#Ark of Covenant is where

[thebirdandhersong]

Re: hard to articulate: I literally cannot tell you in words the whys and wherefores of this but the only time (the ONLY time--I have been filled with absolute misery and terror every time I've gone for appointments at the dentist's office, especially after they took my wisdom teeth out while I was awake and conscious)(this is the only thing that I've been consistently scared of, much to my embarrassment--I can handle public speaking and heights and insects and things like that but I Despise going to the dentist) the only time I have EVER felt peace at the dentist's was the time I prayed the Rosary throughout the whole appointment. I also cannot tell you in words why I felt compelled, after I found out that my dorm is right across the street from a Catholic church, to bring flowers to the statue of Mary on the way back from class, and to sit there next to her and pray.

[for-the-writing-artist]

Keeping it in the tags for convenience.

I want to thank @for-the-writing-artist for being willing to have the discussion we did, but I think they're right that we've pretty much reached a point where we've covered all we'll be able to. In their last post on the matter, they indicated that they're not particularly interested in providing reasons to believe what they believe and I'm unable to adopt any belief without sufficient reason.

I still don't have any good reason to believe that lying is necessarily wrong, or that what the Bible says about god or Jesus is true, or that the Bible ever makes an outright statement that slavery is immoral, or that any interpretation of what the Bible says about anything else is more convincing than any other conflicting interpretation, or that any ancient understanding of morality should be preferred over our modern understanding, and it all boils down to evidence.

We're too far apart on these points and a few others to really continue without retreading the same topics over and over, but it seemed like they wanted some response to their last few points (forgive me if I'm wrong, it's not my intention to push on a topic you're finished discussing), so I'll give some brief notes. (Looking over the post before publishing, I should reconsider my use of the word "brief" lol)

> I get that the burden of proof lies on me, and I would be genuinely interested in your reasons for why God isn't real. But a discussion can only go so far in unequal footing.

It's absolutely correct that the burden of proof is on the person making the positive claim, and that's why I avoid claiming that gods aren't real. My position is that I'm unconvinced by any claim I've ever heard that a god or some gods exist, so I really don't need any other reason to reject them. There may be a god or some gods but I lack any good evidence to support the idea that they exist. I will admit that I have a strong bias against these claims - along with claims about angels, demons, ghosts, goblins, spirits, souls, cryptids, alien abductions, a flat earth, etc. - but that's because the reality itself is biased against these claims, yielding no definitive evidence that any of these things are possible or extant. But I still have these conversations because I want to believe true things, and if someone knows some demonstrable truth that I'm not aware of, I'd like to know about it in order to form a more accurate view of reality.

> And, if by some miracle, it is proven without a shadow of doubt that God is real, and all your answers and reasons for disbelief disproved ─ would you acquiesce? Would you believe then?

I've touched on this recently, but maybe it was with one of the other folks who joined this conversation. Briefly, my skepticism requires that I adapt my worldview to new information when it comes to my awareness. So if a god is demonstrated to exist, then I've no reason to still be atheist, but whether I actually worship or respect that deity depends entirely on whether certain claims about its past actions and moral standards are true as well. In the case of Yahweh, I'd need to know for certain that a lot of things in the Bible are complete lies conceived by ancient manipulative leaders before I ever said "god is good."

> Something is. Something exists that is higher than me, or you. It could be this Krishna, it could be God. But I cannot argue in favor of this, if you believe that Nothing exists (really weird, as nothing is the absence of something). I would need to disprove this Nothing to then argue in favor of Something.

Assuming we're not brains in jars dreaming up all of reality, lots of things exist. We presuppose reality, but can't demonstrate our existence and that's an ancient and ongoing problem, so in order to function we have to take this axiom or be paralyzed by doubt. Depending on what you mean by "something higher" I might agree or disagree, but if you mean that it's necessarily something like a god I certainly don't think so. I can almost see what you're saying regarding something/nothing, but I'm not aware of any possibility that "nothing" has ever or could ever exist. Nothing, by existing, would necessarily become something. I only make this note because you began that point by saying "if you believe..." and I just want to make it clear that I don't believe in "nothing," but I reject claims of undetectable "somethings" where we lack any good indication that they should be there.

All in all, it was a good conversation and I appreciate the time and energy it took to give thoughtful responses to what I was saying. And I hope it goes without saying that although I think you're convinced of some bad ideas, I don't have any such evaluation of your character as a human. I hope you keep asking questions and being open to ideas you might disagree with.

[vaspider]

Agatha All Along Thoughts:

The thing that I've been thinking about that hasn't been touched on yet: the Witch's Road gives "what is missing."

Billy is CERTAIN that this means his brother, or that he gets to choose what it means. However, the MCU has been pretty clear up to this point that this is often not at all how magic works.

Also, if you look at the way the Witch's Road is laid out, like, look at the way the trees look and how stylized they are, look at the decorations in a few places... the same lights that are in Billy's room show up in Agatha's trial, those triangular string lights, and the trees on the Witch's Road are extremely stylized. Some look like the tree on the cover of the Torah Ark, and some look like the tabletoppers/centerpieces from William's bar mitzvah, and some have items hanging from them which look like the items hanging on the centerpieces. Additionally, the door didn't show up until Billy came downstairs. This may just be because the coven wasn't complete until Billy was in the room, but it may also be because he's the driving force behind getting everyone on the Road at all. The Road responds to the coven, right? It forms itself to the coven? And if each of the witches gets a trial, then the only place where William's influence might leak out, the only space that might be 'his,' where he's trying to, maybe, get Billy's attention would be in these liminal spaces. (His ability to reach out only happening in those most liminal of spaces would make a lot of sense if he's sort of been hovering for years in a sort of limbo.)

Oh fuck, I just realized that we got Randall/Ralph Bohner telling Billy "it's like watching yourself on TV." FUCK. FUCK. FUCK. That's not an accident. Ahhhhh fuck. Poor William.

I think what episode 6 has telegraphed to us -- one of the things it has, anyway -- is that what he is "missing" is William Kaplan, and he's going to have to integrate these two personalities/two lives into one thing.

(My theory re: Tommy is that the "quest" in VisionQuest, the third part of this trilogy, will be finding Tommy. I also think that Eddie is Hulkling -- his immediate explanation for the Hex was 'aliens,' Hulkling is often sleeveless, lots of little things. That might be a red herring, but I think they may be giving us Hulkling there.)

I really, really appreciate the level to which these choices have clearly been thought out. I'll be pulling apart the implications of this show for magic in the MCU for a while.

(If you're here to tell me that the MCU is dumb or you hate it, please go away. I'm not interested in that conversation.)

[teecupangel]

Why not just Desmond being an angel.

And it freaks everybody out and everybody thinks he's holy or something and he's just like "all right okay why not"

It had happened by accident.

It had to be an accident, right?

Altaïr had been thrown out of the room and the Templars had unsheathed their weapons. Malik had been focused on protecting his brother, shouting at him to run as he tried to keep all of the Templars busy.

Robert de Sablé didn’t even look back when he walked away after ordering their death.

Malik didn’t know what happened.

He saw Kadar freeze when he neared the scaffolding that would lead to the treasure and Malik swore his eyes glowed gold for the briefest of moments.

Before one of the Templars charged at him.

Kadar snapped out of it and tried to block, his stance unstable enough that he slipped backwards.

Into the scaffolding…

Taking the Templar with him.

The Templar’s sword struck one of the wooden pillars keeping the scaffolding stable and…

Malik didn’t have any explanation for it.

It shouldn’t have happened.

The scaffolding started to crumble, making Kadar and the Templar run away from it as fast as they could.

And then…

The wall next to the scaffolding began to break apart, golden light coming from the cracks before the entire thing fell down.

Together with the treasure and the ark where it had been resting.

The ark broke in half, splitting in the middle to reveal an egg shaped thing made of stone that was around the height of perhaps Malik when he was sitting on the floor.

The treasure fell on top of it, shattering like it was made of glass.

Where the shards fell on the stone, the stone changed and spread.

Until…

What had been stone had changed to seemingly three pairs of wings with white feathers that seemed to shine gold all curled together.

The wings twitched…

Before slowly opening, stretching to its full size.

Revealing a young man seemingly sleeping, the three pairs of wings attached to his back. His head was resting on his propped up knees.

No one could speak.

No one could move.

Until…

“Altaïr?” Kadar whispered hesitantly and Malik could see why he would call out that fool’s name.

The man looked too much like Altaïr for it to be a coincidence.

Almost as if hearing the name, the man…

No.

The divine being in front of them opened his eyes.

Instead of Altaïr’s golden eyes, his eyes were light brown with specks of gold in them.

And Malik wondered how he could see them from where he was standing, a few meters away from the winged being.

The divine being looked around and blinked.

His eyes met Malik and his lips parted.

“It’s an angel!”

Before he could speak, the Templars all knelt and began to pray.

The Templar who had attacked Kadar took off his helmet and…

It was a woman.

A woman who was praying fervently at the divine being who…

… looked at Malik with wide confused eyes.

Unorganized Notes… I mean… sorta notes?:

Desmond is surprised for a few seconds then he goes “Be not afraid” and tried to sound super impressive “Ye are in the presence of…………… the will of God.” and he’s just bullshiting his way to uuhhh. He has no plans.

He glanced at Malik and Kadar and oh yeah, alright.

“Ye shall not harm these… men of justice for they are… under my protection…?”

At that point, Desmond knows he is ffuuuccckkeedd. Malik is obviously onto him. Kadar is super confused and just keeps staring at his face. Then…

Maria, of all people, agree and even goes as pledge her sword to him which is super weird and Desmond’s just “???”

In the end, Desmond accidentally takes the Templars about to kill Malik and Kadar with him as he leaves the temple with Malik and Kadar. It’s a very awkward journey and Desmond has no idea what else to do other than…

Oh wait… there were other Templars stationed nearby and they all saw him leave with his ‘entourage’.

Before he could try to say anything, Maria speaks for him, calling the messenger of God and that he had been sleeping in the Ark of the Covenant which sounded like a super big deal (and he can’t even whisper to Malik to ask what the hell she was talking about because the Farm was never religious and the only time Desmond even heard of the Ark of the Covenant was from Indiana Jones) and…

… why does it feel like Maria was converting people into becoming his personal army???

Oh god… Was this…

Was he going to take his own army to Masyaf???

[walkswithmyfather]

Joshua 3:11-16 (NLT). [11] Look, the Ark of the Covenant, which belongs to the Lord of the whole earth, will lead you across the Jordan River! [12] Now choose twelve men from the tribes of Israel, one from each tribe. [13] The priests will carry the Ark of the Lord, the Lord of all the earth. As soon as their feet touch the water, the flow of water will be cut off upstream, and the river will stand up like a wall.” [14] So the people left their camp to cross the Jordan, and the priests who were carrying the Ark of the Covenant went ahead of them. [15] It was the harvest season, and the Jordan was overflowing its banks. But as soon as the feet of the priests who were carrying the Ark touched the water at the river’s edge, [16] the water above that point began backing up a great distance away at a town called Adam, which is near Zarethan. And the water below that point flowed on to the Dead Sea until the riverbed was dry. Then all the people crossed over near the town of Jericho.”

Joshua 4:1-8 (NLT). [1] “When all the people had crossed the Jordan, the Lord said to Joshua, [2] “Now choose twelve men, one from each tribe. [3] Tell them, ‘Take twelve stones from the very place where the priests are standing in the middle of the Jordan. Carry them out and pile them up at the place where you will camp tonight.’” [4] So Joshua called together the twelve men he had chosen—one from each of the tribes of Israel. [5] He told them, “Go into the middle of the Jordan, in front of the Ark of the Lord your God. Each of you must pick up one stone and carry it out on your shoulder—twelve stones in all, one for each of the twelve tribes of Israel. [6] We will use these stones to build a memorial. In the future your children will ask you, ‘What do these stones mean?’ [7] Then you can tell them, ‘They remind us that the Jordan River stopped flowing when the Ark of the Lord’s Covenant went across.’ These stones will stand as a memorial among the people of Israel forever.” [8] So the men did as Joshua had commanded them. They took twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan River, one for each tribe, just as the Lord had told Joshua. They carried them to the place where they camped for the night and constructed the memorial there.”

“Remembering God’s Goodness” By In Touch Ministries:

“How can you create reminders of the Lord's faithfulness?”

“Some information—like a birthday or phone number—is easy to remember. Yet we tend to forget examples of the Lord’s goodness to us. Today’s verses suggest a way to counteract this.

After bringing His people safely out of Egypt and through the Red Sea, God miraculously provided another dry path by piling up the Jordan’s waters in a heap upstream. He knew the Israelites were about to enter Jericho and would, by His power, overcome that city. It was certainly compassionate of God to give that tangible illustration of His strength and presence before the battle. But He also knew how quickly they had forgotten Him before.

The Lord had a plan to help His people recall the miracle at the river. He told them to create a memorial with 12 stones, each representing a tribe of Israel that had passed safely through the waters (Josh. 4:7-8). Then they would have a lasting visible reminder of divine rescue.

We’re much like the Israelites: When God works in big, obvious ways, it’s easy to trust Him. But in time, we drift toward self-reliance until we’re reminded of our need for Him and repent.

How can you create reminders of God’s faithfulness? Whether it’s by journaling or creating a “thankfulness list,” make sure you have a way to remember the Lord’s involvement in your life.”

[Photo thanks to Mikhail Tyrsyna at Unsplash]

[imagine-darksiders]

Fighting capitalism by having an art ‘aesthetic’ that is so so rancid, no brands want to use you for marketing.

Yes I’m looking at Tiktokkers who have cute tidy work spaces where everything is displayed ‘just right’ lending a superficial atmosphere that’s appealing to consumers and marketers who want you to slide their brands into your videos.

I show my studio space to Instagram artists and they dissolve like I’ve opened the ark of the covenant.

[cainhart]

Thinking about how Sparda was a nomad for so long, traveling the world, closing and sealing rifts and demon portals, and probably sealing demonic relics with his abyssal sigils or outright destroying them. Okay I get it he saved humanity and separated the two worlds, yadayadayada—BUT from a witch’s perspective, I’d be fucking FURIOUS at Sparda because why would you destroy the Ark of the Covenant or the Dagger of Brutus, or Selene’s Light dude I was going to use them my man… please put that tome down, I beg you.

No wonder demons and witches/magicians had a beef with Sparda—he nearly wiped out the magic on Earth, and as if that wasn’t enough he destroyed their tools dhsjdjsdnsm

Then his elder son travels the world just like him (except this time he has the Prince of Hell and his mutts on his tail), seeking knowledge and trying to find more ways to gain power. He gets frustrated and questions why the relics mentioned in ancient tomes aren’t where they should be or have been sealed away. I DUNNO DEVIL BOY maybe ask your dad?!

[halobirthdays]

Happy birthday to Sergeant Major Avery Johnson!

Today is his -450th birthday!

Johnson was born and raised by his maternal aunt in Chicago, who kept him in tidy hand-me-downs and dutifully brought him to church. He enlisted in the UNSC when he was nineteen, believing the Insurrection to be a threat to innocent people. He quickly stood out among his peers and was hand-selected for the newly-instituted ORION project, an attempt at creating a new form of biologically enhanced soldiers to quell the Insurrection.

Avery underwent the training and augmentations, well-exceeding his superiors' expectations. However, the program as a whole was not the success the UNSC was hoping for, and was deactivated, though ORION would be used as the blueprint of the SPARTAN project. Johnson was reassigned to the marines.

He was then deployed to Tribute, where he failed to prevent an Insurrectionist terrorist from blowing up a diner, leading to several dozen civilian deaths. These events left him shaken, and he returned home to Chicago, only to find that his aunt had died. He spiraled, falling into a drinking binge and only recovering when a recruiter stumbled upon him in a gutter. The recruiter convinced Johnson to reenlist, and he was deployed to Harvest.

While on Harvest, the UNSC made contact with Kig-Yar, the first ever interaction between humanity and the Covenant. However, peace quickly failed, and he was involved in the very firsr battles of the Human-Covenant war.

This early experience would prove invaluable, and he was deployed on several key missions following these events. During OPERATION: SILENT STORM, he met Blue Team for the first time, and they earned his respect, with Johnson backing up John as leadership became accustomed to the Spartans. He also helped protect them when he accurately deduced that the Spartans were being targeted by Hector Nyeto.

Johnson continued to serve all the way up to the fall of Reach and the discovery of Installation 04. When the Covenant attacked the Pillar of Autumn, Johnson, along with the rest of the crew, landed on the Halo. Johnson and Keyes investigated intel from a captured Sangheili about a weapons cache on the ring. They found the Flood instead. Johnson survived as the Flood infected his squad and ultimately survived Halo's destruction when he was later discovered by Master Chief.

Following these events, Johnson received a promotion and Colonial Cross for his bravery on Halo, but the award ceremony was cut short when the Covenant attacked Earth. After chasing the Covenant forces off of the planet, Johnson and the In Amber Clad's crew discovered a second Halo installation.

He joined Commander Miranda Keyes to the Halo in search of the activation index to prevent the Covenant from firing the array. However, they were ambushed by Arbiter Thel 'Vadam and taken hostage by Tartarus and his Jiralhanae.

Keyes was brought to the control room to activate the ring while Johnson was about to be executed until they were interrupted by an attack from the Arbiter and the newly-formed Covenant separatists. Johnson then convinced Thel to join forces to stop Tartarus from activating the ring, coordinating the first cease-fire between their species.

After learning the purpose of the Ark and the location of the portal on Earth that would take them there, Johnson, Keyes, and Thel raced back to warn Earth of the coming Covenant invasion. Johnson followed Truth after helping to coordinate a joint UNSC-Sangheili mission to the Ark.

Johnson and his squad were overwhelmed by the Covenant forces at the Citadel. His squad was killed, and he was taken hostage again because the Halos can only be activated by a human. Truth attempted to use Johnson to activate the Halo array, but was stopped by Keyes, who planned on killing Johnson and herself so there would not be humans for Truth to use. However, she hesitated, and Truth used the opportunity to kill her. His victory was short-lived, with Master Chief and the Arbiter arriving shortly thereafter, killing Truth and preventing the rings from firing.

With the pressing danger gone, the UNSC and Sangheili forces focused on Flood containment. Following Cortana's plan, they decided to destroy the partially-built replacement for Installation 04. While Guilty Spark initially agreed with this action, he did not realize that the UNSC intended on destroying his replacement installation--he thought they were going to activate the ring when it was complete. When Johnson corrected him, Spark turned on them, killing Johnson with a sentinel beam.

The loss of Johnson was mourned widely, especially for John but also by Cortana and Thel, who both expressed their condolences. At Johnson's request, John "kicked [Spark's] ass" and activated the ring.

[hiveswap]

Whats that part in indiana jones and the holy grail where theyre down in that crypt in venice and the woman hes with asks what something is and hes like "that's the ark of the covenant" and even says that hes sure of it. Then just like keeps walking

[genesisgrey]

Halo: Season 3

Not that I don't have like 40 half-finished Halo fics on my computer... but let's have some fun with fantasy Halo Season 3 brainstorming, shall we? These are just some notes I made for myself today.

Stuff That Needs to be Addressed:

Kai - Alive? (Okay, if Halo Infinite expects me to buy Master Chief was space debris for six months, not to mention an unprotected slip-space jump, with no side-effects and can just boot up with no muscle atrophy or anything, Kai can absolutely be fine.)

Makee - What is her purpose on the Halo? (In relation to the game storyline, what does she add? What opportunities does she create?)

Talia Perez - Follow Chief to the Halo? Try to regroup Spartan IIIs? Hook up with Ackerson/Kwan group?

Ackerson - What now?

Soren and son (Cassius? No, Kessler?) - What now? (Obviously recovering from the loss of Laera, but what is their quest? Maybe she can be saved? Not likely.)

Miranda - Escape? Hold up with the Flood while science-ing it? (Gravemind avatar?)

Halsey - Are we going to find a cure for Flood infection? Or is she a future carrier when someone pulls her from cryo?

Riz - Come back if her fellow Spartans need her? (Probably not, but maybe? What if her new home is threatened? Her and Vannak's armor is still on the planet.)

Kwan - What does she do now? Does she go to the Halo? Does she seek the Ark? What is helping her along? (Librarian?)

Sparks - Having two Reclaimers with opposite purposes. What is Sparks purpose? (Seemed like a more composed version of Sparks we saw in the last episode. Also, if the Flood outbreak started somewhere other than the Halo, it wouldn't know yet to want to fire Halo?)

Cortana - Definitely getting stuck in the Halo system and separated from Master Chief like the game. (Maybe can be the connection for Makee and Master Chief's storylines?)

Covenant - Survivors of the battle, also going for the Halo? (High Charity is still in play, I believe.)

UNSC/ONI - Do we have a marines dropping to Halo? Possibilities of bringing in Lord Hood and Serin Osman to regroup these factions.

Stuff I had questions about that was probably not going to be addressed even if the show got a Season 3:

How augmented were the Spartan IIIs? Kind of felt like they were portrayed as ODST with better armor rather than augmented.

Why were there child soldiers being trained if Ackerson already had his Spartan IIIs? Parangosky? (Definitely spelling that wrong.) Did he know? I feel this variant Ackerson wouldn't have used kids if he thought he was getting the results he wanted out of adult candidates. Or maybe Spartan IIIs were a publicity stunt, since the show really played up the propaganda around Master Chief's image, and the kids Kessler was grouped with were the real program? (Flipping purpose of Spartan III and IV projects?) Also, where are they now?

Is Violetta Franco from season one still around? I honestly can't recall if she died or not.

Feels like with how Reach went down in the series there had to be Spartan IIs deployed elsewhere to still be around. (I feel like Kai was very much Kurt in season 2. Cut off from all the other Spartans to train new Spartans, and given bad/misleading information about her job and who was still alive.)

And what is Chief's plan?!!?

[dandelionh3art]

The Ethiopian Bible is the oldest, original and most complete bible on earth. Written in Ge’ez an ancient language of Ethiopia, it’s nearly 800 years older than the King James Version and contains 81-88 books compared to 66.

Written on goat skin in the early Ethiopian language of Ge’ez. It is also World’s first illustrated Christian Bible. It includes the Book of EN0CH, Esdras, Buruch and all 3 Books of MACCABEE, and a host of others that was excommunicated from the KJV.

The Ethiopian bible dating analysis dated Garima 2 to be written around 390-570, and Garima 1 from 530-660. During the Italian invasion fire was set in the monastery in the 1930s to destroy the monastery’s church nevertheless the Bible survive.

The original Christianity of Egypt was established by the apostle Mark in AD 42 in Ethiopia (Coptic Church--Coptic Orthodox Christianity) where it spread to Europe and some part of Asia. Today We have been told Christianity came from Rome.

The Catholic Church begin with the teachings of Yeshua (Yehōshu'a) who lived in the 1st century CE in the province of Judea of the Roman Empire. Meanwhile by AD 313, the Roman Empire Catholic Church faced persecution and christianity was not openly practice, the Coptic Orthodox Christianity was flourishing in the Aksumite Empire now in Ethiopia.

Church of Our Lady Mary of Zion Axum Ethiopia, houses the Ark of the Covenant, bears a design similar to that of Eastern Orthodox churches in Europe. Its most recent building, reconstructed in the 1950s, has a dome similar to the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. It is heavily guarded.

Lalibela is a holy town most famous for its churches carved from the living rock, which play an important part in the history of rock-cut architecture. Its buildings, built in the 11th and 12th centuries, are considered symbolic representations of biblical Jerusalem.

For early Christians, the risk of persecution from the Romans sometimes ran high, forcing them to practice their beliefs in private, posing a challenge for those scholars who study this era.

The King James Version Bible New Testament which is said to be translated from Greek, and the Old Testament from Hebrew and Aramaic, and the Apocrypha from Greek and Latin, All were originally translated from the Ethiopian bible. original Greek Bible was written around AD 1500.

It is also known that Ancient Afrikans of Old Egypt (Kemet) studied this bible in their temple which was known as the "The Book of the Coming Forth by Day and Night". The original Bible was produced by Black Afrikans approximately 3,400 years.

Before the Old Testament and more than 4,200 years before the New Testament, and countless versions of it have been written and published. Different scholars also translated the bible to their local languages during their studies in Kemet.

Your comments on this

[helix-enterprises117]

Trying Something New

Okay, I didn't wanna resort to asking Cortana (my ChatGPT's name) for any prompts cuz I wanted ACTUAL human discussion this, but I caved and I asked her to give me 20 generic sci-fi plots. I only asked Cortana 'cuz my last post asking for prompts, concepts and ideas flopped😓. Here's what she gave me; note, I cut some out to just the ones I liked.

Nebula Storm: Master Chief enters a nebula that disrupts electronic equipment, forcing him to rely on primitive weapons and tactics against an alien race that thrives in the electromagnetic chaos.

Echoes of Valhalla: An experimental weapon tears a hole in space-time, trapping Master Chief in a parallel universe where the Covenant won the war. He must find his way back and prevent this reality from bleeding into his own.

Orbital Decay: A city-sized space station is falling into a planet's atmosphere, and Master Chief must rescue the civilian population before it's too late, facing both mechanical failures and insurgent attacks.

The Siren Moon: An SOS signal from a long-lost UNSC ship leads Master Chief to a moon where sound can manipulate reality. Exploring this phenomenon might hold the key to new sonic weapons for the UNSC.

Frozen Tomb: Discovering an ancient alien race frozen in ice on a remote planet, Master Chief awakens them and must deal with their ancient grudges and advanced technology.

The Garden of Eden: A planet that supposedly cures all diseases is found. As factions fight over control of this world, Master Chief must protect its secrets and the indigenous life from exploitation.

Starforge: The race to find a legendary Forerunner facility capable of creating stars and planets pits Master Chief against a rogue faction of ONI who wants to use it for weaponizing celestial bodies.

The Ark of Life: Master Chief is tasked with recovering a lost ship carrying thousands of species from extinct planets. Pirates and alien traffickers also want the ship for the priceless DNA aboard.

What are y'alls favorites? Do you guys have any to add or discuss?

[bookshelf-in-progress]

The Inklings Challenge Stories I Didn't Write

The Lake Queen: When my time travel story wasn't coming together, I brainstormed a secondary world story about a woman returning to the place where, centuries ago, a great kingdom was flooded. Her son was the rightful king of this land, and she'd been called to return to one of the islands in this area and rebuild some type of chapel/temple. The central part of this temple was some kind of Ark of the Covenant type artifact that was lost in the underwater city. Only the rightful king could touch this artifact without dying, so after several years of building a home and chapel on this island, she had find enough faith to send her child on this extremely dangerous quest alone. It was very Abraham and Joseph, but there was also a huge component of this woman developing relationships with the locals on the island, who distrusted these outsiders, but eventually came to trust her as she taught them about the old history and culture and religion. It felt, unintentionally, so much like The Wild Robot that I hesitated to write it. Anyway, the time travel story did come together, and since this idea was much more of a novella than a short story, I gave up on the idea of writing it for the Challenge.

The Mermaid Story: Reading one of the Epistles got me thinking about apostolic evangelization, and this story unfolded very quickly in my imagination. It centers around a mermaid who's the highest-ranking wife of a powerful lord within an extremely wealthy sea-dwelling culture. She goes to the underwater dungeons to visit a human prisoner--to ask him how he can possibly still be alive. He was trying to preach to the merfolk and angered them so much that they tried to drown him, but he finds himself miraculously able to breathe underwater. The man insists he's not alive by his own power, which leads to him telling the mermaid about his message of salvation. The mermaid is extremely educated in science and philosophy and can't resist engaging with these new ideas, that seem both wise and foolish. Anyway, she starts to befriend this guy as her husband keeps trying to torture/kill him, and this starts to endanger her political position (especially since her husband has an ambitious young new wife), until she finally has to decide to give up everything to help this human in his mission. This is another story that probably needed to be a novella. I considered writing it as a short story, but in that case the religious element probably would have come across as way too preachy, so I had to let it fall to the side.

The Lady Knights: A few pictures I saw during my September brainstorming process made me develop a world where lady knights ride on giant insects as they protect the realm. I would have loved to write a short story about this concept--any one of the themes could have provided inspiration--but I just couldn't come up with a plot. I think it would have worked best as a portal fantasy, anyway, with a timid young girl learning courage from these women.

The Reading Room: A time travel short story about a guy who has access to a library that, at a certain time in the evening, brings together people from across different points in time. It would have had a kind of ghostly but cozy vibe, and would have been about the C.S. Lewis concept of escaping the biases of your own time period by reading books of the past (and the future, if we could get them). I didn't have enough of a plot to write a story with the concept (aside from a vague idea that a very "modern" person could meet the MC and get book recommendations from the future that challenge their biases). I could have maybe gone for an atmospheric flash fiction sketch, and maybe I still could, if I could find the right angle.

Shadowstruck: When I was trying to think up secondary world ideas to replace my faltering time travel story, I got intense inspiration for a few scenes in Shadowstruck that came to me so vividly I felt like I had to write them. I did write a scene, thinking that maybe I could pull together a couple of scenes that could work decently enough as a standalone short, but it took more time than expected and needs some more development, so I decided to wait to give this story the time and space that it needs to develop into the fully fleshed-out version. But I still love this story idea and the inspiration keeps coming, so it's definitely going to be my main focus for a while.

[leiascully]

This 'Field Where I Died' exchange has always bothered me, where Mulder says, 'If early in the four years we've been working together an event occurred that suggested, or somebody told you, that we'd been friends together in other lifetimes, always... wouldn't it have changed some of the ways we looked at one another? And Scully says, 'Even if I knew for certain, I wouldn't change a day.' Then she says well, except for that flukeman thing. That's nice and all, but I always felt like she was answering a different question. He was asking her about them, about who they were to each other, not whether she had any regrets. I always felt disappointed in her answer, like she dodged the question. Thoughts?

I feel like that's kind of essential to their relationship, and one of the things we love so much about it. Everything is oblique or shrouded in shadow. They talk directly about so many things, but so rarely about what there is between them. Each time one of them opens up, the other one has to deflect in some way. Their love is too bright to look at directly. To discuss it is to open the ark of their covenant with each other. They're not sure they'll survive. Even her serious answer has to be tempered with a joke. But I do think you're right - she's not answering about their potential multiple lifetimes. She's skating past that assertion and just answering about the last four years. I honestly think that question is something of an apology on Mulder's part, because he was kind of a jerk to her at first. He's saying I didn't know. I couldn't know. And she's telling him It's all right. You couldn't know. There are so few moments that she doesn't show her trust in him - even in Wetwired, you can feel her fighting against the idea that he's betrayed her. They've pledged allegiance to each other.

I think the kindest interpretation of this odd moment in this odd episode, which in its attempt to set up a different soulmate for Mulder ends up reaffirming his connection with Scully, is that it's both of them feeling a little bit of a sense of relief that the depth of their connection makes sense. If they've known each other for lifetimes, the mud and the rain and the quiet hotel room in Oregon make sense. Her willingness to confront other government officials and possibly shoot them to get him back in their second case together makes sense (although the timeline of Deep Throat does not, haha). His devastation over her abduction makes sense. The fact that she shot him, drove across the country to save him, and learned an ancient but living language on his behalf makes sense. All the things their families didn't or don't understand about what they mean to each other are easier to brush aside if there are centuries of companionship and love behind it. They're not being foolish or codependent or toxic or whatever. They're deeply and intricately linked together by circumstances beyond their control. Meeting each other was coming home.

Also they're both very pretty in this episode thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.

[lepertamar]

Since it was buried deep in a long esoteric fandom post, i kinda want to extract and expand on this comment as its own post

There is an ancient, global, historical and cultural meme: a ton of christian concepts of Satan, and of Hell, and satanic-ness, is based on antisemitic interpretations of jews. but also, and i mean this in the coolest possible way, as a Jew, much of it is based on real actual Jewish imagery -- in particular, it is based on Jewish G-d.

take the explicit, overwhelming, absolutely ubiquitous association of G-dwith fire, to the point where it is the overwhelmingly primary attribute of G-d, and any invocation of fire in the jewish tanakh hints at connotations of G-d. Blood dashing and blood marking, and flesh sacrifice by slaughtering and burning of offerings is religiously jewish, throughout the jewish Tanakh, especially in Exodus. The frightening imagery of fire and brimstone that in the tanakh marks G-d’s presence (in Sodom, at Sinai, at the red sea, in the ark of the covenant) has entered basic western vocabulary in the opposite direction, where this imagery -- imagery that in the sources characterizes all of G-d's and the Jews' presence and religious behavior in Exodus and throughout the rest of the Tanakh -- is casually described as hellish and satanic. Volcanoes' lava fields are 'hellish', fires of natural gases producing pillars of flame and smoke (that led the tribes in the desert and out of egypt in exodus) are 'hellish'. rituals of fire and blood and burning and heavy costumery and ancient crumbling scrolls hidden in arks embossed and engraved with strange tongues (all according to direct unsubverted tradition and commandment) are satanic. and the devil is given a characterization echoing judaism’s depiction of jewish G-d: as a challenging and frightening and alluring figure who straddles fae-adjacent borders between tricksterish disruption and extreme legalism, who makes deals and bargains (covenants, even) with humans.

In christianity it's usually a distancing game -- a forcible identification of all these recognizable attributes of G-d and judaism with the non-god, christian figure of the devil; and simultaneously a forcible identification of jewish g-d with christian god (after all these attributes are stripped out), and of christian god with extremely different attributes, or at least opposition to the devil. But not always.

It's found in exactly as many words in foundational Gnostic theology that had a great amount of influence on the development of early christianity: it explicitly and actively (rather than the implicit coding above that mainstream christian imagery does) identifies Jewish G-d, as in the exact God of the Jews who is depicted in the Torah, as a false god, the archon and demiurge, who should not be, who is responsible for creating the material world as an illusory, fallen, sinful, inherently corrupted world as an intentional prison, rather than an incomplete starting point a la grapes-but-not-wine, and whom Jews evilly or deludedly follow to maintain the existence of this sinful world rather than escaping to the neoplatonic purity of true forms, where the True God, the New Testament god who includes Jesus Christ, rules instead.

It's pretty ~normal as a process goes! (it in fact totally mirrors some stuff in judaism, where we identified various things as treyf because they had connotations of a canaanite pagan thing LMAO. semiotics using ingroups and outgroups in this way is very very common, and normal! and our g-d, of course, with Its troubled, complex heart, in many ways comes from folding the hearts of many different canaanite gods into one person). but in this case it's maybe unique in scope and subtlety, for contingent historical reasons: a case of the sign outstripping the signified to an incredible extent and also of trying to backdoor-in identification with the god in question (eg the designation of gnosticism as a heretical sect by christianity, because mainstream christians preferred to recontextualize/repurpose jewish g-d, rather than break from It and allow jewish g-d to be defined by/identified with jews, even if in the gnostics’ explicitly evil way).

it does also have a weird consequence more modernly, among ppl who backlash to christianity with eg [demonic imagery is cool] stuff and don't realize what it looks like to people who have a slightly larger camera aperture: just skipping over the entire existence of judaism in terms of why the hell-stuff exists or is a hell-thing in the first place (there are a few reasons, and this is the big one). like, it DOES feel bizarre when there's like, ppl trying to be edgy and subversive by embracing christian demonicness that [checks notes] is just aesthetics and attitudes that are just very traditional jewish imagery and ritual. yk it just feels a bit....'hm....do they....uh.....know...'. when the old satanists 'inverted' the jesus pentagrammaton with uh, just the sigil of baphomet, as if the hebrew lettering etc is originally christian. like….

as most peopel know, the association of judaism with satanism is both extremely a longstanding Thing in antisemitism, but also smth jews are Super dystonic and jumpy to disclaim for obvious reasons.

now ofc jews's flat statement that this association is just fake is like, 'true', in that while judaism certainly developed in the past 2 millennia with an awareness of christianity and in the same world as a variety of other cultural influences, judaism is obviously not about christianity. as in, it doesn't categorize its elements and framework of the world according to christian elements and frameworks. reversed or otherwise. but 'it's fake' is not like...a complete answer i guess. (like, it implies hell aesthetics were totally independent and preexisting and judaism was only associated with it post-hoc); it's also kinda, giving up ground? in the going straight to 'hdu say we're freaks! we r normal!' rather than 'is that supposed to be an insult? being a freak is cool and also your instinct to categorize us this way is telling and interesting'

this isn't unique, similar reactions happen alot where there's a marginalized culture trying to avoid violence lol, but it's sort of. lame. why not lean into this attempted dunk. the material universe as a delicious as well as incomplete and perilous mass of bursting universeness, whose materiality is what brings about both fortune and misery, brought to material existence by jewish g-d who is scary and bizarre and fiery and has a great deal of weird opinions/ideas about a bunch of detailed specifics about this-worldly life and the this-worldly material of the universe, who makes deals with the particular people who engage with them -- who is a recognizable germinating seed of the surface of christian hell and satanic aesthetics and ideas, is metal and interesting!

and it's not like. idk. a set of frames that are incompatible with christianity either, afaict some traditions lean harder than others, but i'm jewish and obviously not exactly an expert in those aspects of christianity lol.

a friend of mine regarding their conversion to judaism said:

like g-d as a... person, for lack of better terms. g-d who is a bit of an unknown quantity? sort of devilish, smirking at you when They offer a deal and you are not aware of the legalese (or maybe you are! ) and it's just like. this is how g-d is. g-d is just being g-d, g-d is this rascal who is quite particular but also endlessly enamoured with what people will do...

i didnt (& still dont!) care for satan in the christian sense because ....i don't find a god who is unchangign and eternal and sort of... impersonal.... in any way interesting. & thus an anti-god who is.... there and personal but like just to "tempt" you or w/e is also boring in comparison.

but g-d who is playful, who is tempting and trying to seduce you and be seduced, who you can bargain w and get into a contract w which might seem "unfair" in some ways (fucking halakhah right wwww) and like bullshit legalese but it's like....you are agreeing to it! you are taking that on bc you find that worthwhile. like how someone sells t heir soul to the devil, because they think it's worthwhile; but ig in this case you're not rlly getting like, "be able to play the fiddle better than any mortal" type just a... you have the option and you want to take it! that is all far more compelling to me and far more godlike. bc it transforms g-d into an active participant

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Anonymous ask: What do you think of the new Indiana Jones movie? And of Phoebe Waller-Bridge?

In a nutshell: From start to finish ‘Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny’ is watching Indiana Jones being a broken-down shell of a once great legacy character who has to be saved by the perfect younger and snarky but stereotypical ’Strong Independent Woman’ that passes for women characters in popcorn movies today.

I went in to this film with conflicted feelings. On the one hand I was genuinely excited to see this new Indiana Jones movie because it’s Indiana Jones. Period. Yet, on the other hand I feared how badly Lucasfilm, under Kathleen Kennedy’s insipid woke inspired CEO studio direction, was going to further tarnish not just a screen legend but the legacy of both George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. The cultural damage she has done to such a beloved franchise as the Star Wars universe in the name of progressive woke ideology is criminal. The troubled production history behind this film and its massive $300 million budget (by some estimates) meant Disney had a lot riding on it, especially with the future of Kathleen Kennedy on the line too as she was hands on with this film.

To me the Indiana Jones movies (well, the first three anyway, the less we say about ‘Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’ the better) were an important part of my childhood. I fell in love with the character instantly. Watching ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ (first on DVD in my boarding school dorm with other giggly girls and later on the big screen at a local arts cinema retrospective on Harrison Ford’s stellar career) just blew me away. 

As a girl I wanted to be an archaeologist and have high falutin’ adventures; I even volunteered in digs in Pakistan and India (the Indus civilisation) as well as museum work in China as a teen growing up in those countries and discovering the methodical and patient but back breaking reality of what archaeology really was. But that didn’t dampen my spirit. Just once I wanted to echo Dr. Jones, ‘This belongs in a museum!’ But I happily settled for studying Classics instead and enjoyed studying classical archaeology on the side.

I couldn’t quite make sense why Indiana Jones resonated with me more than any other action hero on the screen until much later in life. Looking like Harrison Ford certainly helps. But it’s more than that. I’ve written this elsewhere but it’s worth repeating here.

‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ is considered an inspiration for so many action films yet there’s a very odd aspect to the film that’s rather unique and rarely noticed by its critics and fans. It’s an element that, once spotted, is difficult to forget, and is perhaps inspiring for times like the one in which we currently live, when there are so many challenges to get through. Typically in action films, the hero faces an array of obstacles and setbacks, but largely solves one problem after another, completes one quest after another, defeats one villain after another, and enjoys one victory after another.

The structure of ‘Raiders’ is different. A quick reminder:

- In the opening sequence, Indiana Jones obtains the temple idol only to lose it to his rival René Belloq (Paul Freeman). - In the streets of Cairo, Indy fails to protect his love, Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen), from being captured (killed, he assumes). - In the desert, he finds the long-lost Ark of the Covenant, only to have it taken away by Belloq. - Indy then recovers the ark only to have it stolen a second time by Belloq, this time at sea. - On an island, Indy tries to bluff Belloq into thinking he’ll blow up the ark. His bluff fails. Indy is captured. - The climax of the film literally has its hero tied to a post the entire time. He’s completely ineffectual and helpless at a point in the movie where every other action hero is having their greatest moment of struggle and, typically, triumph.

If Indiana Jones had done absolutely nothing, if the famed archeologist had simply stayed home, the Nazis would have met the same fate - losing their lives to ark’s wrath because they opened it. It’s pretty rare in action films for the evil arch-villains to have the same outcome as if the hero had done nothing at all.

Indy does succeed in getting the ark back to America, of course, which is crucial. But then Indy loses the ark, once again, when government agents send it to a warehouse and refuse to let him study the object he chased the whole film. In other words: Indiana Jones spends ‘Raiders’ failing, getting beat up, and losing every artefact that he risks his life to acquire. And yet, Indiana Jones is considered a great hero.

The reason Indiana Jones is a hero isn’t because he wins. It’s because he never stops trying. I think this is the core of Indiana Jones’ character.

Critics will go on about something called agency as in being active or pro-active. But agency can be reactive and still be kinetic to propel the story along. It’s something that has progressively got lost as the series went on. With the latest Indiana Jones film I felt that Indiana Jones character had no agency and ends up being a relatively passive character. Sadly Indiana Jones ends up being a grouchy, broken, and beat up passenger in his own movie.

Released in 1981, ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ remains one of the most influential blockbusters of all time. Exciting action, exotic adventure, just the right amount of romance, good-natured humour, cutting-edge special effects: it was all there, perfectly balanced. Since then, attempts have been made to reproduce this winning recipe in different narrative contexts, sometimes successfully (’Temple of Doom’ and ‘the Last Crusade’), usually in vain (’Crystal Skull’).

What are the key ingredients of an Indiana Jones movie? There are only four core elements - leaving aside aspects of story such as the villain or the goal - that you need in place before anything else. They are: the wry, world-weary but sexy masculine performance of Harrison Ford; the story telling genius of George Lucas steeped in the lore of Saturday morning action hero television shows of the 1950s; the deft visual story telling and old school action direction of Steven Spielberg; and the sublime and sweeping music of the great John Williams. This what made the first three films really work.

In the latest Indiana Jones film, you only have one. Neither Lucas and Spielberg are there and arguably neither is Harrison Ford. John Williams’ music score remains imperious as ever. His music does a lot of heavy lifting in the film and let’s face it, his sublime music can polish any turd.

This isn’t to say the ‘Dial of Destiny’ is a turd. I won’t go that far, and to be honest some of the critical reaction has been over-hysterical. Instead I found it enjoyable but also immensely frustrating more than anything else. It had potential to be a great swan song film for Indy because it had an exciting collection of talent behind it.

In the absence of Spielberg, one couldn’t do worse than to pick James Mangold as next best to direct this film. Mangold is a great director. I am a fan of his body of work. After ‘Copland’, ‘Walk the Line’, ‘Logan’ and ‘Le Mans 66’ (or ‘Ford vs Ferrari’), James Mangold has been putting together a fine career shaped by his ability to deliver stories that rediscover a certain old-fashioned charm without abusing the historical figures - real or fictional - he tackles. And after Johnny Cash, Wolverine and Ken Miles, among others, I had high hopes he would keep the flame alive when it came to Indiana Jones. Mangold grew up as a fanboy of Spielberg’s work and you can clearly see that in his approach to directing film.

But in this film his direction lacks vitality. Mangold, while regularly really good, drags his feet a little here because he’s caught between putting his own stamp on the film and yet also lovingly pay homage to his hero, Spielberg. It’s as if he didn't dare give himself away completely, the director seems too modest to really take the saga by the scruff of the neck, and inevitably ends up suffering from the inevitable comparison with Steven Spielberg.

Mangold tries to recreate the nostalgic wonder of the originals, but doesn't quite succeed, while succumbing to an overkill of visual effects that make several passages seem artificial. The action set pieces range from pedestrian to barely satisfying. The prologue sequence was vaguely reminiscent of past films but it was still a little too reliant on CGI. The much talked about de-ageing of Harrison Ford on screen was impressive (and one suspects a lot of the film budget was sunk right there). But Indiana’s lifeless digitally de-aged avatar fighting on a computer-generated train, made the whole sequence feel like the Nazi Polar Express. Because it didn’t look real, there was no sense of danger and therefore no emotional investment from the audience. You know Tom Cruise would have done it for real and it would have looked properly cinematic and spectacular.

The tuk tuk chase through the narrow streets of Tangiers was again an exciting echo of past films, especially ‘Raiders’, but goes on a tad too long, but the exploration of the ship wreck (and a criminally underused cameo by Antonio Banderas) was disappointing and way too short. 

The main problem here is the lack of creativity in the conception of truly epic scenes, because these are not dependent on Ford's age. Indeed, the film could very well have offered exhilarating action sequences worthy of the archaeologist with the whip, without relying solely on the physicality of its leading man. You don't need a Tom Cruise to orchestrate great moments but you could do worse than to follow his example. 

Mangold uses various means of locomotion to move the character  - train, tuk tuk, motorbike, horse - and offers a few images that wouldn't necessarily be seen elsewhere (notably the shot of Jones riding a horse in the middle of the underground), but in the end shows himself to be rather uninspired, when the first three films in the saga conceived some of the most inventive sequences in the genre and left their mark on cinema history. There are no really long shots, no iconic compositions, no complex shots that last and enrich a sequence, which makes the film look too smooth and prevents it from giving heft to an adventure that absolutely needs it.

And so now to the divisive figure of Phoebe Waller-Bridge. 

It’s important here to separate the person from the character. I like Phoebe Waller-Bridge and I loved her in her ‘Fleabag’ series. She excels in a very British setting. I think she is funny, irreverent, and a whip smart talented writer and performer. I also think she has a particular frigid English beauty and poise about her. When I say poise I don’t mean the elegant poise of a Parisienne or a Milanese woman, but someone who is cute and comfortable in her own skin. You would think she would be more suited to ‘Downton Abbey’ setting than all out Hollywood action film. But I think she almost pulls it off here. 

In truth over the years Phoebe Waller-Bridge, known for her comedy, has been collecting franchises where she is able to inflict her saucy humour into a hyper-masculine space. I don’t think her talent was properly showcased here. 

Hollywood has this talent for plucking talented writers and actors who are exceptional in what they do and then hire them do something entirely different by either miscasting them or making them write in a different genre. I think Phoebe Waller-Bridge is exceptional and she might just rise if she is served by a better script.

In the end I think she does a decent stab at playing an intriguing character in Helena Shaw, Indy’s long lost and estranged god daughter and a sort of amoral rare artefacts hustler. Phoebe Waller-Bridge brings enthusiasm, charm and mischief to the role, making her a breath of fresh air. She seems to be the only member of the on-screen cast that looks to be enjoying themselves. 

To be fair her I thought Waller-Bridge was a more memorable and interesting female character than either Kate Capshaw (’Temple of Doom’, 1984) and Alison Doody (’Last Crusade’, 1989). She certainly is a marked improvement on the modern woke inspired insipid female action leads such as Brie Larson (’Captain Marvel’), or any women in the Marvel universe for that matter, or Katherine Waterson (’Alien Covenant’). Waller-Bridge could have been reminiscent of Kathleen Turner (’Romancing the Stone’) and more recently Eva Green, actresses who command attention on screen and are as captivating, if not more so, than the male protagonists they play opposite.

To be sure there have been strong female leads before the woke infested itself into Hollywood story telling but they never made it central to their identity. Sigourney Weaver in ‘Alien’ and Linda Hamilton in the ‘Terminator’ franchise somehow conveyed strength of character with grit and perseverance through their suffering, while also being vulnerable and confident to pull through and succeed. Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s character isn’t quite that. She doesn’t get into fist fights or overpowers big hulking men but she uses cheek and charm to wriggle out of tight spots. She’s gently bad ass rather the dull ‘strong independent woman’ cardboard caricatures that Marvel is determined to ram down every girl’s throat. If Waller-Bridge’s character was better written she might well have been able to revive memories of the great ladies of Hollywood's golden age who had the fantasy and the confidence that men quaked at their feet.

What lets her character down is the snark. She doesn’t pepper her snark but she drowns in it. All of it directed at poor Indy and mocking him for his creaking bones and his entire legacy. It’s a real eyesore and it is a real let down as it drags the story down and clogs up the wheels that power the kinetic energy that an adventure with Indiana Jones needs. ‘The grumpy old man and the young woman with the wicked repartee set off across the vast world’ schtick is all well and good, but it does grate and by the end it makes you angry that Indy has put up with this crap. I can understand why many are turned off by Waller-Bridge’s character. As a female friend of mine put it, we get the talented Phoebe Waller Bridge’s bitter and unlikable Helena acting like a bitter and unlikable man. But it could be worse, it could be as dumb as Shia LaBeouf‘s bad Fonzie impersonation in 'Crystal Skull’.

I would say there is a difference between snark and sass. Waller-Bridge’s character is all snark. If the original whispers are true the original script had her way more snarkier towards Indy until Ford threatened to leave the project unless there were re-writes,  then it shows how far removed the producers and writers were from treating Indy Jones with the proper respect a beloved legacy character deserves. It’s also lazy story telling.

Karen Black gave us real sass with Marion Ravenwood in ‘Raiders’. Her character was sassy, strong, but also vulnerable and romantic. She plays it pitch perfect. Of all the women in Indy’s life she was good foil for Indy.

Spielberg is so underrated for his mise-en-scène. We first meet Marion running a ramshackle but rowdy tavern in Tibet (she’s a survivor). She plays and wins a drinking game (she’s a tough one), she sees Indy again and punches him (she’s angry and hurt for her abandoning her and thus revealing her vulnerability). She has the medallion and becomes a partner (she’s all business). She evades and fights off the Nazis and their goons, she even uses a frying pan (she’s resourceful but not stupid). She tries on dresses (she’s re-discovers her femininity). Indy saves her but she picks him up at the end of the film by going for a drink (she’s healing and there’s a chance of a new start for both of them). This is a character arc worth investing in because it speaks to truth and to our reality.

The problem with Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s character is that she is constantly full on with the snark. Indy and Helena gripe and moan at each other the entire film. Indy hasn’t seen her in years, and she felt abandoned after her father passed, so there’s a lot of bitterness. It’s not unwarranted, but it also isn’t entertaining. It’s never entertaining if the snark makes the character too temperamental and unsympathetic for the audience to be emotionally invested in her.

I think overall the film is let down by the script. Again this is a shame. The writing talent was there. Jez and John-Henry Butterworth worked with James Mangold on ‘Ford v. Ferrari’ and co-wrote ‘Edge of Tomorrow‘ while David Koepp co-wrote the first ‘Mission: Impossible’ (but he also penned Indiana Jones and the ‘Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’, and the 2017 version of ‘The Mummy’ that simultaneously started and destroyed Universal’s plans for their Dark Universe). I love the work of Jez Butterworth who is one of England’s finest modern playwrights and he seemed to have transitioned fine over to Hollywood. But as anyone knows a Hollywood script has always too many cooks in the kitchen. There are so many fingerprints of other people - studio execs and directors and even stars - that a modern Hollywood script somehow resembles a sort of Ship of Theseus. It’s the writer’s name on the script but it doesn’t always mean they wrote or re-wrote every word.

Inevitably things fall between the cracks and you end up filming from the hip and hoping you can stitch together a coherent narrative in post-production editing. Clearly this film suffered from studio interference and many re-writes. And it shows because there is no narrative fluidity at work in the film.

Mads Mikkelsen’s Nazi scientist is a case in point. I love Mikkelsen especially in his arthouse films but I understand why he takes the bucks for the Hollywood films too. But in this film he is phoning in his performance. Mads Mikkelsen does what he can with limited screen time to make an impact but this character feels so recycled from other blockbusters. Here the CIA and US Government are evil and willing to let innocent Americans be murdered in order to let their pet Nazi rocket scientist pursue what they believe to be a hobby. But to be fair the villains in the Indy movies have never truly been memorable with perhaps Belloq, the French archaeologist and nemesis of Indy in ‘Raiders’, the only real exception. It’s just been generic bad guys - The Nazis! The Thugee death cult! The Nazis (again)! The Commies! Now we’re back to Nazis again which is not only safer ground for the Indy franchise but something we can all get behind.

However Mads Mikkelsen’s Dr. Voller, is the blandest and most generic Nazi villain in movie history. At the end of World War II, Voller was recruited by the US Government to aid them in rocket technology. Now that he’s completed his task and man has walked on the moon, he’s turning his genius to his ultimate purpose, the recovery of the ‘Dial of Destiny’ built by Archimedes. Should he find both pieces of the ancient treasure, he plans to return to 1930s Nazi Germany, usurp Hitler, and use his advanced knowledge of rocket propulsion to win the war. In a sense then he was channeling his inner Heidegger who felt Hitler had let down Nazism and worse betrayed Heidegger himself.

So there is a character juxtaposition between Voller and Indy in the sense both men feel more comfortable in the past than the present. But neither is given face time together to explore this intriguing premise that could have anchored the whole narrative of the film. It’s a missed opportunity and instead becomes a failure of character and story telling.

Then there are the one liners which seemed shoe horned in to make the studio execs or the writers feel smug about themselves. There are several woke one lines peppered throughout the film but are either tone deaf or just stupid.

“You trigger happy cracker”-  it’s uttered without any self-awareness by a black CIA agent who is chaperoning the Nazi villain. Just because white people think it’s dumb and aren’t bothered by it doesn’t make it any less a racial slur. If you want authenticity then why not use the ’N’ word then as it would historically appropriate in 1969? The hypocrisy is what’s offensive.

“You stole it. He stole it. I stole it. It’s called capitalism.” - capitalism 101 for economic illiterate social justice warriors.

“[I’m] daring, beautiful, and self-sufficient” - uttered by Helena Shaw as a snarky reminder that she’s a strong independent woman, just in case you forgot.

“It’s not what you believe but how hard you believe.” - Indiana Jones has literally stood before the awesome power of God when the Ark of the Covenant was opened up by the Nazis, and they paid the price for it by having their faces melted off. Indy has drunk from the authentic cup of Christ, given to him by a knight who’s lived for centuries, that gave him eternal life and heal his father from a fatal bullet wound. So he’s figuratively seen the face of God (sure, he closed his eyes) and His holy wrath, and has witnessed the divine healing power of Christ first hand. And yet his spews out this drivel. It’s empty of any meaning and is a silly nod to our current fad that it’s all about the truth of our feelings, not observable facts or truth.

For me though the absolute worse was what they did to Indiana Jones as a character. Once the pinnacle of masculinity, a brave and daring man’s man whose zest for life was only matched by his brilliance, Henry Jones Jr. is now a broken, sad, and lonely old man. Indiana Jones is mired in the past. Not in the archaeological past, but in his own personal past. He's asleep at the wheel, losing interest in his own life. He's lost his son, he's losing his wife. He's been trying to pass on his passion, his understanding to disinterested people. They're not so interested in looking at the past. He remains a man turned towards the past, and then he finds himself confronted by Helena, who embodies the future. This nostalgia, this historical anchoring, becomes the main thread of the story.The film tries to deconstructs Indiana Jones on the cusp of retirement from academia and confronts him with a world he no longer understands. That’s an interesting premise and could have made for a great film.

It’s clear that the filmmakers’ intention was for a lost and broken Indiana to recapture his spirit by the film’s end. However, its horrible pacing and meandering and underdeveloped plot, along with Harrison Ford’s miserably sad demeanour in nearly every scene, make for a deeply depressing movie with an empty and unearned resolution. 

By this I mean at the very end of the film. It’s meant to be daring and it is. There’s something giddy about appearing during the middle of siege of Syracuse by blood thirsty Romans and then coming face to face with Archimedes himself. The film seems to want to justify the legendary, exceptional aura and character of Indy himself by including him in History. Hitherto wounded deep down inside, and now also physically wounded, Indy the archaeologist tells Helena that he wants to stay here and be part of history. 

It's a lovely and even moving moment, and you wonder if the film isn't going to pull a ‘Dying Can Wait’ by having its hero die in order to strengthen its legend. But in a moment that is too brutal from a rhythmic point of view, Helena refuses, knocks out her godfather and takes him back to the waiting plane and back to 1969. The next thing Indy sees he’s woken up back in his shabby apartment in New York.

I felt cheated. I’m sure Indy did too.

After all it was his choice. But Helena robbed him of the freedom to make his own decisions. She’s the one to decide what’s best. In effect she robbed him of agency. Even if it was the wrong decision to stay back in time, it’s so important from a narrative and character arc perspective that Indy should have had his own epiphany and make the choice to come back by himself because there is something worth living for in the future present - and that was reconciling with Marion his estranged wife. But damn it, he had to come to that decision for himself, and not have someone else force it upon him. That’s why the ending feelings so unearned and why the story falls flat as a soufflé when you piss on it.

‘Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny’ feels like the type of sequel that aimed to capture the magic of its predecessors, had worthwhile intentions, and a talented cast, but it just never properly materialised. In a movie whose pedigree, both in front and behind the camera, is virtually unassailable, it’s inexcusable that this team of filmmakers couldn’t achieve greater heights. 

The film was a missed opportunity to give a proper send off to a cinematic legend. Harrison Ford proving that whatever gruff genre appeal he possessed in his heyday has aged better than Indy’s knees. He may be 80, but Ford carries the weight of the film, which, for all its gargantuan expense, feels a bit like those throwaway serials that first inspired Lucas - fun while it lasts, but wholly forgettable on exit.

I wouldn’t rate ‘Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny’ as the worst film in the franchise - that dubious honour still lies with ‘Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’.  Indeed the best I can say is that I would rate this film at the benchmark of “not quite as bad as Crystal Skull”.But it’s definitely time to retire and hang up the fedora and the bull whip.

For what’s worth I always thought the ending of ‘Last Crusade’ where Indy, his father Henry Jones Snr., and his two most faithful companions, Sallah and Marcus Brody, ride off into the sunset was the most fitting way to say goodbye to a beloved character.

Instead we have in ‘Dial of Destiny’ the very last scene which is meant to be this perfect ending: Indiana Jones in his scruffy pyjamas and his shabby apartment. Sure, the exchange between a reconciling Indy and Marion is sincere and touching. But that only works because it explicitly recalls ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’. That's what Nietzsche would call “an eternal return”.

I shall eternally return to watch the first three movies to delight in the adventures of the swashbuckling archaeologist with the fedora and a bull whip. The last two dire films will be thrown into the black abyss. Something even Nietzsche would have approved of.

Thanks for your question.