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Defiance - An Adventure in Transmedia (Sophie)

Transmedia, specifically transmedia storytelling is the art of telling a single story or exploring a single world across different media. It is closely associated with the idea of a story world, a more abstract concept referring to a single narrative world that exists across different works of narrative art.

 

In the summer of 2011, Syfy announced an upcoming transmedia collaboration with gaming company Trion Worlds. The result is a two-part project that premiered this year in April with a long-form TV science-fiction political action drama and a corresponding multi-platform MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game).

 

    This is the background of the world they share. In the year 2046, arks carrying survivors of a dying alien solar system carrying an entire ecosystem arrive on Earth, causing war and a complete restructuring of the planet’s surface, society, and biosphere. The show takes place after this, in a town called Defiance, following the myriad political and social struggles resulting from the mix of alien and human cultures and agendas. To some degree, the show relies on tried-and-true plot tropes, such as Romeo and Juliet-style love stories, cultural and spiritual tensions, and classic science fiction elements like alien-on-alien battles, spacecrafts, blue glowy things, and futuristic energy weapons which account for most of Syfy’s budget on the show.

 

    The goal of the project was to extensively link the shared world of the game and the show. They take place in the same area at the same time, and the two branches of the project promise future crossovers, ranging from the ability of the player’s character in the game to appear in the show to large scale players’ actions influencing the show’s narrative future. At the moment, however, the crossover is limited to similar storylines and characters and timed missions in the game that must be completed by the next episode’s airing. The two development teams both made concessions for such a project to become a reality. While, for example, the gaming team thought the alien races known as “Voltan” should bring with them flying car technology, Syfy’s television crew told them that was right-out too expensive.

 

    Meanwhile, Syfy’s conceptual team thought horses or similar pack animals would fit the setting. The logistical team for the video game informed them that pack animals interfere with combat in games like the one they were designing. I admit to having not played the game, but I do have exposure to both television and games of this genre – and the mutual influence is clear.

 

    The TV show brings several well-recognized actors, including Grant Bowler, (known for his previous work in Ugly Betty and True Blood,) and Julie Benz, from (Angel and Dexter). Of course, the television actors served as the live models for their digital doubles in the game. The actors, along with the visual decisions for the various races in the world, had to be decided on several years in advance than they would have been for a typical science fiction show for like this without a collaborating video game team. On the other hand, while video games can relatively easily create very non-human aliens, a TV show has more limitations, meaning Defiance’s aliens look remarkably human. The collaboration has a kind of lowest common denominator effect, where both media have to take into account the limitations of the other.

 

However, transmedia collaboration is not without its strengths. Despite several obvious archetypes and standard genre elements, the extensive world-building is obvious from the very first episode. Because the show is free to tell for of its mythology in the setting of the game, the world feels like it has even more depth. There are two complete languages for the show and game, constructed by David J. Peterson, who also worked on Dothraki, the constructed language from Game of Thrones. Though we don’t see much of some of the alien races, as not all are represented in the main cast, each has distinctive cultural characteristics, evident in their speech patterns, dress, and attitudes, even in minor roles.

 

The races are also original in that the cultures seem to have been built from the ground up, rather than borrowed from Earth cultures and pasted onto alien species, a welcome relief to a veteran viewer of the genre (though some play it a little close at times).

    The show promises a world full of conflict and tensions, some which are more television arc-worthy, others of which could easily permeate throughout the show and game worlds (such as racial tension and environmental dangers). The show has recently been renewed for a second season, hopefully bringing the promised crossovers closer to reality.

O Brother, Where Art Thou: Film as Comparative Mythology (Sophie)

O Brother, Where Art Thou, (2000) written and directed by the Coen Brothers, is, at its heart, a work of comparative mythology. The film overtly claims inspiration from Homer's Odyssey, opening with a title card with the epic poem's invocation of the muse. The plot and characters are all loosely drawn from the ancient Greek epic, but by setting the retelling in Mississippi during the Great Depression, the film places the mythology of the original text against the backdrop of a Christian mythos and Southern US folk traditions. The resultant braid is an exquisitely woven journey, primary a fiercely comical one, but at times just as spellbinding, powerful, and frightening.

The film stars George Clooney as the sly, fast talking, Ulysses Everett McGill, an escaped convict, first seen chained together with his less intelligent “crew,” Pete Hogwallop (John Turturro) and Delmar O'Donnell (Tim Blake Nelson), as they make their way across the state in pursuit of a treasure. Like their mythological antecedents, they encounter many trials and tribulations on their way.

The trio's prophet comes in the form of an old, blind black man pushing a handcar. He is their Cassandra and their Tiresias, and foretells adventure, misfortune, and ultimate triumph in an unexpected form, as well as giving the escapees a specific image of a cow perched on a cotton barn. Though he is drawn from the blind prophet present in Greek tradition, he takes on qualities of Christian legend, the unnamed traveler, the poor man's prophet, and his language is biblical in diction with mentions of trials of the heart and salvation. His race is drawn from a standing (and unfortunately still present) association of wise old men of color with the mystic in the American folk tradition, especially in Southern narratives.

The prophet is an archetypical figure that serves as an obvious bridging point between three traditions, but the mastery of the film is in drawing on complimentary, rather than congruous elements. While hiding in the woods, the men come across a congregation dressed in white robes, heading to the nearby lake to be baptized. The choral musical number, 'Down to the River to Pray' was arranged by modern Country Folk singer Alison Krauss, who leads the rendition for the film. It is deeply religiously Christian, and is sung in gospel choirs.

The effect the performance and the scene has on the audience and on the characters in the film is hypnotic in it's beauty, and the trio find themselves at the water's edge. While crafty and rationalminded, Everett brushes off the idea of born-again salvation as desperation in hard times, Delmar, and after him Pete race down to the priest to be baptized. From a Christian standpoint, this is a positive scene, but in the narrative retelling of the Odyssey, this congregation stands in for the Lotus Eaters, a group of Islanders who takes in travelers and feeds them a drugged lotus leaf that makes them forget all their troubles, and thus their quest. By placing the Southern Evangelist rebirth scene in this light, the film forces a comparison of values, but also a rereading of both cultural "texts."

The movie later parallels this scene with three equally hypnotic singing women, also dressed in white who are referred to explicitly as the sirens. Mythological bird-women whose voice was meant to lure sailors to death, in the film they take on their post-Christian appearance: beautiful in body as much as in voice. After the encounter ends badly for one of the travelers, along with "siren" they are referred to as "the Whore of Babylon."

In the original Odyssey, Odysseus is pursued throughout his journey by the sea god Poseidon who he enrages through his actions. Poseidon himself does not have a strong moral connotation. The mythology is such that a hero can be the enemy of most any Olympian and in favor with another. With Ulysses Everett McGill and his crew being escaped convicts, his natural pursuant was a man of the law. Sheriff Cooley, thus, fills this role in the recasting of the epic. But the role of a law man in the story of a jail break has many different cultural implications. Daniel von Bargen's appearance and performance in the part were inspired by Boss Godfrey in Cool Hand Luke, but the fear and awe that surround him is an older cultural idea.

Here, the Christian and Southern Mythology combine to add an additional layer to his character. Early in the film, the trio stumble on Tommy Johnson (Chris Thomas King) named and based on the real man who also legendarily sold his soul at a crossroads in rural Mississippi for his skill on the guitar. When asked what the devil looks like, Everett describes the traditional "red and scaly with a bifurcated tail, and he carries a hay fork," and Tommy corrects him, describing Sheriff Cooley perfectly saying "He's white, as white as you folks, with empty eyes and a big hollow voice. He loves to travel around with a mean old hound." Every time the sheriff appears, even at night, he is wearing mirror sunglasses, and most of the time, their reflection contains a fire. Thus he becomes three characters in one - the law man, Poseidon, and the Devil. This triplicated role also comes into play in the presentation of the underworld. Odysseus pays a visit to the Greek underworld, which, above all, is depicted by its inhabitants as dark and boring, but with the Hellish Christian overlay, it becomes fiery, with moments of torture, and haunting forewarnings.

The allusions run throughout the film, many of which are only half-serious nods to one mythology or another. When betrayed by a family member, Pete calls him "Judas Iscariot Hogswollop. The biblical flood is both referred to and, in a way enacted. Along with Tommy Johnson, the crew runs into George "Baby-Face" Nelson, and gets a front row seat to depression era political corruption. There are dozens of quick references to the Odyssey and to Homer, including a Cyclops, a blind bard, and the naming of Ulysses Everett's wife Penny, short of Penelope. But it's the moments when the different cultural origins of the film run together that makes this lighthearted tribute also a work of comparative mythic analysis.

When I decided to write about O Brother, Where Art Thou, I knew I would have to choose what about the movie I was going to dedicate a post to. In talking about the use of myth and culture in the film, I am leaving out discussion of a soundtrack that won incredible amounts of recognition and awards, used found tracks from archives, pulled several artists out of retirement, and awarded a Grammy to a man who had led a chain gang in a song in 1959. I am overlooking the then novel technique of digital color correction that was used to give the film a sepia tint, and what good and horrible things Hollywood has since done with the technique pioneered in this movie. Hopefully, in time, someone will have a chance to revisit this film. It is, after all, a modern epic.

 

Once Upon a Time: Disney for the Ones Who Grew Up (Sophie)

I am not often a fan of giant media conglomerations, but for ABC's Once Upon a Time, I have to make an exception. The ABC network is owned by the Disney Corporation, and never has this relationship worked out better for the prime time viewer. The show was billed as a fantasy-drama based on classical fairy tales, but it takes much of it's core characters from Disney's animated features and borrows from them to an extent that would be difficult for anyone forced to navigate the "enchanted forest" that is Disney copyright law. The show is by no means made for children, and is often violent and heartbreaking. Still, it is mindful of the themes of the fairy tales (and is some cases Victorian children's stories or other story classics) it is based on. Family, the battle of good verses evil, and true love are not only paramount thematic issues, but actual forces of power, both magically and when enacted through character motivation. By keeping this fairy tale grounding, the show is free to morph the content and characters, enhance the nuance, and add complications, still while maintaining something that feels authentic at least to the versions of these stories we as viewers are most familiar with.

The result to anyone that grew up or raised children in the age of the Disney Renaissance (Late 1980's to 2000) is a show that seems like an updated, more mature version of these now classic animated films. Obviously, some things are different because of format - a television show demands a cast that is more interconnected and recurring than discrete films. It demands a new twist, a mystery or conflict that bridges the various individual stories and drives the characters, and thus the show, forward in a new way. The show accomplishes this in the form of a new curse put forward by the Evil Queen (from Snow White) to transport all the fairy tale characters to our world, oblivious to who they are, forced to live as she dictates: without their "happy endings." As the main narrative unfurls from this plot point, the show also reveals the actions of the past, in the realm of fairy tales. These stories, are focused on individual sets of characters and are paired up with relevant events in the forward flowing plot, so they are told out of order. Slowly, as the show progresses, the past gets woven together and drops hints as to the events of the future.

In this, the show succeeds wonderfully. The balance between hints that pay off and misdirections, for those readers bouncing theories around in their head, is very satisfying. The show never feels like it is fooling with you just for the sake of convolution, nor does it come off as predictable and boring. Similarly, the show doesn't become a detective puzzle that forces the viewer into hunting for clues, for those viewers who are content in letting the mysteries unfold without trying to guess which well known character might show up and what role they might play, or what betrayal or alliance might come to light next. The overall plotting, and the way the various fantasy stories interweave is done elegantly.

Unfortunately, the writing that is so stellar at the drawing board doesn't always translate into the dialogue. Some of the scenes fall into saccharine or maudlin sentiments, often at the same time sounding like generic and stilted dialogue for a scene of tension, revenge, passion, or some other standard story book fare. During scenes that take place in the fairy tale realm, the writers operate under the added complication of trying to use a kind of folktale mode of speaking. Fortunately, as season 2 progresses the kinks seem to be smoothing out.
 
Part of this fault may lie with the actors as well, especially because TV drama is a medium where the writer of each episode varies and the problems in the writing are much more apparent consistently in some characters than others. In television, the actor becomes more of a constant for the character than the writer, and they become vital in bringing the lines to life. In Once Upon a Time, it's the villains (primarily the Evil Queen Regina, played by Lana Parrilla, and Rumpelstiltskin, played by Robert Carlyle) that outshine their cast-mates.

But they have help from a story that does work hard to challenge the classical fairy tale ideas of evil, while maintaining that true good and true evil exist. It isn't moral ambiguity so much as a deep, pervading sense of sympathy. The show does not hesitate in illustrating true evil and then showing its tragic, sympathetic motivation. This is one way that Once Upon a Time updates its source material for an older audience. As adults, the flat evil-for-evil's sake villains that dominate the Disney canon don't pass for believable characters.

Another update of note the show made is to the roles and ideals of gender. Snow White is turned from the 1937 house-wife princess in distress to a survivalist-princess on the lam who rescues her prince as much as he rescues her. But it isn't just about de-feminizing her role. Snow, in her updated fairy-tale life and in her modern world is powerful as a mother, a lover, and a teacher as well as being one of the most capable fighters on the show. The core cast of Once Upon a Time is, in any given arc, at least half female, and though romance (what with the theme of true love) definitely plays a part in the show, it is far from the only driving motivation.

Briefly, no account of the show is complete without a comment on the aesthetic. As costume designer Eduardo Castro said “We didn’t want it to look like a Renaissance Faire, we wanted it to look like an Alexander McQueen show.” The costumes and styles, aside from certainly being grown up, provide insight into character, future plot points, and clues to morality and timeline. Above all else, they are exquisite.

For anyone familiar with Disney's Masterpiece Collection, Once Upon a Time is a wonderful chance to relive and re-meet childhood classics in a new, more age appropriate way. Even for those who haven't, it's a great way to get to know classic characters in an exciting, innovative way.

Evil, Inc. : The Institution in the Works of Joss Whedon (Sophie)

Before Joss Whedon's Avengers (2012) (reviewed here) rocketed him onto the main stage, he already had a core following of dedicated fans watching and analyzing his works. A lot of attention has been paid to the role of gender and language across Whedon's canon, but on the verge of a new series carrying his creator's seal, Marvel's S.H.I.E.L.D., to premier on ABC, there is another repeated element that deserves examining. Since the beginning of Whedon's television career, his main characters have been pushed and pulled by shadowy unseen organizations, and pitted against not just individual villains, but also entire evil institutions.

Angel (1999-2004) begins by introducing viewers to Los Angeles' literal darker side. The show is set up as a combination of a detective noir and horror/fantasy. The head of this grim side of LA, though, isn't organized crime, it's a law firm, Wolfram & Hart, that specializes in defending and protecting the worst of the worst, which in this universe, means vampires, demons, and genocidal maniacs. Though each season of the show has it's own arc and main villain, the law firm remains as the central embodiment of evil throughout the show.

It's an obvious joke, a firm of powerful lawyers that keeps the rich richer and the poor underpowered (“Evil white folks really do have a Mecca! … Oh, I get it, I get it. You all can cater to the demon, cater to the dead man, but what about the black man!” - Charles Gunn, Episode 1.21 Blind Date). Here, they are taken to the extreme, with demonic clients and bloody rituals. But Whedon uses the idea of evil lawyers beyond the humorous gag. They become an examination of evil, (often seen as wild and animalistic or demonic) as it is enacted through something so proscribed and systematic as law. Angel, a hero on a quest for good and personal redemption, is forced to face a world where evil is institutional, and intrinsically engrained. At one point, the former head lawyer of the LA branch tells him as much:

    "Our firm has always been here in one form or another. The Inquisition, the Khmer Rouge—we were here the first time a caveman clubbed his neighbor and watched in fascination as his brains oozed out in the dirt. We're in the hearts and minds of every living human being [...] The world doesn't work in spite of evil, Angel. It works with us. It works because of us."(Holland Manners 2.15 Reprise)

Wolfram & Hart, then, is about how evil is part of civilization from the beginning, because it is part of us from the beginning. Evil lawyers are in power, but isn't evil always?

Whedon's next evil corporation never got a chance to come out of the shadows. Much of what viewers know about Firefly (2002) and Serenity's (the 2005 movie sequel) mega corporation of Blue Sun comes from piecing things together from the 14 episode show, interviews, and official merchandise. What is clear is that Blue Sun is everywhere. The logo is all over the show, on products from food and clothes, to more luxury goods, to transport vehicles. But the company reaches much farther. On some planets, they are an exclusive monopoly. The show reveals (or would, but didn't have a chance to get that far, and instead does so on DVD commentary) that they have even begun human experiments for their medical and military contracting subdivisions, which have led to horrifying results. There are clearly implied ties to the government and it is not clear whether Blue Sun and the Alliance Government are even actually separately functioning entities. Unlike Wolfram & Hart, which operates inside a system as it's necessary or ever present evil, Blue Sun is the system. Our Heroes, in this show, are rebels against this system and in 14 episodes and one movie, we only see reasons to agree with them. But in an interview, Whedon elaborated on more nuance of the main character, Captain Malcolm “Mal” Reynolds's politics:

“Mal’s politics are very reactionary and ‘Big government is bad’ and ‘Don’t interfere with my life. And sometimes he’s wrong — because sometimes the Alliance is America, this beautiful shining light of democracy. But sometimes the Alliance is America in Vietnam: we have a lot of petty politics, we are way out of our league and we have no right to control these people. And yet! Sometimes the Alliance is America in Nazi Germany. And Mal can’t see that, because he was a Vietnamese.”

If Wolfram & Hart is about evil inherent in the system, Blue Sun is about the dangers of an unbalanced system, of one company with too much power, and people with too little voice to change that.

Dollhouse (2009-2010), unlike his two previous shows, takes us inside a corporation, a biomedical firm, Rossum, that produces the most advanced neurological treatments, and also runs an underground elite network of “houses” of programmable humans, known as dolls. From the inside of one of these Dollhouses, the show depicts several characters moral struggles with the technologies that allow for the complete rewriting of the human mind. The dolls are people who have entered into a contract of slavery to do things they cannot imagine and will not remember, in exchange for financial compensation and being cured of whatever problems they may have had (often mental illnesses) or instead of prison sentences. As the end game for Rossum is revealed, and the stakes get higher, allegiances change and justifications fall away. Rossum has a lot of elements of Blue Sun, in that they are too powerful, and too long unchecked, but it also brings in some elements of Wolfram & Hart's message. The series tells us that the technology that Rossum possessed was so powerful that it would almost inevitably end all of civilization. Why? Because people seek power and control, and now they can have it.

In his non-TV shows, Whedon cannot seem to leave the institutional evil behind him. Though the main character of Dr. Horrible is technically supposed to be evil, the “Hero,” is clearly an absolutely terrible person. In the 45 minute web musical, Whedon makes sure to mention that this hero is a “Corporate TOOL.” Cabin in the Woods, (which this blog already touched on here, [spoiler warning]) toys with a corporation that seems quite evil, and well, turns out to have a more complicated purpose.

The reason all this is important to understand in the wake of The Avengers and the anticipation to S.H.I.E.L.D., is that in the source material,  S.H.I.E.L.D. is a very large, very powerful organization. Though technically under either US or UN control, in the recent Avengers, they are shown to be largely autonomous, and occasionally even act against the advice and order of these authorities. In the block buster superhero movie, of course,  S.H.I.E.L.D. is unambiguously the good guys, coming in and saving the day. But Whedon's fear of such institutional power survived even until filming, as a cut scene from the beginning shows. This scene would have framed the whole movie with the question of whether this agency is, in fact, reckless, dangerous, and too powerful.

With a whole series, more personal creative freedom and less big name super heroes, I for one, and anxious to see where Joss Whedon plan's to take this next large institutional power in the future.

The Fall, a Masterpiece you Might have Missed (Sophie)

When I call The Fall, by Tarsem Singh, a fairy tale or a fantasy, I mean that it is this aesthetic, and this story telling mode that propels this masterpiece of a film, not that it should in any way be taken as a lightweight tale for children. In fact, with it's R rating, The Fall, deals with themes and shows vivid imagery that can be troubling or graphic even for some adults. It is a fantasy because it is driven by fantasy and imagination on every level. The story is of one narrative, that of of how a stunt actor, Roy, (Lee Pace), in the face of shattered legs, and dreams of stardom and love, turns his imagination towards creating a second narrative, fueled by his new fantasy of suicide. He tells a tale of an epic journey to a young patient of the same hospital, and in her imagination, the story becomes sprawling landscapes and rich costumes that the film shows the viewer in stunning color. Even the creation of the movie is driven by fantasy. The project, called a "vanity project" on the part of Tarsem Singh by Variety, was filled over four years and across seven countries, always on location rather than adding the surreal and ornate landscape in during editing.

The film is carried in part by these visuals. If there was ever a movie that will suffer on a small cell or tablet screen with poor contrast it is this one. In place of the quick cutting and digitally rendered backgrounds of so many modern films, The Fall opts primarily for long takes of locations the reader recognizes from photographs out of national geographic archives and lists of exotic architecture. All of these locations are put to use, in their rich palettes, complex geometrical patterns, and mind blowing spaces, to create a dreamlike air to the inner narrative. While some viewers might be looking for a film with tighter action and setting, once you buy into Tarsem Singh's different mode of visual story telling, he has a truly mesmerizing world to show you.

Despite these surreal landscapes, this is a fantasy movie that still remains entirely within the genre of realism. Keeping the realm of the majestic inside the imagination rich mind of a five year old girl gives both the inner and outer story an added air of credibility and emotional impact. In fact, the entire movie is told from the point of view of Alexandria, a five year old child of a migrant worker family in the hospital for a badly broken arm. She speaks poor English, and rarely gets visitors, but she is well enough to wander around the grounds. The viewer learns Roy's story (barring a brief introduction scene) only as she sneaks peeks of it around corners, or as she is hurried in or out of rooms. The outside plot, set in a color drained, confined space, could not be more different from the epic tale Roy tells her, but as Alexandria slowly unravels both, they both become tales of intrigue.

As the movie progresses, parts of the two worlds start to combine. Imagery from the hospital finds it's way into Roy's epic story of revenge, and fantasy characters gain the identities of people around the hospital. The reverse is true as well. Roy's story finds it's way into Alexandria's life in the hospital, informing her actions and reactions. Roy, having intended this from the beginning, uses the girl's interest and dedication to the story to have her help in his suicide plot. As both stories near their climax, Alexandria refuses to be a passive observer, and both stories become as much her own as they are anyone else's.

While the stunning visuals are what set this film apart, it is Catinca Untaru's portrayal of Alexandria that allows it survive. Herself a 6 year old Romanian actress, her character is about as genuine and natural as I have ever seen a child in a movie. Her scenes throughout the hospital were film in order on purpose, so that as Untaru's English improved, so did Alexandria's, and as the actress's front teeth grew back in, that, too was incorporated into the script. Alexandria, unlike many children characters, feels real, active, and motivated. Her actions, because they were partly improvised by Untaru, belong genuinely to a girl, struggling to learn English, in a world of adults.

The film ends, with an old film reel of stunts from early silent films, though I will let you find out the emotional impact yourself, to avoid giving away the resolution. Its impact, artistically, is to reinforce that this is a movie about how films have been made, and continue to be made, the choices directors, producers and actors make. It is Tarsem Singh acknowledging that he is fully aware this is not the kind of movie his viewer might be used to, but that each movie is about what can be done weighed against what the crew makes efforts to do, and ultimately, how the audience receives it. It is, at its core, a movie about movie making, and a story about storytelling.

The Smaller Screen: Television and the Internet (Sophie)

Now-a-days, every film and tv show have an official website, many of them with extra content, ranging from behind the scenes photos to brand new footage or animated web series set in the same universe. More and more people are accessing films and television for the first time from their computers through web-streaming services such as Hulu, Netflix, official Youtube channels, or streaming directly from network or TV show websites. Things that are not officially available are still peddled on the web, either on technically illegal streaming sites or illegal download. The fact is, the web and the computer are now integral parts of how film and television are consumed.

Then, there are the materials created explicitly for the web. The web series, or web television is technically in its late teens as a form, but changes in web speed, accessibility, and technology, such as Youtube's creation in 2005 fundamentally made the web a kind of playground for new, independent creators, especially those interested in episodic structure. Web series, as defined by Wikipedia, consist of everything from weekly news shows, to animated movie reviews, to slapstick comedies produced on low budget to newer dramas made with partnerships in Hollywood or with big name web companies.

Recently, television stations have been buying rights to shows originally made for the internet and airing them. At this point, there are far too many varied forms or web television to address at once. Low budget, episodic comedies are popular and well suited to the short run times that many web series have. Dramas are less common. Nearly all web episodes air short episodes. Very short. For dramas, which on television find it more useful to run for an hour as opposed to comedies at a half hour, the web demands an adaptation of narrative structure. On the longer end, a web show like Sanctuary (one of the highest budgeted, at 4.3 million, and with Hollywood insiders) ran eight 15-20 minute episodes before being picked up by (then) SciFi for television. On the shorter end, several mystery shows ran episodes of 90 seconds each.

H+, a new show this fall, produced by Warner Brother's Digital Distribution, their web specific developers, in partnership with Youtube, chose a median episode length of about 4 minutes per episode. From the creative team of John Cabrera (writer, known from his acting on Gilmore Girls) and Bryan Singer (producer, who worked on The Usual Suspects, along with several super hero movies), the show is on the scale of the post apocalyptic science fiction shows that the major networks keep trying out for prime time slots. With a budget of a little under 2 million, and filmed around Santiago, Chile, the plot spans decades and the entire globe. It calls on special effects for simulated many advanced technologies, as well as classically higher budget effects, like explosions, crashed cars and complex sets.

The bare bones of the plot is what happens when technologies like smart phones become even more advanced to the point of integration into the human body, and what, in an extreme case can be the fall out from that. Quoting inspiration from Lost, the story is told non-linearly, through multiple threads about the technology that slowly (by episode 24, halfway through the proposed 28 episode 255 minute run) seem to be connecting to each other through overlapping character. Every episode has a given location and time relative to “it happening,” the disaster the changes the world that is supposed to be the driving mystery.

Having followed the series through it's 2-3 episodes a week release schedule, the series comes off quite differently than it's made for TV counterparts (Revolution – J.J. Abrams similarly plotted adventure on NBC; Falling Skies – an apocalypse driven by alien invasions – produced by Steven Spielberg on TNT). The combination of short episodes and receiving those episodes as part of disjoint stories seem more like views into a world and do less to push the viewer towards wondering about the mystery. Because the series premiers on Youtube, the comments contain instant reactions. Rather than discussions of the mystery, or insightful connections or theorizing (typical, I am told, of a forum after an episode of Lost,) most of the top comments are complaints about the short format, asking for longer 15-30, even hour long episodes. The creators occasionally step in the discussion and recommend watching a bunch of the episodes at a time.

What seemed curious is that now, in 2012, the web series format is nothing new. Most of the people watching H+ watch other videos on Youtube, maybe even other series. What is it about this one? In gauging my own impressions of the format and the content, perhaps the scope and the scale of the project are just too big for such a small screen. It's only recently that we have come to expect high budget effects and global scale shooting from television. Only recently have the high tech and the post apocalyptic gotten comfortable on the small screen (though, it could be argued, that they are still trying to find their footing there.) Moving it so quickly to the web series, especially to such a short episode, the visuals and intensity feel like small clips from something out of what we have come to expect of high budget television or movies. They feel like additional information rather than the core plot. Certainly the decision to build up this universe that is already hard enough to contain on the web through non-linear slowly converging storylines adds to the frustrations.

Ultimately, H+ has still creating an engaging universe and interesting characters. Whether or not the medium or the form they used is ultimately beneficial is unclear. The web is still a new media, and certainly not one accepted at the same level as television. Budgets are lower, and it's considered an honor to be picked up by a network to be aired through “normal” means. It's future, though can only get brighter as technology improves and people rely less and less on the major networks for their programming. Already, Netflix and Hulu are creating their own content. Perhaps a program like H+ isn't so much in the wrong place, but before it's time.

Check out H+ for yourselves on their Youtube Channel.

Dark City - A Science Fiction Spin on Noir (Sophie)

Dark City is both a science fiction film and a neo-noir. The film, directed and co-written by Alex Proyas, uses its science fictive breaks from reality to create a kind of genre commentary, placing a new spin and plot importance on long standing tropes of the noir tradition. In using a science fiction setting, the film can create a reality in which the metaphorical corruptions and convolutions of the world of the noir become literal. A man waking up with no memory, trying to piece his life together itself becomes a clue in a larger mystery of how this world works. Amnesia is not at all uncommon in noir, but in Dark City, amnesia and confusion of identity become actively malicious, controlled actions of the antagonists, the “Strangers,” who possess godlike powers to stop time and alter reality. Thus, the iconic labyrinthine cities of LA or Chicago give way to a city that is a literal maze that is twisted anew each night and designed purposefully without an exit. One scene, to drive home the metaphor, even depicts such a maze, designed for rats – as the residence of this city serve as subjects of experimentation for these “Strangers.”

The question of fate, of what makes a person who they are, that lurks at the center of many films of the genre is the one that these sinister experimenters are seeking to solve. They seek to understand memory and what drives a person to be the unique agent that they become. To this end, they arrange a classic plot – a betrayed husband, mad with jealousy, turns into a killer of prostitutes. Given the memories of a killer, they wondered, would he continue to kill? But the process fails and the man is left without an identity, framed for crimes he not only did not commit, but most of which never happened in the first place. The detectives who are staged to play their part come onto the scene, walking through dimly lit corridors in an old motel, giving the movie the classic feel – but they too are pawns, and the one detective who has seen the truth is driven mad. By assigning everyone's identities, these puppet masters create a truly noir world of corruption, where there is no secrecy, no innocence, and no place left untouched by a nefarious system. It becomes a world where nothing is as it seems, where no social bond is genuine, and where everything is as tenuous as the will of these unseen powers.

Our protagonist, assuming the assigned name of John Murdoch, is pursued by the Strangers, beings that, they reveal, literally assume the identities of the dead by wearing their skins. John is special – he possesses the same reality warping abilities as the Strangers, and begins to understand the truth – that there is no world beyond the city, that all of their lives are manufactured falsehoods. Much of what he notices fall into the tropes of noir. To convince the detective that the world, rather than he, is insane he says, “Daylight. When was the last time you remember seeing it? I'm not talking about a distant, half-forgotten childhood memory. I mean, like, yesterday. Last week? When? Do you have a single memory? You don't, do you? I don't think the sun even exists in this place.” The Strangers, though they have implanted everyone with the memory of the sun, are hurt by the strong light, and have created a world of perpetual darkness.

The plot is a bit convoluted and at points the artist choices come off as unintentionally comic, but the movie succeeds spectacularly in creating a world and feel with powerful aesthetics and strong philosophical themes.

The Circus and Imagined Realms: MirrorMask and The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (Sophie)

Who doesn't occasional dream of running away to join a circus? The lead females of two whimsical films of the last ten years, want exactly the opposite – feeling trapped by the lives they are forced to lead in small traveling family circuses, Helena Campbell, in MirrorMask (2005) and Valentina in The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009) want nothing more than to run off and join the normal world.

Taking the circus and its themes of possibility, magic, and mystery as a base, both films choose to extrapolate on dreams, identities, and imagination, but visually, take very different directions. Both films are strikingly beautiful and marvelously successful in creating stunning imaginary realms – but you would expect nothing less from the creative brains behind them. MirrorMask is the brain child of Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean, (a team that has worked together several times in crafting wacky and inventive children's books,) and made possible by the Jim Henson workshop, while The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is a Terry Gilliam and Charles McKeownproduction.

MirrorMask choses a steampunk fantasy, with sepia tones and gear-based monsters. The film, like much of McKean's work, looks like a collage, which lends itself wonderfully to the notions of how a subconscious breaks apart the world and rearranges it in dreams or fantasy. Likewise, through the cut and paste landscape that Helena travels, the familiar becomes strange – objects we thought we knew get repurposed. The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus uses are broader pallet, choosing extremes of color and pattern, as well as fantastical architecture. Though both films draw heavily on themes of light versus darkness, the worlds inside the imaginarium explode (sometimes literally) with the contrast. The pleasant dreams play out in near neons and rainbows of pastels, while dark temptations are saturated with deep reds and blacks. Even the tinny props of Parnassus's real world stage are rich with visual detail.

Despite their common themes and settings, the two movies tell different archetypal stories. MirrorMask, using Helena as the protagonist, becomes a liminal fantasy journey to adulthood – an Alice in Wonderland tale. The movie was influenced by Jim Henson's Labyrinth, the splitting and doubling found in many fairy tales, and some story elements that will sound familiar to anyone who knows Gaiman's Coraline, published in 2002. Helena, wandering in a dream-like state, finds herself in a world of two kingdoms, one of light and one of shadow, where the balance has been thrown off – and only she, a girl who looks just like the missing Princess of Shadow, can fix it. She travels with a native companion and overcomes trials, as per the Campbellian pattern, leading to confrontation and reconciliation with her dream-mother figure, solving of the riddle, and a return as a more complete person.

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus by contrast is a story about dealing with the devil. By focuses on Doctor Parnassus rather than his daughter, Gilliam tells a story of morality and temptations, about struggling with consequence rather than circumstance. Gilliam describes the character of Parnassus (played by Christopher Plummer) as almost autobiographical – an old man who long ago worked as a monk dedicated to sustaining the world by telling stories. Tempted away by the devil (a Mr. Nick, played by Tom Waits), he earns his immortality by proving that people cared more about imagination and stories than petty fancies by winning over souls in his imaginarium, a mirror land that turns imagination into landscape. Years later, he makes another deal – his youth returned for his first born – a debt that is coming due as the movie opens. He, his daughter, and his small traveling band take the imaginarium around the cruder parts of London, trying to win over souls for imagination. When Parnassus makes another deal to try to save his daughter, the film becomes a desperate race to see who can win 5 the fastest. Ultimately Doctor Parnassus is only freed from the cycle of suffering when he resists the temptation to make another deal with Mr. Nick. By contrast with MirrorMask this choice mask a resignation of the end of his lifetime, rather than it's beginning.

A final interesting note: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus was Heath Ledger's final film. He died 1/3 through the filming of it. As a result, Johnny Depp, Colin Farrell, and Jude Law were cast to replace him in the scenes inside the imaginarium, and the script was altered slightly to reflect the characters awareness that his appearance altered in response to his own or other people's imagination.