[Weekly Update] Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning (Patreon)

Writing this update from a Starbuck. Been working a lot lately, and my own little work space has become a bit of a wall for creativity. Does anyone feel the same? That a change in environment helps productivity?

CHANNEL UPDATE

Hope you enjoy the latest video on McDull and a brief history of Hong Kong. It's a niche topic that appeals to a very different crowd than our usual audience, so the video isn't getting many views. But hopefully, in the future, it'll get more attention. That tends to be a thing in our channel, our videos tend to get views over the span of months.

Now that we have a couple of videos featuring the new aesthetic, I've gotten a lot of feedback on it. The original idea is to have a less bombastic visual, and I'd also slow down my narration, so that our videos can breathe a bit more. However, It's difficult to do that in the YouTube eco-system, when fast consumption is expected, especially with videos that are under 20 minutes.

So the next step would to be strike a balance between the older extremely bold color, with the newer pastel style. What I'm thinking is swapping the off white background out with the primary color of the main film of each video. For example, if I were to make a video on OldBoy, it'd be a shade of pale blue.

Hopefully, by adding some color back into the style, we can raise the energy a bit, and also help our video thumbnails stand out from the crowd.

Anyway, the script for our next video is near completion, and will be uploaded tomorrow. It'll be about Chocolate, the 2008 movie featuring Jeeja Yanin, and the spiritual successor to Ong-Bak. Have you seen the film? Let me know your thoughts!

The two video after will be about Dangal, a wrestling movie from India, and Switch, a movie I've teased multiple times on Patreon.

For Dangal, I'd like to research a bit more about a Chinese phenomenon of parents (usually the father) raising their daughters as if they are sons: Giving them gender-neutral or masculine names, teaching them hobbies that are typically masculine. If you know anyone that were raised this way, let me know!

MEDIA TALK

So I went to see Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part 1, one of the few movies on earth that has both a colon and a hyphen. If you want my thoughts on the entire series, check out our latest bonus video. In this post, I'll be talking only about the newest film.

Let's begin with the overall impression: It's really good. I think it may be my second favourite of the series, after MI4. That says a lot, because while the action scenes in this film is well-paced, they aren't as memorably unique as many other entries in the franchise.

For one thing, there is no mid-movie heist. It's nearly a tradition in Mission Impossible at this point, that half way through the film, Ethan and his team has to infiltrate a secret location. You know, dangling from the ceiling in the CIA, hanging off the side of the Burj Khalifa. Maybe because this is just half of the story, act 3 actually feels like a mid movie heist.

Yet, I don't mind it one bit. I think the big part of it is just how well filmed and edited the action is. Mission Impossible has always have pretty good action scenes, but this time around, I can see the camera establishing the space, showing us the goal, telling us the method, and seeing the plan being executed. Everything from as small as jumping through a gap, to as big as jumping off a cliff, the audience is always on the same page, given all the information. It helps build anticipation, and it is satisfying to watch.

Except the desert sequence, that sequence is a bit of a mess.

The plot is enjoyable, if a bit unemotional. Even though the movie is just half a story, it somehow feels way too cramped. Dramatic emotional moments come and go within just a minute, the audience only "know" what they are supposed to feel, without actually feeling it.

It's especially jarring, since the series has not attempted anything emotional since the 4th movie. Honestly, it has never been successfully convey emotion beyond "fun and exciting" since the very beginning. It's nice that the series is trying to do more. But right now, it is stuck in an uncanny valley of emotion, where it has it, but not enough to be natural.

Following the surveillance plot of Rogue Nation and Fallout, Dead Reckoning also has by far the most topical plot idea. With The Creator due to come out soon, we'll be getting a lot more movies about AI. but honestly, I don't know if any other movies will depict a more interesting AI villain than Dead Reckoning.

For one thing, the AI has no personality. It is not in the body of a child. It doesn't even speak, except in one small instance. As the characters put it, it is an unemotional algorithm. Essentially, a Twitter bot...

I'm sorry, an X-bot.

Wow that sounds even dirtier than I imagined.

The film also explored the implication and the capability of an AI antagonist to a high degree. Most AI villains behavior just like humans. Even in the Matrix, the AIs are often confined to a body, and can only influence their immediate surroundings.

The AI in Dead Reckoning, in contrast, truly feels omni-present. Everywhere there is an internet connection, it can be there. Communications can be hacked at any moment. Character behaviors can be calculated and future being predicted with terrifying accuracy. It is a villain that seems too powerful to be defeated, yet also feel absolutely realistic. I think it may be the best part of the film.

Anyway, those are my thought about the film. High praise, I know. But the execution is legit great. Have you seen the movie? What are your thoughts on it?

I'll see you soon with a new video!