Did you ever browse around in a comic book store as a kid adn find the Marvel “What If…?” comic books? Books that were about reknown comicbook characters but “What if…?” something abotu them was different… Pat of their backstory, part of their powers, or results of one thing or another that has happened in their comic books…

I won’t go into the geekdom of the what if concept and the different stories that were based on this. Lets just say it as a venerable butterfly effect — the flapping of wings on a different continent were part of the reason why a typhoon formed in the Pacific Ocean.

One small happening causes a huge domino effect and results in something seemingly indirect and different to happen. That kind of thing.

Today I came across (by way of Dave Lowe) a joke observation from the Back To The Future saga and the original movie. It was composed as a (profane) letter from Doc Brown to Marty McFly regarding one of Marty’s choices on the eve of November 12th, 1955. It’s funny as hell but it leaves you wondering just how different the story would have turned out if Marty McFly had done things differently.

So I got me a “What if…?” like this regarding a movie that I love. It’s (the film’s) basis is pretty simple and was the framework for plenty of different action movies from the late 1980′s through the 1990′s.

The movie in this case is Die Hard.

What if…? What if…?

What if Lt. John McClane of the New York Police Department… had shoes on while dealing with the terrorists at Nakatomi Plaza?

Of course there is no definite answer to this with the HOW or WHY. I thought that is part of the magic of the “What If…?” Does John make sure to slip his shoes on instead of doing the stupid fists-with-your-toes thing? Does he grab his shoes when he hears gunshots and ducks out of the room? Shit, does John slip back onto the 30th floor, grab his shoes and socks and slip back out?

How does this change things? Does he employ different tactics, or is the only notable difference in the scene where John is pinned down on the computer floor and the henchman Karl shoots the glass around the office to smithereens?

What if…?

It’s so simple, it’s so stupid but it opens up a huge can of worms. Nothing might change and everything might change in just one minor action. Maybe McClane gets blown away because he has more confidence and takes on the terrorists head on? That’s the most cynical thought I have regarding this every time I think about it — we don’t get John-McClane from the first three Die Hard films, we get the Ah-nuld wanna Be from Die Hard 4 and see him suffer (and die) in the fashion that we saw John proved mortal in the first Die Hard film.

Maybe events fall a certain way so that Ellis doesn’t die — all because John McClane was wearing his stupid shoes instead of making fists with his toes! Maybe Al Powell doesn’t buy Twinkies at the gas station but opts for Ho-Hos instead? Holly doesn’t opt to restrain Joseph Takagi during Hans Gruber’s monologue — resulting in… Takagi giving up the password for the vault and living for another hour or more?

Humor me. What if John McClane tried to save the Nakatomi Hostages while he had shoes on? And would it have been worthy of a feature film?

Happy trails, Hans.

It’s been 50 years since Doctor Emmett Brown discovered time travel…

Just noticed the date and had the memory of Chris Lloyd talking to Marty about the red letter date in the history of science, “November Fifth, Nineteen Fifty….Five… Yes, of course, November Fifth, Nineteen Fifty Five… Hah!”

One of the greatest movies of all time, and even in fiction – it’s hard to just overlook the day for pop culture sake

I was debating writing this here on my own journal or on Kill The Web but I figured I am having such a shitty day that having a topic to write about in here was going to be impossible unless I thought up something like this…

A couple of years ago after The Phantom Menace came out in movie theaters, there was a copy of the movie circulated that cut out Jar Jar Binks from the movie, along with some other cuts. It was titled The Phantom Edit. Personally I think about the editing room and how much Star Wars Episode 1 could have been better if they had left out some of the crap that was in the movie (a lot of the kiddie stuff with Anakin, 3PO and R2D2, etc) and I was thinking to last year’s “Attack of the Clones” and how things could have been improved with that one.

…and it bothers me that it would have been so much better if Lucas had just been a little more liberal with the knife.

I mean, any story is better if you cut the fat. Cut out the bullshit and try to make a long story short… It works in writing and it works in cinema too. I mean, think about this — did they REALLY need to define the Force in Star Wars Part 1 as a fucking parasite in the blood? Absolutely not. What about Back to the Future? Did they need to show Marty’s mom acting really irresponsible more than they did in the final version of the film? Nope, and it worked. They didn’t need to show Marty drugging his father to get him to go back to sleep either… Both shots were cut out from the final version of the movie (but available on the DVD) and would have given just a bit too much information. It wasn’t important that they were in the final version of the film but then again it would have been strange if they had been.

Any Star Wars faithful would balk at the idea of C3PO and R2D2 being cut out from Episodes 1 and 2 but honestly – what point do they serve besides comic relief? Couldn’t there have been written quips in characters lines in order to get them some comic relief in the film? Also the stunning false visuals that they had too many of in Episode 2 needed to be trimmed down a bit. It got to be useless and annoying to see CGI everywhere. Don’t get me wrong, they painted a stunning picture but at the same time, nothing was real (and there’s nothing to get hung about, strawberry fields forever). It wasn’t like they hand-designed miniatures as they had in the first film which awed movie goers because every visual WAS real to an extent.

CGI is good in moderation (as long as you have a good movie attached to the CGI), but over doing it… well, that just bores people. I had that problem when I saw The Matrix Revolutions but I could live with it – the story made up for short comings of reality.

Maybe I’m just too picky with things? Eh, take out the maybe. I AM too picky with things. But then again, if I wasn’t, I wouldn’t be leading my true life.