Arrival Review, Part 3
Investigating the meaning of time and languageArrival is a movie worth watching if you’re willing to not think about it too hard.
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Gary Varner
Arrival Review, Part 2
On the strangeness of a language telling the futureWhen she asks why the aliens want to help humanity, the aliens respond by saying they will eventually need humanity’s help.
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Arrival Review, Part 1
Nobody behaves like they should for the first ten minutes. They act, dare I say, alien.Arrival is an interesting movie. It’s well-shot, well-acted, and well-written. The trouble is the script makes some strange choices in the beginning and I just wasn’t persuaded by the movie’s twist at the end. The story starts out with a montage where Louise is raising her daughter, but the child tragically dies of some unknown illness, presumably cancer. The viewer is led to conclude that this is a flashback, but if one listens to the monologue Louise delivers, she says plainly that she’s explaining when the child’s story begins, if there are beginning at all, which is something she no longer believes. This basically means that the entire movie is a flashback, but the viewer is not supposed to notice Read More ›
Wrapping Up the Westworld Series
Ultimately, the moral of the story is transhumanismThe first time I watched Westworld, I remember enjoying it, but upon revisiting the series, my opinion of it has dropped a great deal. There are a variety of problems. First, it’s a bait and switch. It teases the idea of showing how robots can come to life, and it plays with your expectations for most of the series. It even goes as far as to discuss theories like The Bicameral Mind, and The Turing Test. Then, in the last episode, it confirms what the viewer has been slowly growing to suspect. The robots had been coming to life the entire time, and Ford had been wiping their memories. The show says that Ford programmed the robots to experience everything Read More ›
Westworld Episode 10 Review (Part Two)
Welcome to the dark end of the journeyLast time, Teddy had just finished saving Dolores from the Man in Black, who turned out to be William all along. He takes her to the coast because that was where he promised to take her when they were performing their pre-programmed loop. However, the coast is apparently not very far because as Dolores dies in his arms, Teddy starts reciting a campy monologue, and then shuts down while the board applauds the speech. Even when they’re trying to escape their loop, the robots still, somehow, find themselves trapped in yet another one of Dr. Ford’s narratives. Dr. Ford appears, addresses the crowd, then orders for Teddy to be cleaned up, and for Dolores to be taken to a nearby Read More ›
Westworld Episode 10 Review (Part One)
The maze isn't the only thing that's hard to navigate in this episode.I’ll start out with the most irrelevant plot first because almost no screen time is devoted to it, and it amounts to nothing in the end anyway. Hale successfully convinces the Board to fire Ford, not that he really cares. But Hale has been convinced this entire time that Ford is going to delete the park’s data out of spite. So, after Theresa is killed, she enlists Sizemore, a jaded writer who works for the park, to smuggle the data out through one of the decommissioned robots. This plan doesn’t work; however, because all the robots wake up by the end of the episode, and the data is lost in the vengeful horde. So, it’s a plot point that goes Read More ›
Westworld Episode 9 Review
Bernard learns the truthEpisode nine is fast paced, but if you’re paying attention, the grand twist is obvious, and I found it a little irritating. In the next review, we’ll discuss the conclusion of Westworld.
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Westworld: Episode 8 Review
Is misery the key to consciousness?Episode 8 is one of the stronger episodes in the series. It starts with Bernard waking up after killing Theresa. Also horrified to realize he is a robot.
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Westworld: Episode 7 Review
In which Theresa makes a terrible discoveryThis episode begins with Bernard having a flashback of his son. It’s a very sad scene that turns out to be a dream sequence. After that, we follow Theresa to Hale’s apartment.
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Westworld: Episode 6 Review
Maeve and the audience get some answersIn short, because the writers aren’t exactly sure how to explain the evolution of robot sentience, the viewers get mixed messages.
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Westworld: Episode 5 Review
Mediocre writing made bearable by talented actorsEpisode Five opens with Ford talking to one of the parks older droid’s, something he has grown fond of doing over the years. He tells a story of an old Grey Hound he and his brother once had, and explains that one time, they let the dog off the leash. The dog was used to chasing a fake rabbit around the track, so when it saw a cat, it immediately went after it. But after the dog had caught the cat and killed it, he didn’t know what to do. This story obviously implies that Dr. Ford knows the droids are becoming conscious, and it seems as if he is the dog chasing the car and has finally caught it. Read More ›
Westworld: Episode 4 Review
If nothing matters, then why are we doing this?Episode three spent a great deal of time simply building the characters and world but had one good scene that explored some interesting ideas about consciousness. Episode Four has a lot more action and much less depth. It does; however, feed us some nihilistic nonsense along the way, and I couldn’t help but wonder why. In the first scene, we return to a glass room where Bernard is once again talking to Dolores. She expresses concern about her world, and this seems to be the first time Bernard has heard her communicating thoughts that are somewhat independent of her programming. So, he gives her a wooden toy he calls The Maze and tells her that if she can find the Read More ›
Westworld: Episode 3 Review
Here we get to the theory of consciousessNot too much happens in episode three. It builds off the events set up in episode two. But there is one particular scene that has a couple of interesting ideas we’re going to explore. First, a quick recap of the episode. Dolores hides the gun she found in a dresser drawer, and eventually asks Teddy to teach her to shoot. He does, but unfortunately, not for very long because Dr. Ford has now given him something Teddy’s never had before: a backstory. Ford gives Teddy a nemesis named Wyatt. Teddy was once a part of his gang, and while riding with the outlaw, he committed horrible crimes. Therefore, Teddy is on a quest for redemption and is resolved to finish Read More ›
Westworld: Episode 2 Review
The whole point of the show is to explore a theory of consciousnessIn episode one, several robots break down. It appears they are accessing memories thanks to an unexpected update, which causes the robots to glitch and seize up, unable to communicate. The updated robots are recalled and the worst of them are decommissioned. In episode two, Dolores wakes up, hearing Bernard’s voice in the middle of the night. She goes outside, and it’s later revealed that she finds a gun buried in the dirt. After we’ve seen Dolores rise from her bed thanks to Bernard’s call, we meet William. He and his future brother-in-law are visiting the park. This is William’s first time in Westworld, and he isn’t excited to be there. He’s humoring his future relative. Episode two continues in Read More ›
Westworld: Episode 1 Review
Westworld asks if a robot were to become conscious, how could it happen?The HBO series Westworld is known for having an incredible first season and a lousy second. In fact, the second season was said to be so bad, I personally disengaged from the series altogether and only found out it had four seasons when I began writing these reviews. We certainly won’t be going over all four seasons, but I do want to talk about the first season because it explores the question of consciousness in some depth. Westworld asks if a robot were to become conscious, how could it happen? What could a programmer do to accomplish this task? Dr. Robert J. Marks discusses Qualia in great detail. Westworld tries to tell a story explaining how this quality could come Read More ›
The Guardians of the Galaxy 3, Part 3
This movie isn't the best in the trilogy, but it should be doing better than it is at the box officePreviously, we talked about how Rocket Raccoon was injured during a fight with Adam Warlock, and this event sent the Guardians on a quest to save their friend. They manage to fix Rocket, and along the way, the viewer learns about the raccoon’s past. However, now that Rocket has healed from his injuries, Peter, Gamora, and Groot must save Nebula, Mantis, and Drax from the High Evolutionary, since they snuck onto his ship. The High Evolutionary demands that Peter trade Rocket for the three stowaways and sends Peter his coordinates. Peter hatches a plan with the remaining Guardians and some of his fellow Ravagers from the previous films. Meanwhile, Mantis, Nebula, and Drax discover there are children in cages inside Read More ›
Guardians of the Galaxy 3, Part 2
When an otter and a raccoon make you cryLast time, we talked about how the newest addition to the Guardians of the Galaxy movies had a decent script but suffers from tone issues, mostly regarding how the film treats Gamora’s death. The Guardians had just broken into a space station, hoping to find a way to bypass a device that is keeping them from healing Rocket’s wounds which he received from the mysterious Adam Warlock. They break into the station and manage to steal Rocket’s records, but the code that would allow them to bypass Rocket’s kill switch has been removed. However, the records also show the Guardians the face of the man who took the code, and presumably, he has transferred it inside his own hard drive Read More ›
Guardians of the Galaxy 3 Review, Part 1
It's a decent movie, but the tone doesn't account for all these characters have been throughGuardians of the Galaxy Volume 3 came out in theaters on May 5th, and while the movie is not the best addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it’s better than most, certainly better than Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. However, there have been complaints about theater turnout, and these complaints are a testament to the damage movies like Multiverse of Madness have done to the Marvel brand. I’d say we have the Mouse to thank for that. The only consolation to this turn of events is that as the box office numbers for Marvel films continue to dwindle, so do the subscriptions to Disney Plus. I’ll take the victories where I can get them. The Movie’s Tone Needs Read More ›
Ghost in the Shell, Part 3
There will always be a ghost in the shellIn the previous review, Major had realized the horrible truth. Ninety-eight people died so she could live in her new body. Horrified by this, she retreats to the ocean just outside the city and floats under the water for some time. When she emerges from the depths, she finds Batou waiting for her on the boat. Major asks if he’s here to kill her, and in his own charming way, Batou says tells her he’s not. After a brief conversation, Major asks Batou to take her back to the city because she needs to know more. Batou agrees and the Major returns to shore only to be arrested by the Hanka cooperation’s men. After this, Hanka’s CEO, Cutter, discuss the Read More ›
Ghost in the Shell, Part 2
What’s the harm in human hacking?In the first review of Ghost in the Shell, the Major had just escaped Kuze’s attempt to hack her mind and had found his location. She, Batou, and another member of Section 9 rushed off to find Kuze before he could escape. Major tracks Kuze’s signal to a Yakuza club, and after fighting some thugs, they find the source of the signal in the basement level of the club, but Kuze isn’t there. All he’s left behind is a hologram which threatens them and disappears. Major then realizes the basement has been rigged to blow and pushes Batou out of the room. However, she isn’t fast enough. Major is caught in the explosion, and Batou looses his eyes in the Read More ›