the baa detective

Some observations: All the signs in this evil Christian ninja secret base are written in Chinese. And they really put some efforts to it. I really appreciate that they didn’t just google translate what they tried to convey into Chinese, but instead actually getting someone who was familiar with the language to write them down in (relatively) fluent and coherent sentences. And the signs are actually pretty funny. Here are all the signs I can find: 1. Morning practice (at) 7 o’clock every day 1: Day-off (on) Friday 2: (You can) choose (the type of) pants (you want to wear) 3: Please stay away from drugs (not sure if they mean the cocaine they’re trafficking or just drugs in general) (The sign can first be seen right after the scene of the ninja clan leader and Sam the right-hand man/ brother of Doug laughing maniacally; it always has a ninja standing right next to it) 2. Notice: Today’s (scuba) diving lesson (is) cancelled (You can see the sign during the fight sequence between Carol and ninjas) 3. Caution: Entry Forbidden; Danger (The sign next to the clan leader right after he shoots an anti-raptor arrow at Doug) The writing on Sam’s bandana says: “Brothers” in Chinese The writing on the map which the clan leader shows to Father Stewart says “New World Map” in Chinese The woman who give Doug the raptor tooth speaks in Mandarin Chinese, while the clan leader speaks in Cantonese, while wearing (relatively) traditional Chinese dress. Choi-min, the ninja who’s reminiscing about his girlfriend, is clearly Korean. He narrates his thought in Korean; both he and his girlfriend have Korean names, and Gwangju, where he met his girlfriend, is a major city in Korea. So, any reference to Japan, the birthplace of ninja, in the movie? The answer: zero. Can’t find anything written in Japanese or any character speaking Japanese.

Cough...readcomiconlineto...cough...

What the "Mul" alien or the "Shadow" actually looks like in the book. Notice how they don't look as supermodel-y or Na'vi -y as in the movie. Although the author still gave them a kind of stereotypical traditional African dress and look

Laureline and the shapeshifting hunks

The movie is mostly based on the volume 6 of the series, Ambassador of Shadow; the multi-dimensional black market seems to be Luc Besson’s own invention. Major differences between the movie and the original comic book: 1. The “city of 1000 planets” is called Point Central in the comic. It’s not made of a human space station. Rather, it’s like an accumulation of various space vessels and constructions, built on top of and next to each other, by various alien races gradually over time. 2. Clive Owen’s character is actually the ambassador of Earth in the comic. Before he got kidnapped, he’s about to give a speech to the members of the council of Point Central; this is the first time Earth is giving a turn to preside over the council. 3. Valérian and Laureline are not just space cops; they are space AND time cops. They travelled through space and time to fight the bad guys. 4. Laureline is actually a peasant girl from 11th century France whom Valerian meets during a time travelling mission to capture a mad scientist from the future in volume 1. At one point, Laureline gets turned into a unicorn by the said mad scientist. And because unicorns can read mind, she discovers Valerian’s true identity, so he has no choice but to take her along to the future. And she gets all the necessary training with a zap from a “mnemonic machine.” So no “school,” I guess. 5. Valérian actually does very little in the original story. He gets captured while trying to rescue the ambassador and gets taken along. So, it is up to Laureline to do the rescuing. Teaming up with a mousy colonel (the ambassador’s assistant, who also does very little,) she travels throughout this “city” searching for Valerian and the ambassador. 6. The red-light districts scene is very tame and different from the movie. No Jessica Rabbit. There is more than one “Bubble.” Instead of doing a sexy shapeshifter nurse dance sequence, they turn into tunic-wearing human hunks and try to seduce Laureline. And no, the shape-shifter doesn’t get killed for helping Laureline. Also, no Ethan Hawke 7. The Mul aliens do not kidnaps the ambassador in the comic; they hire mercenaries of another race to do the job. And they are not from the planet Mul, and are not “in-one-with-nature.” Rather, they are an ancient race of beings who not only constructed the foundation for Point Central, but are also so powerful that they have mastered over physical matters. They’re called themselves “Shadow,” as they no longer have a physical body. 8. The Earth ambassador originally plans to take over Point Central with a fleet of spaceships. The Shadows, however, don’t want Point Central to be run solely by one race of people. So they threaten to blow up the Earth’s armada by summoning black-holes. Then they take him, together with Valerian, to what seems like a hut, called the House of Wisdom. We never see what happens inside the hut. But after the ambassador comes out of the hut, he seems changed and decides to pursuit a policy of peace. After he finally goes in front of the council to make his speech, we’re told that another race of alien, called Zools, who are responsible for maintaining Point Central, have begun to takes over the place, because they are sick of corruption on Point Central and want to drive out the profiteers. Then the ambassador emerged from the council and said that not only the council didn’t give him the opportunity to make the speech, they also decided to banish the Earth government from Point Central for 100 years. 9. Valérian and Laureline are very much in love at the start of this story. They do kisses and hugs, but no wrestle.

After seeing Semira drink a cartoonishly large of blood and red veins popping up on her arms and shoulder, I thought she's going to become some sort vampire super saiyan, capable of taking on both the vampires and werewolves combined. Instead, she just became immune to sunlight and...slightly more powerful than other vampires? Which made her plan really dumb. After taking over the coven, how's she going to deal with the looming threat of the werewolf army? The vampires had lost quite few soldiers thanks to her attempt to frame Selene, the only person who's capable of transforming the young vampires into a formidable fighting force. So even if she didn't get stabbed in the back (both metaphorically and literally,) she would still be overwhelmed by Marius the hybrid and his cannon/harpoon-wielding werewolves. Why not just betrayed Selene after she helped to defeat the werewolves, after the existential threat had been resolved? Also, Alexia killed at least 2 train station people (the guys who slumped on their chairs underneath the subway/train map) while searching for Selene. And according to the 4th movie (I only read the wikipedia entry,) the humans were now actively hunting the vampires and the werewolves. Won't these deaths, at the very least, arouse suspicion from some sort of...I don't know...anti-vampire government task-force?

Early in the movie, there is a scene which shows children sleeping in their beds, each with a book laying on their chest, which presumably is the book they are reading before they fall asleep. The last kid apparently has been reading Jean-Paul Sartre’s 1944 existential play “No Exit.” At first, I thought it’s just a gag (kid reading super-serious literature,) but after some googling the synopsis of the play, I feel it might not be the case. The play goes like this: 2 women and a man found themselves in a room after they died. The room has no window and mirror, only a door which cannot be opened. The three characters all did something terrible during their lifetime. Furthermore, Woman A finds herself to be attracted to Woman B, Woman B is attracted to the man. The man initially is not attracted to either of the 2 women, then later succumbed to the seduction of Woman B. But he is only willing to have sex with her if both women say he’s not a coward; the man was executed for desertion, so he wants people to assure him he’s not a coward. Woman B complies, but Woman A refuses, partly due to jealousy and partly because she’s a sadist. Then the door suddenly opens after the man’s several attempts to open the door, but he refuses to leave the room until he convinces Woman A he’s not a coward. However, Woman A tells him she will never give him the approval he so desires. Also, neither of the women wants to leave the room as well for various reasons. This is when the man realizes they are in hell, and what is torturing them is none other than each other. In Jason Lives, after we see the kid with the Sartre play, the movie cuts to a shot of the hamster cage, with a hamster frantically running a hamster wheel, almost like trapped in a loop. Maybe the movie is saying that Jason and the characters in his movies, especially Tommy, are kind of like the characters in the play, trapped in a metaphorical hell. Jason can never stop killing and avenge himself and his mother, as there will always be horny teenagers. Tommy and characters in Jason-verse will forever be haunted by the unkillable monster that is Jason. Oh, if the plot of “No Exit” sounds familiar, maybe it’s because it serves as one of the inspirations for the sitcom “The Good Place,” in which Jason Mantzoukas is a recurring character.

There are few top-down shots of boats and cars moving, like the top down angle in GTA 1 and 2. I feel that the director saw GTA 1 and 2, and got his mind blown, thinking to himself: "Wow, video games can do this?! It's...it's like another reality!" If the nerdlinger is the "Architect," then he definitely not a very good one. As one of the most core components, he should not have that much trouble of reaching Baker. Yes, the rule has change, but the simulation is not actively trying to stop him from talking to Baker. And what purpose does Diane Lane's character serve exactly? What does she do for a living? She seems to be a kind of powerful figure of the community...but she does nothing other than having sex with Baker and give him money.

One can argue that the kid didn't write the "dialogues," didn't decide what his virtual dad, femme fatal mom, and evil step said and did on the island. He merely programmed the AIs, designed their personality, and had them react to each other in a simulation of the real world. The problem with this argument is that I'm not sure if the director is capable of doing this as it is apparent he knows very little about how video games/ simulation work. I mean, there is no way a kid, genius or not, armed with only a pc and all the current technology has to offer, can create a sentient AI and a virtual replica of the reality that is real enough to fool a sentient being into believing it's real. Dwarf Fortress is the most complex indie game I can think of, and it takes 2 people and it's still not finished.

I wish they will make a podcast or youtube series about June playing video games that either don't fit her perceptions of video games in general (i.e. Firewatch, What remains of Edith Finch, Stardew Valley) or have a tear-jerking story/ending (i.e. The Last of Us, Telltale's Walking Dead: Season One) and her reactions to those games. If this game/simulation is sort of being an escape and grief-dealing mechanism for the son, why does he make Baker Dill's life miserable? Baker is constantly strapped for cash, and forced to serve asshole customers. Baker doesn't have to live like a king. Just give him a quiet and idyllic island life that doesn't require him to be constantly worry about money. And why in the end, after knowing everything is a simulation, does Baker try to make the murder seem like an accident? Why is he so afraid getting seen by the gas station kid? Even the man in glasses, which I assume to be a monitoring AI for the game, basically says, okay, let's murder the man. So even Baker just kills the step dad in front of everyone, no-one is going to arrest or punish him. The "world" literally on his side.

I wonder what would have happen if Stephen cast Charlie Sheen instead of Emilio Estevez... The director disappeared for a week then came back. Then the leading man disappeared for a week then came back. Then both the director and the leading man disappeared for a week then came back. Then Stephen King would start to say something along the line of "Listen, me and my buddy Charlie here got just like tons of new ideas...okay, we will have the kid or the girl or the bible guy or whatever just about to be hit by the trucks, then suddenly whoosh! Air Force One comes crashing down and save the day...because you see, the machines want to kill the president of the United States...then a man crawled out of the wreckage and everyone will be super surprised like:'Wow! Mr. President?!" and I or Charlie or Bill or Peter or whatever will say: 'Dad?!' and everyone will be like: 'What?!' because the president is his dad and his dad will play the president and I mean his real dad Martin Sheen Apocalypse Now not my dad because my dad wasn't in Apocalypse Now and everything will be super cool and meta and everything and you know my books are always super meta and everything and we saw Martin just now and he's like super psych and like: 'Yeah okay alright sure! I will be in your movie!' Serious! He's in my trailer right now!"

And let's not forget: God = UFO, UFO = God. I mean, just read "Chariots Of The Gods." The evidences are all in there.

While I was watching this movie, I felt the movie has some sort message, but I was not quite sure what the message was. Then I started to notice the movie seemed to use religious symbolism in a few instances. Like the hitchhiker girl doing a crucifixion pose And the part with Emilio Estevez telling her they could escape using a boat to an island called "Heaven/ Haven" on which has no motor vehicle. A man and a woman on an island called "Heaven/ Haven" with most likely few or traces of human civilization. Mmm... Then there was the trucks' honking, which reminded me of the sound of trumpet in the Book of Revelation. I mean, given the situation, and then the was the bible salesman (who was kind of a False Prophet) talking about "fall of mankind," it's kind of hard not. There were also a lot of black trucks, red trucks, and white trucks.... Then there was this: Who the hell would put de Vinci's Last Supper on a jukebox?!

Stephen King dedicated Gerald's Game to his wife and her sisters. Gerald's Game! Come on! It's a novel about a trophy wife who got handcuffed to a bed in a cabin alone in the middle of nowhere after a SM game had gone horribly wrong; she later was forced to give herself a degloving injury so to get out of the cuff before a serial killer could kill her! For God's sake! Can't you dedicate other novels your wife and her sisters?! Something, like, I don't know...Christine or Cujo? By the way, Stephen King said in an interview he would like to director again if he could; and if he could, he would like to direct Gerald's Game