#and once again the fact that larries can't be YES they were a thing but they broke up later and/or it's messy

[jlf23tumble]

Jen, v random but I think you follow the whatiwillsay pod? I was wondering if you had thoughts about their larry ep from a couple of years ago? 

I do follow her on spotify, but I don't always listen (depends what I have in queue, the topic, etc). I *did* listen to that ep, though, and I disagreed with pretty much all of it MAINLY because you can't have it both ways, i.e., you can't say here's all this gryles proof, here's all this swiftgron proof, then dismiss larry or kaylor when it's the exact same amount of evidenceTM. Like, I'm all for reaching, reach away! But when you're matching, then match it! If it's fandom bullshit, call it as such, but where there's that much smoke, there's at least a wee bit of fire!

[gaykarstaagforever]

The free YouTube (and probably elsewhere) movie extravaganza continues with the 2012 Farrelly Brothers' The Three Stooges.

A movie with a 51% Rotten Tomatoes shrug, because even the reviewers who liked it only gave it a mid rating. Because the cast of Jersey Shore is in it for several minutes and they're awful, and apparently we were so sick of them by 2012 that anything including even a passing reference to Snooki had to be punished?

I'm not going to bury the lede anymore. I unironically think this movie is kind of great.

Now let me immediately qualify that:

It is way too long for the way it is paced. The Stooges' antics work better in shorts because of the high number of laffs they pack in. This movie doesn't provide quite enough down-time between the extended frantic sequences, which means a lot of genuinely funny stuff just washed over me because I still needed to recover from my previous laughing. Old Stooges used more musical numbers. This movie starts with one but that's it. Another would have helped.

The cast is great, with Sean Hayes, Will Sasso and especially Chris Diamantopoulos absolutely nailing Larry, Curly and Moe. The children who play the young Stooges are in fact brilliant, Skyler Gisondo maybe being a better Moe than Diamantopoulos. The supporting cast is also genuinely good, aside from the Jersey Shore idiots. But. No one gets much to do besides stand there and watch the Stooges hit each-other. Other than Larry David as an evil nun who keeps getting nearly murdered by the Stooges. I mean Sofia Vergara gets a live rat down her cleavage in a packed car, that then crashes into a lake, which the Stooges then explode with Curly's lobster farts. It's very good and she is very good, but there isn't quite enough of that kind of participation from the other actors.

Get you a man who can do both.

Yes there is at least one fart joke here. I find those funny if done properly, and feel the original Stooges surely would have done them if their heyday had been after Mel Brooks showed the world how funny farting can be. So this doesn't bother me. But some people apparently think fart jokes are too low-brow and that including them here sullies the memory of the noble comedy troupe who made their mark by splitting their pants and kicking each-other in the butts. So your milage may vary.

There are a fair amount of circa 2012 pop culture references. Again, this in particular doesn't bother me in most cases, because the Stooges always did those. This movie is inconsistent about how much the Stooges do or don't know about things, since sometimes they act like they've been transported from the 30s, and then Moe makes a Star Wars reference. But that's a minor nitpick. One of the bad guys calls Curly 'Butterbean.' I laughed.

I however did NOT laugh at all the godforsaken Jersey Shore garbage, i.e., those idiot morons failing to act or be funny in this movie for way too long. This stuff clearly ruined the movie for some people; I'm more forgiving than that, but Christ Jesus why did the Farrellys put all this in here? As a brief reference it would have been lame in 2012. As a major component of the third act? I realize this movie took awhile to make and in like 2009 when they rewrote the screenplay for the 16th time, Jersey Shore was the hottest thing in the still dominant Monoculture. But by 2012, 2009 pop culture felt like it was from another planet. Obviously the Farrellys couldn't know that would happen, and can't be expected to have dropped the whole subplot about Moe being on Jersey Shore so late in production. But this should never have been blown out to this substantial a thing in the first place. Why would you target Jersey Shore fans specifically with your modern Three Stooges movie? Especially once you see how bad these freaks are making actual creative content? It is such a bad, weird flex. Moe goes up to them and hits them and they say "ow!" and "stop, dude!" and it doesn't work for anyone. Minutes of this. The one positive connected to that is Isaiah Mustafa (the Old Spice Guy) being a Jersey Shore producer who 'discovers' the Stooges and believes they are the Next Big Thing. He is, as always, handsome and charismatic, and like everyone else who isn't Ronnie, not given either enough screen time or fun things to do.

The plot is just a retread of the old Stooges motif of them having to save an orphanage by raising money, which always was and still is just a contrivance for wacky antics. They then get roped into a murder-for-hire plot, and everything gets tied together stupidly at the heartwarming end. No harm, no foul. But this movie, pretending to be three shorts linked together, genuinely seems to forget anything plot-related for long stretches of time, only to interrupt itself suddenly with pointless revelations and double-crosses and people pointing guns at real-life cartoon men who are demonstrably immune to explosives and power tools. It makes the whole movie lurch around, and feels like maybe a result of multiple rewrites.

Other than these qualifiers, yes, I kind of loved this movie. I don't have anything else interesting to say about it, because writing about enjoying things is inherently uninteresting. The slapstick is good. The dialogue is snappy and funny. This isn't just a movie where the Stooges are in 2012 - it is an actual Stooges movie set in 2012, complete with typical joke signs and cartoon physics and no one beating the crap out of these deranged, dangerous men. It was intended as a loving tribute to the Stooges, and it nails that in a way that makes me appreciate what they did all the more. Buffonery as a genuine entertainment is a sophisticated artform, and the Farrellys understand that and how to do that and they did it here. And they were patient about casting just the right, though initially unexpected, actors, who could do this stuff exactly right. It is great to watch Hollywood professionals remind us why we pay them to do these jobs.

There is a scene where the Stooges are thrown over a fence as intentionally bad dummies, and in one continuous shot hit the ground, then the actors get up from the exact positions and run off screen. They must have used CG, but I rewatched it 8 times and I can't figure out how they did it. Do you know how rarely 'movie magic' dupes me anymore? It's amazing.

(I, however, believe I know how they got this to work.)

This was a lower-budget movie, and looks like it did...fine? I mean all things totalled it looks like it made a little money. But what a gamble it had to be, and there is no way a sequel or other entries are ever getting made. The Stooges are popular as a perfectly funny thing from a thousand years ago, appealing especially to children, and people like me who wear trucker caps with vulgar puns to the grocery store. Most people either grow out of the Stooges or don't think they're funny in the first place (my mother in particular LOATHES them). You aren't getting a modern Stooges franchise that makes a billion dollars per movie, and you shouldn't. This movie is a solid family comedy and a fun little treat for Stooge fans, that ONLY exists because the Farrelly Brothers had the sway to get it made and made properly and released in 2012. This is never happening again. This is lightning in a bottle. We got real lucky with this one.

Believe me, I would love to see at least another short with these guys, more of Larry playing his violin, them wrestling professional wrestlers, maybe Curly twists his ankle falling from a space station so a new Shemp has to fill in for a third of the movie. They are janitors at a stand-in for Stark Industries and spend 5 minutes assaulting each-other with zany superhero gadgets.

They have all gotten married somehow and each one had a daughter and now there are three teenaged GIRL Stooges who can hit each-other with crowbars and do farts. That'll piss off my favorite part of the Internet!

And no matter how bad all of those ideas turn out, they will still be better than that time The Situation was in a Three Stooges movie.

[730hcck]

before he could make his usual "well clearly you can't stand me - you're sitting right now" comment, yaz's name was called from the counter. "not you, that's me. i use your name for my orders whenever its at places like these." tyler quickly stood up from where he was sitting, making sure not to cause any confusion with yaz. yes, tyler did, in fact, use yaz's name whenever ordering from places. it quickly shut down any longing looks from workers who think they'd have a chance, because tyler certainly did not look like a "yaz" at all.

tyler collected his drink, returning to yaz quickly just as she joined in her video call. as he sipped at his latte, tyler rose a brow at the mention of north carolina. he set his drink down, slinging his arm over the back of yaz's chair once again and glancing at the screen.

north carolina wasn't... far... at least it wasn't something like hawaii. although, tyler wouldn't cross hawaii off just yet. but he knew one thing for certain: they were all places that were not new york in any way.

he tore his focus away from her laptop, settling for staring at the email he had pulled up on his own screen about transporting larry to gionna's farm. and although tyler knew he should definitely be focusing on when larry would be taken to the farm and how... he couldn't help but focus on the way his chest had suddenly felt heavier.

how many more days would they have together like this? and not just whenever they were in the same city for work... but having days where they weren't in an arena and were able to just be in each other's presence while going about their other responsibilities. so, as if to commit this moment to memory, tyler turned his head to look at yaz instead, admiring her in the moment like a lovesick teenager.

At his poor impression of her voice, she swore she could have turned about six more shades of red, bringing a hand up to shield her face while another continued to playfully swat at him. “I can’t stand you, I swear.” She mused with a shake of her head. Despite the blushing, her smile was about ten miles wide, giggling like a schoolgirl who was hanging out with her first crush ever. Effortlessly.

Once she sent off another email, she was able to take the last name necklace out of the box and admire it. “And yet, you made it happen. Just like you always do.” Reaching beside the table from where she was sitting, she squeezed his hand and cuddled up to him, giving him a kiss to his cheek in her thanks. “I love you.”

Looking at the clock, it was time for her next tour. Popping one AirPod in, she kept her other ear free in case Tyler needed anything. “Feel free to be nosy too, with these. I think this next condo is in Raleigh, I think? I heard good things about North Carolina, so…” She mused, before taking another drink from her espresso and joining the call that was now in progress.

[omamervt]

Look. I know Pokemon is probably beyond third versions at this point. Gen 6 didn't get one, and Gen 8 set up the precedent for expansions over third editions. The state of S/V on release is evidence enough that their current production pipeline barely gives enough time to release the base mainline games as-is. That combined with the higher cost to the customer per version now, it just makes more sense to expand rather than re-release.

THAT SAID! I think there are enough little things that could improve the experience drastically that I'm not sure they can simply patch in or provide via DLC (at least not in the original map), or would be useless to players who don't want to completely reset their game. So, here are the features I think we're missing:

Alternate Ride Pokemon. This game introduced cyclizar and Revavroom, which were explicitly designed to look like transport methods, and Cyclizar are in fact a common Ride Pokemon. They also brought back several ride pokemon from previous generations, including Gogoat and Braviary, and once the games are connected to Home we'll be allowed to transfer in Sneasler, Wyrdeer, and Basculegion. Don't get me wrong, Koraidon is great. I love Koraidon. I'm very upset that I can't transfer the one I've grown attached to through the story out of the game when the time comes. Which, yes, I know, that's why there's Second Koraidon. But again, we're talking Third Version here. Letting players swap in a ride pokemon of their choice would be a good excuse to not give Koraidon/Miraidon right away, since the player would likely end up with both in the end. (yes I know it'd require a rewrite of Arven's plot, I'm not being paid to share my opinions, someone else can fix that)

Make wild Tera Pokemon (the ones found outside raids) about ten times as aggressive. I don't think we need player HP and whatnot brought over from Legends: Arceus but Alphas are the only fun part of that game and if they could make the wild Tera Pokemon induce the same sense of "ha, I'm in danger." when you see them? it'd be perfect. While I'm here I'd love to just say, "bring back Alphas as a permanent feature" but barring that I'll just take hyper-aggressive menaces to society of some form in every game going forward, and the wild Teras are the perfect candidate this game.

Make the badge challenges, but at the very least the Victory Road gym challenges, scale based on the number of badges you have. It was kind of a letdown to start exploring West, completing the bug and water gyms, only to have an area with lv 50 Pokemon preventing me from reaching Larry and lv 35's preventing you from reaching Tulip, only to go out east and discover that I outleveled Brassius and Iono already, and oh, also, when I went back and beat Tulip and her level 40 team, I was ready to take on the lv 50 path only to discover it lead to Larry's lv 35 gym that I was supposed to access from the other way. Route challenge levels don't bother me, but I mean, it'd be nice if the badges really could be done in any order, and barring that, don't give us the illusion of options. They presented it like you could take on gyms in the order you wanted, but really you're supposed to go East first, clear up to Mela, then head back, take on the bug and water gyms plus Bombirdier and the Asado Titan, then go BACK THE OTHER WAY to fight Iono, Orthworm, and Larry, then go southwest for Tulip, and THEN finally head north, fight the last 2 titans, take on the ice/ghost gyms, then the fairy Star base, then do Eri last. They don't tell you this, they just make it sound like you get to choose and then throw reality at you. Be a lot cooler if they just went all in on that premise and scaled the badge challenges based on how many you have.

This is a broken record beaten to death but god damn only having 4 main outfit options with no ability to even recolor them and only being able to customize hair/accessories really sucks, and is a terrible introduction to their "gender-neutral" character creation system. If Kalos really does border the northeast of the map and we get to go there in an expansion we better have access to alternative main outfit options in Luminose, but if we're all wrong about that then man it'd sure be cool if we could just have some other outfits available throughout the world under normal circumstances. Hell let us get Atticus to customize our uniforms. I'll pay him in Tera Crystals or LP, his own made up currency, he can even have his badge back, whatever it takes. just get me out of these orange pants. Hate coordinating my outfit around a single terrible piece. Only one character looks good in the Scarlet school uniform and it's Nemona.