The Strive for Perfection

As I know my readers aren't exactly numerous, I think it is safe to say that you all know that I enjoy drawing as well as writing. Recently I have been trying to adjust my style, and it made me wonder: will I ever be pleased with my artwork? With my writing? Will anyone ever be truly satisfied with their own work? Whatever it is that I do, whatever kind of work I produce, however wonderful I think it is at the time, you can guarantee that a year, a month, even a day later, I will gag at the sight of it. I don't think it's a bad thing: the constant strive for perfection is mostly what keeps me going. If I have no other ideas on what life's meaning is, then I can guess that it is trying to get as close to perfection as possible, even if it isn't attainable.

About a year ago I claimed I was satisfied and comfortable with my art style. I was half right: I was definitely comfortable with it, but several months later I decided I needed a change, then later still I wanted to change it again, and again, and only this week I gave it another tweak to try and push it in a new direction. Then today I was looking at some artwork and realised yet another thing I could do to improve my style ('improve' being used rather loosely). Despite all this, I am actually taking it as a good thing that I understand that I will never be fully happy with my work, and that it hasn't discouraged me from continuing.

Another thing that got me thinking was that when I posted a sample of my new style on DeviantArt, I said "This is not definite... the style I currently use isn't particularly expressive and I'm having less fun drawing in that style... Be very honest with your opinions. If you don't like it, do let me know... if enough people prefer the old one I might go back". It made me wonder whether I was really drawing for me anymore. I always used to draw just for me and close friends, as I only saw it as a hobby, and I was never particularly well-known on DeviantArt. But recently I have been getting more attention there and I am becoming more conscious about what other people will like about my work, whether or not they will enjoy it, whether or not they will appreciate it, or 'get it', whether or not they will find my comics funny. If I really think about it, I do still want to draw for myself: I don't see myself drawing for a living, so I think for now I will continue on the road I am setting out for myself and see where it leads from there. Maybe in the future it will be more than a hobby, I just don't know, but for now, I draw for me, so I'm going to stick with what makes me happy.

The Prince of Persia: Sands of Time: The Film That Could Have Been

WARNING: This post contains spoilers for The Prince of Persia: Sands of Time (film).

Yes, I watched the Prince of Persia film to see what it would be like. I was well aware of the fact that there was a good chance that it would be bad, but I decided to give it a chance, after all, they were given some fairly good material. Unfortunately, the film wasn't really bad so much as it was disappointing. They had an opportunity to make something really great and instead they made something passable. It just wasn't anything special, and I think it really had the potential to be.

Think about it. Had this film incorporated the original source material more appropriately they would have essentially had a Persian zombie movie with time-travel and free-running with the saucy prince and the sexy Maharajah's daughter fighting side-by-side and shooting sarcastic quips at one another. If that isn't a recipe for an awesome film then I don't know what is. Honestly, it was practically served to filmmakers on a silver platter. Unfortunately, they completely removed the zombies (technically 'sand demons' but they are essentially zombies), severely downplayed the time-travelling aspect (they rewound time roughly four times throughout the entire film), and took away the leading lady's bow. Plus they kept spouting lines about destiny roughly every five minutes, even giving the main character (previously a nameless prince) the very unsubtle name Dastan (destin, anyone?). I won't even get into how much they loved to title-drop.

It's true that games aren't particularly renowned for their excellent stories, so it makes sense that they would alter the plot, add some characters here and there, etc. but I would have thought it would be obvious to keep in the sand demons, as that is, apart from being the entire premise of the game's storyline, just undeniably cool. Not to mention it's one of those things that gives you free reign to have the hero waste a lot of baddies without any kind of moral issue: they are monsters, they aren't human, they will eat your face if you don't kill them first and technically they are already dead. Plus they could get away with a lot of impressive violence because they only bleed sand. A sinfully wasted opportunity, people.

One thing I will say I liked is that, although the actor wasn't really right for the part in my opinion, at least the character was still written as being fairly close to the character from the game: arrogant, obsessed with proving himself, convinced that he is always right, and the leading lady was written with the same sarcastic, feisty attitude she had in the game, although for some reason her name was changed to Tamina. What was wrong with the name Farah? She's obviously meant to be the same character, so why change her name? Who knows, or cares? So let's move on.

Overall I think the film would have been okay as a standalone film, supposing the Prince of Persia games didn't exist and this was the first take on the idea, but for a film that claims to be based on the Sands of Time game, I just don't see it. It has the characters (somewhat) and it has the mystical dagger, but that's about it. They changed the story of the prince trying to reach the hourglass to turn back time and undo essentially causing the apocalypse, to the story of the prince being framed for killing his father, then fleeing his home while trying to stop his traitorous uncle from going back in time to undo saving his father's life so that he would never have sons, so the uncle could assume the throne... is it just me or is this sounding like the Lion King with swords, time-travelling and wall-running? So that's just it: it could have been an excellent film, but instead it was a poorly-executed impersonation of the lion king. With magical swords. D- See me.