Author Archives: Kevin Hillman

About Kevin Hillman

Kevin Hillman works in television and is equally capable of discussing 19th century tax law and Pokemon battle tactics. He lives on Planet Coruscant with an Ewok named Moo.

gotham-101

Fox’s Gotham must focus on corruption, not fan service

Fox’s latest foray into comics adaptations, the new television series Gotham, premiered to strong ratings this week. The series follows future Police Commissioner James Gordon in his early years on the police force of Batman’s hometown, Gotham City. The early ratings show how strong the Batman franchise is, with the pilot drawing 8 million viewers. Critics seem to enjoy the show as well, believing it could be the strongest hit of the new season.

But Gotham will only live up to the expectations if its writers quickly figure out what they want the show to be. Should it be the story of Jim Gordon and his mission to clean up the city of Gotham and its corrupt police department? Or should the show be about fan service, winking and nodding at the audience while introducing an 8-year-old Clayface?

Gotham’s first episode tried hard to be both, spending most of its first half with pointless sightings of young Catwoman, Poison Ivy, The Riddler, and The Penguin, before settling into a very strong plot in the second half hour. After getting past those useless Easter eggs, Gotham became an intriguing show, with Gordon realizing the police aren’t necessarily the good guys and coming to terms with what needs to be done to survive. Gordon ends the episode with a new mission to extricate the scum from his new home, and the audience is drawn in to join him on his futile mission, despite us knowing that Gordon will ultimately be unsuccessful. (If Gordon did succeed, there would be no need for a now-8-year-old Bruce Wayne to ever don the cape and cowl.) But the struggle to change the corrupt system from within is intriguing in itself and offers a lot of opportunities for future story lines.

Focusing the story of the first episode on the murder of Thomas and Martha Wayne was another good choice, as it reminds the viewer of the future in store for Gotham while also allowing Gordon an opportunity to utilize his detective skills. Unlike the extraneous cameos of other Batman characters, Bruce’s early meetings with Gordon are internally consistent and in step with the larger scale mythology due to their personal relationship as well as the prominence of the Wayne family name in Gotham City.

Gotham City, just as much as any of the heroes or villains, has always been its own character within the DC Universe. Gotham is almost always seen in the dark, features gothic architecture, and seems to house the worst of the worst in criminals, politicians, and police officers. Bruce Wayne is a victim of the city, having been traumatized by his parents’ senseless murder at a very young age. As Batman, Bruce sets out every night to fight an endless war on crime, supposedly hoping that his actions will eventually make his city safer. But Gotham always fights back.

Organized crime in the city is controlled by demi-warlords, with battles over turf leading to the deaths of innocent victims all the time. When Batman is able to stop the traditional criminals, he is met by more ludicrous and theatrical challengers who often show signs of poor mental health, likely a direct result of living in a corrupt city with no viable social safety net and, consequently, a complete lack of hope.

The Gotham City that existed before Batman emerged has been explored in comics for years but never as extensively as Fox’s new show promises to do. The potential is intriguing right from the start, but it appears as though the writers are short on ideas, with the first episode showing a stark reliance on characters whose relevance is almost completely dependent on the existence of Batman. Catwoman is not interesting as an 8-year-old pickpocket; she’s interesting as the bad girl who boils Batman’s blood. She is interesting in Frank Miller’s interpretation in Batman: Year One because she is the first civilian to adopt Batman’s idea of theatricality. Poison Ivy is not an intriguing character because her father probably beat her; she is an intriguing character because of her power over plants and her use of toxins to incapacitate her foes. Both characters rely heavily on their sex appeal as weapons, often catching Bruce Wayne and other opponents off guard. These characters in their prepubescence are completely useless to a show that should be about police corruption and moral ambiguity.

Gordon, however, has always been one of the most impressive characters in DC Comics, and is certainly a deserving protagonist. Gordon, created by Bill Finger and Bob Kane, was introduced in Detective Comics #27 — the same first issue as Batman himself — and has been a comic book staple ever since. In a world of vigilantes and super-powered aliens, Gordon is a workaday every man, struggling to make the streets safer. Gordon has no superpowers and, unlike Batman, is not motivated by a personal vendetta or a traumatic experience. Gordon just does the right thing because it is the right thing. He is the incorruptible man in a city that thrives on corruption.

One definition of bravery is that it is not the absence of fear, but the presence of fear and the willingness to overcome it. By that standard, Gordon is a braver man than even Bruce Wayne. Batman does not fear his own death and would unflinchingly sacrifice his life for the betterment of mankind. Gordon, however, has constructed a life and a family and does not live with a death wish like his counterpart and friend. Gordon makes mistakes, like when he cheated on his first wife, and he has suffered great tragedy, including seeing his daughter shot and crippled by The Joker. But he fights on, maintaining his moral compass and owning up to his few errors in judgment. Gordon is so compelling as a hero, in fact, that IGN voted him No. 19 in its list of the Top 100 Comic Book Heroes, placing him higher than Green Arrow, Shazam, and most X-Men.

The writers of Gotham will do well to remember the strength of their lead character and build around him instead of focusing on the exciting, theatrical villains of Batman lore before they actually become exciting, theatrical villains. The police corruption plot, unveiled 28 minutes or so into the first episode, is enough to make the series great. We don’t need to see Selina Kyle pouring milk for cats in back alleys.

gungan-army

Episode VII wouldn’t be Star Wars without VFX

The producers of Star Wars: Episode VII have declared they have learned from the supposed mistakes of the film franchise’s prequel trilogy: they will avoid extensive use of computer generated imagery in the sequel trilogy, now in production. Haters of the prequel trilogy jumped for joy knowing that CGI will not ruin their return to the galaxy far, far away. But this attitude toward visual effects, specifically toward Star Wars movies, is absurd.

Of the top 10 highest-grossing films of 2014, eight are live-action movies that are only possible thanks to visual effects, and the remaining two are computer-generated cartoons. Several more movies this year promise to break into that top 10 list, and all of them are visual-effects-driven. These VFX — the effects created in post-production and added to live-action scenes — have become essential to create the modern cinematic spectacles that people all over the world love. And in most cases, these high-grossing, VFX-driven movies do not get by on spectacle alone, but they also tell good, fun stories.

The Star Wars franchise, despite sparking the visual effects revolution, is no longer being allowed the freedom to utilize the CGI that the films’ own company, Industrial Light & Magic, made famous. Whether Episode VII director J.J. Abrams wanted to use VFX or not, so-called Star Wars fans really left him no choice. The decision to minimize CGI was forced upon Abrams by the visceral hatred some have for the Star Wars prequels and by their claim that one of the biggest problems with Episodes I, II, and III was their over-reliance on CGI, as opposed to the puppets and set pieces that helped define the original three films.

This criticism is silly. It focuses on only a few scenes out of hundreds and penalizes them for not achieving “realism” in a movie that is based on laser fighting in space. This narrow lens lets the critic ignore the massive leaps in filmmaking made by ILM and Lucasfilm. ILM’s work since the 1970s has been on the cutting edge of movie effects, bringing incredible, unbelievable, escapist stories to life.

Movies about escapism require imaginative production techniques. This is nothing new in filmmaking. In Hollywood’s Golden Age, films such as King Kong and Metropolis relied on stop motion and model building to create worlds we could never otherwise envision. Willis O’Brien and Ray Harryhausen set the standard for special effects in movie making, creating masterpieces still admired today for their innovation. But while their work certainly was groundbreaking for their time, those techniques could not be used on such a grand scale today to create the movies consumers have come to expect.

Nonetheless, O’Brien and Harryhausen did inspire generations of new filmmakers who sought to replicate the magic they felt upon first viewing the work of those men. Among these movie titans are Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, and George Lucas. Each of these filmmakers, who have a combined box office take higher than the annual gross national product of most countries, have always been on the cutting edge of moviemaking. And some of their most famous and successful movies rely largely on the visual effects made possible because of the technological leaps made by Lucasfilm and ILM.

The much-loved original Star Wars trilogy was put together using practical special effects. But at the time Lucas was working on the movie, the effects necessary to tell his story did not exist. Lucas assembled a team that would become ILM to work on the effects for the film. The result was one of the most stunning visual pieces in cinematic history. The practical effects were incredible, but their production was also daunting, tiring, and limited. Lucas wanted to create scenes as he imagined them, no matter how absurd or unworldly they seemed. ILM and computer generated imagery would be the only viable response to that desire.

Ironically, the first movie franchise to use a completely computer-generated sequence was not Star Wars, but Star Trek. The Genesis sequence in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan was created by ILM and set the stage for the next three decades of moviemaking. ILM followed up a few years later in Young Sherlock Holmes by presenting the first completely computer-generated character, then went on to produce effects for some of the most breathtaking films in history, including Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, and Jurassic Park.

With each new movie came another new milestone, and ILM was making a habit out of changing cinema. Every new film was praised for its innovation and the way it was changing movies into an even greater medium for dreamers. It was around this time in the mid-1990s, with his company changing the film world, that Lucas realized he could create the long-hoped-for Star Wars prequel trilogy, complete with fantastical worlds straight from his imagination. Practicality was no longer a concern for effects in filmmaking.

What Lucas created was another revolutionary work, filled with cinematic firsts. Episode I — The Phantom Menace used visual effects in almost every scene, including the extensive pod race. It even included a major alien character, completely animated in 3D. Unfortunately, that alien character, Jar Jar Binks, angered a lot of old fans of the film series to the point that, to this day, they complain about the movie.

Jar Jar Binks and the entire Gungan society were huge visual breakthroughs. Unfortunately, they faced a backlash due to complaints about the writing. Critics bury the entire film because of the character’s personality traits, then they pile on complaints about the visual effects. What they forget is that many of the effects used in Phantom Menace led directly to the modern epic cinema we enjoy today. Without the fight on Naboo, the war scenes of The Lord of the Rings trilogy may not have been possible.

Such complaints continued throughout the prequel trilogy, with some criticisms holding more weight than others. Certainly, Lucas did go too far at times; almost none of the classic practical effects were used in Episode III — Revenge of the Sith. But each movie pushed the envelope of moviemaking with never-before-seen visual effects creating expansive worlds and realistic characters. Episode II — The Attack of the Clones was even the first movie shot in all-digital. These movies set the stage for the next decade of filmmaking, giving rise to Marvel Studios and the first truly realistic superhero movies. Without Harryhausen, there would be no Star Wars. Without Lucas, there would be no Avatar.

Unfortunately, the perpetual complaints about CGI in the Star Wars prequels have forced Abrams to insist he will be utilizing practical effects wherever possible, potentially robbing audiences of another game-changing moment in cinema. But all hope is not lost.

Where Lucas admittedly went wrong with the prequel trilogy was in finding balance. The new Star Wars trilogy should be the visual successor to all six of the previous movies. Using practical effects for set pieces and a few monsters is a great idea, and doing so can create some incredible movie magic that is absent from today’s big-budget blockbusters. But when it comes time to create vast new worlds and expansive battles in space, the producers should allow ILM to do what it does best. Lucas was notorious for letting the visuals speak first and writing the story around them. Abrams need not go that far, but he should certainly let ILM’s incredible talent shine through wherever possible.

Interestingly, Andy Serkis has been announced as a cast member for the new Star Wars movie. Serkis is famous for portraying some of the most incredible motion-captured characters in cinema, including LotR’s Gollum, King Kong, and Cesar from Rise and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. It seems likely that Serkis will use his incredible talents to portray an alien character that will make everyone forget about Jar Jar Whatshisname.

In the end, Star Wars VII will probably turn out to be another filmmaking landmark, as it will integrate the best of visual and practical effects to create another world in which we can all get lost in excitement.

winter-soldier-br

Winter Soldier, set for home release, lives up to trailers

Nothing gets a fan excited for a new film like a movie trailer. The three-minute teasers of potential cinematic high points pump our adrenaline and prepare our wallets to lose a few dollars. But trailers are a double-edged sword. Many trailers expose too much of the plot, give away all of the big jokes, or showcase too much of the action.

The trailers for Captain America: The Winter Soldier made many fans reasonably fearful. The film looked too good to be true, with previews promising an action epic with a thrilling political spin and a critical look at the security state. Too many movies that have not lived up to their trailers have made audiences wary, leaving some filmgoers to cautiously anticipate nothing but a popcorn adventure flick. But with Captain America 2, Marvel Studios delivered, as they always do. Despite its runtime of two hours and 15 minutes, the second Cap never slows down, never bores, and never fails to deliver on all of the hype.

It’s easy to look at its trailers and assume that Winter Soldier is just a summer blockbuster — action porn for the short attention span. And if the movie was only about action, it would still be worth the price of admission or the cost of the Blu-ray, being released Tuesday. Winter Soldier is one of the best action movies ever made; the movie is one epic scene after another: Captain America fights a jet and wins. Nick Fury engages in an epic car chase scene that could have come from a Die Hard movie. Black Widow and Cap show their martial arts skills in creative and impressive ways, including one fight with Georges St-Pierre as Batroc. And you can’t forget the explosions. Oh my, the explosions.

But Winter Soldier is so much more. The first scene of the flick establishes that comedy will never be far from a Marvel Studios production. Cap and Black Widow have tremendous dialogue, playing off of the characters’ obvious differences. Both are shown to be so good at what they do that they continue to discuss seemingly petty topics during very dangerous situations. The jokes about Steve Rogers’ advanced age are priceless and show how good-natured the man can be about his life’s great tragedy.

And the Russo brothers direct the compelling narrative about that tragedy. Cap spends the movie adjusting to the changes that occurred in the 70 years since World War II, and while he can be light-hearted about it, he is also confounded by the shades of grey in which the world now operates. There are no mustache-twirling Nazis expounding on their villainous plans — the bad guys have been passing off as heroes for decades, and the real heroes lie to Cap constantly.

Rogers misses the life he lost. Throughout the movie, Cap remembers his fallen comrades and spends time with his former love, Peggy Carter — now in her 90s and seemingly on her deathbed. Captain America realizes, however, that he cannot be defined by his tragedy. Cap is a symbol and a tremendous man: relatable, despite his exceptionalism. Winter Soldier is the story of Rogers realizing his place in this new world, finding new friends and fighting new threats.

When Rogers first meets Sam Wilson, soon to be called The Falcon, they quickly bond. Wilson is a veteran of recent American conflicts, and Cap is able to relate to the man and the horrors he’s suffered. It’s a moment of tremendous symbolism that links America’s current struggles in the Middle East to its long martial history.

Cap and Falcon form a strong friendship, but Rogers finds himself questioning everyone else around him. S.H.I.E.L.D. has been infiltrated by an old enemy, and Cap is unable to tell whom he can trust. We see early on that Black Widow and Fury practice their spy tactics even with their supposed friends. Rogers, a military man who understands the value of trust and its necessity in situations of war, is unable to adapt to the world of spies and surveillance.

The Winter Soldier makes the viewer question the motives of everyone in the movie, especially those who follow the Marvel Cinematic Universe closely. Some S.H.I.E.L.D. agents who are in on the Hydra conspiracy appear in multiple episodes of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. television show, and the plot to the movie is directly linked to the show’s entire first season. This is an added bonus to the movie, as it stands alone as a great piece of cinema that is only enriched by knowledge of The First Avenger, The Avengers, and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Of course, while the Hydra conspiracy sets up a great plot, it is the mystery of Cap’s rival, the Winter Soldier himself, that intrigued viewers of Captain America 2’s trailers. The combat between the two warriors appeals to anyone who enjoys a good martial arts film. But added to the great fights is the element of mystery. Who is this skilled man?

The Winter Soldier is a mysterious assassin who was formerly associated with the Soviet Union. His history has taken the form of a legend, with sightings of the man dating back decades. Many agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. have dismissed the sightings as rumor, and Cap even calls the tales a ghost story. But the actions taken against Fury prove that the assassin is real. Cap and Black Widow seek the man out for a confrontation, which proves to be anything but disappointing.

The fight scenes are great, the big screen action is incomparable, and the conspiracy involved makes you question everything you know about the Marvel Cinematic Universe. But most importantly, Winter Soldier asks the difficult questions about American ideals and the role of security in the post-9/11 world. Captain America and Fury’s conflicting philosophies regarding national security set the stage for the debate that every American should have for himself.

Casual fans who have only seen a few of Marvel’s movies in the last six years need to check this one out. Winter Soldier is easily the biggest, best, and most important of Marvel’s Phase Two movies, all of which are great. It is Captain America 2, more than any of the other Phase Two works, that alters the world in which the heroes live and sets the stage for the next set of Marvel stories.

maus-cover

More than just Holocaust, Maus addresses fathers, sons

Batman, Superman, and Spider-Man’s parents are all dead. The superheroes live and fight in the memory of their fallen family members. Luke Skywalker grew up without a father, and upon finally meeting the man, he had to fight him to the death in order to save the galaxy. Mythological heroes, more often than not, have fathers who are literal gods, and the heroes must live constantly in the shadows of their superior parents. Whether it is movies, books, television, or mythology, it is a fact that “daddy issues” are among the most common traits of characters across all forms of fiction.

In some stories, this trope exists to allow the main character room to grow, as life without parents forces a young character to grow up quickly and take on a greater burden than would otherwise be expected of him. But the absent parent trope also exists as a reflection of societal realities: many children do grow up without one or more of their parents, but those who are lucky enough to have parents around also often find themselves at odds with those who raised them. Parents, reasonably, have expectations for their children and may assume their offspring will grow up a certain way. In turn, children often grow up seeing their parents as heroes, only to become disillusioned upon discovering their flawed humanity. And for many, even a father who is physically present is often emotionally distant. The absent father in fiction often hits too close to home.

So what happens when a boy aims to discover the true personalities of his parents? Will he be disappointed at their human failings, or proud of their surprising accomplishments? Is the generation gap bridgeable, or does the difference in time make it impossible for us to truly understand the world of our parents?

Maus is the story of Art Spiegelman’s attempt to understand his parents, specifically his father. Spiegelman’s work is a journey to discover the man who always felt distant and the mother who left him long ago.

Maus follows Spiegelman as he tries to learn about his father’s struggle during World War II. Vladek Spiegelman was a Polish Jew who survived the Holocaust through resourcefulness and intelligence, even using his skills and likability to make it out of Auschwitz alive. In the graphic novel dramatization of his father’s struggle, Art Spiegelman uses animals to create an extended metaphor, casting the Jews as mice and the Nazis as cats, with other nationalities filling out the animal kingdom.

Instead of simply telling his father’s story, Spiegelman tells about the journey to get the story out of his father — making himself a character in the book, whose own goal is the completion of the book in which he is a part. It sounds confusing, but is actually an impressive storytelling device that makes the book more than just a journey of a man but the story of a man and his son.

The fictionalized Art wants to write a book about his father’s story but often finds himself at odds with the man who raised him. To Art, Vladek is insufferable for his numerous traits that likely developed during his time in Nazi Europe. Vladek is cheap, lies to get his son’s attention, and complains frequently, causing Art to voice his frustration with these traits by noting that his father is acting like the terrible stereotype of Jews prevalent in antisemitic thought. Vladek is not a distant father to Art, but overbearing, and someone to whom is son is unable to relate. But throughout the book, even while the character of Art doesn’t appear to be gaining any new insight into his father, the matter-of-fact writing about their interactions seems to indicate the real-life Art’s greater understanding of his father’s nature. Perhaps writing the book truly helped Art to discover Vladek, even though he was unaware of it at the time.

Chapters often begin with Art and Vladek speaking to one another, with Art growing frustrated as he tries to push his father toward talking about his life in World War II. Art learns about his long-dead brother and mother through his father’s narration, and Spiegelman transposes his words in a way that makes the reader feel as though Vladek is speaking directly to them.

The narrative device used to set up the scenes of Nazi-occupied Poland allows the reader to better understand the humanity of the man who survived Auschwitz. We have all had a parent or grandparent whose quirks and pushiness have gotten on our nerves. Showing this frustrating side of Vladek allows us to relate while we also learn about his heroic triumphs. Vladek survived the concentration camps by using his skills as a worker and his knowledge of the English language. He also flashed his business savvy, often making valuable trades for the necessities of his survival. He even managed to keep his wife protected when they were separated by making friends with the right people. These survival traits also earn Vladek the grudging admiration of his son.

Art experiences a great deal of survivor’s guilt, knowing that he will never have to suffer the way his father did. He takes for granted all that he has been given and, during the time he interviews Vladek, is unable to relate to his father’s story. Art knows that he can never understand his father’s struggle but hopes to at least be able to retell it to others.

There is no point in the story where Art and Vladek reconcile their differences, but the writing makes it clear that Art did ultimately love and respect his father, especially after hearing about his struggle. It appears as though Spiegelman’s realization of who his father was only came about after he began writing Maus. While the story ultimately exists to discuss the horrors of the Holocaust, Maus also does a great job tackling a common issue that is rarely discussed in a real way. Hopefully, those who read the tale will be able to learn its lessons and work harder to understand the trials and quirks of different generations.

korra-s3f

Depth of characters drives strong third Korra season

The Legend of Korra’s third season has ended, and fans were treated to another incredible epic. With its latest season, The Legend of Korra proved that strong and diverse characters with powerful backstories and interesting emotional arcs can add immeasurable depth and interest to any series.

Korra’s predecessor, Avatar: The Last Airbender, saw many characters evolve across its three seasons, and Korra inherited that world with all of its implications. In Korra’s season 3, that allowed viewers to rejoin the life of Zuko, now an old man, to see how his life changed since becoming friends with Avatar Aang. But it was not the first time the series used historical continuity to build incredible characters for the world of Korra.

In Korra’s first episode, we are introduced to Tenzin, who, as the son of Avatar Aang and the water bender Katara, has the weight of the world on his shoulders. His family is the last group from the Air Nation, and we can see how Tenzin struggles with the responsibility of being the sole inheritor of a culture on the verge of extinction.

Tenzin spends the first two seasons struggling with being the son of the last Avatar. By definition, he is incapable of measuring up to the legacy of his father, whose statue stands as a beacon of hope in the waters between the Air Temple and Republic City. Tenzin literally lives in his father’s shadow and often makes decisions with his father in mind. At the same time, Tenzin is a father himself, raising four young children, fully aware that they will one day inherit his burdens.

Tenzin’s role as father is fitting, as he is the audience’s closest link to Aang and the previous generation of the show’s heroes. But for so long, Tenzin is defined and consumed only by his father’s legacy. Tenzin reaches a low point when his spiritual connections are shown to not be as strong as his own daughter’s. Tenzin beats himself up, feeling that he has let his father down, until his brother Bumi and sister Kya remind him that, while they are all Aang’s children, each one of them is also an individual. Tenzin finally realizes his value as Tenzin, the father and the mentor, and not merely the son of Aang.

Tenzin’s evolution and relationship with Korra provide some of the series’ most emotionally powerful moments. At first, Tenzin is the stuffy authority who stands in Korra’s way as she tries to live her life. But by the end of season 2, we see how much their relationship has grown into one of mutual respect and familial love. Korra makes Tenzin’s goals her own and takes it as her duty to help rebuild the Air Nation, which, after being wiped out by the Fire Nation over 100 years ago, finally has a chance to be resurrected at the beginning of season 3.

After Korra’s actions open the portals to the Spirit Dimension, the world around the Avatar begins to change drastically. Part of that change is the resurgence of air benders across the globe. Korra and Tenzin seize the moment to reestablish the Air Nation. Tenzin realizes the incredible significance as he finally has the opportunity to fulfill his father’s dreams while also creating his own legacy.

Tenzin’s strength as a leader is visible through the growth of his daughter, Jinora. Jinora started the show as a seemingly minor character, though her potential was always evident. Instead of leaving her character’s development to the imagination, the writers chose to craft an impressive story arc for her, culminating in the final scene of Korra’s third season.

Jinora shows an incredible love for history, philosophy, legends, and everything involving the Avatar and the Air Nation. It is evident from the beginning that she hopes to inherit the leadership of the Nation from her father, and with season 3, Jinora proves that she is resourceful, intelligent, and powerful. Jinora’s connection to the Spirit World gives her a power that is out of the grasp of even the Avatar, as she is able to project her consciousness across large distances. By season 3’s final scene, it is evident that Jinora has become a leader, reaching a new high, just as Korra reaches her new low.

Having two incredibly powerful woman characters would be impressive enough for any show, but The Legend of Korra goes above and beyond in showcasing powerful women. Asami, originally Korra’s rival for the affections of a boy, came into her own in the course of the show and became defined by much more than just her relationship with a boy. Asami, the head of Future Industries at a young age, stepped up in the first season as a hero, defending Team Avatar against her own father, the corrupt industrialist who was supporting the Equalists. Though she is not a bender, Asami proves herself more than capable as a fighter, utilizing her company’s technology as personal weapons and her own martial arts training to help Korra take down the leaders of the Red Lotus.

The Red Lotus, newly introduced in season 3, are four very powerful anarchist benders who seek to destroy the social order. Believing kings and presidents to be antithetical to human nature, the Red Lotus puts its philosophy into action, even succeeding in killing a world leader. Adding to the depth of these antagonists is the fact that many of the world’s leaders show themselves to be incompetent and possibly dangerous. The audience is better able to understand the characters’ motivations because there is an element of truth to what they say. Still, their actions cross a line, especially as they threaten the lives of the new members of the Air Nation.

The Red Lotus proves their might throughout the season by getting into incredible battles with characters whom the fans know are great fighters. The anarchists are able to take down all three of Aang’s children in a fair fight, establishing their credibility as a force to be reckoned with. Their dominance is then used to great effect to establish the strength of Bolin and Mako, Korra’s best friends who have to step up to the challenge of the Red Lotus warriors.

Bolin and Mako have been part of what makes Korra a great series since the beginning. The brothers of mixed nationality have a strong relationship, which we see throughout the series. Bolin, the earth bender, was always the funnier character, while Mako, the fire bender, was much more serious. The two brothers come from the streets of Republic City, where their parents were murdered, and they had to work for criminals just to survive.

Bolin and Mako are the peasants who dine with kings as they join Korra to help save the world. Mako, a detective for the police force, still mourns the death of his parents and does the best he can to be there for his brother. His growth as an independent hero continues to shine through in season 3 as his detective skills often lead the group in the right direction. But it is his emotional connection with his brother that really shines through in in the most recent season.

Bolin was always the comic relief character, and in that role has added much to the show. However, Bolin was starting to feel static by the end of Korra’s second season, which made his growth in season 3 that much more rewarding. We find out in season 3 that Bolin doesn’t have a lot of confidence in himself, which makes a lot of sense, given his brother’s abilities. Bolin tries to learn metal bending, which is a skill that very few earth benders are able to master. Bolin is shown up immediately by Korra, who masters the skill quickly. The writers play with this development throughout the season, making you believe Bolin is about to step up before ultimately failing, until the end of the season when Bolin, the perpetual comic relief character, saves everybody by proving himself in another way.

Bolin and Mako’s characters both shine incredibly when they meet their extended family for the first time. Bolin quickly learns the names of everybody and welcomes them all into his life. Mako, still reserved, finds comfort in meeting his grandmother for the first time. Their family was unaware of their parents’ passing, and when Mako has to break the news to their grandmother, he gives her his father’s scarf, which Mako has been wearing for the entirety of the show. Mako giving up the scarf to his father’s mother creates an unbelievably powerful moment shared by him, Bolin, and their family. That moment wouldn’t be possible without the long-term writing that has made the show so strong.

But whereas Bolin and Mako grow stronger for each other, we are also treated to another pair of siblings who prove that you don’t have to like each other to love each other. The Beifong sisters, Lin, and Suyin, act as parallels to many of the show’s other characters while still being compelling and powerful in their own right. The sisters are the daughters of the first metal bender, Toph Beifong, one of the protagonists in The Last Airbender, who has achieved legendary status within the Avatar World. Toph was blind and lived with an overbearing family that prevented her from living her own life until she ran away. As a parent, Toph chose to learn from her parents’ mistakes and gave her children incredible freedom, perhaps too much, with Suyin slipping into the life of a criminal and Lin going out of her way to become like her mother in an attempt to make her proud.

Lin has been around since the beginning of Korra and was originally used as another obstacle for Korra. As the chief of police, Lin was unwilling to let Korra run free in her city, finding the Avatar’s attitude and behavior to be frustrating and, at times, illegal. In time, however, Lin and Korra’s relationship grew into one of respect, and the two powerful women have been saving each other’s lives frequently ever since.

In season 3, we learn that, like Tenzin, Lin has never been able to get out of the shadow of her more famous parent. Suyin, who has since reformed and become a great leader of the Metal Clan, reveres her mother, continuing to build on her legacy since Toph has disappeared. Suyin does her best to convince Lin of her changed attitudes, but it takes much persuasion and an epic metal-bending fight to finally put the past in the past.

Lin and Suyin are able to move past their differences without ever acting as though their problems don’t exist. Like Bolin and Mako as they take on two of the Red Lotus members, Lin and Suyin work together, saving each other’s lives, to fight the incredibly powerful combustion bender of the Lotus.

Adding to all of these incredible characters is the series’ title star, Korra. Korra was always powerful, always skilled, and always sure of herself. Revered as a demigod since birth, Korra became abrasive, expecting everyone to listen to her and allow her to do as she pleased, leading to early season head-bumping with Tenzin and Lin. In season 2, her attitude almost sparked a civil war, but she came into her own as a leader by connecting to the Spirit World and gaining a greater understanding of the world in which she lives.

In season 3, however, Korra is pushed to the brink. Her decision to leave open the Spirit portals has proven very unpopular, and the people of the world don’t like how their world has been forever changed. Korra faces constant public scrutiny for her decisions, even leading to her banishment from Republic City.

Korra has also become the first Avatar since the original to be unable to speak with her past lives. For much of the show, when the Avatar reached rock bottom, Aang or Korra could call upon the spirits of their predecessors to offer guidance. With the opening of the Spirit portal, however, Korra’s connection has been severed. With the Avatar no longer acting as a bridge to the Spirit World, and without her connection to her past lives, in addition to the Equalists and the Red Lotus calling the Avatar a relic of a bygone era, Korra’s confidence in her ability and her importance to the world are thoroughly shaken. In overcoming the challenge of the Red Lotus, Korra was left broken, in a wheelchair, questioning if she is even needed anymore.

With Korra’s growth as a character, the stakes of the show have been raised. We are left with the idea that the world could really lose its Avatar as it modernizes into a society more familiar to us. The changing times may prove that the Avatar is no longer needed, and Korra could truly be the last. With that idea comes the possibility that The Legend of Korra’s title character will actually die, adding a new layer of interest to the show’s fourth and final season.

By the third season finale of The Legend of Korra, the audience is able to see the incredible depth of characters — and depth of character — that makes Korra so compelling. No fewer than nine heroes get to shine in the final battle, as four distinct and established villains fight them to the bitter end. Each fight carries with it greater emotional weight: we see the relationships between brothers, sisters, and fathers and their daughters. Even subtle moments carry the weight of history in them, such as the moment when Lord Zuko learns that Korra spoke with his uncle, which fans of The Last Airbender will remember was the most compelling relationship of that show.

The end of the season again establishes a new status quo as a Nation slowly rebuilds, a leader steps up, and another hits rock bottom. In an incredible move, the creators of The Legend of Korra have given us three straight epic seasons, full of action, adventure, drama, comedy, politics, philosophy, history, and rich characters. Without a doubt, The Legend of Korra will go down in history as one of the most unexpectedly great shows.

varrick

Korra draws parallels to real-world march to war

In a recent Nerd/Wise article, I defended the medium of animation as art on par with cinema and modern television dramas by pointing out the incredible social commentary in the first season of Legend of Korra. The program, however, was originally made to be a miniseries, and thus fit an entire story arc into only a dozen episodes, leaving out the filler that was more prevalent in its predecessor, Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Korra debuted as a big success, and Nickelodeon ordered three more seasons of the show. With over 40 new episodes to produce and no original plan to make any more than 12, the series creators had to get to work, leaving fans reasonably skeptical. But Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino did not disappoint with Korra’s second season and continued to showcase the narrative capacity of animated television.

How were they able to keep the show compelling? Konietzko and DiMartino created a season that expanded on the show’s spiritual aspects while grounding the narrative in a much more human story — the philosophical disputes and reasons that lead to war. And the on-screen machinations reflect real, historical precedents for the march to war.

Legend of Korra’s second season follows the protagonist as the society she knows begins to crumble around her. In the process, she becomes a participant in a dangerous process that almost leads her people into a civil war. The slippery slope begins, as they often do, with a supposed visionary pushing his beliefs on others, convinced he is on a spiritual crusade.

In the real world, when someone is so convinced he is on the one true path, he is often liable to take extreme measures to spread that supposed truth. We see this today, with the unrecognized Islamic State terrorizing Iraq and Greater Syria, as well as al-Qaida and other fundamentalist religious groups operating around the globe. Throughout history, we have seen these same attitudes manifesting in the Crusades, the Inquisition, and hundreds of other times when two distinct faiths have come into contact.

In Legend of Korra, it is Unalaq, Korra’s uncle, who believes the Southern Water Tribe has lost its spiritual way and seeks to rectify the situation. He shows Korra that the evolution and progress of humanity is actually harmful to its well-being, as their lack of spiritual understanding has led to a rising frequency of attacks from the Spirit World. After Unalaq saves Korra from an attack by a wayward spirit, the Avatar begins to trust Unalaq, at the expense of her own father, who suspects deception in his zealot brother.

Unalaq is the Chief of the Water Tribes, and his belief in the South’s spiritual failings leads him to take action. But Unalaq’s actions have consequences, and his attitudes inspire a rebellious attitude among the citizens of the South. Those citizens become convinced that independence is the only answer and begin their planning in secret meetings. In this way, the South’s actions mirror those of the American colonists in 1776, who grew tired of the British Parliament’s tightening grip.

The Sons of Liberty met in secret and began advocating for independence as the rest of the nation slowly became convinced. Troops occupying Massachusetts convinced most of the locals that action needed to be taken, and Parliament’s attempts to maintain control ironically caused them to lose it. Unalaq acts in much the same way, sending soldiers to occupy the South, raising tensions and marching his people closer to war. While Massachusetts delegate John Adams pushed the Continental Congress to declare independence, King George III made his intentions clear by sending in many more troops to quash the American rebellion. Adams was finally able to win over his colleagues by pointing out the obvious: that a state of war already existed between the colonies and their mother country.

The American Revolution tore families apart, and in Legend of Korra, the Avatar’s father and uncle find themselves on opposite sides of a conflict that promises to be destructive and deadly. When Unalaq’s intentions become clear, Korra decides to take action against her uncle and defend her father and people. Korra seeks out the help of a powerful nation to bring down the overbearing Unalaq and his troops.

During the American Revolution, it was Benjamin Franklin who sought a powerful nation, France, to help the struggling rebellion. Franklin used wit and his crafty personality to persuade King Louis XVI to send assistance to the Americans. Korra is a bit more direct — and characteristically abrasive — when asking the president of Republic City for help, and the president is unwilling to help out the independence seekers.

Without the help of the president, Korra tries realpolitik, going right to the Republic military with the request for help. Korra, as the spiritual center of the Avatar world, holds a lot of sway, and her brashness brings to light the problems with autocracy, whether within a theocracy or even a constitutional monarchy. If the decision to go to war lies in the hands of only one person, it could come about simply on a whim while a diplomatic solution is still viable. This is the reason the U.S. Constitution grants war-making powers to the legislative, and not the executive, branch of government.

Of course, in practice, that’s not the only way armed conflict actually takes shape in the United States. Spreading the war-making powers out among hundreds of people does not entirely tie the hands of the commander in chief and doesn’t mean senseless wars don’t happen. Especially not in a world in which war is profitable.

In trying to protect her people, Korra receives help from the character that perhaps best epitomizes American plutocracy in the entire show, Varrick. Varrick is the head of a large corporation with its hands in everything from manufacturing to media. Varrick uses his money to influence the politics of the world, funding the political campaigns of both Republic City presidential candidates, supporting the rebels in the South, and selling the weapons of war. Varrick is so blatant in his intentions that he makes Halliburton and Blackwater look like Girl Scouts, even outright saying, “If you can’t make money during war, then you just can’t make money.”

Varrick represents everything wrong with the current American military-industrial complex. Varrick is amoral, showing none of the traits we would normally associate with cartoon villainy, yet performing some of the most evil actions in the show. Varrick sees war as big business and will do what he has to in order to ensure fighting breaks out. He hires criminals to bomb public spaces to build support for the rebels, and sends them to rob Future Industries to force Asami to sell her company to him. Varrick then plans to profit even more off of the war by selling those same rebels Future Industries aircraft and robots.

Varrick even proves to be a master of propaganda. He enlists the help of Korra’s friend, Bolin, to star in “movers,” the Avatar world’s movies, which show Unalaq as a blatantly evil, Fu Manchu-like villain, ironically playing off the fact that the villains in the Avatar world are often colored with shades of gray. This, too, has its analog in world history.

During the World Wars, both sides of the conflict used movies to propagate their messages, often to a ridiculous degree. The Nazis disseminated their ideology with films such as Triumph of the Will and The Eternal Jew, while in America, Frank Capra released the film series Why We Fight to rally Americans behind the cause. Dr. Seuss was commissioned during the war to draw cartoons supporting the war effort, including some racist depictions of the Japanese, while Batman fought Asian stereotypes in film serials, and Superman made sure to “slap a Jap” in the comic books. Today, movies may not be as blatant in their propaganda, but using the media to spread a message — and even to start a war — is very much alive.

Legend of Korra, despite Nickelodeon’s decision to limit the show to digital distribution, continues to be an impressive work of fiction. The series manages to create a mythical epic while grounding it in an unfortunate part of the human experience. We may never be able to bend the elements, but we can relate to the feelings of helplessness as we watch the world around us descend into war. We can only hope that cooler heads ultimately prevail, but with so many factors constantly pushing the world toward conflict, that hope often seems misguided.

marshall-statue

Hating on Supreme Court has always been American hobby

The Supreme Court of the United States made a poor, unpopular decision, and nobody seems to be happy about it. Questions were immediately raised about changing the makeup of the court and amending the Constitution to fix the justices’ huge error. After all, they are an unelected branch of government and an anomaly in our democracy.

You probably assume I’m referring to the Hobby Lobby decision handed down in June. Well, yes, I could be. Or I could be referring to Citizens United, or the Affordable Care Act decision, or Bush v. Gore. Or Roe v. Wade. Or Brown v. Board. Or Plessy v. Ferguson. Or the Dred Scott case. Or Marbury v. Madison. Really, I could be referring to any controversial case from the Supreme Court’s 225-year history. The results are always the same: one side or the other screams bloody murder.

See, hatred of the Supreme Court isn’t a liberal or conservative position. It’s an American position. Hating the Supreme Court is as American as complaining about apple pie on the Internet. It’s part of our DNA, and it dates back to the beginning. And there is a very good reason for that: it’s what some of the nation’s Founding Fathers wanted. I say some because, as I’ve stated before, the Founders didn’t really agree with each other.

To many of the Founders, the Supreme Court was deemed a necessary part of a strong republic because it offered something unique to the system: a strictly legal check on democratic power. The court’s advocates were men who believed in the rule of the majority, but also the rights of the minority.

Then, as now, of course, the minority didn’t mean the downtrodden or the non-whites; it meant the wealthy. Most of the Founders were quite well-off and understood that an unchecked democracy would immediately target the landed elite and lead to their demise. The wealthy couldn’t have that. To many of them, the three primary rights were John Locke’s life, liberty, and property — not the pursuit of happiness, as Thomas Jefferson, publicist in chief, phrased it in the Declaration of Independence.

In fact, it was Jefferson who was the first American president to question the legitimacy and necessity of the Supreme Court. Despite being one of the wealthiest men in the country at the time, Jefferson was an advocate for greater democracy in the young United States. When Jefferson became president, he wielded his power forcefully, despite his previous objections to executive overreach by his two predecessors, and was able to justify it through his belief that he was representing the will of the people.

The Supreme Court during the Jefferson Administration was headed by Chief Justice John Marshall, an appointee of John Adams, a Federalist, and Jefferson’s cousin. The court of the day was still uncertain of its place in the government, and many men who had been offered seats on the bench turned them down in favor of what we would see today as lesser jobs. In Marbury v. Madison, the court had its opportunity to assert its position as a coequal branch of the U.S. government but had to do so in a way that would not offend the president so much that Jefferson might ignore the ruling.

In the landmark case, Marshall ruled in favor of Jefferson’s State Department, led by James Madison, which had refused to deliver credentials to another Adams appointee, William Marbury. Marshall’s ruling was that Madison had indeed acted illegally, but the State Department didn’t have to follow through with the appointment because the provision of the Judiciary Act of 1789 that allowed Marbury to argue his claim before the Supreme Court was actually unconstitutional. The decision established judicial review and made it clear that even the president and his administration had to live under the rule of law, under the arbitration of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Jefferson was less than enthused. He wrote to Abigail Adams in 1804:

“The Constitution … meant that its coordinate branches should be checks on each other. But the opinion which gives to the judges the right to decide what laws are constitutional and what not, not only for themselves in their own sphere of action but for the Legislature and Executive also in their spheres, would make the Judiciary a despotic branch.”

And while Jefferson was the first president to have an issue with one of Marshall’s decisions, he was not the most famous. That would be Andrew Jackson, who responded to the Chief Justice’s decision to side with the Cherokee by completely ignoring it, leading to the Trail of Tears.

When Marshall died, it was Jackson, ironically, who had the honor of appointing a successor. True to form, Jackson followed the greatest chief justice with probably the worst: Roger Taney. Why was Taney the worst? Well, he made a ruling in a case we know as “Dred Scott.”

You may have heard of Dred Scott, the slave who tried to use the legal system and the Missouri Compromise to gain his freedom. When his case came before the Supreme Court, the justices could have simply decided whether or not Scott was legally bound to his master, but Chief Justice Taney had another idea. Taney wanted to use the case to settle the slavery question once and for all, and he wanted to settle it in favor of slave owners. Taney determined that not only did the federal government have no power to regulate slavery whatsoever, effectively destroying every compromise made since the country’s founding, but that African-Americans, whether slave or free, were not citizens of the United States.

Abraham Lincoln, who was then running for the U.S. Senate against Stephen Douglas, said:

“I have said, in substance, that the Dred Scott decision was, in part, based on assumed historical facts which were not really true … Chief Justice Taney, in delivering the opinion of the majority of the court, insists at great length that negroes were no part of the people who made, or for whom was made, the Declaration of Independence, or the Constitution of the United States.

“On the contrary, Judge Curtis, in his dissenting opinion, shows that in five of the then thirteen states … free negroes were voters, and, in proportion to their numbers, had the same part in making the Constitution that the white people had. He shows this with so much particularity as to leave no doubt of its truth…”

Lincoln was just one of many Americans outraged by the Supreme Court’s incorrect and biased decision. But within eight years, Lincoln would play a huge part in ending slavery in America, and would appoint Taney’s successor as chief justice. With the slaves emancipated through executive means, Lincoln wanted to preempt any questions the court would have about the Emancipation Proclamation and sought to pass a 13th Amendment to the Constitution, guaranteeing the end of slavery in the United States.

In addition to gaining their freedom, black Americans were given citizenship under the 14th Amendment, which also asserted, for the first time, the rights of individual citizens against the governments of the states. New justices on the Supreme Court, particularly John Marshall Harlan, determined that the 14th Amendment incorporated the Bill of Rights onto the states, so that no state government could abridge the rights of free speech, assembly, religion, etc. Before this amendment, if Virginia wanted an established Episcopal Church, the Commonwealth was constitutionally allowed to do so. Despite that intent, in the court’s first opportunities to rule on the new amendment, the Justices decided that, no, the 14th Amendment actually didn’t protect anyone against state governments. Well, except for America’s most valuable people: corporations.

In the Slaughter-House Cases, the court ruled that the “Privileges or Immunities Clause” of the 14th Amendment guaranteed to Americans only the rights offered by national citizenship, not state citizenship. And those rights of national citizenship were very limited. This paved the way for future cases, particularly the Civil Rights Cases, to state that the federal government had no business interfering in the rights of states to discriminate against their own citizens.

The decisions were met with outrage, at least across the north and among Republicans of the time. The 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments, known as the Reconstruction Amendments, were largely deconstructed, except when it came to freedom of contract. While the court claimed it had no power to stop states from discriminating against their own citizens, it did have the power to stop states from trying to regulate their own economies. See, if a business wants to hire someone to work for slave wages, state governments have no right to stop that business — at least according to Lochner v. New York, which saw the court siding with business against people, setting the standard we still see today. So sure, the amendments couldn’t prevent state governments from enacting Jim Crow laws, but they could stop them from enacting minimum wage and maximum workweek laws.

Perhaps the most infuriating thing about these cases is that most are still on the books. The Civil Rights Acts of the Lyndon Johnson Administration had to jump through Constitutional hoops and claim that Congress held the power to enact the new laws under the “Commerce Clause,” as opposed to the 14th Amendment, which is supposed to grant privileges and immunities of citizenship.

Lochner maintained a limited policing power for the federal government and set a precedent that was used by the court to strike down several pieces of New Deal legislation. President Franklin Roosevelt was no fan of the court’s actions, as he made clear in his 1937 State of the Union Address:

“The Judicial branch also is asked by the people to do its part in making democracy successful. We do not ask the Courts to call nonexistent powers into being, but we have a right to expect that conceded powers or those legitimately implied shall be made effective instruments for the common good.”

But following FDR’s landslide reelection victory in 1936, the court’s opinion seemed to change. West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish saw two justices alter their usual judicial stance and allow a Washington state minimum wage law to remain in effect. Many believe the two justices made the change in order to prevent Roosevelt from enacting his so-called “court-packing plan,” which called for the membership of the Supreme Court to change from nine to 15.

Essentially, FDR was the first President since Jackson to successfully counter the Supreme Court, and he did it without using Jackson’s hilariously illegal means of just ignoring them. But the Supreme Court is supposed to be a bit antagonistic toward the president and Congress. It exists to balance out the power of the government so that even those who write and execute the laws are subject to them. And the president and the Senate get a say in who serves on the court in the first place.

Of course, presidential appointments don’t usually change judicial philosophies of the court overnight. In fact, the idea of lifetime appointments was that the previous generation of leaders would continue to hold some sway over the current. These appointees would last for about a generation before the president could choose a replacement. Ronald Reagan, however, changed the game by appointing very young justices to the court, allowing his appointments to affect American law for much longer than had been standard. His successors have followed the pattern, with George W. Bush’s appointment for chief justice, John Roberts, being young enough to almost guarantee him another two decades at the court’s head.

And the Roberts Court continues the long-held American tradition of frustrating a large percentage of the population. Ultimately, the court is a good thing, but it is easy to see why people are calling for changes in the system. Citizens United and the Hobby Lobby case have opened the floodgates to potentially dangerous changes in American governance. Or, they could be what finally causes some things in the country to change for the better. Only time will tell.

But until then, don’t be shocked the next time the Supreme Court does something that you find infuriating. After all, it is what (some of) the Founders intended.

summer-reading

Round out summer with easy-reading presidential history

Reading history books is tough. Even the most voracious readers often find it difficult to dive into a history. History books have a tendency to be overly academic, and even fans of the subject may have a difficult time with these works. What follows is a list of presidential biographies that are mostly easy to read and teach history in a way that is simple to follow. These authors turn their revered subjects into human beings, complete with flaws, problems, and goals.

American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House by Jon Meacham

Andrew Jackson is a pretty controversial president, and Jon Meacham captures perfectly the profound, contradictory nature of the nation’s seventh chief executive. Jackson is credited for expanding the very scope of democracy, yet he ruled with an iron fist, spit in the face of the Supreme Court, and owned slaves. He was a rough, rugged, angry, and vicious man who could also shake hands and behave cordially with the elites of Washington. Jackson is known for forcefully removing the Cherokee from their lands, yet he adopted a native boy as his son. He hated violently, and he loved sincerely.

Meacham displays the contradictions of Jackson’s personality and the drama that defined him by dividing the book into chapters based on each soap-operatic episode of the man’s life. You are able to more easily understand Old Hickory’s nature by learning about his courtship and loss of his wife, Rachel, his feud and friendship with Thomas Hart Benton, the Peggy Eaton affair that led to the resignation of Jackson’s entire cabinet, the fight over the National Bank, and his vicious, personal disputes with John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay, and John C. Calhoun.

Meacham’s American Lion is a great read that displays the evolution of a nation through the lens of the life of one controversial man — a man who lived through the American Revolution and died trying to prevent a Civil War.

Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America by Garry Wills

Lincoln at Gettysburg is a much more intellectually challenging book than the rest on this list, but it is an important one to recommend. The book is short but dense, so take your time when reading this work.

Garry Wills sets out to explain the historical, political, philosophical, and even literary context of Abraham Lincoln’s famous speech on a hallowed Pennsylvania battleground. You will learn the influences on Lincoln’s mind, from Daniel Webster to Ralph Waldo Emerson, as well as his intentions when making the Address: Lincoln’s goal was to change the purpose of the war, to reclaim the Union’s status as righteous warriors from a Confederacy that was close to gaining help from European powers. And while Lincoln’s short speech was actually right in line with what was expected of him, it achieved a level of notoriety that revolutionized American literature and set the stage for writers like Mark Twain.

Wills makes you think harder about a speech that many Americans know snippets of without understanding the meaning behind the words. The book ties together 100 years of American history in dissecting a single 272-word speech by viewing it from every angle. The reading is demanding but also enlightening and incredibly satisfying.

Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard

When concocting a list of the most interesting presidents, few would rank James A. Garfield among the Top 30. But that is almost exclusively due to his short time as the nation’s leader. Candice Millard does a masterful job of explaining the story of Garfield’s presidency and its abrupt end at the hands of an assassin, making it a much more compelling tale than any history class has been able to tell.

Garfield, more than perhaps any other commander in chief, is a victim of boring history classes. To many, he is just a name in a list of 44 presidents. And Millard even highlights this fact to capture the true tragedy of the nation’s second presidential assassination: Garfield just didn’t have enough time to make a real impact. The assassin Charles Guiteau’s pulling of the trigger robbed us of a good man with good intentions who could have gone down in history as one of America’s greats.

This book is not just about Garfield. It is just as much a book about Guiteau and Alexander Graham Bell. They were all men on a mission: Garfield is determined to end the spoils system and the corruption running rampant in the government. Guiteau is on a mission to gain a government post, which he believes he deserves for a single speech in which he praised candidate Garfield — and when he is not awarded the job, he begins a new mission: to end the president’s life. Bell’s mission is to save the life of the president by quickly inventing an early version of the metal detector to track the bullet that came from Guiteau’s gun barrel; Garfield stays alive long enough for Bell to use his invention, but due to the doctor’s arrogance and monarchical control of the situation, Bell is unable to find the bullet.

Garfield’s America was in a state of change, and much like Meacham’s American Lion, Destiny of the Republic displays the country’s tremendous technological advances on display at the end of a presidency: Jackson was the first president to leave office in a train, and Garfield was the first president who could have been saved by modern science, including antisepsis, which was gaining popularity in other countries at the time.

The President and the Assassin: McKinley, Terror, and Empire at the Dawn of the American Century by Scott Miller

Much like Millard does with Garfield, Scott Miller makes President William McKinley interesting by framing his life alongside his assassin and the popular figures of the era. Unlike Guiteau, who was driven by madness, McKinley’s assassin, Leon Czolgosz, was driven by philosophy — and very much understood what he was doing by killing the president.

McKinley’s presidency marked many significant changes in America, including the end of non-intervention as U.S. foreign policy, the beginning of the American empire, and the expanse of American trade around the globe — all a result of the Spanish-American War. While the book doesn’t apologize for McKinley’s actions as president, it does explain them in a way that shows McKinley as a conflicted character who honestly believed he was doing what was best for the country and the world.

Czolgosz’s path is fascinating as well, as Miller looks at a man who truly believed in anarchism and set out to bring the world closer to that ideal. In many ways, Miller leads you to better understand Czolgosz and his crusade in an almost sympathetic light: McKinley was the president of the moneyed interests in the time of the robber barons, and his death did lead to the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt, who instituted sweeping reforms aimed at helping the middle and working classes. Certainly, killing the president was the wrong course, but Czolgosz’s actions really underscore the growing sentiments of the working class at the time.

1920: The Year of the Six Presidents by David Pietrusza

Want to learn about several presidents all at once? The Year of Six Presidents tells the story of, well, seven presidents. Six of them — Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, and Franklin D. Roosevelt — competed for the presidency in 1920, and a seventh, William Howard Taft, was awaiting the opportunity to join the Supreme Court.

David Pietrusza takes you on a journey through the lives of all seven men as they rise to greatness and attain their respective presidencies. Along the way, you will learn about the flaws and neuroses of each president, like Harding’s love for women and Teddy Roosevelt’s belief that everybody but him did a poor job as president.

Adding to the intriguing tale are the era’s defining issues, including Prohibition, the League of Nations, and women’s suffrage, with the election of 1920 being the first time in American history that women had the right to vote in all 48 states.

Pietrusza tells of Teddy Roosevelt, who was an early favorite to return to the Executive Mansion but died a year before the election; Wilson, who was suffering after a stroke but, as the incumbent, was certain he would win a precedent-breaking third term; and Hoover, who was riding a wave of popularity following his actions in Belgium during World War I but would not be able to secure his party’s nomination until 1928. Pietrusza tells the tale of 1920’s ultimate victors, the unlikely candidates Warren G. Harding and his running mate and successor Calvin Coolidge, along with their vanquished opponents, Al Smith and his running mate, the future president Franklin D. Roosevelt.

All seven Presidents featured in this book get their stories told, and all seven certainly seem more human when Pietrusza is done.

If you’re looking for some good reads that you’ll find both interesting and educational, check out these five books, read Lincoln’s twice, and see just how incredible — and flawed — these historical demigods really were.

the-shield

New era begins, boring one ends in professional wrestling

An era of professional wrestling is about to end, and we never even took the time to like it.

Triple H recently proclaimed a new “Reality Era” — although that will never be accepted by anyone to denote a time period in which Kane still exists. Nonetheless, a change is underway in WWE.

People tend to toss around the word “era” in wrestling pretty freely. The Hogan Era, the New Generation Era, the Attitude Era, the Ruthless Aggression Era, and the PG Era are generally accepted by fans. Most of these “eras” correspond to about a five-year timespan, but if the best way to define an era in professional wrestling is by the talent involved, I would argue that wrestling moves in decade-long cycles.

The eras here defined roughly correspond to WrestleManias, with the next era beginning at WrestleMania 31. They include the 1985-94, kid-friendly, Early WrestleMania Era, the 1995-2004, more mature, Attitude/Aggression Era, and the current era, beginning in 2005, which has been defined by a toned-down in-ring style and mostly interchangeable, bland wrestling characters.

These eras are easy to see in retrospect, with the next generation’s top stars usually debuting in the two years prior to its beginning. Hulk Hogan returned to WWF in 1983 and really hit his stride, along with the company, in 1985 with the first WrestleMania. The next decade was defined by campy storylines and the cheesy antics of the superhero and his villainous opponents. Hogan moved to World Championship Wrestling in 1993, taking his brand of entertainment with him, while WWF stayed the course with a more grounded but still family-friendly champion, Bret Hart, balanced by cartoonish personas such as Doink the Clown, Repo Man, Mantaur, and a silly zombie character called The Undertaker.

And then the wrestling world evolved and a new era began. WrestleMania X was the turning point, acting as the end of one era and the beginning of the next. Hogan was nowhere to be seen. Randy Savage wrestled his last match in WWF. And Hart, the underdog hero, conquered the cartoonish, xenophobia-inspired villain, Yokozuna, in the main event. But the event also saw the first nationally broadcast ladder match between Shawn Michaels and Razor Ramon, a match that would come to define much of the next decade.

WrestleMania XI did not bring a huge change in attitude for the company, but the new top stars of the decade were on full display. Ramon, Michaels, and Diesel were all featured prominently. In WCW, 1995 brought the rise of Brian Pillman and his “Loose Cannon” gimmick, the first dose of “realism” in WCW in some time. Within three years, the wrestling world completely changed, pushed by Extreme Championship Wrestling and a growing self-awareness and interconnectedness of the fans in the emerging Internet age. WWE and WCW adopted to the extreme style, with hard-hitting matches and curse-laden interviews. The new era tossed out caricatures in favor of edgy new top stars, headlined by D-Generation X, Stone Cold Steve Austin, and The Rock, and revamped, darker versions of old stars, such as the New World Order, the Crow version of Sting, and a dangerous biker character called The Undertaker.

Even as the Attitude Era and the Monday Night Wars ended in the early 2000s, the stars of the time and the mature nature held on, with the last remnants surfacing at WrestleMania XX. Like the show a decade prior, WrestleMania XX was a turning point. It heavily featured the top stars of the 1995-2004 era, including The Rock, Mick Foley, Bill Goldberg, Booker T, Michaels, and Triple H. But it also presented the WrestleMania debuts of John Cena, Randy Orton, and Batista. As Hart, the sport’s hardest working wrestler, stood tall at the end of WrestleMania X, so did Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit, the sport’s hardest working wrestlers, reign supreme at the end of WrestleMania XX.

And thus began the era which will soon end. WrestleMania 21 gave us Cena and Batista winning world championships and Orton facing off against The Undertaker. A new era of childish storylines with bland characters began. Within the next few years, WWE and Total Nonstop Action Wrestling introduced CM Punk, Daniel Bryan, Dolph Ziggler, Samoa Joe, and others who would fill out the roster of top stars for the era. To round out the main event scene, these new headliners were joined by a dangerous zombie character called The Undertaker.

It’s nearly useless to try to put a name to the 2005-2014 era because almost nothing happened. Sure, a few deserving men became world champions, and some of the greatest wrestlers of all time retired, but outside of a few moments with a few true stars, this last decade was more about stagnation rather than innovation.

Yet there is still a sadness that comes with the realization that an era is about to end. Punk, whose WWE career could easily be made into a three-hour highlight video, has vanished. There are rumors that Cena, the company’s standard bearer and an honestly-good-to-great wrestler and megastar, will finally make the move to a Hollywood career now that his injuries are catching up with him. Batista, who was already gone for a few years, has an in-ring career that is limited at best. Orton will stick around, filling in the Triple H role of elder statesman that remained long after he stopped being interesting. Bryan, the sport’s hardest working wrestler, stood tall at the end of WrestleMania XXX, signaling the end of the last era, though he will hopefully stick around long enough to rule WrestleMania again.

The next generation’s top stars are already rising to the top. And unlike any of the prospects of the last eight years, these young guns aren’t being stonewalled from reaching the main event. In fact, the company seems absolutely dead-set on establishing the next generation of headliners. Roman Reigns has become the company’s pet project and is being positioned as the company’s next Cena (which is exactly what the company does not need right now). His former partners in The Shield, Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose, are going to be right there with him at the top of the company, filling out this decade’s triumvirate, as Cena, Orton, and Batista did before them. The rest of the main event scene will change at times over the next 10 years, and some of the new additions may become even bigger stars than the chosen ones, as Punk eclipsed Batista in the last decade. But The Shield will remain the consistent part of WWE’s new era. Joining them, as always, will be the top “attraction” star, a dangerous, unholy character called … Bray Wyatt.

Yes, with the end of The Streak (which I still can’t say aloud), we seem to have finally seen the last of the Last Outlaw. The Undertaker is such a legend that he cannot be defined by eras. The man rose above it all and was among the top stars in three decades. His contributions to professional wrestling can never be matched.

But in the previous era, The Undertaker was an obvious anomaly: the only interesting character in a time of six-pack abs and cliches. The true indication that we are entering a new time in professional wrestling is the change in top prospects. No longer does everyone deemed to have potential look like Shawn O’Hare, Mark Jindrak, Luther Reigns, or a million other supposed “future world champions.” Reigns is big, sure, but he’s being joined by Rollins, who, though in incredible shape, is more well-known for his wrestling ability than his biceps, and Ambrose, who wears a wife-beater and jeans to the ring and looks like the craziest guy to step in the squared circle since Cactus Jack.

And most importantly, there is Wyatt. Wyatt is the first man to have a truly transcendent gimmick since The Undertaker, and that is high praise. Whether or not the gimmick has the staying power of Mark Calaway’s is up to young Windham Rotunda and his ability to adapt. As a member of wrestling royalty and an incredible power on the microphone, Wyatt appears to be here to stay. And Monday Night Raw will be much more interesting because of it.

If this new era of wrestling evolves to fit the characters we see now, as opposed to molding the characters to fit a tame, cookie-cutter idea of what “sports entertainment” should be, then we can expect a tremendous next decade. We are in for an interesting ride with the top of the card featuring new stars in The Shield and Wyatt, plus holdover stars like Orton and Bryan, and a revolving door of other main event talent such as Cesaro, Wade Barrett, and Ziggler — plus the future megastar that is Sami Zayn, whom I predict will see an incredible grassroots movement in his favor in the coming years. WWE just has to be sure to protect these men for the time being, instead of rushing potential money matches. Saving Rollins versus Ambrose was a good start, but it needs to continue.

With few exceptions, usually involving Punk, Bryan, Michaels, and The Undertaker, professional wrestling on the national level has been incredibly dull for the last decade. Hopefully, this new era will change things, and WWE will seize the opportunities available to them with one of the most impressive rosters of talent ever assembled.

Please, WWE, use what you have, and don’t hold back new signings like KENTA and Prince Devitt because you think you’ve already found your franchise player. Let your workers work, and you can begin counting your money again. With the new WWE Network changing the business model, it’s easy to see how we are entering a new era of professional wrestling.

legendary

Legendary Pictures falls far short of its name

It’s hard for me to find a movie objectionable. I enjoyed the new Spider-Man movie. The RoboCop reboot was entertaining. I’m even a strong advocate for the entire Star Wars prequel trilogy.

In fact, Curiata.com has gone to bat for many unpopular movies that have been given a bad rap due to high expectations, nostalgia, or simple unfairness. We’ve defended movies as widely panned as X3: The Last Stand and the Transformers trilogy.

But there is one company that places its logo on every movie I have had an issue with for the last few years. That company is Legendary Pictures.

Legendary Pictures has been around since 2000, and, for most of that time, the company has been in partnership with Warner Brothers. Warner Brothers has made plenty of mistakes on its own, but the company’s partnership with Legendary has truly resulted in nothing but wasted opportunities.

Outside of the movies directed by Christopher Nolan (the Dark Knight trilogy of 2005-2012 and Inception), the list of movies released by Legendary reads like a who’s who of terribly underwhelming attempts at cinema. Included on this list are Sucker Punch, Watchmen, Man of Steel, Pacific Rim, and the new Godzilla. And only three of them can be blamed on Zack Snyder.

Essentially, Legendary Pictures is where effects-driven movies go to receive an awful script. Want to make a movie about a daydreaming sex slave and her anime adventures? Sure, Mr. Snyder, have all the money you need. Just make sure you make it look fake and cartoony while talking about the tragedy of lobotomies. The giant robots with claymores will really drive home the point that sex slavery is terrible.

And, obviously, it’s a smart idea to give Snyder free reign with his movies. 300 was great, after all. Of course, I was 15 when I first saw it, but I’m sure there was nothing about being a teenager that made me think an army of men that made Hulk Hogan look tiny slaying monstrous Persians was cool.

Snyder certainly didn’t ruin The Watchmen by completely missing Alan Moore’s point. Sure, Moore was trying to deconstruct the superhero genre by showing how violent the whole thing would look if it were real, while Snyder made a movie with totally badass slow-motion fight scenes and graphic filters that made it look super-cool — but at least the movie was a word-for-word adaptation of the graphic novel.

And I’m glad Warner Brothers and Legendary Pictures were able to learn from the overwhelming fan outrage over the treatment of Watchmen and decided to never use Snyder again. Oh, wait. They handed him the reigns to Superman and all of its sequels, including a Justice League movie.

Nevermind the fact that Man of Steel was awful and, again, completely missed the point. Superman, though he has been a more conflicted character since the 1986 reboot, still does not kill. It is pretty much the only compelling thing about an alien with god-like powers that allow him to do nearly anything he wants. Snyder and his partner in nerd-crime, David S. Goyer, decided it would be better to have Kal-El kill his first opponent ever, as long as he felt really bad about it for seven seconds. Nevermind the thousands, likely millions, of people that he killed when indiscriminately punching General Zod through skyscrapers. I’m sure glad Superman doesn’t value human life or anything.

But Snyder isn’t the only problem with these movies. After all, he had nothing to do with Pacific Rim or the new Godzilla movie. Legendary did, though. You can tell, because all Legendary movies look the same. If a movie has a vague blue-ish or sepia tone, the CGI looks unrealistic, and the plot makes no sense at all — or is completely cliche — it’s a Legendary movie.

Pacific Rim had so much potential to be completely awesome. I am the type of guy who lists Transformers 3 among my favorite movies of all-time, right there with Good Will Hunting. So a movie about giant robots fighting in an insane special-effects spectacle is right up my alley. Pacific Rim was terrible though. The robots looked like cartoons. The kaiju lacked detail. The science made no practical sense. And why did it take two hours of screen time for the heroes to realize their robot could wield a sword that just happened to be able to cut through the skin of the kaiju? You would think the guy from Sons of Anarchy would be a better defender of Earth than that.

The monsters of Pacific Rim looked so fake that I was unsure whether I was watching a new movie or an early cut of Jurassic Park before Spielberg found out what actual dinosaurs looked like. And, of course, it rained the whole time. Just like it does in every Legendary Pictures movie — as if the sheen of the rain will hide the fact that the company put no time into detailing their monsters.

But Legendary has made some progress. The new Godzilla doesn’t look as fake as the kaiju of Pacific Rim. They clearly put time into detailing his scales and grotesque appearance. Too bad they didn’t put the same effort into the enemy M.U.T.O. monsters Godzilla fought. Not that it matters in the end. Even if they all looked like masterpieces out of the Avatar movie, the plot was still terribly cliched and boring.

If you’ve seen one movie about a white military guy fighting some unheard of, existential threat, you’ve seen them all. At least the Transformers movies had Shia LaBeouf, annoying as he is, to balance out all of the one-dimensional military characters. Godzilla does not.

Early on, you’re left with the impression that the human story of Godzilla is going to be about the conflict between the military character and his father, played by Bryan Cranston. Cranston steals the show, making the human element of the movie relatable and tragic. That lasts about 20 minutes. The rest of the movie is about the future Quicksilver trying to stop the monsters so that he can return to his wife, the future Scarlet Witch, and their obligatory military child. Of course, his wife is also a nurse so that she can be vaguely heroic during the giant fight scenes so as to avoid charges of sexism.

And all of this would be fine if we were at least getting an epic monster battle in San Francisco, but we hardly got that. The movie kept cutting away whenever the fight started getting good. What we got instead were a few scenes of Godzilla growling at us. Wow. It makes me long for the days when Ferris Bueller tried to stop the monster from laying eggs in Madison Square Garden. It would certainly be better than watching Kick-Ass fail as much as he did in the actual Kick-Ass movie.

Legendary Pictures, I want to know what’s up. Watchmen, Man of Steel, Pacific Rim, and Godzilla had unlimited potential to be great movies. And I am certainly easy to please. So what went wrong? Why is it that your movies are all about popcorn and explosions when Marvel and Lucasfilm have been able to release much more compelling action-adventure flicks? Do you still subscribe to the idea that big budget movies can’t be smart?

I resent that idea. And I resent your company for your failure to live up to your potential.

I will give Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice a chance to change my mind, but if you somehow manage to make Joel Schumacher’s movies look good by comparison, I promise I will do everything I can to make sure no one ever sees another Legendary movie.