Posts made by insomniac7809

If we're really getting into classical crossover fanfic, though, we have to talk about Jason and the Argonauts.

"Every culture hero from the Greek city-states team up and have an adventure."

@peasoupling said in Alternate Universes, OR, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Fanfic:

A lot of Great Literary Classics are basically fanfiction. I mean, the Divine Comedy is self-insert fanfic, of all things.

"And then Virgil, who was now my bestie, took me to meet Homer and Ovid. And Virgil was like, 'hey guys, this is Dante, he's awesome.' And Homer was like, 'he is awesome, he should join our club.
"And also everyone I hate is in Hell."

@Ghost said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

To be fair, I don't think anyone is refusing to call these centers what they are. I think they've got their own outlook on it, where the dictionary definition grows a bit fuzzy, and whatever form that takes doesn't match 1:1 with what someone else thinks they are.

I'm not judging anyone, here. I'm just saying that in this era of "extreme no quarter given" often a disagreeing viewpoint get mistaken as a "refusal to admit" something.

I'd say it's less a "refusal to admit" and more a bizarre contortion of language to avoid using a term that matches in every particular but that someone doesn't want to apply in the situation.

@ZombieGenesis said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

invited to be guests of our country.

You mean people we're not legally permitted to kick out.

Mac threw a ball with Chase Utley. I thought @Ghost might appreciate that.

@Rinel said in Good TV:

@Jaded said in Good TV:

@Arkandel said in Good TV:

@Testament One thing I heard (but haven't verified) over the radio this morning was the Russians aren't pleased with how Chernobyl was made. The argument was "imagine if Russia had made a mini series about 9/11 and everyone in it had non-American accents".

I have not seen the show yet, is that fair criticism?

Not really. It's a British production, and they use accents to portray class divisions that wouldn't be accessible if they were speaking with a Russian accent. And why is Russian-accented English any less absurd than British-accented English? You could do Russian/Ukrainian and subtitle it, yes, but then you'd miss out on a lot of the nuance.

Yeah, I haven't seen Chernobyl yet, but I'd rather see English-speaking productions feature English-language accents, rather than make a dramatic actor perform role in decadent Hollywood Rooshan Accentski. Like you say, presumably the characters are diegetically speaking their native language anyway.

Or maybe I'm just inordinately fond of Jason Isaacs portraying Field Marshal Zhukov with a Yorkshire accent in Death of Stalin.

The show has attracted praise and criticism both from Russians. People are unanimous in their praise for how accurately it physically depicts the Soviet Union. The costumes, buildings, &c. are apparently spot on.

I'm told that there's a Russian production in response that will present the meltdown as being the fault of a CIA saboteur.

Ehh.

One of the problems with that is that all it winds up meaning is that when a "risky" movie flops it's because of the risk, and when a "safe" movie flops it's obviously some other reason.

Like, Catwoman was considered a risk, because it was a superhero movie about a POC woman (even if Halle Barry probably works for a gender flip of the "any white male, or Will Smith" criteria that movies were using in ~1998). It flopped, but that might have had more to do with the movie being steaming garbage on toast.

The Mummy remake, meanwhile, shifted to 'safe' by (according to what I've read) emphasizing the role of its bankable white dude lead, in a use of an IP that had paid off big not too long back. It was also (according to what I've heard) steaming garbage on toast, and it also flopped.

@Ghost said in Fandom and entitlement:

Not that I think it's entirely right, but when you're attempting to finance a movie that costs over 170 million to make + 100 million in advertising, and you're told that not digging too deeply into any subject matter in the movie could be the difference between losing 10 million or profiting 50+ million...it may not be the entitlement answer people want, but for the super high budget money making projects these movies are, it makes sense.

There are movies where it's wrong to avoid the content, and movies where it's more reasonable to downplay it. In the end you've got to understand that the huge budget movie companies that fund these movies are less concerned about whether or not specific wishes are met and more about the investment.

I really don't think the Harry Potter films are at risk of losing $10mil unless the premier is literally shown on a rapidly-sinking raft made entirely out of $100 bills that is also on fire, and even then they'd probably break even.

I stand by my assertion that "we might lose potential profit from people who think gay people openly existing is controversial, so we're going to write around the gay ex-couple at the heart of the narrative" qualifies as "chickenshit."

Especially when the movie is supposedly commenting on social issues.

No, I don't expect Hollywood creatives to do the right thing--no, scratch that, "meet the basic standards of behavior"--if it might cost them money, but I don't feel any compunctions over calling them cowards for it.

@Warma-Sheen said in Fandom and entitlement:

@insomniac7809 said in Fandom and entitlement:

I don't believe this has anything to do with what works best for the story, as opposed to being too chickenshit to acknowledge a gay relationship in text rather than subtext.

This. Except what you call 'chickenshit' the execs call 'good business', like @Ghost said previously. If the last 3 years has shown anything, it is that hate is not extinct in the world. At all. Even a little bit. There are still many racists, bigots, and all manner of adjacent haters, all of whom are consumers. And not just in Western countries. There are plenty of movie dollars to be made all over the world, many of whom are no where near as "inclusive" as the US.

Trading smaller cash returns for openly acknowledging potentially scandalous text in a movie isn't good business. Even in Hollywood. Its sucks. But that's the world we live in.

"We wrote a gay couple but didn't acknowledge it" doesn't stop being chickenshit because it might annoy China or Russia.

Here's my only thoughts on the Grindledore thing:

It's not about showing sex scenes in a kids' movie.

But when Lupin and Tonks got together, it was acknowledged that they were in a relationship, even though the relationship doesn't really matter for the plot. Say it and move on.

That Grindlewald and Dumbledore are together is buried in subtext, even though their history is a major plot point in the narrative.

I don't believe this has anything to do with what works best for the story, as opposed to being too chickenshit to acknowledge a gay relationship in text rather than subtext.

@Derp said in How to Escape the OOC Game:

Yes, there are some bad actors out there, but ultimately, in almost every instance, they cannot actually hurt you. It's words, on a screen, on a game.

I really think that you're underselling the degree to which a stalker can make people feel unsafe and uncomfortable in real life.

It's possible, sure, to treat online interaction as an espionage game; maintain discrete, disconnected identities, ensure they don't overlap, be ready to burn any given identity at a moment's notice. It's even easier than it is in real life. But it's exhausting, and it's unnatural, and it's awkward, and it's a lot to expect from people interacting in a social environment.

Which ties into another thing, actually: this whole idea that "online" is different from "real life." We're living in the two thousand and nineteenth year of the common era. There are voting citizens whose parents began their relationships over the internet. The President of the United States sets government policy over twitter. Online interaction is just interaction, only with some more anonymity than in the meatspace.

"Your stalker probably isn't going to find you IRL" isn't as reassuring as you seem to think it is.

@Thenomain said in Fandom and entitlement:

Lindsay Ellis did a bit on Death Of the Author. Mostly about history of the topic, and no real conclusions.

Because there are no real conclusions. There's a stance to take, and that's about it.

I'd say that she did quibble with the idea, particularly in the modern age, that the brand and presence of the author can be divorced from the text, especially with the unprecedented availability of creators in the modern media landscape and social media.

Not entirely sure I agree, as such, if only because (in my limited experience) exposure to the author comes after consuming the text, rather than before, but not sure I disagree either...

Does anyone else get flashbacks to The Producers? "YOU ARE THE AUDIENCE! I OUTRANK YOU!"

I'm not saying that fans aren't terrible, but, y'know, the finales of GoT and BSG had problems and trying to dismiss dissatisfaction with those problems as fan entitlement is almost as arrogant and entitled as the guy who got the "REMAKE SEASON 8" skywriting.

BSG had written itself into the corner because, while the Cylons might have had a plan, the writers clearly didn't; they'd spent years introducing Portentous Elements without the faintest clue as to what they were portents of, and dear Lord were the seams showing by the end. GoT had almost the opposite problem, where the last season was desperately ticking boxes at an increasingly breakneck pace to reach the predetermined conclusion at the expense of the characters, messiness, and ambiguity that made the show a success in the first place. Both of the shows suffered, badly, from writers getting excited by "nobody would expect this!" without wondering if the reason nobody would expect it is because it is a terrible idea.

And yeah, people complain about the media we consume. We care about the media we consume. I get how awful it must be to have people coming out of the woodwork to shit on your creative work--I really do. But unless we want to be Kafka, dying with a stack of unpublished works and instructions for our executor to burn them sight unseen, the point is to be consumed and to get a reaction. And yeah, sometimes that reaction, en masse, is going to be "that was horseshit."

@Too-Old-For-This said in Game of Thrones:

Knights of Badassdom in 2013. I'm just saying, he's hit massive mainstream audiences by being in a Marvel movie.

Oh, that movie was so bad and I love it...

@Too-Old-For-This said in Game of Thrones:

He's made his mark and is here to stay.

Peter Dinklage was here before S1E1 hit the air, although it definitely did a lot to boost his profile.

He got a SAG nomination in '03 for The Station Agent, the same year he appeared in the (baffling) Tiptoes with Paula Arquette, Matthew McConaughey, Kate Beckinsale, and Gary Oldman. (Gary Oldman plays a dwarf. Who is McConaughey's twin brother. Kate Beckinsale struggles with the decision of whether to keep McConaughey's baby when she learns his entire family are dwarves seriously you have to see this shit)

Minor peeve:

TFW you get a call about a former coworker, and you're just baffled that he would give your place of business as a reference, but you can't actually say anything except direct the caller to your HR department to get start and end dates when he worked.

@SG Could do it as Fiasco?

@bored Especially when they spent so much of Season 2 with the whole "the Stark troops aren't good guys, the Lannister troops aren't bad guys, they're all just guys--kids, mostly--dying because their respective hereditary dictators are having a tiff."

@SG said in Game of Thrones:

I feel like everyone would be happy with the heel turn if it happened seconds before the bells sounded. Going ape after you've finally won is stupid and clearly insane. Going ape because the city just won't effing surrender, 'okay you mofos, you're going to burn' makes all the sense that the writers are trying to talk about. Even having the bells sounding while she's razing the town is fine and still in character for her, but doing it after the surrender makes no sense at all. "It's personal" wtf is that?

Yeah, the whole thing...

***And So He Spoke Spoilers***

@Warma-Sheen said in Game of Thrones:

I was pretty harsh about the show, but since last week, I think I've changed my opinion a little.

***=Having had some time removed from the episode that really pissed people off...***

click to show

... I think people are being overly harsh because they didn't get the happy ending they wanted. A lot of people wanted a Disney ending. All the heroes die as saviors or live to glorious admiration and respect. Well, GoT isn't Disney. And it never has been.

No, I don't think this is it.

I mean, maybe some of it is, but
***=More Spoilery Goodness***