8 ms·

The post seems to make its point by dismissing just about everything. Bright is "just another Will Smith movie" and Stranger Things is "pistache by design." Gam

The post seems to make its point by dismissing just about everything. Bright is "just another Will Smith movie" and Stranger Things is "pistache by design." Game of Thrones is probably just another fantasy-book-to-TV translation and The Wire is probably yet another crime drama. Through that lens, is anything going to impress you?

IntronExon 9y ago
I agree with your main point, but Bright was just the kind of expensive awful I’d hope Netflix would avoid.
- jusonchan 9y ago
  Why should they avoid? I sort of liked it. And also about 86% of Rotten Tomatoes reviewers out of about 17,620 did. Not every movie has to be liked by the elite movie reviewers or editors in media news media. Some of the movies just works for folks. I'd say keep them coming. I'm only paying a fixed price and I can always choose what I want.
  - IntronExon 9y ago
    I’m with you in that all too often pro reviewers are just jaded or pushing an agenda, but I should be clear that I personally disliked Bright. I didn’t however, mean to offend, and I should have simply said that I didn’t enjoy it, rather than make a generalization about it. Edit: the third thing professional reviewers are, is hungry for clicks.
  - booleandilemma 9y ago
    I felt like I was getting beaten over the head with the metaphors.
    - Goladus 9y ago
      If I dismissed every movie or show with left-progressive propaganda I would have nothing to watch.
      - IntronExon 9y ago
        You’d still have COPS and Blue Bloods...
        Goladus 9y ago
        Which are not at all like Bright.
        IntronExon 9y ago
        If I dismissed every movie or show with left-progressive propaganda I would have nothing to watch. Had no relation to Bright either.
- philliphaydon 9y ago
  I hate will smith, don’t like most of his movies. Enjoyed bright. Started out slow but now hoping for sequel...
- Goladus 9y ago
  I liked Bright. It can be difficult to defend because it certainly has some substantial flaws, but people seem to just love love love crapping all over it like it's the worst thing they've seen all year.
  - IntronExon 9y ago
    I watched The Room for the first time this year. sigh I’m older now, but no wiser.
  - ebbv 9y ago
    It is one of the worst movies I have seen in years. I do not understand how anyone likes it. Literally nothing about it was good.
    - Goladus 9y ago
      That is just silly hyperbole. It had plenty of strengths despite also having many flaws. Will Smith played Will Smith, but that was fine for the movie. Joel Edgerton's performance as Jakoby was great. The dynamic between those two to be compelling and carried the movie. Certainly, if you aren't sold on the Ward/Jakoby dynamic then you probably won't like the movie. But I thought it was good. Tikka's reluctance to speak English or use the wand early on in the plot did strain creduily a bit, but upon watching a second time it's clear the filmmakers did make an effort to keep the wand out of her possession and justify her reluctance to open up to the two protagonists. Again it's not perfect but it's also not completely incompetent. While the social commentary is a bit clumsy and heavy-handed, I found the earnest, straightforward portrayal of that message refreshing. In a world of increasingly group-based identity politics, a clear and simple message about treating people as individuals is a rather nice change of pace. The use of graffiti as world building, some call lazy but I enjoyed it and found worked well enough for a 2-hour movie. The vagueness with regard to the history and backstory did not bother me. It was quickly apparent that the movie wanted to include both familiar real-world elements and familiar fantasy elements without actually running a complete alternate-reality simulation from first principles. For the sake of a single 2-hour movie, it's easy for me to forgive a top-down, less rigorous approach to world building. The characters introduced by the story were compelling enough for me to be interested to learn more. I liked the role played by the Department of Magic. I'm interested to see more about the elves and about the fogteeth clan and the shield of light. Again, while these elements are painted with broad strokes, it's a popcorn movie not a 10-hour TV series, a serious novel, or an RPG campaign setting. I give the sequel about a 50:50 odds at being a disappointment. The humor was uneven, sometimes it worked well and sometimes it didn't. I found myself laughing in spite of myself at lines like "we're not in a prophecy we're in a stolen Toyota Corolla." The action scenes were not well lit, but were much better at conveying a sense of real tension and danger than typical Marvel-style superhero blockbusters. The plot succeeded in developing characters and revealing mysteries. The turning point in the church is exciting. We'd been carrying around the Wand for several scenes and the first use is dramatic and satisfying, as well as carrying with it meaningful consequences for the characters and the story. The climax and big reveal, predictable as it was, is still exciting. Classical music always resolves the dominant to the tonic but it's still fun to hear. I certainly had some complaints. I'm mildly disappointed Ward's wife character went nowhere, although I appreciated the small scene where she appears halfway through. I thought the fairy scene in the beginning was dumb. I think the "kick me" scene was dumb. I thought the scene with the police beating the Orcs was a bit much. In general, the police were portrayed as frustratingly and irredeemably corrupt(and I don't think that was necessarily the intent). A bit more subtlety would have been nice. Jakoby's "I always wanted to be a cop" motivation is cliched (but Edgerton sells it anyway). The villains were introduced as super-powered fighers but then the protagonists didn't have much trouble when the final battle came. There's one moment in particular when four characters are standing in an open parking lot, one gets sniped and the others make it to cover without even taking additional fire. I think there were too many scenes set in a generic urban landscape. The villain is style over substance with no development at all.
Goladus 9y ago
Bright is Urban Fantasy, which is a rather rare genre for feature length films. It's not a great movie but it's a lot better than you'd think if you just listen to critics.
- ebbv 9y ago
  Bright was a truly horrendous movie. Everything about it was terrible. The writing was beyond bad, the performances were weak, even Will Smith was just a bad R-rated version of previous performances. One of the worst movies I have seen in a few years.
  - empath75 9y ago
    Like objectively it’s a bad movie but my inner shadowrun playing 15 year old loved it.
- dagw 9y ago
  I respectfully disagree. I love both urban fantasy and Shadowrun and was really looking forward to the movie as it should have been practically made for me. And I found it unredeemably terrible.
- angersock 9y ago
  It was Shadowrun lite, which is awesome. Now that they have a movie that rates well with normies, they can go deeper and expand (and probably even make a series out of it). A lot of settings that are actually interesting only really work as long-form episodes--Babylon 5 or Angel for example would've been a garbage movie. Bright was essentially a large pilot. I'd be really interested in seeing what the production side of the house is learning.
  - Noos 9y ago
    why? Shadowrun was garbage too. Go back and read the novels some time. There's a reason why Shadowrun consistently failed to get an audience throughout its entire lifetime, even back in FASA days.
AznHisoka 9y ago
I did not read the article but even the damn title reeks of pretentiousness. “Netflix is doing great but when will it finally be a trillion dollar business?”
- nick_g 9y ago
  The article does not concern itself with the business of Netflix, rather the merit of its art
tootie 9y ago
He's specifically comparing Netflix shows to superior HBO shows like Deadwood. His appraisal of Stranger Things feels spot on to me. It was a joy to watch, but it was clearly calibrated to appeal to some niches and, no, it's not the same caliber as The Wire.

IntronExon 9y ago

I agree with your main point, but Bright was just the kind of expensive awful I’d hope Netflix would avoid.

jusonchan 9y ago
Why should they avoid? I sort of liked it. And also about 86% of Rotten Tomatoes reviewers out of about 17,620 did. Not every movie has to be liked by the elite movie reviewers or editors in media news media. Some of the movies just works for folks. I'd say keep them coming. I'm only paying a fixed price and I can always choose what I want.
- IntronExon 9y ago
  I’m with you in that all too often pro reviewers are just jaded or pushing an agenda, but I should be clear that I personally disliked Bright. I didn’t however, mean to offend, and I should have simply said that I didn’t enjoy it, rather than make a generalization about it. Edit: the third thing professional reviewers are, is hungry for clicks.
- booleandilemma 9y ago
  I felt like I was getting beaten over the head with the metaphors.
  - Goladus 9y ago
    If I dismissed every movie or show with left-progressive propaganda I would have nothing to watch.
    - IntronExon 9y ago
      You’d still have COPS and Blue Bloods...
      - Goladus 9y ago
        Which are not at all like Bright.
        IntronExon 9y ago
        If I dismissed every movie or show with left-progressive propaganda I would have nothing to watch. Had no relation to Bright either.
philliphaydon 9y ago
I hate will smith, don’t like most of his movies. Enjoyed bright. Started out slow but now hoping for sequel...
Goladus 9y ago
I liked Bright. It can be difficult to defend because it certainly has some substantial flaws, but people seem to just love love love crapping all over it like it's the worst thing they've seen all year.
- IntronExon 9y ago
  I watched The Room for the first time this year. sigh I’m older now, but no wiser.
- ebbv 9y ago
  It is one of the worst movies I have seen in years. I do not understand how anyone likes it. Literally nothing about it was good.
  - Goladus 9y ago
    That is just silly hyperbole. It had plenty of strengths despite also having many flaws. Will Smith played Will Smith, but that was fine for the movie. Joel Edgerton's performance as Jakoby was great. The dynamic between those two to be compelling and carried the movie. Certainly, if you aren't sold on the Ward/Jakoby dynamic then you probably won't like the movie. But I thought it was good. Tikka's reluctance to speak English or use the wand early on in the plot did strain creduily a bit, but upon watching a second time it's clear the filmmakers did make an effort to keep the wand out of her possession and justify her reluctance to open up to the two protagonists. Again it's not perfect but it's also not completely incompetent. While the social commentary is a bit clumsy and heavy-handed, I found the earnest, straightforward portrayal of that message refreshing. In a world of increasingly group-based identity politics, a clear and simple message about treating people as individuals is a rather nice change of pace. The use of graffiti as world building, some call lazy but I enjoyed it and found worked well enough for a 2-hour movie. The vagueness with regard to the history and backstory did not bother me. It was quickly apparent that the movie wanted to include both familiar real-world elements and familiar fantasy elements without actually running a complete alternate-reality simulation from first principles. For the sake of a single 2-hour movie, it's easy for me to forgive a top-down, less rigorous approach to world building. The characters introduced by the story were compelling enough for me to be interested to learn more. I liked the role played by the Department of Magic. I'm interested to see more about the elves and about the fogteeth clan and the shield of light. Again, while these elements are painted with broad strokes, it's a popcorn movie not a 10-hour TV series, a serious novel, or an RPG campaign setting. I give the sequel about a 50:50 odds at being a disappointment. The humor was uneven, sometimes it worked well and sometimes it didn't. I found myself laughing in spite of myself at lines like "we're not in a prophecy we're in a stolen Toyota Corolla." The action scenes were not well lit, but were much better at conveying a sense of real tension and danger than typical Marvel-style superhero blockbusters. The plot succeeded in developing characters and revealing mysteries. The turning point in the church is exciting. We'd been carrying around the Wand for several scenes and the first use is dramatic and satisfying, as well as carrying with it meaningful consequences for the characters and the story. The climax and big reveal, predictable as it was, is still exciting. Classical music always resolves the dominant to the tonic but it's still fun to hear. I certainly had some complaints. I'm mildly disappointed Ward's wife character went nowhere, although I appreciated the small scene where she appears halfway through. I thought the fairy scene in the beginning was dumb. I think the "kick me" scene was dumb. I thought the scene with the police beating the Orcs was a bit much. In general, the police were portrayed as frustratingly and irredeemably corrupt(and I don't think that was necessarily the intent). A bit more subtlety would have been nice. Jakoby's "I always wanted to be a cop" motivation is cliched (but Edgerton sells it anyway). The villains were introduced as super-powered fighers but then the protagonists didn't have much trouble when the final battle came. There's one moment in particular when four characters are standing in an open parking lot, one gets sniped and the others make it to cover without even taking additional fire. I think there were too many scenes set in a generic urban landscape. The villain is style over substance with no development at all.

Goladus 9y ago

Bright is Urban Fantasy, which is a rather rare genre for feature length films. It's not a great movie but it's a lot better than you'd think if you just listen to critics.

ebbv 9y ago
Bright was a truly horrendous movie. Everything about it was terrible. The writing was beyond bad, the performances were weak, even Will Smith was just a bad R-rated version of previous performances. One of the worst movies I have seen in a few years.
- empath75 9y ago
  Like objectively it’s a bad movie but my inner shadowrun playing 15 year old loved it.
dagw 9y ago
I respectfully disagree. I love both urban fantasy and Shadowrun and was really looking forward to the movie as it should have been practically made for me. And I found it unredeemably terrible.
angersock 9y ago
It was Shadowrun lite, which is awesome. Now that they have a movie that rates well with normies, they can go deeper and expand (and probably even make a series out of it). A lot of settings that are actually interesting only really work as long-form episodes--Babylon 5 or Angel for example would've been a garbage movie. Bright was essentially a large pilot. I'd be really interested in seeing what the production side of the house is learning.
- Noos 9y ago
  why? Shadowrun was garbage too. Go back and read the novels some time. There's a reason why Shadowrun consistently failed to get an audience throughout its entire lifetime, even back in FASA days.

AznHisoka 9y ago

I did not read the article but even the damn title reeks of pretentiousness. “Netflix is doing great but when will it finally be a trillion dollar business?”

nick_g 9y ago
The article does not concern itself with the business of Netflix, rather the merit of its art

tootie 9y ago

He's specifically comparing Netflix shows to superior HBO shows like Deadwood. His appraisal of Stranger Things feels spot on to me. It was a joy to watch, but it was clearly calibrated to appeal to some niches and, no, it's not the same caliber as The Wire.