Category Archives: Criticism

A New Horror

Cosmic horror has seen a resurgence of late. Lovecraft, thanks to the aid of the public domain, has seen a thoroughly widespread infection of the public consciousness. Bits of his horror show up in television shows like True Detective, stories and comics from people like Junji Ito, music from Metallica, DeadMau5 and Iced Earth.

But, perhaps the most famous spread of Lovecraftian lore is in the boardgame sphere. Fantasy Flight has been pretty prolific in offering a line of products focusing on Arkham and all the horrors from which it spawns. These range from card games, dice games to sprawling board expedition games. I’ve written before of my enjoyment of Elder Signs. Thus, I was interested to hear that Fantasy Flight was releasing a new living card game. I’ve also written about their Netrunner product and not only was this new game going to follow a similar release structure but it was also going to be cooperative.

My biggest stumbling block with Netrunner was there’s no middle ground. Either the people I play are very interested in it and I’m wholly outmatched due to my shallow deckbuilding options or I can’t find anyone willing to put in the time and effort to learn the labyrinthine system. But if there wasn’t a competitive element that gave someone with a greater experience lead a significant advantage in the game then I figured it might be quite good for our table.

Thus, I eagerly played the first scenario of the Arkham Horror: The Card Game (referred to as simply Arkham LCG after this).

Image accessed from http://images-cdn.fantasyflightgames.com/filer_public/23/76/23765ffd-e321-4130-b166-fceb78b2cc4a/ahc01_preview1.png

Arkham Horror: The Card Game and all associated image belong to Fantasy Flight Games

And today I’m going to give you my first impression.

It was… ok?

I enjoyed it. The game was certainly entertaining and took a card game in a direction I’ve never seen. There’s a deckbuilding portion which, I had mistakenly assumed, meant it would somewhat similar to Netrunner. You see, you select an identity in a similar manner: in Arkham you pick an investigator and they belong to one of five classes. Each investigator has a specific power and they have deckbuilding restrictions. For instance, I chose Agnes Baker: a waitress at the local diner who was once a deadly witch in a past life. Agnes, for whatever reason, is haunted by the power she formally wielded and is capable of utilising that power to cast some classic lovecraftian spells. As part of her deck building, I could choose cards from both her class (the Mystic) and the Survivor class as well as neutral cards. Other investigators likewise had access to one other class for their deck construction.

Each class has its own speciality too. The Survivor class, from half my deck construction, appears to focus on skill checks and turning failures into successes and successes into ever better results. My fellow investigator was Roland Banks, a Guardian/Seeker cross that specialized in fighting monsters and investigating locations.

It’s an interesting system but I’m not sure how I feel about the deckbuilding portion. Granted, we had access only to the core box which meant that our decks were built for us since there cards that come in the box only allow you to make two legal decks. But decks are apparently thirty cards maximum and in the course of a game you won’t ever really go through them. So there will certainly be a need for redundancy like Netrunner, however you’re fighting against a clock since doom accumulates every round and once it reaches a threshold you’re forced along that scenarios acts.

I’m not sure how I can talk about the scenario itself since it seems highly specific with little variability. What you do during a scenario is move your investigator from location to location attempting to collect the prerequisite number of clues needed to proceed. You have three actions per turn to play items, fight monsters and perform your investigation checks. You must find the necessary clues before the doom accumulates and ends your game. So even though you can spend an action to draw a card – much like Netrunner – you’re disincentivized to do so otherwise you’ll run out of time to finish the scenario.

Now, the locations and the events that happen in them are pretty specific to your mission. I won’t spoil much, but we started the game in our study and the door to our room mysteriously vanished. That’s the sort of opening that won’t really have much recurrence in other stories. So while it sort of followed the loose outline of a standard haunted house, the details themselves were closer to like a round of Imperial Assault.

And this is where I run into my major gripe with Arkham LCG. There is very little variation within the story itself. The act progresses with the same requirements each time. The locations you visit have the same effects each time you go to them. The doom counts up the same track with the same penalties. There really isn’t much reason to replay a scenario, even if it’s only to try out a new class. You’ll have much better idea of what you’ll be facing and will no doubt have to up the difficulty of the game solely to keep interest.

Course, the way the game improves difficulty is neat. Instead of rolling dice, whenever you perform a check you must draw from a bag of chits. These chits will modify your skill number compared to the check’s difficulty – determined by the level of “shroud” in the room you are performing the check. Nearly all the chits in the bag are negatives (one’s even an auto-fail) but the degree that these chits reduce your skill can be adjusted at the start of the game. We played on normal so most of our chits were negative 1 or 0 adjustment to our skill check. You can change it so there are far more negative 2 or 3 chits floating around the reduce your odds of success. But I’m not certain how effective this balances your foreknowledge of the tasks you’ll face and your ability to adjust your deck and fine-tune it for the challenges you know are behind each door.

Even worse, I loathe Arkham’s pricing scheme. I praised Netrunner for not being nearly as gouging to the customer as Magic: The Gathering. However, despite being the LCG format, I feel like Arkham is far worse than Netrunner. You see, because you are playing campaigns and following a story, you can’t really skip releases. The core set launched with a story with three missions in it. But the next releases are set to follow this order:

Accessed from https://www.randolph.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/arkhamcardgamedunwich.jpg

Arkham LCG does provide new and updated art for familiar characters and monsters from the Lovecraft universe and I absolutely adore them for it.

A deluxe expansion the provides the first two missions of a new story arc followed by six booster packs each containing the next story in the sequence. Most of the cards contained in these releases are thus the cards necessary to run that story (the act and mission cards, monsters, locations and rewards specific for that arc). It is impossible to buy the deluxe expansion and simply pick and choose which story boosters you want from its release as they all tie into one another. And it’s not like these releases are cheap either.

The deluxe box sells for around $25. Each booster is $15. For a single post core campaign, you’re looking at $115 for a complete experience. While this is on par with Netrunner, I was never going to purchase each card released since they weren’t necessary to play. Sure, it put me at a disadvantage but it didn’t lock me out of the game. And, for the most part, I could replay with one or two deluxe expansions and just the core quite happily with multiple different deckbuilds that would provide wholly different experiences.

Arkham LCG simply does not work that way. As I mentioned, the core doesn’t change even if I pick two vastly different investigators. The Dunwich Legacy will be the same. And to my knowledge, there isn’t really anything you can do to spice things up. The game requires a set series of events that are triggered by predictable conditions.

Ultimately, it’s the kind of game I simply can’t justify buying. It’s fun and I’ll gladly play with someone but when I look for a game I’m looking for something that I can really get my money’s value. I loathe legacy style games and I won’t ever buy a game that can only be experienced once before losing all value.

Now, I know other people are not held back by these stipulations. And, perhaps for them Arkham LCG would be a far more interesting investment. At any rate, I’m eager to finish off the core campaign and see where things go but I simply don’t see myself stopping by the counter to get my own set to force Kait through at the dinner table.

Which is a shame because I was really hoping to get her into the Lovecraftian universe.

A Natural History of Dragons: A Memoir by Lady Trent

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Yes, I have been reading. But nothing I have read has inspired much thought for discussion. So do not expect much from today’s book review. I will try to do better at some future date.

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Image of the book cover from the internet.

Title: A Natural History of Dragons: A Memoir by Lady Trent

Author: Marie Brennan

Genre: Fantasy

Synopsis (giving nothing of import away): Lady Isabella Trent, preeminent dragon naturalist lays before the reader her beginnings into a career that would make her famous from Scirland to the furthest reaches of Eriga. The start of her story lays in childhood and Isabella’s early obsession with dragons. The book continues until the conclusion of her Vystrana Mountain expedition.

What was good: I like that the author created an original world. I like the description of dragons as another type of animal to be studied. It is successful in its stylized memoir format.

What was less impressive: I did not like the memoir format. Sure it was accurate. It echoed reading Darwin’s Origin of Species. Which meant that it was largely impersonal, vaguely scientific in style and almost dry considering we are discussing dragons. I did not engage well with the main character. Despite efforts to round out the character, I found Isabella largely cold and distant. The word and secondary characters were similarly distant and unapproachable.

Because of the memoir format, it was difficult to have an overarching plot or classical story element. Despite these inherent challenges, the author shoved one in there. Unfortunately this plot was seemingly tacked on at the end of the book and introduced an element of magic that did not fit well with the science bend of the book.

Solid effort, but I struggled to connect with any of the characters. And the side notes became something I skimmed over uninterested.

Prognosis: Since this series appears to be available at the library and I have been bored of late, there is a chance I might continue with the series. I wouldn’t invest money into the book, but the fact that I am willing to mention it on the blog means it is not trashy. And that is something at least. Still, I am not rushing out to read more of Lady Trent’s banal adventures.

Rank and Reason: 4 out of 5 stars for being well written, inventive but still a dry read.

B2 – Beauty and the Beast Movie Review

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Image from the internet.

Confessions: this review is late in coming. True I did not watch the movie opening weekend. Also, true it was a couple of weeks ago that I saw the live-action remake.

To be clear I am old enough that the 1991 animated Disney version is the telling of Beauty and the Beast that I grew up with. It was a classic and grew to be one of my favourite Disney movies. Thus it was with mixed feelings that I saw the live-action 2017 release in theatres.

Unlike some of the other live-action remakes put out by Disney, this one was not bad. It had an excellent and slightly diverse caste. Gaston stood out as a perfect portrayal of his animated counterpart. It had all the classic songs that made the original Disney film a classic. The costumes and set pieces were pretty. So, overall a solid film.

Image from the internet.

That is not to say it didn’t have its faults. Some of them are with the original story – at least its interpretation. Some are because I am reluctant to change and a few were just poor decisions.

A couple of items that stood out for me as detractors to the film include: the ‘Be our guest’ dinner scene; Belle investigating the forbidden west wing; the underutilized, random inclusion of the sorceress and the connection of the castle to the town.

In the animated film, the lengthy but excellent song of the castle staff was used to tell some of their history over the past decade. The imagery devolves into a very cartoon interpretation of dancing plates and utensils. Which makes sense in the medium that it is portrayed. However, this is a live-action film. The design is to make it feel real. So, the change to pure CGI is discontinuous and disruptive to the flow. It makes the song feel unimportant, as nothing additional is being conveyed by the visuals and long, because there is nothing interesting or inventive in whirling platters. It was a clear disappointment, made slightly awkward by the fact that the all the food is passed tauntingly close to Belle, but extracted the instant she reaches to taste something.

Image from the internet.

After this epic fail in nutrition, Belle heads off to bed. Only, instead of going to her room she takes the opportunity to bolt at high speed through the halls of the forbidden west wing. What was supposed to be an act of curious exploration becomes this strangely placed invasion of his bedchamber. Really, the correction to this glaring offense is terribly simple – make it look like Belle is wandering the halls instead of running purposefully towards the magical rose. Which is really odd since she doesn’t know of its existence – in theory.

Like the original, the wrinkled old hag bangs on the door some dark and stormy night. The prince of the castle, visually depicted as a person close to 20 years old (at least 16), turns her away only to be cursed as a Beast. Well, in the live-action telling the sorceress remains in the little provincial village. Where she lives as an outcaste begging form the villagers who scorn her single and pathetic existence. Which makes you wonder why she will curse a selfish prince, but not lift a finger against Gaston – who is very much a selfish, controlling, and abusive brute. Her continued existence in the story raises more questions but seems to add nothing to the plot (which was extend to make it more convoluted).

Image from the internet.

Thus bringing me to my last point (though I could continue to point out the little irritations); the questionable relationship between castle and village. Yes, they start the explanation with a spell to cause people to forget the existence of the castle. But, at least 10 years have passed and I am pretty certain those who were transformed inside the castle (becoming utility items) did not age during that period of time. Otherwise, someone needs to explain to me how Mrs. Potts gives birth to an eight year old son. So, when the spell is lifted, the staff become humans and villagers suddenly recall their loved ones who lived at the castle. At a castle that should be a day’s drive away, unless you are marching against the beast at the end. Nope, there is no way I can look at this and not see some ill-conceived mess – unless the town was cursed too, but no one knew it. Also, what happened to all the guests who were dancing at the party when the curse was put down?

Image from the internet.

So, the final verdict: 2017 Beauty and the Beast live-action film gets a solid B+ rating. It is not the original animation, but it is not terrible either.

PS – did not love most of the ‘additional’ material.

Burning Bright – Melissa McShane

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Image from the internet.

My last book review was a rather lengthy one – at least for me. This promises to be exceptionally short. Every so often I get lucky and a book on my wish list becomes free! Always exciting. Without much thought about what book I was “purchasing” I loaded up my new digital read.

That is not entirely true, I vaguely remembered something about a Regency-like period and a new mage discovering she had the ability to burn things. What I didn’t pay attention to was the author’s name. Thus, I was expecting more of a trashy romance when I started to read: Burning Bright by Melissa McShane.

While there is romance, sort of, in the background of Melissa McShane’s books, they are not what I would describe as trashy. They are not really all that focused on the romance either. Actually, the author is pretty good about establishing a friendship between the two love-interests before anything so scandalous as a kiss happens.

The story centres around Elinor, who wakes one day to discover that she is an Extraordinary Scorcher after nearly setting her entire house on fire. Not wanting to remain in the same residence of her father and not willing to submit to his choice in husband, Elinor offers her talents (as a fire-starter and stopper) to the navy. They are busy with wars and pirates, something Elinor feels she can assist with.

I will say this. Elinor does not dress as a boy to hide on the ship. That would have been silly. Instead she is kept as segregated as possible from the rest of the crew spending much of her time in the Captain’s quarters. It was a surprisingly reasonable set up.

Image from the internet.

Further, the story revolves around Elinor’s adventures helping to root out the pirate problem in the Caribbean. Her Captain love-interest was a reasonably developed character, a little too shiny but otherwise fine. Over all, it is a solid, clean read.

As for my problems with the book. First, Elinor’s tyrannical father was not well-developed. He was Evil! It was clearly done as motivation for Elinor, but left me with a completely unrealistic feeling. My second nit-pick is the pacing. It was a bit slow. Finally, the magic system which was crucial to the plot was not clearly defined nor did it feel integrated into the world. I think the biggest irksome moment was when we are introduced to the skills of a Bounder half way through the story. I didn’t even realize that one of the sailors had this skill. It felt rather tacked on as the author realized she needed scenes to happen in more than one location.

I would give it a solid, generic good rating. Nothing overly offensive (the father can be shoved to the side), nothing overly fantastic (magic system was okay).

Racism without Racists? Get Out

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On February 22, a CERN spokesperson responded to allegations that their experiments with the Large Hadron Collider have not opened up a portal to an alternate dimension and sucked us unwittingly through to a universe where Trump won the American presidency.

I’m not convinced. On March 13, I found evidence of an artifact from the true timeline where the world hadn’t suddenly been engulfed in collective madness. I saw Jordan Peele’s Get Out.

But before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s give the non-spoiler rundown so anyone interested can read this short list and then happily leave if they don’t want to ruin the movie for themselves:

Betty Gabriel is incredible. She sells the concept so hard and practically carries the entire horror atmosphere on her performance alone.
The first two thirds of the movie are actually pretty decent. The third act twist undermines it entirely.
Jordan Peele’s insertion of random comedic elements is tonally dissonant and breaks pacing.
Rod the TSA agent is both the worst character and worst actor. His goofy scenes demonstrate that Peele just can’t shake his comedic inclinations no matter how detrimental they are to the overall themes and narrative.
The movie sucks. Don’t bother watching it.
It’s got Josh from the West Wing trying to be creepy and sinister. But it’s still just lovable Josh from the West Wing.

We good? We good.

Now let’s get into the meat of things.

Get Out is a horror/thriller movie ostensibly about racism that is neither horrific, suspenseful or actually about racism. To say it’s a complete failure is to put it politely. Which is a shame because it was doing so well until it drove its narrative completely off a cliff.

See, there’s difficulty when an artist attempts to change genres. Oftentimes, they can miss the nuance or technique required to communicate the tone and emotion of the piece they’re trying to accomplish. In particular, Peele falls into the dangerous trap of trying to force an M. Night Shyamalan twist into something which really, really did not need it.

But first let’s talk about the shallow, empty promise of Get Out.

Get Out and its associated trainwreck and media all belongs to Jordan Peele, Blumhouse Productions, Universal Pictures and whatever other sorry saps would want to tie their names to this mess.

The trailer and the majority of the movie promises to take a peek into the horrifying effects of racism. Even more, the premise offers something fresh in that we’re offered a window into the terror of social racism from the viewpoint of the victims. It’s such a beautiful concept in its simplicity. Pluck an urban black boy and plunk him down in rural, white, pampered walled communities and watch the growing horror of a world that appears so normal for everyone else take on slow, terrifying new dimensions from another perspective.

The one promising aspect of Get Out is its topicality. There’s no denying that American has a race issue. There was perhaps an argument at some naive point a mere year ago where sweet summer children perhaps professed that racism was a thing of the past. “We’re in a post-racist society!” exclaimed those—at best—idealistic voices. “We’ve elected a black man to be President. Surely man has reached equality amongst himself.”

It’s a quaint proposition and one people had been trying to politely refute beneath Obama’s tenure. But as the Tea Party voices rose and then we had a hugely polarising election where a giant, orange blow-hard who ran on the most blatantly racist platform swept into the highest echelons of the American government, bringing in tow the most racist and corrupt appointments seen in… well… it might have the distinction of being the most racist and corrupt government America has ever had. No one is refuting that racism is alive and kicking in American now. Not when the Ku Klux Klan openly announced a victory parade in Trump’s honour in the streets of North Carolina.

It was cancelled – I think. Due to protest. But I hazard to guess they didn’t plan such demonstrations when Obama won two terms. I certainly didn’t hear anything about their jubilation over Bush winning.

And this isn’t even touching any of the other events making world news.

Ferguson. Flint. Trayvon Martin.

What do all of these events have in common? They are all far more horrific than Get Out.

If I can be generous to the movie, it seems made under the assumption that Hillary would win. It’s a gentle finger wave from yuppie liberal capitalists looking to cash-in on the persistent racial driven protests without carrying an ounce of understanding or clarity for what those protests are about. It’s a movie meant to villainize micro-aggressions—small social faux pas that accidentally perpetuate racist stereotypes or uncomfortable atmospheres towards marginalised groups—instead of actually making any comment on blatant or systemic hatred. It reduces persecution to a small swarm of nettling questions and statements of varying levels of inappropriateness.

“Is it true what they say about sex with a black man?”

“Tell me Chris, what is the black experience like?”

“You don’t have to worry; I voted for Obama myself. Twice. I’d have voted for him a third time.”

It is a movie, as the title says, about racism but without racists.

Which is a pity because it’s clear that Peele isn’t ignorant about those issues. The interaction with the police officer demanding Chris’ licence even though he wasn’t driving after the accident involving the deer shows an awareness for systemic racism in law enforcement. The dramatic pause when the apparent police car pulls up the driveway in the end—to find a pile of dead bodies and the house on fire—only works as a tense situation if the expectation is that Chris will unfairly be killed by an outside actor immediately assuming his guilt due solely to his skin colour.

However, those are the only two moments of racism. Everything else is a fake-out.

You see, Get Out isn’t about American home grown racism. It’s about magical pseudo-science brain transfers. That’s the third act turn. Well, it’s a part of the third act turn.

No, the true third act turn is Peele proposing that white people are racist because they just desperately want to be black people oh so much.

I cannot easily convey how mindbogglingly awful the twist is. There’s nearly an hour and a half of lead up drawing on black slavery and abuse that’s suddenly and immediately dispelled upon the realization that the villains of the movie are simply motivated out of a deep, profound sense of wanting to be black people.

I wish I was making it up because even typing it out sounds so stupid.

You see, Josh Lyman is a brilliant neurosurgeon who has perfected a technique for transplanting human brains into new bodies. He first performed this technique on his ailing mother and father. Unfortunately, the process requires a rather larger organ donation than the Red Cross is used to providing so the Armitage family looks to darling Rose’s love interests to provide the necessary vessel for dear Grandmama and Grandpapa’s grey matter.

This is, in Peele’s own words, the Armitage’s new millennial slavery. The only problem is that this isn’t slavery at all.

When pressed for why any of the villains are doing their evil, Stephen Root’s character best summarizes their motivations during his explanation for why he purchased Chris as his new body: “Why do they want this? I don’t know. I just want your eyes.”

There’s literally no explanation offered for why the Armitage’s target only black people for their bodies. Sure, Stephen Root hypothesises that black people are more fashionable—whatever the hell that means. But why any character is involved with this villainy is never provided a reason. Why does Rose fall in love with so many of the victims to lure them home? We know she actually loves them as both her moments with Chris are never once held as anything but sincere and she confesses that he was one of her favourites. And as for those aforementioned micro-aggressions? They take on new meaning with the reveal that these old, crusty people are looking at a new body. They want some insight into the persecution or perks they’ll gain by shedding their withered, dried husks.

These aren’t people that hate black people. These are people who desperately want themselves or their husbands to be black. They see those lithe Nubian bodies and think “I wish I were them.”

Seriously though, the only shining star in this is Betty Gabriel. If there’s one positive to be squeezed from this travesty it’s in me wanting to see more of this woman’s work.

This is about as racist as turning to a pretty Asian woman and saying, “You are so beautiful. I wish I could look like you.”

To best describe how the brain transfer element of the movie undermines Peele’s bumbling attempts to tap into racial conflict, I want to turn to the debate around same-sex marriage. Often times, LGBT campaigns pull on the civil rights movement to inform why their causes deserve equal sympathy and support. I just want to take a moment to marvel that it’s now the LGBT struggle that can inform how misguided and empty Get Out is.

See, one of the prevailing arguments against same-sex marriage and LGBT rights is the assertion that sexuality is a choice. It’s not, according to pretty much all research in the field. But it’s the largest argument used against it. The counterargument to the claim was elegant in its simplicity:

“Why would someone choose to be gay if all it will lead to is social ostracism, imprisonment, chemical castration and discrimination?”

No one would choose to be gay in societies preceding ours. And yet they existed. Hell, I’d be surprised if anyone would choose to be gay in today’s society and we have incomparable support and acceptance compared to the last five hundred years.

And yet, here is Get Out proposing just that. These rich, old white folk are, en mass, rushing into the wilderness of rural, white America eager to throw their cash and their lives into the hands of crazy Josh Lyman in order to become black. These same people know that black people face discrimination—they ask Chris about it directly and even Rose has been dating enough black guys to be offended when the police officer pulling them over displays systemic racism against them.

But apparently the mystical strength and sexual prowess of the black man is just too much for the white man to resist.

Course, the mind numbing stupidity doesn’t rest there. Once we learn that the black people are actual white people in black bodies, it seems suddenly weirdly cruel how the Armitages are treating their beloved Grandma and Grandpa. Georgina and Walter—originally introduced as the housemaid and the gardener—aren’t being enslaved by the Armitages. They are the Armitages. And yet Josh and his wife are happy to force them into sparse living quarters and put them at menial work in their old and vulnerable age. All to make creepy slavery illusions whenever Rose brings a lover home.

It lays bare the naked and mindless emotional manipulation attempts of Peele. Since, you know, the Armitages could have simply introduced Georgina and Walter as family friends while still maintaining their cover that the two black people on the estate aren’t really the family’s matriarch and patriarch. That wonderful hour and a half spent on creating the unsettling racism of suburban white communities is so hollow and meaningless.

There’s no maliciousness in the Armitage and their clients. They’re not motivated by racism. They don’t hate black people. No one even knows why they specifically pick black people. They could chose white people. It’s not like Armitage’s brain swapping procedure can only work along separate ethnic lines. And, in fact, if the family and friends were actually racist, you would think they would be kidnapping white people to extend their lives indefinitely as.

I think the best summation for Get Out and it’s clumsy, fumbling attempts at a message and horror are best described in the final scenes as Chris is breaking free from the Armitage’s basement clinic.

Having knocked out Jeremy Armitage and plucking a deer head from the wall, Chris ambushes Josh Lyman wondering what is taking his son and patient so long. After being fatally impaled, Josh Lyman stumbles into the operating room and in his last dying grasp reaches for stability and knocks over a single candle lit at the foot of Chris’ empty operating chair, setting the whole room aflame.

It’s such a wonderful scene for how absolutely stupid it is.

Why is there a single candle in an operating room? Surely a brilliant neurosurgeon like Josh Lyman would know that the smoke released from it is unsanitary considering he’s moving a person’s brain literally through it. It’s not like the damn thing was providing any needed light since it was both set at the foot of the chair (as far away from the brain as it could get which is where Peele seems to be most comfortable) and there were a number of bright clinical lights to allow him to see. We can’t even rely on the old Satanic Ritual that mindless, C grade horror schlock lean upon in their creative bankruptcy since there wasn’t any upside down pentagrams drawn in Chris’ blood to bless the holy surgery.

No, the candle literally existed to be knocked over in Josh’s death to set the house on fire.

Just like the racism literally existed just so you could be horrified that the movie wasn’t about racism in the first place. It’s sad that even Jordan Peele doesn’t feel like racism itself is scary enough to carry a horror movie.

Nothing makes sense. Everything is cobbled together in an amateur attempt to draw on topical controversy to sell tickets. Peele’s Get Out has as about much substance on the issues of modern American race relations as the empty cavity of senior Roman Armitage’s skull.

The most poignant moment in the movie is when Andrew Logan King grabs Chris by the shirt and tells him to “Get Out.” It’s a message that resonates across the screen since if the audience doesn’t heed it immediately, they’re about to be left as brain dead as the movie’s protagonist.

Firebrand by Kristen Britain

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The uglishest cover for a Green Rider book thus far. Really don’t like this one. Image from the internet.

Three years later and we have a new Green Rider novel. Sure, I hated the last book and despaired of any future books. But, well, I am bored and the library had a copy. So, once more I will turn my attention to the series on a downhill trajectory from really great to oh-so-dull as we review Firebrand by Kristen Britain.

I am pretty sure this 800 page monstrosity is the longest Green Rider book to date. To those who have perused any of my book reviews, it can come as no surprise that I thought the novel was bloated and the writing mediocre at best. But before we go any further, I just want to assure the adoring fans of the Green Rider Universe: If you loved the first 4 books in the series (no one really liked book 5), then you will undoubtedly love this one too. If you are just starting with Firebrand, I really have to question your thought process. Who comes into an epic fantasy series at book 6?

Over the past couple days, and long-winded pages, I have been ruminating on exactly what I was going to write about. I confess, I am really not sure what to say. I didn’t like the book, but die-hard fans will? True, but hardly a detailed post. I suppose we must look at what I didn’t like and for that we are going to have spoilers. So, be warned!

Like Mirror Sight and Blackveil, Firebrand suffers from too many words/too many pages. It is unnecessarily long. While, it is an improvement over Mirror Sight that was such a low bench mark I really feel it should not count as an accomplishment. Now, to be honest, I did not re-read all the past books before picking up Firebrand. I just couldn’t be bothered. So, perhaps it is my failing memory that has the Evil Grandmother still in Blackveil. Which I thought was an unexplained problem as in Firebrand she is way up north. It is possible I forgotten this transition.

A better version of the cover. Image from the internet.

I’m not cranky, I am emotionally damaged – see that makes me a real and complex character!

So, our spunky heroine Karigan is about 25 years old. Over the course of the saga she has gone from runaway school girl to demi-god. Which brings me to my first major complaint of power creep. In order for Karigan to progress as a character, she becomes increasingly stronger in each novel. She has gone from being able to use a sliver of magic to disappear to being the avatar of the death god with the power to seal the dead and direct the spirits of the recently deceased.

Mostly, she is akin to a god; the one person who can survive anything and do anything. It is more than just a little over the top. Of course, the fact that there are other superheroes, I mean powerful characters does not diminish the ridiculousness of it. Reading about Karigan now requires more than just a little suspension of disbelief, because everything she has done in her short life span is over the top. She is the most capable rider (as is evidenced by the missions she is sent on), she is a sword-master, an honorary Weapon, a friend (maybe?) to the Queen (it is complicated), a friend of the mystical Elt, a friend to the Golden Guardian, the true love any important man to enter into the novels (including, but not limited to the King, Alton, Yates, Enver, Cade, etc.) and inspiration to everyone else (who isn’t Evil).

Yes, I realize that the author then tries to balance Karigan’s super-amazingness with flaws, but being cranky or suffering from grief/torture are not really striking a semblance of realism. Her problems are either stupidly small or overwhelming large that it only emphasize how unrealistic the character has become.

Green Rider – still my favourite book in the series. I do like my beginnings. Image from the internet.

Fantasy creep – where did all this magic come from?

Along with the power creep of the main character there is fantasy creep. That is the incremental increase in fantastical or magical elements to a story. This occurs in fantasy novels where the author strives to recreate that sense of world-building wonder only ever achieved in the first book of a series. Stubbornly, however, the author will continue to dream up wondrous beasts or magic infused elements in their vain attempt to bring back that first rush of amazement felt by the reader.

It never works.

Worse, it creates an internal logic problem. We are told that magic is leaving the lands. That is was scoured from the kingdom thousands of years ago – literally they killed people who had magic. That even the Elt have noticed its decline over the centuries. Then suddenly it is coming back? All because of a breach in the wall, or because the author forgot that this was a low magic world? No explanation. As for the reactions of the people, well, they are hesitant but largely accepting. No one seems to question why we now have Griffins, that didn’t exist three books ago. Or the mirror man – which seemed largely out of place. Nope, this reads like an author who loved the little bit of magic too much and now we are suddenly swimming in it.

Elt improvements – they are now Vulcans!

Image from the internet.

I have previously commented on the Tolkein flavoured Elt (they are the now stereotypical elves) and their lack of originality. Well, someone heard by complaints because not only do we suddenly have half-Elt they are also emotionally-stifled. The problem with the half-Elt is the fact that these beings had apparently not been seen in the lands for several hundred years prior to book one. While that was changed in later books – because naturally our heroine must have an Elt connection – it still seems odd that half-Elt would exist now.

But more importantly, why are they like the Vulcans? Emotionally stoic until it is mating time. Then they have no control over the sexual urges. This is the best you could do for a character flaw? Really?

There was a mission – oops, I nearly forgot.

So, Karigan goes off on an impossible mission to find the moose people, I mean the p’ehdrose and Estral’s father (the Golden Guardian). When the story eventually gets going, we spend most of the time tracking down the missing musician or following the kidnapped King. We have more time with the Second Empire and our dearly departed Grandmother. We are briefly introduced to more Evil characters, because someone has to die by the end. Spoilers, someone from the Good Team parishes too (can you guess which one?).

Image from the internet.

After plodding through the woods, facing freezing cold winds, working in the mines, being physically tortured and finally destroying the Second Empire’s most recent camp we are left wondering, what did happen to our diplomatic mission? And why is Karigan sent anywhere for talks when she always ends up in a battle? Not the diplomat I would choose.

Never fear, you may have thought the author forgot about the p’hedrose, or decided the rest of the mission would be saved for another over inflated book. I would be wrong in this case. Nope, Karigan meets and treats with the p’hedrose in just about 2 chapters tucked in at the end, making us wonder, why it took 200 pages for her to leave the castle in the first place?

Wait, we didn’t forget about these characters – see, they are right here at the end.

Now, I know there are some people out there who hate Lord Amberhill. I am not one of them. Well, at least I liked him in The High King’s Tomb. I was fond of this sword thrusting charismatic thief. And clearly the author was too, because she carried him through book 4 and made him more of a feature in book 5. When it came to book 6, Firebrand, well, I thought poor Lord Amberhill had been forgotten; along with several Green Riders.

Image from the internet.

But that was not the case. Nope, she makes mention of our dear Lord Amberhill as a point of conversation between two green riders in the dying pages of this epic work. Yup, 800 pages and Lord Amberhill is relegated to a passing comment on the very last page. A real clutch character we have here.

Where’s the connection – why did we have Mirror Sight?

There was one question that kept running through my mind as we trailed after Karigan and sat with the Queen (confined to her bed like a good pregnant wife): What was the point of Mirror Sight. Book 5 had zero barring on the characters and plot of Firebrand. And to those who argue otherwise, I challenge you to think about the events really closely.

With a few minor tweaks, Karigan could have been just as emotionally scarred from her adventures in Blackveil. The mysterious reference to the weapon that some super-minor characters are searching for could have come from another source. The mirror eye could still have resulted from the end of Blackveil. The p’hedrose could have been convinced to join the cause for other reasons. Really, with very little effort Mirror Sight could be erased from the series without a problem. Emphasizing once more that it was a waste of a novel.

Image from the internet.

While I will continue to argue the author’s best books were still the first two in the series (Green Rider and First Rider’s Call), there is merit in saying Firebrand is an improvement (slightly) over Mirror Sight. If I could offer a suggestion or two. Perhaps it is time to re-evaluate the over-arching narrative. Does Karigan really have to the main character? Could we not branch out and explore some other issues and other people? Tamora Pierce is fond of series too. However, I think she was really cleaver in her handling of her fantasy world of Tortall. Pierce has several characters and thus different story arches all in the same world. She can move forward or backward in time as her fancy dictates. And regularly has four books for each of her characters, who then appear as cameos in other books. I think this helps to keep individual books from become bloated and any one character from becoming too powerful (though that might be arguable). Certainly, this method allows the author to explore her creativity more. Then we could look at a future as seen in Mirror Sight, still in the same world only facing different problems. That, I think would be really interesting.

Book Review: Veronica Speedwell Novels

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Book cover from the internet.

There is a reason that I always start with book one in a series. It is the book that lays the groundwork and sets the tone and background for the characters.

That said, it is probably good that I started on the second book (accidentally) and not the first. For the first book is not nearly as well written as the second book and I am not convinced I would have finished or continued otherwise.

Book cover from the internet.

So, what are the books I am talking about? It is a new series by Deanna Raybourn. Book 1 is entitled: A Curious Beginning and book 2 is called: A Perilous Undertaking.

Having read A Perilous Undertaking first, I am going to start the discussion here. And we will start on a positive. A Perilous Undertaking is reasonably well written. The level of language is appropriate (even though they use fecundity incorrectly). Generally though, it seems the author did their research well. I learned that Veronica is the name of a plant. The novel is peppered with the scientific names of butterflies, which I assume are correct (though I didn’t actually check). The introduction of the two main leads: Veronica Speedwell our narrating female protagonist and her partner in science and detectiving Stoker (Revelstoke Templeton-Vane). I like the way the relationship is set up in the second novel between these two characters.

Further, the author did one of the best summaries of a first book I have seen in a very long time. We learn all the pertinent information in bits and pieces appropriately scattered throughout the novel. There is not a chapter dedicated to summarizing earlier events, it is all worked in quite nicely – at least for someone who has not read book one. I don’t know if it would be tedious if you had done things in the proper order. So, overall, I think book two: A Perilous Undertaking.

Book cover from the internet.

Book one: A Curious Beginning was a flop for me. It was not nearly as clean, well-organized or interesting. This is in part due to the fact that I already knew what was coming. That said, the writing should have carried me through the story. It didn’t, so the question is why?

The Veronica Speedwell novels are set in Victorian England, about the time the Queen celebrates her jubilee. The offspring are grown into adulthood with children of their own. There is no magic, no mythical creatures and no unusual technology (steampunk). Yet, the stories are pure fantasy. As fantasy, I am willing to overlook many things that would not actually happen during that time period. After all, I do like spunky female leads.

Unfortunately the author does not sell it well enough. Veronica is telling the story much like a memoire, not my favourite style. But the greatest offense is the “telling” not “showing” aspect of the writing. I am constantly reminded that Veronica is a scientist. Veronica:

A scientist is always logical, and I am a scientist.

I am not a simpering female, because I am a scientist and I do not have emotions.

A scientist is always organized and tidy. Why are you not more clean, Revelstoke, because you are a scientist.

Book cover from the internet.

I am a scientist, so it is only natural that I want to sleep with men outside of wedlock. Because being a scientist makes me curious. Unless we are talking about my personal history. Then I don’t care that I was a foundling, raised by two maiden aunts. And strange things start to happen when I burry the last of my aunts. Because that can’t possibly have anything to do with me.

The main protagonist is a pretentious twit who is so selfish that she is essentially oblivious to the rest of the world. Which is rather entertaining, as this 25 year old character has supposedly loved and lost, and traveled the world, escaped dangers, killed men and captured the most rare of butterflies!

For a person with so much worldly experience Veronica is an idiot about the plot of her story. When her home is ransacked and strangers suddenly appear to whisk her off to London saying she is now in terrible danger, Veronica thinks nothing is amiss. Even when that person is found murdered, she believes that this string of odd events is completely unrelated to her. Really? Can one individual be that disconnected from reality? But don’t worry, when she finally allows herself to believe that things might be a bit trickier than she thought, Veronica will convince Stoker to science out the problem. They will solve the murder, uncover the secrets and … save the day, I suppose. Like I said, the story is pure fantasy.

Book cover from the internet.

Only the author struggles with the pacing of the plot in A Curious Beginning. She also fails to create a proper tension between Veronica and Stoker. Stoker being another character who has loved and lost (a wife apparently), worked in the navy as a surgeon, learned knife throwing from a traveling show, hunted the greatest mammals on earth, published important scientific papers, nearly died, fell into the depths of despair, struggled back from the brink, and more! All before the age of about 30 (I think). Yes, her characters have done it all, or nearly. And while the author wants to tease a relationship between her two leads, she doesn’t want them to settle into anything just yet. So it is an on-again, off-again sort of writing; which is tedious.

To summarize: Veronica is a woman with modern sensibilities living in Victorian England. She is a scientist and will remind you of this fact repeatedly. She is sort of forced into the company of Stoker, another scientist, who she can trust and respect because he is ruggedly handsome with a fascinating scare down the side of his face (though the eye does still work – so he is not too damaged) and bad-boy demeanor. Together, they will track down Veronica’s past (not actually much tracking needed), thwart her murder and chum together in book two in order to solve another murder.

While I would rate the books as a good solid mediocre. Book two is certainly the better written of the pair. My suggestion, skip book one and start with A Perilous Undertaking.

Guess Who’s Coming for Dinner

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So our copy of Arrival finally came in to the library over the weekend. This was actually one of the few movies this year I was excited to see. Unfortunately, circumstance saw that I wasn’t around when it passed through theatres so I was left waiting for rentals before I could enjoy it.

And there is something for the theatre experience. I had always dismissed people’s preference for the cinema as being delusional. However, whether it was through a worn disk or ailing DVD player, the audio quality was a bit lacking. We missed a good five minutes of the film trying to get a functional volume that didn’t burst our eardrums anytime an aircraft entered the scene (which is quite frequent) but still allowed us to hear the dialogue.

Granted, no one wants to read a review of someone complaining about their substandard view conditions. Or, maybe they do. I don’t know, I haven’t polled anyone about it. I’m assuming they don’t so I’ll just leave off with going to the cinema is definitely better even if it is crazy more expensive. But I’m not here to review Arrival either. At least, not really. Since I’m so late to this discussion, just throwing my opinions on the matter is probably redundant by now.

So I’ll just give a broad strokes review: I enjoyed it. I didn’t enjoy the time paradox. That’s not how language actually works. Conceit is better than Interstellar’s magic space library.

That should summarize the salient points.

No, there’s a different aspect of Arrival that I really want to discuss.

Awhile ago I wrote a little piece on racism in fantasy. It wasn’t my best argued piece, largely because it was just for the blog and beyond getting a first draft up, I wasn’t going to wed myself to the argument to tighten it further. Suffice to say, it’s a very common pitfall for creators to lean heavily on historical or cultural precepts when making new fantasy and science fiction races. This can, inadvertently, introduce biases, prejudices or stereotypes that were unintended. This can lead to a very flat depiction of a fantasy race wherein all members behave and act as one concept thus reinforcing preconceived notions that “all people are like X.” Wherein X is the original inspiration for the race but oftentimes is a rather unflattering depiction of a real world culture.

For a very simple shorthand, take a look at the modern depiction of elves. What do you imagine? Isn’t it a drunk, hairy midget who speaks like a Scotsman? I’d would be shocked if it was this:

Accessed from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alv%C3%ADssm%C3%A1l#/media/File:All-wise_answers_Thor.jpg

Thor converses with the dwarf Alviss by W. G. Collingwood.

Here we have the potato-headed Alviss coming to Thor to claim his daughter as his wife. Thor, conversing with the dwarf, argues he was made unaware of such an arrangement and will hand his daughter over if the dwarf is able to answer his questions. The dwarf is exhaustive in his reply, speaking with Thor until the morning sun rises and turns him to stone.

Sound familiar? It’s the concept Tolkien used in the Hobbit for defeating the trolls. Tolkien pulled heavily on older mythology and the Poetic Edda in particular for crafting his world. He laid the groundwork for most of our modern tropes.

But outside of being short, Alviss is hardly what you’d first imagine for a dwarf. Not to mention that Tolkien did exhaustive work to present his races in as rounded a manner as he could. I have little beef with Tolkien’s representation outside of it simply being copied ad infinitum since its creation. Hell, the Hobbit had so many dwarves in it that it would be hard to draw a single stereotype of them since they were presented with such a wide spectrum of behaviour.

Anyway, I don’t want to rehash the old argument because my driving point was that the issue with modern races is that instead of shooting for Tolkien’s creativity and diversity, we were getting endless derivatives that were reducing these concepts down to shallow stereotypes. Why not have new species and races that are formed and expanded beyond simple conceits and are informed by their own culture, biology and history into something wholly new, different and challenging?

Thus, we come full circle to Arrival.

Arrival is everything I want in a fantastical race. Not only are the aliens weird but their weirdness is a pivotal crux to the philosophy and themes in the piece. It’s the driving portion of the conflict and it’s really well done.

Needless to say, I’m going into spoiler territory so if you care… why are you reading one of my reviews again?

Anyway, Arrival does a fantastic job of enveloping its audience in confusion and uncertainty. Partly this is the editing and format through which the movie is presented. Sequences are played out of chronological order but, seemingly, in a benign way. I don’t wish to spend too much time discussing the nonlinear time elements. I hate time paradoxes and, sadly, Arrival introduces them with almost maniacal glee at the climax of its action which, instead of being the highlight for me, was the film’s lowest point. I’ve actually studied language and perception so the idea that thinking in the alien’s language suddenly grants super powers is a bit lame. I was willing to accept the conceit – I mean, you always have to accept some outlandish components of genre pieces – but that Amy Adam’s magic powers came even before she fully learned the language meant that their own explanation wasn’t internally consistent in the piece.

Regardless, I don’t want to discuss that. The whole circular time element is only good for its visualization within the written language of the cephalopods. Which ties back to my whole argument of designing alien cultures that are incredibly alien to what we know.

And everything about the cephalopods is meant to be alienating. It feeds into the overall disorientation of the piece and it’s done with such expertise that I couldn’t help but fall in love. I mean, the first appearance of the alien’s vessel – their black kidney bean shaped structure passingly reminiscent of the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey – is probably the most underwhelming aspect of the film. The smooth black curved contours were likely meant to reveal as little as possible for what was to come next and, potentially, lull the audience into a brief sense of respite.

If that is the case, then it does a good job since the first meeting with the aliens is pretty nerve-wracking. I absolutely loved how Arrival puts you on edge even though most of the film is, essentially, going through the daily drudgery of what would occur should we actually make first contact with an alien species. That is it say, it’s focused almost entirely on diplomatic efforts with a high priority placed on creating a line of communication than adhering to any action beats. In fact, the only action beat in the whole film seems really out of place.

However, there’s nothing more delightfully unsettling than that first scene where they board the cephalopod ship and enter the partitioned room. Watching the glass fill with gas as two dark shapes drift down to hover like enormous disembodied hands before the minuscule contact team and their small, caged budgie is sheer visual brilliance.

And, ultimately, we don’t get to see much into the cephalopod culture over the course of the movie. There’s some excellent visual flair in rendering the language as some sort of mutable ink pattern, whose beginning and ending is so indecipherable that their program for creating responses has to present the cobbled lexicon together in multiple configurations during the course of a conversation. But even as we start to understand what little we can between the interactions of the lead characters and the alien visitors (including humanizing them by giving the two characters names of famous comedians), the movie throws us further off kilter when Amy Adam’s is brought aboard their vessel without the standard protective bio-suits near the film’s culmination.

Arrival and all associated images belong to Denise Villeneuve and Paramount Pictures.

We get a peek behind the curtain and we discover things are even weirder than the little we’d grown accustomed. The ground of the alien’s craft is actually some peculiar white ridged surface that looks more like frozen soundwaves. We’re introduced to an even more monstrous cephalopod that looks stranger than the other two we’ve met and the film itself takes on a grainy, dream-like quality for the exchange. Then, Amy Adams is dropped off and, instead of the ships taking to the sky, they just sort of roll over and vanish in a cloud of disembodied smoke.

It’s such a well conceived depiction of an alien that shares nothing in common with humans and I simply love how their own baffling biology is considered from their culture (language) to their technology (ship propulsion). Even better, you never actually see any terminals or anything in the ship since the aliens don’t have any appendages remotely similar to hands.

It is this kind of detail and consideration that makes you intrigued and wanting to learn more. It also works well for convening the mood and atmosphere of the story. Arrival addresses all my standard criticisms and I wholly recommend it for such an outstanding presentation of the power of science fiction imagining and just how it can be used to promote atmosphere and philosophy without falling back on tired and tried tropes and stereotypes.

Unless, of course, we want to argue that they were Lovecraftian horrors. But given the overall lack of destruction of Earth, I’m willing to let the antediluvian pelagic references to slid this time.

The Most Dangerous Game

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We’re going to do something a little differently today. Normally I shy away from talking politics on the blog. People (presumably) come here for entertainment so I try and keep things focused more on that than the nitty, gritty world out there.

But things change and sometimes you just have to type some words about it.

2016 was a year of many things. We saw some rather… unexpected outcomes across the world. Some were jubilant. Others were anxious. At the very least, a number of people and countries were hurtling towards uncertainty. Because at least that would be a fun change from what we normally have.

Up here in chilly Canada, we’d been warming up to our newly elected Prime Minister. Justin Trudeau has been, essentially, everything that Stephen Harper was not. He was young. He didn’t have hair plucked from a Lego man. He led the red party and not the blue. Even more amusing, and after a number of teeth grinding years beneath Harper’s Conservatives, he was the spawn of the more polarizing politician Pierre Trudeau. I wasn’t around for Papa Trudeau’s tenure but I have family who were and, suffice to say, they weren’t big fans.

But Justin was saying all the right things and playing all the right notes so that people were generally willing to overlook this admittedly irrelevant quality. There’s no point in tarring the son for the actions of the father, as they say. I think they say that. I also wasn’t around for the age of tarring people.

I’ll go out and say it though, while many in Canada and the rest of the world were swooned by Justin’s flowing locks, I was hesitant. While I considered him a step up from the prior administration, his handling of Bill C-51 was, at best, amateur. I don’t expect many people to be aware of this bill, least of all most Canadians, but it was our northern version of the far more discussed Patriot Act that implemented a number of concerning powers to overstep citizen’s privacy in the name of federal security. Bustling little Trudeau vowed to address the more sticky parts of the bill should he be elected (holding the bill hostage, I suppose) while the rest of the minority parties outright argued against its disingenuous and dangerous precedence.

Well, news flash, here we are two years later and there’s still no peep from wittle Justin and his lovable band of diverse misfits over addressing the tightening of state power over citizens’ lives. A broken campaign promise? From a politician? Why I never.

I suppose it could be still in the works and Justin just hasn’t gotten around to it. He has been pretty busy with his townhall meetings across the country, don’t you know.

But I get it. Politicians lie. They just want your vote and they just want power. We can’t really trust them after all. But be sure to show up to the ballot box to make the one you’ve arbitrarily chosen like your sports team so that those even worse lying other guys don’t get to take the government and invariably implement what they promise to do on the campaign trail.

Because, as it turns out – and quite contrary to Liberal apologists – most politicians actually make honest efforts to implement their platforms. A Rutgers study in America by Gerald Pomper found that between 1944 and 1976, winning candidate’s implemented two-thirds of their platform. What doesn’t pass is usually due to obstruction by other representatives and not due to the candidate blithely pitching their words away before the eyes of a cynical public. Hell, even President Obama managed to address seventy percent of his 2008 and 2012 campaign promises and he faced six years of hard Republican obstructionism in congress (which accounts for twenty-two percent of his broken promises).

This scepticism of campaign policy is not only unfounded but can be rather dangerous when people elect politicians on the basis that they don’t believe said politician will deliver on their words but pursue some fantasy platform held only in that voter’s own mind.

Thus, we shouldn’t shrug our shoulders in acceptance when a politician does brazenly, boldly and bald-facedly break a key plank in the platform.

Hello, Justin. Please tell me again how 2015 would be the last election in Canada under the First Past the Post system.

You see, the Liberal Party of Canada spent quite a bit of air time telling us how they were going to push through electoral reform if they were to gain power. I mean, they kind of had to since both the NDP and Green party were banging that drum pretty hard and let’s be honest – the Liberals are not ever going to win an election unless they can somehow convince NDP and Green voters to begrudgingly give up parties they actually support to hold their nose for the Liberals at the ballot box.

You see, it wasn’t that Justin Trudeau walked on stage in glitter and beneath spotlights wooing the Canadian public. He won the election because, quite frankly, there was a massive grassroots effort to replace Stephen Harper with someone – anyone – and people would work together to see that goal realized. I think the Liberals walked away from their majority win (on 38% of the vote) with this delusion that they had somehow converted the majority (well, barely a third of voters) to their side.

Thus, nearly out the gate, the Liberal government has been trying to kill electoral reform. I’m not going to repeat the sad display they’ve put on over this. I will repeat the highlights, however:

Accessed from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Sir_Robert_Peel,_2nd_Bt_by_Henry_William_Pickersgill.jpg. It is available, by Wikicommons statement to be in the public domain.

I’d rather not post a picture of your smarmy face, Justin. Here, let’s put up Sir Robert Peel. You know, the man that let the Irish starve to death so the government could cynically steal their land instead.

“We don’t have a mandate despite you voting for us being a good enough mandate to enact all our other policies. So we’ll put together a consultation committee to see what people want.”

“Oh shit, why do you want Proportional Representation? Wait, this is a recurring conclusion founded by all parties, too? It’s only our party representation that’s now arguing we should take some time after the next election to implement it instead of putting it forward now? You know what, we just simply haven’t heard from enough people.”

“Why do people keep bringing up our own committee’s recommendation for electoral reform. Look at this equation they used to measure the accuracy of election results to the vote totals. That’s math! Math is too hard!”

“Look, we’ll put out the world’s most misleading and disingenuous survey to get people to finally admit that they secretly want Ranked Ballot and not Proportional Representation.”

“Oh shit, that didn’t work. Fuck it. You’re not getting reform.”

Kristy Kirkup at the Huffington Post wrote a great summary for this about face from our inglorious leader on why he was turning his back on his promise. Now was not the time for such reform. He feels its not within Canadian’s self interest to have reform. He fears “extremist” voices getting seats in the government and propped up Kelly Leitch as his boogeyman.

Well, surprise Trudeau, but Kelly Leitch could very well be the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada. What are you going to do then? Ban her from running? Or is it that you’d actually rather run the chance of dangerous “anti-Canadian values” individuals getting top billing of your closest rival in the hopes of tarring them in future elections to keep your power?

And tell me, how is playing chicken with hateful, anti-Canadian rhetoric and beliefs in the best interest of Canadians?

If Trudeau legitimately wanted to safeguard Canadian values then it would be to open up proportional representation. Please, let Kelly Leitch run her own party. If she doesn’t represent the majority of Canadians she’ll get a meagre portion of the votes and end up with… what? Two or three seats? On the other hand, if she does represent Canadian values, then she’ll have to convince nearly 50% of Canadians that we’re all xenophobic assholes willing to throw our history, heritage and values in the garbage to bang some misleading drum about Islamophobia… errr, sorry, Barbaric Cultural Practices (TM).

But what you’re doing now is safeguarding nothing. You’re casting the dice, hopeful that Canadians will take her hateful words at face value and run back to the ballots to put you in place to keep her at bay from riding a minority of votes to a majority seats in the government. You’re basically asking us to support you, a self admitted liar and turncoat, to not believe your words but to believe your enemies. Because their words are scarier.

And you’re just a weasel trying to maintain control.

As it stands now, I’m looking at two big parties and neither represent Canadian values. And, news flash, but we don’t live in a two party system no matter how much you’d like that. There remains alternatives for me to choose. And those alternatives have historically siphoned off your votes leaving you in a helpless position to do nothing but watch as “anti-Canadian” advocates dismantle the country you profess to love. And it’s not like you even promised to enact Proportional Representation. You promised to end our broken First Past the Post where just about any other option would be better. Thus, I can only conclude that you’re keeping our broken electoral system (as described by you) simply because you think you can profit off it.

It’s a gamble and the most cynical one at that. And should the Conservatives not elect the boogeyman you’re hoping they will, I’ll shed zero tears if this blows up in your face.

Because it should. You’re not a normal politician, Justin. At least an honest one would have actually kept their word.

Grumpy White Men By The Sea

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I don’t always review video games on this blog. Sometimes I review other things as well. Video games just happen to be a field I’m more experienced in. But if there is one thing that I require little encouragement, it is in providing my unsolicited opinion about topics in which I’m not adequately knowledgeable to provide.

Thus, let’s do a movie review this week!

Oscar season is nearly upon us. At least, I assume Oscar season is nearly upon us. Perhaps it has already happen and this discussion is merely academic between two handsome intellectuals like you, dear reader, and myself. In which case, the rest of my introduction is wholly unnecessary so let’s just get to the review on Manchester by the Sea.

As is often my style, I’ll give the short summary before going into detail: I liked it.

There, if that was all you needed from me to form an opinion about something then we’re done! See you next week!

For a more in-depth and tirelessly examination of why is going to take quite a bit longer. And, of course, necessitate spoilers.

Manchester by the Sea and all associated images are properties of Kenneth Lonergan, Amazon Studios and whoever else.

I saw Manchester by the Sea almost two months ago. I realized I hadn’t seen much within the theatre that didn’t result in me complaining about big Hollywood blockbusters and how they’re morally and creatively bankrupt wastes of time design solely to fleece you of your money and return little more than a fleetingly saccharine experience. Manchester by the Sea is no such thing. It is, as we casuals like to say, an “artsy-farsty” movie. If you’re looking for big explosions, big set pieces and big noises then you’re going to be disappointed.

In fact, I had low expectations for the movie in the first place. By the time it actually released near me it was already generating a bunch of positive buzz but from the trailers I thought I had the movie pegged pretty squarely down: a redemptive story about some cold-hearted uncle returning to his ancestral home to raise his bereaved nephew and learning the importance of family, love, God and warm apple pie.

Ho, how wrong was I!

There’s a funny thing about expectation. Ofttimes it can be the most impactful element to determining your feelings on a piece of art. Usually I’m sorely disappointed because my expectations are well above what the artist is actually delivering. But there are the rare times when I completely misread a piece and am shocked to discover that it surpasses my expectations by doing something I never imagined and I didn’t even realize I wanted it to do.

Manchester by the Sea is such a movie. First, it’s a character piece. If you’re looking for a tight or compelling narrative then this is not the place for it. In fact, my earlier assumptions weren’t too far from the mark in what the actually story is about. But the thing with character pieces is that a simple story isn’t a detriment but often required in order to concentrate on the development and emotions of the character you’re examining. But the way that Manchester engages the audience is by exploring its character in a novel way:

They don’t talk about it.

Manchester by the Sea is more a movie of people not speaking than it is anything else. It’s both the source of the film’s greatest strengths and biggest missed opportunities. I have a keen interest in communicating without communication. Many of my stories involve characters that are either discussing some greater matter couched in a discourse over a petty incident or are telling a story through the things they won’t tell. So I was enraptured watching the film execute a technique with which I struggle constantly.

And the movie delivers on its method with varying success. I find it hard to believe that most audience goers don’t pick on this “lack of communication” element. It’s presented almost heavy-handedly but still manages to not be overbearing. I mean, the opening sequence with Casey Affleck working his janitorial job presents three instances of characters talking without directly talking.

You have the stilted conversation between the old man and Affleck as they stare at a dripping tap. In seconds you can get the older man’s frustrations as he tries to wrangle an answer for how he should fix the tap while Affleck – not being a plumber – refuses to say anything that could be held as a liability against him. Then, we see him fixing the toilet of a woman who is talking on the phone with a friend of hers in a neighbouring room where she’s going on and on about how she has a crush on her janitor and doesn’t know what she should do about it without realizing Affleck can hear every word. Then we have the most important (technique wise) conversation between Affleck and a tenant who thinks he’s being a pervert and trying to see her shower naked when in actuality he’s trying to tell her he simply needs to run the water to find where the leak is while getting more insulted with her insinuations.

The third interaction is perhaps the most important in my mind because it’s a moment where two characters are talking past each other. Presenting the audience with this technique early on and clearly is vital for the later interactions between characters to be understood. There’s a lot of moments in Manchester by the Sea where cross purposes are what lead to the tragedies its narrative encircles.

Following this rather lengthy opening sequence, we then see Casey Affleck go to a bar and turn down the advances of a single lady before displaying clear self-destructive tendencies by getting in a fight with two innocent bar goers. This clearly establishes Affleck’s character as a broken man from the start with the initial intrigue for the audience being the explanation for how he got there.

And this is the point where Manchester by the Sea sort of loses me.

I have no idea how this project was originally conceived by the pacing in its reveal of information seems rather disjointed to me. There are essentially three major hooks at the start of Manchester to draw the audience in to its unfolding story. These are, not in chronological order: why does Affleck have such a negative reputation in town, why is his nephew’s mother unable to be his guardian and why is Affleck self destructive? Unfortunately, two of these hooks are revealed by the end of the first act. The last of the hooks ends up being incredibly minor. We then have a large portion of the movie lurch between rather unnecessary scenes that reinforce what we’ve already learned by that neither advance the character’s arc or lead to a greater understanding of the situation.

And I can’t help but wonder if maybe this was the result of some editing room decisions. I want to say that Manchester by the Sea was originally conceived so that you never had a direct explanation for why Casey Affleck moved away from Manchester and is absolutely against raising his nephew. I feel like the movie meant for you to piece together a lot of vague scenes to come to the conclusion itself. Unfortunately, given what we have of the film, I could see in early screenings that a lot of audiences might be confused or unused to filling in the blanks themselves. Thus, a clear cut explanation was provided in a rather brutish and drawn out solution.

See, the worst part of the movie is when Affleck must sign the guardianship papers for his nephew. He then stares off into space as we go into a very long “flashback” sequence that illuminates us about why he’s self-exiled from his hometown. We learn of the tragic fire, the loss of his children and how he blames himself and tried to commit suicide. Then we hop back to reality and watch the rest of the movie unfold with the new understanding of his personal demons.

Except, so many of the scenes afterwards lose their poignancy because they mostly feel redundant. We see him try to get a job in Manchester but the wives of the men are adamant he shouldn’t be allowed within their stores. We know those minor characters blame him for the tragedy and think he’s irresponsible but this rather obvious conclusion was better represented in Affleck’s ex-wife’s sub-arc. We also have moments where he burns his pasta because he fell asleep on the couch and starts to panic. We know this is because it triggers his memories of the accident but it doesn’t make us feel any greater sympathy or emotional connection to the character. So much of the movie is this reinforcement of rather basic concepts already established that I can’t help but think they were the sole vessel for the narrative before.

If that were the case, I’d have really liked to see Manchester by the Sea without its flashback sequence. As such, I’d say that its pacing is easily the worst thing about the movie since there are many examples of small scenes that don’t do much but just remind you about characteristics of the principle characters that we already knew.

Now, the film still succeeds even with this clumsy editing. I think part of what makes Manchester by the Sea so powerful is that, ultimately, it’s not a redemption movie. We watch Affleck eventually fail to meet his duty to his brother and his family. The wounds inflicted by his past – all almost entirely self inflicted too – are simply too great for him to overcome. Here’s a dramatic moment that should transform a man and he shrinks away from it, retreating from the pain much like he was at the very start. It’s tragic and that’s what makes it work.

But as far as tragedies go, Manchester by the Sea is a fairly cerebral one. Ancient Greek tragedies were meant to put your emotionally through the wringer so that at the end you were utterly drained and left in a numbed state of catharsis. Manchester is a bit strange for its genre because it doesn’t really wring the emotions from you. I feel like it asks that you engage with the movie not emotionally but intellectually in order to understand what is happening. This is largely because, once again, no one is truly talking to each other. It’s like the whole movie is in passive voice and keeping you as detached from the involved emotions as Affleck is trying to be detached from his pain.

So… yeah. I enjoyed the film. It did something I could immediately recognize and in a way that was a little different to keep me intrigued. It’s experimental and from that experiment we see results not normally produced by traditional methods. It’s not particularly refined but I was engaged nonetheless. I would definitely say it’s Oscar worthy though I suspect it won’t be an Oscar winner.

But it has earned its acclaim. That is for certain.