#william mapother is who I mean

[sesamestreep]

best part of the m:i2 experience was going “oh, hey, it’s that guy! from…literally everything…” in the first scene and then remembering he’s very famously Tom Cruise’s cousin

[byneddiedingo]

Tom Cruise in Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1999)

Cast: Jim Beaver, Jeremy Blackman, Tom Cruise, Robert Downey Sr., Henry Gibson, Clark Gregg, Luis Guzmán, Philip Baker Hall, Felicity Huffman, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Thomas Jane, Ricky Jay, Craig Kvinsland, William H. Macy, William Mapother, Alfred Molina, Julianne Moore, Michael Murphy, Patton Oswalt, Mary Lynn Rajskub, John C. Reilly, Jason Robards, Paul F. Tompkins, Melora Walters. Screenplay: Paul Thomas Anderson. Cinematography: Robert Elswit. Production design: William Arnold, Mark Bridges. Film editing: Dylan Tichenor. Music: Jon Brion.

Paul Thomas Anderson's movies are so loaded with crazy stuff that it's possible to recall only some of the jaw-droppers in them, like the "milkshake" scene in There Will Be Blood (2007) or the rain of frogs in Magnolia. That's why it's always worth rewatching them after some passage of time. There is so much more going on in Magnolia��than I remembered. It's really the detail work that comes to the fore when you watch it again. The film has that loose, semi-improvised quality that I have come to admire in Godard. I'm talking especially about Philip Seymour Hoffman's touching performance as Jason Robards's nurse, John C. Reilly's naive cop, Melora Walters's scattered druggie, Philip Baker Hall's disintegrating game show host, and Julianne Moore's descent into hysteria. Most of the attention on the first viewing went to Tom Cruise, who lets out the manic quality that we had only glimpsed before in his work. The performance earned him an Oscar nomination, as over-the-top and supposedly out-of-character performances tend to do. (We would later, in the Katie Hughes era and as his commitment to Scientology came to the fore, come to wonder how out of character this manic Cruise really was.) I think the movie is too long (it runs 188 minutes), and that perhaps some of its segments exist only because of Anderson's commitment to the actors who made his breakthrough film, Boogie Nights (1997). I'm thinking here of William H. Macy's character, which seems to me like a dangling thread in the fabric of the film -- though it does result in a wonderful scene in which Macy and Henry Gibson compete for the attention of a hunky bartender (Craig Kvinsland). As for the frogs, I refuse to speculate on their "meaning," preferring the reaction of Stanley (Jeremy Blackman): "This happens. This is something that happens."

[smokeybrand]

Super Hypocrisy

I feel like I'm talking too much about Jjabrams, man. This dude just keep cropping up in the sh*t i have general interest in and I'm kind of starting to hate it. Dude is kind of a hack and is about the whole “big reveal” rather than organically creating a narrative that leads to a twist. In a lot of ways, he’s the opposite of Shyamalan that way. Personally, i wouldn’t want Abrams anywhere near my franchise as he’s not really that much of creative and more a company man, which is why studios love him, but a lot of his content i just pedestrian. Like, he’s never created anything that can stand toe-to-toe with the likes of Christopher Nolan and he was able to squeeze an Oscar out of Batman. Abrams doesn’t have an eye for detail like that, he doesn’t develop characters enough to give actors enough to really dig into. I feel like giving him the reigns to Supes will end up the same way as it did with Snyder but with brighter colors and more lens flare. This was a tangent but i needed to put into context why he’s trying to cast a Black Supes. Dude can’t make anything of substance so he has to rely on gimmicks for film making. This time is a racebend. Now, let’s get into the meat of this essay.

I spoke about this at length not long ago but it’s relevant today because of the news that Abrams has been out in charge of the Superman reboot was revealed recently and the first thing that’s leaked is his desire to cast a Black Superman, something that fits right in with his penchant toward spectacle rather than substance. This news, obviously, was met with a ton of resistance from the fandom because, you know, Superman is “white.” Never mind that, in reality, he’s an alien, so he can technically be anything. Because he not from earth. But i understand the outrage. If a White boy played Black Panther, I'd be upset. Wait, there is a Whitewashed version of Black Panther. His name is Hunter and he’s known as White Wolf when in costume. Not only that, but he’s the adopted son of T’Chaka. That means this white boy is, quite literally, a prince of a whole ass African nation. Wait, so there IS a White Black Panther? Well, surely there isn’t a film about ancient Egyptian mythology that cast the principal gods of the land with white people and made literally all of the supporting characters people of color? Hold on, that happened, too? Gods of Egypt, is what it’s called? Yeah, that movie where Set, played by Gerard Butler, overthrew his brother, Horus, portrayed by Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, with an epic adventure seen through the eyes of an Egyptian thief named Bek, brought to life by Brenton Thwaites. None of these people are black, in a story about an ancient African nation. There are only two people of color in this entire cast. One is Elodie Yung, a French-Cambodian biracial women, as Hathor and f*cking Chadwick Boseman as Thoth. I mention Elodie because I'm mildly in love with her but the point of this was to highlight the fact that Chadwick Boseman was the only black dude in a movie about ancient Egyptian mythology. Outside of the slaves, of course. But Superman can’t be Black? Okay, bud.

I spent some of my childhood in a church where Jesus looked more like Christian Bale than me, even though, historically, if he even existed, he definitely rocked an afro. This was long before i became an aggressive apostate but, interestingly enough, Christian Bale ended up playing Moses, which, again, would be historically inaccurate because, like everyone depicted in the Bible, especially the Old Testament, were Black as sh*t. They would have to be considering the age these stories were being told and the geographical location of where the Jewish people originated. No one talks about that enough. My point with all of this is, if f*cking Jesus can be a white dude for centuries with no push back from anyone, why can’t the Jesus allegory of Kal-El be Black? Because of racism. Straight up White Supremacy. It’s always White supremacy. It’s maintaining the narrative that the Whites are the best and everyone else has to tows the line. The objective outrage over Abrams wanting to put a black dude in Supes’ red underoos is just another testament to that. Not a word when Gods of Egypt came out. Not a word about White Tiger. Not a word about Exodus: Gods and Kings or The Girl with all the Gifts or Noah or A Mighty Heart or The Ten Commandments or Artemis Foul or Pay It Forward or the Earthsea adaption or Warm Bodies or the entire cast of that ridiculously awful Airbender flick or the equally ridiculous Prince of Persian adaption or however man other countless roles that should have been people of color that ended up going to white folks because the movie had to reach a “broad” audience. That’s code for White Suburban Demographic. White people don’t like not seeing themselves onscreen and they throw fits about it. How do you people think the rest of us feel? Cats literally erase Back people in biographical roles, sh*t like World Trade Center where William Mapother, a White dude, plays  Marine Sergeant Jason Thomas, an actual Black man. Thomas is an actual f*cking hero, a national goddamn treasure, and he can’t even be portrayed by someone who looks like him, that shares his skin tone, in a movie about sh*t he did in real life. But Superman can’t be black? For real? The hypocrisy is palpable. And, the kicker about all of this? It doesn’t have to be.

The DCEU is leaning heavy into the multiverse because Snyder sh*t the bed so hard and they want to diversity their content in order to salvage a profit from that mess. The comics are effectively doing the same thing with the Infinite Frontier initiative because all these relaunches over the years have been met with a collective groan. What that means is the entirety of the DC multiverse is available for development and it just so happens that there is a pretty prominent “Black” Superman available to adapt. See, that’s the thing, unlike the situation where Black roles are Whitewashed in Hollywood, there is already a Kryptonian, who is Superman, and is “Black. No one needs to replace Clark or his legacy  because thee is a whole as Earth where Val-Zod is Superman. Val is the adoptive brother to Hal, just like Hunter is to T'Challa. It’s literally the same thing but in reverse. Val took over the mantle after Clark was killed during the World’s End event on Earth-2, i think. After Clark was buried, Val became THE Superman, legitimately wearing the crest of El on his chest. Val is your Black Superman. He is a Black Superman. Clark can still be Clark in another branch of the Multiverse but in Jjabrams corner, Val is a really good option to do what he wants to with the character without slighting Clark or what came before. Val-Zod is a Superman that Michael B. Jordan can play, without hurting the fragile feelings of these lily white man-children out here in the wild, while still having ties to House of El. It’s a win all round for everyone involved. Unless Jjabrams decides to go full troll and adapt President Superman from Earth-23. At that point, Jjabrams is just trolling.

[tivarocks]

Great 38 Rewatch Rolls On! #BlinkingRedLight

A Great Episode for a Great Rewatch

I adore my mother.  She is a highly entertaining and quirky person.  She loves the arts, numerous forms of entertainment and she's an avid reader.  She mostly reads mysteries, historical essays (some occasionally written by her daughter), romance, and biography.  However, she will readily admit that she truly loves a good suspense book involving a serial killer.  Thus, when I watch this episode I always remember what she said after she watched it the first time.  "A serial killer kills a serial killer?!  Oh, how wonderful!"  She was right and it’s a fascinating story.

For me, Blinking Red Light basically asks the question that runs throughout the series, Does the end justify the means? Specifically in this episode, Is it right that Jane baited one serial killer to kill another serial killer?  It's easy to say that Jane felt compelled to stop Panzer and didn't want anyone else killed and didn't believe that  FBI Agent Susan Darcy who was taking over the case, had the ability to think outside "standard investigative methods."  Therefore, he did what he had to do.  However, he's smart enough to know that the consequences of this will be enormous. 

This is also the episode where we first meet Richard Haibach.  He's a pedophile who seems to know the law well and frustrates Lisbon who wants to arrest him but doesn't have enough evidence to make a charge work.  It's the perfect counterpoint to Jane's decision with Panzer. 

The team brings another great performance but I also enjoyed David Paymer (as James Panzer) and William Mapother (as Richard Haibach).  They perfectly nailed the creepiness of both characters.  Frankly, my blood turned cold when Panzer offered Jane "a snack or something to drink."  The only other thing he could have suggested that would have scared me more would have been a nice Chianti and some fava beans.

I hope you can join us today, January 10th at 5pm EST USA to watch #BlinkingRedLight.  We will be live tweeting throughout the episode.  If you're shy you don't have to speak but watching and reading the #BlinkingRedLight tweets can be great fun. 

Cheers! tivarocks!