tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-60535310386239525052024-02-19T07:39:29.190-06:00Aaron's LogAaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.comBlogger205125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-36674633957748466592016-11-08T18:00:00.001-06:002016-11-08T18:00:30.717-06:00I'm starting a new blogThis blog is ending now. I'm starting up a new one today. <a href="http://aaron-89.blogspot.com/">Link here.</a><br />
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I wanted to wipe the slate clean and start completely fresh, for a lot of reasons. The new blog is probably going to be a lot more personal and less geeky, so follow me over there if you'd like more of that.<br />
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Thanks for reading this far, guys.Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-27619066143510655522016-05-06T00:10:00.003-05:002016-05-06T00:10:47.789-05:00No moreI saw <i>Captain America: Civil War </i>tonight. In short, it was fantastic, and totally made up for everything <i>Batman v Superman</i> did wrong. In fact, it's almost literally the same movie, but with every mistake reversed and turned into something amazing.<br />
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It's weird: I've been looking forward to this movie for a long, long time. Not Star Wars Episode VII-long, but a while. And while I really enjoyed the movie, the moviegoing experience overall wasn't too great.<br />
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I ended up going to the movie by myself. I've gone to movies alone plenty of times before, but this was the first time I've been to a midnight showing (7PM, but still, "first showing") without anyone else. I didn't plan it that way. I asked a few friends, but either they couldn't, had already made plans with other friends, or just didn't want to. I put up a facebook post earlier in the week inviting anyone and everyone to come with me. I got tons of responses from people wanting to talk about the movie, but no one who said they wanted to come, and no one showed up.<br />
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While I waited in the theater for the 2.5-ish hours til the movie started, I looked around. A family was on my left. A group of twentysomethings sat on the floor a level below me and played Zelda Monopoly. Another family was on my right. There was one teenager sitting above me that was by himself. We ended up talking for a half hour about comics and video games. Then some of his friends showed up and he moved across the room to sit with them. A couple took his place. For two hours, I was the only person without anyone to talk to. I sat there and thought:<i> this isn't fun</i>. I hadn't even considered the idea that I'd be miserable by myself because I'd never really been in that situation before. And it's not something I ever want to relive.<br />
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Maybe it wouldn't hurt so much if not for the fact that I've seen every Captain America and Avengers movie with Andrew and Elisabeth. In that exact same room, first showing every time. But this time I sat there and had to deal with the fact that even if and when I reached out to people, I got nothing back.<br />
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I don't want this anymore.Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-89351619731436237982016-02-15T01:21:00.000-06:002016-02-15T01:23:04.386-06:00Deadpool ♥This Valentine's Day, I went to see Deadpool by myself. Popcorn and soda in hand.<br />
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It was pretty great.</div>
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Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-72139987397756537832015-12-22T23:50:00.001-06:002015-12-22T23:50:24.205-06:00Star Wars: A New Hope - A Comic AdaptationI went to a Christmas party tonight that had a white elephant gift exchange with a $2 limit. I decided to buy a $1 Star Wars notebook and draw my own comic adaptation of the original <i>Star Wars</i>. This is what I made.<br />
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Oh, uh, spoilers for <i>Star Wars</i> from 1977, I guess....<br />
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Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-73981870649222673622015-09-26T00:42:00.001-05:002015-09-26T00:44:33.864-05:00Have Courage and Be Kind<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I watched Cinderella (the 2015 live-action movie) for the second time tonight, now that it's out on blu-ray.<br />
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It's so good.<br />
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Something that's been lost from pop culture in recent years (or perhaps just ignored) is the unrelenting goodness and joy of modern fairy tales. Watch classic Disney movies and you get a neverending message of optimism: no matter how dark life becomes, there will always be a door to the light.<br />
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Most fairy tales made today are fraught with the grime of "realism;" the insistence that fiction, fairy tale or not, must reflect real life, not aspire to be better than it. Realistically, this has always been the case. Cynicism is not a new invention. But Disney films in the past always carried a more optimistic outlook. Snow White is revived by a magic kiss; Pinocchio is made into a real boy by the Blue Fairy; Cinderella's fairy godmother turns a pumpkin into a stagecoach. Today, even Disney films have somewhat changed sides. In <i>Frozen</i>, Princess Anna is repeatedly told that she shouldn't decide to marry Prince Hans after only having just met him. This is, of course, perfectly valid and wise advice. <i>Frozen</i> puts familial love on a pedestal above romantic love-at-first-sight. Its messaging is a bit too precisely worded, however, to be anything other than a direct (if gentle) response of disagreement to Disney films past.<br />
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The 2015 live-action <i>Cinderella</i>, however, has a response of its own. In the new film, Cinderella is said to see the world "not always as it [is], but perhaps as it could be—with just a little bit of magic." One of the songs from the animated <i>Cinderella</i> (which also appears during the end credits of the new film) says, "no matter how your heart is grieving / if you keep on believing / the dream that you wish will come true." The new <i>Cinderella</i> continues a now-ongoing dialogue:<br />
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<i>Cinderella (1950):</i> If you keep on believing, the dream that you wish will come true.<br />
<i>Frozen:</i> You can't marry a man you just met. (because he's probably evil)<br />
<i>Cinderella (2015):</i> See the world not as it is, but as it could be—with just a little bit of magic.<br />
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That "little bit of magic" referenced is probably the deciding factor: to believe that the world is exactly as we see it with our eyes, or whether we choose to believe that there's something more at work.<br />
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Just to cover my argument bases, I'm not saying Anna should have married Prince Hans in <i>Frozen</i>. But <i>Frozen</i> also exists in a world completely unlike that of <i>Cinderella</i>. Anna is a princess who Hans only wants for her royal status; the prince in <i>Cinderella</i> wants to be with Cinderella even if it means giving up the advantages of marrying royalty. The situation is almost completely reversed. But the point stands that miracles don't happen on a daily basis, and good things rarely fall into place quickly and easily. Even Cinderella has to endure years of mistreatment by her stepmother and stepsisters before things turn around. So what does one do in a world that often seems to contradict hope in the unseen? Once again, Cinderella has an answer: "have courage and be kind."<br />
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(If you caught my there-will-always-be-a-door-to-light reference, you are wonderful)Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-10480702591349040132015-09-20T00:26:00.001-05:002015-09-20T00:27:31.229-05:00I Name All My Cats After...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMMZZB82TyVP1p4-5SlvJsJMrOzcfuZGQkRT2Oa7JCf3XysOoXPiUmxZa6rGRDWLAabbAoOkHMzHnzQHqbmqo_JV-IQpVCBs5VDtF-Ll0aF2Cp7ngPdtGKvFA6UO9V5AtOA5bDHvu1gEY/s1600/tumblr_ngftps9y6X1qcl4bso1_500.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img adlesse_been_here="true" border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMMZZB82TyVP1p4-5SlvJsJMrOzcfuZGQkRT2Oa7JCf3XysOoXPiUmxZa6rGRDWLAabbAoOkHMzHnzQHqbmqo_JV-IQpVCBs5VDtF-Ll0aF2Cp7ngPdtGKvFA6UO9V5AtOA5bDHvu1gEY/s400/tumblr_ngftps9y6X1qcl4bso1_500.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
This morning I was at Barnes & Noble, browsing their collection of anime merch. They've really expanded their collectibles department; it's slowly taking over the store. I approve. I came across a little plush figure of Luna, Sailor Moon's mentor/pet cat.<br />
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Can't seem to find a very good picture of the specific plush I found, but it's basically perfect.<br />
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It stands on its own four legs, is well-detailed, etc. I saw it and immediately thought of Rachel, the biggest Sailor Moon fan I know. I mentally bookmarked the plush and decided to buy it for her sometime in the future.<br />
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Later in the evening at the regular Saturday night families get-together dealie, Rachel gave me a couple of neat Zelda phone straps that she'd randomly ended up with. They're pretty cool, especially this one:<br />
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It's from <i>The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap</i>, where Link shrinks down and meets the tiny Minish people.<br />
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So basically, the little figure is a life-size Minish. I am pleased. Also, he matches my Club Nintendo exclusive Zelda 3DS bag.<br />
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So after randomly getting a geek gift from Rachel, I thought, "...hmm. I think I need to go back to Barnes & Noble and get that Luna."<br />
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So I drove to Barnes & Noble and bought the Luna. While I was checking out, my cashier said, "what is that cat's name? Luna?"<br />
I was surprised. This lady was in her mid-50s, very bookish-type, with a reasonably thick country accent.<br />
"Yeah," I said, "it's Luna."<br />
She nodded. "I have a cat named Luna."<br />
"Really," I said, "did you name her because of Sailor Moon?"<br />
"No," she shook her head. "I name all my cats after astronomical bodies."<br />
I had to fight the urge to actually laugh. "Wow," I said.<br />
"Yeah, I have Comet, and Jupiter, and I ran out of planets with all the other cats, so she had to be the moon."<br />
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So that happened and it was awesome. Rachel liked her plushie cat.<br />
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Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-16404070072331098622015-07-24T01:00:00.002-05:002015-07-24T01:08:08.409-05:00Home Alone: Wandering LostI've had the house all to myself for the last week while my mom's on vacation in the Colorado Rockies. It's been kind of a weird experience.<br />
<br />
On one hand, it's been nice, having complete control over my own home life. Since my mom is a light sleeper and her room is right next to the living room, the kitchen, the laundry room, and the garage—the front door is also in earshot. To keep from waking her up, I pretty much have to keep to my own side of the house after she goes to bed (between 9 and 10pm on weekdays). No cooking, no watching TV in the living room, no doing laundry, and generally no leaving the house through the front door or garage. Also, when she's home on weekends, she basically parks on the couch or in the kitchen, meaning that I can't be in the main area of the house unless I want to watch QVC, the Bachelor, or NCIS with her—which, surprise surprise, I never want to do. Another thing: my mattress is horrendous. Seriously, it gives me back problems and ensures that I pretty much never sleep well. My mom's mattress, on the other hand, is pretty great. So yeah, having the house to myself is nice: I can watch Netflix in the living room whenever I want, do laundry at 10pm, cook a pizza at midnight, sleep in a bed that actually lets me sleep, et cetera.<br />
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On the flipside, though not exactly a negative, is the fact that I'm in charge of taking care of the house. I'm the one who has to feed and watch the cats (we have two cats now), I'm the one who does all the household chores, and I'm the one who decides what to spend grocery money on. It's responsibility, and it's not a bad thing. It's just different. I do wish I didn't have to take care of the cats—they're still rambunctious kittens but big enough to cause problems—because juggling them can be a hassle. But whatever. At least I'm not technically 100% alone in here.<br />
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That's the other thing. Being alone in the house is weird. I don't actually feel any more lonely than I usually do—though I sort of always feel lonely so maybe I've already hit terminal loneliness velocity—but it is weird to actually be the only one around. Normally if I'm at home and feel lonely, I feel like a victim of my circumstances. But when the house is empty and I'm the one in charge, so to speak, it feels like the responsibility for my loneliness rests with me. That it's my job to make social interaction happen rather than sitting alone at home.<br />
<br />
So I see if any friends want to hang out. I don't ask that many people, because honestly I don't know that many people anymore that I can just call up and ask. Daniel is/was my only real go-to friend, though he's gonna be leaving for college in a month or so. I wonder what I'm gonna do then? Andrew is out of state at the moment, and we don't get to hang out much anyway. Sarah and Zach are gonna be leaving soon, but even they are kind of absent/busy a lot now anyway. Elisabeth and I aren't really friends anymore. I don't really know what to do, but I figure that I need to be making new friends by getting "out" into the world. On that note...<br />
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I went to Barnes and Noble earlier tonight to read some comics. I planned on reading some Batman, but ended up discovering this indie graphic novel called <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Sculptor-Scott-McCloud/dp/1596435739"><i>The Sculptor</i></a>.<br />
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It's a super-thick (500 pages) one-off along the lines of <i><a href="http://amzn.com/1891830430">Blankets</a></i>. It's about a 26-year-old artist named David whose life is a terrible trainwreck: his family members have all died tragically, his few friendships are complicated, and his huge artistic potential is buried under layers upon layers of depression. I found it a little uncomfortable how much I felt like I could relate. David ends up meeting Death himself, and makes a deal: David will only live for another 200 days, but he can sculpt literally any material however he wants, making his sculptures essentially only limited by his imagination. Over those 200 days he learns about life and has an epic ton of drama. The sculpting superpower angle is actually one of the least important aspects of the story; it's really just about a man trying to figure out his life and what he wants out of it in the remaining 200 days he has left.<br />
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While I was reading, there were some 18-year-olds sitting next to me having fun, mostly trading opinions on books, movies based on books, each others' original writing, etc. I talked with them a little. I think they were the kind of people I might've been friends with if I'd been in their social circle (and maybe a little younger). It made me miss having friends like that to hang out with. But on the flipside, I caught one little exchange between them that I found interesting. Toward the end of the night, one of them said, "we have to promise each other that after I go to UNT, we'll get together someday and have lunch or something." The other two nodded and agreed. But the implication was that this group wouldn't be together for much longer. I'd spent a good portion of the night sitting next to them wishing that I still had friends like these three had each other—and yet even this group was soon going to break apart.<br />
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And I don't really know what lesson I should take from that. That nothing lasts forever? That it's always best to keep moving forward instead of holding onto people from the past?<br />
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If I had to guess, I'd say that I haven't been looking for friends lately so much as a family—the kind of people who <i>won't</i> go away, no matter what. Of course, then again, half of my family died in my teens anyway, so maybe even family isn't that permanent. But it should be, right? I don't want to be demanding, or to expect the impossible. Just as long as I don't have to sit inside the house by myself anymore.<br />
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BONUS ROUND:<br />
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As I decided on a title for this blog post ("Home Alone"—look at me, everybody, I'm clever...), I fell across the words "lost" and "wandering" (no doubt because of <i>Home Alone 2: Lost in New York</i>), and the Tolkien part of my brain remembered the line "not all who wander are lost." I googled it to remember the full context, and realized that it's actually part of a larger poem that refers to Aragorn and his destiny:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
All that is gold does not glitter,<br />
Not all those who wander are lost;<br />
The old that is strong does not wither,<br />
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.<br />
From the ashes a fire shall be woken,<br />
A light from the shadows shall spring;<br />
Renewed shall be blade that was broken,<br />
The crownless again shall be king</blockquote>
Well. Isn't that nice.Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-65742295314001485272015-04-30T13:00:00.003-05:002015-10-22T18:34:13.989-05:00Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Back in 2013, Man of Steel came out, and I was pretty excited about it. <a href="http://aarons-log.blogspot.com/2013/06/six-days-and-counting.html">You may have noticed</a>. Even when there were some pretty heavy criticisms of the movie, <a href="http://aarons-log.blogspot.com/2013/06/steel-criticism.html">I defended it</a>. When the Batman/Superman movie was announced, <a href="http://aarons-log.blogspot.com/2013/07/supermanbatman-movie.html">I was pretty ecstatic</a>.<br />
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And now we have the first trailer:<br />
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And I hate it.<br />
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In the last couple years, I've watched Man of Steel maybe five or six times. Every single time I've seen it, I've liked it less and less. Now I can barely watch it at all; it grates on me to a point where I just don't enjoy any of it.<br />
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Here's the thing: <i>Man of Steel</i> is not a Superman movie. It's a movie that has Superman <i>in it</i>, but it's not a Superman story. It's an alien invasion movie, along the lines of <i>Independence Day</i> or <i>Transformers</i>, but way more serious and less fun.<br />
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Seriously, let's cross-examine <i>Man of Steel</i>'s plot with the plot of the Transformers movies:<br />
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<i>Man of Steel</i>, and, from what's shown in the trailer, <i>Batman v. Superman</i>, essentially give us a morally gray universe and story. One where Superman isn't so much a hero as a powerful being, perhaps trying to do good, but in many ways seemingly failing.<br />
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And here's the thing: if Superman were real, in our world, these kinds of controversies absolutely would happen. It's a reasonably realistic view of the way things would work. But that runs contradictory to everything that Superman is.<br />
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Superman is a character made to challenge our views of what is possible or realistic. Not simply because he has superhuman powers, but because he dares to make a difference. In the 1930s, when Superman was created, problems like political corruption, economic devastation, and rampant crime were huge issues in the United States—far worse than today. Superman took those issues head-on. He helped save citizens whose apartments were literally falling apart above their heads. He stood in the path of gang violence. He shone a light upon corruption, and forced politicians to take personal responsibility for their actions. Even problems like domestic abuse weren't off the table.<br />
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It's been said (and rightly so) that at their core, superhero stories are adolescent power fantasies. That sounds juvenile and wrong, but it's a good thing at its core. It could be translated as, "what if I had the ability to fix society's problems and make the world a better place?" It's the idea that every young person has in his or her head, but most somehow lose in adulthood as the status quo of cynicism sets in.<br />
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And of course, that's the trick: we <i>do</i> have the power to change things; we only think we don't. We assume the world is broken in ways that can never be fixed, and we therefore don't even try. Every single problem that Superman faced in those early years is something that we can fix ourselves, as long as we're willing to try. Throughout his entire history, Superman has always encouraged others to do what they can to help in their own way, no matter how small. Superman himself—when written correctly—thinks of himself just like anyone else. At his core, he's "just a guy."<br />
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I've quoted this before, but I think it's poignant so I'll quote it again. Mark Waid, one of the greatest comics writers of all time—and one who claims to have read literally every Superman story ever written—once said this:<br />
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<i>"Here is a guy with the power of a god, someone who can rule the world starting today if he desires. Who can have anything his heart longs for and get away with positively any deed imaginable, all without one single threat of reprisal. But with the totality of time and space subject to his slightest whim... he chooses only to help others. That is Superman's greatest power. When presented with the opportunity, he takes action to make things better — and that's a power that lies within us all."</i><br />
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Superman isn't a story about a powerful alien bringing simultaneous destruction and salvation upon mankind, nor is it a story of humanity's moral grayness. It's a story about making a difference; about improving our world through nothing more than our belief in what's right and our will to carry it out.<br />
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Ironically, there's something about the story seen in the <i>Batman v. Superman</i> trailer that I think perfectly captures my overall point. The world, as seen in the Man of Steel universe, is unaccepting of the idea that Superman is "just a guy" trying to do the right thing; they can only see him as a savior/destroyer. <i>Man of Steel</i> is the story of a world unwilling to let Superman be what he is. In <i>Man of Steel</i>, Superman never wanted the Kryptonians to attack Metropolis, and he was never directly responsible for any innocent deaths himself. He didn't want to kill Zod, and the fact that he was forced to practically broke him. And now in <i>BvS</i>, he's put on a pedestal that he undoubtedly never asked for. Like I said in the beginning, <i>Man of Steel</i> has Superman in it, but it's not a Superman movie. It's not a story of hope, or of positive change. It's a story of destruction, with a world angry at and afraid of an alien invader despite his best efforts. Batman, apparently, represents the voice of an angry humanity, ready to tear Superman down out of the sky.<br />
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Warner Bros. (and perhaps DC Comics in general) seem unwilling to actually let Superman be Superman in the way that he should be. Instead of meaningful stories of hope and "what might be," we're given darkly self-reflective stories that show humanity mired in its own fear.<br />
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If there is any hope in <i>Batman v. Superman</i>, however, it's that we know there's a battle. This is a chance for Superman to stand his ground and make a statement; to put his foot down and say "this is who I am; deal with it." And maybe when the dust clears, we'll have a story that proclaims "this is Superman." We'll have to see.Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-7498116874379631812015-01-11T23:15:00.002-06:002015-01-11T23:15:49.396-06:00Christmas Vacation 2014So my mom and I drove out to Green Bay to visit family for Christmas again. To be technical, it was the week <i>after</i> Christmas, so more like New Years with a side of late Christmas.<br />
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Leaving Haslet.<br />
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Mom didn't know I took this, but if she did she'd be very upset.<br />
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Just inside Oklahoma.<br />
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Oklahoma has these cool rock walls from where the roads were cut into the hills.<br />
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Eventually it started snowing. We didn't know it at the time, but despite the fact that we were headed to Green Bay, this was the most snow we'd see the whole trip.<br />
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This is the 2nd-story back porch view from my Aunt/Uncle/cousins' house. You can kind of tell in the below photo that the bay is frozen over.<br />
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The basement is pretty cool.<br />
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And these are my cousins. Left-to-right: Rhiannon (Rio) (15), Sierra (19), Colin (17), and Celine (20).<br />
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They got a new kitten. He apparently liked my leg.<br />
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Celine also got a chameleon recently. I persuaded her to name him Pascal after the chameleon from Tangled.<br />
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Rio watching Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.<br />
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Even super nice/fancy restaurants in Green Bay have Packers logos on their cups.<br />
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My uncle Mike and Sierra completely <strike>dead</strike> asleep.<br />
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I played a bunch of X-Wing Miniatures with Uncle Mike. As you might imagine, it's a strategy game using miniatures. Uncle Mike really really likes strategy games, so he got really intense with it.<br />
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Celine with the cat.<br />
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Celine and Sierra after a long day.<br />
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Everybody watching Oculus. Which I did not finish because stressful.<br />
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I guess in hindsight Celine was on her phone a lot.</div>
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There actually wasn't a whole lot that went on during this trip. Most everyone was busy doing their own thing, so I spent most of my time alone playing video games at the house. Not that I'm complaining, exactly. I wasn't sad/angry/disappointed. It just kinda turned out to be a "pretty decent" trip rather than the usual "that was awesome" trip it usually is. Maybe if we'd actually been there on Christmas day it would have been better. I dunno.</div>
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Probably not, actually, because most of my cousins are getting older now. Celine and Sierra are both adults, with their own lives. College, working, driving places, seeing friends, et cetera. It's not that they didn't want to spend time with us while we were there, it's just that they have lives now. I kinda always figured it would happen, and I sort of figured I'd be more sad about it when it did. But I think it almost feels normal, really.</div>
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On the way back down to Texas, my mom asked me if there was anything I still wanted to do or anywhere I wanted to go. I said the only place I really wanted to go to was Metropolis, Illinois, a tiny town that's famous as "the home of Superman." Stephanie went there on a road trip earlier in 2014, so it was sort of fresh on my mind. But it was way out of our way, so it wasn't really an option.</div>
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When I got home, I found a Christmas present package from Stephanie. Inside was a deck of playing cards and some green rock candy... from Metropolis, Illinois.</div>
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I can't even explain how awesome that was. It was like finding a piece of a dream in reality. Also, the timing was just too perfect.<br />
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So yeah. That was my trip. Pretty uneventful, but nice. Sorry it took me a week to post this, but I've been out of the blogging habit. Oh well. Hopefully that will change.Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-73217247619595688872015-01-06T03:04:00.002-06:002015-01-06T03:04:22.640-06:00This is the way the year endsSo the last few weeks have been pretty interesting for me. Not interesting as in important, just a bunch of neat stuff that I'd like to go over in blog form this week. More detailed posts will come later, but for now I'll just summarize.<br />
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First of all, I went on Christmas vacation. Sort of. It was the week after Christmas. But it still counts, right? My mom and I drove up to Green Bay yet again to visit family. I'll do up a full post with images and details later.<br />
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While on said vacation, I discovered the American-made CG anime series <i>RWBY</i> (Pronounced "Ruby"). It's officially one of my favorite new shows.<br />
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Lastly, after combining the powers of several gift cards, I bought a Wii U console. It's pretty epic.<br />
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So yeah. More to come on all that later.<br />
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*Note: this blog post's title is not, in fact, a reference to T.S. Eliot, but rather the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9Ezd2FqxAU&spfreload=10">Halo 3 announcement trailer</a>.<br />
<br />Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-87618694356809817832014-10-23T01:01:00.000-05:002014-10-23T01:01:33.080-05:00Fall TVAt this point, the TV season has returned in full. These are the shows I'm watching and what I think about them so far this season.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Returning Shows</span></b><br />
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<b>Agents of SHIELD</b><br />
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It's... good. I can't say I'm terribly excited to see it every week, but it's enjoyable enough that I keep going back to it. It's unfortunate that the first season was so bland that most discussion about the show now consists of "well, it's better than the first season" and "I think the show is good now."<br />
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<b>Arrow</b><br />
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It's three episodes into season 3 as of tonight and it's really good. Arrow has been doing a great job of walking a comfortable line between silly fun and legitimately good drama, having an over-the-top comic book fight scene one minute (motorcycle archery duel!) and then killing off a main character the next. Whether it's to just have fun or to see where the story's going next, I'm always looking forward to Arrow.<br />
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<b>The 100</b><br />
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The 100 started off last season almost as "Lost with teenagers," but it quickly ended up being "Lost and Battlestar Galactica, with all the drama of both." Honestly, it's almost shocking how good the show is. It's not very uplifting, per se, but it's certainly gripping.<br />
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<b>The Legend of Korra</b><br />
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This is the last season for Korra, and although it's sad to see it go, these last episodes are among the best.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">New Shows</span></b><br />
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<b>Gotham</b><br />
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I didn't expect to like Gotham as much as I do. That said, I still have a lot of problems with the show, largely because of the premise.<br />
Gotham is really two stories: one focused on Jim Gordon working his way through the corrupt GCPD system, and the other being a neverending series of winks and nods toward the proper Batman storyline. "Oh look, here's Poison Ivy/The Riddler/Catwoman/The Penguin when they were younger." "Oh look, here's ten-year-old Bruce Wayne being weird."<br />
I like the Jim Gordon stuff, but the simple fact is that you really can't "set up" the Gotham super-villains before they're actually supposed to be super-villains. It's almost getting into Smallville territory, where every character had shown up and been important before the main hero ever put on the suit.<br />
So... it's good, I just have reservations about it.<br />
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<b>The Flash</b><br />
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This. Show. Is. AWESOME.<br />
Seriously, this is so much fun it's ridiculous. Unlike Gotham, Smallville, and most other modern live-action comic book shows out there, The Flash doesn't hold back on what it's doing. This is a straight-up SUPERHERO show, with no comic book character off-limits. Arrow has been doing a similar thing with the street-level characters like Green Arrow, Deathstroke, and Huntress, but The Flash has... well, the Flash. With plenty more heroes and villains on their way.<br />
What's better is that The Flash is a fun show that's genuinely uplifting. None of that grim/gritty nonsense. But it's not devoid of drama, either. There's a genuine heartfelt element to The Flash that's all-too-rare in superheroes these days.<br />
This is my favorite show on TV right now; I love it.Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-31764504053367787512014-10-21T02:57:00.001-05:002014-10-23T02:38:56.520-05:00iTunes Radio - The Princess DilemmaiTunes Radio has a Disney Princess station. When I discovered this, I was elated. Then I realized that I already own the vast majority of songs in the playlist.<br />
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Oh well.</div>
Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-9808337628206522522014-07-16T17:41:00.000-05:002014-07-16T17:41:16.535-05:00Maleficent<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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So I just got around to seeing <i>Maleficent</i>.<div>
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I'm a really big fan of the original animated <i>Sleeping Beauty</i>, so I was really excited to see it brought to live-action. As it happens, it wasn't really the same story at all.</div>
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I really liked the movie overall, but I do have some big problems with it. I'm gonna go into crazy spoiler territory here, so if you haven't seen the movie yet (and it is worth seeing), don't read any further.</div>
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In Disney's <i>Sleeping Beauty</i>, the baby Princess Aurora is cursed by by Maleficent, "the mistress of all evil," who decrees that on her 16th birthday, Aurora will prick her finger on a spinning wheel and die. In order to protect Aurora, the Three Good Fairies are able to slightly alter the curse so that Aurora will not die, but rather fall into a permanent sleep. Additionally, the fairies take Aurora deep into the woods and raise her as their own daughter, hiding her away from Maleficent's gaze. As Aurora's 16th birthday nears, she meets and immediately falls in love with Prince Phillip. Meanwhile, Maleficent finally discovers where Aurora has been hidden, and the curse is finally fulfilled. Prince Phillip, with the aid of the Good Fairies, is able to slay Maleficent. Aurora is still comatose, but awakens when Phillip kisses her.</div>
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<i>Maleficent</i> is much more complicated, and I don't want to summarize the entire thing here. But essentially, in this new movie, Maleficent replaces Three Good Fairies and Prince Phillip. Those characters still exist in <i>Maleficent</i>, but they're entirely useless. The Three Fairies completely fail in their task in every conceivable way; they add absolutely nothing to the story. Aurora herself seems to not even care that they exist. Where Prince Phillip's romantic kiss broke the spell in the original movie, Maleficent's change of heart and motherly love broke it in this one. Maleficent takes on the motherly traits of the fairies as well as the heroic traits of Phillip, meaning that those characters are rendered worthless. Even Aurora herself isn't much of a character, though that's not much of a change from the original. And in order to make Maleficent an anti-hero rather than a full villain, there must be someone even more evil than she is. King Stefan takes on that role, being nearly as all-consumingly evil as Maleficent was in the original film.</div>
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Where the animated film had somewhat of an ensemble cast, with no single protagonist but a group of heroes united against a villain, <i>Maleficent</i> is singularly focused on Maleficent, giving her every role at once: hero, villain, mother, victim. It actually reaches the point where Maleficent herself doesn't at all resemble the original villain—the single greatest villain in all of Disney history, I might add.</div>
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This movie isn't about Maleficent from <i>Sleeping Beauty</i>; it's about a completely different character that merely looks and sounds similar. Such a complete reinvention isn't an intrinsically bad thing, of course, except that the movie itself is clearly a modern commentary on the original. It even ends with a voiceover saying, "this is how the story <i>really</i> happened..."</div>
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And that's the thing: if it wanted to be an original story, it shouldn't have bent over backwards to constantly reference the older movie. And on the other hand, if it wanted to caringly revisit that story, why did it effectively crap all over everything that actually worked about it?</div>
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<i>Sleeping Beauty</i> had a light-and-dark moral tale, with clearly defined heroes and villains. It's often criticized for being too simplistic, but it works. <i>Maleficent</i> is a story that tries so hard to rework Maleficent into a positive character that every other character in the story is either evil or useless.</div>
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Now, I did say that I really liked the movie, and overall I did. I just don't like some of the plot choices that were made. Maleficent's story works on its own, even if it's just odd in comparison to the original.</div>
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I think I'm gonna watch the animated movie tonight, and I'll definitely watch <i>Maleficent</i> again when it comes out on blu-ray.</div>
Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-70317941777867111102014-07-01T22:14:00.000-05:002014-07-01T22:14:59.189-05:00Trans4mersI saw Transformers: Age of Extinction on Friday.<br />
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I've had kind of a weird history with the Transformers movies. Every time I've walked out of a Transformers movie, I've been happy with it.<br />
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Despite the stupidity of the first movie, getting to see actual photorealistic transformers on the big screen was too much of a dream come true for me to not be happy. Every time I've seen it since, I've liked it less and less. Last time I watched it (which was last week,) I realized that a good 70% of the movie does not matter. Literally, you could cut out most of the movie and the story would still work.<br />
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With the second movie, my expectations were so incredibly low (I'd read early reviews) that *anything* good in that movie would have pleasantly surprised me. Also, I walked in thinking, "all I want is to see giant robots smashing each other, and for Optimus Prime to have one awesome fight scene." And both of those things happened on an EXTREME level, so I was incredibly pleased. Then I saw the movie again and thought, "...is this the same movie I saw last week? This is seriously bad..."<br />
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The third movie I think is the only one that, on some level, actually succeeds as a Transformers movie. The action works, there's <i>less</i> stupidity, and it focuses primarily on the transformers themselves rather than the humans. Upon repeat viewings I've liked it far less, but I still don't hate the movie. It has some big problems, but I do still like it to a mild degree.<br />
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And then we have this new movie. Transformers: Age of Extinction. I'm really not sure why they didn't just title it Trans4mers, or Tr4nsformers, or Transformers: 4ge of Extinction, or T4: Judgment Day, but whatever.<br />
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So here's the way T4 is laid out:<br />
After the gigantic battle in Chicago in the last movie, all transformers—including the Autobots—are now pariahs from humanity. A bounty hunter transformer, Lockdown, who is neither Autobot nor Decepticon, is aiding the CIA in hunting down the remaining transformers on Earth. When we find Optimus Prime, he's wounded, barely alive, and rightly pissed at humanity for betraying him. He's seen his allies slaughtered and their bodies used for scrap metal; he's completely done with his mantra of, "we must protect humanity at all costs." That storyline is incredibly cool. It's not dumb, it's done well, and it's a legitimately great new idea for Transformers. But that only goes so far.<br />
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At some point in the movie (really it's when the rest of the Autobots are introduced into the story), the story takes a nosedive back into the cartoony, ridiculous nonsense that plagued the first three movies. Now, this movie doesn't have any of the absolutely horrendous things from the old movies. There's nothing in <i>Age of Extinction</i> even approaching the level of racism and stupidity from the Twins in <i>Revenge of the Fallen. </i>There's no robot testicles like in <i>Revenge of the Fallen</i>. While there is a "hot girl" in the movie, she's nowhere near as molested-by-the-camera as Megan Fox or Rosie Huntington-Whitely were. What this movie does have in the negative category, though, is length. This movie is almost three hours long. And it honestly only needed to be maybe an hour and forty minutes. There's so much unnecessary fluff in T4 that it's sickening. It's like no one hired an editor. Toward the end of the movie, I was sitting there wanting to scream at the screen. I wanted all the robots to die, not for story reasons, but just because I wanted the movie to end. Ironically, the lack of goofiness in the movie only hurt it—without the campy nonsense to lighten the mood, a long Transformers movie is a complete chore to get through.<br />
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And then there was one last fight scene at the end—not over-the-top, well-choreographed, and all in all very well done. It actually made me a little bit bitter at the movie. It started off with a really great premise, worked well up to a point, then went sour for an hour and a half. And then it ended with a great fight scene that only seemed to remind us how good the movie <i>could</i> have been.<br />
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And that's the thing, really. I've seen tons of movies that let me down as a fan of the story: <i>Superman Returns, The Last Airbender, Man of Steel</i>... and this one. I don't put the other Transformers movies on that list primarily because they didn't exactly disappoint me. I've never been 100% certain that a live-action Transformers movie could work the way it does in animation and comics. But here, for the first time, we got a glimpse into a world where Transformers movies were good. And it was squashed in that same movie. <i>Age of Extinction</i> is the Icarus of Transformers movies.<br />
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Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-7836726008597748512014-05-24T15:00:00.000-05:002016-04-25T00:54:41.828-05:00X-Men: Days of Future Past<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9Fa4hw_XkBefC3qdcvI8q7A7xN1IVPoGKmE2rLgfowh7RYxD0NV0H7ZTAdJ32WrccZb4CxfZ3ZkqtWXmkC6Z1pli4SZ65JC-WOZ1XxkWIkleex6qtUjtnh9VsZapZYvm7KHfhYkv3_1Q/s640/blogger-image-1236661348.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9Fa4hw_XkBefC3qdcvI8q7A7xN1IVPoGKmE2rLgfowh7RYxD0NV0H7ZTAdJ32WrccZb4CxfZ3ZkqtWXmkC6Z1pli4SZ65JC-WOZ1XxkWIkleex6qtUjtnh9VsZapZYvm7KHfhYkv3_1Q/s640/blogger-image-1236661348.jpg" /></a></div><br />
As I write this, I'm sitting in the movie theater about to see <i>X-Men: Days of Future Past</i>. I'm pretty excited. I adored the first two X-Men movies as a kid (both directed by Bryan Singer), and Singer is back to direct this one. It looks good, and I can't wait.<br />
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...<br />
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IT WAS GOOD! IT WAS GOOD! OH THANK JESUS IT WAS GOOD!<br />
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So happy right now. Ever since the day I sat in Grapevine Mills Theater in May of 2003 to see X-Men 2, I've waited for this movie. Actually, lemme back up a bit here.<br />
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When I was twelve, I saw a short scene from the first X-Men movie on TV. The film had come out a couple of years prior, but I was ten at the time, so of course I didn't see it then. I'd seen maybe two minutes of the X-Men animated series, but otherwise this was my first exposure to X-Men. It was the scene where Logan and Rogue are in the trailer crash. Logan flies through the windshield, skids across the snow, then slowly stands up as the wounds on his face heal up.<br />
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</div>That was about all I saw; I decided I wanted to see the entire thing from the beginning, so I stopped watching then. But what little I saw completely gripped me. It was... <i>dark</i>, but not Batman dark. It was gritty, but not stupidly gritty like so many other movies and comics from the 90s. I'd seen plenty of superhero movies where bullets bounced off Superman or nearly missed Batman, but the idea of a character with a <i>healing factor</i>—someone who would bleed, but heal in seconds—that was fascinating. And it perfectly represented X-Men's appeal. It had both feet firmly planted in the real world, but it was so mesmerizingly... <i>strange</i>.<br />
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The following months were very X-Men-heavy for me. After watching the entire first movie, I immediately started watching <i>X-Men: Evolution</i>, the then-current X-Men animated series (which I still love to this day), and got really excited to see X-Men 2 (fully titled <i>X2: X-Men United</i>) in theaters the next year.<br />
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I still remember the Sunday afternoon I sat in the movie theater with family and friends to see X2. To this day, it's one of my favorite moviegoing experiences. I'd become a hardcore X-Men fan over the year since seeing the first movie, and I was not disappointed. In fact, I was overjoyed at just how good the movie was. To say that it was satisfying is an understatement. When the DVD came out, I immediately bought it and played the opening title scene over and over again just to hear that awesome theme by John Ottman.<br />
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X2 ended with the promise of epic stories yet to come. I spent months and years waiting to see the next chapter. And yet, ultimately, it never really came. I never got to hear that John Ottman X-Men theme again.<br />
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As the years passed, lots of things happened with the X-Men. Bryan Singer left the X-franchise to direct <i>Superman Returns</i> (which didn't go so well), and the X-Men movies suffered as a result. The one-two punch of <i>X-Men: The Last Stand</i> and <i>X-Men Origins: Wolverine</i> were not only bad X-Men movies, but bad X-Men movies that also ruined the storyline of X2, taking it in stupid directions that didn't make any sense. Then there was <i>X-Men: First Class</i>, which wasn't bad, but somehow I didn't like much at all. Something about it just seemed hollow and frustratingly sub-par for something as epic as X-Men. <i>The Wolverine</i>, which only came out last year, was pretty decent. I liked it. But at best, it's a good Wolverine movie, not a good X-Men movie.<br />
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Another weird thing happened in all that time: I became aware that apparently, the first X-Men movie is not held in super-high regard. It's still liked more than disliked among geeks, but it's also known as being very flawed and problematic. And yet, X-Men 2 is still regarded as one of the best comic book movies of all time. That's still the X-Men gold standard: the childhood love of mine that's always stayed solid.<br />
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Now we have <i>X-Men: Days of Future Past</i>, the triumphant return of Bryan Singer to the franchise he made great. And for the first time since 2003, I feel that same sense of satisfaction. This is, in essence, the true return of X-Men. The true sequel to X2. And I couldn't be happier about it.<br />
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Oh, and what's this? Playing over the end credits of Days of Future Past?<br />
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The John Ottman X-Men theme.Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-80262132406164467092014-03-24T21:20:00.004-05:002014-03-24T21:23:20.409-05:00Looking Forward: 2014 in Movies2014 has a ton of movies that I'm looking forward to, a few of which have already been released. Here's a quick list of everything I want to see (and a few I've already seen):<br />
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<b>The Lego Movie </b>- February 7th<br />
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I saw it. It was indeed awesome.<br />
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<b>RoboCop </b>- February 12th<br />
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This was fine. Not on the level of the original, but fine. I'm looking forward to seeing it again on blu-ray.<br />
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<b>Veronica Mars</b> - March 7th<br />
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This was really just a reunion episode for the TV series, but it was a really fun episode at that. I'm looking forward to seeing how the franchise continues.<br />
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<b>Captain America: The Winter Soldier</b> - April 4th<br />
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I AM SO UNBELIEVABLY EXCITED FOR THIS.<br />
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<b>The Amazing Spider-Man 2 </b>- May 2<br />
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I wasn't a big fan of the first Amazing Spider-Man, but this one looks like it's solved all of the first one's problems. It also looks so perfectly spot-on to my favorite version of Spider-Man that it's seriously a dream come true for me.<br />
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<b>X-Men: Days of Future Past</b> - May 23<br />
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I was a huge fan of the first two X-Men movies, and the director of those is back for this one. It looks epic.<br />
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<b>Maleficent</b> - May 30<br />
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This is about as close as we've ever gotten to seeing a classic Disney animated movie in live-action. I'm really excited to see it.<br />
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<b>Guardians of the Galaxy </b>- August 1<br />
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So GOTG is a comic that I haven't gotten into yet and don't know a ton about, but the idea of an epic space action comedy is pretty appealing to me.<br />
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<b>Big Hero 6</b> - November 7th<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjnkPgmFP-6v02VqnoW-I-x-jOBOQuhYSR0lgSgLvo8Mv5-XCq_ISMZuAMEjauNO1Um4lX4YOXJevb30J3yx1vi7se1enn_FfUNtJNamZRZsBPilvtSFdNz_p7mrsh6Q20BkxIOcCqUgM/s1600/Big_Hero_6_Logo_2.png" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjnkPgmFP-6v02VqnoW-I-x-jOBOQuhYSR0lgSgLvo8Mv5-XCq_ISMZuAMEjauNO1Um4lX4YOXJevb30J3yx1vi7se1enn_FfUNtJNamZRZsBPilvtSFdNz_p7mrsh6Q20BkxIOcCqUgM/s1600/Big_Hero_6_Logo_2.png" height="200" width="400" /></a><br />
It's the next movie from Disney Animation, based on a little-known Asian-inspired Marvel comic series. Almost nothing is known about it yet, but Disney Animation is on a roll at the moment, so this is likely to be good.<br />
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<b>The Hobbit: There and Back Again</b> - December 17th<br />
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Because LOTR. Duh.Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-58551399791951871012014-03-02T00:46:00.001-06:002014-03-02T00:46:16.325-06:00Lyrical EpicThis just happened between me and a stranger on a mutual friend's Facebook wall post. Play the song below while you read the image text.<br />
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<br />Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-35803221984387161932014-01-17T01:37:00.000-06:002014-01-17T01:37:02.167-06:00Favorite ShowsThis is a list of every TV show I have ever thought of as "my favorite show," arranged in chronological order by age. I'm going purely off memory here, so the age ranges may be inaccurate.<br />
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<b>Age 4-5: Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman</b></div>
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This was where my Superman... thing... started. (interest/fandom/obsession?)</div>
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<b>Age 5-6: Star Trek: The Next Generation</b></div>
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I'm a third-generation Star Trek fan on both sides of my family; I think it's fair to say Trek is in my blood. TNG was fascinating for me as a five-year-old, being deep enough to be interesting and simple enough to follow.</div>
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<b>Age 7: Mighty Ducks</b></div>
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In another dimension, mutant ducks live on Puckworld, a planet named for the ducks' love of hockey. When the evil reptilian Lord Dragaunus and his minions invade and conquer Puckworld, a lone strike team of ducks retaliates, chasing Dragaunus to our planet. Now trapped on Earth, Dragaunus and his goons hide somewhere in Anaheim, California, while the team of ducks search for him from their secret base directly underneath Anaheim Stadium, where the ducks have become The Mighty Ducks, Anaheim's official hockey team.</div>
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To say that I loved this show as a kid is a severe understatement. I had a ton of the toys, I watched every one of its 26 episodes with glee, and to this day I get excited when I hear the (cheesy? silly? AMAZINGLY BADASS?) theme song.</div>
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<b>Age 8-10: The New Batman-Superman Adventures</b><br />
This was where I discovered Batman, basically. And modern good superhero storytelling. Still the best superhero stories out there, IMO.<br />
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<b>Age 11-16: Star Trek: Voyager</b><br />
Right as Voyager was ending, I started to rediscover Star Trek. I watched as many reruns of Voyager as I could, only stopped by the fact that network TV simply stopped airing it.<br />
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<b>Age 12-13: Smallville (tied with Voyager I guess?)</b><br />
When I was twelve, Smallville was pretty much the greatest thing I'd ever seen. A show for teenagers but with the epicness of the Superman mythos? A TV series with Hollywood-level production values? It was pretty great. I only stopped watching it because my mom wanted to watch 24 at the same time, so she made up a thing about me not being old enough to watch it anyhow.<br />
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<b>Age 16-17: Fullmetal Alchemist (2003 series)</b><br />
This was my first exposure to anime outside of Pokémon. And it's considered one of the greatest anime of all time, so I guess I started things off right. To say that FMA is amazing doesn't even cover it. It's an incredibly deep, dramatic series with an awesome sense of humor and charm to match. It diverges from the original manga storyline and has a... rather bizarre ending, but the journey is worth it nonetheless. They eventually did a new version of the series (subtitled <i>Brotherhood</i>), which follows the manga exactly, but it lacks the original series' amazing production value and dramatic strength. The 2003 series is up on Netflix right now, so please go watch it (in Japanese with English subtitles, because otherwise it's just wrong). Then go watch the movie sequel/finale, Conqueror of Shamballa.<br />
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<b>Age 18: Bleach</b><br />
I don't quite remember why I started watching this. I think I'd heard good things about it and started watching it on a whim because all the episodes at the time were on Youtube. I spent countless hours watching Bleach during my breaks in-between classes at school. There's a lot of great things about Bleach: its sense of humor, its unique fantasy mythology, its action, et cetera. Maybe the coolest thing about the show, though, is its modern stylistic sense, with its heavy influences from Japanese youth and music culture. A little like <i>The Matrix</i>, it's a fantasy anime made for the modern day.<br />
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<b>Age 20: Legend of the Seeker</b><br />
<a href="http://aarons-log.blogspot.com/2009/11/legend-of-seeker.html">I wrote about Legend of the Seeker awhile back</a>, and I think my old comments are still accurate.<br />
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<b>Age 22: The Legend of Korra</b><br />
The first season ("book") of <i>The Legend of Korra</i> was one of the best seasons of any show I've ever seen. Easily the best action/drama animated season of all time, in my opinion. And it was only twelve episodes.<br />
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<b>Age 24: Video Game High School</b><br />
VGHS is a web series rooted deeply in a love of video games and 80s pop culture. I can honestly say that no movie or TV series has ever captured the "heart" at the core of video gaming like VGHS. It started off a bit rocky in its early episodes, but by the end of the first season I was completely in love with it. Can't wait for Season 3.<br />
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<b>Age 24: Arrow</b></div>
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The first season of Arrow walked the line between cheesy CW teen drama and serialized comic book action drama. Which is to say that it was a little bit... bleh. It was mildly fun and just deep enough to keep watching. The season 1 finale, however, was really strong, to the point where it felt like it became a totally different show. The normal storytelling tropes that CW teen shows rely upon were thrown out the window, and in its place we suddenly had a competent action drama series in the ever-fun DC Comics universe. Season 2 has thus far been tons of fun, while largely keeping up the higher standard of quality. I look forward to every episode of Arrow the way I used to look forward to new episodes of Batman in 1997.</div>
Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-25629456217495807502013-12-13T22:32:00.001-06:002013-12-13T22:32:32.448-06:00The Desolation of Smaug<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I saw <i>The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug</i> last night. In short, I liked it a lot.<br />
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I wasn't too thrilled with the first Hobbit film,<i> An Unexpected Journey</i>. Not that it was <i>bad</i>, per se, just that it was incredibly long and boring. And this is coming from me, an extremely dedicated Tolkien fan who believes that no one should ever watch anything less than the full extended editions of <i>The Lord of the Rings</i>. I once read a review of <i>An Unexpected Journey</i> that compared it to a calm, leisurely drive through Middle-Earth, as opposed to the masterful action drama of <i>The Lord of the Rings</i>. If that's the case, then <i>The Desolation of Smaug</i> is akin to jumping into a Ferrari and blasting through Middle Earth, engine screaming and adrenaline pumping.<br />
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TDOS takes quite a few liberties with the book, adding in natural context in some areas, altering select moments, and sometimes creating things that are entirely new. The end result is something that seems like it should infuriate a Tolkien diehard like myself, but it's all handled with so much love—and so much fun—that it's easy to accept. After all, <i>The Hobbit</i>, as a book, was a largely shallow story, focused more on entertaining children than delivering a powerful dramatic narrative. The fact that the dramatic context of <i>The Lord of the Rings</i> is retroactively applied to <i>The Hobbit</i>'s story in these films—something that Tolkien himself attempted to do in written form but never finished in full—is a welcome change.<br />
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When the Hobbit film trilogy is finished, TDOS will probably be labeled "the action film." There's about as much fighting in this movie as there was walking and eating in the last film—which is, to say, a metric ton of it. If you walk into TDOS expecting or wanting to see lots and lots of epic fantasy action (as I did), you will be very pleased. Furthermore, even though the movie is just over 2.5 hours, it clips along at a rather quick pace, all things considered. When watching <i>An Unexpected Journey</i>, I felt that it needed trimming, but with TDOS I constantly felt that it was cutting from scene to scene unusually quickly. I suspect quite a lot of the movie is on the cutting room floor; the extended edition is sure to be much longer.<br />
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Some notes on the characters:<br />
-Legolas shows up and kicks all the orc asses. Hooray!<br />
-Thranduil was wonderfully venomous.<br />
-Tauriel was enjoyable to watch, though without knowing where her story is going it's hard to tell what her purpose is. She seems to represent the opposing philosophical viewpoint to Thranduil, but given that there isn't any payoff for that yet, her story isn't satisfied as of yet. But, like Legolas, she also kicks all the orc asses, so hooray!<br />
-Bard the Bowman was really well-acted and -written; I look forward to seeing how his story progresses. It's great to have so much depth given to a character that was totally underdeveloped in the book.<br />
-<b>Smaug the dragon is incredible.</b> Seriously, this has to be the best movie dragon of all time. I'm still more than a little in awe of how well-realized he is in this movie.<br />
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Now, as positive as I've been on this film, I do want to clarify that it is not, in any way, on the same level as <i>The Lord of the Rings</i>. This is not the triumphant return to the epic cinematic mastery of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. This is, quite simply, a very fun chapter in a three-part story. But on that level, it's really enjoyable. I plan on seeing it again as soon as possible.<br />
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Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-28301042765164191452013-12-10T01:49:00.000-06:002013-12-11T01:29:37.953-06:00Iced inOn Thursday, a record-breaking winter storm swept through here and covered everything in ice. This is a very big deal for Texas. Unlike in colder states, there are no city-funded snowplows or other measures to deal with the problem. Lots of people found themselves iced into their own homes, myself included. To reiterate, the storm happened on Thursday. It's now Monday, and it's the first day I've been able to leave my house.<br />
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<b>Things I did while being iced in:</b><br />
Watched nine episodes of Star Trek: The Original Series that I hadn't seen before<br />
Finished Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood<br />
Finished Tomb Raider (2013) for the 3rd time<br />
Played through the first half of Pokémon Ruby<br />
Researched elven culture for a story I'm writing<br />
Wrote more of said story<br />
Listened to the <i>Frozen</i> soundtrack because of course<br />
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So yeah. Netflix, video games, and writing. That's about it. There really wasn't a whole lot else to do.<br />
We didn't adequately prepare food supplies before the storm hit, so we ran out of most of our normal food. No bread, meat, or fruit. Towards the end, I had to get inventive. I cooked and ate a lot of popcorn (useful during Trek-watching). I learned to bake blueberry muffins.<br />
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When the sun finally peeked out for a few brief moments and temperatures got above freezing, I got to work on shoveling out the driveway. The problem was that the snow on the driveway had melted and re-frozen at some point over the weekend, forging itself into some kind of bizarre ice concrete. "Shoveling" was really more an act of breaking the ice, cracking it into flat slabs, lifting those slabs and throwing them onto the front lawn. And the ice didn't break easily. The concrete of the driveway warmed just enough to turn the bottom layer of the ice into sticky slush that wouldn't lift off the ground. So I was basically an ice harvester (it's a real thing; watch <i>Frozen</i> if you want to see) trying to break through a rock wall and pull out bricks that were glued down.<br />
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After an afternoon of shoveling (ice-picking? ice-battling? struggling?), I'd only finished half the driveway and I was exhausted. I went to bed that night and woke up late this morning, ready to get back at it. Either because I was (kinda) rested or because the ice and snow had melted even further, I was able to clear the rest of the driveway in an hour or so. And by "clear the driveway," I mean that I just barely made enough space for my mom's car to be able to get in and out of the garage. I actually left a bunch of ice near the sidewalk because I figured the car's inertia would carry it over that patch anyway. I was right, of course. It worked perfectly. PHYSICS.<br />
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Around noon, I left the house (SMEAGOL IS FREE!) to go get more anti-snow gear and a ton of food for the fridge.<br />
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First off, I headed to Home Depot for a new shovel and some de-icing salt for the sidewalk. They were completely out of everything I needed. Then I drove to Ace Hardware for the same items and found them in about 30 seconds.<br />
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Next I went to Kroger for groceries, but that proved problematic: apparently Kroger hadn't gotten many shipments in since the storm, so stock was low on lots of things. I bought what I could and headed for home, stopping at Chick-Fil-A for lunch. After I got home, I finished up the driveway-shoveling and went straight back out to Wal-Mart (they built a brand new one near our house) to finish the shopping. On my way back, I noticed that the car's left headlight was burned out. Since my mom drives to-and-from work in the dark both ways this time of year, that was kind of important. I didn't really have any choice other than to go back out AGAIN and get new headlights. I suppose mom could have gone out to get headlights, but... wait, no, there shouldn't be a but in that sentence. She just didn't want to.<br />
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So yes. I drove out to Autozone (because Wal-Mart didn't carry the headlights I wanted/needed), straight back near where I'd been earlier in the day. I got the headlights, replaced them in the Autozone parking lot, then grabbed a burger out (my payment from mother for my troubles) and came home.<br />
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When I got home, I logged into Facebook and saw that my weekly bible study / board games-playing group (kinda my only regular group of friends/peers at this point) was meeting at 7:30pm tonight. It was then 7:45, and I had literally JUST LEFT that general area. And I haven't seen my friends in... three weeks? Something like that. I'm bereaved. I could have left home AGAIN and gotten there 45 minutes late (which would have been fine), but I was so tired that I just had to shrug and forget about it.<br />
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I've had a day. Everything aches like crazy, and I feel like I need to do something tomorrow to relax. Maybe go see Frozen again.<br />
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<i>(see, my theory is that if I reference Frozen three times or more, it'll Beetlejuice-style summon something Frozen-relate—</i><a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=frozen+death&safe=active&client=safari&rls=en&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=nMWmUrXIG8rA2QWW_4DYDA&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAQ&biw=1280&bih=680">AAAAAARUHGUH</a><i>)</i>Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-37971814600885744182013-11-28T03:00:00.000-06:002013-11-28T03:00:42.479-06:00For the WinEverybody knows the cliché. A down-on-his-luck loser finds a golden ticket. A farmboy who dreams of adventure finds it and blows up a Death Star. The superhero is beaten down by the villain but finds enough strength at the last moment to save the day. The quarterback throws a winning touchdown pass and the team lifts him up on their shoulders as the crowd goes wild.<br />
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A funny thing about me: I've been that loser farmboy wannabe-hero for pretty much my entire life thus far. But I've never won anything. Never won a contest, never got a medal or a trophy. Now, I don't feel like I need to "win" most of the time. I often times actually prefer losing to winning in some board games because I really just like having fun with friends and not having to be the guy who makes everyone else at the table lose. However, occasionally I get super-competitive—completely obsessed with fighting as hard as humanly possible to win whatever it is I'm involved in. I think it comes down to whether or not it actually matters to me. A random game of Apples to Apples? I can stand to lose there; no problem. A swordfighting duel? Screw losing; I WILL ANNIHILATE.<br />
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To some extent, I think it's a matter of self-respect, or the lack thereof. Someone asked me recently when the last time was that I felt really, truly "special." I legitimately had to think about it for a while. The only solid answer I have is maybe my high school graduation in 2007. If I had to pick something more recent it might be when I got a letter in the mail from a friend on my birthday last year. But really, when I was asked that question, my first mental reaction was "well, I'm <i>not</i> special, so that doesn't apply."<br />
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I've lost a lot. Family, friends, my college career (somewhat). I've pretty much been gut-punched repeatedly by life. Every time I've been in a love triangle (a total of two times; I don't recommend it), I've been the guy not chosen. So much for the old "save the world, get the girl" routine.<br />
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People tell me I'm smart all the time. Female friends say they're confused as to why I'm single (but keep me at arm's length). Parents ask me what I'm up to as if they expect me to say I've published three books and solved the energy crisis by inventing a new form of math. By everyone else's indication, I should be a pretty special guy. But I haven't felt that way about myself in a very long time.<br />
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I really just want to win for once. To not be third best, left out, ignored, unwanted. I want that moment of triumph. I don't want to be better than anyone else; I don't want to be held up on a pedestal for all time. I just want to not entirely suck at everything.<br />
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One thing I actually am good at—not pro level, but still really good at—it's playing video games. Lots of my friends growing up were involved in sports, and some of them actually ended up doing really well with that. If video games were a sport, I could be the quarterback. I'd have been the guy winning all the games and getting cheered on by hundreds.<br />
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As it happens, my favorite show is a web series called <i>Video Game High School</i>. It's set in a version of our world where video games dominate modern culture. The so-named Video Game High School is, essentially, Hogwarts for video games: where kids go to learn to be better gamers. Instead of basketball and football, students join teams for First-Person Shooters, Drift Racing, Fighting Games, et cetera. Instead of sports championships, students have gaming championships. In short, it's a place where gamers aren't looked down upon as losers, but are recognized the same way everyone else is. It's a bizarre kind of fantasy world, but it's really fun. It's also got this fun 80s/90s teen movie/TV vibe (think <i>Back to the Future</i> and <i>Saved by the Bell</i>).<br />
Go <a href="http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Video_Game_High_School/70291366">watch it on Netflix</a> or search for it on Youtube. It's awesome.<br />
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So yeah, I didn't really have a point here. It was pretty much just "I want to win something / VGHS is awesome and you should go watch it."<br />
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Also this track by Two Steps From Hell has the same title as this blog post.<br />
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Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-48753491403276915842013-10-14T19:22:00.001-05:002014-07-25T00:23:57.222-05:00Doctor Who<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA3mANUa_kB52NIbiJx9KDoWhKTJHZGxEm-wzepAsfkNX27io6odsyYXAG-3HbubJVhPeu4YLhe14zbQg2o9dpOezUM3Hc2QxMoqKX4YId__FYjdtvjNaUDrTYUBWHiUUkCTHEcd43qGM/s1600/dwlogo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA3mANUa_kB52NIbiJx9KDoWhKTJHZGxEm-wzepAsfkNX27io6odsyYXAG-3HbubJVhPeu4YLhe14zbQg2o9dpOezUM3Hc2QxMoqKX4YId__FYjdtvjNaUDrTYUBWHiUUkCTHEcd43qGM/s640/dwlogo.jpg" height="326" width="640" /></a></div><br />
Doctor Who is something I've gotten into only in the last couple of years, and it's already become one of my core favorite franchises.<br />
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For those uninitiated:<br />
Doctor Who follows the adventures of a mysterious alien man—known only as "the Doctor"—as he travels through all of time and space in his ship, the TARDIS.<br />
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Doctor Who is a staple of British culture, but it's gaining more and more popularity worldwide, especially in the United States. It's also the longest-running science fiction TV series of all time, spanning 33 seasons (soon to be 34). However, although Doctor Who technically has 33 seasons, the show was relaunched in 2005 after a hiatus, and no viewing of the previous 26 seasons is required. Just hop on Netflix, look up "Doctor Who" (not "Classic Doctor Who") and start watching. The first season is a bit rough, but stick with it—it quickly gets amazing.<br />
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One of the reasons that DW has lasted so long is that the show is able to reinvent itself as it goes along. The character of the Doctor, being a Time Lord, is able to "regenerate" when near death, taking on a new physical body and personality. Because of this, new actors are able to assume the role of the Doctor, constantly keeping the show fresh and new. The current Doctor, played by Matt Smith, is the eleventh Doctor, with a twelfth to be introduced later this year.<br />
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The reason I love Doctor Who most is that, at its core, it's a story of endless fun and adventure. It's an oft-random, cartoonish-yet-dramatic story that can go from mind-bogglingly silly to darkly serious at a moments' notice—yet never so serious that it can't turn out happy by the end. The science fiction genre is dominated by shows and movies that are grim, dramatic, and "realistic." In a world where the ultra-serious Battlestar Galactica reigns supreme, Doctor Who stands out as a bright spot of joy. It's not shallow or childish, but it's mature enough to realize that stories can be emotional and fun at the same time. Even more than that, Doctor Who is an optimistic tale: one where altruism wins out, and the hero always does his best to save lives rather than take them.<br />
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Modern Doctor Who is well-written, well-acted, and endlessly imaginative. It'll likely be one of my favorite shows forever.<br />
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<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/7li5eZ3JZbA?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-86708291325196289932013-10-11T22:26:00.000-05:002013-10-11T22:59:46.237-05:00Flickchart: My Favorite MoviesThere's a website called <a href="http://www.flickchart.com/">Flickchart</a> that lets you compile a list of all the movies you've seen and helps you rank them through a tournament-style process. It's pretty amazing.<br />
Here's my top twenty movies:<br />
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<b>20. Raiders of the Lost Ark</b><br />
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Basically the epitome of adventure action. To say that it's a classic is an understatement.<br />
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<b>19. Return of the Jedi</b><br />
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It's my least-favorite of the original Star Wars trilogy, but that's not to say that it's bad. It's an epic adventure on an epic scale. At the very least, this is probably the most fun film of the Original Trilogy.</div>
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<b>18. Tarzan</b><br />
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I love this movie: the score, the "deep canvas" animation style, the Phil Collins songs, all of it. It's not on the epic level of some of the other Disney Renaissance films, but it's still one of my favorites.<br />
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<b>17. X2: X-Men United</b><br />
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Essentially a masterpiece of comic book storytelling, filled with hundreds of character moments, beautiful directing, and a healthy reverence to the source material. The best X-Men film to date, and one of the best superhero movies of all time.<br />
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<b>16. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade</b><br />
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My favorite Indiana Jones movie. It's a bit sillier than <i>Raiders</i> and <i>Temple of Doom</i>, but in a way that's genuinely funny. The action and drama are also probably at their strongest in this film.<br />
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<b>15. The Princess Bride</b><br />
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One of the greatest movies ever filmed. Manages to both capture the essence of fairy tales while also poking healthy fun at them. Whether as a comedy, action film, or romance, it's hard not to love this movie.<br />
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<b>14. That Thing You Do</b><br />
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A feel-good comedy drama about a one-hit wonder band in the 1960s. It's nearly impossible to watch TTYD and not feel incredibly happy by the end.<br />
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<b>13. The Lion King</b><br />
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Some call it the best animated film of all time, but those people are still stuck in 1994. Even so, it is indeed a classic, and <i>one of</i> the best animated films of all time. Equal parts fun and powerful.<br />
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<b>12. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring</b><br />
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The Lord of the Rings is easily the best modern fantasy film series, and The Fellowship of the Ring is easily the most fun of all three films—but not lacking in depth whatsoever. On one hand, there's endless amounts of depth in the culture and music of Middle-Earth. On the other hand, it's hard not to feel a sense of glee while watching the heroes slice their way through hordes of goblins.<br />
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<b>11. Star Trek: First Contact</b><br />
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First Contact is the single most dramatically powerful Trek movie. In just about every way possible, FC gets it <i>right</i>.<br />
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<b>10. Jurassic Park</b><br />
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DINOSAURS, MAN. DINOSAURS.<br />
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<b>9. Tangled</b><br />
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When I walked into the theater to watch Tangled, I only knew that it was a Disney CG animated film that had been very well-liked by critics and moviegoers alike. I had no idea that it was a straight-up Disney Princess film, complete with all the same tropes from my favorite childhood movies. Tangled is unabashedly sweet, and I absolutely love it for that.<br />
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<b>8. Toy Story 2</b><br />
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IMO, still the best Pixar movie. An awesome masterpiece.<br />
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<b>7. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers</b><br />
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This is where Lord of the Rings slows down and becomes more serious and character-focused. The extended cut of The Two Towers is a long-form drama with so many character moments and so much genuine depth that it's astounding. It also feels the most "real" of the series, with more emphasis on humanity rather than the fantastical. It's not as fun as Fellowship or as epic as Return of the King, but Two Towers is still a monument of fantasy storytelling at its best.<br />
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<b>6. The Matrix</b><br />
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Eastern philosophy cyberpunk hard sci-fi action drama. The Matrix is oft-underrated these days, mostly because of its less-impressive sequels. Regardless, it's a wonderfully deep movie that delves into the cyberpunk/hacker counter-culture, mixing it with Eastern philosophy in a surprisingly apt manner. It's also got the best kung fu gunfight action in any movie ever.<br />
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<b>5. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King</b><br />
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Return of the King is one of the rare films I've seen as many as five times in the theater, to say nothing of the many extended edition DVD marathons. Trying to encapsulate its greatness in a small paragraph is ridiculous. Suffice it to say that ROTK doesn't disappoint as the finale to The Lord of the Rings, which is a monumental achievement in itself.<br />
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<b>4. The Little Mermaid</b><br />
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Yeah, this one... I can't entirely <i>justify</i> it, per se, I just like it for reasons I can't entirely explain. It probably has to do with the fact that I watched it a ton as a toddler and it imprinted on my psyche.<br />
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<b>3. Star Wars</b><br />
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Pretty much the pinnacle of action and adventure in film. It's ranked at #3, but it's honestly tied with<i> Empire Strikes Back</i>. <i>Star Wars</i> is the "heart" of the original trilogy: it's Star Wars at its most fun, its most uplifting, and its most simple (in the best way). If you've seen this film, you've seen exactly what Star Wars has to offer: epic, mythic storytelling, told in a relatable and enthralling way.<br />
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<b>2. The Empire Strikes Back</b><br />
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If the first film is Star Wars' heart, <i>Empire</i> is its soul. <i>Empire</i> takes the characters of Star Wars and turns them into real people who we really care about—all while still continuing with the mythic story and expanding it in ways no one ever expected.<br />
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<b>1. Beauty and the Beast</b><br />
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Disney animated films are known for their incredible production value, but are sometimes accused of being shallow. After all, many Disney romances are simple tales of true-love-at-first-sight. Beauty and the Beast flips that concept on its head, forcing its protagonists to come together out of a genuine and mature care for one another. I can't quite explain precisely why this is my favorite movie at this particular moment; it just resonates with me like nothing else at this point in my life.Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-40773739315664405102013-07-23T16:10:00.001-05:002013-07-23T16:12:33.789-05:00Superman/Batman Movie!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The sequel to Man of Steel is now going to be a Superman/Batman movie.<br />
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This is absolutely huge news. Monumental. I've given some thought about how to adequately respond to this, and I've decided to voice my reaction in animated GIF form.<br />
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I am very happy.<br />
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Now, many have voiced concerns about this move by WB. Among these concerns are:<br />
-It's just a desperate cash grab by Warner Bros.<br />
-This is bad for Superman because:<br />
-It robs Superman of another solo movie, thus diluting his story<br />
-WB apparently doesn't respect Superman enough to believe he can support his own solo series<br />
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Personally, I don't agree with any of these points. Yes, it's a move designed to make money, just like <i>every other high-budget movie ever made</i>. That doesn't mean it's going to be bad. On the point of how it affects Superman and his solo film series, that gets into a gigantic conversation.<br />
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Some have pointed out that Batman got three solo films under Christopher Nolan, meanwhile Superman is already crossing over with another hero in only his second film. However, I don't believe it's fair to compare the Man of Steel series with the Nolan Batman films—rather, it's better to compare it to Marvel Studios' cinematic universe.<br />
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The Marvel Cinematic Universe began with <i>Iron Man</i>, which ended with <a href="http://youtu.be/UnvHbetUSGo">a direct reference</a> to the fact that Iron Man would be crossing over with other characters. A mere two months later, Tony Stark showed up in the post-credits scene of <i>The Incredible Hulk</i>. The next Marvel film, <i>Iron Man 2</i>, featured Nick Fury, Black Widow, and War Machine in addition to Iron Man—hardly a true solo film for Tony at all. Until <i>Iron Man 3</i> (five years after the first film's release), no Marvel hero got more than one solo movie before teaming up in <i>The Avengers</i>. If Warner Bros. is following Disney/Marvel's pattern (and they certainly are), it's no wonder we're getting a Superman/Batman movie before a second Superman.<br />
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This also helps WB speed up the process of gearing up their shared universe. Batman doesn't need his own movie to reintroduce him, even if it's an entirely-new version of the character; everyone knows the modern Batman by this point. By introducing Batman in a Superman movie, WB can give the new Batman a proper introduction <i>while also</i> creating the shared universe <i>while also</i> serving the story of Superman.<br />
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That's the other thing that I think many people entirely miss here: Superman and Batman <i>strengthen</i> each other; they don't dilute each other. They're each others' perfect complement: philosophically, physically, mentally, and tonally. They strike a balance and they test one another in the perfect way. Each time they meet, they come away from the experience the better for it. In the <i>Man of Steel</i> sequel, Superman will be dealing with the fallout from the first film while also trying to establish his new role in Metropolis. The arrival of Batman on the scene will further help define Superman's character, as he'll have the Dark Knight to be contrasted against and to be tested against. Conversely, the same will happen for Batman.<br />
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Were I to speculate, based on what little we've been told about the film, it seems that Batman is going to be treated as an oncoming challenger, somewhat like how the Nolan Batman films treated new villains. Batman is essentially getting the same treatment for this new film that the Joker got in <i>The Dark Knight</i>. Of course, unlike those villains, Batman will inevitably end up teaming with Superman at some point to lay some justice-smackdown on Lex Luthor and his evil schemes. (Lex has been basically confirmed for the film at this point)<br />
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This is a good thing. It makes my heart sing with glee (but, like, steely, dark, masculine glee).<br />
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<br />Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6053531038623952505.post-57355684496497771332013-06-27T02:19:00.000-05:002013-06-27T02:36:40.650-05:00Steel Criticism<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I've seen <i>Man of Steel </i>twice now; I'll probably see it a third time in the next week or so. I'll put up a review at some point, but for now I'll just say that I really liked it.<br />
That said, there are a lot of major criticisms people have with the movie; I figured I'd respond to some of them.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">MEGA CRAZY SPOILER WARNING</span></b><br />
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<b>Too grim</b><br />
This one I partially agree with. For a movie about a guy who can fly, this one is extremely serious. At the same time, the tone works for the story they're telling. <i>Man of Steel</i> gives Clark a level of realism and drama that demands a more serious tone than something like what they're doing with the Marvel films at the moment. That said, I do wish there had been more bright moments to alleviate the grimness that permeates virtually every second of the film. The ending definitely is a bright note; hopefully that indicates that the sequel will have a more fun tone than this one. All in all, however, the seriousness of MOS wasn't so much that it made me not enjoy the story, and it's probably better to err on the side of too serious rather than lean too far back towards the Reeve/Routh Superman films of the past.<br />
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<b>Too long</b><br />
MOS takes its proper time. There's one scene that probably should have been edited out (the Indian Ocean battle), but aside from that everything in the story was necessary and well-told. I'd rather have a movie that takes its time to do things right than rush so quickly that it loses its impact.<br />
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<b>Lois knows Clark's identity at the beginning of the story</b><br />
The love triangle between Clark, Lois, and Superman is central to the Superman legend, and the fact that it's tossed aside and accelerated into the Clark/Lois romance from the get-go is a rather bold move. It's certainly different, though not unprecedented (<i>Smallville</i> did the same thing a couple years ago). I don't know that I <i>prefer</i> Lois knowing at the beginning, but it does do three notable things for the story:<br />
1: It makes the story different enough that it's not a retread of every past Superman story ever.<br />
2: It proves how smart Lois is. Instead of seeing Clark's two identities every day and never putting it together, in MOS she's so smart that she figures out Clark is Superman <i>before</i> he's actually Superman.<br />
3: It emotionally ties Lois to Clark much more than normal. As one of the very few people privy to his secret now—as well as someone that's steadfastly supportive of him and romantically linked to him—Lois is now very important on a deeply emotional level. Yes, Lois was important before, but moreso in a "desire/love interest" manner; now she's Clark's confidante, best friend, lover (maybe), etc.<br />
If and when I write a Superman story of my own, I will definitely keep the identity a secret from Lois for a good long while, if only because that fairy tale romance is very important to me for a plethora of reasons. However, I don't fault Man of Steel for breaking that tradition, and I'm very curious to see how it develops in the future.<br />
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<b>Everyone (supposedly) knows Clark's secret</b><br />
David Goyer, writer of MOS, mentioned this <a href="http://www.bleedingcool.com/2013/06/14/david-goyer-tells-me-about-his-plans-for-and-problems-with-the-man-of-steel-sequel/">in an interview</a>:<br />
<i>"In our minds there are people in Smallville who know Superman’s secret as well [as Lois], Pete Ross seems to know, there’s probably a couple dozen people who know and we thought it would be interesting if they’re protective of him."</i><br />
That's fine with me. I think a couple dozen is probably too many, but the two that are confirmed to know on-screen in the movie (Pete and Lana) make sense. It's confirmed in the film that although the military knows Superman was raised as a human somewhere in Kansas, they have no idea who he actually is. The only thing I really don't like is that it's apparently public knowledge that Lois knows who Superman is. Now anyone who wants to know Superman's identity can kidnap her and use her (as was done by Zod in the film). They're gonna have to figure a way to get out of that in the sequel.<br />
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<b>Jonathan Kent doesn't want Clark to use his powers (for now)</b><br />
Jonathan in MOS is far more focused on the big picture than any other version of the character. He's partially concerned for his son, but also concerned about what might happen if the world found out about the existence of aliens. Jonathan is willing to even die rather than have Clark exposed to the world, which at least proves that he's willing to put his actions where his words are. The thing that bothers me about this version of Jonathan is that he's too motivated by fear, to the point where he literally thinks that the possibility of a national scare is more important than the lives of an entire bus of schoolchildren. That means that in Man of Steel, Jonathan represents Clark's fear of rejection and alienation, not his strength as in every other version.<br />
I appreciate that Jonathan in Man of Steel is nuanced and realistic—and that he still loves Clark just as much as he does in every other version—but the fact that he effectively teaches Clark to make bad decisions out of fear is a very, very bad thing. For my money, this isn't the proper Jonathan Kent; this is very much an alternate-universe character.<br />
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<b>Superman does too much fighting and not enough saving</b><br />
He saved the people at the oil rig.<br />
He saved the kids on the bus.<br />
He saved Lois from bleeding internally.<br />
He saved Lois from falling from space.<br />
He saved Martha from Zod.<br />
He saved that helicopter guy from dying during the Battle of Smallville.<br />
He saved Colonel Harding from getting crushed by Faora.<br />
He saved Lois from falling out of a plane.<br />
He saved pretty much the entire planet.<br />
I think he saved plenty enough people; the problem is only that some people think more people should be saved by Superman in the movie than should die. To be technical, since he saved the planet, that's exactly what happened, but it's not necessarily evident on-screen as much as some people would have liked. I'd have liked to see Superman's saving-to-destruction ratio a bit reworked as well, but as it was I was fine with it. At the very least, we finally got to see a real Superman fight scene for the first time ever in live-action. (Superman IV does not count)<br />
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<b>Disaster porn</b><br />
Some say that there was simply too much destruction in Man of Steel. I think I agree to an extent, but it's not as though it's a serious problem for me either. It's an odd move to have Metropolis go through a nuclear bomb-type event that surely killed thousands upon thousands of people. If there had been even one throwaway line about that part of the city being mostly evacuated, it would have helped things tremendously. Still though, the destruction in <i>Man of Steel—</i>particularly the stuff caused by the Kryptonian fighting—at the very least served to show off the incredible strength and scale of the Kryptonians' powers. It's hard to say that it's a bad thing that MOS too greatly realized superhuman fight sequences.<br />
<br />
<b>Superman kills Zod</b><br />
So here we go. This is the big one. Superman actually kills someone, which is literally the last thing he'd ever normally do. Superman <b>does not kill</b>, period. It's not as though there haven't been a few stories here and there in Superman canon where he did kill, but given the sheer volume of Superman stories in comics (literally over 3000 individual comic issues starring Superman), a few exceptions were bound to occur.<br />
So, to summarize: do I think that Superman killing Zod in any way contradicted his character, and do I have a problem with it personally?<br />
No.<br />
In fact, I actually very much like it.<br />
Here's the thing that most people don't understand about Superman: he's a good person because he has great compassion, not because he's made of a list of moral rules. That's perhaps the biggest hurdle for many critics and fans to get over: The Christopher Reeve Superman was an inhuman icon made of rules and ideas, not a living, breathing person. Henry Cavill's Superman, on the other hand, is a man first and an icon second. Personally, I vastly prefer the Superman-as-a-man approach. If Superman is mentally and morally on the same level we are, despite his powers, it makes his decision to do the right thing all the more amazing. It means that despite the fact that we don't have his powers, we can still choose to do the right thing just as he does.<br />
The fact that Superman kills Zod instead of letting him kill the family (as well as the rest of mankind) is an act of compassion for those in danger, not a breaking of his moral code. He even has compassion for Zod to a degree. Clark pleads with Zod repeatedly to stop, but Zod assures him over and over that he is, on a mental and genetic level, singularly focused to destroy and kill. Clark is effectively backed into a corner, and he responds the only way he can given the situation.<br />
Clark's emotional response to Zod's death is perfect and incredibly strong. Clark didn't kill Zod because he wanted to or because he chose the easy way out. He killed because he was forced, and he nearly breaks emotionally because of it. He's not only been forced to take someone's life, but he's also cut off his last remaining link to Krypton. He's effectively killed a part of himself along with Zod. It was an act of selflessness that led Clark to take Zod's life, not any lack of moral integrity. Zack Snyder (director of the film) <a href="http://supermanhomepage.com/news.php?readmore=13438">explained the decision like this</a>:<br />
<i>"...in the original version of the script [Zod] was simply once again banished to the Phantom Zone, but Snyder was adamant that Kal-El should kill Zod - because otherwise where does his aversion to killing originate from?"</i><br />
There you have it. After the ending of <i>Man of Steel</i>, Clark now understands what it means to take a life, and it is precisely why he chooses never to kill again. I wonder how he'll handle similar situations to the one with Zod in the future? Will he work harder to find new ways to avoid killing, or will Snyder and Goyer simply not put him in that kill-or-let-others-be-killed position again?<br />
In any case, I'm extremely pleased with the way they handled Zod's death. It was an incredibly powerful moment that both fit with Clark's character and helped him grow as Superman.<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Superman has no red underwear</b><br />
This one is just unforgivable.<br />
Nah. In all seriousness, I'm slowly getting accustomed to Man of Steel's underwearless Superman suit. I can't say I like the fact that it's solidly blue all the way from chest to knee, but in the actual film and its promo material, it looks great because of the way it's filmed. And it would be extremely bizarre to have the underpants in a film with MOS's level of "realism;" they probably made the right call. In sequels, I do hope they put some more color (gold and red) in the lower torso area just for the sake of breaking up the suit's color and giving it some eye-pleasing contrast, but in the meantime I'm more than happy with Man of Steel's suit.Aaron Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07127938346431178387noreply@blogger.com0