Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2

Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2 (2017; dir. James Gunn) is, of course, a sequel to the previous film of the same title.  The tone is gently subversive and slapdash, nothing to be taken seriously, even though the fate of the universe is at issue.  The first film concerned itself with the origins of the Guardians.  This second one therefore needs a different plot.  Again, the fate of the universe is at issue. This time it is endangered by a character named Ego (Kurt Russell).  He is important for two reasons: he is an immortal god with nearly infinite powers.  And he is Peter Quill’s long-lost father.  He yearns to take over the universe and destroy all life. As the film unravels the long and detailed story of Ego and his marriage to Peter Quill’s mother, the already incredibly outlandish story grows even more so.  I suppose what we must do is what the film expects of us: forget logic and reason.  It’s based on a comic book series, not one that asks to be taken seriously. Just accept it and be entertained.  I have difficulty with entertainment that abandons logic and reason, or that doesn’t substitute some plausible alternative rules of its own.  This is hardly the only film that abdicates logic and reason, but it does so in such an extensive and fundamental way that disbelief and disorientation result.

Kurt Russell, who hasn’t been in films for a while and who might have been desperate, plays Ego.  For some reason Sylvester Stallone shows up as the leader of a group of space hellions.  Briefly, David Hasselhoff appears, as the childhood hero of Peter Quill (Chris Pratt).  My favorite character was Rondu, a rebel space hellion, played by Michael Rooker. The big question which this multi-billion-dollar budget film raised for me is why all vaguely humanoid space aliens have brightly colored skin—especially blue or red skin that looks dyed. 

The Essex Serpent

The Essex Serpent, by Sarah Perry (2017), is well written and introduces an interesting if stock set of characters: a country parson and his wife (who is dying of tuberculosis); a recently widowed woman whose new independence gives her the chance to pursue her interests; the assistant who secretly loves her; the brilliant medical doctor who also loves her; the son who is lonely and probably autistic, and so on.  The novel seems to falter about a third of the way through.  Although I kept reading, the remainder never quite lived up to the promise of the first third.

The serpent itself is obviously a symbol.  From the title of the book itself, to the residents who report its supposed appearances, to the main character’s interest in finding a modern-day ichthyosaur, we’re constantly invited to think about its meaning: the serpent is a catalyst.  It causes change and upset, romantic attachments and separations, social dislocation, a return to old superstitions or a loss of moral values.  It’s clearly a symbol of the dislocations and upheavals caused by the approach of the modern world.  But to what end? 

The center of the novel is the friendship that develops between the country parson, William Ransome, and the divorced woman, Cora Seagrave.  Gradually it deepens, despite the parson’s love for his wife and the woman’s awareness of the social factors that separate her life from his.  The parson is devoted to his wife and children and to his vocation in the remote small coastal town where he lives, Aldwinter.  His parishioners expect him to deal in some way with the rumored serpent, in which they deeply believe.  He doesn’t believe, at best thinks the beast is a superstition, but he can’t find the sentiments and words to bring understanding and comfort in his sermons. Their belief, his disbelief, in the context of the Darwinian world of late nineteenth-century England, offers commentary on the nature of reason and faith.  The parson and the widow are different in their views of the world and of religion, yet they share deep-thinking similarities.  In the end, although they have their moment in the woods, it hardly seems to matter.

Blood and Money: The Classic True Story of Murder, Passion, and Power, by Thomas Thompson

Blood and Money: The Classic True Story of Murder, Passion, and Power, by Thomas Thompson (1976), proves that it’s possible to have too much money.  The main figure at the novel’s center, the dermatologist John Hill, devotes himself to having a wonderful life—a beautiful wife, successful practice, a life devoted to music.  His selfishness and vacuity are appalling.  While he allows his wife a small allowance with which to run their household, he spends money on whatever he wants.  He wants the most lavish music studio in the western world.  He lacks any sense of self-scrutiny and instead is apparently able to justify his every action, including the selfish ways in which he spends money, his sudden abandonment of his first wife, his easy return to her.  He’s almost a kind of robot who goes through the motions of the life he lives without any awareness of their meaning. His wife is a pampered only child of a powerful, wealthy father who manipulates and finances every aspect of her life and her husband’s.  When he convinces himself that her husband allowed her to die, either through neglect or deliberate poisoning, he devotes himself to seeing him prosecuted.  When a trial results in a mistrial, he pays to have his son-in-law killed.  Through connections with powerful people in the city, and through his own machinations, he avoids prosecution, even though local police are convinced he’s guilty. 

The main figures in this book would fit comfortably into any number of reality shows.  They’re vapid walking embarrassments.  Oblivious to the world that begins just beyond the limits of their wealth and power and personal desires, they flap, doodle, and meander about like soulless human simulacra. Blood and Money is an example of the kind of investigative literary journalism that resulted in books like Capote’s In Cold Blood and Mailer’s The Executioner’s Song.  Despite its fascination with its characters and the prodigious research that went into its making, Blood and Money lacks the human and cultural insights of those works.