(no subject)

[trinityvixen]

Last night, I was too lazy to get up and turn off the TV (the remote was all the way across from me! I mean, what's the point of a remote if I'm going to forget it and leave it on top of the stupid TV!?) after Smallville, so I ended up watching the first episode of Supernatural I've seen since I tried to watch the premiere when it first aired.

Lesson learned: Don't be so fucking lazy. Really, I should have gotten up and switched it off the second I recognized the actress playing damsel in distress as Lex's lazy-eyed wife. The woman is a dreadful actress, and I cannot fathom how she is considered hot at all. Even for the not-all--that-attractive-either boys playing the brothers in the show, that's slumming. And, come on show: you probably have the biggest audience of the entire WB/CW netork's worth of shows, judging by your fandom! Can't you afford a little werewolf makeup? No one was even hairy. Not even like Italian-level hairy.

ETA: A cut-tag for ivy03, who is--believe it or not--more fanatical about not being spoiled than I. Yes, I can scarce believe it myself. Cut-tag because I love her crazy head nonetheless.

Still, wasn't worse than what had come before it. I dunno whether it's powerful lame or just a sign of the times that Smallville throws around the phrase "fight club" without a hint of irony. Either they think it's that cool to say or it's just part of the Things Kids Say These Days. The target audience of Smallville, judging from a WB/CW demographic should really be too young to think Fight Club is just something to make slang out of, right?

Whatever. Smallville is so bad. Why can't I turn it off? I had The Descent from Netflix and everything, and still I sat through the show (and the one after, God).

The Descent was fucking creepy, and not for the stupid in-bred cave monsters (though, to their credit, they were pretty good as being creepy, too). It had a reasonsable solution to the age-old problem of horror flicks: it knew how to keep the victims in close proximity to the monsters. The "haunted house" scenario suffers unless there's a reason you can't get away (Alien solved that problem by being set in space; zombie movies work best when the people are trapped in a location and not when they're trying to flee constantly), and The Descent's excuse was the girls involved were cave-diving in a heretofore unexplored cave and there was a rock slide to block their entrance. Excuse me, but that's scary right the fuck there, monsters or no monsters. I was feeling claustrophobic in my living room.

Fun facts about the movie: one girl was the love interest from the worst episode of Farscape (at least, the worst in season one), and another was the here-and-gone Sam from Spooks. Hurrah for my IMDB brain!

Comments

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

Ha, I have The Descent at home from Netflix too, after a friend's recommendation. I was in the mood for a cheesy horror movie.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

It's not all that cheesy. It's enjoyable, and credibly frightening. The only part I didn't like was the ending--it was confusing and a little...meh.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

Um...Supernatural fans who haven't seen last night's ep reading your lj? Spoiler cut please? Yes, I'm one of those who really doesn't want to know anything. I know it's not your show, but cut? Thanks!

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Why is it a spoiler? All I said was there were werewolves that weren't hairy and that chick from Smallville. That's not a spoiler. I got both those things from the preview before the episode aired.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

Ah, spoiler meta.

This is a spoiler because I don't want to know anything. I don't want to know the cast, I don't want to know the plot, and I don't want to know your opinion until I've seen the episode. You hate Supernatural, I know that. I have no problem with you saying that in your lj. What I have a problem with is you saying that you hated an episode that just aired that I haven't seen and not putting it behind a cut. I don't normally like to get any fannish opinions before I've seen an episode. The SPN fans on my lj who write reactions all put every one of their thoughts behind a cut. After I've seen it, I go back and read. Your spoiler policy towards SPN is one of someone who is not a fan. In other words, you would put BSG thoughts even so vague behind a cut, but you're not putting SPN thoughts because you're not a fan of the show, so you're not part of a fannish dialogue, so you're not paying attention to SPN fandom's etiquette. But there are people on your f-list who are.

For me, it's like being attacked on something that I can't defend because I haven't seen it. And I'll go in knowing that you hate the werewolf makeup. Maybe I'll hate the episode too. But now I'll be on the defensive watching it instead of just enjoying.

That's why I asked for a cut.

Yes, I know I'm inviting the wank.

[chuckro.livejournal.com]

"Surprise last for three rounds! A round is fifteen seconds! I counted them off!"
"No, we spent most of that arguing. Anyway, you can't attack until I say so. So stop killing him and let me finish his speech."

There's a little bit in all of us...

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Is that from "The Gamers" by any chance? It sounds familiar, but I can't place it. Plus, I can totally hear Eddie Izzard saying this, and all I'm getting from there is, "Ah, ah, ah! You said 'death' first! You said 'death'...well, okay. You're lucky I'm Church of England."

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

I don't know what that means so I'll just smile and nod.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

...okay. Wow, well, uh, it's behind a cut-tag now.

As a rule, I generally do share my basic opinions about an episode of BSG or LOST or any of those before I cut-tag for spoilers. Unless I'm ranting or squeeing so hard about the episode in question that I can't separate out any thoughts I have on the ep from spoilers. Then the whole thing is cut-tagged.

And no fair faulting me for not knowing the specific trends in Supernatural fandom regarding spoilers! I'm not in that fandom! Sheesh! I might also mention that, at this point, I'm convinced I can't say anything about a show without a cut-tag 'cause you say everything's spoilery, and darkling1 says even stuff I say that isn't manages to be. I am mightily confuzzled.

Anyway, I don't hate the show. I just don't get the rabid attraction to it, and I tend to mock that as much as the show itself, but all with a sense of humor (I hope it comes across as such) because I'm totally that way about other stuff. Plus? If you know I don't like the show, chances are I don't like any of the episodes, so this really isn't a spoiler so much as a "Same old, same old" when I say I didn't like one particular one. Other shows I have never liked episodes of: American Idol, Grey's Anatomy, The Dresden Files, Scrubs, etc.

Well, I've said my peace, and I'm not trying to be antagonistic, and I can compromise and avoid saying stuff in the future, fine. I just happen to think this particular flavor of non-spoilage is kinda unfair and extremely limiting, and that's jsut my POV.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

To clarify my point, my spoiler sensitivity is usually based on my fannish involvement with the show. Something like SGA I don't really care about being spoiled for. A lot of shows I seek out spoilers. There are only a few very rare cases where I don't want to know anything, and Supernatural is one of them.

Spoiler cuts are more of an art, anyway, and as much dependent on who you expect your readership to be than anything else. I don't do spoiler cuts for, say, the ballet of Edward Scissorhands, or a decade-old adaptation of Scarlet Pimpernel, because I doubt anyone on my f-list will care. If I caught a random episode of Heroes, though, I would definitely spoiler cut since I know there are a lot of Heroes fans who read my lj. I often express (as far as I can recall squeeful) opinions outside of spoilercuts.

My negative reaction to this was more because you were ripping into something I was looking forward to. It would be like me going up to you and saying, "oh that movie you were going to watch? The makeup sucks, the acting sucks, and the plot sucks. It's just an awful film." Now, that doesn't spoil anything plot-wise, but it would taint your viewing of it.

In the case of something that is recently aired, I'd err on the side of caution. Whether or not you would care about being spoiled for it, some of your f-list might. I think this is mostly because it's my favorite show and it aired last night and I won't see it until this evening.

That and having spent all of today doing the most mind-numbingly boring work on the planet. (I was actually calculating how many white spaces in a given font were in a centimeter on the printed page. Argh.)

And you're not coming across as antagonistic. My id has just apparently decided that this shall be it's target of the day.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

It would be like me going up to you and saying, "oh that movie you were going to watch? The makeup sucks, the acting sucks, and the plot sucks. It's just an awful film."

Ahhh, so what you're saying is that it would be something like exactly what happened last weekend with feiran, darkling1, moonlightalice, and wellgull all saying how much 300 was going to suck. Well, yes, that can be annoying if it's something reeeeeeally rabidifyingly worth it. I have, on rare occasion, felt that way--"don't even tell me you liked it or not!"--and I seem to remember telling my roommate (your former workmate) not to spoil me on something in that way. It might have been The Revenge of the Sith.

Most often, when I don't want to know about that kind of thing, I avoid reading reviews so I don't focus on what I don't like about the movie because the reviewer mentioned it. I can see how that can aggravate.

If you are so bored, I would recommend doing something else besides counting pixels. That seems more like to make you more bored than not. A game of minesweeper maybe? Spider solitaire?

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

I almost never read reviews in advance of seeing a film if I'm at all excited about it. I was a subscriber to "Star Wars Insider" for years before the prequels, and I scrupulously skipped over all the prequel updates and saved the magazines for reading after I'd watched. (Of course, after I watched I had no desire to go back and dwell on the thing, but that's another issue.)

Keep in mind, I once wrote a letter of complaint to Disney magazine to protest them spoiling Empire Strikes Back. Fifteen years after it was released. I've loosened up since then, but I tend to try to be as spoiler-avoidant as one can be on lj (as darkling1 pointed out, not always easy).

Sadly, the counting white space thing was actual work. You see, there's this report I have to print out and it has to fit on one page, but the $&%* program was interpreting line breaks as two line breaks, so it didn't fit on the page. The only way to get around this, then, was to use spaces to make it jump lines rather than line breaks. The problem is the report is generated in one program and the text is entered in another and it takes a few minutes and reloading the report for any changes to the text to appear.

Hence me calculating white spaces per centimeter to try to shortcut a bout of trial and error.

And then I got it all pretty and perfect on the screen and printed it out ... and when it prints out, the spacing is different. So it ends up looking incrementally indented.

I'm f'ing leaving it that way. The report fits on the page and it looks like I meant to do that.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

It's fitting that, in this discussion of spoilers, I clicked over to Pandagon and the first article at the top is "BSG: You know how we’ve been waiting to find out which you-know-who is actually a you-know-what?" and a link to a Boston Herald article that gives the answer away. I desperately want to click, but I will be STRONG.

I hope that article gets shuffled down their page soon, though. I AM NOT MADE OF STONE. Generally, I like being surprised about things. I prefer not to even speculate overly if I can avoid it because I don't want to be right, I want to be surprised!

Wow, counting spaces as work. I'd just as soon...I dunno, fill up the stupid liquid N2 tank that was fine and not about to run out omg why do I have to do these stupid things!?. I think our work places are each having their own crazy nothing chores to do for us today.

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

Wow.

Anyway, your non-spoilerish stuff ends up being a spoiler if I've already heard rumors about the show, and then you say something that seems to confirm it.

But I guess I can't really complain about spoilers anymore, since I don't make much of an effort to stay current on even the shows I want to see. I appreciate your efforts, though.

I just think there's no way to avoid spoilers anymore if you spend any time at all online, and with media reporting being what it is these days. Eh.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

I agree with you there. Even when you are current with stuff, there's like no helping it. Stupid Canadians who get Heroes a day before us in the States ::shakes fist::

And I freely admit that I spoil because I lack subtlety when reacting to stuff I am involved in. It's unintentional, but I know it happens.

[droidguy1119.livejournal.com]

I didn't think The Descent was all that, mainly because it was being built up as the scariest horror movie ever, and it really doesn't stray too far from pretty familiar horror cliches.

American trailer for Day Watch!

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

I was prepared to think similarly of The Descent, but I still enjoyed it. The setting had enough eerie ambiance to carry it beyond the monster premise.

That trailer for Day Watch sure looks awesome (I'm at work, can't listen to sound), but it seems to be going more in the direction people complained about before--with it being all flash and nothing substantial. Also, hell, I'd love to know how Anton can now teleport or whatever. Wasn't he a Seer?

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

I just watched The Descent and overall it was pretty good. You're right--I was thinking "What do we need these creepy monster things for? It was terrifying just being trapped in the caves!" Mostly, I like the movie for the way it ended. Aside from the false happy ending--Bravo.

Good memory on the Farscape link. I think the rest of us have blocked that episode out.

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

Aw, it figures: according to IMDB, the US version ended with the first ending, and the UK ending was added to the "unrated" DVD. Apparently that last bit was considered too dark for us. I like dark!

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Yes, blocking that one out was the smarter thing to do.

I didn't get the "real" ending. Does it mean that she went crazy and now lives with the cave monsters?

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

What I got, and what the IMDB pages indicate, is that she's hopelessly trapped down there, but she takes some comfort in escaping to that crazy part of her brain that keeps seeing her daughter.

I don't think she needs to worry about living much longer. But hey, if there's a sequel and she has some little cave babies, that might be interesting.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

OK, I've watched it.

I'm calm now.

I agree--I hate that actress. A lot. But this show has a history of picking atrocious actresses to be the boys' love interests.

For the makeup--this isn't a creature show. All of their supernatural creatures are pretty much human looking. The vampires just have fangs, the demons have color contacts. The only actual creature was in the second episode. Although I was sort of wondering what the hooker thought about being pursued by a dude in an evangelical t-shirt who was howling. He had facial hair, though...that's something, right?

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

I guess so? I dunno. I mostly felt bad for that guy. He didn't know he was a werewolf either, and he just died. No one tried to find the guy who bit him and fix him, even if that didn't work. Plus, no nookie before death, alas. Not that having sex with the guy was all that consoling.

But yeah, that actress...gah.

I'm not ragging on the show for not having special creature effects budget--they could probably do a lot by having the creatures themselves sight unseen for a lot of things and have it be less ridiculous. Just it seems like no effort was made at all here and the actors they got to "wolf out" really didn't sell it and could have used the help of prostheses.