The amazing thing about the era of filmmaking that ended with "Wonder Woman 1984" is that a script that dumb and joyless could get past dozens of people without anyone pumping the brakes before a firehose of funding was sprayed over the project.

The most entertaining thing about WW84 is the press tour where the filmmakers pretend to be creative geniuses who learned *so much* from the failings of the vastly superior original film, especially its climactic showdown.
"The studio forced us to wrap the first movie up with a loud, cartoony CGI smackdown!" they cried... then delivered a sequel that ends with an even more cartoony and pointless CGI smackdown, followed by half an hour of Wonder Woman explaining why cheating and selfishness are bad.
How do you come off a surprisingly popular, breezy, entertaining movie that began the turnaround for a flagging zillion-dollar franchise and decide the sequel should be a first-grade morality lesson with the logic of a Care Bears cartoon that's longer than a Tolkien film?
Presumably it's because everyone involved decided they had something Very Important to say about the hellish 80s Decade of Greed that would be Highly Relevant for modern audiences, even though many people involved in the production are too young to remember the 80s.
They were all too busy congratulating each other for being insightful, stunning, and brave to notice the script they crapped out was dumber than a stump, boring as hell, bloated beyond belief, and nonsensical even by the low standards of comic book movies.
I heard someone say WW84 was meant as a tribute to the Richard Donner Superman movies. No, it's very much in the spirit of Superman IV, right down to giving Wonder Woman nonsensical new powers on par with Superman's rebuilding-the-great-wall-vision.
Superheroes had a renaissance because the films were made by people with genuine affection for the source material and some insight into their cultural impact. Likewise with the boom of 80s nostalgia from people who love and understand the 80s, like Stranger Things.
There could have been all sorts of fun stories to tell about Wonder Woman's life in the shadows from WW1 to the modern day. This is all they could come up with? This silly, preachy, plodding mess that steals subplots like Tim Burton's Catwoman and does them WORSE?
The worst thing is that the writers were clearly determined to "improve" on the first movie's climax by having Wonder Woman save the day through wisdom, empathy, and strength of character instead of muscle - and THIS is the best they could come up with. /end

More from John Hayward

When people voted to drain the swamp, they knew the alligators - the high-profile D.C. power players, special interests, and safe seat senators-for-life - would be a problem. They underestimated the vast horde of smaller critters squirming in the muck at the bottom of the swamp.


As @davereaboi pointed out, the ecosystem that feeds on the endless torrent of deficit-fueled D.C. spending is vast beyond belief, and it has tentacles that reach around the world. That ecosystem has multiple layers, and every one of them will fight to keep Big Gov money flowing.

There are entities wholly dedicated to spend money spent by entities that spend money spent by entities that spend money spent by entities that spend money from D.C. Many are invisible to taxpayers. Some are foreign operations utterly beyond the reach of American voters.

And even when an outsider comes along and dislodges a few swamp creatures, we find another massive ecosystem dedicated to breeding and replacing them. Most people in the heartland have no idea how vast is the machinery that produces manpower for the permanent bureaucracy.

Pluck out one parasite, and a swarm of fresh parasites is ready to flow in and replace it. Educational institutions and bureaucratic recruitment systems are working around the clock to embed the ideology of statism in legions of aspiring government employees and NGO staffers.

More from Culture

I just finished Eric Adler's The Battle of the Classics, and wanted to say something about Joel Christiansen's review linked below. I am not sure what motivates the review (I speculate a bit below), but it gives a very misleading impression of the book. 1/x


The meat of the criticism is that the history Adler gives is insufficiently critical. Adler describes a few figures who had a great influence on how the modern US university was formed. It's certainly critical: it focuses on the social Darwinism of these figures. 2/x

Other insinuations and suggestions in the review seem wildly off the mark, distorted, or inappropriate-- for example, that the book is clickbaity (it is scholarly) or conservative (hardly) or connected to the events at the Capitol (give me a break). 3/x

The core question: in what sense is classics inherently racist? Classics is old. On Adler's account, it begins in ancient Rome and is revived in the Renaissance. Slavery (Christiansen's primary concern) is also very old. Let's say classics is an education for slaveowners. 4/x

It's worth remembering that literacy itself is elite throughout most of this history. Literacy is, then, also the education of slaveowners. We can honor oral and musical traditions without denying that literacy is, generally, good. 5/x

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A THREAD ON @SarangSood

Decoded his way of analysis/logics for everyone to easily understand.

Have covered:
1. Analysis of volatility, how to foresee/signs.
2. Workbook
3. When to sell options
4. Diff category of days
5. How movement of option prices tell us what will happen

1. Keeps following volatility super closely.

Makes 7-8 different strategies to give him a sense of what's going on.

Whichever gives highest profit he trades in.


2. Theta falls when market moves.
Falls where market is headed towards not on our original position.


3. If you're an options seller then sell only when volatility is dropping, there is a high probability of you making the right trade and getting profit as a result

He believes in a market operator, if market mover sells volatility Sarang Sir joins him.


4. Theta decay vs Fall in vega

Sell when Vega is falling rather than for theta decay. You won't be trapped and higher probability of making profit.