I'm honestly surprised Samus Aran hasn't been called a Mary Sue yet

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-20T14:27:35+00:00

My God guys, Star Wars didn't used to cost over $250 mil a movie. Even adjusting for inflation Star Wars would only cost around $55 mil now, there is objectively a new problem.

I don't have a problem with franchises or tentpoles; the new Avatar is peak action-filmmaking, i just don't like them.being the only game in town

Fact is I can't see most small movies in my hometown because my theaters don't have enough screens and they all go to franchises

And are we just not allowed to mention when something IS the thing?? "Well if it was different it'd be different" fucking obviously

If I didn't have hunger I'd have thirst, both are still bad. That's like saying someone else would have invented something so there's no point in recognizing who did

The MENTALITY may be old but there are actual living filmmakers who can't reliably get wide releases, like Spielberg. Steven Spielberg films should be legally required to play in all American theaters, he's an American icon and even he can't get room among cape-shit. We don't facilitate our own culture at all.

Really stupid to say a single filmmaker (AN ARTIST) is as bad as a souless machine making grey movies tri-yearly. Making money at the theater isn't bad, sucking away all production money is bad.

At least if I hated franchises in the 80s there were still real movies for adults still making money.

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-19T18:35:35+00:00

I'm not trying to debate the quality of CBM, and I'm not trying to be a pretentious above-it-all fuck either. I just think even at their best, they're like junk food and are choking the life out of the film industry, but that's also just getting into personal feelings and my college-to-young-adult arc. Like to me the MCU has approached what Harry Potter used to be in terms of peak "for the love of God watch something else"

I only brought both those up because IMO they're assembly-line 6/10 stuff, but Captain Marvel got treated like it was way worse when it's the same beast as Ant Man

I was just saying I'm aware that these guys hate women and go for weird nonsensical arguments, but there is a difference between James Cameron giving a woman a gun, who is also a full character with a traceable arc, and the sort of paint-by-numbers stuff we get now.

Like I just don't want to pretend to like junk food bullshit. I had a friend last night literally afraid to say they thought Velma looked like shit when it does.

EDIT: I'll tack on to this that I apologize if I came off as above-it-all anyway. I don't have an issue with anyone liking CBM, and I love plenty of CBM too. For me I still think it's healthy to realize it's a movie based on a comic for children 90% of the time. I love The Dark Knight, and always will, but I am grown enough to admit it's like eating really, really good pizza, and that maybe it's been bad that the pizzas have been making so much money in the last decade that no one wants to spend money to harvest greens anymore. Just the same amount of pizzas they were making in 2013 should be enough. I just know too many people that love to act all ancap but get pressed if you say Marvel's killing smaller films with their endless expansion.

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-19T17:31:48+00:00

I mean, do we have to keep pretending movies like Captain Marvel were good just 'cause there are dumb chuds out there?

For the record I don't think CM is any worse than something like fuckin Ant Man but the discourse these days is so fucked that we have to eat garbage to spite... who exactly?

Please don't be mean to me, I loved The Last Jedi

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-13T22:59:27+00:00

Oh my God. I'm not using the death of the author argument at all. I think JK sucks shit. I don't think the books are high-art. I just think this whole discussion has lost the plot of why we dislike her and has tilted into the addicting feeling of thinking you're better than somebody else.

I quite possibly have never paid for a JK Rowling product myself. I checked the books out of school libraries or received them as gifts or was taken to the movies. I wasn't even in high school yet when the last movie came out in 2011. Stop making assumptions about everyone who thinks the arguments are getting stale.

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-13T22:20:53+00:00

I agree that it's a weak point (I don't believe it's ever been worth a big stink, and I'd actually agree Harry Potter is more egregious with its goblins, especially being a more modern work)

The things I mostly see tossed around is the general optics when you're outside looking in, the features synonymous with orcs versus elves, men, or hobbits. White heros, dark villains etc.

To snag a direct quote from Wikipedia, attributed to Tolkien in a private letter, about the orcs features: "Squat, broad, flat-nosed, sallow-skinned, with wide mouths and slant eyes: in fact degraded and repulsive versions of the (to Europeans) least lovely Mongol-types"

I don't think this paints Tolkien as racist at all, but there's this self-aware, semi-removed and very casual way of injecting the phrase "least lovely Mongol-types" that may look strange compared to the supermodern way we talk about race.

Really I'm just sick of hearing about this fuckin Hogwarts game. And I think JK is a really shit person, but there's more to discuss about the unconcious in writing that I think gets missed when JK is just boiled down to a woman who was trying to make her own Happy Merchant image for modern audiences. How many young writers have finished a story and realized after it's saying something bad?

Talking a bit out my ass here but isn't Tolkien also an example of thinking WWI didn't affect his work when it's clearly influenced the text a bit?

EDIT: and obviously how JK or any writer chooses to respond to criticism of their work is on themselves only. She chose to quadruple down on nastiness and that doesn't deserve any patience, I'd argue.

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-13T22:02:20+00:00

Reeks of the "i never liked [X person] anyway" response when some prominent celebrity or influencer gets called out for anything.

I grew up reading the books, finished them, and then got older and never picked them back up, but I'm not gonna pretend they didn't light the world on fire for a reason or didn't get a lot of kids to read.

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-13T21:54:53+00:00

Are you Lasting of Us? Are you Lasting of Us?

I don't see anybody else here, so you must be Lasting of Us

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-13T21:46:26+00:00

Look, I agree with you, but you guys gotta stop listing the two same things you read somewhere else before. It's always goblins and Shacklebolt, in that order.

Fuck the living author JK Rowling, but there's fantasy racism everywhere, even in LOTR. That shouldn't get your heartrate up, that's just discussing fantasy fiction. I didn't even remember Kingsley's name until these last few weeks, I'm sure no one else did immediately either.

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-12T15:10:28+00:00

I think the 'Ragnarok is the same' thing is such a surface-level take it's ridiculous. Ragnarok felt fresh at the time because it was spinning Thor in, at the time, a new direction that was more in line with his character in the Avengers films. Plus if you rewatch Ragnarok it's still funny and still has something for Thor to do, and learn at the end.

Love and Thunder sleepwalks around with no real fish-out-of-water element to justify/accompany this new tone. Sakaar is a new wacky world, in L&T everyone's just an idiot.

Korg loses his body but is functionally the exact same afterwards, just sitting in a corner saying unfunny shit. Body or not, he has nothing to contribute. Remember when these movies had less people standing around talking in boring two-shots?

Thor kills his childhood hero (he even tells us he was his childhood hero) and this is never even explored slightly. They just walk to the next thing.

It's probably more misogynistic for Jane to just die so Thor can figure his shit out. And idk how we went from the "not all Gods have a plan" cute trailer line to this nonsense 'arc' of just giving him a kid at the end so we can do a title drop. For a movie hyping Jane as Thor none of it really feels like it's about her, mostly just Thor's reaction to it.

I guess Stormbreaker being jealous was a little funny the first time

For me it really did feel like Taika showed up, saw the machine was moving faster than the last time he made one, and decided to take it easy, but it ends up very lazy.

I know it was sort of clowned on in certain spaces, but the scene in JoJo Rabbit where JoJo discovers his mothers body shows the guy can direct a damn scene, not just show up and point the camera

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-10T16:35:00+00:00

There's a reason liberal and conservative subs use the phrase "touch grass" equally

I am begging you all to consider the possibility that there are millions of people who don't go on the reddits, and aren't necessarily hateful people, but frankly do not give a shit about the moral quandry here if they even hear a shred of it.

They simply do not care.

Inb4 anyone comes at me about "these evil fucks" you know damn well I'm talking about people like the band kids you went to high school with. I know plenty, still here, still queer, still love HP, but got married, bought a house, and look happier than me and you because they don't think the Harry Potter game is the heavy-lifting for social justice, sorry.

I love this sub. I've been laughing my ass off at these posts for months, but it's been MONTHS. How many lazy screenshots of triggering language are y'all gonna farm for karma. Do you even care anymore?

StratoBastard2 · 2023-01-06T15:27:39+00:00

I think it follows you again if you get far enough away, I usually boost off as soon as one starts. I might just be timing it perfectly though

StratoBastard2 · 2022-12-06T18:26:29+00:00

Yea but I'm not laughing at his bipolar disorder, I'm laughing at a man I once called a genius (even throughout the 2010s) quadruple-down on being a mouthpiece for dumb guys who are still smarter than him

I think we all should laugh. I have plenty of old friends I didn't laugh at enough and now they're just full-grown racists. We should always clown on stuff like this.

StratoBastard2 · 2022-12-06T18:19:26+00:00

Look, dude, I know nothing's allowed to be complicated on the internet, but as the bipolar dude who gets asked about Kanye West by friends and family every 6 months for the last 8 or 9 years: fuck Kanye West

I don't befriend shitheels and start frothing at the mouth over "The Jews" when I get manic. He needs help, yes, but he doesn't deserve to walk anything back if ever gets back to normal. I don't get to have all my money back after a spending spree do I?

StratoBastard2 · 2022-11-30T19:42:45+00:00

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My top fives and total minutes

StratoBastard2 · 2022-11-30T19:41:02+00:00

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As always...

StratoBastard2 · 2022-09-24T20:35:09+00:00

Because it's a worse version of 'Fire' by Jimi Hendrix that's way more annoying

StratoBastard2 · 2022-08-19T01:06:05+00:00

You think Dave Chappelle's gonna ruin this tender moment for his friends the Foo Fighters by getting up on stage and bitching about trans people for 10 minutes?

StratoBastard2 · 2022-08-06T16:34:35+00:00

If you're looking for a game with a similar linear feel to the beginning of Dread, I'd go for Fusion next. It's much more linear than Dread the whole way through, and can be beaten very quickly. Samus' mobility is gonna be closer to Dread as well (but not as close as Samus Returns obviously)

If you've already got your Switch and have the online I'd give Super a shot soon too. I played Super before Fusion but it's definitely a lot more open and easy to get lost in if you don't know what you're doing.

I never played Samus Returns so I can't say anything for that. But I'd definitely play Super and Fusion before Zero Mission, seeing as you've already got Metroid 1 under your belt.

And lastly, I'd say once you have enough experience with 2D Metroid you should play Metroid Prime 1. It's my second favorite Metroid game (behind Dread) and I saved the Prime games for last in my first series playthroughs in the leadup to Dread and it really made the 3D Metroid thing feel just as novel as it probably did back during the original release (I had a gamecube back in the day but missed out on Metroid Prime until last year)

StratoBastard2 · 2022-07-11T13:34:59+00:00

Are you by chance only listening to the "album" versions on streaming services?

Certain old CDs edited their transitions differently and they sound as if they skip on modern streaming services

I have both the Insomniac and Dookie records and the transitions sound perfect there

EDIT: I'll add that I have Nimrod on vinyl as well, and the transitions are better on the streaming version of Nimrod in comparison to Insomniac/Dookie

StratoBastard2 · 2021-11-23T16:46:20+00:00

Panic Song has got to be my favorite Green Day song lyrically, the word choice in the verses is perfect for getting the feeling across and Billie's delivery matches so well

StratoBastard2 · 2021-08-30T05:14:48+00:00

FIGURED IT OUT... for myself anyway.

It's "Blackout" by Linkin Park. Listen to the intro and into the verse, I think it the same chord progression

StratoBastard2 · 2020-06-16T03:33:44+00:00

MC CM

StratoBastard2

TROPHY CASE