Monthly Archive for June, 2006

Superman Returns—–the Review

Published on June 30, 2006 in Reviews. 52 Comments

After a marathon love-making session, satisfied women coo: ” You are a superman”.

They never say “You are batman.” Or “You are spiderman”.

And there’s a reason for that.

It’s because Superman is by definition “super”–all-powerful, faster than a speeding bullet, a man of steel, totally impervious to everything except Kryptonite. He is neither an angsty teenager trying to come to terms with responsibility (Spiderman) nor a man trying to battle his inner demons and conquer fear (Batman). As Bill says in “Kill Bill II”, Superman is unique because while Peter Parker and Bruce Wayne have to wear costumes in order to become superheroes, Superman does the opposite i.e. he has to disguise his super-humanness by donning theÂ garb of the “common man” (Clark Kent).

However, it is this uniqueness of Superman that is sacrificed in “Superman Returns”—Bryan Singer presents him as just another buff guy in blue tights.

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The Concept of Equality

Published on June 27, 2006 in Media and Pop Culture. 263 Comments

Secularism, the way I understand it, is looking at all religions the same way without bias—in essence accepting the equality of all faiths (as opposed to my God bestest).

Likewise, gender-equality strives to attain equivalence of the sexes in terms of perception and opportunity.

Noble aims indeed and ones to which I fully subscribe to.

One of the fundamental concepts inherent in the definition of “equality” is that to an external observer, the two equal quantities should appear the same, modulo some property. In other words, if I say that A and B are equal in weight, then modulo the property of weight, they should be indistinguishable.

Right?

Or not?

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The Devil Dares Dada

Published on June 23, 2006 in Cricket. 64 Comments

So what’s Sourav Ganguly to do?

No matter how good he performs, he is not going to get selected.

Sourav Ganguly will never be a part of the Indian cricket team as long as Kiran More is the chief manipulator sorry selector.

According to whom?

Mr. More himself. (His minions have subsequently contradicted it)

Sourav knows the reason for that. It’s because he has always been perceived rightfully to be a man backed by Dalmiya — the bete noire of More’s puppetmaster—Sharad The Power, who some may say shares Al Capone’s love for his enemies.

I want this guy dead! I want his family dead! I want his house burned to the ground! I want to go there in the middle of the night and piss on his ashes!

I don’t agree. Pawar would never piss on his enemies ashes. He would just send Kiran More.

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