Musings on Random Musings

[Enforcer84]

The Incredibles Movie--Body Count

 

Not Man Of Steel level, but surprisingly high considering.

meh. Many of those deaths weren't necessarily fatalities. 

[Vondy]

In terms of palatibility?  Or acceptability in the eyes of the gods?

Both.

[Vondy]

The Incredibles Movie--Body Count

 

Not Man Of Steel level, but surprisingly high considering.

I know a lot of comic fans complained about the body count in MoS, but let's be frank: as much as we like to watch epic super-battles we don't want to think about just how much collateral damage would ensure. We want our super-battles, like our media representation of wars, to be clean and bloodless.

 

Its one of the things I've never been able to reconcile about comic book narratives and morality. I find the fan's *expectations* unrealistic. If people who can rend tanks with their bare hands start throwing punches, there will be blood. Its also why my games with superhumans look more like actions films and thrillers than comic books.

 

Of course, Incredibles was animated, but I take body-counts for granted when violence erupts. Blood, bone, and corpses are what violence is. I find attempts to sanitize violence in our media more morally problematic than depicting the results. I know, I'm a stick in the mud.

[death tribble]

One of the good things about the Avengers (both films) was the conscious depiction of getting civilians to safety and saving civilian lives. Man of Steel should have had that other than the one scene with the oil rig.

[Vondy]

One of the good things about the Avengers (both films) was the conscious depiction of getting civilians to safety and saving civilian lives. Man of Steel should have had that other than the one scene with the oil rig.

Which brings up a [serious] game theory question: does stopping to save the civilians you see in harms way actually cause more people to die in the end because it took longer to stop the threat? Is the emotive altruism and feel-good on screen "saved the ones we saw" actually a personal selfishness that, on a macro-scale, got more of "the ones we didn't see" killed.

 

When Spider Man puts himself into harms way to save civilians, its generally s small tactical engagement with a villain and threat scaled to him and a clear-cut moral choice that no one needs to think twice about. But when entire cities [rather than busloads] are potentially on the line and you have to make *strategic* choices?

 

I'm not so sure that taking time out to save a few to satisfy optics is actually the ethical, moral choice. In fact, I strongly suspect that stopping the threat as fast as possible is the better -- even if comic book fans hate the reality of it -- choice to make. So, Supes going head-on with Zod and not stopping to save "the ones we saw" doesn't bother me in the slightest.

[death tribble]

In real life I would agree with you. But entertainment gives you the option to have your cake and eat it. Let the heroes save lives and show why they are heroes and not costumed killers. And that is what inspires people. That the good guys will save the day or die trying.

[Vondy]

In real life I would agree with you. But entertainment gives you the option to have your cake and eat it. Let the heroes save lives and show why they are heroes and not costumed killers. And that is what inspires people. That the good guys will save the day or die trying.

We all pick the entertainment that speaks to us, and most comics stopped speaking to me in my teens. Having your cake and eating it too means there is no serious content to be inspired by to start with. It renders all the "hard choices" made meaningless and vacuous, and that leaves me cold.

 

Someone who saved fifty for optics and got a thousand killed in the process isn't much of a hero in my book. They're a costumed jackass and dangerous amateur who can't make the hard choices when the chips are down. I enjoyed the Avengers films. They made some good feel-good saves. But, ethically, its a sop to sentiment.

 

Narratives with choices rendered clean by author's caveat don't do anything for me.

 

Supes focusing on Zod hardly made him a "costumed killer? Far from, in my book. It made him a man with too much on the line to selfishly salve his own conscience, or to sleep through the night. He made a hard choice in a situation with no better options, which makes him a character I can relate to.

 

And he saved the planet. Tens of thousands of lives vs. billions of lives? I'll take that math and not think twice about it. But, then, I've always been a hard-ass where superheroes are concerned. I'm not imaginative enough. The costumes and powers I can buy, but the trite morality kills my suspension of disbelief. Its the faux-ethics that are too unreal for me.

[Old Man]

I see what you're saying, and I tend to agree. But I don't blame people who like happy endings in their fiction. A body count of "merely" ten thousand is probably not a happy ending for many. It's bleak. I like bleak. Others don't. I can understand that. Better than I can understand why people would want pineapple on their pizza.

[L. Marcus]

It tastes goo-ood ...

[Old Man]

This from the lutefisk eater?

[L. Marcus]

Hah - I won't touch any food from the sea. Imagine how clever I'd be, if ever I ate fish!

[Enforcer84]

 I know, I'm a stick in the mud.

And knowing is half the battle.

[L. Marcus]

And "battle" is a sub-set of "bat'leth".

[Enforcer84]

Actual quote from writing-advice article:

 

 

*twitch*

Ah, writing advice. (with bad grammar)

I know I'm not particularly thick skinned. Recognize many of my failings as a human and a writer. 

But nothing makes me feel so full of righteous rage than any of the writing groups I've ever taken part in. I subscribe to a fantasy writing sub-reddit and every day it's more self-importance faux deep questions and putting down the elements the group think doesn't like. 

[Logan D. Hurricanes]

Not that I really needed it, but it's nice to get some validation as a metalhead.

 

That's the best I've ever seen Taylor Swift looking.

[Enforcer84]

Yeah, my brother and I were tickled by that. 

[Lawnmower Boy]

Taylor Swift is tickling who, now?

 

Perverts.

[Enforcer84]

She wishes. 

But the fact that Metal is popular told us we were right all along.

[Cancer]

Even on the equator, it's not possible to see both the North star and the Southern Cross at the same time is it?

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Heading south with a palindromedary

Actually, you want to be slightly north of the equator, but yes, you can see both of those at the same time, given a clear horizon in both directions. While Polaris is within a degree of the north celestial pole, the Southern Cross isn't that close to the south celestial pole.

 

At the latitude of Manila (14 degrees north), in mid-April, around midnight local time, both Polaris and Crux are about 15 degrees above the horizon. It'll take clear conditions and better-than-average peripheral vision, and advantageous use of topography to lie down on the ground in the right position, but it ought to be possible to see both at the same moment.

[L. Marcus]

You'd have to have eyes like a chameleon, though.

[Cancer]

Well, a visual field width of 75 degrees seems to be pretty common, actually. Now, you can't focus on both at the same time, but you ought to be able to register both at the same time.

[Cancer]

June 15th - Waterloo!

Busy throwing screwed up post-it notes at the only Frenchman in the office. He knows better than to retaliate, but I can sense the simmering rage...

 

The Kazakhs don't understand it which, as I'm still sitting on the banks of the Caspian Sea, surrounded by other Brits, is leading to some odd conversations.

Compare it to what happened to Husayn after the Siege of Balkh, 1370 Christian Date.

[death tribble]

I think Cancer has heis dates wrong. At least according to Wikipedia

[L. Marcus]

Morphology; longevity; incept dates.

[Cancer]

I think Cancer has heis dates wrong. At least according to Wikipedia

?

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Balkh_%281370%29