Shaking Our Fists at the Sun
By Jason Dean
June 8, 2005
In reviewing the SOFATS archive, I’ve come to realize that I had a faulty memory of the format of this column. So here is a bit of an introduction about my take on the whole Shaking Our Fists At The Sun thing. I’ve got a list of complaints that may or may not be rational about our modern world that are listed off with however much explanation my fist shaking will generate. This differs greatly from the much more rational columns that other staff members have written which usually take a single point and create a rational case around it. I will end something along those lines but I can’t vouch for my own rationality.
Anyway, on with the easy stuff:
Attention actresses and celebrities: Being ridiculously skinny is not attractive. Further,those of you who owed at least part of your attention to the fact that guys are guys and if we were ever to meet you we’d probably end up not meeting your eyes but instead drifting below your neck (look, your chest is/was part of your appeal), don’t lose so much weight that your curves disappear. For my generation, I appeal to Jennifer Connelly. For a more topical example, I present Lindsay Lohan. About the only backhanded positive thing, I’ve to say about her new appearance is that hey, I guess this should put the whole augmentation accusations to rest. Her boobs seemed to shrink right along with the rest of her.
Where the heck can I try 3 Vodka? Perhaps my inability to find a bar serving the stuff is an indication of my own lack of hipness, but the concept of 3 (distilling soybeans?) intrigues me and the fact that I can’t find it is rather frustrating. I’m not on a low-carb diet or anything, just a bit of vodka drinker and having tried a fair number of vodkas as well as eating more than my fair share of soybeans.
That brings up another point, when did it become hip to eat Edamame as an overpriced appetizer? I wonder cause I’ve been eating them for what seems like my entire life and even with Japanese ancestry, they’ve always been soybeans, not Edamame. Or is it just me who finds using the Japanese as pretentious and a way to justify the price? It’s not soybeans, it’s Edamame.
The little Jaguars? The bad accent in the commercials is bad enough, but these cars are not Jaguars. They look more like Contours or some other Ford world car. Please stop. You did well to bring reliable engines under the Jaguar hood but Ford, please stop there.
It bugs me that Harry Potter audiobooks are not available through Audible or other download format. Yes, I know that they are available on CD and yes, I know that Rowling’s instructions prevent the Harry Potter books from being available for download. It’s still annoying.
Now, I'm moving on to the topic of films selling out their characters. Spoilers for Contact and Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith will unapologetically be used in the following as there just isn’t real away around it.
First, a fellow staff writer is correctly ticked off by the ending of Contact. As a memory refresher, Ellie (Jodie Foster’s character) is put in front of a Congressional hearing after her trip. The cornerstone Michael Kitz (James Woods) attack is the possibility that the signal is actually a plant, beamed back to Earth from a spacecraft launched by Hadden (the rich industrialist who has been watching over Ellie) so that it appears that the signal is coming from Vega. While the attack is necessary for Ellie’s character arc to end up with her experience coming down to faith, it is utterly annoying that this argument is the one used that causes Ellie to throw in the towel. If Ellie is still Ellie Arrowhead, brilliant radio astronomer, it should be second nature for her to use a second radio telescope, fix in on the signal and by means of triangulation show that the signal is definitely coming from Vega. Well, there’s also the orbital mechanical issues that say it would be pretty tough to put a spacecraft in such a place that it appears to be stationary with regards to the Earth and Vega. Yes, suspension of disbelief and all that, I can hear the accusations now: you believe that there’s an extraterrestrial signal but not the possibility of the signal originating from a man-made point? Sure, that play by the rules of the movie. The problem here is that it doesn’t stay true to Ellie’s character that she wouldn’t be able to better argue against this point.
As nitpicking as that might seem, it may be completely thought out and rational in comparison to my ever growing hate of Episode III.
When people ask what I thought of the movie, I tend to tell them that I thought it was pretty good. At one level that’s mostly true and when I see the TV spot that only consists of the action sequences and then ends with Vader, I can almost believe it myself. As another point of view, I started watching the Star Wars: A New Hope DVD the other day and it reminded me how cool it was to see same ship at the end of Episode III that had started it all back in 1977. I also liked the furitive glances between Luke’s adopted parents when Obi-Wan’s name first come take on a whole new level with the back story established in the prequels.
See, I generally liked the prequels. They weren’t perfect but I found them generally entertaining. More than just an means to the end, Episode III generally carried through as the missing piece and had some moving sequences. It should have been the movie that made the really bad dialogue and other detractions of Episode I and II all worth it, and some levels it was.
However, George Lucas owes me. There were the fans who complained that Episode I had desecrated their childhood memories. I kind of shook my head in disbelief at that over-reaction but now I find myself with an ever growing rage every time I reflect on Episode III. If this were a Star Wars episode, my eyes would turn yellow or red or some other ILM effect, sentences would become choppy, my voice would rise… I would be just a general overreacting idiot.
And what is Lucas’ transgression? The fact that he should have trusted somebody else to direct, to write? No, as much as those are common criticisms, I can generally live with that it’s his universe and he can do what he wants. No, my problem is that Episode III has completely reinforced what I generally suspected: I am more a fan of Natalie Portman than I am of Star Wars.
While Revenge of the Sith generally redeems the characters and performers as much as was going to be possible within the context of the prequels, Natalie Portman’s Amidala simply gets screwed. A character that was established with bad dialogue and strange accents in two previous movies is completely changed in a way that does not match. I get that she’s in love but I do not for a moment believe that she’d become as stupid and starry eyed as her character ends up in Episode III. It was further wounding in that it was just so bad that the actress Natalie Portman comes off poorly, which is just completely inexcusable. I’ve read that due to pacing that some of the scenes of the Senator Amidala being a Senator and actually doing something were left out, but to me what was left was so bad that as much as I adore Natalie Portman, I started wishing that Amidala just not show up on screen anymore. Just die already and spare us the torture.
The thing is, Lucas continues to the piss me off cause there’s a part of me that would like to see the movie again. It’s not like I can just write the movie off as just generally being bad (like Alien: Resurrection). There is some good but at the same time I just have such a reaction to the complete waste of both actress and character that I know watching the movie at this point would probably be a really bad thing as I fully expect that it would yield even new levels of hate. If I were to subject myself to a second viewing, I’d have no one to blame but myself as I know that it’s not going to change any. It’s not like being a fan of a futile team, like, say, a Mets fan. There’s not going to be a next year. She’s going to be the same mindless, whining, can’t-live-without-her-Jedi husband. She so doesn't seem like the mother of Leia. Where’s the Senator who’s the first to make a break for it in the Arena from Attack of the Clones? Where’s the Queen, even if she did have the strangest speech pattern? Damn you, Lucas. Damn You.
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