Ghost in the Shell (2017) | Movie Review!

Logan | Movie Review | No Spoilers!

Logan is the third Wolverine spinoff movie in the X-Men films series.  It stars Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, Dafne Keen and Boyd Holbrook.  It's got a lot of face punching with fist knives.

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Jar Jar Stinks

George Lucas completely sucked the mystique out of the Jedi when he decided that they are genetically predisposed to being in tune with the force.  This was the moment Star Wars became Star Trek.  I love both, but Star Wars has always been about myth and legend, whereas Star Trek retains an air of philosophy and theoretical science.  They are different subgenres when looked at under a high powered tricorer.

Star Wars: The Phantom Menace was a complete debacle and nearly unwatchble.  Episodes I,II & III have no where near the gravitas of the original movies.  What went wrong?  It seems that the consensus is that George Lucas has fallen asleep on his stack of fluffy, cushy cash.  I suppose when you already have a billion dollars in your back pocket, you're not as hungry.  These movies were a tremendous boon to the Lucas bank account after his finances were cut down after a messy divorce.  

It was the perfect opportunity for Lucas to introduce new themes, and create new characters to be enamored with.  Instead we got more death star conspiracy, and Jar Jar Binks.  

Pop Culture

Most people are quick to discard pop music as devoid of all merit. One can say catchy tunes are frivolous, but it's not easy to craft a song that will make the masses smile.  If it were, everyone would do it and make a zillion dollars. 


Sure mediocre artists become popular with hit songs that are slick and polished sounding, but that's because the real talent is working behind the scenes.  There are an army of gifted songwriters, musicians, engineers and producers making sure that what you hear will stick in your head on repeat until you want to bite your own ears off.  It's usually the person performing the pop music who is vapid. (e.g. Britney Spears) 

Even though she's a bonehead, I am able to recognize that the songwriting doesn't totally suck. There is something going on, when it comes to the structure and execution of her music.  People gravitate to her songs because of the well crafted design, whether they know it or not.  Britney, thankfully, has nothing to do with that aspect of her career.  She's too busy staying famous for all the wrong reasons.  


There often isn't enough credit given to music that is readily accessible.  I say to you, dear readers, that quality and mass appeal are mutually exclusive.  You can have one without the other, and yes, sometimes you can even have both!


The Beatles were the poppiest of pop bands back in the day, yet they always had a level of quality that they upheld.  I'm not sure anyone would argue that a song like Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen, is anything but a musical triumph.  That very song was able to climb the charts 2 times in a span of 15 years because of its ability to capture the listener. 

Frank Zappa never enjoyed popular success, but churned out quality while staying under the radar.  Artists like Pitbull release dog shit by the heap, yet remain at the top of the charts.    

I am a fan of good music, regardless of genre.  I will always give a song a chance, no matter how popular or obscure.  There are some songs that slay me on an emotional level, and there are some songs that challenge my intellect lyrically/musically.  There will always be songs that are just there for fun and amusement.

Having been a professional musician for some time now, I've run into this issue on the creative side.  I like to write every song that comes to mind. The process is like fishing, some days you cast out your line and get nothing.  Other days, you get a few nibbles, you start to reel it in, but then it falls off your line. Then there are those days where you catch a whopper, despite a huge drawn out fight.


Once you've caught this musical fish, you say to yourself "do I want to record this song and put it out for people to purchase and support my career?"  This is an important question for every artist to ask if you want to continue making music for a living.  All bands have to make concessions at some point and realize that it's not an entirely self indulgent endeavor.  If you've done good, you've created a song that you like, and think others will like too.  


I often have arguments with musicians who say that they aren't in a band to make music that sells.  To them I say, have fun with your hobby band, because the longer you remain an elitist, the less likely you'll gather an audience.  Music is an inclusive artform.  It is the immediate, visceral translation of a sound into emotion, and vice versa.  Anything that is published must first go through a process of editing.  Unless you're Jack Kerouac - whom you are not.


Being a music snob must be exhausting.  The equivalent would be like eating filet mignon every single night.  Sure it's totally yummers, but every now and then, it's nice to have In 'N' Out Burger.

I Ain't Mad At Alien³

I frequently have obsessions with subjects of arbitrary interest. The spells usually last a fortnight. For instance, last year, all I could think about for 2 solid weeks was the band Journey. I became completely obsessed with the big hooks, hilarious haircuts, and awful music videos; most notably the awesomely bad video for "Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)."

These last 2 weeks, I just haven't been able to shake the Alien movie legacy from my microcosmic mental zeitgeist. What I did to alleviate this geek pressure was to go into a full on onanistic viewing of the Director's cut of Alien (Dir. Ridley Scott), Extended version of Aliens (Dir. James Cameron), and the Assembly cut of Alien³ (Dir. David Fincher), just to gain additional perspective and to follow up on my glowing review of Prometheus. 

As a singular moment in cinema (to quote myself) Alien stands alone in its majesty. It's dark, it's scary, it's xenoclaustrophobialicious. James Cameron expanded the battlefield and peppered it with even more aliens, which by all accounts, reduces the terror factor of being stalked by a single creature and frankly dilutes the xenomorph's ferocity when you're mowing them down with phase plasma pulse rifles, RPGs, flame throwers and sonic electronic ball breakers. But hey, it's so damn fun to watch! Cameron shifted gears and jumped genres from Scott's dark sci-fi space horror to an action adventure, subterranean warfare movie.  

So why are people so angry with Alien³? I believe it's because audiences were expecting to see a rehash of Cameron's vision, though we did not take into account that there was no precedent set for that. There was no reason that the third installment should just be Aliens 2. These movies should be viewed as 3 distinct visions, all with the central characters of Sigourney Weaver (Ripley), and the demon that haunts her fate. It is evident that Fincher's intention was to interpret this dynamic through his own lens, just as Cameron and Scott did before him. 

At the end of Aliens, Ripley, Newt, Corporal Hicks and the android Bishop are the only remaining characters. They all go into cryosleep after successfully ejecting the queen alien into space, in an epic final battle. Alien³ immediately follows with their ship experiencing an onboard fire and is forced to launch an escape pod. We see an x-ray of a face hugger attached to one of the crew members as the onboard scanner monitors their vitals. The pod then crashes on Fiorina 'Fury' 161, A planet populated by only a couple dozen residual XYY chromosome prisoners who have turned to religion, but aren't any less dangerous. The 10 year old Newt is killed in the crash, along with Corporal Hicks and Bishop is destroyed beyond repair. Ripley somehow manages to escape death, is rescued by the prisoners and is forced to shave her head due of the lice infestation. Hardly the manace they are all about to encounter.

Let's stop here for a second. Fans could not get past the fact that Ripley was the only surviving character from the preceding movie, which retroactively renders Aliens anticlimactic. So what's wrong with that? It's not a very Hollywood path to take, nor was it at all what audiences were wishing for, but it's not an entirely unreasonable scenario, even though it feels like a kick in the balls. Their deaths feel arbitrary, but this movie is an illustration of how life/fate can be downright cruel. There is genuine grief that the fans felt for these characters, which conveniently dovetails into the melancholic, nihilistic world that Fincher creates in his installment of the franchise.


It just so happens that a couple of stow away face huggers respectively impregnate Ripley and a local Ox (or a dog, depending on which version you watch) with the alien embryos of a queen and drone. You may ask; "Hey, how did these dang eggs get there?" This was a source of controversy for many fans, but I'm happy to answer that with sci-fi logic; Presumably by the egg laying queen at the end of Aliens. I mean her job is laying eggs, right?  Those alien buggers are so flippin' sneaky!  Perhaps before the crew went to sleep, they should have done a final sweep to check for any left over Xenos, just for good measure. But ultimately, I ain't mad at that point of contention.

Hardly a shot is fired in Alien³, as a main plot points is there are no weapons of any kind on the entire planet. This is a bit of a leap in the opposite direction of Cameron's bang bang, shoot'em up world. It's a smart way to go if you want humans to be the helpless underdog in your story as there are no worldly possessions among this monastic community. It is a true showdown of Woman v Nature. Did we really want to watch another 2 hours of bullets vs acid blood? Maybe... but that's why they made Alien: Resurrection, which is decidedly stupid and a complete waste of time.



Like Prometheus, there is an element of religion in Alien³, though in this film it mainly serves as a pacifier for the troubled convicts who are terminally criminal and knowingly beyond retribution. They use religion as a crutch, and don't seem to have genuine faith. Charles S. Dutton deftly plays the angst ridden Dillon, the religious leader of these societal outcasts. There is a well orchestrated undercurrent of cynicism throughout. Dillon redeems himself, in one scene by saving Ripley from being raped by inmates, and finally by luring the alien into the lead pit to take it on Mano a Xeno. An illustration of how, regardless of religious distractions, humans are the moral animal.

At the end of the film, Lance Henrickson makes an appearance as Michael Bishop (Bishop II), and is purportedly the human who designed the Bishop android in his likeness.  This is where the religious imagery starts to get heavy.  Bishop II claims to be Ripley's savior, but he is really just a chess piece (pun intended) for Weyland Corp.  He is a false prophet, and we never really know whether or not he's another synthetic human even after getting whacked on the head with a pipe. Surely no human could withstand that abuse and maintain consciousness, but he is clearly bleeding red blood. He seems more annoyed than in pain. This is a great artistic stroke on the behalf of the filmmakers. Ripley proves to be the one true savior of mankind and knowing that she is carrying the alien queen embryo, plunges herself into the furnace below in a Jesus Christ pose.

This film is about sacrifice and was meant to be the end of a trilogy. It may not be what the fans wanted, but it does bring a sense of closure to the purgatorial struggles that Ripley withstands in these movies. It is she who becomes the eventual master of her own destiny and the savior of humankind.

In a vacuum, Fincher's filmic vision is a magnificent, artsy effort in its own right. Even though most involved with the picture felt they were being pulled in all directions, this flick is still hinged on a good script and a good director, which yielded a good bit of cinema. As a sequel, it struggles to compete with expectations. It's overall tenor of despair, hopelessness and genuine terror hit a lot of the right, albeit dour notes, but audience expectations were simply unmet and that's why it gets a bum rap.