bulletproofheeb

I feel like I'm coming out a bit, but to write this post I need to come clean.  I watch Smallville.  There, I've said it.  I don't always like it.  But, as with other addictions, even when it makes me mad I still never doubt that I'll go back for more.  I watch Smallville.

So when I heard that Black Canary was going to be on it I got a little happy.  I love the idea of Birds of Prey, but I think the show was handled terrible.  There was no real driving essence behind the characters and they inhabited a universe that was not DC.  Even the villain was switched after the pilot which lets you know how tight the continuity was from the get go.

I am NOT saying that Smallville has the best universe.  I think that bringing in Super Girl was a little bit desperate, especially after getting rid of his other Kryptonian companion from the Phantom Zone.  Then the amnesia... Fine.  And the simple fact that Clark can't fly is driving me nuts.  There's really no reason for that other than the creators or writers started out by saying he can't fly and it's been a long time but they're sticking to it.  Lana not being a red-head?  That majorly pissed me off, but that may also have something to do with my thing for red-heads.

They've actually been doing a not terrible job with their budding Justice League.  Sure, the Flash being a mutation is a little weak.  But on the whole the Green Arrow is nicely done as a foil to Lex.  I mean, it doesn't flat out suck and since it has Aquaman in the group that's saying a lot.  So now that they're tossing Black Canary into the fray for more Green Arrow stories?  Cool, right?  Maybe not.

If you go here, you'll find some tidbits and a good number of pictures of black canary.  First of all, it looks like a sorority girl decided to be Daryl Hannah from Blade Runner for Halloween and then just put on a bondage outfit from Party City.  What's up with that “mask”?  And the hair cut.  And boy-shorts?  It wouldn't kill you to wear the proper unitard?  Or the jacket collar ala 1970's Nightwing?  Really, folks.  Who dressed her?

And then there's her job.  She's a conservative talk show host...  Ok, you lost me.  Yes, conservative.  Why?  Because (and I'm just making an educated guess here) that they wanted a foil for the Green Arrow and his uber-leftists politics.  But since Green Arrow is already a foil for Lex then...  “Well, let's just say that my foil's foil is my wish fulfillment wet dream,” says Lex.  Honestly, would they have been sued if they called her Ann Coulter, Night Stalker?

In the comic there's a lot of fighting between Black Canary and Green arrow.  But it's not because they think the other character is a horrible human being.  It's because

1. 1.Black Canary has a lot of relationship issues.
2. 2.Green Arrow tends to think with his... arrow and not his head.

They fight because they're barely compatible as people but share an ideology.  They fight for good and improvement of the world, not for the status quo of the state.  They rub each other the wrong (and right) way, but they aren't really enemies.  But now we have a conservative talk show host and a green-friendly eco-businessman.

So I've just lost hope for what could have been some great episodes.  If I were writing this I'd have the rooftop romance between Green Arrow and Black Canary spark but hold back because of her.  I'd have Oliver hold himself over with Loise until Black Canary finally comes around.  And then I'd have Oliver fuck it up by cheating on Black Canary with Loise.  I think that would make a very nice and messy dramatic plot arch.  But now?  Who knows.  Maybe Loise will become pregnant with Oliver's kid and Black Canary will try to stop her from having an abortion... by killing her!

Maybe this season won't be so bad after all.

I've been seeing lots of hype about the last book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, being split into two films.  Most of the comments around have been positive.  I disagree, but what I find really disturbing is that so many people think this is great not because it will draw out the end of Potterdom, but because they want the movies to stop cutting out details from the book.  And that's damn folly.

I've felt it since the 3rd movie but think that it's a safe statement since the 4th (Goblet of Fire) the films have surpassed the books.  I'll wait for the screaming to die down before I continue.

Thank you.  I know that a lot of people out there have some sort of emotional involvement with the books.  I like them.  Really, I do.  But I have a critical eye and liking something doesn't stop me from seeing the flaws in it.  JK Rowling has created a full world with a great number of characters, details and a rich history.  She's really good at world building.  What she's not great at is actually writing.  Her style is immature to say the least.  She tends to reuse favourite words to the point of pain.  She has trouble separating how she feels about her characters from what the characters would do.  She's admitted as much when she said she saved Mr. Weasley because she couldn't write his death.  I mean, look at the first book and the last book.  The first book is written about (and to an extent for) an 11 year old.  The last is about (and for) a 17 year old.  And the amount of time between books has been greater than the realtime timeline.  So she's had 10 years (1997-2007) to develop her writing.  And I'll be honest, it hasn't grown nearly as much as it needed to.  The last two books had really interesting stories but the actually writing?  It was shit.

Now, the movies do cut out a lot of information.  They have to.  Hell, even the directors cut of Lord of the Rings cuts out information and they still run over 4 hours each, or so, and they still work.  But JK Rowling isn't as good an author as Tolkien.  It's true.  Her quality isn't that high.  Should every tiny word and detail she puts into the books be left in the movie?  No, not at all.

First of all, you're going to lose some point between the films since they rotate directors like a lazy susan.  Sometimes they even leave out things that should be left in.  For instance, in Azkaban, Lupin never informs Harry of who wrote the map (being his father and his father's pals).  That's a big point that would have cemented some of the plot together.  Skipped.  But a lot of what's left out is to streamline the storytelling and, as I've said, Rowling is good at coming up with stories by not so much telling them.  The books tend to be many many pages longer than necessary because she just loves to drool and ooh and ah over her own creations.

The main movie where cutting information was a problem was the second one.  They casual skip over the fact that every child who was attacked was a mud-blood, which is the essence of the plan.  But the first two movies are the lowest of all of them.  Sure, people tend to give credit to Columbus either because it's the closest 2 to the books or because they were first so he had the least to work with.  But if you honestly go back and watch the movies they are pretty terrible.  The acting and directing is on par with a high budget TV movie.   The first is a little embarrassing now and the second is downright dreary, a complete rip off of the first one with little else to add.

It's after the first 2 books that the plots start to tie together.  Anything later on about the diary being a horcrux and all that tends to be forced and fall apart with the least bit of analysis.  I would venture that Rowling herself didn't have the whole story worked out and then desperately tried to backpedal and ret-con the second book into her continuity.  But it's also after the first 2 movies that the film universe begins to solidify into something wondrous.  Oh, I know that they diverge from the books, but the books aren't religious tomes.  They're recent, moderately competently written children's books.  The movies (3 onward) are made for a wider audience and it shows.  They focus on the dark aspect that Rowling tries to talk about but at the same time lighten with her wordy prose.  No, the movies create their own continuity based on the books.  Personally, at this point, I prefer the film universe.

All that said, a good move based on a book is not a direct transcription from one medium to another.  It should be an adaptation and that's what Alfonso Cuarón does in Azkaban, with his naturalistic interpretation of the world.  Newell takes the same darkness and runs with it, but focuses more on the private school aspect in Goblet of Fire.  See what's happening?  The movies from the 3rd on build on each other.  They aren't just a parade of directors taking the book their assigned and making a moving picture version.  They're adapting between the books, the story itself, and the preceding films.  And they create a cogent whole that starts to grow its own history, character and feel.  Yates inherits all of this and continues instead of dropping it and going only back to the book.  He focuses on the larger conflicts emerging and steps up the fighting.  That incorporates the tone and essence of the story from book number 6 while not throwing away film continuity.  That is the definition of good franchise film making.

So, the last book is going to be 2 films?  On one hand I'm happy that the Potter Experience gets to be stretched out a little bit longer.  I was a bit sad to see the characters go.  But as for the book itself, it is so poorly constructed that I was happy when I thought it would be cut down to one film.  I mean, she felt that she had to drag out the angst to no end but couldn't be bothered to write out some of the biggest deaths in the story, just casually mentioning “Oh, and so-and-so died a while back”?  Oh lord, and the middle is just this:

• Harry, Hermione and Ron in the woods, hiding
• They continue to hide
• They almost get found but manage to hide, still not doing much of anything
• Ron gets pissed (rightfully so) because they aren't actually doing anything
• He leaves
• Harry and Hermione hang out and toast some marshmallows.
• Ron comes back and gets a kiss

That's about one third of the whole book.  It's really not necessary, and in a movie can be left in plot wise, but not shown.  This would really help the slogging pace that is Deathly Hallows.  But now, stretching it to two films?  I don't really see a need.  The movies have been progressing at a good pace.  The last film (Phoenix) was shorter than expected and still held up.  I can't help but think that making two films from the final book is Warner Brother's way of stretching out a finished franchise just a little bit longer.  And since Rowling has now gone completely insane she'll agree to anything to keep her beloved children up in production (see her retconing of characters, gaying of Dumbledor, giving up on writing a real book to return to the Potter world and other assorted stories about her insanity in my upcoming novel: JK Rowling and the Batshit Blues).

I could be cute and say this is one Underdog you won't be rooting for, but that would be cheesy.

A little background.  I saw this movie because I did the equivalent of loosing a bet.  I put up a poll for what movie to watch and review and Mark took it upon himself to hurt me. Anyway, two of my friends came over for suicide watch while I put in the movie.  Did I mention beer?  There was a lot of beer involved.

Read more...

So, I followed through on my promise from last time and watched the "winner" of the last NF:AYFKM poll.  It was Underdog.  And I watched it.  And reviewed it here.  And I hate you all for it.  Oh, and there's a poll for this installment as well.  Click here to vote for what I watch and write up next from this list!  And now, on with the crap.




Part of a 3 part post.  Underdog Review  Netflix Crap  Vote: What to watch drunk next?

So, I turned on the internet today and asked it to show me something that would make me angry.  The internet, being the loving neo-earth-mother that I've come to love, obliged me.  It showed me this site, which informed me that the producer of Alexander, Thomas Schuehly, is going to be pumping out a remake of Metropolis.

Read more...

Who wants to try audio drugs... for science?!  After a lull in bastardism I'm reading Warren Ellis again.  That means I'm reading about crazy things you can (and are) shove(ing) in your brain hole.  And that reminded me.

A while back there was an unsuccessful attempt by the media to freak out parents over binaural beats.  Binarual beats occur when you play two different tones at specific frequencies.  When they hit each other they cause interference patterns that result in a lower pulse.  There are some who think that the lower pulse, if tuned correctly, can affect the brain.  I want help in finding out.

Drop me a comment on this or, if you'd rather, a private message.  If selected the experiment will be carried out as follows:

• I will send you links to a list of the types of "drugs" I have set up.  I will then ask what your cofort range for the experiment is.
• I will then send each person a file or two.  The "drugs" will be within whatever that person labled as OK for them, but the samples will be blind so no one knows what drug they are getting.
• Each drug will come with instructions on how to listen to it.  The lengths are mostly 30 minutes but some are as short as 5 or as long as 50 minutes.
• I will also include an outline of the information I expect back in a short report on what happened while listening and after.
• As a prize I will give each person any of the audio drugs from the full catalogue, labled of course.  Or, if that's not to your liking I can offer something else of interest, such as unproduced movie scripts, unaired TV pilots or something else to your liking for being such a good sport.

While I'm sure that a lot of the descriptions are pomp and a bit rediculous, I'm sure that they do try to stimulate the corresponding areas of the brain.  If they succeed, ah, that's what this is all about.

And we're not just talking straight drugs here.  Yes, there are files to simulate illegal and prescription drugs.  But there are also files that aim to trigger brainwaves that are normally associated with lucid dreaming or certain parts of a sleep cycle or even alertness.  And they're just sound files so they're totally legal.  Well, from a drug perspective.  I'm sure the RIAA will try to sue someone somehow.  They always do.

That's my pitch.  If you're interested, let me know by PM or leaving a comment.  I'm eager to get this rolling (no pun intended).  I mean, it would be awesome to be able to load up your mp3 player and get stoned on long drives (as a passenger!) but if they really work?  To be able to tune your brain between different wavelengths at will.  That's so tempting.

So, who wants to go for a ride?

The little voice inside the radio box just told me that 18% of people would feel something was missing, something fundamental and necessary would be missing from life, if they couldn't check their e-mail.  That just screams ignorance to me.  That number should be a lot higher than 18%.

That's not me being a technophile.  That's me being a realist.  How would you feel if you didn't get US mail anymore?  Bills didn't come.  Invitations to weddings and family reunions.  Holiday cards, catalogs, report cards, junk mail and pay check receipts.  You'd either feel like you were cut off or you'd be a paranoid shut-in who didn't get any of those things anyway.  Now?  Now some people get that in their e-mail.  Why should that be less of a connection to the world than paper?  It's faster, it's more pervasive.  Bills come over it.  Junk mail.  Invitations.  And only 18% of people think that having that cut off would be pulling a serious part of their life's communication away?  Or are only 18% admitting it?

I know not everyone uses e-mail to that degree.  But its taken over a large portion of casual contact between people who don't see each other daily or weekly.  It's the new mail.  Not a gimmick, not a supplement.  For a lot of communication it has replaced mail.  And that's not a complaint or a sales pitch.  It's what's going on.  Should e-mail be regarded more warily than other types of innovation?  It's a new tool so why are people so obsessed with putting it in a basket labeled “silly”, “addiction” or “fad”.  Why is it an addiction when there are other tools that we are so used to and couldn't live without that aren't considered addictions to be broken?  Cars.  Go commute to your job without your car.  It's not a right.  Your drivers license is a privileged that can be taken away.  Are you addicted to your car?  Or try applying to a job without a telephone number.  The telephone is a service you pay for.  It's not provided as a right by the government.  Are you addicted to having a phone number?  I mean, it's just technology so it can't be needed.  It can't be a necessity.

See the hypocrisy?  I do.  Why is it that people who use the internet on a daily basis aren't lauded as being on top of responding to people.  Why aren't they accused of being addicted to attention and communication?  They're told they are addicted to the internet itself.  There are people who need to just surf.  They do it as a casual activity but need it to feel complete.  It's close to a low level of OCD, just something casual and simple to complete their day.  But e-mail?  People, if you're responding on a daily basis to e-mail you're fitting your communication in with other people's schedules.  That's something that should be applauded.  And why do media seem so intent on making the tool of communication something that should be regarded with a wary eye?  Television, radio,phone, mail, even news weeklies are all forms of... communication.  Is it just a fear of the new?  A retaliation against anything that comes along as different?  A sort of technological xenophobia?

Most likely yes.  Just because it's a newer form of getting in touch with people doesn't mean it's not important.  I think that's judged by usage.  I mean, the phone wasn't intended to be in every house and yet here it is, usually at least one in every house and soon in every pocket.  E-mail?  Well, that was intended to somewhat supplement standard mail, now called snail mail (or was in my day).  If you define addiction as “being considered necessary to function” then you have a very small and narrow view of the world.  There are so many things in that definition that no one thinks of as an addiction.  Transportation.  Food.  Water.  Education.  Do we think that anyone who strives to put any of those into their day has a problem?  How about responding to people.  How about contact and timely responses.  That's not addiction.  That's functioning in life.  Just because e-mail is the newest guy at work doesn't mean he's still the new guy.  He's been around long enough to have tenure.  If you don't invite him to the next office party then you're a dick.

I've seen the preview for Wanted.  I've read the news.  And the whole time I've barely had a chance to pick up my jaw from the floor.  I read it a few years back and remember being nauseated by it.  I mean, the writing was crap.  The plot was crap.  The characters were offensive.  But what specifically?  Well, I recalled there was rape in it, and it wasn't regarded as a crime, but what else?  There has to be more for me to hate something.  So this past weekend I re-read the whole thing.  And It's worse than I remembered.

Just to let you know, the basic plot is a loser finds out his dad was just murdered.  His dad was also in a group of super-villains that rule the world.  No one thinks it's odd that there doesn't seem to be a lot of crime and super-villains have never entered into the public's awareness until this guy finds out about them.  Moving on, his father's old assistant (character named Fox, actress will be Angelina Jolie) trains him and he takes his father's place in the organization.

So that's the plot.  Sounds dark and cheesy and possible fun?  Maybe in the film but the comic is pure dreck.  I'll go through some of the specifics that makes me cringe when reading the book.

• The guy blames women for most of his problems even though he's totally afraid of confrontation.  He later finds out (in his father's will) that this is most likely due to being raised by a single woman.
• He is embarrassed to work for his boss because she's black.  He also hates Hispanics.
• His father is seen, right before his death, engaging in a homosexual three-way and makes a big point in stating that it's to remind himself how much he loves women more than men.  Right...
• While learning how to be an assassin he brags about raping celebrity women with no consequences.  When he first fires a gun he looks down at it and states its the solution to his problems.  When he kills a thinly veiled Superman character (with a gun) he says that it is the moment when he truly feels like a man.  There's a moment where he points out how far he's come.  He mentions he drives a $300,000 car and then tells his dead mother to fuck off.
  
•  The protagonist is drawn to look like Eminem.
  
• On top of all that, everything is written with this heavy-handed Chuck Palahniuk wannabe voice.  It tries so hard to be hip and dark (using 3rd person "This is me doing this" and making references to diseases) but really comes across as someone who likes to imitate writers who try too hard in the first place.

To finish it off, the last panel takes place right after he shoots his father in the head to prove his love.  The narration goes self aware about how much the reader's life sucks and how the comic you're reading is a fantasy you need to get through the day.  The final panel is a mad, screaming face that takes up the whole page and the speech balloon reads "This is my face while I fuck you in the ass." Honestly, I didn't feel as if I had been fucked in the ass.  I felt relieved that I took the book out on loan while working in a book store.  Had I payed for it, then I would have felt wallet-raped.

So, that's the guy you're rooting for.  The protagonist is the person you follow.  The person you need to become invested in to make the story worth while.  Does he have to be a "good guy"?  Dear lord, no.  But you do have to care one way or another.  Reading the list above, do you think you'd really like that guy on any level?  Would you care what happened to him, other than being disappointed for every page he wasn't killed?

So yeah.  I just wanted (pun?) to write up a hard list of reasons why this comic pissed me off.  I've read books on unsavory people.  In fact, some of the best comics I've read were about people who weren't kind, nice, benevolent heroes.  Transmetropolitan is one of the single greatest, most inspired and inspiring titles I have ever read.  And the main character takes great pleasure in beating up people he hates and disrupting society.  The main character bothers people he barely has contact with and nearly destroys the lives of the people he likes most (or hates least).  It's the way that Wanted conveys its people.  Fox is a black inner city girl so she speaks poorly and has been killing people since she was 14.  The main character feels impotent in society and only redeems himself through murder.  There's even an instance when he kills everyone in a police station and is disappointed when he can't bring himself to rape the lone survivor.  This whole thing naturally lends itself to a Chuck Palahniuk comparison, since the tone is a blatant rip on him.  Let's look at Fight Club, since that's what most people are familiar with.  Is the protagonist a good guy?  No.  The unnamed half is the victim and the Tyler half is the villain.  I mean, Tyler ends up (in a very tongue in cheek way) becoming his own establishment.  Do you want to be a mindless drone?  No?  Then join Tyler and shave your head, wear a uniform and stop asking questions... (irony).  So that's a story with no hero.  Does it work?  Yes, because you still have someone to identify with, if not root for - the unnamed half of the main character.  And because Tyler is done with sarcasm you also cheer for the villain a bit.  But in wanted?  He doesn't learn anything.  He doesn't want to teach.  He doesn't want to change things.  He states that his entire goal is to just do what he wants and he wants to rape and kill.  He doesn't do it with a sense of humor, situational irony, style (other than a 11 year old gloss of "guns are shiny and cool!") or sense of gravity.  He's just some loser who becomes a sociopathic douche.  And an uncreative, bland one at that.

Can rape be integrated into a comic and retain meaning?  Sure.  Can a protagonist rape and not destroy the point of the writing?  If used carefully, and it's never going to be a selling point for that character.  So why do I hate Wanted?  Is it the misogynist overtones?  The annoyingly frequent use of "faggot"?  No.  It's the fact that the characterization is thin, the ideas are poorly conveyed, any underlying thought seems to have been worked out in early drafts and are non-existent by the time we get to read it, as well as piss poor writing. 

On a semi-comic rant I think it needs to be said that Mark Millar (the writer) isn't worth a damn.  While Hemingway had trouble writing women Millar seems to rejoice in not understanding them, or even thinking they are worth the meat they're made with.  If anyone out there reads comics, what do you think of Ultimate X-Men?  It's gotten good, but the beginning was awful.  The men were ballsy and had a hard time stringing together full sentences and the female superheroes didn't do anything other than wait for men to tell them what to do or rescue them.  Millar wrote that shit.

Now, all of this may (most likely will) be written out of the movie.  I really don't think that Angelina Jolie, with her hip social awareness, would sign up for a project where she needs to tutor a scared white man into raping women to prove his worth.  But I still feel dirty contemplating seeing it.  Millar is getting money from that movie.  The source material is so terrible that I really question how good any product of it can be.  Wow, after re-reading it and thinking about it I feel so dirty that I'm honestly going to take a shower now.  Tah.