TV/Movies Megathread

[Malthus]

Apparently exactly the case: as katmai informed me, and which I subsequently revised my review to include, the 43 year old director is fucking her.  Knowledge of this makes the movie more explicable and even worse.

Hey, we don't know if the actress is as feckless as the character she plays.  Of course it could be an autibiographical portrayal.

Anyway, I always thought it a perfect example in the life-is-unfair category: a maniac pixie girl = super cute, but a young guy doing exactly the same stuff = a loser. Where are all the sugar mommas for vaguely-artistic, tempermentally-unemployable young dudes? 

[CountDeMoney]

a maniac pixie girl = super cute, but a young guy doing exactly the same stuff = a loser.

  Good point.

[Razgovory]

Just saw 12 Years a Slave.  In a theater no less!

Boring.  Nothing really interesting happens. 

C

Surprise, Surprise, Yi is unmoved by a film advocating the restriction of certain property rights.

[Admiral Yi]

 

[Ed Anger]

 

[Razgovory]

Heh.  I am really becoming amused by getting Yi to hit himself.

[11B4V]

3 Avatar Sequels Will Be Made in NZ

(Newser) – New Zealand is about to get a major case of the blues—Avatar director James Cameron has announced that he plans to return to the country to shoot three sequels about the blue-skinned inhabitants of the fantasy world of Pandora. The director and Twentieth Century Fox have guaranteed that the sequels, New Zealand's biggest film project since The Hobbit movies, will bring at least $413 million to the country and the government has agreed to pick up a quarter of the tab through a tax rebate, the AP reports.

Cameron says he plans to start filming in 2015, aiming to have the first sequel ready by Christmas 2016 with follow-ups for Christmas 2017 and 2018. The director, who recently became a New Zealand resident, praised the country and its film industry when announcing the sequels, reports the New Zealand Herald. He told reporters that Hobbit director Peter Jackson is a friend and they will try to avoid having major productions overlapping and stretching the workforce.

http://www.newser.com/story/179241/3-avatar-sequels-will-be-made-in-nz.html

[CountDeMoney]

Great, 3 times the vomit.

[garbon]

Who wants 4 Avatar films?

[Ed Anger]

Timmays.

[jimmy olsen]

I never even watched it and from what I've heard of it have no real desire to.

[Ed Anger]

Tough titties. People like you have ruined movies.

[Neil]

How is that even possible?  Avatar was practically aimed right at you.

[Queequeg]

Watching Wonderfall, show by guy from Hannibal (Fueller) staring Alana Bloom from Hannibal (Caroline Dhavernas).

Caroline Dhavernas.

[jimmy olsen]

Lame

Quite a few embedded links in this article.
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/130556-Paul-Dini-Superhero-Cartoon-Execs-Dont-Want-Female-Viewers

Paul Dini: Superhero Cartoon Execs Don't Want Female Viewers
Marshall Lemon | 17 December 2013 6:05 am

According to Batman writer Paul Dini, most TV networks only market superheroes to young boys, and will cancel shows if other audiences enjoy them more.

It's always disappointing when our favorite TV shows are cancelled by networks, but realistically, that just needs to happen sometimes. If a series isn't attracting enough viewers to justify its costs, everybody loses money, which in the long term that makes it harder to produce quality stories. The good news is once you get a dedicated fan base established, you could keep the show running until everybody gets bored, right? Not so, says Paul Dini, known for his extensive work in the DC Animated Universe. During a recent podcast with Kevin Smith, Dini noted that popular superhero shows will still get cut if the wrong audience is enjoying their stories. Specifically, executives only want young boys to watch superhero cartoons, and if too many girls are tuning in instead, that show will be put on the chopping block.

"They're all for boys," Dini said when asked about series cancellations for Young Justice and Green Lantern: The Animated Series. "I've heard executives say this, you know, not [where I am] but at other places, saying like, 'We do not want girls watching this show.'"

When Smith asked why female audiences aren't being considered, Dini responded: "They. Do. Not. Buy. Toys. The girls buy different toys.

"That's the thing, you know I hate being Mr. Sour Grapes here, but I'll just lay it on the line: that's the thing that got us cancelled on Tower Prep," Dini continued. "'We need boys, but we need girls right there, right one step behind the boys' - this is the network talking - 'one step behind the boys, not as smart as the boys, not as interesting as the boys, but right there.' And then we began writing stories that got into the two girls' back stories, and they were really interesting. And suddenly we had families and girls watching, and girls really became a big part of our audience ... But, the Cartoon Network was saying, 'F***, no, we want the boys' action, it's boys' action, this goofy boy humor we've gotta get that in there.'"

I'd never heard of Tower Prep before (because I'm a boy, apparently), but it was getting decent reviews before being cancelled after a single season. The series introduced a group of superpowered teenagers imprisoned against their will at a private school, like a bizarre combination of X-Men and The Prisoner. That actually sounds like an interesting idea, but as Dini notes, Tower Prep was eventually replaced with a show about "goofy nerds fighting CG monsters".

But hey, in the Cartoon Network's defense, it's not like female-centric action stories would be successful enough to sell toys, am I right?