Launch pad majesty – Chap. 4, Act 2, Strip 9

I’ll spare you the details of everything the Professor put Snuka and the others through before reaching this point, but let me assure you that their flight-readiness was thoroughly assessed through a comprehensive battery of tortu…of tests that were all clearly related and relevant to space-travel and not at all intended to serve the Professor’s entertai..or rather, sadistic pleas…oh well, weren’t intended to serve anything else at all. Which is, technically, not the same as saying the Professor didn’t enjoy himself, of course.

Speaking of the Professor enjoying himself, naturally he’s also were enamored with the idea of space flight in principle, he’s had that one on his bucket list for a long time. Not that that’s the thing foremost on his mind, of course. No, no. He’s definitely mainly focused on the goal of rescuing Dusty…Bucky…whatever her name is. Honestly.

A spaceship on the launch pad rewquires a specific, elaborate cinematiographical treatment…you can’t just have it show up in the background all of a sudden, you need to introduce it to the audience in style, lingering on the details, panning or tilting to capture the size and majesty. That’s mostly why Nolan had that billboard ‘conveniently’ placed in the shot. It was just a lot more effective having the camera linger on that poster, rather than on the cheap plastic toy George unearthed from his toybox to represent the actual spacecraft. Which does look rather cheap, admittedly, but for once that’s actually appropriate – after all, it’s supposed to represent something bought from Stan on a tight budget.

More on Monday

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