@B0bduh

Bobduh

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I had a frustrating day at work. It's more clear to me every day that this career isn't the one for me long-term, but nothing I enjoy doing pays much and I'm not good enough to make a career of it anyway. I'm sorry, not sure what I'm looking for here, I just can't really talk to anyone about this.

Sorry to hear that! I wish you luck finding work you find more satisfying. Here's Chaika.
I had a frustrating day at work Its more clear to me every day that this career
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Liked by: Arjuna Chatrathi Eelz Malcolm Loo Wei-Ning Chen

Iv been rewatching Monogatari 2nd season this last week and was curious what your favorite arcs where in that season?

The first, third, and fifth. And Kanbaru's, if that counts. Basically all the non-Mayoi/Shinobu ones.

So! What is it about Gunnerkrigg that drew you to it?

I started reading it back when I read a good fifty or so webcomics, and at least knew of all the major ones. Since then I've almost entirely stopped reading them, but Gunnerkrigg is fantastic - just really, really high quality fantasy with a rich cast of characters.

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Hey bobduh, hope you're looking forward to buy-the-LN cliffhanger for Oregairu!

Sounds good! I feel like the show's already said what it needs to say at this point, anyway.
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Liked by: William Kaufmann

Could you explain what your reaction to this article was? http://www.elledecor.com/life-culture/a7367/i-made-a-huge-sacrifice-to-buy-my-home/

Disbelief followed by disgust and a kind of existential sadness, ending in a kind of helpless, "might as well" laughter.
It feels like an article you might read in class in two hundred years, to explain the decadence within America's 1% that helped prompt the revolution. It's like it was written by someone in a political cartoon who's represented as a literal fat cat.
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Liked by: Anime GX Rose Bridges Gordon Heath Eelz Arjuna Chatrathi

Will you be joining anitwitter in suddenly deciding to watch Symphogear? Please say no Bob I want at least you and Sohum to remain pure.

Sophia
I'd honestly like to, but I don't really have time to watch it before preview week, and I'm already watching several other shows anyway.

Have you considered making ebooks of essays that ANN might not necessarily pay you for? I know I would be willing to pay to read an indepth analysis on Madoka by you. :)

That unfortunately would probably not work out time/cost-wise. But I'm hoping to add the option for people to basically fund specific show writeups to the site very soon.

Hey Bob, when are you next planning on streaming?

Not exactly sure yet. I think I'll be busy both Thursday and Friday night, so possibly Saturday, but I need to solidify my schedule first.

Did you like Interstellar? I had some problems with it, but it still really choked me up

I loved it. It's my favorite of his films, I think.

Do you think Christopher Nolan is a conservative person?

He seems really super into individualism and the importance of Great Men and all that jazz, at least. That combined with the messages of The Dark Knight makes it seem likely he holds a fair number of conservative values.

about your earlier answer with Reggie and Wind Waker, how do you distinguish between "base level of feedback" and meaningful critiques that you can use to better your craft?

It's tough! On the internet, most feedback will not be useful, but some will be. Generally it's easy enough to immediately discard any of the stuff that's sent in all caps or accompanied by insults or whatnot, but from there, you have to basically use your judgment, try not to let things get to you, and keep in mind that everyone's coming to your work with their own expectations and desires. The best thing to do is to seek criticism in places where people are actually invested in helping you, be that forums where people critique each others' writing or just other consistent writers in general. But quality of advice is always an issue, so you really have to work to be your own critic first, reading work you admire and pushing yourself to improve.

Would the Joker from The Dark Knight classify for what you talked about with the other asker? I've heard the term "force of nature villain" or something like that before, where the reason is that the villain is supposed to represent one specific "anti" against the protagonist (Joker = Chaos?)?

"Force of nature villain" is a good way to describe the Joker from The Dark Knight. He basically represents unknowable, nonnegotiable Evil - as the movie itself says, he's someone who just wants to watch the world burn. The Joker's repeated "know how I got these scars?" refrain is basically a grim joke where the punchline is the idea of "knowing your enemies as people" altogether. The Dark Knight posits a world where there's no way you could ever come to peace with your enemies, and asks "how do we maintain our values as a society in light of that?" And the answer the movie arrives at is "we don't - we let the Batman take the guilt of our sins, and merely /pretend/ we uphold our stated values."
This is a bit complicated by the importance the movie places on both faith in others and faith in symbols, along with the people on the boats refusing to play into the Joker's plan (implying he's not reflective of anything fundamentally true of human nature, he's just one terrible person). But the movie overall has a pretty conservative and pro-surveillance-society message, which is kind of appropriate for a hero as fundamentally conservative as Batman.
This got a little off track. Anyway, yeah, I think the Joker is a good example of a villain who's intentionally inhuman for a specific thematic purpose.

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Liked by: Jonathan T Arjuna Chatrathi Eelz Anime GX KitKatAddiction Vaynonym

How about Kaiki, and Kumagawa? (Not sure if you've read Medaka Hox or not) They're pretty evil-for-the-sake-of-evil and fun to watch because of it, but they also feel like pretty human characters to me

Haven't read Medaka Box, but Kaiki's actually a full person - he just puts up a front. The nice thing about Kaiki is that both the front and the person behind it are pretty damn compelling.
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Liked by: DIGITAL@MUGI Bob Sagget

Would do you think of one-dimensional, evil-for-the-sake-of evil but charismatic and entertaining to watch villains like Dio and Gilgamesh?

Obviously, characters like that aren't "good character writing" in the strict traditional sense, where characters are constructed out of understandable human motivations. The reasons traditional "good character writing" are encouraged are very understandable and generally relevant ones - the road to investment in a character, and further road to insight and human truth gained /through/ that character, generally requires the character to feel "real" in some way. This doesn't require them to speak like a human would speak, but it tends to require them to feel like a human would feel. Villains that feel like real people can demonstrate the ambiguity in all of us, and make for stories full of rich conflicts and ideas that prompt questions in the viewer long after they've finished.
Some stories don't give a fuck about this. Some stories just want to have FUN.
In the context of a story where you're supposed to actually take everything seriously, characters like Dio or Gilgamesh don't tend to be appropriate. They're "cartoon characters" in the way that's normally applied as a pejorative - characters that feel absurd and larger-than-life, who actively challenge the seriousness of their surroundings, who LOVE EVIL. Few people in real life love evil, but characters who straight-up know they're villains can be a lot of fun to be around. They just require a context that makes them appropriate, and a story with goals that don't require the universe to be a grounded place full of difficult questions.
JoJo is exactly this world - it's certainly possible to feel invested in its characters, but almost no-one feels like a real person, and the conflict is always larger than life. Fate doesn't really /want/ to be that world (and Gil is likely intended to be more a representation of a narrow philosophy than an absurd cackling villain), but it kind of becomes that unintentionally. And just like in a bad movie that's taking itself too seriously, in that situation, a villain who's really having fun with their role can easily become the life of the party.

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Liked by: Arjuna Chatrathi Anime GX Adam Wednesdays Vaynonym Rose Bridges

What do you think about euphonium's voice acting? I think I'm falling in love with Kumiko's Voice actress, she portrayed the character so well, makes the character's personality and development more apparent.

Yeah, Kumiko is one of the most clear standout performances I've heard in a long, long time. So much of her personality comes down to that really specific delivery.

What do you think about Reggie's Wind Waker comments?

I think it demonstrated a surprising amount of candor in admitting the obviously true but awkward-to-admit fact that certain loud fans will always complain about basically everything, particularly when it comes to videogames, where it seems like there's an expectation of your specific needs being met by every decision a company (or reviewer, for that matter) makes.
I'm not sure if this is something that's gotten worse as internet culture has evolved and creator-fan barriers have lessened, or if it's just something I only now have perspective on because I'm in a position where the things I create get feedback, but it's basically a fact of creation that everything you make will be The Worst Thing Ever to some people, and you can't try to cater to and resolve that, because it's just a base level of feedback that will always exist regardless of what decision you actually make. Reggie saying "wait and see" would be the most standard answer; him saying "wait and see, we're used to you guys pulling this trick" is actually kinda refreshing.

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Liked by: Arjuna Chatrathi Kittykatstar Nyaung-chi Tiago Coutinho

Speaking of Album albums, have you ever listened to "We don't have each other" by Aaron West and the roaring twenties? It's a concept album about a guy going through a divorce, and I've never heard such a powerful emotional core to an album. Also, it has "Going To Georgia" on it. So yay.

I haven't, but it sounds like my sort of thing, so I'll check it out!

Was there anything you disliked about Inside Out? Aside from the opening short, of course?

Vague structural spoilers ahead, I guess?
I didn't like how the final trip back to headquarters was basically a pure plot solution, just a silly trick that didn't really build off what the characters had learned. Most of the film's turns worked on both a narrative and thematic/emotional level, but that one was just a plot solution. I also didn't like how so much of the growth was constrained to Joy specifically, to the point where she eventually just told Sadness she was okay. Some of the gags also weren't the best.

So by "Album album" you mean like a rock opera but in any genre?

Sort of. There are albums that are really nicely and purposefully sequenced that aren't necessarily all one specific story, too.

What are "Album albums"? An album dealing with themes in a similar manner like usually stories do?

An album that's intended to work as a cohesive whole, as opposed to just being a collection of songs.

I always liked (and loved some) of the music you posted so far, so what album can you recommend of mewithoutYou?

Their most accessible one is probably Ten Stories, which is just a great album all-around, particularly if you're big into lyrics and "album albums." If you like that, I'd check out Brother, Sister and Catch for Us the Foxes.

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