Reviews

Naruto: 5 months of frustration-pt 1.

/ toseealife / 2 Comments

Well…it’s time. Whoo-oo.

I finished all of Naruto and Shippuden in about 5 months, skipping a lot of  later filler because my siblings and I got tired of wasting our time on stuff that had no plot relevance.

I started off kind of liking it, I thought Naruto was cute, I thought Sasuke was okay, I did not like Sakura, but I wasn’t alone in that, at least 90% of the fandom doesn’t either.

About halfway through the OG show I stopped liking Sasuke completely, and about halfway through Shippuden, I stopped liking Naruto also. I began to like Sakura briefly, but before the Ninja War started I stopped liking her again.

However, I do have favorite characters, The Three Sand Siblings, Shikamaru, and the surprisingly great Sai (seriously never expected to like him as much as I did.) I also like Hinata, naturally. I’m going to devote a separate post to them so I can get into more depth.

Anyway, so I do have some positive feelings for the show, but overall it was the most frustrating thing I’ve ever seen.

I don’t need to go over the bad framing, horrible timing, and repetitive character types, because that’s not saying anything a million other people haven’t already said. Plus, those are aesthetic, cosmetic complaints that would not really matter if the quality was still good. Phineas and Ferb proved that repetitive humor and character types can be used in a genius manner, bad framing is annoying but not a death sentence. (Framing, in this context, means the plot points that set up a big confrontation or development. And the ones that follow it to create a cohesive story line. Avatar’s framing is famously well done to be just the right amount of filler and non filler so you don’t feel bored or exhausted.)

What killed this show for me were two, maybe three, consistent issues.

My Little Pony has shown that you can build an entire series out of one main message, split into many different facets and themes, like Friendship, and it can still be fun and profound.

So when I say the show Naruto has one or two basic messages, I do not mean that makes it bad inherently, I have no problem with repeating the same message over and over if you’re doing it well. I grew up on shows like that.

My problem is the messages themselves.

The three main messages are:

  1. Don’t ever give up on a friend who’s lost their way.
  2.  Choose love over hate.
  3. The world is a dark place but by sharing our pain, we can make it better.

Since the friend, Sasuke, is the biggest problem with this series, I’ll start with him.

Like many fans, by the time Shippuden was over I really hated Sasuke. I had been told he was going to go to the dark side, but starting a 500 episode series, I figured there was no way they could drag out his redemption arc till the last 30 episodes…or the end, depending on how you look at it. I was wrong. So, so wrong.

Even so, I don’t think that was what made it bad.

Sasuke starts out as an okay character. He’s introduced as your typical dark, edgy, emo, anime boy. Everyone’s favorite. Literally, on the show, everyone likes him. It’s a bit of a mystery why since he’s antisocial and openly rude to most of them,and we never see him do anything kind or noble around the other ninjas. He finally does something cool at the end of season 1 by saving Naruto, and becomes more likable. For about two seasons after that he’s a good character, he and Naruto have a rivalry that makes some amount of sense. Sakura is annoying, but Sasuke doesn’t treat her terribly and she’s not totally bad all the time. So far, it’s okay, and Naruto is adorable.

About this time we start to get to know our side characters, and Shikamaru grabs our attention. Gaara is introduced, and it’s pretty compelling.

Then, Orchimaru shows up, bites Sasuke (ew) giving him a curse mark that gets activated when he loses emotional control, and says Sasuke will come seek him for power. Permanently traumatizing Sakura, who has flashbacks to this into the following show.

After that, over time envy and hate and resentment take over Sasuke’s soul, and he finally leaves to do exactly as Orchimaru said. He spends the rest of the show going from bad, creepy scientist to bad, creepy cult, to being his own band of bad, creepy people, all the while rejecting every attempt of Naruto, Sakura, and their teacher Kakashi to get him back. Ultimately, he holds the entire world a hostage to get his way, and Naruto fights him, finally winning but at a high price. Then Sasuke leaves again to go on his hero’s journey of atoning for his sins.

(If you think this is poetic coming after my Jellal post, then yes, I’m aware.)

Sounds okay if you only outline it, but the execution was horrible.

I sat through arc after arc of this show knitting my stress scarf waiting for Sasuke to start sucking less…it never happened.

The problem of Sasuke’s character in one word is: Stagnation.

After his brief period of being Naruto’s friend, and not a good friend, by the way, just one who didn’t totally hate him, he goes back to being the way he was before, and after that he stays that way the whole time. He NEVER CHANGES…EVER.

Like stagnant water, Sasuke gets more nasty and sour and gross over time. No matter how often he’s proven to be doing the wrong thing, he never gets it. He goes from one bad decision to another. When he eventually begins to care about “truth” he finds it out and still concludes he should do the same dumb crap that got the ninjas into this position.

Sasuke initially wants to kill his brother Itachi, who’s presented as basically the worst person imaginable, and then retconned into being a tragic hero because, for the sake of the village, he agreed to murder his family and entire clan, including children of all ages, old people, and people not involved in the politics of it…he was so noble, doing all that to protect Leaf Village, just, wow…

I repeat, Itachi committed mass genocide on his own people because Leaf told him to, and didn’t warn any of them to get out, and killed children under the age of 12, and he was portrayed as a tragic hero of the Leaf…

Sasuke finds out that Itachi was forced into it…not that anyone actually told Itachi if he didn’t do it they’d kill his family or anything, they just said he could spare his brother…for some reason…so, you know, they were generous.

But yeah, totally forced. No other options existed. So, Sasuke decides to learn from the past and not stop at one clan, but wipe out the entire village, including the innocent children, and the new Hokage who was not part of the assassination plans and wasn’t even in the village when it happened. You know, cause clearly the problem here was that Leaf was the one that survived, not that genocide is wrong or anything…

What’s really hilarious is when he explains this idiotic plan to Naruto, Naruto doesn’t tell him it makes no sense, instead he tells him he can’t just destroy their bond, and that he’ll have to go through him to get to the village. Sasuke for some reason agrees to this plan and says he’ll kill Naruto first, Naruto being, in his own words, “his closest friend.”

If this hasn’t gotten insane enough for you yet, it gets better.

Later on Sasuke finds out from a reanimated dead guy that the Uchilha clan has always had issues with being unstable and turning on their friends, and abandoning their people in order to seek out dark power, in fact, one such person is the one currently trying to destroy the world as they know it.

Sasuke decides to do what Itachi did and protect Leaf Village…by holding the entire world hostage until he can kill off the current five kages, (three of whom are so new they had nothing to do with the massacre, and have been trying to implement more merciful practices into their villages,) and take over as Hokage. You know…totally unlike the previous rulers who messed things up to this point.

I mean, clearly, holding the whole world hostage till you get what you want is better than what that skunk Madera did by putting the whole world asleep into his jutsu dream prison. Huge difference there.

It’s really a thing of awe that Sasuke is so oblivious to his own hypocrisy…until you realize that’s because the show itself is.

You see, after a certain point, I realized I couldn’t blame the character. Some characters are written to be bad, others are just badly written.

Kishimoto, the writer of Naruto, seems to be the one with the Sasuke infatuation. Somehow, no matter how many bad choices Sasuke made, everyone kept defending him. The plot itself defended him by not having him get himself into serious trouble at any point where he should have.

When Sasuke is confronted by his friends, they never take the tack that what he is doing is horrifying and inhuman, instead they try to convince him that he needs friendship and love.

And he does…but he really needs to be hit over the head with a big stick first.

Even a lawyer who believed that “we are the product of our environment” couldn’t defend Sasuke’s actions because they make no sense. He was admired for no reason, worshiped simply for having good genetics, and at the end of the day he does not rebel out of disgust for that, but because he is too stupid to learn from the past.

However, Sasuke’s one good trait is simply that he hates BS. His open disgust with his friends and village is understandable because they don’t treat him realistically. He knows he’s a villain, and he gets sick of them acting like he’s a lost puppy. Naruto literally laughs it off when Sasuke tries to murder the girl who Naruto’s had a crush on for years, twice. And then threatens his entire village. You know, just Sasuke’s usual antics. What are we gonna do with that boy?

I have a trash can he’d fit in…

I honestly found the show’s attitude disturbing toward Sasuke, it never bothered to prove him wrong, or have him learn that relying on dark power is unwise. On top of that the show then turned the guy who cursed him into comic relief. This guy experimented on people, made them fight to the death, and abused children…and he never repents of all that, he just says his curiosity is now directed elsewhere…and he’s not even imprisoned…

The attitude towards villains on this show was disgusting. No matter how terrible they were, if Naruto fought them and won them over they were hailed as tragic heroes. After all they were just trying to do what they thought was best…even if that was putting the whole world into an eternal trance.

Now, the argument can be made that all anime does this. But there’s a difference in how they do it. Fairy Tail redeems nearly all its villains, but the villain are confronted with the wrong way they view the world, and they admit that love was better. It’s not always well done, but there’s a clear statement of what was wrong with their way, usually.

Naruto never provides that. Naruto himself is often unable to answer the villains.

What killed it for me was the Pain arc. This is the 2nd message: Choose Love over hate.

At the end of this arc, Pain is changed when Naruto gives him a speech that is based neither on facts, nor logic, nor virtue, but on a very vague idea of hope that he might find a better way than Pain’s to fix the Ninja world. This was not the first time Naruto gave a bad answer, but since he was up against someone with a very developed, though terrible, ideology, it struck me as 100% ridiculous that Pain would be moved by such a clumsy argument.

It wasn’t even an argument, just blind, baseless hope.

Naruto can say nothing about the value of love, about the folly of letting pain control you, and of the blindness of choosing to filter the world through only the lens of the horrible things in it.

Instead he uses a book that is fictional, as the basis for his defense of not destroying the real world. Not cleverly, but vaguely. Because Pervy Sage believed in it.

Though Jiraiya was a failure who couldn’t even define what he wanted and walked out on his students multiple times, though the show tried to retcon him into being a good mentor… it didn’t work.

Supposedly, Naruto is walking the path of love, but yet he is unable to defend it by anything more than he believes in it just because.

Yet, Pain listens to this stupid speech and decides to undo all the death he caused…for Leaf, not for anyone else… and leaves the future in Naruto’s hands. Yay…

3. Sharing our pain.

The show is sadistic toward it’s audience.

The show likes to introduce characters who are more lighthearted than the others, get us to like them, and then kill them off in front of us.  Most notably with the jinchuriki they introduced later in Shippuden. We know they’re gonna die, but they still are so likable that it stings when they do. And in senseless ways. No honor.

The show also liked to take any happier moment the characters had and just murder it with something going horribly wrong.

If that wasn’t enough, everyone in this world who isn’t a main character, or a side character of some importance, is a horrible person. All the kids are bullies, all the adults treat anyone who’s different like an outcast. And to expect a common sense approach to problems is like asking someone to jump over the moon…actually that’s more likely, because in one of the movies they go to the moon.

Ninjas can’t seem to not pick the worst possible way to deal with a problem. Either using a forbidden jutsu that is extremely destructive, or ordering murder.

Apparently it’s a cruel, cruel, cruel, cruel world, but it’s also mad.

The reason this kills the show is because of the first two points, that of how Sasuke is handled, and how Weak Sauce Naruto’s defense of his Ninja Way is.

For some more context, back in season one of the OG show, Naruto’s way of ninja was formed when Kakashi told them about Zazuba murdering his fellow ninjas as part of an exam. Naruto was quite properly horrified at this, because at that point the show hadn’t started treating mass murder as negligible in the list of crimes a human being could commit…(again, I am not kidding here.) Naruto resolves he will never be cruel enough to kill his comrades just because its what’s done, and he’ll change the Ninja system.

Which is great. I liked it. Sasuke and Sakura even seem on board with this way of thinking.

But Naruto later changes his Ninja way into meaning he will never go back on his word, even if it was a promise that doesn’t rely just on him in order to be kept, like bringing Sasuke back.

The focus shifts from Naruto seeing the world differently to his obsession with Sasuke, and his guilt over failing to convince him. But Sasuke rejected Naruto because he was his friend, not because he was weak or not good. It had nothing to do with Naruto’s approach.

Instead of being realistic about this, Naruto resolves to try harder next time, but not to change his outlook. However, it’s not necessarily bad writing because Naruto grew up with no examples of love until he was 12, and then it was still never taught to him directly what a healthy relationship was. It’s reasonable that he would not get why this is such a bad thing.

However, at no point is anyone able to explain to him why it’s destructive, no one seems to know what to say to Naruto.

Later, when my boy Sai criticizes the oh, so precious Sasuke, (not a lot, he simply states what Sasuke literally did by abandoning Leaf,) he gets punched. Later, Sai is the only one who bothers to step in and stop Naruto allowing himself to be abused for Sasuke’s sake. And to confront Sakura to make her stop using Naruto herself. Good for Sai!

His reward? Nothing, no acknowledgement whatsoever from them. Instead he gets flipped off by them and the plot and treated like an outsider.

All this comes together when the show’s big moment of preaching that we should share pain is used as a way to win Sasuke back. At that point, my sisters and I started laughing because why the heck would Sasuke listen to Naruto? Naruto knows nothing about sharing pain.

Naruto tries to take all the pain on himself, no matter if it even involves him or not. He tries to be the savior of the world. Instead of demonstrating this very destructive mindset to be faulty, the show gives Naruto god-like powers to be able to fulfill his fantasy. And they thought Madera was insane.

Naruto continues to go on about Sasuke and him being like brothers, and the bond, and all that nonsense, even after Sasuke has divorced himself in every way from morality and a bond with them. He’s completely delusional. Which some people point out. But they don’t stick by that opinion because somehow through pure optimism, not results, Naruto wins them over.

The message of sharing pain is further undermined by the fact that the show rarely bothers to show characters interacting as friends, and never shows them talk about what they’ve gone through, or heal from it. (There’s one exception to this in Shikamaru, I’ll cover that in part 2). The show also devotes pretty much zero time to building up the friendships it does have. They don’t get to be happy, and the romances get almost no attention, and it’s usually pretty clumsy when they do.

So, with no human interaction to back up the claim, we are expected to believe that Naruto understands anything about love and the way it softens pain. Great.

Sasuke would have been justified in laughing in his face. But instead it works because the show was ending and it had to. Not because anyone still cared…well, some people did, but not me.

Anyway, I could go on for a book’s worth of words about why I hate these messages being delivered in such a bad way, but I’ll conclude with this:

The real sin here is that the show lies to its audience, and to its own characters. In real life, Sasuke and Naruto’s relationship would be entirely abusive, but it is abusive on both sides, became Naruto never grants Sasuke the freedom to make his own decisions. He wants to ignore Sasuke’s free will and make him come back and be his friend. Sasuke doesn’t get a choice. Because the choice would mean he had to suffer consequences for it. And we can’t have that.  Either Sasuke was destined to be at odds with Naruto because of the 6 paths, or he was destined to be his friend because Naruto said so, but either way he had no choice.

And with that, I end part one, if you made it this far, thank you and sit tight for the next part which will cover the good things in the show– Natasha

Passengers

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I just watched Passengers.

My reviews would probably be better if I saw these movies when everyone was still interested in them, but that’s what happens when you’re on a tight budget.

I find Space Movies weird. I like Interstellar, I watched Gravity one time, but there’s always a surreal feeling to it.

It’s the opposite of Star Wars, which makes space seem more normal to be in. These movies really empathize how weird it would feel to be in space.

It’s odd, because C. S. Lewis’es idea of space is that it is full. Vibrant. Not an empty vacuum.

And his idea, while seemingly ridiculous at the time, has now some scientific basis. Scientists think space is filled with kinds of matter we can’t identify. They are not sure what it holding everything together anymore. It just is.

Since they aren’t allowed to say God anymore, at least in secular textbooks.

One of the most annoying things about my astronomy class was that every time we got to something that couldn’t be explained, we were not allowed to say God.

Just like in this movie, when Jim is railing at the universe, he is not allowed to call it God.

Yet, the Universe has a sense of humor? How can a thing have a sense of humor?

You might just as well call it God.

If you look for God in nature, you will find Him. You may not find Him quite like how the Bible would describe Him, no one should take Nature as the ultimate authority on God’s character, Nature is fallen, like mankind, and subject to sin and destruction. That’s what Romans would tell us.

Christianity explains why Nature is both cruel and kind, light and dark, creative and destructive, wise and yet senseless. It’s because it reflects us, the same battles we find inside. Why we use nature for analogies, like having “stormy” feelings, or a “sunny” personality.

Space movies (and books perhaps) seem to capture the human feeling of being lost and overwhelmed by what we find around us. Yet, what we find is beautiful, terrifying, and full of wonder.

Without a personal touch, it seems empty and meaningless.

It’s not much of a stretch to say Passengers mirrors the Adam and Eve story, though it also adds the redemption story to it, self sacrifice, and the power of choice.

A chosen fate seems more bearable than one forced on us.

I don’t know if discussing Jim’s earlier actions in a moral light is what I want to do, they were bad, but not entirely unexpected. The important thing is, once he actually learned to love, he made the right choice. The same with Aurora.

The tree symbolism brings the Garden of Eden story into play too.

The message of the movie seems to be two-fold, that nothing happens without a reason, and that paradise is where you make it. That Love makes the difference between heaven or hell on earth–or in space.

I do not agree 100% with  the idea that we can make our own paradise, but I do agree that love makes even a bare spaceship into a garden of life, and that was a fitting way to show it.

It takes both the higher purpose of saving all the other people, and the smaller choice to stay with the other person to make the redemption complete.

A good metaphor for life, in it’s way. Two people united for the good of all is what marriage is meant to look like, and certainly what I hope mine will be.

It’s a sentimental movie, but that is by design. Not sure I would watch it again, I do not like sad stories, but it was worth checking out.

A closing thought from G. K. Chesterton: The only way to feel at home in the universe is to also feel like a stranger in it. (I paraphrase what he says in his book Orthodoxy.)

You could say, through this world, all of us are just passengers. On our way to either the worst possible disaster, or paradise. Our choice.

Until next time–Natasha.

The Incredibles 2

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Whew! I’m sorry I haven’t posted, I’ve been working on a different project and there’s only so much screen time my eyes can take per day.

But I had to get this out, late as it is, but I have finally gotten to see The Incredibles 2!

I know I’m tardy, but hey, I can’t afford movie tickets, my dad took us. I know that some people may still have not seen it, so I’ll warn you there will be spoilers in this review.

But my overall impression was that the movie surprised me. Given the kind of sub-par Disney and Dreamworks sequels we’ve gotten over the past five years or so, (with how to Train your Dragon being an exception) and the reboots of old Disney Classics that did not go over well, it would have been hard not to be skeptical, add that to the fact that The Incredibles is one of the most brilliant superhero movies or kids movies ever made, and who was not cynical about it’s prospects. Everyone I heard was.

And we were partly right, the movie is not as good as the original, but strangely enough, it’s not a bad movie either. It’s actually above what’s come to be average.

What did I not like?

There’s plenty to not like in the film, mostly int he first 40 minutes or so. The movie had a bad case of the 15 year later addition loss of personality syndrome. Even Toy Story 3 lost a little, though I still think that movie is freaking amazing and it makes me cry, and the characters didn’t change much in it. But you can’t say that in this case, Mr. Incredible,or Bob, is the most notable example. On the surface he has the same issues of wanting to be superhero as he did before, but they really ignored all his vies on mediocrity and his concern about helping people. The mediocrity stint comes in a little bit but the focus was more on how unfair the law was. More on that later.

Dash also got hit hard, it wasn’t so much that he lost his personality as that he was barely in the movie at all except as a background character. Somehow the first one managed to give even the characters with no lines, like Jack-Jack, or minimal lines, like Violet, a lot of personality. And Dash just seems…out of it. He was still fun for what he did do, but I miss the kid who just loved using his powers.

The biggest thing not to like however was how they dumped on poor Tony Ryanger. What happened to him was completely unnecessary. The movie opens up with his perspective, which is an interesting idea that I would normally like. What does it look like to a normal kid to see a super villain shoot up out of the ground near his school? Him seeing Violet without her mask might have been interesting too. But then he gets his memory of her erased…and never gets it back. If you knew me and how many times I’ve ranted about this very thing in shows, and I watch so much super-related stuff that you can guess I’ve seen it quite a few times. It’s a common action theme also. Suffice to say, I didn’t like it in X-Men first class, I didn’t like it in Phineas and Ferb: Across the Second Dimension, I don’t like it any other time it pops up. Even Barbie has done it. My reasons are: First of all, memory erasing is unethical, and it’s always good guys who are doing it, usually the government. Which is disturbing on so may levels. Second of all: It’s unfair. Often the character never even gets a chance to be found trustworthy or mature, which happened in this case, they get their free will removed by the event. Third: This is the least wrong thing, but it is just lazy writing. You get someone to forget and you don’t have to deal with the far reaching effects of the dumb idea. Like, it was dumb to do it in the first place if it couldn’t be resolved any other way…which it could have!

I really was almost ready to cry for poor Violet, she’s always been my favorite character and I completely felt her pain. What teenager doesn’t know the frustration of your crush not even knowing you exist!…this time literally.

And Tony, who I also liked as much as he was in it, never gets his memory back, which seems just too unfair. Why should someone’s mind be able to be messed with that much?

Anyway, that was the bad, and it did leave a sour taste in my mouth even at the end of the movie, so that’s a big problem. But now for the not bad.

Though this will depend on your point of view, because the villain in this movie was full on Scary. And I mean that I started getting a Matrix/horror film vibes during one part. It was like a much more mature movie. Now I know a lot of my shortsighted peers are gong to think that’s a good thing, but as someone who works with kids and still remembers what it was like a thing movies like that when I was younger, I cans ya I’m not sure I would show this to my seven year old. Maybe it would go over their heads, but it’s pretty interest. The hypnotism, seeing the heroes you loved being mind controlled into doing evil, and it was scary. They were more terrifying then Baymax going all hulk like for a few seconds in Big Hero 6. No one would have a hard time empathizing with Violet and Dash when first their parents and then their Uncle Lucius end up controlled by the Screen Slaver.

However, because the movie does turn serious rather suddenly, it did have a compelling message. Unfortunately, the compelling one was the villain’s. The Screenslaver calls out our society for being very much like the one in Farenheit 451 (which I just recently read) how we like everything packaged to us, deliver to us in a safe format that we can process. Our danger come s via screens, our talks shows substitute for talking to each other, and we prefer to let superhero take care of a our problem while we watch form a distance, safe. Which is exactly what happens in Farenheit 451, only the problem the police are taking care of is actually the worlds’ salvation. It would be easy enough to see how the Screenslaver would put themself in that position Especially since that protagonist murdered and framed people also to ensure his escape. It’s not the happiest book.

The things is, as the villain points out at the end of the movie to Mrs Incredible. “Just because you saved me doesn’t mean I’m wrong.” And it doesn’t. However well-intentioned Mrs. Incredible might be, she cannot really disprove the villain’s points because by nature she is outside regular society. She has to be. Supers can’t afford to be lazy and indolent.

I love good characters, and I hate it when people say the villain was them more interesting one. And I won’t say she was more interesting, but in a very Marvel like fashion, this movie makes the villain’s case and fails to make the heroes.

My family and I discussed how in real life when disaster strikes, you do see ordinary people coming to the rescue. My dad pointed out that it happen during 911 on the planes, where passengers stopped the terrorist. It happened at the shooting at Columbine high school. It’s happened recently. In fact disaster brings out the best and worst in people. Humans who have some mettle in them rise to the occasion. It is because we have such boring lives that most of us are neither bad nor good. And it is also why Moral Relativism can be so popular. Frankly, only a bored and lazy society could even buy into it. Disaster forces you to pick a right or wrong, you have no choice.

That said, the villain’s professed intent is to scare people into waking up to how fake their society is by using that against them. However the movie show no ordinary people coming to help the Incredibles. In fact the ordinary people are either fired, taken out, or have their freaking memory erased. Anyone who might’ve disproved her point is removed from the equation and no one else is provided. Unlike in Spiderman where the New Yorkers were inspired by his heroism to stand up to the Goblin and Doctor Octopus.

It may be true that many of us here in the real world prefer to watch superhero movies because of escapism. But some of us, like me, are looking for inspiration. Looking for an example to be held up somewhere for us to follow. Oddly enough, in the first movie, Buddy gets this. Though he gets it in an obsessive way.

I call it Marvel Syndrome, the disappointing fact that a movie can explain the villains perspective and even back it up with its own fictitious events, but not do the same for the hero. And that’ a problem. because words have power, and people will remember them. I see the disrespect for human beings spreading in these movies. And though we give lip service to the heroes, we are are sympathizing a lot more with the villains because it seems like they are right. I have endless examples of this just form Marvel. Thankfully at leas Wonder Woman did not fall into this trap. She rocks.

Anyway, despite all the time I jsut spent on what eas wiehter bad or problematice, there is a lot of good in this movie.

I loved having Violet being the smart, take charge character that she became in the fist movie. She didn’t lose that, and that was huge since a lot of the other characters suffered set backs in their personalities. Even though Violet gets burned by being different more than anyone except her dad, she was still willing to don her suit and jump in as soon as she realized what was going on. and she’s definitely the one who can think, she figured out the villain’s plan, how to save the ship, and creative ways to fight the bad guys. She and Dash still have their funny brother-sister exchange.

Dash’es one real charcter moment was usning the incrdibile. Taht was funny. And a good chekovs’s ugn pay off.

And I’ll give Helen this much, she does get fleshed out more. We come to see why she loved being a super hero. And we know she gave that up more willingly then Bob, but she gets to rediscover why she was all “Hey, we’re not letting the men do all the saving. I’m at the top of my game!” And though Bob of course originally was the one who wanted to settle down she was the one who made it work, and she still keeps her family at the top of her priority list even in the midst of chasing down a train. It was great to Helen have her time to shine, yet to be honest, I came to the movie for the family. And we do get it for the last 20 minutes, similarly to the first one.

Now the final battle was not quite as climatic. A ship crashing into a city jsut doens’ thave the smae irng to it as a giant Robot wrecking havoc. But it was dramitc enough to give everyoen time to shine. wE get to see FRozone do a lto more and be a lot mro powerful, which was cool. No pun intended. Mrs. Incrdibles’ fake out to get eh villains’ guard down was clever, had me going almost. I kind of missed Bob having a more cirtical role, but fair enough, he got the winning shot int he last movie. It’s not all about him.

Now to talk about the other message of this movie. There’s a few different one.s One is that people who are true heroes will rise both the family and to hero work equally. Both Bob and Helen have to do this. And so do Vi and Dash, by keeping an eye on Jack-Jack even while rescuing their parents.

But I think there’s a more interesting message. No counter point is ever made to the villain, except just once, when Helen points out that she at least has core values, even if the villain thinks they are stupid.

And that is the hypocrisy of the villain’s plan, claiming you are trying to help, but being wiling to sacrifice other people to get your way and ave your own skin. That’s not heroism.

But even more than that the overall attitude that the law has in this movie, that supers are too dangerous to have around. And yeah, that’ about as original as capes and cowls by now, but the movie approaches it a little differently. The idea being that people are afraid of people who are special. That’s in the fist movie more, but if you take that foundation, then this movie makes more sense. It’s kind of like the whole anti-gun movement. Something is powerful, it’s dangerous, so that automatically makes it bad unless the government controls it. (Ri-ight.)

It’s too risky. But the movie shows that when we remove something good just because it has dangerous potential, we shoot ourselves in the foot. Because danger is what protects us as well as threatens us. Just like we need germs to have a strong immune system, we need danger in order to not be taken out by it.

Superheroes are like that. It’s not only unfair to outlaw them, but it is  unwise. Threats arise, and accidents happen because of them. But how much more could and would happen if they weren’t there? The villain could have hated people just as much without the added motivation of hating supers. And then who would have stopped her?

Eden if supers are not strictly necessary, they have gifts and they should use them for good. It goes back to being special. The question might be do we need exceptional people to keep moving us froward in order to survive? Maybe not, but we need them for other reasons. We have to have leaders, we have to have heroes. They remind us to not just subsist, but to do good.

And that’s what I’m leaving you with. Until next time–Natasha.

Cloak and Dagger.

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My mom says Summer shows are ones the producers don’t think will go over well so they get them out of the way in Summer and launch major shows in the fall.

If that’s the case I understand better why Marvel launched a show about virtually unheard of teen heroes this year, but I thought it looked kind of cool notwithstanding. I wan’t concerned about it being smaller scale, honestly I thought Marvel could use a welcome dose of moderation…unfortunately I did not get that with this show.

If you happen to have heard of it and been curious, I can tell you all you need to know about it to decide not to watch it.

I can’t really list any positives with this show other than the main characters are good actors, and the special effects on on par with Marvel’s other movies, there was one episode that was truly good, number seven, it’s the only one I could recommend. But you’d not understand it without seeing the previous ones, and they are not worth it.

In addition to the standard creepy voodoo and unnecessary sex scenes, this show features one of the worst characters ever: Tandi. The girl lead.

Oh my gosh, Tandi is the worst.  She makes Deadpool look like someone with moral consistency.

Throughout the course of the season Tandi establishes herself as a gifted liar, a thief who drugs rich kids after faking going to have sex with them and then takes their valuables, a drug addict who hates her mom’s boyfriend, and a homeless girl with suicidal thoughts.

If that wasn’t enough to make you dislike her, she constantly lies to and manipulates Tyrone, her only friend, who she met by scamming anyway. Tyrone actually cares about her, but with seemingly no concern and some apparent satisfaction Tandi steals from him and hi parents after faking coming over out of concern for him on the anniversary of his brother’s death. She doesn’t bother to return the stuff after she’s done using it for an investigation, and Tyrone remains blissfully unaware of it. Poor fellow.

Tandi is a selfish jerk and no mistake. Tyrone can always rely on her to fail him when he needs her most. She’ll make the selfish choice and then run from the consequences. She has the gall to chew him out for his own issues, and her apology later seems to be just to get him to do as she wants.

To make matters worse, for whatever bizarre reason, Tandi is one of the two chosen to protect the world with her gift, a shimmering dagger and the ability to touch people and see their hopes. You’d think this would give her sympathy for people, but she uses this gift for her own purposes to try to find whoever was responsible for destroying her dad’s good name. (Tandi’s life being defined by losing her father in a tragic accident.) She sees all sorts of people’s hopes, some of them quite repulsive I might add, and takes a kind of sick delight in being able to intrude.

When Tyrone suggest that that might be crossing a line Tandi responds with “The world has been stealing from me my whole life, it’s time I stole some of it back.”

At this point I wanted to slap her. “Oh yeah Tandi, you have a house, you had a boyfriend before you ditched him, you had a car, you have food, and if you had wanted you could’ve earned your way through school because anyone with your skill at lying to people to get hired could get a freaking job! But no, you’ve lived by drugging and stealing from people who never did zip to you! And the world has stolen form you!? Get over yourself!”

Seriously, her dad’s death was an accident and was partly his own fault anyway, people survive worse tragedies without becoming psychos. As Tryone points out “Would your dad be proud of what his little girl has become?”

To top it all off, Tandi finds out her dad sometimes smacked her mom around, and immediately decides to forget about clearing his name and to cease to believe in him and to feel justified in being selfish because clearly she can’t trust anyone.

Talk about a victim mentality.

Tyrone is a lot more likable. He does kind things and is a better friend to Tandi than she’s ever been to anyone. He’s the real hero of the show, and sadly if you’re familiar with his comic story, he’s actually stuck with an instability due to his power that would make him go to the dark side if it wasn’t for Tandi’s power counterbalancing. Gee, wouldn’t it be nice if she was the type of person I could picture caring about him.

Now, the show really wants you to believe that there’s more to Tandi than meets the eye, even after she’s repeatedly proven that she’s a terrible person, but it has other problems. The overall tone of the show is way darker than most of Marvel material, and that’s with a lower body count. It has this theme of hopelessness, and nobody on it really being truly good, though Tyrone does come through most often. But from cops to parents, the show screws everyone’s rose colored image of the people in their life, and for what reason we don’t know. the show just believes people are incurably evil.

Which as someone who believes in original sin, I might have to agree with. Without God and love, people are incurably selfish. But people still have goodness int hem, and when any show or movie is determined to erase all traces of that by giving everyone a Freudian selfish reason for whatever they do, I question whether it’s really trying to be about heroes.

This show seems to be cash-grabbing by using Marvel’s name as an excuse to let their own sick minds run wile. Because who the heck comes up with stuff like this unless their own world view is skewed?

Now, you may wonder, would someone who likes darker stuff like this show?

No. Unless your really really like dark stuff. Even if you’re a fan of evil characters, this show would not satisfy you; if you like antiheroes, it won’t satisfy; and if you like heroes, you definitely won’t be satisfied.

I’m serious, it’s not even worth it to make fun of it. Just avoid this show, it deserve to go under, but I do with Tyrone’s actor the best of luck making it into an actual Marvel movie.

Until next time–Natasha.

The (not so) Amazing Spiderman.

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I would be the millionth person to say that the Andrew Garfield Spiderman is the worst, but I wasn’t sure what I’d heard was true, so I gave both movies a watch.

And I started the first one with it not seeming so bad…until it got further in, and I started wondering why they changed everything, why all the action scenes looked fake, and why they removed a very important part of Dr. Connors backstory. And then that stupid promise at the end of the movie…

I began to wonder what Gwen Stacy saw in this version of Spiderman and Peter Parker. Sure he did that one nice thing for that one kid, but after that he was consistently a jerk.

After I finished it I decided that the writers had shamelessly ripped off Raimer’s trilogy by copying a lot, but at the same time stripping it of any real meaning. Peter tries to do what Maguire’s version always did and convince the lizard not to be evil, but he lacks the passion for it and it only lasts about half a minute. Big whoop.

He also tried to be quippy, but whoreve wrote his dialogue lacked inspiration.

Gwen Stacy is a much more likable character. I like MJ as played by Kirsten Dunst, I consider her the perfect cast, but Gwen is nice too. I’m used to superheroes being paired off with different people now. I have no problem with Gwen except that she falls for a guy who seems like a jerk. Who keeps sending her mixed signals. Couldn’t she do better?

And when I’m asking if someone could do better than Spiderman, that’s a serious red light.

It’s worse than Homecoming, and I thought that has stripped Peter Parker of his maturity and spiritual undertones.

It’s funny, when I read the Spiderman comics, I didn’t really find Spiritual undertones. It talked about fate a lot. Even though it was written by Jewish guys, it’s not as poignant as Mr. Miracle, Superman, and some of the other big names. But I always trusted Spiderman to bounce back and do the right thing, and give it another try, and I always felt he really cared about people in his own simple teenage–young twenty something way.

I like the big guns of the superhero world just fien for what theyh are. I think we need both the over the top, and the regualr good guy in fiction, because we need to be reminded obthof hwat we could be and what we are.

Spiderman may swing from buildings, but he always felt more grounded then the others. You’ll see him on the floor or on walls more than in the clouds, and so he has a closer perspective of things. That’s what makes his love of humanity easier for us to see.

And the original trilogy nailed that perfectly. It was willing to believe in the goodness of people. Even J. Jonah Jameson. That people change, that they are willing to step up and help even Spiderman. Even someone they don’t know. That love is worth the risk in the end.

MJ’s speech to Peter Parker at the end of Spiderman 2 when she asks “Isn’t it about time someone saved your life?” puts everything into perspective. The reason even superheros need people, because saving your  life isn’t’ always about literally saving your life. MJ means that Peter is a person, who needs to keep their heart going, just like everyone else, and deserves the chance to do it. Even if it’s risky.

And the Amazing Spiderman just does not get it. It seems to blindly feel Peter Parker should have a girlfriend but it can’t justify why.

However that’s the lest of its problems. Aside from ruining his relationship with his aunt and with Harry, and making Harry really, really annoying and unstable; these two movies did something I found horrifying, and I mean in a real way, not just to my cinematic sensibilities.

Whenever you are working with Super villains you run the risk of making them either too appealing or too repulsive. Too repulsive and they cease to seem like actual people gone bad.

In this case the villains were repulsive. Electro was nutty before he got mutated. But Dr. Connors and him both did something I hate. The “embracing the monster” trope. The Green Goblin did the same thing, only when Norman Osborne slips over the edge he actually fights it…briefly, and then we are shown that his strength of character is too small. he won’t resist the goblin.

Dr. Connors on the other hand is immediately devoured by his Lizard formula, he doesn’t fight it. He embraces it and feels no guilt even when he reverts back to human form.  There is no choice anymore.

Electro is kind of the same, only he just likes being powerful and visible to everyone, and turns on Spiderman on a dime, because of stupid unhelpful cops. (Gee, at least in the trilogy the cops were nicer and non stereotypical.)

In Spiderman 3, Eddie liked being evil. But Eddie had been harboring wicked thoughts before the space goo took over, and he clung to it. Max seems like he’s only ever a victim of circumstance.

And in the end , I just appreciate the Raimer trilogy’s refusal to take the victimized attitude toward evil, and toward being special that so may media releases are taking. That attitude is disgusting.

Like Diana says to Cyborg in the new Justice League, his powers can be gifts. It really is his perspective that makes the difference. I liked Cyborg because he didn’t spend the whole movie whining about being a monster and slipping off his crackers. He gave it his best instead.

Which is why I still like Justice League despite its flaws. and  I now realize just how good we had it with the Raimer trilogy and how hard it is to find directors and actors who are truly passionate about the character enough  to make something meaningful out of it.

And that’s all for now, until next time–Natasha.

Footloose (and what it says about mourning and dancing.)

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The movie that defined a generation, right? An oldie but goodie?

Well, they did a remake in 2012 I believe, and I watched it and it sucked. So I was looking forward to seeing the original masterpiece. And it was basically the same as the new one.

Except I have to say, the cast made the original. Kevin Bacon and his best friend really get you through.

But if the movie defined a generation, I’m concerned. The teens in the movie do some really reckless, stupid things, and they don’t really explain why they thought it was a good idea.

But in the end Kevin Bacon makes a good speech with a good point, one I’ve been thinking about this week.

He convinces everyone that dancing is biblical. Which it totally is. I don’t give much for denominations, I figure, each to their own as long as it’s not against God’s word; but the no dancing trend in the 80s and in some churches still really gets my goat. The Bible says to praise God with dancing, David danced, Miriam led the Hebrews in a dance after they left egypt, and Ecclesiastes says there is a time to mourn and a time to dance.

I have no problem with dancing as long as it’s clean.  In fact some people consider it part of spiritual warfare to dance.

Biblical dancing is the best because you don’t have to be good at it, you just make it up, God doesn’t care. No one else does either if their heart is in the right place.

I just got done with VBS (VAcation Bible School) at my church, and there’s never been so much dancing and enjoyment at any VBS in my memory and I’ve been going to them and participating int hem since  I was 8 or 9 years old. sO I have a decade under my belt. The kids were loving th music, and so were the leaders, we all felt celebratory.

It was simple, but that was fine. It didn’t need to be big, the point was that the kids were just enjoying God, and so were the adults.

And for me personally, it marked the anniversary of my cousin’s death. I’ve spent a year in mourning you might say, though I didn’t go all Footloose with it, and now it seems like the time to dance.

Actually, you can dance all the time as a Christian, because our joys and our sorrows tend to intermingle. That’s our life. And it’s not a bad life. Not if you believe it’s just the shadow of things to come.

People really want to live forever nowadays. Or they don’t want to live at all. It seems to be one or the other. And I think for both the reason is they don’t believe in heaven. Or if they do, they believe in it as this abstract ethereal thing that hopefully exists, but it has no bearing on the rest of their lives. Even Christians fall into this.

But how does a heaven like tha fit into Jesus’s instructions to bring heaven to earth? In the Bible heaven is the place filled with the presence of God.

LEt me unpack that a bit. We in the church always talk about “the presence of God” but do we understand what we’re saying? How is it different then just saying God?

It’s complex. We believe or are supposed to, that God is so vast he can’t fit into our perception, so when He is with us, it is never fully all at once there, or it would overwhelm us. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 13 that we see dimly as through a glass. Like a telescope you might say. We look at God as something far away that HIs SPirit makes closer and bigger to us, but if we were close enough to see him clearly without the telescope, we would burn up. (Like the sun or a star.)

The presence of God refers to the amount of him we can sense and recognize. Though it is not the God only gives us a piece of Himself, when you get God, you get all of Him,  Just like the 1 John says whoever has the Son has the Father also. (And therefore the Spirit.) Only God could make himself both small enough for our minds to hold, and large enough to fill our bottomless void of needing love.

That said, heaven is the Christian’s dream, or it should be. Because in heaven our mortal limitations will be removed and we will be like Christ. Paul said “I will know even as I am known.” The Christian wants nothing more than to know God as well as God knows him or her. To finally have more than enough understanding of God.

We can’t have that here, but we are meant to be getting ever closer to it, because our eternal life doesn’t start in heaven, it starts on earth.

And that is why we say “Let heaven come to earth.” And goodness knows this earth needs some heaven.

To get back to the topic of dancing, mourning is at bottom not a part of heaven. Rejoicing is part of heaven. If anyone decides to embrace mourning as the truth of life, they have given up hope. And we shouldn’t do that.

If you’ll pardon me for using as superhero yet again as an example, I would point out Batman as someone who embraces mourning as the fuel for his fire. The only thing giving his life a purpose is his grief and anger.

Happy people puzzle cynical people, have you ever noticed that? And they annoy them. And they make them envious.

Now if someone is depressed, I know the answer isn’t as simple as just saying you perceive things the wrong way, but realizing that there is another way, and there is more to life is the first step toward wanting that for yourself, which is a step toward getting it.

And those of us who are already fairly contented with our lives, we need to celebrate that, dance, sing, have a party.

Until next time–Natasha