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For decades, and possibly centuries, there has been a myth that Eastern swords were superior to European swords. That Eastern swordsmen were light years ahead of their European brethren in the ability to use their weapons, despite the fact that swordsmanship training in Europe started at the age of seven. Meaning no disrespect to Eastern swordsman, they weren't the only ones who knew how to fight and had good steel to use.
Enter Reclaiming the Blade:The History of the Sword. It covers the history and traditions of European swords and swordsmanship.It also covers the struggle to rediscover what was taught by our (well, some of us anyway) ancestors. Oriental Martial Arts are of course well known and well thought of. There are two reasons for that:
1.) They're effective. If you don't believe me, step into the ring with a kickboxer. When you wake up a couple of days later, call me and tell me how you're feeling. But it's not just with empty handed techniques. The art of Kendo, or the katana, AKA the samurai sword is still well remembered, even it if is not currently taught as it was classically per the practitioner, whose name I didn't write down.
2.) They survived. Especially in the case of Kendo, it seems that Eastern Martial Arts were tied even more closely to their culture than those of the west. This was particularly true in Japan, where guns were outlawed for centuries. Why? Because the thought of some unwashed peasant being able to kill a samurai was unthinkable. A commoner with a gun had too much power over his samurai masters. As a result, the sword remained the most popular weapon in Japan until the late 1800s.
This didn't happen in Europe. In Europe, there were external enemies to fight and, although no nobleman want to think about their own peasants shooting them, the thought of a peasant putting a hole in an opposing noble was welcome to them. English archers had already earned a reputation for piercing armor with their arrows. Guns were just a continuation of the same tradition.
And now that the goofy host is going to step down off of his soapbox:
Reclaiming the Blade is well written. Don't make the mistake of telling any of my college professors I said that. It's not "scholarly" or "peer-reviewed." The fact that there are actual primary sources pictured on screen and the techniques demonstrated by actual people seconds later would not matter as much as the fact that there hadn't been 5456465655465465 other scholars who had nodded sagely and given their approval. Then again, what do I know? I've only got a bachelors degree.
The thing is that Reclaiming the Blade is also very entertaining. Part of this is the cast. Jonathan Rhys-Davies narrates. Half the cast of the Lord of the Rings trilogy is featured . Blademaster Bob Anderson is featured, and he's the guy that taught everyone form Errol Flynn to Johnnie Depp how to fight with swords on stage. I'll be honest. The Errol Flynn thing blew my mind. Those are some old movies. I'd have thought that anyone who worked with Mr. Flynn would be retired at best by now...
But I digress.
Actually, I kind of don't digress. All of those guys are my justification for discussing a historical documentary on a Spec Fic blog.
But anyway...
The best part of the thing, at least to me, is the part with all of the people I hadn't heard of. The movie goes into the work being done by members of both the Association for Renaissance Martial Arts (ARMA) and the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA). I really enjoyed this part and for a very simple reason:
It's real. It's really real. These two groups (and probably some others like them) are working with the remaining written records (there are still period manuals of arms in existence. Some have been copied and the copies distributed.) to restore what has gone before. This is important historical work. I makes me very happy to know that someone is doing it. Maybe someday I'll get the chance to help out. I'm guessing it won't be anytime soon though.
Something they mention that I hadn't realized is that movies typically mix Martial Arts styles on screen. So a sword battle might feature the same combatant using techniques that were originally developed in Italy at one point, in England at another point, and in China at some other time. The people in the film feel that the audience of a film would enjoy it more if the fencing techniques used in movies were kept correct to one style. I'm going to disagree with that for one simple reason: If I don't know the difference, I'm guessing most of the rest of the audience doesn't either. What they don't know might hurt them, but it's not going to effect their enjoyment one way or another.
And that, to me, is the point of the whole documentary. It's all about trying to find something that has been lost and educate the general public about it. The cool thing is that, despite the educational aspect, this is a really fun thing to watch. It killed a couple of hours when I felt like absolute crap and kept me enthralled enough that I stopped worrying about my belly aching and got into the story of something fascinating. I hate it when I feel like that and I needed something like Reclaiming the Blade to help me through it.
The only bad part about this movie is that it's only available on Amazon Prime. Don't get me wrong. I love Prime, but if you don't have Prime you can't watch it. That makes me a little bitter since something like this should be on like DVD or something so that it can be shown to high school level history students, at least in my opinion. It may be Hollywood history, but it comes closer to being right than anything else I've seen from the movie industry.
Bottom Line: 4.75 out of 5 Bladed Weapons
Some movies that were sampled for Reclaiming the Blade are available at the following links. If you use my links, I get a small percentage of the sale at no extra cost to you.
Saturday, November 30, 2019
Wednesday, November 27, 2019
Umm... Wow
I find myself a bit unhappy about a bookseller I've been buying from ever since they first came to Michigan back in the Late Pleistocene or some junk. It appears that Barnes and Noble has laid off all of the freelance writers that work on their blogs. I'm a bit unhappy here since I am, personally, a freelance book blogger.
Now listen: I don't write for Barnes and Noble. I never have.The economic cost of this to me personally is going to be zero dollars and zero cents over the next infinity years. That's not what this is about. I mean, I know other people got paid to write for them. I don't know how much they made or how this is going to effect their bottom line. I wish them well and I hope they do well in their post Barnes and Noble career, but that's not what this is about, either.
No, this is a post about something that I'm a big believer in. This is a post about the voice of the fans. Yes, I'm a fan. Yes, I have a voice and I express it right here on this website. Thank you Blogspot for the opportunity. I'll admit that right off rip. The fact remains that if you think I have as big a voice on Jimbo's as I would have on Barnes and Noble, you're fooling yourself. And yes, I said yourself because you're not fooling me. I know better.
I have had authors (David Guenther comes to mind.) contact me after I've published a review and tell me that they experienced a sales bump. I'm pretty proud of that, because I've reviewed some really awesome authors and I've helped some fans get the SF/F fix. That's what I'm all about. But a site like bn.com gets millions of hits a day and that I can't compete with. I hope I'm not disillusioning anyone by saying that.
I don't read Barnes and Noble blogs as much as I probably should given the fact that I have a blog myself, but I have read them in the past and they're uniformly well written and informative. There are times when I may not agree with some of the opinions of the person who wrote the piece, but so what? If I find myself disagreeing, I'm more than capable of firing off a response right here at Jimbo's. I do feel bad that they've lost their jobs though, and here's something else to consider:
The last line or so of the piece states that, " The company will continue to have blogs, but “they will be blogs that express opinions of booksellers.”" I respect that. Booksellers have a right to voice their opinions too. I have no problem with them having a blog or nine million putting out what they want us to hear. (And make no mistake about it, whatever your affiliation, if someone is putting out content they're telling you what they think you should know. Yes, that includes li'l ol' me.) So you know what, whether it's Barnes and Noble as an institution or individual publishers or authors giving their point of view (and all of the above sell books) I think that's awesome. Seriously. Do your thing. Market your product. Let us know what we should buy and why we should buy it. I'm good with that.
Now, before I make my next point, I want to be careful. I'm friend with some publishers and authors on Facebook. Some of them I consider to be just as much friends as the people I see and talk to in real life. I have a lot of respect for both the art and craft of both publishing and writing and I want to make that clear. What I'm about to say should be common sense on one hand and on the other hand, it's easy to misinterpret. So straight up guys, you get much love from Jimbo.
But...
I'm not really all that interested in what a publisher thinks when I'm deciding whether or not to buy a book. Authors, I love you, but I know you're not going to call your own baby ugly. I'm not stupid. Seriously. When I'm considering trying a new author (and I don't really need a blog to tell me I should read a book written by an author I'm already a fan of) I want to hear another fan's opinion. Why? Because they'll tell me what they really think. A bookselling company, or a publisher, or an author is going to tell me to buy their book. It's natural. They're trying to promote their product.
*SIGH*
Yes I see you with your hand raised in the back of the class. What's up? Yes, I do get free copies of books so that I will review them. Yup, that sure is a form of marketing. Here's the difference:
I'm going to give you my personal opinion. I'm not going to sugar coat a book that sucks. I'm not going to hold back on a book that kicks ass either. I'll give you the straight goods and I'm proud to do so.
So, while Barnes and Noble Certainly does have the right to make this move, it's going to cost them some trust I think. I know I won't trust their content as much as I used to. I would think that most thinking people won't either.
Ultimately though, who you trust is your decision to make and not mine. As my father would say though, "When evaluating information, always consider the source." When the source of your information is someone who wants to sell you something, remember that. They're not giving you an unvarnished opinion. They're pushing you to give them your money.
I'm not hating. I've worked in sales and it's a tough job. Monthly goals, high pressure and long days were the result of having to get people to buy things so that I could make my living. I'm just urging you that, before your take what you read on Barnes and Noble seriously, you seek a separate opinion. Find someone who has read what you were thinking about buying and see what they think.
Oh, and click one of the links below and go buy stuff so that I can get paid. (See what I did there?):
Now listen: I don't write for Barnes and Noble. I never have.The economic cost of this to me personally is going to be zero dollars and zero cents over the next infinity years. That's not what this is about. I mean, I know other people got paid to write for them. I don't know how much they made or how this is going to effect their bottom line. I wish them well and I hope they do well in their post Barnes and Noble career, but that's not what this is about, either.
No, this is a post about something that I'm a big believer in. This is a post about the voice of the fans. Yes, I'm a fan. Yes, I have a voice and I express it right here on this website. Thank you Blogspot for the opportunity. I'll admit that right off rip. The fact remains that if you think I have as big a voice on Jimbo's as I would have on Barnes and Noble, you're fooling yourself. And yes, I said yourself because you're not fooling me. I know better.
I have had authors (David Guenther comes to mind.) contact me after I've published a review and tell me that they experienced a sales bump. I'm pretty proud of that, because I've reviewed some really awesome authors and I've helped some fans get the SF/F fix. That's what I'm all about. But a site like bn.com gets millions of hits a day and that I can't compete with. I hope I'm not disillusioning anyone by saying that.
I don't read Barnes and Noble blogs as much as I probably should given the fact that I have a blog myself, but I have read them in the past and they're uniformly well written and informative. There are times when I may not agree with some of the opinions of the person who wrote the piece, but so what? If I find myself disagreeing, I'm more than capable of firing off a response right here at Jimbo's. I do feel bad that they've lost their jobs though, and here's something else to consider:
The last line or so of the piece states that, " The company will continue to have blogs, but “they will be blogs that express opinions of booksellers.”" I respect that. Booksellers have a right to voice their opinions too. I have no problem with them having a blog or nine million putting out what they want us to hear. (And make no mistake about it, whatever your affiliation, if someone is putting out content they're telling you what they think you should know. Yes, that includes li'l ol' me.) So you know what, whether it's Barnes and Noble as an institution or individual publishers or authors giving their point of view (and all of the above sell books) I think that's awesome. Seriously. Do your thing. Market your product. Let us know what we should buy and why we should buy it. I'm good with that.
Now, before I make my next point, I want to be careful. I'm friend with some publishers and authors on Facebook. Some of them I consider to be just as much friends as the people I see and talk to in real life. I have a lot of respect for both the art and craft of both publishing and writing and I want to make that clear. What I'm about to say should be common sense on one hand and on the other hand, it's easy to misinterpret. So straight up guys, you get much love from Jimbo.
But...
I'm not really all that interested in what a publisher thinks when I'm deciding whether or not to buy a book. Authors, I love you, but I know you're not going to call your own baby ugly. I'm not stupid. Seriously. When I'm considering trying a new author (and I don't really need a blog to tell me I should read a book written by an author I'm already a fan of) I want to hear another fan's opinion. Why? Because they'll tell me what they really think. A bookselling company, or a publisher, or an author is going to tell me to buy their book. It's natural. They're trying to promote their product.
*SIGH*
Yes I see you with your hand raised in the back of the class. What's up? Yes, I do get free copies of books so that I will review them. Yup, that sure is a form of marketing. Here's the difference:
I'm going to give you my personal opinion. I'm not going to sugar coat a book that sucks. I'm not going to hold back on a book that kicks ass either. I'll give you the straight goods and I'm proud to do so.
So, while Barnes and Noble Certainly does have the right to make this move, it's going to cost them some trust I think. I know I won't trust their content as much as I used to. I would think that most thinking people won't either.
Ultimately though, who you trust is your decision to make and not mine. As my father would say though, "When evaluating information, always consider the source." When the source of your information is someone who wants to sell you something, remember that. They're not giving you an unvarnished opinion. They're pushing you to give them your money.
I'm not hating. I've worked in sales and it's a tough job. Monthly goals, high pressure and long days were the result of having to get people to buy things so that I could make my living. I'm just urging you that, before your take what you read on Barnes and Noble seriously, you seek a separate opinion. Find someone who has read what you were thinking about buying and see what they think.
Oh, and click one of the links below and go buy stuff so that I can get paid. (See what I did there?):
Tuesday, November 26, 2019
What I'm Thankful for As a Fan of SF/F
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It's Thanksgiving week here in the States. I just heard a sermon about being thankful at church on Sunday. So, in the vein of sharing an attitude of gratitude, I thought I'd share my thoughts about what is going right in Speculative Fiction with all of you. I'm actually thankful that the list is such a long one.
1.) I'm thankful for publishers like Baen Books, Chris Kennedy Publishing, Silver Empire and Superversive Press.
Why? Because Science Fiction does not, and never should, belong to the wokescolds. All of the above publishers put a good story before political correctness. I love the fact that I can pick up a book and be confident that I'll be reading something entertaining. Seriously. Pick up a copy of any of the Four Horseman Novels, or any Declan Finn series (he's on Silver Empire). Do it. Then pick up a copy of another one of the same series. You'll be smiling, because you'll know that something good is on the way.
2.) I'm thankful for indie publishing.
Independent publishing provides an outlet for a lot of works that wouldn't get out any other way. Not all of it's good, but a lot of it is. You can read about the good stuff here at Jimbo's. I love promoting the little guy, and I'm thankful that I'm able to do it. Read reviews first, but if you haven't tried an indie author do so. I know a few and they're all good people as well as being good authors. We've all seen the meme about supporting small businesses right? Well, supporting an indie author helps them a lot more than being the 445465465464654646464645546th person to buy a Steven King novel. I kid you not.
3.) I'm thankful that Science Fiction and Fantasy still matter.
I've been hearing for decades that Science Fiction was dead. I've heard claims that we're already in a Science Fiction future so there's no need to write about it anymore. I may have even read a Facebook post written by a published SF author complaining about how reality was making his job harder. I chuckled about it but it would appear to be true. However, until one of my grandchildren inhabits a distant star system, I'm going with the belief that we're not there yet.
4.) I'm thankful that geekery has reached such unbelievable heights of popularity.
Seriously. Marvel made twenty-two movies and they all rocked. DC has some unbelievably awesome TV shows. You can watch people play Dungeons and Dragons (and dammit, Blogger, I want my ampersand to work!) on Youtube. There are conventions all over the place. Seriously. When I was a kid (yes, they had kids then) Star Trek conventions were a new thing. There was no such thing as DragonCon. I remember a commercial coming on about a local ST con and my dad and I looking each other in the face and getting all excited because we had never heard of any such thing. It's not like that anymore and it stopped being just Star Trek a Loooooooong time ago. Speaking of which...
5.) I'm thankful for the passion of the fans.
Not only does the fact that people care about Spec Fic fuel the readership of blogs just like mine, but it makes it fun, too. I even enjoy being told that I'm crazy for promoting the new Star Wars movies. I mean, I'm probably the only person on the planet that enjoyed TLJ but whatever. I love the fact that fans will argue and debate things about the series. I find it a bit perplexing that people my age and older expect the new movies to feel the same way the old ones did when we were six, but that's on them. Keep caring folks. KEEP TREK vs. WARS ALIVE!!!!! (For the record, I'm a fence sitter, but don't tell my oldest that because she is Wars from now till the cows come home.) Oh, and that reminds me:
6.) I'm thankful for Fan Orgs like The Royal Manticoran Navy and The Mercenary Guild.
Feel free to holler out your org in the comments if you belong to something else, but those are mine. There is nothing better than sitting around with someone else who loves what you love and talking about it. There is nothing better than the feeling of camaraderie that is built with friends over drinks and debating the actions of your favorite characters. Seriously. Being in a Fan Org is an open excuse to have a mini-con that doesn't charge admission any time you can get your crew together. If you're a member of an org, find an excuse to have a gathering today. I'll be there in spirit if not in the flesh.
7.) I'm thankful for my gaming group.
Ok, so this one is a bit more specific to me than the others but hey, it's my blog. Not only do we get together once a week to do nothing but roll dice and eat snacks, but my oldest daughter is now a member. I get to spend more time with her now than I have since I divorced her mother and we both enjoy it. When she was younger, she used to complain about going to Daddy's house because it was boring. Now she asks what new spell she should pick because she just leveled up. Thank you geek culture!
8.) I'm thankful that there is still so much to come.
Seriously all. Think about it. Marvel is preparing a new round of movies. There is a new Star Wars due out in a few weeks (and who's coming with me to see it, BTW?). There is talk of another Star Trek movie in the Abramsverse. Streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime are producing new content all the time. The large publishing houses are losing their death grip on the industry and we're sure to see an upsurge in what we love from smaller presses because those presses have leadership that doesn't come from the wokescold land of academia. It's not over folks. It's just getting started. As Steve Miller once said, "Time keeps on slipping into the future."
Some products that were mentioned above are available at the links below. If you use my links, I get a small percentage of the purchase at no extra cost to you.
It's Thanksgiving week here in the States. I just heard a sermon about being thankful at church on Sunday. So, in the vein of sharing an attitude of gratitude, I thought I'd share my thoughts about what is going right in Speculative Fiction with all of you. I'm actually thankful that the list is such a long one.
1.) I'm thankful for publishers like Baen Books, Chris Kennedy Publishing, Silver Empire and Superversive Press.
Why? Because Science Fiction does not, and never should, belong to the wokescolds. All of the above publishers put a good story before political correctness. I love the fact that I can pick up a book and be confident that I'll be reading something entertaining. Seriously. Pick up a copy of any of the Four Horseman Novels, or any Declan Finn series (he's on Silver Empire). Do it. Then pick up a copy of another one of the same series. You'll be smiling, because you'll know that something good is on the way.
2.) I'm thankful for indie publishing.
Independent publishing provides an outlet for a lot of works that wouldn't get out any other way. Not all of it's good, but a lot of it is. You can read about the good stuff here at Jimbo's. I love promoting the little guy, and I'm thankful that I'm able to do it. Read reviews first, but if you haven't tried an indie author do so. I know a few and they're all good people as well as being good authors. We've all seen the meme about supporting small businesses right? Well, supporting an indie author helps them a lot more than being the 445465465464654646464645546th person to buy a Steven King novel. I kid you not.
3.) I'm thankful that Science Fiction and Fantasy still matter.
I've been hearing for decades that Science Fiction was dead. I've heard claims that we're already in a Science Fiction future so there's no need to write about it anymore. I may have even read a Facebook post written by a published SF author complaining about how reality was making his job harder. I chuckled about it but it would appear to be true. However, until one of my grandchildren inhabits a distant star system, I'm going with the belief that we're not there yet.
4.) I'm thankful that geekery has reached such unbelievable heights of popularity.
Seriously. Marvel made twenty-two movies and they all rocked. DC has some unbelievably awesome TV shows. You can watch people play Dungeons and Dragons (and dammit, Blogger, I want my ampersand to work!) on Youtube. There are conventions all over the place. Seriously. When I was a kid (yes, they had kids then) Star Trek conventions were a new thing. There was no such thing as DragonCon. I remember a commercial coming on about a local ST con and my dad and I looking each other in the face and getting all excited because we had never heard of any such thing. It's not like that anymore and it stopped being just Star Trek a Loooooooong time ago. Speaking of which...
5.) I'm thankful for the passion of the fans.
Not only does the fact that people care about Spec Fic fuel the readership of blogs just like mine, but it makes it fun, too. I even enjoy being told that I'm crazy for promoting the new Star Wars movies. I mean, I'm probably the only person on the planet that enjoyed TLJ but whatever. I love the fact that fans will argue and debate things about the series. I find it a bit perplexing that people my age and older expect the new movies to feel the same way the old ones did when we were six, but that's on them. Keep caring folks. KEEP TREK vs. WARS ALIVE!!!!! (For the record, I'm a fence sitter, but don't tell my oldest that because she is Wars from now till the cows come home.) Oh, and that reminds me:
6.) I'm thankful for Fan Orgs like The Royal Manticoran Navy and The Mercenary Guild.
Feel free to holler out your org in the comments if you belong to something else, but those are mine. There is nothing better than sitting around with someone else who loves what you love and talking about it. There is nothing better than the feeling of camaraderie that is built with friends over drinks and debating the actions of your favorite characters. Seriously. Being in a Fan Org is an open excuse to have a mini-con that doesn't charge admission any time you can get your crew together. If you're a member of an org, find an excuse to have a gathering today. I'll be there in spirit if not in the flesh.
7.) I'm thankful for my gaming group.
Ok, so this one is a bit more specific to me than the others but hey, it's my blog. Not only do we get together once a week to do nothing but roll dice and eat snacks, but my oldest daughter is now a member. I get to spend more time with her now than I have since I divorced her mother and we both enjoy it. When she was younger, she used to complain about going to Daddy's house because it was boring. Now she asks what new spell she should pick because she just leveled up. Thank you geek culture!
8.) I'm thankful that there is still so much to come.
Seriously all. Think about it. Marvel is preparing a new round of movies. There is a new Star Wars due out in a few weeks (and who's coming with me to see it, BTW?). There is talk of another Star Trek movie in the Abramsverse. Streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime are producing new content all the time. The large publishing houses are losing their death grip on the industry and we're sure to see an upsurge in what we love from smaller presses because those presses have leadership that doesn't come from the wokescold land of academia. It's not over folks. It's just getting started. As Steve Miller once said, "Time keeps on slipping into the future."
Some products that were mentioned above are available at the links below. If you use my links, I get a small percentage of the purchase at no extra cost to you.
Saturday, November 23, 2019
Elizabeth Banks is Wrong
First off, go to this link and read the article.
I'll wait.
Ok, now before I start my rant, I want to make to things absolutely clear:
1.) If a filmmaker, whether large, small or somewhere in between, wants to make an action flick with one or more female leads, their right to do is absolute. If it's their money and their movie it's their choice. I will stand by that statement always. If, by my life or death, I can further the cause of free speech by movie makers, I will do so. I mean that.
This is Ripley. She was the lead of the 1979 movie Alien. She is very obviously female. To this day, Sigourney Weaver's most famous role is Ripley. Now it is true that Alien later spawned a franchise. There have been multiple movies, novels, comics, board games and video games that I'm aware of. But that came later after men and women alike supported it in a major way.
Alien was most definitely an action movie. It features guns, aliens and a nonstop plot. So yeah, this one had male support.
Oh and by the way...
This is Sarah Connor. Astute fans will recognize her from the Terminator franchise where she is the lead of just about everything they've ever done. (Except for Alien vs. Predator which doesn't count because it sucks.) The film has since turned into a franchise, but it was not part of any other universe for decades. It was (and remains) wildly popular among dudes, not the least reason for which is that Linda Hamilton is a spectacularly attractive woman.
Terminator is another franchise, with not only multiple movies, but also books, comics, a TV series, toys and only God knows what else. Toy collectors, in particular, are overwhelmingly male. So how did that happen? It happened because men support this female led action series. They love it. I'll be honest in stating that I came to the Terminator franchise late (my parents wouldn't let me watch them when they first came out because I was a wee little Jimbo, and I always start from the beginning) but that's my bad, because The Terminator is an awesome franchise.
I hear you working. Someone out there is thinking:
"But... but... Jimbo, maybe it's just an SF thing? I mean seriously, those are both Science Fiction franchises and arguably so are the superhero movies."
Given what I've written so far, that would be a valid point...
Except that this is Beatrix Kiddo of Kill Bill fame. There's no Science Fiction here. This is just a straight up ass-kicking delivered by a badass, pissed off female. And look, she has every right to be upset. I mean, they tried to kill her. I'd want some payback, too.
Kill Bill has at least one sequel with rumors of another on the way. There is Kill Bill line of merchandising. I didn't see this one when it first came out because it's not SF/F and was ordered to do so by my cousin Ron. He was right. Don't tell him I said that. At any rate, men have supported this franchise since it came out and any rumor I've heard about a third movie (hmm... remember that thought) has been on a comic book related website. Men love this movie because men love badass women. Oh, and by the way...
This is (from left to right) Alex, Natalie and Dylan. They are the crew from the 2000 movie Charlie's Angels. Of course, there was also the TV show that the movies were based off of. Both did very well. Both had and audience that was primarily male. The TV show spawned a movie franchise.
Now I want to be careful here. Elizabeth Banks was quoted in the article as stating that it's okay for Charlie's Angels to have a remake given the amount of times Spider Man has and, on that point, she's right. My only quibble would be that she could have added Super Man, Batman, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica... I could go on. I don't have a problem that this is a remake.
My point is that men supported the previous iterations of the same franchise to the point where the previous movie spawned a sequel: Charlie's Angels Full Throttle.
"So," I hear you thinking, "What is the difference this time, Jimbo? Why did this Charlie's Angels fail where the others succeeded?"
In my opinion, there are two reasons for that.
1.) Lack of marketing.
Look, I'm one guy and that's really too small of a sample to produce any conclusions, but I will say this:
I'm plugged into everything. I watch SF/F sites. I watch nostalgia sites. I follow movie trailer sites. I am everywhere and I have shared trailers that I was excited about in the past, right here on Jimbo's. I found out that Charlie's Angels was coming the day it was released. Seriously. I was researching movie times for Midway and Charlie's Angels came up when I pulled I checked my local theater. Seriously. Maybe I'm wrong and I just somehow missed it, but I'm guessing part of the fizzle was the fact that no one knew that it was coming.
2.) People like Elizabeth Banks.
Yes, I mean that literally. I'm too young to remember when Alien came out. I was born in 76 and it came out in 79. I mean, I had been born but I was far too involved with issues like potty-training and thumb-sucking to watch any movie, really.
I do, however, remember the release of The Terminator in 1984. Yes, it had a female lead. When people talked about it though, they didn't talk about "Oh, look, the lead character has a vagina." They talked about how good the movie was. The only person I knew who cared about Beatrix Kiddo being female was me, and that was because I have a major thing for Uma Thurman. Being a heterosexual male, that never would have occurred with a man.
The thing is that times have changed, and not for the better. It used to be that when you went to see an action flick you went to see an action flick. If the star of the movie was female, then that was really kind of irrelevant as long as it was a good movie. Fans went to theaters and bought pops and popcorn. They watched the movie and they told all of their friends how good it was. It was a good time. That is no longer the case.
In the last few years, we've been treated to not just Charlie's Angels, but Oceans 8 and the Ghostbusters reboot. I have heard precisely nothing about the quality of Charlie's Angels. To the best of my knowledge none of my friends or family have seen it.
I heard bad things about both Oceans 8 and, especially, Ghost Busters. Listen ladies, I hate to bring this to you, but your attitude needs to change if you want female driven action movies to succeed. What you are doing is treating action flicks with female leads as homework assignments. When an action flick is no longer a form of entertainment and instead becomes something you have to see to avoid being accused of mysogyny it is no longer worth our time. Seriously. Oh, and just as an aside, Oceans 8 was part of an existing franchise and it still tanked.
If you haven't seen Alien, then do so. It's a wild ride. We spend an entire movie watching people die and rooting for Ripley to make it out alive. It's a pulse pounding, high adrenaline action flick. That's what made it worth watching.
My point here is this: If you want a female driven action flick to succeed, then here is the two-step recipe:
1.) Market the thing.
I mentioned this earlier. Even if I would love your movie, I can't go see it if I don't know it exists. I'm not blaming Elizabeth Banks for a marketing failure, because marketing wasn't her job, but the fact remains that no one knew it was coming, or at least no one I knew was talking about it.
2.) Make a good movie.
When the Ghostbusters reboot dropped, I was skeptical. The trailers all looked kind of meh. All of the online commentary I saw about the movie was about how little girls needed heroes too. None of that focused on anything about the movie other than the fact that the main characters had boobs. So I waited because it was well marketed and I knew that some of the people I knew would see it. Most of my friends online that went to see it hated it. One of my friends took his sons to see it. They all hated it. I decided to save my time and money for something that was worth my time.
So seriously, come off your pedestal. Understand that if you want our money you need to give us a good product that we know is coming. When that happens, as it has in the past, we'll support your movie. If you make crap and don't market it, that's your bad, not ours.
I'll wait.
Ok, now before I start my rant, I want to make to things absolutely clear:
1.) If a filmmaker, whether large, small or somewhere in between, wants to make an action flick with one or more female leads, their right to do is absolute. If it's their money and their movie it's their choice. I will stand by that statement always. If, by my life or death, I can further the cause of free speech by movie makers, I will do so. I mean that.
HOWEVER...
1.) Their right to make a movie does not equate with a responsibility on the part of men to see them. Seriously. What I decide to spend my time and money on is a choice that belongs to me and not Elizabeth Banks.
If you read the article as I urged you to, then you already know that she mentioned that female lead superhero movies succeeded because they were part of a broader universe. I'm not convined tgat she's right but I'm also not sure she's wrong. I'm willimg to be comvinced either way. If you have a link drop ot in the comments.
Having stated that she may be right about those movies, I won't use them in my argument. It's very rare for people who make these kinds of arguments to have the self awareness to acknowledge that there may actually be an exception. I congratulate Ms. Banks on her self awareness. It's a breath of fresh air.
But...
If you read the article as I urged you to, then you already know that she mentioned that female lead superhero movies succeeded because they were part of a broader universe. I'm not convined tgat she's right but I'm also not sure she's wrong. I'm willimg to be comvinced either way. If you have a link drop ot in the comments.
Having stated that she may be right about those movies, I won't use them in my argument. It's very rare for people who make these kinds of arguments to have the self awareness to acknowledge that there may actually be an exception. I congratulate Ms. Banks on her self awareness. It's a breath of fresh air.
But...
This is Ripley. She was the lead of the 1979 movie Alien. She is very obviously female. To this day, Sigourney Weaver's most famous role is Ripley. Now it is true that Alien later spawned a franchise. There have been multiple movies, novels, comics, board games and video games that I'm aware of. But that came later after men and women alike supported it in a major way.
Alien was most definitely an action movie. It features guns, aliens and a nonstop plot. So yeah, this one had male support.
Oh and by the way...
This is Sarah Connor. Astute fans will recognize her from the Terminator franchise where she is the lead of just about everything they've ever done. (Except for Alien vs. Predator which doesn't count because it sucks.) The film has since turned into a franchise, but it was not part of any other universe for decades. It was (and remains) wildly popular among dudes, not the least reason for which is that Linda Hamilton is a spectacularly attractive woman.
Terminator is another franchise, with not only multiple movies, but also books, comics, a TV series, toys and only God knows what else. Toy collectors, in particular, are overwhelmingly male. So how did that happen? It happened because men support this female led action series. They love it. I'll be honest in stating that I came to the Terminator franchise late (my parents wouldn't let me watch them when they first came out because I was a wee little Jimbo, and I always start from the beginning) but that's my bad, because The Terminator is an awesome franchise.
I hear you working. Someone out there is thinking:
"But... but... Jimbo, maybe it's just an SF thing? I mean seriously, those are both Science Fiction franchises and arguably so are the superhero movies."
Given what I've written so far, that would be a valid point...
Except that this is Beatrix Kiddo of Kill Bill fame. There's no Science Fiction here. This is just a straight up ass-kicking delivered by a badass, pissed off female. And look, she has every right to be upset. I mean, they tried to kill her. I'd want some payback, too.
Kill Bill has at least one sequel with rumors of another on the way. There is Kill Bill line of merchandising. I didn't see this one when it first came out because it's not SF/F and was ordered to do so by my cousin Ron. He was right. Don't tell him I said that. At any rate, men have supported this franchise since it came out and any rumor I've heard about a third movie (hmm... remember that thought) has been on a comic book related website. Men love this movie because men love badass women. Oh, and by the way...
This is (from left to right) Alex, Natalie and Dylan. They are the crew from the 2000 movie Charlie's Angels. Of course, there was also the TV show that the movies were based off of. Both did very well. Both had and audience that was primarily male. The TV show spawned a movie franchise.
Now I want to be careful here. Elizabeth Banks was quoted in the article as stating that it's okay for Charlie's Angels to have a remake given the amount of times Spider Man has and, on that point, she's right. My only quibble would be that she could have added Super Man, Batman, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica... I could go on. I don't have a problem that this is a remake.
My point is that men supported the previous iterations of the same franchise to the point where the previous movie spawned a sequel: Charlie's Angels Full Throttle.
"So," I hear you thinking, "What is the difference this time, Jimbo? Why did this Charlie's Angels fail where the others succeeded?"
In my opinion, there are two reasons for that.
1.) Lack of marketing.
Look, I'm one guy and that's really too small of a sample to produce any conclusions, but I will say this:
I'm plugged into everything. I watch SF/F sites. I watch nostalgia sites. I follow movie trailer sites. I am everywhere and I have shared trailers that I was excited about in the past, right here on Jimbo's. I found out that Charlie's Angels was coming the day it was released. Seriously. I was researching movie times for Midway and Charlie's Angels came up when I pulled I checked my local theater. Seriously. Maybe I'm wrong and I just somehow missed it, but I'm guessing part of the fizzle was the fact that no one knew that it was coming.
2.) People like Elizabeth Banks.
Yes, I mean that literally. I'm too young to remember when Alien came out. I was born in 76 and it came out in 79. I mean, I had been born but I was far too involved with issues like potty-training and thumb-sucking to watch any movie, really.
I do, however, remember the release of The Terminator in 1984. Yes, it had a female lead. When people talked about it though, they didn't talk about "Oh, look, the lead character has a vagina." They talked about how good the movie was. The only person I knew who cared about Beatrix Kiddo being female was me, and that was because I have a major thing for Uma Thurman. Being a heterosexual male, that never would have occurred with a man.
The thing is that times have changed, and not for the better. It used to be that when you went to see an action flick you went to see an action flick. If the star of the movie was female, then that was really kind of irrelevant as long as it was a good movie. Fans went to theaters and bought pops and popcorn. They watched the movie and they told all of their friends how good it was. It was a good time. That is no longer the case.
In the last few years, we've been treated to not just Charlie's Angels, but Oceans 8 and the Ghostbusters reboot. I have heard precisely nothing about the quality of Charlie's Angels. To the best of my knowledge none of my friends or family have seen it.
I heard bad things about both Oceans 8 and, especially, Ghost Busters. Listen ladies, I hate to bring this to you, but your attitude needs to change if you want female driven action movies to succeed. What you are doing is treating action flicks with female leads as homework assignments. When an action flick is no longer a form of entertainment and instead becomes something you have to see to avoid being accused of mysogyny it is no longer worth our time. Seriously. Oh, and just as an aside, Oceans 8 was part of an existing franchise and it still tanked.
If you haven't seen Alien, then do so. It's a wild ride. We spend an entire movie watching people die and rooting for Ripley to make it out alive. It's a pulse pounding, high adrenaline action flick. That's what made it worth watching.
My point here is this: If you want a female driven action flick to succeed, then here is the two-step recipe:
1.) Market the thing.
I mentioned this earlier. Even if I would love your movie, I can't go see it if I don't know it exists. I'm not blaming Elizabeth Banks for a marketing failure, because marketing wasn't her job, but the fact remains that no one knew it was coming, or at least no one I knew was talking about it.
2.) Make a good movie.
When the Ghostbusters reboot dropped, I was skeptical. The trailers all looked kind of meh. All of the online commentary I saw about the movie was about how little girls needed heroes too. None of that focused on anything about the movie other than the fact that the main characters had boobs. So I waited because it was well marketed and I knew that some of the people I knew would see it. Most of my friends online that went to see it hated it. One of my friends took his sons to see it. They all hated it. I decided to save my time and money for something that was worth my time.
So seriously, come off your pedestal. Understand that if you want our money you need to give us a good product that we know is coming. When that happens, as it has in the past, we'll support your movie. If you make crap and don't market it, that's your bad, not ours.
Some products related to the above named movies can be found below. I receive a percentage of all money spent if you use the links.
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