#Doorman Rises

Doorman (who you might remember from here) has spent the last few months working on a web series based on his tragicomic travails in the world of Doorman-ing. With a ferocious desire to escape his shit-tastic job and some generous Internet investment, he's recently wrapped on a pilot for the series. The trailer for that pilot is here, and it's pretty exciting.

I'm not totally sure what's next (ask him yourself), but I imagine it's film festivals, hype, a ten-episode deal with Netflix, coke orgies, a phase of being absolutely intolerable, burnout, back to Doorman-ing, and finally redemption.

Seriously: I'm ecstatic to see any talented and driven writer use their craft to lift themselves from the Everyday. We all need that reinforcement every now and again.

Cheers, Doorman.

Time Dings Millennials, Awaits Sweet Death

Time magazine's cover story this month is entitled "Millennials: The Me Me Me Generation." As the title subtly suggests, millennials have turned out to be shallow, narcissistic, entitled little shits who are tragically destined to wrest control of the world from their wise, patient, sexy elders. Millennials have also achieved some good things, probably, but mostly they have those smartphones and communicate electronically, and that is just the worst. It's author is Joel Stein, an X-er who has been called "a god to people in their twenties and thirties" by boomer and Time editor Richard Stengel. Stein has statistics and studies to back up his claims, so you know he's on the level. And in case you were beginning to think that Time doesn't understand millennials deeper than is necessary to exploit the subscription money out of an aging generation's natural suspicion of everything that will replace it, they made it even more enticing for young people by pay-walling the article; we can't resist paying for content.

If you ask Time why print is dying, they'll stare at you blankly before asking if they can "have money now."

Stein's already been reamed pretty good. Elspeth Reeve pokes some holes in the statistics before digging up a century's worth of exposes on the ever-pending horror of "self-obsessed little monsters," a story originally scooped, I believe, by Socrates.

Marc Tracy takes Stein nearly point for point, concluding:

Right now, older generations are in the process of slowly bequeathing millennials a society more “in debt” than ever before: “in debt” in the sense of living on borrowed time, with only future, merely hypothetical promises as collateral—“in debt” ecologically, financially, politically, culturally. At this moment, Time has decided to focus on the millennials, and to tar them as “entitled” for not feeling totally okay about all of this.

Piling on with Tracy--though actually pre-dating the Time article--Annie Lowrey points out that, whatever millennials' faults, we haven't exactly been given much to work with, observing that "even though the recession is over, this generation is not looking to gorge; instead, they are the kind of hungry that cannot stop thinking about food."

And over at Salon, Daniel D'Addario addresses the media's love affair with our love affair with attention, two phenomenons that would appear to be servicing each other in some kind of accidental circle-jerk. Lowrey and D'Addario's pieces are like better-researched, better-written takes on my own post from last year about millennial self-obsession conflicting with grim socio-economic reality and boomers' tendencies toward self-congratulation. As I wrote (yes, a millennial is about to quote himself; try not to swoon):

Remember: we did not set up the lavish high school graduation ceremonies--ostensibly for our benefit--during which self-important prigs like McCulloch tell us that we actually kinda suck.  Even when not used for the purposes of insulting us, what kind of attitudes do you expect these farces to instill in us?  To say nothing of the middle school, elementary school, and kindergarten graduations that I took part in growing up.  If our achievements are so banal, why throw the parties? 

I don't know how much of this sort of infantilizing castigation is spurred by a feeling of "how dare attention be lavished on people who aren't us; we're still here" (someone recently pointed out to me that Forrest Gump ends in the mid-80s, just about the time that the X-ers started moving in on the sort of culture-shaping that the film celebrates as the birthright of the boomers). But I suspect we can look forward to a few more, increasingly irritating years of this sort of thing. And by then we'll be chastising our own kids for spending so much time on the HoloNet having sex with space aliens, when they should be watching us Google ourselves.

This I can say with some certainty: generations that are given access to social networks can at least provide their own self-love, rather than having to demand that reverence from others.

On Anglophilia

The royal baby is due this summer. If you are at all excited about this and neither your line nor your wallet are about to expand as a result, I advise you to strip ass-naked, throw on your ceremonial bearskin hat, and parade around Trafalgar Square, belting out the score to the H.M.S. Pinafore until Boris Johnson decides that you've got too little dignity to be allowed in public. If that's over the top, it's because I'm overcompensating.

The curse of the Anglophile is not that we know about the baby (everyone does). It's not that we can locate Cambridge, Cornwall, and all the other dukedoms and princedoms sullied by the Windsors on a map. It's not the lazy rebelliousness of romanticizing a culture that's not radically different from our own (compare to Western Japanophiles). It's not even the connotations of old-school Toryism, Etonian-style classism, and visions of racial homogeneity. It's that the posh, royal-obsessed, Hugh Grant-tolerating Anglophile image is so firmly entrenched that it's useless to deny the affiliations. It doesn't matter if your Anglophilia came to you via the Beatles, or Monty Python, or Doctor Who, or, less commonly, Tolkien; if you make the mistake of demonstrating a semi-working knowledge of British culture and politics and history, you're lumped in with George Will and Madonna.

In his essay, England My England, Mark Dery examines the sources of his own Anglophilia and the probable sources of it in American culture--a culture and polity that, by most rights, shouldn't allow for a fascination with England. Dery doesn't get very far on the second aim. As he acknowledges about mid way through, "[e]very Anglophile has his own private England, which is, of course, unrecognizable to the English." Like Batman fans, the Anglophile meshes cherry-picked ideas about England and Englishness into a mostly unique and mostly sturdy whole. The England we invent in our heads may bear only a passing resemblance to the real thing, informed by media, popular culture, a posh accent overheard at a coffee shop, and the occasional visit.

That last imprint is interesting because while there probably aren't any solid numbers to back this up, I suspect that relatively few American Anglophiles migrate to the Isles permanently (at least compared to the numbers of Yankophiles in the UK and elsewhere who make a point of coming here and staying). Those that do risk bursting their Albion bubble because they must confront the fact that England is like any other place on Earth: overflowing with terrible people. "Yes, Patrick Stewart is very charming. Oh look, here are some chavs."

Their politicians are as loathsome as ours. The news media is as intolerable there as it is here and maybe more so--the Murdoch toxins have been at work for much longer. They produced Shakespeare, sure, but they also produced Piers Morgan and decent chunk of our reality shows. Yes, the NDAA is cringe-inducing, but so is CCTV. They've barreled into the same rushed and congested 21st Century we have (Anglophilia is often frozen in time, usually pre-War, but occasionally jumping forward to 1960's mod London), complete with the same economy-crashing bankers who will never be made to regret their avarice. And the Brits have still got the breathing anachronism that is Betty Windsor's brood; to say nothing of the Cult of Diana.

These can be harsh realizations and you can't stay long and expect to keep your Anglo-cherry intact. It's easy for those of us have dealt with this disappointment and come out on the other side to lament these plastic Anglophiles for the deluded pushovers they are. But at least it culls the weak from our numbers.

Some of us (or maybe it's just me) wonder why the "Anglo-" must dominate the -philia. Can't the rest of the Isles be thrown in, too? History leans toward "no" on that question. The "United Kingdom" is a relatively recent political creation, from which much of the rest has either escaped or is ever-trying, featuring more than a few instances of war, famine, and terrorism over the last millennium. Dery mentions this Celtic-branch (which he calls "the Braveheart demographic") and describes it as a generally Anglophobic phenomenon, usually unaffiliated with the royal watchers who prefer the scenery south of the Tweed. It's a very American desire that I should want to ignore inconvenient historical facts. However, if one also genuinely loves the Irish and Scottish cultures, can they claim the mantle of Britophile? Is that any more absurd than Anglophilia already is? No, so I'm keeping it.

As for why an American should feel any such affinity, well, if you don't already share it, you probably won't get it. And if you do share it, you probably have a hard time seeing why it's a little ridiculous. Sure, you'll sheepishly admit your infatuation in that way that you think is oh-so self-deprecatingly British. But you never really understand why your friends get weirded out when you go wobbly-kneed at the mention of words like "pudding" and "Sandringham."

For me, it's pubs and the more sensible British drinking culture (now sadly succumbing to the scourge of binge drinking); a class consciousness that leaves little room for the Ayn Rands of the world (Dery mentions this as well); the serious commitments to public transportation (which may be more of a rejection of America's inexplicable love affair with cars); the weather (try spending a summer in the DC swamp and you'll get it); the breadth of history; the encouragement of dry wit as a virtue; the suspicion of unreserved emotion; Charlie Brooker; the more casual swearing (everything except "arse"); and, yes, goddammit, the accents.

Maybe it was something in the water I drank as an infant, but these things are real to me. However stupid they may be are. And at least I wasn't up before dawn to watch the royal bloody wedding.

Iron Man 3

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

A note of praise to start, because the Iron Man franchise still earns this much: Robert Downey, Jr. is playing himself and that's a very good thing. His Tony Stark remains as endearing as he was the first time around. Iron Man 3 is funny and whimsical and comic book-y, as all the best Marvel films have been (which is to say, most of them). I'm on the record as an abiding fan of Christopher Nolan's Batman, but nobody with their head on straight wants to see that in every superhero movie. There's a bit of gloom to go around, but there's humor, too, and things end well enough for Stark and Gwyneth Paltrow. I can honestly say I didn't see willing, happy retirement in Stark's future. Sure, there will be some threat to bring Stark out of retirement (no Nolan trilogy, this), but for now, we're happy for him.

That last bit is saying something because, from my perspective, it's sometimes too hard to like Tony Stark. The quips as defense mechanisms ring too close to home for me and his ego seems often seems overly flippant for something that manifests as uncharacteristically stupid. Iron Man 2's biggest failing (aside from too much time dedicated to setting up The Avengers) was that Stark had clearly not retained any of the hard-earned lessons of the first film; he was still prone to proving his detractors right, alienating friends, and generally being a dick. We're supposed to like this guy. This time around, those lessons finally seem learned for good. Stark's voluntary retirement is a nod to a thoughtful, considerate, non-sociopathic hero who knows his limits. If When he puts the suit back on, it'll be for the world at large and not his ego; maybe a little for his ego, but the ratio will be respectable.

IM3 is also our first glimpse of a post-Avengers continuity and while I'm happy to see that all is well, I couldn't help but notice a small hangnail. Stark is experiencing panic attacks following the events of last year's team-up. And that makes sense: he nearly died and his world is now a lot bigger, which means (from Stark's perspective) that he's suddenly a lot smaller. The attacks are there briefly and then conveniently forgotten; vague enough that the filmmakers could ignore the details of a movie they probably hadn't seen by the time IM3 went into production. The attacks are referenced for a chunk of the runtime but never get bogged down in specifics, as though they were late draft callbacks. Meanwhile, IM3 gets to remind the audience that The Avengers happened and that if enough of us see this movie, we might get another (mission accomplished, I suppose). It's all... messy and unsatisfying; hopefully just an awkward step in this ongoing, ambitious project. It's hardly a devastating blow to the shared universe, but it's a fault line Marvel will have to watch for in the future.

I'm very happy to see Guy Pearce getting substantive work. The twist is ballsy (more in a minute), and requires the Aldrich Killian role to step up and fill in for what could be an irritating fake out. As usual, Pearce brought just the right level of smarmy unlikability and menace to a villain position that's been lacking thus far in the series. Despite the formidable talents of Jeff Bridges and Mickey Rourke, Iron Man's villains have remained either underwhelming (Bridges) or tacked on and under-utilized (Rourke). I don't count Sam Rockwell's Justin Hammer as a villain, because he was just too damn charming. The chronic weakness in that department was good enough excuse to bring in Iron Man's one iconic villain.

The filmmakers (plus Ben Kingsley) provided a clever and probably necessary new take on the Mandarin. We were never going to get the traditional Fu Manchu-style Mandarin--it's embarrassing enough on the comics page, not to mention the risk of alienating the Chinese market--but it's hard to leave him out of the franchise. So they first make him ethnically ambiguous, and then reveal him as a false face, a flimsy lackey to a character that was effectively a non-entity in the comics. Most of the time, such a shafting of a superhero's number one antagonist would be cause for fan outrage (and it probably is getting some--I don't care enough to look), but the reveal was wisely played and, given the options the Mandarin provides, much more interesting. Though, while "Trevor" was entertaining in his own right, it was a shame to see Kingsley's menace disappear so quickly.

One question: what exactly were the rules for killing the superhuman, regenerating Extremi? Electrocution seemed to do it. Severe enough injury, as well, I guess; Killian was done in by a blow from an Extremis'd Gwyenth Paltrow, after surviving an explosion. Killing Wolverine seems less complicated.

Anyway, I hope Iron Man 4 will have the stones to use MODOK. All I want is for Tony Stark's next existential threat to be a large-headed, tiny-limbed weirdo. Is that asking so much?

Grade: B+