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Jan 3, 2018 21:13
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Metalhead creeped me out because that Big Dog from Boston Dynamics creeps me out. The loving leg movement.... it's just so incredible unsettling. I've read most of the last 10 pages or so here, so I get the general feel for the episode from all of you, but goddamn, in terms of moment-to-moment terror, that one wins for me.
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Jan 3, 2018 21:21
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Rupert Buttermilk posted:Metalhead creeped me out because that Big Dog from Boston Dynamics creeps me out. The loving leg movement.... it's just so incredible unsettling. I've read most of the last 10 pages or so here, so I get the general feel for the episode from all of you, but goddamn, in terms of moment-to-moment terror, that one wins for me. Metalhead Yeah, the part where she throws the paint bucket and the dog starts carving up the wall with its knife was disturbing, just imaging how unrestrained it would be doing that to a person
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Jan 3, 2018 21:32
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I found the dog in Metalhead to be weirdly adorable, so much so that it kind of felt like the idea was "what if instead of a big hideous monster we have this cute little robo-pupper with an injured paw chasing people around?" With a sad moment at the end when all his buddies turned up and found him dead  Retardog posted:Someone hasn’t seen the SpotMini This thing is actually scarier. Tortuga fucked around with this message at 21:40 on Jan 3, 2018 |
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Jan 3, 2018 21:37
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Away all Goats posted:Metalhead Yeah, the part where she throws the paint bucket and the dog starts carving up the wall with its knife was disturbing, just imaging how unrestrained it would be doing that to a person You gotta admit it was really adorable when it thought that wall was human flesh
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Jan 3, 2018 21:38
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I thought it was cute when it was counter surfing for the knife 
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Jan 3, 2018 21:40
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GoGoGadgetChris posted:Are we supposed to take away that 15 Million Merits was just a comic book? It's the only episode other than Metalhead that doesn't fit cleanly with the rest of the series apparently taking place over the course of one man's medical career. It seems like ever since Netflix took over from Channel 4, and given Brooker the ability to make many more episodes of the show than he would have on British TV, he's started to think more about developing ideas from previous episodes into a larger overall universe for the show. I think that's why the first two seasons don't really integrate into any narrative arc you could figure out for the series. Though even if any of this is true I have no idea how Metalhead would fit in the Black Mirror world.
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Jan 3, 2018 22:38
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Crocodile was a mess and also featured arguably the worst person on the show, which is sort of an accomplishment in itself.
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Jan 3, 2018 22:40
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unlawfulsoup posted:Crocodile was a mess and also featured arguably the worst person on the show, which is sort of an accomplishment in itself. I dunno, Daly didn't tip the delivery guy.
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Jan 3, 2018 23:05
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It makes sense to use a small drone to defend a small warehouse like that, it doesn't need to guard nuclear warheads, kill tanks, or chase down transport vehicles or anything, it just needs to brutalize vagrants. Metalhead The puppy can drive cars anyway so it doesn't need to have super long legs for running fast with! Also this has me imagining the puppy stealing a bystander's car to pursue a thief, sounds like a big loving lawsuit in the making.
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Jan 3, 2018 23:44
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WampaLord posted:National Anthem owns so hard, gently caress the haters. i was just about to say, all these posts about how it's one of the worst episodes had me like "the gently caress?" it's great.
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Jan 3, 2018 23:56
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Chillgamesh posted:It makes sense to use a small drone to defend a small warehouse like that, it doesn't need to guard nuclear warheads, kill tanks, or chase down transport vehicles or anything, it just needs to brutalize vagrants. Metalhead The puppy can drive cars anyway so it doesn't need to have super long legs for running fast with! Also this has me imagining the puppy stealing a bystander's car to pursue a thief, sounds like a big loving lawsuit in the making. That's why I really don't buy that the dog came out of the box like it was in the show. Just imagine the feature meeting where someone is pitching the idea that the dog needs to be able to graft knives onto its limbs in a pinch. I'll buy either operated by a person or maybe some machine learned AI that went rogue as really the only thing that makes sense.
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Jan 4, 2018 00:30
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Hang the DJ could've said so much more than it did...I kind of resent the simplicity of the actual ending now that I've thought about it. The matching algorithm for this future-Tinder is ultimately not predictive, it's statistically observed: based on 1000 simulations pairing Amy+Frank, they chose each other 998 times. A 99.8% match. But the thing I can't reconcile is, Amy and Frank aren't the only users. Dating sites don't pick one possible partner, they assess compatibility against the entire userbase. And compatibility isn't 1 or 0, it's a percentage. Amy+Frank are 99.8% percent. But maybe Frank also has a 93% match. Maybe in another city, Amy would have a 99.9%. That's where I wish the episode went, because what's hosed up about it is that these pairings *aren't hypothetical*. They all literally exist, simulated in the cloud hundreds of times. If Amy had a layover in Montreal, the app would simulate 999/1000 scenarios where Pierre was the love of her life. But she swiped left, because she didn't live in Montreal.
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Jan 4, 2018 00:56
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WampaLord posted:Jodie Foster directed Arkangel, not Crocodile. Funny enough, the little boy's theater performance at the end of Crocodile? Bugsy Malone. Which featured a 13 year old Jodie Foster in a lead role!
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Jan 4, 2018 01:24
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Thundercracker posted:That's why I really don't buy that the dog came out of the box like it was in the show. Just imagine the feature meeting where someone is pitching the idea that the dog needs to be able to graft knives onto its limbs in a pinch. The dog didn't come out of the box. It was in powersave mode / rest mode behind the box. It's just a warehouse guard; not a militarized weapon of any type. Remember how cavalier - relatively - the trio was on the drive out there? They were joking around a bit, even. They weren't scanning the landscape for muderdogs, which is what they would be doing if the dogs were just killing machines designed to tear through any civilian resistance. And if you don't like that explanation because you like the idea of WMODs, it still doesn't work. Yes, the dogs are shown to be very powerful... versus unarmed civilians. This is future-land, and resourceful lady manages to utterly destroy one with a combination of pluck, paint, and shotgun shells. Hell, today's military could take them out. A bit of kevlar, a flashbang (they have cameras reliant on "sight"), and an armor-piercing round. Done. Future-military could just do it with drones. No, I don't think there's any reading at all of this piece that lends credence to the military idea, sorry. Besides, it's a far more powerful piece with the dogs as warehouse security. It's just an automated security system. No more, no less. It is absolutely mindless and absolutely ruthless. If you steal, you will be killed. End of story. It's a future where things have been automated beyond the reasonable edge (which seems like Black Mirror's MO). We can assume that the concept of justice has been automated as well - the penalty for theft is death, thanks, and the dogs only alert / track / kill those who have stolen. No need for any fuss about bringing bystanders or courts into the matter. That's what makes the episode amazing, in my opinion. It's absolutely an uncaring world where "proportional response" is gone. The coolest thing is I could see the skips - not even leaps - of logic that get us there. We're automating as much as possible. Everything rote or simple or dangerous should be automated. Stocking a warehouse, packing boxes, and shipping from a warehouse are all jobs that fall into those categories. So if the warehouse is fully-automated (which is not that far in the future!), we need some pretty beefy security because nobody's about. Let's automate that, too, then! And since "detain" is difficult, why not "kill"? Let's automate the court system and have blanket ruling that all thieves get a quick, humane death. Done. Automation wins! Thursday Next fucked around with this message at 01:32 on Jan 4, 2018 |
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Jan 4, 2018 01:27
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Xealot posted:Hang the DJ could've said so much more than it did...I kind of resent the simplicity of the actual ending now that I've thought about it. That's what did happen though. When it cuts back to the real the world they're just two people on dating app that's given them the 98% match, there's nothing to suggest they aren't going on dates every night with other similarly high scored matches.
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Jan 4, 2018 01:35
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Man it would have owned if we even got a hint of this kind of thought in the episode.
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Jan 4, 2018 01:41
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^ Yeah I think the miscommunication here is that in the simulated world they are deemed true love but in the real world its just a tinder match. They can do with that what they will.. I really enjoyed the first and the last episode of this season. The Tinder one had my favourite aesthetics, reminding me of Scrotal Recall (young fumbling with british accents).
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Jan 4, 2018 01:46
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Thursday Next posted:Besides, it's a far more powerful piece with the dogs as warehouse security. It's just an automated security system. No more, no less. It is absolutely mindless and absolutely ruthless. If you steal, you will be killed. End of story. That doesn't quite fit with the double-suicide she stumbles upon in a quite upscale suburban home. Whatever happened is clearly apocalyptic, across all social strata...even this wealthy couple in their marble-and-glass home were so scared of what was out there, they killed themselves. If all the dogs are, are "overzealous security" with a license to kill, it'd make the dystopic aspect of the story more narrow. There'd be some beneficiary out there who's fine with this, because they have resources and don't steal or trespass or break the law. From all we're shown, this is some extinction-level poo poo. There is no one else. I'm still on the military tech gone awry side of it. It's definitely about automation run amok, but in a Terminator sense. An advanced military AI that deploys robots as if occupying a city, except everywhere indiscriminately and for no reason. Though, I'd have vastly preferred the episode if the reveal was that it was a human-run occupation, where the horrific nature of what's happening was sanitized by the layers automation. "BigDog BD.7325-zx33 OFFLINE. 34 units near target. Deploy?" *puts down sandwich* *click*
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Jan 4, 2018 01:49
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Lampsacus posted:The Tinder one had my favourite aesthetics, reminding me of Scrotal Recall (young fumbling with british accents). That's not a porno, is it?
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Jan 4, 2018 01:54
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Xealot posted:Though, I'd have vastly preferred the episode if the reveal was that it was a human-run occupation, where the horrific nature of what's happening was sanitized by the layers automation. "BigDog BD.7325-zx33 OFFLINE. 34 units near target. Deploy?" *puts down sandwich* *click* This was the original ending that was written and filmed for the episode. I don't know if they decided to scrap that idea altogether but they cut the scene because they wanted to keep the episode focused on the woman being pursued.
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Jan 4, 2018 01:54
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HorseRenoir posted:This was the original ending that was written and filmed for the episode. I don't know if they decided to scrap that idea altogether but they cut the scene because they wanted to keep the episode focused on the woman being pursued. I'd be interested in seeing that version, but I don't know if deleted scenes or alternate cuts wind up anywhere for this show. Tortuga posted:That's what did happen though. When it cuts back to the real the world they're just two people on dating app that's given them the 98% match, there's nothing to suggest they aren't going on dates every night with other similarly high scored matches. I suppose that's true. I guess it felt to me like the meet-cute at the end was a consummation. In the moment, I definitely assumed the point was the app had found their perfect matches. The simulations accurately modeled what *will* happen. The idea of some what-if scenario that was transcendent and beautiful, but that doesn't actually come to be, is really poetic to me. Basically a scifi embellishment of that Citizen Kane scene where Bernstein talks about the woman with the parasol.
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Jan 4, 2018 02:04
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Xealot posted:If all the dogs are, are "overzealous security" with a license to kill, it'd make the dystopic aspect of the story more narrow. There'd be some beneficiary out there who's fine with this, because they have resources and don't steal or trespass or break the law. From all we're shown, this is some extinction-level poo poo. There is no one else. Naw, it broadens the dystopic aspect because the beneficiary class - represented by the dead rich couple - is dead and gone but their property remains protected by drones. Capitalism propagates itself past the exhaustion of the earth and the collapse of civilization.
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Jan 4, 2018 02:07
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Supercar Gautier posted:Realizing this season didn't have an episode based on current technology like The National Anthem or Shut Up and Dance. I guess Brooker didn't have a concept for one this time, but those are usually standouts. He probably had a few, but then 2017 happened and they all became reality. Metalhead is like a series of bad choices. Like, she managed to drain the thing's battery while sitting in the tree, why not just pick it up and throw it in a river or tear its legs off or some poo poo, anything BUT letting it sit still to recharge.
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Jan 4, 2018 02:07
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FireWorksWell posted:That's not a porno, is it? A guy has to track down his exes to tell them he may have given them chlamydia. It probably is a porno too tho.
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Jan 4, 2018 02:10
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WampaLord posted:Man it would have owned if we even got a hint of this kind of thought in the episode.
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Jan 4, 2018 02:17
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Thursday Next posted:If anyone has any suggestions for what to watch after White Bear, I'd love to hear it. the correct answer is shut up and dance.
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Jan 4, 2018 02:39
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Zenithe posted:A guy has to track down his exes to tell them he may have given them chlamydia. It’s on Netflix but they’ve renamed it Lovesick. Pity.
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Jan 4, 2018 04:45
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ymgve posted:Metalhead is like a series of bad choices. Like, she managed to drain the thing's battery while sitting in the tree, why not just pick it up and throw it in a river or tear its legs off or some poo poo, anything BUT letting it sit still to recharge. Yeah, I had that thought too just after it recharged - she could have just thrown her jacket over it and lived to see another day, or taken it somewhere dark for a permanent fix like yanking the battery. She may have been able to do it right there even, since it seems to stay in sleep mode until fully charged.
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Jan 4, 2018 05:23
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Mu Zeta posted:It was black and white to cover up the cheap CGI I doubt Double Negative are cheap given their track record, but maybe their TV department is all work experience kids?
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Jan 4, 2018 06:11
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I had a strong feeling that the dogbots only existed because they were running around with tennis balls attached to sticks. They just CGI'd in the smaller dogbots then black and whited it to hide it. Also the entire episode was shot in two locations, one being a stock factory and the other a house so I imagine they didn't get a ton of cash for this episode. I bet the most expensive thing besides the CGI was crashing those two cars.
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Jan 4, 2018 06:22
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Lampsacus posted:^ Yeah I think the miscommunication here is that in the simulated world they are deemed true love but in the real world its just a tinder match. They can do with that what they will.. They're just two people that let a company create a cookie of themselves then use it to endlessly try to gently caress people in their bluetooth range.
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Jan 4, 2018 06:29
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Doltos posted:I had a strong feeling that the dogbots only existed because they were running around with tennis balls attached to sticks. They just CGI'd in the smaller dogbots then black and whited it to hide it. In the GBS thread someone posted an EW interview with Charlie Brooker: Why did you shoot black and white? Was it just to be evocative? Or did it also save on CG costs to render the dog? That was the director, David Slade. He wanted it to be black and white. Like you say it does put you in mind of old horror movies and it fit with the sparse, pared-back nature of the story. I don’t think it saved money on CG. It felt like something I hadn’t seen before — doing lots of CG in black and white. Just finished the season tonight I thought Callister and Black Museum were by far the strongest episodes. I didn't think any of the rest were "bad" by any means but I doubt I will ever watch them again
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Jan 4, 2018 06:37
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even assuming the scenario where it was in b+w because of cheap cgi...that seems like it'd be a smart decision then?? I just appreciated the change of pace. it wasn't just about sentient AI rights again.
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Jan 4, 2018 07:41
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It would be great if s5 is written with a blanket ban on sentient AI.
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Jan 4, 2018 07:46
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Lampsacus posted:It would be great if s5 is written with a blanket ban on sentient AI. But robot drone dogs EVERYWHERE. When you get up one serves you breakfast, another is cleaning your car, and when you get home early from being fired from the drone factory, you see one banging your wife.
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Jan 4, 2018 08:12
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Then your wife has a baby and it's a dogbot, the baby dogbot shoots you.
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Jan 4, 2018 08:58
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Cojawfee posted:Then your wife has a baby and it's a dogbot, the baby dogbot shoots you. Not before the dogbot copied your mind and digitally shoots you over and over again in the dick for eternity.
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Jan 4, 2018 09:26
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Metalhead: I didn't like Metalhead, and neither did the other four of my friends who watched it. After watching it a second time to validate my feelings and criticism, It felt like somebody's college film class project and didn't really fit in to the overall feel of BM. Literally two minutes worth of exposition or world building would have given me more reason to care about the main character and her motivations or to be afraid of the dogs on something more than a visceral "this thing kills indiscriminately" level. The chain of poor decisions the protagonist made early on and survived was annoying because her success didn't feel earned. In the final act, she actually starts making good tactical decisions to outwit the dog and has to try increasingly more clever ways to outmaneuver the dog, making her short-lived victory feel earned before it is cut short by the shrapnel burst. And then there's the box reveal, which completely fell flat and just made the whole endeavor seem pointless. I'm not going to make excuses for the teleplay by filling in the blanks from my own imagination, when it is obvious from the interviews after the fact that they didn't really know what they wanted to do or say with it. In the interview Brooker mentions scrapping the drone operator angle because it didn't feel right: quote:We sort of deliberately decided not to flesh out a lot of the backstory. Originally in my first draft, we also showed a human operator operating the dog robot from across the ocean at his house. There was a bit I liked where he leaves the [control unit] while the robot is watching her while she’s up in the tree and he goes and gives his kids a bath. But it felt a bit weird and too on-the-nose. It kind of felt superfluous. We deliberately pared it back and did a very simple story. It wasn't superfluous, it gave us a context to understand what the main character was up against and a reason to care about her success or failure. What he should of said in this interview was "we sort of deliberately decided not to flesh out any of the backstory" because that is how it came off in the final presentation. The radio monologues establish the vaguest of motivations for the protagonist, but are deliberately obtuse enough to protect the box reveal at the end and don't do anything to tell us what we haven't already been shown in the opening scene; they mostly just serve to build tension as the dog homes in on her signal, which she acknowledges is happening(!), and the proceeds to keep transmitting for some time after anyway(!!). And then they didn't even know what they wanted to be in the boxes up front, other than "toys": quote:We went back and forth on what should be in that warehouse. Originally in the script, it just said “toys.” The idea was a box of toys for a dying child. David wanted it to be the only soft and comforting thing that we saw in the entire piece. He wanted it to be something softer and more immediately comforting. So we went for bears. Which is probably just as well because a crate full of fidget spinners would have been ridiculous. The loss of three lives for a box of toys is depressing, not comforting. It revealed the MacGuffin, which is far more powerful to this kind of story as an unknown element- but it had to be revealed or there wouldn't have been that Black Mirror Twist™. If that final scene had just shown the corpse and the unopened box, it would have been a great tie-in to the first act to wrap things up and left us all wondering about what was in the box that was worth three people's lives (medicine to cure an outbreak the dogs were sent to eradicate? Marsellus Wallace's soul? the holy loving grail?). What we are left with instead is wondering "why is this world the way it is and how did it get to be that way", without really caring about the protagonist or the other two people who died because their deaths seem even more absurd in the context of a box of teddy bears. To me, this just shows that this was a high concept script by Brooker that didn't get much critical thought for execution beyond * a e s t h e t I c * and the broadest strokes of human emotion vs. cold machine decision making. This is also evident in the series of tweets by the director featuring the visuals such as the scouting photos, discussion about the focus on the B&W treatment, and overall execution- which is great when you have good story to tell with it, instead of making the affectation of the execution the focus. The future of BM: My overall impression is that Brooker is struggling to make the same impact and writing quality over six episodes per season for Netflix as he was when doing 3 episodes per season for Channel 4, and this shows with what are often considered the weaker points of each season. To wit, 1/3 of each of the first two seasons had one episode that from my impression this thread feel is weak (S1:E1, S2:E3 [national anthem, Waldo moment]) and when the episode count goes up, the ratio of mediocre episodes follows (S3:E5, E6 [men against fire, hated in the nation]). On the last season, the most lukewarm reception seems to be focused on 3 & 5 (crocodile & metalhead) with several posters mentioning that they feel one or the other of those is the weakest of the entire series. Considering the fact the Netflix only commissioned twelve episodes and this season brings us the last 6 of that order with no news of a renewal, as well as the tidy package that Black Museum seems to wrap around the whole series as a kind of finale, I think Brooker has positioned the show to end while it is ahead if necessary. The future of the show hinges on critical reception and awards this year to determine if it is worth another round of funding by Netflix- and it may very well be with its popularity and the end of House of Cards. Brooker still has an anthology of novellas written by others and set in the BM universe due for release over the coming years, so it will continue in some form. Personally, I hope he steps back on the writing aspect to let others lead, focuses on show running, and we get some fresh ideas that don't retread the VR/cookies/phones but too much plots and the show continues on for a few more seasons.
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Jan 4, 2018 10:42
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ickna posted:And then they didn't even know what they wanted to be in the boxes up front, other than "toys": You're misinterpreting that quote pretty badly. While the fact that they died trying to get them is obviously depressing, the bears themselves are comforting. The message is that this world is so bleak and empty that they were risking their lives for the chance to bring even a modicum of comfort to one of the few people left. The ending would have been much weaker if it had been a crate of medicine, or something else they were going after out of strict necessity.
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Jan 4, 2018 11:23
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God I fucking love Diablo 3 gold, it even paid for this shitty title