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On the evening of Wednesday, May 30, a contingent of concerned SpinDizzian citizens ventured to Portia and Morticon's residence to ask to see Zoie. Zoie had recently been injured when her tree fell, and afterward was taken by Morticon, allegedly for medical care. However, on her subsequent visit to the Rose Garden, she seemed strangely confused, and some witnesses believed she had endured some sort of nefarious treatment at the hands of her caretakers.

Argon lead the expedition, joined by Borris, Skyler, Austin, Findra, Luaie, GrumpyBear, Vassily, and three previously unknown costumed heroes: ElastiCoati, MoralBunny, and EthicsBoy (apparently a squirrel). At the mansion, they were met by Morticon, Portia, and Codex. Portia insisted on inviting everyone upstairs for tea, although Vassily, Luaie, and EthicsBoy stayed downstairs and attempted to engage Aina' in conversation to little success. Upstairs, the crowd made increasingly insistent demands to see Zoie, until she was at last wheeled in.

Zoie still seemed confused, and the crowd repeatedly asked her whether she was being treated well, and tried to convince her to come back with them and be cared for by Findra, who is a nurse. Gilead also arrived belatedly, and showed great concern about Zoie's condition and treatment. Findra reported that Zoie's injuries seemed to have been treated appropriately, but could not be sure about Zoie's mental state. The commotion appeared to upset Zoie, and eventually Morticon and Portia insisted that everyone leave. MoralBunny gave Morticon an angry look and made a growling noise, but he returned her stare unfazed. The crowd reluctantly left, but many remarked that they did not intend to let the matter drop.

Editor's note: Apparently Zoie is recovering as she was able to send in a "Classic Gaming" article to @Action News this week. Although similar to her style of writing, @Action News is unable to acertain her condition by the submission of this article. It does reflect Zoie's determination to remain dependable and for that the @Action News staff thanks her.

A careful observer of Squirrel Park (at S4 E0) might notice a large hole leading into an underground archaeological dig. The dig, now abandoned for some time, discovered a subterranean city sized for, and made for squirrels.

An expedition in this week has revealed that the city was a large domed structure, but has been abandoned for several years. A great disaster clearly struck, and by inspection of the exploration team, seems to have happened rather quickly. No living thing was found in any of the large public places, and numerous charred squirrel skeletons were found in groups, usually in blocked off buildings.

Much to the surprise of all involved, one squirrel by the name of Cadge Flicker was found alive, and, by his count, 10 years after the city was attacked. Here is Cadge's eyewitness account of the disaster, and the aftermath.

"One day me and Tuesday Black were in the park just hanging around, and suddenly something happened I can't explain. Suddenly everything got weird. Everything went distorted and it was like time slowed down, and then there was a big noise, and everything kind of went back to normal except there was this shaking like an earthquake."

"Stuff started crumbling and falling, and people were screaming, but then after a moment it passed and it was quiet again. So everyone was standing there, kind of talking in shock. But then... well, there were these security drones, right? They came into the park and went crazy shooting people. Their weapons, it's awful, they sort of disintegrate people, except it leaves... well, you know."

"There was this panic and everyone ran for the buildings to try to barricade the doors. People ran into the offices and the mall and the apartments which is where we ran. Tuesday and I got into the apartment lobby and people started trying to barricade the door, but it didn't matter because the robots just blasted the door and killed everyone where they stood. I ran, and so'd Tuesday, but she didn't make it and died in the lobby. I got upstairs and hid in my room, in my closet, for days, and I could hear people now and then. After a while I had to leave and... well, after a while everyone else who'd hidden, tried to leave and get out of the city."

"I don't know if anyone got out but I never saw anyone alive again. Eventually, I quit hearing noises, and after a while I figured out that the robots had gotten attracted to something in the subway caused a cave-in behind themselves and blocked themselves in there. So I think it's safe now, although I can still hear them to the northwest, and I have no idea how they're still powered, as it makes no sense. That's why I thought reality had suspended or something."

"There's been plenty of stuff around for a squirrel to eat for ten years though."

Although understandably stressed and in poor shape from his decade long endeavor, Cadge is very much alive and recovering.

After a number of years, Spindizzy's ghost black squirrel, Tuesday A. Black was convinced by a small contingent of friends, Natasha Nelson in particular, to explore Spindizzy's underground squirrel city. This has been a long standing worry of the squirrel; although convinced she came from there, she was rather terrified about making the trip for fear of losing her tenuous grasp on existence.

Natasha was able to find an archaeological dig near Spindizzy's Squirrel Park (S4 E0) which led down to the old city. Accompanied by Austin, Skyler, and BunnyHugger, the five made their way down into the depths. Tuesday wished to find the fate of a friend, Cadge Flicker, who she once knew there.

The city was in dreadful shape. While only large enough for small creatures to enter, squirrel city looked like it had been abandoned for several years. Ominously silent, the city appeared abandoned. Wrecked houses, smashed kiosks, and scattered food littered the streets, and in a few spots, skeletons of squirrels littered the buildings.

Tuesday, quite afraid of the experience, led the way with her glowing green eyes as a light source. After some wandering, she arrived at The Burrows, an apartment complex she remembered as being the place she once lived. Skyler explored ahead into the building. Here, too, in the lobby of the complex, another group of skeletons lay silent. Tuesday and Cadge's apartment were both in the second floor of the Burrows complex, and after Skyler came back from scouting, the exploration party all went to see it together.

Tuesday's old apartment, while nothing unbecoming was found inside, looked devoid of dust, and well kept. Photos of her, cards, and scraps of memories were carefully arranged on the dining room table in a shrine. Unusual as it was, Cadge's apartment across the hall was the real surprise. This apartment was not well kept at all, but instead lived in, food scattered about. This was the first sign of anything recently living in the entire city.

Only a moment later, Cadge Flicker himself, a gray squirrel who looked like he had seen better days, but very much alive, surprised the entire party! He dashed under the bed in his apartment, and, with some coaxing by Austin and Natasha, eventually came out to tell the story of squirrel city as he remembered it.

For years, Cadge lived on his own, through the failure of the power and water system, running out of batteries, and finally being reduced to using a crank flashlight for light, and eating candy and canned foods scavenged around the city. Through the time, Cadge kept Tuesday's apartment neatened, in her memory.

Cadge found at last, Tuesday began to fade, her reason for existence as a ghost seemingly fulfilled - to find the living Cadge Flicker after 10 years in isolation. Only at that moment did Cadge reveal a long held love for Tuesday Black, at the time she might fade for all time. What happened next no-one expected; Tuesday, feeling Cadge's genuine love, took up residence inside Cadge's body and mind, literally sharing her essence in his body.

Cadge-Tuesday, as they have been known since, have been delighted to be reunited with each other, and are enjoying long lost pasttimes. For Tuesday, this has included meals, cold ice cream, and the senses of touch, taste, and smell. For Cadge, this has been exploring the outside world and visiting people for the first time in a decade - and for both, dreams where they might visit one another, and feel each other's love.

In spite of watching this movie twice, I really couldn't make heads nor tails of the plot. None the less, if you are so inclined to see this film, be advised that spoilers, as near as I could make of the plot, are included in this review.

When I mentioned I had found a copy of Dungeons and Dragons (Subtitled: This is no game,) in the $5.00 bin at the store, those who didn't shake their heads in dismay or explain their own opinions of the movie, ran off screaming into the woods. A bit of research on the Internets seemed to confirm these reactions.

Generally, most opinions indicated that this movie howls at the moon. I have to agree. Not so much because of its title, its a rather... well, very badly done sword and sorcery movie, but for the reasons that make it badly done sword and sorcery movie.

First, the plot: Profion, a magic user or "mage", is tring to create a magic wand that will control dragons. It is, "Dungeons and Dragons" so having a dragon in the opening scene is kind of a given. So in the deep dungeons (& dragons, get it?) his minions open a big gate to reveal a big dragon. Profion casts some spell and the wand glows and the dragon seems to be under control. For a minute. Soon the spell cast by the wand fails and the dragon starts breathing fire and wreaking havock. Profion has the gate lowered and... well, the dragon doesn't survive.

Outside, Ridley Freeborn and his buddy Snails, are two theives. Ok, D & D type characters. Both are rather bumbling goofballs and as the dragon's blood leaks into the river it bursts into flame. With this distraction, the theives decide to break into the local magic school. Can anyone say, Hogwarts?

Up these guys climb and into a window they go. As they start loading up with useless items, Marina, a mage in training and her teacher, Azmath, hear the theives and Marina is told to see what it is. So in she goes and finds the theives filling their pockets with magical items. She whips up a rope of binding, (can we now say Wonder Woman?) and takes them back to Azmath, the rope following her wherever she goes. Azmath is getting his backside beat by Xilus, Profion's lieutenant, or captian of the guard or something. His blue lipstick is stunningly out of place as is the general look of the make-up effects in this film.

Marina uses some gold CGI dust and opens a portal in the wall and dashes through it. With the rope of binding on them, Ridley and Snails are dragged along with her. She pops out on the street and runs off with the theives right behind her. Down an alley she dashes and finds (ready?) a dwarf! With Xilus, his blue lipstick and minions behind him, the three dash into the sewers and -SNIP- all of a sudden they're in a "den of theives. Turns out there's some map Marina managed to snag as her teacher was being beat up and the four of them, two theives, a magic user and a dwarf, start figuring out that it leads to some treasure.

Back at the Hall of Mages or Council of Elders or the "We're Better than you commoners" club, the Emperess Savina, a mere youth of a girl, is apparently in charge. Her parents' fate was left of the cutting room floor and she is arguing that "commoners" ought to have the same rights as the mages. Profion, the bad guy, argues against that what with commoners being ignorant of the ways of magic. Savina, by the way, weilds a gold wand / septer that somehow controls gold dragons. Profion wants this gadget but even when he gets it, his use of it doesn't make any sense.

Ok, back to our little group. For some reason, Empress Savina gets an elf to follow our "heroes". No idea how she even knows they exist or why she wants them followed. She, the elf, follows them to the "head of the theives' guild" and our hero Ridley is made to go through this maze to gain some red egg shaped thing that pretty much ceases to exist until the end of the movie. Norda, the elf, if playing the game, would have rolled a 44 DDD on her armor breast plate roll. None the less, rather than reporting back to the Empress, she joins the group and off they go the Elvin Village.

Yikes! Imagine Peter Jacksons' vision of Lothlorien done with an 8mm movie camera, some leafless shrubs with after Christmas dollar store lights on them, and you'll have an optimistic view of the image of this place. Of the four elves we see, two are rather human, Norda with the breast plate and Halvarth (?) who is some elvin high muckady-muck who offers some rather vague advice and sends them on their way.

Then, Marina gets captured by Xilus who Profion has put some curse on and does some torture to get information from her that, thankfully, is as close to yiffy, and not even laughably yiffiness, as this movie comes. The rest of the group arrives to save her and we get two shots of a CGI "Beholder" from the game. Like the rest of the guards it too runs off in panic. But not Xilus, who stabs Ridley in the shoulder, (Ah, Weathertop from Lord of the Rings, perhaps?) and then kills Snails. No, salt is not involved.

After zero seconds of mourning Snails, they all get ready to enter the cave with this mysterious treasure. For some reason, only Ridley can enter and so in he goes and with little fanfare sticks the red egg in the empty eye socket of a dragon statue. The doors open, and here's a big room full of treasure. But with all this do-gooding and "...for the betterment of commoners," the theif in him ignores all this treasure and gets red wand / septer from a poorly audioanimatroniced skeleton.

So out Ridley goes with this red wand thing and... whoa! There's Xilus holding the rest of the party hostage. He has found, not the breast plate of the elf attractive, but has fallen on love with the mage Marina. So he trades the septer for the lives of the party. Tah dah! She tosses some CGI gold dust and off she goes through the portal followed by everyone else. Well, I can't figure out how else they all appear back in Magic School City at the same time. Xilus gives Profion the wand and then...

Aye carumba! For no reason that's explained, Empress Savina is using her golden rod to get gold dragons to attack the city. Profion uses the red wand to bring in red dragons and therein lies the best scene of the movie, whether it has any context or not, a huge aerial fight between red and gold dragons. Blasting fireballs rather than jets of fire, it is pretty nice looking. And, yes, the bad guys get their just deserts.

The final ending is ready made for the sequal, but not sure I have the stomach to see it.

Now don't get me wrong, a movie of Dungeons and Dragons might be rather interesting, if it were related to the game... this movie isn't. In the commentary track of the movie, Dave Arneson who claims to have invented the game Dungeons and Dragons and fails to realise that, although the pencil and paper 32 sided die verson is still played, it's sort of like Gremlin car collectors. Yes, they're passionate about their hobby, but neither are making any money any more. His commentary have no relation to the movie, what of it there is, but is all about playing D & D.

So, from 1 (Bad) to 10 (Excellent) I give this movie a 2 only for the fairly competent CGI work of the dragon fight. As sword and sorcery movies go, the acting is stiff, the plot has holes you could drive a 44 DDD breast plate through, and the costume, special effects and especially Xilus' blue lipstick award it demerits. And Dave Arneson's plugging of D & D the game is grating at best. Watch this for laughs, because you will laugh. Not with it, but at it.

Hi Everyone:

I am trying to type this one handed as I was given a clipping that I wrote game articles.

Well, I can't remember any off the back of my hand except for one that was brought into my room for rehabilitation. To the gentleman in the full black suit and mask, I thank you.

Well, upon good instruction, I was told only to do this one until I recovered some mobility in my spine. The one I shall start off with today is "Wii Sports: Bowling".

Well, from what I am able to tell, the Wii is run by a remote control. It uses motion sensors on the television as well as sensors within the remote itself to know how you are moving it.

The object of the game itself is very much like bowling in reality, to knock down as many pins as possible in the ten frame game. You have two opprotunities to knock down all ten pins in each frame. If you get it on the first try, it is called a strike and on the second, a spare.

Though using math, you would guess that in ten frames, you can only get a score of 100. However, it is possible to score even more points than that. (One hundred Plus)

If you score a strike, you get the total combined pins you get for your next two rolls. If you get a spare, you only get one.

You can control your bowler in different ways. You can move from side to side and at an angle when you release the bowling ball. You can even zoom in for a better look. You can even make your bowler left or right handed.

This game can be played up to four people and it can be pretty fun (for the exception of when I hit my arm on the wheelchair arm... which stinks!).

There are also training sessions on the Wii:Bowling where you can train between obsticles and even more pins. This can help you fine-tune your control and the "seemingly ball curving" glitch. (Trust me, it is not the Wii.. it is our own natural movement that causes the ball to spin and move). I highly recommend the training before the actual game. However, the game is fun when you play it with friends.

This is a good way to train the shoulder, arm, wrist and eyes because you don't have to move your spine and rehabilitate yourself.

When I get stronger.. I may show you other games on this 5 game set. Zoie

Thank you to everyone who contributed to the newspaper!

Special thanks go to:

Moral Bunny, for the information about the "visit" with Zoie,
Cadge Flicker, for the story about Squirrel City,
Skyler, for the information concerning Tuesday Black,
Argon, for watching "Dungeons and Dragons" and writing a review,
Zoie, for her "Classic Gaming" article,
Patch O'Black, for his "Four Kolor Kitty" article,
Gilead, for his heavily censored puns,
Ba'ar, for his survey and
Argon, for this week's cartoon.

Hello, friends, to a special edition of Four-Kolor Kitty. With Mother's Day coming up, I thought it would only be right to look at those super heroines that are also mothers. Of course, one might argue any mother is a super hero in her own right, and I will not argue the fact. However, in this case, we will be looking at those moms who have balanced crime fighting with a family.

First, I will go to the first family of the comic book world, the Fantastic Four. There you will find Sue Richards, better known to the world as the Invisible Woman. However, she is also known as mom. She has two children, and nether were what you would call easy births. Due to her having a cosmically irradiated biology, extreme measures were required in both births. In the case of her first child, the Fantastic Four (including temporary elementalist member Crystal of the Inhumans) had to venture into the dimension known as the Negative Zone to take a device called the Cosmic Control Rod for major-league villain Annihilus. With this gizmo, they were able to safely deliver into the world Franklin Richard.

Her second child had an even tougher and unusual birth. When she became pregnant for the second time, there were additional complications due to her having absorbed radiation from previous trips to the Negative Zone. This time, the baby was apparently delivered stillborn. However, a few years later, they met with a time-displaced young girl who used the code-name Marvel Girl, but introduced herself as Valeria Von Doom, the daughter of...Sue Richards and Doctor Doom!

After a few adventures, it turned out that Valeria was the same daughter that everyone had been thought had not survived birth. This was due to Franklin using his on-again, off-again reality-warping powers to switch his little sister into an alternate timeline. In the end, she was returned to Sue's womb. Once again, Sue had to go through labor. This time, Reed was unavailable to help, and Sue's brother, Johnny "Human Torch" Storm, went to the one man who would have the knowledge and skills to deliver the child. He appealed to Doctor Doom. The longtime foe agreed to help, in exchange for the honor of naming the child. Of course, he named her Valeria, and it was later discovered that he was using her as his "familiar" to spy inside of the Fantastic Four's home. However, it must be noted that when Doom later attacked his rivals, and even teleports Franklin Richards into a hellish dimension, he spared and cared for Valeria. Still, I don't think they will be calling Victor Von Doom to baby-sit her any time soon.

Next, we go over to the DC Universe and to Themyscira, known to most as Paradise Island. There lives the Amazons, ruled over by the mother of Wonder Woman herself, Queen Hippolyta. As opposed to Sue's tough labors, Hippolyta had it easy. As some of you might know, since there are no men on Paradise Island, there would be no normal way to have a child. However, when Hippolyta creates a sculpture of a beautiful baby girl, she is so moved by the image that she prays to the Olympian gods to bring the clay figure to life. They not only grant her wish, they bless the little one with various gifts. When the young princess grew up, she was picked to be sent to the outside world and was dubbed Wonder Woman. However, at one point, Diana was elevated from super-heroine to Goddess of Truth. While she was taken to Mt. Olympus, her mother knew that someone would need to fill her role in "Man's World", so she took up the costume along with various magical items to make up for not having the divine gifts her daughter did. Interestingly enough, during this period, the Amazon queen traveled back in time, and joined the Justice Society of America becoming the Golden-Age version of Wonder Woman, a role that had previously been erased during the Crisis on Infinite Earths. When last we saw here, she had defeated Granny Goodness who had been masquerading as the goddess Athena and is currently fighting off an army being led by Captain Nazi.

Speaking of Golden-Age mothers, a less well-known super-hero mom is a former member of the JSA and the All-Star Squadron, Liberty Belle. In her civilian identity, she was Libby Lawrence, a former Olympic athlete, who was then a reporter (first for a newspaper service, then on the radio). While visiting the real Liberty Bell, she overhears some nazi agents plotting mischief. Instead of going with her first idea to call the FBI, she instead decides to fashion a costume and take on the saboteurs. While, for the most part, she had no superpowers, she did somehow receive an increase in strength, speed, and stamina when the Liberty Bell is rung. She appears to have some mystical connection to it, and the night guard at where the bell is housed seems to know when Miss. Lawrence needs him to ring it. Eventually, she marries to a fellow super-hero known as Johnny Quick, who gains super-speed and flight when he recites a special mathematical formula. They then have a daughter, who at first takes after her dad, using the formula to become Jessie Quick. However, when she loses her confidence and can no longer access her super-speed, her fellow JSA member and future husband Hourman draws a new version of the Liberty Belle logo, and reminds her that just because something has a flaw, you don't throw it away. She then finds she can access her mom's powers as well as her dad's, without having to have the Liberty Bell rung even. Thus, Libby's daughter becomes the new Liberty Belle.

And that is all for this Four-Kolor Kitty. We wish all mothers out there a Happy Mother's Day. Remember, if you would like to suggest a topic or a question to be answered in a future column, send it on to PatchO'Black. Until next time, see you in the funny pages!

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• Gilead chirps, "I want to see Prince Caspian. Though Iron Man is a close second."
• Natasha says, "Um... _Wall-E_, or maybe _Indiana Jones_ if Harrison Ford can keep his belly sucked in."
• Persephone says, "Iron Man!"
• Pa'hti says, "Iron Man!"
• Mischa hmmms. "Speed Racer, I suppose... just to see if it's as campy as the TV show. ;3"
• Jimun says, "Hmm, I guess Prince Caspian. I don't know of many other movies that are out right now..."
• Dingo wants to see Prince Caspian... shi doesn't usually watch movies, but is always curious to see movies made after books shi's read! :)
• Luaie says, "Wall-E. Nothing else even remotely interesting."
• Darius says, "Postal!"
• Persephone says, "Iron Man! Oh yeah, and Wall-E. And the new Star Trek..."
• Lamar yaps, "I'm looking forward to that long awaited sequel with the return of that epic action hero. The one based on nostalga and/or comic books?"
• Darius says, "I want to See Postal."
• GrumpyBear grumbles, "I'm looking forward to the next Star Trek movie."
• Tzolkin says, "I have no idea what all is coming out this summer."
• Argon says, "Oh, easy, Prince Caspian."
• Kamida lilts, "Iron man!"
• PatchO'Black mews, "Hard to say. Iron Man looks good, but so does the latest Narnia picture. Not to mention Wall-E."
• Luaie says, "Narnia is coming out too? I guess I might watch that as well. Maybe."

High gas prices don't bother centaurs as they can gallop to work!

Got something that You'd like to contribute to @Action News, but aren't sure if you should, or how to do it? Here are some basic guidelines.

Contributing a story or artwork for @Action News is easy! Just send it to newspaper@spindizzy.org!

• @Action News is published weekly sometime on Sunday.
• Articles received after midnight Pacific time on Saturday may be held and published in the next edition of @Action News.
• Most any type of story or article of interest to SpinDizzy's newspaper readers will be accepted. Generally, we'd prefer things that aren't out and out lies or flames about other folks, and have a basis in the reality of SpinDizzy.
• Things that occur in public areas are fair game.
• The things reported don't have to have actually happened, (any more than anything that happens here does,) but make sure you don't overstep the social boundaries and rules of interaction that we have.

These are pretty broad guidelines, but we expect good sense to apply.

Thanks!

Argon
Editor - @Action News