Justice League - Review

When it comes to movie adaptions of comics, I am definitely on the Marvel side of life. Sure, I like Heath Ledgers Joker as much as the next guy (and already know I might be roasted for this statement), but Marvel is just a lot more fun for me. Also, I think Superman is the lamest super hero ever (c'mon please, roast me!).
But I am also a highly impressionable person and when the whole of the internet praises Wonder Woman I can't resist the urge to go watch it (the only reason I did not review it is that I was too much in awe to form any straight thoughts about it that could word an actual review - please note the very intentional use of the word straight in that sentence). And when my lady, my wife, the mother of my adopted children returns to the screen, I am impressively able to endure Superman and Ben Afflecks Batman.
Let's start with Batman, actually. I did not see any of the movies building up to Justice League (except WW), and I don't plan to change that. I think it is clear by now that I don't care for Superman, but what is my problem with Batsy? Well... I actually did like the Dark Knight Trilogy a lot. But never necessarily for Batman himself. I never liked any of Batman for Batman himself, to be honest. What I do like is all the characters surrounding him. The villains, obviously, but also characters like Comissioner Gordon, Alfred and Lucius Fox, and for a good part, I liked them in the TDK trilogy because they were cast incredibly well. Therefore, my problem with Ben Afflecks Batman is neither Batman nor Ben Affleck (even though, despite him apparently being one of Hollywoods nice guys, I am not a big fan of his either. It's Alfred not being Michael Caine anymore. It has to be Michael Caine. It's Lucius Fox not being Morgan Freeman anymore - it has to be Morgan Freeman. It's Gordon not being Gary Oldman anymore - you get the drift. Ben Affleck actually plays a quite decent Batsy (but his chin looks weird in the mask, just saying), but everything surrounding him feels wrong.
But let's talk about the newcomers instead because they are the ones who are actually interesting.
The Flash is a character I never dealt with before. I don't know shit about the Flash, so I can't compare the Flash I saw in Justice League with anything. What I saw is a young, quirky character, so quick not only physically but mentally as well that he stumbles, again, not only physically but vocally as well - he's awkward and clumsy, and for the later, I think that little flaw makes him interesting and human. Yeah, I can run super fast but I trip a lot while doing so. He is the main comic relief of the movie without it feeling like laughing at his cost. He brings a bit of Marvel into this DC movie, and I really hope to see a stand alone Flash movie in the future. Also, Ezra Miller is briliant, as always.
Then there's Cyborg who, in my opinion, has the biggest character developement to show for. We have this kid who should have died in the car accident he went through and who is bitter about being alive but not human. He hurts a lot. Wonder Woman, as the compassionate being with the giant heart that she is, tries to take care of him, but it's everything but easy to get through to him. Yet, he learns to embrace his everchanging super body and the opportunity to do good in this world with it.
Last but not least: DC finally managed to make Aquaman cool, but I guess everyone is cool when played by Jason Momoa.The lovely thing about this is that they picked up a lot of the things that made Aquaman so ridiculous before and turned them around for himself to make fun of them. Sadly, of all the less established characters, Aquaman is still the one least threedimensional.
Now what happens to all those characters that makes Justice League an actual story?
The premise for JL is that after Supermans death, the world is pretty much broken and very vulnerable. This opens up a chance for the mother boxes to be activated again. The three mother boxes serve both as a powerful weapon when combined and as portals for the one using the weapons: Steppenwolf, a godlike creature, who attempts to conquer and reimagine planet Earth with his army of parademons. Thousands of years ago, he was defeated by the combined powers of mankind, the amazons, the atlanteans, the olympic gods and the green lanterns, and the mother boxes were separated and hidden away: One was guarded on Themyscira, one in Atlantis and one was burried by the humans so no leader could try to use the power against other human tribes. But step by step Steppenwolf reclaims the boxes kept by the amazons and the atlanteans. Leaves the one burried by the humans, and thus the Justice League gets together to protect it and protect Earth from Steppenwolf and his army.
Boiled down like this, the plot is in fact pretty thin, it is a simple good vs. bad story, but the characters and their side-plots are what keeps Justice League alive and going. Of course it was not an epiphany, but it was solid entertainment and I really enjoyed watching it and would watch it again.
But next time, let Patty Jenkins do it. Just let Patty Jenkins do all of the DC movies from now on. Yeah, Zack Snyder, I saw what you did. Making the amazons outfits more revealing again and make Gal Gadots butt peek out occasionally makes it worse. 

Welcome to Third Reich 2.0

This morning, I woke up at 11am, drank a cup of coffee and then my grandma and I went to the polling station to vote in the federal election. Now it's 9pm, just 10 hours later, and I am depressed.
After the presidential election in November and the Brexit referendum I sure did lose some hope in humanity but somehow, I was able to be optimistic enough to not completely lose hope that our election in Germany wouldn't turn out as bad. Yes, I actually hoped for Germany to still remember that fascism is not a good idea, as we learned from our past. Apparently, a lot of people just took a lot of naps in History lessons.
For the ones who don't know yet: With over 13%, the relatively new right wing party AfD is the third strongest in our parlament now. To give you a remote idea exactly how right wing they are, a quote from their top candidate Alexander Gauland from just a few hours ago: "We will hunt them down and take back our country and our people." In this case, 'them' includes, for example, Angela Merkel. I think that says enough.
As my mum perfectly stated: This is basically just showing us directly, how very right wing this country still is. We now know for sure that about 1 in 5 people actually thinks that way. And we also know that 1 in 4 people couldn't be bothered to go vote to make their chance to get into the parlament smaller. Dear non-voters, this is on you too.
My friend asked me if I'd come to the town hall for a spontaneous demonstration, and as much as I wanted to, I had to realize that I can't do it tonight. I don't have the energy. So tonight I'm going to try to resist the urge to get drunk. Tomorrow, I'll try to somehow get out of bed. Next week, I'll resist the urge to take this as the final reason to move to Exeter (sorry Exeter friends). But when that is done... I'll fight. For the next four years, I'll fight for an openminded, caring Germany. I'll fight for kindness and for freedom and for equality. I'll not punch every Nazi I see because when it comes to physical violence I'm a bloody coward, but I will support anyone who has the courage to do so. I will never shut up against people who are racist, homophobic, misogynistic, transphobic, fascist etc. I will be loud, I will be aggresive, I will be uncomfortable to those who think they won for good now. I'll refuse to live in Third Reich 2.0. We all should. The 87% who voted against them. My fellow Germans - make those 4 years hell for AfD. We will not give up yet.

Excursion To Poetry #3 - Sep. 2017

Not here

nor there

a ghost wherever I go

not really here

nor there

nor anywhere.

What is home?

What exactly does home mean?

Home is where your heart is, they say,

but what if your heart is all over the place?

Little pieces left in every corner of the world

no matter where I go, there‘s always pieces missing,

not here, nor there, nor anywhere,

is fully home to me.

And with every place I go,

I leave bigger pieces behind,

hoping to find home in places

where I left the biggest one

and all the pieces,

all the places,

all the people,

combined in one,

make the biggest home just right inside my mind.

New job, new me - Update

When I leave at 2.30 pm today, I'll be 4 weeks into my new job.
It's surreal taking that in. Four weeks working for this new company, four weeks living in my hometown again, almost 9 weeks since I finished my apprenticeship. I guess I am a grown-up now? (I hope not)
I am not exactly working as a bookseller anymore. I am, in the broadest sense, but I am not spending my days standing in a shop, advising customers, recommending books, carrying shitloads of books anymore. I've got an office job now, and I like it a lot better than I thought, to be honest.
My job title is Customer Success Manager. Well, doesn't that sound fancy? Mostly, my work is managing subscriptions for university libraries. I make sure everything goes as smoothly as possible, have an open ear for complaints when something doesn't go smoothly, and on the side I do a bit of marketing as well. So far, everything goes well. I have a bit of trouble adjusting to the new software and learning a whole lot more about how eBooks work and suddenly having to write business corespondation in English (because you bet your ass I am hella insecure already when confronted with being professional in German to start with). But I learn and grow more confident every day.
Speaking of the company size (in my old job we were 5 people, now we're 60-something), I was pretty sure a lot would change for me transferring to such a (comparably) huge company. But I am good, actually? The people here are very lovely, welcoming me with open arms, taking care of me when I need help learning something, and the working conditions are great as well. I have flexible working hours, the possibility to get further education to do a better job at all times, we get informed about all the important stuff going on (for example, the re-organisation that is about to happen) and get a say in the stuff happening, and on top of that, I am paid well. What more do I want?
Right now, I am just a stand in for a colleague in maternity leave, so this job is only temporary right now, I'll work here until Autumn next year. But that's the great thing about this re-organisation - I might be able to stay because of that. I have a great opportunity here - everyone wish me luck things turn out as I plan. 

Oh Exeter...

There once was a girl who learned about the possibility of doing an internship abroad as part of her bookseller apprenticeship. Via an aquaintance she found his brother, a comic shop owner in Exeter, Devon, England, UK and spent a month there working in said shop, living with said brother and having the time of her life. That girl was me (now imagine a real loud gasp from an imagined audience).
That was last year in April. This year, my boyfriend and I decided to go to Exeter for a week to visit all the friends I've made during my time there and I fell in love with South England all over again.

Our journey began last Saturday. Early. Really early. We left the house at 7am to catch our flight in Düsseldorf at 10.55 am. I kinda sorta hate my boyfriend for being that keen about being early (rather than late, yes, it's the responsible thing but come on). We spent ages at the airport and to be honest, after security checks there's really not much to do in Düsseldorf airport. But oh well.
The one thing that is really annoying about Exeter is that it's not that easy to get there. You can't just take a flight straight from Düsseldorf to Exeter, no - you take a flight to London and then get on a coach to drive for another 3 hours until you finally arrive. Still absolutely worth it though.

Exmouth

Jup, I'm going to do the thing and write about Exmouth first thing in my post about Exeter. To be honest, to me they're more one city than two seperate ones. So we spent our sunday in Exmouth where my friend Lewis' parents live. They are definitely two of my favourite people in the world - when I met them in April last year they just welcomed me with open arms, they are almost ridiculously kind and warm people and I am very glad I got to meet them again.
Before we actually met them we went for a little walk on the beach and through town and I found it again - the shop of my dreams.

Look at this front. Look at the windows. I am dreaming of buying this shop one day and have my own bookshop inside it, along with a coffee place a friend would lead - it'd be amazing. Of course it would actually need a lot of touching up before that, so I'd need to become ridiculously rich to be able to afford that. If someone has a proper plan how to become rich like that, let me know.

The Glorious Art House

The Glorious Art House is a coffee shop I already fell in love with last year. It's located on Fore Street, which is in general heaven. If Frida Kahlo was a building, she'd be the Glorious Art House. It's just a really colourfull, happy place with friendly people, amazing coffee and couches I could spend weeks on. Thus we went there almost every day.

The couch right in the front might be one of my favourite places in the world. It's great to just sit there, read a book, sketch or, you know, talk to people sitting there with you. Also, I can highly recommend their moccha, and my boyfriend was all over the Glorious hot chocolate (because it had all the marshmallows). Another reason to just go there, of course, it that it's one of the many local independent places on Fore Street.

 The Quay

Exeters quay is a thing I didn't see last time - according to Lewis, it's no fun at all in April? I can only tell that in June, it's quite nice down there, even though you have to climb all the way up again when you're leaving.
We went to the quay two times, the first time for a nice lunch (I can recommend going to Mango's!) and the second time for a pedaloe tour on the river.

Well, to be honest, the boat ride has been a bit disappointing. We rented the pedalo for an hour, and while we got in we got told how small the area was where we were allowed to go. Also, I underestimated how anxious I'd be about my stuff falling into the river... accordingly, we only spent half an hour on the river before we gave the pedalo back and instead took a little walk through the neighbourhood to discover what was going on there.

The Museum

Another thing I can recommend checking out is the Royal Albert Memorial Museum And Art Gallery. It's got free admission so it's definitely worth checking out, and it has a broad variety of things to be discovered, from, well, art to fossils to stuffed animals.

There's so much stuff there, and they also give you activities and you can try on different costumes (which I didn't because my hair but the boyfriend was all over this).

So what else?

Other than that we just spent a lot of time drinking coffee in general. Another really nice spot for this is Camper Coffee Co. in McCoys Arcade on Fore Street. 

 

We also spent some time in the park and on the lawn in front of the cathedral sitting around, reading, enjoying the lovely weather and a burrito from Taco Macho (which is, hands down, the thing I missed most about Exeter).

At the end of the week we finally managed to go out with our friends and I ended up having a nice little hangover on our way back...

...which made the fact that Heathrow airport doesn't have a smoking area after the security checks a lot more annoying. Especially since that wasn't stated anywhere before the security checks. Which we entered about 2,5 hours before our actual flight. So yeah, the actual trips were quite unpleasant, but I still think it was worth it and will be every time in the future.

A new face - Thoughts about the 13th Doctor

SPOILERS AHEAD! DO NOT READ IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHO THE NEXT DOCTOR'S GOING TO BE! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

So the new Doctor aka the actor who's playing the 13th Doctor has been announced two hours ago. And I really should say actress because yes, it is a woman. Jodie Whittaker is our new Doctor.
Now I, personally, couldn't be happier about that. Apart from having a strong and popular character like the Doctor being the same gender as me, the lead of the oldest Sci-Fi show in the world be the same bloody gender as me (which feels pretty good tbh), to me it just makes a lot of sense.
I mean, we are talking about an alien race that regenerates into completely random new forms, an alien race that can regenerate into literally everything - at this point I am kind of wondering why it never struck me as weird that even with those endless possibilities the Doctor has always been a white male. Thus, I was rooting for number 13 to be anything but a white male - a white woman, a man of colour or even a woman of colour (now wouldn't that be just extraordinary????), I'd love all of those, just give me a break from the same type all over again.
And here we are. Female Doctor. And with it, the backlash. Of bloody course.
Now I already explained why I think a female Doctor is a great idea. But I think I should also explain why I think it is definitely not a bad idea. Sounds like the same thing? Just wait...
Many people have voiced how they think that a female Doctor would change everything and it would not be the Doctor anymore. Personally, I don't think it would change anything about the character. Here's the thing: character traits rarely if ever are gender specific. I can't think of a character trait any of the former Doctors had that was inherently male. Jesus, I can't think of a character trait that I have that is in any way tied to me being a woman. I am actually pretty certain that I'd be the exact same person I am now if I was a man. Except maybe from me being socialized as a female and experiences I have made that are completely tied to be being female (as in, experiencing misogyny). Now we have been shown repeatedly that timelords don't seem to give two shits about gender. Not that they don't have gender or don't acknowledge it, they do understand the concept, but they just don't really make a fuss about it - mostly because, given female and male representations are a possibility for regenerations, it can be assumed that all time lords are inherently non-binary. So why would the Doctors behaviour and personaility change more than it usually does with this regeneration? She couldn't be socialized as a female because gender binary socialization isn't a thing on Gallifrey and the Doctor hasn't been a woman before (as far as we know). The only thing I can imagine actually changing is the reactions she gets from others. She could not be taken as seriously, she could experience all the misogyny a human woman faces, I guess more in episodes set in the past than in the future because if there's one thing Doctor Who has shown us then it is that the future and aliens are a lot more progressive, really. But I don't think her core characteristics change at all just because now she has a vagina. If she has a vagina, because I am not quite sure how similar human and timelord reproductve organs are. For all we'd know, we could see the same we see on a Barbie/Ken doll when a timelord ever pulls down their pants (and I bet that'll never happen, it's still a family show after all, for gods sake).
In general, I'd say wether or not a female Doctor works is down to the writers and wether or not they make it work. It is down to their ability to write a female character just as multifaceted as they write their males. But if it doesn't work out, I know who I am definitely not blaming: Jodie Whittaker. So let's just wait and see what they make of it. For now, all we have is a new face as always.

Edit: My friend Ryan wrote this amazing piece that you should definitely check out!

Spider-Man: Homecoming - Review

One great thing about being in England this week is that I got to see Spider-Man: Homecoming a week earlier than in Germany. I am pretty sure waiting another week might have killed me. No, patience is not one of my strong features.
First of all, I am very glad they did not repeat the usual Spider-Man origin story. We all know by now that Peter Parker was bitten by a radioactive spider, thus got superpowers, then his uncle got killed etc. etc. with great power comes great responsibility - we've seen it several times and are informed at this point (in case you have not seen it before, were not aware of Peter Parkers backstory and are not informed... spoiler?). This backstory was not told again in Homecoming, and it gave room to a lot more plot after all of that. Of course we knew about the lack of backstory because we have seen Tom Holland as Spider-Man in Civil War already - the story of Homecoming starts off right after that. Peter is told by Tony Stark to "not do anything [he] would do, certainly not do anything [he] wouldn't do, there's a little grey area between those and that is were [he - Peter] should operate" (greatest advise ever) and that he will be called by someone if there's another operation for the Avengers Peter can help with. So Peter is dropped back into his usual life, going to school, being an awkward teen and, secretly, also the friendly Spider in the neighbourhood. And, of course, Peter is ridiculously keen to get on another mission with the big guys. So instead of just doing little things to help everyone around, he also gets in trouble with a huge group of people who develop weapons from the remainings of the alien attack 8 years ago (as seen in the first Avengers movie), some comparedly harmless like a anti-gravity gun, some really everything but harmless, like granates. So of course Peter does all the things Tony Stark would and wouldn't do and gloriously fucks up both as Spider-Man and at being a normal teenager for everyone else - which, obviously, has consequences.
Spider-Man: Homecoming got the whole teenage thing right. For the first time, with Tom Holland, we have a believable 15-years-old Peter Parker - he looks young enough to be 15, he and his peers at school have believable teenage vocabulary and interests, and personally, I think Marisa Tomei is great as May as well - after all, she's supposed to be the sister of a mother of a 15-years-old boy, so why exactly did everyone look so old so far? In my honest opinion, an Aunt May in her late 30s to early 40s makes a lot more sense - even though Marisa Tomei is 52, she does pull that kind of age portayal off very well.
Another point that I really like about this movie is the diversity we see in Midtown High and around the neighbourhood - another point that makes perfect sense since a) America has a diverse population, b) New York sure as hell has a diverse population and c) god, when will the day come when natural diversity actually been shown in movies is something that isn't outstanding? So of bloody course Peters best friend Ned Leeds (Jacob Batalon) is Filipino, his love interest Liz Allan (Laura Harrier) is black, then theres Zendaya as Michelle (who might be the most relatable character ever, at least for me) - it's a proper percentage of brown people in there, and personally, I love it. Yay Marvel!
So we have all of that, plus amazing dialogues, just the right amount of Tony Stark (and other characters from the other movies) making appearances, just the right mix of awesome fighting scenes and a proper plot and a really nice sound track (Marvel clearly learned something from making two Guardians of the Galaxy movies which live from the sound track). Overall, Spider-Man: Homecoming has been a really good experience and I might want to enjoy it a few times more.