Wednesday, July 24, 2024

"Taken."

I don't love this one, because it ran afoul of my staging: Longshot's unconscious ass was on the farthest edge of stage left. (From the point of view of someone facing out at us!) Without breaking up the set, I spent a lot of time trying to finagle a shot from the other side of the bar shooting out; which was difficult because of the placement of the figures, focus, and that such a shot would also include most of my living room! It's something that comics could do easily, but in movies I believe it would be considered breaking the 180˚ Rule. (Stephen King mentions breaking the rule when he was directing Maximum Overdrive, out of ignorance; that's an interesting read there.) Long story short, I ran out of interesting angles or shots for Satana and Dazzler to talk over Longshot.

I wanted to get at the idea that Longshot might be as guilty of toxic masculinity as most superguys; that he decided to forget his wife and kid, under the notion that he'd be better able to protect them. I think this is technically accurate: Longshot leaping into action to protect strangers, would be a noble act, and his luck powers would kick in. Protecting his family, however, would somehow be considered a selfish act, and his luck would not only not work, it may backfire completely. This may make Longshot a more tragic character, or more of a dumbass. Or both? 

In the words of the great Evan Dorkin, "Don't drink Zima! It zucks! And it's made by Coors!" That said, I'm positive I've had it at least once; but I think I drank wine coolers for a ridiculous amount of time, so as usual, my taste is questionable.

4 comments:

Mr. Morbid said...

Considering the inherent limitations you were & are regularly faced with, honestly, you did as well as anyone else in your position. I’m sure I definitely would’ve struggled as well with the positioning of Longshot. But that’s the price of playing.

I can definitely see Longshot intentionally erasing his memories to protect his family. But then he probably didn’t think ahead far enough to save those memories on a device for future storage in case he wanted them back. I mean, once that stuff’s gone, it’s gone.

So if he can’t use his powers to protect his family (how is that considered selfish btw) then he’s certainly of no use on a team either. This basically means he’s only useful for helping strangers, meaning he can’t afford to have friends or and develop attachments to people if he wants to remain effective. In that sense, he REALLY is a tragic figure.

H said...

Okay, more questions than answers here- why did Dazzler come if she didn’t even do anything, what happened to Cable and Bishop, and who’s the mysterious music player? Only one I can think of for the last one is Mojo, and (after some googling to find out the song) I don’t think that’s his kind of music.

H said...

Ok- upon further thought it might be the name of the song that’s the hint and not who’s playing the song. That would fit with what’s come before more.

Side note- you have some eclectic music tastes, goo.

googum said...

Dazzler cared enough to come see him, just not enough to talk to him. Or maybe just didn't want to get sucked back in. Cable and Bishop bailed, as I suspect they often do: I suspect they let everyone think they've gone back to the future or whatever, but have a secret crash pad somewhere. Oh, excuse me, "safe house."