RIP Irvin Kershner

Irvin Kershner, director of The Empire Strikes Back, has passed away at the age of 87. I'm saddened by the passing of Kershner more than I normally would be for a person I've never met, perhaps because I owe a debt of thanks to him for the path I've chosen to take.

One of the first films I can recall seeing is The Empire Strikes Back. It was definitely my first Star Wars film. It had been recorded off television, and my copy started with a Tauntaun coming over a hill and Luke Skywalker spotting a Probe droid crashing through his Macrobinoculars. Talk about thrust right into the story... I had absolutely no bearing for any of this, but does that matter to a five year old? I was transported to another galaxy, shown miraculous things, fell in love with the Millennium Falcon and believed Light Sabres were real. My love affair with Science-Fiction, Space Opera and all things Fantastic was born.

FLCL and The Courier

I'm not going to make any bones about it... this is mostly another opportunity for me to embed The Courier somewhere. However I might as well take the time to do something with this.

One of the reasons I've chosen Jung Justice as a blog name is because as a storyteller I'm heavily influenced by Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell. Jung's views on dreams and art as an important cathartic exercise validate my chosen vocation, so I'm hardly going to disagree and just about everything I've learnt about film and storytelling has come via Campbell's Hero's Journey in some shape or form.


The connective power of myths and legends (and how that interweaves with our dreams and our worldviews) fascinates me to no end and when these colossal elements and themes pervade what appear to be mundane narratives, I'm thrilled.

FLCL is perhaps one of the finest examples of an otherwise banal narrative (domestic drama, coming of age, guy meets girl etc) and infusing it with imagery of mythic proportions. It takes these everyday moments and distorts them to such extremes with the introduction of fantasy or sci-fi elements that you can barely recognise them anymore. 'Scott Pilgrim vs The World' is another fine example of what I'm talking about.

Episode Review: Young Justice "Independence Day" (Pilot)

Friday saw the premiere of the new DC animated series 'Young Justice' and while we wont be seeing it again till January, you'll want to add this to your must-watch list for 2011. That is, if you love your super heroics-in-animated-form as much as I do... and doubly so if you are as disappointed in the Avengers series as I am.

I'm still figuring out a format for how I'm going to write these, and exactly how much detail I'll go into, but here we go....

--RECAP

'Young Justice' hits the ground running, introducing our young heroes (teen titans, if you will) in a series of fun, and very well animated action scenes. In the space of 5 minutes we've seen Robin (Jesse McCartney), Speedy (Crispin Freeman), Kid Flash (Jason Spisak), Aqualad (Khary Payton) as well as Justice Leaguers; Batman (Bruce Greenwood), Superman (Nolan North), Green Arrow (Alan Tudyk), Aquaman (Phil LaMarr), Martian Manhunter (Kevin Michael Richardson), Flash (George Eads), Zatarra  and Red Tornado. Phew! Then there's the quartet of ice-based villains the Sidekicks all take down; Freeze, Icicle, Captain Cold and .... some other one (c'mon, DC just have so many ice villains!).

a new blog appears: awesome anime double title attacks

so what's the point of this blog and why should you read it?

As I was scouring the net the other day for information on a variety of programs, I discovered that only a handful of my favourite shows are getting recaps. Generator Rex is only getting coverage from Republibot as far as I can tell (a good source for Cartoon Network recaps), and bizarrely enough, there's only a handful of Community recappers out there.

It was also occuring to me that I watch a lot of things, be they television shows, movies or animated series... and I don't do a lot with that information. Sure, I'm a struggling filmmaker who likes to keep current, and I just love stories, but I'm starting to feel like I should do something that reflects that.