Given how many plot holes and lens flares were in the reboot Star Trek, my hopes were not terribly high. Still, I'm a little bit of a Trekkie, so I had to give it a shot.
Verdict: A solid, shiny looking movie that is fun to watch, but not very memorable.
One thing that did bother me was the character of Khan (Noonien Singh).
Khan is one of my all-time favourite fictional characters, and Ricardo Montalban (RIP) absolutely owned the role. Montalban's Khan just oozed everything you'd expect out of a 'super-human': Power, Charisma, Confidence, Intelligence, Strength...
Benedict Cumberbatch, owner of the most Englishy name ever, is a tremendous actor. His portrayal of Sherlock (BBC Series) is sublime. That said, I take great issue with his casting in this role.
First off, notice anything different between the two? Yeah, somehow Khan became a white (Anglo-Saxon) guy *facepalm*.
Apart from that, Cumberbatch's Khan just comes off as a very generic bad guy. Khan owned the screen, and you could see why people who either follow him or fear him. Cumberbatch's Khan? Just your ordinary bad guy with powers. Cumberbatch did well with what he was given, though, and turned a generically written role into a good performance.
Into Darkness should have just had Cumberbatch as one of the other super-humans that were encapsulated, rather than Khan. I know they've taken the canon of Star Trek and totally refried it, but this was nerd-rage levels of travesty. Ugh.
---
On another nerdy note, it seems Magic: the Gathering has its first explicit portrayal of an openly-gay couple.
Read the flavour text, and then look at the statues.
It's an incredibly subtle, but bold statement from Wizards of the Coast. I like that they just slipped it in (That's what she said!), rather than making it a big "OMG, WE GOT GAYZ!!" fuss. It's just a normal relationship, after all.
Besides, knowing how the Greeks (especially SPARTA!!!!!) loved their buggery, it fits the mythos of the set perfectly!
---
It seems Magic Deck Vortex was hacked by Turkish nitwits, and the owner is MIA. I know the site was pretty dormant, these days, but it was nice to have a place to do reviews and writing about casual MTG. Most MTG sites cater to competitive players. Those with a casual place either already have a (better) writer, or focus on EDH/Commander.
I'll still blog about MTG topics, but I likely won't do any reviews of Theros cards like I was for Ravnica.
---
I'm one of the 'lucky' folks that was chosen to be a Compass Beta Tester for Translink. I got a compass card loaded with $100 of fake money, and I simply swipe in and out when I take the SkyTrain (or bus).
So far, I've had no issues with the card, itself. Obviously, the gates are always opened, so we haven't seen how quickly that transaction will take.
My biggest worry, all along, has been the number of gates at each station. Brentwood has only 3 gates for the entire station!
There is going to be a huge bottleneck of people during rush hour, so people will need to adjust their commutes and add a little extra time. Still, this card system was well overdue. The fact that they installed SkyTrain without fare gates is just baffling.
Both Ricardo Montalban's parents were actual Spanish Spaniards. Kahn was a white dude in the first movie, too.
ReplyDeleteI've never heard anybody call Montalban or Khan 'white' before. Certainly, he's not dark, but his complexion is certainly darker than the Northern Europeans. "Olive", if you want to be semantic.
ReplyDeleteWhen you hear the name Khan Noonien Singh, do you picture somebody who looks like Benedict Cumberbatch? :D
Apparently, the producers (Into Darkness) were scared of having a darker middle-eastern guy play a 'terrorist', so they went with the whitist white guy. Talk about a cop out...
I think in the hierarchy of casting characters, certainly casting an actor of the same ethnicity of the character is first choice. However, I think changing the race of the character to match the actor is, if not better, then at least no worse than the philosophy that "any ethnic actor can play any ethnic character cause they're all interchangeable, right?" And I would venture that, arguably, casting someone of western European origin to play "genetic caricature of 'brown' person" would be the worst choice of all. Because when I hear the name Khan Noonien Singh, I don't think of Benedict Cumberbatch. I think of an Indian. And if there is one thing neither Ricardo Montalban nor Khan is, it's an accurate portrayal of an Indian.
ReplyDeleteThis is an interesting conversation, albeit unintended...
ReplyDeleteThere are 1 billion people in India, and some of them are fairly light skinned. From what little I see, many Bollywood actors tend to be fairer skinned than the 'darker' Indians many people picture.
Funny enough, Salman Khan, one of the most popular Bollywood actors, (http://www.topnews.in/files/Salman-Khan_64.jpg) is actually fairly light-skinned. At least Montalban is closer to that than Cumberbund :)
I suppose a white guy can have the Khan Noonien Singh name... I am reminded of a part-time job I had. I worked with a fellow named Amrit Singh, who was actually a white guy who converted to Sikhism. I had no idea he wasn't truly Indian until he told me, given that he had the really bushy beard and olive-ish complexion.
In the end, I just feel Khan should not have been white-washed, especially since Indians and Middle-Eastern actors rarely seem to get big roles these days, and because the original Khan was definitely not Anglo-Saxon.