Along with the Winter Lord and the strange cold snap that accompanied him came the opportunity for heroes to have snowball fights in the streets of Paragon City. These widespread fights, although generally non-malicious in nature, have angered Paragon City parents who believe that the heroes involved are setting a bad example.

Cheri Mason, founder of Mothers Against Snowballing Heroes (MASH), says that superstrong and superfast superhumans should think very carefully about throwing snowballs in public places. "I've had several anecdotes told to me about snowballs travelling at 200 kph that just missed children playing nearby," she says. "Just imagine if one of them had hit an average citizen! Also, it sets a bad example for children to see heroes fighting each other, even if playfully, instead of working together. It sets an example that impressionable children may follow."

Ms Mason says that MASH will campaign to stop heroes from throwing things other than snowballs at each other, especially since the Winter Lord has been defeated and snowballs are no longer plentiful. "Idle heroes may find other things to throw at each other - rocks, mudballs, cream pies - that are still dangerous to normal citizens. We at MASH aim to stop heroes throwing objects of all kinds... unless they are aimed at villains, of course."

Several heroes involved in snowball fights believe that MASH is misguided in its target. "We work hard for the city for nary a dime, then when we have a little fun, people jump down our throats," says Bull Runnings, a superspeed Scrapper. "As heroes, sometimes we just can't win."

"Besides, don't these people know that winter is over?"

Paragon City Council last night passed a unanimous motion to send a strongly worded letter to The Council that it should change its name to avoid confusion. According to internal sources, the Paragon City Council has started to receive letters from members of The Council that have been wrongly addressed and cases exist of citizens being attacked after mistakingly complaining to The Council members about civic issues.

Martin Benrali, acting as spokesperson for the Paragon City Council on this matter, indicated that confusion within the Paragon City Post Office has seen the City Council receive Council letters and possibly visa versa. "An example of a message we received was 'All hail the magnificent Maestro, our plans are proceding on schedule - soon the City will be ours! Also, I'd like to arrange some leave time to go the marriage of my brother in August: it'll be held in Ohio and I'd like two weeks. Respectfully, Archon Jannsen'. These kinds of messages are becoming more and more common."

Mr Benrail added, "Given that it takes time to sort out which message actually need our attention and which should be forwarded to the Hero Corps, we'd just like to see it stop. The easiest way would be for the Council to change its name - it's not like they've had time to get used to it, after all."

No members of the Council were willing to speak to The Beholder on this issue.

Paragon City's best architects have walked away empty-handed from the prestigeous Hawksmoor Architecture awards, held recently in Brussels, Belgium. Despite being expected to walk away with some recognition due to their work in rebuilding Paragon City's commercial areas and statues, our local architects were ignored by judges.

Commenting after the awards, one judge commented that Paragon City lost out "because we couldn't figure out the crazy interiors of your offices and labs." The judge, who did not wish to be named but claimed the other judges agreed with him, said that although impressive, the design of many office levels made no sense whatsoever and would be impractical to work in.

"I saw stairs that were very hard to get to, yet were a main thoroughfare to the rest of the building. I wouldn't want to have to leap a balustrade to get to my place of work! Also, there were often cubicals placed at the end of an almost labyrinthine combination of stairs, platforms and corridors - we judges were lost many, many times!" he said.

During his time in Paragon City, the judge claimed to have been abducted by "zombies" before being rescued by heroes. Thankful for his rescue, the judge said he couldn't help but notice that the Sewer Network "was, unlike the offices, spacious and had plenty of room to move, which is odd for sewers nowadays. I tried to convince the other judges to take a look, but they wouldn't come into the sewers with me. Maybe next year we introduce a new category..."

The Hawksmoor Awards recognise the best architects of large scale building projects. This year, the majority of awards were picked up by South American architects for their mixture of Aztec- and Rikti-inspired architecture designs.

Soon even normal Paragon City citizens will be able to become their favourite heroes thanks to an officially licensed pen and paper role playing game just announced. The RPG, which currently goes by the working title All Criminal Flesh Must Be Beaten will be released by Eden Studios and will be available later in 2005.

Crime is rampant in Paragon City. While the influx of heroes has started to make a dent, you won't go far in the Birthplace of Tomorrow without seeing some criminal act, if not being involved in one yourself. Look closely and you will notice one obvious thing - it's the men who predominantly break the law.

Apart from some of Doctor Vahzilok's Eidolons (who probably are made of both male and female pieces) and certain members of the Carnival of Shadows and the Malta Group, there are few female villains that widely operate in Paragon City. This certainly should not be seen as a call to action - The Beholder does not want more people breaking the law - but it does raise some interesting issues regarding gender and lawlessness.

Martin Vanderpreef of Paragon City University's Women's Studies and Gender History Department says that tradional male and female villain behaviour is very different. "Men are very straightforward in their criminal acts. Think of street gangs like the Trolls or the Skulls - they openly mug and vandalise, with little to no subtlety. They really just fall into the 'Thug' category of villain. You occasionally get a male 'Mastermind' type, who controls other Thugs, but their goals aren't much more advanced than power fantasies about ruling the world. Some theorists have been gauche enough to consider this a result of testosterone, but I think it's just that men view the world in a more direct way."

"But when it comes to women, things change. Female villains usually lack the desire to rule everything, instead focussing on just controlling a few key individuals - the 'Seductress' stereotype. Through control of these individuals, the Seductress can get whatever she needs. In cases where female villains have destructive power equal (or greater) than their male counterparts, they generally use it more sparingly than men but to greater effect. We call these villains the 'Amazon' type."

Mr Vanderpreef notes that "these types are just general guides - exceptions exist to every rule." He believes that at the moment men dominate the Paragon City villain scene due to "their lack of foresight. Face it - we don't know when the Rikti will return. I don't doubt that some groups are holding back, waiting to see what happens. These cautious villain groups will have proportionately more women involved in them, often in leadership positions."

Mr Vanderpreef says in the past heroes have had more trouble fighting female villains than male ones. "Traditionally, male heroes didn't like fighting female villains. It was never seen as good for a man to be hitting a women, villain or not. However, as more women have become heroes and the equality movement grows, I'm sure that all villains will start to be beaten... err, treated in the same way, regardless of their gender."