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SilentChaz
Oct 5, 2011

Sorry, I'm quite busy at the moment.
I've got it, by the way.

Witchcraft XVI: Hollywood Coven.

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Baka-nin
Jan 25, 2015

SilentChaz posted:

I've got it, by the way.

Witchcraft XVI: Hollywood Coven.

Hah, that's a good joke about sequelisation.

*Googles it

:aaa: Its real! :psyduck:

Rev. Bleech_
Oct 19, 2004

~OKAY, WE'LL DRINK TO OUR LEGS!~

I've got it by the way

Easy Rider 2: The Ride Home

*podcast and thread collapse into singularity*

Jackapol
Sep 16, 2007
Huh huh buhhh.
Oh man the Phil Hartman skit from SNL that they mentioned is fantastic:

http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/us-fon/n10149?snl=1

Oh Hartman :allears:

RobotDogPolice
Dec 1, 2016
The Craft is crazy stupid and awful and I'd like to see them cover it sometime. I don't think the screenwriters understood money because one girl's mother gets a 100,000 dollars and then buys a really nice apartment in LA.

Gyges
Aug 4, 2004

NOW NO ONE
RECOGNIZE HULK
It's called a down payment.

Cael
Feb 2, 2004

I get this funky high on the yellow sun.

Rev. Bleech_ posted:

I've got it by the way

Easy Rider 2: The Ride Home

*podcast and thread collapse into singularity*

I think I’ve listened to that episode more times than any other. It’s such a perfect mix where both the outrage and the fun they’re having are both maxed out.

Apes-Ma
Aug 9, 2011

Your cage isn't getting any bigger.
Anyone knows when the next Listener Request Month is?

claw game handjob
Mar 27, 2007

pinch pinch scrape pinch
ow ow fuck it's caught
i'm bleeding
JESUS TURN IT OFF
WHY ARE YOU STILL SMILING

Apes-Ma posted:

Anyone knows when the next Listener Request Month is?

March.

(It's always March.)

Tart Kitty
Dec 17, 2016

Oh, well, that's all water under the bridge, as I always say. Water under the bridge!

I have to say, in a podcast full of great bits, I think the "mail away art test" bit from Taking Lives might be my favorite.

"And here's what Kiefer Sutherland might look like if he were a turtle."

RobotDogPolice
Dec 1, 2016
Watched Pet Sematary 2 recently, followed by the WHM episode. What a weird little sequel. The movie sets up Edward Furlong as the main character but a good chunk of the runtime is dedicated to the other kid and his family, then he just dies and it's back to Furlong.

Vakal
May 11, 2008

RobotDogPolice posted:

Watched Pet Sematary 2 recently, followed by the WHM episode. What a weird little sequel. The movie sets up Edward Furlong as the main character but a good chunk of the runtime is dedicated to the other kid and his family, then he just dies and it's back to Furlong.

"Ok, we have a long day of shooting planned Mr. Furlong."

*opens the door to Eddie's trailer and looks inside*

"Aw gently caress. Fine, I guess we're going with that other kid again for today."

bobkatt013
Oct 8, 2006

You’re telling me Peter Parker is ...... Spider-man!?

Vakal posted:

"Ok, we have a long day of shooting planned Mr. Furlong."

*opens the door to Eddie's trailer and looks inside*

"Aw gently caress. Fine, I guess we're going with that other kid again for today."

He was hanging with the trickster that day

precision
May 7, 2006

by VideoGames
Oh goddamn I had forgotten about Taxicab Confessions, now I want to watch all those. I remember them being super awkward and bad.

DoubleCakes
Jan 14, 2015

Chris isn't afraid to get real serious for a second and just outright hate something. I feel sorry for the guy if he has to review the franchise he hates the most.

bobkatt013
Oct 8, 2006

You’re telling me Peter Parker is ...... Spider-man!?

DoubleCakes posted:

Chris isn't afraid to get real serious for a second and just outright hate something. I feel sorry for the guy if he has to review the franchise he hates the most.

I can not wait to read his article on it, and maybe saw franchise for next years review?

Tart Kitty
Dec 17, 2016

Oh, well, that's all water under the bridge, as I always say. Water under the bridge!

bobkatt013 posted:

I can not wait to read his article on it, and maybe saw franchise for next years review?

God, having just rewatched them all on Hulu, I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. Even when set as background noise while I was doing other stuff, I would constantly find myself slowly turning to the screen in disbelief at the dialogue and deliveries.

Super Fan
Jul 16, 2011

by FactsAreUseless
Yeah. I enjoy going through horror franchises but I’m not sure if I’ll be able to do the Saw films.

Rageaholic
May 31, 2005

Old Town Road to EGOT

I used to love the Saw movies. Every year on Halloween night for a while, I'd see the new Saw movie in theaters. It was a tradition of mine.

Like 2 years ago, I re-watched them all leading up to Halloween to see if they held up. 1 through 3 are a decent amount of fun with memorable traps but still not good movies. After that, the series is a total slog aside from whichever one has the insurance company people. That one was alright. But drat, I thought that would be a fun series to re-watch and it really wasn't. The traps in the last few movies aren't even memorable, which is kind of the entire point of watching those movies.

I'm not the least bit interested in going to see the new one, even though I have MoviePass now and can basically go see whatever I want in theaters at any time.

WeedlordGoku69
Feb 12, 2015

by Cyrano4747
The Rube Goldberg machine with the Nazis in 7 was pretty fun, if only because of how hilariously convoluted it was.

Apes-Ma
Aug 9, 2011

Your cage isn't getting any bigger.
After watching it, I really hope they do The Snowman for worst of 2017 now.

Detective No. 27
Jun 7, 2006

I was listening to this episode and a friend of mine asks if I wanted to watch Saw on Netflix, apropros of nothing. Eerie.

Apes-Ma
Aug 9, 2011

Your cage isn't getting any bigger.
Also, Huey, Dewey and Louie as trust-fund shitheads is my favourite impression they do.

Tart Kitty
Dec 17, 2016

Oh, well, that's all water under the bridge, as I always say. Water under the bridge!

Finally listening to the newest episode, and I'm already dying at the Brian Cox suicide scene from The Ring discussion.

"He was either going to die, or go back in time."

Rageaholic
May 31, 2005

Old Town Road to EGOT

Apes-Ma posted:

After watching it, I really hope they do The Snowman for worst of 2017 now.
It's not even entertainingly bad beyond the main character's name. I saw it last night and the scenery is gorgeous because it's set/filmed in Norway, but the plot and characters are super boring.

Guy Mann
Mar 28, 2016

by Lowtax
The production of Saw is a really interesting story, it being so disjointed and weirdly paced is because they basically ran out of money with only an hour of footage and they had to use a bunch of editing tricks to stretch it to feature length.

DoombatINC
Apr 20, 2003

Here's the thing, I'm a feminist.





New Hooked on TJ Hooker up!

"TJ Future..."
*Terminator theme*
"No criminals are left alive and we all eat buuuuuuugs"
*laser blast sounds*

Evil Mastermind
Apr 28, 2008

Chris's Saw article is up.

WeedlordGoku69
Feb 12, 2015

by Cyrano4747
gently caress, do I want to challenge that reading of the Saw series or do I want to avoid admitting to people that I actually have a reading of the Saw series? I guess this is my game to play. :smith:

Soup du Jour
Sep 8, 2011

I always knew I'd die with a headache.

DoombatINC posted:

New Hooked on TJ Hooker up!

"TJ Future..."
*Terminator theme*
"No criminals are left alive and we all eat buuuuuuugs"
*laser blast sounds*

It's really astounding that as they said "time is a flat circle" what with all that "wacky millennial gen-X" stuff in the episode.

Tiny Brontosaurus
Aug 1, 2013

by Lowtax

LORD OF BOOTY posted:

gently caress, do I want to challenge that reading of the Saw series or do I want to avoid admitting to people that I actually have a reading of the Saw series? I guess this is my game to play. :smith:

I want to hear your reading of the Saw series. It's not any dumber than having a reading on the Fast and Furious Franchise, like... my friend. Yeah.

WeedlordGoku69
Feb 12, 2015

by Cyrano4747
Basically, while a lot of his premises are correct, the conclusions he takes from them are... kinda the opposite of what the movie actually wants you to take away.

In no way, shape, or form are you supposed to see John Kramer as a heroic figure. The fact that his targets all did extremely minor things compared to his intended retribution for them is the point; he's a dangerous psychopath, not a hero, and the audience's sympathy is expected to at least initially be with his victims (some of them reveal themselves to be pretty awful, but most are normal or even good people).

The point of the Saw movies, in my opinion, is to highlight the Western desire for retributive justice over restorative justice. Despite John being a total loving monster by any reasonable metric, people still end up going to bat for him or even helping him, because they've been socially conditioned into equating torture with justice. This is not something the movies are endorsing.

It's been argued that the movies revel in their violence too much for this to be the case, but I don't feel this is true, because the way the violence is depicted isn't really fun. It's brutal, painful, and uncomfortable to watch, not cool and stylish, and as much as people rag on the aesthetic of the films, it really helps sell this. The way the violence is depicted seems to be essentially just beating the viewer over the head with this theme; it's essentially saying, "oh, you think this person deserves to be horribly tortured for doing drugs/cheating on their wife/etc? well, here's what that looks like, you total loving bastard." When the movies show people agreeing with Jigsaw, you're not supposed to think they're correct; you're supposed to examine your own beliefs, because a disturbing number of people pretty much think Jigsaw is right. There's no meaningful difference beyond theatrics between how Jigsaw treats people and how the American prison system does.

At the same time, though, I don't think Chris' assertion that the films are "too self-serious" holds. If the films were entirely self-serious, they would be unpalatable to most, the way that something like Funny Games or Irreversible is; the films have a subtle, but present, sense of humor. The stuff that people call out as unintentionally funny- the dialogue, the over-the-top Rube Goldberg kill-machines, how insanely convoluted the plot gets by the end- strikes me as deliberately funny, to act as something of a distancing tool to keep the movies from simply being unwatchably dark and depressing. I do think this sort of undermines the point, but I also feel it's necessary in order to make the movies even remotely commercially viable.

SamuraiFoochs
Jan 16, 2007




Grimey Drawer

LORD OF BOOTY posted:

Basically, while a lot of his premises are correct, the conclusions he takes from them are... kinda the opposite of what the movie actually wants you to take away.

In no way, shape, or form are you supposed to see John Kramer as a heroic figure. The fact that his targets all did extremely minor things compared to his intended retribution for them is the point; he's a dangerous psychopath, not a hero, and the audience's sympathy is expected to at least initially be with his victims (some of them reveal themselves to be pretty awful, but most are normal or even good people).

The point of the Saw movies, in my opinion, is to highlight the Western desire for retributive justice over restorative justice. Despite John being a total loving monster by any reasonable metric, people still end up going to bat for him or even helping him, because they've been socially conditioned into equating torture with justice. This is not something the movies are endorsing.

It's been argued that the movies revel in their violence too much for this to be the case, but I don't feel this is true, because the way the violence is depicted isn't really fun. It's brutal, painful, and uncomfortable to watch, not cool and stylish, and as much as people rag on the aesthetic of the films, it really helps sell this. The way the violence is depicted seems to be essentially just beating the viewer over the head with this theme; it's essentially saying, "oh, you think this person deserves to be horribly tortured for doing drugs/cheating on their wife/etc? well, here's what that looks like, you total loving bastard." When the movies show people agreeing with Jigsaw, you're not supposed to think they're correct; you're supposed to examine your own beliefs, because a disturbing number of people pretty much think Jigsaw is right. There's no meaningful difference beyond theatrics between how Jigsaw treats people and how the American prison system does.

At the same time, though, I don't think Chris' assertion that the films are "too self-serious" holds. If the films were entirely self-serious, they would be unpalatable to most, the way that something like Funny Games or Irreversible is; the films have a subtle, but present, sense of humor. The stuff that people call out as unintentionally funny- the dialogue, the over-the-top Rube Goldberg kill-machines, how insanely convoluted the plot gets by the end- strikes me as deliberately funny, to act as something of a distancing tool to keep the movies from simply being unwatchably dark and depressing. I do think this sort of undermines the point, but I also feel it's necessary in order to make the movies even remotely commercially viable.

I saw an interpretation of the movies that also pointed out something interesting and very true. Jigsaw is a complete and total failure. He keeps trying to get people to see the value in life and whatever and he fails every single solitary time. I've never actually watched the movies because I just can't handle that kinda stuff, but I've read summaries and watched the endings so I know the plots and what have you. Also I will genuinely go to bat for the ending of the first one as a real :aaa: moment that mostly comes together, and I will go to my grave thinking the main theme is a loving fantastic piece of music.

fatherboxx
Mar 25, 2013

LORD OF BOOTY posted:

It's been argued that the movies revel in their violence too much for this to be the case, but I don't feel this is true, because the way the violence is depicted isn't really fun. It's brutal, painful, and uncomfortable to watch, not cool and stylish, and as much as people rag on the aesthetic of the films, it really helps sell this.

Oh come on, not stylish? The traps are used on the posters, and WHM joke how Jigsaw is a steampunk nerd. Using a dozen cuts and filters to depict falling into a pool of used syringes IS trying to make it look cool and entertaining.

LORD OF BOOTY posted:

When the movies show people agreeing with Jigsaw, you're not supposed to think they're correct; you're supposed to examine your own beliefs, because a disturbing number of people pretty much think Jigsaw is right. There's no meaningful difference beyond theatrics between how Jigsaw treats people and how the American prison system does.

people love knowing that an enormous number of people is getting tortured and mutilated and degraded in the real world every second, providing them with an illusion of safety - that criticism would be falling on deaf ears for the next century at least. same goes for the Purge - it is the next step in power fantasy horror and god knows what will come after.
people get a thrill out of seeing random people on screen being punished based on grievances - just like the more conservative audiences of 70s and 80s loved seeing overly sexual teens get merked. Intent, whether the movie endorses something or not, is not important, but the cultural moment that the series dominated and exploited, is.

talking about Saw and 00s torture porn is more interesting than watching any of those movies now

WeedlordGoku69
Feb 12, 2015

by Cyrano4747

fatherboxx posted:

Oh come on, not stylish? The traps are used on the posters, and WHM joke how Jigsaw is a steampunk nerd. Using a dozen cuts and filters to depict falling into a pool of used syringes IS trying to make it look cool and entertaining.

You're missing my point a little. Go watch one of the violent scenes from the first three movies (say, Dr. Gordon sawing his foot off, or the guy with the hooks from the opening of 3), and then go watch an average Jason kill or the ED-209 scene from Robocop, and see if you can't identify how the violence is played way differently between the examples: Saw fixates extremely heavily on the pain and suffering of the victim, instead of simply being setup -> gross special effect. You could argue that this is simple sadism, but I really don't think it's that blunt, and everything around the violence makes me think they were going somewhere with it.

And yeah, it fell on deaf ears; it was probably inevitably going to, because it's a problem that's impossible for a movie to singlehandedly solve, and I'm not even certain that the movies were trying to solve the problem so much as just give people food for thought while they're getting thrilled.

SamuraiFoochs posted:

I saw an interpretation of the movies that also pointed out something interesting and very true. Jigsaw is a complete and total failure. He keeps trying to get people to see the value in life and whatever and he fails every single solitary time. I've never actually watched the movies because I just can't handle that kinda stuff, but I've read summaries and watched the endings so I know the plots and what have you. Also I will genuinely go to bat for the ending of the first one as a real :aaa: moment that mostly comes together, and I will go to my grave thinking the main theme is a loving fantastic piece of music.

Also, this is a really good point: everything pretty much falls the gently caress apart for Jigsaw. Not once does his goal ever succeed. At best, the people who survive his games are driven bonkers by it, like Amanda, and at worst they just... die. And when his "grand design" starts really coming together in 3, it blows up in his face hilariously instead of working out for him.

And yeah, Hello Zepp fuckin' rips.

WeedlordGoku69 fucked around with this message at 09:43 on Oct 27, 2017

Hockles
Dec 25, 2007

Resident of Camp Blood
Crystal Lake

I'm disappointed they didn't refer to "Hello, Zepp" as "the song that plays when the movie reveals it's twist." Because that's basically what it is.

DLC Inc
Jun 1, 2011

Hello Zepp was cool the first 2 times they used it, not so much after like 7 loving movies where it becomes an overbearing and overused leitmotif constantly

Yaws
Oct 23, 2013


Pro-click and sums up what I hate about the Saw series.

I need to check out Cabins other stuff

Hockles
Dec 25, 2007

Resident of Camp Blood
Crystal Lake

I don't remember when I "liked" the Collider facebook page, but their articles started to appear in my feed recently. Most of them are good reads.

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Gyges
Aug 4, 2004

NOW NO ONE
RECOGNIZE HULK

LORD OF BOOTY posted:

In no way, shape, or form are you supposed to see John Kramer as a heroic figure. The fact that his targets all did extremely minor things compared to his intended retribution for them is the point; he's a dangerous psychopath, not a hero, and the audience's sympathy is expected to at least initially be with his victims (some of them reveal themselves to be pretty awful, but most are normal or even good people).

The point of the Saw movies, in my opinion, is to highlight the Western desire for retributive justice over restorative justice. Despite John being a total loving monster by any reasonable metric, people still end up going to bat for him or even helping him, because they've been socially conditioned into equating torture with justice. This is not something the movies are endorsing.


I think that the torture porn genre and war movies are in the same boat where the more disgusting they make them the more they appeal to both the pro and anti groups. Every anti-war movie ends up a favorite of war hawks and it seems like the more torture porn genre you watch the more likely you are to be there because it's cool looking rather than seeing it as commentary on violence.

Like, sure, maybe James Wan and the writers who followed him were trying to make a commentary on violence and society. Now show me an audience that reliably differentiates between the message bearing Saw franchise and whatever Eli Roth movie you throw up on the screen.

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