For Now

Have not been able to write in a while. Well, at least.

Here’s something to put up while I wait for something to come.

http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=2004

Magic: The Gathering As An Accessory

Note: yes, I do play M:tG. I fancy myself pretty good at it, as far as “casual” players go. Casual here means that I’ve spent less than $1,000 on cards (and less than $30 for a single card). I readily admit this is not a perfect definition – some people have gotten tournament-winning decks for less than the cap, and some people have paid more for cards than rent. But for me, that’s not what “casual” should imply.

If you spend a grand on cardstock, it’s no longer something you do on the side. A four-digit investment is not a passing fancy, nor is it something you take lightly. Spending that much on anything, especially cards, suggests that the cards are a measure not only of financial worth, but personal worth as well.

And that’s something Magic does much more effectively than most other card games (and in many ways, as good as video games, fashion, and alcoholism) – it drives the player to invest themselves into their decks.

Yu-Gi-Oh! and Pokemon fail in this regard, because more or less the decks tend to look the same. How many people sat on decks running Charizard? Rather, what kind of idiot wouldn’t do so if they could? How many people depend on the Blue Eyes, White Dragon? Or Ultimate Dragon, I should say, since that’s the end game.

In effect, there’s very little true personalization.

But by the sheer volume of cards and sets released in its history, Magic has cards that will appeal to just about any kind of player, so every kind of player can find something to like.

Want to have a lot of life? There’s a card for you.

Want to have everyone else lose life? There’s a card for you.

Want big motherfuckers? Here you go.

What about lots of motherfuckers? Got that too.

What if people want to do things you don’t like? Well, fuck them!

Just want to fuck with people? Go for it!

Hey, why not win just because? You can do that.

Hell, what if you don’t even want to play by the rules?

Well, actually…

WAIT, THEY DID THAT.

Basically, you can just about do whatever you want. There are thousands and thousands of choices, you’re bound to find something you like. And really, that’s what its appeal boils down to.

If you buy a dress, you accentuate your appearance except for when it’s sitting in the closet or crumpled in a heap at the foot of a bed. If you buy a game, it will collect dust within a few weeks once you’ve finished it off. In both cases, the individual item loses value by virtue of being interchangeable with other, similar items. But a Magic deck, once completed, represents a manifestation of the individual’s personality. Whether they like being super strong or super crafty, whether they like being friendly with opponents or antagonistic… no matter what, a Magic deck is irreplaceable because it does something nothing else can do, and it belongs to them.

So apparently, the message is that Prada bags can suck it?

Recontextualization Culture: Glenn Beck and American Sports

Image via Wikipedia

Tomorrow, Beck will stand two rows down from the site of Martin Luther King, Jr’s historic “I Have A Dream” speech and present a rally that he hopes will become equally historic. Attendance is projected in the ten and hundred of thousands, drawing on support from the Tea Party movement. Sarah Palin is expected to provide star power to the rally. It even has news outlets drawing lines in the sand – is this a display of patriotism, a self-aggrandizing ploy by Beck, a de facto show of force by the Tea Party, or something else? The one element of the discussion that draws my attention, however, is implied through two potential guests of honor – Tony La Russa and Albert Pujols, the manager and star player for the St. Louis Cardinals. For even though they may not agree with the politics or the opinions of Beck, their link to the television and radio personality runs deeper than their Q Score. Both parties (Beck and the Tea Party members on one side, the Cardinals and their professional sports brethren) depend on their desire and ability to alter the nature of the sphere of influence they inhabit.

Beck is a seminal figure in the Tea Party movement – his vocal support of its ideology and membership has lent the movement a good deal of coverage and exposure – and to ignore his role on the eve of its potential greatest display of influence would be irresponsible. How did a talking head get this big? His rhetoric.

Many have argued, correctly or no, that he is manipulating fears and ignorance to accomplish his goals. This isn’t a new approach – McCain detractors claimed he would be no better than Bush two years ago. Its effectiveness will be put to the light tomorrow with the spotlight directly centered on the former morning talk host. But for better or worse, Beck has altered the national political landscape. In this midterm election year, people are legitimately concerned or interested in the results state-to-state. Political activism is more prominent than it has been for a long time.

In short, Beck has helped make politics a full-contact sport. On the flip side, athletes are adopting the opposite trend; through the collective bargaining agreement negotiations in the NBA and NFL and the budget allocation in MLB, professional sport is now a widely political venture.

As a microcosm of the interplay between politics and athletes, three high-profile holdouts caught the media’s attention. Motivations were as widespread as the athletes themselves:

• Albert Haynesworth, unhappy with his changing role within the Washington Redskins’ defense, sat out as many days as physically possible without losing his $21M paycheck;
• Bret Favre, unsure about the health of his ankle, contemplated retirement to avoid training camp;
• Darelle Revis, confident in his being the best cornerback in the league, refuses to this day to show up without a deal making him the highest paid player at the position.

In all these cases, the athlete is significant enough so as to merit attention. Haynesworth is considered his team’s best player, Revis is considered in the top two cornerbacks if not the best, and Favre holds every meaningful quarterback record and had his best season last year. The athletes were (or are) under the terms of contracts that exerted influence over them – Haynesworth was required to show up even if he disapproved of the situation, Favre was required to attend camp as part of the team, and Revis was still under his underwhelming rookie contract.

So what did they do? They acted in whatever way they were possible to exert their own influence over the rules that bound them. Haynesworth eventually caved, though he still resists as best he can. Favre got what he wanted, coming back at the end of training camp and immediately retaking his old starting position. Revis is still in limbo, eternally just moments from receiving his deal but just as likely to miss the entire season.

But by virtue of holding out so publicly and with such determination, these players have shifted the focus of discussions in forming a new CBA. Instead of revenue sharing between ownership and players (which has been the major separation point between the player’s union and the league’s owners), the most pertinent element of consideration going into the season is the nature of guaranteed money in player contracts. They have fundamentally transformed the face of the debate.

So as Beck speaks in DC and Revis sits in New York, remember that they’re not that different. One is a polarizing speaker and political figure, one is a millionaire athlete. But both are players in the high-stakes game that has become modern life.

Piranha 3D: Technically a Movie

Alright, resolved the technical issues and we’re on. Today’s post was supposed to be about grandiose expression of complicated topics. Instead, I happened to see this collection of images sequenced in its sense of order.

America, I think this movie has resolved an issue for me. I admittedly have been confused as to why America has been vilified in so many forms on the global stage. The stereotype of the dumb American has persisted for as long as I have been alive, predated most of the people alive to date, and will survive long after the planet has crashed into the sun and the term “alive” is purely theoretical.  It didn’t make sense to me, but now it does. I know now that the world hates America for tangible reasons. We seek to deny Muslims the ability to affirm their faith, but will undoubtedly give millions of dollars to a film that a just and loving God would preemptively smite.

Well, perhaps I should temper my criticism slightly. This is, after all, one of a handful of movies that I would diagnose with mental illness. Only a person afflicted with Tourette syndrome would manifest the sort of vision found in the movie. Every five minutes, in the midst of a (forgettable) storyline involving (forgettable) characters in (forgettable) relationships, the camera tics.

Suddenly, tits! Or water! Or death scene! And no, there is no effort to justify the meaning.

There is a five-minute nude underwater ballet. A nude. Underwater. Ballet. Five minutes. The swimmers don’t need a breath for the whole dance, miraculously. This happens without a lead-in, without a lead-out… nothing.

A random guy awkwardly cliff-dives into the lake, predictably getting eaten afterward. The sole reason he existed, apparently, was to further support the notion that piranhas exist. As if we somehow forgot. This scene is additionally remarkable because of what happens as he is eaten. Not only does his blood burst forth from the water as if propelled in a fountain (his blood pressure is equivalent to a pneumatic pump, I assume), but the plume of blood is distinctly several feet away from his body.

Now, reviews and previews alike have sought to emphasize that this is all in fun, that it is a summer movie, and it shouldn’t be taken seriously. Fine, fine. Let Christopher Lloyd… Christopher Lloyd all over his cameo. Let Richard Dreyfuss pop in just to reference Jaws. Good for you. But it isn’t really funny. It’s enjoyable in the same way a turtle flailing around on its back might be enjoyable. Watching this movie felt like watching a ten minute Youtube video about a kitten playing with a string – there are about thirty seconds of prime shot, and the rest is tedious. The difference is, you don’t pay $15 to watch the kitten, and you don’t feel obligated to sit there the whole ten minutes.

And Alex Aja, the “mastermind” behind the project, wanted to make an ode to Evil Dead-style movies while setting blood-use records. I think he misunderstood what made Evil Dead successful. It wasn’t the blood, it wasn’t the cheesy dialogue, it wasn’t even the campy effects. It worked because it had a strong focal character in Ash, portrayed wonderfully by Bruce Campbell, who was charismatic and caught our attention. Just because you point a camera at a person doesn’t mean they’ll make us want to watch them. The movie is full of stereotypes and flat characteristics, all parading as people.

It’s as effective as the 3D, in that it makes everything in the movie appear superimposed. Honestly, the movie was tailored to fit in 3D sight gags, and they can’t even get that right. The love interest throws up, and it falls on the camera. Haaaaa…. but later, when the party boys spill beer to do a similar effect, the beer animation looks exactly the same as the vomit.

It’s not the worst thing ever put to film. If nothing else, there are piranhas and 3D. It delivered everything it promised.