The way the Palantir network compromises Saruman and Denethor shows the danger in who controls the algorithm that manages your newsfeed.
Pippin picks it up, starts doomscrolling, and can’t put it down. Literally.
Aragorn plans out his post, gets on just long enough to make his point, and gets the hell out, knowing he’s made an impression.
I find myself thinking about Sam’s speech a lot. About how in the stories that really matter, people faced overwhelming darkness, and had a lot of chances to stop, but they kept going.
Geek Mom’s A Reminder About Story Middles was written before the coronavirus pandemic hit the US, but it’s even more important now: When things look bleak, if you think of yourself as being in the middle of the story, you know it can get better. And that can help you keep going.
Doom and gloom alone aren’t enough to help us deal with climate change, or any of the other problems we face. Fear sustained turns to despair, and to inaction – because why bother?
We have to celebrate successes to keep hope alive so we can keep going.
We do need to know what we’re up against. We need to understand how serious the stakes are. But we also have to believe that what we do will – or at least can – make a difference.
I keep thinking of Star Wars: The Last Jedi. The first time through was grueling, watching the relentless assault of the First Order as it tried to snuff out every last bit of hope. The scenes with Rey and Luke were a relief because he was “only” depressed, not doomed.
But Luke eventually regains enough hope to take action. And enough of the Resistance is able to survive, keeping the spark of hope alive. And their legend survives, passed from Rose and Finn to a stable boy on Canto Bight, who’s already fanning that spark.
The whole movie is about hope: whether you’ve lost it or someone is actively trying to stomp it out, as long as it exists, you can hold onto it. That hope that, to quote another trilogy, “There’s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo, and it’s worth fighting for.”
Actually it’s just the last light of the setting sun reflecting off of a structure (the observatory?) atop Mt. Wilson. Also, you can see the sign on the Wilshire Grand tower is seriously bright, even from this far away.
I was amused to find that Serenity, a restaurant first spotted in 2012 during the Firefly 10th Anniversary, is now known as Strider’s. Different verse, but still matches a well known SF/F name.
Five years ago:
As the release date approaches for the first movie in The Hobbit triogy, I find myself comparing the circumstances to the Star Wars prequels. Why? In both cases you have…
But of course, Star Wars isn’t Lord of the Rings, and Peter Jackson isn’t George Lucas. Let’s look at four big differences.
1. Time
The Phantom Menace came out 22 years after Star Wars: A New Hope and 14 years after Return of the Jedi. An entire generation of children grew up with the original trilogy and were adults by the time the prequels started. And with 14 years of no Star Wars films, the prequels had to justify the wait.
With Lord of the Rings, it’s only been 10 years since Fellowship of the Ring, and 8 since Return of the King. We’ve spent half the time away from Middle Earth as we did from that galaxy far, far away. Children have become teenagers, and teenagers have become adults, but there isn’t quite the same level of “My childhood is back!” nostalgia that could make or break the films for a large section of the audience.
2. Directorial Experience
According to IMDB, George Lucas stopped directing after the first Star Wars film in 1977. He kept writing and producing, of course, but he hadn’t directed a film in two decades when he picked up The Phantom Menace
Peter Jackson may have slowed down a bit, but between wrapping up the extended edition of Return of the King in 2004 and picking up The Hobbit in 2010, he’s directed King Kong and The Lovely Bones.
3. Source Material
This is a big one. The Star Wars saga was an original story by George Lucas. When he wrote Episodes I-III, he was free to do anything he wanted as long as it didn’t contradict Episodes IV-VI. The Hobbit films are based on Tolkien’s novel, the appendices from Lord of the Rings, and his published notes. The core of the story is a lot more well-established.
4. Executive Meddling Potential
Zillionaire George Lucas wrote, directed and produced the Star Wars prequels, financing them himself. Nobody was in a position to tell him no. On one hand, this is good, because there weren’t any suits with more money than talent to tell him to add an extra car chase here, or add a love triangle there, and does Revenge of the Sith *really* need to be PG-13, can’t we dial down the violence a bit? On the other hand, it also meant no one could say, “George, don’t you think Jar-Jar is a little over the top?” or “This fireplace scene just isn’t working.”
Peter Jackson lucked out with the Lord of the Rings trilogy in being able to mostly do his own thing. But the legal battles and rights-wrangling that have caused The Hobbit to take so long to reach the screen indicate that the studios might be trying to exert their influence to “protect” their investment (which usually seems to involve killing the goose that lays the golden eggs). Certainly the decision to stretch the story out to three movies sounds like the studio trying to multiply their ticket sales, though I can also see Jackson and Weta deciding that this is their last chance to explore Middle Earth, so they might as well make the most of it.
Well, it’s just one week until The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey opens and we all get to see how it turned out. One thing that’s definitely changed for me: Unlike Episode I, there’s not a chance that I’ll be standing in line for hours to see a midnight (or 2AM) showing. I can wait until Saturday afternoon.
Today, I watched Green Lantern at the same theater where we’ve been watching a series of special screenings of the extended-edition Lord of the Rings movies. Afterward, thinking about the two ring-focused stories and the in-progress event comic book Flashpoint, I found myself imagining: What would The Lord of the Rings have been like as a modern “event” comic book like Final Crisis or Blackest Night?
No doubt it would have tie-ins, side stories, spinoffs, and a bunch of extra tie-ins added to plug the inevitable gaps in the schedule. Check out my full list at Speed Force!
