CABIN IN THE WOODS

Did you know that Joss Whedon’s a pariah now? Why did no one tell me?! I’m halfway re-watching the entire Angel run when I was informed by a friend I have to throw my entire DVD set in the garbage. 

My immediate reaction was, “how many orphans did he murder?” But the sin is much worse. He had an affair (perhaps multiple) on his wife. He fired one of my favorites, Charisma Carpenter, off of “Angel” because she got pregnant. He wrote a scene where Loki, the villain, called Black Widow (another one of my favorites!) a derogatory name. Then he made an authoritarian government sterilize Natasha as part of her backstory in Age of Ultron. He wrote a shitty draft of Wonder Woman. He treated the actors like crap on Justice League (forget the actors; the viewers were treated like crap watching Justice League. Amiright?)

So I guess Buffy can’t be my favorite hero anymore. All the great storylines, all the heroic perseverance, emotion, and moments the Scooby-Gang shared of redemption, understanding and forgiveness, gone. All gone. Them’s the rules. Way to go, Joss. In this harsh, black-and-white landscape of Cancel-Culture, why couldn’t you have just murdered the orphans? 

But Sophie snuck Cabin in the Woods into the Blu Ray Player (because we still like dead technology in this house). And I was too comfortable on the couch to reach for the remote and too tired to explain to her and the kids why we’re not allowed to watch his product anymore. She’s a sneaky Trickster Goddess like that. 

Look, I did my best not to laugh at its subversive thumbing of horror movie tropes, or its great dialogue, or its likable characters (I even like the annoying character, Marty). I was even disappointed that Sophie and I talked for a good hour about how the human race deserved to be eliminated based on the Secret Underground Organization alone. They take people’s death and misery and meet it with glib callousness; they repeat to their colleagues that they don’t stack-the-deck against the Cabin’s victims when that’s all they do. They literally gamble on misery while people die and then have the balls to plead mercy when the tables are turned. Instead, Sophie and I should’ve spent that quality husband/wife time burning Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along. 

So thanks a lot, Joss. I don’t know what I’m going to do now when the kids want to watch Psycho or Rosemary’s Baby. Why couldn’t you have been like Brett Ratner and just have your work be as repulsive as your behavior? Wait. I’m writing this on my MacBook Pro. I saw Jobs. That guy was an uber-dick to everyone personally and professionally. Does that mean I have to buy a Dell now?! 

Fuck.