I recently re-watched Thor: The Dark World (because, who wasn’t re-watching those recently?) and I couldn’t help but notice certain similarities between it’s storyline and that from the Doctor in Doctor Who and his accounts of the Time War.
First things first I need you to know – The Dark Elves are the Timelords and The Asgardians are the Daleks. You with me so far? Alright, let’s go.
We hear the tale of how The Dark Elves attacked and how their leader, who was cruel and terrible, killed his own people to end the war (and disappear, saving himself).
Just like how the Timelords were at war with the Daleks (who started what is irrelevant here) and the Doctor “killed” the Timelords, his own people, to end the Time War against the Daleks. And then, he disappeared in his Tardis, saving himself.
So, the Daleks then were the Asgardians trying to save the world from the Timelords, excuse me Dark Elves, and their dark matter world transporty machines. Sounds like tardis’s to me.
All I’m saying is that, in the Dalek’s eyes, they’re the good guys, the benevolent rulers, the beautiful gods that are keeping the peace in the realms. And the Timelords are the evil dark elves that are trying to destroy everything.
The Crowned Clown starring Yeo Jin Goo and Lee Se Young!
This drama isn’t new (it came out on TvN in 2019), but for some reason I just hadn’t taken the plunge on it till last night, and hunny let me tell you IT IS GOOD!!
It’s a pretty basic concept – there’s a crazy king who’s paranoid about being assassinated, and there just so happens to be a local circus clown that looks EXACTLY like him! I believe, it’s loosely based off of King Lear by Shakespeare, but I haven’t read that play yet.
So, naturally what’s a crazy king to do but force the clown to assume his identity and die! in his place.
But, with a king slipping further and further into madness and a goodly clown with a heart of gold, who will capture the heart and loyalty of the people and retain the crown in the end?
I haven’t finished it yet, I’ve only just finished episode 6 (of a 16 ep show) and Yeo Jin Goo just had an IT Crowd moment with himself in the street.
Or was it more of an It’s Always Sunny moment?
Anyways, I’m super stressed and excited to finish it and would highly recommend it!
Yeo Jin Goo’s acting is just *chef’s kiss* SUPERB!! He’s one that I had mixed reactions about when I first started Hotel Del Luna, but as I’ve seen more and more of his stuff (the kid is a total child actor superstar btw!) I’ve just fallen completely for his acting!
It’s over on Netflix now, and it was on Viki in the past, so if you wanna get as obsessed as me then go and give it a go! xD
I know what you’re thinking – “What is The Hollow Crown?”
Well, The Hollow Crown is a BBC production of 8 Shakespeare plays condensed into 7 mini movies, Richard II, Henry IV part 1 & 2, Henry V, Henry VI part 1 & 2 & 3 (condensed into 2 eps) and Richard III. It stars British thespian superstars such as Jeremy Irons, Tom Hiddleston and Benedict Cumberbatch to name just a few. You can find it on Amazon if you’re interested.
First let me just say I LOVED IT!!!
But there was definitely a best and a worst episode.
The best was HANDS DOWN Richard III starring Benedict Cumberbatch.
Benedict Cumberbatch is harrowing, hilarious, and horse-less as Richard III. I’d only ever seen Monty Python’s reference of Richard III previously so trust me – those were some big shoes to fill.
At a very close 2nd we have Henry V starring Tom Hiddleston.
Tom Hiddleston is heroic, handsome, and “Harry” as Henry V. If you didn’t have a crush on Tom Hiddleston before then this one will definitely do you in.
Third is Richard II starring Ben Whishaw.
Ben Whishaw genuinely blew me away with his performance of Richard II. I couldn’t look away whenever he was on the screen. Three H’s for his performance would be honest, helpless and hallowed.
4th it’s the 2 parts of Henry IV starring Jeremy Irons.
The reason these two are ranked lower for me is because there was a lot of time spent on pub characters that honestly just didn’t tickle my fancy. It still had Hiddleston though as Prince Hal and he had a good fight scene at the end of the 2nd part, along with good dialogue scenes with Jeremy Irons. Jeremy Irons as Henry IV was hobbled, and two other H words but not happy.
5th and last is the 2 parts of Henry VI.
This was the one that took the most liberties with the text and you could really tell. They made Joan of Arc out to be an actual witch and had it that the queen was having an affair with one of the lords (I forget his name). It did have Francis from Poldark, Kyle Soller (whom I just found out is American and not British!) who was very good and Cumberbatch made his appearance as Richard III in this one. The last 20 minutes – oooo chilling! The three H’s for this one would be How, wHo, and wHat?
All in all though I give the series 5 stars! Definitely worth a watch, especially if you’re a fan of Shakespeare or battles or kings or theatre or Tom Hiddleston or Benedict Cumberbatch.
Have you seen it? Will you watch it after this? What’s your favorite Shakespeare quote? Let me know! 😀
If I were to say that “Disney is just Shakespeare!” you’d be like, “I know, Lion King, duh.”
But I’m not just talking about The Lion King here.
I’m talking about the entirety of Disney, I’m talking about what makes a Disney film a Disney film, you know the thing that whenever there’s a major cliche moment people are like “What is this, a Disney film?”
That, my friends, is the Shakespearean Formula that I’m talking about, and today we’re going to talk about The Tempest.
In the Tempest we have the magical lead Prospero (a banished for-all-intents-and-purposes ‘good guy’, and the father of the female lead Miranda). Prospero makes me think of Merlin from Sword in the Stone or Mushu from Mulan (idk maybe you have a better disney comparison that I just can’t think of) – he is the main character, but in the Disney movie version it would ‘technically’ be Miranda that was the main character. Regardless, Prospero is the magical lead that was banished, that has a score to settle, and that is driving the plot.
The female lead Miranda (a beautiful innocent young maiden who’s never even seen a man before, aside from her father and a gargoyle like creature). Reminds me of Aurora from Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, Belle, Cinderella and basically every Disney princess out there. She’s lovely, innocent and kind but also isolated away from everyone and everything until she meets Ferdinand.
The male lead Ferdinand (the handsome, kind, but not-too-deep-and-still-has-a-lot-to-learn prince). He reminds me of every classic Disney prince.
(We all agree that Prince Phillip is the best Disney prince, right? No need to even discuss!)
The villains and bewitched-by-the villains in Alonso (the king and father of Ferdinand and the bewitched one) Antonio (the evil brother of Prospero who’s just backstabbing people left and right) and Sebastian (the brother of Alonso who’s so ready to backstab). I mean – think of any Disney villain and boom these guys are it.
Then, we have the comical but diabolical but in-the-end-harmless characters in Caliban, Trinculo and Stephano (the gargoyle-like servant of the magical lead, and two drunks from the royal shipwreck). This trio provides much needed comic relief with a dash of danger – very similar to your eels from The Little Mermaid, or the hyenas from The Lion King, or Lucifer the cat and the evil stepsisters from Cinderella – all groups that were scary sure, but more funny then anything else and in the end none of their plans came to fruition.
And last, but not least, we have the literal fairy godmother character in Ariel (Prospero’s spirit helper that does Prospero’s bidding). He’s your Genie from Aladdin, your Fairy Godmother from Cinderella, your Grandmother Willow from Pocahontas, and so on and so on. Without him, the magic doesn’t get done, a lot of the comedy is lost, and the ‘hero’ of the story remains at the bottom.
It’s not just the characters though. It’s the structure too. It’s everything really, but I’m blanking on terms here.
To break it down, in The Tempest there’s a big event that happens (the storm), just like a lot of Disney movies, (Tarzan, Frozen, Pocahontas are just a few that start out with a big storm) and then after the wreck the Prince finds and falls in love with the Princess, the bad guys plot and scheme to get rid of their leaders and in the end the magical wizard saves the day and there’s a wedding.
The big scene that I noticed that made me go “Oh c’mon!” is there’s literally a ‘date scene’ for Miranda and Ferdinand where, after they’ve already gotten engaged after like 3 hours, they watch a musical performance put on by these magical creatures (just like Kiss the Girl, Can you feel the love tonight?, So this is Love, that one from Tangled with the lanterns on the water!) and they fall even more in love.
Anyway – I’m getting a little lost here – my point is, I think that that’s why Disney movies are so famous. Walt Disney copied the formula of one of the most famous playwrights of all time, William Shakespeare.
Wait a minute! Walt – William – is there a little similarity there? 😉 Oh, I think there is! (*cough* John Candy reference *cough*)
SNOKE THEORY (waaaaay past it’s expiration date, I know!)
I think my favorite thing about the sequel trilogy was all of the thought experiments that it gave me.
I mean, if it had been completely perfect then there would’ve been nothing for my writer brain to theorize about, pick apart, or flat-out re-write in my head.
As things stand – oh lordy, are there plenty of things to think about!
(I mean, c’mon, this scene was ridiculous!)
Here’s one that was a theory of mine from waaaay back in the day right after The Last Jedi came out, you know, back when things were iffy in the Star Wars world but nobody had yet witnessed the absolute mess that was The Rise of Skywalker, so people were still generally amicable.
The Last Jedi ended, as you may recall, with a shot of a little slave boy using the Force to call his broom to his hand before staring out at the stars, the writers wanting us to think ‘oh boy, things are changing around here!’. Well, haha, here’s what I have to say to that.
Rewind the film a little bit, and you remember that Kylo killed Snoke, his oppressive, giant, decaying master, to save Rey.
My theory, was that Snoke had discovered the secret of immortality and that Snoke was in fact Darth Plagueis the Wise. The secret to immortality, to not-dying, and the explanation for Snoke’s decaying body was – well, soul jumping.
I think, that Darth Plagueis had learned to soul jump and was jumping from body to body to body and at the end of The Last Jedi, when he got killed, his soul jumped into the body of that little slave boy, and now he was plotting revenge against Kylo, Rey and the galaxy. THAT was why the slave boy suddenly had the Force, even though he hadn’t had it earlier in the film when he’d met Rose and Finn. THAT was why he was looking out at the stars so seriously.
And then, instead of them basically doing a poorer version of that with Palpatine (“somehow – Palpatine returned.”) the third film would’ve seen our heroes having to battle with (and possibly kill/have to think about killing) a child. Not an evil child, but a child that was being possessed by Darth Plagueis. Oh, the drama that could’ve ensued!
Then, you could’ve gone into a whole ‘maybe Palpatine himself WAS Plagueis, maybe there had only ever been Plagueis, maybe Plagueis was the first ever Sith Lord and he was just constantly soul jumping from body to body, and that’s why there was only ever two sith – Plagueis and the body that would eventually BECOME Plagueis! And, if he was the first sith, then maybe Rey was the reincarnation of the first ever Jedi and that’s why she was so strong and important!’. By the way, I have so many thoughts about Rey. You can look forward to many more posts about her and my thoughts and theories (good and bad) on her character.
But basically, yeah, I think (and will always think) that that little slave boy at the end of The Last Jedi was/should’ve been Snoke, still alive, plotting more evil for the galaxies and coming for Reylo’s head.
A Writers View 