algroth

That was not proven with BvS unfortunately.

I thought Wonder Woman was a mess, personally. Gal Gadot is completely miscast as the character, but most of all she served absolutely no purpose to the overall narrative. It's a film that was in serious need of trimming down and writing Wonder Woman out would have not only kept the story pretty much identical to how it was already, but also removed a good 45 minutes of superfluous material. I agree that she could have an interesting backstory and I for one believe her solo film holds the most promise of all these post-Nolan DC films... but she was out of place in this specific film. I'm also not sure what blame Nolan should get (if any) for this latest incarnation of DC comics. I don't adhere to the false notion that his films are restricted in the use of CGI but he does integrate it pretty convincingly to the whole, especially when compared to just about every other big blockbuster there is around. I think the action films, the sombre tone, the gloomy filters in Man of Steel were all Snyder, and owed more to his previous films than any Nolan one. At the very least he did tone down on some of the frantic editing for BvS.

I used to know a murderous golden retriever. Killed three dogs for no apparent reason. I liked him. Sorry to hear about your marriages, Guard Dog.

I think there is no 'default setting' for human beings, just what they get out of their environment. Parenting, whether good or bad, can influence that, but I would also say it is not the one and only factor. Anyhow, I'll be interviewing the members of Cloud 9's LoL teams (both LCS and CS divisions) tomorrow, so I'm currently gathering and setting up all of my gear. Turns out the wireless microphone I rented yesterday is causing some noise so I need to sort that out.

I don't think Cavill makes for a bad Superman. Just about every criticism I have for Man of Steel and Batman v. Superman (and there are many) have pretty much nothing to do with his interpretation specifically. But then again, it is also true that the films make Supes into such a stoic presence that it's understandable to perceive his acting as wooden. Actually I think some of the warmest and most touching moments of the film do involve Supes, the likes of his phonecall with his mother or his tending to the bombing victims. Not Oscar-worthy moments, sure, but they do seem quite natural and believable, and do grant his character some degree of empathy and humanity whereas he before seemed completely impenetrable. Lex was certainly all over the place. Wonder Woman was also the very definition of superfluous, serving no point in the film other than "setting up" in the most contrived manner possible the whole Justice League thread; and Lois I found to also be insufferably dependent in here, didn't she get saved like three times or something? It gets old quickly. And more, of course: Doomsday, the Martha scene, the Batmobile chase, all elements that were very poorly conceived or handled.

Which version are you watching? Though not particularly good in either form, the extended cut is miles above - not to mention a whole lot more comprehensible - than the theatrical one.

Watched Warcraft yesterday... Not being a fan of the videogame franchise in any of the iterations I've played, World of Warcraft least of all, I probably should have skipped this despite my interest for director Duncan Jones' involvement in it, considering he had a spot-on track record with me before this in the shape of the excellent Moon and Source Code. Arguably his two earlier features make him to this day the highest-calibre filmmaker to tackle a videogame adaptation and this too interests me greatly, inasmuch as what it could have meant for revindicating videogames as a valid source material for film. Alas, it was not meant to be, and what we get is a lumbering high fantasy epic with pretty much none of the charm and the humanity that made his earlier two films the success they were. To Jones' defense it is probably not for the lack of trying - the film opens right away with a 'casual' dialogue between the orc protagonist and his pregnant wife, discussing the name of their child. There are moments throughout the film where the action effectively comes to a halt and we're given a little breather where we can see characters interact with eachother in ways meant to be casual and natural, get a feel for them as actual human/humanoid beings and not as mere ciphers with which to keep the standard fantasy plot rolling. And for all the attempt at trying to play down the bombast and fantasy jargon during these sequences, I could honestly not get into any of these characters or believe any of these scenes whatsoever. Largely, I suspect this is a product of one of my greatest grievances with the film, being that everything we see here feels as if it's been post-produced to the point of utter lifelessness, the visuals all having that particular AAA-videogame sheen and luster to them that is at once allegedly "cinematic" and at the same time plastic and artificial beyond belief, if anything the absolute antithesis of how a proper film should feel. To add insult to injury, the CGI is also not only over-abundant but also always one step short of effectively meshing with the live-action context, at once impressively detailed yet on the other hand also overstylized to the point of weirdly distancing itself from the elements that are real, and seeming all the more uncanny and jittery for it. The movements, the emotions, all remind me of the way cinematics in videogames still look like to this day, all two steps short of actual naturalness despite how impressively detailed the graphics are. To all this, I wonder if part of the issue has to do also with the WoW aesthetic it opted to follow. Personally I've never been a fan of it, I find it incredibly gaudy and juvenile, overstylized rather than colourful or interesting, but if you wish to carry on with this aesthetic at least have the decency to take the plunge and go full-animated, and not this sort of garish CG-animation/live-action hybrid that benefits neither side, marked worst by the absolutely *laughable* elf costumes at the only point in the film they make an appearance, that only distract from what should have been a sombre and tense moment in the story (the king attempting and failing to rally the other races against the new threat to their lands and so on). I was in all honesty hoping the aesthetic would have been toned down somewhat for the live-action context, adapt it to a different medium; but as is usually the case with blockbuster fare, greed got in the way of better judgement. There's not much to say other than this, really. Storywise the film feels like yet another pilot to a huge cinematic series that will likely never happen, made mostly out of a collection of stock fantasy scenes that set up the usual world-threatening conflict between two sides which, in the tradition of all post-9/11 narratives, are both grey shades of good and evil. All in all it's a lot of grand statements and bombast with very little meaning to it all, which would be fine were this less of the uncharismatic slog it happens to be. In light of the atrocity that was Suicide Squad I can at the very least say it is not terrible, but I can't find a reason to recommend it either.

I think I did this in my latest run of the game, and it did not have any effect on my choices.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHd4rg6EGSM Bought this yesterday along with a couple of other albums. Pretty superb.

As an Argentinian and generally an anti-Peronist, I'll go ahead and say that much of what is said here could very well be applied to Perón. That said, I don't think Zizek's point was so much that his rise to power did not bring anything new but that his government proceeded to stagnate and maintain a decadent system for much longer than it should have been allowed. Hence his comparison to the cartoon scene of the cat walking on air, not realizing he is bound to fall. I don't think there is a disagreement on his behalf that it was an improvement over Batista. Back to the comparison with Perón, he too presented a number of good policies early on in his rule, giving the rural workers basic human rights and minimum wage, giving women the right to vote, and essentially ending what was up to that point an ostensibly oligarchic system. But he did in turn establish a fascist government that was forcibly controlling the market and media, using education as a tool of ostensible propaganda with means such as making Eva Perón's The Reason for my Life a mandatory read in ethic and civil formation classes all over the nation, incarcerating and expropriating the property of anti-peronists, all of which eventually proved carcinogenic for the country. Nowadays the peronist party lives pretty much in the state Zizek describes, and exists as little more than a romantic fantasy of those early years of peronism that every Argentinian demagogue loves to vociferously stand by and abscribe to even as their politics stand frequently elsewhere entirely (see: Menem, Kirchner, Macri, all self-proclaimed peronist presidents). The way I see it, I think the hatred towards Castro on the Americans' behalf is largely misguided and built on years of mediatic propaganda and bias; but the way Castro is being revindicated is also pretty sketchy, as in our desire to stand against American imperialism we are all too eagerly washing over the many flaws and failures of Castro's regime, not to mention crimes, and making of Castro a very questionable icon and role model. To me this article is pretty much Zizek's warning of this very same issue.

Just came back from Doctor Strange. As someone who is generally ignorant of superhero comics I cannot comment on what is from where or how close it is to the source material, but I really liked this and I loved its interpretation of magic. I love how they extend the notion of magic from the classic/cliché set of spells and actually work on what having potentially limitless power over reality, matter and physics can imply. In terms of visuals it's arguably the most striking of all the MCU films so far, and it more than accomplished its goal of entertaining me for a good two hours. Generally where I feel it falters the most however is in the interactions between characters, each dialogue feeling very stilted and expositional, comprised largely of bombastic statements such as "I did what was necessary", "we don't get to choose our time", "the ritual will bring you only sorrow", "you are driven not by the desire of success but by the fear of failure" thrown back and forth, all with little room for levity or warmth. There's great spectacle here but little humanity to accompany it. And, of course, this being another origin story it also feels very much like another pilot for a cinematic series opposite to its own standalone film. But these are all blind-spots in the superhero genre that only a precious few films (e.g. Hellboy II: The Golden Army) have really broken past, and I was pretty much counting on them as I entered the theatre. I had pretty decent expectations for this and they were pretty much met, which in a year with as many duds as this one is at least a good thing to be said about it. But yeah, all in all very enjoyable, highly recommended for any fan of the MCU.

That's great. Kinda reminds me of a proposition a friend of mine did, where he said that had he been in Carl Sagan's place selecting the contents for the Voyager Golden Record, he'd probably have put this video instead: ...and fill the ship with vibrators. All to show that the Earth doesn't give a ****. We're the Moscow 5 of the universe.

I can agree that not everything is ideology, but at the same time see the position held by Zizek as well as so many post-structuralists does have its degree of truth, as ideology does create a rigid framework that has an effect on any individual's perception, understanding and choice of action. I don't think it's the sole factor to take into consideration but it's certainly one of them, and usually when it comes to art and politics it is rather handily the most important factor. As both a cinephile and screenwriter I do find his observations on film to be very keenly observed and worthwhile, and of course I also think what he has to say on other subjects is frequently very interesting and worth some thought.

Well, I for one respect and enjoy hearing/reading both Zizek and Chomsky. I don't necessarily agree with everything they say, but neither do I see how anyone can say either "lacks intellectual credibility", less so when defending the other. But that's just me, I guess. *shrug*

Alright, so... Suicide Squad... I'll comment more on it tomorrow, but right away I'll go on record to say that it's not only bad, it's very likely a bottom 5 of the decade contender for me. Was this film conceived by a twelve-year-old? It was disgustingly gaudy, it was all over the place, frequently incomprehensible and stupid beyond belief. I was actually not so down on Batman v. Superman so I was hoping that it'd hold at least some surprises and moments of interests, but nope. This was just *awful*.

I would suggest, however, that the reincarnation as seen in the Hindu and Buddhist traditions is very different to the more linear interpretation the West holds of the concept. The Eastern cultures traditionally keep a more circular/cyclical notion of time opposite to linear, things have a way of returning to the same point and beginning a process over once more. In this sense we are not, say, the reincarnations of some soldier who's fought and died in WWII, but rather ourselves through different iterations of the same time period. But certainly the concept of reincarnation, even in its Western interpretation, exists beyond Scientology and thus doesn't make Scientology a direct point of departure for its treatment in the game.

From what I remember it was a mantle assumed by Aglie after the Tres appeared with frequency in the Plan as it was presented to him, with the Tres being an organization he had no knowledge of and so on. Either way it's less the origins of the group as the core ideals and the way it acted that I thought resembled the Leaden Key to some extent. Both are very much centered on the idea of hiding and preserving 'secrets' from the people lest it leads to a crisis in their beliefs, either by the devaluation of said secrets or by their demythification. And certainly it seems like this element, the appeal of the occult and the secrets at the heart of the world and so on are the primary point of attraction for both followers or future followers, and for ourselves as players invested in unravelling what they are doing and hiding. Anyhow, the Tres was more of a random example, but since both the Leaden Key and the Tres are exaggerated/satirical takes on hermetic societies they do share some similar elements and qualities.

I might watch that tonight. Not a whole lot of hopes but I need to put my mind off work for a moment.

I should probably stop posting Magma, but I can't stop marvelling at the band's work. Just look at Christian Vander go mental on this performance. Now this is showmanship: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=goUuuT6xQ0M

Now I know what people think if I write "the book was a lot better", but it's true. In the book you can feel how he tries to survive and how it gets harder for him, while in the movie it's like... nope, no problem. Got them potatoes, got them explosions, all is fine and dandy. They had to cut a lot from the book to make the movie run in time, and it totally shows. It's not like in Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter where stuff from the book is missing in the movies-- the movies still work nontheless. For the Martian on the other hand, it really does not work. Maybe they should have made the book into a 6 episodes tv show instead. That probably would have turned out a lot better. Oh, I think it could have been made to work. I haven't read the book so I'm not sure how much has been cut out, but a couple of strands or challenges could have nevertheless been taken out in order to give greater predominance and threat to some of the more pressing ones instead. The issue I had with the film personally is that it ultimately felt like a Sparknotes cinematic edition of a novel, with plenty of scenes and key moments thrown in but resolved all too quickly only to make room for the rest while keeping it within a controlled runtime.

Was never a supporter, but RIP all the same.

As a huge Shane Black fan I'm very much looking forward to that. Granted, I've liked him the most in the context of 'buddy cop' affairs the likes of the two films you mentioned as well as the first two Lethal Weapon films, so we'll have to see how this turns out since it isn't exactly a genre he has directorial experience with. Certainly an interesting choice for the project all the same.

lol, that kinda reminds me of an interview I made a week ago to Pablo Toscano, animation technical director for Ubisoft, at the Watch Dogs 2 premiere. Everyone wanted to ask him about the game, and yet he hadn't worked on it or played it and was simply invited to the event.