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Came across this in the ol' archives: 

These days I'm working more in ProCreate and ink than I am in Adobe Illustrator. 

The medium definitely shapes the creative process.

Predictions for From Season 4: Change is coming!

As Season 3 of the Paramount Plus TV show From ends, the town is engulfed by winter, after 50 years of stable, consistent warm weather. This cannot portend 50 years of winter... as all the inhabitants of Fromville would die of starvation, being unable to grow anything. We did cycle through fall pretty quick, so I imagine spring will arrive early in Season 4... along with a lot more. 

I believe the seasons are now changing because the system is about to update its roughly 50 year cycle. 

Remember the changing of the weather comes shortly after the arrival of the two cars on the same day (50 years since this last occurred), as well as the explorations of Tabitha, Jim and Jade. They've pushed the limits of the web laid by the emotion vampire-spider that created it. This could also cause the emo-spider (or Man in Yellow) to update the trap's dressing to something more contemporary.

When this happens, I suspect that some new modern buildings will appear, that the overall geography may alter in some way (not the core area which is built on a real site in Nova Scotia, but perhaps areas around it). There was once a river in the area (as shown in the cave drawings), which is now gone, presumably replaced by the road. The lighthouse was there even then, which assumes a sea or ocean nearby, but that's long gone. So the land itself changes over time. Think about Victor measuring the movement of the trees.

The new buildings may even get modern appliances... flat screen TVs and perhaps even WIFI! Actually, no, that would be too useful, and the phones there already don't work, unless it is to be leveraged by the web's evil entities. But there will be more modern stuff... perhaps only there to torment.

The changes will extend to the monsters, too, which will upgrade to modern attire, as they are not really from the 1950s. The cave drawings don't fit that at all: these beings are ancient. The drawings suggest the tragedy of the sacrifice of the children occurred centuries ago. As such, the monsters are 'updated' to reflect the images in the minds of the trapped humans, whether they present as pioneers, civil war soldiers, or 1950's archetypes. 

In Season 4, they'll present as modern people, but be just as creepy. And if they do update, that will explain the disconnect between how ancient the drawings in the cave are, and the much more recent attire of the monsters. It's just a replaceable facade... or more accurately, camouflage. Their dated garb right now is a dead giveaway to survivors: it signals stay away! But if the vampies are in modern dress, will survivors know to run, before it's too late?

More importantly, this will give the Man In Yellow a chance to update his god awful, tattered wardrobe, and return in a slick billionaire's suit, the better to exploit and torment ordinary citizens.

The faces the monsters wear may also change, becoming the loved ones of the surviving trapped humans, the better to deceive and demoralize them. They are lures and deceivers, used by the vampire-spider to trick survivors. It used Tabitha to lure in Victor's dad. That's why she wound up in Maine... that's where the vampire-spider wanted her to go, it knew she'd contact Victor's dad, and that allowed it to bring him into the nightmare, too. This was it's plan all along; the gravy on top is that her return caused even greater despair amongst the Fromvillians. The Entity (spider-vampire, Man in Yellow, whatever) also brought in the significant other of paramedic Kristi Miller (Chloe Van Landschoot), presumably to cause her emotional turmoil and crush Kenny's spirits. The vampires get great pleasure tormenting Boyd and trying to break his spirit... that's far more important to them than just torturing and eating him. Jade is going mad thanks to how senseless the whole place is... so the next iteration of the town may make even less sense than it does now.

It's all a great big deliberate mind f_ck... which could be a fun meta commentary on Lost.

The Man in Yellow / vampire-spider, if they are in fact the same entity and not a group (the Boy In White certainly seems autonomous, but also linked to this hell bubble... yet he was the only entity Tabitha saw in the real world), seems to feed on suffering. It doesn't want to eat everyone, not physcially; rather, it feeds on their fear, despair and emotional turmoil. 

When it updates its web/trap, it will offer a mix of positive and negative. The buildings are like decorations in a fish tank (which is why they have no functional wiring, it's all a front, a Potemkin Village; this is also why there is a motel sign and pool and no motel). It wants the inhabitants to remain in the box, feeding it delicious fear, and to keep that fear feast going, it has to give them enough tools and resources to survive.

When the two cars arrive, bringing back Christopher / Jade and Marina / Tabitha, it marks the beginning of a new cycle. When that happens, the reincarnated pair are coming back once more to save the children. As such, they are a threat to The Entity, and might end the Hell Bubble (Don't let Ellis hear you calling it a pocket universe), so it upgrades things to make it all more difficult.

That's my guess, at any rate.

What do you think will happen in Season 4 of From? Plunk your theories in the comments!

From: Analyzing the symbols in the cave

I tried lightening and increasing the contrast on some frames to see if that helped clarify things.
It doesn't, at least not much.

I love symbols, and From has a bevy. Not only do Victor and Miranda paint up a storm of pictures, the evil creatures paint their narratives in their caves. At least, Victor assumes it was the monsters who painted them. 

Some of the pictograms are easy to decipher, others... not so much.

This is my take on what they might depict.

Let's take it as a given that the tableau goes from left to right. 

The far left side of the mural, showing the river. Has this been supplanted by the the road?

At far left, we see a river with three boats carrying 2-3 people each (8 in total). There is forest on either side of the river, and 3 large conical objects that might be stones, all in white. They may reference the red stone circle (prior to it becoming red). Below this is a large red structure that looks a little like an Inukshuk, but has rays going from either side of the top: this is the lighthouse. 

At the right end of the river is a massive tree, taller than any of the others, and in black, rather than white; possibly the tree the children poured their hopes into, for all the good it did them. Above are two red curves cupping an empty centre, matched at bottom by two similar curves, but this pair is ringed by trees. Possibly cave entrances/exits. Could be Faraway Tree exits, too, but then, why would one have trees around it, but not have a tree motif incorporated around the curves?

The boats (canoes?) are the only mode of locomotion depicted in the entire tableau, which suggests this was the original way to enter the Hell Bubble. The river has since been replaced by the road we know so well.

At the end of season 3, it groes cold and snows, after decades of warm, stable weather. That there is a landlocked lighthouse, and no longer any river (or sea) nearby, suggests that the changing of the weather might extend to the geography itself. The buildings may be replaced, and new buildings may appear. 

We already know this is a curated space (Tabitha was let go to snag Victor's dad and bring him back, Boyd was brought in to organize the survivors, the priest to give them hope, animals appeared out of the forest to provide sustenance, etc), and the geography has changed before, so why not again?

I don't think the monsters painted the mural. This was painted long before the 1950s, likely back in the days of fur traders and Courier de bois. The drawings look more like tribal pictograms than what an educated person from the 20th century would scribble. 

That raises the question: are the monsters the originals, or new iterations? If they were created centuries ago, is their Fifties garb an affectation? Do they 'reskin' themselves to unsettle more modern inhabitants of the town? 

The circle with three roots, the iconic symbol Jade sees in his dreams, and that Miranda paints, is next. Beneath it are 7 white rectangular sacrificial slabs, one for each of the seven children. Below the slabs are 2 figures slightly to the left, and 8 figures to the right. Note there are also 2 more figures in the upper left, just above the circle symbol, which are easy to miss. They may represent the archetypes Miranda and Christopher, in their 'original; past life, fleeing from the sacrifice. They may also be the two below who are to the left, perhaps suggesting they were trying to undermine the sacrifice. 

There are 8 white figures in the canoes, and 10 figures beneath the circle (albeit 2 are slightly separated from the 8). The number of figures varies across the tableau, so it's hard to say if this has any significance. 

Next we have, at bottom, a tree, out of which fly four crows or ravens; beside it, towering over everything, is the Big Bad: a crude, menacing shape that seems to have 4 legs and two stubby arms. It's blood red and outlined in black. This is the demonic being to which the children were sacrificed. Did it also create the pocket universe? Or was it trapped here by another power? Not sure. But the pocket universe could be akin to a spider's web, designed to trap prey, so the Big Bad can feed off their fear and pain. 

To the upper right of the Big Bad is a black square, out of which fly 11 white birds. Not sure if the colour use here is significant or not. 11 does not match the number of any of the previous figure sets. These are likely the crows that appear at the fallen tree on the entrance road.

Below the box are two figures, holding hands. They are off on their own here. Likely MIranda and Christopher ancestors, continuing their flight. 

To the right of the Big Bad: crops, red figures, and infinity

To the right of them is a forest at top, with a white house, and beneath it rows of crops, surrounded by red figures, some of which appear to hold spears. These could be aboriginals, or they could be red because they are the monsters. There are 14 figures in total. Why are they surrounding the crops? Are they farming, or are they raiding? Not sure. The white house could be one of the abandoned houses by the second food source, the one with the freaky warding heads on sticks. But there are 3 houses there, not one. So I am not sure. 

I think the mural was painted long before the modern town was plunked down, like decorations in a fishtank. This seems to represent the original tragedy, which occurred hundreds of years ago. The big problem with this reading is the garb of the monsters: if they are immortal, you'd think they'd be wearing pioneer garb, but they aren't. If the Big Bad grants immortality to people who sacrifice to him, what happened to the earlier generations of monsters, the ones from centuries ago? Did they make a different compact? And yet, it is explicitly stated that the children were sacrificed so their parents could live forever, so the monsters are the original sinners. Their costumes then make no sense, unless they are projections or something. 

In the far upper right are two figures painted in white, holding hands. Again, Miranda and Christopher. Beneath them is an infinity sign with a sidweays line through it surrounded by 'glow' lines. I suspect this represents Miranda and Christopher being tied together as the two sides of infinity, jointly recycling through this ancient trauma/crime. 

The lighting is honestly terrible, and my fidgeting in my phone app hasn't helped much. It's hard to make out detail, and I may have missed things. 

Finally we have the talisman stones (below). It depicts two people overlapping, with what could be a large belly, possibly pregnant. On the left side is dawn, on the right side, sunset. Around them is a ring of trees. The figures protect people in houses/structures from attack, so it could be the spirit of life/birth, or it may just be the merging of Miranda's and Christopher's spirits. Note the monsters twisted pregnancy into birthing Smiley, so it could be a larger thematic element.

From: The New Lost

Yet another Mystery Box in a Bottle show in the same vein as Lost, Dark, 1899, Yellowjackets, and their great grandaddy, the kids show Land of the Lost.

All throw mysteries about like confetti, but not all deliver satisfying answers.

Part of the fun of watching a show like this is trying to put the puzzle pieces together and gain a deeper understanding of what the show is about. Lost famously dropped the ball at the finish line, 1899 got cancelled after one season, while Yellowjackets burned through my goodwill even faster; Dark is the only one that stuck the landing.

Will From?

I have no idea, but it’s a highly addictive, bingeable show: I went through all three seasons over Christmas break. 

It’s about a town from which there is, seemingly, no escape. The road goes in, and as you leave, you find yourself entering again. It’s impossible, a mind bending mystery for both the audience and characters to ponder. 

Yet another Mystery Box in a Bottle show in the same vein as Lost, Dark, 1899, Yellowjackets, and their great grandaddy, Land of the Lost.

Not being able to leave unfortunately is the least of the drafted inhabitants problems: of higher concern are the smiling, easy going fifties archetypes who stroll about town at night, issuing bland platitudes and inquiries… until they get close to you, and then they morph into lamprey mouthed horrors and rip your face off. Okay, okay, they actually leave faces intact, they just disembowel their prey, sometimes after playing with it, like a cat with a mouse. A deep rooted sadism lies behind their cheery demeanour. 

Residents avoid being torn to bits at night by putting a small rune stone (otherwise known as talisman stones) by their door: so long as its hanging, the ‘vampires’ cannot get in. How very convenient! A show about unwashed, smelly, dishevelled, desperate people hiding in dirty bolt holes would be unappealing. The vampires don’t even try to force the windows, even though they have superhuman strength and are practically invulnerable: they shrug off bullets like raindrops. 

The town is presided over by Boyd Stevens, a 30-year army veteran who’s got a lot of experience at managing chaos, having set up and managed bases in the world’s worst trouble spots. Boyd sets the place in order: he’s the one who finds the stones that allow people to live in the houses, rather than trying to hide in random nooks and crannies, with nothing but hope and crossed fingers to protect them. 

So as insane as the circumstances of the town when the show starts, it’s a step up from what it’d been. We enter the story 96 days after the last ‘incident’ (ie. horrible death), with two vehicles: one carrying a tech founder, Jade, and his minion, and the other a camper van carrying the Matthews clan: Jim, Tabitha, Julie (16?) and Ethan (6?). They almost crash into each other, naturally: this show thrives on drama and danger as well as mystery. 

Victor knows this best: he's been in town since he was 8, when his mom and sister, and all the other residents, got butchered in the streets. Victor, now middle aged, is really weird. Go figure.

The Town

The town is very small: one main street, with a church, several houses, a diner, a motel sign beside an empty swimming pool (other than the crashed truck in it), a gas station, a post office that serves as a police station, and a barn without a farm house. It’s an odd mix of buildings. 

They’re augmented by Colony House, up on a hill outside town, and a small high school that serves as a hospital. Season 2 adds an automated lighthouse and ruins that revert to a building when entered by Boyd or Julie. Season 3 introduces 3 abandoned long cabins further out, surrounded by spooky wards.

The church is the oldest looking structure in town, possibly hundreds of years old, going by the look of it, probably the same era as the abandoned log cabins. The diner and post office look the most modern; the decrepit gas station is maybe 1930s. Colony House looks like turn of the century architecture, while the high school is probably from the 50’s or 60’s. 

The town can be viewed on Google maps, but it’s not quite the same as the in universe one. You can see a model of town differs from the real world, eliminating roads and adding rugged terrain behind the gas station. Or is the model a giveaway that this is all an experiment presided over by Kenny?

At first I thought this might all be some kind of virtual simulation, like Harsh Realm (oh yeah, spoilers), but season 3 has disabused me of this now quaint notion. The show’s firmly set in the supernatural, which means no logical explanations are necessary. Fantasy can do anything, but that said, it’s far more satisfying when the fantasy world follows rules we can make sense of.

So let’s join Dale and dive into the mystery pool!

SPOILERVILLE AHEAD

What we know:

We learned at the end of season three that the vampires (Yes, I’m going to call the creatures vampires) sacrificed children to a demonic being in exchange for immortality. Like a classic genie, the demon gave them what they asked for, but not quite what they wanted. 

Jade and Tabitha are reincarnations of a married couple that died trying to liberate the children from their purgatory, the last time two cars came in on the same day, some 50 years earlier. I had been betting on Tabitha actually being Eloise, but she has a mom (introduced in season 3, on the phone), and as yet there is no indication she was adopted.

According to Victor, when the seven children laid on the stones to be sacrificed, 'they poured their hopes into the roots above that formed the symbol, and the roots became the (Farway) tree." The Boy in White tells (Christopher) he has to go through the tree, but Christopher wouldn’t listen, that jerk. So Victor tells his mom, and she goes off and gets promptly killed by Smiley the Joker fan. Cue 50 years later, when Tabitha and Jade arrive, reincarnated, to do the whole cycle all over again. 

...yet mysteries still abound: 

1) The number of people in town seems larger than the number of houses available. Is there another street somewhere? Doesn’t seem to be. The extras seem to change from show to show, too. This may simply be an issue with sloppy or difficult production issues.

2) Boyd and Kenny both carry badges, but there was originally no police station in town: it was post office. So where did they get the badges? Where did they get their guns? Where did they find the keys to the buildings?

3) Why is there a motel sign without a motel? Were the buildings pulled at random?

4) Why don’t the creatures set fires and burn the town residents out of their homes? One good fire would take down the rickety wooden Colony House. There’s no fire department. The creatures are clever and will lay traps. They seem to understand technology. They also seem somewhat robotic, like they are running on limited scripts, which limit their initiative. They could smash the greenhouse, kill all the animals, burn the crops, but they don't. Do they need the humans as a food source? They went 96 days without any fresh meat, though, so it doesn't seem to be a sustenance issue. So why do they kill people? Shits and giggles? Are they simply sadistic? They live such incredibly empty, barren lives, wandering around town tapping on windows and making banal comments, trying to lure people outside so they can eat them. What a seriously crappy immortality. 

5) All the vampires wear 1950’s and 1960’s themed clothing: milkman, cheerleader, librarian, nurse, mechanic, sixties twiggy, cowboy, jock. Yet there’s no postman in the set, no diner cooks, no waitresses, farmers, priests, high school teachers, or police officers. There’s no medical building in town, yet there's a nurse. So… are the town buildings a mish mash lifted from different eras and plopped down together in a pocket universe? Did the post office workers not go along with the immortality thing? Did the nurse work out of town? Would it have been common to commute in rural mid-century America? Why don’t the buildings match the vampires roles? Do the vamps have names? One called herself Jasmine. What about the others? Why not label them? How many are there? I have so many questions.

6) Father Khatri arrived first. He gave the few desperate residents hope. Boyd came next: he provides order and some measure of normality. Jade and Jim follow: one a tech guru, the other an engineer, who can empower the residents in all new ways. Were they chosen for that purpose? Is there a deliberate selection process? If so, why did the gods that be get angry when they started to experiment? Or were they chosen by different entities (The Boy in White?), ones at odds with the powers that be? 

7) Speaking of which, who’s the Boy in White? He looks like he walked off a cricket field, and not at all like a child who escaped being sacrificed. Is he a good spirit in opposition to Yellow Suit?

8) The old white guy in the cheap yellow suit seems to be the dark power behind the whole place, and he’s as worn and rough as the boy in white is clean and sparkly. Yellow Suit looks like he just stumbled out of a dive bar after a week long drinking binge, with an attitude born of a hangover from hell. This bodes well for next season: they’ll very likely toss out a few crumbs relating to his nature, now that he’s appeared in the flesh. Who is he? And more importantly, why is he orchestrating all of this? It seems like a lot of work for someone who can't be bothered to have his suit cleaned. Just saying.

9) Jade had a vision of an angry Civil War soldier, along with a bunch of dismembered troops hanging from a tree in bits. He also saw an early English colonist (circa 1660) nailed to a tree, and, later, drinking blood out of a skull, because that's just what you do when you're an apparition. This area has been messed up for a long, long time. 

10) What was lurking around the log cabins at night? It wasn’t the vampires, so what? Mystery goats? Giant spiders? Ghosts? Production staff? Fans exploring the site? Moose? There are a lot of moose in Nova Scotia.

11) What’s with the spiders? Boyd goes through a forest wrapped in webs trying to reach the lighthouse, rather like on Guam, which is overrun with the eight legs. 

12) What the heck is with the whole music box subplot, and the ballerina? That has to be the whackiest, random thing in the show so far. It was more goofy than spooky. And why did it bring 3 new people into the not-ruin, and subject them to yelling? 

13) Who the hell is Martin the Marine, the guy tied up in the ancient ruin (in its intact state, which can only be accessed by collapsing screaming and having an epileptic fit, apparently). What’s with his magic worm infested blood that kills creatures and births cicadas? 

14) Why is Randall the only one to keep seeing the cicadas? 

15) Who's maintaining the magic lighthouse, and why was there a toy ambulance on the stairway along with playing cards? Is it because that's what will bring Tabitha back to From in the following season? It's a portent, right? Why does getting pushed out of the lighthouse teleport you to a park in Maine, even though it's clearly Nova Scotia?

16) Why is the place shifting to winter from fall so suddenly, after being stuck in summer for 50 years? It wasn't winter outside Fromville... is it now winter there? Is this going to be more of a giveaway that something's not right, when newcomers arrive and find themselves switching from summer to winter, all of a sudden? Mind you, instantaneous temperature shifts can be very hazardous to one's health...

17) Why do the lamps and telephones have no wires, just wire wrappings? Why do these empty tubes go straight down into the earth, to the caves inhabited by the monsters? Why are the electrical outlets useless?

18) They have running water... where do the pipes go? Are the stoves and ovens electrical or gas?

19) What do they do for soap? Shampoo? Toothpaste? Cleaning dishes? Laundry? Why are there no laundry lines outside, or drying clothes inside?

20) Why doesn't every house have a garden? 

21) Animals simply appeared in the woods, a few cows and a bunch of goats, but where did they come from? There are only 2 cows, which is not sufficient as a breeding population, and it's been 50 plus years since the massacre of the town when Victor was a child. Those would be some very old cows, inbred younguns, or out-of-towners. It's like the place is being stocked occasionally, like pouring food into a fish tank. Something introduced the animals. Who? Or what? And why? Are they trying to establish some kind of (semi) functional equilibrium between the vampires and the towns people? 

22) Why are some people seeing ghosts of dead characters? Khatri and the bartender, for example?

The whole thing with the music and the bottle trees, into which the children poured their hopes, is pretty… bonkers. Jade worked out the tune from the notes in the bottles, then played the music on Victor's violin, which summoned both the children and the Man in Yellow. So.. the bottle tree mystery is kind of sort of solved, but I don’t feel particularly satisfied. Maybe an apertif would help? If this is the kind of answer we can expect for the rest of the show’s mysteries, I’ll be nonplussed. 

That said, I have enjoyed the acting, the mysteries, and the drama so far, so maybe this is all about the journey, and not the destination. 

From: The Drinking Game

Every time someone says to another character, 'it's not your fault' or 'everyone's just doing their best', take a swig. You'll be drunk in no time.

Stunning trailer for 28 Years Later

 Complete with a Yeats poetry reading voiceover from... 1905! Talk about daring!

The artistry of this, and the willingness to do something strikingly different and impactful, bodes well for the film. 

28 Days Later I liked, although it was extremely bleak and had an implausible ending. 28 Weeks Later felt nihilistic, a film in which every act of love was rewarded with destruction and death.

Sadly, given the outlook of the film's creators, I suspect the new iteration will be even darker and more annihilating; whatever the case, it'll be compelling cinema. 

Luigi Mangione and the Narodnaya Volya: what's old is new again

Luigi, the anti-corporate assassin captured rather ironically at a McDonalds, has cited the Unabomber as an inspiration. Thankfully, the Unabomber's idiosyncratic paranoia did not widely resonate. 

Luigi may be just as nuts, but he did choose a more widely reviled target in America, where health insurance is widely acknowledged as being substandard.

Luigi has a lot in common with the Narodnaya Volya.

In the late 1880's, a group of socialist revolutionaries in Imperial Russia called the Narodnaya Volya set out to effect social change through targeted political assassinations. They believed these selective murders would provide the spark that would ignite the peasantry against the regime, as peaceful means of affecting change had yielded no results (it was, after all, an autocratic regime sans elections).

How'd that work out for them? 

Not so good.

Luigi seems to be thinking along the same lines and hasn't learned any of the lessons. 

Is he an isolated case, or is he the harbinger of much worse to come?

Already, one healthcare company that was going to raise rates decided not to in the wake of Brian Thompson's assassination. On one level, that's good. On another, it sets a very, very bad precedent: it shows violence and intimidation works. And if you let people know that violence works, what will you get more of?

Go on, guess.

The outpouring of anger and derision at Thompson's murder, the crocodile tears and laughing emojis, all show that something is truly, deeply wrong with American healthcare insurance providers. More importantly, it shows there are deep problems in American society in general, in that people are now resorting to assassinations. 

That's a glowing, mile high sign that things are bad. It's the red flag of red flags. 

With Donald Trump, every oligarch's best buddy, about to reoccupy the Whitehouse and make America safe for rapacious billionaires again, it doesn't look like change is going to be forthcoming any time soon. 

We are entering a new Gilded Age, where the rich flaunt their wealth and openly try to buy the political system. According to Robert Reich, "815 billionaires saw their combined wealth sky rocket by at least $280 billion after Trump's win." And new tax cuts are forthcoming... for the rich, naturally. "The net worth of the twelve wealthiest people just passed $2 trillion." Unbelievable. We're going to be talking about trillionaires soon. None of this is good. Wealth polarization is a sign of increasing social instability. Remember, Monopoly the game is and always has been a warning, not a how to.

Ever since The Powell Memo in the Nixon Administration, when Big Business organized to roll back the accomplishments of Organized Labour, 50 trillion has been transferred from the middle to the top. Salaries of executives have exploded, stock buy backs have been made legal again, areas of the economy monopolized, and banks and reckless stockbrokers bailed out and given bonuses, while the rest of the country was left in the dust. 

So what to do? Reinvest in the democratic system.

One of the great things about FDR's New Deal and LBJ's Great Society is that they provided a safety net for people who fell on hard times. It helped America avoid becoming a completely polarized dystopia, unlike Europe which became mired in the extremes of Fascism and Communism. 

When serial killers get publicized, we tend to get more serial killers. When mass shootings are publicized, we get more mass shootings.

One of the best things about liberal, democratic society is that we solve our issues peacefully. As a result, we have been largely spared the violence, unrest and extremist regimes that have engulfed other areas of the world. 

Let's not screw this up. 

Triple review: The Founder, Worth, and Irena’s Vow

All three are based on a true story, are well made, and worth a watch... if you’re in the right mood. 

Let’s tackle The Founder first: it starts out as a Happy Commercial for McDonald’s, then careens into oncoming traffic, crashes into a ditch, and explodes, leaving black skid marks all over the road in its wake.

The film follows the story of down-on-his-luck (ain’t they all?) salesman Ray Kroc who's selling milkshake mixers in the idealized 1950’s. Or trying to. His travels often leave him eating in his car at roadside diners and burger joints, where the service is slow and the food equally meh. 

Then, a ray of light: McDonalds calls and orders 8 of his milkshake mixers. Impossible! No one orders eight mixers. Kroc immediately sets off to see with his own eyes the magical restaurant that needs 8 mixers. When he gets there, Ray's stunned: no one comes out to his car to take his order. He has to get out (innovation!) and go up to the window on foot. Remember, this is revolutionary stuff: the 1950's were practically the Stone Age. Kroc orders and BAM his food is right there. I mean, BOOM: Food. Instantly. No delay. And what's more, no plates. No dishes. No cutlery.

Ray’s baffled by awesomeness. 

This is the Temple Mount of American Fast Food. It couldn’t be more revelatory if crepuscular rays streaked out from between parting clouds and bathed Ray in light.

From there everything goes downhill spiritually as it goes up financially. Ray, it turns out, is not the paragon of entrepreneurial virtue we might have thought. Indeed, Ray’s an avaricious dick, the kind of guy who thinks Monopoly is a guide and not a warning. 

The rest, as they say, is spoilers. 

Worth also stars Michael Keaton, this time behind a Brooklyn accent and pair of spectacles. He plays a by-the-book star lawyer who takes on, pro bono, the seemingly thankless task of working out compensation for the victims of 9/11. 

It's even more gnarly than you think.

This is the guy who has divvy out money to grieving relatives according to a financial compensation formula. Putting a dollar amount on someone’s life, anyones life, is problematic enough, but when the amounts are less for some than for others, people get... irked. Spouses of formerly high flying execs (sorry) get far more than the building janitors. 

And there are all sorts of legal issues around same sex couples. 

The whole thing is a nasty business, a moral and legal landmine that Keaton’s character cheerfully steps on. The rest of the picture is essentially about him trying to get off that landmine.

It’s a morbidly fascinating look behind the curtain of the legal aftermath of 9/11. Thankfully, there is a ‘happy’ ending of sorts (circumstances permitting: no one is coming back from the dead here).

Irena’s Vow follows a young Polish nurse from 1939 to 1945, as she tries to survive the horrific Nazi occupation. She’s initially fortunate in getting work as a server at a restaurant for Nazi officers. She’s then hired to be the housekeeper of a German Major’s house. Thanks to her job, she learns what the Nazis have planned for the jewish ‘tailors’ who had been working in the basement of the restaurant, and decides to intercede: she offers them a place to hide… in the Major’s house.

Talk about hiding under the nose of the enemy. 

Sounds outlandish, right? Something a fiction writer would cook up. And to be honest, I kind of balked at it... but the film is actually based on a true story. Truth, as they say, is stranger than fiction. 

This is one gutsy lady.

Irena’s played by Québecois actress Sophie Nélisse, and she’s absolutely riveting. Her performance carries the movie. The only real criticism I have of her character is that she’s, well, pretty much flawless. And the real woman the film is based on may very well have been: she did save a dozen lives at great personal risk. But with our jaded modern mindset, throwing in a character flaw might have made her a little more relatable.

This is a low budget film, but it knows its limits, and never oversteps. Everything looks right for the period. There are a few staging choices that seem a little on the nose, and one awkward scene is even more awkward thanks to the direction and dialogue, but otherwise this is a solid film. 

I started watching it on Netflix, just to see if it was a decent movie or a low budget Canadian throwaway. I only intended to watch a few minutes, but half the movie went by before I even realized it. 

There are plenty of mega budget films (*cough* Multiverse of Madness *cough*) that can’t say the same. 

The Founder is the tale of an avaricious, driven anti-hero, while Worth is about a man who transcends his own limitations to become a better person. Irena’s Vow is about a paragon of virtue who risks her life for the sake of others, because it's the right thing to do. 

As people, they couldn’t be more different. 

Guess which one our extrinsic centred society rewarded most.

Go on, guess.

All I can say is, in a world overrun with wannabe Ray Krocs, I am grateful for the Irenas.

Everyone's a critic

Normally, people just say to ignore the critics. That's what professionals do, after all. And many people out there are unbothered by criticism and blithely dismiss it. 

Life would certainly be easier if that was so easy. I don't think they're wrong, but I do sometimes wonder just how intense the criticism they have faced has been. 

Creatives working on major franchises, and especially (as one friend put it) 'nerd franchises', are prone to especially intense, detailed, and vociferous criticism. I don't think that's really much different than what is faced by sports team coaches and players, though. 

They have to get a thick skin, ASAP. 

Professional level athletes and particularly coaches are known for being pugnacious, tough and ornery. It's not a field for shrinking violets.

The creative arts, however, is a little more introspective and idiosyncratic. Good writers aren't always like Hemmingway, and massive waves of criticism can wear their creative energies away.

Such seems to have been the case with Stephen Moffat, the showrunner of Doctor Who. Doctor Who, for those of you not in the know, is one of the biggest shows on the BBC, a nerdy cultural juggernaut that specializes in terrifying children and driving them for safety behind the couch. 

You don't get to that position without having some serious credentials and creative chops. 

And yet, Moffat has said (according to Doctor Who News & Update on Facebook, and on FlickLuster):

"The amount of hate you get could down three passenger jets. I mean, seriously, it doesn't stop... I was vilified endlessly. I was labelled a 'homophobe', a 'misandrist', 'misanthrope', 'sexist', a 'misogynist' and 'racist'. I was against so many people, I could only be described as an 'omni-bigot', because I was treating everyone equally."

When Moffat chose Chris Chibnall as his successor, he joked with him "how would you like me to ruin your life?" Fully aware that "absolutely everything you say or do will be wrong."

Yeah. Doesn't sound appealing.

The common public response is: tough, grow a pair. Entirely devoid of empathy. I'm not so sure that's the best answer, as many talented people who might do a fabulous job will simply not want the hassle and headache. And those who do (*cough* Chibnall *cough) won't be the best option. 

You see what I did there? I snuck in some fan snark. Guilty as the next person. 

This is one reason why I have trepidation about criticizing creative work, even the seemingly god-like show runners of the world's largest franchises. 

I get the passion. I really, really do. 

But we could all do with a little more civility and chill.

Is that a Ben & Jerry's flavour?

Tyson on being and nothingness

 This interview was absolutely hilarious:

Tyson's not really wrong, but wow, talk about different kinds of energy. I want to see more of this on children's programming! Get that man on Sesame Street.

We are all just visiting, everyone dies, and sometimes the best we can do is try and make the world a little better for those who come after. 

I'm glad Tyson, a man who has had a long struggle with his own personal demons and come out on top, made a mint from his last match.

Music!

Illustration for a music poster I did, way back in The Before Time. When they had music festivals. Find more at jtillustration.

Collier's epic review of Star Trek: Picard

Back in The Before Time, in The Long Long Ago, Red Letter Media made a set of feature length Mr. Plinkett Reviews of the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy. 

They were incisive, entertaining, and above all, novel. 

Now? Epic reviews are multiplying at an exponential rate. Soon as fresh content comes out, vast swarms of YouTube reviewers descend upon it and tear it to pieces.

It used to be just Siskel & Ebert. Today there are a LOTS of smart, media savvy citizen reviewers. 

One such is Angela Collier, who's made a long (3 hours, 47 minutes) video on Star Trek: Picard, and why she didn't like it, from the perspective of a TNG fan. This one stood out.

I don't intend to review the review (it could be trimmed down a little), that'd be too meta; I'll just say she makes some great points:

I also hate Section 31. It undermines Roddenberry's vision of the future. 

David Brin on AI (and, sshhh, COVID-19)

Always interesting to listen to. Competition between AIs sounds like the way to go. That Wallstreet AI could become dominant is truly frightening. 

Demons of El Dorado - Part 7, er, 11?

EDIT: Whoops, it's been so long I forgot I already published this on the blog several years ago. I have the remainder in screenplay format, but I've never put it into full prose. Maybe a project for a rainy month...? Or NaNoWriMo...

COAST OF TRINIDAD 

Sails unfurled, the six heavily loaded Brigantines slipped along the lush green coast, towards South America and the Orinoco River. 

Luis sat on the bulwark and watched the soldiers. Their gear was rolled up beneath their seats. They sang martial songs as they rowed. 

They had thirty arquebusiers, thirty crossbowmen, and at least sixty trained pikemen. On top of that were five greyhound war dogs and six horses. Not a significant army by European standards, but then, Cortez had brought down the Aztec Empire with under a thousand men. 

The air, clear and fresh, rushed over them. Beneath the water’s sparkling surface, Luis watched schools of multi-coloured fish darted about like living rainbows. 

He ran his fingers over the leather cover of a book cradled in his lap. It was the diary of a priest, Philip de Riverra, who had accompanied the expedition of Hernan Perez de Quesada into the Orinoco river basin. Professor Martin de Apilcueta Navarro had let Luis purchase it for a few ducats back in Salamanca, from his personal library. Luis thought it might have been of interest to his father, but had forgotten to pass it on. Philip had died of malaria in 1543, and had been demoralized for some time. Much of his writing, according to Navarro, was unreliable, even fantastical, more a product of fever than real events. But it was the best source of first had information Luis currently had access to. Abuljar only spoke to Bartome, and even that he did rarely. 

Luis settled a broad brimmed leather hat on his head, then cracked open the book to a random page. 

He began to read:

“August 5^th, 1542: We have been exploring inland, due South from the third major river fork. Always Quesada choses South. He believes there is yet a civilization to be found in this dark, oppressive jungle. It devours us without qualm, as it would any attempt at establishing order and sanity. The jungle is a beast, an entity, a living force, just one with a thousand thousand manifestations, all guided by an ill will. At first, I saw it as a bewildering, chaotic jumble of vines and trees and bugs and slithering reptiles. But it has personality. Will. And it is eating us up, one by one, felling us with sickness and madness. 

Jose died yesterday of a snakebite. He stepped in between a fallen tree and a rock, and it struck him in the ankle. I tried to suck out the poison to no avail. His death was merciful and quick. Those of us who continue on are wracked by dysentery, the more water we consume the more we expel. After three years, I am but a shadow of my former self. We have no mirrors. Only the rippling reflection in the river, and the man I see there is not one I recognize. 

There is no end to the wretched jungle. It lies over the earth like the rotting corpse of a pagan god. I fear eventually finding ourselves facing a solid wall of curling vegetation, vines so thick they throttle the trees and snuff out the light of the sun. 

August 10^th, 1542: During the night there was a commotion.

We gathered wood before nightfall to make a camp fire, and to cook some of the small mammals our crossbows had felled for dinner. Overhead great shadows flew over us, one after another, but we could not get a good look at their source. The trees are at least eighty feet, and with the sky already dim, it all merged into a single mass of darkness, only with faint speckles of light seeping through gaps. Soon those too were gone, and we were left with the cluster of campfires. We keep them lit throughout the night now, to keep the beasts back. They fear the fire. But some of the men do not like being crowded in beside it, and lay further away, at the edge of its light. I was awoken by shouts of alarm. It was just as well, for I was having that dreadful nightmare again. What awaited me was little better. 

A great black beast had landed on Martin, one of the few of our number still healthy. We could hear it making wet, slurping sounds and grunting. It was a bat, so large and horrific we at first took it to be a demon in the flickering light of our torches. I cannot describe the feeling of horror that seized me. It was the size of a large dog, with thick, knotted black fur, and a flattened, pig like face, with fangs and great veined ears. Sanchez ran his saber through its back so far he nicked Martin. The beast squealed and thrashed about. Martin is lucky we did not set it alight with the torches. Sanchez hauled it off and jabbed it in the neck with a knife until it stopped moving. 

There was much shouting, but none of that woke Martin, who lay in a blissful slumber so deep we feared he would never awaken. There were bite marks on his throat, where the creature had affixed itself. We splashed water in his face and slapped him, until finally he was roused. He described a dream in which he was atop a great, gold pyramid, looking down at supplicating worshippers below. I did not tell him I have had the same dream. I had the men lay the beast out, stretching out its leathery wings, and stepped along the length. I counted twelve feet. We will make sacks out of the wings, or perhaps patches for our boots; when Sanchez cut it open its belly, black blood jetted out; not its own, but Martins. The body we cooked. The meat was tender and delicious. Better than the bugs we’d been eating: big iridescent green monsters, weighing almost two pounds each. Something unholy about how large and distorted God’s creation is here. I hesitate to imagine what form indigenous man would take, here in this hellish jungle.

August 15^th, 1542: The bats left us alone for three days while we crossed a swamp, which was a wretched experience. The leeches concentrated upon my groin, and the filthy brine stank like an open sewer. There were mercifully none of those small predatory fish, and only a few curious crocodiles that our pikes turned easily away. We only lost one porter. I saw the our gold pursuers again, speckles sliding beneath black water, hinting at great hideous shapes. I’d say it was my mind playing tricks, paranoia, but the others saw it too, and fired crossbow bolts. Quesada put a stop to that, as ammunition is in short supply. No one yet has seen what is following us. It could be harmless.

We are but a faint echo of the men who entered this endless green waste. Covered in red welts, our clothes hanging like tents, full of lice, it is a wonder any of us still lives. 

Pity the civilization that fears conquerors such as us. 

August 17^th, 1542:There were two attacks last night. We are once again beneath the canopy, and here the bats seem to prefer to strike. The men nervous, and understandably so. There is talk that we are nearing the end of the world, perhaps even the Gates of Hell. I know that Aguirre reached the coast, through this very jungle, so there must be an end to it. Quesada has given orders for halberds to be set in the ground, pointing up, over us while we sleep, and doubled the night watch. We’re too exhausted to create greater defenses, there’s simply no strength left for it. 

We proceed onward by will alone, the unknown pursuing us, death waiting ahead.

Luis shut the book and listened to the men, who were now chattering, exuberant, eager for the adventure that lay ahead. They joked and laughed in the breezy ocean air. 

He got up and made his way towards Rodrigo and Angel who were at the bow, basking in sea foam. Rodrigo nodded at Luis as he drew near. “Finally got your nose out of a book, eh? As I was saying: we’ll sail through the night.” He put a hand on Angel’s shoulder. “Have shifts set up. de Berrio will send ships after us, if he’s at all like his father.”

Angel grunted agreement. “Once the son of a bitch gets his pants on.”

ICACOS POINT

 

Booming waves drowned out the shouts of men. Luis was wedged between two soldiers, and rowed like mad against powerful cross currents that threatened to dash them into rocks. All pretense of status and rank had been cast aside in the struggle for survival. 

The fleet surged upward atop a bulging swell and began to shift sideways. 

The stern was partly obscured by mist and slashing water, but Luis could still make out Rodrigo and Angel, who held on to the rudder for all they were worth, their teeth grit, faces showing the strain of a three hour long ordeal. 

Luis struggled not to vomit. 

He wasn’t successful.