Tuesday, December 13, 2016

A Great Pop Culture Blender

So everybody should go see Rogue One. Maybe twice.

Why? Some Trump supporters are calling for a boycott. The guy who started calling for this boycott also helped circulate the lies about the pizza place that got attacked in DC. I refuse to call that incident "Pizzagate."

Since his followers are going to make an enemy of Disney, which remember, owns LucasFilm and Marvel, you should also go see Dr. Strange and Moana. If you already have, go again.

But since a pack of racist, misogynist idiots already killed another movie this year, I'm going to tell all those bros out there three reasons why the new Ghostbusters is objectively better than classic.

1. All the Busters are Together by the End of Act One

I don't know about you, but I think Ernie Hudson is kind of awesome. And it kind of sucks that he doesn't get any screen time in that movie until nearly the end of act two. Especially since he has one of the funniest lines in the movie (at 1:50). Even in the abomination that is Ghostbusters 2, where he is introduced in the opening 15 minutes, he still gets markedly less screen time than his white team mates. The big conclusion of act one in that movie still just features Ramis, Aykroyd, and Murray busting ghosts.

It does kind of suck that the equally awesome Leslie Jones is introduced last, but once introduced she has more or less equal screen time. Most importantly, she's with them during the big ghostbust that concludes the first act. Where she gets one of the funniest lines (I know the video is terrible quality, but it's the only one I could find) in the movie! Overall, it leads to a much more satisfying final battle. The sense that these four women are a team is much more palpable.

2. We Actually Get to See Them Building and Testing Their Tech

I know the training montage gets a bad rap, but sometimes you just need it. The original has a one and done scene of Ray taking out another mortgage to fund the new business, followed by a brief moment where they do allude to being almost out of cash. Seconds before their first call comes in, and Venkman manages to con the hotel owner out of an outrageous fee because, at this point, our intrepid underdogs hold a monopoly. And during that first act concluding first case, they joke about the untested, unlicensed nuclear accelerators on their backs. You know the very thing the EPA is supposed to investigate!

But instead of those proton packs just appearing between scenes along with the guys somehow able to use them without training, we see Holtzmann doing her mad scientist thing along with interspersed scenes of them trying, and often hilariously failing, to use their gadgets. The heroes to zeroes thus seems like an active effort as opposed to a moment of pure luck.

3. It Actually has a Feminist Theme

Seriously, just read this article. Notice how every single entry on it is "Women want to be believed..." It's no accident that while skepticism about the paranormal is given lip service in the original, it doesn't really hinder the Ghostbusters.

But in the new one, every step of the way the team is hounded by skeptics and hostile unbelievers. Including Tywin Lannister just doing his best being a condescending jerk. Later, we have the most epic middle-finger giving ever captured on camera. Not to mention Bill Murray's cameo as being, well, just the opposite of Venkman, really.

Next, when the government does show up towards the end of the second act, they don't want to shut down the business: they want the girls to start working for them, but as part and parcel they need to recant their statements and start covering up evidence of the paranormal. You know. Lie. And, of course, the ending is the desperate cover-up that isn't working while New York declares it's love for the city's saviors.

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