Watched Guy Ritchie's new film, In the Grey. I enjoyed it as competence porn - if you want to watch gorgeous people be good at stuff while wrecking billionaires shit this is the movie for you.
I was fascinated by two things. We'll get to the second one in a minute, first I want to talk about the breezily confident lack of emotional stakes.
Why does our badass shady lawyer care about getting a billion dollars back from someone that stole it? She gets a percentage. Okay, you ask the movie, why does she need the percentage? Do you really care? The movie asks back. Look at her, she's hot and ruthless and completely in charge of the situation with her two loyal scary dogs. That's not what we're here for.
Okay, why are the scary dogs so unquestioningly loyal to her? You ask instead. The movie gives a coy shrug. Show don't tell, the movie replies, showing two hot men following her into dangerous situations and wrecking shit to keep her safe. You sort of want to protest that this isn't actually a reason, but by jove those two hot men are so *good* at wrecking shit, I guess that's not what we're here for either.
Okay, onto the second thing (and really the reason I'm sharing the thoughts on Tumblr). This thing feels designed to be fandom bait.
For the M/M lovers: the aforementioned two hot men? Flirt relentlessly in the most deadpan way possible, either effortlessly secure in their heterosexuality or happily married for at least fifteen years, and no explanation given for which one.
For the F/F lovers: the ruthless lawyer? Walks into a corporate office and bullies her way into the job with a smirk and an implied fraught backstory with the Girlboss(tm). This is not at all explained and just waiting for a toxic yuri situationship with hatesex to be painted over it.
For the M/M/F inclined: the hot lawyer and her two hot bodyguards? They move with an effortless confidence with each other, she calls them "my boys" emphasis on the possessive (other people do the same!) The gents have everything planned in service of keeping her safe, and are utterly uninterested in trying to convince her to do safer things. They'll just have to kill everyone that tries to stop her.
I think there's a strong case that this movie hits that Goldilocks zone of not so good people are intimidated out of creating but compelling enough that people want to create. Unfortunately I suspect it simply won't be popular enough to really take off, but my call is that it will be a hopping yuletide fandom for years to come.
I guess tl:Dr - If you want brain off fun with hot people, go ahead and watch the movie, it was a fun time! Lots of fannish potential.
