Why Ben Affleck is a great choice for Batman

As you may know, Ben Affleck has been chosen for to play the role of Bruce Wayne/Batman in the sequel to this year’s Superman movie, Man of Steel.

Firstly, I want to get this out of the way…I think the casting is ludicrous.

I won’t rant as to why I think Ben Affleck will totally flop as Batman in this movie, because I think the rest of the InternetZ is doing a fine job as it is. However, I will say that Ben’s casting is a very positive thing for the Batman franchise.

Batman suffers from what I will call the “Phoenix Syndrome”. It is a franchise which needs to be repeatedly burnt to ashes before it can be born anew into something glorious and exciting.

Before Tim Burton’s rendition in 1989, we had the very camp TV Series which slowly molded our conception of Batman as something fun and zany. Then, the excellent Batman comic books of the 80’s paved the way for Burton to remind us that Bruce Wayne/Batman was a very dark and twisted character in a very dark a twisted world. He was neither good nor bad; he was simply Batman.

                                                                                                                                                         

Then the rot started again, with Batman Returns commencing Warner Brother’s foray into the grotesque. Penguins wore rocket launching backpacks and Danny De Vito rode around on a giant rubber duck.

Next, Val Kilmer, Tommy Lee Jones and Jim Carrey carried the torch into Crazyville, and further continued the campaign to annihilate the Batman franchise. Two Face was basically a poor-man’s rip-off of Nicholson’s joker (and a very embarrassing rip-off). The Riddler was fun…and the Riddler is not meant to be fun.

And finally, George Clooney, Chris O’Donnell, Uma Therman and Arnold Swarzeennaggeggageggegrgegegrr really FCUKED it up with Batman and Robin. I won’t even explain how they did it, because the feat was too perfect to describe.

The year was 1997 and the Batman franchise was in tatters.

Enter Christopher Nolan and Co, and the rest is history.

Chris Nolan and his team took Batman to new heights, they pushed the franchise to places it had never been before; both financially and artistically. The Nolan Batman Trilogy is by no means perfect, but it’s an honest, well crafted and mature attempt to portray a cultural icon.

Ben Affleck will begin the rot. His blocked-nosed Bruce Wayne will herald the start of the downward spiral which needs to take place before Warner Brother’s accountants warn the clueless executives that they need to make a good superhero movie again (and not ones with giant spiders in it).

This guy would have been my choice for Bruce Wayne:

But that would have been too good to be true. Instead we’ll put up with this,

and we will wait for the phoenix to rise from the ashes…bring on Batman 2021

Short Tales Explained: The Jeweller and the Witch (January’s tale)

Back in January of this year, I made a pledge with myself that I would put a short story online on the last day of each month for the entirety of the year. If all went to plan, by New Year’s Eve 2013 I would have 12 short stories on my website, which would be totally free. I didn’t quite keep to the last day of the month part (life is busy) but I am writing consistently.

I started the Short-Story-Project for two reasons. Firstly, to keep my fingers busy. The Spirit Broker is finished and just needs to have art work done for its cover. But before I delved into another novel, I really wanted to know if I had it in me to keep writing anyway. So by making the promise to myself to produce one short story a month, I was testing my creativity and dedication.

Secondly, I think short stories are great. They don’t take long to read, they don’t (often) take long to write, and you can explore new things in them that you may not be able to in a novel. To me, a novel should have no more than 3 flavours. I.e. A romantic, fantasy horror novel could work; but a romantic, fantasy, horror, mystery, crime novel may be a bit too much (or maybe not if written by the right person).

Short stories enable me to focus on horror, and then fantasy in another, and then romance etc, without feeling like I need to balance out a fusion of genres.

Anyway; it’s beyond halfway through the year now, and I have six short stories online so far. This series of blog entries will focus on the messages behind each of the stories – spoiler-free.

The Jeweller and the Witch(January)

This tale has a simple message. I touched upon it in an earlier post, but I will expand. Through my experiences and observations, I’ve noticed that humans are very good at sharing their emotions with others. If someone is in a great mood, and life is going well, the chances are that the people around them will also feel good. It will be pleasant to be in this person’s company, and their positive attitude become infectious.

On the flipside; when people are in very dark moods, they often (consciously or sub-consciously) have a tendency to make others feel like crap too. I’m sure we’ve all had “that person” in the workplace who often comes into the office with a terrible attitude, and makes everyone feel like crap. As my mother says “misery loves company”.

The Jeweller and the Witch is a tale in which our main character, the Jeweller, has the opportunity to transfer the way he feels onto others; and in doing so certain consequences arise.

The next “short tales explained” post will explain the thoughts behind Lady of the Snow, February’s tale.