#bad media criticism

[hedgebotherer]

I 'love' it when somebody has a criticism of something they don't like and they imply/outright state that anybody who disagrees must not be as analytical as they are.

No, we are. We just don't agree with you.

I 'love' the attitude because it makes me nostalgic for my inner twerp. I remember when I used to scoff at people who liked things I thought were bad - I was about fourteen and it was cringey as hell. I understand the urge to hold up your own opinions as evidence of greater intelligence, more depth, refined understanding - but that urge makes for bad criticism.

When people like something you don't it's rarely because they're too uncritical to see the flaws. It's because they either don't interpret the things you find flawed the same way, don't find the flaws weighty enough to shift their opinion dials to negative, or they think the positive aspects outnumber the negative. Some opinions are ignorant, but not all differences of opinions are a matter of ignorance on one side.

You're allowed to just... Not like something. Can't you say why you didn't like it without holding your own opinions up as a mirror to the completely imagined failings of people who disagree with you?

(tagging this #good omens because I saw it in reference to GO2 and I'm hoping the muse to my rant sees this, but it has much broader applicability. Even fans of media that, unlike GO, is actually generally regarded as 'bad' aren't experiencing enjoyment only due to some flaw on their part. Leave them out of your opinion. It's not as if they're wilting away without the light of your personal truth.)

#good omens #bad media criticism

[craycraybluejay]

I also heavily resent the ever-present implication in mainstream media that at all touches on trauma that we cannot have any sympathy for Bad Victims. That it's evil to write a sympathetic Bad Victim. Hell, that it's bad to portray one at all at times. Writing a victim of trauma who's an addict or self-destructive is already an edge case-- writing trauma survivors who end up actually hurting someone else, being chronically "treatment"-resistant or having inconvenient ptsd, perpetuate the cycle, or are just kind of a total dick is considered an evil move. Instead of like. An actually complex and interesting artistic choice.

Idk. It pisses me off a lot how often Bad Victims[TM] are brushed under the rug and if you dare to speak of them/make art of them, let alone SYMPATHIZE with them you're an irredeemable monster. And that's just fictional characters. Don't even get me started on the way people treat actual people who have ptsd in a way that's at all inconvenient and problematic in their opinion.

#bad victims #trauma #purity culture #cultural christianity #cycle of abuse #the invisible victims #trauma survivor #ptsd #purity wank #freedom of expression #dark topics #media criticism #trauma in media #please can i get one traumatized blorbo that isnt purity poisoned #like you're not writing a moral guidebook for small children. you're allowed to write anything at all forever

[courtrecord]

honestly i hate how that “maybe the curtains are just blue” post has become shorthand for anti-intellectualism and shit bc as someone who has an utter passion for media analysis now, I WAS THAT PERSON IN HIGH SCHOOL ENGLISH CLASS.

english class never taught me how to analyze stories, it taught me how to remember what things the teacher said were “symbolism” and how to take quizzes where we had to match a quote to the character who said it. i didn’t give a shit about any of it, bc literally why should i. it was bullshit.

there’s this idea online that people are forgetting or rejecting what they learned in english class when they’re bad at media analysis, and maybe that’s a little bit true, but i think the much bigger problem is they never learned it in the first place. cinemasins & “maybe the curtains are just blue” aren’t convincing people to abandon an intellectualism they already had, they’re filling a void.

when all you learn in high school is to write on the test “blue = depression”, why is it surprising that so many people don’t give a shit about the curtains.

#media analysis #i literally didn’t care about criticism until i started watching video essays in 2017 #and they taught me that u could actually do interesting things with analysis #and i cannot fucking stand this shit that pretends people should all know better #also it’s not new; people who act like media literacy is getting worse are so fucking funny like #have u met an adult. have u spoken to say. an adult family member #ever in ur life #ur just on the internet now. ur seeing a million bad takes that used to be reserved for in-person conversations #or maybe writing into a paper or magazine #get real #get fucking real #1k

[bruciemilf]

Somebody tell me if this is a bad take, or if my love for Bruce is causing my objective brain to glitch, but-- something about advertising Batman, a hero who's very popular for being good with children, for being NURTURING with children, a bad father kinda defeats the whole purpose of what he's supposed to represent.

Batman is a protector; He protects people the world (and especially law enforcement) does not care about. That's literally the point of him.

Something about marketing " you can be incredibly violent to people you care about! And Its fine, because you care about them even if you abuse them, and that's what matters!" towards people, but especially men and young boys, is REALLY fucked up to me.

#it's not really 'wahhh think of the children' because the media you consume isn't a vessel of your character #but. gotham war is so incredibly shallow to me for pulling the 'no no its another personality bruce would never!' like. thats worse. #you get thats worse right? #because 1) dc loves demoninsing DID for some reason but it doesn’t add any substantial weight because bruce will be associated with #the actions of his 'alter' anyway. and dc knew that. 2) if you truly cannot write an interesting comic book where bruce is not abusive #and the batkids aren't being abused. you failed. #this isn't a reprouch or an attack to people who prefer that format. but the creator isn't doing it as genuine exploration of dark tropes #if that's the case -- dont cop out with the personality thing. let him be a bad dad. but its kinda fucked how dc STILL try to paint him #as a good person while doing so. its the collen hoover effect. 'we know the guy is an abuser. thats not the problem. the problem #is that the author wants us to pretend thats a good thing.' #bruce wayne #dc comics #dc #batman #text post #dc critical

[sarcastic-clapping]

already seeing people who clearly don’t understand that a lot of us who are upset about what happened to marwa in this episode aren’t upset about the characters’ in-universe morality but the real life misogyny and racism in the way that this plot was handled lol

#seeing some very smooth brained takes here #’what so you’re mad that the vampire serial killer is a bad guy that made his serial killer familiar sad??? 🙄’ #nope! #i’m mad the writers stripped a female character of color of all her agency to make her subservient to a man #who she presumably (and canonically as freddie) continued to have sex with #despite the very very yucky implications about her ability to consent #only for him to forcibly remove everything about her that makes her an individual with her own thoughts and feelings #transforming her from a woman of color into a white british man #feel free to laugh if you want humor is subjective #it just makes me deeply uncomfortable! #wwdits spoilers #wwdits #anyway it’s ok to be critical of media you like guys #i love wwdits but imo they fucked up on this plot. it was a miss for me. #EDIT: shout out to this post for helping me curate my experience on this site by acting as a fly trap for assholes to block

[lightlavenders]

she-ra (2018) isn't about redemption arcs it's about healing through love. unrelated did you know hordak fans and catra fans can coexist without condemning the other-

#i believe in the power of being a hater! but a lot of the criticism of this show (from its fans) is really bad faith! #stop bringing expectations from other media products to this show actually #teehee #spop #shera #catra #adora #catradora #entrapta #hordak #entrapdak

[deramin2]

I don't know how to really express this except to come across as a "kids these days" scold, but so much of the criticism of queerness in Good Omens would simply not be a thing if kids these days watched more 20th century queer media. Or more complex indie queer media in general.

People seem to want a show that's like the straight stories they grew up with but gay. Or the gay fanfiction they grew up with. But that's not really the tradition it's coming from. First off the novel was released in 1990. Queer film classics of the time are Dead Poet's Society (1989) and Torch Song Trilogy (1988). The TV miniseries Tales of the City (1993) wasn't made until 3 years later and it was so far out there it never had a huge audience. Philadelphia (1993) is also 3 years out and was basically the first big studio queer film. The first fluffy queer Hallmark-style romcom wasn't until Big Eden in 2000, a full 10 years after publication.

Queer stories from the time it was written were about complex and often fraught relationships between people who the world was trying to force apart. There is an incredibly strong tradition in queer films of relationships with no guarantees they will work out both in the face of their personal baggage and the weight of the world. Take a film like Torch Song Trilogy that's about the two great loves of Arnold Beckoff's life over 9 years and how homophobia shapes them. Both externally (especially Allen) and internally like Ed struggling with his bisexuality and being terrified of being publicly out. Written and starred in by Harvey Fierstein, who identified as a gay man at the time and only came out as nonbinary last year.

The Boys In The Band (1968 play, filmed 1970 and 2020) was a monumental moment in Broadway history where finally there was a play about gay men in their own words where no one died and very strongly showed that homosexuality doesn't make people miserable but homophobia sure does. But that homophobia also throws their personal lives into constant turmoil and none of them are in happy relationships, although Hank and Larry are devoted to each other in their own fucked up way.

"Relationships are complicated and hard to make work and sometimes a struggle against the odds" is an aesthetic of classic queer film making. Partly it was influenced by the Hays Code (although independent films were not bound to it), partly influenced by the rampant queerphobia in society at the time that was inescapable. But it's also an aesthetic choice to resist the banal and unrealistic relationship depictions of straight media. There are actual stakes to the relationship. Queer people were actively resisting a world that said "Romance is seeing someone across the room and instantly falling in love with each other and little conflicts happen along the way but ultimately they're destined to be together and everything is happily ever after." Recall that "stalking as romance" was a completely inescapable trope in 1980s straight romance films, and every goddamn movie was being turned into a romance film.

So queer people in film and television when they can make what they please have a long tradition of saying instead "People don't always realize the feelings they've developed for a queer partner right away. They may have reasons for denying those feelings that are both a reflection of the cruelty in society and of their own insecurities. People struggle with where they belong and their relationships reflect that. Loving someone doesn't mean they don't also drive you crazy and you might fight with them constantly. But that doesn't negate the love or that feeling that even if things aren't okay, they're better with that person around. But maybe that person can't stay around. The world may be against you. And also maybe you don't just want that one person in your life. Soulmates is a very flawed model. Sometimes the strongest love is a struggle with yourself and the world and your person. You have to overcome yourself first. Happily ever after is a lie. You may be happy for a while, and hopefully for a long while, but everything ends. And you have to be ready to love again. Also your platonic bonds are just as important and life-altering as your romantic ones. Sometimes those platonic bonds include fucking if you want them to. Real life isn't a bunch of platitudes and world-altering moments, it's daily work to better yourself and the world around you. Especially when things just fucking suck. But also remember to have fun and fuck the haters. People who don't support you can eat rocks and you should yell at them more to shut the fuck up."

That is a fundamentally different outlook on what a "good relationship depiction" looks like. Personally, I thought I hated romance movies and then I started watching queer romance movies and discovered I love them and watch them all the time. Because it turns out what I hated was relationships being shown that had nothing at all to do with reality and privileged incredibly toxic ideals. Finally there was complexity, there were stakes, and there were people who had to truly want to be together enough to fight the world for it and not because they happened to be there. There were people actually talking out their problems and looking for resolutions. (And sometimes that resolutions was "I can't fucking deal with this bullshit anymore and I'm out.") For the first time it felt real.

I'm an aroace trans gay man. Nothing about relationships or being in relationships has come easy to me, and the whole paradigm of straight patriarchal romance depictions makes absolutely no sense to me. It's completely alien. Queer romance stories actually feel human.

And that's the tradition Good Omens is coming from, even as it's being retold in 2019-2023 and hopefully beyond. Gaiman's work has always been based in that queer media paradigm. (I've been remiss and daunted and haven't read Pratchett but from what I do know his work also seems to sit more in that world view.) It's a beautiful cinematic tradition and it's baffling to me that people would resist it instead of embracing it for being honest.

And that's when I turn into a crotchety old man complaining about the youth not connecting with the history of their beautiful culture and instead begging for assimilation into a shithole allocishet media landscape that doesn't actually want them except for their money and has nothing at all interesting or valuable to say. But it's very funny (annoying) to me when people claim Good Omens is someone against queer culture when it's so thoroughly bathed in the best of queer media's storytelling traditions and what people are asking for is straight media with the serial numbers filed off. Like, stop being boring please and know literally anything about the culture the adults in the room lived through and were influenced by. The world didn't begin in 2015.

EDIT: I also want to add that in straight media arcs are linear. Traditionally in queer media arcs are cyclical. Queer media very often depicts people going around in circles relearning the same lesson over and over as they inch towards it sinking in. But every time they go through the cycle they gain just a little bit more enlightenment and slowly move towards a better place. From the comments this is an immensely important distinction. People don't actually have cathartic moments where suddenly all their past bad programming is shed and they saunter forward a new person with none of their old baggage. In reality people fall into the same patterns over and over even though they have had every opportunity to learn better. "People magically get better" is a trope of straight media that's an outright and frankly dangerous lie. Again, Good Omens follows the queer tradition not the straight one and it's depicted 6,000 years of that cycle. The world didn't end, and the wheel keeps turning, as it always has and always will. That's so fundamental to queer storytelling traditions I forgot to even mention it.

#good omens #good omens season 2 #good omens spoilers #go s2 spoilers #good omens discourse #queer media #queer history #discourse #I have been a crotchety old man against the youths since middle school to be clear #if you don't know where you've been you have no hope of knowing where you should go next #I didn't sit all the way through deeply homophobic Brokeback Mountain or Tár just to hear people complain that honest rep is bad rep #This is also why I'm a critchety old man about most Critical Role Shadowgast haters #Liam and Matt have not only watched but copiously reference older queer media and Shadowgast is so clearly that tradition

[babycharmander]

repeat after me: a character doing a bad thing does not make them a bad character, nor does it make the story they're in a bad story

#writing #some of the WEIRDEST 'criticism' I hear about some media is like #'this character did a thing that was BAD!!!' #i mean... yeah??? that's the point?? they were WRONG in what they did #relatable characters are going to make mistakes

[fossilizedhysterics]

guess who finished tlok tonight and immediately had this come to him in a vision!!!!

#i. really like tlok. like a lot #i understand why people dont like it #and i can accept that OBJECTIVELY its not that great #but i had a fantastic time with it #anyways yeah. gay people #tbh. would not call zhu li and varrick normal. most queer straight couple on the planet. #hes a gay man. shes a lesbian. theyre in love. do you get it. #i dont have that many thoughts abt wuko. i really really like it though. #wu is like the webkinz milk cat to me. i need to throw him against a wall really hard. #and of course. korrasami. what is there to even say there #one thing i will say is before watching it i TOTALLY thought asami was a fire bender and also evil #like i kept thinking “yep this is when she turns evil and then theres enemies to lovers” but nope #not a bender or evil and honestly im glad #she totally wouldve been justified in becoming evil though. i sure wouldve #love her.so much #korra too ofc #i have SO MANY more thoughts but im gonna run out of space #last thing i will say is i am a guy who will just always prefer media i can criticize #love atla. but theres nothing there for me to really sink my teeth into or like bitch about #i love it when media is KIND OF BAD and i can RANT ANGRILLY about it #the legend of korra #tlok #legend of korra #korrasami #wuko #zhurrick #korra #asami sato #mako tlok #prince wu

[b0bs0ndugnutt]

It really is so remarkable that a western cartoon was brave enough to frame desertion as the moral and heroic thing to do.

#i really dont think people realize how rare and stunning that is in western media #rwby gets deservedly criticized for the Faunus stuff #but Marrow / Atlas arc IS remarkable and they dont equivocate at all that authoritarianism and militarism are bad #the ‘Ironwood was right crowd’ are so obviously raised on the unquestioned jingoistic propaganda in American media #M watches rwby #Was just thinking about this other day and dont think rwby gets enough credit for this one

[fantasygerard2000]

What are Wish takes you heard that just makes you wanna

#like everytime i hear someone say maginifico is the noble hero and asha is a selfish bad person #my brain just shuts off by how dead their media literacy is #no disrespecting to people having a take you don't like #i understand the criticisms this movie has #i flat out dislike the ones that judged it for what it isn't #disney wish #wish 2023 #wish movie #wish

[mzminola]

This is not a perfect analogy but I am making it anyway to try to convey what being online has been like for me lately.

Seeing people say "Oh, Jews are fine, I just hate zionists!" is like seeing "Oh, women are fine, I just hate feminists!"

Zionism and feminism are both very broad socio-political movements that have changed focus over time, that ostensibly have some very basic core tenets but you really need to ask the specific person you're talking to how they personally define it to be sure.

Both have been subject to legitimate criticism, and hostile reactionary bullshit. Had waves, sub-movements, splinters, people with damn near opposite views sharing the term and people with seemingly identical views rejecting it.

You can give working, broad definitions like these:

Feminism is the belief that all people should be treated equally regardless of gender, with a focus on women's rights due to systemic oppression.

Zionism is the belief that all peoples have the right to self determination and safety, with a focus on Jewish people finding it in Israel.

You can also give different definitions! Many people give different definitions! Many people also hold these beliefs but use different names for them for various reasons.

There are self-described zionists who are jingoistic, racist, etc, and who attribute those attitudes to their zionism. Just as there are feminists who are misandrist, bio-essentialist, transphobic, homophobic, and so on, who attribute those attitudes to their feminism.

There are also incredibly selfless, compassionate activists working for positive change in the world who consider themselves zionists and feminists.

It has been very jarring to see people, who I respect, uncritically reblogging posts or headlines that use "zionists" as a stand in for "bad people", just as jarring as it would be to see them sharing things that use "feminists" that way. Especially when those posts contain easily debunked conspiracy theories that I know you'd have seen right through if the OP said "Jews" but because they said "zionists" you swallowed it whole.

I am not asking anyone to stop sharing important information, petitions, news articles, resources, and so on. I am asking you to slow down and stop spreading inflammatory language that paints a broad socio-political movement for Jewish self-determination as inherently bad. The same way I would ask you not to spread inflammatory language that paints gender equality & women's liberation as inherently bad.

If the information is important, please look for other, more neutrally worded posts. Or verify the links yourself and make a fresh post! There is no situation online in which the only way to share information must be to spread such language.

#antisemitism #being critical of zionism is not automatically antisemitic #just as criticizing the feminist movement is not inherently misogynistic #but the way a LOT of people have been talking lately...it has been indistinguishable #please slow down #being Jewish in America #and online #I have so many filters and yet I cannot escape this even in fandom spaces #''Jews control the media'' repackaged as ''zionists'' or ''the Israeli government'' has been the one I've seen the most #but there's been some outright blood libel too #and of course the usual banking bullshit #when you accept a term like this as synonymous with ''bad people'' you swallow the lies more easily! you swallow the exaggerations! #you fact check less! you reblog from psyops and bigots who've found keywords! #and it doesn't have to be this way #please stop making it be this way #editing tags to add #zionism #I think I left it off originally to stay out of the tracked tags

[doomed-era]

thinking about the (probably) unintentional symbolism of the master sword's state often reflecting link's in the botw trilogy, swords being frequently described as an extension of yourself in popular media, the master sword as an extension of link and link an extension of it. he really is a living weapon if you think about it too hard

#botw #the legend of zelda #breath of the wild #i think about this WAY too much for my own good #botw link always wins the link most dehumanized by the narrative award #the 2d links dont have a lot of character yeah but at least they werent treated like a tool #ww/oot/tp/ss obviously toy with this idea and go 'hey this is actually kind of bad?' but botw is like 'lol' #'we're going to briefly criticize our own metanarrative and then actively say that the people suffering from it were actually in the wrong' #i say this as someone is has been obsessed with botw for the past...shit. like since it came out #my hyperfixation just causes me to criticize the media i like more because i literally eat it #and yet: we stay silly

[idolomantises]

its very funny to see how easy it is to piss off tiktok. that comic i made about you shouldnt tell a lesbian to draw less lesbians is like a month old and im still getting comments fuming about it.

#txt #its funny because we make fun of twitter and tumblr for bad media comprehension but tiktok is a different beast good lord #people couldnt understand a very simple comic and then got mad at me when i told them that its pretty much their fault if they dont get it #if you need someone to hold your hand to comprehend that 'healthy criticism = good' #and 'telling a gay person to draw less gay people = bad' you are quite literally the dumbest person alive #and i feel sorry for anyone who has to put up with you #that comic wasnt even meant to piss off anyone. the people over there are just constantly angry and illiterate

[hellhoundmaggie]

Do you have any SDV hot takes?

Boy do I ever Anon! Thank you for giving me the chance to get on my soapbox about this.

Shane doesn't relapse when he is happily married to the Farmer. The popular "relapse" interpretation is based on faulty assumptions about what substance abuse recovery is supposed to look like and flat-out misreadings of the text of the game.

Shane doesn't "start" drinking again: he never stops, just reduces the amount he drinks. (Unless we are supposed to interpret the phrase "cut back" in the 7 Heart Event as meaning "quit” or "gave up” for some reason. Or if we ignore the new 1.6 dialogue about him drinking less after his 6 Heart event.)

Shane's mess is not a consequence of uncontrolled drinking, but a consequence of his depression and possible under-managed ADHD. His room at Marnie's remains exactly as messy when he's in recovery as it is when he's spiraling, so the drinking has no effect on his cleanliness.

”Okay,” you might say, “but he still shouldn’t drink, and he should pick up his room.” And sure, yeah. Ideally we should all do the same. But that’s not always a fair or realistic expectation for everyone. Not everyone can quit their addictions or bad habits cold turkey. Not everyone is going to be the model citizen. That doesn’t mean they can’t live happy lives. That doesn’t mean they don’t have value. That doesn’t mean Shane doesn’t have value.

So instead of complaining about the ways that Shane fails to measure up to typical adult standards, it may be more productive to ask: is he happy? Is he doing okay? By any reasonable measure, a married Shane is living his best possible life. He‘s surprised and delighted to be your trophy husband. He doesn’t have to worry about taking a soul-sucking job or struggling with unemployment. His drinking isn’t causing him any problems, and if he can’t keep his personal space clean, at least he doesn’t let his mess spread to the rest of the house. He has his own little coop for Charlie and it’s just adorable to watch him bounce her up and down. He actually makes time for Jas. I am not requiring everyone to love Shane the way he is written, or to make space in their farmhouse for him. But please, have realistic expectations for the character that exists. And do make friends with him. He gives you an OP recipe and access to blue chickens!

#My other hot take is that people shouldn’t install mods that “fix” NPC character flaws #Yeah it bothers me too when Penny pushes George’s wheelchair without consent or when Clint gets on his “Nice Guy” hobbyhorse #But CA gave these characters flaws for a reason #Flaws add interest and depth to characters #Instead of knee jerk rejecting my discomfort with the character’s bad behavior #I can sit with it and reflect on my own behavior and values #And I can recognize the worth even in characters who don’t share my values #Or who don’t change and grow in the “right” way #After all I’m not gonna share all your values #Or always change and grow the way I ought to #But we all gotta live together and give each other a little grace #Anywho those are my hot takes #Thank you for your time #shane stardew valley #stardew valley #media analysis #media criticism #media literacy

[godmademeinmspaint]

Going to say this now even though I barely post here::::: Adaptations are never meant to be a 1:1 recreation of the original source material. The goal is never to recreate the exact same experience in a different format, the whole point of remaking something in a different format is to make something new.

I don’t understand why people are out here acting like the new Netflix ATLA walked onscreen, shot the original with a 44 and declared itself the new ATLA. I’m not saying you can’t criticise anything about it or any other adaptation, I just think a lot of people need to remember that an adaptation that gives you the same experience and explores the exact same themes and doesn’t elaborate on or look at things in different angles would be utterly pointless.

#honestly disappointed with how a lot of people are treating the cast of child actors #like even if you don’t like the script writing you don’t need to come after the kids #maybe the fans just have trauma from that terrible movie and don’t know how to cope with an actually decent adaptation idk #while I agree that a lot of live action remakes of animated media are unnecessary that doesn’t instantly make them bad yk #avatar the last airbender #Atla #netflix atla #netflix avatar #avatar live action #natla #natla positivity #natla review #natla critical #avatar analysis