The Vent and Rant Thread

[wodin]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

... Sure seems like a plague of bad weather hit pretty much all over the place. Did anyone get any good weather???

Oh! Oh! Mr. Kotter! ME! ME!

Spoiler:

Lucky I live Hawaii!

[wodin]

Originally Posted by Stitchawl

... Just head towards Korea and turn a bit left...

And stop at the first island chain you get to.

Originally Posted by Stitchawl

All the warm weather you could ever want!


Stitchawl

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Stitchawl

Beyond where the Silvercup Bread factory looked at the foot of the bridge.


Stitchawl

OMG:

Are we homies? Seriously?

Hitch

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by kindlekitten

I actually watch a lot of PBS and have decided if I don't give about 250 this year, I'm a thief. Still, there is Game of Thrones and so on. One thing about DVR, I pay little attention to the network

SPEAKING of GOT....

There was a thread, that started a while back, about an app that "cleaned up swear words," or something like that, here on MR: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=257688

And I thought it was a doofus idea, natch. But now, I have an app that I want. I am going to call it the TWIT App. Now, TWIT is not the word I want to use, speaking of "coarse language;" but I'm cleaning it up for this forum, and my level of aggro about the whole deal is reflected in the fact that my brain is even thinking about the OTHER (extremely similar) word. And here's my rant:

I'm sick to death of the constant bombardment of my eyeballs with TWITS, used as cheap filler, in shows like GOT. For men, and all those chicks out there who are gay, hooray for you, but I'm sick to death of it. I want the TWIT app, which replaces those "oh-so-important-sex-scenes," in which absolutely NO male parts are EVER displayed (oh, gasp, the horror!), with either a) intelligent plot content, that actually moves the bloody plot FORWARD, or b) BOY BITS.

I'm sick of threads, on various and sundry entertainment fora, in which fans of the constant bombardment of TWIT and cheap faux-soft-porn insist that "oh, but the SEX is crucial to the PLOT," as if a 5-second shot of seeing two folks, naked, under the covers, after the act, wouldn't convey the whole bloody PLOT to us, in the first place. It's a miracle any of us ever managed to see any entertainment, or figure out that characters had sex, prior to the advent of Cinemax. And if the PLOT is so bloody advanced by this constant prurient waste of cellulose, if SEEING the sex act is just so bloody crucial, then: where are the boy bits? What, we can't understand the plots without boobs and TWITS in our faces, but, bygod, we are perfectly capable of understanding it with wedding tackle hidden from our eyes? Is there no double-standard too ridiculous for the entertainment industry? Is the cognitive dissonance--"oh, we must be able to SEE all those nude women to advance the plot, but we don't need BOY BITS for that"--just never-ending?

I am no prude, by ANY means, but it seems that the non-stop titillation (in a single direction, mind you, of COURSE) as cheap (in every sense of the word) filler is just everywhere. It used to be other stupid bits, for film-stretcher (driving scenes...swimming scenes. Getting up and getting dressed scenes, you name it). But now, I have to suffer through what is, any minute now, going to turn into a full-blown gynecological exam, just to find out what Danaerys Targar-whatever will do next.

Warning, GOT spoiler if you haven't seen last year or this:

Spoiler:

(n.b.: I can't abide that character, ever since she locked up her dragons).

...and worse, nobody even seems to NOTICE that they're not getting their hour's worth, or whatever; HBO is simply fleshing it out (yes, I said that) with 15 minutes of prurience that does absolutely NOTHING to give us story, and does absolutely EVERYTHING to try to appeal to a teenage boy. The same thing was true of Spartacus--I actually stopped watching it. I mean, how many times can you watch Lucy Lawless being, uhhh..."stimulated" by her female slave before the ick facter kicks in?

</rant>

Done now. I'm sure I'll be in the minority, but really...it's just crap. I forget which actress it was--a high-ranked one--that put in her movie contracts with studios that she'd do full nudity in any scene in which the man would, too, and somehow, magically, for tons of years, her career not only survived, but thrived. (And, surprise! Nobody ever saw her parts, either.) If people want porn, god knows, there's plenty of it. (Of course, on the so-called 'premium' channels, no boy bits THERE, either!).

I'd just like to see the STORY, without the absurd overdose of cheap film-stretching pseudo-porn, under the guise of an actual, high-production-values show. And, yes: I can (and probably will) turn it off. I don't mind sex, don't mind nudity, but I do mind being inundated with it. If I wanted that, I'd watch Max at Night, or whatever it's called now. And yes: I know that the books (from which GOT is derived) are loaded with sex, thanks.

Hitch

[Stitchawl]

Originally Posted by Stitchawl

Beyond where the Silvercup Bread factory looked at the foot of the bridge.


Stitchawl

Originally Posted by Hitch

OMG:

Are we homies? Seriously?

Hitch

Only if the Q60 bus (Green Bus line) ran past the factory.


Stitchawl

[eschwartz]

Hitch -- that is but one reason why I vastly prefer the books. As a general rule of thumb, I prefer books over movies.

There tends to be more plot...

[covingtoncat73]

I'm hot blooded, baby. Check it and see. I've got a fever of 103. Actually, 102, muscle aches, and a bit of a cough.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Stitchawl

Only if the Q60 bus (Green Bus line) ran past the factory.


Stitchawl

Born in Flushing Meadows Hospital, baby. Grew up (literally) under the GW Bridge.

(Not quite literally; one set of grandparents in Malba; the other in Whitestone.)

Hitch

[Stitchawl]

Kew Gardens General, (long since torn down,) corner of Queens Blvd and Union Turnpike.



Stitchawl

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Stitchawl

Kew Gardens General, (long since torn down,) corner of Queens Blvd and Union Turnpike.



Stitchawl

Looooooooong since torn down, indeed. Ye gods, speaking of Kew Gardens...there used to be a fabulous Chinese restaurant there, in the 50's-60's...I practically cut my teeth on their spareribs. Can't think of the name now.

Grew up boating on the sound, the ocean and the Hudson from both sides of the GW; the Malba marina is long since gone, too, I think; and I don't know about the club in Whitestone. Haven't been in...decades, I think.

I also miss all the fabulous markets in Corona. Used to buy the BEST Italian sausage in the world there. Of course...that was nigh on 40 years ago.

I particularly miss it the food available; Phoenix is a lot of things, but an urban food mecca, it's not.

Hitch

[cromag]

Originally Posted by covingtoncat73

I'm hot blooded, baby. Check it and see. I've got a fever of 103. Actually, 102, muscle aches, and a bit of a cough.

Wow, covingtoncat73, given Hitch's GoT rant as an intro, your post went off in a direction that I hadn't expected!

Feel better soon!

[Stitchawl]

Originally Posted by Hitch

I also miss all the fabulous markets in Corona. Used to buy the BEST Italian sausage in the world there. Of course...that was nigh on 40 years ago.

Italian ices at 'The Lemon Ice King of Corona.' Been in business for the last 60+yrs. Best in the world!


Stitchawl

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Stitchawl

Italian ices at 'The Lemon Ice King of Corona.' Been in business for the last 60+yrs. Best in the world!


Stitchawl

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees.

That's exactly right. It's been nearly 4 decades since I had one, IIRC (I think I'm thinking of the same place--it must be), but they were AWESOME.

And pizza, right? OMG, Pizza.

Hitch

[kindlekitten]

Ok, yeah the sex can be over the top but I'm not going to kick it out of bed. The biggest thing I wonder about is what I would do if I still had kids at home. Both of whom read whatever stories HAD been published before they went off to do adult things.

~~~~which reminds me, I think the films are about to catch up to my last read book

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by kindlekitten

Ok, yeah the sex can be over the top but I'm not going to kick it out of bed. The biggest thing I wonder about is what I would do if I still had kids at home. Both of whom read whatever stories HAD been published before they went off to do adult things.

~~~~which reminds me, I think the films are about to catch up to my last read book

Well, that's a problem I've never had (kids at home). But that's not my kvetch. When I have reached the point with a show that I view (or not) the sex scenes the same way I used to think of commercials, on network, before we could fast-forward/delete/whatever "Oh, good, now I'll get up and get some popcorn..." or what-have-you, the tediousness of it pisses me off. It's an egregiously biased double-standard of sexploitation. If they want to argue that it's necessary to the PLOT--which is pure horsesh**t--then sexploit something in which *I* would actually have an interest, and is something I can't already see at the local beach.

As I said: I don't like the cheap filler. I don't like that the networks think that we're all so salacious, stupid and stunted-in-growth that we'll sit there like puerile tweenage boys, (no offense to the male population here, but c'mon, you remember being 12-13, I know you do), salivating over the next boob shot, instead of expecting them to MOVE THE BLOODY STORY ALONG. I mean, as an example:

Spoiler:

The scene this week, in the brothel. There was NO REASON on earth for us to not only see the whore's boobs, but her "front-bottom" (to borrow a phrase from our British cousins) as well. NONE. The point of the scene was that an Unsullied was betrayed at the brothel, and beheaded. She removes her sarong, so we can get the ubiquitous TWIT-shot, and then says, "oh, I forgot, it's habit," and then puts it back on. And the Unsullied guy has to comment on it ("you don't need to do that"), just so they can stretch the TWIT-shot out even longer. It was gratuitous in the extreme. It actually jumped out, it was so obviously shoehorned in, against the actual context of the SCENE and the PLOT. What on earth was actually achieved by that, other than 45 seconds of film-stretcher and, as I said, the TWIT-shot? NOTHING. It was pure and simple salacity. Nothing more, nothing less.

To me, you know what it's like? It's like watching egregiously blatant product-placement in TV shows/movies. The crap that leaps out at you, it's so ludicrous. Two detectives are getting ready to trail the bad guy, but, bygod, they have to talk about how great the XXXX's car's GPS system is, that CAME WITH IT, oh, happy day. Watching a scene like the one in the spoiler, above, strikes me exactly that way. Oh, wait! We've gone 3 whole film-minutes without the TWIT SHOT! Hurry, find a way to cram one in, so the viewers won't flip the channel! Honestly, are they being PAID to product-place those Vajayjays?

Between this type of crap, and the reality-TV popularity contest "contests," it seems that Barnum really was right--you can't go broke underestimating the taste of the American public. We apparently don't have the sense to know when we're being sold a bill of goods, in either case; cheap celebutwits (in the OTHER meaning of the word, as in TWIT) doing cheap reality shows so folks can watch their electronic neighbors and gossip about their goings-on; popularity contests (like those Big Brother shows, etc.) which indicate that nobody ever really leaves 8th Grade, and the same is true of the TWIT app; apparently, folks are all so easily entertained by titillation, that they'll let HBO, et al, get away with filling shows that COULD be excellent with clunky product-placement TWIT shots, instead of spending real money on actual plot elements that require REAL writers to spend money working on REAL scenes.

It's depressing to think that this is the state of entertainment in this country, it really is.

</rant>

Hitch