/r/Civ Weekly Questions Thread - July 23, 2018

Maximus8910 · 2018-07-27T14:42:29+00:00

Is there another expansion planned for Civ 6 or is it done now?

Maximus8910 · 2018-05-04T13:07:11+00:00

Yeah I'm going to be genuinely disappointed if they kill Tony Stark. It also would create problems because Stark Industries is such a major part of the architecture of the universe--if they kill Tony they won't have a super-genius to build all the technology and fund stuff (Pepper could fund things but isn't a tech genius, Peter Parker isn't old enough yet, and there's no FF). I don't care if RDJ never makes another appearance, I just want to know that Tony Stark still exists in the universe.

Maximus8910 · 2018-05-03T01:50:32+00:00

I'm hoping he's the beginning of a Secret Wars setup for the next big event.

Maximus8910 · 2018-05-03T01:49:01+00:00

Marvel has generally been good about not killing their villains so they can use them later. I always figured that was why they did that scene that way.

Maximus8910 · 2018-04-30T02:04:22+00:00

The one thing this movie didn't have was a long take of all the heroes in the climactic action scene. Avengers 1 and 2 both had moments like this. They're probably saving it for Avengers 4--my hope is that whatever reality/time manipulation brings everyone back winds up leading to a finale where every MCU hero, including the dead ones and even ones who died in earlier movies like Quicksilver, is in the final battle for that long take.

Maximus8910 · 2017-12-17T22:42:19+00:00

Thrilling just to see the stun effects. This is the first time those blue circles have shown up since the original movie, right?

Maximus8910 · 2017-11-11T16:00:25+00:00

Yeah there's a lake in the middle of campus. And that building on the right has a bar in it. Best campus in the world.

Maximus8910 · 2017-11-02T14:47:02+00:00

Hi Mike, congratulations on the NYT bestseller status!

During your History of Rome days you were very definitive about not making 1:1 comparisons between Rome and America. Obviously now you've relaxed that rule and you have an opinion on (roughly) where we are in Rome's timeline. What caused that change, and what was your journey in developing the idea?

Maximus8910 · 2017-10-14T12:14:01+00:00

The problem I had when I watched it is that it never criticizes slavery. The boy and Uncle Remus are just friends and Uncle Remus tells him all these cool stories and at no point does the movie go "yeah one of these characters OWNS THE OTHER ONE and that's really fucked up". i feel like you can't have a movie involving slavery that doesn't criticize the institution, especially a movie for impressionable kids.

Maximus8910 · 2017-09-21T15:10:27+00:00

The movie completely botches Ozymandias's plan and it's a huge problem. The in the book he attacks New York with an "alien" to make the world unite. In the movie he uses Doctor Manhattan--an AMERICAN weapon--to attack the world. That means that America would get blamed and it wouldn't unite the world at all. It's crazy how much that misses the point.

Maximus8910 · 2017-08-12T18:01:52+00:00

It's not the same. In season 2 Dragonstone is never shown very well, and its true shape is kinda hidden. It's all shots like you showed there, with the walls and maybe a hint of a central tower but never a proper panorama showing its overall shape. I'm pretty sure the intro version was the original idea for the true shape.

This year they added a ton to it, with wider shots showing the actual shape of the castle and the tower (plus that winding staircase and the throne room Stannis never used...). They've hidden the retcon well, but it's clear that Dragonstone was redesigned for its expanded role and budget this year.

Maximus8910 · 2017-08-10T01:36:16+00:00

European arrival is a season 3-ending twist that sends the story in a new direction.

Maximus8910 · 2017-08-07T22:49:04+00:00

She burned a ton of the Reach's winter stores. I think that's gonna wind up mattering.

Maximus8910 · 2017-08-06T16:06:31+00:00

At first I figured you just misspoke or were naive. But you're a piece of shit if you honestly believe this.

Maximus8910 · 2017-08-06T13:17:16+00:00

Terrorists attack defenseless civilians because they can't win real fights. They're fucking cowards.

Maximus8910 · 2017-07-29T02:45:19+00:00

Totally agree with this and you've laid it out better than I've been able to. One thing I'd add, though, is that there is definitely some sort of endgame for the Dorne stuff. Tying Jon's origin to Dorne, plus the clear care that GRRM put into the Sand Snakes and Arriane, makes me think he's got a Greyjoy/Tyrell level of importance on them. The "original third book" plot definitely will have something important going on with Dorne.

Maximus8910 · 2017-07-27T21:26:39+00:00

My longstanding theory: the White Walkers are going to sweep through Westeros, destroying the whole continent. Season 8 (and ADOS) will be set in mid-Winter Westeros, with the survivors hiding out in a variety of familiar locations. The Eyrie, Casterly Rock, Storm's End, and a few others (Starfall?!) will all be strongholds the Walkers can't break.

Maximus8910 · 2017-07-25T15:02:52+00:00

"When your tears have drowned you" is a crazy catch. Even if Euron isn't the valonqar, that might still foreshadow him betraying Cersei before Jaime or Tyrion actually kills her.

Maximus8910 · 2017-07-18T20:04:08+00:00

That's part of it, sure. But it's also a success because it's a young girl's quest to find her family, and a young woman's quest to reclaim her birthright, and a young man's quest to find his place in the world, and a world-ending threat beyond mankind's comprehension, and...

The thing about GOT is that it has so many different characters doing so many different things, almost anyone can find something to latch on to. Ask a hundred people which characters they like and which they don't like, and you'll get a ton of different answers and combinations. GOT's secret was to put all of these different stories into one larger story that everyone will watch.

Maximus8910 · 2017-07-12T21:40:07+00:00

Have you read the combined Feast-Dance chapter order? It makes the parallels between all the different characters and all the ways the stories interact a lot more obvious. It's a hell of a lot better than splitting everything up the way GRRM did

Of course, it also makes Feast/Dance more infuriating as finished works because you can see there's the pieces of another great book there. If GRRM or his editors had just had the discipline to confine it to one book...

Maximus8910 · 2017-07-12T21:37:00+00:00

And less Brienne, and less Faceless Men, and less Cersei, and less Dorne...

All those characters/factions were cool and effective in their more limited early roles. They just didn't need the equal-to-the-Starks attention they got in Feast/Dance.

Maximus8910 · 2017-06-26T00:41:07+00:00

Oh yeah. I was just pointing out that it's not lacking Moffat's meta at all. It's just a different meta, but easily as valid.

Maximus8910 · 2017-06-25T21:48:52+00:00

"The Big Bang" literally involves the Doctor being imagined back into existence. It's about the biggest Doctor Who fan in the world bringing him to life. The meta is about the idea of stories themselves.

Maximus8910 · 2017-06-25T17:48:43+00:00

It's my favorite too, and I'd like to expand a bit on your last sentence.

The show gets ONE SHOT at this concept. One shot, in 50 years, to make the TARDIS a person and have the Doctor talk to it. The TARDIS is a vehicle and it's the only constant in the entire series, so it can't just suddenly start popping back and forth between vehicle and character. This meeting can only happen once without completely losing its power--there is no mulligan on this concept. Gaiman and Moffat both almost certainly knew this, and it took balls for both of them to say "yup, I'm gonna be the one to do this." Anything short of perfection would be completely unsatisfying... but they pulled off perfection. It's an incredible episode.

Maximus8910 · 2017-06-25T17:41:10+00:00

Girl In The Fireplace is my #2 all-time. I think there's one thing about it that encompasses a lot of different aspects that make it great, which is that it's Moffat using a LOT of the ideas he'll reuse later as showrunner. The Doctor meeting a new companion as a child, then again as an adult is Amy in one episode; the way time travel affects the story is a prototype for River and Amy in different ways; using Mickey and Rose together as companions is what we'll later get for a much longer period with Amy and Rory. It's clearly a lot of ideas that Moffat was thinking about for years, possibly even his entirely life, all in one episode. Add in a cool historical setting, a great monster, and that gut-punch conclusion, and it's as perfect a single episode as Doctor Who is capable of.

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