John Carter

I watched John Carter with the coworkers over the weekend. What strikes me now, thinking back over the movie, is how little of it made an impression. I know I enjoyed watching Carter's difficulties walking in his first minutes on Mars/Barsoom. The superfast dog, Woola? Loved it. Actively wondered why John didn't just use it to get around at multiple points in the story. But no, he always has to try and use one of those flying machines.

I think the part that made the strongest impression was the part about Tars being Sola's father, even if she didn't know it. The idea that Tars is more compassionate than most of his people, and maybe that's because he knows she's truly his daughter, not the group's. Yes, he scars her when she breaks the rules, but I have the feeling those are "warnings", and anyone else would have been killed long before they could run out of space for warnings. As leader, he can't ignore the things she does entirely, but he can still cut her more slack than he would any other. I don't know whether it's these relative kindnesses that created her sense of compassion - because she knows how nice it feels to have someone who actually cares - or if they merely allowed her own sense of compassion to survive.

Beyond the fact it's probably what saves Carter, the compassion is sort of a sea change for them. Barsoom is a dying world, in no small part thanks to the invisible movers and shakers. If he is people are going to survive, they may need to change things up. Is their typical method of doing things, which roughly seems to be "the weak are food for the strong" getting them anywhere? For all the bluster, they hide when the sky ships pass over, relegated to placing bets on the outcome of the battle, and then intervening only when the two parties are distracted and weakened. Which makes them scavengers of a sort. It's an existence, but is it the best they can hope for? So why not try something different, like not having everyone in the group constantly eyeballing each other to see who looks vulnerable? If Tars was, on some level, trying to bring that about by protecting his daughter, it isn't a bad idea. Sola eventually found her strength. Not as a bully, but enough to stand up and protect those important to her, which is a much more productive use of it.

So, that part made more of an impression than I thought, but beyond that, I'd have to rate the movie merely OK. There wasn't anything that stuck out as truly bad, but there also weren't any points that made me stand up and cheer, either. It's the kind of movie that having seen once, I doubt I'd watch again, unless there was absolutely nothing else to do.