Annoying Things

[roguederek]

► It's not "the wrong place at the wrong time". It's "the right place at the wrong time". If it was the wrong place you would have been somewhere else and avoided the situation entirely.

► I'm getting nervous. Dean insisted that she'd do my taxes this year. They're due in a week and she still hasn't done them, and keeps insisting it's ok if

Comments

[exiter]

wow, you know i had completely forgotten about the Happening.
That movie was so horrible that i completely erased it from my memory.

What a waste. that movie, in the trailers, looked interesting but boy was it handled heavy-handedly. the suicide thing was completely ridiculous.

the way hollywood has been tossing people to the wolves in the last decade I can see Shyamalan getting alot of doors shut in his face in hollywood for a while. I'm sure he has one more really good movie in him, but that's probably 10-20 years away.

[roguederek]

Shyamalan is a fine director, but he's not as great a writer as he thinks. He tends to be very heavy handed and revel in his "very important message" moments. He'd benefit from a more hands on producer, someone to help reign him in. Unfortunately it looks like he's taken the joy and wonder out of the Last Airbender cartoon and made it "very important". I agree with you, if he keeps at his current pace he's going to destroy his career with his self-importance.

I haven't seen The Village or The Happening yet, and still think that's probably for the best.

[exiter]

the village wasn't so bad. Although i had forgotten about that movie too, which tells you everything you need to know about it.

I'm saddened that Airbender had to whitewash the cast like that. Even the guy that I assume is playing the firelord gets cast as every ethnic character in hollywood.
I wonder what Shyamalan has to say about that.

[roguederek]

Yeah, I was shocked that they went with a cast completely devoid of anyone Asian. The whole cast is white, with one Maori, right? I can only guess but I suppose Shyamalan saw it as more of a cross culture fantasy film, but dammit, the whole thing is based in Asian cultures. Just insane in this day and age.

I can see Aang being played by a white actor since he looks so different from the rest of the characters with the rest of the cast Asian. But even that would be stereotypically insulting having a white character having to save the ethnics from themselves.

But all of them white? Yeesh.

[anonymous]

MalcolmD says: Ultimate Nick Fury doesn't share mainstream Fury's immortal-ish, WWII origin--he's exactly as old as he looks. Indeed, there's a great moment where Ultimate Cap awakens from his decades-long stasis and is introduced to Ultimate Nick. Cap responds that he's friends with the highest-ranking black in the military, whose rank is significantly lower than Colonel, and concludes that the entire "frozen in ice" explanation is a Nazi ruse. You might like Millar more if you read The Ultimates, but, then again, you might not. ;-)

Yeah, I too noticed that The Last Airbender trailer portrays a very serious Aang, but there's still room for the movie to give him a more irresponsible attitude. I'm more annoyed that they haven't even been faithful to Zuko's visual signatures, but, again, that doesn't mean that the movie will be terrible.

[roguederek]

I read all of Ultimates VOl 1 and it cemented my dislike for Millar. The comic should have been called The Asshole Avengers. Chock full of Millar's Hollywood baiting references.

Great art and good action scenes though.

You're right, I wasn't suggesting that the Last Airbender movie is going to be bad, just pointing out that the trailer seems to really seems self important. But then Shyamalan's major fault as a filmmaker is his obsession with his own hubris.

I sound pretentious tonight!

[anonymous]

MalcolmD says: I'm glad that we agree on Bryan Hitch's artistic ability, then--I love that guy's work, though I don't know anyone who doesn't at this point.

The bad news for you is that the current non-comic book adaptations of Marvel stories seem to be leaning heavily on the Ultimate versions of the characters--hence, Samuel L. Jackson appearing as Fury. Fortunately for both of us, though, movie Iron Man is most definitely not Ultimate Iron Man, so there's still hope for more mainstream interpretations of the other Avengers.

Hmmm, the way that you describe Shayamalan's "obsession with his own hubris", it sounds as though you've seen Lady in the Water after all. XD Your description summarizes that movie quite well.

[roguederek]

The movies seem to be a blend of traditional Marvel and Ultimate Marvel. The Ultimate Avengers animated direct-to-DVD movies really toned down the obnoxiousness of the Ultimate versions of the characters.

The bizarre thing is that I actually like Lady In The Water. More as an examination and deconstruction of the storytelling process and fairy tales. I could do without Shyamalamadingdong's self serving role as the savior of humanity and ridiculously out of place evil critic.

Paul Giamatti gives an excelent performance, beyond what the film deserved. Also, I enjoy looking at Bryce Dallas Howard, so that helped too.