Patrick R

The Flophouse one is the worst. "OOOOOOOoooooooooooooo sick burnnnnnnn!" and "Singling long irritating sen-ten-ceess like thisss one" are the worst things.

Yeah, I don't understand why one would fold socks?

I remember a lot of simulated camera stuff in that game irritating me, like rain beading into droplets on the camera when it's pointed up.

Last night I made this nightmarish remix of The Jackson 5's "I Want You Back" because I am a horrible person.

Reminder that all my music is still available and free to use, if you don't have time to work with a specific composer for your game. Not a whole lot I'd call Christmasy, but it's there. Also, I just spent the last hour futzing around in Fruity Loops and made a brand new Christmas sounding song. And discovered it's hard to make synth sleigh bells sound natural and real. The song is called Ice Cube Christmas. I also made a version that ends how it starts, so it's easier to loop.

Depending on your game's aesthetics, there are plenty of audio plug-ins and programs that have synthesized choirs sounds. It might be easier to deal with those than a straight audio sample.

It's lovelier than I imagined. He looks like a roadie extra from Almost Famous.

Requesting Chris Remo mustache photo.

I spent the past two months exhaustively watching horror films for a special three part bonus episode of my former podcast and am now completely burnt out on my favorite genre. So this month the plan is to watch almost nothing but LGBTQ films. I read Celluloid Closet several months ago (an incredible and entertaining read I'd recommend to anyone, not just those interested in film or gay culture) but never got around to watching many of the films it covered. What are some of your favorite LGBTQ films? What should I check out? What kind of LGBTQ films do you want to see more of? The first film I'm going to watch is Victim (1961) directed by trailblazing English filmmaker Basil Dearden. It's not only the first mainstream English-language film to ever use the word "homosexual" but it's progressive far beyond it's time, with a plot about innocent gay men being caught up in a blackmail ring. It was widely reviled on it's release for being too progressive: the New York Times called the subject matter "disagreeable" and Time magazine said "[it's] a coyly sensational exploitation of homosexuality as theme-and what's more offensive-an implicit approval of homosexuality as a practice...nowhere does the film suggest that homosexuality is a serious but often curable neurosis that attacks the biological basis of life itself." Nonetheless it is said to have been an important factor in England eventually legalizing homosexuality, and as far as dated pleas for acceptance go (of which the world of gay cinema has all too many) it stands out by not only being the first English language film of it's kind but well-directed, with beautiful B&W photography and an intriguing mystery structure. If you have Hulu Plus, it's one of the Criterion films available.

Tongues Untied is more a curated selection of poetry about gay black men than an actual film. Given that I like films and have little tolerance for poetry, this made it pretty decidedly Not For Me. Which is fine.

Then I wouldn't call it pretentious? Or rather, I wouldn't use that term because it doesn't describe what my actual problem with the work is. It would be pretentious, but that wouldn't necessarily be it's problem. Some words are only derogatory in certain contexts. Like, to call Andrei Tarkovsky's Nostalgia "uneventful" isn't necessarily derogatory, because of it's deliberate pace and contemplative nature. I don't know what you're saying here.

ACK! Multi-quote fail! See below!

Nothing is complete. But, to use an example of a work I actually like a lot, Terminator 2 dedicates a lot of it's run-time (including it's final monologue) to ruminations on man's violent nature, the premise of determinism vs. free will, and what defines humanity. None of this is what the film is about. The film is about white-knuckle action sequences and paranoia. Thus Terminator 2 is a pretentious film.

Bolded for emphasis, because yes, we must. I basically never see pretentious used in that context. If this is what you guys actually experience regularly, then I completely understand why you hate the word. I guess I am #blessed, because I have a very small social media circle and I don't really ever interact with people like that. Yeah, I think when people misuse pretentious they often mean "This made me feel dumb" the way the word hipster usually means "person who made me feel uncool".

I guess this is where we disagree then. I think if an artist doesn't take the time and thought to address something properly than it is effectively the same thing as not addressing it at all. EDIT: And I think the argument that one must have "intimate knowledge of a work" (which I take to mean actual cited fact as to what the author was intending [and I think it's worth questioning if that is even actually objectively possible], and I understand not everyone is advocating) is effectively banning from popular discourse.

It has pretensions towards tackling a Big Important Subject. It does not do that thing because it doesn't have the skill or time or whatever to tackle it properly. Yes, dumb people say dumb things often. That doesn't mean we should ban any words they use to say them.

I don't understand the reasoning that "Well you ultimately can't know what an art project was trying to do unless you are the artist, so you can't ever use the word pretentious!" One must infer things all the time when criticizing works of art, and if authorial intent isn't your guiding principle then it doesn't even matter. If it feels like a work is trying to bite off more than it can chew, than pretentious is a word that describes that. It's not the be-all end-all, it's not so strong a word that you don't have to back it up. But pretentious is a word that has uses and if it comes up a lot that is probably because a lot of art is pretentious. And if it's used wrong a lot that probably means that human beings often don't say what they mean in simple and clear terms because they think that hiding behind vaguer big words in their statements makes them sound smarter. IF ONLY THERE WAS A WORD I WAS ALLOWED TO USE TO DESCRIBE THIS INSTINCT.

Absolutely.

Argobot posted a link to the old Idle Thumbs Cafepress page and now Facebook thinks I crave vintage Thumbs merch above all else.

EDIT: SHIT! WRONG THREAD.

I have never found a reunion show to be worth my time but With Bob and David actually just feels like more Mr. Show. So funny.

I have built up a tolerance to the point where I don't really get drunk any more and my two options are "drink a lot more hard liquor" or "stop drinking for a while and only get drunk once in a blue moon" and neither option appeals to me at all.

I just saw Heart of a Dog. The single greatest cinematic depiction of memory and the act of remembering that I have ever encountered. Really really powerful and movie documentary/visual essay from Laurie Anderson.

The idea of another party of travelers in an RPG being the boss is actually just Gary in Pokemon.

I can't really say because I didn't hear the episode in question, but you make it sound like the writer was already strongly implying that stepping outside her comfort zone was a problem. In that case, just saying "Yeah, but for real though, I bet it'd work out if you just really tried." is shitty and unhelpful. To an extent all relationships are a series of compromises, trying to adjust to each other's needs and expectations. But I find that for really big stuff, like sexual incompatibility, trying to thread the needle of "Well I really don't like this at all but I don't want you to leave, so..." just ends up causing more problems, tension and resentment. And often sex/relationship advice takes on the approach of a doctor saying "How can we best preserve this and keep it alive?" when often the best answer is just that most relationships don't work out, for some reason or another. Also no one outside of non-sexual romantic relationships ever seems to view them as valid choices, because sex-positive means "I am positive that if you aren't having sex something is wrong."