#catalyst is a great read and tumblr's the best place to spill my thoughts about it

[air-mechanical]

Catalyst Reading Continues

Tarkin: I spent several weeks in a Separatist facility called the Citadel. Were you tortured, Dr. Erso?

Gaken: No, I wasn't. You were?

Tarkin: Repeatedly.

Galen: I'm sorry-

Tarkin: Fortunately I was rescued before my jailors could do their worst. Had the torture continued, well, who knows?

There's not a chance Tarkin would have spilled secrets to his torturers. He would have died first. Death before dishonour. And shut up with any sympathy towards him, he doesn't want or need that. Tarkin's only throwing this fake scenario out to Galen to see if it sticks, and is the thread that pulls Galen on side. If Galen had been tortured - physically, emotionally or mentally - Tarkin would understand. He wouldn't blame him. Admit your troubles to me, Galen. Lay them down at my feet. Let me burn them. There's no judgement here. Just a chance for a new beginning.

Galen: You're beginning to sound more like a weapons specialist than a legal authority.

Tarkin, smiling: A passing interest.

Catalyst Tarkin is a great interrogator, I love him. Catalyst Krennic is also a smooth operator when it comes to getting people to do what he wants, knowing how to get Poggle [Poggle the Lesser what a name] to work on his death star.

And then Krennic has to sit through days of blood sports and smells in the special visitors' box on Geonosis, hoping that they're not all going to get eaten.

[rankakiu]

Thoughts of the Droid: Joker (2019)

Hello people from Tumblr! How have they been in all this time? As always, I hope very well. I will begin by saying that it was really in my plans to see the film of It: Chapter II; however, due to various circumstances, I could not see in the cinema. However, I compensated, watching another movie that shares a feature with It: both films have a clown as a great antagonist. Only the latter is more disturbing, since it does not need an extra dimensional being, but a human disguised as a clown, which in itself is more disturbing. On this occasion I bring to you all my impressions and opinions of the Joker movie, the second film that Warner and DC have released this year and which (obviously) has a plausible origin for the villain and nemesis par excellence of Batman.

Could it be that this movie continues with the hit streak of DC and Warner? Or is it a movie that had a very high expectation and ends up disappointing own and strangers? Stay in my review to find out.

WARNING: NOT SPOILER-FREE. Read at your own risk.

To start, what did I think of the movie? Short answer: simply magnificent and fascinating. Now let's go into the review in more detail. 

Characters: What to say about this thing? Each of the characters has been thought carefully and although we do not see much of them, at least they fulfill very well their function of being support characters and even some of them serve as a catalyst to further explore the mind of our protagonist. None of these characters will leave you indifferent and also make the movie a more pleasant experience, due to their good performances.

Of course, I could not ignore our protagonist, Arthur Fleck, played by the great Joaquin Phoenix, who once again consolidates himself as an actor of excellent quality, in addition to demonstrating his talent to his full potential.

In this movie, he interprets (as I mentioned lines above) a man in his forties named Arthur Fleck, a poor unhappy man and that life does not treat him at all well. To top it off, he suffers from a peculiar disorder: he laughs uncontrollably when he suffers certain levels of stress and / or anguish. Basically, when he laughs, it is when he ironicly manifests his pain and suffering. And certainly, in the scenes where he laughs that way, it is where Phoenix's acting quality is most noticeable, since while he laughs, his face is disfigured in gestures of extreme bitterness and pain.

If there is something that the film does quite well, it is to explore the tormented psychology of the character, while offering a possible origin and reason why it became the iconic “crime clown” of Gothic City. Throughout the film, we see him resisting as much as he can the attacks and ill-treatment he suffers from a society that cannot and does not want to understand him; we see him slowly succumb to his madness and dark desires, pushed more than anything for days full of disappointment, bitterness and disinterest on the part of his fellow men. Thus, the film knows how to balance these two aspects that manage to give the character its own mythology, while paying a well-deserved tribute by taking certain elements of comics and stories that are already legendary in their own right.

Story: A story, which despite a somewhat slow pace, manages to keep the viewer's interest for about two hours. And it is not for less, since the history has been meticulously planned and well conceived and carried out. It's a story that doesn't bore you at all, and that really leaves you wanting more. It's funny, since, even long before the trailers, we all knew in advance that it would be a story of the character's origin, so we knew that eventually Arthur Fleck would become the Joker. What really left us intrigued and made us go to the movie theaters was the premise of seeing how he became the clown of crime, whose motives he had to let himself be carried away by his madness and had such a unique metamorphosis. Again, the film tells that story precisely and brutally.

And how to start a story with so much potential? Simple, through a scene, where we see Arthur make up as a clown to go out on another work day and while preparing, we see our protagonist break emotionally for a few moments, where he forces himself to smile and while he smiles he spills a Treacherous tear, shows palpable suffering that has to deal with daily and somehow manages to resist almost heroically. But reality and life constantly inflict wounds on his being.

Throughout history we see many evidence of this: we have that, while Arthur does his job, a band of brats steal a sign and Arthur pleadingly asks people for help, who ignores him in that dehumanized way and not according to that, the same band of brats beat him up.

Or how about the scene where one of his co-workers, Randall, gives him a gun so carelessly and that he lost his job - that despite everything, he loved - and his partner decided to wash his hands , before admitting his mistake?

We also have the case in which Arthur fervently tries to fulfill his dream of being a comedian and unfortunately not only does not succeed, but also Murray Franklin, his idol and role model openly mocks him.

But without a doubt, the hardest blow he suffered was when he learned that everything, ALL OF HIS LIFE, until now had been a lie. Finding out that he was adopted only to satisfy a narcissistic desire of his adoptive mother, that his own guardian allowed him to be abused in various ways and that his origin is completely uncertain create an emotional dent in him, since it has been given realize that his life - in his own words - has been a joke in its entirety. In my opinion, this is one of the most emotional and heartbreaking scenes of the film, since that is where we see Arthur laugh more uncontrollably than ever, while shedding tears and his gesture is of such extreme disappointment and pain, that one as a spectator, you can feel a total empathy with the character, despite knowing that he will become a murderous villain.

Another scene to highlight in the story, is when Arthur, already become the Joker, is featured in the show of his now former idol Murray. That is where The Joker, stopping to read for a few seconds a thought he wrote long ago ("I just hope my death makes more sense than my life"), is that he finally decides what he wants to do and what being he wants to become .

And is that previous scenes, Arthur is seen rehearsing his entrance and his act to the show, where we clearly see that he aimed to commit suicide in order to end his life so tragic.

In my opinion, when he reads those lines of his thought, he changes his mind and decides that he will now be forcefully heard and will do what he pleases and brings his own happiness and control of his life. It is also in this scene where there is a monologue that seems quite interesting to me, since Arthur rants against society that abandons not only the patients with mental disorders, but also the poor and the most needy people. It is, in its purest sense, a passionate speech, full of anger and resentment against society that, unconsciously, led him to become an executioner, now free from the bonds and ideas of good and bad with what society intended to retain him. And now the executioner intends to torture this society, which ironically now cries out for mercy when never had it in the first place with a human being like him.

Also in this scene is where the Joker gives another equally interesting speech, and it is that to some extent he is right in describing society as easily manipulable, since in his own words, that society was shocked by the death of the three Wayne business employees, without even knowing how they really were. Recall that behind the scenes, the three subjects were behaving like real patanes, harassing an innocent woman. In part, their deaths are brutal and to some extent an exaggerated punishment. But this must also be considered: at what point would these three have reached if Arthur had not been present? What limits would have been exceeded? An interesting reflection that gives a lot to think about.

Another point in favor of history, is that it not only focuses on the psychology and evolution of the main villain, but also manages to sustain, showing a dark side of society and especially the eternal struggle of social classes, especially The poor against the rich. Just remember that in the movie, these social classes make their position very clear: the rich condemn the crimes that they have done against them. The poor are full of joy for those acts that they consider pure and expeditious justice.

But…

Did it really happen everything that defined Arthur as the Joker?

Because in fact, in the same movie (and in various theories hanging around the internet) there are several clues that would confirm that the whole story we witnessed as spectators would be false. Some say that all their history is false and others maintain that only parts of it. And one might think that that little detail ruins the movie completely.

In this case, I would not think so.

And it is because of how the character is designed from the beginning. Basically the Joker is one of those characters who, as long as we knows less about his past, is much better, since it is part of his essence, being an entity of chaos whose origin is enigmatic and mysterious, a whole unknown. And if in truth his whole story is ambiguous or it didn't happen the way him told us, his past doesn't matter. What matters is precisely that we have been shown how his madness dragged him into becoming a criminal.

The story definitely gives a lot of fabric to cut from and is very worthy of analysis in many facets. The story, along with the characters - especially the protagonist - is the best of the film, and therefore it is a film that has no waste of seeing again and again.

Action and Visuals and special effects: Well ... where to start? Because if you ask me, I doubt that this film has been a great edition of special effects. I do not deny that I have one or another, but most of all the film is beautifully guided with the environments, the color palette and lights and especially a great script, so it is not necessary great effects. As for the action, the film has good sequences but they are very scarce and when they occur they are usually ephemeral. But do the film need action? Of course not, since it focuses on the character and his circumstances.

In conclusion, Joker, is a film very worth seeing and that has already become one of the best DC films, showing that in truth, when they want, they can achieve these wonderful results and that even overshadow their eternal rival Marvel. Therefore, I give this movie 4.5 out of 5 jokers. Beyond that, this film presents a new scheme that, if exploited in a good way, will create a genre in the superhero films: supervillain movies. And that is one of the greatest achievements of the film.

Definitely a highly recommended movie to watch and a very deserved achievement for DC and Warner. Hopefully they stay on this good path.

Greetings

Rankakiu