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rodbeard posted:That's because nobody watched Grease 2 Their loss.
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Mar 2, 2021 20:34
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hallo spacedog posted:It seems really weird to me to send your kid to Catholic school after acknowledging and talking about how traumatized you were by it. It does sound odd when you put it like that: My mother was sent to a convent school, and according to her, some of the nuns were fairly evil. Even so, she sent me to a different convent school and our nuns really were lovely. My school had a very good reputation, and it wasn't undeserved. It was an actual convent, with a school attached, so there were a good few nuns about who weren't teachers, just resident nuns, and the ones I met were nearly all very sweet. Like Sister Berkmanns and her hamster  A lot had changed in the intervening 30 years though; the laws had changed, the power of the church had massively reduced, and women who didn't slot in to the standard 'wife' role weren't automatically railroaded in to the convent anymore. All these things changed the kind of person who became a nun. This was in Ireland though, so 'catholic school' is very much the default, even now. I went to a non-denominational primary school, and they were extremely rare at the time, they are still very uncommon. The catholic church still controls the majority of schools, which is 100% bullshit. In conclusion, research your catholic school before you send your child there; some are savage, many are excellent. Don't assume one way or the other. Also check if the good reviews are from hardcore catholic congregation members, because those are probably biased.
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Mar 2, 2021 21:13
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It makes sense when you guys explain it, it's just so foreign to my experience... My mom just always talked a lot about how she was traumatized at Catholic school and was adamantly against sending kids to one because of it. On the other hand I had a bad enough time at public school, and schools, in general I barely want to send my kids to any school so I am not probably the best judge of what is normal there.
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Mar 2, 2021 21:26
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All school is for nerds, drop out and join a street gang.
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Mar 2, 2021 23:25
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Push El Burrito posted:All school is for nerds, drop out and join a street gang. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbsUsXVyKBw
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Mar 2, 2021 23:34
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Pookah posted:It does sound odd when you put it like that: My mother was sent to a convent school, and according to her, some of the nuns were fairly evil. Even so, she sent me to a different convent school and our nuns really were lovely. My school had a very good reputation, and it wasn't undeserved. It was an actual convent, with a school attached, so there were a good few nuns about who weren't teachers, just resident nuns, and the ones I met were nearly all very sweet. Like Sister Berkmanns and her hamster I went to a Catholic school here in England and the nuns were absolutely lovely also. No corporal punishment to be seen. They did quite often set off the campus-wide fire alarms by burning toast though, that was an entertaining couple of years before they moved the resident nuns out to a different facility.
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Mar 2, 2021 23:42
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Ghost Leviathan posted:The whole point iirc is that it's basically 'adapting' hilariously trashy genre fiction novels so a lot of the problematic stuff is kinda par for the course. With the 'Scotch' as the racial stereotype of choice. Making Merenghi specifically racist against the Scottish is perhaps one of the smartest choices they made in that show. It has the perfect combination of being a vaguely believable prejudice one could have, especially in the era it's making fun of, while also being so patently stupid that you couldn't really take offense.
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Mar 2, 2021 23:46
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Roblo posted:I'd say that Dark place is so very obviously satire that there isn't too much of a risk of it landing wrong, but I'm also aware I'm not really the butt of any of the jokes so may be wrong. Yea, it's pretty clear Garth is the butt of the jokes, but he wouldn't be the first terrible character people tried to emulate. I'd also recommend the short netflix special Frankenstein's Monster's Monster, Frankenstein, which has a lot of Dark Place vibes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaJcZ6yAejI
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Mar 3, 2021 00:24
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Mooseontheloose posted:That might be Mayor Portnoy soon. Dude is constantly bitching and whacking off. Don't bother.
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Mar 3, 2021 05:18
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I mean, there's 'cool terrible' and then there's 'pathetic terrible'. Rick from Rick and Morty is a terrible person who is made to look like a cool antihero regardless and people want to emulate him. I can't think of a single reason why anyone would want to emulate dumpy, weird, socially clueless, obviously destitute, utterly talentless, completely deluded, pathetic creep Garth Merenghi. He is completely wretched, that's the whole point. It seems like a weird thing to worry about Edit now Dean Learner on the other hand... Barry Foster has a new favorite as of 05:23 on Mar 3, 2021 |
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Mar 3, 2021 05:21
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Barry Foster posted:I mean, there's 'cool terrible' and then there's 'pathetic terrible'. Rick from Rick and Morty is a terrible person who is made to look like a cool antihero regardless and people want to emulate him. I could see it from someone with a very poor media literacy. Basically everything about the show is a joke about him being a creepy idiot weirdo, but Garth Merenghi does think of himself as a kind of cool that's at least constantly remained somewhat timely; he's a smooth, attractive(-ish), successful(-ish) author, who wears leather jackets, has sunglasses, smokes, and has Hard Opinions. That's never been the coolest guy at a party, but someone who fits that general bill has always been at least kinda cool. But perhaps most importantly, the kind of person who thinks someone like that is really cool is EXACTLY the kind of person who does all that anyway and then thinks they're cool. You can tell someone who would misunderstand Darkplace because they look and act like Garth Merenghi anyway.
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Mar 3, 2021 05:45
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I always think of him as a cross between Shaun Hutson and James Herbert, if they were trying to imitate William Friedkin.
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Mar 3, 2021 09:16
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That's a bunch of names I have never heard of. More I think the problem is that good satire generally has to also function as a recognisable example of the thing it's satirising, so there's inherently the risk of the intended audience missing even the least subtle implications that what's being portrayed is supposed to be absurd.
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Mar 3, 2021 09:38
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Look, the only thing from DarkPlace that was supposed to be ironically bad but ended up being great actually was "One Track Lover" https://youtu.be/OO-ZGP68-3w
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Mar 3, 2021 10:07
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Torquemada posted:I always think of him as a cross between Shaun Hutson and James Herbert, if they were trying to imitate William Friedkin. I recall that Shaun Hutson was specifically named as an inspiration. He's not exactly a household name, unless you read that sort of book, in which case you probably wouldn't get the satire.
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Mar 3, 2021 10:20
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Disco Pope posted:Look, the only thing from DarkPlace that was supposed to be ironically bad but ended up being great actually was "One Track Lover" The part which gets me is Ayoade picking up the ice, checking that it's going to go in the glass then putting it in the glass. Most of Learner's bad acting is stupidly unsubtle, but that little bit... It takes a level of good acting to be that bad in acting.
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Mar 3, 2021 10:38
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 Directed The Exorcist.
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Mar 3, 2021 10:56
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Samovar posted:The part which gets me is Ayoade picking up the ice, checking that it's going to go in the glass then putting it in the glass. Most of Learner's bad acting is stupidly unsubtle, but that little bit... It takes a level of good acting to be that bad in acting. which is funny because Ayoade insists that his fake acting in Darkplace is about as skilled and genuine as his acting in anything else he's been in as an actual actor
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Mar 3, 2021 11:10
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Ghost Leviathan posted:That's a bunch of names I have never heard of. Shaun Hutson is the godfather of splatterpunk - basically imagine if Guy Ritchie directed a horror movie with a heavy metal soundtrack. James Herbert was the British Stephen King. And Friedkin, as pointed out already, is a famous film director who peaked in the 70s with The Exorcist, Sorcerer and The French Connection.
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Mar 3, 2021 12:25
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Jedit posted:Shaun Hutson is the godfather of splatterpunk - basically imagine if Guy Ritchie directed a horror movie with a heavy metal soundtrack. James Herbert was the British Stephen King. And Friedkin, as pointed out already, is a famous film director who peaked in the 70s with The Exorcist, Sorcerer and The French Connection. That is, to be fair, an incredible goddamn peak right there.
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Mar 3, 2021 12:39
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Neito posted:Small like eraser-sized, or small like baseball sized? Usually golf ball sized.
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Mar 3, 2021 13:31
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Jedit posted:Shaun Hutson is the godfather of splatterpunk - basically imagine if Guy Ritchie directed a horror movie with a heavy metal soundtrack. James Herbert was the British Stephen King. And Friedkin, as pointed out already, is a famous film director who peaked in the 70s with The Exorcist, Sorcerer and The French Connection. Yeah, Billy Friedkin was incredibly grandiose about his talent, and I have very vivid memories of a documentary he was a part of wearing the leather jacket and tinted glasses and just basically being everything Garth thinks he is. Shaun Hutson had the shades and jacket too, but I think he had long rocker-style hair? 
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Mar 3, 2021 14:31
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Dark Place is a wonderful little slice of what British TV was 'like' in the 80s and I adore it for all the silly memories it recreates of being a kid and watching ropey shows. Plus the anger with which Garth says to the camera "I know writers who use subtext and they're all cowards" is one of my most favourite lines in TV. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWJZK5zUS50
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Mar 3, 2021 14:50
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Darkplace is absolutely my favorite British comedy, and I've had to have seen it at least 8 times over at this point. Very fun, has some weird parts but on the whole I think 'supernatural horror hospital drama thriller that's also completely terrible' is just an incredible premise. I've always felt that a TTRPG set in a Darkplace-style 'universe' of purposefully bad horror and hospital melodrama could be a lot of fun with a group that's up for it. Would love to know more about the authors Marenghi is based on, my only real experience is on an episode of the I Don't Even Own a Television podcast that discussed Hutson's Slugs, and I seem to recall them bringing up Darkplace a bit then.
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Mar 3, 2021 16:21
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geeko55 posted:Darkplace is absolutely my favorite British comedy, and I've had to have seen it at least 8 times over at this point. Very fun, has some weird parts but on the whole I think 'supernatural horror hospital drama thriller that's also completely terrible' is just an incredible premise. I've always felt that a TTRPG set in a Darkplace-style 'universe' of purposefully bad horror and hospital melodrama could be a lot of fun with a group that's up for it.  this a good book that gives an overview of the 80s horror boom.
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Mar 3, 2021 16:33
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Ambitious Spider posted:
If Gila! was an album I would absolutely listen to it
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Mar 3, 2021 16:57
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I've been watching Star Trek TOS recently, and in many cases this is the first time I've seen these episodes in years, even decades. And a lot of it really holds up but my god some of the bizarre sexism (often in the midst of some otherwise spectacular writing and acting).
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Mar 3, 2021 17:04
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geeko55 posted:Would love to know more about the authors Marenghi is based on, my only real experience is on an episode of the I Don't Even Own a Television podcast that discussed Hutson's Slugs, and I seem to recall them bringing up Darkplace a bit then. I'm pretty sure I remember Matthew Holness naming Lionel Fanthorpe as one of the inspirations: Wikipedia posted:The exact number of books and stories Fanthorpe wrote for Badger Books is not known, but is estimated to be in excess of 180, 89 of which were written in a three-year period – an average of a 158-page book every 12 days.
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Mar 3, 2021 17:27
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Ambitious Spider posted:
Rascar Capac posted:I'm pretty sure I remember Matthew Holness naming Lionel Fanthorpe as one of the inspirations: Thanks for both of these! That book is extremely my speed, I'll have to hunt down a copy! Any specific works from Fanthorpe worth looking into from a horror-schlock perspective?
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Mar 3, 2021 17:40
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Alaois posted:which is funny because Ayoade insists that his fake acting in Darkplace is about as skilled and genuine as his acting in anything else he's been in as an actual actor It's much like how people keep being surprised that comedy actors do great in dramatic roles: comedy is hard. Doing bad acting on purpose, and in specific ways to emulate a very particular genre, requires a shitload of work and layers.
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Mar 3, 2021 18:13
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Rascar Capac posted:I'm pretty sure I remember Matthew Holness naming Lionel Fanthorpe as one of the inspirations: In regards to first making a cover and then writing a novel around it - didn't Golan-Globus do something similar? Made a bunch of posters for action movies in the 80s and then quickly made a movie about it if someone showed interest in it?
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Mar 3, 2021 18:28
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Ghost Leviathan posted:It's much like how people keep being surprised that comedy actors do great in dramatic roles: comedy is hard. Doing bad acting on purpose, and in specific ways to emulate a very particular genre, requires a shitload of work and layers.
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Mar 3, 2021 18:43
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Ghost Leviathan posted:It's much like how people keep being surprised that comedy actors do great in dramatic roles: comedy is hard. Doing bad acting on purpose, and in specific ways to emulate a very particular genre, requires a shitload of work and layers. i probably worded that very poorly because what i meant is Richard Ayoade thinks that he himself is a poo poo actor even when he's actually trying
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Mar 3, 2021 18:47
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On a different note, the movie Network has aged surprisingly well - it's basically a predictive fable about a guy who goes viral and becomes a meme.
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Mar 3, 2021 18:47
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docbeard posted:I've been watching Star Trek TOS recently, and in many cases this is the first time I've seen these episodes in years, even decades. My favourite for that (of the TOS eps I've seen) is "Metamorphosis" where Kirk says, "The idea of male and female are universal constants." (The modern biological view is that sexual reproduction only evolved about a billion years ago, i.e. the last quarter of Earth's history, and the male-female sexual anatomy familiar to humans probably only evolved hundreds of millions of years after that) Also, the weird energy being is a woman, and you can tell because the universal translator gives it a woman's voice.
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Mar 3, 2021 18:59
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geeko55 posted:Thanks for both of these! That book is extremely my speed, I'll have to hunt down a copy! Any specific works from Fanthorpe worth looking into from a horror-schlock perspective? Lionel Fanthorpe was never a horror writer; he was a boiler room SF author who wrote a truly absurd number of (by his own admission) terrible pulp books under a wide array of pseudonyms, some of which were written in as little as three days. I would, however, recommend his non-fiction work in the field of Forteana and mysteries. He did much of the legwork on these himself, so they're more like personal anecdotes than dry reports or sensationalised storytelling. I once got to sit down with Fanthorpe and his wife for coffee and a chat and can attest that he is extremely funny and completely genuine.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:36
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Ghost Leviathan posted:It's much like how people keep being surprised that comedy actors do great in dramatic roles: comedy is hard. Doing bad acting on purpose, and in specific ways to emulate a very particular genre, requires a shitload of work and layers. This is so insanely true: a good comic actor has to have the basic skills all actors need, plus an entirely extra skillset that is very very context based. Timing, gesture, expression - all hugely important in straight acting, all absolutely critical in comedy acting. I've just been watching A Touch of Cloth and it's a master class of good comedy acting. None of the characters are ever consciously funny;it's all played entirely straight, and it's hilarious. Most of the cast are great 'serious' actors so it's glorious watching them in comedy.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:55
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Pookah posted:This is so insanely true: a good comic actor has to have the basic skills all actors need, plus an entirely extra skillset that is very very context based. Timing, gesture, expression - all hugely important in straight acting, all absolutely critical in comedy acting. Similarly (and to be fair this seems to be changing) people really under-appreciate how much the "straight man" role brings to comedy and how much skill it takes to play that role effectively.
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Mar 3, 2021 20:02
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My mum is rewatching friends during COVID (she’s millennial at heart, somehow) and is begrudgingly becoming a David Schwimmer fan. She loathes his character but has realised that he’s by far the best actor on the show and does what none of the others can do, every episode. I totally agree, the guy has amazing graphics comedic sense, despite being the “not funny” character. Matthew Perry’s the “funny one” but his main job is to sit back and be deadpan or sarcastic. Schwimmer is working hard every episode.
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Mar 3, 2021 21:51
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christmas boots posted:Similarly (and to be fair this seems to be changing) people really under-appreciate how much the "straight man" role brings to comedy and how much skill it takes to play that role effectively. Just look at how effective Leslie Nielson was before he started mugging for the camera.
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Mar 3, 2021 21:56
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