I don't know if I understand people's love of horror, gore or Twilight Zone style O.Henry stories. I am like an alien from outerspace when it comes to that stuff… I just don't GET why people like it. XD
I don't have the part of the brain needed for it.

I can MAKE horror stuff super easy if I try, it requires zero effort at all to make something scary or horrific and I consider Twilight Zone style stories childish because they're the most basic to understand and write of any kind of story.

I understand the form. I just don't understand the appeal. Why does anyone like it?


————–

I finally finished the entirety of “Bones”. Interesting watching the lead actor Emily Deschanel get fatter towards the end and David Boreanaz get uglier XD
They addressed Emily's weight gain in character in an episode or two but never acknowledged David getting uglier… Rather characters tended to act as if he was a hotty, LOL!

The show seemed to stay pretty good all the way to the end.

I think the appeal changes a lot with the “style” of horror, so not everybody will like the same horror stories.

I personally don't care bodily horror or scares, but I like atmosphere, and fancy concepts for supernatural monsters (I love Lovecraft for example).

I think this specific kind of horror works on some archaic parts of the human psyche and are a way to see ourselves, in some very primal way.

Ozoneocean wrote:
I don't know if I understand people's love of horror, gore or Twilight Zone style O.Henry stories.

It could stem from how clever and intelligent you are. You can see the twist or understand it and it's not super clever or special. Nothing special here. Meh.
I try accept the story on its own level. I won't try to outsmart the story. Learned that from a 600 page novel I had totally all figured out on page 6 but kept reading and even enjoying until the end. I can even enjoy the so-called “idiot” plot. The one where the story only works if the entire cast are idiots. I'll lower my expectations and play along. I know it's garbage and wonder how anyone can like it but just enjoy it on its level.

It also helps that I'm an awful hack writer and constantly on the look out for ideas to steal. ;)

I saw Meet the Spartans and that was beyond stupid. The best jokes were the ones about bodily functions and that's really saying something. Some bits had a lot of potential and they just threw it away every time.

I don't think intelligence has anything to do with it, it's merely preference. The smartest people I know love some truly daft stuff and accept it for what it is. There's something to be said immersing yourself in a story and letting go and letting it take you for a ride.

Home Movies was way ahead of its time.

I just rewatched the Ryan Gosling movie “Drive” I think it's one of my favorite movies ever made. It even has an immersive soundtrack. His character is so cool in the film and I can really relate to him because I have always been a lone wolf and immersed in hobbies. He doesn't get the girl in the end and that feels so familiar. The film came out in 2011 and I watch it every year. The ending always leaves me with an emptiness in my stomach yet it has room for lots of possibilities.

I saw drive and I liked it. However, I liked “only God forgives” more (same actor and same director, slightly older).
Only for people who stand/like violent movies though.

The Storyteller and Story Teller Greek Myths the old series from 1988 from Jim Hensen productions. I figured I'd watch one to refresh my memory. Nope, watched all of them. Nine episodes of the series narrated by John Hurt and four Greek myths narrated by Michael Gambon. They are so well told with only the necessary narrative, the creatures are from Jim Henson Creature Workshop and wonderfully realized. I never knew that Sean Bean, Derek Jacobi, Jennifer Saunders and other familiar faces from Absolutely Fabulous to the Sharpe series were in it.
And these are alternative versions and little known folk stories. I tried real hard to catch them first run and then on HBO but always missed them or only saw bits and pieces.

Then there's The Outer Limits which is now on YouTube and there are some fine episodes here of decent science fiction. The series even had an adaptation of Eando Binder's original I, Robot as well two dark tales from Harlan Ellison. Some of the stories will seem very familiar because they've inspired so many copies. That's me. I like to go back and see the trope/cliché when it was still a fresh new idea.

bravo1102 wrote:
The Storyteller and Story Teller Greek Myths the old series from 1988 from Jim Hensen productions. I figured I'd watch one to refresh my memory. Nope, watched all of them. Nine episodes of the series narrated by John Hurt and four Greek myths narrated by Michael Gambon. They are so well told with only the necessary narrative, the creatures are from Jim Henson Creature Workshop and wonderfully realized. I never knew that Sean Bean, Derek Jacobi, Jennifer Saunders and other familiar faces from Absolutely Fabulous to the Sharpe series were in it.
And these are alternative versions and little known folk stories. I tried real hard to catch them first run and then on HBO but always missed them or only saw bits and pieces.

I really enjoyed the first episode about the Hedgehog Prince.

The Giant Spider Invasion (1975) with Alan Hale Jr.as the Sheriff.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073043/

plymayer wrote:
The Giant Spider Invasion (1975) with Alan Hale Jr.as the Sheriff.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073043/

A classic for connoisseurs. 😉 Love that one!

Full Dive: This Ultimate Next-Gen Full Dive RPG Is Even Shittier than Real Life!

This is another spin on the isekai thing and it was really striking because it's so different from the majority and quite amusing because of it!

It's about a guy going into an immersive VR game.

Instead of the trope about them being the best new amazing future thing though VR games here are old hat and almost no one plays them anymore. This RPG game he decides to play was recalled because it was so bad and everyone returned it.

Instead of getting special powers and having plot armour in the game all the NPCs think he's a loser,k he gets bullied and laughed at in the game. He occidentally kills his “friend” in the game and gets arrested as a murderer. You cant get resurrected and healing herbs barely work after 3 days of rubbing them on yourself… You have no special fighting skills unless you already have them in real life.

He meets the only other active player who's been playing for 10 years and spends his time drunk at the casino because he's just got out of jail (in the game) for killing his best friend characters when he stated the game.

It just mechanically undermines all the special protagonist tropes one by one and gives this RPG a realistic spin. I love it!

Even when he chooses to go into a shop to buy equipment… he chooses the shop with a sexy girl salesperson, but at the end of the purchase he gets charged an extra 10 gold as a service fee for dealing with her LOL

I recommend it!

kawaiidaigakusei wrote:

bravo1102 wrote:
The Storyteller and Story Teller Greek Myths the old series from 1988 from Jim Hensen productions. I figured I'd watch one to refresh my memory. Nope, watched all of them. Nine episodes of the series narrated by John Hurt and four Greek myths narrated by Michael Gambon. They are so well told with only the necessary narrative, the creatures are from Jim Henson Creature Workshop and wonderfully realized. I never knew that Sean Bean, Derek Jacobi, Jennifer Saunders and other familiar faces from Absolutely Fabulous to the Sharpe series were in it.
And these are alternative versions and little known folk stories. I tried real hard to catch them first run and then on HBO but always missed them or only saw bits and pieces.

I really enjoyed the first episode about the Hedgehog Prince.

When I first saw this episode I got out my copy of Grimm's Fairy Tales and read it. It's a great story and hedgehogs are symbolic of different things in Europe. They often show up as symbols of strength and determination. Worcester mascot is the hedgehog so I got a plush when I was there for their anniversary.

@marcorossi - Thank you for the recommendation I will definitely check it out! Hey Marco, yet another great gosling dark film is “The Place Beyond the Pines” if you haven't seen it.

bravo1102 wrote:
When I first saw this episode I got out my copy of Grimm's Fairy Tales and read it. It's a great story and hedgehogs are symbolic of different things in Europe. They often show up as symbols of strength and determination. Worcester mascot is the hedgehog so I got a plush when I was there for their anniversary.

I saw all the original series with my sister many decades ago. The hedgehog prince was far better than the crappy version in the witcher- both the take on the story and the costume and makeup.

Watched “Furiosa”, it's a good movie, a bit more about drama and character than Fury Road, but still with a lot of action.

Watching The Shield. Definitely nowhere near the level of The Wire, can't say the characters are very likeable or that suspects are realistic just implicating themselves during the dumbest of interrogations even, but despite how dark it often gets, it's a much lighter meal than Oz. It's pretty decent entertainment. Although half the characters spend 90% of episodes just running side gigs, barely impacting the overarching events, it doesn't feel like they're irrelevant or annoying (unless the character just annoys you by standard).

I'm watching Republic of Doyle on Tubi.
I love it.
It's about a father and son detective team in Newfoundland, Canada. a place I have always wanted to visit.

It's a great show. I like the small scale of things unlike the vast conspiracies and serial killers in Bones and Castle… It's good to have more down to earth situations. The accents are lovely and the weird irishness/not-irish of the people is interesting.
Lovely scenery.
The lead character is a bit too much of a horn dog though. I disapprove. Stick with one woman.

I had only seen Road Warrior until Fury Road came out. So I watched all of the Mad Max movies in preparation for the new one. The first one is the roughest to get through as it is almost a silent film. George Miller is a Buster Keaton fan, and he wanted Mad Max to almost be a pantomime.

I think people are stupid, and that has given us the current situation with Mad Max. Many people complain about Fury Road not being about Mad Max. Besides the first movie, it was NEVER about Mad Max. People don't understand that they are being told a story whose meaning may be subjective.

“But wait who was Kaiser Solze?”

Verbal was lying you idiot! He's a bad guy.

Furiosa was hella entertaining by the way. (It's about Chris Hemsworth.)

I went to see “The Watchers” by Baby Shyamalan. As with Daddy's films, she just told the story she wanted to, and to hell with Hollywood's strict format. It is hit or miss and I figured out the ending almost immediately. Days later I am sure I missed something and I will watch it again soon. The fact that this is Dakota Fanning, and the acting was flat, says something about the script. The movie hints at Irish lore, and you will have to look it up yourself or read the book if you want to fully understand the film.

Huh? Mad Max is Max? 😅
The thing is though that despite being sequels they're really not. Only 2 and 3 actually follow each other. The rest have not much in common.

—-

I watched Warcraft.
I do not understand why people hated it. It was a competently told story. I wasn't very interested in it and it was really muddy with battles and betrayal and stuff but it wasn't bad. It seemed to be based on a combo of warcraft 2 and 3 with an original story. It was also made as the first part of a trilogy it seems so they left it too opening ended 😅

Maybe people wanted it based on the Rpg version?

I've been watching a lot of Isekai anime on Crunchy Roll.
I always loved the genre so I was pleased when it became the big fad so there'd be a lot more stuff to see… But I always knew that would ruin it in the end.

There are SO many crap things they just don't GET the genre- Basically lame Mary Sue wish fulfilment: Some loser poor old sad sack fool dies and ends up in a magical fantasy world being super handsome and super overpowered and respected zzzzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ BORING.

But there are also some good ones that go hard left field (another symptom of saturation).
A Handyman in another world was great. A Vending Machine in another world was fun too. ^_^
There was even a couple about a guy who becomes the leader of the bad guys.
Then Overlord, about a guy who became the evil demon lord- it had so much promise but failed SO hard.
The ones about a pharmacist in another world were good, there were a couple of those.

Generally the better ones are where you have an adult person going to the other world because that automatically gets rid of a bunch of dumb and tired clichés that highschooler protagonists are stuck with.

The very WORST are the horrible crossovers of the shitty Japanese highshool genre with Isekai. The Highschool genre is MUCH tireder than any other genre. It's anicent, creaky, and demented.

—————

I re-watched Mod Psycho 100. Which is a left field take of the ESP/spirits genre.
The first series is SO good! The OAV after it is a lame 1 hour recap episode and the second series so far is just a boring bunch of unconnected stuff that goes nowhere :(
I will try and stick with it to get to the 3 series.

Huh? Mad Max is Max? 😅
The thing is though that despite being sequels they're really not. Only 2 and 3 actually follow each other. The rest have not much in common.

Well… you are right that except for Furiosa and Fury Road the movies are not direct sequels. Like Conan, the Dollars Trilogy, and the Space Odyssey it's really an anthology with some of the same actors in different roles.

It's easy to imagine Toecutter surviving in Mad Max and becoming Immortan Joe years later. Bruce Spence plays a pilot in 2 and 3 but they are not the same character.

There is also “The Green Place”. It is implied that the people at the oil refinery in Road Warrior escaped to the Green Place before it became Gastown. Later Max finds the Green Place in Thunderdome, populated by children. Furiosa was born there, though she does not recognize Max, and later tries to escape to it.

The stories seem to be decades apart, returning to some of the same locations with different iterations of the characters. The only constant is the ageless Death Rider, Max himself.

sleeping_gorilla wrote:
The stories seem to be decades apart, returning to some of the same locations with different iterations of the characters. The only constant is the ageless Death Rider, Max himself.

Yes. Basically.
They're just poetic rips on the same theme rather than really being the same world and people.

Older sequels from the 70s and 80s usually always had that issue (apart from some exceptions, i.e. Star Wars) but Mad Max turns it up to 11. XD

I think of it more like Alternative worlds rather than sequels that happen in an order. Makes more sense that way don't you think?

I watched Warcraft.
I do not understand why people hated it. It was a competently told story. I wasn't very interested in it and it was really muddy with battles and betrayal and stuff but it wasn't bad. It seemed to be based on a combo of warcraft 2 and 3 with an original story. It was also made as the first part of a trilogy it seems so they left it too opening ended 😅

Maybe people wanted it based on the Rpg version?

I had the same kind of opinion, it's fine.

Been watching the new star wars show The Acolyte, it seems to be getting a lot of hate but I don't really see why. Again it's not amazing but it's fine.

I am currently watching Lost in Translation.
It is SO dull.

I avoided it when it came out because it looked like a dumb film that only got made because the director was the daughter of another famous director…
And yeah, that is completely true.

Why do people quote the concept. There's nothing insightful here, no clever take on anything, just a dumb concept that should never have been made into a movie.

Yes, people not connecting at all with the country they're in and treating it like a theme park zzzzzzzzzzz.
It's really just embarrassing.

You get to see Scarlett Johansson before smoking gave her a super deep crappy voice. I prefer her as a woman to a young girl though, it's less weird than ghost world seeing her like that but still ew.