I have watched less and less new entertainment content over the past 20 years. There is plenty of older stuff that is high quality and worth watching again. I assume I'll continue doing this until the end of my days.
I'm alone on this, but i liked the hobbit ones more. I think its because it's a tighter story about a handful of characters rather than a story about a 20 person fellowship, a handful of kingdoms and everyone they know?
That, and one trilogy has a well-spoken dragon that likes money.
I'd knew nothing about the hobbit except he was frotos uncle and that smaug scene (which was the first hobbit movie i saw) blew my fucking mind.
This, and also the "making of" movies -- they came with my boxed set that I bought with a 40% off coupon at Borders. Way back when. I even got a little plastic Minas Tirith.
And I can tell you, those features on how they made the movies are almost as good as the movies themselves! Not kidding. I was amazed.
Yep, the Hobbit movies, although Jackson was involved, were clearly sold out to greed and were a complete pile of shit.
You could take the 3 Hobbit movies and maybe edit them down to a single movie and it would be passable, but all the things they added were horrible and cringe worthy.
They lost the whole point of the book, that even the smallest person can do big things and be an unlikely hero.
That and the entire theme of the Dwarves, in the book they there were lazy, cowardly, greedy, incompetent and self centered but somewhat redeemed themselves when faced with their own short comings. IN the movies, they were strong, brave, competent and heroic from the get go, they even got the girl and only turned dark when faced with the success they achieved.
Guillermo del Toro is to blame for the Hobbit movies fiasco. He was set to direct, made it all the way through preproduction, spent all the funds, finalized the script and then deuced out at the last second. Jackson stepped in to save the films, but he confessed on the directors commentary that it was a mistake to do so. He isn't really very good at working on the fly, and directing takes a huge toll on him. He was just coming off of another production that was very difficult, and was having health issues to boot.
He did it because they simply couldn't push back production to fix the weird script. They didn't have the money, and there was an issue with the license for the story. Tolkien's estate is apparently a bit of a nightmare about their license. It was a use or lose situation for them. To make matters worse, he ended up having timeline and budget issues anyway and spent most of the production mired in conflict with producers and banks over that. It's actually a bit heartbreaking to hear him talk about it.
You aren't wrong. We still watch The Hobbit movies but they are flawed and far less enjoyable than LoTR. I completely agree that one movie that adhered to the book would have been far superior to the crap that they ended up with.
Yes, there is new stuff, but over time the percentage of new content that's high quality has been dropping. They just produce tons of crap to fill all the channels.
Also, decades ago they used to create some excellent content based on good writing and good acting. Today, so much of it is stupid potty humor, cgi, violence and foul language. The available talent has been spread too thin.
Also, these days, most new content is pushing some agenda or another, which annoys the hell out of me.
Sonic the Hedgehog was the only movie I've seen this year. It was pretty good. Even before this covid shit, there wasn't much coming out that was good.
I hate this argument. It ignores the fact that the arts really are becoming worse. Just because every generation has thought art is going to shit doesn't mean it's not true. The Grandpa Simpson argument is supposed to be a joke, not a profound statement.
What you’re saying is absolutely true. If every movie, show, etc is made not with art in mind, but for the purpose of propagandizing the masses or with the aim of political correctness superseding the creation of the art itself—it ceases to be art. It’s no longer functioning in any honest form of its original intent. It’s the purest form of “cringe”—sitting through some movie wishing it was good, lured there by the trailers, only to be massively disappointed by the 2 hour “teachable moment” you had to endure.
People who created ILM and Star Wars are still making new things today. Same thing in the video game industry. And many new artists grew up having curated excellent content like never before. Now musicians can make a polished album with a thousand bucks of equipment alone in their apartment.
We're in for a wild ride of excellent content this next decade.
I've been smelling a Renaissance coming on the horizon. We have everything at our disposal for one, just waiting for the Corporations to be beaten even just a little bit back.
You make a good point about the trickle down economics of production. It’s cheaper than ever to make good audio and video quality stuff. And what I love about it is that the best new creators are just random people, not huge corporations.
The fact that anyone can create music with a MacBook and a midi controller is exactly why music is so awful today. It killed the album, and it killed physical media, which are half the enjoyment in listening to music in the first place. The other half is ruined by any ol Joe being able to put their album up, so you have to sift through tens of thousands of artists to find one good one, and when you do, it’s some unknown who you’ll likely never see or hear about anyway.
This environment killed the music industry. As nice as it is that it became affordable and cut out middlemen like managers, talent scouts, etc; it’s also why the vast majority of anything easily accessible is trash. In the past you actually had to understand music theory, be able to play an instrument, compose good songs, work with other musicians, play tirelessly until recognized and being offered studio time. Without that, far less thought and thus far less quality in music is the result
So? I agree that people have always said it and will always say it, but I still disagree with what you are taking this to mean. And you're not being clear. Woud you mind elaborating as to what exactly are you saying by this?
It’s always applied by leftists. Perfect example is “what people are saying about transgenders is exactly the same stuff as people were saying about gays in the 70’s”. As if things can’t be different this time. But the argument is also a lie. It’s not the exact same stuff that people are saying. And the verdict isn’t in yet on whether the stuff people were saying about gays in the 70’s was correct or not. The left acts like it’s all been obviously disproven, but it hasnt. Many of those arguments were longitudinal - they claimed that promoting this stuff in the long run will destroy families and turn out culture more pedophilic. And every day it’s looking like they were at least partly right. How else do you explain drag queen twerking hour?
I call this argument the “everything is the same” argument. In the minds of these people, once you experience one thing , you’re done learning and you just transplant your understanding onto everything from then on out. They’re basically saying “because we already dealt with this other totally different issue, we don’t need to learn anything here and we can just assume that what we are currently looking at is more of the same.”
That statement would carry a lot more water if it weren't for the fact that a tiny handful of multi-hundred-billion dollar media mega-conglomerates bought every entertainment production outfit that wasn't nailed down, and trot out agenda-driven anti-American Marxist postmodern agitprop trash. But since that fact DOES stand, we can safely say that pop art is now fucking degenerate. The history of Weimar should already tell you this, but if you don't know it then let me tell you straight up: Drag Teens Fucked Live: The Show is only a matter of time from its Netflix/Hulu/Disney premier if we don't put a stop to it.
The difference is that now there has been a long march through our institutions by socialists who are subverting art into propaganda. When this is all over, we will finally see good art again.
Same here. I watched something called The Meg the other night. I laughed for the first 5 mins, then was beating my head in for the rest. I had to watch to see how bad China has gotten
This is the root of endless copyright - the ownership and production companies aren't worried about having to compete with each other - they're worried about competing with their own back catalogs, because topping previous releases requires more effort and creativity, while out-competing contemporary releases only requires being a little less lazy than your peers.
I have watched less and less new entertainment content over the past 20 years. There is plenty of older stuff that is high quality and worth watching again. I assume I'll continue doing this until the end of my days.
the three Lord of the Rings movies were good
Extended cuts. You owe it to yourselves to watch the full extended cut of each movie. I can’t watch the theatrical cuts anymore.
My wife and I watch them every winter around the holidays. We watch The Hobbit movies as well, although they are definitely not as good as LoTR.
Haha yeah same as us. They're our "Christmas movies" of choice.
I'm alone on this, but i liked the hobbit ones more. I think its because it's a tighter story about a handful of characters rather than a story about a 20 person fellowship, a handful of kingdoms and everyone they know?
That, and one trilogy has a well-spoken dragon that likes money.
I'd knew nothing about the hobbit except he was frotos uncle and that smaug scene (which was the first hobbit movie i saw) blew my fucking mind.
Hobbit movies are trash.
Theatrical are so shoehorned with content its awful
This, and also the "making of" movies -- they came with my boxed set that I bought with a 40% off coupon at Borders. Way back when. I even got a little plastic Minas Tirith.
And I can tell you, those features on how they made the movies are almost as good as the movies themselves! Not kidding. I was amazed.
Haha got the same kit, my model is still proudly displayed on my shelf.
I dunno, there's some awkward shit in there I didn't mind getting cut.
Yep, the Hobbit movies, although Jackson was involved, were clearly sold out to greed and were a complete pile of shit.
You could take the 3 Hobbit movies and maybe edit them down to a single movie and it would be passable, but all the things they added were horrible and cringe worthy.
They lost the whole point of the book, that even the smallest person can do big things and be an unlikely hero.
That and the entire theme of the Dwarves, in the book they there were lazy, cowardly, greedy, incompetent and self centered but somewhat redeemed themselves when faced with their own short comings. IN the movies, they were strong, brave, competent and heroic from the get go, they even got the girl and only turned dark when faced with the success they achieved.
Sorry, this subject gets me to ranting.
Guillermo del Toro is to blame for the Hobbit movies fiasco. He was set to direct, made it all the way through preproduction, spent all the funds, finalized the script and then deuced out at the last second. Jackson stepped in to save the films, but he confessed on the directors commentary that it was a mistake to do so. He isn't really very good at working on the fly, and directing takes a huge toll on him. He was just coming off of another production that was very difficult, and was having health issues to boot.
He did it because they simply couldn't push back production to fix the weird script. They didn't have the money, and there was an issue with the license for the story. Tolkien's estate is apparently a bit of a nightmare about their license. It was a use or lose situation for them. To make matters worse, he ended up having timeline and budget issues anyway and spent most of the production mired in conflict with producers and banks over that. It's actually a bit heartbreaking to hear him talk about it.
You aren't wrong. We still watch The Hobbit movies but they are flawed and far less enjoyable than LoTR. I completely agree that one movie that adhered to the book would have been far superior to the crap that they ended up with.
Agree, they were awesome.
Watch newest rambo. Holy shit, dude! Today. Do it.
Thought it was kind of cheap but still better than anything made today.
I saw it and didn’t care for it.
Sicario and most of the stuff Tom Cruise has made is ok.
Broke even on quality.
Yes, there is new stuff, but over time the percentage of new content that's high quality has been dropping. They just produce tons of crap to fill all the channels.
Also, decades ago they used to create some excellent content based on good writing and good acting. Today, so much of it is stupid potty humor, cgi, violence and foul language. The available talent has been spread too thin.
Also, these days, most new content is pushing some agenda or another, which annoys the hell out of me.
Face it, entertainment content has gone downhill.
Yeah, they are giving us cheap commie stuff. We pay for them to brainwash us with anti-American propaganda.
I say let them all go bankrupt.
We can write our own stuff.
Sonic the Hedgehog was the only movie I've seen this year. It was pretty good. Even before this covid shit, there wasn't much coming out that was good.
Blech.
No, it was not good.
It should have been a CGI movie about Sonic going after the chaos emeralds.
Not about Sonic helping Cyclops... become an SFPD officer??
I hate this argument. It ignores the fact that the arts really are becoming worse. Just because every generation has thought art is going to shit doesn't mean it's not true. The Grandpa Simpson argument is supposed to be a joke, not a profound statement.
What you’re saying is absolutely true. If every movie, show, etc is made not with art in mind, but for the purpose of propagandizing the masses or with the aim of political correctness superseding the creation of the art itself—it ceases to be art. It’s no longer functioning in any honest form of its original intent. It’s the purest form of “cringe”—sitting through some movie wishing it was good, lured there by the trailers, only to be massively disappointed by the 2 hour “teachable moment” you had to endure.
People who created ILM and Star Wars are still making new things today. Same thing in the video game industry. And many new artists grew up having curated excellent content like never before. Now musicians can make a polished album with a thousand bucks of equipment alone in their apartment.
We're in for a wild ride of excellent content this next decade.
I've been smelling a Renaissance coming on the horizon. We have everything at our disposal for one, just waiting for the Corporations to be beaten even just a little bit back.
You make a good point about the trickle down economics of production. It’s cheaper than ever to make good audio and video quality stuff. And what I love about it is that the best new creators are just random people, not huge corporations.
The fact that anyone can create music with a MacBook and a midi controller is exactly why music is so awful today. It killed the album, and it killed physical media, which are half the enjoyment in listening to music in the first place. The other half is ruined by any ol Joe being able to put their album up, so you have to sift through tens of thousands of artists to find one good one, and when you do, it’s some unknown who you’ll likely never see or hear about anyway.
This environment killed the music industry. As nice as it is that it became affordable and cut out middlemen like managers, talent scouts, etc; it’s also why the vast majority of anything easily accessible is trash. In the past you actually had to understand music theory, be able to play an instrument, compose good songs, work with other musicians, play tirelessly until recognized and being offered studio time. Without that, far less thought and thus far less quality in music is the result
Today's music is NOT in any way subjectively or objectively better than the music from the 60s/70s/80s. Not by any stretch of the imagination.
So? I agree that people have always said it and will always say it, but I still disagree with what you are taking this to mean. And you're not being clear. Woud you mind elaborating as to what exactly are you saying by this?
It’s always applied by leftists. Perfect example is “what people are saying about transgenders is exactly the same stuff as people were saying about gays in the 70’s”. As if things can’t be different this time. But the argument is also a lie. It’s not the exact same stuff that people are saying. And the verdict isn’t in yet on whether the stuff people were saying about gays in the 70’s was correct or not. The left acts like it’s all been obviously disproven, but it hasnt. Many of those arguments were longitudinal - they claimed that promoting this stuff in the long run will destroy families and turn out culture more pedophilic. And every day it’s looking like they were at least partly right. How else do you explain drag queen twerking hour?
I call this argument the “everything is the same” argument. In the minds of these people, once you experience one thing , you’re done learning and you just transplant your understanding onto everything from then on out. They’re basically saying “because we already dealt with this other totally different issue, we don’t need to learn anything here and we can just assume that what we are currently looking at is more of the same.”
That statement would carry a lot more water if it weren't for the fact that a tiny handful of multi-hundred-billion dollar media mega-conglomerates bought every entertainment production outfit that wasn't nailed down, and trot out agenda-driven anti-American Marxist postmodern agitprop trash. But since that fact DOES stand, we can safely say that pop art is now fucking degenerate. The history of Weimar should already tell you this, but if you don't know it then let me tell you straight up: Drag Teens Fucked Live: The Show is only a matter of time from its Netflix/Hulu/Disney premier if we don't put a stop to it.
We're not "curmudgeons". These are shitty movies with shitty political messages.
The difference is that now there has been a long march through our institutions by socialists who are subverting art into propaganda. When this is all over, we will finally see good art again.
Same here. I watched something called The Meg the other night. I laughed for the first 5 mins, then was beating my head in for the rest. I had to watch to see how bad China has gotten
This is the root of endless copyright - the ownership and production companies aren't worried about having to compete with each other - they're worried about competing with their own back catalogs, because topping previous releases requires more effort and creativity, while out-competing contemporary releases only requires being a little less lazy than your peers.