Deadpool misunderstood by critics? #deadpool2

Most of the reviews I read in the British press for the Deadpool 2 movie gave it three stars. And yet, on Rotten Tomatoes, the film is currently scoring 86% with audiences. There’s a bit of a mismatch there. I saw the film last night and, pondering some of the accusations levelled at the film by the critics, have to say I think the critics are just plain wrong, misinformed or critically unsophisticated enough to ‘get’ what the film is doing. Deadpool 2 is a brave film that is deceptively simple. In fact, a lazy, unthinking viewer (one who doesn’t engage brain or critical faculty) will probably consider the movie to be by-the-numbers or even straightout bad. This is a perfect example of ‘you get out what you put in’.

I saw several reviewers complain that the movie, for all its representation of minority groups, was still centred around two white guys (Deadpool and Cable) proving who was the toughest. These reviewers claimed that the female characters and minority groups were reduced to canon fodder or background filler (with very few lines of dialogue). Such complaints and claims are a fundamental misrepresentation of the movie. At the end of the day, the movie is about the Deadpool character (who, admittedly, is white and male), but throughout he challenges what a white male hero is all about in today’s society – that’s the point of his character! And Cable (who uses the c-word) is only there as the inverse – to show us what a macho asshole Deadpool would be if he was reduced to the traditional white hero – the Deadpool/Cable dynamic is actually a bipolar debate about the nature of male identity. To then say the female characters and minority groups are done a disservice (in ‘service’ to the patriarchy) is hogwash. The Domino character (a woman of colour) proves Deadpool wrong, has plenty of central moments and survives where loads of white males (X-force) get chewed up. Then, when the Deadpool/Cable narrative falls away, it is the narrative concerning the young, large-bodied, Maori Firefist that completely takes over. Yes, the female character of Negasonic Teenage Warhead remains largely surly and monosyllablic throughout, but that’s the whole point – since, if you remember the first movie, she hates adult authority, is too cool for school and absolutely doesn’t want to succumb to Deadpool so-annoying dad-jokes (and her manga-cutesy Japanese girlfriend, who gets on so well with Deadpool, only adds to the tightly-wound interplay). No, the Japanese girlfriend isn’t a tacitly racist stereotype – because she is given telling lines at the end to make it clear that her ‘geekdom’ character was just that – all an act, and one that she used to her own benefit (even if it does play upon our own lazy thinking or cultural bias). There might be a stronger argument that the weedy Asian taxi-driving male character gets shorter shrift (when Deadpool quips that he’s ‘Brown Panther’), but I would argue just as strongly that he’s an aspect of the male identity debate (an aspect which is even more complex when competing cultural expectations are involved).

Another accusation of Deadpool 2 from the critics is that this movie is far less ‘meta’ than the first. It simply doesn’t break the fourth wall as interestingly as the first. There’s only one line from Deadpool like ‘big CGI fight coming up’ to keep things self-aware. Once again, the critics are talking nonsense. The whole point of the ham-fisted X-force team that Deadpool assembles (and promptly gets killed) is that they spoof the X-Men motif. There are geek references to the John Wick movie, lines like ‘that’s some lazy writing right there’, ‘he’s young enough to keep the franchise going for another ten years’, apologies from Ryan Renolds about how poor the Green Lantern movie was, intertextual mention of Thanos (Josh Brolin plays both Cable and Thanos) and a whole host of ‘Easter eggs’ that I just know I didn’t even spot. I am definitely inclined to watch again, as I know I’ll see so much more.

So where does that leave us? The easy assessment is that Deadpool 2 is a far better movie than you may have heard or read. And then there’s a tougher question about what the hell the critics are up to with their relatively poor reviews. I’m not sure I have all the answers to that. Clearly, you can’t trust the media critics to guide you properly. Media critics still don’t properly understand geek culture or current social debates concerning identity (debates that are significantly informed by the (often angry) voices of young people), it would seem. For me, Deadpool 2 is an 8.5 out of 10. Up your bum, critics!

 

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The Alienist – a new gothic classic #alienist #netflix

The Alienist is set in the New York of 1896 – a Victorian, very Jack-the-Ripper sort of place. There has been a spate of child murders. The police are unable to make any progress in tracking down the killer… and some may actually be protecting him, as the suspicion is that he is the son of a powerful family. In desperation, the police commissioner (who is the historical character of Theodore Roosevelt) tasks his psychiatrist/alienist friend (Laszlo Kreizler) with assembling a team to find the killer.

Psychiatry is still in its early stages, as are the sciences of police forensics and profiling. Kreizler has to fight misconceptions, his own preconceptions and a corrupt society. All the while, the clock is ticking… and children are dying. He is frustrated and panicked by his inability to make immediate progress and lashes out at his companions, who are fighting their own demons. Indeed, it is the telling character interactions and growing self-awareness of his team (the feminist, the indolent dandy and the Jewish anatomists) which really make this compelling viewing (along with brilliant acting by the likes of Luke Evans, Daniel Bruhl, Dakota Fanning, and others). The series refuses to indulge in excessive exposition – instead, we pick up clues about the protagonists’ past lives and associations by how they react to their various situations. Each of them has a hang-up, each of them has their own moral code, each of them has skeletons in the closet. The audience is effectively one of the team in having to read the clues and make sense of the narrative. It’s utterly immersive.

And we are immersed in some very psychologically-dark deeds that would only make sense to a dreaming or otherwise altered mind – a mindscape, if you will. It’s the definition of the gothic. The show is gory, in a surrealist way. It is full of disjuncture, false starts, misgivings, bizarre clues and circularity. But it’s thrilling, exciting and daring.

If you can imagine a mix of Mindhunter and Penny Dreadful, then you know what’s in store. If you can imagine a mix of historical fact and fiction, of romance and horror, of depravity and tenderness, of revulsion and compulsion, and if that intrigues and inspires you, then you will enjoy this show immensely.

It’s right up my murky, dangerous alley, this series. I score it 9 out of 10.

Jessica Jones, The Return!

As a massive fan of the first season of Marvel’s Jessica Jones, I’d really been looking forward to the second season. JJ2 was always going to struggle to be as refreshingly adult and ground-breaking as JJ1, I knew that. What I hadn’t been prepared for, however, was just how far short JJ2 would fall of the high standards set by JJ1. The second season is disappointingly brattish and so, so tired.

There are a whole host of problems with JJ2. Where to begin? At the beginning, I guess. Okay, we are immediately hit with a lack of continuity, with plot inconsistencies and with massive plot holes. A nerdy and nervous superhero (called The Whizzer) comes to Jessica saying someone is trying to kill him. It’s not clear why anyone would want to kill him. He ends up dead anyway. Jessica tracks down someone who might be the killer (I won’t spoil it for you), but it’s never actually explained and the show promptly gives up on that entire plotline. Then a rival private detective turns up, accuses Jessica of stealing his clients (although we’ve just been told in the previous scene that Jessica has no proper clients to speak of) and tries to buy her out. She tells him to get lost and – apart from a later break-in – he pretty much does. Then Jessica’s side-kick Malcolm is emotionally blackmailed by Trish to ‘fall off the wagon’ and start taking drugs again – he does, freaks out, runs into the night saying he never wants to see her again – and then appears with her in the next episode as if nothing’s happened. It’s all really random, frustrating and, basically put, rubbish.

Unlike in JJ1, there’s no major baddie in JJ2. This means JJ2 lacks a consistent focus, is often aimless and is frequently pointless. There is a lack of true moral dilemma, a lack of mystery, a lack of consequences to actions and a complete lack of moral compass. Many episodes are simple soap operas, full of angst and whining. Where is the sass and humour of the first season? We eventually get some wit in a couple of later episodes because David Tennant turns up as the ghost of Kilgrave from season one. It was as if the writers of season two suddenly realised/accepted things just weren’t working and decided to reboot… except Jessica then declares to Kilgrave that she is stronger than him… and he promptly disappears (as if Tennant suddenly decided he was really needed on far better productions than this one). And that’s that. We return to the self-indulgent flip-flopping of Jessica’s dull origin story. Argggh!

Look, it could be that the writers of JJ2 were trying to do something brave with the traditional superhero format. In refusing to have a big threatening male as baddie, and in populating the show with strong female characters, perhaps they were trying to pull off something very advanced and experimental. Unfortunately, in devoting so much of their energy to this new style of things, they neglected to put enough into getting the basics right.  Like a basic plot. Like basic character development (rather than the repetition and restating of things we already know). There is a lot of posing and pouting attempted by Jessica, but without any decent dialogue or depth to things, she just looks like a sulky child. In one episode, she says, ‘When you have dreams, but they don’t come true, they become nightmares.’ Eh? Does that make sense? Not really, cos she’s simply having a car ride with her mum. And Trish’s constant tantrums make her seem like nothing more than a spoilt child. Sheesh. The whole thing is a mess from start to finish.

It’s such a shame. Such a wasted opportunity. And to think I’ll never get those thirteen hours back. A score out of 10? Probably a 5 is fair.

Black Lightning rejects the American Dream #BlackLightning

A high school principal asks his students to reject violence in favour of reason and obeying social and moral codes. But waiting beyond the school gates are gangs with weapons, forcing youngsters into whore houses and using drugs. The police seem powerless to protect the students, because they are underfunded and probably corrupt anyway. The students have little choice but to pick up weapons to defend themselves, some getting themselves killed in the process, and some becoming as bad as the actual gangs. All hell starts to break loose. The principal feels forced to resurrect his secret superhero identity (Black Lightning) in order to keep the streets ‘safe’. He has deep misgivings because he is thereby becoming a hypocritical vigilante. He feels (and very much looks) uncomfortable in his skin – in his lumbering, cheesy superhero disguise. It is an augmented suit too, one that takes a personal toll on him physically and mentally – he starts to become a monster at home, driving away all those he loves and wants to keep close. It is a physical symbol and enactment of his moral and spiritual conflict. It represents the damage done to the psyche and a person’s sense of identity (particularly a black person in an underprivileged area) in today’s (Trumpian) America.

This Netflix tv show (an adaptation of the DC character) will at first seem cliched and naff to viewers. But stick with it and you’ll find that your (genre) expectations are defeated time and again. A mother grieving for her son seeks to confront and shame the gang members who killed her boy. Our innate sense of justice expects her to win out where the cops have failed, or expects Black Lightning to turn up and save her when the gang members turn on her. But the gang members kill her. Outraged, we expect the community to rise up against the gangs, or expect Black Lightning to finally deliver justice. But most people shrug and look to carrying on with their lives. Black Lightning tracks down the killers, only to have a suit malfunction, get a proper kicking and become a laughing stock.

Wow. This is a dark series. It’s not bleak, as it keeps looking for a new way out or solution. Hope and humanity drive it on. One episode, we turn to the Church for answers, and the Church organises a peace march, only to have it shot up by the gangs. In another episode, we hark back to better times, when the local newspaper could name and shame, and hold people to account. But the old editor is now too terrified for his life to print anything too critical of anyone. A different solution is tried in every episode, with Black Lightning muddling through as best as he can, trying to keep faith in himself and justice. Is he a deluded fool? We root for him, but we find it harder and harder (with each set-back) to believe he can ultimately win out. We admire him, sympathise with him, but ultimately fear for him.

This is real life, then. It’s not some escapist superhero caper. The goodies don’t win. The baddies always seem to win. Welcome to the world, boys and girls. And Black Panther… you have no idea.

Altered Carbon… murder-porn anyone? #AlteredCarbon

There’s a lot about this show that is very good. There are provocative and thought-provoking scifi ideas. There’s some quite credible world-building. The detective mystery with which we are initially presented is engaging and not easily solved. There are interesting themes about rich-and-poor, religious-and-non-religious belief, shared-blood-and-abandonement, identity, and so on. These things are probably down to the decent trilogy of novels (by Richard Morgan) that inspired this Netflix show. There’s some decent enough acting, and the special FX are impressive too. So why Netflix did you then add the following…

We see the actor James Purfoy entirely in the flacid buff, and that then seems to allow/justify all manner of female nudity, objectification, abuse and murder-porn throughout the rest of the series. The unhesitating ‘male gaze’ involved in the direction throughout is lascivious in the extreme. Maybe this tv show is trying to do something clever? Maybe it’s trying to make us complicit with the commodification going on (in order to make a bigger point about today’s society), maybe it’s trying to desensitise us in this emotionally sterile future where the physical body is temporary and expendable? Sigh. If only it were. There is nothing truly subtle about the Freudian relationships in this series, sadly. There is no genuine nuance of feeling. There is no subtle subversion at work within the plotting or characterisation. In short, things are as objectionable as they look. Why do we actually need to see some poor prostitute being murdered even as she’s being sexually used? Why, Netflix?

To conclude, I’d recommend you reading the novels.

The terrifying running time of Blade Runner 2049 #BladeRunner2049

The running time of the Blade Runner 2049 movie is 2hrs37mins. Arguably, it’s a daunting commitment for any potential viewer. You might go thinking: ‘Ah, that means the tempo’s slow and it’s overly-long or self-indulgent.’ Rest assured, however, that when you are occupied watching awe-inspiring visuals and listening to an intriguing soundscape, you simply don’t notice the time passing. And there’s a decent detective story with tantalising clues, a multi-layered plot and exciting conflicts thrown in as well. This film truly has the lot.

The director is Denis Villeneuve, who also made the award-winning SF flick Arrival. He recaptures the vision of the future we see in the original Blade Runner and then builds upon it, with fine world-building (enough for a third movie, without doubt) and his own original ideas. He is also a skilled, light-touch story-teller. There is nothing clumsy or clunky in Blade Runner 2049. It is all subtlety, allusion and some playful confusion. Such an approach would make for a frustrating watch with certain directors, but Villeneuve makes sure to deliver on revelations and to resolve every aspect of what is going on. It’s masterfully done.

The story? Well, the cyborgs/androids of the first movie have been replaced by a new series of much-more-obedient AIs. These AIs each has an artificial ‘childhood memory’ implanted into them so that they can react in a more human way to day-to-day life, and so that they can react with a certain personality. We follow one AI detective (played skillfully by Ryan Gosling) who comes to suspect that his memory is real and holds clues to the mystery with which he has been tasked by his boss (the ever-wonderful Robin Wright). Chuck in an evil tech corporation (with a sick boss and terrifying henchwoman) and we have everything we need for a dark and glorious tale. And it’s no secret that Harrison Ford is in the movie: he’s not wasted either; his ‘own’ story is really moved on by 2049… In fact, 2049 sorts out all the plot holes of the original film, which I would never have thought possible.

And here’s the kicker. I was never the biggest fan of the original Blade Runner, either when I saw it as a 15yrold at the cinema, or as a 40-year-old who assumed that all the ‘fuss’ about this ‘cult’ movie meant his youthful self must have missed something. I just thought of the original as a fairly predictable, clumsy and derivative SF flop (it wasn’t any Star Wars!).  Yet Blade Runner 2049 has stood everything on its head. It’s almost as if my childhood memory is an artificial one, one that had been implanted to give me character. It’s as if my program has now been rewritten and I am born again. And that’s my last point about the movie: it has an eerie familiarity to it that makes it truly prescient and uncanny. It is a vision of what is most assuredly going to happen to our species. It has the power of prophecy. And so… I can only score this movie 10 out of 10 (a first for me).

 

The Satanic in Science Fiction and Fantasy

Soooo… I’m happy to say I’ve just signed a contract with Luna Press to write a book called ‘The Satanic in Science Fiction and Fantasy’. It’ll be released in early 2019, all being well. The blurb for the book is as follows:

“As long as literature has existed, so has the motif of ‘the dark lord’. However, it was not until the emergence of fantasy and science fiction as distinct literary genres that the dark lord truly became enshrined in popular works. From Bram Stoker’s Dracula, to Tolkien’s Sauron, to Donaldson’s Lord Foul, to Lucas’s Darth Vader, the dark lord was ever present in SFF. Sometimes he was a mad god, evil emperor or evil corporation, but always there was that malign intelligence seeking to thwart the goody-goody Chosen One of the 1980s and 90s. And he had servants in the form of demon armies, alien invaders or intelligent machines, seeking to drag the unwary into the underworld, to conquer us or to make humanity entirely extinct.

Come the new millennium, and the emergence of sub-genres like ‘grimdark fantasy’ and ‘dystopian YA’, we tend to see everything in shades of grey far more. We still have invading hordes, be they zombies or Dothraki, but they are mindless disease-carriers and immigrants-with-a-cause rather than out-and-out followers of Satan. Our sense of evil has perhaps changed. We seem to understand that ‘evil’ is really a matter of perspective. And what has become of ‘the dark lord’ himself? Well, he is now the star of tv series such as ‘Lucifer’ or ‘Dracula’. Has he actually changed from anti-hero into hero? Has he won in some way? Or do we now recognise ourselves in him? Were we really fighting against ourselves all along?

This book considers the early literary origins of the character of Satan and his embodiment within SFF, in order to show how our idea of evil has changed over time, to identify how SFF has shifted since its early days, to suggest the trends which are yet to emerge and, perhaps, to help us better understand ourselves.”

You can see more on the Luna Press site: https://www.lunapresspublishing.com/single-post/2018/02/01/A-J-Dalton-On-His-Latest-Project-for-Academia-Lunare