2016 Q1

Before seeing Deadpool, I thought it was just a regular superhero movie.  I have nothing against those movies, and I often enjoy them, but even when they're well done, they don't really stand out.  Yes, the Avengers had good action and good jokes, and I'm glad I saw the movies, but it's not a favorite or anything.  Action movies typically aren't designed to make you think, and they often don't have that interesting of an artistic style (with notable exceptions like Kill Bill).

The premise: all mammals have evolved with human-like intelligence, though discrimination of different species is still prevalent.  The protagonist is a bunny who wants to be the first bunny police officer.  

I enjoyed the setting a lot.  Much of the story took place in a modern metropolis.  Everyone has a smartphone, and there are plenty of other tech references.  With the city, the movie managed to present a diversity of peoples, cultures, and perspectives that can be hard to capture.  

The Good Dinosaur is a Pixar coming of age narrative featuring a dinosaur and his human pet going on an adventure.  It is beautiful, cute, and a well-done coming of age narrative.  However, it is extremely archetypal, and the archetype that it follows needs to change.

Dorothy Roberts discusses some of the problems with race-based medicine. Before seeing the TED talk, I didn't realize that there were so many issues.

Since this is a collection of short stories that are very different, I will provide thoughts for each one separately.  That said, all of them were well written and interesting, so I would highly recommend this book.

Tower of Babylon

I wrote a post for the Harvard Law and Policy Review blog.  Check it out at http://harvardlpr.com/2016/01/25/technology-development-needs-a-culture-... or read it below.

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In Magic 2.0 (which starts with "Off to be the Wizard"), reality is a computer program and the protagonist finds a file that lets him edit the variables underlying everything, which lets him do magic.  I appreciate the premise because that could be the nature of reality, though I think Perfect State by Brandon Sanderson deals with the idea in a more interesting way.