Snap Review: "LOST Finale"

Warning: CRUSHING, SERIES-RUINING SPOILERS AHEAD. DO NOT READ BEFORE WATCHING THE LOST FINALE.

OK...In spite of my better judgment, I liked the "Lost" finale. It was sad, epic, funny and it felt emotionally satisfying. In the end, it was about the people who landed and how they learned to live together, not about the island and its special brand of baffling magic. I get that, and overall, it was probably the right decision. A finale that was more focused on explaining away all the fantasy elements and minutae wouldn't have really worked dramatically. (A lot of people got obsessed with stuff like Walt's powers in the early seasons, or why everything was influenced by Ancient Egypt, or the Dharma food drops...but I knew they'd never bother to go back and explain that stuff. Just no way to do that and make it an actual episode. Like in a David Lynch film, the surreal touches are just there to be surreal, and really exploring them robs them of their appeal.)

But having said all that, it's still quite bold of Cuse and Lindelof to even try to get away with such an obvious trick. They made up an entirely new story for Season 6 as a pretext to abandon the main narrative that has dominated the entire series up until that point. By inventing "alternate reality" at the beginning of 6 and then focusing almost the entire final episode on it, Cuse and Lindelof escape the corner they painted themselves in over 5 seasons. To torture the metaphor, they basically said..."Well, this whole room is painted, but look next door! A room without any paint at all! What's going on over there?" And because they thought up a nice ending to THAT story, one that gave them an excuse to explore all the main love stories that have played out over 6 seasons, the audience is tempted to overlook the fact that essentially NONE of the main questions get answered, and none of the big plot points of the first 4 seasons are dealt with in any way.

(Seriously, imagine trying to tell people watching the Season 3 finale or something what happened in the last episode. "So, um, they were all in this parallel universe, or it seemed that way, but it's actually where they all go when they die. And the island is a cork holding in an evil presence." Not a single thing that would have seemed really relevant to the show back then - like the significance of Walt and Aaron, or island's ability to heal people and hurtle them through time, or the strange experiments of the Dharma Initiative, or Libby's peculiar backstory, or the meaning of the "numbers" and their origin - means anything or gets any sort of conclusion.)

I don't know...this was a great episode of "Lost," but I sort of feel duped. It feels more like a season finale than the end of the show.

If you think about it, you could start Season 7 really easily in the Fall and it would still totally make sense.

- Rose and Bernard wake Jack up in the jungle. (Presumably, Vincent wandered over from their camp.) He's injured but he'll be fine.
- Hurley is now figuring out what they need to do in order to continue "protecting" the island. Hurley begins to discover he has Jacobian powers, but hesitates about using them. There's now tension between Hurley and Jack over who is really calling the shots.
- Ben gets jealous, maybe starts plotting how he can get rid of Hurley and Jack and run the show himself (?)
- Sawyer, Desmond, Kate, Claire et. al. return to the US. Kate and Claire discover that they will need to bring Aaron back to the island, as he's the rightful heir to Jacob, not Hurley. Unless they bring Aaron back...mysterious unspeakable bad things will happen. (Possibly involving Alvar Hanso, the founder of the Hanso Foundation, which funded the Dharma Initiative? Remember him?)
- We follow Richard as he struggles to begin a new normal life in the real non-island world.

And so on. My reasoning is, if this were truly going to be a FINAL episode that would give us all ACTUAL closure, there should have been a bit more of an effort to give it a real END. The island is destroyed or de-magic-ified, or a perpetual motion machine where these events are just going to repeat themselves ad infinitum. Either of those would be an ending.

Ignoring the lion's share of the show's genuine existential questions while setting most of your main characters off on new adventures, after assuring that they will all eventually meet again in the afterlife? I guess that's an ending, but it's not a real ENDING ending, if that makes sense. Part of me almost feels like they've intentionally left themselves with a loophole in case they ever want to do a follow-up movie or mini-series. I know they SAID they wouldn't ever do this...but then why not really close the sucker out?

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Iron Man 2 review

It's not that "Iron Man 2" is a bad film, or even a poor example of the contemporary "Marvel Film" style. I sense that my disappointment with the movie, which grew progressively as the film unspooled last night, was heightened by my great enjoyment of the original "Iron Man" movie, along with a general awareness that comic book films, as a genre, have essentially fallen into a rut. "Iron Man 2" follows the formula just fine, I suppose, but it's not surprising, innovative or inspired. It doesn't enhance my appreciation for or understanding of the Tony Stark/Iron Man character. Though the action is executed well enough, it's never more than par for the course for this kind of film, and it didn't really even seem to try to exceed or upset my expectations.

10 years after "X-Men" massively renewed the general public's interest in seeing Marvel characters on the big screen, it's time someone threw us a curveball with one of these movies. I feel like we've now established that it's possible to adapt a comic book into a genuinely original, exciting cinematic experience. Now it's time to figure out how to take these stories in another direction, to make the material feel fresh again. Obviously, we've seen this story before...I'm not saying anyone needs to reinvent the wheel here, and there's only so much you can do with these Stan Lee backstories. But does the movie have to make it so OBVIOUS that we've seen this story before?

The plot: Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) is a conflicted hero whose own fame and powers may prove to be his undoing. So in order to save the world, he's going to first have to save himself, along with a woman wearing a body-hugging, largely ridiculous outfit (Scarlett Johansson). You know, for a change.

Stark's facing challenges on a number of fronts, actually. His corporate arch-rival, weapons maker Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell), has hired a brilliant but insane Russian physicist (Mickey Rourke), to create an "Iron Man"-inspired robot army. At the same time, Stark has discovered that the arc reactor in his chest, the device that's not only powering his Iron Man suit but also keeping his heart healthy, has started poisoning his blood, threatening his life unless he can find a cure. Also at the same time, he's being investigated by a cynical Senator (Garry Shandling...for real...), watched closely by the agents of SHIELD (including Samuel L Jackson's Nick Fury) and hounded by his friend James Rhodes (Don Cheadle, stepping in for Terrence Howard) because he won't turn the Iron Man suit over to the US Government.

Whew. It sounds packed with incident, but all of these stories develop in a pretty labored, exposition-heavy fashion, making the movie feel surprisingly tedious. The first movie also had a lot of conflict and different plotlines going on, but Favreau and his various screenwriters (5 are credited in total) approached them with a loose, comic attitude. There was a lot coming at Tony Stark, but it wasn't really about terrorists or Jeff Bridges' evil plot or Gwyneth Paltrow's reticence to get involved with her boss romantically. It was at heart a simple, entertaining romp about a very snarky guy named Tony Stark becoming Iron Man, and whenever the narrative threatened to get bogged down in plot details, they'd throw in a couple of jokes to smooth over the rough spots and keep everyone's attention. The sequel doesn't seem to know where to focus amidst all the chaos, and Justin Theroux's screenplay lacks a lot of the witty rejoinders that populated the first movie. (The decision to have the once-charming rogue Tony Stark think that he's dying for the entire film, and therefore too depressed to behave like his usual "self-aware selfish prick" persona, was a poor one. Downey Jr's usual snarky joie de vivre doesn't really mesh well with chronic depression. So the whole film becomes something of a slog.)

We get a lot of new characters, but Sam Rockwell as the sleazily incompetent Hammer is the only one who makes any sort of real impression. He's easily the funniest character, and Favreau wisely gave Rockwell enough room to sort of overplay the role and infuse it with a lot of his trademark goofiness. (His little silly dance while presenting his new weapons at the Stark Expo is one of the very few moments in the film that feels personal and human.) I'm not sure why they decided to make Hammer so glaringly poor at building weapons. Sure, the film gets some cheap jokes out of the fact that his inventions never work, but he'd be a lot more threatening as a nemesis if he was able to build something - anything - that could actually hurt Iron Man, right?

This is important, as the shockingly lame performance by Mickey Rourke as the villainous Whiplash renders Hammer the film's lone serious antagonist. Rourke clearly connected with the role of Randy "The Ram" Robinson in "The Wrestler" only 2 years back, but he's sleepwalking through "Iron Man 2." Not only do we never for a second believe his character could possibly be a brilliant physicist, but there's honestly not a single scene in the film where I genuinely invested in the character's reality on any level. It's just Mickey Rourke with a variety of stupid-looking haircuts, fake prison tats and a bad Russian accent, not a real character who presents any sort of actual immediate challenge to Iron Man. I've always liked Rourke as an actor and want to root for him now that he's experiencing this big career revival, but I can't excuse the mess that he makes of the Whiplash character here. (It's not entirely his fault...The design on the character and his electrified whip weapon is sub-standard all-around. He looks like a homeless Star Trek villain.)

Other characters don't fare much better. Gwyneth Paltrow's Pepper Potts, one of the great surprises of the first film, seems on the verge of tears for this entire movie. I wanted to give her a hug and a muffin, and maybe tell her to take a nap, but not watch her in a film. Don Cheadle makes zero impact as James Rhodes, and it almost feels like Favreau purposefully keeps him sidelined during the bulk of the movie. Like he was embarrassed that they swapped out actors between films, and kept him in the margins so no one would notice. I forgot he was in this for 20 minute stretches at a time. Scarlett Johansson shows up to look hot but has essentially no character, and after her big "reveal" at about the halfway point in the film, she remains in the movie without anything to actually say or do. Sometimes, she's just in the background to be hot, or make for a better publicity still or something. It's obvious they just threw her in here as a further teaser for the forthcoming "Avengers" movie and didn't really think about whether she had a role to play in this story.

Actually, now that I think about it, this whole movie sort of feels like a promo for "The Avengers." Even the final post-credit scene (which I won't spoil here) serves more as an "Avengers" teaser than a capper for the movie we've actually just watched. I know Marvel execs and creative types (and maybe even fans) are all excited to have all these interconnected movies coming up, leading up to a massive "Avengers" film, but the rest of us still want the individual movies to entertain on their own merits, not as commercials for the REAL movie coming in a few years. It would be a shame if they muted the public's interest in the "Avengers" movie when it finally arrives by releasing a string of lazy, middling shitkickers beforehand.

Okay, so I feel like I'm harping on the film now and being overly critical. There's good scenes and fun little asides to be had here. The main action set pieces, particularly the final fight with Stark and Rhodes facing off against Hammer's robot army, work well and the Industrial Light and Magic effects are solid. Sam Jackson's clearly enjoying the chance to play Nick Fury, and has a lot of chemistry with Downey Jr. As I said, it's not a bad film. It's just a mediocre one, and coming on the heels of arguably my favorite Marvel film to date, that's a big letdown.

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Friday is My Last Day at Mahalo

Congratulations on being employee number 2 at a growing company.

Do come back to the office and do email the team list.

I'm absolutely thrilled with you.

Best j

Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

---

From: Lon Harris <lonharris@mahalo.com>

Date: Wed, 5 May 2010 21:46:17 -0700

To: 

Subject: Friday is My Last Day at Mahalo

Hello Team Mahalo -

I'm assuming by now most of you have heard the news, particularly as we told the community during tonight's "This Week in Mahalo," but just to make sure...

Jason and Mark have generously offered me the position of Creative Director of ThisWeekIn.com, and I have accepted. So, Friday will mark my last day as Mahalo.com's Director of Community. Of course, I will still be in the office every day, and available should anyone have questions or need anything from me. But my attention will now be largely, if not entirely, focused on ThisWeekIn Studios on a day-to-day basis. So if there's anything you need to run by me or loose ends we need to tie up, please bring it to my attention whenever you can.

It has been a distinct pleasure working with all of you, and I can honestly say that in my 3+ years working for Mahalo, I've never felt as confident as I do today that the project will be a grand success. Thanks to all the developers, admins, salespeople, chefs, designers, product managers, CEOs, directors of strategy and, of course, my fellow community team members for all that you have taught me, for being such positive, productive collaborators and generally for making it such a pleasure to come in to work each and every day. I'll still be seated in your midst, so this isn't really goodbye, but it felt like a good opportunity to let you all know how thankful I am for your tireless efforts, and how proud I am to have been a part of such a talented team. Also, I'm buying my stock options, and I'm pretty sure I still get to come on this Vegas trip, so feel free to keep right on kicking butt and taking names.

Thanks again. See you tomorrow.

Lon

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Mark Zuckerberg doesn't believe in privacy. But he does believe in irony.

Posted via email from Lon Harris

What do our tweets say about us? Our outlook? Our intentions?

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Here's the thing about mandating health insurance...

The health insurance system only works right if everyone buys in. If you just have old, sick people buying insurance, every account pays out. Insurers can't earn any money.

You could theoretically solve this by just socializing the entire health care industry, and making it a not-for-profit wing of the US Government. But Americans don't really care for that idea. To be honest, though this is probably the version of health care reform I'd prefer, I share some of their concerns.

If, instead, you want to base the system on the continued existence of private, for-profit health insurance companies, the only way to make the system solvent and universally applied is to guarantee young, healthy people - who won't actually cost serious money to insure - pay in. I kept hoping that someone would propose a third option - a way to guarantee basic, affordable health coverage to every American through private insurers but without a legal mandate for all who were able to pay in to the system - but I've never heard one. If you have, please suggest it in the comments below.

These systems don't exist in a vacuum. Public policy has to work in the real world, not in the hypothetical world of ideological purity. I feel like that's where most Americans, at least the outspoken ones I've been speaking with and reading on Facebook, Twitter and blogs, lose the thread. They begin the discussion based on what's "right," the abstract way in which they would prefer America to function. They speak in moral terms and absolutes. They harken back to particular interpretations of Constitutional law. And, sure, they make compelling points now and again. But unless you're willing to sacrifice living, breathing human beings, suffering from a lack of health coverage or crippling medical debts, to ideology and argumentation, you have to think about how these things actually play out day-to-day.

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Is it just me, or are Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes starting to look alike?

One of us, one of us! Gooble gobble, gooble gobble! One of us!

(Image via Gawker)

Posted via email from Lon Harris

God of War 3 Walkthrough

Oh, how I wish "God of War III" were not a PS3 exclusive. Seriously, I love love love my Xbox, but sort of feel like the PS3 exclusives pwn the Xbox exclusives, especially now that the "Bioshock" series is available for everyone. (I like the "Halo" series, but I don't really LOVE it, and I don't know...can't build up enthusiasm for "Mass Effect").

Anyway, the idea of a kickass action game set in the world of Greek Mythology intrigues me. I've been following along the development of the GOW 3 walkthrough and HD walkthrough videos of the game for Mahalo and would really like to try it out. Anyone got a used PS3 they're looking to sell? To eBay!

Check out the in-progress Mahalo God of War 3 Walkthrough here:

http://www.mahalo.com/god-of-war-3-walkthrough

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Thee Vicars, "Back on the Streets"

via youtube.com

Really loving this song at the moment. Apparently, these guys are at SxSW. Read a blog post on Pandagon that featured this video, and I've had it in steady rotation since. Have these guys been around for a while and I've just missed the boat? Really awesomely retro sound.

Posted via web from Lon Harris

Roger Ebert Speaks!

Roger Ebert, who had a portion of his jaw removed after a prolonged bout with thyroid cancer, will appear on "Oprah" today to show off his new voice, made possible by a Scottish company that designs text-to-speech programs. Basically, hours and hours of archived footage of Ebert's TV appearances have been cataloged, allowing him to type out language and have it repeated in his own speaking voice. The program can even do inflections, so if he writes an exclamation, his "voice" will shout what was typed.

Obviously, it's not perfect, but it's still fairly effective, and does at least simulate the effect of hearing the guy speak. Ebert's always been one of my favorite writers about film, and the few times I met him in person or corresponded with him, seemed like a genuinely good person. It's pretty inspiring to see him pushing on after all that tragedy...Hard to even fathom what it would be like to lose the ability to eat normal foods, speak, etc., especially for such an outspoken and active individual.

We're working on the Mahalo page right now. Check  back here for more updates and info:

http://www.mahalo.com/roger-ebert
http://www.mahalo.com/roger-ebert-oprah

Posted via email from Lon Harris

New "Nightmare on Elm Street" Trailer

The latest, and most detailed, trailer for the new "Nightmare on Elm Street" has debuted online and it's not without its charm. Definitely less jokey and ridiculous than some of the other entries in the series. (I see no indication that anyone will be jerked around, puppet-style, by their veins.) Just watch out for those micro-naps.

Makes me wonder if Jackie Earle Haley ever intends to act in a movie using his regular speaking voice, rather than the gutteral post-Bale whisper-voice.

Also, can we stop the "using children's nursery rhymes in the background to heighten the tension" trick? Starting to feel a bit overdone.

http://www.mahalo.com/a-nightmare-on-elm-street-trailer

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Sarah Palin, like all other uptight people, hates Family Guy

"Family Guy" did an episode this past week about a girl in Chris' class who has Down Syndrome. The episode included a humorous line where the girl reveals that she's "the daughter of the former governor of Alaska," an obvious reference to Sarah Palin and her son, Trig. So Palin is apparently quite upset about the whole thing, because of course, SHE owns the exclusive rights to exploit Down Syndrome for personal gain, goddammit!

Anyway, the voice actress, Andrea Fay Friedman, has struck back, declaring what we all pretty much already knew - Sarah Palin has no sense of humor.

Here's the full "Family Guy" episode:

Read more on Mahalo's page:

http://www.mahalo.com/andrea-fay-friedman

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Jay-Z Grows Tired of Your Shenanigans

One person who's clearly no longer delighted by parodies of the "Single Ladies" video? Beyonce's husband. Here's Jay-Z and Diddy looking on as Chicago Bulls mascot Benny the Bull performs the infamous "Single Ladies" dance. Sigh...

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Gary Coleman Wigs Out on Set of "The Insider"

"Diff'rent Strokes" star Gary Coleman stormed off the set of "The Insider" the other day after a loud, angry confrontation with one of the panelists. Honestly, Coleman's obviously a bit unstable, but I'm not 100% sure this is all his fault, or just another example of him being all crazy. This woman really ambushes him and starts just yelling at him. It's less an interview than a wind-up. His only two options were to basically admit to being a spouse-abusing piece of crap (which, okay, he probably is) or to storm off the set. Although, granted, telling her to walk a plan and drown in the ocean may be a bit BIG considering the circumstances:

More info here:

http://www.mahalo.com/gary-coleman-the-insider

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Austin pilot leaves behind insane manifesto

Joseph Andrew Stack has been identified as the pilot who crashed a small plane into the Echelon Building in Austin, Texas. He left behind a suicide note that could only be considered, um, extensive. More a manifesto than a note, really. It's always fascinating to me when suicidal people have this much to say. You'd think that, if you had all of these ideas to get off your chest, you would want to spend more time writing and speaking and expressing yourself, rather than taking the cowardly way out and ending it all.

The manifesto is as compelling as it is dumbfounding. A lot of blather about the evils of capitalism, the medical system, politicians and corporate greed. You can read the whole thing on our Mahalo page:

http://www.mahalo.com/joseph-andrew-stack

Posted via email from Lon Harris

RIP Doug Fieger

It's hard to even conceive of the ubiquity of The Knack's "My Sharona." This is a song that every human being in the West over the age of, say, 10 has heard eleventy bazillion times. You hear it so much, it becomes kind of shrill and annoying, when in reality it's a pretty ingeniously simple, catchy little pop song. An ideal radio single.

Anyway, the man behind that song, singer-songwriter Doug Fieger, died from cancer today at age 57. He wrote some other popular songs, too, but none of them were THIS big. Once Weird Al has parodied you, that's how you know you've truly arrived.

So maybe it's time to give the song another listen, with fresh ears.

http://www.mahalo.com/doug-fieger

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Is Kevin Smith Too Fat to Fly?

This is an issue that, of course, hits home for me, not only because Kevin Smith is a great guy who should not be disrespected in this way, but because he and I share a similar...um, girth. So it's pretty much inevitable at this point that I will, some day, be asked to remove my oversized ass from a Southwest flight.

Here's the story: Smith was already seated on a Southwest flight from Oakland to Burbank before being approached by a flight attendant and asked to leave the plane. Apparently, the captain felt that Smith was too large to fly on the plane and posed a "safety risk" to other passengers.

This just seems ridiculous, both because Smith is clearly not a morbidly obese individual who could actually prevent the flight from arriving safely, and because he was already sitting in the seat. What could go wrong at that point? He'd get up to use the restroom and put on an extra pound, thus making it impossible for him to sit back down?

It's one thing for airlines to set weight policies as a matter of safety and logistics. But it's another for them to publicly abuse and discriminate against people due to their size without merit. Hard to say, without knowing all the details (I'm judging the entire situation based on Kevin's Twitter feed at this point), but this seems like a case of pretty extreme overreach by Southwest, and a decision they'll probably regret soon enough now that everything is public.

Bonus question for Smith fans: Which is the more hilariously cringe-inducing Smith weight-related confessional? Getting kicked off a plane because he's too fat, or breaking the toilet at Laser Blazer, the DVD store where I used to work? You decide!

Read more about the incident here: http://www.mahalo.com/kevin-smith-southwest-airlines

Posted via email from Lon Harris

BioShock 2 Walkthrough

We're hard at work right now filling out our BioShock 2 Walkthrough over on Mahalo. Looks like our writers have reached about the 4th Area, "Pauper's Drop." Can't believe this game has been out all this time and I still don't have it yet. The first one is seriously among my favorite games ever. So much atmosphere, and such a great narrative...It may be the single best written video game of all time.

Anyway, I love the ability to use plasmids and weapons simultaneously in the new game,a nd it looks just as creepy and intense this time out. Can. Not. Wait.

http://www.mahalo.com/bioshock-2-walkthrough

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Best Ads of Super Bowl 2010: Simpsons for Coca-Cola

Here's my next favorite early Super Bowl 2010 commercial: A bit based on "The Simpsons" in which billionaire C. Montgomery Burns falls on hard economic times. He takes a walk in the park and discovers everyone enjoying Coca-Colas, only to be given one for free by shopkeeper Apu.  Can Coca-Cola turn even the most misanthropic miser around? Let's find out together!

http://www.mahalo.com/coca-cola-super-bowl-ads-2010

Posted via email from Lon Harris

Best Ads of the 2010 Super Bowl: Yo Gabba Gabba for Kia

We've got pages on Mahalo for every single Super Bowl ad, so I've either seen the ads or at least extended previews for them at this point. And I have some predictions about what the best ones will be. So I'm going to post them throughout the day.

First up, this ad for the Kia Sorento, featuring the stars of Nick Jr.'s "Yo Gabba Gabba".

http://www.mahalo.com/kia-super-bowl-ad

Posted via email from Lon Harris