Totenkindly
@.~*virinaĉo*~.@
- Joined
- Apr 19, 2007
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I guess for me the TKs had no "purpose" except /insert powerful bad guy. I know they were introduced at the beginning, but you don't know what they are till later. They seemed unnecessary in the story like if he had another reason for accumulating power like some technology or just a lot of hired muscle it would have been more realistic. What I liked about 12 monkeys more was Willis going forward with his mission even though he thought he was insane and knew he would lose everything in the end
I didn't get the impression he was aware he would "lose everything" until maybe the last two minutes of the movie, and at that point, he did not feel like a hero but like a victim. In 12 Monkeys thinking, time was set and could not be changed, regardless; once that is understood, the story becomes a tragedy, where you are merely a pawn of the system and the only heroic action is to try to embrace one's fate stoicly and with resolution and play the part you were assigned with a kind of nobility, to redeem what you can. (This theme seems to show up in Gilliam's work; Brazil was another one where the hero is faced with no real options for his future, and ekes out the only kind of victory he can.)
Time travel was different in Looper, where it was obvious you could change time (which is another reason why it was such a big deal with an Oldie went back and wasn't wiped); and in this case, Young Joe had a wide variety of future options left to him that would have greatly benfitted himself directly even if they cost other people dearly, and the heroism came in choosing the option he did.