Just Finished Community and I Have a Lot of Thoughts

Like many others, I've been binging shows very hard while twiddling my thumbs through lockdown. My latest was Community and boy was this show the very epitome of mixed feelings. 

Here's your obligatory warning that I spoil pretty much everything. 

Alien As An Allegory For Rape Culture

I recently posted this insight I had about the Alien movies.

Just realized something about the successive themes of the Alien movies. 

Alien: sexuality and conception
Aliens: maternity
Alien 3: death and the afterlife
Alien Resurrection: rebirth

Circle of life I guess.

I thought I was being clever, but one of my friends expressed discomfort at my describing "the number one rape horror film of all time" as simply "sexuality."

We had a little back on forth about it. I tried to point out that there were sexual elements in the film that weren't restricted to the xenomorph, but as I thought about all of it put together, I realized he was right. It was more accurate to describe the film's theme as "rape and unwanted conception" rather than sexuality, which is a much broader term. Honestly, the rape allegory in this film is so much more dense than I even considered. Perhaps its my own recent education about the intricacies of rape culture that have recently come to light on a massive scale that has helped me see it.

The film opens with the characters coming out of their sleeping pods, which many have described as "coming out of the womb" given that the computer is named Mother and the humans are all almost naked. Once they get settled, they learn about an alien signal that they are compelled to follow. They find an alien ship, which depending on who you ask, is symbolic of two legs and a vagina, or two penises. I would argue that its actually both as the characters are tempted into wandering into the hole, only to get throughly shafted by two different creatures.

The rape subtext of this sequence is even stronger once you include what is happening back on the Nostromo. Ripley, a woman, is the only trying to understand the alien signal, and she deduces that its not actually an invitation, but a warning to stay away. But when she tries to alert her crewmates, Ash simply tells her there's no point. On top of that, the only member of the expedition team that says they should leave the ship is Lambert, a woman. So before any aliens show up, we have male characters misinterpreting a warning as an invitation, entering an orifice containing eggs, while the women try to tell them to stop, only to be shut down by their male coworkers. It's then that the tables get turned. Rather than a woman getting violated by an act of reproduction, it's a man, and the crew is powerless to stop the process once it's begun. Their only defense was to not go onto the ship in the first place, a window of escape that is now closed.

Let's talk about the xenomorph itself as an avatar for wonton masculinity. It's certainly not a coincidence that in it's larval form, it's very phallic shaped. As it matured into an adult, it's smooth eggplant shaped head, with an elongating proboscis that spits sticky goo everywhere, all personify men who think with only their dicks. And the best thing about the creature is that it's extremely scary. 

The middle of the story pivots away from rapists as an entity. Instead the emphasis is on the consequences of the rape, including the unwanted offspring. Obviously the crew has numerous ideas on what to do about the monster that's loose, but I think the most important voice for this discussion is that of Mother. When asked, Mother tells the crew to "insure return of organism for study" and "all other considerations secondary." It may sound all businessy and official, but the voice speaking calls back to conservative pro-lifers who maintain that fetuses must be preserved at all costs, even those conceived by rapists. 

It should be no surprise that it's that this point in the story, Ripley looses her shit. Frustrated at men who didn't heed her and an authority that won't support her, she lashes out. Ash responds by trying to shove a cylindrical object down her throat (the filmmakers seemed to have a bit of an oral fixation). What's important from this is that someone whom she thought was an ally really wasn't, and when challenged, he sprays milky white fluid all over the place. Many rape victims have commented on how difficult it is to find support from family and friends after it happens, and I suspect the sequence with Mother and Ash is meant to evoke that. 

During the climax, the film shifts back into sexual assault territory. As the crew moves to escape, Lambert encounters the alien. The creature very creepily puts its tail up between her legs, which she allows because she is too scared to do anything else. Her reluctance to do anything to defend herself, including running away, gets both her and another crewman killed. 

Once Ripley manages to get away and starts to feel safe, she starts to undress, only to find an unwelcome guest in her sleeping pod. She has to put on very thick clothes and use a weapon in order to make it clear that she wants the alien to GTFO. Finally, with the threat expunged, she returns to her sleeping pod, i.e. the safety of the womb, having learned that the world is a scary, violent place.

There are a few things about the production of the film that I find fascinating when coupled with this analysis. One, everyone on the creative team (director, producers, writers) was a man. I'm not sure how much of this symbolism was deliberate and how much was accidental, but I think the results were an insightful representation of the real life source material. Especially when you consider that the Hollywood culture at the time was a lot more mysogonist. Two, Ripley ending up the hero was a very subtle trick the writers played on the audience at the time. We know now that Sigourney Weaver is the hero of the franchise, but at the time, she was the least famous member of the cast. If you look at the first half of the film, Ripley comes off as the rules lawyering naysayer who doesn't care about anyone else. Captain Dallas, with his rogue behavior and selfless courage, fits the description of a more traditional hero. His apparent death was shocking to audiences who suddenly became uncertain who would save the day. Surprise, surprise, it was the woman who everyone should have listened to all along. 

Lastly, there are two deleted scenes that, while I agree needed to be cut, give the material some interesting richness. One is a sex scene between Dallas and Ripley. This definitely needed to come out because the last thing the film needed was to introduce consensual sex while talking about rape. The second is the famous nest scene in which we see the male crew members that the alien kidnapped being turned into eggs. I think this is meant to represent men getting co-opted by rape culture and perpetuating the cycle. It kinda begs the question on whether there is any redemption to be had for those who were going with the flow of those in power. I personally don't like to include the scene in repeat viewings, but that's purely because it clashes with the continuity of Aliens. If its added to the film in isolation, it makes the piece stronger.

Returning to my original post, I've since revised based on comments from my friend and others. 

Alien: Rape and undesired conception
Prometheus: Unwanted children
Aliens: Maternity
Alien 3: Death and the Afterlife
Alien Resurrection: Rebirth 

Of course the individual films have their own flaws and this sequence in no way removes them, but I do think it ties these films together into what the original impetus of every film has:

A lifecycle, albeit a tragic one.

The Last Jedi Didn't Break Star Wars. It Broke the Fans

"You're going to find that many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view"  -Obi-Wan Kenobi 

Sacrifice and Morals in Avengers: Infinity War

Well, Marvel has finally done it. In the first installment of their grand crossover, they've gathered the main characters from 9 of their 10 character lines, along with at least one supporting character from each one, and put them all in one movie. As icing on the cake, they even managed to hold it all together into one cohesive story.

Doctor Who Audiobooks: Where to start

A couple weeks ago, my British boss and I were talking about the BBC 4 audio player and I commented on how when I had been traveling in the U.K., I heard audiobooks playing on the radio, which is a rarity in the U.S. without special channels. My boss nodded and replied, "Just like there is nothing like a Hollywood movie, there is nothing like a British audio drama."

I mention this because if you are a Doctor Who fan who has not discovered the DW Audio dramas produced by British company, Big Finish, you are missing out. These are fully cast and scored stories with all the elements of an episode except the visuals. And like any good audio story, they do a great job of compensating for that.

Now when you visit their website, you might initially be overwhelmed by the selection and have no idea where you want to start. Fear not, I'm here to help. Here's an overview of what I think are the best spots to enter, based on my own experiences. Your choices will of course hinge on which Doctor or characters you are interested in exploring. The stories mostly add extra adventures to what we already know, but in some cases, they fill in gaping holes in the mythology that fans have long been curious about.

Marvel Saga

Now that a new Infinity War trailer has dropped and we've all had time to watch it a thousand times, I want to make a commentary on the journey taken with these films. The Marvel Cinematic Universe films have been an unprecedented endeavor and success in so many ways, but the one I really want to focus on is the long form storytelling. They have basically told an epic saga usually only seen in books and serialized television shows, only they've done it in bite sized, self-contained films. The entire films series (disregarding TV shows) follows a giant 3 act structure.

For those of you unaware, a 3 act structure is a story telling formula heavily favored by Hollywood and many other creators. If you don't know what it is, I guarantee you've seen it without knowing it. Here's how it goes.

Rising Sun Review

Sometime last year, a gaming acquaintence of mine referred me to the Kickstarter campaign for Rising Sun. I wasn't really sold on the idea of Kickstarter games. I'm very much a try-before-you-buy type guy. The only game I had contributed to at that point was the Sentinels of the Multiverse: OblivAeon campaign, which was a mostly known quantity since it was the final expansion of a game I loved. Still, out of polite curiosity, I checked out the Rising Sun game. I was not prepared for how unspeakable awesome their video was.

Concerning Lightsabers, part 2: Style and Design

As I was playing around with my Kyberlight saber, trying to find the ideal design for dueling, I came to a horrifying realization. All the possible combos follow the same general principles and are essentially different "skins" of the same weapon. Furthermore, that weapon doesn't match the sword style I was trained in. In other words, I had the wrong tool for the job.

I had noticed a varying degree of hilt design when I was shopping for a lightsaber, but I hadn't realized how important those differences are to sword style. My own indecision is what attracted me to Kyberlight in the first place, but those sabers follow a single hilt pattern, with mostly superficial differences with the various parts. Let's take a look at the structure behind Kyberlight's design.

No matter which configuration you make, every Kyberlight saber has an a handgrip located evenly between both ends, an activation switch in the upper half, and a big pommel.

My Journey Into Swordcraft

The Gift 

2017 was very troubled in the political realm, but for me, it was a period of a big change as I dived headfirst into the world of sword sports. Now, with a year of training in kendo, iaido, and a dabbling in a few others, I can say with certainty my life has charted a whole new course.

It started Christmas 2016. Trump's election was over a month behind us and everyone was pretty much past the shock. That said, I was miserable for an entirely different reason. I was struck down by food poisoning; the really bad kind that laid me up for 3 days and ended with a trip to the ER. I managed to regain enough strength by Christmas Day, but it was a rough road getting there. The one upside was I ate very little during that period, so I didn't put on any holiday weight. In fact I lost some to dehydration. 

While opening gifts, I recieved a rather unexpected one from my little sister; an umbrella with a katana handle. I was surprised but still excited at the coolness. Up until then, I had expressed very little interest in Japanese swordsmanship. I had offhandedly mentioned 'samurai' in a game of Mad Libs earlier, and played the Onimusha games in high school, but that was it. The umbrella was one of those gifts that I didn't know I really wanted. You might be thinking, "ah ha that's when you decided to take kendo" but no, not quite. That happened about a week later when New Year's rolled around. 

The katana umbrella

I always make New Years resolutions and they're often very personal and specific. Things like reading particular books, finishing projects, etc. I'd say, optimistically, I have about a 30-40% success rate on fulfilling them. Since weight loss was no longer an immediate issue, for January 2017 I resolved simply to "try more things." I felt I'd fallen into a bit of a rut of spending most of my free time on Netflix binges and video games, so I wanted to branch out a bit. As I considered what things to try, my thoughts returned to the katana umbrella. 

Nitpicky Details in The Last Jedi

This is the second part of my review of The Last Jedi. This focuses on really nitpicky details that kinda bring things down for me. Now you might be rolling your eyes and asking "why can't you just relax and enjoy the film." Well, other movies have not gotten any slack for similar issues. Everyone gave Prometheus crap because the map guy got lost. No one gave Jurassic World a pass when Bryce Dallas Howard ran away from a T-Rex in high heels. Even the iconic A New Hope has never lived down the 12 parsecs line. I do have a certain tolerance for these things. Sometimes you can let them slide, sometimes they bring down the film. In my opinion, both as a Star Wars fan and a storyteller, I can't let them all go. Not only are they numerous, but they make it seem like everyone in the film is an idiot and the only reason the plot moves at all is because someone does something stupid. Anyway, you can decide how much these things bother you. I can't most of them go because they're so inexorably linked to the plot.

The Last Jedi Is Too Terrible to be Good and Too Well Done to Be Awful

The latest installment of Star Wars juggles many themes, such as sacrifice, trust, legacy, inner turmoil, letting go of the past, and hope for the future, but I think the grander lesson can be summed up as this: screwing up someone's plan will have short term consequences, but everything will turn out alright in the end. This is reflected both in the characters' actions, and by Writer/Director Rian Johnson's decision to apparently throw out whatever plan, if any, was in place from The Force Awakens.

Many of the film's defenders describe it as bold and/or ballsy for digging into the characters' consistent failures and for scrapping any respect for their expectations. And they're right. It is bold for telling the audiences that what they were expecting to see doesn't matter to him, but those defenders don't get to take umbrage when some interpret that as a giant middle finger. The films succeeds in doing the unexpected in a familiar way, but I hesitate to give it credit for choices that weaken the narrative. For simplicity's sake, I'm saving my nitpicky Star Wars Fan criticisms for another post.

SPOILERS AHEAD.

Thor: Ragnarok 'n' Roll

One of the many pleasures of being part of a film industry group is the ability to go to screenings of current movies, and about half the time, they're ahead of the release date. Such was the case of how I got to see the highly anticipated Thor: Ragnarok this week. I can truly say it was worth the wait.

LIGHT SPOILERS AHEAD IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE TRAILERS OR NEWS

Star Trek Ascendancy w/ Expansions

My friends and I recently played a game of Star Trek Ascendancy, a game of galactic expansion and civilization development in the Trek-verse. I had just bought the new Ferengi and Cardassian expansions and we were all eager to try them. We were hoping for a 4-5 player game to get most or all of the factions in play. Alas, difficult availabilities pared our players down to the minimum 3.

It became quickly clear that everyone wanted to play the Ferengi. With the aggressive capitalism in the game, they rely on literally buying their way to victory ('Merica!)

We were on a bit of a time crunch, so I just passed out the starting turn order cards and we selected factions in that order. One of my friends got the #1 and took Ferengi. The other friend got the #2 and decided to try his hand at the Cardassians. That left me with the Federation, Klingons, Romulans. I'd played the Federation twice and already seen how the Klingons operate so I decided to go with the Romulans.

Concerning Lightsabers, Part 1: Kyberlight

About a month ago, I went with my sensei and a couple other students from my dojo to a lightsaber fight in Washington Square Park. I borrowed someone's saber and we did some lightsaber kendo for everyone. It was a good time, and despite my rather rough technique, I managed to win a bout.

Anyway, afterwards I decided to take the plunge and purchase my own dueling lightsaber. I'd been thinking about it for a while and thought, 'why not?'

What Doctor Who Fans are Waiting for from Big Finish

The Adventures of Martha and Micky

We last saw Mickey "The Idiot" Smith and his former U.N.I.T. bride, Martha Jones, in The End of Time, Part 2 where they were shown fighting a Sontaran. Martha made a reference to them recently "going freelance" which we can only infer as the couple defending the Earth on their own terms. Like most former companions, we've heard nothing from them since, but unlike most other companions, the story potential is endless. What are their lives like? Do they have day jobs? Who do they work for as freelancers? Are they Earth's new A Team? If the actors would be willing to sign on, Big Finish would have no problem pumping out a few action packed stories about this alien fighting duo.

An Open Letter to Chris Chibnall Concerning Doctor Who

Dear Mr. Chibnall,
I'm not going to mince words here, you have an uphill battle ahead of you. You've been given command of a sinking ship and asked to keep it going. This particular ship sprung a leak a while ago, but no one seems to have noticed or done anything about it, and now you're already halfway underwater.

But I want to help you. Doctor Who has weathered worse problems than this and a new Doctor is always an opportunity to win a new audience. Here's what I think you can do to get the show back to the basics that the fans know and love.

The Marvel Movies: You're Either In All the Way Or You're Out

Back in 2012, just after The Avengers came out, I was talking to a friend about it and he told me he hated the movie. He didn't understand what Thor and Loki were fighting about, he didn't get what the deal with the Tesseract was, he didn't know what was going on with Black Widow, or what SHIELD was supposed to be. When I explained that all that info was in the previous movies, he replied, "What? I have to watch other movies to understand this one? That's stupid. This movie should explain everything I need to know."

A couple years later, I was marathoning the MCU films with my step-mom's family. Cumulatively, they had seen about half of them. When we finished Iron Man 2, my aunt said, "so now we watch Iron Man 3?" I said, "No, now we watch Thor, Captain America, The Avengers, and then Iron Man 3." She was puzzled. She wanted to watch Iron Man 3 and didn't understand why we had to wait.

Earlier this year, my friends and I were making plans to go see Captain America: Civil War. Everyone was excited, but one friend asked, "I haven't seen Captain America 2, is that bad?" I was honestly astounded that he was excited enough to see it opening weekend, but hadn't bothered to see the previous one. I explained that not only did he need to see The Winter Soldier, he also needed to see Avengers: Age of Ultron and, if he had time, Ant-Man.

All these cases are people coming from the same general assumption; that each Marvel film, even the team ups, is self-contained and the only thing that matters is watching the individual character lines in the right order. That's been the Hollywood model for superhero films up to this point, but as the loyal Marvelites know, it's no longer the case. The entire Marvel line is one giant series. Each one contributes to a larger story that feeds into the next one. You wouldn't expect The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King to explain what the ring is and how it works, because that was already explained in the first film which you presumably saw. Likewise, the Marvel films will always assume you've seen the previous installments.

Where Suicide Squad Went Wrong

Warner Bros. latest entry the the DC Cinematic Universe is out and its evident that the studio still hasn't learned how to make a superhero film. 

The entry was hailed as DC's equivalent of Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy in that it would be a fun, offbeat, albeit slightly darker, story in a universe of gods and monsters. The problem is that the writers failed to develop any sense of agency in its characters and simply threw them into a blender to make a very bad tasting super-villain smoothie. Like one of those avocado vegan ones that no one likes. Here are the mistakes that knocked the film off course. 

The Fundamental Difference Between The Avengers and Age of Ultron

When Iron Man came out in 2007, it was relatively unremarkable. Several other superhero one-offs were in already in play including X-Men, Spider-Man, and Batman. Iron Man was definitely better than the average, but didn't stand out too much, except for one thing. The post credit scene gave audiences a promise: we're going somewhere with this, The Avengers are coming. Every Phase I film contributed to that goal. Each one was an opening act and The Avengers was the main event. The same cannot be said for Age of Ultron which has more in common with Iron Man 2.

Wolverine and the Terrible, No Good, Very Bad Films

Second only to The Dark Knight Trilogy and The Marvel Cinematic Universe, X-Men is among the most successful superhero film franchises of the 21st century.  The original film was among the opening lineup of what has become a very popular Hollywood genre.  That said, there have been some very noticeable missteps in some of the films and the harshest criticisms are leveled at the Wolverine spin-off films; 2009's X-Men Origins: Wolverine and 2013's The Wolverine.  At face value, this seems a contradiction.  Hugh Jackman, who plays Wolverine, has headlined all the other successful films of the series except one, so why are the films so much weaker with a different supporting cast.  Blame is thrown around to writing, direction, casting and other things, but after some research, I think I've pinpointed the root of the problem to the business management of the series by its studio, 20th Century Fox.

Guide to the Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase 1 & 2

PHASE I
Iron Man 
This is the first film and assumes as much. It very gradually introduces the audience to a superhero character before dropping the bomb of that it's only the beginning of a larger universe. 

The Incredible Hulk
This film is stylistically similar to Iron Man and expands on the "larger universe" that Iron Man promised. We get our first character with actual powers. 

Iron Man 2
This film escalates the universe and begins really putting pieces in place for The Avengers. The post credit scene sets up Thor. 

One Shot: A Funny Happened on the Way to Thor's Hammer (on the Captain America Blu Ray)
This is an optional little interlude that expands on Agent Coulson on his way to the events of Thor. 

Thor
Expands the cosmic side of universe and gives the biggest glimpse into SHIELD. It further sets up The Avengers by introducing its villain and the terrasect. 

One Shot: The Consultant (on the Thor Blu Ray)
Functions as an epilogue to Thor and explains the closing scene from Hulk and precisely when those events took place. 

Captain America: The First Avenger
Though chronologically the first of the series, it relies on Thor to make sense. The bookend scenes also take place almost immediately before The Avengers. 

The Avengers
An act one finale to the events to date. This is the climax to stories from all five previous films and sets up the future of the series. 

Why the War Doctor Was a Pointless Act of Creative Cowardice

It's been almost a year since the landmark 50th Anniversary episode of Doctor Who aired. Upon repeat viewings, the episode does still hold up, but there is one thing I now find irksome; the War Doctor really didn't need to be there. Either the 8th or 9th (preferably the former) would have functioned in that role without a massive retcon and the creation of a zero sum character. Let's look at Moffat's reasons for bringing in the 8.5th Doctor and see why they are invalid and just created more problems. 

Beginner's Guide to Classic Star Trek

Let's face the sad fact that J.J. Abrams new Star Trek films are here to stay.  While they are increasing the number of people who are aware of Star Trek and have seen the movies, most of these new people are often viciously reprimanded that they chose the wrong installment to enter Trek.  Indeed, the new films are truly dumbed down action pieces with little substance and lackluster plots.  Action was never the lure for Trekkies, it was the gravy.

Speaking personally, every time I've told someone to try to watch the older Trek, they usually express intimidation at the size of the franchise, and with 726 episodes plus 12 films, I don't blame them.  What I've done for them is pare the franchise down to absolute essentials.  Instead of watching six full series, they only watch a sampling of each of them to get gist of them.  Ideally, this is enough to hook them into watching more, but if not, they can at least counter the reprimands of the die hard trekkies with an informed decision.

Phase II Begins: Iron Man 3

The latest, and possibly final, installment of the Iron Man films is a mixed success.  On one hand, it's high action with new themes, and Stark's loveable snark is turned all the way up to 11.  Sadly, the film is overcrowded with undeveloped elements and nonsensical plot developments.  For most, it may be an improvement on Iron Man 2 since it's a true hero's struggle  from start to finish and the lessons learned are much stronger, but that doesn't excuse an unfocused story, a mish-mashed villain, and frankly, a significant disservice to the source material.

NOTE: This is a review of IM3 as a film in itself and what it bodes for the future of Marvel Cinematic Universe.  Some Spoilers ahead.

A Completionist Guide to Battlestar Galactica

Most people I know who start watching this series view it in the order of release.  Well, that's not really necessary or even beneficial.  There are prequel series, TV movies, and web series that are scattered throughout the series run and only rarely appear in the proper order with the main series.  Now, after careful analysis, I've determined that a chronological viewing is equally, if not more, acceptable as the release.    

Caprica: (all episodes)
Movie: Blood & Chrome (available on DVD/Blu Ray or digital download)
Webisodes: Razor Minisodes (available on Razor DVD)
Season 1: (all episodes)
Season 2: Scattered - The Captain's Hand
Season 4 Movie: Razor
Season 2: Downloaded - Lay Down Your Burdens
Webisodes: The Resistance (available on DVDs and online)
Season 3: (all episodes)
Season 4: He That Believeth in Me - Sometimes a Great Notion
Webisodes: Face of the Enemy (only available online)
Season 4: A Disquiet Follows My Soul - No Exit
Movie: The Plan
Season 4: Deadlock - Daybreak

If you're planning to enter the Battlestar saga for the first time, I suggest you follow the order I've laid out and tell me what you think.  Caprica and the first two web series are optional, but recommended.  It's also all or nothing.  If you skip Caprica, then jump straight to Battlestar Galactica season 1.  Neither Blood & Chrome nor the Razor Minisodes function very well as introductory material.  

If you're familiar with BSG and are planning to introduce someone to it, read on and I'll outline my reasons for this order.