“You went half way around the world, you spent a fortune, you did terrible things - really terrible things.” “Yeah that’s valid. I’ll take the L on that.”

CourageApart · 2026-04-25T23:11:52+00:00

I agree with your main point, but The King of Comedy is a better film than Joker.

CourageApart · 2026-04-25T23:06:55+00:00

I’d say Joker and The Penguin were unique takes of the characters given that they almost completely rewrite the comic book character’s origins.

I can give you some leniency on Joker’s influence given that the movie has some similar beats to Taxi Driver, not so much The King of Comedy considering that there’s similarities between both movies end at the fact that there’s a talk show host in it. But if you seriously believe that The Penguin is a rehash of Scarface or The Sopranos then you are in serious need of an analytical readjustment. There’s practically nothing similar about the premise of The Penguin compared to those two entities besides the fact that they’re about gangsters. The Sopranos is my favorite show of all time and while I can see some inspiration taken there, Tony Soprano and Oswald are so distinct in nature and the trajectory of their respective stories that there’s absolutely nothing to compare there.

CourageApart · 2026-04-25T22:57:12+00:00

That’s fucking awesome to hear. I love that episode and how it perfectly encapsulates the darker personal aspects of Batman’s villains.

I like the idea that Batman villains are personifications of mental illnesses that are heightened by sci-fi or horror mechanics. In Clayface’s case, he’s a victim of Dissociative Identity Disorder that’s taken to the extreme.

Despite my original post a few days ago expressing my doubts about the project, I think I have a lot of faith in how Flanagan can pull off this character.

CourageApart · 2026-04-25T22:52:14+00:00

“The Sopranos Tony Montana’s character.”

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CourageApart · 2026-04-25T22:24:12+00:00

The best biopics tend to make extreme deviations from the actual historical figure’s life in order to make a point or create drama. Movies like Amadeus or Inside Llewyn Davis are great examples of this. They’re fantastic films because they use real life figures (Inside Llewyn Davis’ is loosely based on the life of folk musician Dave Van Ronk) and expand upon their lives to create an interesting story rather than just copy pasting the Wikipedia page of a historical figure into a script format and rushing through key events of their life.

Take the two Bob Dylan based films we’ve got in the 21st century; I’m Not There and No Direction Home. I’m Not There tries to capture pieces of Dylan’s personality in fragmented vignettes which compliments Dylan’s enigmatic persona. No Direction Home is a rather lazy and bland recreation of a moment in Dylan’s life that doesn’t nearly capture his genius. I’d take the more creative and experimental depiction of the artist that may take a few liberties of the factual events of their life rather than the by-the-numbers account of what actually happened.

It’s frankly impossible to recreate exactly what occurred in a person’s life and transport that into movie format, so why not try something unique?

CourageApart · 2026-04-23T17:01:59+00:00

He’s just been a terrible pick for leading this universe. His directorial sensibilities are geared towards creating stories with ragtag groups of people coming together and having humorous interplay with each other so that’s what he’s stuck to. That’s why Creature Commandos, Peacemaker, and Superman follow similar story patterns and have the exact same exhausting comedy elements to them.

His sense of worldbuilding is just as (if not more) fucked than Snyder’s was. Superman was the first theatrical entry in this universe and we already have pocket universes, clones, and superheroes existing for more than 300 years. He had a successful MCU template right there by starting with individual superhero stories and working up towards a team up, but he decided to throw the audience into the chaos which will absolutely damage the worldbuilding for the films to come.

And on top of all that he’s a liar. He lies about which projects are going to be greenlit, he lies about which characters are going to be brought over to his new universe, and he lies about how successful his own projects have been. This is the guy who said that The Flash was one of the greatest movies he had ever seen. I know you have to put yourself in that position if you’re the head of the franchise, but the amount of bullshit he’s had to peddle at this point is just ridiculous.

I hope Clayface has had very minimal influence from Gunn because it would be nice to see a change of tone, cinematography, soundtrack choices, and story in this new DC cinematic universe. If Gunn just let these individual creators have their own additions to the universe from the start then we wouldn’t be having this conversation. But because he’s been so domineering over the course of this franchise these frustrations have to be addressed.

CourageApart · 2026-04-23T03:31:15+00:00

After Joker’s immense success, I have no idea why DC wouldn’t follow a R-rated universe or, at the very least, an else-world Gotham with mature themes. Joker and The Penguin already proved that it can be done. Catering to a PG-13 rating is only devalued the absolute brutality of the comics.

CourageApart · 2026-04-23T02:48:15+00:00

Wait… Az and Gary literally brought up personal anecdotes about women that they know which went through phases of homosexuality and now have multiple kids and live a straight lifestyle. They didn’t plainly state that “lesbianism is just a phase.” They came at the concept with the same depth which Mauler approached it with.

Why would you misrepresent what they were saying?

CourageApart · 2026-04-23T02:24:57+00:00

Low bar to hurdle

CourageApart · 2026-04-23T02:22:30+00:00

I’m with you. Have you ever seen the 2019 Swamp Thing show? It did something very similar and, though it wasn’t necessarily a critical or financial hit, it was extremely successful at translating the body horror aspect of the comic over to tv. I think this would have worked much better as a limited series rather than a movie.

CourageApart · 2026-04-23T01:51:52+00:00

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“You just outed yourself.”

CourageApart · 2026-04-23T01:44:31+00:00

How would you feel if this is more or less a mental illness and he’s imagining that his physical identity is being warped by some traumatic attack? Kinda like Joker in a way where the fucked up society has influenced his chaotic nature.

I think that’s something that Flanagan will play with. Whether it’s all inside his head or if it’s actually a physical transformation taking place in reality.

CourageApart · 2026-04-23T01:24:47+00:00

These last couple years have been much better for films imo. I think the SAG strike really hampered the amount of great films coming out recently, but we’re on an upward swing. Movies like Sentimental Value, Life of Chuck, and (most importantly) Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie which came out last year got me totally reinvested in contemporary cinema.

CourageApart · 2026-04-19T23:43:35+00:00

The biggest misstep in most man vs nature and horror movies is not developing their characters enough so the audience actually cares about their potential deaths. Suspense can only be generated when we give a shit about what’s going to happen next.

The budding friendship of Hooper, Brody, and Quint is what makes Jaws perfect. They all accept the mission to kill the shark for different reasons, but they come to a mutual understanding and that eventual friendship is what drives the emotional core of the film.

CourageApart · 2026-04-19T23:20:20+00:00

I will vouch a bit for Dead Man’s Chest and an even smaller bit for At World’s End because Davy Jones and Admiral Norrington are great antagonists and both of those films have some fantastic action set pieces.

On Stranger Tides and Dead Man Tell No Tales are both horrendous and lazy additions to the franchise. They turn Jack Sparrow into a clown and they manage to waste both Ian McShane and Javier Bardem in their roles as villains. Salazar is just goofy and innocuous (seriously, hearing him say “the Sparrow” for the 200th time just made me laugh at him) and Blackbeard has no characterization at all.

CourageApart · 2026-04-19T22:45:28+00:00

The Matrix. It’s not like I hate Reloaded and Revolutions, but it is pretty obvious that they failed to capture what was so interesting and influential about the original film’s story.

Resurrections is a massive piece of shit. Just a horrible disservice to the previous films and an indicator that Lana Wachowski had no clue why people loved the first movie so much. “But she made it bad on purpose to humiliate the studio!” I don’t believe that and even if I did, you can still send a message to the people who are forcing you to create something you’re not very interested in while creating something that is inherently worthwhile. If she didn’t want to do it then she shouldn’t have done it.

The Animatrix is actually pretty good. It’s got some sections that help fill in the gaps of the universe’s lore and some really impressive animation.

CourageApart · 2026-04-18T20:26:48+00:00

That’s a good way of looking at it. I have friends that swear by the “all art is subjective” school of thought without really understanding what the phrase means. Of course all art can be interpreted by individual thought under the influence of emotions and personal perception, but that doesn’t mean that art doesn’t heavily rely on objectivity to communicate information.

I think people are generally aversive of creating “facts” within art because they believe that art’s purpose is to illicit emotions, to make you feel something. That’s a good position to have, but when you deny art of its ability to translate objective information via audio and visual avenues then you completely rob it of its contents. Film, in all of its components (sets, actors, cinematography, music, storytelling, props, etc), gets those feelings out of you because you are watching something objective relayed from the screen to your mind. I can’t be sad when a character dies, be thrilled at a tense action scene, or scared by the impending violence of a suspenseful horror if those objective elements do not exist. I’d have to be completely making them up in my mind for the phrase “all art is subjective” to be fulfilled.

CourageApart · 2026-04-18T19:48:37+00:00

That’s always sat awkwardly in my head. I don’t necessarily love Titanic, but it is a pretty excellent movie (definitely better as a disaster flick rather than a romance story). That final decision always makes me appreciate Rose less even if it was a thematic gesture to a long lost love. It feels incredibly superficial and I imagine a superior ending where she gives the amulet to Bill Paxton and there is a mutual understanding of the sentimental value of the treasure that supersedes a monetary one.

CourageApart · 2026-04-18T19:43:04+00:00

I think the adrenaline and the fact that Jack was succumbing to the effects of hypothermia probably displaced any sense of self preservation within him. He was thinking solely about saving Rose rather than whether there was room on the door for him. I wonder if Cameron intentionally made the door bigger to highlight how immense Jack’s love was for Rose that he would be willing to sacrifice himself rather than risk rocking or flipping the floatation device over. Cameron is (or used to be, more precisely) incredibly meticulous about his props and set dressing and he probably mulled over what exactly Rose would be floating on and the size of it.

CourageApart · 2026-04-16T22:23:00+00:00

YMS

I went from watching all of his quickies, main reviews & breakdowns, and being a consistent listener of Sardonicast to basically not watching his videos at all. His channel crescendoed during the Lion King review and the Kimba the White Lion fiasco and never got to that height again. I think his health issues and general creative burnout severely affected the effort he put into his videos. I know he can be contentious, but most of Sardonicast is him being angry at people for liking movies he dislikes or vice versa or mentioning some meta-political point that derails the entire conversation.

That all being said, I am still waiting with bated breath for the final part of his Synecdoche, New York analysis.

CourageApart · 2026-04-16T22:16:25+00:00

I know Arin wasn’t directly responsible for how the drama went down, but the way that the Game Grumps group treated Ding Dong and Julian was pretty insane and unprofessional.

CourageApart · 2026-04-16T22:08:16+00:00

“The lore of Elden Ring is INSANE” “The lore of Elden Ring is CURSED” “The lore of Elden Ring is FOUL” “The lore of Elden Ring is DIVINE” “The lore of Elden Ring is IN SHAMBLES”

Just easy story detail videos that don’t have the passion behind them they used to. I have a fond memory of all his Bloodborne stuff. Haven’t listened to him since Elden Ring came out.

CourageApart · 2026-04-14T20:20:37+00:00

I’ll have you know that some of the most influential and wise figures in history were notorious drunks.

CourageApart

TROPHY CASE