When C.S. Lewis combined aliens and Christianity

C.S. Lewis, a pretty cool dude

Longtime readers of this blog--if there are any--know that I am fascinated with aliens. Perhaps less well known is the fact that this fascination extends at least as far back into my life as high school. It was during that time that my high school library, which periodically gives away books it was trying to get rid of, set out for the taking the three volumes of the Space Trilogy, written by C.S. Lewis (better known, of course, for The Chronicles of Narnia and Christian apologetics such as Mere Christianity). I had somehow heard about these books, which are combine aliens and vintage science fiction with Christian theology, before I saw my library trying to give them away. Hardly one to pass up free books anyway, and already interested in the promised synthesis of extraterrestrials and religion, I scooped them up, thinking I would read them at some point if not right then.

And I did--six years later. I may procrastinate, but I eventually get around to the thing I set out to do. In this case, I'm glad I did. All three novels--Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength--were great reads, though Perelandra stands out as the best of three. After reading all of the books, I wrote essays for the Patheos blog "Love Among the Ruins" about each, interpreting them in light of Catholic doctrine (even though Lewis wasn't Catholic, he might as well have been). I started with the first, obviously, which recounts a trip to the planet we know as Mars, but is known in the book as Malacandra. The main character, a Lewis stand-in named Elwin Ransom, finds himself unwittingly dragooned into a sort of imperialist mission by two other characters to conquer Mars in the name of "human progress," but all three human characters find that the inhabitants on Mars have something to teach the human race. As I wrote in my essay on Out of the Silent Planet:

Thus do three humans travel to a world two of them consider benighted, yet where one of them discovers it quite the opposite. Ransom finds that it is, rather, the full flowering of a world that never diverged from the naturally ordained order of its Creator, as the supreme contentment and harmony of its inhabitants bear out. Instead, Earth is the place that needs help, as it is the domain of humans of a wounded nature.

The inhabitants of Malacandra, then, actually point humanity toward a better way to live in relation to our Creator. 

As Lewis followed up Out of the Silent Planet with Perelandra, so I followed up my response to the former with one on the latter. Perelandra once again details a journey by Ransom to another planet. This time, however, he is sent willingly, to a world that is not old, as was Malacandra, but to young, Edenic Perelandra (to us, Venus). There, he confronts an attempt by an all-too-familiar evil to corrupt that world as it once did our own. Though Ransom wonders whether he must save Perelandra at all, or whether such thoughts are instead vain, even blasphemous speculation on his part, he accepts that this is the correct course of action. As I wrote in my essay on Perelandra:

...he realizes that, though God became Man because of sin, this was not the good that God had prepared for man. “That is lost for ever. The first King and first Mother of our world did the forbidden thing; and He brought good of it in the end. But what they did was not good; and what they lost we have not seen.” Though good came of it eventually, and the great good will come of it in the end, it was not God’s original plan for man and deprived him of the graces of his Original State. Thus does Ransom’s agonizing over his mission end; for so long he had wondered: “Had Hell a prerogative to work wonders? Why did Heaven work none?” His conclusion: “He himself was the miracle.” He was sent to Perelandra to answer that greatest of what-ifs, to prevent a recurrence of the Fall on another world.

Ransom's wondering why the Fall happened on Earth and questioning whether it was necessary, then, both enable him in good conscience to go about saving another world from a similar fate, and deepen his own theological understanding of the Fall of Man.

Lewis concludes his trilogy with That Hideous Strength, and I of course concluded my own trilogy with an essay on it. Lewis brings the action back to Earth in this novel. He shows through the actions of the seemingly well-intentioned National Institute of Co-ordinated Experiment (N.I.C.E. [!]) how man utterly divorced from the spiritual and consumed by the material can be just as dangerous as a religious fanatic, if not more so--especially when armed with the latest technology and a completely utilitarian mindset. Standing against the N.I.C.E. is a seemingly meager resistance that draws its strength from a more integrated, organic view of man, one rooted, moreover, in religious precepts. Lewis offers some advice in the novel of significant import to those who despair at the state of the modern world, which I quote in my essay on That Hideous Strength:

We must change the culture, starting by living lives consistent with John Pauline principles, and then spreading outward to the lives of our peers and the character of our institutions by our examples. For while proponents have lost much ground, the divine lingers in the world and its people. Therefore, “[t]he whole work of healing Tellus [another name for Earth] depends on nursing that little spark, on incarnating that ghost, which is still alive in every real people, and different in each…” It is now up to us to put his advice into practice.

Those who want to do something about the state of the world, then, must work outward from the goodness that still lingers in even the most lost and corrupted souls and institutions of our society. (For another take on That Hideous Strength, click here.)

Given the Space Trilogy's thematic depth, fantastic settings, and intriguing characterizations and plotting, I would heartily recommend it to anyone interested in aliens, religion, or both. Give them all a read, and tell me what you think. I hope you take less time to read them than I did.

How to make "Bill and Ted 3" most excellent

Pictured: A most excellent movie.

On April 13, Alex Winter, one half of the famous Bill and Ted duo, confirmed production of Bill and Ted 3. But many responded with “bogus,” not “excellent,” questioning the need for a sequel 27 years after sci-fi time travel comedy Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. Yet judging by three criteria of sequel worthiness I’ve determined in my prior work, Bill and Ted 3 is justified: the originals are good; the new movie returns with key principals and positive additions; and the originals laid sequel groundwork.

First, let’s establish that the original Bill and Ted movies are good. Excellent Adventure begins the story of two California slackers and wannabe rockstars, Bill S. Preston, Esq. (Winter) and Ted “Theodore” Logan (Keanu Reeves, in by far his best-acted role), whose music will someday bring world peace. The future utopia their music creates sends Rufus (George Carlin) back in time to make sure Bill and Ted pass a history report, their failing of which would otherwise doom that future.

Bequeathed a time machine by Rufus, they journey through time, meeting up with Napoleon, Billy the Kid, Socrates, Joan of Arc, Sigmund Freud, Genghis Khan, Abraham Lincoln, and Ludwig von Beethoven, bring them all to the present, and learn valuable lessons about history (and the correct pronunciations of names). Excellent Adventure also displays some of the best time travel logic in film, avoiding paradoxes through clever and amusing adherence to the Novikov self-consistency principle (basically: whatever happened, happened).

Sequel Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey begins with Bill and Ted still slackers, and confused that is the case. Time-traveling robot versions of themselves, created by a totalitarian rejecter of the future Bill and Ted utopia, then kill them. They explore an Earthly spectral afterlife, hell, and heaven before resurrecting by defeating Death in a series of board games. After all this, Bill and Ted finally decide to practice their music, beginning the path to world peace. If this all sounds absurd to you, you’re right. But Reeves, Winters, and writers Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon sell it all with a laid-back earnest goofiness that endears you to the characters and their bizarre journeys.  

A most excellent sequel.

Second, Bill and Ted 3 involves a worthy mix of old and new. For some franchises, like Conan or Die Hard, returning the main character suffices. But Bill and Ted has always been about Bill and Ted. Fortunately, both Winter and Reeves are returning. Though some great talents once associated with Bill and Ted--most notably, comedian George Carlin--have died, with Reeves and Winter, the movie can survive (I'm no fan of Jon Stewart, but I think he might be a good replacement for George Carlin). The new movie will also bring along director Dean Parisot, who proved skilled with sci-fi comedy (and time travel) in the excellent Galaxy Quest.  

There is, moreover, material in the original movies ripe for sequelization. For one compelling question always lurked beneath the juvenile affect of the first two Bill and Ted movies: Can Bill and Ted succeed independently? This idea has been present from the beginning, when Rufus first came back to ensure the duo passed their history report (and even in the historical figures they encounter, all of whom achieved their greatness on their own merit). If Bill and Ted would have passed without intervention, they wouldn’t have needed Rufus; that they required and received help places an asterisk on their accomplishments throughout the first movie that carries into the second, which opens with Bill and Ted wondering why they aren’t great yet.

Indeed, their self-consistent time travel reinforces this dilemma. For at the end of the first movie, Bill and Ted simply use the “whatever happened, happened” logic of time travel to set up a series of convenient outcomes that they have to remember actually to create later. This is brilliant thinking on their part, but amounts to long-term procrastination; at some point, they actually have to do the things they set up for themselves.

This problem, writ large, could furnish a worthy plot for Bill and Ted 3, as I, now well-accustomed to offering free, unsolicited, inevitably-ignored advice to filmmakers, shall proceed to prove. Imagine if somehow Bill and Ted still haven’t made the music that will establish universal harmony, and have been spoiled by time travel into thinking it will happen automatically. Though they know they will actually do it someday, the movie can chart their realization that they actually have to make it happen for themselves. Indeed, Bill and Ted 3 could even turn the absence of Rufus into a plot point, forcing Bill and Ted to accept that no one will make things happen for them anymore.

A mid-life-slacker-awakening, or some variation of it (one report suggest a journey into a future without their music) would give us a Bill and Ted 3 that not only satisfies the three conditions above, but that worthily sends off the goofy yet surprisingly intelligent franchise. If done right, it would be most excellent.    

Reflections on a year since graduating college

Lording over my former domain

It is something of a cliche by now to quote William Faulkner's famous lines: "the past is never dead. It's not even passed." But every cliche emerged from some truth, and was true at some point, even if it isn't anymore, or has become stale. Yet I don't think this quote has become untrue or stale. I think people just became tired of being reminded of it, because it was and remains a truth that hurts.

The undead past has certainly hurt me over the past year, anyway. Since I graduated from Hillsdale College in May 2015, and even more so since I moved to Washington, D.C. for my first post-collegiate job that July (my first day of work was the day before my 22nd birthday), the past has haunted me. Like some horror movie villain, I cannot seem to kill it; every time I think I have escaped it, it pops right back up.

It doesn't help that I am an unusually time-and-past-conscious person (a trait that Facebook's "On This Day" feature has only sharpened). Nor does it help that I still feel like I am on a school calendar, even though my life's calendar doesn't work that way anymore. Thus, I have spent most of the past year both considering what I was doing on this day/at this time the year before, and somewhat envious of my friends still at campus doing what I once did. And much as a tsunami compresses and gathers strength just before it crashes against the shore, the wave of "on this day" anniversaries has only increased in my life over the past month as I near a full year in this new chapter of my life: one year since my last college race; one year since I cut my senior year of college long hair; one year since I interviewed for the job I now have; one year since I graduated; and one year since I drove away from Hillsdale for the first time as an alumnus. One year since, one year since, one year since...

Hoping to achieve some level of separation from the past, I reserved tickets many months ago for a tour of the Washington Monument last weekend. In a bit of the sort of symbolic, quasi-poetic bookending that I always seek in life, I would summit the Washington Monument on the same day that this year's graduates of Hillsdale College would join me as alumni. But life, as John Lennon once said, is what happens while you're busy making other plans. And last Saturday, the elevator of the Washington Monument had others plans: i.e., to break, denying me both entry and closure. Oh well. At least I got pizza.

Me last weekend, deprived of an opportunity for symbolic closure

All the world's pizza, however, can't help me escape the past. And to exorcise the thoughts that have rattled around my brain over the past year--thoughts that I am, at the same time, loathe to excise, given how paradoxically tightly I cling to the very same past I am trying to escape--I must try to do it the only other way I know how: by writing. I could say many things about my "college experience"--the friends, the experiences, the education, the running--but for symbolic potency nothing beats the off-campus house at which I lived my junior and senior years of college.

In many ways, large and small, 246 N West Street, Hillsdale, Michigan, 49242 (an address I can still rattle off unthinkingly) was the fount of my college experience. Obviously, it was the place where I did most of my sleeping, a good chunk of my homework and eating, and lived other quotidian aspects of my life. But far more meaningful than all of these was the social atmosphere of the house. Both years I lived there, my cohabitants were some of my best college friends, the people with whom I generated some of my most cherished college memories. Along with other affiliated hangers-on, we enjoyed and entertained ourselves and each other in ways that would be practically impossible to communicate to someone who did not. Even to begin listing some of the glories that emerged from our household--the Gadfly Group, DJ Wetwood, the Pisswasser Weekend Warrior Award, "Are You Gonna Be My Girl?"--suggests both their mystery to those who don't understand and the inadequacy of such a list even--indeed, especially--for those who do understand. So I shall simply resort to that convenient out for such situations, one that rings particularly true in this case: You had to be there.

It is probably for the best that I not recount all that transpired on this porch anyway

Yet for all this, my house wasn't always even the most entertaining one on our street. Two houses adjacent to us, both full of friends, also provided ample amusement on both weekdays and weekends. If you were ever bored with what was going on in one, odds are you could go into another, and those inside would welcome you into whatever they were doing. And, on the other hand, if you were ever too exhausted by the silliness happening in one, odds are at least one of the other ones would also contain a few slumped-over souls seeking solace from the shenanigans. In the fall and spring, we would often populate our essentially-shared front yard with couches, former dentistry chairs (God only knows from where), and other various seats, and get a fire and some music going; in the interminable Michigan winters, we would venture out into snow drifts just to travel along the paths shoveled between our houses to see what the other guys were up to; and at all times, we did our best to enjoy that rare moment in our lives when we had more of the privileges of adulthood than the responsibilities.

The houses themselves were also perfectly adequate. They were hardly fancy, but they were perfect for a bunch of young adult males who, like many members of our demographic cohort, had a tendency to live filthily, to get physical, and to break things. Oh, and did I mention that these off-campus houses were actually so close to Hillsdale's main campus buildings that you could roll out of bed and be in class on time in five minutes or less (as I proved on my many occasions)? Nor should I neglect Bob Johnston, our incredibly accommodating, miraculously tolerant, super-helpful landlord who didn't mind us at all. In fact, he encouraged us by making our lives on West Street possible. In many cases, he was the one who shoveled those paths between our houses in the winter, so conscious was he of the friendship between our houses. At the same time, however, he was not a nostalgic who wanted to live vicariously through a group of young people. We barely saw him except when there was some dire issue or when he was performing routine maintenance. And we were pretty sure he deliberately did that maintenance around 3 pm on weekdays, when our houses, most of whose residents were on the track or other sports teams, were absent. He just wanted us to have fun. Well, Bob, we had fun, and the rent was cheap.

As I wrote on Hillsdale's Class of 2015's "Senior Square"

Thanks to Bob, to our friendships, and to the experiences we generated, the houses on West Street generated what you might call a "long tradition of existence to ourselves and the community at large." We created a culture of fun and camaraderie, one that made us an institution both independent of campus and superior to dorm culture. We were an institution the college did not control. Through it, we had a presence on campus larger than ourselves. And through it, we belonged to yet another thing that would persist after we left. For each homecoming during our time on West Street brought years of prior alumni who had once called the houses on West Street home. We looked forward to doing the same during our own homecomings.

Alas, it was not to be. As we learned long before we left our houses for the last time, the college had bought and planned to demolish them in the summer of 2015. You could say this lent an added urgency to the time we had left on West Street until the houses were demolished, which was definitely true; we tried our best to enjoy every minute that remained of our time there, with much success, I think. But I remain bitter to this day about this decision. For not only did it deprive future generations of the opportunity to live in the houses as we did. It also deprived us of the opportunity to return to them. The destruction of the West Street houses also removed from campus the culture we once contributed, making the atmosphere of the place that much less interesting, and putting that much more of campus life under college control. And due to the cruel four-year turnover that marks high schools and colleges, soon no students on campus will have their own memories of our homes. The houses will live on only in hearsay, in testimonies of siblings and friends, and, God willing, in legend.  I owe my life to Hillsdale College, but I shall always remain bitter about the destruction of the West Street homes, if for nothing else than the profound emotions their untimely destruction forced upon me when I left my house for what I knew would be the last-ever time.



Indeed, not long after I recorded the above video, my last glimpse into the place I had come to love, my house ceased to exist.

Pictured: life's cruelty

Pictured: More cruelty

I saw both of the above pictures without being physically present for the destruction. But when I returned to Hillsdale for my first Homecoming last fall, I witnessed it for myself:

Where my house once stood

Seeing what was once my house turned into an empty field made me a feel bit like Charlton Heston:



I did have one physical memory of something I created when I returned to campus: the Senior Square, decorated annually by that year's graduating class (from which the above "We had fun, and rent was cheap" picture comes).

Yet the Senior Square is almost as cruel as the destruction of our houses. For at the end of every school year, that year's graduating class paints over the Square of the prior year's senior class to create its own. By now, then, my own Senior Square is gone as well. Thus now both my house and my attempts to immortalize have vanished, as well as much of my tangible legacy. The destruction of my college house has exacerbated, complicated, and forced upon me earlier than I expected the simultaneous, paradoxical, impossible reconciliation with and separation from my past that I seek. And, as recounted above, now more than a year separates me from any undergraduate experiences I had at Hillsdale. Yesterday, moreover, my school email account, which alumni keep for year after graduation, expired. I am a drowning man, thrashing around wildly around the flotsam and jetsam of my memories, hoping for something to cling to but finding nothing that stays above water.

Pictured: the end of an era

And yet my past is not dead. It isn't even passed. Nor need it be for me to feel content in life. For though I have spent much of the past year haunted by the nearness of my recent college memories, I don't have to let them haunt me, or define me. Yet neither must I jettison them entirely into oblivion to be happy. As I move into this next chapter of my life--the only one-year anniversaries that await me now relate to my time in D.C.--I can cherish the memories of my past, embrace them, and bring them into my being; the college can destroy my house, but it can't destroy my remembrances. I have become a part of all that I have met, as Ulysses states in Tennyson's poem. I don't have to dwell on my past to remember it, to honor it. I bear the imprint of all those I have met and all that I have done on my very being, and I bring it forward to wherever life brings me next. Here's hoping the next year of my life brings me as much to recall fondly as has the year that has now just passed.

Another open letter to Disney/Lucasfilm: 11 ways to make the Han Solo prequel good (without me in it)

My  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ reaction when I learned I wasn't cast as Han Solo.

Dear Disney/Lucasfilm,

On January 31, I published what remains the most-viewed item on this young blog, and one of the best things I've ever written (if I do say so myself): "An Open Letter to Disney/Lucasfilm: 22.5 reasons why I should be the new Han Solo." Responding to the still-open casting call for your Han Solo prequel movie, which would recast the role made iconic by Harrison Ford, I made the case that I was the best choice. I would summarize my previous post here, but I could not possibly do it justice by summary; just read (or reread) it here:

Alas, despite my unimpeachable case, you declined to give me the role (though I appreciated the follow-up letter that stressed how close I came*). Instead, it emerged last week that the role went to a different generic, white, brown-haired young male named Alden Ehrenreich, who had the good fortune of meeting Steven Spielberg at his Bar Mitzvah (some guys have all the luck). Congratulations, you well-connected up-and-comer, you.

Seriously. I look at least as much like a young Han Solo as this guy. What gives?

I'm not bitter, though. Really, I'm not. I'll probably still see this movie when it comes out, even if I'll always think it would have been better with me in it. But let's be honest: You could still screw this movie up. After all, the world still hasn't forgiven George Lucas for the Star Wars prequels he gave us. And so, in the interest of preventing a similar fiasco, as a follow-up to my original post, and as both proof that I'm not bitter and as a possible audition for helping with the screenplay, I give you 11 (approximately half of the 22.5 reasons I gave for my being Han Solo) pieces of free advice on how to make sure the Han Solo prequel doesn't suck.

Or you could still cast me. It's not too late...

1) Make it funny, but not too funny. You seem to have gotten the right idea about Han Solo's character by enlisting Phil Lord and Chris Miller, two guys who are pretty good with comedy (and whose getting the job was announced on my 22nd birthday), as directors. Because as awesome as Han Solo is, let's not forget that he is also funny, even goofy. Just watch him try to fool Death Star personnel into thinking everything's normal (and then just shooting his way out of the situation when he proves unconvincing). Or when he unwittingly charges an entire room of Stormtroopers. Or when a box of tools falls on him in the Millennium Falcon. Or during his witty repartee with Leia. Or in countless other examples when Han embodies either verbal or physical comedy. The Han Solo prequel shouldn't be all comedy, but it should definitely be a bit lighthearted.

I mean, come on. Just look at this face.

2) Don't give us the Han Solo we know; give us someone who could plausibly become the Han Solo we know. This might be the most important thing the new movie has to get right. Getting a different, younger actor to play Han Solo doesn't mean that he should just do an impression; that would be either a very boring movie or a very disappointing one, since no one can be Harrison Ford except Harrison Ford (which is why we should just clone him). Instead, Ehrenreich should play--and the screenplay should allow him to play--a Han Solo we could believe as the Han Solo we will one day come to love, but is not that Han Solo quite yet.

3) Show underdeveloped versions of the traits he will one day embody with confidence. Give us a Han Solo who seems outwardly confident and cocky, like the one we know, but in a way that is totally unearned, and who maybe, on the inside, is actually guarded and somewhat unsure of himself and insecure in a world he doesn't quite fully understand yet. Give us a Han Solo who backs himself into corners because he's confident he can talk, shoot, or otherwise improvise his way out of them, but isn't always capable of that yet. Give us a Han Solo who is sarcastic and witty, but sometimes makes bad jokes that don't always land, and uses sarcasm in large part as a coping mechanism to make sense of a world he doesn't quite have a handle on yet. Give us a Han Solo who is uncouth, immature, and even somewhat slovenly and ill-mannered--a nerfherder?--but in a somewhat juvenile way that isn't yet part of his roguish charm. Give us a Han Solo who thinks he knows how to charm women, but often falls flat or just plain strikes out. At the same time, don't overdo it and make him so completely unlike the Han Solo we know that we can't believe he'll ever become that. Strike a balance.

Make Han not get the girl, like in this scene, but with less incest.

4) Don't make the leap from young Han Solo to the Han Solo we know too quickly. Again, perhaps the overriding temptation of this movie will be to make Han Solo too awesome too quickly. Resist that urge. As great a character as he is, he surely wasn't always that way. Like all of us, he is the product of all of the choices he has already made and all of the experiences he has already had. Show us some steps along the way of his becoming the Han Solo we know. Three possible examples: a situation that gets way out of hand because he declines to shoot first, which teaches him the important lesson of always shooting first; someone calls him "kid" in the same affectionate, older-brother way he later calls Luke "kid"; someone shows him--or he learns himself in a period of desperate necessity--about the Millennium Falcon's helpful trap-doors. At the same time, don't get him all the way to the Han Solo we know, or at least, don't get him all the way there too quickly.

5) Don't make Han Solo a "chosen one." This relates directly to points 2, 3, and 4. One temptation enticing Lord and Miller, as well as father-son screenwriting duo Lawrence and Jake Kasdan, will be to make Han Solo simply a "born badass," or maybe even a "chosen one" (this was a mistake of J.J. Abrams' Star Trek, which turned Captain Kirk, a character who, in the original Star Trek series, earned his status entirely through his own merit, into a chosen one of sorts**). That would be antithetical to the entire spirit of Han Solo. Even if he overcame his initial skepticism about the Force, it was pure chance that he became involved in the Rebellion in the first place. It could have been any space smuggler that Obi-Wan met in the Mos Eisley Cantina and got Luke and Obi-Wan off of Tatooine in A New Hope (heck, it could have even been this guy). Han Solo's greatness was not preordained (even if his first lines were: "Han Solo. I'm captain of the Millennium Falcon"), which is one of the most appealing aspects of his character. Don't ruin it.

6) Don't force Han into the plot of chronologically future-set Star Wars movies where he doesn't belong. A similar temptation to making Han Solo a chosen one would be to tie him into the plot of the Original Trilogy somehow, well before he's supposed to be part of it, or to throw someone/something else from the Original Trilogy into his life where it doesn't belong. I can't find a citation for it, but a perfect example of this would be George Lucas' almost inserting a scene into The Phantom Menace in which someone warns a young Greedo to be careful about fighting, because someday someone might fight back (or something like that). That would have been completely unnecessary self-referential cannibalization. Han Solo should not randomly encounter, say, Darth Vader, or a young Luke Skywalker, in this movie (nor should he cameo in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, as is rumored). The only allowable exception for this would be letting him meet an Original Trilogy character with whom he has an established history; in this instance, meeting Greedo would actually be fine, since Han already seems to know him well during their first (and last) on-screen meeting in A New Hope.

Shooting first has its benefits.

7) Don't use up the Original Trilogy capital too aggressively. The Star Wars Original Trilogy set up several famous aspects of Han Solo's character: Getting the Millennium Falcon from Lando Calrissian, making the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs, befriending Chewbacca, etc. It's probably inevitable that this prequel will show the origin of at least some of these things, maybe all of them. And that's OK. But make them a natural part of the story. And don't make them happen all at once (as in the still-entertaining opening scene of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, in which basically every essential aspect of the character of Indiana Jones--whip, hat, fear of snakes, "it belongs in a museum," scar--comes into place in about 8 minutes when he's an adolescent), or too early. The Force Awakens did this well; the first "character" from the Original Trilogy we see on screen is the Millennium Falcon, which doesn't appear until near the end of the first act. Han himself follows shortly thereafter. And Luke Skywalker, the hero of the Original Trilogy, doesn't even have a line of dialogue in the movie. Those would be great examples to follow.

"Fine, I'll be in the movie. But I don't want to say anything."

8) Explore new parts of the Star Wars universe at least as much as ones we already know, if not more. A great way to follow points 6 and 7 would be to flesh out aspects of the Star Wars universe that don't directly relate to the Skywalkers, the Empire, or the Rebel Alliance. The seedy criminal underbelly of smugglers and Hutts could be fascinating; seeing a young man learn not only how to survive but to thrive in such an environment, even more so. Let's see the Star Wars galaxy for the filthy, used-future, licentious place it really is, outside of the gleaming corridors of Imperial starships or the computer-studded hallways of Rebel bases.

9) Don't just make him the product of a single mentor figure. This was another mistake of the still-entertaining sequence that begins Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. In addition to establishing the entire character of Indiana Jones too quickly, that scene made "Indiana Jones" largely the product of a single mentor figure, who was basically Indiana Jones before Indiana Jones, and who Indiana Jones essentially became. That's boring. The young Han Solo should draw his character from many sources, not just one proto-Solo.

Someone like this should not appear in the Han Solo prequel.

10) Hire me as a co-writer for the screenplay. If you still remain somehow unconvinced of my acting abilities after reading this, then surely it and the post you have just read have convinced you at the very least that I know how to write, and that I understand this character and universe (for more evidence of my understanding of the latter, see here). Therefore, I would be happy to help write or to consult on this movie's screenplay. I'd even gladly help out without a writer's credit, under the radar, without the knowledge of the Writer's Guild of America, or any of the conditions it stipulates for participation. Basically, you could chain me to a desk, give me regular injections of caffeine, and force me to write the screenplay without sleep, and I wouldn't care. You're not going to get a better deal, let me tell you.  

11) Boot Alden Ehrenreich and cast me instead. I know I stated in the title of this post that casting me in this movie wasn't going to be one of my suggestions for making it better. And I know I began this post by saying that I wasn't bitter. But seriously, guys. I belong in this movie, and you know it. And when it's inevitably proven that Alden Ehrenreich just isn't up for the task, I'll be happy to step in. There is precedent for this: Harvey Keitel was originally cast as Col. Willard in Apocalypse Now, but director Francis Ford Coppola decided he just wasn't right for the role, and replaced him with Martin Sheen***. Stuart Townsend was initially cast as Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings, but director Peter Jackson decided he was too young and unconvincing in the role and replaced him with Viggo Mortensen (which was particularly fortunate; I doubt Townsend would have instinctively deflected with his sword a real knife accidentally thrown at him during filming, or kicked a real piece of metal, broken his toe, and screamed in character--both on-set accidents that made it into Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers, respectively). And Eric Stolz was originally cast as Marty McFly in Back to the Future, only to be replaced by Michael J. Fox when director Robert Zemeckis rejected Stolz's overly-dramatic take on the role. All I'm saying is it's happened before, and that I'm available if you decide you need me after all.

Left and top right: What almost was.

So there you have it, Disney/Lucasfilm: 11 (OK, 9) ways to make sure the Han Solo prequel doesn't suck. If done right, it could be a good, entertaining origin story. I must say though that it will never be as good as it would be with me in it, either in the lead role, or as a co-writer. But it's not too late to involve me in either role. Have your people call my people.

Sincerely,

Jack Butler

PS

I am, again, as serious about this as you want me to be.

*This letter may or may not exist.
**Think about it: Dead father with great legacy, tutored by mentor figures, the universe leading him to Spock Prime, Spock Prime making sure that he and young Spock become friends...it's all very Star Wars-y, which reinforces my argument that Abrams basically made Star Trek into Star Wars.
***Incidentally, a native of Dayton, Ohio, where my father and grandfather grew up; Martin and his brothers went to the same high school as my grandfather.
 

Captain America is way too fast - a runner's rant

 

 How I imagine myself to be when I pass slower people while running in D.C.

While Captain America is in the news (you can read my [positive] review of the just-released Captain America: Civil War here), I'd like to get one of my long-standing rants about Captain America: The Winter Soldier, its predecessor, off my chest.



First, let me stipulate that Captain America: The Winter soldier is a good movie. Here's a one-paragraph review I wrote of it back in 2014:

Mod­ernizing Captain America by making a throwback to 1970s con­spiracy thrillers (hint: Robert Redford) seems a strange choice, but it mostly works thanks to a strong ensemble, genuine pathos between hero and villain, and refreshingly kinetic and clear action. Still, some implausible elements dissolve even under comic-book logic: Cap’s 2:18-minute miles, Black Widow’s becoming a KGB agent at seven (we learn she was born in 1984; do the math), and the dubious physics of both Cap’s shield and Bucky’s arm. But it’s still a good story about a character raised in black-and-white con­fronting a world of gray.

That review contains the germ of what has since become one of my bigger complaints about the film. This is not something about its pacing, plot, or characterization, mind you, as all of those are sound. It is, instead, a complaint about its treatment of running, about which I know a thing or two. Ironically, this defect proceeds, in part, from one of the best aspects of The Winter Soldier: A strong sense of setting that comes from actually having been filmed in Washington, D.C., where I now live, and where I had spent two summers as an intern before seeing the movie (though I did not see it while I was in D.C.).

I was particularly pleased to see the movie opening with two characters running at dawn on and around the National Mall, since that was and remains a staple of my D.C. life.



Much as I enjoyed that scene, both for how it echoed my own experience and for how it established a relationship between two characters, I have many problems with it. First, it showed both Captain America and Sam Wilson running laps around the Tidal Basin, along which sits the Jefferson Memorial. You may think that's a great place to run, if you've never been to D.C., or maybe only visited.

You'd be wrong. The Tidal Basin path has many low-hanging branches, which bloom beautifully during the cherry blossom season, but are short enough to require constant ducking from anyone taller than 5 feet, and sturdy enough to clothesline anyone who isn't paying attention. Since Cap is a perfect physical specimen well over 5 feet tall, I can only assume that he spent most of his laps around the Jefferson Memorial either parkour-dodging tree branches, or just straight-up running through them, which he probably could do, being super and all, but which I'd think would be a pain even for a superhuman. The Tidal Basin also floods easily, leaving multiple puddles on its path at even the lightest rain, and flooding parts or all of the path with anything heavier. And because it's so close to the water, the path always attracts geese, aka nature's bastards, who might even defeat a hero as valiant as Captain America.

"Hail Hydra!"

I can forgive all of that. Far more problematic is the depiction of Captain America's running abilities. In the above scene, we see that Captain America is running at what looks to be a constant sprint, such that the ubermensch constantly has to tell the genetic inferior he keeps passing "on your left." At one point, Sam Wilson tries to run with Cap, but he simply can't keep up. Fortunately, Steve stops and talks to this genetic inferior, at which point it is revealed that Steve/Cap has run 13 miles in 30 minutes. When I first saw the movie, I did the math in my head (because I'm a runner): That's 2:18/mile. The male world record for the mile, achieved by Hicham el Guerouj on July 7, 1999 (my 6th birthday!) is 3:43 (and my PR is a rather pathetic 4:27 equivalent 1500m). 

Let's think about this. Captain America can run a 2:18/mile, 1 minute and 25 seconds faster than the fastest mile that has ever been run. This is equivalent to 26 mph, slightly faster than the speed limit in most neighborhoods. And he can keep it up for 13 miles. So he's basically running anaerobically (i.e., into oxygen debt)...aerobically (i.e., without depriving himself of oxygen). Wow.

We can break it down further. The fastest human footspeed ever officially recorded is Usain Bolt running 27.78 mph during a race once. This is faster than Captain America's pace in the scene above...but Cap was basically jogging. He wasn't even sweating when he finished (which is quite the feat during most of spring, summer, and fall in the humid former physical swamp [and current moral swamp] that is Washington, D.C.). I have no doubt that Cap could outrun Bolt if he needed to. So, in sum, Captain America, can run over a minute faster than not only world record mile pace, but Olympic sprint pace (i.e., a constant anaerobic sprint), for 13 miles at a time.

Not pictured: Captain America, in front of Usain Bolt, having already told him "on your left"

Is this implausible? If we limit ourselves to the current capabilities of the human body...yes. But is it consistent with the rules of the Marvel Universe? Maybe. Here is what Chris Evans, the actor who portrays Captain America,  once said about Captain America's physique: 

 He would crush the Olympics. Any Olympic sport he's gonna dominate. He can jump higher, run faster, lift stronger weight, but he can be injured. He could roll an ankle and be out for the season. He's not perfect, he's not untouchable. So a lot of the effects, if I'm going to punch someone they're not going to put them on a cable and fly them back 50 feet, but he's going to go down, probably not getting back up, which I think humanizes it. It makes it something that, again, I think everyone can relate to a little bit more, which I really like.

If you are uncharitable, you could take this to mean that Captain America is only at the peak of human physical conditioning. This would limit his abilities to only the maximum extent of what humans are capable, but in every physical endeavor. If you interpret his abilities in this way, then he should only be able to sprint at the pace he runs for 13 miles for the same maximum distance that Bolt can, and so on all the way up the Olympic ladder (world 1500m, 3k, 5k, 8k, 10k, marathon record, etc.). By that understanding, Cap's D.C. running is wildly overpowered.

On the other hand, you could be more charitable. Maybe it's not that he stops only at the outer limit of human potential. Instead, perhaps he can maintain the highest possible human speed (regardless of duration) over long distances. In other words, he can sustain the fastest pace any human has ever run for as he needs to do it. That is, I suppose, one interpretation of his powers, albeit a pretty generous one. But it would be consistent. 

Am I reading too much into this? Yes. But if you didn't care about this sort of thing, you wouldn't be reading my blog. Permit me at least an occasional indulgence into an exploration of an instance of intersection between movies and running, two of my passions. At any rate, this may not be too egregious a violation of the rules of the universe in which this movie takes place. It's certainly not as bad as when Rocky ran 30.61 miles.

The real Captain America

"Captain America: Civil War" makes superheroes fighting fun...for now

We seem to be in the "smash your favorite action figures together" phase of superhero movies.

Between Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice in March, this past weekend's Captain America: Civil War, and X-Men: Apocalypse at the end of the month, our superhero movies suddenly really like pitting protagonists against one another. And though I can't speak for X-Men: Apocalypse (which hasn't come out yet), Captain America: Civil War is far superior to Batman v. Superman at balancing multiple protagonists, executing myriad plot threads, and simultaneously exemplifying and challenging the conventions of the comic book genre.

Like Batman v. Superman, Captain America: Civil War focuses on the collateral damage of superheroics, and the attendant issues--vigilantism or heroism? Outlaws or fulfillers of the law?--it raises. Unlike Batman v. Superman, however, Civil War does this in ways that seem both logical and unpretentious. A mass-casualty incident indirectly caused by the Avengers, combined with the massive civilian toll of the groups prior world-saving efforts, convinces the global powers-that-be to regulate superhero activity, basically turning The Avengers into government agents. Credible characterizations, established in this and earlier movies, divide the key players over this issue. Tony Stark/Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.,), haunted by guilt and desperate, as in previous movies, to create a system--engineer that he is--that regularizes world-saving, is happy to sign up. Steve Rodgers/Captain America (Chris Evans), motivated, as always, by a strong sense of inner duty and skeptical from his past experiences of government overreach, is loathe to relinquish his conscience to the state.

The rest of the players sort themselves accordingly. Newbies T'Challa/Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman, who lends the role a restrained elegance) and Peter Parker/Spiderman (Tom Holland, who rejuvenates this now-familiar hero with a refreshing dose of youthful energy) join Team Iron Man; Scott Lang/Ant-Man (Paul Rudd, borrowed from his movie and funny as ever), Sam Wilson/The Falcon (Anthony Mackie), and others join Team Cap. Further complicating matters is the lingering presence of Bucky Barnes/The Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan). He is still trying--at Cap's urging--to return to his pre-brainwashed assassin self*, despite the efforts of Machiavellian schemer Baron Zemo (Daniel Brühl) to use him as a weapon to unravel The Avengers to avenge his family (killed in the aftermath of The Avengers' battle against Ultron in Avengers: Age of Ultron).

If this all sounds like a lot, well--it is. But somehow, directors Anthony and Joseph Russo (Community, Captain America: The Winter Soldier) and screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFreely (Captain America: The First Avenger, Captain America: The Winter Soldier)  manage to juggle it all without descending into chaos or Zack Snyder-esque levels of dark pretentiousness. Civil War is, at times, a dark movie by Marvel standards, but it never loses its propulsive comic book sensibilities. And these sensibilities are on full display in the Avenger-on-Avenger battle that the whole movie builds toward. Somehow, a fight between characters of wildly different--and, in many cases, wildly asymmetric--powers and abilities, not only (mostly) makes sense (or at least as much sense as these things can make), but represents arguably one of the best and most faithful reproductions of comic book storytelling on the big screen yet.

Yet for as perfectly as Civil War nails the trappings of the comic book genre, it also, in important ways, both subverts and refines them. For Civil War doesn't just manage a non-heavy-handed exploration of themes about as weighty as a comic book movie can manage (most obviously, whether superheroes defend the law or undermine it). It also avoids some of its genre's common cliches, such as, most notably, the third-act-world-in-peril climax, dispensing with that in favor of some genuinely moving interactions between characters whom we, after spending at least one prior movie or more with most of them, know and genuinely care for. The contrast with Batman and Superman's rushed introduction, relationship, and fight in Batman v. Superman is instructive--and unfavorable to Batman v. Superman. 

One can, of course, always find things with which to quibble. The two most powerful characters in the movie, The Vision (Paul Bettany) and The Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) have often conveniently elastic abilities, more or less powerful/involved as the plot requires to make sense. Spider-Man is fun***, but gets as artificially introduced into the proceedings as Wonder Woman in Batman v. Superman. With everything else going on, Captain America himself sometimes fades into the background of a movie that bears his name (it's really more of an Avengers movie anyway**). And Baron Zemo, the antagonist driving much of the plot, is decidedly one-note as a villain, which one could interpret favorably or unfavorably (as a confirmation of the "Marvel villain problem" of unexciting MCU antagonists) depending on how colorful one prefers his villains. Or you could react to this indifferently, since you see Civil War to watch the heroes fight each other. In such a setup, the villain matters far less. Again, one can quibble, but a good movie emerges regardless.

Yet for all that, something about Civil War still unsettled me. This review mentions the far-inferior Batman v. Superman several times. For Civil War succeeds in pretty much all aspects--plot, characters, themes, acting, patient establishment over years of the foundation for a good movie--at which Batman v. Superman failed. At the same time, however, the two movies are basically the same thing: comic book movies with simple, crass, cynical, commercial motivations, designed to perpetuate a "cinematic universe" by setting up future adventures for old and new characters, theoretically for the rest of time. Civil War just does it better. Maybe it's just that these movies are doing less for me as I begin to age out of the coveted "18-to-24-year-old male" demographic. Or maybe the prospect of superhero movies as far as the eye can see left me a bit disturbed as I left the theater. I suppose that as long as studios keep churning out movies like Civil War (though I wonder how many movies can successfully throw in the kitchen sink like it did), I have little basis to worry. But that can't go on forever.

Can it? 

*Memorably referred to by one character as The Manchurian Candidate.
**Minus The Hulk and Thor, out in space somewhere at this time.
***I particularly enjoyed his (accurate, but who really cares; it's a comic book movie) dig on Captain America's shield: "That thing does not obey the laws of physics at all!"

John Kasich: The man who loves to eat

This man knows how to enjoy food

A few days ago, Ohio Governor John Kasich dropped out of the Republican primary. Now, since I promised when I started this blog to stay away from politics, I shall say nothing of that sort about the man except what I have said already: That he is probably the best Republican candidate for UFO disclosure (though Donald Trump's blatant conspiracy-mongering may give him a run for his money).

The purpose of this blogpost is, instead, to celebrate one of Kasich's non-political virtues: His voracious appetite. Throughout his campaign, the governor showed himself to have by far the biggest stomach of anyone who ran for president (even Chris Christie). And since I, like Kasich, am not only from Ohio (though he was born in Pennsylvania), but also possessed of a black hole of a stomach, I would like to take a moment to celebrate my comrade-in-forks-and-knives. For whatever you think of Kasich, he knows how to eat.

Perfect form

Kasich displayed his appetite on numerous occasions throughout the campaign. But his powers may have peaked when he visited a deli in the Bronx on April 7 in the lead up to the New York primary. Thus did Business Insider describe Kasich's diet there:

...Kasich visited a food market on Arthur Ave in the Bronx. He sat down for what the owners thought would be a brief stop. But he had other plans.First, Kasich ate two plates of spaghetti bolognese, a sandwich with mozzarella, pickles, salami, provolone, and hot peppers.

As a butcher behind the counter named Mike tried to take away his plate of spaghetti, Kasich protested, asking for his plate back.
He then ordered pasta fagioli with cheese and tried some of the antipasto that deli owner David Grecco left on his plate. Kasich turned down the cannoli, though a staffer took some of them to go.
Kasich paused as he tasted the pasta fagioli.
"Mamma mia," he quipped.
"If I lived in the Bronx, I'd eat here every day," Kasich said. ["We'd like that" one of the deli's owners gleefully replied.]

Damn straight. There's a man who loves to eat. 

Alas, perhaps the trough of Kasich's eating career also came in New York. Many people, local and statewide, mocked his attempt there to eat a pizza with a fork. I'll admit, this was a bit of a culinary faux pas. And though I, like Kasich, am from Ohio, I have no clue what part of his Ohio upbringing or background gave him any indication that eating pizza with a fork was a good idea. I spent an entire pre-college life of pizza-eating with nary a fork in sight (the only utensil anywhere near me when I ate pizza was that weird plastic white tripod thing whose purpose has always mystified me); only when I got to college (in Michigan) did I see anyone use a fork to eat pizza, and I scoffed at the practice. In Kasich's defense, however, I'll take him at his word that the pizza was hot. And I'll lightly chastise New Yorkers for being so obsessed with their state that they savage anybody who errs even in the slightest from local custom, especially Midwestern boys like John Kasich. But if we're going to be obsessed with our states, I'll take my governor's side in this eating dispute against self-centered New Yorkers.

I mean, come on. How can you insult someone with such intense concentration?

In the Kasich campaign's final weeks, Donald Trump, one such New Yorker, took to mocking Kasich's eating habits. "I have never seen a human being eat in such a disgusting fashion," Trump said at a rally (he's lucky he's never met me). We'll never know if this criticism, which a born-eater like John Kasich probably took pretty personally, was the reason that Kasich left the race, but it certainly couldn't have helped. If nothing else, it likely made Kasich realize that his presidential run no longer constituted a guilt-and-insult-free way to eat as much as he wanted, which I speculate was the reason he ran in the first place.
 
Indeed, I suggest that Kasich's desire to eat is the proper--maybe the only--lens through which to understand his campaign. He stubbornly stayed in the race because ending it would mean going back to his far more modest Ohio Governor food budgets, being prevented from traveling around the country trying new food, and being stuck with Ohio cuisine. It also helps to explain what may have seemed one of the more tone-deaf remarks of his campaign: when he said that women "left their kitchens" to vote for him. This is not an insult, or a reflection of a mind hopelessly stuck in the past. Rather, from a man who seems to spend most of his time eating, it's either a compliment, or a sign of where he spends most of his time when he's not campaigning or governing anyway. In other words, he thinks everyone spends as much time in the kitchen as he does, not just women.

John Kasich in a kitchen, the room where he probably spends most of his time

And so I salute you, Governor Kasich. Or at least, I salute your stomach. For, like me, you appreciate food, and can't seem to get enough of it. You even ended your campaign on National Hoagie Day. Your campaign greased the pan for other Stomach-Americans like yourself (and me?) to run for president and not be ashamed of eating while they do. Forget Donald Trump and New Yorkers obsessed with their state. You do you, and I'll do me (hey, maybe we should pig out together sometime! I wonder who would eat more...). There's nothing wrong with that--so long as you (and I) manage to avoid sinful excess.