Monday, December 28th, 2009
I don’t get to movie theaters much. But as part of the new family plan to enjoy ourselves on Christmas, I went to see Avatar in 3D with a bunch of relatives. I went in intending to dislike it, and came out having thoroughly enjoyed myself. So much for my hipsterish snobbery.
What’s interesting to me is how the movie is simultaneously so fresh and so derivative. Avatar’s freshness is in its breathtaking visuals, all the technogeekery of its making. It’s derivative in its plot, setting, characters, and all other non-technical content. It’s practically a mashup in movie form. In the spirit of my blog post parsing out all the sources of Halo, I figured I’d do the same for this movie. Here are some of the most obvious sources, similarities and resonances (There are some spoilers within, but the plot of this movie is totally predictable and the least interesting thing about it, so feel free to read if you’re planning to go see it.) (more…)
Tags: aliens, america, anne mccaffrey, avatar, capitalism, gaia hypothesis, green, james cameron, mashups, memes, military, movies, native americans, originality, pop, racism, roger dean, scifi, south park, the abyss, the matrix, white people, yes
Posted in movies | 2 Comments »
Saturday, October 10th, 2009
My taste in video games mostly runs to the cartoony Japanese stuff: Mario, Zelda, Katamari. But I had access to an Xbox and a copy of Halo for a while, and I couldn’t rest until I finished it. I walked around thinking about it whenever I wasn’t playing. Every aspect of it was familiar, except for the fact of all of the sources being giddily combined together without any concern for logic. It’s like a perfect nerd mixtape.
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Tags: bungie, christianity, halo, mashups, microsoft, remix, ringworld, scifi, star trek, star wars, video games, xbox
Posted in video games | 2 Comments »
Sunday, June 28th, 2009
When I was in third grade, my mom and stepfather went on academic sabbatical to London for six months, taking my sister and me with them. I guess I’m grateful for the chance to experience another culture and everything, but it was a rough six months. I missed my dad, school, New York, the Muppet Show. British third graders are manic xenophobes of Eric Cartman proportions. It was the first time I had ever experienced genuine alien-ness, and I didn’t like it. The best thing about being there was Doctor Who.
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Tags: analog, bbc, cold tech hot beats, delia derbyshire, doctor who, eighties, electronica, keybs, multitracking, scifi, sixties, synths, tape editing, tv, uk, vocoder
Posted in autobio, hardware, music | 6 Comments »
