Terminator and Alien were movies that didn't interest me very much. They were all about being chased by terrifying monsters while people died horribly.
Then they each made a sequel with kids. And I liked the sequels much better.
I don't think that adding kids makes something better. But the way they included the perspectives and talents of the kids gave the movies more depth. (I've only seen them once time each, so I haven't done any analysis on these theories!)
After watching the bonus features on my Lord of the Rings DVD's, I thought I'd rent the extended edition from the library. I saw it once before, long ago. This time, I discovered that there are many more hours of bonus features that go with it. Of course I watched them.
Yeah, I'm going to be annoying and call actors by their character names. Even though some characters have multiple actors that play them.
The weapons from Lord of the Rings are so artistic. I have a couple replicas of them, like Sting (and a letter opener of Aragorn's knife).
For a long time, I didn't pay much attention to Theodin's sword. The guard always seemed like an awkward shape, given that it's meant to protect your fingers. This sword guard doesn't seem like it would do that. I finally realized that the guard is actually horses! So I suddenly love his sword.
Rohan is the kingdom of the horse masters, so there are horse motifs throughout their architecture, armor, swords, and flags. I wish I could find an image gallery of all the horse artwork. There's even a horse design inside of Theodin's armor, which only he can see. He said it made him feel like a king when he put it on.
Edoras is the capital city of Rohan. It's on top of a hill in the middle of a valley, surrounded by mountains. Building Edoras took months, and they only filmed there for a few days. The insides of the buildings weren't nearly as impressive though. They were used as offices during the shoot. The perfect location for Edoras was on protected land, so before building, they had to remove all of the native grasses and care for them in nurseries. When Edoras was taken down, the grasses were put back.
Theodin's actor is such a goofball! I never would have guessed, based on Theodin's character. But then again, that's what an actor is. He and Aragorn were often horsing around. Someone said that only they could get away with it because they were kings.
Gandalf is also a troublemaker! When they were finished filming in the hobbit hole, Gandalf said to Frodo, "this is our last chance to steal some props that no one will miss!"
Aragorn's actor seems so soft-spoken on the interviews. But don't let that fool you. He's one of those people that delivers jokes so matter-of-factly that it's hard to tell they're joking. Then you get other actors teasing him for things like making out with a horse (because the horse snuffles around Aragorn's face when he washes out of the river). And he also does stuff like showing Sam how to kiss someone.
Wow, he's dedicated though. In The Two Towers, Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas have been tracking the orcs to save Merry and Pippin. They finally catch up, only to be told that Merry and Pippin have been killed. Aragorn kicks a fallen helmet and screams, falling to his knees at the loss of their friends. During that shoot, when Aragorn kicked the helmet, he broke two of his toes. That guy stayed in character, pouring the pain of his broken toes into the character's anguish.
Holy crud.
And then of course, the characters had to spend the next day running across country. Legolas had just been injured when someone fell on top of him. And Gimli's body-double had hurt his leg. All of them had to do multiple takes, running through hills and country. Ouch.
There were plenty of other injuries. Theodin needed a couple stitches, because Gamling accidentally cut his ear.
Aragorn and many of the warriors had this greeting where they'd headbutt each other. Aragorn dared one of them to headbutt Legolas. That headbutt was hard enough that the elf saw stars and got a welt.
Then there's keeping your voice healthy (which I've had trouble with). Gollum especially had to contend with this, because of how he talks. He had to constantly drink what they named "Gollum juice." A combination of lemon, ginger, and honey. I wish I knew about that when my voice was a mess (I think my voice is still slightly unhinged, honestly).
Some of the actors were gifted special props too. I would hope so! Things like swords, or gowns. Some of the actors and stuntmen bought the horses that were trained for the film too.
And Helms Deep was generally hellish to shoot. Almost three months of night shoots, in the rain. With the costumes not having enough time to dry out before the next shoot.
The people working on those movies were such nerds. Which I love. The music people had a code to communicate with other departments. They'd call, and let the phone rings once. Because "one ring to rule them all."
There's one thing I always noticed, but never realized the significance of. The Ring itself has music and sound effects. That's actually the voice of the ring, either enticing or enraged.
There's a beautiful, haunting moment in The Return of the King, where Pippin sings a song during the massacre of Faramir's men. That only came about because one of the song people happened to hear him sing karaoke. They gave him some lyrics (I think from the book) and asked if he could make a song to go with them. He had about a day, and he came up with that amazing movie moment.
I imagine that's also how "The Last Goodbye" came about. Which is the song he sang for the end credits of the last Hobbit movie. I didn't care about those movies, but I've listened to that song so many times.
As well as Into the West. So freaking beautiful.
The work that went into these three movies is unbelievable. I gotta look up what else this director's done.
When I first saw The Boy and the Heron, I was totally bewildered.
The movie has kind of become an acquired taste though. Cinema Therapy did an episode about it, and they said something that made me see it from a different angle. It's basically a movie about a boy who lost his mother, and is living through a terrible war.
Still, I can't help but look for meaning in some of the Ghibli strangeness. Not that there's any way to prove any of these points. And yeah, people say that a story is however you interpret it. But that's garbage. I've seen people give total garbage readings to movies and books. I like to know what was intended. Even if Miyazaki doesn't always do things that make sense to begin with.
Anyway, here are a few ideas I had.
In the world Mahito falls into, there are many spirits of the dead. Some places belong to the dead, and we see the ones that come to get fish. Are they meant to represent those that died during the war?
And then there are the warawara. They're supposed to fly up to our world to be born as humans. But along the way, many of them are eaten. Others are burned by accident as Himi tries to drive the predators away. Are they meant to represent the children that died during the war?
Mahito's uncle (great, great, great uncle?) Wants Mahito to inherit the world he built. Mahito refuses. It's a broken world, and war-torn Japan must have felt very similar. Sometimes we don't want to continue the work of our ancestors. It's not always right. Sometimes something new and better has to be built, instead of trying to repair something old and broken.
And then there's the beautiful way Ghibli has of making peace with enemies. All the pelicans and parakeets that had been so dangerous manage to escape the wreckage of the old world. They fly to freedom, finding a new, better home. Mahito and his companions are happy for them.
When Big Hero Six released its first trailer, I wasn't sure if Hiro was a boy or a girl. When it was confirmed that he was a boy, I wanted to design a character that looked a lot like him, but was a girl.
And Mabel did it for me! I love her design. Both as a human and a beaver.
I love her passion for protecting the beautiful pond.
Though the movie was a bit weird for me. Maybe I'll feel differently after a second viewing.
Well, I make a post about each X-Men movie I see. So I guess I'll do one about The Gifted.
It was basically a series in which they broke in and out of places over and over.
It was depressing. It may as well not have even been in the X-Men universe, because it's in my least favorite timeline in which the X-Men are gone. And mutants are about to be wiped out? So we know that's waiting ahead for most of the characters.
I don't plan to watch season 2.
I'm impressed when a long-time series manages to keep a clear continuity.
The X-men movies don't have good continuity. Which is distracting, but it doesn't stop me from loving many of the movies.
Doctor Who does have good continuity. I haven't seen all of it. Indeed, many episodes seem to be lost forever, so no one can watch all of it. But I haven't noticed any glaring plot holes from the timeline (Doctor Who logic isn't always logical, but that's a different issue). In some bonus features, they say that people go back through old episodes, to make sure that everything lines up.
There are also audio shows, books, and other stuff too. I wonder how those fit.
I found the anniversary specials with The Doctor and Donna. It was great to see them together again. But they changed the word for "gravity." Does that mean that from now on, they can't use the word "gravity"" in Doctor Who? Or will they go fix it? Perhaps this has been answered already - I haven't caught up with the newer seasons yet.
Star Wars wasn't created to be a series. George Lucas was happy just to get one movie out. He didn't even know if he'd be able to complete the first trilogy, let alone prequels. But since then, there have been more and more movies and series. Characters will pop up from older shows, which is always fun. (Even though I still don't buy the fact that Darth Maul survived being chopped in half).
On the flip side, you almost have to watch all of the different series now just to understand some of them. For example, I watched Ahsoka when it came out. And only now that I'm in the middle of Star Wars Rebels do I realize that many of those characters were actually introduced before. I didn't know I'd need to watch Rebels for Ahsoka to make sense. So while I love that they build off of each other, there's just so much of it now that it's a real time suck if you want to actually follow one of the newer shows.
