Thoughts on the New Superman Movie

Superman has just about always been my favorite superhero. Ever since I was a kid, I wanted to be the big, blue boy scout. Not just in terms of his powers, but to truly be like him. Of course I wanted the super strength and ability to fly, but I also wanted to live up to the example he set.

During my high school years I turned away from superheroes in general, but then The Dark Knight got me back into them again. I jumped on the Batman hype train like everyone else, but within a few years I was back to Superman being my favorite. Every time a big Superman project got announced, I was paying attention. Whether a show or movie, I was there- sometimes for better, sometimes for worse.

This time around was no different. The moment James Gunn's Supes project was announced, I was interested. As more and more came out about it, I was genuinely excited. Then, finally, the day came. My wife and I watched it last Friday. We wore Superman shirts to the theater; her with the new logo, me with the more classic one. 

Ultimately, I really liked the movie. The fun and sincerity James Gunn and everyone else infused into it brought me a lot of joy. For those who like straightforward movie ratings, I'd give it an 8/10 and call it one of the better Blockbuster movies in recent years. If you're a fan of Superman (or even just the genre in general), check it out. You'll likely have a good time.

When it comes to a Superman project, though, I can't just give a simple score and leave it at that. Especially for one like this- one where so many things work, but not quite everything. Like I said above, I really liked this movie- but I didn't love it. I've been thinking about it quite a bit since seeing, trying to sort through exactly what did and didn't work for me. This post is what I've come up with.

Note that I will not have any spoilers here, other than talking about stuff that either happens within the first couple minutes of the movie or stuff that was revealed in the trailers. With that said, if you haven't seen the movie and want to go into it relatively fresh, it may be good to hold off on reading this post anyway. I personally prefer to go into movies relatively uninformed so that I can be surprised (hopefully pleasantly) by what I see. So don't worry about spoilers, but maybe considering holding off anyway.

Either way, enjoy! 

 

WHAT DID WORK FOR ME

1. What We Get of Lois and Clark

A lot of Superman fans say that, despite the relative overall quality of any given Superman movie, Superman and Lois themselves are usually cast pretty well. I agree with that statement for the most part. Still, sometimes even a well-cast Lois and Clark duo have no chemistry (looking at you Henry Cavill and Amy Adams). Luckily, this pairing of Lois and Clark work really well, both individually and as a couple.

Very early in the movie we get a great scene of a date night turning into Lois interviewing Superman after she pointed out she's rarely gotten the chance to do so. The interview starts off well, but Lois completely transitions into journalist mode and grills him to the point it starts a fight between them. It's a perfect scene to show their dynamic, including how different they are and how Lois's dedication to being a tough, quality journalist can get in the way of her personal relationships.

Later on in the movie they reconcile and talk about what they love about each other. I'll leave it at that because it's further into the movie and therefore much more of a spoiler to talk about even in general terms, but what I like about it is that it captures why these two always fall in love with one another in every iteration of Superman. This and the previous scene are two of my favorite scenes in the movie. I wish they could've been built toward a little better, and that we could have had maybe another scene or two to trace out the arc of their relationship in this movie overall (consider this foreshadowing for later in this post), but the scenes in and of themselves are fantastic. 

2. Green Lantern and Mr Terrific

If you've seen any of the promotional material for this movie at all, you know that Green Lantern, Hawkgirl, and a guy named Mr Terrific are part of this movie as the "Justice Gang." Unfortunately Hawkgirl simply does not get much screen time or interesting things to do (other than one amazing moment at the end I won't spoil). Green Lantern and Mr Terrific, however, get plenty of shine in this movie.

Starting with Green Lantern, he's played in this movie by Nathan Fillion, probably best known for his role in the show Firefly. This Green Lantern he plays is named Guy Gardner, the most conceited and arrogant of the humans who have wielded the Green Lantern ring. In this movie, his high opinion of himself is played for effective laughs. He steals a lot of the scenes he's in with his big personality. Of all the times I laughed in the movie, Fillion's Green Lantern was usually involved.

Mr Terrific is a very different character. He's also a much more obscure one. He's basically a super genius inventor, but his costume is a cross between a tech genius and a cool 1970s black guy who would probably say stuff like "dig this, cool cat." The outfit reflects the character more broadly; he has all the smarts of the former, but all the style of the latter. It makes for a really compelling, original character. The fact he gets much more screen time than his teammates (and even many of the main cast) gives him even more room to shine. Ed Gathegi takes advantage of the opportunity in the role and creates one of the most memorable superheroes in years.

3. The Sincerity and Kindness

The sincerity and kindness of this version of Superman was a focus for James Gunn in the beginning. Gunn said in one interview: "for me, the center of it was about kindness in a world that isn't kind." In another interview he points out Superman is "an immigrant that came from other places and populated the country, but for me it is mostly a story that says basic human kindness is a value and is something we have lost."

Those quotes really set the tone for what's at the heart of this movie. Superman doesn't just defeat bad guys. He interactions with the people of Metropolis, remembers their names, cares about them, and tries to save everyone and everything he can- even a squirrel! In fact, this Superman is earnest to a bit of an embarrassing degree. He's teased more than once in the movie about what a boy scout he is. This is not a movie that views Superman the figure with the same sort of reverence the Richard Donner movies had for Superman.

But there's something lovely about that. Reeve's Superman is almost a guardian angel for humanity. This Superman is an overly earnest, vulnerable, borderline dorky human being who happens to have powers. It's so corny it goes back around to being cool again (which is part of why this movie has inspired so many people to say "kindness is the new punk rock"). I think that's great. Heaven knows we could use more kindness in this world. Especially in some of the areas on Earth suffering most right now. Speaking of which...

4. The Message Against Warmongering

The beginning fight happens in this movie because a fictional country called Boravia wants to invade another fiction country called Jarhanpur. Superman, who doesn't want people to die, rightfully stops Boravia from invading Jarhanpur. That ends up being a controversial move for him to make, however, especially considering Boravia is "an important US ally." Superman, though, defends his actions and continues to oppose Boravia's continued attempts to invade Jarhanpur.

Audiences have understood this message to be a criticism of Israel for their invasion of Gaza and a criticism of Russia for its invasion of Ukraine. James Gunn has disavowed the Israel/Palestine comparison, if not the Russia/Ukraine one, but that doesn't seem to matter too much. Maybe it shouldn't. Sometimes art reflects reality so precisely that it doesn't matter what its creators intended. Sometimes art can point things out that are so relevant to our moment in history that it can channel and comment on that moment even if an overt, direct connection wasn't intentional. 

The similarities to Israel/Palestine and Russia/Ukraine start out only in a general sense, but throughout the movie there are some oddly specific parallels that make it hard to believe there weren't at least a couple people involved with the movie who wanted to make a direct comparison. Again, though, we cannot know true intent. All I can say is that this movie unapologetically opposes wars of aggression. Even if watching this movie is not some sort of act of anti-war resistance, it is nice to see a major blockbuster directly, earnestly make that point. 

 

WHAT DIDN'T WORK FOR ME

1. Lack of Time Building Key Relationships

Earlier I said that I really liked the Lois/Clark relationship in this movie, but wish the key moments had been built toward better. That's where this entry comes in. As much as I liked that relationship, it just didn't feel like it was given the attention it deserved. Neither did a number of other important relationships in this movie.

Take Jonathan and Martha Kent, Clark's adopted parents. They are barely in this movie for two scenes. I won't talk about those scenes in detail. I will say this, though: like the Lois/Clark scenes, they're lovely. But they're just not built toward at all. For as perfectly executed as those scenes are, I just didn't feel much emotion in them. Because there is no groundwork laid by getting to know these characters, how they relate to one another, and what they have done for each other. In writing, you can't just have big, meaningful, cathartic scenes without setting them up. The first scene we get with the Kents is supposed to be a powerful one, but it's also basically the first time we meet them as characters.

A big problem is that this movie starts with Superman already facing down the main villains of the movie. You're basically thrown into the middle of the action. The advantage of this approach is that you start off on an exciting foot and can get to the action more quickly. What you lose, though, is setting up the world, its characters, and- once again- the relationships between them. It's not the most glamorous parts of most movies, but it is the setup that allows for bigger payoffs later. We just do not get enough of that in this movie. Hell, the Daily Planet staff (other than Jimmy Olsen) are basically just background characters.

I think the reason the movie doesn't take time to develop its world, characters, and relationships better is because, well... 

2. It Was Pretty Crowded!

This movie has a lot going on. As we already covered, it starts already after the conflict that defines this movie has popped off. By skipping all the setup, we start off with a bang. The movie still needs to set up it world and introduce its characters, though, even if they don't start at the "beginning" per se. And wow is there a lot in here! We have Superman, Lois, Krypto, three members of the Justice Gang, a couple additional heroes who get introduced throughout the film, the Daily Planet staff, the Kents, and a whole stable of villains. And those are just the central characters! It's a lot to balance. Frankly, it's too much.

Some people have said that this movie almost feels like watching the second or third entry in a Superman film series, rather than the first. I think there's a lot to that take. Because what they're getting at really combines this entry and the previous one: things aren't fully set up, yet a ton of things are introduced. I think if this were the sequel to a previous Superman movie that had fully brought in Superman, Lois, Krypto, the Daily Planet staff, the Kents, and maybe Lex Luthor, and defined their relationships and done the less flashy but necessary legwork to build our connection to them as an audience, then this movie could be one of the greatest superhero sequels of all time.

But it isn't. Instead, the first movie we get with this version of Superman is so crowded that no one character has full room to breath. Each character gets some great movies, and sometimes great scenes with other characters, but very few threads are woven throughout the whole thing because no character other than Superman can get the necessary attention to be fully fleshed out. This issue also pairs with...

3. The Lack of Emotional Gravity

 

A problem with a lot of Blockbusters over the past decade is that they don't have the dramatic weight they should have in order to make their more emotional moments hit harder. This movie doesn't fully have that problem (I've already made allusions to big, sincere moments that work really well), but it does have it to an extent. It's not helped by the previous two issues, either. The fact that the movie is so crowded it has trouble fully developing character relationships (and therefore, deeper emotional stakes for when those relationships are tested or those characters are put into danger) means sometimes things aren't felt as strongly as they should be.

A related problem to all of this is that when something serious and potentially impactful does happen, that thread is not woven into the fuller story beyond the next couple scenes. In writing, creating conflict is something that's supposed to build upon itself and have ripples throughout the story. Bad or important things that happen should accumulate throughout the story, and consequences should continue to mount. I don't just mean in terms of the action, like the consequences of a villainous action or mad science experiment gone wrong. But every character's inner conflict, every strain in a relationship between people, and especially every death should reverberate throughout the story. Again, this movie isn't totally absent any of that stuff, but it's much less fleshed out than it could. Often it's pushed to the wayside so that we can get more fun comic book moments, silly jokes, and big action set pieces.

The fun, airy, action-focused approach of this movie makes for an enjoyable time. Without better developed emotional stakes, though, it's almost designed to be surprisingly forgettable beyond the few standout moments. Again, I liked the movie. I think creating a story that is fun with a few genuinely memorable moments of sincerity and real emotional impact is a good thing! I loved a lot of what Superman did on screen! I just can't help but feel we could've gotten something more.

4. Lex Luthor is Too Interesting to be a Billionaire

This entry is, of course, not actually a problem I had with the movie at all. I just can't help but compare how compelling Lex Luthor is as a billionaire mega-villain compared to the more banal villainy and lamer personalities of our real life billionaire baddies. He's not nearly as dull as the off-putting Peter Thiel, the deeply unfunny Elon Musk, or the black hole of humanity Jeff Bezos. Where Lex Luthor is driven by an interesting blend of different motivations, resulting in some of the best villain monologues in years, these guys are driven by pretty mundane combinations of greed and egomania.

I'd rather we not be oppressed in real life by villainous billionaires. But as long as we are, couldn't they at least be a little more interesting? One can only wish.

What Martial Arts Do and Don't Give You

Martial arts have always fascinated me. I've spent a larger portion of my life training them than not. From practicing karate as a kid in the hopes of someday becoming the Green Power Ranger to my current routine of training muay thai and jiu-jitsu, the various fighting arts have truly been an integral part of my life. I would not be the same person today without them.

What they have meant to me over the years has shifted, though. As a child, they were a fun activity with cool rituals that let me feel like my favorite fiction characters. That is, of course, not how I view them today (though training to be the Green Power Ranger or Superman still makes up a small but not insignificant reason for why I train if I'm being honest with myself). As an adult in his mid-thirties, they mean a lot more to me than they did as a kid. They have given me so much and introduced me to countless wonderful people. The benefits go far beyond the basic benefits everyone knows come with training.
 

Someday I can be him

And yet... I wish that was the extent of my feelings about them. I wish I had no uncomplicated feelings here. I guess, in a way, I don't- the actual arts themselves bring nothing but positive thoughts and emotions from me. But the communities, business practices, and politics that have arisen around them do not often inspire such warm feelings.

If you had asked me "should I start training at a martial arts gym/studio/dojo?" a few years ago, I would've enthusiastically replied "yes!!" without hesitation. I would've gone on to gush about how much the arts have done for me like I did in the opening paragraphs above. But those days are gone. I just cannot, in good faith, unequivocally recommend training to people anymore because of how much more I understand the ugly sides of the martial arts world. And that actually makes me really, really sad. Because I want everyone to experience the joys and benefits I've gotten from my fifteen or so years of training. But things just aren't that simple.

This is one post, but really it's two distinct things. It's a celebration of all that is good about martial arts, but also a recognition of its limits. I won't be getting into the full dirt about its more toxic aspects, but I will be shedding light onto what training doesn't provide you- which will, of course, mean at least glancing at some of its worst aspects. I hope you find this useful.

WHAT IT DOES PROVIDE

1. The Obvious Stuff

There are some things martial arts give you that are pretty obvious, but still worth mentioning. So here I'll just briefly mention three of them- fitness, self-defense skills, and confidence (though two of these come with an asterisk, but we'll get to that in a bit).

I'll start with fitness, since it is the most obvious of the obvious. Whenever you pursue any physical activity, there are tons of benefits. Studies specifically focused on martial arts are limited, but there have been studies on both children and adults. And those studies line up not just with my own personal experience, but what I've seen from others in my years of training. Martial arts improve your cardiovascular endurance, strength, flexibility, balance, and pretty much any other physical attribute you can think of. Furthermore, just like other forms of exercise, it's also good for your mental health. Especially martial arts with an athletic and/or sparring component. For example, an hour of boxing can burn 700-1000 calories depending on your weight and other factors.

I am thirty five years old. While I take longer to recover from things like injuries or eating terribly than I used to, on any given normal day I feel about as good as I did in my twenties. I think a large part of that is because of my martial arts training. I'm glad it's kept me healthy, both for my own sake and for the sake of my daughter. Having became a father at thirty three years old, I'm glad I'll be able to keep up with her better than even most other parents who had their kids after their twenties thanks to how healthy and mobile my training has kept me.

Another benefit is self-defense. This is also self-evident, though does require a little myth-busting. First, because there are a ton of factors you don't know if you get into a random fight, you can't count on martial arts to defend yourself with when someone might have a weapon, or friends, or may just be able to get the drop on you in a way you're not prepared for. Second, not all martial arts are created equal when it comes to self-defense skills. Ironically, the martial arts best suited for self-defense are not the ones that market themselves as such. Rather, it's those that have some form of pressure-testing, with sparring being the most effective form (the reason being is without testing what you learn on a resisting opponent, you won't actually know how to perform your moves under distress in an active situation). Having addressed both of these myths, though, yes. Martial arts will still generally help you in a self-defense situation.

Finally, confidence. Simply put, building skills while getting fit and knowing you have a better chance of defending yourself if you ever need to is going to help you with your confidence. I know it's worked for me- in some ways to extent I can't even fully appreciate, considering I have done it so long that I have no idea how confident I would or wouldn't be having never trained.

With that said, though, there is caveat here. But we'll get to that in the second half of this post, because I think this caveat helps at least partially explain why there can be so much toxicity in the martial arts scene sometimes.

 

2. Perseverance 

This one may be obvious too, but I think it deserves its own special spot on this list. Simply put: consistent time and effort in martial arts will make you better. Showing up regularly to class, actively participating in lessons, and exerting yourself when it's wise to exert yourself will improve your skills. It's not about special abilities or secret mindsets or life-hacks. You work hard, you get results.

It may sound funny, but this was something that helped keep me afloat in graduate school when I was working on my History MA. The workload was intense. On average, we read about one history book per week per class, with an average of three classes per semester. There were evenings where the workload so overwhelmed me that I would just freeze up in despair and stare at the ceiling for an hour.

I always had a two-step process to get out of that paralysis. First I would think about how I couldn't quit because I would have to admit to all my loved ones that the program defeated me. Then I would think about how, in all my years of martial arts training, I always made it through adversity by just being consistent and moving one step at time. In jiu-jitsu, for example, if I were pinned underneath someone, I would first breathe. Then move my hips. Then try to get a wedge between my partner and I. Again- one move at a time, step by step. I would take that mindset and try to apply it to my studies. I would pick up a book and get through it, page by page, until I finished what I needed to do.

In a world of cutthroat capitalism where wealth is a better indicator of future success than hard work, it's refreshing to know that hard work can pay off somewhere (though unfortunately, as I discussed in a previous post, that causes many in the MMA world to often think the same thing applies in the economy- but I digress). With enough time and effort, anyone can become proficient in a martial art. That's not to say it's an equal playing field- the more time, money, and/or energy you have to train, the better off you'll be- but at least there is a basic correlation between work and progress. Again, that's not really something you can say for other aspects of the world we live in. It's nice to know that, somewhere at least, there is a place where hard work really does pay off, and in turn allow you to build up perseverance in a way many people don't get the chance to.

 

3. An Outlet for Creativity

We don't talk about it much (especially in an age of economic precarity where people can't afford to spend too much time thinking about it), but human beings are unique in how creative we are, and benefit from flexing our creative muscles. It keeps us engaged with whatever activity we're pouring our creative energies into, it reduces our stress, and it helps reduce brain aging as we get older. As human beings we are not meant to sit in a cubicle all day, or bust our asses in a factory. We do what we must to survive, of course, but we're made for more than that.

Martial arts are great for expressing your creativity. You might be thinking "sure, clearly you can be creative by using flashy, creative moves in training. This should be in the 'obvious' category above." But the beautiful thing about martial arts is that your creativity isn't just expressed in the flashy, cool-looking spinning kicks or flying knee strikes. It's expressed in every movement and every decision you make.

Let's think about it for a moment. Pretend you're boxing, since that's a relatively intuitive martial art to understand even without any training. Let's say you want to land your punches on a sparring partner, but they're really good defensively. What can you do? 

This is where the creativity comes in. You can try attacking a different target than the one you want (for example, if they're blocking punches to the head really well, you can try punching them in the body until they forget about defending their head). You can also try what are called "feints", where you act like you're about to do one move, but it's actually a fake to set up a different move. Or you could, counterintuitively, avoid throwing punches and keep moving away from your opponent until they get impatient and try to rush you because they're tired of you running away. There are so many ways to try to land your attacks. You have to get... well, creative.

There really is nothing like hitting a creative flow state in martial arts, which is where you enter a perfect place between being engaged and focused, without becoming overly tense or rigid. You can feel the creativity channeling through you. It's a wonderful experience and one of my favorite overall aspects of training. It doesn't happen every practice, but that's all the more reason to value it when it does come up.

 

4. Community and Teamwork

A picture from my gym.

In today's world, especially in the United States, people are increasingly lonely. In fact, some have even called it an epidemic of loneliness. There are a lot of reasons we suffer from such stinging isolation, including cars, suburbs, a lack of places beyond home or work for people to go (especially places that don't cost money), and of course every sort of technology that absorbs our attention, from television to video games to smartphones. Lower participation in every community institution from churches to volunteer organizations to labor unions has, overall, been a disaster for both ourselves as individuals and our society as a whole. We are social beings who are meant to be around others.

Martial arts gyms, at their best, can be a place of community in a time where people desperately need more of it. My gym, run by two Mexican-American former b-boys, is a great example. They have created a great, welcoming environment where anyone who comes in is treated with hospitality. Our gym often holds social events in places like parks and bowling alleys. Sometimes they'll even host parties in the gym, like during Halloween. Events for the kids who train in the children's' classes are held, too. This has helped make it so that a number of my training partners aren't just training partners, but friends. It's nice to have that. Especially right now, when as a parent I'm not able to see my other friends as often as I would like to. Whether joking around during training or making the occasional event outside of it, I'm grateful to be part of the community my gym has created.

It doesn't just stop at community, though. Alongside community is teamwork. That might sound odd when describing martial arts, considering any form of sparring or competition you do is one on one. The thing is, though, you need to train with other people to get better. From a short-sighted point of view, that could encourage a view of your training partners as obstacles to be overcome. What you come to understand, however, is that you do better if your training partners are skilled, happy, and able to come to practice consistently; even better if you have a good personal relationship with them, that way you can communicate and train comfortably and effectively. They say there is no "I" in "team." To get really cheesy, there is also no "I" in "personal growth." Because, paradoxically, to get better, you cannot just think about yourself.

All of this is intertwined. Working together with your training partners, rather than viewing them as obstacles, helps build a stronger sense of community. That strong sense of community, in turn, helps create a better atmosphere for people to train and get better. It's a positive reinforcing cycle. It is, like with the creative flow state I mentioned in the previous post, something I'd wish for everyone.

Unfortunately, though, not every martial arts gym reaches this level of positive community building and teamwork. Because not all martial arts gyms are welcoming, positive places. I've been to places with downright toxic environments. Which takes us to our next section. 

 

WHAT IT DOES NOT PROVIDE 

1. Good Character

One of the most popular beliefs among both the general population and martial arts schools in particular is that martial arts teach you good character. They certainly instill positive traits in you, some of which I talked about in the previous part of this post, but that is not the same thing as being a good person. Bullies can be creative, predators can be disciplined, abusers can have community. While some martial arts gyms really do create positive atmospheres geared toward encouraging people to be their best selves, that is a culture that needs to be specifically cultivated. Many martial arts gyms instead simply create bullies who are good at fighting.

Countless professional fighters have done awful things. I could link a hundred articles here about that. But as you read them you might think to yourself "sure, but those are professional fighters- what about instructors and other normal martial artists, who don't fight for a living?" Unfortunately, pretty awful things happen among their ranks, too.

Perhaps the most prominent example in the world of Brazilian Jiu-jitsu, an art that I train, is that of Lloyd Irvin. Irvin created a cult-like atmosphere in his gym, which created a culture of fear and harassment, as well as a culture of ignoring sexual assault victims assaulted by his students. When things started coming to light, however, it was revealed that Irvin himself was brought to trial for gang rape in 1989. During the mid-2010s when all of that came out, Irvin temporarily disbanded his team. But now he is back to being full reintegrated into the world of Brazilian Jiu-jitsu. No one even talks about it anymore.

Irvin is a particularly extreme example, most schools aren't run by rapists. But there is an entire spectrum between good and awful people in the martial arts world. I'm lucky enough to train at a place with great people, but I've trained at gyms where I saw firsthand cultures that encourage cruelty, selfishness, and strict hierarchy (which is absolutely a recipe for things like sexual assault, among other things). Of all the reasons I no longer recommend training martial arts to people as enthusiastically as I once did, this is the number one reason. 

And this isn't even touching on those who revealed themselves to have pretty awful worldviews. I know such a thing can be subjective to a point, but some of the bad shit gets pretty extreme and unambiguously vile, such as UFC fighter Bryce Mitchell praising Adolf Hitler.

 

2. A Replacement for Intellectual Enrichment

A lot of martial arts instructors pride themselves on their wisdom and like to think of themselves as warrior-philosophers. One of the most celebrated jiu-jitsu instructors of all time, Renzo Gracie, once said that, "There's more philosophy in jiu-jitsu mats than in any Ivy League school in America." It's ones of those quotes that is the right combination of simple yet deep-sounding that makes it seem like a profound observation. Then you think about it for more than two seconds and it all falls apart.

Do you gain valuable insights about certain aspects of being human on the mats? Yes, absolutely. I talked about some of those insights you gain through pushing yourself on the mat earlier in this post. Hell, you could even say there are things that you have to learn through struggle that you simply cannot learn through reading and abstract thought. There is a real value to action as a form of learning.

Unless Renzo Gracie is secretly hosting seminars on Rousseau or Sartre on the jiu-jitsu mats after sparring, though, to say there's more philosophy on the mat than in Ivy League schools is just absurd. Are you studying questions about ethics, logic, free will, existence, and reality in jiu-jitsu gyms? Entire treatises have been written and discussed through human history by some of our greatest minds trying to understand these issues. Philosophy programs at colleges and universities, Ivy League or not, dedicate themselves to studying and dissecting those materials while creating new generations of thinkers. Partaking in that pursuit helps us understand ourselves and the world around us much more deeply. And we're supposed to believe all that study and thought people put into earning their degrees don't teach you philosophy as well as a bunch of sweaty guys pretending to strangle each other on foam mats? It's vain self-flattery by Renzo.

Again, there's real value to training as a way to gain philosophical insights- as part of a balanced intellectual diet, so to speak, that should include pursuing other forms of learning. But if you're going to directly compare training vs academic study when it comes to learning philosophy, then obviously the latter is better. And frankly, the fact so many martial artists think like Renzo Gracie and show so little interest in pursuing knowledge through other means goes a long way toward explaining why so many of them think platitude-filled inspirational quotes on Instagram are deep. This is not a community that produces insights up there with Confucius or Plato.

Also, in Renzo Gracie's case in particular, you'd also think all that mat wisdom would be enough to stop him from quoting Heinrich Himmler. But you'd be wrong!

 

3. An Understanding of Health Science  

Within pretty much every fitness or fitness-related community, there is this idea that they understand health and everything related to it better than anyone else. Of course, when it comes to what exercises to do to be healthy, they definitely have a good grasp of best practices. Through experience they have figured out not only effective exercise routines, but also good practices for related routines like diet and rest as well. There is a lot you can learn from people in the fitness world.

But the other side of that knowledge of best fitness practices is entire industries of snake oil bullshit that thrive in the fitness world. There are just so many scams in the fitness world it's hard to keep track. Ironically, part of the reason they're able to proliferate there is because of how healthy everyone is. Most people at the top of the fitness world are in excellent shape, after all. So when they market a product to potential customers promising a sick set of abs while having a sick set of abs themselves, you're tempted to believe it. Often, however, those influencers are fit because of fairly standard fitness routines (plus steroids). The magic shortcut is usually bullshit.

In the martial arts world, which we can consider a subset of the fitness world, bullshit proliferates. Even the highest level fighters often link up with quacks, cranks, and bullshit artists- sometimes knowingly, sometimes being dupes themselves. Like with the fitness world, this is because knowing good general practices through experience is not the same thing as a deeper scientific understanding of everything. When you combine ignorance and confidence, you've got a recipe for disaster (and bullshit!).

This false confidence in how much people know gets even worse when you zoom out to things like public policy. There's a moronic meme that's been floating around on conservative social media with a picture of Robert F. Kennedy Jr next to a picture of Rachel Levine, who was Biden's assistant secretary of health. The meme shows a shirtless, buff RFK Jr and a not fit looking Levine next to each other asking "who would you trust more as secretary of health?" The implication is that RFK Jr makes better personal decisions about his health, therefore you should have him be secretary of health. It ignores the fact that Levine is extremely knowledgeable about public health policy whereas RFK Jr is a dumbass. If the question were "who do you want as your personal trainer?" I'd probably go with RFK Jr. When it comes to the person in charge of public health, though, I'm gonna go with the person who knows about public health.

But so many people in the martial arts world fall for this surface level bullshit, which is part of why so many of them support RFK Jr as health secretary. Their susceptibility to bullshit isn't just dangerous for them, therefore, but to all of us as a whole.

 

4. A Cure to Your Insecurities 

Before I talked about how martial arts can make you more confident. That is certainly true. As I hinted at, though, there is another side to that. A lot of people come into martial arts with some sort of insecurity. After all, when you think about it, willingly going somewhere to take a beating from another person is not exactly a normal thing to do. Tons of people around the world fantasize about training martial arts and learning how to kick ass, but it takes a stronger driving force to actually motivate you to walk through those gym doors and seek instruction. Often, that driving force is insecurity.

I myself am not above this. Less so with my childhood training in karate, which was as much my parent's decision as my own. When I started training in muay thai toward the end of high school, though, that was all me. There were a few things that motivated me to start, ranging from having a bunch of cholos break my windshield and threaten my friends to seeing Tony Jaa movies and wanting to kick ass like he did. But on a deeper level, I'd never been a particularly masculine kid growing up. That gave me some insecurities. I simply didn't have the aggression, recklessness, or assertiveness associated with more "masculine" boys my age. Martial arts gave me an entryway to a masculinity not as defined by those stereotypical masculine traits. The fact I had been chubby in middle school certainly added both to that insecurity and the idea tht martial arts could help overcome it, too.

As you can probably tell by the fact I'm comfortable enough to share these insecurities in a public blog post, these are things I've reflected on and worked through as I've gotten older. They no longer bother me the way they used to. What's key here, though, is that while training generally made me more confident, it didn't resolve any of these underlying issues for me. What did it was a variety of things- finding better friends to surround myself with, having good male mentors who modeled more positive masculinity for me, reading books about mental health, talking to people about mental health, and just doing some good ol' reflecting and thinking that I felt comfortable enough to do thanks to everything else I just listed. Training gave me a bandaid, but it was nowhere near enough by itself.

I say all this because, quite frankly, a lot of men* who sign up to train are fine with the bandaid and never actually confront their insecurities. I've had so many training partners confide things in me, from loneliness to depression to just hating how their body looks when they take their shirt off. It's made me really sad to hear some of that stuff, but with my favorite training partners that has often been a way for us to strengthen our friendship and go beyond just being acquaintances. But for many men in the martial arts world, they don't even talk about it. They simply think they can train their way into resolving their personal insecurities. I've never seen it work out well.

(*I'm talking about men here because I've simply had magnitudes more conversations about insecurities with men I train with than women, but I'm sure women have their own struggles with confidence and insecurity relative to martial arts too)

 

CLOSING THOUGHTS

 

I can't help but feel like I just scratched the surface with this post. For instance, I could've also talked about how marital arts gives you exposure to other cultures, but doesn't necessarily give you an appreciation for them as they are. That's just one of a ton of topics I could've addressed, but if I started adding more to this post I probably never would've stopped.

Still, I hope reading this sheds at least a little bit of light about the good, the bad, and the ugly of the martial arts world. Overall it's still a world I'm happy to be immersed in, thanks in large part to two main communities I'm a part of. One is the gym I currently train at, which I mentioned earlier. The other is the Southpaw community, a collective of liberation-minded martial artists based around the Southpaw podcast and training program. In different ways, both of those communities have taught me a lot and helped me grow as a person. I hope the martial arts world as a whole can move more in that direction.

I hope this post was interesting!

Top Everything of 2024

Another year, another list of my favorite things from throughout the year. Like always, I've compiled a list of favorite things and people from this year for a variety of categories, as I'm interested in too many things to just write a yearly review about a single topic. What can I say, the world is an interesting place!

 

Movie: Uprising

The best historical epics are those that are as rooted in the relationships of their central characters as they are in the time and place they're set in. It's true for recent great historical epics from the last few years, like RRR and The Woman King, and it's true for Uprising.

This movie is set in Korea during the 1590s, when Korea was a kingdom (known as Joseon). During the decade Japan attempted to invade Joseon, which became known as the Imjin War. The story follows Cheon Yeong, an enslaved person who is an expert swordsman. He is best friends with Lee Jong-ryeo, the compassionate son of the Yeong's enslaver. Yeong is a free spirit who constantly tries to escape enslavement despite his affection for Lee. Luckily, because of his great swordsmanship, he escapes harsher punishment because of his value as a tutor for Lee.

The events of this movie put these friends onto a collision course. What's interesting about the larger political conflict here is that it's a three way one- the Korean elite are shown to care for Korean commoners little more than the Japanese do. In fact, the Korean elite sometimes even collaborate with the Japanese invaders. Certainly a biting metaphor for the aftermath of World War 2, when a lot of Korean elites who collaborated with the Japanese retained their power and influence thanks to the US occupiers.

This movie worked for me on multiple levels. The politics were intriguing, the action was exciting, the central friendship was sincere and really got me to care about the people involved beyond just the spectacle of everything happening. It was easily my favorite movie of the year until I saw I'm Still Here, but I still give this one the edge even though the latter is probably a "better" movie. Despite the fact Uprising is on Netflix and was written and produced by Park Chan-wook (of Oldboy, Lady Vengeance, and The Handmaiden fame), it's really slipped under the radar. I'm not sure why that is, but definitely check it out!

Comedy Movie: The Fall Guy

This was such a wonderful, fun movie. It stars Ryan Gosling as a stuntman and Emily Blunt as his ex-girlfriend who has become a movie director. It's a comedic rom-com with some action that is really just a celebration of movies and the people who work on it. I don't have too much more to say about it, because this movie isn't trying to do anything outside of the box. It's just a well-made crowd pleaser that does everything it aims to do in a really charming, enjoyable way. Like last year's pick (Polite Society), I'll fondly remember this one for a while.

Animated Movie: Look Back

Sometimes the process of artistic creation can be a lonely one. Not always, though- sometimes you find fellow creatives and things fall into place. Look Back is a celebration of the collaborative creative process, following a young manga artist named Ayumi Fujino. She draws manga for the school newspaper, but is eventually overshadowed by the mysterious Kyomoto. After an eventual chance encounter, the two become friends and collaborators.

I won't say more, as I think this is a movie better experienced with as little foreknowledge as possible. It's short, and almost ends in tragedy, but things go in an interesting direction after the tragedy that really reorients everything. It does all this not to create a super intricate plot, but to get us to feel the full weight of everything this movie is trying to make us feel. It succeeds beautifully, and manages to do so in just under an hour.

Actor: Aaron Pierre

Rebel Ridge was an exciting action movie that took on the corruption of police departments and the injustice of civil forfeiture policy, where police can arrest you, take your stuff, and not give it back (or have to jump through an exhausting series of hoops to be able to get it back) if they "suspect" it isn't actually yours. Starring in the film is Aaron Pierre, who simply has the it factor. He is cool, he is calm, he is collected, yet he is also a badass force of nature. At the same time, he also manages to inject a respectful humanity and depth to his character that makes him more than just an ass-kicking machine.

I'm not even sure what else to say here, other than this is the sort of performance that should make him an A-list star. Pierre deserves to start leading big, exciting blockbusters.

Actress: Fernanda Torres

I was all settled to give this spot to Maisy Stella in My Old Ass. She brings a refreshing liveliness to the movie that I love. She helps add a sincere yet fun charm to it, really elevating it beyond the script (with serious help from the always great Aubrey Plaza). But then I saw I'm Still Here.

The movie is about life in Brazil in the early 1970s under the dictatorship that ruled during that time. It's based on a true story. Fernanda Torres stars as Eunice Paiva, a mother of five and the wife of former Brazilian Congressman Rubens Paiva. Rubens had been a member of the Brazilian Labour Party until the rightwing military dictatorship came to power in 1964 and purged it. In the beginning of the movie we get a taste of both the love this family has for each other and the vibrant culture of Brazil, even in the midst of such a difficult time. Eventually, however, the military dictatorship ruins the family's peace by abducting Eunice, Rubens, and their second oldest daughter. I'll avoid saying much else so that anyone reading can go in fresh, but it's a powerful movie.

Torres's performance is the center of the movie. She is a mother trying to protect her family, a wife who loves her husband, and a woman of principle trying to do what is right in a system that is so wrong. She pulls everything off with flying colors. She balances toughness and vulnerability with impressive finesse, and the earlier, more lighthearted parts of the movie allow her to have fun before things get serious. Seeing that side of her really helps round out the character. This has to be one of my favorite performances of the decade so far.

 

Male MMA Fighter: Ilia Topuria

There were really only two choices for this spot: Alex Pereira or Ilia Topuria. And while I love Pereira for how entertaining his fights are and how cool his aura is, not to mention how often he stepped up to fight on short notice to save struggling UFC events, he's not exactly beating the best of the best. That's not his fault (the higher weight classes just don't have many good fighters), but in an otherwise close contest between two entertaining fighters, I gotta go with the one who beat higher quality competition.

Ilia Topuria beat two of the best pound for pound fighters on the entire planet in Alexander Volkanovski and Max Holloway. Not only that, but he beat perhaps the most well-rounded mixed martial artist ever in Volk (it's probably him or Demetrius "Mighty Mouse" Johnson), and perhaps the best MMA boxer ever in Holloway (there's a few on the shortlist for this honor, but Max is definitely one of 'em). That's a damn good year. Even if both fighters (but especially Volk) may be a little bit past their primes, beating fighters of that caliber while they're even decently close to their primes is beyond impressive.

Topuria is an interesting fighter. His background is as a grappler, having started martial arts as a kid with Greco-Roman wrestling and getting into Brazilian Jiu-jitsu as a teenager before moving to mixed martial arts. He has developed a dangerous and sophisticated boxing game, however. For many of his most recent fights that was what did the bulk of the work for him, though he did remind us how well-rounded he could be in his fight against Max Holloway (which you need to do to defeat an MMA-boxer of Max's caliber).

The fact Topuria is entertaining in addition to skilled makes him a joy to watch, like most featerweight champions. We'll see if Topuria can keep winning and build a legacy as champion like the other great previous champions of his division, including Volk and Holloway. I know I'll be watching with interest either way.

(NOTE: I usually also choose a female MMA fighter of the year, however this simply wasn't a great year for women's MMA in the UFC. I will, however, choose a female athlete from a different combat sport a few spaces down)

MMA Fight: Holloway vs Gaethje

This is one of those "what else can even be said about this?" sort of fights. Holloway and Gaethje went all out in one of the most entertaining brawls I've ever seen. On top of that, Holloway locked himself into fighter immortality through his point-and-brawl move toward the end that led to him knocking out Gaethje. While this fight wasn't quite as competitive as most of my picks for fight of the year in the past, it was just too fun to pass up.

Boxing Match: Katie Taylor vs Amanda Serrano

The Mike Tyson vs Jake Paul fight was a shit show. It was an embarrassment to the sport of boxing and an embarrassment to our collective intelligence. It was a spectacle of all show, no substance. Frankly, anyone who watched should be embarrassed...

...including me, because I watched it!

The main event was, of course, abysmal. The fights just before it, however, weren't. Especially not this fight. The two had already fought in 2022. They had an exciting, incredibly close fight that Kate Taylor won by split decision. This time, however... well, they yet again had an exciting, incredibly close fight that Taylor won by decision. These two are just made for each other. This fight was far and away one of the best fights of any combat sport I saw this year; it was almost enough to make Tyson vs Paul something of a real boxing card. If you enjoy fighting (especially boxing, but really any combat sports at all) and get the chance, this is an absolute must-watch.

Grappling Match: Kade Ruotolo vs Andrew Tackett

In grappling, there are generally two types of styles: "passers" who prefer to be on top of their opponent in grappling exchanges and "guard players" who prefer to play off of their back. I'm greatly oversimplifying, of course, but these are the two basic types at the most elementary level. Oftentimes in jiu-jitsu when you have two passers face each other it can turn into a boring, slow-paced wrestling match. Neither wants to be put on their back, but because both have good wrestling, they cancel each other out.

Kade Ruotolo and Andrew Tackett are both passing-based players, but their match earlier this year was anything but boring. The two gave it everything they have, constantly going for whatever moves they could without hesitation. The result is one of the greatest grappling matches of all time. You could show it to people who've never seen a grappling match to get them interested in the sport, you could show it to an advanced grappler to look out for high-level technical nuances. Best of all, it's free on YouTube!

Female Grappler: Ffion Davies

I love the martial art of jiu-jitsu. I've been practicing it for about a decade and currently hold the rank of purple belt. It's given me so much. But a dirty secret (that isn't really much of a secret if you're at all familiar with the sport) is that it is full of terrible people. Predators, scam artists, fascists, and straight up lunatics abound in the grappling world. Whenever an exciting new grappler emerges, you pretty much just take it for granted that they're probably not a good person.

But sometimes a good person hits the scene. And everyone once in a rare while, that good person makes it to the height of the sport. Ffion Davies is currently that person. An advocate for making jiu-jitsu more inclusive for women and for better athlete pay in general, she is also one of the best grapplers in the world. In 2024 she beat five high level women, four of them by submission. She even donated part of her purse for her highest profile match of 2024 at the Craig Jones Invitation to Gaza, which is pretty cool!

Scientific Discovery: Chimps Use Forests as Pharmacies

New research shows that chimpanzees may self-medicate when unwell, seeking out plants with anti-bacterial and anti-inflammatory properties to ease what ails them. For example, in one study conducted, a chimp with a badly injured hand ate a type of fern tree that had anti-inflammatory properties. 

This discovery is not only interesting in and of itself, but might be able to help human beings. By knowing that chimpanzees engage in this behavior, scientists can follow chimps around in the forest and study the plants they eat. After all, in jungles around the world there are far too many plants for scientists to study all of them. By having the field narrowed down to what chimps normally it, it makes the selection process for which plants to study a lot more manageable.

 

Scientific Achievement: Lenacapavir

In many countries around the world, HIV remains a serious public health problem. Treatment has improved exponentially over the last couple decades, but its spread is still a serious problem. A new drug, however, has been found to protect patients for six months after taking it. That drug is lenacapavir, which has just about a 100% efficacy rate. It's a wonderful breakthrough that will sure help millions around the globe.

 

Photo: UnitedHealth CEO Assassination 

Was there a single person who makes less than $100,000 a year upset by this assassination?

Bullshit News Story: Haitian Immigrants Eating Pets

During the middle of the 2024 election campaign, the Republicans honed in on an obviously fake news story about Haitian immigrants eating pets. The "story" came from a couple calls from local racist cranks with zero evidence. Normally people would have the sense to brush that story off, but Republicans (particularly JD Vance) never pass up a chance to stoke racism against immigrants. What was shocking about this story, though, was how overtly racist it was. Most of the time, Republicans like to be suggestively racist, that way they have plausible deniability when confronted about it. This was just straight up George Wallace style racism, though.

When confronted about it, Vance more or less admitted he didn't care if the story was true or not. In his own words: "the American media totally ignored this stuff until Donald Trump and I started talking about cat memes. If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that's what I'm going to do." Because the point isn't to figure out the truth. The point is to stoke hatred in order to enact their otherwise unpopular, shitty agenda. 

Actual News Story: The Genocide in Palestine

As of writing this, a ceasefire has finally been reached in Gaza. It's nice that the killing has finally stopped, but the fact a genocide occurred over the last fourteen months (with full funding and arming from the Untied States) is an irrevocable stain on the world for letting it continue this long (with the United States repeatedly hampering all efforts by the United Nations to do anything to impose a halt to Israel's mass killing). All the rhetoric about the "rules based international order" and "human rights" that the United States, and the West more broadly, use was shown to be an empty shell.

Having kept up with news about the genocide for almost every day in 2024, I don't know what to even zoom in on here without writing an essay (or, hell, even a whole book- which I may do someday). From blowing up hospitals and schools to sabotaging peace talks to trying to cover up news of sexual assault against Palestinian detainees, Israel perpetrated countless atrocities. This is why even groups like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, as well as genocide scholars and even the United Nations itself, have ruled it a genocide. But none of that was enough to stop it from continuing.

The people of Palestine have suffered so much. Even in the West Bank, where Israeli settlers continued stealing land from native Palestinians despite no Hamas presence at all in the region. We can only hope the best for them (as well as make donations whenever we have anything to spare), but that will not bring back the dead, or give homes to the almost 40,000 orphaned children, or help rebuilt the utterly ruined infrastructure. And it won't keep them safe going forward, where they're still at the mercy of Israeli occupation.

Inadequate as words are, though, it's still worth saying: free Palestine.

Badass: Palestinian Doctors

Throughout the course of Israel's genocide in Gaza, it repeatedly targeted hospitals. It has completely devastated the Gazan medical system. Yet there are countless stories of Palestinian doctors refusing to leave their patients despite the risk they're taking. Doctors around the world take oaths to care for their patients and do so with impressive dedication, but those who do so during a genocide where they are being targeted shows a level of bravery that is an entirely different league. They shouldn't have to be this brave, they shouldn't have to choose between risking their lives against a murderous rampage or abandoning their patients, but they were put in that position. And they chose to save lives.

Video: Palestinian Children Thank Student Protesters

I share this video not to give special mention to the college students across the world who protested for Palestine (I think they're wonderful, but they're hardly the most important people here), but because it just shows how desperate these poor children were to have some sort of beacon of hope while facing an extermination. Look at these precious kids- some of whom were certainly killed since the recording of the video. Don't their hopes, their dreams, their fears count too? Look at how earnest they are. How they smile in the midst of such devastation. The world failed to keep them safe. It continues to fail to keep them safe. That needs to change.