Cheap Shot Review Of Gravity

THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS SPOILERS FROM THE FIRST SEVEN SECONDS OF GRAVITY FOR THE LOVE OF GOD RUN AND DO NOT LET YOURSELF BE SPOILED

My wife and I really, really did enjoy watching Gravity, but several days of non-stop ranting has caused my wife to ban me from talking about it anymore, so I turn to you. After all, the internet is a loving, non-judgmental safe space.

First off, I've read articles seriously saying that Gravity would ignite new interest in space travel. No. That's like saying Jaws would make everyone want a pet shark. Gravity is the last shovel of dirt on the grave of space travel. It's the science fiction equivalent of your parents telling you that, yes, in fact, they really did get divorced because of you.

This will never, ever be you.

But the part that I'm fixated on is how, at some point, they remembered that they needed to give Sandra Bullock's character an actual character, so they saddled her with a dead, young, tragically dead daughter.

(Just a thought. Wouldn't it have been so much better to give her a live daughter, and she couldn't talk to her because of the loss of communications? It would have given Sandra's adventure real stakes. Even better, it would have given her moving conversation with the Chinese ham radio guys an actual point. She could have tried to break the language barrier to tell them to record what she is saying ("Record? Tape?" "Tape!" "Yes! Tape!") so she could send a last message to her child. Again, just a thought. Though I am right.)

But then, when they needed to decide how Bullock's daughter died, and this is the point where I had to ask three people just to make sure I didn't hallucinate it, it turns out that the kid died when she fell down playing tag.

Yes, I'm not kidding. When she said that, I lost a full minute of space suspense thinking, "No, I couldn't have heard that right." I mean, sure, it is technically possible. (Not really. I mean, I've been a parent quite a while now, and it's not like the dead kids are stacked up like cordwood by the side of playgrounds from tag and monkeyshines-related fatalities.) But the point isn't possibility, it's choosing something that doesn't take people out of the moment. Kids get eaten by lions all the time, but if Bullock said that's what happened to her daughter, isn't there at least a chance you would have said, "Say what now?"

And then his spine snapped like the stem of a Waterford crystal wine glass.

So the conversation actually went something like this.

Sandra Bullock: "My daughter died playing tag. Fell down and hit her head. Just one of those things that happens."
George Clooney: "[Laconic Chuck Yaeger imitation.]"
Random Non-White Guy: "Guys, look! A wrench traveling at 20000 miles an hour!" [DIES]

Actually, I would have written something like this:

Sandra Bullock: "My daughter died playing tag. Fell down and hit her head. Just one of those things that happens."
George Clooney: "No. No, it isn't."
Random Non-White Guy: "Wrench!" [DIES]

But my dream version would be something like this:

Sandra Bullock: "My daughter died playing tag. Fell down and hit her head. Just one of those things that happens."
George Clooney: "What? She died playing tag? Who taught kids in Illinois how to play tag? You do know that, when tagging someone, a light-to-medium-firm touch of the fingers is all that is required. You don't use a bat. You don't need to give the other kid a donkey punch in the back of the freakin' head."
Random Non-White Guy: "Wait. What did she say?"
George Clooney: "She says her daughter died playing tag."
Random Non-White Guy: "Seriously!? Where was she playing tag? The Thunderdome!?" [DIES]

Or maybe just:

George Clooney: "So, Ryan, who's waiting for you back home?"
Sandra Bullock: "Um, can this wait until Space isn't trying to kill us?"
Random Non-White Guy: [DIES]

Please, please let me know if I start to overthink this.

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The Internet Lies To You. WHEN WILL YOU GET THAT!?!?

My heart is singing a joy song.

Take a moment to Google "iOS 7 waterproof". Do it. It's worth it.

Yes. Someone Photoshopped some fake iOS 7 ads to tell people that a software update would make their phone waterproof. And some other people, who may in fact not be as insightful as they possibly could be, believed it. So now thousands of articles saying that, no, a software update will not change the physical properties of your phone.

Anonymous evil ad maker with Photoshop, I wish I could shake your hand. Here's why.

The Internet is an immensely new, hugely important mode of human communication, but we don't yet know how to use it. People don't understand this about the Internet: It is half lies. At best.

Most people who saw the fake ad read it, smiled, and moved on. A few people, however, believed it. They took their phone in the shower. The device was destroyed. They learned a valuable lesson, in a way that won't soon be forgotten, and all it cost them was a few hundred bucks.

And you know something? Maybe they will be less like my older relatives, who never read anything in e-mail so ludicrous they didn't believe it.

I promise you this. One of these days, someone who trashed their phone will get a message saying vaccines are killers, or a guy in Nigeria wants to give them a hundred million bucks, or that they should quit the chemo for their Stage 3 breast cancer because eating enough lemons will take care of it (yes, real example). Maybe, dare to dream, when this happens they will think about their phone and maybe, just maybe hit Delete. Like they should.

It is a small price to pay for a lesson of such value.

Oops. Sorry. What I meant to say was, it's real. You can install iOS 7 on your iPhone and give it to your kids to play in the bathtub. Go try it. You know it's true, because you just read it.

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