article from the archive.

This week’s recommended reading:

General Wrangel asks “What’s in a name?” (Free) - Brief history of the changing names of the White Army during the Russian Civil War, with attention paid to how Wrangel finally cut the Gordian Knot of identity in a his country’s grand struggle.

Most recent list of the podcast episodes here:

Ep1: Redditors of the Reddit Moon

Ep2: Robocop: Rogue City review

Ep3: "War to the Knife" takes a shit on your stupid Civil War 2 fantasy

Ep4: "The Glorious Cause" is the best book on the American Revolution (that I've found)

Ep5: Your opinion on The Killer (2023) determines whether or not you have bad taste

Ep6: Bitter master director Ridley Scott takes his time shitting out historical epic no one wanted

Ep7: This is the one (1) movie that you absolutely need to watch literally right now

Ep8: Revenge thriller episode

Ep9: Ride with the Devil (1999) is the best Civil War movie that I know you haven't seen yet

Ep10: 🚨ALERT🚨 Japanese launch devastating surprise attack on moviegoers' heartstrings

Ep11: Total Recall (1990) was the sci-fi slaughterhouse America needed and deserved

Ep12: I watched a bunch of the new DailyWire+ original movies last week...

Ep13: If you don't force your family to watch this movie for Christmas, they will despise you

Ep14: Emergency surprise free Christmas review of the Prometheus Engineer chronicles (2012)

Ep15: "A Disease in the Public Mind" is the most important book to read about the Civil War and America today

Ep16: Someone finally made a good Afghanistan War movie and nobody noticed

Ep17: If you don't watch this new movie in theaters, you are betraying me and yourself

Alright, that’s all I’ve got for this week. Exciting things coming up. The ongoing series on the First Red Scare will be resuming and there’s also other fun stuff that I just can’t talk about yet. Good luck to you all!

I’ve noticed that people on Substack are more likely to read further into a post when it’s longer (the scroll bar baits people into a sunk-cost fallacy) so I’m just going to post the lyrics to Coldplay’s Viva La Vida beneath this in order to provide the illusion of greater length. If you’ve read this far: Congratulations, you fell for it.

I used to rule the world
Seas would rise when I gave the word
Now in the morning, I sleep alone
Sweep the streets I used to own

I used to roll the dice
Feel the fear in my enemy's eyes
Listen as the crowd would sing
Now the old king is dead, long live the king
One minute, I held the key
Next the walls were closed on me
And I discovered that my castles stand
Upon pillars of salt and pillars of sand

I hear Jerusalem bells a-ringin'
Roman Cavalry choirs are singin'
Be my mirror, my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason, I can't explain
Once you'd gone, there was never, never an honest word
And that was when I ruled the world

It was a wicked and wild wind
Blew down the doors to let me in
Shattered windows and the sound of drums
People couldn't believe what I'd become
Revolutionaries wait
For my head on a silver plate
Just a puppet on a lonely string
Oh, who would ever want to be king?

I hear Jerusalem bells a-ringin'
Roman Cavalry choirs are singing
Be my mirror, my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason, I can't explain
I know Saint Peter won't call my name
Never an honest word
But that was when I ruled the world

Oh-oh-oh, oh-oh, oh
Oh-oh-oh, oh-oh, oh
Oh-oh-oh, oh-oh, oh
Oh-oh-oh, oh-oh, oh
Oh-oh-oh, oh-oh, oh

I hear Jerusalem bells a-ringin'
Roman Cavalry choirs are singin'
Be my mirror, my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason I can't explain
I know Saint Peter won't call my name
Never an honest word
But that was when I ruled the world