A talk in Bozeman

Benefactor Rod meets a single HanHan in the middle of the street – the others just melted into the ruins of Bozeman, a place each of them has known for years, while Refugium’s ambassadors had only a few hours to scout. Mal Porter looks at the two: Rod leaning on his aluminum staff, his grey poncho thrown over his shoulder, the red crosses on his shoulders on display, facing a large, sinewy man, armored with rusting metal plates, a red hubcap protecting his chest, his large hands never far away from a cruel hacking iron hanging from his belt. All hear the talk between the doctor and the feral via their HiTek headsets, and it is not going too well – the feral is quite sure that Ghosteye, new leader of the HanHan, will never leave the junkyard to talk to the men who captured one of his warriors, however interesting their information might be. But he offers hostages for his visitor's safety. Rod knows that his friends will never consent to visiting the junkyard, hostages or no. Mal Porter, for one, has experienced the inconsistent hospitality of ferales before, in the ruins of Chicago. It’s a mistake you make just once, he whispers via the com. The one won’t come out, the others won’t go in. As the negotiations stall, he has another idea: If Ghosteye is a false benefactor, he should be technologically inclined. He leaves his position and walks up to Rod and the feral. He gets a look at the hard man. Old scars crisscross his chest and arms, his face is sunburnt and painted with rust and chalk – a body shaped by times of hunger, fighting and struggle. A necklace with screws, small bones and teeths around his neck. Two old knives in his belt, apart from the scarred cutter. Improbably bright eyes measure Mal Porter. He probably thinks he can take my head in one swing, and maybe he’s right, better keep a bit of distance…”Does your leader know how a radio works?” The big feral snorts “Our Ghosteye knows how everything works. He could build a radio from scraps and dog’s blood.” Maybe he can, Rod thinks, but I am not quite sure if you know what the word radio means “Then I think I have a solution for our situation: We have some radios, they don’t go very far, so we’ll have to drive up to the junkyard.” The feral gives him a stony look. Mal changes tack “We give you one talkbox and we keep one. We talk using the boxes, so we do not have do go into the junkyard where our presence would just trouble your kids, and Ghosteye won’t have to leave his palace…safety assured for everyone. No need for hostages or such bunk. After the talk, you bring back the talkbox, and we go our separate ways. I think, Ghosteye would agree that this is a very smart solution.” A scavvy through and through, Red thinks. If a problem seems insurmountable, just raise the technological bar. The feral takes his time answering, but then he nods “I have to ask Ghosteye if this is agreeable. Wait here, you will have the answer next morning." Then he vanishes – he moves into the ruins and just is gone. Dan Hawking’s voice squawks though their headsets, crestfallen “Fuck, I lost him, it’s like he stepped into a wall…” It’s their playground, Mal thinks, they know it by heart. A few minutes later, Dan reports that the ferales are moving out of the ruins. They move trough the sparse shrubs and the shifting dust like fish in water, that’s what he tells his friends later, when he returns from his perch in the church tower. Not easy to keep a bead on one of them, not easy at all. Mal nods and keeps his thoughts to himself: If Ghosteye is not in the mood for a radio chat, this playground might become a battlefield right quick. And he sees to his weapons.

Justin Lin: Fast Five

Just dumb fun: This is the only reason for watching a movie like this. Dumb stunts, dumb big men saying dumb (but funny) things, a dumb plot with many dumb holes and some dumb gunplay to go with it. If you lower your expectations down to the level of grass roots and hastily buried hookers, a movie like Fast Five can be very entertaining.

The movie delivers, but nothing more. Some of its dialogs are so bad you will claw at your ears, some stuff strains the suspension of disbelief right past the snapping point into the realm were physics are replaced by angels dancing on needlepoints and some things make only sense in a moral universe very different from ours (your husband/ the father of your child has gone missing - you must presume that his stupid friends got him killed on their "last heist". As you enter your home deep in Rio's favelas, you see a large heap of cash on your bed - the share of your dead husband...and you are supposed to be happy about that. But maybe that's how they roll in Brazil.) Also, the movie tries to be about family or somesuch, when it should concentrate on the torque and recoil. But some of the banter is snappy and funny, the Rock and Vin Diesel chew up the scenery as completely over-the-top characters and cars are driven at high speeds and crashed into each other with abandon. And that's why I watched it, anyway.

Two and a half of five tattooed G-men

Edit: a psychological perspective on the series as a whole, probably seeing stuff that isn't even there.

What is a manager?

A manager is a philosopher allowed to do (or apply) shoddy science while being paid too much money. That is Matthew Stewart's conclusion in The Atlantic. It's not a rant, but rather an insightful essay about the fundamental flaws of management as a science. There are also some interesting points concerning the history of management and common management training (getting your MBA), which, according to Stewart, only does two things:

- You make lots of new acquaintances. You build your rolodex. This is, of course, a very good thing, whatever your career.

- You show the world that you are committed to this kind of work: The MBA is like a tribal warrior's initiation scars.

But concerning the skills you need to run a business, Stewart thinks that you would be better off with a solid grounding in the humanities, which brings me to the (now rather old) observation that the humanities are the true life sciences.

Your day isn't weird enough. Check out this week's Photoshop Phriday at Something Awful.

Brutal and Deadly

In Western society, marketing a movie is second only to making the movie itself. Millions are poured into carefully constructed leaks, mini-features, trailers, online campaigns. The marketing budget of a tent-pole summer blockbuster is large enough to create a whole series of indie films or to fight a minor war. In Ghana, you get an old flour sack, paints and a brush. And in Ghana, you bring the awesome.

At the moment, the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich exhibits seventy hand-painted movie posters from Ghana. They are crude and often very brutal and completely over the top: Like a guy carrying a knife between his teeth, and there is also a bloody head stuck to the tip of the knife. A jar full of eyeballs. Often, hacked-off body parts seem to be added just willy-nilly or because the painter still had some red and pink paint to get rid off. But the posters also point to a completely different way of consuming and perceiving cinema. If you want to reexamine your reaction towards Hollywood's marketing campaigns (are they really so different to painting the words "very brutal! very deadly! don't miss this!" on an old flour sack?) and your way of watching movies, this can be a place to start. Go on a Sunday, when it's dirt cheap, and also visit the other exhibitions.

The War Nerd tries his hand at a daily column

Gary Brecher must have broken up with his improbably hot girlfriend. For nearly three weeks he has been writing daily columns now. Here's one about wishful thinking and gun porn as a teaser. The War Nerd is an acquired taste, but I read his pieces with continuing interest.

Zack Snyder: Sucker Punch

In the first dream sequence, the heroine has to fight three samurai. The samurai are very big, like, say, trees. One of them also has a chain gun, which is also as big as a tree. It is not a chain gun, but rather a CHAIN GUN! The demonic tree-sized samurai fills the air with about three tons of ammo, demolishing a huge Buddhist temple in the process. This is the mother and father of all chain gun scenes. The chain gun scene in The Matrix is a duck fart compared to this. Then the heroine shoots his face full of holes. I watched all this with child-like glee.

There might be a serious movie under all this, and some meaning beyond "all men are sweaty, greasy, lecherous swine - including Don Draper". I am sure that Zak Snyder thinks so. I'm afraid, that it might turn out a Disney-approved meaning like "Believe in yourself!". But at the moment I am still giddy with the dream sequences. It is terrible to find out the exact level of one's own immaturity, but clockwork zombie Nazis, the heroes strafing a fantastic battleground with an WWII era bomber, a dragon going after said bomber...sometimes, you just have to let the awesome in, know what I mean?

5 of 5 VTOL-capable, auto cannon-armed powered battlesuits which have a grim, pink bunny face painted on the front/ face armor plating.

I'd pay for a desktop model of this suit.

You can't take it with you

A nice, short article by Dmitri Orlov about money: By now everybody knows that money is basically a belief system, but it is a belief that nobody seems to be able to shake. Orlov gives a hint how to proceed. Joseph E. Stiglitz deals with a different case, offering a different perspective...both texts are highly recommended.