popular culture

Female X-Men

Power comes from control over their surroundings or other people; beautiful (some would say "stacked")

• Dr. Jean Grey: intuitive, empathic, manipulates people and things from a distance
• Storm: controls natural forces
• Rogue: consumer, parasite; saps men of their vital powers

Male X-Men

Power comes from ability to physically defeat opponents; some good-looking, some not so much (e.g. Nightcrawler)

• Psyclops (sp?): creates energy, destroys all in his sight; male gaze destroys opponents
Read the rest of this entry »

I wasn't going to write about the new Matrix film here. I've been posting comments to some of the discussions of the film around the blogosphere, but didn't feel I had enough to say to make it worth a post of my own. But it's a funny thing--certain ideas kept reprocessing, some of my earlier sureties about the movie have come under question, and I find myself admiring the movie a lot more today than I did when I saw it 10 days ago. And then I read William Blaze's take on the political implications of Matrix: Reloaded (via Doc Searls), and it all clicked together. So, for better or worse, here are my thoughts (or a selection of them, anyway) on the Matrix.