2013 Potentially Oscar Nominated Movies

This year I feel like a lot of my feelings on movies were heavily influenced by how I felt about the direction, more so than with other years. Also, I think I am getting increasingly critical (cynical) of what I watch. As of right now I have seen 1423 movies in my life and most of them are ranked above three stars so they are mostly not things like Michael Bay films. I have seen a lot of the so called greatest movies ever made and the more I see, the more difficult I am becoming to impress. I don’t know how Roger Ebert can do it.

As usual I will be including movies nominated for Oscars (especially Best Picture, Actor, Actress, Director, Animated Film, and Foreign Film), Golden Globes, and other movies that got a lot of hype or that I feel are of note. If I don’t include that last category I usually end up not able to talk about other movies I have seen this year that deserve to be noted (like Drive, Shame, and Melancholia last year).

Also like previous years because of my hatred for having so many nominees for Best Picture, I will be marking my five picks with an asterisk and any movie mentioned that was not nominated for an Oscar with a plus sign.

Previous Years:    2011     2012

Movies I Really Liked:

Django Unchained*: This is the feel good movie of the year . . . or at least it was for me. I saw it on Christmas with my BFF Adam and his dad and grandma and we all left the theater smiling. Nothing like a Tarantino movie to bring people together for the holidays. I don’t know what to say about how much I loved this. The cast is ridiculous, the movie made me laugh hysterically, clutch my armrest in fear that the heroes wouldn’t succeed, and even avert my eyes from two scenes that were actually a bit to brutal for my usually iron clad stomach. Things are not sugar-coated in this movie until the happy ending is earned and you can leave feeling like it was all worth it. I could make a joke about DiCaprio’s Oscar snub but I won’t. I just want to point out that obviously he was working for that Oscar; his two costars both have already won them!

Argo*: This is a movie I really need to rewatch because when I saw it in the theater I was so wrapped in the plot that I wasn’t paying attention to much else. It’s a great example of a movie where the conclusion is not the important part; it’s how you get there. You know how the movie is going to end but damn is it not good at making you wonder and worry. It helps that it’s also an interesting moment in history and one that is pretty relevant to current conflicts. My only problem with this movie is that I have a hard time distinguishing between a good movie and a good story. I think I’ve settled on “it’s a good story but the movie makes it a well told one.”

Zero Dark Thirty*: This was a movie I kind of expected to hate. I wasn’t a big fan of The Hurt Locker and in particular, Kathryn Bigelow’s nauseating way of shooting scenes so I kind of rolled my eyes at this movie. I was really surprised to find that I kind of loved it. It is more of a mystery and a character study than anything else with a brief side journey into a war movie towards the end. Although I found it hard to get into at first because of my previously mentioned negativity, at a point it hooked me and I could not look away. Jessica Chastin, who I had no previous opinion of in spite of seeing her in a ton of films, was fantastic. Also, I have to note that the end scene of this movie is utterly perfect and I can be a real sucker for a perfect end scene. If I have any complaints it’s that the movie can be a bit too sporadic during the beginning, jumping around from scene to scene without any real establishing or development of any character other than the main but I think with a movie of this scene, to do so would probably be a bit tedious.

Beasts Of The Southern Wild*: This movie smacked me upside the head and I am still trying to figure out what happened. I know that it was beautiful and probably the most unique movie of the year and that it seemed to be successfully doing exactly what last year’s Tree of Life was trying to do but without any of the nonsensical musings or pretentiousness. This is one I will need to watch again if I want to be more coherent about it but I can just say for now that this was great.

Moonrise Kingdom: I never am quite sure how I feel about Wes Anderson movies but I know what I thought of this one: I thought it was adorable and beautifully made. Usually I have a problem with things that are too sentimental but this movie just felt so sincere and never tried to play with my emotions like other movies of the sort might. I actually got a few laughs out of it and I loved the 60s setting. This movie perfectly captures what it is like to be twelve years old. 

A Royal Affair: I have seen a lot of historical drama movies so a movie with a setting in the 1700s or 1800s about a monarchy has to really do something special for me to sit up and take notice and damn, this movie did. First of all, this movie is not just about a marriage affair like I thought it might be but in fact, a gigantic change in the political face of Denmark. This is a movie of epic proportions and it’s beautiful and constantly intriguing. It’s a long watch but damn is it worth it.

The Sessions: This was a fascinating film that I find I have very little to say about. I don’t know why. It was really good, had a really unique premise and great execution, good acting; I’m just stuck. Maybe it’s because I’m writing this one after having written a bunch of others and I’m tapped out. Yay, for character studies!

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel+: I saw this movie on a total whim while in Cape Cod with my mom where the nearest theater only showed four movies and this was one of them. It was a really fun movie with a lot of interesting characters who each had their own story to tell that showed different aspects of finding a new life in your old age and the idea of finding yourself in a strange land making it relevant to someone of any age. “It will all be alright in the end. If it’s not alright then it’s not the end.”

This Is Not A Film+: I don’t know who has seen this movie but I think it definitely deserves recognition for one reason: it was smuggled out of Iran and into the Cannes Film Festival on a flash drive hidden in a birthday cake. It’s a documentary (kinda) about an Iranian filmmaker under house arrest. Ten minutes in I was wondering why I was watching home movies of a guy answering calls and feeding his pet iguana but thirty minutes in I realized I was watching something kind of brilliant. I kind of hope most of it wasn’t scripted but there are some parts that are so thematically significant that it’s hard to believe they are spontaneous. Certainly not a film for everyone but I really loved it.

Cabin in The Woods+: Joss Whedon had two movies come out this year (almost three; Much Ado About Nothing isn’t coming out officially until June 2013 and I can’t wait) and I actually thought this was the better of the two. It had the right amount of horror and comedy, well written and likeable characters, and it’s a fantastic deconstruction of the horror genre that then takes all the conventions and turns it entirely on its head. Of course, if you know Joss Whedeon’s work with television, the end might not shock you as much as the regular filmgoer. I personally laughed at how typical it is for him but, no spoilers.

Perks of Being A Wallflower+: Having the writer of a book direct the movie of it turned out to be a perfect combination here. I love pretty much everything about this movie: the directing, the adaption of the book, the acting, the accuracy of the time period (one I actually lived though and can remember well). One of the best coming of age movies ever from one of the best coming of age books ever. It’s actually kind of tragic how movies that are directed at a teen audience are so easily overlooked for awards.

Movies I Liked:

Lincoln*: I wanted to like this movie more than I did and sometimes that can be a real killer. Don’t get me wrong; it’s a great movie and everyone else can tell you why. Problem is, in spite of me rating it with an amount of stars that could place it in either this category or the above (4 stars; more than four is automatically above and less is here or lower), I had to only put it in “liked”. I blame Steven Spielberg. I am done with Spielberg. Seriously. His directing style is so sentimental and utterly uncreative at this point that all his recent movies feel old. Like with War Horse (which was quite inferior to this one), there was a scene where I just groaned out loud at a directing decision. This time it was a shot of a flame in Lincoln’s bedroom after he died that Lincoln giving the Gettysburg address is superimposed onto. Way to try to pull emotion from your audience. I do not appreciate manipulative directing. Those feelings should be earned. For my last pick for Best Picture I was torn between this one and Life of Pi and while I think Life of Pi is actually probably a better pick, I caved on this one. I may change it.

Silver Linings Playbook: Ugh. I really, really liked this movie at first and then the last half hour just took it down so much for me. In the beginning this movie was really interesting with all this great acting (Jennifer Lawrence is perfect. In general) and this great theme of everyone seemingly crazy even though only two of the characters are seen as such by the rest and then for some reason it takes this weird turn where suddenly everything is based on a superstition and a dance competition and in the last few minutes we are full on romantic comedy cliché. I’m starting to come to the conclusion that this is the kind of movie David O. Russell makes: a movie that is really strong until you get to the last half hour.

Les Miserables: I can’t say anything about this movie that I haven’t already said. Click here.

Flight: This was a really solid movie that I was ultimately lost interest in as it went on. The first half hour is incredibly strong and then I feel like it kind of limps along to the court hearing at the end. Denzel Washington’s performance is very good but as a movie I only liked it.

The Impossible: This is one of those movies that are mostly based in suspense and emotion. It was certainly solid but for me I think I was having a hard time with it because I kept thinking of the movie Hereafter which also has the topic of the Southeast Asian tsunami as a portion of it. I love a good emotional drama as much as anyone but I didn’t feel like there was much new to be said here that I hadn’t seen in other disaster movies.

Rust And Bone+: There was so nice directing, acting and themes here but I had a problem with the flow of the plot. Aspects of the story-telling seemed to clunk along without reason and it kept bothering me that the characters didn’t seem to be acting like normal human beings. For instance, after Marion Cotillard’s character gets in her accident, she decides to call some bouncer who drove her home from a club one night? Who does that? Also, everything is wrapped up in the end really strangely to me. He runs off but his son nearly dies so he realizes he’s in love? There’s so much missing here.

Cloud Atlas: If I had an “underrated” section, this would probably belong there but alas, I do not. Although, I’m not so sure if it’s that this movie is underrated or that I think the reasons why people are complaining about it don’t seem like valid complaints to me. The people who hate the idea that all the main characters are the same person are missing the point to me. I didn’t even look at it that way. I just looked at them as people whose lives are connected because each has an effect on the other. I think it makes more sense to look at it as each character played by the same actor is the same person. The visuals, camera work and such are all fine. The make-up is occasionally uncanny valley (all the white guys made Asian look like Benedict Cumberbatch) but I saw this as a Brechtian choice and not a realistic one. So why didn’t I like this movie as much as I had hoped? Each individual plot was interesting but only as a very short story. Everything was drawn out WAY too long and so something interesting in a small dose becomes exhausting.

Dark Knight Rises+: Christopher Nolan really knows how to create a masterpiece around a theme and what he has done to the Batman canon, as a Batman fan, gives me so much joy. His modern take is certainly something the world needed. The main fault with this movie that kept me from loving it was that there were a few too many lapses in logic for me. One lapse actually made me burst out laughing. There really needed to be some red pen action with the script because a lot of things were inconsistent or out of nowhere. The ending was great though; just wanted to say that.

The Hunger Games+: As someone who loves the books, I am not going to get hung up on things they left out because that would be utterly useless. This is what I will say: this movie was perfectly cast but the directing was often nausea inducing and the film really needed some small details to help make the plot make sense to someone who hasn’t read the book. Also, the lightning was sometimes egregiously bad. Hopefully a change in director will mean an improvement for the next film.

Pitch Perfect+: I honestly thought this movie could be really stupid but considering how much my friends liked it, I eventually gave in and watched it. It actually brought a smile to my face and gave me a few really good laughs. The music is obviously, awesome and I kind of love how self aware this movie is. Anna Kendrick and Rebel Wilson were just delightful.

Movies That Were Over-hyped:

Amour: . . . Here’s the thing. I thought this was a really good movie but there were a couple things about it and the way it is being talked about that kind of drive me up a wall. First of all, Michael Hanake is a great film writer but I find that there are a lot of times when his directing really gets on my nerves. There’s a really great shot of an audience watching a piano recital in this film that I thought was really interesting and appropriate but then he’ll do stuff like linger on one thing with no symbolic purpose for a seriously long time and it takes me right out of the film. The good things about this film are its unapologetic realism and I loved how the theme was underlying in every conversation even if you weren’t thinking to look for it. That was in part to the great writing. The acting was also really great. My problem with how this film is being talked about is that everyone is acting like this movie is so unique and innovative and it truthfully isn’t. This has been done before. Also, if you were surprised by what happens an hour and 45 minutes in, you are terrible at context clues.

Life of Pi: Every once in a while I come across a movie that is technically good in every reasonable sense I can think of but that I end up having a problem with. Enter this one. It’s well directed, well acted, makes great use of CGI (something I only really notice if it’s particularly bad but it was good here), and it has a very interesting story that made me want to continue watching. All in all, there is no doubt that this is a good movie. The problem is me. I really could not get behind the main themes of this film. Pi adopts a nickname that is irrational and his life follows suit with his fascination with religion (inherently irrational), the unsolved sinking of the boat, the friendship with an animal that should eat him, the island he visits, everything. And when nothing makes sense, what does? God. Faith. Things that are not rational. Speaking as someone who will believe nothing without proof but does hold a very small notion that things are meant to happen as they happen, I had difficulty accepting what this movie was dishing out. I can acknowledge that it was good but there I am.

The Avengers: So I thought this movie was good and yes, it is very impressive how Joss Whedon managed to bring all these different characters together and give them all screen time and something to do but I guess overall I didn’t walk out of the movie thinking, “OMG, Amazing” so much as I was thinking, “Well, that was quite good.” Sometimes I think my inability to be impressed by computer-created visuals is a detriment to my ability to enjoy big budget movies.

Movies I Disliked:

Magic Mike+: I’m reaching an endpoint with Steven Soderbergh. He hasn’t made a movie I’ve liked in a very long time so I think I’m pretty much done. His directing aside, the plot of this movie was very conventional and unimpressive. Channing Tatum didn’t make me want to gouge my eyes out as much as usual but that’s about all I can say (Matthew McConaughey still made me want to kill).

Animated Films Special Section:

Usually I talk about animated films in the regular sections above but this year I found that my feelings on the animated films nominated didn’t really have enough diversity to accurately categorize them in those sections so I’m instead going to talk about them on a case by case basis and compare them to each other because in this case that’s pretty easy to do.

I saw Brave, Wreck-It Ralph, Frankenweenie, and ParaNorman. 

I actually liked Brave the least out of all of them and I was very surprised. Pixar always puts out good to excellent work and this movie was certainly good but I didn’t find it particularly memorable or well crafted from a plot perspective. Its themes were present but ultimately weak and it almost seemed like someone came up with a setting but didn’t think too hard on the story. Although, I will note that I usually don’t notice animation unless it’s particularly bad and this animation was freaking beautiful.

Frankenweenie was probably my next lowest and you could probably argue me into shifting the positions of this one and Brave. I found out after seeing it that this was originally an animated short film instead of a full one and I honestly could tell that it probably worked better in short form. The idea is cute but about halfway through the movie it’s like they’ve run out of things to do with the idea. Then the theme just runs right off the rails in the final act and I don’t even know what I am supposed to be gathering from it. Love is power and greed is evil?

Both Wreck-It Ralph and ParaNorman I enjoyed immensely. They both had me laughing the entire time with Ralph being more universal jokes and delightful references to gaming culture throughout the ages and Norman being occasionally more advanced humor and references to horror movies (and also as a New Englander I had a certain level of joy from the historical witch premise itself). I was really invested in both movies and would be happy to see either of them take home the award but I’m not going to hold my breath. I’ve kind of convinced myself that Brave will win because it’s Pixar even though I don’t think it was the best by any stretch of the imagination.

Other well-rated movies I want to see from this year but haven’t include:
Anna Karenina (3.5 or 3 stars; beautiful directing/visuals/music; issues with acting/casting/script), 
Chronicle (4 stars; surprisingly good and smart considering the premise),
Compliance (4 stars; disturbing and very effective), 
Cosmopolis (2.5 stars; lots of statements but says little, dry but weirdly memorable),
Farewell My Queen (4 stars; great but don't go in expecting it to be all about Marie), 
Girl Model (4 stars; I've seen better docs but this one conveys its point well), 
The Hobbit (Truthfully, I think I may wait to watch this until the others come out), 
Holy Motors (4.5 stars; brilliant piece of WTF), 
How To Survive A Plague (4.5 stars; really good and powerful doc), 
The Intouchables (4 stars; a bit cliche but not manipulative, funny and sweet), 
Jiro Dreams Of Sushi (5 stars; perfect documentary, just perfect), 
Looper (4 stars; really solid and thought provoking action flick), 
The Master (4 stars; solid movie, crazy good acting),
Salmon Fishing In The Yemen (3 stars; had its moments but melodramatic overall), 
Skyfall (4 stars; and I don't even like James Bond movies but I thought this was pretty great).
Sleepwalk With Me (3.5 stars; interesting and pretty funny), 
Seven Psychopaths (4 stars, maybe 4.5; kind of brilliant, liked it even better than "In Bruges"), 
Take This Waltz (3.5 stars; emotional and quirky but not without flaws), 
Then I can comfortably leave this year behind.

"Sherlock" and Female Characters

Since starting tumblr, I have had a lot of GIF-based exposure to shows that have very active and passionate fandoms and one of the most active fandoms that seems to always come up when talking about tumblr is the Sherlock fandom. Doctor Who is also very popular among the people I follow but I already watch that and Downton Abbey appears quite a bit but that was already on my to-watch list by the time I started seeing it everywhere, so Sherlock was the one that intrigued me from a perspective of knowing nothing about it.

I consulted my friend Sarah on the subject since in the last few years she has become my authority on British television and I figured since it was so popular she had probably seen it. Her response was pretty much, "It's okay. It's really amusing but it doesn't really deserve all the tumblr stuff it's getting. You'll have a problem with how the female characters are written." That last bit set off a warning signal in my head because a lot of the time, writing is the most important thing to me about things I watch and Sarah, like me, cares a lot about how female characters are written since, let's face it, a lot of people don't know how to write female characters.

As you would be able to tell from reading . . . anything else I've written, two of the fandoms that I spend the most time in myself are the Fullmetal Alchemist fandom and the Whedonverse and you know what these both have in common? Well written female characters. Fullmetal Alchemist is a story written for the teen boy demographic that is mature enough to appeal to all ages and genders. It is also written by a woman, a fact that alludes a lot of people because she pulled a J. K. Rowling and adopted a unisex, verging on masculine pen name, Hiromu Arakawa. In spite of the nature of the story requiring there to be notably more male than female characters, there are plenty of women represented and they are all unique, strong, and three-dimensional, even minor characters like Mrs. Bradley and Rebecca Catalina. You understand who they are and what their motivations are and they are neither saints nor devils. Joss Whedon and his squads of writers are also triumphant at writing shows where there is a female main character half the time and the ensemble cast is always made up of nearly equal parts men and women. His women, like Arakawa's, are unique and three-dimensional, and strong in their own ways.

Now, I should be clear that when I say that a female character is "strong", I don't necessarily mean that in a physical sense (or even an emotional sense). She is most definitely not flawless. It's the flaws that make a female character strong and three-dimensional and if she doesn't have any then you have failed character writing 101. The first rule of writing a female character is pretty much to forget that she's female for a moment so that does not becoming a defining trait. There's a fantastic article about the differences in the definition of strong called "Why Strong Female Characters Are Bad For Women" that uses the Transformers movies as an example of how not to write women and talks about how a lot of men seem to misinterpret the phrase "strong female character" into a character that is a flawless expert in some field who is sexualized in a way to appeal to the male audience.

Let me take a moment to get back to Sherlock because I do have good things to say about it. I found it entertaining, extremely well acted, and beautifully directed. These elements alone make the show of a very high caliber above a lot of the tripe you are likely to see on television nowadays. It is definitely a good show. The problem comes in with the writing. While, the show is adapted very well, taking Arthur Conan Doyle's original stories and moving them up to a modern setting, there are some aspects of the writing that irk me. First of all, I was really uncomfortable in the first episode and in many of the subsequent episodes at how many times humor was attempted to be derived from a "gay gag" involving Sherlock and Watson. The first time I laughed a bit but every time after that started to get more and more uncomfortable by how often the joke kept coming up. I started thinking to myself, "Does the show think there is something inherently wrong about two men being roommates? Does it think there is something funny about being gay or being mistaken for gay?" On top of those jokes, the show needed to make it ABUNDANTLY clear that both Sherlock and Watson are straight. Watson is dating girls left and right and Sherlock, in spite of the fact that he seems to be written in a way that would make him make more sense as an asexual (although perhaps not aromantic), is given a love interest as well and his lack of sex becomes a topic for discussion on more than one occasion. There was something a little off about the whole situation to me.

There are other small writing complaints I have about the show that are kind of omnipresent in Steven Moffet's shows like that occasionally things are wrapped up in a way that makes no sense and gives no real explanation for ("A Scandal in Belgravia" was full of these) but when these things happened I tried to just tell myself to ignore it instead of getting angry about it.

Then we enter the thing Sarah warned me about: the female characters.

I think it's probably best for me to break this down one by one to say exactly what is wrong about how the female characters in Sherlock are written.

Dr. Sarah Sawyer

Honestly, I found this picture on a Sherlock wiki and read the whole ten sentence description of her and there wasn't a single element on the page that said a thing about who she is. She is a characterless character. Then she gets captured, like all useless women do in fiction. In fact, she is the first in what will be a string of useless women only around to date John and remind us that he A.) isn't gay and B.) can't hold down a relationship because of the chaotic life he leads. Wouldn't it perhaps be more interesting and emotionally compelling if we actually knew who she was? What if she made some appearances in other episodes and the audience started to like her as a character and then she and John broke up because of the aforementioned chaotic lifestyle and we actually got a real impression of how much John's friendship with Sherlock is affecting his private life? Even if a character does exist for furthering the development of a more important character, this does not mean they should just be a figure no one will remember. I couldn't even remember her name until I looked it up on IMDb.


Sgt. Sally Donovan

And while we are on the topic of useless female characters, we have Sgt. Donovan. I didn't even know she had a first name until just now. Sgt. Donovan is around a bit more than Sally and actually has the barest minimum requirement of character to have appeared in three episodes out of six. Here's what we know about her: she hates Sherlock because he likes crime and she thinks he's going to turn into a crazy murderer and at one point she had sex with one of her coworkers which was clearly played for laughs. That's all I've got. It's all well and good to have a detective character who thinks Sherlock is overstepping their boundaries and could even be dangerous, not everyone on the force is likely to have Lestrade's tolerance for him, but I feel like there's something missing from all this hatred. Shouldn't there be some kind of experience in order for her to draw this assumption? A past case? Something Sherlock himself did? Also, why is she always angry? Seriously, every scene she is in, she is pissy and angry. She's certainly around enough to become a real character so why hasn't she become one yet? Any real trait to show she's a person would be lovely.

Mrs. Hudson

Mrs. Hudson is probably the female character I have the best understanding of. I don't necessarily mean she is the best developed character or that she's the best written female character (although, truthfully, she may be). What I mean is that I understand and accept her purpose and why she is written the way she is far more than I understand and accept the logic behind the other female characters. Mrs. Hudson is a parody of the landlady caricature. It has appeared enough in literature, film, and television: the older widow who is very sweet and protective of her tenants and likes to meddle in their lives. The parody aspects comes in with the fact that no matter what utterly ridiculous thing Sherlock has done, she still maintains that sweet, concerned nature typical of her caricature. Finds a severed head in Sherlock's fridge? Scolds him that he put it in the same place where he keeps his food. We even get to see a bit more of her strength in the scene where she exercises her acting chops for Sherlock's sake. We don't ever really get an explanation for why she is so cool with Sherlock's weirdness and I kind of wish we did because I think it would be really interesting and would kind of fill in a missing piece to her character but I'm not going to hold my breath. The writing of the show in general doesn't care much for filling in missing pieces and I doubt they would waste their time on a character who is just a parody and comic relief but since she is the most easily likeable female character on the show, I wish the writing would acknowledge this more.


Molly Hooper

Poor Molly Hooper. I'll get to her character in a second (although that statement sums up most of it) but I would like to point out something about all these female characters that is easy to overlook: they are all gainfully employed. You have a doctor, a detective, a landlady, a pathologist, and (as we will get to) a high class dominatrix. These women are all implied to be intelligent by virtue of their occupations and/or success in said fields. This is another one of those female character writing problems: equating a good job or job success with strength. In spite of most of these women's careers, many of them are so lacking in character that the job doesn't make them any more of a character.
Now Molly. I want so hard to like Molly but I always just end up pitying her. Like Mrs. Hudson, she appears in the show a lot because her career is important to the lives of Sherlock and Watson but Molly for 95% of the show spends her time pining after Sherlock and getting rejected over and over again. She's the Eponine. In spite of this unfortunate role she was saddled with, Molly has actual personality traits: she's friendly but kind of awkward, she has a high tolerance for the disturbing, and, as I was overjoyed to hear, she is very perspective to people's feelings that they keep hidden. Molly's most significant moment on the show is definitely at the end of season two when she reveals herself to be the only person who is really capable of seeing beyond Sherlock's exterior traits. She explains that her father was the same way, which actually makes sense, and in a way this explains her attraction to Sherlock the entire time. She likes him because of the potential she sees underneath as well as the exterior. After having nearly sat through the entire show without seeing any kind of development in any of the female characters, this was a breath of fresh air and I sincerely hope that Molly will be given more to do in season three. This is an important development in both her character, Sherlock's, and their relationship and I am terrified that this will be abandoned by the writers for something that they deem more important. I would love to see a kind of friendship or even therapist-patient relationship crop up here. I'm rooting for Molly's development!

Irene Adler

The sound my frustration makes is: Auuuuuuhhhh. I don't even know where to start here. The original Irene Adler was an American opera singer who had some high profile affairs. She's clever, sexy, and international and in some materials is a sort of love interest for Sherlock. Now imagine that you have to take that information and put it in a modern context. When I do that, I get Irene Adler as a lead singer of a rock band or a pop singer who has had a lot of high profile affairs who has connections everywhere in the world because of all the touring she does and manages to be famous but lead a sort of double life where what is published in the papers doesn't even graze the surface of what she has really done. Now put that through a "poor male writing" filter and what do you get? You get Sherlock's Irene Adler, a famous dominatrix who has incriminating pictures of a female member of the royal family who is a client of hers and has connections around the world. Now, I can't stress this enough, the problem is not that she is a dominatrix although it is a fairly poor translation of the original material. I'm no prude and I have no damage against sex workers. It's also by no means impossible to write a female character who is a sex worker who can be liked by both sexes (Inara Sera from Firefly anyone?). No, the problem is how her occupation affects every other aspect of her character. As I said before, the female characters of Sherlock are all well employed but their jobs don't really define anything about them. This is not the case with Irene. The dominatrix thing comes into play all the time with her speech and behavior. She is almost always overtly sexual which makes her kind of hard to relate to and makes it hard for any other personality traits to seep in. The virgin-whore complex is in full form here with Molly as the pathetic virgin and Irene as the male fantasy whore. I think she would have been more appealing to a female audience if she was a dominatrix but treated her work like a private thing that doesn't factor into her personal life. Then there's the matter of her cleverness. Like the article I referenced before, one of the defining traits of these poorly written female characters is their expertise in a field where they trump all their male counterparts, made okay to a male audience by their sexuality. Although Sherlock does ultimately defeat Irene at the end, she outsmarts him throughout most of the episode she's in and does so in ways that Sherlock can't even comprehend. Also, this is utterly besides the point but I was also kind of hoping Irene would be American because the representation of Americans on Sherlock (and Steven Moffet shows in general) is absolutely atrocious. They are either violent, bigoted, or stupid or any combination of the three.
I think what makes me most sad about Irene is that while Molly has shown signs of being a retrievable character, I'm not sure if Irene is. It's totally possible that she could come back into the show, humbled by her defeat, and become a character everyone could really love but I guess I'm a bit cynical.


Dear Steven Moffet,
A homework assignment: before season three of Sherlock, please watch any two Joss Whedon shows and read at least 3/4 of Fullmetal Alchemist, paying close attention to the female characters and then attention to how they are written in comparison to the male characters and how they function in relationship to them.
- Kay

The First Episode of "Angel" From Memory.

In the not too distant future I will be doing my annual post on movies nominated for Oscars. Usually I finish it somewhere in early February after I have managed to see everything nominated in the four major categories and a portion of the animated and foreign films as well. I'm starting off strong this year with three Best Pictures, three animated, and one foreign under my belt already (usually I start off with way less).

But for now, let's get silly.

So about two weeks ago I decided I wanted to watch some episodes of Angel, frequently my default activity when I don't want to start a new series, can't find any movies I want to watch, and have left whatever book I'm reading in my desk at work. The problem was that I couldn't think of an Angel episode that I hadn't seen recently. It took me a second to realize that the answer to my question was the first nine episodes of the series. Then I had to contemplate why I not only haven't watched them recently but haven't watched them at all since I first saw them maybe five years ago and never watched them in the correct order because I was using streamed videos on a DSL internet that would load at irregular times.

Did I think the episodes were boring? Well, no. "Monster of the Week", yes but not necessarily boring.
Did I just not like Doyle? No. I really like him. I really wanted him and Cordelia to get together. The only main character on Angel who I don't absolutely love is Connor (I actually kind of hate him).
So was I avoiding the episodes because it would make me sad? Perhaps a bit but there's a bigger reason.

Not too long ago I rewatched all of Angel except those episodes and now I remember why: The essay I wrote about Wesley and Fred. I watched season three of Buffy and then skipped ahead to episode 1.10 of Angel because that's where Wesley comes in. I didn't need those episodes to write the essay so I didn't watch them.

I'm watching them now and actually dreading getting to episode 1.9. Sobbing may happen.

So here's my tribute to those episodes I didn't talk about in the Wesley/Fred essay: a summary of the first episode of Angel pulled completely from my very flawed memory.


1.1 "City Of"

Angel: Los Angeles . . . Well, let's save some people.

(He does.)

(Returns home to the lair of the Caped Cadaver.)

Doyle: Hi!
Angel: How'd you get into my house?
Doyle: Not important. I'm here to exposit your backstory!
Angel: Oh come on. Like anyone needs that.
Doyle: Hey, there could be random stragglers who've never seen an episode of Buffy and have no idea what you're about. Don't get all high and mighty. No one knows who I am either.
Angel: Yeah, who are you? You're like every sketchy Irish character Joss Whedon has written with a dash of Xander Harris.
Doyle: I resent that! I was practically the original sketchy Irish character, minus yourself of course, and I'm way more interesting than Xander bleeding Harris. I've got a ton of backstory and layers. I just hope I'm on the show long enough to reveal them.
Angel: Well, you're not human. I can smell that much.
Doyle: Hey, I happen to be very human . . . on my mother's side.
Angel: So other than telling me my own life story, why are you here?
Doyle: I had a vision that told me to come here. The Powers That Be give me visions of people in need, which are like violent migraines with pictures, because blah, blah, blah redemption. It's a big theme, you know? Problem is, I'm not a fighter as you can probably tell, outside of bars at least, . . . but you are. So why don't you buy me some booze and I'll tell you about the latest helpless human.
Angel: I don't know of any demons that thrive on alcohol.
Doyle: That's my human side.

(They wander the streets of L.A. Doyle drinks and yells at homeless people)

Doyle: See that waitress in the coffee shop? Go save her.
Angel: She looks fine.
Doyle: Well, she isn't. Go chat her up.
Angel: Why would a random woman talk to me?
Doyle: Have you seen you? (First of many Ho Yay moments between Angel and Doyle)

Angel: Hey.
Girl: Come to a swanky party with me?
Angel: Sure?

(At the party.)

Cordelia: OMG, Angel! Still a vampire?
Angel: I can't really get rid of that.
Cordelia: Right. Well, I'm gonna go talk to important people because my life is SO wonderful.
Angel: . . . I'll never see that girl again.

(A vampire named Russell Winters who was at the party kills coffee shop girl.)

Angel: NOOOOO, I failed!! (emos)

(Later. Cordelia's shitty apartment)

Cordelia: My life sucks ass. I can't get work and I can't afford food.
Friend on Phone: Russell Winters wants to meet you!
Cordelia: An investment guy?
Friend: Just do it. Connections and crap.
Cordelia: Okay.

(At Russell's mansion)

Cordelia: (exposits backstory becoming depressed with her own tale)
Russell: I can make the pain go away.
Cordelia: Wait a minute, you're a vampire!
Russell: No, I'm not.
Cordelia: Yes, you are! Don't fuck with me; I went to Sunnydale High. Killing vampires was practically a graduation requirement.
Russell: RAWR!
Cordelia: AHHH!

(Angel saves Cordelia but Russell gets away.)

(At Wolfram & Hart office.)

Angel: Huh. Evil law firm. The joke writes itself.
Lindsey: Get out of here.
Angel: This is Sparta!

(Kicks Russell out the window so he burns up in the sun.)

(At the office)

Cordelia: Hi!
Angel: Jeez, how do you people keep breaking into my secret lair?
Cordelia: I cleaned up and made some terrible coffee and I'm your new secretary now so you have to pay me weekly. 'Kay, bye.
Angel: . . .
Doyle: We should let her stay.
Angel: You think she's hot, huh?
Doyle: (says something to imply that she is boner-inducing. Might have been "stiffener" or "stiffening." And now that I think about it you could take that to refer to one's spine and not one's penis but since it's Doyle he probably means penis.)

(END ON UNNECESSARILY EPIC POSE OF ANGEL STARING DOWN AT LOS ANGELES.)


I'm sure that was very useful.

(Exit Kay)