The Dark Knight Rises (or What's Wrong with Cinema Sins) *Spoilers*

Yet another movie that I waited to watch. Ever since The Dark Knight, I've had high hopes for this movie, which, I suppose, was part of its downfall. But I won't focus entirely on what is wrong with the movie--I will also focus on the Cinema Sins video, "Everything Wrong with The Dark Knight Rises in 3 Minutes or Less."


The main problem I had with the movie was the pacing. Things happened very fast, and especially when Bane takes over the city: those 5 months fly past, with no good indication of how much time has passed between jumps other than the snippets of what people say. But time jumps like that, while one of my pet peeves, are not what I'm really concerned about. I'm mostly talking about the fact that none of the scenes feels set up right. Every time we get a new scene, there's automatically someone talking, someone doing something, etc. There is no pause for atmosphere, or for the viewer to get his bearings. Rather, it's just a headlong plunge into the scene.

Sure, they had the movie at 2 hours and 45 minutes, well into the range where most moviegoers don't like their movies to go. I hate this attitude, but I'll focus on that in another post. Here, the issue I have with this is that they could've made it 3 hours, and taken the time to set scenes correctly. It was a really long movie, but to me it felt shorter because it went so fast. And I don't like that, especially with a movie like this.

As for the plot, I thought it was a good idea. I'm kind of tired of the whole nuclear-bomb-must-be-stopped plot device by now, since it's used so often, but other than that it was fairly clever. People were stupid, though. Send all the police below ground? All of them? What tactical sense does that make? Worse yet, the people of Gotham actually believe Bane when he says one of them has the trigger. That's just silly. Sure, maybe they're just scared for their lives and don't dare consider that it's a lie meant to fulfill Bane's weird idea of a scheme, so I won't take it as a real point against the movie, but still...

Next...the Catwoman cartwheel is one of the dumbest moments in this movie. Why does it happen? And when Bruce is in the pit, he breaks the TV. Um, Batman...now you don't know what's going on in Gotham... Two people in fight scenes fall down without being hit. Blake doesn't count to five before throwing...though that's a good thing, since the bomb goes off before it would've reached five.

The worst part, though, is the ending. I liked the twist about Bane not being the real villain behind it all, but then Batman goes off with the bomb, as we all knew he would, and then it blows up over the water, a safe distance from Gotham. Of course, there's the problem of radiation, but that can be overlooked because the bomb was originally an energy source that wouldn't cause radiation. Perhaps there is none because of how Bruce designed it. Other than that, one big issue is that, with Batman and Bruce Wayne dead, no one is surprised to see him at a diner, where Alfred sees him with Catwoman. This could be explained by the fact that Gothamites thought his disappearance was part of the routing of rich people during Bane's rule. This is why they don't automatically say, "Hey, both of them died at the same time! Bruce Wayne is Batman!" Seeing him at the diner, they realize that he has not actually died, and was probably just in hiding. This makes his funeral scene look really cruel, though. He couldn't just tell Alfred he was alive right away?

But that's not all! The part I hate the most is the fact that Batman doesn't die. Granted, dying by nuclear bomb would be a dumb way for him to go; I'd rather he died fighting Bane, either taking him down with him or weakening him for Blake to finish the job. The whole movie was centered around the idea that Batman would eventually die. And that would have been the most epic ending possible. Instead, they decided to screw all the build-up and save the hero. This kind of ending has been happening an awful lot lately, and frankly, I'm tired of it. We get it--heroes are great, and should be rewarded for their sacrifice. But resurrecting them every time really just ends up ruining the effect. We always know now that the guy who gives his life is going to survive somehow. What's the point of death anymore? As long you're a good guy and don't die early on, you're guaranteed to survive the movie. Gosh...

Cinema Sins points out a lot of the above problems, and then some. Since I didn't like most of these things, I enjoyed watching their video and felt good bashing the movie. But there were a few things I felt they didn't think about, and which they rarely do in their review process. They point out small things, like how many fans were at the football game, and how poorly Batman fights when he first loses to Bane, both of which are easily defended against (it's a freaking football game, who cares? And Batman has been out of action for a long time). But the one that got to me was the point about Alfred giving away the ending to the movie very early on.

Alfred says to Bruce that he always went to a certain diner, hoping one day to see Bruce there with some lady, knowing that things were going well and all that. The monologue about this is a bit awkward, but in the end it's just him taking his frustrations out on Bruce for the way he is living his life, and expressing what he wishes for his charge's future. This is a very common device in stories: foreshadowing. The kind that brings everything back around, giving a sense of closure. Now, sure, he gives away the ending. But that isn't a problem. Why? Because he was talking to Bruce about it! Meaning Bruce, once he decides he wants to show up in the world again, can remember this, and choose to do exactly what Alfred wanted. He wanted to do this as a sort of message to Alfred that all would be well after all.

I didn't agree with Cinema Sins on some other movies (especially on The Avengers, where they pointed out a lot of things for no good reason). They can point out some good things, but usually they just pump their videos full of small details so that at the end they can give some big number of "sins" and label every movie as "Hell." While sometimes they are correct in this categorization (as with Looper), they usually aren't, and miss the point entirely. Just enjoy the movie, guys.

Looper (spoilers galore)

To start off, I'll pick one of the movies I watched recently. Ever since I first heard about Looper, I was excited to see a time travel movie with Joseph Gordon-Levitt, especially with Bruce Willis in the cast. I was a little skeptical about the plot, but I figured that it would all shake out in the end, and the movie would be amazing.

But I didn't see it for quite a while. I saw people mentioning it, saying it was a really great movie. I was starting to like Joseph Gordon-Levitt after rewatching Inception, seeing that he was in The Dark Knight Rises, and watching 50/50 (which was a good movie). I thought it would be okay if I just waited for it to go to video first, though, before seeing it.

And what a great decision that was!

Let me just say this: I love time travel movies. Time travel has got to be my favorite plot device...and my favorite science fiction topic. The tragedy, however, is that very few filmmakers use it correctly. And that's not to say that I want them to hold to one specific theory of time travel (like quantum mechanics, which is my personal favorite as far as which one is probably true). I just want films to be consistent in which method they use. Looper is not.

The logic of Looper, which Bruce Willis's part of the main character doesn't want to discuss, is that if any changes are made when traveling back in time, they revise the course of events such that the future will automatically feel the effects. This is pointed to when Joe's friend lets his loop run, and they cut directions into the past guy's arm, so the future him will interpret this as a message from his past self. When the future guy gets to the spot, they start torturing his past self, so that his future self will be weakened when he arrives, and they can kill him.

Seems clever at first. The problem, of course, is that this new version of this guy will already know that it's a trap, and so his future self should know as well. Why doesn't he? Oh yeah, because the past is "blurry" when it's changed. I could try to overlook this. Except for the fact that the future self is weakened. If 30 years go past, wouldn't he have some work done to improve upon his physical well-being? And wouldn't that damage make it impossible for his future self to have run away in the first place?

It was about this time that I realized a glaring hole in the plot. The whole point of the Looper system is to dispose of bodies in the past, because it is nearly impossible to do this in the future. However, when Joe's future self is explaining what happened to him before he went into the past, he describes how the mafia killed his wife...in the future. The place where they don't want to kill people. Huh? The only explanation I can come up with for this is that they will send her body back in time to be disposed of. But if they can do that...why don't they do that for everyone they want dead? Instead of risking people running around screwing up the past, they could just kill them in the future and have them sent back into the furnace, or at least nearby so the Looper just shovels them in or something.

Once I thought of this, the rest of the movie just felt pointless. And the end? Oh, sure, Joe sacrifices himself to stop the Rain Maker from becoming such a bad guy...except that the scenario he cooks up can't be the reason the Rain Maker is what he is. Originally, he had no interaction with the kid, and yet he turned out to be evil. His going back in time would've started the thing that made him go back in time. Paradox. Even that would be okay if they actually pointed it out.

Instead, they make things worse by having his past self commit suicide. This, my friends, is the worst thing he could've done. Now, none of what his future self has done will occur. Meaning none of this movie occurred. (hmm...maybe this the best eventuality then...except that the filmmakers fail to see that this is the proper course of events). Of course, they decided to go along with it anyway, and everything future Joe did is still there...which, by the movie's logic, it shouldn't.

There are countless other problems with this movie (the 30-second steak, for instance), but it really doesn't deserve much more discussion. If you want to see some other problems, just look up Cinema Sins's video, "Everything Wrong with Looper in 3 Minutes or Less." There are some pointless ones in there, and I want to address some of the things they don't seem to comprehend in regards to The Dark Knight Rises, but I'd say they're a good gauge of how bad a movie really is at following logic...and Looper fails their test horribly.

Though there is another way of looking at that ending. Maybe now time should revert to when the original Joe shot his future self...leading to the Bruce Willis timeline, and creating...a loop. Wow. Y'know, that would actually make some sense. If they just fixed the mafia bit, this could work...

Wait, no...because the mafia is too stupid not to realize that forcing someone to kill their future self is ridiculous. If I had to do that, I would just take the gold and split it with my future self, running away from the mafia thanks to my future self's superior knowledge of them. Better yet, I could pretend I had killed my future self, then run away with him. Peaceful life, looping forever.

Edit: My father has recently pointed out that it is possible for the mafia to track the future self, hence they know when the Loop is running. So you can disregard that last bit. I might still try to evade them with future knowledge, though. Perhaps tamper with their tracking equipment so they can't find him?

Kull Wahad!

I find it distressing that both thescattering.blogspot.com and scattering.blogspot.com are blogs about poetry. Has no other Dune fan decided to use that domain? Well, faminetimes.blogspot.com should suffice...

Greetings.

I originally started making a blog called The Postmodern Prometheus for a class, but that'll be bogged down with crappy assignments, so I've decided to make my own, school-free blog, as I should have done a long time ago. People have asked me if I had a blog, since I like sharing my crazy ideas on Facebook, and I've never had the urge to make one until now.

So, what is The Scattering about? Simply, this blog will be a place for me to express my opinions about things--mainly books, video games, movies, philosophy and whatever else I want to talk about. It will be a log of my views and opinions on a scattering of topics (see where this is going?). Also, it is a reference to a very important event in the Dune timeline: the time when humanity broke free from its bondage and spread out into the universe, discovering new things and, eventually, bringing a new danger upon itself that the Golden Path had prepared it for. As you've probably guessed, I'm a huge Dune fan. But I won't let that be the only theme of this blog--that would defeat the purpose, after all!

I'm an English Lit major (and I've read over 450 books in my lifetime), and I love science fiction...so I have experience with crazy ideas. I'm also agnostic, and take it to the extreme: I don't "believe" in anything. It is a philosophy that has been built over the course of my life through my experiences, my college courses, my reading (especially from Frank Herbert and Kurt Vonnegut, whom I will always recommend to everyone who hasn't read them yet), and my own thought processes. This allows me to look at things from different angles without too much difficulty.

I'm always open to suggestions, questions, and recommendations, so feel free to share anything.