and comes up with bizarre arguments (Why doesn\'t Aang use the Avatar State everytime)
He actually argues this? There’s literally an entire episode of Season 2 about why Aang can’t just permanently use the Avatar State!
I have no idea. Then again, this is a guy who spent 20 minutes asking Literature Devil why Ozai didn\'t breathe fire at Aang when the latter was taking his bending. Even though Ozai did exactly that and Mau Ler just didn\'t pay attention.
Scar himself looks like foreign, weak, and with very female moves.
Not sure I\'d call the sequel trilogy, Black Panther, Captain Marvel, the Snyder Cut, and Black Widow low-hanging fruit but okay. It makes me wonder what you mean by low-hanging fruit. I\'ll agree that debating Avatar when he hadn\'t seen the show fully was a dumb move.
I find it weird that you brought up the flickering lights example from his TFA critique because he acknowledges that it\'s ultimately inconsequential in that video. He goes over it anyway for the sake of completeness and to highlight how small details like that show what the writers will sacrifice in terms of realism for a spectacle.
When it comes to conveniences, Mauler explains that they\'re present in almost every story. I\'m pretty sure his criticism comes down how many there are and how believable they are. Tropes Are Tools after all, and they can be handled well or poorly.
As for his channel, however, it needs to be stressed that Mauler is almost always editing. Even during streams he reveals sometimes that he\'s editing in the background. With the length, research and effort he puts into writing, re-drafting, and editing his long-form analyses they will take long to release. He doesn\'t give updates because he feels it creates unrealistic expectations. Though I also wish he\'d devote more time to them even if it meant spending less time on EFAP but I can\'t control his actions and I can only take his word for it.
Maybe I should make a novel length critique about him, and say long man bad on anyone who refuses to read it.
The 'long man bad' thing still bugs me a lot for how blatant the hypocrisy is. Complaining for seventeen hours about a film you don't like is apparently fine, but if someone thinks that seventeen hours is a bit long, well hey, that's invalid criticism, you're totally just being a dick, why can't you be more objective? Hbomberguy and Dan Olson and Lindsay Ellis do long videos, and if people criticize their work for being too long... well, for one thing, people don't criticize them as much for their length because their content isn't as bloated and unnecessary as Mauler's microscopic nitpicks, but if they do get criticism like that, their responses tends to be "That's understandable, I make long-form video essays and they're not for everyone, I tried to narrow this down as best I could but I wholly respect if you don't have the time to spare, thanks for giving me a shot anyway." They and their fandoms don't feel the need to make 'LONG MAN BAD' jokes because... I don't know, I guess they're just not as insecure in their works?
Also I don't want to suggest for a second that not liking Black Panther makes you a racist, or not liking Black Widow or Captain Marvel makes you a sexist, but there's definitely an overwhelming pattern of Mauler predominantly not liking media where the protagonist is a woman or a minority. I'm sure that's just a coincidence.
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A Reviewer Who Isn't That Good
I've seen this guy's videos treated as the gospel by his fans, saying that everyone should follow his standards. Honestly, is it really that impressive when Mau Ler only seems to criticize low hanging fruit?
People tout him as some sort of genius because he criticizes bottom of the barrel content like Go T S8 or The Predator 2018. However, when he's forced to find flaws in good material, like Avatar: The Last Airbender, he fumbles. Remember that he gave the show a 4/10 and comes up with bizarre arguments (Why doesn't Aang use the Avatar State everytime) or literally forgets what happens in the narrative (saying things like how could the Dai Li brainwash the entire population of Ba Sing Se even though the show never said that) and treats it like a flaw. He was so confident that ATLA is a bad show that he debated a guy who couldn't come up with proper counters because he hasn't seen the show for nearly a decade. Totally didn't do this because he was scared of getting BTFO'd.
And in regards to his standards. Yeah, I also value consistency but Mau Ler really loves to focus on irrelevant minutiae. A good portion of his TFA review is spent on the lights in the FO transport ship, even though it has no bearing on the story.
I've also find that his standards has lead several of his friends, like Wolf and Fringy, to dislike content they used to like. Even Wolf has admitted that he doesn't like to watch his favorite media with Mau Ler because there's a high chance that the latter would ruin it for him. Fringy has even went back on his love for Bojack Horseman after watching it with Mau Ler.
Also, Mau Ler doesn't apply his standards consistently, whether he's aware of it or not. If we take his stance on coincidences in storytelling, he'll give A New Hope or Fellowship of the Ring a pass but will criticize ATLA for using the same trope.
Mau Ler's style inadvertently created several copy cats, like Southpaw, that magnify his problems and become insanely contrarian. Which comes hilarious because when the standards is used on a show they like (in Southpaw's case, Terriers), they get extremely mad and disavow Mau Ler's standards.
Lastly, his main channel is practically a ghost town. Other than his parody videos (which you can hardly call his since they're mostly compilations of sentences made by other people), content is pretty sparse. His TFA series basically came to a screeching halt. Part 3 came out almost two years ago and there's no word on part 4. Not to mention he hasn't finished his Go T videos and supposedly had a The Boys, T Ro S, The Joker and Last of Us 2 critique on the way but those are dead in the water. It might seem harsh but EFAP has honestly destroyed his channel. Why put out edited videos when people will throw money at you making low effort streams?