Moments when a piece of entertainment completely lost you.

Cynic · Post by **Cynic** » Wed Jun 30, 2010 12:41 am

You know, I really don't mind dubbing in anime too much. It's a little irksome but I can deal. But when they think that the viewers are so stupid that they have to name a random japanese bento box meal as meat loaf... that's just too much.

MGuy · Post by **MGuy** » Wed Jun 30, 2010 12:56 am

I'm tired of hearing about Death Note. I don't really think it was all that good (seeing as though I couldn't get past the 7th episode). Why do people think its such hot shit?

Juton · Post by **Juton** » Wed Jun 30, 2010 1:08 am

MGuy wrote:I'm tired of hearing about Death Note. I don't really think it was all that good (seeing as though I couldn't get past the 7th episode). Why do people think its such hot shit?

If you've ever been on TV tropes then you've heard about the Xanatos gambit, the series is a just a long sequence of those. It's pretty Machiavellian in parts, but it's not really believable in the end. Or and does that annoying thing where a show's are wraps up after X episodes but then they tack on 10 or so more episodes to milk it.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Wed Jun 30, 2010 1:22 am

Because Miku is hot.
Also "Bad things happen to bad people" fantasy and the Xanatos Gambits. Though note that the series ends when L dies.

That said, I watched it because of the AMVs on AMVHell 3 or 4, and watched it while detoxing from my medication, so I can't actually remember much in the way of specific details other than the funny moments, so I remember it as a comedy. I'm pretty sure it isn't.

Also there's one interesting thing: people who felt wronged were putting the dox of their wrongdoers on the Internet for Kira, and sometimes Kira would grant them their vengeance. That force actually exists today. It's called Anonymous (the not-so-nice kind that doesn't spend its time wearing stupid masks and protesting against Scientology).

Blicero · Post by **Blicero** » Wed Jun 30, 2010 2:33 am

I never watched the Death Note anime, but I did read the manga, and I saw the live-action films.

I really like the beginning, but the series totally loses its heart after L dies. The movies, seeing as they essentially end when L dies but with final resolution there, should have been exactly what the manga should've been, but for some reason, they just...weren't.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Wed Jun 30, 2010 3:15 am

L really made the anime and especially the live-action much more than the manga, really. I liked the extra movie they made especially ^-^

-Crissa

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Fri Jul 02, 2010 3:39 pm

I haven't seen the last episode of Avatar, but a lot of people pretty much say that it's the low point of the series (except for that episode which had two stereotyped tribes whining and bickering like little boys/girls) for several wildly diverging reasons.

So could someone give me the 411 on why it sucked? Because a lot of the clips I saw made it look rad to the maximum.

angelfromanotherpin · Post by **angelfromanotherpin** » Fri Jul 02, 2010 3:49 pm

Lago PARANOIA wrote:So could someone give me the 411 on why it sucked? Because a lot of the clips I saw made it look rad to the maximum.

A lot of the finale is really good.

The big problem is that Aang beats the Fire Lord by entering the Avatar State, which is something he could do as soon as he came out of the ice. Then he doesn't kill him but still ends his threat with a technique ex machina. That all the skills and lessons he'd learned over the course of his travels were basically irrelevant pissed a lot of people off.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Fri Jul 02, 2010 3:57 pm

Lago PARANOIA wrote:I haven't seen the last episode of Avatar, but a lot of people pretty much say that it's the low point of the series (except for that episode which had two stereotyped tribes whining and bickering like little boys/girls) for several wildly diverging reasons.

So could someone give me the 411 on why it sucked? Because a lot of the clips I saw made it look rad to the maximum.

OK first off: the final comet enhanced battle between Azula and Zuko is the most awesome thing ever.

A number of people don't like it for the following reason: Aang is able to complete his mission to save the world without compromising his principles to never directly take a person's life as per his vows as a monk. He is able to do this because he meets the Lion Turtle that was mentioned earlier in season 3 and in the library during Season 2. And it teaches him how to bend the energies of other people so that he can take away their ability to bend without killing them.

So complaints basically fall into three categories:

The Lion Turtle was mentioned earlier several times, but the fact that they have a fifth bending discipline is kind of left field.
The finale allows Aang to save the world without compromising his principles, which many people thought was an insufficiently adult moral for a kid's show.
The finale involves Zuko getting back together with Mai, and Aang getting a final kiss with Katara, and Toph kissing no one. Thus, Zutara and Tophka shippers rage.

-Username17

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Fri Jul 02, 2010 4:05 pm

I think it's kind of funny that Avatar was so good that the 'worst' episode had two points of contention that are fairly minor in the grand scheme of writing.

None of those things were as bad as, say, Batman taking out Mr. Freeze with a thermos of chicken soup in the latter's debut episode (who proceeds to sell it like he was splashed in the face with hydroflouric acid) and people consider that an iconic episode of Batman: The Animated Series.

I guess that show was just too good.

We didn't deserve it. What we deserved is the live action movie.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Fri Jul 02, 2010 4:35 pm

And the Lion Turtle shows up over like the whole last four episodes.

-Crissa

NineInchNall · Post by **NineInchNall** » Fri Jul 02, 2010 7:41 pm

MGuy wrote:I'm tired of hearing about Death Note. I don't really think it was all that good (seeing as though I couldn't get past the 7th episode). Why do people think its such hot shit?

Because:

the chip-eating scene was the shit.
it was nice having the protagonist of a series be what most people would call a bad guy.
it was nice having the "bad guy" be competent.
Xanatos gambits are fun

Koumei wrote:Though note that the series ends when L dies.

This cannot be stressed strongly enough. Everything after that point makes no god damned sense and fucks over the character development up until that point.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Fri Jul 02, 2010 11:49 pm

FrankTrollman wrote:Thus, ... Tophka shippers rage.[/list]

AND THEY SHOULD!

That was nearly as implied as freaking Katara and Aang. I want me some Tophka!

Mask_De_H · Post by **Mask_De_H** » Mon Jul 05, 2010 4:53 am

Kaelik wrote:
FrankTrollman wrote:Thus, ... Tophka shippers rage.[/list]
AND THEY SHOULD!

That was nearly as implied as freaking Katara and Aang. I want me some Tophka!

Eh, it was Sokkoph sorta in season 2, and Zutoph got semi-equal shine when Zuko went good. Besides, we all know that the real OTP of the show is Bikka, or Bitches x Sokka.

And Toph totally wanted to ride the Dragon of the West and...god dammit Kaelik, you've got me talking about shipping.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Mon Jul 05, 2010 10:32 am

Toph is awesome, but she's still a little girl. I think it is refreshing that they manage to not hook the little girl up with anyone.

The big problem is that Aang beats the Fire Lord by entering the Avatar State, which is something he could do as soon as he came out of the ice. Then he doesn't kill him but still ends his threat with a technique ex machina. That all the skills and lessons he'd learned over the course of his travels were basically irrelevant pissed a lot of people off.

I don't think that's true at all. In fact, Aang very specifically rejects that path.

First of all, the Avatar State is an enhancement of his abilities but still clearly limited in some way by what he can actually do. Before he learns waterbending, his Avatar State can water bend. Before he learns earthbending, his Avatar State can earth bend. But his Avatar State doesn't skip ahead - it doesn't fire bend or even earth bend in the beginning at all. It's always just a few levels of training past where he is at any moment in time.

But secondly, he actually rejects the Avatar State's wishes and pulls back from it, because it wants to simply kill Ozai and be done with it. At that point, he drops the Avatar State's restraints and starts going on his moral speech from his own standpoint as an Air Monk. Ozai rejects this and of course attempts to kill him again, and at this point Aang is saved directly and specifically by the tremorsense he learned from Toph. Also in the fight is the lightning redirection he learned from Zuko (which he pulls off at short range, giving him an opportunity to kill Ozai outright - but he rejects that opportunity too because no matter what he won't use deadly force - except against vulturewasps in season 2).

He actually cycles through each of his teachers and each of his abilities in the final battle, considering and discarding the murderous options in turn, but being conspicuously saved by things he learned from each of his teachers on camera. The flaw with the energy bending thing is not that he didn't need all of his other abilities to use it - but that they didn't actually explain what it did until the episode that it is used in. The Lion Turtle shows up 3 episodes before, but the actual run down of how the energy bending thing happens and what it can do is trotted out as a surprise - which makes it feel cheap.

Lago wrote:We didn't deserve it. What we deserved is the live action movie.

No. No one deserved the live action movie.

-Username17

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Mon Jul 05, 2010 10:20 pm

Nagging question about the finale, and season Three is general: Why is everyone afraid of Lord Ozai? In a normal show there'd be some technobabble about how he either stole a sacred artifact, or drew power from blood/death/suffering, or something.

As is, he's apparently just a firebender. Okay, he's old and presumably experienced, but is he as old as Jeong-Jeong? Azula is at least a prodigy, so you could argue that he probably is as well... but she has her blue fire and non-comet rocket feet, while he has... no distinctive technique at all.

He doesn't know the secret of dragons, like Zuko, he doesn't know the secrets of the waterbenders, like Iroh, and he doesn't have blue fire, like Azula. Why is scarier than Commander Zhao?

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Mon Jul 05, 2010 10:34 pm

Orion wrote:Nagging question about the finale, and season Three is general: Why is everyone afraid of Lord Ozai? In a normal show there'd be some technobabble about how he either stole a sacred artifact, or drew power from blood/death/suffering, or something.

As is, he's apparently just a firebender. Okay, he's old and presumably experienced, but is he as old as Jeong-Jeong? Azula is at least a prodigy, so you could argue that he probably is as well... but she has her blue fire and non-comet rocket feet, while he has... no distinctive technique at all.

He doesn't know the secret of dragons, like Zuko, he doesn't know the secrets of the waterbenders, like Iroh, and he doesn't have blue fire, like Azula. Why is scarier than Commander Zhao?

Because he's basically Hitler with pyrokinesis.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Mon Jul 05, 2010 10:39 pm

The fact that he was able to beat down as if they were children, every other firebender?

-Crissa

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Mon Jul 05, 2010 11:05 pm

There is such a thing as being just plain good and powerful without resorting to different.

There's nothing different about me fencing an olympic fencer other than that they are faster stronger think more quickly and have more training.

He shoots lightning that Aang, the Avatar, is totally ready for, and can redirect. And he does it, and he's still out of it afterwords.

Not the whole "Zuko was in a hurry, so he didn't channel through his stomach" thing, but actual "some much fucking lightning it hurts tons even when I do it right."

If someone can seriously just decide to burn down an entire continent, then he's powerful enough that his red not secrets of the dragon flame can go right through Azula's blue and into her face.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Mon Jul 05, 2010 11:06 pm

Because in all likelyhood, he's the best of all the firebenders. Sure, Azula's a prodigy with some fancy tricks, and Iroh is a follower of the Light Side of the Force which won't make him go crazy and unstable and gives him more punch...

So I'd honestly take it on faith that he's some bad news by himself.

Ozai also has the combination of charismatic leadership and personal badassery to make him a threat. At the final battle, he's beating Aang back into a purely defensive posture, and Aang is no slouch at that point, even when he isn't in the Avatar state.

Quantumboost · Post by **Quantumboost** » Tue Jul 06, 2010 3:07 am

Even ignoring his super comet plot powerup, Fire Lord Ozai doesn't "just" have standard firebending tricks - creating lightning is apparently one of the more advanced and powerful firebending techniques, and the fact that only the Avatar and other members of the royal line (Iroh, Zuko, and Azula) have been shown to know techniques to generate lightning or have a meaningful defense against it aside from "dodge/block and pray" indicates that that alone is a sign, if not the source, of him being pretty badass himself.

That's enough at least to explain "how is this guy possibly more threatening than Zhao or Jeong Jeong"?

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Tue Jul 06, 2010 3:18 am

Speaking of nerdrage induced by good series having 'bad' endings, could someone explain to me in long words why the Chronicles of Narnia inspired hatred and woe across the world?

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Tue Jul 06, 2010 3:28 am

The author was a fucker in the sense that Orson Scott Card is.

-Crissa

Josh_Kablack · Post by **Josh_Kablack** » Tue Jul 06, 2010 3:49 am

Phillip Pullman on what's wrong with Narnia

MTV tldr version

Psychic Robot · Post by **Psychic Robot** » Tue Jul 06, 2010 5:23 am

Josh_Kablack wrote:Phillip Pullman on what's wrong with Narnia

MTV tldr version

You're telling me that an asspained atheist who has claimed that he is "trying to undermine the basis of Christian belief" is going to be critical of Lewis's religious propaganda? I, for one, am shocked.