Holiday Giving 2003

Instead of accepting gifts this season, I thought I would encourage people to use that money to give to charity– specifically, organizations related to HIV/AIDS. Yes, yes, I hardly expected that everyone or anyone was going to get me a present in the first place, but it’s just a starting point. Anybody and everybody should give! For more information, visit:

Holiday Giving 2003

If this is successful (hopefully), I’ll pick a new “cause” (I hate calling it that) every year.

Koreans, Koreans everywhere, everywhere the Koreans

There’s been a lot of talk about and mention of Koreans and the Koreas lately. This week’s episode of Kid Notorious will feature an over-the-top caricature of Kim Jong Il. The last few episodes of Reno 911 had a Korean national security expert as well as Officer Wiegel yelling at those Korean kids messing with her cat on Halloween night. Kimchee was featured on the Produce Pete segment on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. The West Wing devoted an entire episode to a North Korean pianist’s attempt to defect and the concept of han. There hasn’t been this much attention on us since the Korean War. Ahem, sorry, “conflict.” But unfortunately, the threat of war is what once again brings the spotlight on that little peninsula on the other side of the world.

While the war in Iraq continues, North Korea rears its ugly head again and reminds us of a conflict that we had decidedly tried to ignore. The truth is that we should have paid this issue the proper attention months ago when they were kicking out UN officials, taking out fuel rods, testing missiles and tailing American spy planes. Time and time again, smart people around the world have been saying that this is the most unpredictable and unstable regime in the world. In fact, North Korea’s highest ranking defector has said this and confirmed what we were all fearing: Kim Jong Il is not just using nuclear weapons as a bargaining chip. If necessary, if pushed into a corner, he will use them.

But what bothers me the most about all of this is that all of the progress we seemed to have made during the Clinton administration has been undone by the current one. By not giving the crisis in North Korea the necessary attention and by taking an overly strict stance, the Bush administration has brought us back ten years, only this time, the North Koreans have had time to truly develop their nuclear weapons program. Gone are the inspirational days when families were reuniting for the first time after fifty years of separation, where brother could see brother once again, even if for a few moments under heavy guard. Gone are the days when North and South walked under one flag, even if only at the Olympics. Gone are the days when North Korea seemed to be willing to open up to South Korea so that Koreans could be united for one brief moment and perhaps, the world could see it as a sign that one day, outsiders would be allowed into the isolated country and bring compassion, democracy and change.

As a Korean American, I hold no allegiance to North Korea. If anything, I am among the most adamant about ending its dictatorial regime. Instead, I hold allegiance to America and Americans, to human beings both inside and outside of North Korea and the Korean peninsula, hoping that we will not be victims of nuclear war, of famine, of the unpredictable insanity of a dictator. And I hold allegiance to the Korean people, whether we are in North Korea, South Korea, the US or anywhere else, that we might be able to see families reunited, our people united once again. That we will no longer see our brothers and sisters living in hunger, in fear, in a quiet desperation under the control of a dictator.

Cartoon taken from NBC 10’s News Today.

Why trilogies don’t work

My big accomplishment for the second day of my vacation is seeing The Matrix: Revolutions. It wasn’t horrible, despite some negative reviews. But I think the big disadvantage The Matrix Trilogy is battling against is the general challenge trilogies and their makers face: overly high expectations.

Usually, movies that seem worthy of ending up as the first part of a trilogy are often groundbreaking or special in some way. For example, “The Matrix” was particularly innovative because of its groundbreaking special effects. It truly took advantage of how far computers had come and what the whole concept of special effects can really bring to the big screen– the ability to create a world completely unlike our own. Instead of trying to make the real world more “special,” such as making explosions bigger and louder, the special effects in “The Matrix” helped create this new world, what it was like to be in this concept of “the matrix,” and rendered an aural and visual experience impossible otherwise. Another example of this kind of special effects use would be in the Quidditch scene in Harry Potter.

In addition to special effects use, “The Matrix” was innovative because of its storyline. To most, it was particularly unique and posed very interesting questions by asserting that our entire human existence was just a simulated computer experience. (Although, I and others argue that this storyline was very similar to the 1998 movie Dark City.) Moviegoers were blown away by this fantastical premise and were drawn into watching Neo discovering the matrix– we learned right along with him.

However, with the second movie, the special effects were no longer as novel and glamourous as in the first, although technically they were quite impressive (especially the many Agent Smiths). And the storyline wasn’t so earth-shattering anymore– we already know about this world set up in the first movie– and everyone is just waiting to find out what happens next, some type of resolution and since we all know there’s a third movie coming out, we’re not really drawn into the second movie in the series. So, in the end, you end up writing off the second movie as simply a stepping stone, a set up for the finale– how most middle movies in trilogies are written off.

Then why is the third movie considered such a disappointment? Because with the first movie, we are blown away by the premise, with the second movie, we are just waiting to see what’s next and with the third movie, we finally do see what happens. And it never lives up to what we expected. After we’ve identified with a concept, characters and a storyline, while waiting for the next release, we consciously or subconsciously develop an idea of what we think would or should happen, an idea of what we might want to happen. And even if never truly realize those ideas, verbalize them and make them real to ourselves, we build up a subconscious expectation of something that’s probably impossible in the end and find ourselves wondering why the final movie in a trilogy is never as good as we thought it was going to be. It’s like getting hyped up for a party and then, it’s rarely ever quite as fun as you thought it was going to be.

Trilogies that are often considered in this category:

• The Matrix (of course)
• Back to the Future

How do you work around this problem? One option is to make a trilogy out of movies with storylines that don’t really have anything to with each other, but have the same characters that exist in the same overarching universe. This holds true for any series or sequels. Some people don’t feel that these movies deserve to be called “trilogies,” but nevertheless, they often are. Trilogies that fall into this category:

• Indiana Jones
• Die Hard

Of course, the problem with this option is that you can always break the three movie rule and continually make additional sequels (as is the case for both of the above trilogies), usually of far lower quality than the first three movies. Examples of this pitfall:

• Superman
• Rocky

The other better option is to only make a trilogy (or any other series of sequels) out of a story that is truly epic enough to warrant multiple movies. Don’t just make a bunch of sequels because with special effects and whatever else, you can stretch a storyline for three movies. All three movies should follow an overarching story arc, but in the end, each movie should be chock full o’goodness and can usually stand as a great movie on its own (even if you might follow the story better after seeing what comes before and/or after). Trilogies that fall into this category:

• Lord of the Rings
• The Godfather
• Star Wars (before the release of the other episodes)

Of course, with sequels being so popular, I’m sure bad sequels and even worse, bad trilogies will continue to be made, released, and disappoint.

Vacation: Day 1

Things I did today:

1. Slept in. Although I did have a dream about work.
2. Caught up with my TiVo.
3. Cleaned my house.
4. Agonized over my yet unshipped eBay purchase.
5. Got my nails done. (Current nail color: Cognac by Essie.)
6. Gave in to my temptation to check my work email. 91 messages. Scary.
7. Bought and installed a new 160 GB hard drive, although the partitions are all messed up because of the 137 GB confusion.
8. Picked up some shampoo finally.
9. Had some milk tea and Q-Pop chicken. Yum.

The last two done while dodging a strange drunk guy in downtown (and being mistaken for being with him/his friend). All in all, a surprisingly productive day for a vacation day. On the agenda for tomorrow: sleep.