Thor is not a good movie.  As a Thor movie, it’s all right.  As a comic book movie it’s quite bad.  As a movie it’s a massive disappointment.  But Roger Ebert’s comments are so in line with my own, I thought I’d approach this differently and focus on Jane Foster.

Thor is a meathead, and this movie plays this aspect of his character up.  Sure, his character growth takes place in a blink of an eye and with little to no reason, but that’s what the movie is.  It’s a movie about and for “dudes” who don’t really want to think much but opt for beer and a good UFC fight (and there’s nothing wrong with that).  Possibly dudes who listen to Neu Metal, I don’t know.  And Natalie Portman’s portrayal of Jane Foster goes in line with what meatheaded gentledudes are looking for.  She’s wooden, infatuated with Thor the instant she runs him down, and offers little to no reason for us to believe that she’s a astrophysicist.  An astrophysicist!  Those people are smart!  They use words like astrophysicist!  I’m sure most of them don’t spend their days trying not to make ripples.  She’s a scientist.  Most scientists want nothing more than to understand and look at the world around them logically and with a clinical eye.  Instead, this Jane Foster recognizes that there’s something weird going on in New Mexico, but that dude with the muscles is far more interesting than an Einstein Rosen Bridge.  She’s also more interested in a cuddly puppy than turning the physics world on it’s head.

But here’s the question, was Jane Foster in the comics the same?  Was she a foil, seemingly in the books for the sake of providing an uninspired love interest and pair of tits for the readers to look at?  No.  No, she wasn’t.  Based on what I remember of the comics, Jane Foster (sure she was a nurse or doctor in the comics but that’s beside the point) was bright and full of purpose.  She wasn’t used by Stan Lee simply to move the plot along.  She was a character in the story.  Interacting with other characters instead of brushing her wispy hair out of her face and smiling like a moron.  In fact, in recent years, she’s done a lot to suggest that she’s much stronger than she was.

So, this leaves us wondering how to judge a movie based on a piece of fiction.  Thor’s universe is entirely based on the comics.  Characters are taken straight from the comic and plastered on the screen.  But not Jane Foster.  Kenneth Branagh turned Jane into the most vapid and pointless character in the movie.  A foil to keep the plot going (poorly).  Even Kat Dennings, whose character Darcy was so pointless she didn’t even need a last name, seemed more likable and purposeful than Jane.  And it brings me again to the point of this rambling thing: was Jane Foster always vapid and pointless or turned into this for the movie?  Was she so unimportant to Kenneth Branagh that he thought it best to have her sit in a child’s seat?  Those questions are fine, but they don’t strike at the biggest problem in comics that have been presented on the screen: Are women in comics anything more than T&A?  In the case of this movie, yes, but, oddly enough, not in the case of the books.  What an odd little turnaround we’ve experienced, huh?

Since then, scammers have tried new ways of luring stupid people into their binary clutches.  They’ve tried credit card fraud, data-mining bots, and “get rich quick” promises.  To put it simply, they’ve evolved.

This morning, I received a blast from the past.  A scam email so sneaky it made it by gmail’s careful spam filters yet so bad as to remind me of those good ol’ days of “I cannot lay claim to this money unless I transfer it out”.  Riddled with it’s “mutual benefit”…I give you General Arnold Quaninoo:

Title: “I do kindly wait on your reply for the investment.”
Body:

Dear Sir/Madam

With warm heart I write you this mail in respect of my intention of investing my mineral resources in your care as my trustee to oversee the investment due to my political affiliation with the united nation as former peace keep.

I am General Arnold Quainoo seeking your advice of investing the above mention investment in your care due to trust and confident that I have build in you for the mutual benefit of the investment and our children. I need your undivided attention as to what my proposal is about.

Kindly notify me of your interest in order to proceed with the investment for what it with stand for. In respect of the investment mention above, with your interest to this investment, I shall offer you a negotiable percentage endorse by signatures for feature reference.

I kindly wait on your reply for our mutual benefit.

Best Regards:

General Arnold Quainoo
Email: gen.arnoldquainoo@gmail.com

What’s great about this is that General Arnold Quainoo is an actual person.  You can put him into google and find articles, websites, and videos of the good General addressing issues in Liberia.  But, obviously, he wouldn’t have a gmail account starting with his title of “gen”.

5 points for creativity, -3 for grammar and punctuation, and -2 for originality.  Sorry, General.  Evolution’s much harder then we all thought.

Lately I’ve been reading American Lion by Jon Meacham and Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.  – this is after I finished Slaughterhouse V for the first time.  My immediate reactions so far are “brilliant” and “whoa” or even interrupting my wife to tell her something that I’ve just read.  These are the normal reactions when reading something that touches you, something that effects you either positively or not.  Their high points in your reading but they ironically lead to low points for me.

What I mean to say is that reading something great should be a motivation but it’s not always.  At times I’ll read something staggering and want nothing more then to write something in that same vein, hoping to stagger the population or something, Mark Twain might say, to shake people from their stupor; that’s not a quote, just an observation and suggestion of what Mark Twain might say.  But therein, as Admiral Ackbar in his infinite online video iterations, will tell you is a trap.  Because writing something with the soul purpose of knocking someone on their ass or shaking off the societal strains put on by the overbearing and misguided words of some megalomaniac man is a trap.  It really can’t be done.  Sure, creative writing teachers have been saying for years to “write with intention” but it doesn’t always work.  If you’re like me, all too often those intentions and purposes derail the story.  Making a well plotted piece a true “piece”.

But that’s not all!  This same derailment can come from  comments both positive or negative.  Hell, someone could shower praise upon you, fill your heart with such happiness that those tasks you were loathe for in the past turn  enjoyable.  It won’t stop there though!  You go home, a skip in your step as you ignore the intermittent rain that has annoyed you for the last week or the fact that you forgot your umbrella.  Then things start to get real.  You read over the review too many times.  You’ve sent it to everyone in your address book in hopes that they’ll share in your glowing moment until there’s a thought that “what if I can’t live up to it?”  What happens then?  I’ll tell you, everything stops.  You’re crippled by a moment that should have been glorious and provided you with enough boast-fuel for the next month has turned into a sprained brain.

To sum this up, there’s no way to tell whether you’re reading will effect you for better or worse.  You can portend that a novel, newspaper article, or trip to the market will actually bring positive results and help you plow through a particularly difficult section of your book, script, short story, whatever.  But that doesn’t mean you should fear those activities.  On the contrary.  I know I offered up some truly incredible points here but the fact is, they’ll only effect you for a short time.  At the top I mentioned that my current funk will probably only last a few hours or the rest of the day, perhaps someone reading this will have moments where they’re unable to hit the keys for months on end.  But think about it, you’re being effected by something.  You’re letting it control your mind, your thinking, your life instead of breast stroke you forward.  Doesn’t that boggle the mind?  Doesn’t it just make you angry at how your mind has decided to process that moment or nugget of information?  Stupid brain.  What the hell?!

The key is, I’ve found, to harness your stupid brain and use those lull-filled moments to get you further than you thought.  After all, what’s a better motivation than being annoyed with yourself?  I don’t think there is anything.

So, get out there and get some writing done.  Don’t let your brain win, let your brain win!  Also, read this awesome review of the ‘Reading With Pictures Anthology’, including some very nice things said about yours truly.

You can’t derail me brain, moment, or book!  Hancomic.com

The growing anti-foreign sentiment doesn’t just dwell in the US. We deal with it here in Korea and now issues in Japan are starting to receive more of the world’s eye. And it doesn’t end there either as all countries have groups that – fearing losing their identity, country, and culture – have lashed out in one way or another.

But, this does seem to be proof that the world has changed substantially and we’re now taking notice. The world is no longer what it once was and everyone is afraid and looking at the past. The problem with doing so, however, is the rose colored glasses people often wear while thinking about the past.

If the Japanese protestors decide to act against Chinese or Korean students, especially children, the world will not only cry foul, they’ll wonder if this is a step backward for Japan. For such a beautiful country they have a fractured culture and a history that all of Asia still remembers.

P.S. – After more thought, I’d like to point out that signs and placards that read “The Volunteer Corps Against Lawless Koreans” or “Expel barbarians” (examples from the Japanese rallies) sound remarkably similar to the diatribes of former Japanese military and political rallies before the 1910 annexation of Korea by the Japanese.  It is clear that whereas before Japan seemed to feel powerful and strong, both militarily and economically as well as in their national psychology, as their nation began their drive to take over Asia, now Japan has no actual military and their economy has struggled and their job-less rates have remained on the decline for the last 30 years while Korea and China have grown and flourished.  Their frustration is a direct parallel to what has happened in the U.S. those people who have been in power since the Declaration of Independence feel they no longer have the ability to do what they once did.

Maybe this is a race issue, maybe it’s a psychological issue.  Either way, the results have been negative, angry, and will lead to violence.

There’s this phenomenon with creative types where they need to keep themselves going.  That’s to say, when everything around them is crushing or there’s little to be excited or have faith in but something keeps them going.  Fuels them.

I’ll explain what I mean in the form of a story:
Nearly a year ago, I finally graduated from college.  When I left, I was flown out to Nashville by Devon and Golriz of the fantastic site SoulPancake.com to work on content and help them manage their volunteer work force.  While there, I saw Dev’s drive and passion for the site.  He stayed up until two in the morning to make sure work was edited and ready for release the next day and pushed himself to wake up early to witness each posts response.

At some point, I thought I might be able to get a job out of SoulPancake.  That I’d be able to, eventually, earn some money from editing or some such work. When I first arrived in Nashville the prospect of a job was suggested to Devon.  He told me that he absolutely expected SoulPancake to earn money, that it would have cash flow from sponsors and other avenues within the next few months and that I would be one of the first to get paid.  This pushed me to do everything I could for the site.  The problem was, it didn’t happen.

Before I left, I wanted to know that this job possibility was still there.  On my second to last day I had a conversation with Golriz about their situation.  In the shadow of their trampoline, she told me that while she had complete faith in Devon and the growth seen on the site, it would be irresponsible to believe that she’d be paid.  After all, the economy wasn’t doing well and advertisers weren’t giving money out to everyone.

I eventually asked why she and Devon pushed themselves so hard if they knew it wouldn’t produce any monetary fruit and she explained that Devon had to.  If he didn’t believe that, eventually, things would work out the site would invariably never have been made or launched.  If he didn’t have faith that writers were talented and capable, it would have been a similar situation.  It was his faith and blind hope that drove the site, and now, it’s remarkably successful with a book on the way.

That might be a difficult concept for a lot of people to understand.  Throwing yourself headlong into a project with the knowledge that it could blow up in your face isn’t logical.  It’s the opposite.  And yet, I’m doing it right now.

I’ve been working on this graphic novel fr the last four months.  I’ve pushed myself by looking at a 6-page short comic I wrote as my motivation thinking, “if this 6-pager is published, publishers will read it and be more likely to give me a change.”  And it kept me going.  I wrote the 6-pager and, when it was done and edited, focused again on the graphic novel.  Now, two chapters in, things have started to fall apart.

There are problems with the artist, and I’m not sure if he’ll finish any of the work he agreed to. I spent two days wallowing in self-pity, talking with Lindsay about how horrible things were and how I should just give up, but somewhere inside me a loud voice responded, “Write the damn thing.”  Despite the anger that I deservedly feel, I want to continue.  I have to.  If I don’t stick my fingers in my ears and shout everything will be drowned out by the overwhelming prospect of failure.  And failure will not happen.  I don’t care if this 6-page story isn’t published.  I’ll try a different venue and a different artist.  I don’t care if the first six publishers shoot down the 6-pager and the graphic novel because someone, eventually, will read it and recognize what I’m trying to do.

Is it egotistical to think this way?  Of course it is.  But, really, there’s nothing else I or nearly anyone else with a dream can do but think we’re awesome and capable and that our idea is worth it.  Because, without that ego, we would sit in cubicles like I used to and bemoan the opportunity we let split.  And I’ve already spent six years in cubicles, working at jobs I had no desire to be doing.  It’s time to buckle down.  My stories will be published, dammit.  Not because I think so, but because they’re pretty damned good.  And when that day comes, I’ll feel vindicated for all my slamming into walls and verbose prose and pontifications.

This is what creative people have to do to keep themselves sane and get work done, put on the blinders, have faith in yourself, and hope.

This derailment doesn’t mean I won’t be writing about the book I’ve been working on or the process, it just means that I’ll be focusing on getting healthy – I’m on the road – before dedicating myself.  It’s not what I wanted, but what ever is?

With all that said, I just want to tell whomever it is that reads this blog that I’m doing better and should be blogging consistently this week; also, writing a script for a book.  That’s it for now.  Night eastern hemisphere!

Lost has, since immediately after season 1, completely gone off the rails. I don’t mean that in the sense that story or suspense has become too much or purposefully attempted to jump any sharks. What I mean is that people’s obsession with the show has gone from any other show to obsession. People have decided that instead of remembering that it is entertainment to it becoming a very large part of their lives. This, I cannot understand.

I live for stories. I thrive when I hear them, I feel energized when I’m writing them, and Lost is a fantastic example of what great storytelling can become. But they’re just that: stories. They mean only as little or as much as we put into them.

At first, the show was simply a show. The show runners didn’t seem to think of it as anything more than that. That is, until the internet showed them what they were missing. Bloggers began aggregating hypothesis and considering establishing a conference for like minded Lost fans to talk and pontificate. This show became more about questions and thoughts than simply storytelling with questions and answers.

It’s at this moment, I surmise, that the writers and producers realized they could have a goliath on their hands. They jumped at the chance to feed those bloggers, to create a podcast that spawned other podcasts, and helped to create what was called the ‘Lost Experience’, an adjoining product that would provide depth to the Lost universe.

As a money making venture Lost became a powerhouse, but as a story it ebbed and flowed. There was a time during season 3 that the show lost much of it’s fanbase and viewership. Viewers claimed the show, the storyline and not any adjoining material, became watered down, and opted for different programming. Me? I was one of those.

Mostly because I became restless and annoyed with how the story seemed to have taken a back seat to melodrama instead of the complaints that there were “too many questions, not enough answers”. In that exodus, I was with the first camp. But the show improved. I picked up where I left off, watching what I missed commercial-free, and the show became great again. How did it become great? It returned to the structure that producer J.J. Abrams so lauds: the Mystery Box Model.

Abrams believes that there’s something innately delicious in not knowing something and wanting to learn. He plays with our tendency toward discovery and fascination with the unknown and it paid off. Just as the show began with questions, the show continued with questions. However, as mentioned above, there was a large camp of people who loathed the massing questions. They cried out when new questions were unveiled and no answers were provided. Their impatience was understandable, after all, because the mystery box had begun encompassing and bleeding into all media.

Last season the show was able to pump out not only answers to questions but a sustained rise and fall structure that made viewing it like reading a mystery novel. I reveled in the questions, trying to piece things together, and the season finale was one of the most inventive cliffhangers every conceived; something the show is well known for.

I’m a fan of the questions, and sometimes I like to think about them while I watch the show and devise my own answers; knowing full well I’ll probably be wrong. This season, my viewing experience changed. I started watching it for what it was, recognizing that it’s just a television show, albeit a brilliantly choreographed one, and enjoying it simply for that. Mostly, my analytic brain was turned off and I thought about the storytelling that was being presented to me. And it was great. It picked off directly where it left off. Not only do I feel the intensity from the season finale, it’s been ratcheted up.

And now I’m left with the complaints that people have. Those vocal watchers who say “enough is enough” with the questions, and why do Jack, Kate, and Sawyer continue to follow blindly what the Others say based only on trust like the analogues people refuse to draw obvious connections to? To those things I say, calm down. Most of you complain as if your voice are the only ones heard by producers. Sure, there are plenty of you angry but there are just as many, if not more, that love the show and will continue watching because they value it as entertainment, entertainment that they can control. Because they remember that they have the ability to turn the tv off.

There have been many conversations and folks sent my way by way of conversations with folks that have lead me to understand, a bit, of what I’ll need to do in order to present myself before Hollywood. In case there’s confusion, I’ll get you up to speed. I am getting married. Then, we will be moving to L.A. While there, I will need to support my new wife, so I’m looking to accelerate my career path instead of working my tail off on comic books, in hopes that I will eventually be able to break into television. (I liked my approach, but what are you going to do; life makes changes for us, doesn’t it)

With that gobbledegook of a paragraph out of me I’ll give you the plan. Right now, I’m writing a half-hour comedy script. When I’m done with that, I’ll need to write a half-hour cartoon and hour long drama script. Once I’m done with that, I’ll need to purchase what a friend of mine has called “balls” and present said scripts in meetings where I’ll need to use the twin guns of life: confidence (boarding on cockiness) and humility.

At this point, I feel like I have humility. I don’t know what I’m doing and am willing to do anything and ask anyone a plethora of questions to help me along the way. And as far as confidence, well, I can fake it!

Hooray! Give me a job, please.

My editors, who I value as friends and bosses, and the higher-ups have made several comments on script drafts that left me baffled. The first of these comments was “a 12- to 15- year-old isn’t going to know the word ‘tithing’”. Well sure they don’t. They don’t because no one has presented that word to them, but if we do, right now, they’re going to figure it out.

Tweens and children today are more resourceful than I ever was growing up. I say that because of ease of access to knowledge. When I was 13, I’d have to grab the encyclopedia or have my parents drop me off at the library, I was that kid, to learn about Iran’s history and cultural significance or to look at art from Japan. Today, kids can sit down at a computer, or their iPhones, and look things up on Wikipedia. Information is so easy to access that new laws are being created every day to prevent our children from accessing the vast amounts of smut on the net. V-chips and parental controls and…well, I’ve gone off topic.

The point here is that if you present a word like “tithing” and offer a short explanation or implied meaning, kids are going to figure it out. And if they don’t figure it out, they’ll go to dictionary.com and look it up; or, they’ll ask their parents; which should happen a lot more, in my opinion, than occurs right now.

Another example is that an editor told me tweens wouldn’t understand the concept of guilt in relation to giving to the poor. But I submit that they do. Unless these children are living in an area with no poverty (I don’t know that such a place exists) or homeless, they’re going to see beggars. And what’s more, seeing beggars allows parents to explain a myriad of things to their children. Off the top of my head: guilt, pity, compassion, love, generosity, several religious stories (if you go that route), and mental illness – ignoring, one would hope, the need for “lessons” on how not to become poor or using them as an example of who is “worthless” as one parent I walked by yesterday put it. Those are important things to learn if you’re growing up. (Truthfully, it wasn’t until I was around 10 or so that I saw my first beggar and I felt awful. It took a conversation with my dad about love and compassion on how to sort out the heft of the emotions I was feeling.)

These kids understand these experiences, they’ve had them. Sure, it might be more simplistic than we might look at it and their sphere of experience is vastly smaller, but they understand the concept. Sociologists have been studying the pit-of-the-stomach feeling children have when they see a homeless person for years and they seem to come to the same conclusion, those children feel terrible. They feel as though they should do something to help that homeless person and that turning away feels even worse. Its important for someone, us if parents don’t, to address these emotions. If we or parents don’t, this leaves our children stunted and confused as to what they should do the next time they see a homeless or downtrodden person. These are things that are imperative for everyone to learn and understand as early in their progression as possible.

My little sister isn’t so little anymore. At 15 she’s learning to drive, enjoying her first summer after her freshman year of high school, and feeling the pull of adulthood. Sure, she might be a tad more mature than some of the other girl’s her age and she may have read more complex books at an early age than other kids her age but that’s because we, and she, pushed her(self). We suggested books that I read in high school and she read them in junior high, books I read in college and she’s reading them right now.

Perhaps this is a direct result of seeing what her older brother and sister are reading or talking about and wanting to be part of that world but I think the real reason is her desire to understand things more quickly than we do right now. We’re growing a generation of incredibly quick kids. They understand concepts faster and with more ease than any generation before them and that must be fostered. If not, they’ll hit a wall and delve into a world of confusing concepts that they may actually not be ready for like sex, drugs, adultery, and that gnashing sound of bills and a lack of funds and concern about pay. These are subjects that they may not, or may I don’t know, be ready for, and that’s where we should draw the line.