The more observant among you may have noticed that we have been in something of a creative slump. I can't really speak for Brian, but for me this is partly a matter of inspiration and partly a matter of sloth. The sloth bit is pretty self explanatory, I'm a lazy fuck and writing about something would require giving fucks that I frankly don't possess 90% of the time. Inspiration is trickier.
For me, writing without impulse is trying enough to provoke apathy. Now, I'm working on that, I want to care, the prospect of being creatively constructive is exciting to me. But a blank page is a daunting foe even without an blank head to accompany it. I've tried writing about current events, successfully demonstrating to myself that I'm not really capable of maintaining interest in pretty much any specific information for longer than it takes to convert that information into its general themes. Not that I don't care about the individuals involved in any particular "newsworthy" event, I'm just less concerned about them then I am about the likely root causes of whatever situation they inhabit. Most of which I've either thoroughly and frustratingly examined or about which I have nothing to say.
I've tried writing short fiction on here, and that was fun but largely aimless and so difficult to maintain. So in response to this aimlessness and apathy I've decided to write about being aimless and apathetic, because while I don't approve of self indulgence I am a firm advocate of masturbation.
I'm working on a D&D game, so I'll probably wander off and work on that soon. Hopefully, some good ol' world-building will refill my reserves and give me something to work with. Probably going to see a lot more random short fiction and Mounting Mythical Monsters from me in coming weeks. With any luck we'll all have some fun.
Showing posts with label Over-examining Things. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Over-examining Things. Show all posts
Monday, April 4, 2016
Monday, June 29, 2015
So Bad It's... Nope, Just Bad
I was coerced into watching The Stepford Wives yesterday, and boy was that not good. Christopher Walken didn't save this movie. Matthew Broderick was just as affectless and baffled as ever, Nicole Kidman's character was completely loathsome regardless of which completely different personality is presenting, and easily half the cast was superfluous. Glenn Close is in this fucking movie, and it doesn't seem to appreciate that.
The overall theme in this thing is probably feminism. I say "probably" not because I feel in any way ambiguous about it but because the way they handled feminism in the movie is so shit-fingered and pigeon-holey as to be insulting, and I say that from the depths of my pasty white, middle-class penis. Undeterred by circumstance or consequences, Kidman's character is kind of a cunt through the entire movie, only at the end does she seem to actually change. Not that she stops being a cunt, just that now she appreciates her manipulative, bitter, cowardly shit-pile of a husband.
The gay "wife" is, to quote Brian, "The gay version of a minstrel show," and that is apt. And where he is flashy and dramatic his partner plays the equally cliché constervative power-top. Actually, there is no subtlety in this movie at all. At all. Even if somehow the whole thing were some layers deep meta-cross-commentary arthouse fucking pretension, that would still be a shitty, shallow cliché.
The overall theme in this thing is probably feminism. I say "probably" not because I feel in any way ambiguous about it but because the way they handled feminism in the movie is so shit-fingered and pigeon-holey as to be insulting, and I say that from the depths of my pasty white, middle-class penis. Undeterred by circumstance or consequences, Kidman's character is kind of a cunt through the entire movie, only at the end does she seem to actually change. Not that she stops being a cunt, just that now she appreciates her manipulative, bitter, cowardly shit-pile of a husband.
The gay "wife" is, to quote Brian, "The gay version of a minstrel show," and that is apt. And where he is flashy and dramatic his partner plays the equally cliché constervative power-top. Actually, there is no subtlety in this movie at all. At all. Even if somehow the whole thing were some layers deep meta-cross-commentary arthouse fucking pretension, that would still be a shitty, shallow cliché.
Monday, June 22, 2015
See Spot Run... Into The Woodchipper
So, I'm not going to be covering anything super special today. Which is depressing, because today I want to talk about plot-killing dogs. Short of movies actually about killing evil dogs (and Old Yeller), no one is ever really down with a dog dying on film. Its almost never justified to murder a puppy for story, its not a plot-crucial action, just blatant, cheap emotional manipulation. Movies and shows kill animals to demonstrate how cruel a villain is or vengeguffin for the protagonist in whatever hackneyed premise the author has devised.
Contrary to how it sounds, my problem today is not so much that they do it, its that they still do it. So much so in recent years that I'm beginning to suspect some kind of Jon Petersesque situation where some big name producer just has the most massive hard-on for killing man's best friend. I get why they do it, a dead dog is a surefire way to get the audience in the feels. The cheapest, most disrespectful way to force emotional investment in the audience next to rape (which is also disgustingly clichéd these days). It works, even if we hate it, even if every reviewer ever has commented on how lazy and contemptible it is. I have to admit, I don't have a solution here. Even if we did start boycotting (lol) movies and shows that kill the dog for cheap pathos, they'd just find another easy target. I just hate the intellectual sloth that this kind of thing demonstrates and what it says about the way we go about entertainment. I'm all for telling a story, just maybe have enough respect for your audience to earn their attention.
Contrary to how it sounds, my problem today is not so much that they do it, its that they still do it. So much so in recent years that I'm beginning to suspect some kind of Jon Petersesque situation where some big name producer just has the most massive hard-on for killing man's best friend. I get why they do it, a dead dog is a surefire way to get the audience in the feels. The cheapest, most disrespectful way to force emotional investment in the audience next to rape (which is also disgustingly clichéd these days). It works, even if we hate it, even if every reviewer ever has commented on how lazy and contemptible it is. I have to admit, I don't have a solution here. Even if we did start boycotting (lol) movies and shows that kill the dog for cheap pathos, they'd just find another easy target. I just hate the intellectual sloth that this kind of thing demonstrates and what it says about the way we go about entertainment. I'm all for telling a story, just maybe have enough respect for your audience to earn their attention.
Monday, June 1, 2015
Pissing away the Future
So here's the deal. Climate change is a thing, its a big thing and by thing I mean problem. Now by problem I don't mean, "oh we're gonna have to have some really uncomfortable discussions." I mean the world as we know it is changing at a frankly alarming pace and if we don't, as a species, do something drastic about it with a fucking quickness a horrific number of people are going to die. It might not seem like it but I hate to soapbox about this, and not just because I think humanity could probably benefit from a bit of a pruning. I hate to get into the climate change thing because talking about it is largely a meaningless proposition for someone like me. Either you agree with me that its a problem and are taking steps in your own life to do what you think can help, you don't care either way and just want to get on with your business, or you think all this "climate" nonsense is just a conspiracy to control the populace or what the fuck ever. If you fall into that last category, by the way, we can't hang anymore and I sincerely hope you die in a painful and culturally scarring fashion, that others may learn from your failing.
The reason I feel the rather rare desire to approach this topic is because of something said on The Nightly Show last week. Usually, I really enjoy Larry Wilmore, he's witty and direct. But to see him flipping shit to the people trying to come up with solutions to a problem that has been plaguing California (not to mention huge swathes of the rest of the fucking planet) for years, a problem that even more of us are staring down the barrel of, pissed me pretty badly off. All water is recycled. Water treatment is a colossal part of the world we live in and people have been doing it in one way or another for a very fucking long time. Some people feel icky about the prospect of drinking water that used to have shit in it and to some extent that makes sense. Unfortunately for these folks pretty much all water has had shit in it. A goodly amount of it has probably been piss. Odds are you drank a little formerly-piss water today even. That's why filtration systems exist, so that by the time you drink it, your water doesn't bear any meaningful resemblance to the piss (or commercial waste, or industrial run off) that it used to be.
I'm hitting this one pretty hard but its not just water. A while back the U.N. suggested people start phasing insects into their diet to prevent against possible insecurity in the food supply. Of course it was kinda laughed off, but livestock is hard to raise, and costly, and if something goes wrong (like the world smolders and livestock becomes too resource intensive to keep alive) a huge number of people are going to be fucked. We can't afford to laugh off solutions at this point, no matter how icky it makes us feel. There are problems amassing in the world, too many to face down and certainly too many to ignore, and its not just irresponsible to keep calm and carry on, its self destructive.
The reason I feel the rather rare desire to approach this topic is because of something said on The Nightly Show last week. Usually, I really enjoy Larry Wilmore, he's witty and direct. But to see him flipping shit to the people trying to come up with solutions to a problem that has been plaguing California (not to mention huge swathes of the rest of the fucking planet) for years, a problem that even more of us are staring down the barrel of, pissed me pretty badly off. All water is recycled. Water treatment is a colossal part of the world we live in and people have been doing it in one way or another for a very fucking long time. Some people feel icky about the prospect of drinking water that used to have shit in it and to some extent that makes sense. Unfortunately for these folks pretty much all water has had shit in it. A goodly amount of it has probably been piss. Odds are you drank a little formerly-piss water today even. That's why filtration systems exist, so that by the time you drink it, your water doesn't bear any meaningful resemblance to the piss (or commercial waste, or industrial run off) that it used to be.
I'm hitting this one pretty hard but its not just water. A while back the U.N. suggested people start phasing insects into their diet to prevent against possible insecurity in the food supply. Of course it was kinda laughed off, but livestock is hard to raise, and costly, and if something goes wrong (like the world smolders and livestock becomes too resource intensive to keep alive) a huge number of people are going to be fucked. We can't afford to laugh off solutions at this point, no matter how icky it makes us feel. There are problems amassing in the world, too many to face down and certainly too many to ignore, and its not just irresponsible to keep calm and carry on, its self destructive.
Thursday, May 28, 2015
Blame Society
Lately I've been feeling like a man divided. On one hand, as regular readers will attest to, I am all about society. Cultural, technological and scientific progress is just tits, and derives directly from the fact that we've banded together in such unreasonably large and cumbersome groups. On the other hand Civilization has always been based on, shall we say, coercive conscription and that is pretty fucking evil.
There is much to be said concerning the wonderful things a large group can accomplish, but all of those things are only possible because of the most basic action of a group. Bullying. While many groups function by accumulating like-minded people, those like-minded people then have the odious duty to enforce their common beliefs upon those in their vicinity. Now this isn't always violent, and it certainly isn't always bad, but it is always oppressive. And the larger the group gets the more power they have to enforce those beliefs and the more territory they need, and so the more people come under their authority, willing or not. Now this is fucked up enough when people are being forced from their homes, but what happens when there isn't anywhere to flee?
We've talked about this before, Brian had a very insightful post about the lack of unclaimed land and what that means, but that's only part of it. It is definitely fucked up that you can't opt out of society, but it is so much more fucked up that you can't opt out of civilization. Say I don't want to be a U.S. citizen anymore. My option is to go to another country that I find more tolerable. What about people who don't find any country tolerable, and just want to strike out on their own. First you would have to go somewhere that isn't already claimed by some group or another, which as previously discussed is a troublesome prospect at best. Then you'd have to make sure whatever magical land you landed on doesn't have any resources someone would want, because then they'd come and take it, and you'd have no claim to stop them. Now sure, this has always been true to some extent, but its a relatively recent phenomena that the people coming and forcing you off your land can do so exclusively from another fucking continent. Assuming you've managed to survive in this probably barren, distant and unlikely new home, you then have to hope you didn't leave behind any reason for someone to come looking for you, lest you draw the wrong kind of attention and someone buys your land out from under you to put up a factory or a landfill or something. The U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights is quite clear that everyone has the right to a nationality, but gives no mention of those who would rather not involve themselves in such an endeavor as a nation. The entire document is framed entirely as a means of protecting the individual within the framework of the State.
The idea that someone wouldn't want to participate in society is alien to us, which kind of makes sense when you account for the fact that civilization has historically been highly interested in justifying itself as the best or only way to live, even and especially when opposed by another civilization. Everyone likes to think that they have a monopoly on awesome, and the more like-minded people you get together the more certain they become of that monopoly. All they have to do is convince the unenlightened, or show the reticent, or kill the barbarians. And those that feel lost or broken under the yoke of the Group, well these days they can either wither away in depression and obscurity, wondering why they always feel so oppressed, or they can slowly work themselves to death trying to numb themselves against a world with no regard for their personhood. I can't fault that we're not all "forced" to participate, but its pretty fucked up that they make us watch.
There is much to be said concerning the wonderful things a large group can accomplish, but all of those things are only possible because of the most basic action of a group. Bullying. While many groups function by accumulating like-minded people, those like-minded people then have the odious duty to enforce their common beliefs upon those in their vicinity. Now this isn't always violent, and it certainly isn't always bad, but it is always oppressive. And the larger the group gets the more power they have to enforce those beliefs and the more territory they need, and so the more people come under their authority, willing or not. Now this is fucked up enough when people are being forced from their homes, but what happens when there isn't anywhere to flee?
We've talked about this before, Brian had a very insightful post about the lack of unclaimed land and what that means, but that's only part of it. It is definitely fucked up that you can't opt out of society, but it is so much more fucked up that you can't opt out of civilization. Say I don't want to be a U.S. citizen anymore. My option is to go to another country that I find more tolerable. What about people who don't find any country tolerable, and just want to strike out on their own. First you would have to go somewhere that isn't already claimed by some group or another, which as previously discussed is a troublesome prospect at best. Then you'd have to make sure whatever magical land you landed on doesn't have any resources someone would want, because then they'd come and take it, and you'd have no claim to stop them. Now sure, this has always been true to some extent, but its a relatively recent phenomena that the people coming and forcing you off your land can do so exclusively from another fucking continent. Assuming you've managed to survive in this probably barren, distant and unlikely new home, you then have to hope you didn't leave behind any reason for someone to come looking for you, lest you draw the wrong kind of attention and someone buys your land out from under you to put up a factory or a landfill or something. The U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights is quite clear that everyone has the right to a nationality, but gives no mention of those who would rather not involve themselves in such an endeavor as a nation. The entire document is framed entirely as a means of protecting the individual within the framework of the State.
The idea that someone wouldn't want to participate in society is alien to us, which kind of makes sense when you account for the fact that civilization has historically been highly interested in justifying itself as the best or only way to live, even and especially when opposed by another civilization. Everyone likes to think that they have a monopoly on awesome, and the more like-minded people you get together the more certain they become of that monopoly. All they have to do is convince the unenlightened, or show the reticent, or kill the barbarians. And those that feel lost or broken under the yoke of the Group, well these days they can either wither away in depression and obscurity, wondering why they always feel so oppressed, or they can slowly work themselves to death trying to numb themselves against a world with no regard for their personhood. I can't fault that we're not all "forced" to participate, but its pretty fucked up that they make us watch.
Monday, April 27, 2015
His Superpower is Punching!
So a friend recently convinced me to watch the new Daredevil series. It should be stated that I've largely avoided the comic/TV bullshit. I dig the new Constantine but I didn't really go for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D or Arrow or any of that kind of thing. I just don't have any faith in the people who make TV happen and I fucking love comic books, so I tend to ignore TV adaptations. Daredevil is the reason I lack that faith. Not because its bad, but because its made by Netflix.
They don't have to worry about the same standards and practices fuckery that TV producers do. People on Daredevil speak like real people because believe it or not profanity plays an enormous role in human communication. I love this. We've discussed profanity here before, and it holds a dear place in both mine and Brian's lexicon. So a show about people in fucked up situations that allows them to discuss them in those terms is always more enjoyable than you'd expect.
The other big thing about Daredevil for me is the violence. It ought to come as no surprise that I appreciate me some physical aggression, and the clarity and relative honesty of the violence in this show is beautiful. Sure we've still got a guy in a kinda silly outfit throwing down with Russian mobsters and not getting shot repeatedly and dropped in a hole, but that doesn't actually reduce the brutality of the combat.
Now this might sound like an ad spot for this one show, but its not. I like some things about Daredevil. Some of it is ridiculous, of course it is, its a comic book adaptation. But the things I like about it stem from a lack of censorship. They don't have to sugar coat things to placate shitty people. I'm a geek; I love stories, the exploration of ideas, and the building of narrative worlds. When Constantine leaves out the details of what happened in Newcastle we lose a big part of that story and the motivations of the characters. I really don't have an issue with adapting comics or books to the screen but when we have to hobble them to make them suitable to irresponsible parents and ego-maniacal busybodies we've failed to respect what makes a story great.
They don't have to worry about the same standards and practices fuckery that TV producers do. People on Daredevil speak like real people because believe it or not profanity plays an enormous role in human communication. I love this. We've discussed profanity here before, and it holds a dear place in both mine and Brian's lexicon. So a show about people in fucked up situations that allows them to discuss them in those terms is always more enjoyable than you'd expect.
The other big thing about Daredevil for me is the violence. It ought to come as no surprise that I appreciate me some physical aggression, and the clarity and relative honesty of the violence in this show is beautiful. Sure we've still got a guy in a kinda silly outfit throwing down with Russian mobsters and not getting shot repeatedly and dropped in a hole, but that doesn't actually reduce the brutality of the combat.
Now this might sound like an ad spot for this one show, but its not. I like some things about Daredevil. Some of it is ridiculous, of course it is, its a comic book adaptation. But the things I like about it stem from a lack of censorship. They don't have to sugar coat things to placate shitty people. I'm a geek; I love stories, the exploration of ideas, and the building of narrative worlds. When Constantine leaves out the details of what happened in Newcastle we lose a big part of that story and the motivations of the characters. I really don't have an issue with adapting comics or books to the screen but when we have to hobble them to make them suitable to irresponsible parents and ego-maniacal busybodies we've failed to respect what makes a story great.
Monday, March 9, 2015
Wade-Giles Fuckery, and Not Deadpool/Buffy Slashfic
Alright folks, this is going to be a (hopefully) short nerd rant. We all know by this point that I have no patience for traditions built on bad ground. Today's shining shit shack of social standards revolves around the process of romanizing languages. I appreciate the value of converting non-english languages into characters comprehensible to english speakers/readers, it would just be great if we made any effort to do that. For instance the Gaelic word Samhain is pronounced sowwan or sahwin. That third letter is a fucking m and has no goddamn place in that word. I've heard the argument that its silent but silent letters are a hold out of a system whereby people use the ability to write "accurately" to enforce social barriers, so fuck that arbitrary elitist bullshit.
Arguably the most pronounced example of this stupidity is Wade-Giles transliteration. This is a method of converting Chinese, which is nuanced and beautiful, into English without any consideration for how those words are spoken. You may have noticed this renders the technique essentially useless for actually learning or communicating the fucking language. There is a chart at the bottom of that link that compares different phonemes and how they are written in Wade-Giles, which was established by two brits at the height of british cuntblubbery in China, and Pinyin, which is the method actually used by the people who speak the language. If you check that list you'll notice that WG seems to have valued exotic spelling conventions over anything even vaguely approaching accuracy.
This isn't super uncommon in romanizing languages, but it is fucking absurd. We romanize languages so that we can learn that language or at least be able to pronounce relevant words without sounding like a fucking moron. So I vote that we start actually writing things phonetically, or at very least consulting with native speakers before we decide how we ought to pronounce their words. Maybe someday we can live in a world where Daoism doesn't set off spell check and its foundational book isn't written as onomatopoeia for an old timey cash register.
Arguably the most pronounced example of this stupidity is Wade-Giles transliteration. This is a method of converting Chinese, which is nuanced and beautiful, into English without any consideration for how those words are spoken. You may have noticed this renders the technique essentially useless for actually learning or communicating the fucking language. There is a chart at the bottom of that link that compares different phonemes and how they are written in Wade-Giles, which was established by two brits at the height of british cuntblubbery in China, and Pinyin, which is the method actually used by the people who speak the language. If you check that list you'll notice that WG seems to have valued exotic spelling conventions over anything even vaguely approaching accuracy.
This isn't super uncommon in romanizing languages, but it is fucking absurd. We romanize languages so that we can learn that language or at least be able to pronounce relevant words without sounding like a fucking moron. So I vote that we start actually writing things phonetically, or at very least consulting with native speakers before we decide how we ought to pronounce their words. Maybe someday we can live in a world where Daoism doesn't set off spell check and its foundational book isn't written as onomatopoeia for an old timey cash register.
Monday, March 2, 2015
The Z Word
I've been playing a great deal of Dying Light lately, and its brought to mind some issues I have with the whole zombie genre. First, let me say that I'm not one of the hipster/geeks that hates zombies because they're all mainstream now. I will gladly agree that zombie fiction has gotten entirely too pervasive and easily exploited. Do we need zombie romance movies? No, that's fucking gross. Does almost every threat to mankind need to be zombies? Fuck no, try harder Hollywood. I love zombie fiction, largely because of the fact that the zombies are the least interesting part of it. Its a rich, effective device that allows all sorts of commentary and satire to thrive when used well.
My concern rises from the habit in zombie fiction to over value the zombies themselves. Now, I don't mean that the hungry dead shouldn't be a pressing and inevitable threat, but zombies (real, shambling, moaning corpses; if your zombies still have any chance of being "cured" i.e. victims of a communicable anger problem, you're just being dishonest) are scary enough on their own. Zombies are a pervasive, constant and yet still surprising concern. They can and will be everywhere, you will never really be safe from them and they can and do just come out of nowhere. This makes for an amazing threat... so stop fucking giving them superpowers. Considering how often the basic premise of so many zombie movies is that man is the real monster (all of which after 1970 are lazy and derivative), the zombies themselves ought not be magic superbeings.
In games like Dying Light the whole idea is that mankind is fucking terrible given even the slightest provocation. The high number of heavily mutated undead is unnecessary because the normal undead often come out of nowhere. Really, the greatest threats are being surprised by zombies (the primary fear of which comes from a problem the game resolves in the first 5 minutes of cut scene), the consumptive evil of other survivors, or just the straight up vile asscovering of the political forces deciding the fate of the survivors. I could be okay with them saying that the fresh dead are still limber enough to be runners, sure, scary and understandable. However, some zombies being nine feet tall and built like the Goddamn Mountain puts a look on my face like a disappointed sibling. Pretty much all of the enemies in the game stop being particularly difficult to kill about half way through so making special monsters that are marginally more difficult kinda cheapens the narrative.
This is, admittedly a very niche argument. I realize that me bitching about the narrative and design weaknesses of a genre predicated upon the wakening of the dead, hungry and mindless, to murder and consume the living is yelling in the dark at best. However, as we've discussed previously, our fiction both shapes and represents us, so allowing and encouraging shitty fiction is a disservice to all of us. Also, I'm a huge geek, this is what I do.
My concern rises from the habit in zombie fiction to over value the zombies themselves. Now, I don't mean that the hungry dead shouldn't be a pressing and inevitable threat, but zombies (real, shambling, moaning corpses; if your zombies still have any chance of being "cured" i.e. victims of a communicable anger problem, you're just being dishonest) are scary enough on their own. Zombies are a pervasive, constant and yet still surprising concern. They can and will be everywhere, you will never really be safe from them and they can and do just come out of nowhere. This makes for an amazing threat... so stop fucking giving them superpowers. Considering how often the basic premise of so many zombie movies is that man is the real monster (all of which after 1970 are lazy and derivative), the zombies themselves ought not be magic superbeings.
In games like Dying Light the whole idea is that mankind is fucking terrible given even the slightest provocation. The high number of heavily mutated undead is unnecessary because the normal undead often come out of nowhere. Really, the greatest threats are being surprised by zombies (the primary fear of which comes from a problem the game resolves in the first 5 minutes of cut scene), the consumptive evil of other survivors, or just the straight up vile asscovering of the political forces deciding the fate of the survivors. I could be okay with them saying that the fresh dead are still limber enough to be runners, sure, scary and understandable. However, some zombies being nine feet tall and built like the Goddamn Mountain puts a look on my face like a disappointed sibling. Pretty much all of the enemies in the game stop being particularly difficult to kill about half way through so making special monsters that are marginally more difficult kinda cheapens the narrative.
This is, admittedly a very niche argument. I realize that me bitching about the narrative and design weaknesses of a genre predicated upon the wakening of the dead, hungry and mindless, to murder and consume the living is yelling in the dark at best. However, as we've discussed previously, our fiction both shapes and represents us, so allowing and encouraging shitty fiction is a disservice to all of us. Also, I'm a huge geek, this is what I do.
Monday, December 1, 2014
You Wouldn't Like Me When I'm Angry
Alright folks, we're back, relocated, recaffeinated, and (after entirely too fucking long) possessed of internet fit to shake the heavens or something. As is tradition, we're gonna leap right back into it with me ranting. The topic of the day is something close to my heart in several, possibly dangerous, ways. Today I'm going to discuss anger. My anger specifically. Its not that I don't care about the righteous indignation of others or the mindless, squalling, rage that some partake of. It isn't even that my anger is shiny and pretty and made of magical hats, though that may bare discussion at a later date.
I'm going to talk about my anger, and the joys and pitfalls therein, because its the only anger I can effectively describe. As some of the more observant readers may have noticed I'm a bit prone to aggression. Rage comes to me with an ease that has been rightfully described as hopeless. I'm pretty good at keeping it in hand enough to avoid actually injuring someone. Unfortunately that doesn't counter the fact that I regularly get the sort of scorched-earth, damn-the-family-line-forever kind of mad that is largely reserved for doomed anti-heroes and relatable villains. Now, I can't say that was never really a problem, mostly because I never really bothered to examine it, but it was something that I never felt I could really do anything about. I mean reactive catharsis tends to be a dopamine loop of the worst kind, and suppressing anger just seems like a great way to snap your fucking brain and wake up in the ward.
Being angry feels really, really good. Dangerously good. It makes me feel powerful, active, motivated in ways that have been unavailable to me in any other state. Its also caused me to hurt people I care about, lose opportunities that I needed to take, and lose arguments that I couldn't afford to lose, not because I was wrong or not thinking clearly, but because I was mad and so my audience was incapable of receiving my point. I've been trying to let go of my anger recently. Not bottle it up or let it out, just let it go. Stop myself and consider the rage itself. Is it productive? Is it meaningful? Or is it just a fire in my chest waiting for the rest of me to catch. It helps, and it is getting better. Do I still get mad enough I feel like I'm going to pass out from the headache it gives me, yes, but only when a succession of idiotic, incompetent cunts absolutely and continuously fails at their one and only job for two weeks despite proper preparation and constant direction. (Later there will be a link here to Brian's post about our adventures in internet acquisition.) I just try and let the useless anger go, go cook something until I calm down, take a few deep breaths and watch a movie, whatever. This is a troublesome process but it is helping. I'm pretty sure I'll always be a wrathful, hate-ridden person; but I refuse to let that hate run roughshod over my life anymore.
I'm going to talk about my anger, and the joys and pitfalls therein, because its the only anger I can effectively describe. As some of the more observant readers may have noticed I'm a bit prone to aggression. Rage comes to me with an ease that has been rightfully described as hopeless. I'm pretty good at keeping it in hand enough to avoid actually injuring someone. Unfortunately that doesn't counter the fact that I regularly get the sort of scorched-earth, damn-the-family-line-forever kind of mad that is largely reserved for doomed anti-heroes and relatable villains. Now, I can't say that was never really a problem, mostly because I never really bothered to examine it, but it was something that I never felt I could really do anything about. I mean reactive catharsis tends to be a dopamine loop of the worst kind, and suppressing anger just seems like a great way to snap your fucking brain and wake up in the ward.
Being angry feels really, really good. Dangerously good. It makes me feel powerful, active, motivated in ways that have been unavailable to me in any other state. Its also caused me to hurt people I care about, lose opportunities that I needed to take, and lose arguments that I couldn't afford to lose, not because I was wrong or not thinking clearly, but because I was mad and so my audience was incapable of receiving my point. I've been trying to let go of my anger recently. Not bottle it up or let it out, just let it go. Stop myself and consider the rage itself. Is it productive? Is it meaningful? Or is it just a fire in my chest waiting for the rest of me to catch. It helps, and it is getting better. Do I still get mad enough I feel like I'm going to pass out from the headache it gives me, yes, but only when a succession of idiotic, incompetent cunts absolutely and continuously fails at their one and only job for two weeks despite proper preparation and constant direction. (Later there will be a link here to Brian's post about our adventures in internet acquisition.) I just try and let the useless anger go, go cook something until I calm down, take a few deep breaths and watch a movie, whatever. This is a troublesome process but it is helping. I'm pretty sure I'll always be a wrathful, hate-ridden person; but I refuse to let that hate run roughshod over my life anymore.
Friday, October 31, 2014
Kinda Whatevs Presents: Weekly Cinemeh
Here is our first list of movies we watched and what we thought of them. We didn't know if we wanted a theme or not, and just decided to do foreign films as a make-shift theme. We will try to do better with that in the future, if we decide to make themes a thing.
Spoilers abound, so read at your own risk.
Week of 10/27
1: Stalled
Stalled was an odd movie for me. It was very funny in bits, but also pulled some of the crappy stuff that most horror pulls nowadays. It is basically a movie about the worst day in a guys life, a guy who, while working a shit job, is stuck in a bathroom after zombies attack. It was fun, with a couple of very unique scenes that had Eshi and I rolling. If you just want to watch a silly zombie movie on Halloween with a couple of friends, this is a great contender.
Other than those couple of laughs it was a fairly standard zombie movie that pulls something that all to many zombie movies pull. I hate it when a zombie movie decides that it needs to have message or make a point. Horror doesn't need to make a point, that's not why most people watch them, but I understand if you want to, just do it better. If they were subtle about it I would have less an issue with it, but when its this ham-fisted it just seems lazy.
(Eshi) I liked this movie, it wasn't good but it was a lot of fun. It doesn't bother me as much as it does Brian when they include messages in their horror movies, what bothers me is when they cram it down your throat unashamedly. Stalled gets into that territory a bit but I can't entirely blame them, subtlety is a troublesome proposition in modern film.
2: Beyond Outrage
This is the sequel to a movie that Eshi and I loved, Outrage, and both deal with modern yakuza infighting/some level of police corruption. Takeshi Kitano (also known as Beat Takeshi) wrote, directed and starred in both, and he is amazing. He has a nice atmosphere about him, and he did a good job showing the political movements in the yakuza that underlie most of the actions they undertake. Beyond Outrage continues the story of the first movie 5 years later, and has a corrupt cop trying to orchestrate a gang war to further his own ambitions (and he is fucking bad at it).
The movie is the right level of violent, only being overt about it when it needs to accentuate the importance of certain kinds of symbolic violence. A scene that shows this well is when a character bites his own goddamn finger off to show submission to someone he is trying to ask a favor of. This is a great way to make sure that the audience is not so desensitized to violence that important uses of it still have impact. This is antithesis to how most American gangland movies/TV shows seems to lack nuance when it comes to showing violence.
(Eshi) Beat Takeshi is a fucking artist.
3: Age of Uprising: The Legend of Michael Kohlhaas
Age of Uprising is a French/German film (originally titled just "Michael Kohlhaas") based on a novella about this guy. Michael Kohlhaas is a 16th century German merchant who seeks revenge/justice for being wronged by a corrupt Baron. This movie is bleak and heavy. It is basically an exploration of justice and whether justice served from the self is better than justice served from the courts and or God.
The movie struggles a bit near the end and ends kind of anti-climatically and things felt kind of unresolved for me. Kohlhaas gets what he wanted but its ultimately unsatisfying, and I am not sure if that was meant to be that way. It could be that the movie was trying to point out that the justice from the justice system and justice meted out by the hurt party are both, at some point, unsatisfactory to society. If so it does a great job of making the viewer feel that way.
Mads Mikkelson is also fantastic. I think that he is one of the best actors I have seen in a while, not just with this movie but with Flame y Citron and the TV show Hannibal. He emotes well, and does a great service when it comes to the dark, oppressive tone of the film.
(Eshi) I cannot stress how oppressive this movie is. It takes place almost entirely in the countryside and yet never for a second does it feel more open than a firmly planted casket. I spent the entire film completely immersed in the futility so masterfully created. Brian mentioned that the film is a commentary on Justice. The most interesting demonstration of this for me was the absolute worthlessness of the theologian character. That single character and his interjection of how a "good christian" finds justice, and how completely he fails to engage, was spectacular.
4: Las brujas de Zugarramurdi (In the US as Witching and Bitching)
LBDZ is a horror/comedy that takes a satirical look at gender politics, and does a great job with it. Both the protagonists, represented as some very badly misogynist, self-centered criminals, and the antagonists, "feminist" and literally man-eating evil witches, are shown as being bad due to the hard line they take when it comes to their positions. Only when the two sides (or at least one person from each side) work together and trust each other does any kind of good relationship occur.
This is the first movie that I have ever seen from Spain and I was very impressed. It was great at creating a surreal, and in an odd way kind of whimsical, depiction of the world; with people acting normal in situations where running away would have been more than appropriate. I would suggest watching it with an open mind as it took a while for us to realize that it was supposed to be a satire and not poorly veiled assholery.
(Eshi) This was the least sexist film about sexism I've ever seen. Through and through it displayed an honesty and earnestness about a subject that is nearly impossible to be honest and earnest about. Also, one of the only movies I've seen that even remotely handles a child character well.
5: The Woman in Black
The last movie in our list this week was The Woman in Black and it was solid, if slightly disappointing. Its a movie about a sad lawyer who goes off to a hamlet in northern England to deal with a dead woman's will, and while he is out there shit goes down. Its a sadly vanilla story with a good, but very telegraphed, ending. Daniel Radcliffe is good at what he does, and the rest of the acting was pretty solid. The movie as a whole though feels flat. Its all stuff we have seen before done well, but not so well as to be exceptional.
I have written about how I feel about horror before, and I want to add something to my list of things that need toning down and or elimination: musical cues. If I am supposed to be scared and you have done a good job setting it up, I will be. You don't need to add tense music only at all the exact times in which shit is going down. WiB does this for every jump scare to "enhance" them, and that just felt cheap. This is especially unacceptable when it ruins the really well established scares.
(Eshi) There were things I really enjoyed about this movie. The environment was beautifully arranged, there were a few well developed scares, and Daniel Radcliffe is one of the rare male actors who can play tortured and empathetic without just being pathetic. Other than my appreciation of set direction and a growing respect for Danny Rads, however, this one was a bit bland, more than bordering on stereotypical. Would be a good third movie in a five movie horror marathon.
Spoilers abound, so read at your own risk.
Week of 10/27
1: Stalled
Stalled was an odd movie for me. It was very funny in bits, but also pulled some of the crappy stuff that most horror pulls nowadays. It is basically a movie about the worst day in a guys life, a guy who, while working a shit job, is stuck in a bathroom after zombies attack. It was fun, with a couple of very unique scenes that had Eshi and I rolling. If you just want to watch a silly zombie movie on Halloween with a couple of friends, this is a great contender.
Other than those couple of laughs it was a fairly standard zombie movie that pulls something that all to many zombie movies pull. I hate it when a zombie movie decides that it needs to have message or make a point. Horror doesn't need to make a point, that's not why most people watch them, but I understand if you want to, just do it better. If they were subtle about it I would have less an issue with it, but when its this ham-fisted it just seems lazy.
(Eshi) I liked this movie, it wasn't good but it was a lot of fun. It doesn't bother me as much as it does Brian when they include messages in their horror movies, what bothers me is when they cram it down your throat unashamedly. Stalled gets into that territory a bit but I can't entirely blame them, subtlety is a troublesome proposition in modern film.
2: Beyond Outrage
This is the sequel to a movie that Eshi and I loved, Outrage, and both deal with modern yakuza infighting/some level of police corruption. Takeshi Kitano (also known as Beat Takeshi) wrote, directed and starred in both, and he is amazing. He has a nice atmosphere about him, and he did a good job showing the political movements in the yakuza that underlie most of the actions they undertake. Beyond Outrage continues the story of the first movie 5 years later, and has a corrupt cop trying to orchestrate a gang war to further his own ambitions (and he is fucking bad at it).
The movie is the right level of violent, only being overt about it when it needs to accentuate the importance of certain kinds of symbolic violence. A scene that shows this well is when a character bites his own goddamn finger off to show submission to someone he is trying to ask a favor of. This is a great way to make sure that the audience is not so desensitized to violence that important uses of it still have impact. This is antithesis to how most American gangland movies/TV shows seems to lack nuance when it comes to showing violence.
(Eshi) Beat Takeshi is a fucking artist.
3: Age of Uprising: The Legend of Michael Kohlhaas
Age of Uprising is a French/German film (originally titled just "Michael Kohlhaas") based on a novella about this guy. Michael Kohlhaas is a 16th century German merchant who seeks revenge/justice for being wronged by a corrupt Baron. This movie is bleak and heavy. It is basically an exploration of justice and whether justice served from the self is better than justice served from the courts and or God.
The movie struggles a bit near the end and ends kind of anti-climatically and things felt kind of unresolved for me. Kohlhaas gets what he wanted but its ultimately unsatisfying, and I am not sure if that was meant to be that way. It could be that the movie was trying to point out that the justice from the justice system and justice meted out by the hurt party are both, at some point, unsatisfactory to society. If so it does a great job of making the viewer feel that way.
Mads Mikkelson is also fantastic. I think that he is one of the best actors I have seen in a while, not just with this movie but with Flame y Citron and the TV show Hannibal. He emotes well, and does a great service when it comes to the dark, oppressive tone of the film.
(Eshi) I cannot stress how oppressive this movie is. It takes place almost entirely in the countryside and yet never for a second does it feel more open than a firmly planted casket. I spent the entire film completely immersed in the futility so masterfully created. Brian mentioned that the film is a commentary on Justice. The most interesting demonstration of this for me was the absolute worthlessness of the theologian character. That single character and his interjection of how a "good christian" finds justice, and how completely he fails to engage, was spectacular.
4: Las brujas de Zugarramurdi (In the US as Witching and Bitching)
LBDZ is a horror/comedy that takes a satirical look at gender politics, and does a great job with it. Both the protagonists, represented as some very badly misogynist, self-centered criminals, and the antagonists, "feminist" and literally man-eating evil witches, are shown as being bad due to the hard line they take when it comes to their positions. Only when the two sides (or at least one person from each side) work together and trust each other does any kind of good relationship occur.
This is the first movie that I have ever seen from Spain and I was very impressed. It was great at creating a surreal, and in an odd way kind of whimsical, depiction of the world; with people acting normal in situations where running away would have been more than appropriate. I would suggest watching it with an open mind as it took a while for us to realize that it was supposed to be a satire and not poorly veiled assholery.
(Eshi) This was the least sexist film about sexism I've ever seen. Through and through it displayed an honesty and earnestness about a subject that is nearly impossible to be honest and earnest about. Also, one of the only movies I've seen that even remotely handles a child character well.
5: The Woman in Black
The last movie in our list this week was The Woman in Black and it was solid, if slightly disappointing. Its a movie about a sad lawyer who goes off to a hamlet in northern England to deal with a dead woman's will, and while he is out there shit goes down. Its a sadly vanilla story with a good, but very telegraphed, ending. Daniel Radcliffe is good at what he does, and the rest of the acting was pretty solid. The movie as a whole though feels flat. Its all stuff we have seen before done well, but not so well as to be exceptional.
I have written about how I feel about horror before, and I want to add something to my list of things that need toning down and or elimination: musical cues. If I am supposed to be scared and you have done a good job setting it up, I will be. You don't need to add tense music only at all the exact times in which shit is going down. WiB does this for every jump scare to "enhance" them, and that just felt cheap. This is especially unacceptable when it ruins the really well established scares.
(Eshi) There were things I really enjoyed about this movie. The environment was beautifully arranged, there were a few well developed scares, and Daniel Radcliffe is one of the rare male actors who can play tortured and empathetic without just being pathetic. Other than my appreciation of set direction and a growing respect for Danny Rads, however, this one was a bit bland, more than bordering on stereotypical. Would be a good third movie in a five movie horror marathon.
Thursday, October 30, 2014
Unreasonably Hostel
As you may have gathered Brian and I watch a fair number of movies. During our cinematic escapades I've noticed something that grates on me in a weird way. I have yet to see a movie service, streaming or otherwise, that can figure out their genres.
Its not a huge deal, I'm not suppressing facial ticks or digging up the ol' Nailbat of Disapproval, but when I'm looking for a nice psychological thriller and Netflix offers Kiss the Girls and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back in the same breath; it goes from funny to annoying pretty quick. That one isn't that bad, I can dig it, bugs happen in any automated system. The thing that bugs me the most is (as per usual) horror movies. It seems these days that anything that has a monster or any significant gore in it counts as horror. Black Death is not a fucking horror movie, an amazing, slow-burn, psychological thriller and one of Sean "Dying is my Job" Bean's best showings sure, but scary it ain't. Now, the organizational failings of a few internet services is disappointing but I can't entirely blame them when neither the people making the movies, nor the people watching them can get their shit together.
There has been a slow divergence in what kind of story is presented as audiences change, but this change hasn't really been observed in our categorizing genres. Thriller has slowly evolved out of the horror category but that's about it. Horror movies are still essentially any movie that makes you any kind of uncomfortable. Comedy is still just anything that can cram more than two one liners into a script. Sci-fi and fantasy still get crammed together (which I kind of understand, considering most people only really differentiate in that one is uses technology and one uses magic) and Action/adventure, well, I don't really have any issue with that one actually, both the movies in the genre and the genre itself are a little too straight forward to fuck up.
I admit that I talk a lot about needing better categorization of things but I feel it really is important. Specification is an absurdly important aspect of language, its how we know what the fuck people are talking about. Its how we know what we're looking at. This is especially apparent with movies. I like gore, the occasional torture-porn movie can be a delightful romp through the nastier bits of the psyche, but torture-porn isn't fucking scary. Unsettling, hopefully, but not scary; and the urges that lead to either watching horror or gore are very fucking different. Wanting to watch a bunch of shitty, pandering cunts get ironied to death makes someone getting skull-fucked by a power drill a disappointing sight.
Rom-coms are another pain point for me, but honestly less because I'm usually looking for something else when I stumble on a romantic comedy and more because they're just... just so bad. But that's another post entirely.
I know its nit-picky but I think we can do better than just shoehorning disparate themes together under whatever happens to be handy. We're in charge of this shit, we can make new categories as new subjects arise and, considering how much time us movie geeks spend on things like this, there isn't any reason not to make the fucking effort.
Its not a huge deal, I'm not suppressing facial ticks or digging up the ol' Nailbat of Disapproval, but when I'm looking for a nice psychological thriller and Netflix offers Kiss the Girls and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back in the same breath; it goes from funny to annoying pretty quick. That one isn't that bad, I can dig it, bugs happen in any automated system. The thing that bugs me the most is (as per usual) horror movies. It seems these days that anything that has a monster or any significant gore in it counts as horror. Black Death is not a fucking horror movie, an amazing, slow-burn, psychological thriller and one of Sean "Dying is my Job" Bean's best showings sure, but scary it ain't. Now, the organizational failings of a few internet services is disappointing but I can't entirely blame them when neither the people making the movies, nor the people watching them can get their shit together.
There has been a slow divergence in what kind of story is presented as audiences change, but this change hasn't really been observed in our categorizing genres. Thriller has slowly evolved out of the horror category but that's about it. Horror movies are still essentially any movie that makes you any kind of uncomfortable. Comedy is still just anything that can cram more than two one liners into a script. Sci-fi and fantasy still get crammed together (which I kind of understand, considering most people only really differentiate in that one is uses technology and one uses magic) and Action/adventure, well, I don't really have any issue with that one actually, both the movies in the genre and the genre itself are a little too straight forward to fuck up.
I admit that I talk a lot about needing better categorization of things but I feel it really is important. Specification is an absurdly important aspect of language, its how we know what the fuck people are talking about. Its how we know what we're looking at. This is especially apparent with movies. I like gore, the occasional torture-porn movie can be a delightful romp through the nastier bits of the psyche, but torture-porn isn't fucking scary. Unsettling, hopefully, but not scary; and the urges that lead to either watching horror or gore are very fucking different. Wanting to watch a bunch of shitty, pandering cunts get ironied to death makes someone getting skull-fucked by a power drill a disappointing sight.
Rom-coms are another pain point for me, but honestly less because I'm usually looking for something else when I stumble on a romantic comedy and more because they're just... just so bad. But that's another post entirely.
I know its nit-picky but I think we can do better than just shoehorning disparate themes together under whatever happens to be handy. We're in charge of this shit, we can make new categories as new subjects arise and, considering how much time us movie geeks spend on things like this, there isn't any reason not to make the fucking effort.
Monday, October 20, 2014
YKWFA: The Least Violent Way to a Man's Heart.
Not long enough ago and not far enough away my wife and I lived with her mother. Now I love my wife spectacularly. Seriously, its crazy. But she and I agree that her mother is a vile, shit-souled, solipsistic, thunder-cunt. I know, I know, this is supposed to be about something fucking awesome, not the subhuman bilge waste that spawned my lovely wife; but it follows, I promise. When she wasn't manipulating my wife or insulting me she was a terrible food snob, not in that she was overly fussy about what she ate (though she did insist that her cats ate organic gourmet lobster cat food), but in that she was bad at being a food snob. So bad in fact that it inspired me.
I once heard this woman utter the phrase "Oh, I don't really care, food is really just fuel." on the 45 minute drive to the organic farmer she bought milk and eggs from. That stopped me pretty much dead. Her hypocrisy boggled my mind, but more than that I was inspired by how wrong she was. I'm a tubby fucker, so I've always had a complex relationship to food (that link rambles a bit and is a bit nsfw but I love Ed Byrne and he makes my point well... eventually). She pushed me over the edge. After that point I loved food, no question, no hesitation. Food is fucking awesome. See, I told you we'd get there.
First, let me say, "food is fuel" is an accurate statement; "food is just fuel" is super fucking not. Food is a massively complex amalgamation of social/cultural/ethnic/religious standards and compromises layered over geological/climatic/biological limitations wrapped in what is both one of the most complex, and the most accessible, sciences and sprinkled liberally with the ecstatic neuro-biological phenomenon of flavor.
Anthropologically, food is almost frighteningly important. The production of food stuffs, the security of food resources, the social systems that arise surrounding going from seed to stomach are all fascinating, interdependent structures that are incredibly enlightening. Not to mention the wondrous cultural gestalt that happens when people from different food-cultures share food with each other. Food can tell us about people, describe ancient environments and technologies, and lubricate peace between cultures. It also has an anthropological "dark side". If you don't believe me go to Philadelphia and mention cheesesteak, hell just saying the word "baklava" in certain company can start fights.
Beyond anthropology there are advanced and novel chemical processes involved in cooking at every juncture. The process of turning light and dirt into energy and passing that energy up the food chain, the way different additions and catalysts (some in terribly minute quantities) can change the flavor, content and structure of a dish, down to the way the body processes different nutrients in different preparations. Have no desire to hunt links for every other word in this post, though I could, so here's a starter link, study up. Also, food is mighty tasty.
I could go on about this for days, the science and culture of food is one of the most beautiful, nuanced aspects of day to day life. Whether or not people think about it, what and how we eat plays a massive role in our lives top to bottom. If you take anything away from this post, let it be this; my mother-in-law is a cunt, and food is fucking amazing.
I once heard this woman utter the phrase "Oh, I don't really care, food is really just fuel." on the 45 minute drive to the organic farmer she bought milk and eggs from. That stopped me pretty much dead. Her hypocrisy boggled my mind, but more than that I was inspired by how wrong she was. I'm a tubby fucker, so I've always had a complex relationship to food (that link rambles a bit and is a bit nsfw but I love Ed Byrne and he makes my point well... eventually). She pushed me over the edge. After that point I loved food, no question, no hesitation. Food is fucking awesome. See, I told you we'd get there.
First, let me say, "food is fuel" is an accurate statement; "food is just fuel" is super fucking not. Food is a massively complex amalgamation of social/cultural/ethnic/religious standards and compromises layered over geological/climatic/biological limitations wrapped in what is both one of the most complex, and the most accessible, sciences and sprinkled liberally with the ecstatic neuro-biological phenomenon of flavor.
Anthropologically, food is almost frighteningly important. The production of food stuffs, the security of food resources, the social systems that arise surrounding going from seed to stomach are all fascinating, interdependent structures that are incredibly enlightening. Not to mention the wondrous cultural gestalt that happens when people from different food-cultures share food with each other. Food can tell us about people, describe ancient environments and technologies, and lubricate peace between cultures. It also has an anthropological "dark side". If you don't believe me go to Philadelphia and mention cheesesteak, hell just saying the word "baklava" in certain company can start fights.
Beyond anthropology there are advanced and novel chemical processes involved in cooking at every juncture. The process of turning light and dirt into energy and passing that energy up the food chain, the way different additions and catalysts (some in terribly minute quantities) can change the flavor, content and structure of a dish, down to the way the body processes different nutrients in different preparations. Have no desire to hunt links for every other word in this post, though I could, so here's a starter link, study up. Also, food is mighty tasty.
I could go on about this for days, the science and culture of food is one of the most beautiful, nuanced aspects of day to day life. Whether or not people think about it, what and how we eat plays a massive role in our lives top to bottom. If you take anything away from this post, let it be this; my mother-in-law is a cunt, and food is fucking amazing.
Thursday, September 25, 2014
YKWFA 2: Player Characters
Alright, I need to go full on squeeing geek for a minute here. This post has been building for a while and I've had a strong need to write about something that doesn't inspire me to try and hate the world to death, so bear with me. Our topic today is my absolute favorite sort of meta-reference: the PCing of a world. Let me explain.
PCing is a narrative device derived from meta-reference wherein the presence of a player character in the world irrevocably changes the structure of the world, typically by fucking over someone in the game who ought to be important. Sometimes this takes the form of ill explained gaps in a game's mechanics that end up illuminating possibly unintentional subplots. Sometimes its the result of active interplay in the story environment. We'll work through some examples and then discuss the value PCing has as a narrative device. (HUGE SPOILER WARNING OF DEATH)
One of the most explored instances of PCing in a game is the roles of "Ash" and "Gary" in the first generation Pokemon games. By all rights the rival character Gary should be a nearly uncontested champion. He's related to the greatest Pokemon researcher in the world, so he's had, or at least had access to, extensive exposure not only to Pokemon in general but to unique qualitative and quantitative information in the field. He's driven and highly talented. Gary as a character has skill, talent, motivation and resources in spades. In fact he accomplishes nearly everything the player does before the player even has the option. He's also over shadowed in every possible way by the PC.
In the beginning of the game Gary's beloved grandfather Prof. Oak doesn't even remember his name (a good example of a mechanical weakness leading to accidental story depth) and he's largely disregarded in favor of his "childhood friend" that no one seems to know anything about. Over the course of the rest of the game Gary develops an almost compulsive need to beat the PC that results in progressively greater failures at the player's hands despite being relatively successful in all other areas. The PC is even the direct cause of the only possible instances of a Pokemon dieing in a battle (though that is debated weirdly fiercely). When Gary does finally become League Champion the PC comes along, beats his ass yet again, and shames him once again before his grandfather. The PC spends the entire game robbing Gary of his every accomplishment and depriving him of the love of his only relative. My favorite part about this is that its not because the PC is an asshole, its because they can't help it. The presence of a PC in the world ensures that the world bends in their favor. Let's see if I can't clarify with a couple more examples.
Fallout 3 starts out in a Vault, which are constantly demonstrated to be long term social experiments, and follows the development of the player in the Vault environment. Butch is one of the children the player grows up with and his story is what we're interested in for this idea; because Butch is the hero of Vault 101. Or at least he would be if it weren't for the PC.
Your first shown encounter with Butch is at the PC's 9th birthday party, where it quickly becomes clear that Butch is a dickhead. In contrast, everyone else at the party, with the exception of the Overseer, thinks very highly of the player. We learn at this point that Butch's mother is a non-functioning alcoholic, providing one explanation for his aggression. At one point during the player's escape from the Vault one of the Overseer's journal entries becomes available in which he is learned to have been utilizing Butch as a means of social control within the Vault. Given the closed system of the Vault and the low population the Overseer is almost certainly grooming the boy for a position of authority not to mention almost certainly vetting him as the likely husband to his daughter Amata, the only female child in the Vault. So lets build the story, it might be a little weird if you haven't played the game, but I have. Lots. So take my word for it.
Butch, seeking support outside his worthless mother, tries to find solace from the other adults in the Vault, who are all preoccupied with the Outsider child (player). Finding no comfort in any of the adults he develops a hefty resentment for the PC as he projects his inability to earn affection onto the player, he instead establishes a "gang" out of the other male children in the Vault. His gang has trouble understanding his aggression toward the PC, but his clear pain on the subject and threats of violence erode their empathy for the player, after all they must have done something for Butch to hate them so much. Being the clear Alpha male of the Vault's children he reaches out to Amata, once again the only female kid, whose father is the only person to value him over the PC. Amata doesn't share that perspective, making Butch feel even further alienated and cementing his rage.
Now here's the thing. The Vaults are all experiments, and Vault 101's purpose is never actively expressed. We know that the culture of 101 is geared to establish the Overseer as a sort of demigod, carrying on the practices that stave off the certain death of the Wasteland. Its not hard to imagine that Butch was meant to take on a leadership role in the Vault. He's charismatic (though his charisma becomes tainted by his aggression), he's strong, and he is highly capable of establishing and maintaining connections with the Vaultdwellers. The mere presence of the PC denies him even the opportunity to explore anything other than his own resentment.
Perhaps the most prominent example of PCing occurs in the Fallout: New Vegas DLC Lonesome Road. In it the player is contacted by a fellow Courier called Ulysses who bears a hell of a grudge. Over the course of the story Ulysses describes both his and the player's actions as Couriers before the events of the game and why Ulysses holds such hate for the player. It turns out that before the events of the game the player essentially tore the country in half. Basically on a whim. Ulysses became obsessed with this act, with what it means to be a Courier. What he finds, what he describes, is a PC. An active, self-actualized being in a world where they are surrounded by people completely at their mercy. The events he describes are the results of PCs in a world without PCs. What Ulysses describes, in both his previous actions and the actions of the player, are what it looks like to the outside world when a PC is active. This is, to me the best description of what a PC is in a game world.
In most games the player is largely lead about by the story, but from a narrative perspective they are all but gods. Their actions fundamentally alter the structure of the world. They are free to act in ways that other actors in the world are not, and the consequences of their actions reverberate through everything. That is why this device is so beautiful to me. By its nature it half-steps the player out of the game and gives context to their actions. It takes relatively simple choices and gives us a chance to consider their consequences, adding depth and engaging us in ways the game otherwise couldn't.
PCing is a narrative device derived from meta-reference wherein the presence of a player character in the world irrevocably changes the structure of the world, typically by fucking over someone in the game who ought to be important. Sometimes this takes the form of ill explained gaps in a game's mechanics that end up illuminating possibly unintentional subplots. Sometimes its the result of active interplay in the story environment. We'll work through some examples and then discuss the value PCing has as a narrative device. (HUGE SPOILER WARNING OF DEATH)
One of the most explored instances of PCing in a game is the roles of "Ash" and "Gary" in the first generation Pokemon games. By all rights the rival character Gary should be a nearly uncontested champion. He's related to the greatest Pokemon researcher in the world, so he's had, or at least had access to, extensive exposure not only to Pokemon in general but to unique qualitative and quantitative information in the field. He's driven and highly talented. Gary as a character has skill, talent, motivation and resources in spades. In fact he accomplishes nearly everything the player does before the player even has the option. He's also over shadowed in every possible way by the PC.
In the beginning of the game Gary's beloved grandfather Prof. Oak doesn't even remember his name (a good example of a mechanical weakness leading to accidental story depth) and he's largely disregarded in favor of his "childhood friend" that no one seems to know anything about. Over the course of the rest of the game Gary develops an almost compulsive need to beat the PC that results in progressively greater failures at the player's hands despite being relatively successful in all other areas. The PC is even the direct cause of the only possible instances of a Pokemon dieing in a battle (though that is debated weirdly fiercely). When Gary does finally become League Champion the PC comes along, beats his ass yet again, and shames him once again before his grandfather. The PC spends the entire game robbing Gary of his every accomplishment and depriving him of the love of his only relative. My favorite part about this is that its not because the PC is an asshole, its because they can't help it. The presence of a PC in the world ensures that the world bends in their favor. Let's see if I can't clarify with a couple more examples.
Fallout 3 starts out in a Vault, which are constantly demonstrated to be long term social experiments, and follows the development of the player in the Vault environment. Butch is one of the children the player grows up with and his story is what we're interested in for this idea; because Butch is the hero of Vault 101. Or at least he would be if it weren't for the PC.
Your first shown encounter with Butch is at the PC's 9th birthday party, where it quickly becomes clear that Butch is a dickhead. In contrast, everyone else at the party, with the exception of the Overseer, thinks very highly of the player. We learn at this point that Butch's mother is a non-functioning alcoholic, providing one explanation for his aggression. At one point during the player's escape from the Vault one of the Overseer's journal entries becomes available in which he is learned to have been utilizing Butch as a means of social control within the Vault. Given the closed system of the Vault and the low population the Overseer is almost certainly grooming the boy for a position of authority not to mention almost certainly vetting him as the likely husband to his daughter Amata, the only female child in the Vault. So lets build the story, it might be a little weird if you haven't played the game, but I have. Lots. So take my word for it.
Butch, seeking support outside his worthless mother, tries to find solace from the other adults in the Vault, who are all preoccupied with the Outsider child (player). Finding no comfort in any of the adults he develops a hefty resentment for the PC as he projects his inability to earn affection onto the player, he instead establishes a "gang" out of the other male children in the Vault. His gang has trouble understanding his aggression toward the PC, but his clear pain on the subject and threats of violence erode their empathy for the player, after all they must have done something for Butch to hate them so much. Being the clear Alpha male of the Vault's children he reaches out to Amata, once again the only female kid, whose father is the only person to value him over the PC. Amata doesn't share that perspective, making Butch feel even further alienated and cementing his rage.
Now here's the thing. The Vaults are all experiments, and Vault 101's purpose is never actively expressed. We know that the culture of 101 is geared to establish the Overseer as a sort of demigod, carrying on the practices that stave off the certain death of the Wasteland. Its not hard to imagine that Butch was meant to take on a leadership role in the Vault. He's charismatic (though his charisma becomes tainted by his aggression), he's strong, and he is highly capable of establishing and maintaining connections with the Vaultdwellers. The mere presence of the PC denies him even the opportunity to explore anything other than his own resentment.
Perhaps the most prominent example of PCing occurs in the Fallout: New Vegas DLC Lonesome Road. In it the player is contacted by a fellow Courier called Ulysses who bears a hell of a grudge. Over the course of the story Ulysses describes both his and the player's actions as Couriers before the events of the game and why Ulysses holds such hate for the player. It turns out that before the events of the game the player essentially tore the country in half. Basically on a whim. Ulysses became obsessed with this act, with what it means to be a Courier. What he finds, what he describes, is a PC. An active, self-actualized being in a world where they are surrounded by people completely at their mercy. The events he describes are the results of PCs in a world without PCs. What Ulysses describes, in both his previous actions and the actions of the player, are what it looks like to the outside world when a PC is active. This is, to me the best description of what a PC is in a game world.
In most games the player is largely lead about by the story, but from a narrative perspective they are all but gods. Their actions fundamentally alter the structure of the world. They are free to act in ways that other actors in the world are not, and the consequences of their actions reverberate through everything. That is why this device is so beautiful to me. By its nature it half-steps the player out of the game and gives context to their actions. It takes relatively simple choices and gives us a chance to consider their consequences, adding depth and engaging us in ways the game otherwise couldn't.
Monday, September 15, 2014
Sometimes Its Cruel to be Kind
I watched Snowpiercer recently and it brought to mind kind of a nasty little issue. For those even more behind then myself on contemporary films, the basic premise of the movie is that the world has ended in a catastrophic ice age and the only survivors are passengers on a magical super train going around the world. Most of these survivors are people who payed to be saved and they reside in the relatively luxurious fronty bits of the train. Others fought their way on last minute and mange to eek out a rather miserable existence of hand-me-downs and brutal opportunities in the tail of the train. without getting into too deep into spoiler country, the things that people did both to stow away and to survive in the tail are pretty fucking nasty. Especially before infrastructure was developed to allow for the excess population to even barely survive. The issue that arises for me in this instance is: does it constitute mercy?
The folks in the tail are fed enough to sustain themselves, in the form of "protein blocks". They have bunks to sleep in and copious amounts of free time, as they aren't trusted/don't have the skills to serve the train. They're also kept in filthy conditions, don't receive actual medical care, apparently have their children taken from them on a whim and are subject to daily abuse from an armed and aggressive police force. Sure they're some of the last people alive in the world, but they aren't even slaves, they aren't even cattle, those things are in some way useful, valuable. They apparently only exist to give the people in the rest of the train someone to feel superior to. Now in the movie their survival is framed as a perpetuated mercy, after all the deified antagonist who owns the train did set up infrastructure to allow them their meager existence. But that infrastructure took not insignificant time to establish, time that occurred after they where already on the train. Sealed in the tail. With no resources. Time in which these desperate people where left entirely to their own devices for survival. I don't even really have to go into spoilers here, you can imagine how fucked up people can get during two fucking months without anything.
I would argue that just having people in that position is fucking cruel as shit and completely justifies very nearly anything the people in the tail do to get themselves out of it. Now, yes, this is essentially the basic thrust of the entire film; but it really caught me that everyone not in the tail takes that mercy as gratis. They have decided that the folks at the back should damn well be grateful for even being alive. So if they're abused and degraded, so what if they have no rights. At least they aren't dead. Its a painfully common perspective amongst the oppressive classes, that those who are oppressed should essentially be grateful for the opportunity. To me this is the core of classicism and really the moral of the story. I think what it comes down to for me is you don't get to decide if your own action is merciful. I don't even think you have the ability to decide if your own action was good. Once other people get involved you aren't just acting, you're acting upon.
I'm not saying that some people aren't ungrateful cunts. What I am saying is that "letting" someone live isn't necessarily merciful, and in fact just the linguistic basis of that statement implies cruelty. That describes a position of near absolute authority over the most basic aspects of someone else's existence that can in no way be positive. The most charitable thing its even remotely possible to say about that mindset is that its condescending. Being merciful shouldn't just not be about you, it can't. Like structurally. Mercy is intrinsically about doing right by other people, we can't forget that, no matter how bad things get.
The folks in the tail are fed enough to sustain themselves, in the form of "protein blocks". They have bunks to sleep in and copious amounts of free time, as they aren't trusted/don't have the skills to serve the train. They're also kept in filthy conditions, don't receive actual medical care, apparently have their children taken from them on a whim and are subject to daily abuse from an armed and aggressive police force. Sure they're some of the last people alive in the world, but they aren't even slaves, they aren't even cattle, those things are in some way useful, valuable. They apparently only exist to give the people in the rest of the train someone to feel superior to. Now in the movie their survival is framed as a perpetuated mercy, after all the deified antagonist who owns the train did set up infrastructure to allow them their meager existence. But that infrastructure took not insignificant time to establish, time that occurred after they where already on the train. Sealed in the tail. With no resources. Time in which these desperate people where left entirely to their own devices for survival. I don't even really have to go into spoilers here, you can imagine how fucked up people can get during two fucking months without anything.
I would argue that just having people in that position is fucking cruel as shit and completely justifies very nearly anything the people in the tail do to get themselves out of it. Now, yes, this is essentially the basic thrust of the entire film; but it really caught me that everyone not in the tail takes that mercy as gratis. They have decided that the folks at the back should damn well be grateful for even being alive. So if they're abused and degraded, so what if they have no rights. At least they aren't dead. Its a painfully common perspective amongst the oppressive classes, that those who are oppressed should essentially be grateful for the opportunity. To me this is the core of classicism and really the moral of the story. I think what it comes down to for me is you don't get to decide if your own action is merciful. I don't even think you have the ability to decide if your own action was good. Once other people get involved you aren't just acting, you're acting upon.
I'm not saying that some people aren't ungrateful cunts. What I am saying is that "letting" someone live isn't necessarily merciful, and in fact just the linguistic basis of that statement implies cruelty. That describes a position of near absolute authority over the most basic aspects of someone else's existence that can in no way be positive. The most charitable thing its even remotely possible to say about that mindset is that its condescending. Being merciful shouldn't just not be about you, it can't. Like structurally. Mercy is intrinsically about doing right by other people, we can't forget that, no matter how bad things get.
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