3:00 pm, Tuesday, October 30, 2012.
PATRICK'S BRAIN EXPLODED.
Ok, I just have to blog about THE news. Even though this really isn't a blog anymore but a place to dump my rare explosions of pop culture long-form writing. WHATEVER.
So as you MUST be aware, George Lucas sold Lucasfilm to Disney, and Disney greenlit a "Star Wars Episode 7" for 2015.
Like most people, I think my reactions have moved from shock to hopefulness. George Lucas is the mind from which it all sprung, but he's a weird fucking dude. He thinks Jar Jar Binks, midi-chlorians, and not releasing proper versions of the OT are all good ideas.
And in a hypothetical universe where the pre- and post- prequel marketing hammer didn't come down, we would all be aching for a fresh take on Star Wars. But part of what makes it weird is that there is currently a ton of Star Wars shit going on in the usual comic-novel axes but also on TV. There's something wretched and cynical about this, as if Star Wars took on a life of its own and the only way it could make EVEN MORE MONEY was to have Lucas throw up his hands and give up the idea that he was the only one making theatrical Star Wars "Episodes."
And yet...
Well, artistically, the franchise sucks right now.
A great number of people feel this way, differing only in where they date the suckage starting. Maybe it's just me but I haven't perceived enthusiasm about Star Wars for a long time, except when a beloved author happens to write a Star Wars book. The show gets some hype but it hasn't attracted this longtime fan, and I know I'm not alone.
I think that's why the social media conversation has so quickly taken a hopeful note.
Myself, my own feeling are very complex and conflicted. Part of the charm of Star Wars was that no matter how bloated or ridiculous it became, and no matter how many big companies were making stuff for it, it all went back to Lucas and his not-very-big, personally-controlled film company. Depending on how you look at it, the Star Wars films could be argued to be independent films; distributed by Fox but financed by Lucas himself and his unprecedented merchandise machine. Whether a Star Wars entry was good or terrible, there was always a certain unique charm.
At one point, even the tie-in "Expanded Universe" had that, though in my opinion it has since lost it.
I grew up in the Interregnum. I rented "The Ewok Adventure" at the video store, played "Star Wars: X-Wing" on the computer, and heard breathless tales of how the Star Wars movies used to have these great action figures that came with them. I wanted more. And soon, the figures came back, and the "Expanded Universe" entered its exciting infancy. My very first "big" novel was Star Wars: X-Wing: Rogue Squadron by Michael Stackpole, which I read in early 1995. It was soon followed by the classic Heir to the Empire by Timothy Zahn. A real effort was made to keep the various official Star Wars works in continuity with each other, building a cohesive universe from the endless hints dropped in the original films. It was very exciting in every way, and blended seamlessly with the Special Editions released in 1997, and even pretty well with The Phantom Menace in 1999.
Much as with the Marvel Universe though, what started as immersive continuity became annoying wankery. The canonical Star Wars universe is crammed to the gills with invasions by stupid-looking aliens, beloved relatives of Han/Leia/Luke becoming psychopathic monsters, Boba Fett saving the universe, and Anakin Skywalker having about ten lifetimes worth of canonical pre-Vader adventures.
So I have a feeling that Disney is going to put an axe in it.
I'd much rather that they SAVE it.
Picture this, fellow children of the Interregnum: Disney's Star Wars team makes it a goal to not copy, but ADAPT, and DISTILL, the best printed Star Wars stories into new films, just like any other novel or comic. Recast the lead characters, throw some good money and talent at it, but use the bona fide classics that have come before instead of throwing it all away.
Imagine: Star Wars Episode VII: Heir to the Empire. Doesn't that just send a shiver down your spine (if you're my age)?
But maybe...now it doesn't conflict with the prequels, and maybe Thrawn is working for the Reborn Emperor (or retcon him out altogether, I can see the case for that) who's the villain of the next arc, and maybe Mara Jade marries Luke at the end instead of having like 10 more years happen.
And maybe Robert Downey, Jr. plays Talon Karrde.
Just...Disney, know your audience. Honestly, you are probably more comfortable playing ball with the 12 year olds who watch Clone Wars. But you do a little research and you find out what young-ish adults are and aren't happy with in the franchise, you are going to wind up with Avengers money. Which is probably why you made this deal anyway...
Either way, this is the end of an era. Star Wars, for better or for worse, will become more like the other shared universes owned by conglomerates...Marvel, DC, Star Trek, Transformers/GIJoe, ALIENS. Whatever happens to continuity, this is a Reboot, and the biggest franchise-related news since Darth Vader told Luke Skywalker about his parentage.
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Friday, June 8, 2012
Some thoughts about Prometheus
Saw Prometheus last night. It was undeniably...thought-provoking for me. However not really about what the movie wanted me to think about. Don't consider this a "review" because I won't go over it point by point, but I will share my impressions. If their ad campaign can be overwrought and mysterious, so can I. SPOILERS.
What is Prometheus?
Prometheus is either very underwritten or very overwritten, and in either case it is half-baked.
Prometheus is a science-fiction/horror movie. However, it's not particularly original and it's not particularly scary.
Prometheus is like a really good issue of the Dark Horse ALIENS comic that was given a massive budget, Ridley Scott, and all the pretension that goes with them.
Prometheus asks lot of questions but doesn't answer very many. This is probably because when it does answer one here and there you find yourself going "oh, that's all?"
Prometheus is overhyped.
To elaborate, in every way the marketing campaign is more of a noteworthy, admirable success than the film itself. It got me there, after all.
Prometheus is a lot of fun if you're an ALIEN fanboy.
Prometheus is Ridley Scott's Avatar. "Blue creatures and philosophy! What rot! Penis creatures and philosophy! That's where it's at!"
Prometheus is the "Episode I" to ALIEN's "Episode IV." Bigger, flashier, but only a quarter of the characters matter this time.
If you have never before been exposed to the "Chariots of the Gods" idea that ancient aliens fucked around with humanity, you will find this film fascinating. However I would like to know what planet the rock you're living under is on.
If you aren't the "Stargate" or "Battlestar Galactica" franchises, let's just declare "Chariots of the Gods" off-limits forever. Also, stop naming ships Icarus and Prometheus, future shipbuilders of the Earth.
Speaking of which, Alien vs. Predator actually introduced the "Chariots of the Gods" idea into the franchise years ago. Bad enough to get beaten to the punch by AvP, but it wouldn't matter except that it is entirely debatable which of the two films is more entertaining.
This movie is not itself a love letter to intelligent design creationism. However, it contains several such letters.
That Space Jockey at the start of ALIEN? He's a big white muscular man. He's also really mean. While there are ways that this makes sense within the universe of the films, it's difficult to overstate how boring it is.
There are two scenes in this movie that are completely conventional horror movie scenes. They require fecklessly stupid out-of-character behavior to set up, they slaughter characters that we care nothing for, only one of them is even marginally original, and they feel like transparent pandering to the horror junkie crowd. That crowd should probably just wait for Cabin in the Woods to come out on DVD, a film that oddly has exactly as many "Xenomorphs" as this film does.
For the most part the design work in this film is very, very good. However, there is one creature that is basically "oh, I have to make a Giger-esque monster? I put a vagina and some testicles on the front of a penis. TIME FOR COCAINE."
There are four-and-a-half good actors in this movie, but sometimes the script requires them to do inexplicable things. Poor Idris Elba goes from a criminally negligent loser to the hero of the movie, and do not mistake me for saying that his character actually develops. This is simply what we're demanded to accept. And Michael Fassbinder's character, while he and the character are both excellent, is so inscrutable that he crosses the line into "random plot device" at least once.
Prometheus has one great hero and one great anti-hero. At the end of the movie they band together and fight crime, which is why the sequel that they transparently set up might actually be decent.
As I say, Noomi Rapace is a great hero, but towards the end of the movie something is so weird with the editing or character work that everyone appears to ignore her for no reason (except Fassbinder's android at the VERY end).
Noomi Rapace is a GREAT hero. She is a completely feminine character who is not physically strong, but proves tougher than she ever imagined she could be. She isn't Ripley, but she is a worthy successor as a character.
You can tell how great a hero she is because I like her even though she is a FLAT-OUT INTELLIGENT DESIGN CREATIONIST. However it's the screenwriter's fault, not hers, because he made it true in their universe, so I guess the character is just smart. SIGH. Her boyfriend is still an annoying idiot though.
Prometheus is not ALIEN. While it mimics and winks at shots from ALIEN at a truly staggering rate (none of them making any impact until the end, a moment that every trailer helpfully spoiled) I was actually impressed by its refusal to borrow ALIEN's structure.
Prometheus also subverts the distressingly common "alien infectees go mad" cliche...for the most part. As mentioned above, there is a bit where a zombie attacks for no reason that is so out of left field that even the characters immediately forget about it.
Appreciation: continuation of the franchise "names of androids" gag. Ash, Bishop, Call, and now David.
There are two great moments toward the end of the film that, as alluded to above, were thoroughly spoiled by every trailer. One of them was also held back by poor characterization. ("I WILL DIE FOR YOU CAPTAIN! Why? Fuck if I know.")
Just to finally get the endless fucking teases out of the way. There are "Xenomorphs," i.e. Aliens from ALIEN, in this movie. One shows up in a wall carving in a baseball-bat-of-subtlety moment, and then one pops up in the last scene (too late to affect the story). It's a completely new design, that is CGI like every other just-good-enough monster in the film, but it's obviously a type of Xenomorph and it's actually pretty cool. Actually, if you disregard the wall relief and the "Alien vs. Predator" movies, there is a suggestion that the Xenomorph race was actually born from the Noomi Rapace character's womb, which is actually a nice sick Giger-esque twist.
The alien bioweapons in this movie are actually a lot more convincing and effective as alien bioweapons than the Xenomorph itself ever was. This is actually a GREAT thing for the franchise because it expands the range of stories that can be told. Apparently nobody but Ridley had the balls to do it.
As a biologist I was really disappointed by the science scenes. They use cool, relatively believable props, but no one actually discusses their findings and their implications in a satisfying way. We never find out something as simple and well-worth-testing as what the fuck is with that black goop that does everything. And no one shows any interest in any life form (that isn't killing them) except for the Space Jockeys. There's even a scene in which a trained biologist's lack of interest in a giant spaceman head is played for laughs. Nothing short of a taser could have gotten me or any one of my colleagues out of a room filled with honest-to-god extraterrestrial cadavers.
It's ok for the Space Jockeys to stay mysterious, but it's hard to sit through a movie when your "gods" are trying to kill you for no reason, only to have the hero lampshade at the end "you know, I really want to find out why our gods are trying to kill us." Perhaps we should have met one that did something other than grunt and punch people out.
STOP TAKING OFF YOUR HELMETS. STOP OPENING THE AIRLOCK.
One problem with sci-fi body horror is that once you can fly to another planet, you have pretty much mastered quarantine procedure and you have the ability to shoot unarmed angry aliens. This film failed to transcend these problems and just resorts to contrived stupidity. This further cements my stance that it would take a real genius to follow up on ALIEN and ALIENS, which work because of the characters' justified ignorance.
In general, the film must disappoint because the only characters we can sympathize with fully are prevented from learning any of the answers that they are so obsessed with. They went to uncover a universal mystery and instead everyone died for no reason. ALIEN was a much smaller story, with much less ambitious characters, and it worked because survival became the goal and the story. Event Horizon worked because the central mystery of the plot was actually answered to our and the characters' satisfaction, and then they could concentrate on escaping. Even Alien vs. Predator worked on some level because the mystery was just the plot hook, we got that answered in 2 minutes of exposition, and then it was just entertaining mayhem. But Prometheus, even though it showed us a Xenomorph and a Space Jockey WMD plant and all kinds of shit, is still just teasing us.
How Prometheus 2 should begin: Shaw wakes up from the Space Jockey cryostasis pod. David informs her that they've located the Jockey home planet. They land their ship and disembark to find millions of dead Xenomorphs on the ground riddled with bullet holes. Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) strides forward toward them. "Now where the fuck have YOU been?"
What is Prometheus?
Prometheus is either very underwritten or very overwritten, and in either case it is half-baked.
Prometheus is a science-fiction/horror movie. However, it's not particularly original and it's not particularly scary.
Prometheus is like a really good issue of the Dark Horse ALIENS comic that was given a massive budget, Ridley Scott, and all the pretension that goes with them.
Prometheus asks lot of questions but doesn't answer very many. This is probably because when it does answer one here and there you find yourself going "oh, that's all?"
Prometheus is overhyped.
To elaborate, in every way the marketing campaign is more of a noteworthy, admirable success than the film itself. It got me there, after all.
Prometheus is a lot of fun if you're an ALIEN fanboy.
Prometheus is Ridley Scott's Avatar. "Blue creatures and philosophy! What rot! Penis creatures and philosophy! That's where it's at!"
Prometheus is the "Episode I" to ALIEN's "Episode IV." Bigger, flashier, but only a quarter of the characters matter this time.
If you have never before been exposed to the "Chariots of the Gods" idea that ancient aliens fucked around with humanity, you will find this film fascinating. However I would like to know what planet the rock you're living under is on.
If you aren't the "Stargate" or "Battlestar Galactica" franchises, let's just declare "Chariots of the Gods" off-limits forever. Also, stop naming ships Icarus and Prometheus, future shipbuilders of the Earth.
Speaking of which, Alien vs. Predator actually introduced the "Chariots of the Gods" idea into the franchise years ago. Bad enough to get beaten to the punch by AvP, but it wouldn't matter except that it is entirely debatable which of the two films is more entertaining.
This movie is not itself a love letter to intelligent design creationism. However, it contains several such letters.
That Space Jockey at the start of ALIEN? He's a big white muscular man. He's also really mean. While there are ways that this makes sense within the universe of the films, it's difficult to overstate how boring it is.
There are two scenes in this movie that are completely conventional horror movie scenes. They require fecklessly stupid out-of-character behavior to set up, they slaughter characters that we care nothing for, only one of them is even marginally original, and they feel like transparent pandering to the horror junkie crowd. That crowd should probably just wait for Cabin in the Woods to come out on DVD, a film that oddly has exactly as many "Xenomorphs" as this film does.
For the most part the design work in this film is very, very good. However, there is one creature that is basically "oh, I have to make a Giger-esque monster? I put a vagina and some testicles on the front of a penis. TIME FOR COCAINE."
There are four-and-a-half good actors in this movie, but sometimes the script requires them to do inexplicable things. Poor Idris Elba goes from a criminally negligent loser to the hero of the movie, and do not mistake me for saying that his character actually develops. This is simply what we're demanded to accept. And Michael Fassbinder's character, while he and the character are both excellent, is so inscrutable that he crosses the line into "random plot device" at least once.
Prometheus has one great hero and one great anti-hero. At the end of the movie they band together and fight crime, which is why the sequel that they transparently set up might actually be decent.
As I say, Noomi Rapace is a great hero, but towards the end of the movie something is so weird with the editing or character work that everyone appears to ignore her for no reason (except Fassbinder's android at the VERY end).
Noomi Rapace is a GREAT hero. She is a completely feminine character who is not physically strong, but proves tougher than she ever imagined she could be. She isn't Ripley, but she is a worthy successor as a character.
You can tell how great a hero she is because I like her even though she is a FLAT-OUT INTELLIGENT DESIGN CREATIONIST. However it's the screenwriter's fault, not hers, because he made it true in their universe, so I guess the character is just smart. SIGH. Her boyfriend is still an annoying idiot though.
Prometheus is not ALIEN. While it mimics and winks at shots from ALIEN at a truly staggering rate (none of them making any impact until the end, a moment that every trailer helpfully spoiled) I was actually impressed by its refusal to borrow ALIEN's structure.
Prometheus also subverts the distressingly common "alien infectees go mad" cliche...for the most part. As mentioned above, there is a bit where a zombie attacks for no reason that is so out of left field that even the characters immediately forget about it.
Appreciation: continuation of the franchise "names of androids" gag. Ash, Bishop, Call, and now David.
There are two great moments toward the end of the film that, as alluded to above, were thoroughly spoiled by every trailer. One of them was also held back by poor characterization. ("I WILL DIE FOR YOU CAPTAIN! Why? Fuck if I know.")
Just to finally get the endless fucking teases out of the way. There are "Xenomorphs," i.e. Aliens from ALIEN, in this movie. One shows up in a wall carving in a baseball-bat-of-subtlety moment, and then one pops up in the last scene (too late to affect the story). It's a completely new design, that is CGI like every other just-good-enough monster in the film, but it's obviously a type of Xenomorph and it's actually pretty cool. Actually, if you disregard the wall relief and the "Alien vs. Predator" movies, there is a suggestion that the Xenomorph race was actually born from the Noomi Rapace character's womb, which is actually a nice sick Giger-esque twist.
The alien bioweapons in this movie are actually a lot more convincing and effective as alien bioweapons than the Xenomorph itself ever was. This is actually a GREAT thing for the franchise because it expands the range of stories that can be told. Apparently nobody but Ridley had the balls to do it.
As a biologist I was really disappointed by the science scenes. They use cool, relatively believable props, but no one actually discusses their findings and their implications in a satisfying way. We never find out something as simple and well-worth-testing as what the fuck is with that black goop that does everything. And no one shows any interest in any life form (that isn't killing them) except for the Space Jockeys. There's even a scene in which a trained biologist's lack of interest in a giant spaceman head is played for laughs. Nothing short of a taser could have gotten me or any one of my colleagues out of a room filled with honest-to-god extraterrestrial cadavers.
It's ok for the Space Jockeys to stay mysterious, but it's hard to sit through a movie when your "gods" are trying to kill you for no reason, only to have the hero lampshade at the end "you know, I really want to find out why our gods are trying to kill us." Perhaps we should have met one that did something other than grunt and punch people out.
STOP TAKING OFF YOUR HELMETS. STOP OPENING THE AIRLOCK.
One problem with sci-fi body horror is that once you can fly to another planet, you have pretty much mastered quarantine procedure and you have the ability to shoot unarmed angry aliens. This film failed to transcend these problems and just resorts to contrived stupidity. This further cements my stance that it would take a real genius to follow up on ALIEN and ALIENS, which work because of the characters' justified ignorance.
In general, the film must disappoint because the only characters we can sympathize with fully are prevented from learning any of the answers that they are so obsessed with. They went to uncover a universal mystery and instead everyone died for no reason. ALIEN was a much smaller story, with much less ambitious characters, and it worked because survival became the goal and the story. Event Horizon worked because the central mystery of the plot was actually answered to our and the characters' satisfaction, and then they could concentrate on escaping. Even Alien vs. Predator worked on some level because the mystery was just the plot hook, we got that answered in 2 minutes of exposition, and then it was just entertaining mayhem. But Prometheus, even though it showed us a Xenomorph and a Space Jockey WMD plant and all kinds of shit, is still just teasing us.
How Prometheus 2 should begin: Shaw wakes up from the Space Jockey cryostasis pod. David informs her that they've located the Jockey home planet. They land their ship and disembark to find millions of dead Xenomorphs on the ground riddled with bullet holes. Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) strides forward toward them. "Now where the fuck have YOU been?"
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
This is why I hate tribalism
What is it about Rebecca Watson (@Skepchick) that inspires me to blog? I think she has a nose for issues too complex for me to sum up in just a few tweets...also, because it seems particularly important to be cautious and avoid misunderstandings, given that she's attracted an unusually strident and persistent hate movement.
Anyway, here is a recent Twitter exchange, that for some reason was brought to my attention by my perennial favorite blog, Pharyngula (@pzmyers).
dcturner:@rebeccawatson Grab an iron bar and leave him "Para-para.....Paralysed"
Retweeted by Rebecca Watson
tkmlac: @rebeccawatson You complain about threats of violence to women on the Internet but think its funny to joke about paralyzingly someone?
rebeccawatson: @tkmlac You might have a point there, however the "victim" doesn't see it so I don't think it's equivalent.
tkmlac: @rebeccawatson True, but the situations are similar enough so that it might be worth asking where to draw the line.
Wait, no. That only happened in the mirror universe, where people who have had no previous disagreement are polite, restrained, and sane.
This is how it went.
Anyway, here is a recent Twitter exchange, that for some reason was brought to my attention by my perennial favorite blog, Pharyngula (@pzmyers).
dcturner:
Retweeted by Rebecca Watson
tkmlac: @rebeccawatson You complain about threats of violence to women on the Internet but think its funny to joke about paralyzingly someone?
rebeccawatson: @tkmlac You might have a point there, however the "victim" doesn't see it so I don't think it's equivalent.
tkmlac: @rebeccawatson True, but the situations are similar enough so that it might be worth asking where to draw the line.
Wait, no. That only happened in the mirror universe, where people who have had no previous disagreement are polite, restrained, and sane.
This is how it went.
tkmlac: @rebeccawatson You complain about threats of violence to women on the Internet but think its funny to joke about paralyzingly someone?
rebeccawatson: @tkmlac If you seriously think that's anywhere near the same, you haven't been paying attention.tkmlac: @rebeccawatson Please explain it to me, then. I put paralyzing someone in the same category as rape. Bad, low humor that could offend ppl.
tkmlac: @rebeccawatson I don't think the rape jokes are taken any more srsly by those making them than this twerp joking about paralyzing someone.
rebeccawatson: @tkmlac You need me to explain the dif btwn that retweet & women getting real, direct threats of physical violence? B/c, no. Figure it out.tkmlac: @rebeccawatson For the record, I'm not defending those ppl. I think it's pathetic.
tkmlac: @rebeccawatson thanks for clearing that up.
tkmlac: @rebeccawatson So you think the rape stuff on reddit are real threats, not kids trying to get laughs from their friends by being shocking.
rebeccawatson: @tkmlac You are very sad if you think an avalanche of rape offers directed at a 15-yr old = 1 RT of a pun that the "victim" never sees.tkmlac: @rebeccawatson That kind of humor should be treated equally. That's all. Let's all respect each other, whether we are women or Coldplay fans
rebeccawatson: One resolution already broken: Do not argue with twits on Twitter, lest you become one with the twit."tkmlac" was offended by Watson's tone and the way the discussion went, so she (judging by the name "Katie" on Twitter) posted the following on Reddit.
So, r/atheism, even with the juvenile and lowbrow sexist humor, you were right all along. (self.atheism)
submitted
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