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priznat posted:I was thinking about how Pete the homeless guy's orders were to not protect Lily but did so anyway thus enabling what is going to happen to happen. Perhaps the opposition forces to Forest/Amaya have their own system to allow seeing the future too and so they knew it didn't matter what they told Pete he was going to save her anyway. Or possibly that's too much of a stretch, who knows. I think it's a stretch but either way it wouldn't matter and what kinda bugs me about the actual plot is that Lily doing what Lily does at the end of the episode is just dumb. If your whole goal is to prove Forrest wrong why not delay your (seemingly out of character?) revenge plan an hour or two and just chill out in your car? Win-win.
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Apr 11, 2020 00:18
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Because everyone she loves is dead and she's not thinking clearly. Possibly with a touch of nihilistic "gently caress it, let's see where this goes.".
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Apr 11, 2020 00:22
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It seems to me that it is showing that moment was deterministic. When it shows Forest and the car crash, it is many worlds and the situation plays out several different ways. With Lyndon, it only shows the exact same way every time. Each scene was showing the opposite of what each character wanted. Forest wants the universe to be deterministic, but his event is shown with a many worlds interpretation where a minor change has drastically different outcomes. Lyndon wants to believe the many worlds theory, but his event is deterministic, where he was always going to fall off the dam.Soul Glo posted:I'm typically not a fan of writing reasons for things to happen in media but my head canon is that Lyndon is never shown surviving the bridge scene because Katie is actually pushing him off. The episode shows this not happening.
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Apr 11, 2020 00:24
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Looks to the Moon posted:That makes a depressing amount of sense. It also makes Forest's bonding with Jamie the night before all the more agonizing. Forest knew what would happen, front and back, from every possible angle and perspective, yet either couldn't or wouldn't stop it. At least Jamie and Lily had one sweet night together before it all went to hell. As events of the subsequent day have revealed themselves, the true horror of the indifference Katie and Forest show is apparent; Forest refers to the Lyndon suicide as "that whole thing", Katie suggests the idea of hanging off the ledge to Lyndon in the first place, Forest and Katie discuss Jamie like he's a character in a novel (Forest tells him everything will be okay!). Seeing the Devs projections and believing in a deterministic universe have stripped them of all morality.
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Apr 11, 2020 00:33
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Mulva posted:Because everyone she loves is dead and she's not thinking clearly. Possibly with a touch of nihilistic "gently caress it, let's see where this goes.". I get not thinking clearly but it comes across as wrong for the character, who frankly has been acted like a flatter Neo. Plus it probably takes a while to get from SF to SV, traffic can be bad, so that's a pretty decent cooling off period. The previous episode and half of this episode were her full-on rejecting determinism so from a plotting (storytelling?) standpoint it would have come across as more real to just have Kenton or Hobo toss her in the trunk and drive her to Devs as a hostage or ransom or whatever, not wanting to hug and kiss determinism.
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Apr 11, 2020 00:46
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Really hard to connect to this show. I don't understand any of these characters motivations, and every dialogue scene is about a literal mystery box that is shrouded in secrecy. Really pretty tho.
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Apr 11, 2020 00:53
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The technology was essentially fully explained in episode 1, the character motivations have been made pretty clear over the season. What specifically don't you understand?
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Apr 11, 2020 01:05
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Yeah, it's not really a mystery box. They built a quantum computer that simulates everything. They run this simulation backwards to see the past, and run it forwards to see the future. It's a simulation, so it's not the actual thing. But it's similar because they are simulating their own world. What I wonder is, are they only simulating Earth? Could they extrapolate out their simulation to look at alien worlds?
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Apr 11, 2020 01:16
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Cojawfee posted:It's a simulation, so it's not the actual thing. SCheeseman fucked around with this message at 01:29 on Apr 11, 2020 |
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Apr 11, 2020 01:24
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Cojawfee posted:What I wonder is, are they only simulating Earth? Could they extrapolate out their simulation to look at alien worlds? Maybe, but it depends on how the search function works, like if they have to give it coordinates (which are probably relative to earth) and a time, and there’s a lot of universe to search! SCheeseman posted:If a simulation is capable of simulating a universe, it is effectively as real as an actual universe as for all we/they know we/they could be in a simulation. As Stewart said: "uh oh". Yeah that ruled. simulations in simulations in simulations etc
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Apr 11, 2020 01:25
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SCheeseman posted:The technology was essentially fully explained in episode 1, the character motivations have been made pretty clear over the season. What specifically don't you understand? From the last episode, why the head engineer wanted Lyndon to die. She also seemed to be pretty alright seeing someone asphixiate in the first episode. There is a backstory of her being a genius college student. The jump to that to being an accessory to multiple murder? Okay. But there isn't much to these characters to grab onto, Ron Swanson (this show does not make me interested in enough to learn these character's names) wanting to revive his daughter is apparent, but I don't find myself caring too much about it. Its purposefully muted dialogue scenes communicating the same ideas of determinism, my attn keeps on wandering. SCheeseman posted:The technology was essentially fully explained in episode 1, the character motivations have been made pretty clear over the season. What specifically don't you understand? It possibly being able to revive things is the not so secret hinge and would explain Ron Swanson's murder spree. But we don't know how those two things connect. Because its a mystery. This is all so unfortunate as being a huge fan of all Garland's work, combining sci fi and moral quandries so well. But there is no moral quandry, there is no buying into Ron's viewpoint. Its the same point, over and over again for 8 episodes.
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Apr 11, 2020 01:30
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Shageletic posted:From the last episode, why the head engineer wanted Lyndon to die. She also seemed to be pretty alright seeing someone asphixiate in the first episode. There is a backstory of her being a genius college student. The jump to that to being an accessory to multiple murder? Okay. She is a zealot, she has seen God and knows only to follow it's plan, "want" is irrelevant in a purely deterministic universe. She also seems certain the universe is about to end so it's not like she's particularly concerned about law enforcement or anything. Shageletic posted:It possibly being able to revive things is the not so secret hinge and would explain Ron Swanson's murder spree. But we don't know how those two things connect. Because its a mystery. The machine is capable of simulating a universe down to a subatomic level, copying and pasting atoms from one universe to the other I guess might be the idea?
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Apr 11, 2020 01:37
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I think a lot of Katie and Forest’s behaviour can be ascribed to their brains are totally broken by what they have seen. Especially due to the belief/hope that the universe is totally deterministic (for Forest) or everything will happen (many worlds) they feel it doesn’t matter what they do since it’ll happen that way anyway.
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Apr 11, 2020 01:40
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Fair explanations for these characters. Shame that they're not that interesting. Okay, amend my earlier post. These motivations are understandable. But they're pretty boring and one note.
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Apr 11, 2020 01:44
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I guess if you find zealots boring? I find it interesting how fast humanity can be stripped away from somebody once they give up on the idea of free will by giving themselves over to a higher power.
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Apr 11, 2020 01:47
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I think it's not so much that they've given themselves over to fate, but that they realize they have no choice but to do so. They've done enough experiments to see that the future still happens even if you tell someone and they say they will just not do that thing. It ends up being that you were destined to tell them, and they were destined to still do it.
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Apr 11, 2020 01:50
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Barring whatever happens in the last episode, I think the core flaw of the show I find Lily's story/character and everything around her fairly bland and dull when the other characters are about what happens to people when confronted with true determinism. You could excise most of Lily's story other than the Chosen One(?) element and have most of the episodes be about how each of the Devs confronts inevitability and the mystery of something that might break it. The one-second-buffer scene and the reactions from extras was more interesting than most of what Lily has done. Like, the hobo/reveal was boring. We know the show is going to put certain characters in certain places because the previous 6 hours made it drilled that in, so we don't need 30 minutes getting there.
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Apr 11, 2020 03:50
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Between all of the Christ imagery, like the Halo of light around Lilly's head this episode, the actual images of Christ on the cross, Forest's desire to resurrect his daughter, and that we have already seen Lilly die, I think Lilly will some how be brought back to life. Why this will break the machine or the universe, I don't really know. Maybe this is a simulation and shes the only real person in it, when she dies in the simulation, she wakes up, or is reborn, and the simulation ends. Or maybe she's just gonna blow the computers brains out, not sure. I like the show though.
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Apr 11, 2020 05:41
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We saw Lily die?
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Apr 11, 2020 05:45
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Enjoying Devs so far if only for the atmosphere and the expectation of something deeper by the time this wraps up. I'm also having a tough time (not) sympathizing with the origins of cold techwoodsman Forest. Very surface level and probably already covered, but I'm guessing Lily's name is significant. quote:Lilies most commonly mean devotion or purity, though meaning can vary by type of lily, culture, and color.
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Apr 11, 2020 06:44
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SCheeseman posted:I guess if you find zealots boring? I find it interesting how fast humanity can be stripped away from somebody once they give up on the idea of free will by giving themselves over to a higher power. I just see it as writer shortcuts. Why add the usual conflicting drives of the modern prestige TV format character and just say, hey, all they care about is doing one thing and nothing else. It feels like that with the determinism stuff but thats the shows central conceit so hopefully that pays off.
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Apr 11, 2020 07:08
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Depicting an existing human behaviour isn't a writer shortcut. Religious zealotry is something that happens all the time, I've known people who succumbed to it. Not to the point of murder, but definitely to the point where it came to control every aspect of their lives. E: also it seems kind of silly to criticise the writers for taking shortcuts and then right afterwards seemingly want them to instead just do what everyone else is doing. SCheeseman fucked around with this message at 08:22 on Apr 11, 2020 |
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Apr 11, 2020 08:19
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Cojawfee posted:We saw Lily die? In the third or fourth episode while the machine's image is still really blurry, the intro to the episode is Lily crawling around on the ground, presumably dying.
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Apr 11, 2020 08:45
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Alex Garland's presentation is amazing as usual but I'm disappointed that he's tackling the extremely worn-out "illusion" of free will, unless the swerve is that it's actually determinism that's the illusion, and just because a machine is making extremely accurate predictions doesn't mean the same thing as showing you an immutable future you can't change with active choices.
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Apr 11, 2020 15:36
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SCheeseman posted:Depicting an existing human behaviour isn't a writer shortcut. Religious zealotry is something that happens all the time, I've known people who succumbed to it. Not to the point of murder, but definitely to the point where it came to control every aspect of their lives. ? I'm not asking Devs to do what everyone is doing, just write 3 dimensional characters with enough going on to be interesting. The presentation and look and idiosyncratic feel of the show is already high tier, I just thought that the characterization should be just as compelling. Just a quick aside, just remembered how the antagonists talked about how amazing Lily was, wish I could have seen that instead of hearing bout it! And zealotry can be interesting, if its used to give a world more depth or make a point about our real life. But we have a show where its plot is driven by people who will do inhumanely things. Okay cool. But why is that interesting to the audience again?
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Apr 11, 2020 15:52
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Shageletic posted:Just a quick aside, just remembered how the antagonists talked about how amazing Lily was, wish I could have seen that instead of hearing bout it! What? She has outsmarted them or caught up to them every step of the way. it's not surprising at all that they are impressed by that. And I don't even recall them talking about how amazing she is outside of one scene where they both say the like her/jamie.
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Apr 11, 2020 16:30
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McSpanky posted:Alex Garland's presentation is amazing as usual but I'm disappointed that he's tackling the extremely worn-out "illusion" of free will, unless the swerve is that it's actually determinism that's the illusion, and just because a machine is making extremely accurate predictions doesn't mean the same thing as showing you an immutable future you can't change with active choices. I can't think of many modern films/television that are about determinism since the idea that the characters are on unbreakable paths is inherently disappointing. Most examples I can think of involve time travel where a closed loop is meant as a twist at the end, like Terminator. As a narrative, I find it fascinating that Lily, a character shown to constantly make bold choices in the beginning, has given up freewill after multiple traumatic events.
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Apr 11, 2020 16:32
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veni veni veni posted:What? She has outsmarted them or caught up to them every step of the way. it's not surprising at all that they are impressed by that. And I don't even recall them talking about how amazing she is outside of one scene where they both say the like her/jamie. Im referring to the bedroom scene between Ron Swanson and Allison Pill where they discuss her at length in ways that I didnt see actually happening in the narrative. Being more afraid of not doing something than doing something, "her truth" being undeniable, being extraordinary. Is this how we're supposed to see Lily Chan? What has Lily done that shows her extra ordinariness? I'd argue the hyperventilating scene is an almost alone case. She keeps on making mistakes, which is interesting in a story, but I have the feeling that the writers want us to see her as extremely competent? Calling the cops after talking about its uselessness, going back home, even visiting Swanson was an ultra bad idea, which again is cool, but it doesnt feel like that is what the show is trying to portray. Instead its just Bad Things Happen to Me: The Lily Chan story. This is supposed to be a mystery right? Wouldnt it have been more interesting to have the protagonist be more proactive in uncovering it instead of just driving to the bad guys house an ep or so before the season is over? The noir/detective/gumshoe template is a well worn one for a reason, bc it works. It instantly makes you sympathetic and root for the protaganist. Instead, we have a show that is innovative on the surface level but hard to hold onto, due to the characters being somewhat formless and without interesting interior lives or agency. Maybe Im being too hard on this show but near misses make much more interesting fodder than the ones that hit it out of the park.
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Apr 11, 2020 17:17
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priznat posted:I think a lot of Katie and Forest’s behaviour can be ascribed to their brains are totally broken by what they have seen. Especially due to the belief/hope that the universe is totally deterministic (for Forest) or everything will happen (many worlds) they feel it doesn’t matter what they do since it’ll happen that way anyway. A goon earlier in the thread mentioned that the show hasn't dealt with compatibilism, the idea that a deterministic universe and free will are compatible. At this point, I'm almost inclined to think that's intentional. Forest has his determinism thing — the "rails" — and is literally building a god machine to figure it out, but 5 minutes on Google would complicate that simple, binary, either/or answer he's going for. It would also complicate any of his and Katie's over-confident justifications for literal murder. As Stewart says, the dude can't even guess. He's just not interested. Both Katie and Forest, despite their intelligence, are pretty much Dunning-Kruger incarnate.
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Apr 11, 2020 17:29
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Shageletic posted:Im referring to the bedroom scene between Ron Swanson and Allison Pill where they discuss her at length in ways that I didnt see actually happening in the narrative. Being more afraid of not doing something than doing something, "her truth" being undeniable, being extraordinary. Lily is a very active character who makes bold choices compared to the average person. She restored her missing boyfriend's phone, recognized an innocuous piece of software as something suspect, and tracked down an ex-boyfriend to ask him to break in. When he told her to gently caress off, she broke into his apartment through a fire escape and insisted that he help her. She finds out the software is actually a messaging app to her boyfriend's KGB handler. She messages the handler and meets him. She tells the KGB handler to gently caress off. She then enlists a friend to create a story that gets her into the office of the man she suspects killed her boyfriend. She goes as far as climbing out on a ledge to distract him so her friend can steal the only tangible piece of evidence there is. She continues the lie of moments of insanity until she realizes that she's being kidnapped. She almost immediately grabs the steering wheel and crashes the car choosing one likely death over the one she can't control. Then she calls the police. Katie and Forest are two people who have purposefully become passive in the world (as far as they are aware) and they're admiring the extraordinary choices Lily makes to take control of the situation.
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Apr 11, 2020 17:57
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Knowing what happens in the future makes you really boring and indifferent apparently
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Apr 11, 2020 18:11
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Field Mousepad posted:Knowing what happens in the future makes you really boring and indifferent apparently Of course, if you know that you are going to act really bored and indifferent in the future, then you have no choice but to do that!
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Apr 11, 2020 18:16
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Shageletic posted:? I'm not asking Devs to do what everyone is doing, just write 3 dimensional characters with enough going on to be interesting. The presentation and look and idiosyncratic feel of the show is already high tier, I just thought that the characterization should be just as compelling. I dont think it's a lack of character depth. It's making the point that Forest has been reduced to a one dimensional person bt the death of his family. He is no longer able to care about anything else, he has no room for it. Katie has been reduced to zero dimensions by the revelation she has no free will and is incapable of anything but a thousand yard stare.
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Apr 11, 2020 19:35
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So I guess it's obvious at this point but Forest totally steered the oversight people out there to see Lily on the ledge just to get them off his back for a while, right?
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Apr 11, 2020 21:38
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Shageletic posted:? I'm not asking Devs to do what everyone is doing, just write 3 dimensional characters with enough going on to be interesting. The presentation and look and idiosyncratic feel of the show is already high tier, I just thought that the characterization should be just as compelling. I find the characters interesting. Saying things like "oh I remember now that the baddies said they admired Lily I wish I could have seen that" is so utterly tedious. You did see it, they're recounting their experiences with the character which were depicted in the show. You haven't really given any reasoning why they aren't "interesting" or justifications as to why the writing is poor, you've just been flatly stating that they are while everyone else recounts the things you have apparently missed. You might not like the characters, but that isn't a flaw in the writing. SCheeseman fucked around with this message at 23:06 on Apr 11, 2020 |
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Apr 11, 2020 23:02
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DirtyRobot posted:A goon earlier in the thread mentioned that the show hasn't dealt with compatibilism, the idea that a deterministic universe and free will are compatible. At this point, I'm almost inclined to think that's intentional. Forest has his determinism thing — the "rails" — and is literally building a god machine to figure it out, but 5 minutes on Google would complicate that simple, binary, either/or answer he's going for. It would also complicate any of his and Katie's over-confident justifications for literal murder. As Stewart says, the dude can't even guess. He's just not interested. Both Katie and Forest, despite their intelligence, are pretty much Dunning-Kruger incarnate. Thankfully the show isn't even considering compatibilism because it's a horse-poo poo idea.
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Apr 12, 2020 01:22
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a helpful bear posted:Enjoying Devs so far if only for the atmosphere and the expectation of something deeper by the time this wraps up. I'm also having a tough time (not) sympathizing with the origins of cold techwoodsman Forest. Her full name is Lilith, AKA (in some traditions) First Man Adam's first wife who was created from scratch instead from his rib. Traditionally, she was exiled for refusing to submit to Adam, refusing to play her part.
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Apr 12, 2020 02:36
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So I just binged through this entire thing and what a trip. Just a gorgeous show doing weird things well. But yeah, I really feel bad for Jaime, you rarely ever see a dude carry a printer that much. Plus I love the Amaya campus, UC Santa Cruz is loving gorgeous
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Apr 12, 2020 02:47
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Anyone watching Dispatches from Elsewhere? In a rather fortuitous piece of timing, compare and contrast Lily's current position and mindset against this piece of narration: Ah, the point of no return, the crucial moment at which it becomes all too clear that the remaining path is the one that leads forward. no matter what perils may lie in wait there is, as they say, no turning back now. At this point in our entertainment, it's possible that you too, dear viewer, are feeling that inexorable tug, that you feel - in the parlance of betters and gamblers - "pot committed". It is, I assure you, a false construct. There is always a choice. Ask yourself: knowing what she knows, feeling what she feels - could you walk away? Think of Apollo's curse on Cassandra. Knowing the future, can it be changed? So far, the answer is no. But how hard did Forest and Katie try? They certainly haven't attempted anything close to full disclosure. Even as Lily fulfills the prophecy given to her, the question remains open. Heck, given the heavy christian imagery and references (Lily -> Lilith, Devs -> Deus etc.) the last episode could be heading in an entirely different direction and resolve none of this. Edit: I should have been clearer, the spoiler is a direct quote from Dispatches episode 7. OTC fucked around with this message at 07:38 on Apr 12, 2020 |
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Apr 12, 2020 03:17
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Shageletic posted:This is supposed to be a mystery right? OTC posted:Anyone watching Dispatches from Elsewhere?
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Apr 12, 2020 06:07
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