JWD trailer 2 - April 29

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk briefly about the latest JWD trailer: what about it?

So far, it is a gorgeous spectacle slash show, but there are always sticky moments, and I came across two of them at least.

Firstly, the pyroraptor. For me, this dinosaur remains ‘colored’ by its’ rendition on ‘Dinosaur Planet’ (2003-4); it was the main character in the miniseries’ European episode. In it, the miniseries’ scriptwriters used the pyroraptor as a vehicle to show the life on proto-Europe’s islands during the late Cretaceous, (80-70 MYA). The new, 2022’s version of pyroraptor is visibly influenced by the previous version, but its’ muzzle is more pointed than the 2003 version on one hand, and on the other – it can swim.

…Yes, the dinosaurs clearly could swim; Mr. Crichton had a T-Rex chase Dr. Grant and the children in his initial novel back in the 1990s; but this version of pyroraptor had DNA of diving birds inserted into it, because Dr. Wu – or his imitators – was, (or were), an artiste! The modern birds, (which are also dinosaurs, yes), have mastered the element of water, true, but the most aquatic of them are the penguins, on one hand, and the loons & the grebes on the other. (The auks and their kin are a close third). Therefore, what is the punchline?

That while the penguins cannot fly, but they can certainly walk on land, the loons and the grebes can fly, but they are nearly helpless & immobile on land. Since the pyroraptor does not appear to be able to fly, but it is certainly mobile on land, I am guessing that it is part penguin, (or maybe auk), instead of being part loon, (or grebe; not that the two bird groups are all that closely related to each other either). What else? (Aside from me waiting for those Carnotaurus/hummingbird hybrids)?

Ah, yes, the giganotosaurus. The trailer proclaims that the latter carnosaur was the biggest land carnivore ever. Sadly, in RL, this title belongs to the Spinosaurus…which was semi-aquatic, true, but still bigger than the T-Rex, and the carnosaurs had been – precisely of its’ semi-aquatic lifestyle, yeah. Therefore, JWD may be fudging the truth somewhat, implying that the Spinosaurus is semi-aquatic and as such – disqualified, but I remain sceptical all the same. These sort of proclamations are a slippery slope, and films like JWD should either embrace the science fully…or not at all.

That is it for now, though. See you all soon!

Moon Knight, 'Afterlife' - April 27

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about MK. Only, it continues to travel down Mr. Riordan’s ‘Kane Chronicles’ trilogy, so here isn’t much to talk about either.

No, really, throughout the trilogy, (especially in the second and the third books), Carter and Sadie Kane regularly travel into the Egyptian Afterlife, to converse with their father, (who is also the avatar of Osiris), and for other goals as well – and here we get Oscar Isaac’s characters, who do exactly that.

The Kane siblings travel usually on a magical boat, clearly associated with the ‘authentic’ slash ‘original’ myths of ancient Egypt; and in this week’s MK episode, ‘Afterlife’, we got the same thing, save that apparently in MK’s case the magical boat is the hospital/mental asylum that Marc and Steven found themselves on/in…which doesn’t make much logical sense, but this is MCU, where logical sense doesn’t always exist…where are we?

Ah, yes, Tawaret. In this week’s episode, she is the one doing the judging of Marc and Steven, and finds them wanting. This isn’t too surprising – since the series’ premiere, MK was all about ancient Egypt, ancient Egyptian myths, and especially the ancient Egyptian afterlife & the myths about the afterlife, but, again, I repeat – the ancient Egyptians’ judge of the afterlife was Anubis, or/and Osiris, not Tawaret, who is more associated with childbirth and fertility instead; Mr. Riordan played fast and loose with her role in the ‘Kane Chronicles’, but MK has him beat easily.

Again, not an issue, but for the statement that DCEU’s WW84 did not do Egypt and its’ culture much respect; compared to MCU’s MK, WW84’s treatment of Egypt was tasteful and restrained instead. Ouch! Anything else?

Yes, back in the real life, we saw a live raccoon in our local park; given that it was a sunny afternoon, this makes it unusual, as wild raccoons are more active and bold during night-time instead; we didn’t approach it, as though it is smaller than a coyote is, a wild raccoon is still formidable and powerful and must be treated with respect, but it was certainly an event that was more exciting – and important – to me in my life than anything than MK can throw at me at this point, all of MCU’s pageantry and spectacle aside. Ah well, real life sucks, but sometimes it does deliver a gem instead.

Well, this is it for now, though. See you all soon!

Moon Knight, 'Tomb' - April 20

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about MK instead.

Sadly, here is not too much to talk about either, except… for the Egyptian mythology: in this week’s MK episode – ‘Tomb’ – we get to meet Tawaret at the very end of the ep. So what?

‘The Kane Chronicles’ by Mr. Rick Riordan, that is still what’s up. In the second book of that trilogy, Carter and Sadie Kane – the titular characters – get to go to the Egyptian underworld, (because of Osiris, cough), where they meet Tawaret, aside from the other characters, (including the moon god, Khonshu). Here, in ‘Tomb’, Marc and Steven seem to be trapped in some sort of a limbo, depicted as a mental asylum, but that… is nothing new in the world of comics, DC’s Batman got trapped in this sort of thing quite regularly, for example, and they meet Tawaret.

To add injury to insult, Carter and Sadie encounter Tawaret who works in a retirement home for aged Egyptian gods, i.e. an alternate medical facility to the mental asylum that the Moon Knight, (Moon Knights?), has found himself/themselves in. I.e., Mr. Riordan associated Tawaret with a medical profession, and ‘Moon Knight’ seems to be running with it. Given how MK’s cast and crew reamed Gal Gadot and Patty Jenkins in regards to their treatment of Egypt in WW84, this dependence on Mr. Riordan’s works seems strange, almost hypocritical. Anything else?

Aye, ‘The Secrets of Dumbledore’ movie. I have seen it, and found it to be disappointing. Why?

Let us start with ‘The Book of Boba Fett’. Unlike ‘The Mandalorian’ series, ‘Boba Fett’ was less of a success because whereas ‘The Mandalorian’ series moved the entire SW universe onwards, ‘Boba Fett’ did not. Well, technically, it did, as the SW universe has the entire linear time concept, but you have to admit that ‘The Mandalorian’ also developed and expanded the SW universe in content, whereas ‘Boba Fett’ did not.

But the same can be said about ‘The Secrets of Dumbledore’ – it didn’t really introduce anything new into the wizarding world; the story did move forwards at a livelier pace than the ‘Boba Fett’ series did, but whereas MK has Tawaret, ‘The Secrets’ had a qilin.

A qilin is a mythical Far Eastern animal that is supposed to appear before a birth or a death of a great sage or a ruler, but to the Western audience/readers, especially the baseline members, a qilin is a Far Eastern analogue of a unicorn instead. Consequently, the use/participation of the qilin in ‘The Secrets of Dumbledore’ and the election that was the climax of the movie, transformed the election from, well, an election, as conceived by the Western audience into something more among the lines of ‘and the hand of God chose the rightful king and cast the pretender into Gehenna’ – this sort of thing. Given how the elections are a big deal in RL – maybe even an even bigger deal given the RF’s assault on the Ukraine – the way that ‘The Secrets’ handled the elections’ concept is outright insulting!

In addition, since we are going back to real life, people have already talked about the nearly complete absence of Tina Goldstein’s character from the movie. The team behind ‘The Secrets’ did not even try to explain it – they could have made Tina pregnant, or ill, or something, but no – and therefore, people are believing that she’s avoiding J.-Ro because of the latter’s transphobic statements. Fair enough, though it is weird – J.-Ro had no problems with Dumbledore being gay so that she could court the sexual minorities for her novels, or Hermione being a person of color so that the real life people of color would like her works before, so why the abrupt change of tune? Ah well, it is her life, her choice, and nothing else. Is that it?

Yes, pretty much – MK continues to be largely divorced from the rest of MCU, the occasional nudge-nudge wink-wink Easter egg aside, the Donald seems to be preparing for the 2024 election after all, and if he does win it, then the rest of the West will stop looking at the U.S. as their spiritual leader for sure, and – that is it.

See you all soon!

Moon Knight, Type - April 13

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about the third episode of ‘Moon Knight’ – ‘Friendly Type’. Sadly, MK continues to not quite deliver, and-

-And nothing, sadly. First, Oscar Isaacs continues to imitate Tom Hardy’s characters – he has Steven, he has Marc, and he can even do Khonshu – though Khonshu got petrified by the finale of this week’s episode.

Second, MK continues to imitate the original Indiana Jones movie trilogy and the like – we got a European adventurer in the exotic foreign country with its’ treacherous natives and mysterious undercurrents – the Dany plotline in the original ASOIAF novels has demonstrated the same theme, and fairly recently too; Hell, the entire face-off in the arena where MK on foot fought an opponent on horse is certainly reminiscent of a certain showdown in one of the ASOIAF novels…

Third, the Rick Riordan factor. In his universe, the modern Greco-Roman world is USA, (with Canada being Hyperborea, seriously!), while Egypt is associated with the U.K. instead. Ergo, now, in ‘Moon Knight’, we got the U.K., (especially England), and Egypt, delivered with barely more maturity than the novels in the ‘Kane Trilogy’ series did! Yes, Disney owns both Riordanverse and MCU, but still, this is not the sort of crosspollination that I have expected in ‘Moon Knight’.

Fourth, I am guessing that this change of focus – from USA, (and especially NYC), to the rest of the world, (especially U.K. & Egypt) might have brought the sudden downfall in the reviews and responses regarding ‘Moon Knight’ – the American public and its’ elite aren’t very fond of pro-U.K. movies as people might think; remember the ‘King’s Man’ film? It was done with all of the main American cultural tropes, but it was Great Britain, rather than the U.S., that was in the focus of the film. The result was mixed reviews, with some of them being quite scathing too – you do not try to out-U.S. the U.S. and not pay the price!

That said, the geography in MCU is atrocious; whereas DCEU went fully imaginary, with its’ world having mostly imaginary cities such as Metropolis, Gotham, National City, Starling City and so on, MCU tries to have some real-life places as well, especially NYC…and little more. Their geography feels a lot more restrained, especially in the 90s and the early 2000s, though now it has improved – some, but not much.

Finally, all of the subtle nods to ‘the greater MCU’. It is not very impressive, about the level of the ‘Eternals’ film. The latter has been one of the least successful MCU films up to date – precisely because of that detachment, and it seems that MK suffers from the same problem, (and the same goes for the Sony films). Ah well, we have discussed this problem before, and now it is too late for MCU to change anything in MK…and they probably did not want to from the start…

Ah well, this is it for now. See you all soon!

Moon Knight, Suit - April 6

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about something else. The second episode of ‘Moon Knight’, maybe?

Unfortunately, not. See, the problem with ‘Moon Knight’ is that it is about as detached from MCU, as ‘Morbius’ is; only while ‘Morbius’ is a separate universe from MCU, ‘Moon Knight’ isn’t. Hence, the notable lack of anything MCU-related in the second episode by now is becoming kind of grating.

No, seriously, when you compare ‘Morbius’ to ‘Shang-Chi’, the lack of Marvel-related Easter eggs and co. is notable…which is expected, (see above), but in ‘Moon Knight’? You would think that we would have encountered at least one Iron Man (or some other Avengers’) graffiti by now as a minimum; but no – we have a seemingly ordinary world, inhabited by Steven, an ordinary man, who abruptly finds himself in extraordinary situation, complete with Egyptian gods. The gods themselves we have discussed in the series’ premiere, and so far, there is little development… but what! The dog-headed demons are not caught by video cameras and co. so poor Steven got fired!

…Well of course they are not seen by electronic equipment, (and maybe even by muggles, cough). If they were, the situation in ‘Moon Knight’ would be different, more derived, because not unlike ‘Morbius’, the plot in ‘Moon Knight’ is also quite basic so far: it is ‘The Bourne Identity’ meeting Rick Riordan’s ‘Kane Chronicles’, save that ‘The Kane Chronicles’ have treated the Egyptian gods more respectfully, professionally as well, but that isn’t the point.

The point is that Oscar Isaac seems to be doing Tom Hardy’s shtick in ‘Moon Knight’, and then there is also Khonshu doing his thing to try to cover this rip-off up. The movies in ‘Venom’ series have their problems, and we’ve talked about this, but they’re also quite successful, and I’m guessing that MCU decided to emulate them, as Steven/Marc summon their suit in a manner not unlike how Venom takes over Eddie in the films. I am guessing that Sony and Disney/MCU have worked out their professional differences for the latter to try this sort of thing. What is left?

…I got a chance to see ‘The Bad Guys’ in not quite legal manner cough. Now there is an interesting movie, actually, as beneath the colorful candy wrapper it sought to talk about such fundamental matters as good, evil, (ok, badness) and redemption. It is quite Biblical, and there is even a ‘Mr. Snake’ to further drive that adjective home, since you cannot go badder than a snake, which stood in for ‘The Great Adversary’ in the original Book. Yet even he – the Snake character is male in the film – becomes a ‘good guy’ by the film’s finale. Hurray, but the movie’s message is marred by several issues.

Firstly, the child-friendly wrapper gets quite heavy at time from time, so the underlying message gets quite lost. And second, while venturing bravely to talk about such monotheistic issues in an increasingly polytheistic West, the movie may not have been brave enough; ‘Mr. Snake’ might be biblical, but Mr. Wolf and The Crimson Paw, (a fox), are more of fairy tale/folklore elements, and fairly baseline too. A wolf and a fox, really?! Moreover, a red fox at that – they could have used an Arctic fox or a grey fox instead; they could have used a porcupine or a coyote; but no – a fox for a wolf.

In reality, wolves ignore foxes normally, which is good, because otherwise? The former can easily overpower and eat the latter, but that is real life, where politicians – no offence, Ms. Foxington – are not necessarily ‘good guys’, eh? But real life has little connection to children films, so let’s just accept ‘The Bad Guys’ as a good film – and the ‘Moon Knight’ as a struggling MCU TV show – and move on.

This is it for now; see you all soon!

Morbius - April 5

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, and that is especially true with the extended family angle. Still, I did give as well as I got, so I should not complain too much, therefore let us move onto ‘Morbius’. What can be said about that film?

It is an origin story, and it is done by Sony, rather than by Disney/MCU, hence its’ lackluster appearance and delivery. The original ‘Venom’ film had the same problem, but it had Tom Hardy and his antics as the titular duo to counteract this; ‘Morbius’, instead, has Jared Leto, who is a good actor, sure, but, apparently, this is not enough.

One may argue that it is unfair to compare ‘Morbius’ to something like ‘Shang-Chi’, which is also an origin story but is done much more glamorously and colorfully and so on, but the problem is that the same has plagued ‘Venom’ – the original film, and ‘Carnage’ wasn’t that much better. Let us elaborate.

In MCU, origin stories tend to introduce other elements and Easter eggs quickly on; Phase 1 may have had its’ problems, but by the time the first ‘Avengers’ film arrived they got past it…by making a bigger, better show than what ‘Sony’ is doing with its’ Marvel characters so far. The first ‘Venom’ film had a script that was rather confusing, in a threadbare sort of way, and ‘Carnage’ was really a reboot of the first film, one that simplified its’ characters, especially Eddie, Venom and Ann, and not in a better way, I would say. What was consistent in that aspect of the SUMC-franchise were aliens; ‘Venom’ and co. were dealing with them and only with them. Hence why AoS was so good in the MCU franchise in that they dealt not just with Hydra, but with other threats; pity that it had outlasted its’ promise and ended in a whimper rather than a bang, no matter how much the cast and the crew tried to pretend otherwise. By contrast, ‘Morbius’ has started with a whimper – it is a variant vampire movie with some ‘Batman’-like aesthetics that don’t really mesh.

…Speaking of DC and ‘Batman’, the Caped Crusader had tangled with vampires, primarily Dracula, who comes and goes to both DC and Marvel at will, but he usually does not become infested with the virus of vampirism himself, and he usually is not associated with vampires at all. Hence, ‘Batman’-like imagery in ‘Morbius’ isn’t very appropriate and it doesn’t work too well either.

The vampire angle itself… it is one of the reasons as to why I remembered AoS – just as AoS had worked the Hydra threat into the ground, so has the cinematography in general done with the vampire threat; Dracula, at least, has panache and authenticity on his side, a certain gravitas, if you will. Michael Morbius – not so much.

Again, it all comes down to the treatment of the character – I first met ‘the living vampire’ during the 1990s Spider-Man cartoon series, (which was a Spider-Man centered MCU, cough). The show had Peter’s origin story done canonically – he was bitten by a radioactive spider and became Spider-Man – and then in S2 his blood and DNA began to mutate, and he began to search for a cure. Enter Morbius, who was Peter’s fellow student in the university, who discovered Peter’s blood sample and began to experiment with it, trying to figure out as to how Peter was able to mutate it, cough. Enter the lab’s vampire bat, (one of  - did I mention that Dr. Connors, aka the Lizard, was running the class in that universe?), who also got irradiated by the lab’s technology, and then it bit Morbius, turning him into ‘a living vampire’, just as a spider turned Peter into Spider-Man. You have to admit, this does sound more glamorous than what Sony did with Morbius in the movie. So what?

So, the problem with ‘Morbius’ is that there’s no Spider-Man in it; whereas Venom did evolve to be an independent character with their own thing, (did you follow ‘the King in Black’ story arch, in particular?), so they can carry their own movie, and even several, but with Morbius this isn’t the case – ‘the living vampire’ has rather faded into obscurity by now, so people aren’t too impressed or excited by his arrival on the big screen, and the trailers didn’t make things any better, unfortunately. People went into theaters – or got to see ‘Morbius’ otherwise – with low expectations already, and the show gave them just that – a variant vampire movie with very little Marvel content, even less so than ‘Venom’ did – and ‘Venom’ does have more oomph in Marvel than ‘Morbius’ does. (See above). So, what is left?

Unfortunately, nothing. Sony’s ‘Morbius’ movie delivered what it promised to do – to introduce Morbius, the living vampire into the Sony Universe of Marvel Characters and that what it did to do. Sadly, the delivery portion of the plan was underperforming, but that may not matter in the end – Sony is not licked yet, according to some news. Ah well, good luck to Sony, then!

For now though, this is it. See you all soon!