WandaVision (an MCU phase four review)

 

There will be spoilers.

WandaVision is as good a place as any to start on MCU Phase Four. It picks up, basically, as soon as The Blip occurred. Wanda returns to find Vision's body gone and goes in search of him, and Monica Rambeau returns to find that her mother died while she was not existing. All of the action happens prior to Spider-Man: Far From Home.

I loved WandaVision when it was first released. From the first episode. Doing the series in the styles of different eras of sitcoms was a lot of fun. But, then, I grew up watching all of those old black & white television shows, so I can also understand younger generations who did not do that not feeling like they were in on the joke. That said, there is enough context provided within the show itself so that anyone watching should be able to at least get that there is a joke and not feel like they were being excluded.

[Yes, I'm talking about all the people (mostly young dudes) who complained that the first few episodes were stupid. They were objectively not stupid, so stop being pissy about not everything being tailored just for you. You are not the only audience.]

It was even better the second time.

It's the kind of series, because of the way it unfolds, where you miss things the first time through. You don't understand the significance. Like The Sixth Sense. If you think you caught everything the first time, I'm just gonna say that you're wrong.

Things that stood out for me on the second viewing:
Jimmy Woo and his magic tricks. Almost as soon as we see Woo, he pulls a business card out of thin air for Monica Rambeau. This picks up from Ant-Man and the Wasp and may be my favorite single moment from the series. It made me laugh hard. It made me re-appreciate having just re-watched all of the MCU movies.

Evan Peters showing up as Pietro. Now, I liked this the first time. Peters performance of Quicksilver is one of the highlights of Fox's X-Men movies, so it was a lot of fun to have him in WandaVision. On the second viewing, though, having now seen Spider-Man: No Way Home and knowing vaguely what's coming in Doctor Strange, I find this move by Marvel rather brilliant. And the mutants are coming to the MCU, too, so... yeah... Loved Peters in this even more the second time.

Kathryn Hahn as Agnes/Ag(atha Hark)ness (get the name?). First, Kathryn Hahn is great. She's amazing and completely underrated. She should have more and bigger roles. It changes your perspective once you know she's the bad guy, like watching Sixth Sense knowing that Willis' character is dead.

Also, I think Paul Bettany is completely underrated among the MCU actors. He has had to be way more versatile than anyone else, starting out as just a voice, being an unemotional machine, being human; it's a lot. His performances have helped the other actors to stand out. He's impressive.

Having said all of that, the real power of WandaVision is that it's a story about grief. And not just Wanda's grief, lest we forget that Monica is also going through her own grief that is just as fresh as Wanda's. It's two different perspectives, but Wanda has been touched by so much trauma, not the least of which is discovering that S.W.O.R.D. has confiscated her "husband's" body and won't give it back, that it's understandable why she would try to retreat into what was the happiest moments of her life. She can't face going forward. The story, while filled with action and a spectacular "boss battle," is heart wrenching and touching. Powerful. Especially considering what Wanda has to give up to set things right. No better encapsulation exists than Vision's words to Wanda to help her to realize that it is, actually, all okay: But what is grief if not love persevering?

We have a societal view that grief is one of those bad emotions. It makes people uncomfortable. But, you know what, it's okay to be sad. We don't need to try to hide it or pretend that we're over it or any of a number of other ways that society says that we should move along. But how much grief is too much? Who can say? That's for the individual to decide. Maybe if we did better at letting people grieve and be sad or any of a number of other "bad" emotions, people wouldn't get so messed up by trying to suppress them.
Just sayin'.

So, yeah, WandaVision is a great show, and, honestly, I'm more than a little impressed that Marvel/Disney took on such a heavy subject. It's not often we see these kinds of topics dealt with in popular media.

Clone Wars -- "The Jedi Who Knew Too Much" (Ep. 5.18)

-- Courage begins by trusting oneself.

[Remember, you can sign up to join the Clone Wars Project at any time by clicking this link.]

[Well, actually, considering that we're into season five, now, probably no one new is going to sign up, BUT! Hop over to The Armchair Squid for his take on the current episode.]

I'm sure the title of this is a reference to the Hitchcock film The Man Who Knew Too Much, but it's been so long since I've seen that movie that I don't know how the episode relates to the film.
Fun fact: The 1956 film featuring Jimmy Stewart and directed by Alfred Hitchcock was a remake of his own 1934 film of the same title. I've only seen the Jimmy Stewart version so, now, I need to watch both of them!

Anyway...

This is one of the most pivotal story arcs in the entire Clone Wars series. Everything changes here, and I think this story more than any other one gives insight into the fall of Anakin, though, ostensibly, this arc isn't even about him. Having seen it before, it's interesting re-watching it now and seeing how they put it together, because it feels like I should have known what was going to happen before it happened, kind of like watching The Sixth Sense for the first time.

Tarkin is back and back with a renewed agenda to cut the Jedi out of... well, out of everything but, initially, out of the clone war. Tarkin's presence in this arc is also a sign of the significance of this story.

And all of this, again, makes me really wonder where they were going to go with this series because it feels like everything before was just leading up to this stuff here at the end of season five (and the limited amount of season six that was later made available), and this stuff is great. It's intense. It's moving. It's powerful. You should watch it.

The Gate To Women's Country (a book review post)

Generally speaking, post-apocalyptic books aren't my thing. Post-apocalyptic stories tend to revolve around one thing: how horrible everything is after the apocalypse. This book is not like that. Refreshingly so.

In fact, I didn't know I was reading something post-apocalyptic at first. Yes, that means I didn't know what the book was about. My wife told me I should read it, and I did, and I did that without reading the back cover blurb or anything. Yeah, I trust my wife that much. Her reading standards are much higher than mine, and mine are already pretty darn high. Basically, if she tells me I'm going to like something, I can believe that that is true.

So, yeah, I started reading it without knowing it was post-apocalyptic, so when I got to the part of the story that revealed it was a future society, not just some alternate or fantasy society, it was really an "oh, wow" moment. And, yes, I do realize I ruined that for any of you who might decide to pick the book up, but, really, how many of you were actually not going to read the back cover? That's what I thought, so get off my case. It's right there on the back, so I'm not spoiling anything!

I'm going to make a comparison, now. Everyone loves Ender's Game because they were caught off guard by the ending. Everyone is always, "Oh, wow! I didn't see that coming!" But not me. Not only did I figure out what was going on before the reveal, I knew what was going on almost as soon as it started happening. I liked the book, but there was nothing surprising about the ending to me, and, what's more, at the time I read it, I didn't know the ending was supposed to be a twist. It just seemed the natural outcome to me. I was surprised to find out that other people were surprised by the ending.

The Gate To Women's Country was more like The Sixth Sense in that regard for me. All of the clues as to what is actually going on in that movie are right there in the movie, but you don't see them for what they are. It makes the movie even more brilliant, because you can go back and watch it again and see how all the pieces are laid out and see how you just missed putting them together because you were too caught up in the story. It's rather like missing the forest for the trees.

There is a thing going on in The Gate To Women's Country that's rather brilliant, but what makes it more brilliant is that Tepper lays it all out in front of you -- she basically tells you what's happening -- but you don't see it. I did manage to work it out before the big reveal in the book, but it was rather late, only a few chapters before the reveal, and a definite "oh my God!" moment.

Considering the secret at the center of the novel, a case could be made that this is a dystopian novel. [When I say that, I mean it in the context of the original definition of the word, not the warped view we have of it currently. So, for your cultural edification: The current popular view of "dystopian" amounts to the same as "anti-utopian" or "the opposite of utopian" (which is anything that is not an actual utopian society (so any society currently on Earth (yes, we are all dystopian))). The actual definition of a dystopian society is a society that looks as if it's utopian but has something wrong or flawed at its core. An example would be the society in Brave New World which looks and acts like a utopia except that the population is largely controlled through the use of drugs.] I suppose that depends upon which side of the morally ambiguous question you fall. It's an interesting question, but not one I can go into without spoiling the entire book. But, trust me, I'd love to go into it.

It's a good book. A very good book. It's well written and will probably keep you wondering what it's actually about for quite a while. In a good way. Because you can probably pick up on it not being about what it appears to be about fairly early on. The characters are really good, too, and many of them are not exactly who they appear to be, too, but also in a good way, in the way of getting to know someone, say, away from work when you have only ever known them as a work acquaintance.

The only warning I would give is that the book has a definite feminist slant and, if you can't go in for that, you should probably skip the book; it will probably make you mad. And that, more than anything, will be quite revelatory. If the book makes you mad, it's probably about you.

Nolan Again Impresses...

...with his ability to obfuscate.

I do realize that I'm going to be in the vast minority with my stance on The Dark Knight Rises, but I'm used to that, so I'm just going to go with it.

I have one thing to say for Christopher Nolan: he's a magician when it comes to making movies. I mean that in a very literal sense. He uses flashy action to distract us from the holes he leaves behind in the story. We can't see them, because we're too busy looking in the other direction.

Or maybe it's just that Marvel has set the bar so high with their string of excellent adaptions that I'm just no longer satisfied with interpretations. Maybe if it was more explicit that these are interpretations, I'd be happier. DC/Warner Brothers could just slap their Elseworlds label on  these things, and I might be more accepting of them. As it is, though, there are so many things that aren't Batman in these movies that I have a hard time dealing with it. Like in Burton's Batman when Alfred brings Vicki Vale down into the Batcave. What?

Unfortunately, Nolan has plenty of those moments himself. Like in Batman Begins when Wayne allows Lucius Fox to know that he's Batman. Whereas that was almost acceptable in that movie, those inconsistencies with the source material have continued to snowball to the point that by the time we get to Rises, I can't accept them. I mean, by the end of The Dark Knight Rises half of everyone knows that Wayne is Batman. And we're just supposed to believe that some random cop walks up to Wayne and just knows? Seriously. I get that Nolan needs that for his story, but, give me a break, he knew because he saw it in Wayne's face? At least Tim Drake did the research to figure out that Wayne is Batman. And I don't want to give spoilers, but having his actual name be Robin? It just makes me cringe.

However, the big issue for me, the thing that set the big disconnect for me, is that we're supposed to believe that this is 8 years later. That Bruce Wayne just quit being Batman and went into seclusion. I get that Nolan is trying to give us a sense of Miller's Dark Knight comics in which Batman had quit and was in seclusion, but that was because he got old. He even gives us a cane like Wayne uses in Batman Beyond, but, again, in those he got old; Nolan wants us to believe that Wayne just quit. I can't buy it. I absolutely can not buy it.

This is where I understand the difference between me, someone that grew up reading Batman comics and was heavily invested in Batman lore for...well, longer than I should have been, and the vast majority of people out there that don't have that same investment. These details aren't important to them. I get that. I also get that I am not really the target audience for the movie. I was the target audience for Batman Begins, because that one was more focused on the fans of the comic, but these last two, after hooking everyone in, have been focused on the general consumer.

Even so, the idea with Nolan's Batman is that he is set in the "real world," and, as such, I still can not accept this 8 year hiatus. He wants us to buy into too many unrealistic ideas:
1. After 8 years of no Batman, people are still talking about him. Give me a break. Culturally, we barely hold onto anything for 8 days, and Nolan expects us to believe that people are still saying, after 8 years, "is he coming back?" Not to mention the fact that he has kids, like 10-year-old kids, talking about Batman as if he's a reality to them. Or was a reality to them. Yes, all of this bothers me, because none of it's how the real world works.
If he'd made it a year after the events of Dark Knight, maybe even two, it would have been plausible.
2. There's a Harvey Dent Day and people care about it. See point 1. No one would care after 8 years. Well, they wouldn't care beyond the fact that it was a day off from work. And it's not clear that they, the common people, do get a day off from work.
3. After 8 years, Wayne just puts the suit back on, and it's like he never quit. There are so many problems with this:

• There is an implication, a strong implication, that Wayne has been doing nothing to "stay in shape" during his seclusion (except, maybe, shooting some arrows). He's just been sulking about. Bodies deteriorate pretty quickly. After just a few months, he would have lost his edge and begun losing muscle mass. After a year, it would have taken considerable training to be able to get back into shape. After 8 years? 
• Aside from the staying in shape aspect of it, Wayne has definitely not been sparring or doing any kind of combat training in those 8 years. As an example of what not sparring can do, you can look at the Foreman/Ali championship fight. Foreman was unable to spar for the entire month leading up to the bout due to an eye injury, and just that one month of not training threw his fighting off so much that he couldn't compete. (Ali won and refused to ever allow Foreman a re-match.)
• On top of all the not staying in shape and not sparring, Wayne has suffered some sort of debilitating injury that has caused him to need a cane to walk. His body is in bad shape. No, it's in horrible shape. So... 8 years of lounging in seclusion and he can't even walk under his own power, but we're supposed to believe that a high tech knee brace returns him to fighting form? Are you kidding me?

While it is true that Alfred voiced concern over these issues, it was given in the sense that it would be a "bad idea" to get back into costume. In truth, it would have been an impossibility. Not to put the costume back on but certainly impossible to be Batman again just like that.

If Nolan wants us to believe that this is a Batman that could be in the real world, he needs to keep him in the real world. And don't get me started on the "fusion bomb," because all of that was just bad science. I'll buy into Wayne creating a fusion reactor, but not turning it into a "time bomb" in the way it was done in the movie. They're equating it to a meltdown in a nuclear reactor, and those things just don't happen on a schedule. Not to mention the last minute save after 5 months. It just doesn't get more cliche than that.

Nolan also uses sleight-of-hand to hide facts from us. I don't have an issue with this in a general sense, but it takes away from the enjoyment of watching it again. He did this very successfully in The Prestige, because, in that one, he gave us the clues to figure out what was going on so that when the reveal happened it was your own fault for not figuring it out. I like that kind of cleverness, and doing it that way does make for good repeat viewing, because you can go back and see where the clues were that you missed (like in The Sixth Sense). I dislike, though, when not only is the information hidden but the fact that there is information hidden is hidden. Of course, then, when you do see that coming because you have more lore than the average viewer, there's no surprise, so that twist didn't throw me at all, and that made the viewing experience... less than it could have been.

Having said all of that, don't take it that I'm saying that it's a bad movie. It's not. It's a good movie, and I'm glad I saw it in the theater. The acting is good (Oldman is still great as Gordon, Hathaway was good, Gordon-Levitt is quite good), and the action and fight sequences are spectacular. But the movie, if you look beyond those things, is not great.

Here's the way I look at it:
After I saw The Avengers, I wanted, immediately, to see it again. After seeing it the second time (opening weekend), I wanted to go back and see it again. I still want to see it again. I have no desire to see Rises again.
I had the same experience with The Dark Knight when it came out alongside Iron Man. I saw Iron Man three times in the first week and still would have gone back to see it. I could barely sit through my second viewing of The Dark Knight because I got bored even though I'd been on the edge of my seat during my first viewing. After 4 years, I barely want to re-watch Dark Knight and that desire is only related to the release of Rises (in fact, I have not seen Dark Knight again since I saw it last in the theater even though I own the movie). I've seen Iron Man numerous times in the intervening years and talking about it makes me want to go put that one in right now. That, to me, is what makes a movie great, the desire to watch it over and over again. I just don't get that from Nolan.

I've said that I'm not in favor of re-boots, and I'm not, but I would certainly be in favor of a Batman re-boot. As long it's more in line with the comics. I really don't want someone coming along and trying to continue on from the point where Nolan left things. Of course, that's part of why Nolan left things the way he did (by his own admission).

I'd say that maybe I'm just getting crotchety in my old age, but that's just not it. In truth, I've always been like this. Even in high school, my friends would be upset because I'd point out inconsistencies in movies. I'd enjoy them just fine anyway, but, then, I'd pop their bubbles of the movies by pointing out the flaws, and they would lose enjoyment of them. So... I like Rises. It was a good movie, certainly big enough to be worth seeing in the theater. It just wasn't great, and it wasn't great because it lacked in the story department. Anyway, I'm not trying to make anyone else not like the movie, but I would like to peel back the whitewash of "greatness" that has been slapped onto it so that people can see past the action smokescreen.

[And, remember! I have a contest going on! Check out yesterday's post for details.]

Super 8 or What's Behind My Back?

My wife screamed. I mean, she really screamed. I don't remember one time in over a dozen years when she's actually screamed during a movie. Generally speaking, she just likes to cut the circulation off in whichever of my limbs is closest to her during any suspenseful or scary parts. This time, she screamed. Loud. And ended up half in my lap. From a movie seat, so that was kind of impressive. She made me jump. I don't even remember what it was that caused the reaction, at this point, but she followed it up with 3 or 4 lesser screams throughout Super 8. And she squeezed my left arm off. Yes, it fell onto the floor, and I had to have it reattached. It was pretty gross, though. I mean, have you ever really looked at the... goo... on a movie theater floor? Let me just tell you right now, you don't want your arm laying around in it. Fortunately, because we went to a late showing several weeks post release, the theater wasn't very crowded, so there weren't many witnesses to take care of.

My first reaction to Super 8 was very positive. There's a good story there. An actual story about real people. So here's the warning: there will be spoilers. I want to actually talk about this movie and J. J. Abrams, and I don't want to try to do it while dodging around trying not to give anything away about the movie. Also, despite anything negative I may say about Super 8, let me just reiterate that I thoroughly enjoyed the experience of watching the film. It's easily one of the best stories in a movie I've seen this year. Not the best, but, probably, top 5.

I have very ambivalent feelings about Mr. Abrams. The more removed I am from the experience of sitting in the theater watching Super 8, the more my ambivalence towards Abrams extends over to the movie. See, Abrams has this problem: he likes to hide things behind his back to generate suspense. You remember doing that when you were a kid, right? Or, at least, having it done to you? When you're a kid, it's kind of fun. Trying to "convince" someone to show you what he's hiding. It's fun because you know he really does want to show you, so, once you've played the game long enough, he'll give you a peek. Teenagers change this to the "I've got a secret" game, but it's really the same thing.

There are two problems with this: 1. the thing is often anti-climactic 2. sometimes, we already know. Oh, actually, there's one other problem: it only works once. It's sort of a cheap trick in story telling because of that, when the suspense is being generated by just holding the secret behind your back. There's no reason to go back and experience it again, because you already know the secret. As opposed to a movie like The Sixth Sense (and I hate using this, because I don't have much respect for what Shyamalan has become. However, you can't deny that this one film was brilliant. Possibly the most brilliant of its genre) where the secret is really in front of you the whole time, you just don't know it because you haven't figured it out. You can watch it over and over again marveling at how you should have figured it out but just didn't.

That was the biggest issue I had with Super 8; I had flashbacks of Cloverfield, which is a movie I just didn't enjoy. I appreciate what Abrams was trying to do (it was a great idea), but the execution was... well, it was just weak. A movie without a plot with the author holding a monster behind his back that he flashes to us for a brief moment at the end and leaves us saying, "That's it? That was all? Two hours of this just for that?" He applies this same gimmick to Super 8, and, although he gives us a better view of the critter at the end of the movie, I still felt like I'd been kind of cheated. It was sort of like finding out that all he'd had behind his back the whole time was a frog. There was nothing startling about the alien. It was an alien. Big deal.

Abrams' genius lies in his ideas. He comes up with great concepts. Like Cloverfield. He doesn't have the best execution, though. He lets the idea run away with him instead of harnessing the idea. His Star Trek is a great example of this. He has this problem. He needs to re-boot the Star Trek franchise, but he doesn't want to just do the same thing over again. How could he shake things up? Destroy Vulcan. Go off on a whole new timeline. It was a great idea. But red matter? Seriously? That's the best he could come up with? And some guy sitting around in a space ship for decades just waiting? Yeah, it sounds malevolent and all, but, come on, decades? There's bound to be a point where the boredom sets in. Don't get me wrong, I loved his Star Trek. It's the best Star Trek out there, but, in the end, it's still just Star Trek with things like red matter that make my eyes roll.

He seems to have a follow through issue, too. Like a cat in a field of butterflies. Alias comes to mind. Another great idea. The first season was exceptional. Hooked me and my wife. We watched the whole series based on that first season. Well, the second season was pretty good, too. Somewhere in the third season, though, he got a new idea, Lost, and left Alias to pursue that instead. And Alias was full of the "what am I hiding behind my back?" plots. Every season. Oh, and everyone was an enemy spy that they would just suddenly reveal "by the way, I have a secret." I haven't watched Lost, but it has sounded like it was much the same. Great concept. It must have been considering how many people flocked to it, but he left it somewhere in there to go do Fringe, which I couldn't watch. I tried. But it was just too Abrams. Oh, and there was Star Trek in there, too, so, really, all you people out there upset about how Lost ended, you can't exactly blame Abrams, because he wasn't there. Other people were responsible for whatever bad stuff happened at the end of the series. Oh, wait. Abrams wasn't there. I guess you can blame him. But, you know, he probably didn't have any idea about how to end it, either, so it probably wouldn't have mattered if he had been there.

Super 8 evokes all of these Abrams issues for me. I can see them all in there. However, 8 has one saving grace: the story is just E.T. With a twist. It's the "what if the government had found the alien first?" version. But it's still a story about a boy that has lost a parent and is trying to cope with his loss. By meeting an alien. If only that was an option available to all boys that have lost a parent. Spielberg gave Abrams an assist on the story, so it's not surprising that that's what we're getting. Just with a lot of explosions and guns and eating humans (because that's really the freakiest moment in the movie, the alien casually munching on a human limb like it's eating a chicken leg). It's a strong story, and I could probably watch Super 8 again for the story, although the suspense surrounding the alien won't be there. My wife said she'd watch it again just to see the train crash again. It is spectacular.

Abrams does an excellent job with the setting. It evokes that sense of nostalgia in people my age and older. Those memories of what it was like to be a kid at that time. It's probably the strongest thing about the movie. It's perfect. Kids riding bikes. Models hanging from ceilings. Star Wars posters and comic books. All those things that are gone from mainstream life today. No cell phones. No computers. Cameras that actually use film that has to be developed. In that respect, I'm not sure how the movie plays to younger audiences. I haven't seen anything from that demographic about it, and we didn't take our kids to see it. I'm pretty sure all the explosions would make up for any lack of connection with the world of the movie, though.

There's even a message. Most movies, these days, don't have messages. Or themes. Nothing beyond the good vs evil. Which is fine, but it can go deeper than that. Abrams doesn't want anyone to miss his message, so he states it plainly for the audience. I'm impressed by this. Not in that he did it, but that people have still missed it. I know they have. I've read more reviews about this movie than any movie in a long time, and they all missed it. I would have thought that stating it the way Abrams did was a bit heavy handed, but, evidently, you have to put it right out there for people to even have a hope of them getting it, and, still, people will miss it. It's like communication with teenagers. Maybe that's where he messed up; he didn't state the message at least three times. Having spent many years of my life working with teenagers, I have experience with the "at least three times" thing. Most of them will get it after three times, although some still miss out and have to come back and ask "what did you say?"

At any rate, it's a good message. So good, in fact, that I'm going to quote it. The whole movie, the whole story, leads up to this one line. From the very first frame, he begins setting up the story, with a true  plot arc, to lead up to the one line of the movie that will sum everything up. However, I don't think it will spoil anything to know it ahead of time, because this particular aspect of the movie is about the journey. The journey of a father and a son trying to figure out how to connect with each other after the loss of the wife and mother. It's a touching journey and more grounded in reality than E. T., since the relationship in E.T. is the relationship with the alien. Who, then, leaves. Like Eliot's father left. This time, though, the boy is left with his father and the knowledge, "Bad things happen. Bad things happen, but you can still live."