Friday, July 28, 2006

 

Stupid sayings

Earlier today someone at work asked me to call up one of our vendors and get some paperwork faxed over. Apparently they had trouble with these people, and suggested that I be extra polite and kiss-ass-ish. "After all, you can catch more flies with honey than vinegar!" he said.

We've all heard this one before in one form or another. It's a very old saying, the lesson being one can get more cooperation from others by being nice than nasty.

This little proverb annoys me though. My problem is not with the moral. It's generally how i apporach my dealings with others. My problem is with the imagery. First of all, the cooperation of others is something you want, whereas flies are more of a pestilence. That's a minor detail, and one that boils down to your own personal sense of literary aesthetics. I can forgive that one.

What really irks me is the fact that the logic is flawed. Yes, you might attract more flies with honey, but you would attract even more files with a big pile of shit. So what does that say about treating others?

Thursday, July 20, 2006

 

Faster Than a Speeding Bullet....

I've always been a big Superman fan. The Christopher Reeve movies were the first superhero movies for most of our generation, and in my mind, Superman I (and to some degree II) were the quintessential comic movies. To me, Richard Donner set the bar, and it's only been in the last two or three years when people have actually managed to come back to that level.

To explain, when Richard Donner made Superman, he told the story as you would any other story, like it actually happened. The characters were real and fleshed out. They didn't approach it with the carnival-ride campiness of say, the Joel Schumacher Batman flicks. They told a good story. They had plenty of action and special effects, but that wasn't the whole movie. Hell, it took half an hour before we even saw Christopher Reeve. (Incidentally, Richard Donner was fired from Superman II because the Salkinds wanted to make the movie campier. Richard Lester was brought in to replace Donner. Lester went on to direct Superman III, which did very poorly.)

When it came to Superman Returns, I wanted them to do exactly what Richard Donner did. Give us the action-packed Superman, but make a decent story. Superman 3 and 4 had plenty of action, but the stories sucked. For the most part, they did that. There are a few critics out there who have had problems with this movie. Let's look at a few of them, shall we?


1) Spectacular effects, but they don't carry a movie.

True. I have long argued that was the downfall of the Star Wars prequels. However, I personally don't see that here. I thought it was an interesting story. Supes disappears for five years, and has to reconnect with the world. Lois has moved on, has a kid, etc. Is the kid Superman's or not?

2) The story was clichéd at best.

Superman is clichéd just by being Superman. He's the quintessential superhero. How many superheroes wear capes and/or tights? How many have their emblem/ logo across their chest? Superman started all that. When we were kids, how did we pretend we were superheroes? We wrapped a towel around our necks and pretended to fly.

They were revamping the franchise. They wanted to put their own mark on it, but more importantly they wanted to remind people why they loved Superman and the original flicks. They had to pick up where Superman 2 left off, keep close ties to the first two movies, and make a good flick with a completely new cast. Sounds hard to me.

In a lot of ways, this new restart is similar to Tim Burton's Batman flicks. It's been 20 years or so since the last on-screen outing of the hero. People remember the last incarnation as being rather cheesy (think the Quest for Peace), so they went back to basics. The hero fights his archenemy, who is plotting a rather typical attack on the people of the city.

Sure they gave us the typical Superman stuff. Lex had a diabolical plan involving genocide and kryptonite. Superman throws the evil thing into space. How else would you suggest they have done it? Doomsday? Most people would walk out of the theater thinking "who the fuck is Doomsday?" How about Mr. Mxyzptlk? Two hours of Supes trying to trick someone into saying their name backwards. Brainiac would probably just remind people of Superman 3.

As for kryptonite, well, it's his only weakness. How else is Lex going to get him?

3) The story was all about Superman and Lois, their kid, and Superman's love life.

Well, duh. When you strip away the "eye candy" of the special effects, Superman is really about Lois and Superman. Hell, they had a show called "Lois and Clark" for crying out loud. As for the kid, I'm glad they finally took it to the next level. I'd be more pissed if it was more of the "I can't truly love you because I am Superman and can't risk your safety" crap. The story's always the same. Clark loves Lois. Lois loves Superman. But because she doesn't know his identity, never the two shall meet. Bullshit.

The story of Superman isn't that complicated. Hell, the original TV series was essentially Superman rescuing Lois and Jimmy from their weekly kidnapping. When I see a Batman flick, I want to see a story about a complicated, emotionally unstable superhero. There are layers to Batman. There's not a whole lot there with Superman.

4) Where's the originality?

My friend and colleague Fogelmatrix pointed out that when it comes to "the big four" comic book movies (Superman, Batman, Spider-man, and X-men), they should be better than the rest of the comic flicks out there. I couldn't agree more. I also think that of the comic book movies to come out over the last six years, X-men 1 and 2, Spider-man 1 and 2 and Batman Begins have been some of the strongest. The stories were good, they were well acted, and there was just enough "eye candy."

A lot of these directors and writers gave us stories that were very close to the comics. Why? Because they understand the fanbase. They played it close to their chest because fanboys are some of the most critical people in the world. Hell, people are still bitching because Hugh Jackman, at 6' 2", is way too tall to be Wolverine.

As for the average fans, they tend to start out with villains people have heard of. You give people a movie with some supervillain no one except a fan had ever heard of, they won't be as interested. Start out with their arch enemy and maybe they'll come back for the sequel. Don't think so? Then imagine if Tim Burton decided that the Ventriloquist was the hero to start with. It probably wouldn't have done that well.

You have to remember that of these four, the youngest title is 43 years old. There's a lot of history and a lot of stories out there. There's also a lot of high expectations. Branching too far from the source material always seems to backfire (just look at Catwoman), so how would suggest they do it?

I don't think I'm settling for inferior plots. I don't think I've lowered my standards. If I were, I would be sitting here praising the great works of Joel Schumacher and discussing the mastery of Ben Affleck's portrayal of Daredevil. Of the "Big 4" franchises of the last 6 years, I've enjoyed all the movies (except X-men 3). They were well-written, well-acted movies with compelling stories and good characterizations that remained relatively faithful to their sources.

So my question to you is, if the stories are clichéd, how would you have done it?

Friday, July 07, 2006

 

That Poodoo That You Do So Well...

As I mentioned in the last paragraph of my last post, I have been playing Knights of the Old Republic (KOTOR) lately. I didn't get a chance to play it when it came out because A) The computer I had at the time was a piece of crap, and B) I didn't have an Xbox.

It's a great game, for the most part. I kind of wish you had more control over the fighting parts of the game, like in Jedi Knight II. That's okay, though. It's still a lot of fun. While it has a definite story to follow, I like the fact that you can take your character in any direction you want. Do you want to be an evil Jedi, or a good one? It’s up to you.

I’m about to talk in some detail about the game, so those few out there who haven’t played the game yet, there be spoilers ahead.

The one thing that annoys me about the game is the same problem I had with the Star Wars fan films. The game takes place roughly four thousand years before Luke Skywalker blows the shit out of the Death Star. The designers obviously wanted to significantly expand on the Star Wars universe by giving us something that takes place centuries before even the oldest Star Wars characters were born. Personally this infraction is more annoying to me because this game is a licensed, official Star Wars storyline. It's a part of the expanded universe. They should know better.

They were off to a good start too. They created a compelling story of a Sith War quite unlike the one in the movies. The planet that you started out on was one called Taris, a completely urbanized world where shit, quite literally, rolls downhill. Admittedly, it's a bit like Coruscant, but I liked the fact that it was a new planet I'd never heard of.

Unfortunately, that's where they stopped. First of all, they began by making most of the aliens in the game the same as the lot inhabiting the cantina in the first Star Wars, with a few from Jabba's palace thrown in for good measure. They have Rodians (like Greedo), Ithorians (Hammerheads), Twi'leks (The dudes with the head tails) and so on. The occasional Hutt shows up as well. They did invent one new alien, but s/he isn't a big part of the game.

You find yourself having to go to the local cantina. Why they can't have a bar, tavern, nightclub, pub, saloon, speakeasy, beer hall, or any of the other thousand or so names for your local watering hole is beyond me. No, it has to be a cantina, and the band has to be Bith players (like the ones in Star Wars) and the dancers have to be Twi’leks (like the ones in Jedi). Nothing new to report here.

A one point, you have to battle a rancor monster. Why they couldn't come up with another giant carnivore is beyond me. How hard could it be? Take a 20' body, add sharp teeth and claws. Add a roar and voila! You got a monster.

You soon find yourself at one point engaged in a Swoop race. For those of you who don’t know, a swoop is essentially like a speeder bike, except it’s a hell of a lot faster and more dangerous. While they don’t really make an appearance in the movies, they do show up in the expanded universe, including the popular Shadows of the Empire book and video game, which takes place between Empire and Jedi.

Again, the problem is that KOTOR takes place 4,000 years before all of that took place. Why are they racing the same damn thing? Even George Lucas, for all of the damage he did to the Star Wars universe with his prequels, was smart enough to create a new racing vehicle for the Phantom Menace, and that took place a mere 30 years before.

Through the course of the game, you gather together a collection of allies who accompany you on your travels. First there’s Carth, a Republic soldier who trusts no one. He’s a little like Han Solo, but I was willing to overlook that. You then meet up with a Twi’lek orphan named Mission, along with her Wookiee companion Zaalbar. After freeing Zaalbar from captivity, he offers you life-debt. (Sound familiar?) He’s followed by the Jedi Knight Bastilla and a few others (including an astromech droid, of course. Fortunately the droid looks more like Johnny 5 then R2-D2).

Finally you are able to escape Taris with your new friends. After stealing a rather familiar looking starship from a local crime boss, you fly the familiarly named Ebon Hawk (because all small freighters must have contain a species of bird in its name) to the planet Dantooine. For some reason, people just love coming back to a planet that Princess Leia mentioned in passing. The way you've designed Dantooine is cool, but why does it have to be Dantooine? You couldn't come up with a new name?

I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again: Dantooine is far too remote to be make an effective part of your video game.

Once on Dantooine, you are trained as a Jedi. One of the Jedi Masters that trains you is Master Vandar Tokare, who apparently is a member of the same species as Yoda. He even sounds like Yoda, except he doesn't switch his verbs and nouns around. He's a paler shade of green also.

After completing your training, which seemed to be like a weekend seminar, you are sent on a mission. You are charged with finding several star maps located somewhere on four different planets in the galaxy. This is the point I got up to last night. Two of them are called Korriban and Manaan. I’d never heard of them, and that’s cool. I’m looking forward to exploring them.

Sadly, I cannot say the same for the other two. The first planet is Tatooine, the home planet of Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader. It’s a tiny litter jerkwater planet that, as Luke so eloquently stated, “if there’s a bright center to the universe, (Tatooine is) the planet it’s farthest from.“ Why galactic events seem to hinge on this miserable speck of a planet, I have no idea.

The next planet is Kashyyyk, the Wookiee homeworld. It was featured in Revenge of the Sith, and also quite memorably in the Star Wars Holiday Special. This was Lucas’ original idea for the planet Endor, but decided to go with the more marketable Ewoks, after already establishing the Wookiees with Chewbacca. While Kashyyyk is a great idea for a planet, I would very much like to see something new. We’ve been there, seen that.

Upon looking at the Ebon Hawk’s navigational charts, I discovered you could also go another jerkwater planet called Yavin. You remember Yavin, right? It’s the big red gas giant that was all that stood between the rebel base and the Death Star at the end of Star Wars.

So far, Knights of the Old Republic is a great game. It’s fun to play; there are a lot of options, not just a single path to follow. The gameplay is solid, great graphics and sound. I love everything about this game, except for the fact that the people behind the games can’t seem to let go of the few little chunks of the Star Wars universe that George Lucas created in the movies. You have a whole galaxy to choose from guys. New aliens, new technologies, new planets. Create something we haven’t seen, especially if the whole idea behind the game is that it has no connection to the Star Wars universe in Luke and Leia’s time.