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[Darkest Hour]

Darkest Hour

No, not SF from the 2011.  Another film featuring a pertinent political figure, a committed actor in ton of make - up and blatant historical innacurracies, seems to me some uncanny role model for these modern type of films. Btw, Gary Oldman just nails Winston Churchill and the movie is technically brilliant. I just wish Gary had better material to work with. I admit, I am not fully immersed in the 1940 May Crisis, and this is not biopic about "the greatest Briton ever lived." But some situations are embellishment, if not distortion. For example, the tube scene. I get that filmmakers were in need of a scene with dramatic power, but real Winston Churchill wouldn't do that. Not in the scope the film portrays him he would. And if filmmakers wanted to show Churchill as a leader with doubts, he factually did consider entering in peace talks (albeit, this was perhaps a moment of hesitation). But overall, I enjoyed in the film. That period was always of the tremendous interest to me and Gary's performance is stellar, just stellar.

[Hardy Kruger]

A name that might get missed in all the news about Meatloaf; actor Hardy Kruger has died aged 93.
Helluva career with some major films on his CV;
The One That Got Away, Barry Lyndon and The Wild Geese.

He was also in Flight of the Phoenix and in one of the greatest ww2 films ever - A Bridge Too Far. I didn't know he was alive...until moments ago.

RIP

[Outrageous Tales From the Old Testament]

Outrageous Tales From the Old Testament

Meh... I picked it up solely on the creator's names (some of em). At the end, the impression is disappointment, at best. Some of the Bible stories were quite brutal, with strong moral message. Close retelling of these stories is ocassionally wrapped in dry, sardonic humour, but as overall, I felt that creators either misread Bible or were just doing it in their spare time. No wit, no thoughtful writing. As it is, Alan Moore's stuff is the best. Neil Gaiman's...well, the part he did with Dave McKean is an inch behind Moore's, but his output here generally sucks (some of his stories nearly landed a publisher in jail in Sweden). The art is mostly bonkers as well. There are some good images, Dave McKean's stuff is in class of its own, but some are just either awful to look at and/or are simply unreadable. Oh, and the collection starts with a three pages poem, that easily can be whittled down to one.

Step backward compared to the predecessors. Tbh, I wouldn't be interested in seeing this film if it wasn't Kingsman entry. Maybe previous films spoiled me a bit but I didn't feel it as a Kingsman film. I didn't find the ww1 setting inspiring and I was not amused a one bit how the film plays out using real historical happenings (and characters, the latter I've found a bit off) for its narrative, but hey - creative freedom. The first half of the film is disjointed, unfocused (is it spy film, family drama, war film), scenes go back and fourth for the sake of moving the heavily predictable plot. Although there a few, npt-seen-it-coming twists here (one is quite egregious). I like Gemma Arterton here, but she always comes at the right time and saying or doing the right thing. Few of the characters have their quirks, but few really stand-out. Rasputin could have a bigger role and I admit I imagined Alan Moore while watching him. The villains' machinations are a bit outlandish for me, not his goal, but the means to achieve it. Future SNP supporter. I almost believed he's gonna be played by Robert Carlyle (mostly because of that Bond film he is in), but no, it was Ozymandias. And if Ralph Fiennes decide to follow the steps of Liam Neeson and does middle-aged man action roles, he's all set.

[Daredevil Yellow]

Daredevil Yellow

A rather poignant story of Daredevil's earliest days, told in one big flashback. How Matt lost his Dad, how he met Karen Page, how his friendship with Foggy Nelson suffered a crisis, the latter falling in love with Karen etc. Owl has a minor role, but manages to utter perhaps the cheesiest, stupid, yet amusingly cracking line I ever heard from a supervillain. Mosaically constructed plot overshadows coherence of the same, but I find the story quite easy to follow. And could be interesting read for newcomers.
I think it was decent for rain afternoon, but I cannot stomach Loeb's dry prose and less Sale's impressionist art.

...now onto Omen 2 which I suspect I will find a bit daft, but also suspect I will enjoy as well...

I wonder what Mike Hodges vision would have been. I am definitely keen on the idea "What if?" What if Stanley Kubrick directed the first Exorcist? Or William Friedkin the third? Or Ridley Scott or Michael Bay I am Legend? Sadly, we will never get the answer.

[13 Hours]

The Wachowski sisters can fuck.

Only one of them.

13 Hours

I rate every military, set in the Middle East movie to Ridley Scott's stellar Black Hawk Down. Rigid rule, but absolute. 13 Hours delivers some of the goods, but fails to reach Sir Rid's masterpiece.
Coming from Michael Bay (the man probably born to do this film), the film is surprisingly dark and mature. But not that it'd matter at the end. Because it's another mindless Hollywood jingoistic crap, this one rooted in real events. It even starta with real life footage of civil unrest in Lybia. I don't know how much of it was truthful, but I don't even care. I don't plan to go on politics rant, so I'll leave all political aspects out if this. About the film, Michael Bay doesn't fail to deliver another high adrenaline actioner (juvenile, pyrotechnics, tons of squibs), but this time he opted I guess for documentaristic approach. Meaning heavy use of hand-held camera set-ups and blink or you'll miss it editing, which was the source of constant annoyance in The Bourne Supremacy (or was it Ultimatum?). Messy it looks, the handling of the story wasn't much better. For the first hour, I had very issues following the story as scenes are jumbled together without any purpose save to move to the gunfight spectacle. The film also never really grabs onto a single soldier, except usual family bits crap. At the end, it didn't matter to me who was who who did what. Which is too bad, because some actors were really good. John Krasinski especially. One thing the film definitely has to be complimented on. At the end are presented images of real life guys the film is based on and I gotta say, the physical similarities are striking. Almost clone-like.

[The Great Wall]

The Great Wall

I realised now how I was misled about the film's content, my mind racing back to the period The Great Wall got released in the theatres. Namely, Matt Damon's character that someone claimed is Chinese (he isn't). Or that white features a "white saviour" trope (it doesn't). But considering this is primarily American production, such criticisms are bonkers.  Plus, I really didn't expect four-legged hounds from hell too, but alas... As it is, the film has very little to do with historical accuracy. Western man in the 10th century China rofl! But I was entertained. The movie doesn't fail on delivering mesmerizing visuals, impeccable production, and costume designs, and CGI is stellar. Plus, the film that doesn't bore with unnecessary long running time so casual in Hollywood epic escapades is okay in my book. The only problem I had was with the by-the-book plot, and the film pulls absolutely nothing of innovative storytelling. Countless times have seen, run of the mill cliche - a stranger in a foreign land, who finds more than he could have bargained for, helps the local population against an impending enemy, meets a girl, they proceed to have a love-hate relationship, but ultimately grow to admire each other [spoiler](though they do not get together at the end)[/spoiler]. But I guess these criticisms are irrelevant now.
Time well spent!

My question was rather hypothetical, in the subverting nature of the topic. Ofcourse, teaching kids to be racists is horrible, but what to say then about those parents who successfully ejected CRT from a school in... Alabama? But I feel CRT deserves its own topic, so I'll stop here.

Woke can be a lot of things, doesn't mean they are less relevant. Ofcourse subhuman doesn't exist, but we are comparing antropology and social interactions here. It's not a lie when someone accuses a person for being woke on the grounds of that other person's (probably far left) politics, which is real. Same thing when labeling someone as arsehole because he is an arsehole because he does or did some arsehole stuff. On the basis of our actions we get labeled and when it becomes a norm...well... Besides, anyone who falls in depression over being called woke has some personal issue. Woke...meh.

DeSantis is not my friend.

https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/rats-playing-doom-twitch/

Can't say I'd uninteresting to watch rats playing for sheer curiosity, but this is animal abuse to me.

Since the topic slipped into "woke" notion, I can't but not to notice that it was probably natural digression. As folks say, one thing lead to another. But I think wokery does exist, because if doesn't, we wouldn't be talking about it. In empirical way that is. The only problem is, we never sat around in order to give it a proper definition. But it exists, considering that more and more people step forward with labelling someone or something as "woke". Tim86 post however, might be the closest to the truth. Sure, it might be weaponized against political opponents of the far left, but aren't all phrases like that? The one "bleeding heart liberals", might is as well replaced with "woke". We usually came spontaneously and it sticks like a movie phrase. Then, if people feel they are threatened by their government, or dominant culture, with perception they have no voice in it, it gets another layer of meaning. In that case, subversion and woke have action-consequence position. This, ironically, might be the only thing that has united both sides of the spectrum. Aversion and anti-trust toward the government. Anti-lockdown protests, BLM, you name it. Either way, these are bleak times to live in.

As for milstar's friend arguing 2000 AD lacks edginess, it would be interesting to know what edginess means for him. Is it just violence? It surely can't be rallying against authority, because 2000 AD is still packed with that.

I have no idea really. I was left with the mystery in my hands.

My condolescences. May she RIP.

The quest for what means subversive today sounds like a deep rabbit hole, for what I guess increasingly polarizing politics, of which is eerie that the both sides of the political spectrum grow far and close, and of which I am no fan of. Far left - far right; thus strenghtening my belief in the horseshoe theory. With no apologetics. It's no big secret that things go increasingly sensitive and PC in today's climate, for good and bad. Paradoxically, 1971 film The Devils (my favourite Ken Russell's film) is a film that could only be made in those years and it was way ahead of its time, and it was subversive as hell! Perhaps the film resonates better with the contemporary audience in mind, but I see no chance in making that type of film today.

Apropo 2000ad, the Dr. Rock's comment reminded me on a bloke I personally know bloke, who was a regular 2000ad fan. I guess him being some 10-15 years than myself and being the kid of the 80s (opposed to me being the kid of the 90s) left him feeling let down a bit by the recent output of 2000ad progs. To paraquote "progs lack edginess and Rebellion name couldn't be more distant from the truth."

Anti-establishment, against already set-up social norms, against conformism, against mainstream (self-insert whatever mainstream would be)... I wonder what anti-comic books would look like...? Is Ron Desantis ban on wokery subversive?
The narrative "it was better before" is so old in existence I don't think it'll ever vanish. Culture is ever-shifting thing. Maybe tomorrow another rock-rap-folk band would stir the next gen crowd crazy much to our dismay. Maybe 2000ad would turn into 2100ad...? Ofcourse, these are just question and I reserve my right to be wrong about this.

Either way, I just realized that Johnny Rotten is the singer of Public Image Ltd. I could never get enough of Order of the Death tune.