Issue #320: The Smaller Small Screen
Issue #320: The Smaller Small Screen
Tomorrow, I am departing for Japan. I’ll be gone for sixteen days which means two editions of the newsletter will be:
written on the road
released in JST (likely Mondays, but who knows)
probably short
Some of you may remember my dispatches from Turkey last year or, if you are a true Paradox oldhead, the letters from last time I was in Japan.
Bon voyage.
Air Travel Theater
I may have told this story before, but last year I took a work trip to Dallas, Texas and had been watching the Apple TV+ show Hijack (2023) in the days before leaving. I only watched the first two episodes and decided not to download this one for the ride. I didn’t end up ever coming back to it, and now on the eve of a much longer flight to Japan, I find myself in the same spot. I do want to get around to finishing Hijack. I just don’t think a plane ride is the best place for it.
I have found that plane rides are a great time to watch a few movies or get through the majority of a TV show. I enjoy having some prepped downloads on my phone or tablet, but I often end up sampling from what the airline offers. The Mighty Quinn (1989), for instance, had been a movie on my radar for a while but it took a plane’s meager streaming library to get it in front of me. God, I love that movie.
Instead of Hijack, I have a couple things queued up in case the airline cinema isn’t up to snuff.
The Gentlemen (2024) — Guy Ritchie’s adventure in streaming television has great reviews. Even if it didn’t, I am a huge fan. The 2019 film was just good enough, but Ritchie is the kind of director who delivers profoundly stylish films when he wants to that are, likewise, heavy on the substance. The sober 90s thriller style has also served him very well, but I get the feeling Ritchie feels most at home directing what The Gentlemen tv edition appears to be.
3 Body Problem (2024) — I might end up reading the novel instead, but this hugely hyped series led by two unfairly maligned show runners (David Benioff and D. B. Weiss of Game of Thrones infamy) seems like must see TV. Most people agree they did a pretty good job adapting complex genre literature for the small screen, so I don’t see why they wouldn’t be successful doing the same thing again.
The Bridge Curse (2020) and The Bridge Curse: Ritual (2023) — Of all the countries with reputations for good horror films, Taiwan doesn’t get enough love. Incantation was one of my favorite movies of 2022. The Tag-Along (2015) and its sequels and spin-offs are also absolutely killer. I’m hoping The Bridge Curse, especially considering it has a sequel, might recapture some of that The Tag-Along magic.
Code 8 Part II (2024) — Netflix has a bunch of off-brand superhero movies that are, frankly, awesome. Project Power (2020), Outside the Wire (2021), Day Shift (2022), and the original Code 8 (2019) (also Freaks [2018] which is not strictly a Netflix movie but feels a lot like these). I like the Amell brothers, so I am all in for this sequel.
The Brothers Sun (2024) — This was cancelled by Netflix and has Michelle Yeoh in it so I’m sure it’s pretty good. My friend Clint also recommended it to me a while back so I am finally getting around to it.
Rustin (2023) — The Academy Award nominated… yeah, I’m probably not gonna watch this on the plane. We’ll see, though.
Badland Hunters (2024) — I would much prefer to watch this one on a big screen, but sometimes a movie can grab you such that the in-flight movie is like watching something projected straight into your brain. Hopefully this is one of those.
Kamen Rider: Black Sun (2022) — This show has been on my phone for every flight since it released and it’s honestly getting a little embarrassing that I haven’t finished it yet, though I have seen the first two episodes at home. It’s a casualty of there just being too much to watch. But Hidetoshi Nishijima as Kotaro Minami is so sick.
Fargo season 5 (2023) — Fargo’s first season is one of my favorite season of TV ever.
I haven’t been super compelled to watch the subsequent seasons, but this fifth season with Jon Hamm is very enticing.
Survivor season 17 (2008) — I’m a big, but recent, Survivor fan and my friend Kelly recommended this season as a “must watch.”
There are a couple other things, but this list is the stuff I’m really eyeing. Maybe I’ll get some True Detective season 4 in there. I am an over prepared traveller, but loading up my phone with TV and film is one low impact way of sating that travel anxiety.
Naoki Hamaguchi Delivers a Written Threat
I finished Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth (2024) this weekend. I have to admit, it was really a struggle to get through. I think the game is roughly 2/3rd pleasant, 1/3rd painful. The mini-games available in Rebirth are, as a whole, not fun. There are a few winners in there, but most of them are an unfun slog. Though people didn’t realize it at the time, GamesRadar was right in their use of “threatens” when describing a quotation from Naoki Hamaguchi about the number of mini-games.
As it turns out, this was a legitimate threat. 28/30 suck. Once I finished the Gongaga region, a universally panned segment of the game for its horrendous traversal, I had to give up on sidequests and mini-games all together. I ended up playing one or two, either because the incentives were great for finishing it or I just wanted to give the extra content of Rebirth one more chance. It never earned anything more from me and I wrapped the game with a ton of unfinished quests.
Even deciding to abstain from mini-games, I couldn’t avoid nonsensical playtime padding time sinks. In the underground dungeon within Shinra Manor, where the player controls Cait Sith, there are a litany of inane box throwing challenges: one that is even so transparently a forced carnival style mini-game that it does not even make any sense within the context of the story. Mercifully, in that example, one can simply watch the boxes go by, score 0, and move on.
There’s also the Aerith portions of the final dungeon where she must “pray” to collect lifestream energy and use it to re-assemble some broken construction of the temple. Everything about this is terrible. Aerith has to break crystals of materia but her staff swinging takes forever. Then, she has to pray to collect the energy, which also takes forever. If you kill a group of enemies, you might have to pray two or three times to collect all the lifestream energy they drop. If you did this once or twice, it might be a minor annoyance. However, this is the main progression mechanic for two segments of an extremely long dungeon.
Speaking of extremely long, the last dungeon overall is a total nightmare. I didn’t enjoy a second of my time there. While playing as Aerith is definitely the lowlight, there is nothing fun about any other part of the dungeon you navigate. Despite this huge obstacle to completing the game, the subsequent (also lengthy) segments constituting the game’s final chapter are actually incredibly fun. The developers were savvy enough, it seems, to end the game on a high note as far as gameplay is concerned.
I don’t really think Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth is the kind of game where recommendations or cautionary tales make a difference. Everybody who wants to play the game is not going to be dissuaded by opinions like these and those who aren’t in deep with Final Fantasy VII wouldn’t touch Rebirth anyway. But if you haven’t started the game yet, let me give you some advice. For the love of god, let yourself off the hook of that completionist playthrough. It’s just not worth it.
Weekly Reading List
Presented without comment.
Until next time.