Category: Brain Dead Serious

The Rise of Skywalker and Hope in Star Wars Films: A Review and Retrospective

For whatever reason, Star Wars has become the most chaotic fandom in recent years. Online, fans blast each other’s opinions on the new movies by Disney (and even the old ones) as professional critics analyze each movie with such intense scrutiny, you’d think they’re talking about some obscure art house French film that could decide the future of cinema.

It was in this murky, bubbling, steaming cauldron of poisonous fan feeling that the latest and final instalment of the Skywalker saga, Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker (TROS) plopped into when it finally dropped in theaters. As a big Star Wars fan myself, and to be completely honest, an active combatant in this mostly silly battle of opinions online, I feel it’s important for me to give my two cents on how this story that I’ve been watching since I was a kid wrapped up–perhaps the last we’ll hear of the Skywalkers and their morally confused family for a long time, if the decision makers behind the scenes are to be believed.

Here’s my spoiler-free review of TROS, as well as a retrospective of Star Wars films.

Feelings Don’t Lie: Mos Eisly Cantina Cheers

My fiancée, Erika, and I attended an early exclusive screening of TROS arranged by members of some of the most prominent Star Wars fan groups in the Philippines, namely the Philippine Lightsaber Guild, FightSaber Philippines, Star Wars Philippines, and 501st Legion Philippine Garrison. I love Star Wars but when it comes to geeking out over the Jedi and Sith universe, I tip my hat to these extraordinary fans. At the screening, we were met by Jedi ushers who wielded their colorful lightsabers to get everyone in line. Some were wearing masks, and one cool fellow actually had a Kowakian monkey-lizard (that adorably annoying creature owned by Jabba the Hutt) perched on his shoulder. Erika and I frankly felt a little intimidated and underdressed for the occasion amongst this crowd plucked out of the Mos Eisley cantina. Yes, I was wearing my Return of the Jedi (ROTJ) Luke Skywalker T-shirt–which I proudly drew and designed myself–but at the end of the day, it was just a T-shirt and sadly unimaginative compared to what these fans were sporting.

Given the kind of crowd at this screening, I was really curious about how they would react to the movie. Will they boo? Will they groan? Will they throw their popcorn or their Kowakian monkey-lizard at the screen if they felt like they were watching trash compactor material? I was expecting the worst knowing that TROS was taking a beating online, with many Twitter users hurling their most savage takes on it as they compared it to The Last Jedi (TLJ) by director Rian Johnson–a movie, which while acclaimed by critics, divided many Star Wars fans and has evolved into a lightning rod of bitter fan debate. And if these people are the most devoted fans here in the country, the ones who have spent the most time and hard-earned money to show their love for this franchise, then it would be logical to assume that they would have the strongest reactions to the final chapter, whether good or bad.

And then it was time.

“A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…”

The crowd cheered and clapped as “Star Wars” appeared onscreen and the iconic yellow text began to crawl into deep space adorned by stars one final time…

———-

TROS lasted around two hours and ten or fifteen minutes, but it was over in a flash. I walked into that cinema with Erika waiting for the moment when I’ll be disappointed, bracing myself at every scene, almost certain that this would be the deal breaker that everyone has been talking about… and to my great surprise–that moment never came. Weirdly enough, the opposite happened. When the lights came on, Erika and I both had watery eyes as we laughingly looked at each other’s face.

What’s even more surprising was that we weren’t alone. The Mos Eisly cantina of a crowd we were with were clapping, cheering, and raising their lightsabers as the credits rolled. Everyone was visibly emotional, but not in a negative way. They were happy and sad that the story a lot of them grew up with had come to a close.

So what was it? What was the reason why instead of an angry mob of fans throwing their cloaks and muppets at the screen, we got a roomful of people who obviously had a great time watching a movie?

I think a lot of it has to do with going into a Star Wars screening in the right frame of mind. To illustrate, it’s best to describe our story.

Perhaps it helped that 2 weeks ago, I rewatched the original trilogy and the prequels with Erika to prepare us for TROS. She has never completely seen these movies before and as I rewatched iconic scenes with her, I felt like I began to see these movies with fresh eyes. She was so stunned to know that Darth Vader was Luke’s father all along in the original trilogy (she has amazingly missed all the references floating about in general pop culture), and so heartbroken when Anakin finally turned to the dark side in the prequels–so heartbroken, in fact, that she needed to take a break to catch her breath because it was too much (it’s usually mocked now but Anakin killing the younglings was really dark for family-friendly sci-fi). She loved all the movies with no exception, and somehow, that childlike wonder rubbed off on me, and I forgot how these movies are now fodder for ridicule and cheap bully points on social media these days.

As I immersed myself in this universe once more, I remembered myself when I was a kid, seeing all these for the first time. I didn’t care about George Lucas, why he’s a big deal, what he did and didn’t change, what he wrote and didn’t write. When I wasn’t aware how Jar Jar Binks could be a bad character when he was clearly a hero, albeit the goofy kind that I was familiar with in many Sunday morning cartoons. I remembered seeing C3PO and R2D2 cross that empty desert for the first time, two strange droids embarking on an epic adventure; and this wonderful feeling of being a happy kid with my imagination going haywire over all these fantastic things was rekindled.

Perhaps that rewatch helped. While I was prepared for a bad experience in the cinema, I also believe I had more actual context when I saw TROS; I actually refreshed my memory of the entire Skywalker arc and didn’t just read a bunch of angry tweets before going to see the movie.

In a word–feelings don’t lie. Whatever we’ve heard from others about the movie, Erika and I and those other fans in our screening unarguably had an excellent time watching a Star Wars film. And it bears emphasizing: TROS actually felt very much like a Star Wars movie in the mold of the earlier chapters. It ended the Skywalker saga in a powerfully emotional note and, in that way, provided a fitting end to one of the grandest stories of our childhood.

The Rise of Skywalker and the Unenviable Task of Making Sense of the Sequels

It’s been noted by a lot of critics and Star Wars fans on Twitter and Reddit that your reaction to TROS will depend largely on how you felt about TLJ; the argument being, TLJ was such a departure thematically from Star Wars that if you felt good about that departure, then you would dislike or hate TROS, which appears to swing to the other direction, in many cases, obviously “undoing” plot threads that were started in TLJ.

But while that may be true for others, it doesn’t apply to me because I’ve been generally critical of the sequels, both TLJ and The Force Awakens (TFA), which was directed by JJ Abrams who also helmed TROS. My personal laundry list of gripes includes: the sequels copying many elements from previous movies (TFA), changing or outright disregarding the arcs of major legacy characters (TLJ), and an overarching narrative that seemed to go nowhere (TFA and TLJ).

What’s great about TROS is it somehow pulls the unruly strings together, not just the sequels’, but the original trilogy’s and the prequels’, too, as it barrells through the final chapter. It must be noted that JJ Abrams planted seeds in TFA that heavily hinted at the ties of the sequels to the main Skywalker saga: namely, Rey’s mysterious parentage and Kylo Ren’s motives as they relate to the Sith. These were depicted in different ways, such as Rey touching Luke Skywalker’s lightsaber and remembering flashes of her past, and Kylo looking at Darth Vader’s charred helmet and talking to it like a deranged man.

A common frustration by critics of TLJ was that these narrative threads went unexplored or altogether discarded by the movie. Rey was revealed to have no ties to any known Jedi family and Kylo seemed to have suddenly gotten over the past. These and other unexpected departures from TFA’s storylines seemed to leave the final film with the unenviable task of herding the narrative toward a cohesive ending that somehow addresses all questions. Heck–with Snoke, the big bad, gone, was the denouement simply a battle to take down Kylo and his cartoonish general, Hux? Or if the true villains behind the war all along were the capitalists who profited from it, was Rey expected to end the galactic conflict by leading a revolution against capitalism (which, of course, her character wasn’t formally briefed about).

Even if an alternate Episode IX directed by Rian Johnson managed to answer these questions, it’s unlikely that version would connect at all to previous Star Wars trilogies. And the more I read about how disjointed the creative process for TFA and TLJ was, the more I believe that when Rian Johnson made TLJ, he decided to take it down a path where everyone must leave behind their feelings for most of the elements of the previous trilogies. It was a bold move and not a small number of people were impressed with it, but it clearly meant that expectations set in TFA didn’t matter and that the familiar Star Wars fans knew was completely gone.

The extreme fan backlash, the blockbuster flop that was Solo: A Star Wars Story, and the overall negative sentiment about the franchise following TLJ were apparently enough to convince Disney that it’s still too early to ignore the main Star Wars arc: the arc of the Skywalker family. But as the narrative threads lay in a total mess after the second act of the sequel trilogy, the last movie had to do something to course-correct while somehow also connecting both movies to the main story where it was initially hinted that they were linked to. It was almost an impossible mission, but shockingly, TROS did just that.

A lot of TROS critics sneer at how the movie dug up old elements and characters (most notably, Palpatine) in what many are calling attempts at “fan service.” It must be noted, however, that these elements only feel like they were made up at the last-minute because TLJ steered the sequels’ narrative to a direction where its predecessors didn’t matter. Had TLJ followed the original plot instead of breaking from the rest, the final movie wouldn’t be perceived as such a rough landing for the franchise.

As it is, TROS, against all odds, managed to make sense out of the diverging tracks of TFA and TLJ. It brought meaning to Rey’s troubled flashbacks, provided a plausible reason for how the son of the two of the greatest heroes of the Rebellion, Leia Organa and Han Solo, became a mass-murdering Sith, and reframed the galactic conflict in the original dichotomy between mysterious good and evil forces, instead of war profiteering and slavery. And while TLJ deconstructed legacy characters to create conflict, TROS wrote fitting prologues to make sure these beloved characters lived a life of meaning and purpose. The choices were obviously controversial, but I feel they generally worked to craft a very fun, touching story that satisfyingly felt like Star Wars, and not some other kind of dejected space sci-fi.

Perhaps more importantly, TROS ended the Skywalker saga in a heartwarming, and one could say more “respectful” fashion in terms of the past, that it has successfully ensured that all Star Wars movies going forwards may not mention the name “Skywalker” ever again, and it would be perfectly all right. Instead of forcefully, insensitively wrenching the story away from the past in order to set itself apart as TLJ did, TROS gently buried the past, put some flowers on the ground, and said a little prayer for it, and then walked off into the possibilities of the future.

Star Wars is a Story of Hope

I began this review describing how rewatching the previous trilogies with my fiancée, Erika, gave me a better lens by which to experience these iconic movies. All of these movies were new to her, and that helped me let go of a lot of weight that was on my shoulders as a lifelong fan. This is not a call to be simple-minded viewers. But it’s important to note that while we can never be the innocent, perhaps easy-to-please children we once were when we first saw these films, it also doesn’t hurt to be aware that we are now going into cinemas weighed down by adulthood and all its stark realities.

Many of us don’t even refer to Star Wars as a mere “story” anymore, but a “franchise”–a sad, corporate venture, not a tale about unbelievable things in a faraway corner of the universe. A lot of us don’t sit back in the cinema anymore to suspend disbelief for a few magical hours–we head into it to dissect the film like a corpse: why it doesn’t fit the established and known universe, why it proves Disney is a giant creativity-sucking company, why the movie is so wrong based on “canon,” and even wrong in terms of today’s morals.

Basically, in many ways, we’ve forgotten how to enjoy Star Wars. And I would argue this is one of the reasons why there’s such a backlash right now over the “return-to-innocence” form of TROS.

I have always said that the reason I particularly disliked TLJ (after two screenings, mind you, that’s how much I love Star Wars that it takes time to convince myself about how I truly feel about a movie), was how it essentially destroyed Luke Skywalker’s character–a sentiment many fans share. From the hero who saved his almost irredeemable father and the galaxy, who defeated the Emperor against all odds and temptations of the Dark Side, Luke was reduced to a guilty, fearful person hiding in a distant island in Rian Johnson’s movie.

At first, I thought it was just that, but having seen TROS, I finally truly understand why TLJ was not my cup of tea—because it was such a cynical movie. A movie without hope.

By making the characters—as diehard fans of this instalment put it online—“realistic,” TLJ tried to pull the mythology from the magical corner of innocence from where it originally blossomed, and uncaringly threw it into the drab, adult corner of experiences, which is, frankly, what we’re accustomed to every day outside the movies.

Suddenly, Luke’s triumphs over the Sith and himself were voided—he’s just an old man willingly whiling away his days in an unknown outcrop surrounded by the sea as the world crumbled before him. After hints that she was connected to the Skywalkers in TFA, suddenly, Rey was just somebody in the crowd who happened to have really strong Jedi powers. And, as mentioned, there’s no big bad. Snoke was a sham that wasn’t even worth five minutes fighting; he’s a bad idea crumpled and thrown into the trash bin. And the most heart-crushing point—the past didn’t matter. Legends didn’t matter. As the movie said, “Let the past die. Kill it if you have to.”

But this is a shockingly cynical view of life. In my opinion, there’s a reason why we watch Star Wars movies aside from sheer “escapism.” It’s to believe in dreams. It’s to get in touch with that inner child we’ve lost along the way, who was told by our parents that we could be something special. That we WERE special. In a word—that we were the Chosen One.

In the real world, we’re not. We’re just another face in a grey cubicle in an office with hundreds of grey cubicles all being worked by people who have mostly stopped believing in fantasies and myths. People who’ve drawn a line separating “childish” things from responsible, grownup things.

In truth, I think some of us don’t like Rey being connected to the Skywalkers and welcomed the fact that she’s not connected to the legends at all because that’s also how we feel about ourselves. We have become so cynical and tired of heroes, that watching movies about the Chosen One is now a cheesy, nonsensical exercise in mush that’s only good for children. We’re ashamed of it. In some ways, we’re even guilty that we once believed in this fantasy, this lie because our everyday life experiences as adults have told us otherwise. This cynicism permeates every facet of our being such that whenever we hear of the classic prophesied hero, we dismiss it as “childish”—in current lingo, “fan service.”

Sure, it’s a valid view of life. And I myself like those kinds of movies that remind you of real life, that check your optimism, and bring you back down to the mundane. But this is Star Wars—this is NOT that kind of movie and it shouldn’t be.

From the very first movie, George Lucas has been weaving a fairy tale about hope. A bedtime story about good over evil. These movies have been trying to speak with the child in you who wants to believe in the fantastic and the impossible. And to snuff out that fantasy and bury it in a mountainous pile of canon detail and “rules,” and, worse, to start turning it into cynical science fiction, the kind we get by the dozen each year, is simply not right.

It’s been said that the greatest stories are those we’ve heard countless times in the fashion of legends because those are the stories that tell us about our unchanging, core wishes and aspirations as human beings. An insignificant character faces insurmountable odds on a great journey, and learns along the way about their strengths and weaknesses, and that they are the One—the one to end injustice once and for all. It’s an ancient narrative as old as people themselves. It’s simple, naive.

It’s also true. As our watery eyes after seeing TROS’ epic last battle attested to.

 

Thoughts on Matters of Taste and the Dutch Tulip Bubble of the 1600s

The first ever critique of someone’s taste probably went something like, “Man, your taste in rocks is horrendous! What a dumb, lowlife you must be to think such a rough, ugly stone dislodged from a mound of bison dung is worth anything. Why don’t you be like me and collect these shiny, smooth, grey pebbles collected from a river? Look how beautiful they are!”

The shiny, smooth, grey pebbles might have also been presented as suggesting something of the higher intelligence of the stone collector.

You think it’s ridiculous now but once there must have lived a cultured ape.

———

When I think about how people go nuts over matters of taste, I’m reminded of the story of the Dutch tulip bubble that happened in the 17th century. For those of you who haven’t heard this crazy tale before, you read that right–tulips. Apparently, at one point in history, the Dutch deemed tulips so valuable that a single tulip bulb was worth as much as or more than an entire house including the land where it stood. Some of these flowers, which were introduced into Europe just a century before, were worth 10 times more than the annual income of a skilled craftsman.

The priciest of them all were bulbs that had an unusual mix of colors different from the more common single-hued varieties at the time. Many years later, people would discover that these exotic flowers were actually suffering from a virus that messed up how they look, producing the strange streaks of colors that the Dutch so coveted.

In short, these were very sick plants.

———

People lost their heads so much over tulips that they gave the flowers intimidating names like “Admiral Pottenbacker” or “Admiral van der Eyck.” There was even an “Admiral of Admirals.”

Come to think of it, if a garden bulb were to command such a great price that some deluded craftsman could lose his entire estate and end up with nothing but a sickly plant in a pot, you might as well call that piece of vegetation an admiral. Few titles would have been fitting.

———

And then as if the Lord of Sense got so tired of the noisy Dutch taverns trading in futures (this was, in fact, the birth of this questionable financial fuss, as well), he just struck hard one evening in February 1637 to end the farce once and for all. For some reason, people just stopped showing up in one such tavern supposed to hold one of these popular tulip auctions that determined who had the right to own a flower that hadn’t even bloomed yet.

And from there, the bubble burst. Some people felt the economic hammer fall more acutely than others, and there were a lot of folks who lost a fortune. Overall, however, the Dutch economy–already the richest of that era–didn’t really take a dive.

After all, when the dust had settled, no serious, logical person with a conscience would really bereave a family of all their valuables just because their drunk father made the wrong decision to sell everything he owned for a rare purple tulip with yellow specks on its petals the night before the mania melted away.

———

I personally think it’s telling that a mania like that happened to the wealthiest economy in that period of history. When people have so much wealth and so little reason to think why one person deserves much more respect or recognition than the other, then the ground is ripe for something truly idiotic to grow and thrive.

I mean, if I were wealthy, and you were wealthy, our neighbors were wealthy, our friends were wealthy–and if we’re all wealthy, then what would separate me from you?

Surely we can’t test our bravery to see who’s of better stock. We’re not soldiers. Or warriors. I can’t defeat you sword in hand and declare I’ve bested you after a decisive, unquestionable final blow to the head. And we all can read and write, can reason our way around issues using the thinnest of facts to back us up, so intelligence would be such a drag to measure. A contest like that takes so long to judge to determine the winner. Besides, people who love to argue never, ever lose an argument. They just keep on arguing until somebody gets parched.

Admittedly, this is a brazenly simple and theoretical version of what might have transpired, but people must have panicked as they realized they were running out of ways to one up one another.

It was probably a goddamn first-world psychological crisis that punctured holes in the very fabric of society.

And so out of nowhere, some florist raised his hand and said, “Ok–how about who owns the better tulip?”

———

True–taste is a good barometer of a person’s standing in life. One’s Admirael der Admiraelen de Gouda Tulip without a doubt indicated that one had sufficient education and class, as could be expected of someone who had sufficient sacks of money to trade for such a renowned plant.

But what of it?

Was that the point? To declare beyond a shadow of a doubt that one was filthy rich and on the cutting edge of culture? Versed in the finest, most secret knowledge of the floral market?

You could say it’s all just a game. People were trying to outsmart each other and make themselves wealthy like they do all the time, and so they put, what is called in fiction, a “MacGuffin” in the center of it, allowing them to play this game of who gets rich and who gets wretched. It could have been anything–a tulip, a sunflower, acorns, a ball of rubberbands, bitcoin… It doesn’t matter. The point was to get a game of big winners and sore losers going.

Things of ghostly value haunting the real world of men.

Isn’t that where taste comes from? Just utter confusion over what something is really worth?

———

Going back to our story, in the end, it seemed like the bubonic plague played a major role in reversing people’s minds about those tulips. Imagine how uninspiring it was to debate whose flower was better as your neighbors perished by the thousands.

Nothing like the prospect of painful death to remind us of what truly matters.

And that a fleet of admiral tulips wouldn’t make a pile of dead bodies any less stinky.

 

Layton’s Operation Somewhere in Orion

The strange purple, part-mechanical beings from Cosmos Redshift 7 had tilted heads as they looked down on what appeared to be Layton lying on a cold operating table.

Bleep. Whirr. Granzik, I think the specimen looks better this way, don’t you think? Whirr. Bleep.

Bloop. Click-clack. True, Krik’ok. It is my personal opinion that you have outdone yourself. This piece is a work of functional art. Click-clack. Bloop.

Bleep. Buzz. Indeed. The highly illogical trajectory of this species’ evolution has resulted in an overabundance of inefficiencies, which I believe I, with your help, Granzik, have corrected. Buzz. Bleep.

Bloop. Clank. Look, Krik’ok. The specimen’s globular section is moving. It appears it’s attempting to communicate. Clank. Bloop.

Bleep. Whirr. Excellent observation, Granzik. Let us temporarily detach the five-limbed appendage affixed to its oral cavity. Whirr. Bleep.

Granzik proceeded to slice away at Layton’s head using a shiny red laser scalpel, which did the job proficiently.

“Ahem, thank you, good sirs. I was really having trouble speaking there with my hand attached to my mouth.”

Bleep. Whirr. Fascinating, Granzik. The specimen is convinced it has need for a means of expression. Whirr. Bleep.

Bloop. Click-clack. Indeed. Why would it need to convey its primitive, illogical thoughts? Click-clack. Bloop.

Uh, well, you know, how could I say ‘no’ to all of this, er, experimentation if I can’t articulate–

Bleep. Whirr. It seems to be under the delusion that it can affect the state of things if it speaks? Whirr. Bleep.

Bloop. Clank. Oh, come now, Krik’ok. Surely, it can’t be THAT deluded? We have already plotted its species’ future and it would not even be capable of reversing its planet’s current climatic course to a biotic crisis. Clank. Bloop.

Uh, excuse me. Wh-what did you mean by that? B-biotic cri… Are you referring to climate change? Are we going to die from cli–

Bleep. Buzz. I wish we could make it understand that affixing its five-limbed appendage to its oral cavity is a more efficient way to expend its biochemical energy, Granzik. Buzz. Bleep.

Bloop. Click-clack. Agreed. Instead of straining itself trying to talk, it could use its appendage to harness resources for us. Click-clack. Bloop.

Ahem, EXCUSE ME again, k-kind sirs, but what do you mean by that? Harnessing resources? Like, am I g-going to work for you now?

Bleep. Whirr. Granzik, did you just hear it say “now?” It seems the specimen is unaware it has been working for us all this time. Whirr. Bleep.

Bloop. Click-clack. Quite amusing, don’t you think? What does it think it has been doing all this time? Something productive? Click-clack. Bloop.

Bleep. Buzz. Quite amusing! Buzz. Bleep.

Hey! Yes! Of course I’ve been doing something productive with my life! I have a fiancée. We’re going to get married. We’ve been saving up, s-so we could afford a.. a decent wedding! And we-we’re going to buy a house, and-and..

Bloop. Clank. Krik’ok, I believe this species is describing its primitive courtship ritual. Clank. Bloop.

Bleep. Whirr. And a means to prolong its biological existence with its mate. Whirr. Bleep.

Bloop. Click-clack. Indeed, a juvenile fantasy! Click-clack. Bloop.

Bleep. Buzz. Its species doesn’t deserve to thrive, Granzik. Buzz. Bleep.

Bloop. Clank. Agreed. Good thing we replaced its reproductive organ with its limb originally designated for locomotion. Clank. Bloop.

WHAT? SO THAT’S WHY I CAN’T FEEL ANYTHING BELOW THERE BECAUSE MY FOOT IS IN MY DI–

Bleep. Whirr. That was an inspired medical suggestion by you, Granzik. I applaud your efforts. Now the specimen can use its libidinal drive to transport itself wherever we please it to be. Whirr. Bleep.

Bloop. Click-clack. Affirmative, Krik’ok. I recommend we place it in Nognon-9, so we can further study its behavior in isolation. Click-clack. Bloop.

Bleep. Buzz. Granzik, isn’t organic matter absent in Nognon-9? How can the specimen sustain itself in that bare wasteland? Buzz. Bleep.

Bloop. Click-clack. Oh, forgive me, Krik’ok. I forgot to tell you that when you went to the bathroom, I replaced the specimen’s stomach with an ancient radio device from its planet. Therefore, it cannot experience hunger anymore. Click-clack. Bloop.

Bleep. Buzz. Brilliant! Instead, it can listen to sad music from its planet. Buzz. Bleep.

Bloop. Clank. Exactly! Clank. Bloop.

WHY YOU DIRTY, LITTLE–

Bleep. Whirr. I would also like to take this opportunity, Granzik, to disclose that when you went to the spaceship’s deck to smoke, I replaced the specimen’s outer covering with polyester. I mean it doesn’t really need a tactile sense, right? Whirr. Bleep.

Bloop. Click-clack. Why, of course, Krik’ok. Why should it? It’s not like it needs comfort. Click-clack. Bloop.

Bleep. Buzz. Definitely. Buzz. Bleep.

Bloop. Clank. Also, when you took a drink in the pantry I put the specimen’s nose in the vicinity of its buttocks. Clank. Bloop.

Bleep. Whirr. Granzik, pray tell what’s the purpose of that adjustment? Whirr. Bleep.

Bloop. Click-clack. Absolutely nothing. It was done purely for the heck of it. Click-clack. Bloop.

Bleep. Buzz. Granzik, I love the way you optimize subjects! Buzz. Bleep.

Bloop. Clank. Thank you, Krik’ok. Bloop. Clank.

SO THAT’S WHY IT SMELLS SO BAD IN HERE I’LL KI–

Bleep. Whirr. So Granzik, shall we continue with the final touch? Whirr. Bleep.

THE FINAL TOUCH? WHAT FINAL TOUCH?

Bloop. Click-clack. Certainly. You may proceed with replacing its heart with a cracked mug, Krik’ok. Click-clack. Bloop.

A-A CRACKED M-MUG? A CRACKED MUG?!

Bleep. Buzz. That should effectively kill all its hopes and dreams. I wonder if it will survive, Granzik? Buzz. Bleep.

Bloop. Clank. I highly doubt it, Krik’ok, but the tests should confirm. Clank. Bloop.

NO! NO! NOOOOOOOOO!

And Krik’ok went on to use the shiny red laser scalpel on Layton’s chest as Granzik held the cracked mug ready.

 

 

 

Social Media is Trying to Define Me, So I Have Chosen to be Defined by a Taco Bell Burrito

The social media industrial complex has been telling us how to define ourselves, shaping our minds and our beliefs, fashioning us into foot soldiers of one brand or another, the coolest cause or the latest mass-produced celebrity–and that’s why as an act of resistance to all of this existential violence, I have chosen to be defined by a Taco Bell burrito.

You may ask why, if I’m being serious in challenging the status quo, did I nevertheless select the best-selling product of an American chain of fastfood restaurants to define my very being. But see, that’s the crux of this willful act of defiance in the face of this monstrous labelling machine. By consciously choosing a delicious item in the menu of a massive capitalist business as an anchor for the definition of my Self, I am strongly subverting the meanings being handed to me without my consent.

Taco Bell thinks that I’m merely a statistic in their usual conversion metrics but little do they know that I’m secretly a dangerous guerrilla of post-modern revolution.

I’m eating their burritos while battling in the trenches of definitions. Every mouthful of saturated fat and sodium takes the fight to this behemoth of colonial capitalism, and every bite of the soft, tender wrap oozing with melted cheese and juicy beef a shedding of imposed needs I have imbibed through constant exposure to advertisements calculated to induce brainwashing in their audiences.

This is my own way of saying “NO” to the repressive forces that have been unleashed on my individuality since I was a child. This is me taking back my life from those who want me standardized like the rest of the poor misguided souls on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and everywhere people are judged, measured, and monetized every day. I eat this Taco Bell burrito and wash it down with Pepsi to assert our humanity and that which is rightfully ours.

I see the underemployed workers, the unhealthy eating habits, the starving farmers, and questionable assembly-line methods that sustain this system of consumerist servitude. And I think of them all, waving the flag for them, as I let out a loud burp smelling of diced onions and sour cream.

I could, of course, subscribe to more conventional advocacies, such as feminism or advancing the rights of LGBTQ, or saving the environment, but after thinking my options through, I have decided to leave these battles to other people in the community while I wage furious war on culture industries, starting with aligning my selfhood with a half-pounder burrito. Not a quesadilla or a Mexican pizza. Not even a taco–but a burrito.

This is only the beginning of my activism. After my thirst for change has been quenched, and the Taco Bell burrito and me are one and the same existence, I’m moving on to the McDonald’s Big Mac.

 

A Man Who Is Extremely Content to Be Perpetually Dissatisfied

DON: Ladies and gentlemen, good evening. This is Don Fernandez, your host for yet another edition of The Human Condition, bringing you the most striking interviews of common people you wouldn’t normally think about if you had something better to do. Tonight–Mr. Charlie Mendez–a man who is extremely content to be perpetually dissatisfied.

Mr. Charlie Mendez–can I call you Charlie?

CHARLIE: Well, I don’t know. I prefer “Charles,” really. Has a more respectable ring to it. But go ahead, call me “Charlie,” if–

DON: No, no! Absolutely not! If “Charles” is what you prefer, then “Charles” it is.

CHARLIE: Nah… Use “Charlie.” I hate that nickname but… fine! Just use it.

DON: But… I’m totally ok with calling you “Charles.”

CHARLIE: Please. Just call me “Charlie.”

DON: Ok, ok! “Charlie” then.

CHARLIE: Ugh. Ugly name.

DON: Good grief!

CHARLIE: I know right? There are thousands of better names out there and your mother somehow saw it fit to give you the most atrocious, banal, wimpy name possible!

DON: Ok. I may have jumped in this interview the wrong way. Clearly, this–what’s manifesting here–is a symptom of the problem you were going to discuss with our audience today. That is–you, Charles–or Charlie–are a man who’s extremely content to be perpetually dissatisfied.

CHARLIE: I… wouldn’t really frame the issue that way. Seems too simplistic. And reductionist. It’s definitely more than that.. but, uh, I guess if that’s convenient for you, then… fine!

DON: I see what’s happening here.

CHARLIE: Do you? I doubt it.

DON: …

CHARLIE: But again–it’s ok!

DON: Ok! So. Let’s move on–

CHARLIE: God, I hate when people move on, but…

DON: –but let me guess–you’re fine with it?

CHARLIE: Sure! I mean, what can you do? Launch a revolution?

DON: Charlie, you don’t have to launch a revolution for anything. You know, you can say “No” if you really don’t like what’s happening.

CHARLIE: I do say “No.” I say “No” all the freakin’ time. But then people or circumstances push back, and when that happens, I say “Fine then, yes!”

DON: Don’t you think that’s a supremely defeatist attitude?

CHARLIE: Oh, I do. I do think it’s defeatist. And cowardly. And absolutely nothing will ever change in my life if I continue being this way!

DON: And? How do you feel about that? Sorry, let me rephrase–

CHARLIE: Oh, I HATE IT!

DON: Jesus.

CHARLIE: GODDAMMIT I HATE THE FEELING! But at the end of the day, I just let it slide. It sucks but.. fine!

DON: See, Charlie, maybe you just need to try harder. If things don’t go your way, perhaps you should try just a little bit harder to, you know, get really, constantly angry at the state of things!

CHARLIE: Constantly? Like, uh, constantly-constantly?

DON: Yeah.

CHARLIE: Like, uh, hate it forever?

DON: Yes!

CHARLIE: To do what?

DON: Well, so that you’re so angry and mad at the state of things that you finally push yourself to do something about it!

CHARLIE: Huh.

DON: Don’t you think that’s a better way to live than just being extremely content to be perpetually dissatisfied?

CHARLIE: To be honest–that sounds like a TERRIBLE idea.

DON: Terrible? How so?

CHARLIE: How? What do you mean, how? It’s freakin’ terrible. Constantly being angry in order to actually do things… are you insane? That’s the most terrible idea I’ve ever heard and it makes me sick!

DON: Oh no, just… just stop th–

CHARLIE: But if that’s your opinion, then, FINE!

DON: This… This isn’t going anywhere.

CHARLIE: Nothing’s going anywhere. You, me, this world. All of us ain’t going nowhere. I’ll keep working my soulless day job working with soulless people, enriching some soulless millionaires that keep this soulless society in check! You think just because people are getting more offended these days that this will actually result in a movement that will free us from the savage shackles that have held our humanity back from time immemorial? No! It’s a deception! A mirage! Fifty, five-hundred, five-thousand years from now, we’ll still be talking about the same issues stuck in the same rut!

DON: Charlie, Charlie… I hate to break it to you. But it’s precisely because of people like you that things aren’t going to change. Because you refuse to do anything about your situation! All you do is complain!

CHARLIE: Are you thick? You think I don’t know that? You think I don’t go to bed at night with those exact, same thoughts haunting me to sleep? Of course I’m aware of my shortcomings! Of course I’m aware I’m part of the problem–and the very CAUSE of it! And you know what? I HATE IT!

DON: Here it comes.

CHARLIE: BUT THEN I TAKE A DEEP BREATH, TURN ON THE TELEVISION, AND THEN… I’M OK!

DON: …What do you watch on TV? Maybe… maybe that has something to do with this attitude of yours.

CHARLIE: Nothing particular. Some sappy drama. Or childish sci-fi. Whatever’s on. They’re all garbage. But I watch them anyway. Because once you get used to the trash the soulless media industry is serving you, they numb your mind and your palate enough, and then… they’re ok!

DON: That’s sad.

CHARLIE: Miserable. Bleak. But I’m fine!

DON: What about a relationship? Maybe you just need to be loved and experience love to get out of this vicious cycle of being utterly content with misery?

CHARLIE: Oh, that has nothing to do with it. I’ve been married for over 10 years already.

DON: Wow! That’s quite an accomplishment. You must love your wife very much.

CHARLIE: …

DON: Er, right?

CHARLIE: …Nah, I don’t like that woman.

DON: What??

CHARLIE: Yeah… I mean, I got her pregnant after the most horrible sexual intercourse I’ve ever had!

DON: …

CHARLIE: Like, I’m not even kidding. It’s shockingly boring and disgusting at the same time! But we sort of… you know, got off, so the thing did its job, so I guess it’s all right. Then her belly started growing bigger after a few months and both our parents pushed us to get together. Oh, I freakin’ raised hell about that for weeks! I screamed at all of them, told them hell no I’m not marrying that woman whom I barely remembered from one drunken night at the pub! But my parents are devout Christians and they believe that a child has to have a father and mother living together yadda yadda yadda. So, you know, after a week, even though I didn’t like her not one bit, I said, “What the hell, FINE, I’ll marry the wench!” And we got married, and the baby was born, and oh God Almighty, what a bloody ugly baby that was who grew up to be one of the ugliest children I’ve ever had the misfortune to lay my eyes on. And my own flesh and blood, you know? But I accepted the kid, anyway.

DON: Because deep inside you loved your kid, right??

CHARLIE: Nah. Because I couldn’t do shit about it anyway. So… FINE!

DON: OK THAT’S IT! FINE! Let’s end the interview right here. I’ve had enough!

CHARLIE: You angry at me, Don?

DON: YES! WHAT KIND OF A FATHER HATES HIS OWN KID? YOU’RE… YOU’RE MAD! YOU’RE PSYCHO!

CHARLIE: So what? What are you gonna do about it?

DON: I–I… WELL, NOTHING FOR NOW!

CHARLIE: So you’re fine for now?

DON: GODDAMMIT. I’M AFRAID WE’LL HAVE TO CUT THIS STINKIN’ PROGRAM SHORT AGAIN! ‘TIL NEXT TIME IN THIS GOD-FORSAKEN MADHOUSE OF A SHOW! THIS IS DON FERNANDEZ, HOST OF THE HUMAN CONDITION, SAYING GOODNIGHT AND GOOD LUCK! I HATE ALL OF YOU!

CHARLIE: Come on, Don! Chill! It’ll pass!

I Read Sartre and I Think There’s No Such Thing as Forever

Young Filipinos have a popular saying, “Walang forever (translated: There’s no such thing as forever / Forever is impossible).” It’s a decidedly pessimistic and mocking view of love and romantic relationships popular on social media where it’s been expressed through innumerable memes. A girl actually coaxed Bill Nye to answer the question whether forever really existed or not, to which Bill Nye answered, yes, forever possibly exists if by “forever” one means time as a property of the universe. Bill Nye was trolled, of course–like all old folks online. The question was not really about time but the permanence of love.

Thankfully, I think I may have found a better answer from my nightly readings. It turns out, Jean-Paul Sartre, French existentialist philosopher extraordinaire famous for confusing the daylights out of students, had something to say about permanence or rather its opposite–“fragility,” which I think we can extend over our analysis of love and relationships.

Destruction and Fragility

In his book Being and Nothingness, Sartre explained that “to destroy” is human. Without human beings, there would be no such thing as “destruction.” You can’t say for example, that a bolt of lightning destroyed a tree in a forest because without man to define what happened as such, the concept of “being destroyed” wouldn’t exist. In fact, there wouldn’t even be any “change” at all. There would just be Being and outside that, nothing.

In relation to this, “fragility” is also a human thing. Nothing in the world is fragile except those which man defines as such. But if man is the one who posits something as “fragile,” didn’t he, in essence, also cause its own destruction? For if he never defined that something as “fragile” in the first place, then it cannot possibly be destroyed.

Sartre says:

“And what is fragility if not a certain probability of non-being for a given being under determined circumstances. A being is fragile if it carries in its being a definite possibility of non-being… Thus it is man who renders cities as destructible, precisely because he posits them as fragile and as precious and because he adopts a system of protective measures with regard to them. It is because of this ensemble of measures that an earthquake or a volcanic eruption can destroy these cities or these human constructions. The original meaning and aim of war are contained in the smallest building of man.”

I personally love this line: “The original meaning and aim of war are contained in the smallest building of man.” Sartre appears to be saying that once man gave birth to the concept of “fragility,” everything that concept touched was doomed to be destroyed precisely because fragility “carries in its being a definite possibility of non-being.” A fortress–no matter how strongly built, no matter how well-defended, is doomed to fall because as a fragile object, it always had the definite possibility of being nihilated.

Throughout history, men went to war because they knew there were fragile things in the world that they could destroy to achieve their goal. We always knew things are breakable, so we broke them–just as planned.

Sartre continues:

“It is necessary then to recognize that destruction is an essentially human thing and that it is man who destroys his cities through the agency of earthquakes or directly, who destroys his ships through the agency of cyclones or directly.”

Once an object has been posited as “fragile,” it was always going to be destroyed directly or indirectly by man. Earthquakes do not destroy cities; it is man who defines and limits the meaning of destruction, and so he is the one who made that earthquake’s destruction possible. It’s actually just a different way of expressing that old philosophical question: can the color red exist for a blind person? No, because he doesn’t have the capability to create that concept in his mind. How could destruction be possible if we didn’t have the ability to conceive of something as fragile?

This takes us now to the concept of love.

There’s No Such Thing as Forever?

Something always taken for granted dawned on me while I was reading Sartre. To say one “loves” hides an unspoken fact people conveniently forget or fail to discuss; namely, “to love” is only possible because it’s possible “not to love.” That is, loving something presupposes that one does not love everything or one can choose not to love.

You say “I love this person” only because you don’t love all the persons in your life–just this one particular member of the human race.

But the scary thing? The statement “I love this person” is possible because “I don’t love this person” is also possible.

As Sartre says, nothingness lives “in the heart of being–like a worm.”

“Not to love” lives in the heart of “love” like a worm.

Love is a fragile thing because we adopt “a system of protective measures” to keep it from falling apart, to keep it from descending into “not loving.” But here is where all lovers, even the most passionate of them all, may have already doomed their relationships if not teetering on the edge of their ruin, because it seems that if we believe Sartre, then to love is to enter into a contract with a disclaimer at the end that says “I can choose to destroy this love if I wanted to because love is a fragile thing and it can and it will always be destroyed by me or someone or something else if they wanted to or if circumstances permitted it to happen.”

Is there no such thing as forever? How could there be one if we’re talking about a thing as fragile as love? It’s a thin sheet of something weak, something that breaks when you pound it with a hammer, or roll it over with a bulldozer, or crush with the weight of the entire world–it doesn’t matter. It is breakable and if it’s breakable, then it’s not a thing made for “forever.” Love presupposes its own destruction.

So we guard against all the forces that could break that “precious” thing apart (love is, in fact, precious because it can be shattered and taken away from you). We do all we can to protect this little magical thing from the pressures of other parties, of our work, our daily lives, the economy, of whatever else in the universe that threatens to annihilate this gift that we have. But the funny thing is that we, ourselves, made it feeble and frail because we posited this thing between us as “love” in the first place–and unfortunately, love is fragile.

Wait, what of “True Love?”

But isn’t there such a thing as “true love?” And isn’t “true love” not fragile?

Adding the word “true” to “love” is more a play on words than anything substantial. It doesn’t contradict the fact that true love is also only possible because there’s a definite possibility not to be truly in love. Thus “true love” itself is haunted by its nothingness, that is, that inside its being lives that worm of “not being truly in love.”

Let me put it this way: you say you two are “truly in love?” Then that must mean you’re not truly in love with everything and everyone in your life–just this one specific person. That must also mean you’re walking on eggshells; you two are adrift in a sea of people not being truly in love with one another, and you two can drown anytime, sinking into that deep sea with all the others.

So what is one to do in the face of potential doom?

Nothing, really, but to accept the ultimate responsibility of the choice in front of you. You can love but to do so, you must accept the fact that it can be fractured and pulverized anytime. You step into all the wonders of it knowing full well that they can spin around and shape-shift into nightmares.

There’s no such thing as forever or maybe there is but the odds are hopelessly against it. What we do have is a responsibility to keep a fragile thing from exploding into smithereens; and, moreover, a bigger responsibility to deal with the consequences if and when it does.

“Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does. It is up to you to give [life] a meaning.” — Sartre

Last Friday Night Was Wild But You Know What’s Wilder? The Chicxulub Extinction Event

Matt and Ray meet at the watercooler in the office:

MATT: Hey, Ray! What’s up? Where the hell were you last Friday? We were looking all over for you just before we headed down to the bar but you were gone! OH. GOD. You missed half of your life, dude! Bob and I went with Jackie from Human Resources and SHIT. GOD. WILD.

RAY: Oh yeah? That’s cool, Matt. But I left work early to get some much needed rest, and I was flipping through cable at home when I chanced upon this documentary on National Geographic about how dinosaurs went extinct–and it was AWESOME. It was called the Chicxulub extinction event!

MATT: Uh… the what now?

RAY: The Chicxulub extinction event, man, and it’s wilder than your party!

MATT: Bugger off! Nothing’s wilder than last Friday, Ray! Bob and I and Jackie got super friendly super quick in the car that we busted out this nasty bottle of Scandinavian vodka Bob’s been keeping in his glove compartment, and we halved that freakin’ bottle of pure gasoline even before we went inside the bar! And then in the bar, there’s this rich South African mofo who apparently got promoted in his job or hit the lottery jackpot or somethin’ and he was makin’ it rain free shots all night! We were so buzzed Bob was already starting a fight with three fellows all named Chet on the dance floor not 30 minutes had passed!

RAY: Huh. Sounds like a good time indeed.

MATT: A “good time?” It was INSANE.

RAY: Well, Matt, that kind of thing might seem insane to you but your Friday night’s nothing compared to the Chicxulub extinction event. See, Chicxulub? It refers to the town of Chicxulub in the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico. That town is the center of a huge-ass crater–and when I say huge, it’s freakin’ gargantuan–93 miles in diameter and 12 miles deep in the earth, Matt. That crater was dug there by an asteroid the size of a goddamn mountain hitting the earth at 40,000 miles per hour 66 million years ago! You know how big of an explosion that kind of massive asteroid produces when it hits a natural tinderbox of oil?

MATT: How big?

RAY: As big as 100 trillion tons of TNT or 10 billion Hiroshima bombs exploding all at the same time on your face, Matt! The impact was so powerful if you were within 1,000 kilometers of it, you’d still be killed by a murder fireball along with the dinosaurs in a snap! Now THAT’S wild!

MATT: Ok. Ok. I agree that’s kinda wild, my friend… But not wilder than my Friday night! See, last Friday night? We were so friggin’ hammered, I dared Jackie to kiss this girl she’s been rubbin’ butts with all night long on the dance floor. And you know what sweet, prim-and-proper Jackie from Human Resources did? She just went and grabbed that bitch by her ponytail and proceeded to devour her throat–gums and all! And the girl hungrily devoured Jackie’s molars and tonsils back! But it didn’t stop there. No, sir! I dared that girl to kiss another girl next to her–and she did my bidding like she was under a magician’s spell, Ray! Not long after that, me and Bob were staring at this glorious, sweating crowd of intoxicated females all lickin’ and slurpin’ each other! Your mass extinction event ain’t WILDER than that, Ray!

RAY: So you saw some women kissing and you thought that was wild? What are you, twelve?

MATT: What?!

RAY: How about this–the Chicxulub Impactor–that’s what they call the dino doomsday asteroid–hit the ground so hard that the resulting explosion, rain of fire, and climate disruption killed off 80% of all plant and animal species on the planet! Eighty percent! This wanker was so deadly that nine seconds after impact, an observer watching this shit from a thousand kilometers away would’ve been roasted by a savage blast of thermal radiation! It was so strong that herds of Alamosaurus–you know these long-necked behemoths belonging to the sauropod clade weighing some 80 freakin’ tons and standing 52 feet–glowed like goddamn transparent light bulbs when hit with that radiation blast! Forests, valleys instantly burst into flames and almost every poor living creature in the vicinity suffered third-degree burns all over their bodies in seconds! Can you imagine that? And that’s just the beginning of it, Matt. This end-of-days phenomenon produced a lingering impact winter that halted photosynthesis in both plants and plankton. Photosynthesis STOPPED. Means plants stopped eating. How can some women kissing compare with that, Matt? THEY CAN’T.

MATT: LAME! Last Friday? I left Bob drinking his mind out at the bar as I was grinding this voluptuous mass of curves that turned out to be an 85-year-old hairy man who had lost his dentures in the dark! And then suddenly, people just came crowding around the bar and I heard everyone laughing, and lo and behold–it was Bob! You know what that dolt did? He dropped his pants to the floor and he was peeing on top of the goddamn bar, Ray! He said he thought it was the bathroom! I pulled him back and almost swiped my hand against his pecker as he was trying to stuff the horrific thing back into his pants, and I think some golden droplets actually landed on my palms! And I didn’t wash because I was so drunk! Security arrived and the Rock and Stone Cold dragged Bob’s ass to the exit as the bartender yelled that he was banned in that establishment forever! But I didn’t care! I was laughing my ass off because I was hammered as hell and, as far as I was concerned, the party was just getting started! That’s what you call WILD, Ray! Not some goddamn–

RAY: To hell with that! The Chicxulub extinction event produced infernal fires from the heavens and a deluge of death! Scientists estimate that the massive blow to the earth’s surface kicked up a mega tsunami measuring up to 1,000 feet high! It’s like that movie Interstellar but it was here on Earth and it was real! The seismic event was so powerful it’s equivalent to all of the world’s earthquakes for the past 160 years going off SIMULTANEOUSLY! Bob peeing is not anywhere–

MATT: Jackie was so drunk she got a bottle of ketchup from the counter and chugged it down like it was chocolate milkshake! I threw up some melted fries on the neck of some guy who then threw up tuna sandwich on someone’s eyes, so shut up with y–

RAY: The Chicxulub shock waves blew winds that tore through everything at 600 miles an hour! That sonic boom roared at 105 decibels, like a jet flying over your goddamn cubicle, shattering the eardrums of T-Rex, triceratops, and all the doomed dinos that day! Your Friday night ain’t got sh–

MATT: I WAS SO WASTED I STAPLED MY NUTSACK TO MY THIGH FOR TWENTY BUCKS AND NOW I’M STILL LIMPING.

RAY: IT TOOK MONTHS FOR THE SOOT AND ASH ALL OVER THE GLOBE TO CLEAR AND WHEN THEY DID, THE RAIN FELL BUT IT WAS ACIDIC MUD.

MATT: I HELD MY BLEEDING CROTCH TO THE BATHROOM WHERE SOME PSYCHO PICKED UP HIS POOP AND THREW IT ON THE CEILING AND IT DRIPPED ON MY MOUSTACHE.

RAY: THE CARBON FOOTPRINT WAS SO BAD IT RELEASED 10,000 BILLION TONS OF CARBON DIOXIDE, 100 BILLION TONS OF CARBON MONOXIDE, AND ANOTHER 100 BILLION TONS OF METHANE INTO THE ATMOSPHERE ALL AT ONCE.

MATT: JACKIE FROM HUMAN RESOURCES WAS APPARENTLY UNDERAGE, AND AN UNDERCOVER COP ARRESTED THE BARTENDER WHO SERVED HER SOME DRUGGED TEQUILA, AND THE COP THREW HIS ASS DOWN TO THE GROUND WHEN HE TRIED TO RUN.

RAY: THE CHICXULUB ASTEROID CAUSED A NUCLEAR WINTER AND GLOBAL WARMING, NOW DINOSAURS ARE JUST CHICKENS, MATT.

MATT: THAT RICH SOUTH AFRICAN MOFO TOOK ME TO A MOTEL AFTERWARD AND NOW MY BUTTHOLE IS SORE, RAY.

A Man Who Doesn’t Have Enough Space in His House for All His Existential Shit

DON: Ladies and gentlemen, good evening. This is Don Fernandez, your host for yet another edition of The Human Condition, bringing you the most striking interviews of common people you wouldn’t normally think about if you had something better to do. Tonight–Mr. Theodore Gonzalez–a man who doesn’t have enough space in his home for all his existential shit.

Mr. Theodore Gonzalez–can I call you Ted?

TED: Yeah. You can call me Ted.

DON: Ok Ted. You called us for this interview bec–

TED: You can call me whatever you want. I could be Ted or Theodore or Mike or Richard. In the end, who am I?

DON: Uh-huh… Yes, I see that this is part of the personal problem you’d like to discuss with our audiences today?

TED: Audiences? Oh, you mean those presumed subjects watching me through their TV sets? I wish I could be sure there were really existences behind those eyes fixed on the screen because frankly I highly doubt it.

DON: Oh… kay…

TED: Yeah, I mean, I’m not even sure you’re here. Are you here?

DON: Well, I think I’m definitely here. You’re looking at me, Ted.

TED: Am I? Or are you just part of a simulation run by highly advanced beings in the 31st century and I’m nothing but a character in their sick version of a video game?

DON: Ok, ok. Wait a minute. Let’s stop for a second here, Ted. We’re already getting ahead of ourselves. Can you please give our audiences a proper introduction to your issue? You said there’s not enough room in your house for all your existential shit.

TED: Yes, there’s none.

DON: Obviously.

TED: Yesterday, I tried to fit all my existential shit in a box but it wouldn’t fit.

DON: How so?

TED: Well, I was about to put all my existential shit into the box, which I found under my bed, but then while I was doing it, I realized… I couldn’t find the box.

DON: So… so the box disappeared?

TED: That’s the funny thing. When I thought about it… it dawned on me that the box wasn’t even there in the first place.

DON: …

TED: You see, I placed the box on the floor. And when I did that, the box was clearly on our wooden tiled floor. But when I opened the box and gestured to dump all my existential shit in it… it… “Poof!”

DON: Poof?

TED: Poof!

DON: C-could you please clarify? It’s a little vague what you’re trying to say…

TED: The box melded into the floor. The floor melded into the box. I couldn’t see where the floor ended and the box started. See–what do you call a box, anyway, and what do you call a floor? You’re going to tell me a box has eight corners. It’s a three-dimensional object made up of two-dimensional squares. And the floor is something you step on and it’s sometimes wooden, sometimes ceramic, sometimes plastic. But what if I don’t agree with you? What if I told you the thing you call a floor is a rooster and the thing you call a box is a pig?

DON: What??

TED: They’re a rooster and a pig. I couldn’t fit all my existential shit in a pig.

DON: I am… I am completely lost.

TED: People have agreed on calling a floor a floor and a box a box but what if I don’t agree with them? I mean, there’s no real universal rule that limits me to that strict definition. If I wanted to call your floor a rooster and your box a pig, what would you do?

DON: I-I guess nothing?

TED: You are a really good actor, you know, for a simulation.

DON: I’m sorry? Like I told you, Ted, I am NOT a simulation. I am not fake. I am here. I am interviewing you about your existential shit that you can’t find room for in your home.

TED: Yes… Because my home is overrun with roosters and pigs.

DON: Ok… Let’s run with this… Maybe we could get somewhere here… If you really believe that your floor and your box is a rooster and a pig, then why not just scare them away to make room for all your existential shit?

TED: Because they didn’t share my language.

DON: You don’t need language to scare away a bunch of animals, Ted. Just wave your hands and make scary noises and they’ll go away.

TED: No, these roosters and pigs are speaking a fourth-dimensional language that my three-dimensional ears couldn’t possibly hear. These things-in-themselves are forever out of my grasp, clucking and oinking behind a veil of reality that I couldn’t pierce… There’s a whole farm of there out there, Don. An invisible farm.

DON: Please… please stop.

TED: It’s not for lack of trying on my part, too. This morning I tried to store all my existential shit in a spare room in the basement. It’s pretty expansive. Even my old motorcycle is in there, so…

DON: So that must be enough space for your obviously huge existential shit, right?

TED: Nah.

DON: Dare I ask why?

TED: Because my motorcycle has turned into a blue whale.

DON: Goddammit.

TED: I couldn’t even step into the freakin’ room. This monstrous blue whale was squirming and spewing water all over the floor–I mean this floor made of pigs–and all the boxes–I mean roosters holding all my other junk–were really wet.

So in the end, it wouldn’t fit even there. Nasty business. I actually just sold the house this morning.

DON: Please don’t tell me why.

TED: Because when I tried to just leave all my existential shit there on the living room pig-floor, the walls became a troop of baboons, the carpet turned into Albert Einstein’s poop, and the sofa revealed itself to be none other than Michael Jackson.

DON: *Breathes heavily*

TED: So as much as I loved that property, having spent so many lovely days there with my ex-wife, I just had to sell that shit to the first man I met on the street. For chump change, mind you. I mean, shit, what would he do with all that racket at night? Pigs, roosters, baboons, and Michael Jackson trying to wake up the neighbors. Not to mention he’ll definitely step on Albert Einstein’s poop the next morning, slip, and maybe even injure himself. Hah. Poor guy.

DON: …

TED: And to your audiences, I say screw you, you pieces of 31st century codes and pixels! You ain’t fooling me! Can you hear me out there in the real world, you 31st century alien bastards?! Screw you and your mothers or wherever the hell Big Bang conspiracy bullshit you came from! I never bought into this spacetime propaganda you’ve been trying to drill in my head! Science ain’t true knowledge! Wormholes and strings and multiverse my ass, you sons of big bang bitches! I think therefore, I am!

DON: I’m afraid we have to cut our program short again for tonight. ‘Til next time. This is Don Fernandez, host of The Human Condition, saying goodnight and good luck.

This Article Will Try Its Best to Cheer You Up But Will Fail Spectacularly

Oh, do cheer up! You’re lonely? Miserable? Gloomy as a grey, cloud-covered sky just before a thunderstorm? It’s not the end of the world, you know? A lot of people are in the same boat as you are, many of them with way worse problems than yours.

But of course, there are also countless people out there who are incredibly happy at this moment that they’re almost literally glowing when sunshine bounces off their smiling face free of any negative thought or emotion… So, er… that kinda sucks for you, I guess.

But wait–so you were left behind by someone who’s not worth a bag of rocks? Get over them! They obviously can’t appreciate your worth because they have the IQ of an earthworm and are most terribly missing out on the best person they’ve ever been with…

That or they actually found someone kinder, funnier, more intelligent, hella attractive and blazin’ hot, and is an absolute psycho in the sheets! Fuck yeah!

*Cough*

*Clears throat*

Sorry. Got carried away there a bit.

But you know what I mean. You should stop crying in the corner and dwelling on these negative energies because you’d just be wasting your time when there are so many other things to do in the world.

Activities that are very productive and worthwhile like… like…  working nonstop 12 hours a day until your fingers fall off and stale saliva from not talking to a single soul droops down your mouth.

Or… uh… watching some mindless TV shopping channel while wondering if judgement day when the dead will rise to take over the earth and sacrifice newborns to the merciless god of the underworld isn’t such a bad thing all things considered.

Learn to love yourself.

Look up from your dreary desk in that empty office to the canopy of lights above you. Remember that you are made from the same material as the stars. Magnificent, giant balls of hot gasses whose light reaches the farthest corners of the galaxy.

Every creature that has ever lived on the face of this planet has looked up to see these very same stars and… died. They died, of course, like any organic being. Some in a truly horrific fashion like the dinosaurs, which were wiped out by a burning asteroid 10 kilometers wide. Fantastic animals, for sure, but they perished nonetheless and quite nonsensically, too, like all of us. Eventually.

But the worst thing you can think of is that you are unloved. You’re not. Your mother loves you… and… and… well, your mother’s love for you is greater than any other type of love out there; everyone knows that!

Your mother loves you so much she barely texts you. And she’s thrown away all your baby albums because in all honesty you don’t look a lot like others in the family and she has a growing suspicion that the nurse made a huge mistake all those years ago and swapped her real baby with another one who’s a bit ugly. And in truth, she’s forgotten about your birthday and she only remembers it on the day itself because you remind her. So she orders fast food to celebrate this cursed day but in reality, it’s such a fuckin’ drag and she would rather knit a jacket than celebrate the birth of her fake child.

So drop that blade and dump that silly rope you’re carrying into the garbage can. There’s hope. Better days await you. Breathe! Breathe deep! Step out into the world, down the tracks, and face the train coming at you at 100 kilometers per hour.

If the World Were Fair, Evil Men Would Walk Into Posts All the Time

Think about it. Lots of people tell themselves there’s some sort of universal karma going on but if there was an invisible hand of justice moving the world like that, you would expect mean people to walk into posts all the time.

There are only so many combinations of bad things that can happen to bad people without the movements of the invisible hand of justice looking too conspicuous, so at some point those posts are gonna have their fair share of “accidents.”

That wild, feral woman who gnashed her teeth at you while bulldozing you inside the train this morning–boom! Hit a post.

Your officemate who makes her day by throwing shade at you with her evil swarm of grinning trolls–boom! Hit a post.

That taxi driver who took his sweet time handing you your change because he was wishing you would just get the frick out of his vehicle and leave your money–crash! Hit a post.

But these people almost never walk or run into posts, don’t they? Nope. Because the world is unfair and what goes around, doesn’t come around. There’s no cosmic justice.

Do you realize how many posts there are in the world? I read somewhere that there are around 80,000,000 roads in the world. Say there are about 12 posts in each road, you will have close to a billion posts in the world.

But guess what? Evil folks just keep on rockin’ without their heads knockin’ into somethin’.

So just give up. You will never get your cold vengeance by waiting for that person who did you wrong to make the wrong turn and slam their face into a nice, smooth, slender post. It’s not gonna happen, dude.