Pressure

Life steps in the way sometimes.
Friendships fade and renew.
Dreams fade and get reinvigorated.
“What’s with the platitudes?” you ask.
Well an annual event between some of my closest dear friends, ne family, almost came to a standstill because of rumor and the rumors of war. I will neither summarize nor identify the parties-[although it’s safe to say I may be a perpetrator; I do, after all believe in appropriate social transparency]. However, the rumors of war are worth investigating as an abstract. Those pernicious sometimes scintillating viral emics that can undo the most carefully laid plan or friendship.
Group dynamics as miniscule as band and as large as “global” have its own distinct network of communicating ideas, some large—multimedia, some traditional – word of mouth, some underground – fanzines. Then there’s the uber traditional uber organic method: the gathering of clansmen [and women] who annually break bread and well… talk shit.
Talking shit is at once humanity’s greatest triumph and defeat. Yeah, I know “hyperbole!” you scream. And well yes it is. I stand accused. But break it down to brass tacks… how many lives have been destroyed by the Mata-Hari-loose-lips-sink-ships? But alas, we are not spies and the weight of the world does not rest on our shoulders. For the most part, we lead normal urban middleclass lives replete with rent, mortgages, education concerns and [for me at least] the reparation of credit debt.] Our actions will not break the world. For fuck’s sake we still read comics. [There’s nothing wrong with that… Neil Gaiman’s Sandman got me through law school.]
At times we believe it’s the force intrusion of the emic that destroys our lives, yet if we look at the core, investigate the context of the rumor; we may realize a greater truth.
“How now, Brown Cow?” again you ask.
The proof’s in the pudding.
During an impromptu, transparent review and discussion into the various rumors that have fueled our present war, and by impromptu, I mean balls-retracting-into ones-stomach-cold-as-fuck-late-Sunday-night-in the street, impromptu, those same friends, ne brothers, and I each came upon a personal realization. Quite simply, we struggle. Every day. Every moment with the image of ourselves and the way we are viewed, especially amongst each other. We gauge our success in relation to each other. We struggle with our “selves” and our circumstances. At times and during review, we may disapprove of how we each respond to our circumstances and we discuss this approval amongst one another… we dish dirt…, we trade gossip…, in short, we talk shit! Yet at the drop of a hat, if anyone of those guys or their families needs any thing, they need not ask… Heaven and Earth will be moved.

Unfortunately, the initial sting of the words, the intersection of that emic, forces us to react in an emotionally cumbersome manner. I’ve been there: recipient and perpetrator. After the dust settled I’ve always meditated on the affect and searched for that kernel of truth, deciphering beyond the smoke and mirrors, pulling back the curtain to study the wizard in his true form. The truth has always been… and will probably always be revealed to be a failing of my character.The precursor to our reactions are pressure, those personally and externally imposed. Pressure creates diamond or maintains coal. It’s all in how you deal with the release of such pressure.

I find those lessons priceless. In the end, all else is nothing but rumors and the rumors of war.

Marvel Universe NYC Star Maps

You've been Obamnated!

Enough said.

Why I now Like Sylar: An argument in favor of Super-Powered Sociopaths

So, I’ve been following this little known show, Heroes for the past two-and-a-half years and I have to say it’s been pretty fucking good. Every single episode leaves you screaming: ”GODDAMN IT-WHAT-THE-FUCK!?!” The first season was phenomenal, although the first show almost lost me as a viewer. I couldn’t get pass the cultural stereotype of Hiro Nakamura , despite immediately alighting to the nod advanced to Neal Stephenson’s adventurous tongue-in-cheek good guy-Hiro Protagonist.[Pen ultimately, in pop sci-fi, the best name provided to illustrate the character’s literary element… Alfred Bester’s Gully Foyle.] The Star Trek references , though appreciated, served as accoutrement to Hiro’s geekified stereotype of what a real- American [to use the McCain-Palin parlance] views of a young Japanese male: sexless, odd mannered and infatuated with speculative fiction.

By episode two, I was like, “ this show is hot.” I don’t know if it was the vivisectioning of Claire and I’m not sure what that says about me as a person, but I was drawn in. The story threads were linking up as we followed Peter and his ambitious brother Nathan, Parkman, Suresh, Nikki, and our own loveable sociopath, Sylar.

Gabriel Gray cum Sylar is the personification of decadent evil. A bit more than a siphon of human emotion, Sylar is a genetic thief, violently stealing the gifts, powers, of his awakened adversaries; and make no mistake, everyone with a power worth having is an adversary. Even the guy who can melt toasters into liquid goop.

I’m gonna jump right into Season three, Villians. Sure it’s running slow. It’s a lukewarm. It comes off as less inspired as the “Genesis” or “Generations” And yes, it reads like all of the worst of Chris Claremont in the eighties. [I fucking went there! All you X-Men heads represent] Really, Mr. Kring, did you think we wouldn’t notice parallels between the Petrelli boys and the Summers brothers, really? Beneath the depths of its contrived story threads, chief among them the promiscuous wanderings of the Petrelli clan, the emotional vulnerability of Claire’s Tin-Man, if only I had a heart to feel; and the Brundel-fly transformation of Mohinder, lies the exploration of Sylar. While Hiro and his trusty side kick Ando (C3PO) serve as the overarching synecdoctal archetype for Joseph Campbell’s heroic journey.

In this season Sylar has taken on the role of the awakened hero called to action. “Villians” is Sylar’s story, his time to change, shifting from sociopath to a kinder-gentler-I’d-drink-a-beer-with-him-kind-of sociopath. A sociopath worth watching and anticipating, unlike Bush’s executive office.

The resurrection of the Petrelli patriarch as a power leech is an excellent of not easily read political statement on the excess of the rich and it’s detriment on the poor. The consumption of communal resources individually outweighing the needs of the majority poor speaks loudly especially in light of the middleclass bailout of the elite. [And these fuckers aren’t even flinching. They stole our money and are enjoying luxurious vacations as a result.] The Petrelli progeny are no different, they just siphon the resources in their own way… Peter absorbs it without taking much [he’s green that way]; Sylar outright ham fistedly takes it; Nathan aspires to control it. This interpretation holds if you’re some Marxist-Scoialist-Commie-Obama-Palin conservative, (notice the small “c” as in the word as an adjective not a political noun)Government loving redistributionist of wealth with a hard-on for injecting socio-political commentary into a harmless television show depicting men and women flying but not in tights. (I’m just saying.)

The audience needed someone scarier, more despicable and less redeemable than Sylar. And we did we get… Robert Forster, who by the way is phoning in his performance (yes, I agree Jamal). But teleconferenced in or not, half of Robert Forster is well… better than no Robert Forster at all. It’s a shame Eric Roberts is not back, he made a hell of a fucked-up PrimaTech enforcer when not doing bad Akon music videos.

Forster’s big daddy Petrelli vastly overshadows Sylar in the badass-evil department and helps to paint Sylar in sympathetic If not physically vulnerable light; while not forgetting the highly manipulative momma Petrelli tugging at Sylar’s heartstrings. If which I must harkens back to the eighties to pull out this sweet little expression: EAT THE RICH!. The Petrellis are one fucked-up family, with the exception of the emo-I-must-save-the-cheerleader-who’s-undeniably-hot-yet-my-sister-and-I-still-wanna-hit-that-seven-different-ways-to-Sunday-but-can’t-and-because-of-so-I’m-conflicted-Peter Petrelli.

But screw Peter, power-no powers, and my money’s on Sylar who has just begun his heroic Journey to discover himself, Gabriel Gray. Won’t it be interesting if just like Ed Norton’s character in Primal Fear, Gabriel Gray never existed. I just got one thing to say to Sylar…

“GET’EM!!!!”