Join me for this interview with Tore C. Olsson, the award-winning historian and University of Tennessee professor whose book “Red Dead’s History: A Video Game, An Obsession, and America’s Violent Past” – the audiobook for which is narrated by Roger Clark (aka ARTHUR MORGAN himself) – will be released on August 7th!!!
Geek Saga Podcast Episode 107: Red Dead’s History Interview with Tore C. Olsson
Please consider checking out the Geek Saga Entertainment Patreonand supporting us for early access to our episodes & some other great perks!
Episode 104 of The Geek Saga Podcast is the fourth episode in my “Impulsive Hyperfocus” series, and features me doing a short but actually pretty focused ramble about Red Dead Online!
I definitely have quite a bit more to say about Red Dead, but before I got into my cosplay, travel, and event experiences, I wanted to do a quick jaunt into my feelings about Red Dead Online, including reminiscing about its glitches…the “good” and the not-so-good…
Geek Saga Podcast Episode 104: Impulsive Hyperfocus Reflecting on Red Dead Online
Please consider checking out the Geek Saga Entertainment Patreonand supporting us for early access to our episodes & some other great perks!
Episode 100 (!!!) of The Geek Saga Podcast is the third episode in my new “Impulsive Hyperfocus” series, in which I’ll pick a different subject for each episode – one that I can connect to personal experiences I’ve had – and, well, try to stay on topic as I rant and/or ramble about it for a while!
This being a somewhat momentous episode (can’t believe I finally made it to 100!!!), I chose a subject near and dear to me: the Red Dead Redemption video game series!
I’ll definitely have to do at least one more Red Dead-focused episode because in this one, I only had time to discuss how I got into the games (around 14 years ago, WOW), some of my basic thoughts on Red Dead Revolver, RDR, and Undead Nightmare, and then a sometimes funny and sometimes emotional read through of the twitter thread I used to keep a running commentary during my first RDR2 playthrough. Hope you enjoy!
Geek Saga Podcast Episode 100: Impulsive Hyperfocus Reflecting on Red Dead
Please consider checking out the Geek Saga Entertainment Patreonand supporting us for early access to our episodes & some other great perks!
Imagine my surprise – and excitement, of course! – when a couple of months ago I stumbled on an Instagram reel from Rob Wiethoff (John Marston in Red Dead Redemption & RDR2) talking about an event he was attending this summer in Tombstone, Arizona – and not just ANY event, an entirely Red Dead-themed event called “Tombstone Redemption”!
The event was actually originally announced in March of this year, so it was disappointing to realize we discovered it too late to snag a hotel in Tombstone itself. But I kept it in the back of my mind, and about three weeks out started checking availability twice a day. And hey, my persistence paid off – about two weeks ago I lucked upon someone’s cancelled room at the Tombstone Bordello Bed & Breakfast! So after work last Thursday Dean and I packed my car full of Red Dead costumes and began our trek to Arizona for this event.
We spent Thursday night at a friend’s house in Tuscon, which was great because we didn’t leave home until about 5 PM and ended up stuck in traffic on I-10 for over an hour thanks to a monsoon that literally blew TEN tractor trailers over. We also both had to work for a bit on Friday, but we still got to Tombstone, settled in to our B&B, and were out and about to explore the town a little before 2 PM…
After getting the lay of the land (which wasn’t hard; downtown/historic Tombstone is technically less than 5 blocks long and 3 blocks wide) we went back to our room to freshen up before grabbing dinner and drinks. (It also helped that it had already started to cool down!)
It was exciting that we were back out for less than an hour before we ran into our first cosplayers!
We ended up chatting with them for a bit under the overhang because there was a surprise rain shower…Dean and the Arthur cosplayer bonded over the impossible knot on Arthur’s hat, haha. And the rain shower made for a beautiful sunset!
We had dinner at Big Nose Kate’s, explored the little store/mine area in its basement, and then made our way to the Oriental Saloon, where we ended up spending quite a long time drinking and talking with some other fans…so long, in fact, that we got a much later start than expected on the first official day of the event.
Dean really wanted to sign up for the costume contest, but by the time we’d eaten breakfast it was already after 10 AM, so we walked over to Schieffelin Hall to sign up. Neither of us had ever done a costume contest before, and to be honest I wasn’t into the idea, but sometimes you gotta compromise with your SO, I guess 😉
Sign-ups took a lot longer than we expected (at least half an hour) because they were talking to everyone about their costumes. We found out the next day – AT the contest itself – that they were considering this “pre-judging”, so needless to say it felt a bit odd that it wasn’t explained that way/there was no announcement that you had to (or at least SHOULD) wear your contest costume when you went to sign up.
Anyway, we ran back to our room to finish getting ready and headed out a little after noon, with Dean dressed as RDR John Marston and me as Bonnie MacFarlane!
We grabbed coffee from the local espresso bar and then wandered around a bit with some friends (new and not-so-new), did a mini photo shoot in front of the Blackwater bank sign (see above) and then had a quick drink at the Crystal Palace before getting in line for autographs/photo ops with the actors at about 2:10 PM.
And we waited. And waited. And waited and waited and – okay, you catch my drift. Seriously though, it was probably about 100 degrees out, and 90% of the line wasn’t in shade. We would creep forward a few feet every 15-20 minutes, or so it seemed. We did at least have time to chat with the friends who were with us, meet some new people, and even got high fives from Steve Palmer (Bill Williamson) when he came out to walk the line and thank everyone for waiting so long <3
The actors were supposed to stop signing at 5 PM to do their 5:30 PM panel, but they ended up delaying the panel until I think about 6:30. We finally got into the signing area at about 5:45 but *only* because someone came out and said that anyone who didn’t need to meet Rob Wiethoff (John Marston) or Benjamin Byron Davis (Dutch Van der Linde) could go in. Thankfully we had Ben and Rob’s autographs from previous events so were able to get in and meet Alex McKenna (Sadie Adler), Curzon Dobell (Hosea Matthews), Gabriel Sloyer (Javier Escuella), Peter Blomquist (Micah Bell), Michael Mellamphy (Sean Macguire), and Kaili Vernoff (Susan Grimshaw).
All of the actors were super lovely despite having been in the sweltering Oriental Saloon signing for nearly 7 hours at that point. And at least we got to say hi to Rob on our way out – while I was lucky enough to moderate the Red Dead actors panel *and* run the Blackwater Squares game show at Dragon Con 2023, Dean wasn’t able to attend last year and was so excited to finally get to meet Rob – however briefly – in person 🙂
I definitely have more to say about the rest of Saturday evening/night, the costume contest on Sunday morning, and the event as a whole, but I’ll save that for part 2, so stay tuned!
PLEASE NOTE: There was only so much sound editing I could do here, and as this was recorded live, there is quite a bit of background noise from the audience. Additionally, some of the ‘squares’ had to share microphones and therefore their sound quality is unfortunately not equal across the board.
“Blackwater Squares” was a Red Dead Redemption-themed version of Hollywood Squares. If you don’t know what Hollywood Squares is, it’s basically a live game of tic-tac-toe, in which the competitors choose a “square”, the host asks a question, and the person in that square gives either a correct or incorrect answer – and in the process, tries to convince the competitor that they’re telling the truth. The competitor then decides whether the square is giving a correct answer or making one up.
GEEK SAGA PODCAST EPISODE 64 – Blackwater Squares Game Show at Dragon Con 2022
STARRING: DESIGN DIRECTOR ALISON CARRIER VOICE OF ARTHUR MORGAN, ROGER CLARK LOREMASTER SEAN COPELAND VOICE OF DUTCH VAN DER LINDE, BENJAMIN BYRON DAVIS VOICE ACTOR GREG HOUSER VOICE OF COMMANDER SHEPARD, MARK MEER VOICE OF JOHN MARSTON, ROB WIETHOFF COSPLAYER & PODCASTER NAMI SPARROW Aaannnndd CRICKET!
Clockwise from top left: Roger Clark & Tara; Tara & Nami Sparrow; Benjamin Byron Davis & Tara; Some of the Blackwater Squares; Action Panorama of the Game; Nami Sparrow & Rob Wiethoff; Nami Sparrow, Mark Meer, & Tara; Allison Carrier, Benjamin Byron Davis, Tara, & Nami Sparrow
When you’re a coupla geeks in love, and you bonded over Red Dead Redemption, what else would you do but go to New Orleans to celebrate your nuptials? Thus, a Red WED Redemption Weekend!
Our wedding ceremony “script” was something that I wrote all on my own, and I’ll be honest, I’m really proud of it. It, like us and our relationship, was non-traditional, non-religious, and peppered with geeky references. There was no “husband” and “wife” nonsense. We are partners in life, and what I wrote reflected that.
Our best friend Nami officiated, and did an absolutely amazing job. We had the most perfect and beautiful experience, and that was entirely because of the people who were there. We missed everyone who was invited and couldn’t make it (almost entirely due to health issues/COVID), of course, but I can never express the gratitude I feel for those who were able to be there to support us.
We ate amazing food, including a lot of beignets (burgnerts? bugwats? binyetts? buhlwahrs?) We drank good beer. We also drank…a lot of other stuff, lol. We listened to awesome music. WE. FUCKIN. DANCED.
Things were broken – arms, phones, car windows. People got lost in NAWLINS from time to time. It was all as it should be. I don’t regret a single moment (okay, except maybe Nami breaking her elbow). We gathered. We got in trouble for gathering. There was oatmeal and there were a lot of mimosas and there was a strip club and there was hanging out at the hot dog bar because yes, of course, there is a hot dog bar in Nawlins.
I am so beyond grateful for the people who love us. For the fact that we all, whether we are related by blood or not, became FAMILY that weekend. I feel so HASHTAG BLESSED for the people in my life who made this weekend happen, who made our WEDDING happen, who made it all so. Darn. Amazing.
I love that so many of our friends and family have become friends with each other now, because of us, because of this time in NOLA.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you for loving us. Thank you for supporting us. Thank you for being there. My life – OUR lives – wouldn’t be the same without you.
And PS
NAWLINS GOT US NOW, Y’ALL.
So without further ado, the one script that bound us all 😉
OFFICIANT: Today is a celebration. A celebration of love, of commitment, of friendship, of family, and of two people who are together in this absurd and wonderful thing called life.
There are thousands of important moments that happen throughout all of our lives, but a wedding is regarded as a moment so critical, it needs to be shared with friends near and far. With us today are guests from South Carolina, Texas, Washington state, California, Connecticut, North Carolina, New Jersey, New York, and Louisiana.
Love, a great unifier and a universal truth, has brought us together here in New Orleans. Everyone here has their own love stories, be they short or long, with friends or partners, already written or yet to be discovered.
Tara and Dean’s tale is one of fan conventions and video games, of a deep and abiding friendship that has become a deep and abiding love. Their relationship blossomed through mutual interests, and has weathered life upheavals and loss and, of course, a global pandemic. It has spanned three years, five months, and twenty-one days…not to mention about 2,300 miles. And they are here – we are ALL here – today, both despite and because of all this.
In stories, love heals wounds, fixes what is broken, allows you to go on. But love isn’t a spell, some kind of benediction to be whispered, a blame, or a cure-all. It is a single, fragile thread that grows stronger through connection, shared hardship, and honored trust.
We are gathered here this weekend to celebrate not just Tara and Dean and their relationship, but their family – because to be part of Dean’s life is to be part of his children’s lives, a choice that Tara made with an open heart and an open mind.
This celebration of Tara and Dean is about what came before, but more importantly is what happens next. They fell in love by chance, but they are here today, now, in this moment, by choice. Tara, Dean, you have chosen each other. You have each chosen to be with someone who enhances you, who makes you think, makes you smile, and makes every day brighter. In that vein, I believe you have each written a little something of your own to say to each other, in front of these witnesses, today.
This is where we both spoke our own vows, but those are reserved for ourselves and our friends and family who were in attendance. Needless to say, they were rife with sweet nothings and Red Dead references.
OFFICIANT: Tara and Dean, do you take each other as lawfully wedded partners, to love, encourage, trust, and respect each other, to work together to foster a marriage of equality, and to create a home for yourselves, Ben, and Camden that is filled with growth, laughter, and compassion?
In which we both said “I Do” as simultaneously as possible
OFFICIANT: Love comes from humble beginnings: through a combination of serendipity and effort, imperfect beings shape it into something extraordinary. You are exchanging rings, which are perfect and unending circles, as a symbol of your imperfect and yet extraordinary love.
Dean, as you place the ring on Tara’s finger, please repeat after me:
With this ring, I bind my life to yours. It is a symbol of my friendship, my love, my trust, and my respect, And the promise to care for you, stand beside you, and share with you all of life’s joys and adversities. For this day and all the days to come.
Tara, as you place the ring on Dean’s finger, please repeat after me:
With this ring, I bind my life to yours. It is a symbol of my friendship, my love, my trust, and my respect, And the promise to care for you, stand beside you, and share with you all of life’s joys and adversities. For this day and all the days to come.
And with that, by the power vested in me by the great state of Lemoyne, I now pronounce you partners for life. Now kiss!
There was a lot of kissing here 🙂
Esteemed guests, it is my pleasure to present to you the Lynbury Gang!
After nearly a year of putting off doing, well, anything with the pictures from my RDR2 photoshoot in New Orleans, I finally sat down and made a few TikTok slideshows with them…and after THAT, I sucked it up and gathered all of those slideshows together for a YouTube video 🙂
I’m hoping to do some more with these – or at least with the information I gathered on my trip – but for now, I had a lot of fun throwing this together, at least!
New Orleans has always been one of my favorite places to visit, so I’m sure you can imagine how excited I was to see so many familiar places copied over into RDR2’s Saint Denis. From the moment I first rode through those streets as Arthur Morgan, I knew I had to go back to NOLA and place as many of them as I could in real life.
And hey, this is me, so ya know, why not do it in cosplay?
Also me being me – that is, super type A – I did a TON of research prior to going on this trip. Not just a lot of googling and searching through every Red Dead subreddit that I could find; I also talked to people I know who live in (or are frequent visitors to) New Orleans, poured through an old NOLA guidebook that I own, and even went back through photos from my past trips there.
I definitely didn’t get to map every single spot that exists both in game and in real life, but I added the following locations – plus a few other fun photo spots – to a Google Map for sharing purposes.
Starting from the ‘top’ of the French Quarter and working your way down through it, here’s what I found: – LaLaurie Mansion – Bastille Saloon – 1041 Royal Street – Doyle’s Tavern – Lafitte’s Blacksmith Shop – Random building – Jackson Square – Tailor, statue, etc. – Napoleon House – La Riviere Cafe – Latrobe’s – Lemoyne National Bank – New Orleans Police Department – Lemoyne Supreme Court – Ochsner Urgent Care French Quarter – Barbour & Crosby Real Estate
Next, a few quick stops in the Garden District can be sandwiched between visits to Lee Circle and St Stephen Church.
– Confederate Memorial Hall in Lee Circle – Quincy Harris Memorial Hall – Seven Sisters – Random homes in game – Women’s Opera Guild Home – Random home in game – Morris Israel House – Random home in game – Commander’s Palace Restaurant – Random building in game (on edge of Saint Denis) – St. Stephen Church – Larger cathedral in St Denis
Despite spending the better part of a day wandering around New Orleans, we still didn’t even get to make stops at all of the places I marked on my map…but hey, that just means I have an excuse to go back to “Saint Denis” and finish my explorations, right?
I’m still in the process of gathering decent screenshots of the Saint Denis versions of these buildings, as well as marking them on a game map, so stay tuned for part 2 of my Saint Denis/New Orleans comparison!
Episode 30 of The Geek Saga Podcast includes live audio from the Dragon Con Video Gaming track’s “Red Dead Redemption Fans” panel from Dragon Con 2019.
With all the hype surrounding Red Dead Redemption 2 this past year or so, I needed there to be an RDR2 panel. Thank you to the Video Gaming track for taking a chance on me (having never worked with them before) and letting myself and my buddy Dean host one!
Episode 26 of The Geek Saga Podcast includes live audio from the two Red Dead Redemption panels featuring voice actors Roger Clark (Arthur Morgan) and Benjamin Byron Davis (Dutch van der Linde) at MomoCon 2019.
As a huge fan of the Red Dead Redemption games, I was very excited when I heard that Roger Clark and Benjamin Byron Davis would be attending MomoCon in Atlanta. I spent the weekend cosplaying Red Dead (Sadie Adler, specifically, along with my buddy who does an amazing John Marston) and made sure to attend both the Saturday and Sunday panels featuring the actors. This podcast features audio from both panels, though I did remove some repetitive questions/stories to make it…well, more cohesive, sure, but also shorter (and it still clocks in at just over an hour and a half long). Whether you attended the con/these panels or are simply a Red Dead fan, I hope you enjoy – I know I did!
(Side note: I do apologize for the fact that there is some annoying ‘foreground noise’ at certain points. Unfortunately, being in the audience meant that I couldn’t control the noise the people around me made, and I didn’t want to lose too much volume on the moderators and actors when they were speaking.)
Geek Saga Podcast Episode 26 – Red Dead Redemption 2 at MomoCon 2019
