Wednesday, April 16, 2014 • Page 4
Opinions
Editor: Katelyn Kennon letters@wildcat.arizona.edu (520) 621-3192 twitter.com/dailywildcat
APropos of nothing
Sequels: too fast, not too curious BY Logan Rogers The Daily Wildcat
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ollywood is supposed to be a magnet for creative people, so why can’t it actually be creative? The movie business is out of ideas and unwilling to take risks. It takes a safe-bet superhero movie franchise like “Superman,” “Batman” or “Spider-Man,” makes a ton of money off of a trilogy and then just reboots the franchise a few years later. It’ll make a bad remake of any classic film or TV series, from “Planet of the Apes” to “Footloose” to “The Dukes of Hazzard” to “The Pink Panther.” Need I go on? It’s time for Hollywood to give up any hypocritical pretense of devotion to artistic integrity and just be honest about what it’s about these days: cashing in, selling out and scraping the bottom of the sequel barrel. So, I’ll pitch some absolutely ridiculous sequels that would be very profitable. I hope the studio big shots in La La Land are reading. “Logging Back into the Social Network” — This sequel will pick up where the original’s ambiguous ending left off. Mark Zuckerberg will continue to update his Facebook status, make friend requests, post to people’s walls and “like” stuff. The entire film will depict his three-hour Facebook binge in real time, with absolutely no dialogue. A film this arty and boring can be made on a very small budget, and since the original won a Best Motion Picture award at the Golden Globes, quite a few suckers are bound to buy a ticket. Besides, tons of people are on their smartphones in movie theaters anyway, and a lot of them are on Facebook. If the audience ignores the screen, why can’t the screen ignore the audience? “Titanic 2: My Brains Will Go On” — Two years after the sinking of the Titanic, the people who died in the shipwreck begin crawling out of the ocean onto the English coast. Now they are undead zombies, and the only thought in their mostly braindead minds is to devour the flesh of the living. Jack used to be after Rose’s heart, but now he’s only interested in her brains! I’m both excited and terrified to hear the inspiring theme song Celine Dion will come up with for this film! “Casablanca 2: Berlin Drift” — The 1942 original may be one of the greatest films of all time, but it’s way too slow for 21st-century attention spans. This one needs to be an action thriller with lots of explosions. Russell Crowe as Rick Blaine and Jamie Foxx as Sam will parachute behind enemy lines during World War II. The Nazis have killed Victor Laszlo, and Ilsa Lund (played by Jennifer Lawrence) is in a prison camp. Our heroes will rescue Ilsa, blow up Nazi stuff and maybe kill Hitler while they’re at it. You can’t tell me this movie won’t do better with the 18- to 34-year-old demographic than the original “Casablanca” did. “Some Country For Old Men!” — Tommy Lee Jones, inspired by a dream, assembles a team of over-thehill action heroes, including Clint Eastwood, the cast of “Last Vegas” and Uncle Drew from the Pepsi MAX commercials. Together, they will unite in the West Texas desert to foil the murderous high jinks of Anton Chigurh, a dastardly villain with a terrible hairdo. This lighthearted romp will do much better at the box office than the original. “Forrest Gump Returns: Stupid Is As Stupid Does… Save The World” — America’s luckiest underdog continues to be in just the right place at the right time to make history. Tom Hanks will definitely agree to act the part again if it gives him a shot at bagging another Oscar. Jenny Curran may have died in the original film, but Forrest was still alive and kicking, and in the 21st century, he will bumble into capturing Osama bin Laden, helping Barack Obama get elected as the first African-American U.S. president and, most importantly, accidentally inventing the selfie. Hollywood, you’re welcome! Steven Spielberg, please call me if you want to discuss how big my cut of the revenues will be. Disclaimer: As a general rule, nothing in Logan Rogers’ columns should be taken seriously.
— Logan Rogers is a second-year law student. Follow him @AproOfNo
Student-athletes frequently shortchanged in academics has definitely been slouching in this area. We do have set requirements, as per the Student-Athlete handbook: a minimum of a 2.0 GPA, penalties for unexcused absences and, of course, the same rules that apply to everyone about plagiarism. But these requirements are awfully minimal; a GPA of 2.0 is what is expected of everyone. It’s also unsettling that these athletes are in a system that just treats them as cash cows. They don’t receive any of the money that the university makes off of their sporting events, and to top it off, many of them don’t receive a real education either — even though higher education is what they are promised in exchange for being a valuable member of the team. It must be insanely stressful to have to compete in a team while also keeping up with schoolwork, and there isn’t much reward to make up for it. There’s no guarantee that college athletes will get into the NBA or NFL after giving all their blood and sweat to their team. According to Business Insider, less than 2 percent of college athletes who play football or basketball make it into the pros. If student-athletes’ grades suffer too much and they don’t graduate, or if they end up with a degree in a field they couldn’t care less about, they’ll be in a very bad situation. Athletes must understand that there needs to be a backup route in case things don’t work out, and to look at their education as something to be cherished and not just a chore to put up with while they play ball. I’m sure not all college athletes are enamored with the dream of making it big, but the ones that are need be wary of what the odds are.
want to study too hard, although the school had to take it down once it stirred up too much controversy. Very few athletes or teachers would want to admit to such behavior, but it’s undoubtedly BY Jesus Luna Tarazon the case for many: All the athletes really hope to The Daily Wildcat get out of college is to make it into the world of professional sports, and the school that offers them ecently, it was revealed that a a full ride only does so because of the tremendous basketball player at the University of amount of revenue that sporting events bring to a North Carolina received an A grade in a university. class where his only assignment was to turn in a Now, just so we’re clear: I’m not saying all “paper” about Rosa Parks that was just 146 words athletes are dumb. I’m sure a lot of them are very long. Not only did this paper consist of barely 10 intelligent, and can do more than just toss a ball sentences, but it also reads like it was written by around. My concern is that when some of these a kid who googled Rosa Parks for a fifth-grade athletes can’t keep their grades up and homework assignment. As it people make cushy adjustments for turns out, UNC athletes are them, the academic world is being made encouraged to enroll in sham into an awful joke. These athletes classes that only require one So many students that attend a paper for the entire semester, are in a system university either had to drop a lot of allowing them to pass with that just treats hard-earned money on their education comically minimal effort and them as cash or plunge themselves into massive debt. boost their GPAs in order to These students work themselves raw, and cows. meet the requirements to in comparison, football and basketball participate in games. players are being churned through the The idea of schools letting system and receiving their degrees for athletes sail through their much less effort in their respective fields. academic careers in order to The situation has been stagnant for be able to compete with their a while. According to an article in The Chronicle teams isn’t a new concept. A similar scandal with of Higher Education, the graduation rate for both athletes enrolling in “independent studies” classes football and men’s basketball in the NCAA broke was uncovered at the University of Michigan, and 70 percent for the first time back in 2012. Despite many studies have shown that student-athletes this, both of these sports still have the lowest tend to, and are encouraged to, cluster around graduation rate out of all the other Division I sports. relatively undemanding majors. Even Stanford Sadly, that same year, the UA was second-toUniversity once pinned up a list of “easy courses” last in student-athlete graduation rates in the that were recommended for athletes who didn’t Pac-12 Conference, at 53 percent. Our school
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Your Views From “Christ! Enough is enough” (by Brittany Rudolph, April 14) I’m glad someone finally wrote about this. I feel the same way. I am a Protestant Christian, and even I felt uncomfortable by their questions and I now avoid them at all costs. I can’t imagine how they are making people not of Christian faith feel. — Maddy Brittany Rudolph may think she’s altruistic, but [she’s] ultimately naive. She always has had the right to say no. What she thinks she lacks is the capacity to. I’ve never had a problem with them. I simply say, “Sorry, I’ve got to go to class,” or “Sorry, I’m too busy.” Stop trying to paint yourself as a victim
because some people asked you a few questions. I can’t even believe that she think she’s trapped on this campus. “Sure, but when it’s dark outside and few other people are around, escaping can be difficult.” What is she so afraid of? She still has the right to say no. It’s not like the practice involves pointing guns or knives at these students and forcing them to take these religious surveys. And I am disturbed by the fact that she refers to the Church’s techniques as cult-like. I don’t understand how the religious surveys are different from a consumer survey or a political survey. It’s just a marketing technique. There is no duty to submit to these things. She’s just annoyed at the subject
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— Jesus Luna Tarazon is a senior studying English. Follow him @DailyWildcat
topic, from what I’m reading. The topic of religion is surely controversial, but she clearly has the right to say, “No, I don’t have time to answer a few questions. Afraid that you might offend them or hurt their feelings by saying no? Grow up. The twoletter word gets to the point and keeps you from doing things you don’t want to do. Don’t be the brain-dead “yes” student. I am an individual for free speech, and I don’t put qualifiers on it. Why? Because if I don’t like what they want to discuss, I leave. I don’t hang around to answer their questions. — Reality Check If Muslims used the same tactics at the University of Arizona instead of Christians, would we even have this discussion? — FoodForThought
“not too much to ask” for those of FCC to set up a booth, but it’s too much to ask for her, as an individual, to avoid the FCC she thinks is annoying. She needs to be responsible for her own actions and stop painting herself as a victim. She’s not a child, and really should stop thinking like a child. No still means no, and she needs to use that power of “no” when she sees fit. — CommonSense Just say “no” or “fuck off ” and they’re more than willing to oblige. — fsfsfsfsfsfsfs From “ASUA Senate approves funding for summer scholarship” (by Madison Brodsky, April 10) What is PC Wind? How about PCWIN – Pima County Wireless Integrated Network. Reporters on this site need to do research! — Jane Doe
It’s weird how she thinks it’s
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