This is the War Handwavium score for the PS3 video game “Call of Duty, Modern Warfare 2″ (Mw2), specifically the online multiplayer game.

Approximate score: 1 million points

MW2 has two different modes, single player and multiplayer.

In single player, the player plays against AI’s run by the computer and the player progresses through different challenges with a thin backdrop of a “storyline”. The story is pretty thin, and pretty outrageous, and by itself would score pretty high on the War Handwavium scale. For example, in one chapter in the game, Russians have invaded the US in a sneak attack and the player must fight them in the streets of an American suburb. That chapter is titled “Wolverines” in reference to the movie “Red Dawn”. And both the game and the movie are pretty outrageous.

In multiplayer mode, the player must connect their game system to the internet and play against other human beings. There isn’t any “story” backdrop between games like there is single player mode. There are a bunch of different maps upon which the multiplayer games take place. And in multiplayer, you get to choose your character “class”, choosing what weapons you want to carry, what “perks” you want, and so on, compared to the single-player game where you’re cast into a fixed character depending on where you are in the game.

Although the multiplayer games don’t have an overlying story between games like single-player, the multiplayer games do have different mission goals depending on which game you decide to play. In “Team Deathmatch”, you and your team must kill the other players as often as possible. I say “as often as possible” because once you kill an opponent, the computer recycles that player to a new location and enters the game again. To win the game, your team must kill the other team players more than the other team kills your team players. Other games include “Domination” which is a capture the flag game. Your team wins the game by maintaining ownership of three flags on the map. The only way to gain control of a flag, though, is to sit on it for ten seconds, which means the opposing team will try to kill you while you’re a sitting duck on the flag, which means, in the end, even “Domination” ends up having as its ultimate goal to kill as many opponents as possible.

There is no storyline in multiplayer to interconnect the individual games. Instead, the player gets to “level up” as they accumulate more experience points. The higher up in levels you are, the more weapons and perks that are available to you as a player. There are 70 levels in MW2. And once you reach 70, you can enter “prestige mode” and reset back to level 1. Entering prestige mode means you lose all your level weapons and perks and start at level 1 again. But you get to keep any “accolades” and titles and medals you received. The only functional advantage of Prestige mode is that you get to create an extra character class for every 2 levels of prestige that you complete. There are a total of 10 prestige levels in MW2.

I originally planned on scoring MW2 multiplayer by going all the way to prestige level 10, but I realized that it was taking far too long to get there and by the time I hit prestige 5, the game had grown stale for me and I believe all the war handwavium relating to the game had become apparent to me (more on this later). So, I got to level 70, prestige 5 (halfway through the game) and decided that was a good point to approximate what it would take to get to level 70, prestige 10.

First the numbers. At the point I reached level 70, prestige 5, I had the following statistics:

experience points 2.5 million
rank: commander
Number of players I killed: 30,000
longest kill streak: 24
times I died: 33,000
time played: 14 days

Luckily the game counted all the stats for me. And time played of 14 days was actual playing time at the controls, not how long I had the game installed on my PS3. So, 14 days means I was playing the game for 20,000 minutes.

The things I do for my readers.

So, the first question is, how do I calculate the war handwavium score from these statistics?

Paper targets: I killed 30,000 opponents, which translates into a score of +90,000. And the times I died? The interesting thing about MW2 is that while almost all your rewards are based off of killing opponents, there are almost no negative consequences for dying. When you die, just hit a button and you start playing in the same game with full ammo and full health. The only thing is the location where you’ll start is random. But even that isn’t entirely true because at a certain level, you can start using something called “Tactical insertion” which allows you to light a flare and place it where you want to respawn if you die.

When you create a character class, you start off with a small selection of weapons. An M4 assault rifle, for example. The rifle has a bunch of possible attachements, such as a grenade launcher, thermal scope, etc. But you can’t get any of those attachments at first. The only way to get a grenade launcher attachment for your M4 is to use the M4 in a game and kill 10 opponents with the weapon. The only way to get an ACOG sight for your M4 is to use the M4 in a game and kill 150 opponents.

The attachments you win are specific to the weapon you win them for. Once you have a thermal sight for your M4, you can’t mount the thermal sight on any other weapon. It only mounts on your M4. If you want a thermal sight on another weapon, say, an M16, then you have to use the M16 and kill 170 opponents with the M16.

But the important point is this: Killing opponents directly correlates to player rewards. Dying has almost no disadvantages.

White hat deaths: Dying in MW2 multiplayer has almost no disadvantages.

Dying takes no advantages away from the player. You get experience points for killing opponents. You don’t lose any experience points when you die. You get weapon attachments when you kill opponents. You don’t lose any of those attachments because you died too many times.

This actually affects game play in fundamental ways.

Since there is almost no cost to dying, players often charge around out in the open, spraying and praying, hoping to rack up some kills to unlock weapons and get experience points, and these people suffer no consequences when their characters die.

Put real people in the same situation where real guns are involved and getting shot means you’re dead and not respawning somewhere, and those real people will act much more differently. They’ll keep their head down. They’ll stay behind cover. They’ll try to remain concealed. They won’t go charging out into the open when they don’t know where the opponents are.

There is a concept of “killstreak” in MW2 multiplayer. If you can kill a certain number of opponents without dying, then you can call in various killstreak rewards. This includes stuff like airstrikes and attack helicopters, among others. So, dying means you don’t get a killstreak reward, but the only way to get a killstreak reward is to kill without dying, so again, it rewards and reinforces the notion of war without cost. Kill 25 people without dying and you get to call in a tactical nuke that kills everyone and you and your team *win* the game.

Because there is no significant cost to dying in MW2, there is no reason that player deaths should count as negative points against the War Handwavium score.

Also, I feel I should note that I played MW2 with a goal of getting through the levels as quickly as possible. Therefore, I usually tried to gain experience points not just by killing opposing players but by getting experience points by unlocking weapon attachments and perks and other features. I seldom played MW2 with a weapon that had all the weapon attachments unlocked. Once I unlocked all of a weapons attachments, I’d start using another weapon. Sometimes this meant I’d stop using a “good” weapon and start using a not-so-good weapon. But the goal was experience points and gaining levels.

Someone playing the game simply for play might stick with the same weapon even after all the attachments were unlocked, at which point, they’d have to kill more opposing players to gain the same number of levels. Which is a long winded way of saying that my kill count of 90k is probably a minimum count. If you played without focusing on achieving levels, by the time you reached Prestige 5, you might have a lot more kills than I did.

There are some other parts to MW2 that affect its score:

No Friendly Fire: Most games in MW2 multiplayer do not have friendly fire. There are a couple, called “Hardcore”, which do have friendly fire, but players are not compelled to play hardcore for any reason. All levels and weapons and equipment, basically all player *rewards*, can be achieved without playing hardcore. You can get medals and titles and badges by playing hardcore, but those don’t directly affect game play in any functional way.

Because players never have to deal with friendly fire, I’m adjusting the War Handwavium score with a multiplier of 1.5

No Civilians: There are 16 maps in the MW2 game (4 additional maps are available in a “pack” that players can purchase for extra money). Out of the 16 maps, 14 of them take place in setting one would normally expect civilians. (the two maps that would not expect civilians are “Wasteland” (an area that features trenches and bunkers) and “Sub Base” (a submarine base). A number of maps are placed in urban or suburban areas (Favela, Highrise, Invasion, Karachi, Rundown, Skidrow, Terminal, Underpass). A couple take place at industrial sites that would normally have civilian workers (Derail, Quarry, Rust, Scrapyard).

Yet for all these urban, suburban, and industrial locations, there are zero civilians in the multiplayer game.

In the single-player game there are a couple of challenges which involve shooting bad guys while there are civilians running around in the same area. But there are no civilians AI’s in multiplayer.

As a player, if you get enough kills without dying you can call in a B2 airstrike that can pretty much wipe out every opponent on the map. But most of the maps you’re bombing are civilian areas. And there are no civilian AI’s in these areas. So, you don’t have to worry about your bombs hitting civilians. This is a major concern for real military operations. It is nonexistent for MW2 multplayer.

Because there are no civilian AI’s in MW2, but 14 of 16 maps are civilian maps, I’m adjusting the War Handwavium score by a multiplier of 1.5.

Wolverine Level Healing Powers: If you get injured in MW2 but don’t die, you will automatically start healing yourself. I’m not sure about the exact time frame, but I think if you were down to one-percent health, I would guess that you could be fully healed again in maybe 30 seconds or less. No medics, no first aid, no bandages, no surgery, no nothing. You just magically heal.

I’m sure it was done for game-play, to make the game more fun, to allow people to keep playing. But it reinforces the idea of War Handwavium myth of war: That war isn’t dangerous.

For Wolverine healing powers, I’m adjusting the War Handwavium score by 1.25.

Nerf weapons: Once you play MW2 long enough, and once you start playing with all the different weapons available, you start noticing that all the weapons in MW2 basically do the same approximate amount of damage. Almost all weapons require at least two shots to kill a player. Even a Barett fifty caliber sniper rifle, which in real life is used by the Coast Guard to stop boat, and can take out an engine block with a single shot, can penetrate most brick and cinder block walls and still kill a person behind it, in MW2, you’ve got to shoot someone twice with a basic Barett .50 to kill them. True, you can get one shot kills in MW2 if you use “stopping power” or if you get a headshot, but a 50 cal round to the torso would kill any human being, and a 50 cal round to an appendage would amputate the appendage.

Another example of nerf weapons is MW2 version of claymore mines. Real claymore mines have an effective range of 50 meters. (meaning they can be expected to kill any human within 50 meters of the mine) In the MW2 game, claymores are a joke. They have an effective range that I would estimate to be something like 2 yards. Any further away and you live.

I can understand why the makers of MW2 did this: It makes the game easier to play. People can run around and get shot and keep playing, rather than have to die and deal with all the sucky negative consequences of dying.

And MW2 multiplayer does have more realistic weapon effects when you play “Hardcore” modes, but you can get all the level advancements you want without playing hardcore.

For nerf weapons, I’m adjusting the war handwavium score by 1.25.

Absurd Marksmanship: MW2 multiplayer has some absurd marksmanship models. weapons in MW2 do have different accuracy models based of of their mechanical abilities. For example, the AK47 is less accurate than the M16. The effect player actions has on marksmanship makes me wonder if the people who designed the game ever fired a real weapon in their lives.

In the center of the screen is a crosshair suspended in midair. The size of the crosshair reflects the general level of accuracy you have at that particular moment. If you are walking fast, the crosshairs are big, because the bullets can go all over the place if you try shooting while running. If you are walking slow, the crosshairs will be smaller. And if you are standing still, the crosshairs will be even smaller, and their size will be controlled by the mechanical accuracy of the weapon. My issue is that the size of the crosshairs appears to be no different whether you’re standing still, kneeling, or shooting prone. Military marksmenship tests generally different shooting positions for different target ranges: standing at 200 yards, kneeling or sitting at 300 yards, prone at 500 yards. In MWw, the size of the crosshair is a function of the weapon and how fast you’re moving. There doesn’t appear to be any significant change in accuracy between standing, kneeling, or prone. And there doesn’t appear to be any concept of shooting from a position where your weapon is resting on something stationary, like, for example, a window sill.

By itself this wouldn’t seem to be a big deal, but it has an effect on game play if you look for it: players often run around the map, looking for opponents, and when they see an opponent, they stop dead in their tracks, the size of their crosshair drops, they shoot, they kill, and then they start running again. In real life, someone prone has a major accuracy advantage over someone shooting while standing. Which means that you have an accuracy advantage for standing still. But a lot of scenes in MW2 play out with everyone running around full speed, stopping when they see somene, shooting them, and then sprinting back to full speed again.

As part of “absurd marksmenship” there is also the issue that transitioning from standing to kneeling to prone to kneeling to standing doesn’t make your crosshairs go away. You can shoot anytime as you transition. As you transition from standing to kneeling, the size of your crosshairs should jump, once you’re kneeling, they should be smaller than they were when standing. As you transition from kneeling to prone, the crosshairs should disappear completely for a moment. You cannot shoot with any accuracy while you’re moving your body to lie down on your belly. Once on your belly, the crosshairs should be extremely small because you’ve got a lot of accuracy when prone. But body transitions, changing from one shooting position to another, should decrease accuracy during transition or make shooting impossible altogether.

I’m not sure if MW2 has absurd marksmanship models on purpose, if it makes the game more playable, or if it’s just a result of the fact that maybe the designers never fired a real weapon before in their lives.

Either way, because of the Absurd Marksmanship models in MW2, I’m adjusting the War Handwavium score by 1.25.

Absurd Hand to Hand combat:

In MW2, hand to hand combat is always a single knife attack kills the target. Always. The only way an attack doesn’t kill is if you miss the target. If you hit, they die. And in MW2, players often sprint around the field, looking for bad guys, and it can take time to stop sprinting, shoulder a weapon, aim, and fire. So, instead, what happens is the player sprints around the field, and if they encounter a bad guy at close range, they knife them and kill them in a single attack.

Compare this to the bloody reality that would be close combat using fixed bayonets, and MW becomes laughable.

Absurd hand-to-hand combat is another 1.25 multiplier.

No prisoners: The game doesn’t even support the notion of prisoners of war. You have to kill the opponents to make any progress.

Mulitpler 1.25

Paper targets: 30,000 kills => 90,000 points
White hat deaths: no negative effects, therefore no points
no friendly fire: x1.5
no civilians: x1.5
wolverine healing powers: x1.25
nerf weapons: x1.25
absurd marksmanship models: x1.25
absurd hand to hand: 1.25

That results in 90k points and a multiplier of 5.5* for a grand total of 494,384 points. Or, roughly, 500k points.

And this is for playing halfway through the prestige levels, only prestige 5 out of 10. So, estimating that the number of kills will be double that, the the final war handwavium score for playing Call of Duty, Modern Warfare 2, in Multiplayer mode, from beginning to prestige 10, is roughly one million points.

Final War Handwavium Score for Call of Duty, Modern Warfare 2, multiplayer mode: One Million points.

If the makers of Call of Duty, Modern Warfare were interested in lowering their score and making the game more realistic, here are a few comments:

The majority of the score comes from the high kill count. This could be compensated against if dying actually had some negative consequences, then I could justify counting the number of times I died against the score. But since dying has no negative consequences in the game, I’m not counting it.

Make friendly fire required for all games.

Add civilians, make killing a civilian cost experience points. Make B2 bombing runs have to worry about civilian casualties.

Get rid of the Wolverine-style healing powers. Make getting wounded an issue that has to be dealt with. Maybe have AI medics or have another player get experience points for giving first aid.

Get rid of the nerf weapons. If you don’t want the game to get lopsided because a Barett 50 in the game would grossly tilt the game in favore of whoever has a Barett 50, then remove the Barett 50 from the choice of weapons.

Make the marksmanship models more realistic. The run-and-gun playing style just reinforces the unrealistic view of war.

Absurd hand-to-hand. I don’t even know what to tell you. Drop it.

Add support for capturing prisoners. Hand to hand should not be instant kill, but a button could attempt instant prisoner. Opposing player cannot choose to not surrender. Something. But make it a player option to choose to do hand-to-hand (and not be instant death) or choose to take prisoner (and be instant prisoner).

Maybe if you try to take a prisoner and the person is wounded, then they must surrender. This might work if you didn’t have wolverine healing powers. If being wounded was a real issue then when confronted with hand to hand while wounded, you’d be more likely to surrender.

http://www.warhw.com/warhw-in-fiction/

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

It’s hard to tell, but I think the combat scenes show a fairly even mix of good guys (blue aliens) and bad guys (conquering earthlings) getting killed on screen. I’d have to get the DVD and count each one to get the real tally, but just from a gut reaction watching the movie on the big screen, it seems fairly even. There are lots of killing scenes, but I think it’s a balance of black hats and white hats, so the final score would be near zero for that aspect of it.

I believe I am going to have to invent a new item for scoring fiction that Avatar made me aware of: military victory delivered by god.

The main character, Sully, decides to fight the big, bad, fully mechanized invading military. And he decides to fight this military using nothing more than soft, fleshy, twelve-foot tall blue people riding soft fleshy horses and soft fleshy pteradactyls.

Needless to say, Sully and his band of spear-throwing, bow-and-arrow shooting warriors get their asses handed to them by heavily armored vehicles firing projectile weapons with a range of a kilometer and a rate of fire measured in the hundreds of rounds a minute.

But when all seems lost, the cavalry comes in and saves the day. The ending is a deus ex machina. God from the machine. The aliens worship a diety that they describe as the planet itself and all the life that lives on it. And towards the end of teh movie, it is revealed that the planet is actually some sort of biologically networked organism that stores people’s memories and their “souls”.

But, this turns out to be only part of the planet-god’s powers. When Sully and his band of warriors are about to be exterminated, the planet itself decides to send in the cavalry, in the form of wave after wave of animal to fight the heavily armored humans with guns.

Sully had no strategy, and the planet-god appears to have little strategy either, other than “war of attrition”.

But Sully goes to war with no planning, no strategy, no tactics, with not enough manpower, not enough weapons, and not enough armor, and really little more than the gut feeling that his fight is the noble fight and somehow it’ll all work out.

And that doesn’t really comply with the “just war” concept. In a “just war”, you must have a good probability for winning before you start the war. If you can’t win, then you’re just going to kill a lot of people, and end up losing anyway.

Sully, who used to be a member of marine recon, should have had some notion of what his odds of spear chuckers versus machine guns would be. Even an idiot should have some notion of what the odds would be. And the odds would be slim to no chance of victory.

But Sully launches the war anyway, and gets a lot of people killed. And he would have lost the war had it gone by his own planning, but victory was delivered by God, because their fight was the just fight, the noble fight. At one point, the spiritual second-in-command of the tribe said the planet-god doesn’t take sides, only maintains the balance. But apparently, the planet-god decided things were so unbalanced that it took sides and stepped in.

For that, Avatar gets an additional 20 points to whatever other points it may end up accumulating.

Overall, I’d say the movie was worth the full evening price, an A-. But that’s because the story of Sully coming of age in the Na’vi tribe seems to be the main story, and the stupid deus ex machina military victory at the end was sort of a sub-plot I can somewhat overlook.

I think the scene where Sully is doing a voice over talking about how they went around to all the tribes and got the warriors to help them fight would have been a good spot to insert a scene where they show Sully talking with the warriors about strategies. They wouldn’t need dialogue, they could have had Sully continue his voiceover so no dialogue would be needed. And then they could have implemented some tribal strategies. Throw some big boulders off the tops of those flying mountains onto the helicopters below. Some punji sticks for the troops on the ground. Maybe the Na’vi don’t use traps for animals, but I don’t think they would be unaware of how to make animal traps. Anything that resembled a plan could have evened out the fight a little bit rather than have a massacre.

But I think the writer, James Cameron, was going for the big surprise at the end. When all seems lost and so many warriors have died, surprise, the empathic planet will help you if you are fighting the good fight.

Ugh.

+3,500 points total score

!!!!SPOILERS!!!!

All levels were played from start to finish on “novice” level. All “kills” were counted once. If while playing the game, I died and had to restart a level, I didn’t count the kills twice. I’ve played through the game on Veteran difficulty through all levels, and I’ve gotten all the “laptops” so I was able to active the slow motion cheat code, infinite ammo cheat mode, and super grenades. Using these cheat modes made it easier to count while playing (slow motion) and it allowed me to go through all the levels as quickly as possible. I tried to avoid any “excessive” killing. There are spots in the game where bad guys will keep coming out of certain locations and you can just sit there and rack up your body count. I tried to avoid anything like that that would overinflate the body count beyond what would be required for someone to play the game normally.

I didn’t count bodies killed by Artificial Intelligence characters. I only counted the ones that I, as the player, killed. I didn’t distinguish between how the bad guy was killed. Various ways include using a knife, a firearm of some kind, hand grenades, and an M203 grenade launcher, among others. I avoided using RPG’s and such to kill bad guys, just to make it easier to count the bodies. I didn’t count the bodies that might have been killed by me calling in an airstrike. Just the ones that I had to directly kill.

The game has a prologue, three acts, and an epilogue. The three acts are broken up into several levels, each with a name. What I’ve done below is list each level and the number of bad guys killed on that level by the player character.

Prologue

33 “Crew Expendable”

Act 1

75 “Blackout”
89 “Charlie Don’t Surf”
88 “The Bog”
81 “Hunted”
125 “Death From Above”
68 “War Pig”
111 “Shock and Awe”
0 “Aftermath”

Act 2

76 “Safehouse”
14 “All Ghillied Up”
92 “One Shot, One Kill”
100 “Heat”
40 “Sins of the Father”

Act 3

62 “Ultimatum”
33 “All In”
72 “No Fighting in the War Room”
57 “Game Over”

Epilogue

33 “Mile High Club”

The total number of bad guys I killed playing the game from start to finish was 1,249. I’m going to round that to 1,250. 1,250 paper targets is (multiply times three) 3,750 points.

In addition to the straight up body count, there is at least one scene during the game where the commander of your team executes a prisoner, for an additional 10 points (not that ten points matters that much).

Also, during game play, members of your team occaissionally die. These are somewhat harder to count because the death of a teammate has zero effect on the game, and the ground is littered with bodies here and there. So, you as the player, are functionally apathetic about your teammates dying. It doesn’t make any difference to you. So I didn’t count them unless it mattered in some way to the player.

In one level, “All Ghillied Up”, you are with one other teammate, and if he dies, the game ends and you have to restart at the last checkpoint. So, that one counts as a -3 points.

At the end of “Shock and Awe”, something interesting happens. You and your entire team all die. You watch as 7 of your helicopters are destroyed. You watch a man fall out of your helicopter. Then you watch your helicopter crash. After the crash, you are mortally wounded and get to struggle around for a little while with burning wreckage everywhere, and then you die.

7 choppers plus the 10 or so people in your chopper dying, that’s a total of -51 points.

At the end of “Game Over”, everyone on your team dies except you. Griggs tries to rescue you, but you watch him shot down. You then watch three of your teammates executed. And when the medics arrive, you watch one of them doing CPR on your commanding officer, and then pounding his fist on his chest (I assume the CO dies). You are left seriously wounded.

5 teammates dead is -15 points. You seriously wounded is -3 points.

Subtracting the points for teammate deaths, gives a total of 3,688 points.

Just because I’m feeling generous, I’m going to take off an additional 188 points, which would account for an additional 60 white hat deaths.

Leaving a total War Handwavium score of 3,500 points.

Summary:

“Call of Duty 4″ is clearly a game where the entertainment is the killing. The counts above are based on how I played after I had mastered the game sufficiently to know where to go and what to do. Someone playing the game for the first time will probably end up having a slightly skewed count because they’d be going through the same levels more than once, so they’d experience killing bad guys a lot more than the numbers above reflect. Also, once you start playing more difficult levels, the number of bad guys goes up. So, this body count listed above (1,250) is really just a baseline. The actual body count that someone playing the game multiple times and different difficulties would be higher.

One of the interesting things in the game is you play different characters. Most of the levels are played as “Soap” a member of the British SAS. But a few levels are played as “Jackson” a US Marine.

Jackson is only in Act 1 because he dies at the end of Act 1. Jackson plays during the levels “Charlie Don’t Surf”, “The Bog”, “War Pig”, and “Shock and Awe” (he dies in Shock in Awe).

An unnamed character plays an airman manning the guns in a C-130 gunship in the level “Death from Above”.

In the Epilogue level “Mile High Club”, Captain Price and Gaz, who had died in Act 3, “Game Over”, are somehow magically back for another level, so I’ll assume the player character is Soap for that level. I almost want to add a few points for reserrecting Price and Gaz after watching them die, but unless it’s a hundred points, it’s really lost in the noise.

Anyway, this means that the various characters in the game have the following individual body counts:

880 : Soap

245: Jackon

125: Airman (C130 operator)

Which I think is a little high for what a special ops person might experience.

Last but not least, most of the levels have absolutely no civilians, even though many levels are played in urban areas. In “Death From Above”, you’re the gunner on a C-130 gunship, and there are two civilians that come out of the commendeered vehicles. There is also a church that you can’t target. Everything else, an entire town, is open game. In “Hunted”, there is one civilian who you are supposed to save from the bad guys. He walks out of some farmhouse and the bad guys come up to him. You’re supposed to shoot the bad guys and he runs into his farmhouse. But many of the levels take place in urban areas, and you have to go door-to-door to sweep out the bad guys. But there are never any unarmed civilians anywhere. If you kill one of your own people, the level restarts at your last checkpoint. There should be some unarmed civilians in the urban areas, and killing them should also restart you at a checkpoint. When you burst into a room, there should be some civilians in there, maybe sometimes the run out and get in your way. Oh, and if you play on veteran difficulty, sometimes the room has bad guys, sometimes it has civilians. It’s different every time you play.

http://www.warhw.com/warhw-in-fiction/

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0053183/

Gregory Peck plays Lt. Joe Clemons, a company commander in the Korean War.

Actor Rip Torn plays Lt. Walter Russel. George Peppard plays Cpl. Chuck Fedderson. Robert Blake plays Pvt. Velie. Martin Landau plays Lt. Marshall. Gavin MacLeod plays Pvt. Saxon.

“This is a true story based on the book by Brig Gen S.L.A.Marshall, USAR. In most cases not even the names have been changed. We are deeply grateful for the cooperation of the United States Army.”

Technical Adviser Captain Joseph Clemons Jr, Infantry, USA.

Total Score: -94 points.

Note: !!!!!!SPOILERS!!!!!!

-3 points: GI (name of Forstman) complains to Clemons that he’s got his points to rotate out. Army says he is one point short. Showing sacrifice due to bureacratic indifference.

-57 points: Initial operation storming the base of Pork Chop Hill, 19 American GI’s shown killed.

+3 points: Americans storm first trench. 1 Chinese shown killed.

28 minute mark: Chinese bugle sounds.

+6 points: 2 Chinese killed.

-3 points: 1 American with Suki killed.

+1 point: 32 minutes: American runner going from Suki to Clemons crosses a chinese machine gun nest. Throws grenade, misses, injures himself. Throws another grenade, takes out gunner. -2 points for injury. +3 points for killing chinese.

+3 points: 1 Chinese killed

-3 points: 1 American killed.

-6 points: 41 minutes: Love company shows up. 12 men left out of 150. Artillery shell kills 2 men.

-3 points: Wounded GI being carried on stretcher with foot blown off.

+9 points: three Chinese are killed as Americans take bunker.

-36 points: Americans take command post. Artillery shells their position. A dozen men shown in wreckage.

Possibly friendly fire incident. Men are angry. Clemons talks them down.

+12 points, -12 points: Bayonet charge over the hill and into the trenches. 4 Chinese killed. 4 Americans killed.

Take crest of hill and trenches.

-3 points: American (Chuck the machine gunner) is killed.

-6 points: Radio man (Sam) and GI eating beans are found dead by Clemons.

Lieutenant from Public Relations comes up hill to take pictures of “successful” operation.

George company leaves the hill

Franklin points gun at Clemons. Says he doesn’t want to die for Korea. Clemons talks him down. Franklin joins him.

Chinese propaganda officer says they have 45 minutes to surrender or there will be a massive attack. Plays orchestra music.

Division finally contacts on radio. Can’t reinforce. Can’t withdraw.

At peace conference, chinese refuse to negotiate over Pork Chop Hill. Americans think Chinese know they aren’t going to reinforce the hill, and know Chinese intend to attack in an hour to take it. American General thinks Chinese picked the hill because it is worthless and they’re willing to die for it, and it’s a test to see if Americans are willing to die for a worthless hill too.

Attack begins.

-2 points: Suki is wounded.

Americans pull back into bunker. Chinese flamethrower attacks them.

American reinforcements show up.

+6 points: 2 chinese are killed.

The hill is won.

Summary:

I was flipping through the channels when I caught a part of this movie. I was intriqued by the fact that it kept showing Americans getting killed, but not the enemy. So I scheduled it to be recorded on DVR and scored it.

This movie really contrasts the differences between a realistic portrayal of war and a fantasy war-handwavium portrayal of war. The movie focuses on the sacrifices American GI’s made. Compare this to some modern day Rambo movie that focuses on creating an enjoyable gladiator fight in the colosseum where we are encouraged to enjoy the sight of killing.

There is one scene in the movie where the radio guy, Sam, sees some Chinese prisoners, and he exclaims, “That’s what they look like? That’s what I”m afraid of?” Compare this to the demonization of the enemy that a movie like “300″ employed to make the bad guys seem nonhuman.

We’re not meant to watch this movie and enjoy the killing of the enemy. We’re meant to watch this movie and see the sacrifices that Americans made in war.

This movie is the antithesis of the war handwavium flick. And the massive negative score reflects that.

From wikipedia:

The Battle of Pork Chop Hill comprises a pair of related Korean War infantry battles during the spring and summer of 1953. These were fought while the U.S. and the Communist Chinese and Koreans negotiated an armistice. In the U.S., they were controversial because of the many soldiers killed for terrain of no strategic or tactical value. The first battle was described in the eponymous history Pork Chop Hill: The American Fighting Man in Action, Korea, Spring 1953, by S.L.A. Marshall, from which the film Pork Chop Hill was drawn.

The United Nations, primarily supported by the United States, won the first battle when the Chinese broke contact and withdrew after two days of fighting. The second battle involved many more troops on both sides and was bitterly contested for five days before United Nations Command conceded the hill to the Chinese forces by withdrawing behind the main battle line.

The movie portrays the first battle for Pork Chop Hill, when the Americans won, rather than showing the second battle, which the Americans lost.

Wikipedia reports that during the first battle, company K and L attack the hill, suffering 50% initial casualties, later helped by Company G. Due to miscommunication, and not realizing the number of castualties suffered, command orders Company G to withdraw. By the time command realized the true situation, K and L companies were down to 25 men. Command sent reinforcements in the form of several additional companies.

In this respect, the movie is fairly accurate in the window of time it represents. Two companies (about 200-300 men total) start the attack and are reduced to 25 men before reinforcements arrive.

The French premiere was received with criticism on grounds of racism, as the character played by Woody Strode, an African American, was shown to be a coward during the initial attack on the Chinese position. I would have to say the fact that the film has only one African American character, and that character is a coward, is a bit suspect.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Pork_Chop_Hill

http://www.warhw.com/warhw-in-fiction/

Total score: +201 points

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119116/

Note: !!!!!SPOILERS!!!!!

Times are approximate, based on DVR recording.

+5 points: entire movie: Inexplicable ball of evil shows up every few thousand years to destroy earth. If that isn’t “othering”, I don’t know what is.

-5 points: 15 minutes: Cocksure General shoots missiles at unexplainable ball of fire in space. Gets his ship blown up.

-2 points: 20 minutes: punk next door tries to rob Korben Dallas. Dallas disarms him without violence.

+10 points: 23 minutes: we meet the Mangalores, a race of trolls. Complete othering of bad guys for easier, guilt-free killing.

-9 points: 23 minutes: Mangalores shoot down the Mondoshawans ship. Three are killed.

+5 points: 29 minutes: General taunts Leeloo in glass chamber. pointless. But it allows Leeloo to punch through the chamber and punch the General.

+2 points: 36 minutes: cops crash into McDonalds truck.

+10 points: 47 minutes: We meet the bad guy, Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg. Zorg has half a shaven head, has a plastic thingy for a hat, weird clothes, a goatee, a funny accent, and walks with a limp. Outrageous othering.

+5 points: 47 minutes: Zorg fires 1 million employess when assistant says he only needed to fire half a million. Pointless display of evil.

+5 points: 48 minutes: Zorg’s minions are bald, have weird plastic hats, and wear tight leather pants. Othering.

+5 points: 1:05 minutes: Cops bag wrong bad guy. Bureaucracy fails.

+9 points: 1:05 minutes: Trolls kill 3 cops to capture bag from cops.

-2 points: 1:07 minutes: Father Vito Cornelius knocks Dallas on head with trophy, steals his tickets.

+12 points: 1:11 minutes: 2 trolls disquised as punks kill 4 cops and then hide in garbage at airport.

+5 points: 1:19 minutes: Zorg blows up his own minion by exploding cell phone for failing. Pointless display of evil.

+6 points: 1:30 minutes: Trolls go into Diva’s room and kill 2 entourage members.

+30 points: 1:31 minutes: Leeloo beats up 15 trolls.

-2 points: 1:33 minutes: Zorg shoots Leeloo in ventilator shaft

+9 points: 1:34 minutes: Trolls take over ships control room. Kill 3 sailors.

+9 points: 1:34 minutes: trolls attack theater. Kill 2 sailors and the Diva.

+2 points: 1:37 minutes: Dallas flips troll, takes his gun, and pins him.

+5 points: 1:38 minuts: Ruby Rohd kills troll by accident. Lethal Rube Goldberg Machine.

+27 points: 1:38 minutes: Dallas starts killing trolls. 9 killed.

+20 points: 1:39 minutes: Lethal Rube Goldberg Machine. Dallas jumps on lever, troll goes into ceiling. Head is stuck. His rifle fires and he kills 4 other trolls.

+18 points: 1:42 minutes: Dallas shoots 2 trolls behind tripod gun and kills 4 trolls with a grenade.

+21 points: 1:43 minutes: Dallas goes to control room. Kills 6 trolls in one sweep. Then walks in and shoots the leader in the head.

-12 points: 1:46 points: Zorg lands on cruise ship for second time, kills 4 sailors.

+10 points: 1:48 minutes: trolls set of their own self-destruct device. Kill Zorg, kill trolls. Lethal Rube Goldberg Machine.

+3 points: 1:59 minutes: Leeloo activates the weapon, destroys giant ball of evil.

Summary: “The Fifth Element” is a comedy, action, sci-fi story that is cartoonish in its portrayal of good and evil and its portrayal of violence. Evil is evil because it’s evil. And good (leeloo) exists just because evil exists. The battle lines are nice and clean. Then we meet the actual bad guys and discover that it’s an army of trolls hired by a weird, balding, funny accented, funny dressed, funny walking, guy with a weird hat, and a penchant for useless displays of evil. And the supreme being happens to be Leeloo, played by super-model Milla Jovovich, who spends a good chunk of the movie running around in tiny bandages, and has a tendancy to take off her top when men are looking.

It’s so, good=beauty, evil=ugly, that it’s silly.

The final war handwavium is moderately high, reflecting this ultra black-versus-white portrayal, and reflecting that the bad guys are othered to teh point that we don’t feel anything when they’re killed.

For me personally, I enjoyed “The Fifth Element”. It’s one of my favorite movies of all time. But it’s a movie I enjoy not for the violence, but for the extremely well written script. It’s a damn funny movie. And the movie seems to focus more on being a comedy-action movie (like “Big Trouble in Little China”) than on trying to be an action-comedy (like “Beverly Hills Cop”). So I can personally overlook the high war handwavium score enough to like the movie and put it on my favorites list.

It is interesting that when you disect the movie it does land on a fairly high end of the scale. But then “The Fifth Element” was written and directed by Luc Besson. Some of Luc Besson’s other works include “La Femme Nikita” and “The Transporter”. “The Fifth Element” seems like a comedy cousin version of “La Femme Nikita”, and I’d probably not like “The Fifth Element” as much if it had tried to be serious like “La Femme Nikita”.

Basically, the cartoonish aspect of the movie allowed me to watch the war handwavium as not to be taken too seriously. And the fact that the movie is an extremely well written comedy meant that there was much to enjoy even ignoring the war handwavium violence. If “The Fifth Element” had tried to take itself too seriously, or if it hadn’t had an extremely funny script, then the violence would probably have been enough of a turn off that I wouldn’t like the movie overall.

As it is, it is in fact one of my favorites. Being an extremely well-quotable movie helps. I can’t not think “Chicken, good” anytime I pop something in the microwave.

http://www.warhw.com/warhw-in-fiction/

Total War Handwavium Score: +7 points

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0105695/

NOTE: !!!!SPOILERS!!!!

No times are given. Didn’t have a DVD. The amount of violence is small enough that it’s pretty easy to track.

+2 points: The movie starts with two men Quick Mike and Davey Bunting, in a brothel. Quick Mike starts cutting up a prostitute’s face, Delilah Fitzgerald, because she “gave a giggle” when she saw how small his penis is. Davey Bunting hears yelling, comes into the room, and tries to stop Quick Mike. The owner of the brothel, Skinny Dubois, comes in and puts an end to it by brandishing a pistol.

The Sheriff, Little Bill Daggett, gives the men a fine. They are to provide the owner of the brothel with 7 ponies next spring. The prostitutes want them hanged, or at least whipped. The prostitutes decide to come up with a thousand dollar reward to anyone who will kill Quick Mike and Davey Bunting.

The first to attempt to collect is English Bob. He comes into town. The sheriff knows him and he and his posse surround English Bob and force him to surrender his guns. Then Sheriff Little Bob Dagget beats English Bob bloody and unconscious.

+5 pointless display of evil. Sheriff’s beating of English Bob.

The Schofield Kid, William Munny, and Ned Logan show up in town to collect the reward. The Sheriff confronts William Munny in the bar, beats him up, and kicks him out of town.

-2 William gets beaten by Sheriff.

William, Ned, and the kid go after Davey. Ned shoots at him, but misses and hits horse. Davey’s leg is crushed. Ned can’t finish him off. William takes the rifle and shoots Davey.

+3 William shoots Davey.

Ned realizes he can’t go through with it and rides out of town. William and the kid stay to go after the second cowboy and collect the reward. Friends of Davey catch Ned and we are told they beat him up, and then they turn him over to the sheriff.

Sheriff Dagget whips Ned in jail. Tries to get information, such as the name of his two accomplices. Dagget shows that he is whipping Ned more out of sadism than anything else. Ned gives false information.

-10 realistic portrayal of torture.

William and the Kid keep an eye on where Quick Mike is hiding. They wait till he goes out to to go the outhouse. The kid shoots Quick Mike.

+3 the Kid shoots Quick Mike.

The Kid then tells William that it was the first time he ever killed anyone. The Kid had been talking trash the whole movie up to this point. Now that he’s actually killed a man, he’s got the shakes, and got a pile of regret.

William and the Kid collect the reward.

We’re told that the Sheriff heard that Quick Mike is dead, and that he tortured Ned to death, not because the information would have done any good, but out of vengeance. As William put it, the Sheriff killed Ned for what William and the Kid did.

-10 realistic portrayal of torture.

William rides back into town. Ned’s body is on display in a coffin in front of the brothel. William kills the owner of the brothel for using Ned’s body as decoration. William then kills Sheriff Little Bill and 4 other men.

+18 William kills 6 men

summary:

When “Unforgiven” came out, it was hailed as being a realistic portrayal of violence and killing. The score, in my opinion, essentially reflects that accuracy. It shows torture being used not for information, but for vengeance. It shows gunmen English Bob and Sheriff Little Bill Dagget as being legends in their own minds, both of them lie to the writer W.W. Beauchamp.

Of all the main characters, none are searching for justice. The prostitutes want vengeance. The sheriff wants peace through visciousness. And William gets that he’s just killing for money and that ‘we all got it coming’.

Clint Eastwood preaches a moral of the failings of violence with this movie. And he walks the walk, not just talks the talk. The movie doesn’t preach against violence while glorifying violence. The movie preaches against violence while showing violence without any handwavium to pretty it up. Torture is shown honestly, brutally. The movie has a total body count of less than 10.

While something like “Watchmen” tries to have a moral to the story of the pointlessness of violence, it tells that moral while showing us a world where torture repeatedly works, where Rorsharch never kills an innocent man, and where vigilantes get to beat up black hat paper targets in dark alleyways.

Contrast this to “Unforgiven” where the movie “tells” us that violence is pointless at the same time it “shows” us a world in which violence is not some guiltfree indulgence.

“Unforgiven” won Oscars for best picture, best director, best supporting actor, and best editing. It also had nominations for best actor, best cinematography, and best original screenplay.

The movie itself has some issues, mainly that it’s longer than it needs be. At 2 hours and 11 minutes, the movie suffered from needless characters, namely the whole thing with the writer Beauchamp wasn’t needed for the plot, and some scenes could have been shortened, and all together, that probably could have cut the movie down to an hour and a half.

I don’t think “Unforgiven” won all those awards and nominations strictly for being the best movie. I think “Unforgiven” won all those awards and nominations because people recognized on some level that “Unforgiven” was showing us and telling us an honest story about the realities of violence.

Whatever the reason for the awards, “Unforgiven” is one of the lowest scoring “War Handwavium” stories that centers around violence that I’ve done. And I think that score reflects that the movie not only talked the talk about violence, but walked the walked. It told us and it showed us violence for what it is.

All War Hw Fiction Scores

+384 points

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0465602/

!!!SPOILERS!!!

All times are relative from the start of the movie, as recorded by a DVR.

+3 points, 0:02, Smith kills thug with carrot

+33 points, 0:03, Smith shoots 11 thugs

+5 points, 0:04, Hertz shoots wounded thug to stop him from squirming

+2 points, 0:07, Smith knocks out thug with gun

+5 points, 0:09, Hertz shoots his own guy in rear

+2 points, 0:12, Smith beats up Secret Service guy

+3 points, 0:15, Hertz kills bystander

+12 points, 0:23, Audience is shown 4 thugs killed by Smith.

-2 points, 0:28, Smith smashes finger of “John” by accident. (poor targeting)

+129 points, 0:33, Smith kills 23 thugs as they invade. Kills another 20 rappelling down stairwell.

+3 points, 0:41, Smith kills Secret Service guy with carrot

+24 points, 0:47, Smith kills 8 guys while he’s having sex.

+2 points, 0:50, Smith spanks Mom

+66 points, 0:54, Smith kills 22 guards at Hammerson factory

+27 points, 0:59, Smith kills 9 thugs in car chase

+3 points, 1:07, Smith killls Senator

+24 points, 1:08, Smith kills 8 thugs while skydiving

+24 points, 1:09, Smith sees a total of 14 dead skydivers on ground, an additional 6 kills

-5 points, 1:12, Smith is tortured.

+12 points, 1:13, Smith escapes torture from Hertz, kills 4 thugs

+3 points, 1:17, Smith kills Hertz

+9 points, 1:18, Smith shoots three punks during holdup.

There isn’t much plot to this movie. Well, there is, and it’s all really convoluted. The short version is that the MacGuffin of the movie is a baby. Bad guys want the baby dead. Good guys want baby alive. Carnage ensues.

There are 2 “good” guys in this movie, Smith and Donna. There is basically 1 bad guy, Hertz, and a whole bunch of cannon fodder. By the end of the movie, Smith has killed 115 black hats.

It was visually interesting at times, but the plot was spaghetti and the dialogue was pretty stiff.

All War Hw Fiction Scores

total: +289 points

!!!SPOILERS!!!

+5 points, 02:21, Bill tells Kiddo “This is me at my most masochistic” just before he shoots her in head. Pointless display of evil.

+3 points, 13:33, Kiddo kills Copperhead

+3 points, 29:30, Kiddo bites trucker’s lip as he was about to rape her.

+3 points, 31:40, Kiddo kills Buck

+9 points, 36:57, Cottonmouth’s backstory, her father kills three mob thugs

-3 points, 37:34, Thug kills father

-3 points, 39:30, Mob Boss kills mother

+3 points, 41:04, Cottonmouth kills Boss

+6 points, 42:32, Cottonmouth kills 2 thugs

+3 points, 43:30, Cottonmouth first professional hit

+5 points, 01:00:20, GoGo kills patron at bar, pointless display of evil

+3 points, 01:02:57, Cottonmouth beheads boss

+3 points, 01:14:24, Kiddo cuts Sophie’s arm off

+18 points, 01:15:34, Kiddo kills first line of bodyguards, 6 dead

+3 points, 01:20:30, Kiddo kills GoGo

information, 01:22:30, Arial shot shows Kiddo surrounded by 43 bodyguards, Crazy88’s.

+222 points, 01:22:30, Kiddo kills 74 of the Crazy 88’s.

Kiddo spanks 1 and tells him to go home to his mother
+5 points, Kiddo ducks an axe and allows it to kill another Crazy 88. Lethal Rube Goldberg Machine.
Kiddo cuts one man in the mouth with sword, looks like the Joker.

+3 points, 10:36:53, Kiddo scalps, kills Cottonmouth

+10 points, 01:40:31, Kiddo tortures Sophie, gets information

Kill Bill part 2

+17 points, 14:25, Bill and others kill everyone in church, 8 dead, Kiddo in coma. Camera pulls away, distancing audience from scene.

-3 points, 26:00, Bud shoots Kiddo with rocksalt

-5 points, 37:30, Bud buries Kiddo alive

+3 points, 01:09:50, California Mountain Snake kills Bud with a real snake.

+5 points, 01:19:52, Kiddo plucks out California Mountain Snake’s eye.

+5 points, 01:58:40, Kiddo kills Bill with 5 point palm exploding heart technique, Bill doesn’t die right away, distancing audience.

Summary:

I’m surprised “Kill Bill” got this low of a score. It appears that the Crazy 88’s were indeed meant to be composed of 88 people. 88 kills times 3 points a kill is 264 points, which gives “Kill Bill” quite a bump in the score. But it turns out that is also the biggest part of the carnage. Compared to “300″, which shows armies getting slaughtered, “Kill Bill” is relatively tame. “Kill Bill” also didn’t “other” the way “300″ did. In “300″, the bad guys were freaks and weirdos and nonhuman. In “Killl Bill”, the bad guys were just people who looked like anyone else. The “Kill Bill” 1 had nearly a hundred deaths on screen. “Kill Bill” 2 had 2 on-screen deaths: Bud and Bill. (It had a replay of the church massacre, but it was a replay, and the camera backed off and didn’t actually show the deaths). Which is probably why most people have the experience of “Kill Bill” that they love the first one or the second one, but they hate the other film. Few people, apparently like both films. The first one has 100 deaths on screen and is mostly a violent action film. The second one has 2 deaths on screen and while violent, spends far more time explaining people’s motivations and exploring the consequences.

There is something about Tarantino movies that comes off as voyeuristic towards violence. The movie starts off with a fake “Feature Presentation” intro clip from the 70’s. And when people bleed, they gush blood like a high pressure hose. Apparently Tarantino did this as an homage to the martial arts movies he was paying homage to. But the effect as a member of the audience is to be reminded that you’re a member of the audience, not part of the movie. When I think of Tarantino and violence, I keep thinking of Chauncey Gardner in “Being There” saying “I like to watch”.

That said, I enjoyed “Kill Bill”. I preferred the second over the first, but the two movies are really two parts of a single story, and as a whole, I enjoyed them.

I think one thing I appreciated about “Kill Bill” was the fact that it took place in our world, with our rules. “Kill Bill” isn’t out to show you that violence is superior to social structures. It shows you violent people operating under and outside of social structures. “Kill Bill” isn’t out to show us that Kiddo had to take matters into her own hands and become a vigilante to achieve “justice”. Kiddo was always a killer. Bill was always a murdering bastard. And when Bill tried to kill Kiddo, Kiddo killed Bill.

Some movies like to tell you the story of the frog and the scorpion, (scorpion asks frog for a ride across the river, halfway across, the scorpion stings the frog. Frog says “you fool, now we’ll both drown”. Scorpion says “It was my nature to sting”.) with the moral of the story being that we’re frogs and we can’t be nice to the scorpions of the world. And when the scorpion stings our spouse, our parents, our friend, whatever, the moral is we must become like scorpions (vigilantes) to fight the scorpions. This is the moral behind many high scoring war handwavium stories.

But “Kill Bill” doesn’t tell that story. “Kill Bill” tells the story of two scorpions who try to kill each other. And they don’t bother the frogs or the rest of the world. And for that, I was able to watch “Kill Bill” without the turn off of being told violence is superior to social structures, or the turnoff of being told that the world can’t handle the truth, and so on. It is a violent movie, no doubt about that. In a few hours of screen time, we see Kiddo kill about 100 people. But it isn’t trying to tell us that we’re frogs in a world of scorpions.

I preferred the second part to the first part, but really, it’s a single movie. And overall, I’d say it’s worth the price of an evening ticket at the movie theater. I also purchased the DVD to add it to my collection.

As for some oddities in the movie, I cannot for the life of me understand why the people are using swords when they have on occaission shown themselves willing to use firearms. When Bill and the rest kill everyone at the church, they’re using automatic rifles. When we’re shown the backstory for Copperhead, we’re shown her acting as an assassin, using a sniper rifle to kill a general in a motorcade. But when Kiddo confronts Copperhead, none of Copperhead’s bodyguards have guns. When Kiddo confronts Bill, Bill has a gun but uses to shoot a piece of fruit. In both cases, Copperhead and Bill fight Kiddo with swords. It was a weird inconsistency. I would have rather Bill and company killed everyone at the church using swords and shown Copperhead taking her first professional hit in hand-to-hand. With the assumption being that somehow super martial arts are better than firerarms. Then at least it would have been consistent.

All War Hw Fiction Scores

!!!SPOILERS!!!

So, the best part of the movie? On the way out of the theater, I was singing “Spock and Uhura, sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g!” That was an interesting and original twist. It also makes me wonder if the two were supposed to be “involved” during the old TV series. And if so, why didn’t Spock get jealous when Kirk kissed Uhura during that interracial kiss?

Otherwise: meh.

It was entertaining to see the new characters reintroduced. At one point, it started to drag a bit. Try to imagine a TV series wtih a large cast, say Brady Bunch, and suddenly they make a movie of what happens after they’ve all grown up. Every main character has to get an intro, have a backstory, yada, yada, yada. Yeah, we get it, Chekov can’t pronounce “v”s. Can we get the movie going now?

The bad guy was no Khan Noonien Singh, that’s for sure. He isn’t even Hans Gruber. He’s just a mad, mad guy, and he happens to have a big ass starship 150 years ahead of its time. Yeah, there’s time travel, more on that in a bit.

First of all, a scenario for the audience out there: You’re at work. Your house catches on fire. Someone calls the fire department, but before they get there, the fire reaches the gas line, and your house blows up, killing your wife and son.

Question: Do you spend the next 25 years of your life hunting down the firemen to kill them? And their families? And the planet they live on?

If your answer is yes, why would anyone put you, an admitted psychopath, in charge of a big ass spaceship with massive, planet destroying weapons on it?

That’s the main problem with Star Trek/Reboot. The bad guy doesn’t make any sense. So, apparently what happens is there’s this big supernova thingy and it’s about to blow up and it’s threatening Romulous, and Spock (who is a 175 year old Vulcan ambassador at this point) gets on a ship in Vulcan, takes some “red matter” which will turn the supernova into a black hole, and rushes to save the galaxy.

Except, before Spock can get there, the star goes supernova and Romulus is destroyed, killing everyone on it, including the wife and child of our villian, Nero. But apparently, no other planets are harmed, so I’m not sure why Vulcan was required to save Romulus.

Nero apparently is somewhere near Romulus. Near enough that when Spock shows up to create the black hole, Nero attacks him. The two ships fall into the black hole and end up a century or so back in time. How he was near enough to attack Spock, but not near enough to rescue his wife and child on Romulus, I don’t know.

They had enough time to know the supernova was a threat to BUILD A SHIP for spock, but they didn’t have enough time to evacuate Romulus?

Anyone who is considering writing a story with time travel in it should take this advice: don’t. Odds are you’ll screw it up.

So, Nero and this big honking ship is thrown 150 years back in time. And what does he do with this unbelievable opportunity? Does he go to the local Western Union office and write his wife a letter to get off the planet, to be delivered a week or so before she would have died? No. Apparently he never saw “Back to the Future 3″.

Does he take his advanced weaponry and attempt to help romulons win their war against the federation starting 150 years earlier? No. Apparently he never saw “The Final Countdown”.

What does our brilliant supervillian do? He hangs out near where the blackhole occurred and waits for Spock to show up, doing nothing else. HE WAITS FOR 25 YEARS. When he first arrives back in time, he destroyes a federation ship, and kills Kirk’s father. But then he disappears for 25 years to allow baby Jim Kirk to be born, grow up, steal a car, drive it off a cliff (apparently Kirk has seen “Thelma and Louise” and knew to jump before he drove the car off the cliff. Why did he drive the car off the cliff? I have no idea. Why is there a big ass cliff in flatland Iowa? I have no idea. But I digress.) Then when Kirk is all grown up, that’s when Future-Spock comes back in time, Nero captures him and puts him on a planet, and then blows up planet Vulcan. Then, and only then, does Nero decide that he ought to blow up the other federation planets while he’s there. Except since he’s waited 25 years, young Jim Kirk is all grown up and can kick Nero’s ass for killing Jim’s father.

If you’re a psychopath bent on vengeance, why would you wait 25 years to blow up Vulcan, and only then go after the other federation planets? Why would you make only one known contact with the federation, klingon, and romuluns (the destruction of the USS Kelvin and the death of Kirk’s father) and then hide 25 years? Why wait till you have captured future spock before you blow up vulcan and earth?

And how did he know that he’d eventually capture spock? Spock might have ended up 25 years BEFORE Nero for all Nero knew, and would forever avoid Nero’s capture, or even put in a crafty plan to defend vulcan, eath, and even romulus from nero and supernova catastrophes. (All he’d have to do is find a Western Union office, really.) If Future Spock got thrown a century back in time, he could have been like the naval officer in The Final Countdown who uses his knowledge of the future to secretly nudge the US in teh right direction. But no. None of that.

Nero is just mad. Really mad. So mad he can’t think about anything for 25 years mad. His crew is either really subservient to their captain, or they’re really mad too. I don’t know about you, but if I found myself on a ship, 150 years in the past, and all we did for 25 years was search for the white whale and remain hidden as we did it, I might think about transferring off the ship.

Which means, the movie has plot holes big enough to drive Jack Burton’s “Pork Chop Express” right through it.

But war handwavium wise, it’s not too bad. When kirk is about to go into combat as a federation officer for the very first time, he’s with Sulu and a red shirt, and the red shirt dies. It’s kind of funny, in a “fruit cart” sort of way. See a guy in a red shirt, shout “red shirt!” and then shout “Red shirt down!” when he dies.

Then Kirk and Sulu kill two cardboard characters. And then no combat happens for a while as the whole time-travel thing is explained. They did get one thing right. When the plot makes no sense, try to gloss over the explanation as quickly as possible. And then we’re back to dealing with Nero. And at that point, spock and kirk beam into nero’s ship and kill maybe a dozen cardboard characters. the rescue Captain Pike, and then spock blows up Nero and his ship.

Overall, the war handwavium score is very, very low. It’s the plot that’s the problem.

Personally, I found the movie was fairly entertaining. It’s flashy and moves fast and so on, so I’d probably say it’s worth a matinee just to see the effects on teh big screen. It’s not a fancy dinner followed by a full-evening-price movie. It’s a grab a burger and some cotton candy at the concession stand matinee kind of movie.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0133093/

!!!SPOILERS!!!

Total: 113 Points

Note all times are from Bluray Disc, absolute times from beginning of movie.

+12 points, 03:02, Trinity kills 4 cops, cardboard targets

+5 points, 20:34, Agents “melt” Mr. Anderson’s mouth. Pointless display of evil.

+5 points, 57:10, Morpheus gives speech to Neo telling him its OK to kill people in the Matrix. Distancing effects of killing civilians.

-3 points, 01:19:56, Mouse killed by SWAT

+9 points, 01:23:31, Apoc @ Switch kill 3 SWAT

-1 point, 01:24:03, Morpheus and Smith fight, Morpheus taken prisoner.

-3 points, 01:26:38, Cypher kills Dozer

-3 points, 01:29:10, Cypher kills Apoc

-3 points, 01:29:39, Cypher kills Switch

+3 points, 01:30:46, Tank kills Cypher

+45 points, 01:41:31, Neo & Trinity rescue mission in lobby kill 5 cops, 10 soldiers

+21 points, 01:46:18, Neo & Trinity rescue mission on roof kill 7 soldiers.

+3 point, 01:46:54: Trinity kills Agent

+9 points, 01:47:59, Neo kills 3 agents with minigun

-1 point, 01:49:26, Morpheus shot and wounded in leg

+5 points, 01:58:28, Neo and Smith fight in subway. Neo kills Smith with train. Lethal Rube Goldberg Machine

-3 points, 02:02:39, Smith shoots Neo, killing him.

+10 points, Trinity brings Neo back to life with a kiss. Good guys don’t die.

+3 points, 02:06:38, Neo kills Smith

“The Matrix” is broken up into a few parts. It starts out with Trinity committing some violence. Then there’s the mystery of what Morpheus wants with Neo. Then there’s the wakeup call when Neo takes the blue pill. Then there’s the training and acclimation to Neo’s new world. Then there’s the trip to the oracle that ends with the betrayal by cypher. Morpheus is captured. The big finale comes when Neo and Trinity rescue Morpheus.

The first four minutes have 4 points when Trinity takes out the cops.

Then no additional War Handwavium points occur for the next hour.

Then Cypher betrays the group, killing several main white-hat characters, racking up a negative point count.

The rescue mission near the end racks up 22 kills of black hat cardboard characters in about 5 minutes.

Then Smith kills Neo, Trinity kisses Neo back to life, and Neo kills Smith. The end.

You can almost see the three-part story play out in War Handwavium points. Part 1 is an hour long and only gets a few points. Part 2 is Cypher’s betrayal and racks up a bunch of negative points. Part 3 is the big comeback and Neo and Trinity rack up an even bigger body count.

Personally, I liked “The Matrix”. I liked the idea of it showing us Plato’s Cave in a way that people could relate to now. I didn’t realize Neo’s world was nothing but shadow until Neo took the Blue Pill. I didn’t see Cypher’s betrayal coming until it happened, but it made complete sense when it did happen. And I liked the way the Oracle told Neo what he needed to hear to become “The One” by telling him he wasn’t “The One”. When she told him that, I wasn’t sure how it would play out, but when Neo finally became “The One”, it all fit.

What didn’t make sense was how the machines violated the laws of thermodynamics to extract energy from a human body when they have to supply all the energy and chemicals to sustain it. The physics didn’t add up. And just assuming the physics did add up, then why didn’t the machines wipe out the humans and use something like cattle or sheep as their power source, and not have to worry about the cattle fighting back. A simple simulation of a grassy hill would be all you need.

The answer, of course, is “Because there wouldn’t be a movie”. Which is fine.

The only thing that turned me off a bit was 22 bodies in about 5 minutes during the rescue mission. That’s a pretty high body count. I also thought the sunglasses and trenchcoat was kind of silly macho stuff. And what simply made no sense and was clearly War Handwavium was Neo and Trinity walking into an assault with 20 different weapons on them, rather than 2 weapons and a bunch of magazines with ammo. I suppose it’s cooler to toss a weapon when its empty and pull out a new one, than it is to simply change magazines. That part annoyed me.

But overall, a good movie. I’d say it was worth the full evening price of admission.

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