|
ulex minor posted:i like the idea of IDEOAT and some of the episodes are very entertaining but they wring their hands over the most tedious things sometimes I by and large like them but holy Christ they love to bloviate about how offensive <insert thing here> was to the point where it really feels less like they were offended by it and more like they want you to know they know it’s offensive and bad. I’ve heard good things about The Worst Bestsellers but I can’t stand either of the hosts’ voices at all so I haven’t made it more than a few minutes into an episode.
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 13:23
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 7, 2024 03:15 |
|
|
Ugly In The Morning posted:I by and large like them but holy Christ they love to bloviate about how offensive <insert thing here> was to the point where it really feels less like they were offended by it and more like they want you to know they know it’s offensive and bad. That is entirely of a piece with the extremely online air of self-satisfaction the hosts have that made me drop that podcast like a hot shovel. It's a pity that a good concept for a podcast got staked out early and thoroughly by people I think are pretty bad at it.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 13:27
|
|
|
Pastry of the Year posted:That is entirely of a piece with the extremely online air of self-satisfaction the hosts have that made me drop that podcast like a hot shovel. They really should do a podcast that’s not book related, because they’re so much better when they derail into talking about music or being lovely teens in the 90’s. I generally even like the podcast but when they’re talking about the book-adjacent stuff the smugness fades into the background a lot more.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 13:42
|
|
|
nonathlon posted:Mack Bolan was one example of many longrunnung one-man-army series. In my youth, I remember visiting a secondhand book shop and finding The Revenger 57, Remo Williams 34, The Incinerator 72 ... Are they left overs from the age of pulp literature? They sure have that feel. Bond is just a well-done example of the form. There were enough of these to inspire Matthew Holness to write a short film about their authors.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 13:47
|
|
|
echopapa posted:There were enough of these to inspire Matthew Holness to write a short film about their authors. Omg, thank you. This is a jewel. IDEOAT had some absolutely brilliant episodes, and they're funny, smart guys but it did seem to to drift towards being very woke and scolding. Their Facebook community is kinda unpleasant, full of people calling others out.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 16:50
|
|
|
Pastry of the Year posted:That is entirely of a piece with the extremely online air of self-satisfaction the hosts have that made me drop that podcast like a hot shovel. yeah, you and Ugly In The Morning summed it up nicely
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 18:14
|
|
|
ulex minor posted:i like the idea of IDEOAT and some of the episodes are very entertaining but they wring their hands over the most tedious things sometimes The rest of 372pages is pretty good, I think it helps that Mike is often confused or frustrated, but never actually angry.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 18:24
|
|
|
nonathlon posted:Omg, thank you. This is a jewel. It's tricky to make jokes about unpleasant and gross stuff without making it seem less serious than it is, but Friedman and Collision are often too uncomfortable with a subject to even try. Like I was really, really disappointed in the Black Jewels book they did, because they were so disgusted with it that they couldn't really get into all the bizarre poo poo. And while that's an reasonable response, it doesn't make for a funny show.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 18:57
|
|
|
Terrible might be overstating it a bit, but I'm currently reading The Strain and am shocked by how boring and bland a book about a disease that turns you into a vampire is. I was excited to find out how they'd scientifically explain vampire weaknesses that have been shown in the book (silver, staking the heart) and how they'd explain why vampires have a weird reflection in the mirror. What I got was "oh yeah silver's a disinfectant" and "I have no idea why their reflections look like that, must just be a thing".
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 19:12
|
|
|
While I only sort of half-liked it, because that seems to be about as much as I can muster for any Peter Watts book, he did a decent job in Blindsight of explaining vampirism as this weird prehistoric offshoot of Homo sapiens. The explanation he came up with for why crosses are a thing (blah blah right angles visual cortex blah blah seizures) reminded me of David Langford's "basilisk" idea.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 19:42
|
|
|
IDEOAT also suffers from neither of its hosts being Comedy Guys who are capable of riffing, and who just kind of automatically revert to menial scolding when it turns out they've chosen a boring book and don't really have anything to talk about. The fact that they're inconsistent about picking good (bad) books doesn't help either. I can already guess what's inside this random 80s has-been's autobiography, I really don't need to hear about another one.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 19:45
|
|
|
IDEOAT is at its best when they do Pulp that's entertaining or something with terrible written prose like any Patterson novel. Other times, they will frequently drop the ball by being too offended to be effective or funny critics - their Xanth episode being a good example of a book that definitely deserve a different approach to show how loving bizarre it is. But the episodes about Ready Player One, Incredibly True Sad Love Story, giant crabs and that weird Patterson book about X-Men bird kids are fun. And the double feature of the Insane Clown Posse autobiography is fantastic, because it allows all the banner about wrestling and bands to come together and actually add to the book.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 19:54
|
|
|
They do seem to be flummoxed when they pick something that's just bad or tedious like they can only repeat and repeat how bad it is. And most bad books aren't entertainingly bad, they're just mediocre and dull.Sobatchja Morda posted:Incredibly True Sad Love Story I'd forgotten that book. It got all this acclaim and I tried to read it and gave up a short distance in. It's awful and just an ever so slightly disguised "horny schlubby novelist wants sexy waifu" piece that could have been written 50 years ago.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2020 20:10
|
|
|
I like IDEOAT and Worst Bestsellers, so take my suggestion with that in mind- '372 pages we'll never get back' is fun. Each season is about one book, and that approach helps imo. Their games (fanfic or real) and reinactments are fun, too. They are writers for riff Trax
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 01:09
|
|
|
A Fancy Hat posted:Terrible might be overstating it a bit, but I'm currently reading The Strain and am shocked by how boring and bland a book about a disease that turns you into a vampire is. Just a head's up it eventually ditches the science stuff and by the third book the explanation is (major spoilers for The Strain series) a chopped up angel body caused vampires.
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 03:01
|
|
|
I enjoed the books until that dumbass reveal, too. Not great literature, but they were fun. Especially weird since the books were billed as "vampires but SCIENCE," too.
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 04:27
|
|
|
packetmantis posted:I enjoed the books until that dumbass reveal, too. Not great literature, but they were fun. Especially weird since the books were billed as "vampires but SCIENCE," too. Which do you think is more common, scifi books that suddenly turn to magic, or fantasy books that suddenly involve aliens and space travel?
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 04:35
|
|
|
packetmantis posted:I enjoed the books until that dumbass reveal, too. Not great literature, but they were fun. Especially weird since the books were billed as "vampires but SCIENCE," too. Same, that was such a letdown of a swerve and not what I was reading the books for at all.
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 04:41
|
|
|
Well, poo poo, now I kinda wanna read the books. I wonder if they made it that far into the tv show?
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 04:49
|
|
|
While the TV show got there in a different way it ended mostly the same.
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 04:50
|
|
|
muscles like this! posted:Just a head's up it eventually ditches the science stuff and by the third book the explanation is (major spoilers for The Strain series) a chopped up angel body caused vampires. But what if the angel was also science?
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 04:56
|
|
|
IDEOTV was way better when it had a different guest each episode, and the episodes with guests are still the best ones by far.there wolf posted:Which do you think is more common, scifi books that suddenly turn to magic, or fantasy books that suddenly involve aliens and space travel? One twist I do like when it's done well though is magic is real but people study it scientifically. Like how in True Blood they figure out what it is about blood that vampires need to live and create an artificial version. Vampires are still magic, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're completely beyond understanding.
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 06:34
|
|
|
there wolf posted:Which do you think is more common, scifi books that suddenly turn to magic, or fantasy books that suddenly involve aliens and space travel? The latter is actually more common in video games and tabletop RPGs, I think. (though I always found 'fantasy world is actually post-apocalyptic Earth' to be lame as hell for no particular reason) Though it's more interesting to do it Barrier Peaks style, where the magic and gods and fairies are all real but there's also aliens too.
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 06:53
|
|
|
A Fancy Hat posted:Terrible might be overstating it a bit, but I'm currently reading The Strain and am shocked by how boring and bland a book about a disease that turns you into a vampire is. Silver used to be used as backing material in mirrors. So technically, it would depend on the mirror. (Although why an anti-vampire material would affect light reflecting off a vampire...)
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 07:42
|
|
|
The virgin "magic is just technology" and "technology is just magic" versus the chad "magic and technology both exist but are mutually incompatible"
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 09:53
|
|
|
packetmantis posted:I enjoed the books until that dumbass reveal, too. Not great literature, but they were fun. I still think they're fun, and I loved that reveal. I also still love IDEOTV and worst bestsellers, so judge my tastes accordingly.
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 11:26
|
|
|
muscles like this! posted:Just a head's up it eventually ditches the science stuff and by the third book the explanation is (major spoilers for The Strain series) a chopped up angel body caused vampires. I finished the first book and decided that was the end for me, but nah, now I want to read the whole series. I got the first one at half-price books for 3 bucks and it's been sitting on my shelf for years.
|
|
#
?
Jul 14, 2020 17:23
|
|
|
Tiggum posted:
The "They're actually demons" theory really does help Signs, though
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2020 16:51
|
|
|
This recent discussion has gotten me in the mood to read a terrible book, but only vicariously. Does anyone have any favorite Let's Read threads for bad books?
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2020 17:32
|
|
|
Pastry of the Year posted:This recent discussion has gotten me in the mood to read a terrible book, but only vicariously. Does anyone have any favorite Let's Read threads for bad books? Trawl Chitoryu12’s post history. If you’re up for being mad about awful right wing stuff, there’s the TFR thread for Unintended Consequences, where the author actually shows up. My favorite “this is dumb and bad but pretty inoffensive” one is the (sadly unfinished) Furlites of Au... something thread, where the author won’t shut up about the fictional game of Shartball and also doesn’t realize how funny that name is.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2020 19:04
|
|
|
Pastry of the Year posted:This recent discussion has gotten me in the mood to read a terrible book, but only vicariously. Does anyone have any favorite Let's Read threads for bad books? I think this is what you're looking for: https://forums.somethingawful.com/forumdisplay.php?forumid=182 Every thread is about bad books so if there's a Let's Read in there, it'll do you.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2020 19:25
|
|
|
END ME SCOOB's Sword of Truth one is pretty great. Good balance of actual text and Scoob breaking things down and pointing dumb poo poo out.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2020 19:46
|
|
|
Pastry of the Year posted:This recent discussion has gotten me in the mood to read a terrible book, but only vicariously. Does anyone have any favorite Let's Read threads for bad books? The Cult Crushers thread by Gutter Phoenix is pretty fun. The book is extremely bonkers, especially how it can't really decide if it is for or against the Nazi antagonists.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2020 22:26
|
|
|
muscles like this! posted:The Cult Crushers thread by Gutter Phoenix is pretty fun. The book is extremely bonkers, especially how it can't really decide if it is for or against the Nazi antagonists. I loved that thread. Gutter Phoenix is a forums treasure.
|
|
#
?
Jul 16, 2020 18:12
|
|
|
A Fancy Hat posted:Terrible might be overstating it a bit, but I'm currently reading The Strain and am shocked by how boring and bland a book about a disease that turns you into a vampire is. I hated The Strain because it had this strong feeling like it was super obviously written to be a screen adaptation rather than just as a book. Michael Crichton books from Jurassic Park onwards are like this too. They feel like you're reading a script at times and you can pretty much tell that the author is thinking about actors and what scenes will be in the trailer
|
|
#
?
Jul 17, 2020 00:34
|
|
|
Cobalt-60 posted:Enough carping about books that may or may not be bad (or Bad); let's have some genuinely terrible books. Years ago, I was stuck at a boring job with nothing to do and nothing to read. The only books I could find were some pulp novels: Mack Bolan. The Executioner. I've always been really fond of the Executioner novels, though I can't say you're entirely wrong there in summarizing them. There's a big divide between the ones written by the original author and when it became a 'brand name' farmed out to whoever the publisher had on hand. I feel they're an interesting snapshot of a lot of different cultural changes, from the situations that involve a lot of mafioso being shot up to the backdrops for different crime syndicates that have to be pulverized. For instance, the tragic backstory mentioned that's brought up semi-regularly: the Executioner's father is a steelworker that has a heart attack, and because they're falling behind on bills they take out a payday loan from a mafia-run organization. Said organization beats up dad and has the big sister dragged into prostitution. Pretty compelling reason to go on a 38-book shooting spree! But the twist is that the family ends up dying because the father finds out about the prostitution, then murder-suicides the rest of the family with only lil' brother Johnny escaping with his life. That itself is kind of unusual for that whole genre. The first few books have a more experimental feel to them at times as well, with the first being a 'one man against impossible odds' situation to the second involving recruiting a bunch of Vietnam veterans for a death squad, then the third being an infiltration story. Even the titles have a big change in how they're done, going from 'The Executioner's War on the Mafia' or 'The Executioner's Death Squad' to just simple LOCATION - ALLITERATIVE WORD FOR MASS MURDER. They're also kind of interesting for cultural influence, since it was the Marvel comics Punisher that ripped the series off wholeheartedly. Also interesting; a lot of the Executioner's little trademarks are baked into White Wolf's World of Darkness RPG systems. Something similar happened with the Remo the Destroyer novels, which later got sifted out to make D&D's Monk class. Though for true top-tier lovely books, the Destroyer series is on a whole other level of worse. Still with that same sort of cultural anthropology interest for me personally, but distinctly more mean spirited, racist, sexist, and just completely degenerate. I'd never, ever claim that the Executioner series is all that worthwhile if you're not already into reading 'men's adventure' novels, but while shooting up thousands of mafia thugs is pretty implausible and also kind of disgusting, Remo the Destroyer is pretty much just a superhero except one of his super powers is rape. It's part of the denouement to the second Destroyer novel and a central plot point in the third, and then just keeps showing up whenever the authors got tired of whining about (And then graphically torturing) those kids these days to pad out the book length.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 21:18
|
|
|
WendyO posted:one of his super powers is rape. Uh, what?
|
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2020 04:11
|
|
|
Danger - Octopus! posted:I hated The Strain because it had this strong feeling like it was super obviously written to be a screen adaptation rather than just as a book. Michael Crichton books from Jurassic Park onwards are like this too. They feel like you're reading a script at times and you can pretty much tell that the author is thinking about actors and what scenes will be in the trailer I thought that was just his writing style
|
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2020 04:46
|
|
|
I remember seeing the Remo Williams movie when the teacher was giving even less of a poo poo than usual. I think it was being silly on purpose? The Punisher is definitely a case where making a character a literal comic book supervillain/antihero actually makes them a lot more thematically consistent. Of course that ended up spawning the 90s, but hey.
|
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2020 05:38
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 7, 2024 03:15 |
|
|
Tiggum posted:Uh, what? Remo Williams learns the ancient Korean art of Sinanju which is like a mish-mash of martial arts and total body control, pressure points, etc. So while its useful for driving peoples noses into their brains with palm strikes or whatever, its also great for stimulating sexual responses, to where he just hits pressure points and suddenly women are overwhelmed with pleasure and immediately compliant. Which is pretty nasty, but then in one of the books he just rapes a PRC agent until she's unconditionally loyal to the stars and stripes.
|
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2020 06:29
|
|