The First Church of Free Speech

I saw it yesterday. So I’m going to work off the assumption that someone out there gives a shit about what I have to say and talk about it.

In a word, it was mediocre. At best. The plot was full of holes and contrivances, and it was nothing more than a vehicle for various mutant cameos and cool displays of mutant powers. I like seeing my favorite mutants from the comics appear as much as anyone else, but you know what I also like? A plot that makes sense.

I’m not going to worry about spoilers since, judging by the monstrous box office take, everyone and his brother has seen this movie.

The basic premise of the movie is that a “cure” for mutation has been developed. Okay, so “curing” someone of the ability to control the god damn weather is pretty far-fetched, but I enjoyed the second movie immensely. So I can suspend disbelief again. This cure, predictably, causes massive upheaval in the mutant community. Many, like the character Rogue, want to be rid of their powers. (Rogue, for example, can’t touch anyone without putting him in a coma and absorbing the other person’s mutant powers and memories.) Others with kick-ass powers, like Storm, can’t understand why anyone would want to use this cure.

The cure was developed by Worthington Laboratories. Fans of the comics know that Warren Worthington III, the son of the company’s president, is the mutant Angel. He has wings. He also had a small, completely worthless presence in the movie. He existed only to refuse the cure, fly off and then eventually save his father from being thrown off a building. He also can apparently fly across the continental United States in under 2 hours. Screw the cure, this guy should start his own airline.

Magneto mobilizes an “army” of mutants (it looked more like about 40 to 50 on-screen), telling them that the humans will force the cure on them and take away what makes them all unique. His right-hand woman, Mystique, has also been captured by the US government. When Magneto goes to rescue her, a guard shoots her with the mutant cure. (The Army has weaponized it so that it can be deployed from fire-arms and other kinds of artillery.) No longer being a mutant, Magneto leaves her behind. Frankly, this was unexpected. The last movie implied a romantic connection between the two of them, and they seemed very close. For Magneto to leave her there didn’t make a whole lot of sense, especially since she has valuable intelligence on how he conducts his affairs, intelligence which she later voluntarily turned over to the US government.

Oh, and I haven’t mentioned Cyclops’ death yet. That’s because I almost forgot it happened. Cyclops, leader of the X-Men, gets axed in the first ten minutes with little to no impact. All we see of him is him crying in his room, hearing a voice and then riding his bike up to Alkali Lake, where Jean Grey was killed. Jean then comes back from the dead, kisses him and kills him.

To be honest, I always thought Cyclops got the shaft in these movies. He was always playing second-fiddle to Jean and Wolverine. The writers kept trying to make a love triangle out of those three, but a love triangle doesn’t work when one of the players has absolutely no character depth. Anyway, Wolverine and Storm go up to Alkali Lake for some reason I can’t remember. There they find Jean Grey’s unconscious body. Wolverine also finds Cyclops’ glasses, but doesn’t mention that little detail until about 20 minutes later in the movie. That’s how much the writers actually cared about Cyclops’ character.

Anyway, as it turns out, Jean Grey is the most powerful mutant ever, and her powers caused her to have split personalities. One was Jean Grey, and the other was known as the Phoenix. Phoenix is basically a creature of pure impulse, doing whatever it wants whenever the hell it wants to. As the professor is explaining all of this to Wolverine, Wolverine still doesn’t mention that he found Cyclops’ glasses at the lake, by the way. Now on a good note, the writers made a good decision on how to handle Phoenix. In the comics, Phoenix was some sort of alien entity from outer space. I can’t remember the details. But following the comics in that regard would have been pushing the bounds of what the audience was willing to accept. So kudos on that point.

After Phoenix wakes up and throws Wolverine into a wall, she goes back home. Magneto and the Professor find her there, and Xavier faces off with her to try and reestablish the psychic blocks he had put in place to cage the beast originally. But Phoenix winds up killing him, and she allies herself with Magneto. Unfortunately, Magneto shows almost no sign of remorse at all over Xavier’s death. There’s a scene where he tells Pyro (who said he’d have killed Xavier, given the chance), that he regrets Xavier had to die for his dream to be realized and that Xavier did more for mutants than he’d ever know, but I was expecting something that wasn’t a reaction to an insult. These are two guys who, even when they were at each other’s throats, still got together to play chess and talk about their differences in a civil fashion.

The problem with writing like this and an actor like Ian McKellan is that he makes you see all sorts of depth to the character that the comparatively shallow writing won’t show and will even contradict. The writing sells Magneto as a maniacal, heartless bastard, but McKellan shows a Holocaust survivor with the power to ensure that his people are never oppressed again. The questions of how the oppressed becomes the oppressor aren’t really explored. It just kind of happens.

Anyway, Magneto eventually finds out what the source of the cure is: a mutant named Leech. Around him, other mutants’ powers don’t work. Scientists took his DNA and made the cure out of it. Magneto’s grand plan is to march over to Alcatraz Island, where the cure is being made, and kill the boy. He gets to the island by moving the Golden Gate Bridge. It’s a pretty cool display, but then he just stops. He lets his group of mutants start fighting the soldiers stationed there and tells Juggernaut (played by Vinnie Jones) to run in and kill Leech. Is that really necessary? He could’ve just thrown the damn bridge into the building and have been done with it. Instead he sits there for the first half of the battle and does nothing. There was a shitload of metallic debris laying around that he could’ve shredded his enemies with, but just stands there. And Phoenix, who is at his side, just sits there as well. You’ve got the two most powerful mutants on the planet … and they just sit there.

Eventually, Magneto gets off his ass and starts doing something. But while Wolverine distracts him, Beast sticks him with the cure. Then Phoenix starts going ape-shit and causing people to spontaneously combust. Everyone except Wolverine leaves the island. He stays behind to kill Jean. His healing factor keeps regenerating him before he can burst into confetti, and eventually he gets close enough to tell Jean he loves her before stabbing her with his claws and kill her. But why not just stick her with the damn cure? There was plenty of it laying around. Jean’s death was a massive contrivance for Wolverine to have “his moment”.

And I never bought the whole “Logan Loves Jean” deal. Wolverine is well over 80 years old; he’s not some horny kid who falls in love with the first piece of ass he can. Treating him like a student in love with his teacher was a disservice to his character.

The movie ends with Magneto sitting in a park playing chess with nobody. He waves his hand, and one of the metal chess pieces moves slightly. Great. So the cure doesn’t actually work. All that destruction and death over something that didn’t even work. Do the writers have no concept of permanence? Drama isn’t just a momentary shock that is relieved by completely undoing what you just did. Drama comes from things like death or the cure, the entire premise of the movie, being permanent, as in no “Undo” option. And Xavier was apparently alive too. His transferred his consciousness into some comatose guy’s body. (They showed this after the credits.) Again, no concept of permanence.

And why was Magneto sitting in a public park? He should’ve been snatched up by local authorities immediately and put back in prison. He still had a sentence to serve, and he should be tried for dozens of murder counts on top of that. He had no mutant powers, no mode of transportation, and he’s a senior citizen. How the fuck did he evade the authorities, especially when everyone in the public knows what he looks like thanks to his broadcasting a video telling them the streets would no longer be safe?

Oh yeah, there was also this love triangle among Rogue, Iceman and Shadowcat. Shadowcat, for reference, looks like she’s 12, 14 at the outside. Iceman had to be close to 20 at that point. Was he that desperate for a piece of ass? And Rogue was basically a worthless character in the movie. She just leaves halfway through to get cured. In the comics, she permanently absorbs another mutant’s powers and actually becomes good for a fight. In the second movie, she didn’t do any fighting, but she served as a sort of bridge between the human and mutant worlds. She couldn’t do anything flashy, but she was still a vehicle for Iceman’s character to show his colors because of her tragic power. Too bad all that character potential, like so much else, was wasted here.

Now a lot of complaints I’ve had were character-related. Are the X-Men movies heavily character-driven? Good question. As a whole, I don’t think the movies could decide. They dealt with a scenario that would have massive repercussions globally and also make for some interesting characters to explore. They tried doing both. In the second one, it worked out pretty well. In this one, it didn’t. The characters’ actions weren’t really believable, and neither was the plot.

Now, I said the movie was mediocre. That means that it didn’t suck entirely. So here’s the stuff I did like.

First of all, the military wasn’t a bunch of cannon fodder for Magneto to beat up on. They deployed plastic munitions and cure darts with some cool artillery. Too many movies like this have the military or police being morons who can’t adapt to new situations, and that’s just not true. Kudos to the writers for making the military competent.

Secondly, I liked Shadowcat. She doesn’t have flashy powers like claws or weather control, but she made good tactical use of her power to walk through walls. She trapped Juggernaut in the floor by pulling him through it halfway and then leaving it there.

There was also a really great scene in a church where Magneto recruits mutants for his army. Ian McKellan is just one of the best actors ever. The man could read my grocery store receipt and get nominated for an Oscar. His little speech was probably the best example of dialogue in the whole movie.

Then there was the Fastball Special in the Danger Room, Wolverine and Colossus’ team-up where the latter throws the former at an enemy. A Sentinel’s head made a brief appearance in the Danger Room, but they didn’t appear anywhere else in the movie, which blew ass.

Oh yeah, and Rebecca Romeijn being naked doesn’t hurt anything. She looks damn good as a brunette.

Vinnie Jones as Juggernaut was just great for reasons I don’t need to elaborate on. Anyone who’s seen a Guy Ritchie film knows why.

Overall, the movie tried to do too many things at once, and it only clocked in at an hour and 44 minutes. I knew that was a bad sign going in. A whole lot of fat should have been trimmed so that the Phoenix plot could be expanded on, and another 45 minutes should have been tacked on for the characters and such. For the scope of the movie, 2 1/2 hours is not all that unreasonable. Too bad Brian Singer didn’t come back for this one.

I figured out the secret behind The Da Vinci Code.

Believe me, it was difficult, but after months of research, painstaking reconstruction of events and retracing my steps, I have finally got the answer. And you will be astounded by it. The biggest secret to one of the hottest novels-turned-movies since The Lord of the Rings. This secret is so deep, in fact, that not even the Catholic Church has managed to figure it out yet.

What is the secret, you ask? Well, I’m not so sure you’re ready to learn it yet. Are you truly willing to deal with the full repercussions of this most hidden truth? Are you willing to question everything you’ve ever been told about Dan Brown and his hit novel? Are you willing to set aside Tom Hanks’ ridiculous hairdo?

If you answered “Yes” to all of these questions, then you might, just might, be ready to figure out the greatest secret in The Da Vinci Code’s history. But first, let me tell you how I finally figured it out.

The evening chill cut through the thin material of my fleece, despite the heat of the day earlier. I had just finished eating dinner and was out to do some browsing at my local bookstore. I was looking for hints for the secret behind The Da Vinci Code and so far had had no luck. I felt it would be my lucky night.

As I took my Civic down Old Country Road, I reflected on the path that led me to this point. It was on a night like this, not very long ago, when I first picked up a copy of a book during a family outing to an Outback Steakhouse in Queens. It was sitting there, a sticker on it marking an attractive discount, and I decided that it was a good bargain for a hardcover. Not knowing what I’d get myself into, I picked it up.

Little did I realize that I would not get to read it for a full month. Yes, first my older sister pinched the book from me to read it first, then my aunt, then my mother, and finally my younger sister. It had passed through four pairs of hands before I could even crack the binding; who knows what deeds they had done to the novel?

My worries were in vain; the book and the text contained therein were mercifully unharmed. I delved into the story of Robert Langdon and the greatest secret in human history, and was left satisfied - but a little underwhelmed - at the story. My interest was therefore piqued when a feature film based on the novel was announced, especially since it was being directed by Ron Howard and starred Tom Hanks and Paul Bettany. A promising cast, to say the least.

Imagine my surprise when the controversy stormed up.

First there were accusations of plagiarism. The book took ideas from a non-fiction work that was previously written! Surely Dan Brown was in a world of shit. Fortunately for him, the judge in the case dismissed it with a clever document that also contained a hidden code - a code which has nothing to do with the book, sadly. But that wasn’t the end of the controversy. As the movie neared its release date, other controversies popped up. Some called it blasphemy. Some called it an attack on Christianity. The Catholic Church out and out supported a boycott of the movie. For what reason, I could not fathom, especially after I found out the secret behind The Da Vinci Code

Back to my discovery. I headed to the shopping center on Glen Cove Road, to the now two-story Barnes & Noble that had recently been renovated. I walked in and immediately headed to a stack of familiar red dust jackets, each of them showing an image of the face of Mona Lisa. I stood there for a moment, trying to put the pieces together. What did it all mean? What was the secret? I glanced around, looking for pointers, when I noticed a sign on the wall.

It was all so simple. The truth slammed into me and brought me to my knees. I stared reverentially at the sign, the solution, the answer to it all. I had finally done it.

I read the word again, and I knew that all of those who stood opposed to the film…all those snub-nosed, self-righteous Catholics, all those powers-that-be that wanted nothing more than to have the book banned, to have the movie banned even, missed the most important clue of all. The following are the glyhps I transcribed that fateful day:

“FICTION”

As you may have noticed (if you’re one of the many … ones who read this), I’ve been inactive for the past 6 weeks or so. The astute observer knows that I am a college student, and the master logician will deduce that I have been busy with finals and various projects. They’re both right. I’ve been swamped lately, but as of about 9:30 this morning, I’m done with classes. That’s right, I took my last final ever at 7-fucking-50 in the morning. Whoever scheduled that shit can blow me. I don’t know what it is with the computer science department and getting the shaft on final exam schedules, but whatever geniuses hand down these schedules from on-high should try going through them. Graduating seniors should get to take all their exams in the afternoon. Period. Stick the freshmen with this early-morning crap.

In my absence from the blogosphere (relatively unnoticed as it was), I have certainly not been unobservant of the political scene. Both the astute observer and master logician will know what I’m talking about. And that, of course, is Stephen Colbert’s brilliant performance at the White House Press Correspondents’ Dinner.

I’ve been a fan of Colbert since his early days as a lowly Daily Show correspondent. To be honest, I expected exactly what I saw and what came afterward. Colbert gave an absolutely skewering speech to the very audience he lampoons four nights a week. And of course, their reaction was lukewarm at best. The president was very obviously distraught at having the embodiment of scathing criticism not relegated to a “free speech zone”, but no more than 3 meters to his left. The audience themselves, with the exceptions of Helen Thomas and Justice Scalia (who looked like he was about to explode from laughter), were subject to being called a bunch of pussies whose only duty is to transcribe the president’s decisions. (And also to spell-check those transcriptions.)

So in short, virtually every person in the room was against him. It’s not at all dissimilar to what happened to Jon Stewart when he hosted the Oscars. Stewart lampooned Hollywood’s arrogant back-slapping fest and got a pretty chilly response. So what’s the common element? The pride and arrogance of the people who wanted them to do these gigs. Stewart fast became a Hollywood golden boy for sticking it to the Bush administration and being single-handedly responsible for blowing Crossfire out of the water and off the air. So they wanted him to host the Oscars, almost surely with the expectation that he’d spend all his time making fun of George W. Bush. They obviously didn’t learn from his appearance on Crossfire. As Stewart said, he’s not their monkey.

Colbert had almost the same deal. The press loved how he lambasted Bill O’Reilly every night, so they thought, “Hey this guy should give a speech!” What did they figure he’d do? Tone it down? Did they watch his show? Colbert showed up in-character, doing the bits that won him the recognition and respect. Colbert’s not the a monkey either. He’s got these things called “balls”. You know, those things the Bush administration severed from between the press’ legs in the name of fighting the terrorists.

So what was the reaction to Colbert’s speech? Outrage at his audacity? Cheers from the supposedly liberal media for making fun of the president to his face? No, try dead silence. All the media could talk about was how hilarious Bush was, side-by-side with an impersonator. Wow, he made fun of his own idiotic speech patterns. Again. The press refused to acknowledge Colbert’s speech in anything but passing. Either they were so incensed at his comments as to their cowardice, or they’re just as castrated as he said they were by refusing to write about something which might upset our precious leader in a time of war.

But if blogs have proven anything, it’s that the press can’t ignore what the people want to talk about. Colbert’s speech was a hugely popular download from places like YouTube and BitTorrent. C-SPAN had YouTube pull the video because they are going to make a DVD out of it. Yes, that’s right. C-SPAN. Making a DVD. Of something that they aired. Everyone and his brother who still believed in free speech was busy talking about Colbert. Like him or not, what he did was too significant to be ignored.

Now, two weeks later, people are still talking. But Colbert has just gone on with his show, business as usual. I’ve always pegged Colbert as the type of guy who’s fairly humble and doesn’t recognize his own significance. Anyone who’s that over-the-top when portraying an arrogance asshole simply has to be able to see it from a rational point of view.

And that’s his talent. He makes people uncomfortable with their own rhetoric. When the social troglodytes in the Republican Party see him bombastically and enthusiastically parroting their talking points, they become genuinely concerned. Colbert did an interview with a congressman from George, and the topic of gay marriage came up. Colbert mentioned that the congressman was against gay marriage and asked if he was against gay driving. The congressman responded by saying that he thinks every American should have the right to drive. (Even though driving is a privilege and not a right, unlike marriage, which could be argued is a part of Americans’ right to pursue happiness.) Colbert responded by saying that he doesn’t want homosexuals “gaying up the roads”.

The guy just kind of stared uncomfortably. But it’s not restricted to conservatives. Anyone who goes on the show gets an earful of either their own bullshit or roasted at the hands of one of the best comedic interviewers to come along in a decade. In any case, the man’s got balls, just like he promised when he was first plugging his show back in November. Colbert doesn’t realize it, but he nailed Bush’s robes to the floor. And the Emperor walked off with no clothes.