Avengers: Endgame (2019): Written
by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, directed by the Russo
brothers. Starring: EFFING. EVERYONE. Running Time: 181
minutes. Based on the comics by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.
Rating: 3.5/4
What does it all mean? After 22
movies spread out over 11 years and astronomical sums of money both
spent and made on the massive, global juggernaut that is the MCU,
what is left to us now that Endgame has, well, ended the game?
Whatever comes next for Marvel, its competitors, and the whole
concept of shared cinematic universes, there will never again be
anything quite like the drawn-out experience that has now come to a
very specific end. The MCU has inspired devotion and hatred in equal
measures of intensity, with the only point of agreement between both
sides being that it is something truly impossible to avoid or ignore.
But to what end? How deep will these roots reach, and will be good
or bad for film-making as an industry?
I feel wholly inadequate to the task
of tackling any of these bigger questions. Set aside the fact that I
am neither a rabid fanboy nor a devoted hater of the MCU, it's also
way too soon; I still need to digest the movie I just saw.
Now don't worry, I'm not going to get
into spoiler territory. What would be gained anyway by trying to
recount the plot? Anyone who cares enough has either already seen
the film or knows more or less what will happen; after The Snapture,
only the original six Avengers, plus a few extras, are left behind,
and they have to find a way to deal with the fallout and figure out a
way to respond, if there is one to find. And they proceed to do
that, through a runtime that, yes, is extensive, but one that is
thoroughly earned by the end.
Fittingly, the bulk of that time is a
devoted send-off to the original six members of the Avengers squad
(though Bruce Banner is ultimately left a bit short). Whole
sequences- some short, some extensive- center around each of them
revisiting or reconsidering key moments from their past, reflecting
on how much has changed within and around them. This, in turn,
inevitably draws the audience in to a similar level of reflection- a
lot has happened to us, too, as we've watched this group battle all
manner of magical, powerful, or fantastical being. The characters
and actors have changed, and so have we, and the film's awareness and
embrace of this is what will make it deeply emotionally satisfying
for all of us who've been on this ride from the beginning. This,
however, may also make the film too dense and plodding for those who
do not feel any emotional connection to the characters; Endgame
will convert no haters, that much I feel safe in saying.
But oh, what a final ride this is, and
I can't help but feel a certain bittersweetness in knowing that this
original squad will never again assemble, at least not in the same
way. The best of the movies will always be there, but at last, there
is nothing left to anticipate or build towards. Much like the
conclusion of The Last Jedi two years prior, there is, for the
first time forever, the sense that the stories and characters from
this world are free to go just about anywhere from here. That the
possibilities of what could come next truly are endless.
Now, whether or not Marvel will
actually capitalize on that in a satisfying way remains to be seen,
but for now, let's enjoy the panoramic spread of all this movie
offers up for our viewing pleasure. Endgame seeks to cram in
pretty much everything, from the small to the inexorably vast, and in
my eyes, it nearly always pulls it off. There are many moments, many
shots, many lines of dialogue that will get audiences howling with
laughter or cheering with aplomb.
But what will give the movie real
heft, in the end, is its relentless focus on providing moments of
closure, or redemption, or whatever was needed for the original cast.
I won't delve into the specifics here, but it hardly counts as a
spoiler to say beforehand that the biggest resolutions surround
Ironman and Captain America, since that is what literally everyone
has been predicting forever. I found both to be excellently
well-done, each one fitting for the particulars of two cases where
the actors and their personas have become synonymous with both their
individual characters and the Marvel brand as a whole.
Beyond those two, though, I think I
personally was most moved by the final big moments given to Hawkeye
and Black Widow, both of whom have, like Bruce Banner, tended to get
rather shortchanged over the years. I feel Jeremy Renner has ended
up forgotten far too often- no one was ever tuning in to the MCU to
see the latest exploits of Hawkeye, Japanese Yakuza Destroyer- so I
was glad this movie gave him a chance to remind viewers that, oh
yeah, there's a reason he was nominated for an Oscar for The Hurt
Locker. Johansson gets a scene with Steve Rogers early on that
allows her, with minimal dialogue, to give us a far better sense of
who Black Widow is than an Age of Ultron flashback ever could,
and it might have my favorite usage of a peanut butter sandwich yet
shown on the big screen.
The most unexpected and unique
treatment may be reserved for Thor, though, and while viewer mileage
may vary, I personally loved every second of this, erm, “new and
improved” King of Asgard, and the doors left open for him going
forward is definitely what excites me the most. Paul Rudd's Ant-Man
is also one of the survivors, and his effectiveness in his scenes as
very much an audience POV figure is a reminder that he might be one
of the most underappreciated of the Avengers crew so far; a
post-Snapture reunion with his daughter in the beginning of the film
carries Steve Rogers/Tony Stark levels of pathos, but unlike the
latter, was something I was entirely not expecting.
If one character gets the sort of
turnaround many were not anticipating, though, it was Nebula. Given
that she was originally not supposed to outlive the very first
Guardians movie, she's come a very, very long way, and if Guardians
2 wasn't enough to get her a solid fan following, Endgame
should do the trick.
Endgame is a massive, carefully
sculpted canvas with a ton of colors, tones, and themes thrown up
onto it. It is everything people love and hate about the current
blockbuster scene. It is maybe half-a-dozen movies crammed into one,
and it is a testament to the dedication of the literal army behind
its creation that the whole thing doesn't fly off the rails. But
then again, why should that surprise any of us? This whole franchise
effort is the work of countless artists and creators over years, all
of whom have put immense effort into making us laugh, cheer, and cry.
Why discount the end product as worthless pop culture? Endgame,
and indeed the entire MCU, is
an example of how the best human art can be collective just as often
as it is individual, and there ain't nothing wrong with that.
When did you first realize you were a
Pokemon fanatic? What was your first starter, and how did you know
it was the one? Were your first dives into the Pokemon games
solitary affairs, in the back of the family car on a long road trip,
or group sessions where you and your friends would hunch together in
the living room, arguing over which part of the Viridian Forest was
most likely to land you that coveted, early-game Pikachu? Nidoqueen,
or Nidoking? Hitmonlee, or Hitmonchan? Which stone would you use on
the game's lone Evee? Was there really a hidden room in Cerulean
Cave with a Togepi inside? How ethical was it to use the MissingNo
Cheat to get infinite Master Balls and/or Rare Candy?
The first Pokemon I ever saw, and
where and when it was, is a detail lost to the mists of time; I
simply don't remember. One day, sometime around 4th
grade, Pokemon was just there, everywhere, all the time. Didn't take
long for my first favorites to become clear; Poliwrath, Victreebel,
Rhydon, and of course, Porygon. My starter was Squirtle, because
Blastoise. Obviously.
For me, as for most people, the exact
nature of how it all started for us is immaterial. Regardless of how
we each game to the world of Pokemon, it remains a part of us. And
for me, at least, I know it always will be. Individual mileage, of
course, varies greatly; with the number of official Pokemon fast
approaching 1,000, the old moniker “Gotta Catch 'Em All” is now
less the cutesy marketing strategy it once was and more a recipe for
psychological breakdown and eventual institutionalization. And with
the increasingly wide range in quality between the Gens, which ones
you actually like the best will boil down to personal taste. Same
for the still-growing variety of side games being built into the
games, some of which offer ways to enhance the story, while
others...don't.
No matter how deep you want to get,
though, there really is something for everyone here. That's the
thing about amazing, detailed, fantasy-filled worlds; the most fun
and most compelling of them endure no matter what, always retaining
an aura of the special in our minds. I never stopped loving Pokemon, but
circumstances of daily life did lead to me putting an active interest
on pause for awhile after I headed off to college. For years, my old
copies of Blue, Yellow, and Gold were stuck in boxes with other old
stuff, untouched and unused. Then, about 5 years ago, for no
particular reason, I decided to grab a used copy of one of the
Red/Blue remakes for the Nintendo DS. Just to see if my old
world-exploring skills were still sharp. To see if that flame still
burned.
Well, still burning it very much was,
because I haven't put the games down since. While I am still jumping
back and forth between newer and older games (the 3DS games remain
mostly untouched- for now), I've successfully played my way
through nearly every set of games for the first five Gens, and am
still rolling. And now that I finally have enough experience to
directly examine and compare all the games from the Game Boy Color
through the DS, it's time to partake in one of my favorite
pastimes; making a Best Of list. Here are, looking just at the first
three consoles from the original Game Boy Color up through the DS,
are my All-Tme Top Five Pokemon Cartridge Games.
Platinum
(4th Gen, 3rd Game)
While Gen 4 was, for me, the start of
Pokemon's decline in terms of the quality, creativity, and originally
of each new lineup (not to mention its explosion of TOO MANY useless legendaries), the Sinnoh region still offered a big,
sprawling map filled with enough variety to make exploring it a lot
of fun. It had a genuine haunted house, a snow-filled paradise, and
a sprawling mountain range. There was also
the mining function that offered a fantastically fun side quest that
rewarded patience and repeated effort by allowing players
unprecedented access to fossils and stones throughout the game.
What made Platinum stand out from the
other two games of the Gen, though, was its unique ending to the
standard Evil Team plot contrivance. While featuring, of course, the
standard “battle evil leader + acquire legendary from box cover”
sequence, in Platinum, this part if then followed with a dive into
the “Shadow Realm,” an otherworldly alternative dimension with
its own weird physics. It is one of the most visually engaging and
creative sites yet shown in a Pokemon game. Playing it made me feel
like I'd stumbled into the sort of secret, hidden, “glitchy”
extra rooms we all fantasized about finding in Cerulean Cave or near
the S.S. Anne in the original series.
Crystal
(2nd Gen, 3rd Game)
Let's get this out of the way right
now- Gen 2 of Pokemon is the best, hands down, no arguments. Yeah.
I said it. Come at me, bro.
For starters, it easily stands
alongside Gen 1 in terms of the creativity, wonder, and quality of
the Pokemon themselves. Later Gens, even the still-strong Gen 3,
were clearly new sets developed and added-on after it was clear
Pokemon was turning into an industry unto itself, giving all the
later Gens a somewhat artificial feel, while Gen 1 Pokemon were
surrounded by a mystical veil of “authenticity.” This same side
divide ultimately lumped Gen 2 in with 1 for most fans, for the
simple reason that, unlike the later Gens, Gen 2 was at least
partially built into the world from the start; Togepi, and later
Marill, were introduced in the anime long before the rest of Gen 2
was announced (and the very first episode of the anime features a shot of Ho-oh), and we all had that one friend whose Dad took regular
trips to Japan and brought back cards of these strange, new Pokemon
that could not be found anywhere else. Erego, when Gold and Silver
finally came out and the anime hit up the Johto region, it felt less
like a cash-grabbing add-on and more like the fulfillment of a
promise that had long been latent within the world.
This was further enhanced by the fact
that the 2nd Gen games were far more involved and
comprehensive than Red and Blue. They had actual color variety in
the graphics; the Pokemon looked crisp and recognizable, as opposed
to some of the....interesting....block images in the original Gen.
Plus, it featured both its own new map AND allowed the player
to return to Kanto, three canonical years after the original games
had taken the world by storm and literally rewired the psyche of an
entire generation. Nothing before or since in the Pokemon world can
or ever will successfully re-capture or re-create the unique,
intensely pleasurable experience had by those of us that had
memorized every tree and bush and stone in the original games, only
to revisit this world a Gen later and see what had changed, hearing
the in-game characters refer to past events in ways that really
rewarded the attentive player.
So why am I picking Crystal over the
original Gold/Silver gameset? Simple- in addition to it having all
the aforementioned benefits, it was also a huge historical first in
the annals of Pokemon gaming: it was the first one to have in-game
Pokemon animation for both the battles and the Pokedex.
True, this animation was extremely
limited in scope, given the restrictions of technology at the time,
and has been long overshadowed by later Gens in terms of sheer beauty
and quality. Nonetheless- the notion of Pokemon actually moving,
however briefly, to match their undying battle cries was mind-blowing
at the time, and for being so groundbreaking, this game deserves
special honors. And even today, it still carries a strong,
retrograde charm, especially when added to the other added wrinkles
of the Johto storyline.
Black
2/White 2 (5th Gen, 2nd Gameset)
It's starting with Gen 5 that I really
check out of later-day Pokemon, and not just because I'm an old
geezer now. Gen 4 was riddled with issues, sure- most notably, a
line of astonishinglybutt-uglyextraevolutionaryforms for Gen 1
Pokemon that did NOT need them- but there was still plenty to like in
it, Luxray and Lucario being particular favorites of mine. Gen 5, on
the other hand....yikes. I can mostly tolerate the three starters.
They're fine, I guess. A viper-style Grass starter slightly makes
up for the fact that Arbok has always sucked way more than a giant
cobra ever should. Sawk and Throh are legit. Lightning Zebra? I
can dig it.
Pretty much everything else, though?
Woof. A Honeycomb Pokemon was offensive enough, but a fucking ICE CREAM CONE? Whatever the hell this is? A literal pile of shit?
Even the fossils, typically one of the most rock-solid promises of
sheer awesome in any Gen, aren't much to write home about. The
Legendaries?
More dragons, yawn yawn. It takes EFFORT to make dragons feel
passe, but later-day Pokemon has somehow managed to do just that.
Given
the inherent suckiness of nearly the whole Gen, then, it speaks to
how incredibly good the storyline and writing of both Gen 5 games are
that this Gen not only makes the list, but manages to beat out one of
the Gen 2 games. The stories of these games were praised to the sky
all around me, which is what finally moved me to pick it up despite
my very uncomfortable reservations about the Pokemon themselves. And
I am ever-grateful I did. Team Rocket remains an iconic part of the
entire Pokemon aesthetic, and deservedly so, but I would argue that
Team Plasma takes the prize for being the most interesting and
clearly motivated evil team. N is a genuinely great character, one
who is understandable in terms of what drives him even as his means
get more and more twisted as the game progresses. And that finale,
with a massive castle literally rising out of the ground around the
Elite Four? Stunning.
The
sequel games, then, took that excellent start and raised the bar even
higher by being the first post-Gold/Silver gameset to actually take
the foundations of a previous game and build a new story atop them,
with a time skip and various alterations to the layout of the world
being built in. You start in a wholly different part of the map, an
island that was not part of the original games, and explore the
original cities (and learn some of the original characters again) in
a completely different order, lending it the sort of alternate,
exploratory freshness that made Gold/Silver so special.
Even
better? While, yes, you are stuck picking one of the Gen 5 starters,
right from the start the wild areas include Gen 1 and 2 Pokemon, with
Fire, Water, and Electric types readily available. No being forced
to built a solely Gen 5 team until after you beat the Elite Four.
Starters aside, you can get away with never using a single other Gen
5 Pokemon for the rest of the game. And no being forced to sweat
through the first gym with just Rattatta, a Bird Pokemon, and maybe
one Bug. Not this time. This time, you can directly get access to
some of the cool guns (MAGMAR! AMPHAROS!) and start building up a
varied and dynamic team right from the get-go. It's the sort of
launching point I sorely wish every Pokemon game had.
Yellow
(1st Gen, 3rd Game)
It
had been years, literally at least a decade and possibly two, before
I finally dug out my old Pokemon Yellow cartridge and started a new
game; thanks to the fact that they contained no clock like in
Gold/Silver/Crystal, the original cartridge games will remain
playable as long as AA batteries exist.
Revisiting
Kanto through the lens of the very best of the first generation of
games, I was struck by how Yellow remains the lone exception among
the games in being, in many ways, a direct companion to the anime.
In all the other games, character designs notwithstanding, the games
have always existed in a realm of their own, separate from the
adventures of Ash, Misty, and Brock. That Yellow is the lone game to
even partially bridge this divide gives it a heft and nostalgic force
that only gets more potent as time goes on.
True,
you don't play as Ash from the show, and Brock and Misty do not leave
their gyms and tag along with you, but Jesse and James sure are
present and accounted for, as are a number of smaller, one-of
characters of various stripes from the show. Gary/Blue/Douchebag
(c'mon- you know you went there as a kid) starts with an Eevee, and
the three Gen 1 starters can all be acquired in-game in ways that
partially reflect their introductions in the show.
Most
memorable of all, of course, is Pikachu. This is the lone main game
where Pikachu, THE de facto symbol of the entire Pokemon world, is
your starter, and like in the show it refuses to stay in its
Pokeball, instead following you around, which in turn allows you to
interact with it and see its reactions to various parts of the game.
It's such an incredibly fun gimmick I can't believe it took as many
years as it did before that particular feature was repeated in a
game.
It
is its utter uniqueness that makes Pokemon Yellow the defining game
of Gen 1, and for many Pokemon fans, it is THE definitive Pokemon
game, especially for us First Wavers. Shockingly, though, it is not
the BEST Pokemon game. That honor goes to....
Heartgold/Soulsilver
(2nd Gen remakes)
Yes,
you read that right. I can hear the monocles popping as I write
this, but I'm sticking to my guns; with all due respect to Yellow,
the absolute best of the pre-3DS Pokemon games are the Gen 4 remakes
of the original Gold/Silver/Crystal games.
Why?
Simple. We've already established that Gold/Silver/Crystal were even
better than the original games, and exceed most of all the later
games, for the simple reason that there was just more- more to see,
more to explore, more to do. They were not just sequels, they
actively bridged two separate regions; Even Black 2/White 2, though
sequels, stayed in the same region; no revisiting Sinnoh, or Hoenn,
much less Johto or Kanto. Heartgold and Soulsilver retains this
fundamental, dual-region, world-building excellence, but then throw
EVEN MORE on top of it all. They are the broadest, deepest, and most
expansive out of all the pre 3DS Pokemon games.
First
off, they are gorgeous- Gen 4 in general is the most beautiful out of
the first five Gens in terms of the color, designs, and quality of
graphics. Yes, even better than Gen 5, which followed it; both the
pixelated quality of the battles and a lot of the Pokemon animation
struck me as a bit off, a bit too frenetic and unclear. Gen 4 does
not have that problem; the lines are smooth and everything flows
beautifully, especially in the heat of battle, though I do find it
amusing that a number of the big power moves late in the game end up
looking like reproduction-destroying crotch shots.
Getting
down into the meat of the narrative, the story is expanded from the
original games in really fun and creative ways. In effect, the extra
quests in the games amount to a fusion of all the games from the
first three Gens, nearly giving you 3 games jammed into one. The
Suicune chase from Crystal is included, expanded to include in Johto
during the game's second half. Cerulean Cave is back in business,
and all the Legendaries from Gen 1 are available to be caught,
whereas in the originals they'd seemingly disappeared from the
Pokemon world. Even Gen 3 gets its day- Latios and Latias are
available to be chased down Dog-style in Kanto, and the island where
Cianwood City resides has a whole extra path into the mountains,
including a cave where Kyogre, Groudon, and Rayquaza are available if
you have access to a trading partner.
And
that whole added trail isn't all that's been added on; a lot of extra
stuff is there if you care to find, stuff that, in some cases,
actually resolves various threads left wide open by the original
games. At the end of that extra trail is the new and improved Safari
Zone, the fate of which had only been hinted at before. Silver's
efforts to redeem himself have a few moments of resolution, including
an aside from Elm's assistant that he eventually returns to New Bark
Town to apologize and offer to return the Pokemon he stole. It's a
really, really small detail, almost insignificant, but the fact that
it's there if you care to find it says worlds about the dedication
that went into making this game something truly special.
There
are sidequests like the Battle Frontier, where you can get points and
access special tutored moves, but honestly, I found this part too
grinding to really be invested. Your mileage may vary on the
sporting competition available near Goldenrod, but I personally found
the games a fun diversion. Plus, the points you win there had the
relevance of offering access to extra Evolution Stones early in the
game. The restriction of exactly one Ev Stone per game in the
originals was one of their few drawbacks, and given that many of my
favorites are Stone evolutions, I was especially happy to see a way
around this added.
My
absolute favorite part of the game, though, are the extra Gym Leader
battles. In the original games, the only endless repeat battles
available were the Elite Four, but even then they were at the same
levels. So, really, once that mountain had been climbed, the only
other challenge was the insanely difficult fight with Red at Mount
Silver.
In
the remakes, though, the Elite Four actually get higher-level Pokemon
in the second go-around. It's a one-time-only boost, but it still
gives another great challenge and also offers the perfect way to test
your Pokemon if you think you're ready to go seek out Red.
Beyond
even that is the ability to, at very specific times and places, run
into the Gym Leaders outside their gyms and cities and get their
phone numbers. Each Leader then has a set day of the week where they
are available for a rematch, which 6 full-strength, Elite-Four level
Pokemon. It's a fun expansion that in some cases gives a little more
insight into the different personalities of the gym leaders, but also
provides a regular way to keep challenging and training your Pokemon
even after they get into the upper levels; it used to be that once a
Pokemon was above level 60, further strengthening them was a real
chore, since there were no options left to get them high amounts of
XP in a short period of time. Heartgold/Soulsilver was the first Gen
that found a way to fix that problem.
Beyond
all these grand, story-level expansions, though, there are numerous
small, technical aspects of these games that make them easier, more
streamlined, and more fun to play. Unlimited items get rid of the
stress of having to use big items too early. Unlimited phone numbers
is also a huge boon; the very strict limit on how many you could save
in the originals made it a chore guessing which ones were most
important.
These
were also the very first games since Yellow where Pokemon follow you
around outside the ball. And not just your starter- any Pokemon
first in your party stays outside, meaning that you can literally see
and interact with all 493 total available Pokemon in-game. Like I
said before, given how cool this function is, I find it astonishing
that it took this long post-Yellow for another game to utilize it.
Taken
together, it staggers me how much, in every way that counts,
Heartgold and Soulsilver managed to exceed all that came before them
and (so far) all that has come since, creating the absolute perfect
Pokemon gaming experience, better than any other I've had before or
since. Pokemon is an amazing world, full of wonder and possibility,
and for my money, there is no other game out there that takes such
full advantage of that potential.
I have been slow in getting into the
veritable cornucopia of podcasts that now fill the internet, but
looking back, it seems only fitting that my first would end up being
the weekly examinations of the latest in Shonen manga by Chris “Rollo
T” Larios and Nick “Y Ruler of Time” Freeman. They may have
started small way back in 2011, but they have chugged along
continuously since then and are now a staple of the small (but
fervent) US manga fandom scene.
Their format has never really changed
since then; each week, they go through the new chapters of all the
regular Shonen Jump releases, reading through them and lending their
own unique takes and voices to the story and dialogue, and discussing
their reactions and thoughts to each one. Occasionally, they start
an episode by taking a deep dive at an entire series they either
selected beforehand or took from readers as a recommendation. And
that's about it- they have the occasional guest, and as of a few
years ago they've started to do monthly Q&A sessions that are
also fun, but the meat and potatoes of the series has remained
really, really basic.
Why, then, is the show so addicting
and fun to listen to? What makes it so compulsively enjoyable?
In short, that which forms the core of
any good podcast; ridiculously good chemistry between the hosts.
Chris and Nick have the sort of indescribable, relentlessly funny
rapport that can only be generated between two really good friends
who know, inside and out, how the other ticks and how they can best
respond to them. They regularly go off on wide tangents that have
nothing to do with the chapter they are talking about at a given
moment, if indeed they have anything to do with manga at all, but
still never miss a beat, making every minute of their banter one of
the most consistent joys of my life since I started following them.
Their bizarro sense of humor reached
its zenith over the course of the tottering, absurdly terrible final
arc of Bleach, where Kudo's story, dialogue, and even character names
almost made it seem like he was daring these two to go all out in
making their dissections of each chapter as comic as possible. It
was, in fact, an episode entitled “Bleach Sucks!” that first drew
my attention to the podcast.
Given how so much of my love for this
show centers around just the experience of hearing these two nutters
bounce off each other- plus the fact that whole episodes can easily
run up to and over two hours, so this is hardly easy listening- it's
often hard to pinpoint specific episodes that stand out particularly
more than others. Nonetheless, I have give it my best effort; here,
in no specific order, are a few special favorites of mine.
This episode, a deep look
at the manga of the title, got me to pick up and read into a series
about teenage angst and romance that I otherwise would never have
even thought of giving the time of day to. Thank God I did, because
this series was way better than it had any right to be, taking a
romance genre usually too filled with cliches to make an impression
and telling a surprisingly compelling story.
Here, too, if I hadn't
taken the time to listen to Nick and Chris examine a bizarre
classroom comedy-drama centered around a powerful octopus-like being
raising a room of grade-school kids to be assassins, it never would
have occurred to me to get into this fantastically funny story that,
much like Good Ending, has no business being as excellent as it is.
May
28th, 2016: Pokemon Adventures Red & Blue
My life has been so much
more fulfilling since I started getting back into the many Pokemon
games, but it took awhile before I learned of the existence of the
Pokemon Adventure series, which at its best moments matches and even
exceeds the best parts of the original show and movies. Starting
with Red & Blue, Chris and Nick have been slowly working through
each major arc of the series, with the most recent episode (as of
this writing) looking at the Diamond/Pearl/Platinum arc. All of them
are worth listening to for anyone who is a Pokefreak like me.
Bakuman, the follow-up
series to Death Note from Tsugumi Oba, was the first major Shonen
series to end after Chris and Nick had made it a regular part of WMR,
making their final retrospective after the conclusion of the series a
great sendoff to a special series.
As special as the ending of
Bakuman was, things got real when Naruto, first of the Shonen Big
Three that had dominated the manga world for nearly two decades,
became the first of the three to wrap up. For all its flaws, Naruto
retains a particularly special place in my heart, so of course, I
couldn't wait to hear the WMR take on the conclusion of this massive
journey.
The
Bleach Chronicles
Each chapter review of
Bleach was a shot of pure joy into my veins right up until its end in
2016, so picking out the BEST moments of that is hard, though Nick's
take on Juha Bach as voiced by Foghorn J. Leghorn easily stands out
as one of the most inspired comedic bits of the decade. Here are
just a few major episodes that provide a solid highlight of their
takes on the series over the years.
Just as the title suggests:
Nick and Chris take a stab at fixing Bleach after the series had
already started to noticeably decline (although, tragically, the
worst was still well off in the future).
In my opinion, this remains
one of the best moments of the entire podcast so far; after the
“truth about Ichigo's sword, Zangetsu, is revealed, Nick takes a
long, but necessary, chunk of the episode to go over, in explicit
detail, how this whole, game-changing twist doesn't make a lick of
sense.
August
25th, 2016: Bleach's Final Chapter
A whole episode devoted to
the very final chapter of Bleach, after Kudo was forced to end the
series way sooner than he wanted to. What more could you want?
September
2nd, 2016: Bleach Retrospective
For all its flaws, I still
think back on the early, glory days of Bleach with an intense
fondness. As such, it was not so easy for me to see the series end
to poorly, but getting the full thoughts of Chris and Nick on the
story as a whole helped me process the strange journey the world of
Bleach ended up taking.
**the following article contains some spoilers for Do The Right Thing**
It was almost poetic, the sort of perverted, fateful irony usually reserved for Greek tragedies. Almost exactly thirty years after the Academy ignored Spike Lee's Do The Right Thing, still argued by many to be his best and most important film, in favor of the whitewashing blandness that is Driving Miss Daisy, it looked like the Academy was set to get this year's apology tour right; Spike won his first-ever competitive Oscar for the screenplay for BlacKkKlansman, and there had been some speculation going into the night that the film could be a sleeper contender for Best Picture.
Alas, in retrospect, what preceded Spike's win was the ominous sign that this good feeling could not, indeed would not, last; Green Book took the other Screenplay award from the hand of a clearly-disapproving Samuel L. Jackson, and at the end of the night, it took home Best Picture as well. Green Book ultimately tied with Black Panther at three Oscars apiece, and Bohemian Rhapsody took home the most with four. It was with good reason that a properly-saucy Spike remarked afterwards to reporters, “Every time someone's driving somebody, I lose.”
It must needs be remarked that this year's Oscars did include a number of real, positive, groundbreaking firsts, with Spike Lee's win being joined by trophies for Peter Ramsay, Ruth Carter, Hannah Beachler, and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, among others. However, the relative dominance, especially among the “prestige” awards, of films made by serial abusers, conspiracy-mongerers, and old, white men blatantly disrespecting the wishes of the black subjects they profited off of will inevitably lead to this year going down as another shamefully embarassing chapter in Academy history. In the age of Trump, defined by rising white nationalism and adjacent-white-nationalism-apologists, and in a post-#MeToo media landscape, there is simply no excuse for this. #Time was supposed to be #Up for shit like this. Clearly, it is not. Not by a long shot.
And so, given the depressing parallels this creates to 30 years ago, it's worth revisiting the film the Academy once deemed less worthy of recognition than Flattering Your Racist Grandma: The Motion Picture.
Do The Right Thing is a film about complex, interlocking racial tensions in a small Brooklyn street, played out over the course of a single day. There is an ongoing heatwave plaguing the city, and as our narrator, the seemingly all-knowing local DJ Love Daddy informs us, the day ahead will be the worst one yet. We get a sense of the personalities, dynamics, and institutions that exist between residents old and new that define life there. Mookie (played by Spike Lee himself), the delivery boy for the famous local pizza joint; Sal and his sons, Pino and Vito, the Italian owners of the pizza place and, apparently, the only white family still living and working in the neighborhood after the others have moved out; Mother Sister and Da Mayor, two elderly locals who form something of a moral compass for everyone else; Buggin' Out, a young black man spoiling for a fight with seemingly everyone; Radio Raheem, famous for his massive boombox, whose Love/Hate brass knuckles provide the focus for one of the film's most famous and enduring images; and so, so many more.
The nucleus of the travesty of justice, understanding, and empathy that ultimately ends the day is Buggin' Out and Sal getting worked up around lunchtime over the fact that only Italian-Americans are presented on Sal's “Wall of Fame.” In Sal's eyes, it's his restaurant, and he's Italian-American, so he can do what he wants. Fair point. In Buggin' Out's eyes, since the restaurant is in an overwhelmingly black neighborhood and propped up by the money spent there day in, day out by black customers, Sal ought to pay tribute to the community that keeps him in business. Also fair, as well as a frighteningly prescient parallel to how the makers of Green Book gained profit and Oscar gold from the story of Dr. Shirley over the explicit wishes of both its subject and his family.
But as with all things, two arguments that, on their own, seem fair and that might, in a cooler situation, be able to find their way to a common middle ground, are in this case entering a proverbial tinderbox of social, economic, and racial tension, all exacerbated by that damned, unending, all-pervasive heat.
Heat is one of the most important parts of the film, both literally and symbolically. It makes everyone just a little bit angrier, sweatier, stickier, on edge. And it works here as a damn-near perfect metaphorical stand-in for how racial and ethnic divisions can pervade and surround everything in a society, and how even the most minor of disagreements and the most innocent moments are instantly imbued- or rather, infected- with a hostility and anger that can lead, all too quickly, to escalation.
Buggin' Out and his anger over the Wall of Fame is one example of this. Another is the incredibly awkward and tense moment when Mookie's sister, Jade, comes in to Sal's for a slice. Sal is clearly head-over-heels for Jade; the way he insists on “making her something special” and the few word they exchange sitting in a booth are moments of real tenderness, a level of kindness and humanity the heat can't touch. But even this is immediately squelched out by both Mookie and Sal's older son, Pino, whose hostility to even the idea of Sal and Mookie's sister being interested in each other is plain to see on their taught, wary faces.
Part of what makes this film such an incredible feat of visual and narrative storytelling is how quickly and effectively each character, large and small, are established and made to feel individual and unique. One of the greatest bugbears of films seeking to deal with race is avoiding the pitfall of generalization, i.e., to not fall victim to exactly that which the film wants to push back against. Here, each character is shown to us as genuinely human, with virtues and vices co-mingling constantly. The title almost seems to hint that there is some clear answer- one thing that truly is “the right thing,” or one character or group of characters are the “good guys” in contrast to all else- but the film is too smart for that. Each character has moments of sympathy, of compassion, of doing a good turn, only to turn around and say or do something aggressive, immature, selfish, or just plain stupid. What the right thing to do even is depends on the situation and perspective of each person. Even the title is open to contradicting interpretations. It works as a gentle plea for humanity in an inhumane world. It could also be a command, barked out in anger and for decidedly “wrong” reasons. Like with everything else in the film, whether or not there is a difference between the “right” and “wrong” thing to do is something the viewers are left to ponder over for themselves.
The lone exception to this masterful shading, at least in my view, is the Korean family that owns the convenience store across the street from Sal's Famous. We are informed that they are relative newcomers to the neighborhood, and this plus the fact that they have already achieved a level of economic success most longtime residents of the street have never had is more fuel for resentment and mistrust between the Koreans and everyone else, be they black, Hispanic, Italian, what-have-you. But the 360-degree treatment never quite extends to this family; they are key to a few scenes, but we never see anything from their perspective. With most of the film devoted to the angers, worries, fears, and insecurities of the African- and Italian-American parts of the cast, the Korean and (to a lesser extent) Hispanic characters sometimes feel like a bit of an afterthought. That, at least, was my impression, but I will leave it to other viewers, especially viewers of color, to decide whether or not this dilutes the film's power as a meditation on racism.
Another imbalance within the film I noticed was its treatment of women. Mother Sister is treated as a wise elder, respected by all in the community, but she is the only woman the men really seem to listen to. Mookie clearly struggles in being present as a partner for his girlfriend and father for their child, and when he sees Jade and Sal flirting, his immediate reaction is standard, overprotective machismo; he tries to ban his sister from ever going to Sal's again, and takes it upon himself to confront Sal and tell him keep far away from her. Where, indeed, is Mrs. Sal? We are never told.
This, however, I don't see as a flaw in the film, but rather as an accurate reflection of how gender dynamics play an equally forceful role in how discrimination seeps into all sorts of relationships and can extend inequality, racial or otherwise. It's yet another shade in a film that succeeds to bringing in nearly the whole spectrum of bigotry for consideration and debate.
All of this builds to the film's devastating climax, a massive confrontation/fistfight/firefight where seemingly every bit of pent-up anger explodes outward, devastating everyone within reach. In the scram that results between Sal, Mookie, Buggin', Raheem, and the others, the (mostly) white cops start wading in. People are beaten, harmed, their livelihood destroyed, and one young man black man is picked up by a cop and strangled to death, in the middle of the street, for all to see.
This devastating moment was controversial and effecting enough when the film first came out in the 80's. Now, though, in 2019- several years after the video of Eric Garner's death and his final words were seared into our collective conscious- it is even more potent, a tragic reminder that the videos, audio, and stories of Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice that seemed, at the time, never-ending, were really only “new” or “revealing” for white people. For minorities- African, Asian, Muslim, Hispanic, Native, LGBTQ, and more- it was nothing new; just another continuation of a long, long history of random, senseless violence this country has never, ever ceased to inflict on the marginalized.
Do The Right Thing retains every bit of its power, fury, and force today because of this. This country- its voters, its politicians, it's business leaders- have continued to refuse to do the right thing, or to even seriously discuss and consider what right things need to be done to allow us to actually begin to heal, in some form, from the past and to truly move on. As long as the thousand-and-one pointed questions this films throws at the viewer remain unconsidered, untested, and unanswered, none of us will have the ability or right to look Radio Raheem in the eye and say that, yes, in the end, Love will win out over Hate.
Captain
Marvel (2019): Written by Anna Boden, Ryan Fleck,
Geneva Robertson-Dworet, directed by Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck. Starring:
Brie Larson, Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Mendelsohn, Lashana Lynch, Jude Law, Gemma
Chan, Lee Pace, Djimon Hounsou, Annette Bening, and Clark Gregg. Running
Time: 124 minutes. Based on the
comics by Stan Lee, Gene Colan, and Roy Thomas.
Rating:
3/4
At
long last, the women are running the show in a Marvel movie.The past few years have finally seen some
major barriers broken down regarding representation in major tentpole blockbusters,
thanks especially to Wonder Woman and
Black Panther, though Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse deserves
to be considered on that same plane.Now
Marvel has gotten into the game of letting a lady lead the way with Captain Marvel, the big prequel film
setting up the character that, we’ve been led to assume, will play a key role
in the next Avengers movie.
This
movie starts in medias res, as “Vers” (real name, we eventually learn, is Carol
Danvers) is introduced to us as a soldier of the Kree, being trained by
Yon-Rogg (Jude Law) to control her seemingly remarkable powers.She has total amnesia regarding her past, but
it’s pretty clear she’s a human who had a strange run-in with the Kree of some
sort.This only starts being revealed to
us after a mission against the Kree’s sworn enemy, the Skrulls, goes awry, and
she finds herself captured and under a sort of memory check at the hands of her
captors, triggering further flashbacks of who she was before the Kree found
her.
She
breaks out in time to make it to the surface of the Earth, circa the early 90’s,
where she soon runs into a digitally-youthized Sam Jackson- the effect is
actually quite good, better than I expected- who she enlists in finding out
where the surviving Skrulls are hiding and what, exactly, they were after in
the first place.
As
far as the story and narrative are concerned, there is nothing groundbreaking
here.Obviously, not everything is at it
seems to be in the beginning, and there are a few twists and turns where some
perceived villains are actually good and vice versa.In the main, then this falls more into the
middling-tier of most Marvel films; perfectly well-made and nice to watch, but
nothing in the bare narrative structure to make it really stand out from the
pack.If this had not had the
distinction of being “The First Female Lead” of the MCU, and simply been about
another white dude, it would have ended up rather forgettable, like Ironman 3, Ant-Man, or Doctor Strange.
Thankfully,
it does have that “first” factor in its favor, and even more beneficially, it’s
Brie Larson in the title role, and she is clearly having a blast.There is a confidence and swagger that she is
able to effortlessly project with every smirk, every twist of her head, every
glance.None of it is explained or
excused or given a reason for being- it would have been all too easy to connect
her strengths as being direct results of the traumatic amnesia she suffered
under for 6 years- but the film doesn’t go that route.Carol is who she is and makes no bones about it,
and is all the better for it.
Larson
has an especially enjoyable chemistry with Jackson, finally getting to have
some fun with the Fury role, and Lashana Lynch is damn near hypnotic as a
friend from her past who helps her discover the truth about who she was and
what, exactly, happened to her.I could
watch a whole set of movies devoted to just these three characters; that’s how
strong their scenes are, which contain the film’s beating heart.
The
lack of a real threat amongst any of the villain characters, real or perceived,
does still drag the film down a bit; there is plenty of Prequel Syndrome to be
found here.I also can’t say that there
is much in the action to really stick in the mind- again, like with the vast
majority of the MCU canon, the action is mostly-serviceable in the moment, but
hardly sticks around afterwards, unlike the occasionally dynamic sequences we
got in the previous few movies.No
matter.This was a fun movie and a great
experience, and I wholly recommend seeing it in theaters.
You
might not have realized it yet, but How
To Train Your Dragon 3 is out in theaters, like, right now, and it’s
good.It’s really good.It’s about as perfect an ending to the story
and character arcs set up in the first movie, all the way back in 2010, that we could have wished for.
In
fact, Dreamworks Animation has proven remarkably good over the years at making bizarre
premises work.But in a world where
Marvel is still the go-to standard for multiple-film continuities and Pixar is
still the guiding standard for animation, I feel the quality of Dreamworks has
so far gone tragically overlooked, and with the final HTTYD experience about to
leave theaters for good, it might be too late for us to give them their
due.
Now,
this is not to get too ahead of myself and suggest Dreamworks is some
Ghibli-level bastion of near-perfect filmmaking, because it isn’t.When looking at the three dozen films thus
far released under the Dreamworks banner, there is very much an uneven mix in
terms of quality; I would rank just under half the titles on the scale between “really
solid” and “genuinely great.”The others,
though….I mean, Boss Baby wasn’t literally the worst film ever, but,
still.
Even
the franchises have as many lows as they do highs; the first two Shrek movies were genuinely
groundbreaking events in American animation that redefined the genre, and Madagascar was…fine, I guess, but those
two franchises soon fell off particularly steep cliffs and stayed around well
past their sell-by dates.Still, though,
it’s amazing to me when I think about how many great movies there are here that
no one seems to be talking about anymore; for every Boss Baby or Over the Hedge,
there’s a Prince of Egypt, a Chicken Run, or even the lone Wallace and Gromit feature.And for the most part, while most of these
movies did well enough at the box office, recognition has never went much
beyond that; Shrek and Wallace and Gromit remain the only two
Dreamworks films to ever nab an Oscar, while Kung Fu Panda and HTTYD have (so far) been completely shut
out.
And
yet, despite this ongoing travesty, the makers of two of the best film trilogies
post-LOTR have kept right on going, quietly and competently crafting excellent
stories out of material that really, truly, should not be this good.Jack Black as a fat panda who stumbles into
mastering kung fu and a series about dragons with remarkably bizarre designs
where the human characters can’t decide if they're Scottish or American are
decidedly NOT the sort of foundations most people would look at and say, “Yep,
that’s trilogy material!”Yet here we
are; Kung Fu Panda and HTTYD not only
rank among the best franchises of the century (so far), I am inclined to argue
that they are the best two animated trilogies every produced within the US,
period.
Why,
yes, I would have been happy include Toy
Story in that discussion, if Pixar were not so determined to take all the
goodwill the third film generated and throw it off a fucking cliff.
So
how did it happen?Why did these two series
turn out so good, succeed where so many others fail?I’ll take deeper looks at the films
themselves in two later posts, but in broad terms, the connective thread
between them is pretty clear; in both cases the studio handed the reigns to a
talented, creative team that knew what stories they wanted to tell, and gave
them just enough leeway to make those stories with no really disruptive
interference from above.
Let’s start with Kung Fu Panda; the primary tissue connecting all three movies are
the screenwriters, Jonathan Aibel and Glenn Berger, who penned all three
scripts.Melissa Cobb and Clare Knight are
also credited on all three as, respectively, the producer and head editor.John Stevenson and Mark Osborne split
directing duties for the first movie, with Jennifer Yuh Nelson taking over for
the second (the first time a woman of any background solely directed a feature
animated film), and then sharing credit on the third movie with Alessandro
Carloni.
HTTYD,
on the other hand, had Dean DeBlois as the central animating force behind its
production, as he shares writing AND directing credits on all three films (with
Bonnie Arnold producing all three); for the first one, he split the work with
Will Davies and Chris Sanders, while he wrote and directed the next two on his
own, and has already gone on record with how his own familial struggles shaped
the narrative he wanted to build around Hiccup.
Both
are also enhanced throughout by killer scores; the Kung Fu Panda music comes courtesy of Hans Zimmer.John Powell contributed to the first two of
those films as well, but he clearly reserved his A-Game for HTTYD, providing us
with one of the best musical creations of the past decade.
Furthermore,
it’s clear that none of these were rushed productions; each installment had at
least three years between the others.It
would have been all too easy to look at the respective success of the first
films and rushed through sequels within a year or two, the animating force
behind such decisions usually being a fear that, if you don’t hurry, people
will forget all about your last movie and not care about the second one.That this so clearly dominates a lot of
thinking within Hollywood is rather sad, because it belies an ignorance of one
of the basic truths of filmmaking; if you make a genuinely good product and
stick by it, the audience will come.And
your chances of achieving this are all the higher when you really take your
time to make each movie something special, and not just carbon copies of what
came before, as so, so many sequels end up being.
Both
of these franchises have born this out; all three Kung Fu Panda films had
budgets in the 130-150 million range, and each pulled in well over half a
million in global box office, a solid, if not overwhelming, profit margin.The budget for HTTYD, I was shocked to find
out, has actually decreased with each successive movie, dropping from 165
million for the first movie to under 130 million for The Hidden World.This,
despite how clearly and amazingly the quality of the animation has risen with
each new installment.The first two
movies likewise hit or topped half a million; the third is still out,
obviously, but it’s well on track to making a comparable amount to the second
movie.
Clearly,
my worries that we still aren’t fully appreciated these movies aside, they
stand as clear rebuffs to the idea that sequels have to be rushed to make a
profit; there were enough people who could enjoy these films for what they are,
and remembered to get excited and get out the door when the next one came
around.
So
let’s take some time, then, to look back at these two trilogies, and appreciate
what we’ve got.And I promise, the next
two installments will not take three years apiece to finish.
Kyle
Kallgren began his online career carrying the moniker Oancitizen, and started
his career at TGWTG/Channel Awesome in March of 2011.Since then, his primary show (aside from the
occasional crossover work or casual vlog) has been the Brows Held High series,
and while the format and quality of the videos and sound have changed a bit
over the years, like Todd in the Shadows, another from the Chez Apocalypse
crowd he continues to work closely with, there is a remarkable consistency to
his work over the decade.
He
officially left the Channel Awesome site in 2015, citing “creative
differences.”At the time he insisted in
a Tumblr post that there were no hard feelings directly involved in his
decision to leave, but when #ChangeTheChannel started to bring out more and
more stories of the channel’s mismanagement before and during the time he
decided to leave, I think it’s clear that that either played a direct role in
his decision, or merely made him far happier in retrospect that he got out when
he did.
His
brand, of sorts, is to take a “highbrow” approach to film criticism, picking
rather unique topics about a film or series of films and diving in deep.His style is simple, straightforward.He looks at the camera and talks, interspersed
with clips and stills from the film (or films) in question.He does not deliberately go for humor, but
when he does, it’s usually a dry or sarcastic form of wit (so, perfect for
me).The closest thing to a long-running
series of his is his series of Shakespeare Month videos, but for the most part
his videos have always been stand-alone works, which for me means that there is
a particularly wide variety of stuff to pick out for viewing.Since the 2016 election, he’s also had a
long-running thread on his Twitter feed where he continuously finds new ways of
wishing death on Fascism and all its associated elements.It is a joy to track and I highly recommend
it to everyone.
Here,
then, is an unranked list of my personal favorites out of his videos.
Anonymous
An
early entry in his Shakespeare series, this video trains Kyle’s ire on Roland Emmerich’s
terrible, terrible film attempting to build up the Anti-Stratfordian conspiracy
theory that Shakespeare…..didn’t actually write Shakespeare.It’s precisely this sort of faux-intellectual
nonsense that is right up Kyle’s aesthetic wheelhouse, and watching him pick
through the massive holes in this strange literary thought-fart is wonderful
catharsis.One of my favorite jokes of
his of all time remains the part where, in utter exasperation, he cries out, “BUT
HOW CAN FALCON IF NOT POSH????”
Cloud Atlas
Now,
I find some of Kyle’s critiques of Cloud Atlas to be a bit harsh- the film is an absolute masterpiece and I
will brook no argument on this front- but still, not enough people talk about this
movie in any fashion.This special
two-parter where Kyle sifts through the differences between the book and the
movie, and on the wider influences within literature, philosophy, and cinema
that informed the story and characters is the sort of take I dearly miss from
most of my personal favorite films.More
people need to see this movie.More
people need to read the book, itself a masterpiece.More people need to watch these videos.Also, remember how I said Kyle usually doesn’t
go for broad comedy?Well, when he does,
he goes big.The
sketches-within-sketches finale of Part 2 is one of the funniest things ever
produced on the internet.
Washington, D.C. Always
Plays Itself
Here
is a prime example of how Kyle is always able to find an idea or angle on
cinema or culture that I never thought of before, forcing me to reconsider much
of how I consume media.Here, he
specifically looks at how the capital of the United States itself functions as
a character all on its own whenever it is part of a film’s setting.This is applicable to all sorts of films; from
straight-up propaganda to subversive critiques of American politics and
society, if D.C. is in your movie, there is latent symbolism and meaning in
every single shot you use of the iconic buildings of the city, whether the
filmmaker truly realizes it or not.Films
are not made in a bubble.They shape and
are shaped by every facet of the culture that surrounds us, and it can only
help to be more actively aware of how we can shape this environment we live in
for the better.
Who Gets To Be A
Civilization?
The
Civilization games have remained a staple of my life for over a decade now, and
I was so pleased when this video was released to find out that Kyle was a
kindred spirit.That said, while we are
both devotees of the game in its myriad versions, his pointed examinations of
how each iteration of the game clearly shows the limits, biases, and flaws in
how we in the 21st-century West tend to think of “civilization,”
specifically how we inevitably define it in opposition to something barbaric,
something “other.”In the Civ games,
this is taken to its ultimate, most ruthlessly logical conclusion; only a
select set of pre-ordained nations, peoples, or cultures can “win.”The barbarians- however they are defined in a
given version- can never win.
That
said, the games have improved remarkably in terms of variety, geographic and historical
spread, and inclusiveness, with each version sporting more and more
non-European and native civs with their own unique colors and special
benefits.This, too, reflects how we can
actively change the culture of assumptions we live within.If we are able to better ourselves, we are in
a position to demand better from our Civ games, indeed all our games, as
well.
Tommy Wiseau: The Last
Auteur
There
are, perhaps, few other things as over-used in the realm of film criticism than
the idea of the “auteur” as the highest, greatest form of film as art.It is a concept with deep veins of sexism and
racism running through it, as Kyle brilliantly demonstrates in the subtlest of
ways, and I found it hilarious- and fitting- that it be given what might be its
purest expression yet in the form of the strange, possibly-criminal creator of
one of the “Worst Movies Ever Made.”
Sherman’s March in 2017
Made
in the wake of the white supremacist marches of 2017, this is one of Kyle’s
most viscerally powerful videos.He
combines his own experiences and frustrations as a white man searching for
answers with those of a filmmaker who, decades before, had intended to make a
film about Sherman’s March, but instead made a film about….well, that, and a
bit of everything else.This video, like
the film, is a stunning reflection on how we interpret and shape our historical
narratives to suit our needs, how we like to draw clear lines between life and
art, reality, and fantasy, while in actuality it all blends together inside of
us, all the time.We all should be so
reflective in our daily lives.
Why Buckaroo Bonzai is
Today’s Most Important Superhero
I
adore the fact that this video exists.I
was but a boy when I decided to pop in my Dad’s VHS copy of the one and only
Buckaroo Bonzai film to ever be made, the film’s teaser of a sequel
notwithstanding.Since then, I was
always tickled by how I knew about this oddball cult classic that very few
people, outside of really devoted, “nerd” circles, had ever even heard of.So to see it brought out into the sun for a
little 21st-century treatment, looking at how surprisingly well so
much of its holds up today, was the sort of treat I never knew I’d been
yearning before until it was offered up to me on my Youtube
Recommendations.
Bisexual Lighting: the
Rise of Pink, Purple, and Blue
The
way color and light is used in visual art is something most people don’t think
about, but once you start to dig down even a little bit, you realize there is
an immense wealth of things to ponder over and appreciate in how the best
artists are able to utilize these tools to shape how we interpret and
experience art.This is especially
fascinating in how sexuality, particularly non-hetero identities, can be
suggested or enhanced by the use of color schemes, specifically the uses of
pink, purple, and blue to suggest bi-sexuality.Kyle concludes it all with what is possibly the most personal reveal he’s
ever made in a video.And it is worth
waiting right up until the end for.Thank you, Kyle, for all you share with use.
