This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
fleb: We have a page for the four Burton and Joel Batman movies, just FYI.
Kilyle: I dunno, I remember liking this movie. The only thing I came away growling over was "They turned Robin into a punk!!"... and even that might be me not being familiar with the Robin(s) of the comic books. (This does assume I'm thinking of the correct movie, though.)
Rebochan: I took out the defense. Seriously, this movie is rarely defended and it's not just comic nerdrage that damns it. In fact, it's one of the rare cases where comic fans, the moviegoing public, and professional film critics all agree. If even The Other Wiki won't defend this movie, why should TV Tropes? :)
Ethereal Mutation: Wikipedia isn't about "defending" anything. They delete pretty much all unsourced opinions (and most sourced opinions, for that matter) and that page regularly gets "IT'S SO SHITTY" type comments purged from it. You'll notice that they do not make any (lasting) direct comment about quality anywhere on the site.
The film is just the usual hundred million dollar turkey. For all its failings (none of which are anywhere close to what people make it out to be), it offers good production values and a fairly brainless level of entertainment. It does what it sets out to do: offer a couple hours of eye and ear candy. People make fun of Batman and Robin because it's an easy target. Camp is always easy to make fun of and the film does represent an unpopular tonal change (although one has to realize that they were reacting to the major success of Batman Forever, not going against the wishes of the viewing public). Suggesting that it has "no fanbase" or that the "moviegoing public" didn't like it are both false. Even outside of the "unwashed masses" (which just results in a No True Scotsman fallacy of elitism), there are people that enjoy the film for being So Bad, It's Good. Hell, many of the most vocal "I HATE THIS FILM" anti-fans are part of that very same group and are just playing a metagame of sorts (what element can have its negative be accentuated today?). Even after the opening weekend grace period, the film still drew in a regular stream of watchers, sold well on home video, and still gets decent enough ratings on TV to be on many cycles. For all the chest beating on how "nobody" likes it, it certainly is pretty successful.
I can name a thousand shittier action films than Batman And Robin. I can find a thousand stories dumber than it. I can find much bigger wastes of large budgets (hell... remember the pseudo-classic film Cleopatra? That was the dumbest financial mistake of all time). Like most of the other "worst whatever ever", it is nowhere near the worst and mostly just gets the treatment because it's an interesting story (nobody gives a fuck about the latest Troma shovelware).
Anyway, I'm going to just clean up the article as per Complaining About Shows You Dont Like.
Rebochan: Few things:
1. The Tonal Shift was complained about in Batman Forever, but it was somewhat excused because it came on the heels of Batman Returns, which most people agreed was too over the top dark and seriously needed reigning in. They had expected a sequel would have found a better balance between the two. Batman and Robin, instead, shifted the tone beyond Batman Forever and pushed the movie straight into caricature.
2. I can in fact prove there is a strong established critical backlash against the film. The original films were not critical darlings, but contemporary reviews at the time show a much more seriously critical bent against it than the previous three.
3. Nobody has ever argued that the film was not successful (though as the article correctly notes, its massive overhead killed its profit), but it's serious failings as a franchise entry are objective fact. Warner Bros. did cancel production on a 4th film, Joel Schumacher still complains that he can't get work because of it, and George Clooney still complains about how much he hated making it. That's not the evil fans. Those are the people who had to deal with the backlash from inside the industry itself.
4. Yes there were bigger flops and easily worse films. That doesn't by its nature make Batman and Robin a good movie, it just makes it not as bad as Plan Nine. And I have seen Plan 9, I can attest it is far worse than Batman and Robin and between the two, I'd take Batman and Robin. And in fact...I'm amazed Plan 9 has no tropes page considered it's far more notorious and it's still regularly far ahead of Batman and Robin on the "Worst Movies of All Time" list.
5. Adding a bunch of comments that are just TakeThats to the film's detractors isn't any better than adding even more TakeThats about the film. So I'm going to try to clean some of those up.
fleb: Hell, all you need to do to prove the critical backlash is link to Rotten Tomatoes.
It's almost as reviled as Warriors of Virtue.
As for "Complaining About Shows You Dont Like"... There's nothing wrong with snarking on Snark Bait. When it's not funny at all, then it has to go.
Rebochan: Because I said this in the edit history, I felt I should cite it - yes, TheOtherWiki
does include an entry for Batman and Robin on their "Worst Movies Of A Ll Time" category. A category with extremely high standards that requires significant outside sources to consider inclusion. As long as the statement that "this movie appears on lists of worst movies of all time" is kept to that simple fact, we are not endorsing an opinion. Our Plan 9 page flat out declares it the worst movie of all time for exactly the same reason.
fleb: About the Edit War: I don't see why it shouldn't be in the main text.
Ethereal Mutation: It forces an opinion and tone on the article and is just flat out complaining. I get the point that you don't like the movie. Forcing it as the primary tone of the article does nothing but make the site look like anybody's personal soapbox so long as they're willing to engage in an Edit War.
Rebochan: We're not "forcing" an opinion - there is a legitimate documented issue that critics hated, hated, HATED this movie and it does appear on Worst Movie Of All Time lists. It's not a personal soapbox unless the intro discusses *our* opinions on it - and for what it's worth, the intro keeps getting slanted towards "People hate this poor innocent film for no reason", so I think the soapboxing has been going on for awhile. Should we start taking out references to this same issue in the Plan 9 article? And for balance, I guess we'd better not suggest that Citizen Kane is considered the greatest film of all time - can't have people forced into thinking it was a good movie! We've already got several tropes that point out how much Snark Bait, Hatedom, and simple follow-the-leader hate gets piled on the film.
Ethereal Mutation: There's a difference between acknowledging that a lot of people hate the film and basically flat out stating such opinion is correct. Putting "and is a frequent appearance on worst ever lists" in the opening paragraph as opposed to trope list(/trivia section) basically says "TV Topes and everybody associated with it believes it belongs on the lists". You don't see the same claim made on the pages for Twilight, Ctrl Alt Del, or other Snark Bait even if they most likely do appear on such lists. (Just as an aside, Plan Nine From Outer Space is a bad example because the whole point behind the film is that it's gloriously bad. There isn't a single person in the last thirty years outside of random channel surfers and prank victims that watched it not knowing this ahead of time and every promotional piece right down to its box art celebrates its awfulness. Saying it's bad is an accurate assessment of why people watch it, not just usual complaining.)
fleb: Where in that sentence fragment you keep cutting does it say that the opinion is correct?
Twilight and Ctrl Alt Del have no noticeably frequent appearance on equivalent "worst X ever" lists. In the first place there aren't nearly so many such lists for trashiest books / worst webcomics as there are "worst films ever" lists. They're noted as being critically panned. That's a fact, and isn't endorsing the panning. And there isn't even something inherently wrong with editorializing in an article here in the first place.
Ethereal Mutation: The thesis statement is the part at the end of the first paragraph that sums up what you want people to get from the article. In this case, you want people to be aware that the film appears on "worst ever lists" without any explanation of how or why. You seem aware of it since you keep editing it back in for the front and center "proof" that this film is completely and utterly unredeemable as opposed to any normal big budget turkey. Honestly, the intent is pretty transparent since every edit has been to remove anything but the "hate this" viewpoint (if at least without a totally blatant bitter fan vibe, I'll admit). But hey, fuck it, doesn't seem like either of us is going to budge, so Edit War ahoy. Let's see if we can get more edits than Magnificant Bastard.
Also, editorializing is easily the single most controversial aspect of the Wiki and the single leading cause of natter, flame wars, edit wars, and other nastiness. Articles get rewritten and cut all the time because of editorializing and the forums have a lot of discussion on the topic. The informal rule is "when something is controversial, neutral is better", something that a glance at both above mentioned pages shows.
Rebochan: The thesis statement? This isn't an essay, this is a Wiki article! The introduction isn't written to support anything, it just gives a bite-sized chunk of information on the trope or film. My beef is that it doesn't matter if this really is the worst film of all time or not, the film was received badly, there are citations for this out the yin-yang, and you're bound and determined to somehow force this article to follow your personal opinion alone even when it flies into the face of how the film is perceived.
And I'm sorry, if you actually think a frickin' Edit War is the best way to resolve this, then just submit the page for cutting - apparently you think anything negative needs to go, so Cut List away. If anyone is being transparent here, it's you for constantly trolling people through this page.
Ethereal Mutation: I find your usage of the word "troll" amusing. Obviously, it's just an ad hominem attack since we both know neither of us are trolls, but to an uninvolved person, it's the person violating Complaining About Shows You Dont Like and Rule Of Cautious Editing Judgment through overly emotional, confrontational personal attacks and blanket statements calling the neutral person striving for a balanced and unbiased look on fiction a "troll".
Anyway, I don't want an Edit War, but this is a debate between neutrality of articles for the respectability of the Wiki versus anti-fans soapboxing their hatred. It would be irresponsible of me to ignore this article, yet it seems that anything not declaring the film as the worst piece of crap ever created by mankind is a blight to the people that hate it, so an edit war seems inevitable. It's not even like I'm trying to make the article positive; only accurate outside of the viewpoint of the Hatedom. At least it's only three people; Ctrl Alt Del has to deal with 4chan Drive By Editors and Twilight is almost entirely Fan Haters.
fleb: Describing the popular opinion of the movie without comment is about as neutral as you can get. Besides, there hasn't been a single neutral edit to this page since its creation; just a mix of information, anti-movie sentiment, and movie-apologist sentiment.
But seriously, what is wrong with stating that this movie appears on (pandering, no doubt) "worst film ever" lists? "It's the thesis statement" makes no sense as an objection. Like Rebochan said. There is no thesis statement. The movie's best-known for being hated, deservedly so or not, so the first paragraph mentions the hate up front; the hate-pandering lists are the ultimate demonstration of that and work to give the reader a good idea of the scope of the hate. Besides, the words' rhythm just flows better that way.
Ugh, as to the contested Quality by Popular Vote entry: It's kind of redundant to mention that the lists aren't the ultimate litmus of quality, isn't it? Since it's a Quality by Popular Vote entry. Meaning "This thing described here is dumb and it should feel dumb."
Rebochan: If you check my edit history, I've been quite fair to this film - I just won't omit any mention of the well-recorded fact that this film is not considered a good film in the popular consciousness and there's real evidence to back that up than just an angry legion of fanboys. Pointing this out in a neutral manner is not "forcing" this to be a negative article. As I said before, other "bad" movies get the same treatment, but only because there is an actual barometer to judge this on - critical consensus, monetary failure, verifiable fan backlash (a trick beast). Something like Ctrl Alt Del and Twilight has a much more divisive base, but there are actually a lot of fans of those works and they received mixed feedback and actually turn a profit. Batman And Robin has no fans and turned no profit - the studio abandoned it and left Schumacher out to dry for it. There definitely are worse films than this, but it doesn't stop it from appearing on "worst of" lists, nor does it suddenly become a good movie. Though I would personally like to see more activity on the Plan 9 page, something I intend to rectify since that actually is "The worst movie of all time".
I'd also like to point out that noting that this film fails to do something is not in and of itself biased or non-neutral. Saying "This film is a piece of shit" is biased and non-constructive, and has no place on this site. Saying "This film is not well-received" when you can point to numerous examples of this being factually correct is not. Since this film is known more for it's reputation, taking that out of the article is unfair. At least in the case of Ctrl Alt Del and Twilight, there's some actual controversy where both entities have large fanbases as well. The other two pages also experience high trolling - having tried to wade through the Ctrl Alt Del page, this page was nothing until the Take Thats started up against the film's detractors.
Ethereal Mutation: I'll be fair, the mention of all attempts to kill positivity is directed at fleb (who even changed individual Weasel Words to make the article more negative). Anyway, the article does use a traditional essay format in its introduction regardless of whether or not it's meant to be academia and it's pretty clear the first paragraph is where the primary message should be communicated. The appearance on "worst ever lists" really shouldn't be there and certainly not without the mention that such lists suffer heavily from Small Reference Pools and are just looking for well-known turkeys that their audience will recognize and maybe have even seen (after all, most casual readers would find a list with ultra-obscure entries like Monster A Go-Go boring). For comparison sake, it's not even close to the cutoff for the IMDb bottom 100. Simply saying it as is at the end of the first paragraph is not being entirely true and also gives a tone of approval in that direction.
The whole point of neutrality is to present all the perspectives without actively endorsing any particular one. What is essentially being done here is the censorship of anything not conforming to the Hatedom's viewpoint. There does exist plenty of perspective both on- and off-site that holds the film as not nearly as bad as the fandom perceives (which is not the same as thinking the movie is "good") and dismissing it because one does not agree with it is not a valid reason.
Also, the film really didn't get anywhere near as negative a reaction amongst the mainstream as it did with critics/fans. Average filmgoers found it forgettable in the same sense that Full House is forgettable; not anything that's really worth going out of their way to watch but not actively rebelled against should it show up on TV or be available at the local library, either. Basically, average. And there's also the fact that amongst the target demographic (pre-teen boys... not geeks), the film received an above average (if unexceptional) reception. It's easy to forget about the mainstream on a site which has seventeen times more references to a [[Warhammer40k niche tabletop game]] than American Idol, but being the "unwashed masses" or not a "true fan" or whatever doesn't make their opinion completely moot (if fact, studios care a lot more about them than the fans).
It's probably also worth mentioning that most of the critics were guaranteed to pan it before a single frame was shown due to superhero movies being an acceptable target and many of the more level headed and respected critics (including none other than Roger Ebert) gave it middling marks. Hell, Leonard Maltin rated it higher than Batman Returns and gave it the same star rating as the original film.
For the sake of completion, the article should offer a concise description of all the viewpoints and reactions without endorsing any of them specifically. Even the Batman Wiki (presumably run by Batman fans, for Batman fans) is more neutral about the film than this article. TV Tropes is neither a fansite nor a soapbox and informal style doesn't mean License To Whine.
Rebochan: The variety of viewpoints on Batman and Robin consist entirely of "This movie is awful" and "This movie isn't really as bad as other bad movies." The article does reflect this, especially in the Snark Bait, Hatedom, and the So Bad, It's Good entry I added because I actually do feel that way about the film. And seriously, most worst-ever lists have small reference pools - Monster A-Go-Go is ten million times worse than this movie, but it's notoriety is mostly because it was an MST 3 K target. Plan 9 is famous for being bad because its famous for being bad (though it definitely deserves it) at this point in time. There are much worse movies than either of those films that are just completely forgotten except by the true die-hard cinema buffs. Plus, unlike *good* movies, there's not really a respectable "serious" organization dedicated to immortalizing terrible movies. The closest are the Golden Turkey Awards and the Razzies, both of which are very informal and tend to pick films with more public awareness (and they both ripped on Batman And Robin).
Neutrality does not mean minimizing one perspective so that both become equal. Then again, TV Tropes and "neutrality" aren't that compatible when we have so many subjective tropes and the entire wiki runs on popular consensus. The Citizen Kane article only describes the movie's reputation as the greatest movie of all time in the introduction and most of the tropes praise it - the ones that discuss people who don't like it are grouped under things like Hype Backlash. It's no different for a film like this where most people just plain hate it.
The Quality by Popular Vote entry also notes that Batman And Robin shows up more because people know about it, and when neutral, points out that its more common on superhero lists. This is neutral. Attempting to portray lists that describe this film as bad as not meaning much? That is not neutral.
As far as actual critics, they may normally hate superhero films, but we do have ways of determining that Batman And Robin was a particularly loathed film compared to other films. They also don't naturally hate superhero films - the first two Superman movies were well received, as was the first Batman film, and more recently, The Dark Knight Trilogy has scored well along with the first two Spider-Man films and Iron Man. Oh, and for what it's worth, Leonard Maltin gave the film 2 and a half stars - he rarely goes lower than 2, even for movies he's trashed more than this one.
Regarding filmgoers, most normal people treat movies they didn't like with a resounding "Meh" - it's only geeks that care about them. But they did react badly to this one and we can see that from the lack of profits and the studios concern over sharp box office drops that the bad reaction from fans was likely mirrored by the average people that just didn't like *this* movie. By the way, pre-teen boys are not the target demographic of Batman - they're all PG-13, for crying out loud. The target demographic was the summer blockbuster audience, which is mostly families (hence the sudden shift with Batman Forever to make them less macabre after that demographic responded badly to Batman Returns). That's the crowd that didn't make this movie profitable or viable for another franchise. Beyond what evidence I can gather that is objective, I'd have to resort to anecdote, which is not worth much.
By the way, Full House is hated by geeks. It was actually very successful, unlike Batman And Robin. I also googled for "The Batman Wiki". This is a neutral article but it still spends more time talking about how much everyone hated the movie.
fleb: Nothing to add to that, except that: E.M., you're no more neutral than I am. There's no Neutrality High Ground here. Saying "it's not that bad! People who say so are just mindless haters" is just as much an opinion as "oh, it's bad." E.g., reverting your changing the word "horrible" to "bad" wasn't any more non-neutral than your changing the word in the first place.It is a ridiculously small change though, so fine, the word can stay "bad." (But what Weasel Words? Don't recall those.)
(almost two weeks later: if this is over I'll just switch it back again. This page is in no way essay-like.)
Ethereal Mutation: The article is fine now. It contains all of the relevant information without forcing an opinion in any particular direction. There's also the recently added review section of the Wiki where you can say pretty much anything you want without it appearing as though the whole site believes it, so the article itself is not the place to make statements (indirect or otherwise) about its quality.
fleb: It's not even... it wouldn't be forcing... No.
Rebochan: And yet you still keep changing the Quality by Popular Vote entry to slam people who didn't like the movie.
Ethereal Mutation: Saying that something is part of a small reference pool of recognizable bad movies for the mainstream publications to draw from is not an insult. The only way to consider it as such is to take offense at the possibility that its inclusion on lists is often fueled by something other than a serious belief of its placement.
Rebochan: Using your own arguments, suggesting that the lists have small reference pools is introducing an opinion that they are not "real" lists, hence Weasel Words.
fleb: Aren't you going to respond to anything that was said earlier? The lists are relevant to give a very quick sense of the scope of the hate, explained more in depth in the last paragraph. The first paragraph just sounds better that way. No opinion is being forced; it's just a commentary about the long-lasting impression on geeks(who are the ones who make the "worst X ever" lists) it had.
(on the new edits:) The new opening paragraph is an exercise in almost deceptive understatement. And wasn't the original "negatively charged" para the one you wrote when you started the article?
Rebochan: I put the line back again. Three...two...one....
Ethereal Mutation: What is there really to discuss? Both sides have been stated to their furthest extent, neither is going to accept the other, and the only thing that continued discussion will yield is a contest over who can best use the Chewbacca Defense.
The motives of the pro-"worst ever list" are pretty transparently "I want this article to be proof of crappiness", since there is no loss in information in having it three quarters of the page down as opposed to the kicker of the opening paragraph but there is a definite change in tone. The censorship of anything that offers a perspective that these lists have a specific creation rationale comes across more as "do not question the lists" than anything else. No compelling reason why the article should be negative on a site that is dedicated to chronicling storytelling conventions without bias have been given or likely will be.
My side is of anti-Complaining, anti-Natter, Rule Of Cautious Editing Judgment following that goes by the philosophy that being clever and being opinionated are completely separate concepts and an article should not play to the agenda of any one specific viewpoint. In essence, the sort of thing that would mean one can't refer to the article and say "it has a page because it sucks so much".
So, the page shall become Schrodinger's Article. I doubt you'll decide the article should be neutral and make observations instead of implications, I certainly won't allow it to be negative, so it shall be an endless Edit War until an administrator is called. Personally, I'll leave that step up to you since it would be a bit more ironic (in the real definition of the word) if the side that would inevitably lose in administrator fiat is the one to call it in.
In the meantime, once again, there is a review section. One can say pretty much whatever they want, how they want it, and it doesn't come across as TV Tropes sponsoring the opinion. Just the author of the text as listed above.
Rebochan: And you seem to fail to grasp that facts are facts and we can't rewrite the wiki to remove them just because they may not all be positive. As I have said multiple times, are you planning on rewriting the Plan 9 article? And the Citizen Kane article? This isn't Wikipedia, this isn't an academic thesis, this is TV Tropes. You're just as willing to toss around accusations, Weasel Words, and negativity when it suits you, then accuse us of the same.
fleb: That is not what your side is. You haven't been making it neutral, you're just neutering it. You consistently edit the article to be biased towards your own point of view by downplaying the kinda important fact that pretty much everyone (who isn't you) who has ever had an opinion on this movie loathes it. Touting a tiny, tiny, tiny minority view as even being on an equal footing, let alone 'neutral' (do we have that here?) is incredibly dishonest. Your side isn't the neutral side. It's the stick-your-fingers-in-your-ears-while-sitting-in-a-cave-on-Mars (for the last decade) side.
(And way to read waaay too much into what other people are thinking, there.)
Fast Eddie: A lot of discussion about people's opinion of the movie. Those opinions should be in Reviews, not the article. It wouldn't be disappointing if the article was reduced down to one or two lines. The main attraction here is the "provides examples of" list.
Rebochan: I just feel that just as the Citizen Kane article points out it's considered the greatest movie of all time, just as the Plan 9 article points out its considered the worst movie of all time, that sticking to the objective fact that the movie got a piss-poor reaction and is considered a terrible film without going "This film is the suckiest piece of suck that ever sucked" is not opinion. The current version of the article seems to be trying to hide the impression of the film. Shall I start editing those other articles to remove those facts as well?
fleb: Yeah. This was never about declaring an opinion of the film; just describing the popular opinion. Which wouldn't even fit into a review, which is for the declaring. There is seriously no endorsement or hidden agenda to 'prove' anything going on. Ethereal Mutation, it would be super-special-awesome if you could show the same restraint from editing I and Rebochan showed during the week we were actually talking to each other about this. Even if the conversation is going in circles, reverting without comment is going nowhere.
Rebochan: To Fast Eddie (assuming he hasn't fled screaming from the wild rantings), are you suggesting we cut the introduction down? Also, the main bones of contention are:
- Including the phrase "the film appears on several lists compiling the worst films of all time"
- Including negative opinions in the examples
- Whether Quality by Popular Vote is a Take That! if it diminishes the importance of the "worst films" lists in its entry.
...and yea, this has been going on in some fashion since December. God, we geeks really do have no lives.
Fast Eddie: I agree that life will continue in fairly good order if no resolution is found for the issues here. The movie has killed very few people — possibly even no-one — in the twelve or more years since its release. ;-) Can't cover the tropiness of the film, though, without at least noting that it is used by some as an enduring example of badness. // Not sure it is possible to diminish the importance of a "worst films" list.
Ethereal Mutation: The issue here isn't whether or not the hatred of the film is acknowledged, but how the whole article is being tinted in that direction. Having the trope entries for Hatedom and Snark Bait describe what makes the film infamous is acceptable, but basically making the article a soapbox for that perspective is very unprofessional.
Also, including opinion (good or bad) that is not an observation of others is just single person natter (e.g. the old Crowning Music Of Awesome entry). There isn't any special treatment here; I rewrite trope entries all the time to remove obvious gushing/complaining. That's been cleared away for the most part, though.
And it's still not a Take That! to simply acknowledge that a lot of its entries on "worst ever lists" is because it's a mainstream movie that still draws in quite a viewership. It never said that this is why it gets on all these lists; there are quite a few that genuinely believe it belongs. Mainstream magazines use it along with other reliable standbys such as Battlefield Earth and whatever is the latest high exposure flop of recent years because if they went with obscure films that next to none of their audience has even heard about, they'd just get complaints about people not being able to relate to the list and be stigmatized as geeky (don't forget that the mainstream still dislikes geeks). The only interpretation of snark here is the opinion that it belongs on every list regardless of whether or not the writer of said list was completely serious and not pandering to their audience.
Rebochan: Okay, first of all - have you ever seen Battlefield Earth? Yes, it's a high profile flop, but it's failures are not simply because of that. It's significantly worse than Batman And Robin. It can't even grasp basic filmmaking and cinematography, which even Batman And Robin can do (badly, but it does it). Second of all, as fleb has pointed out, there is no list of "bad movies" that isn't composed by geeks. The closest high-profile organization you're going to get is the Razzies and the Golden Turkeys, but your criteria seems to discount them entirely because they pick on high-profile films (and both beat the hell out of Batman And Robin). Bad movies generally have little profile whatsoever, because people forget about movies that are bad for the most part.
Second, as fleb has pointed out, this movie is not well-done and is well-known for it. Unfortunately, you can't force the entry to reflect a minority opinion. The movie is not "contested". The movie is not "polarizing". The movie is overwhelming considered, at its best, So Bad, It's Good. It has several objective standards to measure its hatred. This is not Wikipedia. This is not an academic paper. This is TVTropes. The entire site is known for making value judgments of the material it covers. To demand that they reach some vague standard of neutrality is to go against the entire point of the site and its much cherished values of informality. And I may also point out that neutrality is not "Every side is represented equally". It's "every side is represented factually". Kind of like why you're not going to see articles on the Holocaust talking about the bright side of things.
Now that I've taken a discussion on the merits of Batman And Robin and compared it to Hitler, shall this ever rest? And Fast Eddie, you're awfully sure that I am not in fact the vengeful spirit of someone who died watching Batman And Robin.
fleb: TV Tropes, unprofessional? My gods. May we never see the day.
You've been saying it for a while, but how specifically is the article a soapbox or getting "tinted" (tilted?) in the direction of the evil, misguided masses of hatedom? 'Cause I fail to see the phantom menace here.
ETA: Hello? Ethereal? ...Bueller?
Rebochan: I think you have to edit the page before she comes roaring back.
Ethereal Mutation: I'm not the person you're trying to convince.
Anyway, neither Citizen Kane nor Plan Nine From Outer Space are good examples for comparison. Citizen Kane is mostly known because it is academia wank (Roger Ebert even said as much during his "obligatory mention" when somebody asked him what his favorite movie is) and Plan Nine From Outer Space, as mentioned, is mostly advertised for its total lack of production values. Neither is mainstream in the slightest (hell, I bet more people would rather see Batman and Robin than Citizen Kane... Lowest Common Demoninator, after all). Batman and Robin is a mainstream film (125 million dollars is not put into a project exclusively for geeks), still more widely seen and discussed than many other action films from the same time period (when was the last time The Peacemaker came up in a conversation?), and still a pretty reliable cash source for the studio. Claiming the public completely rebelled against it is pretty far from the truth (public rebellion manifests itself in total unmitigated bombs like Gigli; not a nine digit gross) and despite how this site makes it seem, geeks are a very, very, very small group.
An example of a media page that doesn't push any agenda is Star Trek (a surprise, I'm sure). It doesn't preface it with some indirect quality statement such as "one of the most influential series ever" (even though it does have truth to it), doesn't make direct statements about its quality, doesn't try to portray any perception of it as inherently accurate, and is otherwise something that can be read by both average joe and geek alike. It is an example of an unbiased write up while still being pretty informal.
Anyway, your arguments pretty much imply "this site should be geek-exclusive" and "bias in write-ups are A-okay" (along with a sickening amount of ad hominem and shouting). Proclamations such as "all worst ever lists are written by geeks" (may or may not be the case depending on whether all magazine/website creators are declared "geeks", but even then, not even close to a majority are written for geeks and that's the whole point behind the observation) and "this film has no fans" (if it has no fans, why is it still a good cash source?) are pretty empty statements. There isn't even anything "fun" in all the edits; just a vindictive attitude against the film and a desire for the page to reflect that from start to finish. The Hatedom perspective should be reflected and limited to the Hatedom trope listing (it's not even like more than four or five lines are "needed" to communicate the film is unpopular amongst fans and going much over that verges into Author Tract Complaining territory). Again, the article is not a review and there already is a section where one can say pretty much anything they want.
As far as Battlefield Earth is concerned; I haven't actually seen it (although it seems pretty far from the bottom of the barrel judging by the obsessiveness of its Hatedom), but nearly all "worst lists" that include it rail against it for being an infamous vanity project and its association with the Church of Scientology as opposed to its film making credentials. It, also, is a genuine example of the sort of mainstream backlash as mentioned earlier (it had a pretty tiny budget for a summer blockbuster and didn't even make that back).
fleb: ...Yes, the vocal-ness of a hatedom is clearly a great barometer of how great a movie is. The only reason anyone could ever possibly be hating is because deep down they know they're wrong.
B&R getting so much attention or making money isn't evidence that it's not as bad as those other, forgotten movies; unlike them it was part of a huge franchise. One that had three successful recent movies to give it hype, hype that rapidly evaporated as word-of-mouth spread. The box office numbers had a steep curve.(<—That would be the public rebellion.) More people were unwittingly exposed to it than would have been if it were just another stand-alone movie, hence the legacy.
However it's making money now (DVD's and TV broadcasts?), that's hardly proof of non-zero fans. Fans form groups. Dads looking for a cheap DVD at Wal-Mart and people stoned and bored out of their minds watching FX on a Sunday afternoon aren't exactly fans.
There is no soapbox. There is no vindictiveness (bar vengeful spirits from beyond the grave). The current version The other version of the opening paragraph is a great, though rough and obviously highly, highly condensed description of where the movie came from and where it went. At least that writeup's a helluva lot more neutral than yours. (Have you considered, for just one second, that maybe we should talk before Edit Warring? It's kinda rude to just drop the conversation and only come back to start reverting.)
*/utter, utter wikigeekery* So... how was your weekend?
Rebochan: From the Star Trek introduction:
"As a long-running and highly popular franchise, Star Trek is one of largest Trope Makers on television, especially the original series, and it remains one of the canonical examples of Sci Fi in the minds of the general public."
If that's not a value judgment, I don't know what is.
The popularity of those other films I pointed out is irrelevant to my argument. Both pages still point out that they are, objectively, considered the greatest film of all time and the worst film of all time. This is objective fact. Whether they *are* the greatest and worst films of all time is left up in the air (Citizen Kane even has a note about the contested nature of that title). It is objective fact that Batman And Robin is a movie with a poor reception, a bad reputation, and a tendency to show up on lists compiling the worst movies of all time. For goodness sake, the DVD release of it had a director's commentary that was actually apologizing for the movie.
I don't see how chronicling the objective fact that the film is loathed is any different from pointing out that Star Trek was so influential that it became the standard of science fiction in the eyes of the masses.
As for Battlefield Earth, any serious discussion of the film certainly discusses its Scientology and vanity project roots, but also never leaves out the bad writing, horrible set and costume design (the actors playing the Psyklos were on stilts and constantly had trouble walking), tilt-o-vision cinematography, bizarre filtering, wretched acting, and awful pacing. The first two elements are used to simply explain that the film was probably doomed from the get-go (as vanity projects with roots in ideology often are), but the latter elements doom it as it is. Regardless, it's not a good example of "Actually a good movie hated by it's evil Hatedom". I am amused that you seem to make the case that a movie having a Hatedom must make it a better movie by default.
I'm not sure who I have to convince here - the admin seems to be washing his hands of it and escaping before his mind is devoured by the insanity, and even he pointed out its impossible to discuss this film without pointing out the quality. So it's just you maintaining the Edit War for reasons unknown.
Ethereal Mutation: You neglect to mention that this assessment of Star Trek is after the lengthy description of the whole series and even then, it doesn't give any direct implication of its quality as opposed to popularity. Its placement doesn't draw attention towards this perception of the series over what the show actually strives to do. This is what the recent edit of this page strives for (just for your reference: Troperiffic does not mean "good". Tropes Are Neutral, after all). It still mentions that the film was not viewed very positively, but I guess anywhere but front and center is "too positive" or something.
Hatedoms target things that are interesting to write about and, more importantly, easy to watch over things that are really at the bottom of the quality scale. Boring cliche crap like Street Kings (which probably isn't anywhere close to "worst" anything, but is a good example, nonetheless) don't get hatedoms because they just don't have anything interesting to write about. A movie like Baby Geniuses doesn't get much attention at all even with a complete gold mine of Snark Bait for a concept because it genuinely makes one want to kill themselves. Again, you're reading meaning where none exists. I did not imply Battlefield Earth is a "good" movie; only that it's probably not a totally unwatchable one if it has 78 wicks and such detailed analysis of every little aspect of its production.
And it takes more than one to Edit War. Again, it doesn't help your argument to imply bad faith or pettiness. I'm not the one constantly trying to make this article a soapbox and completely denying and dodging the motive.
Rebochan: Who's assuming bad faith? You're the one that stated you will constantly revert the article, demanded we call an admin, and are still continuing to ignore us until we attempt to revert the page. And after several months of the Edit War, you finally explain your logic is having it early in the introduction? That is neither here nor there. If I moved that statement about the film's quality to later in the introduction, would you stop taking it out?
Ethereal Mutation: "If anyone is being transparent here, it's you for constantly trolling people through this page." is about as big and direct a bad faith statement as one can get.
Anyway, the mention of its placement on many lists is already in the examples list under its relevant "trope" (I hate how the site has completely degraded the meaning of that word, but that's irrelevant), so there's no loss of information not having it in the main description. The change that you keep making is to the tone of the article and that's really my point of contention. TV Tropes is a site dedicated to the chronicling of storytelling conventions first and foremost. Having the primary focus of the article be "this is a bad film" (or "this is a good TV show", or "the fans of this book series are violent emo girls", or whatever) is one of the things that gives the Wiki a "fansite for anyone" vibe.
fleb: You're the Edit Warrior who can't seem to leave any version but your own up for even 24 hours without reverting it. You essentially won by default for two weeks by just disappearing because neither of us was willing to rekindle the war without talking to you!
The focus of the article is to be informative. The popular reaction to the movie is information. In this case, the hatedom is really important information because, well, it's so damn big. It's probably the main thing keeping the movie remembered. Hence its inclusion in the description and not just the trope listing. (Same opinion here on the bizarre warping of the T-word, though.)
Rebochan: EM, how many times now have you altered the text of the article to not only cover the actual facts of the film, but also to insult people who disagree? Your most recent edit did it again. Considering that your last edit attempted to strip out mention of the film's negative reaction entirely, I don't know how else to take your edits anymore.
fleb: ...Aaaand another revert without comment here or in the edit history. That's... that's just swell, EM.
What is this about? The Rule Of Cautious Editing Judgment? The whole point of that seems to be: Use common sense, avoid fights by thinking before writing something potentially controversial. There is no controversy about Batman & Robin. It's twelve years old, "time" has done about all the "telling" it's ever likely to do... The only controversy appears to be the one you started about how we aren't trying hard enough to prevent a controversy.
Rebochan: EM, cite some sources - we have. "Critics were guaranteed to hate it." "intentionally drawing upon as many action movie cliches as possible". You also removed a citeable fact that the film took an unprecedented 63% drop in the box office on its second week, hence the fact that the film's utter lack of ability to be a reliable money maker killed the franchise and Warner Bros. specifically stating the film was not what they expected it to be, money-wise.
Meanwhile, rather than get out-manuevered in discussion, you simply show up and alter the page every time someone edits it, then blame us for your own bizarre determination that the article not state that Batman And Robin is a bad movie.
Ethereal Mutation: Critics were guaranteed to hate it because of a combination of the Science Fiction Ghetto, general disdain for action movies (especially superhero ones), and the fact that the previous Batman films weren't entirely free of criticism. Joel Schumacher has stated in the DVD interviews that the executives kept asking for revisions to make it more over the top.
As far as the middling (i.e. average instead of negative; Four-Point Scale doesn't quite apply to movies) reviews go, Roger Ebert, Variety, James Berardinelli (already the top three listed external reviews on the IMDb) are examples of well-liked critics that didn't completely trash the film. Most of the reviews in general are actually pretty neutral, citing it as vapid but well produced. There are even positive reviews from The New York Times, USA Today, and the Houston Chronicle (all listed as top critics by whatever measure the site uses). IMDb lists the film as being nominated for a couple positive awards (even in direct contention with the Razzie nominations; Alicia Silverstone won both Favorite Actress from Kids' Choice Awards and Worst Supporting Actress from the Razzies). (While I'm sure dirt can be digged up on all the nominations to "invalidate" them, the same could be possibly said for the Razzies with their politically motivated decision to give George W. Bush "worst actor" for the documentary Fahrenheit 9/11.)
All of this paints the picture that the general reception was more around the 4-5/10 mark than the "worst shit ever" tone the page keeps being reverted to. It is not inaccurate to say that the film wasn't completely loathed; as far as can be gleaned, the removal of mentions about middling marks and the fact that it won positive awards is more because it's an inconvenient fact to this aimed tone of total derision. I'll include some of the above links in the main text.
fleb: That's a lot of assumptions you're making there. The alleged True Art Sci Fi Ghetto elitism should have applied equally to all four movies, it doesn't fester and grow over multiple installments like a bitter, tomato-throwing species of mold. And the article already described how the camp was turned Up To Eleven.
The reception wasn't 100% negative, no. It's still very accurate to say the reception was terrible, especially considering the big plunge. (Hee at Kids' Choice Awards though. THE ULTIMATE in Quality by Popular Vote in the literal sense.)
Ethereal Mutation: The Kids' Choice Awards is a relevant case of Quality To Popular Vote because it shows the primary demographic liked it enough to cast votes in its favor. While it's accurate to say that it did receive terrible reception in many circles, it's inaccurate to exclude the areas where it didn't.
Anyway, obviously, not all critics are the elitist Straw Critic type of anti-Lowest Common Denominator, but there is definitely a presence and they also often have their perceptions muddied by their job obligation. It gets hard to tell when something is a predetermined review. There's also the fact that camp is antithetical to anyone that has ever taken a film appreciation course. Still, it can just be rephrased so as not to try and pinpoint any specific cause so much as just mentioning that any result would have seen some widespread derision.
Rebochan: EM, you're really stretching this. The Tomato-meter on the film is 12% total, and a mere 20% including the Cream of the Crop. That is not positive. I could pull up a few positive reviews of a lot of bad movies - hell, Roger Ebert awarded Gigli two-and-a-half stars, meaning he liked it more than Batman And Robin. And your commentary on being "pre-disposed" to hate action or superhero films is easily disproven by comparing the scores of Batman And Robin to earlier Batman films, later Batman films, hell, even other superhero films. The original film has a total of 69%, and 57% cream of the crop. The sequel is 77% percent, with the cream of the crop not wavering. Batman Forever has a total of 44% with a Cream of the Crop at a whopping 69%. That means your "hardcore" critics liked it more. If they were pre-disposed to hate action and superhero films, they should have loathed it even more than the last two.
Then there's Batman And Robin which took a severe nosedive across the board.
Now, other superhero films? The original Superman movie has a 93% rating total, and 80% Cream of the Crop. The original X-men is at 80% and 60%. The original Spider-Man is at 90%. Notably, the fourth entry in two of the series I just mentioned all sucked and hard (Superman IV has a reputation as putrid as Batman And Robin, actually), so if there's anything to be said, it's that film quadrilogies tend to suck, but that doesn't say much about critics hating science fiction and superheroes.
And really, the Kids Choice Awards? That's the "contested" standard? Okay, it won a single award. I guess we can just wipe away the critical and commercial failure and blow off the 11 Razzie nominations. A minor awards show that reaches a fraction of the target demographic (it's cable...) gave it an award! You know, I bet that means Soultaker was a success in its target demographic too. After all, it won a Saturn award! It must be as good as the likes of fellow award winners like Star Wars and Back to the Future. And you know what? Pia Zadora's performance in Butterfly must have been wonderful - it won a Golden Globe!
All of this is still dancing around the subject of the Edit War, which is that you still try to sponge the article of its relevance and refuse to discuss your changes unless we alter the page. Seriously, if I move that "worst movies of all time" line to the end of the introduction, will you continue to take it out?
fleb: OH THOSE DAMN ELITISTS. Persecuting the innocent movies. "Now I'm not sayin all of my enemies are strawmen... but look how easily all their nefarious ulterior motives burn! Eh? EH??"
Very few movies get 100% negative reaction, so it's really pointless to mention if a particular movie didn't fail on a cosmic level. When a reaction is 100% negative it's a rarity worth mentioning, because otherwise it's safe to assume no matter how crap X is, someone somewhere gave X a decent review. Doesn't impact the fact of the majority consensus being "Crap™."
Ethereal Mutation: I brought the issue of this page up on the forums.
Inkblot: ...Sorry I asked.
Rebochan: Your punishment is to...watch this movie again!
