[Weekly Update] Superman needs to STFU

CHANNEL UPDATE

Everybody Loves Brigitte
Thank you for the love and support for our last video! It seemed I have unexpected made many people fans of Brigitte Lin. The power of a handsome woman shall never be underestimated.
As with most of our videos, to keep the pace going, we left out a lot of details, such as the variety of operas in China. Some of the comments have raised the point that not all Chinese operas are male dominated. Indeed, the 1671 ban was lax. The further away from the capital, the less strict the ban was. So, female actresses remained in some regional operas.
Yue opera is particularly interesting, as it was main dominated before the 1920s. But due to its romantic themed plays, it gained a large female audience based, and has since became a very female dominated field.

Chinese Geography
The script for our next video on Chinese Geography is nearly finished. I'm very excited for this project, and the script came out pretty well! I managed to include a variety of movies about rural Yunan, residential Beijing, and urban Chongqing. The script is already quite long, but I still have so much I want to add. Hopefully it'll be popular with our audience, because I really want to turn this into a series.

Sailor Moon
Starting next month, I'll focus more on individual films, so I can create a backlog of videos. We'll start with the first Sailor Moon movie, in which Usagi/Serena's boyfriend is kidnaped by his gay alien ex-boyfriend. That's the actual plot.
Except, the American VHS release edited out the film's gay implication. And I want to talk about just that: American censorship. By comparing the two edits, we'll explore how the US and Japan treat children's content differently.

MEDIA TALK

Last week, when I talk about quiet moments in film and how they are disappeared, I didn't realize how on the money I was, because holy moly can Superman please be quiet?

Alright, spoiler for the new Superman movie.

So, I watched James Gunn's Superman, and I did enjoy it. Except I really hated the dialogue, every bit of it. Many of them are forced, expository, and unnatural. An example would be at the end, when Supergirl shows up. Superman lies down, and tells his robot assistant that Supergirl is off to party around a red star, because a yellow star makes her unable to get drunk. The trauma of losing everyone on Krypton is too much for her to handle. And the whole time I was sitting there thinking: I'm sure the robots already know this. This whole exposition is all just for the audience! It is the most obvious Maid and Butler dialogue. I know they sound like comic book dialogues. But when medium is different, perhaps the approach should be different?

But, of course, the biggest problem is the prevalent of it. Like most other modern Hollywood movies, there is not a moment of quiet. In fact, even during fight scenes, people are still talking. Admittedly, the one doing the talking is mostly Nicolas Hoult, so I'm kinda okay with that. But still, come on!

In the only scene where Clark hangs out with his dad, the entire interaction is driven by spoken words. Instead of characters expressing their self-doubt through action, through choices, or even through body language, Clark just explicitly says "I'm not who I think I am". And his dad just replies "your action makes you who you are". There isn't even subtext to the dialogue.

Look, I literally just come up with an alternate scene. Instead of just sitting there sipping away his coffee, Clark is out in the back, washing his Superman outfit. Dad comes by.

Dad: How ya feelin'?
Clark forces a smile.
Dad sits down: Ya headin' back to Metropolis.
Clark: I'm not sure.
Dad: If you aren't sure then why are you washing it?
Clark pauses.
Dad: You know what you should do. And that's the important part.

Like... dude, I'm an ass of a writer and I can write that. Let Clark look at his emblem and contemplate. Let dad silently sit by his side. Let the movie breathe.

Of course, at 2h9m, much shorter than the 1978 original but with many more action sequences, Superman is in a tough spot. There isn't a lot of time for it to take it slow and build a mood. At the same time, the plot of Superman is so simple, maybe we can streamline it a little, so we can actually spend time with the symbol of hope, instead of simply watch it fly through the sky at high speed.

Anyway, that is my update for the week. Script should be up in a few days, but the video will have to wait till next month. I'll see you soon.