13 Replies

1. I assume at one point Keanu had made a “cross my heart, hope to die” promise and had to stick a needle in his eye to make up for that, totally unrelated to the primary plot.

2. … And in a post-credits scene, the deal with the devil is truly revealed as Jones turns into Al Pacino, playing his role from Devil’s Advocate. He turns to the camera and laughs.

   #MayNotHaveHappened

3. Not just “Frankenstein” or “Pet Sematary”, but also “The Brain that Wouldn’t Die”.

4. My name is Sam. When I was a child my parents called me Sammy.

   I now live alone inside of a dumpster with eternal resentments against them.

   You bastards.

5. PS Love your podcast, keep on floppin

6. Here’s a low-bitrate version for people with data caps: https://archive.org/details/TheFlopHouseEpisode286ReplicasLowBitrate

   1. Thanks!

7. The two leads in Booksmart 𝘢𝘳𝘦 both likable actresses (though Jonah’s sister is prone to mugging at times), but virtually every comedic beat and situation seems swiped from other teen comedies. As for Dan’s getting teary-eyed over its SJW bona fides, I don’t have any issue with its casual diversity, but having a couple teen boys literally flouncing around and wearing drag without a second look from anyone seems about as likely as the portrayal of the gay character in the now-fashionably-reviled Revenge of the Nerds. Kids struggling to come out at that age would likely be better served seeing characters who just happened to be gay rather than camp stereotypes.

   1. I’m not sure I trust anyone who (apparently unironically) uses “SJW” to judge something like this. Also, the gay kids ARE camp, but they’re also sympathetic, fully-formed characters. Some gay people are femme. Some are not. I’m not sure that merely reflecting that reality is a negative, in a movie so obviously fully on their side as this one is. Additionally, when you ask for “characters who just happened to be gay” — that’s literally what I praise one of the leads for.

      1. I’m not sure what it is you don’t “trust,” the sincerity of what I said or that I was indecorous enough to say it. I not only believe the extremes represented by that designation exist, but as a lifelong Democrat, believe they’re largely responsible for the push-back that got a cartoon elected president. Is that ironic enough?

         1. Do I wish that liberalism was less broken into purity test factions? Yes. Do I believe that liberalism can make some on the other side uncomfortable, such that they push back with an extreme agenda? Yeah, but that’s true of either side of a political divide. Can liberalism go “too far?” Sure, everything can go too far, though everyone’s mileage on what that means may vary.

            The problem with the unironic use of SJW is that it’s a bad faith term (much like “snowflake”), used to ridicule broad swaths of liberals who care about social causes, in the way the word “liberal” itself was in the 80’s, using the surprisingly effective strategy of “if we call something by a dismissive nickname, then we can dismiss it.” Even the words used, “Social Justice Warrior” show this insidious dismissiveness, as they smugly imply that social justice is a thing that it’s NOT worth fighting for, and that anyone who does is a naive fool. The term smacks of a “kids today/get off my lawn-ism” that I, also as a lifelong democrat of 41 years, hope that I never get old enough to embrace.

            Especially because the outlines of what makes an “SJW” are so deliberately vague, that it makes it hard to even know what people are dismissing when they invoke the term. People labeled as SJWs believe all sorts of things (things I would argue are important and correct), like “maybe we should shoot black people less,” “maybe we should listen to women when they tell us about their experiences,” or “maybe trans people should be treated as full humans in all ways, including not having that humanity taken from them by being the butt of ‘jokes’ that amount to no more than pointing at them and laughing.” I’m not saying you don’t believe that these are wrongs worth addressing too. I’m saying that when you put yourself in opposition to “SJWs,” that’s part of what you’re setting yourself against.

            To sum up this overlong manifesto: I do not know you. We are Internet ships passing in the night. You may be wonderful and pure of heart. But. In simplest words — Social Justice Warrior is a dick term. And people who use dick terms are always in danger of being labeled a dick.

            1. Well, I get most of that, but, sadly, I think that term in all its obvious reductivism actually fits many people on the far left whose smugness is only matched by their vapidity. I don’t find them so much a bulwark against the extremes of the right as the other side of the same coin. They tend to spin things as fancifully as the Trumpian faithful and exhibit the same lack of irony, nuance and common sense. They play just as fast and loose with reality and data in an effort to drive a narrative in which they’re both perpetual victims and perpetual heroes, and anyone who doesn’t affirm that quickly and unequivocally is a Nazi, a bigot… deplorable. Do using those terms also make one a dick, Dan? Does using “woke” unironically? My sense these days is that the right would tell me to fuck off, but the left would tell me to shut up.

            2. Do I think we could all use a little more nuance and understanding? Sure. (Except for literal Nazis, who — you can’t ignore — are making a comeback. Fuck those guys.) But that’s not an argument FOR making generalizations about wide swaths of people (especially those whose main crime seems to be that, in your view, they’re fighting for valid causes the “wrong” way). I’d argue that you’re making your own argument against such generalizations.

Comments are closed.