Batman: Return of the Caped Crusaders

Tonight I saw a Batman movie in theaters, which has not been a rare outing for me in 2016. The year started out with the messy, grimdark Batman v Superman; progressed with the messier, grimdarker, but at least Hamill-ful Batman: The Killing Joke; and then sighed and continued with the messiest Hot Topic mess, Suicide Squad. But despite the third time not being a charm, DC went forth (get it?) with yet another theatrical release.

Turning away from the grimy and the lurid, Batman: Return of the Caped Crusaders harkens back to the 1960s TV show. In Batman: The Killing Joke, the Joker paralyzes Barbara Gordon/Batgirl, strips her, photographs her, and then shows those photographs to her father, Commissioner Gordon, whom he has also stripped and imprisoned in an X-rated roller-coaster, all so that he can convince Batman to kill him. In the 60s Batman TV show, Joker rigs the high school milk machine to dispense money instead of milk, thus robbing Gotham's youth of their passion for hard and honest work, because why be a productive citizen when you can just get money from the milk machine? (Dick Grayson/Robin, of course, is not tempted by this corrupting teat.)

Nice try, commies!

The wholesome zaniness was a boon for great thespians wanting to have a scene-chewing blast in the Rogues Gallery. Eartha Kitt prowled as Catwoman, Burgess Meredith chortled as the Penguin, and barely-in-the-closet Cesar Romero and Frank Gorshin got to be as flamboyant as they pleased with the Joker and the Riddler. However, Adam West and Burt Ward, the painfully earnest Batman and Robin, had a much harder time with the show's legacy.

Fortunately, they both seem to have reconciled with their preppy, do-gooding characters, and reunited as Batman and Robin (along with one of three Catwomen, Julie Newmar) to lend their voices for this animated feature, directed by animation veteran Rick Morales.

Fans who have been disappointed by past 2016 Batman movies might ask, "Do I really want to invest my time into this again?" That's a fair question, so first ask yourself these questions:

• Would I be in hysterics (of the good kind) if the movie opened with Dick doing ballet?
• Do I think deep down that what the Joker really needs is a guitar-gun that shoots paper streamers?
• If Batman were to travel to space, would his spacesuit's helmet having adorable bat ears be important to me? 

If you answered "yes" to all of the above, there's a good chance you'll enjoy this.

Note the seatbelts. They're villains, not uncouth monsters.

And yes, space is involved, but surprisingly, it's not even the climax! The self-aware yet gleeful craziness just keeps coming long after our heroes and villains have fought in the International Space Station. The film's not completely perfect - it is very silly, Newmar clearly struggled with the voicework, and some won't like the adherence to retro gender stuff. But it's darn good fun, and definitely the best Batman movie I saw this year. It was also the only one I saw in a nearly empty theater, but this has been marketed mostly for home viewing. Hopefully the nostalgia factor and yearning for some fun Batman will win over burned-out Batfans.





Image info:
Serious Robin: Batman wikia
Extremely safe driving in a Jokermobile: SciFiNow

Swiss Army Man: It's Always Ourselves We Find in the Sea

My saddle's waiting, come and jump on it

Swiss Army Man, the feature film debut of Daniels (Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, directors of music videos like Turn Down For What), sounds like a movie created on a dare: a man on a deserted island is saved by riding a fart-powered corpse. In that regard, it feels like it could have similar origins to Kevin Smith's Tusk, which came from a joke about a man demanding his roommate dress up and act as a walrus.

Tusk stayed in the throwback-horror genre, and while interesting in its own way, was not terribly deep or successful. Swiss Army Man could have played it safe (as safe as a farting corpse movie could be) by either staying in the gross-out comedy genre or going for a clinically detached symbolist interpretation. Instead, Daniels refuse to shy from either puerile humor or art, and they make something funny and beautiful in the process.

Response has certainly been mixed (walk-outs at Sundance were reported). I particularly enjoyed Onur Tukel's comic-format review (spoilers!). I didn't come to quite the same conclusions as he did, but it's a thoughtful, thought-provoking piece. Interestingly, despite his deep reading and admiration of the film, Tukel decides he didn't like it. I felt the same way about Yorgos Lanthimos's The Lobster - appreciation of its daring and art, but little actual affection. On the contrary, like the conqueror worm, Swiss Army Man has chewed and nuzzled its way into my heart.

Cannes aftermath

Daniels open the film with a shot of the ocean. Soon we see floating pieces of trash bearing desperate messages: someone has had a boating accident. On a very small, uninhabitable island we find Paul Dano's disheveled, sunburnt Hank preparing to hang himself from the mouth of a cave. He hums a song to steady himself, but is distracted by the sudden appearance a body (Daniel Radcliffe) washed up on shore.

Startled, Hank falls from the cooler/gallows he's standing on, but manages to break the noose in his determination to reach the man, whom he hopes is still alive. He's not. A rumbling gives Hank hope, but it turns out to just be gas the bloated body is expelling. "That's funny," Hank sighs before taking the dead man's belt to use as a replacement noose. But before Hank can hang himself (again), the body, continuing to fart wildly, shows off a neat trick: it can propel itself in the water. Hank runs down the beach and - using the broken noose as a lasso - triumphantly rides the corpse out to sea.

Hank wakes up on a Pacific Northwest shore and goes off in search of civilization, carrying the body on his back (Dano apparently did actually carry Radcliffe through much of the film) and sometimes talking to it. To his alarm, it starts talking back. Hank names his new friend Manny and tells him about life, sex, pop culture, his deceased mother, his distant father, and his crush (using hikers' garbage to make educational props) as they look for home. Along the way, it becomes clear how lonely and unsure of himself Hank has been. And Manny's abilities continue to develop and surprise (for example, his penis works as a compass). Will the duo be ready to rejoin civilization by the time they make it back, and will they want to?

A bed of clover...and poop

Dano's and Radcliffe's performances are masterful, funny, and affecting, and Daniels capture the Pacific Northwest's coastline and redwoods in all their glory. Andy Hull and Robert McDowell's powerful, infectious score is a critical part of the movie. If the Oscars refuse to consider Dano's work in the farting corpse movie, they should at least acknowledge that score.

The Atlantic's David Sims is being fair when he writes in his otherwise glowing review that, "The downside of [the story] is that this is an indie film recycling an age-old indie trope - that of the introverted, lonely white dude, unlucky in love and pining for a silent woman who isn’t afforded similar agency by the plot." As Mary Elizabeth Winstead was pursued by an awkward Michael Cera in Scott Pilgrim, here she's pursued by an awkward Paul Dano. In that, it does feel annoyingly familiar and twee. I mean, look at these fucking hipsters who directed it.

That said, I saw a lot of myself in Dano's Hank. Like, a lot. Like...maybe despite being completely romance-adverse, I've seen someone on the bus and imagined our courtship, proposal, and wedding even though that might not be what I actually want out of life. I've never dressed up as a bus crush and made out with a corpse, though. I swear.

I swear

My Interpretation (Spoilers!)

I read the movie as a twist on the "life before your eyes" concept. I think Hank's opening suicide attempt was successful. When he first finds Manny, he tells the body that he had hoped when he died he would see the life he wished he had - full of music, friends, parties, and a lover. With Manny filling multiple roles, Hank gets to see all of that.

The final part of the movie, when Hank and Manny stumble into the backyard of a freaked-out Sarah (Hank's bus and instagram crush) and are soon besieged by law enforcement, the media, and Hank's father, confused me on the first viewing. Having thought about the film and seen it a second time, I think this part is Hank finally accepting himself and his reality.

He's been fantasizing about getting a second chance to talk to Sarah on the bus and having that interaction blossom into romance. But he finally realizes that even if he did get a second chance with Sarah...she's perfectly happy with her husband and child and would understandably be majorly creeped out by some stranger obsessing over her instagram photos. He realizes he wasn't really in love with Sarah, but that he wanted her happy life. He realizes that and accepts it, just as he realizes that even though he'll never have the connection he wants with his father, his father still loves him. Hank's acceptance of himself (symbolized by him admitting, with relief and delight, to farting in front of the crowd) gives him a final moment of peace as he dies.

Maybe that's what the Daniels meant, or maybe not, but that's what I saw in the movie. To close on the closing lines from e.e. cummings' "maggie and milly and molly and may,"

For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it's always ourselves we find in the sea




Image sources: 
Paul Dano riding Daniel Radcliffe like a water pony
A day at the beach
Sleepy Daniel Radcliffe
On the bus

The Bard and Batman: Stories We Tell Ourselves

That time the Joker went meta on some Shakespeare and then flew away.

I love Shakespeare, and I love Batman. I got to enjoy both these things over the weekend. On Saturday, I saw Cal Shakes's production of beloved comedy Much Ado About Nothing, in which the play itself became a play within a play. Then on Sunday I read somber graphic memoir Dark Night: A True Batman Story, in which a writer on Batman: The Animated Series grapples with the characters he's given voice to in the wake of a personal trauma.

While very disparate in tone and format, I couldn't help but notice how both works raised the questions of why we tell stories, and what we're really doing by telling them.

James Carpenter and Stacy Ross in Much Ado About Nothing

I saw my first Cal Shakes performance last year when, pining for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, I realized it was dumb of me to not take greater advantage of the Bay Area theater scene. With its beautiful outdoor theater in Orinda and crowds of Shakespeare-psyched people, I felt right at home. When I learned they were doing one of my favorites this season, I was excited.

Lots (most?) of Shakespeare productions put a spin on the text. I've seen a Harlem Renaissance The Comedy of Errors at Oregon Shakespeare Festival; a 90s pop music Love's Labor's Lost at Silicon Valley Shakespeare; and sat through the biker gang version of Cymbeline where our tragically lost Anton Yelchin did a good job despite the blahness happening around him. This version of Much Ado About Nothing, a collaboration between writer Kenneth Lin and director Jackson Gay, is a brand-new cater-waiter version.

It starts with the end of the play - and behind the scenes. While Hero and Claudio's wedding wraps up off-stage, the catering staff (and the wedding singer, who's been stiffed on his pay) clean up. In verse written by Lin (which feels a little clunky, but what wouldn't next to Will?), they gossip about the events leading up to the wedding and start playfully impersonating their employers. Aided by props from the event photobooth, the co-workers are soon acting out the entire story.

Hero is slandered at the alter.

Gender-bending has always been a part of Shakespeare's work, and having the characters here play-act within their play puts a new and sensible twist on it. Class clown Benedick (or rather, the cater-waiter imitating Benedick) is played by a gangly-but-cool Stacy Ross. James Carpenter's sharp facial features more readily suggest Julius Caesar's Cassius, but he plays Beatrice with dignity and compassion.

The roles the catering staff play are a reflection on their personal relations. Ross and Carpenter's co-workers are clearly longtime adversaries, which is why they jump at the chance to insult each other under the guise of impersonating others. Safiya Fredericks and Denmo Ibrahim's characters are lovers who have hit a rough spot, which gets explored when they play Hero and Claudio. A crush develops between the wedding singer who gets roped into playing Don John (Patrick Alparone) and the catering employee who plays Borachio (Rami Margron), one of Don John's henchmen, and they flirt while scheming. This was my one disappointment: Don John's other henchman is Conrade, and we've now had two Much Ado movies where John and Conrade's "can you make no use of your discontent" scene has been sexy. By having Margron's character play Conrade instead of Borachio, it would be an official trend!

Overlooking that grievous oversight , Gay and Lin's production was a delight - clever, accessible, and joyous.

Less joyous, but life-affirming, is Paul Dini's Dark Night, illustrated by Eduardo Risso. In the 1990s, Paul Dini was a writer for Batman: The Animated Series, the great cartoon that brought us an art deco Gotham, Kevin Conroy as Batman, Mark Hamill as Joker, and Arleen Sorkin as a new character to the Batman canon: Harley Quinn. Also in the 1990s, Dini was mugged in an attack so violent he required facial reconstruction surgery.

Dini talks to us via a cartoon avatar in the vein of Scott McCloud in Understanding Comics. We learn that although he was experiencing creative and professional success at the time of the attack, he was struggling personally. In his narrative, the mugging not only adds new traumas, but brings into nightmarish focus lifelong problems: loneliness, self-destructive tendencies, and a lack of self-confidence.

The attack also leaves him in an existential quandary regarding his work. What's the point of superheroes if no one's there to actually save you when you need it? Why bother with cartoons if they do nothing to help in reality? He feels betrayed by his main characters: Batman was no hero to him, and Joker's villainy now repulses him.

Dini imagines himself both taunted and cajoled by his characters as they guide him through his lowest of lows. And gradually, he heals. He starts looking at his problems head-on instead of turning to denial and drink. He realizes that maybe Batman hasn't let him down after all, and that his work does have value.

On an extremely personal note, seeing the depth of these "conversations" between Dini and his characters and Dini and himself was somewhat of a relief to me. I always have characters in my head (confession: imaginary cover bands "play" all my iPod music for me, I know all of the bandmates' names, etc), and when I talk to myself as myself, I'm horrible to myself. If a friend was being talked to by a significant other the way I talk to myself, I'd tell them to get out of that relationship. I'd have the car running outside for their escape. It's a relief to know I'm not too weird (maybe just writer-weird) for the characters, and that others struggle with the awful self-talk too.

The book is a must for mature fans of Batman: The Animated Series, but its artistry, and its insight into creativity, mental health, and trauma, should earn it a wider audience.


Images:
Flying Falstaff Joker: art by Dick Sprang (really), Charles Paris, and Greg Theakston, originally from Batman #63 in 1951 (reprinted in The Greatest Joker Stories Ever Told)
Much Ado photos: photos by Alessandra Mello for Cal Shakes's Facebook
Dark Night cover: art by Eduardo Risso

Charlotte Salomon: Life? or Theater?

Exhibition banner outside Musee Massena

I recently got back from a vacation, part of which was in Nice, France. One of my "must-do" items for the town was seeing the Musee Massena, a historic villa which is now a museum of Nice history, centering on the belle epoque. Artifacts include a crown of Empress Josephine. It's all very decadent.

The portrait gallery.

The museum also hosts rotating exhibits on the top floor. When my sister and I visited, the exhibit happened to be on Charlotte Salomon, an artist I'd never heard of before. Born in Berlin in 1917, the young painter was sent in 1938 by her father and stepmother to live with grandparents in the South of France, where they hoped she would be safe from the Nazis. While there, Salomon struggled with depression and its legacy in her family: her mother, grandmother, and other relatives had committed suicide. To survive, she decided to throw herself into an epic project: Leben? oder Theater?: Ein Singspiel (Life? or Theater?: A Song-Play), a collection of hundreds of paintings that form a narrative about depression, her family, art, her first love, and the specter of the Third Reich.

Suddenly, the riches in the rooms below lost their luster.

On display at Musee Massena

Salomon gave Leber? oder Theater? to a friend for safekeeping before being deported with her husband, Alexander Nagler, to Auschwitz, where she was killed. She was 26 years old and five months pregnant.

Her story is a gut-punch, especially when paired with her work. In her gouache paintings, one feels her joy for and dedication to art, her thrill of young love, her fear and resilience in the face of terrible odds.

My favorite from the show - Salomon practices her art

Salomon uses an alter ego, "Charlotte Kann," to tell her life story. The pieces displayed at the Musee Massena chronicle her early childhood; her grandmother's depression and suicide; her opera singer stepmother (Paula Salomon-Lindberg, called Paulinka in Leben? oder Theater?); her love affair with and artistic mentoring by her stepmother's vocal coach, Alfred Wolfsohn (called Amadeus Daberlohn); and her exile to France.

The show is full of striking images: a soul ascending to heaven and then descending to Earth for a visit, an open window after a suicide, Salomon diligently painting while surrounded by the bright objects of her study, lovers parting on a darkened street, and Nazis on parade - a vision sickeningly familiar to us by way of history books, but contemporary to her. Salomon's art has boldness and urgency.

What also struck me about the work was its format. With its mishmash of standalone paintings, pages with panels, and text, Leben? oder Theater? could certainly be called a graphic memoir, decades before Alison Bechdel's Fun Home, Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis, or even Harvey Pekar's American Splendor.

One of the pages on display at Musee Massena

Part of travel is the unpredictability of what you'll learn, and I'm grateful to have learned about Salomon.

Charlotte Salomon: Vie? ou Theatre? is at the Musee Massena until May 24, and Leben? oder Theater?'s permanent home is the Jewish Historical Museum in Amsterdam, which has made the entire work available online.

Three pages at Musee Massena

Image info:
Exterior of Musee Massena: my photo
Interior of Musee Massena: my photo
Painting of Nazis: my photo of the Massena exhibit
Painting of Salomon painting: WikiMedia Commons
Painting with panels: Jewish Historical Museum, image 4235
Series of three paintings: my photo of the Massena exhibit

Mark Zuckerberg Force Feeds Someone a Jolly Rancher: Batman v Superman

No caption needed.

Do we need more writing about Batman v Superman, the artistic/critical/fan disaster and financial success? No, but I'll type out my thoughts as a way of coping.

I just got back from a family vacation, during which I watched Batman v Superman with my mom and sister. My sister and I are longtime Batman fans. We knew the movie would likely be bad, but we were still going to see it for the reasons described in this Onion article. My mom does not care about Batman, but does care about Jeremy Irons, this version's Alfred. My mom later told us she was confused during the entire movie and thought my sister and I would know what was going on. She was wrong.

Let me start off with the two moments of the film during which the audience actually indicated enjoyment. These were:

• Wonder Woman enters the battle
• Batman says "oh, shit" at a funny moment

During the interminable movie, the people wanted Wonder Woman and some fun. Who can blame them? 

I will also add that the "murder pearl" scene (when Bruce Wayne's parents are murdered, his mom's necklace breaks, sending pearls bouncing dramatically in slo-mo) was very beautiful. The murder pearls always border on ridiculous, since they happen in every single telling, but I would honestly lose my shit if the Waynes were murdered with Martha wearing a diamond choker.

Plink, plink, plink! Now you're a furry vigilante!

Random Observations:

-One of the weirdest parts of the movie (saying a lot) is Zack Snyder's version of Lex Luthor. He has Jesse Eisenberg, the mumblecore version of Michael Cera, playing his Mark Zuckerberg role again. Ok, young Lex Luthor with a Silicon Valley vibe. J.J. Abrams made millennial Vader and Tarkin work so why can't...oh, right. Because J.J. Abrams is J.J. Abrams and Zack Snyder is Zack Snyder. Lutherberg gets increasingly off the rails as the film continues. What is his motivation in manipulating a fight to the death between Batman and Superman and making a monster out of Zod's corpse? WE HAVE NO IDEA.

-HOWEVER, I will admit I was kind of intrigued by the chemistry between Lutherberg and Holly Hunter's no-nonsense Kentucky senator. I can picture an off-putting but compelling erotic thriller featuring the juvenile, awkward enfant terrible and the older tough cookie Southerner who feels out of place in DC. Not directed by Snyder, though. 

-Going back to Lutherberg's motivations, would it be giving Snyder too much credit to think this might be explained in the upcoming Suicide Squad? Lex's obsession with making Batman kill someone, knowledge of Batman's true identity, and penchant for sending taunting messages in scrawled red letters are all Joker trademarks. Could Joker have been controlling him all along? 

-Did Snyder seriously kill Mercy? We're about to get the first live-action Harley and she can't have a kick-ass fight with Mercy as nature fucking intended? Crossing my fingers that she inexplicably survived. 

Ladies, we all know who the real enemy is.

-All of the Rogues Gallery apparently moved out of Gotham, leaving Batman to battle quotidian human traffickers and pedophiles. He also mutilates them, which I thought was going to be revealed to be the work of a Batman impersonator, but wasn't, I guess.

-Alan Moore's overrated (imho) but iconic The Killing Joke, as well as many other Batman stories, explore Batman's refusal to kill Joker or even passively let him die when he throws himself off buildings or gets sentenced to death for poisoned stamp murder. This would break Batman's "one rule," which is never to kill anyone, no matter what horrific atrocities they have committed. After seeing the carnage left by criminals and cops alike, Batman refuses to take a life. Anyways, in this movie, Batman pretty much immediately decides and then relentlessly attempts to kill Superman. 

-Quick! You're dying! Your final words are to tell the guy killing you to save your mom! How do you phrase this? Do you say, "Save my mom"? Do you say, "Save [your mother's full name]"? Or do you just say, "Save [your mother's first name only]" and hope your murderer can figure out which Joan or Trisha or Leslie you meant? What if a plot point rests entirely on that third option? 

-The director's cut of this film is three hours long. I cannot fathom what could possibly be in those additional thirty minutes, nor do I wish to endure them. 

-Ben Affleck has written his own Batman film for him to direct and star in. You know what? Fine. 

-David Ayer's Suicide Squad is out this August. We're counting on you, Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Annalise Keating, DC Prom King & Queen, et al. 

Lex was just an Amy lackey.

Image info:
Horrified Joker, Penguin, and Riddler: the classic 1966 film
Bouncy murder pearls: from the Gotham TV series, this time
Harley v Mercy: Batman: the Animated Series 
Rosamund Pike contemplating murder: Gone Girl

Movies I Want Right Now That I Can't Have Right Now

Get it, Mia!

There are a number of movies coming up that I'm impatient to see. Some will be out in a few weeks, some in nearly a year, but they all feel like they're taking forever to get here. Here are the movies I'm most mad I can't see yet, in order of release date.

Crimson Peak

Do it for all of us, Mia

I jump when my toast pops up, so this movie will probably terrify me. But that's okay, because it's Tom Hiddleston. And, as the trailer has promised, he takes off his clothes (I'm a lot more understanding of stuff like Sports Illustrated's swimsuit annual now that so many movies cater to the female gaze). Hiddleston teams up with his onscreen sister-in-law from Only Lovers Left Alive, Mia Wasikowska, general phenom Jessica Chastain, and the guy who said "MAKO" a lot in Pacific Rim in this Guillermo del Toro haunted house movie. With a great cast, great director, and lush Gothic visuals, I'm sure the nightmares will be worth it.

Bonus Upcoming Hiddleston: Loki and the Scarlet Witch will pair up to do Southern accents in I Saw the Light, AND he's also starring in High-Rise.

Using the teaser trailer because of the cover of Nick Cave's "Red Right Hand." Nick Cave is always a plus.

Out: October 16, 2015

Room

Entertain your captive child with Eggshell Snake(tm)!

The "princess locked in a tower" trope is ancient. And while it features in countless fairy tales and video games, it's rooted in the very real fear that if you're a woman, some asshole might kidnap you and imprison you somewhere in order to rape you repeatedly. The Cleveland and Jaycee Dugard cases are just two of the biggest headline-makers of the past few years. These horrors have been reflected in contemporary culture in various ways, including Netflix's Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, which creates bright humor out of darkness. Room, by Emma Donoghue, is a thoughtful wonder of a novel. Embracing the challenge of writing a non-cloying child narrator, Donoghue tells the story of two survivors: a young woman who was kidnapped and the son she births and raises in captivity.

I'm sharing the teaser trailer here because the full trailer is kind of an all-over-the-place mess. I hope the movie itself does the book justice.

Out: October 16, 2015

Macbeth

Did you spend all our blood money at Sephora?

If you're Michael Fassbender or Marion Cotillard and also married to either Marion Cotillard or Michael Fassbender, I'm not sure why you would strive for anything else; you have reached peak achievement. Just chill in that French-Irish sea of beauty. But the Macbeths refuse to chill when it comes to the possibility of ruling Scotland in the 1040s, even though it's not like crowns are going to get them indoor plumbing or anything else remotely good. I'm really excited for this. After the disaster of last year's Cymbeline, we need (or at least I want, because I'm greedy) a big, successful Shakespeare adaptation to follow the promise of 2014's blockbuster broadcast of Coriolanus (more Tom, no apologies) and the near-perfect 2013 Much Ado About Nothing. I'm pissed that we're getting this two months after the UK does, in December instead of October. Are they sending an actual reel of the film by dinghy? Maybe they're hoping the Christmas spirit will make Americans more likely to see Shakespeare, even if it's the play containing the famous lines:

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

God bless us, every one!

Out: December 4, 2015  >:(

Batman vs Superman

Oooooooh, Superman's in trouble.

I think all DC fans are on pins and needles for these next two. Like most of the internet, I found the Batman vs Superman marketing pretty laughable (So grimdark! Ben Affleck? What's with the title - is the Kent family farm in a class action against Wayne Enterprises?), but I'm including the above screenshot because that's the exact moment I gained some faith in Batfleck. Seeing him run through Superman-caused destruction to save a small child and then glare at the sky convinced me that this Bruce Wayne is pissed off and motivated enough to really take on the Man of Steel.

Out: March 25, 2016

Suicide Squad

A true gentleman carries a lady when she's trapped in unusable shoes.

The "DC = grimdark" fears were further fanned by San Diego Comic Con footage of Suicide Squad set to morose music, but hopefully David Ayer's film has some actual fun in it. I mean, it is about an off-the-books supervillain task force whose members have names like Captain Boomerang and Killer Croc. But it's likely that a good portion of Suicide Squad's success will depend, fairly or not, on its two most popular characters: Harley Quinn and the Joker. Margot Robbie seems perfect for Harley (this is the character's first live-action appearance), although it's weird that someone born in 1990 will be in a romantic triangle with Jordan Catalano and the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. There's been a lot of drama regarding both Robbie's and Jared Leto's characters' design (though mostly Leto's), and to be fair, it's pretty easy to imagine Robbie Quinn and Joker Leto re-enacting this scene, though obviously Batman would never let anyone choke to death on their own vomit.

What the dynamic between them will be also has a lot of fans anxious. Interpretations of the relationship can range from "supervillains in love" to "Harley is the poster child for domestic violence." Their relationship origin story has been told various ways in the canon, but I prefer it when Harley's transformation to supervillain Harley Quinn is done by her own initiative. Is a good decision? No, but it's hers. The Adam Glass version in the "new 52" Suicide Squad comics, the most probable source material for the film, is my least favorite. Not only does Harley not have a say in becoming Harley Quinn, she wasn't even deviously planning on a trashy tell-all true-crime book while treating the Joker - her boss was. She does kill her boss and free the Joker when she finds out, but it's done in a sort of fugue state. Weak.

So I've gone on for two paragraphs while barely mentioning any of the other characters/actors, which I feel is going to be pretty typical for this movie. Sorry, guys! Viola Davis will likely be fantastic as boss lady Amanda Waller. Will Smith has the right former-military-precision/soulful-interior look for Deadshot. I'm also looking forward to seeing Catholic gangster supervillain El Diablo (Jay Hernandez) and stereotypical Aussie supervillain Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney), whom I call Sargent Australia in my head.

Sidenote: I love that we now have a real-life DC villain marriage with Jada Pinkett Smith and Will Smith.

Here's the trailer, which was first seen as leaked SDCC footage. How do you do have a Bee Gees song in a Suicide Squad trailer without it being "Stayin' Alive"???

Out: August 5, 2016

Let's Speculate on Gotham's Probably-Joker's Amazing Wardrobe

And. Here. We. Go.

I was totally prepared to hate Jerome. The premise of Gotham is/was "Gotham before Batman," with Bruce Wayne as a recently orphaned tween and Jim Gordon as a rookie cop. Seeing a city steadily decay and burn over the years to the point where a high-tech vigilante dressed as a bat seems like a reasonable solution sounds like a great prequel.

But either the writers or the studio or both could not help themselves, and tons of established Batman characters have been crammed into the show already, despite Bruce Wayne being a child at this point. I was hoping they could at least refrain from blowing their Joker load, but near the end of Season 1 came the extremely unsubtle teasers that the mythology's #1 scene-stealer since Batman #1 would be appearing.

If Batman pursues us, we'll step into a 21+ establishment.

I didn't like the lack of restraint; I didn't like the cloying campaign; and I didn't like that assuming this is Joker and not an obnoxious bait-and-switch, he has a known background (he's not a John Doe, his name is Jerome, and he grew up in future-Robin's grandpa's circus being forced to listen to clown sex).

But alas, Cameron Monaghan won me over with a virtuoso performance of a monologue delivered in the presence of Inara from Firefly and Uncle Hector from Breaking Bad. I'm not an actor, but my advice to young actors would be that when performing a monologue for an audition, definitely do it while flanked by Inara and Uncle Hector. Maybe Kaylee and Skinny Pete in a pinch.

Anyways, like the 1960s Batman series, Gotham's best assets have been good actors having the time of their lives as flamboyant villains (RIP Jada Pinkett Smith's Fish Mooney), and previews of Season 2 (premieres Sept. 21) suggest we'll be getting a lot of Monaghan's Jerome, who appears to be high on the "I'm not a carny anymore" life. Joker-fashion focus has been on Jared Leto's version, but Monaghan, finally out of that blue sweater, is also getting a lot of fabulous costumes. What do they mean? Let's speculate.

This screenshot is from this clip, where Jerome and Barbara do some flirting in Arkham Asylum. Barbara is clearly the fashion standout here thanks to her clever re-purposing of the traditional convict stripes to form a cute summery dress, which is apparently allowed, but Jerome's not looking bad either, showing off his undershirt in a Stanley Kowalski move. This isn't a dynamic we've seen before, and I'm looking forward to seeing how it plays out (and how and if Barbara ends up back with Jim to produce Batgirl). If she's not the one, Jerome, don't worry: Arkham remains a great place to meet your significant other.

Rampant speculation: Jerome is so going to be future-serial-killer Jim Gordon Jr.'s biological dad.

These pics from Just Jared show Jerome in what seems to be the world's most fashionable and least effective straitjacket. It looks great, but there do not seem to be any arm restraints, which I think is the only point of a straitjacket? To be fair, arm restraints would make it harder to hijack that bus and thus pay homage to The Dark Knight and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

Rampant speculation: Jerome's clearly Arkham's problem child from Day 1. Here he incites rebellion when the questionable asylum rents the inmates out as backup dancers for a Lady Gaga video.

Why is Jerome dressed like Hugh Hefner? It looks like he's out of Arkham at this point, unless Arkham is holding some sort of inmate smoking jacket competition, maybe as an attempt to make amends for the Lady Gaga incident.

Rampant speculation: Ok, this is actually interesting. In the clip showing the above scene, Jerome appears to be coached by Season 2 newcomer Theo Galavan, who some think might actually be Ra's Al Ghul. This still doesn't explain the Hefnerwear, but oh well.

Jerome is already causing havoc in stolen uniforms, seemingly another nod to the Joker's actions in The Dark Knight. Does Gotham realize at this point just how much of the city's annual budget will be dedicated to dealing with this guy?

Rampant speculation: At the end of the season, Jerome goes good and becomes an upstanding GCPD officer. He is such a great cop that Batman is never needed.

Favorite Mad Max: Fury Road Moments

I'd say my favorite things, but THEY ARE NOT THINGS.

I've now seen George Miller's Mad Max: Fury Road at the theater three times. (The only other movie I've seen three times in theaters is The Dark Knight...is it the brooding heroes and guys painted white?) It keeps getting better - I notice more small details, I feel closer to crying by the end, I can make out more of the Straya slang, etc.

Clearly I'm not alone. Mad Max: Fury Road might not be the biggest moneymaker this summer, but the intelligent, visually stunning, brilliantly edited action film has impressed critics and won the devotion of fans. Comic artists were especially inspired by Charlize Theron's Furiosa. Comic book shops found they, and the printer, had greatly underestimated the demand for the first issue of the tie-in comic. At least one person has made a flamethrower ukulele.

There's been a lot written about this movie, and I'm not going to add my own huge screed. I just wanted to catalog/gush over all my favorite things* about it, because that's really the reason I have this blog. In case it's not obvious, this will be approximately 100% spoilers.

*The Doof Warrior, of course, goes without saying.

Come on.

Favorite Moments in Mad Max: Fury Road

Max's failed escape: When Max is captured by Immortan Joe's scavengers, he attempts the daring escape expected of any action hero: he breaks his bonds and fights off an endless supply of anonymous goons while dashing through the evil lair, then jumps to an improbably convenient hanging rope. But instead of completing a nail-biting and exhilarating swing to safety, he's simply pulled back inside the Citadel. Sure, at least one or two of the minions died, but mostly Max's attempt just took five minutes out of everyone's work day. The expectation-defying sequence sets the tone for the film.

Chain fight: The Furiosa versus Max and Nux (who are chained together and not on good terms) fight. I'm always in awe of well choreographed battles, and this one was especially impressive. 

Spit fight: Super mature Nux spiting back at Furiosa after she spits at him. Really hope we get some blooper reel of that. (We have been teased about one.)

Whoops: Nux tripping on the war rig. I purposefully avoided reading much about the movie before watching, so I didn't know how large a role Nicholas Hoult's Nux played. When we first see Nux, he's just one of many in the swarm of War Boys. When he straps muzzled "blood bag" Max to the front of his car so he can go into battle while getting a blood transfusion, I expected we'd shortly get a scene of Max avenging the humiliation with a quick kill. When Nux survives being thrown off the rig by the wives (after surviving his own kamikaze attempt), I then assumed he'd be the "thorn in our heroes' side" character. But then he falls down like a total klutz in front of his idol in his moment of glory.

I'm lazy, so I'd be fine with mediocre.

Thumbs-up: Max's grudging thumbs-up when Angharad avoids being crushed by a giant rock. I want Tom Hardy to give me that thumbs-up. I just don't want to fall under a repurposed oil tanker immediately after.

The wives: The women's relationships. The bond between the five wives (Angharad, the Dag, Toast, Cheedo, and Capable) is strong and authentic. They've been through hell together. It's easy to imagine how a lesser filmmaker might have taken a misstep here, thoughtlessly making them either uniformly passive or catty, but this movie doesn't do thoughtless. As Riley Keough (Capable) said about the preparation for the role "“Emailing George about the part, you realized there’s more going on than, ‘Here’s hot girl number one and hot girl number two'". 

Subtle smile: Speaking of which, Capable's contemplative, secret smile when she's back in the rig after finding Nux.

Leaving the The Fault in Our Stars kids in the dust.

Facial: Max taking a split second to weigh "face covered in other guy's blood" with "face cleaned with breastmilk." He goes with the breastmilk. You do what you gotta do, Max.

Boot: Max giving Nux a boot. Nux hasn't uttered a word of complaint about only having one boot, but Max still remembers to grab him one after slaughtering the Bullet Farmer's convoy. How...sweet? (Sure he could have given Nux his actual boot back, but he's not quite there yet - he will later swoop in rather than let Nux suffer while siphoning fuel.) It's a small, wordless indication of how Max is gradually letting himself care for others again. At the beginning of the film, he was so hurt and mistrusting that he was willing to take the rig and abandon the women in the desert, but interacting with Furiosa and the others is bringing him back to his noble self.

Tandem: Max and Furiosa's teamwork. Max is still hoarding weapons, worried Furiosa might try to off him, when he's completely caught off guard by her trusting him to start the rig if her deal in the canyon goes bad. Her trust is rewarded, and they start working together seamlessly.

From here.

Road trip: Cheedo, Toast, the Dag, Capable, and Nux all curled up asleep like kittens in the back while mom 'n' pop Furiosa and Max take turns driving through the night. Update: Please check out Joanne Kwan's awesome Mad Max family roadtrip fan art.

Uncouth ladies: The blunt Dag's understanding with the blunt Keeper of the Seeds. Age is no barrier to friendship when you're a smartass.

Pa: The characters say almost nothing about the considerable traumas they've all experienced, but we know from the first Mad Max film that Max had a infant son who was murdered. Max's PTSD flashbacks mostly involve a different young child he was unable to save, but when he's watching his new friends leave across the salt he hears, "Come on, Pa!" Wrenching. Whether you knew about his son beforehand or just put it together, it's a punch in the gut.


Favorite Moment That Wasn't Actually in Mad Max: Fury Road That I Wish Was Actually in Mad Max: Fury Road

On the way back to the Citadel, Furiosa slows the rig to a halt. Max looks at her with a wordless question. She silently indicates with her head, and he follows her gaze. There's a giant billboard reading "Aussie Al's OBGYN and Cancer Center (and Waterpark)." Max grunts and looks back at Furiosa. Furiosa looks at Max. Max shrugs deferentially. Furiosa starts the rig again and follows the sign.

My Favs of 2014

I also really like the polka dot duvet cover I got on sale.

This is by no means a definitive "best of 2014" list. I have not read, watched, or looked at enough things to make such a list. Just a few of my favorite things I read, watched, and looked at in 2014.

Books

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami - My absolute top favorite piece of media in any medium this year. After the unwieldy 1Q84, some worried Murakami had lost his touch. But this year we got a translation of his latest novel, which is also one of his best. A shy young man's life is upended when his close-knit group of friends mysteriously abandon him. Many lonely years later, he finds the courage to confront them about what happened. The novel also handles a tough topic (that coincidentally became an explosive topic in 2014) with compassion and intelligence.

The Guest Cat by Takashi Hiraide - Man doesn't consider himself a "cat person." Then he meets a cat. I also read Tom Cox's Under the Paw, a book about a man who considers himself a cat person and obtains lots of cats. (Ironically, the above Murakami was uncharacteristically catless.)

A Thousand Mornings by Mary Oliver - This collection is likely the swan song of this great poet. A Thousand Mornings is no American Primitive, and I admit I thought her poems about her late dog Percy were overwrought (until my own elderly cat passed away). But it did include one of my new favorite lines ever, in "Out of the Stump Rot, Something": "If you like a prettiness,/ don't come here./ Look at pictures instead,/ or wait for the daffodils."

Other favorites that are not from 2014 but that I read for the first time in 2014:

The Savage Detectives and Amulet by Roberto Bolaño - I went on a Roberto Bolaño binge this year. Like Balzac, Bolaño works with a large cast of characters who span the globe but are mostly rooted in Mexico City. Of these, my favorite is Auxilio Lacouture, a middle-aged drifter and literary devotee from Uruguay who calls herself the "mother of Mexican poetry." In one chapter of Savage Detectives, she tells her story of staying in a bathroom during the army's 1968 takeover of the University of Mexico. In the novella Amulet, we get a fuller picture of her hardscrabble, poetry-filled life.

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn - I don't usually read thrillers, but when I saw the incredible trailer, I knew I needed to read the book ASAP or I would look up spoilers. Even if you know some of the twists, it's still a tense "in one sitting" read. (Warning: there will be some spoilers in my ramblings on the movie version below.)

Short Stories

"Someone in the Room Will" by Falcon Miller in The Rag - Even when I'm fortunate enough to get a contributor's copy of a literary magazine, I'm still convinced my piece was the worst piece. My favorite piece, however, in my contributor's copy of The Rag #6, was Falcon Miller's clear-eyed but empathetic portrait of a woman who is just not going to make it in society.

"River So Close" by Melinda Moustakis in Granta - Another story told about people at the fringes, "River so Close" in Granta #128 tells the story of a younger, sharper woman who is a seasonal worker at an Alaskan cannery where danger takes many forms.

Art

For the Sake of Being(s), Katy Horan and Katherine Rutter at Gallery LeQuiVive in Oakland - I'm a longtime fan of Horan, but this joint show focusing on nature and dark femininity was my first introduction to Rutter's work.

Modern Nature: Georgia O'Keeffe and Lake George, O'Keeffe retrospective at the de Young in San Francisco - The giant flowers were there, but this exhibit showed off the artist's range of subjects, from abstract, modern cityscapes to landscapes far removed from her well known desert scenes.

Movies 

It was a great year for Marvel actors doing arty genre pieces.

Snowpiercer - A cruelly topical, claustrophobic, existential nightmare in which director Joon-ho Bong somehow seamlessly includes slapstick humor and kick-ass action. After the human-caused apocalypse, Earth's only survivors live on a socially stratified train doomed to circle the globe continuously (Marvel Person Count: 1, Captain America. Tilda Swinton: Yes. John Hurt: Yes.)

Under the Skin - This "alien has moral crisis on Earth" movie directed by Jonathan Glazer is...not for everyone. I had to reflect on it for a while before I even knew if it was for me. It's a contemplative film with beautiful visuals and little dialogue. Several people in the viewing I attended walked out, most memorably some guy who apparently decided he just could not watch Scarlett Johansson slowly, slowly, slowly, ever so slowly eat cake. That was where this unknown man drew the line. (Marvel Person Count: 1, Black Widow. Tilda Swinton: No. John Hurt: No.)

Only Lovers Left Alive - The main characters are vampires in this Jim Jarmusch film, but this is less of a "vampire movie" than it is a funny, moving family drama that takes place in deserted Detroit, USA and vibrant Tangier, Morocco. A sunny, earthy woman and her younger musician husband deal with his depression and her reckless little sister. (Marvel Person Count: 1, Loki. Tilda Swinton: Yes. John Hurt: Yes.)

Gone Girl - I read the book so I wouldn't look up spoilers for the movie, and then I had to wait for what felt like forever for the movie! I enjoyed this David Fincher adaptation - I'm sure it helped that Flynn did the screenplay. Some see Amy Elliot Dunne as the ultimate "men's rights activist" strawwoman, but I think she's her own great villain, and Rosamund Pike was excellent in this role (favorite moments: competitive miniature golf, post-murder hair-flip, and that grin at Ben Affleck from the examination room). Although true to the source material, the movie managed to add to a lot of dark humor. Missi Pyle as fake Nancy Grace was a great bonus. (Marvel Person Count: -0.5, with 0.5 for Daredevil and -1 for Batman. Tilda Swinton: No. John Hurt: No.)

Captain America: The Winter Soldier & Guardians of the Galaxy - with a topical political thriller and zany-cute space comedy, Marvel proved it can keep their millions of superhero movies fresh. (Marvel Person Count: check with payroll. Tilda Swinton: No. John Hurt: No.)

TV

Gotham - This prequel series is cheesy and trying to cram in too many famous characters, but I love it. Robin Lord Taylor is an absolute breakout as Oswald Cobblepot (better known as the Penguin) steadily working his way up the ranks of the Gotham underworld. Jada Pinkett Smith, as new character Fish Mooney, is over-the-top and entertaining as a villain who mixes deadliness with the camp of the 1960s series.

South Park - Who knew 18 was a lucky season? The show, which began as a crudely animated short in 1992, found new life in 2014 by drawing inspiration from Silicon Valley, gluten, and pop-star/middle-aged geologist Lorde.

Comics

And...the Rainbow Brite theme song's in my head.

Loki: Agent of Asgard - The Asgardians had quite a 2014, which should provide the foundation for a great 2015. Except for Thor, who lost the power to wield Mjolnir and was replaced by a new Thor (popular new name for old Thor as suggested by Katie Schenkel: Snortblat). Loki: AOA started in February, and then led to a mini-series, Thor & Loki: the Tenth Realm, where the brothers met their long-lost older sister, Angela, who then got her own book, Angela: Asgard's Assassin. And a new Thor has begun telling the story of the still-unknown woman who has taken Snortblat Thor Odinson's place as Thunder God.

Loki: AOA has been my favorite, though. Continuing the extreme identity crisis and self-hatred that Kieron Gillen launched for him at the end of Journey Into Mystery, AOA finds Loki living in New York, singing in the shower, playing video games, grilling salmon, and making yet another take-no-shit platonic female friend. But of course, drama finds him. With clever writing by Al Ewing and art by Lee Garbett, highlights have included a guest appearance by Doctor Doom and goddaughter Valeria, the most determined band of juggling-themed supervillains ever, and an obnoxiously heroic Loki who can turn into Thor AND a unicorn.