Be careful what you wish for!

Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)
Director: Jon Watts

I was under the impression that the Universe moves along and things happen along its path. Whether events occur by pre-determined means or just by chance, for example, by a mere flutter of the butterfly wings, is anybody's guess. Everything goes on with a pre-set sequence despite all the randomness and the chaotic soup it portrays. 

The question is whether everything is pre-determined or it can be changed willfully. If events were pre-determined, nothing we can do changes Nature's course. So why bother to pray and hope that God will change things. A minor change in the complex order would just cause everything to crumble like dominos. If something can be altered at will, then the next course of events should be intelligence, not prayers.

One is reminded of the battleship dilemma here. A sea battle needs battleships. Tomorrow, there will not be a battle if the Admiral does not send a battleship. So, the question of whether a sea battle will take place tomorrow cannot be fate. The grand finale results from multiple 'what-ifs' and 'choices' made along the way that culminated in the showdown. 

"Shit happens all the time; deal with it. It's not the shit we face that defines us; it's how we deal with it." said a wise person.

In this outing, Spiderman finds out that his secret identity is revealed. The public is furious with the damage he had caused during his crime-busting activities. Specifically, Spiderman @ Peter Parker and MJ are vilified by the Daily Bugle and J. Jonah Jameson. On top of all that, Parker, MJ and his friend, Ned, all fail to gain entrance to MIT. Hoping to change all these, Spiderman approaches the mystic, Dr Strange. Change did not happen but not without consequences. It opened the floodgates of many multiverses and villains of those multiple alternative universes. To confuse things further, Spidermen of those universes also got drawn in. The rest of the story is about maintaining order after curtailing all those villains and their nefarious ambitions.

The lesson learnt here is that nothing just happens out of the blues. They are the combined effects of actions and inactions. Like they say about the proof of the pudding is in the eating, the testimony of one's resolute is in how he deals with adversities.

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We dig our own grave?

The Eternals (2021)
Director: Chloe Zhao

The story is actually an amalgamation of many stories, folklore mainly. After all, most world mythologies have almost a similar theme. See how often babies are left to float in a vessel by a river to escape persecution. Moses survived Pharoah's persecution and was adopted by the Pharoah's daughter in a twist of fate. Karna was left off by his unwed mother in Mahabharata to escape humiliation, only to be adopted as a charioteer to fight his younger brothers later! And see how everything comes to an end, in Armageddon, or when Kalki descends from his horse at the end Kaliyuga.

Gilgamesh

So, how did Judea-Christian mythology get intertwined with Hindu mythology? Simple. After destroying the First Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, Jews were taken as slaves and brought to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar and subsequent Persian conquerors. They spend 48 years in Babylon imbibing the Indus culture into their, hence, the cross-overs. King Cyrus freed them from Babylon and helped them rebuild their temple in Jerusalem. So, one can see many cross-over influences in the Judeo-Christian stories.

The Sumerians have their own past stories of glory. Annunaki was an extra-terrestrial king if we believe what our ancient alien theorists say. He thought homo-sapiens were not too intelligent workers and frequently fought amongst themselves. Annunaki decided to infuse extra-terrestrial DNA to make humans into productive workers. Gilgamesh, one of the characters in this movie, is a long-forgotten Mesopotamian hero. In the first half of his life, he was a king who fought fearsome battles and spent the remaining half pondering the meaning of life. His adventures are depicted in the Epic of Gilgamesh.

In this movie, the Eternals are a breed of near-immortal of ten alien superheroes sent to Earth around 500BCE by Arishem to protect the planet against Deviants. Deviants are Arishem's (The Creator) creations who have gone rogue. They are hell-bent on destroying Earth, and The Eternals are assigned to protect Earthlings from them. Periodically, the Eternals infuse knowledge into Mankind. With this knowledge, Mankind made periodical monument jumps in their civilisation. The Eternals were strictly told not to interfere with any conflicts that arose from within humans. The last of the Deviants were slain, so they thought, in 1521. And the Eternals awaited further instructions from Arishem, which never came.

In the present time, the Eternals had to re-group when a Deviant re-emerges. Their leader, Ajak, is killed, and Sersi assumes command. She communicates with Arishem telepathically to be told that their real mission was to save Earth from the Emergence (the End of the World).

Friction ensues amongst the Eternal for what they feel as being 'used' by Arishem. The rest of the show is about how Earth is saved and how they resolve crises.

The human race is meant to progress through the exploration of their intelligence. Their discoveries are meant to propel them collectively forward. Exclusive control of power and knowledge by alpha predators (leaders) seems unhealthy as they would steer the whole race towards a particular that would benefit them. Hence, the Deviants were meant to clip the wings of the alpha predators. Unfortunately, the wisdom handed to Earthlings seem not to civilise them but instead lead to their own destruction. The Emergence/ Armageddon/ End of Days is their own doing.

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5000 years of civilisation given due recognition?

Shang-Chi and The Legend of Ten Rings (2021)

Gone are the times when Hollywood made movies that overtly mocked cultures other than Western ones. Typically Indians and Chinese were portrayed as bumbling fools. Their cultures were made to look ridiculous, and their followers were mere bufoons. Perhaps they still do that but, alas, in a more subtle way. Just try to remember Amrish Puri as a Kaali worshipper enjoying human eyeballs as a delicacy and the faithful and spineless follower of Fu-Manchu plunging to their deaths in Hollywood's Fu-Manchu series.

For that matter, even the Russians and German were made to look like headless chickens running aimlessly in espionage sagas and combat movies.

Shang-Chi was a character introduced by Marvel in 1973 to spice up the series and satiate the appetite of comic fans the world over. Shang-Chi was presented as a long lost son of Fu-Manchu, who had been training in Tibet. In the earlier films, his daughter Lin Tang was characterised as his evil sidekick, doing the groundwork for Fu-Manchu's megalomaniac ambitions.

In concordance to Marvel and Hollywood's agenda to pander to screams of the woke generation and offer so-called 'olive branch' to the minority and marginalised groups, the filmmakers have decided to make a Chinese superhero. However, the legend of Fu-Manchu reminds the world of the bygone idea of Sax Rohmer and writers of his era with the awful idea of 'Yellow Peril'. East Asia was portrayed as a threat to the western world, and Fu-Manchu was singled out as a caricature of a one-man mission to kill all white men and women to bring China back to its ancient glory. In 1932, the Chinese Embassy had expressed its objection to MGM's 'The Mask of Fu Manchu'.

China is such a big market for movies that Hollywood can ill afford to offend. The reminder of an offensive villain would not augur well with the Chinese market and for Chinese diplomacy.

In different versions of the comic series, Shang-Chi's father had been others - Zheng Zu and Mandarin. In this 2021 film version, the screenwriters have cleverly downtoned the evil quotient of these villains to create a composite character called Wen Wu. This works just well for Marvel had not obtained rights over the characters of Fu-Manchu and his nemeses. Incidentally, Mandarin was seen as Iron Man's arch-enemy. His 'Ten Ring' was an alien finding. 

The earlier ten rings were finger worn.
Tony Leung as WenWu

Shaun, a parking valet, leads a quiet life with his colleague Katy in San Francisco. All that comes to a halt when some bad dudes turn up on a bus he was travelling and create a hell ride on the undulating streets of San Francisco, reminiscent of the movie 'Speed'. The baddies are out for his pendant. Fearing that they would go for his sister, Xialing, Shaun (@Shang-Chi) speeds to Macau to meet her.

Malaysian input

That starts the dark family secret, the truth about his missing father, the story behind his mother's death and the legendary fight to stop the forces of evil from reigning Earth. In their own way, the film tries to apologise to the Chinese diaspora about Mandarin's past in Iron Man 3. An impersonator, Trevor Slattery, admits to having portrayed Mandarin and bad stereotyping behind him.

The final outcome is a story rich with ancient Chinese wisdom pregnant with much oriental mysticism. With the advancement of computer graphics and digital enhancement, what churns out is a tale that puts China and Chinese culture back on the map of its ancient glory. It is much like what Admiral Zheng Ho did to the Ming Dynasty in the 15th century when he sailed the high seas to explore till the New World, maybe.

(P.S. Malaysia has two representatives in the movie, Ronny Chieng and Michelle Yeoh)

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Obey Fu Manchu Or Every Living Thing Will Die!

The Face of Fu Manchu (1965)
Director: Don Sharp

A film like this, made in the 21st century, would be wrong by all accounts. Words like cultural appropriation and stereotyping would be hurled to shoot this film into oblivion. Many of its dialogue can be construed as offensive or downright racist. But then, in the 60s, when this film was released, it was pretty okay. In fact, it was such a hit that it earned four subsequent sequels.

The character Fu-Manchu is the brainchild of an English novelist, Sax Rohmer (Arthur Henry "Sarfield' Ward 1883-1959). His first short story in 1912 with the character took such a liking on either side of the Atlantic that it spurred follow-up novels, plays and even a movie in 1923 titled The Mystery of Fu-Manchu.

The average Englishman in the early 20th century UK had probably no contact with an Oriental person. They had probably read about the industrious Japanese and their effort towards modernisation via the Meiji Dynasty. This was perhaps not the case in the USA or continental Europe, especially Russia. Chinese and Japanese immigrants have been working on the Pacific coast and were subjected to the same mistreatment as the blacks. The Russians had been perpetually fighting with the Japanese for imperial ambitions over Manchuria and Korea. The British were sympathetic towards the Japanese in the Russo-Japanese wars.

Sax Rohmer

For the imperialists and expansionists amongst the British, the Far East was a lucrative avenue for business and wealth. Their entry into China was resisted by the Chinese dynasty's closed-door policy. The colonialists justify their involvement in the Opium Wars by vilifying the Chinese as a mystic race with evil exuding from their every orifice. The anti-foreigners and anti-Christian stance of the Boxer Rebellion further cemented the idea the Chinese were terrible. Maybe the Europeans had not forgotten the cruelties Genghiz Khan and Atilla of the Oriental race. The sentiments to paint the Chinese as bad was skyrocketing by the late 19th and early 20th century. Hence, characters like Fu-Manchu and the looming fabled Yellow Peril seem justified. The 1905 Japanese win over the Russians seems to defend their claim that that anti-White yellow race was out to rule the world. Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm II was honoured to have coined the term 'Yellow Peril' (Gelbe Gefahr) to encourage Imperial German interests and justify European colonialism in China.

A racist cartoon of The Yellow Terror in all His Glory
(1899) depicts an anti-colonial Qing DynastyChinese
man standing over a fallen white woman who
represents the Western world. (Wiki)

The xenophobic outlook towards the Chinese and other Orientals never went away. The central involvement of the Japanese in the Second World War and the embrace of Communist by China made the Great White powers somewhat sceptical of them. I guess now with China's threat to the US hegemony of world affairs puts them back in the wrong light. Even the Australians who had overt anti-Chinese clauses in their White Australia have resorted to labelling China and CCP as the Southern Continent's number one enemy of the State.

The yellow peril has had many faces, but Fu Manchu epitomised them for mass culture. A hugely popular icon, he even has a full facial hair is named after him - Fu-Manchu moustache, a wiry well-oiled moustache that almost touches the chin.

'The Face of Fu Manchu' is a predictable offering that mimics many supervillains often seen on the silver screen with megalomaniacal ambitions of world domination. Like the baddies of James Bond, Fu Manchu is an evil genius with tonnes of knowledge into the mystical world of hypnotism and herbalism, escapes execution in China only to appear around River Thames. With his convoluted plan to weaponise Tibetian poppyseed to poison all lifeforms around London, he kidnaps a chemistry Professor to extract the toxic concoction.

In come Dr Fu Manchu's nemeses, Dr Petrie and Nayland Smith of the Scotland Yard, to thwart his plan.

Fu Manchu

Two points piqued my interest here. Firstly, it is the catchy 'Younghusband' documents. Such a document actually existed. As in most British expeditions where surveyance is used as a guise to the British imperial ambitions, it compiled British exploration of Tibet, probably an economic assessment of conquest of that land.

Secondly, it is Fu Manchu's daughter, Lin Tang. She is Fu Manchu's faithful sidekick. Shang-Chi only appears in 1973's edition of Marvel's comics. He is said to be Fu Manchu's son, but due to the non-renewal of rights and probably portrayal of a Chinese character in a bad light, Shang-Chi's father is depicted as Xu Wenwu. Shang-Chi's sister is Xu Xialing (not Lin Tang!). It would just go contrary to the producer's idea of including minority groups as superheroes to tap the lucrative Chinese market, would it not?

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Can anyone really be free?

Black Widow (2021)

Everybody talks about wanting to be free, free from any encumbrances, free to say and do as he pleases, free as a bird to move around. The caged dog looks at his stray counterpart on the other side of the fence with contempt for the freedom that he enjoys. On the other hand, the stray longs for the time when he does not have to scratch his head looking for his next meal.

We think we are free by living with our loved ones or within communities that we find commonalities. Sad to say that even within societies, certain norms and mores exist that one is excepted to conform to. Challenges are bound to happen with the members in the spring of their youth; the young feel restricted with educational exposure. They want to be free of any restrictive chains that bog them down.

Like it or not, it is not easy. Wilfully or not, we are tied down. A society is paved towards a particular direction by the instructions laid down by the majority. To reach greater heights, these laid laws need to be progressive in keeping with the changing times and their corresponding challenges. One cannot hope one archaic rule to apply to the end of times.

The Black Widow story is set before Avengers: Endgame, where Black Widow sacrificed herself trying to undo Thanos' snapping of fingers. It starts with Natasha Romanoff's (Black Widow) childhood in 1995 Ohio. She discovers that her parents had to flee to Cuba to escape arrest by the authorities. She soon discovers that her parents are Russian sleepers in the USA and that her family is just a front for espionage. In Cuba, Natasha's father (Red Guardian - Russia's answer to Captain America) is apprehended by Dreykov. Melina, her mother, is inducted as a chief scientist in the Red Room to research the mind. Natasha and her sister, Yelena, are enrolled on the Black Widow programme to churn out efficient lean, mean mind-controlled female assassins.

Along the course, Natasha escapes, join SHIELD and becomes a fugitive. When apprehending a rogue Black Widow, Yelena is sprayed with Red Dust, which removes her from the clutches of the Red Room mind control.

The rest of the story involves Yelena joining forces with Natasha to break their father from prison, influence their mother to reveal the location of the Red Room and destroy Dreykov to free all the Black Widows.

The word here is free. In the post-credit scene, we are told that Natasha had died, killed by Hawkeye. So, Yelena falls into the trap of Contessa Valentina Allegra de la Fontaine (Val) to avenge her sister's death. So much for being free. It looks like Yelena, like a Black Widow who was under the control of Dreykov before now, maybe under the thumb of possibly HYDRA.

Interestingly, HYDRA believes that humanity cannot be trusted with freedom. When freedom is taken away, they resist. Wars have taught them that humans become most resourceful, efficient and laborious under pressure. Hence, humanity has to surrender its freedom willingly. Sometimes it needs to be done without their realisation.

(P.S. This is a through and through a feminist movie. Almost every assassin, sharpshooters, armoured henchmen (who could be women) and the main characters are female. The theme of freedom and removal of ovaries hint at such an agenda. The male characters are weak. Look at the almost drunk-like Red Guardian and Natasha's sidekick/love interest Rick Mason who yearns for her approval by bending backwards to get the things she wants.)

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He who controls timeline, controls the Universe.

 Loki (Season1, E1-E6; 2021)
Marvel Cinematic Universe

When Loki was apprehended and transported after Avengers: Endgame, in the confusion of Hulk creating a tantrum for needing to use the stairs and Iron Man faking a heart attack, Loki escapes captivity through a Tesseract and enter a different realm. He lands in the headquarters of Time Variance Authority (TVA). 

Here, the narcissistic Norse God of Mischief Loki learns of variants of himself floating in the multiple timelines creating havoc. The Time-Keepers had set a Scared Timeline for events to happen, but somehow variants have made branches from the main timeline. The TVA's job is to ensure that the correct path of the Sacred Timeline is followed. Some of the variants are evil alter-egos and are hellbent on creating chaos. As he is charged against the 'Sacred Timeline', Loki's plea bargain is to hunt down another Loki variant who had killed TVA officers and stolen the time resetting devices.

Time, as we perceive, is a one-way single linear motion. In reality, it is a composite of multiple minor diversions which, from someone from a different dimension, sees it as one, much like we see a slithering snake past us by part by part in a twisting motion but on a straight path, with the present, past and future.

Since a Sacred Timeline is being followed, does it not mean that the characters in the timeline have no free will but have their path determined? No amount of willpower can change anything if everything is predetermined. If the variants have a free hand in doing things, then the whole balance would collapse. 

That brings us to the philosophical dilemma about battles and battleships in the context of free will and determinism. Who decides whether the war starts tomorrow? If it is predetermined that there is a battle tomorrow, what is the commander's decision-making role? If he chose not to go to war, is it his decision, or can we say that not having a battle was predetermined?

Loki and alter ego

Loki soon discovers a few disturbing revelations. The Time Keepers are mere androids but are controlled by someone else.

The rogue variant of himself that Loki was hunting for turned out to be a female, Sylvie. This must be a comforting story plot for those who look at gender as something quite fluid, yoyoing from one end to another and changing with time. The thing that takes the cake is that Loki, the narcissist, is so in love that he develops feelings for Sylvie! What do you call that? Love thyself?

TVA itself, the Lokis realised, is made up of variants. It turned out that it is not an authority to kerb variants after all. The need to find the real person who controls TVA becomes a necessity. This leads them to a new villain comparable to Thanos, 'He who remains' who is created in the mould of Kang the Conqueror.

The tenet of the storyline, which we will learn, is that branches from the Timeline would create variants. Some of them are evil and may overpower another variant on another timeline and exert their authority on the turn of subsequent events. It gets more complicated than in the final finale. A decision has to be made at the Citadel at the End of Time - whether 'He who remains' is the good variant trying to bring stability to the timeline or not. 

A wrong move... and a segue to the next season and the opening of a bag of worms where the evil 'He-who-remains' takes control of TVA, as Loki soon discovers...

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The blurring of real and reel life!

Wandavision (Miniseries, Season 1; 2021)
Disney + (Marvel Cinematic Universe)

Now that memory and brain activity can theoretically be digitised and stored, and our cinematic presentation, (i.e. movies and TV shows) are essentially data that can be modulated and transmitted from port to port, nothing will stop these two forms of data (series of 1's and 0's) from intermingling. 

With our fixation with Tinseltown and penchant to immerse into instant visual gratification added with the obsession with having our TV/computer displays on 24/7, we may want to run our lives like they do on the silver screen. But, unfortunately, nothing will stop what is real and what is fake, fuelled by a fetish for hyper-reality, virtual reality, and obsession to experience in 3D and VR imaging.

How often have we seen children expecting their parents to be like those depicted on American sitcoms? How they wished their parents were cool like them too? When the hard knocks of life hit them hard at their tender spots, how they would have yearned for real life to be as easy as in the reel life? If only the script of our lives is written to our liking and draw to a conclusion at the end of the preset screening times, they would like to have. With the relevant technology at their disposal, it is only a matter of time, if they only could, that they would transform their worldly existence into the make-believe world of filmdom.

Elizabeth Olsen as
Scarlet Witch / Wanda

This must have been the premise to Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch turned to after her defeat in Avengers: Endgame, and she lost the love of her life, Vision. With her telekinetic and reality-altering abilities, she recreated her comfort zone that she remembered watching all through her formative years in Sokovia when love was in the air, and her family was intact. She took over a suburban town named Westview, turned its occupants into TV sitcom characters. She created a robust electromagnetic fence around the perimeter to ward off the FBI and SWORD. Wanda wrote the script of a narrative where she and Vision lead a man-and-wife life in a setting ala sitcom like 'Dick Van Dyke Show', 'Bewitched', 'Mary Tyler Show', 'I Love Lucy', and many more. As time went on, the setting changed to fit shows of the 70s and 80s - 'Brady Bunch', 'Full House', "Malcolm in the Middle', etc.

All the while, the FBI and SWORD teams are cracking their minds trying to infiltrate the perimeter. Then, finally, Wanda world of make-believe slowly crumbled, ending with a spectacular display of pyrotechnics and prowess of computer graphic imaging. 

Even though the series is labelled as the first season, it appears to have a nice ending at Ep #9 and segue nicely to fit Marvel's upcoming superhero offering 'Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness'. A second season is unlikely.

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Daddy loves you! It is what it is.

Irishman (2019)
Director: Martin Scorsese

This movie received brickbats even before it came to the screens (or rather Netflix). Scorsese, maybe on purpose, stirred the hornet's nest by making a statement about the genre that seems to captivate the imaginations of the Millenials - the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). He asserted that the MCU world is not cinema but mere theme parks. To quote Scorsese, "cinema is about revelation — aesthetic, emotional and spiritual revelation. It is about characters — the complexity of people and their contradictory and sometimes paradoxical natures, the way they can hurt one another and love one another and suddenly come face to face with themselves. Marvel movies don't encapsulate those criteria."

To be fair, even Alfred Hitchcock's and P Ramlee's movies were criticised in their days. There were said to be gruesome or too violent (Psycho) or crossing the social norms (Ramlee's Gelora). Even though the new franchises are said to be final products of market-researched and audience-tested, as well as a matter of supply and demand and giving people what they want, there is still place for good old storytelling set in reality.

'Irishman' is based on by Charles Brandt's book 'I heard you paint houses'. It is supposed to be a confession by the protagonist of the tale, Frank Sheeran. He admitted having killed Jimmy Hoffa, a unionist and a mobster. In real life, Hoffa is said to have disappeared since 1975 without a trace. Since then, many have come forward to vouch that they had killed Hoffa and had their versions too. Sceptics have accused Sheeran of making the last kill (money wise) for the family as he struggled in the nursing home counting his end of days.

It said to be a presentation of septuagenarians trying the reminisce the good old times of the genre they are familiar with - Scorsese, De Niro and Joe Pesci and mob movies like 'Goodfellas' and 'Casino'. For good measure, they roped in Al Pacino, Don Corleone himself. 

As the story spans over almost 30 years, and they were utilising aged actors, the filmmakers had to use digitally de-ageing technology on them. MCU fans had a field day attacking Scorsese as it was in one of MCU films that this science was initially introduced - Michael Douglas in 'Ant-Man'.

This three-and-a-half offering tells about Sheeran, a WW2 veteran, who gets entangled with the mafia. He finds it rewarding to support his family. In the course and subsequent to this line of duty, he has to make many life-altering decisions. There is only so much of Mafia-related movies one can watch, the loyalty, the killing and all the coded talk. But still, there are some valuable points to ponder while watching the movie.

People can make a living or make a killing for a living. Ultimately we all work hard to ensure that the generation after us is not deprived of the things that we yearned and never got. We do not want them to go through the similar 'hardships' that we went through. But no, the offsprings will never appreciate this. They would look at the actions of their elders through a different prism quite contradictory to what the adults value. They (the youngsters) fail to appreciate the environment upon which their elders made the decisions they made.

Morality and kindness do not matter in desperate situations. When your next meal is not a given thing, your yardstick of what is right and what is not is malleable. This type of innovation can be seen in slumps and refugee camps. People become imaginative on how to survive, to fulfil their primal desires and acquire money. Somehow, money still remains the panacea of all woes.

This must probably be what Sheeran must have been thinking when he was sending his last few days in a home. All his friends and mentors were dead. He was the only person who would probably carry all his secrets to the grave. He was alone. His wife was dead, and his daughters shunned him for his association with the mafioso.

The question remains. Did he concoct the whole story for his children to savour the fruit of the returns of the royalty of his story? Even though Sheeran admitted in the book to have made the difficult decision of putting a bullet in the head of his mentor Jimmy Hoffa, many others claim to have done the same. Sheeran's story, it seems, did not collaborate with police records. Was the tale spiced up to show Sheeran making the difficult decision of following the orders of Russel Buffolini, his guru, versus killing Hoffa who was a thorn for the mafia? Haffa was possibly going to leak the secret of unionists monies being used to finance Mafia’s Las Vegas casinos.

The movie also suggests that JFK's assassination may have been arranged by the Mafia.

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Fight fire with fire?

Avengers: Endgame (2019)

We always associate destruction with negativity. Erection and construction, on the other hand, is hailed as the epitome of prosperity. Hence, annihilation, collision and termination are scorned upon. Unfortunately, life is not so simple. There can never be peace without prior anarchy; no construction without demolition and no shanthi without ashanti. Life, with its ups and down, are aplenty with cyclical loss and gains.

That was the same dilemma when I came to discover about Lord Shiva, one of the main component of the Trinity in the post-Vedic Hinduism. The trident-bearing Lord is revered for his greatness and ferocious power to destroy and is invoked for peace on Earth. It baffled me how damage can lead to prosperity. Herein lies the profound philosophy of life. Someone or something who jolts the equilibrium, the status quo, has to or to be destroyed before life can proceed in a just manner. The evils do not necessarily come from without to spew negativity. It could be within; an ill-thought good intention, a self-serving need, blinded vision of what is right and the list goes on. We need to kill the roaches to take control of our house. The roaches do not know that they are doing any wrong. They are just performing the tasks they were programmed to - to find territory, food, procreate and ensure continuity of species. Their biological mission is only a hindrance to us, not them. In their compound eyes, they are doing the right thing. We, from our perspective, spring at them with fear of disease, filth and loss of territory. Probably dominance too as we know cockroaches can resist a nuclear meltdown.

Thanos with his Infinity Gauntlet.

Like Shiva, is a destroyer. Vapourised up to half
of the population of the Universe.
If the population explosion is leaving a long
and an ugly trail of carbon footprint, then
Thanos' actions should be lauded.

We always think that colonisation, wars and enslavement are only found in the confines of our history book. The truth is far from that. Even though we are living in an era where education and knowledge had never been so freely available, we are all far from wise. Forget Nazi Hitler and Pol Pot. Even in the 21st century, we have people like George Soros and the Cabal who are hellbent on destroying societies. Soros, the leading globalist is still actively trying to re-organise the community which has evolved itself into a steady state. It looks like he will not stop till anarchy prevails. The Cabal, with its web of destruction, spreading through the world over with the cooperation of the Bank of London and fellow similar minded magnates, have been linked to many well planned and well-executed significant tragedies. There is a concerted effort to destroy the sovereignty of nations, open borders, restructuring societies and make communities godless.

One wonders whether Gandhi's passive resistance would save the day. Do we fight fire with fire, douse with water or practice self-immolation?

To enjoy Avengers: Endgame, one has to have a little background that brought the whole Marvel Cinematic Universe into turmoil. Thanos, the unstoppable destroyer, has in possession the six Infinity Stones (that controls time, space, mind, reality, soul and power) and had sent many of the superheroes into cold storage. With a little push from Carol Danvers (Captain Marvel), the ingenious mind of Iron Man, time travel, Hulk's scientific know-how and a lot of kissass action from the Marvel heroes, sanity prevails. 

To the uninitiated, without a background of the various characters, the film would appear a tad confusing. With so many different heroes with different suits swerving past the villain throwing ammunitions of different hues and explosive potentials, everything would seem like a fiesta of pyrotechnic display. Then, one would be wondering who those cute animals and weird looking ladies are and how they get pulled into the melee. 

The movie also gives the millennials a crash course in time travel, just like what Back to the Future did for the Generation-X in the 80s. Time travel comes with it its own benefits and peculiarities. 

In war, everybody loses, but the winner takes all, whatever is left. In the war to end all evils, the protagonist also faced heavy casualties. You have to watch to find out. The audience goes back with a sombre feeling that this outing could be the last for the Avengers. Bearing in mind that the MCU is a make-believe one, anything is possible, especially when the fans (a.k.a. suckers) feel nostalgic and the filmmakers feel a need to fill their coffers.

Talking about fans, while watching the movie, as and when various superheroes appeared on screen or landed a blow Thanos, I had a certain feeling I am watching a Tamil movie. The viewers were upstanding cheering and even giving hearty laughs to the tongue-in-cheek dialogues uttered by the characters. This is a new experience in Malaysia. The usual cinema going crowd here pay to see bigger-than-life explosions, gore and flesh, not dialogue. And to top it, a large portion of the audience was reluctant to exit the hall even after the credit finished rolling out. As if the 3-hour long movie was not long enough! I later found out some even wept at the ending when.. (oops, no spoiler alert!)

Avengers: Watch This Before You See Endgame

https://asok22.wixsite.com/real-lesson 

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