So I decided to post this as well. The poems I’d previously blogged are from my collection Almost Normal, published in 2012. The topics of the poems include traveling to Asia, living on an Indian Reservation, and some poems touch on my other interests of comic books etc.

I like to think that the book kind of has an arc to it, that it portrays a young boy who liked baseball and boxing who later went down the path of eccentric-ness, then traveled the world a bit before becoming, well, Almost Normal.

You can purchase the book here.

Last week I reviewed Iron Man 3, and my review was strictly non-spoiler. Now that some time has passed I’d like to talk about a few points of the movie, but even here I’ll try to avoid spoliers.

Around April of 2012 it was in the news that the government of China would be co-producing the film via DMG entertainment out of Beijing. We knew the villain was going to the the Mandarin, a Chinese villain from the comics. Not only that, just prior to the film’s release it was announced that China would in fact be getting it’s own cut of the movie. The China cut has extra footage including the appearance of Fang Bingbing, a popular actress in China.

However, once I saw the movie, I wondered why China had anything to do with it. I’d presumed, both because of the co-production by the Chinese Government, and because the lead villain being the Mandarin, that some of the movie would take place in China. However, absolutely none of the movie takes place in China. The character Iron Man himself spends the entire movie in America, with War Machine/Iron Patriot spending a few minutes on screen somewhere in Asia (but not China). This leaves me to wonder what could possibly have been in this China cut? What role could Fang possibly have had? Was she in those exclusive scenes? I can imagine her being in the film’s climax, but again who knows?

This leads me to what may be the most controversial plot twist in recent memory. I’ll still try not to spoil it here, but the actual use of the Mandarin is a hot topic amongst fandom. The Mandarin is a Chinese villain created in the late 1960s, who, especially in his earliest appearances, appeared to be a literary descendent of Fu Manchu and other stereotypical Asian “Yellow Peril” villains.

In Iron Man 3 Mandarin is played by white actor Ben Kingsley. I understand the concern over a Yellow Peril stereotype, but couldn’t you argue that it’s just as racist to have a Chinese character called the Mandarin played by a white man? This is an example of white-washing, having white people play characters that were originally not white. It’s also been called race-bending, in reference to the white cast of The Last Airbender. This website has it’s own take on the Iron Man 3′s Mandarin.

Not only that, but I feel the way the Mandarin was used also did not make sense due to the content of the first Iron Man film. In the first movie Tony Stark is captured by a terrorist group called the Ten Rings. That name was in reference to the ten rings Mandarin has, which in the comics are alien in origin. Said rings are present in Iron Man 3, but are just plain rings. Marvel also made a few comic books taking place in the Marvel Cinematic Universe that also made use of the Ten Rings group. During one of which agent Coulsen said the Ten Rings have never made an attack on American soil. Given the prescence of the Ten Rings terrorist group in the first Iron Man, as well as their use in in-continuity comics, I presumed that Mandarin would be ramping up his group to launch and all out attack against America in Iron Man 3. Story wise it made perfect sense.

In my actual review I said Iron Man 3 is the first truly bad movie from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. My reason for saying that isn’t because of the Mandarin plot twist per say, but because of what I feel it does to the movie. The beginning of the movie has a very serious, dark tone. Terror attacks are launced against the United States, people actually die, (but not actual cast members which I’ve previously objected to) and this looks to be a movie with super-heroes dealing with real world problems. Sounds great, but once the twist comes the tone of the movie shifts to being outright goofy.

Early on the Mandarin videos are chillingly awesome. He seeks to teach us “lessons” regarding the genocide of Native Americans, how fortune cookies are an American invention, and how the Mann’s Chinese theater in L.A. is a cheap American knock off of Chinese culture (he blows it up). It seems that, in the world of this movie, the Mandarin is the same thing. What does that say for the “lessons” he attempts to teach, which deal with the very real ugly past of the United States?

If you wanted to, you could read a lot into Iron Man 3 about Hollywood not taking terrorism seriously, and promoting leftist conspiracies that the War on Terror is actually a ruse by big companies for profit. Some people belief that anyway. Just throwing it out there.

According to the article regarding the Chinese co-production of the movie, in the first quarter of 2012, China overtook Japan as the second biggest film market behind the United States. 2011 was the tenth straight year for double digit growth of China’s box office. That year it’s box office was 2.08 billion, up 31% from the previous year. The same article notes that China has a cap on foreign films, but films co-produced by China do not fall under the cap and are also cleared by censors more easily.

What I am about to say is pure speculation, I have no way to confirm this. I would hate to think that the character Mandarin was used the way he was to appease China so the movie could be shown in the now number two box office market in the world.

In two less serious notes; the Marvel Comics Universe has always operated on what is known as a sliding time scale. Meaning the characters, some of which have been around for 50 years now, don’t age much and the newest stories are always presumed to take place in the present. This means that now and then character origins are updated to keep with the times. Iron Man Three has a prologue set in 1999, and specifically states later that 13 years have passed since then. The first Iron Man gives us the dates of the death of Stark’s parents, and in  Captain America Nick Fury tells Cap he’s been asleep for almost 70 years. It appears thus far that the Marvel Cinematic Universe is not on a sliding time scale, but in fact is moving in real time. If this is so it is curious to see how things play out in ten + years. Iron Man 3 ends in such a way that it could be the last Iron Man film if Marvel decided it to be so. They have so many characters, that I wonder if they in fact to plan to just phase some heroes out over time in favor of new ones that haven’t been filmed yet.

Relating to that, in the comics whoever is President in the real world is always presumed to be President in the Marvel Universe. Iron Man 3 shows us the President and gives his name. (It’s not Obama obviously). This, along with the timeline, is a subtle but stark departure from the comic book universe it’s adapting. (Also the Vice President was in on the villain’s scheme? Really?)

Well that’s my 27 cents. What do you think?

Friday night I saw Searching for Bill, a 2012 film out of Denmark. Here a man named Bill has swindled a lot of people out of money, and the car of a New Orleans man named Bob. Bob’s car turns up in Detroit, with Bill’s notebook still in it. This prompts Bob to stay on the road longer to find the culprit. A long the way the narrative crosses with other people on the road and other people that have been swindled by Bill. It has a documentary style feel to it, and while the various characters are traveling we hear snippets of news reports about the economic hardships of the day. It has a unresolved, if not realistic ending.

After that was Shahid, a 2012 Indian film that hasn’t been commercially released yet. It tells the tragic true story of the title characters journey to become a lawyer where he defends people falsely accused of terrorist attacks. He struggles with balancing family life as well as threats to his personal safety.

Saturday was the 2012 film Baby Keep Smiling, about beauty pageant contestants in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia. What makes this pageant different is all the contestants are mothers. The various characters include someone that was a war refugee, the wife of a diplomat, two rival neighbors, and a mother who’s family is about to be evicted. There were many other characters, in fact there were too many.

The 2012 Canadian film Behind Closed Doors is a series of intersecting narratives about girls of various ages in different foster homes and juvenile detention and treatment centers. The finale is a party   with all the characters present. It is a tense scene as the audience is expecting some shocking revelation that doesn’t exactly come.

Saturday night was last years American film The Master, about a post WWII self help guru whose techniques involve hypnosis and past life regression. The characters were interesting but overall this one didn’t grab me as much.

On Sunday I saw the best movie at this festival. Last year’s Japanese movie Blindly in Love is about a cripplingly shy 35 year old man who falls and his relationship with a blind woman. The guy still lives with his parents, and has worked the same civil service job for 13 years. The girls father is rich and doesn’t approve of the relationship, but the girls mother helps them to see each other. It is both humorous and extremely moving. It was also fun to watch with the Korean audience as they laughed and cheered throughout. They could relate to the similar culture of Japan with being older and still living with your parents and the pressure of getting married and parents setting you up. It does not have a typical ending, rather an unresolved one (There was also a un-finished sub-plot about an attempt for promotion). However it unfortunately repeats a plot device at the very end. I’d never seen a movie I loved so much get everything write and then mess up at the very end. 

This was followed by another American film from last year, John Dies at the End. It reminded me of Naked Lunch mixed with the goofy horror style of Evil Dead. These two guys fight monsters from another dimension with the help of a self help guru. Funny and scary at times, but overall I wasn’t into it.

The final movie was last years Canadian documentary Lunarcy. It’s about various people that have an obsession with the moon. One man uses a legal loophole from the United Nations to sell property on the moon as well as other planets. It largely focuses on a man with Aspergers syndrome who has a genuine desire to colonize moon, and travels across the country earnestly seeking support for his cause. During one high point he meets an astronaut who was on the moon who now makes moon paintings. As much as one might label the various people here as being strange etc. the question is raised of why in fact did we stop going to the moon? Why have the moon and the various planets not been colonized in this post 2000 world?

Good festival overall. 

http://eng.jiff.or.kr/

Iron Man 3′s strength lies in this arc of exploring who Tony is outside the suit. There are various situations where Tony has to accomplish his goals, including combat situations, without the suit or with part of it, or with it only partly working. We get scenes with his friend James Rhodes/War Machine also outside the suit, but he’s obviously trained for combat anyway. We get a moment where both he and Tony are fighting outside of their suits, and James advises Tony in combat. Unfortunately this doesn’t last long. But I thought this also should have happened in Iron Man 2, so at least it happened here a little.

Early in the movie, a terrorist calling himself the Mandarin launches terrorist attacks against the United States, (His videos add a lot to the film) setting the tone for a more serious movie. However the tone gradually shifts into out-right goofiness. There’s great leaps of internal logic and moments that seem too over the top, even for a film based of the Marvel Universe.

You could tell it was going bad early on as just after the attack, Tony and James are sitting at a crowded sports bar, and in this bar full of people James tells Tony classified information.

Also, one thing about the previous movies, through all the disasters it seems there are no real casualties. This movie does at least acknowledge that people died in the attacks. However, there is one actual character that really should have died. The Marvel Cinematic Universe is facing the same critique that mainstream superhero comics often get, which is that things always go back to the status quo. I’d mentioned this in my Iron Man 2 review as well.

There’s quick references to SHIELD, and the Avengers, but no real Marvel Easter Eggs revealing anything new. I wonder why Mandarin was used the way he was given the ten rings group was in the first Iron Man.  

Unfortunately I have to report that in fact this is a very bad movie. Another victim of the curse of the three, and the first entry in the MCU that is generally not good. It will probably still makes tons of money, but I wonder if there will be any fallout.

There is a post credit scene but it’s purely for laughs.

Here’s to hoping Thor 2 is good.

1. The Marvel Horror Movie-verse.

Potential Characters;

Blade, Ghost Rider, Werewolf by Night, Dr. Strange, Hellstorm, Man-Thing, Moon Knight.

While most point to 2000’s X-men as the beginning of the Marvel Age of movies, Blade came out in 1998, and was actually the first Marvel character to have a successful film. If a studio could have had the rights to Blade, along with other horror based characters like Ghost Rider, Dr. Strange etc., the characters could have teamed up for a Midnight Sons movie ala Avengers. It would have been interesting to see a Marvel film-verse with hard R rated characters. If they went that route, imagine if the same studio also had the rights to other horror characters and threw them in the mix, such as Hellraiser, and slasher films like Friday the 13^th, Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street, and Texas Chainsaw Massacre. A truly horrifying universe.

1. Fantastic Four plus cosmic/space based characters.

Potential Characters;

Fantastic Four, Namor, Black Panther, Captain Marvel, Inhumans, Guardians of the Galaxy, Adam Warlock, Nova, Silver Surfer.

Imagine an epic Fantastic Four movie with Dr. Doom as the big bad, whose plan involves an artifact from Atlantis and Vibranium from Wakanda. This introduces Namor and the Black Panther, who could spin off into their own movies. This would be the reverse method of Avengers, with the big movie first then spin-offs later. They could team up again for an Atlantis Attacks movie. Namor and Black Panther movies could explore Earth while the Fantastic Four could go off into space to meet the Inhumans, Captain Marvel, maybe even Guardians of the Galaxy. Eventually bring big g Galactus in, and we can finally get a Silver Surfer movie. Even crazier would be if Paramount Pictures was at the helm of this Marvel Cosmic movie-verse, and decided to cross Fantastic Four with Star Trek.

1. Spiderman and street level/New York based heroes.

Potential Characters,

Spiderman, Daredevil, Luke Cage, Punisher, Master of Kung Fu, Silver Sable, Venom, Black Cat.

It would be fun to see Spiderman team with some NY heroes to fight the Kingpin and the Sinister Six. Throw in Silver Sable for some international adventures and you’ve got some fun stuff here.

I mention this one last because it’s sort of happening already and that’s X-men. At the time of this writing, a Wolverine sequel as well as a First Class sequel is coming soon. Who knows what future installments will bring, but I’d often thought what if they planned to branch out from the beginning. The first trilogy could have set up Days of Future Past; the dark alternate future where sentinels rule the earth (Like Terminator, but this was first. Crossover anyone?). Whole films could have spun out of that starring Bishop, etc., while simultaneously starting the First Class prequels, the Wolverine series, etc.

Consequently I always thought setting the X-men films in the near future was a big mistake. It wasn’t necessary, and given that Magneto’s WWII ties were kept intact, that would mean that, depending on how far ahead you mean by the near future, Magneto could be 100 years old in those movies. Anyway, the First Class spinoff was great, and I hope it’s sequel as well as the new Wolverine is too. If this series wanted to it could even go into space with a Starjammers picture.

Interestingly enough, while Fox continues this franchise, it is also rebooting their Fantastic Four series so they don’t lose the rights to Marvel. At the time of this writing I have no idea if this is a standalone film, or if it will indeed be part of the X-men’s film world. I assume it will be its own thing, but the possibility is there. If Fox Studios would combine the two franchises (and they both have outer-space characters), they could indeed have their own Marvel Cinematic Universe to rival the one Marvel is making in house.  

It’s also interesting to consider the possibilities for tie in products; in continuity comics, video games (The Captain America video game is in canon with the MCU), TV shows, etc. Would it have been confusing for fans? I don’t know if it would have, there were several separate movie worlds as it was, most of them just had one or a small set of heroes. What would have made it work is what makes it work now; they’re similar but not exactly the same. One set could have been straight horror, the other hard science fiction, another more street level stories, and the last a mix of several things.

It would have been fun, but oh well. What do you think?

Did I ever tell you about Rez Baseball?

There are so few people out here

that you cannot have two teams,

but the Indians can adapt to anything it seems.

You only have a few people at bat,

the field is where the rest of us are at,

and if a pop fly lands softly in your glove

then you get a swing at the game you love.

If one is tagged out you’ll see field rotation,

players from the field go to the bases,

the catcher goes to the bullpen station

and players recycle through the diamond animation.

Baseball in its purest form brings out the best in us.

Today there was no fighting,

no anger,

and no egos.

Just fun in the warm April sun.

Timeless music filled the air,

speaking of love, life, and things that are fair,

not death, killing, anger, and despair.

Cusses their tongues did not speak,

hatred their hearts did not keep.

I got to play Baseball tonight.

I hadn’t played Baseball in so long

that it didn’t matter if it was Rez Baseball,

it was Baseball.

hours away from the anniversary

of the dreaded Y2K

I turn to my friend and say

“You know it never really felt like the year 2000.”

I remember when it was the year 1987.

I was in the fourth grade

and could feel the future coming up fast.

I imagined rocket ships and moon colonies.

Cities with that old school sci-fi look.

Clean crisp streets, clear skies.

No garbage or filth before your eyes.

“It doesn’t feel like the future.”

I told my friend.

“We still have dirt, grime, and crud.”

In this room full of ashes he chuckles

“We still have dirt.”

laughing through the thick cigarette smoke.

The future is here, and we still have dirt.

We still have garbage.

We still use gas powered cars,

and my toilet still clogs.

My computer is too slow,

and the secrets of the universe

we still do not know.

In 2001 I had this conversation with another pal,

and he concluded to all of this,

“Where the hell’s HAL.”

From my poetry collection Almost Normal.

Hard Coal Studios

In college there was this coffee shop that had open mics and poetry readings and it’s where I started reading poems. I found the first poem I ever read there and read it again in 2012.

Reading my poem Buffalo 66 in Bloomsburg Pennsylvania

Buffallo 66

The roof is leaking in the $2 theater
dripping near my popcorn as the screen flickers.
I’m as excited at a 12 year old seeing Star Wars.

I’m nearly alone in my cinematic enlightenment.
It’s useless to say not another university student in sight.
Romantic notions of what college was to be faded to black,
and I am content to watch my first independent film.

With so few roads on the reservation

it’s hard to turn the wrong way.

But when the roads are long and it’s your first time

you wonder anyway.

For the next two years

whenever I’d drive by that green sign

I’d always chuckle to myself

and remember that time.

I missed the left turn.

I saw the sign but just my luck,

spray painted over it was “D.G.A.F.”

“Don’t Give A” you know what.