Whenever I mention to anyone that my favorite television show is Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I often find myself met with either a quizzical look or a chuckle, as if I had just made a cute joke. Upon hearing the show’s goofy title, most people assume that it’s a kid’s show or that it’s just more dumb teenage vampire garbage. As someone who harbors a great deal of disdain for vampire nonsense in general, I think I find the latter assumption to be the most frustrating.
Buffy has actually been cited on multiple occasions as one of the best television shows of all time. It was:
Those are an awful lot of accolades for a “dumb vampire kid’s show”. Just saying.
I first watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer when I was about 17. Netflix had been recommending it to me for a while, but it didn’t really look like my kind of thing (re: dumb teenage vampire garbage), so I ignored it. I was bored one afternoon, and on a whim, I decided to watch an episode. I wasn’t sold on it right away, but I liked the characters, so I kept watching. And kept watching. And…..kept watching. I became so invested over the course of the next seven seasons that I couldn’t think about anything else for weeks afterwards.
But I didn’t actually ‘get it’ until the second time that I watched it a few years later, when I was going through what I will call (for the sake of brevity) a ‘romantic disappointment’. I’m not sure what drew me back to Buffy at that time; I think I was just looking for something to distract me, and I thought “hey, I remember liking this show,” and decided to re-watch it.
There was something about Buffy Summers that resonated with me on my second viewing that hadn’t before. I mean, I’m not the Chosen One and I don’t punch vampires every night and avert apocalypses approximately every spring (when season finale time rolls around). But as with any well written piece of fiction, there’s far more to Buffy the Vampire Slayer than demons and derring-do.
Buffy feels like a real person. She struggles, she makes bad decisions, and she has her share of ill-fated romances. Consequently, watching the show ended up being a big part of my recovery process. It was tempting for me to allow this one negative experience to define me; a temptation Buffy herself falls into many times. But ultimately, she doesn’t allow anything external to change who she is, or her commitment to what she needs to do.
There is obviously a deeply emotional aspect of my love for this show, but the other, more intellectual aspect is my subsequent fall down the ‘Buffy studies‘ rabbit hole. Buffy has garnered an extraordinary amount of interest in the academic world, and for good reason. The show has also had a significant impact on the way television is made, the effects of which are still apparent to this day. But first, some background.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer was created by writer/director Joss Whedon, and first aired in 1997 as a mid-season replacement (which is why the first season is so short), and ran for seven seasons, ending in 2003. Of the original conception of the idea, Whedon said:
“I had seen a lot of horror movies, which I love very much, with blonde girls getting killed in dark alleys, and I just germinated this idea about how much I would like to see a blonde girl go into a dark alley, get attacked by a monster and then kill it. And that was sorta the genesis for the movie, Buffy the Vampire Slayer.”
Yes, there was a movie. It came out in 1992. No, we don’t talk about it. Whedon’s script was initially a lot darker than the final product, which unfortunately ended up being interpreted as a broad comedy.
A few years later, Whedon was offered the opportunity to continue the story by turning it into a television series, and fortunately for me, he took it.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer quickly became a pioneer of television. In a time before online streaming and ‘binge watching,’ the general public did not necessarily dedicate themselves to sitting down at the same time every week to keep up with a particular show. Many television shows at this time aired episodes with self-contained plots, making them accessible to the average viewer. This made shows like Buffy that focused on long-form storytelling and character development unique and groundbreaking. The show also devised a serialization model referred to as ‘The Big Bad,’ i.e. one major villain/overarching story-line that spans the course of one season of television. This model is still utilized by television shows today, each adapting it to their own genre.
Over the course of the show’s seven seasons, we follow Buffy from the ages of 16 to 22. She goes through the usual growing pains of a young girl, heightened by the fact that she is The Slayer. A cheesy voice-over that plays before each episode of season 1 (and some episodes of season 2) states: “In every generation there is a chosen one. She alone will stand against the vampires, the demons, and the forces of darkness. She is the Slayer.” According to the lore of the show, there can only be one Slayer at a time; when one dies, another is called. Slayers are usually called when they are very young, and most don’t live very long.
The first three seasons lean heavily into the ‘high school as hell’ metaphor. The monsters aren’t just monsters; they represent conflicts faced by young people as they are becoming adults. The vampires, for example, as the titular and most prevalent monster Buffy has to contend with throughout the series, can be seen as representing the fear of becoming an adult. They are caught suspended in time, incapable of changing or evolving. Like the Lost Boys, they will never grow up.
Within the universe of the show, when a person becomes a vampire their soul is taken and replaced with a demon. They still have the memories and personalities of whoever they were before, but without souls, they are left to follow their own selfish desires. As Mark Field writes:
“What does it mean to be a vampire, not as metaphor but within the story line? Angel tells us the distinction: it’s the difference between having a soul and not. Joss explained later that he saw the soul as a conscience, that is, something which would enable the possessor to choose right from wrong. It’s not that souled individuals necessarily choose well–very often in this show they won’t– but that they are able to make a choice. An unsouled creature simply can’t distinguish between right and wrong, so will be much more likely to make a selfish or wrong choice.”
A common thread throughout the series is Buffy’s attempt to balance her role and responsibility as ‘The Slayer’ with her very human desire to be a normal girl, which is in itself a metaphor. Being endowed with magical super powers is not something that we can all necessarily relate to, but the feeling of isolation and the struggle to accept the burden of responsibility is universal. There are many instances in which Buffy has to actively choose whether or not to fulfill her role as the Slayer, even when the burden seems impossible for her to bear. It is required of her that she make these choices constantly. As she becomes an adult and begins to accept the role that has been thrust upon her, those choices only become more difficult and complex.
So now that I have (hopefully) convinced you that this was one of the greatest shows ever to grace America’s television screens, you have to actually follow through and go watch it. Unfortunately, many people to whom I have recommended this show tell me that they’ve attempted to watch it in the past, but couldn’t get through the first season. To which I say: fair point.
Season 1 of this show is notorious for how…bad it is. It was, after all, a mid-season replacement trying to find its footing on a minimal budget. Some of the major criticisms of the first season are that it is campy, features stunningly bad special effects, and it has too many silly ‘monster-of-the-week’ episodes that do little or nothing towards furthering the overall plot (although at the time the show was on the air, it was still considered to be heavily serialized in spite of this).
Personally, I love season 1. To me, Buffy the Vampire Slayer is like pizza: even if it’s not very good, it’s still pizza, and I’m still going to eat it. I’ve always been a big fan of practical effects, no matter how unrealistic they are, and I love the over-the-top drama of the vampires with their rituals and their Nosferatu-esque leader. I think even the cheesiest (haha, get it? Because pizza?), most imperfect episode still has merit, whether it be a particularly funny bit of dialogue, some impressive acting, or even just more time spent with characters that I already really like.
However, if it’s your first viewing and you’re having a hard time getting into the show, there are really only a few episodes in that first season that you can’t get by without seeing:
S1E1: ‘Welcome to the Hellmouth’
S1E2: ‘The Harvest’
S1E3: ‘Witch’ (This is a one-off episode, and it’s not really necessary to the overall plot, but I would highly recommend it anyway because a) in spite of the camp, it’s actually not a bad episode, and b) the events of ‘Witch’ are referenced later on in the series in a couple of fun ways that you’ll miss if you don’t watch it. Also the title is a fabulous pun that needs to be appreciated–this episode is often mistakenly referred to as ‘The Witch’, which ruins the pun and makes me angry. Even Hulu has it listed incorrectly. Okay, sorry, getting away from the point.)
S1E7: ‘Angel’ (I love this episode. It makes my list of top 20 favorite episodes in the series.)
S1E12: ‘Prophecy Girl’ (One of the most fantastic episodes in the series, also in my top 20. Ugh, it’s so good.)
Skip the rest for now (BUT you have to promise to go back and watch those other episodes after you’ve finished/completely fallen in love with the show. Okay? Okay).
Season 2 features one of the best story arcs of the entire series, but there are still a few not-so-good episodes to contend with. I highly recommend Ian Martin’s episode guide he is currently in the process of uploading to Youtube–I’ve linked to his website where he has all the completed episode guides laid out in order. He has some amazing insights, and I’ve found that watching his videos in tandem with each episode has really elevated my experience of the show overall. (As a side-note, he’s working on an episode guide for Buffy‘s spin-off series Angel as well. Angel is a fantastic show in its own right, and can be watched parallel to Buffy the Vampire Slayer–there’s a great guide for that here.)
Once you make it to the episode pair Surprise and Innocence (S2E13/14), if you’re not hooked already, you will be. Joss Whedon has described Innocence as the mission statement of the show, and cites it as his favorite episode of the entire series. While I can think of several episodes that rank higher on my personal list of favorites, Innocence is undoubtedly a near-flawless masterpiece.
Okay, I really have to stop myself here, or I’ll start revealing major plot points. I’m planning on writing more about the show’s use of metaphor, language, philosophy, as well as some theological/spiritual topics that I think are relevant, but this is just intended to be my spoiler-free pitch as to why you should watch the show in the first place, so I’ll shut up about it for now.
Now go watch the show. Are you doing it? Great! Bye.
They’re waiting for you!
EDIT: Some lovely person on Youtube recently made this beautiful little spoiler-free trailer for the entire series, and they did such a good job I had to throw it in here somewhere:
I had the flu a while ago. The one good thing about it was that I got to watch all the Star Wars movies in one sitting. And when I say ‘all,’ I mean three.
Once I had finished watching three of the greatest films ever made, I was left with an insatiable desire for MOAR STAR WARS. And, in my fevered delirium, I made the decision that watching the prequel trilogy would be a good idea.
I feel this decision of mine deserves a Cliff Huxtable level of disdain.
In fairness to myself, I did have a fever. Plus, I hadn’t seen the prequels in years (mostly because they are terrible), and I thought “Well, yeah, they’re not good movies, but are they really that bad?”
Yes.
While I was watching them, my fever got significantly worse.
I don’t think that was a coincidence.
To make myself feel like I wasn’t completely wasting my time, I broke out my trusty notebook and pen and took notes on everything as it was happening.
Which ended up being kind of pointless, since I found many of my feverish scribblings to be nearly illegible and also totally lacking in originality and complexity on later reading.
The cultural scourge that is the Star Wars prequel trilogy made me start thinking about the fact that within a couple of years, we will have MOAR STAR WARS and they will either be a similar pestilence upon the land or they might actually be good. I’m personally holding out for ‘good,’ simply because I can’t bear to be disappointed again.
While I was in Internet Land doing obsessive “research” on the impending Star Wars: Ep. VII, it came to my attention that a significant number of people wanted Joss Whedon to direct. And apparently, Joss Whedon totally would have done it. Alas, he’s a bit preoccupied at the moment working on a little movie called ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron.’ Insignificant project, really. You’ve probably never heard of it.
So naturally, I combined my trains of thought and began thinking about Whedon and all his attributes coupled with the loathsomeness of the prequels. I imagined an alternate universe in which Whedon wrests creative control out of George Lucas’ hands before any of the films have a chance to premiere, and remakes them himself.
And this is what would have happened:
1. Balance between practical sets and CGI.
One of the things that was really great about the original Star Wars trilogy was the fact that the special effects were limited. Filming took place mostly on-location, either outdoors or on a physical set, which gave the films a very real, accessible vibe. Much like a Western, the sets included a sketchy bar, a remote ‘ranch’ (Luke’s home on Tatooine), and a rickety-looking spacecraft (the Millennium Falcon). Everything was kind of dirty and looked as if it was actually used on a regular basis, which added to the realism.
In the Star Wars prequels, however, there was very little on-location filming. The actors ended up spending most of their time in front of a green-screen. Now, I don’t have a problem with using CGI as a tool, but when you digitally create every environment the characters interact in, we (the audience) can tell it’s fake. Because we’re smart.
Nothing in this shot looks real. Especially Ewan McGregor. AGE, DAMMIT.
‘Firefly,’ Joss Whedon’s oft-mourned prematurely canceled space western (partially inspired by the Star Wars OT), is a perfect example of what could have been. Lee Stringer, who worked on ‘Firefly’ and the subsequent film ‘Serenity,’ has posted these photos from the set of ‘Firefly’ on his Flickr page.
Imagine if the prequels had sets like these. Some practical effects would have been nice too, so that the alternate title in my head for ‘The Phantom Menace’ doesn’t have to be ‘Look At All The Ridiculous CGI Creatures We Made.’
Excuse me while I flap my face fat.
2. Continuity
Why didn’t Obi-Wan remember R2-D2 and C-3PO? How could Leia remember her mother if she died while giving birth to her? How did a nine year-old boy manage to perfectly replicate a mass-produced droid when building C-3PO? If the remaining Jedi were trying to hide Luke and Leia from Vader and the Emperor, as was established at the end of ‘Revenge of the Sith,’ why did they place Luke with his own extended family (without even bothering to change his telltale last name) and Leia with a prominent political family? WHY DOES NOTHING IN THESE MOVIES MAKE SENSE?
Now, most writers/directors (I hope) would be able to manage something as simple as good, solid plot continuity, but Whedon deserves a little acknowledgement, here. When his show ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ started airing in the late 90’s, most television shows aired exclusively self-contained episodes. Other than soap operas, BtVS was one of the first shows that relied heavily on episode continuity and story arcs.
When working on BtVS, Whedon would have series/season arcs worked out years in advance, so he wasn’t making everything up as he went along *cough cough LUCAS cough cough.* There are even some fun little details that Whedon doesn’t forget to either resolve or reference in some way later on in the series.
3. Straight-forward plots that actually make sense.
WHAT IS HAPPENING
Can anyone explain the plot of the prequel trilogy to me? Seriously. Because I had NO idea what was going on.
Overall, I know that they are supposed to be about Anakin Skywalker’s fall from grace and the rise of the Emperor, but what about the details? You know, the events that actually led up to these climactic happenings?
Okay, so in ‘The Phantom Menace,’ there’s a trade blockade, or something? And the Trade Federation is refusing to trade with Naboo? Because…why?
Oooh, right, because these two nincompoops are being influenced by Palpatine. Because…why?
I’ve heard fans of the Star Wars prequels valiantly defend them here. According to them, we purists just don’t get the overarching story of Episodes I-III because it is political, and I guess we’re just too dumb to understand politics. To which I respectfully say, they’re missing the point.
The problem was not that the Star Wars prequels were more political than the original trilogy. I liked that they tried to be political. The problem was that they failed spectacularly at it.
A bunch of stuff happens over the course of the three films, usually involving a couple of dudes wildly flailing their lightsabers around. And it is all portrayed as being really exciting and important to the story, but if you try to actually fit the events together and apply them to the story arc as a whole, most of these occurrences make little to no sense.
Maybe one day, I will write out the plot of these movies and try to make sense of it (spoiler: I will fail), but until then, all you have to do is Google ‘Star Wars plot holes’ and you’ll find what you’re looking for.
4. Smart dialogue.
Oh, honey.
It goes without saying that the dialogue in these movies was atrocious. And it doesn’t help that the actors deliver their lines as if they’re the droids in this story. Which isn’t their fault, by the way. I will defend every actor in these films (yes, even Hayden Christensen) with the argument that bad direction will make any actor appear incompetent.
Anyway, back to the dialogue issue. Whedon is famous for his trademark fast-paced witty dialogue. It would obviously have to be toned down in this film (as it was in ‘The Avengers’), but I can guarantee that we would definitely have been spared the fart jokes.
Seriously. There’s a fart joke in these movies.
5. Characterization
WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE
The biggest flaw in the Star Wars prequels was the utter lack of characters. Oh, there were a bunch of human-shaped things who walked around and sat on ornate couches and said words and stuff, but there weren’t any Real People to be found.
Let’s start with Anakin Skywalker. First of all, his turn to the Dark Side was rushed and ultimately not believable. Also, he was a brat-faced little kid, so even if it had been believable, I still wouldn’t have cared about him.
In ‘A New Hope,’ an aging Obi-Wan tells Luke that Anakin was a great man. Was he? Really? In the prequels, Little Orphan Ani is far from great. Instead, he is a spoiled child. He spends all his time whining about nothing and disrespecting his superiors. And then the first thing he does once he gives in to the Dark Side is to “kill younglings” (which is a slightly nicer-sounding way of saying HE SLAUGHTERED A BUNCH OF KIDS).
That was the first thing he did? Geez. Any normal person would have to work their way up to something that heinous. But I guess George Lucas thought that making him horrid to begin with was enough character development to warrant him murdering children his first time out as a Sith Lord.
Joss Whedon has a knack for writing flawed, but likable characters. The tragedy of Anakin Skywalker would have been handled much more evocatively had Whedon been at the helm. I mean, look at his track record. ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ alone features at least three characters who “go to the Dark Side.” Their transformations are shocking, but ultimately believable because their characters had evolved to the point where everything that they were doing made sense within the context of their story arc. It felt authentic. It also helped that we really liked them and actually wanted them to be redeemed.
Unlike Anakin Sulky-Pants Skywalker, who goes around being a jerk and making everyone wonder how Padme ever fell in love with him, and then suddenly snaps his fingers, turns to the Dark Side, and begins killing children while his eyes glow creepily.
Speaking of Padme, another thing Whedon is known for is creating strong leading ladies. Under his supervision, Padme could have been a heroine to rival Princess Leia. As it was, she was really only there to be Anakin’s love interest and Luke and Leia’s mother. Her character was kind of promising in ‘The Phantom Menace,’ but in the following two movies she just did a lot of crying and walking around wearing dumb outfits and then she dies because Anakin went to the Dark Side and I guess two newborn babies just aren’t enough to live for.
Imagine if instead, she had been written to be like Inara from Whedon’s ‘Firefly.’
Inara is graceful, refined, intelligent, and motherly. She is shown briefly to be competent with a sword, as well as other types of weaponry, but this part of her is far from accentuated. She succeeds at being a strong character without having to be a female action figure. Now this is a woman who I could see Anakin wanting to protect at all costs, even if it meant turning to the Dark Side.
Also, anyone who doesn’t prefer Morena Baccarin to Natalie Portman is insane.
Obi-Wan Kenobi ended up being yet another totally worthless character. He’s there to (supposedly) be a mentor for Anakin, but he spends most of his time elsewhere, frenetically swinging his pretty lightsaber around his head. These movies really should have focused on the relationship between Obi-Wan and Anakin, but instead, they focused on Anakin being a little punk and making googly eyes at Padme.
Oh, and don’t even get me started on Jar Jar Binks.
Jar Jar is there primarily for comic relief, which is a horrible idea because Jar Jar is the least funny character I have ever seen. Here is a list of all the ‘funny’ things Jar Jar does:
1. He talks weird.
2. He looks weird.
3. He steps in space-poo.
4. He knocks stuff over.
5. He falls down.
6. He gets farted on by a space-cow.
I’m sorry, but when your character has the same catch-phrase as a character from ‘Full House,’ you should just give up writing forever.
In conclusion, I would just like to clarify that I do know the original ‘Star Wars’ trilogy was not perfect. I also know that Joss Whedon is not perfect.
But this is MY fantasy world, okay?
And in my fantasy world, Joss Whedon made the Star Wars prequels.
My copy of St. George and the Dragon is now covered in taco salad.
This may not sound like a compliment, but believe me, it is. I’m not a particularly tidy eater, nor am I very good at eating and reading simultaneously, so when mealtimes roll around I often have to put my books away. But in the case of St. George and the Dragon, I found that I was unable to do so. Hence the taco salad.
A soldier in the Roman army, Marcellus thinks he has his life figured out. He’s climbing the ladder of success, one promotion at a time, and now he’s getting married to a girl he actually likes.
But lately, Marcellus has been hearing talk of dragon-worshipers. His curiosity is piqued when his bride-to-be tells him that she herself is a dragon-worshiper, and urges him to go and meet the mysterious dragon. When Marcellus does so, he is enthralled by the dragon, but he also finds himself suspicious of its motives.
Meanwhile, the Christian slaves who work for Marcellus’ father (whom Marcellus has always thought of as harmless, peaceful folk) have introduced him to their unique lifestyle, which he finds oddly intriguing. But the dragon asserts that these Christians are a danger to the Roman Empire, and that they ought to be eliminated.
So what does Marcellus choose? A comfortable life serving the dragon and the Empire, or life as a Christian outlaw?
Like you don’t already know.
The story of St. George is fairly well-known, but it is significantly lacking in detail. Well, not anymore. In this book, the legend of St. George and the Dragon has been fleshed out and turned on its head for your reading pleasure. In a time when the words ‘YA literature’ mean sparkly vampires and shoddy writing, St. George and the Dragon is a refreshing departure from the cultural norm, succeeding as a spiritually valuable piece of literature as well as an example of great storytelling.
Engaging and well-written, my only problem with this story is that it was not long enough. Seriously. It could have been the length of ten pieces of Russian literature combined, and I still would have spilled taco salad all over it in my eagerness to finish it.
One of my favorite parts was towards the end, when George/Marcellus is described killing the dragon in a way that directly mirrors the visual interpretation of the event in the original icon (which is featured on the cover of the book). The art and iconography nerd in me was immensely pleased.
You can buy this book from Amazon, or you can buy directly from the publishing company here, which will result in more of your money actually going to the author.
In case I didn’t already sell this enough, I recommend that you read this book. Now.
This is it, guys. Look no further, because this is THE definitive review of the movie ‘Noah.’ I’m going to tell you right here, right now, exactly how high or low the quality of this film is. Okay? Okay.
Is ‘Noah’ a good movie?
Eh…
What? You want me to be more specific? Sigh. Fine.
I went into this movie with the mindset that I wasn’t going to be nit-picky and judge it on the liberties Darren Aronofsky took with the original text. The things Aronofsky added to the narrative were necessary. The Biblical story of Noah is, what, two or three pages? Of course he’s going to have to add stuff. It’s so obvious that I’m not even going to talk about it. Lord knows enough critics have done that already.
Besides, there’s much more interesting stuff to talk about anyway.
I went into this movie thinking of it the same way that I would normally think of an adaptation of a book. Film and text are two totally different mediums. What works well for one, in terms of storytelling, may not work for the other. I tend to judge book-to-movie adaptations on two separate scales, 1) whether or not it is a good translation of the source material (in the sense that it preserves the original message), and 2) whether or not it is a good standalone film.
As far as Scale #1 goes, Aronofsky himself said that ‘Noah’ was going to be the “least Biblical film ever made.” So what did everyone expect? Perfect, cookie-cutter good guy Noah and his perfect family hugging fluffy animals on a big, fun party boat singing Kumbaya/Hooray Everyone Is Dead But Us?
I don’t know about you, but this is what I was picturing.
That would have been the most boring adaptation of Noah’s Ark EVER. And it probably wouldn’t have ended up being very spiritually valuable, either.
So, instead of talking technical details, let’s talk theology.
There has been a claim made by theologian Dr. Brian Mattson that this film is basically a poster-child for Gnosticism (his article can be found here). While I found his take to be interesting, I was uneasy with much of what he was saying about the film thematically.
Mattson is correct about some things. For example, he does point out that the film borrows from Kabbalah, which is a school of thought within Judaism that explores the relationship between the spiritual and the material.
As Mattson rightly points out, some Kabbalistic teachings do show up in this film. To begin with, Adam and Eve are shown briefly as luminous beings rather than your average flesh-and-blood Joes. There are fallen angels featured in the film who end up being redeemed by the end. The human race is depicted as being segregated into two groups: the nice descendants of Seth, and the not-nice descendants of Cain. Not your typical fundamentalist Christian back-story.
Why can’t I get Jergens Natural Glow Daily Moisturizer to do that?
But then, Mattson takes things a little too far. Because these particular Kabbalistic teachings are similar to some of the teachings found in Gnosticism, Mattson decides that the entire philosophy of the film must be Gnostic. He then proceeds to try and make everything else in the movie fit into this ill-founded, preconceived notion.
For example, he states that Gnosticism teaches that the world was created by a lesser, nastier god, and since this movie is so clearly Gnostic, then the Creator referenced in the film must be a portrayal of that lesser god.
Oh gosh, really? That sounds like a pretty substantial claim. He’s probably going to back that up with something that happens in the movie to support that idea oh wait no he’s not. I guess we’ll just have to take his word for it, then.
While it is true that Gnosticism borrows from Kabbalistic teachings (as do many other belief systems/celebrities trying to be deep), the overall attitude of Gnosticism differs vastly from Kabbalah. Gnosticism asserts that creation is bad and that the only goodness lies with the immaterial. Conversely, Kabbalah views creation as being damaged, but ultimately redeemable.
Now, Aronofsky’s ‘Noah’ exhibits great respect for creation, so Mattson’s interpretation here is significantly misguided. Also, Mattson’s claim that the Creator in the film is silent, evil, and generally contentious is simply not accurate at all. Nowhere in the film is it indicated that the Creator is the mustache-twirling villain. Nowhere is it indicated that, as Mattson puts it, “the serpent was right all along.” In fact, the exact opposite is insinuated. Any doubts Noah has about the Creator’s plan, and any of the heinous actions he takes that he thinks are in service of the Creator are contradicted quite strongly by the other characters in the film.
There was one thing in this movie which Mattson mentions in his article that actually did put me off when I saw it: the snake-skin.
For those of you who haven’t seen the film, the snake is shown shedding its skin before approaching Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden as part of the film’s back-story. That snake-skin is then treasured as a relic, and passed down through Seth’s bloodline from generation to generation. The film actually opens with Noah as a young boy being blessed with the snake-skin by his father Lamech (until Lamech is killed and the snake-skin is stolen by the film’s main villain).
Initially, this creeped me out. But then I read this article by Orthodox film critic Peter Chattaway, in which he debunks Brian Mattson’s article and explores the influence of Kabbalah on Aronofsky’s interpretation of the story of Noah. In his review, he gives credit to several other writers who observed that the snake is originally depicted in the Garden as a glowing, beautiful creature, similar to Adam and Eve, until it sheds its green skin and becomes black in color. The skin itself can then be interpreted as a reminder of Creation’s original goodness, not as a thing of evil.
So, is this film a good translation of the source material? I think I would say yes. It isn’t the adaptation that the fundamentalists were hoping for, but it’s definitely a much more interesting one.
Now for Scale #2: is it a good standalone film?
Meh…
(Warning: In this section of the review, I will be going through the entire plot of the movie. For those of you who haven’t seen it, I will cut you off after my general thoughts about the film with a big, all-caps ‘spoiler alert.’)
So, this movie has some great stuff going for it. The special effects and cinematography were beautiful. My favorite parts of the film were Noah’s dream sequences. They were gorgeous, creepy, and very effective as plot devices. If Aronofsky had decided to have God’s booming voice reverberating through the sky, telling Noah everything he needed to know, I probably would have rolled my eyes. For this movie, it just would have been too hokey.
There was also some really solid acting in this film. Russell Crowe as Noah was pretty much perfectly cast, and he gave an excellent performance. Jennifer Connelly and Emma Watson were fabulous, Ray Winstone was great, but Anthony Hopkins as Methuselah really took the proverbial cake. He should have had way more screen time, if you ask me.
But when it comes to the story and characters…honestly, this movie left me cold.
I was more emotionally invested in ‘Evan Almighty’ than I was in ‘Noah.’
Yes. This movie. I was more emotionally invested in THIS MOVIE.
To be more specific, I thought most of the characters were two-dimensional, the rock monsters were dumb, and Shem was prettier than me, which I resented.
Let’s just go through the story, shall we?
Oh, and here’s that ***SPOILER ALERT*** that I mentioned earlier.
The film opens with a brief synopsis of Genesis; Creation, the Fall, Abel’s murder, and the establishment of Cain’s civilization. A silhouette of Cain raising his arm and smashing his brother’s skull in with a rock is used in this montage, and it is repeated throughout the film until it is directly mirrored when the Main Bad Guy tries to kill Noah towards the end. I mention this because I thought it was a really great use of imagery that let the audience know (and consistently reminded them) what exactly went wrong with humanity and why the Flood had to happen at all.
As I said earlier, the story begins with young Noah witnessing the murder of his father and the theft of the snake-skin. Then, we see Noah all grown up and foraging with his young children for tiny, fuzzy plants to eat. Suddenly, he sees a bizarre dog creature covered in scales run by.
Noah tells his children to hide and then runs after Scaly Dog. At first, I thought he was chasing it because WHOA IT’S A SCALY DOG THAT’S WEIRD, but no, he’s actually chasing it because it has an arrow in its flank, and I guess he feels bad for it or something.
The hunters who wounded Scaly Dog soon catch up to Noah, and they have a cool fight sequence. This is where the undertone of environmentalism in this film first materializes, and a line is drawn that separates Noah and his family, the virtuous non-meat-eaters, from the carnivorous Black Hats (bad guys).
To be fair, animal-eating is not the main vice the Black Hats are shown to indulge in. They are vicious barbarians who have no problem with murder and violence, and their cruelty towards the animals they intend to devour gave me flashbacks to certain scenes in ‘Shaun of the Dead.’
Simon Pegg, you complete me.
Also, as Genesis 9:1-5 indicates, God only allowed mankind to eat meat AFTER the flood. So really, Aronofsky got this part right. However, he conveniently failed to include a part at the end where the Creator tells Noah and his family that they can now abandon their vegan ways, which makes me think he only capitalized on that particular part of the culture back then to send an environmentalist message.
Shortly after this event, Noah has a dream about the flood. So, he packs his family up and they go to visit his great-grandfather Methuselah for some unexplained reason who, for some other unexplained reason, lives in a cave and hasn’t even met his great great grandkids. On the way, they pick up a little orphaned girl named Ila who’s been stabbed in the gut (which, as we discover later, results in her infertility).
Then some Black Hats chase them, and they end up escaping into Watcher territory. The Watchers are big rock people who used to be angels, but they disobeyed the Creator and came to Earth to try to help humanity after the Fall. They end up getting covered in lava or something when they hit the ground, so now they’re Friendly Boulder Buddies. Except not so friendly, because we were mean to them when they were trying to be nice to us, so now they’re Bitter Boulder Buddies.
People mean! ME SMASH.
Now, I really like the idea of including the Watchers in this story, as there is vague talk in Genesis about fallen angels and mysterious creatures called the Nephilim, who have been speculated to be fallen angel/human hybrids (more on the Nephilim can be found here). However, I just can’t get behind the rock monster thing. They’re very well done in terms of special effects, but I personally found them silly looking and difficult to take seriously.
Madeleine L’Engle, one of my favorite writers, also did a retelling of Noah’s Ark in her book titled ‘Many Waters.’ She also included fallen angels; the Nephilim. They appear human-like, except they are freakishly tall, have wings, and can turn into animals.
The reason I bring this up is because I wish Aronofsky had done something like this instead of the Mineral Monsters. In L’Engle’s story, the Nephilim are evil (hence them being “fallen” angels). Oh, and they are SUPER creepy. Physically attractive and dripping with charm, many of them have managed to acquire human wives. They were so much more emotionally jarring than the Watchers were, and for me, if given a choice between ’emotionally jarring’ and ‘good for cool action scenes,’ I will pick the former much of the time.
Anyways, one of the Pebble People decides Noah ain’t such a bad guy, so the Watchers reluctantly let them go about their business. When they finally arrive at the mountain, Noah and his oldest son Shem (who looks to be about ten years old), leave the rest of the family behind and hike the last leg of the trip to Methuselah’s cave alone.
Upon meeting Shem for the first time, Methuselah asks him what his favorite thing in all the world is. Shem replies: “Berries.”
Dream big, Shem.
Methuselah then tells Shem that if he ever finds any berries, please bring him some. Remember this guys, because it’s going to become an important subplot when it grows up.
Methuselah doesn’t prove to be very helpful in elucidating Noah’s dream, so Noah wonders aloud what was the point of him coming at all, and silently the whole audience is asking themselves the same question. Then Methuselah’s like “But wait…there’s more!” and tells Noah that he slipped him some LSD or Rohypnal or something in his tea. Noah passes out and has another awesomely creepy dream about the flood, but this time, he sees the ark too.
Because if God wants to tell you something important, He has to wait for an old man to give you a roofie first.
Lesson: let old men give you roofies.
Methuselah also gives Noah a seed passed down from the Garden of Eden. When Noah plants it, a stream bubbles up and a forest shoots instantly from the ground. The Watchers, who were watching (get it?), are now finally convinced that Neo is the One. I mean, Noah.
Did I really just spend time making this?
Blah blah, eight years later, construction on the ark is almost complete, blah blah, the Watchers are their friends now, blah blah. Animals start showing up, the Black Hats have fewer resources and are starving, and Ham is sulking because he doesn’t have a girlfriend. Because this is an 80’s teen sitcom now.
Seriously, though. Ham’s got some legitimate concerns. For starters, everyone is going to be dead soon. No girlfriend now, no girlfriend EVER. Good ol’ Dad realizes this, and sneaks into the Black Hats’ settlement to find two girls for Ham and Japheth to assure the continuation of the human race. Shem doesn’t need a ladyfriend, because he’s got Ila. Even if he did need a ladyfriend, he probably wouldn’t need Dad’s help getting one.
While Noah is there, he sees a whole bunch of disturbing stuff. Some guy drags off a couple of girls to sell them (either into slavery, prostitution, or for use as much-needed meat–yeah, gross), and I’m thinking “Woo, Super Noah! Go save those girls and bring them back to the ark with you,” but no, instead he gets all existential and angsty and goes back to the ark empty-handed. Uh, Super Noah?
When Noah gets back, he tells his wife Naameh that they are no different from the sinners the Creator wants to destroy and that they shouldn’t be trying to repopulate the Earth; they should just save the animals, and then allow themselves to die out. Naameh thinks Noah’s off his rocker, so she goes to visit Methuselah in his cave and asks for his help.
Ham is mega-huffy that his Dad didn’t bring him home a girlfriend, so he runs off into the woods. Ila, who’s just had a little spat with Shem because she’s upset that she can’t provide children for him, runs after Ham.
While looking for him, she happens upon Methuselah, who is rooting around for, you guessed it, berries. Awww, my little subplot’s all grown up.
Methuselah beckons to Ila, who’s really weirded out by him at first, but then he heals her womb with his magical powers that he apparently has, so she gets really excited and starts to run back to the ark. On the way she bumps into Shem, and, because she is now terribly fertile, she throws herself at him and starts ripping his clothes off. Because this is the best time to fool around. Right now.
I was not a fan of this particular plot development at all. First of all, we have no idea who Shem and Ila are as a couple, so we have no reason to care whether they reconcile or not. I mean, I get that the whole point of this is the continuation of humans, or whatever, but come on. How are we supposed to care whether there are more humans or not if we don’t even care about the few humans we’ve already got?
Who the heck is Shem, anyway? He’s hardly ever in the story. He’s just kind of…there. Sometimes, he stands next to things. Oh, and his hair wafts around in the breeze a lot. Ila had a little more to do and a lot more screen time, but I still didn’t come out of the theater feeling like I had any idea who she was as a person.
I would have preferred Shem finding Ila first, making up with her, and THEN Methuselah could come along and sprinkle her with his magic pixie dust. That would have given us at least some idea of what their relationship is like and why we should be interested in it. You know, by NOT removing obstacles from their path with convenient plot manipulations.
Anyway, while all this is happening, Ham is wandering around the Black Hats’ settlement looking desperate. He falls into a ditch full of dead people and meets a grimy female who appears to be either very traumatized, or very insane. Probably both.
Ham’s really nice to her, so she agrees to go back to the ark with him. However, it starts to rain, and the Black Hats start to freak out because Noah was right all along and now they’re all toast. So, they all run off to try to get on the ark right as Ham and his new ladyfriend are starting to head back themselves.
Shem and Ila finally get back to the ark and Noah’s like “Where’s Ham?” and they look at each other guiltily because OMG, they totally forgot about Ham because they were too busy getting it on in the woods.
Ham and Potential Girlfriend (whose name I can’t remember because she wasn’t that important to anyone but Mr. Wildly Desperate) are trying to outrun the Black Hats, but then Potential Girlfriend gets her leg caught in a trap. Ham tries to help her, but he can’t get her out, and the Black Hat stampede is closing in rapidly behind them.
Suddenly, out of a nearby phone booth, Super Noah appears! Assessing the situation, Super Noah drags Ham away from Potential Girlfriend and leaves her to be trampled to death by hordes of Black Hats.
Naturally, Ham is displeased by this turn of events. “She was innocent!” he cries, his eyes filling with tears. Yes, because she was a creepy girl you met on a pile of dead bodies and knew for five minutes. Of course she was innocent.
But alas, Ham’s cries fall on deaf ears, because Noah is still having some kind of existential crisis and thinks that his whole family should die along with everyone else. And he’s upset that nobody seems to understand his point of view. Poor Noah.
The only story-line I really care about in this movie is whether or not Methuselah is ever going to find a berry. Poor me.
Then, we get the whole reason the Watchers were even in this movie at all: a Really Big Action Scene. Noah and his family all get on the ark, and the Rubble Riffraff position themselves around it and start tossing Black Hats around like parade candy.
Little did everyone know, most of the Black Hats who were storming the ark were actually Shem fangirls.
Tubal-Cain, the Main Bad Guy, manages to make it around one of the Watchers and sneak onto the ark. Because otherwise, who would cause conflict and pose a threat to our plucky heroes and heroines? What would the climax of our film be? We must stick to the basic formula and keep the Main Bad Guy alive until the very end!
Methuselah, in the meantime, is still out in the woods looking for his berry. Yup. Suddenly, a giant wave comes crashing through the forest towards him. Right at the same moment, Methuselah finally finds his berry. HALLELUJAH NOW HE CAN DIE
Wait…what?
Methuselah meets the massive wall of water coming right at his face with arms outstretched, like he wants to give his own death a big hug or something. Because he’s really old, guys. It’s his time.
The only real problem I have with this is that no one else in Noah’s family seems to be the least bit concerned about their dear old Granddad. All it would take is one stinking line of dialogue, i.e. “where’s Methuselah,” to assure us that no, these people are not soulless and heartless, and they do care what happens to their immediate family.
Anyway, back at the ark the Cobblestone-Patch Kids have begun sacrificing themselves. Their rocky exterior is pried off by Black Hats (or by themselves) and their pretty, glowing innards shoot straight up to heaven, exploding as they go. Hooray! They’ve been redeemed!
The flood happens. Everyone dies. And then, we come to the only part of the film that I had an emotional reaction to. We see people clinging to a rock jutting out of the swirling water, then, we cut back to Noah inside the ark, where we can still hear those same people screaming. His family begs to be allowed to let some of them in; they have room. But Noah refuses.
Gathering his family around, Noah tells them the story of Creation and the Fall. He then tells them that they will all die out eventually and that Japheth will be the last man alive. He apologizes to Ham about his Almost Girlfriend, and Ham responds by pointedly leaving the room, because he is 400% DONE, guys.
So Ham leaves, and discovers a broken-legged Tubal-Cain stowed away somewhere on the ark. For some reason, he doesn’t tell anyone about this. Okay, Ham. I was with you until now. Would you kindly explain yourself? No? Okay.
Ila wakes up one day with morning sickness, and Naameh tells her that she’s probably preggers. The rain suddenly stops, which they take to be a sign that the Creator has smiled upon the child, but Noah gets really mad because this has messed up his whole plan, and tells Ila angrily that if this unfortunate kid is a girl, he’ll kill it.
I’m sorry, but is Noah prone to psychological breakdowns? Don’t get me wrong, I actually really like this little crisis he’s having right now. It’s totally plausible that a deeply spiritual guy is going to have a lot of inner turmoil about wiping out humanity only to repopulate it with more people who might still turn out the same way. But now he’s gonna kill a kid? Where did that come from?
I don’t sympathize with Noah at all. I don’t see the natural progression of his descent into madness. One minute, he’s a normal guy, the next minute he’s upset, and then the next minute he’s insane and homicidal. I don’t get it. I mean, I get him saying he’ll kill the kid in a moment of frustration and weakness, but after this scene, we skip over the entire nine months of Ila’s pregnancy, and Noah’s still plotting murder.
So, it is now the aforementioned nine months later, and Ham is apparently in cahoots with Tubal-Cain, who is manipulating him to kill his own father using Noah’s plan to kill Ila’s baby as a primary motive. Ham appears to be just going along with it. And again, I don’t get it.
I get that he’s mad at his dad, for a number of totally justified reasons. And I get that Tubal-Cain is manipulating him. But I wish we could have at least seen a glimmer of how this evil guy is somehow managing to coerce Ham into murder. Since we skipped over that part, the whole thing just doesn’t feel natural.
Maybe if Aronofsky had cut out some of that stuff at the beginning of the movie where Noah’s kids are all wandering around being played by child actors, we would have had time for more important stuff later. Like this.
Shem and Ila have made a raft with which to escape before the baby is born, but Noah gets a torch, burns it, and then stares at them intensely.
Suddenly, Ila goes into labor. Naameh ushers her away to have the baby in privacy, and Ham materializes to tell Noah that he has to come quickly because the animals are tearing each other apart.
Noah goes down into the bowels of the ark with Ham, where Tubal-Cain is waiting for him. He jumps on Noah, and the two of them duke it out. Ham stands aside, torn between the two of them.
While this is all going down, Ila has given birth to twin girls. Shem freaks and runs off to find Noah to keep him away from the babies. He comes in on Noah and Tubal-Cain mid-fight and tries to get involved, but Tubal-Cain bats him aside like a pesky horse-fly and shouts that Noah is his to kill.
Tubal-Cain finally gets Noah pinned down, and, raising a knife over his head, gets ready to kill him. But then, Ham suddenly decides to come to his senses and stabs Tubal-Cain from behind. Tubal-Cain gives Ham the snake-skin, says “Now you’re a man,” and then topples over and dies.
Noah runs to the upper level of the ark and bursts into the delivery room, ready to murder some babies.
Heeeeeeeere’s Noah!
But all Noah finds in the delivery room is Naameh, alone. She lies and tells him the baby is a boy, but Ila’s absence from the room tells Noah otherwise. Naameh weakly grabs at him, trying ineffectually to stop him, but Noah rushes away and climbs the ladder leading to the top of the ark.
Come on, Naameh. I understand that you’re a woman and consequently have no upper body strength, but that was just lame. I could have done better than that, and the only exercise I get is typing and walking back and forth between my bed and the refrigerator.
Noah finds Ila standing on top of the ark, holding her twin sacks of potatoes–I mean, girls–in her arms. Noah comes at them with a knife, but Ila cries and asks him to let her quiet them so they can die peacefully. Noah stands back, and Ila sings her daughters a song that Noah used to sing to her when she was a little girl. Hey, I see what you’re doing there, Ila!
The babies stop crying, and Noah approaches with the knife. Okay, Ila. Your lullaby idea was great, but clearly, it failed to tap into Noah’s humanity. What’s your big plan now?
Apparently, Ila’s new plan is to cry and say “Do it quickly!” Do it quickly? That’s it? You’re not going do anything else? Your big plan is…to stand there? Also, where is everyone? Tubal-Cain didn’t hit Shem that hard. Are we supposed to believe he’s still knocked out? Is Ham just sitting down there, obsessing over his own angst? And how long does it take Naameh to climb a ladder, anyway? Is it those weak, feminine arms that are holding her back?
Oh wait, here’s Naameh, at last. And…she’s standing there. Okay, Naameh. Be useless. That’s fine.
But luckily, at the last minute, Noah can’t bring himself to kill the sacks of potatoes–I mean, the CGI babies they borrowed from ‘Breaking Dawn.’ He instead kisses their heads as a dove flies overhead with a sprig of greenery in its mouth.
The water is drying up, and the family finds a place to land. Noah separates himself from everyone else and goes to live alone in a beach cave. Like great-grandfather, like great-grandson, I guess. He feels really guilty about everything that happened, so he gets super drunk and hangs around naked. (Which actually does happen in the Bible, by the way, just not under these particular circumstances.)
Ham gives his dad back the snake-skin, and then I guess because he’s still mad at him or something, he packs his things, says goodbye to everyone, and leaves.
Shortly after this, Noah has a (fully clothed) heart to heart with Ila, and she asks him why he spared her daughters. He tells her that when he looked at them, he felt nothing but love, but he’s also still upset because he feels like he failed the Creator. Ila tells him that he didn’t fail, rather, his mercy was proof of humanity’s capacity for good.
Noah comes home to his wife, and they kiss and make up. Later, they all gather together and Noah performs the ritual of blessing his new granddaughters with the snake-skin. A rainbow appears in the sky and everyone is happy(ish).
So, that was ‘Noah.’
Again, it’s got some good stuff going for it. Really interesting theological background, great acting and special effects, and a few really evocative moments. But there was so much that just didn’t work for me. Not to say that I wouldn’t recommend it–I would. It’s definitely worth seeing.
But this review is so late most of you have probably already seen it anyway.
Even if you hadn’t, I just kinda gave away everything that happens. Sorry bout it.
Today, I must bare my soul to you all. I must open myself up to disdain and ridicule. Today, I am going to write about all the reasons I secretly love Twilight.
Haha, just kidding. I actually hate it like a normal person.
I realize the subject of Twilight-bashing has been worn to death, but as Twilight-bashing is a long-standing hobby of mine, I thought I might as well wear the subject to un-death (get it? Because vampires? I’M FUNNY). I actually read all four of the books, just so I could make fun of them and actually know what I was talking about. This post, however, only concerns my hatred for the first book, because I like to organize my hate.
Plot in a nutshell: Some average girl goes to a new school, meets a hot guy, who turns out to be (gasp!) a vampire. She falls hopelessly in love with Hot Vampire Guy, and, oddly enough, he falls hopelessly in love with her. But there’s a ‘bad vampire’ after Average Girl who wants to eat her (this guy is my favorite character). So, Hot Vampire Guy must risk all to save her. Complications inevitably ensue. Hot Vampire Guy wins, and he and Average Girl ride off into the sunset together. The end.
Let’s start with the protagonist: Bella Swan.
No, seriously, that’s her real name.
Bella is clumsy, bad at sports, and is constantly in danger of bodily harm. Her awkwardness makes her easy to relate to, but other than that, she’s practically nonexistent. She’s nothing more than a glorified prop dumped in the middle of the story by the author. With almost no personality, she’s as boring as a pet rock. Edward’s Pet Rock, to be precise.
The only persona we can really assign to Pet Rock is that of a whiny child. She spends the entire book moaning about how bad she is at sports, being consumed by how gorgeous Edward is, and generally wallowing in her own teenage angst. She has no real interests–no goals, no ambitions, no hobbies. Stephenie Meyer briefly mentions that Pet Rock likes the book Wuthering Heights, and she also seems to have an appreciation for classical music, but these things are really only mentioned once over the course of the whole book, and are never reintroduced as integral parts of her character.
Now for Edward… Let’s face it, girls, we are NEVER going to find an Edward Cullen. Anywhere. He’s perfect. He even sparkles. Seriously. In bright sunlight, our Edward looks like he was rolled in glitter for a kid’s art project. He is the ultimate hero; tall, polite, mysterious and handsome.
From the moment Pet Rock sets eyes on Edward, she becomes so preoccupied by him that she can’t possibly think about anything else. If it ever crosses Pet Rock’s mind that Edward might leave her, she hurls herself into a black abyss of despair. Not that she’s all that happy anyway, she’s constantly complaining about something or other.
The story, being told in the first person, subjects us to listening to all of Pet Rock’s utterly insipid thoughts, which either revolve around how miserable every aspect of her tiny little life is, or how all of Edward’s shirts seem to fit him snugly enough to effectively show off his sculpted, “incandescent” chest and abs.
Oh yeah. Those weren’t spray-painted on at all.
Unlike Pet Rock, whom we never get a detailed physical description of, every time Edward walks into a room we are forced to listen to the poor, demented author rattle on about how gorgeous he is, exactly what he’s wearing, and what his breath smells like. I kid you not. Half the book consists of paragraphs of Edward-worshiping tripe, something akin to this:
Suddenly, Edward walked through the door. I felt my heart beating faster and faster. Could he hear it? Slowly, I let my eyes travel to his wondrous face. I sighed rapturously. Truly, I thought, Edward’s face must be God’s gift to a depraved humanity. His hair was combed to the left today, I noticed–it had been combed to the right the day before. How utterly angelic he was! He was making an interesting fashion statement today–he was dressed in a tattered, dingy, polka-dotted shirt, and baggy purple pants, all full of holes. He looked like a homeless clown, I thought. An adorable homeless clown. My eyes went down his entire frame until they reached his feet, clad in the ever-classy socks and sandals combo. One of the socks had a hole in it. I drew in my breath. Out of the hole peeped the curved, white surface of his big toe. His beautiful, perfect toe! I was spellbound. I could not look away. Oh, I would have fallen down on the ground at his feet and tenderly kissed that toe, that appendage belonging to the man–vampire–whom I ardently loved.
Edward is infatuated with Pet Rock too, for whatever reason. He seems nice enough at first, once you get past the whole spooky glowering thing, but then he starts to get confusing. He offers Pet Rock a ride to Seattle, and then literally two seconds later he’s telling her that she “really should stay away” from him. Mixed signals much?
Then things start to get creepy. Edward starts BREAKING INTO PET ROCK’S HOUSE AT NIGHT TO WATCH HER SLEEP. I’m sorry, is that not a red flag in the paranormal YA universe? Just to make things even more dysfunctional, we see Pet Rock enthusiastically rejecting the perfectly nice, normal gestures of the boys at her school in favor of Edward’s weird stalker-like behavior.
Edward literally obsesses over Pet Rock and her safety (no wonder–she’s a walking catastrophe just waiting to happen). This is probably interpreted by the teenage girl population as “Oh, that means he really really loves her! How romantic is that?” when it is, in fact, a sign that Edward, perhaps, has psychological problems of some kind? Hmm. In real life, his monomaniacal behavior would be more of an annoyance rather than a swoon-worthy trait.
There doesn’t really seem to be any real love going on between Edward and Pet Rock. Edward (supposedly) loves Pet Rock because she “fascinates him” and…she smells nice. Such ardor. Pet Rock “unconditionally and irrevocably” loves Edward because he’s so pretty and is constantly saving her from the jaws of death. She has no life outside of her relationship with Edward; if she’s not with him, she’s obsessing over him. If she’s not obsessing over him–you must have finished the book.
Edward and Pet Rock are probably the world’s most perfect couple. It’s true. They’re both content to spend the rest of their lives making googly eyes at each other and telling the rest of the world to go to hell (Pet Rock has people practically lining up to be friends with her, for whatever reason, but she dismisses their attentions as ‘annoying’ and instead chooses to hang out with Creepy Vampire Stalker Man).
I did enjoy Twilight to some extent. It certainly was entertaining. So many parodies of both the book and the movie have been made, but it doesn’t really need one. It’s a parody of itself. Reading it out loud, it gets especially ridiculous (my favorite line is “And so, the lion fell in love with the lamb.” GAG ME WITH A SPOON).
At the top, as high as Gandalf could reach, was an arch of interlacing letters in Elvish character. Below, though the threads were in places blurred or broken, the outline could be seen of an anvil and a hammer surmounted by a crown with seven stars…
“There are the emblems of Durin!” cried Gimli.
Here, at the West-gate of Moria, Durin’s Crown makes its first appearance in J.R.R. Tolkien’s popular fantasy trilogy The Lord of the Rings. The legendary constellation is depicted on the West-gate (also known as ‘The Doors of Durin’) in the first book in the series: The Fellowship of the Ring. The constellation of Durin’s Crown appears in the legends of Middle-earth, and the only real proof of its existence is its image on the Doors of Durin. Was it a real constellation, or was it merely a vision; a wondrous event on par with the appearance of the Star of Bethlehem?
If Durin’s Crown were intended to be a real constellation in the Middle-earth sky, it is very likely that it has a counterpart in our own night sky; a constellation which Tolkien may have used as a model when constructing the mythology around it. Tolkien has stated numerous times that Middle-earth is really meant to be Europe in a time before recorded history. In a letter to his publishing company, he says:
Middle-earth, by the way, is not a name of a never-never land without relation to the world we live in…. It is just a use of Middle-English middle-erde (or erthe), altered from Old English Middangeard: the name for the inhabited lands of Men ‘between the seas’. And though I have not attempted to relate the shape of the mountains and land-masses to what geologists may say or surmise about the nearer past, imaginatively this ‘history’ is supposed to take place in a period of the actual Old World of this planet.
Modeling his imaginary world after the real world in a realistic way took a considerable bit of effort. Tolkien put an extreme amount of thought into the world he was creating, and strove to give it as much depth as possible by incorporating as many aspects of our world as he could. Astronomy was one such topic of interest for him that is deeply embedded in the fabric of his literature.
If one were to read the first drafts of The Lord of the Rings (edited versions of which have been published by Tolkien’s youngest son Christopher Tolkien) one would find them to be overflowing with references to the phases of the moon. It also appears that most, if not all, of Frodo’s journey to Mount Doom is choreographed to the lunar phases of 1941-2. There are a few discrepancies however, as the lunar chronology did not work as smoothly as Tolkien had anticipated, and there is evidence of his frustration with this particular problem in his letters to his son Christopher. All his efforts, while not fruitless, went rather unnoticed by the average reader, as many of his lunar cycle references were edited out of the final version before the trilogy’s publication.
Stars played a large role in the mythos of Middle-earth. The Elves, for example, are known as the ‘Eldar;’ the people of the stars. It is said that during the creation of the world, the Elves were the first to awaken and beheld the stars before any other living creature. Also, in Elvish star lore, the stars were created not once, but twice. In the beginning, the original stars were small and dim, and during the second star-making, brighter stars were created to grace the Middle-earth sky.
Tolkien also used the stars as symbols of all that is good. In The Fellowship of the Ring, for example, Elrond, the Elven ruler of Rivendell, sees the Fellowship off and blesses them, saying “May the stars shine upon your faces!”
The planet Venus makes an appearance in the trilogy as well. Venus, or the Evening Star, is called Eärendil in Middle-earth. Eärendil was said to be Elrond’s father, and is described as sailing the heavens wearing a bright jewel called the silmaril. In The Fellowship of the Ring, when the Elven lady Galadriel gives Frodo a small phial as a parting gift, she tells him that the light of Eärendil has been caught in the phial, and says “May it be a light for you in dark places, when all other lights go out.” Both Frodo and Sam use the phial later on in Shelob’s lair (The Two Towers) to ward off the giant spider Shelob.
Another instance in which Tolkien used modern astronomy in his literature is the design of Middle-earth constellations. All of the constellations and stars of Middle-earth described in Tolkien’s works directly correlate to constellations in the current night sky. For example, the description of the constellation Wilwarin (Elvish: ‘butterfly’) can without a doubt be identified with the prominent northern constellation Cassiopeia.
Cassiopeia
Another constellation, Soronúmë (Elvish: ‘eagle’) corresponds with our current Aquila the Eagle:
Aquila the Eagle
Remmirath, a small group of seven stars has been identified by Christopher Tolkien to be our Seven Sisters, or the Pleiades:
The Pleiades (Seven Sisters)
Menelvagor (Elvish: ‘heaven-swordsman’) is clearly our modern Orion, as is indicated in a passage from The Fellowship of the Ring that reads:
Away high in the East swung Remmirath, the Netted Stars, and slowly above the mists red Borgil rose, glowing like a jewel of fire. Then by some shifts of airs all the mist was drawn away like a veil, and there leaned up, as he climbed over the rim of the world, the Swordsman of the Sky, Menelvagor with his shining belt.
Orion
The red star Borgil in the above passage can also be identified with our star Aldebaran, a giant orange star in our sky that rises before Orion, rendering it compatible with the description Tolkien gives above. Another famous grouping of stars in the Middle-earth sky is the Valacirca. Alternative names for this constellation are ‘The Burning Briar,’ ‘Sickle of the Valar,’ and ‘The Plough,’ the latter of which is the name used in British English to refer to the Big Dipper.
The Big Dipper (part of Ursa Major)
Of all the constellations in the Middle-earth sky, Durin’s Crown is the only one with which a definite connection has not been made. All previous evidence would suggest that Durin’s Crown corresponds to a similar constellation located in the night sky of this world. However, which of these constellations it could be has been the subject of much debate. Speculators have very little to go on, as it is uncertain if the shape of Durin’s Crown is the shape shown on the West-gate of Moria or if that was merely an artistic rendition. The only clues we have are the aforesaid image on the Doors of Durin, and the legend of Durin himself.
Durin I was the first of the seven Fathers of the Dwarves to be created at the beginning of time. According to the tradition of the Dwarves, he was set to sleep under the mountains of Middle-earth until after the creation of the Elves, Durin awoke alone at Mount Gundabad in the Misty Mountains during the time period Tolkien refers to as ‘The Years of the Trees,’ and journeyed south until he stumbled across Mirrormere, a lake located below what was soon to become the East-gate of Moria.
Peering into the waters of the lake, Durin saw the reflection of a crown of stars over his head, despite the fact that it was daylight and no stars should have been visible in the sky. He took this strange phenomenon as a good omen, and soon after founded the great Dwarven city of Khazad-dûm, which would later come to be more widely known as the Mines of Moria. A pillar called Durin’s Stone was set in the earth on the bank of the lake Mirrormere to commemorate the location and the event.
Durin I was often called ‘Durin the Deathless,’ although he was not immortal. He did, however, live to a very old age even by the Dwarves’ standards, outliving some of his children. It is speculated that he lived 1000-4000 years, making him the oldest Dwarf ever to have lived. The Dwarves believed that Durin would be reincarnated seven times, and he did have six descendants, all named Durin, who reigned in Moria after his death. The images of an anvil and a crown of stars became Durin’s embelms; their images appearing on the West-gate of Moria.
Tolkien’s original drawing of the Moria gate. Durin’s Crown can be seen near the center, directly above the hammer.
This legend appears in The Fellowship of the Ring, when Gimli sings ‘The Song of Durin’ while the company is traveling to Moria. Within the first stanza, Durin’s Crown is introduced:
The world was young, the mountains green,
No stain yet on the Moon was seen,
No words were laid on stream or stone
When Durin awoke and walked alone.
He named the nameless hills and dells;
He drank from yet untasted wells;
He stooped and looked in Mirrormere
And saw a crown of stars appear,
As gems upon a silver thread,
Above the shadows of his head.
Gimli insists on looking into Mirrormere when leaving Moria through the East-gate, Frodo and Sam joining him. Looking into the water, they see the reflection of the forms of the mountains encircling them, and the reflection of the constellation of Durin’s Crown, although the sun was out and no stars were visible.
In identifying this group of stars with a grouping of stars in our own sky, one must take into consideration every clue that is given. Durin’s Crown was, according to the legend of Durin the Deathless, located in the Northern Hemisphere of Arda (the sky). Since it was described to be visible at all times, even during the day, the options for its current night sky counterpart are significantly narrowed. If it never sets in the Middle-earth sky, then it would most definitely have to be a circumpolar constellation viewed from England (Tolkien’s home), correlating it to the small group of north circumpolar constellations in the sky.
Circumpolar stars are those that, from the viewer’s latitude, never set. The celestial north pole, a point in the sky around which all stars and constellations rotate, is currently situated near Polaris, which is often called the North Star. Polaris always has an azimuth equal to zero, ‘azimuth’ being the measure of the angular distance along the horizon to the location of the object. This measurement, by astronomical convention, begins in the north at the North Star (Polaris) at an azimuth of zero. Put more simply, the measure of the azimuth of a star is a similar concept to the measure of the latitude of a country or place on the globe.
All the stars in the night sky rotate around Polaris at varying azimuths. Those stars which are close enough to Polaris in the sky will simply rotate Polaris above the viewer’s head and never set. This will vary depending on one’s location on the earth. For example, if a person is standing at the North Pole, Polaris will be directly above his head and ALL the stars revolving around it will never go down below the horizon line; all stars at the North Pole are circumpolar. The same goes for the South Pole, only with different stars and constellations. From the equator, there are no circumpolar stars. From mid-north latitudes, Polaris will appear towards the north, some stars will rise and set, while others remain circumpolar. From England, circumpolar constellations included Ursa Major, Ursa Minor, Draco, Cepheus, Cassiopeia and Camelopardalis.
The image of Durin’s Crown represented on the Doors of Durin depicts a curved sort of v- shape, however it is uncertain as to whether or not this is the true shape of the constellation or not. The crown is made up of seven stars, which also narrows the field considerably. Most writers say that the most obvious candidate is Middle-earth’s Valacirca, or our Big Dipper. The number of stars in the constellation is correct, however, the Big Dipper’s shape is not the shape shown on the Doors of Durin.
The final artistic rendering of the seven stars of Durin’s Crown, visible at the top just under the arch.
Corona Borealis has also been suggested, for its seven stars are curved in a crown-like shape (although the shape is upside-down compared to what is seen on the Doors of Durin), and the name ‘corona’ means ‘crown’, however Corona Borealis is not a circumpolar constellation, so from Tolkien’s latitude, it would have set in the night sky. It is not impossible that Tolkien used Corona Borealis as a model when constructing the myth of Durin’s Crown, however a precise identification with the northern constellation cannot be made.
Corona Borealis
Another faint possibility is Auriga, another circumpolar constellation that has almost the right shape.
Auriga
Dr. Kristine Larsen, professor of physics and astronomy at Central Connecticut State University has done massive amounts of research on Tolkien’s use of astronomy in his works, written numerous papers and taught many classes on the subject. She has put forth a hypothesis of her own: Cepheus the King. Cepheus is a north circumpolar constellation with seven stars.
It is possible that Tolkien perhaps used a non-circumpolar constellation (such as Corona Borealis) and simply adapted it to be used in the myth of Durin’s Crown, however considering all of the other constellations have such definite counterparts, and that there are such blatant references and similarities to our world’s astronomy, this answer does not seem entirely satisfactory.
But as the constellation of Durin’s Crown is only a myth in the lore of Middle-earth, and is apparently only visible in the reflection of Mirrormere, a definite identification is impossible to make.
And so Durin’s Crown remains a mystery. As, perhaps, it should.
_________________________________________
References
Byrd, D. (1993). ‘Exploring the North Polar Sky.’ Astronomy, 21(6), 68.
P.S. If anyone wanted to read the whole thing, here is the Song of Durin in its entirety.
The world world was young, the mountains green,
No stain yet on the Moon was seen,
No words were laid on stream or stone,
When Durin woke and walked alone.
He named the nameless hills and dells;
He drank from yet untasted wells;
He stooped and looked in Mirrormere, And saw a crown of stars appear, As gems upon a silver thread,
Above the shadow of his head.
The world was fair, the mountains tall,
In Elder Days before the fall
Of mighty Kings in Nargothrond
And Gondolin, who now beyond
The Western Seas have passed away:
The world was fair in Durin’s Day.
A king he was on carven throne
In many-pillared halls of stone
With golden roof and silver floor,
And runes of power upon the door.
The light of sun and star and moon
In shining lamps of crystal hewn
Undimmed by cloud or shade of night
There shown forever far and bright.
There hammer on the anvil smote,
There chisel clove, and graver wrote;
There forged was bladed and bound was hilt;
The delver mined the mason built.
There beryl, pearl, and opal pale
And metel wrought like fishes’ mail,
Buckler and corslet, axe and sword,
And shining spears were laid in horde.
Unwearied then were Durin’s folk;
Beneath the mountains music woke:
The harpers harped, the minstrels sang,
And at the gates the trumpets rang.
The world is grey, the mountains old,
The forge’s fire is ashen-cold;
No harp is wrung, no hammer falls:
The darkness dwells in Durin’s halls;
The shadow lies upon his tomb
In Moria, in Khazad-dûm.
But still the sunken stars appear
In dark and windless Mirrormere;
There lies his crown in water deep,
Till Durin wakes again from sleep.
P.P.S. I did a brief presentation on this topic for a colloquium event at my university, and I painted the West-gate of Moria on my presentation board and I’M SUPER PROUD OF IT SO HERE’S A PICTURE:
IT TOOK ME FOUR HOURS AND IT’S KIND OF CROOKED AND DISPROPORTIONATE IN PLACES, BUT I DON’T EVEN CARE. BECAUSE LOOK AT ALL THE GLITTER.
When I was a kid, I used to love the movie ‘The NeverEnding Story.’ Last week, I happened to come across it at the library (because I’m ninety years old and still go to the library), and I realized that I had been going around citing it as one of my favorite childhood movies when I hadn’t seen it in years and hardly even remembered why I liked it so much to begin with. So I checked it out. While I was watching it, I thought, gee, I should probably write down all my dumb thoughts about this movie in real time and then blab them all over the internet. So I did.
The movie opens with a montage of rolling clouds set to pop music (this movie is so 80’s already. I love it). And OH MY DEAR SWEET BABY SQUIDS THE TITLE OF THE MOVIE IS IN THE SONG. WOW I WONDER IF THEY DID THAT ON PURPOSE.
I’ll just leave this here…
So, this kid named Bastian Balthazar Bux (because THAT’S a totally normal name) is getting ready for school. Bastian tells his dad that he had a dream about his dead mother the night before. His prince of a dad sees this as a great opportunity to bring up the fact that Bastian isn’t doing well in school and to tell him that his mother being dead isn’t an excuse for slacking off, to which I vehemently say WHO FREAKING CARES ABOUT SCHOOL SOMEONE IS DEAD AND YOUR KID IS SUFFERING GET WITH THE PRIORITY STRAIGHTENING.
The Princely Dad also tells Bastian that he got a call from one of his teachers who said Bastian was drawing horses in his math book. Bastian mutters:
“Unicorns. They were unicorns.”
Yeah, Bastian’s Teacher. Unicorns. (There’s a reason you teach math, isn’t there?)
The Princely Dad then tells his son to keep his feet on the ground, and try not to be late to school again. Then he leaves for work and Bastian walks to school. By himself. In a big, dangerous looking city. I mean, I know this was the 80’s, but come on.
On his way to school, Bastian is accosted by some bullies who demand that he give them all his money. Bastian doesn’t have any money, so the bullies hoist him into a dumpster. Bastian climbs out, the boys chase him, so he hides in a dusty old bookstore.
And here we meet the film’s token mysterious old man, who’s name IMDb tells me is ‘Carl Conrad Coreander,’ because we must use as much triple alliteration in our characters’ names as possible.
Coreander is dismissive of Bastian until he finds out that Bastian is into books and not arcade games like other kids. He then proceeds to tell Bastian that the book he was reading when Bastian came in, titled ‘The NeverEnding Story,’ is different from any other book, and that Bastian absolutely cannot read it under any circumstances.
So of course, when Coreander goes to answer his phone, leaving the book conveniently on his desk, Bastian takes it and runs. Coreander watches him leave as the camera pans down to the note that Bastian left behind promising to return the book.
Bastian gets to school late and discovers that there’s a test going on in one of his classes. So he sneaks off to the attic and starts reading the book instead.
Now, I was home-schooled until college, and having never set foot in a public elementary school before, will someone please enlighten me: do they generally have filthy, cobweb-infested attics? Seriously. I have no clue. Public schools are a source of NeverEnding mystery to me.
So Bastian starts reading the book and we are immediately transported into the world of Fantasia.
We see two eccentric-looking characters called Night Hob and Teeny Weeny, and neither one of them is being played by Mickey Mouse, so instantly I am suspicious. Night Hob looks a lot like a house elf who started smoking pot, while Teeny Weeny kind of looks like the Mad Hatter (if the Mad Hatter had acknowledged that he had a mental problem and went through years of therapy).
Both of them appear to be camped out in the middle of a journey of some kind when this giant guy made entirely out of rocks comes rumbling up and unloads his personal problems all over their campsite. We learn that he’s a Rock Biter, and that he’s on his way to the Ivory Tower to see the Childlike Empress because there’s a big “Nothing” that’s basically turned Fantasia into its own personal buffet and is making things disappear without a trace.
Teeny Weeny and Night Hob reveal that they’re going to see the Empress for the same reason, and they all set off together on their various modes of transportation (namely a giant bat, a ‘racing snail’, and the Rock Biter’s weird rock-bulldozer-thingy).
When they get to the Ivory Tower, Night Hob, who’s riding the bat, flies up to the window of the tower and looks in to find that there is a crowd of Fantasians gathered there already, apparently all there for the same reason. And then we see…
A TIME LORD!
Nope, it’s just a guy named Cairon. He addresses the people of Fantasia and tells them that the Childlike Empress cannot help them because she is gravely ill, which is most likely directly tied to the Nothing. But a brave warrior named Atreyu, who is believed to be the only one who can stop the Nothing, has been summoned.
When Atreyu steps forward, however, Cairon and the rest of the Fantasians see that he is only a little boy. Cairon tells him they wanted Atreyu the Warrior, not Atreyu the Child, but Atreyu retorts that he is in fact the Warrior whom they sent for, and if they don’t want his help, well, he’s outta there. Because Atreyu’s got SASS.
Cairon begs him to stay, and tells him that he must go on a quest to figure out how to stop the Nothing and find a cure for the Empress. Oh, and he can’t take any weapons with him. And here’s where I interject. Um, why not?
Believe me, I get the concept that the Nothing isn’t something you can defeat with weapons. I swear I get it. But Atreyu’s just going to be riding around in this insane country populated by Lord-knows-what, literally looking for trouble. And he can’t have any weapons? Geez.
Well, Atreyu agrees, and Cairon gives him the Auryn, which is a fancy necklace that looks like a couple of intertwining snake buddies. The Auryn is supposed to guide and protect Atreyu on his journey.
Atreyu sets out on his horse Artax while, unbeknownst to him, a black wolf has emerged from its lair and has started tracking him (see? Weapons would have been nice). When wandering around aimlessly doesn’t magically lead to them stumbling across what they’re looking for, Atreyu decides to visit Morla the Ancient One, who lives in the Swamps of Sadness.
So, in order to get through the Swamps of Sadness, you can’t give in to the feelings of despair that permeate it, otherwise the swamp will swallow you whole. Atreyu is actually doing pretty okay, until he looks back to discover that Artax has stopped in his tracks.
Oh please, no. Not the horse. No. NO. I TOTALLY FORGOT ABOUT THIS PART.
NO, HORSEY, NO.
DON’T LET THE SADNESS GET YOU
I BELIEVE IN YOU
OH CRAP HE’S SINKING
STAAHP
NO
OW THE FEELS
Atreyu cries while staring at the place where Artax had been. Bastian cries while reading the book. I CRY INTO MY BOWL OF SPAGHETTI.
So now that everyone’s souls have been sufficiently crushed, Atreyu can continue on his journey. He comes upon a large mound, seemingly part of the land. But as Atreyu approaches, the mound slowly rises up, revealing…
DARTH VADER’S HEAD!
Close enough.
The written description of Morla the Ancient Mutant Ninja Turtle is apparently so shocking that Bastian actually yells out in surprise. Atreyu and Morla hear him, and look puzzled. Bastian, of course, freaks out because WHAT THE CHAP-STICK THEY’RE IN THE BOOK BUT THEY CAN HEAR HIM. HOLY CRAP, GUYS.
Morla starts yammering in the third person because “We haven’t spoken to anyone else for thousands of years, so we started talking to ourselves.” (Sidebar, I looked this up, and apparently Morla is a girl turtle. Which was pretty surprising to me, since she sounds just like Al Pacino.)
Anywho, Morla keeps sneezing all over Atreyu because “we’re allergic to youth,” and she doesn’t seem to be very forthcoming when Atreyu asks her how to cure the Empress. After being pressed for answers though, Morla finally says that no, she doesn’t know anything, but that Atreyu might try the Southern Oracle. Which, by the way, is 10,000 miles away.
Atreyu walks back through the Swamps of Sadness, despondent because the Southern Oracle was his only chance at anything, but it’s too far away for him to get to it. He begins to sink into the swamp, and we see flashes of the black wolf who’s been following him, closing in on him at last. Then, a bright light shines from the sky, and a figure flies down and picks Atreyu up, just as the black wolf is about to pounce. Atreyu passes out, and then wakes up next to Falkor, a white luck-dragon.
Falkor is great, but I’d like to take a moment to appreciate how unintentionally CREEPY he is. First, this happens:
And then this happens:
Atreyu: My name is–
Falkor: Atreyu! And you’re on a quest.
Atreyu: How’d you know that?
Falkor: You were unconsious. And you talked in your sleep.
AND THEN HE DOES THIS:
WHAT.
Then, there’s some super disturbing “Oooooh, that’s soo goooood”-ing while Atreyu scratches behind his ear, as well as some really creeptastic smiling.
You know what, just watch the whole scene. I’ll wait.
Right? RIGHT?
Okay, moving on.
Falkor tells Atreyu that he’s already brought him 9,891 miles along his 10,000 mile trip to the Southern Oracle, which thrills Atreyu. Falkor then introduces Atreyu to Miracle Max and Valerie Engywook and Urgl. Engywook and Urgl live in a nearby hovel. Engywook is a scientist and Urgl is, according to Engywook, a wench. But she’s not a wench, she’s his wife.
Engywook has been studying the Southern Oracle through a telescope for a long time, and he shows Atreyu the way through two gates which will lead him to it. The first gate is two sphinx statues facing each other, their eyes closed. They also happen to be quite chesty and lacking in shirts. Come on, guys. This is a kid’s movie. Anyway, only those who feel their own worth will be allowed to pass through this gate. If the sphinxes sense any lack of confidence, their eyes will open and the traveler will be shot down by their cool laser beam eyeballs.
Atreyu gives it the good old college try, but he falters when he sees the body of one who had tried before him, and the sphinxes’ eyes begin to open. Atreyu makes a break for it, and the super cool laser beams just barely miss him.
Back at Engywook’s telescope, Engywook & Co. celebrate that Atreyu made it through the first gate unscathed. But the next gate will be even more difficult, Engywook warns. The Magic Mirrorgate, as it’s called, shows you who you really are inside. Falkor thinks this will be easy for Atreyu, but Engywook says that’s what everyone thinks, and that:
“Confronted by their true selves, most men run away screaming!”
Atreyu approaches the smooth, reflective surface of the Mirrorgate, where he sees his reflection fade away to reveal Bastian, sitting in the school attic, reading.
ATREYU, YOU’RE BASTIAN….I think.
This was the part of the movie that actually really confused me as a child. Since Bastian is reading the book and experiencing the story through Atreyu, Atreyu is sort of Bastian’s avatar. So that’s why Atreyu sees his inner self as Bastian….I guess. Which is a really neat idea, but as a kid watching this, it didn’t compute. For all the fuss Engywook made about men running away from their true selves in fear, I had been expecting something different to happen. The significance of this scene completely went over my head at the time. Maybe every other kid who watched this got it immediately and I was just really dumb. I don’t know.
Anyways, Bastian predictably loses his mind over the fact that he’s in the story, and throws the book across the room. By this point, it’s dark out, and there’s a thunderstorm going on.
And here I interject again: WHY HAS NO ONE COME LOOKING FOR HIM YET? You could argue that they are looking for him; they just haven’t found him yet, but come on. He’s in the school. And I don’t care if he’s in the attic, he’s been making enough noise up there for someone to have heard him. Seriously. Who yells out loud at the written description of a large turtle?
You know what I think? I think the Princely Dad hasn’t even noticed his son is missing. I bet he’s at home watching infomercials right now and wondering why Bastian hasn’t come downstairs for his half of the pizza yet.
Back to the story. After a contemplative moment, Bastian retrieves the book from where he threw it and continues reading. Atreyu goes through the Mirrorgate and finally reaches the Southern Oracle, which is basically the same two sphinxes from the first gate, only this time they’re covered in glitter. Way to save money, guys.
The Southern Oracle tells Atreyu that in order to save the Empress, she must be given a new name. Atreyu thinks he’s got it in the bag, but the Oracle then tells him that the name must be given by a human child, one of which can only be found outside the boundaries of Fantasia. Back in the school attic, Bastian says to himself that he could totally name the Empress, and adds that his mother had a lovely name. Atreyu leaves to find Falkor as the Oracle begins to crumble away into Nothing.
Then we are treated to a long, rather boring montage of Falkor flying across Fantasia with Atreyu on his back, which suddenly gets much more interesting when they encounter the swirling mass of dark clouds that is supposedly the Nothing (but it looks an awful lot like a Something to me) and Atreyu is knocked off Falkor’s back.
He comes to on a random shoreline and discovers that the Auryn is missing from its usual place around his neck. Not knowing what else to do, he wanders around aimlessly for a while until he comes upon the Rock Biter sitting by himself, looking at his own hands. He says:
“They look like big, good, strong hands. Don’t they? I always thought that’s what they were. My little friends. The little man with his racing snail, the Night Hob, even the stupid bat. I couldn’t hold on to them. The Nothing pulled them right out of my hands. I failed…Listen, the Nothing will be here any minute. I will just sit here and let it take me away too. They look like big, good, strong hands. Don’t they?”
Atreyu continues on his way and finds a cavern in which he is amazed to find cave paintings that tell the story of all his adventures up to this point. Near the end of the gallery though, there is a painting of a black wolf.
Suddenly, Atreyu hears a noise. He turns to come face to face with the black wolf itself, crouched in the shadows.
The wolf says its name is G’mork, and that Atreyu will be its last victim. Atreyu, once more displaying his mad sassing skills, says that he won’t be defeated by G’mork because he’s a warrior. However, he admits that he can’t find Fantasia’s boundaries, to which G’mork contemptuously replies that Fantasia has no boundaries; Fantasia is a world of human fantasy, and its existence is shaped by imagination.
Since humans are slowly forsaking their hopes and dreams, the Nothing has begun eating away at Fantasia. G’mork is a servant of the Nothing, because people with no hopes are the easiest to control, and G’mork wants control. As an agent of the Nothing, G’mork has been sent to kill Atreyu, the one person who can stop it.
Atreyu decides that if he’s going down, he’s going down fighting. So he tells G’mork that he is Atreyu.
And here I interject, yet again. G’mork is the possibly the dumbest assassin ever. Why doesn’t he know who Atreyu is? He was supposedly tracking him, by scent, I assume. Well here he is, buddy, in all his smellyness. Is your nose broken or something?
G’mork lunges at Atreyu, who has picked up a sharp object and holds it out in front of him in time for G’mork to land heavily on it mid-leap. Shades of Peter Pevensie and Fenris Ulf?
The Nothing begins to tear apart the land. Atreyu hangs onto a tree and calls out for Falkor as everything around him disintegrates. Falkor hears him and flies to his rescue. He’s apparently found the Auryn as well.
Fantasia has been shattered. Chunks of earth and debris float in dead space, as Falkor and Atreyu fly on through, hoping against hope that the Ivory Tower is still standing. Atreyu asks the Auryn to lead them to it, and they soon find it, perched on one of the hovering pieces of land.
Atreyu enters the tower to find the Childlike Empress. And then this happens:
And even though they’re both practically babies, SHIP SHIP SHIP SHIP SHIP SHIP SHIP SHIP SHIP SHIP SHIP
Atreyu tells the Childlike Empress that he failed, but the Empress tells him that he has brought the human child with him. She then tells Atreyu details about this human child, such as his flight from the bullies, and how he hid in the bookstore and discovered The NeverEnding Story. Bastian has another mini meltdown because MOTHER OF SQUIDS SHE’S TALKING ABOUT HIM.
A violent tremor shakes the Ivory Tower, and Atreyu is wounded. The Empress begins to plead to Bastian to give her a new name, as this will save both her and Fantasia. Bastian wavers, recalling the Princely Dad’s words to him at the beginning of the film about ‘keeping his feet on the ground,’ but ultimately runs to the window, opens it, and shouts a name into the thunderstorm.
Speaking of which, can anyone actually understand the name Bastian is saying? I had to Google it. Apparently it’s ‘Moonchild.’ First of all, if your viewers have to Google the most climactic moment in your film because they couldn’t understand the key word when the character said it, then your climactic moment has failed. Secondly, ‘Moonchild?’ What is the significance of that? I was under the impression that he would have named her after his mother. And I seriously doubt that his mom’s name was Moonchild. Unless her parents were hippies.
The school attic goes black. Bastian finds himself face to face with the Empress, surrounded by darkness. Bastian asks why it’s so dark and the Empress says:
“In the beginning, it is always dark.”
Aaaand now I’m having all kinds of Genesis flashbacks.
The Empress holds out a grain of sand in her hand, and tells Bastian that it is the last bit of Fantasia. She gives it to him and tells him that Fantasia can live again through every wish he makes.
Bastian makes with the wishing, and finds himself on Falkor’s back, flying over Fantasia as everything is restored. AND HOORAY ARTAX IS ALIIIIVE! Falkor asks Bastian what his next wish is, and Bastian whispers it in his ear.
Back in the normal world, the school bullies are walking down the street, when they suddenly see Falkor with Bastian on his back gliding down towards them from the sky. They are chased into an alley, where the bullies all jump into the same dumpster they threw Bastian into earlier that day. Because JUSTICE.
An unnamed narrator then ends the film by telling us that Bastian made many more wishes, and had many more adventures, but that’s another story.
So, this movie is pretty much just as good as it was when I was a kid. Of course, there were a few flaws that I didn’t notice back then, but everything is flawed, right?
The NeverEnding Story II, however….yikes. And whoever decided that The NeverEnding Story III was a good idea should be institutionalized.
Corona Borealis
nothing irrelevant 