Team Update: TCR Chapter X_X: End of This Line [2020]; It Was a Good Run, Folks!

— Cᴏɴᴛᴇɴᴛ Iɴᴅᴇx —

a MAJOR Team Update by the Azure-Winged Magpie (a.k.a. the Extinction Entity).
^{I know. I know. This is all we do nowadays. But stick with me!}

Hello-hello and chatter-chatter everyone. Number One here. And I’ve got a LOT to ‘splain! You’d better make a cup of coffee or something and sit tight. You’re gonna wanna read all of this!
(And I really mean ALL OF THE “THIS“. This one’s pretty important. Read it right to the end.)

(︶⌒︶ ^✿) ^…

Nope. We haVen’t gone and abandoned ship (yet). Nope. We haven’t binned the posts we’d announced. We actually watched the new Ghost in the Shell when it came out and theeen… ended up sitting on our review for over a month and haven’t Quite gotten around to finishing it. We’ve actually had nine kinda-completed reviews (okay. Three of those are on a film which has two reviews and a thinkpiece on here already) ready to go since January but we jus‘ haven’t pulled the trigger.

Don’t worry. Like I Said… they’re not in the bin or anything. We’re just hanging on to them for a bit. They’ll come out when the dust’s settled a little bit.

Now let’s moVe on to the important stuff…

SoMe of you folks who’ve been following us for the last couple of years probably already suspected this, but things haven’t been the best here on The Corvid Review when it comes to actual reviews for a long time. What we did put out is pretty good, but it’s all been getting really soulless compared to what we used to turn out before. Heck. We’re not even that Quick to getting around to new releases either.

We did some real good work 2018–2019 and did a good (late) job early this year. But we were always going down sooner or later. I’ll leave the deets out, but there are reasons why everything’s been so backed up on here. The Crow’s off doing his thing. I’m off doing my thing. And yeah. We just don’t talk like we used to and we’ve got different things that need doing right now. The Corvid Review hasn’t our main thing since like last April. I mean… it’s not like we gave our lives up to this blog, but still. Apart from the Oscines this year, we haven’t pulled an all-nighter since the ‘2018 Collection’ post.

Life also got in the way and while we’re always coming up with cool things to post… it’s not the same when you’re doing it all on your lonesome and pretending to do it like a team. Nothing ended up happening because we never work together any more. That’s also kinda why I left last year for that bit. We were planning on splitting this blog down the middle once I’d left, but that turned out to be wayyy too much trouble, so I just forgot about it. Since I came back, I had all these ideas, but WordPress wasn’t helping either since half of what I want to do just can’t be done with the options they give you.

We were also planning on making an animated film in 2019 and that ended up getting caught in the middle of all this and never ended up happening. It’s a real shame ’cause the parts we did make were really really pretty. I don’t know if it’ll ever end up happening, but I know I’m not going to be the lead in it if it does.

So yeah… I guess you know where this is going (like the title didn’t give it away). What we’ve decided to do is wrap up all the loose ends we’ve left lying about and call it a day on this chapter. The numbers are up and I can’t keep things together any more. And I don’t think it’s really going to count for much since apart from the handful of folks who are our blog-friends, most people just take a peek and never come back. The blog’s doing really really well right now, but it’s all getting a bit too… meh. The way things are, The Corvid Review‘s a goner already. This project isn’t going to make it in the big bad world the way it’s currently set up.
So I’ll go and say it. What I’m saying is…

DEATH TO THE CORVID REVIEW

Yeah.

I get it. You’re upset. We’re your favourite blog on the intertubes and you don’t want to see us go. Especially now with all this madness going on in the world. But it’s got to happen. It’s time we said bye-bye to our rickety old ship and warped away to new places to explore strange new worlds! Strange new civilisations! Strange new… rubber suited aliens to… beat up with like… big rocks or something.

We’re still gonna be around, but theCorvidReview.wordpress.com isn’t going to be our home any more. This blog isn’t getting deleted or anything (for now anyway) either. Everything we’ve written is still going to be on the internet, and I might even travel back in time ^{oh wait. That’s not allowed} and fix some of them up when I can. But we’re not going to be updating this blog once we’ve gone through the posts we’ve got left. The two at the top of our list are the GitS review I mentioned earlier and the finale to our Death Stranding series, and we’ll have to see about the rest.

We’ve been planning on making some big changes to TCR since 2017 and I guess none of them are going to happen any more. So… yeah.

That’s it.

That’s all the magpie wrote.

It’s been a good run everyone! We really did have the blastiest blast for the last four years chattering about everything under the sun. We could’ve done a lot more but real life is sure a letdown huh? I don’t think we’ll be talking about any of this once this post is over. We’re just going to release what we’ve got left and ride off into the stars one by one all quiet and ninja like. So… bye? I guess. Love you lot loads. Thanks to all of you for stopping by my TED Talk about going away (like I’ve never done that before…).

So for the last time… Azure-Winged Magpie up! Up! Aaand…

.

.

.

.

.

.

waitaminute… what’s this?

Oh! Right! I forgot a little something.

I always said I’d ‘splain what was going on with our banner image up there didn’t I? So before I fly off… let’s talk about evolution.

Let me spell it out! E–V–O–L–U–T–I–O–N.

What a pretty word!

(◔◡◔^✿) ^!

Now… evolution could mean a whole buncha things, but what I’m talking about is evolution in the science sense. Y’know… that whole thing where over time and down through the generations certain bits and bobs become more common or more rare within groups of living things? Y’know… give it a good few million years and BAM! you’re eating deep-fried descendants of dinosaurs with chips and a bucket of gunky cornmeal gravy? That evolution.

(Fun fact: the Crow’s usual hangabout is this pub where there’s a bunch of cReATiOn1Sts who hang around. I met one of them once. He looked like an egg. They’re anti-vaxxers and everything. Stupid really needs to stop breeding. But then they end up breeding the most. Breaks my headbox that…)

But you don’t go from T-Rexes to chicken nuggets easy.

Sure, sure, you had the 65 million years and everything. But what happened during those 65 million years? See… the thing about evolution is that things kinda need to die for it to work (got to love how the Cap’n says that all deadpan). And you can bet yo’ backside that a lot of critters went and died in between when we had dinosaurs stomping around and us birds (andokay… you hoomins too). And all of them that died are kinda like fallen heroes for the rest of us that survive! Mama Nature’s big on experimenting and if it weren’t for those critters dying and proving her new designs (that she kinda throws on the wall and sees which ones stick) didn’t really work out, we wouldn’t be around here to eat all the Swan(!)s … um … “bird” food.

The way this happens is by little changes in the bits and bobs I mentioned. A bird gets born with webfoot syndrome. A bird gets hatched with no down… thises and thatses that just happen and if they stick… they stick. And they stick ’cause some of these changes help the birds survive better.

Over time the differences get so large that you can’t call it a T-rex any more. It’s like a T-rex plus. Then the T-rex plus (like with phone models!) becomes the TR++ and goes on and goes on until you end up with something like a chicken. And then, the TR + something ends up becoming the something — chicken. That’s how it works.

Pretty simple no? Makes you think how some adults don’t get it…

But why the heck am I bringing evolution into all of this?! I know I said I’d ‘splain the banner image but did you REALLY think your Auntie Magpie was going to let this ship go down with all feathers on deck?! Did you REALLY think Cap’n Crow’s gonna let that happen?! Did you REALLY think the Swan(!) was going to sit around and let that happen?! Did you REALLY think Lt Spotty was going to be like O’Brien at Work while the ship went down?! Ha! As if! (Stick with me until the next section. Let me have my moment.)

I said all that ’cause I’m…

……..just THAT kind of bird!

(ಠ ◡ ಠ^✿) ^!

……..who’s OVERLY dramatic! ^{for no… reason}

(◔ __ ◔^✿) ^…

^{……..Oh well…}

(◔◡◔^✿) ^{Keep reading though! It wasn’t all porkies!}

THE TRUTH:

So here’s the thing. The Corvid Review is dying. I wasn’t lying about what I said up there. There are some big problems with this blog and there’s a lot that needs to change. We’ve been talking about the blog changing for years but haven’t gotten around to it because of this or that. I meant it when I said that we’re just going to release the last few posts and call it quits on theCorvidReview.wordpress.com. I meant it when I said things were getting a little soulless on here. And I also meant it when I said we were going away but still going to be hanging about.

The thing is… The Corvid Review dying is a good thing. The way it’s good is because in order for something to evolve, something needs to die first to prove what’s just not working out. And that’s where we’re at right now. We’re about to evolve. We’ve been gearing up for it for a long long time now, but this is the first time we’re making it official.

Now I know that we’ve promised changes on the blog before and haven’t always gone through with them, but this time things are different. This time, we aren’t after changing things. We’re finally about to go and hit the levels we were always planning on, but always holding ourselves back from. Way back in 2016, before I joined up, there used to be a mission statement with a four-year plan on the blog and the Crow triggered it back in April. That’s why he’s never around. He’s not building just one new thing. He’s building hundreds of new things. And the reason I‘ve been quiet is because I’ve been coming up with the other half of the new Corvid battle plans! And they’re SO evil (the plans!) that even the Big KG would blush when his righthead’s read it all. I meant it when I said the Crow and I don’t really talk that much or work together these days but we’re still on the same team! We’re still taking over the world one cool thing at a time! We’re just working on something a LOT bigger than The Corvid Review right now. And if you want a clue about our evil plans, just think of pretty pink things and you might just get it…

Now WE know what our new project is going to be called and what it’s going to be about. And I’m going to tell you right now that the Corvid Review (this one) is going to be all up in its DNA. But you don’t know what it’s called or where to find it. So how are you going to find us when we portal away to the new Nest of World Domination?!

Easy! We’re going to leave enough portals open on this loose end of the Corvid Network so you guys can come over and say hi whenever you want! We don’t want to lose the friends we’ve made along the way, but we can’t really stay on WordPress for any longer than we have to. The transition’s going to take around a year or so in total (we have a LOT of material to copy over and we’re going to be doing it one at a time) and we’d like to see you all there!

So… what can I tell you about the next chapter in the glorious Corvid history of world domination eh? How abut we start with…

NEW CREW MEMBERS / POSTS CONTINUE:

We’ve got three new crew members on the horizon and two looking at the chopping block. There’s also one who got… Q‘d and who we’ll never speak about ever again. So let’s go through our new names!

• We’ve got a Chocobo (don’t worry… this one went and got a real name since we don’t Final Fantasy ’round here) who’s gonna be essaying it up in here with long thinkpieces.
• We got a little bit of kimchi to spice things up (also went and got a real name) when we talk about media from South Korea.
• We also have a third person who I’ve yet to even hear about to help Lt Spotty out with our TV section.

Y’see?! It’s not like we’re totally walking away from the review game when we set up our new battle bridge!

OUR FINAL FORM:

This is the one I can’t really talk about. But here’s a few hints anyway.

It’s something that already exists but no one’s figured out what it is or where it comes from. So you could think of this paragraph as a “secret promo” for what’s coming next. And instead of writing everything out, let me dump a few pictures for you lot to ogle at…

Now this is the Cap’n’s own thing and I don’t know much about it. But I only got to see these pictures yesterday and… gotDAMN! I wish we’d never stopped what we were doing last year and I know this is going to be good… so sit tight and hang on for the ride! And do me a favour and bother the Crow so that he lets me run in and interfere with this new project when I’m back over there (and steal his special Pokémon while I’m at it…)! Y’know… without me having to threaten him with a pointy stick or something… or having to violence(!) him…

Aaanyway! I’m off to sleep (it’s early here). I’ll be back in the evening so I can around the GitS review. We’ll probably take a few days to get it handled so I’m going to have to ask you all to wait for it. But yeah! That’s what’s coming up next!

I’ll see you all there and after that, I’ll probably meet you all next on the latest and greatest flagship of the Corvid Master-race!

Until then, remember that it goes…

and follow it up with a…

Hope you had a great Friday the 13^th yesterday! (This post was written on 13/02. I thought I’d leave it in even though it’s already 01/06 here)

See you soon!
(Here’s what I’m jamming out to these days. Top stuff!)

— Azure-Winged Magpie up! Up! ^{And Awayyy! *BONK!*}

Next up: