Brandon Easton wonders if geeks in the 21st century have become too spoiled and therefore ungrateful about all the wonderful movies, TV shows and books currently available? Have we lost the ability to enjoy anything? Does a lack of knowledge about how the industry operates take away from our understanding of how to appreciate genre material?
WRITING FOR ROOKIES Episode 21: Are Modern Geeks Entitled Whiners? (a.k.a. Critique vs. Cynicism)
- Runtime: 43:06 | Views: 79350 | Comments: 4
Post related photos
By Brandon Easton • 05/02/2013 06:32 PM
James A. Bretney wrote on 05/07/2013 02:06 AM
It is a 45 minute podcast but in those 45 minutes what you have described is an unmet customer need. Without knowing your specific point of reference, I would say that the Geeks do have a point. My collaborator Cody Garcia would whine about this all the time Hollywood is dead and it does not have any new ideas. I will go one further Hollywood sucks. Culturally it fell off and it has this cognitive dissonance with the fan public it serves, Certainly you can see that. I grew up a fan boy loving mostly Marvel and DC. But I don't go and see the movies anymore. I don't buy the books. I have moved on with my life and I don't agree with the direction they have taken. I am a lot older than the Gen Ys but they are saying the same thing and maybe it is because you never want to hear someone whine, but as a manager when someone whines I listen because there is a business opportunity there. The Industry is set up to take 100 million risks. If Scott Pilgrim was made for $ 15 million rather than $ 90 million, people would be singing a different tune. Not everything must be a 100 million. You mock the self loathing cynicism of man-children, but number 1, we were that age once and number 2, the cynicism is justified when you have the arrogance of the writer's staff from Buffy the Vampire Slayer that is running Hollywood. The industry is there to serve the customer not the other way around. Customers always have an opinions and believe things some of which is based on nothing. But come on be real. You grew up in the 80s. One episode of the A-team is better than half the stuff in the movie theater nowadays. You don't have to be an insider to know that the material that is coming out of Hollywood sucks and the execs are risk averse weenies. If I am off base, name names. Thoughts? James A. Bretney Tucson, Arizona
Brandon wrote on 05/07/2013 12:11 PM
I appreciate your comments. I was very specific in my podcast about geeks complaining about things without the benefit of the facts of the situation. In this case, the production of comic book based films. Much of the time, geeks aren't giving a real critique, they are whining because the producers didn't cater to their obscure whims. There's a difference between Hollywood producers making awful decisions about a character being adapted from print to cinema and geeks delivering a real conversation about that; and geeks complaining about things they wanted to see that would be impractical or silly if the filmmakers had included it. Example: costume changes, casting changes, storyline changes. Geeks don't get that the general population of moviegoers have no idea about the minutiae of comic book continuity and character behavior. The average summer movie fan wants to see an entertaining experience, not sit through fanboy fan service for 2 hours. That's what I was saying.
SF Evans wrote on 05/11/2013 02:15 PM
Completely agree with you Brandon. I've been saying this since everybody was whining about the Xmen costumes. Look, a 5'4" actor in yellow tights and knee high boots with points coming out of the top just doesn't translate to the big screen. I won't even mention that ridiculous mask/helmet. That being said, there's been some geek grumbling about Hawkeye's modified uniform in the Avenger's movie. I recently ran across a company that created a comic accurate Hawkeye mask, and while I give them props for putting in the work, it looks goofy. Is this really what geeks want to see brought to the big screen?
Kristina wrote on 05/21/2013 07:05 PM
I like this podcast, but to comment on this discussion, if the common movie goer doesn't know the details that fans know, wouldn't it be more beneficial to cater at least majority percent to the fan base who WILL ultimately give the reviews about these movies, perhaps even make the movies quality BECAUSE the quality of the original content was so good that it has a fan base? I don't even bother with comic book movies anymore, but it seems more like a slap in the face to original fans to completely throw out the original content and use it's original popularity for their mediocre stuff? For example, the last Iron Man, the story was rather... pointless, and it was because they waved around the real story, while they had quality work to bring to life.