THE CHOICE.
"You can save the world" or "if you leave now, you can make Elise's show."
Because she's a ballerina, the most feminine thing imaginable (and he's a Congressman who gets in bar brawls, the most masculine stereotype thing imaginable).
He's in the taxi. WILL HE SEE HER DANCE AGAIN???
I think the Standard Movie Format requires him to betray her or some shit.
He's seeing her dance. Thompson is right behind him again. Wow, creepy much?
"If you stay with her, it kills her dreams as well as yours."
[Mary: Choices #choices.... ]
Ah, Thompson says if she stays with Matty Dames, she will never become the world's greatest dancer and choreographer. She'll teach dance to six-year-olds.
THE HORROR
"When you look back on this... remember I tried to reason with you."
Oh, she fell and hurt her leg really bad. Was it the BDs?
I'm going to blame everything on the Bureau Dudes now.
"Sorry I didn't clean the kitchen. The BDs prevented it."
8:56 PM
Matt is in the waiting room of the ER and Thompson is back AGAIN. Blaming Matt for her injury.
"This is what you do. You get opportunities and you squander them with impulsive decisions." Or something.
She just has a sprained ankle, but Thompson says it will be way worse if Matty stays with her.
Wow, he got Damie's number. Poked him right in the insecurities.
[Mary: Is this a nice way of saying he kicked him in the nuts?]
I think he's going to betray Elise.
Oh no, she won't have the True Love that arose from a kiss in a bathroom and boinking 3 years later one time. Instead she'll have to just be an amazing dancer and choreographer.
Ah, yes. He's walking away from her hospital bed. She's crying. #calledit
He's wistfully and moodily looking
no, that's one of the bureau dudes.
BD is looking out an Artistic and Classic window over the NY skyline at night. Elise is crying prettily in the hospital.
Another BD is talking to the other BD and they're clearly working out their doubts about the hierarchy and their plans for humanity.
DUN DUN DUUUUUUUNNNNN
will their doubts be the key to Mitty Dammy
9:00 PM
Glad Matty Dames drank the Kool aid. Now the world will be okay.
9:00 PM
and Elise committing to true love???
Now that Matt Van Damme has left his true love, he has a 16-point lead in the polls.
But his BFF (also campaign manager) is sad because he wants Matt to be happy and he shows him a newspaper story about Elise being the best dancer ever and getting back together with...
can anyone guess?
Adrian!
Ah, Mitt Domney is now walking wistfully on an industrial pier at sunrise.
Elise is looking at a MARRIAGE LICENSE APPLICATION (with Adrian's name on it).
One can only hope they will get married in a church with a big glass window Matt can pound on at the appropriate moment. (#TheGraduate)
WAIT. Someone is running through the rainy night!
(night? This show is a miniseries in 2 hours; fuck #suspense, we got #plot )
One of the BDs (we already know he's the most doubty one, also the only Black one, I think) has run through the rain with his jacket over his #trilby to meet Matt.
He's coming clean to Mister Matt.
Telling him all the stuff the BDs have done to point Matt in this direction.
[Mary: I read this first line as "he's coming to clean Mister Matt." I thought things were about to take a turn ... ] #Surprise #GayPorn
But his mother's death wasn't their fault. That was just bad luck. TRAGEDY
moving on
we got like 4 seconds for his mom
Matt wants Good BD (GBD) to help him disrupt the wedding.
Wait. Gotta pause for the first time. Things are happening. We're entering the Dramatic Conclusion phase. Or Climax or something.
[At this point, Mary is texting #smh about the incredibly predictable plot]
Matt: Teach me about the doors.
OK, the doors. Apparently the BDs can go through doors all over NYC and the doors go to other places, like the door in the back of a restaurant opens into a park, but when non-BDs open it there's just an alley.
No explanation so far, no consistent structure. I'm waiting to see if someone actually worked out a system for this, or if it's just Deus Ex Machina'd all the time.
[Mary: Many movies with this]
Yup. Like I said, this movie is a #copypaste of other stories. It has good acting and directing, and lots of A-list actors, but it feels #halfassed anyway. But kind of fun. [Editor: This was premature]
OK, you know about the doors. BD is probably about to tell Mott the HoomDam about them. Let's see.
Ah, and if there's lots of water around (FOR REASONS) the BDs can't see your actions and future paths and stuff.
Good Bureau Dude (GBD) is leading Misty Dimsty through some doors.
9:10 PM
Wharf to Smithsonian dinosaur room. Now to underground utility tunnels.
Elise is at her dance place, wants to go dance at night all by herself, and she's obviously unhappy but also for some reason going to marry Adrian tomorrow.
MD an GBD are still in the utility tunnels. Big binder of future paths and whatever.
"There are thousands of ways to get to the dance studio using the doors. I want you to learn how to stay in the substrate so Thompson can't get a fix on you."
I swear they had the Star Trek tech writers feeding them these lines. WTF is "the substrate?" Why does that let Thompson "get a fix on" MD?
Whatevs. MD is going to get to boink ballerina chaos female stereotype like 10 million more times, and this is what he needs to do for that to happen.
MD is memorizing door sequences. GBD is quizzin him.
"I need you to understand this has never been done before, so the minute you go through that first door all hell will break loose."
How can a movie with such a high actor budget still be a B movie?
"Assume everyone with a hat on is a threat."
I don't think GBD meant that to be funny, but it is 100% the best line in this movie.
[Editor: Yes, this continued to be true. It wasn't a high bar.]
"Even you guys can't get through the doors without your hats on, right?"
"Right. It's one of the ways The Chairman limits our powers. Water's another way."
If this was a better movie, the idea of The Chairman as a bureaucratic, petty, not necessarily benevolent God would be interesting.
[Editor: It ended up being so much worse than imagined]
Also yeah, heavy-handed "here's the key to beating the boss" moment.
mmm dried mango [that was me having a snack]
Back to the action
The BDs have trouble with improvisation. That's MattaDamma's forte! What a stroke of luck!
9:20 PM
GBD: We aren't built to lead with our emotions like you are, but that doesn't mean we don't have them.
#TheAdjustmentBureau #foreshadowing
#actually it's just #badwriting
Mostly I think this movie is to make NYC people feel really good about how cool NYC is.
Also boys are leaders who punch people and girls are pretty super-thin dancers who get their ankles sprained and marry stupid men they don't like.
Mastication Damastication is sprinting in a hat through NYC! In a hat!
Street. Alley. DMV.
Hat shop!!! (oh, that's the BDs)
MD: running in traffic!
Up some big stairs!
Granite stairs! Knocks a guy over! STops to help him!
(I'm running out of #name ideas)
he has to send his hat through the metal detector! At a place! With a rotunda an lots of marble!
Oh, he's got it back.
[Mary: The court house!!]
"I'm here to see Elise!"
"She's not in there!"
"Where is she?!!?"
In the bathroom. Ah, full circle.
Barging into the women's restroom.
Luckily, Elise isn't taking a shit or pulling out a slimy, bloody tampon.
[Mary: laughing and snorting]
She's just attractively but sadly spritzing her face with water.
You're not marrying that guy."
Speech.
"Don't touch me! What are you doing?!"
sorry sorry!
"You left me in a fucking hospital!"
[She's got a point]
(BD busts in. MD punches his stupid hat face.)
Shows her the BD's binder with the future paths and shit.
Trying to convince Elise.
"Call in the Intervention Team!
Oh, so bad. Shiny black cars squealing out of the inbetween warehouse
[Mary: At least we're out of the bathroom. ]
Bureau office: Thompson is requesting emergency reset authorization (this means lobotomizing Batt Maiden)
who is bracing the bathroom door with a broom handle
now he's trying to explain things to Elise.
"I never lied to you. I love you. Let me show you something. You deserve to know."
Doing the door thing with Elise.
#TheAdjustmentBureau mentBureau
Backdoor of bathroom to Wrigley field or something (IDK about baseball)
[Mary: Ugh, is one of the stall doors a portal door. I hope so for their sake.]
Subway tunnel stairs.
Plaza in the city.
Hatted-up BDs now in the bathroom. On their trail.
[Mary: I want to have access to doors like that.]
"Got 'em. Sixth avenue"
[Mary: Or even under beds like in Monsters inc.]
"I need you to trust me."
[Mary: Underwater door?!?! ]
doors. doors. Now on Ellis Island under statue of liberty.
Elise is losing her fucking mind.
[Mary: Yes!!]
Elise: wtf IS GOING ON????
Ah, explaining that she won't get what she's worked for her entire life if she stays with Hatt Damon (he's wearin GBD's hat, obvs).
[Mary: Matter Demons; Matcha Dameon]
stealing these
ause while I call the next bit:
Within 3 minutes she will say she doesn't want to be superdancerlady, she just wants to be the wife of the future Senator for NY.
ok back to Ellis Island action, with absolutely zero extra-oppressive symbolism while they hash out free will and letting her make her own choices right under Lady Liberty.
pause while I call the next bit:
Within 3 minutes she will say she doesn't want to be superdancerlady, she just wants to be the wife of the future Senator for NY.
[Mary: 🤢🤮. Bc getting married is important. We haven't even factored in reproduction vessel yet.]
Ah, now Matter Demons is gonna go find who wrote the Plan Book.
he has to ABANDON Elise on Ellis Island (with no boat or #snacks
to go find the book/plan writer.
No, "I'm cmoing with you!"
At least there's some teamwork
and she has a very low-cut dress. Pretty great for chase scenes, actually.
Uh-Oh. The BDs have figured out they're going RIGHT INTO THE BD CENTRAL OFFICES
"You can't be in here!" lots of running
Phalanx of BDs stalking after them, led by Thompson, who know sthe shortcuts
Cutscene: GBD is wanted in the Chairman's office immediately.
More chasing. Team Love4eva is sprinting sweatily. BDs are inexorably walking. Def gonna ambush them.
Pretty sure this was filmed in a big library.
You can't be in here! GEt them! and so forth.
#TheAdjustmentBureau mentBureau
Door: Top of a skyscraper! Wrong door!
But they keep coming here.
Ah, maybe there IS no chairman.
Maybe it's bureaucrats all the way down.
BDs & their goons (with kubatons) have them cornered on a very tall skyscraper roof with a railing. Nowhere to run.
His hat, it does nothing!
Hugs. I love you no matter what, etc. etc. blah blah. Long smooch. Wow
so much kissing. FAce devouring. Kind of desperate. pRetty hot. Goons now gone... what?
I did not predict this (unless it's
"true love triumphs"
nope.
Thompson is right behind them!
[Mary: What?! Is there a hidden door back there? ]
I know. Zero explanation. Seems like lazy #worldbuilding.
[Mary: Oh, bad joke opportunity about back doors. ]
Thompson has been filled with longing.
[Mary: Well that other guy was going to clean Matty, maybe a threesome? ]
WAIT. In another zero-suspense twist, GBD shows up with a manilla envelope for Thompson.
Tommy is reading it.
Unhappy look.
"I undertsand."
We have no time to feel any suspense. If they're going to bre killed or whatever.
"Elise, when you went through that door at the Statue of Liberty, you risked everything, too."
(If this movie is even HINTED for an Oscar, I'm going to vomit)
"You inspired me. Seems like you inspired the Chairman, too."
So this is about how God really is watching and everything happens for a reason and please do not every question the status quo. Got it.
GBD gonna read the message.
They are a serious deviation from the plan.
So the Chairman rewrote the plan.
Okay. Yeah.
This movie should just be renamed Deus Ex Machina (shameless edition)
"Now what?"
"Now, you can take the stairs."
Holy Unsatisfying Perverse Fucking Shitty Movie Making. I swear, if this goes where I thi
Matcha Daemon is doing voiceover while he and Elise walk in NYC. I'm pausing because my disappointment is like a 300-lb basement gamer on the couch right next to me, stinking up the living room. Gonna write some of this #denouement bullshit because I'm feeling that it's going to be very, very bad.
(narration is actually GBD)
"Most people live life on the path we set for them, too afraid to explore any other. But once in a while, people like you come along, who knock down all the obstacles we put in your way. People who realize free will is a gift you'll never know how to use until you fight for it."
[Mary: Replacing their hats with actual cats would have added a lot. ]
[Mary: I'm also glad I didn't spend my time watching that. ]
(continued narration): "I think that's the Chairman's real plan: that maybe one day we won't write the plan. You will."
OH MY FUCKING GOD
A movie that is nothing but a pastiche of stereotypes shoved down our throats, about people behaving in the most stereotyped ways possible, doing exactly what every couple in every romance movie in American history has done, exactly the way they do it, and who find that everything in the world is predestined and manipulated by a loving and unreachable god... is somehow supposed to mean that everyone should do what they want and not follow the crowd.
[Mary: I'm pretty sure I got the better end of this movie. ]
Yeah, I'm very, very glad this was an entertaining live-tweet experience, not $20 at a movie theater.
guyjantic has moved!
Ms. Uppity