Sarah Z

You called them monsters. You want monstrous behavior from an auteur? Why not mention Christopher Nolan literally wanting his fans to go die of COVID to watch his stupid Inception sequel so he can earn a couple bucks and "save cinema", only to throw a hissy fit at WB when they implemented their 2021 HBO MAX plan because of his film's flop? That's an auteur going too far.

"This guy is worse" is not a good argument.

Focus on the topic, not on some internet rando bashing a couple of directors.

Edited by Diana1969 on May 11th 2022 at 8:27:53 PM

Anyways.

One thing the video made me a little confused with is Sarah mentioning how Buffy and Firefly had a comeback of sorts after Joss Whedon directed The Avengers.

And...I genuinely do not remember this happening. Does anyone else remember this?

Edited by Diana1969 on May 11th 2022 at 8:37:14 PM

Probably from newcomers but Whedon has always been a cult fan favorite but Avengers made him a top dog in Hollywood.

I thought the Buffy fandom was strong in the time between the two Avengers movies Whedon worked on.

Edited by Weirdguy149 on May 11th 2022 at 6:57:17 AM

I might just have been in circles where I didn't notice any resurgence, I dunno. I *do* remember getting a little into Firefly when Science Channel reran it.

That was weird, in hindsight.

I noticed it a bit. Buffy also got that (incredibly shitty) remaster and Firefly got a special fancy Blu-ray set in that timeframe. I wouldn't really put it as a full resurgence in popularity, but there was a distinct spike in people going back and looking at Whedon's older stuff. Including a bunch of "so, there's some weird stuff in Firefly that aged real bad" getting into the discourse.

I'm slightly embarrassed to admit that I only found out what Firefly was from uh...a few references on The Big Bang Theory.

And when I actually watched it, my first thought was "Oh damn, that's the guy from Castle as the captain."

Really funny to think about Nathan Fillion going from an icon of nerd culture to being in some generic network TV crime dramas.

Out of the primary cast of Firefly only really Alan Tudyk and Morena Baccarin have broken out to greater heights. Everyone else has had a steady career as guest parts in television, for the most part. Nerd it girl and Whedon's trademark Summer Glau has largely faded away, too.

Edited by Gaon on May 11th 2022 at 8:21:48 AM

RE: this site and Joss Whedon, he was absolutely worshipped on the site in its early days, specifically the late 2000s and early 2010s. Age of Ultron is definitely when people started turning on him for his weird choices.

There were a few annoyingly omnipresent figures across tvtropes. Joss Whedon, Doctor Who, They Might Be Giants, Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, and The Nostalgia Critic were absolutely implacable.

Don't forget Homestuck.

Warhammer 40,000 shows up a lot as well. I definitely remember my early days on this site thinking "People seem to really like this game."

A Song of Ice and Fire too.

Morena Baccarin spends her time on Mel Gibson DTV movies and failed broadcast TV shows. Not exactly "greater heights".

Tudyk, absolutely has, though.

Edited by HBarnill on May 11th 2022 at 9:45:30 AM

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic is an obvious one. The Whateley Universe I saw a ton of, which still surprises me given how niche its genre of web fiction is, even on TV Tropes.

I presume you haven't watched Deadpool.

Channel Awesome in general was everywhere until the controversies exploded.

I never noticed They Might Be Giants promoted that much though.

...she was literally in Deadpool.

Edited by Diana1969 on May 12th 2022 at 2:53:07 AM

So one thing I found oddly missing from Sarah's video is the sheer impact of Channel Awesome and the Rant Reviews style of media criticism on early 2010s geek culture.

They Might Be Giants was the most harmless of the bunch. It was just everywhere.

Sarah would always leave some parts of geek culture out so I can't hold that against her. The most curious tidbit I found is that she tells of the general downfall of geek cultures at the end of the decade but doesn't comment that the MCU remains a cultural juggernaut to this day.

I loved Deadpool (not so much the second one) but let's not pretend her role wasn't just a way for Deadpool to have any kind of motivation. You could have had any actress and it wouldn't change the film nor the actress' career.

I'm sorry I keep getting off track. Continue.

The MCU being a juggernaut means it's not specifically geek culture anymore. Which was Sarah's point, right? That a lot of stuff that was previously "geek culture" just became part of the mainstream because it became popular.

I think that's in part because her co-writer Lady Emily made two very long essays on AVGN and Doug Walker's Demo Reel, the former one specifically goes into Rolfe as a huge influence on early internet criticism and how that was the main venue of criticism for years (as well as drawing a throughline to the video essay format she works in by linking AVGN inspiring Nostalgia Critic to NC/Channel Awesome launching Lindsay Ellis to Lindsay Ellis (and some of the creators more aligned with her like Dan Olson, Todd Nathanson Kyle Kalgreen) influencing creators like Hbomberguy and Contrapoints and getting to the endpoint of the Video Essay format that she's working in right now.

Edited by PippingFool on May 12th 2022 at 4:48:41 AM

"I'm having trouble parsing this, could you rephrase?

"

What I mean to said is I have problem with Sarah coment about fandom using box officies as up-manship gain between each other and a "Proof" their story are worthy and using that as yet another evidence of corporate influences that make "this corporation make huge amount of money" as point of pride, Sarah try to make a point on how fandom using money and fame is a result in part of corporation exploiting geekness.....

My problem with that approach is that it also ignore that feminism and progressive's fandom have also use box oficies in the same, case in point Capitan marvel and Wonder woman sucess and box smash was seen as pretty much a refutation that female led movies are bad, people totally use box offices as "HA, I told you so!" to the gatekeeping fandom, there is this expectation with minorities that if the movie is good or bad, the "Other side" will have bragging rights for a while.

I mean, that show how nerds cutlture have move were nerd can said to one another "My show make 3 billions more than yours!" "Well, mine got an oscar!" and so on, but I dont think she can claim is consumerization more than "My chararter can be yours" or "Your fav is problematic, mine isnt".

Obsessing for nerd trivia and using a cudgel is VERY much a nerd thing and that isnt going away at all.