Overthinking overthinking

A few weeks ago, we watched WALL-E for the first time, and I found it very enjoyable. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants some sweet family-friendly entertainment, and if you do watch it, take note of how much they’re able to convey during long stretches with no dialogue at all.

I was also able to analyze it according to the “Save the Cat” criteria. I caught the “fun and games” section and the “darkest hour” moments on the very first pass.

The next day, while my Patient Husband and I cooked together, I said, “What I find interesting is how Wall-E embodies the theme of the movie.” What’s that? “He finds the value in things that are worthless, and he helps others see the value in things that are worthless.”

We questioned each other: why had Wall-E alone of all the robots been able to survive? I said, “Because he was able to cannibalize the other robots for new parts. He was able to evolve to fit the changing circumstances whereas the humans had stopped evolving.”  You can see that in how the human ship is still dumping massive amounts of trash into space.

My Patient Husband then talked about the BNL corporation and how its logo is on all the trash so that at the same time that they were trying to save humans from the trash, it was probably trash they’d created. We discussed the world-building in the film, how Pixar always seems to be able to create a multidimensional world with just a few brush strokes, so you can guess at “the rest of the story” without an explicit narrative.

At this point, Kiddo#1 came into the kitchen and barked, “Why can’t you just enjoy the film? Why do you have to talk about it?”

Important note: we don’t dialogue about the film during the film. That kind of thing arguably deserves the death penalty.

My Patient Husband said, “Talking about it afterward is a big part of the way we enjoy things.”

I said, “It’s an introspection thing. Yes, it’s a good movie if you just watch it, but we get more out of it that way.”

(This is why God saw fit to have us marry each other — because we’d drive anyone else insane.)

There’s no real point to this story, except that right now Kiddo#1 is in the hospital, and could use prayers. I think he’ll be out sometime this week, but because of this, I’m taking care of a lot of things that need to be done to transition him back home, and I won’t be around very much.

He and we can use your prayers.  Thanks.