#i’ve read some of the prequel comics i thought they were mostly dumb but at times enjoyable

[garak]

i like your rorshach thoughts! did you ever watch the watchmen sequel tv series?

no lol to be honest i don’t like tv shows as a storytelling medium that much right now so i haven’t felt compelled to give it a watch. i’ve heard it’s good but i also heard cws the flash was good when it came out and we all know how that went

[somethingusefulfromflorida]

Pixar Films

I dislike Disney as an entity; it is an evil corporate conglomerate that makes focus-grouped schlock to appeal to as wide an audience as possible at the detriment of story.  That said, Pixar was once the greatest animation studio on the planet.

Keep in mind, these are movies for kids, so anything negative I say will almost certainly be rebutted with “you’re just old and you don’t like Disney because it’s popular and you’re a hipster and you’re not even the target audience anyway so shut up.”  I’m just giving my two cents, whatever that’s worth.

I’m not gonna rate them on a number scale, I’ll just tell you how much I would or would not recommend watching them.  Some are must-see-cinema, others are bland and skippable affairs that you should not feel obligated to watch just because it has the Pixar brand on it.

Let’s start from the very beginning (a very good place to start)

Toy Story (1995) Groundbreaking, the first feature length 3D animated movie, spectacular cast, great story, though a little wonky by today’s standards both in the visuals (though that’s just a product of the times) and in the characterization (Woody is kinda of a jerk in this one; he was worse during pre-production, so this is the tame version).  Pixar started off on the right foot.  Would Recommend

A Bug’s Life (1998) This has some flaws, but is still a really fun movie.  Not as good as Toy Story, but infinitely better than Dreamworks’ knockoff Antz.  Great ensemble, memorable characters and set pieces, really funny.  Would Probably Recommend

Toy Story 2 (1999) An excellent sequel, they knocked it out of the park with this one.  It’s surprisingly deep, exploring concepts like the inevitability of change; nothing lasts forever, you can’t keep kicking the can down the road forever.  The journey is finite, but that doesn’t make it worthless.  Would Definitely Recommend.

Monsters, Inc. (2001) To date, their best original movie, maybe even better than Toy Story 2.  Everything about it is perfect; John Goodman and Billy Crystal have great chemistry, Steve Buscemi plays the perfect sleaze, Boo is just adorable, it’s an excellent movie.  Would Definitely Recommend.

Finding Nemo (2003) This is a beautiful movie; they had to invent new animation techniques to make it look this good, new ways for light to bounce and diffuse through the fishy medium.  Amazing story, absolutely heart wrenching at points, hilarious at others, without feeling tonally dissonant.  Would Definitely Recommend.

The Incredibles (2004) Another home run, they’re just showing off at this point.  This is a much deeper and arguably darker story than any of their previous films.  It doesn’t pull any punches and explores adult concepts like mid-life crises, extramarital affairs, death (oh, so much death; red shirt mooks and civilians alike).  This may be my favorite (definitely top 3; I’ll expand the list below).  Would Definitely Recommend.

Cars (2006) A competent movie, though by Pixar standards it’s not quite up to snuff.  Not bad, by any means, but this one is the most blatant cash grab of them all, just a commercial for hot wheels and die-cast toys.  I have a soft spot for it because this is the one I’ve seen the most; my mom would turn on this DVD to keep my baby sisters occupied, so it was literally always playing in our house.  That said, I’m not nostalgia blind; it has good parts, but it’s not great.  Would Probably Not Recommend.

Ratatouille (2007) C’est Magnifique!  Patton Oswalt does a fantastic job, I identify with Linguini on a spiritual level, the human characters are all perfectly demented and the rats are equally so.  I love this moral; anyone can be successful, it’s about who you are not where you come from.  Funny and relatable, an all around feel-good movie.  Would Definitely Recommend.

WALL-E (2008) Top 3, hands down, this is a true work of art, a modern masterpiece.  A film mostly devoid of dialogue, it expresses so much emotion from how the characters carry themselves and react physically to their surroundings.  The body language, the color choices, the camera work (especially in the space dance sequence), just how RAW everything is, how grounded it feels, how fleshed out these little robots are..  I Cannot Recommend This Enough, Watch it Right Now. Now. Why Are You Still Reading This?  Now! Go Watch it Then Come Back.  Even if You’ve Already Seen it, Go Watch it Again.

Up (2009) Another near perfect installment under Pixar’s belt.  They’ve really nailed the art of opening scenes; Carl and Ellie’s love story moves me to tears, it is so beautifully portrayed.  Some of the characters can be a tad annoying and overly cutesy to sell merchandise, but the story never suffers from it.  The villain actually feels like a threat, there are stakes, and the image of a house sitting by a waterfall and the story connotations thereof are indescribably bittersweet.  Would Definitely Recommend

Toy Story 3 (2010) This is is sort of hit or miss.  It’s a very well made movie, and an excellent CONCLUSION to the Toy Story franchise (Conclusion: noun, the end or finish of an event or process).  I liked it, felt it really wrapped things up in a satisfactory way, but it’s not better than Toy Story 2 in my mind.  I feel like this was a turning point for Pixar; after this, they were never quite the same, never really bounced back.  May or May Not Recommend, I’m on the Fence

Cars 2 (2011) You don’t give the comedy relief their own movie.  That’s storytelling 101; the comic relief bit-character can rarely stand on their own and meaningfully carry a story, though corporations are laughing all the way to the bank as I say this because these types of movies keep making boatloads of money even if they suck.  Minions made bookoo bucks, the Pirates of the Caribbean series is still ongoing despite the loss of Bloom and Knightly (and bringing them back for the last one doesn’t really count because Depp is still the main character), Cars 2 is a corporate cash grab, and devoid of artistic merit; this is my first hard no.  Would NOT Recommend.

Brave (2012) This is not a Pixar film, it is a Disney film that they decided to make under Pixar’s name instead because they knew Pixar had enough good will and positive connotations to get people into seats regardless of story.  It’s not terrible, but it’s not great.  That’s the story of modern Disney; not terrible, not great, just okay because that’s all it needs to be.  People will watch it no matter what, so they put in the bare minimum amount of effort so nobody can say they suck at making movies again (because for the longest time in the early 2000s, they did suck; Dinosaurs, Home on the Range, Chicken Little).  Would Not Recommend.

Monsters University (2013)  Why did you do this, Pixar?  Why did you take one of your best movies and do this specifically to it? Nobody asked for this, nobody wanted this.  I can only applaud them for having integrity enough to NOT give people what they wanted; people wanted a sequel, and that would have bee terrible.  You can’t follow up on Monsters, Inc, it had a perfect ending, it was hopeful and heart warming and definitive.  A prequel is the only thing they could have made without messing up the ending of the original, so I’ll give them some credit for that.  It’s not good.  Would Not Recommend.

Inside Out (2015) Their best one since Toy Story 3.  Not terrible, I actually liked a lot of things about this one.  I like it when Pixar takes on more serious subject matter, and I thought they did a good job exploring how a kid would react to such a drastic lifestyle change.  The cast was good, the animation was fun (inside Riley’s head; outside was generic and samey).  Not bad Pixar, not bad at all.  Would Probably Recommend.

The Good Dinosaur (2015) It doesn’t matter what i think because this movie still made hundreds of millions of dollars.  Disney is losing no sleep over this.  Would NOT Recommend.

Finding Dory (2016) Again with the continuations!  This was better than Monsters University, but the original was still such a hard act to follow.  It had potential, and I liked how it respectably handled mental illness in a way that was easy for kids to understand without dumbing it down and underplaying its significance in the lives of those who it effects.  I think Marlin kinda regressed, having to relearn what he already learned in the first one. The hardest I laughed was during the climax, the truck chase scene, “It’s a Wonderful World,” just amazing.  Would Probably Not Recommend

Cars 3 (2017) I hope Disney was happy with this end product.  I hope the producers really enjoyed cashing their toy checks for this one.  I thought it was worse than Cars 2, but I can see why some people might like it more.  Either way, it’s worse than Cars 1, which wasn’t particularly great anyway.  Would NOT Recommend.

Coco (2017) I’m on the fence with this one.  It was beautifully made, and the songs made me cry, but it’s hard for me to look at this movie without judging it as a product made by a focus group of mostly white people.  By itself it’s a good movie, but when you know how the Disney sausage is made it feels disingenuous and calculated.  Might Recommend, But it Had Some Baggage

The Incredibles 2 (2018)  I am Boo Boo the Fool, Pixar suckered me and I fell for it.  I was legitimately enthusiastic for this one because the original is one of their best, and unlike Monsters, Inc it actually left room for a sequel.  It had so much potential, and big shoes to fill, and it did so in the most generic Disney way it could.  Like Brave it wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t great either.  Middle of the road, some things were fun, others made little sense, it was “appealing” in that it literally appealed to as wide an audience as it could without alienating anyone by doing anything particularly risky.  I liked Voyd, I liked how Helen became the main character, I liked the villain twist; I did not like how easy it was to make superheroes legal again.  It felt like it was tacked on at the end, like he just says “and there we have it, they’re legal again, congratulations,” like he was announcing the winner of the Price is Right.  Would Probably Not Recommend

Toy Story 4 (2019) I want to be clear that I made a point not to pay money to see many of the previous films on this list.  If I thought they were going to suck, I waited until a friend bought it and saw it with them for free.  This one, though, I was forced to pay for because my mom insisted on seeing it in theaters as a family.  It wasn’t terrible.  Wasn’t great.  Wash, rinse, repeat.  It was the same villain again; Stinky Pete, Lotso, Gabby-Gabby... I can’t wait for the fifth one where the villain is an old toy who is mad because they weren’t played with.  Buzz was made much dumber for this one, and I felt they didn’t do enough with Forky.  I was excited to see how they handled the existential aspects of the series; what makes a toy? How are toys sentient? Why are toys sentient? In the first movie Woody implied that there were rules that toys were honor bound to follow, so what is stopping Forky from blowing their cover on accident?  None of these questions were answered.  I liked Keanu Reeves, I didn’t like Key and Peele.  Would Probably Not Recommend.

The mighty have fallen.  It’s just sad. 

”Onward” looks kinda dumb, like a kiddy version of the flop Will Smith movie “Bright.”  I have no faith in this production company anymore, but I’m sure it will make hundreds of millions of dollars; the cast are fan favorites, including Disney’s favorite topical pet celebrities (because let’s be honest, Disney basically owns Tom Holland at this point.  Whether they own Spider-Man or not, they own Tom Holland, he is theirs, his soul contractually belongs to them).

Speaking of souls, ”Soul” will probably go over well with critics, though I can’t help but notice that their main character of color is transformed into a non-human for most of the movie.  Again.  I’m also not a fan of this one-word naming convention Disney has fallen into in the last decade.  “Brave” was originally titled “the Bear and the Bow,” but one-word titles seem to test well with kids.  Hopefully this will pass, but I’m not holding my breath.

I’m swearing off Disney movies, firsthand.  I might catch them second hand, through friends or other means, but I refuse to give this corporate conglomerate one more penny.  They basically own Hollywood, so my money will eventually make my way into their pockets, I just want to put as much distance between them and myself as possible.  No more Pixar, no more Star Wars, no more Marvel, no more Disney.  I am one drop in the bucket, I will not be missed, and they will not be affected in the slightest by my absence, but I need to prove to myself that I have integrity enough not to keep funneling my hard earned cash into a trillion dollar snack company.

Disney movies are snacks, not meals.  And I’m going on a diet.

Anyway, here’s my top three:

Monsters, Inc

The Incredibles

WALL-E

[acearchivist359]

My Rise of Skywalker Opinions/Commentary

this is mostly for me but and for my other blog (not on tumblr) but I thought I’d post it here too cause why not ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ happy Star Ways Day fellow humans, may the force be with you 

   Okay so here's something I have a lot of opinions about. I'm gonna have to say right off the bat, I didn't like Rise of Skywalker. Being said though, I didn't hate it as much as I thought I would. I've seen it twice by now, I wrote my notes having seen it once, I've had lengthy debates about it with multiple people ranging from one of my parent's friends to one of my best friends to my little brother. I saw it like the day after it came out, I wrote my notes on January 1st, so I've sat with this for awhile and I'd sat with the movie before I wrote them. I kinda forgot about it all for a bit cause I blocked it out of my head and then I thought it might be too late to post it but I put a lot of, frankly chaotic, effort into my notes and I figured when it came on Disney+ people might start talking about it again so here we are.  Now I'm still using my original notes, which I added to after seeing it the second time, cause I have no desire to watch this movie again. I really don't. I honestly wouldn't have even seen it twice but I had told my grandma I'd go with her cause she loves Star Wars and she had no one to go with. My grandma loved it, but my grandma loves them all "because it's Star Wars." My mom also saw it and liked it, she's only seen the originals though and had no idea what was going on. I, on the other hand, spent a lot of time hitting myself in the head (the first time round) and there was a few occasions where I honestly said "what the fuck??" out loud in the theatre.  So one more thing I have to note, I feel the same way about the whole trilogy I don't really like any of them and I never did. But I'm not entirely just looking at this as one movie, a lot of what I've got to say looks at this as the end of the "Skywalker Saga" cause that’s what it is. I also have some things that go back through the entire trilogy but this is mainly based around TROS since it's the most recent and I refuse to watch the others to make notes on them. Also, I'm aware of the problem they had with the whole George Lucas vs. Rian Johnson thing and how they wrote them separately, however I'm still gonna call them out on things they should have done to tie things together from the beginning cause that was a really dumb way to do things anyway. Plus like I said I'm looking more big picture on a lot of things (mostly cause there's major plotlines that I hated). One of these days, I'll make a positive review but it won't be about the sequel trilogy, I'll tell you that much.  With all that said, I vote that I get on with this. Just for reference though, none of this is in chronological order. There are some things I did like about this movie, I will give it that, so I feel like we should start there. Small Positive Things:

The first thing I put in my notes is just "Finn and Poe" and honestly that's still a mood. I really liked them in this one and I really saw why people ship them.

The next point in my notes just says "death star" which boils down to two different things: the aesthetic and the Imperial March

I know I said positive things but I didn't think of it in my notes and I need to address this. You're telling me that the Death Star exploded but there's still that big of a piece in tact??? But whatever not the point.

The aesthetic: vague continuity thing aside, I fucking love the Death Star in this I really do. It looks awesome. It's really cool to see this broken down, abandoned version of the Death Star. I loved the Stormtrooper helmets scattered on the ground, for some reason that part really stuck in my head. Being said though I generally love the old Stormtrooper helmets, the First Order ones just don't do it for me, but seeing them scattered around.. Idk it was a nice touch I think

Imperial March: so like the Imperial March is the shit, obviously, but that soft, subtle hint of it in that scene as Rey steps into the throne room is one of the only parts of that movie that made me hit my brother's arm in excitement (we do that at the movies, it's our thing). It reminds me of that thing they do in Clone Wars when Anakin does something just a little Darth Vader.

Right so the next thing I had was that part where Kylo Ren finds Palpatine and he      switches from his voice to Snoke's to Darth Vader's.

It was a little thing but I liked it a lot. As far as having to tie it all together, the idea that it was actually Palpatine manipulating Ren wasn't so bad. (That being said the       whole how Palpatine is around thing is pretty far fetched, but they tried.)

My next thing, and this I actually laughed at as opposed to like confused laughter, is the part where they get back from their little mission to find the map to whatever the place was called and Threepio introduces himself to Artoo and Artoo literally does a double take and backs up like "what the fuck??? " That was such a human expression for a robot, it was hilarious. Also Threepio being like "You're not messing with my head!" *cuts to Artoo messing with Threepio's head* Basically anything Artoo cause I love him.

Again tiny random thing, but the Jet Troopers and the Sith Troopers were really cool. Me and my brother quote the "they fly now??" "they fly now!" part all the time. Also just like red Stormtroopers..

So here's a thing that gave me feelings. (I'd like to just point out that this is one of the      only things that gave me feelings and it's about to be clear why.) Chewie finding out Leia died. That hurt my heart. I knew that they couldn't possibly go through that movie without having Leia die, and I said this before the movie ever came out. What I said before was that they really had two options: they could have Leia die off screen which would have been disrespectful to both Carrie Fisher and Leia or she could just sorta disappear which would have also been bad. However they gave her the death scene she deserved. I mean sort of, jury's out on it really. But Chewie making sad noises and falling to his knees hurt me. Similarly Artoo beeping at her sadly made me weepy. (The Anakin in me really jumps out whenever Artoo comes up but like I love him)

I honestly have nothing else to say for this point besides: I can't believe Harrison      Ford agreed to do that

I just wanna touch on Poe again cause he was always my favourite of the new characters, I wasn't really  connected with any of them (which is so uncommon for me) but Poe was my favourite cause he was funny. He was really good in this one, I thought he was funny, again him and Finn had a brilliant thing going. For whatever      reason this one made me appreciate Poe more.

I have some (general) grievances to air out now

I have to say one thing that really irks me about this trilogy is that none of the original characters reunite. The exception of which being everyone and Chewie. Also are we counting Luke and Leia's? I guess in the end they end up reunited in the force in the end either way but still. I mean really Han and Leia have their scene together, and I love that scene, but other than that nothing. No Han and Lando, no Han and Luke reunion. Han and Luke is the one that bothers me though cause them and Leia are the trio and Han and Luke are the only ones that don't reunite. We never see Leia and Lando together on screen either. It's a crime.

I don't know how I feel about Hux being the spy. I feel like it was just kinda lame, you know? Pretty predictable when you think about it, would have been cooler if he wasn't the spy. Seemed like it was just comic relief when it should have been a plot point.

I think it would have been cool if there were more Jedi in the final scene. Like all those Jedi voices spoke to Rey, but only Luke and Leia are there at the end? I get the symbolism with the lightsabers and Luke's place and all that, but still. Like at least, you know, Obi Wan or Anakin. This is one of those full circle things but still, I think it would have been a cool scene.

Okay so this is just me being petty but like I don't care it bothers me. The fact that they keep acting like the lightsaber Rey has is Luke's when it's actually Anakin's bothers me. I know it's a little thing and Not Important but it's dumb. Cause it's not Luke's lightsaber, Luke made his own later on.

Also the fact that they started calling it Rey's lightsaber annoys me so much for the       same reason. She has her own lightsaber now, leave Anakin's alone.

Okay so, we have reached the point where I start talking about things a bit more, bear with me (if people even bother to read this at all idc this is mostly just for me to rant and stuff):

So like look, I'll be the first to say not a Kylo Ren fan. He had potential, I will give him that, and that's where I'm going with this. The other movies had him as this whiny, try hard, Darth Vader wannabe and I just really didn't vibe with that. I mean this is the first real villian since Darth Vader (not counting palpsy during the prequels cause he was just behind the scenes and every movie had a different Bad Guy) and he throws a temper tantrum. Those stormtroopers were hilarious but still. But anyway, did not expect to come out of this movie having wished Kylo Ren was in it more. If they had had him be the way he was in this one the whole time, I might have actually liked him. He did some cool stuff for once in this one so let's discuss that:

I talk about things being full circle a lot (but with movies as nostalgic as Star Wars there should be full circle, fight me) but him fighting with Anakin's lightsaber was very full circle

I do like that it was Leia's death that triggered his return to the light side (I mean I'll get into some things about that later) as opposed to some romance bullshit with Rey. I really don't ship them, like at all, and I think it makes it more compelling that it was his mother's death instead.

He did some cool shit at the beginning, that fight scene was cool. I like the part where he slams the guy down on the ground, don't ask me why I have no idea. I saw it in the trailer and I liked it.

The Han Solo in him really jumped out in the end there and it was really entertaining

The fight with the Knights of Ren was really cool (besides that one jump thing he       did cause I see where they were going with it but it just didn't look as good)

What was definitely cool is the part where he pulls the lightsaber out from behind his back, that was a cool move

Alright so here's my thing and this is gonna make me sound bad probably but like as already established, I don't really like the new characters as much. I just didn't connect with them on the same level as the past trilogies characters, which is fine it's whatever. But I am just gonna say it, I don't really like Rey. But here's my thing, I've always been indifferent towards her but like not really caring either was but there are some things she did in this one that just.. bothered me so this being my platform I'm gonna talk about it.

So the thing with Star Wars movies for me and most people is the family feel right. But like Rey just goes off on her own and ditches Finn, Poe, Chewie and Threepio all the time and like I get that she's sensing something or she wants to get to the death star but she could say something instead of just.. disappearing

Okay so here's another thing, and I know they wanted to find a way to tie it back to the originals but….. a Palpatine?? There are so many other characters they could have gone with but it's like they just wanted to do the 'watch the light side defeat the dark side' thing in as many ways as possible in one movie (Which I'll talk more about later)

Alright so here's my last solely Rey related point and like I don't know where people stand on this cause they seem to either love it or hate it. But Rey Skywalker?? Here's my thing, I've a really hard time getting past the Palpatine thing on that one. But also is that supposed to be the Rise of Skywalker? Because I don't know that I consider that to be rising for her.

Alright, on the topic of the light side vs. dark side thing. Yes I am aware that this is a fundamental part of Star Wars and always has been. However they did it in two      different ways in the same movie. Here's the thing I don't like Rey or Kylo Ren over each other, I have the same level of indifference with both of them. So this isn't me being a Ben Solo stan, promise cause I could not possibly care less if they bring him back, I'm not gonna fight them on it. But the storyline of him overcoming the dark side, would have been more interesting to me. Because I knew Rey wasn't gonna go to the dark side, this is Star Wars. But I wish we could have seen Kylo/Ben struggle with the dark side vs the light side more. I mean they gave us such a good look at it with Anakin, we watched him struggle and fall. That to me would have been rising.

Not to mention Palpsy literally just tries to use the same trick on Rey that he       already tried to use on Luke. That's not full circle, that's Palps being dumb.

Okay, now for the full circle nonsense I keep talking about. The thing with this is that it probably would have been the things you do over two movies and not just the one but just cause they didn't write them that way doesn't mean I can't imagine it.

For one thing, I'd have had Ben kill Palpatine.

Hear me out: Palps himself refers to Ben as the "Last of the Skywalkers" and given that Palpatine is the reason behind all the Skywalker drama from the beginning. With that being said, having the last of the Skywalkers kill Palpatine and thus end his insane, saga long reign over the universe would have been amazing

Not to mention this would be finishing what his grandfather started which was his thing the whole time. Anakin tried to kill Palpatine at the end, and having the last Skywalker, the last of Anakin's blood genuinely finish what he started would have brought the whole thing to an end

Along the same lines as that, the power the all of the Jedi scene would have in that case (and I'm saying this like he was good for more than the last 10 minutes of the movie) been so much more powerful. To have him hear Anakin's voice, like he always wanted but guiding him towards the light instead. Not to mention his mother.

And also, small thing but on the topic of finishing what Anakin started and all that but his grandson, the last of his blood (I'm gonna keep using that) using his lightsaber, the very one he had when he first fell to the dark side, to kill Palpatine once and for all would have been one of those full circle moments that I expected the movie to have more of.

 SO yeah that's everything, all my thoughts and feelings. This literally took me forever to finish. It's been like 5 months but it's Star Wars Day (May the Fourth be with You!) so I had to cram to get it done or I'd die. Plus once it started to get away from when the movie actually came out, I figured I'd wait for it to come out on Disney+ and it has so here we are. I'm glad to be done with this and get it all out cause I honestly just don't care for that movie. I'd rather watch Clone Wars (the finale was soooo good).  Anyways, peace out and may the force be with you, always!  -Moony

[mathematicianadda]

More Great Ways to Annoy a Mathematician

Which Ratio is Truly Golden?

I find it troubling that the golden ratio has so little in common with the golden rule.

Like, if you did unto others 1.618 times what you’d have them do unto you, then we’d all wind up exhausted.

And if you’re only doing 1/1.618 times unto them, then isn’t that a bit lazy?

  A Puzzle About Rates

I’ve always enjoyed those puzzles like, “If 3 chickens can lay 3 eggs in 3 days, then how long will it take 100 chickens to lay 100 eggs?” They’re counter-intuitive (e.g., in my example, each chicken lays 1 egg per 3 days, so the answer is also 3 days), yet deal only with simple constant rates.

So what if the rates weren’t constant? Like in, say, a bureaucracy, where 20 times more people will accomplish only 1/20th as much?

(Sorry for putting the answer upside down. It reads: “Please complete the attached form (Z302: Aggregate Task Completion Rate Information Request) and we’ll process your inquiry in 4-6 weeks.”)

  In this case, “a mathematician” refers specifically to Matt Parker, whose excellent book Humble Pi discusses the first two of these mistakes.

  The Asymptote of Happiness

Lots of poets have found asymptotes a convenient literary symbol – the idea of eternal striving is a resonant one (even beyond the eternal striving of the struggling algebra student).

  I love me some Raymond Smullyan.

Sorry again for putting the answer upside down. I dunno why I thought that was a clever idea. Mostly just forces you to turn off the auto-rotate setting on your phone.

Anyway, it reads: “Ask anything. You should already know not to buy lowfat yogurt.”)

  Proving a New Theorem

Not that I’ve ever felt this myself. I’m just speculating.

  P-R-E-N-A-T-A-L

What is parenting, if not a neat LARP?

(LARP = Live-Action Role-Playing Game, for those of you with less geeky acumen than I anticipate my audience to have.)

By the way, my friend Rayleen once described to me a brilliant comic, where one person asks, “When’s the baby due?” and the other person is drawn with a small horizontal stick figure emerging from their stick torso. (See? It’s such a good comic, I can just describe it.)

  The Sales Pitch for Math

I think a lot about the different arguments for math, and the ways that they support or contradict each other. Is it a beautiful art? An urgent set of universal civic skills? Key preparation for technical professions?

The answer is yes to all three. But not for all math, and not all at once – and attempting to blend the purposes can lead to a muddle.

  The Meaning of “Let”

It’s always tickled me that the mathematician’s verb “let,” which sounds so chill and laissez-faire, is actually a binding command.

  “All Happy Families Are Alike; Every Unhappy Family is Unhappy In Its Own Way”

I wrote a bunch of these a few years ago. This one has the benefit of being true: all circles are geometrically similar, but not all ellipses are.

(The same is true, by the way, of parabolas and hyperbolas. The former are all the same basic shape, just zoomed in or zoomed out, whereas the latter constitute a whole family of different shapes.)

(Chew on that, Tolstoy.)

  The Court-Appointed Translator

I wrote this little dialogue after listening to a great episode of The Allusionist, before it turned out that Game of Thrones would suffer the worst collapse in storytelling that I have ever experienced.

Oh well!

As my wife said, “At least this way we’ll never have to bargain with our daughter about when she’s old enough to watch Game of Thrones. The ending is so bad, in 10 or 15 years no one will be watching it anymore.”

  Identity Politics

This is a really dumb pun.

Also one of the more popular cartoons in this list.

Go figure.

  Another Dumb Pun

This one is inspired by that time Malcolm Gladwell referred to eigenvectors as “igon vectors,” and Steven Pinker blasted him for it, at which point Gladwell blasted Pinker for something else, and eventually we all lost the thread and just went about our days.

And if you want more godawful matrix puns, I’ve got ’em.

  I don’t know what day you’re reading this, but guess what? It’s also a bad approximation of pi! So go ahead and celebrate!

(Though if you want some very clever alternative pi days, check out Evelyn Lamb’s page-a-day calendar, which includes a Pi Day each month, and not where you’d expect!)

  Uncountably Many Wishes

After I posted this, there was a bunch of discussion on Twitter about whether I’d mischaracterized the Axiom of Choice, which is totally possible, in which case, oops.

Also, some folks pointed out that it’s pretty greedy to wish for uncountably many wishes, when you could just as easily wish for countably many.

To which I say: What’s the point of a magic lamp, if not to have greed be your undoing?

  Maximization vs. Minimization

For lots of optimization problems, maximizing makes sense, but minimizing doesn’t. (Or vice versa.) An example: What’s the largest rectangle you can make from 4 feet of wire?

It’s the 1-by-1 square, with an area of 1 square foot.

But what’s the smallest rectangle you can make (in terms of area)? Well, you could make the 1.9999 by 0.0001 rectangle, which has a very tiny area…

Or you could make the 1.999999 by 0.000001 rectangle, which has an even smaller area…

Or the 1.99999999999999 by 0.000000000000001 rectangle, whose area is microscopic…

…and so on.

I hope that was worth it! And I suspect it wasn’t! Anyway, moving on.

  More thoughts here.

  The Villainous Mathematician Explains His Plan

Clearly this villain should be assigning more group work.

Anyway, I for one am curious to know how a complex-valued currency might work. I’d pay a hefty fee for an accountant or tax attorney who can turn imaginary assets into real ones, or real debts into imaginary ones.

  The Cat on the Bed

I found it very hard to draw a decent space-filling curve.

Also, to draw a decent cat.

  Only Slept Four Hours

This is how I feel about anyone who sleeps less than 7 hours in a given night.

  Axioms of Life

This is my version of that xkcd about kitties.

Also pretty well summarizes parenthood. I still enjoy a cerebral geek-out, as I always have; but I also really enjoy holding my daughter in my arms and calling her the world’s best monkey over and over.

  How Many Stars?

I would totally read a graphic novel about the dating life of Georg Cantor.

The problem is that no one is going to write this graphic novel except for me.

Oh well. I’m under contract for two more books at the moment, but after that will come TRANSFINITE LOVE: THE ROMANTIC ESCAPADES OF A SET THEORIST.

  Quick-Draw Answers

Drawn from an actual experience, in my first week teaching 7th grade. I hadn’t really figured out how to tee up a problem-solving experience yet.

  Twenty Questions

Drew this one for a Jim Propp essay. Recommended as always!

  A New Proof

A teaching friend of mine had a whole list of proofs that 1 = 0, which he busted out at various developmentally appropriate points in grades 6 through 12.

I love that. Curious how far you could get writing a book of proofs that 1 = 0, each introducing a key idea in mathematics…

Maybe that’ll be my next project after the George Cantor romance novel.

  E = mc

Philosophical question: Is this a pun?

The case against: “A pun is a joke that plays on words that sound similar but mean different things. This isn’t doing that.”

The case for: “A pun is a joke that plays on linguistic expressions with similar surface features, but different deep meanings. This is doing exactly that: the premise of the joke is that an exponent and a footnote are both denoted with a superscript, yet mean very different things.”

So I guess this has a deep resemblance to puns, but lacks a surface resemblance… which is itself, not very pun-like.

Ruling: Not a pun!

  “The Exception Proves the Rule”

I guess you hear this inane phrase less often these days. But there was a time, kiddos, when people could hear a devastating counterexample to what they were arguing, and then blithely say “the exception proves the rule” with a straight face.

  The Math Sequence

I’m pretty agnostic on the math sequence. But I have strong intuitions that Star Wars should be screened in the order: IV, V, I, II, III, VI, and so on. (I view the sequels as pretty optional. Prequels too, for that matter, but if you limit yourself to the original trilogy, it’s a boring problem.)

  The “Same” Age

A lot of people on Facebook seemed to read this as though the right-hand character was creeping on Ariana Grande. Not my intention at all! I just wanted to pick a mid-20s celebrity. Could’ve just as easily been Bieber.

(My primary association with Ariana Grande, by the way, is her performance in the short-lived bar mitzvah-themed Broadway musical Thirteen.)

  Lemniskate

I’m not sure there’s a joke here.

I’m fond of this drawing anyway.

  Linear Child

Michael Pershan, the internet’s most relentlessly analytical math educator, inexplicably loved this joke, so I call it a win.

Someone on social media speculated about the position by which this linear combination had been “conceived,” which I found quite vulgar and upsetting (but which I also sort of invited by drawing a comic about procreating vectors).

  If P, then Q

Where do we draw the line between logical succession, and outright stalking? I leave that to the courts.

  Loons and Lunes

Sometimes I just want to do a cute drawing that has no joke in it, okay?

  The Vertical Line Test

I’m actually skeptical that the phrase “vertical line test” has any value. To me it feels like a fancy name for a fact that doesn’t need a fancy name. And, as in the two-column-proof version of geometry, giving fancy names to facts that students should be reasoning out for themselves can become obfuscatory rather than clarifying.

  Whose Fractal is Whose?

Please join me in making “Patricia gasket” a thing! E.g., “Did you know Copley Square in Boston is the approximate shape of the mathematical figure known as a Patricia Gasket?”

from Math with Bad Drawings https://ift.tt/2RlT021 from Blogger https://ift.tt/2wnolKj

[fantasyinvader]

Doomed Lord’s Passing

So, we’re here. The end of the saga. I’m going to have a lot to say about this one, and I just want to start by saying thank you to anyone who has bothered to read any of these.

I was really interested in checking out the Elric saga because of how influential it was to the fantasy genre despite how now it’s mostly forgotten. But it’s been a pretty entertaining ride for me. It really has this feeling that it’s the abridged version of some greater epic, like ASoIaF with a massively reduced word count, and while a lot of what it says may be cliche nowadays I feel Elric did these things better than some of those who followed it’s lead. Hell, when DnD based it’s alignment system on Elric they dumbed down what Law and Chaos meant to simply being how the character acts.

But anyway, let’s get on with the story.

Elric, Moonglum and his cousin are all that remains to oppose chaos, and are hiding on Melnibone. Chaos has nearly won, and now the sun is unmoving in the sky above. Everything has come back to where it started. Elric starts musing that because of everything he’s gone through he wishes he had been a typical Melnibonean. When he goes to sleep, he enters an astral plane where the Melniboneans of ages past reside with Melnibone in all it’s past glory. He meets his father who was always disappointed at him. The father wants to know what happened, since the astral plane will exist as long as Melnibone does and some of the ghosts have been disappearing into true death.

Elric can not answer him.

But Elric is found and taken to meet the White Lords in another plane. There, they talk about how they like Elric despite him be a creature of chaos and task him with one last quest before the final battle. Find the Horn of Fate in another realm. I find it interesting that Moorcock made the Lords of Law so perfect looking that they end up being hard to look at, and when Elric does he realizes that their perfection means they can’t grow further. Chaos may lead to stagnation, but Law unchecked leads to entrophy.

Elric has to take a leap of faith off of the highest tower of Melnibone, which he turned into a funeral pyre for Cymoril. From there, he enters another world where Law is stronger. It feels more defined and alien to Elric, and in the end Elric has to do battle with corpse of Roland of Charlemange fame. Yeah, the Horn of Fate is the horn from the The Song of Roland. Elric returns with the help of the Dwarf that acted as a guide to him.

The Horn of Fate requires Elric to sacrifice his own life energy to blow it, the opposite of Stormbringer giving him strength. The first blow awakens the dragons beneath Melnibone, which Elric takes into battle despite being weak. The resulting battle is 10/10 Metal as Fuck, where we learn Chaos calls Elric Godslayer as he fights Xiombarg who you might recall from me talking about the Corum Swords trilogy.

This gives Elric the strength to blow the horn a second time, bringing the Lords of Law to do battle with the Forces of Chaos. Elric’s cousin dies offscreen, his runesword missing. Elric goes off to fight Jagreen Lern, the theocrat of Pa Tang that led this war for Chaos and Elric’s rival for the events of Stormbringer.

It’s here we get a great irony. Elric is a Melnibonean who left his home wanting to learn from humans, a creature of chaos wanting to learn about stuff like justice from a Law-aligned race. Elric wants to bring Jagreen to justice, even if it is his own vengeance. Jagreen, a human, wanted to emulate Melnibone and in his words he did what he must. All the pain and suffering he caused were just him trying to follow in the example of Elric’s people who cared little for the lesser race of mankind in their pursuit of power.

In a sense, Elric has become human at this point fighting against a mockery of who he expected to be. Elric left Melnibone wanting to make it a force for good in the world, and while the current world is doomed he’s making a better one for the mankind that will someday come. In a sense, this is Elric having become the hero.

Granted, Elric is still cruel. Having Jagreen in his power, Elric spends a hour cutting him into tiny pieces before he died. And it only took that long because Moonglum begged Elric to make it quick. Elric also refuses to drink Jagreen’s soul, not wanting to be tainted by his essence and resisting Stormbringer for the first time.

The battle between the gods leaves the world formless, but Laws victory once again gives it strength. Elric needs to blow the horn for a third and final time in order for it to truly begin, but he lacks the strength. Elric meets the one who gave him these quests one last time.

Wondering if everything was worth it, it ultimately turns into a discussion if the gods themselves actually know if there is a greater plan or are they seeing what they believe to be patterns when in reality it is just random shapes. In essence, Elric’s original belief that things were simply chaos, chance and anarchy may actually be true and that the destiny crafted for him may in fact have been based on the gods thinking it’s what destiny was saying. It’s unknown if the new world will be better, or if it will simply repeat what has already happened in a cycle that will only end with the end of the universe. It’s kinda unsettling to think about.

Moonglum offers up his life so that Elric may blow the Horn the final time, and while he does so willingly (despite Elric’s protests, but Stormbringer was really happy to do so), he experiences horror in his final moments. Elric tosses Stormbringer aside to start the new world as he sees the Cosmic balance, finally evening out. Unsure if it’s real or his own imagination, Elric finds some peace.

Stormbringer then stabs Elric in the chest. It is at this moment that Elric realizes that Stormbringer was no mere living sword that sucked the souls of his foes. Instead, it was a demon in the shape of a sword and he will know no rest. For his soul is now part of Stormbringer, the last bit of Chaos in this world because there needs to be both Law and Chaos for a world to function. This is the end of his quest to bring about the world of Law, now his serves as part of what will bring Chaos. Elric dies with tears in his eyes, while Stormbringer takes it’s true form.

Before departing to spread it’s unholy joy to the universe, it says the following to Elric’s corpse.

FAREWELL FRIEND. I WAS A THOUSAND TIMES MORE EVIL THAN THOU!

The end. And really, it’s the perfect ending to the saga. Elric was the antithesis of your typical fantasy. It’s not ending on a happy note for it’s protagonist, where all the hardships they’ve went through is made up for with happily ever after with no thoughts about the aftermath of the conflict. That there are no consequences or repercussions of the ending. And, it really feels like Moorcock wanted to express that just because the new world will be more attuned to Law doesn’t mean it will be heaven on Earth. Hell, it’s implied that the world Elric made was our own.

But it still hurts to see Elric go out like that. Yes, it thematically fits with his story but you still wanted something good for the guy. I’d almost say the 10/10 Metal as Fuck battle gave way for some boarderline misery porn in it’s final pages. And the fact that his story is being told makes his wish that he and Melnibone be forgotten not come true... You know, maybe it was fitting that the saga did slip through the cracks of pop culture and my postings are against what Elric wanted. It was a story he never wanted to be told, one of tragedy and loss in the name of an uncertain future.

Now, this is just the stories that originally comprised the Saga as well as the Prequel. Together, I’d say they formed a pretty good arc for Elric’s journey but I never felt he was the boarderline villain protagonist some make him out to be. He has dark powers, but usually they were used paying evil onto evil. I’ve heard stuff about some other stories Moorcock used to flesh things out, the past adventures alluded to in this, so maybe it’s more there. After all, the Saga went from two books originally and was fleshed out into six main stories with others as well. Stuff like Elric travelling to other worlds. Hell, that archer Elric killed in the previous story is another incarnation of the Eternal Champion meaning he was another version of Elric.

If you’re interested, I would recommend starting with Elric of Melnibone, then if you can get the Fantasy Masterworks Elric collection. This volume contains the original 9 stories. The Michael Moorcock collection from Gollancz, are reasonably priced if you want to go through the extended version. There’s also comics from the 80′s which have collected volumes that go through the extended saga. The French comics from a couple years ago adapt Elric of Melnibone, but they reimagine him in such a way that it’s not true to Elric’s character in the books. Good for a read, as grimdark as people like to make Elric out as, but not a good substitute for the rest of the saga.

So, once again thanks to anyone who walked alongside me on this strange journey. Till we meet again.

[irenenorth]

New Post has been published on Irene North

New Post has been published on https://www.irenenorth.com/writings/2020/01/the-force-has-always-been-with-me/

The force has always been with me

About a week or so before my seventh birthday, my family climbed into my grandma’s gold station wagon. We were headed out to the Fair Oaks Drive-In to see this new movie everyone was talking about. It had opened on May 25, 1977, but this was the first time my mom could take us all.

The line was about a mile long. Cars pulled partway off the two-lane road so regular traffic could continue moving. We slowly inched our way up to the entrance. When we were the third car in line, I had climbed under Gram’s black and red banana blanket. The drive-in charged per person, not per car and I was the only one left in the family small enough to evade the fee.

Because the line was so long, we missed the first few minutes of Star Wars. We pulled into our spot and my mom set up the speaker. C-3PO and R2D2 had just landed on Tatooine.

My mom and grandma sat in the car. My sister, aunt, and my mom’s boyfriend’s kids sat in aluminum lawn chairs near the speaker. They goofed around a lot during the movie. I stretched out on the hood of the station wagon, my head resting against the windshield. That didn’t last long. I was little and it was hard to see. It’s something I’ve had to deal with most of my life at the theater as well.

I climbed up onto the roof of the car.

“You’re not funny,” Mom yelled. She leaned her head out the driver’s side window and looked up at me.

“Not trying to be,” I said. I settled down on the roof near the front of the car. I crossed my legs. My elbows rested on my legs, my hands upside down, supporting my head. I sat that way for the rest of the movie.

I don’t remember eating any popcorn, candy, or chocolate. I remember lightsabers and Wookiees and Imperial I-class Star Destroyers.

When the movie was over, we stayed to watch it again. The man who took our money at the gate said that since we got in late, we could stay. It was one of the best nights of my life.

A few weeks later, I saw a Star Wars watch with C-3PO and R2D2 on Tatooine. It was a shot from the movie of the first moment I saw Star Wars. I wanted the watch. It was expensive, but Mom said I could have it when I learned to tell time.

Three weeks later, I knew how. I didn’t just know that it was 4:10 p.m – I knew it was 10 minutes after four, it was 50 minutes before five, and that the military would say it was 16:10. I didn’t get the watch. I was disappointed until Christmas. It was one of the few things I got that year. I wore that watch for nearly a decade before it quit working.

I also sold the most Girl Scout cookies that year, more than 1,000 boxes. My prize was The Story of Star Wars LP and the soundtrack to the movie. I still have them tucked away with the album my elementary school band made and my Led Zeppelin albums.

Mom had also recently taught me how to do jigsaw puzzles. I was only a little kid, but I excelled at it. There’s a peaceful calm that comes over me whenever I do a jigsaw puzzle. I’m relaxed, focused, and determined. Five hundred piece puzzles were common for me to do when I was seven-years old.

Mom came home one day with a new challenge for me. It was my first 1,000-piece puzzle. The Kenner Star Wars jigsaw puzzle was absolutely glorious. It was based off of the Hilderbrandt poster. Luke and Leia stand ready for battle. A giant Darth Vader head looms in the background. The Death Star behind him. C-3PO and R2D2 were there, too.

The puzzle was a challenge for me, especially with the different shades of black throughout the picture. Mom had a large piece of wood I could rest across my legs to do the puzzle. When the borders were done, there was a little bit of space on each side to set pieces aside.

I worked diligently for hours to complete the puzzle. I worked mostly alone in Mom’s bedroom to finish it. Mom would often help me with puzzles when I got stuck, but she let me try this one alone, only occasionally stepping in to make suggestions.

Her room was the only place I could safely work to ensure the puzzle wouldn’t be damaged. Finishing it was a proud moment in my life. I finished one of the most difficult tasks of my life.

“The Empire Strikes Back” opened when I was nine. “Return of the Jedi” premiered when I was twelve. I saw both just after my tenth and thirteenth birthdays. That’s what happens when movies open in May: you have to go to school through June and your birthday is in July. You get to see movies when school is finished.

I didn’t have many of the toys from Star Wars. They weren’t cheap and we didn’t have a lot of money. I had Luke’s X-34 landspeeder, which, much to my chagrin, had tiny wheels underneath and did not float on air. My Darth Vader and Luke figures fought often. Darth Vader usually won. Luke lost his head in one of those battles. I glued it back on, but it came off again. My mom bought me a new Luke and told me to be more careful. Luke’s lightsaber got bent so he never won against Darth Vader.

I saved proofs of purchase from my figures so I could send away for Boba Fett, who was originally only available via mail with a certain number of proofs. He had a removable rocket. I got my Boba Fett, but I took too long in mailing in for him. Some dumbass kids supposedly swallowed the rocket so Boba Fett was recalled and remade with a non-removable rocket. I missed out on a piece of history because I was poor.

Unlike today, we all had to wait three years between Empire and Jedi. No one wanted to believe Darth Vader was really Luke’s father. We didn’t have a VCR. There was no streaming. We had to remember the movie from the theater and try to piece together what little information there was. I’m not sure if any of the movies played on television. Even if they did, you had to watch them when they aired. There were no DVRs.

I had a variety of figures from Star Wars. My Han Solo figure never lost a battle because he was a scoundrel who always shot first. I hated Chewbacca with the take-apart C3PO. It was a pain in the ass to keep track of the parts.

I eventually got an X-wing fighter. I beat the crap out of that thing as it fought with the giant GI Joe dolls I had. GI Joe always lost because GI Joe is dumb and Star Wars is cool.

I also had a soft spot for the bad guys. They had all the cool ships while the rebels had whatever piece of crap they could get flying. The exception was the Millennium Falcon. I swore when I grew up, I was going to build my house to look just like it. Unfortunately, that was a dream dashed by reality many years later. I still reserve the right to build a Millennium Falcon house when I win $100 million. No one will tell me no then.

After “Return of the Jedi” ran in theaters, I saved up enough money to buy a kit model of the speeder bike. It was super cool. I also made a model of C3PO. He was easy to build and I still have him today. The speeder bike took a lot of work.

Once I finished the speeder bike, I had planned to go to the kit shop and get some paint to finish it. Unfortunately, our landlady sold our house and the new landlord was an asshole. He came in, served us with an eviction notice and then purposely stepped on my speeder bike model and my model KITT car. I was crushed. We couldn’t afford to replace them, and we now had to move.

I thought about the movies often. I bought the VHS tapes. I bought the DVDs and the Blu-rays. I bought the special editions. I watched them all over and over.

The prequels premiered after I was married. Again, they had May premieres. The difference this time was both Paul and I wanted to see them, so we went in early June. I was 28, 31, and 34 years old when I saw them. I didn’t like Jar Jar Binks because I found him more racist than annoying. Hayden Christensen’s stilted acting was a bit of a distraction, but I gave it a pass. He was a new actor in a heady role and this was Star Wars.

They definitely weren’t the best movies and I didn’t ask for prequels, but I had long given up on sequels. The story line was okay. Yes, there are plot holes, but I never looked at Star Wars as high art. It was always escapism for me and was a time for little me to enjoy the glory of of space battles, light sabers and shit blowing up.

When the sequels finally came along, they had changed from what was written in the books. That was okay with me. Though I knew about them, I never had a desire to read the books or the comics that had come out over the years. I never got into the nitpicking that some fans did.

Many people hate the directors of the sequels. The only thing that bothered me enough to laugh and roll my eyes was Leia doing her Mary Poppins thing and flying back to the ship. Even seven-year-old me thinks that’s dumb. Others find it empowering.

I liked “Solo.” I liked “Rogue One.” I really enjoyed how the end of “Rogue One” ends a moment before Star Wars begins. Now that I have them on Blu-ray, the only delay is in the speed in which I can change discs.

On December 22, 2019, at 49 years of age, I sat in the back of the movie theater and watched “The Rise of Skywalker” with Paul. I didn’t cringe when Emperor Palpatine came back. I just went with the story. It found it intriguing that what remained of the Death Star from “Return of the Jedi” was now partially in the ocean on Kef Bir. I loved the light saber battle there.

I didn’t mind that footage of Leia that was cut from the previous movies was used. Carrie Fisher is dead. They did what they could with what they had and I think it was good enough. I’ve decided to stay away from the nitpickers and naysayers this time.

I can’t help but see Star Wars from the viewpoint of seven-year old me. She loves the movies. The plot holes that seem to be driving people crazy don’t matter to her.

There is always awe and wonder with a sprinkling of joy whenever I see these movies. They have been a huge part of my life. I have seen every one in a theater during their first run, including when the original trilogy was released in the 1990s.

There’s a fondness in my heart for these movies. The movies aren’t perfect. They never will be. They will never live up to everyone’s expectations. There is no way I will ever watch the opening of Star Wars, with the star destroyers slowly moving overhead, without a smile on my face. You can get a sense of the awe of the Death Star blowing up with an recording of people in the theater in 1977 thanks to modern technology.

The movies took me to a place a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away and showed me something wondrous and magical. Star Wars blew my mind. No one had ever seen anything like it. My seven-year-old eyes were witnessing the pinnacle of filmmaking. It was gritty and dirty and real.

I’ve been on this wild ride for forty-three years. It’s been a hell of a trip and I get to take that journey every time I turn my Blu-ray player on.

If you’re as old as I am, take your little self with you when you watch the movies. You’ll never be disappointed and you will find, the Force has always been with you.

[mcnaughton]

Abandoning Hope -- Some Thoughts on Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

*NOTE: I wrote this the day after seeing Rogue One at the cinema. I don't do FB, so I posted it to my neglected G+ and linked to Twitter ( twitter.com/drewmcnaughton ). Every few years I remember I have a Tumblr, so I'm sharing it here 6 months later. Also, to correct the opening sentence, I did not see R1 again in theaters, making it the first live action Star Wars movie I've ever only seen once on the big screen. Enjoy....... Original Post 12/16/16 ( https://plus.google.com/108163877778963936170/posts/TUqccQPVkzf ) I will see Rogue One again while it is still at the cinema. That isn't really saying much since I saw Phantom Menace five times during the summer of 1999, back when I had way more time on my hands and George Lucas was only in his first phase of ruining my childhood. Today at work, I told people who knew I saw it last night that if they like Star Wars, then Rogue One is worth seeing, and if they had seen all of them, then they had already seen worse Star Wars movies as well as much better ones (among which I would include The Force Awakens). I did not really know what to expect walking into Rogue One as I had read no spoilers other than there would be no opening crawl (real spoilers will follow below). While I was looking forward to seeing it, it was the least excited I had ever been for a new Star Wars movie (I was 4 years old when Jedi premiered, and the Emperor's force lightning torture of Luke was too much for my little mind to handle). I identified at least two reasons for my lack of enthusiasm: it would not move the saga forward nor would it likely answer long pondered questions since in at least a general sense we already know what happens because it is literally spelled out for us in the opening title crawl of the original Star Wars. Also, we just got a new Star Wars a year ago. I probably will be much more excited for Episode VIII next year, but it is also possible that the House of Mouse Star Wars saturation is already taking its toll. ***Spoilers below, you've been warned*** I walked away from Rogue One with mixed feelings. I did not enjoy it as much as I did last year's The Force Awakens. This is largely due to Rogue One’s paper thin characters. I don’t dislike Jyn or the Captain guy. The blind Jedi inspired warrior and his brick shithouse companion are fun. I especially got a huge kick out of blind Chirrut (I had to Google his name because I honestly could not remember it) saying "May the Force of Others Be With You" and his reference to the Whills, both of which are ancient relics of the earliest drafts of The Star Wars by Lucas (I highly recommend The Star Wars comic book miniseries that brings the rough draft to life; it isn't exactly what I'd characterize as a good story, but it is a fascinating look at from what Star Wars evolved, as well as how certain elements emerged decades later in the prequels, for better or worse). But the only character I really cared about was the droid K-2S0. He dies. They all die. That was fairly predictable. But only K-2S0's sacrifice made me even somewhat emotional. The Captain is a one note character, and while I embrace the diversity on display in these new Star Wars films, I honestly had a difficult time understanding some of his dialogue due at least in part to the character’s (or actor’s) accent. Then there is Jyn, who goes from not really caring about the Rebellion (or anything for that matter) to preaching about "hope" to Mon Mothma almost immediately after her father is killed, seemingly turning on a dime in terms of her character’s motivation. This character’s shift is less convincing than Anakin's turn to the Dark Side. I cared less about Jyn after 2+ hours than I did about Rey in her first couple of minutes on screen in The Force Awakens while scavenging the crashed Star Destroyer, hocking her goods, and making her portion of space bread. Maybe it was a difference in the quality of the acting, the script writing, or both. The absense of characters in whom I am emotionally invested is a big problem I have in fully embracing Rogue One. Not caring about the characters is largely what sank the prequels, especially The Phantom Menace (though to be fair, I really liked Ewan McGregor’s performance in Attack of the Clones because he seemed to be having fun with the role, and even Hayden Christensen had a few shining moments about midway through Revenge of the Sith where I actually felt his inner turmoil). Speaking of which, Darth Vader is in Rogue One and it is pretty awesome. We see his lava planet castle, based on old conceptual art for Empire Strikes Back, I believe. Most of the planets in Rogue One are identified by title cards. This one is not, though I assumed it was Mustafar and I'm sure that will be confirmed or denied through some official Star Wars sanctioned means if it hasn't already. I absolutely love the planet Jedha, with the relics of the last remaining Jedi temple and fallen statues that are very much in the spirit of the Lord of the Rings films (think The Argonath from Fellowship of the Ring). Pretty much everything that happens on this planet are my favorite parts of the movie. I'm getting slightly ahead of myself here though. The film opens with a somewhat cliched scene of young Jyn seeing the murder of her mother and abduction of her father by the Imperial bad guy who needs help finishing the construction of the Death Star. It is notable that the mother is wearing clothing very similar to the Jedi robes in the prequels that were also worn by common Tatooine folks in A New Hope and Return of the Jedi. She also is the bearer of a Kyber Crystal, which have long been known to be the power element for both Jedi/Sith lightsabers as well as the Death Star's main weapon, though never acknowledged on film until now. We then flash forward to Jyn in an imperial jail. It is at this point that I really started to worry about Rogue One because in the next 10 minutes, we visit at least 4 different planets, and I started to wonder if the film was heading into a narrative nightmare not witnessed since David Lynch's Dune (which, in full disclosure, I absolutely love, though I'd never try to convince anyone that it is actually a good movie). Fortunately it does not (although perhaps Rogue One would be far more memorable if it was a complete disaster of a film rather than one that is just somewhat off its mark). As I write this, it has been about 24 hours since I saw Rogue One, and that brief, messy stretch of the film is mostly a blur in my mind, but at its outset, Jyn is going to help the Rebels find Saw Gerrera played by Ghost Dog himself Forest Whitaker because plot reasons.. That leads to the terrific sequences on Jedha. The film is worth seeing for these alone. In The Force Awakens, Han Solo stated that Luke Skywalker went in search of the last Jedi temple. Perhaps what we see on Jedha will come into play in next year's Episode VIII, or perhaps not. There was no teaser for Episode VIII before or after Rogue One. Then a bunch of stuff happens: Jyn's dad dies, we see Tarkin which is cool, and we see some other OT characters, some of whom's cameos are clever, while others are shameless fan service and pandering. And then we get to the film's third act, which has been what most people who have seen and enjoyed Rogue One have pointed to as its highlight. Frankly, I was underwhelmed. Again, I got a little emotional when the droid K-2S0 is killed protecting Jyn and Captain guy. Many of the more iconic images from the film's trailers didn't even make into the final cut of this sequence (which calls into question the apparent validity of the rumors of the production being troubled). I did not hate this extended sequence, but this is the first time in any Star Wars movie where I was not fully engaged in the epic battle. Yes, that includes the ones in the prequels. I did really like when Darth Vader's Star Destroyer popped up to thwart any sense of pure victory the Rebels may have felt after capturing the Death Star plans. Then we see Princess Leia, obviously a special effect, and she lightspeeds away on the Tantave IV into the opening shot of Episode IV. This all calls into question why The House of Mouse felt compelled to make this movie. Well, the answer is simple, to continue to make "a shitload of money" (to quote Lone Star from Spaceballs) off of their $4 billion investment. But why this story? My guess is that the powers that be recognized that Revenge of the Sith’s attempt to tie directly into the beginning of A New Hope failed miserably, largely because of the 20 year gap in the saga timeline between the two films. This is probably why they went with Princess Leia at the end of Rogue One and not Artoo and Threepio, since we already saw them on the Tantave IV in one of the last shots in Episode III. There's a lot of unaccounted for events on the Star Wars timeline, especially in light of the abandonment of the Extended Universe (which was fine by me because most of those novels and comic books were really dumb) and the introduction of new characters, concepts and entities in The Force Awakens. Maybe years from now (or much sooner) we'll get to see the Battle of Jaku on the big screen in another standalone film. I would have preferred that to what we get in Rogue One. Some of my specific nitpicks, such as how can the X- and U-Wings destroy the AT-ATs when in Empire Strikes Back their "armor is too strong for blasters", I've already found answers to -- according to Den Of Geek, these are actually AT-ACTs, designed for cargo, not combat ( http://www.denofgeek.com/us/movies/star-wars/260771/star-wars-rogue-one-easter-eggs-and-reference-guide ). My brother picked up on some other nitpicks, particularly how the end of Rogue One and the beginning of A New Hope don't exactly match up ( https://t.co/q881t4Jr5e ). I'm sure more of those will occur to the collective Star Wars community as time goes by and second, third and perhaps fourth theatrical viewings occur. *****END SPOILERS**** Look, when new Star Wars (and also Star Trek) movies are released, I am tense when I see them the first time because I am anxiously waiting for them to start sucking. There is an unfortunate precedent for that for these two franchises. In the last year, I enjoyed both The Force Awakens and Star Trek Beyond way more on subsequent viewings than I did the first times. In the case of Rogue One, it stumbles out of the gate, then thrives during the Jedha sequences, and finally settles in as a B-/C+ grade Star Wars film. There is a chance I might like it even less when I see it again, but I might also find more to appreciate. I've seen the worst Star Wars and Star Trek films at least several dozen times each, and the best ones hundreds if not thousands of times (no exaggeration…. I wore out my VHS copies of Star Wars, Empire, Wrath of Khan, Search for Spock and The Voyage Home as a kid). I'll see Rogue One again. I even look forward to it. I just HOPE I find something more to like about it.