Meanwhile With Trevor
Culture • Lifestyle • Fitness & Health • Movies • Books • Food
Four Missed Opportunities
September 17, 2024

This last weekend my mom was quite sick. As her only caregiver, there wasn’t much else I could do but sit nearby and watch movies while she slept. Maybe I could’ve read a book or written one, I admit. But frankly, I just wasn’t in the mood. As with anything that I really enjoy, if I’m away from it for too long I get hungry in my spirit for that thing.

And I was hungry for movies.

So it seemed like as good a time as any to catch up on a few of this year’s releases that interested me, and it’s a pretty short list. I still didn’t get to all of them. However, given how lackluster what I did watch was, I don’t have much hope for the others. Everything I saw had potential, and with a few, obvious, adjustments could have been far better. If there’s any value in watching weak movies, it’s the opportunity to learn from their mistakes so that I don’t miss any opportunities in my work.

Again, the movies coming out right now have some good ideas and are lacking because of missed opportunities.

There will be spoilers.

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire

As soon as I started Frozen Empire I realized that all I remembered about Ghostbusters: Afterlife was that I kinda liked it. As it went on, I remembered that one reason came from the fact that there’s a character named Trevor who has a know-it-all little sister. Finally, some representation! But since poor Trevor is hardly in this movie, and I felt no connection to anyone, really, the story just fell flat. The longer the movie went along, the more I wished I was just watching the original 1984 movie.

The missed opportunities

One of the biggest criticisms against Frozen Empire is that flirts with a lesbian romance and never commits. Now, I don’t need or want that in my family film anyway. But if they’d kept things traditional and had poor Trevor fall for the ghost who needs a human to provide the big twist, they could have had a real romantic subplot without worrying about offending half the country and much of the world. Another problem is that the OG Ghostbusters don’t get to do much. Actually, the people who save the day are new characters we barely get to know. A moment of self-sacrifice for our original trio was even foreshadowed! 

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire

As with Frozen Empire, my recollection of the previous installment in this franchise was foggy. Apparently we aren’t doing memorable characters anymore. The only actor who seems to know what kind of movie he’s in and having any fun is Dan Stevens as a vet to the monsters. I’d watch a whole TV series if it starred his character and was designed in a Crocodile Hunter style. I will say, I laughed more at this movie than I did Frozen Empire, just because Kong uses Baby Kong as a club in a fight.

The missed opportunities

None of the characters have arcs. They go from Point A, to B, to C, without ever growing or changing. What if Stevens’ and Hall’s characters had hated each other and gradually fallen in love? Everyone in the movie (except Godzilla) emotes, but none of them actually seems to feel. Consequently, I felt nothing. The monster fights are pretty cool, though. No missed opportunities there. 

The Beekeeper

No surprise, this was the best movie I watched all weekend. Jason Statham’s quasi-political thriller with a John Wick plot is a blast. Plus, it’s not bogged down by being a sequel. Sure it’s about as thought-provoking as an 80’s action movie, even with a Hunter Biden analog accidentally taking down the military industrial complex. But that’s a feature, not a bug. We’re here for the violence, and The Beekeeper delivers in spades.

The missed opportunities

These aren’t so much complaints as observations. If this movie had been made in the 80’s there would’ve been a sex scene. If were from the 90’s there’d be a trip to a strip club. And at least in the 00’s the female FBI agent chasing our hero would’ve been a hot latina and not a thicc black woman. But apparently we’ve moved beyond such tawdry things.

The Heiress and the Handyman

Yes, I did follow up my brutal action movie with a Hallmark romance. Variety is the apple-spice of life, as it were. Can’t lie, I had hopes for this one. Like every guy my age, I’ve always had a little crush on Jodie Sweetin, and Hallmark movies tend to hit more than they miss. This one? This one’s a miss. Our heiress is nice, if comically incompetent. Actually, she’s too incompetent and, though Sweetin gives it her all, I don’t buy that she’s that dumb any more than I buy her hair isn’t a wig. She and the “handyman” get along from the get-go, which means the movie doesn’t even deliver on its premise of mistaken identities. But we do get this gem of a line, “I run the organic farm next door with my sister.”

The missed opportunities

Where to begin? First, they should have played the mistaken identity thing out longer. If the dude had let her think he really was her new estate’s handyman for more than two seconds we would’ve gotten some awkward hijinks and humor. Then they could’ve had fallen in love, fallen out of love, and gotten back together. There’s also no stakes. If the organic farm was struggling and our heiress was frustrated because she’d just lost her fortune, something more than winning a pie baking contest would’ve mattered.

Final thought

I still like movies, even when they disappoint.

community logo
Join the Meanwhile With Trevor Community
To read more articles like this, sign up and join my community today
0
What else you may like…
Videos
Podcasts
Posts
Articles
Tuesday Update

New article is on the way, but I'm feeling too overwhelmed to crank it out.

00:01:17
Update!

I cover it in the the video, but I've got some new professional writing opportunities coming up and I'm trying to finish my next novel, all while navigating a change in schedule. So look for more pictures and videos, and new articles here on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

00:02:47
He Who Rides on the Clouds - Conclusion

Leo and Britt come face to face with a prehistoric god a new cult on Saturn. Can they save the children doomed to sacrifice and escape?

He Who Rides on the Clouds - Conclusion
He Who Rides on the Clouds - Part 2

Leo and Brittany have arrived on Saturn, but not in the way they'd hoped. Captured by a pagan cult, they don't have time to stop the unthinkable from happening. But they'll try anyway.

Content warning: language and sexual situations.

He Who Rides on the Clouds - Part 2
He Who Rides on the Clouds - Part 1

Star Wars is dead and the more apathy you show the faster it will be allowed to rest in peace.

Instead of griping about what Disney has done, why don't you listen to my space adventure story? He Who Rides on the Clouds is supernatural noir that spans space and time. When children on Mars go missing, Alexis Leonard and his ex-wife Brittany go looking. Their search leads them to a pagan temple and an ancient religion.

If you'd like to buy the story and read ahead, it's available in the Fall 2020 issue of Cirsova, available here: https://amzn.to/3yRRywY

He Who Rides on the Clouds - Part 1
No Posts This Week

Hey everyone, with BasedCon coming up this weekend I'm busy catching up on things and getting ready to go. But I'll be back next week with lots of new thoughts!

Big Changes Ahead

Hey Friends, I've got some big life changes on the horizon and should be able to create more content. What would you like to see? More fiction? More fitness? Maybe you'd like more video or audio content. Let me know in the comments.

Also, if you aren't a paid subscriber, what would get you to pay $5 a month?

Is Ladyballers Doomed from the Start?

The most honest analysis I've seen.

post photo preview
Girl-Power Isn't the Problem: Stop Treating Movies Like TV Pilots

Last weekend I was able to sneak off the theater for a screening of From the World of John Wick: Ballerina. Did I feel silly, telling the high school girl at the ticket counter, “One for Ballerina, and a small drink”? Well, not in the moment. 

I probably drank a liter of cherry vanilla Coke Zero, and that didn’t feel so great.

Plenty of box office analysts and Hollywood types are wracking their brains, trying to figure out why movies like Furiosa and Ballerina aren’t drawing huge crowds. Mad Max and John Wick are popular franchises, but apparently telling the stories of the women in those worlds isn’t working. Even if the movies are pretty good.

I’ve seen both, and they’re pretty good.

Some are arguing that no one will go near a movie that looks like it’s feminist girl-bossing. Others counter that movies like Alien and Kill Bill are female-led action films that were successful. Now, I’m not going to say that Ballerina is on par with those modern day classics. But I will say that, as a man watching the movie, it didn’t offend me. The movie never challenged me to confront any internalized misogyny. The small girl doesn’t take down John Wick in hand-to-hand combat.

Honestly, if you like franchise, whether you’re male or female, you should watch Ballerina.

In short, from a purely cinematic experience perspective, neither Furiosa nor Ballerina would be any better or worse with a male lead. Maybe that’s a hot take. But that’s mine, for whatever it’s worth. Well, okay, I wouldn’t watch a movie called Ballerina if it stared a dude. Nevertheless, I think you get my point. Petite women warriors aside, the plots and action are exactly as expected.

So what’s the deal?

Well, what no one seems to have noticed is that Ripley and The Bride weren’t replacing anyone. As we were watching their movies for the first time, we weren’t thinking about other characters for whom we already had a preference. Movies are more like TV than TV right now, and replacement characters have always been a hard sell, regardless of gender. We all remember Sam and Diane. Who still talks about Sam and Rebecca (even though Kirstie Alley won an Emmy and a Golden Globe for the part)? I had to look up her name. 

No, they aren’t technically replacing them. It’s a spin-off, set in the same world.

Spin-offs tend to succeed when the characters are already well established (eg: Frasier). Furiosa and Ballerina are more like backdoor pilots, where new characters are dropped in for a single episode to sell us on the idea of a new show. This technique is very hit and miss on TV, and I can’t think of a single example of this working in a movie franchise. Film and television are very different mediums, and should be treated as such.

Still, if it doesn’t work on TV, it’s probably not gonna work at the movies. Not where new characters and spin-offs are concerned. 

Read full Article
post photo preview
Going Back to 1995

Maybe I’m just getting old, but it doesn’t feel like we had the thriving and distinct pop culture of past generations. Has there been a look or stye, or feeling, that defines this moment? Everything seems to have stagnated for the last twenty years. And it’s not as if I don’t pay attention. 

It’s making me nostalgic. 

Consequently, for the rest of the year, I’m prioritizing movies from 1995, the year I was twelve. At that time, my family didn’t really go to the theater, and when we did rent VHS tapes, more often than it is was older Disney movies or entirely forgettable Christian titles. Now that I’ve grown tired of trying to keep up with new releases, not there’s much worth watching anyway, it feels like a good time to catch up on those 30 year old movies that have become ingrained in what’s left of our pop culture.

So over on Criticless, I made a list.

Some of these are movies I’ve seen before, but not in a long time. Others will be first time watches for me. There’s really no rhyme or reason to what I put on my list. It’s just movies that either interest me, or are currently in my collection, sadly unwatched. As things become available on streaming, I may add to the list. And if I don’t get to everything before the end of the year, no big deal.

Hopefully, they aren’t going anywhere. 

I’ll be posting some reviews and analysis as I go, so be sure to follow me here. 

Read full Article
Ironheart and Superman: A Failure to Launch

Yesterday two trailers were released for upcoming superhero projects. First, we had Marvel's Ironheart, which Disney has been sitting on for years at this point. Apparently it follows Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne), a young black woman at MIT who is (was?) intended to take over for Tony Stark as Ironwhathaveyou. If you haven't seen the trailer yet, take a look.

I stopped paying too much attention to the MCU a long time ago, but apparently Riri was introduced in Wakanda Forever, and her fans have been clamoring for a standalone show ever since (/sarcasm). Watching the trailer, I can't help but notice how many times we're told she's smart and capable. Any suggestion that she can't do something is shot down immediately. We're supposed to believe that The System is against is her because she's poor, I guess, and doesn't have Tony Stark's advantages.

Remember Tony Stark? Sure, he was rich. But he was also a self-absorbed man-child who found himself in a cave in Afghanistan who had to engineer his own escape with scrap parts. Tony Stark, who had to learn about self-sacrifice and the consequences of his actions. Robert Downey Jr. make us like the guy, with his easy charm, even though we wanted to see him grow up. There was room for a character arc. No offence to Dominique, but she doesn't have the charm, and her character clearly has nowhere to go.

A few hours later, Warner Bros./DC released the trailer for James Gunn's Superman, the latest reboot of the iconic superhero. We've been waiting for a good Superman for a long time. Something to reunite the fans, the casually interested, and possibly the entire country. And to be honest, I don't think this is gonna do it. Take a look.

Before I go any further, I want to spin my theory on the interview scene, which is a little different from what I'm hearing from most anyone else. Notice how David Corenswet pitches his voice really high when he says, "Sure!" At this point in the movie, I don't think Lois (Rachel Brasnahan) knows that Clark is Superman, and thinks he's just playacting. But when Clark drops his voice, he's showing his cards a little bit. Then, when he completely loses his cool, he's just acting how Lois thinks Superman would respond. In context (the scene is reportedly ten minutes long!), it might be interesting. Out of context, in a trailer, it's a stupid decision.

Throughout the entire trailer we see Superman smacked around, knocked out, screaming out in self-defense, and made fun of for having a dog. There are some super-heroics, to be sure, but they're mitigated by the overwhelming amount of thrashing he takes. Unlike Riri, I guess he's got some room for growth. But it doesn't inspire me to see the movie. Some are defending this approach, suggesting that someone with such a clear cut understanding of right and wrong would be frustrated and confused by our complex, political climate. And I agree. But his moral compass and grace towards an unfair world should have been set before leaving Smallville and going out into the world.

So on the one hand, we've got a flawless female character. And on the other, we've got an immature Superman. Neither character is attractive, warts and all. Neither character is relatable or inspiring in the ways the filmmakers intended, as presented. Maybe the show and movie will be good. But someone else will have to let me know. Because right now, I'm not inspired to see either one.

Read full Article
See More
Available on mobile and TV devices
google store google store app store app store
google store google store app tv store app tv store amazon store amazon store roku store roku store
Powered by Locals