(no subject)

[oakenguy]

So this weekend I saw several things which were good, but could've been a lot better.

Friday I saw "Hinterlands", the latest production by Rough & Tumble, with modpixie. A play about a ragtag group of vaudeville performers, done by the best physical comedy troupe in the area...how could it miss? I meant that as a rhetorical question, but I'll answer it: it can miss when the only physical moments aren't comedic, and the only comedic moments aren't physical. It can miss when you try to do a soap opera, basically, and yet at the same time try to make every character likable and sympathetic. This show missed.

(And on a note that might not have bothered other audience members but which really got to me--one of the big plot points revolves around the angst of one of the characters, the stage manager, who doesn't have any acting talent but who desperately wants a moment in the spotlight, and everyone else is like OH NOES SHE HAS NO TALENT WE MUST HIDE HER BACKSTAGE FOREVER and hello??!?? A troupe full of seasoned performers can't think of a *single* comedy routine or vignette for her to take part in and get a round of applause?? My suspension of disbelief snapped so hard, it blinded the person behind me.)

On Sunday Deb and I saw 'X-Men 3: Wolverine and His Amazing Friends'. My flist seems fairly evenly divided between folks who liked it and hated it. I'm in the middle, I guess--it had some really enjoyable moments, and by the low, low standards of a summer blockbuster movie it was good. If it turns out to be the movie I enjoy most this summer, I won't be surprised.

But.

Trying to avoid spoilers....there are about eight different plotlines all competing for space, which is maybe five too many. There are a lot more brutal deaths than I'm really comfortable seeing my comic book heroes inflicting. (Which makes me sound like a wimp, I know..."Waah! Why can't Wolvie just hit them with the BLUNT part of his claws? Waah!") Magneto's new Brotherhood, with the exception of Juggernaut, seemed about as competent and dangerous as the cast of the latest 'MTV Road Rules'. (If more androgynous.)

And costume design people, we need to talk. The attraction of the X-Men is the way they can represent every persecuted minority. So when you make everyone in the X-Academy look like they just stepped out of an Orange County mall and put every 'evil' mutant in either goth/bondage gear or Ellis Island rags, you're inserting some interesting-but-unsettling class distinctions that weren't in the original text, neh?

Comments

[khep.livejournal.com]

I really liked X3, but it felt like they were treating it like it would be the last of the series by busily cramming everything into one space- but then they left it open at the end...

Did you see the extra at the end of the credits?

X3 Spoilers

[tersa.livejournal.com]

there are about eight different plotlines all competing for space, which is maybe five too many.

That's a great summary of the problem. :P Or as one of the friends commented afterwards, "They introduced all these new characters, who had to have their five minutes of screentime, but that was all they got."

There are a lot more brutal deaths than I'm really comfortable seeing my comic book heroes inflicting.

And I was more distracted thinking, "OMGWTFBBQ! I can't believe they just killed that character!!!!" ... "Wait, shouldn't I be feeling sad they killed that character?"

Magneto's new Brotherhood, with the exception of Juggernaut, seemed about as competent and dangerous as the cast of the latest 'MTV Road Rules'. (If more androgynous.)

LOL. Yeah. It wasn't until the end of the movie that I realized Callisto's little lackey was female.

And costume design people, we need to talk.

Wow, good point.

Although I did like the touch of giving each of the X-characters distinctively colored piping in their black leather suits.

[wylddelirium.livejournal.com]

Check your voicemail, man. :)

[oakenguy.livejournal.com]

That was the most flattering invite I've heard in years! I'd love to, but I'm stuck here in Beantown this weekend. :(

[flopart.livejournal.com]

Good call on the costume design.

[palusbuteo.livejournal.com]

Damn! damn you for making me rethink how I feel about the movie and pointing out DUH flaws and moments I didn't want to recognize!
:D

[sistahraven.livejournal.com]

LOL on the costuming - I have had the same running commentary just through their previews. I imagine I'm going to wait to see this one on rental :P

[modpixie.livejournal.com]

i love that description of the x-movie.

[foresthouse.livejournal.com]

Hee! I completely agree with you on X-Men 3 - Dave and I both liked it ok but not as well as the other two. Immediately after exiting the theater, he said he had issues with the way they'd put in a subplot but not really develop it or the character (see: Angel, many others), and I asked, "Why are all the bad mutants Goths?"