[Weekly Update] I'm taking a break!

Everyday I wake up, my body cracks. That's how you know I'm old and need to take breaks.

CHANNEL UPDATE

Hope you enjoy our last video on the Train to Busan sequels. While Seoul Station and Peninsula are both disappointing movies to me, neither of them are out right bad movie, and have their fans. If you enjoy one or both of these movies, I can definitely understand why. It's the whole reason I also talk about the good points, too.

As an aside, Seoul Station probably has one of the most divisive critic/audience divides I have ever seen in Rotten Tomatoes. Look it up, it's almost hilarious.

Anyway, I'm currently taking a break, and things have been pretty slow. New video ideas are being written down, and the schedule is being shifted to keep things interesting.

For our next video, we'll talk about the underrated Hong Kong robot movie I Love Maria, and talk about why we love practical effects more than VFX. 

Beyond that, I also want to do a video explaining the Mahjong scene in Crazy Rich Asians. I saw a channel called "Lord Ravenscraft", and the whole channel focuses on explaining board game scenes in movies (which is oddly specific). I happened to know both the cultural context and the rules of Mahjong. So I might be able to explain what is actually happening in the climax of that movie.

Finally, for Chinese New Year, I'm looking to make a video on Kung Fu Food Fight movies, kinda like God of Cookery. If you have any suggestions, let me know!

MEDIA TALK

Last week, I mentioned that I don't like Rian Johnson movies. And some of you are curious about why. So, let's talk about the man.

I watched Knives Out and Glass Onion, and I can safely say... Yeah, I still am not a fan of RJ. That's not to say I didn't enjoy both movies. I think Knives Out is his best work! Although I personally enjoy Glass Onion a lot more.

That's the kind of feeling I have about him as a director. I can appreciate his work. He is one of the few directors in Hollywood that still have strong and somewhat eccentric styles. He's not your corporate for hire artist. That, to me, is very respectable.

The best way I can describe my feeling for RJ is that his work is just not for me, and that's for multiple reasons. The main reason is his writing style. His stories generally prefers style, flow, and pace, often at the sacrifice of logic. Looper is one such movie. The entire story of Looper is constructed on a probability driven multiverse timeline universe. But then in the last minute, the movie pulls a double twist and says the Rainmaker always appear because the universe is actually a closed loop, like 12 Monkeys. In a Loop, things don't have an origin point.

So he casually just breaks everyone out of the loop with a single gunshot, erasing his own future. And now, the film is stuck in between two contradicting models of time travel. It probably bothers no one except me. But as someone with a passion for writing, this feels really sloppy and inconsistent.

While his other movies don't bother me to this degree, they all give some level of disappointment: Introduce a villain for Star Wars sequel, then unceremoniously kill him and takes him out of the plot. Introduces the most obvious asshole character in a murder mystery, makes him the actual killer. Rian Johnson movie often has this sort of anti-climax. Depending on your taste, it may or may not bother you.

But really, I think the ultimate reason I don't like RJ is because... When I look at his movies, I see what I wanted to become: Someone given a budget to explore stylish storytelling, with results that a both good and bad. Someone with unbelievably dry sense of humor. RJ reminds me of myself to some uncomfortable degree, and I don't like that lol.

Which also explains why so many of my viewers like Rian Johnson.

I mean, I hope you like me...?

Which also explains why I like Glass Onion. It's the least Rian Johnson of his movies. That film plays it fast and loose and doesn't take itself nearly as seriously. Without the pretence of airtight logic, I find myself in just the right mindset to enjoy the humor to its fullest.

Anyway, that's the update for this week. No video for the rest of the month, but I'll see you on February. Stay safe!