Friday, July 29, 2005

angels and demons

So I just finished Dan Brown's Angels and Demons about an hour ago. It has a similar formula to the Da Vinci Code. But where the Da Vinci Code ended on a mellower, more contemplative note, and gave more food for thought in terms of religious ideas... Angels and Demons had several radical and surprising reversals which kept you on the edge of your seat, and was more satisfying in terms of storytelling.

At the same time, if you have a nit-picking mentality, some have pointed to a great number of factual errors, inconsistencies and holes in the plot. And some of the twists might be a little hard to swallow. Also, a major villan in the novel is a sadistic, misogynistic Arab man only identified as "Hassassin" so I don't think Dan Brown is going to be getting any prizes from any Arab/Muslim civil rights organizations any time soon. Come to think of it, in the Da Vinci Code, there is an albino villan who plays an analagous role (as a pawn who does most of the dirty work) and I've heard that some albino groups have expressed concern about how this villan will be portrayed when the movie version is produced.

I imagine that Brown probably feels justified in using such stock stereotypical characters in order better hide the identity of the real villans, but still I wish he had gone a different route.

A big part of the plot involves the Illuminati which is a big favorite target of many conspiracy theorists. I think of myself as pretty moderate when it comes to accepting such theories. But as I've said before, the fact is, the world isn't a democracy. Some people have more power over human lives than others, and some of these powerful people hang out. That doesn't mean that you should believe every conspiracy theory presented to you, but it also doesn't mean that you can dismiss them all out of hand without considering them. Everything should be weighed on its merits.



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