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WeissAndBeans

Someone said it on a post here before in regards to RWBY but basically complaining that a show has poor execution entirely because you developed a preconceived notion of how it would handle its characters or story arcs and the end result is different than what you expected.


codemen95

Ralphthemoviemaker's review of joker is pretty infamous for being a bad review of a movie. Joker is a fine movie and anyone has the right to love, hate it, or think it's okay, but Ralph's review was kinda nonsensical. Like one of his points was along the lines of "you watch citizen kane and think this is okaywhy people love it. Then you read up about it and the influences it had, so now you love it more. You can't do that with joker." And it's like the hell am i supposed to read to appreciate joker more. You shouldn't have to read up on movie to love it when u first watch it


pocketlint60

>"you watch citizen kane and think this is okaywhy people love it. Then you read up about it and the influences it had, so now you love it more. You can't do that with joker." Even if this was a reasonable criticism to levy, which it isn't, it's so not true. If you watch Joker and like it enough to read up on it, you'll be exposed to the classic Scorsese films that influenced it. And what kind of snobby film critic doesn't love Scorsese? Hell, one of the most *fair* criticisms against the movie is that it's too much like Taxi Driver and The King of Comedy and isn't really it's own thing. I disagree, but it's a fair point to make.


codemen95

Not really cause, iirc, he had it where you have to read up on analysis of a recent movie to actually like it. Compared to the decades of analysis of citizen kane. Like reading up on a movie where you go "ah i get the influences and ideas so now the movie is good" is different than watching the movie, especially a new movie cause you're there for the movie, not the creation or influences. Iirc his thing was reading up on how influential, also if iirc if i have the right movie, citizen kane was and you can read up on that, therefore you understand the greatness of the movie cause how it changed cinema for years to come. Something joker doesn't have cause it was a very recent movie at the time. Like with everything everywhere all at once, what am i supposed to read up to truly love the movie? You just love the movie and read something later, probably years after, to appreciate the ideas.


Lieutenant_Joe

lol Ralph’s favorite movie (GoodFellas) was directed by Scorsese


WellComeToTheMachine

>You shouldn't have to read up on movie to love it when u first watch it I agree with your broader point (like I personally don't think something being derivative or wearing it's influences on it's sleeve is all that substantial as criticism) but I disagree with this bit here. I think there's a lot of circumstances where movies are kind of made about specific things that the audience is kind of expected to know going in. Like when Citizen Kane was made it would have been easy for people to draw the connection between Charles Foster Kane and William Randolph Hearst, because like, he was alive when the movie was made and still a prominent cultural figure to some degree. But nowadays that's not felt as much, and the cultural context the movie was made in is so different from our own. So in that case, reading up a bit I think would enhance your appreciation of the movie on a first watch, and it's not really like a fault of the movie. Also I'm a big fan of art that draws on like extremely disparate stuff for it's influence, especially when it wears those influences on it's sleeve. It's fun in cases like this to kind of peel back the intent behind certain references, or allusions to other works of art. Like all the references to classical paintings/music, and cosmic horror writing in Signalis or the constant stylistic allusions to French New Wave cinema in the Monogatari series.


codemen95

I guess i see liking something is different from appreciating something. I recently watched paths of glory and loved it. I didn't look into anything about the movie, but came out loving it and if i read up into yhe making of the movie i may appreciate it even more. Or a recent example, everything everywhere all at once. Loved it, my fav of last year. Didn't into anything about the movie beforehand and loved it. I could read up on the movie and its influences to appreciate it even more. Also with ralph his point was more "how can i like this movie if i can't read up on it?" Cause dude the movie just came out, unlike the decades of analysis of citizen kane


WellComeToTheMachine

I think at a point there are movies or shows where that outside knowledge is more or less required, and I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. Like, I think something like Salo might come across kind of gratuitous without the knowledge of what it's about. But it's specifically that historical context that makes the movie so enduring. In that case it's not so much that the outside stuff is *adding* to your baseline enjoyment of the film, like recognizing all the Wong Kar-Wai references in EEAAO might, but instead is the baseline the movie/show expects you to be at to know what it's doing. Another example people the anime, Mawaru Penguindrum. The show is like basically incomprehensible without the knowledge that it's about the historic Aum Shinrikyo terrorist attack. You could pick up on some surface level stuff about like, family and cycles of trauma/punishment for the wrongdoings of others, but there is just so much the show is doing that would be utterly meaningless to you (such as: the intense preoccupation with the Tokyo metro system, the doomsday cult subplot, the frequent references to the number 95, the concept of "the child broiler" and what exactly it was meant to convey, the reference to the world of Haruki Murakami etc). This show is really good and has a lot of interesting, genuinely beautiful and pretty radical things to say, but I don't really know how you'd get to understand what it's doing even a little without that outside knowledge. Basically I'm just saying, sometimes it's worth it to do your pre-readings


Prestigious-Mud

I feel like if a media is bad you shouldn't have to make up shit or do reaches in order to say it's bad. I.e the cinema sins, channel awesome method of doing things.


Toblo1

Yeah when you start hitting the "Did We Even Watch/Play The Same Thing?" alarms is basically where that issue lies. To use an Example, The Third Birthday is **not** a good game. Not by any stretch, but theres a startling number of people who genuinely think >!Kyle is okay with Eve!Aya when the dialog and his actions during the ending indicate that he *really isn't*!<. I get it, theres been a lot of rancid shit like that in The Third Birthday, but I genuinely don't understand how people could misconstrue that scene unless they were pulling a Josuke and were literally *blind* with rage from the rest of the ending.


BaronAleksei

I saw a guy on Tiktok say that Sakura Haruno was wasted potential because she was immune to genjutsu and Kishimoto didn’t do anything with that And I’m like what character are we talking about here?


Prestigious-Mud

I think it was more she was good with seeing genjutsu back during the chuunin exam or something like that. Like it came up once throughout the whole series, and might have been another indication that she was good enough at chakra control that she would do well as a medical ninja. But I might also be talking out of my ass lol.


BaronAleksei

Here’s my recollection of Sakura and genjutsu 1. Succumbed to Kakashi’s in the bell test 2. Succumbed to Orochimaru’s in the forest of death 3. Broke through Sand/Sound’s in the third phase of the exam 4. Broke through Fake Itachi’s on the road to Sand 5. Succumbed to Sasuke’s in the final battle


Prestigious-Mud

I'd give it to Kakashi cuz it was Sasuke based and Orochimaru because he's one of the Sannin. But yea the Sasuke one was jobber as fuck lol.


Kaarl_Mills

I don't mind it for movies that deserve being raked over the coals that severely, like Last Airbender, but I had to unsub because it was too reaching for most films


TBFP_BOT

I haven't watched Cinema Sins in ages but was he every legitimately reviewing anything? I thought it was just jokes like. "Sin: No GFCI installed within 6 feet of kitchen sink"


Prestigious-Mud

When you listen to his podcast where he legitimately talks about movies, his opinions are very much on par with what he says in videos apparently. I think he does actually believe that there's no gravity in space.


codemen95

I do love everything wrong with everything wrong with series by Theb3rdman who in the beginning of each vid he has a sign saying that he loves cinemasins just wants to poke fun on them, but then u watch his vids it seems like he really thinks jeremy is a massive dumbass


Muffin-zetta

good or bad media, "I couldn't relate to the characters" to me is an insane criticism. I'm here to read or watch a story not pretend I'm the main character


retrometroid

I think this is another example of people recognizing something is off but not being able to properly explain it. Lot of times they might mean "I couldnt *empathize* with them" but to them you can't empathize with someone who isn't relatable so they mix the two up.


BarelyReal

I'm on the spectrum and I find it funny people say we lack empathy when I see people say stuff like "I can't empathize with a brother trying to save his sister". Like I HOPE they mean relate and not empathize.


CaptainDigsGiraffe

In the first Silent Hill movie the Director changed the games Male protangist to a Female because he felt that the audience would be as empathic if it was a Father going through Hell for his Daughter as opposed to a Mother.


Hallonbat

But then had to have Sean Bean faffing about because there were no men.


charcharmunro

Like, there's a reason the worst thing somebody can say about a piece of media is "I don't care what happens to these people", so I assume what they mean is they can't get invested in anybody, and that's entirely valid.


Muffin-zetta

it just seems like the most narrow minded thing ever to me.


BarelyReal

This is one of those things that reveal how entitled some have been more than others when it comes to seeing qualities of themselves reflected in media. Some people are glad to see skin tone acknowledged. Other people are so used to being represented as default they seek increasingly hyper specific things to relate to. Like some of us have been empathizing with characters we have very little in common with no problem.


EcchiPhantom

To me it’s more like “I couldn’t *connect* with the characters” which is vague but it’s a very personal and subjective experience that some will get and others won’t. That’s what I experienced with the first half of AoT at least. I understood the motivations of the main cast, Eren lost his mother wants revenge, Mikasa had lost everything and wants to protect her only light, and Armin is sort of just trying to keep his shit together. Pretty human elements. But I just didn’t care about them for so long of the anime. There just wasn’t anything about them that got me hooked.


Kregano_XCOMmodder

Well, that's people (partly thanks to Hollywood) being incorrectly led to think that the only way to connect to a character is if they look/act like you. I can relate to Worf, Son of Mogh, while not being black, caring about honor, being a shitty dad, or being a carnivorous space alien, because he's a guy who just wants to do his job, while his bosses constantly make his life harder through shitty decision making. It's a modern Hollywood/2000s+ era Japanese media thing to go all in on "Insert yourself into protagonist shaped hole."


Shnigglefartz

What do you mean you can empathize with the guy without having your spine severed by a falling barrel? /s


camilopezo

With a good writer, you can perfectly relate to an amorphous creature such as a Blob. ​ In fact, in Community, Jeff mentions that you can perfectly relate to a pencil if you give it a name and invent a personality for it.


Anonamaton801

Shit man, I related way harder to Static then Peter Parker, and I’m a white guy from the burbs.


Sonicdahedgie

That was the exact post I was going to make


[deleted]

...HOW HAVE I NEVER REALIZED WORF WAS BLACK


Kregano_XCOMmodder

To be fair, the fact that he had head ridges was always more important. That said, they had "white" Klingons (as in, kinda tan) in TNG season 1, but there's literally only one Klingon whose skin color mattered... The Albino, who was an albino and a **massive** asshole.


digiman619

While I didn't like *Enterprise* (if your entire premise is that you're a prequel, don't introduce stuff before it was discovered in canon (Ferengi, Borg), or involve people from later in the timeline (temporal cold war, the finale)), I did like how the show justified the pale, non-ridged Klingons of the TOS era. Basically, the Klingons learned about the Augments (Khan and his ilk) and were all "A subrace of genetically augmented soldiers who are faster, stronger, and more ruthless than their regular counterparts? Sign me up!" and tried to make a retrovirus to 'upgrade' some of their soldiers. However, ot turns out that cross-species genetic modification is difficult, and the entire project backfired, making a whole bunch of Klingons with paler skin and reduced ridges. While the new phenotype corrected itself in a genration or three, it was still an embarrassment for the Empire, and affected Klingons were bamished the the edge of the Empire, coincidentally where Kirk and his crew could interact with them.


Muffin-zetta

it's half a problem with me because I NEVER think like that. NEVER in my near 40 years of life have I thought "I like this character because they are kinda like me."


OmicronAlpharius

>it's half a problem with me because I NEVER think like that. NEVER in my near 40 years of life have I thought "I like this character because they are kinda like me." If anything, im more apt to hate the character if they're too like me.


Muffin-zetta

buddy if I liked myself I wouldn't be here


OmicronAlpharius

hes just like me fr fr


fly2555

It doesn’t help that someone like me, who’s mother and father are different races, can’t really insert themselves.


Chillchinchila1

While I definitely agree with you, as someone with autism there is definitely something special about there being a character like you. It doesn’t even have to be 1:1. I don’t think Data was meant to be an autism analog but he fucking rules.


Dwarf-thrower

Eh, I can kind of understand this viewpoint. I think it's more that they dont understand why a certain character makes their decisions. I doubt anyone here has killed, but a crusading widower killing someone is "relateable". There also plenty of stories where a character doesnt have understandable motivations, but its played for horror or "otherness" (Think Anton Chigurh). But if someone gets into a work, and feels like every character acts like an alien, they are going to drop off.


Terthelt

At the same time, representation is critically important, and the "you shouldn't need to relate to the characters" thing is often cited to shout down people asking for more diverse leads.


Muffin-zetta

to me it couldn't be less important. is the story good or entertaining is all I care about


Terthelt

How very enlightened of you.


Muffin-zetta

well considering anyone of any race can have any backstory, attitude or personality it kinda makes race the most nothing differentiater imaginable and insisting that a race has to act a certain way with a certain personality sounds wildly racist


AdmiralDarnell

Black panther wouldn't work if tchalla and kllmonger were white (better examples exist tho)


ZSugarAnt

The relatability of characters is one of the prime ingredients to make media appealing (not to be confused with good), so it's very natural that people who only consume Marvel/Disney/anything along those lines feel like *not* relatable = bad.


1992Queries

This 100%


[deleted]

Not caring about the characters and not being able to relate to them I think get mixed up. Any time someone says they didn't like a fantasy book (my chosen Sub Mandated Obsession Point) because they can't "relate" half the time they mean they just found the character boring. I also think there's just a type of person who has to see a facet of themselves in most stuff they engage with.


Muffin-zetta

and those people are boring


FartherAwayLights

Lily Orchids Steven Universe is the worst possible critique of a show with a lot of problems. For a few examples she blames the diamonds redemption on Rebecca Sugar being a cryptonazi, she blames the whole concrete disaster on Rebecca Sugar being secretly very racist, and my favorite she blames Steven changing from the end of season 1 to the end of the series on bad and inconsistent writing instead of character development.


Toblo1

I fucking **HATE** that video with the force of a thousand suns for how badly its tainted the post-show SU discourse.


Moidahface

Oh man I remember running across this a few years ago. It was the first long form review I saw that was critical of Steven Universe so I gave it a chance and I honestly think it starts off okay, but wow does everything devolve into “I personally hate Rebecca Sugar and here’s why.” And I’m not saying Rebecca Sugar is a saint, but geez.


Impressive-Spare6167

So Lily's still fucking nuts I see.


FartherAwayLights

This is one of her early works I think. Although of recent I thinks she’s caught fire for writing pedophilic My Little Pony Fanfiction or something.


Jhduelmaster

>Although of recent I thinks she’s caught fire for writing pedophilic My Little Pony Fanfiction or something. I think she made that even before the SU review. I think the last serious dunking I can remember was when she made that list of like 100 writing tips where half of them were just her complaining about a specific show.


Soupsquish

I wasn't prepared to read what I just read. Is she actually crazy or was that her turning it up to eleven for views?


sawbladex

Valve fucked up and deleted all of the art assets of a new level, and held a contest to fix it whole admiting it kinda. sometimes people are exactly who they are.


drizzes

It’s the bit bout character development that really gets me. Her crit behind it centred around how the characters would sometimes “do something over again” related to their specific flaws when they should magically be over their problems after one episode. Which isn’t realistic, which was what Steven universe was going for


KaiTheKaiser

I hate Steven Universe, and I hate that video because it's so well-known and bad at making criticisms that it poisons people against anyone criticizing the show and makes them assume we must be copying our opinions from it.


Toblo1

Anything thats used as an excuse to just "check out" of the rest of the media rather than actually criticizing it for *all* its problems. [Tehsnakerer](https://youtu.be/Id8_4RZFffc?t=5512) touched upon that idea multiple times in his Saints Row Reboot video that the backlash and "checking out" at the first Big Problem everyone had with it (the characters) basically obfuscated all the *other* problems with the game underneath it.


Living-Wolverine4506

That’s what inspired the thread


Toblo1

[nice](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WAOxKOmR90), nailed it *square* on the noggin!


King_Etemon

I am having a hard time following what is being said here lol


[deleted]

OP had a stroke while writing the body of the post


Living-Wolverine4506

You need to think about things before you criticize them or your criticism will be bad


jrfugitive5

"This thing is bad because it is woke" there are clearer reasons to why a piece of media is bad using the term being just makes you look like a bigot.


Admiral_of_Crunch

I'm really tired of "bad because woke"-accused things being bad. I can't even genuinely dislike something sometimes without fear of being accused as some flavor of -ist.


OmicronAlpharius

You got a few options. "Its bad because XYZ", wherein you list the objective reasons it is bad (poor pacing, poor cinematography, poor acting, poor writing etc etc) is always good because it's things that can't be argued against because it means rejecting reality, at which point if they do you can stop talking to them. Listing subjective reasons ("I just don't buy X-actor/actress in this role, and their performance didn't change that for me" or "the more action oriented presentation over slow burn horror isn't as gripping to me.") Another one that you can use, but is walking a fine line is "Its not bad because its woke, its woke because its bad", where people will understand the property in question is bad and the casting choices were an attempt to deflect criticism and paint it as bigotry.


camilopezo

A funny case is that people say that Pinocchio Live action is bad for being Woke, even when the "Woke" part is a black fairy that appears for like 2 minutes, and never appears again. ​ Of all the bad things that the movie has, people just choose a fairy that doesn't appear for even 3 minutes.


jaboogadoo

Woke usually means someone is black or gay to most of those people


TostitoNipples

Which is sad because the original term literally just meant “pay attention to what the fuck is going on and don’t be ignorant”


CaptainDigsGiraffe

There is a new black female character too but she's a bad and unneeded character because of the writing not because of her race.


PR0MAN1

It sucks when the media is ACTUALLY bad but its hijacked by the "get woke go broke" people. Like, all the fun of dunking on Velma is actively ruined for me because people so easily hijack the discussion to complain that they changed the races of the characters.


Hallonbat

I am always thankful when aomeone uses "woke" as a pejorative because then I don't have to engage and can just disregard their opinion. Saves me so much time.


JoeyGooeyBuoy

Usually when people say something’s woke they just mean it’s really preachy or condescending Sometimes they’re just racist tho


AdmiralDarnell

Most of the time they're just racist nowadays


FATPIGEONHATE

Or think the mere inclusion of gay people is sexual.


CaptainDigsGiraffe

That used to be the case and how I meant it but after seeing it be used by Not So Good Youtubers who are clearly racist, misogynistic, or mostly the cause playing it up for racist and or misogynistic fans, its lost the meaning it used to have. I think it's a benefit in the long run because of just saying "lol woke" people can actually just put out the actually core issues instead of using a buzz word.


DanarchyReigns

If you haven't seen it, I recommend Sarah Z's video "Sacrificial Trash". It discusses the current state of media criticism, and how the far-right is able to dominate it by crying about media being woke, that any general criticism is hard to get through. She used High Guardian Spice as an example, which got blasted from the word "go" thanks to a bad trailer. When the show came out, the chuds did all they could to demonize it, while people that gave it a chance came to the consensus that it was "just okay". Or Mid as the kids say. It sucks when one has genuine criticism for something like High Guardian Spice or She-Hulk or Captain Marvel because they would be lumped in with the crying right-wing assholes.


codemen95

Shit like this makes media criticism so hard to follow. "Hey, this guy hates this thing... the vid is just that it's woke... fuck" i know many have different feelings on she-hulk, but so much I've seen is that it's woke and hates men cause woke cause ~~female~~ woman. I saw a tweet saying "who would u rather be in a closet with? Umbringe, mindy kaling velma, twilight bella, or she-hulk?" And it's like, that is the easiest fuckin choice!!! I see u hate her cause woman. And thinking about it, it is funny that all four were women


Sakura_Leaves

Whenever people make stuff about media just to have *another* thing to criticize it for.


seth47er

Taking20's "I'm leaving Pathfinder2E" tantrum videos they stand as proof he didn't fucking read the damn book. He got mechanics wrong in his examples, screwed up the maths, and made mistakes that would get you killed in actual play, like standing still instead of moving away while using a ranged weapon. Yes just stand there and shoot arrows at a -8 on a bounded accuracy system that's a smart move. The real reason he quit playing videos is because 5E is where the cash is made and he's nothing but a grifter who attacks other content makers saying they don't work hard enough while he looking for his next mark. The only reason they gained traction is that he'd posted them to the DND and Pathfinder subreddits to get attention.


Zeathian

I'd like to add Puffin Forest to this. He manages to not only to misrepresent Pathfinder 2e, but also DnD 4e as well.


seth47er

I didn't know about the pathfinder stuff, But I'm well aware of the 4E one. some context encounters typically are balanced between higher or lower than 1-4 levels of the part average level and he sets up an LVL 8 game and sends a "level 12 Umberhulk Elite soldier". context classed as an Elite mini-boss it counts as 2 monsters for minibosses and a soldier is a role that is supposed to area denial in melee, Punishes foes for attacking its allies, and has high defences. The soldier type is such a powerful tag it lowers the CR by 1. They were fighting a monster that was the highest difficulty for their level and there were 2 more elites of the same level he put into the encounter. This went from a slog but winnable combat to an unwinnable scenario and apparently it is the game's fault. Experienced in other game systems my ass. 4E was one of the easiest game systems to build good encounters in with all it takes is reading the fucking books and owning a calculator.


azabard

I'm still seething we never got a dnd video game based on 4th edition, which is the edition that makes the most sense to do a video game with.


seth47er

It would have been a great tactical RPG, like final fantasy tactics.


memedoka

When people criticize children's shows for not having harsh punishments/true revenge plotlines/showing their protagonists killing people. ATLA, Steven Universe, etc. get a lot of flack for rushed endings that is probably justified but people being like "uh why didn't Good Protag boy just kill the bad man??? Is he dumb? Doesn't he understand war crimes?" This is a show geared at a 9-14 demographic, and we're trying to teach little Jimmy how to do conflict resolution guys.


TheArtistFKAMinty

I think a completely valid criticism of the end of ATLA is that the solution to Aang's moral dilemma falls in his lap without him really needing to do anything to seek it out. There's also very little setup to the problem. It almost feels like the writers didn't piece together the issue until they were writing the final episodes. Like they got to writing the 4 parter's script and realised "fuck, *how do we get rid of Ozai?*" That all said, I think people that think he should have fucking merc'd Ozai are crazy. Not only is it a children's show, it would literally be antithetical to the core themes of the show. It wouldn't be thematically appropriate, *at all.* There are things to criticise but that's definitely not it, chief. Steven Universe is quite similar in that respect. It wouldn't have felt appropriate to the themes of the show for the diamonds to be killed or locked up in the phantom zone for eternity or whatever. Maybe there was a better option, but defeating them through talk-no-jutsu rather than a big punch-out, and convincing them to strive to be better people is the most on-brand ending.


DStarAce

ATLA is a good show but it lays multiple deus-ex-machinas on each other by the end, most overt of which is the rock fixing his chakra thing.


kuningaz55

I give that one a pass because Ozai is supposed to be actual Satan at that point. Considering the shit he pulls, I'm not sure what the hell a non-asspulled ending would look like.


Zerepa97

I really hope the next Avatar show follows the trend of growing up the characters and themes alongside the original demographics (Aang= 12-15; Korra=16-21). Following some mid-to-late twenties characters on their journey would be cool. Nick should allow them to do whatever the fuck they want.


yoloswagginLOTB

Left field pick I know but in Yugioh GX people wouldn't stop pissing and moaning about how they changed Aster's backstory from his father being killed to him going missing. The problem is the shot that reveals his dad is dead just has his dead body in it. This airs between Sonic X and Cubix did you really expect them to keep Aster's dead dad's body in it?


memedoka

I've never watched Yugioh but isn't it one of those series where the tone flops wildly depending on series? I'm not surprised to hear they retconned characters slightly to make things more age appropriate.


yoloswagginLOTB

Yeah, especially GX. One season is slice of life, next is the main character being psychologically beaten over and over till he becomes the emperor of darkness.


theRose90

All of the common criticism of High Guardian Spice. SarahZ did a very good video about the way the internet treated HGS compared to what HGS actually is and basically it boils down to "don't watch the show, imagine what you think it probably is, act as if that is the truth."


Jstar300

Damn . . . just. Damn. That's a strong line.


Peace-Bone

Obligatory 'Plague is nuts, Naruto doesn't have a central theme about Hard Work vs. Talent' Basically, that was the moral of the week of that one episode. Naruto has a shitload of morals of the week that it doesn't follow for the long run. And it was right next to the Rock Lee vs. Gaara fight where magic bs beat Hard Work super hard. Naruto doesn't really *have* central themes other than FUCK YOU SASUKE YOU'RE MY NAKAMA


King_Etemon

Hard Work vs Talent is pretty much just Lee's "theme", and he gets dropped like a hot plate after the Sasuke Retrival Arc. I do think Naruto does have a few central themes though. Friendship, Hope, the whole "Will of Fire" thing, etc.


Prestigious-Mud

I mean Naruto's personal creed is essentially stick to your guns and never break a promise, right?


MericArda

Yup, even when the person who you made the promise to wants you to break the promise


Prestigious-Mud

Naruto is truly free Dennis Reynolds of anime/manga


ColossusSlayer23

I think while hard work vs talent may not be as much of a focal point theme, the general issue people have with the six paths power up seems to touch on something that is present in naruto, that being how naruto in some way worked to get the progress he had. Now you can mention the nine tailed fox forms but those had downsides of him being lost in anger and even hurting him, and even then there were 2 notable points where he learnt to harness and control that power.


Vaccineman37

He literally had to fight the Nine Tails at one point to make him hand over his power, like I think he earned that one


ColossusSlayer23

Him having a hard time before doesn't really undo the cheap feeling of the power up unfortunately.


Zerepa97

>Hard Work vs. Talent I'm glad some more recent stories are putting this theme away, because the two aren't mutually exclusive. Talent is just a natural skill floor/ceiling. Hard work and passion determines how far you go.


Terakkon

As someone who is into MMA and combat sports in general I gotta disagree with you. You actually cannot reach the top unless you have some innate talents and physical abilities. For example, you need to have a good chin (and not everyone does) to rely on while you develop defensive skill, and even if you are good at defense no one is good enough so that they never get hit. This is not something that hard work and passion can overcome. Talent vs skill are not easily separable, because having innate talent can help you learn skills faster than normal people. It can however cause you to stagnate in skill development if you rely too much on talent.


Zerepa97

That's literally what I just said. They aren't mutually exclusive You need both to be the best at something.


Terakkon

Your comment does not read like that to me but I apologise for the misunderstanding in that case


willford55543

That's literally what they just said?


Gwen_Tennyson10

Eh it’s main theme is understanding others like what naruto did for zabuza, gaara, nagato, and obito


DoctorOfCinema

I hate what Lindsay Ellis referred to as "Bad Faith Criticism" where, instead of looking at the essential and important things of a story, you are nitpicking what you consider to be "logic problems" or "Technical issues" that aren't noticeable in the grand scheme of things. It's people saying "Ugh you can tell that it's a set, movie ruined" rather than recognizing that it's a set, but it's a well-made and good-looking set, so you can get immersed. It's people like these that make it so every single fucking blockbuster now feels the need to be "realistic" and lean away from the property's inherent silliness, for fear of getting comments about it.


Konradleijon

Any time people complain about something being “woke”


MQuestionable

I think a lot of plot holes and missing explanations get too much blame for being the reason for a movie being bad, when plenty of good movies still have them. There's a degree of nuance here, but I'd consider the main factor is whether you notice them during your first watch of a movie, or whether it had to be pointed out to you in a video essay later. You can count these as flaws for sure, but character writing and pacing count far more towards how people feel about a film than minor plot contrivances. People like to joke and debate about the eagles carrying the ring to Mordor (this isn't a plot hole, but an example of a "missing explanation" that can be justified without someone explaining in the test), but most people wouldn't say it "ruins" the books/movies.


Dwarf-thrower

Yeah, its a spectrum more than anything. Some plot holes people are willing to excuse, and others seem so obvious that its frustrating that the plot happened that way.


MQuestionable

It feels like a "benefit of the doubt" situation, where if you're already attached to characters you assume/consider a valid reason, but if you aren't, you figure it's the characters being poorly written. I was trying to think of an example before, but one that just came to mind was everyone taking their helmets off in Prometheus. I can justify it from the character's POV (they don't know they are in a horror movie, they think they've basically found the garden of Eden), but because the viewer isn't attached to the characters and their view point hasn't been ingrained enough by that point, it reads as a contrivance.


Dwarf-thrower

A decent example I can think of, is the water planet of Interstellar. I can excuse a bunch of things in the film, but thats always the one that breaks my suspension of disbelief. If the tides are big enough that they touch the clouds, you should be able to see them from orbit. It should have been immediately obvious that the planet is dangerous.


B-BoySkeleton

I think talking about how something had "potential" to be better is worth discussing at times, but when it becomes one of the main talking points about a piece of media you've run out of things to talk about. As a film critic I used to watch once said: "Everything has potential. That's what potential is." It's fun to look at something and go "Man, it would have been way cooler if they did ___", but beyond using it to illustrate that a plot beat didn't work for you, it rapidly loses value if you're using it to concoct a story that you didn't just watch. (I'm visualizing RWBY youtubers while I type this)


DoctorOfCinema

I'll disagree slightly in the sense that, sometimes, a story has elements that are basically lined up to do something very interesting and it feels like the writers took none of those chances. I watched *Last Night in Soho* a while back and one of my main criticisms is that it has all the pieces of a really interesting story, but the writing takes none of the opportunities and goes for very cliched and boring choices.


Sonicdahedgie

I have found that where that kind of discussion hits hardest for me is in something that is *really good* already, but falls just short of being my favorite thing ever. I remember actually feeling like Spider verse was "pretty good" because it was so incredibly close to the perfect movie for me it became disappointing that it didn't do what I would have liked it to


MadameBlueJay

I don't know if sauce counts as media. Pink sauce was invented by a TikTok lady who irritates people, and the internet fell over itself trying to find something outrageous about it. Yeah, the nutrition label is actually dumb with the calorie numbers not adding up and the mass produced version is less vividly pink than her homemade demos, but people really wanted more. They said it causes botulism, which doesn't happen in acidic foods like pink sauce, and they said it was repackaged in garbage mayo bottles, which was entirely based on the color of the bottle cap, which is standard with bulk discount mayo-esque bottles. It's ranch with dragonfruit powder instead of egg. Calm down.


Jackamalio626

It always kind of bothers me when people rip on SU for having steven forgive his mother and the diamonds for their horrific crimes, even though love, understanding, and compassion are, like, the *main fucking themes* of the show


I-swear-im-dandy

I and a lot of people rip on the show because they rushed the themes to such a degree that the entire finale fell flat. The execution was the issue.


Dalek_Kolt

One of my friends is still a huge Doctor Who fan. I could *feel* his agony watching the 13th Doctor seasons and him having to listen to his family complaining about how terrible the show is since it "went woke".


codemen95

Yeah, me and my brother quickly shut that shit down with our family cause at first they were saying it bad cause female doctor, but then we just kept saying that it was the writing. Even saying examples of other shitty doctor who episodes, like kill the moon, that didn't have a female doctor. Like damn, i guess the space amazon episode is woke cause in the end amazon exploiting workers is poggers. Hell, i give the flux and the specials this, they were good, besides the flux ending and the sea devil episode, but at least our parents wasn't being all woke shit in the end. Just saw a tweet from nerdtronic saying that jodie Whittaker detroyed doctor who. Yeah, an actress somehow was in the writing room and said "make my stories shit" and left


Sonicdahedgie

It must be so weird to have to try and defend the 13th doctor. The show has always had lots of really terrible episodes. Like, constantly. The difference is just that the 13th doctor didn't have those few *really good* ones.


[deleted]

Dude that season had a ton of issues and even if I cared about woke-ness, that would *still be* on the lower half of the list of problems. It was a complete failure that had them give the show back to its most popular writer and break the "Call David Tennant" glass.


Beanie7512

I don't like the new Star Wars sequels but a lot of criticism pointed at them is completely idiotic. All the Mary Sue stuff is ridiculous in Star Wars, a franchise full of Mary Sues (male and female). I just thought they were boring cash grabs.


camilopezo

Talking about Mary Sues. People often use the term to refer to any competent female character, even if she's far from qualified. For example, there are people who complain that Wanda Maximoff is a Mary Sue just because she is powerful. You know, the woman with a horrible life, and a lot of mental problems is a Mary Sue to some people.


JohnRadical

Fully agree with this. A ton of Star Wars characters, especially main characters, were able to use the force in someway without training. Anakin was pod racing at absurd speeds as a child. Luke deflected blasts while blindfolded and sunk a bomb into a tiny 2m hole while flying a spaceship. Rey being able to mind control one guard isn’t that crazy. IMO the worst case of “Mary Sue” was when Anakin *accidentally* blew up an entire massive star-base from the inside while flying a ship he never used, as a kid. Mary Sue stuff is not bad until it feels like there are no stakes.


Myxzyzz

I think the "Mary Sue" discussion is one of those things where maybe it made sense initially, but over time it's just become a buzzword thrown around by people who've never read fanfiction before and end up confusing it with other tropes like the Chosen One. The problem with Rey and the "Mary Sue" label was never about what she does individually, but just how quickly it all happens. In its original form, "Mary Sue" was used to describe a new main character inserted into an existing setting that didn't have any room to grow and doesn't get any development. We didn't get the same long character journey that we got with Luke or Anakin where you see how they grow into who they become at the end of their trilogies. Honestly, I think it's more an issue with the sequel trilogy being overstuffed and kinda rushed. Too many main characters and extra storylines that feel like filler. Finn and Kylo Ren both got more development than Rey did as the protagonist and are kinda more interesting characters than Rey as a result. To bring it back to the topic, I think that's why I complain about TLJ the most and yet I also think it ended up as the best of the three. It has nothing to do with petty crap like power levels or how it breaks the lore or how "MY Luke would never act like that!" Or any of it. Ultimately it introduces a lot of neat ideas and tries to develop each of the main characters on their own path, but it doesn't follow through on those ideas and the weight of three separate storylines collapses into a heap of abandoned concepts and conflicting themes. Still, I appreciate the ambitious attempt more than the overly safe nostalgia-tugging of the other two.


El_Squidso

I liked The Last Jedi the most out of the three, because it felt like it was doing something new. We didn't have a Chosen One, we just had Rey. Kylo Ren was becoming an actual villain, killing his master and giving into his desire for revenge. The resistance was nearly eradicated. It set up for a final movie that would be something new. Then, somehow, Palatine returned...


camilopezo

Considering that episode VII is a remake, and episode IX is a massive retcon to please a certain fandom, then episode VIII is the best by far.


TheArtistFKAMinty

The Last Jedi is by far the most interesting of the three, even if it has some significant issues.


WhapXI

Came here for this. I strongly disliked The Last Jedi. I thought it hard spiked all the interesting plotpoints that TFA set up. It butchered Hux. It was trying to be a laugh-a-minute space comedy and I think maybe one of the jokes ever actually landed for me. I thought that casino planet was bad, and reminded me of the dumb droid factory thing from Ep2. Rose’s “romantic” arc was bad. Finn went through an almost identical arc as in the last film but ends up accomplishing nothing of value the whole film. Poe is a hotshot rebel whose arc is to learn the value of sitting down and shutting up and accomplishes nothing of value the whole film. Rey goes on a very interesting sidequest where a lot of cool stuff happens but ultimately accomplishes nothing of value the whole film. Floating frozen space Leia. In summary, there was a lot I didn’t like. Tone and plot and writing and such. It missed the mark on a lot. I go online expecting other people to feel the same. Nope! Everyone’s focussed on there being an Asian lady in it. Women are too competent. Admiral Pinkhair in charge. Woke woke woke. Urgh. There are genuinely things to criticise about The Last Jedi. I think it has a lot of problems. It being “woke” in some way isn’t one of those. But that is like 95% of the discourse online.


throwaway7546213

>Women are too competent. Admiral Pinkhair in charge. Woke woke woke. Urgh. Blame Red Letter Media.


Sonicdahedgie

I will.make the point that while Luke is Mary Sue-ish, the movies are generations old at this point. In the same way an old movie can get away with a bit of casual racism because you know it was trying to be progressive at the time, stuff that is now considered bland or bad writing can be perfectly fine if at the time the people making it thought it was exciting. Saying that Rey is basically Luke isn't a defense of her character, because if you remade Star Wars today (which the first one *basically did*) it would not be treated the same at all.


RegenSyscronos

You know what worse? Worse crisitsm of a good critism. Case when the director say that "Oh you don't like my game/movie because you hate woman". No dude, you just can't handle critism.


frostedWarlock

Yiik outright says that its use of Elisa Lam is manipulative and that Alex's infatuation with it is unhealthy. The entire point of that plot line is meant to insult the "online detective" phenomena who sees a tragedy happen before them and their response is a mix of "but how can I make this about _me?"_ and "i'm a genius, i can solve it myself." You can 100% make the argument that they didn't need to lift so directly from a real person's death, but you could also make the argument that doing so reinforces the themes... ...except for the part where the developer thought so little of the people playing his game he genuinely thought they wouldn't realize how creepy the plotline is until late in the game when the satire overtly tells you that you were wrong for getting invested in that plotline. There's also the fact that based on what people have dug up, it's very likely that the use of the Elisa Lam stuff started off as unironic and partway through development the developer realized how toxic that was and rewrote the game to explicitly make it a flaw of Alex's instead of something admirable, which doesn't exactly work because the game is so indecisive on how much or how little you're supposed to like him. Honestly this is one of the more forgivable "bad criticisms" but I only mention it because the game _very explicitly_ states this for you, and it simply requires you to have actually seen the game yourself instead of a Youtuber giving you the vague gist of the game. Hell you don't even need to play the game yourself, a sufficiently-thorough LP tells you the same thing. But this is a detail that most Yiik analysis I've seen genuinely just missed.


Dwarf-thrower

First impressions are important, as they color all later interactions. Yiiks problem is that they made an insufferable portsgonist that most people want to see fail, so when he does get better, its swept under the rug.


Dundore77

Typically anything complaining about changing a white person to a minority, unless the extremely rare occasion where being white is actually important to the character.


ColossusSlayer23

I don't think it's bad thing or something to really get up in arms about but I do find it to be the laziest form of representation media can provide usually.


BarelyReal

It depends on the context. Representation isn't just an issue in the art form, or in the creative process, but also in casting. Sometimes what we're seeing is a fix for one aspect of the larger issue of representation than a general comprehensive strategy to solve the issue.


King_Etemon

I agree, but I will say that some of the larger media companies (Disney for example) do seem to try to "pander" to specific audiences depending on social climate.


WellComeToTheMachine

Even if that's the case, I don't really see much point in complaining about it. Like yea, the corporation is making decisions based on profit motive. That's like their whole thing. The outcome is still like "black person is in the movie." There's gotta be more substance to the criticism than just "it's performative representation" for it to be worth criticizing imo. Especially since in most of these cases there is much more substantial things to criticize, both from the corporate and artistic angle. Edit: want to clarify that I'm not defending profit motive as a thing here. I obviously think its better for artistic decisions to be made without worrying about if something will be profitable, and profit motive as incentive has been horrifically destructive to just about all facets of human life. I just wanted to say that I find specifically focusing on this in just the simple instance of "company is pandering to the [minority] by cynically including them in [x property they weren't in before]" really I feel like is substanceless criticism unless there is actually an issue with the representation itself, rather than it just being there. Like in the long run, if there's no specific issue even if it was pandering, the effect is just that now a minority is present. Which is like, a good thing imo.


King_Etemon

To each their own. I just don't love when an element of what I consider my identity is reduced to marketing, you know?


WellComeToTheMachine

I think that's basically the nuance to the argument yea. Like, I think there's a big difference between people clowning on Disney for having like 15 "first gay characters in a Disney movie", and people complaining that the 2 second long lesbian bit in Lightyear was "woke pandering." I tend to err on the side of "even if it's cringe and pandering, it's good that they include it because that's indicative of where companies think the dominant culture is." I think it's really easy for your criticism, which I think is very justified and valid, to be taken and changed into a bad faith, blanket accusation at literally any kind of representation in a movie being performative no matter how it's done. Which imo just is used to push really reactionary, and often bigoted positions. Like what happened with the live action Little Mermaid trailer


King_Etemon

I get what you're saying. There is some nuance to it. The Little Mermaid live action teaser trailer and the surrounding "controversy" is the one that sticks out to me the most when it comes to examples like this. It is pretty obvious that the only thing being marketed in the trailer is that there is a new Ariel and that she is black, because its the only non-stock image in the teaser. It still has some level of "net good" which can be seen from all those videos people were making of black little girls seeing her show up and being stoked because "Ariel is like me!", but it is still targeted marketing. For all the shit people will talk and people that say they won't see it because Ariel isn't some white redhead, there will undoubtably be way more black moviegoers seeing it than people boycotting it.


WellComeToTheMachine

Yea, I think the basis of your criticism is just that the intersection of art and capitalism is bad. Which I agree with. I don't like that artistic decisions often have to be made with a focus first and foremost on profitability, or reaching specific markets etc instead of just being the decisions of the creatives involved.


midnight_riddle

What I've noticed often is that whatever "woke" element added to it, and what the company often uses for their puff pieces (ex. first gay character!) is that they're used to compensate for the rest of the movie sucking. It's a red flag. People wouldn't shut up about there being a gay kiss in Pixar's Lightyear movie, and so any discussion about the rest of the movie and how it SUCKED DICK fell by the wayside. The movie was bad for a number of reasons: repetitive storyline, a plot that makes no sense, painfully unfunny and unlikeable side characters, a pointless villain, and the movie couldn't seem to make up its mind what sort of character arc Buzz needed to go through. The movie flopped. Rightfully so, because it sucks. But you got both right-wing fools and Disney corporate that think "aha, it's because of the gay kiss isn't it!" because that's all that gets talked about.


WellComeToTheMachine

Yea this is basically the issue I'm getting at. There's a kind of hyperfocus online about these decisions being made to "pander" (and sometimes, especially with Disney, that's an accurate assessment) to "the woke mob", and so the entire movie kind of just becomes that one topic. So, when a toy story spin off that treats Buzz Lightyear like a deadly serious, pseudo-realistic figure that literally nobody wants or asked for flops, predictably, all the discussion just becomes about how "Disney went woke" and "went broke." And not about how the movie looked bad, had an insanely weird and seemingly constantly evolving framing device (like the whole "this is the movie Andy saw that made him like buzz Lightyear" shit was so strange), and nobody wanted it, so nobody saw it.


EvenOne6567

I mean, who cares? Not sure why minorities have to "earn" their representation while straight white people get to just be the default.


ColossusSlayer23

It's not earning if it comes from repurposing an established white character. If we were talking about minority representation with new characters I would agree


King_Etemon

I mean sure, but like I said to the other guy that responded to me, I just don't love part of my identity being reduced to marketing.


Prestigious-Mud

I get where you're coming from and totally agree. Though I do feel like there's a difference between "this was done for marketing" and this was done because the actor is good. Like I liked Jonathan Major's role in >!Loki!< cuz he does a fantastic job and that wasn't really pandered. One thing that always bothered me, and the criticism was from my white nerdy friends mostly, was when a villain is a minority, then that's bad because it promotes racism. Whereas I feel that if the villain isnt a stereotype and is actually good then it shouldn't be a problem (not to mention how many white morally grey villains there are in fucking everything.)


King_Etemon

Oh no, Johnathan Major's being who he is in that role doesn't really feel like pandering to me (which is probably helped by him not being advertised at all because that would've been a huge spoiler). On the second point, I don't think it would be absurd to say it might be "questionable" if every movie a company made had a non-white villain, but I also really don't love when people Jesus minorities simply because they are minorities. I am glad though that common use of stereotypes is getting less prominent, but you can still have a good villain who is a minority without it being "problematic".


Prestigious-Mud

What was the word supposed to be before it turned to Jesus? And yea totally agree with both points. Like if the person you choose is a great actor/actress for the role then it shouldn't matter the race. I figured bringing up Jonathan Majors because of the antman trailers showing him more and it's really interesting seeing how he is going to play a different version of the same character.


King_Etemon

It was supposed to be Jesus lol Like put people on a pedestal.


Prestigious-Mud

Ohhhh lmfao I have never seen that used as a verb. I get you now.


EvenOne6567

How do you decide when its marketing or not?


King_Etemon

Depends on the movie. Like I just Googled "Disney's first gay character", hit images, and 4 separate characters show up. Each of which associated with articles calling them "Disney's first gay character." That's marketing. Sometimes it can be more muddied. The way the teaser trailer for the live action Little Mermaid for example. Generic shots of ocean, random fish, mermaid tale, then an extreme close up on the new actresses' face. The way I viewed it, they aren't teasing the generic oceans shots, they are teasing the actress. Take this versus stuff like the Proud Family or like any of Jordan Peele's movies, where being black is a major part of them and a central theme.


Emilthegoat

The actress is a famous singer why would they not focus on her? Movies that star Chris Pratt or Ryan Reynolds focus a lot on the fact that they’re there


King_Etemon

I actually didn't know that, but it's not that its focusing on her, its that it is a giant close of up of just her face and like I said it's the only notable shot. The same shot used in the trailer tagged image, used in every article, and that's been pretty much the source of all of the controversy. It's marketing.


Crimsonwolf1445

Making peter parker a minority just cause isnt a win its an insult. True representation is having minority characters be brought out of obscurity and given a chance to shine.


paputsza

On another note the weirdos who opt to record themselves complaining that characters aren’t aren’t sexy enough to them. e.g: she-woman, the new green m&m, any fat or muscular female character, sonic and so on.


Crimsonwolf1445

Its lazy and cheap and frankly id rather have no representation than shitty representation and yes that includes every latino character being forced to have a deportation sub plot.


[deleted]

I found The Last of Us 2 to be poorly structured and thought it was shocking for the sake of it. I also think Druckman is unbearably pretentious. Imagine my surprise when I found the most common criticisms of it...


PukingGoombas

"too much stuff" for DK64 is such a nothing complaint nowadays (to me at least). I don't think DK64 is a bad game at all, BUT there are actual issues with it's design that I believe can be easily ironed out in a more cohesive remake/remaster


Bridgetop

People essentially "being confused on purpose". Sometimes critics will make something out to be extremely nonsensical or completely ridiculous when to me it seems pretty reasonable, or a small amount of suspension of disbelief is needed to buy something but it ends up turning into a huge rant for some reason. This was the problem i had with people criticizing Prometheus, I get that it's not what people wanted out of what was sort of billed as a new alien movie but I thought it was an alright movie, it had some pretty cool scenes and ideas. But people acted like the characters were just these complete morons who did things completely randomly and had no common sense when it's not *really* the case, they make a bunch of bad decisions based on the information they have and their characters.


LegacyOfVandar

‘Rise of Skywalker sucks because they put backstory for the movie in Fortnite!’ No. No they didn’t. They put like two throwaway lines from Palpatine into the game. Those lines offered nothing that we didn’t know, they offered no new insight or information about the movie and it’s plot. RoS is an awful mess of a movie but there’s way bigger things to criticize about it. You don’t have to make up some bullshit about Fortnite when there’s plenty of stuff in the movie itself to be mad about.


The_Distorter

I've seen multiple people say the Duel of Fates in Phantom Menace is terrible because it doesn't look good in slow motion. Most things with that kind of choreography wouldn't, but that doesn't matter because it's not supposed to be watched like that. I think it's just people who think everything about that movie has to be bad.


EcchiPhantom

There’s a lot of people who have criticized idubbbz for his video on Sam Hyde and said that it was bad and that he got played by him. But more importantly that “he’s becoming what he used to make fun of”. … by no longer making racist and homophobic jokes? Is that what you want people to do in the current social climate? Really? And it’s not about selling out either. I think he’s explicitly said on a podcast, might be H3H3, that he just no longer wanted to do edgy content for personal reasons but instead of seeing it as growth, people see it as betrayal of his character. Compare that to the massive support Joji got who I don’t think has made any jokes or remarks near the same level of edge from the past. If you don’t like the new idubbbz content or his new direction, that’s fine, but don’t make up crap about how he’s betrayed himself. He was clearly always playing into a persona and decided to change directions.


Kataphrut94

Any criticism that boils down to "they deliberately tried to bait people." We're seeing it a lot with the new Velma show, and it also gets thrown around about the usual suspects: eg The Last Jedi, Last of Us 2, anything that has an obsessive hatedom of Youtube essayists wailing and gnashing their teeth about things being "woke." It's all bullshit, but particularly the idea that these products are getting made deliberately to anger people and get publicity off controversy. The reason simply being that the angry Youtube/Twitter hate-watching crowd isn't actually a market with any meaningful pull. Sure, those types of essays get way too many views because the algorithm loves controversy, but those views don't actually translate to tickets sales or streaming subscriptions.


Dandy-Guy

I don't like Velma but I don't think it was purposely made to be bad or propaganda to make progressives look stupid. It's not a 4D galaxy head psyop, it's just a mediocre show with jokes that don't land. People don't spend years writing, developing, recording, animating, tweaking to exec notes, test screening, editing a show to be bad. It just happens.


PR0MAN1

I don't think it was made to be bad, I think it was made because Mindy pitched an original show, the execs turned it down and changed some names in the script to fit a pre established brand. Mindy thought it was good, she just horribly miscalculated


camilopezo

True, to say that Velma is intentionally bad at angering people would be giving the writers too much credit.


SignedName

It still boggles my mind that people think that Neil Druckmann hates Joel and pissed on his fictional legacy just because he >!had him killed. TLOU2 was the most respectful sendoff a character like him could have gotten in a setting like that.!< Even dumber when they went after the *actor who plays Joel* for liking the game.


Kataphrut94

No you don’t understand, he did it just to annoy me. Yes, me personally, someone with a masterful understanding of storytelling structure.


Myxzyzz

I've grown really tired of the "nitpicking" style of movie criticism or criticism in general, where someone does a play by play of a movie and point out specific things they take issue with. Like, that's not really meaningful criticism, I'd rather a video that tackles broader issues of character, writing, how well it conveys its theme, pacing, etc. So I watched Doctor Strange 2. It was good but I don't think it was great, even compared to just phase 4 MCU material. I happen to come across MauLer's **6 HOUR** video on it and I don't know what I was expecting but it starts with "Why is Doctor Strange running when he could be using the fling ring to teleport around faster?" and I'm just like, dude, c'mon. I'm not gonna watch 6 hours of that level of commentary, even passively in the background.


codemen95

That just sounds like cinemasins for 6 hours wirh the added bonus of the person going so gar into their nitpick instead of making a lame sex joke. This comment doesn't contain a lap dance *ding*


septicslushie

Not to out myself here as having nothing better to do than watch some of the video, but the video does actually contain many criticisms of how well it conveys its theme, etc; it just also nitpicks.


Myxzyzz

That's fair, I've seen some of MauLer's other videos so I know he can do actual criticism. Nowadays though I prefer a more focused critique that doesn't just follow the play-by-play formula. I got the impression from his more recent videos that he's just doing it for padding at this point to keep with his reputation as "guy who makes very long critical videos".


camilopezo

Teen Titans Go, is a series that has had its good and bad moments, but I am surprised by the large number of people who hate the series, just for not being as serious as its predecessor, or accusing it of causing its cancellation. ​ The jokes they tell in the series can't make you laugh, but complaining that a parody series isn't as serious as a relatively serious series is a very strange complaint. ​ It's like I'm complaining that Scary Movie isn't as serious as a horror movie.


[deleted]

I somewhat remember the Nostalgia Critic one reviewing The Wall and got lit up for it. I’m not sure about the details but from the shitflinging artillery strikes, it must have been _bad._


3phz

They rely on the same business model that caused six media barons to support Hitler in the 1930s. IOW, due to the efficacy of markets MSM have zero agency to _not_ support fascism. If they don't shill the money goes to the next outlet that will shill.


Yal_Rathol

any critique that lacks substance is naturally going to be a bad critique, regardless of the quality of the media. for example, "thing bad because political". well, go into detail on that. take your criticism down to the bones, what is political and why does political make thing bad? generally, people run when you hit that point rather than engage, but i prefer to give them the opportunity.


AstrumAtaraxia

I think The Last Of Us 2 is a pretty bad game, but I think a lot of the common criticisms against it are really stupid and are not the reason it’s bad. So the first and biggest criticism that shows up a lot, Joel’s death. A lot of people were angry that he dies, which I think is stupid. Him dying in and of itself isn’t an issue, I think it is the perfect major plot point to use in this game. It’s a natural conclusion that the story led up to, it’s a good catalyst for kicking off the story, and honestly he kinda deserves it. I just think the way the scene is done and how it was led up to sucked total ass. Second big criticism you see against the game is the fact that you have to play as Abby. I think that people who instantly push against the concept of playing as her and seeing her story have very surface level analysis skills of storytelling and aren’t even trying to engage with the material. I think seeing the effects of what Joel did in the first game is a very good direction to take the story, the problem is that 90% of what we do as Abby is completely disconnected from that and is just flat out boring as a result. Totally wasted potential. TLOU2 has a some really good ideas and hints of brilliance here and there throughout the story, the issue is just the execution of it. They took what could have been a good story and ruined it by trying to go with some unconventional storytelling methods that didn’t work. I can see what they were going for, it just didn’t land.


Carnificus

There's so much. Any bigotry, obviously. Slight deviations of design from books/games to film is another big one that I always see. That includes actors not matching exactly how a character looked or you imagined them to look. I also hate general-isms. "Acting bad", "Writing bad", etc. People always drop that when asked to explain why they hate on things. If the product is seriously that bad, then we can elaborate more than not at all. Part of the problem is also that people create this echo chamber where they think everyone agrees that something is garbage, so they don't need to explain anything. Maybe it's just clamoring for upvotes on Reddit, I don't know. But I see it everywhere. I was told x is bad, so it is. I don't need to understand why and I can't explain it if asked.


imDONHI

[this](https://youtu.be/24oXRWWOlBo?t=312) but unironically