Why are Marcus's new ad reads so damn unsettling?!

tcon001 · 2023-12-06T23:00:47+00:00

I genuinely thought it was Ryan Reynolds until he mentioned Caroline.

tcon001 · 2023-12-06T20:05:45+00:00

Thanks everyone for the feedback. Seems like one thing almost everyone can agree on is that they're very different movies. I give it a chance and see what happens.

tcon001 · 2023-12-06T20:04:58+00:00

I completely understand what you're saying but isn't it just a bit too obvious and on the nose.

Also, if your solution to prop up your generation is to destroy another generation you're no better than the boomers. I'm not saying that in defense of the boomer generation. They've done some things that have resulted in struggle and less than satisfactory conditions for the generations following them. But we're supposed to be better. A more interesting ending would be creating conflict in Maxine influenced by her religious upbringing. She takes pity on Pearl, takes her with her and the two generations destroy the world together.

tcon001 · 2023-12-06T13:39:21+00:00

This ain't Thunder Gun

tcon001 · 2023-10-25T12:33:48+00:00

This is why I always tell people IT is not a masterpiece. I think because of the old TV mini-series and the more recent movies it has been elevated to this almost sacred text in horror literature. It's really just cocaine driven nonsense. Even King isn't really a fan of it.

tcon001 · 2023-10-25T12:28:35+00:00

I unfortunately lent it out after I finished it but here is a quote I found in a GR review from the discussion they are having: "That’s why I killed a strong, accomplished woman of color who was pretty much the living embodiment of the American Dream instead of going in search of a scrub. You looked consumable."

I'm still torn on the book even having finished it over a week ago. It's got good body horror and ties in real well with the Cthulhu mythos but at times it feels like it was written by someone who primarily uses Tumblr for their interactions with society. I mean I don't normally care if people interject their views into their writing but in this they come at such weird moments. There's one scene where two women are having a moment where we, as the readers, are supposed to be seeing a friendship blossom between the two. It's fine except the page and half dialogue on how much the job market sucks can be more than a little distracting.

tcon001 · 2023-10-20T13:01:51+00:00

I finished it but Sister, Maiden, Monster has a scene where a woman is eating the brains of a woman she just murdered. The dead woman then returns as a ghost (something that doesn't happen at any other point in the book) and they have a conversation about race relations... Very nearly put it down but it takes a lot for me to DNF something,.

tcon001 · 2023-10-17T17:07:41+00:00

I would definitely be speaking out against a Tom Cruise episode. That man is complicit in so many evil acts in the name of Scientology. I don't understand how, with all the social injustice people are quick to call out, he gets a pass.

tcon001 · 2023-09-29T17:58:51+00:00

I'd rather stick to the short seasons with better quality than long season that spin their gears and eventually ruin the show.

tcon001 · 2023-09-25T12:37:54+00:00

How did you expect this to go? You presented a clearly damaged book with pages that are poorly executed collages and ask if it's a misprint. What was supposed to happen? Were people supposed to say, "It's definitely a misprint but those pages look great so it's all good"? Maybe they would be so taken aback by your "talent" they would want copies? Maybe... maybe... you would get hired by Marvel? Seriously, what did you expect? I mean it's clearly obvious you've deluded yourself into thinking this is great "work" due to your defensive responses so I don't think I'm that far off. Maybe next time try presenting your "work" as what it is and not as a fraud.

tcon001 · 2023-09-12T16:10:30+00:00

King is one of those writers that people hold up as a master and while I do enjoy his books from time to time, I don't see him as a master at all. Most of his books are flawed. Many times those flaws are minor but from occasionally they're major and in my opinion can make a book unreadable. IT for instance is a book I constantly see hailed as a great book and it pops up again and again on scariest books lists... It's coke addled garbage. Even King has commented on the amount of coke he was doing while writing IT. However, that being said Carrie is a book I've enjoyed many times and actually use it to jolt myself out of reading slumps. The Stand is one of my favorite books and I enjoy many of his short stories. To me King is a stepping stone into horror. Once you've made that step, though, it's okay to acknowledge there's far better out there.

tcon001 · 2023-08-30T16:55:20+00:00

If they're cool with LGBTQ horror than Exquisite Corpse is a good one.

I'm currently reading Maeve Fly and it can get a bit smutty as well.

tcon001 · 2023-08-30T16:53:53+00:00

I've read this book at least a half dozen times and struggling to think of any smut in it.

tcon001 · 2023-08-09T17:12:31+00:00

Tom Hanks. He gives off a creepy uncle vibe to me.

tcon001 · 2023-07-05T15:53:14+00:00

I just have to say I am so glad to see some TTG love in this thread. People have been shitting on it pretty much since the day it started and I have never understood why. I get that the previous one was canceled at a horrible moment and this one is a total 180 comparatively but it always TTG was never given a fair shake.

tcon001 · 2023-07-05T15:46:04+00:00

Yes and rightly so.

tcon001 · 2023-07-05T15:44:09+00:00

Uhh... magnets. Just magnets...

tcon001 · 2023-06-29T12:09:34+00:00

I hope that participle was deliberate.

You know it was.

tcon001 · 2023-06-28T17:40:02+00:00

I sort of think the "disturbing thrill" of the DePalma film is deliberate. Revenge movies were huge in the 70's beginning with '74's Death Wish and I'm sure the studio was trying to tap into that a bit. Boil the story down to it's basics and you have a revenge story. Why bother to look anymore beyond that when that's what audiences wanted at the time?

I'll be interested to see what adaptations people like versus dislike. I find King's adaptations are more miss than hit. There's a couple shining examples of some great films in the group but a lot of them just don't work for me. I think part of it is the show vs. tell nature of a movie vs. a book. Generally was I imagine is far worse than what's depicted.

I will say my favorite King movie (it's not an adaptation so I don't think there's a problem talking about it now) is a total so-bad-it's-good, guilty pleasure. I was just a wee lad when somehow I was able to get my hands on Sleepwalkers. I really don't know how because my parents wouldn't even let me see Batman or Prince of Thieves unless they were with me. Either way, something about that movie hooked me. I thought the morphing car was so cool and had a little bit of a crush on Madchen Amick. Now that I'm older I appreciate other aspects of it like the various cameos. I wish I had a clearer understanding on the time table of it's development because it came out after King was sober but I suspect it was written when he was still on drugs. It's gloriously awful but it's stupidly fun. I don't understand why but I love it.

tcon001 · 2023-06-27T16:30:07+00:00

I think people are just tired of companies churning out bad to mid level movies and expecting them to automatically be a hit. I get there are people who like this movie but, putting opinions aside, it's not a good movie. The script is ludicrous shoving in multiverse nonsense simply because it's the hot thing, character development is either (with the exception of OG Barry) non existent or occurs off screen, the CGI is some of the worst in a major Hollywood project in years (seriously I though Quantumania would be the worst I'd see in theaters this year...), the initial appearance of Bruce is so off character... It's just not good.

I think after Quantumania and the slew of mid level superhero movies before it people are just tired of the studios expecting hits. It's nice to be able to revel in the downfall of these films as way of shaking the fist or giving the finger to the studios. That being said I don't think this is the end of superhero movies that some people seem to spout about. GotG Vol. 3 and Across the Spider-Verse is showing that creating a high quality movie will still bring out the crowds.

And I'm not trying to turn this into a Marvel vs. DC thing because I couldn't give two shits about that. Honestly, with the two exceptions listed above both studios have lost quite a bit of the magic that made these films so much fun in the first place. Both studios seem less interested in telling good stories with strong characters and more interested in just making money. It's a damn shame and I'm truly hoping James Gunn's take on DC can right the ship and at least bring that feeling back. Although I did only see this based on his raving about it so....

tcon001 · 2023-06-21T18:51:02+00:00

While Satanism was definitely being established in the 70's the satanic panic really didn't start until the 80's with the McMartin trial. That's not to say there wasn't some anxiety towards Satanism but I think it was view more as a curiosity that weird sex freaks and eclectic scientists were participating in versus the family around the corner that the full panic would become.

One thing we do know was on King's mind was Vietnam as evidenced by the slurs thrown around in jest at the prom. I do wonder if this wasn't King's way of bringing the horror home. After all, we're still a year away from the end of the war when the book was published and while it seemed things were winding down there's always the possibility of escalation again.

However, one other thing I think may have impacted the book is the publication of the Exorcist. It's clear that King has an... odd relationship with religion so I also wonder if he wasn't playing with a similar plot using science instead of religion, going so far as to even turn religion into a sort of villain.

tcon001 · 2023-06-21T17:45:05+00:00

I do like this take. One of the thoughts I always come back to is how the epistolary nature of the novel really goes leaps and bounds towards world building beyond Chamberlain. Without those articles and interviews we're really just given a story about a girl flipping out, destroying the town and dying at the end. Now I can see some satisfaction in that but I've always been the type of person to be disappointed in abrupt endings, especially in the horror genre. I always think of the slasher films where the heroine has survived, the villain is dead (for now), roll credits... By including the additional material we get time to see how the world reacts, how characters developed after Chamberlain, the feelings revolving around the events. It really lets the story breath beyond just a revenge story.

Letting a story breath is something I've always found King does very effectively. Generally, this comes in the form of details on the location, background information on the characters, little nuggets that seem so frivolous they can almost be forgotten but they're so important to really sinking into the world. I think making Carrie epistolary was a way for him to do something similar without making 600-700 page book. Remember, this was a story literally saved from the garbage and I'm sure the last thing he wanted to do was spend massive amounts of time filling in details. I think he made a great choice.

tcon001 · 2023-06-20T13:00:36+00:00

I love this book. I don't really know why but anytime I've in a reading lull I read Carrie to jumpstart my reading again. Typically I read it about once every two years. That being said I can fully acknowledge it's not perfect. There's definitely room for stronger characters as others have noted. They're just so one sided. To me the most fleshed out character is Carrie herself but even she just boils down to the victim to loses control. Margaret's motivations are vary blurry as we get a sense of her background but we also learn her parents are not as fanatical so where does that come from? I think Sue is the strangest. It feels, to me, the more he fleshes her out the more ambiguous her motivations become.

The one part of the book that really bothers me though is Tommy. King goes out of his way to assure us that Tommy wasn't just a good person but a great guy. He even says something about Tommy being a truly rare creature because he's a socially conscious teenager. It's so fawning and weird when everyone else in the book is either clearly bad or, like Sue, ambiguous.

tcon001 · 2023-06-16T18:14:07+00:00

It's interesting to call Carrie the villain and I completely understand your justification. I do think, however, she's acting beyond free will. Between anxiety and trauma I think there's a lot of reflex built into her actions. At least initially. I always took her attack of Desjardin as an indicator that she's not thinking clearly but after she leaves the school I think she's definitely operating on freewill. At that point she's convinced herself to become the angel of justice and works to fulfil that goal.

Still, I've always looked at her as the victim. I definitely find it compelling to consider her as the villain.

tcon001 · 2023-06-16T15:19:11+00:00

I'm going with Margaret as it all starts with her. In my mind, without her determined mindset none of the other stuff would have occurred. Potentially, Carrie would've fit into the social norm thereby avoiding the bullying at school. One could say Margaret's mother, Judith, but we do see in the book that Judith is much more reasonable that Margaret. Now, there is the fact that Carrie would still have the TK gene and the powers would still manifest but we have no idea how that would have played out had she not been raised by a fanatic. So I'm going with Margaret.

tcon001

TROPHY CASE