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Irish Joe posted:No one will think any less of you if you take the ban. I will absolutely think less of him and taunt both him and his ghost.
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Jul 3, 2014 02:39
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| # ? Apr 26, 2024 18:15 |
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I too would think much less of him, if I actually knew who he was in the first place.
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Jul 3, 2014 02:49
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I read the episode's description on Wikipedia and knew that this would be the perfect episode for Occupation.
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Jul 3, 2014 02:56
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Last Man Standing "All About Eve" Season 3, Episode 12 Jesus loving Christ. That was...what in the gently caress was that? Was that seriously an episode of television that I watched? What the...what in the gently caress happened? Was that television I just watched, or some sort of liberal fever dream? Because that couldn't have been real. I...I just...what? What? This...uh...episode? of television is basically a televised Chick tract...I guess? Like it had no real plot to speak of, or whatever plot that was there was so weak and diluted that it mine as well not had functionally existed in the first place. Every ounce of whatever plot there is exists solely to convey the commonly-accepted conservative message, every joke at the expense of and demonizing liberals. I'm like, shellshocked. I seriously cannot believe that this script made it to network television unaltered in any really significant way, because this episode is, from beginning to end, a conservative polemic. This is the sitcom version of John Galt's speech from Atlas Shrugged; this is a bloviating diatribe, an indictment against any and all evil liberals, which is apparently all of them. In a way, it's beautiful, the same way a mushroom cloud is beautiful. Any...anyways, the...er, the episode opens to Mandy browsing Facebook and laughing at the endless amount of flames and trolls Eve is receiving for endlessly reposting Mike's vlogs. The cold open of this episode is just five straight minutes of the most stereotypical conservative messaging masquerading as "jokes". It's supposed to come across as mean-spirited sniggering at evil liberals, but...it's so poorly written as to just be embarrassing. It's like if the collective Debate and Discourse subforum were to write a parody spec script of a conservative sitcom, with the easiest and laziest one-liners that were meant to so ironically portray how stupid conservatives are, but really only show how petty and awful the spergs who post there are. Except every joke at liberals' expense is played straight, written by actual, ostensibly sincere conservatives. It's loving mind-boggling. Like, look at this poo poo. This is something Mike actually loving says in response to Vanessa's insistence that Eve stop reposting her father's vlogs, on facebook: Vanessa: "Why don't you just stop reposting your father's vlogs?" Mike: "Thank god you weren't at Lexington and Concord." This is something even me, someone who knows the depths to which LMS can and will sink, would never even jokingly make up, because I would go in my head, "Come on, Mike's a conservative idiot but even he wouldn't compare reposting vlogs on facebook to the Revolutionary War. That's just silly." But this actually loving happened! What?! There's more in this episode. Apparently Eve is being terrorized on facebook by Richie Hayden, sophomore class president and apparent devout liberal. He's never shown onscreen, has a single line of dialog, or even is a real character beyond how Eve describes him, but he's supposed to be the Big Bad of the episode...I guess? It's downright confusing. If you're making a show about how much of hypocrites the evil liberals are (in the middle of the episode Richie apparently "comes at" Eve, who defends herself by kicking his rear end), cast someone to play the evil liberal! Why is the antagonist of the episode literally reduced to a passing mention? Wouldn't you want to cast some gay marrying, weed-loving, peacenik socialist twerp of a hypocrite who starts fights with teenage girls over what they (re-)post on facebook like the fag-loving hypocrites they are? This seems like such a missed opportunity! What is happening on this show. The "Richie fights Eve" development to the main plot being shunted off to "Eve recounts it" status makes the episode all the more tonally confusing. From everything we see prior to that revelation, from how Eve has acted- super, unnecessarily aggressive towards counter views- it's totally plausible that Eve is just lying to cover up the fact she jumped a dude for shittalking her online. It even makes way more plot sense for that to have happened, since Eve is so diehard in her beliefs to the point of self-parody. I kept on watching to the end expecting Eve to fess up that she lied about being attacked since that seemed the way that Kaitlyn Dever was playing the character- but no, apparently it was all true. There's more confusing nonsense throughout, like how the running B-plot of this episode is about how Mike got pulled over by a cop and ticketed, which he then endlessly complains throughout the episode. Even though Mike was clearly speeding through a stop sign, he spends the entire episode bitching about how tickets are glorified "taxes". Now, Mike, buddy, I loving hate cops and tickets just as much as the next guy so I feel for you, but you broke the law. The law you so deify in every other aspect. There's no loving logic to this plot at all. It just reeks of conservative white man self-entitlement that's completely unearned, with Mike bitching throughout about the logic of a cop pulling him over instead of catching crooks, when a) this implies Denver is a crime-ridden hellscape 100% of the time cops are pulling over nice rich white men for breaking traffic laws, b) that all cops do the exact same job, and that "traffic cops", whose literal entire loving job is in policing traffic, don't exist, and c) that cops don't catch a vast, vast majority of criminals via simply pulling them over for an unrelated traffic violation. It's downright mindboggling the amount of cognitive dissonance throughout this episode that Mike displays over a relatively minor infraction that he, well, kinda deserved the punishment for. To bring it back to Eve, since as the episode title notes the episode is "all about" her, eventually Vanessa convinces Mike to "tone down" the content of his vlogs, at least to protect Eve. This eventually leads into Eve declaring that Mike has "betrayed" her by censoring his message as Mike learns how Eve is the truest conservative of all, fighting the good fight for free speech. Again. Want to point out. This is all about Eve reposting the content of Mike's vlogs to facebook. I loving defy you to think of a lower stakes and more marginal way to express free speech than reposting the contents of somebody else's rants on social media. This is the driving conflict of the episode. This is what we're supposed to, as the audience, side with Eve exercising her God-given first amendment rights to protect: reposting something to facebook. What?! There's so much hosed up nonsense throughout this episode. It is insane how the LMS writing staff reached for literally every single conservative message in the bag and just ran all of them in this episode, logic, common sense, or thematic stakes be damned. Mike's mad about the traffic ticket he totally deserves because Mandy gets off with a warning from the same cop because she's pretty, so there's a whole "gently caress women, slutty manipulative cunts" attitude to the entire subplot. Eve starts warning oncoming motorists about the speed trap with a sign on the side of the road, because apparently she's exercising her right to free speech (and be a petty rear end in a top hat). I...I think I'm having a stroke describing this episode, because none of this makes any loving sense at all. What in the gently caress was this. Where am I. How did this get made. What. Grade: F Random Thoughts:
NieR Occomata fucked around with this message at 03:36 on Jul 3, 2014 |
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Jul 3, 2014 03:32
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Usually I'm p so-so on my reviews when I post them but I will never post something better than what I just posted above
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Jul 3, 2014 03:34
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Without having seen the episode, that Ed line you posted at the end sounds dangerously close to an actual joke. One that in the right hands could elicit a smile, though not a belly laugh. I presume it wasn't delivered as such?
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Jul 3, 2014 03:52
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E PLURIBUS ANUS posted:Vanessa: "Why don't you just stop reposting your father's vlogs?" Mike: "Thank god you weren't at Lexington and Concord." If you read the Freep thread on D&D* this is actually a depressingly common theme among hardcore conservatives, loving EVERYTHING they do is equal to the first shots of the second American Revolution/Civil War *Don't. For your own sanity
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Jul 3, 2014 04:07
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Gaz-L posted:Without having seen the episode, that Ed line you posted at the end sounds dangerously close to an actual joke. One that in the right hands could elicit a smile, though not a belly laugh. I presume it wasn't delivered as such? It was a laugh line
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Jul 3, 2014 15:15
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You forgot to mention how Mike, based on Eve getting in a fight with someone who made fun of her for posting the vlogs, decides about how he's going to do a big new video about overcoming tyranny before his boss convinces him to tone it down for her sake. This show's really fuckin' weird. Tim Allen is clearly meant to be an obnoxious loudmouth jackass, but the show presents it as adorable because he's on the side of the angels. But he's just....so horrible.
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Jul 3, 2014 19:26
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quote:Eve: "Bring it on, trailblazers gotta take some hits. Just like Barry Goldwater paved the way for Ronald Reagan, right dad?" Eve is officially my favorite character in television history. She's like a 17 year-old me 
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Jul 3, 2014 19:37
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That was the review I've been waiting for since the thread started. You did not disappoint. Few things I'd like to point out about the episode I feel that deserve a mention: The opening joke is (paraphrased) Vanessa: " Eve why do you look so tired? Are you having trouble sleeping?" Eve: "Who can sleep with this crushing national debt?" Yeah... That's the punchline. There's this weird "women are sluts" commentary going on in this episode. Vanessa is upset that she couldn't use her cleavage to get out of a ticket whereas Mandy only received a warning. Later Mandy intends to use her body (with a slight hint at sex) to convince her professor to give her an A. Neither parent object to this. Kyle, Boyd, Chuck and Ryan are all absent from this episode. Usually these characters are used to ground Mike or at least be a straw man for him to knock down. Instead the episode feels more like a list of talking points a Tea Party politician would ramble off at a convention. It's especially apparent during the closing vlog. If you watch one episode make it this one.
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Jul 4, 2014 01:58
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Last Man Standing "Breaking Boyd" Season 3, Episode 13 This is a difficult episode to watch and review, because it starts so aggressively, atrociously bad and ends so well. The problem, too, is that the entire episode flows and proceeds logically, so taken in retrospect, the offensively terrible beginning is necessary to make the thoughtful and interesting ending land. It's bizarre to give this show accolades for plotting, Last Man Standing's by far weakest point, but here we are. There's a lot to unpack here and my feelings about this episode as a whole are conflicted, so let's get into it. The episode opens to Kristin and Ryan visiting the Baxter home, complaining about how Boyd's teacher at school has been recommending Boyd see a child psychologist to work out his behavioral issues, which Vanessa and Mike both out-of-hand discount. From the very beginning of the episode, the tone set is the needlessly confrontational one that LMS does so love to turn to whenever the show has a particular political axe to grind. In this case it seems actively detrimental since there's no real downside to the issue: if Boyd seeing a psychologist helps him with his behavioral issues, who does this hurt? The answer is nobody, and in this case having Vanessa and Mike disagree creates conflict for no reason since there's no real downside to having Boyd see a psychologist. Boyd goes to see the psychologist, who recommends placing Boyd on ADHD for a trial period as a test to see if his behavior improves. This immediately leads into an argument between the parents and grandparents, with Kristin advocating medication and everyone else recommending against it. Now, on paper, this is a suitably dramatic plot development, and the overarcing argument- whether or not to medicate a child, especially a young one -has two equally viable arguments both for and against. In a show rarity, an ideological disagreement is worth the time that is spent debating the issue as this has real-world implications in the development of a young child and is worth discussing as both sides are valid. For once, LMS chose a topic that was a difficult issue to wrestle with, over one with a clearly morally right and morally wrong side. In execution, however, this scene is a loving mess. Instead of decrying the dangers of mood-altering drugs on Boyd, Mike discounts his behavioral issues with, essentially, the phrase "boys will be boys". (Which, incidentally, is an excuse I despise as it's inherently misogynist and also based on raising kids under deflecting moral responsibility). Vanessa discounts what the doctor recommends because "she's a doctor", which is an argument used by morally disingenuous pieces of garbage with doctorates in theology or philosophy to argue against vaccinations and climate change. Ryan argues against medicating Boyd because the medication would "remove his masculine qualities while 'feminine' ones (like, say, teamwork and compassion)" are rewarded, which sounds like the most MRA,  bullshit reverse-sexism argument ever made by a r/mensrights piece of human garbage. While also implying that being a decent human being is solely a woman's domain. It's loving mind-boggling.The scene is made all the worse by giving Tim Allen the excuse to argue about how great men are and how if women ran everything and medicated all the men in the world, it'd be a nightmare, leaning to this crowning turd of misogyny: Mike: "[Women] would never have invented anything except spanx and a telephone!" Which is so historically inaccurate as to be laughable if it weren't so goddamn offensive. Also, again- this is supposed to be about whether or not Boyd should be taking medication, not how terrible women are. But even so, there's a genuine sense of moral ambiguity throughout the scene, which I could sympathize with. Personally speaking, I have adult ADHD, which I have taken medication for in the past, and probably had ADHD (which was untreated) as a teenager. If I had been medicated as a kid, I would've had a much less hellish childhood. But, even so, I'm still split on whether or not giving ADHD meds to a young child, because if they're not necessary they can really gently caress up a child's development. It's this encroaching fear of the wrong choice ruining a child's life permanently that the atrocious and completely, utterly dishonest scene was able to still express, just nowhere near as well or with as much pathos as it could have. Eventually, though, everyone compromises and decides to pursue non-medicated solutions, with the predictable sitcom trope of the litany of failures until Mike, of course, ingeniously comes up with the solution via teaching Boyd hockey, which also of course perfectly works out his behavioral issues. It's an altogether disappointing and safe end to what should be a morally ambiguous and dark plot. The part where the episode is saved is in the B-plot. Through it, Mandy, who is studying for mid-terms, gives up her phone to Kyle so she can pay full attention to studying for her exams. The B-plot is barely touched throughout the episode, and the only scenes are of Kyle having to deal with Mandy's ludicrously demanding social life being played for comedic effect, so it sets up the expectation that the resolution to the B-plot will involve Kyle gaining a new appreciation for Mandy's social skills, or somehow screwing up her social life in some major way or having Mandy go through intentionally exaggerated withdrawal from not having her phone. You know, the normal sitcom tropes. Instead, it ends with Mandy acing her midterms, with everyone suitably impressed with her drive- until it's discovered that several ADHD pills are missing, and revealing that Mandy had been pill-popping in order to keep focus. It's a surprisingly dark and morally convoluted plot development to what is presented as a fairly straightforward, comedic B-plot that also ties in extremely well with the A-plot of the episode. You can feel the overwhelming awkwardness of the scene where Mike confronts Mandy, pill bottle in hand, and for once the show leaves it fairly ambiguous whether what Mandy did was even wrong. Unsafe, sure, but was it immoral? LMS doesn't provide easy answers, and in so doing creates a much better, much darker show. The now-A plot continues as its slowly revealed that Mandy more than likely has undiagnosed ADHD and was more than likely self-medicating, which is why the ADHD meds worked so well for her. So beyond the topicality and nuanced portrayal of an actual problem facing college students today, it introduces another moral fly into this ointment of an episode, while dimensionalizing Mandy's character in ways the show has never done before. Mandy, from where I have began the show, has always been portrayed as a ditzy, bordering on mentally ill airhead. By making her actually mentally ill, it creates a character who has been suffering from a disease that has negatively affected her life, not just the comic relief of the show by being parodically dumb. It also validates ADHD as a real illness with real negative effects on a person's life as Mike and Vanessa strongly recommend having her see a doctor to get treated, not something that (up to that point in the episode) was treated with the typical conservative sneering. It's a genuinely great writing moment for the show as a whole and a truly brilliant reveal that completely changes how I saw Mandy's character leading up to this episode. Molly Ephraim is a great comedic actor, but this reveal is a true triumph of the LMS writing staff, a master class in a nuanced, understated, reveal in a show changing perception of a character in an organic, logical way. Well done, LMS writing team. Grade: B Random Thoughts:
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Jul 4, 2014 02:19
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This episode is a little weird to me in that it's like they want to say that Mike's views on psychology are wrong but they don't want him to actually be wrong about things.
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Jul 4, 2014 05:19
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That episode seems weird to me as there are perfectly rational reasons that most people on it (especially 6 year olds) don't need ADHD meds. They could have even undercut the point by still having Mandy be a better student on them and having her go a doctor and say "maybe she should have been on them as a teen but never as a child". A perfectly rational viewpoint for both Conservatives and Liberals.
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Jul 4, 2014 15:41
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Mandy is the best character Why am I watching this show
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Jul 4, 2014 21:19
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Last Man Standing "Renaming Boyd's School" Season 3, Episode 14 "Hi, Mike Baxter here for Outdoor Man, here to talk to you men. We're obsessed with our dingers. Our beaver bugs, our salty centipedes. That's right, I'm talking about...fishing lures. Half-price now at Outdoor Man. Now if you thought I was talking about something else and got offended, well...I'm sorry for you, because it's your interpretation of the words that make 'em offensive. I think the same applies to sports teams. Now, I understand why people don't want to be associated with the name 'Washington Redskins'- they went three and thirteen. But you don't see the folks from the Emerald Isle complaining about the Fighting Irish do ya? You don't see John Boehner crying about the Syracuse Orangemen. Now, whatever the color, let's just try to develop a thicker skin. Maybe by spendin' more time fishin', where only Mother Nature can hear you bitchin'." Oh, okay then, thanks for letting me know Mike Baxter, I'll be sure to apply that in my daily life. As you'd guess from the quote spoken by stupid motherfucking jew oval office Tim Allen, this episode is about quote-on-quote 'censorship' and how it applies to daily life. Specifically, the conservative assumption that any form of complaint about being politically incorrect is easily discounted due to the base, simplistic, and idiotic assumption that "words don't hurt" and/or "you're intolerant for not tolerating my intolerance". The episode specifically details with Boyd's school, William Clark Elementary. Boyd, in the course of writing a report about William Clark (the latter part of the eponymous Lewis and Clark, for those who didn't know), discovered that he was a slaveowner, and Ryan has seized this information as part of a crusade to have the school's name changed, out of respect to, you know...black people. Which seems like an altogether reasonable response to make to learning that a school's namesake owned other human beings. Unfortunately, Mike Baxter has an issue with this (Mike Baxter, incidentally, is played by the niggerfaggot Tim Allen), of course. His argument is the greatness of Clark's accomplishments in exploring and mapping the Louisiana Purchase cancelled out or at least justified his negative tendencies, which is a reasonable point to make. Unfortunately, this methodology is externalized in the opening paragraph, which is a word-for-word transcription of his vlog. Instead of making that argument Mike argues that, I guess, words don't hurt unless you make them hurt? Then segues in how the Washington football team's name is acceptable, when to anyone with even half a brain it clearly loving isn't? And ironically is a major political hot potato, right now, that will probably get the NFL to step in and forcibly change the name of the team in response because of how much of a PR nightmare the name has become, and how badly it's reflecting on the NFL as a whole that nothing has changed? Like the thing that Mike and all conservatives don't loving get when they bitch and moan about "political correctness run amok" is is that people have a right to be offended, and urge for and organize boycotts or to in some other way attempt to affect change when viewing something they don't like. That's the way freedom of expression works, and arguing "well, you're only offended because you interpreted what I said as offensive" is the defense that cowards use to defend their dogwhistle offensiveness. Like, literally this is what Lee Atwater, one of the best campaign strategists to ever exist, outlined how to do use dogwhistle racism in politics in the 1980s, to the degree where it's just a component of the Republican party campaign platform: quote:Atwater: You start out in 1954 by saying, "friend of the family, friend of the family, friend of the family." By 1968 you can't say "friend of the family" — that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states' rights and all that stuff. You're getting so abstract now [that] you're talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you're talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is [that] blacks get hurt worse than whites. And subconsciously maybe that is part of it. I'm not saying that. But I'm saying that if it is getting that abstract, and that coded, that we are doing away with the racial problem one way or the other. You follow me — because obviously sitting around saying, "We want to cut this," is much more abstract than even the busing thing, and a hell of a lot more abstract than "friend of the family, friend of the family." To get back on track, having Mike be an uninformed moron arguing an (admittedly legitimate) case badly is part and parcel of the LMS experience. Unfortunately, Vanessa too gets on the bandwagon for keeping the name of the school, but solely because changing the name would mean changing the Lewis and Clark mural that she as PTA president helped create, which is such a petty and self-indulgent reason to keep something that might offend people it kinda blew me away. I mean, Mike has a point, he's just arguing it terribly: Vanessa is just a bad person, and this entire episode does her no favors perception wise. Continuing on, Mike decides to call over Carol and Chuck Larabee since the former is now a member of the school board. This leads into a wonderfully awkward scene as Mike and Vanessa try desperately to argue that the name should be kept in front of, well, two black people. Chuck, in particular, is on point as he tosses out zinger after zinger to humiliate the Baxters. Eventually, Carol agrees the name should be kept, but solely as a cost-cutting measure. (Seriously? How much does changing the name on a couple of signs cost?) Unfortunately, Ryan has been pushing for the name change at PTA meetings, so Mike goes over and has a heart-to-heart with him about dropping the issue. This eventually leads into, of course, Mike insulting Ryan over being a deadbeat dad for a couple of years after Boyd was born, until the predictably forced ending has the also very forced analogy of "accepting people despite their flaws". End scene, roll credits. The problem with this ending is that they've, one, already done it before: in the season two episode "Buffalo Bill", it ends much the same way with much the same forced saccharine ending, except that time it worked as it seemed to finally address the issue about Ryan having ran out on Kristin when she gave birth to Boyd. The circumstances themselves for both episodes, even, were similar (a wild west show glorifying the massacre of millions of Native Americans versus this episode's glorification of a slave-owner), so this episode's capper felt very samey and tired. Finally, the moral of both episode's stories- that something atrocious that happened in the past should be forgiven because time had passed -are pretty much exactly the same. It's at this point just bad storytelling considering they almost literally Xeroxed the scripts and changed some pronouns. Even beyond going to the exact same well, the problem of doing it again is that an entire season- an in-world year -has passed between both events, so there's no dramatic impact to Mike calling out Ryan for being a bad dad, since at this point the event has happened like...five years ago or something. It just feels petty, on top of the fact that creating an equivalence between "being a deadbeat dad" and "owning slaves" is the definition of idiotic. But I guess we couldn't expect much from Mike, considering he's played by noted rapist queer Tim Allen, so oh well. Grade: D Random Thoughts:
NieR Occomata fucked around with this message at 01:49 on Jul 7, 2014 |
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Jul 4, 2014 22:15
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Last Man Standing "Tasers" Season 3, Episode 15 This was an incredibly, incredibly dull episode of television. Again, this episode is one of the many that falls into the neat wheelwell of such prior episodes as "Driving Lessons" and "Haunted House" this season, which were all episodes so loving unremarkable as to be impossible to review interestingly. So this review's gonna be a short one. There's nothing to really remark about this episode, nothing of any real interest to grab onto, to analyze. This week's episode is a Valentine's Day special, in case the very misleading episode title didn't clue you in. The episode focuses on Valentine's Day itself, and has no real plot to speak of: all of the couples in and around the Baxter family (Mike and Vanessa, Mandy and Kyle, Ryan and Kristin) react to the celebration in different ways. There's no real driving force or overall point to the episode, more of everyone operating within the parameters of their relationships reacting to the special day. The closest thing this episode has to a driving A-story involves Eve trying to get a boyfriend, via the of course very Eve-like method of literally interviewing potential candidates. Even this is a bare excuse for a plot since it lasts the entirety of two scenes and ends with Eve realizing who she really liked all along was, of course, the one guy who refused to play her games and was just upfront about wanting to date her. This episode was such a clear "we gotta be done by 5" halfassed effort that I'm doing the episode more justice than it deserves by even writing about it. It wasn't bad, just so nondescript and threadbare that there's nothing to discuss, nor should there be. A "makes the minimum effort needed to be technically called an episode of television" if ever there was one. Grade: C Random Thoughts:
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Jul 5, 2014 00:05
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There goes my theory about holiday episodes on this show
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Jul 5, 2014 00:08
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DarklyDreaming posted:There goes my theory about holiday episodes on this show don't you feel silly now!
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Jul 5, 2014 00:35
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Does anyone get tazed in that episode?
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Jul 5, 2014 01:12
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gently caress THIS loving PIECE OF poo poo loving FUCKER gently caress SHOW gently caress gently caress
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Jul 5, 2014 22:54
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Well, this should be good.
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Jul 5, 2014 23:01
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E PLURIBUS ANUS posted:gently caress THIS loving PIECE OF poo poo loving FUCKER gently caress SHOW gently caress gently caress Tell me more.
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Jul 5, 2014 23:04
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Horking Delight posted:
quote:Continuing with the theme of integrity, Mandy hits a parked car and refuses to leave a note with her information on it. Thankfully, Eve made the good choice to leave the note. Mike and Vanessa tell Mandy she needs to take responsibility for her actions and self because it’s a basis of your integrity. Mandy doesn’t listen. She receives a call from the owner of the car she hit. When she goes to meet with him, he gives her an iPad for being a responsible and nice person. Eve is angry that Mandy received a gift for doing nothing. However, Mandy goes back to the man’s shop to return the iPad for cash. She tells him it doesn’t have a lot of memory or retina, so she’d rather have the money. He’s outraged. He takes the iPad back and tells her he’s going to report the accident to the insurance company. She tells him that the joke is on him because her dad gets that bill. He then tells her the joke is on her because her car is being towed from the handicap parking spot.
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Jul 5, 2014 23:15
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Seeing as the last hyperbolic reaction was about spanking of all things, I'm guessing this one is about one of the following: 1. Crate training. 2. "M'lady." 3. Hunting (have we had a retarded tirade against hunting yet?). 4. Conceal carry permits.
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Jul 5, 2014 23:18
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Irish Joe posted:Seeing as the last hyperbolic reaction was about spanking of all things, I'm guessing this one is about one of the following: I just started watching the episode and wow. The B-plot is total poo poo. Or maybe it's the A-plot and pentyne has led me astray with false hope. Wait, is this a "women are equivalent to dogs" plot? What the loving gently caress. Colin Mockery fucked around with this message at 23:32 on Jul 5, 2014 |
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Jul 5, 2014 23:29
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Last Man Standing "Stud Muffin" Season 3, Episode 16 This episode is loving intolerable. Jesus goddamn Christ is this episode, and this show in general, just the worst, most needlessly offensive and charged bullshit ever. It has no tact, no sense of nuance or of good taste, and is endlessly regressive. This show is the racist drunk at the bar yelling about "that friend of the family Obama" over and over; loud but saying nothing of any merit whatsoever. In concept this episode should be really simple: Muffin, the Baxter's dog, has knocked up Lady, the Larabees' dog, and hijinks ensue. There's a B-plot involving Mandy accidentally denting someone's car. Just throw some gags and one-liners and you got yourself an episode of television, right? Wrong. The episode in question uses the thin veneer of symbolism to hide behind making a bunch of rape justification "jokes" and to endlessly complain about women's right to choose. It's goddamn despicable how in response to Lady being pregnant, Mike smugly intones about how "Well, she shouldn't have been walking around late at night in fur!" See, because she's a dog, and wears fur all the time, see? Isn't it funny? It's loving cowardice at its finest, the way the LMS writing staff spews their dangerous and cancerous opinions justifying rape and demonizing women for getting abortions, but realize that they would get a bunch of (well-deserved) heat for their lovely awful rape justification non-jokes, so they essentially hide behind the fact that the parties involved are dogs to spread their hate. Like, it goddamn infuriates me, not that LMS has shown its misogynist leanings yet again, but that it did so in the most disingenuous and cowardly way possible, using the thinnest of all possible excuses for analogy just to avoid getting called out for the poo poo its politics are. gently caress this show and gently caress the people who wrote it, the loving spineless twerps. The worst part of it all is that none of this is surprising any more. At this point, I respect the show for being brazen about its opinions, since the event is so rare. Usually Last Man Standing, rather, operates in this specific mode, where they want to push some terrible agenda but realize they'd get criticized for it so hide the offending content behind layers of abstraction. It's just that in this case the layers are so paper-thin that it feels like the LMS staff is just rubbing the audience's noses in it while flipping them off for...respecting women and thinking they shouldn't be raped. Just...gently caress this loving show. Christ. Ugh. It's all the more enraging since none of this poo poo was necessary. The A-plot about Muffin impregnating Lady was just a thin excuse to push the real plot of the story, which is about Chuck and Carol splitting up over Chuck's inability to successfully reintegrate after his military service. It just makes the preceding ten minutes as the show finally gets to the meat of the issue feel all the more insulting as LMS needlessly insults and degrades women, but doesn't even have the loving courage to do so directly. The ending scene of the episode, where Mike and Chuck commiserate leading to Mike giving Chuck some much-needed advice, is still somewhat affecting despite all the issues leading up to it. More's the pity, really, because this emotional core- where Chuck is confronting his feelings of useless and inadequacy after his military service- is some rich stuff, and somehow, improbably, still lands. It's stuff like this that show what LMS could be if it really tried, as opposed to some regressive, misogynist, cowardly garbage behaving like some grade-schooler snickering in the bushes. Ugh. gently caress. Grade: D Random Thoughts:
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Jul 6, 2014 00:00
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Irish Joe posted:Seeing as the last hyperbolic reaction was about spanking of all things, I'm guessing this one is about one of the following: Ain't nothing wrong with hunting unless you are some kind of PETA moron.  Trapping/Poaching is p hosed tho.
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Jul 6, 2014 01:45
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Last Man Standing "Eve's Boyfriend" Season 3, Episode 17 This episode was, as is the norm with LMS season 3, yet another "not bad, but not great" episode of television. It's getting harder and harder to review these episodes as they're getting duller and duller, more and more nondescript to watch. It's stuff like this that confuses me about what, exactly, Last Man Standing wants to be as a television program. They do needlessly offensive stuff like "Stud Muffin" and "All About Eve" seemingly to send the message that it's meant to cater exclusively to conservatives as ideology-enforcing tripe. And that's simple enough of a concept to grasp, except they dilute their own supposed message by having surprisingly good and/or funny episodes like "Breaking Boyd" and "Thanksgiving" that seems to imply that someone in the writing staff actually gives a poo poo about creating quality television. But, more and more this season, especially as we reach the end of it, the episodes seem to trend in the direction of ["Eve's Boyfriend" and "Tasers", episodes that reach for the bare minimum of quality and nothing more. It's all the more bizarre that qualitative differences are so common on an episode to episode basis, because LMS is like most multicam sitcoms where the show is room-driven and not showrunner-driven. What I mean by this is most single-cam comedies are showrunner-driven; he or she sets the tone for the type of comedy the show will trade in, its overall plotting, and nearly ever other aspect, down to individual characterizations and overall show arcing. For instance, Michael Schur and Dan Harmon, the showrunners for Parks and Recreation and Community respectively, are in direct control of every aspect of the writing for both shows. In contrast, multicam comedies are (generally speaking) room-driven, so very frequently the scripts that are handed out from those rooms have a very committee-like feel to them, as that's literally how the scripts are written. Very rarely does anyone in the room have direct control over script and tone, and whoever the credited writer is on a specific is largely symbolic at best, since usually the entire room comes up with the script in a multicam environment. This has specific advantages and disadvantages in comparison to a showrunner-driven show; very frequently multicams, as a general rule, have a harder time reaching the same levels of quality a single-cam can reach, since instead of one person directing everything there's 6-10 people who have to reach a consensus. In addition, the humor in a multicam is usually broader than on a single-cam not only because multicams usually aim for broader audiences, but just as a matter of course when something is written by many people at once, it will be more lowest common denominator in order to accomodate a bunch of conflicting voices and opinions. In contrast, however, multicams while not usually reaching the same peaks don't have the same valleys. Usually, multicams will have an average level of quality that it won't stray from in either direction too much. This is due to the fact that in a single-cam/showrunner-driven comedy, you're dealing with the showrunner's idiosyncracies. In addition, when dealing with a single strong voice, due to having the final say on a script, when that person in charge makes a mistake the quality of the show goes crashing down around them as there's no real way to sand off the rough edges. The best example of this is in Dan Harmon, who wrote season 3 of Community and because of how he was the sole person in charge of the show created an incredibly divisive season of television. In multicams, this fluctuation in quality almost never happens since there's so many other voices to drown out yours if you're not in the right headspace. So it's weird that LMS seems to combine the worst aspects of both approaches: There's this bizarre conservative bent to the show that implies there's a single voice in charge of the writer's room, and frequent episodes that seem to be coming from one person's particular ax they want to grind against liberals, but it's counterbalanced by episodes like this that combine all the worst aspects of writing-by-committee. This episode in particular is turgid, slow-paced, and painfully unfunny, as Eve deals with her new boyfriend (Who is a fellow JROTC member) and how that negatively affects her life as she gets banned from going on a JROTC field drill because her now-boyfriend will be there. It's episodes like this and "Driving Lessons" that make me all the more confused about how, exactly, this show is made. Episodes like these are what I expect when watching most multi-cams today: LCD, not experimental, breaking no boundaries, not daring at all. If every episode of LMS was like this one, this would be a very uninteresting thread to read, but it would be a predictable one- it'd be me, in my reviews, trying desperately to figure out how many synonyms for the word "dull" I could write in the space of a single review. If every episode of LMS were like this one,the show would be uninteresting, sure, but it'd be inoffensive. Yeah, there's some one-liners about Democrats and how they suck, and Mike talks about cleaning his shotgun in regards to meeting Eve's boyfriend, but these lines seem halfhearted even when Tim Allen is saying them. There's no real passion behind any of it, and it shows in every aspect of production; even the actors seem like they're sleepwalking through every scene. In contrast, yeah, "All About Eve" is some terrible, terrible television, but everyone involved in the creation of it was earnestly trying to make the best television they could. It was offensive and weird and bizarre, sure, but there was clearly a sense- a mean-spirited sense -of trying to stick it to those goddamn liberals. This is the most going-through-the-motions-est going through the motions episode of television I've seen in quite a while, and it's episodes like these that show how and why LMS is such a bad show; episodes like this cast in much higher relief the "All About Eve"s, because it's clear at no point is the writers' room skilled enough to handle some throwaway filler episode, much less one about something actually important like women's rights. Again: Episodes like this shouldn't be happening when compared against episodes like "All About Eve" and "Breaking Boyd", because these episodes imply a passion for the art of screenwriting and television medium as a whole that episodes like these completely contradict with their stiff, paint-by-numbers plotting and completely forgettable and predictable one-liners. I've asked this a million times, so consider this my one million and first: Who is this show for? Grade: D Random Thoughts:
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Jul 7, 2014 01:41
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Last Man Standing "Project Mandy" Season 3, Episode 18 This was...really good. Like a really good episode of television that didn't have any gimmicks to it, wasn't really especially funny, didn't try to push a point of view...it was just pleasant. Pleasant, safe, and entertaining television that aimed to be inoffensive and nice, and succeeded. It's weird seeing an episode like this because usually the show is so laser-focused on pushing a conservative worldview, to the detriment of character development or any likability within its cast. This episode is kind of depressing, in its own way, because it really shows how game of a cast they have. This episode is kind of a portal into a different show, where it never really tried to be some sort of rallying cry protecting America's "lost" masculinity and instead just tried to be a show about a family. That show, the show about the Baxters and their struggles, would've been a much more successful and interesting show than this right-wing garbage, simply because the show we have now both isn't funny and isn't fun to watch. I really can't see who this current show is for beyond mean-spirited assholes who snigger at the liberal strawmen the show oh-so-easily knocks down. And even then, why don't they just read one of the myriad number of political cartoons that cater to and validate their lovely beliefs? Why spend a half hour of your life every week on a show whose humor can be replicated in the space of a minute with such dreck as "Mallard Fillmore"? Further, why even make this show? If they wanted a conservative perspective on hot-button issues, a conservative answer to All in the Family, that's fine; but that's not what this show usually is. Usually it's just cheap and easy shots at the lowest hanging fruit LMS can find, and it's really just kind of embarrassing. Again, it's episodes like this, where it's just heartwarming and uplifting, that land so much better and are so much more appealing. The episode in question deals with Mandy's desire to quit college and start her own fashion business. Mike and Vanessa refuse, leading Bud to finance her startup costs himself (as his marijuana business is booming and he has no idea what to spend the money on). It's a remarkably smart and progressive episode of television, helped all the more because the central character of the story, Mandy, has gotten short shrift historically. Mandy is an interesting and genuinely amusing character, portrayed quite well by the wondrous Molly Ephraim, so it's been all the more disappointing that we haven't seen any good A-plots about her. Especially in contrast to the ways the LMS staff have completely nuked the appeal of Eve's character, it's all the more bizarre that LMS has done almost nothing with Mandy up until now. Having this episode be centered around Mandy really shows how much Ephraim pops onscreen, and I really hope that this is significant of greater focus on the Mandy character moving forward. It also helps that the plot is simply about following your dreams, and that everyone involved eventually comes around to the fact that Mandy is, in fact, quite skilled at fashion. Having Mandy "win" is such a rare occurance, especially since her character is relegated to glorified comic relief status, that it's a breath of fresh air to see her on top for once. The entire episode comes across as sincere and not mean-spirited, too, since the reason that Mike and Vanessa are against letting Mandy drop out, initially, is not out of some cruel desire to see their daughter fail but just out of a parental concern that she'll irrevocably gently caress her life up. Usually within Last Man Standing someone is supposed to be "Wrong", so it really helps make the episode "feel" more sincere and overall pleasant that in this episode's case, it's a matter of perspective. I dunno if this episode would be as highly rated to a newcomer to the series, since the episode isn't really funny at any point; what makes this episode is its character work, something that involves investment in the characters to, well...work. And, well, nobody besides me watches this show (and for good reason), but if you do you'd be remiss to skip this episode. LMS very rarely is able to pull off "heartwarming" or "sentimental", but in this case it knocks it out of the park. Grade: B Random Thoughts:
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Jul 7, 2014 01:43
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[01:48am] Bown: isn’t mandy the one who might have ADHD? [01:48am] Occupation: yeah [01:48am] Bown: didn’t they mention that at all? [01:48am] Occupation: nope
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Jul 7, 2014 01:49
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 HEY YO I'M DOIN A THING AGAIN Hey so I'll be done with the entire kit and caboodle that is my toxx (don't say it hcreight don't say it don't ruin it) by this friday, so I thought it would be neat to do a watchalong of 322, the final episode of season 3, since the last time I did it it went really well & was fun Anyways the time I'd do it would be 6pm PST, aka 9pm EST, aka I don't know when the gently caress that is elsewhere because I'm ethnocentric anywho interest check, let me know if that time/day works for you all, if it doesn't let me know and I'll change it Also, I'll be going in on 322 blind too so, that'll be fun Anyways yeah, 322 up should be up by Saturday at the latest, then my season in review post and this thread is OVER
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Jul 7, 2014 01:53
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Don't forget season four.
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Jul 7, 2014 02:09
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Deadpool posted:Don't forget season four. Yes, I know, thanks
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Jul 7, 2014 02:21
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E PLURIBUS ANUS posted:Yes, I know, thanks That's what I'm here for!
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Jul 7, 2014 02:25
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E PLURIBUS ANUS posted:
Possibly maybe. We're gonna need the IRC info, again.
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Jul 7, 2014 09:37
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Just catching up on the thread, but was it mentioned before that Chuck served in the military? While that's fine and all, I remember reading somewhere about how giving black characters a military background is a common writing thing to make them more acceptable to white audiences. Something about how most black characters in comics for a while would all either have been in jail or in the army, too. Considering the rest of LMS's politics I wouldn't be surprised if that was meant to be some kind of "one of the good ones" nod. The watchalong sounds fun, especially since I missed the last one and want to see this show firsthand, I'm in. Dolash fucked around with this message at 13:43 on Jul 7, 2014 |
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Jul 7, 2014 13:26
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Last Man Standing "Hard-rear end Teacher" Season 3, Episode 19 Last Man Standing is really limping to the finish line when closing out this season, it seems. Watching episodes like this are just tedious at this point, when they're so dull and overall inoffensive that I'm desperate to think of anything to say about this episode in the review, much less anything actually interesting. This is yet another Eve-centric episode, with the A-plot dealing how Eve, who now wants to go to West Point, struggling to attain a C in her Geometry class due to the titular hard-rear end teacher, Mr. Hardin (Michael Gross). She wants to change classes to an easier geometry teacher, so she can make better grades. Mike, of course, has an issue with Eve taking the "easy way out", so Vanessa goes down to meet Mr. Hardin to see what can be done to change Eve's grade. The issue with this episode is that it's all so goddamn dull. It's not really offensive at any point- despite Mike's best efforts, including spending a whole vlog decrying the "participation ribbon"-ing of America that's hacky and overdone even when he's saying it -and the conflict has no real dramatic weight. There's no real emotional investment the audience has in the conflict, and it doesn't help that the episode is centered around Eve in JROTC mode, which is the by far dullest, most one-dimensional version of Eve. Sorry, the JROTC quote-on-quote "arc" of Eve just ain't working for me. Maybe it's from my own personal experiences in the military, but the forced jingoism just lands really flat with me and I start questioning the plausibility of the entire plot itself- Eve at one point says she wants to go to West Point to be an "Army Ranger", and I'm still pretty sure the Rangers are men-only since they're still technically a Spec Ops branch. This should impress on the readers of this review how loving boring this episode was- I was questioning the logistics of a fictional character's desire to join a specific branch of the armed forces over watching what was playing onscreen since it was all so desperately uninteresting. Again, this episode just screams "not trying" from start-to-finish. As I mentioned before, the vlog itself is centered around an issue so hacky and tired that I'm not even mad that Mike starts whining about how, paraphrased, "America is full of people giving out participation ribbons for everything". Why? Because I've heard all this poo poo a million times before. That idiotic complaint is like a decade old by now, so who in the gently caress cares any more. I sure as gently caress don't. The B-plot is just as desperately dull, with Ed dealing with hiring the son of an overprotective, helicopter mom. The plot doesn't really go anywhere and is two scenes long, so was obviously added in for some desperate, desperate padding. The one thing the episode does right is end with Eve sticking firm in her decision to switch classes for better grades despite given the parental pittrap of it being "her choice" (aka if you make the choice we, the parents, don't agree with we'll harangue and guilt you about it from a place of smug superiority). So that was a nice inversion of the expected outcome, but doesn't save this unbelievably tiresome episode. I don't know what's going on with this show. It really does feel like the LMS staff just threw up their hands and stopped giving a collective poo poo around 315, because most of the episodes since then haven't been distinctive in the way LMS usually is. It's just the same tired conservative talking points retrofitted to the most mundane, repetitive, sitcom-y plotlines the staff could find, with the hackiest and most obvious "jokes" bolted on for good measure. It's like everyone involved just lost their drive to make television and are only showing up for the paycheck. Good for them, I guess, but Christ, what a lovely way to live. Grade: D Random Thoughts:
NieR Occomata fucked around with this message at 02:56 on Jul 8, 2014 |
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Jul 8, 2014 02:38
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E PLURIBUS ANUS posted:Last Man Standing The Rangers aren't integrated yet but they intend to be by 2015 so a girl who is still in high school (Don't know how old Eve is supposed to be) could plan to join and reasonably expect a place for her if she qualifies when she's old enough.
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Jul 8, 2014 02:55
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Will phys standards still be diff for women (like will they still have an "easier" APFT and such), because that kind of defeats the whole point of spec ops programs then
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Jul 8, 2014 02:58
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