Cook, Serve, Delicious! 3?! The Movie

I am incredibly proud of the story my writing partner and I wrote for Cook, Serve, Delicious! 3?! but unfortunately there was no way to experience it outside of playing through the entire 40+ hour game ... until now!

Watch the entire story from start to finish in this 27 minute video that includes every cutscene and in-game story moment!

Thanks for the support! Bigger and better things are yet to come!

-Ryan

Why and How I Created ANOTHER Blade Runner Ambient Soundscape

Okay Kyle. This is for you.

My Blade Runner Ambient Soundscape has grown more popular than I expected it to. What started off as a fun little project just for myself has (at the time of writing) 216,738 combined views/listens on YouTube and a combined watch time of 6.7 million minutes, or 111,666 hours. All of those big numbers are hard to fathom, but what's even harder for me to wrap my head around is that, since those videos were posted, I've gone from 17 subscribers to 655.

That's 638 more people who want to be notified whenever I post a new video. Reasonably, that's an oodle of people who are telling me that they love the soundscape and want me to make more. Unfortunately, I mostly use YouTube for uploading non-soundscape things like my relatively mundane and personal monthly 1 Second Everyday videos. Furthermore, I am not in any way, shape, or form, a professional sound designer, musician, or audiophile. Making soundscapes was not my true calling in life nor my passion. I just happened to have a clear idea in my head for a thing I wanted to exist that didn't exist yet, and I just happened to have the knowledge, tools, and skill set to make it myself, so I made it.

However, there's an anonymous quote that I try to live by. It goes like this:

"Whatever your talent is, don't be precious or stingy with it. Give it away to as many people as generously as you can to the point of exhaustion."

When I first heard that quote I decided that it should be my motto, but I'd never gotten a chance to put it into action. Naturally, this was my chance. Regardless of my own doubts, I needed to make another soundscape. Unlike the first one, though, this one wouldn't be for me. This one would be for everyone who subscribed or left a comment praising my work and thanking me for my effort. This one would be a gift.

This one would be tough.

Blade Runner 2049 is not the same movie as the original Blade Runner. It doesn't have the same legacy, the same tone, or even the same type of score. Whereas I created my original Blade Runner soundscape around the foundation the original movie set up – where the use of slowed-down music, ambient rain sound effects, and wind chimes came naturally from the film itself – a soundscape based on Blade Runner 2049 would essentially need to be shoehorned into the mold that the first one had set for it. I'm sure Denis Villeneuve felt exactly the same way about filming it as I did about making my soundscape from it. Yup. Exactly the same.

So I told myself what all artists should probably tell themselves before working on a sequel to a beloved work; "It will never be as good as the original. The very fact that it is a sequel diminishes its quality by taking away the spontaneity and uniqueness that is so necessary for any art to stand out. People will hate it. People may even hate me for making it. That's okay, because in the end I'll have made something that someone else might really enjoy."

With that out of the way, it was time to get to work.

This Time, Let's Start with the Art

Since I didn't want to forget how to Photoshop the album artwork because it took a while to figure out the first time around, that's the first thing I did. Aside from brainstorm, I mean, but I'll get to that later.

For obvious reasons, I wanted to use the same technique on the album art for the 2049 soundscape as I did for the first soundscape (which I'll refer to as the 2019 soundscape from here on out, since that's the year the first film takes place in, for the uneducated). While there was one pretty obvious candidate for which scene to adapt, I watched the movie again hoping to be inspired by something I hadn't thought of.

First I tried a scene that was somewhat reminiscent of the one I used for 2019:

While the result is pretty cool, I felt that it was lacking in some qualities that made the 2019 one work better. Perhaps the largest flaw was (aside from the text being nearly unreadable) that this scene isn't very iconic, so it's not easy to recognize that this is a scene from Blade Runner 2049. Realizing how important this quality was, I gave in to my initial gut idea and applied the same effects to the most iconic scene in the whole film:

I had to do some tweaking to the effect in order to make the text stand out, but in the end it was pretty obvious that this was the best scene to use. Now that that was out of the way, all I had to do was make the actual soundscape. You know, the actual hard part.

The Same but Different

Sequels are hard. Did I already say that?

Taking Kyle's request literally, I began brainstorming sound effects I could use to differentiate the 2049 soundscape from the 2019 soundscape. Since snow is unique to 2049 and is seen quite a bit in the film, the most obvious idea was to replace the sound of pouring rain with ... uh ... the sound of falling snow? Okay, fine. Because the only sound associated with falling snow is a chilly whistling wind, and that's not really as relaxing for most people to listen to, I decided that I'd make a minor concession in the uniqueness of the soundscape by keeping the rain – though I was determined to make the rain sound more like 2049 rain than 2019 rain, if possible. I figured I could do that by using the sound of a heavier downpour, pairing the rain sound with a cold wind, and alternating between different ambient sound effects layered on top of the rain such as Kyle's idea of crashing waves.

Because this project felt like a gift I was making for the fans (especially Kyle) rather than a little project for myself, I wanted to get an idea for what it was the fans actually wanted in a 2049 soundscape. To find out, I asked the r/BladeRunner community on Reddit what it was they would want in weather effects (as well as if anyone had a way to extract the 5.1 audio mix from the movie as separate files, but more on that later). Fortunately, I got replies that were both enthusiastic and clever. These ideas included heavier rain, subtle wind, snow hitting water, crashing waves at the sea wall, and the throat singing from the "Wallace" track on the soundtrack. Some folks even suggested ideas for the "sounds of the city" version, such as the clink of whiskey being poured into a glass, a dog panting, and bees buzzing like in the Las Vegas scene, or the sound of footsteps in the snow.

Fast forward to the actual creation of the soundscape, and despite all the great ideas being thrown at the wall, there was only one option that was really practical for making a sequel to the original soundscape while retaining the same relaxing qualities. I needed to stick with rain. Just rain. I tried pairing it with different cold wind sounds, but the results were either too creepy, too subtle, or too much. To make the soundscape unique, I went looking for an ambient rain track I could use that was heavier than the original while still sounding like it existed in the same setting.

To elaborate: some heavy rain soundscapes sound more like they were recorded in a jungle or from inside a car rather than in a city, and even then they might have the sounds of passing cars, leaking gutters, people talking, or too thick of rain hitting dense puddles. I needed the rain to be just right.

For a couple months I couldn't find the perfect rain, so I just used the 2019 soundscape rain as a placeholder. Fortunately, about a month ago, someone uploaded a brand new rain recording to the internet that fit my criteria just perfectly. The timing couldn't have been better.

Marking Time

Speaking of time, in the original soundscape I used the sound of faint wind chimes to mark every 10 minutes, which was meant to help those who wanted to track time keep it (such as for timed meditation) while allowing people who wanted to lose time ignore it completely, since wind chimes are featured in the movie enough to make them just another part of the experience. I wanted to do something similar for the 2049 soundscape, but I ran into the big problem that comes with doing a sequel such as this: there was no iconic sound that immediately came to me that could be used to subtly mark time in the same way as the wind chimes did. I managed to brainstorm several different ideas, all of which failed compared to the wind chimes when tested. These included:

• A Singing Bowl — this was too harsh
• Sound from beginning of "Pilot" — this was too soft
• Peter and the Wolf — this was too distracting
• BR2049 Chime (a singing bowl-like noise from the actual movie that I discovered) — this was both too low and too distracting

Much to my dismay, after testing out all of my ideas at different volumes, none of them worked quite as well as the wind chimes. I had to make yet another concession of uniqueness and keep the wind chimes.

Stretching the Score

As with the 2019 soundscape, the ambience in the 2049 soundscape comes not only from the pouring rain, but also from the sounds of the movie's score stretched out to nearly unrecognizable lengths. Personally, I love the Blade Runner 2049 score that Hans Zimmer and Benjamin Wallfisch came up with, but it is very (intentionally) different from that of Vangelis' score for the original. While it fits the movie perfectly, it doesn't have the same beautiful dreamlike quality to it. It's darker, dirtier, not nearly as iconic, and doesn't stand on its own (without context) as well as the original. I knew that these differences would drastically impact the quality and tone of the new soundscape as compared to the first, and I had to come to terms with that being completely out of my control.

Still, I knew there were some profound moments of beauty in the score that would work perfectly for the soundscape. To find the right tracks, I simply listened to the soundtrack on loop and noted what songs I thought would do the job, or, in some cases, which songs would need to be edited in order to do the job (for example, I thought the second half of the track "2049" could work, but the first half was full of booming bass and eerie ambience that didn't fit what I was looking for).

I then stretched the songs out 6× using Paul's Extreme Sound Stretch and listened to those versions several times to see if any potential issues revealed themselves that way. I was especially listening for tones that might irritate others even if they seemed normal given the reference point, since my wife and I found out that we couldn't sleep to the original soundscape because there's a loud, high-pitched tone that wakes us up at around 1 hour and 50 minutes every single time – something I wish I'd noticed and corrected during its creation. This led to me eliminating tracks like "2049" because, although it contains the incredibly beautiful synth melody that sounds distinctly Blade Runner, that melody also sounds incredibly distracting when stretched out over what's meant to be a calming soundscape. 

In the end, I had to stretch out two tracks to 8× their original length in order to make it to my 3 hour goal (I chose "Rain" for its distinctly Blade Runner beauty and "Wallace" for its iconic throat singing) and I had to actually remix a small segment of "Wallace" to remove one of those distracting tones that would have kept my wife and I up at night – a blasphemous act, no matter how small the change – but in the end the stretched-out 2049 score proved fully capable of supporting the soundscape and providing the 2049 vibe it needed.

Capturing the Sounds of Los Angeles 2049

When I made the original soundscape, I was fortunate enough to have access to decades of fan-made resources, specifically the multitrack bootleg CD "Los Angeles - November 2019" By Esper Productions, which remixes the background audio from the original film to create audio vignettes of locations visited throughout. It proved incredibly valuable in the creation of my version of the soundscape with city sounds, and unfortunately there was nothing of the sort created for 2049, as the film hasn't even been out for a whole year yet.

Again, here's a case of me trying to shove a 2049 peg into a 2019-shaped hole. If I'd started out with a 2049 soundscape, I probably wouldn't even try making a city sounds version. I brainstormed all sorts of ways to get around the issue, such as including generic sound effects that are associated with the movie (such as footsteps through snow and crashing waves) and scrounging up whatever little bits of audio I could find in the movie without dialog over them to try and create some sort of ambient loop out of, neither of which was ideal.

Going back to my Reddit post that I mentioned earlier, I got a big break in the form of a user by the name of SleepyBacteria pointing me in the direction of a SoundCloud page where the sound designers for 2049 had apparently released eight whole minutes of sound effects from the movie without any dialog or score layered over it (the "BR2049 Chime" I mentioned earlier is what you hear in the beginning of this). On this eight-minute-long track alone, I knew I had a fighting chance to make my three-hour-long 2049 soundscape version with city sounds. It was discovering this resource that gave me enough confidence to actually begin developing the soundscape, and I quickly went to work breaking it up into smaller chunks (separating the scenes) so I could be more selective about what I was going to use.

My next big break came when another Redditor by the name of m0rp shared that they had gone and separated all the 5.1 audio channels from both films into individual tracks for sampling. For a few weeks prior to this I had been tinkering with the idea of trying to do this myself since my original plea to Reddit went unanswered, but I wasn't confident that I would be able to do it. Now, however, I had access to all the sounds from the movie that I could play around with myself. While some scenes were still useless to me due to dialog or score being present in every channel, this resource gave me much more freedom in designing my own samples from the movie's sound effects, which is exactly what I did.

With the separate audio channels, I was able to work around score and dialog to create new, "cleaner" ambient mixes to be used in my soundscape. The most challenging of which was the Chinatown scene (pictured above) in which I had to work around the "wub wubs" from the score as well as the dialog between K and Mariette by turning those moments down and replacing them with sounds from other areas of the same scene.

In the original 2019 soundscape with city sounds, I foolishly drag-and-dropped each city sound in manually, adjusting the volume levels multiple times for the same (repeated) sound, and had gaps in between each city sound track. For the 2049 soundscape with city sounds, I wanted the sounds of the city to never leave your ears, and I also really wanted to make work a lot easier for myself. As such, I next created my own 2049 ambience track made up of all the different city sounds that I had made so I could easily loop one track throughout the entire soundscape. I then imported that ten minute track into the overall project, adjusted the volume levels once, and then copy-and-pasted it back-to-back throughout the entire three hours. My suspicion had been correct; it was better to work smarter, not harder.

Wrapping Up

After months of work, I finally had the entire final version of the soundscape in front of me. It looked like this:

Cautiously, I exported both versions of the finished project and got to work on the final steps: listening through them on loop to make sure they work, adding notes (as lyrics), album art, and other information in iTunes, teasing the release to some Blade Runner fan groups, uploading them to Google Drive, creating the YouTube versions, and writing this blog post.

On listening to the non-city-sounds version, I was honestly a bit let down. It was too much more similar to the original 2019 soundscape compared to what I had originally imagined, and the 2049 score made it sound so much less compelling than I'd hoped.

On listening to the city sounds version, however, I was pleasantly surprised. The sounds of the city really brought the track to life in a way I hadn't anticipated. Whereas I prefer the non-city-sounds version of the 2019 soundscape to the city sounds version (and if YouTube views mean anything, so do the rest of you), I consider the version of the 2049 soundscape with city sounds to be far superior to its plain counterpart.

So here I am with one version that's not what I hoped and another that's better than I expected. You know what? After all the work I've put into it, I'm happy with that.

I hope you're happy with it too, Kyle.

Thanks again for reading! Stream them here or click one below. Download links are in the descriptions. And if you happen to like reading short stories or know someone looking for a freelance writer, please check out my true passion over at www.RyanMatejkaWrites.com.

Just the Facts:

• Three hours long
• Fades in and out for interruption-free looping
• Consistent heavy rain throughout
• Two alternating wind chimes every 10 minutes to mark time
• Several short rain variations intermixed approximately in the middle of each chime

Elongated Background Music:

[All tracks stretched with Paul's Extreme Sound Stretch]

• 00:00:24 Sapper's Tree 600% Slower
• 00:10:00 Rain 800% Slower
• 00:28:30 Wallace 800% Slower [Small Ear-Piercing Segment Removed]
• 01:11:48 Memory 600% Slower
• 01:24:50 Someone Lived This 600% Slower
• 01:41:38 That's Why We Believe 600% Slower
• 02:02:32 Her Eyes Were Green 600% Slower
• 02:38:00 All The Best Memories Are Hers 600% Slower

Intro and Outro:

• Clip of unaltered "Rain" by Hans Zimmer & Benjamin Wallfisch plays at start
• "Tears In The Rain" by Hans Zimmer & Benjamin Wallfisch plays at end in place of wind chimes

City Sounds Version Intro and Outro:

[Taken from Sergei Prokofiev’s Peter and The Wolf]

• Begins with Joi Emanator Startup
• Ends with Joi Emanator Shutdown

Why and How I Created a Blade Runner Ambient Soundscape

There are a bunch of awesome Blade Runner ambience projects out there on the web, such as the "Blade Runner Ambience Sounds Of The City 2019" By Curtis8516 which is a 30-minute long track that uses music and effects from the movie and video game to make you feel like you're standing on a street corner in the film's version of Los Angeles in November 2019. There's also the multitrack bootleg CD "Los Angeles - November 2019" By Esper Productions which does something similar but aims to transport you to several distinct locations of the film for a total of 1 hour and 19 minutes.

Those and many others are seriously amazing works by truly dedicated lovers of the film that just go to show how much people love the atmosphere of the classic 1982 cult hit.

However, none of them really gave me what I, personally, was looking for in an ambient Blade Runner soundscape. I wanted an ambient soundscape that was a bit more calming, dreamlike, and meditative. I wanted something that reminded me of the feel of Blade Runner's city without the distracting parts of it like the sudden sound of a passing vehicle, or a loud conversation, or even the incredibly beautiful notes of the iconic soundtrack. I wanted something more subtle.

If You Want Something Done Your Way ... Do It Yourself

One day it occurred to me that it wouldn't be so difficult (or crazy, but that's debatable) to make a Blade Runner soundscape myself. I had experience with sound mixing from my teenage years of making really bad songs out of sound loops, and I had plenty of audio resources to work with.

The goal was simple – whereas other fans had made Blade Runner soundscapes that were intended to make you feel like you were standing on a street corner in Los Angeles 2019 from which you may or may not hear Vangelis' iconic score, I wanted to make something that reminded you of Blade Runner without explicitly calling it out. As I explained it to my friends; others intend to recreate the world while I intend to lull you into it.

I created a folder on my computer specifically for storing the sounds I would use, and took to the internet to download the ones I didn't already have. I downloaded a dozen different ambient rain recordings and a couple wind chimes, then copied over sound effects from the movie I already had as well as some songs from the soundtrack that played as in-world backdrop in the movie.

The final touch I needed was the synths. It was vital that I incorporated iconic sounds of the score without including the songs themselves, because I didn't want to be listening to this thing and get distracted by an iconic track I recognized. To resolve this, I took a few Vangelis tracks from the movie score and stretched them out to upwards of 30 minutes each using Paul's Extreme Sound Stretch. The result was long, moody, and dreamlike. Perfect.

Starting Small

Rather than jump in head first, I decided to experiment with a proof-of-concept soundscape track. I mixed seven minutes that included several short rain samples I had downloaded overlaid on an 800% slowed down version of "Rachel's Theme," as well as a very quiet introduction of the "Blade Runner Blues" and a brief moment of distant wind chimes. The result looked like this:

I decided to keep direct references to the movie (unaltered songs and SFX) very muted while keeping the rain and slowed down song the primary focus. Given that all the rain samples I found were so short, I also needed to experiment with which ones would give the true Blade Runner feel as well as if it was possible to transition seamlessly between different rain effects without drawing attention to this. This is where the most difficulties came in, as I had to mess around with position and volume in order to smooth out the transitions, and it was impossible to simply copy and paste a single rain track over and over since the transition from one end to the next beginning was jarring without extra effort on my end. It was obvious that I needed a longer rain track to work with for the full version whether that meant finding one someone else had recorded/mixed, or mixing my own. Otherwise, the seven minute long track was a success, and it kept me motivated to move on toward the full thing.

The Full Version

I took to YouTube and searched for different long-form ambient rain mixes, hoping to find the perfect one that either lasted at least 3 hours or could be easily looped to last that long. Fortunately, I found a 3 hour long track of gentle rain falling without any songs or thunder that fit the mood I was looking for perfectly, so I downloaded it to use myself.

Using that as the basis, I began constructing my full version. While the new three hour long rain sample I found provided a great basis for the track, I didn't want to let all the shorter samples I'd downloaded go to waste, and decided to mix them into the full version to keep it from being completely repetitive. Additionally, in order to utilize the wind chime samples I'd downloaded in a way that was a bit more practical, I decided to alternate between the two of them every 10 minutes so as to provide a sense of time passage to anyone using the track for meditation.

Next, I had to make sure I had enough of the synthesizers to last the full three hours, so I again used Paul's Extreme Sound Stretch to lengthen a few other Vangelis tracks from the soundtrack that already had a dreamlike quality to them in order to make them even longer and more dreamlike.

Lastly was the harp. I had really wanted to utilize the Gail Laughton track "Pompeii 76 A.D." in the soundscape, as it was used during a brief moment in the film in which several bicyclers are seen riding past the camera and felt ethereal. I tried placing it in between the chimes, but the repetition became too distracting and so I had to try something else. Going back to the mentality of how I used the chimes practically, and keeping in mind that I used an unaltered clip of "Blade Runner Blues" as an introduction to the soundscape, I decided to place this beautiful harp track at the very end of the soundscape in place of the final chime as a way to signal the listener that the soundscape was coming to a close and would soon fade out.

The Alternate Cut – Including Sounds of the City

Blade Runner is famous for it's seven different cuts of the film, so it seems fitting that I ended up making two cuts of the Blade Runner soundscape as well. With it finally completed, I knew that some people might prefer it with a bit of unaltered ambient noises from the movie thrown in for added immersion. Not wanting to disappoint this part of the fanbase, I decided to try it out. Using mostly a few of the tracks from the Esper Productions "Los Angeles - November 2019" bootleg, I inserted several sounds of the city to alternate repetitively throughout the three hour soundscape (keeping the tracks low and quiet to stay true to the intent of the original version) and saved that as an alternate cut. I'd say it turned out pretty good.

Designing a Cover

I'm not a very good visual artist, but when I get this far into a project I tend to go all the way, so I felt compelled to create an album cover for the soundscape that wasn't embarrassing to look at. There was no way I would be able to design something good from scratch myself, so I needed to figure out a way to make the fanciest thing possible utilizing my relatively limited skill set and resources. This led me to find inspiration in a fan-made wallpaper that I found on Reddit wherein a user wanted a high-resolution version of a screenshot from Blade Runner 2049 as their wallpaper, but disliked how the foggy nature of the image gave the impression that it was in fact blurry. To remedy this, they photoshopped the image to appear as if you were looking at it from behind a foggy, rain-soaked window. This is the result:

Not only is this a beautiful image that perfectly captures the vibe of Blade Runner, but I was fairly confident that it was an effect I could recreate myself with a little bit of guidance. I messaged the user who created that image asking for a tip on how to do it myself, and thankfully they replied shortly later with not only how they did it, but they also provided the rainy window overlay they used for me to use in my own version.

I quickly went to work applying the same effect on two iconic images from the original film, resulting in the following images:

While those made neat wallpapers, they weren't much for album covers. I decided to move forward with the second image, resizing it to the square shape of an album cover and adding text in the Blade Runner font (which I downloaded from dafont). Again, keeping my limited visual creative skill in mind, I decided that the easiest way to make the text look good would be to make it look as though it was drawn on the window itself. While this sounds complicated, it seemed far less intimidating to me at the time than picking a solid color that looked okay.

In the end, of course, the text took much longer than everything else about the cover. Using a guide I found online for making it look like someone had finger-drawn words onto a foggy window, I realized that my image was too dark in some places and too bright in others, making certain letters almost impossible to read. I needed a solution to this, and it wasn't something the guide offered. I was left to experiment in the very intimidating Photoshop software all on my own. After quite a bit of trial and error, I realized that I could make the text itself 75% transparent behind the window layer (on which the words were imprinted using some other technique I can't even remember or begin to describe) in order to even out its visibility quite a bit, so I did that.

This was an album cover I could be happy with. It looked somewhat professional and stayed true to the spirit of the movie and the soundscape I had created. The next thing I had to do was make a widescreen version of it to attach to a video version of the soundscape so that I could finally upload that to YouTube. The process of exporting the three hour high-definition video file, despite it being of a static image with music playing, took long enough that I didn't dare try it again when I realized I had made the background image blurrier than I had originally intended. I was stuck with that mistake. I've since convinced myself that it probably looks better that way. Maybe.

Sharing My Work with Everyone

My original plan for spreading this soundscape was to upload it to YouTube, which is a pretty common place for folks to post their soundscape projects, and to provide links to download the MP3 on Soundcloud. While uploading to YouTube went about as well as could be expected given the huge file size (so huge that I've since already deleted the video files to make room on my hard drive), I soon found out that non-paying members of Soundcloud could only upload about three hours of music to their account in total. Even if I hadn't had all those embarrassing songs I made when I was a teenager on there, not even only one of the two versions would work, since they were technically each just barely over three hours long.

After some trial and error with other hosting options, the compromise became clear to me: host the files on Google Drive. That was easy enough.

I was finally done and ready to share my creation with the world.

Anyway...

It was both a headache and a pleasure to make. I've listened to both versions several times myself and have enjoyed them thoroughly. Stream them here or click one below. Download links are in the descriptions.

Thanks for reading!

Just the Facts:

• Three hours long
• Fades in and out for interruption-free looping
• Consistent gentle rain throughout
• Two alternating wind chimes every 10 minutes to mark time
• Several short rain variations intermixed approximately in the middle of each chime

Elongated Background Music:

[Vangelis tracks stretched with Paul's Extreme Sound Stretch]

• 0:00:00 Rachel's Theme 800% Slower
• 0:35:10 Blade Runner Blues 600% Slower
• 1:36:15 Esper Analysis (Longing + Empty Streets) 600% Slower
• 2:35:51 Fading Away 800% Slower

Intro and Outro:

• Clip of unaltered "Blade Runner Blues" by Vangelis plays at start
• Pompeii 76 A.D./Bicycle Riders by Gail Laughton plays at end in place of wind chimes

Movie Review: Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle

My wife and I went to see a pre-screening of "Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle" last night, and I never thought in my life that I would say this, but the sequel to Jumanji is really, really good.

The Actors:

Jack Black steals the movie. His performance as a teenaged selfie-obsessed pretty girl was easily the best "one sex trapped in another sex's body" performance I've ever seen (which is probably a low bar, but stay with me here). He was so incredibly good, that I was actually 100% convinced that I was not watching Jack Black, but an actual teenaged girl. He just completely disappeared into the role, and it was amazing to watch him work.

Dwayne Johnson was also fantastic playing a fantastic parody of himself. Though he didn't disappear into the role as much as Jack Black, his portrayal of an awkward nerd in a huge handsome muscular body was fresh and fun through the whole film. Special shout-out to Alex Wolff, who plays the real world kid who becomes Dwayne Johnson. Through Wolff's limited screentime, he portrays some great acting and comedic ability that left me wishing he'd been in more of the film.

Karen Gillan was the main actor I'm the least familiar with (I only know her from GotG), and I'm glad to say her acting was a pleasant surprise. Like Johnson, she's playing a social outcast girl in an athletic pretty girl's body, and she does it wonderfully. For the entire film she seems awkward in her body – often slouching over, crossing her arms, etc. – but even the facial expressions she'd make when she wasn't meant to be the center of the shot's focus were 100% in line with the concept of her character. Also of note is that, despite some controversy awhile back over the reveal of her tight and small outfit in this family film, her appearance is a part of the character's story arc and she's shot tastefully and not at all sexually.

Kevin Hart was Kevin Hart. I enjoyed his performance and he had plenty of laughs, but in the end he was the only one of the core four characters that didn't surprise me. He's supposed to be playing a big football player trapped in a small man's body, but Kevin Hart plays this like he does any other role where he shouts about how short he is. It never really felt to me like his identity was based on a life of being a tall muscular athlete.

Nick Jonas was in this movie. He shows up about halfway through and he does a good job. Nothing special, but he didn't pull me out of the experience.

The Story & Directing:

I went into this movie skeptical. For me, the original movie was fun because of Robin Williams but ultimately forgettable. The trailers for this movie, however, had piqued my interest enough for me to wait an hour in line for a chance to see it (and it turned out my wife and I were the last two people the theater had room for, because the two in front of us left when they found out the remaining seats were not together).

The story is a straight-up sequel and it was incredibly solid, coherent, and fun. This movie is the opposite of Jurassic World, in that almost everything mentioned in the first act is made relevant later in the film, including each of the avatar's listed strengths and weaknesses and the real-world character's faults, which ultimately makes it a very tight and competent story that feels like there's no wasted space or time. It was also really, really funny. The types of humor were pleasantly varied so that there were things I laughed at that nobody else did and vice-versa. There's something for everyone here. The bad guy was one-dimensional but it worked well for the setting.

This is also probably the best "video game movie" I've seen. It adapts video game tropes such as the idea of NPCs, levels, and multiple lives very well. Gamers will especially get a kick out of some of these gags.

SPOILER STORY SYNOPSIS:

(Click and drag your mouse to read)
The movie picks up where the last one left off. A dad in the 1990's is out for a jog on the beach, hears the drumming of the Jumanji board game, digs it out of the sand and brings it home to his son. His son opens the box, then laments "who plays board games anymore" then tosses it aside to play Playstation (I think it was Twisted Metal, specifically). Overnight, a bright green light emits from the board game and the boy wakes up to hear the iconic drumbeat. He opens the box to find that inside is now a cartridge of a Jumanji video game. He puts it into a console (resembling but not exactly a NES) and is sucked into the game. Cut to modern day and four kids are given detention (after some nice but quick character building), during which they find the game, select their characters, and are sucked into the game. Inside, they are represented by avatars that juxtapose their real-life selves, and realize they have to work together to win the game in order to escape. About halfway through they run into Nick Jonas, who is the avatar of the kid from the 1990s and lives in a shack built by none other than the original film's Alan Parrish (Robin Williams). They reveal to him that he's been in the game for 20 years and team up with him to escape. After beating the game by returning a magical crystal to where it was stolen from (which gives the guy who first removed it the ability to control all the animals in the jungle and a tendency to be evil), they are all returned to the real world, where they're all friends now (and the two nerds who developed a relationship during the game are now a couple) and find out that Nick Jonas' character returned back to his time and has lived out a great life for the past 20 years and named his daughter after Jack Black's character since she saved his life. The group returns to school on Monday and again hears the drumming of the game, so they smash it with a bowling ball that was mentioned earlier in the film.

Closing Thoughts:

Overall, this is a good movie and I recommend people go see it with some family and/or friends if they're looking for a good fun time at the theater. It continues the spirit of the original movie and surprised me with its quality. The acting, directing, and writing is all solid. The jokes are funny and varied, and I wouldn't be surprised if some of the lines from this movie became popular quotes or memes. The action is fun and well-shot.

This review was first posted on Reddit by me.

Character Depth in Superbad - A Movie Essay

Note: This essay is a slight revision of one I originally posted on reddit.com/r/truefilm. You can read the original essay in its entirety here.

I was 16 years old when the 2007 movie Superbad was released. At the time, I thought of it as nothing more than a really funny movie full of lines that were quotable for years to come (as evidenced years later by my friend Yuriy shouting "prepare to get fucked by the long dick of the law" as we exited my vehicle to crash a freshman party - unknowingly right in front of the mother of the kid hosting the party).

Over time though, as I read about, reflected on, and re-watched the film, it became apparent that it is much, much more.

Character Depth in Superbad

As an adult, the first thing that becomes apparent about the quality of Superbad is just how accurately it portrays the thoughts and behaviors of an otherwise hard-to-capture time in a growing boy's life; sex is a constant topic of thought and conversation, girls are magical and mysterious creatures, the best friendships feel like true love, and why can't someone just invite me to a party already?

But now, as a writer, what really astounded me upon my recent viewing of Superbad was the story structure and characters. For something that appears on the surface to be nothing more than a raunchy film about trying to get drunk and laid that was written by two stoner comedians when they were in high school, Superbad has some of the best and most layered characters of any comedy movie, which helps to make the plot that much more intricate.

Let's look at each of the main character's motivations:

Seth (portrayed by Jonah Hill)
Seth's primary motivation is to get laid a few more times before college. The object of his desires is Jules (Emma Stone), who tells him after a fun time together in baking class that she's throwing a party. He offers to buy liquor for her party, thinking that will not only impress her but get her "drunk enough to get with him."

Seth's secondary motivation is his feeling of betrayal that his best friend Evan (Michael Cera) will be going to a different college than him and is going to be living with Seth's frequent punching bag Fogell (Christopher Mintz-Plasse). Though we have not seen their friendship prior to the events in the film (aside from a brief flashback Evan has to a prior night of hanging out), it can be assumed that this motivation is the reason for Seth's constant desperation and annoyance with Evan.

Evan (portrayed by Michael Cera)
On the surface, Evan's primary motivation seems to be the same as Seth's; to get laid. However, it is slowly revealed that he is actually much more motivated to have a meaningful romantic relationship with Becca (Martha MacIsaac), as evidenced by his repeated insistence to forget about the alcohol because he can just tell Becca how he feels instead of going with Seth's line of logic to get her drunk. Nonetheless, he promises to buy her favorite liquor for the party, which remains a goal of his throughout the film.

Evan's secondary motivation is to keep Seth happy, and specifically to keep Seth from learning about his future living arrangements with Fogell. This explains why he puts up with all of Seth's bullshit.

Sam Fogell (portrayed by Christopher Mintz-Plasse)
Fogell isn't quite as well-developed of a character, and acts more as a plot device to give Evan and Seth more obstacles in the way of their quest to acquire alcohol, but nonetheless his primary objective seems to be to get to the party with the booze. After getting punched in the face while trying to purchase alcohol, he spends the majority of the film with two hilarious police officers who say they'll drive him to the party (and even they have secondary motivations that inform their actions; to show Fogell that cops can be cool).

Fogell's secondary motivation is very similar to Seth's primary. He wants to get laid. The object of his affection is Nicola (Aviva Baumann), whom we only see in the very beginning and end of his character arc.

How the filmmakers use this to tell a complex story:

So we've got two and a half complex and layered characters to follow. This allows for both external and internal conflict, as the three get separated and are often at odds with each other over their conflicting motivations. From strictly a story perspective, it's also brilliant how Fogell, the least developed of the three, basically exists in an entirely different type of movie from Seth and Evan that intersects first in the liquor store, then when the police hit Seth with their car, and again when Jules' party is broken up. His plot fits his depth.

But the movie's climax doesn't come about from the characters simply making it to the party, because even the two main girls have a surprising amount of depth considering their limited screen time (and the genre of the film they're in). Despite Seth's desire to drunkenly hook up with Jules, it turns out that Jules isn't the girl he thought she was because she doesn't drink and doesn't seem interested in hooking up. Similarly, despite Evan's desires to (soberly) tell Becca how he feels after her liquor bottle is smashed, she seems more convinced with the idea that she must express her feelings for Evan with drunken sex. It's almost like Seth and Evan fell for the female versions of each other...

This isn't just a twist for twist's sake, either. There is evidence of it throughout the film that my 16-year-old self was completely oblivious to. Becca repeatedly tries to express to Evan how much she's into him, yet her flirtations go over his head, and instead he focuses on the idea that he needs to bring her a bottle of Goldslick Vodka to get her attention. Similarly, Seth and Jules have such a great time together in class that Jules invites him to her party, yet he convinces himself that the only way to get her attention is to perform the grand gesture of bringing the liquor to the party.

Oh, and Fogell gets laid. Kind of. He's really the only one who gets exactly what he wants in this movie.

In the end (the mall scene, specifically), Seth and Evan learn from their mistakes and move on from each other and toward a more realistic method of pursuing a their relationships with women.

People (and writer Seth Rogen himself in a podcast interview) talk about this movie being about two things; on the surface it's about getting booze and getting laid, and the deeper story is about friends dealing with growing up and growing apart.

I'd argue that the surface-level story is even more complex than that, though; this is a story about two friends going through hell to impress girls that already like them. It's a story about the misguided perceptions of being a teenager who's still trying to figure out how the world works, and it's executed brilliantly thanks to incredibly well-developed characters and multiple plot lines and character arcs that ebb and flow and twist and turn through each other.

If you haven't seen Superbad recently or at all, I highly suggest it. It's leagues above your average teen sex comedy.

From 2016 to 2017 - Keeping the Momentum Going

Do you like this new graphic? I made it myself with a photo I took of my beautiful wife.

I felt like I should do some end-of-the-year blogging to get some closure on 2016 and publicly express my goals for 2017, especially after writing a lengthy post/essay titled "Spider-Man or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Reboot" that I then decided not to publish because it was basically just me telling the entire story of my love for Spider-Man and expressing my opinions (that nobody asked for) about the upcoming reboot film.

Concerning My 2016 Resolution

I don't actually remember my primary resolution for 2016, and looking back on last year's review, I didn't really state anything specific. Therefore I'm just going to assume my resolution was to complete the second draft of my novel, which I came very close but ultimately failed to do. I do remember, however, resolving to learn to meditate in 2016, which I did a little bit of throughout the year but not as much as I wanted to.

So what did I actually do this year, then? I read a lot more books (the entire Hitchiker's Guide series, several books in the Detective Bosch series, four books in the Series of Unfortunate Events, The Martian, How to Win Friends and Influence People, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, and Childhood's End), watched a bunch of good movies for the first time (La La Land, Sunshine, 10 Cloverfield Lane, Good Will Hunting, The Revenant, the "Before" trilogy, Spirited Away, High Rise, Begin Again, Deadpool, Ghost in the Shell, There Will Be Blood, Victoria, Carol, Room, Sixteen Candles, Straight Outta Compton, Steve Jobs, Brick, 2001 A Space Odyssey, Memento, Sicario, A Scanner Darkly, Snowpiercer, and more), watched some good TV shows (Westworld, Stranger Things, Black Mirror, Game of Thrones, Better Call Saul, Parks and Recreation, etc), discovered some new music and played the occasional video game (mostly on Android).

I also lost my job, found a better one, got a new phone that lets me play Xcom anywhere, put up a fence in my back yard for my dog, started using Instagram, redesigned the blog to actually look like a writer's blog, started writing short stories based on writing prompts (one of which has gained enough attention for two individuals to ask me if they could adapt it into a short film), made new friends, reconnected with old friends, did a lot of hiking, tried out a few different haircuts, and lost 10 lbs.

2017 Resolutions

First and foremost, I really want to get the second draft of my novel finished and start sending it out to publishers. I'm really close thanks to NaNoWriMo, and I really only need to write the ending, rewrite a secondary character's arc, and punch up the humor and charisma in some parts.

Secondly, I just want to keep writing more, especially those writing prompts, and eventually put a few up on the website for public consumption.

Thirdly, ever since experimenting with mixing music again a few weeks ago and seeing the amazing film La La Land in theaters a few days ago with my wife, it's starting to look like I might finally be learning to play an instrument or two. You see, she grew up playing the violin and guitar, but after seeing Ryan Gosling in La La Land and learning that he trained himself in only three months she's been wanting to learn piano (and her parents have a beautiful one in their home that rarely gets used), and I grew up owning a guitar but not knowing how to play it and always wanted to learn to play the keyboard so I could make some music on the computer without relying entirely on pre-recorded loops. So I'll say my tertiary big goal of 2017 is to learn to play piano and/or guitar, but this just came up recently so we'll see if it really sticks.

Fourthly, I should probably continue to lose weight and get in shape. I did some pilates this year, which proved to be quite enjoyable and challenging, tried to get into a routine of exercising (beyond taking my daily walks) at least once a week, and made an effort to eat healthier or smaller portions, so more of that would be good. Now that the wedding has long passed, my biggest motivation to be healthy and in shape is that I want to be able to keep up and play with my future kids as much as possible.

Lastly, I really just want to keep trying new things in my area. For years, I was stuck in a rut of eating at chain restaurants, shopping at chain stores, and going to the same places to do the same old things, but this year my wife and I made a solid attempt of eating and shopping more locally, as well as visiting parks we'd never been to before and just overall trying to attend more community events like concerts, movies in the park, and beer gardens. More of that is always good fun.

And I still want to do more Tactical Laser Tag. Seriously, I only went once this year.

-Ryan

From 2015 into 2016

Firstly, concerning my 2015 resolution

So there's this novel I've been working on since my last semester of college when a bunch of girls in my writing workshop class told me that they loved one of my short stories and wanted more. At the end of last year, I made the resolution to finally finish the first draft of that novel in 2015.

Today is the last day of 2015, and while I did finish the first draft of a novel this year (for the first time), it was for a completely unrelated story that I started and finished during the month of November for NaNoWriMo.

While I admit it's a huge bummer to not have a draft done of that college story yet, I'm proud of what I have accomplished in writing this year. I've written a 50,000 word novel from beginning to end, gotten a freelance job writing for a video game that I truly believe in, and am so incredibly close to finishing that college story that I can taste it!

And now, everything else 2015

This year, I've also been making more friends of coworkers than I thought I would, purchased a house along with my lovely wife, adopted the most adorable and fun dog on the planet, and continued to try eating more vegetables.

As far as my hobbies go, I've read several books (The Girl on the Train, Orange is the New Black, The Black Echo, The Girl with All The Gifts, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Survivor, etc.), seen countless movies (Mad Max, Star Wars, Ex Machina, Nightcrawler, Inside Out, Brooklyn, It Follows, Whiplash, The Guest, John Wick, and so many more), listened to a hell of a lot of music (Halsey, Grimes, The Weeknd, Panic! At The Disco, Melody Gardot, Purity Ring, Nero, and holy crap so much more), but played mostly one video game (Xcom: Enemy Unknown).

So, what about next year?

More. More of everything. More novel drafts, more freelance opportunities, more fun at work, more projects on the house, more playtime with my dog, more books to read, more movies to watch, more music to thrive on, more Xcom (the sequel comes out soon), and - of course - much more time with my amazing, caring, fun, can't-survive-without-her wife!

Maybe not as many more vegetables, though. We're starting to get down to the really weird ones.

Oh yeah, and a million times more Tactical Laser Tag. It has seriously been too long since I did that.

-Ryan

Melting Pot Movies

Watch the trailer for this upcoming movie titled "Every Secret Thing" and tell me what you notice about it:

If you need a hint, check out the actors. Count them at the end when they're mentioned; how many white men do you see?

I count four lead women and only two lead men (neither of whom are white). How many movies can you think of with female-led casts that aren't chick-flicks where the girls are fawning over men? How many movies where the only leading men were black can you think of that weren't about being black?

This is something I'd love to see more of. It seems plainly obvious to me that the easiest and most effective way to spice up movies and television in an age full of sequels and remakes is to replace most of the white men with anything other than white men, without necessarily making the movie/show about how the characters aren't white men. "Every Secret Thing" seems to be a standard crime thriller that just happens to star four women and two black men rather than a cast full of tried-and-true white male actors, and I give it huge kudos for that.

Of course I'm not saying that we should have a never-ending cast of Michelle Rodriguez-type characters wherein we shoehorn a diverse cast into stereotypical white roles, but if America really is the melting pot of the world, shouldn't some of what has melted in our culture pour over into our movies? TV is starting to get the hint with shows like Empire, Fresh off the Boat, and Jane the Virgin popping up, and I think it's about time that Movies caught up to how innovative TV has been recently.

Can't wait for this movie to come out, and I can't wait for more to follow.
-Ryan

My Thoughts on Fifty Shades of Grey - The Film

It's difficult not to talk about; Fifty Shades of Grey has been released in movie form. Upon reading many (negative) reviews, I considered blogging my two cents about the film, decided not to bother, then reconsidered when someone on Reddit, upon reading a brief post about my thoughts on the film, said:

"The world needs more people like you man"

So now I have decided to write down and publish my thoughts for all the world to see. I will start with my initial impressions of the book series, so feel free to skip further down for just my thoughts on the film (I've tried to make it easy to navigate with relevant headlines), or see my review on Flixster for an even more brief critique.

Disclaimer: I just want to state for the record that I am not going to discuss the Fifty Shades of Grey film purely because it's the hot thing to talk about right now; I was genuinely impacted by the film and feel the need to share my thoughts amid a sea of negative reviews. I'm sure this post will get lost to the untouched corners of the web, so I assure you that I am not writing this to get attention or any sort of profit. Also, I refuse to use "the film was fifty shades of __" wordplay in my review like seemingly every other blogger.

My Introduction to the "Fifty Shades" Books

My wife read the entire Fifty Shades trilogy in a matter of days, and around the same time I was made aware of the phenomenon that the media circus called "Mommy Porn." My wife and I were still in college at the time, and she had never before expressed any interest in erotic fiction. I was glad that she had found and enjoyed the books, because I knew it was important for her to explore her sexuality beyond the confines of our relationship (as we are each other's first and only significant others).

When the Fifty Shades phenomenon started to gain more media attention, I grew curious to it. As an aspiring author and feminist, I realized the importance in trying to understand what it was about these books that took such hold of so many women; I was curious to learn from them so that I could understand the female perspective better and apply that understanding to my own writing. One day, on a whim, I picked up the first book and read through a few chapters. While I found the quality of writing to be as poor as I'd heard, I found the emotional charge of the book electrifying. Anastasia's "should I/shouldn't I" monologue was filled with an undeniably intense emotional tone that was incredibly addicting. I didn't finish the book on account of the sexual scenes being quite boring to me, perhaps because I'm a heterosexual male, or perhaps because much of the tension I enjoyed of the earlier chapters vanished, but I was left with an understanding of what made the books break so many sales records.

The moment I heard about the movie deal, I was delighted that something so risqué was being created for the mainstream, and when casting petitions were started I immediately signed every one begging for actor Ian Somerhalder to play the part of Christian Grey.

Ian Somerhalder was born for the part of Christian Grey, in fact, he already plays an eerily similar role perfectly in The Vampire Diaries

My Thoughts on the Film - A Valentine's Day Treat

When I saw the first trailer for Fifty Shades of Grey, I was in a movie theater, and upon seeing the release date of "Valentine's Day 2015" I immediately burst out laughing so annoyingly that my wife smacked me across the arm. The trailer had a brooding and serious tone to it, seemingly completely unaware of just how ridiculous it was. Such became my attitude for the film in the months leading up to its release; mockery.

My wife asked me to take her to see the film on Valentine's Day, and I accepted. Aside from my obvious desire to do good by her, I was as curious to see the film as I was to read the first few chapters of the book. I wholeheartedly expected it to be terrible in that over-the-top cheesy romantic sort of way that the movie The Best of Me was, which I took my wife to on sweetest day and absolutely detested.

I'm quite glad to say that my expectations were completely shattered, and I left the theater wishing that I could re-enter to see the film yet again.

A Fantasy World

I think that the key to enjoying the Fifty Shades of Grey movie (aside from not being uptight) is to go into the movie with realistic expectations. For example, whereas many of the negative reviews I've read point to the cheesy dialog as a prime reason that they couldn't enjoy the film, claiming that it wasn't realistic or believable, I went into the movie knowing full-well that the film was based on a poorly-worded romantic/sexual fantasy. The key word here is fantasy. Every time that a character said something odd and unrealistic ("are we going to make love now?" Anastasia asks the moment she signs the non-disclosure agreement) I needed only to remind myself that, though the world I'm looking at looks like ours on the surface, it is not; it is a fantasy world where every bit of cheesy dialog serves to either set you up for or deliver a sexy retort ("I don't make love. I fuck. Hard." Christian replies to Anastasia). The source material for the movie is one woman's sexual fantasy that thousands of other women happen to enjoy, which is a very important detail that I feel many reviewers either deliberately or obliviously ignored.

The movie cannot be reviewed by the same standards that we hold other movies to, because it is unlike other movies in this regard. It is not about being realistic, it's about emotion. From the beautiful sight-seeing flights over and around the Seattle area, to the palpable sexual tension, to the emotional lows of Anastasia trying to come to grips with her complicated relationship, the film did an excellent job making me feel like I was right there; feeling all those emotions along with the lead character. I'll even admit to feeling on the verge of joyful tears as the couple experienced the beauty of a nighttime Seattle skyline set to the perfectly-selected song.

Actress Dakota Johnson did an excellent job selling Anastasia's inner thoughts and emotions through the slightest of expressions.

A Playful Interpretation

I was quite worried that the film would take itself too seriously and end up being completely dull as a result (see "The Best of Me" as mentioned above). Fortunately, the movie had several moments that felt genuinely funny and self-aware. Having not read it, I cannot personally speak for how many of the jokes came out of the book, but my wife said she didn't remember the book being so funny - a great indicator that the film knew not to take itself too seriously. The jokes did a great job to break up the tension and remind you that it's meant to be a fun film.

Barely Controversial

The two most common complaints causing controversy with Fifty Shades of Grey are that:

1. It's too graphic/kinky (or not enough, depending on who you ask)
2. The relationship portrayed is abusive

The first point is absolutely absurd no matter which side you take. To the prudes who say it's too much: the sexual content of the film pales in comparison to the source material. All on-screen sex amounts to nothing more kinky than topless humping while Anastasia is (willingly) tied up in various positions. If you've seen sex in any R-rated film, you've seen what Fifty Shades of Grey has to offer. To the perverts who say it's not enough: I'm sorry, but what did you really expect? These are not pornstars in an X-rated film. It may not be the most faithful adaptation of the books, but it's a step closer to the line that Hollywood has been unwilling to approach in years. There's plenty of videos online to please your kinky desires.

This compilation from the trailer is literally as kinky as it gets.

This second point seems to stem largely from the same controversy regarding the books. As someone who has not read the books, I can only say that the arguments seem somewhat valid, though I've heard others (including my wife) disagree. However, thanks to the film's creators, with the gift of hindsight, all of the points made in that article regarding the books are completely absent from the theatrical adaptation:

"For example, the researchers pointed out, she withholds information about her plans to visit friends and family members and avoids social outings so as not to anger Christian."

In the film adaptation, Anastasia withholds information about these plans because (as she boldly states) "it's none of your business." The Anastasia in the film is actually quite strong-willed, and she frequently talks back to Christian so as to point out his obvious possessive issues and flaws.

"In consensual BDSM relationships, partners take negotiations seriously and respect each others’ boundaries, she said. In “Fifty Shades,” she noted, Christian bullies Anastasia and plies her with alcohol to coerce her into sexual acts that she finds uncomfortable."

Again, there is an entire scene in the film in which Anastasia and Christian sit down for a very serious (and playful) discussion about the terms of the BDSM contract, during which time Anastasia orders certain acts to be removed from the contract entirely and Christian obeys without debate. As a bonus, at the end of this scene, it is made obvious that the whole situation has aroused Christian, and Anastasia straight-up leaves him high and dry. Furthermore, Christian never once gives Anastasia alcohol in the film as far as I can remember, and in fact occasionally warns her of the dangers of excessive drinking, at one point taking a glass of wine right out of her hand so as to keep her clear-headed in accordance to the contract.

The Bottom Line - A Step Forward for Women and Cinema

Fifty Shades of Grey was an at-times cheesy, self-aware fantasy that successfully tugs at your emotions and removes the flaws of its source material. At the same time it stands on its own as a daring attempt to push mainstream cinema to not only recognize that women have been neglected as sexual beings, but to push the boundaries of our culture's ability to understand and accept diverse sexuality as something totally okay to talk about. We are now living in a post-Fifty Shades world, and I, for one, think the future is looking bright.

Also, the soundtrack was absolutely incredible! It fit the mood perfectly and stands on its own as one of the best compilations from different artists of original and reworked material that I've ever heard.

-Ryan

Book Review: Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

A few months ago, I heard that my favorite director, David Fincher was selected to direct a movie adaptation of the bestselling novel Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. I'd heard good things about the book before then (mostly just that it was good and a bestseller), and had already added it to my "to read" list on GoodReads, but finding out that my favorite director was about to adapt it to film made it an absolute must-read for me. David Fincher is famous for adapting many great works of literature to film, such as Fight Club (which was written by my favorite author), and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (one of my favorite books). He tends to gravitate towards anything dark and thrilling, which happen to be right up my alley.

Thus, I immediately read the free sample available on my e-reader and decided I had to finish it before the movie came out. I've only just recently for the first time read a book before the movie was announced (World War Z) and I've read a book after seeing the movie plenty of times. This would be the first time that I decided to read the book purely out of anticipation for the film (as many seem to do nowadays).

Within the first few chapters, the book grabs you and holds on tight. You're treated to chapters that alternate between the perspective of the husband, Nick Dunne, as he copes with the realization that his wife has seemingly been kidnapped and possibly killed, as well as his wife, Amy (famous for being the inspiration for the main character in her parents' famous book series "Amazing Amy"), in the form of diary entries from before her disappearance. It's made clear early on that Nick Dunne has something to hide, and hinted to several times that he may have, in fact, killed his wife. Amy's story, on the other hand, is of the joyful beginnings and middles of a relationship and marriage to her perfect guy. The interlacing story-lines not only serve to show you the contrasting perceptions of their marriage (though Amy's chapters eventually show that things were not going so well for the married couple as of recent), but also serve as tools meant to keep the tension at an all time high, as new information in Nick's story is then interrupted by Amy's diary entry.

Author Gillian Flynn

Gone Girl could have simply kept this format through to the end and it would have been a good, suspenseful novel, as we would potentially find out slowly that we're following the narration of a killer, but apparently Gillian Flynn wasn't satisfied with her book simply being good. After the first of the three parts ends, a major twist occurs that affects the format of the storytelling itself. From then on the book keeps the surprises coming, until the last handful of chapters where it slows down and ends on a less thrilling but just as dark tone.

There's not much more I can really say about the story without revealing some major plot points, especially since the biggest plot twist occurs quite early on in the book. What you need to know is that Gone Girl is a mystery novel turned on its head. It was written well, the characters were interesting, and the plot was exciting. If that's your kind of book, Gone Girl is for you.

So how has this affected my excitement for the movie? I'd say I'm about equally as excited as I was before I started reading it. As luck would have it, the trailer for the film came out only one day before I finished the book:



One of the things that I'm most excited for now, however, is that Gillian Flynn herself has penned the movie's script, and has stated that she's changed some things (including the controversial ending) and that the story won't be told in the same way. Considering how the story was told was such a huge part of what made this book great, it will be interesting to see an alternate take from the writer herself.

Oh, and check out the movie's website. It's awesome.
-Ryan

Modern Fantasy

Have you ever realized just how few fantasy movies take place in the modern age?

I'd venture to guess that number is somewhere around ... hold on, let me do the calculations here ... NONE.

I didn't even realize this until I had a fantastically brilliant idea a while ago when I was watching Jack the Giant Slayer with m'lady. You see, the movie shows the whole Jack and the Beanstalk and Jack the Giant Killer thing at first where it's a fantasy adventure set in (when else?) medieval Europe. Then at the very end (SPOILER-ISH THING) it transitions to the modern day where it is implied that the whole movie takes place not in a fantasy world, but in our world, and that Giants are still living on floating islands in the sky that none of our planes have crashed into or our (Google) satellites discovered.

So this movie isn't the best representation of a true classic fantasy story, but still, who says elves, dwarves, wizards, and orcs cannot exist in our modern world?
Imagine if some crazy hack decided it would be a good idea to pen up a Lord of the Rings movie sequel that took place today.

Gandalf (now known as "the Blue") would be a Broadway tech engineer (or a dentist), Legolas would be a FBI agent, the dwarves would probably still be mining (except for oil and natural gas), and Frodo would be dead, because you know ... he's not an elf or wizard and hobbits only live for like 150 years or something.

Seriously, what would those fantasy worlds be like if technology/magic progressed?

This is the sort of stuff I think about in my free time.
-Ryan