Essays, Not Rants! 139: Representation, Big Hero 6, and Me I saw Big Hero 6 last Saturday, a couple days after Interstellar. They’re very different movies, different beasts. I’m not sure yet which one I like more, but there’s one thing that makes Big Hero 6very special. But first let’s talk about me. I’m one of those weird people who can claim two races. No, not the mix of mayonnaise and sour cream that is the 1/4 Irish, 1/4 German, 1/8 Polish, 1/3 English, 1/24 Swedish mixes, I’m Asian an
Essays, Not Rants! 125: The Reels Are Alive With The Sound Of Diegetic Music Here’s a word that no one uses unless they want to sound smarter than you: diegesis, that is the type of story that’s told by a narrator. Which means what, exactly? Well, in The Princess Bride the Grandfather is performing an act of diegesis when he tells the Grandson the story. The interactions he has with the Grandson are thus non-diegetic. Of course, it’s all a narrative being told to us, the audience, by the filmm
Last night, the power went out. Shortly thereafter the Freedom Tower went out. In our dorm we have no power, no water, but we do have wifi. Planning on venturing to other NYU buildings today for charging and food. And exploration. Because this is the closest I'm coming to a post-apocalyptic scenario with an internet connection.
Essays, Not Rants! 245: But What About The Men??? I write a lot about women in fiction on this blog, to the point where I’ve had friends term it a feminist blog. But if you’ve ever wondered “jeez, Josh, you keep talking about women this and feminism that, what about the men!?”, well, this rant essay is for you. One of the many things I like about (500) Days of Summer, is Tom. Not that he’s a particularly great guy or anything like that, but that with Tom we have a male protagonist who is all
Essays, Not Rants! 216: A (Civil) War of Flaws. Civil War came out. This post it about that. Yes, that’s all the intro I’m giving. Marvel’s done a fantastic job of giving their characters major flaws. Look at the original (cinematic) Avengers: Iron Man’s selfish, Captain America’s noble to a fault, Thor’s proud, The Hulk’s, er, angry, Black Widow doesn’t trust anyone, and Hawkeye’s just the archer (okay, so he’s more the cynic). It’s these clearly defined character defects that make them cla
Essays, Not Rants! 112: Computer-mediated Communi-what now? Being a big fan of his other stuff, I saw Jon Favreau’s Chef last night. It’s a wonderful movie full of heart and food porn. Seriously. That movie will make you hungry. Really hungry. It’s remarkable for more than just salacious shots of food, though. There’s the fun character dynamics and the great soundtrack. There’s the fact that it avoids the obnoxious Bad Thing Before the Third Act that’s so commonplace in comedies and other fi
Essays, Not Rants! 192: The Surprising Elegance of Jackie Chan I’ve been on a bit of a different movie kick lately. Watched Attack The Block (finally!) before jumping into a bunch of martial arts flicks like The Raid and Armor of God. The latter prompted a dive into Jackie Chan’s filmography and that’s how I found myself watching Police Story. Which, somehow, I hadn’t seen before. Which is a real shame. Because, dang, that’s an excellent movie. And not just in the “Good-Jackie-Chan-flick” or
Holy mess, I'm in love. I'm usually a fan of bands changing their sound (see Barcelona's three projects, or Relient K's Forget and Not Slow Down versus Mmhmm), and as much as a departure as Believe is from everything else Mumford's done before, holy crud I really like what they've done. I cannot wait for Wilder Mind.
Essays, Not Rants! 213: Where TMD Explains Why You Should Fund His Movie There are five days left for my movie’s Kickstarter. So that means it’s time for me to go on a spiel about why you should fund The Conduits. ‘cuz I’m really proud of this story and want you to be able to see it when it’s done without all that festival hoopla (and just for $9!). So what is this whole production? The Conduits is fundamentally a student film, given that it’s being worked on primarily by students and being
Essays, Not Rants! 311: Beauty in Destruction I saw Annihilation this week, which, y’know, shouldn’t really be surprising. I like Alex Garland as a writer (Never Let Me Go is heartbreakingly beautiful, Dredd is a solid action movie) and enjoyed his directorial debut in Ex Machina. Annihilation is science fiction replete with a primarily female cast, so it checks a lot of boxes for me. And it’s a wonderful film, truly haunting with some moments of absolute horror, but one that is essentially
Essays, Not Rants! 149: But What Is A Strong Female Protagonist? I write a lot about strong female characters here, heck, it was my first post. It’s still something I really care about, seeing how often it pops up in my blog posts here. I’ve got a small list of characters I bring up often: Black Widow, Captain Marvel, Chloe Frazer, Katniss Everdeen, Zoë Washburne, etc. Thing is, it’s easy to conflate the idea of a strong female characters with that of a woman who kicks butt. When we compare
Essays, Not Rants! 144: Of Movies and North Korea I have a strange fascination with a certain North Korean dictator. Maybe it’s because he’s barely eight years older than me, hangs out with Dennis Rodman, and tyrannically rules a country of 25 million people with a combination of a cult-of-personality and sheer terror. Like I said, fascinating. So naturally I was really looking forward to The Interview. I had passes to a preview of it on Thursday and was all set. Only, it turns out, North
Essays, Not Rants! 208: Of Zootopia Stories are often a reflection of reality. Star Wars was a reflection of the existential threat posed by the Cold War. The Hurt Locker was, quite obviously, a discussion of the human cost of war. The Revenant reflected Leonardo DiCaprio’s all-consuming want for an Oscar. And then there’s Zootopia. Which holds an unrelenting, condemning-yet-hopeful mirror to modern America. Which you wouldn’t exactly expect, because it’s a major Disney movie. Nonetheless,
Essays, Not Rants! 324: On Rose and Trolls The internet is often a place as terrible as it is wonderful. This past week, Kelly Marie Tran, who played Rose in The Last Jedi, left Instagram (and social media in general) after months of sexist and racist harassment. Months. This isn’t the first time this sort of thing has happened. Daisy Ridley (aka: Rey) left Instagram for much the same reason. Back in 2016 I wrote about Chelsea Cain leaving Twitter after being bullied for writing Mockingbird
Essays, Not Rants! 086: Once Again On SHIELD Yep. I’m talking about this show again. Because it’s great and I don’t have much time to watch new movies (besides The Dark World) or read or play much video games. So we’re talking about Agents of SHIELD again. The show started strong and since then has steadily improved in itself. Characters have been fleshed out, dynamics enhanced, and it's proved itself capable with taking on different sorts of plots. What's even better is that all of this is
Essays, Not Rants! 148: I'm Complaining About The LEGO Movie Snub Too I’ve made it clear that I don’t really care for movie awards. Mostly because there’s a level of snobbery and predictability to them and also because, well, mostly because of the snobbery. So naturally, like many people, I have great opinions on the stuff I don’t care about. Like how this year’s acting nominations are blindingly whitewashed. Which, sure, happens, but is also incredibly indicative of culture as a whole and
Another RPG session tomorrow! Unlike last time, this time I've got a detailed plan moving forward (I'm currently writing Page 4). The party finds an abandoned Old Republic military ship in the middle of nowhere. There's gonna be battle droids, droidekas, and a fight on foot against a vulture droid all while taking part in an old fashioned dungeon crawl through an Acclamator. Which, it turns out, due to a hyperdrive malfunction kinda time travelled! So Clone Troopers! Who were recently give
Essays, Not Rants! 141: That Teaser I saw The Phantom Menace for my eighth birthday. It wasn’t the first Star Wars film I saw, nor was it the first I saw in theaters (I have the vague recollection of seeing A New Hope when it was rereleased in Singapore). But it was a new Star Wars movie and I loved it unaware of its flaws. A teaser for the new new Star Wars dropped yesterday and I am so freaking excited. First off, it’s a new Star Wars, which, has had me pumped for quite some time. But se
