I received an email from Bryan Singer this morning concerning a project in development in light of the success of Valkyrie:

Many saw evil. They dared to stop it.

But not every story has been told…

An apparent line of dialogue from the film:

Bonhoeffer: I came here to confess sins and kick ass… and right now I’m all out of sins. (EXPLOSIONS! And gun fire *blam, blam, blam*)

Clearly you are thinking the exact same thing as me: I can’t wait until this comes out!

I saw The Dark Knight a couple of days ago. I really liked it. Apparently, Jesus liked it more than I did. He appears at 1:55:

“My children, I have come back to you. The sheer awesomeness of The Dark Knight has brought about my second coming, and with it the Rapture which shall begin immediately… after the 7:45 showing. I got to see this bad boy.”

HT: What If…

I went and saw Iron Man yesterday and it is hands down the best comic book or superhero movie ever made. Even if you are not a fan of this genre or are only looking for two hours of enjoyable escapism go see this film. Robert Downey is brilliant.

There are flaws. It is not perfect. Think, especially, nonsensical segue of guerrilla interview into hate sex at beginning.

However, there are also Hollywood directors that after watching this film should be making public apologies for their comic book movie atrocities they forced on the public with 150 million dollar budgets. Yes, Ratner that means you.

For any fellow comic book fans I give you the greatest Youtube video ever:

I am mildly excited about this movie. The Narnia books along with The Lord of the Rings trilogy were a large part of my youth, and I think as a fan you always enter the theater with a little trepidation, “What will they do to my beloved, cherished memories?”

Anyways, I hope they at least make movies good enough that make enough money that we can get to The Silver Chair.

Here’s the new poster for Prince Caspian:

Now the real question is how long does it take the fundies to notice that this poster says “New Age”? Perhaps we will have a debate in reverse of the last one? I can hear the salvo now, “They took Lewis’ Christian message and turned it into a modern secular new age message. Retreat! Retreat!”

Lately Christianity has been taking a pretty good beating. I am reminded of G.K. Chesterton, “It looked not so much as if Christianity was bad enough to include any vices, but rather as if any stick was good enough to beat Christianity with.” People such as Richard Dawkins and Cristopher Hitchens are getting a lot of mic time to espouse their negative views of Christianity and religion. Regular readers of this blog know that I have spent my own fair share of time taking certain individuals or groups that identify themselves as “Christian” to task. However, I hope that I have not left anyone with the impression that I am one step away from being like many religious bashers, and have thrown the baby (Jesus) out with the bathwater.

It seems to me that often some of these detractors use arguments that would not be accepted or sustainable in many other cases. Let me use an example to illustrate: let’s say hypothetically that our present law enforcement system was totally corrupt; that 999 out of every 1000 cops was taking bribes, using their authority to abuse people instead of protecting them, officers were using the law as a means to create power structures that dehumanized the people they were sworn to serve. I wonder how many people would suggest that we should just get rid of laws because the ideal of justice was obviously flawed. I don’t know about you, but I’m the sort of person that would look at that one cop and I would say, “No, the abuse of the law and of justice does not mean that we should get rid of them. That is what a real cop looks like. This is what justice looks like. This is how all cops should behave.”

I feel similarly about Christianity. The difficult thing about someone like Hitchens is that some of his observations about religion are true, but like the above example I refuse to let the abuses of an ideal by evil people negate the ideal itself. Undoubtedly there have been, are, and will be many people that use religion as a means to manipulate people, dominate people, rob people, and to create power structures that dehumanize them. This does not negate the Christian person that works within much of the same religious system and uses the same text, but like the one officer leaves the world a better place. No matter how many people abused religion for horrible reasons, at the end of the conversation I would still say, “Look at this person. This is what real faith looks like. This is what we need to point others to. This is what Christianity is, and how Christians should conduct themselves.” Recognizing the difference is a discussion for another day.

This post started out as an introduction for a video. I wonder if I have now set an internet record for longest video intro? Anyways this is a promo for a movie coming out Summer 2008: Jesus Makes Me Laugh.

I think this should be a very interesting movie. Though I’m sure that even the people obviously satirized in the movie will assume he is talking about someone else. I mean there are many people that can read the Gospels and come across something like this: He said to them, “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, “This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.’ You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition. This is the sort of thing that should give one pause when reading the Bible. But just like the Judean religious authorities could not recognize God in front of them, I think the modern day Saducees will also be blinded by their religion to God in front of them.

I first saw this video on Codex. Tyler asks the question “Does Jesus Make you Laugh?” Actually, some of the things Jesus said scare the heck out of me. It’s the mess we have made of so much of Christianity that makes me laugh. It’s the sad man behind a pulpit with his co-dependent congregation whom he psychologically assaults with his proof-texting abuse of the Bible that makes me laugh (and cry). It’s the argument between self-righteous people about which man made form of tradition is better that really makes me laugh. Jesus? Gotta be honest, he unnerves me a little bit. C.S. Lewis once wrote about his children’s Christ figure, “He is not a tame lion.”

It’s the people with their tame Jesus that make me laugh the most. He was not a tame lion (of the tribe of Judah) .

{Disclaimer: I don’t know if Jesus really wants you to read this post, but I grew up in the church and I know the lingo to make you take a peak at least! If I have offended anyone (especially Jesus!) please forgvie me. Please?}

Seeing as some bloggers have disappeared over the last week, and not many post over the weekend, I thought I would throw some links your way of some interesting things I came across this week. If you are really bored you may even enjoy some of them. Be good.

LINKS:

Got a new cell that starts with an ‘i’ and ends with Phone, and now you want to responsibly get rid of your old phone? Safely donate or recycle your old phone with exPhone.

Scott Adams is often brilliant. Be careful reading his stuff it can be addictive. I thought these were two good posts from this week:

My Compliments To You

How To Be Creative

This is a good post from …and his ministers a flame of fire: About Nuance

Here’s a story for worst-parents-ever: 11 year old girl faces DUI charges after high speed chase

Is your procrastination hindering you? Ten things you should know from Psychology Today

Not sure about the Left Behind series? Pisteuomen has some thoughts: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4.

This guy is seriously messed up, and seriously funny. His Fourth of July post reeks of awesomeness!

And finally, it is an oldie but it always makes me smile:

Tom Cruise is the new “Christ” of Scientology, according to leaders of the cult-like religion. The Mission: Impossible star has been told he has been “chosen” to spread the word of his faith throughout the world. And leader David Miscavige believes that in future, Cruise, 44, will be worshiped like Jesus for his work to raise awareness of the religion.

A source close to the actor, who has risen to one of the church’s top levels, said: “Tom has been told he is Scientology’s Christ-like figure. Like Christ, he’s been criticised for his views. But future generations will realise he was right.”

Cruise joined the Church of Scientology in the ’80s. Leader L Ron Hubbard claimed humans bear traces of an ancient alien civilisation.

Story Here

Many, many comments have come to my mind, but they’re just too easy and obvious (not to mention how asinine the whole thing is to begin with) so I’m not going to bother.

I finally went and saw Spiderman 3, and the title of this post expresses how I felt as I left the theater. I would like to go back in time and be a fly on the wall during some of the script writing scenes in this movie.

Guy 1: Let’s have Peter Parker dance in this one

Guy 2: Dude, that is a great idea, high five.

I’m not sure why Sandman had to be turned into the sand creature from The Mummy. Also, if he can make himself into whatever he wants why does he have to roar when he is big? How is it that he loses the ability to articulate himself?

I don’t know, maybe after Raimi pillaged The Mummy he thought he might as well keep on going. Dancing didn’t work in Batman, and in my opinion it horrified the screen in S3. My question is what one of these videos is worse? Perhaps, wondering if camp such as Batman might be better than S3 answers the question.

The original Batusi:

Equally bad idea:

Some good moments in S3, but overall I was very frustrated as a fan.

I went and watched 300 this weekend, and suspending my disbelief, enjoyed it. If you might be wondering what the real story is, and the differences between the Greek historian Herodotus who originally recorded the story, the comic book by Frank Miller, and the movie then click the link below. Perhaps, his most interesting point (other than the differences) is his take on the characterization of the Persians. Orientalism lives!

 The real 300

Time for bed… and to make my own stand at the Hot Gate!