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tsob posted:You also thought you knew what transhumanism meant. You didn't. And it only took a couple of years to convince you of this. Evil is often used in a hyperbolic manner to describe even rather petty acts, but most people hold it's meaning to be not the opposite of good so much as the complete absence of good. Thus people or characters who hold some good in them or their actions are still not evil, even if they do morally objectionable things - they're just misguided. Or ignorant. Or jerks. Or stupid. Or a mix of the above. In other words, human - because all people, yourself included fall under those banners at some point or another. Most people fall under them on a regular basis. Hmm, how best to put this, other than to draw reference to what used to be one of my favorite anime, Digimon. (which I strictly watch for irony now, but I still say that there a very few select parts of it that are good. Not many, though.) In Digimon, whenever a character acted mean or confrontational with their teammates, often it was because they were being tempted by evil digimon if not directly under influence of darkness. It taught me from a young age that you should stive to be good, and any negative thing you feel, anger, dark or evil thoughts, ambition, etc. was evil trying to impose on your soul. While I do admit that aspect of Digimon as a show was very ridiculous at times, but since it was very much my opus anime, it no doubt had no small effect on my views of morality, that when people do bad things, it's evil weighing down on their soul.
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Mar 27, 2015 21:12
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Clawshrimpy posted:Hmm, how best to put this, other than to draw reference to what used to be one of my favorite anime, Digimon. (which I strictly watch for irony now, but I still say that there a very few select parts of it that are good. Not many, though.) I'm probably opening yet another hornet's nest here, but why do you feel you can only watch something you enjoy ironically? Just because you no longer hold it to the same standards you used to (nevermind that this appears to be solely because other people made you feel the work was less than perfect, which any work is) doesn't mean that you can't still watch it for enjoyment's sake alone. Most people have a lot of stuff they read, watch or listen to that they wouldn't describe as holding a lot of philosophical or intellectual depth, stuff that they would even freely admit is rather garbage. Those things can still be fun so long as you find enjoyment in them though. Using the word ironic to describe it just seems to indicate that you feel ashamed for enjoying something. If you were enjoying child pornography that'd be one thing - you're watching a cartoon though. Just let yourself enjoy it dude - there's nothing to be ashamed of. Clawshrimpy posted:In Digimon, whenever a character acted mean or confrontational with their teammates, often it was because they were being tempted by evil digimon if not directly under influence of darkness. It taught me from a young age that you should stive to be good, and any negative thing you feel, anger, dark or evil thoughts, ambition, etc. was evil trying to impose on your soul. While I do admit that aspect of Digimon as a show was very ridiculous at times, but since it was very much my opus anime, it no doubt had no small effect on my views of morality, that when people do bad things, it's evil weighing down on their soul. I haven't seen much of Digimon, so someone else may need to correct me on this, but I would imagine that the external evil tempting those characters was meant to act as a visible representation of an internal struggle the character was experiencing - not to indicate that everyone was an angel made flesh and would never do wrong on their own. Even if that was meant to be the case though, cartoons aren't a perfect representation of reality and are only meant as a guideline morally, not a hard and fast rule book. Treating reality like a cartoon is just plain silly. In general morals aren't an absolute that we can and should never break. We're not robots after all, they're not hard coded inside us (and even in the case of fictional robots, they often break those hard coded rules, for both good and bad regardless), they're a set of values that we aspire to. A perfect way to act that we chase, but like anything perfect, they are in reality unobtainable. It's the fact that you chase them, even when you stumble that gives them worth - not the fact that they exist in the first place. Character's breaking their (or your) morals should be something that causes you to examine why they did so, and what you would do in their place - not just to dismiss them because they don't meet your standards. The fact that when questioned on any of these actions your response has always been "well, I would try and find another option" is a good indication that you recognize those characters were left with little choice. If they had another good choice, you'd be able to say precisely what it was, rather than just giving a vague "do more research, find more food someplace" or what have you. Next time you find a situation where you're labeling Gain (presuming it will be him) evil, then perhaps you should pause it and sit down and try and think precisely what you think he should do given the resources and time to hand. He often does do lovely things, leaving his pregnant girlfriend being a major one, but just as often he has little enough choice that most people can empathize with him quite readily. And, as others have said, the ending to his character arc sheds some light on even his most despicable acts and should be interesting to see what you make of it. The word opus also doesn't mean whatever you think it does by the way, and is one more word you need to check the definition of if that usage is any indication. tsob fucked around with this message at 21:36 on Mar 27, 2015 |
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Mar 27, 2015 21:33
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Paper Lion posted:The thread has done a good job of communicating, and I would like you to respond Shrimpy. I'd also just like to add that you said you use "evil" because it's easier for you to communicate. The problem with that is the goal of communication is NOT ease, but clarity, and ease of communication frequently runs counter to clarity of communication. The easy road is very rarely the good road in life!!! But ti seems even when I use other words, like rear end in a top hat, unlikable, horrible, etc. it's still being treated like I am saying evil.
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Mar 27, 2015 21:33
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Clawshrimpy posted:Hmm, how best to put this, other than to draw reference to what used to be one of my favorite anime, Digimon. (which I strictly watch for irony now, but I still say that there a very few select parts of it that are good. Not many, though.) It's not entirely surprising, but that's definitely a misread of Digimon. At least in Adventure, most of the "negative" traits characters experienced were flaws within themselves that they had to overcome the physical conflict the bad digimon of the week presents. Sometimes a bad digimon would exacerbate the problem, but there aren't many times where it was the bad digimon causing the non-physical problem. It's not trying to say that negativity is something evil weighing on people, but that you have to realize and grab hold of the goodness within yourself, in spite of your inner darkness, to accomplish your goal. It doesn't look very deeply at all into this, being a kid's show, but it's definitely there in some capacity.
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Mar 27, 2015 21:37
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mikeycp posted:It's not entirely surprising, but that's definitely a misread of Digimon. At least in Adventure, most of the "negative" traits characters experienced were flaws within themselves that they had to overcome the physical conflict the bad digimon of the week presents. Sometimes a bad digimon would exacerbate the problem, but there aren't many times where it was the bad digimon causing the non-physical problem. See the entire first 5 or so episodes of the second part of Adventure where Tai is aggressively pushing his partner because he's afraid to fail his friends which spawns a horrifying abomination that almost kills him.
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Mar 27, 2015 21:45
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mikeycp posted:It's not entirely surprising, but that's definitely a misread of Digimon. At least in Adventure, most of the "negative" traits characters experienced were flaws within themselves that they had to overcome the physical conflict the bad digimon of the week presents. Sometimes a bad digimon would exacerbate the problem, but there aren't many times where it was the bad digimon causing the non-physical problem. Yeah, but I'm talking like the way, say, 02 handled it when Ken's arc (that the things he did were mostly Oikawa taking advantage of him), or how Xros Wars handled it with Yuu. (that it was DarkKnightmon/Baguramon taking advantage) But I guess I see your guy's points, and I'd really prefer not bing dragged into a Digimon discussion, I only brought it up as a possible way I think the way I do. I'm just going to move on to the next episode of the actual show I'm watching here and I'm going to try my hardest to not say the word evil. Clawshrimpy fucked around with this message at 21:53 on Mar 27, 2015 |
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Mar 27, 2015 21:47
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ZenMasterBullshit posted:See the entire first 5 or so episodes of the second part of Adventure where Tai is aggressively pushing his partner because he's afraid to fail his friends which spawns a horrifying abomination that almost kills him. I'm not sure what part of that goes against what I was getting from the show. Though I will grant that the monster that is spawned from Tai's fear of failure caused the existing fear to grow to almost unmanageable levels, to the point where both he and Agumon were afraid of letting Agumon digivolve. I may definitely be missing something, but that seems a lot like a bad digimon making an existing character flaw worse, rather than causing it outright.
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Mar 27, 2015 21:52
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mikeycp posted:I'm not sure what part of that goes against what I was getting from the show. Though I will grant that the monster that is spawned from Tai's fear of failure caused the existing fear to grow to almost unmanageable levels, to the point where both he and Agumon were afraid of letting Agumon digivolve. I was agreeing with you and giving an example showing that the kids have genuine flaws that the villains just exacerbate.
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Mar 27, 2015 21:53
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ZenMasterBullshit posted:I was agreeing with you and giving an example showing that the kids have genuine flaws that the villains just exacerbate. Oh ok. My bad for misreading your previous post. Clawshrimpy posted:Yeah, but I'm talking like the way, say, 02 handled it when Ken's arc (that the things he did were mostly Oikawa taking advantage of him), or how Xros Wars handled it with Yuu. (that it was DarkKnightmon/Baguramon taking advantage) Fair enough. I don't remember much about either of those besides them being a bad mess and only ok, respectively, so I can't comment knowledgeably about them.
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Mar 27, 2015 21:57
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Okay, sorry for taking all day on this. Overman King Gainer Episode 11 So this episode is actually mostly about the Princess, which is a nice change of pace since before she's been little more than a background character at best. The episode starts with how the Exodus has been affecting the various Domepoli, especially Wulgusk, and that's how Ana plays into this, as the big thing is whether or not the Duke's family and leadership is going to get discontinued over the Yapan Exodus. Most of the other characters don't pay that any mind, but it's clear over the entire episode of how much of an issue it is for Ana, that even if she allowed herself to become a "pitiable hostage" and have fun on this journey, she still cares about her home and her father. So there's this big bazaar train thing un-affiliated with SR where Yapan will be able to get some much needed supplies without having to steal them this time, to you know, see that would be like for once to obtain something through honest methods. no robbing trains, no boxing schemes, just good old fashioned paying for goods and services. Ana is using all of this as a way to sneak on the bazaar train in order to get back to Wulgusk because she's worried about her father and all, without telling anyone. Well it looks like this good method of getting goods stops cold when Gain is accused of stealing, and without the horrible poo poo Gain's done, stealing would be pretty low on that list, so, sure, why not. Except it's actually being done with Asuham's shiny new Overman, who's Overskill allows him to "steal" anything! Including even the inner workings of one of King Gainer's arms, that's like having a magic trick of instead of pulling a coin out of the person's ear, you actually pull out their brain. So with one of King Gainer's arm on the fritz, that's really bad. But it gets even worse when Asuham notices the Princess and her handmaiden lady, in which Asuham figures they'd be useful and decides to capture them, because if there's any way to make Gain look better in comparison it's to kidnap a little girl! So obviousl this is bad, as Asuham has them and Gainer obviously can't fight the Overman now without endangeriong the handmaiden and the princess, but of course Gauli decides to play the part of Gain this episode in order to remind us how morally awful these protagonists are by suggesting to attack anyway, because "Sacrifices must be made for the good of the Exodus!" Which, you know, this episode had been going okay! Can this show go even one god drat episode without the protagonists being awful? But then Princess Ana insists that Gainer attack, about how horrible capturing the two of them and using them as shields is, which it is, but it's hard to take it seriously with how skewed the Princess sense of right and wrong is since she's been so pro-Gain in the past. Yeah Asuham is worse than Gain but that's the entire reason Asuham exists is to make Gain look better, because Jin looked more like a understandable protagonist than him so they needed to do something. Anyway speaking of Gain, he finally shows up and Asuham moves in to capture and get him to take care of that woman and his kid, but Gain does the ol "swap self with bomb" thing and Asuham loses an Overman arm, the pricess is saved, and that's all! Well not quite, the Princess has to confront why she tried to leave, and settles on having Gainer foot her long distance phone call bill, because we all know by now Gainer will do anything anyone wants if they bug him enough. I swear Gainer is the mecha equivalent of Ned Flanders by this point, I guess that's the only way he can remain calm anymore. ANyway, the duke is a complete rear end in a top hat to his daugther, big suprise, and we're treated with Gainer with the sad task of the poor crying princess.
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Mar 28, 2015 02:26
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Did you not get that Duke Medaiyu was disowning Ana so she wouldn't be associated with him as he was being punished by SR/London IMA? She's not going to spend forever in the dark, at some point she'll realize the same or be told as much. Also Gain still is not a bad dude, but you're definitely right about Gauli. It was always weird to me that the show sorta makes them rivals when the latter is almost irredeemable.
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Mar 28, 2015 02:51
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Yeah it's actually kind of bizarre to miss the subtext of the phonecall scene.
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Mar 28, 2015 03:03
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Sharkopath posted:Yeah it's actually kind of bizarre to miss the subtext of the phonecall scene. Honestly I thought the show outright revealed it but that might be the beginning of the next episode?
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Mar 28, 2015 03:09
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dogsicle posted:Honestly I thought the show outright revealed it but that might be the beginning of the next episode? No cause I totally remember both of them tearing up during it, they're both mega upset but it had to be done.
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Mar 28, 2015 03:11
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Sharkopath posted:Yeah it's actually kind of bizarre to miss the subtext of the phonecall scene.
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Mar 28, 2015 03:12
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he's bad with like just text, so, ya know
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Mar 28, 2015 03:15
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Man, you really dislike that literal child because of the people she associates with.
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Mar 28, 2015 03:17
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Endorph posted:I think we've established by now that clawshrimpy is really bad with subtext. That isn't even me being mean. Even if her dad was "totes doing this for a good reason" it's still pretty nasty of him. When you haven't seen your child in god knows how long, disowning the child and being cold isn't exactly the best way to do things. Even if you have a good reason. Clawshrimpy fucked around with this message at 03:34 on Mar 28, 2015 |
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Mar 28, 2015 03:18
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John Carstairs posted:Man, you really dislike that literal child because of the people she associates with. I don't hate Ana, I just think she could stand to be less pro-Gain maybe empathise with Gainer more than him, but gently caress even Gainer doesn't mind the Exodus anymore and does whatever people tell him, so if they've already shot Gainer's character arc in the foot so badly I'm not expecting much from the Princess. She was the reson this episode was decent until Gauli ruined everything.
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Mar 28, 2015 03:20
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Sharkopath posted:No cause I totally remember both of them tearing up during it, they're both mega upset but it had to be done. The Duke's aides ask him if he disowned her for that her own good and he talks about her carrying on the Medaiyu family. Then they cheer him while he cries. Meanwhile, Ana is crying and then starts bawling and thanking her dad (Gainer gets weirded out by it) and that she knows to fulfill her duty as a Medaiyu. So it was spelled out, but I guess this comes down to Shrimpy not liking him because he caused his daughter minor, temporary emotional distress.
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Mar 28, 2015 03:24
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Sakurazuka posted:he's bad with like just text, so, ya know Hey, that's not true.
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Mar 28, 2015 04:09
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lol sorry
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Mar 28, 2015 04:15
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New game: Take a shot every time Clawshrimpy uses Digimon to describe any character plot point
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Mar 28, 2015 05:13
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Parrotine posted:New game: Take a shot every time Clawshrimpy uses Digimon to describe any character plot point I regret even brining it up, but I guess it's better than breaking rule 2. I won't bring it up anymore.
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Mar 28, 2015 05:14
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Clawshrimpy posted:Hmm, how best to put this, other than to draw reference to what used to be one of my favorite anime, Digimon. (which I strictly watch for irony now, but I still say that there a very few select parts of it that are good. Not many, though.) Goku killed the demon king picollo, is goku evil?
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Mar 28, 2015 14:01
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Namtab posted:Goku killed the demon king picollo, is goku evil? I would imagine he views Goku in the same light he views Kamina, because he has many of the same virtues and flaws and thus it doesn't matter if he did because he was a horrible, evil monster who shouldn't be idolized in the first place anyways. Even Superman killed Doomsday though, among other characters he's killed in the main continuity over the years and he's probably a better paragon of virtue in this case since he neither enjoys nor encourages fights and so on. tsob fucked around with this message at 16:37 on Mar 28, 2015 |
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Mar 28, 2015 16:33
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Goku was never portrayed as some paragon of virtue that people should seek to emulate, though. He's friendly and good-natured, but that's explicitly shown to be not the same as having a strong moral centre, and the manga does note some of his actions are bad/wrong/reckless.
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Mar 28, 2015 16:44
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Namtab posted:Goku killed the demon king picollo, is goku evil? I wouldn't know, i don't watch fighting anime. In the Toonami days DBZ was just a chunk of the block I basically ignored and pretended didn't exist because it got in the way of Big O, Robotech, and Gundam stuff. (when I was young and stupid I liked Gundam Wing, but then i got older and realized, like any Gundam show, the plot and characters are awful.) Clawshrimpy fucked around with this message at 16:57 on Mar 28, 2015 |
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Mar 28, 2015 16:54
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Is ADTRW evil?
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Mar 28, 2015 17:06
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im evil
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Mar 28, 2015 17:06
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Clawshrimpy posted:(when I was young and stupid I liked Gundam Wing, but then i got older and realized, like any Gundam show, the plot and characters are awful.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7SloE7AjqI
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Mar 28, 2015 17:08
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With some hindsight Gundam Wing is almost a prelude to late period Tomino where things just happen. And yeah, the entire cast is basically nuts but in a weird adaptive way. It's not wonderfully written but it's good fun.
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Mar 28, 2015 17:29
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Clawshrimpy posted:I wouldn't know, i don't watch fighting anime. In the Toonami days DBZ was just a chunk of the block I basically ignored and pretended didn't exist because it got in the way of Big O, Robotech, and Gundam stuff. (when I was young and stupid I liked Gundam Wing, but then i got older and realized, like any Gundam show, the plot and characters are awful.) I don't think you should be able to criticize any Gundam given that you couldn't follow the plot of G Gundam.
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Mar 28, 2015 17:31
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Pureauthor posted:Goku was never portrayed as some paragon of virtue that people should seek to emulate, though. He's friendly and good-natured, but that's explicitly shown to be not the same as having a strong moral centre, and the manga does note some of his actions are bad/wrong/reckless. He wasn't held up as some paragon of virtue in the same way Superman is within his own setting, no, but he is, in some ways a better person than even Superman. He is almost insanely naive and innocent even as an adult, and will believe most anything he's told - which can be either good or bad dependent on the viewer and circumstance. He's also willing to forgive even the most awful villain at the drop of a hat, and holds no grudges. Superman often displays those characteristics too mind, just never to nearly the same degree as Goku rather routinely does. Iserlohn posted:I don't think you should be able to criticize any Gundam given that you couldn't follow the plot of G Gundam. To be fair, he's not wrong in the case of Wing. It's an entertaining show at times just for the insanity of it, and in the case of the dub for the sheer hamminess of the voice acting along with having some nice designs, good music and interesting ideas, but it's not by any stretch a good show in most people's opinion.
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Mar 28, 2015 17:52
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Gundam Wing is the poster child for "very entertaining but not very good"
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Mar 28, 2015 18:05
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Nah, Wing blows, but it isn't representative of the Gundam franchise as whole. And this isn't necessarily about the quality of the shows as much as it is about the content. I don't agree with Shrimpy for making that sort of sweeping generalization across the franchise when it's the case that Gundam has been handled by several different directors, writers, and artists for over 35 years. Yeah, a lot of it is derivative, but a fair amount of it attempts to do something unique with the license. He had the same issue in the Super Robot Thread where all stories that involve martial arts are the same story about stereotypical kung-fu guys.
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Mar 28, 2015 18:26
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Iserlohn posted:Nah, Wing blows, but it isn't representative of the Gundam franchise as whole. And this isn't necessarily about the quality of the shows as much as it is about the content. I don't agree with Shrimpy for making that sort of sweeping generalization across the franchise when it's the case that Gundam has been handled by several different directors, writers, and artists for over 35 years. Yeah, a lot of it is derivative, but a fair amount of it attempts to do something unique with the license. He had the same issue in the Super Robot Thread where all stories that involve martial arts are the same story about stereotypical kung-fu guys. I've seen enough of Gundam to make that generalization. I've seen Zeta, Victory, pretty much everything of UC except ZZ and Unicorn, and it's all confrontationalist stuff where nobody is likable. I've also seen SEED and AGE and it's the same poo poo I saw in Zeta and Victory that I hated. The only Gundam stuff I could say I liked as Build Fighters (which isn't a war story). Gundam X (had a likable protagonists, but it's too bad because it flopped.) and the 00 movie (and solely the movie, the 00 show was just as bad as the rest.) That's why i picked one of Tomino's non-Gundam things for this thread and not Turn A because of my opinions on Gundam as a whole would've made it difficult. Now, let's try to draw the topic back on King Gainer. I'm gonna watch the next episode and write up the next thing.
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Mar 28, 2015 18:40
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Wing has some of the best suit design and features a protagonist so wracked with guilt he's constantly trying to blow himself up/get someone to kill him. It's pretty okay.
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Mar 28, 2015 18:43
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I'm really surprised you could tolerate Robotech given than the main character is a pedophile.
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Mar 28, 2015 19:38
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PoptartsNinja posted:I'm really surprised you could tolerate Robotech given than the main character is a pedophile. Even Macross/Robotech is a thing I sorta got disallusioned with when I got older TBH
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Mar 28, 2015 19:40
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