Johnny wants to suck on a Coke

My night bequeathed to me an extraordinary dream wherein I was sitting front row at a Shakira concert in a curious venue no larger than the average high school auditorium.  I do not recall any of the songs in her setlist save for a rather unexpected cover of David Bowie’s I’m Afraid of Americans.  The overall narrative flow of this experience was largely lost to the sands of time yet I clearly remember suddenly being with her at an impossibly massive and colorful backstage area.  She was so kind.  She seemed to have a genuine interest in talking to and interacting with me.  I wanted to confess my love but I was not able.  And at once the cruel and ugly morning tore me away from a life far sweeter than any I’ve ever known.  Please shed a tear for me my friends.  Life has killed the dream I dreamed. 

I recently ventured to the cinema to watch X-Men: Days of Future Past.  I found the movie to be predominantly enjoyable though it is already fading fast in my memory.  Still, I would like to see it a second time in order to really get a firm grasp on my feelings.  However one thing I can say with all the certainty of a man who recently had his hand eaten by the same aquatic lifeforms he could so recently communicate with via marine-oriented telepathic powers is that I did not like the ending(s) one iota.  Superhero movies in recent years have developed a rather disturbing trend to end things with a sequel hook – either in a pre-credits end scene or in those horrible post-credit scenes – as opposed to providing an actual conclusion to the narrative.  I have several very close friends who love this trend but I’m convinced they are all drinking Drano. 

These weak and stilted setups for sequels do nothing but cheapen the movie in which they appear.  It is as if to say “We do not have enough confidence in this particular film nor do we view its story to be of any significance to actually provide it with a self-contained conclusion, instead we are just going to set up the next one which we promise will be ZOMG so much cooler!!!”.  The result frequently leaves me holding a bag of unresolved emotion and I leave the theatre with a dawning feeling of dissatisfaction. 

It boggles my feeble brain why this happens (logically I know it happens for the money, the moulah, the dough, the shickles, the greenbacks, the pesos, the bread, the coin, the bank, the cabbage, the dead presidents but this does little to calm my spirits) because the final scenes in these flicks can be so beautiful if they are actually treated like final scenes and not commercials for the next installment.  2008’s The Dark Knight had a perfect ending.  The characters all end up in spots which are logical to the story – not forced due to sequel demands (this is especially proven true given the unexpected and controversial path taken by 2012’s The Dark Knight Rises).  Just recall it right now in all its ending glory: arch-fiend is caught, tragic backbone-of-the-story character took his figurative and literal fall from grace which mirrors the hero’s own journey and key supporting character gives excellent theme summarizing monologue, he’ll haul ass because we’ll chase him, he’s not a hero, guardian, or protector, he’s a strong silent type, a watchful eye in the sky, the Knight Before Christmas, boom, fade to black, The Dark Inky Knight, perfect ending because it is an actual ending to that particular story.  

Last year’s Man of Steel also had an actual ending which was even more ass-jigglingly shocking to see given the glut of superhero films between Knight and Steel which insist on concluding things with sequel teases.  Another great finale: villain defeated, world saved, lessons on humanity learned, I’m taking a leap of faith, father is proud of me, I need a high profile, fast paced competitive job, this is our new cub reporter Bark Bent, welcome to the Daily World Mr. Bent , happy to be here Cloris, Boom! Fade to orange! Man of Metal!  Perfect fucking ending.  And the thing those two movies – and in particular the endings – both have in common you are no doubt screaming at the top of your tar stained lungs?  That’s right: Hans.  Hans Zimmer scored both those feature films and as both movies cut to the title and subsequent end credits his score drives it all home with the subtlety and strength of a brown bear lopping the head of a hapless national park tourist (the kind that wears khaki shorts and socks with sandals).  Am I saying that Zimmer’s presence is what secures a legitimate ending to a superhero movie?  I’m not not saying it, that’s for sure.  

Yet I also recall that before either of these Sam Raimi’s 2002 Spider-Man movie also had a perfect ending, thus undoing the Hans theory I spent years researching and developing.  Raimi’s ending: villain vanquished, characters developed, funeral, love you but can’t be with you, uncle taught me lots, power, responsibility, who am me?  Me Peter Spiderman, photographer for Daily World, cue web-slinging, sticking to buildings, CGI American flag, Boom!  Fade to brown, Man-Spider!  Raimi did it before everyone!  Except now I am remembering that Bryan Singer’s original X-Men had a reals honest ending and so did Timothy Burton’s Batman movies before that and Richard Donner’s Superman movies before those so really it is only some horrific unholy trend in recent years that has brought about all these unnecessary teases and meaningless endings and mid-credit scenes and post-credit scenes and post-post credit scenes and extra holographic 4-D post-post-post credit post-next-day and post-two-weeks in the future pre-pre-Superbowl-pre-show scenes.  I credit this to movie audiences being far less intelligent in a general sense these days but that’s just because I’m an old curmudgeon ruled by his fears and insecurities. 

But come on!  Some entire movies – Iron Man 2 and Captain America: the First Avenger among others – take it to even further vomit inducing extremes and feel like nothing more than stopgaps released solely as prologue and promotion for the “big and important” movie, in this case The Avengers.  If this trend continues – and Thor: The Dark World certainly suggests it will and I am terrified of Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice for this very reason – then I will have no choice but to make a turkey sandwich on whole wheat bread with lettuce, tomato, mustard and mayo and eat that sandwich while perusing a book of delightful nature photographs.    

I was watching a sitcom when a strange demonic voice kept speaking in my ear.  It said my name and told me terrible things.  I started to cry and tremble.  There was a man standing in the corner of the room.  There was something so horrible and off about his appearance.  He took slow, measured steps toward me and while doing so began to smile. 

I was a rabbit wondering who I would be.