I found myself wandering down an Amazon rabbit hole, or worm hole… there should be one dedicated term for when you go down one of these random, online maze journeys. I suppose if you find yourself just meandering around Amazon, letting the minutes–or hours fly by, I guess technically that could be called a Bezos hole. But I digress.

I was mentally strolling through the Bezos hole and happened upon some odd games.     The first one that drew my eye was the Donner Dinner Party game. 

This seems to add a fun twist to an evening get together, adding cannibalism. I did not want to look at any potential game pieces. “ha! You rolled a three, eat my femur! Haw!”

There was Secret Hitler, a rather unassuming looking game where I guess somebody’s Hitler in this spy thriller. I don’t know if the mustache is included.

There was an interesting spin on the old “Operation” game: “Hasbro Gaming Despicable Me 3 Edition Operation Game – Spanish Edition”. I *totally* missed the Spanish editions of the first two Despicable Me entries. Heck, I had no idea the Minions had organs to BE removed!

There’s the “Deadwood board game”. Maybe I should take a better  ******* look at this ********** since I was such a huge ******* fan of the ******* show. Maybe the loser gets eaten by pigs! 

Of course the always enjoyable “You’ve Got Crabs” board game. Perfect for date night. On the darker side, there’s the “Salem 1692” game, plenty of curses, dunking and drowning there. “Draw four and BURN WITCH BURN!” Heh, kids. If that theme isn’t depressing enough for the average game player, there’s always the game “Election Night”. Who *wouldn’t* have fun with Election Night?!?

But it was when I got to the Marvel Comics Black Panther *officially sanctioned* Connect Four game, did my lazy, Saturday morning start to come into focus. 

My first thoughts of course were all those scenes in Black Panther with all the characters’ innate fighting and weaponry skills. During many of these scenes–T’challa hopping on Klaw’s car, Okoye kicking ass with her staff, Shuri pulverizing bad guys with her gauntlets, my thoughts naturally drifted straight to wondering how all this would play out in a Connect Four game. As you do!

No, this wasn’t some misguided attempt to honor the late Chadwick Boseman. This is just how big business franchises work. Sadly.

But I only spent an hour thinking about the vast array of possibilities, because then I made another discovery.

From what I’ve observed, the very concept of competing with other people to be the first to slot four chips together into a vertical lattice might be the most amazing, popular and highly sought after game in the cosmos. 

I don’t know if Connect Four was the first to actually attach a name to this marvel, and maybe (?) tried to copyright it, or if there were already about a thousand variations of it and someone said hey, let’s make like we’re the official version– and then there were another thousand more that came along afterward.

Although I don’t know what can even be called the official version, as there’s a Connect 4, Hasbro Connect 4, Connect Four, variations on the same packaging, then then there’s the multitude of generic versions out there. Plastic, wood, various chip designs set some versions apart (this one has ridges!), etc.

But in your quest to eviscerate your opponents by making your four chips align flawlessly four times while they whimper in the corner, hopelessly blocked at aligning a mere three, you begin to ponder.

If *only* there was a version of this game so big, I’d have to assemble it in the back yard…

Well friends, I’ve got good news for you.

Yes, now you can have a giant version of this taking up a lot more space. Just imagine the majesty of setting up this monolith in the middle of your backyard! You can taunt your small children who can’t reach top, embarrass your teens by dancing around it and be the envy of all your neighbors, as they hang drooling and breathless on top of the painful, pointy, picket fence just wanting you or wanting to BE you.

Oh, but we’re not done yet, friends. 

You’re all done playing game, the neighborhood knows who the top bitch is in the cathouse but what ho? You’ve got to take the giant game down and put it away. Do you just put it back in its original box?

What are you, some kind of Secret Hitler?!?

No, because right now, for a limited time only, we have this amazing, sturdily constructed carry bag specifically designed for giant connect four games. Yes, it comes with a handle yes, it *probably* fits most versions of the many many MANY giant connect four games that Amazon clearly has a dedicated warehouse for by this point.

Act now!

That’s all for now, goodbye from the Bezos hole!

All hail Bezos.

(I, for one, welcome our Bezos overlord)