Geri's Game: The Simple Story

Geri’s Game brings its audience through a microcosm of the hero's journey. In a little less than five minutes, we meet a character, get to know that character, empathize with him in his losses, and then celebrate with him in his victory. It is an emotionally satisfying experience. All of this, and we are only watching one man play chess alone in the park.

Geri is of course the hero of this story, but as soon as things get under way, we are introduced to this other Geri, the Nega-Geri who has the same goal as Geri but is kind of jerk about it. This is our villain. Pixar eased us into the power struggle between these two by having us watch the transition Geri makes after each move. The first time is almost too slow, he first removes his glasses, then we watch the him feebly cross to the other side of the table, and make his move as Nega-Geri. We then watch again as he shuffles back. It’s slow, but it’s important. They are making sure we understand the reality of the situation, because they are about to completely make us question the whole thing. The cuts speed up as Geri switches from side to side. In these transitions we see the emergence of the two different characters. Geri and Nega-Geri. Eventually, these cuts will cross between the two as seamlessly as if we were watching two people interact. We lose track of the time it takes geri to make his switch and are now enveloped in the illusion he has created for himself.

They have done some important things to separate our two Geri’s; a difference of appearance, personality and setting help the viewer separate the two and pick a side, without really thinking about it. Because in five minutes, you don’t have time to think about it. The story needs to flow so seamlessly that the audience is presented with the right information at the right time. If information is out of place, it could either be missed or cause the story to call attention to itself. A lot of good information will sneak under your nose the first time you watch it, that doesn’t mean your experience of the story wasn’t affected by it, instead you were just unaware of how the filmmaker was manipulating you. Geri takes his glasses off and leaves them on the table the first time he goes to switch sides. He makes his move as Nega-Geri and then returns to his first seat and put his glasses back on before making his move. As the transitions get faster, we see less and less of the action until we are left with a cut between a man with glasses and a man without. The glasses are an important character trait. The humble and submissive Geri hunches over the board as he makes his moves while Nega-Geri is decisive and ruthless. The glasses weaken our hero. And that weakness is confirmed as Nega-Geri cuts down all of Geri’s figures, nigh to the point of defeat. With his lack of glasses Nega-Geri is also sitting against a background of red trees. Not only for the sake of separating the two visually, but it adds to his aggressive and bold character. His actions are faster, he is smug and confident, he sits upright against the red background across from his slouched opponent. These two men could not be more different. And once that is clear, it is seemingly too late. All Geri has left on the board is his king. A very unlikely scenario for someone playing chess against themselves. But Nega-Geri apparently plays chess much more often than his counterpart.

So what we have is the Hero, who has crossed the threshold into this world where he is playing chess against a rude version of himself. He has lost all of the trials along the way and is now brought to the climax, the narrow ridge between victory and defeat. Because there is only one character in this story, there are no allies to help him, no mentor, no deus ex machina. Geri defeats Nega-Geri by switching the board on him in a moment of distraction. And because of Nega-Geri’s early onset alzheimer's, he wouldn’t know the difference, I guess. But that being done, Geri defeats Nega-Geri in one fell swoop and claims his prize: his dentures.

What is a very simple story of a man playing chess against himself in park is really beautiful miniature of the hero's journey broken down into its simplest form and executed in a unique way. Because we got to know both Geri and Nega-Geri as characters we wanted a certain outcome as an audience; even though we know that it is just one guy. That is the power of character, when a character has a goal, the audience adopts that goal until they are suddenly strung into the the journey for victory. The resolution to the story gave the audience what they wanted, but not how they expected it. The ending was further validated by having an actual reward for Geri once he had won. Giving us the closer of knowing that there was some kind of motivation. Once it's over Geri sits alone in the park victorious, and the audience snaps out of the illusion and is left to reflect on what they just witnessed.

Black Panther: Why The Villain Needs Your Respect

The Black Panther almost had a great villain.

       Killmonger left me disappointed at the end of Black Panther, not because he was a bad villain, but because he could have been an incredible villain. He had the right kind of origin and the right personality, and he even had the right goals, but where he fell flat was how he went about achieving them. He grows up believing that he was wronged by those professing to be the heroes of the story. Both him and T’Challa came from royal blood, but instead of being raised in the utopian Wakanda, he was abandoned in Oakland California. He grew up with what T’Challa could never really appreciate, the hate, discrimination and inequality of man. T’Challa was pretty content at the beginning of the film to keep Wakanda in its isolationist prosperity, but that way of life is what would be called into question throughout the story.

       So he had the right motivation. He knew that there was a world out there where his African brothers lived in peace and prosperity. He was raised in the world where the black people who were once held in slavery had been disenfranchised and discriminated against for so long, that there was no escape from the poverty, violence and addictions that they had been cornered into. He saw the oppression of the culture around him and knew that salvation was attainable, but kept secret from the world. To him, his Wakandan family had turned their eye from the struggles that him and many others faced around the world. He was a victim of oppression, and he knew where they hid his deliverance. This is a villian that we can so easily get behind; though you may not have experienced or can empathize with his world of inequality, we can all see the injustice that he has faced. So from this information alone, it isn’t hard for the audience to want his goals to be reached. The greatest of villains are the ones who are real, probable people. Not the over-the-top, evil for no reason monsters that we are most familiar with. The Joker in Batman: The Dark Knight is an almost perfect example of villainy. Batman and the Joker have the same goals, they want to win Gotham. The Joker wants to prove that everyone in Gotham is just like him, a monster. Whereas the Batman wants to prove that everyone can be redeemed, that they can be heros and not the villains. We don’t support the joker’s goals the same way that we might support Killmonger’s, but we understand his goals, and we may even think that he could be right. And that is what is so threatening about the Joker, he might actually win, because he might actually be right. And so it is with Killmonger, he might actually win, because maybe the hero is wrong. And ultimately, he was right; Wakanda comes out from their hiding place and enters the world with the intention to make things better for those who have been sold short.

       So what was it that ruined Killmonger? The perfect storm of villainy was brewing, but instead we got a short shower of bad decisions. The reason he wasn’t a believable character was because he was attempting to achieve his goals in probably the least reasonable way. He thought to himself “I know, I’ll become an unstoppable killing machine. Then I will go to Wakanda, Kill the king, and then with my newfound power give all of the oppressed and powerless black people throughout the world wakandan weapons so that we can start a war and take over the world. And the Wakandans will have to do what I say, not because I will help them understand where i’m coming from, but because I killed their king and they will have to do what I say.” Ok, Ok, that sounds silly, and It is important to understand that he came from a world where he had to fight to survive. Every man conquered according to his strength. So perhaps the only solution he ever thought of was ‘Kill everyone I disagree with.’ But I think it is safe to assume he wasn’t raised under a fascist regime where he was taught that the only way to achieve peace was to round up everyone you don’t like and kill them. And it’s hard to believe that he spent a many years serving his country as a decorated soldier to have been secretly wanting to turn his gun on his comrades the whole time. There are plenty of arguments against this, but stay with me. A helpful comparison is that of the villain Magneto, he thought that mutants belonged in power and that they should come together and seize that power. Professor X thought that mutants and non-mutants could live together in harmony without oppression by either class. The exact same struggle is happening with Killmonger and T’Challa, one wants the Wakandans to use their superior technology to take control while the other thinks that keeping to themselves will keep the peace. And it isn’t even really Killmongers silly goals that made him an unbelievable villain, because Magneto had the same goals, but he was just a little more thoughtful in how he went about achieving them.

       I think I am finally getting to the point, my biggest beef with Killmonger and this story, it’s his leadership. We know he is incredibly smart, we know he is incredibly strong, he is charismatic and calculated. Our introduction to him reveals his competence and ability. So why was he a bad leader? Ultimately, he wasn’t a leader, he was a short lived dictator. He showed up in Wakanda, told them that they were all fools, killed their king and bossed them around. And he was never very pleasant about it. So the problem is twofold: he was never a leader that solicited respect, and the Wakandans were inconsistent as to how the decided their loyalties. I’ll first address his bad leadership, and then the wakandan loyalty issues.
He ascended to the throne using his brawn. He 100% just strong armed his was into power. Which is disappointing because we know he is capable of so much more, he’s not just strong, he is brilliant. We see that brilliance with his team in the beginning of the movie and it is what gets him into Wakanda; but does he use any of that brilliance to win over the loyalty of the people? No. Instead he belittles their culture, kills their king and the elder Zuri. He then immediately orders the destruction of the heart shaped flowers that allow the king to become the Black Panther, chokes a lady, and orders everyone to prepare for world war. Now that he is in power, we have lost all of our sympathy, he is just a blind bully. At no point does he actually win the support of the Wakandans around him who are now doing his bidding. Nobody is impressed with the guy who comes into town with nothing to offer but his ability to though the beloved king off a cliff. Where we once empathized with him, we have forgotten that because we are frustrated that anybody is taking this guy seriously. Our empathy will return, but not until his dying moments. Magneto, however, is a villian who has the continuous support of his people. They are loyal to his cause, not because they are evil, but because they see the reason in it. This is what was missing in Killmongers reign; He took control of another group and instantly forced them to play his game. That would be like if Magneto shows up at Xavier's school for gifted youngsters, kills Professor X and then lets everyone know that they have to fight for him because he is now in charge. Nobody would have bought it. Of course, there are some cultural loyalty things happening here that i’ll address in a minute. The point is, Killmonger never actually became their leader, He was just a bad guy, that for some reason the people were following. And because he never actually won their loyalty, everything that was done under his command was frustrating at best.

       But wait a second! This is nothing like Magneto taking Professor X’s place, Magneto has no right to that position, the students would never have incentive to follow him unless he won them over through argument. In Wakanda, they have a monarchy, and whoever sits on the throne calls the shots. Just because somebody is a jerk doesn’t mean they can’t be king. Killmonger has a legitimate claim to the throne and wins it in all fairness. This is frustrating to the audience, but it is okay because we understand that this is a culture of loyal, honest people (except their new king of course). So even though we don’t like to see the royal guard remain loyal to whoever is on the throne, we give them it, because they are what their king isn’t: reasonable. This of course all blows up in our face about ten minutes later. After we have finally accepted that the Wakandans are going to be loyal to the throne, T’Challa is back and ready to finish what they started. In this moment there was a tiny cheer in the hearts of the audience members, The hero is resurrected and carries with him salvation. Now all the Wakandans can drop what they are doing and go back to serving the previous king. And then the movie breaks, They had just established that the people are loyal to the crown, but as soon as the crown comes back, W’Kabi and his border protecting troops are like “Whoa, no way, lets go kill the guy who was our king yesterday.”

Uh, What?

Why?

       I understand that W’Kabi believed that Wakanda should enter the rest of the world and share it’s knowledge and resources. But he is suddenly Ok with supporting a murderer, instigating a world race war, and a civil war within his own nation? And all of this is makes him enemies to his friend, the king, and his lover, the head of the royal guard.

Uh...What?

       So now the Wakandans who were a united people a day before, are killing each other because some guy from Oakland showed up and said that things need to change. He was right of course, Not a lot of people are disagreeing at this point. But killing your neighbors and former allies? That’s a stretch. And after a brief tussle with his lady, W’Kabi surrenders and calls off his men. What kind of a conflict is that? W’Kabi and his people fought for no other reason than to provide a large fight scene for the movie. Cool stuff happened during that fight scene, sure, but was it believable? No. It could have been perhaps, if Killmonger had actually won their loyalty by convincing them of the need for change and turning them against those who wanted to keep the old way of life. He never became the respectable leader that inspired loyalty, he was only ever the hateful dictator.

      In X-men, mutants don’t just start killing each other for kicks and giggles, they have diametrically opposed ideals that lead to conflict. This story was missing that opposition of ideals, they were there, and they were an underlying motivation, But they were not established and communicated enough to be a believable motivation for a people to turn against their king and start a world war.

       Killmonger could have been great. He just needed to win the hearts of his followers, and by extension the audience.

This Isn't Supposed to make sense, much like W'Kabi's Loyalty.