Category Archives: movies

Virtues of X-Men: The Last Stand often overlooked

It has always surprised me that fans of the X-Men films really don’t like the third installment, X-Men: The Last Stand. Admitting that you like X-Men 3 is enough to get you sidelong looks from your fellow nerds at best and scathing criticism about your nerd-cred and taste in films at worst. Say that you enjoyed The Last Stand in the company of your fellow comic-book fans at your own risk.

But with X-Men: Days of Future Past making its way to theaters, I felt it was time to revisit the third film in the franchise and talk about what it does right and why I like it. And I don’t mean that I like it in comparison to, say, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, a film that deserves the vitriol heaped upon it by fans (a proper destruction of which warrants an article in itself). I think The Last Stand deserves its place among the X-film pantheon and is, in fact, the perfect film to set up the translation of the iconic “Days of Future Past” storyline from page to screen.

There are legitimate criticisms leveled at The Last Stand. I really don’t think Halle Berry is a strong enough actress to pull off her role as Storm, successor to the leadership of the X-Men. James Marsden’s Cyclops and Ben Foster’s Angel were both chronically underused. This is particularly regrettable with regards to Angel, a character that could have given us some serious insight into the world created by this film.

I really think the producers of X3 dropped the ball on Vinnie Jones’ portrayal of the Juggernaut. There were any number of other, just as recognizable, bruisers in the pages of the X-Men comics that would have been easier to translate to the screen. The Juggernaut has a complex relationship with Professor X and, to boot, isn’t even really a mutant; his powers derive instead from the Crimson Gem of Cyttorak. While I like the character in the comics, I don’t think he has a place in the film universe.

The same can be said (and has been by my colleague Charissa) of the incredibly abbreviated version of the Phoenix sagas that begins in X2 and concludes in X3. There is no space travel, no Shi’ar, really none of the defining aspects of that storyline outside of Jean Grey’s incredible psychic powers. But that really doesn’t bother me as much.

That might come as a surprise to you. After all, one of the marks of the true nerd is the desire to be technically correct, because it is the best kind of correct. But if you enjoyed the Lord of the Rings films despite the innumerable differences between the book and the movies, then you really don’t have a leg to stand on with this complaint. Film and comics are different mediums with different rules.

It would take a lot of time and effort to do an accurate adaptation of the original and Dark Phoenix sagas, and I don’t blame the writers and the director for opting to take a shorter route, less grounded in comic book lore. The Phoenix sagas are cosmic stories, and the X-Men movies have been about human stories: a group of people who are born different, trying to make their way in a world that doesn’t want to treat them as human. X3 director Brett Ratner made the right choice here, and because of that choice, the movie remains thematically consistent with the other entries in the franchise.

Perhaps Dark Phoenix should have been left out of the third film altogether, but I don’t want to dwell on what The Last Stand does wrong. Let’s look instead at what it does right.

First, this movie sets up and connects the sundry X-Men films. Putting aside the atrocious Origins: Wolverine film, the X-Men film series has had two acts so far, and with the release of Days of Future Past, we will be moving on to a third. X3 acts as the bridge from the prequels, through the original trilogy, and into the next era. It introduces elements of the Future Past saga: Trask and the Sentinels show up here, and the plot includes several references to the massive power of mutants, which makes a good connection to the newest film. X3 also segues directly into the rather enjoyable The Wolverine, which is a really fine film that primes Wolverine’s character development for Days of Future Past.

The relationship between Professor X and Magneto is handled wonderfully in The Last Stand, and the groundwork is laid for the first-act prequel X-Men: First Class. While that film would explore the beginnings of the friendship between the two mutant leaders, X3 explores the endings, showing a troubled Professor X who has to live with the consequences of his choices and a Magneto who is finally depicted on screen as the mesmerizing and influential leader of a violent revolution.

This character exploration leads directly to another thing X3 does very well. The actors, on the whole, absolutely nail their characters. I love Kelsey Grammar as Beast (complete with an “Oh, my stars and garters!” line). I think Hugh Jackman is dead-on with his Wolverine. I love the conflicted Professor X and the charismatic and driven Magneto. I love the near endless little shout-outs to the X-Men universe in the form of the extended cast of mutants. And the way Bobby Drake finally lays the smackdown on Pyro is just epic.

The action sequences are top-notch. The fight in Jean Grey’s house, the subtle and effective depiction of Magneto’s convoy takedown, the incredibly rewarding and exciting final conflict — each action sequence is fast and exciting and chockablock full of mutant powers and comic-book references. I particularly enjoyed the Fastball Special (a true X-Men classic) and the casual yet overwhelming power of Magneto. The characters move in a way the evokes the comic book action sequences, and I get a thrill watching Beast somersault through a battlefield or Bobby Drake do the full Iceman transformation.

I get that The Last Stand is not as cerebral as some people might have liked, and it is definitely aiming more for “big-budget action flick” than for “accurate-as-can-be comic book film,” but it retains elements of that intellectual, questioning nature, and it does something that no other film in the X-Men franchise had yet done: It shows, for the first time, that this is a world where there are mutants who aren’t X-Men or members of the Brotherhood. The film portrays the mutant community in a moment of crisis, and that’s what makes it brilliant.

The first two X-Men films are essentially superhero movies. Sure, the superheroes are born with their powers instead of getting them from gamma radiation or power armor or a super soldier serum, but they still pretty much use those powers to fight the bad guy who wants to do bad things. Those films are either conflicts between the Brotherhood and the X-Men or between a small group of mutants and a shadowy government agency. We never get a sense of the rest of mutant-kind.

With the central conflict of The Last Stand revolving around the so-called “mutant cure,” Ratner had a reason to depict the larger mutant community. Thats what makes X3 special. Whereas the other films are full of mutants who are heroes and villains, many of the mutants in The Last Stand are citizens, or students, or politicians, or community activists. We get to see how the cure impacts the world beyond the scope of super-powered combat and action. We get to see how this community reacts to the presence of a drug that can take their mutation away. They wrestle with the implications and challenges of this new reality.

The X-Men provide us with a way to look at how we treat the “Other” and the outsider, the marginalized and the misrepresented. By allowing us to see the broader scope of the mutant community, by turning them into people and not just heroes and villains, we are forced to reckon with the question of how we would use a drug that would change the Other. And when that X-factor that we seek to change is a source of potentially overwhelming power, we have to ask ourselves if we want to change the Other to make them more like us … or to take their power away so they don’t threaten our way of life.

While The Last Stand is far from a deep and philosophical look at how we treat our fellow man, it does a great job of creating an exciting and immersive film that highlights a crucial aspect of the human condition. If you plan on catching Days of Future Past in theaters this weekend, you may want to reacquaint yourself with this movie. You just might like it better the second time around.

X-Men: The Last Stand ruined Dark Phoenix Saga

After seeing Captain America: The Winter Soldier with friends, we spent some time discussing how well Marvel has done creating the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and how well they’ve adapted the various Avengers heroes. This led to a discussion about some other comic book films that were much more disappointing. At the top of my list: X-Men: The Last Stand.

To give you some context: I am a big X-Men fan. Prior to the creation of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I would say the X-Men were probably my favorite Marvel characters. I confess that I have not read every issue of every X-related series — though I would love to someday. However, when I was in elementary school, I frequently borrowed comics from a friend, and we would often get into debates about who was the coolest X-Man. We would also fantasize about our dream casting for an X-Men movie, if one were ever made. (I’m pretty sure Patrick Stewart is the only actor from our list who actually made it into a film, but come on, who else would you cast as Charles Xavier?)

X-Men finally made it to movie theaters about six years after the height of my comic book craze, but I was still excited to see my favorite heroes on the big screen. I was so excited that I was willing to give the creators the benefit of the doubt and forgive them for things like altering Wolverine’s height (because Hugh Jackman), excluding Beast and Angel from that first movie while making Iceman much younger than Cyclops or Jean Grey despite the fact they were all founding members of the team, and pretty much everything about Anna Paquin. (I’m sorry, I have nothing against Paquin — she is terrific in True Blood — but Paquin in the role of Rogue, a character I love, just bothers me).

Despite these complaints, I really enjoyed the first film, and X2 wasn’t bad either. In fact, I got really excited at the end of the second movie, because I recognized they were setting the stage for the Phoenix to appear in the third film. At the time, I had no idea which incarnation of the Phoenix we would see, but I was looking forward to watching what was arguably one of the best X-Men storylines ever written translated to the big screen.

If you’ve been following my column, you may recall a few weeks ago when I wrote about trying to judge books and movies separately lest you be inevitably unhappy with every film adaptation. Perhaps if I had taken my own advice while watching X-Men 3, I wouldn’t have been nearly as disappointed. Then again, The Last Stand is more likely one of those exceptions that I just can’t forgive.

After viewing The Last Stand, I remember leaving the theater with my brother, both of us extremely disappointed with the film. One of his comments was that it was a great action film about people with superpowers, but it was not a good X-Men movie. I’m inclined to agree.

X3 tramples all over the X-Men lore that laid the groundwork for the films to be made in the first place. I was very frustrated that the writers killed Professor X and, even more so, Cyclops. The field leader of the team — the one who is supposed to actually outlive Jean, many times, in the comics — gets killed off-screen early in the movie with very little fanfare. But my real problem with the film was in how it handled the Dark Phoenix storyline — or more like how it didn’t handle it.

As I stated earlier, I haven’t read all the X-Men comics, and at the time I first saw X3, I hadn’t read “The Dark Phoenix Saga.” Nonetheless, I was pretty familiar with the general plot and knew that what they had shown in the film was not anything close to the original story. After reading the actual comics, I only got more frustrated with the liberties the film took.

I understand that the entire Phoenix storyline, from the time Jean Grey became the Phoenix until she died, encompasses several years’ worth of comics. It’s not an arc that could easily be told in a single film. I even understand going straight to Dark Phoenix and never showing us the good side of the Phoenix power. The problem lies in the fact that it seems like director Brett Ratner and the screenwriters only wanted an all-powerful weapon for Magneto to wield so they shoehorned Dark Phoenix into that role.

Jean Grey’s death in X2 and resurrection as the Phoenix in X3 are very similar to the story described in Uncanny X-Men issue no. 101, only instead of taking on radiation while landing a spacecraft as in the comics, Jean sacrifices herself while trying to hold back a flood long enough for her friends to take off in the Blackbird. This is the only way in which it feels like the film’s producers were attempting to incorporate anything from the original storyline into the movies.

Dark Phoenix was an incredibly powerful being. As The Watcher says at the end of Uncanny X-Men issue no. 137, “She had only to think, and that thought would become instant reality.” In the comics, Dark Phoenix is a force of nature; she wields limitless power and is perfectly aware of how to use that power. She consumes stars and destroys worlds in order to feed this power; she’s nearly unstoppable. Yet, in X-Men 3, she is made subservient.

Dark Phoenix kills Xavier because she thinks the Professor is trying to control her, but then she turns and allows Magneto to actually manipulate and control her. Despite being the most powerful mutant in Magneto’s arsenal, Phoenix spends most of the final battle observing before she begins to unleash her full strength, only after Magneto has been neutralized. While in the comics she is completely independent and a threat in her own right, in the films she needs to have someone to follow.

Perhaps one of most controversial changes to the storyline — and the part that bothered me the most — is the death of Dark Phoenix. In the original comic, the X-Men temporarily subdue Dark Phoenix using a device created by the Beast. Jean gains control of herself for a brief moment and she begs Wolverine to kill her, but he hesitates and Dark Phoenix once again takes over. Near the end of Uncanny X-Men no. 136, Xavier engages in a psychic battle with Dark Phoenix and, with the help of Jean’s suppressed consciousness, is able to build up a wall around Dark Phoenix in Jean’s mind, suppressing the malevolent entity. However, the Professor’s solution is not permanent: Dark Phoenix begins to reemerge in the next issue. This time, before Jean completely loses control, she takes her own life in order to save the lives of her friends and the universe.

Jean Grey’s sacrifice is the ultimate depiction of love and strength. Instead of once again becoming Dark Phoenix and being responsible for countless more deaths, Jean takes control of her destiny and chooses to defeat the evil within no matter the cost. However, in the on-screen version, Jean was robbed of this noble act. Instead, Jean dies at the hands (claws?) of Wolverine, thus taking a strong and noble act of female empowerment and turning it into another example of male dominance.

This effect may have been unintentional on the part of the writers. I’m sure this ending was chosen for its drama, but the change still sends the message that Jean, though able to kill anyone with no more than a thought, is not strong enough to defeat Dark Phoenix. She needs someone else to do it for her, and that someone just happens to be one of the most masculine characters in the movie.

Another problem I have with this sequence of events is the focus on Wolverine in general. I understand that Wolverine had become the breakout star of the X-Men franchise, and don’t get me wrong: I like Wolverine and I love Jackman. But Wolverine has become the face of the X-Men and the star of these films, and that simply shouldn’t be the case. The X-Men are, first and foremost, a team, and no one character should stand out more than any other. If anyone should receive top billing, it is the leader of the team: Cyclops. This shift in emphasis to Wolverine added to my frustration that Cyclops was killed within the first half hour of the third movie and, consequently, doesn’t even appear in the final battle.

Basically, Dark Phoenix is used as a subplot in this film, taking a backseat to the mutant cure storyline, which seems like a huge waste of one of the best arcs in Marvel history. “The Dark Phoenix Saga” did not receive the attention or focus it deserved in this film, and probably shouldn’t have been squeezed into the story at all. Imagine the separate compelling, blockbuster film series that could have been developed with proper treatment of the saga.

As my colleague John has elaborated on in his defense of X-Men: The Last Stand, the film had some good moments. (Kelsey Grammer as the Beast is one of the best parts of the movie.) In fact, if you were to take the Dark Phoenix storyline out of the movie entirely, it probably would have been decent, and I certainly would have enjoyed it more. The final battle sequence was well done, and I enjoyed the fight between Iceman and Pyro — particularly the moment when Iceman finally becomes the completely frozen version of himself.

Needless to say, X-Men: The Last Stand was a huge letdown for me. However, X-Men: First Class restored some of my faith in the franchise, and I’m cautiously optimistic that X-Men: Days of Future Past — despite the decision to once again put Wolverine front and center, taking over Kitty Pryde’s role in the original storyline — will not disappoint.

X-Men portray historic, ongoing civil rights struggles

In a previous Nerd/Wise article, I explained why comic books and graphic novels are unfairly criticized and should be viewed as a form of modern art and literature. That discussion was limited to more unique works in graphic literature, ignoring the superhero genre that has come to define the medium. Today, we give superheroes their due by looking at how they can be used to tell complex, real stories. Specifically, we look at the X-Men and the allegory of civil rights, starting with its allusions to the African-American Civil Rights Movement and moving on to today’s references to the push for LGBT rights.

In 1963, Stan Lee, legendary creator of almost all of our most famous heroes, was running thin on ideas for origin stories and, in a bout of laziness, decided to create a team of heroes who were simply born with their powers. Ironically, this decision created the most compelling trait ever tacked onto a superhero team. The X-Men were heroes, like Spider-Man, because they chose to be, and chose to use their gifts for the betterment of mankind. Unlike Superman, they weren’t deified and honored but marginalized and feared.

Since (Uncanny) X-Men #1, this has been what makes the X heroes unique. They didn’t ask for their gifts, but they have to deal with them. And as such, they became the stand-in for every person who has ever felt marginalized for traits beyond their control, whether it be skin tone, gender, or sexual orientation.

The real world shows us that it is difficult to come to terms with the qualities we bear for which society chooses to judge us. Some of us are unable to handle this pressure, and we seek an outlet for our frustration. Sometimes, that frustration is let out through art or music, but many times, it can lead to outbursts of violence. Those of us who feel marginalized need the guidance of those who relate and understand our problems and can offer direction. In the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, the African-American community chose a leader in Martin Luther King Jr. The X-Men were given Professor Charles Xavier.

Professor X, the mentor and leader of the X-Men, faced discrimination his entire life — not necessarily for being a mutant, which he could easily hide, but for being a quadriplegic. Professor Xavier, like King, was proof that an educated man with a vision could make a difference. Both men guided the marginalized, gave value to the voices of the unheard, and spoke truth to power while offering a vision of peace. Obviously, there are some differences. King never trained the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to fight giant robots bent on his peoples’ destruction in the streets of New York, but the similarities are still worth noting.

On the other side of the coin exists Magneto, who, for most of his history in the comic books, was the leader of the Brotherhood of (Evil) Mutants. While Professor X appealed to the better angels of our nature, Magneto appealed to the more likely response from people who have spent their lives oppressed and hated. Magneto, as leader of the Brotherhood, offered mutants a chance to retaliate against human hatred. Instead of pushing his followers to win over the hearts and minds of humanity, Magneto told them they were superior, they were ascendent, they were meant to replace homo sapiens.

Magneto began as a more simplistic villain, even outright calling the Brotherhood “evil,” but he eventually evolved into a nuanced and accessible character, thanks primarily to the tremendous work of X-Men godfather Chris Claremont. Magneto was revealed to be a Holocaust survivor, and his hatred of humanity can be better understood in this light. He has already seen what humans will do to the “other,” and he refuses to allow it to happen again.

It’s easy to see the appeal of Magneto’s message — except for the mass genocide parts, at least. Magneto’s later characterizations, including those beautifully portrayed on the silver screen by Ian McKellen and Michael Fassbender, show him as a militant mutant advocate but not an inherently evil man. He appeals to the young men and women who are sick of the status quo and see that the entire system is flawed and biased against them. To them, the problem can not be fixed through gradual change and education but by tearing the whole system down. Philosophically, this isn’t necessarily wrong; sometimes, a revolution is necessary to fix humanity’s mistakes. The problem is when this is taken to its logical extreme and philosophy begets violence.

Magneto has been compared to Malcolm X for his “by any means necessary” approach. Perhaps this is unfair to the man and to the character, but it is obvious that Malcolm X, Elijah Muhammad, and the Nation of Islam at least inspired much of Magneto and the Brotherhood’s characterization. The militancy, the rhetoric, and the desire to separate mutantkind from humanity are lifted from the Nation of Islam and their push for separation of the races.

The X team has historically been very diverse. Since Giant-Size X-Men #1, the team has had an international flavor. Joining Scott Summers and Jean Grey were the Canadian Wolverine, the German Nightcrawler, the Soviet Colossus (in the middle of the Cold War), and Storm, who was born in New York City but raised on the African continent.

This second X team was introduced in 1975, when even including an African-American superhero was still controversial. Even more unique was that Storm’s character was not defined by her “blackness”; she was a character in her own right, with an interesting origin story and traits unique to her — something incredibly rare for a woman superhero, let alone a black woman superhero.

Despite the team’s ethnic diversity, Xavier’s new gang of uncanny heroes often dealt with problems more appropriate for a cosmic opera than a civil rights allegory. However, Claremont’s skills as X-Men writer knew no bounds, and he managed to create an enduring story that appealed to fans of both science fiction and political allegory.

The upcoming X-Men movie, Days of Future Past, is based on the comic book of the same name about a dystopian future in which mutants have been hunted down and placed in internment camps. The story is the realization of Magneto’s nightmare: a second holocaust for his people. The Sentinels, giant mutant-hunting robots, seek out the former X-Men and capture or murder them ruthlessly, strictly because of their X-gene. This potential future is a reminder of everything the X-Men have to fight against. They are being destroyed strictly for being different, like the Jews of the 1930s and 40s. They are feared without reason, like many of those put through the communist trials of the early Cold War era.

And this future seems very possible in the comic book world Marvel had created by 1980. The mutants were being marginalized since their kind had first been known to the world. They had been called “mutie” and attacked by mobs. Despite doing everything right, they never seemed to make much progress.

The X-Men have evolved over the years and have taken on the characteristics of each new group being marginalized by the American mainstream. At times, they are derided as enemies of God and demons incarnate, corrupting society with their sinful ways, like the LGBT community of today. They’ve been told to stay in the closet about their powers and asked to simply “stop being a mutant,” like Iceman was in X2. And in Joss Whedon’s “Gifted” story line, scientists created a “cure,” to which the mutant community asked, “Does that mean we have a disease?”

Since 9/11, the X-Men have taken on the burden shared by Muslim-Americans. Should they be judged for the errors of others? Should all Muslims be feared and marginalized because of a few extremists? Should good, tax-paying mutants be feared and marginalized because of a few mutant terrorists?

The X-Men teach us about ourselves. They bring into focus our fears and our prejudices and ask us to rethink what we claim to already know. They show us that the world isn’t always black and white, even in a medium that was built on black and white morality tales. Are the X-Men perfect? No. They make mistakes. Often tragic ones. And many times, their dealings with the government create morally ambiguous situations in which we are left to believe that both sides are right. They challenge us. Hopefully, they continue to do so, and future generations can find themselves questioning their world thanks to the brilliant stories told about the Uncanny X-Men.

‘Sideways Effect’ pushed Pinot Noir into American cellars

There’s probably no other wine that has benefited from pop culture more than Pinot Noir. Rex Pickett’s buddy comedy novel Sideways and the Alexander Payne movie it inspired had a significant impact on Pinot Noir sales in North America and on wine consumption in general.

For those who haven’t seen the movie or read the book, Sideways is the story of two friends, Miles and Jack, played in the film brilliantly by Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church, traveling through the Santa Ynez Valley for “one last hurrah” before Jack gets married. The story ends up as a modern-day comedy of errors, focusing on the clash between Miles, who is focused on tasting wine and relaxing, and Jack, who would prefer to be flirting, womanizing, and having a fling or two before his wedding.

Miles, who is a serious wine aficionado, teaches Jack about wine along the way, and we learn about his obsession with Pinot Noir: “It’s thin-skinned, temperamental, ripens early. It’s, you know, it’s not a survivor like Cabernet, which can just grow anywhere and thrive even when it’s neglected. No, Pinot needs constant care and attention, you know? And in fact it can only grow in these really specific, little, tucked away corners of the world. And, and only the most patient and nurturing of growers can do it, really. Only somebody who really takes the time to understand Pinot’s potential can then coax it into its fullest expression. Then, I mean, oh its flavors, they’re just the most haunting and brilliant and thrilling and subtle and ancient on the planet.” The movie was a hit at domestic box offices, and in the few years following the film’s release, Pinot Noir sales saw significant increases.

We also learn in the film of Miles’ distaste for Merlot, as at one point he screams: “If anyone orders Merlot, I am leaving. I am not drinking f***ing Merlot!” This, too, altered U.S. wine sales: there was a noticeable decline in Merlot sales after the film’s release. The increased popularity of Pinot Noir, along with the decrease in Merlot, was dubbed “The Sideways Effect” by many in the wine industry. In more recent years, the effect has leveled off, with Merlot regaining the ground it had lost.

Ironically, Merlot and Pinot Noir are two wines that are commonly suggested for novice wine drinkers to try. They are both typically low in tannins, which cause a bitter, cotton-mouth sensation — a quality commonly disliked by those trying red wine for the first time. Both wines are also typically fruit-forward, meaning the flavors that stand out the most are fruit characteristics, like cherries in Pinot Noir and dark berries and plum in Merlot. Yet Miles is enraptured by the former and detests the latter.

Pinot Noir has an interesting status in the wine world. Serious winos sometimes say that you “graduate” to Pinot Noir from other, less sophisticated red wines. How can Pinot Noir be a good wine for novice drinkers but also be the prized wine of wine snobs?

The answer has to do with the less obvious flavors, the subtleties and nuances that an experienced palate can detect. While the typical tastes of Pinot are easy for inexperienced wine drinkers to enjoy, it’s the flavors that you find when you get past the obvious that truly fascinate winos. Pinot Noir is usually not powerful like Cabernet Sauvignon and is typically never a “fruit bomb” like an Aussie Shiraz. It is light- or, at most, medium-bodied and has delicate rather than in-your-face fruit flavors. Cherries, cola, and earthy flavors are most commonly associated with Pinot Noir, but descriptions often also include red fruits like raspberries and cranberries, as well as herbs, spices, caramel, leather, and mushrooms.

The most famous region for Pinot Noir is in Burgundy, France. This also leads to some astonishingly high prices, which is why I’ve chosen to leave Burgundy aside for now. Pinot Noir is also grown in another French region, Alsace, along the border with Germany where acidic white wines otherwise dominate. Trimbach’s Pinot Noir Reserve is a high-quality offering priced reasonably. The nose is beautiful and “outdoorsy” with floral and spice components, along with a forest aroma, like damp leaves in the woods. There are abundant cherry and cranberry flavors on the palate, with a little earthiness and very subtle tannins.

In the United States, California’s cooler growing areas produce some fantastic Pinot Noir, including along the Central Coast and in the Russian River Valley / Sonoma County regions. As with most California wines, the flavors are bigger and bolder than those from France. The 2012 La Crema Pinot Noir from Sonoma is a really solid wine for the price and is a great choice to drink at home or to bring along to a dinner party. It is also widely available, given its place within the Kendall Jackson wine empire. I like the cherry cola component to this wine, along with ripe berries, a hint of coffee, spice, and oak.

In Oregon, Pinot Noir is truly king — and very popular these days, particularly in the Willamette Valley. Most Oregon Pinot is not cheap, however, perhaps due to its high demand. The wines are typically bolder than those from Europe but more delicate than California’s, sometimes with a beautiful tartness. Left Coast Cellars’ 2011 “Cali’s Cuvee” Pinot Noir is an affordable example, with a nose of berries, mint, oak, and a hint of chocolate. The palate has plenty of black cherry, plum, and pomegranate, but the twist is the astringent, fresh-brewed tea on the finish.

You’ll find plenty of Pinot Noir outside these areas, but almost always from temperate or cool climate regions. Excellent bottles are easily found from Germany, Northern Italy, New Zealand, and the Finger Lakes of New York (Ravines and Red Tail Ridge make excellent Old World-style Pinot).

Do you smell and taste the subtleties, deep down, past the bright cherry flavors? Close your eyes, and swirl, sniff, sip.

Star Wars was robbed by Academy in 1977

Star Wars is a cultural phenomenon. Lightsabers, droids, Wookiees, and the Death Star are part of our everyday conversations. The Washington National Cathedral is adorned with a gargoyle of what Americans voted to be the epitome of evil: Darth Vader. And almost every single piece of media made in the last decade, in my experience, contains at least one reference to a Star Wars movie.

Star Wars is easily one of the most successful franchises in world history, yet it is so much more than that. The Star Wars films have inspired generations of young people to dream and to fight back against injustice. They taught us to realize our places as individuals, while remaining integral parts of a much larger universe. The original, historic chapter of the film series, however, is the ultimate example of Academy Award oversight.

Each year, when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences awards excellence in film, only one movie can take home the top honor: Best Picture. It’s no secret that the Academy naturally favors a certain type of movie. And that is OK. As much as I love Superbad, it’s certainly not the type of movie that should be named Best Picture.

Often, a tremendous work of art is given the nod, much like this year’s 12 Years a Slave. Sometimes, however, the best film of the year gets overlooked in favor of a Hollywood vanity piece or a good movie that will be forgotten in a few years. But some types of movies — in certain genres or with certain characteristics — seem doomed, however good, right from the start.

Seeing that a few comedies have won Best Picture was actually quite jarring. In my time, every winner has been a period piece or a film that raises awareness to illness. These films are often heart-wrenching masterpieces that did not get the proper box office respect. But the Academy’s love affair with these true, or at least almost true, stories neglects original writing and punishes those who make creative films.

Blockbusters are typically big moneymakers. Recently, Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight.com identified 11 features that define a film as a blockbuster. Those 388 films are listed here, beginning with number 62, Jaws; how many Best Picture winners can you pick out? You won’t find many. Only three Best Picture winners have grossed over $200 million domestically (in the United States), and only six winners are in the top 200 domestically grossing films of all-time. Does the Academy have a natural aversion to blockbuster films?

Examine the Best Picture nominee list closely. Star Wars is one of only six science fiction films in eight decades to receive a Best Picture nomination. I understand that science fiction does not typically stand out for nuance or impressively written scripts. In a lot of instances, a science fiction film shouldn’t get the honor of Best Picture. Did The Avengers deserve to win Best Picture? Absolutely not. That doesn’t prevent it from being one of my all-time favorite movies. But I have a special affection for hero stories and movies that stretch my imagination.

Other blockbusters and science fiction films, however, are more than blow-em-up spectacles. Unfortunately, I think the prejudice against genre films has led to some egregious oversights from the Academy. Escapism can create movies just as compelling as reflection can. That brings us back to the original Star Wars film. This masterpiece was a victim of the Academy’s predisposition against films about the extraordinary, and was ultimately passed over for the top award. If Star Wars didn’t win in 1977, I have to ask: can a science fiction movie ever win Best Picture?

Star Wars defied conventional Academy practices by actually receiving a Best Picture nomination in the first place. The film even took home seven trophies, primarily for its innovative approach to filmmaking. But at the end of the night, the statuette for Best Picture was awarded to Woody Allen’s Annie Hall. Don’t get me wrong. Annie Hall is a tremendous film. The movie is hilarious from beginning to end and holds up even after 37 years. It’s a rare older movie that feels like it could have been made today. And it defies awards expectations of its own as a comedy, which is so rare to see honored with an Oscar. It is also not nearly as innovative as Star Wars.

Consider: which movie has made a greater impact on world culture, Annie Hall or Star Wars? I challenge you to name any movie that has made a larger impact than Star Wars. But again, I understand if you disagree about cultural relevance being a factor in naming Best Picture. That is also an impact that cannot be fully measured for many years after a film’s release. So let’s dissect the iconic film for its specific merits.

In my view, a movie should be graded on plot, characters, acting, world building, creativity, innovation, subject matter, and historical relevance. Annie Hall gets high marks for several of these categories, while Star Wars is superior to most films in nearly every one.

Star Wars is, perhaps, the most technically innovative movie of all time. Sure, it doesn’t look like Avatar, but the original movie was made before computers were even a factor in filmmaking. In fact, the production of Star Wars helped to create the computer generated imagery that made movies like Gravity and The Avengers possible.

George Lucas, with very little money available to make his vision come to life, managed to create an entire universe of societies, spacecraft, and sentient beings of peculiar appearance, using only models and costumes. Lucas created the Wookiee, the Jawa, dozens of background alien species, and two legendary droids named C-3PO and R2-D2 without any help from the CGI that would eventually become synonymous with Lucasfilm and its spinoff company, Pixar.

However, these technical leaps don’t necessarily make a film worthy of Best Picture. If they did, Gravity would have been the 2013 winner. Thankfully, it wasn’t, but that’s because the story of Gravity, while interesting, was shallow and lacked any kind of memorable character. That might also be one of the potential weaknesses of Star Wars. Its characters may not be as complex as something from Shakespeare — but they are just as recognizable, if not more so. Are there any movie characters more well known than Luke, Han, Leia, Vader, or the droids?

Again, popularity does not mean a film is necessarily good. I can admit that Obi-Wan never made me cry like Oskar Schindler, and Luke isn’t perhaps as inspiring as Abraham Lincoln. But these characters live in a galaxy different from our own, and yet they still manage to make us feel as though we have joined them on their journey.

Luke Skywalker is offered as a stand-in for the viewer. He is a kid from a simple place looking to leave his world behind him when an unexpected turn of events leads him to the stars. He is motivated by a desire to accomplish something, and he believes the Galactic Empire needs to be brought down. He is a man who longs for his father, aspiring to be like him without even knowing who he was. It is a story familiar to every boy and girl who feels they are destined for greater things.

Luke has to come into his own while learning from his mentor, Ben Kenobi. Ben becomes a surrogate father — not just to Luke, but to those of us who want to believe we can achieve greatness. Ben’s climactic fight with his former protege, Darth Vader, ends with the mentor’s sacrifice before the eyes of his apprentice. Luke then has to rise up and become the new hero the Galaxy needs. It is the advice of his mentor, along with the assistance of his new friend, the roguish Han Solo, plus his newfound faith in his own ability and the world around him that leads Luke to an immeasurable victory as he brings down the planet-destroying Death Star.

Sure, Luke isn’t facing disease or dealing with being a slave, but he’s a young man fighting a literal galaxy of problems, dealing with his inadequacies and yearning to know about his parents and find himself. Perhaps the acting isn’t on par with Daniel Day-Lewis or Gary Oldman (though Oldman had been rumored to be joining the cast of the next Star Wars flick), but there is never a scene in the original movie that takes the audience out of the moment through bad acting or unbelievable sets. What Lucas and the actors did was create an unbelievable world and make it believable. That type of talent should be honored.

The Star Wars films aren’t overtly about the human condition and they don’t raise awareness to some controversial topic, but they do follow a time-honored story structure, one that has been imitated many times since and has been honored in other, non-sci-fi films. Star Wars is about the hero’s journey, a narrative technique that is rooted in ancient mythology.

As explained by mythologist Joseph Campbell, the hero’s journey is the arc that follows a hero from the common to the extraordinary. This hero is often an everyman on an unlikely quest, an epic campaign to overcome the greatest odds. The hero will grow as a person either for surviving the trek or for dying a legend. These stories also often follow the friends of the protagonist as they come into their own and help the hero defeat the great evil. The hero’s journey may not involve human suffering in a way we can always relate to, but that doesn’t make a film any less qualified to be considered the Best Picture of the year.

Perhaps you believe the Best Picture winner should speak to something beyond what appears on the screen. As I said, great movies must have compelling subject matter. A Best Picture winner should teach a lesson and make us think about how we live our lives. Star Wars, with its philosophical underpinnings and questions on war and proper government, accomplishes all of this in spades.

Star Wars is packed with philosophy. Questions of destiny and the great interconnectedness of all life fill the movie from beginning to end. The Force, introduced in the first Star Wars movie, took traits from religions and philosophies across the globe to create a mystical, mythical energy force that binds us and guides us. Fans of Star Wars were inspired by Kenobi to listen to our surroundings and become attuned to the space in which we live. And the Force is just the glue that holds together the enormous world built by Lucas and his crew.

No movie was as thorough as Star Wars in creating an entire universe. Many lines in the 1977 film were carefully crafted to construct a history of this galaxy so different from our own. When speaking to Obi-Wan, Luke casually mentions “The Clone Wars” years before this event would be expounded upon. Obi-Wan’s lines about Luke’s father display an uncertainty that takes on new meaning when the viewer learns the truth in the sequel. What other movie has created lines so rich in content that books could be written for years expanding on just several hours of film?

If a movie is funny, dramatic, original, compelling, and innovative, what else does it take to be given the honor of being called Best Picture? By denying the statue to Star Wars, was the Academy simply making a pretentious statement against a movie that requires such suspension of disbelief? What is the point of movies if not to create new worlds and tell stories that can’t really happen? As much as I am a fan of realism in movies, escapism should not be so marginalized.

Lucas and the folks at Lucasfilm created the world’s most enduring movie, lasting across generations of fans and penetrating our culture in every way. And even if you take away all that has happened since the 1977 release, what you are left with is still a modern myth, a compelling narrative of trial and loss, a rich plethora of characters who take us on a heroic journey to a galaxy far, far away.

Star Wars was the most innovative and influential film of the 20th century. It was unjustly denied its due respect from the Academy by not receiving the award for being the Best Picture of 1977.

Rebuttal: Prequels are fine sci-fi, bad Star Wars films

Your regular Nerd/Wise contributor and my esteemed colleague, Kevin Hillman, made a very strong argument for the value of the Star Wars prequel trilogy. As a lifelong Star Wars fan, I largely agree with him. There are a lot of fun and exciting things in the prequels.

If there ever was a series that has attracted more outrageous and unfair criticism than Episodes I to III, I surely haven’t heard of it. Kevin calls out the most fallacious and unsustainable criticisms directed at the films and, one by one, knocks them down with reasonable arguments. I see no reason to engage in a point-by-point rebuttal.

Because Kevin is missing the forest for the trees.

I disagree with the basic premise that Kevin is trying to argue, namely that the prequel trilogy is good in some objective sense, and therefore is of the same quality as the original trilogy. Art — whether cinema, television, literature, poetry, painting, sculpture — can by its very nature only ever be experienced subjectively. Nonetheless, there is an element of objectivity to good film-making. Indeed, there are basic tools that can objectively improve the structure of a work, thereby increasing its subjective appeal.

That’s where George Lucas dropped the ball with the prequels.

I see four major, overarching issues with Episodes I to III: a lack of editing, an abundance of sub-par humor that doesn’t serve the story, a lack of continuity between the films, and the squandering of cultural capital earned among fans of the original Star Wars trilogy. It’s hard to keep these areas entirely separate, so expect things to get a little blurry around the edges at times.

Let’s start with what I feel is the biggest issue: Lucas chose to squander the overwhelming good will he had with Star Wars fans by making pointless and frustrating edits to the original trilogy. In 1997, the Star Wars Trilogy Special Edition was released upon the fan base, followed immediately by much gnashing of teeth. It was full of edits and CGI additions, all of which felt forced and unnecessary.

I’ll pluck the low-hanging fruit first. The infamous “Han shoots second” edit reduced Han Solo from a cunning, dangerous, and lightning-quick gunslinger to a man who got lucky. Never mind that the edit is awkward and obvious: it was a bad storytelling decision.

Though none of the other edits are as egregious, the CGI additions just don’t fit. They lack the solid, grounded feel of the practical special effects, model work, and puppetry of the trilogy as it was originally designed. And some of the new scenes are just pointless. Did we really need an extended musical performance in Jabba’s Palace? Did we really need any more dewbacks in Mos Eisley?

Fans, by and large, didn’t think so. And then Lucas added insult to injury by making it so that the original, unedited Episodes IV to VI would never be available again. If you wanted the original trilogy, you had to settle for Han shooting second. The fan base feared that this was a sign of things to come.

Now, to be fair, Industrial Light & Magic and Lucasfilm have always been innovators in the special effects world. A lot of what they were doing with digital sound, green-screen work, and CGI effects would revolutionize the film-making industry. And despite the hatred heaped upon them by disgruntled fans, the prequel episodes will always have a place in the world of film making, along with The Matrix and James Cameron’s Avatar, as hallmarks of technical innovation in cinema.

But why did Lucas choose to spend his cultural capital by changing the movies we loved into something we didn’t like? Why did he change a pivotal scene and alter the nature of a popular character forever? Why did he do all of this right before releasing a series of films that were aimed straight at those same fans?

Obviously, I can’t answer those questions definitively. But it is my opinion that Lucas could have side-stepped some of these issues had he held off on the release of the remastered versions of his original films until the prequels had been completed. Further, if he had edited the original trilogy in such a way that would patch some of the continuity holes that exist between the two sets of films, the fan base would have been more positive going into the 1999 release of Episode I. (One example: Lucas could have explained where the heck R2-D2’s rockets, present in Episode III, disappeared to in the 20 years before Episode IV, when the droid could have used them.)

My esteemed colleague Mr. Hillman likes to say that arguing against changes to the original Star Wars films is an appeal to nostalgia, and I don’t necessarily disagree. But my point is that Lucas chose to open that door for us; revitalizing a 20-year-old franchise was inherently an appeal to nostalgia. If I could still get my hands on a licensed DVD or Blu-ray version of the unaltered original trilogy, I would gladly buy it from Lucas. And I would be a lot more tolerant of his prequels.

Moving on, we come to issues of editing. As a storyteller myself, I have come to believe that the guiding principle behind all storytelling is simple: everything you put on the page or screen must serve the story. Do otherwise and you run the risk of losing the audience. Stephen King said in his On Writing, “In many cases when a reader puts a story aside because ‘it got boring,’ the boredom arose because the writer grew enchanted with his powers of description and lost sight of his priority, which is to keep the ball rolling.”

The prequels fall victim to this misdirected enchantment, stuffing in extraneous material that stretch Episodes I to III to a total run time of about 45 minutes longer than the original movies. Let us consider the pod racing scene in Episode I. This thing lasts the better part of 12 minutes; that’s about one-tenth the total run time of The Phantom Menace. While the scene certainly starts out exciting, it rapidly descends into self-indulgence. In fact, scene after scene of the prequels degrades into what are essentially long special effects demo reels. The battle between the droids and the Gungans, the precarious duel on floating platforms over rivers of lava on Mustafar, traveling through the droid factory on Geonosis: these are but three examples of scenes that started out interesting but went on just way too long.

This is another wasted opportunity for Lucas. As the scripts for these two film trilogies were written 20 to 30 years apart, the temptation to alter the original films, due to both hindsight and new technology, proved irresistible for Lucas. The tinkering resulted in many continuity errors that brought aficionados of the older films to their feet in frustrated outrage, shaking their fists and demanding explanations.

For example, how can it be that Tatooine, described in A New Hope as: “if there’s a bright center to the universe, you’re on the planet it’s farthest from,” appear in the prequels to be just a few hours travel from the galactic center? How can the planet have an economy that supports a racetrack long enough for one lap to take 12 minutes at jet-fighter speeds?

I posit that, had Lucas devoted those extra 45 minutes in the prequels not to showcasing special effects but to strengthening the connections between the two trilogies, giving us explanations for the seeming inconsistencies, the movies would have tied together more cleanly and caused less cognitive dissonance in the moviegoer familiar with the original trilogy.

That cognitive dissonance also rings loudly with the humor of the prequel films, which would have benefited had Lucas shown better editorial judgment. Jar Jar Binks is all slapstick and fart jokes, and those elements do nothing to support the story. The long, painfully awkward, unfunny sequence where C-3PO and a battle droid swap heads and act confused neither adds drama nor cuts the tension of the Battle for Geonosis. It should have ended up on the editing room floor.

In the original films, R2 and 3PO were funny because of the way their personalities interacted with each other and the rest of the cast as they went about doing things that moved the plot along. Han was witty and sardonic — while moving the plot along. Jar Jar bumbling his way through a battle with droids, obviously incompetent and clueless, does not move the plot along and, to boot, is not funny. In a real army, “General Jar Jar” would have been put out of commission by a subordinate officer as a danger to the unit, and no one would have batted an eye.

The sum of these weaknesses manifests in the overarching problem I have with the prequels. I sometimes refer to it as continuity, and sometimes as a tonal shift. It’s the hardest of the criticisms to explain, and some of its impact is deflected because Lucas was obviously going for a different feel to Episodes I to III than he had used in Episodes IV to VI. Still, I feel the tonal shift and incongruities between the two sets of films are unforced errors.

This is another one of those areas where Mr. Hillman likes to pull the nostalgia card on me, saying that I am looking at the past through rose-colored glasses. I disagree. After all, I am one of the few people I know who liked X-Men: The Last Stand, and I cheered when I heard there would be a Batman reboot. I like The Amazing Spider-Man and X-Men: First Class. I’m not averse to change. Sometimes things are done better the second or third time around. I get that.

But that doesn’t excuse the prequels. They are not a reboot; they exist in the same universe. To that end, there must be a coherence in tone and in story throughout the entire hexalogy.

My complaint is rooted in my own experience. I watched Operation Desert Storm unfold on television 23 years ago. I remember the footage from smart-bomb cameras, the scenes on the ground the day after the air war, the broadcasts from the Baghdad hotel as the U.S. Air Force spearheaded the attack. I remember the event. This is one of those things that happens as you travel through life — you remember significant things from the past.

So how is it that in the original trilogy, 18 years after Episode III, no one remembers the Separatist Droid Army, the nature of Clone troopers, the home planet of the famous General Skywalker, or Naboo? Why didn’t Yoda or Obi-Wan Kenobi, both preeminent trainers of Jedi, ever mention midi-chlorians and their role in the Force? For that matter, why didn’t anyone recognize the power of the Force? (Consider the disbelieving Imperial officer, Force-choked by Darth Vader, or Han’s dismissive attitude; these men, both of whom were alive during the Clone Wars, don’t believe in the Force in Episode IV.)

I can go on. Why didn’t Anakin ever consider checking in on his only surviving relatives (OK, step-relatives) at any point? How come Anakin, as Vader, doesn’t recognize R2-D2, who spent nearly 20 years as his constant companion, or C-3PO, who Vader built with his own hands? Why do all the Jedi wear Tatooine desert garb? Why is it that no one, anywhere, remembers the miracle of the virgin birth of Anakin, an event the Weekly World News would still be milking for all its worth if it had happened 20 years ago in this country?

There are dozens and dozens of little details like this. And that’s what drives me nuts and keeps me from enjoying the prequel trilogy.

In many ways, I think that what the prequels did wrong was that they didn’t diverge far enough from the original films. The story of Anakin parallels that of Luke Skywalker a little too closely. The mythic background of the Clone Wars, set up by the original trilogy, loses something by being broken down into a rather mundane political crisis and armed conflict. There are loose plot threads everywhere — and I can’t even buy a DVD with Han shooting first.

It’s frustrating.

At the end of the day, the prequel trilogy was very successful. It spawned a whole raft of new tie-in novels, television shows, and video games, many of which are excellent (Star Wars: Republic Commando remains one of my favorite Star Wars experiences of all-time). It gave the writers of the Expanded Universe a new playground to work in, and they worked hard, doing their level best to re-imagine a Galaxy Far Far Away in the light of Lucas’ new vision. The heroic effort to tie everything together seamlessly is admirable.

But it’s a patch job that was necessary only because of the poor choices that led up to the prequels and the slap-dash nature of the scripts for the prequel films — scripts that more or less ignored the events of the original trilogy and just assumed that no one would question the details.

In conclusion, just as the J.J. Abrams Star Trek reboot is a fine science fiction movie but a terrible Star Trek film, the Star Wars prequel trilogy is a perfectly serviceable space opera — and a terrible Star Wars film, at least according to my entirely subjective criteria. And that’s a tragedy, because with all of the technical know-how and special effects wizardry that Lucas had at his fingertips, there is no reason he couldn’t have taken the effort to go back to the original trilogy and bring it in line with his new vision. Sure, we would have bitched about that, too, but at least the loose ends would have been tied up and the story would be complete.

At least, from a certain point of view.

Bechdel test gives glimpse of inequities, not quality

This week on Curiata.com, many of our contributors are writing about Star Wars, given that Sunday was Star Wars Day. In honor of that spirit, I am going to examine, with A Feminist Sensibility, a topic at the nexus of cinema and feminism: the much-debated Bechdel test. For anyone who may be unfamiliar with the concept, the Bechdel test was created in 1985 by feminist cartoonist Alison Bechdel. She suggested a rating system for movies based on the following criteria:

Is there more than one named woman in the film?
Do the women talk to each other?
Is the conversation about something other than men (or one specific man)?

It’s easy to see how Star Wars — and many other classic films — can come under fire if the Bechdel test is the sole criteria for measuring the worth, feminist or otherwise, of a movie. At least, it seems Star Wars would come under fire based on the comments at bechdeltest.com. I don’t know for sure because, you see, I have a confession: I have never seen Star Wars. Well, I’ve never seen Episodes IV, V, and VI, but I have seen the prequel trilogy. I’ll give all of the Star Wars purists a chance to clutch their pearls and head over to Kevin’s article to tell him how wrong he is about the prequels.

Despite not having viewed the original films, most of the plot, characters, and controversies of the movies have pervaded mainstream culture and media. There are volumes written about the sexual portrayal of Princess Leia and the fact that she is the only female main character. And as I’m not personally knowledgable about the failings of Star Wars in terms of the Bechdel test, I’ll leave it to the folks over at Bitch Flicks, who already did a great breakdown of women in the Star Wars franchise.

Instead, I’ll talk about the Bechdel test in general and its effects on how we view and value films. Fans of Curiata.com will note that we take our movies seriously. All one has to do is check out our reviews from the Academy Awards, the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival, or even this week’s Star Wars coverage to see that is true. In my cinematic experience, I have discovered that there are amazing cinematic works out there that fail the Bechdel test miserably, and there are truly awful films that pass with flying colors.

A few weeks ago, our local cinema showed The Godfather on the big screen. This was my first time viewing the film in its entirety, and I was blown away. The Godfather is a true piece of cinematic art that is still amazing and beautiful to this day. The only thing The Godfather fails at is the Bechdel test.

Yes, there are several named female characters (Kay Adams, Connie and Carmela Corleone, Apollonia), but not once in three hours do they share conversation in a scene. Not only does it miss the mark on the critical Bechdel test questions, but the closing scene where Michael Corleone is conducting business and the door closes in Kay’s face made my feminist blood boil! I came out of the film both angry and awed; I declared it amazing, despite its chauvinistic tones.

(Note from the editor: The aforementioned scene sets up The Godfather: Part II, where the Michael/Kay tension is dealt with head-on. Incidentally, the featured image on this page is from the scene in The Godfather: Part II that allows that film, unlike the first installment, to pass the Bechdel test.)

Conversely, all five films in the Twilight saga pass the Bechdel test. I’m not trying to pick a fight with the Twihards, but I think we can all admit that no one came out of Twilight thinking, “Wow, that film really pushed the art of cinema forward.”

As an aside, I feel compelled to mention that I’m not arguing all modern-day blockbusters are terrible films. I’m planning to see a midnight premiere showing of X-Men: Days of Future Past. I realize that even though it is likely I will enjoy the movie immensely, I doubt I will come out of the theater with the same zen cinema-as-art feeling as I did after The Godfather. I’m also interested to see if Days of Future Past, with strong females including Mystique, Storm, Rogue, and Kitty Pryde, can match or exceed the Bechdel test success of previous X-Men films.

The point I’m making is that the Bechdel test is but one method of measurement. It does not inherently determine whether a feminist will find a film worthwhile. As a matter of fact, films that are, at their core, anti-feminist, like The Godfather, can give a feminist like me great enjoyment while reaffirming my dedication to the equality of women.

The Bechdel test gives us a place to start the conversation about the role of women in Hollywood. Are women under-represented in Tinseltown? Absolutely. According to a study by the San Diego-based Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film, women account for just 30 percent of all characters and a paltry 15 percent of the protagonists of the top 100 U.S. films in 2013. Not only that, but the same report found that women were less likely to be portrayed in leadership roles.

These are all issues that need to be discussed and corrected. The Bechdel test gives us an easily digestible, buzz-worthy platform to discuss these inequities. But the judgment of a film’s pro-feminism or its cinematic quality must be made by an audience tuned in to more in-depth criticism than the Bechdel test offers.

A love letter to The Star Wars Holiday Special

The Star Wars Holiday Special is a thing of legend. It was a television special set in the Star Wars universe that ran one time in November 1978. The story goes that George Lucas thought the special was so bad, he said that if he had enough time, he would smash every copy in existence.

As a Star Wars fan, I was naturally curious about the special. What could be so terrible about the piece of history that introduces Boba Fett to the world? Could anything Lucas touched really be that bad? (Even the prequel trilogy has its defenders.) A copy of the special is not exactly easy to come by, but thanks to the miracle of the Internet, my friends, husband, and I were able to obtain one. We picked a night and settled in to what we thought would be two hours of “it’s-so-bad-it’s-awesome” television.

We could not have been more wrong — or more right.

First, let’s discuss the basic plot of the movie: Han Solo and Chewbacca are racing through space, dodging the Empire, and trying to get back to Chewie’s home planet of Kashyyk in time for the Life Day celebration. For all intents and purposes, Life Day appears to be the Wookiee version of Christmas. We get to meet Chewie’s family and actually end up spending a good deal of time getting a peek at how a “typical” Wookiee family prepares for Life Day … including approximately 15 to 20 minutes of untranslated Wookiee conversation.

You read that correctly, no need to go back. There is a significant portion of the show in which the audience is left to either speculate what Chewie’s family might be saying to each other, pull out their Wookiee dictionaries, or do what I did and lie on the floor crying out that they didn’t understand what was going on.

The strangeness doesn’t end there. The audience is subjected to suggested Wookiee porn (go to 3:30 in this video), an obviously not-all-there Carrie Fisher singing a Life Day song to the tune of the Star Wars theme, Bea Arthur looking sadly out of place as the owner of the Cantina, and a pretty fantastic Jefferson Starship non sequitur. It was honestly enough to make several in our group fall to the floor and wish for death to take them, non-ironically.

I will not say that The Star Wars Holiday Special is without merit — this is a love letter, after all. As I stated before, no matter how you may feel about the character, the fact that the special was the first appearance of Boba Fett is a pretty noteworthy thing in Star Wars fandom. There was a fantastic cast that, under normal circumstances, would have made the special worth viewing just by being on the screen. If you watch it with a group of friends, you will definitely feel bonded for life to those people with whom you have shared the experience of watching the most terrible, most nonsensical, and — somehow — the most awesome holiday spin-off special in existence.

And if the fact that so many people are willing to go to such great lengths to find, watch, and experience this piece of Star Wars history doesn’t make Lucas feel at least a little better about its existence … well, then I don’t know what will.

Cinco de Mayo: May the Fifth be with you?

Even though the title of this article sounds like I’m telling you to carry whiskey around (I’m not not telling you that), I will in fact be talking about why we in the United States and Mexico celebrate Cinco de Mayo. We’ll also take a look at the similarities between the events that inspired that holiday and the narrative structure of one of the most beloved modern mythologies, celebrated with its own holiday yesterday, Star Wars.

Cinco de Mayo, or El DÃa de la Batalla de Puebla (Spanish: “the day of the battle of Puebla“), is not Mexican Independence Day, as is too-often thought in the United States. Instead, May 5 is the anniversary of a battle fought at the city of Puebla in 1862, wherein the Mexican army, outgunned and outnumbered nearly 2-to-1, crushed the army of the Second French Empire on its way to Mexico City. As it happens, the French still managed to work their way around and take the capital for a few years, but the battle at Puebla hampered their resources and might even have been a key factor in keeping the French out of the American Civil War.

Puebla, or Puebla de los Ãngeles, means “village of the angels,” (as opposed to Los Angeles, California, which is an abbreviation of the city’s original name, a reference to “Our Lady the Queen of Angels,” or the Virgin Mary). Puebla is so named because the bishop of Tlaxcala in the 16th century dreamed the site where he would found the city, and he saw angels tracing it out for him. Turned out, the place was about five miles from the monastery where he lived. It’s one of the major waypoints between the Atlantic port of Veracruz (where CortÃ©s offered up a “true cross” when he conquered the place) and Mexico City.

Mexico had spent a lot of money in civil wars and, indeed, needed to spend more in ongoing efforts to discourage rebellion, so Mexican president Benito JuÃ¡rez decided to suspend repayment of the country’s foreign debts after his 1861 election. Many European creditors came in through Veracruz to get their money back. Spain, France, and Britain made a temporary alliance with each other to send their troops into Mexico for this purpose, but after taking Veracruz, Spain and Britain backed out, seeing that France wanted more than just debt repayment.

France, under the direction of Emperor Napoleon III (not to be confused with the more famous Napoleon, who was his uncle), decided to take a straight shot at expanding its empire while the Americans were distracted with their own war and in no real position to enforce the Monroe Doctrine (which was basically the States flipping the bird at Europe, telling them not to mess with our continent). Even better, if France was able to get a stronghold in Mexico and set up its own puppet regime, the French would probably support the Confederates in exchange for the Rebels tolerating France’s nearby presence. That support may have given the South the edge it needed to win.

But when France’s army of 8,000 took on the Mexican force of about 4,500 on that fateful Fifth of May, the French were repelled. The aggressors suffered casualties at three times the rate of the defenders, forcing them to retreat by the end of the day and hold off their advance for an entire year while they waited for reinforcements and additional armament. JuÃ¡rez declared Cinco de Mayo a national holiday four days after the battle, and it served to help strengthen the unity of the Mexican people.

After France won the second battle of Puebla, moved on to take Mexico City, and forced JuÃ¡rez into exile, the American Civil War was almost over. Emperor Napoleon, not wanting to leave all his armed forces stuck across the ocean fighting Mexicans and Americans while the Prussians were consolidating power closer to home, decided to pull out. The puppet emperor of Mexico Napoleon installed was ousted and executed by JuÃ¡rez, who assumed power once again.

Without the victory at Puebla on May 5, 1862, Mexico might not have been able to keep its sovereignty as a state. So, in celebration of that battle, and the cause of freedom, we in the United States like to … drink tequila and eat tacos, I guess. Cool.

Of course, reality and fiction often overlap. And with May the Fourth and Cinco de Mayo just one day apart, my mind naturally draws connections between the two. So what do the second French intervention in Mexico and the rise and fall of the Galactic Empire have in common? Let’s see …

A politician becomes emperor after enacting a coup d’etat (French: “stroke of state”). Both Napoleon III and Palpatine were granted unilateral power over their respective state militaries and used them to overthrow the government to become emperor.
Said politician misleads allies as to his true intentions in order to use their armies. In Star Wars, Palpatine uses the Separatists to spark war and scare the Republic into giving him power. In real life, Napoleon led Spain and Britain to believe he only wanted to force Mexico to repay its debts rather than to take over the country.
The army of the empire overruns the front lines of the opposition with overwhelming force. In Star Wars, the Empire obliterates Alderaan with the Death Star. In history, the allied Europeans swept into Veracruz easily.
A plucky, outnumbered band of courageous defenders thwarts the empire in order to avert catastrophe. In Star Wars, the rebels blow up the Death Star with the dead Bothans’ intelligence and Luke Skywalker’s powers of the Force. In history, the Pueblans repelled France’s forces despite terrible odds.
A powerful force, conflicted until the very end of the engagement, turns against the empire and enables the underdogs to emerge victorious. In Star Wars, Darth Vader realizes he wants his humanity, even more than he wants revenge, and kills Palpatine, allowing the rebels to wipe out the new Death Star. In history, the Union wins the Civil War and turns at least some part of its attention to the French occupation, prompting Napoleon to get out.

On the other hand, Emperor Napoleon was generally a pretty good ruler, unlike Palpatine. He was a progressive who did a lot to further women’s rights in France, promote equal opportunities, and help the economy, until he was ultimately kicked out of power by yet another revolution (say one thing about France, say they liked revolting in the 1800s).

Also, Mexico was a political madhouse prior to France’s invasion. Embroiled in civil wars and reform wars, the opposition liberal and conservative parties were hardly afraid to back up their politics with violence whenever and wherever they could. Part of the reason Napoleon thought he could take over was because the Mexican people were sick of their country’s politics and infighting. The Battle of Puebla went a long way toward cementing the public against foreign power, but perhaps otherwise they would have largely welcomed the intervention.

Either way, Star Wars has much fewer shades of grey in its morality than real life does. Big surprise there.

Clone Wars: Restoring magic lost in prequels

Star Wars: The Clone Wars (Cartoon Network)
Where to binge: All six seasons available on Netflix; Season 1 through 5 on Amazon Prime

I went to see Return of the Jedi with my father when it was released in 1983. I owned the original Star Wars trilogy on video cassette. I read Star Wars novels. I owned the Star Wars role-playing game (the one published by West End Games in 1997, not the D20 knockoffs that followed).

The epic, three-part saga about the the rescue of a princess, the return of the last Jedi Knight, the defeat of an Empire, and the destruction of a space station so large it was mistaken for a moon shaped how I looked at stories. I have come back to Star Wars throughout the years, reconnecting with Luke and Leia and Han.

In short, I love Star Wars.

And, as might be obvious from my curriculum vitae above, I dislike the Star Wars prequel trilogy. Most of the fans in my age bracket (i.e. way past 20 years old) were disappointed in the prequels. We felt that George Lucas had traded in heartfelt mythological storytelling for green-screen effects, wooden dialogue, and a confusing, directionless story. Sure, the music was great, and the lightsaber duels were amazing, but Lucas had gone CGI mad, remastering the originals and changing them to paper over continuity lapses between the new films and the old.

And I didn’t like it.

I did, however, like Genndy Tartakovsky, of Samurai Jack and Dexter’s Laboratory fame. He did a tie-in cartoon, called Star Wars: Clone Wars, that covered the years between the second and third movie episodes. It was a fun, exciting, heartfelt romp through epic Star Wars action. The show was hand-drawn, stylistically very similar to Samurai Jack (which I loved) and, hey, it was Star Wars, so that was a plus.

In 2008, LucasFilm Animation built upon the foundation laid by Tartakovsky with their own series, Star Wars: The Clone Wars. I avoided it at the time but kept hearing solid recommendations from people I trusted. When Netflix started to stream the entire run of the show, as well as the previously unaired Lost Missions, it was enough to convince me to watch it.

And, boy, was I glad I did.

The Clone Wars is a computer-animated show that follows Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi in their roles as Generals of the Grand Army of the Republic during the Clone Wars. It has a large cast of well-developed recurring characters, both old and new. The show splits its focus between military action and political manipulation, as it sets up the long, slow fall of the Republic into the grip of the tyrannical Supreme Chancellor Palpatine and his servant and apprentice, Count Dooku.

The Clone Wars tackles the events that take place between Episodes II and III and fleshes out the Clone Wars, the Clone Troopers who fight for the Republic, and the Separatist forces they fight against. Each season is comprised of several long arcs, and each arc builds cleanly upon the last.

Like all good sci-fi, The Clone Wars lets us look at our own world and its issues in a different light. Though there are a lot of space battles and Jedi duels (and the show doesn’t pull any punches on the violence front: named characters are killed on-screen so often I found myself wondering how they managed to show this on Cartoon Network), the real standout aspect of the show for me was its portrayal of the politics of the Republic. The major plot devices were usually things like negotiating treaties, securing bank loans to purchase more troops, and passing laws to deregulate industries. By taking this tack, the show fills in the sizable plotholes in the prequel films, as well as giving it a topical, relevant feeling.

While there are a great many things that the show does well, the most fascinating thing for me was how it handled the Clone Troopers. Instead of the faceless legions depicted in the films, the Clone Troopers are shown as brave and determined, excellent soldiers who are loyal to their cause and to each other. They are all given distinct personalities, and the viewer comes to admire and respect them. They are used to tell stories about what it means to be human, what it means to fight for what you believe in, and how far you are willing to go for a friend.

Despite all the things The Clone Wars does right, it’s not a perfect show. Like the prequel films, many episodes are bogged down by stilted storytelling and hampered by the writers assuming the audience knows things they might not know. There are a few throwaway episodes that were either too weird or too silly to feel like they belonged among the rest. It takes about one full season to really pick up steam, and I don’t think it found its voice until season 3. But once it finds that voice, it is often brilliant. And when it is brilliant, I was very willing to forgive its failings because of how strongly the writer’s love of the franchise shines through the material.

There are six seasons, for a total of well over 100 episodes, so the show covers far more ground than I can hope to address in one review. It is ambitious in its scope, though it sometimes falls victim to that ambition.

But The Clone Wars does something that I didn’t think it could do. It made Star Wars awesome again, and not just the old Star Wars I knew and loved as a boy. It fleshed out the narrative framework of the prequel films in exciting and challenging ways. It brought mysticism back to the Force and heroism back to the Jedi. It makes you fall in love with the Star Wars world and the characters again, and as a fan, thats the strongest praise I can bestow on anything.

Watch it while it’s still streaming on Netflix. It might just make you a fan again, too.

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