Results of Ruminations

When I talked about dual identities a while ago, I focused on the Batman and a little on the Hulk. I had originally planned on incorporating an analysis of how Peter Parker and Spider-Man intersect as identities, but the essay was going too long by that point. I cut the stuff--which, for me, means highlighting the text and pressing Delete . So whatever I was thinking about apropos of Peter/Spidey, it's gone now. However, I'm at the precipice of beginning another school year  and I've been feeling incipient stirrings of what I can only assume is the (apparently) real phenomenon of a mid-life crisis. My parents were pretty steady, stay-the-course kind of parents, so I don't have a lot of up-close context for these feelings, but I've been struggling a lot with what I understand of myself, my goals, my ambitions, my dreams, and my realities. One of the things that I've always used as part of my identity, with varying degrees of severity, is my obsession with Spid...

Note: Since the new film version of the book is coming out soon, I'll put a spoiler warning on this post, if only because someone may be planning on watching the film without having read the book. So here it is: As I mentioned before , I'm reading Stephen King's It. The book is massive--clocking in at over 1,400 pages--and tells the story of a haunted town called Derry, set in King's home state of Maine. A handful of kids end up being compelled to defeat the evil entity known as It (or Pennywise the Clown), and then, when they get older, they have to return to Derry in order to defeat It once and for all. So the set up is pretty straightforward, but part of what I found so interesting was how  the story was told. Despite its sprawling size, the book is tightly connected. Small details ripple through the narrative, which spans a summer in 1958 and a spring in 1985. Even the paper boat that kicks off the tragedy and terror and leaves by the end of the first chapter...

In the first part , I set up a rewrite for Batman v. Superman  to try to salvage what happened in that film. Obviously, this is not a unique exercise, and there are a lot of others out there who have done similar things. I haven't read or watched those thought exercises, so if there are parallels between my ideas and others, it's happenstance. Part 2 Batman's unsatisfied, so he breaks into Luthor's office to see this "curiosity". He hacks (because it's this easy) the files, but doesn't have time to decrypt them as the alarm goes off (of course) and he has to do his disappearing bat-trick to keep from being caught. Now, however, he's on the trail.   Back at Lexcorp, Luthor figures out what Batman has done. "They know." He places a call, then says to the scientist fellow from earlier, "We have to move forward the Doomsday Protocol."  "To when?" asks the tinny voice on the other side of the call. "As...

Note: I'm assuming most people who care about Batman v. Superman  would have seen it by now, but I guess I should say I'm talking about that film in this essay. So...spoilers on it, Man of Steel, and  Wonder Woman , y'know? I tried " script doctoring " Jurassic World , so I thought I'd throw out some ideas about what I would have done differently with Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice.  Because multiple different films are contingent on the BvS  as the flagship, tent pole, or whatever metaphor you want to use for the entire DC Extended Universe, there are likely parts from Zack Snyder's film that had to be in there as setup for the other films. In fact, that setup is part of what makes BvS  such a hard film to follow. (In essence, DCEU went the opposite route of Marvel: What if The Avengers  had been the third film in the franchise, with only Captain America and  Iron Man  coming before it? It wouldn't have worked the way that it did. DCEU is...

If you don't subscribe to Netflix, here's a write up about the documentary Nobody Speak: Trials of the Free Press from The Atlantic .  The documentary is pretty good, though, if you're sensitive to profanity and frank discussions of awkward experiences, you may not enjoy it. There are some problems (like most documentaries, it manipulates via music what you're supposed to feel throughout certain sections, and the second half feels too heavy on "broad strokes" style storytelling since the ostensible focal point is Hulk Hogan, and that section is finely detailed. Still, it's a worthwhile viewing. I don't want to talk about free speech, though. I'm interested in a strange, protracted argument that Terry Bollea (the man most people identify as Hulk Hogan) gives during his time on the witness stand. The details are embarrassing, but it isn't the details that Bollea is giving that made me sit up a little, it was the crux of the argument: According ...

Being an abashed Twitter-(over)user, I was delighted when I saw this tweet : I love homework! Not only is Doug Robertson a great resource for connected educators (you can check out his blog right here ; it's entirely education centered, rather than the hodgepodge of stuff that mine features) and a funny guy, he also throws out a lot of ideas online that have helped me think differently about my profession. He let me guest blog on one of his other sites, too, and that's pretty spiffy. But what got me excited about the tweet was not that it was Doug (sorry, Doug), but that it was talking about Revisionist History . I already geeked out about finding Malcolm Gladwell's podcast (another find that occurred because of Twitter, as it so happens), so this shouldn't come as a surprise. What was exciting was that the second season is being released. Eagerly, I listened to the first two episodes, taking extra time to do my chores so that I had an excuse to keep listenin...

Brigham Young: The gospel of Jesus Christ embraces all truth. All truth is for the salvation of the children of men—for the benefit and learning—for their furtherance in the principles of divine knowledge; and divine knowledge is any matter of fact—truth; and all truth pertains to divinity (DBY, 11). Be willing to receive the truth, let it come from whom it may; no difference, not a particle. Just as soon receive the Gospel from Joseph Smith as from Peter, who lived in the days of Jesus. Receive it from one man as soon as another. If God has called an individual and sent him to preach the Gospel that is enough for me to know; it is no matter who it is, all I want is to know the truth (DBY, 11). “Mormonism,” so-called, embraces every principle pertaining to life and salvation, for time and eternity. No matter who has it. If the infidel has got truth it belongs to “Mormonism.” The truth and sound doctrine possessed by the sectarian world, and they have a great deal, all belong t...

Note: To discuss the themes of Cars 3 and look at how they affected me, I have to talk about the end of the movie. In that sense, I'm spoiling the film...or, at least, the film's plot . Don't read if you don't want to (which is always the way it works, obviously), but I feel like there's more to this movie than the story and whether or not it's "spoiled". And though I believe that, I wanted to make this paragraph a little longer to ensure that no one catches an eyeful of spoilers that they didn't intent.  Major spoilers. ( Source ) Pixar's third entry into its Cars  franchise is significantly better than Cars 2 , in large part because Mater isn't around very much at all so the story instantly improves. Okay, that's probably not fair. Cars 2  had some endearing zaniness, and the chance to expand the world of the franchise was a natural step: First film, bring the urban to the rural; second film, bring the rural to the urban. Both ...

I started my reread of Book IV of Paradise Lost  recently. It took the better part of an hour to get through the first 115 or so lines. They are fraught with implications, questions, and applicable ruminations, which meant that I had to go very, very slowly. And, as so often happens when you're reading good literature, there were three real showstoppers: ...is there no place Left for Repentance, none for Pardon left? (4.79-80) and ...he deserv'd no such return From me, whom he created what I was (4.42-43) and Hadst thou [Satan] the same free Will and Power to stand? Thou hadst: whom hast thou then or what to accuse, But Heav'ns free Love dealt equally to all? Be then his Love accurst, since love or hate, To me alike, it deals eternal woe. (4.66-70) Taken out of context as they are, the meaning of the passages is rather opaque. I should probably note that these quotes come from Satan's soliloquy before he enters the eponymous (well, one  of the eponymous)...