Sooo much to catch up on this week! Lots of movies! Lots of video games! Lots of aspiring novels! Also, Tony doesn’t know the name of the show. Enjoy!
QUESTIONS:
Hat tongues, Any interest in guest hosting anime review podcast, Tooning Japanese. I owe you a guest appearance. If so, –Azuretalon
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I was mistaken… big surprise…
Caity Lotz was in The Machine, and she was outstanding in it.
The actor playing the AI in Ex Machina was Alicia Vikander… and the points I made about the film were about the right film, in spite of me thinking of Lotz in The Machine when I thought about the AI character.
And, the main scientist guy who I KNEW was someone everyone would know if I could recall who he was… Oscar Isaac, who of course is very famous now for his recent role in Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
Oh, and I guess I didn’t make it clear… I’d be honored to help out, Azuretalon. 🙂 I’m afraid I’ll drive listeners away with my ignorance, but I am willing to help. 🙂
We would certainly appreciate one or both of your takes, we’re mostly amateur in our own right, and my entire gimmick is that I am the non fan of the group. Honestly, I’m not sure we aren’t just comedy around the framework of anime review. Like if Siskel pulled Ebert’s finger!
And…
Songwriter David Fenton and Wikipedia dispute assertions made about the meaning of the phrase “turning Japanese”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turning_Japanese
And we totally knew what was being implied in the name, although I took it more as achieving orgasm instead of simply masturbation as Tony said. But I could be wrong, I didn’t have a “My Body” book growing up.
Hmm, I had pretty different responses to the two movies mentioned that I’ve seen.
Ex-Machina–this might have been influenced by the fact that I was watching screening it to consider using it for thinking about AI in a class. But anyway, I didn’t really like it, despite the fact that the acting was good. Two main reasons: I actually found it very predictable, but then was also hoping I was going to be wrong because one of the things that led to the predictablity for me was a sexist trope.
Captain America I liked better, though I didn’t think it was great. But one thing I liked about it was the political/moral part.
Did you ever see The Machine, Jaz? If so, I’m curious as to what you thought.
Obviously, I’ve got The Machine and Ex Machina all mixed up in my head, so not sure if the opinions I’ve shared about either of them make any sense! 🙂
I haven’t. I’ll have to check it out.
I really like that podcast–I’d be so excited to hear either or both of you on it.
Thank you Jas! Appreciate the compliment!
Oh speaking of anime–the movie that Will was thinking of–the one where Scarlett Johansson is playing an Asian character is the live action version of “Ghost in the Shell.”
Yep, that’s the one.
Ohhhh… got to see “My Neighbor Totoro”–very cute, but also lots of stuff about kami (nature spirits/Shinto) which I think Will would like too.
Would love to help with editing.
What’s the distinction either of you are making about politics/ethics? Cause I see most political issues as also being moral ones, and that would certainly be true of the kind of questions in Captain America–which could be some of the following:
(As an analog to Superheroes) If some group has immense power, does that group get to make “policing” type decisions for everyone else, or should that group fall under some kind of legislative/regulatory control? Ex: Does the U.S. invade acountry on it’s own or does it seek approval from the UN?
There was a kind of argument about something akin to libertarianism being made which I thought could be read as both/for against Cap’s group. One way would be to see them as the group wanting weapons/power without control by government–in this they would represent the individual. But in another reading you could see them as the government determining right/wrong for everyone.
If we admit that some of our actions are determined (by nature, by nurture, or whatever)–where is the line between determination and will that decides whether a person is/isn’t morally responsible.
I don’t recall the conversation contrasting politics and ethics, but, rather, politics and morality.
I didn’t perceive a moral debate in the film, which, to me, would be, “Is what we’re doing right or wrong?” It looked to me as though the moral question was decided and everyone agreed that the Avengers were in the right, at least as far as “fighting the bad guys” was concerned. There was no debate in the main narrative as to whether or not the Avengers ought to be charged with crimes for their past actions, for example. Certainly, we were shown that the Avengers had their critics, but it didn’t seem to me that the storytellers intended for the audience to spend any time questioning the morality of the Avengers or the things the Avengers have done. And, anyway, the individual members of the team clearly felt bad about the loss of life and property that resulted from their actions, so, you know… that’s good enough, right?
There was clearly a political debate, though, which addressed questions of authority and accountability, and ethical considerations come up with such questions. The relevant questions here were things like… well, like, “Hey, who’s going to pay for cleaning up this mess?” and, “Who is *legally* responsible for these collateral deaths?”, with that latter question relevant not because they needed to decide who to punish for the deaths, but because they needed to sort out who the combatants in these battles actually were… for, really, bureaucratic purposes. Like… is the battle actually over? Have countries declared war here? Like… the Avengers are Americans, right? Is the US at war with this country, then? Do we need to sign treaties now or something? That sort of thing.
Tony no longer wanted to be “responsible” for this stuff. If the UN made the decisions, then the UN could take the blame… and, perhaps, Tony would argue that the UN might make wiser decisions as to what the Avengers should do and how they should do it. Cap, on the other hand, seemed to argue that there was no logic or reason behind concluding that the UN is more qualified to make these judgments, and that for the members of the Avengers to feel personally responsible for the missions they choose and how they execute them is the best way for them to keep themselves in check, otherwise they just become a mindless weapon for a blindly trusted world government. Which side is right? That’s a matter of opinion, an issue of one’s political ideology. There isn’t really a morally right or wrong answer. At least, I don’t think the film narrative is telling us there is.
Now, did Cap and Tony trump up their political positions with moral appeals? Sure, I guess I recall seeing that. But people do that all the time, try to legitimize a mostly arbitrary political position by convincing themselves and others that their position isn’t arbitrary at all, but, rather, a moral imperative. Was the audience supposed to buy that crap and pick a *moral* side (rather than merely a *political* side, or merely the side with the guy they feel the most warm-fuzzies for)? I didn’t really catch that. But I acknowledge that that’s probably just me.
I’m sure the film wanted people to pick a side, but I didn’t see much in the narrative dedicated to that purpose. I don’t think the storytellers wanted either side to seem more *moral* than the other — they didn’t want either side to seem more *heroic*. So they were left with getting people to pick a side based upon oversimplified politics or, alternatively, “feels”. Superficial political ideas and/or sentiment, that’s all I noticed the storyteller’s fiddling with, not morality so much.
Hmm, well now I think I’m confused as to the difference between ethics and morality. By morality I guess you mean that there’s a settled definition of right and wrong, and then one labels different actions as right/wrong, but ethics is trying to make the definition?
I guess I thought that though no one suggested charging anyone with a crime, there was a suggestion that what they had done in the past could be considered morally wrong. And the morality doesn’t rest on whether the people are actually bad guys or not. It would be sort of like the question–is it morally wrong for the U.S. to have toppled Saddam Hussein (who nobody disputes was a bad guy)? What gave the U.S. the moral authority to make that decision? And going into it–without any ability to absolutely predict the number of deaths or the instability in the region it would cause–still one has to acknowledge that such an action will result in collateral damage. What gives them the moral authority to decide on the acceptable level of collateral damage?
But getting back to the film–I think the film does kind of clearly lead us to pick a side narratively, because between Cap and Tony one of them is right about where the narrative is going. If the secrets of the narrative were revealed differently the other one would be right.
Yeah, the moral questions you’re talking about? Those aren’t the questions I saw the film asking. I’m not even so sure those are questions that most Americans ask about issues like the US toppling Saddam. And, on the level of UN considerations, it starts to get a little ridiculous asking “moral” questions, because of course it’s morally wrong to engage in war and other globally coercive activities. At the UN level, the only real question is, is it *morally justified* to engage in, say, a given life-threatening conflict, and the answer to that question often has little to do with serious considerations of morality. (Unless, I suppose, one assumes that the UN is just such a “moral authority” as you’ve mentioned, which, of course, is a matter of opinion… and, I suppose, argument over that particular point — whether or not the UN is a valid “moral authority” — does touch a bit upon the debate between Cap and Tony.)
If the film clearly leads us to one side or the other, I guess I don’t know what that side is. I won’t say more than that, because I’m not sure how to do so without giving spoilers, but I didn’t personally feel compelled by the narrative towards one side or the other. I’ve read the reviews of a few critics who cited it as a strength of the narrative that it didn’t seem to play favorites. But, again, I (and these critics) could easily be wrong about that.
On a different note–I liked the way the film imagined the country of Wakanda, and I’m looking forward to The Black Panther movie.
Yeah, agreed.
Every time people discuss Civil War, I think they’re accusing me of positions and beliefs that I don’t believe I feel! It makes me angry!
Then, I eventually figure out that they mean Tony Stark.
(Seriously, this has happened 3-4 times already)
Heh… I wondered about that, actually…
I’m really late to this conversation and I have little to add about the morality of the conflict, but I did want to share the following:
This is the first Avengers movie I have seen (I did see one iron man movie before). I was so exhausted trying to keep straight the characters and which side they were on (forget about knowing the super power of each) that I kept dozing off. To that end, I did not feel that the film stood on its own.
MS Windows: I like 10 better than 8.1, especially since the release of the Anniversary Update.
Is Kirk the baby show whisperer?
e-Cig servant: Oh well, maybe I’ll have to stop listening; wouldn’t want to get addicted or anything.
New Car: Nice, we’ve got a slightly older one of those; we love it for road trips.
Car buying: Yup, that always sucks and unfortunately I think I’m going to have to do that myself before the year is out (my old Honda is getting to be in sad shape). 🙁
Marvel Movies: The first Iron Man movie was the best Iron Man movie, but I liked the first Captain America more. Also, I was annoyed that it wasn’t really a Captain America movie so much as it was an Avengers movie. Also didn’t care to have yet another Spiderman reboot built into the movie.
Revenge stories: Yup totally overdone.
Wait, you found this version of Spiderman less annoying? Wow, I found this version to be the most annoying one yet. I was also irritated that Aunt May keeps getting younger/hotter every time they reboot Spiderman.
Ex Machina: I fall into Tony’s camp here except the psycho-drama bits weren’t good enough to make it interesting enough to make up for the weakness of the Sci-Fi in it.
Review podcasts: So Tony, how would that be different from the two of you?
In terms of market dominance, Studio Ghibli is the Pixar of Japan and they do similarly amazing work. My personal favorite of their films would be Porco Rosso.
Fallout 4 | Far Harbor: I’ve been liking it but (I might have mentioned this before) my character is just perhaps, maybe a tad overpowered. My stealth sniper character build can one-shot kill damn near everything. ^_^ So it’s fun, but not challenging. I suppose I could up the difficulty setting but I kind of enjoy being Death…