#to have a show aimed at an even younger audience so BLATANTLY act like people like that are actually freaks.

[gemsofthegalaxy]

"For kids like these college is where your life really start"

This show is bullshit on this front. They keep telling us that Devi and her friends are uncool and yet showing us that she dates fucking Paxton and Ethan and Ben ( who is nerdy is also fucking jacked and totally gets along with Paxton and his crew) and has almost no problem making new friends or getting involved in anything.

And they're dorky..... but they're still far above all the lame sweaty gross boys in the robotics club who somehow Fabiola has nooooo clue are assholes until someone else points it out to her and btw the Only fat person in this whole show happens to be the gross dude who is a misogynist. Sure there is much diversity for culture and race but i was floored when Devi called herself slim-thic when she is clearly just skinny. And so is every other person in the show.

Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad show at all, but there are much better shows with actual outcasts if that's the type of narrative you'd like to explore. Devi and her friends get along well with tons of people and all of them have multiple love interests and have sex in high school, they are not fucking alienated from their peers, nor are they nerdy weirdos who nobody talks to. They get tons of "experience" in high school that plenty of other people don't get until college and yknow what? Both are fine. But this show really plays into the expectation that the most normal time to start fucking is in high school.

[5secondsofdrama]

Just gotta say it's nice to find fans who are OG and also a similar age to the boys cos fr I feel like the majority of the fam are like 14-16 (18 tops) and I'm out here the same age as the boys like ... Ahaha. And I do think it gives a different pov of their music to be their same age. Like, SGFG is my favourite, but ofc it is "immature". Nonetheless, a good half of the SGFG songs they could still perform today and it wouldn't sound weird for a mid 20s to perform (eg SOAU, V, OS, C22) 1/?

Like, dgmw, I adore JBH, but it's whole vibe is so teenage that I would have thought they would have dropped playing her by now (likewise with SKH...) Heck, even their early stuff they could still play and it not be weird (the exception of the obvious being like 18, KMKM, LB) but fan faves like WAYF or IYDK I don't think would be weird for them to play. They could also change the songs up a bit, too to make them sound more mature. Idk, it seems a waste if they plan to shift fully away. 2/?

They have a catalogue of what, over 100 songs? And seem to want to move away from all their early stuff when so much could still be played today. Yb is a great album, it's matured and you still have alot of SGFG (and even their 2014 EPs) vibes in there. So I'd say it's objectively my fave as I can understand the direction they took to mature to get there. CALM however I can't stand. It feels so try hard. I'm all forcreative expression but honestly can't stand the tinny RnB mix acoustic style 3/?

The mainstream complaint of the boys back in the day was that they were a boy band who were try hards to not be and to be punk rock when they aren't punks cos they don't have that edge to their attitude that punks do. But now they're very obviously trying sooo hard to be mainstream people don't seem to pick up on that. The whole RnB vibe when let's be real, it doesn't suit who they are at all. 4/?

Last one I swear sorry but I was just thinking about all this before I went to sleep aha. They claimed CALM was genre bending when it just doesn't work to be (while Yb was more so and actually worked) and also as tho that's unique to them when you have artists like Post Malone, YUNGBLUD and MGK out here executing genre bending incredibly well but that blatantly isn't their aim, they just make music they enjoy. Wish 5SOS could just reflect and do the same instead of being try hards.

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Ok so, I think this last one goes with this grouping but I’m not sure? It’s not numbered and I technically already answered it but I’m throwing it in here anyways.

There are a lot of younger fans, I try not to judge them too much bc I was pretty young when I started listening to the guys, even tho I’m closer to their age. This being said there are definitely 15 year old fans out there being super problematic and immature on twt and everywhere else. The fandom was toxic way back when too tho, and there are people in their 30s, and mid twenties out here acting like immature disrespectful brats. You can find 16 y/os who are respectful of others, they may still have some growing up to do but I don’t think it’s fair to group alll younger fans into one category and all older fans into another. As I mentioned there are some pretty poorly behaved older fans out there, who flaunt their behaviour, as immature as it is. I think overall maturity is majorly lacking across all facets of the fandom. You’re lucky when you can find small pockets of it.

When we were on ST people liked to call us all sorts of names and sent us hate. And would turn around and say that we were so immature and hateful to Sierra. Reality is that we’ve never stooped that low, and we never will. We don’t post hate, we don’t send it and we don’t promote it.

As for age changing how people experience music, I tend to agree with you. There are certain songs that are attached to young experiences of mine. I think self-titled is the most immature, Amnesia makes me think about my high school heartbreak. I can’t relate it to my current life at all. I don’t really think SGFG is that immature, a part from the name. I think they just had a lot of other influences. I disagree that JBH has a teenage vibe to it. I would say for songs like Money, SKH, and Hey Everybody, or Gotta Get Out, Social Casualty, Reject etc. But JBH has more of an undercurrent of mental health than a need to break free of social constraints put in place by school and parents.

I fully agree that they should play more of their old stuff they have some amazing lock ass songs. Ones that didn’t become massive hits, but the majority of people that buy their records and come to their shows are fans that have been around awhile. They have it in their head they need to appeal to a bigger audience. Whether that’s a then thing or that’s soemthing management is imposing we can’t be sure. I feel like overtime they’ve grown less appreciative of the fans.

People have said if they didn’t evolve their sound they wouldn’t have survived, and I think some evolution is important but I don’t know that an outright complete genre switch is necessary for them to remain successful. Youngblood was a change from their punk pop roots, which we embraced and it was good but it was different. Why they felt the need to entirely shift from that seems so strange to me, and almost unnecessary? Maybe they are having an identity crisis. Even if they had stayed pop punk forever I think they would have been fine. As you mentioned the fanbase was always so strong behind them and a lot of the fans will blindly buy whatever they put out. I’m glad we got YB, I don’t understand why they could have just evolved form their rather than doing whatever the hell they did. Overall, I agree with a lot of what you had to say. And if also like to add I miss the punk vibe and the damn lip ring, grumble.

[robedisimo]

Re-view review: Prometheus [FULL SPOILERS]

[Disclaimer: this review is based on the Italian dub of the film. As such, all opinions on the quality of dialogues and acting are subjective and partial.

This is a film I did originally watch in a theatre, but at a time when this blog wasn’t yet up and running. This review is based both upon that first experience and a second viewing on home video.

The main reason I’m doing this is to avoid spending half of my upcoming review of Alien: Covenant talking about this dud. Needless to say, spoilers ahoy. Let’s friggin’ go.]

“I guess it’s a good thing you can’t be disappointed”, says a wholly unlikeable and un-scientific scientist to a sociopathic robot roughly midway through Prometheus’s runtime. We are, unfortunately, human, and so we can’t claim that privilege.

When the first trailer for Prometheus came online, a good portion of the nerdsphere erupted in joy. It looked good, man. One lengthy and successful viral marketing campaign later, the actual film reached theatre screens and... it still looked awesome, but it felt pretty bad. “Disappointment” was the right word for it, considering that it came fifteen years after the last proper instalment in the Alien franchise – and twenty-six years after the last good one, for those of us counting.

Much of the point, of course, was that this film wasn’t really an Alien instalment at all. Despite beginning its life in the early 2000s as a story concept going by the title of Alien: Engineers, the final product was less of a direct prequel and more of a thematic and aesthetic cousin of the original franchise. That in and of itself would be a slight letdown for fans, but definitely not enough to file the movie away as a failure. But boy, did it get worse from there.

Simply put, Prometheus is a dumb film. It just is. And, as many times before – if you take anything away from my reviews let it be this – it’s mostly a matter of scripting. In this specific instance my woes have a first and last name: Damon Lindelof. The guy is perhaps most notorious as the co-creator and showrunner of Lost, for never writing an actually decent film in his entire career (the closest he ever got being Star Trek: Into Darkness, not exactly a ringing endorsement) and for being capable of making Brad Bird direct a bad movie (2015′s Tomorrowland).

Some noble soul on the Internet described Prometheus as “Alien vs. the idiots”. An apt descriptor, if not for the fact that there’s no Alien in sight; the other part, though, is entirely accurate: not one single decision made by the script, or indeed by the characters in it, is understandable, believable, or relatable. The participants in an unprecedented scientific mission involving two years of cryosleep are briefed about the mission’s objective after getting to their destination. A scientist removes his helmet simply because the atmosphere on an unknown planetoid suddenly registers as containing enough oxygen, without scanning for pathogens... and everyone else in his scientific crew shrugs and follows suit. The guy who brought drones actively 3D-mapping the structure he’s in gets lost. A biologist decides to touch an unknown, blatantly hostile alien creature rising from Ominous Goo™. People earnestly seem to believe that running alongside the trajectory of a vertical object toppling in your direction is a better idea than stepping aside and watch it roll over. And more.

It’s all just a grievous betrayal of what the franchise used to stand for. The Ripley in the original Alien was a sensible, rule-adhering person who constantly pointed out the risky decisions made by her teammates; James Cameron’s Aliens actively subverted clichés by painting its space marines as competent and battle-efficient, which only heightened the terror of seeing them ruthlessly dispatched by the Xenomorph infestation. Of course a horror movie needs its characters to make a couple bad decisions in order to facilitate the plot: in a sane world everyone would just take a look around, say “nope”, and hop on the first rocket home. But Prometheus is one continuous, uninterrupted moment of idiocy on the part of its entire cast. It’s one thing to ask your audience for suspension of disbelief; it’s another to place a sign reading “you must be this dumb to ride” outside the theatre.

What’s worse, every single cringe-inducing moment in the script could’ve been handled in a way that made sense without altering one single story beat, and that’s even discounting all the elements of the script which simply don’t make any sense whatsoever. What was the point of the “watching dreams through a cruddy Photoshop filter” sequence? Why was the fact that Weyland is alive and on board the ship treated like a big plot twist, when it could’ve just as easily been transparent from the get-go? What does the useless character of Vickers gain from being “revealed” as Weyland’s daughter? And why oh why is Weyland played by Guy Pearce in make-up that would make Keir Dullea blush, instead of, I don’t know, an actually elderly actor?

Most of these questions have the same answer, of course: script tampering. As stated before, Prometheus was once Alien: Engineers, and that original script was the work of one Jon Spaihts, who you might know as the writer of Passengers (coincidences are weird) and co-writer of Marvel’s Doctor Strange. His original script was definitely less of an assault on common sense; for one thing, Weyland was overtly in charge of the expedition from the very beginning, without the need to keep his presence pointlessly secret from the crew. As for his casting, I can only assume that at some point the character was supposed to show up as his younger self, either through flashbacks – as indeed he did in a promotional pre-release video – or some more contrived plot tomfoolery. Either way, it’s awkward.

Then Lindelof came on board and, well, did his thing, which left me to wonder whether his portrayal of scientists was informed by some hidden grudge on his part: was he bullied by science majors for attending film school? Is he a secret Scientologist with an agenda to make the bad eggheads look stupid? We may never know. Luckily for us, unlike some other guy I could mention – and if you find it strange that most of my script-related grievances keep being aimed at Fox productions... sue me, I guess – he seems to have a trend of blowing it once and not being offered the job back: Alien: Covenant is in the more capable hands of John Logan, which gives me a smidgen more hope for it.

I don’t want this review to be all complaints, so let’s briefly go over what’s good about the movie. For one thing, the cast is pretty neat: Michael Fassbender obviously steals the show as the passive-aggressive android David, and Noomi Rapace gives a suitably distressed performance throughout, doing her best with the dialogue she was given. As to Charlize Theron and Idris Elba, I can only say that the amount of talent involved in this film definitely exceeds what it was worth.

In addition, the plot isn’t all bad. Prometheus does manage to deliver a couple good horror moments; it’s all rather seen-before, but the harrowing C-section sequence briefly brings the franchise back to its shocking “sexual horror” roots, easily positioning itself as the most memorable scene in the whole affair.

And lastly, Ridley Scott’s direction can hardly be described by an adjective other than “pristine”. While I don’t always appreciate his movies, I’m constantly amazed by how Scott’s directorial style keeps updating itself: far from being an obsolescent has-been, he keeps cranking out features that could easily pass for something made by a young, emergent filmmaker. So I’ll say this: just as those first trailers suggested, Prometheus is an often gorgeous movie, absolutely dripping with visual atmosphere.

Is that enough to redeem it? Hell, no. This was a mediocre movie, and we deserved better given what we were promised. Let’s hope Covenant can deliver something more substantial, and maybe – by answering some of the many questions Prometheus left open – make its predecessor slightly better in hindsight. The last good Alien film was now thirty-one years ago.

[Verdict: MIXED TO NEGATIVE]