Them scenes yo

So here I am working on Forces and with a bout of particularly nasty writer's block I decide to switch up which part of the story I was working on just to mix things up. Well I finally got to write a scene that's been in my brain for years. I can't tell you how good it feels to get it out. I hope now that I can write everything around it just as quickly. SO FREAKING PUMPED.

Movie Review: Jupiter Ascending

Genre: Sci-fi/Fantasy/Space Opera
Actors: Mila Kunis, Channing Tatum
Writers: The Wachowskis
Directors: The Wachowskis
Runtime: 127 mins/ 2hrs 7 mins
Soundtrack: Michael Giacchino

IMDB

Rating:
This is not to be considered a star rating. This is my personal point of view on how much I liked it. Some things are worth watching more than once, and some things not.

Never watching again, yuck.
Wouldn't watch again except if someone asked.
Would watch maybe one more time
Would not hesitate to watch again
Would watch multiple times, might drag a friend along for the ride.
Going to make everyone I know watch this movie

Going to buy it when released? Yes.

BEWARE! SPOILERS LIE BELOW!

Intro
Anyone who knows me, knows I love Cloud Atlas-- the previous Wachowski movie that met with mixed reviews. I love the length, the complex story lines and the interesting characters. But Cloud Atlas was based off a book by the same name and much of what I loved about Cloud Atlas came from that book. Jupiter Ascending is their most recent foray into original storytelling not based on anything prior.  The Wachowskis are what I consider TRUSTED. I will generally without hesitation go see what they put out. That being said, I was not disappointed.

The Story
Jupiter Ascending is about the titular character Jupiter Jones, played by Mila Kunis, who at first blush is an ordinary housekeeper who scrubs toilets and  fixes people's beds for a living. In a money making scheme initiated by her cousin to sell her eggs to a fertility clinic she is attacked by Grey-like aliens called Keepers. Thus enters our male hero Caine played by Channing Tatum who saves her and whisks her away to safety. As the story progresses we learn that Earth is a human-farm. That is, the leaders of the Abrasax Empire have seeded Earth with human genomes and after the planet has reached its carrying capacity they harvest the planet for genetic material that extends life. Jupiter is the genetic reincarnation of the former leader of the Abrasax Empire and has been targeted by the children of that former leader. They are vying for the control of Earth a veritable cash cow of sorts and all they need to do is get Jupiter to abdicate control.  

Most movies like this tend to follow the same sort of formula, so not a lot of it came as a surprise, but that doesn't mean it wasn't executed well. I thoroughly enjoyed the storytelling and didn't feel like was watching a poorly-made rehash of the last epic movie I watched. In fact, I was quite pleased that towards the end Jupiter actually took control of her own safety and even took on and managed to take out the Big Bad on her own without the help of our male hero. Yay for feminism!

I especially loved that she got her own gravity boots at the end in the last 5 minutes of the movie. Part of me had hoped that she could have gotten them sooner so her ultimate salvation from the wreckage of the burning city could have been under her own power, but we can't always have everything.

The Music
Another great score by Michael Giacchino! I can't say that I was a big fan of the music at first. It felt a little off in context with a sci-fi epic and it seemed to me that the music would have been better suited to a Gladiator or The 300-era epic. I feel though that it also may have been intentional to sort of evoke the epic feel of those kinds of movies. I did however, come to appreciate the music towards the end, and it never felt bulky or out of place with the scenery. I feel as though on a second viewing the soundtrack in context will grow on me.

Cinematography/visuals/effects/scenes
Wonderful cinematography by the Wachowskis. Very pleasant to view and I didn't feel put off by any of the visuals. The only effects that felt out of place were the lizard-like minions of Balen Abrasax.

The only scenes that felt out of place were a couple at the beginning that were there to establish the idea behind planet seeding. I felt like they could have been better placed or left out entirely. Some of the dialogue and situations later effectively explained the ideas.

Characters
Fairly typical characters for this type of movie, so no real surprises. As I said in the Story section I was very pleased with Jupiter's take-command attitude towards the end. I feel like her character progression took the greatest leap and it made me a very happy camper! I kind of wish Caine wasn't such a simple character, his back story was vaguely tacked on and I honestly didn't really feel the romantic tension between him and Jupiter at all. Which I'm okay with to an extent, but the tension felt a little too forced. Fairly on par with popcorn flick storytelling these days though, so no real shock.

As for our Big Bad, played by Eddie Redmayne, I think I could have done without his low, almost-whisper method of talking, but it certain made it shocking when he yelled.

Overall 
I plan on watching this movie at least one more time and then probably again when it comes out on blu-ray. Super pleased with Jupiter's character, going to give the soundtrack another chance, and I hope Eddie's character can grow on me. Despite the lacking romantic tension, I'm really happy there wasn't any gratuitous sex or or snogging. Lord knows I get tired of sexy times fluff taking away from precious time that could be used for storytelling.

A few of my favorite things
Crop circles! Bees! That Statue of Abrasax's mother! "I love dogs!" The ship designs! Doona Bae!

Favorite Trailer

Audiobook!

I just received the first fifteen minutes of the audiobook version of Kinetics. I'm so freaking excited! The wonderful Brian Richard Robins is doing the voice work and so far I'm super stoked to hear what he's doing with it.

Brian's ACX page

If production goes as planned then the audiobook will be available sometime in May or June.

Book 2 Update

Current word count 15,000.

The hard part is done, I have my beginning and my ending. Now the next step is writing everything in between. But if Book 2 (henceforth referred to as Forces) is going to be anything like Kinetics, then I've got about 90,000 words left to go. I was a little under par for my initial projection for the month of January by about 9,000 words. Real life sadly gets in the way.

My plan for the beginning of this month is to get back to full speed. Minimum 1000 words a day. That seems to be a good pace for me, so I really need to keep up with it. Forces is going to be a little easier to write, mainly because of how strong my foundation is in Kinetics.

I'm also considering what supplementals I'll want to put at the end of the book. While that's almost a cosmetic decision for later I still want to think about it in the process of working on it. In any event, time to get back to it.

~AWB