MovieChat Forums > Lovecraft Country (2020) Discussion > Beautifully Executed Crap

Beautifully Executed Crap

posted 4 years ago by R_Kane (15828)
8 replies | jump to latest

My topic headline is specific to Ep 7, “I Am.” I want to like this series. I really do. It engages me viscerally. It has first-rate casting and production values. It mixes the occult and social commentary exponentially better than Season 3 of Penny Dreadful. BUT: (1) gotta say this, the name is pronounced Hip-OL-ita, NOT Hip-O-Lee-ta, and she was the queen of the Amazons; (2) if you know me at all, you know I champion women warriors, but the fight between Hippolyta’s African women tribe and a cadre of male Confederate soldiers was absurd because the men would have used their firearms to kill the women (cf, Raiders of the Lost Ark), so this scene was blatant, pandering bullshit; (3) the scene with the presumably extra-dimensional entity with the mile-wide Afro who tells Hippolyta that (and this is a paraphrase) “black Americans don’t exist” is yet another lash across the back of a dead horse— sophomoric, sophist, smug and simplistic as hell, and should have been beneath this series. Sadly, it was not.

Other than that, I enjoyed it.

[–] Filmtenk2 (3401) 4 years ago

What become of the security guard that went through the portal did he go on a wild ride also?

[–] [deleted] 4 years ago

He came from beyond and was re-animated as Pickman's muse going on an Antarctic mission with a stop at the bottom of the sea, fixing some awry architecture.

[–] MinaVladimir (4077) 4 years ago

I'm beginning to enjoy the show more and more, though its structure is a bit weird and wonky IMO. That being said the social commentary is a bit much. And by a bit much I mean it's both the text and the subtext in a very obvious way. As you said, it's simplistic. I feel like they wanted to have their cake and eat it too.

A sign of good horror is that the monster stands for the real thing your story is about. Here you have monsters and magic and all that, and then you have the reality which is also filled with human monsters (which admittedly must have been the reality of black people in the US at that time). It's a tricky thing keeping a balance between those two things and I don't think they're doing a great job on that front. As an example of someone that balances those things well I'll give Guillermo del Toro. His movies are filled with monters and over the top evil people in a fairy tail sort of logic and it somehow works and it's not as in-your-face as Lovecraft Country is.

I see there are a lot of threads about the racial content of the show. I don't think it's bad that the show is so focused on that, and it's obviously a conversation that needs to happen, and it probably is very cathartic for the people involved with the show. It's just that the execution is a bit lacking.

I'm all over the place here haha.

The worrior women, I though too that the men would've just shot at them. That's the main reason *some* European nations were able to colonise Africa. They had guns and the Africans didn't.

BTW, the humungous afro... I very much enjoyed it. It was great.

It's not necessarily a bad show, it's just a bit "extra", as the kids would say.

[–] R_Kane (15828) 4 years ago

Hello, Mina. It’s so good to see you again. I’ve been trying to find the time to tell you that. I hope you are healthy and safe🙏

[–] Forky (1739) 4 years ago

nah, it sucks

[–] exatera (3944) 4 years ago

Did you watch the last ep, Forky?

[–] joi2049 (5494) 4 years ago

According to this HIP wasn't an AMAZON but was suppose to be a MINO WARRIOR:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle/lifestyle-buzz/josephine-baker-was-just-the-mentor-hippolyta-needed-in-lovecraft-country/ar-BB19voYa?ocid=uxbndlbing

In the latest episode of HBO’s Lovecraft Country, Hippolyta Freeman (Aunjanue Ellis) embarks on an inter-dimensional journey of self discovery that takes her across planets and eras. She spends time in 19th century Benin as a Mino warrior, the female soldiers that inspired Black Panther’s Dora Milaje, and also became a futuristic space explorer. But first, she landed in Jazz Age Paris and temporarily traded her pleasantly decorous life as a widow, mother, and travel guide publisher to become a friend and dancer for legendary entertainer Josephine Baker (Carra Patterson).

Which also means if one hasn't seen that Black Panther film then knowing that she's a MINO Warrior also isn't going to help one to better understand or comprehend the situation where they're fighting what looks like Confederate soldiers.

And since NO ONE forced her to marry her husband, how fair is it to blame him for the decision that she made to be HIS WIFE when she also had the option to remain SINGLE???

Since she also ends up dressed up like the character on the cover of her daughter's COMIC BOOK, perhaps the best way to view what we saw was as it being a FANTASY rather than it being something that took place in REALITY???

That would probably also explain the way we'd see her exploding at the end of the FANTASY as if she were a FIREWORK that fizzles away into NOTHINGNESS???

In that sense it was also kind of like she was under the same kind of a TEMPORARY SPELL where whatever she was wasn't going to LAST very long before she's back to being HIP again (anymore than the other SPELL where RUBY becomes a WHITE WOMAN last for very long before she's back to being RUBY again)???

🧐

[–] [deleted] 4 years ago

It is woke nonsense that perpetuates the victimization of blacks.