In the end, all things break down to a desire for love. No one admits it but everyone lives it!
Case in the point is someone who is actively seeking to destroy the world because he feels he cannot have love. And the reason this person feels this way is because of his dyslexia.
His "I'm a victim!" charade is simply due to hiding a common condition. And there you have it, folks. Your human comedy playing out right before our eyes and no one saying a word.
When the Israelites began to lose battles, Joshua asked God, “Wassup wit dat? You said we’d win!”
“You got a homey stealing shit from your enemies. That won’t fly.”
So homey was found and purged from the tribe and winning ways resumed.Nowadays we find the honest people, purge *them*, so the corruption can continue. In the immortal words of Alec Leamas: “What a planet!”
7/7/23
Talked to a millionaire friend of mine and told him I was counting down the days to retirement. He said he tried it three times and didn’t like it. He’s working at a job even now.But I told him for me it would be like getting out of jail and feel alive for first time in my life.
When your gun buddy asks you about gun rights tell them you think every 18 year old should be issued a bazooka! If they think that’s too much then ask where *they* would draw the line.
Stop asking hypocrite politicians if they support a nationwide ban on abortion. Ask them why they would not.
If the reply is “states’ rights” then assert they are then pro abortion in part of the country.
The rape, murder, and annihilation of Ukraine can be stopped in a heartbeat by admitting them to NATO and pushing out the terrorists.
Some insist this is not possible but the answer remains the same whether chosen or not.
Things are dying all around us
...And yet we pretend
Children are drugged up zombies
...And yet we pretend
Anger keeps rising
...And yet we pretend
Trash keeps piling
...And yet we pretend
Trust is evaporating
...And yet we pretend
Lying gets louder
...And yet we pretend
We know there's no endgame to this
...And yet we pretend
1981 was the tipping point, the beginning of our post-truth world. We celebrated the newfound freedom of insanity, untethered to reality. The march towards to destruction accelerates with the growing consciousness of the futility of our way of life - a way of life we've killed for. Fear is the new national pastime. Enemy creation our national obsession. Thinking getting others to agree with our lies will save us will turn out to be one of the great human comedies of all time.
But nothing can stop the coming revelation. And the Days of Lies And Poses will be gone forever.
It was a question she'd only murmured to herself up to this point in life. A wrong answer could mean an annihilating ruin, cast into the deepest depths of hell. So best not to know.
But why now, at 57, as she's getting ready with her morning makeup, dabbing and brushing, seeing her face in the mirror same as a thousand times before, did this question burst forth?
Perhaps one can only hold one's secrets in for so long. Shame she didn't die before this question came to the fore. She could have pulled off the perfect crime.
Sheila the Hidden Housewife had mastered her role as the dutiful wife, loving mother, and - most of all - fierce protector of her way-of-life. So fierce, in fact, she'd killed to protect it.
Murder weighs on one's mind and only gets heavier over time.
Perhaps that also explained her recent nightmares of entrapped suffocation, eternally drowning in horror.
The art of successfully living a lie is in one's dedication. Oh, the bitterness she swallows on a daily basis, grinding her into tormented rage.
Just make it stop!! Someone make it stop! This can't go on!
And, yet, it does. Certainly a question is in order with such a dilemma.
"Who am I?"
Her previous answers of "Nobody" wouldn't suffice this time. But if she were something or somebody that would mean she'd spent a lifetime in self-betrayal. A 'nobody' does what is expected and the world applauds. That had become the center of her life.
The murder of her love had been a necessary evil, she reasoned. After all, worldly approval is all a 'nobody' has to live for. Only if she's 'somebody' would it be a crime.
An old and cold fate awaits her the rest of her remaining days. She'd made sure her world is locked tight where no one can get in to speak unwanted words - which also means no way out.
"Confess!"
Nooo, you idiot! NEVER do that. You'll die on the streets alone and unforgiven. You'll die with your lies in a snake filled pit, hated by any who see you!
Yet she must come clean somehow. Even set for life with her millions she raged against imaginary foes who wished to destroy her. They were the reason she has no future.
Yes, her Bible told her she must be a clean spirit. But not now. Maybe tomorrow.
Saint Petersburg is the historic soul of Russian culture with her grand architecture and exquisite art. Inside one of these buildings filled with connecting grand ballrooms had gathered dignitaries of the criminal elite (i.e. the mob and government officials), agents who conducted the business of state wielding power in an infinite state of internecine conflict.
In dresses unfamiliar to their wearers were women who monitored from the edges of the rooms: the order of Savaged Souls. Peasant women plucked from rural villages traditionally brutalized by the state, left to starve and fend for themselves as their crops and livestock were plundered by city dwellers throughout Russian history.
With no way to fight back, they turned on each other, maiming and disfiguring in heated hate, crippled for life. From such places were these woman recruited.
Part of their training was gang rape from troops conscripted for war (conscripts are pulled from rural areas to keep the city elites on board with the Ukrainian war.). The soldiers took their anger out on these women until the eyes of the women flickered with life no more. From this point on, their only mission in life is to kill men - a very useful tool for the state.
A few of the Savaged Souls mingled with party-goers, missing nothing and no one, in communication with their stationary partners along the edge. Each possessed a hidden blade hungry for sanctioned blood. Trained and inbred with these knives, the women were impossible to disarm. Only death can stop the cutting.
An Intruder was at this party. He too is stopped only be death. Though his mouth betrayed a certain cruelty of decision, his eyes were alive - that was his edge. But he was just the sort of person for whom the Savaged Souls were seeking.
For the Intruder the women posed a problem. Inept pot-bellied military generals - the only kind Russia allows to stay alive lest they become too popular for the president czar's comfort - had been compromised by the Intruder who now needed a way out. But there was no fooling the deep dark ethnic eyes upon him. He'd been spotted.
That's when the lights went out.
Screams and gasps of resigned fear echoed within. A killing time had come.
One terrorized voice wailed. "My name is Igorian Petrovitch! I am protected member of the syndicate!"
"Oh, shut up, Igorian. There's nothing to be done now," replied a weary older voice.
But others cried out their names hoping their station and political connections would protect them.
Like hissing snakes the assassins slithered through the rooms seeking the Intruder. A heavy air of despair silenced the room in diminishing murmur. Only the rustling of the women's formal attire could be heard.
The gig was up. Deception is no protection this time. This must be faced head on.
"My name," stated an unapologetic voice with singular clarity, "is BOND."
It was like a nightmare from which I could not wake at the Motel No-Tell.
First I hear the grunting of a large nude black man with a gorilla mask over his head. Behind him is a well-suited white man with CEO PRICK printed on his back as he deeply penetrates gorilla guy. As he finishes, the black man angrily confronts the courtyard and yells, "Next!"
On a far wall a man is singing and wailing his one hit wonder, rabidly hitting his head against the bricks because he'll "never have that love again."
In the middle of the yard a man was being kicked and beaten in tormented desire - or as they called it: Tongue Fu fighting. The beaten man struggled to his feet crying, "Who didn't hit me?? I know someone didn't hit me!"
A man in a white robe was identified as the non-hitter. The Beaten Man was livid to his core. "Kill him! Kill him NOW!"
"Now you will pay for not hitting!"
The fighters proceeded to murder him in the worst way possible and when someone asked Beaten Man why he rationalized, "Because he's not like us and will betray us. But after he's safely dead we'll declare him a savior who died for our sins making us saved. Brilliant, huh?"
Along the perimeter I noticed a string of explosives. A group of children was placing detonators in them. "They think we don't know what's going on but we do and we're going to blow this place back to hell!"
One man panicked as he noticed the impending doom planned by the children. "Hey, look, we'll be blown up if we don't do something!"
The CEO barked, "Shut up! I'm busy!" The Tongue Fu fighters laughed, "We don't have to care. We are saved!" The head banging zombie singer slurred, "It sounds like a hit!"
Although with only a few minutes left to spare, the motley crew assembled for a press conference. Gorilla man put on his judge's robes. The CEO proudly displayed his instrument of profitable rape. The fighters put on their priestly collars. Dead head crooner exalted in an audience at last.
The judge declared the white-robed man's murder to be "absolutely legal - no appeal!" The priests displayed their bloody faces saying, "We've been persecuted for our sins!" One Hit Wonder guy confidently proclaimed the constant banging of his head against the wall "has finally fixed me! Everything seems great!"
Those were the final words spoken before the great blast which I heard as I myself was fleeing far into the desert. The explosion left no stone in place. In front of me was a sign designed to enlighten me: "Desert = death! Do not enter!"
CODA: Later I was banned from MSNBC's Morning Joe for insinuating Supreme Court Justice Uncle Tom Thomas was regularly sodomized by a real estate CEO who'd inherited all his wealth. Sorry, not sorry. Got to call them as I see them.
When the police give a lie detector test, they start with a few innocuous questions to measure your reaction.
"Place of birth?"
"I can't answer that."
"Sir, this is not a game."
"You'll be upset. I could tell you and you still wouldn't know."
"Just answer the question."
"The Dog Star, as you call it. Sirius."
The two detectives and the man running the lie detector sighed at one another.
"I can't accept that as an answer."
"Does it show as a lie?"
"I need an honest answer to set an honest baseline."
"I gave you one."
The tall detective spoke up. "You're from another planet? That's your story."
"Not everything is as it appears. Forget what you know."
The men queried each others' faces.
"You're going to sit in that chair until you answer truthfully."
"No, I'm not going to sit in this chair unless you can prove I'm lying."
"Look, pal," said the short detective. "I don't care what kind of game you're playing, we won't stand for this."
"Your game. Your rules. I'm following them, you're not. No way I can stay in this chair if you don't accept the truth."
"Is that right? You going to zap us with a ray gun?"
"There are no weapons in space. That would be complete insanity, like devising something to blow my own arm off."
"How convenient: 'no weapons in space.'"
"There's a structure to the universe you clearly do not understand."
"Well, buddy, I'll tell you what I do understand -"
"Your violence speaks for itself. You are at war with yourself, you can see it in your eyes. Once you move beyond that, the universe will pour forth, simple as that."
"We're not interested in the universe, only our investigation."
"Th universe is your investigation. Open your eyes! You're crying out for it, pleading for hope and an everlasting way to life."
"If you keep refusing to cooperate we can only infer the worst."
"Infer as you please. I have not spoken falsely. Search within and ask yourselves. Determine for yourself what is right and what is wrong. Anything else is a betrayal."
"How is it we can make you understand we don't care about the universe??"
"You might as well say you're not interested in breathing - while you do exactly that!"
"OK, I've had enough of this. But I'm going to get this much on the record: you know so much, tell us just what the universe is."
"You already know."
A murderous silence entered the room. Up and down reversed. The three inquisitors instinctively felt the urge to kill. The angriest of them exploded.
"I can tell you one thing! I can tell you what the universe is NOT! It's not LOVE!!"
The butter was melting and the popcorn was popping as Jamison waited on my living room couch. It's not often I get to inflict my Asian passion on someone. Today he was going to meet one of the all time great film characters: the blind swordsman Zatoichi.
I was hoping to provide something I rarely got during my own homeless bouts: a reprieve from the constant bombardment of scorn and soulless judgments. It felt almost too good to be true, that somehow God was slipping up to let this slide through the net of daily torment.
And I wasn't being completely selfish: Jamison already loved samurai films.
I put the popcorn down in front of him when:
"Man, I can't do this. I gotta go."
I knew that disturbed, lost tone - I've used it myself. But I had to say something.
I was dead-ending my way down the crumbling concrete of the side streets of my apartment cell wandering and wondering how to live up to the life narrative I'd constructed so not to spoil my script as I peered a poverty stricken fellow with his head stuck under the hood of his misbegotten jalopy under a searing sun with only a hint of sky boiling we in the immaterial world with the lost pity of eyes spying ants vialed in endless labors when in sudden final exasperation a twinkling surrender unleashes a universe of uncried tears whose pull halts the earth causing it to spin no more
After a lifetime of despair, I collapse on my front lawn. As my head hits the green Spring grass, I remember how I got here: trust no one.
I realize I trust no one because I don't trust me.
As birds sing out to each other I spy two insects exactly alike only one has small pieces of purple and gold draped on him as if they were a hat and a robe.
The draped one is giving absolution to the second one and I think: "How can one insect give absolution to another?"
Neighbor across the street comes out to check his mail. His face is bloodied and one eye injured and patched. It was from his auto-feeding cyber fork. He need only sit there and food is delivered to his mouth.
Only its aim is not too good and it is possible he could lose that eye. "But isn't it cool!" he pleads, begging for belief.
Two brazenly blonde girls of rich man's loins stroll down the street. Too late they see me splayed in green demise and proselytize that all their blessings "flow from God."
I sigh, "No one who believes that says that." I don't know if they heard me.
Johnny "Ten Toes" (Don't ask. He just wanted a nickname) pulls excitedly into his driveway. He gets out and exclaims, "Don't just be smart, be Wal-Smart!"
People wander over to see a giant "W" branded onto his forehead. Johnny explains he's getting a commission for the disfigurement.
"That's a pretty smart whore!" assume many in the horde.
A loudspeaker from a pickup truck blares around the corner. In the back is a frail man propped up by stiff dried lizards who used to be men. A sign says, "STRONGEST MAN IN THE WORLD!"
He's known as the Great Deceiver and as such those who can still move (unlike me) gather around. I hear a woman say, "Only the deceitful tell the truth. Everyone else is a sucker."
Enraptured, they follow him to a nearby cliff of fatality to flap their arms and fly. An Earnest Man tries to stop them. "Verily I say unto you: Do not go off this cliff or you will die!"
"Now that we shut him up we can be free and fly!"
The Earnest Man is duly crucified as a power-mad controller bent on preventing their flight to salvation. The Great Deceiver lashes out.
"What is this 'Gravity'? Show from where it comes. If it cannot be explained it must not be true!"
But as the first one falls screaming to his death, the next in line proclaims with pride, "I hereby double-down!"
As does each that follows. His mission fulfilled, the Deceiver continued on his rampage across the land.
Atop a hill afar with the setting sun glowing behind it, I see a raven-haired girl lost in mystic Spanish sorrow cry tears of gold.
A dream meant to be she does not see, slipped forever in time.
I agreed to go to church with my friend because I had nowhere else to go and did not want anyone to know that.
The sermon was titled "Lonely Is The Liar" and all sorts of things went through my head, as if it were directed at me. Is this why I was invited?
I drastically wanted to get up and walk out but that would have been social suicide. But to my final regret it was just the opposite...
After the service of a thousand years I was finally free. My friend said we could go out the back way and avoid meeting the priest. Was my friend ashamed of me? Or was my friend ashamed for inviting me under false pretenses? Lonely is the liar.
Either way I did want out with as little exposure as possible.
We descended through the basement where the church artifacts are kept. It was like a huge labyrinth of crisscrossing stairways and light was sparse. I felt we'd stepped back into medieval times
I blindly followed my friend but we soon got lost. We heard a rustling noise down the end of one of the countless hallways to find a doorway with a privacy ribbon across it.
It was the priest's quarters! He was masturbating in the bathroom. So we frantically turned our back on that way out.
It's holy when he does it!
Places after that got mustier and dustier. There were a bunch of old robes laying about on a stairway leading up. My friend felt sure that was the way but I was exhausted and decided to stay back for a bit.
I never saw my friend again. No trace anywhere, as if fallen into an abyss. Now what??
I remembered Rambo stuck in a cave using a torch to detect air flowing out. I gathered the old robes and wrapped them on a cross, setting them aflame. I'd worry about the blasphemy later.
To my shock it actually worked as I came to an out-of-use entryway with broken glass in the doors. I could see the outside at last!
Then dozens of sheriff's cars came screeching up and deputies with guns drawn came pouring out. Someone yelled, "Shoot the fucker!"
Had I triggered an alarm? Even if it wasn't me they were intent on shooting I didn't want to be caught in the crossfire.
We all know how cops fantasize about shooting people.
I stumbled back down the stairs back into the dark passageways, my torch burning out. There was no going back.
Or forward.
How did I even get here?? Oh, God, what can I do?
I could have just left during the service when I wanted to and avoided this nightmare! Why do I always think it's wrong to do what I want? I have a right to my feelings! I was terrified of not sparing others' feelings. I must face up! Dishonesty was my downfall. Now I die alone in the dark, knowing what I need to know too late.
Silent darkness engulfs me. I deem myself unlovable and deserving to die, so why even try?
Then, like a miracle, I heard a woman's voice calling out my name, pleading for me, like I'd always wanted to hear. Her voice echoed through the chambers.
No way could I let her see me like this, to know what a lying cowardly idiot I've been! I'll find her when I get out so she can see me in my best light!
But I did so want to cry out, every instinct and desire in my body yearned for her. A little voice kept asking, "Why am I staying silent?"
It's only when her voice stopped did I realize my horror: there is no reason for silence. Eternally too late, I called back until my voice gives out but the chance I thought would always be there is gone forever.
I was going to only let her see me after I got out but she was the way out.
We're all looking for something to live for and to die for. I crumple down in final despair. For my lies I do die but there was no reason why.
If you cling to your life, you will lose it.
But if you let your life go, you will save it.
Peering mirages through a Dali Impossible Desert I see masses of purposeless people...leading is a hero complex, a Man Without Purpose..."Now we have purpose!" they chant in follow accord...the Man Without Purpose - defiant to his ending - heads them to cliffs where buffalo were once driven...I ask a passing woman why she chants as such. "I'm not chanting, you idiot's idiot! I hate chanters a-chanting!"...none noticed me but all felt fear, eyes woefully shut to draw worth from the Man Without Purpose...one follow-man reads my thoughts. "Do not tell us what you see," he insists with stubborn pitchfork. "An open eye destroys faithless hope."
A smokey line in the not so distance took me to a city on mountain high. A house of refined fineness burned as a man with robotic smile stood proudly by out front...when I remarked on his flaming dilemma he shook my hand with both hands imploring, "I thank you for your concern. You're a good man."...then he gave a wink to deport myself. "I hope you'll say as much of me someday."...that seemed a curious profit as I reached the edge of the orderly block a wind blowing in a far away voice cried: "We're the city on the hill! The best there's never been!"
In the city square, every building has a steeple, stores and temples alike, the banks tallest of all...a man in a fiery fast car to be envied screeched up beside me...his Contorted Face turns to me to explain, "Suburban urban pain is the worst!"...then he twisted-turned forward-backward to the rear view mirror. "The dream trapped forever within."...as he reversed back to where he'd run from in Sisyphean defeat
Loosened Children mobbed me as coal mine canaries.
"We're in trouble!" "We're in trouble!" "We're in trouble!" "We're in trouble!" "We're in trouble!"
I suffered to ask why.
"It's our parents!" "It's our parents!" "It's our parents!" "It's our parents!" "It's our parents!"
"Do you want to take me to them?"
They silenced in deafening disappointment. "Oh, no," they rejected in unison. "It's so hard raising parents nowadays," their furrowed brows sighed. "They just won't listen."
A Singled Mother accompanied by hungry mouths to plead of her own making asked me, "Food, please, food."...I informed her I had no food..."Then where can we get what truly we are owed as fellows beings?"..."From those who have food?"..."No, that would be wrong. They told us so."..."They told you wrong."..."I'm not one to think unpleasant thoughts of others."..."But you just said it's a human right!"..."I'm only moral when disconnected."...thus she pleasantly starved in the land of plenty Storming towards me with panther lust eyeing fresh meat was a Man Undisputed..."I'm angry! Angry, I tell you! This insanity must stop or it will be the end of all of us!"..."I would not dispute that."..."Of course not! I'm a man of the season of reason. Once I have the Final Answer we'll be saved! So betray me please with an answer."..."Love?"..."Love! Never love. I do know what the answer is not!"..."If you didn't know what you not know then you'd know what you do know."...he quizzed his head for a lost moment. "I know I want to be angry."
My eyes turned to the night sky where I swam among star dreams dancing in the infinity of a future already passed, singing songs of boundless joy with knowledge of light both known and unknown causing me to lift my arms in released delight, at last.
Then a Mob Of Politic Saviors spots me as they'd been Jacobin informed by the Man Undisputed of my certain lunacy. "You fool! We found the answer: Magic Rocks. Rocks is all you need! We had them implanted in our Elongated head. Come with us to Impossible Desert. In the sand an unmade man will save us/you/all!"...as I stared at the loveless eyes boring me I knew I had finally come full encirclement.
Some of the crowd I used to run with call me "Howard Hughes" now. But they are gone for a reason, living only in the corner of my eye. Can a bum have real friends anyway?
I scrape by day after day, staying mentally intoxicated; living inside my head where I can make true things untrue - and untrue things true.
I've got nowhere to go, floating in the vacuum of space, grasping on emptiness. Any scrap of life I do find is immediately used as fuel for my lying mind. With a billion dollars (1.2) at my disposal I technically can do anything I want. So why do I feel so trapped?
I'm just like the wino who funnels every cent he finds to stay in his bottle. Put a wino in a penthouse and that's me.
I hide in esoteric mania on Mercury and Mars, where any truth I find remains unknown to this world. Do you know how disorienting it is to see the stars from a different planet? With all reference points lost, one is wholly at the mercy of one's thoughts.
An even bigger wino than me
Dying alone isn't much of a plan. I searched every goddam crook and crevice but cliche as it is, only love is real. Maybe it's only me but I can't find a way around it. There's no end game to anything else, only a series of dead ends.
I read where it would cost 250 million to air condition Texas prisons. Last summer here in Dallas was excruciating so that headline stuck out to me. I could write a check to cover that cost.
But it's not money that's holding them back as much as being possessed with crucifying Jesus. That's where the real battle would be, on the spiritual plane.
How's a wino going to win that fight? Especially when the truth does not suffice. I would need help.
What's to be done? (Probably what every wino says)
Goupil, Born c. 1973; Marseilles, France. 5'11, 82 kg.
Following is pieced together from worldwide intelligence and police reports and subject's diary.
At 17, subject killed his girlfriend in a heated argument. From this incident he was unable to recover.
Tied to a guilt that hounded him until death, he judged himself a killer, a fate from which he believed could not rise above.
Attaching himself to criminal elements on the French docks, the subject made his first for-hire kill at 19.
His reputation grew over time as that of a "reliable man". Connections were made overseas making him an international commodity of the highest order.
Subject kept to himself with an extremely low profile. This was fueled by the fact he did not trust himself with another personal relationship.
His career both peaked and crashed in Russia on an assignment originating from Senator [CLASSIFIED], after which the subject himself became the target as a possible loose end.
He self-documented his time on the run, psychologically breaking down as his self-myths shattered, leaving him in a hazed state of confusion.
Searching for lost redemption and grasping for impossible hope, he strayed into religion, online political forums, and self-exposure in a fast food drive-through.
Still, through this time he was able to remain connected to the reality of his legal situation and was able to evade pursuit though much of it was due to his unexpected life choices throwing off law enforcement.
With the walls closing in on him over time, realizing escape meant merely treading water with no resolution in sight, subject ended his wasted life.
A full accounting of the subject's activities is still ongoing by French authorities, hoping to solve past assassinations on French soil. All references to Senator [CLASSIFIED] were scrubbed beforehand.
It's been a good 25 years since I walked into Premiere Video, Dallas's legendary movie rental store, and saw this snarling face of Klaus Kinski. I had a standing rule never to rent a film based on its cover alone. In this case I (thankfully) violated it.
From the initial haunting scene descending from the mists of the mountainside into the depths of the Amazon jungle, we're taken on an odyssey of insanity. Watching the film, one senses the terror of being trapped in a whirlpool, hoping against hope for a way out. It never comes.
Kinski is the perfect vehicle for this madness, a single-minded agent of destruction whose purity in thought lies in its absolute devotion to power. His way must rule! Only when it's too late does anyone stand up to his beloved delusions.
I had a chance to view it on the big screen at the famed Texas Theater last week. And, boy, did it blow my socks off. Not just its enlarged presence on the big screen, but as a commentary on the suicide of our time. I can't tell you how many moments I wanted to scream out loud, "This is us!"
Even the first time watching this I said to myself, "What the fuck are they doing dragging that stuff through a jungle?" The "civilized people" taking vestiges of civilization wherever they went in some sort of fantastical delusion, reality be damned. The environment must adopt to them.
"This is us!"
The more dire the situation the more they cling to vain illusions of a future: passing laws, nominating a king, instituting a social structure. In stubbornly adhering to these rituals signifying nothing, the more they seal their fate while floating down a river into oblivion; running out of food, driven onward possessed by a false sense of entitlement. This is us.
Our pretense is everywhere, ceaselessly propagating our madness can continue forever. We're all supposed to be in on the joke, congratulating ourselves on our cleverness of lying and "getting away" with it. But just like the grotesquely doomed party of Aguirre, we only become more pathetic, more ridiculous, and more farcical by the day - until nothing is left.
I had my doubts while watching this on where exactly it was going with the story. Turns out my fears were mislaid by a rewarding ending. The film is an outstanding commentary on how peoples' lives look from the outside as compared to the inside. Or, at least, that was the intent. It does succeed in many ways but they failed to fully flesh out the story. The wife keeps saying there was more to their marriage than just the negative aspects that came to light. Fair enough. SHOW IT. Show us what brought you two together and the flower of love once nurtured. That would have been a home run instead of a triple.
What a mess this film was. For some reason it was set in 1970 but the dialogue is very 2023. That's just the beginning of the contrivances for characters that have no real grounding and a story with no underlying truth. This was written wholly with the audience in mind as to what will get the most applause from moment to moment. These people simply had nothing to say regardless of how badly the film wanted to believe it has something to say.
Another Ridley Scott spectacle film. This will thrill the mouth-breathers who will be taken in by the huge battle scenes and allegedly kinky bedroom dialogue. Good for them! But while Scott is many things, he never has been and never will be a storyteller. I'm a huge Blade Runner fan and his broken narrative style worked perfectly for that film but only in an outlier case like that does it excel. The director is also highly defensive about his utter lack of historical accuracy and as a Napoleon fan I can tell you I don't know who that character is up on the screen, but it's definitely NOT Napoleon (or even a hint of Josephine).
Instead, the names were used as outlines to be filled in whole cloth from whatever commercial fantasies the filmmaker dreamed up. Scott's offensive response to those who criticized this approach was to say, "Get a life!" I suggest he should take his own advice to prevent any further waste of time and energy (his and ours).
some earth girl told me "no one is trash, we are all valuable"
i asked her if i could my rub my hard dick on her nice soft leg
then she said i was trash
i have that kind of power
i saw some fancy blonde chick in a giant ass white suv stop at the intersection
i wanted to rush up to her and say "mmmmm! you smell good!"
then she'd scream, go home, wail about how "something must be done about all these smelly homeless people!"
i have that kind of power
i could woo her with lines like "i used to shit inside too"
then she'd do her utmost to vote me out of existence
i belong to the army of the fallen
every day our numbers grow stronger
the number of yet to fall grows weaker
guess how that will turn out!
we have that kind of power
blondie stands barefoot on her marble floor demanding the world can be no other way
don't worry blondie, i got a spare trash bag for ya
By virtue of his 00 designation, Bond has a license to kill. It is not, however, a license to live.
*****
Oh, no. No way. This will never happen.
The minute Q branch brought out the device for him (were they smiling?), Bond's instinctive rejection was resolute and final. The scuba gear was for deep sea ice water with a special air tank designed for its user to be shot from a cannon with an ersatz umbilical cord deep into the sea where the user would have minutes to spare before death by compression.
"It's fully vetted, sir," claimed the technician, reading Bond's face.
Bond snorted with a wry smile and walked away.
It had always been a fine line he walked between being useful and being used. The difference, of course, being life and death. While Bond would never say he has no appetite for danger - bordering on a need - he kept it in balance with his survival instincts. It's the other fellow's job to die. Thus, when called before M for an explanation, Bond refused.
"So you'll not give me a reason then?" mused the wrinkled face of the ex-admiral.
Bond had never tested the old man like this before. He was about to see a side he'd never seen.
Bond shrugged. In observing the time it took M to form a response, 007 saw the respect the man had for his instincts and the futility of arguing with them.
"You understand this is not my decision. I have to revoke your 00 designation. In consideration of your considerable contribution in the past you may continue your time in the service in an administrative capacity, if that suits you."
The idea of that revolted him as much as the scuba contraption. "No, sir, it does not."
"Then let me leave you with this thought: Once you go out that door, there's no coming back."
M's final card played, Bond laid his gun on the desk and walked out. He, too, had no choice.
*****
The myriad of thoughts racing through Bond's mind while sipping whiskey alone in his flat were beyond his consciousness to record; a near death experience flashing before him.
He remembered The Promise, when he first entered the service, his rationale for taking orders in the first place: "If they ever cross the line, I'm quitting. No ifs, ands, or buts. I'm out, end of story."
As the days passed his peace with leaving had only grown stronger. No, he had not been rash or hasty. He did not overreact. For the first time in his life, time was on his side. It dawned on him that the day the service would cross the line was inevitable. He'd simply been pushing it out of his mind.
For whatever reason, Bond had always been drawn to Battersea Park. He'd sit on a bench overlooking the Thames and dream of 18th century naval ships, when Britain came to rule the seas. But sitting here now he felt something different. He noticed the soft sun, the glistening greenery, the mysticism of the shire.
Good God, how they'd laugh back at the office if they knew the thoughts in my head!
M was right about one thing, though: there's no going back.
*****
Though Bond no longer haunted the "good old boy" bars of his past, preferring rather a local pub that granted him a more lively view of the world, he knew contact was imminent.
The psychology of the man the service picked was obvious: send a younger version of himself. And as he approached Bond in his booth, the man certainly had all the boxes checked - except one. Bond was his own man while his opponent clearly was not.
The sent man was all grins and charm as he put out his hand. "Why, if it isn't 00 coward!"
The comment was loud, intended to be overheard, to rattle Bond.
Bond stood as the man arrived, gripped his outstretched hand and sheepishly replied, "You win! I can never hope to match your repartee."
The man had been prepared for anything but surrender. Truth was, Bond was incensed that such a juvenile comment was meant to fluster him. But it was the fake Bond who was now flustered.
"Sorry about that. Was a stupid thing to say. It's just that's there's a general consensus you skipped out when the going got rough. If there is a bomb embedded in the ocean floor it has got to be defused. I don't have to tell you what's at stake."
"Oh, bloody hell, you're right! Put that damn contraption on me and give me a shot at disarming the blasted thing."
The man squirmed trying read Bond's famous deadpan expression. "Well, uh, there's no coming back, of course."
Bond's eyes were drill bits into the man's mind. "But, of course," agreed Bond, still giving nothing away.
It's impossible to counter-punch a man who won't punch. Bond threw him a lifeline, flashing an ironic smile. "Kind of makes this entire conversation pointless, doesn't it?"
The knockout blow had its effect, the man dropping his facade, in a struggle for his life.
"I understand how you feel. I read your file. I was recruited like you were. I had my doubts when these pompous buggers made their pitch but I couldn't get their words out of my head."
Bond sipped his martini, recalling that same moment for him - the moment he made The Promise. At least he was being treated with more respect. He leaned back to let the man continue.
"So I think I know how you feel, this sense of betrayal. I've struggled with it myself." In this the man is being genuine, thought Bond. "But I've learned there's two types of evil in the world: both good and bad. We use the good evil to protect us from the bad, so to speak. It's how we ensure the future. And as ridiculous as this sounds, that's a pragmatism I've had to face."
Bond's sense of self-preservation went on red alert. He had no doubt of the struggle possessing the man's soul, of trying to live beyond the crossed line, crying out for both help and murder with the same voice.
"Sounds like a conversation for your pastor," Bond blithely responded, buying time has he calculated the situation.
The man's presence left the moment. "You could say I've already had it."
The 'pastor' in this case would be an overlord in the secret service sanctioning the job - as if one man can sanction another man's murder in the eyes of God.
Could Bond defeat this man? Yes. Could he defeat every man sent to kill him? No. Bond had come too far to look over his shoulder the rest of his life.
Sliding out from the booth, standing as an easy target mere feet away, Bond looked at the man as one who'd faced death before. Everyone must pay for one's sins. Time to pay for mine.
"Then do what you musn't," he offered, his gaze never leaving the man's now anguished face.
Like all assassins, the man had been programmed, cajoled, bribed, and punctured into making the hit. Bond was simply giving him a sense of his immortal soul.
Then something unexpected happened: the man retched, turning his head, coughing and puking on the bench. He felt used, a sucker on a fool's errand, placing blood on his hands like a Roman crucifier, wrecking his own future. No "good" evil, after all.
Bond left the man to himself, slipped out the back door, and checked into an anonymous hotel.
*****
CODA: In ancient Japan, the country was divided between East and West. Ishida of the West took over Osaka castle, an impregnable fortress. His plan was to take hostages from the families of the clans there to force them to his side. First on his list to kidnap was Gracia Hosokawa, the beloved and admired wife of a powerful general. Literate and multi-lingual, she changing her name with her conversion to Catholicism.
Only his plans went awry as Gracia let herself be killed before she'd let herself be taken hostage. The fury and outrage over this bungled attempt forced Ishida to abandon his plans for hostages. In this way, also, the plan to eliminate Bond was discarded.
