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The activity on Tumblr is dropping at a precipitous rate, but the activity on Pillowfort is stillborn, so I'll just trundle along on the former until it folds and then find another place to call home. I thought LJ and DW might experience a renaissance, but aside from a brief uptick after the Tumblr porn ban announcement, they remain moribund. Fandom has, for the time being, switched to a more visual medium and manner of discourse, and the old, text-based blogging platforms hold scant appeal for this mode of expression.
I saw Aquaman yesterday.
Pros:
-Hot men everywhere. If Karl Urban had been in this as either Orm or Black Manta, as was being bandied about in the early going, I would have died. Jason Momoa is sex on legs, and Patrick Wilson, at least in this movie, was possessed of a certain preppy, Stepford man hotness. Dolph Lundgren wasn't bad, either, and I'm well aware that he's sixty-one. He was still ripped.
-Seeing Arthur, badass, manly superhero, devolve into a little boy and start wailing, "Pops! Pops!" as he floundered toward the overturned truck after the tsunami endeared him to me completely. And melting into his mother after he finally found her was even better. Hulking dudes who unashamedly love their parents are my emotional catnip, apparently.
-The cinematography was gorgeous. I wanted to play in that undersea world forever. I also want a giant seahorse, please.
-I love that the battle for Atlan's trident wasn't a battle at all, but Arthur talking to the Krathen and admitting his fear and unworthiness.
-The Krathen was a total badass, and she certainly settled Orm's sulky hash. I wish her scene had been longer.
-Even though Orm and Black Manta are villains, there motivations are understandable. Humans are destroying the oceans and exterminating the sea life without compunction, and of course it would affect and poison the Atlanteans. Any good leader would take umbrage with this and fight back. It's just a shame that Orm's method of coping was to kill anyone who tried to slow his roll.
And why wouldn't Black Manta want to kill Arthur? He loved his father just as much as Arthur loved his, and Arthur turned his back on them in a fit of moral superiority and left them to die. As a consequence, Manta had to watch his father drown, a fate Arthur was spared by the kindness of Mera. I have no doubt that Manta or his father would have rewarded Arthur's compassion by trying to shank him had he relented; they had just gunned down and stabbed dozens of submariners, but the unassailable fact remains that by leaving, Arthur made Manta watch his father die. In Manta's world, that makes him the villain, and in truth, it's hard to argue his point.
-Yay, Willem Dafoe wasn't an asshole! And he didn't die! Score!
Cons:
-AHAHAHA! Nicole Kidman as a twenty-something, my ass. Atalanta was a warrior, though, and I loved her otherwise.
-Arthur is a naive doofus is he thinks Orm is going to forgive and forget. By the end of the movie, he's lost his throne, his father's trident, the belief that Vulko, his trusted vizier and possible surrogate father, had any faith in him, and his best friend and betrothed, Mera, to his half-human half-brother. And he has a sneaking suspicion that his mother, whom his usurping half-brother saved, loves him less than her cherished firstborn. Arthur, my man, there's going to be no talking, no mending of the familial rift. Nope. Orm is going to stew over that shit however long he's in the undersea pokey, and he'll gank you the first chance he gets.
I saw Aquaman yesterday.
Pros:
-Hot men everywhere. If Karl Urban had been in this as either Orm or Black Manta, as was being bandied about in the early going, I would have died. Jason Momoa is sex on legs, and Patrick Wilson, at least in this movie, was possessed of a certain preppy, Stepford man hotness. Dolph Lundgren wasn't bad, either, and I'm well aware that he's sixty-one. He was still ripped.
-Seeing Arthur, badass, manly superhero, devolve into a little boy and start wailing, "Pops! Pops!" as he floundered toward the overturned truck after the tsunami endeared him to me completely. And melting into his mother after he finally found her was even better. Hulking dudes who unashamedly love their parents are my emotional catnip, apparently.
-The cinematography was gorgeous. I wanted to play in that undersea world forever. I also want a giant seahorse, please.
-I love that the battle for Atlan's trident wasn't a battle at all, but Arthur talking to the Krathen and admitting his fear and unworthiness.
-The Krathen was a total badass, and she certainly settled Orm's sulky hash. I wish her scene had been longer.
-Even though Orm and Black Manta are villains, there motivations are understandable. Humans are destroying the oceans and exterminating the sea life without compunction, and of course it would affect and poison the Atlanteans. Any good leader would take umbrage with this and fight back. It's just a shame that Orm's method of coping was to kill anyone who tried to slow his roll.
And why wouldn't Black Manta want to kill Arthur? He loved his father just as much as Arthur loved his, and Arthur turned his back on them in a fit of moral superiority and left them to die. As a consequence, Manta had to watch his father drown, a fate Arthur was spared by the kindness of Mera. I have no doubt that Manta or his father would have rewarded Arthur's compassion by trying to shank him had he relented; they had just gunned down and stabbed dozens of submariners, but the unassailable fact remains that by leaving, Arthur made Manta watch his father die. In Manta's world, that makes him the villain, and in truth, it's hard to argue his point.
-Yay, Willem Dafoe wasn't an asshole! And he didn't die! Score!
Cons:
-AHAHAHA! Nicole Kidman as a twenty-something, my ass. Atalanta was a warrior, though, and I loved her otherwise.
-Arthur is a naive doofus is he thinks Orm is going to forgive and forget. By the end of the movie, he's lost his throne, his father's trident, the belief that Vulko, his trusted vizier and possible surrogate father, had any faith in him, and his best friend and betrothed, Mera, to his half-human half-brother. And he has a sneaking suspicion that his mother, whom his usurping half-brother saved, loves him less than her cherished firstborn. Arthur, my man, there's going to be no talking, no mending of the familial rift. Nope. Orm is going to stew over that shit however long he's in the undersea pokey, and he'll gank you the first chance he gets.
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