Space Sweepers
Jul. 21st, 2022 03:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
psocopteraSpace Sweepers. Always exciting to get to watch a sci-fi movie that's not part of some giant franchise and doesn't suck! This was a little bit Firefly, a little bit Blade Runner, a little bit Star Wars (sorry, now I'm describing it by franchises, but it's a useful shorthand). I had trouble focusing in the first half, but that could just be the kind of brain day I was having; I liked the cast and their characters (attractive leads, an adorable child, an excellent robot), the worldbuilding around language and translation was really neat and nicely done, and while basically all of the plot and action were of the "just accept that it works like that and don't think about it" variety, I recommend it if you would also like to watch a live-action spaceship cartoon.
And now I get to rank Dramatic Longs!
1. The Green Knight
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
WandaVision
Space Sweepers
Encanto
Dune
I'm torn about 2 through 4 here - WandaVision was so clever until the last couple of episodes got too MCU and lost my interest, and I'd kind of love to see Space Sweepers win on the "how often does anything non-franchise and non-anglosphere get recognized" front (non-franchise, actually fairly often; non-anglo, occasionally: Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon in 2001 and Pan's Labyrinth in 2007). But Shang-Chi is actually the one I would recommend most, for entertainment value. (I know Green Knight isn't going to win - I've accepted that I liked it more than basically anyone I'm aware of - but the beauty of ranked choice voting is that I can list it first and still do the ranking that might matter underneath.) (I didn't do a prediction when the ballot came out but I suspect that the aging fanboy contingent is going to go for Dune and the younger media fandom contingent is going to go for WandaVision and I think we think the latter is larger these days? (This is obviously shorthand and stereotyping, neither group is a monolith. But I think there are some clusters sort of around areas that you could call something like that.))
And now I get to rank Dramatic Longs!
1. The Green Knight
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
WandaVision
Space Sweepers
Encanto
Dune
I'm torn about 2 through 4 here - WandaVision was so clever until the last couple of episodes got too MCU and lost my interest, and I'd kind of love to see Space Sweepers win on the "how often does anything non-franchise and non-anglosphere get recognized" front (non-franchise, actually fairly often; non-anglo, occasionally: Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon in 2001 and Pan's Labyrinth in 2007). But Shang-Chi is actually the one I would recommend most, for entertainment value. (I know Green Knight isn't going to win - I've accepted that I liked it more than basically anyone I'm aware of - but the beauty of ranked choice voting is that I can list it first and still do the ranking that might matter underneath.) (I didn't do a prediction when the ballot came out but I suspect that the aging fanboy contingent is going to go for Dune and the younger media fandom contingent is going to go for WandaVision and I think we think the latter is larger these days? (This is obviously shorthand and stereotyping, neither group is a monolith. But I think there are some clusters sort of around areas that you could call something like that.))
