seriousfic

I didn't dislike this movie, it's fun and all, but I did have a really bullshit day at work before watching it and I continue to have dark thoughts about the bromance genre's impact on female characters (it turns out, divorcing female characters from love interests isn't so much creating strong female characters who aren't just there for a love story as creating female characters who have nothing to do). Also, I'm a snarky bitch at the best of times. I'm sure Sherlock would approve.

( Briefly... )

Also, I saw the Dark Knight Rises trailer.

1. I could understand Bane. It just sounded like he was talking through a gas mask, and I like the gas mask. It has a good design (less luchadore and more Giger) and it gets rid of the stupid "just pull the tubes out" thing with Bane.

2. I like that they're not only keeping Catwoman's poverty status, but making it a major motivation. Catwoman and Black Cat are the same archetype, but I've always distinguished them as Felicia being a rich bitch thrill-of-the-hunt cat burglar who deservedly reformed, while Selina is a social justice-driven cat burglar (with a side of thrill-of-the-hunt) who deservedly doesn't reform.

An okay episode. The X-Men inventing the collar to help unstable mutants is a good twist on canon, but they didn't go anywhere with it. And Wolverine going alone to get it back when it could clearly have major consequences to not recover it makes him look like a bit of an ass. Especially during the whole fight with Gambit.

Gambit: I won't tell you where the collar is.

Emma: Yes you will. Then you'll dance. For my enjoyment.

Gambit: (mind-controll'd) Yes, mistress...

But onto the whole-sale mockery!





Stormtroopers: Hold it! Shoes can’t conduct that much heat!

( Read more... )

Some would say that Wolverine And The X-Men is what you’d get if you took Spectacular Spider-Man and subtracted the animation quality, good voicework, plotting, fidelity to the source, non-Gary-Sueness, and awesomeness. I said instead that WatXM is what would happen if you did all those things, then added DARING POLITICAL SUBTEXT.

It seems obvious that WatXM, with its selection of Wolverine as the leader of the team for reasons that were either arbitrary (textual) or because he was popular (metatexual), then showcasing him as an ineffectual leader who continuously leads the team into disaster and misfortune, is an adroit satire of the American political landscape. But who is it parodying? A doddering McCain? An inexperienced Obama? An in-over-her-head Palin? Regardless, I think this multilayered assault on philosophical sensibilities makes WatXM one of the most compelling shows on television.

Previously, on Wolverine And The X-Men



Xavier: I’ve been psychic rick-roll’d!

( And introducing Storm as ‘Countess Kill!’ )

The Joker starts his bank robbery/social experiment, having all the other robbers kill each other so he can get all the money (which he doesn’t care about. It’s okay, this feeds into my pet theory). But suddenly…

UNEXPECTED WILLIAM FICHTNER!: YOU FUCKERS, I WAS ABOUT TO FIND MICHAEL SCOFIELD!

EVEN MORE UNEXPECTED HEATH LEDGER!: What doesn’t kill you only makes you stranger!

William Fichtner: Oh my God! Trevor Goodchild!

Joker: No! I’m the Joker!

Last Bank Robber: So you’re going to kill me?

Joker: No, the getaway school bus is when it drives through the wall.

Last Bank Robber: Oh, come off it. I know you’re a wunderkind bank robber, but how could anyone arrange for someone else to be standing in the spot where a bus drove through the…

A bus drives through the wall and runs him over.

Joker: I’m the villain in the first hundred minutes of a comic book movie, I can pretty much do anything.
( Spoilers, as if there's anyone who hasn't seen it yet. )

Doctor Who is a humanistic show, so the premise could almost be described as “ordinary people are sufficient to any challenge.” However, the Doctor is the Hero, so it frequently becomes “ordinary people are fallen, pathetic creatures who need a supernatural being to inspire/redeem them”. It’s a juxtaposition that keeps getting noted and it’s hard not to see that here, where the basic premise of the show gets overridden. ( Not to be confused with Twilight, where an immortal being breaks his centuries-long celibacy to enter into a romantic relationship with a teenage... OH SHI-! )

The Forbidden Kingdom - It's actually pretty good, especially once you realize that both Jet Li and Jackie Chan are playing their own versions of Wong Fei-Hung (just with the serial numbers filed off). As just an action movie that happens to star Jet Li and Jackie Chan, it's good, but as "THE FIRST TEAM-UP BETWEEN JACKIE CHAN AND JET LI!"... errr, there's a lotta "The Chosen White Guy" to sell all those stupid fly-over country white people on the movie... then the film's entirely marketed as Jackie Chan meets Jet Li, and it still gets butts in theaters. As it turns out, Jackie Chan and Jet Li are bigger box office draws than some white kid. Who'd a thunk? I mean, you can't even have the excuse for Transformers where the Autobots cost money to have on screen (well, and Megan Fox is the best special effect you can ever show... rowr). Just point the camera at Jackie Chan and you're done.

The plot's basically nonsense, as it should be, a combination between an old Shaw Brothers kung-fu fic (as it should be) and the old Never-Ending Story "angsty teenager goes to fantasy world to find the discipline to survive in real world". But at least the screenwriters were smart enough to realize that prolonged background exposition goes down a lot easier if people are kung-fu fighting during the narration. And it has the very American "superheroes battle each other before realizing they're on the same side." Although there's no scene where Jackie Chan turns to Jet Li and says "I need your help to take out... you know... the bad guy... whatever his name is... the guy who always dresses in dark armor and likes to kill people, that guy?" Which makes the climax a lot less fun than it has any right to be.

Street Kings - If I had a dime for every movie where a badass supercop-detective went for months or even years without figuring out that his closest friends are really raping, murdering, mustache-twirling nogoodniks... the problem I have with films like these is that the screenwriters just throw up their hands. They've gotta know how obvious the "twist" is. Like, what, do they think the audience hasn't seen a movie before? The obvious thing to do is to move the twist forward in the story, so that the audience isn't so far ahead of the hero -- which just makes the hero look stupid (when he's played by Keanu Reeves, that's just asking for trouble). Give the bad guy an evil plot so that when the hero finds out who the bad guy is, he has more to do than just walk up to the bad guy and killinate.

Keanu Reeves isn't exactly miscast, but when you see Forest Whittaker and Hugh Laurie squaring off each other with him in the middle and Neo is... just kinda there? Yeah, it really makes you want to see what another actor could do in his place. Any other actor. Leighton Meester, maybe. Who wouldn't want to see Leighton Meester as a hard-drinking rogue cop on the edge? That's gold, Jerry, gold!

Oh, and in addition to Sucre from Prison Break (who seems to have become the go-to token Latin guy for Hollywood, sorta like a prettier Lou Diamond Philips), the guy from House shows up. Using the exact same accent and most of the mannerisms. He's even introduced in a hospital. So the movie is a lot more fun if you pretend that House has suddenly become an IA cop. Or if you ever wondered what House would be like if the writers were lazy monkeys...

Forgetting Sarah Marshall - Yes, some dude's penis is in it. It's about average size. I think it's actually used as a bit of a crutch, like "here's a generic break-up scene, but it's funny because he's naked!" And it kinda is. But not very. Things pick up a bit when they get to Hawaii and the film starts establishing a very nice "universe" of side characters and subplots so it's kinda like Crash with sex instead of racism.

Anyone else surprised that Crash with sex isn't Crash with sex instead of racism? Two different films. Oh, that Cronenberg... he was in Jason X, you know. Really tied the movie together.

So, anyway, it's very good, very funny, gets you to root for the characters without making anyone the "bad guy" (which makes that obnoxious marketing campaign even more stupid) except for one scene where the lead is justifiably angry at Sarah Marshall and she turns it around by criticizing him for his hithertofore undocumented slackerness, revealed by a flashback. Making this yet another "slacker gets his life on track for the love of a good woman" movie for Apatow. I wonder if that's going to become as tiresome as Will Ferrell sports/period comedies ("This summer, Will Ferrell as you've never seen him before... playing Cricket in the 1960s!" "Oy, guv'nor, can you step aside, I need to hammer my balls!"). It wasn't even hinted at before. What is this, fucking... Smokin' Aces? It's frustrating because there he totally backs down, but later he has a big blow-up at her while you're thinking "actually, she's not that bad, she doesn't deserve that."

Horton Hears A Who - Don't laugh, okay? I'd say it's okay, although they unfortunately went down the Shrek/Aladdin road of having a bunch of obnoxious celebrity voices/pop culture references. Which is just stupid, because what makes Dr. Seuss so great is the otherworldiness, which makes his work a timeliness that some dated jokes can't touch. Really, who in fuck reads Dr. Seuss and thinks "you know what this needs... is a Facebook joke." Still, at least it's better than the last time Jim Carrey did a Dr. Seuss movie... which we will not speak of, lest I once more test the limits of my restraining order. (I swear, guys, the rock slipped from my hand!)

Terminator tonight was good. Not much with the action, but I can see how they can't afford to stage a Terminator bitchfight every episode. And they more than made up for it with Summer Glau's Invader Zim act (seriously, was I the only one getting that vibe?). Some neat questions raised, with John continuing to grow on me. Apparently he's going to be the only role-player in a party of munchkins. Poor guy.

“You look better with clothes.” Sarah, you don’t mean that!

"Don't kiss me." - Stop it!

Obviously, this calls for Cameron giving a series of tight gifts to Sarah to get back on her good side after killing Master Bra'Tac. Perhaps something from the heart... twenty quarts of type-O blood? It's the hot item among Terminators these days...

Prison Break alright, although the best part was when Mahone said "We're not some chicks you're trying to pick up at a bar!" and then said "Are we?" to Michael, but apparently I misheard and he really said something much less funny. Also, the power of Michael's Blue Steel has become such that flashbacks of him are now show in... Blue Steel-Cam! This may call for Michael&Mahone fic. Because they are bonding like Elmer.

Okay, so no one's going to be calling it "The Sarah Connor Chronicles," are they? Because they make it sound like it's one of those Animorphs-wannabe young teen novels.

So, this is taking place in T3 continuity, but after history has been changed so that Judgment Day is still up in the air. Of course, in T3 Judgment Day happened in 2004 and in SCC it hasn't/won't happen until 2007/2008. To-may-to, to-mah-to... And the Christian Bale/John Connor movie is supposed to take place after Judgment Day, so I'm guessing SCC is an alternate timeline to the movies post-T2 but taking into account events in T3... kinda like when you're reading a Choose Your Own Adventure Novel and you turn to page 13 and you cut the blue wire and the bomb blows up, but if you go through a completely different narrative branch and cut the blue wire you'll go to page 45 and save the day?

Okay, probably nothing at all like that.

Personally, I see a lot of potential, but also a lot of "this could go downhill, fast." ( Spoiler for week-old series. )

And I know I shouldn't ship, but Tin Man? Sarah already has a pet name for her girl. After the Sam&Dean focus of Supernatural and the McKay&Shepherd focus of SGA, it's kinda refreshing to have a dual-female (well, female and female-shaped robot) series. Oh, and there needs to be fic about Cameron meeting a Cylon. Any of them, really.