On Tyranny
A short read which should really be required reading for the world right now.
Here are a few passages I highlighted from the book.
These two excepts came from the Prologue of the book:
Since the American colonies declared their independence from a British monarchy that the Founders deemed "tyrannical," European history has seen three major democratic moments: after the First World War in 1918, after the Second World War in 1945, and after the end of communism in 1989.
Fascists rejected reason in the name of will, denying objective truth in favor of a glorious myth articulated by leaders who claimed to give voice to the people.
From Chapter 1 "Do not obey in advance":
Crucially, people who were not Nazis looked on with interest and amusement.
From Chapter 3 "Beware the one-party state":
The American abolitionist Wendell Phillips did in fact say that "eternal vigilance is the price of liberty." He added that "the manna of popular liberty must be gathered each day or it is rotten."
From Chapter 5 "Remember professional ethics":
If lawyers had followed the norm of no execution without trial, if doctors had accepted the rule of no surgery without consent, if businessmen had endorsed the prohibition of slavery, if bureaucrats had refused to handle paperwork involving murder, then the Nazi regime would have been much harder pressed to carry out the atrocities by which we remember it.
This section is largely reminding that the Nazi atrocities relied on professionals bending to the evil acts of others to either support directly or at least not impede. The government machine we see happening in DC is the system working as it resists the changes the government is undergoing.
From Chapter 7 "Be reflective if you must be armed":
Yet we make a great mistake if we imagine that the Soviet NKVD or the Nazi SS acted without support. Without the assistance of regular police forces, and sometimes regular soldiers, they could not have killed on such a large scale.
This section largely says "look, if you're going to get a gun, don't lose perspective." But again, similar to the above, it's a reminder that secret police rely on the support of local law enforcement. Which makes the local PD and Sheriff departments refusal to help with ICE etc. are critical resistance elements.
Chapter 10 "Believe in truth":
Post-truth is pre-fascism.
Chapter 14 "Establish a private life":
What the great political thinker Hannah Arendt meant by totalitarianism was not an all-powerful state, but the erasure of the difference between private and public life.
Chapter 17 "Listen for dangerous words":
The way to destroy all rules, he explained, was to focus on the idea of the exception. A Nazi leader outmaneuvers his opponents by manufacturing a general conviction that the present moment is exceptional, and then transforming that state of exception into a permanent emergency. Citizens then trade real freedom for fake safety.
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Home Alone 1 and 2
It's hard for me to explain why, but I found myself greatly disliking the second movie's decision to further rely on slapstick and painful moments with the thieves. I haven't watched Home Alone 2 in a long time and so the rewatch today made me realize how far it trails the first in my overall enjoyment.
I realize they're kid movies and may as well be cartoons, but the painful moments definitely hit harder (no pun intended) and are less entertaining for me in the second movie than the first's, which I still find largely enjoyable and nostalgic.
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The Wager - DNF
I finally gave in on trying to read The Wager. I think it is a me-thing and not a commentary on the book. It's an interesting fictionalized telling of a historical event based on journals and other historic records.
I am about 45% of the way through and I just... lost motivation to keep going on it. It's well reviewed and many people enjoy it, so it's not a universal experience with the book, but I just have decided to, well, abandon ship.
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Running Man (2025) - 2 or 5 Hunters
An especially important and poignant commentary on society and modern entertainment, but nothing particularly life changing as far as movies go.
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Frankenstein (2025)
Overall, I quite enjoyed it. It didn't blow me away, but it was classic Guillermo del Toro doing what he does. Also, I restrained myself to only shouting out "It's Franken-steen!" once while watching.
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Thunderbolts* (2025)
I didn't love this one the way other people did, but it's still a decent MCU flick, and of the recent era it's great.
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Naked Gun (2025)
Okay, that movie was fucking hilarious. And so true to the vision and experience of the first. Liam Neeson killed it.
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Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning (2025)
I haven't loved an MI movie since maybe... 3? I don't know. Finally checked this one out and... woof. Good riddance to this series, maybe we can get a new action star series going..
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The Thursday Murder Club (2025)
Such a disappointing film with such a murderer's row of talent in the cast. I think some of what I attribute to low quality in the film is more of a purposeful schlock for the genre and feel they were going for.
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Superman (2025)
We finally watched this at home, never made it to the theaters for it. It was... fine. I think my expectations were too high going in.
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The Amateur (2025)
Just flat and ultimately slow moving. I should have loved it but I didn't.
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Nonnas (2025)
Put on Nonnas today and found it cute but overall nothing amazing. It's a feel good Vince Vaughn movie with a few notable faces and some delicious sounding and looking Italian food.
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Fountain of Youth (2025)
The movie is not amazing. It's the latest in the lineage of Indiana Jones, the Librarian, and National Treasure. But, it is not an amazing movie. I hope it does well enough they get to do another one and perhaps find their groove.
Also, I legit can't remember much of the soundtrack at all, but there is a Thai version of 'Bang Bang' at the start of the movie which is a banger:
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Chef (2014)
Still a fantastic movie. Makes me realize I really need to get a panini press.
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Mission Impossible (1996)
Crazy to think this movie is 29 years old. I remember seeing it when it came and even then thinking it was kind of hokey. I was also pissed off they killed Emilio Estevez.
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Sinners (2025) - 4.5/5 Cigarettes
I went and saw Sinners yesterday and ended up really enjoying it. The story was really really good and it kept me engaged the entire way through. What surprised me was how amazing the soundtrack was, including this song. But even more than the song was the cinematography in the movie during this song.
This movie also reminded Katie and I how much we like Blues music, so I added a bunch of blues music to our audio library. B. B. King, Robert Johnson, Albert King, Buddy Guy, and others. So much good stuff.
After seeing the movie and posting about it, my feed on TikTok and YouTube has since been inundated with content about the behind-the-scenes for the film, and interviews with Coogler and Michael B. Jordan. And, I'm not mad. This is a really good movie and I'm so thankful we're seeing it succeed.
As I said on my Bluesky post yesterday, I feel that calling Sinners a horror film is a disservice to it as it turns a number of people off from watching it. Myself included. Had it not been Coogler + Jordan in the movie, I likely would have let it pass. But I am a fan of both of them and so I did some further research and determined that it was within a sphere that I was likely comfortable with. I would call it a Suspense / Action movie.
To me, horror is the sphere of movies which are the SAW franchise, or "Final Destination" etc. (none of which I've seen.) And this is more of a supernatural action + suspense.
None of the jump scares were gratuitous just to generate a reaction from the audience. None of the gore was over-the-top. There was no drawn out grown sense of fear hammered into the viewer.
This led me to consider using radar charts for showing what a movie's horror is. Giving a better sense of how gory it is, or how much it's about the audience fear rather than the story on screen. I know a big part of horror movies is surprise and not knowing what's coming, but I don't think hardcore horror lovers gain much from a chart like what I'm talking about.
I haven't made any charts, and as someone who avoids horror films, I definitely don't know enough about the genre to even know how to adequately encompass the genre. But, it feels like an interesting idea.
This idea then jumped to the idea of using a radar chart for straight movie rating. And thus, this evening, after doing a quick bit of mowing part of my backyard until the mower's battery died, and after making dinner, I have come up with a function that can be used to generate movie rating radars.
I'll write more about it, the method, etc. But I really like this idea for how to rate movies. I can go back and start rating movies like this, and then even pull two movies and compare how their ratings are drawn. I'm still deciding on the scoring axes, though I feel pretty good about these ones.
However I'm going to start sharing it with friends and we'll see what feedback people smarter than me have!
Footnote:
[1] - Cigarettes are bad. Don't do them. They're used for this rating thematically based on the film.
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The Pitt (2025) - 5/5 ER Nurses
My current favorite show on television. ER's successor and a truly fantastic first season. I missed shows like this and can't wait for season 2.
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The Bondsman (2025) - 2.5/5 Demons
Kevin Bacon is entertaining enough to keep me watching, but the show is quite middling.
One thing that struck out to me was a plot of episode 3, 'Maphos':
To which an online acquaintance gave me the answer I was looking for:
The plots are similar on the surface, but in truth quite different. The Adventure Zone episode plot takes place at a waterpark, not a swimming pool like on the show. The Bondsman episode refers to the demon as a 'marphos,' which isn't a real demon in history or fiction; but I would bet that both drew from similar sources in history and mythology.
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G20 (2025) - 3/5 Australian Accents
I love Viola Davis and will watch her in anything. Overall, this movie was fine and entertaining, but I doubt I'll ever watch it again.
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Zero Day (2025) - 4 of 5 Hackers
A painfully on the nose mini-series of a the current political era mystery/thriller. I didn't love it all, but I found it entertaining. And I liked the ending.
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The Residence (2025) - 5 of 5 Purple Grackle
Quite enjoyed the show, it was sold to me as 'Knives Out' at the Whitehouse. And it's definitely in the same branch of the tree, but it's not the same show. I would definitely like to see a few more seasons of Detective Cupp.
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Ardent Violet and the Infinite Eye (2024) - 4.5/5 Space Mechs
I've got to share how much I enjoy the second book in the Starmetal Symphony series by my friend Alex White. It's a great follow up in the series, filled with twists and turns, as well as dramatic and touching moments. Just a fun and enjoyable ride filled with memorable characters.
Just wait until you meet Scent of Rot. 🦀
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