What's wrong with Batman?

It is natural to not notice what's wrong with Batman

because of this,




who could do this,



and who looks cool like this.




But put aside the gorgeousness of Christian Bale, the genius of Christopher Nolan, the talent of Ann Hathaway and while you're at it - un-suspend your imagination and what do you see?

A man pretending to be a bat so he is dressed like one;



Also, if Batman was in his right mind, he would have worn his briefs first and then slip into his skin-tight pants after - not the other way around.



"Generally, the explanations that are given for the motivation of these characters is pretty flimsy. People I'm sure have had their parents killed in front of their eyes. I think that would probably lead to a life in analysis and probably all sorts of personal problems. It probably won't lead to you becoming a bat-themed vigilante." - Alan Moore




But why do we lap Batman up? Why are we willing to suspend our logic and common sense?

Is it because we want to be entertained?

Is it because we `get' him?

So who would readstories of an impotent society desparated for a faceless (and therefore dehumanized) avenger? People who are themselves frustrated, and and angry and who perceive their anger against their parents, school, job..as righteous rage. The worldview presented in the stories is usually simple and uncomplicated, with the hero as simultaneously the stand-in and avenger of a wounded society that in some metaphorical way reflects the reader’s worldview. They’re hurt by or afraid of forces smarter and more powerful than them, so they want to lash out. Both the hero and the villain share this outlook, but from opposites sides of course. And it’s important to note that the reader sympathizes with both the villain and the hero. (The villain is the hero of his own story, after all.)

This kind of story is literally thousands of years old. Achilles, the strong invincible superhero of Greece, directed his rage just as much at the leader of the Greek forces, Agamemnon, as at the Trojans. And his rebelliousness is very much a part of the subtext of the story. In Achilles’s eyes, Agamemnon was too weak, too dissembling. Too quick to hedge his bets and to hold back. Achilles is the first superhero. DC and Marvel have slaughter forests and made fortunes from retelling his story over and over again.

Sing to me, O goddess, of the rage of Batman, Son of Gotham…

The problem that the superhero genre has is that it didn’t model itself after the rest of the Iliad. Achilles is an asshole. For all his talk and bravado, he didn’t win the Trojan War. What won the war was the Trojan Horse, a scheme concocted by a secondary character, the rather put-upon mortal named Odysseus. Where Achilles is an unrealistic character that reflects the unrealistic way in which youth views itself, Odysseus is a very realistic representation of a middle-aged man. He’s burdened by all the responsibilities he has left unattended back home. Odysseus, “the man of many twists and turns,” is like all reasonably mature middle-aged men, fed up with the all the high and mighty bullshit. He just wants to go home and play with his dog.

There is no DC or Marvel superhero franchise patterned off of Odysseus.

That a genre originally targeted at teenage boys would approach storytelling in this hyper-masculinized, hyper-sexualized way is not at all surprising. This is how many adolescents see the world. What is surprising is that the people who buy comics aren’t teenage boys anymore, they are men in their late twenties and thirties. For them, the comic book is an escape from that which frustrates them in the real world. - PastaBagel from Partial Objects




And then this happens:

"The suspected gunman at a Colorado showing of the latest Batman movie had painted his hair red and called himself the Joker, one of the villains populating the comic book world of Gotham."




It's not solely Batman's fault though. There are tons of Batman-fanatics who do not go out and shoot people.

But Batman is a convenient excuse for our mental dis-ease.

He's right up there cathartically fulfilling what we could only wish for in our dysfunctional hearts.

Batman doesn't need us. We need Batman.

What's wrong with that?

The Stalker Song

Did anyone ask God if he/she/it wants to be followed?

Would you want to be followed wherever you may go?

Nothing could keep your follower away? Not even a restraining order?

I dont know about you, but that is just creepy.



I will follow Him
Follow Him wherever He may go,
And near Him, I always will be
For nothing can keep me away,
He is my destiny.

I will follow Him,
Ever since He touched my heart I knew,
There isn't an ocean too deep,
A mountain so high it can keep,
Keep me away, away from His love.

I love Him, I love Him, I love Him,
And where He goes,
I'll follow, I'll follow, I'll follow.
he'll always be my true love, my true love, my true love
from now until forever, forever, forever

I will follow Him,
Follow Him wherever He may go,
There isn't an ocean too deep,
A mountain so high it can keep,
Keep me away, away from His love...

We will follow Him,
Follow Him wherever He may go,
There isn't an ocean too deep,
A mountain so high it can keep,
Keep us away, away from His love...

I love Him
(Oh yes I love Him)
I'll follow
(I'm gonna follow)
True love
(He'll always be my true, true love)
Forever
(Now until forever)
I love Him, I love Him, I love Him,
And where He goes,
I'll follow, I'll follow, I'll follow,
He'll always be my true love,
My true love, my true love,
From now until forever,
Forever, forever...

There isn't an ocean too deep,
A mountain so high it can keep,
Keep me away, away from His love

Are we rude or are white people lame?

aka

Are we insensitive or do white people feel entitled?

aka

Are we humble or are white people too proud?

aka

Are we comfortably mature or are white people whiny and childish?


There were three incidents which made me ask these.

1st: We were lined up in front of Landmark Makati's grocery side waiting for a taxi along with a slew of other families and people. My mother, nephew and I were patiently in line. Other people were not but members of their family were lined up for them. Those people who were not in line were waiting at the sides whilst guarding the bags of groceries they purchased. The line was moving slow. In front of us were two white males animatedly talking to each other. My mother and I were all paying attention to how slow the line moved due to the scarcity of available taxis when a cab finally did arrive. Us who were in the middle of the line watched hungrily as a man who was in front of the line opened the cab door and called his family who was waiting outside the line to enter the vehicle. To which one of the two white males loudly protested at this perceived injustice and literally pointed his fingers at the family members hauling their grocery bags towards the cab.

"They're not in line!" First white male said.

"They're not in line!" He repeated.

The second white male sensibly responded, "I think they're together."

"They're not in line, we're lined up here waiting like everyone else."

First white male's protestations was further piqued when the family members entering the cab smiled quietly but good-naturedly at them the same way other people in line also were.

So were we.

Second white male tried to pacify his friend by insisting "I think they're together. They were just waiting outside the line."

That didn't stop first white male though nor did he try to understand what was going on, nor did any of us cared to explain.

Us: If these guys are looking forward to be beaten up, they should take this attitude to a Manila alley and get stark raving mad not in front of middle class shoppers but amidst a group of drunk male videoke revelers. That way he'll not only see injustice, he'll feel it.



2nd: I was at SM Makati buying a bag of flavored nuts. I was at the cashier putting the change in my wallet making sure to distance myself from the register because my transaction has been completed so I was at the far edge of the counter. Though I was still there, the space for the cashier was open for anyone to freely come up to - yet this old white dude with his brown female companion decided to stand behind me. So the cashier called on him to come up and go around me. He then loudly replied: "But she's still here."

I proceeded to close my wallet and take my nuts with me and left.

Me: "I am not going to enable your sense of entitlement by ushering you towards the cashier. This is Manila. This is not the deep South. Not that we aren't polite to tell you that you could proceed ahead, we're just being real by allowing you to find out for yourself what you need to do. What, you want me to bring out a blackboard and draw an arrow towards where you're supposed to walk so you can get to the cashier? What are you, 5 years old?"


3rd: Just this week, I was at Glorietta. I was thirsty so I proceeded to go to the second floor of the mall to buy a watermelon shake at Big Chill. Walking towards it I saw a white woman leaning by the railing and looking at the list of Big Chill's fruit shakes. When I approached the Big Chill cashier and ordered a regular-sized shake, the white woman approached the other end of the stall and spoke to the other Big Chill staffer who was preparing the shake. The staff didn't reply or say anything to her as the staff was busy preparing my order. In the corner of my eye I saw the white woman stay for a micro-second more waiting for the staff's non-reply. And then she left.

Me: Admittedly, I felt guilty by not looking at her or acknowledging her presence or her thirst for a fruit shake. But, I also didn't expect her to leave that fast seemingly hurt that she wasn't paid attention to by the staff who was busy doing her job or who probably didn't hear her or who probably - like her - is as fearful of speaking with a foreigner lest their conversation get lost in translation.

All these reminded me of the below clip. I found this Simpsons scene funny maybe because it's true.

Mind your use of language the way the Natoka Indians did

Mind your use of language.

It tells you what you're thinking and how.

When the Brits discovered this beautiful, blue, pristine lake in Alberta Canada,



(NOTE: The water is authentically blue and oh so clear you'd think that, by looking at it in real life, God photo-shopped this postcard-perfect view.)


guess what they named this breathlessly majestic body of water?



That lake is in Alberta, Canada and it is popularly knows as Lake Louise.

The lake was named after Princess Louise Caroline Alberta (1848–1939),[1] the fourth daughter of Queen Victoria and the wife of the Marquess of Lorne, who was the Governor General of Canada from 1878 to 1883.

Did you notice how they named the lake after themselves? See how they immortalized their identity by pasting their names on a body of water nature has created?


Do you know what the original settlers of Canada, the Stoney Natoka Indians, named this lake when they first saw it?


They named it "Lake of the Little Fishes" maybe because they saw that it is a lake that has lots of little fishes swimming in it.

See how the Indians named this lake for what it is and not for what they want it to represent about themselves? See their absence of ownership?

See the mine-mine-mine-sensibility of the former?

See how the Indians named the lake based on how they saw it?

See how the Brits named the lake the way they wanted to see it?


How about you? Do you see things as they are or how you want to see them?

How The 1992 Director's Cut of Blade Runner Came About

According to Ridley Scott himself, Blade Runner earned zero, zilch, nothing, nada, it was a box office flop when it was released theatrically back in 1982.



He never made anything from the movie and had to give his all just to make it.

Ridley Scott: "But the important thing is to make it."

Film critics back then claimed the film was too slow touting it as "Blade Crawler."

Moviegoers didn't understand what it was all about, no thanks to the other sci-fi movies which were released roughly around that time: ET, Star Trek 2.

But Ridley Scott said, "You know what, I like it, screw you."

Later on, Ridley Scott was informed that his film was to be kept in the Library of Congress.

It was also the 2nd most requested film in the Warner library, after The Maltese Falcon.

When the Santa Monica Film Festival, 10-14 yrs ago, requested a print of the film from the studio,
someone haphazardly took out the film from a drawer and sent it.

It was not checked, it was simply shipped off.

Ridley Scott: "Does that tell you anything?"

Turns out the film was a 35 mm raw version of Blade Runner. It had no titles, "It had some of Jerry Gold's music on it, it had some of Vangelis music on it..it wasn't even labeled properly...It was a longer cut, my version."

The result was an `earthquake' of reaction for the film and voila, it was touted as the Director's Cut

which later on was further improved to the Final Cut that was released in 2007 which Ridley Scott 100% approves.



And yes, he is making a sequel to the Blade Runner. Let us all thank the heavens.

Michael Fassbender strikes a Mr. Pogi pose

and Noomi Rapace laughs.




and he does it again.



Because he can.

But he usually doesn't.

He only did when he was asked how it was to be Hollywood's "It Boy" and so he shows how it is to be "It" now

and tomorrow, he says he is the "Tit." Seriously.

He's not only pogi (handsome) he's also funny.




O di ba, kala nyo kayo lang ang pwdeng mag Mr. Pogi?

Kaya din mag-Mr. Pogi ng mga pogi.

Ad for Belo Men is Aspirational

The ad for Belo Men does not reflect the truth that there are non-white (in the PH context, this means brown) car owners as much as there are white (in the PH context, this means mostly Spanish/American/Chinese - or a combination of all - mestizos) car owners.

NOTE: If you are Caucasian white and you're in the PH, you're not expected to commute because you are supposed to be rich and own a car. You are also not supposed to commute because you don't want to invite anyone to kidnap or mug you (I am not being racist by implying Filipinos are violent, but the PH is a third-world country and I am being realistic).

The Belo Ad for Men's whitening products wants your insecurity, your colonial mentality to come alive enough for you to feel that yes your skin needs some brushing/scrubbing up enough for other people to think you're not poor or that you own a car. Though you don't actually have to own a car, the point is to make people think you own one. The Belo Ad for Men reflects not the truth but what you want to be true: you can look like you own a car = rich without actually owning a car or being rich.

Similarly, the Belo for Men ad doesn't have to reflect what is culturally true but simply show what it wants to be true: you're brown, you need to be whitened up, you need our product, Buy Belo.

If you agree, if you have bought into the idea that your skin is not good enough, you can easily buy a Belo. If you agree, you are its target market. If you believe the ad, it's for you.



But hey, is it just me or is the ad making fun of itself too and making light (no pun intended) of the fact that we equate skin whiteness with sosyal-ness?

As if it's pointing its finger at you and making you look at how you look at yourself and others. Tongue-in-cheek much?

Because, be honest, where were you when you were taught about PH history and our "pre-colonial" and "colonial" past?

When I was in the fifth grade, I was curious about the teacher's use of the terms "colonial" and "pre-colonial" but could not mouth the words of my wonderment.

It was only years later that I understood what I was wondering about: why use pre-colonial to refer to PH history before the Spanish came? As if our history was anchored / leveraged at us being "colonized."

What? The PH didn't have a life before it was colonized and could only refer to itself before it got screwed by Spain? The PH didn't exist as its own? and had to attach its identity to only that part in history?

We were taught to see our country this way, the Philippines circa B.C. (before colonization) and A.C. (after colonization).

aka -- The Philippines before it was ransacked and pillaged and The Philippines after it was ransacked and pillaged.

Is it a wonder now why most of us still see ourselves this way?

How much do we know about the Philippines from year 0 to 1520?