Merry Christmas and happy holidays to you all, beloved readers! It's the day after Christmas and the vast majority of the Ars staff is enjoying their well-earned vacations and preparing to return to work and tackle the new year, but a few of us—Megan, Sam the Red, Dr. Jay, and I—are holding down the fort here for the back half of the week. With Ken, Eric, and Nate out, that means they have foolishly left me in charge of things. It's a bit like when the Enterprise's real crew goes to bed and the night crew takes over!

Because doing real work is difficult and boring, I've been coming up with creative ways to dodge actual responsibilities and do fun stuff instead, and a tweet from @pinstripedline provided exactly the right inspiration for exactly the right kind of work-dodging. To wit:

For those unfamiliar with this particular meme format, this is a recreation of a scene from Die Hard in the style of the Bayeux Tapestry. It's a somewhat older meme format, having first surfaced roundabouts 2004-ish, but it's always been one of my favorite bits of Internet silliness. Seeing that frame from Die Hard made something click in my brain, and suddenly the medieval meme possibilities seemed endless.

And so, I present the following four films, retold as medieval tapestries courtesy of the Historic Tale Construction Kit. The Ars front page will return to normal in a few days; if this silliness doth offend, think of that, and all shall mend.

Commando: the tale of Sir Jon of Matrix

























Evente Horizone



























Ye Silence of ye Lambs



































William and Theodore's Most Excellent Adventure