Plur1bus review

The Pur1bus debut is slick and fascinating high concept television: humanity downloads instructions for ai virus sent from 600 light years away, and promptly accidentally infects itself.

Because of course it does.

If you’ve read The Hot Zone, so far, so believable.

The show centres around Carol (Rhea Seehorn), a cynical and disillusioned writer of romance novels who holds her own audience in complete contempt, who is immune to the virus. Everyone else hits pause, jitters in place, and then becomes part of an interconnected, altruistic hive mind.

It's happy happy joy time, which doesn’t sit well with our anti-heroine. She loses her partner in the great virus download. Some 870 million others also died... not that Carol really gives a shit about them.

One of the main themes underlying the drama is the battle between selfish individualism and selfless collectivism. 

We all know what side Elon will be on.

Carol doesn’t really care about anyone… except her romantic partner. She’s willing to shove aside, or even drive over, anyone who gets in her way if her partner is at risk. 

Shortly after the altruistic virus takes over (it’s fittingly spread by mouth to mouth kisses... and less so by surreptitiously licking donuts), a White House representative talks to Carol through her TV set. The spokesman, the (former) Secretary of Agriculture (or something), tells her that everyone got a infected by a virus from outer space. No alien invasion. 

Just happy people!

The hive mind then ships to Carol someone from Israel who resembles her romantic ideal. The hive wants Carol to be happy, you see. 

It’s totally selfless.

It’s also sensitive: when Carol explodes in rage at Romantic Substitute, the hive goes into shock and 11 million people die. 

Talk about Emo. 

It reminds me of that episode of Star Trek where Spock is infected by happiness spores.

Carol asks if there is anyone else who is immune, and it turns out there are a dozen, 5 of whom speak english. 

So they organize a get together in Bilbao, Spain, and we see just how different individuals can be. Carol is sorely disappointed by this pack of unnotables. The most eccentric, and narcissistic, is a young man who’s already assembled his own harem, and flies in on Air Force One. 

Not the kind of person Carol was hoping to sync with. 

But is she any better?

As a social experiment contrasting individualism with collectivism, it’s fun. The collectivism, however, is so extreme and complete, I wonder how much dramatic fuel can be wrung out of it. Carol needs to be exceptionally dysfunctional for the show to work. 

Happiness, after all, writes white on a page.

The most interesting direction I can see is to lean into Carol’s efforts to thwart the aliens. She’s correctly determined that it’s up to the uninfected to save humanity.

Why? 

Because the hive here is completely incapable of defending itself. It won’t slap a bug that’s biting them. It won’t kill. In other words, if there are bed bugs, it will let the vermin breed and feast on the hosts until they die of blood loss. That’s how extreme the altruism here is. They will let lions and tigers out of zoos, and just accept people being eaten by these predators as a cost of doing business. Or being virtuous. Whatever.

It's like some kind of extreme, Heinleinian or Randian caricature of altruism. Yes, there are some people out there (like Madonna) who spout half-baked, naive, altruistic peacenik slogans such as 'violence never solved anything'. (Really? Have you checked with the Phoenician  Carthaginians? Oh wait, you can't: the Romans slaughtered their armies, razed their city, and sold those who were left into slavery. Seems to me they solved their rival problem with an awful lot of thoroughly genocidal violence. As Tacitus wrote: "To ravage, to slaughter, to usurp under false titles, they call empire; and where they make a desert, they call it peace." Dare I mention aboriginals? No? Too soon?) But these are the exceptions. 

Heinlein famously despised altruism, saying that it was 'self-deception, which is the root of all evil'":

"Gratitude: An imaginary emotion that rewards an imaginary behavior, altruism. Both imaginaries are false faces for selfishness, which is a real and honest emotion."

and: 

"Of all the nonsense that twists the world, the concept of 'altruism' is the worst. People do what they want to, every time. If it pains them to make a choice - if the choice looks like a 'sacrifice' - you can be sure that it is no nobler than the discomfort caused by greediness... the necessity of deciding between two things you want when you can't have both."

That's right: altruism is the worst: it was behind The Holocaust, the witch trials, slavery, the Robber Barons, cryptocrime, tech oligarchies, dictators, and most vile of all, The Salvation Army. 

Personally, I think unrestricted selfishness, which gives birth to bigotry and greed, are behind the vast majority of suffering. Sure, sometimes a fig leaf of justification is pinned atop, but it's not often the underlying motive. Rudolf Hoess wasn't driven by 'concepts of altruism'. 

There are worse concepts that twist the world.

But hey, that's just me.

I can only wait for the show's underlying ideology to unfold with bated breath.

Within the narrative set up by Vince Gilligan, however, we can immediately see a core flaw in the hive's altruistic nature. The show's deck is naturally stacked that way. Given how grounded the show is with its presentation of events, I’m not sure we’ll ever actually see aliens arrive, but that's what would reveal the game. 

The virus is a very clever, clean weapon: it’s turned humanity into a codependent hive mind that’s incapable of self-defence, an entirely willing and exploitable workforce, determined to please anyone who still has a POV. 

In other words, when alien invaders do arrive, humanity will do everything the aliens want. The aliens don’t have to fight anyone. All the infrastructure, along with the workforce, will be captured intact. No loss of productivity. 

Like codependents servicing their favourite narc.

Will the show go in that direction? I have no idea, but it seems the most logical path. 

We'll see if the hive mind starts preparing for their arrival.

Otherwise, what on earth are all these hivers doing with their time? We see them cleaning up the detritus caused by the virus download, but beyond that? Everyone knows what everyone else knows. Individuality is gone. There are no specialists, because everyone is. What need then is there for entertainment? Gambling? Vanity products? Tchotkies? Education? Crime? Military forces? Police? 

So much is rendered obsolete by the virus. 

The problem here is that I’m not sure the answers will be interesting.

Spiderman: Across the Spider-Verse review

Hands down the most radical, unrestrained, gobsmacking, visually creative animated film I’ve ever seen.

Well. 

Other than the first one.

Watching Across is like main-lining pure creativity. It’s a kinetic, visual cacophony of cinema marvels. 

On the downside, it’s exhausting. Innovative approaches are jam packed into every frame. It’s so radically different, it overwhelms.

All kinds of sweet gee-jaws, evoking printed comics, saturate the film: half-tone dots shade character faces, colours are shown with slight off-register, scenes morph from 3-D backgrounds to beautiful pastel paintings. Characters change colour based on mood. People from other dimensions may be made of paper, scratchy scribbles, or LEGO. Frames are dropped from character movement, creating a staccato jerkiness that gets across the idea of watching moving pictures. Trips between universes are accompanied by kaleidoscope FX rainbows. Visual representations of emotion, and sound effects, punctuate important moments. 

The direction is as kinetic and super-powered as the heroes, spiralling around and through them (in the case of the villain), then pulling back for serene scene setting long shots. 

Across relentlessly pushes the boundaries of animation, taking the medium to infinity and beyond.

Pixar films are beautiful, but they’re not radical. This? This is radical artiste experimentalism in pop-culture packaging. 

Unfortunately, you can have too much goodness. The movie is over two hours long; shorter, discrete episodes might be more enjoyable for my limited attention span. I wanted to freeze frame and have captions (the dialogue can be hard to catch at time, it’s so rapid fire). 

Story wise, Across doesn’t hold back; it pummels the audience with The Multiverse’s kitchen sink. 

Thankfully, Verse movies are grounded in authentic character moments. Without them, it might just be a gorgeous way to induce an epileptic seizure. Miles is an endearing lead, and the Morales’ family dynamic equally so. Even the villain has his charms. And Spider-Gwen is well matched with Miles. The other bajillion Spider-men (including an Indian one) are icing on the Spider-cake. 

The film relentlessly barrels towards its no-holds-barred… To Be Continued. 

Which is fine by me, I don’t think I could have taken any more in one sitting. 

The story isn’t tight, but the characters and the visual spectacle are so incredibly enthralling it doesn’t matter.

In the theatre, it's an overwhelming visual feast; I look forward to watching it again at home, in smaller (both screen scale and time) doses. 

There’s nothing else like it. 

Radical, energetic, barely controlled creative chaos the likes of which I've rarely seen, it's audacity and innovative ferocity is breathtaking to behold.

It's genius in motion.

Highly, highly recommended… albeit not for everyone. 

Top Gun: Contrived but fun

Top Gun: Maverick is a template driven popcorn blockbuster, but it's a hoot nevertheless. 

It starts with our eponymous hero, Maverick, working as a test pilot on a secret Air Force project that's about to be terminated... spoil sport general (Ed Harris) is on his way! Mav has to steal the plane and push it to Mach 10 to avoid the program being cancelled! The jobs of his comrades (who look sad) are on the line, and only Mav can save them (as if the Air Force wouldn't reassign them elsewhere). 

He flies over the general as he takes off, blasting Ed Harris with a huge gust of wind. The script is not subtle.

Maverick being Maverick (show character!), he pushes the plane beyond its limits, causing the experimental craft to break up in mid air. Oh noes! Is Mav dead in the first five minutes, like Seagal in that nineties flick? Surprise! Mav ejects safely and winds up at a diner for a comedy beat. 

The program he was trying to save is not so fortunate, as their billion dollar plane is now toast. 

Whoops.

Fortunately, Mav is immediately reassigned (they do that!) to Top Gun again, to train young hotshots for the most difficult target imaginable. And I mean that: the mission comes across as wildly contrived and artificial, a mix of Star Wars trench run, test material (every challenge thrown into one scenario) and video game. As if the screenwriters asked pilots what would be the most ridiculously difficult mission to fly and cooked this up.

Obvisously it has to be flown by pilots, not programmed drones or missiles.

To avoid offending foreign markets, it's against an unnamed enemy. The target's an uranium enrichment plant; Russia and China already have plenty of nukes and enrichment plants. North Korea also already has nukes. The enemy nation also has fifth generation fighters, which I don't think Iran or North Korea have. They're flying over snow covered forests, somewhere in the north... the only choice is North Korea, but even that doesn't really make sense. 

Whatever. Don't think, just do! That's the film's mantra. It's something Yoda might say.

Before sending Tom off, General Party Poop had told Tom pilots were no longer necessary. Unfortunately, I think Harris is right. Before long, planes will either be piloted by machine or remotely. 

But that'd make for a short movie though.

The mission is so Death Star trench run it's funny (I laughed out loud a couple of times), but that's the tone of the film: bonkers and high octane silliness.

The action scenes, however, rock. They didn't use (much?) CGI; a lot is actual planes pulling crazy stunt maneuvers. That gives scenes a verisimilitude and kinetic energy that's nothing short of enrapturing. You get a sense of the thrill (and horror) of being a fighter pilot. 

Wow!

Sometimes it's difficult to understand where exactly the planes are in relation to each other, but given the limitation of using actual footage, they do a pretty good job.

There's an emotional aspect to the film, with a peripheral love story and strained relations between Mav and Goose's son. You care about the characters just enough to feel involved in the action sequences (well, Mav and Rooster). 

Tom Cruise fits in a running scene (must be in his contract) and the ending piles on the ridiculousness. 

If you're looking for a grounded, gritty, realistic fighter pilot flick, this isn't it. It's gung ho action and wahoo fun, with (barely, just barely) enough emotional connection to keep you interested. 

The best thing I can say (given my jaded tastes) is that I was engaged during the action sequences and finale. 

There are a good number of other big budget bonanzas where I was bored stiff during the spectacular CGI climax. 

Cardboard characters surrounded by explosion bling just isn't enough anymore. 

For a fun diversion excursion, I'd recommend Maverick (with the caveat you should leave your brain at home).

Demon Design 101: Louis Le Breton

The Lesser Key of Solomon, MacGregor Mather edition, is graced with some truly macabre illustrations, courtesy of Breton.

Derived in part from the 16th century's Pseudomonarchia Daemonum, the Lesser Key of Solomon is broken into five parts, the most interesting of which is the first, the Ars Goetia. It describes seventy-two demons that Solomon bound to service with magic symbols.

Each is given a rank, interests and expertise (natural philosophy, astronomy, rhetoric), method of seduction (laziness, vanity), powers (noisome breath, conciliates friends and rulers, finds hidden treasures, flight), and the number of demon legions at their command.

It includes illustrations by Louis Le Breton taken from the 1863 edition of the Dictionnaire Infernal. That's the best part. In fact, you can skip the whole Lesser Key and just go straight to the Dictionnaire Infernal. Just make sure it's the 1863 edition.

Louis Breton was born in 1818 and spent much of his time doing bland marine paintings that disturbed no one.

Then he blind sided the world with the most bat shit insane demon designs ever created.

I've referenced several in the book: Asmodeus, for example, appears as Breton depicted. I wanted people to recognize Assman from his earlier 'portrait'. Albeit cruder and more graphic, as my humble abilities allow.

I also used Breton's Baal, only for Kurgoth, Hell's Justice Minister in Hell Lost.

Baal's actually the root of Beelzebub (Baal Zebub, 'Lord of the Flies', in rabbinical texts; a sly way of saying he's shit and his followers are flies); so I have some lee way with him, since he never existed in the first place. Or Beelzebub didn't. One of them. Whatever.

Next to Bosch's mad hybrids, Breton's demons are my favourites. They're unique. Original. Much more interesting than the typical buff or bodacious Hollywood demon with bat wings and horns. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but variety is the spice of life.

Artist Ariana Osborne created a series of gorgeous cards using the illustrations.

Next up: The biggest, the baddest, the best: Bosch!