ICantDoThatDave

[decided it was better to just ignore it - my bad]

[decided it was better to just ignore it - my bad]

Why did you quote me on this?

Well, yes, but that's because that door only swings one way - we never get "male versions" of existing female characters. But if we did, they'd get the same pushback I believe. At least from me they would. Ooh, that's tough for me - I don't think my Supergirl-fanboy-ism can let me make that leap, even hypothetically. :) It influences my thought process on this topic too much, because: what the studios do is "take Superman, keep everything the same, but insert female actress = Supergirl!" And that's fundamentally not who Supergirl is. It really allows me to empathize with others who see their favorite characters get this treatment . But I'll go with it as best I can... I think portraying people using phrases like "delicate feelings of the fanboys" isn't helpful to the discussion. I feel like we're all having a good conversation here, albeit with different POVs of course. Still, let's just take Marvel movies-up-through-Endgame. Where would you rank Captain Marvel? Just take it in quadrants if that helps - would you put it in the top quartile, or even the second? I'd personally put it in the third quadrant - well above Iron Man 3 or Thor: The Dark World, but below even Iron Man 2 for me. It's certainly no Winter Soldier or Infinity War I think. Basically, I'm just saying: it got the reviews it deserved - a lot of people saw it in theaters, but it wasn't a real great movie in & of itself. IMO of course. The audience that saw it in theaters was ~2/3rds male. According to Deadline: 65% male. Women didn't show up for it either. Did they also have a pre-existing dislike of Brie Larson? Because that version of the character only showed up for something like 3 issues in an alternate universe "What If?"-style story, while the Norrin Radd version has existed for ~60 years over hundreds & hundreds of comics. As I've been emphasizing: that is someone's favorite character. And they won't get to see that character on screen. Anyway, thanks for the civil discussion, even if we disagree!

I honestly missed this my first go-round regarding gender-swapping, but for some reason (masochism?) I went back & re-read a few pages, & this illustrates a very important distinction, so wanted to address it (we're gonna disagree I think? but IMO we're still good - we've had some cool discussions, hear me out): I believe(?) I've illustrated above how Kara Zor-El is a very different character from Kal-El. She is exuberant, sometimes naive (regarding "our" world), revels in her powers. At least early on in her stories she has a whole "fish out of water" thing going on. Quite a different character from Kal-El. Basically, she has her own personality, with a different approach to her new world. She was in no way just a "gender-swapped" version of Superman (which was kinda my whole problem with The Flashpoint Paradox The Flash). And all that is why she's one of (maybe even...) my favorite characters. That's the difference IMO. They made her a new character. Not simply "a female version of Superman". I think that's what gets the pushback: "an [insert changed race/gender]-version of [existing character]". It's boring, pandering, & lazy, plus it justifiably alienates "that's my favorite character!" people. Whereas a whole new character (Supergirl, Gwen, Miles Morales for example) doesn't get that pushback, because they are new characters in their own right.

Oh, that is totally fair. I'm more referencing Steve "in universe" not making the connection, rather than an audience member who might jump ahead & figure it out. Like, totally off-topic, but way back when Sixth Sense came out (first analogy that came into my head), there were likely people who figured it out during the movie, but it doesn't undermine how in the movie Bruce Willis didn't figure it out. I fully believe Nat has intel sources that have heard of that name! 😁 just kidding on that, but good point So much agreement on this - they eviscerated Fury in Secret Invasion (AND Rhodey! EDIT: AND Maria Hill!) I choose to believe that whole thing never happened.

That's all I said: He suspected, maybe? Steve replies to Tony: "I didn't know it was him." Unless you think Steve was lying? Otherwise, I think we have assessed the situation the same.

I think it was... implied? but up in the air? I think the audience is in the same seat as Steve there - when you, as an audience member, saw that detail in Winter Soldier, did you immediately think "Bucky killed the Starks"? I doubt anyone did, even Cap, although it may have entered his mind. Steve knows what we know from Winter Soldier: Tony's parents were assassinated by an "agent of Hydra" (as opposed to a random car wreck, which is what Tony thinks) It's not until Civil War that even Cap starts to sorta suspect it was Bucky that killed the Starks, & that was due to Zemo's Zola's (EDIT: duh) plan. When confronted by Tony, he even says "I didn't know it was him" (& it's Cap, you know he wouldn't lie). He knew Hydra killed the Starks, but didn't know it was Bucky. Also clearly didn't know *why*? So I guess my take is: it was not supposed to be obvious. We, the audience, were "supposed" to be as... unsure, as Steve was.

Aye, I did. That was literally my premise: "I think the number of people who will go see Fantastic Four simply because "Silver Surfer is a woman in this one" is literally zero. But the number of people who will *not* go see it because of that change is greater than zero. You can disagree with them, but they exist:" Then that's your premise. But we both have the internet.

The Lucky Stiff dirty trick was particularly annoying because the girl only changed her testimony once it would financially benefit her, so her credibility at trial would be virtually 0%. But they acted like it was, by itself, enough to convict. Plus, I'm pretty sure the falsified ME report would have been brought up by the Defense at trial, which means Cutter would have been in big trouble.

Just trying to reset the conversation - I didn't mean to get into a big Supergirl rant (particularly in this thread), I just meant to illustrate how when someone's favorite character is portrayed radically differently, whether in personality or appearance, it's easy to see how that fan will "check out", as I did with The Flash. Adam Warlock in Guardians 3 is another example. That was *not* Adam Warlock. I didn't go see GotG3 in theaters, whereas I might have if they got Adam Warlock right, but it was clear from the trailers they had no idea about that character, so they lost a theater viewer (saw it on streaming, at no extra cost to me, so no extra revenue for them). My main point is, if the studio fundamentally alters a popular comics character: that is likely someone's favorite character. Might not be yours, you may not care. But that is likely several someone's favorite character. Those people will check out, & not see the movie. And they will tell other, non-comics people. Just to take this back to the discussion that started all this: I think the number of people who will go see Fantastic Four simply because "Silver Surfer is a woman in this one" is literally zero. But the number of people who will *not* go see it because of that change is greater than zero. You can disagree with them, but they exist: As in: "Do you have any interest in seeing the MCU Fantastic Four movie in the theater?" Yes = X, No = Y "What if I told you Silver Surfer will be a woman?" X goes down, Y does not change (except in that in gets the former X's of course). There is literally no downside to adapting the version of a character that has existed for decades. That character likely has many fans, who would love to see their favorite character adapted faithfully in a movie. Fundamentally changing that character's look or personality has no upside. Even if there's an Elseworlds version that happened for a few issues which might have been interesting as a "What If...?" scenario. There is no upside to changing the long-standing, decades often, version of a character, only a downside, particularly when we're talking about movies which only come out every 2-3 years & need to make hundreds of millions of dollars to even break even.

That's so disingenuous that you had to know it wasn't true when you typed it. She's been a white girl with blonde hair since 1959. That's not even the point & you knowingly, disingenuously, gaslighted the point. Hi, tell me you know nothing about Supergirl without telling me you know nothing about Supergirl. Kara Zor-El is always portrayed as optimistic, fun-loving, loves using her powers. She came to Earth at age 17, fully powered, totally different from Clark. Her exuberance, her optimism, is central to her personality. If you think The Flash portrayed Supergirl correctly, you are just... wrong.

I think in regards to being comic-accurate & pleasing the fans, it's important to get the character right, but not so much the stories. Like how Robert Downey Jr. was basically "Iron Man jumped off the page into movies". Or how Chris Evans embodied Captain America. It's much less important that the whole Infinity Gauntlet movie arc, or the Civil War storyline, didn't follow the comics. But the characters involved were portrayed accurately, both in resemblance & personality. I know this is the Marvel thread, but as a personal example, I had no interest in The Flash once I saw their portrayal of Supergirl in the trailers (I know there are many problems with that movie, but just to focus on my point). I have several action figures of Supergirl. I have many Supergirl comics. I am a huge fan of Supergirl. My brother got me a Cameo from Laura Vandervoort, the Supergirl actress from Smallville, for my birthday one year! But they didn't get the look, much less the personality, of Supergirl right in that movie, so I had no interest - active disinterest even. Because they didn't accurately portray Supergirl correctly. Basically, if the character is done right, looks comics-accurate, carries the persona... that's all comics fans are looking for. And comics fans are the ones who recommend movies/shows to their non-comics friends & family, which can really help spread interest.

Way too many fake out "deaths" this season. It really lowers the stakes.

While I agree with your assessment of the episode overall (especially on the "shoot" sketch being painful), I thought they very much shied away from "Sydney's hot" or "Sydney's a bimbo". Given recent episodes that centered almost entirely on "OMG the male host is hot" they really seemed to avoid that topic even in her costuming, other than the one Hooters sketch. Not saying they *should* have leaned into that, just that I didn't see them leaning into that at all other than one sketch. It was still mostly terrible, just not for that reason, IMO.

What a weird collection of made up non-jobs these contestants have.

It felt oddly appropriate to send Sam off having Jack get a guilty verdict no actual jury would have possibly delivered. I can see the deliberations now: Juror #8: "Well, there's no actual evidence he committed the crime, & there's another equally valid suspect..." Juror #3: "But... don't forget he did totally say something slightly mean about her once 6 years ago." Juror #5: "That's true. Did we hear any testimony as to why he would have said that 6 years ago?" Juror #1: <checks notes> "hmmm... nope. Oh well, it's Sam's last episode though so... everyone good with Guilty?" Other jurors "Sure, what the heck. Guilty."

Maybe she just cut up some hot dogs?

I watched "Family Hour" today, the one with the dysfunctional Senator's family, where he stabbed his daughter to death (who killed her mother/Senator's wife) & Nina said he stabbed himself (but had a confrontation with him earlier in the interrogation room). The one where the ME referenced the wrong "Crime Story" book. I just read over the thread in order to see other reactions & saw where people enjoyed Connie doing the closing (most of those posts are nearly two years old, so didn't want to quote them). But.. I thought Connie really undermined her own closing. Her point was that he was 6'1 180 lbs while the "attacker" was 5.5 110 lbs (I'm pulling that from - [recent, granted] memory, but could be off). Yet Connie demonstrated in her closing just how much damage *she* could do, by stabbing that book; how threatening she appeared with that knife in her hand. Just weird to me how Connie wielding a knife, showing how much damage she could do, was somehow shown (in the show) to be a reason to convict. Just strained my credulity even for Law & Order (which is saying something).

Can the writers go back on strike, please?

I'm curious as to how Dee handles the fallout from this. Sure, Sean told Sifu he didn't vote for him, so Sifu is now wondering who did. But... if Dee is smart, she should play it as if she's just as offended as Sifu is likely to be - as in "we all know Sean voted Sifu of course, so who voted for me?!?" And just tries to discredit Sean as having lied to Sifu to stir up trouble when Sifu inevitably brings it up.

Chirrut had clearly watched Star Wars movies & simply knew that Storm Troopers can't hit the broad side of a barn.

I haven't watched Walking Dead in years, probably since around when Rick "left", & even then I was kinda meh & just saving up shows, catching up when I had nothing else to watch. I tune in now, to this show, kinda randomly, &... Negan is still around?!? I'm back out. How many sharks can one show jump?

Just watched seasons 1 & 2, back-to-back. I liked the show, but didn't love it. Probably a B- overall, IMO. I have no background on the show in regard to the stuff talked about upthread. I've played D&D, both table top & CRPG, so I appreciated the characters & the world building. The interactions were great, the supporting characters were great, the whole party was great. But the plot, the story, the encounters... were just terrible & ridiculous. The massive Plot Armor of the the party was a constant distraction. Outrunning constant Dragon Breath was simply eye-roll inducing. The Crouching Tiger leaps & bounds characters pulled off while fighting even mundane enemies was insane. Several of the super high-level enemies they faced should have destroyed this party multiple times over. In the opening to the first episode, we're shown the (later revealed) Blue Dragon just wiping an experienced party, to establish the threat. And I'm supposed to believe these main characters not only survived it, but later beat it (cause "hit it in the throat" I guess)? And they have now survived an attack by not just one Dragon, but several Old/Ancient Dragons (not to mention a Vampire Lord)? What freakin' level are these people? This is the type of campaign me & my friends used to run when we were 13-14 & didn't know any better - a "Monty Haul" campaign where we beat Dragons/Beholders/Chimeras/Mind Flayers/Death Knights... just 'cause it was fun & we kinda ignored the rules. Also, the number of times a character "died", but then not really, was ridiculous. Vex I guess was at least a plot point, but "OMG this character died! we all are sad! OMG they're fine now!" just happened waaaay too much. Still... I like the characters (Keyleth, Grog, & Pike are my favorites), & will watch season 3 when it comes out just for their interactions. But the plot is... waaay dumb & waaay over-the-top, & just ignores all the rules. The characters are the only thing that makes this worthwhile, IMO.

The studios don't get 100% of the Box Office so it's going to need a LOT more than 200-250 million. Studios get the highest % from domestic (50-55% generally), less from foreign (33-40%), & the least from China (25%). A good rule of thumb is a film needs to make 2.5x its budget worldwide to break even. So if the $250 million budget is accurate, it would need to make $625 million to break even. That is highly unlikely at this point & would require almost unprecedented retention, word of mouth, & repeat viewings - like The Force Awakens or Endgame levels. They could easily wind up losing $50-100 million if the film has average-to-poor tails legs.