He is gorgeous. But Mal kicked his ass yes he did. Crew of Serenity vs Bond... fight!
He was also in Love Actually, and gets Kiera Knightly. Yeah, he's weirdly good looking. No Stringer, though.
God, that really is a good idea. He would rock as Bond. But as long as whatshisname [oh: Daniel Craig] looks that good in a bathing suit, lets wait just a few more movies.
As has been my recent habit, I'll chime in to a film thread to note that I saw Paper Moon tonight, and that while at least 95% of the humor is meant to come from a nine year old character acting in an adult manner, it's nevertheless very funny. There's more restraint in it than my description suggests.
This thin gesture towards equal opportunity is not going to save you from the firing squad, Ogged.
Tatum O'Neal told us all beforehand that she'd recently rewatched and thought both her and her father's performances were very good.
Was I the only one rooting for "The Operative" against Mal in that movie?
No, he's not. Fact: you root for the hero. Fact: you root for the underdog. When your heroes are underdogs, you root for them even if their adversary is totally fucking awesome.
Just being the underdog isn't enough. If it's any consolation, I thought it was great on the TV show when Mal kicked that guy into the jet turbine.
And don't forget Kinky Boots! That was some fun cinema.
Yeah, when the Operative started the movie by murdering the government scientists because they weren't doing a good enough job of creating brainwashed psychic assassins, I couldn't help but fall for him.
Wait, that's nonsense.
Some people (drab souls destined to become functionaries in some system) concentrate on substance. Others (angels) prefer style. Live and let live, I say.
It's telling that some find the distinction between "interesting villain" and "hero" to be a difficult one.
Next you'll tell us that you preferred Luke to Vader.
Luke was whiny. And lame. He did not aim to misbehave.
Some people (drab souls destined to become functionaries in some system) concentrate on substance. Others (angels) prefer style.
Wanna refresh us on your dating criteria, Ogged?
And everyone knows that Han Solo, not Luke, was the actual hero of Star Wars.
1. Vader was much more evil than the operative. The operative just wanted the best for everyone
2. Mal was (amazingly) more irritating than Luke
3. A hybrid Luke/Mal creature would have been remarkably irritating. Behold:
"I conjure that I was going into Tachi Station to pick up some power converters!"
Who killed the Emperor, people? Hint: not lame and whiny Luke.
But 3/4 seriously, The Operative was basically the equivalent of a Special Forces guy (neither name more Hollywood than the other). He wasn't uniquely evil. Plus, style.
The Force was the hero of Star Wars: everyone else was an instrument, hence the bad acting. The more the Force dominated a character's choices, the better the acting. Thus, the best actors were Obi-Wan and Yoda, the worst Luke and Leia, both of whom tried to defy the force.
He was kind of an asshole in Melinda & Melinda as well.
24: That's right, but let me suggest that it's the same thing as saying he was no worse than your everyday SS officer. This isn't a reason to root for him. You have to make the case against Mal, baa's 2 isn't enough for that.
Mal seems to have working-class roots.
Well the Operative was a big fan of Pet Sounds.
I knew there was something off about the Operative, I just couldn't put my finger on it.
He'll make a bitchin' Felix Leiter!
Definitely Bond. And Barry Adamson's Fantasy Bond Theme for the title sequence.
28: This isn't a reason to root for him.
The reason to root for him is if you don't take the story over-seriously on its own terms and root for the characters you find most sympathetic.
In Firefly / Serenity's case, there's even some reason not to take the story too seriously on its own terms. We get a pretty selective picture of the Alliance vs. border moons backdrop, for instance, so who's to say the Operative doesn't have some compelling reasons to believe he's killing in a good cause (just as the heroes evidently do whenever they shoot people)? Essentially, he's probably much like what Shepherd Book* was before the latter became a priest.
(* And what a piss-off that the series got cancelled before we got more of the Shepherd's back-story. Aside from Jayne Cobb he was my favourite character.)
You have to make the case against Mal
And not that I didn't love the show, but you know what's always bothered me about the whole Firefly premise is that of the heroes, Mal especially is heavily reminiscent of the old noble victim mythology of the Confederacy. Transferred into space to avoid the whole inconvenient business about slavery, true, but still... that's always struck a false note for me.
re: 33
Oh yes. Best opening to a track ever. Although Adamson's version is in turn a version of earlier ska versions.
"Have no fear, if we're under attack, because Bond is ..."
DS: They hit you so many ways with the confederacy myth (also the Indians as savages myth) you know they have to be doing it on purpose. Joss seems to be creating a fictional world where the worst myths of the old west are actually true. But why? I speculated in a proposal that didn't make it into a book on Firefly and philosophy. It is still something that bugs me.
The operative's not so bad. He let the heroes live at the end, and arranges for Serenity's repairs. His 'true belief' in his task was shaken when he saw hot-woman-from-studio-60 explain the problem with the pax.
34, 36: Rob, your analysis suggests to me that Whedon wanted a way to take some of the emotionally compelling components of the Western out of a context in which they're horribly racist, and that your problem with this is that in so doing, Whedon leaves it for someone else to solve the nation's race problems.
39 True. Perhaps Whedon and Rowling should get together and ignore more of society's ills.
39: I could see it as an anti-racist statement along the lines of "Here's your western hero. You don't have to feel bad about rooting for him; he's a veteran of a justified rebellion, and he's fighting genuinely merciless and inhuman savages." followed by an implicit "The western hero from the John Wayne movies? Not in the same factual situation. Him, you have to feel bad about rooting for." That may have been a component of Rob's argument, and it may not have been in Whedon's head at all. But it's close enough that you could argue it.
