Word of Nathan

A couple of nights ago I had the opportunity to watch Kurt Wimmer’s Equilibrium, which has been on my buy/rent/download list for a year now. I wasn’t disappointed. This film definitely goes on my list of favorites both for the amazing action and the stark aesthetic.

Funny enough, I’d actually say this movie has surplanted The Matrix in my list of favorites. Where The Matrix gets almost silly (”We all mentally live in a giant computer!” “Little scorpion tracking bugs will crawl into your stomach!” “You have the power to change reality!”), Equilibrium sticks to a gritty version of reality where the future just means more advanced bullet-firing guns and taking your feel-nothing drug three times a day like a good drone. The aesthetic of the film tracks the protagonist’s journey from cold killer to heart-led rebel and the cool monotone at the start is gradually replaced by warmer color, not the least of which is freshly spilled blood. Rather than altering or withdrawing from reality, Equilibrium proposes going deeper into the one we have.

If you at all liked The Matrix or you are a fan of dystopian stories, you owe it to yourself to see this film. You’ll be wondering by the end why Christian Bale was not cast as Neo instead of Keanu Reeves.

Has anyone noticed that Balligomingo’s “Wild Butterfly” uses a hook pattern weirdly similar to the bridge hook from Enya’s “Orinoco Flow” or is it just me? I could swear they’re almost identical. Given that Balligomingo has been accused of plagiarism before, I suppose this wouldn’t be a complete surprise…

I picked up this book recently since I have no major epic fantasy or sci fi series on my reading list at the moment, and thought maybe it would be worth a shot. The short of it? An interesting world, neat quirks and abilities, and such poorly written characterization that the story was painful. It resulted in a lot of stop-and-start reading until I finally took a couple of hours Saturday and finished it.

While I am definitely curious to know what happens to Karan, Llian, and the others, especially given the infuriatingly confusing ending (I read it three times, looked up spoilers online, read it again, and finally had to read the first chapter of the next book to understand what happened), I’m not sure I can sit through more pages of stilted dialogue, wooden characters, and predictable actions for another three novels in the main sequence. My verdict? Save your money, or pick it up at a used bookstore if you ever see it there.