Trope-a-Dope
- Thread starter MovieBob
- Start date
Thank you, Bob. This is putting it in far better terms than I could ever possibly hope to.
Interesting story, too; the fact that it's insanely quoteable is certainly a plus. Especially that last line... I'm gonna put that up on my Facebook as a quote.
Interesting story, too; the fact that it's insanely quoteable is certainly a plus. Especially that last line... I'm gonna put that up on my Facebook as a quote.
Ha, thanks for writing my article on "imitation" in games for me. Excellent point about a story's details.
Cut both ways.Dark Templar said:
[small]My mom thinks I'm cool.[/small]
I don't suppose, Moviebob, that you got that story from anywhere? I would be very much interested in reading the science fiction equivalent of One Thousand and One Nights.
Well said. Hear hear. All that jazz. It pisses me off when people ***** about Avatar. It's one of my favorite movies now. No story is ever fully original, and anyone who claims they have one is simply ignorant of what came before them. Sometimes the story IS what makes a good movie or game, and those stand out because of it, but more often than not it is the delivery, and even the best story ever told can be soured by poor delivery. Similarly, familiar old stories can be given new life through excellent delivery.
Yes, true originality doesn't exist, but a good movie/game knows how to take a tried and true story concept and make it it's own.
The Matrix ripped off Ghost in the Shell and Terminator, but it stood on it's own two feet - the source material wasn't shoved in your face.
Same goes for Ponyo; Miyazaki took the story of The Little Mermaid and spun it around to create a unique experience.
I don't dislike Avatar because it isn't original, but because it does absolutely nothing unique in any way except for the CGI.
The Matrix ripped off Ghost in the Shell and Terminator, but it stood on it's own two feet - the source material wasn't shoved in your face.
Same goes for Ponyo; Miyazaki took the story of The Little Mermaid and spun it around to create a unique experience.
I don't dislike Avatar because it isn't original, but because it does absolutely nothing unique in any way except for the CGI.
I've totally heard all of this before. I mean, aren't you just rehashing what many others have said Bob? I mean I could count the number of times I've seen someone stand up on a soapbox and scream "YOU'RE NOT ORIGINAL FOR DISLIKING THINGS BECAUSE THEY ARE UNORIGINAL" then I'd be an old man by the time i was through
Honestly, I thought you were above this sort of redundant bullcrap Bob. I had faith in you. I held your hand when your dog died. I weeped with you when your dad got in that horrible car accident just after realizing that in fact going to your baseball game WAS more important then going to his board meeting. I laughed and cheered your name when you won that game, even though all of the odds were against you - the other players were just so huge, and skilled, and your team was a scrappy band of rapscallions, with just a single Ringer and you, LEADING THE PACK!
For shame.
Honestly, I thought you were above this sort of redundant bullcrap Bob. I had faith in you. I held your hand when your dog died. I weeped with you when your dad got in that horrible car accident just after realizing that in fact going to your baseball game WAS more important then going to his board meeting. I laughed and cheered your name when you won that game, even though all of the odds were against you - the other players were just so huge, and skilled, and your team was a scrappy band of rapscallions, with just a single Ringer and you, LEADING THE PACK!
For shame.
I disagree.Casual Shinji said:
I thought the way Avatar delved into great detail about both opposing cultures, all the characters, their motivations, the technology, the biology of the forest, ect.
A ton of the small details where pretty original and the presentation of the whole thing made the movie a blast to watch. I honestly don't see how you can find NOTHING original about Avatar. There is soo much there.
well said. i see so much of this elitist attitude on WoW when someone who plays 90 hours a week starts chewing out someone who plays more casually because that person put a point into the wrong skill or put the wrong enchantment on a piece of gear. these people ruin the internet.
Haven't you heard that TV Tropes Will Ruin Your Life [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TVTropesWillRuinYourLife]? Any movie can seem poor by pulling it apart. Yet the most fun of the recent GI Joe movie for me was tearing it apart afterward because I've seen too many of that kind of movie.
This is definitely my favorite intermission article yet because it really spells out a feeling I've had for a while that fandom of all sorts is being hurt by this feeling that "we're better than the material", which is really making a lot of people all sorts of pretentious.
Ironically, this is probably most exemplified by another commentator on this very website...
(Yeah, I know I'm extending Bob's thesis a lot)
Ironically, this is probably most exemplified by another commentator on this very website...
(Yeah, I know I'm extending Bob's thesis a lot)
Being a rabid TVTropes diver myself, I can definitely resonate with what's going on here. As much as I love that site, I never let it destroy my own sense of judgment on something, lest what you described happen to me. I mean, if it kept on going the way you said, God forbid how bad it would be with future movies...
Guy 1: Hey, did you want to go see "Adventures of Crotch-Puncher" with me tonight? I heard it's awesome!
Guy 2: No way, dude, that movie is such a boring ripoff. The first word in the movie is "the", and, like, MILLIONS of other movies have started that same way. So cliche, dude.
Guy 1: Hey, did you want to go see "Adventures of Crotch-Puncher" with me tonight? I heard it's awesome!
Guy 2: No way, dude, that movie is such a boring ripoff. The first word in the movie is "the", and, like, MILLIONS of other movies have started that same way. So cliche, dude.
I'd say this elequently encapsulates my feelings on the subject. It just so happens that there are only a few variations on the tradtional video game narrative, but sometimes those irrelevent differences are all that stand between a game who may as well entirely dismiss the premise that the narrative needs to exist and a game who's story is compelling and engaging enough to experience for the sake of story and character alone.
Good stuff, all in all I agree that you can pick apart any movie and say that it's all be done before. At the end of the day though, that's kind of a useless thing to do and you should observe each movie for how well it executed itself.
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Having said that, I wasn't wowed by Avatar not because it's "Dances with wolves in space" but because I found it to be childish, manipulative and guilty of the unforgivable in my eyes sin of being contrived.
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Having said that, I wasn't wowed by Avatar not because it's "Dances with wolves in space" but because I found it to be childish, manipulative and guilty of the unforgivable in my eyes sin of being contrived.
It was completely unoriginal in narrative. The visuals were stunning. The world details in the other materials [http://www.pandorapedia.com/doku.php] were fascinating but largely not included in the movie. The cultures were not original, they weren't supposed to be, it would have ruined allegory and message.Dark Templar said:
So, it's great eye candy with a wealth of details implied but not examined in the movie. I liked the movie but I prefer more originality in narrative so I didn't think it should be lauded as great movie. But that's why it's art, people can disagree.