Teaching Reported Speech for Writing: A Game Approach

C. David Smith
aief {at} msn.com
Chuo University (Tokyo, Japan)

In this short article, I describe the creation and use of a game to teach the use of reported speech for English writing.

Introduction

Although Japanese university students study, or are at least exposed to the use of reported speech in late middle school or early junior high school English lessons, they rarely master the accurate application of this language feature. While in conversation, the correct use of reported speech isn't of such great importance, proper use of this form in writing is an absolute necessity to express clear meaning. Issues regarding word order, proper identification of subject, direct object and indirect object, and situation; place and time, can make the conveyance of intended meaning extremely unlikely.

A conventional approach to teaching proper reporting of direct utterances may involve explanation of the grammar involved followed by oral or written exercises for reinforcement and confirmation that the student has mastered the form. For students with at least a perfunctory exposure to this form of written expression, I believe this approach is flawed and produces an unsatisfactory outcome. The syntactic and lexical transformations involved are numerous, and though the situation is not as complex as the rules governing the use of the definite article in English, it is not that dissimilar. A much more effective approach involves utilizing a game format. Not only is this far more efficient; it is much more enjoyable for both learner and instructor. While lecture, exercises and drills may have an ancillary role to play in reinforcement of this linguistic skill, they are exceedingly ineffective in the absence of a more activity oriented approach.

Procedure

I begin by composing or choosing representative quotations. Among the transformational features which cause the greatest difficulty for my students are tense, auxiliary verbs, proper identification of subject and object; and time and place. I then use the cell (table) function in my word processing program to create cells into which each direct speech quotation is placed. For example: He said to her: "Did you come here by bus today"? I then type the corresponding reported speech expression on the corresponding reverse side cell: He asked her if she had come there by bus that day. A non-interrogative statement such as He said to her: "I didn't know that your sister was married" becomes He told her he hadn't known that her sister had been married. In this way, a set of double faced cards can be created.

FRONT

She said to him: “I’m tired.”	He said to her: “Are you a doctor?”	She said to him: “Will the train be late?”	He said to her: “I won’t be able to go to the meeting.”
She said to him: “Where is my husband?”	He said to her: “What time does the next bus leave?”	I said to him: “You can’t have any money.”	He said to me: “Can you swim?”
I said to her: “Maria doesn’t understand English.”	I said to him: “Does she know what she’s doing?”	She said to me: “How many people know about the plan?”	He said to me: “It takes about three hours to drive to Cambridge.”
She said to me: “Why do your parents live in Greece?”	He said to me: “I live a long way away.”	I said to her: “I’ve always thought your sister was married.”	I said to them: “When we’ve finished this game we’ll have dinner.”
He said to me: “Have you got a credit card?”	He said to him: “Do you work here?”	He said to me: “Do you know these are my lights?”	He said to her: “Can you give me your phone number?”

BACK

He told her he wouldn’t be able to go to the meeting.	She asked him if the train would be late.	He asked her if she was a doctor.	She told him she was tired.
He asked me if I could swim	I told him he couldn’t have any money.	He asked her what time the next bus left.	She asked him where her husband was.
He told me it took about three hours to drive to Cambridge.	She asked me how many people knew about the plan.	I asked him if she knew what she was doing.	I told her Maria didn’t understand English.
I told them when we had finished that game we would have dinner.	I told her I had always thought her sister had been married.	He told me he lived a long way away.	She asked me why my parents lived in Greece.
He asked her if she could give him her phone number.	He asked me if I knew those were his lights.	He asked him if he worked there.	He asked me if I had got a credit card.

These cards can be cut into sets; usually 20 or 25 cards works best. It should be easy for students to determine which side of each card is the direct quotation, and which represents the reported equivalent; but to make things a bit easier for them, distinctly different fonts may be used for each. As I begin the lesson, I provide three or four examples on the board just to help activate the students' memories; an affirmative, negative, and interrogative example of each. Students are then seated in groups of between three and five members. As these groups receive sets of the two-sided cards, they are directed to place them in a pile with the direct quotation sides facing up. In a predetermined order, a student looks at and reads the direct quotation on the top card in the pile. He/she must then say the equivalent reported speech form. Finally, the student turns over the card and checks the answer, which all group members are shown. If he/she is correct, the student may keep the card. If not, it is placed at the bottom of the pile. Then the following student repeats the procedure and once all the cards have been won by the group members, the student with the largest number of cards is declared the winner.

Extension

This game can be repeated or, for more intensive practice, a different rule may be applied. In this version, students receive a point for each correct answer, rather than receiving the card. In addition to the above direct-reported speech quotations, functional equivalent expressions may be employed. For example, the direct quotation He said to her: "Will you give me your phone number"? corresponds to the reported expression He asked her to give him her phone number. Of course, this activity can be followed by oral drills or written exercises to confirm mastery of the transformational structure.

This two-sided card game format is also useful for other potentially problematic grammatical features, such as passive-active sentences and relative clause formation.

Discussion

The content of the cards and the difficulty of the expressions used should relate to the level of the class, of course. They should be designed to generate a high rate of errors, initially. Gradually, students learn from theirs and others' mistakes, and they become completely absorbed in the activity. Often, about 20 minutes of practice is sufficient to refresh and reinforce the grammatical form. During the activity, I circulate around the classroom, monitoring students' progress. If some of the groups finish up early, I spot check their performance and if this is lacking, I direct them to repeat the activity.

Conclusion

Using games and other competitive activities is, in my experience, the best way to introduce or reinforce proper use of grammatical structures. In writing, grammatical accuracy is especially important, and the reported dialog form represents a major element of this. The activity and game format described in this article is definitely both an effective and enjoyable way for students to master the use of reported speech in English writing.

Weaving the Web into an EAP Reading Program

Weaving the Web into an EAP Reading Program

Bonnie Ellinger, Simone Sandler, Debbie Chayen, Keren Goldfrad, and Jackie Yarosky (Israel)

As we enter the new millennium, there are two realities that few people would contest. The first is that English is an essential world language today. The second is that the Internet is here to stay. As university teachers of academic English, we decided to explore the possibilities of combining these two realities. This article describes the steps we have taken toward that goal.

English for Academic Purposes (EAP), as taught at Bar Ilan University in Israel, emphasizes reading academic texts. This focus on reading has not allowed for a holistic approach in our curriculum, so the courses tend to lack variety. Even with carefully chosen materials, we often encounter low interest and motivation among both students and teachers when an entire course is based on teaching the skills needed for the comprehension of academic texts. (The advanced level course is 108 hours long—4 hours weekly for 27 weeks).

Some of us teaching at the advanced level at Bar Ilan began to discuss ways to better motivate and challenge the students as well as ourselves. We knew that certain conditions had to be satisfied. First, we wanted the material to be authentic and up-to-date. Second, we wanted the students to have more choice and greater autonomy in their reading. Furthermore, we had to make sure that the students were reading with a purpose and that their reading had meaning for them. No less important, we hoped that the reading would be enjoyable.

The computer, or more specifically the Internet, seemed to be the tool to meet these needs; and as we began exploring this possibility, we found that the professional literature supported our intuitions (Cummins and Sayers 1990, 1995). According to Vygotsky (1978), purposeful human learning is connected to activity and language is a crucial tool for learning. So, we decided to use the Internet to combine purposeful activity with language learning. Vygotsky (1962, 1978) also sees the classroom as a sociocultural environment in which collaboration and cooperative learning are made possible. The computer laboratory can develop into just such a collaborative environment, since teachers and students interact to explore various topics and exchange ideas about them. These concepts formed the rationale for our university Internet project.

Initial problems and solutions

As we began to create the course materials and implement them in the lab, our group became involved in a dynamic, insightful learning process. From the start we discovered that developing materials was no straightforward task. Thus, to a great extent, the course evolved as a result of our experiences, which will be described below.

We faced a number of important questions. First, how and to what extent could we integrate the material into our existing EFL advanced reading comprehension program? Second, how could we best utilize the computer facilities available to our department? Finally, what would be the reaction of our students?

We realized that it would be best to start modestly, so each member of our group of five instructors created a unit consisting of activities based on various Internet sites related to a particular topic. With five units, we would have sufficient material for our first year. To integrate our material into the EAP reading comprehension program at Bar Ilan, we chose topics related to those in the textbooks used by our EFL department. In addition, we developed units related to current world issues for which academic reading material would be readily available. Topics were also chosen based on their likely appeal and relevance to the students, and their availability on the Internet.

With regard to computer facilities, we knew that we could not exchange all our classroom hours for language laboratory time. To begin with, we still planned to use traditional teaching and learning methods which would not require the lab. In addition, the language laboratory was simply not available for our exclusive use. Our EFL department shared two computer labs, together containing approximately 50 terminals, with the rest of the Faculty of Humanities. Even within our department there were a number of advanced-level courses given at the same hour, thus necessitating a rotating schedule for laboratory use. As a result, each of our classes was allotted one laboratory slot approximately every three weeks and we planned accordingly.

Perhaps our greatest surprise was the reaction of the students. At the beginning of the semester we asked our students to fill out questionnaires detailing their familiarity with computers. Fortunately, the majority were eager to use the Internet. But we were shocked by their lack of computer literacy, since Israel is a technology-friendly society. Most elementary and high school curricula include computer instruction. Even families at the lower socioeconomic levels make a great effort to purchase a home computer. Despite all this, we discovered that even if students had computers at home, many did not know much about using them, beyond loading games. In fact, most of them did not know how to access the Internet.

As a result of the students’ limited computer literacy, we had to add some introductory material. Today, our first unit includes familiarizing the students with the computer keyboard, using the mouse, explaining what the Internet is and how it works, accessing the Internet, locating various Web sites, and doing simple searches.

Implementation and insights

When we finally began our content units, we found that flexibility and change would be integral to the success of our program. We had created units based on a theoretical concept; but we found that when put into practice, the material had to be adapted constantly. Thus, from the outset, the nature of the Internet, student reactions, and our own experience influenced the development of the material. We needed to account for the fact that Web sites change regularly, so we had to create material that would not be bound to any one aspect of a particular site (Sperling 1997). For example, for a unit on drug legalization, we originally directed students to a news item on a particular Web site and created an activity based on that item. But later we simply directed the students to the "Press" link, allowing them to choose any news clip available that day. The revised activities took into account the changing nature of the news on the Internet.

In retrospect we realized that this kind of flexibility was not only practical but beneficial, because students were given an element of choice. Since we viewed choice as important for learning, we allowed students to choose different topics. In addition to the drug unit described above, we developed units on other topical issues such as cloning, human rights, and the environment. As Collins, Brown and Newman (1989) note, "Carrying out tasks that reflect students’ own personal interests encourages situated learning."

We found that entire classes as well as individual students within classes reacted differently to using the computer and the Internet. Some students needed to overcome their fear of the computer before they could progress at the rate we had originally intended, and other students were unable to progress independently. Again we had to adjust. Whereas we assumed originally that students would prefer to work individually, in fact, many of them worked more successfully in pairs. Because students collaborated, we needed to create activities that would allow them to explore sites together. The activities also demanded a reasonable amount of individual effort, however, because our department requires individual evaluation at the end of the course. Moreover, we had to ensure that the individual/pair work option was available to suit the nature of the class. As teachers, we are well aware that some classes have a dynamic which allows for fruitful group work, whereas others do not.

In addition, within our group of teachers we had to make the material flexible enough to adapt it to individual teaching styles. A case in point was an activity sheet created by one of our members. A particular section included open-ended questions meant to stimulate thought and provoke further exploration, but another teacher in our group felt that her students needed a tighter structure. The material had to be edited to allow for these differences.

Finally, we needed to account for lost time. Often our students were more curious about the material than we anticipated; they linked to other Web sites and ran out of class time before finishing an assignment. This meant that we had to create activities which could be completed outside of class without the help of an instructor. Again, these factors necessitated a serious effort to adapt the material accordingly.

Pedagogical implications

As we gained experience with the Internet, so did our students. Their familiarity with the Internet and interest in the topics allowed for increased autonomy in choosing the individual Web sites and reading passages, as well as the type of activities to be completed. At the beginning of the semester we directed students to particular sites and guided them step-by-step to various links and activities. But by the end of the semester we designated a broad topic, suggested various sites and key words for searches, and let them choose the material and tasks they would engage in. We were pleased and impressed with the enthusiasm and seriousness with which our students managed their more independent academic assignments. We attribute their success to the purposeful and autonomous nature of the tasks (Ehrman 1996; McDevitt 1997).

Most significant was the fact that our students enjoyed reading in English. As one student commented, "I was learning English and didn’t even feel it!" Our experience has shown us that the Internet gives our students choices about what they read, provides access to topics which are relevant to them, and involves them in purposeful activities. All of these elements create the motivation which is essential to foreign language learning (Dulay, Burt, and Krashen 1982; Ellis 1986).

Conclusion

Clearly the Internet is an important tool which can encourage language learning. As with all innovative teaching tools, a sound theoretical base, careful planning, practicality, and flexibility are essential. If we expect to successfully incorporate this dynamic resource in our teaching repertoire, we must be prepared to accept the ramifications of its ever-changing nature. Using material which centers on the Internet demands a flexibility and an adaptability to change which was probably unimaginable 10 years ago. Compare Web sites, which may change weekly, to textbooks, which take years to revise! Good teachers regularly review and revise their materials, but the degree to which materials must be revamped once the Internet is routinely used may surprise even the most conscientious planner. Internet-related innovations appear regularly, and as we continue to learn more about this evolving medium, we will adapt our material accordingly. We welcome the opportunity to remain abreast of the latest developments so we can continue to engage our students in a meaningful EFL learning experience.

References

Collins, A., J. S. Brown, and S. E. Newman. 1989. Cognitive apprenticeship: Teaching the crafts of reading, writing and mathematics, In Knowing, learning and instruction, Ed. L. B. Resnick. pp. 453–494. Hillsdale, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Cummins, J., and D. Sayers. 1990. Education 2001: Learning networks and educational reform. Computers in the Schools, 7, pp. 1–29.

Cummins, J., and D. Sayers. 1995. Brave new schools: Challenging cultural illiteracy through global learning networks. New York: St. Martin’s Press.

Dulay, H., M. Burt, and S. Krashen. 1982. Language two. New York: Oxford University Press.

Ehrman, M. E. 1996. Understanding second language learning difficulties. London: Sage.

Ellis, R. 1986. Understanding second language acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

McDevitt, B. 1997. Learner autonomy and the need for learner training. Language Learning Journal, 16, pp. 34–39.

Sperling, D. 1997. The Internet guide for English language teachers. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall Regents.

Vygotsky, L. S. 1962. Thought and language. Cambridge, Mass.: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press.

Vygotsky, L. S. 1978. Mind and society. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.

Note: We invite teachers to examine our materials, which can be found at http://www.biu.ac.il/HU/ef/weavin

5 Villains Who Were Good

The Lighter Side of the Dark Side: 5 Villains Who Were Good

Being a movie villain is not easy. Nobody respects your work, everyone loves your sworn enemy, and cheers if he straight up murders your ass.

Of course, the villains deserve it, right? Well, actually Hollywood is littered with supposedly evil characters that, when you take a step back and ignore the cackling laughter and yellow teeth, were clearly the ones getting screwed over. Here are the so called bad guys who got the rawest deals of all:

#9.

Edward Rooney (Ferris Bueller's Day Off)

The "villain":

Mr. Rooney was the mean old Dean of Students who spent the entire movie trying to prove that Ferris was skipping school while pretending to be sick. What a mistrustful tight-ass. Why the hell does he care so much if one student takes a day off?

Above: The eyes of an educator.

Hold on a minute there:

Let's get the obvious out of the way: this is his goddamned job. He is the Dean of Students, not the Dean of Not Giving A Damn. People are always all up the public schools system's digestive tract for not taking a more active interest in their students and that's exactly what Mr. Rooney was doing. It doesn't matter if, on a personal level, he's a dick or not -- he is literally paid with your tax money to make sure kids aren't doing exactly what Ferris did. The kid can go to a museum and drive a sports car on the weekend. During the week, he and the other kids are Rooney's responsibility so they can, you know, get an education.

The movie glosses over the fact that Ferris couldn't read

And you know what? He was right all along. Ferris was skipping school. Worse yet, he lied to his parents and friends about being sick and pretty much got the whole town involved in the farce. He lied, he stole, and he caused millions in property damage by destroying Cameron's dad's beautiful car. That's not adorable, that's just being an egocentric cock. It wouldn't have been a satisfying movie ending to see Rooney expose Bueller for his douchebaggery, but it would have been by far the more just outcome. What happens instead is that Rooney loses his wallet and almost has his nipples ripped off by a Rottweiler.

And we're asked to sit back and say, "serves him right for caring about the future of our country!"

Suddenly the recession makes sense.

#8.

Mutant Registration Side (X-Men)

The "villain":

Headed by Senator Robert Kelly in the first X-Men movie, the Mutant Registration Side are the speciecist.. spesist... racist ... the jerks who demand a legislative bill forcing every super-powered individual in the country to register with the government. Just like the Jews in Nazi Germany!

The Night of Broken Glasses would end differently.

Hold on a minute there:

The Nazi analogy would probably work a lot better if real-life Jews could shoot boiling acid out of their assholes or level entire cities by blinking, which our Jewish friends assure us only Mossad agents can do. The X-Men mutants on the other hand actually can conjure up hurricanes, stop time, and completely alter a person's mind until he really believes that Flavor Flav is a reasonable and intelligent media personality. It seems perfectly understandable that some folks might want to keep tabs on such individuals.

If they require licenses for concealed handguns, they should probably keep this guy on file too.

And what happens when he can't? As a human in the X-Men movies you constantly have to be on the lookout not only for the evil mutants who want to kill you, but also for the supposed "good guys" who are often in the process of accidentally killing you. In X-Men, Cyclops loses his protective goggles in a crowded train station and just starts straight fire-blasting with his Murder Vision uncontrollably, unable to handle his powers or discern between bad guys and random kids who happen to be in the same building. And he's the good guy! In X2, every human on the planet almost had their brains melted simultaneously by a mutant.

Obviously there is a thin line between cautious concern and downright mutant-prejudice but cut the civilians of the X-Men universe some slack. They live in constant fear, not knowing if the guy they just cut off on the freeway can explode their dick with his mind.

Let's just say you don't want a handjob from Gambit.

#7.

The Hyenas (The Lion King)

The "villain":

In one of Disney's finest rip-offs to date, The Lion King hyenas were the mangy lowlifes who tried to kill Simba, assisted in the assassination of Mufasa and utterly destroyed the Pride Lands after helping Scar take over as king. Jesus, what is those assholes' problem?

Hyenas, chief douchebags of the Serengeti.

Hold on a minute there:

They want something to eat. That's their problem, and it's only a problem because Mufasa banished them from the Pride Land and forced them to live in an elephant graveyard, which is no place to raise a child, hyena or otherwise. We never know why they were banished to the Pride Slums, leaving us to assume Mufasa's unedited explaination of the Circle of Life went something like this:

Mufasa: Everything you see exists together, in a delicate balance. As king, you need to understand that balance, and respect all the creatures-- from the crawling ant to the leaping antelope.

Simba: But Dad, don't we eat the antelope?

Mufasa: Yes, Simba, but let me explain. When we die, our bodies become grass. And the antelope eat the grass. And so we are all connected in the great Circle of Life.

Simba: Wow... Say, Dad, where do the hyenas fit into the great Circle of Life?

Mufasa: Ugh, the hyenas. No, f#@k those guys.

Simba: Yeah, that's fair.

That's the only way to explain how Scar got an entire army of these animals behind him with such dissident slogans as "Stick with me, and you will never go hungry again!" Scar wasn't promising them unlimited power, just the ability to eat and function as members of society. The hyenas were pissed because the oppressive lion regime had reduced them to second-class citizens, hoarding all the pie for themselves.

Hooray for racism!

No wonder they followed Mufasa's brother. What Scar offered the hyenas was a revolution of the common man. He was more or less their four-legged Lenin.

#6.

Carl Anheuser (2012)

The "villain":

In Roland Emmerich's latest "planetary kablooey movie with a date in the title", 2012, Carl Anheuser is the asshole chief of staff-turned-president who in the film's climax closes the doors to the ships carrying the last surviving humans on Earth, allowing thousands outside to drown...

He certainly has the jowls of a mass-murderer.

Hold on a minute there:

...and securing the future of the human race.

So these giant arks...are they why our country is $13 trillion in debt?

Anheuser didn't simply wake up one day and think to himself "Today, I shall be a massive dickcheese for no good reason." When he closed the entrance to the arks, it was because a mile-long tsunami was coming their way, threatening to violently flush humanity's last hope down earth's crapper. It was either the few thousand people outside, or the few hundred thousand inside, and someone had to make that call. Luckily, Anheuser wasn't born with a burnt sack of crap where his brain should be.

We know it sucked for those who didn't get onboard, but the whole planet was about to go tits up and Carl had to make sure that the last human survivors on Earth... you know, survived. He didn't even let his own mother on the ships because she was like a million and, frankly, when you're picking survivors, you have to think long term, which means one thing: Repopulation.

By bringing his mother onto the ark, Anheuser would be implicitly stating "Yes, I want as many people as possible to have sex with my mom so we can repopulate the world. Everyone does their part, come on." The man had to make some very hard choices just so the arks' 400,000-something inhabitants could breed in peace in the future, but putting his mom out to stud was not one of them.

"We only have 30 slots left. Drop your pants and prepare to be swabbed."

#5.

The Wicked Witch of the West (The Wizard of Oz)

The "villain":

You're in a tough spot if "Wicked" is right there in your name, but WWW isn't exactly the most image conscious celebrity in Oz, either: She kidnapped Dorothy, threatened to drown her dog and tried to set The Scarecrow on fire, all to get her hands on the girl's ruby slippers. Foot fetish or not, that was some stone-cold villainy.

Nice teeth, though.

Hold on a minute there:

Remember that the Witch wasn't after Dorothy, and she wasn't trying to rule the world. All she ever wanted was those slippers. Say, how did Dorothy acquire those magical shoes in the first place? Why, by taking them off the blood-drenched feet of the Wicked Witch of the East. Who she just murdered. Who also happened to be the Wicked Witch of the West's sister.

These shoes used to be white...

Let's look at the whole "accident" from the West Witch's perspective:

The Witch sisters are hanging around Oz, minding their own business when some random teenager crushes a woman to death with a house, killing her instantly in an act of domiciliary manslaughter. Next, the teenager waltzes out and corpse-loots the victim's shoes (some sort of creepy kill-trophy, no doubt) which under every inheritance law in the universe damn well belong to the deceased's surviving family.

From where we stand, the Wicked Witch of the West had every right in the world to bludgeon Dorothy to death with a sock full of toxic batteries, but what did she do? Absolutely nothing. She just wanted her shoes back, and every action that she took was motivated by that want. Then, of course, Dorothy raises an army in the form of a giant, talking lion, a man made of metal and an unkillable scarecrow, steals the Witch's broomstick and kills the Witch, staging a nice little Witch sister reunion in the afterlife.

Never forget.

#4.

Brigadier General Francis X. Hummel (The Rock)

The "villain":

The actions of General Hummel (Ed Harris) in The Rock read almost like a How-To Guide for Villainous Assholes: 1.) Break into Alcatraz, take lots of hostages, 2.) Demand $100 million from the government, threaten to launch a WMD nerve agent over San Francisco if your demands are not met, 3.) Eat a puppy (probably).

"Braised puppy. You can't find good barbeque this far from Texas."

Hold on a minute there:

There certainly is a major villain in The Rock but it's not General Hummel. Ironically, it's the U.S. government, something you wouldn't expect in a movie by Michael "Star Spangled 'Splosion" Bay. Hummel was only doing this in the first place because the government used him and his troops for illegal clandestine missions all over the world. But Uncle Sam wouldn't spare a counterfeit wooden nickel for the families of soldiers who died during those missions. For some reason Hummel had a problem with that.

And he tried getting money and attention the legitimate ways. Hummel exhausted every official channel, trying to get the country to cough up some cash, before finally giving up and moving from strongly worded letters to the next logical thing: chemical warfare terrorism. Besides, he never wanted the 100 mill to be paid from the country's homeless kitten shelter budget or anything. Hummel specifically asks for the money to come from the Red Sea Trading Company... "a slush-fund where the Pentagon keeps proceeds from illegal arms deals."

But it's ours! We earned it fair and square by breaking international laws!

In the end, Hummel never hurt one innocent person and revealed that the nerve agent missiles he had prepared were all a bluff, making his whole operation something of a large scale charity performance, only with guns and WMDs instead of smugness. Elaborate and dangerous, sure, but his punishment, (that Nicolas Cage goes down as the hero of the movie he died in), should count as a war crime.

Look! Two atrocities posing for a picture together.

#3.

Captain Skroeder (Short Circuit)

The "villain":

In the theological-nightmare movie "Short Circuit" a military robot is granted a soul after being struck by a lightning bolt. Gaining sentience and running away, he is constantly pursued by the ruthless security-chief of the company that built him, Captain Skroeder-a man who will stop at nothing to destroy the so called "malfunctioning" machine.

Were ascots really ever standard Army issue?

Hold on a minute there:

Here's a riddle for you. What do you call a piece of electronics which stopped working the way it was supposed to? We'll give you a hint: it starts with an "m" and Eminem cuold make it rhyme with "mouth-puncturing." Johnny 5 was not only a malfunctioning piece of machinery for which Skroeder was responsible, he was a dangerous robot designed for killing and armed with one of the most powerful lasers in the world. If Skroeder could stop Johnny 5 and fix the broken, highly dangerous robot from wandering around a world full of life, the value of which he didn't understand, Skroeder would be a god damned hero.

But hey, it's not like laser cannons are dangerous or anything.

It's still unclear to us how, in a movie full of scientists and people not currently in mental institutions, it took Skroeder, a security officer, to disbelieve that souls can travel through lightning strikes. The funny thing is he sort of had a point there, because during the first days of Johnny's so called "sentience", he didn't even understand the concept of life and death. Do you understand the implications of that? A machine that can kill but doesn't know what killing means? We should have been rooting for someone to drop a bomb on this military murder-bot before it "disassembled" a bunch of toddlers.

In comparison, all Skroeder wanted was to quietly run the robot over with his truck. That's not so bad. But instead, Johnny got to go and live his life, and Skroeder loses, disgraced. A note to all of the special Captains of Robotics out there: Do not take any lessons from Short Circuit. If your brand new kill-bot gains sentience and wants to explore the world with its newfound emotions, do not let it.

"Hey Mitch, why did we install that 'kidnapping' protocol again?"

#2.

The Machines (The Matrix / Animatrix)

The "villain":

The Matrix bots freaking harvest people for energy, man! And use us as characters in their twisted robot versions of The Sims, where you know they amuse themselves by messing with our minds and reprogramming random people to do really stupid stuff, like make and watch additional Matrix movies.

"Don't forget our nefarious plan to convince people that Keanu Reeves is an actor."

Hold on a minute there:

Let's go back to the start. Some of this backstory is relayed in the films, some of it in The Animatrix, the series of shorts the creators released between films. Either way, this is canon in the Matrix universe.

In the beginning, the Machines were our slaves, used for every job imaginable -- and yes, someone probably was screwing them over -- before they got too smart for their own good and decided that serving us wasn't the most efficient use of their time. So we tried to mass-murder them. As a neat little compromise, the bots created a peaceful robot-utopia in the desert, which quickly became the world's leading economy. Our response was to mass-murder them some more (it was the future's hot new answer to all possible problems, including failing test scores among middle-schoolers).

Why is it wearing pants?

But suddenly, out of NOWHERE, a war broke out between us, and the machines won. They won and the humans lost, so after all of the years of being treated like slaves by the humans, it was time for the robots to get revenge. And what did the robots do to make us humans pay? They gave us a Paradise Virtual Reality. They realized that a world of both humans and robots could not exist peacefully, so they gave us a world where robots didn't exist and said "Live out your lives here, and we'll live out our lives in our world." Humans weren't living in the real world, but no one could tell the difference anyway, so it shouldn't have mattered.

"There's an orgy in our collective unconscious and everyone's invited!"

And to show our appreciation for one of the most even compromises in history, we began a campaign to murder every single last robot. That'll teach them to beat us in war and show mercy.

#1.

Sauron (The Lord of the Rings)

The "villain":

Oh, come on. Sauron is like the archetypal evil overlord. He's got massive armies of monsters. He has a flaming eyeball. He has a helmet made of spikes, people, come on. And, he did... you know, he did all of those... things. And...

Sauron, seen here evilly defending his home from an invading army.

Hold on a minute there:

And what exactly? Please tell us, because throughout the entire 2000-hour run of the Jackson trilogy, we couldn't find a single reason why everyone demonized Sauron like he was a debt-collecting pedophile. Yes, he was building an army to advance on Middle Earth. But who was in that army? What were they fighting for?

This was a world where Orcs were used as target practice among elvish communities. The elves loved that shit. Sauron put a stop to that by offering all the underprivileged creatures a place in his non-race-exclusive army (the only nonsegregated force in Middle Earth other than the Fellowship), with promises of their own country in the future. After what he did for the orcs and the goblins, Sauron was just some towering, mace-wielding folk hero.

"Let freedom ring! Also, let's eat some man-flesh."

Of course the humans and elves couldn't have that, because if orcs moved-in next door to them, their houses' property value would go down. After all, these creatures are dark and smelly and have weird voices. They must be murdered on sight.

Above: Segregation?

We hear a lot about freedom, and the free peoples of Middle Earth standing up to Mordor. What do we mean by "free?" They're certainly not fighting for Democracy -- each kingdom is a monarchy where the people have no say over what the leader does as long as that leader possesses the right genes. And overwhelmingly it seems like what those leaders like to do is shit on the Orcs, and the countless other minorities who Sauron was able to recruit onto his side.

What you were seeing in these films was not an unprovoked act of aggression, undertaken just for the hell of it. You were seeing generations of pent-up frustration by oppressed minorities, harnessed by a leader they could get behind. What Sauron did was nothing more than try to cut out a piece of that Middle Earth dream for himself and his followers, and find land that doesn't require them to live under a continuously erupting volcano.

On the plus side, it isn't Oklahoma.

His methods were violent and there were excesses -- as you see in every revolution. But if Middle Earth doesn't take a moment to understand why Sauron was able to draw tens of thousands of disenfranchised individuals to his cause, then they're destined to fight the same war all over again, as soon as the next Sauron shows up.