*promote
I'd love to see something longer that was just as in-depth.

I kind of get it. But on the other hand, every time you change mediums the way you tell the story changes. Every time a movie comes out based on a book (I mean an all-text novel, not a graphic novel / comic), most people that love the source book *think* that they want the movie to be a 100% verbatim adaptation. But the medium just doesn't work the same way.

Describing a setting or a character might take many paragraphs in a book, possibly spread out over multiple chapters or even multiple books. In a movie, *bam* -- you put it on screen, and you can see it. Done. On the other hand, describing a character's motivations can be done very succinctly or in great depth and detail in a book, but it is harder to do that in a purely visual medium like film.

Wolverine's color scheme and costume design works in comic books. His mask/hat thing with the horn-like points works in the comics. But in live-action film, what materials can look or behave like either or those things, and not be jarringly weird? Even cosplay type stuff is generally built to look good in still images -- not necessarily in video, being subjected to action-movie kinds of physical motion. I believe the directors / filmmakers when they say that they have tried more authentic costumes, and felt that they "didn't work".

Deadpool was a very good example of how it *can* work to move the imagery in a direction visually closer to the comic books. But I think the best we can hope for is a happy medium where *some* visual cues are adapted from the comics, in the situations where those things adapt well to the format.

@ChaosEngine

i do not see anyone here defending anything.

now maybe we can view stephen's commentary "dismissive and belittling" as @entr0py pointed out,but i think the deeper issue was prefaced quite succinctly by stephen in his characterization of american,and western societies,as being "infantilized".

where words have become the final bastion of totality in communication and are judged strictly on a word by word basis.so much so that some on the left have been pushing harder and harder to have certain words removed from our lexicon,because they represent negative thoughts/feelings/actions or they may represent a trauma,or horrific violent memory for some people.

but this is the wrong approach.
excising words will not erase those feelings/thoughts/emotions.this will just force people to come up or use different terminology to express those feelings/thoughts.actions that once had words to at least to attempt to express those horrors and/or offenses.

which will just equate to a whole new slew of verbiage being found offensive and in dire need of being castrated from our collective vocabulary.

yet the left (extreme left i grant) appears hell bent on not only attempting to control speech but to also judge those who DO use speech that they find offensive.

this is censorship with prejudice and to claim otherwise is the lie.

just look at your first comment.
you "used" to like stephen fry's opinion,until he became callous and dismissive with what?

words.

but do you REALLY think his attitude and compassion towards those who have suffered emotional trauma is truly dismissive?

well..i do not think so.i have spoken to you enough times to have a modicum of understandings in regards to you,as a person,that you have far more depth of character.

yet it is the WORDS that have hung you up.

look man,words are inert.they are things that are only given life,meaning and context when we add our own subjectivity to them.

words are inadequate.they will ALWAYS be inadequate.
which is why we admire and praise those of us who have a command of words that can reach into our own understandings and extract meaning in a way that blossoms like a spring flower and can create worlds in which we can play,and even share with other people.

i am intimately aware of this deficiency.i do not have an economy of words,and only on rare occasions can i relay,convey and express with ANY form of reductionism.

i struggle to express not only my opinion,but the intent,humanity and compassion of my opinion.

if the extreme left gets their way,the tools we have to express ourselves becomes lesser.

and in the process,WE become lesser.because the tools for dissent,debate,discussion and even..ironically..to expose the more venal and bigoted of our society,will have been reduced to words that offend nobody.

there is danger here,and no good will come from it.no matter if the intent sounds just and the goal compassionate.

freedom of speech is the right to speak freely.
to espouse our opinions,philosophy and yes,our bigotry and prejudice,with legal immunity,but NOT social impunity.

so while we have a right to free speech.
we do not have a right to not be offended,and maybe we need to be offended sometimes.to shake us from our own self-induced apathy and our adoration of digital hallucinations.

so when the westboro baptist church says the most hateful,vitriolic and disgusting admonishments,all in the name of god.
we can be offended by them,and then ridicule them relentlessly.

would stripping words from the english language prevent this group from espousing their own brand of hate?

of course not.they would just find new words.

so what do we do then?
make words illegal?
criminally libel?

so don't judge mr fry too harshly.
he is just pointing to the dangers of controlling speech and the new trend of the perpetually offended.

the extreme right attempts to control morality,and there is serious danger in that practice.
the extreme left attempts to control how we communicate,and hence how we interact,and there is great danger in that as well.

There are a LOT of similarities. It definitely blurs the line between "reboot" and "homage", but I'd argue that isn't necessarily a bad thing.

I think it will take a few years for me to digest and figure out where I think it ranks in my personal assessment of the Star Wars movies.

That being said, I'm excited about the future of Star Wars again -- the prequels came very close to destroying any optimism that I had in that regard.

For the moment, consider Episode VII but ignore the plot and parallels / homage / blatant copying between it and A New Hope. In all three prequels combined, there wasn't a single character that was interesting; that we could identify with. Anakin was annoying -- in kid form and adult form. Ewan McGregor did OK with the material and directing he was given, but the script and writing in general did NOTHING to connect prequels Obi-Wan with the original trilogy. Padme, Jar-Jar (ha!), Palpatine, Dooku, etc. -- not a single memorable, interesting character that made me want to learn more about them. Sam Jackson's Mace Windu was probably the closest, but didn't get enough screen time or depth to really establish interest.

Already I feel confident in saying that in terms of characters, Episode VII is massively, overwhelmingly better than the prequels. Rey, Finn, and Poe are each individually far more interesting than every character from the prequels combined. AND, I want to see how those new faces interact with the old stars also. Luke, Leia, even Chewbacca (my personal favorite of the OT) all seem like they will continue to be very important to the story moving forward -- and continue to develop their own story arcs in addition to the new cast.

The Force Awakens wasn't *perfect* -- I tend to think it leaned a bit too much on revamping A New Hope also -- but it was very good and very entertaining. And I am definitely excited about the future of Star Wars again.

Reports of the GOP's death have been greatly exaggerated.

I predict them sinking to even more glorious depths before the general election. Stock up on microwave popcorn everybody, this implosion is going to be one for the ages...

I'm not sure about the video not doing the painting justice. Depth perception would probably take quite a bit away from the effect.

Speaking as someone who played since the original I completely get where you are coming from.

But, this is easily the most R6 a game has felt since raven shield and once you start to learn the maps and build up a team the planning stage kind of comes into it's own.

I know it's not the same as spending hours tweaking the plan alone (before watching your AI sqaud mess it up). But the tactical depth is very much still there.

Terrorist hunt on realistic difficulty is the equal of any challenge I had in the old R6's, more so really considering the destruction and tools available.

A game with a good team, scouting with drones and breach/sweeping together feels every bit as tense and cerebral as before IMHO.

The only big downside is you need other players, there is a lone wolf mode, but no AI teammates regrettably.

I think if someone is in a particular church -- or not -- or whatever they are personally drawn to -- IT IS NONE OF MY BUSINESS TO JUDGE THEM.

If they need it, they need it. Whatever happened to them in their childhood, or whenever -- the church -- whatever church -- or non-church -- fits them.

You are an atheist, right? I don't know if you grew up in a church or not. I don't know why it is so terribly important to you to be an atheist.

But it FITS you.

It is the height of judgmental righteous behavior to look at anyone else's choice and say it is wrong.

Am I a Mormon? No. I agree with you. How this church started is the height -- or the depth -- of religious absurdity. How anyone can choose this church as an adult? How can that be.

And yet. My brother -- who has a Master's Degree in Aerospace Engineering from USC, military pilot, history buff, wide stripe of artistic urges and talents -- this guy chose the church in his early 20's. For his own reasons. Because he needed it, coming from our family of origin.

To quote Jerry Maguire -- it completed him. And like love, it is illogical and not for anyone else to judge.

You don't like religion being all judgey? I recommend you stop doing it yourself, and let people be.

Now, the Mormon church getting involved in the laws of the land? I got a big beef with that.

But as for individuals, making individual choices, for individual reasons.... I gotta say I don't see much difference between your judginess and any Catholic priest laying down "God's law" about how people are "supposed to" believe and behave.

You see that, don't you? There is no difference between your judgement and any religious person's judgment?

I wrote Peter Jackson off (to the depths of hell) after that Two Towers shield-slide. I will forever harbor a punch in the face for that man, should I ever see him.

God created the devil, but he wasn't always Gods enemy. The scripture reveals that he was a cherub who covered the mercy seat in Ezekiel 28:11-19..here is an excerpt:

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=ezekiel+28&version=NKJV

14 “You were the anointed cherub who covers;
I established you;
You were on the holy mountain of God;
You walked back and forth in the midst of fiery stones.

15 You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created,
Till iniquity was found in you.

A cherub does not look like what is described in the popular imagery. You can find a description of them in Ezekiel chapter 1.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ezekiel+1&version=NKJV

We see in Isaiah 14:3-21 that Satans sin was wanting to replace God and be worshiped himself. Here is an excerpt:

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah+14&version=NKJV
12
“How you are fallen from heaven,
O Lucifer,[b] son of the morning!
How you are cut down to the ground,
You who weakened the nations!

13
For you have said in your heart:
‘I will ascend into heaven,
I will exalt my throne above the stars of God;
I will also sit on the mount of the congregation
On the farthest sides of the north;

14
I will ascend above the heights of the clouds,
I will be like the Most High.’

15
Yet you shall be brought down to Sheol,
To the lowest depths of the Pit.

In Heaven, Satan had a perfect life but he threw it away in a mad ambition to replace God with himself. This is exactly what he tempts us to do, as we disregard what God wants and sit on the throne of our lives as king. He got what he wanted in a way, as scripture calls Satan the god of this world, his rule over this world, as ours, is only a temporary affair; we will all stand before God on judgment day and give an account.

"Access to guns" certainly plays a role, but I'm not convinced that it is even the biggest factor. In web researching gun violence rates and mass shooting rates by country *per capita*, I've found that the US isn't really as much of a "wild west" / lawless nation as the media portrays it.

For example:
http://www.ijreview.com/2015/06/348197-obama-said-mass-shootings-dont-happen-in-advanced-countries-like-in-us-one-chart-proves-him-wrong/
has interesting data. It is *clearly* biased / written with an "agenda", and there are other problems with it (small countries with one or two incidents rule the top of the chart), but it is interesting nonetheless.

I think culture has as big or bigger impact as anything else.


As to your final paragraph, I'm hesitant to paint all "terrorists and mass-shooters" with the "pathetic little shit" brush. I think the tendency to dismiss them in that way when trying to delve deeper into the questions of *why* does us a disservice in terms of preventing and/or limiting those people and incidents.

It's sorta like examining Hitler. Went about as evil and wrong as a human being has ever gone, and so we often want to just leave it at that. But I think that there have probably been plenty of garden-variety non-famous people who have been as evil and wrong as Hitler, but simply didn't have the unique level of power and opportunity to, uh, "sink to his depths".

That shot at 3:43 created an optical illusion for me causing me think the depth was inverted (the way those inverse/hollow reliefs appear to continuously follow your point of view; I'll link if you don't know what I'm talking about).
Anyway, if you can get your eyes to do, quite trippy. It made the river look as though it were perfectly balanced on a long ridge, with the forest falling away down sharp cliffs on either side. I think my eyes were focused on the river at the time.

"They're freaking amazing scribbles."

Umm... no.

Of course she chooses examples where there's more explainable depth in the artist's intention (e.g., the clocks) or where there's actual skill required (e.g., straight lines with oil paint), but what about examples of paintings made up of random smudges and brush strokes? Not only am I sure I could do something like that, but I've been loosely considering making something like that to hang up at home.

No, you're absolutely right

I pay attention to what you and others on this site say because I've read what you've written in the past, and I think there are some smart people here who have interesting things to say.

But we can get in depth here. It's not just a soundbite; it's a discussion where people are forced to defend their arguments.

That just doesn't work with a tweet on a news show. It doesn't add anything to the conversation.

Especially with complex topics.

I couldn't care less what Joe Public thinks about climate change/ universal healthcare / GMOs. Get me someone educated. Sure, we can discuss it after, but on a limited time format, it's just noise.