Cowboy Bebop is amazing. If you haven't seen it go :suicide:.

cowboy bebop sucks

NO ITS AMAZING AND I WILL DEFEND IT TILL I DIE WRAA


its pretty good, i saw it a few years ago

[quote=Ayn Rand]WELL **** NOW YOU TELL ME[/quote]

Depends on what you mean by "prove." If I mean prove as in "prove a moral argument," why would I need a real event? Do I need to fry a baby in a microwave to "prove" that doing so is wrong? If you mean "prove" as in, to demonstrate empirically, then you are right. But only in the second sense of the word "prove."




What do you make of the alter egos complaint that "we are a society of men raised by women" (paraphrase because the copy of my book is in another city). It is implied that Fight Club breaks away from the "womanly" society.

Also, can't remember his name, but the dude played by Meat Loaf in the movie... I think there's a bit of a feminist critique to that character.

For one, he engages in hard-core masculine activities in his life which ironically cause him to lose his testicles. Once he loses the ultimate male symbol, he becomes an outcast and left by his own family who no longer respect him. He is forced to go to a support group called "Staying Men together" which only seems to make him more feminine since he cries into people's shoulders. I read this as a message that society is male dominated, that men who are not manly are put to the fringes. Narrator goes to this thing so that he can feel better about his own masculinity at the cost of others.

I can see you reading this as "feminization of men can be destructive" but, to me, it's more of a critique of gender as a social construction that is used to put people in a lower class. Women are at the bottom, followed by men who act like women, with manly men at the top.

The destructive thing is when people try to change who they are to fit in line with a socially constructed gender norm. Meat Loaf ends up getting shot and killed because he is compensating for who he actually is, based on a gender identity that exists to oppress him.

I think "feminization" is at the core of the novel. Of course, some people who've read too much lit theory would say that it is at the core of every piece of literature, but I disagree.


I think you have an interesting and fair reading of the text, but I would be interested to hear what you make of the "staying men together" group and how that fits into your interpretation.

Fight Club was a parody of that lifestyle, although there were some pertinent points I thought. It was a book before it was a movie, and never was flashed around "to be cool", though too many people read palahniuk for that reason.

[QUOTE=Mort Hog]What did the director's commentary say?[/QUOTE]

"Writer/director Richard Kelly does not deny personal interpretations, but has expressed his own theories through the extra commentary on the two DVDs, his own (fictional) book The Philosophy of Time Travel, and in various other interviews.

According to Kelly and his Philosophy of Time Travel, at midnight on October 2 a Tangent Universe branches off the Primary Universe around the time when Donnie is called out of his bedroom by Frank, immediately before the appearance of the Artifact, the faulty jet engine. The inherently unstable Tangent Universe will collapse in just over 28 days and take the Primary Universe with it if not corrected. Closing the Tangent Universe is the duty of the Living Receiver, Donnie, who wields certain supernatural powers to help him in the task.

Those who have died/will die within the Tangent Universe (and would not have died otherwise) are the Manipulated Dead (Frank and Gretchen Ross). Manipulated Dead Frank, at least, is also given certain powers in that he is able to subtly understand what is happening and have the ability to contact and influence the Living Receiver via the Fourth Dimensional Construct (water). All others within the orbit of the Living Receiver are the Manipulated Living (e.g. Ms. Pomeroy, Dr. Monnitoff), subconsciously drawn to push him towards his destiny to close the Tangent Universe and, according to the Philosophy of Time Travel, die by the Artifact.

There are two "Franks" in the story: the living boyfriend of Donnie's sister Elizabeth, and the Manipulated Dead Frank who appears to Donnie as a premonition from the future in the disturbing rabbit suit (the second Frank is dead, or undead; at the end of the film he is killed by Donnie). Dead Frank is aware of Donnie's fate and destiny."

I think my use is obvious.

The coddling child-state. The feminization of the 'healing process' actually impedes success: the narrator, for instance, becomes addicted to this coddling because it's easier than resolving his actual issues. It isn't until he becomes subconsciously sexually attracted to Marla that the child-state loses its appeal.

The feminization of the characters was a really important part of the book. For instance, the narrator never had a father figure in his life, so when he is ready to man it up he creates one. All quite Freudian, really. You could view the ending as fourth and fifth stages: senility and patriarch-worship/godhood.

I don't like people that don't realize Starship Troopers was satire.

The movie was a satire of the book. The book was chillingly enthusiastic about military fascism.

Yeah.

Horrendously creepy to read, but interesting, intriguing, and I think a must-read for everyone. Along the lines with 1984 even.

****ing awesome alien killing too.

The bible...
Oh wait it's not a movie. Fiction none the less.
Snakes tricking nekkid people into stealing forbidden fruit..?

sounds like something good to kill millions of people about to me.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060164/

you dont know anything about Heinlein then.

JL pretty much stated my opinion about fight club with more elegance and tact than I will ever have.

But I like the discussion raised by Jon`C anyway.

but but wikipedia says it's about military fascism

its about military fascism, but it is not endorsing it, its meant to point out how terrible it is.

I think I prefer what Palahniuk had to say about Fight Club (as well): "all my books are about a lonely person looking for some way to connect with other people." Man, that solved a bunch!