A Reflection on “The Princess Diaries”

*cue music*

“MIRACLES HAPPEN ONCE IN A WHIIIIIILE, WHEN YOU BELIEEEEEEEVE!

YOU SHOW ME DREAMS COME TO LIFE,

THAT TAKING A CHANCE ON US WAS RIGHT.

ALL THINGS WILL COME WITH A LITTLE TIME

WHEN YOU BELIEEEEEEVE!”

It’s been over twenty years since The Princess Diaries came out? SHUT UP.

This is an anniversary post that I meant to write last fall. The Princess Diaries turned twenty last summer. As far as I know, there wasn’t much fuss about it. So let me make some fuss about it now, because this is one of my favorite movies and it has influenced me a lot.

Just to be clear, I am aware that the movie is based on a book series by Meg Cabot. I read the first book when I was in middle school, just to sate my curiosity. Let me tell you, it is quite different from the film. It’s set in New York City, for one thing. Mia is a blonde, her dad is still alive, and her grandmother is Satan. (Lily is about the same as she is in the movie, though). 

The book is nowhere near as wholesome or uplifting a story. So for once, we have a case where the movie actually IS better than the book it was based on. I’m sure that there are people who adore the book series who would like to pick a fight with me on the issue, but I’m not interested in doing so.

‘The Emperor’s New Groove’ Twenty Years On

The Emperor’s groove was thrown off once–and the world has never been the same since. 

Well, twice, actually, once literally when he knocked into the old man, and the second time when his evil adviser who just happened to have a stockpile of magic potions–accidentally–turned him into a llama. We never looked at llamas the same way again, did we?

THEORY TIME: Don’t quote me on this but Machu Picchu actually WAS a holiday retreat for the Inca Emperors. So the person who pitched ‘The Emperor’s New Groove” was probably like: what if Machu Picchu was never built because the Emperor was turned into a llama?

Twenty years ago this December, The Emperor’s New Groove hit theaters. That was the last time that I ever walked out of a movie during the “scary” scene, escorted to the bathroom by my mom. From what I recall, that break took place from the moment when Paacha and Kuzco fell into the canal up until they got the vial. Maybe it started later than that.

To the point, though, this film has always been a favorite in my family. My siblings and I loved to argue like Pacha’s kids: “uh-uh” “yeah-HUH” “uhuhyeahhuhuhuhyeahhuhuhuhyeahhuh”. We also tried to settle our arguments with “You infinity.” But then we turned it into “You infinity and beyond,” and then “you et cetera” and “you infinity et cetera and beyond” and we kept going ad nauseum. Good times. 

Gifycat

Remembered

I.

September 11, 2001: I was nine years old going on ten and in the fourth grade. I attended a small country school in a small country town in Texas. My first brother had just started kindergarten. My two younger brothers were in diapers. My dad had an actual job. My mom was working part-time as a nurse while parenting. 

In August we had just adopted three little kittens, a gray tabby and two calicos. I was in the middle of my ancient Egypt phase, so I named them Rameses, Bastet, and Ankes-pen-amun (we just called her Sam). Bastet was my special favorite and I considered her MY kitten. 

The night before, September tenth, I got into a fight with my first brother. My dad had made us a set of cardboard walls out of giant boxes, and my siblings and I were jealous about our individual time with them for playing make-believe or building forts and such. That Monday night, my brother and I quarreled so badly that we were on the floor beating each other. I don’t remember the details of the fight beyond that but it was aggressive. 

The next day I wondered if the catastrophe was some kind of cosmic consequence of fighting with my brother. Well, both were generated by the evil that has existed in this world since the beginning, so kinda. 

‘Buzz Lightyear of Star Command’ Twenty Years On

You have heard of Buzz Lightyear in the Toy Story franchise. But did you know he had his own television show?

The premise is simple. In Toy Story 2 (1999), Woody the cowboy doll discovers he is merchandise for a vintage children’s show called Woody’s Roundup. So someone at Pixar had the idea to give Buzz Lightyear his own show, a cartoon about the hero that inspired the toy in Andy’s world, a show about Buzz the Space Ranger fighting the evil Emperor Zurg and protecting a galaxy full of weird aliens and fabulous spaceships. 

The DVD/VHS cover for ‘The Adventure Begins” (myreviewer.com)

The debut film Buzz Lightyear of Star Command: The Adventure Begins came out in August of 2000. The series began to air on Disney’s affiliated channels a couple months later. This year marks the 20th anniversary of that premiere. 

But there hasn’t been a peep about it from Disney. 

Disney Collect put out some limited edition digital trading cards. I have seen a couple of tributes from fans. But yeah, no acknowledgement from Disney/Pixar and little noise about it overall online.

I know that Disney likes anniversaries. According to Disney+ it is the 80th anniversary of Fantasia and the 30th anniversary of Home Alone (which they can now celebrate because of the Fox deal). Why pass this one up?

Or did people celebrate earlier this year and I just missed it? It’s been a crazy year, you never know.

Buzz Lightyear and His Space Friends

In a time not so long ago, in a galaxy not quite so far away, there was a Galactic Alliance that unified the different inhabited planets and sentient beings. While parts of the galaxy were populated and connected, there were still many places that were unexplored and mysterious. The Alliance employed a force called Star Command, made up of all species who took the title of Space Rangers, to police yes but also to protect and defend the galaxy at large.

The greatest of all the Space Rangers was the one and only Buzz Lightyear. However, he could not, indeed did not, protect the galaxy alone. In a dramatic turn of events, he ended up taking not one but three young rangers under his wing.

This One’s for You, Charlie Brown

This is one of those posts that I have been meaning to write for a long time, a long time meaning ever since I started this blog or maybe even before then. 

The Peanuts comic strip and characters have meant a lot to me since I was a kid. My relationship with Peanuts is mostly happiness, but with a little bit of agony.

Happiness is when mom turns on Blues Clues for your younger siblings and one of the first ads that plays is for the Peanuts home video collection..agony is when it’s over two minutes later. Watching Blues Clues might be fun for the younger ones but you know what you really want.

The Music Hall

Happiness is going to the babysitter who has all of those Charlie Brown and Snoopy videos and getting to watch them. I remember when I was in first grade, my pediatric dentist decided to perform an unscheduled tooth extraction and I ended up being sent to the babysitter. But then I got to watch You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown on her TV in her bedroom and drink soup for the rest of the day instead of going to school. Not bad at all.

Happiness is also renting a Peanuts flick every once in a while. It’s also getting to watch A Charlie Brown Christmas on TV in early December. Happiness is Mom finally buying It’s the Pied Piper Charlie Brown on VHS and then watching the documentary at the end.

Agony is seeing the clips in the documentary of all the Peanuts shows you haven’t watched.

As you can see, some of these are very well-worn.

Happiness is getting a stack of vintage paperback books of Peanuts strips for your enjoyment for Christmas, reading them all through in one day and then reading them again and again. It’s checking the comics section of the local newspaper every day for the daily reprinted Peanuts strip along with Garfield and Frank and Earnest (and, for a few years, the strip that my dad wrote twice weekly, but that’s another story).

‘The Empire Strikes Back’ 40th Anniversary: A Reflection

One of my earliest Star Wars memories is my parents buying the Original Trilogy on VHS at Sam’s Club. At some point after watching A New Hope, probably a few nights later, Mom and Dad put in the second movie. I remember seeing the snowy wasteland of Hoth on our TV screen, and then my mom saying, “Here come the walking machines.” And there they were: four giant AT-AT walkers bearing down on the Rebel base. 

Tenor

Those Imperial walkers have made an impression on nearly every Star Wars fan ever since they first graced the silver screen in 1980. However, that isn’t the only thing that fans and even me love about this movie, Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, which has just celebrated its fortieth anniversary.

“You Don’t Have to Do This to Impress Me”

Confession time: The Empire Strikes Back isn’t my favorite Star Wars movie.

There are a million reasons it SHOULD be, I get it. But it’s not. It’s great but I like Return of the Jedi better because of the happy ending. I appreciate ESB a lot. I really do.  It’s kind of like how I like neapolitan ice cream, but my true love is chocolate chip cookie dough.

What I’m trying to say is Star Wars fans and a lot of people in general put ESB on a pedestal because it’s such a great movie.  It is a great movie, objectively speaking, and I have fun watching it, but I can’t connect with the hype that says it’s the BEST Star Wars movie.

Part of my beef with ESB is the cold, dark visual atmosphere of most of the film. We have Hoth, which is cold and icy. We have Dagobah, which is wet and gray and not a comfortable place to hang out, and it also includes a cave strong in the Dark Side of the Force. There’s Cloud City, which while light and airy has a sterile design and contains a dark carbon-freezing chamber and a maze of gloomy maintenance hallways. It’s enough to make me feel my Vitamin-D Deficiency.

The First Vision: The Power of God’s Light

This year marks two hundred years since Joseph Smith’s first vision. For those of you who are not familiar with this event, let me put it simply: in 1820, a fourteen-year-old boy saw God the Father and Jesus Christ in a miraculous vision.

(As per my own faith tradition, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are three separate beings, and this is why). 

This vision is important because this is considered the start of Joseph Smith’s career as a prophet, and eventually led to the original Church that Jesus established on the earth being restored, organized officially in 1830 (which means in ten years we’ll have another big anniversary to celebrate, yay). 

I am not writing this post to debate the authenticity of this event or the legitimacy of Joseph Smith or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. That being said, I just want to make it clear that I believe that it actually happened. 

The reason I am writing this post is because I want to share an insight that I have about the First Vision. About a year ago, I was casually thinking about the First Vision, and I realized something: this event is a metaphor about how we are rescued by God’s light.

20 Things I Love about ‘The Phantom Menace’ 20 Years Later

To the people who actually read this blog, all five of you: I know what you must be thinking. You are anxiously expecting me to write a review about Endgame or talk about FanX. But this coming Sunday—the nineteenth of May—is THE twentieth Anniversary of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. I care about this movie enough that this is an occasion worth commemorating with a blog post, if I do nothing else. So if you don’t like the prequels or skip TPM in your Star Wars marathons, come back later. 

Now, to business:

When I was a little kid, my family had the Star Wars original trilogy on VHS, but I didn’t care much for watching it. Maybe I was a little young for Force lightning and Darth Vader.

Twenty years ago this week I was wrapping up first grade and on my way to second. Mom and Dad went to see The Phantom Menace by themselves the first time around, and then the second time they took me and my two little brothers (I only had two back then???).  Except for a Jar-Jar Binks cup lid I had for a while (more on that below), I didn’t care much for the film.

 

It was when TPM came out on VHS that it got my attention. The world that it showed me was completely different from the original trilogy: it was brighter, cleaner, and more organic. Being a little girl who grew up watching princess movies, of course, I very quickly became obsessed with the queen, because she had so many beautiful dresses. For a while I thought of The Phantom Menace as its own world, because I wasn’t ready to admit that the boy my age who won the podrace was going to grow up and become Darth Vader (and I was naieve enough to think that Senator Palpatine wasn’t actually Darth Sidious).

A Message of Hope

You would think I need to be writing about this awesome convention I just went to. But it is the anniversary of 9/11 and I feel the need to address the occasion. Because there is a very geeky message of hope that I need to share with you.

When I worked at that one thrift store in Provo, Utah, I made a hasty purchase of a couple of books, the visual guides to the first two Lord of the Rings films, with explanatory text by Jude Fisher. I discovered that the guide book for The Two Towers has a forward written by Viggo Mortensen, the actor who played Aragorn. And in that forward, Mortensen makes the most peculiar address: