The Island and Wisdom Teeth Week

I had my wisdom teeth taken out this week. Most of the discomfort and inconvenience came after the procedure, with dietary restrictions(I still can't drink carbonated beverages, and for a time, only drank liquids, and ate ice cream and stuffed baked potatoes), bleeding, and switching the ice pack every 20 minutes.

Here are my impressions about the Island


-It's interesting that they named the movie after a place that doesn't exist(but then again, after having sex with Jordan, Lincoln says "The Island is real".)

-There was quite a bit of product placement in the film, such as Xbox being the provider for the virtual reality fighting game(as it's 2019, it should probably be Xbox 4 or 5), Ben and Jerry's ice cream, and MSN powering the video phones.

-The bunker with the clones had quite advanced technology, but the outside world looked similar to the modern world, with some technological improvements(for example, the hovertrain, the flying bikes, and the video phones).

-The brainwashing the clones and creating memories of life before the contamination was an interesting trick, but I liked "The Manchurian Candidate's" version more.

-The clones learn relatively quickly; 3 and 4 year old Lincoln and Jordan have a typical adult vocabulary, know how to operate some machines, and work in the laboratory.

-It sounded as though Jones was unraveling the sinister truth behind "The Island" lottery when he devised his formula(given that Lincoln already expressed skepticism), but he actually found a formula that spelled out his own name(incidentally, he's wrong; Q is not the 15th letter, O is.)

-I thought that this movie had the most obvious set-up of romance between Jordan and Lincoln, particularly when Jordan persuades the breakfast server to serve her bacon, and gives it to Jordan, and that Jordan is reprimanded for "proximity violation".

-The film effectively made it clear that people often don't speak out against the worse aspects of society because of ignorance, as after the pregnant clone gets a lethal injection after giving birth, the couple only sees the nurse coming out with the baby, and Tom Lincoln is skeptical about Lincoln's story. Then again, Tom Lincoln reports Lincoln to the cloners, and attempts to turn Lincoln over to the mercenaries.

-On the subject of the pregnant clones, I'm not sure how they are able to impregnate the clones in such a way that the baby resembles one that the couple ordering the baby might have(perhaps with in vitro fertilization). Additionally, while childbirth is an ordeal for the mother, $5 million(if that's what they pay for a pregnancy clone, which, by the way, is only used once) seems like quite a steep price(then again, Tom, Sarah, and the football player who got the liver of the Island lottery winner before Jordan have conditions that would kill them without clone organ donors).

-Strangely enough, for someone who doesn't know what a motorcycle or rattlesnake are, what the meaning of "take a dump" and "the can" are, Lincoln seems quite good at driving the flying bike(even though he plows through the 70th floor of an office building and falls onto the R logo.)

-The killing of Lincoln's supervisor friend isn't really dealt with in much detail, except for when Lincoln and Jordan are arrested for his murder.

-I was personally under the impression that plastic handcuffs were used for mass arrests(such as with protesters), due to the fact that they're lighter, which is why I found that they were used on Lincoln and Jordan as a plot convenience(notice that Jordan breaks her handcuffs on what's left of the back door of the police cruiser, something she obviously couldn't have done if they had been made of metal).

-I liked it when the railroad wheels came off the truck and smashed the mercenaries' vehicles, even though it seems convenient that Lincoln and Jordan would find a truck like that.

-I find it strange that the mercenary leader, who was branded for being "less than human" during African tribal wars, would help hunt down the "less than human" clones(even if he ultimately helped Jordan save the last group of lottery winners from the gas chamber).

-Some of the stunts seemed quite bizarre, such as when Lincoln and Jordan fell from the building on the giant "R" logo, and landed in the construction site uninjured, and when Lincoln and the head of the cloners are hanging from the bridge on different ends of the grappling hook gun.

-Strangely enough, the plotline with Jordan's replacement is never resolved(possibly with her meeting the kid and becoming his mother figure), although it is assumed that the real Jordan dies in her coma.


I've been playing "Final Fantasy I and II: Dawn of Souls"(I'm on Final Fantasy I, and I enjoy the Soul of Chaos dungeons), and also "Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories"(entertaining, even if some of the bosses near the end of "Reverse/Rebirth" are horrible mismatches*, and other bosses, such as Captain Hook, the fourth battle with Riku, and the final boss, are quite difficult.)

*In one fight against yourself, I had two health bars(and, by the way, no ability to heal), the boss had three, and the boss was continuously in the form that I was only able to obtain by breaking enough cards or taking enough damage.