Red and Black

A world about to dawn, a night that ends at last.

[jrplowman]

The Ad Council’s 2009 “Stay in School” PSA uses humor and original music to encourage high school students to keep from dropping out.  As wistful, upbeat music declares “these are the good times,” we see an elderly man facing off against high school students in various athletic events. Needless to say, he holds up rather poorly, leading to the punch line “Once you leave school, it’s hard to go back.”

The premise reminds a young audience of the good parts of being in school, and encourages them to consider the permanence of the decisions they make even in their youth. While philosophically the ad could be criticized for ignoring the education aspect of high school altogether – which is of course the point – the “extracurriculars” perspective is probably better for communicating with the intended audience.

[jrplowman]

Premise Summary - The World's End

The World’s End is a sci-fi comedy rounding out Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright’s Three Flavors Cornetto Trilogy. The previous two movies, Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, share no common thread of premise or plot, but involve the same actors, writers, and to some extent, themes. Because of this, World’s End, though considered a part of a series, has a set-up and story line all its own.

This story follows Gary King, a forty-something alcoholic still stuck in his glory days as a teenager. After realizing that a graduation-day pub crawl in his small, English hometown remains the best day of his life, Gary determines to recreate the event, rounding up all his old high school friends for another attempt to make it to their final pub, The World’s End. Gary’s friends, in contrast to himself, have moved on with life quite nicely since high school; they have jobs and houses and families, although most haven’t even had a night out in quite a while. Reluctantly, they agree to follow their intrepid “leader” into one more crazy night, but it turns out to be more than even Gary King bargained for. In their absence, the residents of their quiet hometown have been replaced by alien look-a-likes, as the starting point of an invasion meant to civilize humanity. It quickly becomes clear that the aliens intend death for anyone who doesn’t conform to the idyllic lifestyle they’ve envisioned for the planet. In an effort to blend in, Gary’s friends initially attempt to continue the pub crawl they had announced on their arrival, but even when they realize that’s too dangerous and they need to get out, Gary is determined to finish.

The character Gary King, for all his faults, is dynamic, charismatic, nostalgic, energetic – in short, likeable even if annoying. It’s easy to see why the other characters would have been drawn into his crazy schemes, especially in high school. Additionally it creates great audience sympathy when they get glimpses of how Gary’s life turned out so lonely and disappointing. The setting of a small English village – particularly, in its function as a hometown for the characters – serves as a physical manifestation of “living in the past.”

More complex is the conflict, which is twofold: obviously there is the physical conflict of battling the aliens. More intellectually engaging is the conflict between Gary and his friends, or even Gary and his own life, as it soon becomes clear Gary only wants things that lead everyone into more destruction. The two conflicts converge at the end, when it is revealed that Gary had been committed to rehab, and hadn’t done well there. The aliens trying to rehabilitate and conform Earth serve as a parallel to the way the outside world reacted to Gary. Like the aliens offered humanity no alternative to job-house-wife but death, humanity offered Gary no alternative to job-house-wife than drink. But when the aliens are defeated, Gary also manages to defeat expectations, and find an alternative to the traditional lifestyle that didn’t suit him which doesn’t involve self-destruction.

The World’s End is a sci-fi comedy rounding out Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright’s Three Flavors Cornetto Trilogy. The previous two movies, Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, share no common thread of premise or plot, but involve the same actors, writers, and to some extent, themes. Because of this, World’s End, though considered a part of a series, has a set-up and story line all its own.

This story follows Gary King, a forty-something alcoholic still stuck in his glory days as a teenager. After realizing that a graduation-day pub crawl in his small, English hometown remains the best day of his life, Gary determines to recreate the event, rounding up all his old high school friends for another attempt to make it to their final pub, The World’s End. Gary’s friends, in contrast to himself, have moved on with life quite nicely since high school; they have jobs and houses and families, although most haven’t even had a night out in quite a while. Reluctantly, they agree to follow their intrepid “leader” into one more crazy night, but it turns out to be more than even Gary King bargained for. In their absence, the residents of their quiet hometown have been replaced by alien look-a-likes, as the starting point of an invasion meant to civilize humanity. It quickly becomes clear that the aliens intend death for anyone who doesn’t conform to the idyllic lifestyle they’ve envisioned for the planet. In an effort to blend in, Gary’s friends initially attempt to continue the pub crawl they had announced on their arrival, but even when they realize that’s too dangerous and they need to get out, Gary is determined to finish.

The character Gary King, for all his faults, is dynamic, charismatic, nostalgic, energetic – in short, likeable even if annoying. It’s easy to see why the other characters would have been drawn into his crazy schemes, especially in high school. Additionally it creates great audience sympathy when they get glimpses of how Gary’s life turned out so lonely and disappointing. The setting of a small English village – particularly, in its function as a hometown for the characters – serves as a physical manifestation of “living in the past.”

More complex is the conflict, which is twofold: obviously there is the physical conflict of battling the aliens. More intellectually engaging is the conflict between Gary and his friends, or even Gary and his own life, as it soon becomes clear Gary only wants things that lead everyone into more destruction. The two conflicts converge at the end, when it is revealed that Gary had been committed to rehab, and hadn’t done well there. The aliens trying to rehabilitate and conform Earth serve as a parallel to the way the outside world reacted to Gary. Like the aliens offered humanity no alternative to job-house-wife but death, humanity offered Gary no alternative to job-house-wife than drink. But when the aliens are defeated, Gary also manages to defeat expectations, and find an alternative to the traditional lifestyle that didn’t suit him which doesn’t involve self-destruction.

[jrplowman]

Dialogue Exercise 2

Featuring the character created in this exercise.

Uncle: You understand the board was expecting you today.

Rodney: The board knows I have nothing to offer them.

Uncle: Did it occur to you maybe they wanted to offer you something?

Rodney (laughing): What could they give me? I already own the company.

Uncle: They wanted to give you an actual interest in it. A say. Let you know that you won’t be shut out just because of your age. That they know you’re your father’s son.

Rodney: Funny how I wasn’t my father’s son until my father was dead.

Uncle: Yes I thought maybe they also wanted to give you their condolences.

Rodney:  Hm. That’s the trick isn’t it?

Uncle: Trick!

Rodney: They’re so convinced I’ll want my life to revolve around them! “Sorry your dad’s gone, let us offer ourselves as an alternative! Surely ten fogey old businessmen and incomprehensible wealth was as good a father as you’ve ever had!”

Uncle: You could really talk about your father that way right now?

Rodney:  I couldn’t.

Uncle: I don’t understand, Rodney. A role in the company is what you’ve been fighting for for years now!

Rodney: The company?! Uncle, I never want… No. Clearly, my intentions were misunderstood.

Uncle: What were your intentions? …You’re really just going to ignore me? I can’t understand you. Most people faced with a situation like this – well, it puts things into perspective, not out of it. It makes it more important to remember the people we’ve lost and what they stood for. I’ve never seen anyone so determined to wipe out the memories of their family!

Rodney: There are plenty of other people to remember Dad.

Uncle: But you’re his son!

Rodney: I’m not only his son! That takes two.

Uncle: Excuse me?

Rodney: I know what the board would’ve said about my dad if I had shown up today. How many of them do you think would have remembered that my mom was in that car too?

[jrplowman]

Premise Exercise

1 – Character:

A charismatic, attention-deficit lone-wolf, Garrison Grant sells his charisma to companies as a self-proclaimed “guerilla advertiser.” If a company has an important client in their sights, Garrison approaches them posing as a new friend, builds up trust, convinces them to buy, then disappears.

2 – Setting:

A secluded small town in Rhode Island, best known for its prestigious boarding school. The prolific geniuses educated there are a great source of pride for the town – so much so that many are willing to turn a blind eye to the surprising number of local scientific anomalies.

3 – Conflict:

A race to invent the time machine between two young physicists in 1905. The loser is convinced his opponent stole his designs and took them back in time to make it appear as though he was first.

[jrplowman]

Character Creation Exercise

He’s wealthy and pretentious, young and bored. He’s dressed in a Belstaff overcoat and red cashmere scarf, cigarette between his lips. He’s standing on the frozen Connecticut lake where he used to play hockey with his grade school friends, and he has just inherited everything he can see: the gated mansion, the stables, the lake house… the old family cemetery.

He’s the picture of fortune – not just in the zeroes in his bank account, but in his education, his health, his companionship. None of it comes to mind as he takes another drag. The luckiest orphan in the world.

[jrplowman]

Premise Summary: Doctor Who

Doctor Who, in the name of education and social commentary, is purposefully constructed as perhaps the most limitless show on television. At its core, Doctor Who is the story of a genius, humanitarian alien called “The Doctor” and his interactions with humanity.  Setting and secondary characters have virtually no restrictions and are constantly changing, as allowed by the “TARDIS,” the time machine used by the Doctor as his vehicle of exploration. While the cast of characters is constantly changing, and no single storyline pervades that show’s whole 50-year existence, the role of humanity in the universe is the constant driving force behind each episodic adventure.

When the show was revived from cancellation in 2005, the human character who accompanied the Doctor for the first few years was 19-year-old, lower-middle-class shop worker Rose Tyler. Rose, with no objective successes or exceptionalities in her background, serves the thematic purpose of showing that human worth is not defined by objective successes, but by character. Plot-wise, she is the catalyst that brings the Doctor back to his explorations and humanitarian investments after he had been called away by a war on his home planet.

[jrplowman]

Dialogue Exercise 1

V1: They got a veggie burger.

V2: Who?

V1: The people from corporate.

V2: Fantastic.

V1: I mean what was I supposed to say? “Don’t get that, our vegetarian options are always horrible?” To the people who determine whether or not we still have a job two years from now?

V2: They’re gonna find out anyway now.

V1: Maybe. I figure there’s always a chance they just like horrible food. More than a chance, given they asked for a veggie burger.

V2: Funny.

V1: Optimistic at least. You know what, maybe it’s a good thing they’ll hate it. I mean we can’t do anything to keep guests from ordering it, not without sacrificing salesmanship. But if it’s swiftly and vengefully wiped from the menu by a pissed-off CCO…

V2: Don’t count on it.

V1: Nah. Nah, I guess not. I’ll just have to take comfort in the knowledge that when the axe falls it can’t fall on me. You don’t shoot the messenger. …What?

V2: I didn’t say anything.

V1: Yeah well smiling’s not usually your forte. Something’s up.

V2: You know what’s gonna happen when our CCO gets a truly horrible burger at one of their own establishments? Nothing. You know why? They know better than anyone that it’s horrible.

V1: Well they should, but they don’t let themselves really believe that.

V2: No, they just don’t let you believe that they don’t believe that. We know it’s horrible, we don’t stop selling it to customers. Why would they stop selling that same lie to you? Marketing doesn’t stop at the public. You’ve got to trick yourself first.

[jrplowman]

Is it possible for a foreign nation to address Syria from a humanitarian perspective?

When nations discuss whether or not to engage in foreign crises, rarely does “engage” indicate anything other than acts of war. While brokering diplomacy is often offered as an alternative, the effectiveness of foreign mitigation is variable at best. For that reason, it’s sometimes understandable why a foreign nation hoping to improve affairs abroad would consider participation the most effective means. This is the root of the United States’ current deliberation over whether or not to engage in missile strikes against the Syrian government.

It must be made clear to anyone reviewing the US’ dilemma that our motivation must aspire toward humanitarian ends. So the question becomes, does a missile strike against an oppressive, murderous government achieve humanitarian ends? The answer must be no; additional violence itself would do little to help the Syrian children and revolutionaries America claims to defend. What they need is construction, not destruction.

Remarkably, the United States already has a contingency in place for such needs – the Peace Corps. No country has ever considered using Peace Corps tactics in open war, but if, as we profess, human rights are the object of our actions, I can think of nothing more helpful. Consider the possibilities if the 30-odd-year-old organization were employed on a level never before seen? Imagine if the government redirected all the resources it is ready to put into warmaking to food and water for refugees, the building of bomb shelters, and evacuation or communication routes?

In this crisis, what America is really asking is not “should we bomb Syria?” but “are those abroad exempt for our conviction of the right to life and liberty?” I must believe that the answer is no, but the means of standing by that answer lies not in destruction, but construction.