#design like

[repentmf]

Design-Write: a comparison review - watching two M. Night Shyamalan movies in a row

To say that watching movies has been taxing lately wouldn’t be a stretch. Despite my personal feelings about how Hollywood is handling the production and distribution of Spider-man: Across the Spider-verse and how the ending is practically the end of a Dragon Ball Z episode, I loved the movie. The animation was crisp, the music was bumping, the voice acting was killer, and the setup for the next movie is clear. Now that you think you know my feelings on the movie, let me confuse you proper; I can’t stand Across the Spider-verse. (***Spoilers for the Sixth Sense, Into the Spider-verse, Knock at the Cabin, and Across the Spider-verse ahead***)

The movie has no real climax, falling action, or resolution, and it’s simply something my delicate, little brain can’t handle. To me, a story is a series of events that can categorically be considered opened and closed regardless of whether or not it has title cards, or credits. In AtSV, we end the movie seeing that Gwen has created a band of Spider-people to go find and protect Miles-1610, Miles-1610 is captured by Miles-42 and Aaron-42 after accidentally stumbling into Earth-42, and that the Spot is likely going to kill Miles-1610’s father. And that’s all we can really say about the ending of AtSV. For me, there are no definitive themes in the ending, and no clear-cut motivations for if Miles-42 is actually going to assist or work against Miles-1610 or any other nuggets of information. If somehow Hollywood kills Beyond the Spider-verse, we may never have that closure. In Into the Spider-verse however- Miles-1610 has made some kind of peace by the end of the movie with the fact that he is Spider-man and even enjoys the notion that while he is alone and has difficult obstacles to face, he can think of his friends who are much like him and regain some of his hope and confidence in himself. Confidence in that he can do all of these incredible things, even though he thought he never could. “You could wear the mask,” he remarks. There’s a clear connection and emotional through-line for viewers and characters to latch onto here in Mary Jane-1610’s and Miles-1610’s monologues of “He always said it could've been anyone behind the mask. He was just the kid who happened to get bit,” and it comes off as a completed and realized idea- seeing somewhat meek and afraid Miles-1610 become the hero that saved him in the first half of the movie is engaging, interesting, and more than those- fulfilling.

So much media that we consume in today’s age does not fulfill me. It exists merely in my brain-space as a way to wearily pass my time because I have an addiction to social media. And so I did not have strong hopes and aspirations going into Knock at the Cabin- I mean, any movie following up Spider-verse is already difficult enough as it is, but add in the fact that I am skeptical of and not fond of your past works means I am 98% confident I won’t like what I’m about to watch. But it’s the 4th of July weekend, I’m gonna watch what my family is watching (within reason). And I was definitely right about my gut-reaction. The movie’s pacing is sluggish, the characters (with exception of one) feel wholly static, and the finale feels like it was what the entire movie was written for. The movie and all of its catastrophic events and murders all feel pointless in wake of how the movie ends.

It watches like the movie existed to justify the ending of the movie existing. And this is largely how I feel about the majority of new media that gets released in our time. “The writing does not exist for the people that it’s being written for or about; the people exist to experience the writing.” To be more thorough here, by the time Eric has fully changed his mind (about an hour and a half, if memory serves correctly) an entire feature-length film’s amount of time has already been consumed full of writing that just comes across more as fluff than dynamically altering Eric’s point of view. Credit where credit is due, there is one scene where Eric gets a concussion and talks with the Nurse, Sabrina, and seems to make a small connection- at least hearing out the other side- that there may be a need to believe in something bigger than just the self. But this scene is a drop of interesting characterization and motivation in an otherwise 1-dimensional pond of characters and for me, it all comes down to the writing. The actors themselves did great with what they were given- believable, and sympathetic. The scene mentioned earlier has exactly what I’m talking about: Sabrina shows she’s able to empathize with Eric’s family about not being able to believe that they will really be determining the end of the world- she says she’d think they were religious freaks, too. But this unfortunately isn’t what the movie is about. The movie is about Eric, Andrew, Wen, and their collective decision. Which they do not actually discuss for all but around 10 minutes total. They do finish talking about who should be chosen as a sacrifice to stop the world from ending, but it occurs moments before the world ends and around 15 minutes out from the end of the movie- really, do excuse me if my times are off here, I did not go back and research if I was right on the money. The snail pacing and lack of actions/ influenced choices makes the twist at the end feel like the movie’s reason for existing, rather than the twist just being a cherry on top of a great cake of a movie. While KatC technically meets my initial qualification to be a complete story, it’s not enough to be a story- you also need to have thought and meaning- a clear theme backing your start, middle, and end. And all I was able to gather from KatC is that people suck and Eric should have lived.

So we finish Knock at the Cabin and the next night we’re back at it again- we NEED something to watch because when we’re at the in-law’s house, every night is movie night. Both anx and I had NEVER seen the Sixth Sense (I know, I know- please don’t hurt me) and her brother INSISTED we fixed that. Now this is THE movie of M. Night Shyamalan’s career and I know the twist of the movie. This should be a done-deal. I don’t like his other works, I know the ending of the story going in- and it’s a masterpiece.

Everything I’ve complained about for AtSV and KatC the Sixth Sense just does not do. The Sixth Sense not only has an abundance of characterization for its small cast of characters, but all of them have a collective, clear connection and emotional through-line for both the viewer and the characters to latch onto- hey doesn’t that sound familiar? When Cole has fears about talking to the ghosts that have been appearing to him and finding out what they want, they are CLEARLY well founded and easily related to because he has been hurt by these ghosts. He has been terrified emotionally and scarred physically by them. It’s only by communicating with Malcom that Cole can see that his power is making a difference that can affect not only his situation, but others’ situations. This can be seen from the other direction as well but in the converse way: Malcolm working with and treating Cole through therapy allows Cole to assist with Malcolm himself and his believed-destroyed relationship with his widowed-wife. Malcolm is only able to see that he is gone by allowing himself to continue helping Cole. There’s this beautiful arc of emotional motion that Malcolm and, to a lesser extent, Cole both have from “I have to help people,” to “Can I even help people?” to “I want you to be helped, but I can’t help you,” all the way back to “I’m going to help you, despite my own insecurities.” There’s real, observable change in the story thanks to characters in tSS- and we don’t seem to get that kind of writing from Shyamalan anymore. It’s always about the twist instead of about the movie. Shouldn’t the events of the movie be about the movie? Not about the twist? Not about the next movie? And then if the movie has a twist or sequel, we can all go “I just can’t believe Bruce Willis was a ghost!” When a movie doesn’t have any climaxes, falling actions, resolutions, or visibly-realized dynamic characters, it can be hard to like the movie, let-alone watch it. With all of the CGI/ AI/ multIverse workings, it can be difficult to remember what movies or even media is about- it’s about people. It’s about expression. It’s art. And when the movie isn’t created for those sakes first? The ideas and execution can come out deflated and underbaked.

Rewatch Spider-man: Into the Spider-verse and the Sixth Sense, they’re both masterpieces and two of my favorite movies.

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have a blessed day, fam

[puppyeared]

filipina miku!! my mom helped me with her outfit ^_^

[alleesaur]

casual blue crab miku doodle

[kochei0]

I turn to Ares.

Thanks to Tyler Miles Lockett who allowed me to draw inspiration from his ARES piece for page 2! Look at his etsy page it's SICK

⚔️ If you want to read some queer retelling of arturian legends have a look at my webtoon

[fallout-lou-begas]

the sexless lesbians who say every horny thought makes them "no better than a man" might kill me for this but regarding chappell roan's ass in the tight chainmail and thigh-high plate armor forming a pseudo-garterbelt situation, it needs to be said: AWOOGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA HUBBA HUBBA WOWEEEEEEEEEEEEE HELLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[yeepof]

Local PHD student at wizard school HARRASSED!! FOR SHAME!!

[rosered-schneeweisschens-sis]

i never knew there were men in the room for this, “that was tough” oh man they were not prepared XD

[daftmooncretin]

spock’s room decor is actually fucking bonkers. The weapons??? the big red velvet curtain??? like ok phantom of the opera go crazy.

for reference jim’s room has some photos and a plant so we can surmise this is uniquely a spock being a dramatic weirdo thing

[jabberwick]

Human Bill Cipher

(Based on Alex Hirsch's "canon" design)

And just to be clear, writing dissertations at me justifying why he should instead be a conventionally attractive twink will involuntarily cause me to draw him with even fewer teeth.

[hinamie]

trick or treat!

[scurvyboy]

au where fiddleford decided to start forgiving and stop forgetting way earlier in his life and is just a cool guy that is bad at hiding the fact that he knows things

[and-corn]

shoutout to the "foolproof" bread recipe I fucked up entirely for inspiring this

[cholvoq]

My Bill Cipher Design!! He’s so shapes…..

+ my inspo board bc a LOT inspired this design 😭😭

[pumpkinhrat]

no hope for that guy

[t00thpasteface]

who let this man adopt a child