title: Solitary confinement

text: The 2013 California prisoner hunger strike saw approximately 29,000 prisoners protesting conditions. This statewide hunger strike reaching two-thirds of California's prisons began with the organizing of inmates at Pelican Bay State Prison. On 11 July 2011, prisoners at Pelican Bay State Prison began a hunger strike to "protest torturous conditions in the Security Housing Unit (SHU) there..." and to advocate for procedural and policy changes like the termination of the "debriefing process" which forces prisoners "to name themselves or others as gang members as a condition of access to food or release from isolation". More than 6,000 inmates throughout the California prison system stood in solidarity with these Pelican State Bay prisoners in 2011 by also refusing their food. Also in solidarity with the 2011 Pelican Bay prisoners on strike is the Bay Area coalition of grassroots organizations known as the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition. This coalition has aided the prisoners in their strike by providing a legal support force for their negotiations with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) and by creating and running a media based platform to raise support and awareness for the strikers and their demands among the general public.


title: Solitary confinement

text: Solitary confinement has served as a site of inspiration for protest-organizing against its use in and outside of prisons and conversely, as a response tactic for prisons to react to the protest-organizing of its prisoners. In March 2014, authorities at the Northwest Detention Center in Washington relegated multiple detainees to solitary confinement units after their participation in protests for the improvement of conditions within the facility and in solidarity with activist organizing against deportation escalations outside of the facility.


title: Solitary confinement

text: Scrutiny of super-maximum security prisons and the institutionalization of solitary confinement is accompanied by suggestions for alternative methods. In July 2013 the New York City Department of Correction transferred more seriously mentally ill inmates to an internal facility, similar to a hospital psychiatric ward, for more intensive therapy. Those with less severe mental illness who break disciplinary rules are still restricted to solitary confinement, but with increased hours of therapy and a behavioral intervention program.


title: Solitary confinement

text: A second alternative is to deal with long-term inmates by promoting familial and social relationships through the encouragement of visitations which may help boost morale. Familial counseling and support may be useful for inmates nearing the end of a long-term sentence that may otherwise exhibit signs of aggression, and prison rules and discipline should be clear, rational, and consistent, while inmates should be given objective goals to improve their situation.


title: Solitary confinement

text: In 2013 Maine reduced its then-full supermax solitary population by half and implemented "informal sanctions" of restricted priveliges, rather than solitary as punishment for every infraction. A 2013 Vera Institute of Justice report praised Washington state's use of alternative discipline to solitary and careful review and transition process when inmates enter and leave solitary, which began as a voluntary reform by prison officials 15 years prior.


title: Life After Death

text: Life After Death is the second and final studio album by American rapper The Notorious B.I.G., released on March 25, 1997, on Bad Boy Records and Arista Records. A double album, it was released sixteen days after his murder. It features collaborations with guest artists such as 112, Jay-Z, Lil' Kim, Mase, Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, Too $hort, Angela Winbush, D.M.C. of Run-D.M.C., R. Kelly, The Lox, and Puff Daddy. "Life After Death" exhibits The Notorious B.I.G. further delving into the mafioso rap subgenre. The album is a sequel to his first album, "Ready to Die", and picks up where the last song, "Suicidal Thoughts", ends.


title: Life After Death

text: "Life After Death" sold 690,000 copies in its first week, soon reaching the No. 1 spot on the Billboard 200. It received widespread critical acclaim upon release and was nominated for Best Rap Album, Best Rap Solo Performance for its first single "Hypnotize", and Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group for its second single "Mo Money Mo Problems" at the 40th Annual Grammy Awards. The album is widely considered to be one of the greatest hip hop albums of all time. In 2020, it was ranked at No. 179 on "Rolling Stone" magazine's list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.


title: Life After Death

text: Two and a half years before the album's release, the Notorious B.I.G., who had married Faith Evans, became East Coast's icon in the East CoastWest Coast rivalry and made guest appearances on albums by Michael Jackson and R.Kelly amongst others. The album had numerous planned release dates, one was supposed to be on Halloween in 1996, but Biggie was involved in a car accident in September 1996 which delayed the finalizing of the album. It was pushed back to 1997.


title: Life After Death

text: As he explained on BET's Rap City, Biggie aimed to reach a wider audience with "Life After Death", collaborating with a wider variety of artists than his debut. In addition to Bad Boy Records labelmates Mase, The LOX, 112, and label owner Puff Daddy, guests include Jay-Z, Angela Winbush, Too Short, Lil Kim, & Bone Thugs N Harmony. A record with Bay Area rapper E-40 was not included on the final track listing. Production for the album was handled by DJ Premier, Easy Mo Bee, Havoc, RZA, Stevie J and other members of Bad Boy's in-house production team, The Hitmen. Q-Tip also submitted a beat for the album; Biggie enjoyed the beat when it was played for him, however, the album had already been completed and turned into Bad Boy. The beat was later used for A Tribe Called Quest's song "The Love", from their 1998 album "The Love Movement".


title: Life After Death

text: Biggie traveled to the West Coast in February 1997 to promote the album, and shoot the video for the lead single, "Hypnotize." Two weeks before its release, on March 9, the Notorious B.I.G. was shot four times in a drive-by shooting and was later pronounced dead at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.


title: Life After Death

text: Conflict with other rappers is a major theme throughout the album. Numerous songs contain references to B.I.G.'s rivals, some subtle and some obvious.


title: Life After Death

text: The track "Kick in the Door" is directed at Nas, Jeru the Damaja, Raekwon, Ghostface Killah and even the track's producer DJ Premier. The subtle messages have been speculated on by listeners and confirmed by artists on several occasions, including "XXL" magazine's April 2003 edition, "The Making of: "Life After Death"".


title: Life After Death

text: In "The Making of: "Life After Death"", Nashiem Myrick reveals that the second verse has lines directed at Jeru the Damaja and DJ Premier: "Nas said that record was for him, but when Big said, 'Son, I'm surprised you run with them/I think they got cum in them, 'cause they nothin' but dicks,' he was talking about Jeru the Damaja to Premo 'cause Jeru was going at Big and Puff and all them [with the Premier-produced 'One Day' in Jeru's album "Wrath of the Math"]."


title: Life After Death

text: The line "Fuck that, why try, throw bleach in your eye" is a reference to Raekwon's jab on the track "Ice Water" from "Only Built 4 Cuban Linx..." where Raekwon raps.


title: Life After Death

text: The lines on the final verse are directed at Nas as a reference to Nas challenging The Notorious B.I.G. for the title of "King of New York" in the song "The Message" from the album "It Was Written" in which Nas raps:


title: Life After Death

text: In "The Making of: "Life After Death"" article Lil' Cease explains, "Big talked about Nas a little bit in that shit. It was the King of New York part, the last verse: 'This goes out for those that chose to use disrespectful views on the King of NY.' That's when Nas had that freestyle out, where he was like, 'I'll take the crown off the so-called King and lock it down.' That's when Big had the cover of The Source, and it said, 'The King of New York.


title: Life After Death

text: It was speculated by many listeners that the song "Long Kiss Goodnight" contains cryptic insults towards 2Pac and Death Row Records CEO Suge Knight, although at the time it was never confirmed due to the sensitive nature of both rappers' recent deaths.


title: Life After Death

text: However, Lil' Cease, Biggie's cousin and a member of Junior M.A.F.I.A. claimed the following in "XXL" magazine's April 2003 issue about "Long Kiss Goodnight": "That was about 'Pac. He had some shit at the beginning of that though, nobody heard it, on the reel. We had to change it. It was a little too much. I can't remember what Big said about him, but it was terrible. It couldn't make it. He didn't want to do it. He had some fire. But he didn't want to make it too much. He just wanted to address it and to let nigga know, "I know what's going on, and I could get wreck if I want to." Like, "If I really wanted to get on ya niggas, I could.""


title: Life After Death

text: Sean Combs, however, denies these claims stating, "Naw, it was just some emcee lyrics. I know people wanna have their imagination, but it was just lyrics. You're hearing it from the horse's mouth. I would tell the truth."


title: Life After Death

text: In the first verse, the lyric "Laugh Now, Cry Later" is allegedly a reference to two tattoos on 2Pac's back.


title: Life After Death

text: The lines seem to be making reference to Tupac frequently mentioning Biggie "by name" in his raps, and allegations spread by Wendy Williams that he had been raped during his prison term at Rikers Island.


title: Life After Death

text: Although some fans have interpreted these lines as references to Shakur's murder, XXL Magazine wrote that the song was most likely recorded before 2Pac's death.


title: Life After Death

text: In "Going Back to Cali" the second verse opens up with Biggie's thoughts on the inter-coastal war and his relationship with the West Coast:


title: Life After Death

text: In the song "Notorious Thugs", B.I.G. clearly refers to longtime nemesis 2Pac in the line "so called beef with you-know-who", calling the feud between him and Shakur 'bullshit', while Bone Thugs-N-Harmony (who featured 2Pac on one of their songs the same year) throw jabs at Three 6 Mafia, Twista, Crucial Conflict and Do or Die.


title: Life After Death

text: The tracks "What's Beef" and "My Downfall", both of which deal with the subject of feuding, as well as "Last Day" and "You're Nobody (Till Somebody Kills You)" are also said to contain apparent jabs aimed at his rivals (including Shakur), even though Biggie stated in a "Spin" magazine interview that the song "You're Nobody (Till Somebody Kills You)" was not directed at Shakur, who at the time had recently been shot.


title: Life After Death

text: "Life After Death" received widespread acclaim from critics upon release. Jon Pareles of "The New York Times" described the album as "flaunting affluence with a leisurely swagger, midtempo grooves and calmly arrogant raps". Anthony DeCurtis of "Rolling Stone" magazine called it a "conscious continuation of "Ready to Die"", and stated ""Life After Death" captures crime's undeniable glamour but doesn't stint on the fear, desperation and irretrievable loss that the streets inevitably exact". Cheo Hodari Coker from the "Los Angeles Times" wrote that ""Life After Death" reflects both the dark and the heartfelt sides of the rapper's Gemini personality. It's not only a complex testament to who he was in his private life, but also a demonstration of his amazing rhyming ability. In key moments, B.I.G. does a marvelous job of surfing between accessible music fare tailored for the radio, and more challenging material that will be savored by hard-core rap fans who have long admired B.I.G.'s microphone skills. Rarely has a rapper attempted to please so many different audiences and done it so brilliantly". In a five-mic review for "The Source", Michael A. Gonzales felt that it would "undoubtedly become a classic to any true hip-hop fan". Although David Browne of "Entertainment Weekly" was unfavorable of the album's long length, and some of its violent and materialistic content, he commended Notorious B.I.G.'s "bicoastal respect" by working with other hip-hop styles and artists from other regions of the United States.


title: Life After Death

text: Since its release, "Life After Death" has received retrospective acclaim from critics. Rob Sheffield, writing in "The Rolling Stone Album Guide" (2004), called it "a filler-free two-disc rush of musical bravado" and commented that the Notorious B.I.G.'s voice and lyrics were "deeper" than before. AllMusic's Jason Birchmeier wrote, "It may have taken the Notorious B.I.G. a few years to follow up his milestone debut, "Ready to Die", with another album, but when he did return with "Life After Death", he did so in a huge way. The ambitious album, intended as somewhat of a sequel to "Ready to Die", picked up where its predecessor left off." Birchmeier further said, "Over the course of only two albums, he achieved every success imaginable, perhaps none greater than this unabashedly over-reaching success." Evan McGarvey of "Stylus" magazine wrote in his review, ""Life After Death" is a grand exercise in personal mythology, narrative sweep, and truly diverse, universal pop excellence. As a double album it is the very definition of cinematic; it essentially perfected the concept and standard in hip-hop ... Sequenced as an unpacking of sorts, the album's progression from song to song is an essay itself." In 2013, "VIBE" named "Life After Death" the greatest Hip-Hop/R&B album since 1993.


title: Life After Death

text: "Life After Death" was released to a significant amount of critical praise and commercial success. The album sold 690,000 copies in its first week. In 2000, the album was certified Diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), denoting shipment of 5 million copies (the threshold for double albums) and it has been credited as one of the best-selling rap albums of all time. It also made the largest jump to number one on the "Billboard" 200 chart in history, jumping from number 176 to number one in one week. Also, it spent four weeks at number one on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart and topped the Billboard Year-End chart as a "Billboard" 200 for 1997.


title: Life After Death

text: Although released in the wake of B.I.G.'s fatal shooting, "Life After Death" signaled a stylistic change in gangsta rap as it crossed to the commercial mainstream. After "Life After Death", Puff Daddy's Bad Boy Records continued to bring pop and gangsta rap closer together: the references to violence and drug dealing remained, as did the "gangsta" rhetoric, but the previously dark production changed to a cleaner, sample-heavy, more upbeat sound that was fashioned for the pop charts, as seen in the single "Mo Money Mo Problems". The Notorious B.I.G. is often credited with initiating this transition, as he was among the first mainstream rappers to produce albums with a calculated attempt to include both gritty and realistic gangsta narratives as well as radio-friendly productions.


title: Life After Death

text: The majority of the album was produced by Steven "Stevie J" Jordan, Deric "D-Dot" Angelettie, Carlos "July Six" Broady, Ron Lawrence, and Nashiem Myrick. However, notable hip-hop producers such as Easy Mo Bee, Havoc from Mobb Deep, DJ Premier and RZA from Wu-Tang Clan contributed beats.


title: Life After Death

text: Various artists were specifically influenced by songs on "Life After Death". Evidence's "Down in New York City" is essentially "Going Back to Cali" from the perspective of a West Coast hip hop artist. Jay-Z borrows four bars from "The World Is Filled..." in his song "I Just Wanna Love U (Give It 2 Me)", as well as the chorus from his song "Squeeze first" from "Hypnotize", a line in "The Ruler's Back" from "Kick in the Door" and "You're Nobody ('Til Somebody Kills You)" on "D.O.A. (Death of Auto-Tune)". Ice Cube borrows the chorus from "Kick in the Door" for his song "Child Support". As with B.I.G.'s "I Love The Dough" Monica's 2010 song "Everything to Me" samples "I Love You More" by René & Angela. The official remix includes a verse from B.I.G. that originally appeared on "I Love The Dough". SWV sampled "Ten Crack Commandments" on the opening track "Someone" featuring B.I.G.'s former protege and friend Puff Daddy. The French rapper Rohff named his album "La Vie Avant La Mort" (Life Before Death) (2001) as a tribute to B.I.G, Joey Badass interpolated the lines 'Kick in the Door' on "Super Predator" from "All-Amerikkkan Badass" (2017).


title: Abortion statistics in the United States

text: Both the Guttmacher Institute and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) regularly report abortion statistics in the United States. They use different methodologies, so they report somewhat different abortion rates, but they show similar trends. The Guttmacher Institute attempts to contact every abortion provider. The CDC relies on voluntary reporting of abortion data from the states and the District of Columbia. As of July 2022, the Guttmacher Institute had reported abortion data for the years 1973 through 2020 and the CDC had reported abortion data for the years 1970 through 2019.


text: Abortion statistics are commonly presented as the number of abortions, the abortion rate (the number of abortions per 1,000 women ages 15 to 44), and the abortion ratio. The Guttmacher Institute defines the abortion ratio as the number of abortions per 100 pregnancies ending in an abortion or a live birth, excluding miscarriages, and the CDC defines it as the number of abortions per 1,000 live births.


text: The figures reported by both organizations include only the legal induced abortions conducted by clinics, hospitals or physicians’ offices, or that make use of abortion pills dispensed from certified facilities such as clinics or physicians’ offices. They do not account for the use of abortion pills that were obtained outside of clinical settings.


text: In 1973, the "Roe v. Wade" Supreme Court decision legalized abortion in all 50 states. From 1973 to 1980, the abortion rate rose almost 80%, peaking at 29.3 abortions per 1,000 women of childbearing age in 1980 and 1981.


text: From 1981 through 2017, the abortion rate fell by more than half, always falling faster in Democratic administrations than Republican ones. The abortion rate fell below the 1973 rate in 2012 and continued to fall through 2017, when it stood at 13.5 abortions per 1,000 women of childbearing age. The abortion rate then rose from 2018 through 2020.


text: During the 1980s, the population of women of childbearing age grew faster than the abortion rate fell, so the annual number of abortions performed did not peak until 1990, at about 1.6 million abortions. The number of abortions generally fell from 1991 through 2017, and rose thereafter. The largest percentage decrease in the number of abortions occurred in 2013, the year the contraceptive mandate of the Affordable Care Act took effect for most health insurance plans. Approximately 860,000 abortions were performed in 2017, rising to about 930,000 in 2020.


text: From 1973 to 1983, the abortion ratio reported by the Guttmacher Institute rose about 60%, peaking at 30.4 in 1983. From 1984 through 2016, the abortion ratio fell about 40%. It hit a low of 18.3 in 2016 and rose to 20.6 in 2020. The abortion ratio was slightly lower in 2016 and 2017 than in 1973 because a 40% decrease more than offsets a 60% increase.


text: This summary is largely based on data collected by the Guttmacher Institute. Data collected by the CDC shows similar trends, but the CDC consistently finds fewer abortions.


text: In 2022, the "Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization" Supreme Court decision overturned "Roe v. Wade". The effect of "Dobbs" on the abortion rate will not be known for several years.


text: Abortion data for the four most recent years reported by the Guttmacher Institute appears below. The abortion ratio is the number of abortions per 100 pregnancies ending in an abortion or a live birth. From 2017 through 2020, the abortion rate rose 6.7%.


text: Abortion data for the ten most recent years reported by the CDC appears below. The data comes from 47 states, excluding California, Maryland, New Hampshire, and the District of Columbia. The abortion ratio is the number of abortions per 1,000 live births. In 2018 and 2019, for the first time since 1979 and 1980, the abortion rate rose two years in a row.


text: Independent clinics provide about 60% of abortions in the United States while Planned Parenthood provides about 35% of abortions in the United States.


text: The abortion rights research and policy organization Guttmacher Institute estimates the number of abortions in the United States by surveying abortion providers. Every third year they attempt to contact every abortion provider. They ask for data for the two most recent years, and they estimate abortion statistics for the missing year by interpolation.


text: For 2020, the Guttmacher Institute reported 930,160 abortions, an abortion rate of 14.4 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15 to 44 years, and 20.6 abortions per 100 pregnancies ending in abortion or live birth.


text: The means in the graph above are geometric means. For example, the mean annual increase during the Carter administration was 4.9%, because the abortion rate rose 21.1% in the Carter administration, and 104.9%*104.9%*104.9%*104.9%=121.1%.


text: For the first time in 2020, medication abortions, as reported by Guttmacher, accounted for more than 50% of all abortions.


text: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began abortion surveillance reports in 1969 to document the number and characteristics of women obtaining legal induced abortions. The CDC aggregates the information that the states and the District of Columbia collect to produce annual national estimates. Because New York City and the rest of New York State report separately, there are a total of 52 reporting areas.


text: The CDC always finds a lower abortion rate than the Guttmacher Institute. For 2019, the CDC reported 11.4 abortions and the Guttmacher Institute reported 14.2 abortions per 1,000 women of childbearing age.


text: To estimate the percentage change in the abortion rate from one year to the next most accurately, we must compare data from the same group of states in both years. Unfortunately, different states report their data to the CDC in different years. The black, blue, green, and purple pieces of the graph allow us to make accurate apples-to-apples comparisons. Each differently colored piece shows data from a different group of states. For example, the blue piece shows data from 46 reporting areas that reported continuously from 1997 through 2006. To estimate the change in the abortion rate from 1996 to 1998, we use the black part of the graph for 1997 and the blue part for 1998. The black part shows a 4.8% decrease in 1997, and the blue part shows a 2.3% decrease in 1998. The gap between the black and blue sections in 1997 occurs because data from California, a populous state with high abortion rates, was not available after 1997.


text: The rapid increase in the reported abortion rates from 1970 through 1972, prior to "Roe v. Wade", was due in part to improved reporting of the abortions that occurred.


text: In 2017, Guttmacher reported that almost 25% of women will have had an abortion by age 45, with 4.6% of 20-year-olds and 19% of 30-year-olds having had at least one.


text: Abortion rates tend to be higher among minority women in the U.S. In 2000–2001 the rates among black and Hispanic women were 49 per 1,000 and 33 per 1,000, respectively, vs. 13 per 1,000 among non-Hispanic white women. Note that this figure includes all women of reproductive age, including women who are not pregnant. In other words, these abortion rates reflect the rate at which U.S. women of reproductive age have an abortion each year. In 2019, 38% of women who underwent abortion were black; 33% were non-Hispanic white; 21% were Hispanic.


text: A study by the National Institute of Health in the United States found that of the Obstetrician-Gynecologists that provide abortions, more identified as Protestant than Catholic. The Guttmacher report of 1987 found Protestants accounted for 41.9% of abortions while Catholics accounted for 31.5%. The Guttmacher report of 1994 found Protestants accounted for 37% of abortions while Catholics accounted for 31%. The Guttmacher report of 2000 found Protestants accounted for 43% of abortions while Catholics accounted for 27%. The Guttmacher report of 2014 found Protestants accounted for 30% of abortions while Catholics accounted for 24%.


text: Roe v. Wade legalized abortion nationwide in 1973. In 1972, 41% of abortions were performed on women outside their state of residence, while in 1973 it declined to 21%, and then to 11% in 1974.


text: In the decade from 2011 to 2020, during which many states increased abortion restrictions, the percentage of women nationwide who traveled out of state for an abortion increased steadily, from 6% in 2011 to 9% in 2020. Out of state travel for an abortion was much more prevalent in the 29 states hostile to abortion rights, with percentages in those states rising from 9% in 2011 to 15% by 2020, while in states supportive of abortion rights, out of state travel for abortions rose from 2% to 3% between 2011 and 2020.


text: Gutttmacher has released data about abortions by "state of occurrence" and "state of residence." In some states, these numbers can be tremendously different, for example in Missouri, a state with relatively strict controls on abortion, the "abortion rate by state of occurrence" dropped from 4 in 1000 women aged 15–44 for 2017 to 0.1 for 2020, because 57% of abortion recipients went out of state in 2017, while 99% did so in 2020. In contrast, from 2017 to 2020, the "abortion rate by state of residence" for Missourians went up by 18% from 8.4 to 9.9.


text: Some out of state travel pertains to locations of population centers in states; if large cities are close to state borders it may be common to cross borders for an abortion. For example, Delaware, which is generally permissive of abortion, saw 44% of residents obtain their abortions in neighboring states.


title: Larenz Tate

text: Larenz Tate (born September 8, 1975) is an American film and television actor. He is best known for his roles as O-Dog in "Menace II Society" and as Councilman Rashad Tate in "Power". Tate's other films and television series include the films "Dead Presidents", "Love Jones", "A Man Apart", "Crash", "Waist Deep", "Ray" and the television series "Rush" and "Game of Silence".


title: Larenz Tate

text: Larenz Tate was born in Chicago, Illinois, to Peggy and Larry Tate. He is the youngest of three siblings; his two brothers, Larron and Lahmard, are also actors. The family moved to California during the early 1980s. Convinced by their parents to enter a drama program at the Inner City Cultural Center, the trio did not take the lessons seriously until classmate Malcolm-Jamal Warner's ascent to fame after being cast on the sitcom "The Cosby Show". Subsequently, realizing that they could parlay their efforts into a tangible form of success, the siblings began to receive small roles and in 1985, Tate made his small-screen debut in an episode of "The New Twilight Zone". Tate attended Palmdale High School, graduating in 1993.


title: Larenz Tate

text: Following appearances in such television series as "21 Jump Street" and "The Wonder Years", Tate was cast in the television movie "The Women of Brewster Place" before receiving the recurring role of Steve Urkel's nemesis, Willie Fuffner, in the sitcom "Family Matters". He also appeared as Charlie, a grandson of Redd Foxx's character on the CBS series "The Royal Family". Foxx died of a heart attack a month after "The Royal Family" debuted, and a reworking with Jackée Harry as part of the cast failed to save the series.


title: Larenz Tate

text: After numerous acting roles on television, collaborative filmmaking siblings Albert and Allen Hughes approached him to star in their debut feature "Menace II Society" in late 1992. In the film, Tate portrayed "O-Dog", a trigger-happy teenager. Frederick I. Douglass of the "Baltimore Afro-American" opined Tate's performance in the film made it an instant classic. Tate had a regular role on the short-lived television series "South Central" (1994) as Andre.


title: Larenz Tate

text: Tate acted in "The Inkwell" (1994) as Drew. One reviewer praised his performance and called Tate a "promising" actor. However, in negative reviews Tate was seen as "overacting" and compared unfavorably to Jim Carrey. In 1995, Tate portrayed Vietnam veteran Anthony Curtis in the Hughes brothers' "Dead Presidents". A film reviewer stated Tate proved he could play sympathetic characters with his performance in the film.


title: Larenz Tate

text: He took on the role of love-stricken young poet Darius in "Love Jones" (1997). Critic Jay Carr found Tate "engaging" in the role. Tate also played Kenny in "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" in the episode "That's No Lady, That's My Cousin", which was produced by Quincy Jones who Tate would later portray in the 2004 film "Ray".


title: Larenz Tate

text: In 1997, Tate appeared as Ford Lincoln Mercury in "The Postman". He played Frankie Lymon in the biopic "Why Do Fools Fall in Love" (1998). One critic praised Tate's dancing prowess in the film. He was the lead character, Neville, in 2000's "Love Come Down".


title: Larenz Tate

text: Throughout the 2000s, Tate continued his film career. Tate portrayed Vin Diesel's drug officer partner in "A Man Apart" (2003), with his other film work including "Biker Boyz" (2003), "Crash" (2004), and "Waist Deep" (2006). Tate was featured in R&B singer Ashanti's 2003 released music video "Rain on Me", where he played the jealous, abusive spouse of Ashanti. The video touched on the subject of domestic abuse. In the video game "187 Ride or Die", Tate voices the main character, Buck.


title: Larenz Tate

text: Tate portrayed Shooter Cooper in "Love Monkey", which was cancelled after three episodes. He starred in seasons 4-7 of FX's "Rescue Me" as Bart "Black Shawn" Johnston. Tate appeared as Malcolm, the brother of Don Cheadle's character, in "House of Lies" and guest starred on an episode of "The Mindy Project". Tate starred as beta tester Max in "Beta Test" (2016) and appeared in the 2017 film "Girls Trip". Starting in 2017, Tate played Councilman Rashad Tate on "Power", and continued portraying the character in sequel series "".


title: TAG Heuer

text: TAG Heuer S.A. ( ) is a Swiss luxury watchmaker that designs, manufactures and markets watches and fashion accessories, as well as eyewear and mobile phones manufactured under license by other companies and carrying the TAG Heuer brand name.


title: TAG Heuer

text: The company began as Uhrenmanufaktur Heuer AG, founded in 1860 by Edouard Heuer in St-Imier, Switzerland. In 1985, TAG Group purchased a majority stake in the company, forming "TAG Heuer". In 1999, French luxury goods conglomerate LVMH bought nearly 100 percent of the Swiss company.


title: TAG Heuer

text: TAG Heuer is based in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland, and is led by CEO Frédéric Arnault. Jack Heuer, great-grandson of the founder, is the honorary chairman. TAG Heuer maintains a watchmaking workshop in Cornol, Switzerland, and a watchmaking factory in La Chaux-de-Fonds. TAG Heuer's slogan is "Swiss Avant-Garde Since 1860".


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 1860 Edouard Heuer founded Uhrenmanufaktur Heuer AG (English: Heuer Watchmaking Inc.) in St-Imier, Switzerland.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Edouard Heuer patented his first chronograph in 1882 and in 1887 patented an "oscillating pinion" still used by major watchmakers of mechanical chronographs.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 1911, Heuer received a patent for the "Time of Trip", the first dashboard chronograph. Designed for use in automobiles and aircraft, two large hands mounted from the center pinion indicate the time of day, as on a traditional clock. A small pair of hands mounted at the top of the dial (12 o'clock position) indicates the duration of the trip (up to 12 hours). A top-mounted crown allows the user to set the time; a button mounted in that crown operates the start/stop/reset functions of the "duration of trip" counter.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Heuer introduced its first wrist chronograph in 1914. The crown was at the 12 o'clock position, as these first wrist chronographs were adapted from pocket chronographs. In 1916 Edward Heuer's son, Charles-Auguste, introduced the "Mikrograph", the first stopwatch accurate to 1/100 of a second. This model was soon followed by the "Semikrograph", a stopwatch that offered 1/50 of a second timing, as well as a split-second function (which allows the user to determine the interval between two contestants or events).


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 1933, Heuer introduced the "Autavia", a dashboard timer used for automobiles and aviation (whence its name, from "AUTos" and "AVIAtion"). The companion "Hervue" was a clock that could run for eight days without being wound. Over the period from 1935 through the early 1940s, Heuer manufactured chronographs for pilots in the Luftwaffe, known as "Flieger" (pilot) chronographs. The earlier version featured a hinged-back case and one pusher (for start/stop/reset); the later version had a snap-back case and added a second pusher (for time-in and time-out). All these Flieger chronographs had two-registers, with a capacity of 30 minutes."


title: TAG Heuer

text: In the mid-1940s, Heuer expanded its line of chronographs to include two- and three-register models and a three-register chronograph that had a full calendar function (day/date/month). As the highest development of Heuer's chronographs, these "triple calendar" chronographs came in stainless steel and 14, 18, and 22 karat gold cases. Dial colors were white, black, or copper.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In the early-1950s, Heuer produced watches for the American retailer Abercrombie & Fitch. The "Seafarer" and "Auto-Graph" were chronographs produced by Heuer to be sold by Abercrombie & Fitch. The "Seafarers" had special dials—with blue, green, and yellow patterns—that showed the high and low tides. This dial could also be used to track the phases of the moon. Heuer produced a version of the "Seafarer" for sale under the Heuer name, with this model called the "Mareographe". Heuer produced the "Auto-Graph" in 1953 and 1954, which featured a tachymeter scale on the dial and a hand that could be preset to a specific point on the scale. This complication allowed a rally driver or navigator to determine whether the car achieved the desired pace over a measured mile. Advertisements and literature also pointed out that this hand could be rotated to count golf scores or other events.


title: TAG Heuer

text: From 1911, Heuer manufactured timepieces to be mounted on the dashboards of automobiles, aircraft, and boats. These clocks and timers included a variety of models designed to address the specific needs of racers and rallyists. In 1958, Heuer introduced a new line of dashboard timepieces, which included the Master Time (8-day clock), the Monte Carlo (12-hour stopwatch), the Super Autavia (full chronograph), Sebring (60-minute, split-second timer), and Auto-Rallye (60-minute stopwatch). Heuer continued to manufacture these dashboard timepieces into the 1980s when Heuer discontinued them. Heuer also introduced timing devices for ski and motor racing events, including Formula One.


title: TAG Heuer

text: From the 1950s to the 1970s, Heuers were popular watches among automobile racers, both professionals and amateurs. Heuer was a leading producer of stopwatches and timing equipment, based on the volume of its sales, so it was only natural that racers, their crews and event sponsors began to wear Heuer chronographs. Heuer produced special chronograph versions with the logo of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, as well as the names or logos of racing teams or sponsors (for example, Shelby Cobra, MG and Champion Sparkplugs).


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 1962, Heuer became the first Swiss watchmaker in space. John Glenn wore a Heuer stopwatch when he piloted the Mercury Atlas 6 spacecraft on the first US crewed space flight to orbit the earth. This stopwatch was the backup clock for the mission. It was started manually by Glenn 20 seconds into the flight. It is currently on display at the San Diego Air and Space Museum.


title: TAG Heuer

text: The Autavia chronograph was introduced in 1962 and featured a rotating bezel, marked in either hours, minutes, decimal minutes (1/100th minute increments), or with a tachymeter scale. All manual-wind Autavias from the 1960s had a black dial with white registers. Early cases had a screw-back, and later models (from and after 1968) had snap-backs. Heuer had previously used the "Autavia" name for its dashboard timers.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 1963, Heuer introduced the Carrera chronograph, designed by Jack Heuer, great-grandson of Edouard. The Carrera had a very simple design, with only the registers and applied markers on the dial. The fixed inner bezel is divided into 1/5 second increments. In the 1960s, Carreras were available with a variety of dials, including all-white, all-black, white registers on a black dial, and black registers on a black dial. A three-register, triple calendar version of the Carrera was introduced around 1968.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Most of Heuer chronographs from this period—including the Autavias and Carreras—used movements manufactured by Valjoux, including the Valjoux 72 movement (for a 12-hour chronograph) and the Valjoux 92 movement (for a 30-minute or 45-minute chronograph). The Valjoux 72 movement utilized a "tri-compax" design, with three registers on the dial—one register for the chronograph hours (at the bottom), one register for the chronograph minutes (at the right), and a third register for a continuously running second hand (at the left). The second hand for the chronograph was mounted on the center pinion, along with the time-of-day hands.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Heuer acquired the "Leonidas" brand in the early-1960s, with the combined company marketing watches under the "Heuer-Leonidas" name. One of the designs that Heuer acquired from Leonidas was the "Bundeswehr" chronograph, used by the German air force. These "BWs" feature a "fly-back" mechanism, so that when the chronograph is reset to zero, it immediately begins running again, to time the next segment or event.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In the mid-1960s, Heuer partnered with Breitling and Hamilton (and in competition with Seiko and Zenith) to introduce an automatic chronograph. These projects were conducted in secret, as none of the competitors wanted the other companies to be aware of their efforts. Heuer-Breitling-Hamilton held press conferences in Geneva and New York, on 3 March 1969 to show their new lines of chronographs.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Heuer's first automatic chronographs were the Autavia, Carrera, and Monaco. These were powered by the Cal 11 and Cal 12 movements (12-hour chronograph); Cal 14 movement (12-hour chronograph and additional hand for GMT/second time-zone) and the Cal 15 movement (30-minute chronograph). The winding crown was on the left, with the pushers for the chronograph on the right. The earliest of Heuer's Cal 11 chronographs (from 1969) were named "Chrono-Matic". In the early-1970s, Heuer expanded its line of automatic chronographs to include the Daytona, Montreal, Silverstone, Calculator, Monza, and Jarama models, all powered by the Calibre 11 movement.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 1975, Heuer introduced the Chronosplit, a digital chronograph with dual LED and LCD displays. Later versions featured two LCD displays.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Heuer began using the Valjoux 7750 movement in its automatic chronographs, with the Kentucky and Pasadena models (both introduced in 1977). The Valjoux 7750 movement was a three-register chronograph (with seconds, minutes, and hours), that also offered day/date windows.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In the mid-1970s, Heuer introduced a series of chronographs powered by the Lemania 5100 movement. The Lemania 5100 movements have the minute hand for the chronograph on the center pinion (rather than on a smaller register), greatly improving legibility. The Lemania 5100 movement is considered very rugged and has been used in a variety of chronographs issued to military pilots. There are ten models of Heuer chronographs powered by the Lemania 5100—Reference 510.500 (stainless steel), 510.501 (black coated), 510.502 (olive drab coated), 510.503 (pewter-coated), 510.511 (Carrera dialed acrylic crystal PVD finish), 510.523 (Carrera dialed acrylic crystal stainless steel), as well as models with the names Silverstone (steel case with black dial) and Cortina (steel case with blue dial); the Reference 510.543 was made for the A.M.I. (Italian Air Force) and a special edition (with no reference number marked on the case) was made for AudiSport.


title: TAG Heuer

text: TAG Heuer formed in 1985 when TAG (Techniques d'Avant Garde), manufacturers of high-tech items such as ceramic turbochargers for Formula One cars, and British businessman Ron Dennis, acquired Heuer.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 1999 TAG Heuer accepted a bid from LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton S.A. of CHF 1.15 billion (£452.15 million, USD 739 million), contingent upon a transfer of 50.1 percent of stock.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 2010, TAG Heuer introduced the "Pendulum Concept", the first magnetic oscillator without hairspring capable of providing restoring torque comparable to that of hairspring.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 2013, TAG Heuer celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Carrera, the racing-inspired chronograph that is a key part of the TAG Heuer range today. There have been ten generations of Carrera since its introduction, with models launched in every decade since 1963.


title: TAG Heuer

text: A company slogan of TAG Heuer is "Don't Crack Under Pressure". The slogan was originally introduced in 1991.


title: TAG Heuer

text: TAG Heuer's current lines include Formula One, Aquaracer, Link, Carrera, Monaco, Connected, Autavia, and Heuer Heritage.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Some of the more recently announced models include the Monaco V4 (the movement of which is driven by belts rather than gears); the Carrera Calibre 360 (the first mechanical wrist chronograph to measure and display time to 1/100 of a second) and the Monaco 69 (with both a digital chronograph accurate to a millisecond and a traditional mechanical movement, with a hinged mechanism allowing wearers to flip the watch between its two separate dials).


title: TAG Heuer

text: London-based Christoph Behling has been the lead designer for TAG Heuer since 2004. The collaboration has resulted in some of the brand's most celebrated pieces including the world's fastest chronograph, the Mikrogirder 1/2000th, launched in 2012.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Many TAG Heuer watches feature chronographs. In January 2011 TAG Heuer announced the new Carrera Mikrograph, the first TAG Heuer to use the in-house Mikrograph movement, which is accurate to 1/100 of a second. Additionally, TAG Heuer has also released the limited edition Carrera MP4-12C to commemorate the launch of the McLaren MP4-12C supercar. TAG Heuer has been a partner of the McLaren F1 team for over 26 years.


title: TAG Heuer

text: At the Basel 2011 show in March 2011, TAG Heuer announced the Mikrotimer Flying 1000, a concept mechanical watch capable of accuracy of 1/1000 of a second—ten times faster than the Mikrograph.


title: TAG Heuer

text: This mark was superseded in January 2012 with the Mikrogirder model, precise to 5/10,000ths of a second.


title: TAG Heuer

text: On November 9, 2015, TAG Heuer announced the launch of their first smartwatch which they named Tag Heuer Connected. The watch runs on the Android Wear operating system which is used by many smartwatch brands.


title: TAG Heuer

text: TAG Heuer Connected also offers its own app which principally offers several custom TAG Heuer watch faces which include "Three-Hand", "Chronograph", "GMT", "Themed", "Ambassador" and "Exclusive" watch faces. Each watch face (other than Ambassador and Exclusive) offer black, blue and white backgrounds. The app also provides three smart functions which are a stopwatch, alarm and timer.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In March 2017, TAG Heuer introduced a new smartwatch, TAG Heuer's Connected Modular 45, which allows its owners to switch between connected and mechanical modules.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In May 2017, TAG Heuer partnered with 20th Century Fox to make the TAG Heuer Connected the official watch of "".


title: TAG Heuer

text: Morez, France-based Groupe Logo manufactures TAG Heuer-branded eyewear under a licence acquired in 2002.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Paris, France-based ModeLabs Group manufactures TAG Heuer-branded mobile phone under licence. ModeLabs acquired the license in late-2007 and marketed the first TAG Heuer branded mobile phone in late 2008.


title: TAG Heuer

text: The company also markets a line of men's accessories including wallets, belts, bags, jackets, bracelets, and cuff-links.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 2007, TAG Heuer won the iF product design award for its Monaco Calibre 360 LS Concept Chronograph. The award was given away by the International Forum Design Hannover GmbH, held in Hanover, Germany. The watch received the award in the Leisure/Lifestyle category. It was chosen among more than 2,200 timepieces presented by watchmakers from 35 countries. TAG Heuer received the iF product design award for the second time in two years. In 2006, another TAG Heuer watch, entitled Professional Golf Watch, won in the same Leisure/Lifestyle category. The design of the Professional Golf Watch was developed with Tiger Woods.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In 2010 the Carrera 1887 won "La Petite Aiguille" ("the small hand") award for watches retailing for less than CHF5,000 at the Grand Prix d'Horlogerie de Genève.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In December 2018, World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) released an official report giving environmental ratings for 15 major watch manufacturers and jewelers in Switzerland. TAG Heuer, along with Chopard, was given a below-average environmental rating as "Lower Midfield", suggesting that the manufacturer has only taken a few actions addressing the impact of its manufacturing activities on the environment and climate change.


title: TAG Heuer

text: In the jewelry and watchmaking industries, there are general concerns over the lack of transparency in manufacturing activities and the sourcing of precious raw materials, such as gold, which is a major cause of environmental issues, such as pollution, soil degradation and deforestation. The situation is especially serious in the developing countries which are top producers of gold, including China, Russia and South Africa. It is estimated that the watch and jewelry sector uses over 50% of world's annual gold production (over 2,000 tons), but in most cases the watch companies are not able to or are unwilling to demonstrate where their raw materials come from and if the material suppliers use eco-friendly sourcing technologies.


title: TAG Heuer

text: TAG Heuer, in keeping with its image as a luxury brand with an innovative spirit, has long-standing links with the world of sport and Hollywood. The brand has had a long list of sports and Hollywood ambassadors. In addition, TAG Heuer has paid numerous celebrities to endorse its products, including: Tom Brady, Ayrton Senna, Kevin Richardson, Cristiano Ronaldo, Chris Hemsworth, Jessica Michibata, Tiger Woods, Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, Sarah Fisher, Louis Koo, Chen Daoming, G.E.M. Tang, Jeff Gordon, Maria Sharapova, Jeremy Lin, Juan Pablo Montoya, Kimi Räikkönen, Uma Thurman, Fernando Alonso, Lewis Hamilton, Max Verstappen, Sergio Pérez, Therese Johaug, Shah Rukh Khan, Priyanka Chopra, Cameron Diaz, Sydney McLaughlin, Steve McQueen, Ranbir Kapoor, Mary Kom, Alexander Rossi and Li Yifeng.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Steve McQueen wore a blue Monaco in the 1971 movie "Le Mans" (this model is now referred to as the "McQueen Monaco"), and Swiss Formula One star Jo Siffert customarily wore a white-dialed Autavia with black registers. In 1974, Heuer produced a special version of the black-dialed Autavia that was offered by the Viceroy cigarette company for US$88. This version of the Autavia was called the "Viceroy" and advertisements for this promotion featured racer Parnelli Jones.


title: TAG Heuer

text: TAG Heuer has been the official timekeeper of the three Summer Olympic Games of the 1920s, the Skiing World Championships, the Formula One World Championships and has developed a watch for the McLaren F1 team.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Heuer was the official timepiece of the Ferrari F1 team in the 1970s and McLaren from the 1980s until 2015. TAG Heuer is the official time keeper and sponsor of La Liga, Bundesliga, Ligue 1, Serie A, J1 League, and Major League Soccer.


title: TAG Heuer

text: From 2017 to 2020, TAG Heuer was the official timekeeper for "Gran Turismo Sport", a racing video game that was released on PlayStation 4.


title: TAG Heuer

text: TAG Heuer is an official partner of Red Bull Racing. TAG, now known as TAG Group which is no longer affiliated with TAG Heuer, sponsored Formula One team Williams during the early 1980s. TAG also gave its name to the Porsche engines used by the McLaren Formula One team from 1983 through 1987. TAG Group continues to hold a stake in McLaren.


title: TAG Heuer

text: The endorsement with Red Bull was part of a larger promotional outreach program by former TAG Heuer CEO Jean-Claude Biver to entry into markets that may not necessarily be traditional markets for the company, an idea Biver calls "Universes", which include sport, heritage, lifestyle and art and music. Other brand ambassadors in the "Universes" program include David Guetta, OneRepublic, Martin Garrix, Cara Delevingne, Chris Hemsworth, Manchester United F.C. and Muhammad Ali.


title: TAG Heuer

text: Starting in May 2018 TAG Heuer picked up the title sponsorship of the pagoda at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.


title: TAG Heuer

text: The driver did not finish the Grand Prix, but was classified as he completed over 90% of the race distance.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The Grumman F4F Wildcat is an American carrier-based fighter aircraft that entered service in 1940 with the United States Navy, and the British Royal Navy where it was initially known as the Martlet. First used by the British in the North Atlantic, the Wildcat was the only effective fighter available to the United States Navy and Marine Corps in the Pacific Theater during the early part of the Second World War. The disappointing Brewster Buffalo was withdrawn in favor of the Wildcat and replaced as aircraft became available.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: With a top speed of , the Wildcat was outperformed by the faster (), more maneuverable, and longer-ranged Mitsubishi A6M Zero. US Navy pilots, including John "Jimmy" Thach, a pioneer of fighter tactics to deal with the A6M Zero, were greatly dissatisfied with the Wildcat's inferior performance against the Zero in the battles of the Coral Sea and Midway. The Wildcat has a claimed air combat kill-to-loss ratio of 5.9:1 in 1942 and 6.9:1 for the entire war.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: Lessons learned from the Wildcat were later applied to the faster F6F Hellcat. While the Wildcat had better range and maneuverability at low speed, the Hellcat could rely on superior power and high speed performance to outperform the Zero. The Wildcat continued to be built throughout the remainder of the war to serve on escort carriers, where the larger and much heavier Hellcat could not be used.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: Grumman fighter development began with the two-seat Grumman FF biplane. The FF was the first U.S. naval fighter with a retractable landing gear. The wheels retracted into the fuselage, leaving the tires visibly exposed, flush with the sides of the fuselage. Two single-seat biplane designs followed, the F2F and F3F, which established the general fuselage outlines of what would become the F4F Wildcat. In 1935, while the F3F was still undergoing flight testing, Grumman started work on its next biplane fighter, the G-16. At the time, the U.S. Navy favored a monoplane design, the Brewster F2A-1, ordering production early in 1936. However, an order was also placed for Grumman's G-16 (given the navy designation XF4F-1) as a backup in case the Brewster monoplane proved to be unsatisfactory.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: It was clear to Grumman that the XF4F-1 would be inferior to the Brewster monoplane, so Grumman abandoned the XF4F-1, designing instead a new monoplane fighter, the XF4F-2. The XF4F-2 would retain the same, fuselage-mounted, hand-cranked main landing gear as the F3F, with its relatively narrow track. The unusual manually-retractable main landing gear design for all of Grumman's U.S. Navy fighters up to and through the F4F, as well as for the amphibious Grumman J2F utility biplane, was originally created in the 1920s by Leroy Grumman for Grover Loening. Landing accidents caused by failure of the main gear to fully lock into place were distressingly common.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The overall performance of Grumman's new monoplane was felt to be inferior to that of the Brewster Buffalo. The XF4F-2 was marginally faster, but the Buffalo was more maneuverable. The Buffalo was judged superior and was chosen for production. After losing out to Brewster, Grumman completely rebuilt the prototype as the XF4F-3 with new wings and tail and a supercharged version of the Pratt & Whitney R-1830 "Twin Wasp" radial engine. Testing of the new XF4F-3 led to an order for F4F-3 production models, the first of which was completed in February 1940. France also ordered the type, powered by a Wright R-1820 "Cyclone 9" radial engine, but France fell to the Axis powers before they could be delivered and the aircraft went instead to the British Royal Navy, who christened the new fighter the Martlet. The U.S. Navy officially adopted the aircraft type on 1 October 1941 as the Wildcat. The Royal Navy's and U.S. Navy's F4F-3s, armed with four .50 in (12.7 mm) Browning machine guns, joined active units in 1940.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: On 16 December 1940, the XF4F-3 prototype, BuNo "0383", c/n 356, modified from XF4F-2, was lost under circumstances that suggested that the pilot may have been confused by the poor layout of fuel valves and flap controls and inadvertently turned the fuel valve to "off" immediately after takeoff rather than selecting flaps "up". This was the first fatality in the type.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: Even before the Wildcat had been purchased by the U.S. Navy, the French Navy and the Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm (FAA) had ordered the Wildcat, with their own configurations, via the Anglo-French Purchasing Board.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The F4F, initially known in British service as the Martlet, was taken on by the FAA as an interim replacement for the Fairey Fulmar. The Fulmar was a two-seat fighter with good range but operated at a performance disadvantage against single-seater fighters. Navalised Supermarine Spitfires were not available because of the greater need of the Royal Air Force. In the European theater, its first combat victory was on Christmas Day 1940, when a land-based Martlet destroyed a Junkers Ju 88 bomber over the Scapa Flow naval base. This was the first combat victory by a US-built fighter in British service in World War II.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The type also pioneered combat operations from the smaller escort carriers. Six Martlets went to sea aboard the converted former German merchant vessel in September 1941 and shot down several Luftwaffe Fw 200 Condor bombers during highly effective convoy escort operations. These were the first of many Wildcats to engage in aerial combat at sea, including Convoy HG 76 to Gibraltar, in December 1941.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The British received 300 Eastern Aircraft FM-1s giving them the designation Martlet V in 1942–43 and 340 FM-2s, (having changed to using the same name as the US) as the Wildcat VI.Nearly 1,200 Wildcats were flown by the FAA and by January 1944, the Martlet name was dropped and the type was identified as the Wildcat. In March 1945, Wildcats shot down four Messerschmitt Bf 109s over Norway, the FAA's last Wildcat victories.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The last air raid of the war in Europe was carried out by Fleet Air Arm aircraft in Operation Judgement on May 5, 1945. Twenty eight Wildcat VI aircraft from 846, 853 and 882 Naval Air Squadron, flying from escort carriers, took part in an attack on a U-boat depot near Harstad, Norway. Two ships and a U-boat were sunk with the loss of one Wildcat and one Grumman Avenger torpedo-bomber.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The Wildcat was generally outperformed by the Mitsubishi Zero, its major opponent in the early part of the Pacific Theater but held its own partly because, with relatively heavy armor and self-sealing fuel tanks, the Grumman airframe could survive far more damage than its lightweight, unarmored Japanese rival. Many U.S. Navy fighter pilots were saved by the Wildcat's ZB homing device, which allowed them to find their carriers in poor visibility, provided they could get within the range of the homing beacon. (However, the Zed Baker was wildly inconsistent in practice, especially during the Battle of Midway, when an entire squadron of Wildcats crashed in the sea after failing to locate their carriers).


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: In the hands of an expert pilot with a tactical advantage, the Wildcat could prove a difficult opponent even against the formidable Zero. After analyzing Fleet Air Tactical Unit Intelligence Bureau reports describing the new carrier fighter, USN Commander "Jimmy" Thach devised a defensive tactic that allowed Wildcat formations to act in a coordinated maneuver to counter a diving attack, called the "Thach Weave". The most widely employed tactic during the Guadalcanal Campaign was high-altitude ambush, where hit-and-run maneuvers were executed using altitude advantage. This was possible due to an early warning system composed of Coastwatchers and radar. On rare occasions, when Wildcats were unable to gain altitude in time, they would suffer many losses. On 2 October 1942, a Japanese air raid from Rabaul was not detected in time and the Cactus Air Force lost six Wildcats to only one Zero destroyed. During the most intense initial phase of the Guadalcanal Campaign, between 1 August and 15 November, combat records indicate that US lost 115 Wildcats and Japanese lost 106 Zeros to all causes; the Japanese lost many more pilots compared to the US.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: Thach was greatly dissatisfied and a vocal critic of the Wildcat's performance during the war (as were many US carrier pilots), stating in his Midway action report;


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: Four U.S. Marine Corps Wildcats played a prominent role in the defense of Wake Island in December 1941. USN and USMC aircraft formed the fleet's primary air defense during the Battle of Coral Sea and the Battle of Midway and land-based Wildcats played a major role during the Guadalcanal Campaign of 1942–43. It was not until 1943 that more advanced naval fighters capable of taking on the Zero on more even terms, the Grumman F6F Hellcat and Vought F4U Corsair, reached the South Pacific theater.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: Grumman's Wildcat production ceased in early 1943 to make way for the newer F6F Hellcat but General Motors continued producing Wildcats for U.S. Navy and Fleet Air Arm use. At first, GM produced the FM-1 (identical to the F4F-4 but with four guns). Production later switched to the improved FM-2 (based on Grumman's XF4F-8 prototype, informally known as the "Wilder Wildcat") optimized for small-carrier operations, with a more powerful engine and a taller tail to cope with the increased torque.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: From 1943, Wildcats equipped with bomb racks were primarily assigned to escort carriers for use against submarines and attacking ground targets, though they would also continue to score kills against Japanese fighters, bombers and kamikaze aircraft. Larger fighters such as the Hellcat and the Corsair and dive bombers were needed aboard fleet carriers and the Wildcat's slower landing speed made it more suitable for shorter flight decks.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: In the Battle off Samar on 25 October 1944, escort carriers of Task Unit 77.4.3 ("Taffy 3") and their escort of destroyers and destroyer escorts found themselves as the sole force standing between vulnerable troop transport and supply ships engaged in landings on the Philippine island of Leyte and a powerful Japanese surface fleet of battleships and cruisers. In desperation, lightly armed Avengers and FM-2 Wildcats from Taffys 1, 2 and 3 resorted to tactics such as strafing ships, including the bridge of the Japanese battleship , while the destroyers and destroyer escorts charged the enemy. Confused by the fierce resistance and having suffered significant damage, the Japanese fleet eventually withdrew from the battle.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: U.S. Navy Wildcats participated in Operation Torch. USN escort carriers in the Atlantic used Wildcats until the end of the war. In October 1943 F4Fs participated in Operation Leader, an anti-shipping strike on Norway.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: In all, 7,860 Wildcats were built. During the course of the war, Navy and Marine F4Fs and FMs flew 15,553 combat sorties (14,027 of these from aircraft carriers), destroying a claimed figure of 1,327 enemy aircraft at a cost of 178 aerial losses, 24 to ground/shipboard fire, and 49 to operational causes (an overall claimed kill-to-loss ratio of 6.9:1). True to their escort fighter role, Wildcats dropped only 154 tons of bombs during the war.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The original Grumman F4F-1 design was a biplane, which proved inferior to rival designs, necessitating a complete redesign as a monoplane named the F4F-2. This design was still not competitive with the Brewster F2A Buffalo which won initial U.S. Navy orders, but when the F4F-3 development was fitted with a more powerful version of the engine, a Pratt & Whitney Twin Wasp R-1830-76, featuring a two-stage supercharger, it showed its true potential.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: U.S. Navy orders followed as did some (with Wright Cyclone engines) from France; these ended up with the Royal Navy's Fleet Air Arm after the fall of France and entered service on 8 September 1940. These aircraft, designated by Grumman as G-36A, had a different cowling from other earlier F4Fs and fixed wings, and were intended to be fitted with French armament and avionics following delivery. In British service initially, the aircraft were known as the Martlet I, but not all Martlets would be to exactly the same specifications as U.S. Navy aircraft. All Martlet Is featured the four .50 in (12.7 mm) M2 Browning machine guns of the F4F-3 with 450 rpg. The British directly ordered and received a version with the original Twin Wasp, but again with a modified cowling, under the manufacturer designation G-36B. These aircraft were given the designation Martlet II by the British. The first 10 G-36Bs were fitted with non-folding wings and were given the designation Martlet III. These were followed by 30 folding wing aircraft (F4F-3As) which were originally destined for the Hellenic Air Force, which were also designated Martlet IIIs. On paper, the designation changed to Martlet III(A) when the second series of Martlet III was introduced.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: Poor design of the armament installation on early F4Fs caused these otherwise reliable machine guns to frequently jam, a problem common to wing-mounted weapons of many U.S. fighters early in the war. An F4F-3 flown by Lieutenant Edward O'Hare shot down, within a few minutes, five Mitsubishi twin-engine bombers attacking off Bougainville on 20 February 1942. But contrasting with O'Hare's performance, his wingman was unable to participate because his guns would not function.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: A shortage of two-stage superchargers led to the development of the F4F-3A, which was basically the F4F-3 but with a Pratt & Whitney R-1830-90 radial engine with a more primitive single-stage two-speed supercharger. The F4F-3A, which was capable of at , was used side by side with the F4F-3, but its poorer performance made it unpopular with U.S. Navy fighter pilots. The F4F-3A would enter service as the Martlet III(B).


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: At the time of Pearl Harbor, only had a fully equipped Wildcat squadron, VF-6 with F4F-3As. "Enterprise" was then transferring a detachment of VMF-211, also equipped with F4F-3s, to Wake. was in San Diego, working up for operations of the F4F-3s of VF-3. 11 F4F-3s of VMF-211 were at the Ewa Marine Air Corps Station on Oahu; nine of these were damaged or destroyed during the Japanese attack. The detachment of VMF-211 on Wake lost seven Wildcats to Japanese attacks on 8 December, but the remaining five put up a fierce defense, making the first bomber kill on 9 December. The destroyer was sunk by the Wildcats, and the Japanese invasion force retreated.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: In May 1942, the F4F-3s of VF-2 and VF-42, aboard and "Lexington", participated in the Battle of the Coral Sea. "Lexington" and "Yorktown" fought against the fleet carriers and and the light carrier in this battle, in an attempt to halt a Japanese invasion of Port Moresby on Papua. During these battles, it became clear that attacks without fighter escort amounted to suicide, but that the fighter component on the carriers was completely insufficient to provide both fighter cover for the carrier and an escort for an attack force. Most U.S. carriers carried fewer than 20 fighters.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: In June 1942, 17 F4F-3s and one F4F-3A (18 total) were converted into F4F-3P photoreconnaissance planes. The F4F-3Ps were for short-range tactical reconnaissance, as their reserve fuel tanks were removed and replaced with Fairchild F-56 cameras. The F4F-3Ps retained their machine guns and were mainly flown by VMO-251 on air defense missions from Espiritu Santo in the South Pacific, arriving in July 1942. In October 1942, long-ranged and unarmed F4F-7s began replacing the F4F-3Ps, but a detachment of three F4F-3P from VMO-155 operated from the "Bogue"-class escort carrier USS "Nassau" (CVE-16) during the amphibious invasion of Attu Island in May 1943. Boston, MA, USA: Little, Brown and Co./Atlantic Monthly Press


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: This floatplane version of the F4F-3 was developed for use at forward island bases in the Pacific, before the construction of airfields. It was inspired by appearance of the A6M2-N "Rufe", a modification of the Mitsubishi A6M2 "Zeke". BuNo 4038 was modified to become the F4F-3S "Wildcatfish". Twin floats, manufactured by Edo Aircraft Corporation, were fitted. To restore the stability, small auxiliary fins were added to the tailplane. Because this was still insufficient, a ventral fin was added later.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The F4F-3S was first flown 28 February 1943. The weight and drag of the floats reduced the maximum speed to . As the performance of the basic F4F-3 was already below that of the Zero, the F4F-3S was clearly of limited usefulness. In any case, the construction of the airfields at forward bases by the "Seabees" was surprisingly quick. Only one was converted.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: A new version, the F4F-4, entered service in 1941 with six machine guns and the Grumman-patented "Sto-Wing" folding wing system, which allowed more aircraft to be stored on an aircraft carrier, increasing the number of fighters that could be parked on a surface by more than a factor of 2. The F4F-4 was the definitive version that saw the most combat service in the early war years, including the Battle of Midway. Navy F4F-3s were replaced by F4F-4s in June 1942. During the Battle of Midway, only VMF-221 still used F4F-3s. VF-42 of the Yorktown was the last carrier group converted to the F4F-4, and that was done as it left Pearl Harbor on the way to the Battle of Midway as VF-3 flew in new F4F-4s with Com. Thach.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The F4F-4 version was less popular with American pilots because the same amount of ammunition was spread over two additional guns, decreasing firing time. With the F4F-3's four .50 in (12.7 mm) guns and 450 rpg, pilots had 34 seconds of firing time; six guns decreased ammunition to 240 rpg, which could be expended in less than 20 seconds. The increase to six guns was attributed to the Royal Navy, who wanted greater firepower to deal with German and Italian foes. Jimmy Thach is quoted as saying, "A pilot who cannot hit with four guns will miss with eight." Extra guns and folding wings meant extra weight and reduced performance: the F4F-4 was capable of only about at . Rate of climb was noticeably worse in the F4F-4; while Grumman optimistically claimed the F4F-4 could climb at a modest per minute, in combat conditions, pilots found their F4F-4s capable of ascending at only per minute. Moreover, the F4F-4's folding wing was intended to allow five F4F-4s to be stowed in the space required by two F4F-3s. In practice, the folding wings allowed an increase of about 50% in the number of Wildcats carried aboard U.S. fleet aircraft carriers. A variant of the F4F-4, designated F4F-4B for contractual purposes, was supplied to the British with a modified cowling and Wright Cyclone engine. These aircraft received the designation of Martlet IV.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: Two F4F-3s (the 3rd and 4th production aircraft, BuNo 1846/1847) were fitted with a Wright R-1820-40 engine and designated XF4F-5.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: General Motors / Eastern Aircraft produced 5,280 FM variants of the Wildcat. Grumman's Wildcat production ceased in early 1943 to make way for the newer F6F Hellcat, but General Motors continued producing Wildcats for both U.S. Navy and Fleet Air Arm use. Late in the war, the Wildcat was obsolescent as a front line fighter compared to the faster (380 mph/610 km/h) F6F Hellcat or much faster (446 mph/718 km/h) F4U Corsair. However, they were adequate for small escort carriers against submarine and shore threats. These relatively modest ships only carried two types of aircraft, the Wildcats and GM-built TBM Avengers. The Wildcat's lower landing speed and ability to take off without a catapult made it more suitable for shorter flight decks. At first, GM produced the FM-1, identical to the F4F-4, but reduced the number of guns to four, and added wing racks for two 250 lb (110 kg) bombs or six rockets. Production later switched to the improved FM-2 (based on Grumman's XF4F-8 prototype) optimized for small-carrier operations, with a more powerful engine (the Wright R-1820-56), and a taller tail to cope with the torque.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The F4F-7 was a photoreconnaissance variant, with armor and armament removed. It had non-folding "wet" wings that carried an additional 555 gal (2,101 L) of fuel for a total of about 700 gal (2,650 L), increasing its range to 3,700 mi (5,955 km). A total of 21 were built.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The F2M-1 was a planned development of the FM-1 by General Motors / Eastern Aircraft to be powered by the improved XR-1820-70 engine, but the project was cancelled before any aircraft were built.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: At the end of 1939, Grumman received a French order for 81 aircraft of model G-36A, to equip their new s: and . The main difference with the basic model G-36 was due to the unavailability for export of the two-stage supercharged engine of F4F-3. The G-36A was powered by the nine-cylinder, single-row Wright R-1820-G205A radial engine, of and with a single-stage two-speed supercharger.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The G-36A also had French instruments (with metric calibration), radio and gunsight. The throttle was modified to conform to French pre-war practice: the throttle lever was moved towards the pilot (i.e. backward) to increase engine power. The armament which was to be fitted in France was six 7.5 mm (.296 in) Darne machine guns (two in the fuselage and four in the wings). The first G-36A was flown on 11 May 1940. After France's defeat in the Battle of France, all contracts were taken over by Britain. The throttle was modified again, four 0.50 in (12.7 mm) guns were installed in the wings and most traces of the original ownership removed.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The Martlets were modified for British use by Blackburn, which continued to do this for all later marks. British gunsights, catapult spools and other items were installed. After attempts to fit British radio sets, it was decided to use the superior American equipment. The first Martlets entered British service in August 1940, with 804 Naval Air Squadron, stationed at Hatston in the Orkney Islands. The Martlet Mk I did not have a wing folding mechanism and was therefore used primarily from land bases, with the notable exception of six aircraft of 882 Sqn aboard "Illustrious" from March 1942. In April 1942 "Illustrious" transferred two Martlet I aircraft to HMS "Archer" while in port at Freetown. One of her four retained Martlet I aircraft were subsequently fitted with folding wings by ship's staff during passage to Durban. In 1940, Belgium also placed an order for at least 10 G-36A's. These were to be modified with the same changes to the French aircraft, plus the removal of the tailhook as they were to be landbased. Belgium surrendered before any aircraft were delivered and by 10 May 1940, the aircraft order was transferred to the Royal Navy.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: Before the Fleet Air Arm took on charge the Martlet Mk Is, it had already ordered 100 G-36B fighters. The British chose the Pratt & Whitney R-1830-S3C4-G engine to power this aircraft; this too had a single-stage, two-speed supercharger. The FAA decided to accept a delay in delivery to get Martlets fitted out with the Grumman-designed and patented "Sto-Wing" folding wing system first fitted onto U.S. Navy F4F-4 Wildcats, which were vitally important if the Martlet was to be used from the first 3 Illustrious class carriers which had elevators that were too narrow to accommodate non-folding wing aircraft. Nevertheless, the first 10 received had fixed wings. The first Martlet with folding wings was not delivered until August 1941.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: In contrast to the USN F4F-3, the British aircraft were fitted with armor and self-sealing fuel tanks. The Mk II also had a larger tailwheel. For carrier operations, the "sting" tail hook and attachment point for the American single-point catapult launch system were considered important advantages. Nevertheless, the Martlets were modified to have British-style catapult spools. Deliveries of the folding-wing G-36Bs began in August 1941, with 36 shipped to the UK and 54 shipped to the Far East; they were designated "Martlet Mark II". Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment (A&AEE) testing of the Martlet II at a mean weight of approximately showed a maximum speed of at and , a maximum climb rate of at at weight, and a time to climb to of 12.5 minutes. The service ceiling at was .


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The Martlet was the second single-seat, monoplane fighter to operate from Royal Navy aircraft carriers following the introduction of the Sea Hurricane IB on in July 1941.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The majority of the Martlet Mk IIs were sent to the Far East. The first shipboard operations of the type in British service were in September 1941, aboard , a very small escort carrier with a carrier deck of by , no elevators and no hangar deck. The six Wildcats were parked on the deck at all times. On its first voyage, it served as escort carrier for a convoy to Gibraltar. On 20 September, a German Fw 200 was shot down. On the next voyage, four Fw 200 "Condors" fell to the guns of the Martlets, and of the combined total, two of these five Condors were shot down by Eric "Winkle" Brown during his time aboard. Operations from "Audacity" also demonstrated that the fighter cover was useful against U-boats. "Audacity" was sunk by a U-boat on 21 December 1941, and of the pilots only Brown and one other survived, but it had already proved the usefulness of escort carriers.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: In May 1942, 881 and 882 squadrons on participated in operations against Madagascar. In August 1942, 806 NAS on provided fighter cover for a convoy to Malta. Later in that year they participated in the landings in French North Africa.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The first 30 F4F-3As were released for sale to Greece, after the Italian invasion in November 1940. However, at the defeat of Greece in April 1941 the aircraft had only reached Gibraltar. They were taken over by the FAA as Martlet Mk III(B). As these aircraft did not have folding wings, they were only used from land bases. They served in a shore-based role in the Western Desert.


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The Royal Navy purchased 220 F4F-4s adapted to British requirements. The main difference was the use of a Wright R-1820-40B Cyclone in a distinctly more rounded and compact cowling, with a single double-wide flap on each side of the rear and no lip intake. These machines were named Martlet Mk IV. Boscombe Down testing of the Martlet IV at weight showed a maximum speed of at and at , a maximum climb rate of at at weight, and a time to climb to of 14.6 minutes. The service ceiling at was .


title: Grumman F4F Wildcat

text: The Fleet Air Arm purchased 312 FM-1s, originally with the designation of Martlet V. In January 1944, a decision was made to retain the American names for US-supplied aircraft, redesignating the batch as the Wildcat V.


title: Hello

text: Hello is a salutation or greeting in the English language. It is first attested in writing from 1826.


title: Hello

text: "Hello", with that spelling, was used in publications in the U.S. as early as the 18 October 1826 edition of the "Norwich Courier" of Norwich, Connecticut. Another early use was an 1833 American book called "The Sketches and Eccentricities of Col. David Crockett, of West Tennessee", which was reprinted that same year in "The London Literary Gazette". The word was extensively used in literature by the 1860s.


title: Hello

text: According to the "Oxford English Dictionary", "hello" is an alteration of "hallo", "hollo", which came from Old High German ""halâ", "holâ", emphatic imperative of "halôn", "holôn" to fetch, used especially in hailing a ferryman". It also connects the development of "hello" to the influence of an earlier form, "holla", whose origin is in the French "holà" (roughly, 'whoa there!', from French "là" 'there'). As in addition to "hello", "halloo", "hallo", "hollo", "hullo" and (rarely) "hillo" also exist as variants or related words, the word can be spelt using any of all five vowels.


title: Hello

text: The use of "hello" as a telephone greeting has been credited to Thomas Edison; according to one source, he expressed his surprise with a misheard "Hullo". Alexander Graham Bell initially used "Ahoy" (as used on ships) as a telephone greeting. However, in 1877, Edison wrote to T. B. A. David, president of the Central District and Printing Telegraph Company of Pittsburgh:


title: Hello

text: By 1889, central telephone exchange operators were known as 'hello-girls' because of the association between the greeting and the telephone.


title: Hello

text: "Hello" might be derived from an older spelling variant, "hullo", which the American Merriam-Webster dictionary describes as a "chiefly British variant of hello", and which was originally used as an exclamation to call attention, an expression of surprise, or a greeting. "Hullo" is found in publications as early as 1803. The word "hullo" is still in use, with the meaning "hello".


title: Hello

text: "Hello" is alternatively thought to come from the word "hallo" (1840) via "hollo" (also "holla", "holloa", "halloo", "halloa"). The definition of "hollo" is to shout or an exclamation originally shouted in a hunt when the quarry was spotted:


title: Hello

text: It is used by Samuel Taylor Coleridge's famous poem "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" written in 1798:


title: Hello

text: In many Germanic languages, including German, Danish, Norwegian, Dutch and Afrikaans, ""hallo"" literally translates into English as "hello". In the case of Dutch, it was used as early as 1797 in a letter from Willem Bilderdijk to his sister-in-law as a remark of astonishment.


title: Hello

text: Webster's dictionary from 1913 traces the etymology of "holloa" to the Old English "halow" and suggests: "Perhaps from ah + lo; compare Anglo Saxon ealā".


title: Hello

text: According to the "American Heritage Dictionary", "hallo" is a modification of the obsolete "holla" ("stop!"), perhaps from Old French "hola" ("ho", ho! + "la", there, from Latin "illac", that way).


title: Hello

text: The Old English verb, hǽlan (1. wv/t1b 1 to heal, cure, save; greet, salute; gehǽl! Hosanna!), may be the ultimate origin of the word. Hǽlan is likely a cognate of German Heil (meaning "complete" for things and "healthy" for beings) and other similar words of Germanic origin. Bill Bryson asserts in his book "Mother Tongue" that "hello" comes from Old English "hál béo þu" ("Hale be thou", or "whole be thou", meaning a wish for good health; cf. "goodbye" which is a contraction of "God be with ye").


title: Hello

text: Students learning a new computer programming language will often begin by writing a "Hello, World!" program, which does nothing but issue the message "Hello, world" to the user (such as by displaying it on a screen). It has been used since the earliest programs, in many computer languages. This tradition was further popularised after being printed in an introductory chapter of the book "The C Programming Language" by Kernighan & Ritchie. The book had reused an example taken from a 1974 memo by Brian Kernighan at Bell Laboratories.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: A soldier named Guts attracts the attention of a mercenary group, The Band of the Hawk, when he kills an enemy champion during a siege. He is forced into joining the group after being defeated in single combat by its leader, Griffith. The Band of the Hawk are employed by the Kingdom of Midland for its Hundred Year War against the Tudor Empire, and Griffith rises in the kingdom's hierarchy after a successful battle. During another siege, Guts and Griffith encounter the demon Nosferatu Zodd, who notices the pendant around Griffith's neck and warns Guts that Griffith will be his doom. Griffith's rise in status is ill-received by Midland's noblemen, and there is a failed assassination attempt on Griffith by the king's brother, Julius. Griffith charges Guts with murdering Julius, and Guts also kills the noble's young son. Guts, emotionally scarred by his actions, overhears Griffith say that The Band of the Hawk are his comrades, but for people to be friends they must purse their own dreams and not someone else's.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: Guts and Casca are separated from The Band of the Hawk, and fend off attacks by the Tudor's cruel commander Adon and his men. Guts defeats most of Adon's men while covering Casca's escape, but begins to lament his life's path and decides he will eventually leave the Band of the Hawk, find and pursue his own dream, and become a true friend to Griffith. Later, the Band of the Hawk participates in the battle to capture the impenetrable Fortress of Doldrey and end the Hundred Years War, wherein Casca kills Adon. A month after the war's end, Guts parts ways with Griffith after defeating him in a duel. Griffith is distraught at Guts' departure, and in a lapse of judgment he is caught sleeping with the king's daughter, Charlotte. Griffith is charged with treason and imprisoned in the Tower of Rebirth while the members of the Band of the Hawk are branded outlaws.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: A year after Guts' departure from the Band of the Hawk, he returns to aid them in freeing Griffith from the Tower of Rebirth. However, when they find Griffith he is barely alive, rendered mute, and physically withered after months of torture. Griffith attempts suicide, and his pendant reacts to his despair, opening a portal to another dimension experiencing a solar eclipse that draws in him and The Band of the Hawk. There, they encounter archdemons known as The God Hand and Griffith is told that his tribulations have been leading to this moment, when Griffith agrees to sacrifice his allies in exchange for being reborn as Femto, a member of the God Hand. The Band of the Hawk are slaughtered by the God Hand's monstrous Apostles (former humans like Nosferatu Zodd) and Femto rapes Casca. Guts loses his left arm and right eye trying to save Casca, but Casca loses her sanity from the nightmarish ordeal. Guts and Casca are spirited back to their world by the mysterious Skull Knight, who tells Guts he has been branded by the God Hand and will be subjected to nightly attacks by evil creatures. Guts leaves Casca under the care of former comrade Rickert and embarks on a journey to hunt down Apostles and the God Hand.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: The Japanese voice cast features Hiroaki Iwanaga as Guts (replacing Nobutoshi Canna from the original anime), Takahiro Sakurai as Griffith (replacing Toshiyuki Morikawa), and Toa Yukinari as Casca (replacing Yūko Miyamura). The English voice cast features Marc Diraison as Guts, Kevin T. Collins as Griffith, and Carrie Keranen as Casca, all reprising their roles from the original anime.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: The project was first announced as a new anime project in September 2010 on a wraparound jacket band on volume 35 of the "Berserk" manga. was released on February 4, 2012, in Japan.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: In North America, Viz Media has licensed all three films for a home video release. "The Egg of the King" was released on November 27, 2012; "The Battle for Doldrey" was released on August 6, 2013; and "The Advent" was released on April 15, 2014. "The Golden Age Arc" has also been available for streaming on Netflix.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: In June 2022, it was announced that the trilogy would receive a television broadcast version, titled . The series was featured at the Aniplex Online Fest 2022, held on September 23, 2022. The series is directed by Yuta Sano and premiered on Tokyo MX, Tochigi TV, Gunma TV, BS11 and other networks on October 2, 2022. The series is streamed outside of Asia by Crunchyroll.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: The soundtracks for the film series are composed and arranged by Shirō Sagisu, with the theme song composed and arranged by Susumu Hirasawa. The insert song of all films, "Aria", is performed by Hirasawa, a live performance (from "Phonon 2555 Vision") is included on the home video releases of the second film, another live version is on the "Nomonos and Imium" DVD; the ending theme of the first film, , is performed by Japanese-American singer-songwriter Ai (in an uncharacteristic epic ballad style) and composed by Rykeyz and Redd Styiez; lastly, the ending theme of the third film, "Breakthrough", is performed by Kaname Kawabata of CHEMISTRY, written by Kawabata, Hidenori Tanaka and UTA, and arranged by Sagisu, Miho Hazama and CHOKKAKU. A special TV program, narrated by Akio Ōtsuka (the voice actor for the Skull Knight), that summarized the events of the first two movies, used the Hirasawa song (from "The Secret of the Flowers of Phenomenon") as its ending theme.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: The television broadcast version of the trilogy, "Berserk: The Golden Age Arc – Memorial Edition", features an exclusive ending theme by Mika Nakashima, titled "Wish". It also features new music composed by Sagisu and Hirasawa.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: In Japan, "Berserk: The Golden Age Arc I: The Egg of the King" brought in $594,707 with a gross of $1,348,352, and the last film in the trilogy brought in less, with an opening weekend of $280,248 and grossing $399,445.


title: Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

text: "Kotaku"'s Richard Eisenbeis panned the first two installments of the trilogy, but described the third installment, "Berserk: Golden Age Arc III: Descent", as supreme and delivering an experience surpassing the original manga both in emotional turmoil and brutal violence.


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: Lawrence Edward Kasdan (born January 14, 1949) is an American filmmaker. He is the co-writer of the "Star Wars" films "The Empire Strikes Back" (1980), "Return of the Jedi" (1983), "The Force Awakens" (2015), and "" (2018). He also co-wrote "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (1981) and "The Bodyguard" (1992), and is the writer-director of "Body Heat" (1981), "The Big Chill" (1983), "Silverado" (1985), "The Accidental Tourist" (1988), and "Dreamcatcher" (2003). He is known for updating old Hollywood genres—film noir, science-fiction, westerns—in a classical dramatic style with quick-witted dialogue, but dealing with contemporary social themes. As a director, he has made various personal films that examine characters and generations.


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: Kasdan has been nominated for four Academy Awards: as a producer for Best Picture nominee "The Accidental Tourist", for which he was also nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay, and for Best Original Screenplay for both "The Big Chill" and "Grand Canyon" (1991). He has often collaborated with his wife, Meg Kasdan, his brother, Mark Kasdan, and his two sons: Jonathan Kasdan and Jake Kasdan. He frequently casts Kevin Kline in his films.


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: Kasdan was born in Miami Beach, Florida, the son of parents Sylvia, an employment counselor, and Clarence Kasdan, an electronics-store manager. Kasdan is Jewish. His older brother is Mark Kasdan, who co-wrote "Silverado" (1985) and produced "Dreamcatcher" (2003), and he has two sisters. Kasdan grew up in Morgantown, West Virginia. "I felt very fortunate to have had a regular American childhood in the fifties," he said. "It was a safe place, where you owned the town if you had a bicycle."


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: His parents were both "thwarted writers." His father, who died when Kasdan was 14, had wanted to be a playwright, and his mother claimed to have studied with novelist and playwright Sinclair Lewis while she was at the University of Wisconsin. She sold a few stories to "confessional magazines" in the 1950s, and later would buy self-help books and type up their contents with the dream of writing her own book one day. She would also strike up conversations with strangers on the bus, saying it was all "grist for the mill" for some future writing. "Looking back on it now," Kasdan wrote, "I wonder if maybe I owe her everything. Whether by nature or nurture, I became a writer."


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: Many of Kasdan's movies were inspired by his "difficult childhood and home life," he wrote. "So, in my work, I've looked for something more stable or explored why growing up in my home was so upsetting."


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: "We didn't have a lot of money and neither did anyone around us, and going to the movies was the happiest thing about my childhood," he said. "Movies weren't very big in Wheeling in those days. We used to call up the theater to ask what time the show began, and they'd say, 'What time can you get here?'" He particularly loved "The Great Escape" (1963) and "The Magnificent Seven" (1960), both directed by John Sturges—movies that shaped his ideas of manhood and heroism. "Film made its values tangible for me in the ways that parents, school, Sunday School had not. I wanted to live in the world I found in the movies."


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: In 1963, his brother Mark took him to see David Lean's "Lawrence of Arabia". They arrived a few minutes late, and Mark insisted that they kill six hours until the next showing. "I thought my brother was crazy. But when the show was over, I knew I had done the right thing. As I stumbled from the theater, having seen the whole movie, I had a new hero. It was not T.E. Lawrence, but David Lean."


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: He graduated from Morgantown High School in 1966. To earn money for college, he worked various jobs at a glass factory and the night shift at a supermarket in Wheeling, scraping meat from butcher machines. He applied to the University of Michigan because he was told they had the best-paying college writing contest in the country (the Hopwood Award), and that the playwright Arthur Miller had paid for his studies by winning the award. Miller's teacher, Kenneth Thorpe Rowe, was still a professor at the university, and Kasdan studied drama writing with Rowe.


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: He won the Hopwood Award four times between 1968 and 1970, winning a total of $2,000. "When I received the letter telling me that I had won Hopwood Awards in both fiction and drama, my life changed forever," Kasdan said. "It was the first sign the real world, the outside world, the big-time world, had given me that this was not just a hopeless dream. ... Even though I had many discouraging years after that, there was never a day after I received that letter that I doubted I would be able to make my way as a writer."


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: While in college, Kasdan marched on Washington to protest the Vietnam War. He also made one short film. "Technically, it was very crude," he said. "It was a wry look at a professor I knew who was very interested in all the young female students—sort of a rough, humorous film about his fascination with one particular girl. It was shot on 16mm. I cut it and did the sound, but I was never a technically proficient student filmmaker."


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: He was determined to become a director, and decided the best path was by writing screenplays. He got into the writing program at UCLA and briefly moved to Los Angeles, but found the experience frustrating and moved back to Ann Arbor, where he worked in a record store and continued writing screenplays.


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: He pursued a master's degree in education at the University of Michigan and graduated in 1971, with plans to support himself as a high school English teacher until he broke into Hollywood. But he soon discovered that there were no high school English teaching jobs. "It was almost as hard to get that kind of work as being a movie director," he said. The experience he did have as a student teacher later proved useful on film sets: "You can control an unruly class at almost any level, but the more you yell, the less effective yelling becomes," he said. "That has influenced my approach to directing; for me, being hard is giving someone a look where another director might scream at them."


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: Unable to find a teaching position, Kasdan took a job as an advertising copywriter at the W.B. Doner agency in Detroit—a profession he didn't enjoy but found success in, earning a Clio Award for his first TV commercial, as well as an award from The One Show. His supervisor, Jim Dale, remembered Kasdan "always said he was better at writing for TV than for print, and that was certainly prophetic." Kasdan described his five years in advertising as "hellacious," and he persisted in writing screenplays at night.


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: Kasdan's sixth finished screenplay was about a female singer who falls in love with her bodyguard, which he wrote in 1975. With "The Bodyguard" he was able to get an agent, Norman Kurland, and he took an advertising job in Los Angeles to further justify a move to California. Kurland sent the script around town for two years, and it was rejected 67 times. "We couldn’t even get him a job writing "Starsky and Hutch"," Kurland said, although Kasdan had no desire to write for television. He was hired to write a treatment for a low-budget feature for Paramount, but the film was never made. He continued to write screenplays, including what he's called an "un-producible historical" movie.


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: "The Bodyguard" was finally optioned by Warner Bros. in 1977 for $20,000. It was rewritten many times over the years, and attached to different actresses (including Diana Ross and Whoopi Goldberg) whose characters were in various occupations. Kasdan wrote it with Steve McQueen in mind as Frank the bodyguard; in the original draft, the U.S. president Frank failed to save was John F. Kennedy. Kevin Costner read the screenplay when Kasdan directed him in "Silverado", the role that made him a star. In 1991, he asked Kasdan to make "The Bodyguard" with Costner in the title role. Kasdan had "messed around" with it so many times that he felt too burned out, and he was also preparing to direct "Grand Canyon"—so instead he chose to produce it with Costner, and they hired Mick Jackson, who had just made "L.A. Story" (1991) with Steve Martin, to direct. Whitney Houston was cast as superstar singer Rachel Marron.


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: Kasdan was not happy with the way the film turned out, "but I think it had nothing to do with Mick Jackson," he later said. "I think it had to do with the fact that I'm not a good person for having other people direct my screenplays ... and so I was very unhappy with "The Bodyguard". Kevin and I got very involved in the editing, which is not something I would normally do with any other director. I don't want people messing with my movie. But we were the producers and we had serious problems with it."


title: Lawrence Kasdan

text: Despite receiving "probably the worst reviews I've ever had," Kasdan said, the film was a huge box office success when it came out on November 25, 1992—earning more than $411 million worldwide. "If I had directed that film it probably wouldn't have done anything like that business," Kasdan wrote: