I recently hooked up my old 360 in hopes of playing original Xbox games, I inserted The Suffering and was told the system needs an update. Can I update via a usb drive? Also, do I need to update separately for each individual game I want to play?

I've been playing offline just fine this past week until today. Now suddenly I need to update the console even though I haven't been connected to the internet. I'm not tech savvy at all so I don't understand how it knows it needs the update when it has been offline. I also don't know why I can't play the single player games I have bought. Why is this such a headache?

Sorry if the question is unclear.
I've been playing on my brother's old Xbox Live account since he gave me the system and GTAV a few years ago, but I never connected it until last month.
Now when I try to resume the games, it asks to sign into an Xbox Live account which I don't have.
So now do I have to buy an account to continue playing my old games?
Thanks!

I have a Vizio 32" tv (Model number is E320-B1) and My phone is an LG X Power. I've googled it but all I see is doing it by chromecast or mhl cable but my TV doesn't have mhl. Anyone help me out? Thanks.

Stardew Valley 1.5 is now available on console (Switch, PS4, and Xbox One) and on PC (Windows, macOS, and Linux)!
Feel free to ask here if you have questions about the update. Remember to use >!spoiler here!< to mark spoilers (it'll appear like spoiler here). Please be aware that thread titles cannot be hidden by a spoiler tag and must be kept spoiler-free.

About the update

• What changed in 1.5? Stardew Valley 1.5 adds split-screen multiplayer and lots of new content. For more info (including on console), see the PC announcement (spoiler-free summary) and PC release notes (detailed list including spoilers).
  
• How do I download the update? The game should update automatically soon. To force an update check now:
  
  • PC: restart Steam or GOG Galaxy.
  • PS4: highlight the game on your home screen, press Options on your controller, and select Check for Update.
  • Switch: highlight the game, press +, select Software Update and then Via the Internet.
  • Xbox: go to "My Apps & Games", select the game, click the "more options" button, then select "Manage game & add-ons" and "updates".
• When will 1.5 release on mobile? There's no announced release date for mobile yet, but they're working on it.
  

Bugs and known issues

• Why don't I see the game in the EU PlayStation Store? The game was removed temporarily and they're working to restore it. See "Why was the game removed from the EU PlayStation Store?" in the pinned FAQs thread for the latest info.
  
• How do I report a bug? On PC, make sure it's not a mod issue first (see modding FAQs below).
  On console (or if you've checked that it’s not a mod issue on PC), please report bugs in the official forums! See the forum's bug report guidelines for what to include when reporting an issue.
  
• Common issues Please comment in the linked threads instead if you're affected!
  
  • (all consoles) Blue ground in the island area
  • (PS4) Black bars around the screen
  • (Switch) Misaligned UI elements when UI scaling is enabled

Gameplay questions for 1.5

• Do I need a new save? Nope, older saves will update automatically and all new content is available without starting a new save, with some small exceptions:
  
  • If you want to use the new Beach Farm it's easier to start a new save. (On PC you can migrate an older save with save editing and temporary mods.)
  • When creating a new save, you can now set advanced options like randomized community center bundles. You can't enable these for an existing save without modding or save editing.
• How does split-screen work? Split-screen multiplayer is a new feature in 1.5 which lets multiple people to play together on one device. See multiplayer on the wiki for more info, including how to start split-screen mode.
  
• Are the Stone Owl and Strange Capsule more common now? Yep, they're much more likely to appear in Stardew Valley 1.5 (the previous rarity was a bug). See the Stone Owl and Strange Capsule wiki pages for more info.
  
• How do I reach the new Ginger Island area? After completing the community center, Willy will send you a letter inviting you to an event on the beach. That reveals a broken boat you can repair, which will unlock access to the new area.
  
• How do I unblock the new path north of the railroad? That leads to the summit, a late-game area unlocked once you reach a 100% perfection score.
  

Modding FAQs (PC only)

See the announcement thread on SMAPI for FAQs and help!

Disclaimer I want to thank everyone for the gilds, replies and suggestions. I just do not have time to reply to everyone, but I am reading everything. I am not sure how much bigger the thread can be, I already typed this but it vanished so I think I'm at the limit. I will try to keep updating, but I don't expect the thread to be up top for much longer and will likely vanish soon, so if you need anything save it.
Yes, it's hard, it sucks, it's depressing. It is something we all have to do if you want to see this virus go. Everyone knows the deal, too many think they're the exception but no one is. However, staying home is hard so maybe I can help at least one or two people with some incentives. I'll try to give links to some things that can help cure the boredom, and some support if you need it.
Most of this might be obvious to some, some might not even have internet and of course, money is a big issue, so I'll try to give some suggestions:
For streaming and on demand things such as Netflix et al, don't forget you can subscribe for free for your first month. This goes for most things in the list. If you are worried about putting in your payment details and forgetting to cancel a month later, don't worry! You can sign up and immediately cancel and you still get your free month!
For people who don't have a smart TV, you can buy a cheap Amazon Fire TV stick or a Roku box. The Fire stick can go as low as £20 often for 1080p. It will drop to £30 for 4k.
I picked up a 4k Roku device for £18 on Amazon once. It's fast and snappy. currently it's going for £33 for the 4k version. Having both, there is little difference between the devices. NowTV also do their own roku powered device.
Subscription based streaming sites that all offer 2-4 weeks free for first timers

• Netflix *According to comments the second month is free.
  
• Amazon Prime You can either get Amazon video on its own, or take prime with other benefits. I strongly urge those who use Amazon for buying off their store front to use [https://smile.amazon.co.uk/] as there is literally no difference except everything you buy amazon donates to a charity of your choice.
  
• Now TV (I believe it's 7 days)
  
• Disney+
  
• Britbox
  
• Amazon channels. I believe you can get all these individually but Amazon offers them as channels bound to your prime account, and they are again either free for a couple weeks (again, take them, cancel instantly) or very cheap. I recently subscribed to Starzplay for £1 for 3 months. It has some good shows on it like Fringe, doom patrol. It also has channels like Curiosity stream and shudder
  

If you have not subscribed to the any of the above, you can get a few months of free TV by signing up and cancelling instantly. I suggest waiting at least 5 minutes just to let it go through the system.
Some tips for Now TV. IF you already have a subscription, I've noticed you can get it cheaper by cancelling. When you cancel they will beg you to stay. Select "I can not afford it this month" and they should beg again, telling you what shows they have. If you say you still want to cancel, they'll beg one last time and offer you the subscription for cheaper. This won't work every month, but I've noticed they'll always offer it the first time, then again after a couple months. If you're subscribed to both films and entertainment do the most expensive one as it may not work both times (but it might!). You can also pick up passes from storefronts a lot cheaper sometimes, before I could pick one up on Amazon for £3 but, they seem to have cracked down on it. If you shop around (or if anyone knows of a legitimate store please let me know) you might be able to pick it up cheaper. Lastly, check their website and under your account they should have an "offers for you" section.
Completely free TV

• Pluto TV
  
• Viki
  
• Roku
  

If you do have a smart TV and/or device, there are some good free streaming apps. One I really love is called PlutoTV. I know this is on both Roku and the fire stick, as well as Ps4/Ps5 and xbox.
Pluto offers a bunch of live channels and now an on demand section, all for free. It has adverts but they are actually short (shorter than regular TV and fewer of them). Some of the channels are just streaming certain shows like Mythbusters 24/7 or Dog the bounty hunter, but it has a lot of old movie channels as well as 24/7 kickboxing and MMA. It also has a 24/7 poker channel I quite like.
Another one I like is Rakuten Viki however, I haven't watched it for a while as my fire stick is only 1080p and I have too many other devices attached. I believe it is on Roku but you have to jump through some hoops and have an account. The last I checked on the fire stick you did not. Viki offers a metric ton of Asian shows, mainly from Japan and South Korea but it does have chinese, Malaysian etc. It has subtitles. Some Japanese shows are hysterical, albeit weird.
Roku also do their own channels with free shows if you own a device.
For those who don't have a smart TV or a Streaming device, you can set up your own computer as a dedicated streaming device with Plex. It's been a while since I used it but I believe it now also offers free movies and TV.
Anime
If you are into Anime there is

• Crunchyroll
  
• Funimation
  
• HiDive
  

The first 2 are free to watch, or offer premium without ads which you can have a trial with. Crunchyroll is the better of the two with more original choice for Japanese voice and subs, while Funimation has more Dubs. I don't believe HiDive is free to watch but you do get a 2 week trial. These are more exclusives than the previous two.
PC Centric software
If you are a gamer or like Audiobooks or anything that uses computers for things like music making, programming or graphic design

• Humble Bundle
  
• Fanatical
  
• IndieGala
  

Humble Bundle offers, as per the name, bundles. A long running site that got bought out by IGN. It offers both single items and bundles you can buy individually/as a pack while also offering a separate monthly subscription for around £8-9. The subscription gives you 12 games on average per month. That's the simplest explanation but it changes somewhat as sometimes you get to pick 10 out of 14 games, or get all 12.
Humble bundle offers more than just games though. Every Tuesday they bring a new bundle of games, while Thursday (I "think) a new bundle of books. They very often have books from the Black Library giving you a ton of Warhammer books. Sometimes it's standard E-books, other times it's audiobooks. A few times a year they do bundles for graphic design, a typical bundle would include programs like Paintshop Pro Corel Painter etc, They usually go for £0.76 for tier 1 up to around £18 for tier 3, which would include 4-6 full titles with 10+ addons. They also often have Music making bundles or video editing software as well as Programming or video game development.
The bundles change often, they usually have around 11 bundles at a time that last for 20 days. Sometimes it's trash but they do often have some very good deals.
Fanatical offers the same as humble bundle except usually not as high quality, but sometimes they do have some incredible deals, and they are very very cheap.
Both humble and fanatical are safe, trusted and been around a long time, and they are NOT grey market key sites. They work with the publishers and developers. You can buy games both old and new for a lot cheaper than you would most other places. Unless it states otherwise, keys are usually for steam.
**BOTH HB and Fanatical (HB much more common) offer free games fairly often. The catch is linking your steam account to them (at least HB). It is safe however.
IndieGala is another site like above. Except, these are much much lower quality. However, they offer a metric ton of free games. Quality is low but it is legitimate, and a lot of free stuff.
Game Store Fronts

• Steam This one is so obvious I didn't add it, but apparently many want me to. It is the best out there, and you can find almost everything, with fantastic deals.
  
• Greenmangaming offers games cheaply. Again, not a grey market site (which are legal but unethical) and they sometimes do bundles.
  
• GoG (Good old games) is a DRM free site run by CDPR, the makers of the Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk. They offer you games quite cheap and not needing DRM (such as Steam, Uplay etc which is less invasive versions of dodgy DRM from the olden days).
  
• Epic Games Despite the controversy whether you care about their rivalry with valve, they offer free games ever week. Without ever having bought anything I have gained over 170 games. literally. Good games for the most part. They often give you £10 coupons as well.
  
• Twitch Everyone knows twitch, but if you don't, it's a streaming service for watching gamers and girls with low cut tops accidentally bending over in front of the game. However, if you're signed up to prime, you get free games each month (and randomly between the set bunch).
  
• Playstation Store Currently has January sales. Currently the free games for PS+ are for PS4: Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Greedfall. For the Ps5 it is Maneater
  
• Games with Gold Bleed 2 and the King of Fighters XIII is available until Janurary 15th whilst little Nightmares is available until January 31st.
  

Gaming Subscriptions
Like the TV versions, you can sign up to these for a free trial (or very cheap). If you do sign up to only one at a time, it should keep you busy for a few months

• Xbox Game Pass You can do this on both/either an Xbox or PC. If you sign up to the regular one, you can get a month (maybe three!) for £1. After you have done that, you can sign up to the premium version for 3 months at £1 a month. Most people know game pass, but you can download a large selection of games for free. The premium version gives you games with gold, allowing you to keep the games forever (but can only play with a subscription)
  
• Ubisoft+ I'm not 100% sure if you get a trial or not. This allows a large collection of Ubisoft titles to play for £12.99 a month. Quite expensive but good if you like Ubisoft titles I guess.
  
• EA Play EA's version. Goes by a ton of names I think, EA Access, EA Play, Origin Access etc etc. There's a couple of versions of this, and it is across all platforms (PS4/5, Xbox, PC) but not sure about the switch. I "think" the premium allows you to play on all platforms, while the cheaper one on a single platform, but I may be mistaken.
  
• PS Now a once terrible service that is now actually very good. Allows you to download some Ps4 games to your PS4/5 and lets you stream a massive amount of Ps2/3/4 to your PC or playstation.
  

There's more like nvidia's service but you need the Shield device which is quite expensive. I'll leave it at that.
Audiobooks & Ebooks

• Audible Not sure what the current deal is but if you are a prime member you can sign up for a trial and get a free Audiobook each month for 3 months. Some warhammer books are 48 hours long, 3 of those gives you a good 100+ hours of listening!
  
• Comixology Another Amazon company, but lets you download some free comics I believe.
  
• Marvel Unlimited No experience with this. ItFuckingWont wanted me to add it. A subscription service for Marvel.
  

Education

• Sign Language BSL here No experience myself, suggested by n21brown and asked for a few times. Didn't know SL was so popular! Listed as "Pay what you can"
  
• BBC's Bitesize here is apparently good for home learning. Again, no personal experience.
  

If you need some spare change
Okay, I don't generally bother with it, but maybe some of this could be useful to you. These are NOT a quick way to make a fortune. These are small things you can do over time for a bit of pocket change

• If you have prime you can get a FREE FIVE POUND GIFT CARD by literally just streaming a song from Amazon music (which is included in prime) here is the details According to the comments it's only for select people, but it's worth trying If the link doesn't work for you just google "Amazon £5 coupon music"
  
• Now, these sorts of sites have been around for years, I haven't used any other than talkInsights which I must have signed up to 10-15 years ago. Basically they send you surveys and you answer them. They are confidential and don't ask for personal details in the survey. You need 2000 points and you get £20. During the pandemic they've slowed down but I probably get around £40 a year. Not much I know, but it's an email followed by a quick survey ticking boxes. Depending on your answer sometimes you get screened out, I'm not telling you to lie but just be consistent with your answers and you should be able to work out how to not get screened. Some emails are only worth 20 points, others 200. It's slow to get to the 2000 but very quick to just answer a few questions.
  
• Apparently beermoneyuk is a good sub to make some pocket change with.
  
• There is also matched betting. I have never done this, I don't have the patience but from what I've read, it's legitimate, it works and you can make a fair amount of cash from it so long as you do it correctly, and there's a ton of guides. I mention this because people stuck at home could get into it and as long as you're careful (I.E not entering in the wrong numbers) it's risk free AND it pisses off the betting shops. It seems people in comments have had success with it. Disclaimer A couple have complained about gambling. This arguably is not gambling. If you are susceptible to addiction do not do it. However, it's argued that there is no fun or buzz in this, and it's a very tedious and time consuming thing. Others argue you can't make the same money anymore (People were making thousands, now only hundreds if that). It's risk free providing you know what you're doing, the risks are user error, such as entering the wrong numbers. Someone pointed out that due to the lockdown, bets could potentially be cancelled due to sport stopping. So use on a side of caution. We're (mainly) adults so I'll leave it up just because this doesn't have the excitement of regular gambling.
  
• Microsoft Rewards This is an easy way to make pocket change doing very little. Most people have a MS account. The rewards program offers you numerous ways to grab points, by playing free to play games, answering small questions (you don't even need to answer most of the time, just open the link and shut it) and by using bing and searching on it. I've gotten 20k points JUST by answering questions over a couple months. There are many rewards but you can grab a £5 gift card for 6k for example, or a month of game pass (and AFAIK you can make points playing the games)
  
• Google rewards Someone mentioned this in the comments. I have not used it, so can not give any input on it. Sounds similar to TalkInsights which I linked. Google states "Complete short surveys while standing in line, or waiting for a subway. Get rewarded with Google Play or PayPal credit for each one you complete. Topics include everything from opinion polls, to hotel reviews, to merchant satisfaction surveys. We’ll notify you when a survey is waiting."
  

That's it for now. I will try to update as I go along. A long post but I hope that it can help some of you with finding something good to do that's free, cheap or a bargain. I do suggest getting prime, especially since you get free music, free delivery, free TV and music and free video games each month. In fact, there's a ton of perks and I feel I've gotten way over the cost investment.
Hope it helps someone at least
PartTimeCrazy said if you bought an Apple product you get 3 free months of Apple Arcade and Apple TV free for a year
fakehunted is upset I didn't mention wanking. Tesco have 225 sheets of Tissue for £0.75!
tale_lost suggested Project Gutenberg for a collection of free E-Books
Learning Language
Unfortunately, I don't have time to check every link listed so I will link the comments:
Togtogtog Gives a lot of links for Spanish

• Duolingo Numerous people have suggested this So I haven't used myself. Thanks to OhHiGCHQ StephanieMecredy & Allorie_95

Board & Tabletop games
Corporal_Anaesthetic has made a list of Board games
ilyemco suggested these
HEALTH
I'm not a doctor! But if you're a smoker, something I strongly suggest is to quit. I struggled for years but in the first lockdown I quit, technically. I haven't had a cigarette since, however, I do that silly thing millennials do. I vape, but, it made quitting extremely easy. I would not have been able to do it if it wasn't for 88Vape They sell extremely cheap liquids at £1 each. You can find these in B&M but you can pick up 25 for £20 or buy your own mix.
Vitamin D deficiency has been said to be a big problem for the virus. I'd suggest (again, not a doctor!) that you pick some up. Tesco do a 3 for 2 deal. So you can pick up 270 tablets for £7.
If you are vulnerable you MIGHT be able to phone tesco and get put on their delivery saver list (currently it's paused but phoning may help. At the very least they might give you a priority slot. I did this for my mum, we didn't shop at Tesco but I phoned for her, and they put her on with no hassle, so she can always get a delivery.
HELP & ADVICE
The lockdown Rules.
Reasons to leave home include:

• Work or volunteering where it is "unreasonable" to work from home. This includes work in someone else's home, such as that carried out by social workers, nannies, cleaners and tradespeople
  
• Education, training, childcare and medical appointments and emergencies
  
• Exercise outdoors (limited to once a day). This includes meeting one other person from another household in an open public space to exercise
  
• Shopping for essentials such as food and medicine
  
• Communal religious worship
  
• Meeting your support or childcare bubble. Children can also move between separated parents Activities related to moving house
  

I want to add, if you are in danger you are also allowed (and must!) to get away from the situation for some reason, BBC seems to have missed this very important thing (or I am blind)

• To flee the threat of harm or violence.*
  
• CoronaVirus Symptoms
  
• CoronaVirus government site You can check your location and how many cases here.
  
• Worldometers Shows cases around the world.
  
• Interactive UK Map Another easy to read map with cases in counties and local area's.
  
• World Health Organisation
  

Support

• Samaritans
  
• Mental Health UK forum on reddit
  
• Link to above's stick post for support outlets
  
• Mindful
  
• Mind.org
  

FOR THOSE SHIELDING YOU CAN CONTACT THE ROYAL VOLUNTARY SERVICE. These people helped my mother with picking up her medicine from the chemist. They were very helpful and went out their way to keep in touch and do it immediately. (It's the only experience I have with them though)
_riotingpacifist wanted these links added, but I simply just don't have the time to vet and check all the suggestions here, so I will link as is:

• https://england.shelter.org.uk/housing_advice/
  
• https://www.goodsamapp.org/
  
• https://vaccinationvolunteers.sja.org.uk/roles/volunteer-vaccinator.html
  
• https://nhsvolunteerresponders.org.uk/getting-you-started-guide-steward-volunteer
  
• https://peoplesmomentum.com/evictionresistance/
  
• https://londonrentersunion.org/
  

Update:
Digital Art
These are Free

• Krita Arguably the best in my opinion. It has a load of options, brushes and a decent UI. It works fantastic with a tablet.
  
• Gimp This is a decent program but last I used, the UI was a pain, and it isn't so user friendly while misses features, but it works, and it is possible to do some incredible creations on it.
  
• Medibang Paint This is slightly geared towards Comics and Manga. I really enjoy using this with my drawing Tablet. As far as I know, it also for regular tablets for Android/Ipad and is free.
  

You can pick up a drawing tablet on Amazon quite cheap these days! Small ones that are just a black slate such as the wacom ones are good but takes some practice to get use to, but very worth it if you can't afford a dedicated drawing tablet with a screen.
Office suit software
A couple of free applications for word processing, spreadsheets etc.

• LibreOffice This has most the average user would need to write their own books or to work from home. There's not a huge amount of difference between the two I'm linking (since I last used anyway) so it's more for preference.
  
• Open Office You can pick this up here and again, like above it's just preference.
  

Music Making
I'm going to direct to matthewharris806 for some links as all the programs I've used like Reason are expensive, or cheaper stuff in bundles such as Magix software.
Games development
D_Dad_Default gives some links for that here

The Dude: It's like what Lenin said…you look for the person who will benefit, and, uh, uh...
Donny: I am the walrus.
The Dude: You know what I'm trying to say...
Donny: I am the walrus.
Walter Sobchak: Shut the fuck up, Donny! V.I. Lenin! Vladimir Illanich Uleninov!
Donny:What the fuck is he talking about, Dude?
Hello again, GME Gang. What a fun day we had yesterday! Could it continue today? Only Melvin Capital (and maybe Ryan Cohen) knows!
And an extra special hello today to our newest WSB lookie-loo, Mr. Cramer (Can I call you Jim? I’m gonna call you Jim).
Now Jim, from what I’ve been able to gather, you and your Boomer stocks and your Hot Manic Takes don’t always get a lot of love around here. But that’s not all your fault, Jim. The Paste-Eating Rocket Kids are often good for a solid meme (FYI: it’s pronounced “Mee-Mee.” Feel free to use that on air without verifying). But the Rocket Kids can be a dense bunch and they’re also often one click away from Total Financial Ruin (Quick shout out to SPCE: Pleas fly again). So you have to dig a bit in here to separate the wheat from the chaff, as someone like you actually says in real life. What the fuck even is chaff, Jim? And why do all Boomers seem to think that folksy farm-based idioms are the perfect way to conclude a thought?
Anyway. Those of us who watched your teevee clips last week where you reference your interest in WSB know that you, Jim Cramer, might be one of the Olds, but that you also Think Young(TM). https://www.thestreet.com/jim-cramestock-market-advice-moderna-boeing-fed-ftc-dec-15. So we’re going to do our best to help your young-thinkin’ brain find the Needle In the Haystack here so you can get All Your Ducks In a Row on GME. Because we know that you’re a long way from being Put Out to Pasture, and though you may be an out-of-touch millionaire prone to facile yammering, we now like you here, Jim—simply because you mentioned us and that made us blush a bit since we’re needy Millennials who just want our Boomer mommies and daddies to Tell Us They’re Proud of Us. So even though the Paste-Eating Rocket Kids here are often Buying A Pig in a Poke (Christ, please do not ever say that or the kids’ Mee-Mees are gonna fuck you up), we appreciate you recognizing that, every now and then, there’s something worth paying attention to over in this weird little pocket of the Interwebs. And since you’re actually telling your loyal single-finger-typin’ viewers to check out this WSB shitshow, and “if they’re running GME, then do some work on GME,” we assume you might actually be checking this shit out too, since all true Young Thinkers know that What’s Good for the Goose is Good for the Gander.
Now, is the GME play as solid as your recent recommendation to buy Bed Bath and Beyond? Who knows? That seems pretty stupid, and I would look it up myself this weekend but my nice little Saturday is already pretty full so I don’t know—I don’t know if I’ll have enough time. But I’ll tell you one thing: the GME play is a lot more fucking fun. Life in a pandemic is boring, but here in this weird WSB place, these kids like fun. And for all your Boomer weirdness, you seem like you still like to have a little fun in this Mad, Mad world of ours. So consider joining us here more often. A word of warning, though: if you don’t like all the dern cuss words we use around here, Jim, well that’s just, like, your opinion man, and we’ll have you know that the Supreme Court has roundly rejected Prior Restraint.
First thing’s first: we have a bit of a bone to pick with you (now there I go). The stuff you said last week about GME as the next Blockbuster was D-U-M dumb, Jim. You were a bit out of your fucking element with that. You even made our largest shareholder and conqueror-in-waiting, Mr. Ryan Cohen, send an emoji-only tweet in response, which if you know the super nice-guy Ryan Cohen like all of us do (we actually know nothing), that is pretty much the equivalent of him bringing his dog over to micturate on your and George Sherman’s rug.
Now, I myself have never been into the whole brevity thing, but I wanted to take this opportunity to get you up to speed on the GME movie you’ve wandered into. And I know you’re down with this because you told all your viewers that if WSB is talking about GME, then “make sure you know GME.” So before you say something Absolutely Mad again and Cohen sends a tweet with an even less ambiguous emoji, it’s high time that you start Making the Sure here, Jim. Just consider this to be CPT Hubbard delivering you some Orange Sunshine and turning you on to some of that Sweet, Delicious Non-Chaff Wheat you love so goddamn much.
Part 1: GME’s Bonkers-Ass Short Interest
Now, I’m going to lead with the most crowd-pleasing part of the story here (Get ready, Rocket Kids!), and it’s the one that you did not even seem remotely familiar with in your “Stay out of GameStop, Deadbeat!” rant last week. Maybe that was by design or maybe not. We’ll return to that, Jim. But the point here is: the short interest here is batshit insane. And not just your garden variety Boomer in Rolled Up Sleeves Ranting About Buying Estee Lauder While Hitting Buttons On The Beep-Bop-Boop Machine kind of insanity. Really and truly fucking nuts.
So to TL/DR this shit for you, Jim (to use the parlance of our times): GME is the most shorted stock trading today—by far. https://financhill.com/most-heavily-shorted-stocks-today How shorted? Well, the value of shares short exceeds the market cap of the company; there are currently more shares short than the total number of shares outstanding. And when factoring in the institutional and insider ownership, the total short percentage of float is nearly 300%. https://www.gurufocus.com/term/FloatPercentageOfTSO/GME/Float-Percentage-Of-Total-Shares-Outstanding/GameStop-Corp Even higher, actually, now that Cohen’s interest is over 10%. Now, I’m not a numbers whiz like you, but that level of short interest and the small available float seems pretty fucked up to me. Like: “how is that even legal?” fucked up. And just for a frame of reference, the third most shorted security right now is your beloved Bed Bath and Beyond, with a short percentage of float at a nice and tidy 69%.
Are you starting to gather why some of us in this weird little pocket of the Interwebs are a little excited about GME? You see, as u/Jeffamazon and RodAlzmann u/Uberkikz11 and others have explained in these here corners and on the twitter machine with their top-notch DD, and as I will translate to you in lingo you can dig, the short sellers got way over their skiis on this one expecting a bankruptcy in Spring of 2020 that never came. And yet, amazingly, the short interest has only increased since then—there has effectively been no covering in the aggregate and, in fact, the short percentage has only gone up. And now, on the threshold of 2021, we all sit atop a massive powder keg wondering what is going to be the thing that finally lights this shit up. And at the end of this little missive, I’m going to tell you what I think that thing might be (Spoiler: It’s Ryan Cohen! Better start getting used to seeing his name, Jim, because this dude does not fuck around and he’s not going anywhere).
https://www.reddit.com/wallstreetbets/comments/k4csaa/the_real_greatest_short_burn_of_the_century_part/
https://twitter.com/RodAlzmann
https://thecollective.finance/2020/10/gamestop-gme-a-squeeze-to-44-from-14-can-be-justified-fundamentally-100-of-the-shares-are-short-watch-out/
Part 2: GameStop Isn’t Going Bankrupt and People Actually Want to Buy Shit There
So, you foul mouthed little prick, a bonkers-ass short interest is neat and all, but why is Jim Cramer wrong when Jim Cramer compares GME to Blockbuster you might be asking yourself in the third person. First, the most obvious answer, Jim, which you should fucking know already: Blockbuster was nearly $1 Billion in debt and missing debt payments left and right when it was delisted way back in 2010. That was also when there was a bit of a credit crunch, if you recall, right after that whole Housing Crash Unpleasantness that you saw coming from a mile away and from which you made hundreds of millions of dollars due to your contrarian foresight—I’m sorry, I’m clearly confusing you with Christian Bale starring as Dr. Michael Burry, weirdo head of Scion Asset Management, which also holds about 1.4M shares of GME (You really gotta start looking into this stuff, Jim. This story is made for TV, man—and you Boomers were raised by TV and you turned out TV!). Also, in 2010 when Netflix is ripping and when Blockbuster was about to be delisted and bankrupt, an analyst noted the obvious fact that Blockbuster had “nothing on the horizon that makes it look like Blockbuster is going to be more profitable.”
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-blockbusteblockbuster-wins-debt-reprieve-forced-to-delist-idUSTRE66052720100702
But Jim, if your Blockbuster comparison has any plausibility, GameStop must have a major debt problem then, right? And yet just last month GameStop repaid $125M in debt several months ahead of time. It’s also really weird that over the past year management bought back a ton of shares, taking the OS from 102M down to just under 70M (making a short squeeze even more likely, my Rocket Children). The weirdness continues with a soon-to-be-bankrupt company holding almost $500M in cash on hand. And according to George Sherman’s “Thine Omnichannel Shalt Be The Omni-est Channel of Them All” Conference Call following Q3, by March 2021 GME will have retired a total of $500M in debt and returned $200M to shareholders through stock buy backs. I’m no expert here, and I do not presently own a Beep-Bop-Boop Machine, but that’s all pretty weird shit to be doing if you’re about to go bankrupt.
No, no – I get it: who the fuck actually looks at balance sheets anyway before spouting off about what a stock is going to do? I sure as hell don’t. That’s why I follow my man u/Uberkikz11, since that dude is a GME DD Encyclopedia and was born to crunch numbers. No, when Really Smart People make the Blockbuster comparison, it’s usually just Mouth Sounds for: A B&M Store That Used to Be Popular But Now Is Not Because Technology, QED. But here even the Really Smart People might be missing something as well. They’re right in the sense that GME must use this new console cycle window and cash influx to quickly pivot to a tech-first gaming company (more on that and our boy RC shortly!), but they’re wrong on the timing and relevance of this Super Smart Insight.
So fine, they’re doing ok on debt and cash. But who even goes to that 90s-Ass-Looking Cluttered Mall Geekery anymore anyways? I confess: in my darkest moments, as the short sellers manipulate the fuck out of this stock and I curse the names Bell and Sherman, I too have wondered this. But it turns out that, just like I have no idea why anyone listens to Maroon 5 or eats at Applebee’s, apparently a lot of people in America do shit that I do not. Crazy huh? So here is some pretty neat data showing us how out of touch we might be here, Jim:
First, when a pretty large sample size of people were recently asked the question: which of the following stores or websites do you plan to buy holiday gifts from? The #5 response from United States Americans was none other than GameStop (Ticker, Jim: GME). Only Walmart, Amazon, Target, and Dollar Store (poor people buy gifts too, Jim) were ahead of little old GameStop. That’s higher than Nike, Macy’s, the Apple Store—and double the response of Bed Bath and Fucking Beyond in every category they surveyed. Check it: (h/t to my man u/snowk88)
https://stocktwits.com/snowk88/message/260983915
That’s kinda crazy huh? See Jim, when you Think Young(TM), you really can learn something new every day. And by following our man u/snowk88 (@snowk88 over at stocktwits), I learn lots of cool shit. But guess who already knew that? The guy that wrote this bad-ass letter that identifies GME’s brand and customer data as being one of the most valuable things GME has going for it. https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/RC_Ventures_Letter_to_GameStop.pdf
So now we know that Real Life People actually buy shit at GameStop here in the year of our lord 2020. But like that analyst from 2010 said about Blockbuster, there must not be anything on the horizon for GameStop to be more profitable in 2021, right?
Now, I will admit that being a bit bearish on GME in December of 2020 would make more sense if, say, GameStop were the nation’s largest purveyor of limp and half-lit pumpkin spice-scented candles and we were exiting the apogee of Shitty Candle Season. But as it turns out, GameStop is currently selling basically the most sought-after items that exist in the marketplace right now—where demand for the Xbox and Ps5 is far outpacing supply and is projected to continue well into 2021. https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2020-11-17-microsoft-expects-xbox-series-x-s-shortages-until-q2-2021 I don’t really need to get into the details on that here, because it’s pretty goddamn obvious, but I think 2020 GameStop at the precipice of a new console cycle might be in a bit of a better position than, say, 2010 Blockbuster relying on the latest Adam Sandler release to lift its sagging rental numbers. But I don’t know. Millions of people don’t watch my show looking for Candid Analysis from me and my folksy man-of-the-people-lookin’ rolled-up sleeves.
Part 3: Ryan Cohen is the Sword of Damocles Hanging Over the Short Sellers’ Dumbass Heads
And now we’ve gotten to the best part. It’s my favorite part of all of this, Jim, and if you give this a little time, I think it will be yours too. You see, all that corporate bla bla bla about balance sheets and console cycles and early debt repayment and overleveraged short sellers and brand recognition is neat and all—and definitely worth a second look by itself. Maybe even a little Beep-Bop-Boop on the ol’ sound machine—I don’t know your methods. But the real thing that’s about to rip all our faces off here is the business and investment decisions of a mild-mannered wunderkind named Ryan Cohen.
Now you can revisit my prior epistle if you want to know a bit more about the involvement of Mr. Ryan Cohen in Le Affair GameStop. https://www.reddit.com/wallstreetbets/comments/kakxrm/gme_tribe_a_story_about_how_ryan_cohen_is_about/. My fly-by-night theory of his lawyer’s possible use of the consent solicitation could have probably marinated for another day, but the thrust of my argument there was that Cohen and his attorney have been laying the groundwork to come after GameStop for a while now. And that Cohen was likely emboldened by the humiliating, lame-ass CC performance by some dude with a mid-century comic-strip sounding name that we’ll all soon know only as: The Guy With the Punchable Face Who Used to Be CEO of GameStop.
But here is where things get really interesting. This is a story in the making, Jim, for fucks sake - take notes! This Monday, on December 21, Mr. Ryan Cohen filed a revised 13D showing that last week he started buying a shit-ton of shares—starting on Tuesday December 15th—which is the day after the stock price inexplicably plunged on Monday the 14th and the very same day you were yammering on the teevee about GME being Blockbuster! Instead of listening to you, however, Cohen started buying more GME shares (super-sleuth dark pool watchers u/rgrAi and u/snowk88 noticed in real-time that there was some very large accumulation taking place), which culminated in the big reveal that Cohen purchased a total of 2,501,000 additional shares last week—500,000 of which were purchased on Friday December 18, 2020 at the price of $16.02 a share. Ryan Cohen is still the single largest shareholder of GME with 9,001,000 shares in total, taking his ownership of GME above the 10% threshold from 9.98% to 12.9%. And so he apparently thinks that the floor for his investment is $16.02 per share. Is he still buying? We’ll know soon. But yesterday seemed like a little taste of what it might look like if a large buyer steps in to prevent short sellers from manipulating all of my nervous little Rocket Children here and their delicate little paper hands.
There was another thing we learned from this 13D filing: Ryan Cohen has apparently hired a new attorney and law firm. Instead of the great Christopher Davis of Kline Kaplan, now Ryan Cohen is represented by Ryan P. Nebel, a partner with Olshan Frome Wolosky, LLP. Now, if you’re familiar with my prior ramblings, you might wonder if I was a bit confused, and maybe even a little sad, at this sudden change from my man C. Davis. And you might be a little right. But then the wonder of the internet allowed me to learn a bit about these new lawyers. And holy shit, things are about to get fun.
Now, I liked what I knew about Chris Davis and he seems like a genuine bad ass activist attorney. But the folks at Olshan Frome and Wolosky, LLP are Next Level Players and really seem tailor-made for this exact situation. First off, Olshan is ranked as the top global lawfirm for Activist Attorneys. https://www.olshanlaw.com/assets/htmldocuments/Bloomberg%20Activism%20League%20Tables%20H12020.pdf (H/t @flummoxed at stocktwits). They seem to be the go-to law firm for major proxy battles initiated by activist investors. But possibly even more important is that Olshan is the same firm that represented Hestia and Permit in their successful proxy battle earlier this year to appoint two new directors to the GME Board. I’m not going into the fine details of that, because this is already a bit of a long-form Idiot’s New Yorker article, but GameStop just went through a proxy fight last year with Activist Investors Hestia Capital and Permit Capital, which resulted in two Board seats for our shareholder buds from Hestia and Permit. So, it’s reasonable to assume that the attorneys at Olshan might know their way around GameStop at this point and where the pressure points are here.
http://www.globallegalchronicle.com/hestia-capital-and-permit-capitals-two-new-directors-to-the-gamestop-board/
https://www.olshanlaw.com/resources-mentions-HestiaCapital-PermitCapital-GameStop-BoardofDirectors-ShareholderActivism.html
And if you follow u/snowk88 over at stocktwits (@snowk88)— you’d also find a wealth of DD on how Olshan rolls when entering these activist-investor-replaces-dumbass-boards-and-CEOs type disputes. To bottom line it: they get it fucking done.
https://stocktwits.com/snowk88/message/266158534
https://stocktwits.com/snowk88/message/266155112
https://stocktwits.com/snowk88/message/266153175
But what else did we learn from the 13D? We learned that Ryan Cohen is definitely not going anywhere any time soon. Specifically, the filing notes that RC Ventures intends to continue to engage in discussions with GameStop’s board “regarding means to drive stockholder value, including through changes to the composition of the board and other corporate governance enhancements." And while RC Ventures “desires to come to an amicable resolution with [GameStop, it] will not hesitate to take any actions that it believes are necessary to protect the best interests of all stockholders.”
I really like that last part, don’t you? And although I thought his November 16th letter was pretty goddamn clear, this 13D just ratcheted up the transparency level here. In sum, Ryan Cohen has all of our backs and he’s going to replace this Board and Sherman with people that are on the level and that will help implement his vision.
And now seems like a good time to return to those “Ryan Cohen: Boy Genius” articles that were definitely NOT part of a well-coordinated pre-hostile takeover media campaign initiated earlier this year. I think there might be a few things in those articles that Mr. Cohen wanted all of us shareholders (as well as the short sellers and the Board he’s about to replace) to really and truly understand. Recall also that Cohen is not one for diversification or for playing it safe. So here’s a few choice nuggets for you to ponder:
***
Bloomberg, June 2020: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-05/chewy-founder-cashes-out-bets-on-apple-wells-fargo
· "It's too hard to find, at least for me, what I consider great ideas," he says. "When I find things I have a lot of conviction in, I go all-in."
· Cohen uses the word “conviction” a lot. He says it’s something he learned from his father, who ran a glassware importing business in Montreal where Cohen grew up. “He taught me how to block the noise from the masses,” says Cohen. “To have a point of view and have conviction and not waver.”
· He wouldn’t, however, recommend his [non-diversified] investment approach to everyone. “You need to have the temperament to block the noise,” he says. “Sometimes it feels like a roller coaster.”
· He likens his obsessive focus on building Chewy to his approach to stock picking. "I don't want to swing for a single," he says.
***
You hear that, Jim? Our man Cohen likes idioms too! But fuck those farm idioms, Jim – we’re upgrading to the Sportsball kind now. So what’s the takeaway here? I’d say that Cohen has his Eye On The Ball and that it’s time for all short sellers and the Board to Throw in The Towel because Ryan Goddamn Cohen likes to Take the Bull By The Horns and will ensure that he Hits a Homerun for shareholders that believe in his vision.
Here’s a few more things Mr. Cohen wants all of us to know:
***
Forbes, August 2020: https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2020/08/16/entrepreneur-chewy-founder-ryan-cohen-shares-his-best-advice/?sh=41e1370e5840
· “For me, each no sounded like they just didn’t understand my vision. It was frustrating at times, but never discouraging. Those ‘no’s never made me doubt my strategy – it was the opposite. I was motivated by all the rejections and they just got me fired up.”
· “I understood that thinking big was likely going to be misunderstood along the way. I’m contrarian by nature, so being misunderstood often validates what I’m doing. It wasn’t until Chewy boxes were on doorsteps across the country that the bulk of investors started to recognize our formula.”
· “[M]y biggest risk would have been not taking risk. The risk of going head-to-head against Amazon. The risk of insourcing fulfillment. The risk of building a company in Florida rather than a popular tech hub. The risk of spending $3 million a month on TV ads, more than Home Depot HD -0.1%'s budget. The risk of hiring expensive executives even though we weren’t profitable. These decisions were some of the most controversial and required me being comfortable betting against conventional wisdom, and were often contrary to the advice of my board. Suffice it to say, I was not the most popular board member.”
· “Dad never swayed when he believed in something. I never compromised my vision, regardless how many investors turned me down I was not going to give up on building Chewy into the world’s biggest online pet retailer. I love to be challenged, and I’m flexible on details, but I’m never willing to give up.”
***
Goddamn it, Ryan. I was done having children but now you’ve forced me into getting back on that train just so I can name this future child Ryan Fucking Cohen. Thanks a lot, asshole.
But to return to my point: are those the statements of a man that seems likely to walk away at this point? Or is Cohen trying to tell us all to get ready because he is going All In on this shit?
So where does this leave us? After a huge week where Cohen buys 2.5M more shares and then the SP skyrockets to $20 yesterday on that news? Well, this is where I want to tip my cap to my man Justin Dopierala over at Seeking Alpha and allow him to conclude this section. He, along with his pal Dmitriy Kozin have been pretty clear-eyed on all this shit for a while now and they both deserve some credit. And I know I gave my main man Justin a bit of a hard time in my last novella, but the dude is sharp as hell and helped a lot of us see the forest through the trees here. And you should also definitely invite him to join your poker nights (seriously: check out the dude’s tweet in response to our own Rod Alzmann’s introduction of the #WeWantCohen hashtag right after the Q3 call debacle). https://twitter.com/DOMOCAPITAL/status/1336446055685230592. You have no comment on a potential takeover involving Ryan Cohen, Justin after your hour-long googly-eyed call together? Can’t believe you’re just preemptively leaving the WSJ and Bloomberg hanging like that. Justin, I love you dude, but if I’m holding pocket Kings I’m folding after that tweet because that twinkle in your eye lets me know you’re about to drop two Aces on my ass.
Anyway. Here is what our man Dopierala thinks might happen here soon (and he called this way back on November 17th- and sorry - no links here, per the mods, as apparently no Alpha must ever be Sought from these parts):
I think a very likely outcome at this point is a majority slate next shareholder meeting where Cohen takes over BOD and then makes himself CEO. A majority slate proxy battle would require all institutions to call in shares and would force a squeeze.
We’re intrigued, Justin. Please continue:
If Ryan Cohen successfully negotiates a purchase price with the Board then the shareholders will have to vote on it. Unlike the proxy battle where Hestia and Permit were running a minority slate of directors, an offer to purchase GameStop would force institutions like Vanguard and Blackrock to call in their shares. By doing so, the shorts would be forced to close out their positions and GameStop would finally have the greatest short squeeze of all-time. Ironically, Cohen could use this opportunity to sell all of his shares and use the proceeds to entirely fund the acquisition of GameStop going down as the first person in history to acquire a billion dollar company... for absolutely nothing. In fact, his acquisition price would be less than zero.
And now is when I get to speculate on what I think is going to happen here. But I do not necessarily think Cohen is going to put an offer to buy GME to take private. That would definitely trigger a MOASS, but I’m not sure I see it given the attorneys he’s hired and his recent buys up to $16 and the amount of cash that would take. Like Dopierala’s first comment, though, I think Cohen is going to nominate directors to replace nearly the entire Board of Directors with a vote happening at the annual meeting and once that Board is in place, they’ll appoint Cohen as CEO. And as Justin notes, if he nominates a majority slate of directors, shares will have to be called in to vote. And this vote and proxy battle will make the prior minority slate Hesita/Permit battle, and the tiny short squeeze that took place when that happened, look tame by comparison.
Now everyone: get your calendars out. Because the date to nominate directors here is in Mid-March, and my super-smart corporate lawyer buds inform me that it’s standard practice to file about 7-10 days prior. So, if this actually happening, we should be seeing something on this by early March.
But even though early March is now the mark on the wall, today’s insane price action caused me to think about all of this a bit harder and speculate a bit more. And a major h/t to my buds on the stocktwits board, especially u/rgrAi (@amarbar) for all the sharp analysis on this. But if you were Ryan Cohen and you knew this company was hugely undervalued and you had a high level of CONVICTION here and also knew you needed shareholder votes to sweep out these dumbasses and implement your vision—then how would you play this with the short interest here as crazy as it is? I’d keep buying. Why? Well, lots of reasons, you smart alecks.
First, so I have more guaranteed votes (duh?). Second, so that when the building starts burning and short hedge funds run for the exits they find that a mild-mannered Millennial with super-good ideas has sealed off all the doors and windows. That’s gruesomely delicious, isn’t it? Why else, CPT? Well, finally, and maybe most importantly, because I would want to excite and delight all my fellow shareholders by triggering a slow-burn short squeeze, raising the SP significantly, so that I can once again make the point (as he did in the Nov 16 letter) that the incompetent management that caused a HUGE drop in SP following that utterly incompetent Q3 call and the shelf registration, had nothing to do with the SP increase that again happened once Cohen announced his intent and started buying. Not the console cycle, not the cost containment measures, not the buybacks and not the early debt reduction. Nope: rightly or wrongly, shareholders will see Ryan Cohen buying shares and the corresponding SP increase and everyone—especially all new buyers who are delighted at their good fortune and swept up by Ryan Cohen Fever 2021—will start getting #WeWantCohen tattoos on their ass they’ll be so happy. And all of us, newly enriched by Ryan Cohen’s Big Canadian Balls and tactical brilliance, will crawl over glass to vote for him over The Boomer Artist Formally Known As GameStop’s CEO. I could be very wrong on this last point in particular, but if we start seeing 13Ds drop here shortly, things should get very fun very quickly.
Part 4: A Return to Our Short-Squeeze-to-Da-Moon Discussion: Who’s Side Are You Fucking On, Jim?
Now, Jim, given the fast friendship we’re creating here, and all we’ve been through over the past 5000 words, I hesitate in bringing this up. But we’ve all seen the video, Jim. You know the one I’m talking about. Yes, the one where you actually tell the truth about how short selling hedge funds manipulate the market to knock down the price of perfectly good securities that many hard-working people invest in—many normal-ass people all assuming they wont ever have to Point Where On The Dolly The Invisible Hand of the Economy Touched Them. But that’s not life now is it Jim? And fuck those poor-ass rubes for not knowing how to play the game with you sophisticated Masters of the Universe, amirite?
https://www.reddit.com/dashpay/comments/93evx4/jim_cramer_reveals_dirty_tricks_short_sellers_use/
https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2007/03/20/cramer-market-manipulato
So where are you in this whole GME/Cohen story, Jim? You candidly (gleefully?) acknowledge that a prime strategy that shorts deploy is to spread negative rumors that are then amplified by Big Smart Trustworthy Financial Media Titans like yourself to shake out unsophisticated retail players like my Rocket Kids here—who because of their tiny paper hands and you mean short selling brutes often subsist on paste and paste alone.
So for this particular security, are you the one helping with the manipulation and actively creating the “new truth” or are you just one of the Useful Idiots that these short sellers use to manipulate with an anodyne, TV media-ready comparison like: GameStop Is The Next Blockbuster? And how in the fuck does this fit into your Think Young(TM) project, Jim? Because if there is one thing that we over at WSB fucking hate, it’s a bunch of Manipulative Short Selling Boomer Fuckwads. Why on earth would a hip Young Thinker like you want to be included in that crew, Jim?
And I know we’re all friends here now, Jim, but I need to push back a bit on some of what you said in that video in such a cavalier whatareyagonnado manner. So if I understand you, short and distort and fomenting negative reactions from retail players based on deliberately false narratives is illegal, but still easy as fuck to do "because the SEC doesn't understand it." But you fucking do understand it, Jim! So why are you helping those short and distorters break the law here? Why are you being such an obtuse dumbshit? Just check out what happens to the borrow rate and short selling every time there is any good news for GME:
https://stocktwits.com/Slantedangles/message/264519950 (h/t @slantedangles). This manipulation isn't just happening with GME; it is happening everywhere. It’s baked into the cake. And that is pretty fucked up that we all just accept it because whatareyagonnado.
I think that one thing that those of us who truly do Think Young(TM) have a hard time understanding is at what point in your lives do you Boomers all finally come to realize that it’s maybe time to stop playing the game like you have been? What point do you finally have enough where doing the right thing matters more than getting paid? Maybe start by telling the truth more often—and maybe don’t go out of your way to help those corrupt-ass hedge fund managers who continually fuck over average people merely because they were stupid enough to believe you all. What contempt you Masters of the Universe have for all of them—for all of us. There is a bigger story here on GME and this out-of-control short interest (naked shorting, counterfeit shares) http://counterfeitingstock.com/CS2.0/CounterfeitingStock.html than even Ryan Cohen and the inevitable short squeeze we’re about to witness here. And it begins and ends with people like you and Melvin Capital and Bank of America not giving a fuck about the rules while thinking you’re smarter than the rest of us who do—but who lack power to do anything about it. And you know what? Maybe you are smarter than us. You certainly know how to play this game pretty well, as that video shows. But if I know my old school 1980s movies like I think I do, this is usually the part of the story where the rag-tag kids from across the tracks come over to show you hubristic rich fuckheads what happens when you fuck a stranger in the ass.
Now I myself have never dabbled in pacifism, Jim, so this isn’t too much of a stretch for me, but seeing that video of yours and seeing the insane short interest and all the manipulation here makes me want to burn the whole corrupt system to the ground—while barricading the doors to trap in those arrogant-ass short sellers who lie and cheat and distort to profit off average people. And though I’m certain that this larger battle is not driving him, maybe that result is one that Ryan Cohen wouldn’t mind too. Though he’s a polite Canadian and would probably just let everyone know that he’s not really mad, just disappointed. But me? I’m an Angry American and I say: Block the fucking doors and windows and light that shit up.
So maybe this epistle will be useful for your Think Young(TM) project and cause you to reflect a bit more on what’s really going on out there with this whole GME thing and the likely illegal shorting that has driven the short percentage of float to these insane levels, drawing in new retail shorts too stupid to know what’s even happening. Or maybe it wont cause you to reflect in the slightest (count me as one of those cynical types that see your overtures to WSB as a transparent play for greater market share from the Young Crowd since your old-ass audience is dying and/or switching to bonds). But in a few months when all the Billy Ray Valentines and Louis Winthorpes assembled here are toasting each other in stupid shirts on a white-sand beach somewhere, we do not want you to look back on your knee-jerk boomer-ass dismissal of GME and your Useful Idiot blathering with that same tinge of regret and longing you feel when you look at a pre-Client 9 picture of you and your old roomie: warm-toes-and-hosiery-enthusiast E. Spitzer, Esq.
In conclusion: GME = Blockbuster comparisons are for Simps and Corrupt Short-and-Distorters. Don’t be like them, Jim. And to my Rocket Children: the only weapon we wield in this stupid game is Diamond Hands with a float like this. Toughen the fuck up.
And Happy Holidays everyone.
--CPT Hubbard
TL/DR: Jim Cramer likes farm-based idioms and apparently being a useful idiot to scummy short selling hedge funds. DD on the GME turnaround is solid and overleveraged short sellers should be shitting themselves. Ryan Cohen, our polite, hard-working Canadian benefactor is about to rip all our fucking faces off and trigger a MOASS. Probably even by early March, if that time is good for you (he’ll text before he comes). And fuck infinite regress: It’s rockets all the way down here. 🚀🚀🚀 Now: diamond hands, motherfuckers.
**This is a shitpost and is only to be used as investment and life advice for Mr. Jim Cramer, Esq.

28f/29m been together for like 4 years I think.
I love this guy to death but when I say he is lazy, that is seriously a huge fucking understatement and doesnt even shed an ounce of light on the actual problem. Hes also a gaming junkie-like the worst of their kind. For example, when a game is being released, he waits up until midnight to purchase the game (no matter how expensive) and will binge on it for weeks straight while hardly sleeping. During this time you will be lucky to get so much as a "hello" out of him without him getting pissed for you disrupting him. BUT still expects people to literally cater to his every need so that he doesnt have to get up to do anything. I dont entertain this because I'm not his fucking mother.
Anyways, a year and a half ago I had to give him an ultimatum. You either get a fucking job and start supporting yourself OR you can leave and go mooch off someone else. He chose to get a job. Lasted a month before he quit. Found another job 2 months later, lasted 2 weeks and quit. He was unemployed for 11 months when he finally landed this job in September. Assassins Creed was just released, what, 2 weeks ago and he started calling out every. single. day. Started staying up until 4am playing his game, would sleep until 8-10am and then be right back at it while asking me to cook and cater to him.
Yesterday I unplugged and hid his xbox. I knew he was going to call out and jump on his game. As I suspected, that's exactly what he tried doing. He picked a fight with me. Said he hated working and I was forcing him to waste away his life. Claimed he was depressed, though that's the first I've heard of it. He then tells me to get off my lazy ass and do something for once. I told him to leave. He takes my car because his is "on its last leg"- his words. Hes not in work clothes so I know he wasnt going to work. I texted him and said "If you arent going to work, bring my car back. And if you plan on flaking on this job like the rest of them, you will not be using my car or my internet. Make your choice." He texted back saying "You trying to mother me all the time is a fucking turn off. You holding things against me all the time also makes you a fucking asshole."
AITA?

Come gather ‘round GME management wherever you roam. And admit that the waters around you have grown and accept it that soon you’ll be drenched to the bone. If your time to you is worth saving, then you better start swimming or you’ll sink like a stone, for the times they are a-changin’.
Story time for the GME crew. All those who are certain tHis iS bLoCkBusTer or the paper hands that sold yesterday can just keep scrolling. We wish you the best of luck in the best of all possible worlds: this one, dear Pangloss.
**I’ve tried to submit this three times now and the moderators keep rejecting it. Maybe because I use too many naughty words? I guess I’ll try to clean that up a bit, which runs counter to all my instincts.
Did we have a good day Wednesday after that Q3 call? No, we did not. Do you know who lost over $20M (at least on paper) yesterday? Mr. Ryan Cohen. How do you think he felt about that CC and that inexplicable shelf registration that is, as one stocktwits commentator put it, a “poor man’s poison pill” and as obvious of a FU to Cohen and shareholders that the Board could have possibly designed? Do you think he was happy to see that?
I think he was thrilled to see it.
And now I’m going to tell you why.
This is a long post, so I’m going to give the TL/DR sum up for you Paste Eating Rocket Kids, and this will serve as a warning that there are, in fact, a lot of words that you may choose to read or not. So if I still see one goddamn comment about this being a lot of words and where’s the rockets maaaaan, I might just transport myself through this internet connection and [removed to satisfy the delicate sensibilities of the robot moderators].
So here’s the TL/DR: I believe that Cohen is executing a plan to take out the GME Board. And I think that Sherman just walked right into Cohen’s trap because he’s a dumb, selfish Boomer with a huge ego and a Broken Brain. And Cohen is going to be a legend because of it after he executes this plan, triggers the MOASS, and takes control of GME to convert it to a tech-first gaming juggernaut.
Now, if you’re in on this GME shit, you likely know the outlines of the story here. But here’s a good link to refresh your memory about why we’re all here:
https://www.reddit.com/wallstreetbets/comments/k4csaa/the_real_greatest_short_burn_of_the_century_part/
And for further background, my recent post about the battle here between George Sherman, out-of-touch Hired Gun B&M Boomer CEO with the Boomer-est of all possible Boomer names, and Ryan Cohen, Boy Genius, Actual Good Guy, and Man With The Chewy-fication Plan: https://www.reddit.com/wallstreetbets/comments/k9apx5/gme_q3_call_thoughts_on_the_clash_between_cohen/
So: are we ready to start READING and THINKING, children? Good.
Now what were you doing in the summer of 2020? I don’t give a shit what you were doing. But I do give a shit about what Ryan Cohen was doing. And there is a decent amount of evidence that Ryan Cohen spent the summer of 2020 hiring a bad ass lawyer and crafting a pretty solid plan to wrest control of a struggling Mall-based gaming retailer from its out of touch Boomer Board and CEO so he can turn it into an ecommerce juggernaut like his baby Chewy. And I think we are about to enter the next phase of that plan here shortly.
But before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s first all get acquainted with Christopher P. Davis, Esquire, the attorney listed on each of the 13Ds filed by RC Ventures.
Chris Davis, Activist Attorney Extraordinaire and His Successful Use of the Consent Solicitation to Remove Dipshit Boards/CEOs
To cut to the chase, Chris Davis (who is definitely NOT the same dude playing first base for the Orioles) is a badass NYC attorney recently recognized as one of the nation’s premier shareholder activist lawyers. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/kleinberg-kaplan-partner-chris-davis-recognized-by-chambers-usa-as-leading-shareholder-activist-lawyer-301090571.html.
So what was Chris Davis doing in the summer of 2020? So glad you asked. He was celebrating a major win he helped engineer on behalf of a “first time activist Michael Gorzynski” for a wholesale replacement of the sitting Board at HC2 Holdings, Inc (sounds fancy). He helped engineer this takeover via a “high stakes consent solicitation rather than the more typical proxy contest.”
Learn more about this here: https://www.kkwc.com/insights/kleinberg-kaplan-advises-mg-capital-management-in-its-consent-solicitation-and-successful-settlement-with-hc2-holdings/
Here’s a few more links if you care to learn more about that and how it all went down (spoiler alert: the activists settled for two seats on the Board and then the new Board very quickly ousted the dipshit Boomer CEO, Phil Falcone)
http://www.shareholderforum.com/shfk/Library/20200611_II.htm
http://www.shareholderforum.com/access/Library/20200219_Deal.htm
In sum: if you look into Chris Davis, you can see that this guy is dialed the fuck in and knows how to get activist shareholders a win—even in very challenging circumstances.
The Summer of ’20 Out-of-the-Blue Boy Genius Media Campaign and Cohen’s 13D Filing in August
I’m going to return to the “consent solicitation” thing at the bottom and why I think it matters here, but I don’t want to lose momentum on the timeline and evidence. And the consent solicitation is Advanced Level Shit that I barely understand anyway. But I think it’s likely to be goddamn important so I’ll get to it.
Now, where were we? Oh yes, the inexplicable media campaign.
RC Ventures files its 13D on August 18th announcing that Ryan Cohen is now the proud owner of 5.8M shares or 9% (later increased to 9.8%) of That Cluttered Video Game Geekery You Used to Pass on Your Way to Jamba Juice or Wherever People Go in Malls. Uh, ok man. But then this is when the SP of this Future Blockbuster™ starts its real run as more catch on that Cohen has taken a huge stake and that is also part of the portfolio of Mr. Big Short himself and a bunch of institutions and they actually have cash and are definitely not going bankrupt and oh have you heard about the insane short percentage of float and the upcoming console cycle that invariably corresponds to a sharp spike in SP? Well have you? But to return to the point: RC was and is the largest shareholder.
But prior to the date Cohen filed his 13D, there is a renewed media campaign focused on Ryan Cohen, Ecommerce Billionaire Genius who built Chewy, kicked Amazon’s ass, and then sold it for $3.35B way back in the heady mask-free days of ‘17. Why the sudden re-emergence of Mr. Cohen in the summer of 2020 in such a prominent way with this glowing media campaign about a guy who sold a very successful pet supply business over three years ago? Fawning media exposure like that doesn’t just happen (or not usually). It’s engineered. Or, more charitably, helped along by people who know people and can introduce those people to Interesting Topics to Write About. And my guess is that Chris Davis, bad ass activist attorney based in New York City, Knows People and had a little something to do with it.
Here are the links to all of the glowing media pieces starting in the summer of 2020 (all absolutely worth a read to get to know who this guy is and what makes him tick):
June 5 (Bloomberg) https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-05/chewy-founder-cashes-out-bets-on-apple-wells-fargo
August 4 (CNBC) https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/04/chewy-co-founder-ryan-cohen-this-is-the-side-hustle-id-start-now.html
August 16 (Forbes) https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2020/08/16/entrepreneur-chewy-founder-ryan-cohen-shares-his-best-advice/?sh=41e1370e5840
October 15 (Business Insider) https://www.businessinsider.com/chewy-ryan-cohen-warren-buffett-lessons-apple-investment-2020-10
And a lot of the speculation I’m wheeling and dealing here was introduced by our man Justin Dopierala at Seeking Alpha way back in a September article not too long after the 13D filings: https://seekingalpha.com/article/4373819-gamestop-chewys-founder-ryan-cohen-finds-whats-next
But for now let’s “put a pin” on Mr. Dopierala, as George Sherman or some other Corporate Robot Dipshit might say, as he will be important to the story here again soon.
The November 16th “F U Old Man” Letter
If you haven’t read this ballsy letter Cohen wrote to the Board last month, you really should. We’ll wait for you. https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/RC_Ventures_Letter_to_GameStop.pdf
OK, ready again?
I don’t want to question Cohen’s possible writing abilities or give away too many tricks of the lawyer trade here (AI should take care of that in about a decade), but that letter was 100% written by Chris Davis. I’d literally bet my entire portfolio on that fact alone. That’s why you hire gunners like him. The letter has that has deliciously direct and aggressive lawyerly tone—the kind you use when you want to send a very clear message to some asshole without spelling it all out. I fucking love this letter. It was one of the main reasons I put the rest of my chips into the GME basket. I doubt I’m alone there.
And what did we learn from this letter? Well: a lot. But I’m going to focus on a few quick things. First, we learned that over the Summer, Cohen had “private conversations” with the Board and Sherman about the need to pivot toward becoming a technology-driven business with a new strategic vision. And he calls out Sherman and the Board directly for lacking this vision, using Mainstreet-Friendly pejoratives like “c-suite” and “boardroom.” He takes a direct shot at Hired Gun Sherman’s Boomer-Ass Business Record (Advanced Auto Parts! Cool!) and his obvious bent towards what he knows: Boring Ass Low Margin B&M Bullshit Companies and straight-up calls him a dumb-ass old man (“twentieth-century focus!”) who Just Doesn’t Fucking Get It. He alleges that he and the Board have presided over “massive value destruction” (almost makes it sound intentional, or at least grossly negligent) and have never taken “full accountability” for all their fuck-ups and intransigence.
Some folks have suggested that, sure, Cohen wants change and yeah he seemed like he had a bit of a bee in his bonnet, but if he doesn’t get some good movement in those areas, he’ll just sell his 6.5M shares to tank the stock and take his ball and go home to play with his dog, who loves him No Matter What. In this interpretation, the letter is just Cohen Asking To Speak To The Manager and then if the response is not to his liking, well then, He Will Just Take His Business Elsewhere, thankyouverymuch.
I do not think that is what is going on here. Not with Ryan Cohen and Chris Davis. This letter is Ryan Cohen Crossing The Fucking Rubicon.
He did the honorable thing and took his vision to the Board and Sherman. How genuine he was in that effort, I have no idea, as my thesis is that he has had a takeover plan in place since he hired Chris Davis. But whatever the initial motivations, it was the honorable thing to do to discuss his vision with Sherman and the Board before he and Chris Davis eventually rip their fucking hearts out (which, spoiler: I believe he is getting ready to do as we speak).
Reasonable minds can disagree here, but I do not think you write a letter like that unless you have a plan to handle all possible responses to it. He just torched his collegial relationship, such as there ever was or could have been, with that CEO and that Board. He flaunts Chewy’s world-class infrastructure and market cap versus their lame ass sub-$1B Dying Mall Store Bullshit. And he makes a very public rejection of a seat on the board (and the reason given: because you fuckheads would just ignore me and drive me nuts while you continue doing Dumb Boomer Shit with my money all goddamn day), which made it 100% clear to me that this is Cohen Serving Goddamn Notice that unless they get serious about the scope of their turnaround and start listening to him and convey this new direction to shareholders asap, that he’s coming for them. He even alludes to his own turnaround plan but then tells them to do their jobs like the Big Capable Adults they are.
And then Cohen attaches this letter to an amended 13D to ensure that all shareholders see it and also see that he still holds all of his shares. Within hours, the WSJ had an article on this: https://www.wsj.com/articles/gamestops-new-billionaire-investor-calls-for-tech-centric-makeover-11605565458?mod=hp_lista_pos5.
And guess what’s neat? If you are an interested shareholder or a habitual reader of the Wall Street Journal (I, sir, am not) and you saw that article, you might have wondered what this Cohen guy is all about? You know, Mortimer, the dog guy—made billions. And thanks to the recent out-of-the-blue marketing campaign that was definitely NOT engineered by Chris Davis as part of a takeover plan, your subsequent Google searches, and the recent articles they produced, likely made you think: this guy is a fucking whiz kid and I like the cut of his jib.
Cohen Quietly Meets With Funds/Investors
In the weeks leading up to earnings, sharp observers also notice something: Ryan Cohen is meeting with various large shareholders for some reason. There were several reports of this on stocktwits (links are lost to eternity in that cluttered hellhole unless some astute commentator can find and link in the comments), so some salt is a necessary accompaniment here (I like to cite my evidence), but we have at least one confirmed meeting with the head of DOMO Capital: Mr. Justin Dopierala. Now, Justin happens to be a pro-GME writer (and a sharp one at that) at Seeking Alpha. You know, that paywall website where people purporting to know what they’re talking about get paid peanuts to write purposefully inane articles for maximum clicks from other idiots? That one. Well Justin is one of the good ones there, and DOMO Capital is also a large shareholder of GME. (Conflict of interest, you say? Shut yo’ mouth!).
On November 30, at 9:19 AM (the payin’ for inanity crew can go see this – the comment is still there), Dopierala made the following comment on another SA article:
***
“I've recently had the pleasure of having a 1 on 1 video meeting with Ryan Cohen that lasted over an hour.
Going forward, I no longer feel comfortable commenting on the topic (of Ryan Cohen), so please understand when I do not respond to any of your questions on this specific topic.
Ryan is a very intelligent man, and I remain as bullish as ever on GameStop's future."
***
So what can we extrapolate from this?
Ryan Cohen likely reached out to DOMO Capital/Dopierala to discuss his strategic vision. I do not know if he announced his plans directly, or what the purpose of the call was (see the very below on how I think this all could relate to a consent solicitation to recall the board) but I’m sure, at the very least, the text, if not the subtext, was heavy as fuck on that Zoom call. And why do I think Cohen contacted him and not the other way around? Because Dopierala, a writer for SA that I’m sure would love to publish even an anodyne Q&A with Ryan Cohen to Get Him All the Clicks, didn’t get an on-the-record interview. Not even some softball about whether his dog prefers his Apple investment decision or his Wells Fargo one. No: he got the concession (assuming he did) to simply acknowledge that a discussion took place (buried in a comment on some other dude’s SA article), but he explicitly says he’s not going to talk about anything related to Cohen going forward. No sir, no how. But if Cohen is just a regular old fellow shareholder (Cue Ryan: “And Justin, please: the pleasure is all mine”), then why the fuck are you making a cagy comment and acting like you Have A Big Fucking Secret and Oh God I Wish I Could Tell You Something But I Just Cant! with that comment, Justin? The Man Doth Protesting and Shit, I say.
Here’s the article link for you Seeking Alpha Super Sleuths: https://seekingalpha.com/article/4380313-gamestop-likely-already-digital-revenue-sharing-sony-up-to-10
And even yesterday, Dopierala can’t help himself. In a discussion about Cohen’s tweet yesterday (you saw the tweet right? What kind of GME-to-da-moon! investor are you anyway? https://twitter.com/ryancohen/status/1336775515101949963), Dopierala gets all Jim Carey As The Riddler on us in a response to “EricinPDX,” (some dude living in the Portland Airport) who writes:
EricInPDX
I take his tweet as a total negative .. the Jim Cramer thing.
I have no position at the moment.
Our man Dopierala then responds “then you are wrong yet right.”
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4393394-gamestop-cohen-right-to-downplay-ps5-xbox-series-mistakes-core-digital-problem
So I think he’s having a little fun talking like a slightly less backwardsy Yoda saying: yeah, that Cohen tweet was obviously negative because he’s highlighting how fucked GME seems after that Q3 call (and also, check out how Chewy’s doin’ in that clip!). But it’s also not negative because it means Cohen is about to rip Sherman’s still-beating heart out and Shock And Awe our asses with a vote. And I, Justin Dopierala, head of DOMO Capital, can be a little wink winky about this because, oh I don’t know, on our hour long call Cohen maybe used puppetry to act out “Bryan Flohen’s” plan to call a vote and supplant the Bad Man “Gerald Shorman” while asking “Would You Theoretically Be With Bryan Flohen?” with a few well-timed arch of the eyebrows. Or he got his explicit consent to his plan (see below re consent solicitations). We just do not know.
In conclusion: We know that Cohen met with shareholders in the period between the day he sent that letter and the date of the Q3 call. We just do not know what was said. But we do know that Dopierella, either out of a sense of journalistic ethics (Stop laughing you guys! Seriously!) or out of concern about possible SEC lookie-loos, decides to be up-front about his inability to even utter the name Ryan Cohen from now on.
General George “Custard” Sherman’s Lame-Ass Empire Striking Back
Let’s recall the letter now. I’m guessing a rich, egotistical pampered-ass hired gun Boomer CEO named George goddamn Sherman didn’t like someone who reminds him of his asshole kids talking to him like that.
We all know what happened next: the Q3 “Say Omnichannel One More Time Motherfucker!” call. As I mentioned in my prior post on this (link above if you care), Sherman pulled the boomer-ist of boomer moves in an act of self-sabotage that is likely to be studied in business courses once this whole story plays out. You see, that letter that Cohen/Davis sent was a trap. And Sherman and the Board and their Big Fucking Corporate Brains clearly lack an inner Admiral Ackbar.
Cohen sent that letter three weeks before the earnings call. And demanded that they conduct *another* strategic review and present a plan to shareholders outlining how they are going to fully pivot into a new technology focused company. Cohen knows they have no intention of doing this. He’s apparently been hectoring them all summer about it. And I’m guessing he talked to Sherman enough to know that the dude is just not on the level (as all of us who listened to that fumbling bland-ass corporate caveat-speak on that call got to experience as well). So he knows, like we all did, that Q3 earnings are likely to be middling at best. But unlike me, who clearly thought that the one way out of this for Sherman and the Board was to give some exciting guidance on Q4, maybe even a share buyback (as they are authorized to do) and some more info on the Microsoft deal, likely revenue, other possible similar deals with Nintendo and Sony. I don’t know, but Something. No, Cohen and Davis are way smarter than me and know Sherman a bit better and probably assumed that Sherman is likely to whiff on a response to his letter. And lo and behold, whiff he does. Nothing. We get no response to the letter and no real plan to transform GME into a tech-driven gaming company (Sherman: “but, but…I said Omnichannel you guys! What do you want from me beyond bland corporate robot speak!?”).
But what else happens? Sherman and the Board inexplicably authorize a shelf registration for up to $100M worth of ATM shares. This from a company that just bought back shares, is authorized to buy back more, paid down debt early—and now is about to be flush with Sweet, Sweet New Console Cash. What in the everlasting fuck?
And in case you were inclined to give Sherman and the Board the benefit of the doubt here, the reason was simple and straightforward and included within the S3 filing itself. And that is: “Hey Cohen: Fuck Off. And if we have to dilute our shareholders to get you to fuck off, by God that’s the kind of shortsighted ME-first move that got George Sherman where he is today! So go find another company to hassle you ungrateful Millennial Start Up Dog Store Bro and let the adults handle this.”
Here is the provision in the S-3 (under the heading: Anti-Takeover Provisions):
Authorized But Unissued Shares
The authorized but unissued shares of common stock and preferred stock are available for future issuance without stockholder approval. These additional shares may be utilized for a variety of corporate purposes, including future public offerings to raise additional capital, corporate acquisitions and employee benefit plans. The existence of authorized but unissued shares of common stock and preferred stock could render more difficult or discourage an attempt to obtain control of us by means of a proxy contest, tender offer, merger or otherwise.
So instead of crushing the call and giving some dope guidance about Q4 and trigger the MOASS so we all revere the name George Sherman for All Eternity, Sherman and the Board make a lame-ass move to try to protect their jobs and--lo and behold!--THIS is the main takeaway of the report and call. And what drives the precipitous dive in SP AH and yesterday. A dive so steep that it removes well over $100M in market cap in value, the kinda-lame amount that you’re trying to stick Cohen with (and dilute all of us) so you can keep your Big Fancy-Man Job and the bonus you’re counting on so you and the misses can jet off to Sandals Jamaica like you always do. George: Whoops? Knew we should have gone with a higher number! A lame ass “poor man’s poison pill” as u/snowk88 on stocktwits put it (shout out because he also helped me flush out this thesis a bit and clued me in on Chris Davis’s work for MC).
So back to how I started this missive, back when we were all younger and maybe a bit more naïve, right? Anyway. Yesterday Ryan Cohen lost over $20M on paper because George Sherman thought the best way to handle that Punk-Ass Millennial was to use shareholders as a hostage in any possible fight over control of this company he’s been building his entire—oh, eh, the last 18 months because he’s just a hired gun that goes where the money is and waits for his ka-ching moment before splitting because who gives a fuck he’s George Sherman and You’re Not. But guess what happens when you do that? (Hand down, George: you’ve had your turn). You ENRAGE the shareholders who you want to have your back and vote for you in any possible proxy fight or takeover offer! What strategery! You must have been involved in planning the Iraq war, George.
But guess who was likely laughing their ass off yesterday at their colossal good fortune at this misstep? Ryan Cohen and Chris Davis. Because now Sherman has opened the door even wider than it was before and made it that much easier for Cohen to get the votes and kick down his fucking door.
And yesterday, to no one’s surprise, the SP falls almost 20% and even Jim Fucking Cramer piles on and tells all his braindead Boomer TV watchers that this is The Next Blockbuster like all the other Super Sophisticated Analysts out there.
And now we see the #WeWantCohen and #InstallCohen hashtags (which you all should consider using frequently if you dig all this and think Sherman needs to go).
What are you thinking if you’re Ryan Cohen? Take your ball and go home time? Or: maybe that it’s time to Show George Sherman that You Do Not Fuck With a Super Nice Guy With Really Good Ideas That Are Usually Respectfully Presented (Unless You Piss Me Off) Like Ryan Goddamn Cohen?
I’m thinking it’s the latter. Taking all of this, I think Cohen and Chris Davis have been planning some kind of takeover, possibly even via consent solicitation like Davis did in his MC matter, since the summer and that George Sherman’s ironic attempt to save his own skin is about to backfire stupendously to help Cohen lock in the votes he needs. And it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy—excuse me—I mean: Smug Asshole.
Epilogue: The Consent Solicitation
Ed: the consent solicitation is not likely in play here. But Cohen is definitely still coming for Sherman and Co - we just don't know exactly how yet.
Now, just what in the hell is a consent solicitation and why does it matter? I confess that I didn’t know shit about this until I started READING ALL THE WORDS, but our friends at theactivistinvestor.com have some useful information to help those of us with tiny little baby brains understand what it is and why it may be relevant here (relevant excerpts below, but it you really want to geek out on this shit, I would recommend clicking the link, reading the words and THINKING BIG THOUGHTS). And also, hoping that some folks can respond in comments to help flush this out further because it’s late and I’ve already written too many words.
But, before I drop some k-n-o knowledge from our friends at theactivistinvestor.com, just to remind you: GameStop is a Delaware Corporation.
Now imagine being magically whisked away to…Delaware! (Hi. I’m in Delaware).
*******
From: http://www.theactivistinvestor.com/The_Activist_InvestoConsent_Solicitations.html
[Ed: removed quoted text] *****
CPT Hubbard here again. I’ll release you momentarily. But study those steps a bit and ponder where Cohen might be in that process. And also recall that we know that Cohen had an “off the record” meeting with our man Dopierala from DOMO Capital and we have no idea what they talked about. Could Cohen have been getting shareholders consent? No idea. But it certainly seems possible. If that is the case, the 60 day clock is ticking. Which means that, assuming Dopierala was stop #1 (probably doubtful, but it’s the one data point we have), we should know something by at least late January if Cohen is actually initiating a consent solicitation on this incompetent Board and probably a lot closer to mid-January (Sorry Jan call holders) since I assume Cohen started reaching out around the time he sent that letter on Nov 16th.
To which I say to Cohen: Little old me and my 20,000 shares consent! We consent most emphatically, sir. And no one will ever accuse you, Mr. Cohen, of not seeking consent. You may retain this for your records.
To conclude, Cohen is Young, Scrappy and Hungry and He’s Not Throwing Away His Shot. And Fuck George Sherman.
“I’M FINISHED”
**To be clear: this missive is for information purposes only and I would advise against following my example in any way, shape or form, as this pandemic has quite plainly knocked a screw loose if I'm here writing novelas to a bunch of Paste-Eating Rocket Kids.

All good things must come to an end and how they end will either be with a whimper or a bang. In Arkham Knights case it kind of ends with both and I did not think that could be. To me for every good thing I liked about Arkham Knight there was something I disliked that prevented it from becoming my personal favorite Arkham game. Let me start off with the pros: First these graphics are incredible and still hold up five years later. Which is even more impressive considering this was still in the early years of the PS4/XBOX ONE generation. Gotham City feels like it was taken straight from the comics and aesthetic wise its a weird, but cool combination of old and new. One section of the city is filled with classic architecture while another looks like it was plucked straight out of Time Square with its neon build boards and lighting. But that doesn’t mean there is time for leisure because with the city evacuated all that is left are thugs and the militia run by the new villain called Arkham Knight.
I praise how easy it is to access side missions, just a spin of the wheel and you can select who to bring to justice next. You will have to reach a certain percentage of the story as a requirement and that was the right call. It allows you to take a break from the heavy story moments and believe me this is a heavy story. Every Arkham game IMO outdoes itself narrative wise. Last warning, spoilers incoming because there is no way to talk about this game without talking about it. It turns out Batman along with four other civilians have been infected with Jokers blood, it turns out it messes with a persons psyche and will eventually become the Joker without a cure. Add a dose of fear gas in Batman’s system and now he is hallucinating the Joker, voiced again by Mark Hamill. Some have noticed that Bruce never addresses or talks to Joker and that is because Joker’s dialogue is Bruce’s inner doubts and insecurities. Seriously go on YouTube and really listen to what he is saying you’ll notice it too. Sometimes he will just flat out say Bruce’s methods are just wrong. When you arrest Chief Underhill Joker explains how he will become another criminal. When you (finally) lock up the Riddler he says my favorite line: “Beat him up, lock him up. That’s the best medicine” be honest you know he’s right. There is also Barbra’s “suicide” which had me in shock and then there’s the mystery of who the Arkham Knight is, and it is pretty obvious. Kind of disappointing really. Wouldn’t it have been cooler if we never find out who the Knight is? Alfred tries so hard to uncover his identity only to end up short and not knowing is something Bruce can’t handle. As a long time reader as Batman comics trust me when I say that “not knowing” is one of the many things that he hates.
When you need a break from the story there are side missions to seek out like stopping Two-Face from robbing the banks, stopping Hush from bankrupting Wayne Enterprises, liberate Gotham from Militia forces and several DLC missions that wrap up some loose ends with Ra’s Al Ghul and Mr. Freeze.
My personal favorites were chasing Firefly and Man-Bat. Man-Bat came out of left field and while he doesn’t have a real boss fight, the thrill is in the chase. Firefly also doesn’t have a boss fight, you just have to keep up with him which does make sense. If I was facing Batman and had a jetpack I too would get the hell out of there. And since there is no avoiding it lets talk about the bosses. It’s pretty clear Origins had the best bosses in the franchises as in Arkham Knight they are underwhelming. I mean c’mon you don’t even fight Deathstroke hand to hand! Could you imagine the possibilities if Rocksteady went all out on a Deathstroke vs Batman rematch. I did enjoy Killer Croc because you’re teaming up with Nightwing and Scott Porter nails the charismatic/over confidant personality of Dick Grayson.
Crispin Freeman is back as Lynns and he is an absolute delight. I don’t know what direction he was given, but I’m assuming he was told to chew up as much of the scenery as possible. I cannot share the same praise for some of the new casting choices. John Noble and Johnathan Banks are a fine Scarecrow and Jim Gordon respectively, but aren’t very memorable. Curiously Kimberly Brooks was replaced as Oracle. A tad disappointing because she would have nailed the material. And for my last complaint is Troy Baker as Arkham Knight/Red Hood. Normally I would be so down for it, but Troy was already Joker, Two-Face, and Robin. Did he really need to be a fourth character? In fact Robin is in the game and is voiced by Matthew Mercer? Why didn’t Troy repriseTim? Mercer would have made an excellent Red Hood.
Anyway back to the positives: Combat has peaked with the inclusion of environmental takedowns, team takedowns, and multi fear takedowns. At this point you do feel just as overpowered as the Batman himself. The skins are great and are easier to access compared to Arkham City (still didn’t get that Red Sun skin though). We have even more playable characters than ever and all of them have their own skins… except for Batgirl who was done dirty. I mean no classic suit? Not even the Cassandra Cain and Stephanie Brown costumes. Everyone also has their style and at least one or two different gadgets. Except for Batgirl who does play pretty similar to Batman, but makes up for it with her ability to hack into certain hazards to provide stealth takedowns. And let me just say playing as Red Hood is essentially playing another game as one of his stealth takedowns is a neck snap and he straight up murders henchmen with his pistols… it’s a change of pace for sure.
Each of the DLC characters have their own side story (excluding Azrael which is weird because it seems like they were setting him up for one) and Batgirls is easily the best as it has a more fleshed out campaign, collectibles to destroy, and a respectable map size. Everyone else’s is very disappointing as they are are about 15 minutes. Even faster if you are a season veteran of these games. To add in some extra difficulty you can’t upgrade any armor (and let me tell you these kids are made out of paper without it). At least you can still play them in the combat challenges.
Ok I’ve avoided the elephant in the room for long enough. Let’s talk about the Batmobile. I know a lot of people have opinions on it and mine are rather mixed. The combat is simple and that’s ok, you aim for the drones weapons and press X to dodge. Remember this is the first time the Batmobile can be operated so combat was never going to be as polished so I had no problem with how simplified it is. The driving controls can be over sensitive at first, in my experience one slight movement of the joystick will send me into a U-Turn, but you will get use to steering and the boost functions. What I have a problem with are the stealth segments. Imagine you have the ultimate tank ready to tear down any foes that stand in your way head on. What if instead of doing that you have to slowly move around the map, sneak up behind another drone, wait till you have a lock on, then fire. These segments stops the pacing of the game dead on its tracks and you will wish that they will just end. Don’t even get me started on that fucking excavator boss fight. Is the Batmobile really as bad as the internet says it is? No I don’t think so, it’s fun in the beginning, it doesn’t feel like a drag until the third act of the game and it makes you forget about the fun you were having. The developers had good ideas on paper, but playing them out they weren’t fun, like I said this is the first time the Batmobile has been featured so prominently, maybe if there was another Arkham game we would have seen some improvements.
Well there is only one thing to talk about and that’s the ending. Personally I liked how it ended, but what I don’t like are the requirements, well more like one specific requirement. You see in order to initiate the Knightfall protocol you have to complete every side mission and lock up every single criminal. Shut down Penguins gun smuggling operations? Got it. Rescue all of the Firefighters? Done and done. Takedown all of the watchtowers/drones/bombs deployed by the militia? Someone has to do it. What I hate is that in order to arrest Riddler you will have to solve every riddle and collect every trophy. It is even more tedious considering the fact that you had to pass nine trials to free Catwoman. Shouldn’t have that been enough to unlock the boss fight? If it had ended after said trials that would have been fine, but getting every trophy and riddle and disarming the bombs? What if you had to that for Arkham Asylum and Arkham City? Or even Origins? Would you have enjoyed them as much?
So in the end was Arkham Knight my favorite game in the franchise? No, City will always be my personal favorite. Is it a bad game like the internet says it is. I certainly don’t think so. It’s a solid 8 out of 10, there are just a few problems I had that prevented it from being a 9 to me personally. Its story, combat, and playable characters makes it worth playing.
It is a bittersweet feeling marathoning all of these games. I miss them. Their stories, the easter eggs, the gameplay, everything. Rocksteady crafted not just one, but three love letters to Batman and his mythos. These weren’t just developers, they were fans just like us. Whatever the future holds with Suicide Squad I know Rocksteady will deliver a memorable experience.
Side note: I loved Arkham Origins when I played back when I was 15 and I would have reviewed it if it had a remastered.