RubixsQube

No, that's not being a downer! Asking for strong and nuanced characters, with well-written dialogue and interesting relationships is perfectly valid. I want that too! I just also want X-wing dogfights.

What do you mean? What is the cross guard protecting you from? Specifically, what is the cross guard on that dumb red sparkey lightsaber protecting sith woodsman from?

I would love it if filmmakers would just call me up when they're about to make a decision, and they instead tell me what they're thinking, and I think about it a second, and say, "no, hey, J.J., the lightsaber, as an object, is about as iconic as they come. There's two parts: something you hold, and a glowing bit. You...you don't need to add anything to that. I know maybe Disney is like: 'hey, we gotta have a new toy, J.J.,' but seriously, just push back on this one."

Less dumb lightsabers, more cool X-Wing shit, plz

I think that there's a lot of like, video game coolness pressure to make people who use guides and FAQs and the internet feel bad for seeking outside information, usually under the guise of: "it's cheapening the experience," or "it's making it easier than it would otherwise be," or "it's not how the game was designed." I'm ok with how anyone wants to play a game. I tend to be on the side of the New Criticism view of video games, where developer or authorial intent takes a backseat to my own reading/playing of a game. I seek out guides all the time, because I don't have an infinite amount of time to play and re-play an area and slowly tease out its secrets, and I get what I want out of the experience. Sure, discover and experimentation are very fun, but I'm not at an age where I can do that forever in a video game.

This boat from the trailer is either named Isla Nublar, or is bound for Isla Nublar, or both.

I love how John Hammond excitedly says something that sounds like "oh! Mr. DNE!" Also, I love how John Hammond plans on either being there for every tour himself (presumably this is easy for him, since he is present at all of the lab dinosaur births), or at least staffing someone named John for the tours. "Hello John. Oh, Hello John."

Danielle, when you do the "hup hup hup hup" noise, what is that imitating? It's a wonderful noise, and on the previous episode you say it's a Yoshi noise, but I don't know where it's from.

A+++ WOMAN TO BLAME CUT TO BRYCE DALLAS HOWARD

(Also, I can sponsor a few people if they are on the fence? Maybe this is a weird thing to offer, but I would love it if people on the board who wanted to, but were hampered by finances had a chance to do this)

I'm very sorry, everyone.

Notice how little camera movement there is, apart from a few tracking shots. Also, notice that the film is from a human's perspective most of the time, instead of flying around. When we enter the (ACTUAL PHYSICAL) doors of Jurassic Park, the camera is sitting on the roadway, just pointed towards the doors, which are slightly left of center. Just because you can make everything dynamic doesn't mean you should.

You are both right, the hyper color saturation and white, clean, futuristic setting both make this look stale and uninteresting. Also, two messy-haired white boys is boring as fuck, as well. Hollywood, listen, if you can literally make a character any possible gender, or race, put "white, male" at the bottom of the list, and let's start there, since that's as boring as it can possibly be. I also think that what makes everything look fake and bland (in recent CGI-heavy films) is the camera movement. When everything is a big CGI playset, you can have the camera swoop and fly and hover, and it just makes my brain go "oh, this is fake, this is a fake set." Argh, this film is going to be really bad, and then there will be little bubble sphere toys and genetically modified spinosaurus playsets and it just makes me glad that at least, at one point, overproducer Steven Spielberg made this perfect film about dinosaurs.

Jimmy Buffet is fine! Popular island beach music that's easy to listen to. His chain of dumb restaurants is less fine, but people enjoy eating and drinking exotic flavored, watered-down margaritas, so cool. I just don't want to see a velociraptor knocking over a bunch of parrot-head t-shirts after slipping on a "5 O'Clock Somewhere."

Ben, I don't need to come up with reasons why a person should seek to minimize ignorance. Taylor Swift is just another in a long line of popular music artists, and you don't have to listen to her if you don't want. Video games are the same way. Films are the same way. Books are the same way. Art is the same way. I don't need to have a reason to seek information. It's not even seeking "news," which is not in an of itself what I'm talking about. You can understand who Taylor Swift is, and why she, or any artist, might matter without having to read gossip. Look at some of these articles! Look at how weird it is to be a popular singer in the modern age! Look at how important this person is! Even if she's another iteration on a theme. Maybe you've just already made up your mind. I have a question, though, trying to switch topics from Me Having a Strong Opinion and Most Likely Putting Myself on Everyone's Block Lists. The Monument Valley discussion was really fascinating, but it was missing a crucial piece of information. Just how prevalent was this animosity to the DLC price? Like, I agree it was A Thing, and I saw the various news pieces about it, but how really do you think that this might impact the sales of the game? Right now, Monument Valley still shows spectacular reviews on the app store. Did this all blow over? It's very hard, in the era of the internet, to tell how meaningful an issue is.

Wait, what Taylor Swift is the first female performer to top herself on the number one charts. She's a Big Deal, across a huge demographic. I can understand not knowing every song that comes on the radio when you're sitting around, but I don't understand a human being who isn't at least aware of the most important pop culture personalities. Again, I find a lot of what people watch or care about to be uninteresting to me, personally, but I can at least identify it. I don't know how that hurts me at all. It's not like my brain can get "full." I don't listen to the radio or watch TV either, but I am a human being who seeks out information. Edit: You know, it's not worth having this conversation, since it's opinion vs. opinion. If you don't know who Taylor Swift is, that's fine. If it's not important to you, it's not important to you. Sorry if I offended anyone.

As always, there is a great discussion here, but I really wonder why so many people who listen to Idle Thumbs were unaware of who Taylor Swift was. I think that, even if you don't like her music (and I'm actually way, way into 1989), it's good to just know who she is, consider her importance in the current cultural landscape. Some amount of cultural literacy is completely fine, everyone. I have zero interest in watching a TV show like Duck Dynasty, but the way it pervades the culture has made me learn a little about it so that I can understand it's impact. (Gah, I wish that I could write this with the genial tone with which it was meant) Also, I immediately looked up what the official translation of "Buca di Beppo" is, according to the company. It's apparently a slang term for "Joe's Basement?" Beppo's Hole is far, far more appealing.

The thing I like is the music that plays when it shows the results, that like, groovy tune from the SNES game. I want more F-Zero, all the time, forever. Also, I know that this vine is all over the internet but let's all watch it again and again and again

What a fun episode. I really liked hearing the discussion of arcade games at the end. I am an avid arcade fan even though I only have a limited set of experiences with them growing up. I'm also incredibly jealous of people who are real skilled at an arcade game, since it implies that they either pumped a lot of quarters into a machine as a kid, or somehow owned the machine. While I didn't transport it across country when I moved, I own a Space Invaders Deluxe cabinet that I bought for very cheap five years ago from a person who needed to get it out of his garage. When I bought it, I definitely thought: "I'm going to get so good at Space Invaders" but what I actually learned is that "Space Invaders is very very difficult, and only gets more so." I played it a lot and never found that groove. It's still a handsome cabinet, and it's in great condition, but damn is it a tough game.

I'm going to take a few steps back from what I said upon immediately seeing the film regarding it's scientific inaccuracies. I'm still pretty sour on the film as a whole, but they're primarily similar thoughts to what's been going on in this thread already. I think that, because Kip Thorne was brought on board to coach the science in Interstellar (and wrote a book about it, apparently), Neil deGrasse Tyson is maybe letting the science have more of a pass. I have read a few other comments around the internet that discussed the situation in the film (Gargantua is a supermassive black hole spinning very rapidly, which would allow for a planet to be relatively far away and still experience crazy 1 hour = 7 years relativistic effects, and the light that heats these planets is being emitted from the black hole accretion disk, which is depicted warped and twisted around the top and bottom of the black hole due to gravitational lensing of the light, etc etc etc), and it mostly seems as if the science sort of checks out, but it's set up in a very, very filmic way specifically for the story that the film wants to tell. It would be INSANELY unlikely for that sort of situation to come about naturally in a galaxy center. OH, if someone has not seen it yet, or if someone in this thread goes and sees it for a second time, can you look out for something?

I'm in. Also, I take the concept of giving gifts very, very seriously, so I'm pretty excited.

Mostly what makes me sad is that I don't know if I trust people to have the critical eye for things like this. I see this, and I see a lot of people like this guy, people who revel in their ignorance. And that makes me sad. I'm really glad that the Idle Thumbs fanbase is what it is.

This image makes me laugh a whole lot

Two things: 1) I really wish the Wii U Netflix app had the ability to switch profiles, since my housemate uses it constantly (like, every day), to watch as many teen paranormal romance tv shows as she can. And now I get weird suggestions. 2) Best Buy is running a Wii U Black Friday bundle deal that is ludicrous: "32GB Wii U bundled with Super Mario 3D World, NintendoLand, Super Smash Bros for Wii U and Donkey Kong Country Tropical for $359.97" That's Christmas, right there. "Merry Christmas, kids, we are the best parents ever."