Killing Emmitt was justified
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Ringworm7 — 9 years ago(July 19, 2016 03:00 PM)
I think Howard was extremely confused, possibly mentally ill and not acting out on a normal healthy conscience. He had his own militaristic worldview and he stuck to it.
At the end of Cloverfield
we see a satellite drop into the ocean
and we know Howard's worked on satellites for years in the Navy. I'm thinking he is driven insane by a failure and also the guilt of not being able to keep his family where he can control and protect them.
7even days
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joem420 — 9 years ago(July 24, 2016 12:43 AM)
This question sums up my problem with this moviefor the first 3/4 of the film the driving question is: "is howard good or is he bad"(aka is he right or wrong about the apocalypse)?
It's a bit of a cop out that the answer is: BOTH!
Clearly, howard was 1000% right about the "attack". He might have been wrong about some details (i.e. the air wasn't poisoned)but this was exactly they type of scenario his shelter was built for and an "attack" has definitely occurred. And Howard definitely was a "good Samaritan" when Emmett showed up at his door and he let Emmett in.
However, it is obvious that Howard kidnapped and murdered a girl in his bunker before the "attack" ever took place.
And it is unclear whether he kidnapped Michele in "cold blood" and then the attack just happened to occur.or if he told the truth that he accidentally ran her of the road as the attack was starting.
So, Howard is both correct about the attack and is protecting Michelle and Emmett from whatever is out there.and he is also a (sick? deranged? evil? delusional? all of the above? some of the above) individual who has kidnapped and murdered people before.
The movie tries to straddle the fence..and when you straddle the fence, you lose your balls.
I was entertained, but disappointed in the end. On a true 0-10, bell curve style scale (where '5' is average) I would give this flick a 6..aka above average, with a few highlights, but also a few disappointments.so decent, but nothing special. Glad I caw it..but even more glad I saw it for $5 on ppv instead of $12 on the big screen. -
arizonaangels — 9 years ago(July 31, 2016 08:04 AM)
I thought about it in a way that he was just a sad and desperate man that had gone mad before and started prepping. I think he lost his real daughter a long time ago, maybe even by the hands of a bad man, seeing as he gets quite angry at the time when Emmet and Michelle touch hands at the table. He wanted to replace his little girl and keep her safe (he even keeps referring to Michelle as little girl during that game.. even saying little princess) and at the end he is really desperate for her to stay.
He might be insane but I don't think he is a bad person. He wanted to keep her safe and the fact that he reacted differently to Emmet was because he never wanted him there, he fought his way in and in that way intruded on this man and his plan to go into his shelter and just be there by himself. He took Michelle because he rammed her car and probably saw her and thought of Megan. -
koffeenkreame41-1 — 9 years ago(September 13, 2016 07:54 PM)
I thought about it in a way that he was just a sad and desperate man that had gone mad before and started prepping. I think he lost his real daughter a long time ago, maybe even by the hands of a bad man, seeing as he gets quite angry at the time when Emmet and Michelle touch hands at the table. He wanted to replace his little girl and keep her safe (he even keeps referring to Michelle as little girl during that game.. even saying little princess) and at the end he is really desperate for her to stay.
He might be insane but I don't think he is a bad person. He wanted to keep her safe and the fact that he reacted differently to Emmet was because he never wanted him there, he fought his way in and in that way intruded on this man and his plan to go into his shelter and just be there by himself. He took Michelle because he rammed her car and probably saw her and thought of Megan.
Agreed.
"I'm the ultimate badass,you do NOT wanna f-ck wit me!"Hudson,Aliens -
truetexian — 9 years ago(August 01, 2016 11:28 AM)
Ah, earth to slgr7, earth to slgr7!!
That you ask the question is disturbing.
Da, hell yeah Howard was 'bad'! Bat-sh*t crazy, but 'bad' just the same.
You do remember what happened to Emmett and who-done-it, don't you? -
ivyelle4 — 9 years ago(August 23, 2016 06:04 AM)
It's incorrect, IMO, to to say there's no evil, just degrees of mental illness and other's perception of 'evil acts'. There are truly horrible things that society as a whole condones. however, I do think that it's mostly true that "the victor writes the history". How many evil deeds were committed by our "heros", in the name of right. But who is right?
Various groups (religions, countries, races, clans, etc etc) have had centuries-long battles, both sides believing they are doing God's side. The people involved are doing horrible to others are either:
-completely evil and have no humanity (possible in some cases, but not likely)
-possessed by demons (hey, its possible. I watch Supernatural lol)
-completely believe they are doing the right thing to protect their people from the "other" (who is doing the same thing for their side) but neither heinous act is done out of malice, just "protection" of their people, or following orders. This accounts for most military or police, I guess. Generally are psychologically normal people, but convinced by their leaders that the other is a bad person and they are simply defending themselves. This is the gray area. I think what the one person above was saying about Hitler wasn't inaccurate. We believe him to be pure evil because that's what we've been told. Not to say he wasn't pure evil, but if they had won the war, there definitely would be a different slant on the guy. How do we, as Americans, idolize "cowboys" or our military when the Native Americans think of them as evil aggressors? And the military personnel heard of the "Indians" as savages that will scalp soldiers. An entire, huge group of people got lumped together as "savages", when they had limited contact with other tribes across the nation. Similarly, the Jewish people were blamed unrightly for WW1 which made the Germans band behind the Nazis and were easily swayed by their propaganda.
This has happened for all of history, of various propaganda and "righteous acts against aggressors".
Anyway. Cloverfield. What were we talking about? Lol -
C-Younkin — 9 years ago(August 31, 2016 11:29 AM)
You can't tell and that is was made him great- the complexity Goodman brought here was fantastic. Still the year's best performance.
Trying to create a funny, engaging YouTube channel. If you guys check it out, hope you enjoy what you see. Thanks in advance.
Review of the film here- -
saintmarsh — 9 years ago(September 01, 2016 08:38 PM)
He was dangerous and thus had to go. He happened to be right about the world but she wasn't given a choice to survive he took her and kept reminding him that she should be gracious. He was ill which isn't his fault but he definitely hurt people therefore he couldn't continue on.
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Innsmouth — 9 years ago(September 13, 2016 08:04 PM)
He was insane, and had no empathy for human life, but it just so happened that his craziness was proven right in some aspects.
Arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice: www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhBWDzkqEPY -
boomcube — 9 years ago(November 07, 2016 12:57 PM)
Yes he was messed up.
It seems obvious to me he killed megan. And that guy said he saw a different picture of his daughter so it seems that wasn't the first person he killed. His martian delusions just happened to be correct but he was a serial killer. -
postandreply — 9 years ago(November 13, 2016 06:49 AM)
I didn't read the three pages of responses to your question "So was Howard good or bad?" but I have your answer. He was bad. Unfortunately.
Before the aliens even attacked Earth, he had already kidnapped a female and was forcing her to roleplay as his daughter inside the Doomsday bunker. When she tried to escape, he killed her. That's the one who disappeared like over two years ago that no has ever seen again.
This movie was very entertaining and I enjoyed it a lot. However, it is extremely feminist. It doesn't jump out at people as being feminist. Most people wouldn't notice or they will just deny it.
This was my summary of the movie:
"It's about a woman who leaves her boyfriend after only one fight and then kills the guy who saves her because he turned out to be a psychotic who kidnaps women as a substitute for his daughter who left him a long time ago and kills them if they try to escape. The heroine then destroys an alien spaceship by herself and decides to go to war with the aliens instead of going to a safe city."
It's pretty mainstream BS. Women are victims or heroines. They can do no evil. They are the warriors of justice and most men are bad. Blah. But it didn't have a bad impact on the movie because the movie was great. Howard's character added mystery to the plot where you didn't know if the aliens were real or not or if he was a bad guy or not.
EDIT:
To add more to what I wrote above. I do agree that despite his evil deeds that there is a real sincerity to everything that he does. So it would be more accurate to say that he was sick in the head. I think that his real sickness was his obsession with Doomsday bunkers. His Doomsday bunker is probably why his real daughter left him. After she left him, he kidnapped a female and forced her to live with him in the Doomsday bunker as a replacement daughter. I think the replacement daughter was an afterthought and that the Doomsday bunker fantasy was more important to him than anything. So when she tried to escape and leave him, he killed her. I don't think that Michelle was ever kidnapped. He really did crash into her by accident when he was in a hurry to his Doomsday bunker. He would have continued to care for her and protect her but he would have killed her if a.) she did anything that would jeopardize his safety or the Doomsday bunker and possibly b.) she decided to leave peacefully because he didn't want yet another daughter walking out on him. -
Stovepipe99 — 9 years ago(November 17, 2016 05:19 PM)
It's pretty mainstream BS. Women are victims or heroines. They can do no evil. They are the warriors of justice and most men are bad.
What movies are you thinking of when you say this?
This just isn't my association with the "mainstream" treatment of women, especially in horror/sci-fi.
I think that Michelle's character arc is more complicated than victim->heroine. And her main character flaw is something that she shares with a male character. -
jfish-85389 — 9 years ago(November 16, 2016 06:33 PM)
He was definitely bad IMOthe implication is that he had imprisoned and murdered a young woman in the past, and he murdered Emmett and was also extremely controlling and flew off the handle very easily. I think the writers meant for him to seem like someone who had become detached from reality upon his daughter leaving him, and was trying to replace her. I felt as if the outside events that required them to stay in the shelter were coincidental, I don't think that was his intended purpose in constructing it. How else can one explain the girl in the picture whose earring was found with blood on it?
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PotatoMonsters — 9 years ago(November 17, 2016 06:51 AM)
IMHO:
I would say he was sick, making him dangerous, not bad.
I didn't see him as bad but just a sick man doing bad things.
It's a very delicate issue and he was very frail and unstable.
In the end he had to be taken care of simply because he was dangerous and sick.
I don't mean to justify anything. Every character acted Reasonable. Execept Howard of course. I like the mystery of not knowing, that way we can see all people discuss what COULD have happend. -
bigman0692000 — 9 years ago(November 28, 2016 09:23 PM)
Like real life a lot of times its very open to interpretation. Its not black and white. He certainly was a good guy in a lot of ways. I mean he let them both in the bunker, he told the truth about almost everything, and helped with everything else.
He killed emmitt, but he had good reasons why he choose that. We dont know what happened with the missing girl so that could go either way how she died. So there were signs he had a bad temper, but that does not mean he was going to for sure kill her if she stayed inside.