Skip to main content

Final: Phineas and Ferb: Across the Second Dimension

         When discussing what film to pick for our final, my group talked about a number of different contenders. Soylent Green, Sorry to Bother You, Blade Runner 2049... but all those movies, though deep and high budget, were really depressing. Sure, there are glimmers of hope and the everyman hero manages to expose the truth to some success, but none are really fun. 

        We started talking about sci-fi movies and shows we watched as kids, How to Build a Better Boy, Zapped, Phil of the Future, and others were discussed. But none of them held as much nostalgia for us as the TV movie Phineas and Ferb: Across the Second Dimension.  Fun machines, secret agent animals, robots, songs, familiar characters, and cartoon logic all made this the perfect pick as far as we were concerned. What better movie to pick to discuss how we'll be living in 50 years than one that's already affecting us now?

        Phineas and Ferb were how the majority of our generation was introduced to science fiction. This movie was one of our first experiences with the concept of parallel universes and the TV show was based on the idea of currently unachievable feats of engineering. And as we learned while working on this project, they're not too far off from the real scientific theories surrounding implementation.  The creators of Phineas and Ferb also include a barrage of pop-culture references and satirical humor that critiques modern society, consumer culture, and suburbia.

        Parallel universes do exist and we may one day understand how to enter another universe. Phineas and Ferb: Across the Second Dimension reminds us that we will have to be prepared for the consequences of those interactions- but not in a way that is emotionally draining and monochromatic. 





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Love, Death & Robots: Pop Squad

            Prior to becoming a short film, Pop Squad was originally a short story published by  Paolo Bacigalupi in a collection titled "Pump Six and Other Stories".    While Phillip Gelatt, the script adapter changed the ending for the film, it made the symbols and the story's theme more impactful overall. For starters, the hat is left behind on the kitchen table, signifying that Briggs has shed his role as an enforcer and is choosing to abandon his post as a state-sanctioned murderer. Furthermore, this allows him to feel the rain on his face. While he feels the rain in the short story, he does not die as he exits the house where Eve and Mealanie live like he does in the film. This enhances the meaning of the rain, signaling to the viewer that he is experiencing a change in his final moments as water is often a symbol of cleansing and rebirth. As he is faced with his own mortality, his eyes widen and come to life for the first time since th...
2 comments
Read more

Metropolis (1927)

 Metropolis utilizes biblical references to emphasize class conflict; notably does not use god to "punish" man but rather the structures of society and the struggle and exploitation of the working class to demonstrate the dangers of technology and its monopolization. The dangers of machines in this film are not ascribed to the technology itself but rather the use of the technology by those in power as a means for the exploitation of one's fellow man; Man-made Maria's mission to destroy the workers, as well as the wealthy, was instilled in her by J on Frederson and the inventor Rotwang.        Unlike our modern fears about technology, the autonomy of the machine is not the thing the film is warning us of. While now we worry that machines will gain autonomy and choose evil, Metropolis highlights the fears of machines being operated by evil men. In both cases, we fear the harm a machine is capable of; but the critical difference is the motivation of the devi...
Post a Comment
Read more