The Conservative Cat

First off, we have got to stop this peasant-with-a-great-destiny stuff. The most painful part of any such story is the point where the protagonist shouts out I DIDN'T ASK FOR THIS! Give me a break! Does anybody ever ask for anything? Did I ask to spend my childhood in a shoe box? Did Bruce ask to be hard of hearing? Did any of you ask Anna Nicole Smith to plaster herself all over creation for months after her death? Let's face it: we all know that the farm boy in Eragon is going to become a great hero, so there's no point in wasting my time having the poor sod anguish over it. While we're at it, there's also no point in having him behave like a complete idiot. How many times have we seen this exact same scenario: the old wise man explains that the hero is not ready, and the hero goes off anyway, and the result is a colossal screw-up. At least the old wise man in The Empire Strikes Back had the decency to not get killed by the hero's stupidity. He just sort of died for no apparent reason.

Say what you will about Harry Potter, but he's not stupid. He doesn't spend half the movie complaining about his destiny, instead he spends his time trying to figure out what's going on. That could be why he's so popular.

The movie also suffers from being utterly humorless. Perhaps that works in a novel, but in a film it makes the dialog ever more ponderous. We have a big aerial battle, and the substance is not in the flying or the sword-work, it's in the complaints by the hero and his dragon. Bruce kept saying Believe in yourself, Sailor Moon! over and over and it did not at all feel out of place.

Also, I think it's time somebody realized that the greedy king probably has more money than the exiled peasant resistance, and as a result, it's going to be the royal guard with the brightly polished armor and the peasants with the dirty cracked stuff. The fact of being evil does not make you dirty. For example, I've never seen Rosie O'Donnell with a torn skirt or a muddy shirt. I mean, standing under a waterfall for a few seconds would bring about an improvement in the appearance of the king's hordes, while the tiny resistance has these fancy mirror-bright chain mail things that go all the way down to the wrist. The hero's armor alone would feed a family of four for two months, to say nothing of the giant-size custom-fit dragon barding that the rebels pull out of a hat just before the big fight.

Anyway, if you're looking for a fantasy about love, loyalty, and heroism, go out and rent Season 1 of Dead Like Me. Or, if you're looking for something more appropriate for children, see if you can get your hands on a copy of Wyrd Sisters. Eragon the movie is just more of the same old same old, and quite frankly I think we've had enough of that.

Respectfully submitted,

Ferdinand T. Cat