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thestray

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Posts posted by thestray

  1. Posted

     

    I get what you're saying and I definitely don't think you're crazy. One thing I'd point out though is Metropolis is basically Manhattan, and Manhattan only has about 1 million and a half people in it, so no way were the casualties in the millions. Thousands, yes. The destruction was big, but it wasn't millions big. Metropolis is still there at the end, admittedly worse for wear. And I'm not trying to downplay thousands of people dying, that's awful. But in the end, he's saved literally BILLIONS of people. I think most people would consider that a pretty big win.

     

    I don't know math.

     

    If most people would consider only thousands of people dying instead of billions, a pretty big win, than that is pretty disturbing to me in and of itself. Preventing the worst case scenario isn't a triumph to me. When some crazy gunman or terrorist murders a bunch of people, I don't consider it a pretty big win when they're stopped before they could've killed even more people. Is "It could've been worse" really supposed to be the positive takeaway in this movie? Thanks to Superman only thousands died! Yay Superman! What a beacon of hope! The next time some bad guys come to our planet trying to kill us we have Superman here to protect us, and thousands might die but he'll make sure not evvvrybody dies!

     

    Zack Snyder is very good at showing us cool things, and telling us what is supposed to be important in the movie, but I don't think he understands how to make a story reflect the themes he's beating us over the head with. Superman gives the people of earth no reason to have hope. Zack Snyder makes them hopeful in the end, but he didn't justify it with the events in the story.

  2. Posted

    I don't feel grim cuz it's a movie and I just go for the entertainment and realize its not real. I shut my mind off for the most part in knowing it's a sci-fi comic movie. And for the most part the point was made that the buildings were almost entirely evacuated by the time Superman arrived at Metropolis, so when Zod and he were fighting in buildings, especially in higher stories, they were empty. It was kind of A-Team in that aspect.

     

    Oh word? It wasn't real? Haha. I know it's not real, but fiction should still make you feel something if you're a human who has empathy, right?

     

    I mean, to each their own, if some people like to shut their mind off when they watch a movie I guess that's fine. A movie is storytelling, and for me there's no point in experiencing a story if I'm not going to attempt to empathize with it's characters and put myself in that world. I want to feel things when I watch a movie, even if it's a sci-fi/action/superhero movie. That's what stories are meant to do, to make you feel something, or learn something. I don't watch a movie as just random audiovisual stimuli. I feel like you might miss out on the full experience of cinema if you watch it detached not allowing yourself to be affected by it.

  3. Posted

    I legit feel crazy having to explain this. I'm not saying it was a bad movie. It's a cool movie. It's a cool sci-fi alien disaster movie. But I don't understand how people can watch literally millions of people lose their life, some due to the recklessness of the hero himself, and NOT feel like it's kinda grim.

  4. Posted

    Superman has killed before though, he killed Doomsday as well as Zod, Faora and Quex-Ul of another universe after he used their krytptonite to de-power them. Then depending on the universe, Superman has killed others depending on the storyline. Unlike virtually all Batman stories, Superman will kill but will only use it as a last resort and will be tore up about it afterwards for having done so. This isn't the Superman of the gold/silver age where he was the perfect boyscout, the past couple decades have been about Superman figuring his place in the world and what he should do with his advantages like whether he should become a hero or a tryant.

     

    As for the massive casualties, that is very much in line with comics where events like this happen and those outcomes are understood. The only superhero movie that really put a face to that was The Avengers when the different news feed were doing man on the street interviews and assessing the damage. And there is good that happens in the movie, Earth doesn't become Krypton II.

     

    This is how I feel about Superman killing Zod in this film. That was clearly the choice the writers, or Snyder, wanted to make. Why? I understand that it's not unprecedented, but why, in this new iteration of Superman, setting up a new franchise, did they make the conscious decision that a character who is known for being adamantly against killing, needs to kill? They could've easily had him make the conscious decision not to kill Zod, end his threat in a way that didn't involve killing, and in the process show how strong Superman's moral character is. But they decided to go with the most convenient shallow solution, just have Supes murder him, and I feel like it was unnecessary to do that.

     

    Massive casualties are definitely in line with comics. But it's also in line with comics that heroes try to prevent them. It's in line with comics that when heroes can't prevent them they feel shame for it. It's not in line with comics that Superman himself kills thousands of innocent people. Avengers did everything in their power to minimize casualities, and they didn't really have the ability to take the fight anywhere else. Superman on the other hand just goes ahead and rips through buildings. He doesn't think to himself let me try to lead this guy away from people, or grab him take this out into space or something.

     

    But like, the logic of it is not even my point. My point was that all the death bummed me out. A Superman movie where Superman lets people die, causes people to die, millions die and he can't stop it, humans sacrifice themselves, it was kind of disturbing to me. It doesn't matter what has and hasn't happened in comics, everything in the movie was a deliberate choice, and they chose to make this Superman movie pretty dark instead of fun or uplifting.

     

    As for earth not becoming krypton 2, I view that less as something good that happened, and more as something bad that didn't happen. Like, Hitler didn't exterminate ALL the Jews, he was eventually stopped, but that doesn't minimize how fucked up the Holocaust was. Millions of people died in this movie, and it could've been worse, sure, but it doesn't really make me feel happy and positive about the tragedy that ensued.

  5. Posted

    I feel like it WAS Superman but grittier. MILLIONS OF PEOPLE DIED! Superman let his dad die. Superman kills. Superman recklessly kills innocent people himself. I'm not understanding how that isn't gritty. I feel like it was for sure weighed down. There's no real triumph, Superman doesn't make everything okay, he just makes the dying eventually stop after millions have already lost their lives.

     

    I don't really buy that he just didn't have control of his powers. He seemed to have a pretty good handle over them. But even if he didn't have total control, that doesn't excuse him from making conscious choices to fight through buildings. He doesn't even take a beat to realize how much death he's causing or show any desire or effort to stop destroying buildings. He just keeps fighting like he doesn't give a shit how much collateral damage is happening.

     

    Like I said I liked a lot of things about it, I think the Kryptonian stuff was really cool. I'm not saying it's even a bad movie by it's own merits, it's impressive in lots of ways, and it told an interesting story. But as a Superman movie I feel like they sucked the positivity out of that character's world. And I enjoy it more as a sci-fi disaster film than really a superhero film. I don't know if I'm just crazy or if everybody else has just become so desensitized by catastrophic death in blockbuster movies that all those faceless death just don't have any weight or meaning to anyone anymore. I mean, did you guys really watch that movie and after all the dust settled felt like "Yay! Hooray for Superman! He did it!" I don't know how to interpret this movie any other way than being a downer, literally nothing "good" happens in it, the tragedy just eventually stops.

  8. Posted

     

    See, I thought all of that was very much there. I've read these reviews saying it's grim and a downer, and that's just not the movie I experienced.

     

    SPOILERS

     

    I'm very curious where you saw the hope and idealism and upliftingness(that a word?) in this movie then. I feel like there was no joy about it at all. When Superman finally lets loose and starts fighting these aliens I didn't feel like "Yeah! Go Superman!" I felt like "Holy shit! Everyone and everything is getting FUCKED UP right now!" It seemed like every minute of every fight scene a 9/11 scale tragedy was happening. The loss of life is catastrophic in this film, and a lot of it is directly Superman's fault who often seemed to not give a shit about collateral damage as he recklessly cut through buildings in his fight with Zod. There wasn't a moment of him trying to take the battle to a less populated area or anything. Chris Meloni was more of a hero than Superman was, he sacrificed himself to save us, and is never mentioned or thought of after that.

     

    Superman let his own dad die. Why? Because his dad was afraid that people would freak out if they saw him use his powers? And Clark just trusted him. What? I'm guessing that was supposed to be some defining moment, but what did he learn from that? He helped people before that incident, and he helped people after the incident, there was no change. It was just a dumb moment that was trying to say something but it was really just a pointless tragedy there to make Superman's origin more grim. Another thing about Pa Kent though, he tells his son he maybe should've let a school bus full of children drown to death. Pa Kent is crazy,

     

    The Kryptonians activating that world machine, which seemed to be wracking up thousands of casualties by the second... how is that not the most grim thing imaginable?

     

    Superman has to make the choice to kill at the end of this movie. What the fuck? I know people will say "He had to!" but he only had to because the writers decided he had to. Superman doesn't kill, that's one of his principles, Superman is about idealism, he always thinks there's a better way, that's what he's about. I don't know why they decided they needed to make Superman break someone's neck. I guess they were trying really hard to go against the whole notion of Superman being a boyscout. Now we just have a Superman who is not above killing. Of all the superheroes, Superman is supposed to be the one who finds a way to do the right thing against all odds.

     

    When all is said and done, Superman coming to this planet is not a gift, it's the worst thing that could've happened to the earth. Jor-El is kind of the real villain of this movie by deciding to send his dumb God-baby to our planet. Even if he didn't think Zod would escape and find him, how did he know Kal-El wouldn't just grow up to become a sociopath with the power to wreak havoc on our planet?

    A Superman movie is supposed to make you feel like thank God we have Superman, Superman saved the day, yay! But after the events of this movie I can't realistically see how anybody could smile after everything that happened, they all just went through the greatest tragedy in human history. Superman should feel so much shame that he wouldn't want to show his face again after all that. How can Superman be a beacon of hope after that? If you were a person in that world and all of that happened, how in the world would that fill you with any hope? An invincible alien refugee is on our planet, millions of people died because he was here, we're not alone in the universe, how do we know there won't be more aliens coming for him?

     

    I know some death and destruction is supposed to give these popcorn superhero movies a little weight and make it seem like the stakes are real. But this movie had soooo much death. Superman couldn't prevent millions of deaths, and he was even responsible for probably thousands of those deaths himself. At least in the Avengers we saw the superheros trying their darndest to prevent casualties, and at least there was plenty of levity and fun moments in that climax. I felt good watching that. The climax of this movie was just full on disaster, people running and screaming and being crushed to death, buildings collapsing everywhere for several miles, Superman doing nothing to really try to minimize it. I don't see how that's particularly fun.

     

    When you watch Richard Donner's Superman, or even the old Fleischer cartoon, or Bruce Timm's Superman adventures, or heck even the Dean Cain show, there's always that rousing moment when the music swells and Superman is giving his all and succeeding against all odds and saving the world and it's inspiring and positive, and the people on the street cheer for Superman and it's happy. Superman reassures you that as long as he's around everything's going to be alright. I guess that's too antiquated for today's audiences and we need colossal death and destruction and Superman being forced to murder by the end of it?

    • Like 1

  9. Posted

    I just got back from this, and honestly I'm kinda ambivalent about it. I liked a lot of things about it, all the Kryptonian stuff was pretty cool, Henry Cavill was great as Superman, everybody else was pretty good too, there were some cool visuals... but it sort of left a bad taste in my mouth. Maybe I'm crazy but I just didn't find this movie to be fun, I kinda expect a Superman movie to be overall uplifting, but I felt like this movie was kind of a bummer. For all the constant talk of hope in this film, I didn't feel at all that this movie was hopeful, or optimistic, or inspiring, or uplifting, or any of that. It didn't feel like it was in the spirit of Superman basically. Isn't Superman about idealism? It was cool for what it was, big sci-fi superhero spectacle, but I feel like they missed the mark when it comes to nailing Superman.

     

    Not a good HDTGM candidate at all though.

  10. Posted

    This movie has the most aggressive foley artist of any movie I have ever seen.

     

    OH MY GOD YES! I just watched this last night with a friend I kept commenting on the foley work. Whoever did the sound in the movie really wanted to make sure people heard those goddam footsteps.

     

    The lead character never shows ANY emotion. This guy makes Rod from Birdemic seem like an over-acter. He reacts to everything with a blank face.

    -My new girlfriend is the daughter of this village's king and betrothed to be married? Blank face.

    -This guy that I had bonded with just got murdered? Blank face.

    -Spoiler: My dad who I thought was dead has just saved my life? Blank face.

     

    His special fighting style that blends gymnastics and karate is really him just doing pointless flips and then punching or kicking someone. But in this movie people seem to have no idea how to react to a guy flipping around. In the final fight he's getting his ass handed to him, until he starts doing some backflips, and suddenly his opponent just can't figure out how to counteract flipping. At one point there's a scene where a guy trying to kill him falls down apparently just from the sight of him flipping. It's fucking crazy.

     

    And the fucking crazy village sequence, HOLY SHIT! I can't believe no one up to this point has mentioned the guy in the village in the white robe who turns around to reveal the whole back is cut out, exposing his bare ass. WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?

    Fucking old toothless women in windows making animal sounds. This whole town seems like a bunch of inbred bloodthirsty psychopaths.

     

    When all was said and done I had no idea what the hell this movie was about, The government sends him to put his life on the line in this game but I do not understand why or what was at stake. I'm sure they explained it but I probably got distracted by all the stupidity. I don't even understand the game itself... did anybody understand the rules of this game? You have to run an obstacle course, but people can shoot you with arrows while you do it? That hardly seems fair. This movie is incomprehensible.

     

    This movie is very entertaining though. Watch it with friends, it's a good time.

    • Like 2

  11. Posted

    Hilarious episode from start to end. Honestly up there with the Lennon/Jessica/Mantzoukas ep, the Walsh/Roberts/Husky ep and the other top notch ones.

     

     

     

    At no point did he say he 'loved' it, and he wasn't even really advocating it. He was just trying to explain his thoughts on it, and having seen a few videos he probably has the most experience in the subject.

     

    I've honestly had the same conversation maybe 2 times in my life, and I side more with Gemberling on the subject than the other comedians.

     

    1. To clarify: I have never been, nor will I ever be involved in any such act. I'm not an advocate of legalizing it, and most people who do it are no doubt 'slightly off' in the head.

     

    2. I think it's much more okay when an animal is the one doing the fucking. They are put in the position to do it sure, but they're the ones doing it. Fucking an animal is way worse, because like everyone said, "how can you really know they want it?"

     

    3. But then think about a farmer having a full arm, up to the shoulder inserted into a cow to artificially impregnate it. There's no way your dick is bigger than a farmer's arm. Assuming the animal is over a certain size, you really won't bother it... Even though I still think it's the worst of the two options.

     

    4. Snakes, eels, and all that weird shit in Japanese porn is wrong in my opinion. None of those things are actually a part of sex, interested in having sex with some person, or getting anything out of it (other than probably death).

     

    5. Then there was Gemberling's point about, "Is it really any worse than making an animal work for humans all day?" Think about it, is sucking off an ox really worse than making it plow an entire field? Or worse than a pony getting humiliated and walking in a circle at a carnival or kids' birthday party? A blowjob vs. manual labor. Which would you take?

     

     

    I just went down a weird rabbit hole there...

     

    Those are good points, but I also feel like it's the kind of logic that people use when they fuck kids and stuff. Like, is it okay for some NAMBLA dude to have a relationship with an 11yr old boy if the boy is into it? I know that's very different, but it's a weird rabbit hole indeed...

  12. Posted

    See, that sort of thing is what makes me like her as a player, because I feel like she's always trying to stay true to her character. And I like that someone on the team tries to act with a conscience. And if they never would've gone back to that survivor camp they never would've got those necklaces, which might come in handy. As for El Ryan, the way I see it that idiot killed himself. I can't be mad at the survivor camp for El Ryan's dumb choices.

    • Like 1

  13. Posted

    Haha. I have a high threshold for bad movies. Baby Geniuses was very dumb, but it was watchable dumb, at least that's how I remember it as a young teenager. Wing Commander to be honest I've only ever seen enough to decide it was painfully dull. I STAND BEHIND MY STATEMENT!

    • Like 1

  14. Posted

    Ugh, can we vote Sarah off the show? Kills the fun every time she opens her mouth.

     

    Whoa whoa whoa... what? WHAT?! That makes no sense to me. Kills the fun? I don't understand.

     

    Sarah, in my opinion, is probably the BEST player of the group. She's always trying to make sure they think two steps ahead, always trying to gather information, plays with compassion (which there's usually a strategic benefit to), and she's a bonafide badass.

     

    Sarah's the shit. Huge asset to the team, they'd probably be dead without her.

    • Like 8

  15. Posted

    When I was in highschool I took my younger brother to a double-feature movie theater and we saw Baby Geniuses, and then this came on, and my little brother wanted to leave and refused to stay and started crying and stuff, so we left. At the time I was pissed off at him, it wasn't until years later that I realized that he helped me dodge a bullet when I saw this film on cable. Kids some times have the right instinct.

  17. Posted

    Awesome episode. Imagining 'Jazz hands' actually made me lol. I wonder what would happen if all of the magic armor was on one character. If it had a collective effect. If the guantlet didn't require an 'energy hand', or if 'stargoyle' could 'power' it somehow, I'm guessing the dragonborn would have to don it all (cuz no one else has a breath weapon). Might be an option if the party finds themselves in brick shithouse situation.

     

    Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't all of the armor perfectly fit all the characters wearing them? I feel like that was stated when all the armors were being described, but I could be wrong, just going off memory.

  19. Posted

    Which is more disturbing: Gemberling's encyclopedic knowledge of bestiality porn -OR- Engineer Brett having a bestiality documentary bookmarked and ready to go at a moment's notice?

     

    Definitely Gemberling. That bestiality documentary was posted in the youtube thread and it was the first thing I thought of too when they started talking about the subject. So Brett was just doing his job. Gemberling on the other hand has just been watching man on beast fuck films in his spare time over the years, haha.

  22. Posted

     

    But if that was the case the line is unnecessary. All they had to say was, 'This planet is full of predators that won't hesitate to kill you'. By making it about humans specifically they blew it because it's impossible for animals to evolve to kill things that haven't been present in their ecosystem for 1000 years.

     

    I kinda see what Lando is saying, I was also thinking that may have been what he meant and it was just a stupidly phrased sentence. Things on earth hadn't evolved to specifically kill humans, just that the way the earth had evolved is now super dangerous for humans. Like, for instance the age of the dinosaurs would've been super dangerous for humans, so I think without humans on earth at the top of the food chain keeping the animal kingdom in check things started kinda going back to how they were pre-humanity. Maybe? Who knows, maybe he meant exactly what he said and the movie is just stupid.

     

    As for things evolving in 1,000 years, I'm kind of a sci-fi nerd so it's not totally unheard of in the genre, there's a book called Darwin's Radio by Greg Bear where the basic premise is that instead of evolution happening slowly, it makes leaps. Good book, check it out if you're a super nerd.

     

    I'm not trying to make excuses for this movie though. In sci-fi you can make literally anything "make sense" with enough finesse, and After Earth definitely had no finesse, it all seemed like nonsense.

    • Like 1

  23. Posted

     

    Yes! A more realistic father-son bonding film meets "The Grey" would have been great! But I do agree with June in that they had a good nugget for a movie with this film (sci-fi craziness and all) but the stuff about not choosing fear and Will Smith acting like a robot was weird and made no sense. And the part about Will blaming Jaden for the sister's death is ABSOLUTELY BONKERS!

     

    Yeah, I have to admit there were some cool sci-fi elements, and it could've been a better movie if someone with better instincts were at the helm.

     

    But I agree with Jason that I didn't get that Will ever blamed Jaden for his sister's death. I think that was just Jaden's fear. I think the reason Will never tells his son "It wasn't your fault" is because that kinda goes along with that speech he gives earlier about how fear is not real, it's a choice, fear is what we imagine, blah blah blah, so I think he wanted Jaden to decide on his own to stop feeling that blame that was only in his head. So I don't think he blamed him, but he also did nothing to absolve his son's guilt. Which is really just as bad.

  24. Posted

    There's a couple of stupid plot points that I thought should be cleared up (not that they really matter). The opening sequence says humans evacuated earth 1000 years ago. When they got to the new planet some "aliens" dropped the "ursas" on the planet - which were specifically designed to kill humans. Bizarrely the aliens are never really mentioned or explained - or even given a name. Then apparently the humans were helpless until Cypher Raige - the "original ghost" - developed his ghosting technique. Of course this makes no sense. Were the ursas dropped on the planet a thousand years ago? How long ago then? If Cypher was the first to develop ghosting, wouldn't the humans have been wiped out long before he was born? If the ursas were designed, why don't they have eyes and why didn't the aliens just re-design them to compensate for the ghosting technique? Also, why would the plants and animals be designed to kill humans if humans left the planet 1000 years ago? It would make no sense. Anyways, just a few of the many things that made no sense about this film.

     

    I feel like there's probably logical explanations for all of that, but unfortunately they never shared it with the audience.

     

    It was apparently planned as a trilogy so I'm guessing some more backstory of this universe would've been given over the course of the next 2 films. I don't know. Whatever the case may be, they failed.

  25. Posted

    According to wikipedia this movie was apparently originally conceived after Will Smith watched an episode of I Shouldn't Be Alive, and was going to be about a father and son involved in a car crash in a remote mountain region and the son having to go and get help. I feel like that could've been a GOOD MOVIE. Drop all the sci-fi nonsense that doesn't add up, and actually let Will Smith be a human being with emotions, and I think that would've been a watchable movie. I Shouldn't Be Alive is fucking gripping, I'm not going to lie I cry almost every time I watch that show, so if they could've replicated that instead of deciding to turn it into a sci-fi epic for what seems like no reason, I think that could've had something.

     

    This movie felt like a big budget excuse for Will Smith to preach some of his esoteric philosophies.

    • Like 2
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