My decision to watch Jupiter Ascending
despite reading the reviews beforehand was based on sociability
rather than quality, so this review will focus less on the question
of whether it is worth seeing in theaters (if you have a large screen
at home, the answer is no) and more on the details; as such, there
will be numerous spoilers.
The best way to picture the movie if
you have not seen is a combination of the poor man's Dune and
Star Wars with an aesthetic but not the heart. The heroine of our
story is Jupiter Jones, an illegal immigrant (her words, not mine)
with a stupid name and a crappy job. She is the daughter of an
English ambassador's son, whose life expectency is governed by the Law
of Disney, Parental Division, and a Russian woman. Her
soon-to-be-late father is, of course, an astronomer, and like many
scientists, is terrible at naming things, in this case his unborn
daughter. The choice of the name Jones for our protagonist is no
doubt meant to remind us of Indiana Jones, and therefore Harrison
Ford, and therefore the good Star Wars trilogy. Our hero is an
adventure – IN SPACE! The alliteration is typical of a superhero
name, which our heroine definitely is not. The use of the name
Jupiter, however, goes beyond this. One can tell from the spelling of
their surname that the Wachowskis are Polish rather than Russian, and
there is a Polish name, Juspeczyk, that is sometimes
transliterated as Jupiter. The most prominent characters in comics
with the surname Jupiter are Sally and Laurie Jupiter from Watchmen
and the financier of the version of Teen Titans
with teenage Ray Palmer, Loren Jupiter (who may be a gender-swapped
version of the Watchmen
character, given how the DC multiverse/hypertime tends to work). The
use of Jupiter in this context makes me wonder whether the
Wachowski's protagonist was Polish before the demands of blockbuster
movie-making mandated that all Slavs be Russians with ties to
criminal activity.
In the world of
Jupiter Ascending, humans are not native to Earth – Earth is in
fact a long-term plantation. I do have to give the Wachowskis credit
for answering the question of why there are humans in space before it
irritated the more perceptive members of the audience. In science
fiction terms, panspermia, the idea of genetic seeding, is a better
explanation than “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.” The movie only
discusses planting humans, but I must assume that other items were
also seeded when the Earth humans were. The deliberate extinction 65
million years ago would certainly provide the opportunity – because
of course the movie has to tie in the one extinction event that even
a moron has heard of. No doubt the novelization of the movie will
fill in some of these details.
Jones is important
to the powers that be because she is a genetic recurrence, the exact
genetic copy of an important figure in the universe. I should mention
that this movie illustrates the common flaw that science fiction
writers have no sense of scale. The Empire in Dune does not encompass
the whole galaxy, and even the Republic and Empire is limited to its
own galaxy. The use of Babylon 5-style hypergates suggests that long
distance travel is not as “simple” as putting in coordinates.
Since this is a movie rather than a book or television series, the
limitations are not explained. But I digress. The idea of a genetic
recurrence as the secular equivalent of reincarnation in a human
population which is probably in the quadrillions or quintillions is a
good idea. The movie makes it clear that the powers that be are
looking for a genetic recurrence because the will of Jones' late
identical space twin has a clause that drew attention to the
possibility rather than some mystical prophecy or some Kwisatz
Haderach-y nonsense. In a bit of foreshadowing, Jones is identified
as a genetic recurrence when she goes into a clinic to sell her eggs,
which her creepy Russian slacker cousin identifies as “harvesting”
in order to make money to pay off his debts. Perhaps the Wachowskis
used Russians rather than Poles because Russians are an acceptable
target for ethnic slandering.
The
universe of Jupiter Ascending is a highly aristocratic place, complete
with Houses, servants, and planets as properties. Jones is the
genetic recurrence of the matriarch (no father is mentioned) of the
House of Abrasax, which is a stupid Star Wars name if I ever heard
one, although to be fair there are some profoundly stupid names in
Dune as well. The House of Abrasax is one of the most powerful Houses
of the universe – nobody ever discovers that they are the scion of
some piddling mid-rank House in adventure stories – although since
we don't see or hear anything
about any other Houses, the House of Abrasax might as well be rulers
of the universe. The other reason for their importance is their
control of the human resources (quite literally) to make the liquid
that allows indefinite life provided that you can pay for it. This is
not only gross, but also begs many questions regarding the function
of the harvesting industry.
Let's
take a look at the numbers. The human race, according to the movie,
emerged one billion years age on a planet other than Earth. The Earth
was seeded 65 million years ago by the Abrasax Corporation. The House
of Abrasax is therefore at more than 65 million years old. Kalique,
the daughter of the genetic original who exposits at Jones is 14,000
years old and the genetic original was murdered at 91,000 years old.
Kalique feels that this was an abrupt and untimely end, but the movie
never clarifies what is a normal lifespan for the one millionth of
the 1%. This means that if 100,000 years (rounded up to the nearest
hundred thousand) is an average lifespan for the member of a House,
the House of Abrasax has existed for 650
generations! To put this in perspective, the Empire in Dune is 10,000
years old, and the maximum life span of aristocrats is around 200
years. Houses Corrino, Harkonnen, and Atreides have existed from the
beginning of the Empire. Therefore there are at most 50 generations
between the foundation of the Empire and Muad'Dib. This is still an
absurdly long number of generations for one group of families to
consistently hold power, but at least it is within the time frame of
human history measured in generations. Assuming that 50 generations
is a reasonable time span for space aristocrats, this means that a
healthy life span is 1.3 million years! Even at 100 generations, it's
still well over half a million years per individual. This exaggerated
(and I've never had to use the word 'exaggerated' in a understated
sense before) life time would explain why the children of the
genetic original behave like petty infants. They are, after all, only
tens of thousands of years old. Since there is no suggestion that
ordinary humans such as the space navy captain, live any longer than
Earth humans, the longevity of the aristocrats is dependent on the
liquefied humans. This longevity allows the Houses to maintain
dominance over the other races of the universe. Since there are no
other products shown of similar importance, I must declare that the
spice must flow! - in the most literal and disgusting way possible.
The three primary
heirs to the Abrasax fortune naturally fight over control of the
resources. Although two are content to use coaxing or intimidation,
the third combines these tasteless but expected corporate tactics
with the creepiest seduction to ever “grace” the silver screen. I
can understand how aristocrats can present a marriage as a business
arrangement, and I'm no prude, weaned on Greek and Egyptian myth and
history but this is beyond the pale. Luke and Leia didn't know that
they were related (although the ret-conned information about the
Force suggests that they should have), Jaime and Cersei Lannister
have some level of affection for each other, and Pietro and Wanda
have serious psychological problems, but a son marrying his own
mother (from his own, genetically-oriented perspective) is creepy
beyond words. That said, this lack of concern about genetics in a
future space society is nothing new. The Spacers of Isaac Asmov's
Robot series show no concern for kinship outside of reproduction, but
this is made more palatable by an exaggerated avoidance of the
Westermarck effect. Not so here. Jones rejects her own son's sexual
advances before agreeing to the political marriage.
The
aesthetics of the spaceships is different, but not as impressive as
some of the reviews indicated. Perhaps a contemporary audience has
been spoiled by the abundance of movies and especially video game
designs. The extensive use of force fields in the construction of the
spaceships is definitely futuristic, but immensely impractical. Here
is seen the benefit of using actual models at some stage of world
building. There is considerable latitude in spaceship design once you
are free of atmospheric considerations, but wide freedom does not
equal absolute freedom. If there were peace throughout the realm and
nothing ever crashed, then perhaps detached parts of a spaceship
would make sense, but it is an absolute that in any adventure set in
space the power will fail. In a world full of million-year-old
aristocrats, I wouldn't place much faith in the detachable parts
having adequate life support or engine capability.
