I don’t have anything new or interesting to offer regarding the pulling of The Interview, but that’s not stopping me from typing words.  That’s right, if Michael Moore can say something funny about it, then I certainly can type a long winded blog piece that rambles a bit then ends abruptly.  That’s how I roll. My words carry weight – like air.  Is that a bad analogy?

See, I was actually one of those people who did plan to see it on Christmas Day, which is my birthday, but a certain hypersensitive great leader made it so that wasn’t possible.

I confess, I’m kind of a Kim Jong Un nut.  Some people form cults around Benedict Cumberbatch, I happen to follow sanitized news about Un quite religiously.  If he makes the news on a Monday, then I’m kvetching about it… on a Monday, because see I just read it and I’m on top of it. I was excited when he recently disappeared from the media for a good month, I had the highest hopes for a coup – fingers crossed and all that someone in his regime said, “hey, we’re the darkest spot on the globe and our so-called “great” leader is batshit crazy.”  My disdain comes from the human rights abuses, the multi-generational hard labor camps (North Korean holiday retreats for the entire family) established for those moments when you (or a distant relative in your family) offend the Kim’s, and the outrageous threats against South Korea and the rest of the world.  I can’t tell you what a complete let down it was for me when he re-emerged with a cane and started pointing at things again for the press. He’s got mad pointing skills.  Are there worse out there who are more deserving of my ire? Absolutely, but Un is the one on my radar.

He got there some time after he fired some rockets into the Sea of Japan, then fired some more missiles close to the South Korean border, “purged” his uncle (not by starving dogs) and then later executed (not him personally, of course) his girlfriend and her band for “pornography”, closed access to the Kaesong Industrial Complex, and held his breath and blustered some incendiary threats.  Yes, Un is on my radar and more importantly on my nerves.  He’s a pudgy humorless sociopath with nuclear capability.  It’s well-documented (ie. I’m writing it here) that I don’t care for sociopaths with nuclear capabilities (that actually goes for the slender funny ones, too).  They tend to get unstable and button-pushy and when they get like that, they work my nerves (and countless innocent civilians end up dying).

We won’t talk about Rodman.

So, when I heard of The Interview some months ago, I didn’t care that it was Seth Rogen and James Franco (whom I may love more in Freaks and Geeks) – it could have been anyone and I’d reserve my seats.  And the truth is, deep down I know Seth Rogen and James Franco can make me laugh even if those laughs are cheap.  I’ve accepted the fact that I’m a simple soul. When Sony announced it would release on my birthday, it was like Christmas had come early. (See what I did there? I was born on Christmas.  Get it? I’m so alone. 😦 ) In other words, it was a big win

Of course, once they got wind of it N. Korea held its breath, stomped a lot and issued threats, which actually ensured the success of the movie. Unfortunately they finally “got real” and well, you all know the rest.

Here are my thoughts on that:

• No, it’s not the world’s greatest marketing campaign and no, we saps are not all being duped by Sony.  As much as I love a great conspiracy story, I’m pretty sure (call me naive) Homeland Security, the FBI and President Obama do not care about how well this movie does for Sony. There aren’t kickbacks to the administration.  The FBI’s cyber-terrorism unit likely has better things to do than get a fix in for a movie studio.  And let’s be honest, there are stronger movies for them to get behind.
• Yes, it is great publicity for the movie.  While I would see it minus the whole circus, I recognize two things about myself: 1) I have no natural sense of taste, and 2) I’m kind of alone in my love for Seth Rogen and James Franco.  Now, if it is released, the movie is going to do gangbusters (that’s really really well), because people who would never have seen it, will go. Way to market one for us, Un! Solid job, mate!
• While I agree Sony completely caved, so did the theater chains like Regal, Cinemark, AMC, and Carmike even after Homeland Security said they had no credible intelligence that there would be any attacks on theater chains.  Granted, I get the theaters don’t want to take the risk when it comes to their theater goers and likely their staff, but come on… Couldn’t we send some National Guardsmen in to see a free movie and in turn take care of any would-be psychotic Un fans?
• Note to Sony:  as one person said on NPR, when you write an email think “how would that look as a headline in the New York Times”?  It’s a simple rule of thumb – use it.  Yes, you do look like asses. Yes, they did get about 10 terabytes of your data, which is a ton of data, and will lead to nowhere good. And yes, the malware is destroying your systems – also bad, but hey the damage is done.  Your pants have already dropped.  The one way you can make it worse (depending on what else is in that 10 terabytes) is capitulating.  I don’t say that because I have waited to see the movie for six months… no wait, that’s exactly why I said it. My bad!
• Paramount… thought I didn’t see you over there.  Really, you can’t re-release Team America: World Police? Way to stand up! No wait, I mean that opposite thing for “standing up” – I think that’s “roll over”.

In the end, I guess we’ll end up seeing The Imitation Game for my birthday – another bit of  holiday hilarity that will end with the suicide of Alan Turing – a fun, light-hearted holiday romp for my birthday – just what I was hoping for.

Thanks for ruining my birthday, Un.