Transformers, Politics, Film meta + fricken Bagpipes
I'm in my office, I can't really concentrate anyway, and some guy is outside playing fricken Mairi's Wedding on BAGPIPES. It's horrid, and this is the second time this has happened to me. Please stop!
I saw Transformers, and really enjoyed it. Bang, crash, TRANSFORM, save the world, what's not to like?
Although I had this NERDtastic few minutes during the final showdown contemplating writing a paper on the permeability of the urban landscape, post 9/11. Seriously, I think there's a comparison there... the buildings are like human skin, infinitely destructible, infinitely fragile. Old Megatron just flies straight through a whole office floor, scattering paper and middle-class life in an image that I found eerily evocative of the planes going through the Twin Towers.
Which led me to think, yeah, what about that scene in Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer where the S.Surfer just surfs right through the building, being pursued by the Human Torch. He penetrates the building, doesn't destroy it, just goes straight through it. The city is infinitely destructible... compare this to A.I: Artificial Intelligence (which I saw three days after 9/11) which shows the WTC still standing after global warming covers NY in water, and then some millenia later after an ice age.
Does this represent a kind of cultural shift, or is it merely the inevitable advance in digital technology which allows these images to be represented differently? There was a time when anyone, hero or villain, smashing into a building, meant that they got INJURED. Or, the building collapsed (see, Godzilla)... this whole penetration thing seems new to me.
I think enemies are different now, as well - the scariest, most threatening thing is often within - the villain who hides among us, as, you know, a big old Army Tank. Or, Hummer (get into THAT, David Caruso, I dare you). Or, like in that dreadful Bond directed by Lee Tamahori, where the villain is the North Korean guy who gets plastic surgery to make himself look like a White guy. And... clearly he's not, he's the Yellow Peril in disguise, perhaps one of the most problematically racist representation I've seen.
That the heroes are also invisible isn't reassuring - there's a whole battle for the fate of the world going on around us, but we're blind and ignorant to it, and to any of the atrocities on either side that may be done in the name of our safety. Section 7, anyone? Guantamo Bay? It rings Cold War Manchurian Candidate and Invasion of the Body Snatchers bells too. Is this a kind of 50s paranoia revival?
I found this idea of the illusion of safety, of solidity, being disrupted by things unseen- very thought-provoking.
Lately as well: villains who aren't politically motivated. They're... the herald of the devourer of worlds, or, looking for their lost cube of Doom. They're the sort who don't even hate freedom, they just hate, devour, completely random. Evil vs Good - even less politically sophisticated than when it was the evil Reds.
Hmmm, possibly more on this later...
Impala=Transformer fics abound!
Yes!
What I love about fandom is that you wish for something, and it appears. I like the Impala-Transformer things I've read. They're cute and funny and who WOULDN'T be totally stoked to find that their beloved car is a goody in the war of the robots. GO IMPALA! And yeah, a 1989 White Honda Concerto like my baby wouldn't be nearly so cool. Maybe it could transform into a refrigerator, or something. But I still like the idea.
BUT - having seen the film, now, I think the ultimate Transformer-Impala fic would feature the Impala as a Decepticon. Dean has to KILL her. You see where I'm going? Something else Dean loves turning evil and destructive, and this time he HAS to destroy it/her. Maybe I'm just programmed for angst. Or maybe I just know that Dean loves Sammy more than his car. I just think the parallel would be awesome.
I saw Transformers, and really enjoyed it. Bang, crash, TRANSFORM, save the world, what's not to like?
Although I had this NERDtastic few minutes during the final showdown contemplating writing a paper on the permeability of the urban landscape, post 9/11. Seriously, I think there's a comparison there... the buildings are like human skin, infinitely destructible, infinitely fragile. Old Megatron just flies straight through a whole office floor, scattering paper and middle-class life in an image that I found eerily evocative of the planes going through the Twin Towers.
Which led me to think, yeah, what about that scene in Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer where the S.Surfer just surfs right through the building, being pursued by the Human Torch. He penetrates the building, doesn't destroy it, just goes straight through it. The city is infinitely destructible... compare this to A.I: Artificial Intelligence (which I saw three days after 9/11) which shows the WTC still standing after global warming covers NY in water, and then some millenia later after an ice age.
Does this represent a kind of cultural shift, or is it merely the inevitable advance in digital technology which allows these images to be represented differently? There was a time when anyone, hero or villain, smashing into a building, meant that they got INJURED. Or, the building collapsed (see, Godzilla)... this whole penetration thing seems new to me.
I think enemies are different now, as well - the scariest, most threatening thing is often within - the villain who hides among us, as, you know, a big old Army Tank. Or, Hummer (get into THAT, David Caruso, I dare you). Or, like in that dreadful Bond directed by Lee Tamahori, where the villain is the North Korean guy who gets plastic surgery to make himself look like a White guy. And... clearly he's not, he's the Yellow Peril in disguise, perhaps one of the most problematically racist representation I've seen.
That the heroes are also invisible isn't reassuring - there's a whole battle for the fate of the world going on around us, but we're blind and ignorant to it, and to any of the atrocities on either side that may be done in the name of our safety. Section 7, anyone? Guantamo Bay? It rings Cold War Manchurian Candidate and Invasion of the Body Snatchers bells too. Is this a kind of 50s paranoia revival?
I found this idea of the illusion of safety, of solidity, being disrupted by things unseen- very thought-provoking.
Lately as well: villains who aren't politically motivated. They're... the herald of the devourer of worlds, or, looking for their lost cube of Doom. They're the sort who don't even hate freedom, they just hate, devour, completely random. Evil vs Good - even less politically sophisticated than when it was the evil Reds.
Hmmm, possibly more on this later...
Impala=Transformer fics abound!
Yes!
What I love about fandom is that you wish for something, and it appears. I like the Impala-Transformer things I've read. They're cute and funny and who WOULDN'T be totally stoked to find that their beloved car is a goody in the war of the robots. GO IMPALA! And yeah, a 1989 White Honda Concerto like my baby wouldn't be nearly so cool. Maybe it could transform into a refrigerator, or something. But I still like the idea.
BUT - having seen the film, now, I think the ultimate Transformer-Impala fic would feature the Impala as a Decepticon. Dean has to KILL her. You see where I'm going? Something else Dean loves turning evil and destructive, and this time he HAS to destroy it/her. Maybe I'm just programmed for angst. Or maybe I just know that Dean loves Sammy more than his car. I just think the parallel would be awesome.