Catching Up With The Films of 2016: God’s Not Dead 2 (dir by Harold Cronk)

Posted on December 25, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Much like Warcraft and Nine Lives, God’s Not Dead 2 is one of those films that you just know is going to be mentioned on all of the “worst films of 2017” lists. I imagine that it will get a lot of Razzie nominations and it might even win a few.

But you know what? I watched God’s Not Dead 2 on YouTube and I enjoyed it, though probably not for the reasons that the filmmakers intended. God’s Not Dead 2 is one of the most thoroughly over-the-top and shamelessly melodramatic films that I have ever seen. This is one of those faith-based films where all of the Christians are practically saintly while the atheists are portrayed as being so evil that they might as well be tying people to train tracks and twirling their mustaches. This is one of those films where the good guys discuss their plans while sitting in quaint kitchens while the bad guys gather in conference rooms and growl about how much they hate religion. And the propaganda is just so blatant and lacking in subtlety that it becomes undeniably watchable.

God’s Not Dead 2 is, for lack of a better comparison, the Reefer Madness of Christian filmmaking. It’s a film that makes Rock: It’s Your Decision look like a work of subtle nuance. You may want to look away but you won’t be able to.

Essentially, God’s Not Dead 2 takes the heavy-handed sanctimonious sermonizing of the first film and then adds a healthy dash of anti-government paranoia. (And you know how much I love anti-government paranoia.) In this one, Melissa Joan Hart is a teacher who makes the mistake of 1) mentioning to her class that the Sermon on the Mount inspired Gandhi and Martin Luther King and 2) counseling a student who is struggling to deal with the death of her brother. (When the student asks Melissa what gives her strength, Melissa replies, “Jesus.”) Melissa is brought before the school board, which says that Melissa has broken the law and that they want to take away her teaching license. Offering absolutely no support is her principal (Robin Givens). Fortunately, a handsome lawyer (Jesse Metcalfe) is willing to help her out. He doesn’t believe in God but how long do you think that will last?

Prosecuting Melissa is … a lawyer from the ACLU! We know that this lawyer is evil because his name is Peter Kane and he’s played by Ray Wise. And here’s the thing — Ray Wise gives perhaps the least subtle performance of the year. When he talks about the importance of convincing America that there is no God, he does so with the type of evil gleam in his eye that we typically tend to associate with lower tier MCU villains. When he cross-examines Melissa’s students, he smirks like a serial killer. Whenever he has to say words like “God” or “Jesus,” he literally spits them out. The only thing that trips him up is when a Christian admits to having once been an atheist and Wise looks so stunned that you half expect him to say, “But that is illogical and does not compute” before revealing that he’s actually a robot sent from the future. He’s one of the most evil characters of all time and Wise so throws himself into the role that you can’t help but enjoy watching him.

So, on the one side, you have Ray Wise spitting hellfire and, on the other side, you have a literally beatific Melissa Joan Hart. And let’s give credit where credit is due — Melissa Joan Hart does as well as anyone could with her seriously underwritten and kinda drab character. (Add to that, Melissa Joan Hart was Sabrina, The Teenage Witch and, therefore, I will always give her the benefit of the doubt.)

Meanwhile, there’s another subplot going on. The local preacher — who somehow manages to get on the jury, despite the fact that there’s no way a preacher would actually be put on the jury of trial that centered around separation of church and state — is being pressured by the local authorities. They want to see copies of his sermons. Damn government!

Of course, what’s interesting is that this actually did happen in Houston. In 2014, several preachers were presented with subpoenas demanding copies of their sermons, in order to determine if they had been preaching against the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance. For that matter, there was also recently a story down here about a high school football coach who lost his job because he led his team in a prayer. There is a basis in reality for both of the film’s main storylines but you’d never guess that from watching God’s Not Dead 2. God’s Not Dead 2 is so melodramatic and so firmly devoted to its good-vs-evil worldview that it sacrifices whatever real world credibility it could have and probably does more harm than good to the cause that it supports.

That being said, it’s a fun movie in much the same way that the Atlas Shrugged trilogy was fun. It’s just so silly and over-the-top that you can’t help but watch. I imagine that believers will enjoy seeing the nonbelievers ridiculed while nonbelievers will enjoy shaking their head and saying, “How can anyone buy into this?” By taking the side of half the audience but doing so in a way that seems to confirm every pre-conceived notion held by the other half, God’s Not Dead 2 appeals to all.

If nothing else, Ray Wise deserves some sort of award for perfecting the art of villainous overacting. Though this year, he may have to share it with Kyle Secor. Secor’s work in The Purge Election Year is impossible to top but Ray Wise sure does come close.

Overacting is not dead.

Sorry Sockmonkey, But This Is The Best Commercial Ever!

Posted on June 25, 2010 by Arleigh

My fellow resident writer Lisa Marie posted that the Kia commercial which aired around the time of the Super Bowl was the brest freakin’ commercial ever but I shall disagree and nominate what has to be the best one ever. It’s a series of Old Spice commercials for their line of Body Wash products.

If you’ve already clicked the YouTube video attached above then you can see that it has action, comedy, sci-fi, nature, and Godzilla-style city destruction. All of them delivered by actor Terry Crews who can and will destroy Chuck Norris and that’s without help from his human-eyed tiger.

It was a tough call for me to pick this as the best commercial since a past Old Spice commercial with God (Bruce Campbell) shilling their product was my previous pick for best and greatest ever. But God didn’t have a tiger or city destruction in his Old Spice commercials.

Lisa Marie’s 10 Favorite Episodes of South Park

Posted on June 22, 2010 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I love South Park and, when I decided to list my ten personal favorite episodes, I thought this would be an easy article to write. How wrong I was. It’s hard to narrow 203 episodes down to 10 when you happen to love 193 of them. As I struggled to settle on my ten, I did a google search to see what other South Park fans had listed as their top ten episodes. What I discovered was that a lot of people had a top ten list and no one seemed to be in agreement. I guess that’s why I love South Park. It’s a show that people either love or hate, often for the exact same reasons.

I first truly discovered South Park when I was 18 and the show, itself, was either 7 or 8. Don’t get me wrong. I knew about the show and I’d seen the occasional episode (though my mom would always promptly change the channel if she walked into the room and saw it on the TV). But, as far as becoming a true “fan” of the show, I arrived late. Perhaps as a result, my list of favorite episodes is pretty much dominated by the latter seasons of the show (though I did come very close to putting Gnomes on the list).

10) The List (Original Airdate: November 14th, 2007) — Okay, technically The List isn’t really one of the best episodes of South Park but it’s always made me laugh, largely because me and my girlfriends used to obsessively make lists like the one in this episode. We also always took it way too seriously, even though the police were never called and I don’t think anyone ever ended up pulling a gun on anyone else.

9) You Got F’d In The A (Original Airdate: April 7th, 2004) — Not only is this episode of perfect parody of You Got Served, it’s also full of priceless WTF moments like the duck dancing to a song about Ketamine, Randy Marsh dancing to Achy Breaky Heart, and Butters killing even more people than usual as a result of his dancing. It also features the Goth kids at their negative best. Speaking as someone who used to have an exclusively black wardrobe even while she was fantasizing about becoming a world-famous prima ballerina, this episode gives me the best of both worlds. It was also one of the 1st episodes of the show that I ever sat down and truly watched.

8 ) Ginger Kids (Original airdate: November 9th, 2005) — Cartman reveals that along with being a racist and an anti-Semite, he’s prejudiced against redheads as well. Then he’s tricked into believing that he is a redhead and promptly organizes all the “gingers” in town into a cult. Admittedly, one reason I like this episode is because I’m a ginger kid myself and, oddly enough, this episode was first broadcast on my 20th birthday.

7) Miss Teacher Bangs A Boy (Original Airdate: October 18th, 2006) — Cartman as Dog, the Bounty Hunter. What else needs to be said? (Well, let’s not forget Ike’s facial expressions as Kyle tries to warn his parents about Miss Teacher.)

6) Night of the Living Homeless (Original Airdate: April 18th, 2007) — The homeless invade South Park and the end result is a brilliant parody of both zombie movies and liberal good intentions.

5) Whale Whores (Original Airdate: October 28th, 2009) — I like this episode for a lot of reasons. First off, the TV show Whale Wars is one of those smugly, self-satisfied shows that just deserves to be ridiculed on general principle. Secondly, it brought attention to just how barbaric Japanese whaling really is and it did so in a far more entertaining way than the Cove. But, ultimately, it all comes down to Cartman’s performance of Poker Face.

4) You Have 0 Friends (Original Airdate: April 7th, 2010) — This is the episode that made me proud to have deleted my Facebook account years ago.

3) Pandemic and Pandemic 2: The Startling (Original Airdates: October 22nd and 28th, 2009) — Yes, a lot of South Park fans disliked the two Pandemic episodes but I loved them. Along with ridiculing the current “home video horror” craze (which would later be epitomized by the ludicrous Paranormal Activity), the show also worked as a wonderful commentary on the whole series itself. From the minute Craig said, “You know, this is why no one else wants to hang out with you guys…,” Pandemic had me. Of course, needless to say, there’s also nothing cuter than a guinea pig in a pirate costume.

2) Go God Go and Go God Go Part XII (Original Airdate: November 1st, 2006 and November 8th, 2006) — There’s a lot of reasons why I like these episodes but the main reason is that, speaking as a nonbeliever, I’ve always felt that a lot of comedies satirize organized religion (excluding, of course, Islam) because it’s an easy target as opposed to actually having anything interesting to say about it one way or the other. (Hello, Family Guy.) It takes more guts to satirize something like atheism, especially the Richard Dawkins brand of disbelief. Plus, the Sea Otters. You have to love the Sea Otters.

1) The Imaginationland Trilogy (Original Airdates: October 17th, 24th, and 31st, 2007) — I don’t know that there’s anything left to be said about Imaginationland so I will just say that the relevance of this trilogy — in which humanity’s imagination is threatened by a bunch of thugs and bullies — became all the more obvious after Comedy Central decided to censor South Park’s 201st episode to avoid hurting the feelings of terrorists.