Yeah, I knew Inception didn't have a snowball's chance in hell. I'd figured that out even before I'd heard that Nolan didn't get a Best Director nomination. The reason is simple.
Hollywood hates science-fiction.
No, really, it does.
Hey, pop quiz, what film won the 1977 award for Best Picture? Annie Hall. Ever heard of it? I haven't. Can you name one line from it? Anything about that movie that has permeated into popular culture? No?
Know what film from 1977 everyone's heard of? Star Wars. If you haven't heard of it, you are officially dead. No, really, report yourself to whoever keeps track of the Wonders of the World because, as someone who can read a blog while dead, you certainly qualify.
Now, I'm not in any way defending a film like Transformers. Hell no. Transformers is all Stuff Blowing Up. You can sell that to an overseas market without investing in a decent translation, because Stuff Blowing Up is a universal language.
I'm certainly not defending the Star Wars prequels either, because really, really dumb. Also unoriginal. Now you might be thinking that Star Wars itself was unoriginal, because it synthesizes a bunch of myth tropes together. But it's not. It was groundbreaking on practically every level.
1999. I don't care what part of the planet you're on, you're going to know that bullet time comes from The Matrix before you remember that that one chick naked in a bathtub full of flowers is from American Beauty.
Then there was the Avatar versus Hurt Locker thing. I don't like Avatar myself, but it's not the butt of nearly as many jokes as, say Transformers or The Phantom Menace. If ever there was a time for the Academy to overcome its sci-fi-phobia, that was it. And of course it didn't.
Now, in 10 years, what do you think there's going to be more of: spinning hallway fights, or characters with speech impediments? My money's on the former.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that Hollywood doesn't reward creativity. All it really wants is formulaic drivel that can appeal to a foreign market. Or baring that, historical drama.
And that is sad.
Because there were two films this year that were so amazingly on top of their game. One showed us just how you could mix what essentially amounted to a mystery story into a not-quite-cyberpunk heist film; the other made us bawl our eyes out. Toy Story 3 picked up an award that was practically tailor-made for it, while Inception got several of the awards it so richly deserved (as well as Sound Mixing, whatever that means), while missing out on a few. And not nominating Nolan for Best Director was simply criminal. No, really: not giving him the Best Director nomination automatically means that he's not going to win Best Picture, because the two are almost always picked up by the same film. And then it went on to win Best Cinametography, when it wasn't even nominated for Best Director. Somebody was tripping balls when they came up with these nominations.
And I'd be making this argument even if Inception had been up against, say, The Godfather. Not because I think that Inception's a better film than The Godfather; it's practically an apples and oranges situation (yes, that is me dodging the question*). It's not necessarily that I think The King's Speech is bad; I think it's a glorified documentary, and if you want to honor a glorified documentary over something shockingly creative, go right ahead and do that. Just don't expect any sympathy from me.
(*Okay, here's a slightly more thought-out dodge. My biggest complaint about The Godfather is how very slow it is. It's also my biggest complaint about The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and indeed about any film I like before, well, Star Wars. And even Star Wars deliberately spends 20 minutes following two comic relief characters around. You cannot get away with that sort of thing today. Inception has a tighter story; scenes are generally shorter and the plot unfolds more concisely (sort of). The two films are products of two different times and two different genres. It'd be like comparing Pulp Fiction to Star Wars. You could do it, and you could even make the argument that one was better than the other, but it wouldn't be very satisfying.)
Here's a humble suggestion. Next time around, pare away all the adaptations, regardless of whether they're adapting a novel, short story, comic book, candy wrapper, other film, historical event, what have you. Give them a separate category. You already do that for screenplays, sort of. Do it across the board. Costume design? If you're setting it in the past, your job's easy. Look at some newspaper clippings. If newspapers didn't exist yet, just look at the most famous film already set in that time. Yeah, the costuming will be dead wrong, but it's what everyone expects. If you're setting it in the future, you've actually got a challenge; you've got to find something that's not going to look stupid dated even 5 years down the line.
Would that suddenly bias the non-adaption segment towards science fiction? Absolutely. And about time, too, given that it's pretty much the last creative genre out there.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that if you want to make awesome and even trend-setting science-fiction, Hollywood could care less. But they've already turned their back on original, intelligent storytelling; don't hesitate to turn your back on them.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Who Review: Army of Ghosts/Doomsday
Right, let's get this rotten, horrible season over with as quickly as possible.
Now, let me just start off by surprising you and saying that I actually thought that this two-parter was fairly good. Well, aside from the last 5 minutes. Yes, Daleks-versus-Cybermen is a stupid publicity stunt that Rusty had the the brains to never repeat again (Moff took it in the other direction, see "The Pandorica Opens").
In fact, rather than go through minute-by-minute, let's just jump right into this story's big thing. Other than Rose leaving, we've got Daleks-versus-Cybermen, as well as Pete.2 meeting Jackie.1 for the first time.
Guess which one got hyped more.
Guess which one was actually supremely well-done, and which one was a cringe-worthy insult-a-thon.
Daleks in particular have absolutely no reason to speak. They haven't needed a reason since, oh, Day of the Daleks. In the 60s stories, yes, they were evil genius schemers (unless their creator was writing them, in which case they were pathetic space Nazis). But from the 70s on, and especially once Davros showed up, they were just implacable exterminators. There was absolutely no need for them to say anything, because they ran out of interesting things to say in 1967.
Now, the Cybermen actually had a couple of good lines. Most notably, "You will become like us," which the younger people in the audience probably mistook for the biggest hint yet that the cybs are Borg knock-offs, but which the older fans who knew better recognized as a line from Tomb of the Cybermen. They now have lasers on their arms instead of the electro-hands they had back in "Rise," except that all it does is let them shoot at the Daleks, for all the good that does. Frankly, I liked the electro-hands better. It made the Cybermen pretty much what they were in their first appearance: cybernetic zombies. Yeah, yeah, the Borg did that whole shtick, which is probably the other reason (the first being they'd never get close enough to the Daleks otherwise) that the electro-hands got replaced by the wrist-lasers.
Now, here's the thing. The stakes were already high enough when the Cybermen showed up en masse at the end of "Army." I mean, let's face it, the Doctor's plan would have been exactly the same if it had just been the Cybermen as opposed to both the Cybermen and the Daleks. But the Daleks have to be shoehorned in here so next year the Doctor can have yet more catharsis with them: "They survive. They always survive, while I lose everything." For those of you keeping score at home, this is the second time in as many years that the Daleks have shown up and derailed an interesting plot during the season finale.
So anyway, monsters show up, cause carnage for 45 minutes, then the Doctor does something magical and sends them packing. Huzzah. It'd be nice to actually see him struggle for a moment or two... I suppose in a way this is one of the more gratifying season finales, because his magic fix ends up costing him dearly. I did like how the Doctor seemed to recover his confidence when Pete told him he could do it, but I guess I would have liked to see him actually lose it in the first place. Because as executed, it looks like he just forgot he had plot-relevant superpowers for a few minutes.
On the subject of Pete, let's talk about him for a moment. My favorite parts about "Doomsday" have to do with him and Jackie and Rose. Even though he's not Jackie's husband and Rose's father, in a way he still is. And everybody takes their time to accept that, but they eventually do. Except, apparently, Rose.
Rose, who was so desperate to have her father in her life that she tore open a hole in the Universe trying to save him. Rose, who blatantly defied the Doctor's wishes on parallel Earth and went off to see a version of reality where her parents were still together. Rose, who dropped what she was doing when her mother called her and told her than an annoying blogger was stalking her. Rose, who had not one but two adventures this year that should have been clear indications that her time with the Doctor was limited (and no, I don't mean the bloody Satan Pit, I mean "School Reunion" and "Girl in the Fireplace"). That same Rose Tyler is now perfectly content to lock both her parents away in a different Universe to keep tooling around with Mr. Immortal. It's like Twilight 3 years early.
No, seriously, when did this big shift in her character happen? Between "The Age of Steel" and now, she's gotten her face snatched off, been taunted by Satan and some Cthulhu knockoffs, and been forced to confront a terrible child actress. And only that last one happened after the incident with the annoying blogger. Yup, I can see what made her go stark raving bonkers here.
The fact of the matter is, when faced with an explicit choice between her family and the Doctor, the only time she ever chooses the Doctor is when it's the last episode of the season. What's more, he explicitly sends her away both times. Now, granted, if she'd stayed gone in "The Parting of the Ways," he would have been killed and that would have been game over. But here she accomplishes nothing except dragging the episode out for a few more minutes.
And I still haven't gotten started on the backdoor pilot for Torchwood, but honestly the pristine offices seen here are such a far cry from the sewer-lair the Cardiff team uses that there's not much of a point.
The final scene notwithstanding, "Army of Ghosts" and "Doomsday" get a 5 and a 6. A slightly above-average finish to a less-than-stellar season.
Now, let me just start off by surprising you and saying that I actually thought that this two-parter was fairly good. Well, aside from the last 5 minutes. Yes, Daleks-versus-Cybermen is a stupid publicity stunt that Rusty had the the brains to never repeat again (Moff took it in the other direction, see "The Pandorica Opens").
In fact, rather than go through minute-by-minute, let's just jump right into this story's big thing. Other than Rose leaving, we've got Daleks-versus-Cybermen, as well as Pete.2 meeting Jackie.1 for the first time.
Guess which one got hyped more.
Guess which one was actually supremely well-done, and which one was a cringe-worthy insult-a-thon.
Daleks in particular have absolutely no reason to speak. They haven't needed a reason since, oh, Day of the Daleks. In the 60s stories, yes, they were evil genius schemers (unless their creator was writing them, in which case they were pathetic space Nazis). But from the 70s on, and especially once Davros showed up, they were just implacable exterminators. There was absolutely no need for them to say anything, because they ran out of interesting things to say in 1967.
Now, the Cybermen actually had a couple of good lines. Most notably, "You will become like us," which the younger people in the audience probably mistook for the biggest hint yet that the cybs are Borg knock-offs, but which the older fans who knew better recognized as a line from Tomb of the Cybermen. They now have lasers on their arms instead of the electro-hands they had back in "Rise," except that all it does is let them shoot at the Daleks, for all the good that does. Frankly, I liked the electro-hands better. It made the Cybermen pretty much what they were in their first appearance: cybernetic zombies. Yeah, yeah, the Borg did that whole shtick, which is probably the other reason (the first being they'd never get close enough to the Daleks otherwise) that the electro-hands got replaced by the wrist-lasers.
Now, here's the thing. The stakes were already high enough when the Cybermen showed up en masse at the end of "Army." I mean, let's face it, the Doctor's plan would have been exactly the same if it had just been the Cybermen as opposed to both the Cybermen and the Daleks. But the Daleks have to be shoehorned in here so next year the Doctor can have yet more catharsis with them: "They survive. They always survive, while I lose everything." For those of you keeping score at home, this is the second time in as many years that the Daleks have shown up and derailed an interesting plot during the season finale.
So anyway, monsters show up, cause carnage for 45 minutes, then the Doctor does something magical and sends them packing. Huzzah. It'd be nice to actually see him struggle for a moment or two... I suppose in a way this is one of the more gratifying season finales, because his magic fix ends up costing him dearly. I did like how the Doctor seemed to recover his confidence when Pete told him he could do it, but I guess I would have liked to see him actually lose it in the first place. Because as executed, it looks like he just forgot he had plot-relevant superpowers for a few minutes.
On the subject of Pete, let's talk about him for a moment. My favorite parts about "Doomsday" have to do with him and Jackie and Rose. Even though he's not Jackie's husband and Rose's father, in a way he still is. And everybody takes their time to accept that, but they eventually do. Except, apparently, Rose.
Rose, who was so desperate to have her father in her life that she tore open a hole in the Universe trying to save him. Rose, who blatantly defied the Doctor's wishes on parallel Earth and went off to see a version of reality where her parents were still together. Rose, who dropped what she was doing when her mother called her and told her than an annoying blogger was stalking her. Rose, who had not one but two adventures this year that should have been clear indications that her time with the Doctor was limited (and no, I don't mean the bloody Satan Pit, I mean "School Reunion" and "Girl in the Fireplace"). That same Rose Tyler is now perfectly content to lock both her parents away in a different Universe to keep tooling around with Mr. Immortal. It's like Twilight 3 years early.
No, seriously, when did this big shift in her character happen? Between "The Age of Steel" and now, she's gotten her face snatched off, been taunted by Satan and some Cthulhu knockoffs, and been forced to confront a terrible child actress. And only that last one happened after the incident with the annoying blogger. Yup, I can see what made her go stark raving bonkers here.
The fact of the matter is, when faced with an explicit choice between her family and the Doctor, the only time she ever chooses the Doctor is when it's the last episode of the season. What's more, he explicitly sends her away both times. Now, granted, if she'd stayed gone in "The Parting of the Ways," he would have been killed and that would have been game over. But here she accomplishes nothing except dragging the episode out for a few more minutes.
And I still haven't gotten started on the backdoor pilot for Torchwood, but honestly the pristine offices seen here are such a far cry from the sewer-lair the Cardiff team uses that there's not much of a point.
The final scene notwithstanding, "Army of Ghosts" and "Doomsday" get a 5 and a 6. A slightly above-average finish to a less-than-stellar season.
Friday, February 25, 2011
Who Review: Fear Her
So first The Idiot's Lantern, now Fear Her... who on the writing team had such terrible terrible daddy issues?
We open with a shot of Glorious Suburban London, 2012, and quickly discover that Gasp and Alarm, there is a missing child. A woman walks around, confused, and the music just goes on. It's like Murray Gold was payed by the minute.
A kid disappears, and we discover that Gasp and Alarm, there's a little girl drawing that kid, and Gasp and Alarm, that drawing comes to life. Ceci n'est pas un kid. Anyway, there's some atrocious stalling for time as the Doctor re-orients the TARDIS so he can get out. Guys, if nobody thought to use that gimmick in any of the previous 27 seasons, it's probably a bad idea.
The Doctor's off in his own world, ignoring children in danger. Wow, Eleven actually is really different from Ten.
So I'm four minutes in and I'm trying to understand why the music's aping the music from the 80s. It's not synthesized, but it's just cheery and annoying.
A car stops. This has been happening all week. Just like the kids disappearing.
And then in the middle of a squabble, David Tennant does something that finally makes me like him. In this, one of the worst episodes of Nu Who, he tells a bunch of whiners to shut up. Yay!
So then we learn that girl's name is Chloe, and that her mother can't control her at all. Also, Chloe's actress, um, simply can't act. I don't really like child actors in general, and this one's just annoying.
Now, why all the nonsense about the Olympics? This was 6 years away when this episode came out. Were they trying to trick us into thinking the Olympic torch would be the torch in Torchwood? I kind of doubt it.
Rose finds a cat. The Doctor says he's not a cat person, making me want to go watch Survival instead. It's the same setup, people disappearing in the middle of the suburbs, only better.
Then the cat disappears. Aaaaaaaaaand the epic tilt-a-cam is back, as Rose walks down another street. Minus five billion points just for that. And then the worst special effect in Nu Who's history attacks Rose. The Doctor disables it with his magic screwdriver, and determines that it is a scribble creature.
Then Rose decides she saw a creepy girl. Yeah, and I saw a girl who's morphed from Billie the Dalek Slayer into Sherlock Holmes with the biggest crush ever. Sherlock Rose sneaks upstairs in the girl's house and investigates. Woo-hoo, Rose doing something other than cling! Unfortunately, she gets freaked by a scary closet and knocks some pencils over. Just when I was congratulating her, she had to go and do something clumsy. Typical Season 2. Then she finds a drawing of Satan in the closet.
Meanwhile, the Doctor meets Chloe, who blows him off. He gives her the Vulcan salute because hey, why not? Rose screams, and Chloe reveals that she drew her dad in the closet, and then her mom goes all stupid. Because this is one of the last gasps of Billie the Dalek Slayer, and as everyone knows, adults are always useless. Rusty hates moms and somebody has daddy issues.
Okay, so let's see. She's got a useless mom and a dead father. There's room for a "Rose, this could have been you" story here, but ha ha not a chance in this season.
Turns out Chloe's posessed by an alien who's even more annoyingly childish than she is. It's an empathic being that needs to be with its brethren. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaw kiddie needs friends. Apparently the moody bratty aliens can't navigate, because they let themselves get hit by a solar flare, and one of them crashed on earth and posessed Chloe.
Satan starts breaking through the closet, but the Doctor gets Chloe's mother to sing to her and make the nightmares go away. And with that we're halfway through the episode, with really nothing to do except make the alien leave Chloe before her nightmares unleash Satan or she draws all the kids.
But ha ha, Chloe saw footage of the Olympic ceremony, so she decides it's time to add to her drawings. But first, she's got to attack the Doctor. Meanwhile, the Doctor casually mentions that he was a dad once, making Rose go catatonic. For a moment anyway. And then the Doctor and the TARDIS disappear. Rose tells the useless mother not to let Chloe out of her sight - thus proving once and for all that Rose is only marginally more intelligent than half a pancake - and then goes outside. She meets the street paver guy who helped push a car in an earlier scene. He says there's a lump in the road, but Rose ignores him because she's looking for a crashed spaceship. You know, a tiny little thing that could make a lump in a road. I guess it's an easy oversight to make if you're only marginally more intelligent than half a pancake. And then the guy starts whining again.
But Rose manages to find the spaceship.
Meanwhile, mommy has left Chloe alone, because she's so damn responsible. And guess what? The crowd at the olypic stadium is gone. And we listen to the TV commentator underact. And then we watch Chloe overact. And then we listen to Satan threaten a bit from the locker.
And then there's a gobsmacking coincidence. The Doctor draws a torch on his piece of paper, probably with the magic screwdriver. And the TV shows the olympic torch. You know, because pancake-brain wouldn't have worked it out otherwise. And Rose tells the ship to feel the love, because when I see the olympic torch I think of love.
But whatever, the alien realizes it can go home and so abandons its human host without a second thought. No, nuking the selfish little brat would never be an option. I swear, after this episode and the one before it, I'm going into the season finale thinking "Go team Torchwood."
And somehow the alien leaving makes all the drawings come to life, not just the ones that were real people trapped in there. Rose, despite being only marginally more intelligent than half a pancake, realizes this too. And she gives Chloe the whatever it is, love, courage, whatever, that they need to defeat the thing that shouldn't even have existed in the first place. The Doctor carries the olympic torch, and the episode ends, but not before Rose goes catatonic again, wondering "who's going to hold [the Doctor's] hand now." Aaaaaaaaaaaaand then they close it out with some foreshadowing.
Gah. Well, this isn't as bad as "Love and Monsters" because at least this one has the Doctor in it, even if he's generally acting only marginally more mature than the childish alien brats. 2 out of 10.
We open with a shot of Glorious Suburban London, 2012, and quickly discover that Gasp and Alarm, there is a missing child. A woman walks around, confused, and the music just goes on. It's like Murray Gold was payed by the minute.
A kid disappears, and we discover that Gasp and Alarm, there's a little girl drawing that kid, and Gasp and Alarm, that drawing comes to life. Ceci n'est pas un kid. Anyway, there's some atrocious stalling for time as the Doctor re-orients the TARDIS so he can get out. Guys, if nobody thought to use that gimmick in any of the previous 27 seasons, it's probably a bad idea.
The Doctor's off in his own world, ignoring children in danger. Wow, Eleven actually is really different from Ten.
So I'm four minutes in and I'm trying to understand why the music's aping the music from the 80s. It's not synthesized, but it's just cheery and annoying.
A car stops. This has been happening all week. Just like the kids disappearing.
And then in the middle of a squabble, David Tennant does something that finally makes me like him. In this, one of the worst episodes of Nu Who, he tells a bunch of whiners to shut up. Yay!
So then we learn that girl's name is Chloe, and that her mother can't control her at all. Also, Chloe's actress, um, simply can't act. I don't really like child actors in general, and this one's just annoying.
Now, why all the nonsense about the Olympics? This was 6 years away when this episode came out. Were they trying to trick us into thinking the Olympic torch would be the torch in Torchwood? I kind of doubt it.
Rose finds a cat. The Doctor says he's not a cat person, making me want to go watch Survival instead. It's the same setup, people disappearing in the middle of the suburbs, only better.
Then the cat disappears. Aaaaaaaaaand the epic tilt-a-cam is back, as Rose walks down another street. Minus five billion points just for that. And then the worst special effect in Nu Who's history attacks Rose. The Doctor disables it with his magic screwdriver, and determines that it is a scribble creature.
Then Rose decides she saw a creepy girl. Yeah, and I saw a girl who's morphed from Billie the Dalek Slayer into Sherlock Holmes with the biggest crush ever. Sherlock Rose sneaks upstairs in the girl's house and investigates. Woo-hoo, Rose doing something other than cling! Unfortunately, she gets freaked by a scary closet and knocks some pencils over. Just when I was congratulating her, she had to go and do something clumsy. Typical Season 2. Then she finds a drawing of Satan in the closet.
Meanwhile, the Doctor meets Chloe, who blows him off. He gives her the Vulcan salute because hey, why not? Rose screams, and Chloe reveals that she drew her dad in the closet, and then her mom goes all stupid. Because this is one of the last gasps of Billie the Dalek Slayer, and as everyone knows, adults are always useless. Rusty hates moms and somebody has daddy issues.
Okay, so let's see. She's got a useless mom and a dead father. There's room for a "Rose, this could have been you" story here, but ha ha not a chance in this season.
Turns out Chloe's posessed by an alien who's even more annoyingly childish than she is. It's an empathic being that needs to be with its brethren. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaw kiddie needs friends. Apparently the moody bratty aliens can't navigate, because they let themselves get hit by a solar flare, and one of them crashed on earth and posessed Chloe.
Satan starts breaking through the closet, but the Doctor gets Chloe's mother to sing to her and make the nightmares go away. And with that we're halfway through the episode, with really nothing to do except make the alien leave Chloe before her nightmares unleash Satan or she draws all the kids.
But ha ha, Chloe saw footage of the Olympic ceremony, so she decides it's time to add to her drawings. But first, she's got to attack the Doctor. Meanwhile, the Doctor casually mentions that he was a dad once, making Rose go catatonic. For a moment anyway. And then the Doctor and the TARDIS disappear. Rose tells the useless mother not to let Chloe out of her sight - thus proving once and for all that Rose is only marginally more intelligent than half a pancake - and then goes outside. She meets the street paver guy who helped push a car in an earlier scene. He says there's a lump in the road, but Rose ignores him because she's looking for a crashed spaceship. You know, a tiny little thing that could make a lump in a road. I guess it's an easy oversight to make if you're only marginally more intelligent than half a pancake. And then the guy starts whining again.
But Rose manages to find the spaceship.
Meanwhile, mommy has left Chloe alone, because she's so damn responsible. And guess what? The crowd at the olypic stadium is gone. And we listen to the TV commentator underact. And then we watch Chloe overact. And then we listen to Satan threaten a bit from the locker.
And then there's a gobsmacking coincidence. The Doctor draws a torch on his piece of paper, probably with the magic screwdriver. And the TV shows the olympic torch. You know, because pancake-brain wouldn't have worked it out otherwise. And Rose tells the ship to feel the love, because when I see the olympic torch I think of love.
But whatever, the alien realizes it can go home and so abandons its human host without a second thought. No, nuking the selfish little brat would never be an option. I swear, after this episode and the one before it, I'm going into the season finale thinking "Go team Torchwood."
And somehow the alien leaving makes all the drawings come to life, not just the ones that were real people trapped in there. Rose, despite being only marginally more intelligent than half a pancake, realizes this too. And she gives Chloe the whatever it is, love, courage, whatever, that they need to defeat the thing that shouldn't even have existed in the first place. The Doctor carries the olympic torch, and the episode ends, but not before Rose goes catatonic again, wondering "who's going to hold [the Doctor's] hand now." Aaaaaaaaaaaaand then they close it out with some foreshadowing.
Gah. Well, this isn't as bad as "Love and Monsters" because at least this one has the Doctor in it, even if he's generally acting only marginally more mature than the childish alien brats. 2 out of 10.
Poking Around in Dreams
As I recently mentioned, I love Inception.
That's not to say that I think there are about a zillion plot holes in it.
1) Robert Fischer never once recognizes his last remaining competitor. Not in his dreams, not in reality.
Yeah, his father just died and maybe he's all upset about it, but still.
2) So you can get close enough to Fischer to slip something in his drink. Huh, maybe you should just poison him.
But then we wouldn't have our movie.
3) So you can't go to the USA or any country that has an extradition treaty. Here's a thought: move your kids to France.
...yeah, there's just no defense for this one.
4) Dom goes into Limbo to rescue Fischer. That's pretty much stated. He and Ariadne wash up on the beach, go looking for Fischer, find Mal, find Fischer, shoot Mal, etc. Then Dom says he's going to stay and look for Saito. Next time we see him, he's on the beach again. What?
I've actually got an explanation for this one: Dom drowned in level 1 after the van hit the water. He wasn't conscious of it when it happened, because he was on level 4/Limbo, but it happened. No matter where you are when you die on an earlier level, you always go back to the start of Limbo. Even if you're already in Limbo.
5) The kicks. How? What?
It's pretty clear both in the first dream sequence and when Yusuf is explaining about inner-ear function that you'll snap out of the dream in level n+1 if your body in level n is dropped. So why, in order to get from level 3 to level 2, does Eames set up charges to blow up Piz Gloria and drop himself and the others? Isn't it Arthur's job to bring Eames and the others from level 3 to level 2? And on that note, once the van is in freefall, Arthur's body in level 1 is in freefall... so why doesn't that take him from level 2 to level 1?
Possible explanation: there's some mumbo-jumbo about a synchronized kick. Maybe, due to the nature of Yusuf's particular chemical, the kicks all need to come at once or they won't have any effect. Still doesn't explain why Eames needs to place any charges, but it covers Arthur's weightless improvisations.
6) If level 2 is weightless, why isn't level 3?
Because. Yusuf's magical chemical.
7) Okay, smartass, they say Yusuf's magical chemical will give them a week on level 1, six months on level 2, and 10 years on level 3. Hang on a second.
7a) They work all this out from a starting point of ten hours in the real world, before they know they're going to do the job on a ten-hour flight. Where did that ten-hour figure come from in the first place? That's just a continuity error. We now return you to the logical flaw...
7 continued) Instead of a week on level 1, six months on level 2, and 10 years on level 3, we get about an hour on each level. Maybe 2 on level 3 if we accept that it really did take Fischer and Saito an hour just to reach Piz Gloria. Explain!
Explanation one: Fischer's projections being militarized caused problems in one way or another.
Explanation 1.1: Fischer's mental training somehow decreased the time dilation. I have no way to back this up.
Explanation 1.2: Fischer's militarized projections sabotaged the plan on level 1, speeding up the timetable. They say pretty much that, but that doesn't mean the problem goes away. Either Yusuf was driving around for a week (unlikely), or he reached the bridge a lot faster than he was supposed to. So far, so good. Except that the team - or at least Dom and Saito - are under for the full 10 hours. The mission starts as soon as the seatbelt sign goes off, and Dom only wakes up 20 minutes before the plane lands.
Explanation 2: see Explanation 1.2, assume that most of the operation took an hour in real time, tops, and that Dom spent the rest of the time prowling Limbo looking for Saito.
Not buying it. Dom doesn't look nearly old enough.
Explanation 2.1: But elsewhere in the film (right before it, in fact), we see that Nolan doesn't always put old-makeup on the actors.
Still not buying it. Saito's "I'm an old man now" line implies that Dom is not.
Explanation 3: Yusuf lied.
Yeah, either he panicked and got to the bridge way too fast, or he was simply wrong about the time dilation. No matter how you spin it, it's his fault. No wonder Dileep Rao's name isn't on the DVD case.
8) Killing yourself under the effects of Yusuf's magic chemical sends you to Limbo... unless you're already in Limbo, in which case it sends you back up one level, as opposed to all the way out, which happened when Mal and Dom waited for a train?
...mmmmmm yes. Or possibly all the way. Ariadne killing herself only sends her up one level, but Saito (apparently) kills himself and Dom at the end, causing them both to instantly wake up. Of course, by that point all the other dreamers and architects were out, so it's possible that the intermediate levels didn't exist anymore. In the first dream, the castle (Arthur's dream) collapses when Arthur wakes up. Presumably something similar happened to levels 1, 2 and 3 here.
9) So basically all these logical flaws together mean that the top never falls over at the end?
Pretty much, yeah.
That's not to say that I think there are about a zillion plot holes in it.
1) Robert Fischer never once recognizes his last remaining competitor. Not in his dreams, not in reality.
Yeah, his father just died and maybe he's all upset about it, but still.
2) So you can get close enough to Fischer to slip something in his drink. Huh, maybe you should just poison him.
But then we wouldn't have our movie.
3) So you can't go to the USA or any country that has an extradition treaty. Here's a thought: move your kids to France.
...yeah, there's just no defense for this one.
4) Dom goes into Limbo to rescue Fischer. That's pretty much stated. He and Ariadne wash up on the beach, go looking for Fischer, find Mal, find Fischer, shoot Mal, etc. Then Dom says he's going to stay and look for Saito. Next time we see him, he's on the beach again. What?
I've actually got an explanation for this one: Dom drowned in level 1 after the van hit the water. He wasn't conscious of it when it happened, because he was on level 4/Limbo, but it happened. No matter where you are when you die on an earlier level, you always go back to the start of Limbo. Even if you're already in Limbo.
5) The kicks. How? What?
It's pretty clear both in the first dream sequence and when Yusuf is explaining about inner-ear function that you'll snap out of the dream in level n+1 if your body in level n is dropped. So why, in order to get from level 3 to level 2, does Eames set up charges to blow up Piz Gloria and drop himself and the others? Isn't it Arthur's job to bring Eames and the others from level 3 to level 2? And on that note, once the van is in freefall, Arthur's body in level 1 is in freefall... so why doesn't that take him from level 2 to level 1?
Possible explanation: there's some mumbo-jumbo about a synchronized kick. Maybe, due to the nature of Yusuf's particular chemical, the kicks all need to come at once or they won't have any effect. Still doesn't explain why Eames needs to place any charges, but it covers Arthur's weightless improvisations.
6) If level 2 is weightless, why isn't level 3?
Because. Yusuf's magical chemical.
7) Okay, smartass, they say Yusuf's magical chemical will give them a week on level 1, six months on level 2, and 10 years on level 3. Hang on a second.
7a) They work all this out from a starting point of ten hours in the real world, before they know they're going to do the job on a ten-hour flight. Where did that ten-hour figure come from in the first place? That's just a continuity error. We now return you to the logical flaw...
7 continued) Instead of a week on level 1, six months on level 2, and 10 years on level 3, we get about an hour on each level. Maybe 2 on level 3 if we accept that it really did take Fischer and Saito an hour just to reach Piz Gloria. Explain!
Explanation one: Fischer's projections being militarized caused problems in one way or another.
Explanation 1.1: Fischer's mental training somehow decreased the time dilation. I have no way to back this up.
Explanation 1.2: Fischer's militarized projections sabotaged the plan on level 1, speeding up the timetable. They say pretty much that, but that doesn't mean the problem goes away. Either Yusuf was driving around for a week (unlikely), or he reached the bridge a lot faster than he was supposed to. So far, so good. Except that the team - or at least Dom and Saito - are under for the full 10 hours. The mission starts as soon as the seatbelt sign goes off, and Dom only wakes up 20 minutes before the plane lands.
Explanation 2: see Explanation 1.2, assume that most of the operation took an hour in real time, tops, and that Dom spent the rest of the time prowling Limbo looking for Saito.
Not buying it. Dom doesn't look nearly old enough.
Explanation 2.1: But elsewhere in the film (right before it, in fact), we see that Nolan doesn't always put old-makeup on the actors.
Still not buying it. Saito's "I'm an old man now" line implies that Dom is not.
Explanation 3: Yusuf lied.
Yeah, either he panicked and got to the bridge way too fast, or he was simply wrong about the time dilation. No matter how you spin it, it's his fault. No wonder Dileep Rao's name isn't on the DVD case.
8) Killing yourself under the effects of Yusuf's magic chemical sends you to Limbo... unless you're already in Limbo, in which case it sends you back up one level, as opposed to all the way out, which happened when Mal and Dom waited for a train?
...mmmmmm yes. Or possibly all the way. Ariadne killing herself only sends her up one level, but Saito (apparently) kills himself and Dom at the end, causing them both to instantly wake up. Of course, by that point all the other dreamers and architects were out, so it's possible that the intermediate levels didn't exist anymore. In the first dream, the castle (Arthur's dream) collapses when Arthur wakes up. Presumably something similar happened to levels 1, 2 and 3 here.
9) So basically all these logical flaws together mean that the top never falls over at the end?
Pretty much, yeah.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
In Which Your Humble Blogger Engages in Serious Backpedalling
So in my last entry I mentioned that I'm not really that big on films based on books, and I gave Lord of the Rings a few knocks for just that.
Well I guess I should clarify.
See, The Godfather, quite possibly the greatest movie ever made, is based on a book. In contrast, Twilight, quite possibly the worst movie ever made, is based on a book.
The difference is, The Godfather was done with style, while Twilight was made to make a quick buck and to give the lead actor a chance to hit on the lead actress. If you can call either of them that.
Or to put it another way, The Godfather gave us "I'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse," a horse's head in a bed, "Luca Brazi sleeps with the fishes," Sonny getting utterly blown away, the baptism/purge, and half a dozen other iconic scenes and lines. It also had Marlon Brando, Al Pacino and Robert Duvall all at the top of their games. In contrast, Twilight gave us sparkly vampires and the opportunity for me to use an awful, awful pun: it put a stake in the heart of good vampire stories.
Now, that's not to say that The Godfather was a page-for-page transcription of the novel with good acting, direction and music. Actually, about half the novel got cut (and about half of that wound up in the sequel, which I honestly don't think is as good, but apparently I'm in the minority there). Much like with LA Confidential, another good film based on a book, The Godfather's writers judiciously excised almost everything that was irrelevant to the central plot.
The Godfather even went as far to not actually be called that: The full title of the film is Mario Puzo's The Godfather. I defy you to find another film (other than Bram Stoker's Dracula) based on a book that actually acknowledges the author in the title. It was Coppola's way of saying "hey, there's this book! If you liked the movie, go read it and see what I left out!" If you wanted a similar effect from Lord of the Rings, you'd have to wait through a three-hour movie and about ten title cards at the end before they got to the "Based on the novel by" credit.
So, there you have it: The Godfather is a perfect example of how to adapt someone else's idea for your own cinematic masterpiece. And there's nothing wrong with that; when I did my list, I didn't disqualify Lord of the Rings because it was bad, but rather because I was looking for original ideas. There is something to be said for repackaging something old; that's just not what I was looking for in my list.
Well I guess I should clarify.
See, The Godfather, quite possibly the greatest movie ever made, is based on a book. In contrast, Twilight, quite possibly the worst movie ever made, is based on a book.
The difference is, The Godfather was done with style, while Twilight was made to make a quick buck and to give the lead actor a chance to hit on the lead actress. If you can call either of them that.
Or to put it another way, The Godfather gave us "I'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse," a horse's head in a bed, "Luca Brazi sleeps with the fishes," Sonny getting utterly blown away, the baptism/purge, and half a dozen other iconic scenes and lines. It also had Marlon Brando, Al Pacino and Robert Duvall all at the top of their games. In contrast, Twilight gave us sparkly vampires and the opportunity for me to use an awful, awful pun: it put a stake in the heart of good vampire stories.
Now, that's not to say that The Godfather was a page-for-page transcription of the novel with good acting, direction and music. Actually, about half the novel got cut (and about half of that wound up in the sequel, which I honestly don't think is as good, but apparently I'm in the minority there). Much like with LA Confidential, another good film based on a book, The Godfather's writers judiciously excised almost everything that was irrelevant to the central plot.
The Godfather even went as far to not actually be called that: The full title of the film is Mario Puzo's The Godfather. I defy you to find another film (other than Bram Stoker's Dracula) based on a book that actually acknowledges the author in the title. It was Coppola's way of saying "hey, there's this book! If you liked the movie, go read it and see what I left out!" If you wanted a similar effect from Lord of the Rings, you'd have to wait through a three-hour movie and about ten title cards at the end before they got to the "Based on the novel by" credit.
So, there you have it: The Godfather is a perfect example of how to adapt someone else's idea for your own cinematic masterpiece. And there's nothing wrong with that; when I did my list, I didn't disqualify Lord of the Rings because it was bad, but rather because I was looking for original ideas. There is something to be said for repackaging something old; that's just not what I was looking for in my list.
Monday, February 21, 2011
Oscars? I Do Not Care
Full disclosure: I haven't seen either The King's Speech or The Social Network. Nor do I intend to see either. Ever.
The two films are glorified documentaries, based on real events and real people. I make a point not to watch glorified documentaries, especially when I can just read a history book instead.
There are two points I need to make immediately. One, a glitzy heartless CGI-fest is not going to win any critical support from me, and two, that doesn't mean that I refuse to watch films that incorporate historical events; The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, one of the greatest films ever made, was set (with admittedly only marginal accuracy) in the American Civil War, while Apocalypse Now was set in Vietnam. But neither of these were about the historical events; both films merely used the war as a backdrop for the main characters' adventure. The brief to these films' writers was certainly more than "go look up event X in a history book, glorify it a bit, put in a romantic subplot and turn it into a 100-page script."
Now before I forget, Apocalypse Now was based on a novel, and I've got a whole rant about that coming. But Apocalypse Now is significantly divorced from its source material. Unlike, say, Harry Potter, you don't need to read the novel to have half an idea as to what's going on.
Anywho, I thought I'd go ahead and unleash my own version of the Academy Awards. But since honestly Hollywood's output is generally so pathetic, I decided that just focusing on one year would be a pointless exercise. Instead, I'm going to go ahead and list my favorite science-fiction films from the past decade.
Why science fiction? Why not every genre? Well, because outside of science-fiction (and fantasy, but see Disqualification #1), you have The Dark Knight, Toy Story 3, and well, that's about it.
So before I get to naming the big three, let me get some impressive disqualifications out of the way first.
Disqualification #1: The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
Wait, am I serious? Yes, yes I am. While The Lord of the Rings was awesome in every way, it also taught kids that they no longer need to read. Am I being petty? Yes. Yes I am. The music was awesome and the visual effects represented the greatest technological leap forward since an Imperial Star Destroy zoomed over our heads back in 1977. So let's praise LOTR for what it accomplished, but let's not kid ourselves into thinking that it was anything more than an expensive adaptation of an already-existing story.
Disqualification #2: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Even if this hadn't been one of the worst movies I'd actually convinced myself to see this decade, I'd still disqualify it for the exact same reasons as I did The Lord of the Rings. It's an adaptation with bells on. No prize.
I thought about disqualifying all the Star Wars prequels and The Matrix sequels because they aren't self-contained stories, but rather stories split up over multiple movies to sell more tickets and, in Star Wars's case, toys. But they all pretty much sucked, so there.
And now, the list.
Honorary Mention: Star Trek
Star Trek without Shatner? Blasphemy! Well, I mean, TNG and DS9 pulled it off (insert abuse towards Voyager and Enterprise here), so...
What helped this movie tremendously was a) the fact that the writers obviously cared about their source material and weren't just milking it for a quick dime, and b) Leonard Nimoy. What hurt this movie was, well, it didn't really have a heart. The character who gets the biggest Emotional Grief Moment is, well, Spock. Who is an alien. Who's not supposed to show emotions. The film was essentially a glitzy CGI shoot-em-up, but done with enough loving nods to the original show and films (though I do have to say that seeing this film first and knowing what Kirk does with the Kobayashi Maru scenario kind of wrecks part of The Wrath of Khan) to forgive it.
Star Trek was leagues better than the last two Next Generation films, the Star Wars prequels, or the Matrix sequels. But it paled in comparison to each of the next three, which are all so good it was honestly hard to rank them.
Third Place: Wall-E
I adored this film. It's not based on a previous film, novel, comic book, television show, or candy wrapper, so go it. The reason it comes in third is because I felt it was just a tad heavy-handed. Yes, it's a kid's movie so it can't exactly be subtle. But remember the original Toy Story? There were jokes in there that kids didn't get, or at least shouldn't have gotten ("laser envy," anyone?) What I'm saying is that there was stuff for adults in there too. The closest we got with this film was a HAL-9000 knockoff, which admittedly clued us in pretty quickly to who the villain was going to be.
Second Place: Serenity
Yes, not even my die-hard Whedonist sympathies can keep this film in the number-one slot. Much like Wall-E, it's got a heart and a message, and it isn't too subtle either; you can practically hear the teacher at the beginning say "we've got free health care! Whether you want it or not!" Nevertheless, Whedon went out of his way to not make his villains stereotypical space Nazis. "The Alliance is not the Evil Empire," indeed; it's just a bunch of well-intentioned extremists. Not unlike today's politicians. My only real complaint about it is that it works somewhat less as a standalone film than it does as a series finale to Firefly. Still, in the competition of "Feature Films Based on Television Shows," this one trumps Star Trek, a film that had about 3-4 times Serenity's budget. Admit it: you cared a lot more when Wash got skewered then you did when Vulcan did the big firework.
First Place: Inception
Inception ranks first on my list partly because, while I'm a diehard Whedonist and was thus inclined to overlook Serenity's shortcomings, I actually went into Inception prepared to pick it apart as The Matrix with just a slightly different premise. I was biased against it, but I came out quite liking it. Yes, it's a spectacle, but it also presents an unfolding and deeply captivating story. It's not hard to believe that this film was a decade in the making; from my perspective, it seems to have more in common with Memento than The Dark Knight. This film rates above the other two because: there's no obnoxious message being beaten into you with a sledgehammer, there's no need to watch 14 hours of supplementary materials to get the whole story, and the main character is truly three dimensional, as opposed to a love-struck mime or a version of Han Solo that actually does shoot first.
The two films are glorified documentaries, based on real events and real people. I make a point not to watch glorified documentaries, especially when I can just read a history book instead.
There are two points I need to make immediately. One, a glitzy heartless CGI-fest is not going to win any critical support from me, and two, that doesn't mean that I refuse to watch films that incorporate historical events; The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, one of the greatest films ever made, was set (with admittedly only marginal accuracy) in the American Civil War, while Apocalypse Now was set in Vietnam. But neither of these were about the historical events; both films merely used the war as a backdrop for the main characters' adventure. The brief to these films' writers was certainly more than "go look up event X in a history book, glorify it a bit, put in a romantic subplot and turn it into a 100-page script."
Now before I forget, Apocalypse Now was based on a novel, and I've got a whole rant about that coming. But Apocalypse Now is significantly divorced from its source material. Unlike, say, Harry Potter, you don't need to read the novel to have half an idea as to what's going on.
Anywho, I thought I'd go ahead and unleash my own version of the Academy Awards. But since honestly Hollywood's output is generally so pathetic, I decided that just focusing on one year would be a pointless exercise. Instead, I'm going to go ahead and list my favorite science-fiction films from the past decade.
Why science fiction? Why not every genre? Well, because outside of science-fiction (and fantasy, but see Disqualification #1), you have The Dark Knight, Toy Story 3, and well, that's about it.
So before I get to naming the big three, let me get some impressive disqualifications out of the way first.
Disqualification #1: The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
Wait, am I serious? Yes, yes I am. While The Lord of the Rings was awesome in every way, it also taught kids that they no longer need to read. Am I being petty? Yes. Yes I am. The music was awesome and the visual effects represented the greatest technological leap forward since an Imperial Star Destroy zoomed over our heads back in 1977. So let's praise LOTR for what it accomplished, but let's not kid ourselves into thinking that it was anything more than an expensive adaptation of an already-existing story.
Disqualification #2: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Even if this hadn't been one of the worst movies I'd actually convinced myself to see this decade, I'd still disqualify it for the exact same reasons as I did The Lord of the Rings. It's an adaptation with bells on. No prize.
I thought about disqualifying all the Star Wars prequels and The Matrix sequels because they aren't self-contained stories, but rather stories split up over multiple movies to sell more tickets and, in Star Wars's case, toys. But they all pretty much sucked, so there.
And now, the list.
Honorary Mention: Star Trek
Star Trek without Shatner? Blasphemy! Well, I mean, TNG and DS9 pulled it off (insert abuse towards Voyager and Enterprise here), so...
What helped this movie tremendously was a) the fact that the writers obviously cared about their source material and weren't just milking it for a quick dime, and b) Leonard Nimoy. What hurt this movie was, well, it didn't really have a heart. The character who gets the biggest Emotional Grief Moment is, well, Spock. Who is an alien. Who's not supposed to show emotions. The film was essentially a glitzy CGI shoot-em-up, but done with enough loving nods to the original show and films (though I do have to say that seeing this film first and knowing what Kirk does with the Kobayashi Maru scenario kind of wrecks part of The Wrath of Khan) to forgive it.
Star Trek was leagues better than the last two Next Generation films, the Star Wars prequels, or the Matrix sequels. But it paled in comparison to each of the next three, which are all so good it was honestly hard to rank them.
Third Place: Wall-E
I adored this film. It's not based on a previous film, novel, comic book, television show, or candy wrapper, so go it. The reason it comes in third is because I felt it was just a tad heavy-handed. Yes, it's a kid's movie so it can't exactly be subtle. But remember the original Toy Story? There were jokes in there that kids didn't get, or at least shouldn't have gotten ("laser envy," anyone?) What I'm saying is that there was stuff for adults in there too. The closest we got with this film was a HAL-9000 knockoff, which admittedly clued us in pretty quickly to who the villain was going to be.
Second Place: Serenity
Yes, not even my die-hard Whedonist sympathies can keep this film in the number-one slot. Much like Wall-E, it's got a heart and a message, and it isn't too subtle either; you can practically hear the teacher at the beginning say "we've got free health care! Whether you want it or not!" Nevertheless, Whedon went out of his way to not make his villains stereotypical space Nazis. "The Alliance is not the Evil Empire," indeed; it's just a bunch of well-intentioned extremists. Not unlike today's politicians. My only real complaint about it is that it works somewhat less as a standalone film than it does as a series finale to Firefly. Still, in the competition of "Feature Films Based on Television Shows," this one trumps Star Trek, a film that had about 3-4 times Serenity's budget. Admit it: you cared a lot more when Wash got skewered then you did when Vulcan did the big firework.
First Place: Inception
Inception ranks first on my list partly because, while I'm a diehard Whedonist and was thus inclined to overlook Serenity's shortcomings, I actually went into Inception prepared to pick it apart as The Matrix with just a slightly different premise. I was biased against it, but I came out quite liking it. Yes, it's a spectacle, but it also presents an unfolding and deeply captivating story. It's not hard to believe that this film was a decade in the making; from my perspective, it seems to have more in common with Memento than The Dark Knight. This film rates above the other two because: there's no obnoxious message being beaten into you with a sledgehammer, there's no need to watch 14 hours of supplementary materials to get the whole story, and the main character is truly three dimensional, as opposed to a love-struck mime or a version of Han Solo that actually does shoot first.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Oh Brave New World: why BNW is a more dangerous scenario than 1984, why it's a more realistic scenario, and why I'd rather live there anyway
My liberal friends like to bring up fears of a "1984-like police state" from time to time. It is of course impossible; enough of us know what a dictatorship looks like to be able to avoid it. But even if it were possible for America to sink into a 1984-like police state, it couldn't stay there for long.
People won't work without the incentive to work. There are, broadly speaking, two types of incentives: carrots and sticks. Police states rely almost entirely on the latter. Fear and brute force can be excellent motivators in the short run, but not over time. People want rewards for their work, rewards beyond just enough food to live.
But here's the thing: even in 1984, rebellion is possible. The book treats us to a small-scale uprising that gets brutally crushed; Iran, if you will. What would Big Brother do in the face of an Egypt-style revolt?
Besides, how does the government structure in 1984 work? Unless power is hereditary, passed along with strict indoctrination from one family to the next, they'd have to do some recruiting. No matter how stringent their security is, they'll inevitably slip up; human systems always do. And then you eventually find yourself in a situation like the one in Inglorious Basterds, where all it takes is one opportunistic Judas and your entire Reich collapses around you while you're shot to death in a burning theater.
(Obligatory clarification: no, not a Nazi, don't support Hitler, very much enjoyed seeing him get his in Basterds, etc, etc.)
I always thought 1984 was actually a bunch of crock, honestly (I thought Orwell made his point much better and much more concisely in Animal Farm), and that if it hadn't had the famous "Big Brother is Watching You" catchphrase, it probably would have slid into obscurity when compared to Brave New World.
In Brave New World there is no opportunity for advancement. You die in the caste you were born into. And you like it that way. Conditioning is absolute; the only dissent comes from outside the system, and no-one cares.
And it's here that we must distinguish between mind control and thought control. 1984 accomplishes the latter, for the most part; Brave New World has the former in spades. There's no resentment towards the system. You get to live it up however you want so long as you do your job, be a good little cog in the machine. The entire values system is gone, so its not like there's any moral compass (does BNW assume that souls don't exist or are irrelevant? Definite topic for future essay). It is the land of do-as-you-please. It just so happens that what you please overlaps with what the government wants you to do. In 1984, it's a very restrictive government and everyone knows it. Resentment surfaces from time to time. In Brave New World, it appears to be a completely lax government - nobody cares who's sleeping with whom, Alpha and Beta society practically worships at the altar of the Seven Deadly Sins - until you realize that you've been made to think that way.
But there's no resentment.
Everyone's an efficient worker because they've been made that way. No-one gets bored; no-one says no. I guarantee you, if you put 1984 on one continent and Brave New World on another and gave them equal resources to start with, in 50 years Brave New World would have a stronger economy.
By all means, read 1984 if you've got the time. But definitely read Brave New World. It's a much more feasible future.
And no, I'm not saying I'd prefer a Brave New World over a 1984-esque police state just because BNW embraces more capitalist values - it doesn't, really, what with the whole concept of social advancement gone out the window. I'd prefer it because, for better or for worse, the people of BNW are happier and more productive than their Orwellian counterparts.
People won't work without the incentive to work. There are, broadly speaking, two types of incentives: carrots and sticks. Police states rely almost entirely on the latter. Fear and brute force can be excellent motivators in the short run, but not over time. People want rewards for their work, rewards beyond just enough food to live.
But here's the thing: even in 1984, rebellion is possible. The book treats us to a small-scale uprising that gets brutally crushed; Iran, if you will. What would Big Brother do in the face of an Egypt-style revolt?
Besides, how does the government structure in 1984 work? Unless power is hereditary, passed along with strict indoctrination from one family to the next, they'd have to do some recruiting. No matter how stringent their security is, they'll inevitably slip up; human systems always do. And then you eventually find yourself in a situation like the one in Inglorious Basterds, where all it takes is one opportunistic Judas and your entire Reich collapses around you while you're shot to death in a burning theater.
(Obligatory clarification: no, not a Nazi, don't support Hitler, very much enjoyed seeing him get his in Basterds, etc, etc.)
I always thought 1984 was actually a bunch of crock, honestly (I thought Orwell made his point much better and much more concisely in Animal Farm), and that if it hadn't had the famous "Big Brother is Watching You" catchphrase, it probably would have slid into obscurity when compared to Brave New World.
In Brave New World there is no opportunity for advancement. You die in the caste you were born into. And you like it that way. Conditioning is absolute; the only dissent comes from outside the system, and no-one cares.
And it's here that we must distinguish between mind control and thought control. 1984 accomplishes the latter, for the most part; Brave New World has the former in spades. There's no resentment towards the system. You get to live it up however you want so long as you do your job, be a good little cog in the machine. The entire values system is gone, so its not like there's any moral compass (does BNW assume that souls don't exist or are irrelevant? Definite topic for future essay). It is the land of do-as-you-please. It just so happens that what you please overlaps with what the government wants you to do. In 1984, it's a very restrictive government and everyone knows it. Resentment surfaces from time to time. In Brave New World, it appears to be a completely lax government - nobody cares who's sleeping with whom, Alpha and Beta society practically worships at the altar of the Seven Deadly Sins - until you realize that you've been made to think that way.
But there's no resentment.
Everyone's an efficient worker because they've been made that way. No-one gets bored; no-one says no. I guarantee you, if you put 1984 on one continent and Brave New World on another and gave them equal resources to start with, in 50 years Brave New World would have a stronger economy.
By all means, read 1984 if you've got the time. But definitely read Brave New World. It's a much more feasible future.
And no, I'm not saying I'd prefer a Brave New World over a 1984-esque police state just because BNW embraces more capitalist values - it doesn't, really, what with the whole concept of social advancement gone out the window. I'd prefer it because, for better or for worse, the people of BNW are happier and more productive than their Orwellian counterparts.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
To Do list: April 19
Buy Portal 2. That is all.
Eat? Sleep? Bowel movements? Nah.
Portal 2 Portal 2 Portal 2 Portal 2 Portal 2 Portal 2...
...but realisitically. Yeah there's gonna be multiplayer, but I'm a bit skeptical as to how much new stuff they can have in single player. The original game didn't outstay its welcome, and it did a good job of showing off what you can do with a portal gun. I don't know that there's that much more to do.
Oh, I'm still looking forward to it, and I'll still buy it, but I won't be at all surprised if its not significantly different from the original.
Eat? Sleep? Bowel movements? Nah.
Portal 2 Portal 2 Portal 2 Portal 2 Portal 2 Portal 2...
...but realisitically. Yeah there's gonna be multiplayer, but I'm a bit skeptical as to how much new stuff they can have in single player. The original game didn't outstay its welcome, and it did a good job of showing off what you can do with a portal gun. I don't know that there's that much more to do.
Oh, I'm still looking forward to it, and I'll still buy it, but I won't be at all surprised if its not significantly different from the original.
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Various Songs for Various Occasions
thiContinuing yesterday's theme...
Easter: "The Holy War," by Thin Lizzy. Yes, despite the fact that it's essentially the template for every Iron Maiden chord progression ever, it's all about Christ's temptation in the desert.
Christmas: "Thank God it's Christmas," Queen.
For the start of summer vacation (through high school): "Jailbreak" by AC/DC. Because you're free!
For the start of summer vacation (college, graduate school): "The Boys are Back in Town," Thin Lizzy. Because you and your high school buddies are back in town, duh.
Right before finals week: "For Those About to Rock (We Salute You)" by AC/DC. If you think you stand a fighting chance in Hell. Otherwise, go out in style with "Highway to Hell." And if you ace an exam you thought you'd fail, "Back in Black."
Graduation: "We Are the Champions," Queen.
The day after your first date: "I've Just Seen a Face," by the Beatles. This one's fairly obscure, I'll admit (I know, I know, a Beatles song that's obscure is some sort of oxymoron), but "she's just the girl for me, and I want all the world to see we've met" pretty much sums up what any guy is thinking after a (successful) first date.
At other people's funerals: "Wish You Were Here," Pink Floyd. Heck, that entire album.
Your first day at a full-time job that you expect to turn into a career: "Dogs," Pink Floyd. "And after a while, you can work on points for style, like the club tie and the firm handshake, a sudden look in the eye and an easy smile." Yeah, you end up "another sad old man, all alone and dying of cancer," but who doesn't?
At your wedding: "Something," the Beatles, and a whole host of others (see the previous post).
During your midlife crisis: "Time," Pink Floyd. "The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older, shorter of breath and one day closer to death." I just realized that the second verse has absolutely no rhyming scheme whatsoever. (No, not even breath/death, because if that were the case, "around" would have to rhyme with "again" earlier in the verse.)
At your funeral: "High Hopes," Pink Floyd. "Hells Bells" for irony.
Easter: "The Holy War," by Thin Lizzy. Yes, despite the fact that it's essentially the template for every Iron Maiden chord progression ever, it's all about Christ's temptation in the desert.
Christmas: "Thank God it's Christmas," Queen.
For the start of summer vacation (through high school): "Jailbreak" by AC/DC. Because you're free!
For the start of summer vacation (college, graduate school): "The Boys are Back in Town," Thin Lizzy. Because you and your high school buddies are back in town, duh.
Right before finals week: "For Those About to Rock (We Salute You)" by AC/DC. If you think you stand a fighting chance in Hell. Otherwise, go out in style with "Highway to Hell." And if you ace an exam you thought you'd fail, "Back in Black."
Graduation: "We Are the Champions," Queen.
The day after your first date: "I've Just Seen a Face," by the Beatles. This one's fairly obscure, I'll admit (I know, I know, a Beatles song that's obscure is some sort of oxymoron), but "she's just the girl for me, and I want all the world to see we've met" pretty much sums up what any guy is thinking after a (successful) first date.
At other people's funerals: "Wish You Were Here," Pink Floyd. Heck, that entire album.
Your first day at a full-time job that you expect to turn into a career: "Dogs," Pink Floyd. "And after a while, you can work on points for style, like the club tie and the firm handshake, a sudden look in the eye and an easy smile." Yeah, you end up "another sad old man, all alone and dying of cancer," but who doesn't?
At your wedding: "Something," the Beatles, and a whole host of others (see the previous post).
During your midlife crisis: "Time," Pink Floyd. "The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older, shorter of breath and one day closer to death." I just realized that the second verse has absolutely no rhyming scheme whatsoever. (No, not even breath/death, because if that were the case, "around" would have to rhyme with "again" earlier in the verse.)
At your funeral: "High Hopes," Pink Floyd. "Hells Bells" for irony.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Songs that will be played at my wedding (which, given current trends, will probably be sometime after my funeral)
Yeah, I'm celebrating being alone this Valentine's Day weekend by listening to a bunch of love songs. And it occurred to me that there are some songs that are just absolutely going to be played at my wedding. No, my bride-to-be does not have veto power over this. I assume she's going to have control over everything else, so I'll fight for this one. Besides, music tastes are actually a major issue for me (seriously, conflicting music tastes will be a dealbreaker long before politics and religion); if she doesn't like at least a few of these, I doubt we'll ever even get to the second date.
"Something," by the Beatles
In an ideal world, this would be the first song at the reception. As no less a person than Frank Sinatra once pointed out, "Something" is one of the greatest love songs of all time, and it pulls this off without ever once saying the words "I love you."
Hey, speaking of...
"The Way You Look Tonight," by Frank Sinatra
I first heard this song when James Darren sang it in the series finale of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Sinatra's version is more upbeat than Darren's, which makes sense, given that Darren was essentially singing about the breakup of a team we'd come to know and love for seven years. Yeah, I'm a nerd, and yeah, this song is ancient, but man, it's beautiful.
The rest of these are generally faster-paced, for later on in the evening when all the people who think only slow songs should be played at weddings have worn themselves out.
"Crazy Little Thing Called Love," by Queen
Continuing my descent into unforgivable nerdhood, if this song is good enough for Rory and Amy Pond, it's good enough for me.
"Bargain," by The Who
"To win you, I'd suffer anything and be glad." Again, the phrase "I love you" is totally absent from it. And yeah, my best man will point to its inclusion on this list that I am totally whipped. And I'll call that a bargain, the best I ever had.
"Love Struck Baby" by Stevie Ray Vaughan
What? you ask, no "Pride and Joy?" That one's a bit overrated in my opinion. Other than "Something," I'm trying to stay away from the signature songs.
"Everybody Needs Somebody to Love," by the Blues Brothers
Because come on. The Blues Brothers are awesome.
"Nothing Else Matters," by Metallica
I might keep this one in reserve, just in case someone requests a song from their lifetime. I'm really not that big on this song, but my favorite Metallica tunes just aren't appropriate for a wedding.
In completing this list, I'm stunned by the lack of Pink Floyd. That's because the closest they ever came to a love song was "Pigs on the Wing 2," which has two problems. One, it's incredibly short, and two, it's got one hell of a naughty double entendre in it. I do know that "High Hopes" is getting played at my funeral... but that's a list for another, much later day.
"Something," by the Beatles
In an ideal world, this would be the first song at the reception. As no less a person than Frank Sinatra once pointed out, "Something" is one of the greatest love songs of all time, and it pulls this off without ever once saying the words "I love you."
Hey, speaking of...
"The Way You Look Tonight," by Frank Sinatra
I first heard this song when James Darren sang it in the series finale of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Sinatra's version is more upbeat than Darren's, which makes sense, given that Darren was essentially singing about the breakup of a team we'd come to know and love for seven years. Yeah, I'm a nerd, and yeah, this song is ancient, but man, it's beautiful.
The rest of these are generally faster-paced, for later on in the evening when all the people who think only slow songs should be played at weddings have worn themselves out.
"Crazy Little Thing Called Love," by Queen
Continuing my descent into unforgivable nerdhood, if this song is good enough for Rory and Amy Pond, it's good enough for me.
"Bargain," by The Who
"To win you, I'd suffer anything and be glad." Again, the phrase "I love you" is totally absent from it. And yeah, my best man will point to its inclusion on this list that I am totally whipped. And I'll call that a bargain, the best I ever had.
"Love Struck Baby" by Stevie Ray Vaughan
What? you ask, no "Pride and Joy?" That one's a bit overrated in my opinion. Other than "Something," I'm trying to stay away from the signature songs.
"Everybody Needs Somebody to Love," by the Blues Brothers
Because come on. The Blues Brothers are awesome.
"Nothing Else Matters," by Metallica
I might keep this one in reserve, just in case someone requests a song from their lifetime. I'm really not that big on this song, but my favorite Metallica tunes just aren't appropriate for a wedding.
In completing this list, I'm stunned by the lack of Pink Floyd. That's because the closest they ever came to a love song was "Pigs on the Wing 2," which has two problems. One, it's incredibly short, and two, it's got one hell of a naughty double entendre in it. I do know that "High Hopes" is getting played at my funeral... but that's a list for another, much later day.
On the Death of Guitar Hero
Okay, with a title that could be mistaken for a badly-translated version of "Guitar Hero Dies," let me first say RIP Gary Moore.
If you said "who?" I can provide you with a partially correct answer: he was one of Thin Lizzy's guitarists. Of course, Thin Lizzy has had about as many different guitarists as Megadeth (and that's only counting the Thin Lizzy that ended in 1983, not the zombie that still tours today), and Mr. Moore was not the longest-lasting of these (his only full album with the band was the oft-overlooked and underrated Black Rose, although he apparently also did at least one guitar solo on one of the earlier ones), so that answer's not exactly complete. But it's what I know him from, so it's what I'll miss.
Moving on, this post is actually about the demise of the rhythm-based wailing on plinky plonky plastic. Huzzah! Go out and buy a real guitar, realize that there's more to, say, "The Number of the Beast" than five easy buttons, and then get a real job as you contemplate just how badly you fail to measure up to your idols.
Seriously, the games ran out of good songs by the time they got to the third real installment, which is the only explanation I can think of for half that game's soundtrack. It's not like there are any major improvements to the control schematic anyway, so if they revive this in the future they should just do it as DLC. Let us pay $10 or whatever to play our favorite songs instead of shelling out $40 for a game we're really only getting so we can pretend to know how to play "Free Bird." The series ran down an end as dead as the one Mario Party found itself in, and it's taking the opportunity to retire with a few last shreds (pardon the pun) of decency.
Incidentally, was "The Boys are Back in Town" ever on one of the Guitar Hero games? If not, what is wrong with the developers? Yeah you had "Bad Reputation," but that's really not the same.
If you said "who?" I can provide you with a partially correct answer: he was one of Thin Lizzy's guitarists. Of course, Thin Lizzy has had about as many different guitarists as Megadeth (and that's only counting the Thin Lizzy that ended in 1983, not the zombie that still tours today), and Mr. Moore was not the longest-lasting of these (his only full album with the band was the oft-overlooked and underrated Black Rose, although he apparently also did at least one guitar solo on one of the earlier ones), so that answer's not exactly complete. But it's what I know him from, so it's what I'll miss.
Moving on, this post is actually about the demise of the rhythm-based wailing on plinky plonky plastic. Huzzah! Go out and buy a real guitar, realize that there's more to, say, "The Number of the Beast" than five easy buttons, and then get a real job as you contemplate just how badly you fail to measure up to your idols.
Seriously, the games ran out of good songs by the time they got to the third real installment, which is the only explanation I can think of for half that game's soundtrack. It's not like there are any major improvements to the control schematic anyway, so if they revive this in the future they should just do it as DLC. Let us pay $10 or whatever to play our favorite songs instead of shelling out $40 for a game we're really only getting so we can pretend to know how to play "Free Bird." The series ran down an end as dead as the one Mario Party found itself in, and it's taking the opportunity to retire with a few last shreds (pardon the pun) of decency.
Incidentally, was "The Boys are Back in Town" ever on one of the Guitar Hero games? If not, what is wrong with the developers? Yeah you had "Bad Reputation," but that's really not the same.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Who Review: Love & Monsters
So, the production team have themselves in a bind. Thanks to blithely ignorant contract management, the regulars will not be appearing in this week's episode. So instead we're given 25 minutes of Secret Agents in Space as a means of setting up a forthcoming monster 12-part Dalek story...
...wait, what? Oh, it's apparently not 1966. Well then.
The production team have themselves in a bind. Thanks to the Christmas special messing up the number of episodes and an impossible-to-renegotiate contract with the regulars, one of the regulars will barely be appearing in this week's episode. So instead we get to follow the adventures of the other regular as she deals with an alternate timeline featuring the death of the Doctor and gives us a taste of what's to come in the season finale...
...oh, hang on, it's not 2008. Let's try again.
The production team have themselves in a bind. Thanks to the Christmas special messing up the number of episodes and an impossible-to-renegotiate contract with the regulars, the regulars will barely be appearing in this week's episode. So instead we get to follow the adventures of a nice young person as she gets terrorized by statues and manages to save the Doctor, who's stuck 38 years in the past.
...oops, apparently it's not 2007 either. Once more:
The production team have themselves in a bind. Thanks to the Christmas special messing up the number of episodes (which somehow no-one saw coming) and an impossible-to-renegotiate contract with the regulars (which somehow no-one thought would be a problem), the regulars will barely be appearing in this week's episode. So instead we get to follow the adventures of a tragically hip young person as he stalks Rose and finds twoo luv with a slab of concrete. Oh joy.
Let's get one thing clear: the reason I hate this episode has nothing to do with the fact that the Doctor's not in it. I just listed three other episodes that either don't have the Doctor in it or barely feature him, and none of their flaws add up to the monumental pile of crud that this story is. I hate this story because it is seriously the most godawful piece of nonsense I'd ever had to sit through until I got to "Fear Her." It's a story so bad that I didn't give Buffy's "Storyteller" a fair chance after I realize that, like this one, it was primarily about an annoying blond yakking into a camera for 45 minutes. Hell, this story gave me misgivings about Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. That's how bad it is.
Next thing to get clear: I'm not faulting the acting. With the exception of the Abzorbaloff, everyone's on decent-enough form - well, if you can call Jackie's attempts at seduction "decent," but I choose to believe she was written that way - and even when he's Victor Kennedy, the Abzorbaloff is simply mildly annoying.
So here's the plot in a nutshell. Elton is recounting, via his dance-along vlog, his adventure of that one or three times he met the Doctor and also that time his mother died. He meets a group of fellow conspiracy theorists who all turn out to be decent people, and they hang out having fun in a library's basement until the sharp-dressed villain shows up and ruins everyone's parade. Elton develops feelings for Ursula, another member of the group, but she kinda sorta dies before he can get anywhere with her (and the notion that he got anywhere with her after that... squick. Thanks, Rusty). Well, Elton gets chased by the Abzorbaloff, gives up when he runs into a dead end, and prepares to accept death. But the Doctor shows up out of nowhere, actually refuses to save Elton, and gets his absorbed friends to do it for him. The Abzorbaloff goes poof, and Ursula gets saved in concrete-slab form. Elton muses on how everyone around the Doctor gets screwed, and wonders how long until it's Rose's turn.
Things that don't make sense: 1) they can play rock music in the basement of a library. 2) Rose doesn't call often enough for Jackie's liking, but she evidently calls twice in less than 24 hours. 3) Elton can't be bothered to tell us that he first met the Doctor on the night his mother died. Gah!
(On a side-note, I'm really annoyed to find that the thing that killed Elton's mother was a "living shadow." Yeah. This piece of crud spawned the Vashta Nerada. And slab-Ursula probably inspired the "flesh aspects" in that same story.)
Okay, now if I were in charge, and knowing that I was headed to a finale that would essentially be a backdoor pilot for Torchwood, I would have made this one a Torchwood story (and moved it past "Fear Her" so that this led into the two-part finale). Elton gets traumatized as a kid when the Doctor (apparently) kills his mother. Later, he's recruited by Torchwood to help track him down, but it turns out that his superior is an alien infiltraitor. Or something. Anyway, Elton gets the opportunity to either kill the Doctor and let the alien escape, or to catch the alien instead, and, being Our Hero, chooses the latter. The Doctor reveals that no, he didn't actually kill Elton's mother, and then goes off to investigate this Torchwood thingy. That's a much better story, and a much better lead-in to the Torchwood setup. It could present Torchwood as a serious threat to the Doctor, instead of a stale repeat of Van Statten's private army (cf. "Dalek"). Elton's allies could be interesting and original characters instead of a knockoff Scooby gang.
Look, my point is that Rusty did this a whole lot better two years later when he actually linked it in with the season finale. Moff can do a Doctor-lite that's gripping and engaging, but "Love & Monsters" honestly doesn't feel like Doctor Who. We already had our knockoff Scooby gang whenever we went back to Earth in the form of Rose, Mickey and Jackie.
We know from "Turn Left" and "Blink" that these stories don't have to suck. Unfortunately, we've got a thong-wearing booger-monster who talks like Fat Bastard, a number of pointless dance scenes ("character touches"), and, since we know Elton's going to live through it all (and we know from early on that everyone else is going to die), absolutely no emotional investment in these characters.
But all that's scraping the surface. The big problem with this episode is not that the Doctor's not in it, but that there's no reason for the Doctor not to be in it. In "Blink," he's stuck in 1969. In "Turn Left," he's dead. There's no tension in this episode partly because of what I just discussed above, but also partly because there's absolutely nothing at all preventing the Doctor from showing up at any second and saving the day. The plot also requires Earth to have been apparently infiltrated by two alien races in as many years (and we will forgive the Master for doing it the following year because he's been doing it since 1970). Part of the Doctor's mission statement is to prevent just this sort of thing. Instead of doing that, he's presented in this story as a flighty wizard who shows up at the end to sort everything out not because "save planets" is very prominent in his job description, but because Rose's mom thinks she's being stalked by a loser.
1 out of 10.
...wait, what? Oh, it's apparently not 1966. Well then.
The production team have themselves in a bind. Thanks to the Christmas special messing up the number of episodes and an impossible-to-renegotiate contract with the regulars, one of the regulars will barely be appearing in this week's episode. So instead we get to follow the adventures of the other regular as she deals with an alternate timeline featuring the death of the Doctor and gives us a taste of what's to come in the season finale...
...oh, hang on, it's not 2008. Let's try again.
The production team have themselves in a bind. Thanks to the Christmas special messing up the number of episodes and an impossible-to-renegotiate contract with the regulars, the regulars will barely be appearing in this week's episode. So instead we get to follow the adventures of a nice young person as she gets terrorized by statues and manages to save the Doctor, who's stuck 38 years in the past.
...oops, apparently it's not 2007 either. Once more:
The production team have themselves in a bind. Thanks to the Christmas special messing up the number of episodes (which somehow no-one saw coming) and an impossible-to-renegotiate contract with the regulars (which somehow no-one thought would be a problem), the regulars will barely be appearing in this week's episode. So instead we get to follow the adventures of a tragically hip young person as he stalks Rose and finds twoo luv with a slab of concrete. Oh joy.
Let's get one thing clear: the reason I hate this episode has nothing to do with the fact that the Doctor's not in it. I just listed three other episodes that either don't have the Doctor in it or barely feature him, and none of their flaws add up to the monumental pile of crud that this story is. I hate this story because it is seriously the most godawful piece of nonsense I'd ever had to sit through until I got to "Fear Her." It's a story so bad that I didn't give Buffy's "Storyteller" a fair chance after I realize that, like this one, it was primarily about an annoying blond yakking into a camera for 45 minutes. Hell, this story gave me misgivings about Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. That's how bad it is.
Next thing to get clear: I'm not faulting the acting. With the exception of the Abzorbaloff, everyone's on decent-enough form - well, if you can call Jackie's attempts at seduction "decent," but I choose to believe she was written that way - and even when he's Victor Kennedy, the Abzorbaloff is simply mildly annoying.
So here's the plot in a nutshell. Elton is recounting, via his dance-along vlog, his adventure of that one or three times he met the Doctor and also that time his mother died. He meets a group of fellow conspiracy theorists who all turn out to be decent people, and they hang out having fun in a library's basement until the sharp-dressed villain shows up and ruins everyone's parade. Elton develops feelings for Ursula, another member of the group, but she kinda sorta dies before he can get anywhere with her (and the notion that he got anywhere with her after that... squick. Thanks, Rusty). Well, Elton gets chased by the Abzorbaloff, gives up when he runs into a dead end, and prepares to accept death. But the Doctor shows up out of nowhere, actually refuses to save Elton, and gets his absorbed friends to do it for him. The Abzorbaloff goes poof, and Ursula gets saved in concrete-slab form. Elton muses on how everyone around the Doctor gets screwed, and wonders how long until it's Rose's turn.
Things that don't make sense: 1) they can play rock music in the basement of a library. 2) Rose doesn't call often enough for Jackie's liking, but she evidently calls twice in less than 24 hours. 3) Elton can't be bothered to tell us that he first met the Doctor on the night his mother died. Gah!
(On a side-note, I'm really annoyed to find that the thing that killed Elton's mother was a "living shadow." Yeah. This piece of crud spawned the Vashta Nerada. And slab-Ursula probably inspired the "flesh aspects" in that same story.)
Okay, now if I were in charge, and knowing that I was headed to a finale that would essentially be a backdoor pilot for Torchwood, I would have made this one a Torchwood story (and moved it past "Fear Her" so that this led into the two-part finale). Elton gets traumatized as a kid when the Doctor (apparently) kills his mother. Later, he's recruited by Torchwood to help track him down, but it turns out that his superior is an alien infiltraitor. Or something. Anyway, Elton gets the opportunity to either kill the Doctor and let the alien escape, or to catch the alien instead, and, being Our Hero, chooses the latter. The Doctor reveals that no, he didn't actually kill Elton's mother, and then goes off to investigate this Torchwood thingy. That's a much better story, and a much better lead-in to the Torchwood setup. It could present Torchwood as a serious threat to the Doctor, instead of a stale repeat of Van Statten's private army (cf. "Dalek"). Elton's allies could be interesting and original characters instead of a knockoff Scooby gang.
Look, my point is that Rusty did this a whole lot better two years later when he actually linked it in with the season finale. Moff can do a Doctor-lite that's gripping and engaging, but "Love & Monsters" honestly doesn't feel like Doctor Who. We already had our knockoff Scooby gang whenever we went back to Earth in the form of Rose, Mickey and Jackie.
We know from "Turn Left" and "Blink" that these stories don't have to suck. Unfortunately, we've got a thong-wearing booger-monster who talks like Fat Bastard, a number of pointless dance scenes ("character touches"), and, since we know Elton's going to live through it all (and we know from early on that everyone else is going to die), absolutely no emotional investment in these characters.
But all that's scraping the surface. The big problem with this episode is not that the Doctor's not in it, but that there's no reason for the Doctor not to be in it. In "Blink," he's stuck in 1969. In "Turn Left," he's dead. There's no tension in this episode partly because of what I just discussed above, but also partly because there's absolutely nothing at all preventing the Doctor from showing up at any second and saving the day. The plot also requires Earth to have been apparently infiltrated by two alien races in as many years (and we will forgive the Master for doing it the following year because he's been doing it since 1970). Part of the Doctor's mission statement is to prevent just this sort of thing. Instead of doing that, he's presented in this story as a flighty wizard who shows up at the end to sort everything out not because "save planets" is very prominent in his job description, but because Rose's mom thinks she's being stalked by a loser.
1 out of 10.
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Who Review: The Vampires of Venice
“Tell me the whole plan! …one day that’ll work.”
We are now in the Awkward Doctor phase of this season – see especially “The Lodger.” So Eleven’s comically inept intervention in Rory’s bachelor party. Rory’s immensely jealous, feeding the ludicrous flashlight-envy scene later on. Matt Smith has the sort of enthusiasm that only a new guy can have, but he also does a nice fusion of Baker and Tennant as he goes all cheerful about Venice.
“I like the bit where someone says ‘It’s bigger on the inside.’ I always look forward to that.”
…Matt Smith doesn’t want to run into Casanova. Hilarious.
Well since Ezio Auditore da Firenze isn’t around (and has probably been dead for about 30-50 years), it’s up to the even more flamboyant Francesco to be Mr. Venice. Except he’s something of a mommy’s boy, isn’t he? Good grief, I thought the Edward Cullen School of Vampirism was a joke. The whole hand-or-cape-in-front-of-the-face deal doesn’t really say “fear,” more like “vaudeville.” Though there is a clever bit of foreshadowing when he disappears into the river, so yay.
The Doctor enters a crypt, finds a mirror, finds some people who don’t show up in the mirror, and whips out a library card with William Hartnell’s face on it. Because this is the second Reminder That This Is That Thing With William Hartnell In It that we get this season.
Our heroes assemble and find a convenient amount of gunpowder, but the Doctor has a thing about guns (despite his willingness to use one what, two weeks ago?) Also, they raise the possibility that the villains aren’t vampires, but are instead something worse. Rory has to do a ridiculous Arthur Dent-hapless attempt at subterfuge.
“I have a right to know! I’m getting married in 430 years!”
Well Amy gets herself kidnapped (deliberately) but it doesn’t go according to plan and the Doctor and Rory have to go get her. They have a whole debate about who Amy’s actually in love with – heeeeeeeeeey, guess what the next episode is gonna be about! The Doctor promises Rory that Amy will be fine, and since no companion has actually died since the series came back, we believe him. The new format doesn’t really lend itself to companion deaths anyway, and what we get later on this season is probably as close as we’ll ever come. Speaking of stuff that doesn’t happen often enough, we now finally have a villain who can see through psychic paper.
On another side note, KAREN GILLAN’S LEGS does “hypnotized” wonderfully. On a less encouraging note, that “not watertight” line was cringeworthy. Well they can’t all be winners. And the fake lightning that hits the Doctor near the end of the rescue scene is embarrassingly bad. And the scene after that, where a character has to basically narrate her own death, isn’t very promising either. So yeah, this is kind of polarizing; the premise is good and largely well done, but with one or two embarrassing details. In old-school Who, this wouldn’t have been a major issue, because those effects are always bad.
The scene between the Doctor and the villainess is great, surprisingly better than the one in “School Reunion.” That Matt Smith can hold his own against an actress, what, twenty years older than him is a good sign.
“They’re not vampires. They’re fish from space.”
So we get to our rip-roaring climax, but the weather-changing effect is terrible. Again, not something that would really matter to Old Who.
The Doctor techs the tech and the villainess strips down to her underwear (this is the 1580s, so it’s not exactly revealing) and the commits suicide. The end. There's some random stuff about silence, which is extra-strength foreshadowing, roll credits.
6 out of 10. Could be 7 if the ending wasn't teching the tech.
We are now in the Awkward Doctor phase of this season – see especially “The Lodger.” So Eleven’s comically inept intervention in Rory’s bachelor party. Rory’s immensely jealous, feeding the ludicrous flashlight-envy scene later on. Matt Smith has the sort of enthusiasm that only a new guy can have, but he also does a nice fusion of Baker and Tennant as he goes all cheerful about Venice.
“I like the bit where someone says ‘It’s bigger on the inside.’ I always look forward to that.”
…Matt Smith doesn’t want to run into Casanova. Hilarious.
Well since Ezio Auditore da Firenze isn’t around (and has probably been dead for about 30-50 years), it’s up to the even more flamboyant Francesco to be Mr. Venice. Except he’s something of a mommy’s boy, isn’t he? Good grief, I thought the Edward Cullen School of Vampirism was a joke. The whole hand-or-cape-in-front-of-the-face deal doesn’t really say “fear,” more like “vaudeville.” Though there is a clever bit of foreshadowing when he disappears into the river, so yay.
The Doctor enters a crypt, finds a mirror, finds some people who don’t show up in the mirror, and whips out a library card with William Hartnell’s face on it. Because this is the second Reminder That This Is That Thing With William Hartnell In It that we get this season.
Our heroes assemble and find a convenient amount of gunpowder, but the Doctor has a thing about guns (despite his willingness to use one what, two weeks ago?) Also, they raise the possibility that the villains aren’t vampires, but are instead something worse. Rory has to do a ridiculous Arthur Dent-hapless attempt at subterfuge.
“I have a right to know! I’m getting married in 430 years!”
Well Amy gets herself kidnapped (deliberately) but it doesn’t go according to plan and the Doctor and Rory have to go get her. They have a whole debate about who Amy’s actually in love with – heeeeeeeeeey, guess what the next episode is gonna be about! The Doctor promises Rory that Amy will be fine, and since no companion has actually died since the series came back, we believe him. The new format doesn’t really lend itself to companion deaths anyway, and what we get later on this season is probably as close as we’ll ever come. Speaking of stuff that doesn’t happen often enough, we now finally have a villain who can see through psychic paper.
On another side note, KAREN GILLAN’S LEGS does “hypnotized” wonderfully. On a less encouraging note, that “not watertight” line was cringeworthy. Well they can’t all be winners. And the fake lightning that hits the Doctor near the end of the rescue scene is embarrassingly bad. And the scene after that, where a character has to basically narrate her own death, isn’t very promising either. So yeah, this is kind of polarizing; the premise is good and largely well done, but with one or two embarrassing details. In old-school Who, this wouldn’t have been a major issue, because those effects are always bad.
The scene between the Doctor and the villainess is great, surprisingly better than the one in “School Reunion.” That Matt Smith can hold his own against an actress, what, twenty years older than him is a good sign.
“They’re not vampires. They’re fish from space.”
So we get to our rip-roaring climax, but the weather-changing effect is terrible. Again, not something that would really matter to Old Who.
The Doctor techs the tech and the villainess strips down to her underwear (this is the 1580s, so it’s not exactly revealing) and the commits suicide. The end. There's some random stuff about silence, which is extra-strength foreshadowing, roll credits.
6 out of 10. Could be 7 if the ending wasn't teching the tech.
Friday, February 4, 2011
An Announcement from Our Benefactors
People of Earth, it is time for me to speak to you yet again about the state of your ineptly-governed lump of rock. While it is clear that you have faced many hardships in the past year, that does not excuse certain actions and trends I have noticed. It is with great displeasure that I must actually voice my concerns; I honestly thought you'd grown out of this childish phase.
I am, of course, talking about annoying teenage pop stars.
And many, many other things.
Let's get one thing straight, mankind, your best creative years are behind you. There are those among my people who think Star Wars is a documentary and The Phantom Menace is a deliberate parody. Your planet is never going to produce another band like the Beatles. Da Vinci, Monet, Van Gough... gone. Today "art" either means "a convenient way to get nudity past the censors" or "a random splotch on a canvas."
Now then, on the subject of auto-tune: if you told me, back when I subjugated/liberated [delete according to personal taste/whatever the censor board feels like] your world that in twenty years people who cannot actually carry a tune would be able to sell records seriously with the help of a computer, I would have laughed in your face. And my laughter is deadly to your face, so that wouldn't end well.
Same goes for your movies: if you told me you'd use computers instead of actors, I'd say you were trying to sell me an extended video-game cutscene. Yes, Cameron, I'm looking at you. I see these ads for some new movie "from the director of Titanic and Avatar." I don't want to see it. I want to see another movie from the director of Terminator and Aliens. Hell, Aliens was so good I let it get past the censor board... Verhoeven had to maneuver around them by claiming his bug hunt movie was a parody. But I digress.
It's a curious dichotomy, mankind: as your movies get more and more "realistic," by which I apparently mean they contain finely-detailed smurfs in loincloths, your pop albums sound more and more like they were sung by robots. Are you trying to hold a normal mirror up to nature, or one of those goofy funhouse mirrors that makes your necks look as long as mine?
No, wait, I know, you're all a bunch of pigs, all concerned only with looking out for number one. And what's with this nonsense at the Oscars this year? You've got that movie about the stutterer versus that movie about that webernets thing, and that movie that honestly seems like The Matrix without the robot war part is the long shot. Don't get me wrong, I loved Inception. But part of the reason I loved it was because pretty much everything that could be done without CGI was done, well, without CGI.
In conclusion: Don't make me come down there.
-Overlord C'patu
ps - upcoming Who Reviews: "Vampires of Venice" on Feb 5 and "Love and Monsters" on Feb 6. "Flesh and Stone" sometime next week, plus updates of "The Hungry Earth" and "Cold Blood." Possibly "Fear Her" late next week. In case you can't tell, I'm working through seasons 2 and 5 simultaneously.
I am, of course, talking about annoying teenage pop stars.
And many, many other things.
Let's get one thing straight, mankind, your best creative years are behind you. There are those among my people who think Star Wars is a documentary and The Phantom Menace is a deliberate parody. Your planet is never going to produce another band like the Beatles. Da Vinci, Monet, Van Gough... gone. Today "art" either means "a convenient way to get nudity past the censors" or "a random splotch on a canvas."
Now then, on the subject of auto-tune: if you told me, back when I subjugated/liberated [delete according to personal taste/whatever the censor board feels like] your world that in twenty years people who cannot actually carry a tune would be able to sell records seriously with the help of a computer, I would have laughed in your face. And my laughter is deadly to your face, so that wouldn't end well.
Same goes for your movies: if you told me you'd use computers instead of actors, I'd say you were trying to sell me an extended video-game cutscene. Yes, Cameron, I'm looking at you. I see these ads for some new movie "from the director of Titanic and Avatar." I don't want to see it. I want to see another movie from the director of Terminator and Aliens. Hell, Aliens was so good I let it get past the censor board... Verhoeven had to maneuver around them by claiming his bug hunt movie was a parody. But I digress.
It's a curious dichotomy, mankind: as your movies get more and more "realistic," by which I apparently mean they contain finely-detailed smurfs in loincloths, your pop albums sound more and more like they were sung by robots. Are you trying to hold a normal mirror up to nature, or one of those goofy funhouse mirrors that makes your necks look as long as mine?
No, wait, I know, you're all a bunch of pigs, all concerned only with looking out for number one. And what's with this nonsense at the Oscars this year? You've got that movie about the stutterer versus that movie about that webernets thing, and that movie that honestly seems like The Matrix without the robot war part is the long shot. Don't get me wrong, I loved Inception. But part of the reason I loved it was because pretty much everything that could be done without CGI was done, well, without CGI.
In conclusion: Don't make me come down there.
-Overlord C'patu
ps - upcoming Who Reviews: "Vampires of Venice" on Feb 5 and "Love and Monsters" on Feb 6. "Flesh and Stone" sometime next week, plus updates of "The Hungry Earth" and "Cold Blood." Possibly "Fear Her" late next week. In case you can't tell, I'm working through seasons 2 and 5 simultaneously.
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