Time-magazine (the very same that made AI-fuckwads the person of the year last year.) decided to team up with “Executive Producer” Darren Aronofsky (the director of the live-action remake of “Perfect Blue” Requiem for a Dream) to make the patriotic-est slop that has ever existed.
Since i am lucky enough not to be from those “United” States of America i have the privilege of not getting a boner from just hearing the name “Benjamin Franklin”. This puts me in a unique position to watch the entire video without blowing my load at the first mention of the word “freedom”, and dissect the second worst moving picture thing that came out last month.
Let’s dive in.
The blurb below the video reads:
America’s first meme is born.
There is more text after that, but i can’t read any further because i am now hunched over a toiletbowl expulsing my home cooked sunday dinner. I will need a drain cleaner.
Ok, let just start the goddamn video on an emptied stomach then.
The video starts and we are greeted with a “Times Studios” logo (insert “we have Marvel Studios at home”-meme here), followed with what i presume is a death metal band logo that is in view for 0,5 seconds.
Then follows the first shot of the video proper. THE FIRST SHOT.
The flames are coming out through the glass. I have checked with fire-scientists, they agree with the thesis that this should not be possible.
What follows are some shots artisticaly avoiding showing someone speaking, and a doctor devoid of any sort of expression entering a typhoid-riddled ship. The doctor enters the ship and shows him speaking two full words of his lip-synced sentence, before the prompts lead the camera to a man in a bed and freeze-framing on his face to reveal that man is Thomas Paine.
I presume Mr. Paine can not hear a word of what the doctor is saying, due to his aparent lack of ear canal. It could be there, but without proof of prompts, who could possibly know for sure.
Next scene. Drinks are poured, voices are heard, drinks are share-OH MY FUCKING GOD WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS ABOMINATION
His eyes scramble to adjust to where his face is. This uncanny valley is the Mariana Trench. They talk over color-changing drinks (according to drink-scientists this is possible, but unlikely) until mid-scene, when they found another model more fitting for the role of Tommy Paine.
Fair game, at least the second model came with a nice shirt and some surplus buttons.
We move on to some quick shots of people doing American stuff, like washing clothes, cutting thread and talking in markets with the voice-over of Tommy Paine saying stuff, to end his monologue with “you need an englishm’n”, which causes Benny Franklin to turn into the grinch.
Thomas Paine starts writing with ink and quill, mostly because he had no way of asking chatgpt for writing it for him. We see his written words turn into printed words and finaly his pamflet/book (depending on the shot it’s in) is ready. “COMMON SENSE, ADDRESSED TO THE INHABITANTS OF AAMEREEDD”
We move on to see a revised copy of the pamflet/tome (it still varies in size from prompt to prompt) being distributed and shared between Aamereeddians Americans as some start to recite the contents of the work uncanningly to rejoicing listeners. The text reaches the (i presume) king of England, who isn’t too pleased with this talk of revolution.
The king’s stuntdouble jumps up from his chair and rips the now 2 sheets of paper from the hands of the messenger.
The next shot is General Washington staring empty-eyed at the booklet before turning his hollow gaze into the far distance as he’s contemplating why he’s in this abomination of a video, before smirking with the rejoice of him not being real. The camera cuts to Thomas Paine still writing and sipping from the color-changing liquid he probably stole from Benjamin Franklin four score and seven prompts ago.
The video ends with him not blowing out a candle. A quote appears on the screen about a pen and a sword, but it’s hard to read because my eyes are now bleeding so heavily i need a bucket.
I hate that this exists in the same timeline as i do.
Now if you’ll excuse me, i have to call an ambulance. Thank god i have healthcare instead of “freedom”.
If you made it this far, here’s a well deserved pallette cleanser:
Update (26.02.04)
Aftermath has also done an article about this (they even went through the trouble to go back in time and to write it before me).
