Weekly Cinemeh

Hello again~
This week's theme was horror movies that are also bottle movies. For those of you who don't know a bottle movie is a movie that takes place almost or completely in a single location. Combining this with horror seems like a great idea, and it was. There are a lot of "fuck that" moments in movies, and that make for entertaining watching (for me at least). So, without further ado: the list!

1: Leviathan
This is a movie about robocop fighting sahagin. Not really I guess, but there are robot suits and Peter Weller does use one. This is a fun movie about a bunch of people trapped in an underwater mining facility after one of them gets infected with a gene altering sickness that turns them into fish people. This was a fairly standard monster movie, and for a minute I thought that they might break the trope and let the black character live through the whole movie, but then they kill him for like no reason in an end scene that bordered on the ridiculous due to the amount of danger they cram in around 30 seconds (oh no, we might not get saved. Oh shit, sharks. Oh shit, sea monsters). Not great, but a good movie to watch with friends while drinking.

Eshi: Brian went with Robocop and sahagin but to me this movie can't help but be Buckaroo Bonzai vs the Deep Ones. This movie is chocked full of nope, deep sea mining? Nope. Reanimating corpses full of gene manipulating virus type thing? Fuck nope. Spending time isolated underwater with Keith David? ... Maybe, but I don't see that going well. I agree with Brian pretty whole-heartedly on this one, get a good buzz going before you hit play on this one.

2: Below
A movie about a WWII American submarine rescuing a hospital ship's crew after it gets attacked. Soon after shit starts to go down on the sub when a ghost starts messing with everyone. If this movie didn't rely so heavily on the jump scare it would have been far better. The general idea was kind of cool, and there are some genuinely unsettling scenes, but to often did shit have to pop out of nowhere to try to scare the audience. The acting was better than most horror movies, but still a little shaky at times. Another good movie to watch with people while you drink and poke fun at it (it occurs to me that this is true of every movie). On a side note, I have never seen a movie where Holt McCallany didn't play an asshole.

Eshi: I always like a movie where the asshole gets some poetic justice and this movie is all of that. None of the characters are particularly likeable and most of them are either fucking idiots or dickbags. I've been feeling pretty cthulian lately so I was deeply disappointed that this was a ghost movie. That said it was still pretty good, worth watching on a slow evening anyway.

3: John Carpenter's The Thing
I really love this movie, as it was one of the first horror movies that had me guessing constantly as to what was going to happen when I watched it as a kid. The base premise of the movie is designed to make everyone in the movie untrustworthy and that creates a good level of tension for the audience. It does horror well, and that doesn't happen enough. If you haven't seen this version, you should watch it.

Eshi: The Thing is a classic for a reason. I have a colossal nerd on for practical effects and this movie does practical effects insanely well. Other than some unfortunate puppy violence and my general disapproval of Kurt Russel this is a damn fine film. We are, for the record, talking about the 1982 version for those too paranoid to click a link. It is the best version. If you haven't, see this movie. Do it.

Honorable mention: Crash Course
A great channel on youtube that seeks to educate people in an entertaining way. I have recently finished the history section of the channel and am focusing on the astronomy side of the channel now, but there are plenty of other subjects covered. There is a lot of focus on understanding the global/universal contexts from where things arise, and that makes it a step above the rest. These kinds of things help you understand why something happened, which is often just as important as the thing happening if we are to avoid the mistakes of the past.

Eshi: Yay Nerds! 

Bad Romance

So, every time I watch a movie or a TV show something inevitably happens when a male character and a female character meet, the show turns into a rendition of the beloved narrative game, Trying to Fuck. There is something odd about TV shows that make it so that every time eligible people meet (sometimes ineligible too) there has to be that undertone. You know, little glances at each other with smiles. That kind of shit.

This isn't bad on its face. We are supposed to like characters on TV, so them getting it on and/or finding love is supposed to make us feel good because something good happens to someone you like. I have no problem with this, except when it happens in every TV show ever. Seriously, I can't think of a TV show that didn't devolve into primary characters putting their genitals together.

My problem comes from the "need" for people to be paired off (most of the time in male-female relationships) and the subsequent enforcing of social stigma on sex with people who aren't an S.O. I don't mean cheating on people, that's fucked up and you probably shouldn't do it. No, I mean one night stands, friends with benefits, or casual sex. This also reinforces the idea that men and women can't be Platonic friends.

Basically by showing only one type of relationship, you reinforce stigmas against alternatives that have nothing really wrong with them. I get that its a ratings disaster to do something that's unpopular, but I wanna point something out to TV and Movie producers: you get to help decide what is acceptable. Also, if people freak their shit out about your TV show, more people will watch it, just to see why. Also Also, if a side story about characters romantic lives "ruins" your show, it must have been pretty shitty to begin with.

The Path to Agoraphobia is Paved with Good Intentions, Poorly Executed.

Over the course of the last several years I've pretty much completely lost the ability to functionally interact with people. I'm not completely sure when it started but it probably had something to do with the fact that I stopped leaving the house. There was a period in which I could only afford to leave the house if I was looking for or going to work and even then bus fare was a prohibitive expense. Preexisting antisocial traits started to assert themselves more aggressively as my whole interaction with society was relegated to news-bites and poorly contextualized academia (thanks higher education!). Over time habits were established in such a way that I could no longer come up with reasons to go out. After I was told outright not to get a fucking job the idea of leaving the house fell even farther from a necessary evil to make ends meet to the least interesting or meaningful way to waste my wife's money, so I just stopped.

I've come to understand, with some work, what a bad idea this was. Justification became rule, rule became habit and habit became neurosis. Now the thought of doing anything at all, much less anything out of the house is accompanied by a combination of panic, apathy, and rationalizing my inaction. Now I can't even trust myself to be able to break the habit without outsourcing my motivation to someone else. I will get better, I have to.

Thanks for playing therapist, beloved internet. Now I'm going to go psyche myself up so I might be able to do something today.

Weekly Cinemeh

This week's theme was humans as the monsters in horror movies. Sometimes you don't need to make up some sort of supernatural creature to do evil. Sometimes people are fucked up.

1: Eyes Without A Face aka "Les yeux sans visage"
A French move from the 60s, it is about a surgeon trying to fix his daughters deformed face by murdering people and taking their faces. Its an odd horror movie because there isn't any of the traditional tropes. There are no jump scares in this movie (thank god) and it has a villain who isn't straight up evil, just a little off kilter. It was well acted and had some truly gory bits. You see kids, this movie was from the time where practical effects where still in vogue so all the face removal is done without any CGI and it looks great (at least as great as ripping a face off can look). I appreciate the things you can do with CGI, but practical effects in horror are important because stuff like blood looks very, very fake in CGI, which breaks the immersion so critical in a good horror movie. Anyway, its a good movie that deserves a watch.

Eshi: Eyes Without a Face was a hard act to follow. It has enough of its own thing going on that finding a theme to fit it was... troublesome. As the other entries on this list demonstrate. The acting was about what I expected from a black and white french movie, which isn't by any means bad, but as Brian said the practical effects on this were really fucking good for their time. I found myself most enthralled by the film at the end when the opportunity arose to insert my own narrative. I wont go into it too far because it breaks theme pretty bad and completely derails the established plot, but this would have been even more amazing if the ingenue had been the antichrist.

2: Lost
This movie had a great concept and was paced very well, the reveal about the main plot was actually a little surprising, though I knew something was up. I have a feeling that I would have liked this movie a little more if the description hadn't led me to believe that the bad guy was going to be more prevalent. Dean Cain, who plays the main character in a way that made be want to hit him in the face repeatedly, plays a douche who is pursued by Danny Trejo, the world's best bad man, in a chase around the back roads of Nevada. There are some great tense moments, but ultimately I felt let down. I don't want to go into the ending, but it wasn't quite what I was expecting (not in a good way). I think my preconception of what this movie was about shaded it for me, but I can see why some people would like it. This is definitely a movie I will need to watch again to see if I like it. My first impressions: not bad, but not great. Also, I wish Danny Trejo was in it more.

Eshi: Danny Trejo got robbed in this movie. The man is epic, and positioning him opposite Dean Cain, whom I could punch forever, was a great choice; up until you realize that you aren't really going to see any of it. This movie wasn't terrible, just disappointing.

3: Seven
This is a good movie about a serial killer who bases his killing on the seven deadly sins and the detectives who pursue him. Morgan Freeman, Brad Pitt, and Kevin Spacey all give great performances (birds fly, fish swim, and all that.) and the story is good, if a little heavy handed at times. This movie has a very bleak view of humanity, though not completley unjustified, and is ultimately about how the fight against evil has no winner, but needs to happen none the less. The end is good, and the ride to it is enjoyable and has some interesting and fucked up twists. If you haven't seen it, watch it.

Eshi: I love Seven, in ways that do not bear public discussion. Its a delight to see some of my favorite actors doing what they do best and largely being in good form, not the strongest roles of their careers but all solid. Brian and I always clash a bit over the end but that just shows the movie is good enough to actually think about. The storyline bludgeons the point a bit, but given the tone and nature of the film its supposed to. If, for some unspeakable reason, you haven't seen this film, do. Even if you aren't into this kind of thing its worth the watch.

An Open Letter To PETA

Dear PETA,
You people are monsters and you need to stop. You talk about the ethical treatment of animals, something that I believe should be something that people actually talk about, but then you kill 88.3% of the animals you take in. 88.3%! You could have left the animals on the street and they would have had a better chance to survive. You are monsters just on that point alone, especially after you protest against shelters for committing euthanasia. What makes you even worse? You hired a lobbyist to stop Virginia state from restricting euthanasia of animals. This is something I thought you guys would appreciate: something that would stop people from killing animals. But noooooo, you hire one of the most notorious lobbyists in history to make sure you can still kill animals at your whim.

The Virgina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services filed a report in 2010 that investigated their shelters and found that 90% of the euthanized animals were killed within 24 hours of their arrival at the shelter. You didn't even try to adopt out those animals, did you?

As I said in the first paragraph, I am a believer that treating animals in a humane way is important. I disagree about a few of your other policies and beliefs (specifically about why being vegan is better) but the main view you have, I share.

Most of our meat industry is bad for animals in terms of living conditions. We are in a time in which technological advancement is moving so quickly, you would be vastly better served to help fund technology that replaces animal products or reduces the cruelty of conditions. You are a huge organization, spend some of that money you spend making video games that shame imaginary violence against animals on researching how to make technology not hurt animals. I think that animal testing is kinda fucked up, but its also how we create vaccines and treatments for stuff like AIDS so instead of just protesting, help develop technology for testing without using live subjects. And on the side of animal adoptions, I think that there should be someplace that treats animals well and actually tries to adopt them.

Oh wait, there totally is. The Humane Society doesn't kill any animals, and their rates of adoption are amazing, at least here in Seattle, you have to check individual sites for numbers of adoptions and I didn't feel like looking through all of them. The humane society trumps you completely. You claim on your website that no kill shelters don't accept animals with diseases and massive injuries, but I couldn't find anything like that on the Humane societies website, even though they are a no kill shelter.

So here is my idea for you PETA. Stop killing animals. Start creating new technology. You want to cause change? Create an alternative. Don't just say there should be one and then moralize about how the things you do aren't fucking evil because its you doing them. Instead of making Billboards that show Pink naked, use the money you would have given her to do actual good for the beautiful plethora of life on this planet.

Sincerely,
Brian

Weekly Cinemeh

Hey, we actually had a theme this week! Crime! We both noticed something this week while watching these movies. People who steal remove their mask/disguise way to often in the midst of shit. As Eshi pointed out at one point: If you are gonna spend your time as a criminal, wear a disguise that is comfortable so you don't keep ripping it off whenever you get the chance. Anyways, to the list!

1: Glengarry Glen Ross
Not a typical kind of crime movie one expects when dealing with crime movies in general, but I would consider it a crime/mystery movie. Its main story is kind of bland, people are having trouble at work, stakes get raised, someone steals the fucking leads. The story exists to put emphasis onto the characters and their interactions, all of which are amazing. These are not good people, they are salesmen. Al Pacino's character says something when he gets introduced in the film:

I have always thought that this is basically his character justifying his behavior as a salesman, pointing out that morality doesn't need to play a part in his action. 

All in all, its a great movie. Any movie that has that cast list (Jack Lemon, Al Pacino, Alan Arkin, Ed Harris, and Kevin Spacey) will have some amazing acting in it and will be worth the watch. Add an amazing script that forces these actors to compete for who has the best screen presence, and you get a great experience. Watch it, more than once if you get the chance.

Eshi: I had never seen this movie until this week. I was initially hesitant because I've worked in sales and pretty thoroughly hate everything even remotely involved. That said, the tensions and interplays in this film are fucking masterful. It plays to the things that I hate about sales and does so in such a way as to ensure my attention. It was masterfully cast and represents some stellar work from some of my favorite actors.

2: The Score

To my surprise I had apparently absorbed this movie via osmosis when it played in the background at sometime in the past. I had never seen it, at least intentionally, but I remembered weird shit, like Edward Norton faking being retarded. Anyway, it was a pretty standard heist movie. Gang gets together, doesn't trust one another (by the way, why the fuck would you commit a crime with someone you don't trust?) set up a massive payoff (one last heist) and betrayal inevitably happens. It was fun, the heist was cool, and the movie was well acted. Worth the watch, but not spectacular. 

Eshi: Eddie Norton has a very special place in my heart, and in this movie he tries really hard to abdicate the position. The whole film is a series of dick-move and counter dick-move. Honestly the only surprise in the whole thing is that Robert De Niro even fucking bothers with any of these assholes. Fun, very watchable, but by no means the best work of anyone involved.

3: Shadow Run

This is our first bad movie the we have watched for Weekly Cinemeh, and it pains me. I love Michael Caine, but this movie is bad, just... so bad. There are entire chunks of this movie that play no part in what the movie should have been about. I loved the idea behind this movie. We are going to steal the paper used to print money, so our forgeries are way more real and worth millions. Great! There is a place where radio signals get jammed and the armored car can't call for help, so we have to set up a heist in that area and workout all the details. I love it! Oh hey, here is this kid and he is sad. What? Oh, and now there is a side plot about how the bullied kid will save his school via a choir competition. OK, I thought we were watching a movie about gangsters, why the fuck is this glee all of a sudden? The only good part of the movie is when the haughty Lord gets killed. That was great. All the rest of it jumps around in tone and doesn't do shit to make me care about any of the crew. From what the movie showed us, only 3 people of a 5 person crew get fleshed out, and the other 2 come out of nowhere to drive and lift heavy things, they aren't even named. This movie is bad.

Eshi: I never thought Michael Caine could disappoint me. I don't like being proved wrong. His character has no real depth, just a generic, shitty old cockney. I have weird feeling about English culture and this movie focuses on all the worst parts. A cunty noble, a general sense of superiority and entitlement, I understand that none of these characters are supposed to be particularly empathetic but jesus. I can only say two things in favor of this movie; it was free, and no one got raped.

My God, Its Full of Stars

Writing my post from last week got me thinking about human endeavors and how far we have come as a species. While I was lost in this reverie something got caught in my craw. Humans built the pyramids of Giza. These things are marvels of engineering. Unfortunately, there is a group of people who disagree for various reasons.

The bulk of these people believe that humans couldn't have built them because they are aligned with stars, are made of massive stones that couldn't have been moved easily, and are such a massive undertaking that it is impossible to conceive of how they did it. So, I am going to try to point out a few things that try to refute these worries. This list will not be exhaustive, it will just cover a list of things that I found in my googling.

On the first point, the astronomical exactitude of the pyramids. Egyptian astronomy dates back to the 3000's BCE, when they were making star charts on circular stones, more than 400 years prior to the building of the earliest pyramid. This means that all you would need to do is plan where to put stuff prior to building, something that anyone who has run a city does because they don't want shit to get out of control. Its called urban planning and its been around since people needed to use space efficiently. In fact, Egyptian cities are famous for it.

Second, moving large rocks isn't hard. Here is a guy moving a stone henge sized rock by himself. Just a dude in his backyard. Archeologists found large sled-like machines in Egypt that move very heavy weights around easily if you wet the sand in front of them. All it takes is a little bit of knowledge and experience to make hard tasks far simpler.

And finally on the third point, if only the things you can conceive of as you are now are possible, then humanity is doomed. Just because a person doesn't understand how something happened, doesn't mean it didn't.

The bulk of these and other arguments against ancient peoples building massive structures is based on the idea that people from back then must have been stupid. Ancient people didn't have cranes, so they couldn't have built tall things. These arguments ignore evidence and make assumptions. Yes, they had less tools to work with, but that doesn't mean that had none. All our tools today are just improved tools from long ago. People have always been about as intelligent as they are today, we just have access to more information. All we are is slightly less ignorant than back then.

And lastly I want to talk about a conspiracy theory: Aliens built the pyramids. I am not going to say it didn't happen. I might have happened. Show me proof. If you can come up with proof that doesn't rely wholly on what you just think might have happened, then I will consider it an actual possibility. Yes, archeologists don't know 100% how the pyramids were built, but their arguments are based on evidence not just spastic speculation and occasional doses of crazy.

What's All This Faggotry Then?

I feel like we've been doing pretty well lately, not getting too rantish. So lets talk about slurs. Now, I feel the need to preface this with some context. I look like what would happen if Thor had a thing about cake and couldn't be bothered to shave, this tends to shade the audience against anything I would have to say about hate speech with either bland apologetics or low rent nazi propaganda. I'm also bisexual, which given my appearance tends to go unnoticed. It also opens me up to a weird perspective on hate speech because, while I'm sensitive to it, most people don't bother to sensor themselves around me. Given that, I've come up with a rule. Just don't be a dick about it.

As with any kind of profanity, slurs are bound entirely by context. So while I can understand a bit of discomfort if someone you don't know very well yells "faggot", if you have a reasonable expectation that they aren't actually decrying someones sexual preference leave them the fuck alone about it. Yes that word is one used by a certain group to make another group feel bad. Its also an expletive and those are just to useful to ignore. The meaning that it has with the offended group relates entirely to the fact that said group identifies with the word. Faggot has meant a lot of things over the years, but you don't hear old ladies getting up in arms about it. No pagans (I sincerely fucking hope) getting their knickers twisted about references to burning heretics. I tend to agree with Louis C.K., faggot only actually refers to a caricature, not necessarily of homosexuals but of a specific brand of annoying pedant. No person should ever acknowledge themselves as a caricature. I'm sure that there are some people who definitely mean gay people when they say that, just as I'm sure that there are some people how very much mean it in the pejorative when they utter any variation on the word "nigger". Those people are using words wrong. Not just those words, all words. They have misappropriated language and should be disregarded.

The trick here is something we've talked about before at some length, language is completely reliant on context. The idea of a word that is inherently bad is absurd in the absolute, as evidenced by the sheer fact that meanings can change. In fact I tend to argue that by legislating language we give certain words undue power. By limiting words like faggot and nigger we're essentially reserving them for the people who are just going to be cunts about their use and that isn't good for anyone. Suddenly, using a certain word ends conversations and shuts down discourse. The only words that should ever have that kind of power are "good bye" and its cousins. Lets get back to being people, stop blaming words for their use and start blaming people for their ignorance and hate.

Weekly Cinemeh

While we didn't have a dedicated theme this week, all of the movies were worth watching. I swear, one day we will work out that theme thing.

1: Poona The Fuckdog And Other Plays For Children
This was an odd one. It was a stage play that had been filmed and put onto amazon. We watched this out of curiosity due to the name and frankly this movie made me love it the instant the phrase "fairy god-phallus" was uttered. It was funny, if a little preachy at times. This is a problem with most stage shows that try to get some form of political point across. They beat you over the head with it to make sure that the message is received. Its a fun play that pokes fun at a lot of topics and ends in an amazing way. If you have 2 hours to kill I would suggest giving it a look.

Eshi: This one kinda came out of nowhere. We saw it on amazon and curiosity prevailed. Poona was cute and fun, very classical college theatre.

2: Megamind
This movie (as well as How To Train Your Dragon) is easily one of my favorite animated films in the somewhat recent boom of them since Toy Story. It pokes fun at the classic hero-villain dichotomy and does so in an interesting way. The voice acting is well done, and the jokes are great. If you are ok with it being a little childish at times, its a great watch.

Eshi: I have a soft spot for a certain flavor of kids movie and Megamind plays well to that. It is well cast and cleanly voiced, I always love it when Will Farrel actually enjoys a role.

3: It Happened One Night
One of the first romantic comedies of the silver screen, it was something that I heard about on the youtube channel Blamesocietyfilms on their bi-weekly show "Welcome to the Basement"as a movie that Spaceballs rips its romantic subplot from (spoiler: it totally is). Curious, I watched it and enjoyed it immensely. Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert have amazing chemistry and it was easy to see where other romantic comedies pulled inspiration from it. This movie blows all of the romantic comedies I have seen out of the water. I suggest watching it, even if you don't like all that mushy romance shtick, because it is genuine in its comedy and doesn't bog itself down with a lot of modern romantic comedy tropes.

Eshi: I hate Romcoms. The tropes, the character stereotypes, the implicit lessons, all of it is trashy and distasteful. It Happened One Night breaks my heart with how good it was. Modern romantic comedies fail the bar this movie set by leagues. Clark Gable is, as usual, charismatic as fuck and Claudette Colbert is a delightful.

4: John Wick
This movie was a surprise. It starts out like the movie version of the "sad Keanu" meme and turned into a violent joyride that was a great action movie. I love this movie because it knows what it is: an action movie. Not a lot of information is put into the plot that you don't need. Keanu angry at Alfie. Keanu Smash! I might be exaggerating a little, but not that much. Its got very well choreographed fight scenes and Keanu is in top form. A great movie for anyone who is a fan of well done action movies and/or violence. Also, I love the idea behind the hotel in the movie. I would watch the hell out of a series where the hotel staff had to deal with all sorts of wacky hit man situations. Like a fucked up dark comedy version of Fawlty Towers.

Eshi: I think I've mentioned before my weird love of Keanu Reeves. I have wondrous dreams of him walking up to Joaquin Phoenix and whispering "wrong kid died" al la Walk Hard. Keanu is fantastic in this movie. There are no pretexts of subtlety or moralizing, just good clean violence. A Great Sunday afternoon movie.

Honorable mention: Blamesocietyfilms.
I have been watching their stuff since I found out about Chad Vader in the middle of season 1 and have been a fan ever since. Chad Vader is great, beer and boardgames is wildly funny at times, and Welcome to the Basement made me want to talk about movies (I am still kinda shitty at it, but I will get better~) Not to mention some of their other stuff. Take some time to watch and laugh when you get the chance.

Eshi: I came a bit late to the Blamesociety bandwagon, but I am gladly on board. These folks are a fucking inspiration. Watch them and know their greatness.

In Which I Tell Superman To Fuck Off

So I want to talk about Superman today. I don't like Superman. He is a Mary Sue, and because of that he is insanely boring. He doesn't need to fear losing because he is invincible. Sure you might say, "oh, but kryptonite makes him weaker!" and sure it does, but how often is it a lasting threat? If kryptonite was a meaningful weakness then superman should have died a long time ago. Fuck, on that note he is basically the reason comic book heroes don't need to fear death.

I will admit though that having a hero who is supposed to represent all the good in the world who is happy and a symbol of hope (Despite what Zach Snyder seems to think) is a net positive. What I want to talk about specifically today is that Superman and superheroes like him are bad for the world they inhabit. Stopping crime is a good act, I think we can all agree, but with the basic powers that superman has, he hurts the world.

Humans are an amazing species. We have adapted to the world in ways that other species can only dream about. Hunter/gathering doesn't provide a stable food source for us? Invent agriculture! Don't like walking long distances? Boom: horse and cart. Not fast enough? Car. Still not fast enough? Super sonic fucking planes. To hot? Lets create a device that can make it freezing in your house. Sure, some of these changes fuck with us in bad ways, but hey its only been 14,000ish years, we are still working out the kinks.

Why has this adaptation occurred? Need. I joked about not going fast enough up above, but faster forms of travel allowed us to transport goods to areas of the world where they are needed. Refrigeration and agriculture both allowed us to have far stabler forms of sustenance. What superman does is eliminate need. Social changes to eliminate crime will never need to take place because a superhero is taking care of it for us. We become reliant on a higher being for an entire form of ethics and it will never solve the core problem (stuff like treating drug addicts as people who suffer from a disease instead of criminals /programs to increase funding to inner city schools and improving the neighborhoods they are in).

You can see why this happens. We tend to default to the easiest solution to a problem that we can see. Superman is the perfect easy solution. This is why I dislike him. He puts himself in this position. Instead of only using his powers on enemies that we can't stop (i.e. other supers) Supes stops basic fucking robbers. This is like using a tactical nuke to take out a mouse you saw in your kitchen, way fucking overkill. I appreciate how easy it is, and that superman thinks its his responsibility because he has the power to do so, but it stunts personal/societal growth, and that's a problem.

D.C. brings up this problem in a different context with Sinestro, so its clear that they know it is a possibility. I know that this shit is just comics, but comics, movies, and television are our modern equivalent to mythology. Mythology is supposed to be a template for how people should act as we've discussed before. In the case of Superman, there is a major failing and I think its important to point it out. Easy solutions aren't always the best solutions.

Athletics, Advertising and Apathetic Naming Conventions

So there was the SuperThing yesterday that everybody and their dog got their dicks hard about. My apathy resounds on that specific front. I don't particularly care that a bunch of grown men got together to try and kill each other in tight pants, or that an obscene number of people chose to live vicariously through strangers to forget the unyielding, soulless monotony of their existence. I don't even really care that the standard response I receive when I tell people I'm not a "sports guy" is a cross between sneering derision and knee jerk hostility. You know what I do care about? Fucking Katy Perry's Halftime performance. Or better yet, did you see that one commercial that cost as much as the GDP of Jamaica?

There's a point here I promise. See I'm not alone in not being big on watching sports, lots of people abstain from the sportitude, the unrepresented population here seems to be those of us who don't think sports are particularly special. Its not that I don't think that what they do is impressive to some extent, its that the physical talent athletes demonstrate has more to do with the fact that they've spent their whole fucking lives pretty much just playing a game than any thing else. There is talent involved certainly, hell they even serve a degree of social good. Sports brings communities together and that is definitely a net gain. The issue that arises for me is that while I don't have a problem with people who enjoy sports I also don't really care about all of the shit that surrounds sports culture. Its fucked up that that one guy ran a dog fighting ring or whatever, but no more fucked up than the fact that that happens anyway. I find it sickening that that dude beat the fuck out of his wife, just like it is when anyone does it.

"Oh", you may well find yourself saying, "but they're role-models, Children look up to them, so what they do matters more". First, no; they're grown men who get carte blanche because they run real fast and can take the rock to the goal or whatever. Second, children look up to them because they make a shit ton of money for playing the same games they play after school. Children aren't great at recognizing their best interests, that what parents are supposed to be for. Children would also look up to somebody who got rich from eating cake, little fuckers love cake.

Athletes can be fucked up and sports people weird me, but what is worse to me is the people who make a big deal out of demonizing them and talking about how they don't watch the sportsing, and then in the same breath start a dissertation on SuperThing ads and halftime shows. Fuck those people, they are the worst violators of the "if you don't like it, don't look" rule. These are the same class of fuckheads who watch reality shows ironically. They are on par with anorexics bitching about how unhealthy fat people are, sure they aren't fat but they're just as unhealthy and weird about food. Hell, events like the SuperThing make as much money off of random assholes tuning into the commercials as they do from asses in seats. I don't care for sports, so when the SuperThing or the Series of the World (in very small considerations of what "world" means) is on, I fucking do something else. None of that something involves even tangentially the event in question. My thinking is that if enough of us just don't bother at all maybe they'll finally fucking go away. It worked on the Jocks in highschool, maybe I'll get lucky.