Blackmoor Vituperative

It’s no small secret that I don’t even consider Man Of Steel (2013) a Superman movie. It’s not a bad science fiction film, in the same vein as Hancock (although I prefer Hancock), but the guy in that costume is not Superman.

Superman knows right from wrong, but like Gene Roddenberry’s “Star Fleet”, he is very careful about using his power to save people from *themselves*, because he knows that it often makes things worse, and he respects the rights of individuals even if their decisions disappoint him.

Superman has a sense of humour, and he’s easy-going. Why wouldn’t he be? He is powerful enough to deal with any ordinary problem, and there is virtually nothing that ordinary people can do to hurt him. He’s like a lumberjack in a room full of puppies and kittens (we’re the puppies and kittens).

Above all, Superman cares. That’s why he fights corruption as reporter Clark Kent — contrary to what some people have claimed, Clark Kent is not the disguise. Clark Kent is who Superman *is* — a man raised by decent people, who cares about others, and who wants to help make the world a better place.

He also just happens to have the powers of a god.

I watched The Last Survivors recently. It’s a well made movie, and it held my interest.

There is a common assumption that the people who survive past the first days of the apocalypse are the lucky ones. People seem to like the idea of struggling against insurmountable odds to hold on to scraps of a dying world.

I do not agree. The Last Survivors does a pretty good job of supporting my opinion.

I don’t mind that the vast majority of Star Wars’ sequels and spin-offs have been declared no longer valid by Disney (what nerds call “canon” — or “cannon”, if they are exceptionally illiterate). I only wish Disney had taken the additional step of declaring it all no longer canon, and started over from scratch. The Force Awakens would have been vastly improved if it had not been dragging along the baggage of the last 40 years. Every time they trundled out the cast from the 1977 movie (including the robots), the film ground to a cringe-inducing halt. What’s more, the most egregious plot holes were directly the result of shoehorning those characters into the story.

Ah, well. The film appears to have served its purpose, regardless. It’s the most successful toy commercial ever made.

Or to put it another way: “Eschew petty criticisms.”

I posted a comment on a YouTube video this morning, “helpfully” pointing out that the alien in Alien (and sequels) is a xenomorph, not the xenomorph — that any extraterrestrial encountered in that film’s universe is “a xenomorph”. It occurred to me that this is the modern version of telling people that Frankenstein is the scientist, and not the monster.

And then it occurred to me how incredibly annoying it is to be around someone who talks like this, pointing out petty errors or inconsistencies in movies, comics, or TV shows. I don’t care if Nightcrawler has face tattoos in the comicbooks. I don’t care if The Purple Man looked or acted anything like David Tennant in the comicbooks. I don’t care if Gal Godot’s Wonder Woman costume looks like the one in the comics.

And even if I do care a little, listening to that sort of thing annoys the hell out of me. So I am going to try, from now on, to not be someone who says that sort of thing. If I like a TV show or a movie, I will say that I like it, and I’ll say what I like about it. Other than that, I’m going to try to keep my mouth shut.

Me: You know, I watched “Manos: The Hands Of Fate” the other night, and I don’t think it’s as bad as everyone says.

Susan: … Really.

Me: Yeah, really! I mean, yeah, the pacing is pretty bad —

Susan: And the acting, and the sound, and the cinematography…

Me: And the directing, yes. But other than that —

Susan: The writing?

Me: Okay, not the writing itself, no, that’s terrible. But the basic premise —

Susan: The plot?

Me: Yes, the plot. The essential concept of the film. That’s actually pretty cool. This family goes on vacation, takes a wrong turn in the desert, and they wind up somewhere that normally isn’t there. It’s off sideways, and most people can’t find even if they are looking for it.

Susan: I don’t remember that.

Me: Yes! Everyone says that road doesn’t go anywhere. So where did this family end up? It’s like some otherwhere. And there’s a creepy caretaker, and a Master who’s always with us but “not dead as you know it”, and then the Master returns, and the family runs away into the desert but they come back… it’s actually a pretty cool idea.

Susan: Huh. So maybe they should remake that.

Me: Yes, they should! Only bad movies should have remakes, and only until a good movie is the result. They should never remake a good movie, because there is no need to — there is already a good movie with that concept. That’s how we got “The Maltese Falcon”.

Susan: So what do you think about the new Ghostbusters?

Me: sigh

Years ago, while watching The Wraith, I wondered out loud why “cool” villains like Dracula (or Nick Cassavetes in The Wraith) were always surrounded by incompetent creeps and toadies like Renfield (or “Skank” in The Wraith) — people I wouldn’t trust to guard an egg salad sandwich. Her reply was, in essence, because those are the kinds of followers they deserve — that they are not, in fact, “cool” at all.

I am reminded of that conversation whenever I read comments by Larry Correia and Brad Torgersen where they make weak attempts to distance themselves from Theodore Beale without distancing themselves from what Beale says or does. When you find yourself on the same side as the Theodore Beales of the world, it’s time to reevaluate your position.

Just watched Hustle & Flow. To my surprise, I liked it a lot. Craig Brewer and John Singleton get the South. They get it.

Everybody gotta have a dream.

Ten things I learned from Mad Max: Fury Road…

1. Bad people are ugly; good people are pretty.
2. Pretty redheads have the power to turn a bad person into a good person (if the bad person was not actually that ugly to begin with).
3. Gasoline and bullets are mandatory; food and water are optional.
4. Breast milk can be used as a medium of exchange. (Eeeuuw.)
5. Spitting gasoline into a carburetor makes a car go faster.
6. Pouring thousands of gallons of water on the ground in the middle of the desert is not ridiculously wasteful: it is performance art (see #3).
7. Never leave your citadel undefended.
8. When starting a post-apocalyptic cult, marketing is essential. A simple but distinctive logo is vital; a thematically similar mask is also helpful in establishing the “brand”.
9. When running a post-apocalyptic cult, it is important not to get personally involved in “away” missions.
10. Being a pretty young woman in a post-apocalyptic cult is horrible. Being anyone else in a post-apocalyptic cult is worse. If you can’t be the one who started it, it’s best to just stay away.

Just finished watching Gaslight (1944), with Charles Boyer, Ingrid Bergman, and Joseph Cotten. It’s interesting to contrast Cotten’s performance in this with his role in Shadow Of A Doubt, released the previous year. If you’ve not seen these two films, I suggest that you do.

And is that a very young Angela Lansbury as the saucy house maid with aspirations “above her station”? Why yes, it is! In truth, I did not recognize her. I only know this because I read the credits.

Just watched Lucy with Susan and Vixen. Vixen and I LOVED it. What the Matrix is to computer science, Lucy is to biology. No, it does not make sense, and in fact it’s absurd on several levels, but it is nonetheless AWESOME and perhaps even mind-blowing. And much like the Matrix, any sequel(s) would be both superfluous and inevitably disappointing.

Vixen agrees.