I remember watching this live a few months ago while a different band was staying at my highschool. I don't remember any other show because of how incredible this one was
I was so desperate for Mandarin's Inside the Ink to surpass Madison's ignorant, racist show featuring teepees and Native American head dresses and a gratuitous stereotypic Indian scalping. I wanted Mandarin's elegant, layered show to trounce Madison's disingenuous macho posturing. I wanted Mandarin to obliterate Madison's simplistic thematic argument that violence is a masculine celebration. Seriously, I was desperately calling on the forces of the universe for Mandarin's show to crush Madison's soulless, cliched, ignorant, copyright-infringing, meaningless Mad Max-esque abortion. Alas, Inside the Ink had no pattern or through line. Mandarin's ending was the same as the beginning. By the end, visually nothing in Inside the Ink had changed to indicate transformation, passage, or evolution. Yes, we see drops of blood replacing the ink in the first Act. Sure the Rorschach appears by the end, but what does it mean? How does it follow what came before it? It's too abstract. Too open to interp, and without a satisfying ending. I'm sorry, Madison's grotesque desert fighters in a killing ritual showed at least some group transformation, and even though it featured some atrocious choreography and inexplicable anger by performers who were clearly mis-cast as vicious masculine desert fighters, Madison at least eked out some flimsy dramatic action centered around a fight and scalping, after which there was some sense of cohesion among the band of desert fighters. That's all they had, and that's all Madison needed to beat Mandarin. I'm sorry to say Madison's ignorant show had just the slightest bit of a stronger dramatic spine. I'm vomiting as I'm typing this, but it's true. Next year, Mandarin must focus on clear set pieces that allow the audience to follow a pattern and predict what comes next, visually. Either a story or a pattern with a relatable ending that resonates with audiences. Random visual imagery around the act of writing, the mystery and angst of the creative process for writers and artists, or the magic that happens when pen hits paper simply doesn't cut it. We want a pattern that's visually concrete, and that transforms by the end, eliciting oohs and ahhhs and "I get its" from the audience. Keep the artistic abstraction if you must, but throw us a bone. Otherwise you're just another Blue Knights, wallowing in grim end-times pseudo philosophy, and struggling and failing to say something coherent for the last 20 years. Show less REPLY
@@jesuspectre9883 I guess it is hard to be subjective when you’ve lost all objectivity... you might not appreciate, understand, or agree with what a Corps does, the Scouts in this case, but you need to remember it’s a musical, visual composition based on a time or a place or an event. The composition is at the very least an editorial from a certain perspective. Those young men and women worked their asses off in the heat like every other corps, they’re competitors and will give their best to any show. Please calm down and find some joy, even if it’s in the music alone
@@sputnikalgrim I'm not talking about the Broadway-quality performers. I'm talking about the design which victimizes them. Design is not taught in drum corps. Design is not discussed by the members because designers do not want interference by the members. Marching members have been conditioned not to question designers, and to only pay attention to their own work ethic and technique. Meanwhile, the thing that lasts is the content of the show. In this case, Madison's show was about cliched Native American stereotypes-- vicious infighting, scalping and tribal war drums, with a very very thin nod to camaraderie. In this day and age, that selected theme was meritless, culturally reckless and unconscionable.
