Altered Carbon on Netflix

FINALLY A NEW SCIENCE FICTION SHOW WORTH WATCHING

Yes I know this came from a book series. And I know it's a little derivative, paying homage to Blade Runner and other Noir detective fiction. And I know it exists in a well-established genre of cyberpunk. But can't we just rejoice in the fact that Netflix pulled off something no one's done in a long time: an original sci-fi concept  pushing all the right buttons while simultaneously pushing some boundaries.

I've maintained that a good TV show is essentially beautiful people in dangerous situations wrapped up in an episodic arch that connects to a larger whole (season). Altered Carbon does this in spades. Beautiful people? Check! We've even fit some nudity in there. Violent situations? Check! We spent so much money on gore effects some of our CGI cars look a bit wonky. Story arch? CHECK! We get well-encapsulated stories that build on one another until they come to a tightly satisfying ending even your English professor would be stoked about.

There's even a scene in which a beautiful woman kills fifty naked clones of another sexy woman as they come alive attack her. It's creepy, sexy, violent, and creative.

Altered Carbon sells us a universe with as little exposition as possible and trusts its audience to go along for the ride and figure it out as we go. There are a couple clunky lines in there, but who cares? We're having fun piecing it all together. And even when the show introduces a good soldier vs. bad soldier scenario, we at least have some motives in play. And that's hugely refreshing. The terrorists might be the good guys, or they might not be; you decide! 

I still don't know why the Star Wars Empire is going around blowing up planets? Tax collection?

NO CHOSEN ONE!!! NO PROPHECY!!! They could have gone down that road for expediency, but instead they put characters and events in motion creating a protagonist worth following around. I'm so sick of Harry Potters and Luke Skywalkers and Alices and Neos ad nauseam. It's cheap story-telling, and we'll have none of it here. Instead we get women of agency and men who aren't idiots and men playing women and even a black man playing an Asian woman playing a black man. That's Shakespearean!

Music. The music is fantastic in this thing. Two stand-outs were the More Human Than Human cover by Sune Rose Wagner and A Nyughatatlan's God's Gonna Cut You Down cover. There's a Nine Inch Nails song in there for measure, too. Check out this track list!

The plot moves dexterously through some big blink-and-you'll-miss-them points but still addresses some major themes. Obligation is a big one: Familial, friend, class, state loyalties are questioned and investigated. We get to ask what mortality is, what power is, and even what God is.

In the end we get to ask my favorite sci-fi question: What is it to be human?

OK! But is there anything you hated?

Yes. I hated this stupid tattoo Takeshi and Reileen had. This tired old symbol, Ouroboros, is the most boring, lamest symbol they drag out on TV. It's a dragon biting its own tail in the shape of an infinity loop, and it's featured heavily in the opening credits sequence. I rolled my eyes every time I saw it. It reminded me of Hemlock Grove, and this is leaps and bounds better than that early Netflix attempt. It's unneeded and loud.

The ending was a little rushed, but it was satisfying and didn't leave a ton of question marks like most science fiction does. Altered Carbon also plays by the rules of its own universe. There are some Chekhov's guns in there that seem a little elastic, but that's OK; they all pan out.

Over all, it's a wonderful new show. Aren't you tired of Disney trotting out more Marvel shit to see what sticks? Aren't you just a little bit bored by Star Wars by now? Doesn't the Pacific Rim sequel look ridiculous and stupid? This breath of fresh air is worth every moment spent watching it. 

Star Trek Discovery: Michael Burnham Needs a Sense of Humor

STAR TREK CAN STILL BE FUNNY

SPOILERS

In the episode What's Past is Prologue, we get a mixed bag when it comes to story-telling.

There's a ton of awesome action sequences with the rebels' weapons turning people in to vapor and the Empire felling rebels with one hit. A couple surprising head shots sneak in there, and Michelle Yeoh finally gets to open a can of whoop-ass with some martial arts and sword through Lorca's heart through his back. That sword was a Chekhovian pistol for a few episodes now, so that was satisfying.

I love that the rebels are as bad as the Empire in this series. Our Star Fleet heroes are stuck in a war where both sides are crap. What about the war they're fighting back home? 

And throwing Lorca into the Moon Door a la the GOT Eyrie was pretty great too, as he disintegrated in the fall. What a way for a captain to eat it!

Speaking of eating it, the cannibalism/animal rights sequence was kind of intense and perfectly suited for Star Trek. I've always loved that Star Trek asks interesting questions about what it is to be human when we are far away from Earth. 

There was a lot to love about the last few episodes. But I think there was something severely lacking: Humor.

There was a stretch where all the beats were off that could have used some humor to help it, too. When they're tracking Burnham through the communications link she's using, she pulls out a bit of fiber optic cable, and just when they think they've got her, they say she'd rerouted blah blah blah, so they can't find her. I feel like Lorca could have said something there. "Clever girl"? "Resourceful little bitch"? "She always was a slippery one"? Any of these could have worked with his character and would have been hilarious. 

And the writers seem to get this in other parts. It's very funny that they're all talking about not believing in no-win scenarios in their ridiculous conundrum. Of course this is because the Kobayashi Maru hack Kirk pulls off and the switcharoo he uses to trick Kahn haven't happened yet. Did Kirk meet Commander Saru? I hope so!!!

The worst beat was when Michael manages to hack into the communications network and contact Discovery and she's told the entire multiverse, all of existence, "life as we know it" is about to end if they're not successful. And she just stares.

She could have said "those are some high fucking stakes" or "is that all?" or "I guess we better hope this shit works" or "if we do fail, at least no one will know." Anything! There would be some substantial gallows humor when it comes to something as dire as this. And they've already shown they're not afraid of a little cursing.

Anyway, I love this show. It's so much better than what's happening in the Star Wars universe. It's opening itself up to some really cool story-telling opportunities, but I hate it when they miss those opportunities, too. I mean Why So SERIOUSSS?!

SHUT UP WESLEY!

Starkiller Base Is the DUMBEST Thing in Star Wars History

You already know about Starkiller base, the First Order's planet-sized space station/weapon/Macguffin. It's by far the dumbest thing in Star Wars canon, and one of the dumbest things in Sci-Fi history.

It destroys Coruscant and all of the planets in its system. There's some debate to that statement, but it doesn't matter here for my purposes. They definitely destroyed five planets.

There are only a few ways for this to occur:

They didn't build it from scratch.

Maybe they weaponized an existing planet.
How do you weaponize a planet without the neighboring planets not noticing. It has a breathable atmosphere and trees growing on it. No one wants to live there? Did they just kill everyone already living there and drill into its core to create a superweapon that converts star energy into ammunition? How do you test that without destroying a star? The worst part of that plan is that it's a one-time-use weapon. You just get to destroy one solar system and then have to abandon the planet or try to use it as a base of operations until the debris from all the exploding planets destroys it. Planets don't travel from one system to another.

They built it far away.

How do they get it close enough to target and destroy the solar system? There are several projectiles travelling slowly enough for lens flares and for Kylo Ren to behold the impending destruction from a window. Consider it takes months to get to Mars, and that's only possible every other year. Even if these missiles "blast through hyperspace" (which is not what we see in the film) the movies have established nothing can be tracked/targeted through hyperspace. So, unless they want to fire these interstellar missiles and wait around for potentially years to see if they land properly, they're not going to shoot from too far. But that means they need to move this space station unfathomable distances to get into range.

Now, range matters. Star Wars weapons have ranges, and vehicles have fuel ranges, too. How much fuel would it take Starkiller base to travel from one star system to another? All the other ships that are jumping in space have visible blue exhausts. Not Starkiller. It's simply not built for travel.

It has to be super-long range weapon. Its size makes it able to launch plasma ridiculously long distances and it houses boundless computer capacity to target very faraway places. And the First Order is incredibly patient. That would be like the USA launching missiles at china and waiting 20 years for them to hit their marks. That's a long time to hold a grudge. 

Distance in space is usually overcome in Sci-fi by faster-than-light drives, subspace mumbo jumbo, wormholes, warp-speed, teleportation, etc. It's a necessity that some universes ignore (Firefly) to their detriment. Sci-fi has to do some work your brain won't in the suspension of disbelief. Star Wars used to not give a shit about what you thought about anything. But they've since talked about midichlorians and kyber crystals. And they always had the Force (which is just magic) and hyperspace (which is just sci-fi magic) to dismiss the impossible.

Anyway, the Starkiller base is idiotic, and anyone saying this movie was superior to episode VIII or any other Star Wars movie should start thinking about why they like these movies in the first place. They're stupid, bad movies we like despite all that. They're Fast & Furious in space. It's OK to like garbage. Garbage is fun sometimes.

Let's say they built a planet-sized weapon in the same solar system they were bent on destroying even though Hux says they're attacking planets in a system far away. How did its construction go unnoticed? The whole solar system thought it was normal somebody was building a whole new planet? Cloak?  That would still throw off the tidal patterns of nearby planets. It's simply impossible for the thing to have been built anywhere near their intended target. Meanwhile, the natural resources involved in building your planet would mean basically dismantling an entire world, to create a new weaponized one. So we have to take Hux at his word here.

Abrams can't function without an explanation-free MacGuffin. That's his power over his audiences, and he wields it with frustratingly successful results. 

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I always imagined that the Death Star could move faster than light. You don't see any blue engine burns on the Death Star either, but maybe you just never get to see them in the movies. How would Alderaan not see it coming? It'd have to jump in and destroy and then refuel or recharge and jump to its next destination. Maybe that's why it just sat around waiting for the rebels to attack it; it wasn't able to escape the scene of the crime back to its secret location in time.

Kyle Hill has a fun article about Starkiller base here »

Universe Fucking: An open letter to Max Perkins on his birthday

Dear Max,

I know it feels like the universe is a malevolent force or at least an indifferent one.

I've decried the fools who have the nerve to tell the downtrodden if they put good vibes out into the universe, the universe will reward them with good luck. It's an offensive conceit. Anyone whose breath's been knocked from their guts knows no good vibes will save them.

You've elucidated through postings and rants how you feel about the universe and those who espouse stupid Sufi sayings in defense of universe fucking. And yeah, fuck the universe I guess. Who cares anyway?

But it seems to me you're wrong about one fundamental thing: separation from the universe is a persistent and tricky illusion.

You are the universe. You're a tiny, maybe insignificant part. But that's kind of cool I think.

The universe is infinite, so you're infinite.

It's usually pretty beautiful too.

So indeed, the universe doesn't care about you or me just as our bodies and minds don't care about us, but that really shouldn't matter.

And hey, being an infinite being part of a swirling glowing expanse is pretty nifty, right?

Your pal in the void (there's no such thing as a void),

Sky Jack Morgan

Have You Seen Interstellar?

I kind of think that Christopher Nolan did the Batman movies so he can con top-rate actors and studios into letting him make movies like Interstellar, and that makes me feel better about his Batman movies. Interstellar is pretty stellar.

I saw it on 35mm Wednesday night at the Galaxy at the Cannery in Las Vegas. It's the most luxurious cinema I've been to. Electric lounge seats with little tables attached and craft beer on tap makes it my new favorite. Plus, they announce in the beginning of the show that they will literally remove you without refund if you so much as look at your cell phone. And seats are assigned.

The grainy 35mm lends something to this project, I think. It's a dying medium, and the scratches and cigarette burns made me a little nostalgic. It also reminded me of 2001:Space Odyssey in a theater. The film deals a lot with the struggles against decay, reciting Dylan Thomas over and over again, so there's an elegant reach with the degradation of celluloid mirroring the dying of cellulose on planet Earth. And, the Dylan Thomas reading was welcome because it assumes you know a poem--gasp! Smart people who know a few poems by heart will save the world if it ever is saved.

Heavy themes aplenty in this one, but in particular I liked the notion of being stuck between wanting to be a pioneer/adventurer on the cutting edge, doing what you know you're best at and wanting to fulfill your duty to the greater whole of humanity. Being born a generation "too early or too late," Cooper (McConaughey) wishes he could do it all. If that's not a theme for Gen-X-ers I don't know what is.

The sci-fi premise touches some familiar bases that make it a tiny bit predictable, worm holes, time-bending, relativity, black holes, interdiminsional shifting about. But Christopher Nolan navigates them so adroitly, and the acting is so good, and the look and feel of the film is such that you don't mind you might have seen some of this before. And sci-fi suffers from that so frequently at this point, I kind of like that it reminded me of Warren Beatty's Reds in parts.

It's a little talky, but I like cerebral science fiction and wish J.J. Abrams never turned Star Trek into Buck Rogers. It's a little heavy-handed on philosophical themes like love, but that's refreshing too after the genre has been riddled by laser pistols and giant explosions, zip-zap.

Jonathan Nolan wrote this one, but that kind of goes without saying with Christopher Nolan movies. Why we aren't calling these films "Nolan brothers movies" is weird to me. He wrote Memento. If you liked Memento, and since you have eyeballs and are human, I'm assuming you did, you will like Interstellar.

And one more thing: can Jessica Chastain ever be bad in anything? It's as if she single-handedly saves some films. I think she's the most alluring woman in Hollywood, and I hope every filmmaker save Michael Bay starts begging her for even a cameo. Actually, she could probably even make a Michael Bay movie watchable.

Liquid Nitrogen and Centrifuges

Liquid nitrogen is a toy I'd love to play with. I remember thinking it could freeze a person instantly like Sylvester Stalone and Wesley Snipes in Demolition Man. Now I want to chill glasses with it and make weird caviar things.

Maybe it's my love of science, maybe it's my love of good show, but I really want to have a go with it. What excitement people demonstrate when they see the explosion of gas or get super-cooled strawberries in their mouths and breath cold white smoke out their noses like dragons! And it happens to be useful.

I also want a centrifuge. I want to separate the solids out of juices and carbonate them in bottles. Once at Billy Sunday in Chicago I had a Fernet and Cola in a bottle that was made that way. I don't know if they used a centrifuge, but it was a perfect drink, and I think doing Gin and Tonics that way could be incredible. Also, punches might be interesting to serve in house bottles. ARGH! the possibilities are limitless.

If I get to manage a cocktail bar soon, or if I start my own speak easy up again, I'm going to get a centrifuge at the very least. I'd love to get a freezer cold enough for liquid nitro, but that might have to wait. They're a little expensive.

But the future of mixology is now!

Some of it's so old it's new again. Dave Arnold is also using hot pokers to burn up some hot cocktails the way they did in the olden days at his bar, Booker and Dax. I love this guy and what he's doing.

Here's a link to an article about some of the cooler cocktail bars I like out there »