Tag: movies

Seriously, Eddie?

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

As an actual Asian person who earnestly cares about actual Asian representation in film, theFacebook has gotten wind that they can target me movie trailers for movies starring Asian people and I’ll probably actually give more than the passing glance or hide-from-X treatment that I give the fast majority of other targeted ads.

Recently, I saw this preview for this film called Boogie, which is the directorial debut of Eddie Huang, the guy who made Fresh Off the Boat, a series that I really wanted to hate based on the horrible title, but ended up watching way more of than I care to admit and actually liking a lot of it.  The premise of the film is pretty simple: charismatic and athletic Chinese guy living in New York, aspires to play basketball professionally, but has to overcome all sorts of stereotypes, oppression and racism to strive towards his goals.

I’m typically on board for all Asians vs. the World kind of plots, especially ones that feed the observational narrative of the racist double-standard that exists within all races in the world, towards Asians.  However, there was one thing that instead has piqued my curiosity, and really makes me skeptical of the, planning of the film, regardless of how the story and film actually pans out.

The titular character is played by some guy named Taylor Takahashi, and my very first thought was, really?  A Japanese guy to play a Chinese guy?  Not that there’s anything inherently wrong with that concept, it’s just that this seems like one of those characters that I feel like would probably have been a little more appropriate if it were actually being played by a Chinese person.

Look, I’m all about guys like Randall Park and Ken Jeong being arr rook same’d and getting cast as Chinese guys, because they’re still getting paid and go get it if it’s offered, but the same rhetorical question applies to them as it does for Taylor Takahashi: were there seriously no talented Chinese actors to play these roles?  Or I guess more accurately, was there any genuine effort in trying to cast any talented Chinese actors for these roles?

Like, in the case of the Boogie preview, I’m having a hard time digesting and a hard time not laughing, when a Japanese guy is reciting lines about how stereotyped we Chinese are, and how he’s got 2,000 years of Chinese oppression on his shoulders that he’s trying to overcome so he can be what sounds like a fictional version of Jeremy Lin.

I know I clown on China a lot being Korean and all, but real talk here is that I’m very aware that in a country with a population of a gabillion, there are bound to be quite a number of talented, bilingual, and physically comparable actors as Taylor Takahashi, who probably would be slightly more believable and convincing to play the role of Boogie, than a guy that’s inherently of Japanese descent.

So egg on Eddie Huang’s face for what I think is kind of an embarrassing faux pas here.  Looking at all promotional material for Boogie, it’s embarrassing to see the three marquee names, being Takahashi, Paige and Jackson, in a movie that’s basically about Chinese culture living in New York.  But Huang’s kind of become a giant king of the twinkies anyway, or as what I saw a friend say on the internet being an Uncle Tong, so I guess it’s no surprise that he’s utilizing all these non-Chinese guys to promote his own stories of ironic appropriation and further exploitation of his own culture in order to stay relevant and famous.

I wish for the 2.5 hours I lost back

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

My job put me in a shitty mood today, which sucks, but for the sake of writing out a post of criticism, it’s actually kind of advantageous.  I tend to believe that intent is sharpest when paired with an emotion that rides along the same wavelength, so when I’m in a pissed mood, lighting into something might be the right mindset for doing such.

Frankly, I knew what I was getting into when I sat down to watch WW84 because making a title card “Wonder Woman 1984” would have been the hardest thing to do for this day and age where people can sparsely be expected to use vowels when writing their shorthand bullshit, even in a professional working environment.

But I had already heard that this movie wasn’t good, and I’d seen the memes, my favorite of them being the title of this post because I felt the exact same way after watching it.  However, out of one part morbid curiosity and another part simply because Gal Gadot is gorgeous and I could probably put up with watching Boys Don’t Cry or The Boy With the Striped Pajamas if had Gal Gadot in it, I decided to watch it anyway.

Despite knowing that it probably wasn’t good, and despite knowing that it was 2.5 hours long and I could have done a myriad of things with 2.5 hours instead of watching WW84, I did something stupid and watched WW84.

And it sucked.  Unsurprisingly.  Frankly, in spite of the praise of the original Wonder Woman received, I didn’t think it was particularly close to as good as the praise it was getting, and I hate to sound completely sexist, but I think films like it and shows like Jessica Jones get a bump in credit solely for the fact that they’re stories about strong female leads with mostly female production crews.  Frankly, the gender of casts and crews are irrelevant to me, and I’d rather not know it at all as long as captivating and entertaining stories and presented to me.

Regardless, it goes without saying that the original Wonder Woman was easily the strongest DC property film since the Christopher Nolan Batman trilogy, and easily the best DC flick in the supposed Justice League universe they’ve tried to cobble together with most notably a Ben Affleck Batman.

But ultimately, that’s like saying the least stinkiest turd in the punch bowl because for whatever reason, DC Comics can’t seem to get their shit together when it comes to translating their properties into film.  Wonder Woman was alright, which makes it the strongest DC film in their respective universe, but honestly, I’d rather have watched episodes of the lowly Iron Fist or the fairly mediocre Defenders shows than DC’s top film.

I kind of feel bad for DC comics.  Because in the actual world of comic books, DC has plenty of quality properties and capable writers and some legendary stories told.  Batman alone carries DC comics way more than any single Marvel property can take credit for carrying Marvel Comics.  But no matter what, they just can’t seem to make good movies, and it’s almost as inevitable that a non-Batman DC movie is going to suck as much as the Braves will always collapse in the most embarrassing or heartbreaking fashions possible.

So needless to say, a sequel to a marginal quality film was bound to be a downhill ride no matter what, and to WW84’s credit, they basically lived up to expectation.  Thank goodness this never made it to theaters, because I already want my money back for it wasting 2.5 hours of my life, despite watching from the comfort of my own home on HBOmax.

The Mandalorian Season 2 Thoughts

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Mythical wife and I just caught up with The Mandalorian’s second season, which is kind of miraculous in its own right, as we’re both on new parent schedules plus we don’t want to introduce our child to screens, so our general television consumption is probably a tenth of what most of our friends and family tend to watch.  The fact that we’re only a week removed from the finale is a miracle, since there’s a litany of shows and movies that we’ve stated interest in wanting to watch but the realism is that it’ll be eons before we do, if we even remember to watch them in the first place.

However, a week removed wasn’t nearly enough time for the shitheads of the internet to spoil a ton of shit for us in advance of our opportunity to watch the show.  Between all of the excitable fuckwits on social media who couldn’t shut the fuck up even if it there were guns held to their family’s heads, and now actual sci-fi/pop culture sites themselves just outright blow covers and spoilers under the guise that there’s some appropriate official statute of limitation when it comes to being allowed to talk about shit, it’s been impossible for mythical wife and myself to not get spoiled to varying capacities.

Mythical wife apparently got it worse than I did, because of her choice of people she connects with, but even a relative shut-in like me was still spoiled to some degree when someone posted a gif of X doing Y, revealing a pretty substantial moment of the show (was that so fucking difficult, no), so we agreed that before it could get any worse, we needed to buckle down and watch the show before I declared jihad on everyone I know for when they would inevitably spoil more shit for me.

Yes, it sounds like I’m making my problems the problems of others, but at the same time, do people really lack the common sense to just shut the fuck up about things for just a little while?  Yes, the answer is always yes.

Regardless of quality of acting, plot, and other superlatives, one of the greatest things about The Mandalorian in general, is that they’re fairly quick and short episodes, and it’s a very easy show to stay on top of, provided the effort is put forth to actually start watching it.

And just like that, I’ve conveniently blathered on long enough to create a meaty post that hasn’t actually gotten to the point, and now I can comfortably tuck anything else that might be considered spoiler-ey behind a cut.

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Advent Beer #16: Bären Weisse by Privatbrauerei H. Egerer

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

When I was but a n00b to drinking, one of the very first things that I really took a liking to was wheat beers.  Hefeweizens.  It started with the hefeweizens at Ellis Island Casino in Las Vegas, one of my favorite places on the planet, and it didn’t hurt that they were free, plentiful, and served by a super cougar of a waitress, as long as I was continuing to piss away cash at $5 blackjack or playing Mermaid’s Gold penny slots.

Now by now I’ve tried all sorts of other drinks, spirits and beers, but when the day is over, I’m still fond of hefeweizens.  Sours, hard seltzers, goses and other things can come and hold my attention for periods of time, but I’ll always remember that some of my earliest loves were wheat beers.

When I pulled today’s beer out of the fridge and saw this silhouette of a bear on it, for some reason I felt optimistic before I saw any text at all.  I don’t know why, but incorporating animals into the designs of things always curries my favor; maybe it’s because animals are better than people, or I just like seeing animals on my products.

Regardless, seeing the word “Weisse” was enough for me to know that this was going to be a hefeweizen, and be optimistic about it.  Cracking it open and pouring it into my glass, I’m greeted by a cloudy, caramel colored brew with a light aroma that’s kind of fruity.

At first sip, I’m greeted by a lot of flavors that’s kind of spicy, kind of banana-ey, but it’s not too heavy, and goes down smooth.  I’m reminded heavily of Shotgun Betty by Lonerider Brewery, which is one that I’m very fond of, so this is very much a compliment.

In fact, it’s such a compliment, I would dare say that this has been my favorite beer in the entire collection thus far, and has taken the #1 spot from First Coral after two weeks.  It’s a delicious beer that is easily remembered, has a very easy comparison for me to recollect how much I liked it, and there’s this fucking bear on the can that I dig.  Seeing “Bären” also reminds me of that scene from Inglorious Basterds where Hitler is talking about the Bear Jew and I remember hearing the phrase “Bären” from it.  Yes, it’s little things like that, that make easy mnemonic devices to help me remember stuff like a really awesome beer.

Current Rankings:

  1. Bären Weisse (#16)
  2. First Coral (#2)
  3. Kirta (#5)
  4. Turbo Prop (#6)
  5. Schwarze Tinte (#13)
  6. Perlenzauber (#9)
  7. Loncium Vienna Style Lager (#12)
  8. Jubiläumsbier 333 (#7)
  9. Zwönitzer Steinbier (#4)
  10. Grandl (#11)
  11. Altbairisch Hell (#15)
  12. Hell (#1)
  13. Tannen Hell (#8)
  14. Tradition (#10)
  15. Hallertauer Hopfen-Cuvee (#14)
  16. Käuzle (#3)

Advent Beer #11: Grandl by Ankerbräu Nördlingen

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Eleven days in, I think I’ve made it pretty clear that I don’t really know much about beer, and that I most certainly judge books by their covers.  That said, I had optimistic hopes for tonight’s beer as I’ve been not having the greatest time with job these days and drinking on Fridays always seems like a good idea after a long week of work, and I was wondering if whomever put together this advent calendar had the wherewithal to put some quality beers on the Fridays of the calendar, because it’s not like they wouldn’t be able to look at a calendar to know when they are.

So when I pulled Grandl out of the fridge, I was pleased to see a fairly traditional, nondescript beer can design that reminded me of a throwback style like a Miller High Life can or like the Milwaukee Brewers typeface, which are kind of the same things considering Miller’s influence with the Brew Crew.

But anyway it’s almost like this can was a metaphor for the beer itself, because out of the can came a clean, golden lager with not a lot of aroma.  The first sips were positive, but not really blown away; everything about this beer seemed pretty no-nonsense, nothing special, but at the same time not at all bad, and very drinkable.

The fact that BeerAdvocate lists this as simply “lager” and not like “festlager” or “alleybier” or “kellerbrau” or some other weird classification I’d never heard of until embarking on this journey, brings everything back to earth for something simple, basic, yet perfectly adequate.

Sure, it’s not bursting with flavor like Turbo Prop (#6) or has the explosive characteristics of a good dunkel like Kirta (#5), but it’s still a classic, smooth beer that goes down smooth, doesn’t overstimulate my novice pallet, and is something I know I could drink 2-3 of without breaking a sweat.

Either way, I’m gassed.  I found myself already beginning to fall asleep at 8:45, while trying to watch Scrooge virtually with some friends, but such shouldn’t be a surprise considering I’m raising an infant that’s up by 6:30 every morning.  And I thought I was all ahead of the curve by knocking out all of my daily chores and running earlier in the day that I’d be able to have a ton of time to myself to wind down the evening, but now all I want to do is go to bed before 11 pm and actually feel like I can get some sleep, so this review is about as long as most of the other beer reviews but is in fact full of fluff and talking about how I’m wrapping this up but overall, Grandl was solid, refreshing, and it’s general position in the rankings don’t do it justice as much as it shows where it stands to other beers with stronger gimmicks and more memorability.

Current Rankings:

  1. First Coral (#2)
  2. Kirta (#5)
  3. Turbo Prop (#6)
  4. Perlenzauber (#9)
  5. Jubiläumsbier 333 (#7)
  6. Zwönitzer Steinbier (#4)
  7. Grandl (#11)
  8. Hell (#1)
  9. Tannen Hell (#8)
  10. Tradition (#10)
  11. Käuzle (#3)

 

Now that I’m caught up, I don’t know what to do with myself

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

For the better part of the last three months, whenever I had a free moment after work or when I wasn’t tending to the baby, I was basically working on getting the brog back up online.  At first, it was manually backing up the old posts, then it was sorting and organizing all of the unposted posts, and then came the arduous task of manually re-posting every post in chronological order.

As I’ve mentioned before, this whole task took approximately 82 days, and a few more to fine tune and tweak things and get ready for the day in which I would let people know and officially open as if I were some grandiose important entity.

But now that I’ve accomplished the task of getting the brog back up, I really don’t know what to do with myself in my free time now.  Since I’m still on paternity leave, my only real tasks are tending to my daughter, but when I put her down for naps, and she goes to sleep for the night, suddenly I have anywhere from 2-5 hours in the day in which is me-time that I don’t really know how to fill anymore.

Sure, I’m still going to be dedicating time to writing and looking for things to write about, but since there’s no massive backlog and queue behind it anymore, I’m back to the days where posts are mostly going to be one at a time, save for those times where I write a bunch of things and put them in the can for a rainy day.  But otherwise, I’m not going to be spending all my time on my site anymore, and I’ve been perplexed on what to do next now that I’ve accomplished the one big thing for myself that I had set out to do.

There’s always a gargantuan backlog of shit I want to watch on television, which would be nice, but I’m a person who really needs to immerse myself into media to really take it in.  Basically meaning, if there’s any risk of possibly getting interrupted, I probably won’t bother starting it, and what with the fact that my daughter sleeps anywhere from 35-60 minutes, there’s no sense in starting any shows which episodes are in the 45-55 minute range, because inevitably I will have to cut it short to get my child, and then I’ll be annoyed (not at the kid) at having to stop early.

So that effectively knocks out hour-long shows and movies, and limits me to 22-30 minute shows, which are fewer and further between save for signing up for a Quibi account and I don’t want to add monthly subscriptions these days anyway.

I can’t really hit the treadmill, because my usual sessions are 32 minutes, but that’s not including the need to change, shower and cool down, and if my daughter wakes up at the short end of a nap, then I’ll be a sweaty monster that has to dirty up my child which I’m not going to voluntarily do, so that nixes that idea.

So far, I’ve just been dicking around on the internet and watching YouTube clips and seeking out wrestling belts to throw my money away further into.  Otherwise, it’s not lost on me that this is the epitomal first-world problem to be having and when the day is over, I do feel a sense of accomplishment that I’ve got the brog back up and it makes me happy, and that I’d rather be in this position rather than the former times in which I’d wish to have my brog back up, and it weren’t, and my thoughts and words would stay confined to my own digital storage.

This is really the state of America in 2020

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

No matter how much I never liked to admit to feeling it, now that the faucet’s been turned, it seems like not a day goes by where the words don’t pass through my lips, and it doesn’t make me feel any better verbalizing it now as it did when I first came to the realization that right now, America sucks.

Talking with a friend about the state of the world, I found myself saying things that I’d never said before in regards to how I felt, mostly because I’ve been isolated, and mythical wife and I try not to talk about things too much because they really are that depressing, but what came out of my fingers in text is that I don’t think it’s ever felt so physically possible to feel just how much our country is letting us down, the way America is completely and utterly failing the American people on a daily basis right now.

It really is becoming impossible to keep up with all the ways things are fucked up, at least for me, who likes to jot down notes on a daily basis so I can remember the things happening in history for another day, especially in case I feel inspired to write about them at some point.  But it’s downright sad and pathetic the things that emerge on a daily basis about the state of America in the state of the world currently, and I realize that it becomes a little more difficult every day to not grow more jaded and nihilistic about how things are, which are definitely things I don’t want to be happening when I’m in a period of my life where I’m trying to enjoy and savor the time of new fatherhood and spending time with my baby.

It’s kind of not fair that America is in such chaos and forced to hunker, when all I want to do is show my kid the great big world and can’t, because neither of us want to get the coronavirus that’s fucking everywhere and risk our lives.

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