L.B.: Imperio

Left Behind, pp. 384-387

Buck sat without interrupting as this most lucid and earnest professional calmly propounded a theory that only three weeks before Buck would have found absurd.

We're being given Buck's point of view here, a window into his thoughts, so this choice of words is apparently his: a "most lucid and earnest professional calmly propounding a theory." Indubitably, my good man. Suddenly Buck Williams has turned into Bertie Wooster.

Buck seems unduly impressed with Rayford's after-the-fact prediction of the Rapture. This theory might certainly have sounded absurdly audacious if he'd made the claim three weeks earlier, but a week after the Event it's not terribly impressive. Much of Left Behind is a variation on the self-congratulatory, question-begging Visitor from the Future* schtick. It works even less well here, with Rayford playing the role of an oracular time traveler from the very recent past.

Buck, however, finds this ex post facto prophecy immensely compelling:

It sounded like things he had heard in church and from friends, but this guy had chapter and verse from the Bible to back it up. And this business of the two preachers in Jerusalem representing two witnesses predicted in the book of Revelation? Buck was aghast.

The assumption here is that "chapter and verse from the Bible to back it up" provides an irrefutable, indisputable trump card. The confusion here is not unique to LaHaye and Jenkins -- it's a common notion among American evangelicals.

II Timothy 3:16 sums up what we evangelicals believe about the Bible: "All scripture is given by inspiration of God." But evangelicals rarely cite this passage as a mere statement or summary of what they believe. They cite it, rather, as though it were proof and validation of that belief. (See also II Peter 1:21, Psalm 119, etc.) Every word in the Bible is true. How do we know? Because it says so right here in the Bible and every word in the Bible is true.

This circular reasoning can seem to make sense if you've spent most of your life within a subcultural bubble in which everyone else shares your premises and conclusions and your inability to distinguish between the two. The trouble arises when they venture outside of the bubble and encounter others who do not share the same preconceptions about the self-evident authority of this particular holy book. Those others won't be convinced by the self-affirming recitation of II Timothy 3:16, and the evangelical innocents abroad aren't equipped to do much more than repeat the assertion. Second verse, same as the first ...

That's part of what we're seeing here in LB. It's not that the authors don't agree with or understand those who don't share their assumptions about the inherent, undeniable authority of citing "chapter and verse from the Bible." It's more than that. The authors can't even imagine that such people exist. Thus we have the supposedly secular and skeptical Buck Williams shaken to his core by something he has no reason to find impressive, persuasive or even relevant.

Try to imagine what it would mean if the world were like this -- if, as the authors imagine, everyone inherently recognized the teaching of the KJV Bible as an unchallenged and unchallengeable authority. In such a world there would only be atheists or pantheists or Buddhists or Hindus because all of those people simply didn't yet realize that the Bible told them not to be atheists, pantheists, Buddhists or Hindus. It follows that if any such person were to be confronted with "chapter and verse" explaining this to them, they would be forced to concede the point and would convert without hesitation. LaHaye and Jenkins probably wouldn't agree with the idea expressed in such stark terms, but something very much like this seems to infuse the prophecy-evangelism scenes in this book. The same notion also seems to lurk behind much of the mass media "proclamation evangelism" conducted here in America.**

The other idea that seems to be at work here in LB is a variation on the magical/spellcasting spirituality we've seen elsewhere in the book. The incantation of chapter and verse, the authors seem to believe, invokes mystic power. This idea is prevalent in a lot of the "spiritual warfare" talk popular among the charismatic strands of evangelicalism. The spiritual warfare gurus love to cite the story of Jesus' temptation in the wilderness as though it were an introductory course in Defense Against the Dark Arts. The salient point of the story, for them, is not its profound contrast of love and power, but rather its demonstration of mystical defensive techniques. A magic trick. When tempted by Satan, Jesus quoted scripture. Thus, they believe, when confronted by the forces of darkness, Christians should follow suit by raising their wands and chanting "Expecto patronus!" ... er, I mean, by citing chapter and verse from the Bible to invoke divine protection.

This chapter-and-verse invocation of mystical power is implicit in the way Rayford casts a spell over Buck here. It's made much more explicit later in the book, when Buck's newfound holy mojo serves as a literal counter-enchantment to Nicolae's sorcery.

"Enchantment" isn't too strong a word for the head-spinning awe Jenkins describes as Buck's reaction to Rayford's sales pitch:

Buck was desperate to maintain his composure. He wasn't sure what he was hearing, but Steele was impressive. ... What else would give Buck this constant case of the chills?

Buck focused on Captain Steele, his pulse racing, looking neither right nor left. He could not move. He was certain the women could hear his crashing heart. ...

Phew. Is it getting hot in here or is it just Buck? This is all intended as a description of Buck's spiritual anxiety, but if he's about to drop to his knees it doesn't seem like it would be for prayer.

We get a great deal more of Buck's insistence that Steele's spiel is "impressive" and "profound and convincing," yet as usual we hear almost nothing of his actual words. The longest speech here comes from Buck -- just after we're told how he sat "without interrupting" and just before we're told he was "speechless" he rattles off some more exposition from the End Times Checklist:

"Have you heard the latest?" Buck told him what he had seen on CNN during his few brief minutes at his apartment. "Apparently thousands are making some sort of a pilgrimage to the Wailing Wall. They're lined up for miles, trying to get in and hear the preaching. Many are converting and going out themselves to preach. The authorities seem powerless to keep them out, despite the opposition of the Orthodox Jews. Anyone who comes against the preachers is struck dumb or paralyzed, and many of the old orthodox guard are joining forces with the preachers."

"Amazing," the pilot responded. "But even more amazing, it was all predicted in the Bible."

While this is a bit more impressive than the initial story of the trip-and-die guys, it still doesn't qualify as "amazing." (When are the prophets going to breathe fire? We were promised fire-breathing.) "Religious dispute in Jerusalem," isn't front-page news now, let alone something that would knock The Event out of the No. 1 spot in the news cycle a mere eight days later. The Event would have reset the scale for what survivors would consider amazing. Post-Event, video of Elvis and Bigfoot riding the Loch Ness Monster bareback would scarcely qualify as "remarkable." "Amazing" would be reserved for something huge, something earth-shattering -- like, for instance, if CNN had been reporting that they had found a child, a 4 year old, in an abandoned house somewhere in upstate New York. That would be amazing. That would have people gathering around television sets, hanging on the reporter's every word. Post-Event, a lethally successful membership drive by Jews for Jesus might register as "notable," but not amazing.

Despite Buck's palpitations, when we switch back to Rayford's point of view, we find that he's convinced his sales pitch is falling flat:

Rayford was certain he was not getting through. ... It was clear that Williams wasn't buying it personally. If Rayford had to guess, he'd say Williams was trying to hide a smirk ...

It's just like Rashomon. Or at least just like Rashomon if, instead of showing us the different versions of the story, Kurosawa had just told us about how they made the various characters feel.

The point here is a reminder that we may not always be aware of how the Holy Spirit is at work in what we say and do. This is a common point in sermons on the duty of evangelism, so it's not surprising to see the authors emphasizing thispoint here in what they are trying to pretend is a scene about evangelism. The authors follow so many of the conventions of such sermons in all of these pseudo-evangelistic scenes, creating such an air of familiarity for their evangelical readers that it's easy for those readers to miss what's really going on in these scenes with Rayford and Hattie or Rayford and Buck. It's not evangelism.

The authors seem to be trying to obscure this point. They follow all the conventions of evangelism stories and sermons, as though Rayford were setting out to share the gospel. But he never does. He never attempts or intends to. Rayford's message for Hattie and Buck and everyone else is not the Christian gospel. His message is never "God loves you," or "Your sins are forgiven," or even "You're going to Hell unless you pray this magical prayer." His message has nothing to do with sin, forgiveness or eternal life. It has nothing to do with Jesus Christ, whom Rayford never mentions. His message is exclusively this: "My interpretation of prophecy is true."

You've doubtless witnessed the outcry and indignation that ensues when American evangelicals become convinced that someone is threatening to "take the Christ out of Christmas." Yet here LaHaye and Jenkins have completely removed Christ from the gospel of Christ and no one seems to have even noticed.

Of all the dismaying aspects of these books' runaway popularity among evangelicals, this might be the most surprising.

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

* The time traveler turned with great sadness. "If only," he said, "if only you had listened to the author of this story and done everything he advised when you had the chance." And then he was gone, returned to that doomed and tragic future from whence he came. ... That sort of thing.

** The expectation seems to be that hearers will respond to such proclamations of the gospel the same way that the Karen people of Burma did when Adoniram Judson arrived. The Karen had a legend that one day their white brother would come from across the sea with the golden book that would teach them the way to salvation. "About time you got here," they said when Judson showed up. "Now let's get on with the mass conversions already." This turns out not to be the typical response when missionaries arrive.

Comments

[MikhailBorg]

'Cause, y'know, butterflies are the rarest insects on earth, and never appear to any random human being unless God Has Willed It.

[Ken]

The nasty side-effect of thinking this way is that it erects a very clear and solid delineation between Us and Them. It leads one to the conclusion (even if only subconsciously) that people who don't share this Obvious Belief are flawed; it may be merely a pitiable ignorance, or it may be an almost malicious warping of normality. Either way, it justifies classifying the Others as truly subhuman. And once classified subhuman, there's no reason they need to be given the rights and consideration of real people. -- Raka

Tribal thinking, elevated to Cosmic Importance by Divine Sanction. That's the road Jihadi Islam is going down right now. Except "once classified subhuman", there's no reason the Infidel should even be allowed to live. Case in point: the Nick Berg Beheading video. THAT is where that side-effect leads when it grows into final form.

If I remember right, the last time we saw the two preachers they're "preaching" consisted of reapeating the same few phrases over and over again, mostly variations on "Jesus is Lord." -- Lax Tool

That's not "preaching", that's reciting a Mantra. And Mantras can easily become what the Moonies called "Thought Stoppers": Every time you have any doubt about Reverend Moon (or The Cause), just start repeating the Thought Stopper Mantra until it crushes and smothers all the doubt. That's what a lot of Islam has done with it's praise-phrase of "Al'lah'u Akbar", the Nazis did with their praise-phrases of "Heil Hitler" and "Sieg Heil", and a lot of Christians do with the praise-phrase "Praise the Lord".

Stephen King's "The Dead Zone" implies that it's a simple inability to deal with emotional trauma - during John Smith's coma, his religious yet earthy mother gradually descends into Hal Lindseyland. At one point she is convinced that the Rapture will involve spaceships rescuing the elect. -- Tonio

Syncretism between PMD and a Space Brothers Cult. John Nelson Darby meets Spaceship Ruthie of Unarius. (Or, more sinister, "The Planet is about to be Recycled. Join Bo and Peep behind Hale-Bopp.")

When I was about 14, I read a copy of "The United States and Great Britain in Prophecy" that I had found in my grandparents' house. I had never spoken to them about religion, although I knew that their background was Presbyterian. I don't know if my grandparents believed the nonsense in the book, which claimed that the English-speaking peoples were the descendants of the ten lost tribes of Israel. -- Tonio

Ah, Anglo-Israelism. Founded during the Victorian Era, during the height of the British Empire. (Americans are not the only ones who think that being The Superpower is a sign of God's Favor.) Started out very pro-Semitic, hailing the Jews as long-lost brothers, but ended up viciously anti-Semitic claiming God's Promises to Israel applied to "the Anglo-Saxon Race", not the Jews. Still pops up now and then; Herbert W & Garner Ted Armstrong had a Semitic-neutral strain of Anglo-Israelism in their Ambassador College/"Worldwide Church of God" mix.

All that banging on about the truthfulness of it sounds more like you're interested in being right than in what you're right about. 'This is true and I'm right, this is true and I'm right, love thy neighbour this is true and I'm right and anybody who disagrees with me is EVIL!' It's not very convincing.

The website Making Light quotes this comment: “The United States behaves like a salesman with a fantastic product who tries to force people to buy it at gunpoint.” (Emma of Late Night Thoughts). This kind of evangelism seems to be taking a similar line. -- Praline

That reminds me of Islam's historic tendency to spread by Jihad. The hyper-emphasis on the Bible as a literal word-for-word Word of God to the point of Bibliolatry also reminds me of Islam's emphasis on the Koran (literally "Recitation") as being dictated word-for-word for Mohammed to recite. ("Rewordgitate", as Gagdad Bob puts it.) As does the "run-on-rails" scenario of the End Time Prophecy checklist, where everything is predestined in detail ("Written on their foreheads before the creation of the World," as Arabic describes it poetically) and "God's Will" is a raw display of overwhelming power.

But then, I've noticed that when Christianity goes sour, it tends to resemble Islam in a lot of ways. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

[Axiomatic]

Brazilian women who Just Know Things because God Told Them So (and who turn out to be right) are also the rarest insects on earth?

[Tonio]

Is that the same routine where Jesus had to explain to His girlfriend where He'd been all weekend, and she didn't believe Him?

I'm fairly sure that it is.

possibly that whole idea of God/Satan planting the fossils there to test our faith/tempt us with atheism

Doesn't that sound exactly like a conspiracy theory devotee insisting that powerful forces are covering up evidence of (blank)?

My theory on that is that he's a smart guy, and sometimes his subconscious nags him with concerns that the Bible stuff may not all be what he thinks it is, so he has to believe a bunch of other weird things too, to make it seem less crazy.

For argument's sake, why wouldn't his Lindseyist beliefs and his other crackpot beliefs spring from the same psychological source? I suspect PracticallyEvil is right - many otherwise intelligent people can't or won't the realities of death and suffering.

You have been hanging out with the wrong sort of Christian. Or, more likely, the other sort aren't beating you over the head with a Bible. Wander down to your local Episcopal church and ask them their opinion on the subject.

I know a few Episcopalians and Unitarians, but I don't discuss religion with them.

The Episcopalians who say "well duh, the Bible is a logically flawed, internally inconsistent book of myths full of debauchery and slaughter, but we have peaceful and valuable spiritual beliefs based on cherry-picked portions of it" don't necessarily strike me as a whole lot smarter than the fundie dimwits. What makes them think there's any kind of baby in all that dirty bathwater?.

I disagree with the Episcopalians but for a different reason. The "baby" is not the spiritual beliefs but any particular moral teachings that may have merit independent of the scripture's supernatural framework. One should be able to read any scripture and analyze its moral teachings for one's self, no matter what one's own religious stance. Versions of the Golden Rule can be found in numerous religions and philosophies, which means that its merit transcends mere doctrine.

How exactly is Hollywood secular? Hollywood's idea of an atheist is a Christian with a traumatic past that made him or her abandon God, and who needs to go through another traumatic (and coincidentially 90 minutes long) experience to find his or her faith again.

Someone please tell that to Michael Medved.

[Axiomatic]

Ken, are you Dan Simmons by any chance?

[cjmr]

italics off?

[cjmr]

trying again?

[cjmr]

maybe there's more than two open?

[Axiomatic]

Off off OFF DAMN YOU!

[Tonio]

Correction - "many otherwise intelligent people can't or won't deal with the realities of death and suffering."

[cjmr]

I give up.

[Tonio]

Sorry about the italics - I don't use TypePad but have been adding the HTML symbols manually...

The paragraph that beings with "I disagree with the Episcopalians but for a different reason.." is mine, along with the Medved comment.

[Karen]

Latin grammar has aediles, censors, and vigiles, but no Nazis.

[Axiomatic]

Who cares, at least Latin grammar gets the important bits - the sticks and the axe.

[practicallyevil]

'Cause, y'know, butterflies are the rarest insects on earth, and never appear to any random human being unless God Has Willed It.

The weird thing is I don't recall any actual butterflies, just depictions of them. One as part of his kids game, one as a tattoo on someone's neck, and finally a series of interlocking cracks in glass that sort of looked like a butterfly.

Brazilian women who Just Know Things because God Told Them So (and who turn out to be right) are also the rarest insects on earth?

Even though the movie suggests that the Brazilian beauty is correct and Robert "the Atheist" Neville is wrong in their beliefs about God, its Robert Neville's hard science that saves the human race. Marta's "Believe in God and he will save you," version of God does provides nothing in the way of a cure for the plague.

[cjmr]

Kirala: Come to think of it, while I remember Jesus affirming the validity of the Law, I can't remember any affirmations of the verity of Scripture.

anonymous person:"If he called them 'gods,' to whom the word of God came—and the Scripture cannot be broken—what about the one whom the Father set apart as his very own and sent into the world? Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said, 'I am God's Son'?" --John 10:35-36

Yeah, but the scripture referred to there is the Torah, etc., not the NT.

[Geds]

practicallyevil, re I Am Legend...

I walked out of that movie feeling completely non-plussed by it. Turns out that the original screenwriter had been trying to shop it for a good ten years and didn't really get anywhere until some other guy saw it and decided to throw his (apparently considerable) weight behind the project. The ending as we see it was tacked-on on by writer No. 2 in an attempt to make the movie more marketable or something. So maybe there was some sort of wrap-up that brought it together...

It leads to an interesting thought, too. You take guys like J. Michael Straczynski and Joss Whedon who have a lot of interesting ideas but only sporadic success because they insist on making sure that the universe they see in their head is actually reproduced on the screen. This tends to make producers and studio execs quite angry because artistic integrity =/= big money. So maybe with I Am Legend we were actually robbed of a much better movie because it was apparently impossible to sell in its original form. Furthermore, we have enough stories about that exact thing, like the infamous example of Brazil or the changes to Army of Darkness to make me wonder if that's much closer to the norm than we think.

But then, I've noticed that when Christianity goes sour, it tends to resemble Islam in a lot of ways. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

Dude, I'm not one to ruin a good rant, but Christianity had a good eight-century head start on figuring out how to go sour...

[PurpleGirl]

Began reading the comments but it's about time to go back to work... A few thoughts though...

JWs don't celebrate holidays, even their own birthdays. (A boyfriend was raised by a JW grandmother, there were a couple of JWs working in my organization.)

Yes, you can be a liberal Christian, even an evangelical, and not believe that the Bible is the literal word of God. In the late 1970s and early 1980s there was a schism in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS) over the literalness of the Bible. There was a group of professors and students at one seminary who were teaching that the Bible is the inspired word of God, that it was not taken down as if it was word-by-word dictation to the writers. Eventually, after the LCMS tried to enforce the concept of the Bible is LITERALLY TRUE, these professors and students left the seminary and started their own ("Seminary in Exile" or Seminex). The backing and support for Seminex led to administrative/corporate problems between local synods and the national LCMS, which in turn led to many local churchs breaking away from the LCMS to form their own national synod. Eventually they joined with two other Lutheran Church groups (ALC and LCA) to form ELCA (Evangelical Lutheran Church in American). They are evangelical because they believe in proclaiming the gospel... I wouldn't call them fundies, though.

[alannaofdoom]

Raka: My favorite was a classmate who was genuinely puzzled by why foreigners had to go and use different words for things that any toddler knew the right words for.

Wow. Just... wow.

Completely irrelevant story that I'll tell anyway: when I was in high school, I chose to take a class called "American Studies" to fulfill my US History requirement. It was great for someone unable to remember dates, and turned quickly to philosophy and ethics (essay question from our final exam: "Is there such a thing as a just war?" I think we had an hour). Unfortunately, it was also the chosen class for those members of my grade (read: the football team; with apologies to any football players/fans - that's how it shook out in my school) who wanted to learn as little as possible. One day I found myself explaining that feminists who burned their bras took them off first.

[Geds]

Latin grammar has aediles, censors, and vigiles, but no Nazis.

Beautiful.

Even though the movie suggests that the Brazilian beauty is correct

I disagree. She was pleasantly attractive. Although compared to the zombie chicks and the mannequins she was certainly quite the hottie...

[ajesquire]

Granted, there's a lot of shittiness on every page of this book series, but I think there's a glaring offense in this passage that you glossed over:

"It sounded like things he had heard in church and from friends, but this guy had chapter and verse from the Bible to back it up."

That's a shot at those churches that purport to preach the Gospel but don't use "chapter and verse from the Bible to back it up." (i.e. the Catholics and, in L&J's opinion, alot of mainstream Protestant denominations.

[Vermic]

Can I also step up and mention Ultrachrist!, in which Jesus returns and people don't care very much, so he adopts a superhero look to get more attention. Then Satan dispatches a hit squad consisting of Hitler, Nixon, Vlad the Impaler and Jim Morrison. Awesome.

practicallyevil: Unfortunately an evangelical, or some other religious witness, sitting commented very loudly on the fact that it was nice to see an affirmation that God has a plan for us all.

You know, both Signs and I Am Legend use this trope (in the midst of great calamity, a small miracle), and in both cases my response is: if God's plan also includes terror and death on a global scale, then thanks God but no thanks. The catastrophes that occur in these films seem more horrible to me, not less, after the revelation that God is out there watching it all. Baseball and butterfly visions seem like a pretty crummy consolation prize for all that.

[damnedyankee]

Others will fall back on the "Two Billion Christians can't be wrong!" fallacy.

"One of the proofs of the immortality of the soul is that myriads have believed it-- they also believed the world was flat." - Mark Twain

possibly that whole idea of God/Satan planting the fossils there to test our faith/tempt us with atheism

My wife went to a school that taught exactly this idea. Fortunately, she was (and is) too smart to fall for that spiel.

[Newscat]

practicallyevil, the missing subplot in "I Am Legend" about the fact the zombies were getting smarter (and clearly the "leader" could recognize and even miss his female companion) was a callback to the original story and probably got cut in the process of making the movie.

Damn shame though because it might have been interesting discussion. Was what Robert doing evil? Were his victims sentient or animals?

[Geds]

You know, both Signs and I Am Legend use this trope (in the midst of great calamity, a small miracle), and in both cases my response is: if God's plan also includes terror and death on a global scale, then thanks God but no thanks.

Word. I was totally on Neville's side during his anti-god rant.

It's just about the same proof set used repeatedly here against L&J...

[Tonio]

They are evangelical because they believe in proclaiming the gospel... I wouldn't call them fundies, though.

The mainstream media tends to use "evangelical" to mean not just conservative Christians but also Christians who support the religious right's initiatives. I typically define the latter group as fundamentalists, but that doesn't sound right either.

One day I found myself explaining that feminists who burned their bras took them off first.

If they didn't, it would be a great image for a biker tattoo, or a logo for a Southern death metal band.

[MikhailBorg]

Y'know, I'd love to see construction workers dig out matched sets of engraved plates from a 2.5 million year old rock face. These plates would be made of a titanium alloy we can't currently produce, and would carbon-date to the same age as the surrounding rock. They would contain complete texts of a Bible in modern Mandarin, English, Hindi, Spanish, and Arabic - and just to make the point, Quenya and Klingon.

One's belief in (a) God would have to increase at that point... or, at least one's belief in the Doctor.

[cjmr]

ELCA (Evangelical Lutheran Church in American). They are evangelical because they believe in proclaiming the gospel... I wouldn't call them fundies, though.

Unfortunately, the ELCA adopted the 'Evangelical' label probably seconds before it was taken over by the Fundamentalist-types.

[Elmo]

Evangelical. I remember when the Methodists merged with the Evangelical United Brethren to form the United Methodist Church. One of the reasons why the church I grew up in doesn't seem to exist anymore.

[aunursa]

"It sounded like things he had heard in church and from friends, but this guy had chapter and verse from the Bible to back it up."

That's a shot at those churches that purport to preach the Gospel but don't use "chapter and verse from the Bible to back it up." (i.e. the Catholics and, in L&J's opinion, alot of mainstream Protestant denominations.

No, it's just that Rayford was dozing during the sermon.

[Blackadder]

I honestly don't understand the knee-jerk defense of Islam on this site (Axiomatic's snarky comment to Ken is typical). Considering how many people here claim to be opposed to religion (especially fundamentalism), opposed to war, opposed to theocracy, opposed to misogyny, etc. I would think Islam would be regarded as an abomination. Is it due to some fear that opposition to Islam = endorsement of Bush administration policies?

[mmack]

Vermic,

I followed your link and had to stop. Otherwise my boss would stop by my desk and demand to know what the f@ck was so funny that I was laughing so loud.

When your plot synopsis is this:

Jesus returns to Earth in present-day NYC, sent by his Father to usher in 2000 years of Godly peace. Unfortunately, modern young people respond poorly to this bearded weirdo. Taking the advice of a market research guru, Jesus has a Spandex costume made and declares himself "Ultrachrist", an urban sin-fighter. Unfortunately, his Father doesn't approve of these unorthodox techniques, while the Antichrist (the NYC Parks Commissioner) ressurects an army of famous sinners to make sure Ultrachrist's mission fails

you just know it has to be good!

Faster than Pharaoh's Chariots

More powerful than an clean shaven Samson

Able to leap cathedral steeples in a single bound

"Look, up in the sky, is it a bird?"

"Is it a plane?"

"No, it's ULTRACHRIST!"

"Here I come to Save the Day!"

[kodiak]

@Karen; my dad had a slightly shorter version of the sermon you heard that I still end up repeating at funengelicals when they quote scripture at me or try to tell me I'm wrong for not beliving in biblical inerrancy "The trinity is NOT the Father, Son and Holy Scripture". That shuts them all up right there, becuase, startlingly, most of them don't believe that the Holy Spirit could work without the magical words of the Bible.

@everyone talking about I Am Legend. Sheesh people! It hasn't been out all that long, and some of us can't get to the theatres right at the start and are still planning on going! I haven't seen it, but now I understand that there's a zombie plague, a hot latin woman who believes (apparently correctly) that she hears the voice of God telling her to accomplish something, and that by the end Will Smith's charachter is totally convinced that she's right through a series of butterfly moments. No more please! I don't care how crappy it is, my significant other wants to see it, and I'd like to be unspoiled... so that I can decide it's crappy all on my own!

[practicallyevil]

@Geds

I walked out of that movie feeling completely non-plussed by it. Turns out that the original screenwriter had been trying to shop it for a good ten years and didn't really get anywhere until some other guy saw it and decided to throw his (apparently considerable) weight behind the project. The ending as we see it was tacked-on on by writer No. 2 in an attempt to make the movie more marketable or something. So maybe there was some sort of wrap-up that brought it together...

It leads to an interesting thought, too. You take guys like J. Michael Straczynski and Joss Whedon who have a lot of interesting ideas but only sporadic success because they insist on making sure that the universe they see in their head is actually reproduced on the screen. This tends to make producers and studio execs quite angry because artistic integrity =/= big money. So maybe with I Am Legend we were actually robbed of a much better movie because it was apparently impossible to sell in its original form. Furthermore, we have enough stories about that exact thing, like the infamous example of Brazil or the changes to Army of Darkness to make me wonder if that's much closer to the norm than we think.

Well yeah thats fine and dandy, but the changes were massive. Like I said earlier they dropped a whole sub-plot, and the movie had very little to do with the book. The first 2/3'rds of the movie felt like they were right on track, Robert Neville was fighting sort of Vampire things that were getting progressively smarter. Even when Marta shows up it's fine, as her reasons for surviving and her tales of a "survivors colony" are definitely not to be trusted by anyone paying attention.

But then BAM, it's all your fault for not having faith, God told her so, and you should believe her when she says that the virus can't survive the cold even though when the virus first started appearing in New York when they'd just gotten two feet of snow and it was the coldest day of the year. But, the appearance of the butterfly proves beyond a doubt that you should listen to any severely traumatized person who claims to have heard God talk to them, even if you're reasonably sure it will result in getting yourself killed.

[Geds]

Damn shame though because it might have been interesting discussion. Was what Robert doing evil? Were his victims sentient or animals?

Yeah. Too bad it would have been almost impossible to do that.

Neville himself was a massively unreliable narrator and the zombies didn't exactly have a spokesperson. I totally saw potential in the way they kept very obviously making the "leader" a central, driving force and in quick flashes of how the "leader" was doing stuff and possible subtext of intent.

But I did ask that question myself a few times during and after the movie. I think it's the sense that there was a much better and far more interesting concept hidden within what was ultimately a fairly stupid action flick with a crappy Hollywood deus ex machina ending that left me so entirely nonplussed by the whole experience.

[kodiak]

and the very next comment....

*headdesk*

[practicallyevil]

Whoops, sorry kodiak, don't read my post then, spoilers. But most of what we're saying is really vague and not giving away anything that the commercials don't, aside for the butterflies.

[aunursa]

Blackadder,
I honestly don't understand the knee-jerk defense of Islam on this site ... Considering how many people here claim to be opposed to religion (especially fundamentalism), opposed to war, opposed to theocracy, opposed to misogyny, etc. I would think Islam would be regarded as an abomination. Is it due to some fear that opposition to Islam = endorsement of Bush administration policies?

There's an article that discusses that peculiarity in today's FrontPageMagazine.

[Geds]

Considering how many people here claim to be opposed to religion (especially fundamentalism), opposed to war, opposed to theocracy, opposed to misogyny, etc. I would think Islam would be regarded as an abomination. Is it due to some fear that opposition to Islam = endorsement of Bush administration policies?

Because we tend to be opposed to strawmen, too?

[Geds]

Also, sorry, too, kodiak.

[practicallyevil]

and the very next comment....

*headdesk*

Sorry, I was typing my rant while between my last post and your post.

[Blackadder]

The Vincent Price movie Last Man on Earth is actually a decent and fairly literal version of I Am Legend, given the limits of fifties cinema technology and budget. I like Will Smith well enough but I imagine the Price film is better.

[Raka]

Oh, hell. Andy Olmsted, who you may or may not know as G'Kar at Obsidian Wings, was killed in Iraq.

Obsidian Wings has put up his his posthumous post.

[aunursa]

I saw I am Legend last week ... very little of the plot has been divulged in this thread.

[Tonio]

Is it due to some fear that opposition to Islam = endorsement of Bush administration policies?

No, the fear is probably a more general one of opposition to Islam = Western imperialism and racism. I understand the concern over the history of Western exploitation of the Arab world. However, that should not exempt any irrational fundamentalist ideology from the criticism that it deserves.

[mmack]

Um... Do I get kicked off the board for Net-ignorance if I ask what 'props' means?

Praline, please stay. Props is short for "proper respect", as in "Giving you your props" for a funny post.

HTH

[Geds]

There's an article that discusses that peculiarity in today's FrontPageMagazine.

By a guy who wrote one of the Politically Incorrect Guide to... books, no less.

So you know its overflowing with moderate, well-balanced, and properly backed-up data points.

[damnedyankee]

One's belief in (a) God would have to increase at that point... or, at least one's belief in the Doctor.

The Doctor is my Time Lord, I shall not want.
He makes me lie down as patrols of Cybermen walk past.
He leads me past 'sploded Daleks.

He saves my planet,
and guides me through the alien invasion,
never dropping his name.

Even though I walk
among the Robots of Death,
I will fear no evil,
for you left K9 with me.
The sound of your sonic screwdriver
shall comfort me.

You set my cell phone to Universal Roaming,
so that even in the presence of thine enemies,
I can drive the subplots forward.

Surely evil and wrongness shall follow me,
because this TARDIS is some kind of $#!+ magnet,
and I will be running from some kind of alien menace
forever.

There. That oughtta put the final stamp on my express ticket to Hell...

[kodiak]

Sorry, I was typing my rant while between my last post and your post.>/i>

I got that, but thanks!

[kodiak]

end italics!