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The Great Wall

Once upon a time, a meteor crashed into the mountains of China, unleashing a horde of monsters who will get the munchies and descend upon the people of China every sixty years. And the only thing standing between China and the monsters is Matt Damon and his very square jaw.

Or so the movie poster for The Great Wall would have one believe. I mean, look at it. It’s Damon’s big head versus, well, everything.

Despite the poster, The Great Wall isn’t white washing per say. Damon is the superfluous Westerner, thrown in to milk extra millions from Hollywood studio execs who think a movie won’t do well without an American A-lister. But the bigger problem is that Damon is horribly miscast. As a gee-whiz, (more…)

Could Jar Jar Have Been Less Jarring?

Came across this article about the actor who play Jar Jar Binks. Gotta pity the poor guy who played Jar Jar. At least, unlike Hayden Christensen, nobody actually saw his face. In fact, until I read this article, I didn’t know the name of the actor who played Jar Jar.

In the article’s comments, there’s some discussion regarding what would have made Jar Jar a good addition to the Star Wars universe, instead of something reviled. One suggestion being that like the aliens in previous films, Jar Jar not speak English.

Maybe, but the issue goes beyond linguistics. The problem with Jar Jar, as I see it, is that he’s used for over-the-top, kiddy-friendly, comic relief and is tonally a bad fit. Star Wars was obviously geared toward a younger crowd, but young doesn’t mean preschool or elementary. In fact, I remember, as a child, finding some aspects of the Star Wars (New Hope, et al.) films rather scary. The crispy bodies of Luke’s aunt and uncle, for instance. Or the severed arm in the cantina. Nowadays, I’m a total gorehound, but back then, when I was a delicate little flower, that was some frightening shit.

Star Wars tone is lightened by the antics of C3PO and R2, and sometimes, Chewie, but the humor never (rarely?) gets infantile. Jar Jar’s idiocy, obviously geared for paste-eating demographic, drops like a ton of silly bricks on a serious story line. I mean, the prequels are the tragic downfall of Anakin Skywalker, the kind of plot that demands drama, not the SF equivalent of the Three Stooges.

Adding insult to injury, Jar Jar’s entire species is treated as a joke, rather than a living, breathing culture. Basically, you’ve got the addition of a character and his people whose sole purpose is to make the preschool set happy and distract from all the war n’ schtuff.

Could the character still have retained the funny and been a good fit? Sure, if the humor was derived from smart, snappy dialogue rather than slapstick gags.

Ultimately, George Lucas was so busy making the world of the Star Wars prequels absolutely beautiful, that he forgot to populate it with actual people. Jar Jar Binks is pretty much a feature, not a bug, of the prequels.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

So…Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

Saw it. And…

Liked it.

Whaat? I do like things–sometimes*. Yeah, I hated Jurassic World, a movie universally loved by people of questionable taste everywhere. I mean, seriously, people? Did we see the same crap fest of bad CGI, uneven (read: “adolescent”) plotting, and horrible characterization? Jurassic World was the “Let’s serve up a shit sandwich and see if the audience will eat it” kind of movie you’d expect from Michael Bay. Except, he didn’t direct it. (Or did he? Me, I suspect he stealth directed the fuck out of it.)

But, I digress…back to Star Wars: The Force Awakens. It’s fun, fast-paced and exciting. Kinda fluffy and fun, in the same vein as the original trilogy. Back to the basics with a simplistic depiction of good vs. evil, and archetype-driven characterization (the loveable rogue, the reluctant hero, the orphan with a destiny, etc.). It even recycles the “droid is the McGuffin” plot. Back too is the “Scruffy, rag-tag rebels versus the mighty war machine” conflict.

With that comes (more…)

Guardians of the Galaxy

On watching Guardians of the Galaxy, two things become quite evident. First, Thanos should hire better minions, or he needs to get his bad-ass, mad Titan self off the throne and fetch his magical McGuffins o’power all by himself. Because the hired help, thus far, in Marvel movie ‘verse, just aren’t working out.

Also, if it weren’t for daddy issues, nothing–good or bad–in the universe would get done.

Of course, if it weren’t for dead mothers, no hero would ever get motivated. Consequently, the first scene in Guardians shows a young Peter Quill, eventual Starlord, sitting outside a hospital room, listening to that awkward predecessor to playlists, the mixed tape. His grandfather appears and ushers him into a room where a deathly pale woman lies in bed. Before getting down to dying, Mom rambles about the boy’s father, using the word “angel,” so that you know young Quill is something special.

Mom lifts a trembling hand toward the lad and (more…)

The Lone Ranger (2013)

“Well. That was a hot mess,” says my husband as The Lone Ranger‘s credits crawl up a scene of Monument Valley, a dispirited Tonto limping off into the sunset.

The statement is significant, in that my spouse, unlike me, is generally kind to movies. Me, I love excoriating a bad movie, detailing its sins against plot, characterization, cinematography, etc. But the hubs usually just shrugs and says, “It wasn’t good, but there were some funny parts.”

To say The Lone Ranger is a hot mess is to disparage steaming piles of poop everywhere.  After all, certain types of excrement make good fertilizer. Not so, The Lone Ranger.

Possibly taking a page from (more…)

It’s Alive

Been AWOL, busy, making like a hippy (growing my hair). And creating art.

Por ejemplo, this little demon, a collaboration between myself and my talented spouse. Little demon haz the sad, so he brings rose.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Also making jewelery* from scrap metal. This pendant’s my fave.

 

*”jewelery?” Seriously? Wow. Hooked on Phonics really worked for me.

Don’t Know Much About Geology

In which I try to teach the greyhound geology.

The lesson is precipitated by our new granite countertops and because I have nothing better to do (other than laundry, yard work, writing, taxes, etc.).

I’m in the kitchen, having a healthy snack of baby carrots and the greyhound is watching in that bright-eyed, super intelligent way that dogs have been watching humans with food since the dawn of time. I crunch a carrot, chew, swallow and consider the hound.

“See this?” I point at a reddish smudge on the counter. The greyhound, a very tall dog, shoves his skinny nose where I’m pointing. “That’s garnet. My birthstone. Can you say, ‘garnet?'”

Finding no food where I’ve indicated, he flares his ears out like a bat and stares at me in a way that says, “Carrot!”

“No, not ‘carrot.’ ‘Garnet.'”

“Carrot?”

I try again, finger on a black streak. “This here is biotite, a mica. Can you say, ‘biotite?'” ‘Mica?'”

“Carrot!”

Because I’m stupid that way, I try with feldspar and quartz. I go back to garnet, because it sounds like carrot.

“Carrot?”

I give the hound the damned carrot.

 

Horse Eats Hound

Yes, the vacuum is running.

And, no, the greyhound isn’t budging from his spot on the carpet.

In fact, his head is up is because he saw me with the camera and wondered what was going on.  In the absence of the camera, the end result would have been a roughly greyhound-shaped dirty spot on the carpet.

He also does this with the lawn mower, so he isn’t allowed outside when I’m cutting the grass.

On the other hand, he’s wary to wet-himself-afraid of nearly everything with a heartbeat. Even rabbits, yes rabbits.

Of course, Wonder Horse was quick to exploit the hound’s neurosis.

Once upon a time, before heading out for a mid-afternoon walk, the hound and I would stop by the barn to visit the horse. I’d bring along carrots for both critters. We’d meet the horse at the gate and there I’d give a carrot to the equine and one to the canine, then another to the equine, and so on.  The greyhound would eye the horse very warily, but tempted by the carrots, stay at my side.

Then one day, the horse, in one of his Professor Snottypants moods, banged his hoof on the metal gate, making a delightful racket. The hound leaped back, startled. At this point, you could see the wheels turning in the Wonder Horse’s brain. After a pause, he banged again. Dog leaped in the air, and strained on his leash, trying to get as far from the horse as possible. Horse smirked and banged again. And thus was the demise of carrot sharing at the gate.

To this day, when the horse sees the hound approaching, he lifts a foot, poised to start hammering on the gate. I have to drag the hound, his long legs braced and feet sliding through the sand, to get anywhere near the barn.

The hound, the predator, is deathly afraid of the horse, the prey animal.

Horse Sketches and Fictional Workplace Hijinks

I start off with a plan. “I will practice drawing people today. Because I still can’t draw people. I will not draw horses. Because horses are easy to draw. Seriously, no horses!”

Five minutes later, and I’ve got this. Four quick horse sketches. Because I can’t stop myself. I’ve been drawing horses since I could hold a pencil. People are hard to draw, with their weird round heads and walking on two legs.

Anyway, I’m making this a sketchbook dump Friday and excerpt Friday. Technically, the sequel to The Music of Chaos is about 90-percent done. First draft, anyway. I got stuck on a scene at the end, and then wandered off to two other projects. The problem is, I got two author voices–Hello, Sybil!–the snarky, first person, Mary Sue-ish voice of The Music of Chaos and the third person voice that I use elsewhere. The second voice has been in control lately.

In this bit of dialogue from Chapter One, Hallowbone Holiday (working title), Regan O’Connell leaves work, the day job, early…. (more…)

Things that Go Beep in the Night

It all started with a beep.

At 3 AM in the morning.

Remember that episode of Friends where Phoebe’s fire alarm keeps beeping? She unplugs it, takes out its battery, beats it with a shoe, and then throws it in the trash, but it keeps beeping.

Yeah, it was like that.

Beep! Then blessed silence. Just as I start to doze off again, “Beep!” Like the flipping Roadrunner, but without Wile. E. Coyote and his army of ACME toys. (Roadrunners, btw, don’t beep; they don’t eat seed–they eat cute little bunnies; and coyotes don’t fuck with them because they’re mean.)

After about a half hour of this, my husband growls and staggers out of bed and into the living room. He returns a minute later and flops back in bed. On the floor, the greyhound stretches his long legs, claws scratching on the bed, sighs and goes back to sleep.

Beep!

“Fucking alarms,” says my husband after the fifth beep. He gets up again and turns on a fan to block the noise.

Beep!

“I hate the (more…)