#stars genuine interest in and respect for the black arms and their culture and such things

[totaleclipse573]

Thought about Starleon for too long LET ME OUT

[lady-divine-writes]

Klaine Advent Drabble 2020 - “Take One” (Rated PG13)

Summary: Embroiled in the aftermath of two very messy break-ups, Kurt and Blaine are preparing to film their first love scene together. But how do you pretend to be in love when your love life is falling apart?

It probably doesn't hurt to be in love with your co-star then. (1982 words)

Notes: Written for the @klaineadvent Drabble Challenge 2020 prompt 'grey'.

Read on AO3.

“Ooo, I get a limo this time,” Kurt mumbles, not nearly as impressed as he’s pretending to be. But he needs to keep up appearances. Even though it’s the literal buttcrack of dawn, he’s not alone. There are about thirty asshats, armed with cameras, camped out on his doorstep, climbing over each other to snap a candid of him for the gossip sites. A photo of him emerging from his townhouse fresh-faced and ready for another day on set will fetch an easy couple hundred.

But if he looks like he rolled out of bed, drank a bottle of whiskey for breakfast, then fell down a flight of stairs, landing face-first onto a mountain of cocaine - those pictures would fetch considerably more.

That’s what he gets for going through a horrendous break-up while having the nerve to be rich and famous.

Despite how he feels about his life at this moment, he went for the former, not the latter. He would never touch hard drugs, not for any reason, and he can't justify looking less than his best. 

Like a good friend once told him - never let them see you sweat.

“Kurt! Kurt Hummel! Over here!” the pariahs start calling, some of them whistling for his attention like he’s a dog. “Hummel! Hey, Hummel!”

Hummel.

That’s the one that gets him, burrows into the roots of his teeth and makes his whole head pulsate. It keeps his feet moving when he might have stopped to exchange a polite hello. Who talks to people like that? When did it become acceptable to bellow out someone’s last name as a means of getting their attention? Is it too much to ask for the respect of at least shoving a ‘Mr.’ in front of it? Have these glorified stalkers forgotten that if it weren’t for him and stars like him the only jobs they could get would be snapping photos of families for minimum wage at Six Flags?

Ugh. 

Too much thinking too early in the morning.

He could write an essay on how much he loathes pap culture, but today, Kurt can’t be bothered caring.

He slaps on a smile and waves, sliding his glasses down his nose only far enough so they can’t see how red his eyes are from crying.

“Oh, hello! I didn’t see you all here! It’s so nice of you to greet me at 5:30 on this fine winter morning! Oh, careful there. You spilled your coffee. And I think you just kicked that poor young man in the face.”

Kurt greets his guests this way every morning, killing them with kindness, as subtle an eff you as he can come up with when his brain cells have yet to kick in for the day.

Coffee. He needs coffee. About a gallon-and-a-half of it.

Kurt glides through the crowd, an angelfish among sharks, and comes out unscathed.

A man with dark hair and olive skin, wearing a fitted, black uniform tailored to within an inch of its life, opens the car door for Kurt as he approaches.

"Good morning, Mr. Hummel."

“Good morning, Harold. It's nice to see you.” Kurt slides into the car, thankful when the chauffeur shuts the door. He sinks into the leather seat and tosses his sunglasses aside. “God!" he moans, burying his face in his hands. "I don't want to do this! I want to stay home and eat ice cream! I don’t want to kiss anyone today!”

Blaine, who had been waiting quietly and wearing a sympathetic smile, frowns. “Gee. Thanks.”

Kurt's head snaps up, his face splotchy and red in seconds. “Blaine! I’m so sorry! I didn’t know you were …! That’s not what I meant!" He takes a deep breath in, lets it out slowly. "It's not you. I just don’t feel particularly romantic today.”

“It’s okay. I know what you mean. I feel the same way.”

Kurt squares Blaine with a stern look. “Gee. Thanks.”

Blaine ducks his eyes, his cheeks turning pink as he pours Kurt a glass of champagne. There’s always champagne, no matter what vehicle the studio sends to pick them up. But Kurt and Blaine never avail themselves to it.

Today, however, Kurt thinks as he accepts the flute Blaine offers and takes a sip, is an exception.

“I didn’t know Harold was picking you up first,” Kurt says, starting small talk to ease the tension. Kurt and Blaine don’t usually have trouble making small talk.

But, again, today is an exception.

“Well ...” Blaine clears his throat, seems embarrassed “... I was just … you know … a few blocks down the way.”

Kurt sits up further, leans forward with interest. “So you did it. You moved out.”

“Yup,” Blaine replies quietly. “I couldn’t … I just couldn’t stay. Not after …” He stops and sniffles, turning his head to hide eyes that must be as red as Kurt’s. Kurt doesn’t know.

He only ever notices how striking they are.

Kurt rests a comforting hand on Blaine’s knee. “I know.” 

“Yeah,” Blaine says with a slightly bitter laugh. “So does the whole world. In fact, the photogs knew I was leaving before I knew. You should have seen it. I could barely get past them.”

Kurt pulls a box of tissues out of the side panel and offers one to Blaine. “They’re bottom feeders. Try to ignore them.”

“Easier said than done.”

“I know,” Kurt repeats, feeling exceptionally useless. He’s in the exact same boat, but his heart hurts more for Blaine.

Blaine doesn’t deserve what he's going through. He doesn’t deserve such a public break-up.

He doesn’t deserve having his name drug all over social media by an emotionally manipulative bastard.

Kurt gazes out the window at the sky above. The forecast said it would be clear and sunny today, but it’s cloudy and grey. It matches Kurt's mood. Everything is cloudy and grey.

Well, maybe not everything.

The champagne isn’t. It’s cool and refreshing, and the bubbles make his tongue tingle.

That helps.

And Blaine helps, too.

Even gloomy, melancholy Blaine helps.

Just being in Blaine's presence helps.

“Living in the public eye isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, huh?” Blaine asks, though it sounds as much like a statement to himself as a question for Kurt.

“Not on days like today. But that’s the trade-off for being a star, I guess.” 

“Would you ever give it up?” Blaine takes a sip so slight it doesn’t lower the level of the liquid in his glass.

“I can’t say I would. You?”

“Nah. Acting has given me so many opportunities I could never have dreamed of. And all the great people I've met? I mean, this is what? The fifth film we’ve starred in together?”

“It is." 

Blaine chuckles, shakes his head. "Some of them have been real winners."

"I know! The roles you get offered when you're just starting out are criminal! Let’s see, we’ve been rogue enemy agents from different factions …”

“High school frenemies …”

“Alien co-conspirators …”

“Jealous rivals …”

“And now … lovers.”

“Yes,” Blaine says bashfully. “And today …”

Kurt smiles. “We get together for the first time.”

Hearing Kurt say it makes Blaine’s heart race, his pulse thrumming so fast it disappears.

The day Blaine found out he’d gotten the role of Kurt’s love interest and not the ‘jealous ex’ (the role his agent originally pitched him for since they play adversaries so well) was a dream come true. The studio felt the two of them could take their insane sexual tension (the studio's words, not Blaine's, although he doesn't disagree) and use it to fuel the plot of their latest 'friends-to-lovers' rom-com.

Blaine has always wanted to be a leading man. Deep down, he prayed that his first time, he'd play opposite Kurt. Now that it has finally happened, the role of his dreams comes with the greatest perk in the universe - an intimate moment with Kurt.

In front of about three dozen crew members, but still. 

It's Blaine's chance to indulge his crush, which he plans to savor since it may not come around again. 

Not in the way Blaine wants.

As friendly as Kurt is to him, as flirty as he can be, Blaine doesn't know for sure whether Kurt shares his feelings.

“If you don't mind my asking, when did he tell you?” Blaine asks.

“He didn’t." Kurt snorts humorlessly. "I woke up, and he was gone. I thought he had left for work. He had a table reading at six that morning, so I wasn’t immediately suspicious. Not until I started noticing important things were missing - clothes, toiletries, his contact lenses, his laptop …” 

"Did he tell you why he was leaving?"

Kurt chews his lower lip at the question he'd known was coming ... the answer he's debating whether or not to give. "Eventually." He glances up at Blaine, flashes a sly grin, and decides to go for broke. “He left because he thought I was falling in love with my co-star.”

"Really?" And just like that, Blaine Anderson dies, his heart shrinking into nothing and blowing away on the wind. "W-which one?" he asks, solely for conversation's sake.

This time, when Kurt snorts, clamping a hand over his mouth to keep from spraying champagne all over the interior of the limo, it's genuine. "You, you gumball!"

"Oh. Oh!" Blaine’s expression of shock is so endearing, Kurt can’t look at it too long. There's a glow about him. It's like staring into the sun. “That's ... that’s funny. My ex broke up with me for the same reason. Because of ... you. At least, that's the excuse he gave on Twitter ... and Instagram ... and Facebook. There were other things. Other men, too.” Blaine's glow dims as he talks about his ex. Their relationship, and separation, weren’t as civil as Kurt’s. In reality, trouble had been brewing behind the scenes for a while. 

He’s glad they finally went their separate ways. 

But it stings just the same, finding out that someone you once loved, who you thought loved you back, was using you for clout. 

And in that, Blaine's ex was a better actor than Blaine ever was.

"That is funny. Not funny ha-ha. Just ... funny. Who would have thunk?" Kurt goes back to his glass of champagne, keeping an eye on Blaine above the rim.

Blaine glances out the window as the limo slows, approaching the gates to the studio lot. Kurt doesn't follow Blaine's gaze, but he doesn't need to. 

He knows what Blaine sees by the way his face falls.

Blaine had hoped they could slip in quietly, but there's already a mob three feet deep waiting for them. The photographers and fans won't be able to see a thing through the car's windows. The tint on them is darker than dark. Still, the whole lot will be on high alert with them here. 

Inevitably, a handful will slip in. 

They may even find their way on set.

Blaine doesn't have the energy to deal with that.

Not today.

“How are we going to get through it?" Blaine asks. "Filming this scene? I mean, the timing is ... uncanny, to say the least.”

“Think of it this way …” Kurt slides across to Blaine’s side, sits as close as they're both comfortable with. Crooking a finger beneath his chin, Kurt draws Blaine's attention away from the gathering crowd and over to his eyes instead “… we get to spend the entire afternoon making each other feel better. That's how we're going to get through this. Agreed?”

Blaine's eyes lower, flicker to Kurt's lips unintentionally. When they travel back up, he notices Kurt's eyes do the same. He swallows hard. At this distance from Kurt, from his mouth, Blaine only has the wherewithal to say one word. He makes it count. "Agreed."

[ravenclaw-craftsgirl]

~IDENTITY (AS OF 6TH YEAR)~

Name: Lilian Marie Le’Reau

Gender: Female

Age: 17

Birth Date: February 23, 1973

Species: Human

Blood Status: Muggleborn

Sexuality: Gay

Alignment: Neutral

Ethnicity: Caucasian

Nationality: French/English (dual citizenship)

Residence: London, England

Myer Briggs Personality Type: INFJ-T The Advocate

1st Wand: 

Alder Wood 12 3/4 Slightly springy flexibility Unicorn Hair core Alder is an unyielding wood, yet often its ideal owner is not stubborn or obstinate, rather helpful, considerate and most likable. Whereas most wand woods seek similarity in the characters of those they will best serve, alder is unusual in that it seems to desire a nature that is, if not precisely opposite to its own, then certainly of a markedly different type. When an alder wand is happily placed, it becomes a magnificent, loyal helpmate. Of all wand types, alder is best suited to non-verbal spell work, whence comes its reputation for being suitable only for the most advanced witches and wizards.

2nd Wand:

Acacia Wood 13 Supple flexibility Horned Serpent Horn core A very unusual wand wood, which I have found creates tricky wands that often refuse to produce magic for any but their owner, and also withhold their best effects from all but those most gifted. This sensitivity renders them difficult to place, and I keep only a small stock for those witches or wizards of sufficient subtlety, for acacia is not suited to what is commonly known as ‘bangs-and-smells’ magic. When well-matched, an acacia wand matches any for power, though it is often underrated due to the peculiarity of its temperament.

Animagus: Black Ragdoll with curved white marks under the eyes and on the paws

Misc Magical Abilities: Naturally adept at most forms of transfiguration and animation charms, wandless spell casting, silent spell casting

Boggart Form: Death Eater from her past

Riddikulus Form: Darth Vader saying “Lilian, I am your father”

Amortentia (others): A kitchen cooking a full meal; generally steak, green beans, baked potatoes, buttered rolls and brownies

Amortentia (Lilian): (before dating) Machine shop oil, the smell of grease and degreaser (after dating/ married) The smell of an old book and the fragrance of Merula’s perfume

Patronus: Multiple Wolves (average 2-3, more depending on the need)

Patronus Memory: The memory of all her friends, family and loved ones attending the unveiling of her first golem

Mirror of Erised: Herself, living life without fear of persecution by muggles or pureblood wizards.

Specialized/Favourite Spells: 

Piertotum Locomotor

Baubillious (for offense and creation)

Permanent Sticking Charm (It’s easier than weeks of welding)

Aguamenti (you wouldn’t believe how many fires are started near Lilian)

Incendio (speaking of fire…)

Engorgio

Reducio

~APPEARANCE~

In game

Height: 6’3” (190.5 cm)

Weight: 170 lbs (77 kg)

Physique: Toned/ Lean build

Eye Colour: Purple/ Amethyst

Hair Colour: Snow White (originally chestnut)

Skin Tone: Porcelain

Body Modifications: Single Purple streak of Dyed hair

Scarring: After the battle of Hogwarts in the second wizarding war, Lilian loses her left arm and right leg below the joints. She later develops prosthetics nearly identical to her original limbs, but stronger than steel

Inventory: On her person she will have a charm bracelet of several shrunken items including:

-a table -a cooler -a medical cabinet (with everything inside secured) -three Tiny Golems (for easy transport when not in use)

As well as a satchel with several books, pencils and sketch pads for when she has an idea or observes something inspiring. She owns a car and a Thunderbolt broomstick.

Fashion: Lilian normally dresses in black slacks, a white button up shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a black vest over the white shirt. She also owns several pairs of boots, most in the style of buckle up platforms with steel toes.  She will also wear various dresses to accentuate her figure, muscles or the dresses design as well as several pop culture t-shirts (her favorites are often science fiction based such as Star Wars and Halo)

~ALLEGIANCES~

Hogwarts House: Ravenclaw

Affiliations/Organizations:

The Order of the Phoenix

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

The Constitutional Republic of France

The Royal Crown of England

Professions:

Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office (consultant)

Department of Magical Equipment Control 

Freelance Craftswoman (magical prosthetics)

Freelance Craftswoman (miscellaneous items)

Freelance Craftswoman (Animated Objects)

~HOGWARTS INFORMATION~

Class Proficiencies:

Astronomy: ★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆ (E) Charms: ★★★★★★★★★★ (O) DADA: ★★★★★☆☆☆☆☆ (O) Flying: ★★★★★★★★☆☆ (A) Herbology: ★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆ (E) History of Magic: ★★★★★★★☆☆☆ (A) Potions: ★★★★★★★★☆☆ (O) Transfiguration: ★★★★★☆☆☆☆☆ (O)

Electives:  Study of Ancient Runes Ancient Runes Alchemy Arithmancy Advanced Arithmancy

Extra Curricular: 

Dungeons and Dragons club Potions Club Magic TheoryAncient Runes Club Education of Muggle Items Group (unofficial president)

Favourite Professors: 

Professor McGonagall: While not typically the first choice of Ravenclaws, Lilian respects Professor McGonagall for her cool and decisive temperament, her rational thought processes and her ability to make the correct call in stressful situations. She is also partial due to the shared Animagus attribute as well as the professor’s forgiving nature towards Lilian’s Experimentation with magical creations.

Least Favourite Professors:

Professor Trelawney:  While Lilian respects every form of knowledge, she never understood why this class was a core requirement and not an elective. Surely if someone was that desperate to know their ‘future’ they could use their own time instead of forcing an entire class to follow suit. Lilian is a firm believer in ‘you make your own fate’ and views Professor Trelawney as overly superstitious, even by wizarding world standards.

~RELATIONSHIPS~

Father: Daniel Le’Reau Muggle English Professor Attended University of Cambridge, England Short, Chestnut brown hair with matching Goatee. Tall, slightly scrawny 38 years old.

Daniel is soft-spoken and amicable, often seeking the least confrontational methods. Polite and poised, as expected of a respected University professor

Upper Middle Class 

Professor of Literature and English Studies at the University of Cambridge 

Daniel is a very well known professor, often sited in many English studies papers for his ideas on early literature such as Shakespeare and Anglo-Saxton ballads, noting their implications in modern art and culture as well as their historic significance. He is also known to be quite supportive of his students, often treating them like family members and helping them achieve their dreams. 

Known the McKinley family since Lilian was 5 (the day she was almost kidnapped)

Mother: Amelie Nicole Le’Reau Muggle Long straight Black hair, Amethyst eyes, Average height, toned muscles, rugged beauty. Mechanic (military contracted) 37 years old.

Amelie is an outspoken, avid thinker who spends just as much time as her husband educating people.

Amelie originally served in the Royal Engineering Corps in her early years until she met and fell in love with a rather awkward yet lovable man named Daniel. Shortly before her Exit date, she married him and had Lilian. Since then, she’s been a military contractor for the Royal Engineering Corps. Assisting with various mechanical jobs from basic transportation to armored troop transports to Tanks and Mobile Weapons Systems.

Nearly traumatized when a dark wizard kidnapped Lilian after killing several bystanders with magic and curses. Almost forbade Lilian from attending Hogwarts when she received the acceptance letter. Remains in good standing with Shamus McKinley.

Love Interest: Merula

While they only officially started dating during the Sixth year, their relationship started in the Fourth year.

During the Celestial ball, Lilian noticed that Merula didn’t have anyone to dance with and offered to dance with her.  After the Celestial Ball, Merula’s Attitude softened to a degree. While Lilian was still being teased about how tall she was, she was no  longer harassed for being a muggle, nor was she mocked for her passions. While Merula wouldn’t outright ask for help from Lilian, She would never deny Lilian helping her.

Generally the attitude of the two was always Lilian genuinely trying to learn about Merula while Merula made an effort to understand Lilian and where she was from. Eventually Mistrust and Resentment would make way to curiosity and intrigue. 

Only when Lilian had saved Merula’s life from Dementors had she finally figured out her mixed feelings for Lilian, realizing that she had fallen in love with the quiet muggle born witch, eccentricities and all.

Best Friends:

Rowan Hubei Khanna (Female Khanna) Rowan Harrow Khanna (Male Khanna) Ben Copper Penny Haywood Badeea Ali Ismelda Murk Rival: None

Enemy:

Patricia Rakepick

R

Dormmates: 

Rowan Hubei Khanna Badeea Ali Tulip Karasu

Pets:

Eleanor is an american shorthair that Lilian rescued from the street during her trip to Diagon Alley. Eleanor had been a kitten at the time, thus Lilian was given special permission to have her familiar with her during all classes to make sure she didn’t go hungry.

Due to outstanding Circumstance, Lilian has also (legally) adopted an Acromantula that refers to himself as Cain. While technically intelligent enough to take care of himself, he does allow her to give pets and scratch his carapace in the right areas. In exchange, Lilian is given a supply of webbing to refine into silk as she needs.

Closest Canon Friends:

Ismelda Murk Rowan Hubei Khanna

Closest MC Friends:

Helene Adler @heleneplays​

Skylar Morningstar @angrynar​

Ada Corcoran @ask-bincopper-archive​

Neon Welkin @neonbluewaves​

Ethren Whitecross @hogwartsmysterystory​

~BACKGROUND/HISTORY~

[The following is an excerpt from the book The Craftswoman, a biography on the Life and Philosophies of Lilian Le’Reau]

Interviewer: What do you know of Mrs. Le’Reau? Headmistress Rowan Hubei Khanna: Lilian? Wow, where do I begin… She was always quiet. It was almost as if she were watching everything that happened for the sake of safety and precautions. Like she was always expecting the worst to happen to her no matter what. But given her history I wouldn’t put it past her. 

I: Could you please elaborate on that? Headmistress Khanna: Well, I suppose so. When Lilian was around the age of five, she and her mother were attacked by a rogue Death Eater, one of the remnants of the first wizarding war. A lot of people died that day, several more had to have their memory erased. 

I: With the Memory Erasing Charm, yes. The report of ‘The Market Massacre’ were in the papers for weeks after the incident, if I recall. Headmistress Khanna: Right. Well, This death eater had a particular goal in mind. I was told that he kept on rambling about how he was gonna make  new army, one to combat the remnants of the Order of Phoenix. He had planned on kidnapping Children with magical talent in order to build this order. 

I: Fortunately, the Auror Shamus McKinley was nearby to save her. He not only saved her, but dispatched the dark wizard as well, yes? Headmistress Khanna: While this is true, it still had its ramifications. No one goes through that sort of experience the same. Lilian didn’t like to talk about where she came from or about her childhood.

I: Well, how about her years alongside you at Hogwarts? How would you describe that? Headmistress Khana: Our time at Hogwarts was actually rather mundane compared to the adventures of our other classmates. Lilian and I were generally the part of the plan that collected information and helped solve the riddles of the vaults, rather than actually fighting any of the curses there. Otherwise, much of her time was spent studying, trying to figure out new ways to apply spells and context of said spells, and honing her own personal abilities.  Like I said, a rather average Hogwarts tenure for the both of us.

I: Alright. How about during the battle of Hogwarts? Or perhaps anything during then and your graduation of Hogwarts? Headmistress Khanna: The time before the battle of Hogwarts, I can't testify for. For a while, most of us fell out of contact as we moved on with our lives, trying to make a name for ourselves in our own fields. But… 

I: It’s okay if you would like to avoid this subject. Headmistress Khanna: No no, it needs to be said. During the battle of Hogwarts, a lot of us were scared. None of us had been in this sort of conflict before, and those of us that had weren't ready for what we faced. Yet there Lilian was, setting up perimeters and directing people to the best suited jobs to help defend. She even brought in nearly a dozen golems to assist in the defense. We were lucky too, since those were the only things stopping the main host of trolls from climbing up the bridge. The battle itself is a blur, but when the dust settled, we all saw Lilian slumped against a wall, babbling on about equations and how many litres of blood she felt she had lost. She was missing her arm and leg, surrounded by a dozen or so dark wizards. 

I: Thank you, Headmistress. I think that’ll be all for now. Headmistress Khanna: I appreciate the need to document Lilian’s life. She’d be too busy to actually sit down and write it herself, believe it or not.

~PERSONALITY~

Lilian is a very open minded individual. Creative and Intelligent, She will always see projects through to the end, even if she already knows that the result will be failure. Despite the innumerable amount of failures that she’s had, Lilian always finds a way to take joy from any situation. While she mainly focuses on her work, she is a rather quiet and shy woman despite her imposing stature and very apparent abilities. She doesn’t like to brag, nor is she prone to any outwardly negative emotions. 

She does have several flaws though, first and foremost being her inability to cope with overly strong negative stimuli as well as a tendency to hyper fixate on a project at hand, often forgetting to eat and rest until her body physically forces her to sustain itself. (most common being her collapsing from exhaustion and sleep deprivation.)

MISC

Lives in the muggle world (London specifically)

Has family in both France and England

While not typically a fighter, Lilian has mastered the Patronus charm to astonishing success, manifesting three or more Wolf patroni with one casting.

While she is missing her left arm and right leg from the joints down, Lilian has since made prosthetic arms that are not only nearly identical to the previous limbs, they are far stronger than steel and well crafted enough to fool Muggles unless they closely inspect the hand in question.

Lilian married Merula nearly a year after the Battle of Hogwarts

In order to maintain hold of her tools while working and simultaneously casting spells, Lilian has mastered both the art of wandless and silent spellcasting.

Lilian owns a machine shop in London, making both Muggle and Magical items for multiple clients. She is allowed to do this through the employment of Squibs. This also allows her to take Auror Interns, teaching them how muggle technology works.

Lilian attempts to pioneer Golemancy, even attempting to have it recognized as an official practice of magic.

After Much convincing and reassuring, Lilian managed to get Merula to move to the Muggle world. Even then, this was only after several charms had been cast to help hide their magical nature from Ordinary Muggles. (Merula is particularly keen on cell phones.)

After several letters, Lilian agrees to teach several Magic Theory classes at Beauxbatons, much to the joy of several students and faculty. Lilian even demonstrates the magic and technology behind her prosthetics, inspiring the next generation of magic craftsmen and women.

[charliejrogers]

Birds of Prey (Or, Men Suck: An Action Movie!)

Before 2019’s Captain Marvel or 2017’s Wonder Woman had the opportunity to be smash successes, Margot Robbie’s turn as Harley Quinn in Suicide Squad, a character that was equal parts bad-assery, sadism, and unabashed sexuality, was the closest the comic book movie world had to a genuine female star. And, yes, that’s a direct knock on ScarJo’s Black Widow. Given the character’s popularity, Robbie’s interest in playing the character, the Me Too movement, and the subsequent success of Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel, a Harley Quinn movie was somewhat inevitable. The marketing for the film made it quite clear that Quinn’s new movie, Birds of Prey, aimed to rise far above the ashes of its predecessor. The previews advertised Quinn literally killing off the Joker (and symbolically cutting ties with one of the most complained-about aspects of Suicide Squad) by blowing up an ACE Chemicals building with Joker presumably inside. It was the location in the previous film where the Quinn and Joker’s relationship was born. This seemed like a bold, exciting jumping-off point for the film. Combined with its striking art design and lengthy sub-title (Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) the movie had me excited to watch a spirited indictment of the patriarchy under the guise of a comic book movie. That’s mostly what I got.

The movie indeed starts with an effectively brief animation detailing Harley’s life up to that point: haunted by her abandonment by her father and raised by harsh nuns, Harley’s need for male approval and hate of the establishment were finally realized when she met the Joker, a man for whom she cast aside her MD/PhD in psychology for a life of crime. But she gets tired of doing all the work and planning for Mr. J., but receiving none of the credit. It’s here you’d expect some big fight between Joker and Harley culminating in the explosion from the trailer. But the trailer was deceiving. We don’t see the fight. We just see Quinn’s reaction to being dumped by the Joker in a manner similar to how break-ups are portrayed in thousands of other pieces of fiction: crying hysterically, getting belligerently drunk, getting a pet, and denying that the break-up even happened. All this onscreen activity is accompanied by constant narration from Quinn who, instead of telling the truth about her pain and insecurities, lies and brags about her strength and maturity in dealing with the situation. When she ultimately decides to blow up ACE Chemicals, it is not an attempt to fight back against her abuser, but is instead her response to hearing other women talk shit about how she will likely go running back to the Joker. Blowing up the building doesn’t kill Joker (he’s not even present); it was just an immature, symbolic gesture to let the Joker know that she wasn’t coming back to him (like he would even care).

This rather weak portrayal of Quinn stands in stark contrast to the character as portrayed in the pilot of the recent animated show Harley Quinn. Interestingly, the show has Harley, who has recently been left for dead by the Joker, empower herself to leave the Joker. Yet, the portrayal at the start of Birds of Prey is intentional. It paves the way for eventual growth. It wouldn’t be much of a movie if she achieved her emancipation in the first five minutes. Plus, it perfectly falls in line with the relationship and characters established in Suicide Squad. There, Quinn and Joker were a couple madly in love, always desperately trying to get back to one another. Still, by shying away from the truth and horrors of the abuse Quinn suffered from the Joker and instead choosing to couch her abuse as “not getting credit/appreciation,” the movie weakens her power, strength, and growth in character. Her emancipation becomes less an empowered victory over abuse and misogyny and more just escaping the shadow of her arrogant boyfriend. This is unfortunate as symbolically it is satisfying that even Quinn’s first step towards independence, blowing up the ACE chemical building, is met with punishment and the assumption by male society that she can no longer defend herself. Seemingly every other bad guy in Gotham City knew to interpret the explosion exactly as Harley intended, and now they all seek vengeance for Miss Quinn’s many misdeeds, now that she lacks the protection of Mr. J.

The actual plot for the movie focuses on its villain, Ramon “Black Mask” Sionis, the epitome of white male privilege but without the confidence, a wealthy billionaire man-child so insecure he lashes out violently in response to the smallest insult. Sionis is trying to acquire the film’s MacGuffin, a diamond, on the exact same day all of Gotham’s underbelly, including Sionis, is out for Quinn’s head. The diamond is inadvertently pickpocketed by Cassandra Cain, a teenaged, female ne’er-do-well (Ella Jay Basco) who, like Quinn, is the victim of abuse and abandonment and has now turned to thievery to get by. For reasons I won��t spoil, Cassandra is unable to part ways with the diamond, so the hunt for the diamond becomes the hunt for Cassandra. It’s a hunt that involves multiple female protagonists. There’s Detective Montoya (Rosie Perez), a veteran detective trying to make a criminal case against Sionis. There’s Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell), a singer in Sionis’s nightclub whom he forces to be his personal driver and errand-girl. And then there’s the Huntress (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), a cross-bow-wielding bad-ass who actually isn’t after Sionis at all but is just kinda there on her own, separate revenge scheme. And, of course, Quinn inevitably gets involved in the hunt as well.

But for as much as the plot is about acquiring the diamond and escaping Sionis and his goons, it really is a film about female empowerment. The patriarchy, its inherent misogyny and perpetuation of rape culture, is the true villain. And emancipation from the grips of patriarchy is ultimately desired by all its female protagonists, not just Quinn. Detective Montoya is constantly passed up for promotions at work for decades even though she’s the brain by many successful operations. Black Canary, a Black woman, has an arc that combines misogyny with racism as she is forced into near slavery by Sionis (a white male who refers to her as “his little bird” and, not so subtly, “owns” an extensive collection of shrunken African heads). Her arc is my favorite in the film. And then there’s Huntress who… well, she’s just doing her own revenge thing, man. Like she’s killing dudes and stuff, but it’s hard to really link her with the deep anti-patriarchy themes the other three protagonists have. But where the movie really elevates itself beyond the sort of surface-level “girl power!” (that the Huntress unfortunately sorta represents) is in its willingness to be honest and nuanced about the brutality of sexual assault, even in the small degree it does address it.

Twice, Quinn finds herself incapacitated while being directly threatened by a man. The first occurs after her post-break-up binge-drinking night out where on the verge on consciousness, she is being caressed and fondled by a man in an alley and nearly kidnapped (and presumably raped) by two men. In the second instance, she’s hit with a paralytic agent. Her assailant crouches down next to her, puts her arm around his neck. “You’re still conscious,” he says to himself, as if reassuring himself like a man about to rape a drunk girl on the drink of consciousness. It’s rather disturbing and powerful to see our protagonist who is, in every sense of the phrase, a bad-ass be just as susceptible to be raped and taken advantage of as any other woman in society. No one is safe, and she’s not alone. There’s another rather difficult scene where the movie’s villain, Ramon Sionis, forces an innocent female patron at his night club, under the threat of death, to strip and dance on top of a table in front of the whole club. These are powerful and scary scenes that generally aren’t a part of superhero movies. No doubt, the success and nuance of the scenes is due to the fact that the movie is directed by a woman, Cathy Yan, written by a woman, Christina Hodson, and produced mainly by women (including the star Margot Robbie herself). If allowed to explore these issues more deeply, it would have been a fantastic film.

Still, this movie is not intended to be a deep, serious dive against real issues women face; I recognize its an action-focused comic book movie. And to that degree, the movie is mostly a success. It’s a fun movie with clever, visually-stunning action sequences. I was floored by its use of color (of purples, reds, and blues particularly) throughout all the fight scenes. There’s an extremely satisfying scene where Quinn infiltrates a police station with a gun that shoots out what looks like bean bags that release colorful dust/confetti upon impact. And the final battle scene in an abandoned boardwalk’s funhouse featured one of the most creative set pieces for an action movie this side of Temple of Doom, replete of trampolines, mirrors, and gripping melee combat (with mallets, bats, and kicks to the groin, instead of the often-more boring-shoot-outs.)

I really cannot say enough good things about the visual style of the film or its tightly choreographed fight scenes. Less good things can be said about scenes that do no feature fighting/action. McGregor as Sionis is fine, but Sionis is an uninteresting villain, and his over-the-top childish nature is boring to watch. The movie would have been better served by a villain like Jason Schwartzman’s Gideon from Scott Pilgrim vs the World, a well-respected, successful, confident, misogynistic tool, rather than the insecure mess seen here. Also, Ella Jay Basco as the teenaged pickpocket Cassandra is not a great actress and there was little chemistry between her and Robbie. This is unfortunate since the movie aims to cast Harley as Cassandra’s new foster-mother to highlight Quinn’s growth and this sequence takes up a good chunk of the middle of the film. I did like how the film explored the idea that Harley Quinn, though a “super villain,” is a normal person who needs to get groceries like the rest of us. Scenes like these helped to make Quinn more sympathetic but were largely hampered by bad dialogue.

Furthermore, are we just going to ignore that Harley handed Cassandra a bomb with a lit fuse, giving Cassandra no choice but to throw the bomb out a car window thereby killing one of their assailants?! Cassandra cannot be more than 15 years old, but the movie does nothing to explore what this obviously traumatic situation does to Cassandra. I’ll buy the film’s excuse that she has a penchant for pickpocketing as a consequence of her social circumstances… but you can’t tell me that she would have no second thoughts/trauma about killing another human being! Sorry, that’s the pediatrician in me getting out.

So yeah, I liked the movie. It’s not great, but it ain’t bad. Its weak dialogue and weak villain are made up for by the film’s great visuals and its absolute commitment to doing right by its themes, even approaching serious issues with nuance and grace, something that would never have happened if a bunch of dudes crafted this picture. And even if the first hour isn’t great, most of my complaints washed away in the last half hour when all the female protagonists finally join together and that awesome funhouse battle takes place. Further, it is satisfying to see that Harley Quinn really does change throughout the film. In defeating Sionis, she is able to finally free herself from the Joker, but also from all the men who assumed she was nothing more than the Joker’s bitch. The movie doesn’t leave much room for a sequel which in itself is refreshing. It tells a complete tale. Still, I’d happily seek to watch more of these birds of prey having been let out of their cages, free to take on more of patriarchy.

 **/ (Two and a half stars out of four)

[grigori77]

2018 in Movies - My Top 30 Fave Movies (Part 3)

10.  BLACK PANTHER – remember back in 1998, when Marvel had their first real cinematic success with Blade?  It was a big deal on two fronts, not just because they’d finally made a (sort of) superhero movie to be proud of, but also because it was, technically, the first ever truly successful superhero movie starring a black protagonist (the less said about the atrocious Steel movie the better, I say).  I find it telling that it took them almost twenty years to repeat the exercise – there have been plenty of great black superheroes on-screen since Wesley Snipes rocked the fangs and black leather, especially in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but they’ve always been in supporting roles to the main (so far universally WHITE) stars (the now-cancelled Luke Cage was a notable exception, but that’s on-demand TV on Netflix). All of this makes the latest feature to glide smoothly out of the MCU mould so significant – the standalone star vehicle for Civil War’s OTHER major new success story (after 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming), Prince T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman) of Wakanda, finally redresses the balance … and then some. Picking up pretty much RIGHT where the third Captain America film left off, we see T’Challa return to the secretive, highly-advanced African kingdom of Wakanda to officially take up his new role as king and fully accept the mantle of protector of his people that his role as the Black Panther entails. Needless to say, just as he’s finally brought peace and unity to his homeland, an old threat reappears in the form of thuggish arms dealer and fugitive-from-Wakandan-justice Ulysses Klaue (Andy Serkis, gleefully returning to his blissful scenery-chewing Avengers: Age of Ultron role), leading T’Challa to travel to Busan, South Korea to bring him back for judgement, but this is merely a precursor to the arrival of the TRUE threat, Erik “Killmonger” Stevens (Michael B. Jordan), a mysterious former Special Forces assassin with a deeply personal agenda that threatens Wakanda’s future.  This marks the first major blockbuster feature for writer/director Ryan Coogler (co-penning the script with The People V. O.J. Simpson writer Joe Robert Cole), who won massive acclaim for his feature debut Fruitvale Station, but also has good form after sneaky little sleeper hit Rocky-saga spinoff Creed, so this progression ultimately just proves to be another one of those characteristic smart moves Marvel keeps making these days. Coogler’s command of the big budget, heavy-expectation material is certainly impressive, displaying impressive talent for spectacular action sequences (the Busan car chase is MAGNIFICENT, while the punishing fight sequences are as impressively staged and executed as anything we saw in the Captain America movies), wrangling the demanding visual effects work and getting the very best out of a top-notch ensemble cast of some of the finest black acting talent around.  Boseman brings more of that peerless class and charisma he showed in Civil War, but adds a humanising dose of self-doubt and vulnerability to the mix, making it even easier for us to invest in him, while Coogler’s regular collaborator, Jordan, is absolutely spell-binding, his ferociously focused, far-beyond-driven Killmonger proving to be one of the MCU’s most impressive villains to date, as well as its most sympathetic; Oscar darling Lupita Nyong’o is far more than a simple love interest as tough and resourceful Wakandan intelligence agent Nakia, The Walking Dead’s Danai Gurira is a veritable force of nature as Okoye, the head of the Dora Milaje, Wakanda’s elite all-female Special Forces, Get Out’s Daniel Kaluuya muddies the waters as T’Challa’s straight-talking best friend W’Kabi, and powerhouse veteran actors Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker and John Kani provide integrity and gravitas as, respectively, T’Challa’s mother Ramonda, Wakandan religious leader Zuri and T’Challa’s late father T’Chaka.  Martin Freeman and Andy Serkis have joked that they’re essentially the “Tolkien white guys” of the cast, but their presence is far from cosmetic – Freeman’s return as Civil War’s bureaucratic CIA agent Everett Ross is integral to the plot and also helps provide the audience with an accessible outsider’s POV into the unique and stunning land of Wakanda, while Serkis is clearly having the time of his life … and then there are the film’s TRUE scene-stealers – Letitia Wright is a brilliant bright ray of sunlight as T’Challa’s little sister Shuri, the curator of Wakanda’s massively advanced technology and OFFICIALLY the most intelligent person in the MCU, whose towering intellect is tempered by her cheeky sense of humour and sheer adorability, while Winston Duke is a towering presence throughout the film as M’Baku, the mighty chief of the reclusive Jabari mountain tribe, despite his relatively brief screen time, his larger-than-life performance making every appearance a joy.  This has been lauded as a true landmark film for its positive depiction of African culture and presentation of a whole raft of strong black role models, and it certainly feels like a major step forward both culturally and creatively – it’s so rewarding to see a positively-charged black intellectual property enjoying the almost ridiculous amount of success this film has so far enjoyed, both critically and financially, and it’s something I hope we see far more of in the future.  Like its predecessors, this is a fantastic superhero movie, but under the surface there are some very serious, challenging questions being asked and inherently powerful themes being addressed, making for a deeper, more intellectual film than we usually receive even from a big studio that’s grown so sophisticated as Marvel. That said, this IS another major hit for the MCU, and a further example of how consistently reliable they’ve become at delivering great cinema.  Very nearly the best of the Phase 3 standalone films (that honour still belongs to Captain America: Civil War), and it was certainly a spectacular kickoff for the year’s blockbusters.

9.  BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY – I’ve been waiting for this movie for YEARS.  Even before I knew this was actually going to happen I’d been hoping it would someday – Queen were my introduction to rock music, way back when I was wee, so they’ve been one of my very favourite bands FOREVER, and Freddie Mercury is one of my idols, the definition of sheer awesomeness and pure talent in music and an inspiration in life.  Needless to say I was RIDICULOUSLY excited once this finally lurched into view, and I’m so unbelievably happy it turned out to be a proper corker of a film, I could even tentatively consider it to be my new favourite musical biopic. Sure, it plays fast-and-loose with the historical facts, but remains true to the SPIRIT of the story, and you know what they say about biographical movies and their ilk: “if it’s a choice between the truth and the legend, print the legend.”  That’s a pretty good word to describe the man at the centre of this story – Queen frontman Freddie Mercury truly was a legend in his own lifetime, and watching the tale of his rise to fame alongside fellow musical geniuses Brian May, Roger Taylor and John Deacon is a fascinating, intoxicating and deeply affecting experience, truthful or not, making the film an emotional rollercoaster from the humble beginnings with the formation of the band, through the trials and tribulations of life on the road and in the studio, the controversies of Mercury’s personal life and the volatile personal dynamics between the group themselves, to the astonishing, show-stopping climax of their near-mythic twenty-minute performance slot at 1985’s Live Aid charity concert at Wembley Stadium.  Needless to say it takes a truly astounding performance to capture the man that I consider to be the greatest singer, showman and stage-performer of all time, but Mr Robot­ star Rami Malek was equal to the task, not so much embodying the role as genuinely channelling Mercury’s spirit, perfectly recreating his every movement, quirk and mannerism to perfection, right down to his famously precise, deliberate diction, and he even LOOKS a hell of a lot like Mercury.  Sure, he’s come under fire for merely lip-syncing when it comes to the music, but seriously, there’s no other way he could have done it – Freddie had the greatest singing voice of all time, there’s NO WAY anyone could possibly recreate it, so better he didn’t even try.  (Honestly, if he doesn’t get an Oscar for this there’s no justice in the world.)  Malek’s not the only master-mimic in the cast, either – the rest of the band are perfectly portrayed, too, by Gwilym Lee as May, X-Men: Apocalypse’s Ben Hardy as Taylor and Joe Mazzello (yup, that kid from Jurassic Park, now all grown up) as Deacon, while there are equally strong supporting turns from Sing Street’s Lucy Boynton as Mercury’s lover and lifelong friend Mary Austin, Aiden Gillen as the band’s first manager John Reid, Tom Hollander as their lawyer and eventual manager Jim “Miami” Beach, Allen Leech as the Freddie’s scheming, toxic personal manager Paul Prenter, and New Street Law star Ace Bhatti as his stoic but proud father, Bomi Bulsara.  This is an enthralling film from start to finish, and while those new to Queen will find plenty fo enjoy and entertain, this is an absolute JOY for fans and geeks who actually know their stuff, factual niggles notwithstanding; it’s also frequently laugh-out-loud HILARIOUS, the sparky, quick-fire script from The Theory of Everything and Darkest Hour writer Anthony McCarten brimming with slick one-liners, splendid put-downs and precision-crafted character observation which perfectly captures the real life banter the band were famous for.  The film had a troubled production (original director Bryan Singer was replaced late in the shoot by Dexter Fletcher after clashes of personality and other difficulties) and has come in for plenty of stick, receiving mixed reviews from some quarters, but for me this is pretty close to a perfect film, chock-full of heart, emotional heft, laughter, fun and what was, for me, the best soundtrack of 2018, positively overflowing with some of the band’s very best material, making this one of the very best times I had at the cinema all year.  They were, indeed, the champions …

8.  MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - FALLOUT – while Bond may remain king of the spy movie, and Jason Bourne still casts a long shadow from the darker post 9-11 age of harder, grittier espionage shenanigans, I’ve always been a BIG fan of the Mission: Impossible movies.  This love became strong indeed when JJ Abrams established a kind of unifying blueprint with the third film, and the series has gone from strength to strength since, reaching new, thrilling heights when Jack Reacher writer-director Christopher McQuarrie crafted the pretty much PERFECT Rogue Nation.  He’s the first filmmaker to return for a second gig in the big chair, but he’s a good fit – he and star Tom Cruise have already proven they work EXTREMELY well together, and McQuarrie really is one of the very best screenwriters working in Hollywood today (well respected across the board since his early days co-writing The Usual Suspects), an undeniable MASTER at both crafting consistently surprising, thoroughly involving and razor-sharp thriller plots and engineering truly JAW-DROPPING action sequences (adrenaline-fuelled chases, bruising fight scenes, intense shootouts and a breathless dash across the rooftops of London all culminate in this film’s standout sequence, a death-defying helicopter dogfight that took the prize as the year’s BEST action beat), as well as penning some wonderful, wry dialogue.  Anything beyond the very simplest synopsis would drop some criminal spoilers – I’ll simply say that Ethan Hunt is faced with his deadliest mission to date after a botched op leaves three plutonium cores in the hands of some very bad people, leading CIA honcho Erica Sloane (a typically sophisticated turn from Angela Bassett) to attach her pet assassin, August Walker (current big-screen Superman Henry Cavill), to the team to make sure it all runs smoothly – a prospect made trickier by the resurfacing of Rogue Nation’s cracking villain Solomon Lane (Sean Harris).  Tom Cruise is, of course an old hand at this sort of thing by now, but even so I don’t think he’s EVER been more impressive at the physical stuff, and he delivers equally well in the more dramatic moments, taking superspy Ethan Hunt to darker, more desperate extremes than ever before.  Cavill similarly impresses in what’s easily his meatiest role to date, initially coming across as a rough, brutal thug but revealing deeper layers of complexity and sophistication as the film progresses, while Rebecca Ferguson makes a welcome return from RN as slippery, sexy and very complex former MI6 agent Ilsa Faust, and it’s great to see Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg back as series keystones Luther Stickell and Benji Dunn, who both get stuck into the action far more than in previous outings (Benji FINALLY gets to wear a mask!); Jeremy Renner’s absence this time could disappoint, but the balance is maintained because the effortlessly suave Alec Baldwin’s new IMF Secretary Alan Hunley gets a far more substantial role this time round, while Sean Harris tears things up with brutal relish as he expands on one of the series’ strongest villains – Lane is a thoroughly nasty piece of work, a monstrous zealot with a deeply twisted but strangely relatable agenda, and method man Harris mesmerises in every scene.  McQuarrie has cut another gem here, definitely his best film to date and likewise the best in the franchise so far, and strong arguments could be made for him staying on for a third stint – this is the best shape Mission: Impossible has been in for some time, an essentially PERFECT textbook example of an action-packed spy thriller that constantly surprises and never disappoints, from the atmospheric opening to the unbearably tense climax, and if ever there was a film to threaten the supremacy of Bond, it’s this one.

7.  THE SHAPE OF WATER – one of the most important things you have to remember about my own personal mythology (by which I mean the mishmash of 40 years of influences, genre-love and pure and simple COOL SHIT that’s informed and moulded the geek I am today) is that when it comes to my fictional heroes, I have a tendency to fall in love with the monsters.  It’s a philosophy shared by one of my very favourite directors, Guillermo Del Toro, whose own love affair with the weird, the freakish and the outcast has informed so much of his spectacular work, particularly the Hellboy movies – the monster as a tragic hero, and also the women who love them despite their appearance or origins.  Del Toro’s latest feature returns to this fascinating and compelling trope in magnificent style, and the end result is his best work since what remains his VERY BEST film, 2007’s exquisite grown-up fairytale Pan’s Labyrinth.  Comparisons with that masterpiece are not only welcome but also fitting – TSOW is definitely cut from the same cloth, a frequently dream-like cinematic allegory that takes place in something resembling the real world, but is never quite part of it.  It’s a beautiful, lyrical, sensual and deeply seductive film, but there’s brooding darkness and bitter tragedy that counters the sweet, Del Toro’s rich and exotic script – co-authored with Hope Springs writer Vanessa Taylor – mining precious ore from the fairytale ideas but also deeply invested with his own overwhelming love for the Golden Age of cinema itself.  This makes for what must be his most deeply personal film to date, so it’s fitting that it finally won him his first, LONG OVERDUE Best Director Oscar. Happy Go-Lucky’s Sally Hawkins thoroughly deserves her Oscar nomination for her turn as Elisa Esposito, a mute cleaning woman working in a top secret aerospace laboratory in Baltimore at the height of the Cold War, a sweet-natured dreamer who likes movies, music and her closeted artist neighbour Giles (the incomparable Richard Jenkins, delivering a performance of real sweetness and integrity). One night she discovers a new project in the facility, a strange, almost mythic amphibious humanoid (Del Toro regular Doug Jones) who has been captured for study and eventual vivisection to help create a means for men to survive in space.  In spite of his monstrous appearance and seemingly feral nature, Elisa feels a kinship to the creature, and as she begins to earn his trust she develops stronger feeling for him – feelings which are reciprocated.  So she hatches a plan to break him out and return him to the sea, enlisting the help of Giles, her only other real friend, fellow cleaner Zelda (The Help and Hidden Figures’ Octavia Spencer, as lovably prickly and sassy as ever), and sympathetic scientist (and secret Soviet agent) Dr. Robert Hoffstetler (a typically excellent and deeply complex performance from Boardwalk Empire’s Michael Stuhlbarg) to effect a desperate escape.  The biggest obstacle in their path, however, is Colonel Richard Strickland (Michael Shannon), the man in charge of security on the project – the rest of the cast are uniformly excellent, but the true, unstoppable scene-stealer here is Shannon, giving us 2018’s BEST screen villain in a man so amorally repellent, brutally focused and downright TERRIFYING it’s absolutely impossible to take your eyes off him – who has a personal hatred for the creature and would love nothing more than to kill it himself. He’s the TRUE monster of the film, Jones’ creature proving to be a noble being who, despite his (admittedly rather bloody) animal instincts, has a kind and gentle soul that mirrors Elisa’s own, which makes the seemingly bizarre love story that unfolds so easy to accept and fulfilling to witness.  This is a film of aching beauty and immense emotional power, the bittersweet and ultimately tragic romance sweeping you up in its warm embrace, resulting in the year’s most powerful and compelling fantasy, very nearly the finest work of a writer/director at the height of his considerable powers, and EASILY justifying its much-deserved Best Picture Oscar.  Love the monster? Yes indeed …

6.  DEADPOOL 2 – just as his first standalone finally banished the memory of his shameful treatment in the first X-Men Origins film, Marvel’s Merc With a Mouth had a new frustration to contend with – Wolverine riding his coattails into the R-rated superhero scene and outdoing his newfound success with the critically acclaimed and, frankly, f£$%ing AWESOME Logan.  It’s a fresh balance for him to redress, and bless him, he’s done it within the first five minutes of his own very first sequel … then again, Deadpool’s always at his best when dealing with adversity.  There’s plenty of that here – 2016’s original was a spectacular film, a true game-changer for both Marvel and the genre itself, unleashing a genuinely bankable non-PC superhero on the unsuspecting masses (and, of course, all us proper loyal fans) and earning one of their biggest hits in the process.  A sequel was inevitable, but the first film was a VERY tough act to follow – thankfully everyone involved proved equal to the task, not least the star, Ryan Reynolds, who was BORN to play former special forces operative-turned invulnerable but hideously scarred mutant antihero Wade Wilson, returning with even greater enthusiasm for the material and sheer determination to do things JUST RIGHT.  Working with returning co-writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, he’s suitably upped the ante while staying true to the source and doing right by the fans – the script’s another blinder, a side-splitting rib-tickler liberally peppered with copious swearing, rampant sexual and toilet humour, genuinely inspired bizarreness (a grown man with baby balls!) and an unapologetically irreverent tone nonetheless complimented by a f£$%load of heart. Original director Tim Miller jumped ship early in development, but the perfect replacement was found in the form of David Leitch, co-director of the first John Wick movie, who preceded this with a truly magnificent solo debut on summer 2017’s standout actioner Atomic Blonde.  Leitch is a perfect fit, a former stuntman with innate flair for top-notch action who also has plenty of stylistic flair and strong talents for engaging storytelling and handling a cast of strong personalities.  Reynolds is certainly one of those, again letting rip with gleeful comic abandon as Deadpool fights to overcome personal tragedy by trying to become a bona fide X-Man, at which he of course fails SPECTACULARLY, winding up in a special prison for super-powered individuals and becoming the unlikely and definitely unwilling protector of teenage mutant Russell Collins, aka Firefist (Hunt for the Wilderpeople’s Julian Dennison), who’s been targeted for assassination by time-travelling future warrior Cable (Josh Brolin) because he’s destined to become a monstrous supervillain when he grows up.  Deciding to listen to his “better” angel, Wade puts together his own superhero team in order to defeat Cable and start his own future franchise … yup, this is as much a platform to set up X-Force, the Marvel X-Verse’s next big money-maker, as it is a Deadpool sequel, but the film plays along to full comic effect, and the results are funny, explosive, blood-soaked and a magnificently anarchic joy.  Brolin is every inch the Cable we deserve, a world-weary, battered and utterly single-minded force of nature, entirely lacking a sense of humour but still managing to drive some of the film’s most side-splitting moments, while Atlanta star Zazie Beets, originally something of an outsider choice, proves similarly perfect for the role of fan favourite Domino, a wise-cracking mutant arse-kicker whose ability to manipulate luck in order to get the better of any situation makes her a kind of super-ninja; Dennison, meanwhile, is just as impressive as he was in HFTWP, turning in a performance of such irreverent charm he frequently steals the film, and the return of Stefan Kapicic and Briana Hildebrand as stoic metal-man Colossus and the world’s moodiest teen superhero, Negasonic Teenage Warhead, mean that the original X-Men get another loving (if also slightly middle-fingery) nod too.  But once again, this really is Reynolds’ movie, and he’s clearly having just as much fun as before, helping to make this the same kind of gut-busting riot the first was with his trademark twinkle, self-deprecating charm and shit-eating grin.  He’s the heart and soul of another great big fist up the backside of superhero cinema, blasting tropes with scattergun abandon but hitting every target lined up against him, and like everything else he helps make this some of the most fun I had at the pictures all year.  I honestly couldn’t think of ANYTHING that could make me piss myself laughing more than this … the future of the franchise may be up in the air until the first X-Force movie gets its time in the spotlight, but Reynolds, Leitch, Reese and Wernick are all game to return, so there’s plenty of life in the un-killable old lady yet ...

5.  BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE – my Number One thriller of 2018 is a cult classic in the making and the best work yet from Drew Goddard, co-writer/director (with Joss Whedon) of Cabin in the Woods (one of the best horror movies ever made, in my opinion) and screenwriter of Cloverfield and The Martian.  It’s an intoxicating, engrossing and somewhat unsettling experience (but in a very good way indeed), a gripping, slippery and absolutely FIENDISH suspense thriller to rival the heady best of Hitchcock or Kubrick, and, as his first completely original, personal creation, Goddard’s best opportunity to show us JUST what he’s truly capable of.  Wrapped up in multi-layered mystery and deftly paying with timelines and perspective, it artfully unveils the stories of four disparate strangers who book a night’s stay at the El Royale, a “bi-state” hotel (located on the California/Nevada border) that was once grand but, by the film’s setting of 1969, has fallen on hard times.  Each has a secret, some of which are genuinely deadly, and before the night’s through they’ll all come to light as a fateful chain of events brings them all crashing together.  Giving away any more is to invite criminal spoilers – suffice to say that it’s an unforgettable film, fully-laden with ingenious twists and consistently wrong-footing the viewer right up to the stirring, thought-provoking ending.  The small but potent ensemble cast are, to a man, absolutely perfect – Jeff Bridges delivers one of the best performances of his already illustrious career as seemingly harmless Catholic priest Father Daniel Flynn, Widows’ Cynthia Erivo makes a truly stunning impression as down-on-her-luck soul singer Darlene Sweet, John Hamm is garrulously sleazy as shifty travelling salesman Seymour Sullivan, Dakota Johnson is surly but also VERY sexy (certainly MUCH MORE than she EVER was in the 50 Shades movies) as “dirty hippy” Emily, Lewis Pullman (set to explode as the co-star of the incoming Top Gun sequel) is fantastically twitchy as the hotel’s troubled concierge Miles, and Cailee Spaeny (Pacific Rim: Uprising) delivers a creepy, haunting turn as Emily’s fundamentally broken runaway sister Rose.  The film is thoroughly and entirely stolen, however, by the arrival in the second half of Goddard’s Cabin leading man Chris Hemsworth as earthy, charismatic and darkly, dangerously seductive Charles Manson-esque cult leader Billy Lee, Thor himself thoroughly mesmerising as he swaggers into the heart of the story (particularly in a masterful moment where he cavorts, snake-hipped, to the strains of Deep Purple’s Rush in the lead-up to a brutal execution).  This is thriller-cinema at its most inspired and insidious, a flawless genre gem that’s sure to be held in high regard by connoisseurs for years to come, and an ELECTRIFYING statement of intent by one of the best creative minds working in Hollywood today.  One of 2018’s biggest and best surprises, it’s a bona fide MUST-SEE …

4.  AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR – is it possible there might be TOO MUCH coming out all at once in the Marvel Cinematic Universe right now?  What with THREE movies a year now becoming the norm, not to mention the ongoing saga of Agents of SHIELD and various other affiliated TV shows (it seems that Netflix are culling their Marvel shows but there’s still the likes of Runaways and the incoming Cloak & Dagger on other services, along with fresh, in-development stuff), could we be reaching saturation?  My head says … mmmmm … maybe … but my heart says HELL NO!  Not when those guys at Marvel have gotten so good at this job they could PROBABLY do it with their eyes closed.  That said, there were times in the run-up to this particular release that I couldn’t help wondering if, just maybe, they might have bitten off more than they could chew … thankfully, fraternal directing double act Antony and Joe Russo, putting in their THIRD MCU-helming gig after their enormous success on the second and third Captain America films, have pulled off one hell of a cinematic hat trick, presenting us with a third Avengers film that’s MORE than the equal of Joss Whedon’s offerings.  It’s also a painfully tricky film to properly review – the potential for spoilers is SO heavy I can’t say much of ANYTHING about the plot without giving away some MAJOR twists and turns (even if there’s surely hardly ANYONE who hasn’t already seen the film by now) – but I’ll try my best.  This is the film every die-hard fan has been waiting for, because the MCU’s Biggest Bad EVER, Thanos the Mad Titan (Josh Brolin), has finally come looking for those pesky Infinity Stones so he can Balance The Universe by killing half of its population and enslaving the rest, and the only ones standing in his way are the Avengers (both old and new) and the Guardians of the Galaxy, finally brought together after a decade and 18 movies.  Needless to say this is another precision-engineered product refined to near perfection, delivering on all the expected fronts – breathtaking visuals and environments, thrilling action, the now pre-requisite snarky, sassy sense of humour and TONS OF FEELS – but given the truly galactic scale of the adventure on offer this time the stakes have been raised to truly EPIC heights, so the rewards are as great as the potential pitfalls.  It’s not perfect – given the sheer size of the cast and the fact that there are THREE main storylines going on at once, it was INEVITABLE that some of our favourite characters would be handed frustratingly short shrift (or, in two notable cases, simply written out of the film altogether), while there are times when the mechanics of fate do seem to be getting stretched a little TOO far for credibility – but the niggles are largely overshadowed by the rich rewards of yet another MCU film done very well indeed. The cast (even those who drew the short straw on screen time) are all, as we’ve come to expect, excellent, the veterans – particularly Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man/Tony Stark), Chris Hemsworth (Thor), Mark Ruffalo (Bruce Banner/the Hulk), Chris Evans (Steve Rogers/Captain America), Benedict Cumberbatch (Doctor Stephen Strange), Chris Pratt (Peter Quill/Star Lord), Zoe Saldana (Gamora), Bradley Cooper (Rocket Racoon), and, of course, Tom Holland (Peter Parker/Spider-Man) – all falling back into their well-established roles and universally winning our hearts all over again, while two characters in particular, who have always been reduced to supporting duties until now, finally get to REALLY shine – Paul Bettany and Elizabeth Olsen, as the Vision and Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch, finally get to explore that comic-canon romance that was so prevalently teased in Civil War, with events lending their mutual character arcs particularly tragic resonance as the story progresses … and then there’s the new characters, interestingly this time ALL bad guys. The Children of Thanos (Gamora and Nebula’s adopted siblings, basically) are showcased throughout the action, although only two really make an impression here – Tom Vaughan-Lawlor is magnificently creepy as Ebony Maw, while Carrie Coon (and stuntwoman Monique Ganderton) is darkly sensual as Proxima Midnight … but of course the REAL new star here is Brolin, thoroughly inhabiting his motion capture role so Thanos GENUINELY lives up to his title as the greatest villain of the MCU, an unstoppable megalomaniac who’s nonetheless doing these monstrous things for what he perceives to be genuinely right and moral reasons, although he’s not above taking some deeply perverse pleasure from his most despicable actions. Finishing up with a painfully powerful climax that’s as shocking as it is audacious, this sets things up for an even more epic conclusion in 2019’s closer, and has already left even the most jaded viewers shell-shocked and baying for more, while the post-credits sting in particular had me drooling in anticipation for the long-awaited arrival of my own favourite Avenger, but in the meantime this is an immensely rewarding, massively entertaining and thoroughly exhausting cinematic adventure. Summer can’t come fast enough …

3.  UPGRADE – in a summer packed with sequels (many of them pretty damn awesome even so), it was a great pleasure my VERY FAVOURITE movie was something wholly original, an unaffiliated standalone that had nothing to follow or measure up to.  But Blumhouse’s best film of 2018 still had a lot riding on it – they’re a studio best known for creating bare-bones but effectively primal horror (even The Purge series is really more survival horror than dystopian thriller), so they’re not really known for branching out into science-fiction.  Going with one of their most trusted creative talents, then, was the kind of savvy move we’d expect from Jason Blum and co – Leigh Whannell is best known as the writer of the first three Saw movies (a fully-developed trilogy which I, along with several others, consider to be the series’ TRUE canon), the film phenomenon that truly kicked off the whole “torture porn” sub-genre, but he’s become one of Blumhouse’s most well-regarded writers thanks to his creation of Insidious, still one of their biggest earners.  Once again he wrote (and co-starred in) the first three films, even making his directorial debut on the third – admittedly that film wasn’t particularly spectacular, but there was nonetheless something about it, a real X-factor that definitely showed Whannell could do more than just write (and, act, of course).  Second time out he’s definitely made good on that potential promise – this is a proper f£$%ing masterpiece, not just the best thing I saw all summer but one of THE TOP movies of my cinematic year.  It’s also an interesting throwback to a once popular sci-fi trope that’s been overdue for a makeover – body horror, originally made popular by the cult-friendly likes of David Cronenberg and Paul Verhoeven, and the biggest influence on this film must to be the original Robocop.  Prometheus’ Logan Marshall-Green is an actor I’ve long considered to be criminally overlooked and underused, so I’m thrilled he finally found a role worthy of his underappreciated talents - Grey Trace, an unapologetically analogue blue-collar Joe living in an increasingly digital near future, a mechanic making his living restoring vintage muscle cars who doesn’t trust automated technology to run ANYTHING, so his life takes a particularly ironic turn when a tragic chain of events leads to his wife’s brutal murder while he’s left paralysed from the neck down.  Faced with a future dependent on computerised care-robots, he jumps at the chance offered by technological pioneer Eron Keen (Need For Speed’s Harrison Gilbertson), creator of a revolutionary biochip called STEM that, once implanted into his central nervous system, can help him regain COMPLETE control of his body, but in true body horror style things quickly take a dark and decidedly twisted turn.  STEM has a mind of its own (and a voice that only Trace can hear), and an agenda, convincing him to use newfound superhuman abilities to hunt down his wife’s killers and exact terrible, brutal vengeance upon them. There are really strong performances from the supporting cast – Gilbertson is great as a twitchy, socially awkward genius only capable of finding real connection with his technology, Get Out’s Bettie Gabriel is subtly brilliant as Detective Cortez, the cop doggedly pursuing Trace’s case and, eventually, him too, and there’s a cracking villainous turn from relative unknown Benedict Hardie as sadistic but charismatic cybernetically-enhanced contract killer Fisk – but this is very much Marhall-Green’s film; he’s an absolute revelation here, his effortlessly sympathetic hangdog demeanour dominating a fantastically nuanced and impressively physical performance that displays truly exceptional dramatic AND comedic talent.  Indeed, while it’s a VERY dark film, there’s a big streak of jet black humour shot right through it, Whannell amusing us in particularly uncomfortable ways whenever STEM takes control and wreaks appropriately inhuman havoc (it helps no end that voice-actor Simon Malden has basically turned STEM into a kind of sociopathic version of Big Hero 6’s Baymax, which is as hilariously twisted as it sounds), and he delivers in spades on the action front too, crafting the year’s most wince-inducing, downright SAVAGE fight sequences and a very exciting car chase. Altogether this is a simply astonishing achievement – at times weirdly beautiful in a scuzzy, decrepit kind of way, it’s visually arresting and fiendishly intelligent, but also, much as we’d expect from the creator of Saw and Hollywood’s PREMIER horror studio, dark, edgy and, at times, weirdly disturbing – in other words, it’s CLASSIC body horror.  Whannell is a talent I’ve been watching for a while now, and it’s SO GOOD to finally see him deliver on all that wonderful promise. Needless to say it was another runaway hit for Blumhouse, so there are already plans for a sequel, but for now I’m just happy to revel in the wonderful originality of what was the very peak of my cinematic summer …

2.  SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE – oh man, if ever there was a contender that could have ousted this year’s Number One, it’s this, it was SUCH a close-run thing.  Sure, with THREE major incarnations of Marvel’s most iconic superhero already hitting the big screen since the Millennium, we could AGAIN ask if we really need another Spider-Man “reboot”, but I must say his first ever blockbuster animated appearance leaves virtually all other versions in the dust – only Sam Raimi’s masterpiece second Spider-feature remains unbeaten, but I’ve certainly never seen another film that just totally GETS Stan Lee’s original web-slinger better than this one.  It’s directed by the motley but perfectly synced trio of Bob Perischetti (a veteran digital artist making his directorial debut here), Peter Ramsay (Rise of the Guardians) and Rodney Rothman (writer on 22 Jump Street), but the influence of producers Christopher Miller and Phil Lord (creators of The Lego Movie) is writ large across the entire film (then again, Lord did co-write the script with Rothman) – it’s a magnificent, majestic feast for the eyes, ears and soul, visually arresting and overflowing with effervescent, geeky charm and a deep, fundamental LOVE for the source material in all its varied guises.  Taking its lead from the recent Marvel comics crossover event from which the film gets its name, it revolves around an unprecedented collision of various incarnations of Spider-Man from across the varying alternate versions of Earth across the Marvel Multiverse, brought together though the dastardly machinations of criminal mastermind Wilson Fisk, aka Kingpin (a typically excellent vocal turn from Liev Schreiber) and his secret supercollider.  There are two, equally brilliant, “old school” takes on the original web-slinger Peter Parker on offer here – Chris Pine impresses in his early scenes as the “perfect” version, youthful, dashing and thoroughly brilliant but never ruining it by being smug or full of himself, but the story is dominated by New Girl’s Jake Johnson as a more world-weary and self-deprecating blue-collar version, who can still do the job just as well but has never really been as comfortable a fit, and he’s all the more endearing because he’s SUCH a lovable slacker underdog.  The main “hero” of the film, however, is Dope’s Shameik Moore as Miles Morales, a teenager who’s literally JUST acquired his powers but must learn FAST if he’s to become this universe’s new Spider-Man, and he’s a perfect lead for the film, unsure of himself and struggling to bring his newfound abilities to bear, but determined to find his footing all the same.  There are other brilliant takes on the core character here – Nicolas Cage’s wonderfully overblown monochrome Spider-Man Noir is an absolute hoot, as is anthropomorphised fan-favourite Spider-Ham (voiced by popular stand-up comic John Mulaney) – and a variety of interesting, skewed twists on classic Spider-Man villains (particularly Liv, a gender-bent take on Doctor Octopus played by Bad Moms’ Kathryn Hahn), but my favourite character in this is, tellingly, also my very favourite Marvel web-slinger PERIOD – Earth-65’s Spider-Woman, aka Gwen Stacy (more commonly known as Spider Gwen), an alternative version where SHE got bit by the radioactive arachnid instead of Peter, very faithfully brought to life by a perfectly cast Hailee Steinfeld.  It may sound overblown but this is about as close to perfect as a superhero movie can get – the script is an ASTONISHING piece of work, tight as a drum with everything lined up with clockwork precision, and instead of getting bogged down in exposition it turns the whole origin story trope into a brilliant running joke that keeps getting funnier each time a new character gets introduced; it’s also INSANELY inventive and a completely unique visual experience, specifically designed to look like old school comic book art brought to vivid but intriguingly stylised life, right down to the ingenious use of word-bubbles and textured printing dots that add to the pop art feel.  This is a truly SPECTACULAR film, a gloriously appointed thrill-ride with all the adventure, excitement, humour and bountiful, powerful, heartbreaking emotional heft you could ever want from a superhero movie – this is (sorry MCU) the VERY BEST film Marvel made in 2018, and maybe one of their very best EVER.  There’s already sequel talk in the air (no surprise there, of course), and I can’t wait to see where it goes.  PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE give me a Spider Gwen spinoff.  I’ll be good, I swear …

1.  A QUIET PLACE – the most unique and original film of 2018 was a true masterpiece of horror cinema and, for me, one of the best scary movies I’ve seen in A VERY LONG TIME INDEED. It’s a deceptively simply high-concept thriller built around a dynamite idea, one that writer/director/star John Krasinski (co-writing with up-and-coming creative duo Bryan Woods and Scott Beck) has mined for maximum effect … Krasinski (still probably best known for the US version of The Office but now also gaining fresh traction for killer Amazon Original series Jack Ryan) and his real life wife Emily Blunt are Lee and Evelyn Abbott, a mother and father who must protect their children and find a way to survive on an isolated farm in a world which has been decimated by an inexplicable invasion/infestation/whatever of mysterious and thoroughly lethal creatures that, while blind, use their incredibly sensitive hearing to hunt and kill ANYTHING that makes a sound.  As a result, the Abbotts have had to develop an intricately ordered lifestyle in order to gather, scavenge and rebuild while remaining completely silent, a discipline soon to be threatened by Evelyn’s very advanced pregnancy … there’s a truly fiendish level of genius to the way this film has been planned out and executed, the exquisitely thought-out mechanics of the Abbotts’ daily routines, survival methods and emergency procedures proving to be works of pure, unfettered genius – from communication through sign language and slow-dancing to music on shared headphones to walking on pathways created with heaped sand and painted spots to mark floorboards that don’t squeak, playing board games with soft fruit instead of plastic pieces and signalling danger with coloured light-bulbs – while the near total absence of spoken dialogue makes the use of sound and music essential and, here, almost revolutionary, with supervising sound editors Erik Aadahl and Ethan Van der Ryn becoming as important as the director himself, while composer Marco Beltrami delivers some of his finest work to date with a score of insidious subtlety and brazen power in equal measure.  The small but potent cast are all excellent – Blunt has rarely been better in a performance of impressive honesty and a lack of vanity comparable to her work on The Girl On the Train, affecting and compelling as a fierce lioness of a mother, while Krasinski radiates both strength and vulnerability as he fights tooth and nail to keep his family alive, regardless of his own survival, and their real-life chemistry is a genuine boon to their performances, bringing a winning warmth to their relationship; elsewhere, deaf actress Millicent Simmonds (Wonderstruck) effortlessly captures our hearts as troubled, rebellious daughter Regan, delivering a performance of raw, heartbreaking honesty, while Suberbicon’s Noah Jupe impresses as awkward son Marcus, cripplingly unsure of himself and awfully scared of having to grow up in this terrifying new world.  There’s great power and heart in the family dynamic, which makes us even more invested in their survival as the screws tighten in what is a SERIOUSLY scary film, an exquisitely crafted exercise in sustained tension that deserves to be remembered alongside the true greats of horror cinema.  Krasinski displays a rare level of skill as a director, his grasp of atmosphere, pace and performance hinting at great things to come in the future, definitely making him one to watch – this is an astonishing film, a true gem I’m going to cherish for a long time to come.

[recentanimenews]

A Celebration of Women of Color in Anime

  Anime has always meant a lot to me as a person of color. I didn't see much of myself in my surroundings growing up, and even though I'm mixed Filipinx and not Japanese, it felt valuable to me that anime was an Asian-created medium. There were far more limits in terms of exposure and what you could readily learn about underrepresented cultures in the years before the internet became more widely accessible. As a result, early TV and video exposure to anime helped me indirectly feel proud of my own heritage.

I generally relate to media depictions of women more than men, so it should come as no surprise that women of color in anime comprise some of my favorite fictional characters, period. Though woefully misrepresented in all kinds of media, here's a non-hierarchical list of anime WOC who are respectfully depicted, nuanced, and poignant role models for our own lives too. Read on for more!

Nadia — Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water

    A series known for its tumultuous production and Hideaki Anno's distinct directorial hand, Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water is an aquatic adventure anime from the early '90s. The main character, Nadia, is a young woman of color searching for the truth about her past — and the secret of her blue-jeweled pendant.

One of Nadia's crowning traits is her connection with animals and the care she displays for them. Nadia communicates easily with King, her lion cub sidekick, and openly detests meat and hunting. The show also makes it clear that Nadia is a *gasp* vegetarian. It was pretty rare in the '90s for any show to feature a positive portrayal of vegetarians, so it's pretty cool to see her depicted as a genuinely caring animal-lover and not some meat-hating caricature.

Nadia is an "imperfect" heroine in the sense that she actually comes across like a real person with real struggles. She is (justifiably) prone to distrust others, can act hot-headed, grapples with intense depression, and doesn't always give people like Jean and Nemo the benefit of the doubt. Nadia's tendencies and behavior make perfect sense given her awful and abusive childhood, and that makes her one of the most interesting anime protagonists out there.

Yoruichi Shihōin — Bleach

    In Bleach, Yoruichi's coolness factor is off the charts. She can outrun Byakuya (one of the most powerful captains), knows how to help you achieve Bankai in three days, and can also transform from a black cat into a human at will. If Soul Society had its own version of LinkedIn, Yoruichi's resume would be top tier — it's no small feat to be the former Onmitsukidō commander and former 2nd captain of the Gotei 13.

Finally, much like the rest of the cast of Bleach, Yoruichi possesses a simple yet keen sense of style. Can you think of anyone over a century old who can wear purple and beige striped arm wraps and orange apparel with such finesse? I thought not.

Carole — Carole and Tuesday

Shinichiro Watanabe's new show Carole and Tuesday is yet another music fan's dream. While Kids on the Slope focused on Jazz, Watanabe's new outing hones in on pop singer/songwriters. One central message in the show is simple, yet timeless: Pursue your creative expression by staying true to yourself, and keep your creative fire safe from societal pressures intent on manipulating and/or extinguishing your gift. And with a Black woman — Carole — as one of the lead protagonists, this important message feels even more moving and powerful.

A Black woman as a lead character is the exception rather than the rule in the world of media, which is a disturbing reflection of larger oppressive social structures. That's why it feels refreshing to see a respectful portrayal in the form of Carole. We first meet her as an impoverished teenager in a big city without parents or a support network. Despite the financial and social odds stacked against her, Carole still longs to express herself and create a loving community through the power of music. Her dedication to her own creative integrity is a joy to watch, and as a musician myself, I found legitimate personal solace in her drive to be as artistically genuine as possible.

One of my favorite things about Carole is the ego-free support, sense of awe, and goodwill she displays toward other musicians. There's barely a hint of jealousy or competition between Carole and her main musical partner, Tuesday. The two get along amazingly well despite a few roadblocks, and Carole consistently honors their shared creative spirit. She even voices repeated praise for a rival musician named Angela, despite Angela's antagonistic remarks against the series' duo. As another impressive feat, Carole also manages to revive the joy of seasoned — and occasionally downtrodden — musicians due to her infectious creative passion. How can you not love such an inspirational character?!

Anthy Himemiya — Revolutionary Girl Utena

Revolutionary Girl Utena, is, well, revolutionary for a number of reasons. The show tackles gender essentialism head-on and makes some hefty statements about the toxicity of conventional social norms. Utena is an incredible character who challenges the classic patriarchal notions associated with princedom. I'd argue though, that her partner Anthy Himemiya is the true star of the show.  Without going into spoilers, Anthy is key to one of the biggest themes in the show: That for its own selfish gain, society is willing to endlessly enact cruel rigidity and heartlessness against women. It'd be both reductive and missing the larger point though, to interpret Anthy as a defenseless, subservient victim controlled by the harshness of a misogynistic culture. On the contrary, Anthy is perhaps the strongest figure in the entire series. Anthy does (at least in some ways) behave according to the interest of others, but she ultimately asserts her own worth and personal agency in a way that truly embodies the show's beautiful core. There are plenty of fascinating, insightful articles that go into depth about Revolutionary Girl Utena's symbolism and topics, so be sure to check some out. Anthy is a phenomenal character who stands out as one of the most memorable depictions of self-love, showing it's never too late to define your own life according to your needs, desires, and dreams.

Casca — Berserk

                              Berserk is likely my favorite manga, and undoubtedly my favorite work of dark fantasy. I always pair that praise with a very cautionary recommendation due to the intense gore and many disturbing sexual depictions throughout the series. While it's up to each individual to decide their limits in terms of extreme content, Kentaro Miura (the creator) softens Berserk's more unseemly edges by featuring sympathetic protagonists who organically evolve, and who are driven by immense love and support for one another in spite of a horrifyingly bleak world. That said, I find the central character Casca to be one of the strongest and most nuanced women in all of fiction. It's rare enough for a dark-skinned woman to be depicted at all in most media, and rare still for her to be given proper depth and well-deserved narrative development. Fortunately, Berserk gives us both.

In the Band of the Hawk arc — the first lengthy saga in Berserk, covered by the three recent films and the '90s anime — Casca is introduced as a well-regarded figure within the ranks of her mercenary brigade. Although she's portrayed as a strong fighter and a capable leader, the series deploys many different elements that prevent a one-sided characterization of Casca. For example, her tragic backstory highlights not only her strength and will to survive but also lends added weight to why she's so watchful of her comrades. After Casca is sent away by her own family as a child, she gains a new one in the form of the Band of the Hawk, and — much like a protective older sister — leads many of her men to safety on more than one occasion. The life and attachments Casca forges from the hell of her childhood imbues her character with skillfulness, tenacity, and meaningful emotional capacity. 

The love between Casca and Guts is a genuinely moving, reciprocal bond. While it's true that Guts saves Casca from demons on many occasions (which carries more than a hint of the misogynistic damsel-in-distress cliche), it's also true that Guts is saved from his lonely life largely because of Casca's love and presence. Though there's plenty to critique about the notion that masculine dependency is evidence of a healthy relationship, overall I find that Guts and Casca exhibit selfless, mutual gestures of love that challenge standard relational dynamics.

It can't be stressed enough how pivotal Casca is to Berserk's central storyline. Her badass skills as a fighter, coupled with her nuanced backstory and emotional depth, makes her one of my favorite anime characters of all time. 

Each anime in this list offers a uniquely touching testament to women of color. While by no means an exhaustive list, I hope you enjoyed it!

Are there other women of color from your favorite anime who aren't listed here? Let us know in the comments!

                              Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com

[somefunnyshits]

Star Trek: Discovery shows us a side of the Federation we've never seen

Enlarge/ Welcome to Star Trek: Discovery.

CBS

The debut of Star Trek: Discovery last night was unlike any other TV series premiere. It was a cultural event that people have been analyzing and anticipating for years. There are now three generations of people who grew up with Star Trek in its various incarnations, and the franchise has come to represent what many of us consider a better tomorrow. Discovery arrived on the scene with no shortage of baggage, both good and bad.

There was absolutely no way that the first two episodes (available now on CBS’s All Access streaming service) could have met all our expectations. Plus, the odds were already stacked against Discovery. The production lost a showrunner midstream, and advance buzz has been tepid, to say the least. So it should come as no shock that the first two episodes were flawed, with moments that felt a little clunky. And yet I was genuinely surprised by the show at many points, in a positive way. It gave us a dramatic, original perspective on the Star Trek universe. Even though the series is set 10 years before the original Star Trek series, it had a weird, futuristic edge that has been sorely lacking in the recent J.J. Abrams movies.

And the best part? For the first time in decades, Star Trek feels dangerous again.

Spoilers ahead.

No more cozy spaceships

Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham.

CBS

Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham.

CBS

Chris Obi as T'Kuvma.

CBS

Mary Chieffo as L'Rell; Chris Obi as T'Kuvma.

The first two episodes of Discovery are definitely a slow burn. The acting feels oddly understated, and there are some awkward, info-dumpy conversations between First Officer Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and Captain Philippa Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh) as we establish their characters and the mission of the USS Shenzhou. But by the time we’re deep into the final battle with the Klingons, I found myself yelling, “Holy $%&!!” a lot. Ships are on fire! Klingons are yelling about their new messiah! Major characters are dying! The series went from zero to warp speed in less than two hours, which is pretty damn hard to pull off.

We leave the cozy confines of a typical Trek series behind after the opening scene, in which Burnham and Georgiou are on a peaceful mission to help a pre-contact civilization survive drought. After vaporizing the blockage in a well, they exchange a little banter and return to the Shenzhou to check out a strange object in the debris field of a binary star system. Obscured by some kind of radiation field, the object could be related to damage suffered by a nearby Federation communications relay.

When Burnham goes to investigate the object wearing nothing but a spacesuit and jetpack, we get a moment that really nails the tone of this new series. Alone in a vast debris field, illuminated by the light of two stars, Burnham seems more vulnerable and audacious than Starfleet officers we’ve known before. There’s no beaming down with an away team here. There’s no shuttle enclosing her in a protective shell.

When she finally encounters the object, an ancient sacred beacon, she lands on it with her own two feet. She's alone in a vacuum, encountering something literally awesome. There’s something visceral about this scene, especially when she winds up in a deadly fight with a Klingon guarding the place. It’s as if they’re two knights battling in armor, except they’re in the middle of outer space.

Arresting scenes like this lift Discovery out of its slightly clunky plotting and suggest that it could become a truly breathtaking work of science fiction.

A troubled protagonist

Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Burnham.

CBS

Get a load of that Discovery!

CBS

Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham.

The space gladiator moment is also our first hint that Discovery won’t be returning us to the “everything is fine” baseline of previous Trek shows. Showrunners Gretchen Berg and Aaron Harberts had already hinted in interviews that this series would be an arc rather than episodic, and, as a result, there are no tidy endings.

Instead, there are dramatic consequences to the space fight, in which Burnham eventually manages to skewer the Klingon on his own bat’leth. She returns to the ship radiation-scarred and wrathful, begging Georgiou to reject Starfleet’s peaceful mandate so they can immediately destroy the Klingon ship lurking nearby. Unlike the tough-but-fair Sisko or the always-ethical Picard, Burnham is a disturbingly flawed hero who sometimes opts for realpolitik rather than idealism.

When Georgiou tries to use diplomacy with the Klingons, Burnham consults privately with her adoptive father Sarek (yes, this makes her Spock’s sister), who appears via some kind of holographic telepresence system that we’ve never seen on Trek before. He advises her to give the Klingons a “Vulcan hello,” referencing an event in Vulcan history that’s going to be news to fans of the franchise. Apparently when the Vulcans first met the Klingons, they fired on the warlike species before doing anything else to earn their respect. This doesn’t sound much like the rational Vulcans we know, but then again this series is all about revealing hidden and often dark complexities beneath the Federation’s peaceful facade.

Armed with this knowledge, Burnham mutinies and tries to get the crew to fire on the Klingons. Here, again, Discovery surprises us. When Kirk bent the rules, he was usually rewarded for it in the end with a good outcome. Fighting to save his crew is the right choice, even if it seems wrong at first. But when Burnham tries her desperate move to save her ship, it turns out to be the first bad move in a terrible plan that backfires. Her choices cost her the friendship she has forged with Georgiou and get her thrown in the brig. As more Klingon and Federation ships arrive and the Shenzhou is shot to ribbons, Burnham is trapped behind the failing force field of her prison cell. She's forced to witness the first melee in a war she helped start from a position of helpless shame.

Though Burnham does eventually escape (in a pretty cool scene), it’s not exactly a triumphant moment. She has to endure the death of everything she holds dear, including Georgiou and most of the crew. As the second episode ends, she’s facing life in prison for her crimes—and a hellish lifetime of guilt after striving to overcome the horror of her family’s death at the hands of Klingons.

These emotional beats feel like a real departure for the franchise, which typically celebrates hope, bravery, and fecklessness in its protagonists and rarely dwells on how they might also be motivated by frustration and agony. At worst, we would see Kirk feel old and bored or see Sisko’s loyalty being tested by his evolving relationship with the Bajorans. In Discovery, we see an unsettling parallel between Burnham and T’Kuvma, the messianic leader of the newly unified Klingon Empire: both are ruled by rage and seemingly fueled by a history of trauma.

The new Klingons

Enlarge/ Chris Obi as T'Kuvma.

CBS

Discovery pulls a fast one on us by introducing Captain Georgiou only to kill her off. The same goes for the Klingon leader T’Kuvma (Chris Obi), who perishes in the exact way that Burnham feared. He becomes a martyr while fighting the evil humans. As the series gets underway, our main protagonist will be Burnham, and our main antagonist will be T’Kuvma’s protege Kol (Kenneth Mitchell), a pale-skinned Klingon who is the “son of none,” an outcast among the Klingon elites.

The pilot episode actually begins with the Klingon point of view, which is an interesting choice. T’Kuvma gives a patriotic speech to his followers, laced with religious fundamentalism and myriad references to the mythic Klingon leader Kahless. One of the most talked-about parts of this series is the Klingons’ new look, which is sort of a cross between H.R. Geiger’s alien art and a goth take on the Afro-futurist styles of Black Panther homeland Wakanda. Their armor is all techno-spines and curves; their faces are masklike, with oddly doubled nostrils and exaggerated mouths turned deeply down at the corners. The Klingon language no longer sounds Slavic; as T’Kuvma speaks, it has the tenor of an east African tribal language (though Obi reads his lines so haltingly that it’s unintentionally comic, which is unfortunate).

T’Kuvma has whipped up the great Klingon houses into a frenzy of nationalism. He promises them that a war with the Federation will allow them to “stay Klingon” and resist the lure of the Federation’s soft, semi-democratic way of life. But he also has an odd democratic streak of his own, elevating the lowly Kol to his second-in-command. He’s a kind of Klingon populist—a terrifying mixture of authoritarian and religious zealot. When Burnham shoots T’Kuvma, he gets exactly what he wants: an honorable death and a chance to unify his people in what’s basically a holy war against the Federation.

Despite their new look, the Klingons are very much in line with the humanoids we knew in the Next Generation series. They’ve got a complicated history and are obsessed with honor, racial purity, and spiritual tradition. Of course, they hate the polyglot Federation, with its multi-species fleet that promises peace but still fires first with their “Vulcan hellos.” Though a lot of this series feels like it’s taking Star Trek in a new direction—both in terms of characters and storytelling—it’s nice to see the Klingons' motivations have remained unchanged. They’re still the Federation’s ultimate enemy, and yet their violent impulses are hardly alien. They represent the worst instincts of humanity. When humans fight Klingons, we also fight ourselves.

Yes, there are problems

Though Discovery has its great moments, the first episode is also bogged down by some bad dialogue and bland acting at moments when the action should have felt white-hot. As tensions heat up with the Klingons, it feels like we’re in one of those “let’s discuss this case” moments on NCSI rather than a looming space massacre.

One particularly awkward moment stood out, when we are getting to know series regular Lt. Saru (Doug Jones of Pan's Labyrinth), the science officer. He explains to Burnham that he’s from a planet where his species is the “cow,” hunted by predators and bred to live in constant fear of death. Basically, Saru admits that he was a compliant food slave on another world. Which is pretty damn creepy and makes him fascinating as a character. How did a cow become chief science officer in Starfleet? But instead of highlighting his alien, tragic history, he’s given a long, garbled speech about “food chains” that makes no sense—and ends with him suggesting that he somehow has a special, evolved ability to sense when death is imminent.

That's why Saru announces that he “senses death” when the Klingons show up. Which—duh. You don’t need to be a prey species to notice when Klingons are itching for a fight. His character’s whole disturbing backstory is wasted in this scene, plus it gave me an uneasy feeling that there will be a lot of junk science in this show about how biology and ecosystems work. That feeling did not go away when Burnham, supposedly a "xenoanthropologist," announces that war is part of the Klingon’s “nature,” which she later seems to suggest means it’s part of their “culture.” Huh?

Nature vs. culture nitpicks aside, the main problem with the pilot is the directing. Which isn’t surprising, given that the series’ original showrunner Bryan Fuller (of Hannibal and American Gods) has said that one of the reasons he parted ways with the show was CBS’ insistence that he use David Semel as a director on the pilot. Semel has mostly worked on NCIS and is perfectly competent. But he doesn’t seem able to draw out the tension in scenes or inspire taut performances in his excellent cast. By the second episode, however, the actors are owning their characters in a way that’s infinitely more compelling, so my hope is that we’ll see more intense performances as the series progresses.

The glimpse we got of upcoming episodes was intriguing, and it suggested that Discovery is going to continue taking Burnham in a disturbing direction. Jailed and outcast, she’s going to have to struggle hard if she wants back into Starfleet. As she fights to redeem herself, a war is brewing between the Klingons and the Federation, so her personal struggles will be complicated by the larger astropolitical conflicts raging around her.

Overall, an unexpectedly good start

Despite its problems, Discovery is packed with intriguing ideas and characters who are already changing my idea of what the Federation represents. I love that we got a peek at the Vulcans’ less-than-peaceful treatment of the Klingons, offering us a better understanding of why the Klingons think the Federation is run by hypocrites. And Burnham’s character has a terrifically complex backstory, as the survivor of a Klingon attack who was raised by Vulcans. Like her brother Spock, she has to find a middle way between Vulcan realpolitik and her passionate, human sense of justice.

For the first time, we’re starting a Trek series by focusing on a person, Burnham, instead of a ship and its crew. Eventually, Burnham will have a crew of her own, including Saru, but it was interesting to walk into this series by focusing on her character and personal history.

What sets Discovery apart from previous Trek series is that it takes for granted that the Federation is not some monolithic entity where everybody is making relatively good decisions. Its history is riddled with shady conflicts. Its officers are in conflict. This isn’t a new idea, of course—we’ve seen it a lot in Deep Space Nine and Voyager, but both those series always tried to reassure us that rationality and good will would ultimately rule the day. You won’t have that feeling as you watch Discovery. Things aren’t going to be alright, at least not for the characters we know.

It’s not so much that the future feels darker in Discovery. The future just feels more realistically complicated. We’re not trying to make the galaxy a better place anymore, kids. We’re in the real world. And I think I like it.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

Posted from: this blog via Microsoft Flow.

via Blogger http://ift.tt/2xGLl59

[itsnelkabelka]

Speech: British High Commissioner's congratulatory message for Ghana at 60

On behalf of Her Majesty’s Government, all of us at the British High Commission offer our congratulations on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the independence of Ghana.

Ghana is one of the UK’s longest-standing and strongest partners in Africa. Our vibrant, modern and forward-looking partnership is based on a close and genuine friendship. The UK and Ghana have a wide range of shared values, aspirations and interests across all spheres. In business, Blue Skies stands as a promising example of UK-Ghana business relations - a company committed to exporting cut fruit daily to the UK. It is the largest private employer in Ghana and a great, tangible example of Global Britain and how our economic cooperation can bring about mutual prosperity. And in sport, several Black Stars continue to compliment the Barclay’s Premier League - one of the UK’s biggest cultural exports.

The UK is enthused about the next generation of Ghanaian entrepreneurs. Through the Department for International Development, that’s DFID’s, ENGINE programme, the UK looks to support Ghana in the area of Micro and Small Enterprises (MSEs) with the necessary skills and resources to improve their business plans and operations, while creating a thriving community of entrepreneurs that is vital for a successful economy.

Ghana and the UK continue to work together to achieve common goals on both domestic and global issues. A key arm of our relationship is a vibrant and creative Ghanaian Diaspora community in the UK, with well over a quarter a million British citizens of Ghanaian family heritage. Ghana is a modern, dynamic country – full of talent, and I am very proud that the UK remains a close friend.

60 years ago on Independence day itself, Ghana’s founding father, Kwame Nkrumah, spoke of Ghana’s parting from the UK, and I quote,

with the warmest feelings of friendship and goodwill, adding that: we enter our independence in association with Great Britain and with good relations unimpaired”. May those warm sentiments of close mutual respect continue into the farthest possible future.

Please accept our very best wishes for the happiness and prosperity of the government and people of Ghana - today and in the years ahead.

Happy Birthday, Ghana!

from Announcements on GOV.UK http://ift.tt/2mJZxFI via IFTTT

[somefunnyshits]

Star Trek: Discovery shows us a side of the Federation we've never seen

Enlarge/ Welcome to Star Trek: Discovery.

CBS

The debut of Star Trek: Discovery last night was unlike any other TV series premiere. It was a cultural event that people have been analyzing and anticipating for years. There are now three generations of people who grew up with Star Trek in its various incarnations, and the franchise has come to represent what many of us consider a better tomorrow. Discovery arrived on the scene with no shortage of baggage, both good and bad.

There was absolutely no way that the first two episodes (available now on CBS’s All Access streaming service) could have met all our expectations. Plus, the odds were already stacked against Discovery. The production lost a showrunner midstream, and advance buzz has been tepid, to say the least. So it should come as no shock that the first two episodes were flawed, with moments that felt a little clunky. And yet I was genuinely surprised by the show at many points, in a positive way. It gave us a dramatic, original perspective on the Star Trek universe. Even though the series is set 10 years before the original Star Trek series, it had a weird, futuristic edge that’s been sorely lacking in the recent J.J. Abrams movies.

And the best part? For the first time in decades, Star Trek feels dangerous again.

Spoilers ahead.

No more cozy spaceships

Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham.

CBS

Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham.

CBS

Chris Obi as T'Kuvma.

CBS

Mary Chieffo as L'Rell; Chris Obi as T'Kuvma.

The first two episodes of Discovery are definitely a slow burn. The acting feels oddly understated, and there are some awkward, info-dumpy conversations between First Officer Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and Captain Philippa Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh) as we establish their characters and the mission of the USS Shenzhou. But by the time we’re deep into the final battle with the Klingons, I found myself yelling, “Holy $%&!!” a lot. Ships are on fire! Klingons are yelling about their new messiah! Major characters are dying! The series went from zero to warp speed in less than two hours, which is pretty damn hard to pull off.

We leave the cozy confines of a typical Trek series behind after the opening scene, in which Burnham and Georgiou are on a peaceful mission to help a pre-contact civilization survive drought. After vaporizing the blockage in a well, they exchange a little banter and return to the Shenzhou to check out a strange object in the debris field of a binary star system. Obscured by some kind of radiation field, the object could be related to damage suffered by a nearby Federation communications relay.

When Burnham goes to investigate the object wearing nothing but a spacesuit and jetpack, we get a moment that really nails the tone of this new series. Alone in a vast debris field, illuminated by the light of two stars, Burnham seems more vulnerable and audacious than Starfleet officers we’ve known before. There’s no beaming down with an away team here. There’s no shuttle enclosing her in a protective shell.

When she finally encounters the object, an ancient sacred beacon, she lands on it with her own two feet. She's alone in vacuum, encountering something literally awesome. There’s something visceral about this scene, especially when she winds up in a deadly fight with a Klingon guarding the place. It’s as if they’re two knights battling in armor, except they’re in the middle of outer space.

Arresting scenes like this lift Discovery out of its slightly clunky plotting and suggest that it could become a truly breathtaking work of science fiction.

A troubled protagonist

Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Burnham.

CBS

Get a load of that Discovery!

CBS

Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham.

The space gladiator moment is also our first hint that Discovery won’t be returning us to the “everything is fine” baseline of previous Trek shows. Showrunners Gretchen Berg and Aaron Harberts had already hinted in interviews that this series would be an arc rather than episodic, and, as a result, there are no tidy endings.

Instead, there are dramatic consequences to the space fight, in which Burnham eventually manages to skewer the Klingon on his own bat’leth. She returns to the ship radiation-scarred and wrathful, begging Georgiou to reject Starfleet’s peaceful mandate so they can immediately destroy the Klingon ship lurking nearby. Unlike the tough-but-fair Sisko or the always-ethical Picard, Burnham is a disturbingly flawed hero who sometimes opts for realpolitik rather than idealism.

When Georgiou tries to use diplomacy with the Klingons, Burnham consults privately with her adoptive father Sarek (yes, this makes her Spock’s sister), who appears via some kind of holographic telepresence system that we’ve never seen on Trek before. He advises her to give the Klingons a “Vulcan hello,” referencing an event in Vulcan history that’s going to be news to fans of the franchise. Apparently when the Vulcans first met the Klingons, they fired on the warlike species before doing anything else, to earn their respect. This doesn’t sound much like the rational Vulcans we know, but then again this series is all about revealing hidden and often dark complexities beneath the Federation’s peaceful facade.

Armed with this knowledge, Burnham mutinies and tries to get the crew to fire on the Klingons. Here, again, Discovery surprises us. When Kirk bent the rules, he was usually rewarded for it in the end with a good outcome. Fighting to save his crew is the right choice, even if it seems wrong at first. But when Burnham tries her desperate move to save her ship, it turns out to be the first bad move in a terrible plan that backfires. Her choices cost her the friendship she’s forged with Georgiou and get her thrown in the brig. As more Klingon and Federation ships arrive, and the Shenzhou is shot to ribbons, Burnham is trapped behind the failing force field of her prison cell. She's forced to witness the first melee in a war she helped start from a position of helpless shame.

Though Burnham does eventually escape (in a pretty cool scene), it’s not exactly a triumphant moment. She has to endure the death of everything she holds dear, including Georgiou and most of the crew. As the second episode ends, she’s facing life in prison for her crimes—and a hellish lifetime of guilt after striving to overcome the horror of her family’s death at the hands of Klingons.

These emotional beats feel like a real departure for the franchise, which typically celebrates hope, bravery, and fecklessness in its protagonists and rarely dwells on how they might also be motivated by frustration and agony. At worst, we see Kirk feel old and bored, or we see Sisko’s loyalty being tested by his evolving relationship with the Bajorans. In Discovery, we see an unsettling parallel between Burnham and T’Kuvma, the messianic leader of the newly unified Klingon Empire: both are ruled by rage and seemingly fueled by a history of trauma.

The new Klingons

Enlarge/ Chris Obi as T'Kuvma.

CBS

Discovery pulls a fast one on us by introducing Captain Georgiou only to kill her off. The same goes for the Klingon leader T’Kuvma (Chris Obi), who perishes in the exact way that Burnham feared. He becomes a martyr while fighting the evil humans. As the series gets underway, our main protagonist will be Burnham and our main antagonist will be T’Kuvma’s protege Kol (Kenneth Mitchell), a pale-skinned Klingon who is the “son of none,” an outcast among the Klingon elites.

The pilot episode actually begins with the Klingon point of view, which is an interesting choice. T’Kuvma gives a patriotic speech to his followers, laced with religious fundamentalism and myriad references to the mythic Klingon leader Kahless. One of the most talked-about parts of this series is the Klingons’ new look, which is sort of a cross between H.R. Geiger’s alien art and a goth take on the Afro-futurist styles of Black Panther’s homeland Wakanda. Their armor is all techno-spines and curves; their faces are masklike, with oddly doubled nostrils and exaggerated mouths turned deeply down at the corners. The Klingon language no longer sounds Slavic; as T’Kuvma speaks, it has the tenor of an east African tribal language (though Obi reads his lines so haltingly that it’s unintentionally comic, which is unfortunate).

T’Kuvma has whipped up the great Klingon houses into a frenzy of nationalism. He promises them that a war with the Federation will allow them to “stay Klingon” and resist the lure of the Federation’s soft, semi-democratic way of life. But he also has an odd democratic streak of his own, elevating the lowly Kol to his second-in-command. He’s a kind of Klingon populist, a terrifying mixture of authoritarian and religious zealot. When Burnham shoots T’Kuvma, he gets exactly what he wants: an honorable death, and a chance to unify his people in what’s basically a holy war against the Federation.

Despite their new look, the Klingons are very much in line with the humanoids we knew in the Next Generation series. They’ve got a complicated history and are obsessed with honor, racial purity, and spiritual tradition. Of course, they hate the polyglot Federation, with its multi-species fleet that promises peace but still fires first with their “Vulcan hellos.” Though a lot of this series feels like it’s taking Star Trek in a new direction—both in terms of characters and storytelling—it’s nice to see the Klingons' motivations have remained unchanged. They’re still the Federation’s ultimate enemy, and yet their violent impulses are hardly alien. They represent the worst instincts of humanity. When humans fight Klingons, we also fight ourselves.

Yes, there are problems

Though Discovery has its great moments, the first episode is also bogged down by some bad dialogue and bland acting at moments when the action should have felt white hot. As tensions heat up with the Klingons, it feels like we’re in one of those “let’s discuss this case” moments on NCSI rather than a looming space massacre.

One particularly awkward moment stood out, when we are getting to know series regular Lt. Saru (Doug Jones of Pans Labyrinth), the science officer. He explains to Burnham that he’s from a planet where his species is the “cow,” hunted by predators and bred to live in constant fear of death. Basically, Saru admits that he was a compliant food slave on another world. Which is pretty damn creepy and makes him fascinating as a character. How did a cow become chief science officer in Starfleet? But instead of highlighting his alien, tragic history, he’s given a long, garbled speech about “food chains” that makes no sense—and ends with him suggesting that he somehow has a special, evolved ability to sense when death is imminent.</em></em>

That's why Saru announces that he “senses death” when the Klingons show up. Which—duh. You don’t need to be a prey species to notice when Klingons are itching for a fight. His character’s whole disturbing backstory is wasted in this scene, plus it gave me an uneasy feeling that there will be a lot of junk science in this show about how biology and ecosystems work. That feeling did not go away when Burnham, supposedly an "xenoanthropologist," announces that war is part of the Klingon’s “nature,” which she later seems to suggest means it’s part of their “culture.” Huh?

Nature vs. culture nitpicks aside, the main problem with the pilot is the directing. Which isn’t surprising, given that the series’ original showrunner Bryan Fuller (of Hannibal and American Gods) has said that one of the reasons he parted ways with the show was CBS’ insistence that he use David Semel as a director on the pilot. Semel has mostly worked on NCIS and is perfectly competent. But he doesn’t seem able to draw out the tension in scenes or inspire taut performances in his excellent cast. By the second episode, however, the actors are owning their characters in a way that’s infinitely more compelling, so my hope is that we’ll see more intense performances as the series progresses.

The glimpse we got of upcoming episodes was intriguing, and it suggested that Discovery is going to continue taking Burnham in a disturbing direction. Jailed and outcast, she’s going to have to struggle hard she wants back into Starfleet. As she fights to redeem herself, a war is brewing between the Klingons and the Federation, so her personal struggles will be complicated by the larger astropolitical conflicts raging around her.

Overall, an unexpectedly good start

Despite its problems, Discovery is packed with intriguing ideas and characters who are already changing my idea of what the Federation represents. I love that we got a peek at the Vulcans’ less-than-peaceful treatment of the Klingons, offering us a better understanding of why the Klingons think the Federation is run by hypocrites. And Burnham’s character has a terrifically complex backstory, as the survivor of a Klingon attack who was raised by Vulcans. Like her brother Spock, she has to find a middle way between Vulcan realpolitik and her passionate, human sense of justice.

For the first time, we’re starting a Trek series by focusing on a person, Burnham, instead of a ship and its crew. Eventually, Burnham will have a crew of her own, including Saru, but it was interesting to walk into this series by focusing on her character and personal history.

What sets Discovery apart from previous Trek series is that it takes for granted that the Federation is not some monolithic entity where everybody is making relatively good decisions. Its history is riddled with shady conflicts. Its officers are in conflict. This isn’t a new idea, of course—we’ve seen it a lot in Deep Space Nine and Voyager, but both those series always tried to reassure us that rationality and good will would ultimately rule the day. You won’t have that feeling as you watch Discovery. Things aren’t going to be alright, at least not for the characters we know.

It’s not so much that the future feels darker in Discovery. The future just feels more realistically complicated. We’re not trying to make the galaxy a better place anymore, kids. We’re in the real world. And I think I like it.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

Posted from: this blog via Microsoft Flow.

via Blogger http://ift.tt/2fu4twL

[somefunnyshits]

Enlarge/ Welcome to Star Trek: Discovery.CBSThe debut of Star Trek: Discovery last night was unlike any other TV series premiere. It was a cultural event that people have been analyzing and anticipating for years. There are now three generations of people who grew up with Star Trek in its various incarnations, and the franchise has come to represent what many of us consider a better tomorrow. Discovery arrived on the scene with no shortage of baggage, both good and bad.There was absolutely no way that the first two episodes (available now on CBS’s All Access streaming service) could have met all our expectations. Plus, the odds were already stacked against Discovery. The production lost a showrunner midstream, and advance buzz has been tepid, to say the least. So it should come as no shock that the first two episodes were flawed, with moments that felt a little clunky. And yet I was genuinely surprised by the show at many points, in a positive way. It gave us a dramatic, original perspective on the Star Trek universe. Even though the series is set 10 years before the original Star Trek series, it had a weird, futuristic edge that has been sorely lacking in the recent J.J. Abrams movies.And the best part? For the first time in decades, Star Trek feels dangerous again.Spoilers ahead.No more cozy spaceships Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham. CBS Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham. CBS Chris Obi as T'Kuvma. CBS Mary Chieffo as L'Rell; Chris Obi as T'Kuvma. The first two episodes of Discovery are definitely a slow burn. The acting feels oddly understated, and there are some awkward, info-dumpy conversations between First Officer Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and Captain Philippa Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh) as we establish their characters and the mission of the USS Shenzhou. But by the time we’re deep into the final battle with the Klingons, I found myself yelling, “Holy $%&!!” a lot. Ships are on fire! Klingons are yelling about their new messiah! Major characters are dying! The series went from zero to warp speed in less than two hours, which is pretty damn hard to pull off.We leave the cozy confines of a typical Trek series behind after the opening scene, in which Burnham and Georgiou are on a peaceful mission to help a pre-contact civilization survive drought. After vaporizing the blockage in a well, they exchange a little banter and return to the Shenzhou to check out a strange object in the debris field of a binary star system. Obscured by some kind of radiation field, the object could be related to damage suffered by a nearby Federation communications relay.When Burnham goes to investigate the object wearing nothing but a spacesuit and jetpack, we get a moment that really nails the tone of this new series. Alone in a vast debris field, illuminated by the light of two stars, Burnham seems more vulnerable and audacious than Starfleet officers we’ve known before. There’s no beaming down with an away team here. There’s no shuttle enclosing her in a protective shell.When she finally encounters the object, an ancient sacred beacon, she lands on it with her own two feet. She's alone in a vacuum, encountering something literally awesome. There’s something visceral about this scene, especially when she winds up in a deadly fight with a Klingon guarding the place. It’s as if they’re two knights battling in armor, except they’re in the middle of outer space.Arresting scenes like this lift Discovery out of its slightly clunky plotting and suggest that it could become a truly breathtaking work of science fiction.A troubled protagonist Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Burnham. CBS Get a load of that Discovery! CBS Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham. The space gladiator moment is also our first hint that Discovery won’t be returning us to the “everything is fine” baseline of previous Trek shows. Showrunners Gretchen Berg and Aaron Harberts had already hinted in interviews that this series would be an arc rather than episodic, and, as a result, there are no tidy endings.Instead, there are dramatic consequences to the space fight, in which Burnham eventually manages to skewer the Klingon on his own bat’leth. She returns to the ship radiation-scarred and wrathful, begging Georgiou to reject Starfleet’s peaceful mandate so they can immediately destroy the Klingon ship lurking nearby. Unlike the tough-but-fair Sisko or the always-ethical Picard, Burnham is a disturbingly flawed hero who sometimes opts for realpolitik rather than idealism.When Georgiou tries to use diplomacy with the Klingons, Burnham consults privately with her adoptive father Sarek (yes, this makes her Spock’s sister), who appears via some kind of holographic telepresence system that we’ve never seen on Trek before. He advises her to give the Klingons a “Vulcan hello,” referencing an event in Vulcan history that’s going to be news to fans of the franchise. Apparently when the Vulcans first met the Klingons, they fired on the warlike species before doing anything else to earn their respect. This doesn’t sound much like the rational Vulcans we know, but then again this series is all about revealing hidden and often dark complexities beneath the Federation’s peaceful facade.Armed with this knowledge, Burnham mutinies and tries to get the crew to fire on the Klingons. Here, again, Discovery surprises us. When Kirk bent the rules, he was usually rewarded for it in the end with a good outcome. Fighting to save his crew is the right choice, even if it seems wrong at first. But when Burnham tries her desperate move to save her ship, it turns out to be the first bad move in a terrible plan that backfires. Her choices cost her the friendship she has forged with Georgiou and get her thrown in the brig. As more Klingon and Federation ships arrive and the Shenzhou is shot to ribbons, Burnham is trapped behind the failing force field of her prison cell. She's forced to witness the first melee in a war she helped start from a position of helpless shame.Though Burnham does eventually escape (in a pretty cool scene), it’s not exactly a triumphant moment. She has to endure the death of everything she holds dear, including Georgiou and most of the crew. As the second episode ends, she’s facing life in prison for her crimes—and a hellish lifetime of guilt after striving to overcome the horror of her family’s death at the hands of Klingons.These emotional beats feel like a real departure for the franchise, which typically celebrates hope, bravery, and fecklessness in its protagonists and rarely dwells on how they might also be motivated by frustration and agony. At worst, we would see Kirk feel old and bored or see Sisko’s loyalty being tested by his evolving relationship with the Bajorans. In Discovery, we see an unsettling parallel between Burnham and T’Kuvma, the messianic leader of the newly unified Klingon Empire: both are ruled by rage and seemingly fueled by a history of trauma.The new KlingonsEnlarge/ Chris Obi as T'Kuvma.CBSDiscovery pulls a fast one on us by introducing Captain Georgiou only to kill her off. The same goes for the Klingon leader T’Kuvma (Chris Obi), who perishes in the exact way that Burnham feared. He becomes a martyr while fighting the evil humans. As the series gets underway, our main protagonist will be Burnham, and our main antagonist will be T’Kuvma’s protege Kol (Kenneth Mitchell), a pale-skinned Klingon who is the “son of none,” an outcast among the Klingon elites.The pilot episode actually begins with the Klingon point of view, which is an interesting choice. T’Kuvma gives a patriotic speech to his followers, laced with religious fundamentalism and myriad references to the mythic Klingon leader Kahless. One of the most talked-about parts of this series is the Klingons’ new look, which is sort of a cross between H.R. Geiger’s alien art and a goth take on the Afro-futurist styles of Black Panther homeland Wakanda. Their armor is all techno-spines and curves; their faces are masklike, with oddly doubled nostrils and exaggerated mouths turned deeply down at the corners. The Klingon language no longer sounds Slavic; as T’Kuvma speaks, it has the tenor of an east African tribal language (though Obi reads his lines so haltingly that it’s unintentionally comic, which is unfortunate).T’Kuvma has whipped up the great Klingon houses into a frenzy of nationalism. He promises them that a war with the Federation will allow them to “stay Klingon” and resist the lure of the Federation’s soft, semi-democratic way of life. But he also has an odd democratic streak of his own, elevating the lowly Kol to his second-in-command. He’s a kind of Klingon populist—a terrifying mixture of authoritarian and religious zealot. When Burnham shoots T’Kuvma, he gets exactly what he wants: an honorable death and a chance to unify his people in what’s basically a holy war against the Federation.Despite their new look, the Klingons are very much in line with the humanoids we knew in the Next Generation series. They’ve got a complicated history and are obsessed with honor, racial purity, and spiritual tradition. Of course, they hate the polyglot Federation, with its multi-species fleet that promises peace but still fires first with their “Vulcan hellos.” Though a lot of this series feels like it’s taking Star Trek in a new direction—both in terms of characters and storytelling—it’s nice to see the Klingons' motivations have remained unchanged. They’re still the Federation’s ultimate enemy, and yet their violent impulses are hardly alien. They represent the worst instincts of humanity. When humans fight Klingons, we also fight ourselves.Yes, there are problemsThough Discovery has its great moments, the first episode is also bogged down by some bad dialogue and bland acting at moments when the action should have felt white-hot. As tensions heat up with the Klingons, it feels like we’re in one of those “let’s discuss this case” moments on NCSI rather than a looming space massacre.One particularly awkward moment stood out, when we are getting to know series regular Lt. Saru (Doug Jones of Pan's Labyrinth), the science officer. He explains to Burnham that he’s from a planet where his species is the “cow,” hunted by predators and bred to live in constant fear of death. Basically, Saru admits that he was a compliant food slave on another world. Which is pretty damn creepy and makes him fascinating as a character. How did a cow become chief science officer in Starfleet? But instead of highlighting his alien, tragic history, he’s given a long, garbled speech about “food chains” that makes no sense—and ends with him suggesting that he somehow has a special, evolved ability to sense when death is imminent.That's why Saru announces that he “senses death” when the Klingons show up. Which—duh. You don’t need to be a prey species to notice when Klingons are itching for a fight. His character’s whole disturbing backstory is wasted in this scene, plus it gave me an uneasy feeling that there will be a lot of junk science in this show about how biology and ecosystems work. That feeling did not go away when Burnham, supposedly a "xenoanthropologist," announces that war is part of the Klingon’s “nature,” which she later seems to suggest means it’s part of their “culture.” Huh?Nature vs. culture nitpicks aside, the main problem with the pilot is the directing. Which isn’t surprising, given that the series’ original showrunner Bryan Fuller (of Hannibal and American Gods) has said that one of the reasons he parted ways with the show was CBS’ insistence that he use David Semel as a director on the pilot. Semel has mostly worked on NCIS and is perfectly competent. But he doesn’t seem able to draw out the tension in scenes or inspire taut performances in his excellent cast. By the second episode, however, the actors are owning their characters in a way that’s infinitely more compelling, so my hope is that we’ll see more intense performances as the series progresses.The glimpse we got of upcoming episodes was intriguing, and it suggested that Discovery is going to continue taking Burnham in a disturbing direction. Jailed and outcast, she’s going to have to struggle hard if she wants back into Starfleet. As she fights to redeem herself, a war is brewing between the Klingons and the Federation, so her personal struggles will be complicated by the larger astropolitical conflicts raging around her.Overall, an unexpectedly good startDespite its problems, Discovery is packed with intriguing ideas and characters who are already changing my idea of what the Federation represents. I love that we got a peek at the Vulcans’ less-than-peaceful treatment of the Klingons, offering us a better understanding of why the Klingons think the Federation is run by hypocrites. And Burnham’s character has a terrifically complex backstory, as the survivor of a Klingon attack who was raised by Vulcans. Like her brother Spock, she has to find a middle way between Vulcan realpolitik and her passionate, human sense of justice.For the first time, we’re starting a Trek series by focusing on a person, Burnham, instead of a ship and its crew. Eventually, Burnham will have a crew of her own, including Saru, but it was interesting to walk into this series by focusing on her character and personal history.What sets Discovery apart from previous Trek series is that it takes for granted that the Federation is not some monolithic entity where everybody is making relatively good decisions. Its history is riddled with shady conflicts. Its officers are in conflict. This isn’t a new idea, of course—we’ve seen it a lot in Deep Space Nine and Voyager, but both those series always tried to reassure us that rationality and good will would ultimately rule the day. You won’t have that feeling as you watch Discovery. Things aren’t going to be alright, at least not for the characters we know.It’s not so much that the future feels darker in Discovery. The future just feels more realistically complicated. We’re not trying to make the galaxy a better place anymore, kids. We’re in the real world. And I think I like it.Let's block ads! (Why?)Posted from: this blog via Microsoft Flow.

http://gooogleenews.blogspot.com/2017/09/star-trek-discovery-shows-us-side-of_25.html

[somefunnyshits]

Enlarge/ Welcome to Star Trek: Discovery.CBSThe debut of Star Trek: Discovery last night was unlike any other TV series premiere. It was a cultural event that people have been analyzing and anticipating for years. There are now three generations of people who grew up with Star Trek in its various incarnations, and the franchise has come to represent what many of us consider a better tomorrow. Discovery arrived on the scene with no shortage of baggage, both good and bad.There was absolutely no way that the first two episodes (available now on CBS’s All Access streaming service) could have met all our expectations. Plus, the odds were already stacked against Discovery. The production lost a showrunner midstream, and advance buzz has been tepid, to say the least. So it should come as no shock that the first two episodes were flawed, with moments that felt a little clunky. And yet I was genuinely surprised by the show at many points, in a positive way. It gave us a dramatic, original perspective on the Star Trek universe. Even though the series is set 10 years before the original Star Trek series, it had a weird, futuristic edge that’s been sorely lacking in the recent J.J. Abrams movies.And the best part? For the first time in decades, Star Trek feels dangerous again.Spoilers ahead.No more cozy spaceships Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham. CBS Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham. CBS Chris Obi as T'Kuvma. CBS Mary Chieffo as L'Rell; Chris Obi as T'Kuvma. The first two episodes of Discovery are definitely a slow burn. The acting feels oddly understated, and there are some awkward, info-dumpy conversations between First Officer Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and Captain Philippa Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh) as we establish their characters and the mission of the USS Shenzhou. But by the time we’re deep into the final battle with the Klingons, I found myself yelling, “Holy $%&!!” a lot. Ships are on fire! Klingons are yelling about their new messiah! Major characters are dying! The series went from zero to warp speed in less than two hours, which is pretty damn hard to pull off.We leave the cozy confines of a typical Trek series behind after the opening scene, in which Burnham and Georgiou are on a peaceful mission to help a pre-contact civilization survive drought. After vaporizing the blockage in a well, they exchange a little banter and return to the Shenzhou to check out a strange object in the debris field of a binary star system. Obscured by some kind of radiation field, the object could be related to damage suffered by a nearby Federation communications relay.When Burnham goes to investigate the object wearing nothing but a spacesuit and jetpack, we get a moment that really nails the tone of this new series. Alone in a vast debris field, illuminated by the light of two stars, Burnham seems more vulnerable and audacious than Starfleet officers we’ve known before. There’s no beaming down with an away team here. There’s no shuttle enclosing her in a protective shell.When she finally encounters the object, an ancient sacred beacon, she lands on it with her own two feet. She's alone in vacuum, encountering something literally awesome. There’s something visceral about this scene, especially when she winds up in a deadly fight with a Klingon guarding the place. It’s as if they’re two knights battling in armor, except they’re in the middle of outer space.Arresting scenes like this lift Discovery out of its slightly clunky plotting and suggest that it could become a truly breathtaking work of science fiction.A troubled protagonist Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Burnham. CBS Get a load of that Discovery! CBS Michelle Yeoh as Captain Philippa Georgiou; Sonequa Martin-Green as First Officer Michael Burnham. The space gladiator moment is also our first hint that Discovery won’t be returning us to the “everything is fine” baseline of previous Trek shows. Showrunners Gretchen Berg and Aaron Harberts had already hinted in interviews that this series would be an arc rather than episodic, and, as a result, there are no tidy endings.Instead, there are dramatic consequences to the space fight, in which Burnham eventually manages to skewer the Klingon on his own bat’leth. She returns to the ship radiation-scarred and wrathful, begging Georgiou to reject Starfleet’s peaceful mandate so they can immediately destroy the Klingon ship lurking nearby. Unlike the tough-but-fair Sisko or the always-ethical Picard, Burnham is a disturbingly flawed hero who sometimes opts for realpolitik rather than idealism.When Georgiou tries to use diplomacy with the Klingons, Burnham consults privately with her adoptive father Sarek (yes, this makes her Spock’s sister), who appears via some kind of holographic telepresence system that we’ve never seen on Trek before. He advises her to give the Klingons a “Vulcan hello,” referencing an event in Vulcan history that’s going to be news to fans of the franchise. Apparently when the Vulcans first met the Klingons, they fired on the warlike species before doing anything else, to earn their respect. This doesn’t sound much like the rational Vulcans we know, but then again this series is all about revealing hidden and often dark complexities beneath the Federation’s peaceful facade.Armed with this knowledge, Burnham mutinies and tries to get the crew to fire on the Klingons. Here, again, Discovery surprises us. When Kirk bent the rules, he was usually rewarded for it in the end with a good outcome. Fighting to save his crew is the right choice, even if it seems wrong at first. But when Burnham tries her desperate move to save her ship, it turns out to be the first bad move in a terrible plan that backfires. Her choices cost her the friendship she’s forged with Georgiou and get her thrown in the brig. As more Klingon and Federation ships arrive, and the Shenzhou is shot to ribbons, Burnham is trapped behind the failing force field of her prison cell. She's forced to witness the first melee in a war she helped start from a position of helpless shame.Though Burnham does eventually escape (in a pretty cool scene), it’s not exactly a triumphant moment. She has to endure the death of everything she holds dear, including Georgiou and most of the crew. As the second episode ends, she’s facing life in prison for her crimes—and a hellish lifetime of guilt after striving to overcome the horror of her family’s death at the hands of Klingons.These emotional beats feel like a real departure for the franchise, which typically celebrates hope, bravery, and fecklessness in its protagonists and rarely dwells on how they might also be motivated by frustration and agony. At worst, we see Kirk feel old and bored, or we see Sisko’s loyalty being tested by his evolving relationship with the Bajorans. In Discovery, we see an unsettling parallel between Burnham and T’Kuvma, the messianic leader of the newly unified Klingon Empire: both are ruled by rage and seemingly fueled by a history of trauma.The new KlingonsEnlarge/ Chris Obi as T'Kuvma.CBSDiscovery pulls a fast one on us by introducing Captain Georgiou only to kill her off. The same goes for the Klingon leader T’Kuvma (Chris Obi), who perishes in the exact way that Burnham feared. He becomes a martyr while fighting the evil humans. As the series gets underway, our main protagonist will be Burnham and our main antagonist will be T’Kuvma’s protege Kol (Kenneth Mitchell), a pale-skinned Klingon who is the “son of none,” an outcast among the Klingon elites.The pilot episode actually begins with the Klingon point of view, which is an interesting choice. T’Kuvma gives a patriotic speech to his followers, laced with religious fundamentalism and myriad references to the mythic Klingon leader Kahless. One of the most talked-about parts of this series is the Klingons’ new look, which is sort of a cross between H.R. Geiger’s alien art and a goth take on the Afro-futurist styles of Black Panther’s homeland Wakanda. Their armor is all techno-spines and curves; their faces are masklike, with oddly doubled nostrils and exaggerated mouths turned deeply down at the corners. The Klingon language no longer sounds Slavic; as T’Kuvma speaks, it has the tenor of an east African tribal language (though Obi reads his lines so haltingly that it’s unintentionally comic, which is unfortunate).T’Kuvma has whipped up the great Klingon houses into a frenzy of nationalism. He promises them that a war with the Federation will allow them to “stay Klingon” and resist the lure of the Federation’s soft, semi-democratic way of life. But he also has an odd democratic streak of his own, elevating the lowly Kol to his second-in-command. He’s a kind of Klingon populist, a terrifying mixture of authoritarian and religious zealot. When Burnham shoots T’Kuvma, he gets exactly what he wants: an honorable death, and a chance to unify his people in what’s basically a holy war against the Federation.Despite their new look, the Klingons are very much in line with the humanoids we knew in the Next Generation series. They’ve got a complicated history and are obsessed with honor, racial purity, and spiritual tradition. Of course, they hate the polyglot Federation, with its multi-species fleet that promises peace but still fires first with their “Vulcan hellos.” Though a lot of this series feels like it’s taking Star Trek in a new direction—both in terms of characters and storytelling—it’s nice to see the Klingons' motivations have remained unchanged. They’re still the Federation’s ultimate enemy, and yet their violent impulses are hardly alien. They represent the worst instincts of humanity. When humans fight Klingons, we also fight ourselves.Yes, there are problemsThough Discovery has its great moments, the first episode is also bogged down by some bad dialogue and bland acting at moments when the action should have felt white hot. As tensions heat up with the Klingons, it feels like we’re in one of those “let’s discuss this case” moments on NCSI rather than a looming space massacre.One particularly awkward moment stood out, when we are getting to know series regular Lt. Saru (Doug Jones of Pans Labyrinth), the science officer. He explains to Burnham that he’s from a planet where his species is the “cow,” hunted by predators and bred to live in constant fear of death. Basically, Saru admits that he was a compliant food slave on another world. Which is pretty damn creepy and makes him fascinating as a character. How did a cow become chief science officer in Starfleet? But instead of highlighting his alien, tragic history, he’s given a long, garbled speech about “food chains” that makes no sense—and ends with him suggesting that he somehow has a special, evolved ability to sense when death is imminent.That's why Saru announces that he “senses death” when the Klingons show up. Which—duh. You don’t need to be a prey species to notice when Klingons are itching for a fight. His character’s whole disturbing backstory is wasted in this scene, plus it gave me an uneasy feeling that there will be a lot of junk science in this show about how biology and ecosystems work. That feeling did not go away when Burnham, supposedly an "xenoanthropologist," announces that war is part of the Klingon’s “nature,” which she later seems to suggest means it’s part of their “culture.” Huh?Nature vs. culture nitpicks aside, the main problem with the pilot is the directing. Which isn’t surprising, given that the series’ original showrunner Bryan Fuller (of Hannibal and American Gods) has said that one of the reasons he parted ways with the show was CBS’ insistence that he use David Semel as a director on the pilot. Semel has mostly worked on NCIS and is perfectly competent. But he doesn’t seem able to draw out the tension in scenes or inspire taut performances in his excellent cast. By the second episode, however, the actors are owning their characters in a way that’s infinitely more compelling, so my hope is that we’ll see more intense performances as the series progresses.The glimpse we got of upcoming episodes was intriguing, and it suggested that Discovery is going to continue taking Burnham in a disturbing direction. Jailed and outcast, she’s going to have to struggle hard she wants back into Starfleet. As she fights to redeem herself, a war is brewing between the Klingons and the Federation, so her personal struggles will be complicated by the larger astropolitical conflicts raging around her.Overall, an unexpectedly good startDespite its problems, Discovery is packed with intriguing ideas and characters who are already changing my idea of what the Federation represents. I love that we got a peek at the Vulcans’ less-than-peaceful treatment of the Klingons, offering us a better understanding of why the Klingons think the Federation is run by hypocrites. And Burnham’s character has a terrifically complex backstory, as the survivor of a Klingon attack who was raised by Vulcans. Like her brother Spock, she has to find a middle way between Vulcan realpolitik and her passionate, human sense of justice.For the first time, we’re starting a Trek series by focusing on a person, Burnham, instead of a ship and its crew. Eventually, Burnham will have a crew of her own, including Saru, but it was interesting to walk into this series by focusing on her character and personal history.What sets Discovery apart from previous Trek series is that it takes for granted that the Federation is not some monolithic entity where everybody is making relatively good decisions. Its history is riddled with shady conflicts. Its officers are in conflict. This isn’t a new idea, of course—we’ve seen it a lot in Deep Space Nine and Voyager, but both those series always tried to reassure us that rationality and good will would ultimately rule the day. You won’t have that feeling as you watch Discovery. Things aren’t going to be alright, at least not for the characters we know.It’s not so much that the future feels darker in Discovery. The future just feels more realistically complicated. We’re not trying to make the galaxy a better place anymore, kids. We’re in the real world. And I think I like it.Let's block ads! (Why?)Posted from: this blog via Microsoft Flow.

http://gooogleenews.blogspot.com/2017/09/star-trek-discovery-shows-us-side-of.html