What a journey these poems have taken me through. What started as a single poem turned into an unexpected trilogy that somehow provides the closure the first poem needed all along. 

If you haven't already, you might want to read (or re-read!) the first two parts, since they follow a chronological order: Part 1 and Part 2.

After writing the first Father and Son poem, I got some great feedback from friends and soon realized I still had more to say.

Thus, Father and Son 2 was born.

In the first poem, the father takes his time to reply and try to show his son a beautiful way to live his life. It’s kind of stated in bigger terms that a lot of parents speak in, where it’s like “be good” and “help others” and all of that. But here’s the thing: when it comes to parenting, kids can sometimes be jerks. And express/profess opinions that you think are absolutely wrong. And you still have to love them.

Men! Dudes! Bros! Countrymen! Dude-Bros! Bro…dudes…
​
Tired of women having to tell you how they’re “feeling” all the time?
Sick of being told that your comments hurt someone’s “feelings?”
Done having to be PC because people’s “feelings” are being offended?
Are you constantly putting the word “feelings” in air quotes because you just can’t even?
Scared to talk a woman because you might accidentally become a rapist?

First of all, I don’t like calling it a “MeToo Era,” because it feels like I’m saying that it’s a brand new thing that suddenly’s been happening. Like men haven’t been the perpetrators of horrific sexual crimes for thousands of years. But I couldn’t think of a better title for this post, so here we are.
​
In response to some recent events in our country, as well as inspiration from recent conversations I’ve had with friends, I wrote a poem, which I present to you now without further comment:

I really tried, but apparently I’m not done thinking about these ideas. So here we go! My first Trilogy! Part 3: in which I discuss some of the ways that thinking about action aesthetics in terms of stunt-centric and choreo-centric could be helpful or useful.

This is Part 2 of my post attempting to more accurately describe and delineate the differences between two general approaches to action. Click here for Part 1, in which I describe the general priorities and emphases of a stunt-centric approach to action. This post will deal with the choreo-centric approach. To recap my goal real quick from Part 1:

Since my last post on the Emmy snub of Into the Badlands for Best Stunt Coordination, I’ve been thinking a lot about one of the claims I briefly made regarding the difference between action stunt work and action choreography. To be absolutely clear, I think that the men and women in the stunt world do not receive the kind of recognition and acclaim they deserve. The same is also true for action/martial arts choreography. However, due the frequent conflation of the two – particularly in the US – choreography gets the short end of an already short stick. While there are certainly overlaps in skills and abilities, they are also distinctly different in many ways.

Yes. This is another post about Into the Badlands. Here are some other things I’ve written about the show.

Let me get right to it: the Emmys announced their nominations for 2018, and Into the Badlands was snubbed completely. Forget the fact that they have some of the most amazing, beautiful, and original costume, makeup, and overall character designs you’ll see anywhere. Or the fact that they have some incredible production design, set pieces, music, and cinematography. All of those areas - and more, like, you know, acting - would have been well-deserving for Into the Badlands to at the very least have earned a nomination, much less a win. And I’m sad that such an original, diverse, and engaging show, and all the incredibly talented people in front of and behind the scenes missed out on all that recognition.

Season 3, Episode 1: Enter the Phoenix

Wow. What a season opener! I was thinking of writing something after each episode, but don’t want to make it too long either, so here’s where I landed. My goal will be to post some hopefully-weekly quick thoughts about what stands out, no more than 2-3 days after each episode. I feel like they should be pretty spoiler-free, since I don’t see myself spending too much time on the specific events of the episode. But, in the event that I do, I will definitely give you a SPOILER ALERT.
​
This post will be SPOILER-FREE. Though I will have some screenshots.

It’s been criminally overdue, but I’m finally catching up on Season 2 of Into the Badlands, and – mark my words – I will never let another season go by to be caught up later! I feel like AMC developed a technology to go into my head, scour the depths of my psyche for everything I love – and didn’t even know I loved – and created a show from their exploratory efforts. To name a few of its Munib-approved elements: post-apocalyptic settings, kung-fu action, western aesthetics, fantasy-ish elements, Daniel Wu, a diverse cast, strong female characters, father-son relationships, Chinese martial arts cinema aesthetics, appropriate and knowing nods to martial arts cinema history, etc.

I came across the image above about a month ago, and decided it sounded like the perfect time/excuse to introduce my 9-year-old son to the Marvel Cinematic Universe with the coming of the new year. And thus was born The 2018 Father-Son Marvel Movie Marathon Extravaganza, or The Marvelthon, for short. When I shared my plan on Facebook, my friend Maria had the awesome idea of having him write blog posts for each movie. Ultimately, I decided that for him, blog posts might be a little too open-ended and intimidating, so instead I’ll be giving him some questions to answer and which I’ll type up as posts – verbatim, with typos and all. Maybe I’ll even share some of my thoughts on his answers and where I might take future questions. Related: I teach high school film and media courses, so he’s been asking me to give him some “movie lessons,” as he calls them. So I see this as fulfilling that request too.

So I went to see Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird in theaters the other day, and my trip to the movie coincided with what feels like a significant moment in my movie-watching / media-consuming decision-making process. But first, a bit of background…

I had originally posted the following as a Facebook status update, but thought I’d post it here as well to give it a more permanent home.

The last few weeks have felt so busy and emotionally draining that I haven’t had a real chance to fully contemplate on the enormity of what this weekend means for the world. This weekend, Bahá’ís all over the world celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Bahá’u’lláh – prophet-founder of their faith.
​
It’s been 200 years since the birth of an incredible boy who brought about the teachings and exemplary life that revitalized the eternal truths shared by all the world’s great religions, as well as new social teachings to address the most urgent need of our day: unity.

This post was originally published on a second blog I maintained for a brief time when I was a stay-at-home parent full-time. For archival purposes, I have copied it over with no edits.

Man! It’s been a long time since I’ve updated this blog!

Tomorrow, my oldest turns 9. Nine years ago tomorrow, I became a father. In honor of this occasion, I thought I’d write down some thoughts and reflections on fatherhood.

Surprisingly, when I sat down to write, my thoughts came out in verse.

Enjoy:

Since posting my last post on Iron Fist, I’ve completed the series and kept telling myself that I was done with it. As the show went on, I liked it less and less but wanted to write about it more and more. I still have some Iron Fist demons that need to be exorcized, because I still find myself talking about or thinking about this show on an almost-daily basis. And I feel a little bad because I don’t want it to be all critically negative stuff. I also wanted to discuss some of its greatness (like Claire Temple and Madame Gao), some of its goodness (like some of the not-Danny-Rand-performances), and some of its awkwardnesses (like every time Bakuto speaks).

But I still haven’t said my peace on the martial arts and action of the show. And it turns out Episode 8, “The Blessings of Many Fractures,” provides some really great concrete examples to talk about. AND, since the show’s been out for a little longer now, it’s easier to find clips of specific fights streaming online. So here goes!

So I’m finally getting around to Iron Fist (I’m only 6 episodes in at the time of this writing) and I think I’ve come to certain realizations. Episode 6, in particular, helped crystallize a lot of the thoughts that were bubbling and percolating in my head throughout the first five episodes.
​
Let’s start with the big one: Chinese martial arts.

It seems like I can’t go more than a day or two without seeing another video of someone being “ripped,” “schooled,” “destroyed,” or “shut down” after saying some racist, misogynistic, hateful, or otherwise ignorant thing. There are whole shows that are practically dedicated to this kind of content. And you watch it. Because you want to see that moment when the ignorant individual makes that comment you so completely disagree with. You can’t believe it. How can anyone actually believe that? But that’s not even the best part. The best part is how they are completely shut down by the interviewer. They’re able to say what you wish you could say when faced with that kind of ignorance. They put it together so intelligently and snarkily, maybe in the form of some elaborate and expletive-riddled analogy, that you feel a sense of triumph. Like you and that interviewer collectively fought ignorance today and won. I’ve watched a lot of these videos. And I’ve laughed at a lot of them. But I’m finding myself increasingly uneasy with them. It took me some time to figure out why, and a little longer to be able to put it down in a string of words that – hopefully – make sense, but here goes.

Philando Castile. Michael Brown. Ezell Ford. Dylan Noble. Tamir Rice. Alton Sterling. Delrawn Small. Sandra Bland. And so many, many more.

This post was originally published on a second blog I maintained for a brief time when I was a stay-at-home parent full-time. For archival purposes, I have copied it over with no edits.

Happy Father’s Day Week!

In honor of Father’s Day, the PhDadBlog is sharing a Dads Roundtable throughout the week.
​
This is it! The final installment of the 2016 Father’s Day Dads of the Roundtable©™!

This post was originally published on a second blog I maintained for a brief time when I was a stay-at-home parent full-time. For archival purposes, I have copied it over with no edits.

Happy Father’s Day Week!

In honor of Father’s Day, the PhDadBlog is sharing a Dads Roundtable throughout the week. 
​
In today’s installment, the dads reflect on two different spheres of influence on their parenting: the effect their own parents had on their parenting, as well as the role of religion.