Independence Day (Regurgitation)

Me and Mo did a double feature this weekend. I generally take her to the movies once a weekend when I have her (three weekends a month). But the way the show times were stacking up, and there were a few movies I wanted to see, I opted for the binge.

Which is fine with Mo. She loves going to the movies. So we hit Independence Day Resurgence, then the Big Friendly Giant.

The first movie, meh. I know a sequel to Independence Day is a dodgy proposition. I enjoyed the original well enough, though having some British assheads quote President Whitmore in the process of swindling voters into the whole Brexit silliness makes it seem a little less charming. Of course, access to a half-billion-person market and free travel to 26 countries isn't really the same thing as aliens who blow up cities and want to exterminate the human race. And as John Oliver brilliantly pointed out, the U.K. was already independent, it's the country a lot of countries celebrate their independence from.


But the Independence Day sequel is, if this is possible, dumber than the Brexit.

Spoiler Alert

For a start, it takes the aliens exactly 20 years to come back. Because they wanted to time out their re-invasion with our celebrations? Then there's the whole going-for-the-molten-core thing. Supposedly any old boat with shipwreck searching bounty hunters can probe just how fast the aliens are getting to the core with their big coring machine, but worse, if the aliens are just after the molten cores of planets, why the fuck do they start with the only inhabited planet in the solar system? I know they have superior technology and all that, but really, they skipped how many soft targets to re-attack the only planet that's ever given them any resistance?

There's more. I'm all for a good stupid movie (loved the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles flick, for example), but if you're going stupid you have to be entertaining, and Resurgence falls short at every turn. So anyway, BFG is a much, much better movie. It's more believable for a start (and if you're familiar with Roald Dahl's work, that's saying something). I'm pretty sure Mo dug the BFG more, too.

There's plenty of logical faults to the storyline of BFG, but of course you have Spielberg's magic, a charming giant, an adorable kid, I can forgive Roald Dahl for making the Queen actually matter. I mean, really, even if giants are eating children, calling the Queen of England is about as useful as calling Mick Jagger. Famous? Sure. Priviliged? Obscenely. British? Definitely, but not really someone who can solve your problem.

Anyway, then I didn't have Mo on the Fourth itself this year. Me and Corinna headed out to see the fireworks. Well, that's not quite it. We headed out, but she could give a shit about fireworks, and she had another mission to accomplish. Which we did, as we navigated neighborhoods where fireworks are legally sold to people who probably can't afford to make such a big noisy stink, but they do it anyway. I like the big, professional pyro well enough, and I grew up shooting the small stuff but I really have no use for the street level stuff these days. It's expensive, not impressive, messy, noisy, traumatizes our dog, it's likely to end in an ER visit, there is no upside to strings of firecrackers, Roman candles, buzz bombs and whatnot.

And don't even get me started on the idiots who shoot guns in the air as if those bullets don't have to come down somewhere. I want to drive through the neighborhood taking pot-shots at those assholes, they're too stupidly dangerous to be allowed to live.

But I like the big public displays. Leave it to the pros, they do it so much better.

Anyway, Corinna's mission ended up making us a bit late for the start. We'd talked about watching from the Heart of America bridge bike lane but we were lucky to make the Town of Kansas overlook. Which turned out to be, probably, a better place to watch from. A few years ago we watched from the Cheauteu Bridge but that's way too far east to get good shots (though we had fun meeting Ryan Hefron and making margaritas on the bridge). And the past few years I've headed to the IBEW building which is a pretty good view from above. I think I'll try to make it down to River Market again next year but earlier, with time to get down to the trail and get over under the ASB bridge, it appears they were launching from right past it.