7 ms·

I’m geniunely wondering what the audience is supposed to get from all the 2020 references (Covid, Among Us, Zoom, Twitch), and the barrage of celebrity name-dro

I’m geniunely wondering what the audience is supposed to get from all the 2020 references (Covid, Among Us, Zoom, Twitch), and the barrage of celebrity name-drops. I feel like the film was written for some specific Twitter subculture Rian Johnson is a part of, and maybe they find all the references hilarious. The mystery is dull, the dialogue obnoxious, the jokes unfunny, and the camera has that patented ugly digital Netflix look. By the time the movie picks up about an hour in, I had long stopped caring. It’s a shame because I enjoyed the first one. It’s a shocking drop in quality.

drewcoo 4y ago
> all the 2020 references (Covid, Among Us, Zoom, Twitch), and the barrage of celebrity name-drops Today's mystery, tomorrow's "beach blanket?" Haven't seen it, but if it's campy enough, it could have staying power.
- mypastself 4y ago
  That’s actually a good point. I suppose the film might have some nostalgia appeal for specific groups of people decades from now. I suspect I’m going to dislike it even more, though.
GaryNumanVevo 4y ago
Huh, sorry you had a bad time watching it at home. It looked great in theatres!
cramjabsyn 4y ago
Is it shocking? Sequels are notorious for being this way. It’s rare that a sequel can capture lightning in a bottle in the same way as the original.
- mypastself 4y ago
  I don’t know if you’ve seen the movie, but it’s almost a completely different style and tone. Sequels tend to play it safe and try to redo the original, but Johnson instead tried to make a completely different film. I’m wondering if Netflix gave him much greater creative freedom, and if the original movie would have been much worse without studio notes.
chadlavi 4y ago
Pretty sure they're supposed to get that it takes place in 2020
- mypastself 4y ago
  Surely the on-screen text “May 2020” at the beginning should have clued us in. And I’m not sure why the year even matters for the plot.
  - matthewdgreen 4y ago
    I thought it was nice to see a movie set in 2020 that actually reflected the way many of us lived in 2020, if only for the first portion. Most film/TV made that year went out of its way to simulate normal living conditions (typically by “bubbling” the cast and using a lot of testing.)
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
HWR_14 4y ago
They did a great job making the contemporary things at least work in the service of the story. COVID allows a shortcut to describing each character. The detective is depressed and bored. Birdie ignores lockdown restrictions and throws massive parties. The scientist is alone in his lab working the whole time. Duke built a home studio and spent his life online, etc. And Miles has a cure/vaccine for COVID but only uses it for his personal benefit. He never even shares it with his "friends" until they will be around him. Among Us is supposed to show that the detective is bad at lying and sneaking around. This is later proven false, but it builds the expectation it goes against in the future. Zoom and similar software is a good way to have characters talk to each other. A decade ago the same scene would have happened with everyone using a cellphone and the viewer at home getting the same view. Meanwhile Twitch as a way that someone can become a famous influencer just seems about correct. Would you rather they just had a blog?
- mypastself 4y ago
  As a writer, you can choose to convey character and plot points in many different ways. You don’t have to use things that are considered “hip” at the time of writing. It seems to me that Johnson’s foremost concern was having all those elements in the film, after which he reverse engineered some of the character and plot points you’re talking about.
  - HWR_14 4y ago
    You don't have to have anything in a movie. The question isn't "why include hip things", the question is "were those hip things just tacked in". They weren't. They served a purpose. You could replace them with some generic thing, I suppose. But how would that make the movie better? Meanwhile, if you eliminate them, the story gets worse. Unlike most product placements, which are at best removable background and at worse make the movie worse. Meanwhile, I imagine Zoom arose naturally to solve the speakerphone but still need to see characters issue. I'm guessing Among Us was added because someone on the set played it and thought it would add something, and Twitch seems like the best real-life example of someplace that you would expect a modern tech mogul to help someone set up a streaming channel. Far from being tacked in, those seem like the best possible solutions to those problems. And COVID is a fact now. You could release a movie in NYC in 2003 with the Twin Towers still in them, but I don't think people would claim you were being "hip" removing them. They would say you seem out of touch for leaving them in. Even if the story was set in "indefinite past time when they still could have existed"

drewcoo 4y ago

> all the 2020 references (Covid, Among Us, Zoom, Twitch), and the barrage of celebrity name-drops Today's mystery, tomorrow's "beach blanket?" Haven't seen it, but if it's campy enough, it could have staying power.

mypastself 4y ago
That’s actually a good point. I suppose the film might have some nostalgia appeal for specific groups of people decades from now. I suspect I’m going to dislike it even more, though.

GaryNumanVevo 4y ago

Huh, sorry you had a bad time watching it at home. It looked great in theatres!

cramjabsyn 4y ago

Is it shocking? Sequels are notorious for being this way. It’s rare that a sequel can capture lightning in a bottle in the same way as the original.

mypastself 4y ago
I don’t know if you’ve seen the movie, but it’s almost a completely different style and tone. Sequels tend to play it safe and try to redo the original, but Johnson instead tried to make a completely different film. I’m wondering if Netflix gave him much greater creative freedom, and if the original movie would have been much worse without studio notes.

chadlavi 4y ago

Pretty sure they're supposed to get that it takes place in 2020

mypastself 4y ago
Surely the on-screen text “May 2020” at the beginning should have clued us in. And I’m not sure why the year even matters for the plot.
- matthewdgreen 4y ago
  I thought it was nice to see a movie set in 2020 that actually reflected the way many of us lived in 2020, if only for the first portion. Most film/TV made that year went out of its way to simulate normal living conditions (typically by “bubbling” the cast and using a lot of testing.)

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

HWR_14 4y ago

They did a great job making the contemporary things at least work in the service of the story. COVID allows a shortcut to describing each character. The detective is depressed and bored. Birdie ignores lockdown restrictions and throws massive parties. The scientist is alone in his lab working the whole time. Duke built a home studio and spent his life online, etc. And Miles has a cure/vaccine for COVID but only uses it for his personal benefit. He never even shares it with his "friends" until they will be around him. Among Us is supposed to show that the detective is bad at lying and sneaking around. This is later proven false, but it builds the expectation it goes against in the future. Zoom and similar software is a good way to have characters talk to each other. A decade ago the same scene would have happened with everyone using a cellphone and the viewer at home getting the same view. Meanwhile Twitch as a way that someone can become a famous influencer just seems about correct. Would you rather they just had a blog?

mypastself 4y ago
As a writer, you can choose to convey character and plot points in many different ways. You don’t have to use things that are considered “hip” at the time of writing. It seems to me that Johnson’s foremost concern was having all those elements in the film, after which he reverse engineered some of the character and plot points you’re talking about.
- HWR_14 4y ago
  You don't have to have anything in a movie. The question isn't "why include hip things", the question is "were those hip things just tacked in". They weren't. They served a purpose. You could replace them with some generic thing, I suppose. But how would that make the movie better? Meanwhile, if you eliminate them, the story gets worse. Unlike most product placements, which are at best removable background and at worse make the movie worse. Meanwhile, I imagine Zoom arose naturally to solve the speakerphone but still need to see characters issue. I'm guessing Among Us was added because someone on the set played it and thought it would add something, and Twitch seems like the best real-life example of someplace that you would expect a modern tech mogul to help someone set up a streaming channel. Far from being tacked in, those seem like the best possible solutions to those problems. And COVID is a fact now. You could release a movie in NYC in 2003 with the Twin Towers still in them, but I don't think people would claim you were being "hip" removing them. They would say you seem out of touch for leaving them in. Even if the story was set in "indefinite past time when they still could have existed"