[ There's a point where he stops reaching for the popcorn bucket, side of his jaw rested on his palm as he stares down the movie projection. It’s a lagging start for him. The scene setting for the main character's self-loathing, jumping then into this exhibition of what's always left after a war, what people always say it was all for: Other people, and the trauma reel that stretches on, outlasting the flagging smoke and flame and nationalist pride. It continues like that, with the action parts not being as much of a focus as he thought it'd be from the poster.
THE WOMAN: As flames took my parents, they ordered me to live. So whatever happens next, I know I must survive! That’s kept me going.
They stare at each other for a long time.
THE MAN: I can’t. They beckon to me in my dream every night. “Hurry and come,” they say. “Why are you still cheating death?”
THE MAN begins shaking again.
THE MAN: What if I’m really dead already? I died long ago on that island… and lie rotting. You and Akiko are just the last dream of a dead man.
THE WOMAN: You are alive!
It’s boring, for Denji. He can’t care about the main character any less, the turmoil inside him conflicted between dying in penance or living for retribution… He doesn't get what the fair-faced love interest sees in him at all. Why she's willing to sacrifice herself for him at the climax, and why he hears other people gasp, seeing her push him outside range of the shockwave following the creature's heat blast.
It's after the climax that Denji begins spending way more time following the story progression of each blink and microscopic movement in Angel’s expression than the actual film he paid actual money for. His gaze flickers over his way several times. The halo crowning the space above his head isn't the only oddity about him, it's the stillness in the way he sits there, well-kept, like something you secure in a glass case under very specific temperatures in dimmed light to avoid discoloring the pigmentation of his wafery frame. When he catches himself thinking something he's pretty sure he shouldn't, his eyes race to switch back to the screen.
Notably, he doesn't look away again until the main character is evaluating his jet right before what feels like the last battle. He's with one of the engineers, seeming to have resolved himself to carry out his vengeance, yet allowing, one last time, for his inner doubts to leak. "That’s funny. Part of me wants to live."
Like it just occurred to him. Like it hadn't been an underlying shadow this whole time haunting him far more than the comrades he left to die. What was it that Angel said last night?
DENJI: What's it like to live better? Is it dying?
ANGEL doesn't look back at him. What did his face look like? Did it sour? Did it reveal something?
ANGEL: Humans have everything. You're born, you fall in love. You get to die.
It's then ANGEL glances at him. Or did he? He did, didn't he?
ANGEL: That's why humans should suffer. There should be a punishment for not appreciating that kind of simple freedom.
DENJI: I think I get what you mean.
No, Denji didn't say that. But it probably doesn't matter what he really said back.
There's a crash as the main character's plane slams headfirst into the open mouth of the lizard creature, choking it for a few seconds, before taking out half its skull in an explosion. Someone in the theater is sniffling, believing the character to be dead, until the screen zooms on his ballooning parachute. A small group in the very back claps and laughs in relief, that feeling carrying throughout the remainder of the movie to its expected conclusion. Nobody moves throughout the credits until the screen fully blackens and the auditorium lights return to its default intensity. People pick up their trash, gradually filtering out of the aisles.
Most of their trays and boxes are empty, so Denji begins stacking those together, dusting off all the crumbs to the floor, while tossing their wrappers into their cups. ]
That was pretty whatever. Like, I get it's a prequel of a sequel of a sequel of something, so the lizard wasn't as powered up, but it still didn't feel like the real bad guy of the movie.
[ He gets up, moving for the exit to the room. ]
It was a solid six for me. But not every movie's going to be a ten out of ten, though. You have to keep watching to find the right one. [ So what if he's just repeating the same lines from his conversation with Makima? She was right. A pause, then he looks over his shoulder, prompting Angel for his own thoughts with: ] Well?
no subject
As flames took my parents, they ordered me to live. So whatever happens next, I know I must survive! That’s kept me going.
They stare at each other for a long time.
THE MAN:
I can’t. They beckon to me in my dream every night. “Hurry and come,” they say. “Why are you still cheating death?”
THE MAN begins shaking again.
THE MAN:
What if I’m really dead already? I died long ago on that island… and lie rotting. You and Akiko are just the last dream of a dead man.
THE WOMAN:
You are alive!
It’s boring, for Denji. He can’t care about the main character any less, the turmoil inside him conflicted between dying in penance or living for retribution… He doesn't get what the fair-faced love interest sees in him at all. Why she's willing to sacrifice herself for him at the climax, and why he hears other people gasp, seeing her push him outside range of the shockwave following the creature's heat blast.
It's after the climax that Denji begins spending way more time following the story progression of each blink and microscopic movement in Angel’s expression than the actual film he paid actual money for. His gaze flickers over his way several times. The halo crowning the space above his head isn't the only oddity about him, it's the stillness in the way he sits there, well-kept, like something you secure in a glass case under very specific temperatures in dimmed light to avoid discoloring the pigmentation of his wafery frame. When he catches himself thinking something he's pretty sure he shouldn't, his eyes race to switch back to the screen.
Notably, he doesn't look away again until the main character is evaluating his jet right before what feels like the last battle. He's with one of the engineers, seeming to have resolved himself to carry out his vengeance, yet allowing, one last time, for his inner doubts to leak. "That’s funny. Part of me wants to live."
Like it just occurred to him. Like it hadn't been an underlying shadow this whole time haunting him far more than the comrades he left to die. What was it that Angel said last night?
What's it like to live better? Is it dying?
ANGEL doesn't look back at him. What did his face look like? Did it sour? Did it reveal something?
ANGEL:
Humans have everything. You're born, you fall in love. You get to die.
It's then ANGEL glances at him. Or did he? He did, didn't he?
ANGEL:
That's why humans should suffer. There should be a punishment for not appreciating that kind of simple freedom.
DENJI:
I think I get what you mean.
No, Denji didn't say that. But it probably doesn't matter what he really said back.
There's a crash as the main character's plane slams headfirst into the open mouth of the lizard creature, choking it for a few seconds, before taking out half its skull in an explosion. Someone in the theater is sniffling, believing the character to be dead, until the screen zooms on his ballooning parachute. A small group in the very back claps and laughs in relief, that feeling carrying throughout the remainder of the movie to its expected conclusion. Nobody moves throughout the credits until the screen fully blackens and the auditorium lights return to its default intensity. People pick up their trash, gradually filtering out of the aisles.
Most of their trays and boxes are empty, so Denji begins stacking those together, dusting off all the crumbs to the floor, while tossing their wrappers into their cups. ]
That was pretty whatever. Like, I get it's a prequel of a sequel of a sequel of something, so the lizard wasn't as powered up, but it still didn't feel like the real bad guy of the movie.
[ He gets up, moving for the exit to the room. ]
It was a solid six for me. But not every movie's going to be a ten out of ten, though. You have to keep watching to find the right one. [ So what if he's just repeating the same lines from his conversation with Makima? She was right. A pause, then he looks over his shoulder, prompting Angel for his own thoughts with: ] Well?