Skittles & The Weird pt.1

Over the years I've noticed that commercials have gotten quite bold with their approaches. Nowadays, to catch our attention commercials are designed to be shocking, repetitive, annoying, humorous, catchy, viral, cool, epic, inspiring, tongue-in-cheek, familiar, or classic. Some commercials like this one and this one  are outstanding works of visual storytelling. The quality of such commercials rival that of most films. 

Today I wanted to elaborate on the quality of being weird and its capacity to encompass all of the types of feelings and responses. Weird is the word that we ascribe to feelings that we don't quite understand and that we can't quite put into a neat category like the ones I listed in the introduction. Weird has a way of taking us by surprise, making us laugh, revealing an inspiring side of things, being cool (because it's different), catching on, and/or just being bad.

In some ways being weird (ie. mixed and muddled, crossing across categories/boundaries) is more reflective of real life than being anything else. Humans are complex beings. When we're happy, we're not just happy. We're a lot of things. A lot of emotions and thoughts exist in the background of all of our emotions. The deeper you look, the more you'll come to see that every moment in life is a little weird, and every emotion is more compounded than a 3 letter word.

To highlight some of the very best weirdness I've come across, I've selected the Skittles commercials. Commercials make perfect examples because of their brevity. Like (relatively short) poems, commercials can studied and examined repeatedly without consuming much time at all. For each Skittle commercial, I will supply commentary that will bring the full weirdness to light.

• Everyone is equal, right? Black, Hispanic, Filipino, Thai, and White. In this commercial, we see a white man getting fitted for a suit. In each of the 3 mirrors, the suited man is reflected as a difference race. Everything is going fine, until he realizes that he doesn't have any Skittles like the Filipino man in the mirror. Apparently, the suited man and his reflections aren't all equal.
• When the issue is brought to the storeman's attention, he proceeds to argue with the Filipino reflection. Their words aren't subtitled, so we're awkwardly pushed to the outside of the dispute. The conflict escalates until the Filipino reflection kicks the mirror and takes himself out the picture.
• After this shocking and sudden debacle, the stunned suitman looks to the storeman. The storeman smilies in such a way that seems to say "nevermind what just happened. please buy the suit." After all, the store isn't a fancy, high end looking place. Instead the store is small and homey. I can imagine that the storeman could use the business. But what are we (from the perspective of the suitman) supposed to believe in after our views on equality have been shattered?
• The reason why the awkward ending is so impactful is because all of the characters (reflections included) in the commercial treat the supernatural conceit of the commercial (magic mirrors) as a common thing. The suitman isn't taken aback because one the mirrors shows a him that isn't "him." Rather, the suitman is shocked simply because he inadvetenly started a conflict that ended up with a broken mirror. In other words, when the characters in a fictional conceit treat the fictional elements as common, everyday occurances the attitude is translated to the audience. In this way, this commercial doesn't create a sense of weirdness because of the mirrors. The weirdness comes from the racial tension. The mirrors are simply a very effective visual metaphor.

• Some people think it's foolish to believe in things that you can't see or touch. But we can all agree that it's foolish to question the existence of a rainbow that you're sitting on high in the sky. I wonder what kind of person would question the existance of the very support that's keeping him/her safe. Perhaps the commercial implies that no matter where you are or what kind of situation you're in, there will always be the non believer. In a world where rainbows are physical, literal metaphors, it's "believe the rainbow" or else.
• How these kids got up onto the rainbow in the first place, I can't say. Perhaps we've all been resting on a "rainbow" in our own lives. Enjoy it while you can like the other two youngsters do in the commercial. For to believe is a sweet deal; like a mouth full of Skittles no doubt.
• "That fool got what he deserved," or so we're left to think by the end of the commercial. "I'll never be that stupid" we might think as we go about our lives waiting for our chance to sit upon a rainbow and not make the same mistake.

• The commercial opens with a strange man poorly impersonating a fledgling bird: "Quack. Quack." An eagle flies by and deftly opens a bag of skittles. After dropping a few into the man's mouth, the eagle flies away. 
• The commercial up to this point is weird enough because both the man and the eagle are acting out of character in two very different ways. After the eagle flies away, the man breaks the charade and thanks the eagle for the Skittles with a common phrased typically used between humans: "Thank you. Thank you very much."
• By the end of the commercial all of the established ideas are nullified. The bird-man returns to being a man-man. The seemingly normal eagle dexterously opens a bag of skittles and feeds a man. All the ideas contridict each other execpt for the nourishing Skittles and the thank you. If everything around you makes no sense, at least there's nourishment (Skittles). And that's something to be thankful for. The look on the man's face says it all.

Stay tuned for more weird Skittles commercials.

Lie To Me: First Impressions

I think what hampers Lie To Me (LTM) the most is that it tries to be too much like other popular detective/crime shows. The same formula that shapes shows like CSI, Bones, The Closer, and many others has clearly influenced LTM. To be a bit reductive, these shows are little more than a shuffling of the following types of scenes: interrogation, investigation (on site), and conversing with coworkers in the office or some other setting. Some shows take this formula and use it well. Others, like LTM, simply fall flat. 

Being a cop or an FBI agent is an active role. It's not only dangerous and often times tricky to apprehend suspects, but it makes for interesting scenes/conflict within a story. Mr. Lightman, the main character in LTM, doesn't have an active role in his own story. Mr. Lightman's character is brought into various cases and situations to do what he does best; look at people. Waltzing in after the suspects have been detained is a pretty passive role to focus and entire series on. But looking at people isn't exactly thrilling either. Fortunately, studying people's faces and their expressions works well in a visual based story telling medium.

Lie To Me is carried by Lightman, who has a strange and slightly abrasive way of interacting with people. He leans back in chairs and keep his head tilted dramatically to the side. His demeanor and gait are reminiscent of Dr. House from the TV show House. Unlike my favorite limping drug addict doctor, Lightman is hard to relate to. Like a machine that never tires, Lightman propels the plot of the first episode from the beginning to the end. He doesn't slow down and he is never too puzzled by any problem or situation. He's never shown eating anything, and he refused to take a break from his work. On top of all of this, he surrounds himself with co-workers that are only shown working. Ultimately, I found the central characters in LTM without flaws and banality, ie without that human touch.

Playing close attention to all forms of non verbal communication is a powerful a gimmick. From what I've seen so far, Lie To Me doesn't take its gimmick seriously enough. Instead of making lying/uncovering the truth the action that connects, defines, and changes the characters in the story, lie detecting seems to be the theme stretched thinly over the top of ordinary plots. Perhaps Samuel Baum, the writer, should study how the Japanese treat the gimmicks of some of their movies and tv shows. Or perhaps he should look into storytelling through action.

As engaging as being able to read a character's face for the truth is, Lie To Me isn't about figuring out the cases. In other words, the show doesn't give enough  clues and information so that the viewer can piece together the solution before the reveal at the end. In fact, Lightman does a lot of explaining after every eye twitch, brow furrow, and nose touch. All the explanation drags down the show by separating the few interesting actions and scenes with dialog, the stuff the premise of the show is trying to get us to look past.

It would be a far more original and flexible angle if Lightman wasn't a wannabe detective. Instead, he should explore how people perceive truth as being  multifaceted and ultimately relative from the perspective of a man who's job isn't to throw people behind bars. Instead of the show explaining everything step by step, it would be more impactful to view situations from many perspectives with Lightman as the anchor and entry point. Lying to cover up one's wrong doings can only go so far. Asking the tough questions and examining the many ways people lie to themselves on a regular basis is where the human touch is. For such a story, you wouldn't need bombs that are about to go off and people running from the law. Capitalizing on how we all lie to ourselves to get by is more real and more thrilling than any imaginary time bomb on TV.

In Lie To Me, characters move about each scene. People are interrogated. Eyes dart, and sweat drops. Sure the cases are wrapped up, but at least in the first episode, there weren't any clear messages or character changes. This isn't my idea of a story. With a worn formula for a foundation, an underdeveloped and passive gimmick, and tools for characters contrived to move a plot that's not very believable as a detective or crime show, I won't be tuning in for another episode.

Slowly Building Something Worthwhile

There are some things that can only be said slowly. And there are some experiences that can only be communicated over time. Good stories must earn their climaxes. To mean more, you must communicate more. One can't borrow or buy an epic scale to their journey without going through an epic journey step by step. Every moment that is poured into a work has the potential of paying off in a big way.

Time is special like this. The purpose of this article is to highlight a few musical examples of works that take their time building up to their single, significant, and at times epic climax/conclusion.

If you're the kind of person that's in a rush, I suggest finding the time not to be. I also suggest listening to each of these songs. Play them in the background of your routine computer tasks if you must. 

I am very fortunate to have played the Firebird Suite with a full orchestra and Adagio for Strings with a full string orchestra. I must say that I didn't enjoy rehearsing these songs at first. Adagio is written in a key with 5 flats, which is very uncommon for string music. This made the song difficult enough, but it was even more grueling to rehearse the song under tempo. Some days, we'd only get through a few lines before our time was up.

Then one day it hit me. Adagio wasn't boring. It was building. Slowly, one small step at at time, it was still going somewhere. And it was going to a place I had never experienced before along a path that I thought was insufficient. I found that even though the song moved slowly, it developed much in the same ways as a faster paced song. Also, because the tempo was so slow, every change and inflection on every note was more pronounced. In this way, Adagio and slow songs like it create a richer listening experience per note simply because there's actually time to linger and express each note completely over seconds instead of split seconds.

These songs don't disappoint.

Firebird Suite by Stravinsky

Adagio for Strings, op.11 by Samuel Barber

Hide and Seek by Imogen Heap

• lyrics here.

Another good example of a song that fits the group is "Wait" by The Afters. Because I couldn't find an adequate online recording, I did not include it with the other examples.

Though the songs build slowly, time seems to melt away. At least, this is how it is for me. And it's not just time. My thoughts and physical state seem to match the song as well.

Forest Gump and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button are two films that have a similar slowly building progression. In both of these films, the life of the main character is shown including their travels, battles, hardships, and growing pains. In Gump's case, the metaphor between life and a box of chocolates was made more impactful because the film shows us the life of this character. After having experienced the life of Forest Gump filled with mishaps and unforeseeable happenings, we can easily relate to the idea of never knowing what we're gonna get out of life.

I wonder if there's a video game with a slow building structure. Sure, many games slowly progress their stories and increase their difficulty through a series of challenges and scenes over many hours of play. However, I think the analogy between the songs/movies above and video games falls under game mechanics.

The nature of a game mechanic, in general, is an action and quick response. Hit the punch button and the character on the screen quickly punches. Tap the jump button, and the character on the screen most likely makes a short jump. To make a game with a slow build, one would have to develop mechanics based on actions that are slow and/or create responses that aren't immediate.

The closest examples I can think off are some of the exercises and games in Wii Fit. Holding a stretch is a single action that is drawn out for a small period of time. When doing the Tree pose or the Sun Salutation pose, the prolonged action and delayed response (scoring) of the game create a very slow, unique pace. Likewise, Lotus Focus is a game that tests the player's ability to sit very still for 3 minutes. SIT, in the case, is just one long action. When the player fails to SIT still, the consequences are quickly brought to the players attention. "CUT"